Romans 8:15
The Spirit you received does not make you slaves, so that you live in fear again; rather, the Spirit you received brought about your adoption to sonship. And by him we cry, “Abba, Father.”
Like many other people, I have recently been making an effort to learn more about American history, particularly regarding issues of race, that I either wasn’t taught in high school or simply don’t remember learning. In my reading, I came across the story of Elizabeth Key.
Elizabeth Key was born in the 1630s in Virginia, the daughter of an enslaved African woman and a white English planter. Her father acknowledged her as his daughter, and christened her with his last name. As an adult, Elizabeth Key sued for her freedom from slavery on the basis of her father’s identity and it was granted. While this legal loophole was quickly closed, the law at the time in England and its colonies was that a child’s status was determined by who his or her father was.
Slavery is evil in all its forms, whether the legal institution that ended long ago in the western world or the less visible forms that persist to this day in all parts of the world. Or the form that continues to plague each of our hearts, in ways both obvious and cleverly hidden.
Fear is an enslaver of the human heart. When our hearts are in bondage to fear, we are obliged to allow it to master us. Fear tells us how to respond to our circumstances and to the people around us. Fear speaks and we cannot see the difference between lies and the truth. It is a cruel master that makes us do things we otherwise wouldn’t do. And so very many of us have accepted its power over us, even in the subtlest of ways.
The reason Elizabeth Key needed to sue for her freedom was that her father died and without his protection, she was being forced back into slavery. But she was a strong, brave woman who knew who she was and who her father was, and she refused to accept that slavery was her lot in life.
Romans 8:15 tells us that when we receive the Spirit of God, it is like Elizabeth’s father christening her with his name. God is claiming us, adopting us as sons and daughters, and conferring upon us the rights we are entitled to because he is our Father. While we will never lack his protection, we are still prone to surrender to voices that would return us to bondage. But we are children of God! When I remember that my identity is in who my Father is, then I can assert my right to be free. Fear is not my master and has no claim on my heart – unless I allow it.
Galatians 5:1 reminds us that, “It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery.” We cannot afford to be complacent because we will constantly be confronted with choices to exercise our freedom or to submit to bondage.
To clarify, in drawing parallels between physical slavery and spiritual slavery, it is not my intention to diminish in any way the suffering of those whose bodies have been claimed as property by another person. Physical and spiritual bondage are related but not the same. But we downplay the reality of spiritual enslavement to our own peril, and I hope that the comparison can help us all to discover the freedom that can be ours. I am convinced that it is only through experiencing true freedom that we can see and fight injustice wherever it exists.
The enemy of our souls would love nothing more than to use fear to ensnare us back into spiritual slavery. For 30 days, we have explored God’s word to learn the truth about fear and strategies to help us resist its influence. I have to make a choice every day, often many times each day, if I am going to use these tools or not – and so do you. I sincerely pray that, in community, we will help each other to choose freedom every time.
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