“Free at last, free at last, thank God Almighty, we’re free at last!” These famous words of the great civil rights pioneer, the Reverend Dr.Martin Luther King, Jr., were spoken as both a hope and a commitment and promise for the future as he mesmerized the hundreds of thousands of men, women and children who listened on August 28, 1963 in Washington, DC as he spoke from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial.
My brothers and sisters, freedom is indeed both a gift and challenge for each of us who gather this Sunday not only to remember our nations Independence but most of all to gather around the Holy Table of Word and Sacrament in gratitude for that gift.
Some years ago, the NBC news magazine, Dateline, presented an astounding story that spoke of freedom in a radically different way. The segment featured the work of an American scientist and entrepreneur who found himself obsessed with developing a way to give wheelchair bound individuals greater freedom in the midst of their physical disability. One day, he saw a young man come to an impasse in his traditional wheelchair in the face of a series of steps. There was nothing he could do on his own. He was completely dependent on the help of others if he was to maneuver through this obstacle. Challenged and intrigued by this situation that struck his heart, his creative and imaginative instincts took over. In time, he developed a prototype of a revolutionary new type of wheelchair that enables those who use it to go where they never thought possible. With automatic lifts, the individual can reach to normal heights to perform such simple tasks that we take for granted like, taking a glass from a kitchen cabinet, or cereal from an upper shelf in a super market. Because of specially designed wheels, the chair can traverse through sand and rough terrain enabling individuals to enjoy a “walk” along the ocean or in the forest. However, the most dramatic feature was its ability to go up flights of stairs on its own through an ingenious rotation of its wheels as well a computerized balancing system. A young girl who had been wheel chair bound for years was featured trying out this amazing new wheel chair. With family and friends around her, they saw the glow on her face as they experienced for the first time in years that physical freedom and mobility that had been taken from her in a tragic accident. As the chair lifted she was able to see her mother face to face and embrace her with tears of joy with the freedom that this new technology would bring to her life.
My brothers and sisters, the gift and promise of freedom is not only a reality we celebrate this Independence weekend but it is a gift that we cherish and celebrate as Christians who have been made new in Christ.
St. Paul in his letter to the Romans reminds us all that we are not bound to the life of the flesh rather have been empowered and freed by the gift of the Spirit in our lives. The spirit that raised Jesus from the dead can transform whatever holds us captive, freeing us to live fully as sons and daughters of the Father, brothers and sisters of the Lord Jesus.
That gift of Christian freedom is given to each of us so that we in turn might be the leaven in our world for transformation and change. The challenge of Christian freedom is a legacy given us by the Lord so that we might work for the fullness of God’s Kingdom here on earth. Yet, over the centuries and to the present day, it remains a scandal that often we Christians empowered and gifted in freedom by Christ, have failed to use that legacy as a gift for others. Whether it be the anti- Semitism that led to the holocaust in Christian Germany, apartheid at the hands of Christians in South Africa, slavery and segregation in our Christian land, or most recently, the keen awareness that the “Black Lives Matter” movement has brought to our country, all of these events remain a painful reminder to us all of the hypocrisy and blindness that is unworthy of our calling as children of light.
As we gather this weekend to be nourished and strengthened by the food of eternity and the words of everlasting life, let us be grateful for all that we have and all that we are in the this land of freedom and blessing. But let us also be mindful of those for whom freedom is still a distant reality and dream, whether they be enslaved by oppressive political systems, ideologies that crush the human spirit, victims enslaved by domestic violence, those imprisoned by seductive addictions in life or those who are crushed by poverty, sickness and disease. May the hope that is our in Christ, and the life giving spirit that he has given to us as his abiding gift, empower us all to work for justice in this land of freedom, and inspire us to channels of freedom and peace for all our sisters and brothers in the human family. May we indeed be able to proclaim in deed and in fact that in Christ we are, “Free at last, free at last, thank God almighty, we are free at last!”