Scripture~
Gen 2:15-17; John 8:31-36; Gal 5:1-15

As one who often counsels I find it a hard question . . . well not hard but an often question of why, if God wants us to be good would he allow us to do evil. The answer is Free Will. We, as human beings, have free will. We can choose to do good or evil; we can choose to follow Christ or Satan. The Genesis passage stresses that from the beginning we were born to be free.
But why? Well, God could have made us in any way He saw fit. Let’s play it out like this; my wife and I have a daughter, now we could have taken all the money and resources we’ve invested on and in her to do something else. Let’s say we did that and created a machine, an android if you will. We could program it to love us as we saw fit. But that wouldn’t be real love. Forced or programmed love is not real love at all; it’s simply a programmatic response to a set of rules. Now, go back and set things to as they are now. When my daughter wraps her arms around my neck and tells me that she loves me, or better still when she says, “You’re my favorite deputy dad” . . . I know that comes from the heart and it means more to me.
God did not want machines; He wanted people. No glory is brought in having a bunch of machines which are commanded and forced to love Him. But a people that has the free will to do as they please, choosing to love Him . . . glory is indeed there. There is an untold and often unseen freedom that comes in serving Christ. I have yet to see the bible as a long list of rules or my service to my King as something to dread . . . a forboading list of do’s and don’ts.
I think perhaps that is one of the greatest lies the enemy tells us about the bible and serving God. Satan would tell you that you can be just as great as God, that you can be . . . or are . . . just as wise and that this is all there is and you should do whatever you want. This sounds like freedom, but it’s the best snare laid by the enemy to date. Think about it, lets say you enjoy the freedom of sleeping with whomever you wish whenever you wish . . . how many people have I spoken to that regret such a decision. But it’s your right to take the drugs of your choice . . . and how quickly you become a slave to those drugs. Get drunk all the time and become a slave to the bottle. Chase your career and become a slave to that chase. Pursue riches until the end of your life and die an empty cold individual. I would go as far as to say . . . and I say this carefully . . . chase religion with all it’s legal trappings and become a slave to the Law.
Or, accept the gift of true freedom offered by Christ as described in Paul’s letter to the Galatians. I can drink alcohol, have sex, play games, worship, work, build relationships, anything I want . . . within the boundaries set by Christ. I am not burdened by such religious doctrine of “who is fit” to come to church or are my clothes good enough . . . because Christ has set me free to worship Him and placed me in a church that gets the point of a relationship with Christ.
In the end, we serve one of two masters. We are either subjects in the Kingdom of Christ; or subjects in the kingdom of darkness. The enemy would have you believe that there are many masters of this world, but the kingdom of darkness is full of empty kings that are nothing more than puppets to the master of deceit. In John’s passage Christ speaks of the freedom found only in Him. I would ask those who suffer under the burden of legalism to read on in that passage. You either serve Christ, or you serve Satan; there is no gray area . . . there is freedom in Christ, indescribable freedom . . . freedom that I thankfully enjoy today. Praise God for it!