Jesus on freedom from sin

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Category: Alison Marshall's Column
Created: Sunday, 02 April 2006 14:39
Published: Sunday, 02 April 2006 14:39
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I am in the process of reading the fourth Gospel, that of St John. It's amazing. Jesus really gave those Jews a hard time. He wasn't one to mince words, that's for sure. He spoke with real authority, although he frequently makes it clear that he is saying only what his Father tells him to say. And I can hear that same voice of authority in the Kitab-i Iqan, where Baha'u'llah gives the hypocrites a hard time.

Anyway, in John 8:31-35, Jesus talks about sin and what he says is interesting in the light of what Abdu'l-Baha says about freedom from sin in Some Answered Questions.

"Then said Jesus to those Jews which believed on him, If ye continue in my word, then are ye my disciples indeed; And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free. They answered him, We be Abraham?s seed, and were never in bondage to any man: how sayest thou, Ye shall be made free? Jesus answered them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Whosoever committeth sin is the servant of sin. And the servant abideth not in the house for ever: but the Son abideth ever. If the Son therefore shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed."

You can see that the people that Jesus was talking to believed themselves to be free. Like people today, they saw freedom in political terms. They were not slaves to anyone, so what did Jesus mean that they weren't free? Jesus answers them by explaining that those who commit sin are the servants of it. In other words, these people are not free because they are imprisoned by sin. But this doesn't have to be a permanent state. They can be freed from sin permanently and truly, through their belief in Jesus.

And another interesting passage from the same chapter is verse 23: "And he said unto them, Ye are from beneath; I am from above: ye are of this world; I am not of this world." He is telling them that they live entirely in the human world, the world of good and evil. But Jesus is from the spiritual world and is not of the human world.

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