This oversimplifies, however. Freedom cannot be defined in strictly negative terms, as the absence of confinement and constraint. In fact, in many cases, confinement and constraint is actually a means to liberation.

If you have musical aptitude, you may give yourself to practice, practice, practice the piano for years. This is a restriction, a limit on your freedom. There are many other things you won’t be able to do with the time you invest in practicing. If you have the talent, however, the discipline and limitation will unleash your ability that would otherwise go untapped. What have you done? You’ve deliberately lost your freedom to engage in somethings in order to release yourself to a richer kind of freedom to accomplish other things.

This does not mean that restriction, discipline, and constraint are intrisically, automatically liberating. For example, a five-foot-four, 125-pound young adult male should not set his heart on becoming an NFL lineman. All the discipline and effort in the world will only frustrate and crush him (literally). He is banging his head against a physical reality–he simply does not have the potential. In our society many people have worked extremely hard to pursue careers that pay well rather than fit their talents and interests. Such careers are straitjackets that in the long run stifle and dehumanize us.

Disciplines and constraints, then, liberate us only when they fit with the reality of our nature and capacities. A fish, because it absorbs oxygen from water rather than air, is only free if it is restricted and limited to water. If we put it out on the grass, its freedom to move and even live is not enhanced, but destroyed. The fish dies if we do not honor the reality of its nature.

In many areas of life, freedom is not so much the absence of restrictions as finding the right ones, the liberating restrictions. Those that fit with the reality of our nature and the world produce greater power and scope for our abilities and a deeper joy and fulfillment. Experimentation, risk, and making mistakes bring growth only if, over time, they show us our limits as well as our abilities. If we only grow intellectually, vocationally, and physically through judicious constraints–why would it not also be true for spiritual and moral growth? Instead of insisting on freedom to create spiritual reality, shouldn’t we be seeking to discover it and disciplining ourselves to live according to it?

The popular concept–that we should each determine our own morality–is based on the belief that the spiritual realm is nothing at all like the rest of the world. Does anyone really believe that? For many years after each of the morning and evening Sunday services I remained in the auditorium for another hour to field questions. Hundreds of people stayed for the give-and-take discussions. One of the most frequent statements I heard was that “Every person has to define right and wrong for him- or herself.” I always responded to the speakers by asking, “Is there anyone in the world right now doing things you believe they should stop doing no matter what they personally believe about the correctness of their behavior?” They would invariable say, “Yes, of course.” Then I would ask, “Doesn’t that mean that you do believe there is some kind of moral reality that is ‘there’ that is not defined by us, that must be abided by regardless of what a person feels or thinks?” Almost always, the response to that question was silence, either a thoughtful or a grumpy one.”

—

- The Reason for God: Belief in an Age of Skepticism, by Timothy Keller. This quote is found in the chapter “Christianity Is a Straitjacket,” where Keller goes more in depth on this issue. More resources for this book available at www.TheReasonForGod.com

Read the rest of the book to hear Keller’s additional responses to the following commonly-held reservations people have against Biblical Christianity:

1. There can’t be just one religion.
2. How dould a good God allow suffering?
3. The church is responsible for so much injustice.
4. How can a loving God send people to hell?
5. You can’t take the Bible literally.

…along with serious reasons in favor of faith in God.

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One of the other homeless guys last night was one of those people that honestly looks you in the eye (maybe that came along with his past experience serving in the military), and I took something he said as his way of saying thanks to us… His words were, “You guys have better stuff to do,” in reference to us stopping to serve people in need.

I guess my question is… do I?

I mean, to put it in simple terms, should my entire life be scheduled around the things that I get some sort of reward from, be it personal enjoyment, money, whatever? Hey, right now I could even turn this little incident into a boost for my oh-so-delicate personal reputation, because isn’t it wonderful how I helped someone? (actually, I do it very rarely). So yes, anything can be done for the wrong reasons. But would it not be equally sad to sit around (or fill up all my own free time!), ignoring a world in need? I guess the next logical step in peeling back the layers of this conversation is to ask what kind of motivation actually has the power to convince me to live for something other than myself. Certainly not exclusively the enjoyment I personally receive from serving others, because am I not back to square one–the motivation being for my own reward? …more to come, comments are welcomed.

What I’m saying is that in the free time we have, we make time for what we really want to do. This may not be true in all parts of our world, or in all past generations, so I’m speaking to myself and other Americans that can relate to this, for the most part, comfortable lifestyle. I can’t tell you what to do with your time, but I can certainly examine my own daily life, diagram my evenings and weekends, filling in notes as to what made me choose that particular activity or even what made me say “no” to something. Sadly, my natural tendency is to take that assessment and compare it to those around me, and although there may be some value in that, there’s definitely a danger when I make assumptions that turn out to be judgments. Take for example the owner of an expensive boat, who takes his prized possession out on the water every weekend of the summer. To some that may appear on the outside as a selfish use of time and money. They might be right, but they’ve put themselves on the throne as a judge. Now let me throw in a twist, saying that what if that boat owner purchased the boat for the purpose of building stronger relationships with those around him, AND for every one of those weekends took friends with him to encourage and challenge them with whatever they were dealing with in life? He seems like a really caring person to me now… and who did I think I was to assume exactly what was going on in his situation?

Now I must say I know few people living by that principle of owning a lot of nice things for the purpose of being generous… It’s something I heard Randy Alcorn quote a Romanian pastor on Twitter the other day, and this is in the context of Christians, so I wouldn’t want to give off the impression that I expect it out of those who do not call themselves a Christian. Please keep that in mind if you’re not a Christian yourself. Alcorn cited the Biblical passage in Deuteronomy 8:10-14, where there is a strict warning to God’s people that they take care when they’ve become wealthy, so as not to forget God. You can see a similar warning over and over in the Bible. Here’s what Romanian Pastor Joseph Tson said: “90% of Christians pass the test of adversity. 90% of Christians fail the test of prosperity.” … Wow.

Back to the idea of time being linked to priorities, I think now that I’m aware of this issue, it’s important that I’m honest with myself the next time I turn down an opportunity to go out of my way for someone where there may be zero repayment. A very genuine guy at my work has a note that he wrote himself as a reminder on his mirror, saying “Bless someone today.” I want to keep that on my mind as well, so I put it in the form of a post-it note on the edge of my computer screen.

Stopping to care about someone doesn’t have to be big and fancy. It might be as simple as keeping an eye out for a stranger that has a dead car battery, while having a set of jumper cables in my car ready to help them. I’ve met some nice people with that one. It might mean actively looking for the person outside the pizza place that looks hungry, and buying them dinner for a couple easy bucks that I might’ve spent on my dessert anyway. Sometimes these things fall in my lap; other times I really need to go out and look for them. And there have been times when I’ve missed opportunities (countless times, actually), which might be followed by disappointment in myself. I often fail at things. But the key is that a good pattern is developed over time ONLY IF I take action. There’s always tomorrow to start again. No action would still mean a pattern is developed; it just becomes a pattern of ignoring the needs of my fellow man! As with other things we do in life, we become better at it the more consistently we do it. Can’t get around that. To bring in an illustration: I’m a drummer, and after the first few years of playing drums, I looked back and realized I could not have just skipped the early practicing stage. The 30 minutes straight repetitious pounding on one simple practice pad, which is nothing compared to a serious drummer, but it was a start. And to keep the skill up or improve upon it, I must still see it as a work in progress. My goal might later become either avoiding long periods of inactivity with that musical instrument, or to practice X amount of time per X amount of days, depending on what’s realistic and what the long-term desired result is. The connection I want to make with that simple analogy is that as a Christian, I can’t expect to pass Tson’s “test of prosperity” if my weekly routine ignores the small things that I tell myself there’s no time for.

It’s already obvious that time goes by quickly. I never feel like I have enough of it. I just hope that when I’ve finally run out, those around me can see it as well spent. We all run out, sometimes very suddenly. Michael Jackson just died the other day before starting his 50-concert tour. That’d be the last time I would’ve expected someone to die. Farah Fawcett, Steve McNair, and Billy Mays just died too, a little unusual for that many celebrities at once, but thousands of people are dying every day. I could be next. My 22 year-old cousin recently found out she has a serious cancer that the doctors somehow didn’t catch for a year, and I hope and pray it’s not serious enough to end her life, but it brings the real possibility of death down to a personal level. Tonight I was at a concert for the band Death Cab For Cutie (I know, ironic), and I sat next to a girl whose mother just died in a car accident. The car accidents seem too frequent. A really sweet girl named Bethany from my college was killed in a car wreck one summer, and I still remember that big, contagious smile of hers.

I don’t like closing on the sad subject of death, but sometimes it takes the harsh reality of death for us to examine what our priorities are when we’re living.

   More recently, I’ve been surprised at how busy I can still be after the test studying, assignment due-dates, and late nights of college life have past… shouldn’t I have free time now? So the part that hit me lately was simple of course, and I’ve heard it before, but you know how some lessons don’t stick in your mind the first few times? Yeah. Well it’s a little sad, but at the same time helpful to understand where the problem is coming from. The problem here being my frustration with not having enough time.

   Here it is: It’s not really my time. It’s not really my day, as if I somehow own that? I don’t think you’ll necessarily understand this unless you’re a Christian, because when you’re a Christian, you’re not really living for yourself (And yes, I do know plenty of people wearing the name Christian who are by all appearances living for their own self). So in that context, for me to be frustrated–that I didn’t get MY to do list accomplished for MY own personal goals of keeping MY schedule–is just a little set of planets orbiting around my head. But if you’re reading this and not a Christian, then it must seem a little strange, because it’s just easier to plan the day and the year and the rest of your life around what you feel like doing. Or better yet no need to plan because no other people are really involved, unless they conveniently fit into your plan.

   Weird side note–some close friends and I were talking tonight about giving, and one guy was saying that it’s really the Christian’s duty to go out and look for opportunities to help people, rather than sit back and decide what to do when an opportunity gets put right in front of us. Anyway my realization was that I give or help people only when it’s really convenient, and not even then sometimes. Sad. It’s called sacrifice, basically what I’m willing to give up–is that really loving of me to just help people when all the planets have aligned and a voice from Heaven comes down? I think it’s kind of pathetic. Maybe it’s part of why Christians have such a bad reputation with everyone. It’s like we’re just this annoying bunch of close-minded protestors that usually dress a certain way and have these weird anti-science views because we’re idiots. (That was me shareing how outsiders often really do view Christians). So the part about me realizing I only do something when it’s convenient–why don’t I specifically look around for a homeless guy that wants to eat each time I go to the gas station? Or watch for people by the side of the road that need a ride? Yeah there’s safety concerns, but honestly I think we use that as a blanket excuse.

   Back to the idea of time… here’s the implication. If time isn’t mine, and I didn’t get everything done that I wanted to… why is that such a problem? Yes of course I’m responsible commitments I’ve made and making every effort to do my best (1 Corinthians 10:31), but the tangible result I see right in front of me shouldn’t be how I measure success. It’s about coming to the end of the day and being content with the time I was given, then looking forward to the next day for a fresh new start.

(related: psalm 24:1)