Bob Hamp

"Freedom" in Chinese

“What will you be teaching on your trip to China?” I was asked again and again. 

“I only have one message,” I would respond, “Freedom; it’s the only thing I know!”

Still uncertain about the “Freedom” message, some people stay away. Let me tell you what I learned in China.  Our translator put the Chinese symbols for “Freedom” on our marker board.  A bit enamored by the uniqueness of seeing my life message in symbol, I inquired further.

“What do the symbols mean?”, I asked.

The answer still excites me.  They got it right!! It must be the wisdom of the ancients for which the Chinese are so renowned.  Whatever the reason, they got it right.  Here is what our translator said.

“These two symbols mean, The reason to become yourself”.

All the crazy definitions and expectations we conjure up for freedom and here it was all along.  The reason to become yourself.  For most Western christians, this definition stirs up a question.  We have been told to die to ourselves, and to deny self.  So to urge people to “become” themselves feels a little egocentric.  Is becoming myself freedom or selfishness?

The key is in our definition of “self”.   If we understand the implication of the Adam and Eve story, we may see a whole new picture of God’s intent and desire for our lives.  And in seeing this, we may see a whole new element of exactly what it is Jesus purchased for us with His death and resurrection.

God put His image in us and set us on the earth as His representative.  He was quite pleased with the “selves” he had made.  Plugged into the breath of life, we were to the Earth what He was to the Heavens.  He liked it, and He liked us.  When we unplugged He did not stop liking us.  He disliked the things that got in the way of the original design.

When we unplugged, disconnected from the Spirit of Life, we began to develop a “self” with another source.  This “self” was selfish and full of destruction.  God’s blueprint was not destroyed, but the power source was changed.  We could not become the “self” we were created to be as long as the Spirit of God was not present in our souls. 

In scripture, we find two definitions for freedom. Both have to do with the reclaiming of the original “self”, or perhaps stated differently, the reason to become yourself.

First we see In John 8:32 Jesus tells the crowd, “If you continue in My word, then you are truly disciples of Mine;  and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free.”

If Jesus meant we should finally get our doctrine straightened out, and get this religion thing right, then the Pharisees of Jesus’ day would have been His favorites.  They read scripture all the time and devoted themselves to trying to obey their understanding of it. 

“Continue in my Word“, rather I believe, is more a picture of the constant connection to the breath of life that maintained Adam and Eve as the selves they were designed to be.  This brings us to our second Biblical definition of freedom.

Second Corinthinas 3:17 tells us, “Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.”

Do you see it again?  When we re-connect to the One who made us alive in the first place, His breath, His Word, we become again the self He designed us to be. 

God did not make us broken and insist that we act whole.  He did not create us as a frustrating and unruly race, and demand that we act differently.  He created us the way He intended. That is who we were as long as we stayed connected to Him as our source of life.  When we disconnected, another nature, not the original design, began to grow in the place of the orginal design.  Die to that, and in that death you become alive.

The reason to become yourself is The One who made you yourself in the first place.  He wants to make you yourself again.  Plug in.  Breathe in the Breath of Life, in this you will find yourself.