Freedom.

It’s the most overused word in human history — and the least understood. Everyone wants it, everyone claims to fight for it, and yet the moment we get a taste of it, we start looking for a way to cage it again.

The illusion of liberty

On paper, the world is full of free people. But scratch beneath the slogans and an uncomfortable truth appears: most of us don’t want freedom as much as we want comfort. Freedom is messy, uncertain, and lonely. It means taking responsibility for what you do and what happens next. It means no excuses, no warden, no priest, no politician to hide behind.

So we lie to ourselves. We chant about liberty while we trade it away for safety, routine, and someone else’s rules. Governments call it law and order. Religions call it obedience. Companies call it policy. But it all comes down to the same quiet fear — that we can’t handle freedom without breaking something.

The prison of certainty

Think about the man who walks out of prison after twenty years. He’s technically free, but he doesn’t know how to live anymore. He misses the structure, the routine, the certainty. That’s humanity in a nutshell — terrified of chaos, begging for a warden. We build our own cages, just with better lighting.

Freedom wears many disguises. A man doesn’t need a warden to lose his liberty — just a steady paycheck and a fear of what’s outside the gate. The company man who stays in the same job for thirty years isn’t much different from the prisoner who dreads release. He knows the rules, the routines, the expectations. The cage is comfortable, so he calls it success. And just like that, freedom dies quietly — not from chains, but from habit.

The fear of spiritual freedom

Christ preached freedom through truth, not control. But we couldn’t handle that either. We turned faith back into a list of rules and rituals. People prefer guilt to grace because guilt feels familiar — you can measure it, manage it, and use it to control others. Real spiritual freedom is terrifying because it leaves no one to hide behind but yourself.

“If the Son sets you free, you are free indeed.” He wasn’t talking about a ticket out of the fire — He was talking about life without fear. Not freedom from consequence, but freedom from control. Yet most churches treat that kind of liberty like heresy. They tell people they’re saved, then bind them to rules, tithes, and rituals just as rigid as the old law. They call it order, but it’s really fear wearing a cross. True freedom in Christ means you don’t need another man to stand between you and God. That kind of freedom terrifies institutions, because a soul that knows it’s free is impossible to govern.

Christ and Paul both said the same thing in different ways: there are Gentiles who, without the law, still do what is right — because the law is written on the heart. That was the point of grace. Real faith doesn’t need a rabbi, pastor, or denomination to approve every move, because the Spirit Himself teaches. But people fear that kind of direct connection, so they run back to human authority to tell them what they already know inside.

Faith as a market

To feed the machine, modern pastors have resurrected the old tithe — something never commanded of Gentile believers. Paul taught giving from the heart, not a tax on salvation. But when a church is paying interest on a multimillion-dollar loan, “voluntary” doesn’t balance the books. So they sell fear in the name of faith: Give your ten percent or you’re robbing God. The early church gave freely because they loved one another; today we give to keep the lights on in buildings no one asked them to build.

The first believers met in homes, breaking bread and caring for one another. There were no steeples or building funds, just community and Spirit. The strength of the church was in its people, not its property. Now we build sanctuaries that look like convention centers and call it growth. Maybe the church was never meant to be a business with a logo. Maybe it was supposed to stay what it began as — a gathering of equals who needed no middleman between themselves and God.

The casual church age

Now the new sanctuaries look like cafés, complete with espresso bars and stage lighting. The old dress codes are gone — thank God for that — but sometimes the message feels watered down with the coffee. Churches trade conviction for comfort and call it outreach. It’s faith repackaged for a market that wants to sip grace without tasting the truth.

Churches now speak the language of growth charts and brand identity. They build campuses on prime commercial lots, hire marketing teams, and track attendance like quarterly sales reports. They call it outreach, but the mechanics are the same as any franchise: attract, retain, expand. Once faith becomes a market, truth starts taking orders from demand. The message gets trimmed to what sells, and the church ends up managing customers instead of nurturing souls.

Freedom under quarantine

We got a taste of what fear can do during COVID. In a few weeks, “flatten the curve” turned into two years of curfews, mandates, and permissions. Illinois, like the rest of the country, learned how fast freedom disappears when fear writes the rules. The virus was real, but so was the revelation: people will trade almost anything for the illusion of safety, and governments will never give back the power they gained so easily.

Freedom without discipline

Modern life proves it every day. People confuse emotion with truth and outrage with courage. They shout down strangers and call it justice, never stopping to ask what’s actually happening. That isn’t liberty — it’s noise from souls that were never taught restraint. Real freedom requires self-control; without it, the loudest and angriest end up ruling the moment while wisdom stands silent.

What discipline really is. Most people hear the word “discipline” and think of punishment or control, but real discipline is freedom’s backbone. It’s the ability to master yourself — to think before you act, to hold a steady course when everything around you screams for impulse. It’s not about rules from the outside; it’s about strength from the inside. True freedom requires true discipline, because if you can’t govern yourself, someone else eventually will.

Freedom through Christ

This is what Christ meant by freedom. It isn’t the license to do whatever you want — it’s the power to do what’s right. Freedom is only real through Him, because He gives both the strength and the discipline to live it. And yes, He disciplines His own, not to control, but to train the heart toward self-governance. The world’s freedom says “no limits.” Christ’s freedom says “no chains.” That’s the difference.

I know the Spirit has been working in me during this time. Not through lightning bolts or voices from the clouds, but through quiet rewiring — changing how I see truth, faith, and freedom itself. The shift started in my mind, but it’s spreading through everything I am. I’m not the same man I was a few years ago, and that’s how I know this is real. The Spirit works from the inside out, freeing the heart long before it frees the world around it.

The truth underneath

Maybe mankind was never serious about freedom. Maybe it only survives on the personal level — the courage to think for yourself, to speak honestly, to live without asking permission. Institutions will always fear chaos more than they love truth, so the only real freedom left is inside the individual soul.

Yes, we’re liars — not because we hate freedom, but because we fear what it demands. We talk about liberty the way addicts talk about quitting: loud, righteous, and dishonest. Real freedom isn’t comfortable or patriotic. It’s the daily decision to face uncertainty without begging for someone else’s control.

Freedom has always been available. We just don’t really want it.