During my teenage years, my favorite band without a doubt
was the Christian ska-core-turned-rock outfit Five Iron Frenzy. After they
broke up, I put them aside for a few years, venturing instead down the rabbit
trails of blues rock, blues and psychedelic rock which ultimately and naturally
led me to Jimi Hendrix who is now my favorite musician.
But sometime late last year I happened to run across the
long-awaited FIF documentary that front man Reese Roper had been working on for
what seemed like decades. In watching that film, I was reminded just how many
really good songs the band had. I was initially drawn into Five Iron Frenzy by
their silliness, listening to the song "Superpowers" with my brother
and my friend Grant who owned the band's second album, titled "Our Newest
Album Ever". It was because of the band's sense of humor that I started
listening. But the greatest strength of Five Iron Frenzy was its ability to
make you laugh one minute then strike a deep emotional nerve the next. Look no
further than the lyrics to Four Kids In Memphis—a true story about some kids who offered
Reese money to write a song about them—for the light-hearted side:
Four kids in Memphis,
should pay me five dollars.
I wrote this song and they said they would pay me,
and I want to buy a hot dog.
should pay me five dollars.
I wrote this song and they said they would pay me,
and I want to buy a hot dog.
As for the emotional side, the final song on “Our Newest
Album Ever” is one of the rawest I have ever heard. I've listened to it
probably one thousand times since I first heard it in 1998, but I still get a
bit emotional whenever it comes through the earbuds—especially when I get to
the end and Reese sings these words:
Healing hands of God have mercy on our
unclean souls once again.
Jesus Christ, light of the world burning bright within our hearts forever.
Freedom means love without condition, without a beginning or an end.
Here's my heart, let it be forever Yours,
Only You can make every new day seem so new.
Jesus Christ, light of the world burning bright within our hearts forever.
Freedom means love without condition, without a beginning or an end.
Here's my heart, let it be forever Yours,
Only You can make every new day seem so new.
The reason I even bring this up is because of all of the
times I have listened to this song, I don't think I ever paid attention
to the key phrase, "Freedom
means love without condition, without a beginning or an end."
It stuck out to me this time because of that key word
freedom. Independence Day is today in the United States of America, and we
often talk about freedom. Hearing this song made think about the concept in a different way. I didn't write the lyrics, so I am not going to try to interpret
the author's meaning, But what they mean to me begins with the most famous
scripture in the Bible, John 3:16:
For God so loved the world that
he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but
have eternal life.
God had such a great love for us that he gave his son as a
sacrifice so that we may no longer be bound by the chains of sin, but instead
have freedom in the love of Jesus Christ. Paul writes about this to the Romans:
For
we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body ruled by sin
might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin—because
anyone who has died has been set free from sin (6:6-7).
Jesus himself also spoke about slavery to sin:
Very
truly I tell you, everyone who sins is a slave to sin. Now a slave has no
permanent place in the family, but a son belongs to it forever. So if the
Son sets you free, you will be free indeed. (John 8:34-36)
Jesus fulfilled His conditional statement “if the Son sets
you free” when he carried our sins to cross and died a sacrificial death. The
unconditional love of Christ frees us to live our lives knowing that whatever
happens, whatever we do, he will always love us. He loved us before we were born,
and he will love us forevermore. We are free of the curse of the law, by which
we deserved death (Galations 3:13). This is why Jesus said, “I am the way, the truth
and the life” (John 14:6); it is through Jesus that we have eternal life. We do
not have to worry about being perfect, being bound to the Law of Moses. Instead
we accept the fact that we are sinful in nature, that we are flawed and embrace
God’s love and grace.
So although we celebrate our freedom on July 4th, the day
you accepted Jesus Christ as your savior, confessed your sins, and believed in
Him is the real Independence Day.
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