Today caps the celebration of the 92nd Anniversary of the Davao Central Church. And I would like to congratulate all of you for putting up such an appropriate theme: Reclaiming our Dynamic Heritage and Renewing our Commitment Towards A New Beginning in the Spirit of the Jubilee.

I believe then, and I believe now that the Church should speak up about the hopes and fears of our people because it has a prophetic role. Christianity is never a way of life for the fence sitter or the uncommitted spectator. God’s call towards discipleship is a call for involvement, and a summons for engagement in a world of choices that demand a decision.

Just last Monday, you have witnessed on your television screens and read about them in the national and local papers the voices of protests and the faces of frustration and disillussionment on the streets of our country, timed with the delivery of the State of the Nation Address of the President. While the Chief Executive painted an illusory picture of our economic performace and sounded the drums of war, many of our countrymen - from all walks of life - spoke about the real state of the country and called for peace.

It was about freedom that I would like to speak to you today.

Political scientists, historians and leaders agree that freedom is a necessary ingredient of the human personality and of human society. Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation, freeing the negroes from slavery - because all men are created equal. We had our own Cry of Balintawak, marking our symbolic break away from the shackles of Spanish colonial rule. Nations all over the world have had their own struggle for freedom, and the finest political thought were written and delivered in winning or defending freedom.

Of course, freedom is commonly discussed in relation to its opposite: enslavement and bondage. And yet there are people who are politically free but psychologically chained, because they have learned to be comfortable in their subjugation, or have been accustomed to being afraid.

But the Scriptures have alot to say about freedom. In addition to what the Pastor has earlier read, Galatians, Chapter 5 Verse 1 reads: “It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by the yoke of slavery.”

Political freedoms are necessary for our people and country. In fact, the idea of freedom is inspired by Christianity. We believe that man is created with a free will. He is free indeed.. . ..if he believes himself to be free.

In this particular scriptural passage, Paul the Apostle was addressing the Christians in Galatia. In verse 7 he asks: “You were runnning a good race. Who cut in on you, and kept you from obeying the truth?”

He was referring to those who refused to see the truth, and detested the new freedoms that come with the abundant life with Jesus Christ. They wanted the people to be bound by their own enslavement to tradition, to old mindsets and to rigid rules that had only kept the people in chains. He was telling them: You now have freedom. You are free from the requirements of the old unredeeming law. You are now under grace.

Christ has set us free from freedom based on truth. We must therefore stand our ground to preserve this freedom that Christ himself bought with his own life and won through His resurrection.

Come to think of it. What is being free? Dictionaries have varying definition about being free.

It is not being a slave..

It is not being under the control of another.

It is not being subject to foreign domination.

It is not being subjugated by a despotic goverment.

It is having personal rights and socio-political liberties.

But the Scriptures have a deeper and therefore more compelling concept of freedom: “You shall know the truth and the truth shall set you free”. This meaning of being free was laid out by Jesus Christ himself.

Indeed, truth has a liberating impact on people. It led an honest government official to take stock of his principles, consider the cost in worldly gain and power, and then resigned to uphold the truth about himself and about his belief in real public service.

Truth confronted a government functionary about the strange work hours and work habits of his boss. And so he spoke out his mind telling the media that at 3 in the morning, he is the only sober individual among drunker men!

Truth rang out clear in the Halls of the Congress, one particular day, when the majority of senators, led by its President, did what nobody dared doing. They voted to dismantle the US Military bases. The rest is glorious history for our people.

As for myself, truth stared me in the face when I defied the President. I took a stand on the issue of cronyism, corruption and the abuse of power. I simply refused to accede to his wishes and unlawful directives, against the advice of many, who felt that going against a person, perceived to be acting more as bully than as leader of the country, is to say the least crazy, if not outright dangerous. They had a point. As some of you may have read in the newspapers and watched on television, the President did not only call me a liar and referred to me as a son of a prostitute, he also called upon lightning to strike me. He even threatened to personally seek my prosecution for economic sabotage, the penalty of which, under our statute books, is death. In the end, I lost the Chairmanship of the Securities and Exchange Commission. But I was glad I did not let the opportunity to tell the President he was wrong, escape me.

I visited India recently, and there I met a Filipino traveler who told me that even as he admired my gallant stand against the President, he was sorry that I lost the fight. I told him I only lost my job. But I would have been defeated if I did not fight for the truth.

The truth is, first ofall, that I did not owe my position in government from President Estrada. I owed it to God who placed me there for His purpose. Second, I was there to serve the interest of the country and lay the foundations for a sustained economic growth through reforms in the securities market. I was not there to serve the President’s whim and caprice. Third, the truth is that, one’s position in government could be as honorable as the occupant wants and fights it to be.

On the basis of these truths, I stood my ground, but I was only able to do so because I fell on my knees before God. I was only able to stand firm because I knew that God was with me. And if He is with me, who can be against me?

My experience is a lesson in utter dependence on God. And the realization that He is watching. He is fighting our battles and has already prepared us victory, is the most liberating experience one can ever go through. As the scripture read on us today, the Lord Jesus is the vine and we are attached to Him as branches. Unless we drew strength from this vine, we will wither and die, and will have to be proned off.

To me, this is the true freedom, and the most important requirement of freedom is that we are unafraid. No wonder God has always asked his leaders not to fear. No wonder God always says, “take heart for I have overcome the world”. No wonder God reassured Moses, Joshua, David and all the heroes of the Bible - “Be of great courage, because I will always be with you, I will never forsake you.”

The Bible is very clear. We must stand firm to preserve this freedom. And Paul warns that we should not revert to slavery again. It is so easy to hark back to the past. In fact when the Hebrews saw the vastness of the Red Sea, they were afraid and wanted to go back to their life of slavery.

We have the tendency to start liking our chains. We have the tendency to escape from freedom, as Erich Fromm said in his book of the same title. We dread the responsibility that comes with it. We are intimidated by the mental burden of deciding for ourselves We abhor the idea of speaking out and be responsible for what we say. We take to the safety of silence.

As for the Church, we must remember that we have a prophetic role. In the tradition of John the Baptist and the prophets of old, we denounce evil in society and uphold the good. We expose the lie and declare the truth. The Church was given by Christ the freedom to do so. Thus, it should continue to speak, to denounce corruption and fight dishonety wherever it rears its ugly head; to be the advocate of her people; to be the champion of their rights and aspirations.

To paraphrase a popular saying, “for evil to triumph, it is enough for people to do nothing”. Too often, Christians are not fulfilling their role as ‘salt of the earth and light of the world’ because they are actually afraid to see through conclusion the taking of that role faithfully and uncompromisingly..

We pride calling ourselves the only Christian nation in the Asia, but our religion has not made any significant difference in the socio-economic development of our people. Sadly, even the non-Christian countries in the region who have suffered more from the Asian financial crisis that began in 1997, have already left us far behind in terms of recovery. Perhaps, as Christians, we have been waiting too long for the grand opportunity to take a stand on major cosmic issues, in the performance of that prophetic role, not realizing, that the opportunity is now.

Wherever we are, whatever work we do, whatever activity we are involved in - we can actually make a difference. We do not need to seek a dramatic moment to make our role count. The country is divided enough.

The nation is divided enough by the issues of corruption, cronyism and abuse of power. We are well aware of the tension between the festering legacy of an unjust order brought about by a previous dictatorship, on one hand, and our noble goal for social justice on the other.

Our people are aware of the tension between the few who are rich, and the many who are poor, where the rich become richer and the poor become poorer. The tension is clearly there and when Christians speak out and take a stand against these inequalities, they not only make a difference, they in fact recognize and uphold their freedom - freedom to believe, once again in every individual’s ability to better himself, and freedom to believe, once again, in our collective ability to rebuild our nation.

The Davao Central Church has the sterling tradition of valuing, cherishing and using this Christ-given freedom. Even as it stands in the midst of upheavals, of conflicts, of doubts, of apprehensions, and mistrusts here in Mindanao, it can with the love and teachings of Christ, extend the healing hand of unity among the divided people.

Today, as we reflect on this year’s Anniversary Theme, may we continue to engage at their point of need as we journey on towards justice and peace. We have a Good Samaritan role to play wherever we are and we must remember what Jesus taught us in the parable of the Sheep and the Goats: “I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these my brothers, you did to me also”. God will ensure that such a role will make a difference in the life of our country and the people, thereby making us truly reclaim our dynamic heritage, and renewing our commitment towards a new beginning.
 

Thank you and may God Bless us all.