From my youth do many passions war against me

In this sermon, Father Nicholas discusses how for the Christian, spiritual freedom is liberation from our passions. The Church – the Kingdom of Christ that is freedom. How?
 
Christ offers the rich young man the option of selling everything he has and giving the proceeds to the poor. The young man baulks at this because of his enslavement to his material wealth. There are many rich people in both the Old and New Testament, however none of them were told to do this by God because they were not enslaved.
 
In contemporary society, freedom is “when I can do what I want to do” and of course, money is helpful to achieve these ends.
 
The Kingdom of heaven belongs to people with the heart of a child. Adults are fraught with passions… pride, alienation, selfishness. Other passions develop to protect our carnal self – our so-called ‘freedom’ to do what we want ­– acquisitiveness, sensuality, love of money, vainglory. Christ offers us the option to walk away from these. 

​Freedom FOR passions vs. freedom FROM passions