By Joshua Arnold

Exactly 250 years ago, this past Saturday, American militias confronted British soldiers at Lexington and Concord, Massachusetts, in the opening skirmishes of what became known to history as the American Revolutionary War. But these men weren’t concerned with making history. They were patriots, risking their lives to preserve what they understood to be the rightful freedoms of their country.

The British colonists objected to 1767 taxes, imposed by the English Parliament rather than the colonial legislatures that represented them. The longest lasting was a tax on tea, which colonists boycotted en masse. In an ultimately counterproductive effort to enforce the tax, the royal governor of Massachusetts resorted to increasingly repressive policies. When he sent regular British soldiers to seize caches of ammunition and weapons gathered in response to his escalating repression, the colony erupted in the first vibrant flash of revolution on April 19, 1775.

Weeks earlier, on March 23, 1775, as the Virginia colonial legislature debated whether to throw in its lot with Massachusetts, Delegate Patrick Henry had predicted that “the next gale that sweeps from the north will bring to our ears the clash of resounding arms!”

“Gentlemen may cry, Peace, Peace — but there is no peace,” Henry warned, citing Jeremiah 6:14, a prophecy about false hope for Jerusalem. “There is no retreat but in submission and slavery!” Henry bellowed. “Our chains are forged! Their clanking may be heard on the plains of Boston!”

These fiery phrases finally folded into the speech’s famous crescendo, “Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!”

The patriotism oozes from every pore. From Patrick Henry to Paul Revere, these opening scenes of the American Revolution are among the most famous in our nation’s history. What characterizes them most is the love of liberty. These men so yearned to live in a free country that they were willing to wager their very lives in the venture — more than that, they pledged “our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.”

We admire the original American patriots for everything they risked to boldly secure the freedom we still enjoy 250 years later.

As Christians, however, we are not only citizens of America. “Our citizenship is in heaven” (Philippians 3:20). That is, we belong to the “kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 4:17) of which Jesus is king (John 18:36).

We do not belong to the kingdom of heaven by nature. We “were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind,” subject to Satan’s dominion and effectively dead in our slavery to sin (Ephesians 2:1-3). We had no hope of winning for ourselves a place in God’s kingdom.

But out prospects decidedly changed approximately 2,000 years ago (the exact date is debated), in another anniversary Christians observe this weekend. On Friday, the incarnate Son of God hung accursed on a wooden cross (Galatians 3:13). He “died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures,” “was buried,” and “was raised on the third day” (1 Corinthians 15:3-4) — that is, on Resurrection Sunday.

Therefore, we who were once enemies of God through our rebellion are both “reconciled to God by the death of his Son” and “saved by him from the wrath of God” (Romans 5:9-10), if they repent and believe in obedience to Jesus’s commands.

As citizens of God’s kingdom, we too have freedom, of a different sort. Ours is not an Englishman’s right to choose the representatives who have authority to levy taxes upon him. Instead, Christ’s substitutionary death has freed us “so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin” (Romans 6:6). And, since we are no longer bound in servitude to sin, Paul urges, “let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, to make you obey its passions” (Romans 6:12).

Yet, as Paul explores in the next chapter, this is easier said than done. Our old, sinful nature will not easily relinquish its mastery over our lives, and it is only through the power of the Holy Spirit within us and the grace of Jesus Christ that we are able to overcome. This means that the life of the Christian is one of constant struggle, as we seek to throw off sin’s power and “put to death … what is earthly” in us (Colossians 3:5). In a very real sense, we are at war.

Of course, just like in 1775, Christians still encounter deceptive agents of their spiritual enemy who proclaim, “peace, peace,” when there is no peace. It’s possible for us to unilaterally disarm ourselves for spiritual warfare by neglecting God’s word, forgetting to pray, and isolating ourselves from the encouragement and accountability only found in a local church. But unilateral disarmament only leaves us more defenseless before a scheming adversary.

There are only two ways to avoid spiritual warfare: 1) simply surrendering and returning to our fatal slavery to sin, or 2) persevering until the Lord Jesus finally triumphs over sin and death forever.

One option is clearly preferable, which means we must keep fighting against sin, even when we feel exhausted, even when we feel that our warfare saps all our strength — and even against the last vestiges of sin that remain.

Two hundred and fifty years ago, the American colonists resisted a tax on tea that seems modest by today’s standards, coming out to somewhere between 6% and 8%, depending on prices. They were willing to risk their lives over an 8% tax. This is because it was not the tax itself, but the principle behind it, that a foreign body had the power to subject them to taxes outside their control.

In like manner, our “struggle against sin” (Hebrews 12:4) must be all-or-nothing. We must “give no opportunity to the devil” (Ephesians 4:27), lest in that one opportunity he reasserts his mastery over our lives.

When the American colonists took up arms in defense of their liberties against Parliamentary taxation, they went down in history as patriots for valuing their land and their liberty more than their life. As Christians, we also belong to a kingdom, we also have unique and precious freedom, and we also must go to war against sin to defend it.

Every Christian must ask himself the question, what will you wager in the war against sin? Are you willing to sacrifice your reputation, your possessions, and your very life for the sake of your freedom in Christ? Are you a kingdom patriot?

Joshua Arnold is a senior writer at The Washington Stand.