Good morning,
Genuine Freedom
The word ‘freedom’ is a wonderful word, until you give it a twist. Those of us living in the United States are looking forward to celebrating another anniversary of our declaration of independence from a very oppressive England. The early residents of North America knew what it was like to be treated as objects and subjects, not fellow citizens of their European countries. The war for freedom was costly and many paid with their lives so that others would live free from the harsh control of those self centered rulers. The word freedom meant so much to those early settlers, but given more than 200 years of use, the word and the ideas that they stood for have become badly twisted. Freedom has now become a word used by evil people to force others to follow their own twisted thinking.
That is also true of the word ‘freedom’ used in the New Testament. Freedom is the word that describes the wonderful, joy filled, singing heart of those individuals whose sins have been forgiven and are now genuine citizens of heaven. Freedom is the wonderful state of mind and heart that allows God’s children to keep on loving and serving God and those around them, no matter how dark and unfair the world around them has become. Freedom to these believers means that they are determined to live lives so tuned to God’s will that their enemies will be forced to make up accusations to support their hate for them. Now, thousands of years later, most religious Christians take the view that they are free to live life the way they like because God owes them his blessing. This gives them the feeling that they are in control of their lives and that God is responsible for giving them what they want. The fact that this life style causes others, as well as God, great pain is unimportant to them. May the Lord help us to live our lives based on God’s definitions and not our own self centered twisted truths.
I Peter 2: 15 It is God’s will that your good lives should silence those who make foolish accusations against you. 16 You are not slaves; you are free. But your freedom is not an excuse to do evil. You are free to live as God’s slaves.
Roy Wisner
