The Life of Freedom

Galatians 5 (The Message)

The Life of Freedom

 ¹ Christ has set us free to live a free life. So take your stand! Never again let anyone put a harness of slavery on you.  ^2-3I am emphatic about this. The moment any one of you submits to circumcision or any other rule-keeping system, at that same moment Christ's hard-won gift of freedom is squandered. I repeat my warning: The person who accepts the ways of circumcision trades all the advantages of the free life in Christ for the obligations of the slave life of the law. ^4-6I suspect you would never intend this, but this is what happens. When you attempt to live by your own religious plans and projects, you are cut off from Christ, you fall out of grace. Meanwhile we expectantly wait for a satisfying relationship with the Spirit. For in Christ, neither our most conscientious religion nor disregard of religion amounts to anything. What matters is something far more interior: faith expressed in love.
 ^7-10You were running superbly! Who cut in on you, deflecting you from the true course of obedience? This detour doesn't come from the One who called you into the race in the first place. And please don't toss this off as insignificant. It only takes a minute amount of yeast, you know, to permeate an entire loaf of bread. Deep down, the Master has given me confidence that you will not defect. But the one who is upsetting you, whoever he is, will bear the divine judgment.
 ^11-12As for the rumor that I continue to preach the ways of circumcision (as I did in those pre-Damascus Road days), that is absurd. Why would I still be persecuted, then? If I were preaching that old message, no one would be offended if I mentioned the Cross now and then—it would be so watered-down it wouldn't matter one way or the other. Why don't these agitators, obsessive as they are about circumcision, go all the way and castrate themselves!
 ^13-15It is absolutely clear that God has called you to a free life. Just make sure that you don't use this freedom as an excuse to do whatever you want to do and destroy your freedom. Rather, use your freedom to serve one another in love; that's how freedom grows. For everything we know about God's Word is summed up in a single sentence: Love others as you love yourself. That's an act of true freedom. If you bite and ravage each other, watch out—in no time at all you will be annihilating each other, and where will your precious freedom be then?
 ^16-18My counsel is this: Live freely, animated and motivated by God's Spirit. Then you won't feed the compulsions of selfishness. For there is a root of sinful self-interest in us that is at odds with a free spirit, just as the free spirit is incompatible with selfishness. These two ways of life are antithetical, so that you cannot live at times one way and at times another way according to how you feel on any given day. Why don't you choose to be led by the Spirit and so escape the erratic compulsions of a law-dominated existence?
 ^19-21It is obvious what kind of life develops out of trying to get your own way all the time: repetitive, loveless, cheap sex; a stinking accumulation of mental and emotional garbage; frenzied and joyless grabs for happiness; trinket gods; magic-show religion; paranoid loneliness; cutthroat competition; all-consuming-yet-never-satisfied wants; a brutal temper; an impotence to love or be loved; divided homes and divided lives; small-minded and lopsided pursuits; the vicious habit of depersonalizing everyone into a rival; uncontrolled and uncontrollable addictions; ugly parodies of community. I could go on.
   This isn't the first time I have warned you, you know. If you use your freedom this way, you will not inherit God's kingdom.
 ^22-23But what happens when we live God's way? He brings gifts into our lives, much the same way that fruit appears in an orchard—things like affection for others, exuberance about life, serenity. We develop a willingness to stick with things, a sense of compassion in the heart, and a conviction that a basic holiness permeates things and people. We find ourselves involved in loyal commitments, not needing to force our way in life, able to marshal and direct our energies wisely.
 ^23-24Legalism is helpless in bringing this about; it only gets in the way. Among those who belong to Christ, everything connected with getting our own way and mindlessly responding to what everyone else calls necessities is killed off for good—crucified.
 ^25-26Since this is the kind of life we have chosen, the life of the Spirit, let us make sure that we do not just hold it as an idea in our heads or a sentiment in our hearts, but work out its implications in every detail of our lives. That means we will not compare ourselves with each other as if one of us were better and another worse. We have far more interesting things to do with our lives. Each of us is an original.

Image courtesy of Photobucket.com.

Is God in a Box?

I was discussing our relationship with Christ (it being a relationship and not religion) with someone recently and a thought came to mind again that has come to mind often over the years when asking myself, "Why do some people have a vibrant, real relationship with Christ and others do not?"  I think the answer is that some people put God in a box!

When you think about it, many of us live our lives in boxes of our own creation.  We also put all of the other people around us in boxes, too.  We even put God in a box.  And when Sunday comes around, we take Him out for a few hours and then we put Him back in.  We don't allow Him to permeate our lives.  We think that it is enough to spend a few hours in church on Sunday or perhaps we may add a midweek Bible study.  None of this is enough!  He wants to be Lord of your whole life every day of the week, every hour of the day.

I think we may be confused!  This life is not our own; we have been bought with a price.  We cannot do whatever we want Monday through Saturday and then sit piously in church on Sunday.  May it never be!  Monday through Sunday belong to the Lord!  Every day is the Lord's day as it says in Psalm 118:24 (NASB) "This is the day which the LORD has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it." 

"And this is the testimony: God has given us eternal life, and this life is in his Son."  1 John 5:11 (NIV)

"Your old life is dead. Your new life, which is your real life—even though invisible to spectators—is with Christ in God. He is your life. When Christ (your real life, remember) shows up again on this earth, you'll show up, too—the real you, the glorious you."  Colossians 3:4 (The Message)

 ^"Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; you were bought at a price. Therefore honor God with your body." 1 Corinthians 6:19-20 (NIV)

"Jesus answered, 'I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.'"  John 14:6 (NIV)

"You know the message God sent to the people of Israel, telling the good news of peace through Jesus Christ, who is Lord of all."  Acts 10:36 (NIV)

"When Peter saw he had a congregation, he addressed the people:  'Oh, Israelites, why does this take you by such complete surprise, and why stare at us as if our power or piety made him walk? The God of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, the God of our ancestors, has glorified his Son Jesus. The very One that Pilate called innocent, you repudiated. You repudiated the Holy One, the Just One, and asked for a murderer in his place. You no sooner killed the Author of Life than God raised him from the dead—and we're the witnesses.'"  Acts 3:12-15 (The Message)

"From the very first day, we were there, taking it all in—we heard it with our own ears, saw it with our own eyes, verified it with our own hands. The Word of Life appeared right before our eyes; we saw it happen! And now we're telling you in most sober prose that what we witnessed was, incredibly, this: The infinite Life of God himself took shape before us."  1 John 1:1-2 (The Message)

 "With the arrival of Jesus, the Messiah, that fateful dilemma is resolved. Those who enter into Christ's being-here-for-us no longer have to live under a continuous, low-lying black cloud. A new power is in operation. The Spirit of life in Christ, like a strong wind, has magnificently cleared the air, freeing you from a fated lifetime of brutal tyranny at the hands of sin and death."  Romans 2:1-2 (The Message)

"What actually took place is this: I tried keeping rules and working my head off to please God, and it didn't work. So I quit being a "law man" so that I could be God's man. Christ's life showed me how, and enabled me to do it. I identified myself completely with him. Indeed, I have been crucified with Christ. My ego is no longer central. It is no longer important that I appear righteous before you or have your good opinion, and I am no longer driven to impress God. Christ lives in me. The life you see me living is not "mine," but it is lived by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. I am not going to go back on that.   Is it not clear to you that to go back to that old rule-keeping, peer-pleasing religion would be an abandonment of everything personal and free in my relationship with God? I refuse to do that, to repudiate God's grace. If a living relationship with God could come by rule-keeping, then Christ died unnecessarily." Galatians 2:19-21 (The Message)

"Jesus provided far more God-revealing signs than are written down in this book. These are written down so you will believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and in the act of believing, have real and eternal life in the way he personally revealed it."  John 20:30-31(The Message)

Apart from Christ, there is no life!  You cannot put Him in a box.  He cannot be contained and if you try to contain Him, your new life in Christ will wither as it says in  Mark 4:18-19, ^"And these are they which are sown among thorns; such as hear the word,  and the cares of this world, and the deceitfulness of riches, and the lusts of other things entering in, choke the word, and it becometh unfruitful." (KJV)  Jesus wants all of you.  He wants all of your days, decisions, duties.

You may be saying to yourself, "Oh, that's not me!  I  pray everyday.  I read His word.  I don't have God in a box!"  That may well be, but you had better look closely!  Do you discontinue your connection with Him when scripture demands something from you that you are not willing to give?  Do you slap the lid down when God asks you to do something that feels very uncomfortable to you (like sharing your faith)?  Do you decide that certain decisions are yours to make and do not require God's assistance?  Do you take matters into your own hands?  Do you try to control things?  God wants to be the Lord of every area of your life, all day, every day...

If there is an area that you are holding back, I guarantee you that it will hinder your walk with Him.  Find out what it is and give it over to Him immediately!  "So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed."   John 8:36 (ESV)

Dear Lord,  Please show us the areas that we are holding back from You.  Shine your spotlight on them and help us to hand them over to You so that we might be free to walk the path that You have set before us.  Help us to take You out of the box permanently, never putting You back in.  Thank you for the life You have given us if we will only receive it...