Freedom!
This past Tuesday, we celebrated our 247th birthday as a nation. Happy Birthday America! I love the word freedom. As a guy who is somewhat claustrophobic, I love the sound of it, the taste of it, and what freedom feels like.
Jesus spoke very clearly about freedom. In the Gospel of John He said, “If you abide in My word, you are My disciples indeed. And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.”
When He said that, a group of Jewish people nearby recoiled. They probably did that physically but most definitely emotionally. We can know that because they say, “We are Abraham’s descendants, and have never been in bondage to anyone. How can You say, ‘You will be made free?”
These people must have experienced some major league memory loss. If we survey the life of the Jews, they had been in and out of bondage in one way or another throughout most of their existence as a nation. They had experienced bondage in Egypt and Canaan. For 70 years they were in captivity to several nations like Syria, Assyria, Babylon, and the Medes and the Persians.
Even as those people spoke words about being free, they were under the thumb of the Romans. But there biggest slave master was a thing we know as sin.
To their claim of freedom Jesus responded, “Most assuredly, I say to you, whoever commits sin is a slave of sin.”
Many of you reading this article know personally what it means and feels like to be released from this tyrant. Many people have not experienced this blessed reality. If you would like to experience this, give me a call.
To those who have tasted freedom, there is more. Sometimes we know or have experienced something but not the full extent of it.
Several years ago a group of people meeting several weeks in a row on Wednesday night, helped put together a document that helps a person go much further down the road of personally knowing what is involved in spiritual freedom.
A copy of that document can be yours free of charge. You can get it by dropping by the church or you can see it and/or download a copy from our website. That document can be found here: https://www.sugarcreekbc.com/our_identity_in_christ_.
If you have never experienced this freedom, start working through this document on page six. If you have experienced this freedom, start on page one. If you decide to read the document online, you can put your answers on a separate sheet of paper.
Do a few of these a day or knock it out in one setting. You will begin to see all that is involved in true spiritual freedom.
Please take note, it’s not enough to just fill in the blanks. Let’s remember what Jesus said about knowing truth. He said, “you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.”
