I'm so amazed and honored that the Lord continues to use me to minister to the broken-hearted. It was only about 10 years ago I was that broken-hearted person. Now, He gives me a platform to encourage and share His love with others. Every time I minister, I am grieved by the tremendous amount of sin and hurt that many people carry around. For some, it's as though that hurt and sin have become a part of them in such a way that they don't realize they could ever live any differently. Some do not even recognize that it is there. To others, the sin and hurt have become their best friend. The sin and hurt never stops being taxing on your life, you just learn how to work with it. Slaves...that's what we become. Slaves that feel no hope or need to break free. Others want it to go away but just don't know how to get away from it. So they crawl into a cage where the sin and hurt can not reach them. Only, they too are within the bars of slavery inside that cage. I had one of those cages too. It was a great "escape" for a short while. I was certainly a prisoner no matter where I went or what I did. My happiest moment was not as happy as it could have been. My good friend Jenny says that we do not live as free as Jesus died for us to be. Freedom...how precious.
We sing about freedom, honor freedom and cherish freedom when it comes to our country and our rights. We even focus on freeing a whale name Willie. But we tend to forget that there is another type of freedom. Spiritual freedom. A real freedom. A freedom that is not dictated by the policies of man. A freedom that was secured for us on a cross. A freedom that costs but one person His life...Jesus. A freedom that we did not have to march down the streets of Heaven and picket or demonstrate outside the throne room of grace to get. There are no "Free The Sinners" signs and cheers needed. A freedom that was freely given to us...all we have to do is receive it and walk in it. THAT freedom is the type of freedom that we are all called to walk in. Freedom from wickedness, bondage, yoke of sin, curses, hurt, etc. A freedom that is sweeter than Mississippi sweet tea and state fair cotton candy. We can fight to keep our guns. We can fight for the freedom to vote or to choose our own healthcare, but what good are those temporal things if we continue to live in bondage to an enemy that is looking to bankrupt us, steal from us, kill us and throw us into eternal hell? Paul lived in prison more than any one innocent person should have to...BUT...he lived in complete freedom in his spirit. His surroundings, circumstances, enemies, etc. did not take away from the fact that Paul was a free man.
We may continue to have circumstances around us that are painful and pressing. We may live in surroundings that honor everything and everyone except God. We may have more enemies that we can count. However, when we are free from sin and hurt we find strength, peace and grace as we press towards the goal of being men and women of God. We will be a light in the midst of all that darkness. We will have peace. Yes, peace. A peace that we can't understand in the natural. A peace that man-dictated freedom can't give us. Spiritual freedom brings peace. And as long as I have the peace of God, I can get through anything.
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