The Truth shall make you free....what the heck does that even mean? Let’s back track for a moment,this verse is a continuation of the previous one which states that “If you abide in My (Jesus’) Word, you are My disciple indeed”, so we see if we abide in His word we become a disciple, and learn the Truth and that Truth will set you free”. It took me a really long time to be able to grasp the concept of this verse. For many years I sat in a chair sunday in and sunday out, hearing the words spoken by a preacher, going to youth group, read young girl’s christian devotional books, listening to all the right “christian” music , taking bible classes, doing my own background research on the culture and context of many bible verses, doing everything I thought a disciple was supposed to do, yet there was always an aspect of Christianity that seemed to go over my head. I had all the head knowledge I thought I needed, I knew all the right things to say, knew where to quote from, knew what to do, knew what to act, yet I still felt as if I was missing something, like if everyone else around me could clearly see something that was I was completely blind to. If I was really honest with myself I didn’t really know anything. I tried to act like a duck, quack like a duck, look like a duck, but no matter how hard I tried I couldn’t make myself a duck! (metaphorically speaking of course). I was saved, but that was barely it,I definitely wasn’t a disciple, I was a Christian on life support and even that was starting to fade.
I can still remember clearly the day that I stopped “knowing” what I thought was the truth, and when the Truth became known to me. God broke me and brought me to a place where no amount of intellectual knowledge or social etiquette could save me,and to the realization that only the Truth of His Love for me could get the job done.No amount of reading, or memorization could substitute the True Heart understanding of who He was, what He had done for me and how much He truly Loves me. His Truth set me free and allowed me to actually begin to accept Love and find freedom in who I was in Him. Allowing me to let go of the baggage and embrace being His disciple, nothing was holding me back from Him anymore, His truth really did set me free.( as cheesy as that might sound to some of you, its True)
It’s still something I have to work on today,on a moment to moment basis, some moments are easier than other, but I always have the Rock to stand on and the Truth in my heart to remind me that His love redeemed and restored and nothing can take that freedom away from me. My identity is not who I was, but who I am in Him.
God has the ability reveal a Truth so powerful that it will set anyone free from any addiction, shame, guilt, past, hurt or pain that they could have possibly experienced or still carry around.
My prayer is that I not just be a hearer of the words but a doer, may the words that come from abiding in Him continuously be traveling those troublesome 18 inches from my head to my heart and make grant me a little more freedom in Him each and every day.
Application:
I will commit to memorizing a verse from psalm 139 each day until I’ve inscribed the entire psalm into my heart, in an effort to instill more of His truth in my life
No comments:
Post a Comment