Monday, March 24, 2014

Today is a Day of Freedom


Today is a Day of Freedom (Sunday)

When we go to rallies we are usually given an armband as we pay for our registration. This armband has a pretty strong glue on it that holds. The armbands are even washable these days. When we leave the rally Danny does the honor of cutting off the bands from both of us. If we didn’t cut the bands off with a knife or scissors we’d just have to wear them. Imagine how many bands we’d have on after having gone to rallies for 30 years!

Even as believers, who are taught about our freedom in Christ, we still often have bands wrapped tightly around us. Some of those bands are given us by others: useless, unwelcome, rejected, inferior. There are times when we band ourselves with the same words. Our fiascos cause us to believe we are a failure. Disappointment comes and we slap on a depressed band. Someone crosses us and there goes the unforgiveness band. We get hurt and protection band is wrapped tightly around us. We try to loosen them ourselves but to no avail. Pretty soon we can be covered in bands, so much so that we can hardly move. We’re held captive by the wrong words and banding of others as well as ourselves. Someone has labeled us in such a way that we feel every inch of the displeasure, hopelessness, exclusion and all. We try to tell ourselves we are okay, but the truth is the bands remain. So we fill our lives with fun and frivolity, surround ourselves with people, get busy doing unimportant but distracting things and the problems, the bands, remain – they even increase. The bands have slipped from our arms to our hearts and we’re completely captive. What we thought would set us free has now caged us. The fact is what we believe, what we receive becomes our worth and our value.

God speaks to my heart: You were never meant to be bound by the words of others. You must be careful about the words you speak over yourself as well. I AM the one who provided freedom from the bands that want to hold you captive. I break every chain over you. My child, won’t you walk in the freedom I have already provided? Today is your day to walk freely. But the freedom you desire has to come in My way. I sent Christ to set you free from the law of sin and death. Without Christ you will never have real freedom. But in Christ you are free indeed. I have given My Word, God breathed over you, to take in and live out in total freedom. Your desire to be free is a beginning. But coming to Me and allowing Me to remove those bands is what completes your deliverance. My Word is a sharp and two edged sword and I alone AM able to cut those bands from you. Return to Me and see how free you can really be.

Oh beloved! Let God arise and His enemies be scattered! The enemies of God are marching to band you and cage you and keep you ignorant of God’s Truth. But I came to give you an incredible abundant life. No need to walk in the bands of fear, unforgiveness, untruth or despair. Breathe in God’s Word this morning and walk it out in faith and watch as band after band falls to your side. No yoke of bondage, no lie of the enemy, no scheme of the world can hold you down as you live in the light of God’s Truth.

God loves you and He’s for you. Today is a Day of Freedom! So grab His hand, let Him loosen the hold that has been put on you and watch as the freedom of life in Christ unfolds to set you free and for the world to see.

Isaiah 58:6 “Is this not the fast which I choose, To loosen the bonds of wickedness, To undo the bands of the yoke, And to let the oppressed go free and break every yoke?

Romans 8:2 For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and of death.

Psalm 119:45 And I will walk at liberty, For I seek Your precepts.

John 10:10 The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly.

2 Corinthians 3:17 Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.

Galatians 5:1 [ Walk by the Spirit ] It was for freedom that Christ set us free; therefore keep standing firm and do not be subject again to a yoke of slavery.

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