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God's Words For US
by Cecelia Lester
We celebrated our nation’s freedom earlier this month. We hear scriptures talking about the freedom we have in Christ. The newspaper in our state capital has the scripture, “Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.” written as part of its masthead.
The leaders of our nation remind us that freedom not free. Ask any family that has lost a member who gave his/her life for the cause of maintaining or establishing freedom for our or another nation.
We have freedom in Christ because God planned for His Son to come to earth eventually to die a criminal’s death. Jesus Christ went through the agony of Golgotha in order to take away our sins.
The Apostle John tells us “So, if the Son sets you free, you are free indeed.” (John 8:36 NIV) Just before this verse, He speaks of each individual who sins is a slave to sin. Seeing people who say they live for Jesus and deliberately do sinful things are the ones to whom this passage speaks.
When I was a teenager, our church youth group used to discuss the question, “What is sin?” We heard the different answers our group could come up with—murder, stealing, and not honoring the Ten Commandments. Our Youth Pastor told us that sin was missing the mark God has set for His children. “I press on toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.” (Philippians 3:14 (KJV)
As we read this passage from Paul’s writings, we realize we are ALL sinners, sinners saved by grace. Once we accept Jesus into our hearts, we desire to keep ourselves away from sin.
Sometimes the enemy enters into our midst in our churches and stirs things up. We have to be on the alert for signs that he is active around us. We need to be aware of how easily those annoying little issues that arise can build into confrontations and cause heartache and problems within a community of believers.
As children of God, we have to be aware how precious our freedom in Christ is and to protect it. We should spend time in prayer if we are aware of some incident that allows God’s people to give up and surrender our freedom to the enemy. May God help us to hold onto our freedom in Christ during these difficult days for our nation and our world.
A friend of ours walked away from the LORD while she was going through a divorce. She kept saying she would come back to Jesus when he brought her a man. In the years she was living away from God, she managed to live very well in spite of her limited income. When she attended a revival meeting, the LORD convicted her and called her back to live for Him. She spent one whole day admitting to different agencies that she had abused their services and offerings to which she felt entitled. Because she went to them before they discovered what she had done, not a one of them took steps against her. She was free, indeed. Free from sin and, in her case, free from civil, maybe even criminal, prosecution.
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Cecelia Lester has been serious about her writing for over two decades..
She composes Christian essays and posts them to her blog quietspirit-followingmyking.blogspot.com/
She has served in a faith-based organization, Grace In Action by writing two newsletters and searching for possible grants.
In July 2017, she published her first book, 'Times of Trouble Bring Rays of Joy.'
She and her husband of 54 years live in central Indiana. They have one grown son.
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