What happens to you when you enter a relationship with Jesus
Christ? Is your freedom curtailed or expanded, diminished or enhanced?
Think of it this way: freedom is merging your will with
God’s will, so that your life choices are augmented by the Lord’s reservoir of
wisdom. After all, God’s been around an awfully long time. He knows how to
navigate your path up the mountain, while meeting your needs along the way.
Yet many people feel squeamish about calling on God for
daily guidance. “I need to take responsibility for my own choices,” says one
man—“I can’t go running to God for every little problem.”
I respect this perspective. There is a certain amount of
truth here. God gives us freedom of choice, and exercising that freedom
develops initiative and responsibility. But what is missing from this view is
the recognition that Christ loves people wisely. The Lord doesn’t intend to
merge your will with his to keep you immature or make you slavishly
codependent. He’s not interested in lording his power over you.
No, the Lord wants to guide you through a rhythm of creative
interaction, the way two lifelong companions talk things over and keep each
other near at heart. Jesus is interested in everything you face, just as he was
with the disciples. His goal is to keep you free and growing
toward ever greater dimensions of psychological and spiritual wholeness. Paul
has it right in Galatians 5:1—“For freedom Christ has set us free.”
Think about it. At all times, and in every situation, you
have freedom to pray for God’s unfolding will. This doesn’t undermine your
identity, but strengthens it. You trust God to move inside you and within every
situation so that his blessings for you are made real.
If you are prone to worry, refuse to accept this as a
precondition of life. Have you ever realized that worry is optional? That worry
is a choice, not a necessity? Worry is a habit of not trusting yourself and not
trusting God. Worry rates the Lord as a failure when it comes to guiding you.
Usually we develop the worry habit when someone has undermined our
self-confidence, or when a series of reversals have made us fearful that life
will never turn out okay.
Worry is not God’s will for you. “But I’m afraid I’ll make
the wrong choice,” you say. Or, “How can I tell if God is really guiding me?”
You’ll never have 100% certainty. Don’t waste your time searching for spiritual
guarantees. Just build a creative rhythm between worry and trust, weakness and
strength. That works just fine.
You are not alone when it comes to worry. I worry. My wife Kate
worries. All people fret when they can’t control life and make it behave. On
top of that, we’ve all experienced bitter losses and moments when life has nearly
crushed us.
The way out of worry is to remember that the other side of
worry—the other fork in the trail—is trusting in the Lord. Deepening your
individual bond with Christ helps you bypass chronic worry by leaning on him
for help. You still have to make choices, and you still have occasional doubts,
but you begin to know that the Holy Spirit hovers over you like a mother
watching over a child.
Fear loses its grip when you trust the Lord in real-life
situations and discern the nuances of his ready help in the face of need. Over
time, you develop a faith history with God that bears witness to his ingenious
provisions—his sometimes subtle and sometimes dramatic interventions on your
behalf.
There is no perfect way through life, nor is there a way of
living that bypasses disappointment and adversity. But you can understand that
most frustrations are merely inconvenient, not catastrophic. Over the years you
evolve an encompassing trust in Christ’s love, reaching out to him
instinctively when you face particularly gnarly problems.
Today alone I have asked the Lord to help me pay some
important bills, guide Kate and
me in fulfilling our life callings, and help a friend who is undergoing
surgery. I even prayed for assistance in writing this blog.
Openly express
gratitude to God, never writing off a blessing
as good luck or coincidence. Catch him
being good to you and let him know how you feel about it. You praise Jesus for his faithfulness, and give
him lots of heart hugs. Watch for God's blessings in your life this week!
For an in depth treatment of finding freedom and wholeness in Jesus Christ, read:
For an in depth treatment of finding freedom and wholeness in Jesus Christ, read:
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