Be generous

"When you happen on someone who’s in trouble or needs help among your people with whom you live in this land that God, your God, is giving you, don’t look the other way pretending you don’t see him. Don’t keep a tight grip on your purse. No. Look at him, open your purse, lend whatever and as much as he needs. Don’t count the cost.....Give freely and spontaneously. Don’t have a stingy heart. The way you handle matters like this triggers God, your God’s, blessing in everything you do, all your work and ventures. There are always going to be poor and needy people among you. So I command you: Always be generous, open purse and hands, give to your neighbors in trouble, your poor and hurting neighbors." (vv 7 - 11, Deuteronomy 15)

Be kind. Be generous. Be as loving as Jesus who gave his life beyond generosity. Thinking of yesterday's thought and how Jesus took time to slow his life down and notice the moment, I too need to live slowly enough to notice and be aware of others' needs, opening my ears to listen and eyes to see.

Such living is rewarded, not least in inspiring devotion:"But if your servant says to you, ‘I do not want to leave you,’ because he loves you and your family and is well off with you,  then take an awl and push it through his ear lobe into the door, and he will become your servant for life." (vv 16 - 17)

I am reminded of the song:

"Pierce my ear, O Lord my God,
Take me to Your throne this day
I will serve no other god
Lord, I’m here to stay
For You have paid the price for me
With Your blood You ransomed me.
I will serve You eternally,
A free man I'll never be."

Such a beautiful song which has remained in my heart for thirty years now....to be devoted, committed to God such that all else - even freedom - is worthless. Just yesterday, there were Walk For Freedom marches in cities in the UK, organised by A21 in its fight against modern day slavery. I can't imagine that any slave today is so well treated that they would wish to remain with their master....

...even then, though slavery was openly common, it wasn't in God's plan but arose out of sin and selfishness. 'Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up."  (Galatians 6:9)

Keep loving. Keep going.

Yeast

Interesting. Paul is warning the Galatians against being misled so that they lose sight of Jesus, lose sight of the Truth and become deceived. In Galatians 5:9, he uses the proverb  ‘A little yeast works through the whole batch of dough.’ but this is not in the Bible.

Nevertheless, yeast symbolises sin in the Old Testament; is cited as obduracy in belief by Jesus; and, by Paul, sin which disrupts the church's worship of God.

For us in a Western world, this seems almost counterintuitive.

Our bread is not chapatti or tortilla, injera, or even traditional Irish sodabread or heavy German sourdough ryebreads.
No, we depend on yeast for the light, soft, delicious spongy wheat bread.

Interesting.

The pleasures of the world can indeed distract and detract from our pursuit of Jesus. I remember Romans 12:2 "Don’t be like the people of this world, but let God change the way you think. Then you will know how to do everything that is good and pleasing to him."

That is freedom: "It is absolutely clear that God has called you to a free life. Just make sure that you don’t use this freedom as an excuse to do whatever you want to do and destroy your freedom. Rather, use your freedom to serve one another in love; that’s how freedom grows. For everything we know about God’s Word is summed up in a single sentence: Love others as you love yourself. That’s an act of true freedom." (vv 13 - 14)

"Live freely, animated and motivated by God’s Spirit. Then you won’t feed the compulsions of selfishness." (v19)

And if I am NOT animated and motivated by God's spirit? Then it is chaos: "It is obvious what kind of life develops out of trying to get your own way all the time:... a stinking accumulation of mental and emotional garbage; frenzied and joyless grabs for happiness; ...magic-show religion; paranoid loneliness; cutthroat competition; all-consuming-yet-never-satisfied wants; a brutal temper; an impotence to love or be loved; divided homes and divided lives; small-minded and lopsided pursuits; the vicious habit of depersonalizing everyone into a rival; uncontrolled and uncontrollable addictions; ugly parodies of community. I could go on.

This isn’t the first time I have warned you, you know. If you use your freedom this way, you will not inherit God’s kingdom."

LiFE!

Another You Version plan from Brian Houston: Release, Revive, Repair.

Jesus said - Luke 4:18, Isaiah 61:1 - that the spirit of the Lord had come upon HIM to preach the good news, proclaim freedom and give sight to the blind, freeing the prisoners.

We are all ignorant, trapped, blind and imprisoned in some way. In our thoughts, our emotions, our physicality to varying degrees.

And so he offers help: “Are you tired? Worn out? Burned out on religion? Come to me. Get away with me and you’ll recover your life. I’ll show you how to take a real rest. Walk with me and work with me—watch how I do it. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. I won’t lay anything heavy or ill-fitting on you. Keep company with me and you’ll learn to live freely and lightly.”

Yes, but how? Paul has the answer:
"I can anticipate the response that is coming: “I know that all God’s commands are spiritual, but I’m not. Isn’t this also your experience?” Yes. I’m full of myself—after all, I’ve spent a long time in sin’s prison. What I don’t understand about myself is that I decide one way, but then I act another, doing things I absolutely despise. So if I can’t be trusted to figure out what is best for myself and then do it, it becomes obvious that God’s command is necessary.

But I need something more! For if I know the law but still can’t keep it, and if the power of sin within me keeps sabotaging my best intentions, I obviously need help! I realize that I don’t have what it takes. I can will it, but I can’t do it. I decide to do good, but I don’t really do it; I decide not to do bad, but then I do it anyway. My decisions, such as they are, don’t result in actions. Something has gone wrong deep within me and gets the better of me every time.

It happens so regularly that it’s predictable. The moment I decide to do good, sin is there to trip me up. I truly delight in God’s commands, but it’s pretty obvious that not all of me joins in that delight. Parts of me covertly rebel, and just when I least expect it, they take charge.

I’ve tried everything and nothing helps. I’m at the end of my rope. Is there no one who can do anything for me? Isn’t that the real question?

The answer, thank God, is that Jesus Christ can and does. He acted to set things right in this life of contradictions where I want to serve God with all my heart and mind, but am pulled by the influence of sin to do something totally different.
The Solution Is Life on God’s Terms

With the arrival of Jesus, the Messiah, that fateful dilemma is resolved. Those who enter into Christ’s being-here-for-us no longer have to live under a continuous, low-lying black cloud. A new power is in operation. The Spirit of life in Christ, like a strong wind, has magnificently cleared the air, freeing you from a fated lifetime of brutal tyranny at the hands of sin and death.

God went for the jugular when he sent his own Son. He didn’t deal with the problem as something remote and unimportant. In his Son, Jesus, he personally took on the human condition, entered the disordered mess of struggling humanity in order to set it right once and for all. The law code, weakened as it always was by fractured human nature, could never have done that.

The law always ended up being used as a Band-Aid on sin instead of a deep healing of it. And now what the law code asked for but we couldn’t deliver is accomplished as we, instead of redoubling our own efforts, simply embrace what the Spirit is doing in us.

Brian Houston: ""For we were slaves." Ezra 9:9
Many people who have already walked through the door of freedom in Christ are still slaves to something or someone....The word 'release' implies momentum and action. It carries the idea of liberation, spaciousness, generosity, forgiveness, mercy and grace. Release is about emancipation - set free from whatever has restricted us. When I think about release, I see prison doors swung wide open with overjoyed people running onto a wide-open field....

It's time to break free from bondages in circumstances, relationships, finance, addictions or health. It's time for deliverance into an overcoming life. Don't settle for brokenness - Jesus came to heal the broken, to release us from everything that weighs us down.
God has not forsaken you. He has not forgotten you nor has He given up on you. Do whatever it takes to walk in the freedom that Jesus won for you."

Freedom

I have echoing in my mind the song shout 'Freedom...!' I think it's Brian Doerksen. Or maybe I just think that because he is my favourite singer songwriter and I could listen to his music for ever.

Whatever. It resonates in my spirit - a cry for freedom, a longing to be free.

Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. And we, who with unveiled faces all reflect the Lord's glory, are being transformed into his likeness with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit. 2 Corinthians 3:17 -18

I paraphrase the Message version:

Whenever, though, we turn to face God as Moses did, God removes the veil and there we are — face-to-face! We suddenly recognize that God is a living, personal presence, not a piece of chiseled stone. And when God is personally present, a living Spirit, that old, constricting legislation is recognized as obsolete. We're free of it! All of us! Nothing between us and God, our faces shining with the brightness of his face. And so we are transfigured much like the Messiah, our lives gradually becoming brighter and more beautiful as God enters our lives and we become like him.

We are free.

Living in freedom

It is absolutely clear that God has called you to a free life. Just make sure that you don't use this freedom as an excuse to do whatever you want to do and destroy your freedom. Rather, use your freedom to serve one another in love; that's how freedom grows. For everything we know about God's Word is summed up in a single sentence: Love others as you love yourself. That's an act of true freedom. If you bite and ravage each other, watch out—in no time at all you will be annihilating each other, and where will your precious freedom be then?

My counsel is this: Live freely, animated and motivated by God's Spirit. Then you won't feed the compulsions of selfishness. For there is a root of sinful self-interest in us that is at odds with a free spirit, just as the free spirit is incompatible with selfishness. These two ways of life are antithetical, so that you cannot live at times one way and at times another way according to how you feel on any given day. Why don't you choose to be led by the Spirit and so escape the erratic compulsions of a law-dominated existence?

Galatians 5:13 -18

A digression from the theme - freedom

It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery.

Christ has set us free to live a free life. So take your stand! Never again let anyone put a harness of slavery on you. (Galatians 5:1)

Don't live by the 'oughts' and 'musts'.
Don't live by the fear of being found out.
Don't live as if under a cloud of disapproval.
Live freely.

Put yourself in a place where Jesus, the Christ, is as real as your best friend, your flatmate, your spouse, your child.
Put yourself in a place where you can listen, take good advice, and act.
Live in freedom.

I no longer live, but Christ lives in me.

The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. Galatians 2:20(NIV)

What actually took place is this: I tried keeping rules and working my head off to please God, and it didn't work. So I quit being a "law man" so that I could be God's man. Christ's life showed me how, and enabled me to do it. I identified myself completely with him. Indeed, I have been crucified with Christ. My ego is no longer central. It is no longer important that I appear righteous before you or have your good opinion, and I am no longer driven to impress God. Christ lives in me. The life you see me living is not "mine," but it is lived by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. I am not going to go back on that. (The Message)

FREEDOM!