Gal 5:1    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.

           

Yesterday we considered the peoples of Canaan who actually were in bondage to fear and superstition in their false worship. All false worship involves fear and superstition and is in fact bondage. Before we were Christians we worshipped ourselves (we were the highest priority in our lives) or things of the world (fame, success or possession were the things we struggled for to make ourselves something). We were slaves to sin. It dominated our lives and we couldn't help ourselves. We might have tried to ‘be good' but we failed again and again and with our failure came guilt and shame or a searing of our conscience until we learned to live with failure (sin).

But then God's Holy Spirit came and broke in and convicted us. We turned to God and received His forgiveness, cleansing and freedom through all that Jesus had done for us on the Cross. That ‘freedom' was being set free from the fear of constantly striving and constantly failing. As God's children we were at rest before Him. Life was now just receiving His love. But there was more because He put His own Holy Spirit within us and we found a new power source that enabled us to do what our hearts told us to do; to walk free of the old life and enter into a new freedom of receiving and giving love. Now we have to make sure we hold onto that, and don't fall back into self-centred striving. Now we have to reject our own ‘bright ideas' and go with the leading of the Spirit. Now we are free! Hold on to it!