Freedom

                                                            by Laura Kuester

Just recently, I was out with my five-year-old son and my 21-month-old daughter in a department store doing a little shopping. I parked the stroller in the shadow of a clearance rack teeming with discounted clothes. Since this area of the store was fairly empty and my mission was grand, I decided to grant my daughter’s very insistent request to release her from her stroller. As soon as her two little feet hit the floor, she began running forward, hands waving in the air, squealing and laughing like someone had just given her an extraordinary gift. Just then a salesperson walked by and exclaimed, “She seems to be saying, ‘I’m free, I’m free!’” And she was!

For me it was as if God illustrated, “It is for freedom that I have set you free”. (Galatians 5:1) When I set my daughter free from the confines of her stroller, I did not expect her to crawl back inside it and sit. I also did not expect her to stand beside it clinging fiercely to the security it represented. I did expect her to do exactly what she did- fully enjoy her freedom. God set us free for that kind of freedom too. Not that we would remain in the confines of our old self and not that we would be bound or dictated by the whims of our flesh. These are just pictures of someone held captive, a slave. It was for freedom that we were set free.

God’s freedom causes us to explode with excitement over the blessings of such an extraordinary gift. The kind of freedom that causes us to run with full faith into our future. The kind of freedom that causes others to notice as our lifestyle screams, “I’m free, I’m free!” Have you realized and engaged the joy and intent of this extraordinary gift in your life? Listen to the song by Celine Dion called, “I’m Alive”. This song reminds me what it is like to be free and alive in Christ. She says, “When you call me, when I hear you breathe, I get wings to fly, I feel that I’m alive!”  I love to play this song really loud, dance around the living room, and contemplate my freedom and how I am alive.

Since this kind of freedom cost God so much, breathe deeply, run hard and celebrate often; for you are free!

“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.” (Galatians 5:1)