The Beauty of His Story: A Conclusion

It's time to wrap up our The Beauty of His Story series.

And I think it's fitting that this wrap-up is coming at Christmastime.

The most beautiful thing about this story God is writing is this: He has entered into the story with us.

He is not just some distant author setting a plot into motion and letting us figure out how to live within it. He's been at work throughout the story, providing light and hope, bringing freedom, teaching us how to be good. But He didn't stop there. He knew that this story needed a hero, someone who would rescue us completely from the opposing forces. So He wrapped Himself in human flesh and took on the role that no one else could play.

This is perhaps the thing that amazes me most about Christmas. The boundless God of the universe taking on the boundaries of humanness just so He could rescue a bunch of messed up people. He could have let the story play out without His help, but He knew we could never survive. Instead, Jesus came to be the hero, to fight for light and goodness and freedom and hope and life to win out over darkness and evil and bondage and despair and death.

So what does this tell us about our Author?

• He is good: The Author of this story is on the side of light and freedom and life. Although He allows evil to exist within His story, He is also at work to overcome it. He sent His Son to defeat it. He empowers us to fight against it. In all of this, we see His goodness.
• He is gracious: Throughout the story, we see countless examples of God providing freedom and life to people who have turned their backs on Him. It is true of every person who has placed their faith in Him. Instead of leaving us to our own devices, He graciously carried out a plan to rescue and redeem us.
• He is just: We have talked quite a bit about what will happen at the end of this story-- God will bring our Enemy to justice. Satan will be vanquished and suffer for everything he has done in his efforts to destroy us. In this story, the bad guy WILL lose.

Yes, there will be times when we feel we have no idea where the story is headed. Yes, there will be times when all the dark and evil things seem to be winning. Yes, there will be times we feel utterly without hope.

But we have to remember that those times are not the end of the story. We have to trust that the Author of our story is good. We have to believe that He is continually working to bring light and freedom and life into the midst of our darkness and bondage and death. He already sent us a Hero who defeated Satan. He already determined the end of the story. Regardless of what's happening around us, that will never change. Let that fill you with hope this Christmas.

The Beauty of His Story: Bondage & Freedom

Photo by Trevor Leyenhorst (Used via Creative Commons)

How many of you have watched the movie "The Ten Commandments"?

If your family was anything like mine, you probably gathered around the TV to watch it when one of the major networks aired it every year at Easter. I'm still not sure if it was the thrill of watching the movie or getting to stay up past my bedtime, but it was always a much anticipated event.

The story of the exodus, the moment when God freed Israel from slavery to Egypt, is perhaps one of the greatest moments in God's story. It's quite the epic story complete with burning bushes, an evil king, plagues, and the parting of the Red Sea. It's a story of God coming through and delivering His people from bondage.

Fear Leads to Oppression

I find the beginning of this story intriguing. Famine in Canaan (the Promised Land) drives Jacob and his family to Egypt. Because Joseph (one of Jacob's sons) is in a position of power, Jacob's family is able to settle in Egypt, finding provision and protection. This provision and protection allows for the birth of many children and grandchildren, and so the nation of Israel becomes "extremely powerful" (Exodus 1:7). Eventually, Joseph's generation dies and a new king comes to power who knows nothing about Joseph or his legacy. He sees the Israelites as a threat: "Look, the people of Israel now outnumber us and are stronger than we are. We must make a plan to keep them from growing even more." (Exodus 1:9-10, NLT)

Because of their fear, the Egyptians begin to oppress and eventually enslave the Israelites. Egypt decides that whips and chains and ruthless demands are the answer, the way to keep Israel from fighting against them. And it works (until God steps in). In all the time the Israelites are slaves, they never seek freedom on their own. They cry out to God and wait for a deliverer.

Satan is Afraid of You

In the same way that Egypt seeks to limit Israel's power through bondage and slavery, Satan seeks to limit your power through bondage to anything and everything but God. Much like the Philistines who sought to remove Samson's strength so they could tie him up (Judges 16:5), Satan wants to tie us down and subdue us so we can't accomplish what God has purposed for our lives. He does this by leading us into slavery to a number of things:

• Sin: "You let yourselves be slaves to impurity and lawlessness, which led ever deeper into sin." (Romans 6:19, NLT) A few verses later, Paul talks about the shame that comes as a result. We sin; we feel ashamed; we sin some more; we feel more ashamed. It's a never-ending cycle that leads us deeper into bondage, fashioning chains we could never hope to break.
• False gods: "Before you Gentiles knew God, you were slaves to so-called gods that do not even exist." (Galatians 4:8, NLT) We worship all kinds of things instead of God: financial security, entertainment, relationships, etc. We decide these things are more important than God or can provide better than He can. So we become slaves to them, seeking to serve them so they will be good to us.
• Whatever controls you: "For you are a slave to whatever controls you." (2 Peter 2:19b, NLT) What controls you? Fear? Money? Lust? Food? Your emotions? Whatever it is, you are a slave to it.

When we are slaves, we lose the ability to be what God created us to be. We are restrained by the ropes and chains that bind us. We are locked in prison cells, unable to effectively love and serve the people around us. It's exactly what Satan wants. And he's pretty good at making it happen.

The Time of the Lord's Favor Has Come

Fortunately, the story does not end with us stuck in slavery. Eventually, God sent a deliverer to Israel and led them out of Egypt, out of slavery and into freedom. He has done the same for us.

Jesus came to set us free. It's part of His mission statement, one of the main objectives of His time on earth.

The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,

for he has anointed me to bring Good News to the poor.

He has sent me to proclaim that captives will be released,

that the blind will see,

that the oppressed will be set free,

and that the time of the Lord's favor has come.

(Luke 4:18-19, NLT, emphasis added)

In fact, freedom is such an integral part of Jesus' ministry that it gets mentioned twice! We can't truly have a relationship with God until we've been set free, until the chains are broken and the prison door is opened.

So how do we get freedom? By believing we can have it through Jesus. When we spend time in His Word, we come to know the truth and the truth sets us free. The truth is this: through His death and resurrection, Jesus bought our freedom. All we have to do is ask and He will break our chains and unlock our prison doors. 

After that, it's up to us to choose to live in our freedom by getting up and walking away from the sin and the false gods and the things that control us (Galatians 5:1 and 5:13). We won't be perfect at it. We won't be slaves to sin anymore (Romans 6:22), but we will still sin. There will be a lot of stumbling and falling. But there will always be grace because freedom does not require our perfection; Jesus' perfection is enough. And because of that grace we can continue to put one foot in front of the other, walking in freedom toward God and away from sin.

That is the Good News: No matter what sins created the links in the chains that have kept you in bondage, Jesus is still extending to you the opportunity to be free. Take it. And make Satan afraid of you once more.

What do you need Jesus to set you free from?

The Beauty of a Daring Rescue

SPOILER ALERT: If you're a fan of the TV show "Castle" and haven't yet watched the episodes "Target" and "Hunt" (Season 5, Episodes 15 & 16), consider this your spoiler alert. If you don't care about knowing what happens before you see it, read on. Otherwise, get caught up first and then come back and read on.

Back in February, I joined millions of other "Castle" fans to watch the annual "two parter" episode with baited breath. Because I follow the show and some of its stars on Twitter, I knew that the episode would center around something happening to Alexis, but I didn't know how emotional I'd become while watching the story unfold.

For those of you who have no idea what I'm talking about, let me fill you in. Castle is a TV show about Richard Castle, a mystery novelist who shadows an NYPD detective (Kate Beckett) and her team in order to get inspiration for his books. Turns out he's actually a fairly good detective, and 5 seasons (and quite a bit of comedy and drama) later, he's still around and finally dating Beckett. Alexis is Castle's daughter (and only child), and in this season she's in her freshman year of college.

During this episode, Alexis and one of her college classmates get kidnapped. At first, Beckett & Castle think the classmate was the target (her father's an Egyptian businessman who has some enemies). But when the kidnappers release the friend and not Alexis, their thinking takes another turn. They eventually discover that she's being held in Paris, and Castle takes matters into his own hands by flying there himself to try and get her back. The guy he hires sells him out... but Castle is rescued by a mysterious man who turns about to be his father- a spy with dangerous enemies. Together they mount a rescue attempt and manage to free Alexis.

I've been watching this show from the beginning, so I'm pretty emotionally invested in the characters. But as I watched Castle and Alexis run through the streets of Paris to freedom (the US Embassy), I found myself tearing up for another reason. I couldn't help but see the similarities between this rescue and my own. Just like Alexis, I needed to be rescued- not from scary Russian spies, but from the clutches of sin and Satan. And just like Castle, Jesus rescued me- not with explosive walkie talkies, but His body and blood. But Jesus' rescue mission was meant to save more than just me. He came to rescue you, too.

As I've been thinking about it in the weeks since, I think there are three specific ways that these episodes mirror our own situation.

1. Who we are and whose we are matters: Alexis became a target because of who she was. Her classmate got taken because she was in the wrong place at the wrong time. But as far as Alexis was concerned, this was not a random act of violence. The kidnappers' ultimate goal was to get to Jackson Hunt (Castle's father), and they knew they could do that by threatening something that belonged to him. If Alexis had been anyone else, related to anyone else, she would have been fine. The same is true of us. As human beings, we're created to bear God's image in this world. Satan hates that. So in an attempt to wound God, Satan does his best to keep us from being what we were created to be. We may not be in a visible cage like Alexis, but we're still trapped by sin, addictions, fear, shame. Why is it important for us to know this? Because if we don't, we're looking for the wrong enemy in the wrong places. We'll chase down leads, but we'll never be any closer to rescue until we recognize our enemy for who he is.
2. Our Father will do anything to get us back: Castle vows to do whatever it takes to find Alexis. God is no different. For Castle this meant paying any price to those who could help him (no matter how unsavory those characters might be) or to the kidnappers. He takes matters into his own hands, knowing it's going to take action to get his daughter back. For God this meant giving up His Son as a sacrifice, paying the ultimate price to rescue us from sin and death. It was a plan that only He could think of and execute, and it was the only way to get His children back.
3. Rescue means going behind enemy lines: Castle and his father hatch a plan in which Castle will navigate the sewers of Paris (sounds a little like Les Miserables!) to shut off power to the building the kidnappers are in. To the viewers' dismay, the kidnappers find Castle and drag him back to their hideout. He surrenders his walkie talkie to Volkov (the ringleader) who begins to taunt Jackson; it would seem the plan has failed. As they talk, though, we begin to get hints that Castle's abduction was actually part of the plan. Eventually, the walkie talkie blows up, and in the chaos, Castle frees Alexis and they run to freedom. In the same way, Jesus comes to earth as a human being and allows Himself to be caught and even killed. In that moment, it would seem the rescue attempt has failed. Much like Volkov, Satan was probably confident in his victory... right up to the moment Jesus dealt him the final blow by rising from the dead. Our cage is open; our shackles are broken. Rescue has come, and we are free.

So that is why I sat with tears running down my face as the credits rolled at the end of this heart-wrenching episode. Happy tears for the well-being of some of my favorite characters. But most of all, grateful tears and tears of awe as I remembered my spiritual kidnapping and the God who loved me enough to do whatever it took to rescue me.

How does the truth of God's daring rescue impact your life? Leave your comments below.

27,000,000

That number up there? That's the number of people in slavery TODAY in 161 countries around the world, including the United States. That's more slaves than any other time in history. Fear, violence, debt, drugs-- these are the shackles that keep these 27 million men, women, and children enslaved.

But there's something we can do about it. We can raise our voices and put an end to this. Educate yourself and get involved. Watch the video below from End It Movement, a coalition of organizations working to raise awareness, to prevent, and to end slavery. Check out their website and raise your voice. When your grandchildren look back at this time in history, they will ask where you were and what you did. How will you answer?

There's a reason we call it GOOD Friday (or, The Beauty of the Cross)

I'm finding it hard to believe that it's Easter weekend already. Time is going so quickly! Seems like Lent just began, and yet here we are at Good Friday.

Over the last 6 weeks, I've been using John Piper's book Fifty Reasons Why Jesus Came To Die as a way to prepare my heart for Easter. Each day, I read one of the reasons and reflect on its truth in my own life. Today I want to share the reasons with you in the hope that they might help focus your heart on the beauty of this day, the beauty of Christ on the cross, the beauty of what He accomplished there. And I pray that this beauty will fill your heart even fuller as we celebrate His resurrection on Sunday-- the truth that what He accomplished is complete!

1. To absorb the wrath of God (Galatians 3:13; Romans 3:25; 1 John 4:10)- "God is both just and loving. Therefore his love is willing to meet the demands of his justice."

2. To please His Heavenly Father (Isaiah 53:10; Ephesians 5:2)- How stunning to know that this rescue plan was God's idea!

3. To learn obedience and be perfected (Hebrews 5:8; Hebrews 2:10)- "... he was gradually fulfilling the perfect righteousness that he had to have in order to save us." He was obedient because of His love for God and His love for us.

4. To achieve His own resurrection from the dead (Hebrews 13:20-21)- "... the resurrection proves that the death of Jesus is an all-sufficient price. If Jesus did not rise from the dead, then his death was a failure, God did not vindicate his sin-bearing achievement, and we are still in our sins." I cannot wait to celebrate this truth on Sunday!

5. To show the wealth of God's love and grace for sinners (Romans 5:7-8; John 3:16; Ephesians 1:7)- "Our debt is so great, only a divine sacrifice could pay it." And He did pay it by making an infinite sacrifice. That's how much He loves us!

6. To show His (Jesus) own love for us (Ephesians 5:2; Ephesians 5:25; Galatians 2:20)- "Surely this is the way we should understand the sufferings and death of Christ. They have to do with me. They are about Christ's love for me personally." Do you believe that Christ loves you enough to die for you?

7. To cancel the legal demands of the law against us (Colossians 2:13)- "There is no salvation by balancing the records [doing enough good deeds to cancel your bad deeds]. There is only salvation by canceling records." Do you realize that you don't need to prove yourself worthy of salvation by doing good things? Christ is your only hope. Just put your faith in Him.

8. To become a ransom for many (Mark 10:45)- Jesus willingly paid the price to release us from God's condemnation if we will only choose His payment plan.

9. For the forgiveness of our sins (Ephesians 1:7; Matthew 26:28)- "Oh, how precious is the news that God does not hold our sins against us! And how beautiful is Christ, whose blood made it right for God to do this." Have you sought forgiveness? All you have to do is ask!

10. To provide the basis for our justification (Romans 5:9; Romans 3:24; Romans 3:28)- "Justification... is a declaration that happens in a moment. A verdict: Just! Righteous!" We are declared innocent because of what Jesus did, not what we have done.

11. To complete the obedience that becomes our righteousness (Philippians 2:8; Romans 5:19; 2 Corinthians 5:21; Philippians 3:9)- If you have placed your faith in Jesus, when God looks at your life, He sees Jesus' perfect obedience instead of your sin!

12. To take away our condemnation (Romans 8:34)- "Christ has died once for our sins. We will not be condemned for them. Condemnation is gone not because there isn't any, but because it has already happened." Look to the cross and see there Jesus bearing the condemnation that should have been yours.

13. To abolish circumcision and all rituals as the basis of salvation (Galatians 5:11; Galatians 6:12)- Nothing we do saves us. Faith in Christ is enough to put us right with God.

14. To bring us to faith and keep us faithful (Mark 14:24; Jeremiah 32:40)- "When Christ died, he secured for his people not only new hearts but new security. He will not let them turn from him. He will keep them. They will persevere. The blood of the covenant guarantees it." What does it mean to know that your faithfulness is not dependent on your strength alone?

15. To make us holy, blameless, and perfect (Hebrews 10:14; Colossians 1:22; 1 Corinthians 5:7)- "The suffering of Christ secures our perfection so firmly that it is already now a reality. Therefore, we fight against our sin not simply to become perfect, but because we are. The death of Jesus is the key to battling our imperfections on the firm foundation of our perfection." This truth became the foundation for my battle against addiction and the only way to find freedom. Do you believe it?

16. To give us a clear conscience (Hebrews 9:14)- "When our conscience rises up and condemns us, where will we turn? ... the blood of Christ. This is the only cleansing agent in the universe that can give the conscience relief in life and peace in death."

17. To obtain for us all things that are good for us (Romans 8:32)- "The suffering and death of Christ guarantee that God will give us all things that we need to do his will and to give him glory and to attain everlasting joy."

18. To heal us from moral and physical sickness (Isaiah 53:5; Matthew 8:16-17)- "The horrible blows to the back of Jesus bought a world without disease." Whether or not you experience physical healing in this life, you will experience it in the next. That is a guarantee!

19. To give eternal life to all who believe on Him (John 3:16)

20. To deliver us from the present evil age (Galatians 1:4)- On the cross, Jesus defeated Satan. You are no longer captive to "the evil one" so follow the Victorious One!

21. To reconcile us to God (Romans 5:10)- God took the steps to make us His friends while we were still His enemies!! Receive what He has already done and be reconciled to Him.

22. To bring us to God (1 Peter 3:18; Ephesians 2:13)- Our fullest experience of joy comes from "seeing and savoring the glory of God". Jesus made that possible through His death on the cross. "Hear then the invitation: Turn from the 'fleeting pleasures of sin' (Hebrews 11:25) and come to 'pleasures forevermore.'"

23. So that we might belong to Him (Romans 7:4; 1 Corinthians 6:19-20; Acts 20:28)- You can belong to Christ or you can belong to sin; which will you choose?

24. To give us confident access to the Holiest Place (Hebrews 10:19)- Come into God's presence through Christ. You are welcome there!

25. To become for us the place where we meet God (John 2:19-21)- "When Christ died and rose again, the old temple was replaced by the globally accessible Christ. You may come to him without moving a muscle. He is as close as faith."

26. To bring the Old Testament priesthood to an end and become the eternal High Priest (Hebrews 7:23-27; Hebrews 9:24-26; Hebrews 10:11-12)

27. To become a sympathetic and helpful priest (Hebrews 4:15-16)- Jesus knows our struggle with temptation; even when we fail, He is with us, not against us!

28. To free us from the futility of our ancestry (1 Peter 1:18-19)- No matter what issues live in your family history, you can be free of them through Christ!

29. To free us from the slavery of sin (Revelation 1:5-6; Hebrews 13:12)- "Sin is such a powerful influence in our lives that we must be liberated by God's power, not by our willpower." What do you need God's power to set you free from?

30. That we might die to sin and live to righteousness (1 Peter 2:24)- "The old self that loved sin died with Jesus. ... My new life is now swayed by righteousness. ... The beauty of Christ, who loved me and gave himself for me, is the desire of my soul."

31. So that we would die to the law and bear fruit for God (Romans 7:4)- God gives us the Holy Spirit to help us produce fruit instead of striving to keep the law.

32. To enable us to live for Christ and not ourselves (2 Corinthians 5:15)

33. To make His cross the ground of all our boasting (Galatians 6:14)- "We are not as Christ-centered and cross-cherishing as we should be, because we do not ponder the truth that everything good, and everything bad that God turns for the good, was purchased by the sufferings of Christ."

34. To enable us to live by faith in Him (Galatians 2:20)- "... the new self is defined by Christ's presence and help at all times. He is always imparting life to me. He is always strengthening me for what he calls me to do." How would your life be different if you lived rooted in this truth?

35. To give marriage its deepest meaning (Ephesians 5:25)- "... marriage is meant to make Christ's love for his people more visible in the world."

36. To create a people passionate for good works (Titus 2:14)- "Christ died to make us this kind of people-- passionate to help the poor and the perishing. It is the best life, no matter what it costs us in this world: They get help, we get joy, God gets glory."

37. To call us to follow His example of lowliness and costly love (1 Peter 2:19-21; Hebrews 12:3-4; Philippians 2:5-8)- "Jesus suffered for us uniquely, that we might suffer with him in the cause of love." How is God calling you to show costly love to the people around you?

38. To create a band of crucified followers (Luke 9:23; Matthew 10:38)- "... when I follow Jesus as my Savior and Lord, the old self-determining, self-absorbed me must be crucified."

39. To free us from bondage to the fear of death (Hebrews 2:14-15)- "The fear of death enslaves. It makes us timid and dull. Jesus died to set us free. ... We are freed to love like Christ, even at the cost of our lives."

40. So that we would be with Him immediately after death (1 Thessalonians 5:10; Philippians 1:21,23; 2 Corinthians 5:8)

41. To secure our resurrection from the dead (Romans 6:5; Romans 8:11; 2 Timothy 2:11)

42. To disarm the rulers and authorities (Colossians 2:14-15; 1 John 3:8)- Satan is defeated. He has no power. Let us turn from him and walk in victory with Christ!

43. To unleash the power of God in the Gospel (1 Corinthians 1:18; Romans 1:16)

44. To destroy the hostility between races (Ephesians 2:14-16)

45. To ransom people from every tribe and language and people and nation (Revelation 5:9)- "Christ died to save a great diversity of peoples. ... As the disease of sin is global, so the remedy is global."

46. To gather all His sheep from around the world (John 11:51-52; John 10:16)

47. To rescue us from final judgment (Hebrews 9:28)- "Sin was dealt with once for all. No new sacrifice is needed. Our shield from future wrath is as sure as the sufferings of Christ in our place. For the sake of the cross, then, exult in future grace."

48. To gain His joy and ours (Hebrews 12:2)- Feeling a lack of joy? Find it in Christ and the hope that comes through His suffering and death.

49. So that He would be crowned with glory and honor (Hebrews 2:9; Philippians 2:7-9; Revelation 5:12)

50. To show that the worst evil is meant by God for good (Acts 4:27-28)- "God meant to show the world that there is no sin and no evil too great that God cannot bring from it everlasting righteousness and joy. The very suffering that we caused became the hope of our salvation."

Papa, thank you for Jesus' suffering and death and all that it accomplished. Help us to see how each of these things are true in our own lives. Help us also to see where we need to join you in making these things true in our lives by living out what Jesus completed on the cross and in His resurrection. May our hearts swell with love and praise as we celebrate the beauty of the cross. Amen.

An Ebenezer for the Modern Age

"Samuel then took a large stone and placed it between the towns of Mizpah and Jeshanah. He named it Ebenezer (which means 'the stone of help'), for he said, 'Up to this point the Lord has helped us!'" 

~ 1 Samuel 7:12, NLT

This moment takes place just after God defeats the Philistines. Israel had gotten off track-they were worshiping other gods-but they turned their backs on those gods and sought help from the one true God. He blessed them and brought them a great victory. Samuel recognizes that help by setting a stone, a memorial. This stone, this Ebenezer, would be a permanent physical reminder of what God accomplished on that day. From that day, Israel would be able to see that stone and remember... and remembering is a huge part of faith! When we remember what God has already done, it will help us to trust Him to come through again.

This story was the inspiration for item #10 on my "30 Before 30" list: get my tattoo. Actually, this has been much more than just an item on a list that I want to check off before I turn 30. I've spent the last 3 years thinking about getting a tattoo as an Ebenezer to recognize the work of God in my life. The question was: what would it look like? I thought about broken chains to represent how He had set me free from addiction, but that didn't really speak to my heart. 

A few months ago, I realized that it needed to be a butterfly. Butterflies have great significance in my life. The image of a caterpillar going through the process of becoming what it was created to be has been a metaphor for my own life. God has faithfully led me through the metamorphosis and allowed me to struggle to break free of the chrysalis so I could fly as he meant me to. I'm not perfect, but I'm free to be me. When I started looking at butterfly tattoo images, I came across a few that had words written in the wings. I decided to add the words 'beauty' and 'freedom' to mine: these are the two best things that God has restored in my life as I have turned from my "small 'g' gods" to the only One who loves me and has the power to prove it.

My prayer is that this tattoo will be like that stone Samuel set up so long ago: every time I see it, I will remember what God has done and believe He will do even more. Even better than that, every time others see it and ask about it, I get the opportunity to tell them about my God and His love.

Breaking the Silence

I've always found it interesting that a recovery program that's all about groups and sponsors would have the word "anonymous" in its name.  It's not very anonymous to stand in front of a group of people, announce your name, and then admit to being addicted to alcohol.  But I wonder if some of the power of the program comes from the fact that anonymity isn't really an option.  The message seems to be: You think you're alone in this, that no one sees or understands your situation, but that's not the case; there are others who have struggled and found freedom, and they want to help you.

Sometimes I wish church services were more like AA meetings...  People could stand and share their struggles without fear of judgment.  Everyone else would respond with understanding nods as they think of their own struggles.  Once you shared your story, you would be paired with someone who would be your mentor.  This person would tell you their own story of finding freedom from addiction, how they're still learning to walk in the grace of God.  They wouldn't be a mentor because they had it all together.  They would be a mentor because they would know how far they had come and Who had brought them that far, they would know that walking in the truth of freedom is a daily process.

I guess what I really wish is that it would be easier for people to be real and honest about what's going on in their lives.  How many people go through life missing out on what God has to offer them because they're stuck in sin and pain and lies?  How many are stuck because they don't want anyone else to know what's really going on, because they fear that judgment and disappointment will be the reaction?  How many spend every Sunday morning sitting next to someone who is going through or has gone through the exact same thing?

There is power in the humility required to share your reality with others: the power to set you free and even the power to set others free.  When you choose to talk about it, you can ask for help and find the accountability you need to make freedom a reality.  When you choose to talk about it, you can help others to know they're not alone and that there is hope for freedom.

Of course, the reality is that this sort of honesty can't really happen in the context of a Sunday morning church service.  The trust needed for that sort of intimacy doesn't come from sitting and listening to the pastor on a weekly basis.  There's some work required.  You have to be willing to get to know people, to spend time with them, to begin sharing some of the small things before you move into the bigger stuff.  It requires community.  And it requires courage.  Someone has to have the courage to start sharing.  Someone else has to have the courage to listen with grace and not judgment.

So do you have the courage?  Whether you're just stepping out in the search for freedom or you've been walking in freedom for some time, do you have the courage to break the silence and share your story?

"Hi, my name is Katie, and I was addicted to pornography; as of today, I have been walking in freedom for 1 year, 7 months, and 21 days..."

True Identity

How many mirrors do you have in your house?  How often do you look in them?  How often do you walk away and forget what you look like?  I find it interesting that James uses that illustration in talking about listening to the Word of God but not doing what it says (James 1:23-24).  My first thought is of looking in the mirror, noticing I only have make up on one eye, and then walking away without doing anything about it.  But I'm not sure that's really the point James was trying to make.

I'm currently doing Beth Moore's new study on James, and she wrote one sentence that seemed to unlock the meaning of this passage for me: "What James will teach us is the difference between talking about living in victory over things like self-centeredness, addiction, seduction, and temptation and actually doing it."  So what makes the difference? Identity!  Where are you finding your identity?  In the mirror?  Or in the Word of God?

In her study, Moore focuses in on verse 23, where James talks about "glancing at your face in a mirror" (NLT).  The King James Version translates it "natural face", and the Greek word used there is genesis.  Hearing that takes me back to the book of Genesis where we're told all about our identity: We are created in God's image. And perhaps as we look in the mirror, we see more than just the elements that make up our faces.  Perhaps we glimpse what we were created to be... but, as James says, we all too often walk away and promptly forget who we really are.  We let the world around us, our successes and failures, our past, or even the mirror define our identity.  And this is how we become trapped in self-centeredness, addiction, seduction, temptation, etc.

So how do we get free?  "If you look carefully into the perfect law that sets you free, and if you do what it says and don't forget what you heard, then God will bless you for doing it." (James 1:25 NLT)  In other words, spend time in Scripture, letting the truth of it define your identity.  Let God's Word be the mirror you stare into to figure out who you are.  Let the law (which Jesus sums up in the commands to love God and to love others) become the guide for your actions, helping you to live out your true identity.  That's why James emphasizes the importance of not only hearing the Word, but also doing what it says.  We can find freedom in every area of life when we allow God to change us through the power and truth of His Word.

Note: For more on letting God define your identity, check out the messages in the Hijacked series from Daybreak Church.