The freedom of God

Have you ever stopped to think that God is truly free? If man desires to be free in any sense, free from what might control him, how much more God?

Freedom is indescribable. It is something we will even die for. We strive for freedom in all spheres of our lives, even subconsciously. Freedom from being controlled by others, financial freedom, free do do what is in your heart to do, free from destructive habits, free to love, free to be yourself. Many times we do not even realise that we are still being controlled by some unknown force only until it is revealed in some or the other way and we will always strive to be free from that.

Captivity is bondage and death, freedom is life, spontaneity and overflow.

If we are to look for a role model of freedom, someone to look up to with regards to being totally free we need to look no further than God.

Is God free, or is he bound by you? Is God free, or is He required to answer your every prayer. Is God free or is He indebted to you?

One might argue that what is mentioned above are not things that binds a person or God in any way, but that answering your prayers for example is something that is done out of love and not obligation. It is true that God loves you but does God saying that he loves you force him to do things for you when you need it? Or is it precisely his love that doesn't?

Have you ever felt angry or disappointed at God for not answering your prayers? Why do you feel like this? Is it because God is required to answer you and give you what you asked for? Is it because you did your part and now you deserve it?

No, God is not bound by your expectations of him. If He were, He would not be a model of freedom that we are all striving for.

God can come and go as he wishes. He can create 42 different universes and tell no-one about it if he feels like it. He does not worry about being misunderstood, hated, ridiculed or even told that He doesn’t exist. His joy is not put out by us. He can and do whatever is in His heart to do and he does not require anybody’s permission. He is creative, spontaneous, full of live and totally free. Is this not what is also in your heart?

The problem is that we are attempting to put God in our box of expectations and use our best religious manners to try and manipulate God to give us what we want. If God were to give us what we asked for because of anything we did, to make him do it, that is called manipulation, and is totally opposed to love and grace.

You see God burns to give us even more than what we can ask for. God doesn’t give because we ask, asking opens up our hearts to receive. God gives because He doesn’t have to, but wants to anyway. He gives out of grace and love and not out of obligation. 

It is precisely our conscious and subconscious attempts to get God to do something for us, that disqualifies us from receiving from him. You might be tempted to stop “trying to do things to get it from God” so that God will give it to you. But this is just still a misunderstanding of the heart of God.

Asking does not equal receiving. Jesus did well say, ask and you will receive, but that doesn’t mean that you receive only because you ask. God wants to give more than we could possibly ask for. Asking prepares our hearts to receive a gift that is more than we asked for. And that is precisely the soil which in which we receive from God. It comes in gift wrapping. Everything God gives is a gift, and if we stop seeing that and think it is because of something we did, then God doesn't give out of love and grace but out of control and manipulation.

My point is this : Unanswered prayer is a testimony to the glorious freedom of God. God reserves the right not to give you anything at all. Even if you are the most righteous and blameless person on the face of the earth.

Think of Job. Job was perfectly righteous and blameless before God. Then God allowed his life to be totally destroyed. Job was angry at God, because he could not understand why such a thing would befall him? He is righteous and didn't know of anything that he might have done wrong? Job’s friends on the other hand accused him that he must have done something wrong for God to punish him like this.

But then God speaks and cancels both arguments. Neither are right. Job didn’t deserve his blessings because he was righteous, nor did God smite him because he was not. No, God is God and is owned by no man. What Job had and what was given back to him is totally by grace. Even his righteousness was given to him by God. That was Job's lesson.

Losing perspective of this will cause us to resort to all sorts of “religious” methods and tricks or puff us up in pride or into shame on the other end of the spectrum. Christian Voodoo. I did my part God, now you have to do yours" or "I didn't do my part, and now God isn't going to do his".

When unanswered prayer, difficult times and disasters in our lives run their course and God seems aloof and disinterested, it is merely our false lens of perception. In our fleshly minds and hearts we view God from the “you owe me” perspective and God refuses to be put in that box. I believe he will not climb into our box for at least 2 reasons. Firstly because he is doing us a favour by staying true to his free nature. If we could manipulate God in any way, then God is susceptible to manipulation. And if He is found to be susceptible to manipulation then it means he can also manipulate. Manipulation is anti-love and anti-God. So to release us from manipulation and launch us into freedom, God refuses to be manipulated. He stays true to himself. 

Secondly, if God were to give because of our deeds or performance (another means of manipulation) then the giving would not be by grace but by law, or in other words, by our performance. Then we are back in the old contractual covenant of “this for that”. For us to experience the love of God, which is a burning fire in the heart of God we have to learn that God gives out of love and grace and not because of anything that we have done. Paul writes in Galatians that while we were “slaves” or “children” we were under the law (of “this for that”) which was a "schoolmaster" to bring us to full maturity, grace. 

I believe God will still answer us in our wrongful and lawful asking, but as we mature we might find some basic prayers and even deeply painful requests unanswered. I believe this is a maturing process to lead us away from our own love-less minds and hearts to the wonderful freedom, grace and love of God. As we start to see everything around us in gift wrapping, I'm convinced our lives will be transformed in unspeakable ways and we will receive immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine. (Eph 3:20).

God is free. and by staying true to that, we are lead into His glorious freedom.