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.

Give your heart to Jesus?

Has anyone ever told you to give your heart to Jesus? "If you want to be saved, you must give your heart to Jesus".

While I can understand what people mean when they say this, I don't think they fully understand what they are saying. Am I to give my heart to Jesus, then he will save me? Is he waiting for my good intentions and then he will accept me?

Can I really give my whole heart this time? I still have this itch for playing playstation and I know that I sort of like it more than church, but I'll try to give my heart... I'll try and God should respect that at least...

2 weeks later after failing an exam : Oh God, please forgive me for my sin, I feel so far from you. I now give you my whole heart, I will give up playstation (you're just saying it to bargain with God so you can feel better), I promise. Here is my heart and my life again.

Oh no...

God has already given His heart to each and every person that has ever lived on the face of the earth. He was crucified naked, his heart pierced, humiliated and suffered a gruesome death. He gave you his heart all right...

All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting people’s sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation. -2 Cor 5:18


The challenge is not to give your heart to Jesus, but to hear and see that he has already given you His. He has already forgiven you of all sin. He has already forgiven you for sin that you are going to commit tomorrow and in 10 years. Your good intentions, repentance or giving of heart DOES NOT BUY SALVATION. Jesus bought it on the cross for you and now we experience this amazing gift by believing in the free act of grace. You experience freedom by knowing the truth of the glorious Gospel that God is not against you but that he is fully and 100% for you.

It's all by grace. None of your internal or external works were ever required. Jesus took all the effort upon himself 2000 years ago.

Now after realising this and connecting the dots that God has in fact done me this indescribable favour... Something so amazing... Bigger than my mind and understanding... It is at this point of coming to an understanding of the goodness of God that our hearts change.

It is now no longer us giving up our hearts, but we realising that this indescribable God's heart was fully given to me. He loved me before I even knew it... While I was still a gross sinner. (Rom 5:10) Now without any effort I cling to His heart. That beautiful and most loving heart has now found its permanent residence in me.

It is at this point that my own heart becomes insignificant and worthless. All I want is his love, his grace and his goodness.

So next time someone asks you if you have given your heart to Jesus, you can answer with the good news of the Gospel : God has without restraint already given his heart to me, and my own heart was totally transformed by beholding his goodness and grace.

The way, the Truth and the Life

Jesus answered, "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. (John 14:6)

This scripture has been used to exclude certain people from "entering heaven" as it were, as to say that Jesus is the exclusive saviour, and if you don't follow him you're going to burn in hell.

I think there is a deeper reading to this where one does not get a "negative" impression but instead read it as to let the word of God provide us with life - which is what the word of God does. It gives life.

Meditating on Jesus as "the way, truth and life" you will come to the conclusion as Paul says :

Rom 11:36 For from him and through him and for him are all things. To him be the glory forever!

and

Col 1:15-20
The Son is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. 16For in him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things have been created through him and for him. 17He is before all things, and in him all things hold together. 18And he is the head of the body, the church; he is the beginning and the firstborn from among the dead, so that in everything he might have the supremacy. 19For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him, 20and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross.
Jesus is also the Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end.

Jesus is what the old testament is really all about. For it finds it's fulfilment in Him. Jesus is the exact image of God (the father) and he is our peace. He is also our Righteousness, wisdom and sanctification not to mention that he died our death and was resurrected and now we find our life "in Him".

What John 14:6 is to say is that if you are looking for God, as many spiritual seekers, new age followers, Buddhists, catholic priests and charismatics are doing, then the way to find God is by looking to Jesus.

If you have somehow found "God" and he does not look like Jesus, you have not found the true beautiful God. The God who saturates your life with His life. The God who is in love with you and lets His spirit permeate through you. You might have found a lesser version of God.

Our western mindsets have taught us to think of Christianity as being all about heaven and hell. How do I get to heaven and how do I avoid hell and who is going there. That seems to have become the bottom line of it all. It seems as if fear is the driving factor for seeking God. Fear of hell.

Paul writes in Romans that it is the kindness of God that brings us to salvation, not a fear of hell directly. It is the grace of God that opens our eyes to a salvation already bought for us, we just have to hear it and naturally receive it. A fear of hell might push you in the right direction, especially if you are already in hell on the earth, but if you "accept Jesus" because of fear, you have accepted a fake version of God in the making of your own thoughts.

At the end of the day, Jesus is what your life, my life and everything in all of creation is all about. Jesus is my response to God. Jesus is my life. Jesus is my obedience. Jesus is my healing. Jesus is God in a man's body and Jesus is what God sees when he looks at the world. Jesus is what you really look like and your true self.

Stop looking to yourself. Stop seeking to get closer to God. Stop trying to find fulfillment in life, but start to look to the cross, to Jesus in the flesh representing you and I. Then you will find that this Jesus who is totally unlike you, who is perfectly holy, righteous, full of life joy and love, pristinely innocent and fearfully mighty is already living inside of you. You and "This" Jesus have become one and His life is now yours...

The Spoken Word

I thought that the spoken word could change anybody...

I spoke with passion and I spoke without end sometimes... I thought my passion would be contagious and that the hearing of the truth and word of God could change anybody and any situation... Like it changes me...

Turns out I was wrong. The more I spoke the less I felt understood, the more I tried to explain... a vicious circle.

This was utterly disappointing, because I longed to see someone transformed by the power and the revelation of God, and I longed to share the life and passion in me. But I have learned that the field is not always ready for the seed.

The seed might be sown with good intentions but the field might not be ready. It is no use sowing seed in unfruitful ground and I have also learned that throwing pearls before the swine is a saying to be heeded indeed ;-)

Don't think that you can change anybody in the way that you were changed, this is the work and privilege of the Holy Spirit. Sow where He leads, where your seed is welcomed and respected less you frustrate yourself and your listeners...

The “Basic” Gospel

I was recently told that all I can talk about is the Gospel and that it is 'basic', that I am preaching to the choir.  This person basically meant that “everyone” already knows what Im talking about and that they are “past” the gospel long ago onto greater things.

Wow… I never had that train of thought in my life before.. What this person failed to realise is that I went onto greater thoughts about that just same way of thinking 7 years ago and came to the realisation that the greatest thing is “the gospel”. If you think you’re past it you have never known what it is in the first place - hence my inability to stop speaking about it ;-).

The gospel is the beginning and the end of everything. Paul said he came preaching nothing else but Christ and Him crucified. (1 Cor 2:2).

Heb 5:13 For everyone who lives on milk is inexperienced in the message of righteousness, because he is an infant. 14 But solid food is for the mature, whose perceptions are trained by practice to discern both good and evil.

Here Paul basically says that “the Message of Righteousness” is maturity or solid food. The message of righteousness is the Gospel. The elementary things mentioned in Hebrews 6 are : “repentance from dead works and faith in God, 2 teaching about baptisms, laying on of hands, resurrection of the dead, and eternal judgment.” - These things are basic because they are teachings that are about peripheral things, things around the Gospel and not the message of Righteousness or the Gospel itself.

In Hebrews 5:13 Paul says “those whose perceptions are trained by practise to discern both good and evil” - in referring to being mature. I suspect he is speaking about training our thoughts to be in line with the Gospel, in line with the righteousness we already have in Christ and training our perceptions by the truth and not our feelings, or fleshly or sinful perceptions, but looking to the cross for our righteousness, forgiveness and wholeness.

Maturity is to be about Jesus, and as Paul says in Col 1:28 "He is the one we proclaim, admonishing and teaching everyone with all wisdom, so that we may present everyone fully mature in Christ."

and also : Eph 4:13 until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ. -

We become mature in Christ if we look to Him and him crucified. By doing this we realise what He has done in us, for us and who we are in Him. This is the way to grow in maturity, maturity not in normal knowledge but in revelation knowledge of who He is and who we are through Him.

Going past the gospel means missing it entirely...

The "Man" Christ Jesus

God became a Man, a human so that men may sit in the company of God.

Tasting the elusive carrot

Our lives revolve around expectations. Expectations that life, our society, work and people place on us. Some of the greatest expectations we have are those that we place on ourselves and this is generally formed by the expectations of others.

When we are in the process of trying fulfilling these expectations we have a certain drive or motivation to fulfil them as we go through life and when an expectation is fulfilled we find a certain satisfaction. This is because we have proved that we are something special.

Think about it, you might have an expectation to be the best in your profession, the best person you can be, or an expectation to become rich or to find happiness when you’ve reached a certain milestone in your life. And right now, you are not yet there, you have not proved it and cannot accept that you are special or the person you thought you could be.

This feeling or subconscious drive for fulfilment makes us attempt more, try harder and fight for what we want in life.

Some of us have reached our goals and found a level of satisfaction and then we set out to form new expectations that will give us more fulfilment in order to prove more things about ourselves. And so the cycle continues.

Some have failed miserably, disappointed themselves and others and have not had the courage to get up again and remain unfulfilled.

But is this really the way to a fulfilled life? Is meeting your own expectations really going to give you the joy and fulfilment that you want? Is proving a point to others and yourself really going to cut it? History kind of tells us that those who make their millions and reach their dreams are generally not fulfilled and become depressed after climbing the proverbial ladder. It seems kind of deceptive to think that one can reach the pinnacle of happiness by following this subconscious drive. There is always a higher ladder to climb and you never seem to quite reach the top. You might have accepted that this is just the way that life is, and seeing that everyone else is doing it like this it makes sense to do it anyway. Or we just keep on doing it and try to be better at it then other people.

Perhaps the greatest expectations we can have are those that we believe God has of us. If God expects something of me, I can never really relax until I’ve met that expectation. And quite frankly if God expects something of you now, he always will, and you will never quite reach His expectations of you. And if God is not satisfied with you not reaching expectations how on earth can you be satisfied in yourself?

Is this just the way things are or are we missing something?

Yes, we have missed something. We have missed the simple Gospel (good news). We have missed the point of life and Christianity altogether.

We are not to live up to a certain level of fulfilment but rather from a place of fulfilment.

We are not climbing the ladder to get more, we have already reached the top.

God is not expecting anything of you except that you be fulfilled in what His son Jesus Christ has already done for you.

You see, I am not trying to please God anymore, living my life in a way to meet expectations and obey certain rules so that I may be accepted, blessed or approved. I believe that Jesus in my place has been accepted, approved and that He has met all expectations.

I have died, all my attempts to meet expectations have died, and a new creation has emerged that is perfect and seated with Christ in heavenly places.

The focus in no longer on myself, or what I believe God expects of me, but my focus is on Him and that He has met all expectations, carried all sin and paid the whole price.

Rom 6:1It 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.

We are so quick to be entangled in a yoke of slavery and fall back into self-improvement, or find ways to reach fulfilment by attempting to do it our way, instead of seeing and accepting what He has done for me.

You see the whole problem is with what we see and believe.  If I believe that I am poor while missing the fact that I already have 1 Billion Dollars in my bank account, I will live poor and work my head of to get the money.

But if I see and believe that I have been made rich by the perfect Son of God, I will live like a rich man. This is not merely “the power of positive thinking” as positive thinking sometimes ignores the facts and makes me lie to myself in order to feel better. The power of positive thinking will eventually run out as my subconscious continually reminds me that I am lying to myself.

No, this is recognition of eternal, spiritual truth. This is a spiritual epiphany where you come face to face with the gospel facts. The fact that you have indeed died and have were resurrected as a new creation. The fact that you were accepted, forgiven and welcomed into the eternal embrace of your creator 2000 years ago regardless of who you are or your successes or failures.

Once this more powerful spiritual truth takes hold of you, it doesn’t just transform your spiritual life, but everything else too.

Now you no longer do things to get more, but you do things to give more of what you have already freely received.

You no longer start that business to reach the top, you start that business because you are overflowing with creativity and passion of God.

You no longer become a preacher because it is what God expects of you, but you become a preacher because you cannot shut up about this goodness of God.

The father of lies will always lie, and try to keep us climbing the same deceptive ladder, striving our lives away trying to reach that elusive carrot.

But the simple truth of the gospel declares that through Christ we could have tasted it all along!