If you want to be free, begin by having a God who is free. Let Him be free to do whatever He wants. He’s going to anyway, whether you like it or not, so you might as well give Him your blessing.
If God wants to work in your life through hardship, unemployment, sickness, marriage difficulties, or any other form of suffering, let Him do it. You’re going to suffer anyway; it’s guaranteed. So you might as well suffer well, in the way that is ordained for you at the present time. Set God free to be God in the midst of your suffering. He is greater than any trouble. He is greater precisely because He is beyond it all, totally free.
If you do not have a God who is free to do with your life anything He pleases, then you will not have a God who can set you free regardless of your circumstances. Instead you will have a conditional God, one who will only be real to you when your children are well behaved, your debts paid, your diseases healed. You will have a King who is King only in heaven and not on earth. God preserve us from such a narrow, wicked little substitute for Him!
Does God want to strip you of your job, your money, your reputation?
Let Him!
Does He want you (as He did me) to pour five years of your life into a business venture that utterly fails?
Let Him!
Does He want to sit up there in the sky having all the answers, while you struggle away below in helpless bewilderment?
Let Him!
What if God wants to take one of your children to heaven?
Let Him!
What if He wants to condemn ninety percent of the world’s people to everlasting hell?
Let Him!
Don’t just let Him do all this, but praise Him for it. And don’t just praise Him—love Him! Love Him unconditionally. If you want to know God’s unconditional love, try loving Him that way.
Listen: “Woe to him who quarrels with his Maker, to him who is but a potsherd among the potsherds on the ground. Does the clay say to the potter, ‘What are you making?’ Does your work say, ‘He has no hands’?” (Is 45:9)
How much freedom do you want? Do you want to be completely free of shame and guilt and know that you are respected, cherished, and loved without limit? Do you want to be free to be fully, outrageously yourself? Do you want to be exactly who you are, no strings attached? Do you want to see your wildest dreams come to life? Do you want all your plans to succeed?
If this is what you want, then begin by setting your God free. Don’t condemn the awesome King of the Universe to a dull existence in a box. Let God be God, and He’ll let you be you.
~an excerpt from Practicing the Presence of People: How We Learn to Love
(Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay)
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