It seems the resonating theme of this week, pertinent to Guatemala’s independence day being today, Saturday September 15th, is freedom.
Freedom was the overarching refrain that graced Sunday sermons these past few days. It was the underlying axiom that appeared in testimonies and freedom was the profound blessing that needed recognition in my life this week.
I tend to conceptualize freedom as a mandated, apportioned right, like everything the Constitution enumerates. But in fact, true freedom is not the right to keep and bear arms or the right to petition. It’s not the ability to speak one’s mind, nor is it geographically confined to man-made borders. And despite its historical significance and how we think of it, man has no control over our freedom. Instead, true freedom is a gift from God.
Visiting the nursing home this week reiterated that fact. The people there lacked the type of basic liberties I take for granted everyday. They lacked the physical control over their own bodies that I don’t take the time within a day to pause and be thankful for. Yet without so much, everyone at the nursing home still found the grace of God’s freedom to rejoice in worship and prayer. I could practically see the light shining within them completely change their countenance—we left with smiles on both sides.
It is because the Lord has deliberately chosen to give us free reign over our hearts and because we have the ability to choose to embrace him, we have true autonomy.
Conversely, God’s gift of liberty in our lives extends beyond giving us independent minds and souls to free us from our enslavements. These are not simply the figurative chains that so many struggle with in earnest, but literal bondage, as in the parable of Joseph. Pertinently, as the story was recalled last night in church, Joseph’s unbreakable faith in God brought him from slave to prisoner to second-most influential and powerful man in all of Egypt.
Living outside of the U.S. has changed my idea of freedom, but not in the ways I would have anticipated. I still feel incredibly blessed to have the ability to worship freely in this country without persecution. But true freedom has turned out to be a present I never knew to ask for, even though we conveniently pretend it’s a right. This kind of freedom can’t be relinquished or taken away. The reason we’re given such generous liberty and what we’re supposed to with it are one in the same; to greater glorify God.
More next week and ¡Feliz Día de Independencia!
Participant Login
Donor Login