Mentoring Manna:  Deliverance vs. Freedom

© 2003 Pastor Keith Hassell

MM00046

John 8:31-32  “If you abide in My word, you are My disciples indeed.  And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.”  Contrary to popular belief, it is not the truth that sets us free.  That’s right.  It is the truth we know that sets us free!  Suppose you were wrongfully accused of committing a gruesome murder.  Because it seemed sure that you would not get a fair trial and would be sentenced to death, you chose to run and live a life in hiding. Let’s say you chose to live in a desolate place under primitive conditions having no communication to the outside world.  Then one day, the true murderer confesses to the crime and your name is cleared.  You are free!  But there is one problem.  Although you are free, you do not know it.  As a result, you live the rest of your life in hiding, robbed of the freedom you could have enjoyed. Regrettably, this is the tragedy experienced by many Christians today.  Like the children of Israel during the wilderness wandering, we have been delivered from the bonds of slavery, yet we still think like slaves. Because the minds of the Israelites were still enslaved, they were not able to possess God’s will for their lives. Proverbs 23:7 tells us that as a man thinks in his heart, so is he.  It matters not that the prison door is open if we sit inside of the cell under the illusion that we are still prisoners. Elephant trainers are able to hold a mighty elephant with a small leg chain hooked to a stake in the ground.  How do trainers accomplish this?  They do so by chaining the elephant when he is very young.  Of course, the baby elephant is too weak to pull up the stake.  Soon he quits struggling against the chain and becomes mentally conditioned to his slavery. As an adult elephant, he could easily pull up the stake up and go free.  The truth is that he is no longer held by the strength of the chain but by the power of an enslaved mind. If the bull in the bullfight ever realized that his enemy was the matador rather than the red cape, the bullfight would be over. The truth is that both the elephant and bull are really victors, but their ignorance and mental conditioning makes them victims.  In Christ we are free.  That is the truth.  But un-renewed mindsets can keep us enslaved. Jesus said that if we would live our lives in His word then we would know the truth. This knowledge or “revelation” of truth will liberate us from the old mindset of slavery so that we might enjoy and exercise our true freedom in Christ. Thank God for deliverance!  But remember, deliverance is not freedom. Deliverance simply prepares us for freedom. Don’t settle for simply being delivered. Israel did and became stalled in a wilderness.  It takes a mindset of freedom to possess our promise land.

Application:  Old mindsets are hard to change.  Salvation is only the first step in our walk of freedom.  Are saved but continue to live a life of defeat? Do you live as though your problems are bigger than God?  Do you focus on the problem rather the promise?  Do you see yourself as a grasshopper before giants or as a super conqueror though Christ Jesus?  Are you delivered but continue to live in a wilderness without purpose or vision?  Or on the other hand, are you a Christian whose mind has been liberated by the knowledge of the truth?  Do you see yourself as God sees you---free to possess His promises? Live in His word until His word becomes alive in you.  Remember: freedom is not based on truth but, rather, on of the truth we know!

Prayer:  “Heavenly Father, I thank You for delivering me from sin.  I make a quality decision now to live in Your Word daily so that I might know the truth that will set me free.  I choose to cast off old mindsets of slavery that hinder me from moving forward in freedom.  I believe that the same truth that sets me free will keep me free and enable me to possess the promise land of destiny set before me. I thank You for this in Jesus’ name. Amen.”

Grace Fellowship     P.O. Box 260       Rusk, Texas 75785       (903) 683-6550

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