Time To Jump

If the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.

No Longer Prisoners

When an elephant is first trained, the trainer puts a chain around its ankle, and this way it cannot be free. The elephant remains where it is, and after a while, the trainer will put the smallest rope around the elephant’s ankle. This rope is so weak that the elephant could snap it easily, but the elephant still believes that the chain is there, and therefore it won’t break free even though it has complete power to do so.

In the same way, we have been given complete power to walk in the beauty that God has personally called us to, but instead many of us believe that we are still prisoners to our past, prisoners to our thought patterns, prisoners to our old lives. But this is a lie. The psalmist David prayed this way, “Set me free from my prison, that I may praise your name” (Psalm 142:7).

So often we live based on what is not true. If the Son sets us free, then we are free indeed (John 8:36), but some of us are still living as slaves to fear, when His perfect love has cast out all fear (1 John 4:18). Jesus has offered us something worth far more than silver or gold. In Him we can operate in the true purpose that God fearfully and wonderfully made us for. Paul tells us, “It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. . . . Do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery” (Galatians 5:1).

No Longer Lame

One afternoon Peter and John were going up to the temple. There was a lame man being carried to the gate called Beautiful to beg from anyone who would be passing him by as they went in and out of the temple courts. He saw Peter and John as they were coming in his direction, and just as he did with many others who passed by, he begged from them and asked for money. Peter and John looked straight at him. (Isn’t it incredible how they gave him their full attention, just as God gives us His full attention?) Peter told the man to look at him, and the man did, thinking that they were about to give him something (Acts 3:1-5).

Little did the man know that they were not about to give him something that would take care of him temporarily, but they were about to bless him exceedingly and abundantly more than what he could have ever asked or imagined according to the Lord’s power at work. Acts 3:6-8 tells us, “Then Peter said, ‘Silver or gold I do not have, but what I do have I give you. In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, walk.’ Taking him by the right hand, he helped him up, and instantly the man’s feet and ankles became strong. He jumped to his feet and began to walk.” The man then headed to the temple courts and began jumping and praising the Lord! Other people saw him and began to realize that this man was the same man who used to be lame. The same man who used to beg was now the man who was giving praise. The same man who used to not be able to walk was now jumping and praising God in an instant. There is nothing that God cannot do. They were awestruck at what they were witnessing (verses 8-10).

Through Jesus we have all been given the freedom to walk and jump and praise God, but we still live as though we are lame, paralyzed, and unable to be who God has called us to be. Just as Peter reached down and helped the lame man to his feet, Jesus came down and lifted us up so that we, too, can stand tall in hope that is not shaken.

In 2 Timothy 1:7, we are reminded that the spirit God has given us is not a spirit of fear or timidity but of “power, love and self-discipline.” Because we are a new creation in Him and we no longer have to be prisoners to our old selves, we can stand up and walk and jump and praise God and actually experience all of the beauty that we were each uniquely designed to embrace and radiate (2 Corinthians 5:17).

Walk in Abundance

Through Christ, you have intentionally been given the power to walk in freedom. Because of Christ’s undeniable and unfailing love for you, you have been given the freedom to love yourself and others just as He loves. You have the authority to jump into beauty with a mind that is self-disciplined in the truth to daily choose that His promises will be what are leading your steps. This is the spirit that you have been given. This is why when you operate out of fear, you will feel defeated or sometimes apathetic or even ineffective, and this is because the enemy’s goal is to paralyze you with the belief that you can never experience God’s beauty for your life. He wants to keep you in a place of apathy so that you will never taste and see the fun of praising God and leaping in all that He has done. He seeks to keep you from being effective.

After the man in Acts 3 began to walk and praise God, the people “were filled with wonder and amazement at what had happened to him” (verse 10). God not only calls you to freedom, but He also calls you to be a vessel of His freedom to lead others who are lame to begin walking and praising His name fully too. We have been given His Spirit to live abundantly in all that He has called us to and to lead others to stand up and be all that He has called them to be too. His love does not end with us, but His love continues with us. How beautiful it is to praise His name fully.