Set free to be bound to love

“For freedom Christ has set us free; stand firm therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery.” Galatians 5:1

Freedom is something that I took for granted for many years. I had no idea that countless thousands, even millions were bound in physical slavery of all kinds all around the globe until just years ago. The realization of that devastating reality woke me up inside to a new gratitude for the life of freedom and privilege I had been given. The more I became aware of physical slavery, though, the more God opened up my eyes to spiritual slavery – being bound to sin and its destructive ways. The fallout of our sinful choices can be tragic. Not only does sin and addiction to it destroy us, but it has the ability to destroy our relationships and devastate those that love us most.

Over the past few months, I’ve been reading and studying a lot about spiritual strongholds – anything that exalts itself in our minds causing us to need, crave, or desire it more than Christ Himself. Every opportunity that we take to indulge in sin, we give the enemy ground in our lives to wreak havoc. The more we open up ourselves to sin and anything that is contrary to God’s ways, the more we cripple ourselves in slavery. But Christ offers the reminder to us again today from His Word that He died to set us free. Freedom is His desire for us, and being bound to any sin is simply not the life He has for His children. But then, I started looking intently at His love for us. You see, the unconditional, never-ending love that He offers to us is so great, so far above and beyond any earthly love that we will ever know on this side of heaven, so satisfying and ultimately so freeing that we are intended to cling to this love like nothing else. It’s a love that takes an honest look into our deepest, darkest places and calls us out of those pits. It’s a love that refuses to allow us to remain in the place where we first encountered its healing waters, but rather it’s a love that pulls us into the arms of our Savior.

Through it all, I’ve come to grasp this freeing truth: The only thing we were ever meant to be bound to in this life is the love of Jesus Christ. The more I submit to be bound to His love, the more freedom I experience from my sin. His love sets us free. I pray that today and always you know and believe this vital truth. God desires that you would be so wrapped up in His love for you, that you would not only have less and less opportunity to choose sin, but even more so that you would have no desire for it. Find freedom today from every chain that has kept you bound to sin in this: Be bound by Christ’s love for you. Freedom is found in His arms.