Do you hate boundaries?
Don’t you feel boxed in by fences?
Boundaries are oppressive, right?
Boundaries are freedom?
Growing up I tried to find ways around the boundaries that were given to me and I thought that those around me were giving the rules and boundaries were trying to oppress me (let’s be honest I still think that the rules my parents gave me were because they didn’t want me to have fun…just don’t tell them).
Here is the crazy thing about it, I still think that and act the like the boundaries that God gives to me and by fellow followers of Jesus to oppress us and to make it so that we don’t have fun. Then I read this,
Whenever the LORD raised up judges for them, the LORD was with the judge, and he saved them from the hand of their enemies all the days of the judge. For the LORD was moved to pity by their groaning because of those who afflicted and oppressed them. But whenever the judge died, they turned back and were more corrupt than their fathers, going after other gods, serving them and bowing down to them. They did not drop any of their practices or their stubborn ways. (Judges 2:18-19 ESV)
God, my loving Father doesn’t show and tell us the best way to live because He is mean or wants to keep us from being from or even from being truly human. In fact when we follow Jesus and His way of living we find out what it truly means to be human. God gives us guidance and rules so that we will not be afflicted and oppressed, Jesus came so that we might have life abundant. God as the designer of all tells us what it looks like to live, to truly live, why, so that we may have joy true joy that can not be found anywhere else.
For my joy?
Here is the thing brothers and sisters, why are we so opposed to what God says? Why do we want to disregard what God says in Scripture says? Why is not what God revealed about Himself and told us enough? Why is true joy not enough?
Why do we say “God say ___ about ____ and yet that was for that culture and not for us”? Do we think we know more than God? Are trying to apologize for God? Are we trying to make God more palatable? Are we ashamed of God?
What if in ignoring or blatantly disregarding God’s commands we are actually experiencing death? What if we in our “sophistication” are missing out on life, life to the full? What if we are missing out on what it means to be truly human? What if we are missing out on true joy, the full joy that we as humans are supposed to experience? What if we are trading in the real thing for something that is so fake that is barely resembles the real thing?
What if we are letting those false things oppress and afflict us?
What does it look like for us to be free?
What does it look like for us to say “what does Scripture say about this”?
What does it look like for us to live inside the boundaries and find true joy?
