So it's been a while since I last posted on my blog. After I started this, I decided to take some time and really analyze whether or not having a blog was something that I was willing to put the time and energy into. It was necessary to make decisions as to whether or not I wanted to be serious about it, or just throw down some thoughts from time to time. After careful thought, I think that this is something I was meant to do. So, onward we go...
Last Wednesday, I spoke to the Middle School students about God's freedom. While doing so, I felt led to not so much get into the freedom part, but more into our responsibility in that freedom. You see, God sets you free by allowing you to get away from whatever it is that has it's grip on your life, heart, or time. He then allows you to set yourself free by removing away the shame and guilt associated with that very thing. But, it then becomes our responsibility to stay in that freedom; to sort of live within the house that has been carefully built for us.
I asked for the smallest student to come forward. I began to hand him objects, make him wear huge articles of clothing of mine (small kids in size 13 golf shoes is pretty funny), taped his ankles together, and gave each thing a label such as lying or pornography. It made doing a simple task of carrying a chair become nearly impossible. As he illustrated my point, I was taken back to my days of restraint. The days where outside forces had control over my movements and shaped my ability to live life.
The young man who was my poor victim er... volunteer was then allowed to begin removing these things from his life by giving them to Jesus and being forgiven for them. I did not want to stop at that point, because I feel like Christianity too often stops there. You're forgiven, you're free, go get 'em tiger! Every student was given fake money. On the opposite side was the word restraint. It was important for them to see that something can be intentionally made to look like something else, in order to make the person feel like it is real when really it is worthless and empty. Why? Because that is everything in this world that we hold near and dear to our hearts. All the possessions, money, power, appearances, pornography, drugs, and wants are all so carefully crafted to look like something that they are not. They are intentionally made to look like things that will fill you up, when they are merely made to make you feel more empty and wanting more. And we purposely go back to these things. We purposely pick all of the objects back up, put the bulky clothes back on, and tape our own ankles together because we so quickly forget where and who we are in God.
Why would we do this? Because we are broken and fragile. We are empty and hopeless. At least, we are these things on our own. We become like a cancer patient who starts treatment, begins to feel better and then stops treatment, merely because of the outward feeling. The whole while, not paying attention to the fact that the cancer still exists and needs further treatment. Maybe we even decide that we can now beat it on our own?
On Wednesday night, I looked at the fake money that I had gathered from the students. On the back were the things restraining them from God that they had written down. "Selfish" "Forgive my Dad" "Being with the wrong people" "Pornography" "Girls" "Boys" "Sex" "Homosexuality" Those were just SOME of the restraints that these Middle Schoolers had. Life is even more complicated and hard to navigate for students than it ever has been. Students have access to things that their parents never had. Not good things, destructive, life altering things.
