No More Horror Story!

We are free for the Father's glory!

9/8/2001

Can you imagine the depth and magnitude of pain you would feel if your young child was stolen from you, and you had no idea what horrors they were encountering, day by day? Had they died in your arms, difficult and painful as that would be, it would be far better in some ways than if your child had been stolen in the market place or store when you were not watching. And now, you have to live daily with the agony of not knowing where they are, or what hideous darkness they’re being subjected to. The steady flow of tears and anguish would be unavoidable, for any parent who has learned to love. “What a GHASTLY thought,” to quote JB Phillips. Ghastly, sickening, crushing, never-ending—in the natural sense.

Do you realize that this is the anguish that we put our Father through, when we wander off from Him into “our own worlds” without staying connected to Him in the affairs and decisions and moments of life—or when we live in continued sin, un-repented of? When we leave His side for other things, other unsaved relationships, other affections, other diversions, other traps of ego or pleasure or time—internet wandering, wasteful “entertainment,” or the like?

THIS pain, as with any parent who loves his or her young child, is the crushing pain that our Father feels for the darkness we are subjecting ourselves to, when we are willing to do that to Him and to ourselves, and to the Saints of God, His Family and the Body of His Son.

Argggghhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Unthinkable and boundless torment and distress we place upon a Father’s heart, when we live like that. Oh how it MATTERS to Him when we are stolen from His side, and subjected to the darkness of this present age, subtle forms or not!

YET, there IS a place of Peace and Light... we CAN run Home.......... !!!

“I put this in human terms because you are weak in your natural selves. Just as you used to offer the parts of your body in slavery to impurity and to ever-increasing wickedness, so now offer them in slavery to righteousness leading to holiness. When you were slaves to sin, you were free from the control of righteousness. What benefit did you reap at that time from the things you are now ashamed of? Those things result in death! But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves to God, the benefit you reap leads to holiness, and the result is eternal life” (Rom.6:19-22).

“Those who live according to the sinful nature have their minds set on what that nature desires; but those who live in accordance with the Spirit have their minds set on what the Spirit desires. The mind of sinful man is death, but the mind controlled by the Spirit is life and peace; the sinful mind is hostile to God. It does not submit to God’s law, nor can it do so. Those controlled by the sinful nature cannot please God.

“You, however, are controlled not by the sinful nature but by the Spirit, if the Spirit of God lives in you. And if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Christ. But if Christ is in you, your body is dead because of sin, yet your spirit is alive because of righteousness. And if the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit, who lives in you.

“Therefore, brothers, we have an obligation—but it is not to the sinful nature, to live according to it. For if you live according to the sinful nature, you will die; but if by the Spirit you put to death the misdeeds of the body, you will live, because those who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. For you did not receive a spirit that makes you a slave again to fear, but you received the Spirit of sonship. And by him we cry, ‘Abba! Daddy! Father!’ The Spirit Himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children” (Rom.8:5-16).