There is Freedom
Written by Sarah Stokes | 1st February 2025
I was talking with someone I trust about thoughts that I had been having from the past. I became a Christian 50 years ago, aged 11. My early experiences of being a Christian were of a sound foundation, but produced a lot of guilt, for example:
Have you had a time with God today? If not, God is not pleased.
If you don’t always consider other’s interests before your own, it was ungodly.
If you set out to do something purely enjoyable, you weren’t putting God as priority.
God’s love felt conditional.
She asked me, “Do you still believe this?”
I then pictured a child bound up with rags in the corner of a room, immobilised. I began to realise “No, I don’t believe this anymore. They are lies and I knew I had changed and that I was no longer that bound-up child.”
I remembered the tethered elephant story...
“A baby elephant joined the circus and was tied to a stake to stop it escaping. It pulled and pulled, but the stake never moved. As the elephant grew to an adult, he became very, very strong. With one pull, he could remove the stake and escape, but he had been so conditioned from an early age that this wasn’t possible. He believed he wasn’t strong enough, so he never tried.”
I was trapped by the lies I had believed in the past and only on reflecting did I realise I no longer believed them. Like the elephant, I saw myself conditioned to be a bound-up child when in fact I was free. Now I believe:
I can move, I am a child of God.
I am a Kingdom child, a princess to the King.
Seated in heavenly places.
From slave to adoption.
I serve from a place of love and affirmation. I don’t serve to gain love and affirmation.
There’s no pressing guilt about time spent with God.
My giving comes out of love, not duty.
Duty and performance have gone.
In my own church whilst having a time of extended time with God I was able to say, “No rules, Sarah, no striving, no people-pleasing.” I would never have felt permission to say that a few years ago. I am free and need to live in that.
I am dancing.
I am no longer conditioned to be tied to a stake of lies when I know I am free. I no longer need to be bound by them, or ruminate on them.
From dirty rags to a robe of righteousness.
Liberated.
I live in a place of love, not a place to try and gain love.
Eph 1:4-5 (NLT)
Even before He made the world, God loved us and chose us in Christ to be holy and without fault in His eyes. God decided in advance to adopt us into His own family by bringing us to Himself through Jesus Christ. This is what He wanted to do and it gave Him great pleasure.
I have finally discovered the Father’s heart. It is His doing. All glory to God.
LET’S DO THIS
We have an opportunity here to take action, like Sarah, to see freedom in your life and walk into the promises of God.
Take a moment and ask the Holy Spirit to reveal any areas in your life where you may feel limited, and show you any lies that you may be believing.
Take a moment and repent of limiting God or believing lies rather than the voice of your Father over you.
Find the truths of these in scripture and start to declare these over yourself today (and tomorrow too!) Here are a couple of examples how to do this:
Lie: God can never use me, others are a better choice
Truth: I am called for purpose; He has a plan for my life
Scripture: Jeremiah 29 v 11
Lie: I’m worthless
Truth: I am valuable, loved and cherished, so much that my Father sent His only son Jesus to die for me.
Scripture: John 3 v 16
Lie: I’m not beautiful, he made a mistake with me
Truth: I am no mistake, I am beautiful, designed, thought about and created. I am His handiwork.
Scripture: Psalm 139 v 13-14
Pray: what do you have to say to me Father? Please reveal now your heart of unconditional love to me.
Wait and delight in His love as it surrounds you – be prepared as this will blow you away!
Write down your steps how you will walk in the truth knowing your Father is for you and not against you and His love is not conditional – be courageous girls!
You may like to play this song: There is Freedom, Josh Baldwin.