Saturday, October 20, 2012

Keys to Emancipation 208

"This is what the Lord says: “When seventy years are completed for Babylon, I will come to you and fulfill my gracious promise to bring you back to this place. For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. I will be found by you,” declares the Lord, “and will bring you back from captivity. I will gather you from all the nations and places where I have banished you,” declares the Lord, “and will bring you back to the place from which I carried you into captivity.” 
Jeremiah 29:10-14

The 11th verse  of Jeremiah 29 is well known, much more so than the verses before and after. The prophecy deals with restoration from slavery as we seek-and find-Him, bought from the physical captives in Babylon, and the spiritual captives we can often become.
We often step right up to the shackles, so willingly allowing those manacles to  bind us to a variety of prisons and captivities. But freedom is the place we dwell when God, whom we seek with all our hearts, brings us back from self imposed imprisonment. I realize that I must constantly seek after my Magnificent Obsession, because otherwise I stand in the doorway of a prison cell.
The spiritual implication to me here is that the place we dwell, where we stand, without seeking and finding our Father constantly  is the place of captivity. We are either walking in freedom or locked away in some form of prison. The Holy Spirit, not the things of this world, nor worldly wisdom, nor vain imaginations, brings truth and freedom, to be filled with the Spirit brings deliverance, and in His presence is fullness of joy. With the joy of the Lord is our strength, so I finds all of these principles to be connected: in His presence is freedom-restoration- redemption- deliverance-joy- strength- forgiveness ,and above all-love.

No comments:

Post a Comment