April 23, 2023
When I was going to seminary, studying to be a minister, I had to get psychological testing. The psychologist asked me my life story. I took a test. At the end, he gave me an analysis and a prescription. His prescription was, “Don’t get stuck.”
That’s a good prescription for me, and for anyone! We get stuck in life. You have a habit you wish you could change. Like you eat when you’re stressed, but you want to change and lose weight. Or you smoke and you want to stop. Or there could be a habit you wish you could start like you want to read the Bible and pray. You want to, but you don’t do it. You might spend more money than you actually make, and it’s causing problems. Or you want a better relationship with a family member, but you’re stuck. The relationship doesn’t get better.
Life is better when you’re not stuck! Freedom from what holds us back is so much better! We’re in a message series called, “What’s next?” In karate there’s always another level you can attain, like you start with a white belt, and you gain skills and pass a test to move up to a yellow belt, and then to an orange belt, and so on until you reach a black belt. There is always a next step in Christianity. Last week we learned steps to know God. Next week we’ll talk about next steps for discovering your purpose. The final week we’ll talk about next steps to make a difference. Today, we’re going to learn next steps to find freedom! It’s so important to know God. Last week we learned that Jesus’ followers, after he went to heaven, gained a life-giving relationship with God, because they worshipped, prayed, fellowshipped, and got to know God. Still, you can know God. You can acknowledge God is your Father, redeemer, and comforter, but still be stuck in an area of life. So how do you live into the freedom God offers, and get unstuck?
It’s possible to change old patterns and live in freedom.
To gain freedom, we need to understand how to really change. One way to approach change is to say, I love God, but change is up to me. This is a wrong mindset. It says, God loves me and saves me, but change is by my power alone. So, we might say, “Well, I’m trying to stop losing my temper with my kids. I’m trying.” Or “I’m trying to stop cussing!” “I’m trying to get close to God.” Or “I’m trying to stop scrolling through my phone 4 hours a day. But “It’s all up to me, I’m trying!” This is not how we change.
Another way we can try to change is, to believe, it’s all up to God. We expect Him to do everything, and we don’t have to do anything. You might not like your job, so you quit your job for the glory of God and say, “God has to bring me a new job.” Which is maybe not the best strategy, you find that out the hard way! Or you want to get closer to God. But you haven’t looked at a Bible since 1999, and you stopped going to church about then, too. And you wonder, “Why am I not close to God?” You shift all the responsibility to God! Or you spend more than you make over and over and over. Then you buy a lottery ticket, dedicate it to God, “Maybe God is going to make me win big with the lottery and get me out of debt.”
Saying, “It’s all up to me,” and trying on your own power doesn’t work. Saying, “It’s all up to God,” doesn’t work. But there is a mindset that works and brings freedom: God through me. Everybody say “God through me.”
The Apostle Paul knew this. He said in Romans 7, “I’m trying to change, but I can’t. I don’t wanna do wrong, but I do. Who can save me? God will, through Jesus Christ!”
And Paul says this in 1 Corinthians 15:9-11, “For I am the least of the apostles” and this is Paul who wrote so many books in the New Testament, and so many verses that we love, like, “Love is patient, love is kind…”: He brought the good news of Jesus to people the disciples of Jesus hadn’t even thought of. So, Paul’s a hero of the faith.
But Paul says, “I don’t even deserve to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God.” But God’s grace to me had an effect. Paul worked harder than all of the other apostles. He got up earlier, stayed up later, showed more courage, started more churches, developed more leaders, preached the gospel more places. He was beaten and left for dead, whipped, snake bitten, shipwrecked, persecuted, and imprisoned. Paul says, I worked harder than all of them. But it wasn’t me, it was the grace of God with me. I’m not any good, I don’t deserve to be here. But by the grace of God, he did something in me! His grace was not without effect. It wasn’t me, just me by my own power. It was the grace of God THROUGH me. Paul teaches us that real spiritual change is God through you.
So how does that look? On Monday, when I want to eat three bags of chips, when I want to yell at my boss, all for the glory of God because God’s gonna get me out of this, right? How do I not do all that?
For change to work, it has to be spiritual transformation. Empowered by the Holy Spirit and not by your willpower.
If you want to lose weight, why do you want to lose weight? You say, “I want to fit in my skinny jeans.” That’s your why. And then you have your how: “I’m going to do the diet my friend likes. And I’m going to the gym.”
But it needs to be spiritual, right? Add a spiritual why and a spiritual how. Your spiritual why is God’s purpose for you. Your spiritual how is God’s power through you. It’s not behavioral modification. It’s spiritual transformation.
So, say you get a notification on your phone, and it tells you “You spent 92 hours on your phone this week.” And you think, “I should spend less time on my phone! Why? Cause I don’t wanna spend so much time on my phone.” But add a spiritual why. So why? Well, God is love, and what’s the greatest commandment? Love God. How loving am I staring at a screen? So my spiritual why might be,” I wanna love God and be more engaged with the people I love.” And that’s your spiritual why.
Maybe you want to get better with your money. “Why? Cause I’m tired of being broke. That’s not bad. But what if you added a spiritual reason: “Everything I have comes from God, and one of the best ways I could worship and honor Him is by managing His resources to a point where I’m not just trying to pay my bills, but I can be a blessing to people around me.”
I told you that psychologist I who tested me said, “Don’t get stuck.” Part of why he said that was growing up, my family didn’t have much money. My Dad was not great with money. The psychologist didn’t want me to also be bad with money. My parents had a credit card debt that at one point was over $40,000. When I talked to that psychologist I was engaged to Kevin. Kevin’s parents in their lifetime accumulated a $200,000 credit card debt. So, we could have been headed for a financial train wreck! Well, we got married. We got by financially, although we had big student loan debt to pay. Then something would come up, and we would carry a balance on our credit card. Then things would get better, and we would pay it off. But then we would carry a balance again. It was a cycle. One day I was on a list serve with pastors, who said, “A minister needs to give 10% of their income to the church.” I didn’t like that idea! But I came around to it. We decided we would give 10% of our income to the church, because a minister needs to live by faith, needs to show they believe in the church they serve and give glory to God. We got a spiritual why for why we wanted to get our finances in order. We were going to give 10% of our income to our church. But how do you give 10%? I read books, we started a budget, and made a spending plan. We grew our giving by one percent at a time of our income, then another percentage, until we got to 10%. We didn’t carry credit card debt. Kevin and I weren’t stuck anymore. We had a spiritual why and God’s grace worked through us.
11 days ago, our plumber told us we need to replace the sewer line on our house. (It’s a 110-year-old house.) It will cost $15-18,000. God did amazing things in our finances when we had a spiritual why! We have the money for the sewer line. I am so amazed at where we are. We can write a check for it all. God is good! That’s freedom! We experienced real change in our lives, real change in our finances, because it was God through us.
If you want the freedom of change, you can’t just change your behavior. You need to change your heart, or your old behavior will come back. When you can’t change, it’s because you’re trying to meet a need or relieve a hurt without God’s grace, and that’s why you don’t change. So, you need to stop trying on your own and start trusting.
My homework for you is to think of a place you’re stuck although you want to change, you want freedom! And add a spiritual why. Find why God wants you to succeed, why God will be your strength in making a change.
God told the apostle Paul, “My power works best in weakness.” Paul was the least of the apostles, but he made a huge impact. When you don’t have the willpower, and you fail, like we all fail, it’s ok. Because it doesn’t have to be just you. The grace of God can work miracles through you. Who the son has set free, is free indeed! Amen!
Maureen Duffy-Guy's blog 