Be Free!!

Christy Dragotta explores the true meaning of freedom in Christ, emphasizing that salvation and righteousness are rooted in Jesus' finished work, not our efforts. She discusses how to live simply in faith, love God and others, and avoid the trap of legalism, encouraging believers to abide in Christ for true freedom.

#freedom, #nomorebondage, #allabout Jesus

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:01

Hey friends, I am so glad that you're with me today. Hey friends, I am so glad that you're with me today. We are going to talk about being free. And I I want to get back to simple. You know, part of my heart in creating this podcast was to really help you walk into a freer life, a life free from the expectations and bondage that the world, the flesh, and the devil put on us, right? And so I just want to help you to become more free, but I also want it to be about creating an authentic life of faith that's simple, not something that's difficult, not something that you have to try really hard at. We have plenty of things we have to try hard at. So I want your faith to be freedom and abundant and simple. And so today I want to take us back to simple. And we're going to be looking in Galatians, actually, Galatians 5. We're also going to visit Galatians 3, and we're going to see what the word says about being free. And Galatians 5, 1 actually says, it is for freedom that Christ set us free. And that's kind of like a, okay, what do you mean? What do you mean it's for freedom that Christ set us free? And it's because he came to remove all of the heavy yokes, all of the bondage, all of the chains that keep us enslaved to different things in our life that are killing us, different things in our life that are causing us to choke out the abundance and live in a place that's just hard. And so I'm not saying that the Christian life should be easy, but honestly, when we trust God to be who he says he is, and when we offer up our lives to him to guide us everywhere he wants us to go, it can be simple. And so I want to take us back there today. Okay, so where we're going to start is with the highest commandment, right? And there's a man that comes up to Jesus and he's trying to trick him, but he says, What is the greatest commandment? And Jesus says to him, To love God first, right? To love God with your best, to love God with all of your heart, mind, soul, and strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself. And so it's then he says, in these two commandments, every commandment is kept. So when you love God with all that you are, and you love other people, you are literally fulfilling the entire law. That's what the law was designed to do, not to keep us from doing the wrong activities. It was designed to help us love God and love other people so that we can live in abundance and freedom. That is what the Bible teaches us. And so I want to take us back to the gospel, right? Because I think sometimes we forget what is the gospel. I know we could all rehearse, you know, Jesus came to earth and he died on a cross, he saved me from my sins. We can say that. But I want to look at the real, the real, real gospel. That is the gospel. So what is the gospel beyond just the kind of rote thing that we have in our mind? The gospel is that my heart was never going to lead me into right behavior, right action on my own. I just cannot will myself, make myself for any length of time do the right activities. Without God's grace, without his help, all day long, every day, I would be making choices that sabotage myself. And even with his grace, I still stumble into sinful behaviors or activities that I don't like. And Paul had the same struggle in Romans. It's Romans 7. He says, Why is it we do the things we don't want to do and the things we want to do we don't do at all? And he even ends with like, oh, who can save me from this body of death, right? And then Romans 8:1 has the great news. It's the gospel. Ah, praise be to God. There is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. And so it's not like we are alone in this struggle, and it's not like once we make the decision to follow Christ, we won't struggle with sin. And God knew that. No matter how much our heart wanted to do the right things, he knew that as long as we were in these fleshy bodies on this earth, we were going to continue to choose sin. So he acted, he took action, and he said, I'm gonna send my son, which is really himself, right? There's no separating God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit. They are the Trinity, they are one, they are together. And so God Himself took on flesh and came to earth so that he could rescue us from these bodies of death. Only God could keep all the commands. So Christ, when he came, was perfect, he lived a perfect life, and he did that in a body of flesh, so that when he died on the cross, his sacrifice counted for you and for me and for anyone who would believe on the name of Jesus Christ. It's that simple. That's the gospel. We couldn't do it on our own, so God sent Christ so that we could all, what's the end result? So that we could all be with them in glory in heaven. He wanted us to be with them. That's why he created us was to live in a harmonious relationship for eternity. And the only way that could happen is if Christ came and rescued us. And so that's the gospel. Christ did everything. It doesn't depend on you and me. It always and only has depended on Christ's finished work on the cross. That's why it's good news. I feel like that does sound like good news, don't you? So let's look at Galatians 3:1. I'm gonna read it here. You foolish Galatians, who has bewitched you? Before your very eyes, Jesus Christ was clearly portrayed as crucified. I would like to learn just one thing from you. Did you receive the spirit by observing the law? Or by believing what you heard? Are you so foolish? After beginning with the Spirit, are you now trying to attain your goal by human effort? So he goes on and he just is he's rebuking them. This is a rebuke from Paul, and he's calling them foolish, and he's saying, You're trying to do this on your own. Who tricked you into this, right? And I think it's so interesting because I was I was just reading Bible study, is kind of how I came up on this particular the need for this particular podcast. And I was reading in Galatians 5, and we'll get to that in a minute. And it was interesting because I had just had a conversation with another friend of mine about a little yeast working through the whole batch of dough, and also um where it's used the words fallen from grace, and in the same actual conversation, the words were said about a little yeast works through the whole batch of dough. And I've been in church since I was very young, and so every time I've ever heard reference to those verses, to those scriptures, I have really had a picture in my mind. And right now I want you to just think of what comes to your mind when you hear those scriptures. When you say when you hear a little yeast works through the whole dough and fallen from grace, right? And I always have thought of backsliding. Somebody, it's sin. Sin has gotten into somebody's life, and that little bit of sin is working its way through the entire batch of dough. So that little bit of sin is gonna eat the entire thing up. That's how I've always looked at that first, and then fallen from grace very similarly. When you fall from grace, it's like, oh, you're backsliding. You've you have decided that you're gonna live in a sinful, repetitive behavior. And those are the ways that I interpreted those scriptures. And so the other day I was just talking with God, and then I was doing my Bible study, and for the five millionth time I read in Galatians 5, and I did not know, first of all, that those two verses were actually all in the same chapter in the Bible, which is Galatians 5. But what caught me even more off guard is what it was in reference to. And so now I'm gonna pop over and we're gonna read in Galatians 5. So he starts with, it is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery. And then he goes on and he says, You who are trying to be justified by law have been alienated from Christ. You have fallen away from grace. There it is. There's the first one. You have fallen away from grace, and so it isn't that they have backslidden, it's that they have decided that it depends on them and their good behavior, right? Any behavior is what is going to gain them approval before God. And he's saying, you're actually alienating yourself from Christ. That is anti-the gospel, because it was never about our works, our good works, our bad works, it was never about our works. And so, as I look at this, well, let's go on, let's read, let's let's read a little bit more. So, if you go on down and you read five verses seven through eight, it says, You were running a good race. Who cut in on you and kept you from obeying the truth? That kind of persuasion does not come from the one who calls you. So he's saying, Somebody cut in, they've kept you from the truth, and that comes from the enemy. It does not come from Jesus. And what is he talking about? Okay, so we're gonna go back up to verses five and six to find out worse what verses what the truth is that verses seven and eight are talking about. And it says, But by faith we eagerly await through the Spirit the righteousness for which we hope. For in Christ Jesus, neither circumcision nor uncircumcision has any value. The only thing that counts is faith expressing itself through love. So that is what it's talking about. Faith in Christ as our righteousness expressing itself through love. We're right back to what Jesus always told us: love God, love other people. And so he's saying somebody's cut in on you, they're bringing you information that isn't the truth, you're back under slavery, in bondage to the law. You have literally been separated, alienated from Christ. You're alienating yourself from Christ because you think it depends on you. And it's for freedom he wants to set us free. It's all just, I mean, my mind was just going, I've heard that preached before a thousand times, but for some reason it hit me new because I was thinking how often we think that it is our good works, that our right behavior is what righteousness is. And I think we've probably been taught that. But the truth is, righteousness is found in Christ, it is his righteousness that becomes our righteousness. It isn't our right behavior that is righteousness, it is about Jesus from beginning to end and always has been, and about the work that he did, not the works that we do. And so just kind of take a deep breath and sit in that for a minute, really receive the fact that Jesus does not want you to get caught up every day thinking that your righteous works are what pleases him. That's not the truth, and we get so focused on our own sin. What we do is we just focus in on those places of sin in our lives that we can't seem to break free from. And as long as we're focusing on that sin, we are not fixing our eyes on Jesus, who is the author and protector of our faith. We are so ready for our behavior to get in a good enough place that we feel good about ourselves so that we can love other people, like Christ says to. And he says, No, fix your eyes on me, seek the kingdom first, put your mind on the good things, the things that are pure and lovely and praiseworthy, and everything else is gonna take care of itself. You will no longer be drawn into those sinful patterns when you stop focusing on your sin. But it's just like if a pink elephant were to come walk into the room. You see the pink elephant, and then somebody says to you, I want you to stop thinking about that pink elephant. I want you to quit thinking about it. I mean, all you can think about is the pink elephant, right? You can't get your mind to stop thinking about that. And Jesus is saying, Let me be the pink elephant in the room, let me be the thing that you can't take your mind off of. Because when you fix your eyes on Jesus, everything else is gonna fade away. Everything else. But when you fix your eyes on that sin or that circumstance, the same thing happens. The faithfulness of God takes a back seat, it fades away because all you're focusing is the thing that is causing you pain. And so he says, Give me your pain, right? My yoke is easy, my burden is light. If you are weary and heavy laden, just come here. Come to me, let me take your burden, let me take away that pain. And so it's absolutely beautiful, the exchange that is offered. And I wanted to give you some freedom today. I wanted you to walk in a way, and you may have to re-listen to this again tomorrow, just to get your mind fixed on the right things, which is always Jesus, right? Always. I wanted to get back to how complicated we make things versus the simplicity that's really there. We love God, even when it's hard, even when we don't understand him. We love God. And through that, we realize we only love him because he loved us first. So it's in receiving the love that he has for us that we can love him, and then from that love is going to flow a love to others, and it says, as you love yourself, because when we receive his love, it will, we don't need any more self-help manuals, we don't need any more daily motivation. When we really truly receive how he feels about us, what he thinks about us, the love he has for us, it enables us to love others in the same way because we lack nothing when we rest in his love. So sometimes loving other people is difficult. There are people that make it very difficult, they're broken people, they just hurt, and they aren't receiving from God how much they're loved. That is the truth, and so our call is to abide. We need to abide in Jesus because the only way we can see other people the way that Christ sees them, love other people the way that Christ loves them, is to abide in Him. When we are in Him, just like a branch and a vine are all together, right? That's when we are able to love people the way that Christ loves them. But we have to abide. If we take ourselves away from that life source, how do we think, how long do we think we're going to survive? When I cut a branch off of my tree and it's green, I actually picked some off this morning of one of my trees because it was at the base of the tree, and I didn't want that part to start sprouting branches. And so I just peeled those little green shoots off. Bright green, vibrant, and even now, probably a couple hours later, they're still green, right? They still look good. But tomorrow, when I go out there, they are not going to be good. They are not going to be green, they are not going to be alive because they have separated themselves from the lifeblood. Well, I separated them from the lifeblood, which was the tree, the trunk. And Jesus is saying, Don't separate yourself from me, from your life, from the source. Everything that you need to love me and love others is in the source. Don't unplug from the source. And so I just want to encourage you today. His call is to have an intimate relationship with him. He wants you to come to him for everything. He doesn't want you to run away and hide when you're not feeling good about yourself. He doesn't want you to try to take on all these things so that you can be good enough and earn his favor. He wants you to abide. He wants you to rest and he wants you to listen to what he tells you. And that is obedience, just responding to what he tells you. And sometimes it just looks like as simple as get up and go take a walk. Is that hard? No, it's not hard. When he invites you into things, sometimes it's just, hey, go over and ask that lady if you can pray for her. He tells you things, he invites you into things, not to put a burden on you, but to set you free, encourage your faith, and encourage other people. It's just beautiful and it is simple, and it all goes back to the gospel. So as we think about that, a little yeast working through the whole dough. It was the yeast of the Pharisees. It was the bondage that we put ourselves in when we think that it's our right behavior that equals our righteousness. It just isn't. So I want you to think about that for the rest of the day. How does this message of freedom impact us? And I would encourage you this week go back and read Galatians, the whole book of Galatians. We don't want to just miss any of it or skip any of it. Read it all. It's such good information for us to have, but it's only good if it impacts how we live, right? It's it's well, the word is good no matter what, but it will only do us good if it impacts the way that we think and the way that we live, if we receive it as truth. He says, Who is stealing the truth from you? I want to encourage you this week, read Galatians, the entire book. And then as you're thinking about all of these things, I want you to think about do you normally judge people? Are you acting as judge and jury? Um, especially the believers that are around you. Do you constantly kind of in your mind criticize the things that they're doing that you think they shouldn't, or the things that they're not doing that you think they are? God did not call us to be judge and jury. Speak the truth and love, right? He did call us to do that. But he didn't even come. Christ says, I did not come to condemn people, I didn't come to judge. The first time when he came, the time he says, model your life after this, he came to serve. He came to love, and he came to set people free. And so, what does he want us to model? Service, love, really love. That covers it all. But in love, we will serve others and help rescue people from bondage and set them free. So today I just hope you're encouraged in this. It was very encouraging to me. Do we have areas in our life that we need to continue to surrender to God because we are in bondage? Yes. Get to the root of why that thing is appealing to you. The yeast is the belief that your righteousness would ever equal or supersede Christ's, that you could ever act your way into favor with God. So I hope that you go today and take that word as encouragement. I hope that it stirs up some freedom in your mind and heart. And I just pray that you go forward from here, not enslaved to that Pharisaical thinking. But set free to just love people and let God handle the judgment. Let him handle the part that he is fully equipped to handle because he sees it all. We don't see it all. We always have only part of the story. Can you imagine going into a courtroom and that judge only hears one perspective of the story? Every single time that person would be considered guilty. It's by introducing the second half of the story that you find out, oh, in fact, scripture even says when one testifies, they seem right until the other one comes in, and it's just true. So we need to stop trying to play judge and jury, and we just need to love. That's the call. The call is to model Christ's behavior. And he will come back and he will judge. Every knee will bow, every tongue will confess, and we will be before God and we will speak the truth about our whole lives from beginning to end. But our righteousness will be based on Christ if we have accepted him as our Savior. And he says, all you need to do for that is to cry out, Jesus, save me. It is an answer he gives a yes to every single time. No one has ever cried out, Jesus, save me. That he said, no, you're too dirty. I can't do it. He will answer that prayer yes, 100% of the time. So be saved, be free, and have a wonderful week. Thank you for sitting with me today. I really, really hope you are encouraged. I'll see you next week.