I was reflecting this week about the influences in my life over the years – the men and women, the preachers and authors, the theologians and scholars from whom I have absorbed so much. As I started to recall them I easily counted well past 60 key influencers. Sixty! Sixty awesome Christians who have, mostly unknowingly, as I have read their books and listened to their preaching, and read their articles, sat in their lectures, have enormously shaped who I am today. Largely, because of them, I have the theological understanding, the doctrinal perspectives and spirituality insights that I now cherish – but I am still learning. Of course, God has been the one who has churned all of this together to produce the end product with the inclusion of insights and revelations that He has personally imparted to me through His word, prophecy and revelation. It’s hard to tell sometimes, to discern exactly, what’s from me and what is a composite of all I have absorbed so far from so many people. But, that’s true of all of us, isn’t it?
Although I have learned from many remarkable people, and am still learning, often the most valuable, most precious insights the Lord has revealed to me are the ones He has given to me Himself as I have been fellowshipping with Him, or other believers around His Word. I value all the learning from many sources, but I especially value those deep and personal revelations.
This last week, as I was participating in the ReChurch School of the Prophetic, Anne mentioned something about liberty and, quick as a flash, the Lord took me to Paul’s statement in 2 Corinthians …
2 Corinthians 3:17
“Now the Lord is the Spirit: and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.”
It was an instantaneous thing! As I recalled this verse, learned by heart as a kid, the Lord revealed His wisdom about how the tripartite human being lives. The born again’s spirit is regenerated and is thus the dwelling place of Holy Spirit. Now, liberty is a relative experience in our natural world – there are all kinds of curbs on our liberty, even hinderances. Laws and rules prevent us from doing whatever we want at any time. So, there is a limited amount of liberty that we can claim at any one time. In different countries around the world liberty is varied, as we know. What one person in, say, China, might regard as liberty would be seen in Australia as anything but liberty. So, liberty is a relative concept in some ways, in our world.
But this is not what the apostle Paul is saying to the Corinthians. No. He is revealing what real and unlimited liberty is. Real liberty is where the Spirit of God dwells – there is liberty! Where? There – in our regenerated spirit. What does that mean? It means simply that we have unfettered access to the Father – nothing and no one can prevent us, or inhibit us. To press this further, because we are born again, and God’s Spirit dwells within us, we are free to access all the promises and spiritual riches of God. This just isn’t the experience of the unborn again person – such liberty does not exist for them. They are limited to the finitudes of this world, whereas the born again has access, by grace, to all that an open heaven makes available to them. There is no greater liberty on this earth.
You see, the Spirit of God (who dwells within us) is not subjected to anything. He knows nothing of relative liberty, or any limitation. Holy Spirit has never experienced a limitation of any kind. The Spirit of God redefines liberty for the born again person who can now declare with confident joy and rock solid assurance …
Philippians 4:13
“I can do everything through him who gives me strength.”
No limits or curbs on liberty – everything is possible. Every … thing … in the One who empowers me.
That’s liberty in its purest form … and is precisely why death could not hold Jesus in the grave.
We need to learn to walk in this liberty more and more, by faith, and so transcend the limitations of our earthly world as we are led by Holy Spirit.
That’s liberty. And it is not relative.
Selah!
Ps Milton