The final week in our Escaping the Trap series!
A number of months ago Andy White wrote a fantastic article in our newsletter about a wild tree that had grown in his garden. He likened it to sin in our lives, and how often we know something is there but don’t deal with it until it’s so big that it becomes a huge project to try and bring it down. This is the case with idolatry.
I’ve been really encouraged over recent weeks to hear many of our church family talking about the identification of idols in their lives. Throughout the series we have focused on exposing these idols, and many of us can see where these idols are and the impact they are having.
The big question now is, what do we do about it?
You see, it’s absolutely critical that we identify the idols, but unless we then take action to deal with them we are no different to Andy, in his story about the tree, leaving our idols to grow and grow until they eventually become so rooted and strong that it takes a bulldozer to bring them down.
This Sunday we will look together at how we identify our idols and then how we deal with them. Galatians 5 v 1 says “For freedom Christ has set us free…” Yes, you were created for freedom! And yet how many of us still feel like a slave? A slave to our job, a slave to others expectations of us or our expectations of ourselves? A slave to worry, anxiety or stress? A slave to the need to be someone, to do something, to feel loved or valued?
A number of weeks back whilst praying I had a picture of men and women walking into our building with chains wrapped around their feet and hands. They were slaves to things in this world that are no gods at all! And yet, as they came to the Lord their chains fell off and were never put back on again. Our prayer is that through Christ we would be free, and in Him we would be free indeed!
Let’s not leave things where they are, but eagerly come and seek the Lord to find the freedom that He has promised us.
Tim Barton