Today, in America, we celebrate our freedom. We take time to reflect and remember and thank God for the men and women who laid down their lives so that we can be free and continue to do so.

As I was thinking about this yesterday, though, I realized that there are quite a few people who today is a difficult day for.

1) There are those people whose families are grieving today, because they have lost a loved one in the current war or a past war for the sake of our freedom. So, today stirs up all kinds of emotional grief for them instead of celebration.

2) There are those who are missing their family members today, because they are on the other side of the world fighting for our freedom and spreading freedom to other people groups who have been under oppression and haven’t experienced the same freedom we have.

3) There are those in America, who are citizens of America today, but aren’t free. They might be incarcerated somewhere. And while everyone is celebrating freedom, throwing parties, shooting off fireworks, having barbeques, they sit in a cell staring at bars, not free at all.

4) There are those who are not free spiritually. Those people who have not heard the message of our Lord. Those people who have not accepted his unbelievable gift of salvation. Those who are “followers of Christ”, but have not surrendered everything to Him.

I’ve chosen to take some time today and remember these people. For those who are grieving the a family member who is either dead or away right now, I am praying that God’s comfort would be a guide for them today. For those who are incarcerated or have family members or friends who are incarcerated, I pray that there would be an unbelievable sense of God’s peace in their hearts and minds. And that God would guard their hearts from depression or suicidal thoughts. For those who are not free spiritually, I am praying that today God would reveal Himself strong to them. Maybe it might come through an encounter with someone. I don’t know. I just pray that happens. I pray that for those who are following Him and haven’t surrendered completely, that they would embrace His true gift of complete freedom. That the hurts, habits, hang-ups, addictions, etc. they don’t have to carry anymore. Christ died for ALL of my stuff and He invites me to give ALL of it to Him.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, July 4th, 2006 at 8:54 am and is filed under Misc.. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.