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Purpose
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The purpose of these email reflections is to stimulate the God-given longing we all have for that which is truly life-giving, and to encourage sacrificing the lesser, more immediate "satisfactions" for the greater, in all areas of life, so that one may Live and share that Life with others!
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Hello ,
If knowing the truth makes people free, does hiding it bind them up ? That's the question for today.
- Sheldon Swartz
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The Connection between Secrets and Bondage
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"If we walk in the light, God himself being the light, we also
experience a shared life with one another, as the sacrificed blood of
Jesus, God's Son, purges all our sin." I John 1:7
I still well remember laying on the back of the couch at home while my mother read a Bible story (it may have been about Achan hiding his sin) to us children one evening. I was being mentally tortured by the awareness that I had broken a garden rake trying to loosen it from the ice it was frozen in, and had not told my dad or mom. I think I had carried this guilt around for several weeks by this time. I couldn't do it any more and blurted it out to Mom. Of course she was forgiving and understanding and I felt much cleaner, like I could live again.
Yes, that was a very little thing, but not too little to put me in bondage. I'm glad I made the life-giving choice to confess. It was humbling (I had done something wrong, and I had hid it for awhile) because I liked to think of myself as a good boy. So much for that . . . lost my pride, gained my freedom . . . is that not a good deal?
I suspect we could all tell stories of the bondage and duplicity we began to be in when we kept a secret about some failure of ours, or something about which we felt shame, or something for which we were afraid to accept the consequences. It is possible to hide, but it isn't possible to hide and live. Fortunately, God has made a way out for us and it is through the narrow gate of confession, to God, to others. Often we have to become quite small to get through this gate, and can't carry a lot of baggage (like our pride) and get through the gate.
In order to do this, of course, we have to care about something much more important than our pride or what we think others think of us. We have to care about our own freedom, our own sense of being clean, our desire to live out in the open.
From what I have observed, it seems that some of the most significant secrets people hold have to do with sexual violations. Not a surprise, I suppose, considering that sex is one of the most wonderful gifts God has given, thereby being something the evil one takes pleasure in contaminating with all sorts of guilt, shame, and emptiness, mostly by convincing people that living within the boundaries for which it was intended cuts one out of pleasure.
Fortunately, God already knows all our secrets and deals with them a whole lot better than we do. We condemn ourselves, try harder, blame others, etc., but God in Jesus insists on honesty, accepts our sorrow, and forgives.
"Lord Jesus, help me to value freedom of spirit above everything that would seem to be more important than that, especially my pride. Help me to take the narrow road that leads to the life you have created and redeemed me to live, no matter what. Amen"
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Sheldon Swartz, M.A, LMFT works with individuals, couples, and families to identify the ways of life and death in their lives and help uncover the motivation to choose that which leads to life, whether it be through counseling or spiritual direction.
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