freedom

A loud, annoying buzzing echoed off the unfinished walls of our garage early the other morning. I put on my socks and my Sherlock Holmes hat and ran outside to solve this mystery. The buzzing was coming from our electric dog fence box.

The electric current that runs through a wire buried in the ground is disconnected somewhere along the loop. Not fun, and Bubba' isn't happy with us. He is temporarily tied to a makeshift yard leash until I can fix the problem. (Bubba' is the pet name of our beagle for those newcomers to these e-news updates.)

Cooper spent the whole weekend standing in the yard just staring. His once bountiful boundary now limited. His freedom now leashed. It's a bummer.

I'm not sure what is more disappointing. This recent dog fence debacle or the fact that the Cavs will not get the chance to crush the Celtics in the next round of the playoffs. TOTAL BUMMER! Bubba' is bound. He can't chase birds, or traipse the garden, or scare the mailman, or hunt a lobbed tennis ball.

Why don't we let him off the leash and just watch him closely? Good question.

'Cause beagles run. Cooper has some training, but if his insatiable nose catches a scent...he's gone, baby.

Our insatiable desire to live by the law steals our freedom. Under the law we're a leashed hound dog. We're disconnected from God. Our best efforts result in us just standing around staring. Someone once said, "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" (NIV, Galatians 5:1).

Jesus gave us His Spirit to set us free from the law. Life in the Spirit sets us free to serve and love God and our neighbor (Galatians 5:13-14). But for some reason, we don't believe that God could ever love us. I witness this all the time with cafe guests and volunteers and even in my own heart. Maybe it's because we look in the mirror everyday and see how unlovely we really are. We think: If I don't love me, how could God?

I was reading last week and came across this nugget of truth, "In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself" (NIV, Ephesians 5:28). A thought occurred to me. The opposite of this must be true. If I hate my wife, I hate myself. Those moments when I do not love my wife are pieces of evidence that in my heart I really hate myself. OUCH!

I want to be free to love my wife. I want to love myself. I want to love and serve others and be loved and served by God and my neighbor. I don't want to be bound by the law that was never intended to give life in the first place. It was given to reveal our inability to keep or obey it (Romans 3:20). Obedience to the law will never set us free.

I want the law of the Spirit; the fruit of the Spirit in my life.

Are you living like a leashed beagle?