Daily Radio Bible - April 2nd, 22

 You're are Loved. You are Free.  You are His

We are reading Judges 17-18, Psalm 89, and II Corinthians 3.  We are reading from the New Living Translation.

Paul compares our life to a letter.  It’s a new letter.  God has written us a new letter and has imprinted it on our hearts.  God’s old letter, the Law, could not be transferred to our hearts.  That old letter was good. Paul says that it was glorious!  But it’s glory pales in comparison to this new letter that God is writing on our hearts.  The old was meant to pass away.  The old letter was temporary until the new letter arrived.  And this new letter was not written on tablets of stone with human hands.  It was written by God, through his spirit, onto our hearts.  And this Spirit-written letter sets us free!  How about that!?

You are loved. You are free. You are His.

The new letter of your life reads this:  You are loved. You are free. You are His.  Paul wants you to know the contents of this new letter.  Your identity is found in this letter.  And, oh, how we need to know its contents well!  People have been trying to write their own life letter since the beginning of time.  Like Micah, who we read about today.  Those were the days when everyone did what was right in their own eyes.  And those days have never ended. They continue on even to this day.  Micah and his mother had an idol, an image, an ephod, and an altar, all crafted and written, as it were, with their own hands.  It was all about them.  These things really had nothing to do with God.  They even had their own priest, their own Levite, someone to help tell their own story.

And this story gets lived out time and time again.  All through history men and women have been trying to write their own letter, apart from God.  But it never really works.  It never really satisfies.  It never really sets us free and it never really gives us the life we long for.  No matter how we try, that letter proves incapable of bringing any change to our lives.  It doesn’t set us free.  In fact, it seems to bind us up even more.  It makes things even more complicated. We find ourselves exhausted, discouraged and lost when we make the letter all about us. But God’s letter is written on our heart.  And it gives us confidence before God.  The confidence doesn’t come from our own virtue and strength.  The confidence rests on the person of Christ – his virtue and his strength.  His spirit living in and through us.  It is Christ in us that makes our lives a living letter, not a dead letter.  And that letter is to proclaim life, freedom and joy into this broken world.

Receiving His Letter is the way out of the trap of our own hand-written letters, that serve us so poorly. Receive this handwritten letter from God, transferred onto your heart.  It sets you free and makes you new. Proclaim to the world that there is love and hope and freedom in Christ.   This is your way forward from the way of the Law, the old covenant letter, that couldn’t set you free.  The new letter is the Gospel, and it’s hand-written on each human heart that says ‘Yes!’ and surrenders their life to Him.  Live in the light of this letter written on your heart, and find your freedom in Christ.

You are loved!