Getting To Know The Real Youনমুনা

Remember how it felt the first time you didn’t have to ask your parents for a ride? To be able to start the car and drive yourself is freeing! A driver’s license gives us all the privileges and responsibilities of other drivers on the road. We have the freedom to get behind the wheel, and with it, we have a responsibility to pay attention to the road and obey traffic laws. A similar thing happens when we become Christians. We gain all the privileges and responsibilities of a child in God’s family. One of those privileges is life with the Holy Spirit. Before Jesus, we were stuck in our sin. (Kinda like the way you were stuck at home before you could drive.) But when we gave our lives to Jesus, He freed us from sin and from an old religious system. Instead, He gave us the Holy Spirit as a guide so we’d never become enslaved to anything again. Galatians 5:13 says, “You, my brothers and sisters, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the flesh; rather, serve one another humbly in love.” Freedom from our old self is the freedom to be our new self. We discover who God made us to be, not from doing what we’ve always done, but from listening to the Holy Spirit and following His lead. Reflect : * Think about who you were before you gave your life to Jesus. What has He freed you from? * How has your life changed as you’ve listened to the Holy Spirit and followed His lead? * Read all of Galatians 5 in a translation that’s easy to understand. (The NLT, MSG, or NIV are all good places to start.) Do you feel like you’re living in the freedom of following the Holy Spirit? Why or why not?