A Journey of Breaking Free

Topic : A Journey of Breaking Free

Text : Galatians 5:1-15; Romans 6:1-14

28 January 2018

The pastoral team and church leadership are inviting everyone to a journey together - the Discipleship Journey.  In life, especially in our Christian faith journey, we don’t need to know everything before attempting something new, we don’t need to be an expert before serving in a ministry, it’s a journey of faith, a journey of learning to give room for God to act, for Him to lead and for us to trust and follow.

Pastor Edmund Chan, in his book “Radical Discipleship” talked about “The Five Defining Questions”. Eg. on the topic of “Breaking Free” :

Q1. Why is breaking free so important for Christianity?

Q2. If it is so important, why is it so neglected?

Q3. What is breaking free all about?

Q4. What makes breaking free so difficult?

Q5. How can it best be accomplished?

Breaking Free is important for Christians because that is the main ministry of our Messiah, the main reason why Jesus was sent to us. To proclaim good news to the poor. “He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to set the oppressed free.” (Luke 4:18-19; Gal. 5:1)

Jesus’ work is finished on the cross, He was crucified, died, buried and resurrected. But we did not die to many of the sins in our life, especially in our mind set, that is why as Christians we are still bound in many ways and have not experience the total freedom in Christ.  (John 19:28-30; Romans 6:1-7)

A journey of Breaking Free requires our _______

* Repentance – metanoia (Greek) – change of mind. Changing the way we view or do things, from our way to God’s way (according to the teaching of the truth.)
* Rekon dead to sin (Romans 6:11-14)

EDWJ – 7 Jan “Finding our way back”

Sin is pushing God out of the place He has reserved for Himself. It is something that move us away from dependence on Him. To restore our relationship with Him we must repent.

* Resurrection

To experience resurrection, we must go through the process of “Crucifying, dying. Burying”, and God will bring about the resurrection in us.  Such process is known as sanctification & transformation.  Transformation is not changing from one person to another, but rather bringing to life (revive) what was dead in us due to sin.

Conclusion :

A journey of breaking free begins with repentance. Repentance is the path that leads to life. As we make progress in our movement towards God, sin gets pushed out of the way, ongoing process of sanctification and transformation sets in.

Questions :

1. Jesus said “It is finished.” Share the implication of these words to you.

2. What are some of your struggles, concern or fear in “dying” to sin? If the above mentioned is not a struggle, concern or fear for you, share how you overcome such thoughts?

3. Self-sufficiency is idolatry, an underlying sin of trusting in yourself and bypasses the divine. How much are you trusting God or yourself in life? How would you like your CG to help you in breaking free from such sin?