Lately I have been reading a historical fiction about the civil war. It has me looking at the war in a different light. I am not sure if it because I am seeing the complex issues through adult eyes, or if it simply being drawn in to the hypothetical lives of people enduring the daily details of war. The south was crying freedom and states’ rights and channeling the same spirit that gave America its freedom in the first place. Yet the country was divided and the north saw it as a war over the ability to own people.
Then I start thinking about the way the country began. The men of the time had to decide that risking their lives as well as their way of life to have the freedom to govern themselves. They were in a new land that was—compared to England—vastly underdeveloped. Much of the goods that they enjoyed came from “across the pond.” I imagine there were many people who were willing to compromise their desire to self-govern in order to keep the tea coming. We don’t talk about those people much, but I imagine they existed. However, the majority felt the temporary cost of comfort was worth the eventual reward of freedom. They loved freedom more than comfort.
Do we? As a nation now, do we value freedom over comfort? Do we value anything more than comfort?
I can’t help but think of the movie WALL-E. The people were left to their own demise and then transported off the planet while they were lulled into a sedentary lifestyle by the comfort of technology. Their comfort was the top priority.
Even in my walk with God, I struggle with the beckoning call to comfort. With growth comes pruning and refinement. The process is painful at times, but the end result is worth it—every time. As I am invited into a new season of growth, I must lay comfort down. I have to love freedom in Christ and growth more than I love comfort.
Comfort is a seductive monster that will quietly lull you to sleep and then steal your freedom.
I still believe we live in one of the greatest nations in the world. We enjoy more freedom than we realize. Our nation is full of people that truly have no idea how good we have it. I don’t even think that I know how blessed we are as a nation. I have not traveled much and am still waiting my first mission-trip opportunity. I know it is going to wreck me. I pray that God can wreck me even before that. I don’t want to take my freedom for granted. On this Independence Day, ask God what new way you can express your freedom for Him. Ask Him why you were born in this country and in this time in history. The answer to both of those is intentional. We are all born intentionally in time and place. Ask. Seek. Knock.