My friends and family in the United States just celebrated the Fourth of July last week. I love the way my little home town of Inwood, Iowa celebrates this holiday with its small town parade, games and lunch with neighbors in the park, the demolition derby (go ahead, laugh), and their great annual fireworks display. Americans love freedom, and the Fourth of July is a great time to celebrate the freedom that our nation enjoys. I was thinking recently of a different type of freedom, though - the freedom I am longing for so many to experience here in Cambodia, the freedom that we who have trusted in Christ get a taste of here, but will fully experience at the end of time when Jesus returns and makes everything new. While we wait for that day, we have the incredible opportunity to participate in demonstrating for this hurting, enslaved world glimpses of what that freedom looks like. What a privilege it is to partner with Jesus to "loose the chains of injustice" and to "set the oppressed free" (Isaiah 58:6). I was thinking back to a chapel at DTS where guest speaker, Michael Frost, spoke about creating "little foretastes of the Kingdom." It was a memorable message anyway, but had an even bigger impact on me because the example he gave was of a young Cambodian pastor who responded to God's call by proclaiming His kingdom in action as well as in words within a slum community outside of Phnom Penh. It is a beautiful testimony to the amazing things God can do through our willingness to be His agents of freedom. It was refreshing for me to listen to it again because it can be so easy to get discouraged by "the system." How could anything I do be more than just a drop in the bucket within an endless sea of need? But there are stories everywhere of how one life committed to the purposes of God can make an enormous difference, and the story of Abraham Heng as told by Mike Frost is one such story.
"Live as free men, but do not use your freedom as a cover-up for evil; live as servants of God." 1 Peter 2:16
I hope that you will listen to this message and be encouraged to use your precious freedom to fashion little foretastes of the Kingdom for those whom God loves, those whom He desires to live in freedom as well.
If you'd like to hear the edited (i.e. shorter) audio version of this chapel message click here.
If you want to see the unedited video of this chapel message click here.
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