What I am trying to communicate here is what freedom means… freedom means that I am set free by a supernatural intervention of God… He delivers me from the addiction… it is not that God helps me to overcome some addiction… it is not that God gives me the strength to handle the temptation… it is not that Philip was somehow able to stop anything… it means that Jesus’ life came in and Philip’s life went out… Philip became a new creature… by a sovereign act of God in Philip’s life.
I have told the story several times about my addiction to cigarettes... 3 packs of Camels every day…. my very first experience after surrendering my life to the Lord and giving Him the right to run my life… (anyway He saw fit)… was the peace that flooded over me… that peace that passes understanding... wow… so… Philip does what Philip does… reaches for his pack of Camels… and Philip hears the voice of God for the very first time in his life…
“You never have to do that again”… Such a gentle… loving voice… I knew it wasn’t the guy sitting next to me in my car, so I looked around to the back seat. Hmmmm. Nobody was there. I say to myself… “this is really different”…. looked at the pack of cigarettes, crumpled it up and chucked it out the window. Haven’t had a cigarette since that moment.
I had experienced years of trying to quit… I had stopped for a week … or a month or two… but I was never free….. always went back… I was still addicted. This was so totally different. No desire… no withdrawal… no substitutes… just totally free.
And that is what I experienced with the other two as well… tomorrow….
🙂