Note: Bits of Wisdom posts are normally posts taken from my social media accounts and placed here to reference back to easily. Click on the “Bits of Wisdom” tag to read more.
Earlier this week I read a post that said that the word of God should be oppressive to your flesh. We do this often—the church. We use words to try and make a point about an individual belief that we have. In doing so, we use wrong terms, or, the exact terms we believe. Often times it’s hard to tell from the outside.
Friends, let me assure you, the word of God should not oppress you. The character of God is outside of oppression. The Bible says in 2 Timothy that “all Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.” The key words there—in righteousness, and equipped for every good work.
The term oppression means this—prolonged cruel or unjust treatment or control. If you do not know God fully, then you may absolutely believe that scripture is oppressive. But if you know God fully, you’d know that He never forces Himself on you, and that salvation is a gift, not a process of control or unjust treatment. In fact, God is the opposite of unjust treatment—He is a very just God.
In 2 Corinthians we are told that where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. Freedom doesn’t come from nations or people. Freedom was, and has always been, a gift from God. Oppression is the way of the oppressor, who is not God.
Church—we absolutely have to be mindful of our words and our actions, and mostly our personal convictions and personal beliefs. Often times when someone states a statement like this, it means that they themselves feel oppressed by scripture, or a portion of it. If this is the case, I would challenge you to consider that maybe your interpretation of the scripture is not, in fact, Biblical at all, but a doctrine or mindset that is of the oppressor, not the Liberator. The oppressor (Satan and the world) condemns, the Liberator (God) convicts. There’s a very real difference.
Be careful with your words…the world is watching.
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