You’re going to laugh at this one. Our 3 year-old car battery warranty was surpassed by two years when it finally died today. I knew I was going to exchange it at the store, but I got distracted and forgot to bring the few simple tools I’d need to make the exchange.
Well, we get to the store without the tools to discover that it was going to be a hour-and-a-half wait for a 5 minute job. What did I do? Wait was not in my vocabulary! So we could be on our way sooner, I purchased the battery and an inexpensive set of tools to do the job that didn’t work for this particular job! Here’s the funny part,though. By the time we purchased the wrong tools and the right battery, the service bay became available to do it for us! Ugh!
I hate life lessons, don’t you? Distractions keep us from getting the right tools for each decision we have to make throughout our day. Impatience then makes us use the wrong tools to make those decisions.
Quoting just any Scriptural verse will not solve your challenges. You need the right biblical truth/tool for each job/decision. As you spend time with and in the Word, you’ll get the biblical tools you need, the wisdom to know which ones to use, and the power to implement them. As you do, you’ll experience the freedom Jesus came to bring, which in this case was spending more money for tools I didn’t need!
S“E”t Free Nowww

It’s not about how far, fast or what you do, but who you travel with. This truism came to mind when I read the following.
“This January, ESPN anchor Stuart Scott died of appendiceal cancer. Scott faced death with enough winsomeness to persuade anyone to keep fighting for life: ‘You beat cancer by how you live, why you live, and the manner in which you live. So live. Live. Fight like (crazy), and when you get too tired to fight, [lie] down and rest and let someone else fight for you.”
Pain – emotional, spiritual and physical – can make quitters out of the best of us. Yet, it doesn’t have to. This is why God lives inside every believer and why the Spirit had King Solomon write, “Two are better than one, because they have a good reward for their toil. For if they fall, one will lift up his fellow. But woe to him who is alone when he falls and has not another to lift him up!” (Ecc. 4:9-10) This is not only about marriage either!
Life is not about how long you live on this planet, but how you lived it while you were here. Did you listen to the Spirit and become a secure child through faith in Jesus and then followed Jesus in the Spirit’s power with every decision you made?
This is impossible to do alone. Who is walking this journey with you to pick you up when you get tired of the fight and want to quit? This takes vulnerability and transparency. I know that’s scary, but are you really tired of quitting?
Set Free Noww“W”

The following popped up on my computer’s start-up screen: 110 million PC users can’t be wrong. Yes they can! I purposefully bought a computer that allowed me to use an older operating system. It fit my needs and purposes much better than the newer versions.
110 million people can be wrong! My mom used to tell my brothers and me, “Just because your friends are jumping off the cliff doesn’t mean you have to follow them!” (As know-it-all smart alec kids we’d respond, “Of course we would!” Kids reading this: don’t follow this advice. It got us into further trouble then as it will you now.)
Playing the follow-the-leader game is a dangerous if the leader isn’t thinking about what’s best for each person. Playing the comparison game can be a joy stealer, discouragement bringer and depression starter because you’re comparing yourself with the wrong person!
The only person we are to compare ourselves with is Jesus. The only person’s opinion we should care about is Jesus’. The only leader we should follow is Jesus Himself. He is the only source for all we’re looking for in life today, tomorrow and into eternity.
Watch yourself today. Who are you listening to? Following? Comparing yourself with? Use your FREEdom tools to filter out everyone so you can stay focused on the only One who brings true freedom – Jesus.
Set FREE Nowww

This might not look like much, but it’s a plant breaking through the soil. I noticed it a couple of days ago and have been watching ever since. It’s so hard not to push the soil away to see what it is.
However, God doesn’t need my help to do His job. He designed the growth process for that plant. If He thought getting through the soil faster would be best, He would have designed it so.
A friend of mine recently texted, “I’m trying to let God work, but He’s so slow!” Doesn’t this sum up quite well how we all feel? We all want our struggles to cease…yesterday. We desire our God to answer this second. We want the pain, from emotional to spiritual, to end right now.
Yet, do we trust the One who designed the life change process (Set Free Nowww)? Do we believe He knows tomorrow as well as today? Do we have the faith that breaking through the hard soil of our old character, no matter how difficult that may be, will produce the fruit of Christ-like character?
It’s so easy to trust God when we’re tasting the fruit of a changed life, which makes our lives so much sweeter. Real trust, however, comes during the struggle. Real trust is when we don’t intervene in God’s process, either in our lives or in those we see struggling.
Let the Father be God who sees well down the road. Let Jesus’ finished work on the cross do its job. And let the Spirit walk us and them through that struggle to a fruit bearing Christ-like life.
Struggle well my friends by trusting the God who designed the life change process set out in Scripture. Yes, it takes time. The sweet taste of a change life is well worth the wait and struggle.
S“E”t Free Nowww

Jesus tells a parable of the seed and soil. One is rocky. The seed takes root, but it withers under the summer heat due to shallow soil. This is a wonderful picture of it. Imagine more rocks and less soil. With more rocks, where could the seed germinate, sinks its roots and then grow strong enough to withstand heat?
Life’s heat and dry times should not rattle a believer! In fact, Scripture says we should expect them. These dry and hot times should not make us wilt. Instead, they should force us to remove the rocks in our lives allowing our roots to go deeper into Jesus.
Mark 4:17 says that when this type of believer is persecuted for Jesus’ name, they do scandalous things (“are offended” KJV). Romans 9:33 even calls Jesus a “rock of offense”. What is offensive or hard for you to believe about or from Jesus that you’re unwilling to let Him change your life and drive your roots deeper to withstand persecution?
If you want to never embarrass yourself through your choices/scandalous actions, under the heat of stress, take the hard stuff Jesus is asking of you and let it take deep root into your heart through exercising that truth by faith Spirit empowered, rather than allowing it to crowd Him out.
Set Free Now“W”w