It’s FiveMinuteFriday on this 4th of July! I find myself in a foreign country celebrating the birth of the United States of America. Yet, I am happy. Happy that I have this opportunity to interact with precious people on another part of this planet, and happy just that I am alive, breathing, and FREE. That, my friends, is much to be thankful for! Today’s word prompt is EXHALE.

Go!

“I know too well my weakness, that our only hope is in God.” ~Robert E. Lee

Every single day we choose what we will breathe in: Anxiety, depression, fear, anticipation, happiness, joy, love, hatred, judgment, gossip, liberty…and the list goes on and on and on…

What if we exhaled, breathed out, some things in our lives that are weighing us down?

What if today, this day of FREEDOM we got rid of some heavy weights?

Paul said it like this, “Therefore we also, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, 2 looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher ofour faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.” Hebrews 12:1-2.

Look at another version,“… let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles.” (NIV)

Let’s lay aside, throw off, EXHALE those things that would hinder us, ENSNARE us, trip us up along the way!

Do we truly have time for the “nit-picky” things of life? The judging, the backbiting, the tear-each-other-apart, fault-finding and negativity lifestyle that we breathe in day after day will weigh us down, get us off track and could even cause us to lose our way.

But if we realize the FREEDOM we have in Christ Jesus, if we ever really understand what He has done for us, we would breathe out those things that hinder and start breathing in the love of Christ that will set us FREE and KEEP us FREE!

“For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death.”       Romans 8:2.

Free. Free from the weight, the worry and the sin.

Today let us celebrate the freedom of this great nation by laying aside some weights. By breathing in the good things of God and breathing out those things that would hinder us from accomplishing His will.

Stop.

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