What a freeing definition of freedom…….set free to become more like Jesus, with ever-increasing glory, under the controlling work of the Holy Spirit.

Driving through Nevada on our way to Montana, we encountered an interesting sign.  It was one of those big green exit signs, announcing the exit for “Independence Valley.”  Beneath it was further information, announcing,   “No services. Prison Area. Hitchhiking Prohibited.”   What a contrast, a prison in Independence Valley.   Independence, freedom from the control and influence of others,  contrasted with the regulating guards and prohibitive walls.

A great discussion flowed from that scene.   Could the unrestrained  exercise of our own independence actually become  a form of  imprisonment?   We can become prisoners of our own pursuit of independence, constrained by the category by which we define it.   If we are left to invent ourselves, we end up in the bondage of self, captives of that which we pursue for selfish independence.   Independence freely sought doubles back for a handshake with the imprisonment of an empty destination.    What the world offers for independence can be costly.  The self-imposed jail of independence is a dangerous place.  There is a better alternative, being in dependence on Christ and His Word-----there is freedom.



Can one person’s independence be prison for another?   Could independent exercise of freedom put others in bondage?  That is a dark independence valley, a terrible freedom.

 
A bright alternative exists, one which requires courage, the expression of interdependence flowing from living in dependence on Christ, grounded in the Word, in contrast to the independence of self.    Freedom from Independence Valley!