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{\b\fs48 Episode 1554: Called to Freedom\b0}

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{\b\cf1 Scott Maderer:\b0}

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{ Thanks for joining me on episode 1,554 of the Inspired Stewardship Podcast. }

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{\b\cf3 Mila Grigg:\b0}

{ I'm Mila Greg. I challenge you to invest in yourself, invest in others, develop your influence and impact the world by using your time, your talent, and your treasures to live out your calling. Having the ability to live your authentic personal brand is key, and one way to be inspired to do that is to listen to this The Inspired Stewardship podcast with my friend Scott Mader.}

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{\b\cf1 Scott Maderer:\b0}

{ We talk about sanctifying grace and the means of grace, spiritual dis disciplines, things that we are called to do to build our faith and our spirit. Those include prayer, searching, scripture, communion, fasting, and gathering in groups to }

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{ share faith and hold one another. Welcome and thank you for joining us on the Inspired Stewardship Podcast.}

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{If you truly desire to become the person who God wants you to be, then you must learn to use your time, your talent, and your treasures for your true calling. In the inspired Stewardship podcast, you will learn to invest in yourself. Invest in others and develop your influence so that you can impact the world.}

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{In today's spiritual foundation episode, I talk about Galatians chapter five, verse one and verse 13 through 25. I talk about the call to the singular command, and I also talk about the multitude of distractions that pulls us off the mark. Galatians chapter five, verse one and verse 13 through 25 says, for freedom Christ has set us free, }

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{ stand formed.}

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{Therefore, and do not submit again to the yoke of slavery for you. We're called to freedom. Brothers and sisters only. Do not use your freedom as an opportunity for self-indulgence, but through love become enslaved to one another. For the whole law is summed up in a single commandment. You shall love your neighbor as yourself.}

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{If, however, you bright and devour one another, take care that you are not consumed by one another. Live by the spirit I say, and do not gratify the desires of the flesh for what the flesh desires as opposed to the spirit and what the spirit desires as opposed to the flesh for these are opposed to each other to prevent you from doing what you want.}

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{But if you are led by the spirit, you are not subject to the law. Now, the works of the flesh are obvious. Sexual immorality, impurity, debauchery, idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, anger, quarrels, dissensions, factions, }

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{ envy, drunkenness, carousing, and things like these. I'm warning you, as I warned you before, those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.}

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{By contrast, the fruit of the spirit is love. Joy, peace, pat, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. There is no law against such things and those who belong to Christ have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. If we live by the spirit, let us also be guided by the Spirit and the us.}

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{We're very close to Independence Day. Now that I'm releasing this, or the day that we call the July 4th holiday, and we talk about freedom as something, freedom as a concept, or an abstract idea, we all talk about wanting freedom, believing in freedom, fighting for freedom, sacrificing for freedom and this is a }

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{ powerful statement, often used as a patriotic one, but also even in our personal life.}

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{That's something that we desire. I have clients that talk often about wanting freedom, the ability to do and think and be, but it does beg the question when we say freedom, what do we want freedom for? And a lot of times, of course, the initial thought is what we want. Freedom so that we could do and think and believe anything we want, except if you find yourself as a follower of Christ, does that always work?}

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{Yeah, because if our will was perfectly aligned with the will of Christ, then yes, anything we wanted to do would be what Christ wants us to do. But I don't know about you. I often recognize and fight to keep my mind and my heart and my soul aligned with the directives of Christ. We often need a little bit more }

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{ transformation, a little bit more change, a little bit more directive.}

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{What are we called to freedom for? And Paul here actually makes a list for us. In fact, he makes a couple of lists. Paul often makes lists in his passages. He puts in a list of what he's looking for or what he's not looking for. And in this case, the first list that he gives this first lift is a do not list as opposed to a do list.}

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{He lists a bunch of negatives and oftentimes it as he's listing them, I don't know about you, but as you start getting in the list it often is yeah. We get it. We get it. Sin is bad. Got it. But then he continues to list things out until hoping maybe one of these things will step on our toes instead of being the toes on the other side of the sanctuary.}

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{Yeah, there's things in there that maybe we hear and go, oh yeah, that's not a }

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{ big deal, or That's not something I do. But then if you keep going, it gets onto things like jealousy, anger, and we recognize that sin is something that we all have and all fight against. But thankfully Paul goes on and doesn't just give a list of the things that we shouldn't do, just a disapproval or stay away from list.}

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{He also lists the lists that we are to embrace the list of life, and that's one of the things that we're all looking for, right? A, a life. A life of new possibilities. A life that is ours, but not ours. It's ours in Christ. So we have another list, but it actually is a singular list. The list of negatives goes on and on.}

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{It's a list of many things of diffusion, of scattering of this and that and the other thing. But the first }

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{ list the list of singular things that's not destructive to the community but instead is fruit. Of the spirit. He doesn't actually say fruits of the spirit. He says fruit singular, because it's a singular gift, it's an attribute.}

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{It's something that we focus on and e list it as love. I. He goes on and does some descriptors to tell us what kind of love that we need. Because after all, there's love and then there's love. And Paul says that the fruit of the spirit is love, but it's the love that is joyful love that is peaceful love that brings peace to ourselves and to others.}

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{It's love that is patient and kind. It's love. That's generous. That pours out like the rain of grace that is poured down upon all of us constantly. It's a love that's faithful, that honors relationship that lifts others up, }

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{ that doesn't always ask what's in it for me. The fruit of the spirit is love that is gentle, not gentle, as in it just loves things that are soft.}

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{But gentle in that it leans down and helps those who have fallen. It holds up and hugs those that are hurting so that they are strengthened and not drained. And the fruit of the spirit of love is self-control. It means spirit controlled in a way gently is our soul entwined with Christ that it starts to become easier and easier to love a little bit more like God loves each and every day.}

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{Yet it isn't really us. That's not in us by ourselves. We can't do it by our own will, by our own strength. We cannot do it really by fighting. We have to do it by surrendering. Surrendering self }

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{ control to the spirit and being spirit controlled instead. That's the only way we can really begin to love in the right way, to turn away from all of that list of do nots and begin to focus instead on the do.}

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{Yeah, there's always work to do. There's always work on ourselves to do. There's always work to build relationship to make the earth a little bit more like the kingdom of God each and every day. And we all have our own strengths, our own tools in the Methodist religion we talk about. Sanctifying grace and the means of grace.}

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{Spiritual dis disciplines, things that we are called to do to build our faith and our spirit. Those include prayer, searching, scripture, communion, fasting, and gathering in groups }

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{ to share faith and hold one another accountable to be in community. In other words. And all of these things are things that we have to do each and every day to surrender ourselves to the spirit and become led by the spirit each and every day.}

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{Thanks for listening.}

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{Thanks so much for listening to the Inspired Stewardship Podcast. As a subscriber and listener, we challenge you to not just sit back and passively listen, but act on what you've heard and find a way to live your calling. If you enjoyed this episode, do me a favor. Go over to facebook.com/inspired stewardship.}

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{And like our Facebook page and market that you'd like to get notifications from us so that we can }

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{ connect with you on Facebook and make sure that we're serving you to the best of our abilities with time and tips there. Until next time, invest your time. Your talent and your treasures. Develop your influence and impact the world.}

}