I’ve recently been celebrating a special birthday, and some friends decorated our house with lovely gold and cream helium balloons including a huge pair of golden numbers. They lasted an amazingly long time but last week I noticed them going down, so I tied them to a garden chair outside to enjoy their last bit of floaty life. It was a breezy day and I found it quite surreal to catch sight of them every now and again ‘dancing’ before the kitchen window, the breeze tossing them this way and that. The ties of the 2 huge numbers became entangled and they looked strangely intimate, clasped together as they whirled, fell and rose again.
I was watching them closely, fascinated by both their entanglement and their pull to be free. I found myself thinking, ‘I am a bit like those balloons, I long to rise up and soar into the fullness of all that God has made me to be, but so many things restrict or even shackle me. I may rise up in worship but am soon pulled down again. I repent of a certain way of thinking or acting, exulting in the joy of God’s forgiveness and the certainty of a new beginning, but then a negative word cuts me down.
I left my balloons outside overnight and the next day something amazing happened. Our pastor and his wife came to help us with a garden job and brought their young grandchildren with them. While they were playing, the weights securing the balloons were released and one by one they rose up, danced a little then seeming to discover a new strength, soared up into the clouds, the two big gold numbers still clasped together. They hovered by the treetops then zoomed away, rolling with exhilaration at their freedom. It reminded me of when Jesus told us: ‘If the Son sets you free you, will be free indeed.’ (John 8:36)
We can try endlessly to be free from life’s shackles, but like the child removing the weights from those balloons, only Jesus can take away the weights that pull us down. The guilt, the fear, other’s control, the hurts of the past, the apathy of the present. He carried all these on the cross to buy us the freedom we could never find for ourselves.
I found myself mesmerised by the sight of those weakened, tethered balloons rising freely and gloriously through the sky. There was a beauty and majesty about them that made my heart cry. I prayed ‘O Lord I long for that to be me!’ And I sensed Him whispering in my heart, ‘it is you! I’ve done it for you. You just need to rise up into what is already yours!’
I found that very profound. It is awesome to think that because of Jesus I can soar away from my shackles and dance in heavenly places.
I pray you will be know that joy too and begin to discover the wonder of the freedom Jesus bought for you.
Rise up in lightness and freedom. Soar high in glory with Jesus.
