Live In The Freedom God Has For You | 30 Days To Becoming A Woman Of Prayer by Stormie Omartian

Live In The Freedom God Has For You

Finding the freedom God has for you means separating yourself from anything that separates you from God. It means getting free of whatever holds you back from becoming all He made you to be. It also means being liberated from anything that keeps you from moving into all God has planned for your life.

Living in freedom involves receiving deliverance from such things as anxiety, fear, addictions, depression, obsessive behavior, bad attitudes, and the traps and consequences of sin. We are all walking on a narrow path, longside which are dangerous traps we can fall into. We can be deceived and get off the path by buying into lies the enemy throws our way, and end up living with things from which God wants us to be free. Sometimes we have lived so long with certain habits, thoughts, and feelings that we accept those things as us. We think, This is just the way I am or This is how life is. We don’t realize that those are things from which we can be liberated.

God wants to transform us all from the inside out. That’s why Jesus came as the Deliverer. He didn’t come as the precursor to FedEx. He came as the curser of evil, from which He wants to deliver anyone who receives Him as Savior.

What Is Deliverance?

Deliverance is the cutting hose from anything that controls you other than God. If anything in your life has control over you—such as an eating disorder, addictions of any kind, compulsive behavior, fear, or

gripping negative emotions—you need to be free of that because it is hindering all God wants to do in you. (More about that in chapter 19, “Refuse Negative Emotions.”)

Deliverance releases you to become who you really are—it doesn’t change you into something else. When you receive deliverance from the Lord, you won’t say, “I don’t know who I am anymore.” You’ll say, “Now I know who I really am.” You will not lose yourself; you will find yourself. And you will like what you see. What God made you to be is good, because He desires that you become more like Him and He is good.

Deliverance sets us free from anything negative in our past that still has influence into our lives. If you have any memories from the past that have a negative effect on your life now, you need to be delivered from them. Even a cruel or insensitive word spoken to you yesterday that makes you feel bad today means you need to be set free from it. God wants you to be liberated from anything that keeps you from moving into all He has for you.

Deliverance was a regular part of Jesus’ ministry. When Jesus said, “All things are possible to Him who believes,” He was specifically talking about being delivered from evil spirits (Mark 9:23). But deliverance is not limited to that. We often need to be set free from our own bad habits of thought and action. If there wasn’t a need for deliverance, why would Jesus have come as the Deliverer? And why did He set so many people free and tell others that they would be able to do the same or even greater things?

Deliverance happens in many ways. You can find deliverance and freedom in prayer. You can also find it in the presence of God when you are in worship. Deliverance can happen as you are reading the Word of God and He opens your eyes to see His truth about your situation. It can occur when someone prays for you. It can also manifest during or after a time of fasting and prayer.

I found freedom from depression and anxiety after fasting for three days and being prayed for by others. I have found freedom from fear

after reading God’s Word every time I felt afraid. I have found freedom from obsessive thought patterns, negative emotions, and a bad attitude while I was in a time of worship and praise. I have been set free from bad eating habits involving a preoccupation with specific foods—such as sugar, which is like a poison for me—as I fasted and prayed. I have been set free from temptation, which I knew was a trap of the enemy to destroy me, by going into my prayer closet and laying prostrate on the floor before the Lord and praying that He would break that assignment from hell.

I have been set free from unforgiveness so many times over the years I can’t begin to count them. God always wants us free from that debilitating thought process. Unless we live as a recluse and have no interaction with anyone else, there will periodically be someone we need to forgive for something. The moment you detect unforgiveness in your heart, know that God is waiting to set you free from it.

How Do We Find Freedom?

It is important to remember that even though we are not specifically choosing the enemy’s path, we can still end up on that path if we are not intentionally and deliberately choosing the will of God.

For that reason, in order to find freedom you must choose to confess each sin, to pray about and reject each temptation, to bring concerns to God before they get out of control, and to ask God to deliver you from any stronghold the enemy is trying to erect in your life. Ask God to wash you clean with the flow of His Spirit, so that there is nothing in your mind and soul that is polluting. Ask Him to help you stay in His perfect will in all you do.

Far too often we are living with things we shouldn’t. When you have anger that is hard to control or bad habits you cannot break, or you can’t stop from thinking about something negative that has happened or something you fear might happen, you must go to the Lord and ask Him to set you free. If you are unable to forgive someone, or you feel distant from God, can’t make decisions, or find it too hard to do

constructive things, then you need deliverance. Don’t live with these conditions, because Jesus paid the price for you to be free of them. Choose to do whatever is necessary in order to be liberated.

Choose To Obey God’s Laws

You can become burdened by bondage if you continually allow yourself to disobey God. Choosing to live God’s way can set you free.

Choose To Have A Clean Heart

During times of great disappointment, tragedy, or trauma, when negative emotions such as anger, fear, hatred, or unforgiveness go un-confessed, your heart can be gripped by emotions that are not God’s will for your life. Bring all that to God and ask Him to set you free from it.

Choose To Cry Out To The Lord For Freedom

God is always waiting for us to come to Him, so we can be set free from anything that keeps us from becoming more like Him. To the children of Israel in bondage in Egypt, God said He saw their oppression, heard their cry, and knew their sorrows, so He came to deliver them (Exodus 3:7-8). He will do the same for you.

Choose To Praise God For Who He Is And What He Has Done

One of the ways we can find freedom and deliverance is to praise God in the midst of our imprisonment. When the apostle Paul was imprisoned, he didn’t grumble and complain. Instead, he prayed and lifted up praise to God. “At midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the prisoners were listening to them. Suddenly there was a great earthquake, so that the foundations of the

prison were shaken; and immediately all the doors were opened and everyone’s chains were loosed” (Acts 16:25-26). Praise opened the prison doors and broke the chains that bound the prisoners. Praise will do that for you today. Praise invites God’s presence, and in His presence you will always find liberty.

Choose To Have Faith That Brings Down Strongholds

Having faith in God and His Word is powerful enough to bring down strongholds in your life. “They cried to You, and were delivered; they trusted in You, and were not ashamed” (Psalm 22:5). You can be set free simply by standing on faith in God’s Word.

If you have something in your life from which you would like to be free, remember that the power of God—the power of the Holy Spirit in you—is greater than anything you are facing. “He who is in you is greater than he who is in the world” (1 John 4:4). The power of God is far greater than the power of the enemy. Speak to whatever you are struggling with and say, “I will not be controlled by this because God is in control of my life and I submit and surrender to Him.”

Don’t become discouraged if you feel that you are never going to get completely free of something. Freedom is often a process. There may be many layers to get through. Whether it is a new level of freedom you need, or freedom from the same old thing coming up again, the Bible says that God will continue to deliver you as long as your heart is open to Him working in your life (2 Corinthians 1:10).

If He is not giving up on you, then you shouldn’t either.

Prayer Power

Lord, I thank You that You are “my fortress, my high tower and my deliverer, my shield and the One in whom I take refuge” (Psalm 144:2). Thank You that “You have delivered my soul from death,” and have “kept my feet from falling,” so that I may walk before You (Psalm 56:13).

Lord, show me anything from which I need to be set free. Reveal whatever I am not seeing. I don’t want to be living with something from which You already paid the price for me to be liberated. I pray that You “will deliver me from every evil work and preserve me” for Your kingdom (2 Timothy 4:18). Bring me “out of the house of bondage” (Exodus 20:2). “O God, do not be far from me; O my God, make haste to help me!” (Psalm 71:12). “You are my help and my deliverer; do not delay, O my God” (Psalm 40:17).

I see that the forces rising up against Your believers are powerful, but I know You are far more powerful than they are. I cry out to You to liberate us from the enemy who tries to put us into bondage. I thank You that You will answer by setting us free (Psalm 118:5). Thank You that You will never give up on us but will continue to deliver us (2 Corinthians 1:9-10).

Thank You, Lord, that You will deliver me from all evil and be with me in trouble. To You be glory forever and ever.

In Jesus’ name I pray.

Word Power

You are my hiding place; You shall preserve me from trouble; You shall surround me with songs of deliverance.
Psalm 32:7

Stand fast therefore in the liberty by which Christ has made us free, and do not be entangled again with a yoke of bondage.

Galatians 5:1

The righteous cry out, and the Lord hears, and delivers them out of all their troubles.
Psalm34:17

Yes, we had the sentence of death in ourselves, that we should not trust in ourselves but in God who raises the dead, who delivered us from so great a death, and does deliver us; in whom we trust that He will still deliver us. 2 Corinthians 1:9-10

He shall call upon Me, and I will answer him; I will be with him in trouble; I will deliver him and honor him.
With long life I will satisfy him, and show him My salvation. Psalm 91:15-16