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Freedom! Welcome to Living Influence. I tell you what, this is one of my topics that I love. Galatians 5.13 For you were called to freedom, brothers. Only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another. Amen.

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As I read that, I think, now, why does Paul say, only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh? And it's because we're really free. Amen. And so this I can that we've been talking about, it really fits. It really matters. We are free. And because we're free, let's live life. Let's enjoy life. You know, the kids or the guys in the class, the young people in the class of teaching grace, and they go, well,

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You mean I don't have to do anything? That's their response because everything they've been doing has been trying to stop sinning. Exactly. And it's like, well, no, actually, you just get to begin to live life by loving, by living, by enjoying the gifts God gives us. Beautiful. Freedom is a fun concept. To me, freedom is where we begin to risk.

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When we begin to risk trusting what God says is true about us and we act in freedom, that's where we discover he has changed our heart. Amen. Well said. Amen. Amen. So where would you take this, Bill, from there? Thank you. I guess it just causes me. I kind of use my hands, but it kind of causes me to ask something. The question I ask is, am I experiencing freedom or do I?

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function from a position of bondage. Do I do that? Yeah. Now, if I'm experiencing freedom, it's because something's true about me. Right. I no longer feel condemned.

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Yeah. In our last episode, I talked about a guy being in jail. He knows he's in bondage. He's in jail. Well, let's say he gets out of jail. He's free. He no longer has to live in jail. Now, there's a statistic on how true it is, but I think 70% or 80% of all inmates return to jail. It's such an ugly picture. But you know what? We return to shame because it's familiar. But what if I could begin to trust who God says I am

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and what Jesus has done for me. So I wanna review that with us. How much am I convinced Jesus is capable of doing for my benefit? Am I really convinced that he took upon him my shame? Is that true in me? Or is it because it's so familiar to me that I keep returning to it? Or is there a new way for me to see who my reality is?

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What if I began, you've said this a couple times, Scott, what if I began to actually live out of who he says I am? That would be freedom. What if, gosh, without having to practice it, it was a natural thing for me to act with love toward others? There's a freedom in that. Yeah. A huge freedom in that. What if I began to imagine that?

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that God actually chose Bill Thrall for eternal purposes. What if I believe that? You know, if I believe that there's a freedom in that. You know, there's a lightness to life. There is, I like that. There's a lightness to life. I became a Christian when I was 17, and I'll never forget sitting at my brother's couch in Wisconsin, Milwaukee, and praying a prayer, a 17-year-old young person's prayer. But I remember my prayer.

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was almost this verbatim. I'm inviting the God of the universe into my heart. It must make a difference.

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when I was 19 I had this almost profound sense I was at bible college at the time a profound sense of a meeting with God in which I had I left that meeting with just a profound sense of destiny I got in touch with what I believed was the possibilities of God for me could I say to all of us

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Wouldn't it be a wonderful way to break the bondage of this nonsense if we had the freedom to say to our God, would you begin to reveal to me the possibilities that you have for my life? See, when you're in bondage, there's no possibilities. You just want a way out. You don't think beyond that. But what if the way out's already been provided? What if I now got to live into the possibilities of God for me?

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and living into the possibilities of God for me has given me an incredible freedom. Yeah. You know, it's interesting. One of the freedoms it gave me, almost as a side gift, but a freedom it gave me is it gave me a focus. And for many years, that focus has given me the freedom to say no to a lot of stuff because it doesn't fit the purpose that God has for me.

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That's, you can't believe how freeing that is. Just the freedom to say no. Just the freedom to say no. Imagine God designed us to not only declare this to true about us, but to give us the ability to live in it by trusting him with it. And then we read that earlier about Ephesians, but what if my heart really believed that,

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that because of now who I am in Christ, I can, listen carefully, I can honor the Lord by living into who he says I am. Wait, wait, wait, wait, what? You can honor the Lord

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By living into who he says you are. Absolutely. Teasingly, I call a theology, a worm theology. Lots of Christians are trapped in it. It's like, woe is me. There's nothing good about me. Oh, God can't use me. That's all garbage.

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That's not who you are. That's garbage. That's made up theology. That's what man wants you to think about you. That's not what God thinks about you. God has some amazing value in you, and he's given you the ability to can, to do it. Beyond anything, beyond anything I could have ever dreamt, I have experienced amazing value

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the purposes of God in me. And God's done things, taken me places, I've met with people, et cetera, et cetera. Now, last time we were together, I made a statement and I wanna repeat it right now. When I see myself in my shame, it's because I'm convinced my heart is evil. But what if your heart were new?

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And in a new heart, you could see yourself clearly, see God clearly, and trust God with who you are. That's what I think of Baltimore, when you asked me that. That's what triggers in me, all of the things triggered in me.

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One of my favorite books, and I've told you both this many times, that you wrote, it's called The Ascent of a Leader. Yes. I love that concept because at the end, it's about stepping into the purposes God has for you. Absolutely. Destiny. Absolutely. As an idealist, just who I am, my personality, I'm always craving meaning. Yes. And purpose and God's purpose and the freedom that comes from that. This image has been in my mind the last few minutes of the lion who's in the cage, right, at the zoo or whatever. Yes.

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finally released, like the shackles are off, the doors open, and he stays. Yeah. He just stays because that's what he's comfortable with. That's what he knows. That's what's familiar. That's what's familiar. He may go check it out. He's like, no, I'm going to go back. I want to step out of that cage. Amen. And then you have that. Then it's endless. Yeah. The purposes of God...

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are vast and endless and full of meaning. Absolutely. And then what you were just saying too, and then he gets to just take your giftedness and focus you. Amen. But it starts with that saying yes to freedom. Amen. I love that. I love that imagery. And the amazing thing is when you're in bondage, you're always working.

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On trying to be better. Yeah. You know, that's, that's the bondage you're in. Right. Is I'm always working on trying to be better because I'm always working on trying to be better. Any thought that I have, I have to think about, I have to analyze. Is it right? Is it right? Yeah. It truly slows me down. It keeps me from making decisions. And when I'm in freedom, I,

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I just make decisions. Well, you've said this so well. It's like if the Holy Spirit lives inside me. Yeah.

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shouldn't I just start with the assumption God is talking to me? Yeah. It's his thoughts. If I'm having this thought, what if it's God's? And maybe I should act on it. And so for me, to the person that says, well, with grace, what do you mean? And what do I do? Is there anything for me to do? And it's like, oh, my gosh, there's going to be more for you to do than you could imagine because you're going to step into what God has for you. That's going to come with grace.

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Well, maybe you should do this. And so you act on that. And it brings the joy of the Lord as your strength. You're talking about the energy that you can have when you have freedom. It's so much more than when you're trying to self-generate it. Think of the early church. The person who asked, well, what would I do? Yeah.

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Well, here's something for you to be challenged with. I'll tell you, with your church, they changed the world. Do you want something to do? Why don't you try that? No, I want to work on something as, what, as minor as the sin you do? Wait a minute. You've got the perspective all screwed up. That's a little thing. Why don't you turn out to here and look at this world out here. God wants you to be a vehicle in his hands to change the world. That's what they believed. And there's another area that...

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It's just as significant because it fuels you. So I read your book, The Cure, probably in 2009.

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And I started teaching the book. I started using it, my men's group, like I've talked about before and whatnot. And so then at one point, I started to engage with your website. And then you had a class that you could take on your website. I took that and then I took it a couple of times. And then the people that were running that portion of that website invited me to be a facilitator. And then lo and behold, I'm in Phoenix and I meet you and John for the first time.

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And oh my gosh, what am I going to say to these people that are like my heroes? And I'm fumbling on my words and I don't, you probably don't even remember it, but I'm like trying to say something witty and good. So they're going to, and I just remember all of that stress from wanting to perform well. I was reminded of that like three months ago, we were doing some podcasts in Phoenix and I went to dinner with you and Grace and John and Stacy.

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And I just was, it was just so comfortable. Wow. I wasn't worried about what I was going to say. Read illustration. I was just enjoying what was being said. Amen. I wasn't worried if it was being said by me or by John or who, you know, I wasn't worried if I was in the conversation or listening. I was just enjoying it. And so this, it's this life.

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that this faith can bring to you. Amen. When you can let, stop performing. That you can enjoy. You can enjoy, yeah. So thank you, Scott. That's really, really helpful. I want everybody to know that these two guys spend a lot of time together. You know what we enjoy? I know you want to think, well, we just, all we do when we're together is we just talk about Jesus. Well, actually, sorry to disappoint you, but we actually played Jim Remy a lot.

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We've been playing Jeremy Freed. We have a running total. Unfortunately, he's 2,000 points ahead of me, but we do that. You know why we do that? It's 2,600. Okay, excuse me, 2,600 points. Do you know why we do that? Because we enjoy life. We fish together. We're going to go fishing this year, way up in Alaska. We're going to have a wonderful time.

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What are you guys talking about? I thought you were godly men. You mean you guys have the freedom to go fishing? Oh, my gosh. And we're getting Voldemort to play golf. Yes, we're getting Voldemort to play golf. Watch out. Watch out. I'm coming. He's going to be good. He's not good yet, but he's going to be. Oh, he's such a good athlete. He's going to be beating us. I know. I know. It's going to be bad. That's it. I like that. Yeah. The reality is that is life.

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Yeah, we're doing. We're enjoying the freedom we have in Christ because we have the freedom to do things we like. It's like, could we just break the bondage of stereotyping godliness and let godliness be the freedom of who we are? Yeah. For freedom, Christ has set us free. Amen.

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Stand firm and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery. Amen. Amen and amen. We appreciate you joining us. I'm going to remind you to subscribe, to share this podcast with others. But we're really happy that you're here. Thanks. Thank you.

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Thank you for listening to the podcast. We're really glad that you're here. We'd love to know that you're here. And so if you could leave a comment, we would appreciate that. But more importantly, if you know someone that should listen to this or hear it, we would love for you to share it with them. Thanks again.