Hello, good people, and welcome to daily

Bible refresh with doctor Brad Miller brought to

you by voice of god daily.com.

This is the podcast where we look to offer a daily reading of the

bible, the holy scriptures. We do so in a way that is understandable,

relatable, and applicable. We read the particular

verse for that is given to us from the revised common

lectionary. We're in year c, the epiphany season. We read

the particular verse of scripture that is based on today,

on this very day. And we do so in a way that

is understandable that we read it from the new testament and

from the, the message translation of the Bible.

We make it relatable because we offer you a couple of points to

ponder to think about regarding the scripture, some teaching points, and

applicable because we give you an action step. To follow, we have a

prayer and we do the whole thing in under 10 minutes. Today's

reading is from Romans 7 verses

1 through 6, reading for the message. Torn

between one way and another.

You shouldn't have any trouble understanding this, friends, for you know

all the ins and outs of the law, how it works, and

how its power touches only the living. For instance,

a wife is legally tied to her husband while he lives, but

if he dies, she's free. If she lives with another man while

her husband is living, she's obviously an adulteress. But if

he dies, she is quite free to marry another man in good

conscience with no one's disapproval.

So my friends, this is something like what has taken place

with you. When Christ died, He took that entire

rule dominated way of life down with Him and left it

in the tomb, leaving you free to marry

a resurrection life and bear offspring

of faith for God. For as long as we live

that old way of life doing whatever we thought was we felt we

could get away with, sin was calling most of the shots

as the old law code hemmed us in,

and this made us all the more rebellious. In the end, all we

had to show for it was miscarriages and stillbirths.

But now that we're no longer shackled to that dominating

dominating mate of sin and out

from under all those oppressive regulations and fine print, we're free to

live a new life in the freedom of God.

A great passage of scripture there really about breaking free, about being

liberated from legalism, religious legalism in this

case, and Paul uses the metaphor of marriage

to discuss spiritual freedom. So let's talk

about it and some points to ponder. One of them is the liberation

from from a religious control. Paul's metaphor being freed

from the law speaks to liberation from oppressive

systems, religious systems in particular. Progressive

Christianity recognizes that many have experienced spiritual

trauma through rigid religious rules and

regular and expectations. This

passage affirms freedom to break away

from harmful religious structures and embrace that which gives

freedom. Secondarily, there is

transformative relationships. Here's another point to

ponder here. Paul uses the marriage metaphor

from the in as much as there's a patriarchal

patriarchal context here in the biblical time,

And we're called here to reframe this as a

call to examine our relationships. So with

institutions and traditions and each other, the question is,

are these relationships life giving or are

they constraining? And true spiritual growth

often requires leaving behind relationships and systems

that limit authenticity and

authentic expression. A third point to

ponder is the birth of new possibilities,

the imagery of bearing offspring of faith.

I love that turn of a phrase there, suggests that liberation

creates space for new forms of spirituality

to emerge. When freed from oppressive religious

systems, we can give birth to new ways of understanding

God, community and justice

that were not possible under religious

control. Here's your action step.

Create a liberation inventory, That

is list the rules, the religious rules,

expectations, or beliefs that have caused harm in your life, or

maybe you've seen how they've caused harm to others,

or limited your own spiritual expression.

And choose one of those that you might need to release, or let go of

by some symbolic action, maybe writing it down, or praying about

it, or creating some piece of art that somehow symbolizes

that, that expresses freedom and may you may want

to share your experience of what you wrote down or what you did to

some others as some sort of a demonstration of letting

go and setting yourself free. We're gonna have a closing

prayer in just a moment. I did want you to know that we actually provide

a resource for you that I think you're going to find helpful.

It is called the ABC 123

Bible study guide. It's really designed to make Bible study,

individual Bible study, as easy as ABC 123.

You can find it at our show notes which is at our website

voice of God daily dotcom. You can

also find an archive of all the, of the

Bible refresh podcast episodes over 700,

and of course transcripts to our programs.

Let's pray. God,

you are a divine source of freedom and help us recognize

where religious rules have replaced loving relationships with

you. Give us courage to break free from systems that have

caused trauma in your name. Guide us in birthing new

ways of being faithful, that honor authenticity and justice.

When old patterns try to reclaim us, remind us of our freedom and

love, may we create communities of liberation where all can

flourish and grow, free from the weight of religious shame.

Thank you for walking with us as we learn to

live in your freedom. Well,

it's been a joy to be with you here on daily bible refresh. My name

is doctor Brad Miller. Love being with you. I'll be with you tomorrow

morning. We often we usually drop our episodes before 6

AM EST. We hope that you'll join us and be with

us here at voice of god daily.com and

invite someone else in your world to join us here as we reflect on

the scriptures every day in a way that is

relatable and understandable and is applicable.

Until next time, remember that God's loyal love doesn't run out. His

merciful love hasn't dried up. It's created

new every morning.