And you shall remember and thoughtfully consider that you were once a slave in the land of Egypt, and the Lord your God redeemed you.  Deuteronomy 15:15

Steve Brown, in his book A SCANDALOUS FREEDOM, tells this story.

Abraham Lincoln went to a slave market.  He noted a young, beautiful African American woman being auctioned off to the highest offer.  He bid on her and won. He could see the anger in the young woman’s eyes and could imagine what she was thinking, ‘Another white man will buy me, use me, and then discard me.’

As Lincoln walked off with his ‘property,’ he turned to the woman and said, ‘You’re free.’  

‘Yeah.  What does that mean?’ she replied.  

‘It means that you’re free,’ he said.   

‘Does it mean,’ the young woman said hesitantly, ‘that I can go wherever I want to go?’  

‘Yes, it means you are free, and you can go wherever you want to go.’

‘Then, sir,’ said the woman with tears in her eyes, ‘I think I’ll go with you.’

Though she had been declared free, and though she sensed that she could trust her rescuer, she would have the mindset of a slave for years to come.  It would take years for her to process the freedom she was granted.  She would struggle to understand respect.  She would think twice before going in a restaurant or into a store to purchase goods.  

So it is with sanctification.  We each come with the baggage of our stories.  At our spiritual birth, the Good News of the Gospel changed everything.  We were declared innocent because of the blood of Jesus.  We were adopted out of darkness.  Yet the vestiges of slavery still haunt us.  

Every day, God must work in the unseen parts of us—the places where we still question whether Jesus’s love is as unconditional as He says it is. We are skeptics and accusers of the One who loves perfectly. We are afraid of the dark and insist on walking alone, while not understanding that God goes with us around every corner and on every detour.  

Jehovah Mekaddishkem woos us to keep trusting and keep believing until every part of our scared hearts are won over by a Gospel that is ‘so good it must be true.’  

You sanctify me in all the messy places of my heart.  You untangle the webs that still hold me captive.  This doctrine is very personal, and I’m in awe of how you love me.  Amen