The Treasure of Freedom!

     Freedom! A treasure we stop to celebrate each year on the Fourth of July. Our freedom may not be tangible, we can't hold it in our hand, but it's reality effects every facet of the lives we live. It is something so precious, people are willing to sacrifice their personal comfort - even their lives, that it may continue to exist in our country. Thanks to the men and women in our military who make these great sacrifices!

Trifari Enamel & Rhinestone Brooch

     In December of 1941 my grandfather reported to his ship and spent the years of World War II in the South Pacific. He was newly widowed, with a baby daughter - my mother- to care for. She was left with a family friend while he went off to serve his country, duty-bound by the responsibility of an oath that went beyond his grief for the loss of his wife or time with his new infant. The freedom he treasured came with a price. 

     Not long after, my great-uncle signed up for the Navy, and left on his ship in a different direction. Off the coast of Italy the ship was bombed. He and many of his ship mates paid for freedom that day with their lives.  A few years ago I spent some time writing to the survivors. Each man that answered my letter remembered the day sixty-plus years earlier like it had been yesterday. When the price of freedom is paid, it isn't easily forgotten or taken for granted.

     And in all this talk of freedom and it's price, I have to stop and give thanks to the One who truly paid the ultimate price, so that we may be free no matter what place we call home.

     The death of Jesus Christ on the cross of Calvary was the price required for me to be free from the oppression of sin. Sometimes I take this freedom for granted. 

     So maybe, as the Fourth of July is celebrated with great sparkling fireworks, I will stop oooing and aahhing for a moment and give thanks to God for His gift of freedom in Christ Jesus, and His gift of a free life in our great country. 

May God bless America!

"...If you continue in my word, then are you my disciples indeed; and you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free...If the Son therefore shall make you free, you will be free indeed." John 8:31,32; 36