NO MORE SHACKLES (Personal Reflection)

I've been a wanderer, I've been a thief

I've been a liar, a dirty cheat

I've hurt my brother, let down my friends

Gave into weakness time and again

Grace came down, turned everything around

No more shackles weighing on me 

Hallelu, I'm finally free

All my burdens cast upon thee

Thank you Jesus, You are the one who redeems

Calling all wretched, sinners like me

Who didn't stand for what they believe

I've really blown it and so have you

We can't be quiet, we've got Good News

Grace came down, turned everything around

No more shackles weighing on me 

Hallelu, I'm finally free

All my burdens cast upon thee

Thank you Jesus, You are the one who redeems

I was handcuffed by my shame

You released me, loosed my chains

I was captive, labeled slave

You paid my debts and changed my name

No more shackles weighing on me 

Hallelu, I'm finally free

All my burdens cast upon thee

Thank you Jesus, You are the one who redeems

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I am a huge fan of Aaron Pelsue Band's music. Years ago, I helped lead worship at a megachurch in Indianapolis before their band was hired to take over the contemporary program, so I have kept up with them closely through the years as a close friend of ours records on their albums. What I love is their lyrics are always Christ-centered with a heart to reach the next generation, but what appeals to me most is their music resonates with men especially. Scripture teaches, "Iron sharpens iron, and one man sharpens another" (Proverbs 27:17). Therefore, my prayer is that we (as men) rise to the challenge God has laid before us, in accountability to one another, to lead our families in obedience, submission and worship to Jesus Christ. Make no mistake, there is a crisis in the church today where men are passively sitting idle in church pews disengaged from worship. Granted, the majority of songs sung on Sunday mornings lean heavily toward emotional sensitivity and men typically don't jump at the opportunity to express their feelings, unless it is sports-related. However, we desperately need a masculine revival in the church to ease the emotional and spiritual weight on marriages and in homes across the world. I know that sounds extreme, and in no way am I minimizing the importance of women and femininity within the church. Quite the contrary! In the absence of marital headship, many wives by default have been shouldering the spiritual weight in the home with a burden never intended to be theirs in the first place. "For the husband is the head of the wife even as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its Savior" (Ephesians 5:23). To that end, we should praise the Lord for our wives' faithfulness in the midst of our passivity! However, if we desire to ignite revival in our homes, it must begin with men accepting the responsibility God gave us to lead our families in submission to Christ, and that begins with self-examination. Therefore, "Let us test and examine our ways, and return to the LORD!" (Lamentations 3:40).

"I've been a wanderer, I've been thief. I've been a liar, a dirty cheat. I've hurt my brother, let down my friends. Gave into weakness time and again. Grace came down, turned everything around." Self-examination is an integral part of the Christian faith and the first step we must take to foster change in our lives. Scripture exhorts, "Examine yourselves, to see whether you are in the faith. Test yourselves. Or do you not realize this about yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you?—unless indeed you fail to meet the test!" (2 Corinthians 13:5). That is a somber truth each one of us should reflect upon and wrestle with in our hearts. For it is one thing to say we are Christian, but our actions speak louder than words and support or deny the faith we profess. That is why James warns, "But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves. For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man who looks intently at his natural face in a mirror. For he looks at himself and goes away and at once forgets what he was like" (James 1:22–24). It is imperative we recognize the image staring back in the mirror, knowing we were once dead in our sins but redeemed by the blood of the Lamb. That is spiritual self-examination personified—recognizing who we once we're compared to our present identity in Christ. I know I can easily identify with being a wanderer, thief, liar and cheat, and how I deeply wounded others with my selfish choices. There once was a time I destroyed any semblance of credibility I had, even as a self-proclaimed Christian, yielding to weakness more than resisting temptation. I once embodied hypocrisy by knowing the truth and living contrary to it. Yet despite my sinful actions, God chose to show me grace, changed the trajectory of my life from living for the pleasures of this world to seeking righteousness, and forgave my sins. Therefore, I humbly proclaim, "Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!" (Romans 7:24–25a).

"No more shackles weighing on me. Hallelu, I'm finally free. All my burdens cast upon thee. Thank you Jesus, You are the one who redeems." The image of being shackled by guilt, shame and regret is a powerful reminder of sin's magnitude. Even the slightest of sins can morph into something far greater if we minimize its impact and lose sight of the big picture. James reminds us, "But each person is tempted when he is lured and enticed by his own desire. Then desire when it has conceived gives birth to sin, and sin when it is fully grown brings forth death" (James 1:14–15). That is why we must cast off our old sin nature and embrace new life in Christ. "But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to gratify its desires" (Romans 13:14). If we take a step back and reflect upon what Jesus did for us, we understand how important self-examination is. However, remembering past sins should not become a stronghold in which we cannot forgive ourselves for what we have done. Rather, embracing God's forgiveness sets us free from the bondage of regret Satan seeks to ensnare us with. Our memories should do nothing more than help sustain our abstinence toward past sins through self-control. That is why we must never forget, "But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved" (Ephesians 2:4–5). When we accept new life in Christ, we cannot assume we will never sin again. Undoubtedly, we will fail the Lord more than we ought despite our best efforts. What changes is the Holy Spirit begins to illuminate God's Word and convict us so we can choose wisely. Yes, sin remains, but we are not bound by its deadly snare so easily as we once were because we were bought with an infinite price. Hallelujah!

"Calling all wretched, sinners like me who didn't stand for what they believe. I've really blown it and so have you. We can't be quiet, we've got Good News. Grace came down, turned everything around." As men ordained by God as spiritual leaders of our homes, we must stand for the absolute truth of God's Word and more importantly, live according to its precepts. "With my whole heart I seek you; let me not wander from your commandments! I have stored up your word in my heart, that I might not sin against you" (Psalm 119:10–11). For a righteous man humbles himself, accepts responsibility, repents of his sin, embraces change, welcomes accountability, resists temptation, seeks restitution, obeys God's Word, and submits himself under the authority of Jesus Christ daily. He does not blame-shift or justify his mistakes, nor deflect or minimize his shortcomings. Rather, he recognizes how critical a Biblical foundation is in his life and disciplines himself to change for the better. In retrospect, it seems many of us struggle taking personal responsibility for our thoughts and actions at times, which is cancer in our homes. Our children desperately need to witness Godly character builders such as submission, obedience, personal discipline, and humility modeled, and that begins with husbands and fathers. "Train up a child in the way he should go; even when he is old he will not depart from it" (Proverbs 22:6). Dare I say the reason so many women struggle with the Biblical teaching of submission today is because far too many men are void of spiritual fruit in their lives. Nonetheless, the Bible teaches plainly, "Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord" (Ephesians 5:22), because submission is ultimately an act of worship to God, not the husband. That is why God commands, "Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her" (Ephesians 5:25), because submission and self-sacrifice go hand-in-hand in marriage. Therefore, a wife can fulfill her Biblical role of submitting to her husband because inevitably her submission is a willing sacrifice unto Christ—not to the husband, but through the husband. And a man can love his wife even when she is unlovable at times because his self-sacrifice is not a reluctant duty, but an act of true worship to God.

"I was handcuffed by my shame. You released me, loosed my chains. I was captive, labeled slave. You paid my debts and changed my name." Again, as we reflect upon the role we (as men) need to embrace in our homes, we must cast off any doubt why God appointed us spiritual leaders in the first place. Scripture declares, "But I want you to understand that the head of every man is Christ, the head of a wife is her husband, and the head of Christ is God" (1 Corinthians 11:3), because there must be a semblance of order to maintain peace within the home. Order is designed by God on purpose, for even Jesus submitted to His Father's will as an example for us. "And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross" (Philippians 2:8). Today, men are increasingly deflecting and delegating headship responsibility to their wives, primarily out of laziness, apathy, fear or rejection. They are either too passive to lead, unwilling to lead, fearful they can ever measure up to lead, or not allowed to lead by the wife. Sadly, in some cases, wives have assumed the spiritual reigns in their husbands' absence and hesitate relinquishing control because they doubt their husband's desire to lead is genuine. Honestly, I can relate. In some ways, my lack of spiritual disciplines are an easy excuse to justify why I don't lead as much or as well as I should. On the other hand, past sins and passivity have left my wife doubting whether positive changes she sees in me are genuine. Nevertheless, I cannot allow myself to be handcuffed by shame and regret nor feed into my wife's insecurities by passively leading at a bare minimum pace to check off a legalistic box. Scripture affirms, "Likewise, husbands, live with your wives in an understanding way, showing honor to the woman as the weaker vessel, since they are heirs with you of the grace of life, so that your prayers may not be hindered" (1 Peter 3:7). Therefore, we must respect our wives enough to embrace our headship role in humility, fully engaged and intentional in our efforts to protect them from spiritual warfare which plants seeds of doubt into their hearts and minds.

In the end, the survival of Biblical Christianity lies in the ability of men to embrace their God-given headship role in the home and act upon it. There are simply too many single-mothers struggling to compensate for absent fathers, and too many wives burdened with the exact same plight. For an absent husband and father can be physically present yet spiritually lost at the same time, despite even the greatest of intentions and promises. That is what worries me most in the church today—men who assume they've got it together, but nothing could be further from the truth. They are spiritually blind to their blindness, just as I once was. How then can we break the cycle? Scripture offers three powerful warnings every man should seriously consider the moment he gets out of bed each morning till the second he falls fast asleep. "Therefore let anyone who thinks that he stands take heed lest he fall" (1 Corinthians 10:12). "Pride goes before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall" (Proverbs 16:18). Therefore, "For by the grace given to me I say to everyone among you not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think with sober judgment, each according to the measure of faith that God has assigned" (Romans 12:3). If we embrace these absolute truths, the trajectory of our homes will instantly change because Christ is glorified above all. Undoubtedly, "He (Jesus) must increase, but I must decrease" (John 3:30), because our personal will is insignificant in the grand scheme of things considering Jesus paid it all for our eternal salvation. Therefore, if we desire to be the Godly men our wives have always dreamed of, we must take up our cross, humble ourselves, and obey the Lord by praying and studying God's Word both independently and with them. Men, our wives are longing for us to lead them with grace, mercy, love and understanding and we are inept to provide any of those gifts apart from Christ. Therefore, may we RISE UP to our calling and glorify the Lord by our obedience to His Word and in complete submission to His supreme authority.