God gives freedom (Who is determining our path III?) ...

Wednesday, July 20, 2011. How much freedom do we have to choose our path of life? In what way are limits governing our choices? What is the role of responsibility?

Freedom and Responsibility …

When I was a student, I had a lot of freedom to think about the possible options. I wanted to carry out a postdoc, and I looked at options in France and in the US. In the USA I had the choice between Texas, Minnesota and Delaware - and finally chose Delaware to live close to Philadelphia for a while. There seemed to be a real choice with many exciting options.

Later, the choise was much more difficult to make. After the family started to grow, there were many more side conditions in this game. Could I apply for a job in the United States? That seemed to be difficult. But then options in the UK opened and we moved there. There was a moment of freedom in this move, since we had to make the choice: do we want to move the whole family to the UK or do we want to stay in Germany. We moved and it was a good step. But the whole process took a year and was strongly influenced by its side conditions, by the responsibility for the family and its needs.

There are of course more limits in our choices. We cannot just choose to change things here or there. You cannot swap company every year. And when you get older, it might be difficult to change at all. Who wants to employ a 55 year old guy in a completely new environment? So Freedom is always limited!

God gives Freedom …

For me, God is a key source of freedom. He is a very broad source in the sense that the freedom which is coming from him is on many layers or levels!

A first level: God is giving me freedom by showing me how things could be. He is opening my mind. He is giving me reasonable goals. He is like a light, which is making everything bright and showing me many possibilities, new tasks.

I tend to be suck into my daily routine, into the many things which need to be done. I tend to be taken over by the needs and requests I get day by day. But when I look to the Lord, I am immediately taken out of all of this. I am immediately free to look from a more general viewpoint onto my own life, onto my tasks. I am able to judge the needs and to sort and prioritize them. He provides the freedom to do this … the freedom to live and take control over the bits and pieces! On this first level (as on many others) I would say: God gives freedom. God really gives freedom! ... more texts