{"id":4988,"date":"2013-07-04T08:00:32","date_gmt":"2013-07-04T12:00:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/doinglifetogether\/?p=4988"},"modified":"2013-07-02T17:20:16","modified_gmt":"2013-07-02T21:20:16","slug":"does-spiritual-independence-bring-freedom-happy-4th","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/doinglifetogether\/2013\/07\/does-spiritual-independence-bring-freedom-happy-4th.html","title":{"rendered":"Does Spiritual Independence Bring Freedom? Happy 4th!"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: center\">HAPPY FOURTH of JULY!<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.freedigitalphotos.net\/images\/4-th-of-july-photo-p175815\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft size-full wp-image-4990\" alt=\"4 of July\" src=\"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/258\/2013\/06\/4-of-July.jpg\" width=\"400\" height=\"299\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p><em>As we celebrate our country&#8217;s freedom today, here is an interesting take on the concept of independence as a Christian trait. My brother, the Reverend Dennis Marquardt, preached a sermon on the spiritual difference between independence versus interdependence. One of these concepts is more a mark of our spiritual walk.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>The 4th of July always reminds us of our freedom as a people. It is a great celebration of independence. Unfortunately, this word &#8220;independence&#8221; has come to mean something that our forefathers never meant it to mean. Today it means &#8220;no one tells me what to do, I can do whatever I want, and I&#8217;m INDEPENDENT.&#8221; To our forefathers however, the idea of INDEPENDENCE was more like INTERDEPENDENCE.<\/p>\n<p>This is also true spiritually. One of the reasons American Christianity is in trouble today is because we have a false idea of what it means to be a Christian. We think being a Christian is like being an American &#8230; we are independent, we don&#8217;t answer to anyone but God (although actually if this were true we would not be independent, we would be interdependent), and no one can tell us what to do, and attending a church or being a member of one is optional.<\/p>\n<p>The Bible NEVER supports the idea that we are supposed to be independent! Actually, this is the concept of EVIL! Satan got Eve to think and act INDEPENDENTLY from God and her husband &#8212; sin resulted! Satan himself acted INDEPENDENTLY from God and it was his downfall &#8230; the drive for independence is built on a foundation of sin and evil!<\/p>\n<p>The Bible teaches INTERDEPENDENCE &#8230; we are not alone, and we don&#8217;t grow alone &#8230; we are built together as a Holy Temple, upon the foundation of the Apostles and prophets. Nothing good happens spiritually with independent Christians &#8230; it is a contradiction in terms! There is no power in being independent.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>For the full sermon, go to <a href=\"http:\/\/www.sermonsearch.com\/sermon-outlines\/76671\/declaration-of-interdependence\/?utm_source=Sermon_Search&amp;utm_medium=email&amp;utm_campaign=06\/26\/2013\" target=\"_blank\">SermonSearch online<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>HAPPY FOURTH of JULY! As we celebrate our country&#8217;s freedom today, here is an interesting take on the concept of independence as a Christian trait. My brother, the Reverend Dennis Marquardt, preached a sermon on the spiritual difference between independence versus interdependence. One of these concepts is more a mark of our spiritual walk.\u00a0 &nbsp;&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":419,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[916],"tags":[2368,2366,2364,2365,2363,2367],"class_list":["post-4988","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-god-relationship","tag-christian-living","tag-faith-and-interdependence","tag-independence-day","tag-interdependence","tag-july-4th","tag-spiritual-walk"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Does Spiritual Independence Bring Freedom? Happy 4th!<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/doinglifetogether\/2013\/07\/does-spiritual-independence-bring-freedom-happy-4th.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Does Spiritual Independence Bring Freedom? Happy 4th!\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"HAPPY FOURTH of JULY! As we celebrate our country&#8217;s freedom today, here is an interesting take on the concept of independence as a Christian trait. My brother, the Reverend Dennis Marquardt, preached a sermon on the spiritual difference between independence versus interdependence. One of these concepts is more a mark of our spiritual walk.\u00a0 &nbsp;&hellip;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/doinglifetogether\/2013\/07\/does-spiritual-independence-bring-freedom-happy-4th.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Doing Life Together\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:author\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/drlindamintle\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2013-07-04T12:00:32+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2013-07-02T21:20:16+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/doinglifetogether\/files\/2013\/06\/4-of-July.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Linda Mintle\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@drlindamintle\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Does Spiritual Independence Bring Freedom? Happy 4th!","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/doinglifetogether\/2013\/07\/does-spiritual-independence-bring-freedom-happy-4th.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Does Spiritual Independence Bring Freedom? Happy 4th!","og_description":"HAPPY FOURTH of JULY! As we celebrate our country&#8217;s freedom today, here is an interesting take on the concept of independence as a Christian trait. My brother, the Reverend Dennis Marquardt, preached a sermon on the spiritual difference between independence versus interdependence. 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Dr. Linda\u2019s fun personality and expertise comes through whether she\u2019s helping her audience stress less or make peace with their thighs! Dr. Linda has her Ph.D. in Urban Health and Clinical Psychology and is a national expert on mental health. She has specialized in the treatment of eating disorders, anxiety, depression and pain management. With 30 years of clinical experience working with couples, families and individuals, she brings her common-sense approach to people who want to live in positive mental health. Dr. Linda is also a bestselling author with 21 book titles to her credit, a radio host of the Dr. Linda Mintle show, professor, national speaker, winner of the Mom\u2019s Choice Award, a national news consultant, featured writer for Beliefnet and hosts her own website. Her academic appointments keep her abreast of current research in her areas of expertise. Her media experience includes seven years as the resident expert for ABC Family\u2019s Living the Life television show and regular appearances on network television and radio. It is often said that being with Dr. Linda is like having coffee with a friend. She makes the complicated issues of relationships and mental health easy to understand and applicable to everyday living. The ease she has with people, coupled with her clinical training and experience makes her a sought-after speaker on college campuses, conferences and special events. Whether she is doing a TV skit with Tim Conway or discussing teen violence with Queen Latifa, Dr. Linda will entertain, educate and integrate faith and mental health in everyday living. Check out her latest book Hope and Healing for Anxiety, a whole-person approach to eliminate anxiety. .","sameAs":["https:\/\/drlindamintle.com\/","https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/drlindamintle\/","https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/drlindamintle\/","https:\/\/x.com\/drlindamintle"],"url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/doinglifetogether\/author\/lmintle"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/doinglifetogether\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4988","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/doinglifetogether\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/doinglifetogether\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/doinglifetogether\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/419"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/doinglifetogether\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4988"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/doinglifetogether\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4988\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5021,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/doinglifetogether\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4988\/revisions\/5021"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/doinglifetogether\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4988"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/doinglifetogether\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4988"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/doinglifetogether\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4988"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}