10 Ways You Can Allow God’s Truth to Set You Free

Shutterstock.com

When we allow lies and deception into our lives, it’s as if we’re shrouded in a thick fog of gray clouds, unable to see which way to go. Imagine driving in that thick, dense cloud of gray fog at 75 mph (because life never slows down). Driving in thick fog at that speed becomes incredibly dangerous, especially without headlights. Or try driving on a twisting highway on the side of a dangerous mountain on a dark, moonless night at high speeds and no headlights. In either situation, can you sense just how closely tragedy hovers around you? One small misstep and your life could tragically change for the worse. In John 8, Jesus Himself relays the power of truth to His followers,

Then Jesus said to the Jews who had believed Him, “If you continue in my word, you really are my disciples. You will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” John 8:31-32

Truth has the power to pierce through the thick darkness that obscures our vision, breaking the chains of darkness and deception that keep us prisoners of the life we do not want. It’s not just enough that truth exists out there that sets people free. Absolute truth exists independent of us, whether we acknowledge it or not. It’s when we acknowledge the truth, submit to it and continue it that this truth begins to set us free. The simple act of ‘knowing’ the truth becomes spiritual warfare, setting us free from the bondage that the enemy has worked for years enslave us in.

Here are nine practical ways you can begin to saturate yourself with truth on a daily basis.

Turn off the television.

For some people, television is their constant companion, even if it is turned down low, humming quietly in the background of your day. The average American watches over five hours of television every day. So what’s wrong with that? Paul warns the first-century Christians in Colossae not to taken captive through the hollow and deceptive philosophies of this world (Colossians 2:8). It becomes much harder to avoid the deceptive philosophies of this world when we give it a platform to broadcast its philosophies directly into our homes for over five hours per day. Do you want to start saturating your mind with truth in a way that it can begin to set you free? Start by turning off the television for awhile. Very rarely does television project God’s truth, more often than not it projects the world’s truth, so be cautious about what you watch.

Filter your social media.

Worawee Meepian/Shutterstock.com

If you’re a parent of a teenager, you would be doing incredible harm to them to give them unfiltered and unrestricted access to the internet. There’s just too much filth out there. It’s unrealistic to keep them offline forever, but you can put a filter on their access. In the same way, to saturate yourself with truth you need to put a filter on what you consume. You need to be careful about what you ingest online. For many, social media is a huge source of deception. It gives the appearance of interaction but it drives people towards relational isolation. Social media is also a type of deception because it tempts you to compare your behind-the-scenes with everyone else’s highlight reel. Facebook depression is a real thing. What you’re consuming makes a difference. How you’re engaging with social media is actually spiritual warfare. So filter your social media.

Change your music.

Music is a surprisingly powerful form of spiritual warfare. When you read Ephesians 5:18-20, you’ll see the Apostle Paul directly connecting music and being filled with the Spirit. Music has power because it speaks directly to your soul. Everyone has a certain song that can somehow transport them to a different place and touch memories and emotions that have long laid dormant. What you listen to makes a difference. If you’re listening to music that is even subliminally reinforcing the world’s values or the world’s version of truth, those deceptions will begin to affect you in a way that most people don’t notice. Saturate yourself with music that reinforces the truth of God’s Word, and you’ll begin to find yourself looking at your world in a new way.

Read your Bible daily.

Canva.com

Jesus said in Matthew 4:4 that man is designed to live on a regular consumption of God’s truth in Scripture. When you ingest the truth of God’s Word on a regular basis, you’ll find your spiritual strength increasing, making every area of your life more protected from spiritual attack. What’s important to know here is that when you saturate yourselves with truth, there is nothing truer than God’s Word. How does that begin to set you free? Think of God’s Word like a powerful spotlight shining into all the dark and murky areas of your life. Although the light might be overpowering and harsh as it exposes all the dark areas of your life, you’ll be able to avoid dangers and pitfalls so much easier when you can see them ahead of time. Get into God’s Word and allow the truth of God’s Word to set you free!

Memorize fighter verses.

Shutterstock.com

To truly ingest the power of God’s Word, it’s not enough to simply have a printed copy of the Bible on the coffee table or the Bible App downloaded on your smart phone. If you stop and think you’ll realize that the enemy rarely attacks you when you have your Bible open and you’re ready to do battle. To truly saturate yourselves with truth, you need to begin to memorize specific Bible verses, what I call ‘fighter verses.’ Fighter verses are verses that specifically address areas of spiritual warfare where you’re constantly under attack. Be strategic and memorize truths that will be with you day or night. Memorization is how you move from reading God’s truth in Scripture to saturating yourself with God’s truth in Scripture. Let’s say you decided to memorize one verse a month. One verse a month is a very achievable goal. In five short years you’d have over 60 verses in the Bible committed to memory, ready to do spiritual battle whenever you sense an attack coming.

Challenge your thoughts.

Shutterstock.com

When you make the choice to saturate yourself with truth you’ll begin to find a rebellion forming from the most unlikely place: your mind. For years, your mind has been the playground of the enemy, where the lies and deceptions of the enemy have been allowed to fester unchallenged. When you shine the spotlight of God’s truth into the darkest recesses of your mind, you’ll begin to discover that many of the thoughts you have about yourself, about God, or about others are untrue. This helps explain why the enemy has been able to be so victorious in your life. When Paul tells the first century Christians in Rome to be transformed because of what Christ did, he tells them that their first battlefield will be their minds (Romans 12:1-2). Quite simply, if you can change the way you think, you can change the way you live. When you challenge your thoughts, you’re choosing not to accept any and every thought that pops into your head at face value. Make sure that every thought you allow to simmer in your head lines up with the Word you read and the fighter verses you have memorized. If your thoughts don’t line up, reject them as deceptions and dive deeper into the truth of God’s Word.

Cultivate authenticity in relationships.

Shutterstock.com

What do relationships have to do with saturating yourself with truth? Everything, because everything is connected. When you become someone you’re not to try and impress other people, you are inviting deception into your relationships, which will always spill over into the other areas of your life. Deception needs to be rooted out in every area of your life, including your relationships. If you can’t be your true authentic self in your relationships, you need to look for new relationships. Ask God to send relationships into your life where you can live truly. Work at identifying a few current relationships where you can talk about deeper issues that you’re struggling with, not just surface level issues. Find an accountability partner and be truthful with them. Fostering an environment of truth in your friendships and other relationships is a key part of saturating yourself with truth.

Stop lying.

When we don’t have authenticity in our relationships, we’re compelled to lie to maintain our deception, and speaking any lie is speaking the native tongue of Satan (John 8:44). Where are areas of your life where you’re currently lying? Are you lying in your family to maintain a secret addiction? Are you lying at work to get ahead? Are you lying in church to maintain the picture perfect image that you think other people expect to see? Even little white lies, failing to follow through with a task you promised to complete, gives the enemy a foothold in your life that he does not deserve. If you want to saturate yourself with truth, stop lying. This includes lying to yourself. Many times the person most likely to deceive you is the one staring at you in the mirror. Saturating yourself with truth means being honest with yourself about yourself.

Confess something.

Shutterstock.com

Saturating yourself with truth isn’t just avoiding lies, it’s intentionally cultivating an atmosphere where truth is celebrated and championed. There may be a lie or deception that you buried deep within, something you haven’t spoken of in years, something that needs to be confessed. It may be something that happened to you that you’re ashamed of, or something you did that you’re afraid may see the light of day. Confession is a critical part of spiritual warfare because it’s all about allowing light into the dark recesses of your life. When you live in the light, you live in the power of God’s spirit. When you allow dark areas to fester in your life, nothing good ever grows in the dark. Target some of those authentic relationships you’ve cultivated and take them to the next level. You will be overwhelmed at the weight that’s lifted and the freedom you feel when you confess your sins to one another (James 5:16).

Speak the truth in love to those around you.

Shutterstock.com

In Ephesians 4:15 Paul gives the first century church a timeless principle about the power of words. The truth, spoken in love, has an incredibly powerful ability to shape and heal the lives of those around you. That is how you can take the truth you are experiencing on the offensive and begin to take back ground from the enemy. Become a Christian that intentionally speaks the truth (in love) into the lives of those around you. Jesus is wanting you to be the fulfillment of John 8:31-32 when He says that the truth can set you free. Wage war on behalf of those you love. Speak the truth in love and watch the lives of those around you change for the better. Have an intervention with someone. Have that difficult conversation (in love) with that person you know you’ve needed to talk to for some time now.

Is Blaming God a Sin?

It’s easy to make God the scapegoat when tragedy strikes, but He doesn’t deserve the blame. Read next feature >