Going With Him

There’s a story told, from Civil War days before America’s slaves were freed, about a northerner who went to a slave auction and purchased a young slave girl. As they walked away from the auction, the man turned to the girl and told her, “You’re free.”

With amazement she responded, “You mean, I’m free to do whatever I want?”

“Yes,” he said. “And to say whatever I want to say?” “Yes, anything.” “And to be whatever I want to be?”

“Yep.” “And even go wherever I want to go?” “Yes,” he answered with a smile. 

“You’re free to go wherever you’d like.”

She looked at him intently and replied, “Then I will go with you.”

Jesus has come to the slave market. He came to us there because we could not go to him. He came and purchased us with his blood so we would no longer be a slave to sin but a slave to Christ, which is the essence of freedom.

And now there’s no freer place to be in life than going with him—with the One who is himself our true liberty.

- Tullian Tchividjian, Surprised by Grace: God's Relentless Pursuit of Rebels, 182