The Spirit is like the wind blowing, which is not conformed to this world’s mold.

John 3:7-8

Click for a description of the mark of the beast.
Click for a description of the image of the beast.

“Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘You must be born again.’ The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear the sound of it, but cannot tell where it comes from and where it goes. So is everyone who is born of the Spirit.” John 3:7-8 

When I think of the freedom of the Spirit opposed to being tightly controlled, several images come to my mind. Mostly, that the Spirit gives a sense of individuality to a person, opposed to not having that individual identity. For example, in the days of Jesus, the Pharisees wanted every Jewish person to be identified according to their teachings. They wanted people’s mind and heart to be molded to their interpretation of everything. In contrast, Jesus Christ brought freedom in the Spirit. He brought a freedom to the people which they had never felt before. The Pharisees had no idea what the people would do next because they were no longer following the script given them to follow. To the Pharisees, the people were like the wind blowing and they never knew what the people would do next. The Pharisees lost control of enforcing the letter of the law to the Spirit of Christ.

Nowadays, every person is on the “same sheet of music” from city to city around the world. There is obviously no freedom in the Spirit in what they say, do, feel, or think. Everybody is under the tight control of the thing which gives them what to say, do, feel, and think. To break away from its influence is to break away from acceptance within their “democratic” society. They do not accept the freedom in the Spirit because that freedom causes people to be like the wind blowing in their orderly society.

The thing which forms feelings and thoughts enables the image of the beast to live and speak through people, which is nothing like being free in the Spirit at all. In fact, it blasphemes the Holy Spirit, denies God, and discards the need for Jesus Christ. As it lives and speaks through people, they are conformed to their orderly place in life by what they say and do. They are conformed to their mark in life as they are groomed to the mark of the beast.

As followers of the Spirit of Christ, we are like the wind blowing through the orderly and synchronized “democratic” society of today. While they seek to stop the spiritual winds from blowing, we express our belief in God, we acknowledge the need for the remission of sin through the Lord Jesus, and we embrace the Holy Spirit in what we feel, think, do, and say. We must be born again of the Spirit, and in today’s world we are described as an unharnessed wind, people who march to the beat of a different drummer, an unwanted sound in their “democracy,” and people who have no set course in life.

As Jesus says to us, “Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘You must be born again.“

Born again, free from sin
I’m happy night and day
Makes me shout
There’s no doubt
I know I’m born again
Satan tells me that I only thought I got saved
He tells me what a fool I have been
But when my mind goes back to that old place where I’ve prayed
I know that I’ve been born again
Born again, free from sin
I’m happy night and day

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“….to you who do not hold to her teaching and have not learned Satan’s so-called deep secrets,“
‘I will not impose any other burden on you, except to hold on to what you have until I come.’”
“I am coming soon. Hold on to what you have, so that no one will take your crown.”
Revelation 2:24-25, 3:1