Age

P 3089 Keep running.

/ DVH

“Do you see what this means—all these pioneers who blazed the way, all these veterans cheering us on? It means we’d better get on with it. Strip down, start running—and never quit! No extra spiritual fat, no parasitic sins. Keep your eyes on Jesus, who both began and finished this race we’re in. Study how He did it. Because He never lost sight of where He was headed—that exhilarating finish in and with God—He could put up with anything along the way: Cross, shame, whatever. And now He’s there, in the place of honour, right alongside God. When you find yourselves flagging in your faith, go over that story again, item by item, that long litany of hostility He plowed through. That will shoot adrenaline into your souls!”

“Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses [who by faith have testified to the truth of God’s absolute faithfulness], stripping off every unnecessary weight and the sin which so easily and cleverly entangles us, let us run with endurance and active persistence the race that is set before us,…” Hebrews 12:1 (GNB & AMP)

My first thought was this … these guys use more words than I do!!  Would you believe this is just one verse both times? There is something therapeutic in reading the bible in an unfamiliar version. I do it a lot, because words are incredibly limited, and we can become overly familiar with the version we read every day. However, every single fresh glance at a different version, clarifies and expounds our understanding.

We don’t want past knowledge to throw us off present revelation. Otherwise it is easier to start skipping bits instead of absorbing precious old truths in new ways. When you have been reading this book for many years like I have, the newer translations are like meeting an old friend with brand new up-to-date clothes on. I love it.

What’s not to love about this? “… It means we’d better get on with it. Strip down, start running—and never quit! No extra spiritual fat, no parasitic sins. Keep your eyes on Jesus, Who both began and finished this race we’re in. Study how He did it. Because He never lost sight of where He was headed …”  Doesn’t that paint pictures in your mind?

In my mind’s eye, I can see the Lord Jesus – He ran this race before me. He’s warming up on the tinder track, stretching His muscles – now He is on the blocks, ready to run.There is no-one else on that track – He was a solitary runner. We all know the end of His race — He finished it and HE WON. Despite how it looked as He rounded that last curve, when the enemy was beating Him, taunting Him, and throwing all kinds of stuff at Him from the stands, He finished His race. 

The Holy Spirit is always there for us – He’s our Coach – the heartbeat of God inside us. He runs with us. He calls out encouragement, and warns us of any pitfalls ahead. He wants each one of us to finish our race. We don’t have to win – Jesus did that for us – we simply need to stay in the race and keep on running. Keep following in the Lord Jesus’ footsteps. I don’t run against you, you don’t run against me. We are in an individual race toward glory, and Jesus is our prize. 

Our task is to throw off anything that will slow us down. Things like other people’s opinions, our circumstances, our youth or our age, even our own self-efforts. All those things and more can distract us. They can stop us from being in peak spiritual condition, as well as break our stride and try to prevent us from keeping up with God’s pace for us as individuals. Some of us are racing this race holding onto a walker, some have no home. What does it matter? We all need to grasp and hold onto the stamina the Word of God gives us. Our race is not a sprint – it is a marathon.

We can’t afford to strive and strain, otherwise we will exhaust ourselves and throw this race off the rhythm we need to keep running. Step after step after step. Heart pounding, blood pumping, feet striking the ground bam, bam, bam! We cannot afford the luxury of wondering whether we are doing it right. Instead our eyes are on the prize. So we ignore anyone else but the Holy Spirit. He’s ALWAYS there. His loving voice is in our heart and ears – He helps us remember that verse we read yesterday: “I can do all things through Christ Who strengthens me.” Big deep breath, quick prayer, and on we go. We cannot afford to let distractions, noise, or the difficulties and heartaches of this world keep us from running our race.

As we round yet another turn, suddenly all hell breaks loose, stuff is flying through the air at us. Our bodies are screaming for fresh water, as well as relief. Every muscle, every part of us aches with tiredness. Then we become aware of all kinds of voices and distractions around us, calling out. Not every voice we can hear is cheering for us, or on our side. We must remember that the finish line is not unattainable. Then suddenly we become aware of the sound of SomeOne Else’s footsteps running beside us, and we can see the Lord is there with us. He is our constant Companion in this race. He is praying for us – He lives to pray for us.

As we grow closer to the end, we can see so much compassion in His dear face. He is laughing, because He knows that we can do this. And He knows, personally, intimately, how hard this race is. “One more step dearest, you can take one more step. I have given you My power to keep running. Let go of the past, let go of your infirmities and weaknesses, and just keep taking one more step. I love you!”  Bye.👋

P 2929 Maturity.

/ DVH

We live within a society that often judges maturity by age, plus the level of responsibility a person exercises. So we feel we are ‘grown up’ and mature when we hold down a job, and raise children – by providing clothing, shelter and food for them. But God sees maturity differently. Today I want to look at Moses, who saw incredible miracles – yet he was still human. However, Jesus attitude toward submission and obedience is our perfect example of how we need to live, NOW. Today. 

It seems as if Almighty God was unfair in His dealings with Moses, until we look more closely. This man missed out on the main reason he and the Israelites ended up on the road in the first place — he did not get to go INTO the Promised Land. He led more than a million Jews round and round for 40 years, saw huge miracles of provision and protection — all of this in a desert that the Israelites could have crossed in just a few days! It was not his leadership that was at fault, what brought about his faulty finale, was he stumbled over the immaturity of his followers.

We might have called Moses – who was 80 years old  when he started out  – mature. After all he was 120 years old when he died! But age is never the issue. It seems that this man of God still had unresolved anger issues toward the people he was leading, and that led to disobedience to the Lord’s specific instructions. His ignominious end didn’t come about because God didn’t dearly love this man, or care deeply about him. We know that because Almighty God arranged Moses’ burial. Personally I think he missed out because His character was not complete and leaders are meant to be examples of how the rest of us need to live.

The Lord’s greatest wish for each one of His children is that we become mature in Christ – not just that we are saved! Father God wants salvation for the whole world — but He desires MATURITY for Jesus’ disciples. The Lord Jesus’ maturity was complete in every way, in every detail. Read the book and count how many times Jesus’ said –“… it has to be so, for now.” Here is my point for today — maturity to God, is not the same as age.

Let’s read Ephesians 4:13 AMP: “[That it might develop] until we all attain oneness in the faith and in the comprehension of the [full and accurate] knowledge of the Son of God, that [we might arrive] at really mature manhood (the completeness of personality which is nothing less than the standard height of Christ’s own perfection), the measure of the stature of the fullness of the Christ and the completeness found in Him.”

If we are not careful we can sometimes mistake wisdom for maturity. Wisdom is a gift – we can ask for it and go after it. The book of Proverbs exhorts us to ask for it, over and over again. Do it!! Wisdom, by the way, is a Person, not just intellectual prowess. Proverbs tells us that. But true maturity is about allowing God to work in and on US – our character, our responses, our lives – until what He wants for us is more appealing in our eyes, than what we think we want or need. 

Maturity flourishes in the joyful expectation of God’s goodness in the middle of utter chaos. A mature Christian knows their God, and deals with themselves accordingly. Maturity is the ability to accept God’s will, God’s way. Just to be clear – this Grace is not about resignation, or even careless indifference — instead it’s the joyful anticipation that God will do something wonderful with whatever is going on in my life, no matter how it currently looks. 

Jesus knew exactly what was in front of Him when He faced the cross, and He did not flinch or falter. In the Garden of Gethsemane He wrestled with His flesh to bring it into submission to His Father’s will. Maturity has nothing to do with feelings, it has to do with developing and allowing our faith to be stretched. That faith is in God’s ability to take a total disaster and make it into something so spectacular it blows your mind. 

Maturity has learnt to wait, always alert for the next instruction. It waits submissively, quieting its heart until the work is done: “But I have calmed and quieted myself, I am like a weaned child with its mother; like a weaned child I am content…”  Psalm 131:2. Please note “I” do this! I am the boss of my soul. So I make a choice to obey God, and trust Him, above and beyond my immediate circumstances.

Almighty God will not do this for me. I can pray and yell and carry on, and even blame Him – when the truth is, I still have the same ugly attitude I’ve had for years …It is my responsibility to tell my soul ‘this is what we are doing.’ The Holy Spirit will always help me – but I must personally make those hard choices and follow them through to the end. And the end comes when the job is done, not when I think I have had enough. It’s about submission. People want to rule and reign in this life – but Jesus Himself the One we follow, took on the role of a servant.

We waste a lot of time asking the Lord to give us stuff that can only be gained by eating, breathing, and growing the fruit of the Spirit. In this case, for Moses, it was self-control, faithfulness to obey, patience with a disobedient people and the peace that comes from a deliberate attention to detail. “To whom much is given, much will be required.”(Luke 12:48). Fruit grows over time, that means that these things will not just fall on us! Because fruit comes from within the tree.

And maturity develops within us as we trust Him more than our own understanding, practise devoted obedience to His will, His Way, and acknowledge Him in everything we do. Bye for now, 👋.

P 2189 Fellowship.

/ DVH

“There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for ye are all one in Christ Jesus.” Galatians 3:28

Hubby is Singaporean Chinese, a chosen-Aussie, but he doesn’t speak a whole lot of Chinese any more. Meanwhile, his mother speaks 5 Chinese languages as well as English – she was matron of a hospital! I adore her, she is the sweetest, dearest lady. There are plenty of highly-motivated people in my hubby’s family. His father was a nursing educator before he retired, as well as a lay preacher – his family is filled up with over-achievers. There were no Christians at all in my family, but several generations of Christians on my husband’s side. What a contrast! Meanwhile, because I am a multi-generational Aussie, I can have trouble with this world’s idea of English … forget Chinese!

Years ago now, my dear hubby’s beloved mama, his precious grandmother was still with us, here in this world. When she died, we both cried and cried for days. I still have tears in my eyes while I am typing this. What a truly wonderful little lady she was – from the minute she met me I was instantly family – and hubby was a favoured grandson. She didn’t speak a great deal of English and her main fellowship came from her church family. 

The Holy Spirit pointed out to us one day that whenever we saw her, she always had her dear little nose in her bible. He reminded us that we could talk to her … using the bible. So we did. Her bible was written in Chinese, and ours was in English. We just made sure we had the same version and … away we went! Oh, we had such a glorious time together. It was truly God-kissed.

We laughed, we cried – with joy – and we shared our love for Him together as well. Other people couldn’t work out how we were managing to talk to her because she only spoke Teo-Chew. But that didn’t matter one bit, the Holy Spirit’s system worked splendidly! And every time we went to where she lived, we’d go down to the room where she sat, and fellowship with her, we never wanted to leave her. It was just such a blessing and  something we looked forward to doing.

Because of Mama, I learnt to say ‘praise the Lord’ in Chinese, pretty quickly. And hallelujah is the same in any language. Mama prayed for us, and we prayed for her – and nobody understood a word anybody else said but it didn’t matter! There are no barriers in the Spirit. Hubby’s grandma went to a Chinese Church of Christ, and we went to a Pentecostal one and that did not matter either! Theology never came up – but Jesus came up a whole lot. You know this dear elderly lady merrily gave out words of knowledge to other people? Even though she didn’t actually have a label for it – she just told them whatever God told her to say! And those words were accurate, every time. 

At 85 she used to catch the bus to go across town to visit the ‘old’ people in her church. Some people are just pure gold! … And she was one of them. I learnt so much from our too-short time together. I plan on hugging her to bits when I get to heaven I can tell you. Because Mama taught me so much about the unity we can have in the Spirit – the unity that has nothing whatsoever to do with theology.

I was not exactly a prized granddaughter-in-law in this world’s eyes, but that did not matter at all to her. She loved me on sight and I loved her right back. You know, older people still have a lot to give if we don’t park them in the snoozing bay up the back of the church. 😂 The bible tells us not to despise wisdom, and growing old teaches you a lot – if you let it, and your brain doesn’t periodically go on strike!  Age teaches us all about what is important … and what is not. 

It seems today, that I am bragging on family, so I’m just going to continue. As you know, hubby just had a nasty operation on his right hand recently. His dominant hand. He is sitting two feet from me painting some things to give away on our next trip. My dear man likes to paint prophetic paintings for other-people-who-don’t-know-Jesus-yet. Right now he is painting with his LEFT non-dominant hand. And it looks no different to the lovely work he does with the right one. I told you we have really talented people in our family! See above.↑

My point today is obvious, there are no barriers that can keep the Holy Spirit out. Not language, race, creed, or attitude … if you see a barrier ask the Lord how to bring it down. He comes up with the most amazing things. We can spend so much time trying to figure stuff out, trying to be the people we think we are meant to be – and heaven’s vast resources are left dormant.  We need to learn to access those heavenly things … and throw our supposed skills out of the window, by cultivating Holy Spirit’s Presence. He will do amazing things in our ordinary everyday lives. Let Him. 👋🏻