Conference

P 3082 I AM your oasis.

/ DVH

“Are you weary, carrying a heavy burden? Come to Me. I will refresh your life, for I am your oasis.” Matthew 11:28 TPT.

When I read this verse today the thing that hit me right between the eyes was that Jesus said: ‘I AM your oasis.’He didn’t suggest going on a 4 week cruise, or going to some spa, or theme park or even a Christian conference of some sort – the Lord says HE(!!) is our oasis. We have been misled by our feelings to think that Jesus only goes to conferences or turns up for revivals – He’s IN US – we take Him with us wherever we go! Ya might want to sit and think about that for like a millennium – I know I did – OK so it was 60 seconds … you caught me. 

You know I think we can be really bad at comprehending what the Lord is saying, most of the time. We either overstate it to the point of fanaticism and make it into rules, or we ignore it and hope He won’t mind. We can be so lax with our obedience that we only participate in extending our faith for minor things – like finding a car spot when we need one – or asking God to help us with our day. He wants to BE our day!!

He’s not an add-on. Faith steps are about things we can’t easily do by ourselves — and maybe we kind of step really quickly around things like submission, which is also a faith step. It’s like we think these things are beyond us … so we hope the minimum participation will do …”After all, Jesus knows I am weak!” That’s why He wants you to call on Him to be your strength. We go through this life trying to avoid problems or pray them away, He wants us to confront them with Him!  He longs to be our oasis.

It seems we have yet to work out that His motivation is not just to bring relief, but to usher in permanent change. Transformation of our hearts. Maybe we are hoping the Lord won’t notice because we are embarrassed with our lack of engagement with the things that matter … well guess what?? He knows, because the same Heart that tenderly watches over you, pays attention to everything else. Some problems can be solved by simply changing the way we live. Please do not misunderstand me, He is not watching over us to catch us out in our sins or errors. Instead He patiently waits and watches for us to turn our heads, even just a little bit in His direction – because He knows a better way. 

There is an easier way to live this life we have inherited from Him. But we will have to humble ourselves and submit to Him in order to fully participate in it. Everything in our world’s current view of modern reality suggests submission is not a good thing. Children don’t have to submit to their parents, wives don’t have to submit to their husbands, and nobody has to submit to anybody else’s agendas — unless they pay them well! Submission seems to be a bad word — but that word actually means we have a primary mission which takes priority over other things. Seeking His kingdom is primary – then other things get added on!

It is no wonder that we have left God’s Kingdom behind, it’s because His kingdom is a theocracy, not a democracy. Let’s daily remind ourselves that Jesus Himself submitted to His Father’s will. Sadly it seems that unless human beings can see that it BENEFITS them, they don’t give those ‘other things’ He wants to add into our lives very much attention. So many Christians have cleverly found and featured all the me-first benefits … because the bible tells us“to forget not all His benefits…” I am not sure this response is all He had in mind! 

Off-loading our burdens onto Jesus seems to be a gigantic benefit to me – but we will have to relinquish our anxiety, worry and fear at the same time. Personally, I can’t think of anything better than handing my awful pile of nasty impossible stuff to Him. However, what does He mean by – I am your oasis? An oasis is a place of water in a desert, or a place of refuge in a crisis — or even a place of refreshing. When you view that word this way it begins to make sense. The Lord is not talking about using His Presence like we would drop off our dry-cleaning and return to find everything neatly pressed and clean …He means in this life His Presence is our dwelling place.That’s an AIM – not a suggestion.

I like Ephesians 3:16-19. These 3 verses are great to meditate on because they show us what we are aiming at. 

“I pray that out of His glorious riches He may strengthen you with power through His Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ,  and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.”

Being filled to all the fullness of God is another AIM. We need to remember ..these verses are a prayer … the Apostle Paul prayed it for the church at Ephesus. But the Holy Spirit Himself not only inspired it – He preserved that prayer in the bible for our benefit. Paul is praying for US too – every time you read it say Amen! And please –  read it a lot. Now we need to use our faith to believe that Christ actively dwells in our hearts, and we need His power to understand what we have been given! It is not enough to say ‘yes’ — we have to DO yes!

Then our roots go down, so deeply into His love we cannot be moved. This is how and why the saints of old gave up their lives and were martyred. They didn’t do it for an ideology, they did it because they had been internally changed, forever!! His Presence in our lives is our OASIS. Bye. 🥳

P 2862 Are we an explosion, or a pop?!

/ DVH

You can put that title on the back-burner for a bit, and let’s look at Colossians 2:11b-14 …“Your whole self ruled by the flesh was put off when you were circumcised by Christ, having been buried with Him in baptism, in which you were also raised with Him through your faith in the working of God, who raised Him from the dead. When you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcision of your flesh, GOD MADE YOU ALIVE IN CHRIST. He forgave us all our sins, having canceled the charge of our legal indebtedness, which stood against us and condemned us; He has taken it away, nailing it to the cross.”

Our faith is in what Christ did, not in who or what we are! I think we need to stop seeing ourselves as ordinary people, who happen to have faith. The bible clearly tells us not to live ordinary lives anymore, instead we need to remind ourselves that we are dead to this world, and constantly alive to Him. When we live that way — every single day – every encounter with someone else becomes an opportunity to share His love. His love is not meant to live on that ‘back burner.’ It is the fire that sends us out every single morning!

The only thing dead people can successfully do, is to become worm food! Yeah. Right now I am hoping you aren’t  eating your breakfast and reading this … but I ain’t taking it back!! Our Heavenly Father God, did it all, He provided Jesus as the sacrifice for us – and then Jesus chose to die in our place. Now we continually make a choice to die to this life and live for Him. Our resurrection comes moment by moment as we live by faith in the brand new life He has already given us. That’s our bit ← and it’s past tense! Jesus Christ gave us a life do-over. We can still live our lives as worm food if we choose to, but the truth is — the sky is the limit!! It always was around Jesus! 

That’s why people followed Him around. It didn’t matter if He spoke for hours and hours, because His very words were filled with Holy Spirit life. Have you ever thought of asking yourself what are your words filled with? 😳People were enthralled by whatever Jesus said. So much so, they forgot about ordinary stuff like eating! Imagine that! God’s Words are filled to the top with His life, and it is satisfying. Plus what the Lord Jesus said was often explosive!

His preaching was like a geyser, it flowed out and up and over everyone who heard Him – every single time He did it! Thats why people got mad – they were convicted! Others kept talking about what He had said all the way home! God’s word, when it is preached in the flow of the Holy Spirit, fills us and satisfies us like ordinary food never will. Jesus said it much better than I can: “Man cannot live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.”  Matthew 4:4.

I know many many Christians are incredibly sincere, they love the Lord and they want to serve Him … but maybe they are shy, and they don’t want to intrude on other people. So if someone else wants to know something – they will have to ask them. These people have forgotten they’ve been made brand new, we don’t live like other people anymore – the old has passed away – the new has come. They are living like they are the can of fizzy drink in the picture above, it bounces and fizzes when shaken, then… … it settles down again. All the fizz will eventually go out of it when it is opened. The “POP” becomes a trickle. Many of us live our lives in that place.

Others live their lives going from conference to conference to conference, hoping to regain their ‘fizz.’ I’ve personally been to a lot of conferences, but let me tell you a secret … the very best way to become a geyser, is to develop a relationship with Him. Then you become far more than you can personally contain! Instead of fizzing up and calming down, you become a part of the Giver of Life – you and He flow together. If He turns, you turn, and His happiness inside you explodes like a geyser! 

God’s Words have eternal life in them, but sadly most of the people in this world have never ever heard the real Gospel. They may have heard about this religion or that one – they may have even tasted a bit of the fizzy drink, but they haven’t heard the Good News that they can be reconciled instantly back to God FOREVER! That’s where the geyser comes from! Are you a can of pop or a force of His nature? Bye for today. 👋.

“They were amazed at His teaching, because His words had authority.” Luke 4:32.