Conformable

P 3074 Use your faith to make withdrawals.

/ DVH

“Everything we could ever need for life and godliness has already been deposited in us by His divine power. For all this was lavished upon us through the rich experience of knowing Him Who has called us by name and invited us to come to Him through a glorious manifestation of His goodness.” 2 Peter 1:3 TPT.

Our Heavenly Father’s goodness and generosity is glorious! It has forever changed the whole of human history. Humanity went from an exclusive club, to an everything-included open-door policy that flourishes and grows as we all get to know Jesus! Knowing Him continually opens new spiritual doors. Whether you are at the beginning of your walk with Him, or you’ve been walking with the Lord for years —there is no greater joy than to know Him and follow Him, by serving Him and others. 

The Apostle Paul says this in Philippians 3:10.“That I may know Him, and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, being made conformable unto His death;…” Knowing Him includes suffering. We are bound to suffer when we don’t get what we want, because to serve Him, we must die to self! However, there is a huge plus — now we enter into true fellowship with Him. We have a shared experience! He is our chosen Leader in and through every situation.

Whatever we need to gain transformation, and greater intimacy with Him we already have. He already gave it to us.1 Peter says that in verse 3 Chapter 1! We didn’t even have to earn this honour. Feel free to raise a ruckus and jump about, because if that thought doesn’t want to make you cheer, maybe you’ve fallen a bit behind as you are following Him. May the Lord fix that! I’ve found astonishing things happen when we start yielding to Him. The more we lean our head on His chest, and listen to His words, the more we understand that this world has nothing lasting to offer us. 

If you were to give me a hundred million dollars and show me that you deposited that large sum in my name, in writing, all I would need to do to participate in what I have been given, is to turn up at that bank and start making withdrawals. And that’s the problem for many Christians — they don’t make withdrawals. That’s what our faith is for – to make withdrawals. We have been given everything we need for this life, but we need to use our faith to access it. 

We are going to have to put our whole selves into this new life we’ve been given, in order to experience transformation, because these holy, heavenly things won’t fall on us. So there is a pathway we tread, as we follow Him. That pathway leads down, and it will take care of pride. We learn to practice repentance and reparation, even when we think the other person should apologise. Now we are choosing to value peace above being right. The by-product is that we stop judging others by one standard, and myself by another. There is a far greater blessing when we walk through difficult things with Him.

Back to my thought above:  If I want to access that deposit Jesus died to give me, I will have to exercise my faith. Belief means I will act on what He has told me, whether it seems too amazing to be true or not, simply because Jesus Himself has told me. He tells me I can live life proactively instead of reactively now. I don’t have to wait for proof! It’s all in the book. I have chosen to live this life differently and I stick with it. I don’t try to weasel out of what He says, or excuse myself because of some reason or other — instead I ask Him to show me how to obey Him and then I do it. I don’t do it for YOU, I do it for Jesus, because that’s what a life laid down for His sake looks like!

When He says I don’t have to conform to this world, because I am no longer captive to its demands and threats, I step into what He said, rather than check with my feelings or previous experiences. When He tells me I can love the unlovely, I don’t wait to feel like it – I start loving them. I follow His instructions from His book daily, and I know He will teach me:  ‘this is how I want you to love that person.’ 

I might wait for you to bring that mythical 100 million dollars to my house, but I could have a mighty long wait. The way for me to access this blessing is to go to where the provision is – the provision is in activating our faith, and JESUS IS OUR PROVIDER. I go to Jesus and learn from Him how to repent about sin, and fix things with others, and then I obey what He says in His book.

The Lord has already told me that every other yoke I can pick up, apart from His, will be too heavy for me to bear.“Come to ME, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls For My yoke is easy and My burden is light.” Matthew 11:28-30.

Ask a bible-believing Jesus follower if they have experienced transformation, so they can live like He did – without His input. I’ve tried. I got fed up, then I gave up. My desires and needs were too great for me to manage. But when I asked Him to help me, I began to make withdrawals on the deposit He has already put into my name.“…Everything we could ever need for life and godliness HAS ALREADY BEEN DEPOSITED IN US by His divine power.” Amen. Use your faith to make withdrawals. Bye. 👋

P 2807 Keep your anchor fixed in His Love.

/ DVH

Part of the reason Christians can become inactive is that we have been careless, we have lost our first love. That means we will have no sense of purpose. Here’s what I have learnt … when you watch what the Lord does and is still doing, every single day, you will fall in love with Him over and over again. You know … somebody ought to write a song about that! I believe our love can grow cold, when we are not using our faith … and ‘.. faith without works is dead!’ 

A boat without an anchor drifts about, moved by this current and that storm – tossed around by this theology, or that special event. Our hope is IN Christ, everything He did, everything He said — Who He is, and what He has done for us. Nothing more, nothing less. MY hope is not in my faithfulness it is in HIS.  I must learn to accept that I can get to know Him, no matter what is currently going on. “Not only so, but we also glory in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope.”Romans 5:3-4. I don’t care two beans for whatever fabulous Christian teaching book is currently flooding the market place … our hope is always IN Christ. Loving Him is our finest priority. 

Then all we need to do is to reflect what we see when we look at Him, and be ready to tell someone else how wonderful the Lord is. I’m absolutely blessed when our Heavenly Father gives someone I know this revelation, or that dream, and this vision, and I love that they want to tell me about it…. YAY! But I want to see Him for myself thank you. We need to know Him, personally. He is our only hope, so we cling to Him like a baby Koala clings to its Mum.

The bible says this: “That I might know Him, and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings; being made conformable to His death,” Philippians 3:10. Over the years I realised that I will have to die to what I want for my life, in order to know Him. I must take personal responsibility for my response to what He’s done for me. Suffering is a part of life and a great leveller. But it is not a happy word.

We all know we will suffer – it’s in the book, but we must still choose to give up this attitude, and put down that expectation and let Him be God. He never sleeps. Now we no longer say this by choice, instead we simply must say that! When we live chasing Him, we will get to know Him. Jesus Christ chose to live His life for our sake. That means we have a shared fellowship with Him as we choose to deny ourselves and take up our cross daily – and live our lives for His sake.

People can go to church week by week and chat to everyone there, but that does not mean we know each other! So, how do we get to know each other? Here’s my little theory … …you knew I’d have one!  …we need to share each other’s joys, sorrows, suffering together and learn to help one another. We must celebrate our victories, and pray for one another in our defeats! Privacy is great, but it can be costly – nasty things hide in the dark. 

Our hope in Christ, is our firm anchor and without that hope it is too easy to drift from this fad to another one. Sadly we can foster and cling to the things that tickle our ears and tell us we can do whatever we like because we belong to God now. We can’t develop our own personal faith, living like that because we are too busy following the way somebody else does it!  The way to develop our own faith is to USE IT. I call that obedience to the Word.. We read what the Lord wrote and find something to do in it. There’s always something to do in that book! But I admit that I do sometimes need the Holy Spirit’s help to find it.

I’ve read about Samson, just like you … and Jonah and Moses and Jeremiah … however, that doesn’t mean I will grow my hair long and avoid whale-watching trips …  Instead, I read the bible looking at the way God interacted with the people who are in it. So I look at how Moses talked to God … and I see how Jeremiah complained a lot because his life was hard. At the same time, I notice our Heavenly Father’s response. I see His patience with Jeremiah and Samson. Our God is so incredibly diverse, He totally loved both of these very different men. I also see that these men had contestable issues with the Lord, they weren’t perfect. But boy!  Was HE LOYAL!

To me that means I can disagree with God and not get zapped by lightning bolts from heaven. He is way more tolerant of my humanity than that –  I just need to live my life honestly, before Him. I’ve learnt if He tells me to do something, I’d better do it, because it did not go well for any of those men I’ve mentioned when they ignored Him! I have learnt through their testimonies, as well as my own life, that trouble cannot be avoided but it can be an opportunity for transformation, it is not something we must hide from. Holding your breath and waiting until it is over doesn’t work so well either!

The New Testament has taught me that I am so much more fortunate to have been born on this side of Calvary. I don’t have to be swept along by how I feel – or how you feel – I just need to keep my anchor fixed by staying attached to Him. This means my life will be run by my hope in Who He is. Everything else passes away. My hope is fixed. It is in Who Jesus Christ said He is, and what He did, as well as what He said He did. He did it all those things for us … …including the big guy in the supermarket who is a grump … plus the receptionist in the doctor’s surgery who is totally unhelpful. I don’t have to go digging around to find candidates who are eligible for His love – they are all around me! 

Those thoughts about Him, His goodness, His reliability – keep my little boat from swinging about, and going under in a storm. I honestly don’t believe it is wise to live my life rushing from this port to that one, trying to distract myself from the fact that I am finite. One day I will leave all this behind me. But I am going somewhere when this life is over, and so are you. That’s what hope looks like. We are anchored into Who He is, and How reliable He is. His book tells me, over and over again, that He loves me. It is my all consuming hope that one day I will hear Him say that to me in person. Bye. 👋