Digesting

P3332 Where have all the encouragers gone?

/ DVH


“Let the inner movement of your heart always be to love one another, and never play the role of an actor wearing a mask. Despise evil and embrace everything that is good and virtuous. Be devoted to tenderly loving your fellow believers as members of one family. Try to outdo yourselves in respect and honour of one another. Be enthusiastic to serve the Lord, keeping your passion toward Him boiling hot! Radiate with the glow of the Holy Spirit and let Him fill you with excitement as you serve Him.” Romans 12:9-11 TPT.

The Apostle Paul did not write this stuff simply to impress people with His literary style. I believe he was giving the church a list of instructions as well as teaching them the way to walk with Jesus day-by-day. We skip over verses like these at our own peril. They are not just positive suggestions, they are life and health to us and they need action … digesting.

We have inadvertently allowed our feelings to get in the way of what Paul is saying here. This means we can end up avoiding Sister Mergatroid because we don’t like the way she is raising her kids – or the way her husband always takes over at testimony time. Whatever! You fill in the blanks. We need to continually remember that personal opinion, and the right to have one, died when we gave our lives to Jesus. Dead people don’t have opinions – they are far too busy accessing the new life Jesus promised us... live in the resurrection not the grave clothes!

Our new life is an example of what Jesus can do with people, who are living in ordinary circumstances. There is something quite astonishing about normal people living a life totally sold out to Him, yet we’ve become used to special people doing it. Maybe we have failed to comprehend the fact that the “old has passed away, behold the new HAS come.”  This is not just a form of adaptation to a different way of life – that very life has come to live in us now!

So now our job is to use our faith and walk out what we have been given. The unknown, unseen church-goer has far more effect upon the community than they realise. It all starts with the way we treat each other, and floods out from the church into the way we treat other people. Because we always rely upon His wisdom, we don’t look down on anyone. We have His Grace to see potential, not faults — so we take the time to speak into someone’s potential – and let go of criticism.

When my kids were small I did all I could to help them see that their one little life matters. Somewhere in that relatively short time of influence, I had to learn to let go of prodding and pushing, plus speaking good – and I had to watch them make mistakes. They became His people … not just my kids. They have their own way of expressing their faith. He’s their Father — and in my observation, fathers are great at speaking encouragement. They help us to have the ability to take a risk so we can grow, plus they offer us steadfast love, comfort and affection, when things don’t go so well.

We need more encouragers. People who help us believe that our breakthrough is our birthright. Encouragement is a spiritual gift found in Romans 12:8: ‘that empowers individuals to inspire, comfort, and strengthen others, bringing hope to the church and everyone else.” This gift is greatly underestimated. It has the ability to stand someone up on their feet so they can go again. It doesn’t push, or look down upon someone, instead it leads and instructs.

One of the Holy Spirit’s Names is “Encourager.” As an Encourager He helps people to find the faith to go on when everything inside them wants to give up. Our collective task is to keep our focus on what He says about us, because the Lord Himself is so reliably generous with His praise and love. This world has damaged many Christians, who have eventually fallen through huge cracks of disappointment and discouragement. Mainly because theyt have misinformed expectations and they are not met. Encouragement is about lifting them up again.

When you can’t find something encouraging to say, ask the Lord – He knows what that other person needs to hear. At the same time, you will be using your faith and you will see Him in action, for yourself. Sadly, there are also times when you have to be your own cheer squad. For one reason or another someone else is not available or you feel like you can’t hear the Lord. That’s when it is good to go to the bible, and read uplifting verses out loud. 

God’s Word strengthens us when we are weary, lost, or broken hearted. At the same time it is important not to deny whatever is going on, we live in a real world with real pain and human needs! These things are not just about sin, they happen because they are a part of life. We can be sidetracked if  we focus on how we feel, above what He says. Faith chooses to believe what Jesus said, despite these times. After all, acknowledgement is not the same as approval.

Let’s read the bible, and remind ourselves that these verses were written for US, for this day, for these moments. Encouraging ourselves in the Lord is important and it is also extremely helpful. David did it. Remind yourself that you are not a bad Christian, you are in a battle and our enemy is relentless. However, …”The earnest (heartfelt, continued) prayer of a righteous man makes tremendous power available [dynamic in its working].” James 5:16b. Bye. 👋

P 3328 You may need your molars!

/ DVH

“When You speak to me, I devour every word. Your Word brings me such boundless joy. The endless delight of my heart is in knowing that Your beautiful name is attached to me, O  Yahweh, Commander of Angel Armies.” Jeremiah 15:16 TPT.

Right. Let’s be clear. This is Jeremiah speaking, he was the prophet who didn’t want to be a prophet — who had to lie on one side for a year, and then he had to do the same thing on the other side – all of this was for the Lord’s purposes. Once he was told to bury his loin cloth in the dirt, to teach the Israelites a lesson, and after that he had to wear the mangy, mouldy, mostly-destroyed loin cloth … that’s the scoop for all you fashionistas out there – mouldy clothes! 

This is a guy who walked about with half his head shaved … nothing new there! He was known as ‘the weeping prophet’ because his life was very hard. He was imprisoned, persecuted, betrayed, thrown into a pit by his friends. This man was a walking illustration of what God wanted to say to His people about what was rapidly coming toward them! But, please note — this stuff wasn’t just information to Jeremiah – it was his LIFE! And this man, whose life wasn’t a whole heap of fun, fun, fun — also still said those beautiful words at the top of this page.

My point today, is that life is filled with dichotomies. None of us are just one thing, we all wear different hats in different circumstances and each of us have been asked to deal with all kinds of things in our lives. Some people won’t like what we say – or we do – or even what we don’t do. My conclusion is this – you can’t please people, they are way too fickle! Go with pleasing the Lord. It’s much safer – He’s reliable! Just wait, your troubles will all make sense, eventually.

It is time to relinquish the idea that our lives are always meant to be happy, and but go after His joy! Instead of chasing this world’s idea of happiness our God saved us to use us to enlarge His kingdom. Let’s also remember, our God loves a big family! But just like Jeremiah … belonging to the Lord and being named and owned as the Lord’s child, is our greatest joy and aim as well as … … here comes a word we all hate … responsibility! 

I’ve learnt to deeply appreciate what Father God says, and what He does, and how He does it. Often that actually happens after the hard stuff has been resolved. The difficulties life throws at us can hurt like mad, but eventually these thing fade, or we get used to it … or … we learn from Him how to live with it, like Jeremiah did. The secret to surviving is to allow the bad stuff to be regularly replaced by our ever-present knowledge that Almighty God loves each one of us, unconditionally, and He always wants our good. At the same time, we need to remember, whatever we focus on becomes bigger. 

Try focussing, like Jeremiah did, on Who the Lord is, and what He says about this life. We belong to Him now, that’s a comfort as well as a promise! Many people today want to be the prophet. I just want to say to them — “have you even read the Old Testament??” That kind of life is not as much fun as someone might think it is. A prophet’s life is a visual aid. Jesus’ life was! They often show us by the way they live that God’s Ways are costly, even though they are beautiful to behold. Jeremiah’s life did, so did Hosea’s!

The bible says: “It was for freedom that Christ set us free no longer to be made subject to a yoke of slavery.” (Galatians 5:1). However that verse needs to be firmly accompanied by the knowledge that we are now yoked to Christ. So now we go where He goes, and do what He does – we become His heart, hands and feet.

I believe the Lord’s Word sustained Jeremiah through the hard times that constantly came hurtling right at him. This is a wonderful reason to cherish whatever the Holy Spirit says to us, when He says it. He wants to sustain us through trials. Father God promises to be with us, when we are in trouble — but sometimes the distance between that promise and its fruition is bigger than we would like. That’s when our faith in God’s goodness is tested.

Jesus warned us about this, in another back molar chewy verse – “I have told you these things, so that IN ME you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.” John 16:33. So where is the peace? IN HIM. God has stated His purpose for what He does, and why He does it. We need to listen. Everybody likes the peace bit, but many of us wanna skip the ‘in this world you will have trouble’ part.

When we take what He says as information, we are instantly missing the application of His Words into our own lives. It means we aren’t chewing, instead we are browsing looking for answers that we might like more than the ones we found so far! Here’s my advice for free – simply ask the Lord: “What would You like me to learn here Lord?” This means we are both chewing and digesting God’s Word with the help of our molars!!  Bye. 👋

P 3182 Gold can be found by a smart seeker.

/ DVH

Here’s a fairly common family scenario – it’s early, you just got up, and you have 40 things to do before you leave for work, and suddenly the dog throws up in the lounge. When you’ve dealt with all that, plus getting kids off to school — you pray, and hope that somehow, something from reading the bible might fall into place. Meanwhile you are actively looking for encouragement, because you are already stressed!

The following parable gives us an example of adaptation, doing what we know realistically, we can do, rather than stuffing too much in, hoping we will somehow slide by. Remember, we are not reading for the sake of learning or understanding it, we are reading the bible trying to find something to DO. Our aim matters. I have sometimes read 3 words, and had enough food to keep me chewing on it all day. We are aiming at digesting truth so that our behaviour changes. Jesus is explaining that even a crook knows how to make the best of a difficult situation!

The following parable seems very puzzling, because it appears inconsistent with everything else Jesus teaches. This manager is a lazy crook and a bad servant, and yet the Lord is commending him. But this manager knew how to survive in difficult circumstances. I think sometimes we give up too soon, and so we adapt our aim to facilitate our TIME, instead of making HIM our priority. So we aren’t aiming for food—instead we are settling for soothing our conscience. 

In Luke 16:1-13 MSG Jesus said to His disciples, “There was once a rich man who had a manager. He got reports that the manager had been taking advantage of his position by running up huge personal expenses. So he called him in and said, ‘What’s this I hear about you? You’re fired. And I want a complete audit of your books.’“The manager said to himself, ‘What am I going to do? I’ve lost my job as manager. I’m not strong enough for a laboring job, and I’m too proud to beg. . . . Ah, I’ve got a plan. Here’s what I’ll do . . . then when I’m turned out into the street, people will take me into their houses.’

“Then he went at it. One after another, he called in the people who were in debt to his master. He said to the first, ‘How much do you owe my master?’“He replied, ‘A hundred jugs of olive oil.’“The manager said, ‘Here, take your bill, sit down here—quick now—write fifty.’“To the next he said, ‘And you, what do you owe?’“ He answered, ‘A hundred sacks of wheat.’“He said, ‘Take your bill, write in eighty.’“Now here’s a surprise: The master praised the crooked manager! And why? Because he knew how to look after himself. Streetwise people are smarter in this regard than law-abiding citizens. They are on constant alert, looking for angles, surviving by their wits. I want you to be smart in the same way—but for what is right—using every adversity to stimulate you to creative survival, to concentrate your attention on the bare essentials, so you’ll live, really live, and not complacently just get by on good behaviour.”

This sneaky manager, found a way to gain something to benefit him despite his circumstances. He did what he could to survive. Reading paragraphs in the bible when you have no time may not help you survive spiritually. Why not read just one or two verses, and chew on them, and find something to do in them, and then do it. Fresh bread from heaven, doesn’t have to be a whole loaf, it can be a small slice instead! Valuing God is about looking for what He wants to say to you personally, rather than treating Him like a chore you must perform. I consider going over and over the things that I don’t really understand, extremely valuable. So I pray ‘please help me understand this Lord,’ and I keep on doing that until I get an answer. 

I was impacted by these two verses – V9-11:“I want you to be smart in the same way—but for what is right—using every adversity to stimulate you to CREATIVE SURVIVAL to concentrate your attention on the bare essentials, so you’ll live, really live, and not complacently just get by on good behaviour.” See what I mean? When you are having “a day’ and it is not a good one, doing something is better than doing nothing at all. Even though doing nothing is far more tempting! It is much easier to say: ‘I’ll catch up tomorrow,’ When we do this we’ve missed the point, it is not the amount of scripture we read that matters – it is the attention we give to it while we are reading it. It’s the chewing that matters.That plus the actions we deliberately choose to carry out, to bring what we’ve read to life in our lives.

This steward was lazy etc. but he did something and it saved him. He didn’t get his old job back, but at least two other men would have been quite happy to employ him because he helped them out! Meanwhile his old boss received a benefit as well. Before, when this manager did what he did – his old boss wasn’t going to receive any payment at all!  We all need to be smart and prioritise the right things. You don’t have to read 12 chapters, so long as you keep putting what it says into action!

Even a little bit of God’s Word, when you act on it to digest it, will keep you going spiritually. We make friends with unrighteous mammon when we are realistic about what we can actually do and still prioritise our relationship with Him. Jesus Himself said: ‘every word’ that comes out of God’s mouth has power in it.’  We are better off to take in the little we can digest, rather than bite off huge chunks that get relegated into never-never-land and simply add to what I call ‘overall knowledge!’ Stuff that lies about in our brains and doesn’t benefit us because we didn’t give it enough attention. Make your situation work for you. With reading comes digestion.

The Gospels and Epistles are great places where we can find stuff we can do. Read and reread and then insist in your prayers that you want more than lip-service. Gold can be found by a smart seeker. Bye  👋

P 2665 His Way.

/ DVH

There is a way to look at this life that will change our thoughts about how we live our lives, today. The Gospels describe this over and over again. They are not talking about a set of rules, they are talking about the way Godly people view their time on earth and what that looks like. These people don’t consider their time here, belongs to them. They consider whatever time they have, to be HIS. Even if we start to want to understand God’s Ways, that thought will begin the transformation process and change how we perceive this life. 

Listen to Isaiah 48:17: “Thus says the Lord, your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel, “I am the Lord your God, Who teaches you to profit, Who leads you in the way you should go.” Human beings don’t walk His Way automatically, we need to learn to follow the Holy Spirit and He will teach us the way we should go. Otherwise we will continue to walk in the way which seems right to us! Proverbs 14:12 says:“There is a way which seems right to a man, But its end is the way of death.” BTW that verse is repeated in Proverbs 16:25.

When Christ died, there was a possibility released – an exchange. Our sin for Christ’s holiness, purity and clarity of purpose. We cannot participate in that exchange and still live the same way we always have. We need to purpose in our hearts to progressively put aside OUR ways, and actively go after HIS. For example: Jesus Christ chose to die –  now we choose to die, to our old life, and ways, daily. Our aim becomes what Christ wants … what He would do. So we choose to become even more deeply acquainted with the way He does things through reading the bible, prayer, and our actions. As we seek after God’s Ways, we will stop trying to fit the Lord into and around our existing lives.

When we choose to live this life Christ’s way, dedicated to Him, everything around us changes – because WE change. Heaven accompanies His Ways, and so we begin to release the Kingdom of God right here into the earth. Instant miracles are just one of His ways. Those incredible events are not the only Way God does things. Some things happen in our lives over time, simply because we’ve chosen to die to ourselves. This means that we can see that His Way is a wider and far more encompassing stream to enter. It includes digesting His Word and making it part of us, plus taking the time to continually learn to love, and walk, and live like Christ did … He is our example of how we are to live now because we belong to Him..1 John 2:6: “ …the one who says he abides in Him ought himself to walk in the same manner as He walked.” 

Jesus Christ called Himself the Way. Jesus Christ is God’s living WAY of saving mankind and changing our lives. Christ’s earthly life reveals what mankind can look like when they follow the Holy Spirit and live the way we’ve been designed to live. In John Chapter 14 we have a brief paragraph that shows that even His disciples were puzzled by what He said – they needed revelation. The Lord Jesus kept on talking about leaving, dying, and stuff they didn’t want to know! Thomas actually says that He has no idea about this Way Jesus talks about. Then Christ makes one of the greatest declarations in the New Testament. in Verse 6. “Jesus answered,“I am the Way and the Truth and the Life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.” 

Interestingly enough, the early church was also called the Way …that term appears at least six times in the book of Acts. It represented a totally different kind of life – a life surrendered to, and dedicated to God’s glory. These saints of old gave up their lives because the Holy Spirit had given them a revelation that there was a better way to live. To me those early stories illustrate the gap between Christians today, and all of those the Christians who lived and died for Jesus’ sake back then.

Sadly, now we seem to live our lives to suit ourselves, and we try to fit God and His ways in around the edges. But those early Christians chose to completely become acquainted with God’s Ways and they followed Him to their deaths. They left their old ways of thinking, doing, and being, and embraced whatever He told them to do. Because of that they spread the gospel to everyone, everywhere they went.

Isaiah 55:8-9 says:“For My thoughts are not your thoughts, Nor are your ways My ways,” declares the Lord.” Our task every single day is to embrace the mystery of following Jesus and learning His ways. The bible also tells us in Isaiah 30:21: “He, your Teacher will no longer hide Himself, but your eyes will behold your Teacher. Your ears will hear a word behind you, “This is the way, walk in it,” whenever you turn to the right or to the left.” That’s our aim. Our new life is a new WAY to live. Bye.👋

P 2538 Self examination.

/ DVH

We need to learn to live our lives actively recognising any triggers or anger we have allowed in our lives, which can send us into a spin. I am talking about those moments when we are tempted to doubt that GOD IS GOOD … or we stop living by love and start living by our feelings. Your feelings will lie to you. In those shaky moments it is time to dig into the word. 

The Holy Spirit is here with us and He will help us to identify what is going on, because we can easily be misled by our own triggers, passions, and even infirmities. James 1:13-15: “When tempted, no one should say, “God is tempting me.” For God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does He tempt anyone. But each one is tempted when by his own evil desire she is lured away and enticed. Then after desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, gives birth to death.…” 

Instead of laying the blame for our mistakes, missteps and contrary actions at the feet of others, or even blaming the Lord Himself — we need to make a choice to ask the Lord to help us see past whatever we did or thought, to whatever caused it! Ask yourself questions, and include useful thoughts like: “does the Bible support my thinking right now?” Making excuses for yourself, or others, is a waste of time and energy. It leads to keeping score. This journey we are on is one of progressively growing our faith, and that includes the faith we exercise to eliminate the things that cause us to stumble.

Meanwhile, our enemy is quite capable of capitalising on pain and anger. Even those things he deliberately seeded into our hearts and minds years ago. he does this to strangle out the strength of God’s Word in our lives. It is up to us to recognise what is going on, and then prayerfully challenge those things with the Holy Spirit’s help. “So give yourselves humbly to God…” (Because if anyone knows our motivations HE does!) …then we…“resist the devil and he will flee from you.” James 4:7. Take a stand and tell the enemy he cannot send you down the plug hole of despair and guilt over things you did in your past. Even if the past was just … yesterday. Jesus Christ paid all our debts for us!

Personally – I repent, if I haven’t done that already, then I forgive myself and/or the offender, then I repair any damage done to everyone involved. That can involve me going to my brother and confessing my fault! Yeah wot fun! The thing is that if we are harbouring anger toward someone else, going to them and confessing our fault is humbling. That will probably hurt, but it has a huge ongoing heart effect. Then we pray for healing. 

To dig out any lies in our minds and hearts, we will also need the truth of His Word to be constantly hidden in our hearts.  Whether you choose to memorise scripture or not, let me exhort you that the …sword (God’s word) that you pick up in the heat of battle and USE, will not be easily forgotten. And digesting His word, by doing what it says, is one of the best ways I know to have any sword handy! Don’t just read – obey. 

It is a waste of time to say to Him, and to yourself: “I’m not mad at anyone.” It is way more fruitful to ask the Lord “Who am I mad at Lord?” In other words, let the Holy Spirit excuse you, don’t do it for yourself. When in doubt, ask for forgiveness, anyway. Think of grudges as being like a pile of dirty socks. If you keep throwing more dirty clothes on top of them, pretty soon you can’t see over the pile! Hiding stuff leads to mould growing in the corners. 

When you’ve finished sorting out your dirty clothes, ask the Lord to complete the work by cleansing you from all unrighteousness.“IF we confess our sins, He is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.” 1John 1:9. Whatever the Lord asks us to do, we CAN do. He wouldn’t ask us to do it if we couldn’t. Feeling like we can’t do these things is living by our feelings and “… we walk by faith, not by sight.” 2 Corinthians 5:7. 

Self-examination in times of stress is often difficult. It is so much easier to let fly with anger than step into the Holy Spirit and gain the spirit of self-control – but doing the latter leads to growth. 👋