Discernment

P 2663 He is always with us.

/ DVH

1 Chronicles 5: 18,20 -22: “The Reubenites, the Gadites and the half-tribe of Manasseh ,.. …They waged war against the Hagrites, Jetur, Naphish and Nodab. They were helped in fighting them, and God delivered the Hagrites and all their allies into their hands, because they cried out to Him during the battle. He answered their prayers, because they trusted in Him…”

The Israelites figuratively stood behind Almighty God in all these battles. They sought His protection and He gave it to them…’because (the bible says) the battle was God’s…”  So what does that mean to us, here, today? How do we do that? How do we know which battle is about endurance, and which one is about God Himself dealing with the enemy who is dancing around in front of our eyes? We need a word from Him. Like … “stand still …” OR …”you have need of endurance.” That’s two I can think of! No matter which one is appropriate at which time  – He is always with us.

I’ve found the secret to discernment in times like this comes to me as the battle is raging …  in the heat of what is going on! The above scripture from 1 Chronicles says “…during the battle.” The Holy Spirit is not like a boss who says, ‘do this’ and then he goes off, forgets about you, and expects you to do whatever it is … whether you know how to carry out those instructions or not! The Holy Spirit is also ALWAYS WITH US. He wants us to win.

But, we need to remember that He will not intrude or force us to do anything. If we ever feel pushed, it’s not Him! The Holy Spirit is the same Spirit that was in Christ Jesus, and Jesus was gentle and lowly in His heart. He told and showed His disciples what to do, by example, but He did not force them to do anything! 

Trust often operates best right in the middle of the battle, while we are making choices – good or bad ones. Sometimes our choices sound like this: ‘I feel sorry for myself. The things that have been happening to me are awful!’ You know, this life doesn’t operate on fair or unfair…we are living in the devil’s territory – nothing is fair here!!  Another easy choice might be: “I am too tired to fight. It’s all too much for me.” Pretend your troubles are a boiling hot rock and hand it off to the Lord ASAP. Either way, you will get endurance!

Our enemy loves to play with our feelings. Our feelings have been his playground over many years. So our faith is stretched when things get hard. At this time, I am learning to refuse to let satan and his minions drag me down to their level. Just stretch out your hand toward the Lord Jesus, your victory and healing is right in front of you. God is with us in the heat of the battle.

Fighting for our new life in Christ is difficult when we are engaged fighting multiple difficulties, on multiple fronts, and it seems that our peace, our happiness, sometimes even our very life is at stake! Those Israelites we read about today were fighting four different nations at once! The best time to fight is when we don’t feel like it. That’s actually when our faith grows. Because it is being stretched, it is very likely that this process will hurt and seem hard!  We fight for our right to stand still and let Him do what He wants.

However, at the same time, our fight is also easy. We simply give everything over to Him. Israel experienced victory when they let Him have His way. Just hand your situation over and refuse to take that stuff back and worry over it. “His yoke is easy, His burden is light ..” So if whatever is happening is heavy and hard – then WE are still carrying it!!  Yeah, I know handing over things that are important to us can seem irresponsible, but this is part of salvation’s provision. Victory belongs to us. We no longer need to be tormented by whatever is going on around us. He gave us the power to relinquish those things that so easily beset us. Those things that happen and hang round our necks like weights.

As we learn to give these things to Him, we will become even more aware that He is with us. Focus on the Lord not the junk. Start thanking Him because He promised that He will be here, with us. He said:“I will be WITH you in trouble…”  In testing times, feeling around in our feelings to see if we feel like He is with us, is counter-productive! Ask Him to be with you and then believe that He will not lie to you. Because He won’t. 

The thing is, TRUST is one of the ways we learn to be LED BY THE HOLY SPIRIT. We obey His directives, in season and out of season, and we turn over the results to Him. If we get it wrong, then we repent. Then we repeat, and repeat and repeat  – until eventually this becomes part of our new nature. There is nothing mystical about being led by the Holy Spirit, it is the most natural thing. He is present when we are born, and He is the best ‘Nanny’ and care-giver this world will ever know!

What I hear in my heart, when I am under pressure can be affected by my circumstances and how I feel, but His Word is rock solid – it never changes. We need to let Him help us listen as we read His book – whether the sky is sunny and it looks like we are winning, or there’s a hurricane raging and nothing is as it should be. I know, from my own experiences, that He will always kiss HIS book.

He’s with us in its pages, no matter what is raging around us. It doesn’t matter what version we have – it’s our faith that He will speak to us through what He has written … not the version! Our God loves us with incredible passion and He will always respond to our hearts seeking His. Let go and let Him fight for you. Bye 👋

P 2560 We are in a war and we must learn to fight.

/ DVH

2 Samuel 2: 1-7, 8-9. 12-17 plus 3:1. “So “David went up there with his two wives, Ahinoam of Jezreel and Abigail, the widow of Nabal of Carmel.David also took the men who were with him, each with his family, and they settled in Hebron and its towns Then the men of Judah came to Hebron, and there they anointed David king over the tribe of Judah. … … …

Abner son of Ner, together with the men of Ish-Bosheth son of Saul, left Mahanaim and went to Gibeon. Joab son of Zeruiah and David’s men went out and met them at the pool of Gibeon. One group sat down on one side of the pool and one group on the other side.Then Abner said to Joab, “Let’s have some of the young men get up and fight hand to hand in front of us. “All right, let them do it,” Joab said… …

So they stood up and were counted off—twelve men for Benjamin and Ish-Bosheth son of Saul, and twelve for David. Then each man grabbed his opponent by the head and thrust his dagger into his opponent’s side, and they fell down together…The battle that day was very fierce, and Abner and the Israelites were defeated by David’s men. … …

3:1 The war between the house of Saul and the house of David lasted a long time. David grew stronger and stronger, while the house of Saul grew weaker and weaker.”

Saul and David had a ‘history’ which consisted of King Saul trying at every opportunity to kill David. At one stage this king even took David’s wife, Michal, Saul’s own daughter! … and gave her to someone else to marry! satan does not fight fair either! I personally see these battles between Saul and David as a parallel to the battle we fight every single day, between the flesh and the spirit. David only ever did this jealous King good, because His ultimate loyalty was to the Ways of God and Saul was the anointed king..That’s also the way the Spirit of God works for us – He only does us good. No matter how things look – He wants to bless us.

In this life, thanks to everything Jesus did for us — just like David, we’ve already won. Our Hero, our mighty Warrior Jesus Christ, fought for us and won. And one day He will fight the last battle and dispose of that enemy forever. But even though we know that Jesus has already won on mankind’s behalf, yet we are still destined to have to fight for what is ours while we are here, because our enemy refuses to let go of this battle. Just like Saul – he will cheat and fight ’til the end.

However we can daily defeat our enemy by the way we choose to live!  We are the peace bringers and peace-keepers. We are called to rout out the enemy’s damage in people’s lives and usher in God’s kingdom – by the way we treat others. Our weapons aren’t ordinary – they operate in the Holy Spirit’s power. They are the Word of God plus our humility, yieldedness to the Lord, and Love is our greatest weapon of all! Even when our enemy tries to take us out – the key to winning is being prepared to die for Jesus’ sake. However, if or when we do not choose to enter the battlefield, we will still be battered and bashed by this life’s sorrows and suffering, and our flesh will lose every battle by default!

Sometimes the enemy’s strongholds are inside us – which means we must choose to fight our natural inclinations to be snarky and nasty and grab at things by force or manipulation. We do this by asking the Holy Spirit to help us. The devil will also twist our perceptions and our emotions to trick us into fighting over the things that don’t matter eternally. That means we will waste our energy and get weary in the battle. Our flesh will always be at war with the Spirit, because the Spirit has a much higher aim … to glorify God … Dying daily is the only way to learn to fight and WIN.

It is interesting to note that David had been selected as King, by God Himself – but not everyone in the kingdom accepted God’s edict. A whole lot of people still followed Saul! Which is why popularity is never our aim! This story shows me that there are many people who are not discerning. Spiritual discernment is one of the treasures I talked about yesterday, it keeps us from falling into sin’s snares. However, at the same time, any difficulties in our day-to-day lives need to be used as opportunities to be transformed in our POV, attitudes and actions with the Lord’s guidance and help. We should never ever forget that we are in a war, and let the stuff that rushes at us, take us by surprise, and change our aims. Our aim is not comfort – it is Christ proclaimed – we are to bring His kingdom here, now.

Sometimes I think that the Body of Christ is like a bunch of small children at a Bazaar. They run from this shiny new thing, to another tasty thing …without any thought at all. They chase after easy answers that will give them what they think they want. Immediate gratification. We are in a war, we MUST learn to fight. Even our own flesh only wants what it can see. However, the Spirit wants what only God can see, so we can see it too! Now that’s a good place to praise God! 🙌 

P 2422 Understanding choices is a mark of maturity.

/ DVH

“And in love He chose us before He laid the foundation of the universe! Because of His great love, He ordained us, so that we would be seen as holy in His eyes with an unstained innocence. For it was always in His perfect plan to adopt us as His delightful children, through our union with Jesus, the Anointed One, so that His tremendous love that cascades over us would glorify His grace —for the same love He has for the Beloved, Jesus, He has for us. And this unfolding plan brings Him great pleasure!” Ephesians 1:4-6 TPT.

Choice is a funny thing;  when we are teenagers we can end up choosing to do stuff because all our friends are doing it, whether that stuff is good or bad. And unless we happen to be Sam Kerr, David Beckham or Roger Federer, we can end up not chosen for some sporting team etc. at school, because everybody has worked out that we are a liability not an asset. I could never hit the broadside of a barn myself – and I often fell over my own feet. I bench-warmed my way through High School!

However … Jesus Christ chose us first … ‘while we were yet sinners…’  And at the same time maybe we actively hated this parent or that sibling, or this teacher or that boss, and wished them gone or dead – He still chose us. And He did that before we ever even got here. Such is the power of real love. Immaturity, I’ve personally discovered, often leaves all the hard choices to other people. I have a terrible feeling that the sub-text on that kind of decision is about being able to blame someone else if things work out badly. Not choosing is still choosing!

One of the worst enemies of the freedom to choose, is fear of failure. This means that we don’t choose because we don’t want to look stupid or unpopular. We don’t call it that, of course, we call it discernment, or even preferring one another. Speaking for myself, again, I discovered that idea is a bald-faced lie. Most times the only feelings I’m looking after are my own.

Human beings can go to great lengths to cover up their secret defensive agendas. For instance, if I accuse you of something, then you will be so busy defending yourself you will probably forget all about what I did. It is plain to me that the Lord wants me to get rid of all my defensive weapons and let HIM look after me. My problem comes because I can see that thing works both ways. What if He wants to look after you? 😳 PS He’s God… He can do BOTH.

Meanwhile, I’ve spent my lifetime sharpening and honing these implements of defence I’ve designed – and I don’t want to give them up – they are almost automatic now!

Have you ever watched a little kid hesitate between two items because they want both and you’ve told them to choose one?  Yeah, now you’re getting it. That’s what choice is all about. It means deciding in favour of one thing and against another and that’s not a bit popular in the world we live in.

We know that we can only choose well, because He chose us first. The real power of personal choice actually resides in knowing we’ve been empowered by what He did. Even if no-one ever empowered us as children, Jesus Christ, the ever-loving powerful Son of God has empowered us now! We simply have to choose to believe what His book says and act on it. We both know choices are hard because the habits of a lifetime compel us to “look after myself” — because no-one else will. 

So here some final questions to ask yourself: who taught either of us to be suspicious of other people? If you or I happen to think of someone when we ask that question, we should start by forgiving them. And remember, forgiveness, is not a feeling – it’s a choice! Of course you’ve never heard me say that before have you? 😂

And it helps to deliberately remind ourselves that Jesus chose us. Not because we have a sterling character, or we are aesthetically pleasing, or we are gifted one way or another. His choices were made the same way ours need to be. It involved sacrifice. Understanding the power of personal choice is a huge key while we are learning personal maturity with His help. It’s part of following Him. He chose – so now we choose … despite how we feel. 👋🏻