Extravagant

P3334 Let’s be observers of God’s goodness.   

/ DVH

Ephesians 5:1-2: “Watch what God does, and then you do it, like children who learn proper behaviour from their parents. Mostly what God does is love you. Keep company with Him and learn a life of love. Observe how Christ loved us. His love was not cautious but extravagant. He didn’t love in order to get something from us but to give everything of Himself to us. Love like that.”  Jesus said this, He was observant. John 5:19&20: ”Jesus gave them this answer: “Very truly I tell you, the Son can do nothing by Himself; He can do only what He sees His Father doing, because whatever the Father does the Son also does.”

One of the things I enjoyed doing with my kids when they were little was I taught them to be observant. It’s a great skill! I really enjoy watching birds, and I’ve found if I want to see them in action I need to be alert and watch out for the slightest movement around me. In the same way, I’ve learnt that watching out to see what the Lord will do in any given situation, at any moment will keep me alert. Those two scriptures above talk about such a simple way to help our focus, and at the same time, they tell us how to ‘keep company with Him’ daily.

Here’s an interesting scripture from Habakkuk 2:1, it piques my curiosity. “I will stand at my guard post. And station myself on the tower; And I will keep watch to see what He will say to me, And what answer I will give [as His spokesman] when I am reproved.” ‘I will watch to see what He will say to me…’  Habakkuk discovered a different type of language of our Father’s, that does not consist of words. Our God has many languages, and we miss most of them because we only “hear” Him in our own. But this verse shows us there is a whole other way to hear Him … by watching to see what He is doing right now! Did you know that the word ‘watching’ is used sixty-one times in the bible? To see the Lord we must observe what is going on around us and look for His goodness in it. 

So much of our learning in the Body of Christ is passive. We sit, we take notes, we stare out of the window, we say ‘Amen!’ We clap, we dance, we sing, we shake hands with others … But are we listening for the Voice within the voice? Only alert people can hear His secrets. We can listen to the same sermon other people hear, but we can also hear something more, something entirely different. Simply because the Lord has put His NEON highlighter over a few words that totally change our POV.

Imagine what could or would happen if the whole Body of Christ did that? We would have the ‘manifold many-sided wisdom of God to guide us,’ daily. I don’t have all His wisdom, neither do you – but when we get together – we more than double our opportunities to watch and see Him at work. Father God will share Himself with anyone, so let’s be alert and wait, and watch for Him to move. Our God is to be experienced.

At the same time, we watch what He does, because that is the way we learn what we are to do. Jesus was constantly watching His Father to see what He was doing. He tells us that in John. Learning to notice things is a cultivated skill, but anyone can do it. The difference between seeing and really seeing is choosing to pay attention. Sadly this world slathers itself with an attitude of distraction and passivity. So we watch stuff, we listen, we absorb information, maybe we even memorise it – but we are not actively participating in anything we hear, because we are information gathering! Let’s actively take part in an incredible process that means we are always watching out to see what God will do next!

His goodness is all around us. We can see evidence of it every day, the sun came up where I live, did it come up at your house? Let’s value what we see. If it is raining and I am going to the car, and the rain stops – I thank Him for taking care of me … my thought is this… I can slip and fall in the rain. I often look at other people’s faces and see sadness and sorrow, I can’t help them, because we are just ships passing in the night, but I can pray for them. I don’t have to know what’s going on, but He does.

I think Jesus lived His life alert to whatever His Father was doing, because He just loved to watch His Father at work. Some people waste their lives waiting for someone else to make a  mistake, what a tragedy! What a waste of sight!! Any dill can find fault – but can we find the good in a supposedly bad person? That’s real insight! 

Loving people is not hard when we look through Christ’s eyes. He saw the potential for good in a tax collector who climbed a tree. Once, He saw far more than a woman who was sleeping around, when He stopped at a well. She had potential. It was released when Jesus recognised His Father had been working in her life. And Jesus saw fledgling faith in Peter when He said “Come!” He saw His Father stretching that man’s faith into areas Peter didn’t even know about. This man was a fishermen by trade — they know you can’t walk on water! But Peter suspended his earthly expertise when he put his eyes on Jesus and saw what HE was doing! He just did what He saw the Master doing.

Maybe we wouldn’t be as judgey with each other if we learnt to see this world through His eyes. As we see, and watch out for ways to bless people, I believe we will see them through our Father’s eyes. Love gives us eyes to see the good.  And watching Him at work, every single day, helps us do the impossible and leads us to be observers of God’s goodness. Bye. 👋 

P 2993 Holy Spirit breathing – in and out.

/ DVH

“For athletic training only benefits you for a short season, but righteousness brings lasting benefit in everything; for righteousness contains the promise of life, for time and eternity.”1 Timothy 4:8 TPT.

One of the things that I love about this verse is anyone can do it.  You don’t have to be physically fit or train for 5 hours a day. Being trained by righteousness simply takes faith and dedication. The only thing that will stop any of us from living this way, are the choices we make. However, if we continually make the wrong choices it is like sticking our fingers in our ears and ignoring what the Lord is saying to us.

This option for spiritual fitness is available to all of us, because of what Jesus did for us. Ignoring the Holy Spirit is dangerous – so we need to train ourselves to listen to Him. When I don’t want to do whatever He asks me to do, I ask for His help to do it, then I do it anyway, using my faith. My job is to let God live in me and through me, just like Jesus did and the Lord Jesus gave us His own ability to do whatever God wants from us.

Romans 5:15-17: “Yet the rescuing gift is not exactly parallel to the death-dealing sin. If one man’s sin put crowds of people at the dead-end abyss of separation from God, just think what God’s gift poured through one man, Jesus Christ, will do! There’s no comparison between that death-dealing sin and this generous, life-giving gift. The verdict on that one sin was the death sentence; the verdict on the many sins that followed was this wonderful life sentence. If death got the upper hand through one man’s wrongdoing, can you imagine the breathtaking recovery life makes, absolute life, in those who grasp with both hands this wildly extravagant life-gift, this grand setting-everything-right, that the one man Jesus Christ provides?” 

We need to grab hold of what the Lord has already given us with both hands and not let go, using our faith. Instead of believing we are ‘not good’ at spiritual things, and keeping a record of our failures – or the disappointments we’ve experienced when we’ve prayed and the answer we wanted did not come. To increase our faith we meditate on Who He is, what He gave us, plus things we’ve seen Him do through us and in us. This is how we train ourselves to walk in faith with Him – we take note to encourage our hearts.

We all know Jesus succeeded in what He set out to do, so that’s where we look – not at our failures… but at His victory! He was perfectly righteous with God and His death and resurrection gave us the power and right to:“act in accord with God’s divine law.”  So any sin is to be owned, repented from and walked away from. The very word repent means ‘turn around and walk in the other direction.’ Our aim is to maintain God Himself living within us – just like Jesus did. Then, by actively choosing to live in His Grace – His way of acting and thinking – our response to this world will be unconditional LOVE.

Training yourself to live in a Godly fashion takes dedication to living aware of Him. However, our continuing response to God’s faithfulness can also deliver us from all kinds of evil. Dying to self, and living for Him means we choose to value Him above everything else. We lean on what He has given us. Jesus died and gave us His ability to live differently, we enter into that gift by using our faith. Just like we expect the bank to have our money when we make a withdrawal, we make faith withdrawals by ignoring our feelings and inclinations and obeying Him instead. We will encourage huge spiritual deposits into our lives by spending time with Him.  

Athletes train for years, to achieve goals, they employ self-discipline, plus a singular focus to achieve what they want. We also need to have just one focus, pleasing Him! If we live our ordinary everyday lives putting to death those things that will only give us temporary relief or pleasure, in favour of making Him Lord, then our joy increases. The more we want what He wants, the more He will give us opportunities to use our faith, and choose His Ways over our own. It seems impossible simply because we are so used to indulging our flesh. 

The Lord loves the secret place. He does not want us to see time spent with Him as a duty, rather it is a privilege and provision that Jesus willingly paid for, to give us an incredible kind of togetherness. An athlete rehearses their skill to improve it, but instead, we practice looking to Him daily to be our ever-present help — all day every day. This hones our focus, our total faith-driven reliance upon Him to be there and help us. 

Knowing what the Lord likes and wants, occurs as we read the book, then we do what it says, and use our faith to obey what we’ve read. As time passes we begin to carry His secret place within us, everywhere we go.  It’s like breathing: valuing Him and spending time with Him is IN… and going out and sharing what He gives us is breathing OUT. Athletes need good breathing as well as fitness … so do Christians! We also need active faith. As we learn to hear His voice and do whatever He asks us to do, we will learn Holy Spirit breathing. Bye 👋

P 2826 Anybody can choose to come.

/ DVH

Luke 2:8-20 “And there were shepherds living out in the fields nearby, keeping watch over their flocks at night. An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified. But the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid. I bring you good news that will cause great joy for all the people. Today in the town of David a Saviour has been born to you; He is the Messiah, the Lord. This will be a sign to you: You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger.”

Matthew 2:9-12: ”After the Wise Men had listened to the king, they went on their way. The star they had seen when it rose went ahead of them. It finally stopped over the place where the Child was. When they saw the star, they were filled with joy. The Wise Men went to the house. There they saw the Child with His mother Mary. They bowed down and worshiped Him. Then they opened their treasures. They gave Him gold, frankincense and myrrh. But God warned them in a dream not to go back to Herod. So they returned to their country on a different road.”

Matthew 2:3-5a “When King Herod heard about it, he was very upset. Everyone in Jerusalem was troubled too. So Herod called together all the chief priests of the people. He also called the teachers of the law. He asked them where the Messiah was going to be born. “In Bethlehem in Judea,” they replied.“

I wanted to give three different examples from the bible today of 3 different types of people that sought out the Christ child shortly after His birth. Let’s look at them one at a time… 

First – the local shepherds going about their normal routine. They were doing what they had always done, day after day. I call this group … the smelly people. Not many bathrooms out in those hills, and no shower stalls either! These men lived their lives outside the camp, providing for those who lived inside the cities. 

“What was life like for shepherds in Jesus’ time? They were in daily contact with dirty, smelly sheep, their manure, their blood from cuts and scrapes, and the insects that buzzed around them. All of this meant that shepherds were almost never clean enough to worship with God’s people in God’s presence. So they were generally treated as outsiders.” (Google) The very first people outside of Mary and Joseph, that were chosen by God to worship His Son were unacceptable by their society’s standards. That makes me think! How about you?

Group number two: the kings! Or astrologers, depending on which interpretation you look up. Personally I think a king can also be an astrologer. These three very rich, brilliant men were most probably Gentiles and unbelievers, they were the intellectuals of their day –  they may have been Persian. Matthew 2:1-2.“Now when Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judæa in the days of Herod the king, behold, there came wise men from the east to Jerusalem, saying, Where is He that is born King of the Jews? for we have seen His star in the east, and are come to worship Him.”

These Magi are powerful, but little-known strangers. They were so important, and so unusual, that King Herod himself heard that they were in his area and he sent for them. Their gifts for the Baby were not just prophetic, but extravagant. And yet these important, learned men were prepared to lower themselves, and go to a little house on an ordinary little street to find Jesus, the newborn King, and worship Him. They came to worship an infant.

“The Magi recognized God’s special presence in the baby Jesus. Astrologers like the Magi believed that a special or unique star (like a comet or meteor shower) in the sky was a sign that a Special Person with special significance in history was being born.”. (Google… again!) These men didn’t smell bad, their clothes were refined and beautiful, instead they smelled of spices and perfumes, and they rode everywhere. Most people in those days had to walk. 

Last of all came King Herod. He obviously believed the prophecies the Magi gave him, he knew what he was doing , otherwise why would he have ordered the death of so many tiny male children? Matthew 2:16: “When Herod realized that he had been outwitted by the Magi, he was furious, and he gave orders to kill all the boys in Bethlehem and its vicinity who were two years old and under, in accordance with the time he had learned from the Magi.” 

This man was powerful, but he was threatened byan infant, yet he already had everything that most people would have dreamt about! He was chosen to be in that powerful position by Rome, and that meant he had whatever he wanted, when he wanted it. A palace with servants, fine clothes, perfumes, baths, great food and wine … Plus he had a powerful place in the community. But his response to Jesus, was to kill Him, because he saw the little baby as a challenger to his authority under Rome. Herod could have chosen to protect this child, instead he chose to try to destroy Him. I think that this was his opportunity to bend his knee, and he chose to oppose God. 

Three different groups of people, three different responses.  Right from the beginning, at the birth of Jesus – anybody could come to worship Him. Some travelled a few miles, others travelled for days, and one never left his throne but he was told too! Here we have three different responses to the King of heaven and we see what Jesus Himself taught us:  the poor are welcome, the rich must bow their knee … and the proud are doomed … unless they repent.

God has room for everyone at the cross – the choice is always ours. Everybody deserves to hear, no matter how they choose to respond.“The [Holy] Spirit and the bride (the church, believers) say, “Come.” And let the one who hears say, “Come.” And let the one who is thirsty come; let the one who wishes take and drink the water of life without cost.” Revelation 22:17. 👋

P 2443 Stand on His love for you.

/ DVH

“And I pray that He (the Holy Spirit) would unveil within you the unlimited riches of His glory and favour until supernatural strength floods your innermost being with His divine might and explosive power. Then, by constantly using your faith, the life of Christ will be released deep inside you, and the resting place of His love will become the very source and root of your life. Then you will be empowered to discover what every holy one experiences—the great magnitude of the astonishing love of Christ in all its dimensions. How deeply intimate and far-reaching is His love! How enduring and inclusive it is! Endless love beyond measurement that transcends our understanding—this extravagant love pours into you until you are filled to overflowing with the fullness of God!” Ephesians 3:16-19 TPT

This scripture has so much in it, it just blows my mind whenever I read it. Today I want to think about the word continually, as in on purpose (!) … reminding ourselves of the ever-present presence of God’s loving favour in and on our lives. Oh how He loves us! And His love is an utterly committed love. The price He paid to buy us back from hell and damnation is beyond our understanding, far more than we could ever ask or think.  You know, my opinion of my performance and who I think I am, does not matter to Him. Neither does yours. His opinion is the one that matters.

You may like me, you might not. The main thing I have to wrap my heart around is that Father God utterly loves me. In order to walk with the Holy Spirit, Who is the revealer of these great truths, I will need a firm foundation to stand on. Jesus died for my sins, once and forever, to make all this possible, is that foundation. Now we have to let that love sink down into our hearts so we become so completely saturated by it and there is no room for insecurity. Otherwise if my life does not go well, I might end up blaming Him, or other people … like you, or my family, my circumstances etc. And then the ground I am standing on becomes shaky. Our houses (lives) are only as good as their foundations!

We cannot start out with anyone else’s performance but HIS. What Jesus did was perfect. Anything else is this world’s measuring stick. Christ is now the perfect illustration of what mankind can look like. We can’t afford skip, or dismiss lightly this truth about how much God loves us. As soon as we dismiss it, or water it down with provisos, we miss the  magnitude of how wide, how deep, how all encompassing and powerful God’s love is! We dare not build on the wrong foundation, because His demonstrated Love is the only foundation that is eternally stable.

Many human beings don’t value love, except as a feeling —because this world’s idea of love is fickle, selfish and unpredictable. Humanity can be so unfaithful that our Father’s eternal faithfulness hardly registers in our hearts and lives. But it must. Otherwise we are moved around by circumstances and the winds of change too easily. We cannot use OUR measuring sticks to put a value on God’s love. It is far too easy, in these times we live in, to think that real love means permissiveness. 

Self-sacrificing, altruistic love wants only the very best for the one it loves. Father God’s incredible vibrant love has provided all of us with the means to be transformed. And all we need to do is to live for Him the way Christ lived for us. We have all the needed illustration and demonstration of that, in the book! Comprehending that sort of ongoing loving grace gives us a firm footing, as we walk through a weak wobbly world with no stable footholds.

I have learnt, from experience, that WE WILL GIVE OUT TO OTHERS WHAT WE STORE UP! If we store up our own mistakes, our wrong attitudes, our own idea of what love looks like … OR … spend our lives concentrating on someone else’s sins, their mistakes, and their wrong attitudes, we are no longer standing firmly on LOVE. The Holy Spirit was sent here to teach us to how to walk, talk, sit, and stand totally saturated with God’s love. He’s an expert. Re-read today’s scripture it entertains no doubts. 

We must mature enough to understand that real LOVE corrects, it shapes, it guides, it teaches, and … it helps us. Love always fosters connection. Father God’s love is with us in the Person of the Holy Spirit. Jesus did not leave us alone to muddle along without Him – He sent back the Holy Spirit to help, teach, guide, correct, counsel, and comfort us into His Way of Love. We must let the love of God live in us, and make us so rich in love we can easily give it away!  We need to learn to stand on these things, gratefully. 🕊❤️‍🔥 

P 2440 How do we smell to others?

/ DVH

“Be imitators of God in everything you do, for then you will represent your Father as His beloved sons and daughters. And continue to walk surrendered to the extravagant love of Christ, for He surrendered His life as a sacrifice for us. His great love for us was pleasing to God, like an aroma of adoration—a sweet healing fragrance.” Ephesians 5:1-2 TPT

Jesus Christ is the perfect role model – He is what active Love smells like! We can have this strange man-made idea of what love should smell, or even look like …depending on our personal needs, or favourite perfume, flower or plant. Christ’s love smells like obedient sacrificial death. It was His unconditional devotion to His Father’s will on our behalf, that was a beautiful fragrance to Father God. Jesus Christ conquered death, by what He voluntarily did, and that heavenly aroma is pleasing to God. Not the smell of death, BTW .. but the smell of sacrifice.

The Lord accomplished everything He did for us by that total obedience, plus He treasured every word that came out of His Father’s mouth. He acted on every single one of those words — even when it killed Him. Christ’s faith in our heavenly Father’s goodness, and His ability to bring life out of death was not only complete, it went into places we cannot begin to imagine. Right into the depths of man’s depravity, despair, indifference and disobedience. Jesus conquered it all – with a vibrant living faith founded on God’s truth. The smell in heaven must have been incredible on Resurrection Sunday!

And Jesus Christ passed that incredibly perfumed blazing torch onto US. “For WE are the aroma of Christ to God among those who are being saved and among those who are perishing, to one a fragrance from death to death, to the other a fragrance from life to life. Who is sufficient for these things? For we are not, like so many, peddlers of God’s word, but as men of sincerity, as commissioned by God, in the sight of God we speak in Christ.” 2 Corinthians 2:15-17. We smell like LIFE to those who are perishing in their sins!

We are definitely not perfume salesmen. Instead, I think that we are His perfume bottles. Some of us are short ordinary looking bottles and some of us are amazing feats of glass. That bit does not matter – it is what is inside those bottles that matters! It is the sweet fragrance of Christ that matters. The more we use our faith to obey His word, the more His perfume inside us is released, and then it becomes an appealing and sweet fragrance to God, and also toward others. 

Our living sacrifice of Love for Him, is precious incense toward Him. If you want to really worship God – present your body as a living sacrifice and follow that through! He trusts us to carry His sweet fragrance out into the world, where that glorious fragrance changes us and impacts others. Christ’s death was terrible to see, but it brought forth a fragrance that is still present all over this world today, in the hearts and lives of His laid-down lovers.

On another note, I want to take a brief moment to look at Esther. FYI, this young woman was already beautiful — that’s why she was chosen! For six months this lovely young woman was treated with oil and myrrh and for a further six months with perfumes and cosmetics. That was some beauty spa she went to!! After all that she was deemed ready to go to meet the king. (Esther 2:12) 

First of all, we can start cheering that we can go to our King Jesus with or without beauty(?) treatments, because His love toward all mankind is unconditional! We can come into His Presence whenever we like. After meeting Him, we can get spiritual beauty treatments from the Holy Spirit. They are optional, but effective.  Unlike Esther who had to get slathered and gussied up to even get into the room with King Xerxes!

At that time SomeOne just like the Holy Spirit came into her life, in the form of a eunuch named Hegai. That person knew exactly what Xerxes liked!Here are a couple of  brief sentences that I think have great significance in this true story. Esther 2:8&9: “Esther also was taken to the king’s palace and entrusted to Hegai, who had charge of the harem. She pleased him and won his favour. Immediately he provided her with her beauty treatments and special food.”

I believe that Hegai is a quiet reflection of the nature of the Holy Spirit in our lives. Likewise the Holy Spirit knows exactly what our King likes. He knows what attitudes and actions etc. will please the Lord Jesus, and He is so happy to share those things with us. Everything is free, all we need to do is to obey whatever He says! Like Esther, all we must do is be prepared to take His advice. Spending time soaking in the precious things the Holy Spirit has provided for us, will bring the smell of heaven into our lives and distribute it out into the world around us. 🥰 👋🏻

P 2428 Jesus Christ – Grace and mercy personified.

/ DVH

“So now we draw near freely and boldly to where grace is enthroned, to receive mercy’s kiss and discover the grace we urgently need to strengthen us in our time of weakness.” Hebrews 4:16 TPT Jesus Christ is grace and mercy personified. And every single thing He did and said was God’s incredible mercy toward mankind. But what does all that mean? Right here, right now, to us … where you and I live? Jesus Christ did not just provide us with a new copy-cat way to live – He has real life IN Him — and He paid for and gave that life to us. We gain strength when we are weak because of what He did.

Grace and mercy can often just be words to mankind, but to Father God they are a PERSON. “When the extraordinary compassion of God our Saviour and His overpowering love suddenly appeared in Person, as the brightness of a dawning day, He came to save us. Not because of any virtuous deed that we have done but only because of His extravagant mercy.” Titus 3:4-5 TPT.

If we are not careful, we can rush on by the words, and what we’ve been GIVEN. We were given a PERSON. Jesus didn’t simply have grace and mercy, like we might have kids or a house or a car – He IS grace and mercy!  And when mankind tortured and killed Him – grace and mercy came out… His life-giving blood flowed out and covered us all! Grace and mercy are the essence of Jesus Christ.

He is the perfect love of the Father expressed in a Person. Father God deliberately planned for that kind of love to come to earth and walk among us, so we could know, see and experience His love through Christ for ourselves. So now we know that these things are real and they belongs to us! We will not chase after what we do not know we OWN. Grace and mercy belong to us.

Sadly, our-not-so-grateful response to this precious gift was… … we, and people just like us, killed Him! It seems we liked the things we made up for ourselves, better! Jesus’ glorious truth about Who He is, and why He came, threatened our lies, our traditions, our very frame-work of what we chose to think about God Himself. This shows us a great deal about what human beings are really like!! We will make up a god that suits us rather than embrace the reality of Who He is. Does that sound familiar?

We cannot have grace and mercy in our lives, and sustain those things without the Author of those qualities IN us, helping us. They are simply not human qualities. When our long-ago forbearers, Adam and Eve, were caught in their sin, their immediate response was to blame someone or something else. Adam blamed God! He did the whole pathetic: “It’s-not-my-fault-God-You-gave-her-to-me thing.’ One of the hardest opponents we must fight in this life is our own overwhelming arrogance and pride. Sadly, we often think we know better than He does. That’s why we all need a brain transplant … via the bible renewing our minds! 

Lamentations 3:22&23.“It is of the Lord’s mercies that we are not consumed, because His compassions fail not. They are new every morning: great is Thy faithfulness.” Our God’s Character is saturated in incredible qualities that are not greatly esteemed by mankind. He gave these qualities to us for free, although His gift cost Him everything! His mercy is the reason we are still here and not roasting in hell. His compassion is so rock-solid we can stand on it. We need to learn to esteem what He esteems, first … then any other stuff will get added unto us along the way – if we actually need it.

The thing is, we can learn from the Holy Spirit how to live this life the way Jesus lived His. He was there with Christ. Jesus Christ was totally and humbly devoted to His Father’s will. Our devotion to God and others matters! God’s Mercy gives us access into the kind of real obedience we need, and His Grace empowers us to make the same choices Jesus would. BTW, FYI, in His Name means Jesus would do whatever it is if He were here. It isn’t just an add-on tag to legalise the prayer! Mercy and grace are not qualities to be used to our own advantage or even glossed over – they are the very essence of His new life IN us. Bye.👋🏻

“Now it’s time to be made new by every revelation that’s been given to you. And to be transformed as you embrace the glorious Christ-within as your new life and live in union with Him! For God has re-created you all over again in His perfect righteousness, and you now belong to Him in the realm of true holiness.” Ephesians 4:23-24 TPT

P 2424 This is His way.

/ DVH

“So I kneel humbly in awe before the Father of our Lord Jesus, the Messiah, the perfect Father of every father and child in heaven and on the earth. And I pray that He would unveil within you the unlimited riches of His glory and favour until supernatural strength floods your innermost being with His divine might and explosive power.Then, by constantly using your faith, the life of Christ will be released deep inside you, and the resting place of His love will become the very source and root of your life. 

Then you will be empowered to discover what every holy one experiences—the great magnitude of the astonishing love of Christ in all its dimensions. How deeply intimate and far-reaching is His love! How enduring and inclusive it is! Endless love beyond measurement that transcends our understanding—this extravagant love pours into you until you are filled to overflowing with the fullness of God!” Ephesians 3:14-19 TPT.

We don’t do the things that Jesus did or the things He asks us to do simply because He needs our hands and feet. We are not His robots, or even His portable advertising!  Christians do what they do to be obedient and their obedience expresses their loving devotion to Him. But at the same time the more we walk with Him in that obedience, the more we will see and experience His incredible Love for us. This is the very heart of these wonderful verses in Ephesians 3.

His love for us, as well as in us, these things are the riches we’ve been promised. Forget gold, silver and precious stones, His love is beyond price! And His Loving heart is toward us. He is like that King, Ahasuerus, who adored his wife, so he held out his sceptre toward Esther even when she  disobeyed the rules of his kingdom. God’s heart reaches toward us, to relieve us of our burdens and to help us with life’s difficulties. There are days when others do not like me or my company, but those days, those feelings, don’t reflect Him. Nothing will alter His love toward me. That is a huge gift. In those moments, I simply must believe what He says, not how I feel.

Years ago on ancient TV in the 1950s, we had an ad in this country for a man’s hair product, called Brylcreem. Its motto was “a little dab’ll do ya.” Father God’s love is NOT like Brylcreem! It is not mingy, or space-saving or economical! Christ’s sacrificial love sustains this universe and beyond. Despite what the scientists say, if God withdrew His loving favour from mankind the stars would fall out of the sky. Read the book of Revelation! You will see written there what happens when His boundless Love is withdrawn from the earth. His love is the incredibly powerful force that holds this world, including us, together.

The more we use our faith by being obedient, the more His love expands within us, until it becomes the very centre of our lives. Slowly His love transforms and replaces any imperfect human love we have that may have done damage to our hearts. Some of our responses are not sin – pain causes reactions too. However, the knowledge of His love is expanded in our hearts as we watch Him touch other people’s lives through us. 

While we were away this time, because of a series of God-ordained events, we managed to give an older cleaning lady a keychain. Her face seemed hardened by age and life, she was tiny but she looked tough. Scary even! But the Lord said to bless her, so we did. And the most amazing thing happened. Her face cracked open, and she looked just like a happy little child. Transformation happened right in front of our eyes. She danced up and down on the spot. This keychain was the most delicate one I have ever made. I probably would not have given her that particular one – my own judgment of how she looked would have gotten in the way! 

None of us know how hardened anyone else can become inside and out, because this life can deal each one of us terrible blows. In order to go on, human beings put on protective armour. That armour often changes our outward appearance, and at the same time it can alter what comes out of our mouths! Just like a barking dog that is scared of a stranger – we can become vicious and mean. But Father God’s love goes right around our disguises and touches hearts. Then we have the privilege of seeing someone else the way He designed them, that utterly transforms both parties, and opens their eyes to new possibilities. 

The bible says:  “perfect love casts out all fear…” The reality is, if we are afraid, it is not enough to just know this verse, that’s simply words. We need to know the heart of the One Who is speaking love over us. Watching Him work in the lives of the people around us opens our eyes to how incredible His love is. It seems upside down to think that in order to get love, we will have to give away Love. But that is His Way. It’s the way of faith. His way forward is for us to learn LOVE. 👋🏻

P 2416 Mercy is a fountain.

/ DVH

“Celebrate with praises the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, Who has shown us His extravagant mercy. For His fountain of mercy has given us a new life—we are reborn to experience a living, energetic hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.” 1 Peter 1:3 TPT

In everything we do and say, we must never forget God’s mercy, because of what Jesus Christ did for us. This mercy is not a small pool of water – it is not even a large body of water like the pool at Siloam – it is a fountain. A fountain has life in it. It is not static;  it flows, dances, bounces and beams light in every direction. A fountain is a symbol of His joy dancing over each one of us – all the time. We spend our lives in that fountain! Bathing in it, praising God for it, allowing God’s mercy to impact the way we think and act.

Our Heavenly Father’s mercy is like that. His mercy transforms everything it touches. We do not have to instruct people into the kingdom of God. We simply need to bring them into the proximity of that fountain. Our relationship with Him provides the proximity. So how do we do that? We extend mercy and grace to everyone – whether we like them or not! Then we stir up that fountain within us, and act on everything He says to do to keep it alive and bubbling. 

This includes showing mercy to people who don’t deserve it. PS neither did we!  That fountain resides in us now, the minute we said yes to Him. Everything Jesus Christ did on our behalf contributes to that living fountain. We stepped under/into that fountain and it began to bubble and grow inside us. Christ’s mercy is always so incredibly extravagant beyond our wildest dreams, because that flow always exceeds our demand upon it. Why would we abuse such Grace?

Our God knows everything, but that is no threat to us. Not to His kids. It is a promise that the fountain of His life is more than adequate for everything that has happened to us in our lives so far … and it will carry us in its sweet waters right on to the end. The thing is – when we appreciate that fountain and the cost that was paid – we would not dream of skating on by doing the minimum we can, hoping we can somehow fool Him into thinking it is enough. We would never dare take advantage of such a glorious gift that was given so freely for all of us. 

Christ is always our example, and the men and women who followed Him after His death and resurrection illustrate the sort of devotion we need to cultivate and protect in our ordinary everyday lives. It means whenever I talk to my neighbour, that mercy fountain within me reaches out to them, it embraces them. There is no pressure needed, because that fountain is so appealing, so incredible, so sweet, it draws everyone in. Are they grumpy neighbours? Then this fountain is more than adequate. Ask for His help! He made His help for us available through that fountain.

We have found as we talk to people all over this country that religion glazes their eyes and stops conversation. But mercy and grace opens unseen doors within them and you cannot shut them up. The person in front of us who seemed business-like and together, is suddenly transformed into a person with needs and hopes and dreams. They cannot believe that God is interested in them. They are drawn to His fountain – inside us  – they know they need Him. Both hubby and I would say we are totally inadequate to do this work, but daily He rises up within us, like a fountain springs into the air alive and working. He does whatever is needed! 

Mercy and joy go together. They transform lives by their very presence in us and through us. We will get so blessed by blessing others! Believe me this world has nothing to offer that competes with the reality of seeing His Presence touch someone. His little hidden ones, out there in every nook and cranny of this grumpy old world, know His voice. They may not know His Name, but something inside of them knows His voice. 

You and I carry that glorious wealth inside us everywhere we go. I exhort us all to bathe in that fountain, take it in with every single breath, and then allow it flow through us. Enjoy what Christ died to give us. Don’t spend so much time feeling guilty – use your time to be grateful.  Like Jesus said to His Father in the Lord’s prayer:“Manifest Your kingdom realm, and cause Your every purpose to be fulfilled on earth, just as it is in heaven.” Matthew 6:10 TPT.

“Use me Lord. Let your joy-mercy flow out of me.” Bye.👋🏻

P 2365 We need to pray for the veil of our ignorance taken away.

/ DVH

“And I pray that He would unveil WITHIN YOU the unlimited riches of His glory and favour until supernatural strength floods your innermost being with His divine might and explosive power. Then, by constantly using your faith, the life of Christ will be released deep inside you, and the resting place of His love will become the very source and root of your life. 

Then you will be empowered to discover what every holy one experiences—the great magnitude of the astonishing love of Christ in all its dimensions. How deeply intimate and far-reaching is His love! How enduring and inclusive it is! Endless love beyond measurement that transcends our understanding—this extravagant love pours into you until you are filled to overflowing with the fullness of God!” Ephesians 3:16-19 TPT

Verses like these ones are kind of a mouthful, and if we don’t stop and pray and WAIT for Him to open our eyes – we can easily end up hearing …blah blah blah blah blah …. ……’constantly using your faith’ … ‘transcends our understanding” Those phrases can unfortunately easily translate into – I must try harder!! 

Trying isn’t in it. Especially when the veil comes off and you realise Jesus Christ already did all the work. We simply need to keep walking alongside Him … like the disciples did. We give up our agendas and dreams for His sake because He died for our sake. It’s our choice. Will our focus be on ‘our day’ or ‘the day Christ gave us!’ Those 12 disciples in the Gospels did nothing to merit the honour of walking with Jesus! They were going about their daily business, when the very real Presence of God showed up in the Person of Christ.

But, sadly we sometimes try to fit our faith in around our already established ordinary lives. OUR LIVES ARE NOT MEANT TO BE ORDINARY. Jesus died to give us HIS LIFE IN US. However, life itself can quickly overwhelm us and we end up praying quick prayers at the beginning of the day, and tired half-asleep ones at the end.  And eventually our failure rate is bigger than our success rate, and we coast along not sure about what we believe, and if it works or not but well-meaning people keep telling us we are missing the mark. WE CANNOT MISS THE MARK – CHRIST BECAME A MAN TO HIT THAT MARK FOR US.

We were not reborn to FAIL. We were reborn to bring His kingdom into our ordinary everyday humdrum lives. We need that veil removed so we can see and comprehend everything Christ already did for us. satan will fight you over that veil. But we have the power now to win! Simply ask the Lord to show you what He wants you to do with your day. Don’t promise Him tomorrow, or Monday, give Him today. And keep reminding Him, (not because HE forgets but because WE need the reminder,) that today is about Him, His kingdom. Tell Him you are willing to listen to what He wants done. Then live listening for what He says next, AND DO IT.

We will actively have to choose to look for His way. The real secret to walking with Christ minute by minute is choosing to live in love. Be like a plant that has put its roots down deeply into His love and then make a quality decision to give it away at any opportunity, whether the other person deserves it or not. Just keep giving it away. Jesus died to give us His life, now we give Him ours, by choosing to live this life as a life of love toward others. That’s how you spread the kingdom of God that is in you. 

We, you and I, already HAVE everything we need for this kind of life! Listen to this: “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. 

All this stuff in His book, is in a heavenly bank account with our name on it. We just gotta use our faith and go to that bank and make faith withdrawals. Our faith is not meant to be about having a new car, or house or holiday or staying safe when we travel – that faith was deposited in us so we can live a brand new life that pleases the Father. The Son’s blood now covers our lives so we can walk with Him unafraid.

That veil produces the rumour that a Spirit-filled well-lived life for Jesus, is only for some people. It is for all of us. This is something we have to value so much we go after it deliberately for ourselves. And that means we will end up taking risks – using our faith to obey what Christ said, and pouring out His unmerited love on other people.  👋🏻

P 2351 What smells good to God?

/ DVH

“Be imitators of God in everything you do, for then you will represent your Father as His beloved sons and daughters. And continue to walk surrendered to the extravagant love of Christ, for He surrendered His life as a sacrifice for us. His great love for us was pleasing to God, like an aroma of adoration—a sweet healing fragrance.” Ephesians 5:1-2 TPT.

Jesus is our own personal visual aid for our lives here on earth. It is a mistake to think we can serve Him and live the same sort of life that the people around us live. We are not from here anymore – we are travelling through this world representing SomeOne Else, with the Holy Spirit’s help. Our home is elsewhere. Now we have eternal eyes, not just eyes fixed upon the immediate. The thing is, to stay in those places we find challenging and difficult –  we must fix our eyes on Him, not our circumstances.

Walking surrendered to Christ’s extravagant love means no matter what goes on around us, or what happens to us, we must never ever forget we are dearly, over-abundantly, loved. As far as this life is concerned, realistically speaking, it is hard to feel loved, when people are being mean, or you are in pain, or your circumstances have gone awry. But the Cross changed everything. Christ’s freely-given Grace is our ever-present help in times of need. The difficulty is this, we must learn how to fight our enemy for our God-given rights, as well as yielding to the Holy Spirit’s leading. 

There is no room for striving in yielding. We cannot afford to berate ourselves for our dumb remarks and our accidental, or even intentional, lack of response to His Will. Jesus Christ understands humanity – and the Holy Spirit is now with us to continually remind us that we can be our renewed self – with His help. However, we cannot give Grace away if we do not take Grace in!There are times that the way to fight for victory over our circumstances and feelings is to refuse to entertain the thoughts that we are somehow exempt from that GRACE. 

When the day to day earthly realities remain difficult… and God’s goodness comes into question – our resting position is to hold fast to the fact that He is good. Even if we’ve prayed and prayed to no avail, and so have other people, we must learn to stand firm. At the same time we aren’t denying the reality of pain and heartache, rather we face them with the quiet confidence that the Lord has a way through our current circumstances.

I have had many increased physical limitations after those falls I had, now I get very tired. Some nights I barely manage 4-6 hours of very broken sleep. Let’s be clear, I’m still praying, hubby is still praying for me even at 2.00am when I can’t sleep for the pain in my arm. PAIN has a plus, it keeps you honest! Other faithful people are regularly praying for us, including both our families. Yet we are still stuck going round and round. WHY? I dunno but our God is doing something I can’t see …YET! 

I just know that in order to cultivate eternal eyes, I need to deliberately keep my eyes on Him. I know that God is not the Author or the sustainer of my discomfort, but, nevertheless, it is still daunting and exhausting. At these times I have to watch over my feelings and thoughts and focus on the God I know – Who is always good! I can drive myself batty trying to figure out why this has happened or what can I do to escape or … I can yield and wait. 

I have found great comfort in the Psalms because good old King David doesn’t seem to always be cheerful when things go bad for him either. However I cannot recommend the ‘smash them, get them, squish them, kill them all dead … mindset’  he had either. 🤪

Now let’s look at what smells good to God – a life laid down for Jesus’ sake, no matter what our external circumstances look like, and yes, we do that without lying! We need to remember that the Lord God called some things a pleasing aroma. Things like dead burning flesh from cattle, sheep, birds  (Genesis 8:20,21;  Exodus 29 :18;  Leviticus 1:9) —  my conclusion is this —HE DOESN’T LIKE WHAT I LIKE!  My death to self may hurt me, but HE is pleased by it.

Ephesians 5:2 says: ‘Jesus’ death was a pleasing aroma.’ That’s hard to comprehend, but true. If we tell Him “I want to know You more”  then we must remember the journey Christ took – ‘He learned obedience through suffering.’  Hopefully, right now, that is what I am learning too! 👋🏻