Face

P 3156 Imagine that!

/ DVH

Jesus lived and walked, talked, loved and healed, right alongside the people who wanted to make Him king on one day — and on the next, they wanted to torture and kill Him! The bible says:“And He did not need anyone to bear witness concerning man [needed no evidence from anyone about men], for He Himself knew what was in human nature. [He could read men’s hearts.]”John 2:25. He knows all about you, the good, the bad, and the ugly – and He loves each of one of us anyway. Our God is always speaking to us – He just doesn’t always use words! People often tell me that they can’t hear the Lord, my advice is this, we need to learn to look around us – at the people He loves more than life itself.

But our priorities often kill off spontaneity. Most of us like to make plans for holidays and outings. Those preparatory days are often filled with excitement, laughter and anticipation. You know, if we can take the time to remember to bring the sunscreen, and the insect repellant, then it seems to me that we can make some time to meditate on God’s Word!

Maybe the reason that kind of meditation seems difficult, is that mulling over God’s Word doesn’t have a sun hat, the blue sea, plus a golden beach, with drinks that have little umbrellas in them. We have become so tied into what makes ME feel better, we are losing the joy of knowing Him, personally. We’ve become self-obsessed, which is in total opposition to the way the Lord Jesus lived.

The bible tells us that meditation on scriptures is good for us – it helps us keep Christ before our eyes. “… because we don’t focus our attention on what is seen but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but the unseen realm is eternal.” 2 Corinthians 4:18 TPT. You would think that if someone saved your life you wouldn’t forget them in a hurry! Yet we all yield our precious time to the things that won’t last, or we monitor the time with the Lord because we are busy people. So we remain content to live inside the nether world of those soon-to-be-forgotten things. And try really hard to forget that God is calling us to Himself. You know that’s the very safest place to be!  

It is sad to think that many little ones today, are being raised in an atmosphere that is frivolous, pressurised and frenetic  One that has no more meaning than the next gift – the next fashion, the next shiny thing. Our world is currently filled with so many useless distractions. From the time that we get up, and we go back to bed again, we don’t seem to think about anything else but the things we have to get done before we finally collapse! Even leisure has become an effort. It is so easy to live this way. This world presses in on all of us, with its opinions and temptations. We live in a buy, buy, buy atmosphere —‘You must have one of these because the one you bought the other day is now obsolete!” 

Meanwhile, outside — right over our heads, day and night — God is speaking to us. He made everything we can see, purely for our sake. The stars, and galaxies, are His decorations in the sky. Our Father hung them there like we might hang ornaments on a Christmas tree. “The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of His hands. Day after day they pour forth speech; night after night they reveal knowledge.” Psalm 19:1-2. This shows us that there are so many different ways for our God to speak to us. Jesus spent His life loving others, speaking love everywhere He went by what HE DID! Our world is filled with useless words, words that don’t have any life in them. So let’s stop making everything purpose-driven and just step outside and look up!

Here’s what real life sounds like “…(Jesus) emptied Himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men.”Just think about that scripture for a minute. He’s the One Who made everything we can see. But once long ago in a life just like ours, God Himself was see-able!  Every time we read His book, and think about what He said, we can see Him again and again. Jesus Christ stripped off every vestige of His heavenly glory and became one of us. He spoke to our hearts by what He chose to do!

The One Who made everything is speaking to you every time you look at His creation, every time you read His book, every time you look into someone else’s face. One day He is going to step back onto this world’s stage and blow mankind’s collective mind. Imagine that!  Bye. 👋

P 2928 Sometimes the Lord plays peek-a-boo!

/ DVH

Isaiah 8:16-22 “Gather up the testimony, preserve the teaching for my followers. While I wait for God as long as He remains in hiding, while I wait and hope for Him. I stand my ground and hope, I and the children God gave me as signs to Israel, Warning signs and hope signs from God-of-the-Angel-Armies, Who makes His home in Mount Zion.

When people tell you, “Try out the fortunetellers. Consult the spiritualists. Why not tap into the spirit-world, get in touch with the dead?” Tell them, “No, we’re going to study the Scriptures.” People who try the other ways get nowhere—a dead end! Frustrated and famished, they try one thing after another. When nothing works out they get angry, cursing first this god and then that one, Looking this way and that, up, down, and sideways—and seeing nothing, A blank wall, an empty hole. They end up in the dark with nothing.”

Isaiah is making a profound point in this scripture. It is so easy to want an instant solution to prayer! But the Lord has His own timing. See Ecclesiastes 3! And we’d better get used to this, cos that’s just the way it is. He is God and we are not. Trying to be in charge got the Israelites into a whole heap of trouble  – maybe that’s why Isaiah wrote these six verses. BTW, in one version it says the spiritualists etc. chirp and mutter. Somehow I find that thought hilarious.

But my real point today is that the Lord appears to be hidden sometimes, and it seems to occur at a time when we need Him the most. The bible tells us a few ways that we may have contributed to this situation. Again, many thanks to Isaiah, who seemed to have no problem with the fact that any mistakes that may have occurred came from his side of the relationship! Isaiah 59:2 explains that our sins can get in the way. So it is good to not let them pile up around us like leaves on the lawn!  

Job mentions this phenomenon too. In chapter 13 verse 24: “Why do You hide Your face and consider me Your enemy?” Hands up anyone who has had that thought!  This man was described by God Himself, as a righteous man, but his initial understanding of the Lord appears to be founded upon fear and superstition, not love.

Moving on from that scripture to Psalm 88 – this Psalm expresses the depth of despair that any human being feels when they cannot find God in the midst of their terrible suffering. It is also a prime example of how feelings can escalate into anguish and then we often let go of what is good, right and profitable and focus on all the things that have interrupted our idea of a happy life.

All I want to say about that is, I’ve bin there and dun that. My feet got stuck in the sticky, unyielding toffee-like morass of expecting God to explain Himself to me! Not.Happening.Jan! In Matthew 11:25-26 the Lord Jesus says this:“At that time Jesus said, “I praise you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because You have hidden these things from the wise and learned, and revealed them to little children. Yes, Father, for this is what You were pleased to do.” 

Father God sometimes hides things from people who think they are eminently qualified because they already know everything there is to know. Instead He reveals things to those who are prepared to embrace humility. These people are open to learn. However, having a child-like heart is not the same as being childish and pouting when we don’t get our own way. Father God cares about our attitudes – the moment we think we have arrived spiritually, we better get ready to throw a pillow out in front of us, because we are getting ready to fall on our head! 

It seems to me that now is a good time to remember that Almighty God turned His face away from His only-begotten Precious Son, Jesus. That’s how much and how perfectly Jesus identified with us in our humanity. He suffered all that dreadful pain for us, so we don’t have to. In our current daily lives, this kind of rejection is an emissary from the pit, and it needs to be rebuked. The best defence against satan’s lies is the truth in the bible. 

Hebrews 13:5&6 says: “…for He has said, “I will never [under any circumstances] desert you [nor give you up nor leave you without support, nor will I in any degree leave you helpless], nor will I forsake or let you down or relax My hold on you [assuredly not]!” So we take comfort and are encouraged and confidently say,“The Lord is my Helper [in time of need], I will not be afraid. What will man do to me?”

We can often allow human beings to loom larger in our lives than God Himself – because our theology is faulty.

I have learnt that I only doubt the power in this verse when I look to my feelings to validate whatever is happening instead of His Word. However, I freely admit that this response is hard when the world falls on top of you!

There is another kind of hiding, I want to mention today, that the Lord does, and it is for you and I to protect us.  in Psalm 91 there is a marvellous explanation of how to enter into God’s protection and rest. We choose to make Him our very own hiding place! In that place we are hidden from the difficulties and torments of this life – waiting, watching to see what He will do next. Always remembering and relying upon the fact that He has deliberately chosen to love us. 

Lastly, I hope the above ‘keys’ help to identify what is really going on so we can make and have an appropriate response. Sometimes the Lord simply says ‘peek-a-boo,’ and He is being playful. Our wonderful Father has an amazing sense of humour, and fun, which we can easily overlook. But you will have to learn that for yourself, if you haven’t already found it. Bye. 👋

P 2880 Use your faith – pray for the sick.

/ DVH

Christians often want to know God’s will, or perhaps what gift they have been given to contribute to His kingdom. That’s admirable. But I have a short-cut to all those diagnosing courses, seminars, conferences, and fantastic inspirational books. Do something using your faith in Who He is. Christ didn’t come to make US famous. We are here to make HIS NAME famous.  In other words use your faith. It’s the same faith that got you saved and be prepared to pray for anybody.

Begin by praying for any sick people around you. What if they are not healed? You might think like me:  “I’m pretty ordinary. How can I pray for the sick?”  First of all, you are not the Healer, you take the Healer with you. My suggestion is this — choose to BE there for that sick person. Talk to them about Jesus, how much He loves them. Encourage them. Walk with them, even if it is just for a little while, as they trudge through their personal dark valley. Or be an extremist, and find an enemy and pray for them too – that will stretch anyone’s faith!

This is what disciples of the Great Shepherd do! They love people – they genuinely care for them. We are not supposed to be a hit squad. In the past, we prayed for someone, a-n-d … we moved on … … NEXT!  Jesus didn’t do that! He talked to people when they came to Him. He gave them His attention and interacted with them. In those moments, the Holy Spirit hovered over both of them. There are no magic words – say what He tells you to say. Your heart of compassion speaks to His heart of compassion. I once prayed for a baby who was blue in the face and not breathing. I yelled: “Don’t you dare die on me.” The kid opened his eyes and started screaming. The words don’t matter. It’s Who we are connected to, that matters, not what we say or how we say it. Jesus spat on the ground once. I figured we all came from dust, so easy-peasy to make another eyeball out of it!

People have never been projects to God. His love wants to draw out the very best in each one of us. Here’s a revelation for you, some people need their hearts healed even more than their bodies. They need to know they matter to Him. You don’t have to move IN with them, but you can be there for someone!  Sick people can be lonely people. They can’t move about and see others because their illness isolates them. That isolation easily leads the neglected into despair.

We can get so caught up in seeing the results of our prayers— so we can feel good about ourselves — that we forget we are not here for us we are here for them!  Jesus didn’t pray to get results, He prayed because He was filled with compassion and pity for the sheep who didn’t know He was their Shepherd. We can justify wanting results by saying that praying for the sick is glorifying God, and people will come to our churches and get saved. Yes, they probably will! But what people really need most is genuine love. And we are their all-weather, every-situation access pass to Christ Himself! He’s the Lover of all our souls!

When we pray we give Him an opportunity to touch them with His love and Presence. We’re His temple, and the Body of Christ has a job to do. We’ve been saved to serve Him, so we all need to begin to use and stretch our faith. As He leads us, and we take a risk and step out in faith, we will learn about loving others. The church at large has put so much importance on results we seem to have forgotten all about being filled with His love and compassion for people!

Whether people are sick or not, all of us need love, appreciation, exhortation, kindness, patience, etc. and Jesus is the eternal fountain of all those things. WE NEED HIM – because Jesus knows how to love!! Remember, He is the ever-lasting, ever-living fountain – He’s bigger than results. We want His dear face, not just His hands! 

So how do we get to know Him better? My advice is to talk to the Lord and always be honest with Him. There’s no use pretending. We may need to step away from distractions and read the book. Look at how other human beings in that book … who were just like you … interacted with Him. Meanwhile Jesus hasn’t changed His focus just because He went back to heaven! He came here to redeem us, and He is still interested in every single bit of our lives … even the bits we can’t manage. He’s the Saviour Who came!

People ask God to: ‘change this or that in me,’Lord.’ Great! It’s OK to pray about stuff, but most of the time it won’t fall on you. You and I are going to have to engage with His processes. We will need to make some hard decisions and stick by them. Maybe we got stuck somewhere because we’ve been ignoring what He said – there’s a great place to practise repentance! We gotta stop chucking worship AT Him and start talking TO Him. Ya might want to think about that one. 

Jesus’ death and resurrection covered everything. If we’ve fallen down a hole because of some weakness, some habit or other, then WE are going to have to change. Duh! Will He help us? Too right He will!! It’s His nature. He utterly understands humanity – He fell in love with His future Bride, when He was here!!. You and I need to stop waiting for other people to step up to the plate and stand up myself and participate. Salvation is not pie in the sky when we die — it’s about dying daily, simply because He’s always worth it. Bye. 👋

P 2698 Some things really are as plain as the nose on your face.

/ DVH

Thank God we always have HIS MIRROR! The bible clearly reveals to us that we cannot love God and hate our brother. “We love because He first loved us. Whoever claims to love God yet hates a brother or sister IS A LIAR. For whoever does not love their brother and sister, whom they have seen, cannot love God, whom they have not seen. And He has given us this command: Anyone who loves God must also love their brother and sister.” 1 John 4:19-21. And just in case we think we can wiggle out of that particular idea on a technicality, Jesus Himself answered the whole …  “Just who is my brother?” scenario, brilliantly, in the story of the Good Samaritan. He made it clear, my brother or sister is the person I want to avoid, or the person I blame for making ME feel bad!

We can be easily fooled into missing out on our new life in Christ’s life-giving lessons, by dismissing our own personal responsibility to fix things. Being reconciled means humbling yourself not just shoving the blame off onto the other person. We can’t just silently excuse or dismiss our need to cherish Him, and His Word above everything else, and hope He won’t notice! Fixing stuff isn’t just a process of negotiation, and agreement – true reconciliation means we can go back to walking with each other in love, as quickly as possible. The aim is change – not pretending! Self-deception is the worst kind of deception.

“Do not repay anyone evil for evil. Be careful to do what is right in the eyes of everyone. If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone. Do not take revenge, my dear friends, but leave room for God’s wrath, for it is written: “It is mine to avenge; I will repay,” says the Lord.” Romans 12:17-19. Personally, I ask the Lord for His help to sort me, and the other person out. I let Him know I am happy with what He wants to do about it, either way. And I aim to take the low road – because I probably did something or other! His Presence is way more important to me than my ego. People who protect themselves have fragile egos and, sadly, they can easily miss opportunities to die to self.

I recommend true reconciliation with others highly, because that action quickly diagnoses all the greebilies that hang around, unnoticed, in our own lives. These creepy critters disguise themselves as terrible wounds that have been inflicted on us – and that means many times we avoid the stab-ber like the plague. Have you ever noticed how dead-set easy it is to prove your point and get sympathy for your sorrow when somebody hurts you and everybody else can see it was their fault? My advice is to give sympathy a swerve and go for the Gold – walking with Jesus.

Oh the temptation to feel justified can be such a battle. We can easily want to bad mouth that person who did us so much harm! We can end up collecting other people who agree with our assessment of the perpetrator’s behaviour like we’d collect postage stamps! The temptation rises up to go over and over the events in our mind, revisiting what we should have said to put that other person in their place. Of course YOU don’t do that … and … neither do I! Where is the faith in self-justification? Nobody should owe anybody anything but LOVE … and that situation is only diagnosed by the One Who paid it all.

Unless we choose to leave our fate in His hands, we can end up wasting our time and effort trying to paint a picture of how right WE are and how wrong the other person is. Of course they are wrong! It’s often as plain as the nose on anyone’s face who is at fault. But the real point is this … our response is our response. And guess what? The only thing we have any power over is OUR RESPONSE. Um … ‘turn the other cheek, and walk the extra mile’ seem familiar to me.  You know if Jesus had avoided the toxic people WE WOULD ALL BE DEAD IN OUR SIN!

Yes, I know I am advocating letting that person who hurt you or I go free! But that’s what Jesus did for US, and He didn’t put any caveats on what He did either… He died once for all. That’s what the book says. So that serial killer who has despatched numerous people in ghastly ways… can stand on the same ground I do. GRACE. Sin is a great leveller, and fast recognition of what I’ve done, is a brilliant way to get humble quickly! That murderer can change their life too, just like I did. Meanwhile it is so dumb to keep lists of things anyone did! Just give it all to Jesus quickly, and make sure that you fix things with that other person too – to both people’s satisfaction.  

The thing that has a permanently lasting effect on us is to value Him above all the bumps, breakages and bruises this life hands out. It’s as plain as the nose on your face. My advice is …keep your mirror handy – we all need it! Bye. 👋

P 2695 Loyalty matters to God.

/ DVH

Let’s not take Father God’s kindness toward us for granted, or we can end up walking in presumption. To start with, we can easily be distracted by the cares of this life and forget Who He actually is! That’s when we could end up focussing on our own greedy little agendas of what we need or want. The point of a relationship is not just about what the other person does for me, it is also about what I bring into that relationship! What do I do that benefits that other person? We must not use Him for our own ends, He needs to be our great treasure. 

Our God’s benefits are for always seeable, and available to be easily seen, when we are living our lives loyal to Him. And He loves 💕 loyalty! Read the book. In the Old Testament we can see that His people spent more time being disloyal to the Lord than they did being loyal. But, whenever they repented and turned back to Him – His loving provision and benefits were seen and recognised and appreciated. I believe in order to see the Lord’s benefits, we need insight into the way we regard Him. God is not wishy-washy, whimsical, or careless. His preference for our salvation is crystal clear, but the decision to accept that, with all it means, needs to be taken seriously.

This is a good time to ask ourselves, where do I, personally, stand on this loyalty issue? Am I ”on the Lord’s side?” …like Joshua was? Joshua was prepared to die for God’s will to be done. Or am I on my Saviour’s side purely for so-called benefits, “I’m saved, He answers my prayers.” Maybe I get disengaged or ticked off when I happen to get trouble or tears? Is my main desire to live in His Presence? Can I see past His hands to His face? In my observation, most of the time when the going gets tough for Christians – the not-so-tough bail out!

I want to briefly talk about the incredible value of the Lord’s benefits. We have such wealth. We are strongly exhorted in Psalm 126:3 to: “… forget not all His benefits…”. In this Psalm, it talks about restoration of fortunes, reaping in joy, carrying seed to sow, and bringing in sheaves. But all of that comes after a whole lotta shaking and hardship going on – including sowing in tears! The thought struck me that we all want the joy, and the restoration, and the seed plus the sheaves … but not-so-much with the tears. It’s a package deal.

Some Psalms contain lists of the benefits of our loyalty to God. In Psalm 119 there are a whole lot of stated benefits. However, I think seeing God’s benefits is linked to our loyalty – and if we do not value Who He is, we won’t SEE them. These things are way too costly to be treated carelessly, haphazardly or poorly. Anybody can participate in everything He has done for us, but our response needs to be a heart filled with loyalty to Him because He has been so gracious to us.

Let’s look quickly at Psalm 23:1. In the Living bible it says:“Because the Lord is my Shepherd, I have everything I need!”  This shepherd was totally in charge of his sheep! While they were under his protection the sheep lacked nothing. Even if they wandered off he would go and seek them out. This is a fine example of Jesus’ loyalty to us! Outside the camp there are wolves etc. This shows me that our faith can easily be devoured by cares and worries of this life – the shepherd’s sheep knew the value of staying close.

Some times we merrily produce our largish lists of needs and wants, and post them off to the Lord without bearing in mind where our loyalties are currently lying. Are we paying lip service, or are we His devoted servants, looking to simply be His sheep? Meanwhile if we are that distracted, will we even see the answers He sends? In Philippians 4:19 it says: “I pray that God will take care of all your needs with the wonderful blessings that come from Christ Jesus!”

Our God is so much more than the supplier of our needs – He’s Almighty God. He made everything we can see!

Every blessing we’ve received was bought for us by Jesus Christ’s own suffering. This life is not about Him getting us a new car, or having a baby, or getting into a course we think we want!  It’s about belonging to SomeOne so incredible, so loving, so focussed on us, that we take the time to see His heart and love Him back. We need to carefully inspect the origins of some of the things we claim and ask for, because loyalty and gratitude matter – especially to Him.

GRACE IS FREE BUT IT WAS NOT CHEAP. This is why everything we do, or want, needs to be prayerfully requested with our eye firmly on the prize of honouring Jesus. Otherwise we can go from faith into presumption in a heartbeat. Let’s not rob the Lord of our loyalty … 👋

“Jesus said to all of His followers, “If you truly desire to be My disciple, you must disown your life completely, embrace My ‘cross’ as your own, and surrender to My ways. For if you choose self-sacrifice, giving up your lives for My glory, you will discover true life. But if you choose to keep your lives for yourselves, you will lose what you try to keep.” Luke 9:23-24.

P 2264 Gratitude leads to surrender.

/ DVH

“Keep your eyes open, hold tight to your convictions, give it all you’ve got, be resolute, and love without stopping.” 1 Corinthians 16:13-14 (MSG) Loving other human beings the way that God loves us, not only seems impossible – I actually think it IS impossible. On the other hand, earthly Love promises the moon but rarely gives us anything as valuable in return. Earthly Love can often take everything from you. And sadly, sometimes, nothing comes back.

I think we’ve reduced loving God into a concept, rather than aiming at it becoming a reality. Some people might say, “I really love roses or I love chocolate, or I adore my car.”   Whilst all those kinds of things are legitimate, because we all have likes and preferences, sadly I think we have also reduced the word ‘love’ to just another adjective – like ‘blue sky’ or ‘pretty rainbow.’ However in reality, the kind of love God talks about in the bible, is not only interactive, it is see-able. After all His love came to earth to save us from ourselves.  

This kind of love often remains unseen, unheralded, and unappreciated, and because of it’s invisibility, many people try to escape from their own sacrificial response to God’s love –  because  they want to have their cake and eat it too. His Love does not have divided loyalties. My biggest concern is that Christians have adopted this word the way the world has adopted it, as an adjective, and it has become a description, using it as an adjective or noun. Those things are often tied to feelings. There is an unseen war in this world today over the word Love.  It has been watered down and used frivolously.  To understand love, and in particular God’s love, we must always look at Christ – He is our glorious illustration of inward affection being expressed outwardly and perfectly, by the way He lived and died. 

It seems to me that we are very happy to receive whatever Jesus died to give us – so we can go to heaven, but sadly, we are not nearly as happy to give up our idea of this life and all of its benefits, for His sake. We have forgotten Calvary was an exchange – His life for ours. There are no exceptions to this new way of life. We need to understand that we are not too young or too old or too infirm or preoccupied with making our own personal lives successful. “Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.” John 15:13 NIV. 

Jesus Christ was not a kissy huggy demonstrative person – yet He still absolutely demonstrated His love in a way we can see and copy. His love went beyond outward signs of affection into living His whole life for our benefit. We cannot, and dare not, ignore what He intentionally modelled it in front us. Despite popular opinions Christ did not die so we could have a better life here. He died to give us the power to live this life here and now for His sake. For the sake of His kingdom.

Jesus was not a part-time lover of God, He lived every second of every day He was given, for His Father’s sake.

It is true that He believes we are worth it, but we are taking advantage of His huge largesse when we do not live this life to the full.  What would it be like if our earthly friends only helped us when it suited them, or when it was convenient?  Does that seem like true friendship to you? Jesus told us in the above scripture that this is the pinnacle of love, to live a sacrificial life dedicated to Him, representing Him, with no thought of recompense.

I would go so far as to say if we think we are fulfilling this criteria by using our ministry gift, prayer, bible study, worship in a form of tokenism and hope He won’t notice the difference … this means, at the very least, we are terrible friends of His. Up until Jesus came, the lamb offering people brought for sacrifices for their sins had to be perfect.  Christ was our perfect sacrifice.  I don’t think He is looking for us to get it perfectly right, rather, I think He is looking for us to be so in-love with Him that the word, “No”, doesn’t even occur to us, our response to His love is our devotion.  I know I’m not there yet.  

All I want to do today is to challenge everyone about what needs to happen in our lives for US to love Him back the way He loved us.  It’s our heart attitude that matters. It doesn’t matter that we fail.  But just like a compass always points to true north, our hearts need to swing away from the distractions and troubles of this life back to the Saviour. And then gratitude will lead to surrender.

“See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are! The reason the world does not know us is that it did not know Him.” 1 John 3:1 NIV. The way to behold Him is see Him for Who He really is – so we must go past His hands to His face which is filled with Love for us. He doesn’t want spoiled brats, He wants people who voluntarily choose to love Him right back. 👋🏻