Faith

P 2299 God’s authority is transferable.

/ DVH

This is not a popular subject in today’s independently-minded society. Instead of authority being transferred, and cultivated, it is grasped at and treated like a weapon for control. It is only when we yield control that we find out it does not matter … God’s will does … Most people aren’t having a problem with submission – their problem is Lordship.

Let’s look at the Roman Centurion incident “…just say the word, and my servant will be healed.  For I myself am a man under authority, with soldiers under me. I tell this one, ‘Go,’ and he goes; and that one, ‘Come,’ and he comes. I say to my servant, ‘Do this,’ and he does it.” When Jesus heard this, He was amazed and said to those following Him, “Truly I tell you, I have not found anyone in Israel with such great faith…” Matthew 8:8-10.

The first thing I want to mention is that Jesus saw that the Centurion understood how faith works. Christ saw what this soldier said and did … as faith. Many people are so afraid of being controlled by others they have limited comprehension of the safety of submission. They have not been taught about its benefits – instead they have been made subject to a perversion of this truth. 

This illustration explains that first of all, authority is transferrable, and secondly, when you are submitted to God using your faith, you can’t be controlled by men. We can only be controlled by others, when we are not fully surrendered to Christ. NOBODY CAN CONTROL YOU IF YOU ARE DEAD – spoiler alert …you no longer CARE! Ya might want to stew on that one for a while! 🧐

This Roman soldier was a man under authority, and he understood authority and how it works. He willingly and respectfully surrendered his own authority in favour of Christ’s greater authority. He was actually spiritually aware. He could have ordered Christ to come with him, as a Roman soldier he had all the power in that world available to him, but he recognised there was a greater authority present. 

God’s authority is not something to be snatched at, or about bossing people around. It doesn’t work by yelling the loudest, or making a better point. When we put ourselves under authority we are choosing to be totally submitted to Christ. Submission is not something Christ talked about to keep unruly, power-hungry, dissatisfied followers under control. It is a chain of command. We gotta stop thinking we have to control other people’s behaviour with threats and doctrinal points and start dying to self, serving others and put the Holy Spirit in charge of what happens to US. 

So … wives do not submit to their husbands because they have to, they submit using their faith. And children obey their parents exercising their faith. It’s a choice freely made. Remember, Jesus Himself chose the cross – HE LET humanity torture and kill Him because He believed in His Father’s greater good.  He understood submission is powerful.

Almighty God has given us people who have delegated authority. His AUTHORITY.  The point to be concentrated on here is not who’s got the ‘power’, but ‘are we walking by faith?’ Submission is about faith not power. It’s about delegated authority — look at this interchange between Pilate and Christ. “Pilate said. “Don’t you realize I have power either to free you or to crucify you?” Jesus answered, “You would have no authority over Me at all if it had not been given to you from above.. “ 

Power comes from total submission. That person in charge, the one who has delegated authority, does not have to know everything, and be able to dot all the ‘i’s’, cross all the ’T’s’, for us to submit to them. As a matter of fact, I have submitted to people in faith and I knew they had no clue about the things that were important to me, but I wasn’t submitting to them, I was submitting to the chain of command, which always goes back to Christ. 

I could quite honestly care less whether the person in charge understands what end game I might have in mind, because I gave all my end games to Jesus. I don’t have any kind of agenda either because I gave those to Christ too! My faith is in Christ’s ability to go round the numpty in the middle, and bring about what He wants. 

Authority is totally transferable when we don’t try to steal or snatch it, or usurp it, or batter it away from someone else who has already been given it by God. Food for thought. 👋🏻

P 2295 Let’s choose our clothes wisely.

/ DVH

There is no limitation on our understanding of God’s Word. What limits us is our actual desire to seek out what He wants to say to us. Plus some things actually need repeating because … we don’t get it.

Currently I am reading Exodus again. Every now and then I try to read my way right through the whole Bible. I don’t put a timetable on it, because stuff happens, and then you get out of order – so I just go along as I can. And I will get there when I get there! Today I was totally captivated by the description in Exodus 29, of the first high priest’s robes. 

This description is so complex and beautiful it is worth a serious look. The Jewish nation’s whole history is literally all over these garments that the high priest wears as he represents his people to God. Plus, Almighty God makes a statement about how He feels about His chosen people, with these specially designed garments.

Now hang onto your hat, because we are going to pass by a few scriptures quite quickly. Isaiah 61:10: “I will rejoice greatly in the Lord, My soul will exult in my God; For He has clothed me with garments of salvation, He has wrapped me with a robe of righteousness, As a bridegroom decks himself with a garland, And as a bride adorns herself with her jewels.” 

In Exodus 29 Aaron is getting ready to clothe himself in special garments of God’s design. Just like we do, right now, and every single day, no matter what we are doing. The Lord has things we are to put on by faith. Using the power of CHOICE. Even as we raise our kids, go to work, go shopping, go to college, and do our daily chores etc. we decide, minute by minute, whether or not to choose these spiritual garments using our faith. These beautiful garments belong to us – Jesus bought and paid for them with His life’s blood.

In Romans 3:10 the Scriptures say, “No one is righteous— not even one.”  No-one means NO-ONE… So, in a nutshell, from the worst sinner to the one who studiously avoids even a whiff of sin … we are all on a level playing field. You might take a long pause and think about that. Part of God’s provision of salvation is that level playing field for all.. We’ve each been washed in His blood, and given His power for personal transformation –  for free. 

From the person that you struggle most with in this world, to the person who does the worst thing you’ve ever heard of, if THEY choose to embrace what Jesus did for them from their heart, and give their lives to Him, they have the right to receive that garment of righteousness, just as much as anyone else. This garment of righteousness is a great equaliser. It has been specially made for each one of us, because it fits each one of us in our individuality, it has a design suited to our circumstances.

Just like Aaron had to put on those specifically designed garments before he could even think of approaching God, these faith-based, specifically designed, spiritual garments/circumstances bring about our transformation into Christ’s bride. We can go in and out to the throne of Grace and spend time on the mercy seat. Their application depends on our choices. Christians are saved —but we all need transformation.… We are transformed by daily choosing, using our faith to die to what we want. Then we pick up His garment of praise, or patience, or choosing to learn LOVE etc. Whatever the Holy Spirit hands us in the middle of our learning curves.

And all it takes is the knowledge that we have already given our life away. His life for ours. “He spoke and said to those who were standing before him, saying, “Remove the filthy garments from him.” Again he said to him, “See, I have taken your iniquity away from you and will clothe you with festal robes.” Zechariah 3:4. This verse in Zechariah shows us that we quite literally cannot, and must not return to our old life, because it has been stripped away! 

Why would we wear this life’s garments of defensiveness, pettiness, bitterness, unkindness, and a distinct lack of goodness etc.— when we have brand new handpicked  garments, waiting for us? Garments that help define us into our God-given roles and destiny. Those precious things that will always bring Him glory and praise. LET’S CHOOSE OUR CLOTHES WISELY. 👋🏻

P 2293 Sound advice.

/ 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) When I read this today I thought … brilliant. This verse is simple, concise and extremely clear.  Sometimes our biggest hardships occur when we overly complicate things and in the end we have so many things to remember, the truly important things get lost.

In my case they seem to fall out of my ears despite my hearing aids! More’s the pity. Keeping it simple stupid works best for me. I love to remember those bible verses I first fell in love with – back then we had pure scripture in song. When things get tough those versions flood back into my heart. These older versions remind me in the heat of battle of the reason why I live this way. 

I don’t know about you, but under pressure from the really high and low tides of this life, plus the normal everyday wear and tear and daily grind, my little faith boat sometimes slips its moorings and starts floating away. That is not good in a crisis. Then we need something sure and solid to hold onto, and the bible has such strength and stability in it.

Ideally, because His book says so, our faith should have substance to it, and not just bob about on the sea of life getting tossed by this and that. Otherwise it is unfortunately far too easy to feel like you are nearly sinking all the time. I know that faith can have its highs and lows, but in the main, our faith needs to be a slow steady progression upwards. We should literally be able to see our faith grow over a prolonged period of time, especially when things have been rough. 

In those times this is where we need to learn to cling to the Lord and His book more tightly. However we must remember, no matter what season we are in – GOD IS FAITHFUL. HE WILL NEVER EVER LET GO OF US! Even when we are faithless, He is always faithful. 

The above scripture from 1 Corinthians 16 doesn’t actually sound like it includes ‘time off for good behaviour.’ There are no holidays from being His kid! When stuff gets tough cling like a limpet to the Rock of all ages!  This particular scripture is both directional and instructional. ‘Keep your eyes open, hold tight to your convictions, give it all you’ve got, be resolute, and love without stopping.’ 🤔 There is order in these instructions. The easiest place to end up defeated is in our HEAD. This is where self-talk, from the Word, is a strong rope keeping us moored safely. It directs us so we know what to look for, and how to do it.  You may need to pause and think about that. I did. 

And this verse is definitely correctional, because the absolutes in it are not muddy or unclear. I personally love it when the bible is like that. I definitely love the stories of people just like me and how they succeeded in spite of themselves. Or even how they got it wrong, and God rescued them because He pitied them. But I also love this kind of clear directive. Forget the language, look for the instructions.

Things like the word pity, in any language, is not common today. That word is like …’feeling sorry for.’ But God actually pities us and has mercy on us, because He remembers we were made from dirt. He knows our frame and He knows our weaknesses, and He never despises us for them. To top that kindness off, our Lord Jesus came and walked through this life as a human being, subject to the same temptations and distractions that we are, and He did it without sinning. It demeans His total reliance upon His Heavenly Father, and the Holy Spirit, to think that this life was easy for Him, because we think He somehow had a special advantage we don’t! 

Actually, we have exactly the same advantage He had, the same Helper He had, the same Person Who would’ve held Him fast to His purpose – holds us. The one thing I admire about the Lord Jesus is the only time we see any outward struggle is during His time at Calvary. All of time this everyday stuff was totally settled for Him, He knew where victory lay. Victory lies in obedience.

His purity of His purpose is our benchmark, plus it is also a place of wonder and worship. Remember, the Lord knew irritating people too! He walked around with people who didn’t understand His purpose and started trying to enforce their own agendas. It kinda reminds me a bit of politicians, who start out enthusiastically wanting to help people, and quickly discover there are an awful lot of hurdles in the way! Jesus made that complicated process extremely simple, He loved the person in front of Him. He treated each person in front of Him with God-inspired attention. It totally fascinates me that He didn’t give up under pressure, which is where I sadly fall over.

Thank God we all have His righteousness undergirding us, plus His grace flowing freely through the open channel of our lives, as we give away His love for us, using our faith. One resolute step after the other, in good times and bad, is the only way to follow Him and remain steadfast. Bye. 👋🏻

P 2292 Disposing of myths…

/ DVH

There was a theory in Christianity like 30-40 years ago that ‘what you say is what you get.’  I’ve found that human beings are fascinating … we are always looking for the easy way, or the soft touch or an escape clause etc. etc. But actually I think we have all gone a bit soft. Not in the head, mind you, but emotionally speaking. When things get tough … sadly, ’the tough don’t get going’ … They are far more likely to squawk and complain their heads off and drive their poor pastor nuts.

God is not obliged to answer our prayers, He always hears us – but we are now living under His Grace. We can ASK – but then we trust. Unfortunately, I think we’ve become way too used to outsourcing our problems instead of getting alone with God and working things out with Him.

I can remember, years ago, way back in the Ark – metaphorically speaking – after some huge difficulty or other, crying my eyes bloodshot. I was surrounded by piles of soggy tissues, and I explained to God that I just couldn’t take any more, and could He please feel sorry for me and come and help me out of the mess I had somehow manage to get into? You know, I really don’t have experiences, or hear an audible voice – I’m a plodder… one foot after the other kind of thing … This one time I actually heard HIM LAUGH!

Well that was a tad discouraging! So I said so. But that didn’t seem to make a lot of difference. His reply was even more discouraging… “You don’t know what YOU can do,” He said. You know, He was right!  I’ve learnt the Lord God maker of heaven and earth – always IS. Since then I have been through far worse things, still crying, complaining and filling up our oceans and landfill with even more tissues. But I survived. Despite my heart and mind telling me I couldn’t possibly live through this kind of pain … I DID!

“But the love of God will be perfected within the one who obeys God’s Word. We can be sure that we’ve truly come to live in intimacy with God, not just by saying, “I am intimate with God,” but by walking in the footsteps of Jesus.” 1 John 2:5-6 TPT. 

As you can see, it isn’t, what you say is what you get … it’s what you get – YOU GET! 🤔 And then comes the joy of learning to live with whatever the problem is, while you are trying to grow through it, and at the same time straining forward to follow Jesus. That’s the real rubber, hitting the real road – impacting lives. I wish I could tell you after all these years that I have learnt the magic formula to managing hard things but … NOPE!!  However, I have learnt to give UP much quicker … but then again, that could be old age. Are you cheered up yet? 😂

Here’s my genuine advice. Go into His book and look for a reality rush. Try reading Hebrews 11. Particularly V13. “All these people were still living by faith when they died. They did not receive the things promised; they only saw them and welcomed them from a distance, admitting that they were foreigners and strangers on earth.” So are any of us better than Abraham or the guys in this list? No! Jesus Himself said:’In this life you will have trials … but cheer up, I have overcome the world.’ John 16:33.

Unrealistic expectations have killed off more faith than any of us will ever understand this side of heaven. Our faith must always be in God’s goodness, not in answers. Answers are simply the result of the outworking of His plans for all of us. We restrict the Lord when we try to explain or interpret His ways with our finite minds. We will always need the Holy Spirit to help us. ALWAYS! Otherwise we will start reducing Almighty God to SomeOne after our own image … and that is not good at all! 

What we say is definitely not always what we get – Father God always gives better than we ever imagined… in His timing. His timing is different from what we asked for or hoped, or thought, but it is always perfect. Let’s let God be God and we’ll just be us!  Deuteronomy 32:4 (KJV) “He is the Rock, His work is perfect: For all His ways are judgment: A God of truth and without iniquity, Just and right is He.” And that is definitely worth thinking about. 👋🏻

P 2288 HIS righteousness.

/ DVH

“Seek ye first the kingdom of God, and HIS righteousness and all these things will be added unto you.” Matthew 6:33. Going after, and relying upon our own righteousness is a waste of our time, plus this life we have been given – which is why works will never get us anywhere. Our works need to come from faith, from the Holy Spirit’s leading, not from our own hopes, dreams, or clever ideas. GOD IS LOOKING FOR OUR FAITH IN HIS ABILITY TO LEAD US through this life – minute by minute. Just like He led Abraham a-n-d … everyone else in His book!

Jesus Christ suffered and died to give us HIS RIGHTEOUSNESS, His position before His Father. This blessing freely belongs to all of us but we can too easily ignore this incredible sacrificial gift by living what I call a divided life. A divided life views this life we have now, as our time – it only looks at what the Lord wants for us, for our own gain, not HIS. A person living this way has not fully comprehended the value and cost of what we’ve been given.  

Our Heavenly Father now views us the same way He viewed His Precious Son. But we can eliminate ourselves from this faith walk by using our own understanding, and not taking the time we’ve been given to treasure and go after what He has told us we are here to do. Our God dearly wants to protect us from many, many difficulties – but … not all of the blows this life throws at us. Some things are permitted, they prune things from our lives that are irrelevant, to shape us into His Son’s likeness. 

“He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit He prunes so that it will be even more fruitful.”  John 15:2. We must get it fixed firmly in our minds and hearts ‘that His Ways are not our ways.’ Expecting God’s ways to make sense to our finite minds is simply unrealistic. Without the Holy Spirit’s revelation and enlightenment, human beings can fall prey to disobedience, pride and gathering knowledge. Human beings like systems. ‘If I do this, then that happens…’ 

If we think about those words carefully, we can see that ‘I’ am still in charge. HE wants to be in charge of every single thing in our lives because He has a plan for our good, for each one of us. But when we go through this life with our preconceived ideas – plus the things we have embraced because we have been taught them – and leave out relationship, we can’t step into the place Jesus Christ died to give us. 

Righteousness is a position we can readily occupy with God. It’s ours. Christ gave it to us with all that He did on mankind’s behalf.  When we occupy this position, striving goes out the window and true relationship comes in! Jesus modelled this way to live for us in His life and ministry. All He cared about was doing His Father’s will.  There was no room for any other earthly agenda. Every single time something came up to drag Him away from His God-appointed purpose He rebuked it!  You can check it out for yourself. 

His purity of purpose within His relationship with His Father was essential – BUT! all of this happened under a huge banner of love … not works, or even destiny. Jesus Christ loved His Father, and us, so much, He did what He did in joyous anticipation of our restoration to our Heavenly Father and our total redemption.  IT WAS HIS SOLE PASSION! When we read the bible with that in mind, it ceases to be a book of mere instructions and becomes a living thing. Deftly shaping us all into a bride worthy of our Saviour King. The Word of God cuts away anything that spoils our growth and fruit production. 

We have been tricked too many times by our own appetites. and needs. into living this new life that we were giv-en – in a half-hearted fashion. I believe our greatest mistake is to put ambition for God’s ways and ushering in His kingdom, ahead of our own passionate response to our beloved bridegroom.  Nothing substitutes for that. We must not put aside our eternal destiny for immediate gratification! Christ gave us HIS robes of righteousness for us to wear here and now. We wear them by faith, in purity, embracing our earthly lives as a gift to be sown into His purposes.

Isaiah 61:10ESV “I will greatly rejoice in the Lord; my soul shall exult in my God, for He has clothed me with the garments of salvation; He has covered me with the robe of righteousness, as a bridegroom decks Himself like a priest with a beautiful headdress, and as a bride adorns herself with her jewels.” 🙌

P 2287 Trust.

/ DVH

“But blessed is the one who trusts in the Lord, whose confidence is in Him. They will be like a tree planted by the water that sends out its roots by the stream. It does not fear when heat comes; its leaves are always green. It has no worries in a year of drought and never fails to bear fruit.” Jeremiah 17:7-8

Trust is an amazing thing, it undergirds faith. Any building that has no strong foundation is doomed to fall. Those amazing skyscrapers that tower over us in our cities start from an absolutely huge hole in the ground. The bigger the building the deeper and more complex the foundations are. Trust is the foundation of everything else we learn from Him. Everything else is like a multi-storey building which is seen by other people;  but the stabiliser, the thing that keeps us strong when storms come, is trust. 

Even faith is built on trust. If you have trouble with your faith, then my suggestion is perhaps you have trust issues, and maybe you and the Holy Spirit can spend some time in the Word praying over it. Even the love we receive from God Himself, however we receive it, is based on trust and our personal decisions and choices about the authenticity of His WORD.

Unfortunately, we learn to trust, or to not trust, as the case may be, almost from infancy. You can see this when a loving Father throws his toddler up in the air and he catches them. That child is not afraid. At the front of my mind and heart is always the thought that: ‘“HE knows the way I should take …” Jesus talked a lot about His death toward the end of His ministry. He was preparing the disciples for what came next, even though the thought was distasteful for them. But, after His death, because their trust in Him was not yet deep enough, they did not appear to cling to what He had already told them. Rather they clung to each other like frightened children.

So words alone sometimes do not produce trust – we need the Presence of the Holy Spirit. How do we deepen our trust in God in a way that will lead to a firm trust foundation? We make friends with the Holy Spirit, and we study His ways. Plus we deliberately pay attention to the things He does. This means living our lives watching out for, and appreciating even the seemingly smallest miracles of protection and provision in our lives, helps trust grow. 

Secondly, and this almost sounds like an oxymoron (!) – to learn trust you have to take risks. Taking risks is the last thing you want to do when you have trust issues. But it is a sure way to deepen and strengthen your foundations. If your trust has been abused by people, then I recommend doing a character study about Father God’s totally reliable character. 

At the same time there is nothing like trusting the Holy Spirit and speaking to someone about your own faith, when inwardly you are feeling afraid. Using your faith in these moments gives us an opportunity to experience God’s grace in action. “What time I am afraid, I will trust in Thee.”  When the person we are speaking to cracks open like an egg, and we can see their heart, then we know whatever we heard from the Holy Spirit was accurate and He is there with us! 

I believe most Christians nowadays do not have the sort of abiding trust we are going to need in the difficult days that lie in front of us. The saints of old had a tangible trust that Almighty God always knew exactly what He was doing. However, today’s generations think way too much of what they think they know, and not enough about what He says, in the book! I urge everyone reading here today to stop playing it safe, and relying on their own understanding, and start following our Mighty GOD as He is described in His book! This is one of the finest ways I know to get to know Him intimately. Bye 👋🏻.

P 2286 Love that grows.

/ DVH

“I continue to pray for your love to grow and increase beyond measure, bringing you into the rich revelation of spiritual insight in all things. This will enable you to choose the most excellent way of all —becoming pure and without offence until the unveiling of Christ.” Philippians 1:9-10 TPT

Love is not just about having nice feelings toward other people – it is not even about being glad to see them! Paul prays for US in these two verses that our love will increase beyond our ability to measure it. Now there’s a mighty fine ambition! However, Love has a purpose over and above human beings simply feeling good. Love opens spiritual doors that will remain shut fast without it. Love opens the door to insight and revelation into the secrets and ways of God Himself. 

His love is not even remotely like our human experiences with love here on earth. ALMIGHTY GOD LOVES THE UNLOVEABLE, freely. Human love can be fickle because it depends on feelings and perceptions, and our feelings often depend on circumstances. God’s love dictates holy circumstances, it is not influenced by them. 

The wonderful thing about God’s love, is that when we choose it in the face of difficulties and hardship, THEN we begin to use our faith. We simply make a God-given choice, then ask for His help, and then we step out in faith and do whatever He says to do. Just the same as Moses had to, or Peter or Timothy.  At the same time we are giving out His love in faith we are personally receiving it. Insight and revelation are God’s love in action. 

Actually all of the gifts of the Spirit are God’s love in action. It is not enough to say kind, or sweet things, those kind of things need to ride upon the wings of the Spirit. His Love changes everything. I hope it is obvious that I’m not talking about man-made flattery. When we partake of His love, using our faith, and then we give it away, we are personally touched by Him, and changed, and the person we give it to is also touched by Him. The only thing you will touch with theories or flattery, is the mind. 

If we pick up the sword of the Spirit under the instructions of the Holy Spirit then it becomes a powerful weapon that can clarify, divide and open up circumstances so we can see what is actually going on in a situation. A lot of the time we are boxing with or fighting shadows when we are unhappy with people. Shadows have no substance so you feel like any discussion is pointless and not worth the effort. 

This means you have not fully connected with the Holy Spirit, because He will not frustrate you, or anyone else. When He is present, it is as if a veil has been lifted off our eyes and we can see the real issues clearly. My advice is this, always be prepared to be the one who is in the wrong, the one who has judged the subject amiss. Even our own hearts can deceive us – live prepared to repent and repair things.

God’s word exposes the reality of the condition of our hearts. There’s nothing like discovering that the person you are mad at is being sinful, and suddenly realising YOU are sinful too, because clarity and wisdom removed the logs and specks! Initially we can see the person we are mad at with seemingly righteous indignation, but then insight comes and we see that person’s heart as well as our own, and we realise that we are all sinful.

‘Sin is common to man!’  When the love of God illuminates our hearts we find we all have sin in common. Now we can identify with the other person’s weakness, and mercy starts to flow because in them we can see ourselves. Difficulties occur when love is not present and we use man-made judgment to try to rectify problems. We need wisdom from above, not earthly judgment – that judgment always prefers itself. 

Every single time we call on the Lord for His love and insight and revelation in a difficult situation we are building a bank inside us of knowing Him and His ways. Those revelations change us. His Love expands situations. It gives meaning, it does not obsess about problems – it looks for the pain behind the problem in both parties and addresses that. Love grows as it is experienced through ordinary circumstances and then it is applied as the Lord Himself sees fit. Living a life of love is challenging but oh so rewarding. 👋🏻

P 2283 A Personal Opinion.

/ DVH

I want to begin by saying to those who are sick, brokenhearted, or injured – God has not left you, no matter how you feel. Even if your friends, or family have given you up – He will not EVER leave you. I have learnt in the hard places, like many men and women of God have learnt before me, this is the time to lay down upon the altar: “I will build an altar to You in this difficult and dark place. I surrender once again Lord, to Your will, Your way.” Amen.

This is a difficult subject for me, I have experienced healing from the Lord, supernaturally, many times in the past. But at this moment in time that is simply not my current experience. I wanted to talk today about some of the things we don’t want to talk about. Instead we can get caught up in a little man-made eddy of “I’m asking the Lord to heal me, or somebody I care about, and I must speak positively all the time or I will wreck it” – only to find that the answer is not what we hoped. 

We can easily go astray in our faith walk while we are in a dark valley. We know the Lord Jesus is with us – He promised to be there. But the reality of our experience denies the faith we are fighting to hang onto. So we read books about healing, because we desperately want to be healed, or to see it happen for someone else. We read the Bible reading the appropriate scriptures out loud over and over again. We run after His grace and go and get prayed for in every and any healing line. 

Meanwhile all of these things are good things to do – however, would the Lord require us to lie? I don’t think so. HE doesn’t lie, so why would He require us to lie on His behalf? Still, we can and must learn to persevere, Jesus Himself said so on several occasions. “… ask keep on asking so you can you find knock on the door will be open to you.” He taught us that perseverance in in prayer is a good thing. It was said of the Lord that He healed ALL who came to Him. Even when He fed people – no-one left hungry… Our God loves to provide and heal – it is His nature.

So what do we do when our experiences in these areas do not match up with what we are taught? Here is my two cents worth: whether it is my fault, and I don’t have enough faith, or it’s misunderstanding about what the Bible says, or simply haven’t been to the right person to get prayed FOR … —I refuse to measure Almighty God by my experience of Him or with Him. Instead I choose to find out Who He is from His book, independently from my own experiences.

He doesn’t ever answer to me, I answer to Him. You could easily say that I have weak faith in this area, but I say it takes more faith to believe in His goodness in adverse circumstances, than it does to believe in His generous and precious provisions in this life and receive them. Often we measure the King of all Kings with our grotty little man-made rulers and then we do one of two things –

We decide that it must be the unhealed person’s fault …OR …we sentence the sick person into a nether world of trying hard to get healed, and strangle them with the edict that they must not be negative and honest about their difficulties, thereby leaving them to struggle with their enormous burdens – alone. Neither of those responses even vaguely resemble what Jesus would do! He once prayed for a blind man twice… and offered no explanation for doing it that way either!

Jesus’ disciples also prayed for a little boy that had a demonic spirit that kept throwing him into the fire. The kid had convulsions, and the disciples couldn’t do anything about it. It is interesting to me to note that the Lord rebuked THEM. He didn’t growl at the father, or the kid, or even the people standing around watching. He rebuked his disciples instead for not having enough faith! 

I believe this is our problem in this day and age. We have tied the burden of being healed onto the sick person. As if they haven’t got enough to go on with! We haven’t thought about the fact that we have taught a whole generation that being sick is a sin. Plus we are saying that these sick people are responsible for their current circumstances. Implying that there must be something terrible hiding around corners in their lives somewhere, and they’d better toddle off and dig about until they find it! Instead of simply holding them up before the throne of Grace, and reminding them that they have greater faith than even they understand, because they love Him and serve Him, despite their negative circumstances.

Jesus told the disciples once when they asked Him: “Who sinned this guy, or his parents?” His response was – ‘Neither! This is for the glory of God.’ Funny how we tend to overlook that answer. We must learn to be honest with ourselves and others, and learn to say: “I DUNNO!” when we do not know. Then turn everyone’s attention to the goodness of God and all His Mighty works, and praise Him because He is worthy. Healing is absolutely His children’s bread but the children are led by a loving gracious Father. 👋🏻

P 2282 There are no undercover Christians.

/ DVH

There’s an old saying; “You can run but you can’t hide.” Hmmm … not from where I’m standing! It seems to me most Christians could audition for ‘The Invisible Man’ and get that part – easy-peasy. On a really good day, we can also get some unsolicited applause for being extremely nice people. BUT, unfortunately, nobody would ever know we are actually almost superheroes … ‘cos we often do what we do to look good. Plus we don’t want to bring His Name into disrepute.

Jesus gave up His right to have a good reputation when He freely, permanently, associated Himself with US. Now He wants every bit of us … not just a nice outward picture. Christians desperately need the Holy Spirit’s minute by minute guidance and input. Then when we modify our behaviour, it is under His supervision. This life has nothing to do with our power to mislead people, and has everything to do with who we really are inside. We need to have active faith to co-operate with Him. Always believing that what Jesus said He would do, He will. Sin needs God-power to overcome it. Otherwise we are deceiving ourselves. Jesus Christ is our proof that it works!

Speaking of impossible concepts … I always wondered what on earth was wrong with the people from the Comic city of Metropolis? I mean really, a guy takes off his glasses and suddenly he’s Superman and they didn’t notice? They should’ve gone to Specsavers. There were a whole lotta blind as a bat people în Metropolis! Moo-ving along quickly… but not entirely irrelevantly… we can fool a whole lotta people, until they discover we weren’t being REAL and that we sin too, we just hide it better! Our sin is not an issue to the Lord.

Jesus Himself got into trouble for hanging about with sinners, however that didn’t damage His ability to speak the truth, because He IS living truth. He lived the truth out in front of everyone.  Christ knows truth comes from the inside OUT. That’s the key, following, step-by-step, the Man Who did it first. Being honest with our failings and continuing to follow the Holy Spirit’s leading.

Our God loves people. Proud ones, hypocrites, religious ones, liars, thieves, murderers, gossips, prostitutes, cheats, sexual deviants etc.etc. Aha! I hear you say, how can He possibly love those people? Here’s the long and short answer – He took all our sins to the cross and the whole of the punishment and banishment that belongs to all of us – fell on Him. ’And the Lord hath laid upon Him the iniquity of us all.” 

Wonder of wonders, Jesus chose to do what He did!! Complete purity became utter depravity for our sakes on that cross. Of course He understands sinners! All of our sin was put ON Him! “He was despised and rejected and forsaken by men, a Man of sorrows and pains, and acquainted with grief and sickness; and like One from Whom men hide their faces He was despised, and we did not appreciate His worth or have any esteem for Him.” (Isaiah 53:3) We dare not skip on by any verses like this one, simply because they make us sad, or they seem to be beyond our comprehension. 

Jesus understands sin thoroughly, it landed on Him, the One Who had never sinned   … And then the unthinkable happened. Christ died and Father God turned His back on His Son Who had only ever known perfect love and unity. The Holy Spirit FLED from Him. We must aim so much higher than looking good. It’s like those apples you sometimes buy at the supermarket. They’re red and shiny, so they outwardly look delicious – but they are actually brown and going rotten inside …

Heaven forbid we should mimic goodness instead of using this life to be transformed! Our aim is to be as fresh as an apple that was pulled off a healthy tree 2 seconds ago. Then, the worst circumstances make us glow in the gathering darkness all around us. The meaner someone else gets the sweeter we become. We need to do more than pray, “Lord, change me from the inside out,” WE NEED TO LISTEN TO, AND CO-OPERATE WITH THE HOLY SPIRIT! SomeBody gave US the keys to HIS kingdom, and every asset from heaven that supported Christ, now supports US, as we draw on it by faith.

There is no need for us to live undercover anymore – instead our job is make the Holy Spirit welcome, and let Him chuck out anything He wants to – then goodness will flow from the inside of us OUT! Best advertising E-V-E-R.👋🏻

P 2279 Transformation sucks…until it doesn’t!

/ DVH

Loving other people,  especially difficult ones, is our biggest test. As we let the Holy Spirit touch our lives and hearts, the things that really annoy us about other people, start to quietly melt away. There was no one singular moment for me, personally— instead, there have been thousands of little choices – to shut up when I didn’t really want to – and to look for the good in situations when the bad was banging me on the head repeatedly. 

There is no specific secret – I just had to stop putting ME first. The more we can drag our unredeemed minds out of self-preservation and start actively renewing them, the more we start to understand that following Jesus really works. There are still times my mouth starts running without thinking, then irritation takes over, and I couldn’t care less how someone else feels, all I care about is some clown is standing on my foot, metaphorically speaking. 

Over the years I’ve learnt that the subject of love makes a magnificent theory, but it doesn’t always work out the way we hope it will IRL. People do stupid annoying stuff. It’s inevitable! The point, is whether they mean to hurt us or not, the result is we still have deal with it. That part IS our problem. This is one of the best reasons I know to take judgment right out of the picture. As soon as we go into judgment, we’ve run right past mercy and left faith behind, and skidded right on through to feeling entitled to getting a break in our adverse circumstances … Which hardly ever happens BTW.  

There is just no going around the fact that we need an external-soon-to-become-internal source of power – because we don’t have that kind of grace toward other people, in us. Speaking for myself, in the past 2 weeks, I have found any number of reasons to get irritated. Pain is a fantastic motivator – unfortunately it mostly motivates you in the wrong direction… and then you start to feel sorry for yourself. 😱

Loving other people the way He loves us is utterly impossible by ourselves. We have to put aside the habits and actions we’ve cultivated in a lifetime – and deliberately, as in on purpose, step into His never-ending stream of love. This also means that at the same time we will have to realistically face who we truly are – warts and all. Not fun. Realism is not always a major feature of our Western churches.

Eventually you and I are gonna have to put a whole lot of stuff down, and deliberately forgetaboudit! And begin to pick up His sacrificial love, ask for His help, and start to use our choices. We do that simply because of what Christ did for us. Love is a chosen sacrifice. The good news is we don’t have to like it, we just have to bite the bullet and do it anyway. But the more we make the choice to live this life cooperating with the Holy Spirit, and learning His ways, the easier it becomes. That is when we will start to see His fruit forming in our own lives. 

All of this spells out the fact that just like Jesus Himself …“by myself I can do nothing.”  Human beings need restoration. Praise GOD He does that kind of thing, brilliantly. Loving others is always going to be hard, because in reality, I don’t always want to choose love – I want to choose comfort and convenience instead. However, change will never come unless we start to make hard, sacrificial choices. One of the most important choices we will ever make is to choose to believe the Lord Jesus is more important than how I feel or think, or anything awful you might do to me.

My final thought is this … we can follow Jesus to the cross and choose to die; and wait for Him to fulfil His promise to resurrect us – or we can put all our energies into self preservation. We can’t do both, not if you want to live in love the way He did. Bye 👋🏻.