Genesis

P 2460 Never underestimate the power of choice.

/ DVH

Yeah, I know I rabbit on about choice all the time. However, I have a good reason to do that. Our minute by minute choices determine the intimacy of our walk with the Lord as well as others. I want to highlight the power of choice today, because many people are under the impression that if they just pray about something – that is all they need to do. I disagree. First we choose, then we carry whatever it is out.

I totally believe that Father God always hears our prayers. I think that He hears the prayers we never even say out loud.  His love is so incredible, He cares about the unspoken things that tear at our hearts, but they are unseen by other people’s eyes. In that place human heartache has no words – the bible calls that ‘sighs and groans too deep for words…’

It seems to me that this is why He says:“Seek ye first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things will be added unto you …” Seeking His will above everything and everyone else in our lives, positions us to be under His Government. And boy, is HE a fantastic governor! His government is far more than just provision – there is shelter from the storms of this life when we choose His will, His way. He sent us the Holy Spirit to help us carry out Godly choices. The Holy Spirit is poised, ready and waiting and longing to help us … because He loves each one of us dearly and He wants us to win! Jesus relied upon the Holy Spirit, and so should we, if we want to follow Him. 

The Holy Spirit IS Jesus Christ Himself, with us – He is literally standing right at our elbows, waiting for us to ask Him to help us out of our learnt patterns of disobedience, and fear, as well as the stupid messes we make. And all that takes is the humility to choose to ASK. Jesus told us that He left this world so the Spirit could come to be with us, and convict us of sin. We know that He will help, guide, comfort, counsel, instruct, and support us. However, the Holy Spirit in us, is also the Lord’s deposit upon us for our eternal future – His Presence in our lives assures us we belong to Jesus now. We need to treasure Him, and obey Him, plus walk with HIM – that is also a choice. 

Because we long to be His obedient people, we cannot afford to rely upon our own choices, no matter how small they seem. We daily need the Holy Spirit’s help to make kingdom choices. Yesterday our kitchen sink tap started leaking into the cupboard under the sink. What a mess! We could have thrown up our hands and cried: ‘Oh no, more bills!” But we chose to ask the Lord what He wanted us to do about it. Because of that choice hubby was able to witness to a young plumber. Our choices can hinder our growth or encourage it. They invite us into our destiny or close the door.

Right at the beginning of mankind’s interactions with God, and the wondrous world He made … the one Adam and Eve lived in… Everything was lost by that one bad choice. Genesis 2:16–17: “You may surely eat of every tree of the garden, but of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.” Death came into that garden. God gave Adam a reason not to eat from that particular tree, but they both went ahead and made the wrong choice. They were tempted to doubt God’s truthfulness and they fell into sin! They thought what they could see was all there was, because that fruit looked and smelt good!

The devil wants us all to think that our choices do not count. he whispers: ‘You are no-one, what you do doesn’t matter.’ Or he says: ’Who will know? After all this or that need is so great, God will understand.’ I know about that particular rabbit-hole, I’ve fallen down it myself … sadly, many times. I ended up in Alice’s wonderland, where nothing made sense – until I chose to acknowledge my sin and repented. 

We cannot afford to put aside the kind of faith-filled obedience that demonstrates that God knows better than we do. In reality without faith, nothing can actually make sense. Let’s face it, it made no sense humanly speaking, that Adam and Eve could eat from any tree but that particular one! But immediate gain overtook caution … and they fell in. In our own lives that is also true.

Here is some advice: ‘choose God’s way from His Word, quickly, and stick with it despite any opposition.’ And there will be opposition, from our flesh as well as our enemy! I think we can easily blame the devil when the real point is, we either don’t want to, OR our flesh is weak and it is crying out for whatever it wants. That means our flesh has become used to being indulged.

When we are not walking with the Holy Spirit we can make really bad choices that affect tomorrow… and tomorrow … and … tomorrow. That’s how our eyes are blinded by our needs, and the overwhelming desire to sort out our own lives. We start to focus on the immediate, instead of the eternal. The power of choice is huge, and we cannot miss God if we are guided by His Word, as well as the good advice of mature saints … plus the desire to obey … above everything else. Never underestimate the power of choice!  Choose life.👋🏻

P 2456 Whose kingdom are we building, ours or His?

/ DVH

I asked myself the above question this morning, as I set out to write this blog. Despite the fact that we all like the easy way, the really great transforming things in the Christian life will not fall on any of us. Transformation takes choices, and there are no short cuts to a well-formed character. We need the Holy Spirit to kiss us — plus loving, listening, obedient hearts to His will. That will also take God-purposed choices. Many Christians want to know what their ministry is – but they have not learnt to love others. Ministry not motivated by His love, becomes a chore.

Our desire is to love and trust Jesus, but without God-motivated actions, we will wander along, mostly building our own little kingdoms. There is no other way, we need to choose to die to self bit by bit, day by day.  That means choosing to say nothing in the face of criticism, or being kind to someone who could care less about us. Instead we ask the Holy Spirit to help us. Because He will. The good news is … that’s how we get to know Him! 

Jesus Christ steered His way through this life accomplishing so much more than we can ever understand or imagine – and He did it all so now, today, we can be free to follow Him. He was incredibly passionate about His Father’s kingdom coming! He spent alone time with Father God, then He chose to be where hungry, sick, demanding people were, so He could pray for them as well as preach. He chose to obey.The only thing that can stop you and I right now is our will to change. We can’t turn back from it, we must press on.

Learning to yield to Him and His ways is part of ushering in His kingdom. But at the same time, we cannot be constantly distracted by the earthly things around us that don’t matter. People matter. When we let money or stuff become more important than the Lord, we’ve gone the wrong way. Making promises at the altar will not get us out of our self-absorbed ways, but paying attention to the Holy Spirit’s leading, will. Jesus is eternal, so is His kingdom.

Upholding our own little kingdoms, at the expense of other people all around us who are suffering, is not following Jesus. Loving Him means reaching out to others, simply because God has been good to us, and we want them to know His active goodness through us. At some stage in all our lives we met Him, face-to-face, figuratively or literally.  So now we know that we know, that the people around us need Jesus too. They need that much love and acceptance. The Lord dripped every single drop of His love and acceptance all the way down that cross, onto the ground beneath it – for every human being – even the evil ones.

In today’s world, it can seem like we have forgotten how to share and be there for each other. Human beings were not designed to live alone. Remember Genesis 2? The Lord God Himself said, right after He created man – “It is not good for man to be alone.” God called a whole lot of things good: but ALONE-NESS was not one of them! Reach out to those who will have no Christmas unless we include them. Spread forgiveness around because we have so much of it to give.  

There are times, in this modern world, when we can be so busy minding our own business we lose sight of the person who is in deep pain and sorrow standing right next to us. Their pain is our pain. Have we forgotten that we are quite literally, engaged to be married to the Healer of all Healers. We cannot afford to ever lack His OIL in our lamps! Political correctness has taken over from the kind of love that Jesus gave away for free. He made room for everybody.

We need to throw away our theology and just love people.

At the same time, because we are part of the Body of Christ, every single member is important. We cannot afford to lose anyone. So please take time to send that text, and make that phone call. We must persevere with people, even the difficult ones – and yes, I have some of those!  One day when we look back on this life we were given, the things that will matter are the relationships we had – the love we freely shared. 

Many people have been incredibly traumatised by this world, so they might take a bit of effort on our part. But loving others is the reason God saved us. Learning to love and include others takes effort, patience, forgiveness and time. Ask yourself, what have you invested your time in this year – your kingdom, or His? 👋🏻

“This is My commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you.” John 15:12.

P 2377 Whether we can pray in tongues, or not …

/ DVH

… that’s OK! The Holy Spirit is already praying for all of us and His intercession is the very best there is!! “And in a similar way, the Holy Spirit takes hold of us in our human frailty to empower us in our weakness. For example, at times we don’t even know how to pray, or know the best things to ask for. But the Holy Spirit rises up within us to super-intercede on our behalf, pleading to God with emotional sighs too deep for words.” Romans 8:26 TPT.

AND …!!!  The Bible also shows us that JESUS prays for us. Romans 8:34 says that Jesus “is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us.” In 1 John 2:1 we read that Jesus is our “Advocate with the Father,” and from Hebrews 7:25 we learn that Jesus “always lives to intercede” for us. We will never ever meet anyone kinder, more loving, more accepting and more gracious, than the Lord Jesus Christ, and our precious Holy Spirit. They both pray for us constantly because They want us to win – in this life!! In the above Scripture Romans 8:26 it says the Holy Spirit gives us power in our weaknesses. Don’t be ashamed to feel weak. Don’t hide it – hiding it means you will miss His power working on your behalf!

In our lives, some sorrow, some suffering, some disappointments are too deep and painful for words. I’ve been there. You simply don’t know how to pray, and you wish somebody would pray for you. You can phone a Christian friend, which is always a good thing to do, or even weep until you feel a tiny bit better – but this is where the bible stands alone. It reminds us we already have TWO SomeOnes!! And what’s more these two beautiful People know how to pray, and what to pray, and they don’t stop to go shopping or have a cup of tea either! You might just like to sit still and think on that one.🧐

SomeBody is always praying for you and I right now, even better than we could pray for ourselves. (That’s what “always lives to intercede” means.) SomeBody totally gets you, even if you can’t explain yourself properly. All the little tiny bits of our day to day lives that seem quite irrelevant to others, but they contribute to the whole miserable mess you feel you are in. You don’t have to feel alone – They are right here, with you, right now!  Jesus and the Holy Spirit are both holding you up, standing up for us all, pleading to the Father on our behalf. 🙌 We’ve got Friends in very high places!

The Lord Jesus loved mankind so much that when He left He sent the Holy Spirit back. We are not alone. Don’t let your feelings win – He is with you! The exceptionally marvellous bit, is that Jesus walked this earth so He knows the kind of stuff that comes at us. The Holy Spirit helped Him to overcome – so They both know how this thing we call ‘life’ works.

I love that word in Romans …. ‘super-intercede.’ Boy! That’s intercession on steroids! They come to help, to bring us power to overcome the very things that want to destroy us and our faith. The Lord Jesus and the Holy Spirit are both reminding the Father and our enemies that we belong to Him now. We don’t belong to the kingdom of darkness anymore – we are people of the light! We have this fabulous legal representational team in the throne room – right now. 

They are our God-kissed authentic legal team and They are fighting for us all the time, because our enemy speaks human fluently. (Genesis 3:1-24;  Matthew 4:6) Jesus Himself said in John 14:30: “I will not speak with you much longer, for the ruler of the world (Satan) is coming. And he has no claim on Me [no power over Me nor anything that he can use against Me]; …” I mean, what a relief! Our legal team is totally incorruptible! Woo-hoo! And they are FOR us …!!!

The thing is, most people will stand up for you if you are proven to be right, but if you aren’t, then human beings have the habit of leaping off into judgment. Often they bail out on you. That’s when Jesus steps up into the throne room and lets the enemy have it with a great Bible-based legal argument, and at the same time, the Holy Spirit comes alongside US and prompts us that it is “time to repent and fix things here.” He says things like: “pray this, bind that, loose this other thing.” 

He shows us how to fight, because we can lose our way under pressure. And the one thing the enemy loves to put us under, is pressure. If you take the time to read the above verse in Matthew 4, you will see Christ was under enormous pressure – 40 days fasting from food and water, and satan pressed home his advantage – to no avail. We can easily lose our way if we mentally delegate things as being stuff only SomeOne like Jesus can do. He died, went to hell, bashed up the enemy and came back more alive than anyone was ever before. He did all that so we can win!

Ask yourself, why would the perfect, sinless Son of God need to go through all that? He had no personal need to do it. HE DID IT FOR US. We are not victims – we need to stop being blind to the power of God within us to overcome. The body of Christ has two incredible Intercessors praying for us, right at this moment. Take a minute. Thank them both for praying for you, gratitude is like the needle on a compass – it returns our hearts to ‘true north.’ 👋🏻

P 2369 We cannot legislate unity.

/ DVH

Unity comes from an overflow of love, compassion and respect for the other guy. Instead of constantly rehearsing what divides us, let’s try to find common ground. Sadly we now have 45,000 denominations!! Look, as long as the other person you are talking to believes Jesus Christ is the God-sent Son and Saviour of the world, just let go of other things you don’t agree with and find things you can agree on. Jesus is Lord is a good one!! 

Seriously. We can lose opportunities for reconciliation by being pedantic. Telling the other guy where he is wrong will shut down a conversation faster than the bullet train in Japan travels between Tokyo and Osaka. Just let love loose – love is about focusing on the good. I don’t mean we have to agree with everything, but our POV doesn’t have to collide with someone else’s in the name of straightening them out. One of the best things to do when conflict arises is to ask if you could pray together. Come before the throne in Jesus’ Name and let the Holy Spirit do what He does best … sort things out. 

We do not put enough faith in the power of the Holy Spirit to change US as well as the world. Sometimes I don’t think we put enough faith in Him to sort out our lives! That’s why we start meddling and throwing in our own good ideas. Remember the garden. “And when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was delightful to look at, and a tree to be desired in order to make one wise and insightful, she took some of its fruit and ate it; and she also gave some to her husband with her, and he ate.” Genesis 3:6. Eve used her own wisdom and initiative to decide what was right. Look at how that turned out!

Obviously rebellion dropped in, and of course her husband didn’t even run it by his brain – he just did what she said for peace! (Joking) 🤪 That kind of peace, BTW, giving our agreement to shut somebody else up, is not true peace. True peace happens, and unity begins, when both sides agree because they want to, because maintaining love is more important. In that place there is no coercion. Silence isn’t in the answer either – it’s a beginning, but we are aiming at LOVE not just an absence of sound. We must not aim too low!

All Eve shows us is how easily we can be led astray, away from peace directly into blame. Meanwhile sometimes I think we consult one another because we don’t want to be bothered waiting on God… He can take too long. Hmm… maybe He takes a while so we can calm down and reflect instead of reacting! That would be His Grace in action. Perhaps He wants us to choose to die to self out of love, instead of an absence of conflict! How do I know that? I’ve done it! I’ve given up my power of choice and compromised. PS it never works. Our hearts can’t be right when we disagree and then lie about it. Duh! 🙄

That is why I started memorising verses like: “Why not suffer wrong?” 1 Corinthians 6:7. Because the minute I start to straighten you out – I’ve stepped out from under the Holy Spirit’s guidance, and I’m back leaning on my own understanding! You know, some people are so committed to their own POV, they would exercise their free will even if their entire house was on fire but they weren’t ‘ready to leave yet!’ 😱 Learn to yield. First to God and then to each other.

True unity can’t come under a dictatorship. The fault is not just the people disagreeing – it is that people need to pray together more than they talk AT each other! We cannot maintain our agendas …  things founded on fear, or rebellion – in the throne room. Sorry to repeat myself because I know I’ve said this before, Isaiah was a prophet who turned to JELLO in the throne room. He spoke for God all over the place, but when he was confronted with God, he knew his place — ON HIS FACE! 

In the Presence of the Lord any disunity disappears. I have been known to  have heaps of opinions – until I get in there. We are handling disagreement badly if our aim is to get the other guy to think like me, because I know I am right. If people can’t see pride in that sentence they need Holy Spirit glasses and they also need to pray heaps more. 

Unity matters to God. He’s got the best unified game going in the history of the Universe. Not only does the Trinity agree – They PREFER one another. We need to set our aim higher. Unity is about love, and what the Father wants, not about what you or I think. 👋🏻

P 2309 Grab a cup of something you like and … enjoy what He is saying to you!

/ DVH

1 Thessalonians 1:3&4 “We ought always to thank God for you, brothers and sisters, and rightly so, because your faith is growing more and more, and the love all of you have for one another is increasing. Therefore, among God’s churches we boast about your perseverance and faith in all the persecutions and trials you are enduring.”

I figure if my life is difficult day by day, then perhaps your life is too! And then I read the above verses in 1 Thessalonians and the matter was confirmed. I thank God for you and your life laid down for His sake. It is good to read what the Lord has recorded in His book, and kept through the ages for all of us… and now, we need to personalise it! I urge you to read these verses like the Holy Spirit is speaking to you… because… He is! He is using Paul’s words to help each one of us with the hard bits of this life. These verses are a prophetic word of loving encouragement.

I have also included today, something I read recently from The Passion Translation blog called: “I Hear His Whisper.” Hubby passed it on to me. As I read it, I cried and cried. Life can be so very tough, and loving encouragement from our brothers and sisters in Christ is essential, so words like these mean a great deal in difficult times. Meanwhile, personally, physical therapy for a shoulder broken in 3 places can seem endless, plus typing this blog with one hand using my index finger for the past 7 weeks, is painfully SLOW! 😂

This lovely piece below has been written as if the Lord Himself is speaking to us. It is called – 

‘There is Beauty in your Pain.’

“Your pain has become the birthing ground for the beautiful.  In your greatest devastation, your worship has become a fertile, healthy womb.  From the seasons of sorrow now come glorious gifts for you to share.  Nothing has been overlooked.  Now you will see what I will do through you, because of what you endured while you bowed before Me in surrender.  In your place of your pain, I have poured out My beauty.

Heartbreaking tears of surrender have made you beautiful – so very beautiful to Me.  This is the most perfect offering of your yielded heart.  I haven’t forgotten one single prayer.  I have seen every movement of your heart toward Me in your suffering.  For every tear, I give you a seed to sow in someone’s life.  I have taken your sorrow.  I have cleansed your tears with My love.  Now I pour these tears back to you as rain upon dry soil – golden rain of a new season where flowers bloom and the air is clean and fresh.  Breathe deeply, My love.  The season has changed. “

(“I Hear His Whisper” by Brian Simmons and Gretchen Rodriguez.)

You might want to just sit a while and let that sink in, it is worth meditating on. 😶 

Sometimes doing nothing and holding on tight to Who He is, is the best answer of all. In Genesis it tells us that the Lord Himself rested. I think there is a time when it is good for us to hold on to what we know, and just keep hanging on, and let His great Grace carry us. I can remember during my accident, sitting awkwardly at the bottom of our stairs … having just bumped my way all the way down to the bottom,… and marvelling that I had such great peace. If I didn’t move my shoulder about I could almost pretend I was OK…⚡️ … I did say … almost! 😂

So I exhort us all to take the time today to remind ourselves  that Almighty God knows what is going on … even when we don’t. Take the pressure off and just BE …   He knows what He is doing. 👋🏻 

P 2255 A true intercessor.

/ DVH

In Genesis 18:23-25. Almighty God and Abraham are dialoguing about Sodom and Gomorrah. “Then Abraham approached Him and said: “Will You sweep away the righteous with the wicked? What if there are fifty righteous people in the city? Will you really sweep it away and not spare the place for the sake of the fifty righteous people in it? Far be it from You to do such a thing—to kill the righteous with the wicked, treating the righteous and the wicked alike. Far be it from You! Will not the Judge of all the earth do right?”

This is, by far, one of my very favourite verses in all the bible. This mighty man, Abraham, the Father of our Faith, has such incredible confidence in the Character of God! We all need this kind of confidence in Who our God is, and know His Ways, intimately. I pray the people of these current generations know the Lord so well, that they cannot comprehend Him doing anything evil! We all need that kind of confidence and knowledge about Him, desperately. Abraham is extremely respectful, but he insists.

This passage in Genesis is what I think that an intercessor looks like. I know many people think intercessors spend hours on their faces praying and interceding for the lost – and I praise God for that kind of gift! However I’d be overjoyed to have 5 minutes of someone praying for me, for my life and future, with this sort of confidence in God Himself. 

Abraham was interceding for the people in Sodom and Gomorrah, and they didn’t even know their fate. However God knew their hearts, and He had purposed to deal with the evil in this city. But one man stood in the breach and had a conversation with God about their destruction. Abraham’s point of intercession was not about the people, or their wickedness, or deeds … it was all about HIS CONFIDENCE IN THE CHARACTER OF GOD – He challenged God to do right.

If you read Chapter 18 you will see he gets pretty overwhelmed somewhere in the middle of this conversation. It is almost like he’s kind of got his big toe almost outside the door, ready to run, 😐 but he still talking and still bargaining for these lives. We need this kind of intercessor, today, people who hold God to His word. We can see that this man learnt the Father’s Ways as he journeyed with Him from Haran to Canaan.

However, the basis of Abraham’s prayers are about Who God is! The Father’s reputation. I have heard it taught before that perhaps Abraham did not bargain hard enough for these people to be saved. I don’t know about that – but I love this man who stood toe to toe with Almighty God and pleaded for the lives of these people, whether they deserved it or not. Please do not tell me that God doesn’t love or care about everybody – I don’t believe you. This is what He is like, right here in these few verses – He doesn’t just love good people – He loves all of mankind. Jesus died for all. The penalty that was paid indicates Almighty God’s estimation of worth!

Jesus Christ Himself prays and intercedes for us with even more fervency than Abraham shows here – we are so blessed to be alive NOW! I think you can see Father God’s righteous loving Character so clearly through Abraham’s confidence in Him, when this man speaks and negotiates with God. If the Lord had disagreed with him, He would have told Abraham not to bother praying for them. In my heart this is what real prayer looks like! It looks like this kind of confidence in God’s goodness. The Body of Christ must go far, far beyond the places we’ve already been before – right into His heart, and gain further understanding of His love for everyone. 

Meanwhile, just prior to the above verses God says this, in Genesis 18:17 “Then the Lord said, “Shall I hide from Abraham what I am about to do?” I think that this is what true intimacy between God and man looks like. Father God regards Abraham with respect. This shows us over and over again, that the Lord loves to dialogue with mankind. What you and I can hear throughout the the pages of the bible, is His disappointment that the man He made doesn’t love Him back!

The wonderful old Patriarchs, Abraham and Moses, knew God in ways we can only imagine. However, we are so blessed to be alive today in this world we live in. Praise God we have the joy of knowing the Answer – Jesus! We can know the Father through Christ, even better than these men did. Jesus Christ is now our perfect intercessor. Let’s not live in the shallows, let’s dive deeper into the Bible, together with prayer, so we can know and understand Who He is, and what He wants, and fight for it. 

We need to learn how to pray with understanding for His heart, and His desires and passions. Let’s AIM bigger. We’ve been aiming at too little for too long. We need men and women who intercede like Abraham! 👋🏻

P 2250 Value His opinion.

/ DVH

We should never be surprised by this world’s actions and activities – this kind of hate filled stuff has been going on for centuries. Sin is common to mankind. After all, we were like this from the very beginning. God said to Adam and Eve: ‘You can have everything you see, but that tree over there – don’t eat from that one.’ He had a great reason, and He gave it to them … but they didn’t value His opinion.

So Adam and Eve ate from the only tree that was forbidden. Did you know that there are 73,300 tree species? Approximately 20,000 plants are edible by human beings. That’s a whole lotta choices. Yet the tree that attracted those two was the one they were not allowed to eat – and it wasn’t about hunger at all. It was really  about ambition. That teaches us a lot about what makes people tick! The power of choice was always going to be our downfall – as well as our salvation.

satan put a caveat on that fruit when he told this couple if they ate it they would be just like God Himself. satan, BTW lied, by twisting the truth and not stating the consequences. Adam and Eve were already like God, they were eternal pure beings. satan implied that the lack of choice in one area was robbing them. However when they sinned, it corrupted them, the same way satan had been corrupted. he was ambitious too. Many people want a God who provides – but not one Who is in charge. 

Now let’s look at Genesis 9:1 for another illustration: “Then God blessed Noah and his sons. He said to them, “Have children so that there are many of you. Fill the earth.”… But they didn’t! … Genesis 11:2-4: “The whole world had only one language, and everyone spoke it. They moved to the east and found a broad valley in Babylon. There they made their home. They said to one another, “Come on! Let’s make bricks and bake them well.” They used bricks instead of stones. They used tar to hold the bricks together. Then they said, “Come on! Let’s build a city for ourselves. Let’s build a tower that reaches to the sky. We’ll make a name for ourselves. Then we won’t be scattered over the whole earth.” 😳

That is in direct disobedience to what they were told to do. And here’s human defiance and ambition sticking up its nasty little head. Father God told those people to fill the earth, literally … spread OUT. But they clubbed together instead. Then they built a tower because their building was going to get them to heaven – their way! They even changed their building materials to make that tower more permanent! They had to work to make those bricks!

Humanity wants the freedom to decide what is good for us, and what is not. Instead we need to recognise that what holds us all back is common to mankind. Sin. Defying God. Wanting our own way. Let’s look at Job 5:1-7: ““Call for help, Job, if you think anyone will answer!To which of the holy angels will you turn? The hot temper of a fool eventually kills him, the jealous anger of an idiot does her in. I’ve seen it myself—seen fools putting down roots, and then, suddenly, their houses are cursed.

Their children out in the cold, abused and exploited, with no one to stick up for them. Hungry people off the street plunder their harvests, cleaning them out completely, taking thorns and all, insatiable for everything they have. Don’t blame fate when things go wrong— trouble doesn’t come from nowhere. It’s human! Mortals are born and bred for trouble, as certainly as sparks fly upward.” 

The bible tells us that sinful attitudes are inevitable – because human beings think that what WE know, is all there is. That, and blaming others when we get it wrong, is our downfall. Sin isn’t just sex, booze and deviancy. Sin is saying: “I know better than You do God.” That’s what happened in the garden. Blame and disobedience. However, Almighty God already had a much bigger plan. If satan had had even a whiff of God’s plan he would have left those two newbies in the garden alone! 

We are more than capable of corrupting ourselves – we once gave away purity for independence.  We gotta stop blaming the snake for our own proclivities. All satan did was give Adam and Eve an opportunity. he’s a tempter, and he studies humanity for flaws, but he’s not able to make us do, anything. Our will can oppose his temptations, but instead we allow supposed needs, and our own opinions drive us. We need to value God’s opinions above our own, and see what He will do with our obedience. 👋🏻

P 2245 Some versus ALL.

/ DVH

Genesis 4:3&4 “In the course of time Cain brought some of the fruits of the soil as an offering to the Lord. And Abel also brought an offering—fat portions from some of the firstborn of his flock.” In this verse we can see the danger of having a partial commitment mentality. Cain brought some of his offering, but Abel brought the Lord the very best bit, the fat portions from a firstborn. Abel sacrificed a living thing. These two men show us that our relationship with Almighty God is not meant to be a part-time thing based on dead works.

The key to successfully walking with the Holy Spirit is a voluntary total surrender. And the thing that stands in our way, stood in Cain’s way – pride and rebellion. Mankind has struggled with those particular sins since the garden. We decided that we knew what was better for us, instead of what God wanted us to do. We’ve become filled up with our own self-importance.

In today’s society it is essential, despite all the protests and flag waving about everybody’s rights, that you and I live out our daily lives recognising and respecting the price that was paid for us. Our lives need to be lived laid down for Jesus, in loving gratitude for what He did for us. Christ was the firstborn of many obedient, loving sons and daughters. His cross was an exchange, even though it was a free gift. Our old life was exchanged for His new life. He took our sin, and now we freely take up His calling, empowered by His Spirit. “Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, Who is in you, Whom you have received from God? You are not your own; you were bought at a price. Therefore honour God with your body.” 1 Corinthians 6:19-20. 

There are a number of theories about why God accepted Abel’s sacrifice, and not Cain’s … but the real point is this – if Cain had responded to the Lord’s clarity about his behaviour differently … Abel would not have died. Jealousy and rebellion shoved Cain into a downhill slide, but I think that pride pushed him to react that way in the first place. He thought he knew better. Cain thought he could give Almighty God any old thing, after all it represented all his hard work (!) So he thought that God should accept it. But it is God’s right to chose what is acceptable or not!

Cain was the first-born son, so the younger son Abel knew his place in the pecking-order. But the eldest son was like many of us today, we can easily have an elder brother mentality. That stuff leads to jealousy when the pastor accepts someone else’s spiritual gift, and ignores ours, or someone gets healed, and we don’t. Or somebody becomes an elder, and we are still washing dishes in the kitchen. This is an entitled works-based mentality. It rationalises spiritual truths with logic. It sounds like this: “I did my best! I’ve kept on being a Christian even when it meant I had to make hard decisions. Why is my effort not recognised? Why is God not blessing me – He said He would. Why isn’t He doing it?” Offence takes the place of submission, and steers us away from living under God’s authority, into self-preservation.

And all that started in the garden, and has continued throughout man’s history. Mankind thinks it has a right to define itself and … well … really (!)… our God just ought to be grateful that we make the effort to follow Him at all … in days like these! 😳 But the bible shows us that our God will not be satisfied with some – He wants all! Just like He cautioned Cain to be careful, we need to be careful too. Giving the Lord what we’ve decided is right and good – is where Cain fell over in the first place! We cannot define what He gives us, He does. He’s God, the Creator of all things. We are not. And no matter how smart we think we are, our wisdom is not only finite – but vastly limited. Particularly by our own arrogance. 

Our God is not a despot. He doesn’t ask for all because He’s greedy or controlling. I believe He asks for all, because it is the safest place for us to live. With all of our lives laid down we are sheltered inside His love. Other people cannot steal from us if we do not own anything in the first place. This means we hold earthly things loosely. The Lord wants to do what He has promised to do, save, protect, guide us through hard things, and keep us safe from the enemy’s ploys and plots. But when we stand about in the enemy’s playground, giving in to satan’s logic and attitudes, it becomes extremely easy to grow resentful. Cain did.

Abel respected God’s wishes, and his offering was honoured – He offered an animal’s life to His Creator. Cain had an expectation that what he thought would be OK would be OK – and he got good and mad when God wanted to correct him. Our attitude to correction will reveal our heart to us – if we will let it. Some is not in God’s vocabulary – ALL is the only language God speaks … because HE GAVE US HIS ALL!👋🏻

P 2244 Avoiding sin.

/ DVH

Genesis 4:5-7 MSG “God liked Abel and his offering, but Cain and his offering didn’t get His approval. Cain lost his temper and went into a sulk. God spoke to Cain: “Why this tantrum? Why the sulking? If you do well, won’t you be accepted? And if you don’t do well, sin is lying in wait for you, ready to pounce; it’s out to get you, you’ve got to master it.” 

My first point is this – Cain wasn’t mad at Abel – he was actually mad at God’s response to his sacrifice. The thing is, it is sometimes easier to get angry with the person who is standing next to you – than it is to tackle the real problem. The place to turn away from sin isn’t afterward … it’s before it grabs hold of you. In this passage, Cain seems unaware, or unconcerned about his own weaknesses and where they will lead him. He simply exhibits envy and jealousy. Recognising what is going on inside us, is a key to stopping or pushing the pause button on something before it starts.

Brooding is a useless thing to do. Nasty things grow in hidden places. At the moment the Lord identified those stirrings in Cain it would have been opportune for this man to pause and acknowledge his sin. But he didn’t. I’ve found that anger is an emotion that loves to escalate – it can grow into resentment and bitterness very quickly. Let’s be clear, the Lord was trying to help Cain to recognise he was in danger of doing worse things than getting angry – but Cain was not happy to be uncovered, and have his fault identified. Often this scenario has nothing whatsoever to do with the person who is trying to get the truth out – they want to help!

Learning to recognise our triggers is part of overcoming the potential for sin, so I ask the Holy Spirit to help me with this process. We all have blind spots, and as we recover from painful things that have happened in our past, we will hopefully mature enough to ask our partner, or someone else close to us, to help us to pause, think about it, and then turn to the Holy Spirit for His help. BTW, the other person in a disagreement does have some responsibility… 

… here’s a red hot tip if you happen to be that other person. “A soft word turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger.” Proverbs 15:1. Kindness and understanding at the moment of impact can turn an angry person around, and give them breathing space. Then they can recover and realise they are headed down the wrong road on a skateboard… and there is a hairpin bend coming up rapidly! We can help each other with our faults, if and when we all want transformation, more than being right.

Unfortunately this confrontation between Cain and Abel escalates – and the next stage is harder to turn away from. When we get into retaliation we have entered the going-down-the-drain stage. It is not impossible, but it is very difficult to come back from there. This is because we have invested in the drama with our own words and attitudes, and now we have an ax to grind about it all. A point to prove. A beach-head to defend! It is hard to recover when you feel under attack – but it is not impossible with His help.

In this case we all know Cain’s last step was to kill his brother, and then he lied about it. The place to stop murder is in our thoughts, not when we’ve entered into out-of-control anger. By then our emotions are totally in charge. This is why the bible says we need to renew our minds. Our natural minds are defensive, and we go into “protect me” mode whether there is a danger or not. BTW, when the Lord told Cain he was now cursed for shedding his brother’s blood, Cain also lost his role in society. He was a farmer, and he could no longer successfully tend the ground because of what he had done. 

Mastery of any sin starts in our thought life, not in our words or actions. James 3:2 says: “For we all stumble in many ways. And if anyone does not stumble in what he says, he is a perfect man, able also to bridle his whole body.”  👋🏻

PS A disclaimer: despite the last three blogs featuring pictures about physical activity, I have not joined a gym. My main physical exercise is getting out of my chair to go to the loo! 😂

P 2234 Dead, dead, dead, dead, DEAD…BUT…

/ DVH

Over to Paul. “My old identity has been co-crucified with Christ and no longer lives. And now the essence of this new life is no longer mine, for the Anointed One lives His life through me—we live in union as one! My new life is empoweredby the faith of the Son of God who loves me so much that He gave Himself for me, dispensing His life into mine!” Galatians 2:20 TPT.

Are we looking to our own strength to fix ourselves or “looking to Jesus Who is the Author and Finisher of our faith!?”  So what does that phrase mean? It means Jesus Christ did not just die to get us a free ticket through the pearly gates. He died for our total transformation into His spiritual likeness as well as our restoration into real fellowship with our Heavenly Father. Now, in this life.

Here’s a question for you:  if we expect heaven when we die …. then shouldn’t we live now, today, expecting He will use our everyday circumstances to constantly renew and transform us, through our relationship with Him?  Otherwise, how do we think that transformation will happen?? By osmosis?? Somebody is going to have to die and Jesus already did …now it is over to US.

Our time away this time has been fun-filled with all kinds of medical difficulties. However, hubby and I both know personally, from experience! … That … ’we can do ALL THINGS because He will and HAS strengthened us.’ And He’ll do it again tomorrow too! We are about to go out and talk to people again, and we know we can’t, not without Him helping us. Knowing or thinking you can’t do something doesn’t negate God’s will in your life – it ACTIVATES it. 

Humanity’s destiny has always been to be restored into the image of God, like we were in Genesis …”let us make man in Our image …” In that garden of His provision, Christ Himself is our living breathing example of what God’s provision looks like. It doesn’t look like a Lear jet, or a posh house, or a fancy car, or expensive meal, it looks like the ability and the desire to love others the way Jesus did when He was on this earth. He gave His life for us, so now we can have His power to give our lives for others. And we get the power to overcome through obedience. 

Adam and Eve did not have to plant that garden … it was planted for them … their job was to look after it, to manage it. It was already established for them. I said all that to say this: GOD ALWAYS DOES THE WORK for us, but… we still have work to do. We must look after what He has given us. We need to be protective of it, by listening to the Holy Spirit, reading His word, and following His instructions.

When sin overcame mankind Jesus came to take our punishment. He came to restore our relationship with Almighty God back to the one Adam and Eve had in the garden. And we get that inheritance, which is rightfully ours, by sheer obedience. We need to manage what we have been given. This life, right here, right now, is our garden, how we manage it, matters. We may not feel anything – we simply need to live this life the way He wants us to live it – knowing He promised to help us win.

Genesis shows us that God wanted to be with humanity, but we were tricked into wanting our own way to get there. satan virtually said to Adam and Eve: ‘You will become like gods, if you eat that fruit. God is keeping something from you.’ Sin is appealing for a season … and then the consequences turn up! Unfortunately, we didn’t just want fellowship with God – we were tempted to be like God. When God told that couple they would die – it was more than a literal death – mankind’s relationship with Him died too.

Long ago, satan wanted to be like God and that’s why he got chucked out of heaven in the first place. Now he is busy trying to make people into his own image! he wants to hurt our Father, by taking away His Beloved Son’s BRIDE. The Holy Spirit is not leading us to die to self because He’s mean, or a party-pooper!  He’s teaching us these things so we can escape from satan’s lies …  “Jesus said: “I AM the Resurrection and the Life, the one who believes in Me will live even though they die.” Dying to self is the only way to escape from satan’s lies and truly LIVE. 👋🏻