Goodness

P 2902 Give yourself a break OK?

/ DVH

The Lord knows we all need a break sometimes, so God has been incredibly generous to mankind, He has given us gifts to help us. When you read His book you might easily notice that Almighty God often picks the oddest people to represent Him, I think it is because His goodness shines very brightly in needy people. 1 Peter 4:10-11 says:  “God has given each of you a gift from His great variety of spiritual gifts. Use them well to serve one another. Do you have the gift of speaking? Then speak as though God Himself were speaking through you. Do you have the gift of helping others? Do it with all the strength and energy that God supplies. Then everything you do will bring glory to God through Jesus Christ. All glory and power to Him forever and ever! Amen.”

We can sometimes overestimate and esteem human beings, because they have been anointed by God to deliver His Grace to His people. Then we face disappointment and a further battle for our peace. However, it is God Himself Who deserves the glory and honour. Those people who represent Him are a gift from Him. With things like teaching, writing, sermons etc. we need to remember as we listen, that the person communicating is His Grace in action. If it touches our heart, that’s our Father, kissing us, hugging us — those things that bless us have been inspired by God for our benefit. 

I believe we desperately need to pray for our leaders – not occasionally, but all the time! Leadership is not only a gift of spiritual stamina, it is a gift of His Grace. These people are out in front of us, right in the firing line of our common enemy. They need our prayers. And we need to consistently elevate and thank the Lord because He gave us those who lead, they are His gifts to the church. Yes His gifts are precious, but that’s because they came from Him! So the glory belongs to Him. Everything He does is worthy of our praise – we simply need to wake up enough to notice what He is doing, all the time, every day.

If any one of us fail, or give up temporarily, or get discouraged or even lose heart — let’s remember that we have SomeOne praying for us, 24/7. Jesus and the Holy Spirit take our walk with our Heavenly Father, personally! Father God could care less if we are successful – He is looking for us to be His own submitted obedient kids, following His Son’s example. Jesus Christ was not successful by today’s standards – yet everything He achieved will one day be revealed in heaven. For now, WE HAVE HIS BOOK! 

I believe we are to be a people who press forward toward the goal, and live every single day, with the knowledge of an  astonishing revelation — we know that our God is always for us! Nothing else can prevail against us because He is on our side. He’s with us when we get it right, He’s with us when we get it wrong. Now here’s 2 Peter 1:3:“Everything that goes into a life of pleasing God has been miraculously given to us by getting to know, personally and intimately, the One who invited us to God. The best invitation we ever received! We were also given absolutely terrific promises to pass on to you—your tickets to participation in the life of God after you turned your back on a world corrupted by lust.”

The ones Jesus loves (Zach Williams):

It may be that this life has become so difficult we have begun to give up on ourselves, because our situation seems so dire we cannot see any answer. In hard times it is so easy to forget Jesus is the answer… to anything. One of the most passionate, desperate prayers was prayed by a little lady who crawled through the dirt unseen to get to Him. Luke 8:43-48. God knows when we get stuck and He runs to the aid of one of His little ones. If He seems to be absent, don’t be afraid – He is confident you will get through this. Incredibly, even at the same time as our troubles, we actually need more than a resolution of our pain and hard situations, even though those things are merciless — we need to be reminded that Jesus is filled with mercy. Pressed down and running over. He won’t leave us or forsake us.

These are the times that I need to remind myself how very much God loves me. How much He understands my pain and loss and sorrow, personally. Jesus didn’t pick out an easy escape route when His life got hard for Him. He totally understands what severe testing is like! He came to this earth, by His own choice, to live this life the way we do. Praise God the Lord Jesus has personal experience, He understands where we are. He will hold us up, relieve our suffering and sorrow and set us free to live in His love despite our circumstances. He has promised to walk with us through our deepest valleys.

Last scripture here! Matthew 11:28-30.“Are you tired? Worn out? Burned out on religion? Come to ME. Get away with Me and you’ll recover your life. I’ll show you how to take a real rest. Walk with Me and work with Me—watch how I do it. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. I won’t lay anything heavy or ill-fitting on you. Keep company with Me and you’ll learn to live freely and lightly.”

Give yourself a break and remember that it is not the end of the world to be human. God honoured mankind by sending His only Son to become one of us. What a wonder that is! And oh how very much He loves us! May He shower you with His peace and love, and help you to see those things today, Amen. Bless you, bye. 👋.

P 2901 Walking in love means …

/ DVH

… that I will probably never get my own way! According to 1 Corinthians 13, this kind of heart attitude is now my NEW priority… Now I will need to rely upon God to help me be patient in the middle of unpleasant circumstances. The Lord has promised He will help us. There is no reason to be envious of your fruit, because I’m way too busy growing my own! At the same time I will cultivate a caring concern for your well-being, while I’m putting my own needs on His altar. Also I no longer want to keep records of all the dumb things you’ve done!

Pardon me a minute, now I need to dash off and look in His mirror, (His Word) and see if there is any chance my reflection there backs up what I just said! Meanwhile, fake fruit looks a lot like the real deal nowadays, until you take a bite out of it! Here’s an interesting side note: fake fruit is too shiny. Just like those fake plastic smiles we slap on when somebody has stepped on our heart for the 15th time and we lie and tell them, “Oh I’m OK, really!” It’s a wonder that my nose isn’t longer than Pinnochio’s. Why do we do that? Here’s my answer … a lack of humility. An aversion to correction and connection, plus I’m deathly afraid you will continue to tell me the truth about myself … and… I don’t want to hear that, thank you!

Here is my point for today, this life is constantly taking bites out of us – our response to those bites is a much better thermometer or diagnosis, than even any reflection could be. Instead, now we want to make His Word flesh in our lives – that happens when we do it to obey Him. Living like Jesus’ told us to, means we learn to be quiet when someone else is utterly wrong and we can prove it to them but instead we choose not to do that. We won’t even brag about the fact that we’ve resisted temptation, because we know, that the Holy Spirit helped us through it. 

Let’s be clear — it is not our behaviour that is at fault – it’s our belief system. We use our experiences to validate what we believe, instead of His Word. This side of the cross we need to believe in His love IN US more than we believe the lies that flourish around us. I can’t do anything without Him, because I know I will dive straight back into looking after ME. I can make pretty good excuses for doing that. Sadly, sometimes we keep right on using our own understanding, instead of acknowledging Him in all our ways.

We must continually revisit truths from the bible. looking for things for us to apply into our lives. Jesus did all this work for us, all by Himself, at Calvary …once and for all! If I give you a brand new house with everything you ever personally wanted or needed in it, and you still chose to continue to live in falling down rented digs – because you are too proud to say “thank you” — whose fault is that? The Lord has already deposited everything we will ever need to be transformed, in our forever account.We just need to learn to live in forever, instead of the immediate. Otherwise the immediate takes over.

Romans 4:20–25: “Yet he (Abraham) did not waver through unbelief regarding the promise of God, but was strengthened in his faith and gave glory to God, being fully persuaded that God had power to do what He had promised. This is why “it was credited to him as righteousness.” The words “it was credited to him” were written not for him alone, but also for US, to whom God will credit righteousness—for us who believe in Him who raised Jesus our Lord from the dead. He was delivered over to death for our sins and was raised to life for our justification.” 

Those words: ‘fully persuaded that God had power’ …matter. We’ve met SomeOne Who is not like anyone else we’ve ever met. He doesn’t just tear up any record of our sins, at the same time, He deposits His love, righteousness, goodness, compassion, mercy, loving-kindness etc. inside of us. We already have whatever we need for this way of life. Jesus did not just empty out the bad, He is in the process, with our co-operation, of loading in the good. Abraham believed God and He acted on His belief, and God said: Now that’s righteous.”

Now we choose to stop doing things the way this world does them, and we ask Him how He wants us to handle everything that comes our way. Loving others is our permanent focus. Instead of asking the Lord to make you patient, (generic wish thought) you and I ask Him – ‘Who am I being impatient with, Lord?’  (Specific attitude check.) And we don’t argue with whatever He suggests, even if it happens to be someone we can’t stand! We go to them and humble ourselves. If we wait for that other person to deserve it … it will never happen! 

LOVE ACTS. It is unafraid of the consequences. Walking in love means my whole life changes! Bless ya 👋

P 2899 Never give up, never surrender!

/ DVH

One of my all-time favourite movies is “Galaxy Quest.” My title today is one of the lines in it. This phrase inspired me  because the disciples often seemed to give up at the drop of a hat. Hubby and I were talking about them and the continual spirit of stupid they seemed to prefer to live under, recorded in the gospels! Even though Jesus was right there… like … they could see HIM! Those disciples remind me a little of those bobble-headed dogs that people have in the rear window of a car. They nod their heads up and down all the time, but they aren’t really saying ‘yes,’ – movement and momentum got them instead!

Picture this, the disciples are in a boat, (Matthew 8:23-27) and the wind and the waves are threatening to sink it, but Jesus has fallen sound asleep up the back of the boat with His head on a cushion. He’s tired. Let’s take a second to think about what He had already done in that day. He actively taught His disciples, as well as the crowds who had come to hear Him speak. He healed many others, including lepers. Like I said – He’s tired! And the disciples climb all over each other in total panic to wake Him up! Then they wail and whine at Him and say: “Don’t you care if we are going to drown?” 

I mean, Jesus is in that boat too, right? If they are correct, then everybody is going to drown not just them! It seems that these men still had not grasped what He had given them. Let’s be clear, panic can easily set in for all of us, but I’m not talking about what you or I might say out loud, I’m also talking about the miscellaneous rubbish that rolls about inside our heads when we shift our gaze OFF Him … and onto some problem or other! Bad move. Our focus matters. We simply cannot afford to forget Who our Father in heaven IS.

I can’t count the times when I have said, inwardly — and, sigh, sometimes even out loud: “Oh God, don’t You care that I am not coping?”  Like how I feel should be HIS number one priority!? The bible says this: “Do not yield to fear, for I am always near. Never turn your gaze from Me, for I am your faithful God. I will infuse you with my strength and help you in every situation. I will hold you firmly with My victorious right hand.’” Isaiah 41:10 TPT. Yield, BTW means I’ve given in to fear and I am flap-doodling about.. But it also says that if I can’t see Him, guess who turned their head?? … Not the Holy Spirit!! We are under His gaze 24/7. 

How about another time when the Lord is teaching the disciples to forgive over and over and over and over again … and: “The apostles came up and said to the Master, “Give us more faith.” (Luke 17:5). Boy that last line made me chuckle.  Basically, what the disciples are saying is: “We want to do it! And we would do it if we just had more faith Lord!” Hah! Like somehow their faith or lack thereof is HIS FAULT. What a miserable excuse for them to make. Remember, the boat story above in Matthew? But Jesus said to them: “Where is YOUR faith?” He expected them to have faith in Him, and what He had already taught them. Those guys had private personal lessons.

Faith is personal. God gave each one of us a measure of faith and sometimes I think we feel and act like He short-changed us. Maybe what we actually think in hard times is that He hasn’t given us enough for something this big! Our faith is not like fairy dust, which can blow away in the winds of bad circumstances, and melt in the heat of tribulation — it is a real gift given to us straight from God’s throne in heaven!

ps: That faith is the same faith we received when we said ‘yes’ to Jesus in the first place. We all have it, it is what causes us to read the bible, pray, fellowship with others, and go to church. Faith is not a feeling, it is a choice we act on! If I have feelings then I have evidence! BUT!! …“…faith is the substance of things hoped for, the EVIDENCE of things NOT SEEN.'”Faith has no evidence but the cross.

It is designed to grow. It will grow quickly if we use it! But if we park it on a shelf and only drag it out when the sky falls in on us, we can easily find our faith is not as big as we hoped it was! That was the problem for the disciples, they weren’t using the opportunities He gave them to stretch and strengthen their faith. When things got hard, I think they kind of figured that Jesus would fix it. But the Lord knew He had to eventually leave them, so embracing that tactic was not going to be a viable solution. Remember, He sent them out in twos to practice their faith! And when the Lord saw their faith was in the results, He rebuked them. 

They were His servants, they served Him. Being a servant is simple, you obey whatever it is you are told! You know, some truths are more weighty than others. The fact that one day we will all die and leave everything we know and love behind us is true. But there is a bigger truth, our salvation. It will sustain us through that end-of-life process. If one day I prayed for someone for a headache and they still have that headache, that is not proof that my faith does not work- it means it needs more using and stretching!  My faith is in what He said, not in what I can see.

Jesus will never leave us, EVER. Just because we can’t always see anything, that doesn’t make how we feel true. It probably means we need to crucify our flesh and move on over into the Spirit. We need to have more faith in His goodness, than we do in our circumstances! Never give up – never surrender! Bye. 👋

P 2893 People need to see HIM in us.

/ DVH

Luke 13:10-17 “On a Sabbath Jesus was teaching in one of the synagogues, and a woman was there who had been crippled by a spirit for eighteen years. She was bent over and could not straighten up at all.When Jesus saw her, He called her forward and said to her, “Woman, you are set free from your infirmity.” Then He put His hands on her, and immediately she straightened up and praised God. Indignant because Jesus had healed on the Sabbath, the synagogue leader said to the people, “There are six days for work. So come and be healed on those days, not on the Sabbath.”

The Lord answered him, “You hypocrites! Doesn’t each of you on the Sabbath untie your ox or donkey from the stall and lead it out to give it water? Then should not this woman, a daughter of Abraham, whom Satan has kept bound for eighteen long years, be set free on the Sabbath day from what bound her?” When He said this, all His opponents were humiliated, but the people were delighted with all the wonderful things He was doing.”

Why were these people so delighted? Here’s my theory … instead of rules and regulations, theories and hypotheses about this or that … God’s Love for ordinary people, those who daily lived in pain and suffering, was being acted out in front of their eyes! Suddenly His Love was no longer a theory — it was on display! Something they could see and experience for themselves. People saw His love in action, through everything Christ did. Sometimes I feel that we have failed the Lord, by talking, talking, talking about this idea or that one, but we haven’t actually moved from theory into practice.

Romans 5:8:“But God demonstrates His own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”  Jesus is God’s love demonstrated. Let’s just think about that. He was kind to sinners and saints alike and He healed and delivered people who were trapped in terrible situations. He taught everyone around Him what God is like by the way He treated them. You and I meet people who need these demonstrations of His love every single day. They need His touch, whether it is an encouraging word, or a prayer for healing, or even food or shelter.

Our God chose to come here as a vulnerable infant, He lived among us, and … “Jesus Christ set a perfect example of kindness and love. Throughout His earthly ministry, He showed His love for others by blessing and serving the poor, the sick, and the distressed.” (Thank you Google!) Here’s my question for today – how do WE as in … you and I …choose to demonstrate our love for God to others? If we are not distracted, or weighted down by the cares of this life, and we are living vastly unaware of our personal contribution – we can think that simply avoiding sin meets His requirements. Sadly that kind of stuff will turn anyone into a legalist in a heart beat. Instead of peace flowing like a river … judgment will drown anyone who comes near it!

Here’s a revelation — trying to avoid sin is not the answer. Jesus already dealt with sin at Calvary and He expects us to use the power He bequeathed to us to deal with our own sin in our own lives using our OWN faith! There’s no point in sweeping junk under the carpet … that lump in the middle of the carpet is a dead-giveaway. Other people are bound to stumble over it. Luke 8:17: “For there is nothing hidden that will not be disclosed, and nothing concealed that will not be known or brought out into the open.” Sooner or later who we really are jumps out under pressure. What we do after that happens, hits everyone around us with a learning curve. Then we can’t continue to pretend that we are AOK, because it eventually becomes obvious we are not.

The people who live around us need God’s love demonstrated toward them – that’s why He has given all of us Grace gifts, now we can deal with this world without hating it, or avoiding it. These Grace gifts change other people’s lives – and awaken faith in His goodness in us. It is consistency that matters – so day by day – we need to choose to  live our lives for His sake. This is how we usher in His kingdom – we follow Him, and we see people through His eyes. Tolerated and/or hidden sin can make us deaf and blind to other people’s needs. However, His love causes our faces to shine the way Jesus’ face shone with the love of the Father. 

Father God knows how to go around other people’s fierce, disinterested faces and attitudes, and bless them with His Love – despite their postures of indifference. We just follow the Holy Spirit and obey His prompts.The glorious thing about God’s loving, fruitful kingdom is that even a little tiny bit of it released into someone else’s life grows. That’s because His kingdom is not of this world – or subject to the junk we tolerate.

Always remember, people need to see Him in us. Every single day we need to use our faith to move beyond this world’s thinking, and start thinking and acting like HE does. My last thought is this, make friends with the Holy Spirit, He knows how to reach people. Bless you. 👋

P 2881 This is the battle.

/ DVH

“So fight with faith for the winner’s prize! Lay your hands upon eternal life, to which you were called and about which you made the good confession before the multitude of witnesses!” 1 Timothy 6:12 TPT

Entering into eternal life here and now, is not just a one time event. It is an ongoing process that is designed to saturate every single part of our lives, so that we progressively become like Christ, while we are still in this world! It is very important that this thought becomes the way we see everything. Some not good things we choose to do are one off actions, but other things are entrenched in us as part of the way we think and conduct ourselves. The more we become saturated by His life in us, and through us, the easier it is to identify the stuff that is the wrong way to think. God Himself has the best Way to think no matter what we are going through!

He is so incredibly good to us while we are learning to yield every area of our lives to Him, His patience with us is far beyond our imagination. It is far greater than any of our experiences have been with other people! Sometimes people’s attitudes and responses may be harsh, so it is extremely important that we know what the bible says. I can’t stress that enough! This is why we let Him and His Word have the last say on our lives, over our personal responses to hardship and trouble. However, to do that we have to be honest with ourselves, and with others.

We have Christ’s example from the bible that show us what His love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control look like! Read the Gospels, follow the Lord Jesus around, you will see that fruit all over His life! God’s kindness etc. is not indulgent or self-serving, it is something steadfast that we can stand on. This means we can identify the things that come to attack us, simply by knowing what real Love looks like. At the same time, we must remember that we are not in a popularity context, and that means that there are times we can end up at odds with someone else – because their learning curves and ours may not match. Grace needs to prevail.

Things like this, are not just tests, or trials. They are opportunities to learn God’s ways. We learn how to hide from the storm, in Him, when there is an actual storm in our lives blasting away. His transformatory ways are often learnt right in the middle of situations we would much rather avoid! As we understand and remember this, it becomes part of our way of looking at this world. Difficult circumstances are not sent by Him, but they are used by the Lord to teach us His Ways of thinking, doing and being. They teach us our limitations. Plus our often unknown weaknesses, and they present us with situations where we can practice relinquishment, by leaving stuff with Him. 

It takes humility to let go of our own solutions, defence mechanisms etc. and trust the Lord to take care of us and the people, or the things that we love. And humility is often learnt, firsthand, when we submit to others – especially people we don’t like! That’s what not leaning on your own understanding means. Experience with His Ways will grow us up in the things that last! We learn trust by trusting Him when everything around us screams “Panic!”

Jesus Christ was man-handled roughly even before those Roman Soldiers beat Him mercilessly. He was verbally abused and He did nothing. He knows what silence in the face of lies looks like and what it costs us when we do it. This was a grown man in His prime – He could easily have fought back! Instead, He humbly submitted to those evil circumstances that battered and beat Him, when He paid for our sins. And now He can identify perfectly with US!

When people come at us with untruths against our character, we have SomeOne who knows how hard these things are and He knows how to get through them without defending ourselves. Jesus was not stoic about what happened to Him — He was GRACE personified. He fought the battle before He ever got into that courtyard, where evil people questioned and beat Him. He knows how to get through things.

This voluntary submission to Him is our daily battle. We choose it. Because of what Jesus has already done for us, we will always have the power to enter into His rest, and lean on His understanding. Bye. 👋

P 2855 He will give what we need to us.

/ DVH

You know, I hardly ever feel like forgiving people when they have hurt me. I’m usually too angry or wrestling with my  logical/illogical thoughts, plus my own personal justification. Our feelings are not the right resource for us to look at our reasons to choose to hold onto unforgiveness. Personal justification is anti-everything-that-Christ-died-to-give-us. 

By reading His word, and taking what I read as Him talking to me personally, I’ve learnt that deliberately cultivating forgiveness, plus responding with obedience, are two of the best ways we can keep our communication channel between us and the Lord, clear. In this new life as we live for His Kingdom – we definitely need to be able to hear Him.  I’ve also learnt that consistent choices to obey to what He has already said – opens our ears and eyes more and more. 

The Holy Spirit is far more willing to trust me, than I am willing to trust Him. He is incredibly generous, beyond what you and I can think or imagine. He will even take our heart effort to obey, and still steer us through every pitfall. Even if we fall off the wagon, He will help us back up! Because He is so generous and gentle-hearted, we must never misuse His generosity. Seriously, we must not treat such a precious Person carelessly. It isn’t that we simply respect Him and His wishes – we need to honour Him with our substance … which means all that we are, and do!

Deliberately planning on the Holy Spirit glossing over something we know that we intended to do, without being genuinely repentant, is not on. We are talking about SomeOne so special … He’s the One Who brooded over, and cared for this earth before it was ever formed, and then carefully designed each one us within our mother’s womb. We look the way He planned for us to look. He sees you and I as beautiful –  because we are people who have been made in God’s own image. The Holy Spirit is SomeOne Who knows and understands our weaknesses. He walked with Jesus, and He has an incredible depth of understanding of pain and suffering. 

I like to actively reflect upon what I read, and I know the bible says that our Heavenly Father could not look upon His dearest Son, Jesus, when He became sin.  We all know that when Jesus became our sin, that sin disfigured Him beyond our imagining. Yet our Heavenly Father IS a FATHER and that was His lovely Son, humanity deliberately and maliciously killed. Think about it, even if you knew one day your precious child would die for a good cause, right in front of you – do you think you could watch while He was being tortured? Our God has a bigger idea of good than we do! That’s why His goodness is the essence of all He does.

He needs to be more than a distant figure, too holy for the likes of us to look upon – even though that thought is true. He knows how to make hard, wise choices! He chose to enter into mankind’s existence. And in Isaiah 53:10 it says: “Yet it was the LORD’s will to crush Him and cause Him to suffer, and though the LORD makes His life an offering for sin, He will see His offspring and prolong His days, and the will of the LORD will prosper in His hand.” This shows us a great deal about God’s Ways. He can rejoice in things that are happening because they are for mankind’s greater good. We can get so wrapped up in our idea of what’s good – we can miss that our Heavenly Father has a bigger plan. We must learn to trust in His processes. 

When I choose to forgive you, I give my thoughts of who you are and what you do, and how I think you should treat me – back to Him. I put you under His Grace – a glory that is more powerful than anything this world has ever seen. This is not something I owe you because I am religious, it is my own hard choice to forgive you and that is what obedience looks like. We need an ever-deepening understanding of how His Grace works.

On a mountain long ago, when Jesus stood there with Moses, and Elijah – His glory was revealed to the disciples. His glory contained His chosen obedience to the Father and His will. Jesus only wrestled with being obedient once in His life and that was right before He went to the cross, and faced all that His death contained. But He did not flinch … He still went forward. He went forward ALONE and He did not defend Himself. The disciples lost their leader, their friend and teacher, but, it took the Holy Spirit’s intimate knowledge of what actually happened in those moments, to change their lives at Pentecost. They received a download of spiritual revelation that transformed them. 

Today, we continually need greater revelations of what was done for us, so that we will happily choose to live joyfully respecting and honouring Christ’s life and death. At this moment in time, it seems to me like, we are living like usurpers not children of the King. We never have to demand what we need, because if we truly need it, HE WILL GIVE IT TO US.  Bye.🕊️

P 2853 Be real.

/ DVH

Hi! You know, there are times that we like to quote the verse “with God all things are possible …” especially when we need the Lord to do something impossible on our behalf! Being real means we see Him change impossible things in our lives, every single day. Yet, most of the time, we merrily roll along ignoring change, hoping the guy who annoys us will change instead! We only drag out our faith first thing in the morning and last thing at night, as well as on Sundays, and maybe for prayer meetings. OR we crank it up for those desperate times when the emergency bell is clanging away in our lives, and something has happened that we can’t fix!

Ticking off spiritual boxes is a way to appear to be spiritual. Many Christians seem to be totally unaware that we are knee-deep in practising living with the appearance of goodness – without embracing the substance of the kind of change that will transform us. And consequently, we affect the lives of every one else around us. Unfortunately living like that is like a great looking apple that’s been in the cool store too long. On the outside it looks fine but inside it is all brown and inedible. Real fruit is startling in its sweetness with every bite.

We can get by with hiding our faults from other people by going to church regularly, giving to the poor, never swearing, always being seen to do the right thing … but the truth is …if what we are doing is not coming from our hearts, then we actually need the kind of repentance that is followed up by change — not play-acting. Here’s an astonishing and amazing thought: GOD LOVED US WHEN WE WERE YET SINNERS! Pretending, or keeping up appearances, is a waste of whatever precious time we actually have on this earth. His love will never withdraw from us – actually most of the time, we withdraw from Him. Humbly admitting our faults to each other clears up the idea that we are somehow perfect. It is a much safer place to stand.

My point for today is that we always need to be real. Let’s not live our lives pretending to be something we aren’t just so we can fit in. Be yourself, warts and all. Let the One Who has changed men and women’s hearts since the dawn of time operate on your heart. One of the most valuable graces we can embrace – besides repentance, and obedience – is honesty with ourselves. The truth is, we don’t have to be afraid of sin anymore, because Jesus paid it all! So now there is no reason to hide. Hiding from His love is counterproductive – the power for us to change comes through receiving His unconditional love and forgiveness, and then giving it away to others. If we hide we short-circuit this process.

Today I want to briefly look at a woman who threw herself down on the floor at Jesus’ feet, at a dinner party. To start with – she wasn’t invited! And for her efforts the rest of the crowd judged her, plus they judged the Lord as well! But like I said before – HE looks at hearts! “She has been forgiven of all her many sins. This is why she has shown me such extravagant love. But those who assume they have very little to be forgiven will love me very little.”” Luke 7:47 TPT. The result of diminishing our sin is this: we miss out on understanding how much love HE gives us and how much worship He deserves!


Dismissing sin’s very real consequences produces ongoing bad results. To start with, we lose gratefulness. This dear woman did not care what others thought, she knew she needed to be right with God more than she needed their approval! She poured out all she had on His feet in repentance, and total adoration. And the Lord saw her and received her. Her honesty gained her an audience with the King and a chance to worship Him. Who doesn’t want that?

Here’s something I have learnt, over the years … Instead of spewing out my anger or withdrawing from people who hurt me …kindness, mercy and forgiveness opens amazing unseen new doors. Those doors lead to refreshing changes, and deeper relationships. Instead of minimising our faults, and accenting someone else’s sins against us – releasing loving forgiveness takes us out of any hot-headed drama and puts us squarely back into His kingdom.

It will cost us, of course. Worthwhile things are costly – just like that alabaster box. But our transformed attitudes in those moments become like that perfume that was released to the Lord. Jesus is not concerned with sin anymore – now He wants us all to move on into the freedom that flourishes in His Father’s kingdom. When I set you free, I get freedom too, whether you pick up your share or not! Learning to be real about who we are, plus who we are not —removes the weights and burdens we’ve tied on ourselves.

“Those whom the Son has set free, shall be free indeed.” These people will be free to enjoy who God made them to be. We can pick up a lot of dumb stuff in this life, and some of it comes from when we are too tiny to block it out. Let God Himself heal you and reveal how He sees you. Learn to be real. Nobody else can do YOU like YOU can! Bye. 👋

P 2845 This is what love looks like.

/ DVH

Grace, hope, peace, joy, mercy, patience, kindness, these things are the love of God freebies we are to give away to other people every single day! The bible tells us that giving away this stuff is not even illegal. Galatians 5:22-23:“But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.” Well, yay!! It’s great to find things that are legal! Sneezing on your kid is now called child abuse, so there isn’t much around us that isn’t illegal. The thing is legal systems can’t change hearts, but He can!

Regarding Love, Father God’s barns are always bulging full – there is no trouble with OUR SUPPLIER! I keep hearing from the Lord, it’s time to feed the poor in spirit! You and I have an all access-pass to that bulging barn of love-joy-peace-patience-kindness-goodness etc. we simply need to use our faith to grow the fruit, and then we can give away what He has grown in us. You get patience, kindness etc. as you lean on Him and ask Him to give it to you. Then you go out and act like you have it… Does that actually work? It has so far … !!! 

The spreading of any sort of excess is a very current subject in our household over the past few weeks. Our mango tree had stacks of fruit on it this year, so we have given away lots of huge mangoes, the largest was nearly 1kg in weight! We gave them away everywhere, to everyone around us. That’s what happens when you have an abundance of something, it means you have plenty to give away. I urge all of us to daily let the Lord overflow your spirit with loads of … lots of … an abundance of … as well as a huge excess of … all these things!! So you can give them all away! But make sure you take in some yourself OK?

The only thing that can take away our knowledge of His incredible excess is our focus. If we focus on our lack, of  patience, kindness, goodness etc. we will always see and feel that lack. That’s a good time to remember that Jesus took 5 loaves and 2 fishes and fed thousands. He can multiply and create anything, even intangible things. He once gave me love for a spoiled brat… strangely — after I began loving this child, I found it was a sweet kid after all! That’s what I mean when I say, most problems are both sides! The Lord has also multiplied bibles in the boot of our car. We counted them about 20 times, and sure enough, there was more than we put in! 

The poor in spirit, the unlovely, the forgotten, will never be hard for us to find because they are all around us. I’ve decided to just love everyone I meet the way He would. I figure that covers it, and makes it easy for a bird brain like mine. That’s not modesty BTW, as you get older things fall out of your ears far more easily than you would like!  I forget words all the time, always in the middle of a sentence. My poor hubby gets to be my memory bank, concordance, and dictionary all at once. And you thought your spouse was a pest! Meanwhile, hubby just shared these thoughts with me regarding God’s love:

“The expression of God’s love toward others is the fruit of HIS Spirit in us and through us. So His fruit is simply an expression of Who He is flowing outward. When we display His fruit of love, through us, it will produce life, simply because it flows from Him. But when we try to mimic the behaviour of the fruit of Spirit, without His help, those things without His love as our source – eventually produce judgment, intolerance, guilt, obligation and religion.” “Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit.”John 3:6. 

The sap of God’s love in and through His chosen vine is constantly flowing … we will receive its benefits as we choose to remain in that vine. Remaining “in Christ” is the secret to living a life of love. Jesus simply can’t help loving people, despite their personal proclivities – He simply wants what is best for them without using force or manipulation.  Remaining in Him means that we learn to want what He wants, instead of living a life that makes us feel comfortable.

That will happen without us even thinking about it. This is what His Love looks like…. letting the Holy Spirit have His Way … and … loving every bit of it!  🥰

P 2840 We must remember, we sin against GOD, first.

/ DVH

“Then David said to Nathan, “I have sinned against the LORD.” Nathan replied, “The LORD has taken away your sin. You are not going to die.” 2 Samuel 12:13. 

“And the son said to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against heaven and in your sight; I am no longer worthy to be called your son.’”Luke 15:21.

“Against You, and You alone, have I sinned; I have done what is evil in Your sight. You will be proved right in what You say, and Your judgment against me is just.”Psalm 51:4.

We often talk a great deal about sinning against each other, but today I want to talk about the fact that first of all, any sin is against Him. When we dismiss or disobey His word, our sin is dismissive of God’s holiness. Yes, we need to fix things with others, but we need to start at the top … with Father God Himself. Everyone of our sins had a consequence. And Jesus bore the penalty of those consequences on His body – so we need to treat these things with humility, honestly, reverence and respect. 

Let me be as clear as I can be … Our sins are absolutely, positively, completely G.O.N.E. – gone forever! Thrown into the sea of forgetfulness, with a NO FISHING sign clearly displayed. That sign needs to be read over and over again because guilt and shame no longer belong to us. “Jesus said, “I tell you most solemnly that anyone who chooses a life of sin is trapped in a dead-end life and is, in fact, a slave. A slave can’t come and go at will. The Son, though, has an established position, the run of the house. So if the Son sets you free, you are free through and through.”John 8:34-36.

This means that before we repent and repair things with others, first of all, we need to thank God and His precious Son again, for all Jesus suffered and chose to do for us. Thankfulness, not guilt is now our response – however presumption is not a right response either. We need to treasure our relationship with our Loving generous Father above all else. There is no longer any fear in sin and God’s love has now taken over our way of thinking, doing and being. We live a life of love now, standing by our choices- we are now free to choose His Will, His Way.

We’ve been set free from the demands and focus of sin, to focus upon HIM.  Freedom means we can still sin – however, now, we’ve been empowered not to!! Instead of blame and shame motivating us, we can be confident that we can restore things – simply because Christ’s death on our behalf has empowered us. Now we praise Him for all He has willingly done for us and we go back into happily submit to His will, His way. The point of the ‘get out of jail free card‘ is not carelessness – it is redemption. So we must acknowledge our sin against His freely-given goodness.

Here is another scripture for all of us to think on today:“My little children (believers, dear ones), I am writing you these things so that you will not sin and violate God’s law. And if anyone sins, we have an Advocate [who will intercede for us] with the Father: Jesus Christ the righteous [the upright, the just One, Who conforms to the Father’s will in every way—purpose, thought, and action].”  1 John 2:1. The best news ever is this, JESUS is in the throne room praying for us, every single second of the day. IMAGINE THAT! Because of what He willingly did, sin is not the “norm” for us. Our new normal life is in Him. THAT’S WHERE THE POWER TO OVERCOME COMES FROM!

Almighty God does not wink at our sin … it says so in the book!  An exchange took place 2,000 years ago and Jesus Christ became the Lamb Who was slain, forever. It’s part of His title, just like Prince of peace, wonderful wise Counsellor, and Saviour of the World. So when we sin and disobey God, we take ourselves out of fellowship with the Father, and the Holy Spirit, Who is the One Who helps us – and the Son. The One Person Who perfectly understands how hard it is to be human! Dumb move … He knows the way through temptation!

Let’s be clear. God made sure all this stuff was written down, we have a book! Now we do not have to be dragged about by our weaknesses, and weird ideas. Because of what Jesus did, we have a live-in Helper. The Holy Spirit was our midwife! He birthed us and now He is raising us, day by day as we learn to live a life of obedience. God did not just trust our discipleship to ordinary men … Jesus Christ, Who followed the Holy Spirit’s instructions to the letter – is still making disciples! 

We have the bible to show us where we are out of order with His ways and we need to respond to conviction with real repentance. Because when sin happens we stop walking with Him and start hiding from Him. And people don’t just hide by leaving the church, they hide in busyness, and by elevating things that are distractions, or supposed  recreational activities. Dead people don’t need that stuff – they don’t have an opinion or a need. That’s why we rely upon God to meet them!

If we sin, we need to go to our Heavenly Father, first, and confess our faults, errors, lapses, nasty attitudes and selfish ways and He will empower us to overcome. “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.” 1 John 1:9. Bye. 🕊️

P 2807 Keep your anchor fixed in His Love.

/ DVH

Part of the reason Christians can become inactive is that we have been careless, we have lost our first love. That means we will have no sense of purpose. Here’s what I have learnt … when you watch what the Lord does and is still doing, every single day, you will fall in love with Him over and over again. You know … somebody ought to write a song about that! I believe our love can grow cold, when we are not using our faith … and ‘.. faith without works is dead!’ 

A boat without an anchor drifts about, moved by this current and that storm – tossed around by this theology, or that special event. Our hope is IN Christ, everything He did, everything He said — Who He is, and what He has done for us. Nothing more, nothing less. MY hope is not in my faithfulness it is in HIS.  I must learn to accept that I can get to know Him, no matter what is currently going on. “Not only so, but we also glory in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope.”Romans 5:3-4. I don’t care two beans for whatever fabulous Christian teaching book is currently flooding the market place … our hope is always IN Christ. Loving Him is our finest priority. 

Then all we need to do is to reflect what we see when we look at Him, and be ready to tell someone else how wonderful the Lord is. I’m absolutely blessed when our Heavenly Father gives someone I know this revelation, or that dream, and this vision, and I love that they want to tell me about it…. YAY! But I want to see Him for myself thank you. We need to know Him, personally. He is our only hope, so we cling to Him like a baby Koala clings to its Mum.

The bible says this: “That I might know Him, and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings; being made conformable to His death,” Philippians 3:10. Over the years I realised that I will have to die to what I want for my life, in order to know Him. I must take personal responsibility for my response to what He’s done for me. Suffering is a part of life and a great leveller. But it is not a happy word.

We all know we will suffer – it’s in the book, but we must still choose to give up this attitude, and put down that expectation and let Him be God. He never sleeps. Now we no longer say this by choice, instead we simply must say that! When we live chasing Him, we will get to know Him. Jesus Christ chose to live His life for our sake. That means we have a shared fellowship with Him as we choose to deny ourselves and take up our cross daily – and live our lives for His sake.

People can go to church week by week and chat to everyone there, but that does not mean we know each other! So, how do we get to know each other? Here’s my little theory … …you knew I’d have one!  …we need to share each other’s joys, sorrows, suffering together and learn to help one another. We must celebrate our victories, and pray for one another in our defeats! Privacy is great, but it can be costly – nasty things hide in the dark. 

Our hope in Christ, is our firm anchor and without that hope it is too easy to drift from this fad to another one. Sadly we can foster and cling to the things that tickle our ears and tell us we can do whatever we like because we belong to God now. We can’t develop our own personal faith, living like that because we are too busy following the way somebody else does it!  The way to develop our own faith is to USE IT. I call that obedience to the Word.. We read what the Lord wrote and find something to do in it. There’s always something to do in that book! But I admit that I do sometimes need the Holy Spirit’s help to find it.

I’ve read about Samson, just like you … and Jonah and Moses and Jeremiah … however, that doesn’t mean I will grow my hair long and avoid whale-watching trips …  Instead, I read the bible looking at the way God interacted with the people who are in it. So I look at how Moses talked to God … and I see how Jeremiah complained a lot because his life was hard. At the same time, I notice our Heavenly Father’s response. I see His patience with Jeremiah and Samson. Our God is so incredibly diverse, He totally loved both of these very different men. I also see that these men had contestable issues with the Lord, they weren’t perfect. But boy!  Was HE LOYAL!

To me that means I can disagree with God and not get zapped by lightning bolts from heaven. He is way more tolerant of my humanity than that –  I just need to live my life honestly, before Him. I’ve learnt if He tells me to do something, I’d better do it, because it did not go well for any of those men I’ve mentioned when they ignored Him! I have learnt through their testimonies, as well as my own life, that trouble cannot be avoided but it can be an opportunity for transformation, it is not something we must hide from. Holding your breath and waiting until it is over doesn’t work so well either!

The New Testament has taught me that I am so much more fortunate to have been born on this side of Calvary. I don’t have to be swept along by how I feel – or how you feel – I just need to keep my anchor fixed by staying attached to Him. This means my life will be run by my hope in Who He is. Everything else passes away. My hope is fixed. It is in Who Jesus Christ said He is, and what He did, as well as what He said He did. He did it all those things for us … …including the big guy in the supermarket who is a grump … plus the receptionist in the doctor’s surgery who is totally unhelpful. I don’t have to go digging around to find candidates who are eligible for His love – they are all around me! 

Those thoughts about Him, His goodness, His reliability – keep my little boat from swinging about, and going under in a storm. I honestly don’t believe it is wise to live my life rushing from this port to that one, trying to distract myself from the fact that I am finite. One day I will leave all this behind me. But I am going somewhere when this life is over, and so are you. That’s what hope looks like. We are anchored into Who He is, and How reliable He is. His book tells me, over and over again, that He loves me. It is my all consuming hope that one day I will hear Him say that to me in person. Bye. 👋