Grace

P 2279 Transformation sucks…until it doesn’t!

/ DVH

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

P 2276 Mercy starts with US.

/ DVH

Mercy is like a well, sometimes we can run dry, and at that moment …we often let fly!  When that happens, repent quickly, fix it, and go and get alone with Jesus as soon as you can. Then ask for a fresh infilling of His love and grace. We extend mercy to ourselves when we do that instead of beating up on ourselves. However, at the same time, we are not absolving ourselves of the need to repair, and re-connect with the other person. 

Self flagellation and self accusation is not profitable, we need His grace first before we can begin to analyse what happened, and we need to look through His eyes at the current event, and not ours. We need to choose to look at whatever happened from His POV and not the world’s. His POV of restoration is far more important than us yelling at ourselves for getting it wrong.

We need to rush to our mercy seat, Christ, and sit down with Him. The bible tells us when we run toward Him, He runs toward us. Just stop and think on that. The God of the Universe rushes toward us and the Holy Spirit is on point and totally engaged on our behalf as well. He is ever-listening and ever-present to carry out Father God’s wishes. This is the exact moment that we need to remember Whose child we are. 

There is also no room for shame either! Jesus took our shame, sin, guilt and blame with Him to the cross.  “There is …no condemnation etc . etc.”  We need to get to Him as fast as we can. Then we prayerfully override our feelings of despair about what we did or said, and start reminding ourselves of how much we are loved by Him. He is the source of healing. Healing is not just about bodily ailments, our souls can be sick …it’s in the book.

I am not talking about ignoring our own personal responsibility to fix things with other people. Father God is the place where we get the grace to forgive others. The way to get a clear conscience is to deal with the matter. Don’t get tied up in who is to blame, or who said what. The point is we have to get back to Jesus, throw ourselves on the mercy seat, acknowledge our own fault, and don’t just start raving on about what the other guy did or said and  how much it hurt you. There is no value in that. It’s like yelling at the bus when it’s already gone, all the yelling in the world won’t bring the bus back.

Condemning yourself is a bit like adding fuel to the fire of your own hurt. Take a breath. Remind yourself that our precious Father loves you no matter what and He doesn’t change … “in Him there is no shadow or turning…” Now turn and look at the cross! It’s empty!! We live in the other side of the resurrection there is hope there! The Holy Spirit knows how to turn that mess we are in around.

Don’t try to fix something while your own emotions are in turmoil. Just breathe slowly, tell the Lord you’re sorry, ask Him to forgive you. Wait for Him to speak. You need instructions. If your toaster is malfunctioning then you will probably need to look at the instructions or check out the guarantee. The bible is God’s personal instruction manual for human beings. It is His guarantee IN WRITING! So when we are malfunctioning we need to go back to the word of God, and start reading. 

When I’m in a tizzy emotionally, or in in my mind, OR both! I find reading a Psalm calms me down. I rediscover my humanity by reading about what the psalmist said.- I like to go to one of the Psalms David wrote. Pick one where David is cranky at somebody or other, so he wants to kill them, and tell God they died. And I keep reading because I know that by the end, he will have calmed down and started turning his thoughts back to God. And that’s what we need to do too.

If you need to cry, cry. BUT – our God does not take sides. He only has one side – HIS! Remember the angel asked Joshua ‘who is on the Lord’s side?’ There are no winners or losers in Father God’s plans because when the Lord is in charge …everybody wins!  He loves us all. His aim is for every single human being to know Him and trust Him. We need to actively learn to have mercy toward ourselves. However that does not mean we are right or wrong, or that He favours us over someone else. Everything hinges on us treating the other person with His grace because our relationship with Him cannot go forward without active grace. Grace for us and grace for them. 

The Lord has already forgiven mankind – as His family we operate by His agenda now. Forgiveness is the hallmark of Who He is, and now, it has to be the hallmark of who we are. Focussing on our flaws magnifies them – this is why it is destructive to our faith to focus on someone else’s flaws. Our focus is always on the Answer – JESUS. 👋🏻

P 2269 We need to use our faith to access His Grace.

/ DVH

Think of Grace as a huge endless heavenly container that has all the provision you will ever need to access in this life for anything you need to do. It is limitless. It is time to rely upon His boundless Grace to change our ways of thinking being and doing instead of misusing it as an escape clause to remain the same not change. We can’t see it, BUT … it’s in the book! Having faith is about trusting God to be true to His Word.

At the immediate point of impact when somebody says or does something that hurts or irritates us … we need to take a breath and ask the Lord for help. It’s a choice. It’s a hard choice because we are used to making decisions without referring to anything else other than what we know. Or maybe in desperation, we try to make scriptures back up what we want. Faith is about Who HE is – can we trust Him to work everything together for good, even in our bad moments?

Think of it this way God knows the way through anything we come up against, no matter what difficulty we are in. This is why we need His help, to put this Grace that is so readily available in our time of need, into action. In Exodus the Israelites could not go into the promised land because  it was in signs and wonders and provision. We need to change our focus. Our faith needs to be in Him, in the One who did everything for us. 

We don’t have to feel ashamed of being inadequate in the face of trials and tribulations. Our GOD loves to help and protect us. The more we use our faith to access His grace the more our faith will grow. Faith is not just the thing we drag out when the sky has fallen on us, or something bad has happened. If we live that way then we could easily find that our faith muscle will atrophy, and we have no faith strength to make it through whatever it is that confronts us.

The Lord Himself told us to live by faith. Living by faith means it’s a day by day thing, sometimes minute by minute. The only way to strengthen this kind of Living interactive  faith is to continually use it. Unfortunately we are way too used to relying upon our own understanding and strength so we automatically do some things out of habit or personal ability. 

This means we are living our lives acknowledging the power of God but not using it. It is no wonder that faith fails to uphold us, when it is the emergency spare. To live by faith means we live by our confidence in the power of His Word, from His book. Because we have become so used to referring to what we know, and going on with that –  this will mean praying without ceasing, sometimes. 

Not the sort of prayers that we sometimes use and try to hope in …these honest sorts of prayers … like help Lord or I need You, Lord. Heart prayers, not just pretty prayers we hope the Lord will accept. He already permanently accepted us, forever. In our efforts to be reverent and to pray the sorts of prayers we think God wants to hear, we’ve lost the ability to communicate with Him in every day language that comes  truthfully from our hearts. He’s our reference point, which means He knows what we need before we do! Believing in His goodness, and acting upon that thought in mind, means we are moving in faith.

This does not mean that we run around like loose cannons blaming our mistakes on the Lord, and taking credit for the victories. It’s an attitude of heart that says ‘I can’t do anything without You’ Jesus. We do not lose our independence by force, rather we surrender in favour of His great great wisdom and insight. I often find myself praying what do I do here Lord? 

True freedom exists when you have the freedom to make a choice. Automatic responses are not choices either. They are a reflex action. Sometimes we do things ourselves because it seems quicker than leaning on Him. The more we practice leaning on Him – using our faith, the more it becomes the way we think. That’s called renewing our minds. Do you think Jesus was ever so distracted by His circumstances, or whatever was going on around Him that He forgot about His Father or the Holy Spirit? He started from what God said and went from there. He was still Himself, but He was Himself with the benefit of the Father’s wisdom and the Holy Spirit’s applications. 

Using our faith is an investment in our relationship with Him and whatever ministry He has for us. Faith needs to be like sneezing or sitting down … a part of life. Remember we must never be afraid of getting it wrong, Jesus redeemed everything but He cannot redeem our inertia! Grace is accessed by faith, no matter how wobbly that faith seems to be to us. Let’s live our lives believing the bible is true. He said He did it, so it’s done. Bye 👋🏻

P 2268 We need His Grace to make changes.

/ DVH

Have you got a problem person in your life? Somebody that makes you feel like there are nails dragging down the blackboard? Sometimes in order to see the very real people around us, who love us, and live with us, we almost need to be laid aside to start being taught by GRACE. We simply must start giving each other room to grow. At this juncture I think it is important to point out that it’s all too easy to see what’s wrong with somebody else and totally ignore the fact that not only are we not perfect, actually we do the same thing all the time! 

I think the Bible talks about that somewhere in there -…logs and specks! No matter what we tell everyone else, what we all actually need as individuals is Grace. It takes great Grace to own your own faults, but if we keep skipping our own change whilst examining everyone else’s life, we’ve missed the point. The old standards of looking and sounding right are shackles – they must come off. Otherwise the pressure to perform will imprison the whole body of Christ! It will be scary at first but the plus side is we will be free to grow and HE gets what He wants. Win – win!! 

Some of us have been grown-ups for a very long time and others still feel they need to revert to control to get their own way. Our own way was never part of the deal! His life for ours, that’s the deal. Christians are battling with immature leftover feelings from childhood. People often need healing not constant critiquing, or reprimanding. It is unfair to expect perfection from others. God doesn’t, and we shouldn’t either.

Grace is the currency and language that we need to use to help one another, as well as ourselves. This life is not about convenience and expediency, it’s about us growing into Christ’s likeness. Everything we need for this is available using our faith; our job is to seize the opportunities. People do not mean to make mistakes. We need to leave others the room to learn. That is costly if you feel that you are the person everybody else is learning on! Nevertheless somebody has to decide that making sacrifices is part of Christianity and I think we all need to start with ourselves first.

“But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. To Him be the glory both now and to the day of eternity. Amen.” 2 Peter 3: 18. GRACE is our vehicle for growth. But in order to progress, we need to practise it. So those people who annoy the living daylights out of us are God sent opportunities for us to practice. They are not put there to annoy us, these people are just on their own journey toward truth and acceptance. Christ is our model … what He didn’t say speaks volumes. 

Sometimes we are so used to our own way of thinking, behaving, and being, that we forget that other people have a different place they are coming from. So what looks like a bad thing to us may be purely harmless to someone else.  We need to practise humility, and purpose to lean on Him and learn His ways. That will make us all bigger inside. Our task now is to encourage one another into good works. I think humility and vulnerability are a prime position to do that. I also think it’s why Jesus said, “Don’t call your brother an idiot.” Other people’s learning curves are often our greatest challenges and source of annoyance.

The Holy Spirit will not make anybody do anything. He can present us with urgency and encourage us to persevere. But He’s not a bully. The Lord means for us to treat each other in the same way. “Love one another as I have loved you.” Love does not have to abuse – instead it undergirds, it provides support, simply so the other person can learn. It does this unconditionally because that’s the way the Holy Spirit supports us. Some things are better not even being spoken about if it’s going to cause someone else to feel pushed or coerced. It is not another person’s job to force someone else to conform to their standards or ideas, to transform your life your attitudes your actions etc. 

Everything is about Grace. Christ’s death released unending Grace, which is always available to us but we must not abuse it – when we abuse it, we lose the benefit. The way to get Grace is to use it and rely upon it and realise that we are not complete without the Holy Spirit’s input. His Grace is freely available but we must humble ourselves, acknowledge our need and cooperate with the One Who was sent to help us. I have learnt, from experience, to trust the Holy Spirit’s opinion above my own – He knows me better than I know myself – plus He’s just plain lovely.  👋🏻

P 2265 Praise is a heavenly language.

/ DVH

Previously, there was a trend in Christianity to use the word “praise” almost like we would use a comma or a full stop. I don’t mean people weren’t genuine when they said praise the Lord etc., what I mean is the use of that phrase was tacked on the end of everything. as it can be. Praising God is not a punctuation mark. It’s joining in with His already established kingdom, by worshipping Him, and praising God for Who He is.

Praise comes easily when you are living aware of God simply because of Who He is. Who He is literally pulls out a response from us. But what happens when He’s not around and we are not aware of Him. Maybe instead we have had a lousy morning preparing to come to church. How do we praise him then? The Bible says that we can bring a sacrifice of praise into God’s house. This means we take our eyes off our suffering, pain and circumstances and deliberately focus on Who He is.

Praise is a way to enter the throne room. The bible says,  “enter His gates with thanksgiving, into His courts with praise.” Thanksgiving and praise are key to preparing our hearts for worship. Thanksgiving is thanking Him for what He has already done, including saving us, and praise focuses on Who He is. I think we’ve become tangled up about the way thanksgiving, praise and worship work. I don’t want to speak about worship today and thanksgiving is fairly self explanatory.  Today I want to focus on praise. I think praise is essential. It shifts our focus away from ourselves and onto the Lord and His kingdom.

The point of praise is to make ourselves aware of Who He is. If my husband only loved me for what I did, I’d be sunk right now. I’m in bed with a broken shoulder and I can’t even pull my own pants up. Praise is ‘other’ person centred. And in this case, it is God-centred.

Praise is about proximity and focus. We move away from our earthly circumstances toward Him. Many of the Psalms were written as prompts for praise. I truly believe in reading out loud the bible so your own ears can hear it. We need to come out of our minds and thoughts into our spirits and shift our focus onto Who He is. I’m reminded of an old Wesleyan hymn – “And can it be that I should gain? An int’rest in the Saviour’s blood? Died He for me, who caused His pain? For me, who Him to death pursued? Amazing love! How can it be That Thou, my God, should die for me?”

I am also aware that praise is not just singing, although we do have some lovely songs nowadays that open our hearts toward Him. However, I personally think there are way too many modern songs with ‘I, Me and Mine’ in them. Praise is where I choose to shift my focus away from ‘I, Me and Mine’ onto Him and Who He is. To do that we need to study the bible with a deliberate awareness of Who He is. Praise is also a faith statement – it tells our enemy that no matter what he threw at us before we arrived at church – our God is on His throne!

Father God does not need our praise, we praise Him to prepare our hearts to focus heavenward. I switch my focus from my needs onto Him. There is an often unseen benefit in doing this, my problems get smaller ‘and the things of earth shall grow strangely dim in the light of His glory and grace.’ For a short while we stop being earthbound people having this battle and this difficulty and become children of the King and His greatness and grace enfolds. We must remember the Holy Spirit loves to praise God. So did Jesus!

Praise puts me on a journey that takes me outside of the influence and attack of the enemy.  The ‘hooks’ of despair, discouragement and fear weaken their hold on me because I have deliberately turned away from them and am walking towards the Greater One. Praise is a heavenly language. It bursts forth from hearts that know this life is not just about all the humdrum, awkward, difficult and unpleasant things we have to endure, our praise comes from a people who have fixed their eyes upon a goal, and that goal is to give Him what He deserves.

BTW for Spirit-filled people, praise is our new residential address. Our greatest power lies in our ability to focus on His kingdom more than the earthly one around us. 👋🏻

P 2261 Agreement is not participation.

/ DVH

“So this is why we abandon everything morally impure and all forms of wicked conduct. Instead, with a sensitive spirit we absorb God’s Word, which has been implanted within our nature, for the Word of Life has power to continually deliver us. Don’t just listen to the Word of Truth and not respond to it, for that is the essence of self-deception. So always let His Word become like poetry written and fulfilled by your life!” James 1:21-22 TPT.

Yes, James did just say we can totally deceive ourselves! Not responding to what we read, or even not co-operating with the Holy Spirit in our lives, is self-deception. Lots of people agree that Jesus was a man Who came to earth, lived and died here. Most of them do not do anything further about it! Agreement is not enough! God is looking for changed hearts – not just mental assent. Our hearts will not be changed without us giving Him permission PLUS acting on what He tells us. Those two things go hand in hand. We need to swallow our pride … and be careful we don’t choke … and start again, this time with humility.

Here’s a litmus test for you. Would your spouse, family, or friends, say you have visibly changed in your attitudes and actions since you started following Jesus? I’m not just talking about church attendance either. I mean other people can see that God is knocking off the rough nasty bits and polishing your life like a gemologist polishes a fine stone. The point of salvation is a changed life. Not just somebody who knows how to look good, or sound good or parrot off the right words. Instead, like Paul of Tarsus, we aren’t the same old frightful person we were before we met Him!

We can all play nice when we are in company- smile, nod, and suck up our feelings when they are hurt, because we don’t want to embarrass ourselves. But who are we when the front door closes and somebody at our house annoys us? Yeah! I know. Trust me to ask that one! 😳 Transformation is a sign God is at work within. You don’t lick apples – you bite into them … what will someone else taste when they accidentally, or not – bite into you? We can all end up deceiving ourselves into thinking “I’m doing OK, I did such and such the other day, that makes me a good Christian.”

Skipping over God-given opportunities is a very risky business. I tell myself, “one more time!”  Almighty God does not like it when we abuse His Grace. It is better to admit, to the Lord, yourself and especially to others – that you have failed. Asking the person who is annoyed at you or the one who has hurt you, to pray for you is humbling – but powerful. Like I said, agreement is not participation. Participation comes when we bite the bullet and say ‘no’ to what we think and submit ourselves to one another. And yeah, it sucks! Dying to self does. 

In the Western world we are so indulged by comfort and ease we actually think we still have options. Ask the African lady who has been raped multiple times how hard it is for her to forgive those that trespassed against her. Or the Ukrainian man who has lost his entire family to a missile. Our choices in the West are not hard – they are simply cutting across our self-indulged ways. I know that we can suffer hardships too, but these things, when we face up to them, make us stronger in the Lord and the power of His might… if we let them and act on them. We need to stop protecting the old-self …sometimes even with scriptures and supposedly Godly attitudes. We must stop believing what we say qualifies us. What Christ DID qualifies us. And He died to change us.

Saying I am a horse does not make me a horse. Even if I go and live in a stable and eat hay and neigh all day. I could even learn to run faster … well, maybe not that …!!  😂 Saying I’m right, or I’m a Christian, or refusing to acknowledge that I need to be corrected, does not make my opinion of myself true. We have whole churches full of people who love to sing songs and prophesy and wave their arms about. They smile at everyone and the minute they get into their car to go home they are shouting at each other.  

Plus they cheat on their income tax. Hilariously I can almost hear someone grumbling at me: “now, that’s enough, my income tax is my business lady!” A humble heart takes correction with Grace, even if it is wrong. If you don’t believe me, then believe this: “I gave My back to the smiter and My cheeks to those who plucked out the hair. I hid not My face from shame and spitting,..” (Isaiah 50:6 KJV)… or this … “When He was reviled, He did not revile in return; when He suffered, He did not threaten; but He trusted to Him who judges justly.” (1 Peter 2:23 RSV) We are not aiming at a better, nicer ME – our aim is to be LIKE HIM. Agreement that what God says is true, is not participation. 👋🏻

P 2253 One step at a time.

/ DVH

Our God is overwhelmingly limitless … so we must never limit what He is able to do with one person who is prepared to live their life for Jesus’ sake!  I love the Old Testament, there are huge glimpses of Almighty God’s Personhood for those who take the time to look.

Take the book of Job – he was a happy man. Then God and satan had a word war over what was the source of Job’s happiness. Job lost everything he owned, plus his wife, kids and friends! Then God did an amazing thing – He showed Job the difference between man’s wisdom and HIS. Almighty God shifted Job’s reliance over to Himself, and He made Job’s faith even deeper by revealing Himself. One step at a time.

Moses was a murderer. He ran away from his destiny as Pharaoh’s adopted son. Instead he was living a happy, quiet life, looking after his father-in-law’s sheep … when God confronted him. Through Moses we see how God handles perceived problems, situations and people. We get insight into His Ways. Our God moved that man from shepherding sheep, to boldly confronting Pharaoh and demanding that he let his Israelite slaves go. Moses followed the Lord’s instructions … one step at a time.

Gideon was another ordinary man, living an ordinary little life. He was hiding grain from the multitude known as the Midianites. The conversations that Gideon had with an angel the Lord sent, show us the way Almighty God takes into account our character, our weaknesses. The Midianites stomped all over the Jewish people, they stole everything that wasn’t nailed down, but God used an ordinary fellow to defeat the very people who oppressed them. One step at a time – that’s how the Lord taught Gideon. 

Peter, Andrew, James, and John were simple fishermen. But their Heavenly Father had other plans. One day an itinerant Teacher turned up and told them to follow Him, so they did. They saw more in their lifetimes than they ever imagined they could. God gave them a commission they couldn’t turn down, and they followed it – one step at a time.

Stephen in Acts, was Greek. He waited on tables, looking after widows and orphans, then God made him a deacon. He taught others about Christ, by what he did and said. Then he was arrested, and ended up preaching the gospel, going from Moses to Jesus in front of all the religious leaders of that day. A brilliant sermon. They promptly hated every word he said – and even as he lay dying, surrounded by their rocks, he pointed to their Messiah. He did all this … one step at a time.

Paul was killing Christians when God knocked him to the ground and made him blind. Truth be told, that man was already blind, spiritually! And Almighty God just let his outsides match his insides for a few days. However Paul was irrevocably changed by that encounter. He went into God’s private bible school – the accelerated course – for three years, and then he trundled all over the known world. He also spent time in jail on and off, and he wrote letters that are still changing our world. One step at a time.

I could go on and on – Mary was simply a devoted peasant girl. She had ordinary plans for her life, and Almighty God interrupted them with His own plans to bring His Son into this world. Esther was the town pretty girl, and God had plans to make her a queen so she could save her nation. Ruth was a widow, and so was her mother-in-law – yet God made her one of Jesus direct fore-bearers. Ordinary people living ordinary lives until an extraordinary limitless God transformed them all into sign-posts, keys, and examples of what His Grace can do with an ordinary life – one step at a time.

My point today is this: … what does He want to do with your life?? We will never know our real purpose for being here in this world, outside of His plans. Our lives may be ordinary and hidden – but when we read the Old and the New Testament, these people who went before us, are a blazing flashing neon sign in the sky that our God can do anything …if we will just follow Him … one step at a time. When we follow Jesus we don’t arrive, we begin a journey … one step at a time.

Will you let Him use you? It is highly unlikely that most of us will have a book written about our God-given exploits – but I believe, in heaven, there are books and books and books. Why? Because the things we do down here, are the things of faith, and they point to Jesus, just as surely as Job, Moses, Gideon, Paul, Peter, Andrew, James, John, Stephen, Mary, Esther and Ruth’s faith steps did… one step at a time. 👋🏻 

P 2252 Trust is more than a word!

/ DVH

Genesis 15:6 “Abram believed the Lord, and He credited it to him as righteousness.” I think this is one of the most important verses in the Old Testament.  Paul says this about Abraham in Galatians 3:6-9 TPT:“Abraham, our father of faith, believed God, and the substance of his faith released God’s righteousness to him. So the true children of Abraham have the same faith as their father! And the Scripture prophesied that on the basis of faith God would declare Gentiles to be righteous. God announced the good news ahead of time to Abraham: ““Through your example of faith, all the nations will be blessed!” And so the blessing of Abraham’s faith is now our blessing too!”

Abraham’s example of faith and trust is an illustration of our new place of freedom in Christ. We accept that what Christ did for us, was complete. Being subject or powerless to avoid any kind of sin is living in slavery!  Christ set us free to choose to follow Him and the Holy Spirit leads us into a new way to live. Just like Abraham chose to follow God to a new land – we choose to follow Christ into our eternal destination – living in His kingdom right here, right now. We use our faith to live this life differently, as the Holy Spirit leads us.

Abraham’s decision to follow God’s instructions, implicitly, even to the point of sacrificing his only son, Isaac, shows us the focus of this man’s heart. He utterly trusted God. In conversation with Isaac about where they would find a lamb for the sacrifice – Abraham said this: “…“God Himself will provide the lamb for the burnt offering, my son.”And the two of them went on together.” That was a faith statement and it also pointed toward Christ, 4,000 years later! Jesus is our Lamb of provision – He is our way out of serving sin… His Spirit leads us into serving God.

We need to actively learn, day by day, to trust our God … and that means we will do some dying to self along the way! To live in Christ’s freedom means we leave our old life behind, and we use our faith to live the life that God has prepared for us. Sin is not our main focus – what He wants for our lives is. We know that God Himself has provided the sacrifice for our sin, just like He did, on Mount Moriah, with Abraham and Isaac. So we press on, following in the footsteps of Christ, denying ourselves the things we want, in favour of the things HE wants. We’ve decided, once and for all, that what He said He did, He did. It’s finished. It’s done. 

Now it is our responsibility to live our lives, every single day, for love’s sake. Because of our devotion and allegiance to Jesus we accept that the things that happen to us, around us, and in us, are opportunities for change. That change consists of finding out what Jesus wants us to do in any kind of situation, for His kingdom to come. That’s the way we live now – we choose Him. He chose us, and now we choose Him right back. 

Sometimes that may mean that our days pass uneventfully, but those are the days that we need to stay focussed. Because we’ve learnt, that when we least expect it, we are going to need our faith … in the heat of sudden battle. We’ve learnt that our faith is developed by the everyday choices we make. It is strengthened every time we use it. Our faith will be tested, just like it was for Abraham! And he is called the father of our faith – he did it first. This is why we need to practice letting go of what we want, and learn to trust God instead. True freedom comes when we live in that trust because we are not driven about by our own sinful desires.

However, there is no real working faith if we simply let life happen to us. Instead we need to purpose in our hearts to rely upon God’s Grace to only do those things we need to do – and some of those things will involve sacrifices. That is part of our new life, our commitment to Christ. We cannot serve our God part-time or half-heartedly. We will end up disappointed and we will miss out on the freedom Christ died to give us. As Christians we need to pay attention to developing our trust in His ways. 👋🏻

Titus 2:11-12,14.“God’s marvellous grace has manifested in person, bringing salvation for everyone. This same grace teaches us how to live each day as we turn our backs on ungodliness and indulgent lifestyles, and it equips us to live self-controlled, upright, godly lives in this present age.”…  … “He sacrificed Himself for us that He might purchase our freedom from every lawless deed and to purify for Himself a people who are His very own, passionate to do what is beautiful in His eyes.”

P 2246 The Lord gives great advice.

/ DVH

When everything goes wrong – stop! And give yourself some breathing space. Seriously. Unless somebody is drowning or bleeding to death, it is good to just take a chill pill and send up a help help prayer. He knows everything, so He is our greatest asset!

I asked the Lord recently when I was very sick, what can I do about this illness? Now what I actually meant was – ‘What can I do about this interruption to my life… so I can keep on doing what I always do?’ The Lord said this to me: “You are not respecting your body. When it says stop, LISTEN. I got tired and sat down – read the book! You need to take a step back and let yourself recover, before you charge on pushing yourself to do something you can’t do without hurting yourself.”

That sounded like really good advice to me. It is not that I am crazy about work or whatever, because my life hasn’t allowed me to do much of anything, anymore. To be honest with you, I think what really happens is that I’m hoping that if I distract myself enough, I will feel better faster. That’s when I saw that I was actually relying on distraction as the answer, instead of Jesus.  After that ghastly thought, I repented, and then I asked the Holy Spirit what He thinks the answer is, instead. 

“My strength is made perfect in your weaknesses…” He said. “Which do you want more? A solution or My perfection?” I was speechless. 😳 Then I went and looked up the scripture, and lo and behold, it says…“My grace is sufficient for you, for …” – are you ready for this(?)  –  “… My power is made perfect in weakness.” His Grace is all I will ever need, so why try harder, when what I need, at the very beginning of anything I do, is His Grace? Look, I know this scripture. OK? I know it because I need His strength a lot!! But I had not seen it in this light before. By keeping on going when I really should lie down and rest, I was interfering with receiving His perfect strength.

If we want a perfect solution then we need His Grace. It’s funny how we can read the scripture and understand what it says – and sometimes even lean on what we think it is saying … and still miss the point. What the Holy Spirit was actually asking me, is this: “what will you SETTLE FOR?” I realised that I was settling for the lesser blessing. I took that verse to mean that when my strength ran out, I could ask Him and then He would take over.

I had a daring thought! What if I just started OUT by telling Him I’m weak and then give everything over to Him? Instead of bursting my boiler trying until I couldn’t try anymore … What if I gave up… right away? Why not start everything I do with Him? Right at the beginning! By that time I really did need to sit down and rest and reflect for a while. New thoughts do that to me. 

Then I told the Lord immediately, that I really can’t do anything, anymore! I mean why give God the big things when the little things are the stuff that steal your peace? My list of stuff I really can’t do, is endless. And just in case you are thinking to yourself that you are able-bodied and you can do practically everything by yourself … think again. Do you want to be “strong in the Lord and the power of HIS might?” Or do it yourself and get exhausted and frustrated. Do you only give up when it gets too hard, and then ask Him to take over? Why not ask for His help all the time. Trying is exhausting, and we all need the Holy Spirit like AIR.

Here’s the really big thought He left me with. I still haven’t got my spirit around this one yet! Jesus knows how to suffer, He did it perfectly, for us. Now I’m really bad at it. I just try to ‘suck it up buttercup’, for His sake, as a good witness. I wonder what would happen if I exchange my weakness for His Grace and strength in that suffering? The Holy Spirit’s advice was so timely, today. I saw that I need His help because He can help me do all things! Maybe I’ve been reading this stuff upside down and He just turned it right-side up. I’ll let you know about that. 🤗

P 2238 Grace is our teacher.

/ DVH

“For the grace of God has appeared that offers salvation to all people. It teaches us to say “No” to ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives in this present age,” Titus 2:11-12 NIV.

Grace is more than an established spiritual fact. It is our teacher. To walk in His Grace we need to know what it looks like. The best way I can explain what I mean is to say this – that person who drives us utterly crazy is the very best person to reveal our heart to us. They do what we often cannot do, because we hide who we are even from ourselves. His Grace takes us deeper. God’s Grace is like a jet engine that kicks in and launches us into a whole new sphere of travel. Grace empowers us, it comes in and it goes out. We can’t produce it, and we need Him and His help to live in it. Because of Jesus, we don’t have to be all that – He’s all that. He did everything He did for us … and for that annoying person/s too!

Grace is an attribute of God that teaches us about His very nature, Who He is and How deeply He loves. It also teaches us forgiveness, because none of us can truly forgive without knowing His Grace. The way to get GRACE is a great big reality rush. First of all we have to recognise and settle in our hearts that we are not perfect and now matter how much we try we ain’t ever gunna get there by ourselves! It is way beyond our capabilities, but He gives us His Grace freely. Jesus died to take the shame of our very real daily guilt away. And His Grace dives headfirst right down into the centre of our very being and shouts in the darkest places – “God loves YOU just as you are, and He loves you way too much to leave you there!” His Grace powers the engine of unconditional love.

His Grace focusses on His love for us, not our faults. Even our best efforts at godliness, forgiveness and kindness fall short of the way Christ Himself was. I exhort us all to read the bible looking for the Lord’s attitudes towards the people mentioned in it. God was not stingy in His actions toward our sinful plight …His Grace doesn’t have a ceiling. Read Ephesians 3:14-21. Our heavenly Father was generous beyond our need or comprehension. Grace is so solid, so permanent, so all encompassing that we can actually live in it. It is not just a ps on the bottom of our prayers, with us hoping like mad that we can somehow impress God with our repentance. 

Grace is Father God’s state of mind toward mankind, it is an outward expression of His great Goodness. His Grace rushes toward us like the mighty river Niagara rushes over those incredible falls. Grace does not hesitate! It thunders, it leaps and cascades over us. His Grace will not let any barrier come between us and our Maker. It utterly covers and saturates us. Always. Forever… I exhort you to put your ‘buts’  and “”ifs” down, because thinking about your failures will not allow anyone to jump in and soak in all that He has given us. 

I’m going to quote somebody I listened to this morning because they said it so well: “It isn’t just death to self, that’s the beginning. It is living in the resurrected new life He died to give us.” (Shay Arthur.) That’s GRACE at work. What we lay down and die to must be transformed by His Grace into a new way to live. We can now live in place of permanent ongoing forgiveness because God’s Grace released through Christ’s willing sacrifice, is simply THAT BIG. 

The Holy Spirit inhabits all the words in the bible. People split hairs over this meaning and that deep thought, but the bible goes beyond our comprehension and enjoyment – it feeds our very spirits. Something happens when we read His book. Grace for understanding is released. That Grace speaks to a part of us that the Lord made alive, and it broadcasts life in us, and from us. When we read we are looking for Him. His ways, His attitudes, His actions. We will fall in love with what we find. The bible is a book about our gracious, loving, beyond-our-comprehension Father, God. Don’t read it to know stuff – read it to find Him. 

We human beings don’t have this kind of Grace in us. Realising that is the first step toward being taught by Grace itself. It is when we understand – without any threat or fear of punishment – that we don’t have this kind of passionate love and acceptance in ourselves … then joy rises up. Grace is our teacher and our lesson. And knowing we can’t forgive and let things go, puts us firmly into the school of Grace… Choosing to stay in that school will transform each one of us utterly. Have an ace day, you are so loved by Him. 💖 👋🏻