gratification

P 3249 He says we can.

/ DVH

Hey, you can argue with the King all you want, but … He’s gunna win… in the end! Living in and for the kingdom of God is like an investment. What we decide to do today, influences tomorrow. Unfortunately, bad decisions can often lead to worse ones. We are constantly faced with choices — will we invest in His Ways, His kingdom, or in our own needs and wishes? One of those things provides instant gratification, and the other builds trust in God’s Word. Plus it proves its reliability peace and joy in our personal experiences. Daily we are faced with choices, some of them easy and others are puzzling, that’s why we need our Helper, the Holy Spirit. 

My point for today is this — nobody feels equipped to do and say what the Lord asks us to do and say all the time. And if someone tells you something different wait for it… just like Pinocchio their nose will grow!  So let’s add  to that the idea that we all have stuff at the back of our spiritual closets, that we hope nobody else knows about! We can easily pile all the good stuff up in front, and hope that it’s all that is seen. But the point is –the Holy Spirit knows and sees, and He can clearly see what will make us stumble. That’s why He allows difficulties into our lives — under pressure who we really are comes OUT and e-ve-ry-bod-y can see it. Here’s what I’ve learnt along the way… the stuff you hide, from others and yourself, ends up leaking out, anyway!!

So that’s why I like to keep things simple and deal with nasty things as they happen. BTW, SIN is not a personality trait!  I’ve mentioned before – that I can’t remember details easily anymore – like what I wrote yesterday!! Sorry ‘bout that!  Sadly if I panic about it, it gets a whole lot worse! Hasn’t the Lord got the most hilarious, funny and amazing sense of humour to pick an old lady to write a blog – and she can’t remember what she said ten minutes ago! That’s why I need my editor.

Here’s the thing that helps keep me humble. My short-term memory has been affected by minor explosions in my brain. All of this happened without my permission, more’s the pity! All the positive speak didn’t fix it, so I just roll with the punches. However…my spouse remembers the stuff I wrote, because’s he’s the editor. Well, I can sometimes end up cranky at him because I am sure that “I never said that!”  And he is sure I did, and off we go… … to places we’d both better avoid. Getting older is really good for humbling yourself because you need help with almost everything…which is why I recommend that we learn to humble ourselves before we get there. Too late for me – sadly, I’m learning on the job! 

Here’s a helpful hint when it comes to living with other people. I love this particular scripture in 1st Corinthians 6:7. It says this: “These court cases are a black eye on your community. Wouldn’t it be far better to just take it, to let yourselves be wronged and forget it? All you’re doing is providing fuel for more wrong, more injustice, bringing more hurt to the people of your own spiritual family.” What is Paul saying? I think you can end up in even more trouble and strife, when you try to defend yourself, and you set out to prove it. Legally or not! It is far better to take a big breath, and just let things go. Boy, do you find out how much PRIDE … yeah, that’s it, the ‘P” word… when you try to let things go that have really irritated and irked you! That’s when logic tries to take over … and logic makes a terrible commander-in-chief.

The reason Jesus is a great leader is that He beat our enemy once and for all, and then He died for us to set us free from compulsively serving satan. We don’t have to do, or react, or entertain those nasty things anymore. Investing in God’s kingdom is like putting things on lay-by, the gratification usually comes later.  We  continue to invest in Him by our actions. We remind ourselves that in His kingdom there are ongoing costs – things we will have to let go of – but we walk with the King. Nuthin’ beats that! Here’s the bad bit, investing in this world’s kingdom is like putting stuff on your maxed-out credit card when you just got fired! There’s no way you are going to pay that debt off in a hurry!

The kindness of God is that He will never make us choose His Ways, that choice is always ours. Here’s another verse I love, it is a hard one. 1st Corinthians 12:31b says: “And yet I will show you a still more excellent way [one of the choicest graces and the highest of them all: unselfish love].”  We can find many ways to serve God and others, but Paul tells us this is the BEST way. This isn’t hard to remember! Big plus for me – absentminded Annie! I simply ask myself: “Is this love?”  If I am in doubt about what love would do, I refer to His book, and I ask Him to help me find an appropriate scripture. 

Don’t despair if you lose your way, or maybe your will seems like it is acting independently! This can happen when we stop regularly meditating on His love for us. Remind yourself that nothing can separate from His Love and go back to what you were doing in the first place. Putting Him first. The joy of belonging to Jesus is that our debt has already been paid, and with Him we are safe and saved. We have His power in us to overcome our own selfish ways, and we can let other people’s selfishness go, plus we look in our own back yard to see if we are growing the right fruit! Love is always the right fruit. 

Our first and most important ministry is to love others the way He loved us. We may not feel like we can, but because HE says we can, we can. We simply need to choose to believe His Word, over whatever we think we know about ourselves. PS When I read stuff like the Beatitudes I ask the Lord to show me what He thinks, I don’t excuse myself. Bye. 🥰

P 3220 Let’s watch what we do with our keys.

/ DVH

“Now may the Lord Jesus Christ and our Father God, Who loved us and in His wonderful grace gave us eternal comfort and a beautiful hope that cannot fail, encourage your hearts and inspire you with strength to always do and speak what is good and beautiful in His eyes.” 2 Thessalonians 2:16-17.

Watching what we say is an incredibly important key to walking with the Holy Spirit and living in the kingdom of God. I’m not talking about being fake, or using flattery, or saying stuff that is not true – that stuff feels hollow. I’m talking about coming into agreement with the Lord and how He sees things. Now there’s a good thing to do just because He said to do it. However He didn’t say we would always enjoy it. I find the fun comes after the faith step!  

Doing what it says, even if we do it badly. and not always with the best of attitudes, certainly alleviates this problem. Jesus is not legalistic and He knows we are trying to obey our Heavenly Father. We are so blessed, we can ask the Holy Spirit to help us. Watching our words is a ‘key’ part of walking with the Holy Spirit. I’ve said dumb stuff and afterwards I sat about thinking – “Did I really just say that?” Instead of joining into a conversation that downgrades, or bad mouths someone else, it’s best to say nothing, inwardly pray and head for the exit! 

The thing that grabs us and traps us into opening our mouths, is that what is said is often true in some way or another. None of us are perfect, so somebody can often find something or other to criticise someone else about. Our negative comments will not help! At the same we don’t have any idea how this gossiped-about person arrived wherever it is they landed. 

We have been given, at great Personal cost by the GIVER, the power of agreement. Jesus gave that to us. So when we agree that so and so is a pain in the neck — we are thoughtlessly adding our powerful agreement to a bad thing. And then we wander about wondering why that person never changes! It’s because we aren’t helping with our opinions. So here’s something to chew over: “If you forgive anyone’s sins, their sins are forgiven; if you do not forgive them, they are not forgiven.” John 20:23. That’s an enormous responsibility!

We can be so consumed by the momentary gratification of flapping our gums, we forget we are doing untold damage to someone else. The enemy lies to us that we will feel better if we talk about this slight or that incident. Sadly, we can easily forget about what that person may have done for us in the past — what was good, what was right what was profitable. We must get rid of the idea that our opinions are more important than someone else’s reputation and spiritual welfare.

What we say needs to build other people up — and in the heat of awkward moments, we desperately need to say things that are true, right and profitable, or … … say nothing. However, when we actively dislike someone, or we are mad at them – those precious positive things can be hard to locate. I ask Him to please help me and spend time with Him working on forgiveness, because that’s the only way through it..

This world we currently live in has a me-centred focus, so we can easily have a consumer mentality … which means that other people are like chess pieces, we move them around a board in our minds to help us to win.  I can’t find that in His book! Winning that way means everybody loses. We immediately begin to negate our gifts in the body, and eliminate or minimise someone else’s ...all at the same time. 

Guilt, blame, and shame render everyone powerless!  If we want to see change, then we need to approach difficult situations or people, His Way. At the same time I think we need to pray far more for our leaders, they meet most of our bad attitudes head on. In moments of temptation I am learning to lean hard on forgiveness and to rebuke spite in me. In the past if someone had a problem with gossiping etc. they were either ostracised, or everyone simply joined in. Neither of those things will help us follow Him. 

When I say something stupid, it can be so much easier to try to justify what I just said, than it is to own my mistake and apologise. But that is the only true way to deal with the problem. James 3:10 says:“Out of the same mouth come both blessing and cursing. These things, my brothers, should not be this way [for we have a moral obligation to speak in a manner that reflects our fear of God and profound respect for His precepts].” 

This is the major reason why we should avoid gossip, or even continually chewing over someone else’s faults! We may dislike that person who is being slowly dissected in front of us, but that is not the real point. We need to remain silent because we love and respect the Lord more than our own opinion. When we disrespect others, we are disrespecting Him. I don’t want to make a law out of this, however, I am simply stating a truth.  When our God says don’t do it – don’t do it!

Jesus has given us the joy of speaking life to other people and that privilege is powerful. “I will give you the keys of heaven’s kingdom realm to forbid on earth that which is forbidden in heaven, and to release on earth that which is released in heaven.”” Matthew 16:19. We can easily lose or misplace our God-given keys, and this is why we need to watch what we do with them! Bye. ✋

P 3003 False expectations.

/ DVH

I unintentionally, and without any prior warning, walked into a wall of nasty attitudes in someone else yesterday. They were angry with me for no other reason than they could not have their own way. This is someone I care about, and sadly I’ve had many bad experiences with them before, but I thought that kind of trouble between us was gone… It’s just goes to show we cannot afford to let our guard down –  we need each other. My own discernment was severely lacking! Hubby was far more discerning than I was – he emphasised caution.

So what do you do in those moments, when you feel utterly betrayed by someone you think you can trust? I start with the realisation that I can’t deal with anything else but my emotions in that moment, because they’re all over the place like jam on a baby’s face. After that I need to go straight into my will and reinforce my decision to live my life His way. This step is important, otherwise I can get tangled up in what I want, and leave what He wants behind me! 

The next thing that happens is I pray and choose to forgive myself — despite my awareness of many multiple feelings of ineptitude and lack of wisdom — I know that I need saving from my own reactions like everyone else does! So I deliberately put blame, guilt, recrimination and shame down — and at the same time I pray and ask for the Lord’s healing, help, forgiveness and guidance.

Then I deliberately forgive the other person as an act of my will. It is so much easier to forgive someone else when you’ve just dealt with the log in your own eye first. Just saying is all … At the bottom of our instant pain, are often even more memories of previous pain – and that definitely needs sorting out, but first things first.  Any sort of betrayal is painful, and Jesus Himself knows personally all about that.

Judas betrayed Him for 30 pieces of silver, and Peter ran away under pressure. When someone we care about suddenly reverts to previous behaviour, it can be easy to be taken by surprise and feel like we’ve been ambushed. But we can’t afford to sit there, we must choose to move past our feelings into a place where we can pray full of His Love for that other person. Jesus prayed for Peter, remember? He prayed for Peter’s faith to not fail. 

Loving people who are often erratic in their way of speaking and living, means we need to pray before we spend time with them. I actually remembered to pray this time, but because I thought things had changed for the better, I relaxed. I forgot that scripture in 1 Corinthians 16, verses 13&14. “Be on your guard; stand firm in the faith; be courageous; be strong. Do everything in love.” I was distracted and forgot to stay on my guard. I wanted something from this person, that they can’t give me, and I let my emotional need blind me to where they are actually coming from. Jesus Himself, does not meet their needs… yet. 

At the same time I forgot to ‘stand firm in the faith.’ The bible says:’My God shall supply ALL MY NEEDS according to His riches in glory.’ Philippians 4:19. Part of our surrender to Christ entails our willingness to lift our expectations off other people, and put them firmly with Him. That takes practice! It appears I missed out on a practice session this time, but I’ve put the Lord and my hubby on alert to remind me! Otherwise I could easily fall down the same hole again. Instead of “being courageous” under fire, I crumbled like a stale biscuit. So I repented of that too and asked the Holy Spirit to help me to go back into “doing everything in love.”  

Sometimes, in personal relationships our expectations of other people are so great, the other person will probably fail in meeting them.That’s life. We must realise that we cannot meet each other’s needs – our job is to point people to the One Who can do all things.  Sometimes when I think that Hollywood has totally messed with our brains and we see someone else and think they will totally understand me. In a pig’s eye! That’s narcissistic. I don’t care who it is, people aren’t here to serve our needs, we are here to serve Him..

We can easily be blinded by our own need for immediate love and gratification. I think this is why many marriages fail. The couples have false expectations. Only Jesus can meet all our needs. There is no point in expecting human beings to meet them, simply because we like instant answers. In case you haven’t noticed …Jesus doesn’t often DO things immediately! My advice is to remind yourself that God always has a better, bigger plan. Bless you! 👋

P 2674 Yeast.

/ DVH

“Then He (Jesus) taught them another parable: “Heaven’s kingdom can be compared to yeast that a woman takes and blends into three measures of flour and then waits until all the dough rises.””Matthew 13:33 TPT.

“Later, as Jesus and His disciples crossed over to the other side of Lake Galilee, the disciples realised they had forgotten to bring any loaves of bread. Jesus spoke up and said, “Watch out for the yeast of the Pharisees and the Sadducees.” Thinking Jesus was scolding them over not bringing bread, they began to discuss it among themselves. 

Knowing their thoughts, Jesus said to them, “You have such little faith! Why are you arguing with one another about having no bread? Are you so slow to understand? Have you forgotten the miracle of feeding the five thousand families and how each of you ended up with a basket full of fragments? And how seven loaves of bread fed four thousand families with baskets left over? Don’t you understand? I’m not talking about bread, but I’m warning you to avoid the yeast of the Pharisees and the Sadducees.” Then finally they realized He wasn’t talking about yeast found in bread, but the error of the teachings of the Pharisees and the Sadducees.” Matthew 16:5-12 TPT.

Years and years ago, when I was in my late twenties, I decided to make my own bread. In those days bread making was not popular, nor was it an easy task! No bread making machines back then …the baker was the bread making machine!!  Like most mothers of three young kids, I was looking to save money anyway I could, and so I had the brilliant idea that if I made my own bread it would be healthier and save money – all at the same time. Win, win!

Boy was that a growing edge! Back then dried yeast was not what it has since become … it had only just arrived on the market. So I spent a whole lot of time writing back and forth to the manufacturers and distributors, explaining my struggle with their recipes, because their product was not all that good or even greatly effective. 

Bread making occupied an extremely tiny niche back then, but I am convinced my perseverance in complaining about that yeast product, made all the difference … eventually! Thank the Lord. My poor kids daily ate all sorts of not wonderful bread – which they privately called “lead bread.” (The little darlings!) And they longed to return to the days of eating unhealthy white bread like everyone else! After a day of struggling to make said bread — one of my kids – I forget which one … it might even have been my ex … remarked that yesterday’s bread would have made a particularly great door-stop! I was not enchanted. 

Bread making involved a whole of of kneading and proving and it took absolutely ages. Eventually, I got better at making it … OR …maybe the manufacturer finally improved the product!! But I know how hard I worked to give that manufacturer feedback! I ground up Vitamin C to improve the rising, plus I purchased bread improvers and generally worked like a navvy … all to save a few pennies. Eventually I even graduated to making fancy bread like croissants and bagels. Meanwhile my mind was consumed with bread making for years. Over time I decided fresh yeast was best … it worked a treat.

After reading these two scriptures the other day, I must confess that I totally understand why the disciples were side-tracked when Jesus began to talk about yeast. It’s easy to get side-tracked when you know a lot about the subject, especially if it is food! Food is so ordinary – you don’t expect spiritual illustrations about it. If I had been there when the Lord was talking about the yeast of the Pharisees and Sadducees I would definitely have been a dumb bunny like they were, thinking totally irrelevant material thoughts about that subject, as well as utterly missing His point!

Human beings often look for immediate results, and gratification … but Jesus Christ spent His entire life glorifying God. He had spent His time on earth allowing the ‘good yeast of God’s Word’ to infiltrate every corner of His Being. I think this is the essence of our faith, so I was motivated enough to ask myself: “Are my prayers about my own comfort – something immediate, like food!  Or am I looking to see what God will do for His kingdom with what is actually going on?” Unless the yeast of His word transforms me, I have nothing to offer others. Reflectively, I wonder  if the “yeast” In our daily lives could be the digested Word of God? As we add it into our days, it will permeate every single bit of our lives, causing us to become palatable to others.

Then it hit me — Jesus always saw God in ordinary things, those things we confront day by day. We need to see Him that way too! We must allow the yeast of His Word to rise within us so that other people can “taste and see that the Lord is good.” Bye for now, 🍞😊.

P 2349 Faith is to be generational..

/ DVH

“If your faith remains strong, even while surrounded by life’s difficulties, you will continue to experience the untold blessings of God! True happiness comes as you pass the test with faith, and receive the victorious crown of life promised to every lover of God!”

James 1:12 TPT.

Today, sadly, our society has become people of the immediate. We are addicted to instant answers, instant gratification, instant provision and instant success. When things don’t happen immediately it seems as if we are in danger of losing our faith. The bible doesn’t talk about stuff like that …it talks about eternity, eternal consequences.

Our list of priorities are askew because God isn’t first or last or even in the middle of our list. HE OFTEN ISN’T ON THAT LIST AT ALL. The truth is we all get the same amount of time in a day – it’s the one thing we have in common. And no matter how young or old we are, we will all run out of time eventually! We’ve forgotten that TIME is a gift, to be cherished and used wisely.

But those pesky day to day things press in on us, so we can easily get caught up in the immediate. So this kid has to go to football practice, and that one is off to gymnastics, and the other one is off doing heaven knows what with their mates. We, however, are breaking our necks to the point of exhaustion, because we also have to make sure we work, so we can pay the mortgage or the rent, plus the fees for the football and gymnastics, as well as provide the little darlings with the right clothes to go schlepping about with their mates! 

I think that we have passively taught our kids how to keep themselves busy and distracted, so successfully, it has become hard to get their attention for something really important. Like God’s will, and what He wants.  Instead they have been hardwired into indifference about other people’s pain, by their exposure to various types of media. 

Some times I want to ask people – what the heck did you want to have children for? … The experience?? If you did that then boy did you get gypped!! As I see it, our children are the seeds we sow into a future we may not see. Let’s hope we produce a crop of decent human beings that care about more than the ozone layer! Part of raising kids is to teach them how to manage their own thoughts, attitudes and emotions, while they are wading through this life’s share of difficulties. Instead our generation has chosen to protect them from reality. We’ve taught them that owning your own home and having a great holiday is all there is.

Sadly, most young people today probably won’t see their parents go to homeless shelters, to distribute food and clothing. We’ve protected them from the sad and difficult realities of this life. They don’t see us fast and pray either, or press into God to see what He wants us to do. They may see us plant trees, so we can all continue to breathe, or take stuff to the recycling depot – but have we taught them how to cope with this life’s everyday hardships? Have they seen us turn to God first? Do they watch us pray over things?

You can teach your family about faith and how it works, or you can SHOW THEM how your faith works, in front of their own eyes, when you help and care for others who are struggling. Today, real active, fruitful faith seems to come into the same category as sex – we’ve abrogated our own responsibility and left the work to someone else or handed them a book! Why should children’s church have the sole responsibility to teach your kids to give? We’ve learnt to ‘outsource’ everything – including learning about God. Does your family see you with a bible or facsimile in your hand? When is the last time you prayed with, or for your kid when they hit some snag or other at school?

Future generations must learn that troubles and hardship are normal in this imperfect world of ours. This life is always going to be difficult – it is full of people who all want to do their own thing – but because we all inhabit the same planet,  we are all doing our own thing in a limited space. Kids need to learn about faith more than they need to know how to get tickets to some pop concert or have a well-known brand of sneakers! We must remember that our character reflects our faith levels.

Life is not only difficult, people can be downright impossible, but they can also be instrumental in challenging and growing our faith – and all our kids need faith that is real.. “Your faith will be like gold that has been tested in a fire. And these trials will prove that your faith is worth much more than gold that can be destroyed.” 1 Peter 1:7. What we believe must be shared with the generations that are coming after us – it looks to me like they are going to need it! 👋🏻