Gratitude

P 2799 Father God gives to us.

/ DVH

“Give, and it will be given to you. …” Luke 6:38 AMP. I don’t think I have ever felt led to do a ‘follow up’ to something I have written before — but today I strongly felt to continue yesterday’s exhortation, because I believe there are two sides to the coin of giving. We give, and the Lord responds to us, by blessing us, personally, or through other people. However, we need to take note that He does not always respond, in kind.

It is a tremendous blessing in the first place to give, but we also need to understand that His blessings may not come back to us in the form of money etc. That’s the receiving bit of this equation. If we happen to need money, then it is natural to assume God will bless us where we have a need… But I have not found that is always true in every circumstance. Let me explain, using the three women from yesterday’s blog. 

Hannah gave up her first-born son and that child was a gift from God to her. Children are a stated heritage from the Lord, and Hannah had 5 more children after Samuel. This restored her stature within her community! God totally transformed her circumstances. That little widow woman with the two coins did something so spectacular that Jesus used her as an object lesson to His disciples, and it is recorded in the bible, but she knew nothing about it. But we know that God has a soft spot for women who are alone. Now, her giving is an example for all of us, two thousand years later.

The lady who broke her alabaster box for Jesus, received forgiveness for her sins, and Jesus commended her even further by telling His disciples that what she did was going to be remembered and recounted generations past their life-times! Mark 26:7-13. “Truly I tell you, wherever this gospel is preached throughout the world, what she has done will also be told, in memory of her.”This woman’s act was so spectacular to the Lord, He memorialised it!

Sometimes when God blesses us in return, we can utterly miss what He does because we are looking for something that we think we need. The bible says: “…give and it shall be given to you …” Here’s a thought …. maybe we need favour more than money! The Lord can sometimes give us favour with other people, and unless we have spiritual eyes we will miss His response and we won’t thank and praise Him for it. The Israelites were given so much favour when they left Egypt they literally looted the place — with the Egyptians’ freely-given permission!

Today I want to highlight, yet again, that God’s ways are not our ways. Our loving Father loves to bless His kids because He’s a good good Father! If we stretch our faith to see beyond our immediately perceived needs, and remain aware of what He is doing, it can help us to ascertain what shape His blessings are taking this time.This means we cultivate eyes to see whatever blessings come our way, as coming from HIM.

Hubby and I have occasionally experienced upgrades to something far more expensive than we can afford. I truly believe when that happens, that the Lord is blessing us – with His blessings pressed down and running over. It all depends on how you look at things. People have given us stuff over the years – things we never asked for or even knew we needed, but those things turned out to be an unforeseen blessing when we regarded them from a different POV. Like I said yesterday, the river of His blessings flows through our lives … it is a river not a dam! If we hold on too tightly to things, we will end up closing our spiritual eyes to what He is doing – NOW.

There have been times when hubby and I were given an undeserved discount on a large, unexpected bill. That’s favour. Everything depends on the way we look at this life. Other people have come and helped us when we were both unwell. That’s favour. Our dear neighbour next door has mowed our front verge, which is huge BTW, for years! Favour!  The bible tells us that the Lord Jesus Himself enjoyed favour:  “And Jesus increased in wisdom and stature, and in favour with God and man.” Luke 2:52. The Pharisees etc. didn’t have spiritual eyes so they could not see the favour of God on Him. Mary, Jesus mother was called highly favoured by the Angel Gabriel.

Psalm 41:1-3 talks about blessings that are not monetary: “The favour of God keeps my enemies from defeating me.” But unless we are vigilant and living aware of His goodness, we may not see how God Himself is blessing us by keeping our enemies at bay. Living a life filled with gratitude for all He has done, and is still doing in our lives — will lead us into walking, day by day with His Spirit. As we live with internal peace, when the rest of the world around us is in chaos, then that peace is His gift to us. He is blessing us. If we have less money than we did before, but we are still managing … we are blessed.

I will finish with this thought, the more you SEE His blessings, the more your life will be enriched, despite your circumstances.  Ask for eyes to see Him at work, because Father God is always giving to us! Bye. 👋

P 2780 Sin has no power over us.

/ DVH

We need to change the way we look at sin. Sin is not just what we do, or don’t do – it is giving into how we feel. Our feelings will lie to us. The reality is in the bible! Jesus Christ conquered sin – He killed it and its consequences, stone dead. Did you get that? Our inheritance here and now, is life, life and more life!  Of course none of us deserves that. We never will, obedience and gratitude are the only response. Meanwhile we can’t possibly live this life, here and now, without His guidance and help, and Father God thought of that too – we have the same Holy Spirit Jesus had to help us. The good news is – Jesus became a man and He knows the way through the mire around us.

Instead of looking at our difficulties as mountains to climb, lift your view higher – look at the One Who did everything for us. Can you trust Jesus? Is He a Man of His Word? He has climbed all the mountains we will ever face, before we were born. We simply need to walk with Him day by day, and keep our eyes on Him. Then we follow Him up the mountain of our own fear, doubt and unbelief conquering it …step by step. As we walk with Him, we learn to rely upon Him. Sadly, our unrealistic fear of failure can keep us from doing anything lasting in this life.

Ask yourself, if everything depends on our performance, in order qualify to for such a love, then WHY would Jesus have to die? Why would our Loving Heavenly Father put His ONLY Son through all that! The work for our total restoration has already been done. We must simply learn to fight, day by day, all the things that our flesh has learnt to value above Him! Then we can hear and see Him at work, in our lives, and in the lives of others.

We need to stop wasting our energy, thinking that being a Christian means we have to get everything right, all the time … and put on a good show. Now, today, we have a wonderful Helper Who has come to help us and prepare us for our wedding. Jesus Christ came to each one of us to woo and court us — now we are engaged, promised to Him. We are a part of His Bride. Christ loves His Bride – she’s everything He ever wanted, and more. He loves her so much He wants to be with her, every single minute of every single day.

Has the Holy Spirit ever nudged you and said: “Don’t watch that TV program or play that video game?” And then maybe, you rationalised what He said away and watched it anyway. Afterward you felt terrible! However, the answer is dead simple. Don’t do it! Obedience in these little things is like training your body in the natural – that spiritual exercise helps our spiritual fitness. Look, if you obey and it wasn’t the Lord, what have you lost? A dumb TV show or video game? H-e-l-l-o!!  Isn’t His life within you worth more than entertainment?

Like I said yesterday, we don’t need to have faith in our faith, our faith is IN HIM. Who Jesus is! Is He Who He says He is, or not? Is He kind, loving, generous, faithful, gracious, forgiving? … Does Christ love us so much He died to be with us forever ….or not? Tell me something He can’t do!  Even being dead didn’t stop Jesus. How can we go on, day after day, turning a blind eye to personal sin, when sin is like a blindfold. The result is we can’t see or hear Him clearly anymore. In the bible what pleases God is obedience. Read the book! The Israelites failed to obey Him. So- let’s learn something from that … sh-all we?

The Lord has promised to be with us. We can eliminate ourselves from the flow of the Holy Spirit’s river in our lives, when we dance around, pouting like a child refusing to surrender its favourite toy. Love watches over us and His love is our prize.  It’s His choice to be with us. Jesus longs to see His Father, and our Father, glorified in all our lives! So, let’s stop getting on with our lives day after day, dumb as rocks – with our hands over our eyes. Distraction wastes a precious thing we have to give Him – our time! So does living this life believing we can’t help it. That’s why we have the book, to diagnose sin, and we have the Helper to guide us around it.

Christ’s death took all the power sin had and killed it. DEAD. We do not have to sin anymore. We can look that rubbish in the face and choose to deny ourselves, pick up our cross and follow Him. When people are in love …the relationship comes first.  Don’t let this temporary life with its temporary pleasures blind you to what He has for you. Sin has no power over us anymore. Bye. 💕

Romans 6: 6-11.“We know that our old sinful selves were crucified with Christ so that sin might lose its power in our lives. We are no longer slaves to sin. For when we died with Christ we were set free from the power of sin. And since we died with Christ, we know we will also live with Him. We are sure of this because Christ was raised from the dead, and He will never die again. Death no longer has any power over Him. When He died, He died once to break the power of sin. But now that He lives, He lives for the glory of God. So you also should consider yourselves to be dead to the power of sin and alive to God through Christ Jesus.”Amen.

P 2741 Some suggestions.

/ DVH

Just to round out what I wrote yesterday, I wanted to talk about what we can actually take with us into the secret place —-NOTHING! We cannot take anything with us into this place. Our troubles, cares, woes, our sins, other people’s sins against us, all those things need to be dealt with as they occur, or as the word of God convicts us. Glory to God we have the blood of Jesus, and the Holy Spirit’s help with our repentance, and reparation. He will uncover our selfish, sinful ways! I have written some suggestions today to help anyone who needs some guidelines for walking with Him in their daily life. That is all they are …suggestions. 

I often pray the scriptures for myself. “Keep creating in me a clean heart. Fill me with pure thoughts and holy desires, ready to please You.” Psalms 51:10 TPT. I love the ongoing tense of this version. I can’t, by myself, manage to achieve this stuff, because I fall over, all the time. I get grumpy wa-ay too many times, and I want my own way because it seems far more convenient, so I need to ask the Holy Spirit to help me – over and over again.

To me, praying scriptures like this is useful. Here’s another great one to focus on: “Don’t be pulled in different directions or worried about a thing. Be saturated in prayer throughout each day, offering your faith-filled requests before God with overflowing gratitude. Tell Him every detail of your life,”Philippians 4:6 TPT. I ask the Holy Spirit to show me my heart, and reveal my sin – your sin, anyone’s sin(!) and I deliberately and permanently forgive everyone – including ME. 

We aren’t just rubbing our noses in our sins, BTW, instead when we go to read the Word with the Holy Spirit’s help, we are washed and cleansed by the water of the Word. Then our hearts are ready to hear whatever He wants to tell us for today. My advice is always read the bible, looking for stuff to do, ready to receive today’s instructions. At the same time, I ask the Holy Spirit as I read, “do I do this?’ I look carefully for clues about what Almighty God loves, what He hates, and what the bible shows me about His ways and I take those things on board.

Next I pray about my peace. I can lose it in the impatience and argy-bargy of every day life. Wherever we have left our peace we need to go and get it and repent of losing it in the first place!  it is of no use to blame others – losing our peace is a sign that we valued something else above being with Him. We are peace-makers and you can’t make peace unless you have it in the first place and you know what it looks like!

Philippians 4 Verses 4-7. These verses, among many others, show us how to get our peace back. “Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again:Rejoice! Let your gentleness be evident to all. The Lord is near. Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.” Wise advice.

So I hand everything I am struggling with over to Him and thank Him for His peace. And then I focus on spending time with Him, expressing gratitude for Who He is and all He has done for me, and what He has given me. Most people underestimate the value of gratitude and worship – it lifts our spirits and helps us to focus ‘on the things that are above.’  Worship is about reminding ourselves of His great worth. I give Him all of me, every single day. “Presenting our bodies …” sacrificially, is another form of worship. All sorts of nasty stuff can simply fall off when we worship, and it helps us focus on Him.

The bible tells us that:“…in His Presence there is fullness of joy.” Psalm 16:11. So if you and I want joy we need to just BE with the Lord. This joy in us grows as we give our time, on purpose – to Him. However, there are days when the Lord has other ideas about our time together, and then I do whatever He says to do, because I’m not locked in to a system … they don’t hold water. I need His water and His fresh bread, every day, it is like my life blood. Ticking off prayer and bible study, repentance, etc. as a completed task, is a fruitless empty action. We need to let the Holy Spirit take our hands and guide us into an ongoing deeper relationship with God, by letting Him take control.

One of the best parts of walking with the Holy Spirit is that He knows what is going to happen today, and He will walk me around any relationship pot-holes and stop me from running into the often on-coming traffic of this life! All I need to do is cultivate a relationship with Him, and take note of what He likes and what He doesn’t – and keep right on listening and obeying.  The secret place is not a secret club for a few special individuals who have somehow been blessed more than you and I.  ‘Whosoever will may come.’   Bye for today, I hope these few suggestions are helpful to someone. 👋

P 2695 Loyalty matters to God.

/ DVH

Let’s not take Father God’s kindness toward us for granted, or we can end up walking in presumption. To start with, we can easily be distracted by the cares of this life and forget Who He actually is! That’s when we could end up focussing on our own greedy little agendas of what we need or want. The point of a relationship is not just about what the other person does for me, it is also about what I bring into that relationship! What do I do that benefits that other person? We must not use Him for our own ends, He needs to be our great treasure. 

Our God’s benefits are for always seeable, and available to be easily seen, when we are living our lives loyal to Him. And He loves 💕 loyalty! Read the book. In the Old Testament we can see that His people spent more time being disloyal to the Lord than they did being loyal. But, whenever they repented and turned back to Him – His loving provision and benefits were seen and recognised and appreciated. I believe in order to see the Lord’s benefits, we need insight into the way we regard Him. God is not wishy-washy, whimsical, or careless. His preference for our salvation is crystal clear, but the decision to accept that, with all it means, needs to be taken seriously.

This is a good time to ask ourselves, where do I, personally, stand on this loyalty issue? Am I ”on the Lord’s side?” …like Joshua was? Joshua was prepared to die for God’s will to be done. Or am I on my Saviour’s side purely for so-called benefits, “I’m saved, He answers my prayers.” Maybe I get disengaged or ticked off when I happen to get trouble or tears? Is my main desire to live in His Presence? Can I see past His hands to His face? In my observation, most of the time when the going gets tough for Christians – the not-so-tough bail out!

I want to briefly talk about the incredible value of the Lord’s benefits. We have such wealth. We are strongly exhorted in Psalm 126:3 to: “… forget not all His benefits…”. In this Psalm, it talks about restoration of fortunes, reaping in joy, carrying seed to sow, and bringing in sheaves. But all of that comes after a whole lotta shaking and hardship going on – including sowing in tears! The thought struck me that we all want the joy, and the restoration, and the seed plus the sheaves … but not-so-much with the tears. It’s a package deal.

Some Psalms contain lists of the benefits of our loyalty to God. In Psalm 119 there are a whole lot of stated benefits. However, I think seeing God’s benefits is linked to our loyalty – and if we do not value Who He is, we won’t SEE them. These things are way too costly to be treated carelessly, haphazardly or poorly. Anybody can participate in everything He has done for us, but our response needs to be a heart filled with loyalty to Him because He has been so gracious to us.

Let’s look quickly at Psalm 23:1. In the Living bible it says:“Because the Lord is my Shepherd, I have everything I need!”  This shepherd was totally in charge of his sheep! While they were under his protection the sheep lacked nothing. Even if they wandered off he would go and seek them out. This is a fine example of Jesus’ loyalty to us! Outside the camp there are wolves etc. This shows me that our faith can easily be devoured by cares and worries of this life – the shepherd’s sheep knew the value of staying close.

Some times we merrily produce our largish lists of needs and wants, and post them off to the Lord without bearing in mind where our loyalties are currently lying. Are we paying lip service, or are we His devoted servants, looking to simply be His sheep? Meanwhile if we are that distracted, will we even see the answers He sends? In Philippians 4:19 it says: “I pray that God will take care of all your needs with the wonderful blessings that come from Christ Jesus!”

Our God is so much more than the supplier of our needs – He’s Almighty God. He made everything we can see!

Every blessing we’ve received was bought for us by Jesus Christ’s own suffering. This life is not about Him getting us a new car, or having a baby, or getting into a course we think we want!  It’s about belonging to SomeOne so incredible, so loving, so focussed on us, that we take the time to see His heart and love Him back. We need to carefully inspect the origins of some of the things we claim and ask for, because loyalty and gratitude matter – especially to Him.

GRACE IS FREE BUT IT WAS NOT CHEAP. This is why everything we do, or want, needs to be prayerfully requested with our eye firmly on the prize of honouring Jesus. Otherwise we can go from faith into presumption in a heartbeat. Let’s not rob the Lord of our loyalty … 👋

“Jesus said to all of His followers, “If you truly desire to be My disciple, you must disown your life completely, embrace My ‘cross’ as your own, and surrender to My ways. For if you choose self-sacrifice, giving up your lives for My glory, you will discover true life. But if you choose to keep your lives for yourselves, you will lose what you try to keep.” Luke 9:23-24.

P 2651 The Western world is believing a lie.

/ DVH

I believe the lie is this: we think we are entitled to have a happy, prosperous care-free life. Who told us that? Where did that lie come from? And where does that leave the billions of poor people, those who are oppressed and tortured? Those people who constantly live in fear of their lives. They think they are lucky to have one meal a day, and their only shelter is a cardboard box or they sleep out in the open… victims of the elements. These people have no access to clean water, or facilities — all those things we take for granted in the Western World. Our thoughts of entitlement are terrifying … and unscriptural. (Read the book!) We are miserable because we are self-obsessed! Learn to be other centred.

Yet we can get irritated and out of sorts when our bus or train is late. Even our kids have learnt to live entitled lives – they feel deprived if they don’t have the latest iPhone!  Our society acts like the world we live in, is there to serve us. We lack GRATITUDE, big time. We need a much bigger attitude of gratitude and generosity. There are plenty of people in our own country who are doing it tough … who says we have to own a home at 25 years of age? The way to live this life as an overcomer is to not complain, or be jealous, angry or fretful – those things are a waste of the precious time we have been given. The way to overcome is to live like He did – Jesus used His faith all day every day – and He was thankful!

We must deliberately look for things we can be thankful for. Some days my attitude of gratitude is that I woke up!  There are millions of people across this planet who live on $2.15 a DAY. Let’s look at this life sensibly – ya can’t buy too many big Macs or chips and a coke for $2!  We don’t have to feel grateful to BE grateful, we simply need to be obedient.“In everything give thanks for this is the WILL of Christ Jesus concerning you!” I Thessalonians 5:18. Let’s use the time we have been given to be observant and interested in what is going on around us and help others. The feelings of gratitude often come later. Here are some scriptures that have impacted me:

“What do you have that was not given you?”  John 3:27, Romans 12:3. (That’s in the book twice!) “For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” Matthew 6:21. Here’s another great diagnostic tool – people who are living in the flesh, are constantly reviewing and revising their current situation, looking for improvement, and feeling deprived if they think there is none. People of the Spirit know that: “My God shall supply all my needs according to His riches in glory.”  Philippians 4:19. Father God is rich in ways we can’t count!  So if we don’t got it – then we don’t need it! If we lack something, ask the Lord for it, and if it doesn’t happen – then praise and thank Him that we can live without it.

Here’s something that Paul said that has always grabbed my attention: Philippians 4:11-13: “I am not saying this because I am in need, for I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances. I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want. I can do all this through Him who gives me strength.”Paul rejoiced in his lack because his lack gave him an opportunity to rely upon God even more! That’s a sentence that’ll blow our minds! It is the WAY we look at this life that helps or hinders our day to day living.

At the same time, other people can’t hurt us by their nasty attitudes … unless we let them. So we need to make a quality decision that the peace we get from the Lord Himself is worth something. It is a waste of time to make up excuses for others, sin is sin – forgive them instead. It is not our place to judge, so let’s pray and then give it all to God and let go. We need to put our everyday effort into remaining attached to Him and His ways – and let the world do whatever it must. Lately I’ve had to stop watching the news because I want to yell at the people on the TV for their appalling behaviour toward each other. 😳

Lastly, listen to this exhortation – it’s IN the book:“Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things.” Philippians 4:8. I’m the boss of my mind. If it keeps thinking things that are out of line with what the bible says, then I need to deliberately renew my mind. Let’s begin to weed out the lies we’ve embraced and give His truth priority! The Word of God is our reference point, it is the Manufacturer’s handbook. It tells us how to proceed in this life we lead.

As we learn what it says, then we become responsible to apply what it says into our lives. It is not enough to memorise it – we must become it, by changing the way we think, and act. Using our faith. Many people are living a lie. We’ve become obsessed with wanting more, things that are bigger, brighter and more expensive. I know someone who has a clapped out old car – that car somehow runs on God’s goodness, forgedabout petrol! Personally, I know I’m blessed. I have food and shelter and medicine for what ails me, praise God! Amen. 👋

P 2557 Our thought life matters.

/ DVH

“Don’t be pulled in different directions or worried about a thing. Be saturated in prayer throughout each day, offering your faith-filled requests before God with overflowing gratitude.Tell Him every detail of your life, then God’s wonderful peace that transcends human understanding, will guard your heart and mind through Jesus Christ. Keep your thoughts continually fixed on all that is authentic and real, honourable and admirable, beautiful and respectful, pure and holy, merciful and kind. And fasten your thoughts on every glorious work of God, praising Him always.”Philippians 4:6-8 TPT.

These verses are, without a doubt, a collection of the most amazing spiritual advice that I’ve heard in years. I think if we all took the time to apply what these 2 verses in Philippians say, there would be a world-wide transformation in the Body of Christ! What Paul is saying here is we need to let our minds, hearts and spirits be fixed on the Lord – no matter what is clamouring all around us for our attention. 

What does that mean? Whenever we find ourselves think-worrying etc. we give whatever it is to the Lord and leave it with Him, and we thank Him for His help. That’s the secret of living within the shelter of the most High God. It isn’t that we always have to have exactly the right attitude, now, living this new life He gave us is about knowing where our help comes from and turning to Him. Our God must never be an add-on, His Ways are our NEW life now. 

The problem we face is that it is way too easy to have a divided heart.  A divided heart sadly has a part- time God! People living like this consider what the Lord wants only when they have time, or when they need Him. Knowing our God and obeying Him is not a hobby, to be picked up and put down. I’m sure we can all see the hole in that kind of thinking. Here’s a good thing to pray:“Teach me your way, LORD, that I may rely on Your faithfulness; give me an undivided heart, that I may fear Your Name. I will praise You, Lord my God, with all my heart; I will glorify Your Name forever.” (Psalm 86:11)

A lack of Godly fear and reverence can also produce a divided heart. Especially if we do not put the Lord in His proper place in our lives and hearts. He is to be enthroned in our lives, through our demonstrated obedience to Him. Other people must see HIM through us! Christ Himself is the perfect example of this in action, as we watch Him relate to Almighty God personally. And if we take the time we can also study just how He related to others. Christ’s life is our example. 

Think about Lazarus, Martha and Mary – the Lord Jesus was close friends with them. BUT! God’s WILL took precedence even over that special friendship – Jesus chose to do what He did, God’s way. Their close friendship did not drag Him to the women’s side when their brother died. He waited for His Father’s timing. This shows us how obedience works. Otherwise we might easily forget ourselves and start telling the Lord what we think He should do! Remember, we serve Him, God does not serve us!  At the same time we need to be prayerfully careful that any disappointment in our lives, does not turn into disappointment with Him and His choices for us. Or we can end up presumptuous, like satan did. 

We have been reborn for a reason. Now we are living and learning to continually draw upon that new life within us. It is impossible to live this new life in our own strength. That’s why our focus is so important! We are progressively learning to lean on Him. As we live this way we will acquire soft hearts that are tender-hearted towards the Lord, as well as others. There is a reason we are told to fix our mind on what is good, right, pure and honourable. This world around us will drag us under and extinguish all our God-given hope!

Obedience to what He has already told us in His book, plus  our chosen, personal God-given obedience, as well as our abiding love for Him, are essential. These things will help us keep our focus on what’s good right and just. Our first response in any given situation needs to be:  ‘What does the Lord want here?’ Lately every time I ask Him that question, the Holy Spirit says to me …”trust Him.” At this moment in my life learning to trust is my learning curve! 

Our obedience is motivated by faith, and that obedience is one of the greatest tools to help us increase our confidence in His Ways. We will see Him personally, at work on our behalf. Nobody has to preach at us, now we have our own testimonies! If our thought life is weaving about between the things of this world and what He says – we will lose our clarity. I am reminded of a grand old hymn: “Turn your eyes upon Jesus, look full in His wonderful face. And the things of earth will grow strangely dim, in the light of His glory and Grace.”Almighty God is revealed to us and through us, when we allow Who He is, to take over our focus. Bye. 👋

P 2438 Please don’t give in to despair …

/ DVH

… just like the tide, money is designed by God, to flow in… and out. Many people in these difficult days are struggling with providing their family with ordinary things …they are trying to make sure that they have food, shelter, and they can pay their bills. Money has become a huge scary monster, gobbling everything in its path. But our God is God, IN season and OUT. We are in a difficult ‘out’ season right now, and so this means we are all in a testing time. Father God is watching over us to see how we prioritise our funds.

Today I want to talk about how easy it is to pull back away from giving when times are tough.  However, all kinds of giving is actually our mandate. Our God gave – so we, His followers give! Because we are continually and evidentially being transformed by Christ, we are free of material obsessions, so now we can freely give away all kinds of things, including money! Freedom doesn’t come from feeling free … freedom comes from acting in faith. The feelings come later!

Every single day we have a limitless supply of incredible things like love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control because there is no law against those things. What does that mean? It means giving goods, money, love, mercy and grace are never out of season. We are always available to do good to others. Personally, I think that our own hearts are revealed to us by the way we give. 

Of course, every parent wants to provide for their own family – that’s normal. But we can sometimes forget about the poorer families in our society who struggle, through no fault of their own, to provide for themselves. The bible exhorts us to look after “widows and orphans.” So much so, James calls these actions pure religion. James 1:27.“Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.”  

So while we are carefully watching out for inappropriate intake from all kinds of sources;  at the same time, we need to make sure we help those people who cannot help themselves. God calls that pure religion – religion that is untarnished by this world’s agendas. I can tell you from personal experience, we cannot out-give God.

At the same time we are also encouraged in the bible to make sure our pastors and their families are cared for. The bible tells us that we should make sure those people who work hard in leading us and feeding us, are highly respected and well-paid. 1 Timothy 5:17-18: “The elders who direct the affairs of the church well are worthy of double honour, especially those whose work is preaching and teaching. For Scripture says, “Do not muzzle an ox while it is treading out the grain,” and “The worker deserves his wages.” 

Whatever you decide to do about your own financial matters is none of my business, but I would exhort everyone to take what the Lord says about finances, seriously. I am writing this today out of my own experiences in this area. Our Heavenly Father cares deeply about our leaders, as well as the helpless and the tormented. Remember Jesus Himself  said in Luke 6:38: “Give, and it will be given to you. A good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over, will be poured into your lap. For with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.”

Sometimes our inability to get free in some areas can be directly related to our ongoing generosity and attitude of gratitude. We can put a ceiling over our own heads by the way we bless, regard and treat others. Hubby and I have found that the more we give, love, kindness, money, things …the more we will live pressed down and running over!  We see our lives together as a channel, and just like the tide, stuff comes in, and it goes out again. We have also purposed that if we don’t got it then we don’t need it because:“my God shall supply all my needs according to His riches in glory..” Philippians 4:19. 

We live with our eyes on the benefits of His tide flowing over us, and we are totally aware that it sometimes goes out … but we know it will come in again.  I love giving of all kinds. Including loving people, giving gifts, money, help, you name it, this giving thing is my all time favourite thing to do! As Malachi 3:10-12 says, this man challenges that giving is a place we can prove God for ourselves. He tells us that we will see the results with our own eyes. 

The marvellous side-effect of all this giving, from my own POV, is that the more I do it, the more cheerful I get about doing it…“and the Lord loves a cheerful giver.”  Win, win!  Father God loves it when we share with each other. People can call that charity, but in my mind and heart it is simply sharing, caring for others. Please don’t despair about your own current financial situation – just keep looking for ways to give, no matter what is going on. The Holy Spirit will show you how. 👋🏻

P 2387 God calls us His riches.

/ DVH

“I pray that the Father of glory, the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, would impart to you the riches of the Spirit of wisdom and the Spirit of revelation to know Him through your deepening intimacy with Him. I pray that the light of God will illuminate the eyes of your imagination, flooding you with light, until you experience the full revelation of the hope of His calling —that is, the wealth of God’s glorious inheritances that He finds IN US,His holy ones! I pray that you will continually experience the immeasurable greatness of God’s power made available to you through faith. Then your lives will be an advertisement of this immense power as it works through you! This is the mighty power that was released when God raised Christ from the dead and exalted Him to the place of highest honour and supreme authority in the heavenly realm!” Ephesians 1:17-20.

Did you know that because the Lord has all of us in His family, He considers Himself wealthy? He doesn’t care if you and I are fat, skinny, short, tall, good looking, extremely spiritual, or not. The bible says He counts US as His wealth. Now that’s something worth thinking on isn’t it? It shows us His heart toward us. I’ve prayed that God would illuminate the eyes of my heart for myself for years, because I know how easy it is to be distracted by this world and become as thick as a plank to the deep things of God. But everything we have ever needed or wanted we will find in Him.

We human beings concentrate on what we will gain from Him loving us, but we need to pause and look hard at what He says HE has gained, because that information is a sliver of insight into His Ways – Who He is. His incredible generosity. Before we were ever His adopted children, He looked at us with love and saw every single bit of our true potential in Him and He claimed US as His inheritance. Father God sees Himself as rich simply because we are His family. I find that astonishing! Especially because I know many people have been rejected and reviled by their earthly family. 

Today, the things we think make us as human beings rich, are mostly material things. In the Western world we accumulate ‘stuff’ a lot – it makes us look quite wealthy. Perhaps we are monetarily rich, but spiritually poor because our worth is measured by accumulation and achievements. But our God has chosen to love us simply because we are His family. If you and I are looking for acceptance, incredible acceptance flows freely from His throne.🙌

Paul is praying here in Ephesians for all of us, that we would understand what we have that was freely given to us. Sad to say, human beings can get so stuck in the things we are not – that we forget the most important thing of all. We are His and, it is only by His Grace that we know it. He chose us. Our worth is not in money, but in the fact that SomeOne so incredible – dearly and tenderly loves us. We have His love, and grace upon us … that very fact will take us into eternity. We’re loved and cherished by the One Who made the world, then He went further than that and saved us … then He went even further than that and He owned us … He claims us as His relatives. His kids. How amazing is that?

I think that realising and appreciating what we have already been given helps keep us content in a discontented world. Discontent rumbles around this world daily … my team won, your team lost. That guy got a promotion, I didn’t. That kid got great marks, I didn’t. Maybe this is why so many people have gotten into huge debt. Discontentment with the norm grabbed them and they want to escape it and prove to themselves they are special.

We are special because we are special in His eyes and that doesn’t change. Father God hates sin, not the man He made. We are made valuable by the fact that the God of all the Universe loves us. The value of the price He paid, is an indication of the depth of the love He has for us. When Jesus Christ died as a MAN, He gave us all worth.  

My point is this: fancy all of us working so hard to get something we already have! All of mankind is made in His image. You and I were His idea! I believe this is why the eyes of our hearts need to be DAILY enlightened. When we get saved, we are incredibly grateful for it … but then, for some reason, we do not park there. We move on. All I want to say today is – go back to the place where you first understood His salvation and stay there. We must have an appreciation for His sacrifice, not with our heads but with our hearts.

There is a part of us that needs to continually gaze at God’s love hanging on that cross for the world to see – and not stop doing it. It is a good thing to relive our gratitude for what He has given us, every single day, and enjoy our new found love in Him as it grows. It is in the light of the cross, where our real place in this world and the next is made clear. We don’t have to be special to this world’s eyes, we are God’s riches because we are the saved ones. “Oh, what manner of love the Father gives that we may be called the sons of God!”  We are His chosen riches and I pray we all know how very rich we are because of all He did for us.. Bye 👋🏻. 

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

/ DVH

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

P 2374 Take these two verses together with prayer.

/ DVH

“Casting all your cares upon Him because He cares for you.” 1 Peter 5:7. “Don’t be pulled in different directions or worried about a thing. Be saturated in prayer throughout each day, offering your faith-filled requests before God with overflowing gratitude. Tell Him every detail of your life, …” Philippians 4:6 TPT. This could be a good time to reflect on the fact that one of these verses was written by Peter, and the other one was written by Paul.  From what we know about these two mighty men of God they had plenty of opportunities to practise this stuff, even if they did live in totally different locations! You might want to think about why they wrote these things in the first place.

I try to see the cares of this life as being like playing basketball – not that I have ever played that game (!) 😂  I just throw everything over to Jesus as it comes up … that’s in the book … the casting thing… Two things happen then, the problems get resolved or He tells me what to do. BTW, the former is usually something I would not have ever thought of doing! And sometimes, I get to practise my hoop shot over and over again!  I’ve also found that prayerfully naming said cares can be useful, especially when things are a nameless knot of stuff in the middle of your stomach. I do whatever He tells me to do, immediately, and hand the rest off to Him, one by one.

Isn’t Jesus so lovely? He doesn’t want us to wander about weighed down by cares. Relieving us from the weight and pressure of them is one of the ways He shows us He is always there for us. I find that ‘cares’ are kind of like very sticky paper, before you know it you’ve flicked the dratted thing off one hand but it lands on the other one! You gotta work pretty hard to get rid of that kind of darn sticky stuff. It’s the same with our cares, it might take quite a few tries to actually leave what is bothering you with Him. Persevere. Bonus buy, perseverance is a fruit of the Spirit so if you do it enough, you are growing good fruit!!

And if you accidentally get to thinking after time has passed and nothing has happened yet, that NOW you just might find a solution – then immediately send whatever it is, wrapped in love and prayer, right back toward Him and refuse to take it back again. That’s because YOU need to remember you aren’t stupid, and it is obvious that you are going to need a supernatural solution! I usually find I chase ‘solutions’ at  2.00am when I can’t sleep. Eventually (!!) I repent for thinking I can somehow work out that thing I couldn’t actually work out when I was fully awake !!! … And then … I give it all back to Him again. It’s a process.

Paul also tells us not to be worried about anything. Great aim! But sometimes, when you have cultivated a lifetime of stewing on stuff, that can be a hard habit to break. That’s why you have to practice it.  In my family of origin we had a designated worrier — and, oh joy! — it was me! This was decided without any personal consultation with me, so that the other members of my family could be free to enjoy a life without any worry at all – having handed the bad bits off to me to resolve, apparently that was my job. As a result, if you hand me a problem I will turn my brain upside down trying to solve it for you. Obviously I actually can’t do that! And that’s where my spiritual game of basketball has been incredibly helpful. Then I repented of being a rescuer – that’s Jesus’ job.

Back to the book. I also love the Passion Translation of Philippians 4:6 TPT“Don’t be pulled in different directions or worried about a thing. Be saturated in prayer throughout each day, offering your faith-filled requests before God with overflowing gratitude. Tell Him every detail of your life…”  See? I told you those two verses are similar. Here’s how I do my best to be saturated in prayer … I’m working on being friends with the Holy Spirit. I look for the good in things going on around me, and anything that reminds me of how wonderful He is. Even if all I can see is the sky, or a little bit of grass, or hear a bird sing or a child laugh. I wish I could tell you that I pray all day, but I don’t. However, I do my best to keep my mind and heart on Him, and I’ve learnt to cultivate thanking Him heaps as I go along. 

Plus, I refuse to let my inability to be good at something stop me from working on it!  Like the scripture up the top of my blog says: ‘Not that I am there already, but I keep aiming at it!’ BTW, I am also not all that sure about always making faith-filled prayer requests, sometimes I accidentally make complaining prayer requests instead. ☹️ The secret to getting rid of worry and anxiety is to give the situation to Jesus, do whatever He tells you to do about it, and then leave it with Him. He is way more concerned about our past, present and future than we are, and He can be trusted. I simply take these two verses together, and wash them down with prayer! Bye 👋🏻