Guilt

P 2538 Self examination.

/ DVH

We need to learn to live our lives actively recognising any triggers or anger we have allowed in our lives, which can send us into a spin. I am talking about those moments when we are tempted to doubt that GOD IS GOOD … or we stop living by love and start living by our feelings. Your feelings will lie to you. In those shaky moments it is time to dig into the word. 

The Holy Spirit is here with us and He will help us to identify what is going on, because we can easily be misled by our own triggers, passions, and even infirmities. James 1:13-15: “When tempted, no one should say, “God is tempting me.” For God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does He tempt anyone. But each one is tempted when by his own evil desire she is lured away and enticed. Then after desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, gives birth to death.…” 

Instead of laying the blame for our mistakes, missteps and contrary actions at the feet of others, or even blaming the Lord Himself — we need to make a choice to ask the Lord to help us see past whatever we did or thought, to whatever caused it! Ask yourself questions, and include useful thoughts like: “does the Bible support my thinking right now?” Making excuses for yourself, or others, is a waste of time and energy. It leads to keeping score. This journey we are on is one of progressively growing our faith, and that includes the faith we exercise to eliminate the things that cause us to stumble.

Meanwhile, our enemy is quite capable of capitalising on pain and anger. Even those things he deliberately seeded into our hearts and minds years ago. he does this to strangle out the strength of God’s Word in our lives. It is up to us to recognise what is going on, and then prayerfully challenge those things with the Holy Spirit’s help. “So give yourselves humbly to God…” (Because if anyone knows our motivations HE does!) …then we…“resist the devil and he will flee from you.” James 4:7. Take a stand and tell the enemy he cannot send you down the plug hole of despair and guilt over things you did in your past. Even if the past was just … yesterday. Jesus Christ paid all our debts for us!

Personally – I repent, if I haven’t done that already, then I forgive myself and/or the offender, then I repair any damage done to everyone involved. That can involve me going to my brother and confessing my fault! Yeah wot fun! The thing is that if we are harbouring anger toward someone else, going to them and confessing our fault is humbling. That will probably hurt, but it has a huge ongoing heart effect. Then we pray for healing. 

To dig out any lies in our minds and hearts, we will also need the truth of His Word to be constantly hidden in our hearts.  Whether you choose to memorise scripture or not, let me exhort you that the …sword (God’s word) that you pick up in the heat of battle and USE, will not be easily forgotten. And digesting His word, by doing what it says, is one of the best ways I know to have any sword handy! Don’t just read – obey. 

It is a waste of time to say to Him, and to yourself: “I’m not mad at anyone.” It is way more fruitful to ask the Lord “Who am I mad at Lord?” In other words, let the Holy Spirit excuse you, don’t do it for yourself. When in doubt, ask for forgiveness, anyway. Think of grudges as being like a pile of dirty socks. If you keep throwing more dirty clothes on top of them, pretty soon you can’t see over the pile! Hiding stuff leads to mould growing in the corners. 

When you’ve finished sorting out your dirty clothes, ask the Lord to complete the work by cleansing you from all unrighteousness.“IF we confess our sins, He is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.” 1John 1:9. Whatever the Lord asks us to do, we CAN do. He wouldn’t ask us to do it if we couldn’t. Feeling like we can’t do these things is living by our feelings and “… we walk by faith, not by sight.” 2 Corinthians 5:7. 

Self-examination in times of stress is often difficult. It is so much easier to let fly with anger than step into the Holy Spirit and gain the spirit of self-control – but doing the latter leads to growth. 👋

P 2533 Hold fast to what is good and right.

/ DVH

1 Samuel 22:6-8 “Now Saul heard that David and his men had been discovered. And Saul was seated, spear in hand, under the tamarisk tree on the hill at Gibeah, with all his officials standing at his side. He said to them, “Listen, men of Benjamin! Will the son of Jesse give all of you fields and vineyards? Will he make all of you commanders of thousands and commanders of hundreds? Is that why you have all conspired against me? No one tells me when my son makes a covenant with the son of Jesse. None of you is concerned about me or tells me that my son has incited my servant to lie in wait for me, as he does today.”

It is a good thing to listen to the way that these guys in the Old Testament, talk. Did you notice that King Saul has gone right around God Himself being in charge, and is acting like this is a competition between him and David? The Lord is left right out of this picture. Saul is exhibiting one of satan’s nastiest prods: ‘Troops, you’ve let me down! Remember, I have all the power to make or break your lives and David doesn’t!.’  Guilt is a terrible evil motivator  — a poor freedom fighter – it isn’t from GOD.

Do you know the saying… there is nothing new under the sun? Right there in 1st Samuel, satan is using his power to persuade Saul that power, results and might are right. In other words it’s OK to manipulate men for a good cause. But the actual good cause is really Saul’s cause!  That’s a great clue to help us figure out just who is talking to us when we are desperate for answers... who will ultimately benefit? What this king is saying is a twisted highly manipulative truth – Saul’s power was limited by God’s WILL.  Almighty God was WITH David, He WAS NOT with Saul!

Manipulation, judgment or the ‘end justifies the means’ – those thoughts should not exist in the Lord’s church. Have you ever heard someone say this – ‘that church has 4,000 people and this one only has 30?’ The implication is the second church is doing something wrong! Like numbers or popularity are a sign of success in the Lord! God’s ways are not our ways. He used 300 men to defeat without number when He chose Gideon as a leader. And the Lord’s fruit does not always show up with numbers! Jesus Christ was everlastingly fruitful with 11 men!

At the same time, any kind of spiritual gift manifesting itself does not mean we have immediately toddle off and start using it. This is why an anointing or a gift need to be submitted to the pastor. Proverbs 4:5-7 teaches us – “Get wisdom, get understanding: Forget it not; neither decline from the words of my mouth. Forsake her not, and she shall preserve thee: Love her, and she shall keep thee. Wisdom is the principal thing; therefore get wisdom: And with all thy getting get understanding. Exalt her, and she shall promote thee:” There is a good way, and a right way of doing things. Let other people you trust supervise you. 

The bible is a WHOLE BOOK – we dare not cherry-pick our motivation or our answers. We should not even think about prophesying all over people’s lives without wisdom. Recognising a gift is not activating it. No matter how well intentioned we are, quite often we do not even know the state of our own hearts and that will affect what we say and do towards others.The body of Christ needs spiritually gifted people, but we need WISDOM just as much. The Holy Spirit is the source of our wisdom.

He likes to lead us through difficult circumstances to the other side, because as we follow Him we gain wisdom along the way! So many people have stumbled over the temptation to rush rush, hurry hurry ahead of God. He lives in eternity – He doesn’t have to hurry! He doesn’t care about popularity either!! Gifted people can go into ministry because it has been recognised that they have a wonderful gift from God, and that gift blesses others and has great results! But only God Himself knows what’s inside us that can shoot us in the foot down the road. Ask yourself regularly in any form of ministry – where is the fruit? What does the fruit of this tree look like?

Also, having a gift does not mean you are ready to use it, or the world around you is ready to receive it! Our God is way more interested in our character than we’ve understood so far. He wants to repair and inhabit our lives. Just because other people have responded to His gift in your life don’t be fooled… always, always remember that gift you have is still His! It is a GIFT— not a REWARD FOR GOOD BEHAVIOUR! He gave it to you to build up His church, not just build your own ministry. 

God’s power can be so awe-inspiring, when others see it operating through a person they start to elevate the person. Plus spiritually gifted people sometimes do the right things for the wrong reasons! They are deceived by satan into believing acting like this is for the greater good… “People are getting saved Lord!” Hallelujah! – but we always want Jesus to shine like the SUN — not just some here again, gone again shooting star! King Saul had no love for God or his men – he was too busy trying to get David out of the picture. Our  Lord is a master-craftsman – He forms His swords … His servants — in the fire of adversity or the heat of His personal gaze. As His servants we need to learn to be resilient and tough.

A really good blacksmith can take three strands of metal and twist, weave, beat and forge those three strands into ONE SWORD. This kind of sword can take knocks, and rebound without shattering. Our precious Heavenly Father doesn’t want any of us to break in the battles of this life, He wants us to defeat our foe. Father God wants us to have and live under, the three-fold, tightly woven cord of Himself, His Son and the Holy Spirit. Otherwise like King Saul, we could easily mistake having POWER, for BEING RIGHT and the Lord’s badge of approval.

The Trinity long to become so woven into our thinking, doing and being, that people like King Saul will taste bad to us. However, in order to resist temptation, we must first be able to identify it. Only by God’s Grace and wisdom, we’ll be able to avoid deception, because what the Trinity wants is everything  we want!  The Lord’s army won’t have any ambition, good or bad. Their only aim will be to please Him, and hold fast to what is good and right. Fame and power can spoil people. It goes to their head. Look what it did to Saul, it made him into a megalomaniac and liar – among other things!  Gaining wisdom is incredibly important – it means we have learnt to walk with the Spirit of God. 🙌

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 2275 It is essential to practise mercy.

/ DVH

“So we must both speak and act in every respect like those who are destined to be tried by the perfect law of liberty, and remember that judgment is merciless for the one who judges others without mercy. So by showing mercy, you take dominion over judgment!” James 2:12-13 TPT

The reason the phrase mercy triumphs over judgment is often accurate, is that the human mind leans toward the side of justice. Do the words; ‘that’s not fair’ ring any bells?’ Look, if someone pinches your parking spot, then you can easily lean on mercy, but, if someone pinches the car or burns down our house most of us could easily tip over into judgment! The severity of the sin against us can create harsher responses. Unfortunately unforgiveness is deadly, it’s a no-brainer. Repentance clears away our guilt, but it does not take away the need for reparation and restoration.

The thing about Mercy is it has to become our permanent state of mind, not just something we try to find on the spot when something bad has happened. When things happen, our emotions become engaged, and we are more likely to go with how we feel at that moment, instead of leaning into being merciful. 

Memorising scriptures is a great way to know what the bible says – but the very best way to change our hearts for good is to continually choose the harder thing and do it. Doing what the bible says takes God’s Word out of the realm of knowledge, and puts it firmly into the place of our own experience. Other people will benefit from our learning curves but the main benefit is to US. That stretching, the feeling that you can’t bear whatever is going on any longer, is normal. Don’t  believe what you feel, instead, pray for help and maintain the new merciful attitude.

I am not saying that letting Mercy triumph is an easy thing to do. As a matter of fact I think it’s probably one of the hardest things … like, ever! But we are not just simply learning a way to live – we are giving the Holy Spirit room to transform our hearts. This means we have an opportunity to change or  soften our hardened heart… by believing His word to the point where we act on it. A changed heart has no problem with mercy. This person knows from experiencing His grace when they’ve needed it, that growing and changing can be painful. Plus they understand the principle of giving away what they need. 

The Bible says: “Cast your bread on the surface of the waters, [be diligently active, make thoughtful decisions], for you will find it after many days.” Ecclesiastes 11:1 Amp. This means that we will often give away what we need over and over again before we see any change in our response, but remember – God is no man’s debtor! Now if we are still actively hostile inside our brain two days later … eventually that bubbling pot of anger and resentment will boil over!  Often it is at some poor schmuck who said the wrong thing at the wrong time. We have all the grace and power we will need to overcome the things that come at us, or even the things that are already inside us – simply by practising His word as He reveals it to us. Hallelujah!

Human beings see things in terms of big and small.  To the Lord sin is not something big or small – it’s the thing that separates us from Him. It causes us to hide from Him right when we need Him the most.  When Jesus died for our sins He utterly cleared away the pathway between us and sin – we don’t have to sin any more. We need to remember this verse: “If we sin, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and cleanses from all unrighteousness.” 

In the old Testament when Rebecca gave birth to twins, the twins were wrestling inside her for supremacy. That’s what happens inside us – either in our minds or in our emotions or both. The new you – that is who you are now in Christ Jesus – is now inside you. But the old us, our old habits and indulgences are wrestling against the person that God wants to release. This fight is ongoing, we don’t just fight against what the enemy throws at us, we are fighting our old ways of thinking, being, and doing with the Holy Spirit helping us.

Just because something is hard that does not mean it isn’t God’s will. We are in a wrestling match daily, sometimes minute by minute to make the choices Christ would make … Dying is hard but it is extremely powerful!  👋🏻

P 2179 No more weight-lifting…

/ DVH

…unless it is part of our fitness regime!  “…let us lay aside every weight and sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus, the Author and Finisher of our faith, Who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.” Hebrews 12:1-2 says that sin, and the things we try to ignore, plus the semi-forgotten stuff – weighs us down spiritually. We need to decide to deal with it with the Lord. It can get tangled up around our feet if we do not deal with it. It will cause us to spend our time in the land of condemnation and regret. Spend time in His Presence being grateful, instead! “There is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus …”  SomeBody else paid – Jesus carried that weight. 

Things like idolatry, murder, lying, etc. are really obvious sins, however, I think Paul makes a fantastic point: “… but one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and reaching forward to what lies ahead …”  Philippians 3:13. Our point of faith looks like this: we pray over whatever we’ve done that is weighing us down and ask Him to show us if there is anything we need to act on to repair things. First, we ask for His forgiveness, then we thank the Holy Spirit, and ask Him for His insight and wisdom. Now if I’ve hurt someone I need to go and ask their forgiveness. I don’t make excuses, I just confess my fault. If something needs to be done about my sin then I go and do whatever is necessary. Why? Because I value His Presence more than my pride or embarrassment. 

After that, I give every single bit of it back to Him a-n-d … I leave it there. If I get emotional, worried or distraught about that subject, it is important to go back the Lord and ask and thank Him for His comfort, a-n-d then … put it down AGAIN. Don’t skip repentance and confession. Sin is a barrier to freedom in the spirit – it renders us deaf and more easily deceived. The critical thing is to deal with things but leave the weight of them on Jesus, instead of lumping it about weighing down our hearts. I’ve learnt, from experience, that heavy hearts can’t pray easily.

Laying aside weights is an ordinary part of Christian living, but that does not mean that we have a free pass to walk away from our responsibility to fix things. There are too many scriptures that make it clear we need to fix whatever we have broken. Meanwhile after we’ve done all He tells us to do, it can be incredibly valuable, to take our hands off things. ”Having done ALL, STAND!” Ephesians 6:13. Having repented etc. standing is essential. The enemy is not about to let go of areas in our minds and emotions easily – we will probably need to insist. Guilt over something we’ve confessed, repented about, and changed our ways with His help – is false guilt – it is a shadow cast by the enemy into our heart to weigh us down.

We all know that sin is the poison that pollutes our faith. And I am not talking about tolerating sin – when we do that, we can easily start explaining what God said in the book away – by making excuses for ourselves etc. The aim is to do everything we can, then roll the care over onto Him. With any stubborn sin I’ve also learnt that it is valuable to confess my fault to someone else, and ask them to pray with me, and for me. Humility releases more Grace to overcome. It goes without saying that I avoid any situations that might lead me back into sin again …  It goes without saying that we need to take our sin seriously. Our sin killed Christ. We cannot be blase about something so serious. 

It is also good to remember that sin is also not just what we do, it is also what we don’t do. It is unfortunately much too easy to ignore the poor, or even the needs of our own immediate families because our lives are busy. In Isaiah 58:7 it says: “…is it not to divide your bread with the hungry. And bring the homeless poor into the house; When you see the naked, to cover him and not to hide yourself from your own flesh.” Jesus Himself told us to remember the poor, and so did the Apostle Paul. It’s in the book. And the Lord Jesus was extremely respectful to His mother and brothers even when they did not understand what He was doing.

The minute we decide to change our sinful ways, the weight of sin becomes easy because Jesus already carried it. We don’t have to be ashamed, because SomeBody else already bore that shame.The past is now the past  – we need to put it down.  And because Jesus has taken our sin for us, we must resist going back to pick it up again. This area is the battlefield … but this battle belongs to the Lord so we can always ask for His help. “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.” 1 John 1:9. Father God wants to give all of us the total freedom to be with Him and not be ashamed. Jesus paid the cost – He took the weight, the shame, the regret, the damage of sin, and He redeemed it. 

That very act shows us the lengths that our God will go to, to have His kids walking with Him. What is of primary importance is our response. Is it gratitude, honouring Him, and a life of service with the Holy Spirit guiding us? The consequences of our sin fell on Christ, but we need to remember to ask for His help to let go of the weight of it. 👋🏻

P 2171 Who told you that?

/ DVH

In Genesis, right after Adam and Eve sinned, they hid. The Lord God came walking along in the garden, like He did every evening, and the first question He asked them was: “Where are you?” The second one was: ““Who TOLD you that … you were naked?Have you eaten from the tree that I commanded you not to eat from?” Genesis 3:11.

Recently the Lord put His big highlighter over those four words. ‘Who told you that…?’  was all He said, so I went away and looked that scripture up. Suddenly I realised, there is somebody who stands at our elbow whispering in our ears, constantly replaying our sins and disobedience – even after we have repented. Our enemy won’t ever remind us about what the blood of Jesus did for us, because he never wants us to live in the knowledge of our freedom from the compulsion and temptation to SIN! We were made free when Christ died. Once for all. 

I believe the Lord Himself wants to say to everyone reading this blog today – “Who told you you’ve failed me? Who told you I don’t love you? Who told you that you have to run and hide from Me? Who told you that I am angry with you? Somebody told you that … and it wasn’t ME!” …satan led Adam and Eve right up the garden path and then shoved them off a cliff of his making.

I believe the Lord highlighted those words to me today, because the devil used that ploy back there in the garden, and he is still doing it now, today. he hands us the weapons for our own destruction and then clobbers us with what we’ve done after we did it. The good news is – we don’t have to take anything from him! Seriously … turn your hand upside down whenever he comes at you, refuse to take guilt, shame and the blame. Instead, intentionally – repent, repair and restore things, with the Holy Spirit’s direction and help. Don’t give him a reason to accuse you – fix things.

There were two trees in the garden of Eden. Genesis 2:9b says: “In the middle of the garden were the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.”  In the middle of that garden was a choice! They could choose to obey God and live … or not. Genesis 2:16 says: “And the Lord God commanded the man, “You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat from it you will certainly die.”  And we all know what came next. 😵‍💫 Meanwhile did you ever wonder if Adam and Eve both lived a long time just because they actually did eat from the tree of life? That tree was not forbidden. I’m just saying is all …

Back to my point this morning  – the enemy can’t wait to hand us our sins. Meanwhile those sins are real! We do dumb disobedient horrible things, but … we don’t have to live under his lies. We can focus on our failures, or the cross. The choice is ours. Jesus Christ died to give us that choice. Now, we have access to redemption – because it has already been released. We must learn to embrace what has already been done for us … “IF we CONFESS our sins, He is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.” 1 John 1:9

There were two trees in back in that garden, one brought eternal life and the other brought death. Jesus came here to die for all mankind. He hung on another type of tree and defeated death forever.  His cross truly was the tree of life for us! He released life for anyone who believes in Him. We don’t have to take the guilt and the shame that satan tries to hand out to us when we sin, accidentally, or not. Our enemy started that game back in the garden – but we have the power to live differently now – we don’t have to play that game with him anymore. Thank you Jesus! 👏

Our enemy will always try to tell us that we are trapped in the past, or stuck in our old behaviour – he’s a liar remember? he’s called the father of lies!  Jesus Christ FINISHED the work. We do not have to listen to the one who tells us we are failures, and that we can’t possibly belong to the Lord – the bible tells a different story!  We need to take note of who is telling us that we are not loved – and ask ourselves: “Who told me that?” 👋🏻