Impatience

P 3336 Love suffers long.

/ DVH

“Love suffers long,,,” is from 1 Corinthians 13:4. It seems to me that this kind of love has patient endurance and steadfast kindness. And I think it is easy to see why we can’t fake it. We might manage to control our temper or our impatience for a few times in a row, but, under pressure, we can eventually reach the end of what we can do, and then … we definitely need supernatural help! 

The Message bible says on this subject: “Love never gives up…” So that means we can’t quit on our weaknesses. I know, personally, I can want to give up quite quickly, because I find the urge to be impatient usually comes right on the heels of someone else’s mistake or their bad temper. Sadly I can be very  intolerant of other people’s flaws… whilst I am merrily glossing over my own! …

It’s a set-up. These things don’t happen in isolation, one thing quite often stands upon the shoulders of something else. That can include a lack of forgiveness coming from past situations. The trouble with unforgiveness is that it doesn’t happen overnight it builds slowly. It is like endlessly throwing dirty socks into the corner of the room, sooner or later that smell is gunna get ya!

We cannot fight the enemy of our souls with will power. Mankind’s first entanglement with him ended badly … remember?? We need the Holy Spirit’s wisdom and help to manoeuvre our way through the stuff that can go right back into our childhood. Impatience starts early in children when they want something and they don’t want to wait. Many times I’ve noticed that without God, most of us can’t suffer very long!

I believe in forgiving people and putting the past where it should be, behind us. Don’t let the enemy ruin your future by leeching away your obedience, while you weep and mull over your past. People can get bogged down in past injustices, and other people’s very real sins against them. Use that time to practice looking for the good instead and don’t forget to pray.

Let’s not leave the real race to go and try to fix something we can’t change. Whatever happened to you back then was terrible, it was SIN let loose on a little kid. But that sin is definitely is not bigger than God’s grace is. We cannot face this world, and the state it is in, without His Grace. We need Him guiding us through the minefields of our own damaged thinking and emotional wounds. Being patient with people who treat us badly, exercises our faith so we can tackle the next bit … loving those who despitefully use us.

Either we take His Word seriously, or we don’t!  Unchecked, eventually we will end up blaming our impatience etc on someone else, which very nicely relieves us of the responsibility to ask Jesus to help us! Taking responsibility for our own actions is the first step into spiritual maturity. Other people may do things to me – but, because of who I am now, I don’t have to let my responses to their actions, limit me. Good place to stop and think. 🤔

Feel free to pray, I subscribe to the idea of fixing anything at any time immediately, when you remember it. Don’t let the enemy make a case against that other person – that’s fatal to living in love. Impatience will take over and if they sneeze it will annoy you! It’s time to put those things away, otherwise yesterday, is stealing today and tomorrow. 

That means we have His love over us and His book to teach us. That’s the best focus. We can learn to take our thoughts captive, when we don’t hold them close to us. I often tell “torment” to take a hike. That thing hangs around wounds and pain and pokes at them.

When we make what Jesus said the plumb line, then the things that are out of line in our own lives, start to show themselves. You know, suffering long is something the Lord faced daily. The disciples were just ordinary men, they all had different ways to earn a living, plus they were just human beings, not holy men. But Jesus was patient with them while they were learning. He will be patient with us too.

Under the Holy Spirit’s guidance these ordinary people were transformed. Jesus had renewed their minds for 3 and a half years teaching them, instructing them, then what they saw and heard and experienced next changed them, forever. They all encountered the Holy Spirit and He renewed their minds to what was real and important. I bet they all had opportunities to get impatient while they waited for the Holy Spirit, Who was unknown to them, to come.  

Love suffers long, is first in a long line of stuff we simply cannot produce by ourselves, not just because it is too hard, but because it requires maintenance. At the same time, blaming other people for our impatience is fruitless. Literally! Instead this is a good place to see our spiritual progress IRL We need to see these imperfections so we can remain humble and pliable in the Lord’s hands. 

Love is patient, it suffers wrong, because it’s mind is on something far more important – maintaining and giving away God’s love with our Resident Expert’s help. Thank you Holy Spirit! 👋 Bye 

P 3282 Live dead!

/ DVH

“Since Christ, though innocent, suffered in His flesh for you, now you also must be a prepared soldier, having the same mind-set, for whoever has died in his body is done with sin. So live the rest of your earthly life no longer concerned with human desires but consumed with what brings pleasure to God.” 1 Peter 4:1-2.

It is good to ask ourselves questions about our own reactions. The thing I have learnt is that you can think you have utterly surrendered to the Lord, and you only want to live for His will — then suddenly something unexpected happens and things that you didn’t know were inside, pop up like daisies! My advice is this, don’t excuse your behaviour, pay prayerful attention to it. Making excuses gives us a back door out of personal growth. It stops us discovering the real issues. These issues are far more likely to be about us, than others. We can make other people’s lives a living hell by refusing to confront our own inner attitudes.

When life stays on a pretty even keel, we begin to understand the normal day by day pressures, and we learn to manage them, by yielding to the Lord, and watching Him do the miraculous on our behalf. But it becomes easy to dismiss some not-so-great attitudes we have as …”that’s just who I am. It’s normal for me.” Ignoring the fact that we have a new normal now, and it isn’t based on our individuality, it is whether we look like Jesus, inside and out.

What comes out under pressure? Love, or temper, and impatience, or a distinct lack of mercy etc. What happens if it is your kid suddenly being bullied at school? satan knows that we will lean on the Holy Spirit to manage stuff coming at us, but what if trouble hits your kids, or your parents, or your friends? Maybe your spouse has to take a pay-cut, or even lose their job. Who are we then? I learnt many years ago, the yardstick we use to measure things must be based on the Word, not on our feelings, or our personal coping skills. The place of equality for all is in Christ Jesus, it is not in our ability to make nice noises under pressure.

For a number of years, Christians clung to what we believed about a group of wonderful verses that tickled our ears and made us feel good about ourselves. Sadly, I believe that has led to a distinct lack of adulthood in the Body of Christ. Pastors are often so busy trying to wipe adult noses, and soothe adult bumps and scrapes, plus sort out their life issues, that they have very little time to do what the Lord wants them to do! The way to maturity is through selflessness.

Years ago, I was a latch-key kid I got into all kinds of mischief because there was no parental eye on me. I was reduced to what I could get away with, rather than what was required of me. Not a good place to be. I realised I could out-think the person in charge and go around the rules! That is not obedience, it is evasion, half-truths and deception. Who are we when nobody is looking over our shoulder? 

Our new life is a new way to live not just a theme. The other day I spoke a little bit about money. I think most people don’t like it very much when money comes into the picture — however, the truth is dead people don’t own their money anymore. When we give everything we have to the Lord, He takes it and that includes the things WE think WE own.

Let’s be clear. This life we are living flows directly against our old one. And we are more familiar with the old way of thinking than the new. Some dear people don’t last, because they give up too soon. The cares, worries and struggles of this world overtake them.The best news ever is that we are NEVER alone! The Holy Spirit is a brilliant strategist and leader, we simply follow His Ways by reading the bible and applying what we’ve read, with His help, into our own lives. Plus we obey His inward checks and prompts. 

Initially that can be scary. But this also is how we find out, for ourselves, that we don’t like apologising, or looking like a daft goose. Human beings don’t like making mistakes or even having them pointed out – the old life rises up within us. We are always going need the Holy Spirit’s help – we can’t do this alone. But He’s not a tap we can turn off or on. He’s a Person! Let’s learn to live in such a way, that we are not distancing ourselves from Him. 

As we let go of the reins and allow Him to guide us through the potholes and bumps, He becomes the driver in my life, and I get to sit in the car as a passenger. But some days I really do think I belong in the boot! Soldiers are trained to obey orders, and as we learn to be obedient and cherish the Lord’s will, we are dethroning the whole me, mine, myself and I, mindset. Most people don’t drift away from faith because they hate the Lord — instead they drift away on a sea of careless indifference, aimlessly floating along unaware they are being  influenced by the changing tides of this world around us.  

Living dead’ means we have chosen to exchange our old way of life for His Ways instead, our faith is in Jesus and it is progressive,  Bye. 👋

P 3243 Using our faith can be scary.

/ DVH

Are you cheered up yet? Seriously — Jesus told us: “I have told you these things, so that in Me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.” John 16:33. He has a way to overcome whatever is going on in our lives. The Lord may not take the trouble away. Believe it or not, faith grows when we hang on to His goodness, even if it is by our fingernails. I think the Lord means that whatever it is coming at us, He’s already conquered it through the cross. We need a way through, more often than we need a way out!

In the past, I’ve wanted to throw my hands in the air and give up too easily. The giving UP part is not all bad —if you THROW yourself upon HIM—- but sadly, my own impatience, together with fear and negative responses, were keeping my faith under a lid. Faith is not meant to be suffocated – it needs to act and breathe Holy Spirit air. Now I just give everything to Jesus and leave it with Him. That can be a bit hair-raising, because the Lord always has His own timetable, however His kindness toward my growing faith In Him is always lovingly constant. 

The thing is, our Father’s plan is for us to grow up into the fullness of Jesus. “So Christ Himself gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers, to equip His people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ.” Ephesians 4:11-13.

That prophet, evangelist, pastor or teacher up the front of your church week by week is not simply there to become famous, or have a big church. That person is there to help you, as an individual, to grow to be like Jesus. The criteria for a great leader isn’t whether we like what they preach for not – it’s whether they challenge us week by week into using our own faith! Jesus learnt obedience through suffering. (Hebrews 5:8)  Yet He lived to do His Father’s Will! If that’s not what is happening to us, then we may have stepped into error and stopped listening or reading carefully. We can be deceived into thinking that  we are always supposed to like what the leader says. Phooey. That’s called tickling our ears. 

These things are a tests, and they can prevent us from living by faith. It’s an attitude of submissiveness that matters. We’ve been pampered for way too long. I think we need to learn how to be transformed by our circumstances, and become humble like Jesus was humble. He learnt from His earthly mother, father and teachers. Let’s remember …at the same time …He only made the Universe! His Mum once told Him ‘these people need a miracle please Son … ‘ and He did it.The fact that Jesus wasn’t keen on the idea helps me to realise that doing it is more important than liking it!  The Living Word submitted to earthly parents. Need I say more?

I don’t know why others go gaga over this subject, truly I don’t! For me this is a no-brainer. Sometimes people get into little groups, and then they prophesy criticism and doom over their leaders. You know, our God’s arms aren’t short! (Isaiah 59:1.) He’s still in charge, so unless the leader tells you to throw your kid into the mouth of Molech, or some other idiotic thing – remember, our God can teach us in a wilderness!  We could be amazed if we choose to let His love prevail, instead of our opinions. We gotta stop using the bible as a club to whack people who don’t happen to agree with us, upside-the-head.

Yesterday, we talked about swimming. Today I urge you to think about running, Even when we think we can go no further, our faith is destined for growth. Look at a long distance runner. They train their bodies, stretching them, so that they can go the distance. Hopefully, we are stretching our faith daily, training it to go further than we’ve ever gone before. Meanwhile, there are times when I can feel like I don’t have enough faith to blow my hat off! Let’s be logical for a second – how can I raise the dead when I can’t raise my own hopes? God already knows how to grow our faith, we need to simply take the next step, and that’s in the book. 

The next step might be telling someone you can’t stand that you are sorry that you haven’t been the sister/brother/mother/father/child/friend/believer you could have been! Repentance opens doors that are normally nailed shut. It even opens doors for that other person too! Our whole church society has become risk-averse. The people-who-don’t-know-Him-yet have an excuse, they have reprobate hearts. So they often blame the people who raised them for making them that way! Blame is a waste of energy and good health and it ought not to be so. In God’s world …we run on faith.

Let’s take some responsibility for our own actions. Nobody can change our past, but it is a great pity to let our past decisions run our future actions! The Bride-of-Christ simply must learn to take risks, by following our Bridegroom into the hard places. Following Jesus can be scary – you never know what He might ask you to do next! Bye. 👋

P 3048 Immaturity is not a bad word.

/ DVH

“Now, those who are mature in their faith can easily be recognized, for they don’t live to please themselves but have learned to patiently embrace others in their immaturity. Our goal must be to empower others to do what is right and good for them, and to bring them into spiritual maturity. For even Christ did not please Himself but, as it is written: “The insults of those who insult you have fallen on me.””“Whatever was written beforehand is meant to instruct us in how to live. The Scriptures impart to us encouragement and inspiration so that we can live in hope and endure all things. May the God Who gives endurance and encouragement give you the same attitude of mind toward each other that Christ Jesus had, so that with one mind and one voice you may glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.” Romans 15:1-6TPT.

Encouragement is not just saying: “gee you are a great guy” no matter whatever a brother or sister-in-Christ is doing. It may make you popular but that’s called lying!. We must not deny the truth to save someone else’s feelings. We are not here to build up anyone’s ego, etc., rather we hold up the truth so we can all see our mistakes and adjust our course. Love demands that we persists for as long as the Lord says. 

Biblical encouragement consists of verbal, physical and emotional help others to walk away from whatever is holding them captive — without becoming their entire support system. We want Jesus holding them up – not you or I. We fall down too, remember? Keep pointing them toward Him, and stay humble! Love does not look down upon others.

Sometimes people have daft beliefs and they can’t see that there was anything wrong with what they just did. Simple stuff that slips by someone, but we can’t afford to put our stamp of approval on it. Situations like this one: “It’s OK, God understands that you’ve decided to keep the $10 extra change you were overpaid in that shop. We need to go back and return it.”

Meanwhile, if you are like me, then you might say something like: “What on earth are you thinking? That’s called stealing!” OK, I’m blunt, but nevertheless hinting around is not encouragement. But lovingly holding up what God says, IS. We dare not continue to try to weasel out of our personal responsibility to take ownership for our own actions. After all, Saul stood by and approved of people killing Stephen, and God held him accountable.

Biblical encouragement always has a point! It is a sign of love, and it can also be a correction for someone else’s course of action when they are going the wrong way. The truth is that there will be times we need to say the same thing 487 times before the other person gets a revelation. Initially, they may not even hear us clearly! However, if my family member-in-Christ needs spiritual hearing aids, that does not mean I am licensed to shout at them. But it could mean we will do a little bible study together, asap!  

Human beings can be proud because they don’t like to be wrong – and this sometimes means that people may not take course-correction well. This is a good place to pray without ceasing! There will be many times when you get to the maximum input with someone, and the Lord Himself will say to us: “stand back, this is not your assignment any longer – I will deal with this.” However, if what we do isn’t coming from love, then we need to go after love for ourselves and self-correct! Impatience isn’t love. Sigh. It has taken me a while to figure that one out! 

Sadly there are also times when we can lose our own hope, because we have misunderstood the meaning of the word encouragement and the other person failed to listen. We are not meant to be a generic cheer squad turning a blind eye, no matter what is going on. Encouragement means we will give someone else courage to keep going – His way. It also means ‘I will stand with you while you learn.’ 

Personally, when I can see someone is headed down the wrong path because of their own deliberate choices – I go away and pray for them. Next time it will probably be me down that hole. “Therefore lift your drooping hands and strengthen your weak knees,…” Hebrews 12:12a. Maturity and encouragement mean that we stand in the gap until that person can stand with Him, by themselves. Love always looks for the good in others.

There have been many times I’ve suffered because I took someone else’s rejection and response to what I said, personally. There are things most of us don’t want to hear – and it is not personal at all, because the truth cuts right across our wrong theology. If someone else gets snippy at you because you held up His mirror, the Word of God – then that is their problem. It really isn’t personal. Even if it seems pretty personal when they tell you off!

Despite the fact that this whole area seems fraught with danger, true encouragement is actually His love-in-action, whether we like it or not. Immaturity is not a bad word, it is a place we all occupy from time to time as we follow Him. He is the Perfect One, we are His disciples, and some of us are on a giant learning curve. Let’s encourage one another with love and support in our hearts no matter what we need to say. Bye. 👋. 

For those of you who have been praying for me and the family about my mother’s illness, thank you. 🕊️I am so grateful. Your prayers were so powerful, they were tangible. My mother was finally released from this life last night, to go to be with the Lord. May God bless you for your loving intercession. 😢

P 2754 A most valuable tool.

/ DVH

One of the most useful tools in my interpersonal toolbox is the one that says: “my response is my responsibility.”  I have found it can be much too easy to blame the way I am responding, or reacting, onto someone else’s actions. Maybe someone ticks me off, and instead of doing something (prayerfully) about it, I let it go because I am busy and I don’t have time to poke about in my feelings, or sort out your not-so-nice attitude toward me. What’s inside me, that has been stored up – so to speak, and it will eventually come out … usually at another person!

Unfortunately that kind of neglect buries any difficulties – it does not clear them up. Buried things have a tendency to rot away and stink! The next time you do something that ticks me off, I will have a less tolerant attitude toward your actions. If you keep on bumping into my ever increasing irritation, eventually – I could feel justified to snipe back at you. However, there is no ownership in those actions. I have unrealistically, farmed out my responsibility for my emotions onto you, because I am expecting you to pull up your socks and stop ticking me off! 

The only person in charge of the way I respond is ME! I would be far better off handing my irritation over to the Lord, and asking Him to help me with it, instead of stuffing it down inside me … making it a time bomb waiting to go off. I don’t have to say anything to you unless He says I should… I simply talk to Him and ask Him to adjust my inner ‘dial’ so that I am not so sensitive to the argy bargy stuff that happens in this life. I ask Him for more love and less impatience, and could He please show me what is actually going on inside me?

Babies are a perfect example of uncontrolled emotions. They cry and crank, mainly because they don’t have any language for how they feel. So someone comes and picks them up to soothe them. We have a society full of people who do not know how to handle their own emotions and soothe themselves. They keep waiting for someone else to do it, or they will throw blame everywhere. These people shrug off their own responsibility to manage their anger, rage, whinging, weeping, irritation and plonk it onto the people who are annoying them. It might be the wife and kids, it could be the government, or a neighbour, but I can guarantee that if you ask them, it  will always be someone else’s fault they are angry, full of rage, or sad etc. It will never be their fault. 

This life has bad things in it. People do truly dreadful things to each other and they are not only not sorry – they’ve let the aforementioned storm inside them build up to gigantic uncontrollable levels. We need to learn, with God’s help – how to manage our own responses and reactions. 

Repentance and ownership of my own flaws and faults must be like breathing. The bible clearly tells us that we don’t have to feel bad, or even less than somebody else;   because we know Jesus died for ALL our sins. And I’m not better than them either. I am not perfect myself, and, despite my feelings, I am not as excessively fragile as I think.

God put a fighter in all of us – we are designed for transformation, so we will have to fight our own human inclination to retaliate. I need to use His weapons of warfare. Those weapons I choose will transform my inner life so that it is not a litany of other people’s faults playing over and over and over again. That’s why I read the Bible, I am looking for Him, plus my own sin, not yours!

Today I want to look at those two men who were crucified right alongside Jesus. One man was bitter, the other became bigger. That second man was also suffering but he made hard choices at an incredibly difficult time. BTW, they both deserved their punishment.  

Luke 23:32, 33: “Two others, both criminals, were led out to be executed with Him. When they came to a place called The Skull  they nailed Him to the cross. And the criminals were also crucified—one on His right and one on His left… … 39-42 “One of the criminals hanging beside Him scoffed, “So You’re the Messiah, are You? Prove it by saving Yourself—and us, too, while You’re at it!” But the other criminal protested, “Don’t you fear God even when you have been sentenced to die? We deserve to die for our crimes, but this man hasn’t done anything wrong.” Then he said, “Jesus, remember me when You come into your Kingdom.”

Ownership of our own faults is imperative to becoming a mature Christian. We must transform our self-talk by digesting the bible. Instead of dismissing ourselves as innocent, we need to remind ourselves that there is nothing that happens to us that is not Father-filtered. We need to ask for more FAITH to overcome our human inclinations. 1 Corinthians 13 is not a dream … it is a reality, ready to enter our lives, if we live prepared to press in and value the tools He has given us. If I truly want to be free I will deal with ME. Bye 👋