Joy

P 2993 Holy Spirit breathing – in and out.

/ DVH

“For athletic training only benefits you for a short season, but righteousness brings lasting benefit in everything; for righteousness contains the promise of life, for time and eternity.”1 Timothy 4:8 TPT.

One of the things that I love about this verse is anyone can do it.  You don’t have to be physically fit or train for 5 hours a day. Being trained by righteousness simply takes faith and dedication. The only thing that will stop any of us from living this way, are the choices we make. However, if we continually make the wrong choices it is like sticking our fingers in our ears and ignoring what the Lord is saying to us.

This option for spiritual fitness is available to all of us, because of what Jesus did for us. Ignoring the Holy Spirit is dangerous – so we need to train ourselves to listen to Him. When I don’t want to do whatever He asks me to do, I ask for His help to do it, then I do it anyway, using my faith. My job is to let God live in me and through me, just like Jesus did and the Lord Jesus gave us His own ability to do whatever God wants from us.

Romans 5:15-17: “Yet the rescuing gift is not exactly parallel to the death-dealing sin. If one man’s sin put crowds of people at the dead-end abyss of separation from God, just think what God’s gift poured through one man, Jesus Christ, will do! There’s no comparison between that death-dealing sin and this generous, life-giving gift. The verdict on that one sin was the death sentence; the verdict on the many sins that followed was this wonderful life sentence. If death got the upper hand through one man’s wrongdoing, can you imagine the breathtaking recovery life makes, absolute life, in those who grasp with both hands this wildly extravagant life-gift, this grand setting-everything-right, that the one man Jesus Christ provides?” 

We need to grab hold of what the Lord has already given us with both hands and not let go, using our faith. Instead of believing we are ‘not good’ at spiritual things, and keeping a record of our failures – or the disappointments we’ve experienced when we’ve prayed and the answer we wanted did not come. To increase our faith we meditate on Who He is, what He gave us, plus things we’ve seen Him do through us and in us. This is how we train ourselves to walk in faith with Him – we take note to encourage our hearts.

We all know Jesus succeeded in what He set out to do, so that’s where we look – not at our failures… but at His victory! He was perfectly righteous with God and His death and resurrection gave us the power and right to:“act in accord with God’s divine law.”  So any sin is to be owned, repented from and walked away from. The very word repent means ‘turn around and walk in the other direction.’ Our aim is to maintain God Himself living within us – just like Jesus did. Then, by actively choosing to live in His Grace – His way of acting and thinking – our response to this world will be unconditional LOVE.

Training yourself to live in a Godly fashion takes dedication to living aware of Him. However, our continuing response to God’s faithfulness can also deliver us from all kinds of evil. Dying to self, and living for Him means we choose to value Him above everything else. We lean on what He has given us. Jesus died and gave us His ability to live differently, we enter into that gift by using our faith. Just like we expect the bank to have our money when we make a withdrawal, we make faith withdrawals by ignoring our feelings and inclinations and obeying Him instead. We will encourage huge spiritual deposits into our lives by spending time with Him.  

Athletes train for years, to achieve goals, they employ self-discipline, plus a singular focus to achieve what they want. We also need to have just one focus, pleasing Him! If we live our ordinary everyday lives putting to death those things that will only give us temporary relief or pleasure, in favour of making Him Lord, then our joy increases. The more we want what He wants, the more He will give us opportunities to use our faith, and choose His Ways over our own. It seems impossible simply because we are so used to indulging our flesh. 

The Lord loves the secret place. He does not want us to see time spent with Him as a duty, rather it is a privilege and provision that Jesus willingly paid for, to give us an incredible kind of togetherness. An athlete rehearses their skill to improve it, but instead, we practice looking to Him daily to be our ever-present help — all day every day. This hones our focus, our total faith-driven reliance upon Him to be there and help us. 

Knowing what the Lord likes and wants, occurs as we read the book, then we do what it says, and use our faith to obey what we’ve read. As time passes we begin to carry His secret place within us, everywhere we go.  It’s like breathing: valuing Him and spending time with Him is IN… and going out and sharing what He gives us is breathing OUT. Athletes need good breathing as well as fitness … so do Christians! We also need active faith. As we learn to hear His voice and do whatever He asks us to do, we will learn Holy Spirit breathing. Bye 👋

P 2987 Tell someone what’s good about them.

/ DVH

“So I say to my soul, “Don’t be discouraged. Don’t be disturbed. For I know my God will break through for me.” Then I’ll have plenty of reasons to praise Him all over again. Yes, He is my saving grace!”Psalms 42:11 TPT. Critics often spring up all around us like field mushrooms, but an encouraging soul is a joy to those who live with them.

I have the above thought from Psalm 42, practically every single morning. Actually I think I have had it for a little bit more than 8 years! Daily I sit and stare at a blank page in ApplePages and wonder – what on earth I am going to write this time? My hubby often sends me scriptures that have spoken to him that day, and they inspire me into the flow of what God wants me to say. But sometimes I just have to tell my soul to “cheer up and get going!”

I think talking to our soul when we are under stress or strain is good for us. It establishes Ownership at a moment of great vulnerability. Psalm 42:11 says that like this in the KJV:“Why art thou cast down, O my soul? and why art thou disquieted within me? hope thou in God: for I shall yet praise Him, Who is the health of my countenance, and my God.”The Psalmist instructs his soul to turn away from despair and focus on God’s goodness and help. In other words, He’s talking to his own soul and telling it what to do. This is a fantastic thing to do, my spirit is the boss of my soul.

For me, the “hope in God” prayer is right up there with the “help” prayer…It sits right next to the: “I’m in pain and it is awful” prayer. I also have often prayed a prayer that says: “God can do anything.” I hold fast to that one too, and sometimes I throw in: “You can get me through this Lord.” But there are times when all I can do is to mumble: “God You are good.” I’d love to tell you that after praying these prayers the pain or hardship just melts away … but it doesn’t. Praying like that simply pulls my focus back onto Him and reminds me that I am no longer my own, SomeBody bought and paid for me!

Then I start to remember that Jesus suffered too, and He has always been utterly righteous, and He did not deserve what happened to Him. The Lord bore it all bravely, mostly in silence. There are definitely days when  I pray to be more like that! Faith to me, is utterly relying upon the Holy Spirit to get me out of whatever mess I have fallen into – whether it is pain or some dumb thing I have said or done. The truth is, I can’t live without Him and His wonderful guidance and help. At the same time I want to say that I’ve noticed that there can be some time between this kind of prayer and the answer, but it gets answered!

Like you, I fight discouragement a lot. Personally, I think it runs riot in our streets. And the news does not help me with it either. To be absolutely honest with you, I’ve discovered that very few Christians are often encouraging — and encouragement from our brothers and sisters is like a service station we pull into when we are running out of love. (Petrol!) Today I just want to briefly touch on what encouragement looks like. I have a dear friend and whenever she encourages me, she is specific. She says things like this: “when you said or did this, or that, I was helped by it.” Specific encouragement is like putting the highest grade petrol into someone’s tank — it gives them a whole lot more ‘go!’ 

Encouragement is not flattery. Actually flattery is about gaining something for yourself. It happens when someone says nice things to another person for their own purposes. However, encouragement enables the other person to get up again, and go on. This kind of encouragement has no gain, except to benefit the other person. It is a spiritual impartation of courage toward someone else, with no gain except that you want to see that other person receive hope again. It assists the person who has fallen over and needs to be lifted up, so they can believe that God is for them. We all limp, and fall down. And we all need help to stand up again!

So there are two kinds of encouragement, one from someone on the outside of our inner life, and the one that we deliberately choose to give ourselves when we need it. Learning to encourage yourself in the Lord is a worthy occupation. Like everything else we do, it takes faith that God will not only hear us, but He will help us in our time of need. The wonderful thing about our faith is that we only need a mustard seed of it to access the kingdom of God! 

God knows whatever source we need, whether it is self-encouragement, by speaking to our souls, or external encouragement from our brothers and sisters. And in my experience, sometimes we need both! Encouragement is listed as a spiritual gift in Romans 12:8. But we are all instructed to do it in 1 Thessalonians 5:11. “Therefore encourage one another and build each other up, just as in fact you are doing.”

So keep up the good work and keep asking for His inspiration to encourage others. This road can be long and hard and we all need help along the way. Tell someone what’s good about them! And don’t forget, we can always speak to our own soul too. Bye. 👋

P 2982 Dig and insist.

/ DVH

“Stop dwelling on the past. Don’t even remember these former things. I am doing something brand new, something unheard of. Even now it sprouts and grows and matures. Don’t you perceive it? I will make a way in the wilderness and open up flowing streams in the desert.”Isaiah 43:18-19 TPT.

Sometimes when we hear verses like those two above, we can hear it as a prophecy for the whole church. I’ve heard it quoted that way many times. But we also need to remember that God has always His eyes on each and every sparrow, so when we read verses like these we need to ask Him: “Lord, how does this apply to me, please?” We always need to personalise what is said … and then action it. 

Today, I want to concentrate on the fact that these two verses are for YOU, right here, right now. Our glorious Father, God, takes the messes we make in our lives and transforms them so wonderfully, that we don’t recognise them any more. He is so brilliant at it, I have had to pray: “And dear Lord please put a big sign over what You have done because I’m a bit thick and I will probably miss Your answer otherwise.” Sad but true. 

It is a fact of life that we can easily prejudge how our answers to prayer are supposed to look. I know I am stating the blooming obvious, but the Lord can do more than one thing at a time! Because Jesus paid our debt for us, it is His prerogative to answer however He likes. After all His answers are always for our good and far better than anything we can think up! They just don’t always look the way we think they should.

That’s why we need eyes to see Him at work. They really matter in instances like these – I ask for ‘His eyes’ all the time. The thing is, if what He does is ‘brand new,’ then our chances of knowing what it is in advance are most likely zero! However, the way we tell that it is His work is that it GROWS, and it produces life, and more life. Plus when that life flows out, away from us, it does other people good.

In this brief passage we also learn that dwelling on the things of the past is d.u.m.b. stupid. But we do it. It seems we have this inherent desire to find someone else to blame for our behaviour and reactions – read Genesis.  Adam and Eve passed blame about like we would pass the salt!  We blame our parents, our schools, our jobs, our friends, society etc. Nobody talks about personal choices any more. Death to self has always been difficult.  Even when it seems like there is no choice … taking a default position is still a choice. 

This is why we desperately need to renew our minds, so we can think and see things from His point of view. Otherwise we self-protect! Our own personal point of view can often be clouded by the past, and a hidden dominant sense of self. In another version, the above verse is written like this: “SEE,I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it?” This verse is the utter joy of our faith and life. The old is gone, the new is here. God says ‘SEE” … because most of the time we miss it!

If we want more insight into His Ways and thoughts, we need to make what He has already said, our priority. When we read His word in faith believing that He will speak to us, today— even if we are reading somewhere that seems more boring than somewhere else—He will speak to us. It is our expectancy/faith … that is the key to opening the door to fresh revelation.

And if I don’t get anything from what I am reading the first time, then I read it again. Then I read it out loud. Then I read it in another version. I have been known to read five or six versions to fully understand what He is saying to me. Insisting is the best kept secret. And sometimes we will have to break through a wall of unbelief we have constructed, to release our faith! 

Yeah, yeah I can hear someone up the back saying: “That’s alright with you lady, but I have to go to work most days and look after my family, etc. I don’t have all day!”  And that’s the problem, Jesus is not your first priority, dealing with any immediate needs is. That happens to me too! In other words the Lord is an add-on. Whatever bashes on your life and says: ‘Fix me now’ is a distraction. He must be our first thought even if someone is bleeding out! (Help!) We can’t afford to fit God in around our routine – we will deal with whatever happens far better after we look to Jesus—otherwise everything goes Kaput! 

If you follow the “I’m very busy” thread of logic back to its source, you will find that Jesus is not our first priority. This kind of attitude is not intentional, sadly what we have failed to realise is that Christianity is not a part-time commitment. Many people make excuses for their lack of engagement with the Lord. (Matthew 22:1-14.) Our failure is not the issue —our priorities are. We cannot afford have a part-time faith in a full-time hell-bent world! Try having a part-time faith the next time your ceiling falls in on you, it doesn’t work. “For me to LIVE is Christ …!!!” 

We need Him like we need air, and in order to get ‘our daily bread’ we need to dig and insist.The Lord spoke to me  today from that one word…“SEE!” Because I didn’t ‘see’ right away…but now I do.  Bye. 👋

P 2973 My Strength and Song.

/ DVH

Isaiah 12:1-6: “And you will say in that day, “I thank You, God. You were angry but Your anger wasn’t forever. You withdrew Your anger and moved in and comforted me. “Yes, indeed—God is my salvation. I trust, I won’t be afraid. God—yes God!—is my strength and song, best of all, my salvation!” Joyfully you’ll pull up buckets of water from the wells of salvation. And as you do it, you’ll say, “Give thanks to God. Call out His Name. Ask Him anything! Shout to the nations, tell them what He’s done, spread the news of His great reputation! “Sing praise-songs to God. He’s done it all! Let the whole earth know what He’s done! Raise the roof! Sing your hearts out, O Zion! The Greatest lives among you: The Holy of Israel.”

This scripture is a wonderful example of someone enjoying Almighty God and all He has done for each one of us. This is our true destiny – to enjoy God Himself. And that’s not just worshipping Him with songs etc. Sunday by Sunday either. Daily being grateful, and noticing whatever He does lifts our hearts like nothing else. I love that Isaiah is realistic, he does not pretend he is perfect. Instead, he features what God does about his imperfections.This guy’s whole perspective has changed, he is so soaked in joy for all God has done for us, he’s dripping all over the carpet!

I love it in the Old Testament when people say stuff they cannot know, purely because they are under the influence of the precious Holy Spirit! Jesus Christ is all over these verses. He’s the reason we, the Gentiles, can stand and sing our hearts out – because He came and changed the whole game-plan. Just stop reading for a minute and ask the Lord to help you to pull up a couple of buckets full of the joy of your salvation. That will help you more than reading what I am waffling on about. You know, sometimes I think we don’t have a song because we have our lives so organised there is nothing to be delivered from!

These verses in Isaiah remind me of Moses’ and Miriam’s song. I can’t put it here in full because it was a huge spontaneous song that just flowed out of everyone, as they gave thanks for Who He is and what He did … in front of their very eyes!  Exodus 15. They broke out the tambourines and just let it rip! After all they had seen the sea standing still and they walked on the bottom of the ocean! Water standing still is in the bible a few times, its in Exodus 14;  Joshua 3:16;  Psalm 89:9 … the thing is: God had already pushed aside the water away from the land underneath, all the way back in Genesis 1:6-7. And people wonder where fossils found on land come from. Duh! Read the book!

I think I’m going to be stuck all day singing Miriam’s song in my head… there’s so much joy in it. (Pity I haven’t got a tambourine at hand!) I don’t think we know anything about rejoicing in the Western world and I’m not sure we’ve met JOY yet either…We need joy! He’s always doing things for us. That’s the kind of wonderful God we serve!! Always caring, ever-present. Isaiah understands the idea that God’s plans are long-range and he acts accordingly, expectantly. His faith level is off the charts as the man says: … “ask Him anything.”!!

Isaiah has been to heaven, before the Throne, and his perspective is now clear, it is not clouded by this world’s troubles. But, because of what Christ did for us, the bible makes these things clear to US in Ephesians 2:6 MSG:“It wasn’t so long ago that you were mired in that old stagnant life of sin. You let the world, which doesn’t know the first thing about living, tell you how to live. You filled your lungs with polluted unbelief, and then exhaled disobedience. We all did it, all of us doing what we felt like doing, when we felt like doing it, all of us in the same boat. It’s a wonder God didn’t lose His temper and do away with the whole lot of us. Instead, immense in mercy and with an incredible love, He embraced us. He took our sin-dead lives and made us alive in Christ. He did all this on His own, with no help from us! Then He picked us up and set us down in highest heaven in company with Jesus, our Messiah.”

Right about now we should all be searching for a tambourine! Father God has done so much for all of us it blows my mind, over and over again. I can’t believe His intentional devotion to someone like me. I know I deserved hell, yet in His great mercy He provided — A WAY.  A way for me to know Him and live with my heart already in heaven, even if my feet can sometimes be still stuck in the mud and muck of this life. When pain haunts me – and it does sometimes – I can look toward Him and be radiant.

This is what being seated in heavenly places is all about. Isaiah experienced it and he was not the same afterward. You and I may not have his experience, but we know the same God he knows and …  ‘our God never changes.’ He’s not mad at you and he’s not mad at me, even though we fall over and fail Him. This is why Paul said: “For to me, to live is Christ and to die is gain.”Philippians 1:21. This man was in prison in Rome when he wrote those lines. But he knew the Beautiful One in Isaiah 12:1-6, and this is why I think he said: “… nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus.” Romans 8:31.

🎼“I will sing unto the Lord for He has triumphed gloriously the horse and rider thrown into the sea. The Lord my God, my strength my song, has now become my victory!…”🎶 Bye. 👋

P 2971 You can find Jesus anywhere and everywhere!

/ DVH

“My heart and soul explode with joy—full of glory! Even My body will rest confident and secure. For You will not abandon Me to the realm of death, nor will You allow Your Faithful One to experience corruption.” The Lord Jesus is all over the bible! Right here, for instance in Psalm 16:9-10, hundreds of years before the Lord arrived – there is a wonderful statement where we can clearly see His hope in God’s faithfulness. Obedience, hope and faith took our Lord to the cross. And faith in His Father’s Word kept Him there, until God’s plan was completed. Imagine that!

Our Lord has not ever asked us to do anything He has not already done Himself, and He did everything fully co-operating with the Holy Spirit, in obedience to His Father’s wishes… Jesus cultivated and lived in Love, and He didn’t move away from there…He had the Grace of total obedience. I pray for that a lot!. Some of the things that the Lord Jesus did are beyond words. Like this one:

John 13:3-5“Jesus knew that the Father had put all things under His power, and that He had come from God and was returning to God;  so He got up from the meal, took off His outer clothing, and wrapped a towel around his waist.  After that, He poured water into a basin and began to wash His disciples’ feet, drying them with the towel that was wrapped around Him.”

This scripture sets a precedent for each one of us — Jesus showed us two ways to cultivate humility. The first is this …we can deliberately choose the lowest place. I don’t think there is a more beautiful action than this one. The God of the Universe sent His Son to serve mankind and redeem us all, and yet right before his crucifixion occurred, Jesus humbled Himself even further, by washing His disciples’ feet. Astonishing!

The King of all Kings, and Lord of all Lords was kneeling on the floor washing those grubby, travel-worn feet. (22 of them!) I prayed about this brief episode, and it occurred to me that in the bible it says that the ones who take the gospel of good news everywhere —have beautiful feet. The disciples went on to take the gospel everywhere. I think this was a prophetic action – a statement of things to come. He is everywhere, in the lowest position – except for the last book, then watch out!

Another example I want to mention is at the cross, He submitted to His tormentors without a word.  Speaking for myself I’ve always got plenty of words … sigh! Jesus suffered the incredible pain of utter separation from both of His constant companions, the Holy Spirit, and the beyond words loss of His Father’s Presence for us too. “He Who knew no sin, was made sin for us…”

During His time on earth, the Lord Jesus walked in complete intimacy with both The Holy Spirit and His Father … minute by minute, day by day. I believe this means we can walk with Them like that too. We simply need to put the Holy Spirit’s needs, and ways, above our own. As each one of us eventually approaches death, we can do so with great confidence, because we remember that Jesus has already walked through death’s door on our behalf. He’s waiting for us and we will not die alone, our Saviour went there for us too.

He flung that door open for every human being that has ever lived on this planet. Death cannot hold any of us captive.. I used to explain it to my kids like this – death is simply somewhere else where we can’t see people for a while — like another room. People are not gone. Some will sleep and some are already dancing through the streets of heaven.

The enemy has no right to hold any of us captive to the fear of death because of what Jesus did for us. It goes without saying that we should be spreading this info around to anyone who will listen while we still have the chance! Death is a door not a destination. Even if we have spiritual unhealthy thoughts about hell, let’s remember that Jesus also went there too, and He held a parade when He came OUT!  

And my last example is this:  Jesus’ glory knocked Saul His persecutor to the ground.“As he neared Damascus on his journey, suddenly a light from heaven flashed around him.He fell to the ground and heard a voice say tohim,“Saul, Saul, why do you persecute Me?“Who are you, Lord?” Saul asked. “I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting,” He replied. …” Acts 9:3-8. There is no place we can go that He will not be there with us… He’s the Good Good Shepherd, remember?  Bye 👋

P 2961 God is not angry with you.

/ DVH

Isaiah 12:1-6:“And you will say in that day, “I thank You, God. You were angry but Your anger wasn’t forever. You withdrew Your anger and moved in and comforted me. “Yes, indeed—God is my salvation. I trust, I won’t be afraid. God—yes God!—is my strength and song, best of all, my salvation! He’s done it all! Let the whole earth know what He’s done! Raise the roof! Sing your hearts out, O Zion! The Greatest lives among you: The Holy of Israel.” 

Instead of thinking we know what verses like these mean – perhaps we need to pray about them …as well as praying them over ourselves! You and I have greatly benefited from what Isaiah saw and understood. Did you get the prophet’s response? As he saw these things he’s comforted and strengthened – plus he found trust, and he let go of fear! Isaiah also saw that God Himself would move in to live inside us.Because of what the entire New Testament says, we know the truth of what this great prophet saw! Isaiah saw God withdraw His anger toward mankind and he saw all of us being sooo happy about it. If you’re happy and you know it tell your face!

I think that in the Presence of God’s greatness and goodness, Isaiah was given the capacity to comprehend that God was going to withdraw His anger from all of mankind, and he saw it as if it was happening at that moment. This man of God was in heaven at that time, in the eternal NOW – where there is no past, present or future. In subsequent chapters he also saw that God’s own Son would come here and pay the price for our sin, and that one incredible action means God withdrew His anger — because the Lord Jesus voluntarily took the punishment that belongs to every man, woman and child.

You and I are living our everyday humdrum lives inside these verses. We are living in the bit that says He comforts us so we can be joyful. My question today is this: have you comprehended what God did for you, is for today, it is for now? You could be living in a pig pen or a penthouse, a war zone or a peaceful place but because of Jesus, and everything He did, you now have God’s favour. We have a book that testifies to that. Salvation is not ‘pie in the sky when we die’ He wants us to be happy with what He did for us right now. Almighty God took all His anger out on Christ. Isn’t that astonishing!  Boy do those thoughts blow my tiny mind! 

I cannot comprehend how our Heavenly Father God could hurt SomeOne He loves  … but He did — and He did it for our sake. “When my father and my mother forsake me, then the Lord will take me up.”We know that these verses are prophetic, because in Isaiah the Lord is talking about “in that day.” I believe THAT day is THIS day to us … it has been THIS day for the last 2,000 years. I think this day lasts until the Lord Jesus comes back. We hurt His heart when we choose to sin and live outside of His enormous provision of Grace.

You know, I cannot imagine letting evil men do evil things to my son… e-v-e-r. Even if I knew there was an incredible greater good involved. But that’s what God’s love looks like. He counted the cost and decided we were worth it – how astonishing.  At Pentecost, when the Holy Spirit came, He made those people who were waiting in that upper room — NEW. The One Who created the world …recreated them! Our job is to trust what He did then, is totally true today. Now day by day we can be recreated in Christ’s image, and glorify God. 

Isaiah was given an expanded view of the wisdom, long-suffering and deep deep love God Himself has for all of us. Even if we erroneously believe that the Lord is angry with us, here is something concrete. We learn it from this passage – God’s anger did not last – His goodness won. And all that happened before we were born! Not only that, He wants to comfort us when we are suffering, that is also why Christ came. We see this in the way Jesus treated people. Changed circumstances are not our strength and song … HE IS. God illustrated personally, and publicly, for all time, and for all mankind to see — that Love is prepared to wait for the best outcome, no matter what it costs and how hard it is to bear.

Sometimes we cannot embrace these concepts because the world has taught us that we need to feel good, in order for things to be good. We think trouble should be far far away from us. But God’s Ways are not our ways, they are higher than ours. There is a greater good! The only way we can see this life, things like terrible situations around us, is through His eyes. We don’t know LOVE well enough yet. After all He might joyfully pardon someone we might want to punish! WE desperately NEED HIS EYES to view the people and situations around us. 

Our personal opinions have been bent by circumstances and selfishness. People see love as getting what they want. What our God sees as Love is almost a foreign language to most of us. In spite of our inadequacies, our unbelief, our God is not angry with us, His anger was satisfied by what Christ did. We will find our strength in what He has already given you. Bye for today, 👋

P 2960 Are you ‘sanctified and enriched?’

/ DVH

“To the church of God in Corinth, to those sanctified (set apart, made holy) in Christ Jesus, who are selected and called as saints (God’s people), together with all those who in every place call on and honour the Name of our Lord Jesus Christ, their Lord and ours: Grace to you and peace [inner calm and spiritual well-being] from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. I thank my God always for you because of the grace of God which was given you in Christ Jesus, so that in everything you were [exceedingly] enriched in Him, in all speech [empowered by the spiritual gifts] and in all knowledge [with insight into the faith].” 1 Corinthians 1:2-6.

You know, the first night someone eats great spaghetti bolognese it is yummy, everybody enjoys it. But if you leave some for another night, the left-overs will be enriched by time, and the melding together of the various flavours into something new and even more fabulous. Tickling our taste buds into a deeper experience. After we are saved, we learn to love like He did so that the flavour of our life is sweet, rich and good to those around us.

Christians are destined to do more than give mental assent to the truths in the bible – we are destined, right here, and right now, today, to mirror the love and life of Christ to everyone we meet and know. God’s sanctification and richness are meant to flow through us, so He can touch the lives of everyone around us. These holy things, the qualities that are in Christ Jesus, need to soak into our lives and join together to produce a brand  new sanctified, greatly enriched SELF! 

God didn’t just re-vamp us when Jesus saved us, or even update us with some sort of fantastic, whizz-bang upgrade. He totally transformed our lives with His love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control as we practice yielding and co-operating with Him. We are permanently changed and … wait for it … ENRICHED and made HOLY.  We are destined to become what He planned for us from the very beginning of time.  Because of Jesus’ sacrifice, we can be bigger and sweeter, and more loving than we can comprehend.

Sadly it is too easy to be the product of this fallen world all around us. We’ve been influenced, battered and blasted by other imperfect people, who are just like us. Living within relationships and situations beyond our control. Those things have shaped us into the kind of people who live to hide to protect ourselves against the ugly things of this world. There is healing in the blood of Jesus. God planned for His kids, to volunteer to exhibit the same qualities that Jesus Himself had from the beginning of time. And this process is not about what we can do by ourselves. Just like the spaghetti gets better from soaking in its own flavours, we get better and richer by soaking in His love for us and spreading that flavour around.

Christ opened something that can never be closed again when He died in our place. He tore open in this world the forces that imprisoned all of mankind to sin, death and destruction. He flung opened the door to the possibility of change! We have been given the power to choose to be transformed under the Holy Spirit’s influence. Now, if you are happy with who you are right now, then perhaps that is not going to seem like such a wonderful gift. BUT! If being like He was, in this world, seems like a dream to you, cheer up! It’s now a reality.

How do we get there? We go through the same door of death Jesus went through, and we choose to die to what we want, like He did, minute by minute. By the way, I don’t mean you literally kill yourself!  We are to die to self, by giving up our right to live this life the way we want to, the way we planned for ourselves. And instead we deliberately choose to lay our lives down for His sake, just like the Lord did for us – using our faith to do it.

Then you and I will come out the other side of those everyday, deliberately made choices transformed. Selfishness, spite, anger, lying, murder – all those things that have held us captive to our own personal circumstances – even the choices we have made so far –  melt away under the power of what Christ did for us. The way to be transformed, is to choose to yield our will to His will. 

And that is not a part-time job, it is a life-time of day-by-day specifically chosen decisions to live this life Christ’s way. Jim Elliot, the modern martyr, said this better than I can: “He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep, to gain that which he cannot lose.” And the bible itself says that like this: “For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake will find it.” Matthew 16:25.

We will all die eventually, but it is how we choose to live from day to day that matters. We can live this life grabbing at all we can, to meet whatever needs we’ve picked up along the way. Constantly angry with others because they are trapped as much as we are … or we can choose to live His Way. Having a servant’s heart and loving those people around us this world pronounces unloveable. BTW, we are ALL unloveable!! And we all have our own nifty little devices to hide that fact from the world around us.

To live like Christ did, we learn from the Holy Spirit Himself, to be the change we want to see. We too can be sanctified and enriched and be like the Lord in every circumstance, as we choose to die to our old way of thinking and start to embrace and act on His ways. He died to give us the power to change and live a brand new life. What are we doing with that power? Bye. 👋

P 2946 Learn to trust Him, no matter what happens.

/ DVH

“I know what it means to lack, and I know what it means to experience overwhelming abundance. For I’m trained in the secret of overcoming all things, whether in fullness or in hunger. And I find that the strength of Christ’s explosive power infuses me to conquer every difficulty.” Philippians 4:13 TPT.

When I read this verse In Philippians, I can see that good or bad experiences can teach us things that we cannot learn any other way. Paul had learnt from the Lord Himself, that everything that happened to him, the good and the bad, the ugly, and everything in between – was an opportunity to be trained in God’s Ways. He learnt to accept His Heavenly Father’s help in every situation. He found that he could overcome whatever came at him, I believe he used the circumstances to train his faith in God’s goodness. 

Faith is not just memorising what God likes in this circumstance or that situation, and doing that to please Him. Faith is knowing that whatever situation we find ourselves in, Almighty God will always do what is right and best for us – despite how it looks from our end. If it isn’t good yet, then we are not at the end. And sometimes the very best end result is that you have come to know the Lord better than you did before the difficulties started! Our society is so geared to fixing things so ‘life works for me,’ and that can creep over into our way of thinking about the things of God.

No matter where we find ourselves, or what kind of day we’ve walked into, the Lord’s is always there with us to help us to overcome whatever comes our way. His strength is eternal. I think that thought needs to be steeped in a bit. OK, you can see that I read that word ‘infused’ in the verse in Philippians, and I thought about tea! Just like some people enjoy a cuppa, and they let the tea bag sit in the boiling water for a while, we need to voluntarily soak in Jesus’ power, His Presence, His Word, and let it soak into us and through us by acting on it. When we let the Word of God penetrate further than our brain, it automatically saturates the rest of our behaviour and attitudes, and, at the same time, it releases more faith in Him and His ability to transform us.

Many people travel long distances to go to places where they think God might turn up. It seems to me that they’ve forgotten, or maybe they didn’t know in the first place, that God actually goes wherever it is they are going – with them! We don’t have to go somewhere to “get” God – He has already “gotten” us! We are, after all, His temple! However, when a whole lot of people get together, we have something that I call a collective agreement to worship and learn about Jesus, and that’s just lovely.

That’s a place the Lord likes to inhabit because it is something He told His disciples: “Wherever two or more gathered together in My Name, there I am in the midst of them.” That same thought is also said in the Old Testament. “Behold, how good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity!” Psalm 133:1. We are in unity when we deliberately gather together to worship Him and learn more about His Ways. We have a common purpose. But this is not the only way to learn about Him.

Anybody who chooses to use to use their faith to overcome hard things in their lives can learn more about the Way God does things. Those kinds of choices change our perception and our experience of Him. Please be aware, that in any and every circumstance we experience, the Holy Spirit wants to grow His fruit. And never ever forget that one of His fruits is JOY! Our walk with Jesus is meant to produce JOY, actually … ‘joy unspeakable and full of glory!’

So what does that mean? It means if all we do is follow rules and regulations we are not growing fruit. We have to follow our Heavenly GARDENER around to learn how to produce fruit – so we need to submit to the difficulties in our lives with our faith in His goodness, intact. We are not destined to live straightened joyless lives, we are destined to walk, daily, minute by minute with the One Who knows how to grow joy in the midst of suffering and trials.

We can walk with Him far more easily when we actively practice living in His love toward others, through our actions as well as our words. We don’t have to have a list of rules five miles long, we simply need to remind ourselves “Is what I just said or did, LOVE?” It is extremely important to remember that I can’t define LOVE. HE already did that, in the book. If I can define it then I am in charge of it, and I can make up the actions to suit myself.

For instance, patience isn’t just about saying nothing in the face difficulties, it means we are actively supportive and loving toward the one who is learning!  And faithfulness cannot ‘run out of patience’ either!  Its aim is to be true to the One Who oversees every life, not just mine. And self control is the result of loving God more than I love my own opinion or my own way! 

Paul trusted God’s ways over his own. He let the bad things in this life become opportunities to face those things God’s Way. This meant that He was trained to recognise God’s actions by the results in his own life. He saw and learnt what was flesh, what was not, and what was actually real fruit from the Holy Spirit!  And he actively allowed God to infuse every cell in his body with His power and purposes. Bless you, bye. 👋

P 2934 A true Shepherd.

/ DVH

We have been watching a vlog on YouTube about a senior couple from Azerbaijan, who live a very simple life. They harvest whatever is around them, and store things up for the severe winters that are bound to come. Today, they had a shepherd and his flock of sheep as part of the vlog, and he inspired me to think about Jesus. 

This wonderful old man just stood, or sometimes sat, watching over his sheep. That’s what he does. In the wind and the rain, in the snow, in sunshine, and the heat of the day, all day long – this old man watches over his flock, and protects them. He knows their worth. And if they wander off, then he herds them back, to where he wants them, and makes sure they are safe. That elderly Azerbaijanian, with a face carved by age, and experience, is a good shepherd.

That’s the picture Jesus chose to give us about Himself, to help us relate to Him. And this is what He does, minute by minute, for each one of us …He leads us – He never drives us along….“I am the good shepherd. The good Shepherd lays down His life for the sheep. The hired hand is not the shepherd and does not own the sheep. So when he sees the wolf coming, he abandons the sheep and runs away. Then the wolf attacks the flock and scatters it. The man runs away because he is a hired hand and cares nothing for the sheep.“I am the good shepherd; I know My sheep and My sheep know Me— just as the Father knows Me and I know the Father—and I lay down My life for the sheep.”John 10:11-15.

Nothing escapes the Lord Jesus’ gaze, He does not fall asleep on the job, or take a walk … because He is bored out of His gourd with our boring little seemingly pointless lives … NO! His eyes are firmly fixed upon each one of us. He knows if even one of us goes missing. Someone bailed out of our family a couple of years ago, and we haven’t laid eyes on them since. I pray for their safe return all the time – I don’t pray because I have to pray, I pray because I can’t help but pray! The Holy Spirit reminds me that this person’s absence hurts Him far more than me!

Sometimes my dear hubby is up almost all night praying for someone or other.He keeps right on praying for the people we meet on the road. That’s what a true shepherd does – he is faithful to his flock. He doesn’t just teach the sheep, he doesn’t push and exhort them not to be so dumb, he doesn’t even necessarily prophesy over them etc. He watches over and protects his flock. You know, maybe parents are also a kind of shepherd.

Years ago, I used to take my three very small children to the shops in all kinds of weather. It was a big walk, about 2 kms up a very large hill and they all learnt to stretch their little legs as they did it. If they got really tired then they hopped into the pusher. When we got to the shops I had a particular habit. As I walked with them around me, I would count,1. 2. 3. And I looked for their little heads bobbing along in the store in front of me. It was like my head was on a swivel. 1,2,3, all present and accounted for! I always knew when a little head disappeared.

I guess I was remembering those times today, when I watched this old shepherd. He knew every one of his sheep and he would definitely know if one wandered off. He leant on his staff, and watched carefully over them to make sure they were safe. As you probably already know, sheep are remarkably stupid – they need watching! I’ve seen one leap into the air and then the next one jumped in the same spot and the next and the next etc. .But there was nothing there for them to jump over. No wonder we call them dumb!

Human beings also do the dumbest things. Sometimes we know we are going the wrong way and doing the wrong thing, and yet we do it anyway. That’s what a lack of ongoing transformation does. It ushers us into a stupid state where we erroneously think whatever we are choosing to do, won’t matter and God won’t mind. ‘After all our Heavenly Father loves us, and He knows we just can’t help it!’   We stupidly make room for sin, when we need to oppose it. What a load of rubbish that attitude is!

Time not spent in His Presence is time wasted. Our good Shepherd always wants to be with us – leading us to greener pastures, protecting us from harm, making us lie down in safe places. Jesus chose to make Himself our very own Shepherd when He died in our place, and then He deliberately sent back His Holy Spirit to be everywhere. He knows we need SomeOne to be with us and watch over us. The Holy Spirit imparts love and joy etc. freely, daily “…we are His people the sheep of His pasture.”

Jesus’ sacrifice needs to be in the forefront of our minds, that’s a cultivated skill. He has never, and will never EVER forget us, or pass us over…This world may not know us or care about us, but the Lord is always our ever-prayerful, deeply-involved Shepherd. Whether we are injured, beaten up or lost … even if it is our own fault …Jesus will always come after us. No thief, wolf or foe can steal us away from Him. He fought every demon in hell and defeated them so He could call us His very own. 

Jesus is our true Shepherd. He will not leave us or forsake us, or give any one of us up – not without a fight!  Bless you 👋

P 2933 Joy is not just happiness.

/ DVH

I’ve learnt this truth from experience, even as I have grown older. When I was about 40 years old, I was misdiagnosed with liver cancer and told I had 6 weeks to live. To confirm that diagnosis I had to undergo a series of large needle biopsies to find the whereabouts of the cancer. A biopsy means you have a local anaesthetic into the area to start with, and then they poke a hole in the liver. If you’ve ever had a biopsy you will know what I mean. 

So the consultant did the biopsy and phoned for results. Negative for cancer.. So she did it again – negative. Apparently it is dangerous to repeat this test over and over, yet they did it 18 times on me, that day. My liver consultant, on the phone, insisted they were missing what he wanted, and he made the female consultant do it again and again, and the results all still came back negative. Even experts can be wrong. At the same time I had to lie perfectly still while they did this test.

After 18 times, the specialist consultant was crying, and so was I .. silently. Tears were pouring down my face but I couldn’t sob or cry out loud because the liver is a vascular organ, it bleeds very badly. So poking holes in it meant I could haemorrhage if I moved, so I had to lie still. In the end I heard this lovely lady yelling at the liver specialist that there was nothing there and she refused to take anymore specimens. Boy was I grateful!! 

They trundled me back to the ward, to lie on my side, doomed to lay there, absolutely still, for at least 8 hours. Fortunately the liver clots quite quickly, but because mine was not functioning properly it was more of a problem. The various liver specialists were so convinced that I had cancer, I had to have a major operation, so they could actually see the liver. It turned out I did not have it, I had an auto immune disease. That’s also when I learnt that joy is not necessarily happiness, because that was when I found out I needed a liver transplant!

Now, let’s look at a commentary, in Isaiah, about Jesus’ suffering: “I GAVE My back to the smiters, and My cheeks to them that plucked off the hair: I hid not My face from shame and spitting. For the Lord God will help Me; therefore shall I not be confounded: therefore have I set My face like a flint, and I know that I shall not be ashamed. He is near that justifieth Me; who will contend with Me? Let us stand together: who is Mine adversary? Let him come near to Me.”Isaiah 50:6-8.

The full details of the Lord’s crucifixion appear in Matthew 27, Mark 15, Luke 23 and John 19. Those details reminded me today of that particular day in my own life, long ago. It powerfully reminded me about how hard it must have been for the Lord to keep still as He let them beat Him, shredding the skin off His back. Then they shoved those awful thorns into His dear head, pulled out His beard, and hammered those huge nails into His hands. He did not cry out in pain – the bible tells us He was silent as a sheep is going to the slaughter. He did not choose to retaliate against His tormentors or try to escape.

When the Lord reminded me about that time of difficulty I had, long ago, I remembered all I wanted to do was escape! Imagine the level of self-control Jesus must have had, the love, the patience, despite severe provocation, and the injustice of it all! My consultant, a perfect stranger, kept yelling down the phone: “This is not fair, it’s torture.” But Jesus had nobody to speak for Him. He LET those soldiers carve our names into the palms of His hands with those huge nails. He could have called for angels. Angels were present at His birth. But in this terrible process they were absent. He kept silent and still, and endured the cross because He could see all of mankind on the other side of it. I said all that to say this: “For the joy that was set before Him He endured the cross.” Hebrews 12:2.

WE are His joy! His sacrifice made our transformation possible when He let those soldiers do what they were doing, even though they were tormenting and torturing Him beyond our imagining. Joy comes from completing the Father’s will. You know, the Lord Jesus did not deserve what happened to Him. It was deliberate, a malicious spite-filled action filled with hate, murder, rage and jealousy and death. 

Pilate himself did his best to walk that huge surge of evil, murderous emotion in the crowd, back. … But the Jews were determined. At the same time their prognosis of Jesus’ purpose was wrong! The same people who cheered Him and sang “hosanna”and threw their coats down in front of the donkey He was sitting on … cried out; “Crucify Him.” A week later!

Human beings are often evil, fickle and selfish, and despite all our best efforts we are often very wrong. As Christians we must learn to be pliable within His hands… even as we pray and believe for deliverance and release from any captivity. Almighty God promised us all far more than a nice car, a house, a good job, a perfect spouse, plus intelligent perfectly healthy kids!… He promised He’d make us like Him!🤔 JOY is not the same as happiness – happiness comes and goes. .

Happiness is this world’s answer to everything. True Joy is a fruit of the Holy Spirit. That fruit grows in the face of sorrow and suffering. It grows even when you lose someone you dearly love, or someone betrays you, or even if the doctor is totally wrong. It grows as we let Him rule and reign in our lives. Bye. 👋