Master builder

P 3112 Bob the Builder just won’t do.

/ DVH

“If God’s grace doesn’t help the builders, they will labor in vain to build a house. If God’s mercy doesn’t protect the city, all the sentries will circle it in vain. It really is senseless to work so hard from early morning till late at night, toiling to make a living for fear of not having enough. God can provide for His devoted lovers even while they sleep!” Psalms 127:1-2 TPT

Psalm 127 has impacted me, because in the past, I was one of the wrong kind of builders, labouring in vain to make sure my ‘house’ looked good, ran fairly smoothly, and everyone in it was kept happy! I wanted to be a good witness for Jesus – and I failed.That’s too much weight for any human being — that’s why Jesus told us to give HIM our burdens! I had no idea that labouring in the flesh, together with maintaining positive talk – without any real substance to it— meant God was not building what He wanted, because I was in His way!

The real blessing of Jesus’ redemption is that it takes the mess we’ve made and utterly renews it, through asking for, and receiving the Grace of God into our lives! DAILY. Truthfulness with ourselves matters, and real intimacy with Him will bring us face to face with our own humanity. Back then, I prayed and waited, for my new life in Christ to fall on me …and … everything stayed the same. Actually, I think I got worse! At the same time I constantly felt that my life should be easier now, because Jesus was in it! That was what I was taught. But change doesn’t come from osmosis – it comes from obedience. 

I have always been rotten at being fake, but now it seemed like God Himself expected me to do it, so I gave it my all!! It was kind of a ‘fake it ’til you make it ’attitude. However, my poor behaviour was my own responsibility and I was lousy at changing me. It was years before I realised that there was far more power and grace released when Jesus died and rose again, than I had ever dreamed about! I’ve learnt that transformation comes when I obey what I am reading, whether I like it or not!  He died to give me that power too! Prior to that I thought if God loved you enough —.He would do it for you. You can just imagine the kind of conclusions I came to, when He didn’t!! Building a house involves work. We are going to have to build it brick by brick with His help and oversight, one step at a time.

I want to strenuously make the point that none of any of my fakey-fake attitude was the Lord’s fault! The teaching I had at that time made it sound like transformation was easy, you prayed, you woke up and you were different. You went to church regularly, prayed, read the bible, and … you were different. I did all those things and then… I learnt to hide my faults!  Transformation happens when we give a different response. The bible teaches us what kind of responses God is looking for, and the Holy Spirit has been sent to help us.

Father God is longing to get our attention. He isn’t going to use a trumpet or a donkey – He wants us to believe He really is that good and what Jesus did is complete. This means He points something out, and He shows us a way to overcome it, using HIS power – not our own strength. It is better, if we can’t be honest with ourselves or Him, to make that the subject of our prayers. Ask the Holy Spirit to help you to be real with Him and honest with yourself. We can spend our Christian lives aiming our prayers at the leaves on the tree of our life, instead of going straight to the root of what is causing us to slowly die, spiritually, and lose hope.

In the end, I decided to only read the bible, instead of the hundreds of books in the Christian bookshop that made big promises, and delivered nothing but even more information! That stuff didn’t work for me. Reading other people’s books was like watching someone else make a sandwich, eating it, and expecting that I would get the same benefit they did! What I was aiming at was their revelation and Father God wanted to give me my own!! 

The things I write here have been written on my own heart through my own interactions with the Lord. I know that He wants to talk with you too. But please don’t follow ME, follow JESUS. There’s been way too much piggy-backing going on in our faith. If I follow someone else’s ideas and thoughts, instead of Jesus, I will end up with their limitations! There is no quick fix to transformation, because we have unfortunately cultivated weeds in our lives. We will always need Him to identify them and help us to pull them out.

Our journey with Jesus is personal. I can share with you, you can share with me, but until both of us admit that ‘without Him we can do nothing!’ …  then we are building a house that cannot stand. Jesus doesn’t want CLONES – He wants you to be you, and me to be me. The Holy Spirit was very particular when He made us both. He put things inside you that no-one else has. Now the Lord wants to express Himself through you to others, simply because you know Him and you know you are dearly loved by Him.

We don’t need Bob the Builder – we have the Master Builder, the Standby, the Precious Holy Spirit Who knows the way He wants you and I to go. Yes, we will repent of sin – often. Yes, there are truths we cannot, and must not avoid, because we all need transformation. It comes as we realise how much He loves us. Meanwhile we owe each other compassion for our frailties and disobedience, not judgment. We need to read His book and then act on what we read. And we continually ask for His help. That’s how you build the house. Read Matthew 7:24-27. Bye 👋.

P 2637 Be an original.

/ DVH

I sometimes live in the land of stone-cold-tea! I actually get so focussed on writing, I forget to drink it when it is hot. It is the bane of my hubby’s life having to warm up my tea all the time, so I can enjoy it. There are days that I’m such a FUN person to live with. Not. Ho- hum. ☕️ I think my record of tea re-warming is 3 times in a row. Ask hubby!  Any-hoo, the other day I discovered this great little gizmo from China that keeps a cup of tea or coffee hot for hours. I love the creative genius behind that seemingly insignificant invention!! 

I have learnt over the years to appreciate human diversity and our individual ability to see the same thing in different ways. People are truly amazing, and our God made us that way, on purpose. Ya gotta love that!! It also means that when I look at you, I can see Him, in a totally different way. WOW!! It is a shame that religion aims at everyone being the same — yet God celebrates our differences. They are part of His creativity.  In my heart I believe that each person has a unique expression of Who He is to share with the world. In other words we are all richer because He sent YOU here! Thank you Lord – You really do give good gifts!

“God’s purpose in all this was to use the church to display His wisdom in its rich variety to all the unseen rulers and authorities in the heavenly places.” Ephesians 3:10. We have this lovely lady, (she’s God’s gift!), who comes into our house once a fortnight to help us. She cleans the floors for us. I had to give up floor cleaning years ago!  Hmmm. I wish I thought that was a bad thing … but I don’t!! Tee hee. Ya win some – ya lose some. Maybe that’s one of the Lord’s benefits I’m not meant to forget!! 😂  A-ny-wa-y … this lady is the dearest Irish-born-Aussie person and having her around is a joy when you are mostly shut-in. Some people celebrate who they are, don’t they?

When she came to help us last time, she shared the above picture with us. Somebody had carefully chalked thought-provoking things about the Lord on a jogging track. There were a lot more chalk sayings that I could put here!  However, the minute I saw them, I was gobsmacked to see how this person had found such a non-threatening, original way to speak to people. I can’t begin to tell you how much that blesses me. I just adore to see people being themselves and loving Jesus and sharing His truth… all at the same time. 

Each of us has a unique way of expressing His love to others. The thing I have personally learnt lately is this — unless we are doing those things that make us feel a bit vulnerable, we are probably staying within our own comfort zone. That comfort zone is a poorly-made construct that we’ve allowed, it is used to hide us. And it will restrict our efforts to shine for Him if we are not aware of it. So we will have to learn how to be “strong and courageous” — like Joshua said. That’s what faith does. It tackles the difficult things as well as the unknown ones simply because those things can be a tourniquet on the life of God within us. 

We can sometimes hesitate to remove those restrictions that we’ve adopted into our lives because they protect our inner selves. Maybe somebody else thought that was who we are – or who they wanted us to be. Or we can use our weaknesses to our own advantage, because remaining unseen seems safer. But Jesus cheerily says: “Don’t be afraid, death is not your enemy – a lack of real life within you is!”  None of us are finished yet, but the Lord wants us to be established in Him daily, within our ordinary lives. If we yield to Him, we will have enough strength to withstand the bigger storms and dark seasons of this life. The way through difficulties is to trust in Him more than we trust our own judgment. 

I love the way the Lord is been removing those badly made constructs around our lives to expose the great work He has been doing inside… Even when we weren’t looking! Personally, I think if we had seen what He was doing with some of us, we might have meddled with it or tried to help Him! But He works in, and on our hearts in secret and brings out the very best of who we really are, and He doesn’t do His big reveals about us until His project in us is established. Our God is a master builder, and unlike the world around us, He knows how to work with stone to bring it to life! Praise Him!! 

Years ago there was this dumb riddle …”Which came first? The chicken or the egg?” The minute I heard that riddle I thought:  ‘how silly, God would never leave a little vulnerable egg all alone to raise itself!’  Then I realised that my faith is in God’s judgment, not in what seemed right to me. It was meant to be a clever puzzle but my knowledge of Him made the answer into a fact!  BTW, please don’t ask me why that stupid chicken crossed the road? As far as I’m concerned that chook deserves whatever it gets when it is challenging cars! Like I said, be an original, we need your POV.  Bye for today, have a good one. 👋