Method

P3456 Fix your eyes on Jesus, not on the results.

/ DVH

“Jesus replied, This is the work (service) that God asks of you: that you believe in the One Whom He has sent [that you cleave to, trust, rely on, and have faith in His Messenger]…” John 6:29. Father God sent His Son here to us to save us. We believe that. The bible was not given to us to be nice stories and sentiments — it has been given to us to be a life-line, so we can negotiate the good times, bad times, pitfalls and difficulties of this life, still holding onto the GRACE God has given us. That Grace was released by His Son, Jesus Christ, and what He did.  

So when we start foundering on the sea of our sometimes difficult lives, that’s when we actively choose to hang on to our belief in the One Who God has given us. We need Him to save us from the things that could drown us and ruin our faith. The Lord Jesus doesn’t care how many times we need saving from our own misbeliefs, He will just keep doing what He does best, loving us, leading us and saving us.

Our part is to believe that He wants to help us be all we can be … that’s the key. Please don’t let the enemy throw up any disappointing times on the screen of your mind, when things appear to get worse. Instead, believe and focus on the ever-present Presence of God Himself, right here, right now. Standing there with you. That’s WHY Jesus came to be with us, and it is why He gave us the Holy Spirit – the same Spirit Who was IN Him.

Ask Him to help you get through whatever is going on.  It is human to ask for our difficulties to go away — do it! In the bible there were people Jesus fed, just because they needed food. But at the same time we need to plant our feet and make a quality choice that Jesus Himself will see us through whatever is going on, and we will come out the other side with our faith still intact, plus a testimony to the goodness of God. 

Many Christians set false finishing lines. Their aim is about their comfort here and now. We need to learn to remain steadfast, in the good times and bad, just like Jesus did. His eyes were fixed on the prize, His faith in God was steadfast. Jesus did not come just to do miracles. He came to manifest and glorify our Father in Heaven and fulfil His Father’s Word… and He came to save us. Let’s keep our faith steady in the knowledge that we are to stay fixed in what Jesus has already done. This life is not about whether we win or lose, it is about the One we choose to believe in, no matter what happens.

Almighty God Himself has asked us to believe in Jesus, and He told us that this is the way we serve Him. I would like to read the above verse in another version: “Then they ( asked Him, “What must we do to do the works God requires?”Jesus answered, “The work of God is this: to believe in the One He has sent.” (V28 & 29) Believing in Jesus means we live our lives faithfully guided by what He said and did. The disciples wanted a method, but God gave them a PERSON to follow. We can still make that mistake today, we seek methods because methods are easier to follow. There is no method, we simply follow the Spirit of God, like Jesus did.

Following Jesus means we will give up anything in order to keep up with whatever He wants to do next. In order for the Head to help the Body, the head and the body have to be co-ordinated in their purpose. The Lord Jesus gave us signs – the purpose of a sign is it is like an arrow … it points somewhere. Now we are to live our lives pointing at God’s Love with the Holy Spirit’s help.

The verses right before V28,29 show us why Jesus said what He said: “Jesus answered, “Very truly I tell you, you are looking for Me, not because you saw the signs I performed but because you ate the loaves and had your fill. Do not work for food that spoils, but for food that endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you. For on Him God the Father has placed His seal of approval.”

At that moment in time the disciples were taken up by the miraculous free food, but Jesus didn’t focus on that, He used it as an example of our real target … eternity. “On earth, as it is in heaven.” Many people have used that scripture to say that nobody is sick in heaven, so that should be true down here. But the truest thing in Heaven, is that our God is forever glorious and He is still sitting upon His throne!! It is not about whether we have enough buns for our dinner! Our focus needs to rest on Oneness with Him, not just the stuff this life is made of.

Jesus is the best bread, He is everlasting! “Then Jesus declared, “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to Me will never go hungry, and whoever believes in Me will never be thirsty.” John 6:35. Let’s stop labouring for the wrong food!  What happens here and now will pass away … our food needs to be like His, doing the will of the Father. Our eyes need to be fixed on Him, He started our faith and He will finish it. When we ‘seek His kingdom first, all those other things we need will be added unto us.’ Bye, blessings! 👋.

P 2979 Saturated.

/ DVH

To be saturated means that when life squeezes the daylights out of you — all that comes out is love! The Holy Spirit’s Presence in us, transforms us, and touches everyone around us. He attracts people, and He knows exactly what every heart we meet needs to hear. We are not called to pat down or pacify other people’s sin – we are called to shine HIS light into sin, without destroying the person captured by it. Love shines into the darkness with such a brilliance that even grumpy people are surprised.

We don’t seem to understand that He is now in all of us, and it is our joy to co-operate with Him. We make our hearts, His home, with the Holy Spirit’s help, otherwise we will get progressively deaf. That’s what disobedience, and carelessness does. Because He is now our dearest, most trusted Friend, the Holy Spirit can put His finger on anything He sees that is clogging up our flow of His love, in us and for others. As He flows through us that is the normal Christian life. 

Peter told the lame man in the book of Acts: “I don’t have money but what I do have I will give you.” He knew the Holy Spirit was in him and with him. Peter’s focus was on walking with God not ministry, or avoiding sin. The secret to flowing with the Holy Spirit is to allow Him to lead you. He is not some kind of emergency spare Friend sent to bail us out of trouble or make us look good! Life is so much easier, when He is in charge. Meanwhile, I can guarantee you that whatever He wants us to do, we will need to use our faith to do it. 

I find it incredibly interesting that Jesus Himself did not teach the disciples about what we call “the anointing.” He did not speak about God’s Presence with these men as a method—because the Holy Spirit is a PERSON, not a method! He simply taught these men God’s ways, then He demonstrated them, and then He told them to go and do it! 

The Lord’s importance and proximity in their lives had an overflowing effect – they were able to do what He did because they were living in His Presence. Ya might want to stop and think about that one! 🤔 Yet these men, who walked with Jesus, weren’t perfected in their personal faith – until their spiritual debt had been paid, and the Holy Spirit came to each one of them at Pentecost. After the Spirit’s arrival, they would’ve gladly died for what they believed instead of running away, as they had previously done.

The bible tells us that the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts. We already have it, so we must stop checking out our feelings and instead follow His prompts. God loves it when we do what we do prompted by faith – every single day. Including TODAY! … “Today when you hear His voice, don’t harden your hearts as Israel did when they rebelled.” Hebrews 3:15. When you hear Him—obey Him. If He says you should apologise and fix things, then that other person’s response has nothing whatsoever to do with the outcome… even if they snarl at you! We are here to please Him, other people may be touched by Him as we obey, but that is not our priority. Our obedience releases our faith.

The source of His life in us is never US—it is His Presence IN us. “Christ in you the hope of glory..”  As we daily choose to use our faith to allow God to redeem our lives from fleshly habits—like holding apathy, offences,  bitterness, bad attitudes, wrong relationships and carelessness, we will become increasingly more free. Even seemingly unimportant things, that can trip us up — things like lying to save someone else’s feelings must go.

The love of God needs to fill us daily with the purposes and things of God. We can’t just pray: “Fill me now please Lord” and then walk out of the door and get grumpy because somebody parked across the driveway. And we don’t just go to work to do a job – now we work for Him! As we walk with Him we will move away from those things that are distracting us from our true calling and purpose. 

At the same time, the love of God captures our hearts. We begin to see Him do things through us that we cannot do ourselves. And I’m not just talking about walking on water! I’m talking about a bad tempered person finding that as they yield to the Holy Spirit’s promptings, and obey Him in faith, they are transformed. They experience the growth of the  fruit of self-control. Because of their obedience, they are choosing to remain in the vine.This love lifestyle doesn’t just work on things like a bad temper, it works on anything that keeps you and I from being distracted by this life. We remember how much God loves us! 

Our proximity to Jesus minute by minute, grows exponentially as we live aware of Him. The Holy Spirit is with us to remind us we are not guided by our flesh anymore.“Don’t be pulled in different directions or worried about a thing. Be saturated in prayer throughout each day, offering your faith-filled requests before God with overflowing gratitude. Tell Him every detail of your life, then God’s wonderful peace that transcends human understanding, will guard your heart and mind through Jesus Christ.” Philippians 4:6-7 TPT.

As you can see, God’s peace is the final umpire. Our task is follow His peace. We have to protect our peace and be guided by it.  Living this life saturated with His love is not a pipe dream – it is our new way to live.

Bye. 👋

P 2551 Run after Him and He will catch you!

/ DVH

When I am typing this blog the Lord will often drop a phrase or a few words from a scripture into my spirit, to start me off and help me. Sometimes it is a phrase for a title, and it floats through my mind unexpectedly. At that moment I know that this is what I call, a loose thread. If I pull on that thread and/or follow it as far as it goes, it will lead me into knowing Him better. 

So I take those few words I have, and type them into Google. Or I look the phrase up on Bible Gateway. It is always amazing to me how well Google knows the bible – especially as I am pretty sure they don’t believe in it!! 🤪 This stuff often happens outside of my normal bible time with Him – but He also inspires me in the same way, as I am reading the bible privately, for myself. 

I am sharing this because when I was first born again, I was given the traditional method of bible reading  — pray, read, take notes, then pray again. In the main, that did not work for me. I took copious notes, that I never ever referred to again (!) but taking notes did not result in building a relationship between the Lord and I. As time passed and I continued the routine I was taught, my faith eventually grew stale, because my appetite to know Him, decreased.

There is nothing like meeting Almighty God over the pages of the book He wrote! The bible is full of HIS stories, His interactions with mankind – they may feature Moses, Noah, Elisha, Amos and Habukkuk etc. but those stories are actually about the Lord, and what He did … and is still doing! Almighty God has not stopped doing stuff just because we regard the bible as a complete work! 

I cannot remember how many times I have read all the way through this book. Although, to be fair, the systems that people recommend to read it in a year have always let me down. I find myself caught up in the system, and ticking the box in my mind that says I did my duty.  Meanwhile I am pretty sure I was totally missing out on what He wanted to say to me! I don’t think dotting “i’s and crossing “t”s works for me. In years gone by, I was lousy at playing games like chasey or tag at school – I can’t run for toffee. But I love to chase the Holy Spirit … plus … I strongly suspect He loves to be chased!

Nowadays, I spend as long as it takes to research what I want to know. Sometimes that can take me quite a while. It seems to me a little like the Holy Spirit and I are playing “catch Me if you can!” … as I go all around the place, picking up stuff here and there. There are still times when I misremember a scripture, which means I’ve managed to get my theory wrong. But then I repent and ask Him to help me fix it and He never lets me down. I know this random method will not suit some people, but just for today, I wanted to offer an alternative way to get to know Him.

I’ve often thought about the fact that the disciples followed Jesus around for three and a half years – so this “follow the Leader” game isn’t completely weird! Today when I was prayerfully thinking about this subject, I was reminded of Moses and his personal encounter with the Lord. Moses was walking along minding his sheep, making sure none had fallen down a hole, or gotten stuck somewhere, when something unusual captured his attention. He saw a bush that was on fire but it did not burn up. 

“There the angel of the Lord appeared to him in flames of fire from within a bush. Moses saw that though the bush was on fire it did not burn up.So Moses said, “I must turn away [from the flock] and see this great sight—why the bush is not burned up.” Exodus 3:2,3. Moses’ innate curiosity drew him away from his work to something totally new, and that’s when God changed his life. He went from chasing sheep to standing up to Pharaoh … and we all know that outcome!

I believe that formality can have a place in our lives, but if it overwhelms spontaneity and true affection, then we are in danger of becoming religious. I want to be clear — there are days when I do not want to read the bible at all … but I read it anyway for my spiritual health. Sometimes I will read whole books … other days I only read three lines and His inspiration falls on me and I follow that instead. The bible is the only reference tool I use every single day.

What I have learnt is this: The Holy Spirit wants to be known. But He is not frivolous, or capricious, even though He is fun, He will always have a purpose for what He brings up in our lives.  It seems to me that He is more interested in our lives changing, than He is in us ticking the “I read the bible today” box. And that includes our prayer time as well. Christians desperately need His divine intervention into our bible reading times. I think if what we read is simply confirming what we already believe … we’ve missed Him. We cannot possibly know all there is to know about our God!

We can’t grow, if we are not challenged to think differently, behave differently, and do things differently. I say that mainly because whatever we are doing now IS NOT WORKING. The Body of Christ at large is vastly idle — it would rather go to a prayer meeting, or a bible study than witness! The Lord is not static – He has a plan. It is important that we join in with His plan, instead of fitting Him in around ours. Running after Him keeps us spiritually fit. Bye. 👋