Power

P 2841 Real RAW power.

/ DVH

I mentioned this parable a few of days ago, and almost immediately after I talked about it – I was tested on my response to someone else’s apparent debt toward me. 🙄 

Matthew 18:23-35: “Therefore, the kingdom of heaven is like a king who wanted to settle accounts with his servants. As he began the settlement, a man who owed him ten thousand bags of gold was brought to him. Since he was not able to pay, the master ordered that he and his wife and his children and all that he had be sold to repay the debt. At this the servant fell on his knees before him. ‘Be patient with me,’ he begged, ‘and I will pay back everything.’ The servant’s master took pity on him, canceled the debt and let him go.“But when that servant went out, he found one of his fellow servants who owed him a hundred silver coins. He grabbed him and began to choke him. ‘Pay back what you owe me!’ he demanded.

“His fellow servant fell to his knees and begged him, ‘Be patient with me, and I will pay it back.’ “But he refused. Instead, he went off and had the man thrown into prison until he could pay the debt. When the other servants saw what had happened, they were outraged and went and told their master everything that had happened. “Then the master called the servant in. ‘You wicked servant,’ he said, ‘I canceled all that debt of yours because you begged me to. Shouldn’t you have had mercy on your fellow servant just as I had on you?’  In anger his master handed him over to the jailers to be tortured, until he should pay back all he owed.“This is how my heavenly Father will treat each of you unless you forgive your brother or sister from your heart.”

It is obvious to me in this life, that forgiveness is meant to be a supernatural act!  We are to freely give forgiveness to others because we are aware that Jesus has already given it to us. But there is nothing like a nasty argument to wreck our memory! By ourselves, we don’t have it within ourselves to forgive someone else, because sin is UGLY, it fills our perception and it definitely distorts our view of other people. But we took in the seed of the Holy Spirit when we said “yes” to Jesus, and He lives inside us now. That seed wants to grow as we walk with Him. Because we have been freely given forgiveness, we already have forgiveness on the inside of us – so now we can give it away using our faith. 

The reason this can sometimes seem difficult is because we don’t feel like we can forgive the other person. Our feelings are hurt, they betrayed us, they did something unforgivable etc.etc. Sadly then we are no longer looking at someone else’s sin through spiritual eyes, instead we are choosing to see it through injured ones. Have you ever noticed that what they did seems much bigger and badder than what you did? Yeah, me too.

However, our new lives are designed to be lived in the Spirit, we must not be guided by the flesh. The flesh has nothing profitable in it. It will come to nothing but dust one day, but the things of the Holy Spirit last forever. So now I must personally make the choice to obey, or to hold on to my hurt feelings. The thing is, I need to die daily to what I feel, or want, or like, and deliberately yield to the Holy Spirit’s guidance. 

Recently somebody pushed hard on a button I didn’t know I had inside, and my flesh had a whole lot of junk to say that profited nobody. I came to, when I realised I was so mad I wanted to  … quote: choke the life out of the person who was annoying me! Figuratively of course. I’m too much of a coward to be literal about it! 

That’s when the Lord reminded me of all the stuff I’ve written on this blog. So, through gritted teeth, I obeyed the word and let the other person off the hook, I accepted their apology and kept taking those nasty little irritable thoughts captive – whether the other person deserve it or not. God’s ways are not our ways! To be totally honest it was like stripping my skin off a centimetre at a time! I had a list of reasons as long as my arm as to why I shouldn’t have to do it … and then I did it anyway. 

However, my ‘hurt’ feelings kept jumping up and down, and they kept right on doing it. Learning to love when you feel wounded is very difficult, as I am sure we all know from experience. The thing that helps, is to focus on how much He has forgiven us – until our thoughts are taken captive and we go back to being grateful. Otherwise our memory of the offence – which can often be carefully coloured in, so WE look like the injured one – blocks out everything else. It really is a choice to renew our mind, and to deliberately push all thoughts about whatever has happened out, and focus on obeying the Lord instead. 

Holding a grudge needs to be addressed because that is also a stumbling block. And yes, I understand that the other person keeps on doing whatever it is, despite your pleas for mercy! The thing is, we cannot know what is in someone else’s heart, and mind, and perhaps they think they are right too. We can all think we are totally right and be totally wrong … all at the same time.

Meanwhile our obedience to His word despite our feelings, is the best way I know to prove HIS power! The more we practice the things Jesus told us to do, the quicker we are released from being tossed about by our emotions and mind. Having power over your own feelings is REAL RAW POWER.  Bye. 👋

P 2840 We must remember, we sin against GOD, first.

/ DVH

“Then David said to Nathan, “I have sinned against the LORD.” Nathan replied, “The LORD has taken away your sin. You are not going to die.” 2 Samuel 12:13. 

“And the son said to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against heaven and in your sight; I am no longer worthy to be called your son.’”Luke 15:21.

“Against You, and You alone, have I sinned; I have done what is evil in Your sight. You will be proved right in what You say, and Your judgment against me is just.”Psalm 51:4.

We often talk a great deal about sinning against each other, but today I want to talk about the fact that first of all, any sin is against Him. When we dismiss or disobey His word, our sin is dismissive of God’s holiness. Yes, we need to fix things with others, but we need to start at the top … with Father God Himself. Everyone of our sins had a consequence. And Jesus bore the penalty of those consequences on His body – so we need to treat these things with humility, honestly, reverence and respect. 

Let me be as clear as I can be … Our sins are absolutely, positively, completely G.O.N.E. – gone forever! Thrown into the sea of forgetfulness, with a NO FISHING sign clearly displayed. That sign needs to be read over and over again because guilt and shame no longer belong to us. “Jesus said, “I tell you most solemnly that anyone who chooses a life of sin is trapped in a dead-end life and is, in fact, a slave. A slave can’t come and go at will. The Son, though, has an established position, the run of the house. So if the Son sets you free, you are free through and through.”John 8:34-36.

This means that before we repent and repair things with others, first of all, we need to thank God and His precious Son again, for all Jesus suffered and chose to do for us. Thankfulness, not guilt is now our response – however presumption is not a right response either. We need to treasure our relationship with our Loving generous Father above all else. There is no longer any fear in sin and God’s love has now taken over our way of thinking, doing and being. We live a life of love now, standing by our choices- we are now free to choose His Will, His Way.

We’ve been set free from the demands and focus of sin, to focus upon HIM.  Freedom means we can still sin – however, now, we’ve been empowered not to!! Instead of blame and shame motivating us, we can be confident that we can restore things – simply because Christ’s death on our behalf has empowered us. Now we praise Him for all He has willingly done for us and we go back into happily submit to His will, His way. The point of the ‘get out of jail free card‘ is not carelessness – it is redemption. So we must acknowledge our sin against His freely-given goodness.

Here is another scripture for all of us to think on today:“My little children (believers, dear ones), I am writing you these things so that you will not sin and violate God’s law. And if anyone sins, we have an Advocate [who will intercede for us] with the Father: Jesus Christ the righteous [the upright, the just One, Who conforms to the Father’s will in every way—purpose, thought, and action].”  1 John 2:1. The best news ever is this, JESUS is in the throne room praying for us, every single second of the day. IMAGINE THAT! Because of what He willingly did, sin is not the “norm” for us. Our new normal life is in Him. THAT’S WHERE THE POWER TO OVERCOME COMES FROM!

Almighty God does not wink at our sin … it says so in the book!  An exchange took place 2,000 years ago and Jesus Christ became the Lamb Who was slain, forever. It’s part of His title, just like Prince of peace, wonderful wise Counsellor, and Saviour of the World. So when we sin and disobey God, we take ourselves out of fellowship with the Father, and the Holy Spirit, Who is the One Who helps us – and the Son. The One Person Who perfectly understands how hard it is to be human! Dumb move … He knows the way through temptation!

Let’s be clear. God made sure all this stuff was written down, we have a book! Now we do not have to be dragged about by our weaknesses, and weird ideas. Because of what Jesus did, we have a live-in Helper. The Holy Spirit was our midwife! He birthed us and now He is raising us, day by day as we learn to live a life of obedience. God did not just trust our discipleship to ordinary men … Jesus Christ, Who followed the Holy Spirit’s instructions to the letter – is still making disciples! 

We have the bible to show us where we are out of order with His ways and we need to respond to conviction with real repentance. Because when sin happens we stop walking with Him and start hiding from Him. And people don’t just hide by leaving the church, they hide in busyness, and by elevating things that are distractions, or supposed  recreational activities. Dead people don’t need that stuff – they don’t have an opinion or a need. That’s why we rely upon God to meet them!

If we sin, we need to go to our Heavenly Father, first, and confess our faults, errors, lapses, nasty attitudes and selfish ways and He will empower us to overcome. “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.” 1 John 1:9. Bye. 🕊️

P 2837 What we do with what God tells us daily, matters.

/ DVH

I know that many people, past and present, have had a great deal to say about this parable, I personally love the clarification the Lord Himself gave, which comes directly after it in Matthew 13:1-9:

“He (Jesus) taught them many things by parables, and in his teaching said: “Listen! A farmer went out to sow his seed. As he was scattering the seed, some fell along the path, and the birds came and ate it up. Some fell on rocky places, where it did not have much soil. It sprang up quickly, because the soil was shallow. But when the sun came up, the plants were scorched, and they withered because they had no root. Other seed fell among thorns, which grew up and choked the plants, so that they did not bear grain. Still other seed fell on good soil. It came up, grew and produced a crop, some multiplying thirty, some sixty, some a hundred times.” Then Jesus said, “Whoever has ears to hear, let them hear.”

Almighty God gives us seed to sow from His Word – hopefully… daily!! His book is a fantastic source of life-giving seeds. We need to take those seeds He has personally given to us, and share them with others. That seed that His Spirit kisses, especially for us, has His life in it. Its power lies in the fact that God revealed His truth to us.

It may have been something someone said when they were preaching, and it struck us in the heart like an arrow finds the target. Or it may have been something that stood out as we were reading the bible. It could even be when we were talking to the Lord and suddenly a scripture fell down from our thinking and meditating —- where we had hidden it while we were renewing our minds – and it sank down deep inside us, into our heart where growth can begin. Wherever or however it happened, that fresh seed is now ripe for planting. It can produce a crop.

The seeds of His Word that we sow into our lives – as we daily read the bible and act on it — can behave exactly like this parable describes. Sadly some seed doesn’t even make it past 2 seconds of thought, because it has fallen upon a well worn pathway of previous knowledge, and so it is whisked away by the birds of the air … those thoughts and words that are constantly flying past us, because of everything we are exposed to in a single day. It is so easy to think: “I know that already.” Now we have a seed immediately stolen by pride.

Also in our daily bible readings, if we take the time to treasure His voice, we can sometimes discover “rocky places” in our hearts. They are not like the well-worn pathways that we barely notice, these are hard places that we try to skim over and ignore with thoughts like this: ‘The truth is, I don’t think I have to change, I think the other person should.’ The scorching heat of that bad attitude kills off the power of His precious seed, and it is killed off by negligence. Always remember that true forgiveness doesn’t keep accounts, be-ca-use … hallelujah!!… fortunately for us, Jesus doesn’t keep them either.

“The thorny ground” seeds are the places in our hearts we haven’t bothered to weed and keep watch over our wrong thinking. ‘Weeds of unbelief, or discontent or disappointment’ have flourished there. What we haven’t realised is that, spiritually speaking, any one rotten attitude can take over our thinking. So the possibility of a harvest from any seeds that are sown into the weed-filled patch, is negated. These spiritual seeds won’t receive their share of nourishment from any water and good soil, because the weeds of our wrong thinking are crowding them out, and soon the whole plant of His word, becomes sterile and unproductive.

Now let’s look at “good soil,” the stuff we are to cultivate and watch over in our hearts. Good soil not only gladly receives the seed of God’s Word;  as we act on it, that seed begins to flourish, and grow into a healthy plant. The increase in our seed production, is always up to the Lord, our part is to cultivate the soil of our hearts with humility and love. And take the time to prayerfully water and feed these His seeds with tears of repentance, and acts of sacrifice as the healthy plants begin to grow. Now we have seeds that will bear fruit and can be harvested.

As you can see, there are four different results from exactly the same seed. The seed does not change, but how it is received does. Even if we sometimes feel unsure about what we think the Lord is saying – it is our responsibility to watch over His seed and act on it accordingly. What we do with what God tells us daily, matters. How we receive it matters. Preparing our hearts to be open to change and transformation matters. A huge harvest can come from our dedication and our willingness to yield to His Ways, even to the death. Bye.  👋“They triumphed over him (satan) by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony; they did not love their lives so much as to shrink from death.” Revelation 12:11.

P 2825 We are weapons that are forged in the fires of adversity …

/ DVH

Many Christians like to think that we are doing our best when we just meander along, picking up this new thought and putting down that old one — hopefully teaching our own kids … but probably not very worried about other people. We pray, and then we secretly blame God if He doesn’t send us revival! Be your own revival. To be a Christian is to be a true revolutionary! These passionate individuals see hatred as an opportunity to love others!  Meanwhile. loving and caring for those that hate you, is contrary to what humans want to do – of course it’s radical! 

In most countries today there are not many practising Christians. And by practising, I don’t mean going to church week by week. I think we’ve been reduced to a remnant – how else can we explain the excesses of the West in the face of the total deprivation everywhere else?! We’ve learnt over years of inactivity to pay lip-service to things that need our total devotion. When Jesus said: “Follow Me” – He wasn’t talking about a parade!  

Christianity is not designed to be a religion. Jesus is the way we live and breathe and learn to love others – even the ones that wish we were dead. We cannot call ourselves Christians, if we have not learnt to OVERCOME — things like our own penchant for sin, our greed for the things of this world, as well as our own personal trials and tribulations. We must learn to handle bad times the same way as good ones looking to Jesus Who is the Author and Finisher of our faith.

It seems to be that what we believe has not affected the entirety of our lives. Instead we plaster over the things that need to be purged, including those personal attitudes that Christ Himself preached against. Sadly, when we water down what we believe for our own benefit and convenience, we are watering down the power of God at the same time! We need to remember, we are either on fire, or the fire is slowly dying, or it has gone out! A tiny bit of Christianity that makes us feel safe will not do, we must be completely immersed in the things of God. And what we say has to be exhibited by our lifestyles. His love always becomes incredibly real in the fire of adversity.

We’ve been reborn to take what this world thinks, and stand it on its head. We don’t just saunter along smiling at everybody, waving cheerfully, holding a banner for Jesus and putting up cute pictures of scriptures over our sink! What we believe needs to be lived out – day by day by day. We are His living bibles, to be read by everyone else around us, we are not just nice polite people! Instead, Christians live real lives filled with real problems, and a lot of those problems are totally insurmountable without God’s help … so we are learning how to utterly RELY upon Him.

Our faith is nothing without the power and Presence of God. All we have to offer others presently, is pie in the sky when they die. God cares so much more about all of His kids, than the trite things we present to others. He is not an absent God Who benignly, and absent-mindedly smiles down on His sometimes AWOL, naughty children. That is insulting to the Holy Spirit, Who is ever-present. He longs to be our ever-present help in time of need, not the spare tyre on the back of yet another brand new vehicle! Instead of working ourselves up into a lather trying to demonstrate His power – we need to daily die to self and demonstrate HIS LOVE instead.

I think the reason people aren’t coming to Jesus is because our ideas of witnessing have made Him seem weak. We present Him as a baby, or God on a cross unable to come down. Or even SomeOne Who can be contained by a church building!  WE ARE HIS ALTAR – our hearts are His home. Our contribution to this world is that we know the God of all Hope! We need to talk about Who He is. He’s the Almighty, ever-present, always holy, always with us, Father. The God Who knows everything about each one us. Who freely gave us His own Son to pay for humanity’s wilful sinfulness.

We must not be afraid when the fire around us, and in us, heats up, and life becomes unbearable. That’s when the truly great weapons of war are forged … IN THE HEAT OF THE FIRE. He promised to be with us when we walk through the flames. (Isaiah) The biggest enemy we face, is not the other guy – it’s us – as we lead lukewarm lives at the cost of someone else coming to know Christ. God’s Love cries out daily to be demonstrated.“But God demonstrated His own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” Romans 5:8. 

It’s time to do more than idly talking about Him when the subject comes up. It’s time we showed our enemies His love, like they are our best friends. We need to stop using prayer for release or an escape vehicle, and pray for the Grace and courage to walk through the flames – untouched. ‘We are weapons of His warfare, and those weapons are not carnal but mighty to the pulling down of strongholds.’ 2 Corinthians 10:4. People are dying every single day and they have no knowledge that this life is not all there is. 

We have to become His swords, forged in the fires of adversity, so we can cut off other people’s chains and set them free, like Jesus did. Bye.🔥

P 2819 Antagonistic people.

/ DVH

“But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you;..”Matthew 5:44.“But to you who are willing to listen, I say, love your enemies! Do good to those who hate you.” Luke 6:27. Here’s how it works – you find out who are your enemies then you deliberately, as in, on purpose, do something nice for them. Start by blessing them. Yeah, you know, if everybody did this then it is likely that our so-called enemies would not know they are our enemies! Think about it.

Living like the bible says takes a quality decision. There is no turning back or quitting. Here’s another favourite, much memorised verse – just kidding!!: 🤣 “…and a man’s enemies will be the members of his [own] household [when one believes and another does not]…” Matthew 10:36. I imagine most of the people who read this blog have experienced that last one. Long ago I had a first hand experience of this one. Praise God those people are now following the Lord themselves. But I know enough to know that a happy result does not always follow hard choices … there was a big space in the middle! People can be like mules.

Now, let’s look at Romans 12:20.“On the contrary: “If your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink. In doing this, you will heap burning coals on his head.” Romans 12:14 ““Bless those who persecute you. Don’t curse them; pray that God will bless them.” I have prayed that last verse many times through clenched teeth. I persevered until I was able to let go of my anger! Being transformed involves choices and self-control.

You know, I can’t help but wonder how many wars might have been stopped if mankind acted on these verses. It seems to me that the entire world has gone from what the Apostle Paul said …into this style of thinking … ‘they did bad things to us, now let’s exterminate them.’ O-Kay! …That could be called extreme…!!  We can fool ourselves that we are justified in our anger, but that’s not what the book says – outside of Christ Himself, there is no justification … so why would anybody choose to live there?

This whole subject about enemies is a very interesting personal study. Because we often don’t think we have any! We will grudgingly acknowledge that we sort of kind of don’t like some people all that much. Now here is something else I’ve learnt that is fascinating. Never go into why you don’t like so and so – even in your mind. ASAP take those thoughts captive. 9 times out of 10 that kind of thinking leads to not liking that person/people even more! Many times in the past I have read verses about the way we need to treat enemies, and I have thought to myself …’I have no enemies …’ Hah! That’s like asking yourself “who am I mad at?’ It doesn’t work. Now I will give you my advice for free … 

Try not to excuse yourself on the grounds that “I-am-a-very-nice-person-just-ask-me !!”…  … Instead ask the Holy Spirit what He thinks. Ask Him who you see as an enemy. Take a pencil and some paper with you, OK? Because I’ve learnt that this kind of stuff excuses itself, hides, and jumps straight into blame … We excuse our feelings and put pretty titles on them. Like: ‘This kind of person and I are not compatible.’ The very worst kind of lies are the ones we tell ourselves … because they are so hard to uncover.

The answer to this dilemma is to ask the Holy Spirit to help us to love people the way He does. Even the ones who would like to see our heads on a pike! After that we must be prepared to go to war within ourselves, because our old self does not want to die, and it has strong roots and a big pile of great excuses!

There are times when giving into what the Lord wants, seems to be losing a battle we badly want to win, but: “He who loves his life will lose it, and he who hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life.” John 12.25. The battle belongs to the Lord, just point your heart at Him and hang on. I will warn you, sometimes it takes a while to hear that mythical fat lady sing … 

There are also times when I think that fear motivates us far more than we realise. “Though I walk in the midst of trouble, You preserve my life. You stretch out your hand against the anger of my foes; with Your right hand You save me.” Psalm 138:7. When we believe this, and live by it, as well as counting on verses like this one, we are ‘living in the secret place, the shelter of the Most High God…Whose power no foe can withstand.” We don’t have to be afraid, GOD HAS A PLAN. Like Esther we can say: “If I die I die.”  

Except some of the time we have 94 good reasons why we shouldn’t die — yet! Those are the very best times to go ahead and choose to do it anyway. Stop counting how many times you’ve let somebody else off the hook even though they keep right on doing it – and do it one more time. And don’t peer into the future seeing the same result stretching on and on .. that’s not faith, it’s necromancy.

Antagonistic people are a gift. They call our attention to the stuff in our lives that we don’t want to see. They help us grow bigger than the traps the enemy has set before us. Now we get to fight different battles, not the same one over and over again. See you next time, bye. 👋

P 2816 Do great exploits.

/ DVH

Matthew 25:14-30 TPT: “It’s also like a man going off on an extended trip. He called his servants together and delegated responsibilities. To one he gave five thousand dollars, to another two thousand, to a third one thousand, depending on their abilities. Then he left. Right off, the first servant went to work and doubled his master’s investment. The second did the same. But the man with the single thousand dug a hole and carefully buried his master’s money.“After a long absence, the master of those three servants came back and settled up with them. The one given five thousand dollars showed him how he had doubled his investment. His master commended him: ‘Good work! You did your job well. From now on be my partner.’ “The servant with the two thousand showed how he also had doubled his master’s investment. His master commended him: ‘Good work! You did your job well. From now on be my partner.’

“The servant given one thousand said, ‘Master, I know you have high standards and hate careless ways, that you demand the best and make no allowances for error. I was afraid I might disappoint you, so I found a good hiding place and secured your money. Here it is, safe and sound down to the last cent.’“The master was furious. ‘That’s a terrible way to live! It’s criminal to live cautiously like that! If you knew I was after the best, why did you do less than the least? The least you could have done would have been to invest the sum with the bankers, where at least I would have gotten a little interest.“‘Take the thousand and give it to the one who risked the most. And get rid of this “play-it-safe” who won’t go out on a limb. Throw him out into utter darkness.’”

When I read this passage today some things stood out, so I have highlighted them. It always seems to be important to me to place the things the Lord highlights into context. So let’s look at this one the way it happened in the first scripture where it says: “…according to their abilities…”

The servants’ master had taken into account each man’s ability when he handed out the money to be invested. That would be so foreign in today’s society. Grading people into categories would be a no, no. It might even be considered demeaning, and in some instances it could be taken very personally. However, these few words show me that the Lord doesn’t ask us to do anything that we can’t actually do, as we operate in His grace.. And at the same time, He may not test you the same way He tests me, because He knows our frames, He knows how far we can stretch.

The second thing I noticed was this: that man who buried his portion of the money was capable of far more effort than he gave his master. I don’t know if he was lazy, or he underestimated himself, but the point is – he could have done better, if he had just overcome his fear. Instead he was underusing what he had been given.

If we translate this parable into what our part in God’s kingdom looks like  — which is what Jesus intended — then that third servant did as little as possible because of fear. Yeah, I know, that sort of clarity sucks doesn’t it? It’s actually so clear we cannot deny it. Jesus was pointing out to each one of us that fear is never an excuse. This master points out that living in fear and evasiveness is a terrible way to live …Like the man said, nobody else is limiting our capabilities – the reality is that we are doing it to ourselves! I thought about it like this: our next miracle may be right around the corner of us taking a risk, and being obedient to whatever He has told us to do. 

Jesus Himself once used the phrase: “the least of these…”  Not everybody is born with excess talent oozing out of their pores. Whatever we want to do with our lives for His kingdom — we will need a calling, some talent …PLUS .. a whole lotta hard work. Many people like to skip that last bit. Devotion to the task is part of the prerequisite for a kingdom person. Our devotion to Him translates into action on His behalf.

Jesus was God Himself, personified, but He still had to live this life like every other human being. The exchange with our enemy in the wilderness proves that He did not use the Holy Spirit’s power to get things for Himself. He refused to turn a stone to bread – even when He was hungry. What I mean is this – Jesus knows man’s limitations personally.

You know I would much rather try, and fail … than sit and hope heaven will fall on me and motivate me. It is easier to steer a moving vehicle than a stationary one. The Lord is a Redeemer – He can take all the bits of our lives that seem useless and make something glorious out of them.  God can take a man who was killing Christians and make the greatest Christian theologian this world has ever seen. Paul!

Redemption is transformation on steroids. It is outside the realm of our thinking, or our efforts, because our thinking is too small and our efforts cannot be sustained. In His kingdom, redemption is normal. If we are going to invest our lives for His sake, then we need to expect that we will continually undergo the process of redemption. That man who buried his master’s money needed his mind renewed!  So do we, because: “ … the people who do know their God shall be strong, and do exploits.” Daniel 11:32. Bye. 👋

P 2805 Righteousness.

/ DVH

“This gospel unveils a continual revelation of God’s righteousness—a perfect righteousness given to us when we believe. And it moves us from receiving life through faith, to the power of living by faith. This is what the Scripture means when it says: “We are right with God through life-giving faith!”” Romans 1:17 TPT.

Righteousness, means the ability to live, day-by-day in right relationship with God, and others. It is not a static thing – it keeps unfolding and expanding in and through our lives. We need to live valuing what we have been given, and we do that when we live justly, honestly, and faithfully according to God’s instructions from the book. This kind of life is not a dream, or a wish-thought, it is an ongoing process that we enter into with Him. It flows from a continual revelation of what He died to give us.

Jesus Christ revealed, in Person, what righteousness before God looks like. It looks like – praying for lepers, forgiving those who have treated you dreadfully, giving without measure, and loving others, as we honestly wrangle with the hardships of this life. After the Lord went back to heaven, He left behind Him a small group of ordinary men who changed history. However, those men found out everything He told them was true – firsthand – for themselves. Don’t ever be content with knowledge about righteousness – learn to live in it instead. Let the Holy Spirit teach you.

‘Righteousness’ is an old fashioned word that is easily overlooked or ignored in today’s abbreviated language. As we embrace absorbing this incredible, church-ified word into our lives, and we choose to look our lives through His eyes — the way we think is changed. It needs to be. We must move past the try-harder-to-be-a-good-person school into the I-can-never-do-that-by-myself … one! There we will learn that our faith is not just series of idioms we repeat endlessly hoping they are true. We will begin to see what we believe come to life, like the disciples did. We will learn to rise up to be all each one of us was sent here to be.

That’s because the cross was an exchange and not just a destination — we were taken out of this world’s kingdom and made citizens of heaven when we said yes to the Lord Jesus’ sacrifice. Christ’s righteousness, His Godly, right way of living, giving, and dying on planet earth, is available to us. We gave Him our sin, and He gave us His Grace, His place – His position before our Heavenly Father. 

If you pause and take the time to think about it, Jesus was never ever worried that God would not listen to Him when He prayed. He expected to be heard because there was no sin to separate Him from His Father’s will. “Jesus raised His eyes to heaven and prayed, “Father, I’m grateful that You have listened to Me.I know You always do listen, but on account of this crowd standing here I’ve spoken so that they might believe that You sent me.” John 11:41. That’s why we can be trusted to ask for whatever we want – because now we’ve entered into a new agreement with God. We are going to live our lives for His will, His way, from now on.

We too, can have confidence we will be heard when we stand on the simplicity of the gospel and let it daily work on our lives, thoughts and hearts. Now …”In this [union and fellowship with Him], love is completed and perfected with us, so that we may have confidence in the day of judgment [with assurance and boldness to face Him]; because as He is, so are we in this world.” 1 John 4:17. The thing we need to remember is that His righteousness is not permissiveness. Jesus Himself “…only did what He saw His Father doing  etc…” The limitless One chose to limit Himself, as He lived in obedience to His Father’s will. Even to His death. 

The bible tells us that God’s kind of Love avoids even the appearance of wrong. We call that self-control, and it is a fruit germinated and fulfilled by our relationship with Jesus Himself. We choose to live like this because of the passion we have for Him – He is our Beloved! We limit ourselves in this life for His sake, because He limited Himself for our sake.

Almighty God became one of us and He came here to show us He means us no harm! Now when He looks at you and I, He sees the pure, spotless, innocent blood of Jesus covering our sins. We’ve moved out of sin and darkness into His marvellous light. Which is why it is D.U.M.B./stupid to deliberately keep on sinning. God is so good! When we sin – Jesus is our lawyer/advocate – He points to His blood covering our lives and claims us as His own.

Real repentance is our only way back into the light of love. Ask yourself: ‘Why would I ever choose to move out of His light? What can possibly be more important than walking with Him?’ We can see this world far more clearly in the light. Darkness blinds us to reality. Jesus Christ died to give us His righteousness – so let’s live our day-to-day lives for Him, grateful. Bye 👋.

P 2802 Don’t live like an orphan.

/ DVH

You know, orphans have to find their own way, they have to do everything for themselves. They do not belong to anyone. They have no family, no family to support them and back them up. You and I, we are no longer orphans!… Not only were we re-born into God’s family … then … God Himself adopted us. We must learn to make Him welcome in our hearts!“But to as many as did receive and welcome Him, He gave the right [the authority, the privilege] to become children of God, that is, to those who believe in (adhere to, trust in, and rely on) His name—…” John 1:12. 

First of all, being adopted by God is a wonderful privilege, it is not a right – and secondly, that privilege becomes ours AS we choose to receive Him. BTW, that word ‘become’ stands out like a sore thumb to me. Christians have not arrived anywhere … yet. While we are still here on this earth, we are becoming …! We are learning His ways, that’s why we read the book. We have entered a life-long process of transformation. We daily walk with the Holy Spirit because we want to look like our Older Brother Jesus. At the same time it is no small thing to be eligible to use His Name – that’s part of our adoptive inheritance. His Name has authority here on earth, as well as in heaven.

Ephesians 1:5 says:“He predestined us for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of His will.” Our adoption was always God’s plan. He let humanity have its head … and look where that landed us! Then He personally provided a perfect way back to Him. Almighty God has a plan for each of our lives. He’s a good good Father. He demonstrated how much He loves humanity when He sent His only One-of-a-kind Son here to live, and die, among us. Father God’s plans are always so much better than ours, but human beings have a cultivated, internal independence that often refuses to yield.

God will not take us over – He simply wants help each one of us reach our full potential – just like any good father would. A son or a daughter is an heir – whether they were adopted, or born into a family. The mistake we have made in modern Christianity is to think that being born again, plus being adopted, means that we can have whatever we want. He wants voluntarily yielded vessels for His kingdom. You know, our precious Father is not a despot running a conglomerate, handing out favours to a special few.  He is our ever-loving ever-living Heavenly Father. The One Who made heaven and earth, Who is worthy of praise and glory and honour – every single earth-bound day of our little lives. He gave everything for all.

In the absence of our Father’s Presence on this earth … as His kids, His heirs – we have been delegated to act like He would.  A true son or daughter represents His Father. So we are here to serve, like Jesus served. Even if we LEAD other people, we are still serving. Jesus wasn’t showing off His power when He healed people, delivered them, or raised the dead. Even when He multiplied food, He did that because… “…the people were hungry and they would not have made it home without food!”Jesus is an illustration of how much the Father loves us and cares about our lives.

The Lord disapproved of religious people because they misled others — often for their own benefit. You and I are here on this earth, right here, right now, to pour out His Love on others. Because we are no longer orphans we have a confidence that can willingly share. This is the love that we received when He adopted us. We need to tell others that they can be adopted too. Our whole aim is to love and serve people the way He loved and served us. There are no bright stars in His kingdom – most of us are NOT automatically relegated to be minions! The only star in His kingdom is Christ!

This means the way we treat each other matters: “But if that servant says in his heart, ‘My master is taking his time in coming,’ and begins to beat the servants, both men and women, and to eat and drink and get drunk,..” AMPC. We dare not mistreat any of the people Christ died to save! Before Christ came and negated the power of sin, we were powerless to change our self-centred behaviour. Now, because of everything He did and said, we have been given the power to live this life differently. That’s what faith does, it chooses to respect its freedom by laying down its life for others.

There are human beings all over this earth who do not know that they have been set free from sin and death, and they are living their lives as orphans – struggling and straining to make the best of their time here. Cheating, stealing, hurting others to gain things.  (BTW, FYI, death is a door … not an ending! Jesus showed us that.) Most orphans have to learn to fend for themselves. But in a family, one member looks after another. Jesus loves us because we are His family. How many Christians have been fooled into living like they have no inheritance? HE is our inheritance. All that He did and is.

Don’t live your life like an orphan, there is more to this life than having enough money, power, position etc. We have been given His power to usher in change, simply by choosing to love other people into His kingdom. SELAH. 🤔

P 2800 Cultivate walking with the Holy Spirit.

/ DVH

Matthew 17:1-3: “After six days Jesus took with Him Peter, James and John the brother of James, and led them up a high mountain by themselves. There He was transfigured before them. His face shone like the sun, and His clothes became as white as the light. Just then there appeared before them Moses and Elijah, talking with Jesus.”

I was reading these verses this morning and it occurred to me that these verses about the Lord’s transfiguration show, without a doubt — that absolute purity, honour, truthfulness and glory CAN LIVE in this world and NOT SIN.  I think Christ always looked like that, but His glory was hidden from everyone around Him. Those 3 men saw Him that day, as He really was! Meanwhile all that purity, honour, truthfulness and glory etc. was nailed unjustly to a cross! If Christ hadn’t yielded to them, those Roman soldiers could not have touched Him!  “…He gave His back to the smiters …” Absolute purity became sin on that cross. Ya might like to think on that lot for a while. I did! 

For me this scene reinforces, the importance of us walking with the Holy Spirit!  It also made me think, we could easily be walking around with angels, unaware of who they are … because they’ve left their hat, glowing clothes and halos at home, and now they look just like us! We don’t know what we can’t see! These three disciples were exposed to a huge revelation in those moments, and they didn’t quite know what to do with it!  There is a fascinating reaction to the visual revelation in front of them. One of them, who shall remain nameless, but his name begins with P … starts making dumb remarks. Then they all fall on their faces when Almighty God literally says from heaven: “Just listen to My Son, please!”

I mean, after that event nobody even dares to talk about it  or ask questions – yet they had had holy huddles before speculating on what stuff meant! However, Jesus instructed them not to talk about what they’ve just seen with other people, and they didn’t. Imagine not saying anything about something like that! These men were in ushered into the Presence of God in all His glory! They saw Christ’s purity on this earth, unveiled. WOW!! 

My first question when I read this is, why were the disciples even present? What was the Lord Jesus looking to teach them? What did it mean? Isaiah the prophet once ended up in the throne room and his first response was that he had a revelation of his own sin. Why didn’t these three men react like Isaiah? They only fell on their faces when God Himself spoke from heaven! Ya might want to think on that!! Meanwhile, it is practically a hallmark of their relationship with the Lord, that His disciples asked questions all the time. But instead of talking about how their Master looked, they start talking about Elijah.

At the bottom of that mountain these three men are back doing what they’ve done before, casting out demons etc. — or trying to! And … they failed. Even after what they had just seen — they failed. It seems that Jesus was a bit ticked off with their faith failure. I think that this incredible, spectacular revelation of Who Christ really IS, didn’t actually help their faith. The Living breathing Word of God was standing there right in front of them, but they didn’t understand what they saw!

Does that ring any bells with anyone? Do you ever read His book and not get it?  Moo-ving on … those same disciples thought after the Jesus’ crucifixion, that that was it, game over! Whatever they had seen and experienced, thus far, did not give them enough faith, or power, to continue. Jesus eventually scared the daylights out of these grown men by walking through a wall, but they still didn’t get the magnitude of the story they were in. They had heard what He had said previously, but it was not digested. I think, they did all the things they did, in those 3 years together, in the power of HIS Name. There’s power in HIS Name! But their faith was extremely challenged by those events that happened when He died. 

Jesus knew this would happen and I think that’s why He told them … when He finally left them to go back to His Father … to WAIT for the Comforter, the Helper, the Advocate, the One Who comes alongside. Every single person present in that room needed the Holy Spirit  — and SO DO WE!  Seeing miracles is not enough to grow the kind of faith that changes the world. We all need to learn to walk with the Holy Spirit. We need to encounter Him. Not presumptuously marching ahead of Him, telling Him what to do, but in step and in tune with His Ways – we need to let Him guide us, teach us, correct us, comfort us and lead us into new places in God.

BTW, if any of you out there in blog land have ever wondered why those 3 disciples ended up on that mountain with Jesus, Moses and Elijah …I believe this is why … Jesus told them they would. Matthew.16:28: “Truly I tell you, some who are standing here will not taste death before they see the Son of Man coming in His kingdom.”They were privileged to see Jesus the way we will all see Him one day. And on that day …we will be changed by His glory, forever.

These men walked for 3 1/2 years with Jesus and participated in all sorts of miracles, yet they still needed to be filled with the Holy Spirit and POWER after He died, and was resurrected. God knows we can’t do this life on our own, so cultivating our walk with the Holy Spirit needs to be our first priority. This is not about feelings, dreams or visions, or weeping at the altar  … meanwhile we all need to cry our eyes out for our hard-hearts, sins and disobedience.

What will help us grow, and step into our inheritance, is our daily obedience to His Word, enlivened and kissed by His Grace – going IN and OUT like the tide. As we live like this, Holy Spirit will show us the way we should go! Amen. Bye👋

P 2794 Be spiritually focussed.

/ DVH

Here’s a thought:  attitudes that we PUT ON to look spiritual, can be taken OFF when it doesn’t suit us!  We need to become intimately aware of spiritual things, instead of leaving everything to the minister or pastor. The secret to abiding in Christ is to keep His attitudes ON, and if and when we ever choose to take them OFF, then we need to quickly repent and put them on again. It is a new way to think. Just as you and I once learnt to read and write, we can also learn, with the Lord’s help, to live a Kingdom-focussed life. Listen to these scriptures in Colossians 3:3-15 ESV.

“For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is your  life appears, then you also will appear with Him in glory. Put to death therefore what is earthly in you: sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry… … But now you must put them all away: anger, wrath, malice, slander, and obscene talk from your mouth. Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have put off the old self with its practices and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its Creator… 

 …but Christ is all, and in all. Put ON then, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. And above all these put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony. And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body.”

Action needs to be our middle name. We don’t just read things, smile and agree with them – now we put them into practice by choice! Many Christians are totally unaware that they have not changed their lives. They avoid and frown on supposed identifiable bad stuff, like swearing smoking, drinking, taking drugs, sleeping around, stealing, lying, gossiping etc. This means they are often ‘good’ people ‘on the ‘outside’ … but they have very little power to witness, or to overcome the habits and attitudes of their former lives. So they live, they sin, they eventually repent, but they are never changed. 

Transformation is not an optional extra – it’s a part of the deal! These people I am talking about do not move on from getting to know Him, into living their lives, here and now – differently. Prompted by the Holy Spirit’s help and guidance. It’s a progressive thing. We can see an example of this ongoing learning in the New Testament. These people kept faithfully doing what they knew and were taught to do, but they were not taught everything, initially.  Paul says this in Acts:“And he said to them, “Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?” And they said, “No, we have not even heard that there is a Holy Spirit.” These people did not know the Helper, so Paul laid hands on them and then they did! When you read parts of scripture like:  Matthew 16:5-12, you can easily see the difference between carnal thinking and Holy Spirit inspired thought.

Meanwhile I’m with Paul, things like fasting or praying in tongues, will definitely help my devotion to the Lord… but it will not change my character without my consent! I have to choose, every single day, sometimes minute by minute, WHO I will serve, There is a world of difference between salvation and transformation. Meanwhile, there’s also a whole ARMY of Christians stuck in that valley of decision! The decision facing them is whether they will serve Christ with their whole hearts, and lay down every single bit of their lives, for His sake. This path has just gotten a whole lot harder, because we are living in a hedonistic society.

We need to choose to submit to the Holy Spirit’s promptings and be governed by what the bible says. It’s called OBEDIENCE. I’ve met heaps of Christians who pray up one hill and down the other, God bless them for their devotion, but they are still as internally ornery and rebellious as they ever were. Their hearts aren’t soft, or changed. Transformation is part of the deal. Jesus didn’t just die to save us from our sins – He died to give us the power to live this life differently. To live life like He did… here and now! People will get saved if we stop living for ourselves and start living our lives for His sake.

However, the Lord will not do anything without our consent. And a blanket “I surrender all” at the altar once, long ago, doesn’t cover it.  God is looking for our active allegiance, not lip service. Our minute by minute lives need to be under the Holy Spirit’s control to make a difference. We have the power to release His Presence into this world by our God-given chosen attitudes and actions. Otherwise, sadly we can all be motivated by self-preservation.

Any manipulation and control, so I can feel ‘happy,’ will short-circuit this process. When I live that way, I cannot bring His life into anything I touch. I have to let go of what I want, and what I think is best for everyone else, and allow the Holy Spirit to have HIS WAY … and He’s not pushy. To be spiritually focussed I need to choose to DIE – every minute, every second, of every day I live. But when we choose to die to self – the Holy Everliving One – lives in us! And He makes all the difference. Bye. 👋