Prune

P 3027 Run your race on purpose!

/ DVH

“For in the Son all our sins are canceled and we have the release of redemption through His very blood. He is the divine portrait, the true likeness of the invisible God, and the firstborn heir of all creation. For in Him was created the universe of things, both in the heavenly realm and on the earth, all that is seen and all that is unseen. Every seat of power, realm of government, principality, and authority—it all exists through Him and for HIS purpose!” Colossians 1:14-16 TPT.

The verse above is about establishing Who the Lord is! If we want to live this life in an extraordinary fashion, then forget about becoming a successful famous person … Hang around with Jesus instead! That’s what the disciples did. Did you ever notice that when the Lord called those fishermen – they went after Him straight away? … They left everything behind them, instantly. They even walked away, from their employment! The Lord loves to be with people who are seeking Him. These people don’t want to manipulate Him, most of them are just happy to find out He knows their name and where they live!

You will always find the Holy Spirit in some obscure, secret, tiny room with someone on their face, praying for their leaders and their fellow citizens. You will also always find Him with people who are spiritually hungry. The people who aren’t looking for a book of rules — mainly because they already understand they’ve broken a whole lot of them, and they don’t know how to get out from under the weight of what they’ve already done! You will find Him with the people who think “God can’t possibly care about me.”  Our Heavenly Father wants to comfort these people, change their lives, give them a reason to live AND take away the sin that is holding them back.

We have done this world a great injustice as Christians, when we have used prosperity of body, mind, and soul to portray Christianity. We’ve misled so many people into thinking: “If God is pleased with me, then there will always be definite signs of financial, physical, and spiritual blessings in my life.” I think we need to repent. We have misrepresented God Himself. He’s God and we are not.and the idea that He MUST bless us is not scriptural. He simply WANTS to bless us – it’s Who He is!  His blessings are free, they are not coerced or finagled by us. We don’t have to jump through hoops. Tell Him what you need and leave it with Him. Remember, the biggest blessing we will ever have in this world is His Presence in our lives. 

The road we have chosen follows Jesus. It goes down, not up! Disciples do not care about material benefits. His Presence is all they need! The Lord could care less about our success and appearances. Right now, He’s looking for obedience – even in our ordinary everyday lives.  He wants us to go into the dark places, where nobody ever wants to go, knowing He will go with us!! “Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for Thou art with me; Thy rod and Thy staff they comfort me.”  Psalm 23:4.

Jesus’ death and resurrection, dealt with our sin. He took it away, forever. He asks just one thing of us – follow Me! The biggest clue to the scripture from Colossians 1 at the top of the page, is in the final three words…for His purpose … Not for my purpose, or my comfort. Not for my convenience. Not so I will feel like I belong…but …For.HIS.Purpose! Jesus did everything He did because His Father had a purpose in mind. Here’s a thought – when God’s purpose and my purpose don’t match  … guess who might have to change?

I’ve experienced many disappointments, and unanswered prayers, in my Christian life. Sometimes It took me a while to go back to God and ask Him what happened. I didn’t always get an immediate answer, so I turned myself inside out trying to figure out just what I had done that had separated me from Him. Especially at some crucial point when I felt I desperately needed His help. Eventually, after persevering in prayer, as well as prayerfully reading His word, I realised that My problem was not separation because “nothing can separate us from the Love of God in Christ Jesus.“ It had to be something else…

… I looked at my life carefully and I realised that I wanted all my problems to be taken away … and HE wanted to use them to prune out stuff in my life that was not going to produce fruit. We were not on the same page! I stopped whining and feeling sorry for myself and asked Him to go with me, and help me walk through everything that was happening. I changed MY purpose. I gave up getting what I thought I needed, instead it became … following Him.

The power of God has been given to us to set us free from the things that will stop us from running the race God has put in front of us. All of our sin went to the cross. There is no reason to believe the other guy’s lies that we can’t help sinning, so we cannot afford to let satan tie us up with the past. We have our God-ordained future to run toward. Throw off any sin, and start running the race…on purpose.  . Bye 🏃‍♂️‍➡️.

P 2350 Jesus, our perfect example.

/ DVH

John 15:26 “I will send you the Helper from the Father. The Helper is the Spirit of truth Who comes from the Father. When He comes, He will tell about ME.”Whenever there is a problem, difficulty or hardship – God has an answer!  Let’s look more closely. The answer is always JESUS. 

Jesus gave us the Holy Spirit – His Helper! It is important to know that if the ‘voice’ you hear is not leading you to know Jesus better – then it is not the Holy Spirit. If that ‘voice’ tells you there is a short-cut or an easier way to go … guess what? That’s not the Holy Spirit. If that ‘voice’ tells you that you are going to be so-oo-oo important in God’s kingdom – that’s not the Holy Spirit. He doesn’t talk like that.

So Who IS important? JESUS is, that’s Who! Everything is all about Jesus. The Father has put everything we will need or we are going to need IN Him. That was the Father’s plan right from the beginning of this world. Jesus is the only way IN. He shows us the way forward, and we need to follow Him. Plus Jesus Christ is the way through whatever comes at you. Park on those promises.

Long before Christ was born Almighty God reached out to us through His prophets and leaders. Now in our time, God is telling us through the bible, that we can be strengthened against difficulties, instead of being bowled over by them. That’s what Jesus came here to give us – a God-sent way through hardship and difficulties. Christ knew that God does not leave us when things get hard and intense. Grabbing hold of that reality will stabilise and establish our hearts so we can hold steady in the middle of any storm.

In John 16:31-33 “Jesus answered them, “Do you finally believe? In fact, you’re about to make a run for it—saving your own skins and abandoning Me. But I’m not abandoned. The Father is with Me. I’ve told you all this so that trusting Me, you will be unshakable and assured, deeply at peace. In this godless world you will continue to experience difficulties. But take heart! I’ve conquered the world.” 

Now isn’t that fascinating? Jesus is giving His final instructions to His disciples and He says: ‘Guess what boys, it’s going to get HARD – but it is all good because I’M GOING TO WIN. You will all leave Me — BUT — He’s got this too!’ Faith is believing what Jesus Christ said, simply because He said it! The bible is not an opinion or a theory, it is a faithful recording of God’s interaction with other men and women who are just like us. Some things look disastrous but it is God working in our lives …He’s pruning!

Lastly, let’s quickly look at something Jesus said in – John15:1-2 “I am the true vine, and My Father is the gardener. He cuts off every branch in Me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit He prunes so that it will be even more fruitful.” The Lord does not ‘prune’ us for nothing – He has a purpose. Pruning is God’s plan to develop more fruit, it is not punishment or desertion. We need to let Him prune away any stuff – even if it looks good to us. There are some things that will not add to our character and strength. This is when we need to use our faith in His goodness to hold fast to our beliefs. Pruning cuts away any extraneous junk that we’ve adopted to cope with this life. 

Who is going to be with us and hold us up while all this stuff is happening to us? The Holy Spirit will… He did it for Jesus and He will do it for us. He will bring what the bible says into our minds so we can hold on to Christ’s words when everything in our lives has gone utterly insane.  We can be at peace despite the chaos around us because Jesus knows the Way out … He IS the Way out. We must learn to recognise our Helper, He sounds just like Jesus did. Despite what is going on around us – or even TO us, our God doesn’t change.

This life is not meant to be an easy ride, because we are producing Godly fruit, and the people of this world have never seen or tasted that kind of heavenly fruit. So we need to live by faith that He is good no matter what kind of stuff flies about, in us and around us. This means that others can “taste and see that the Lord is good.”👋🏻

P 2322 Grace opens our hearts, as well as new doors.

/ DVH

John 1:17 “For the Law was given through Moses, but grace [the unearned, undeserved favour of God] and truth came through Jesus Christ.”  Unless the Holy SPIRIT is in charge of our actions and thoughts I believe we will accidentally  automatically revert to upholding the law and judging others. We won’t end up doing that on purpose, rather it may be a life-long default button.  

Our relationship with the Holy Spirit needs tending to and caring for … He needs our private and specific attention. Otherwise what we already know, or our previous experiences will take preference over what He wants. He’s so quiet and non-intrusive, we actually need to make room for Him. Here’s what I’ve learnt that helps me to make room for Him.

The Holy Spirit likes God’s LOVE to be in charge. Not the gooey stuff we all think of as love but the kind of love clearly defined in 1 Corinthians 13. So if I am selfish, or defensive or angry etc. I will not be able to hear His quiet voice in my heart. I am learning to do my best to fix things immediately with HIM so I can get His perspective – no matter how right I think I am!  😂 I’ve found that when I make His comfort, His wishes, my priority, it opens my inner spiritual ears. And it also helps keep me humble. 

Galatians 5:22-23 says this: “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.” If we cling to the fact that He is cultivating and protecting His fruit in our lives, then we are positioning ourselves to walk with Him. It is an inner attitude rather than a law. It means we want what He wants – first. Unfortunately when the above qualities are absent, that means He is not around – no matter how much scripture or intention to do right is present, without His breath on things we will simply end up in law again.

Psalms 40:8 TPT. “I delight to fulfil your will, my God, for your living words are written upon the pages of my heart.”The Holy Spirit is not flighty or huffy. But He can be grieved easily, by the hardness of our hearts toward our Heavenly Father, and others — but, at the same time, let us remember that He wants to be with us.

Human beings have limited ideas of what love looks like because we all have a natural predilection to put ourselves first, and then we look after the people we love, or the people who benefit us. But when the Holy Spirit is in charge … a different kind of love prevails – a love that seeks the best for everyone. 

The Lord’s kind of love is not afraid or reticent to prune the one it loves. In this permissive world, any idea of correction or cutting away stuff for benefit, is totally foreign. But the passionate love of God does not hesitate about wanting to do whatever it takes, and whatever will bring out the best in the one He loves. 

Actually, when you look at what He did to save us … it becomes totally clear He will do whatever is necessary to deliver us from any of the crutches we frantically employ to cope with, sin, pain and suffering in this life. His love is passionate and relentless …all at the same time… and we would be wise to remember that. There are times when we may not even know, notice, or understand when we’ve slipped out of Grace into law. However, as we let go of our desire to get things right, or even the desire to please Him, we will begin to understand that we are no longer living under this world’s system.  SOMEBODY ELSE DID THAT PERFECTLY FOR US. 

So if the Holy Spirit leaves us, then we are doing it wrong, and it is time to stop and reassess where our spiritual train jumped the tracks. His Presence in our lives is our guide. New doors will open when we follow Him and start living in, and by His Grace. 👋🏻