Relationships

P 2404 Really loving others is costly.

/ DVH

“It is absolutely clear that God has called you to a free life. Just make sure that you don’t use this freedom as an excuse to do whatever you want to do and destroy your freedom. Rather, use your freedom to serve one another in love; that’s how freedom grows. For everything we know about God’s Word is summed up in a single sentence: Love others as you love yourself. That’s an act of true freedom. If you bite and ravage each other, watch out—in no time at all you will be annihilating each other, and where will your precious freedom be then?” Galatians 5:13-15 MSG.

God’s idea of freedom verses ours is another one of those things that seem to be in opposition. In reality it is available to the tough, those who will persevere, and the utterly committed. I believe the Lord wants us all to live a life free of the oppressions that drive and devastate people, and spoil relationships, and break- up homes. That sort of life is truly our witness, not just our words. There is an incredible freedom in living out the truth, and His Word is the only truth. When we willingly exchange our ideas of truth and freedom for His TRUTH, from the bible, everything looks different. 

And we’ve actually exchanged human glasses for heavenly vision. This is what renewing our minds looks like. It is more than being able to quote the bible. It is allowing ourselves to become a living bible. We are no different to the thousands of men and women of God who lived this way right after Christ died. They gave everything for the gospel. And they had the same Holy Spirit we have!  Reading the bible and simply agreeing that what is in it is a good principle, or a nice thought, or a good way to live —will not set us free. In God’s kingdom there is no compromise. He gave everything and He asks us to do the same. That includes exchanging what we esteem as truth, for real truth, HIS TRUTH. 

This means mental agreement is not enough, practicing what it says is. We might think – but I will not be ME anymore if I follow what the Holy Spirit says. GOOD!! The idea is to die to who we think we are, and all the stuff we’ve grabbed at in this life to achieve that image in our head – and trust in what Christ did for us instead. The Holy Spirit is not an add-on. He is essential to our new life in Christ. He knows what Jesus would do! If we lean toward making excuses for our own behaviour, or attacking other people to defend ourselves, we are immediately walking into satan’s territory. I believe obedient hearts attract the Holy Spirit’s Presence.

satan is the prince of the power of the air. he loves to distort words, meanings, looks, attitudes into negative things. We need to see other people from God’s perspective. He can use our prayers, our kindness, self-control, and love to bring out the best in others. We have a choice … we can live on the fringes of what the Lord says, or we can change the way we view people to His way, and practice obedience. I have people in my life that are not always supportive, but the Holy Spirit has asked me to see those people through His eyes. I owe Him my obedience.

Our God is fantastic at multi-tasking. Boy is He terrific at it!! He can take my desire to be obedient and transform me, as I act on it. And at the same time He will use my obedience to break into other people’s lives and bring about change there too. The thing we need to hold onto is that it will take as long as it takes. There is no magic formula. Ask for help, do what He says, keep your ears open and your heart humble … and be obedient … and remember flattery will not do. We are not buttering other people up – we are in process with God learning to live in the truth. The best words we can ever learn in this process are: “I’m sorry please forgive me.” Whether we did something to warrant those words or not. Read the book!

Sometimes we are like little kids who are planting seeds. We plant the seed, and a day later we are disappointed because we can’t see any growth! Changing adults who are set in their ways, and used to defending themselves, can take time. In our eyes, it is often the other person who is wrong, or maybe wrong-er than us. It is that view we must change.

We are committing ourselves to learn LOVE. It will take time, compassion, and loads of humility as well as repentance. It’s a process … not a magic formula. Truly loving others is always costly – it cost Christ His life. 👋🏻

P 2398 To really live, we must die.

/ DVH

Absolutely everything depends on how seriously you and I take what Jesus said! “For whoever wishes to save his life [in this world] will [eventually] lose it [through death], but whoever loses his life [in this world] for My sake and the gospel’s will save it [from the consequences of sin and separation from God].” Mark 8:35 AMP.

Salvation is not just a one time event, where you make a decision to become a Christian and that’s that. At the time of that commitment, we might cry a little … or a lot, depending on our response … but this moment is the beginning of our understanding of what Christ did for us all. After this moment then we need to begin to fix the broken relationships we have. Plus we start to pray about tithing, and regularly attending church. Maybe we also go to prayer groups or bible studies. These are difficult but still attainable life-changing things. Sadly many Christians stop right there. 

However, salvation is a PROCESS – not just an event. That process involves the transformation of our lives and it takes a lifetime to bring it about. As we enter into it and God teaches us His ways — we will be changed. We won’t pray, walk, talk, think, or speak the way we did before. Not because of rules or traditions, but because the bible itself changes us. This is when we start to understand that our old nature was taken to the cross when Christ went there – we deliberately choose His ways. Now we want to live the way He did, for God’s glory. Jesus Christ came to earth to die for humanity’s sins, and He also left us an incredible legacy.  A new way to live.

Hubby and I have been married for 35 years. Knowing him has changed me heaps. I laugh more than I used to, despite the difficulties we face daily. It is not that he is hilariously funny … sometimes he tells the worst jokes(!!!) … but in spite of that, his humour evokes a happy response from me. Knowing him and how he thinks, has changed the way I view this life. You could say his life has influenced mine.

Some things that I used to panic over, I have learnt to dismiss or leave alone. Hubby has taught me something no-one else ever taught me … it is possible to stay in love with one person for the rest of your life. However, always liking them … meh! Some days that’s a whole other story. 🙄 But ongoing, fully-committed love is actually possible from a human POV, if each person is prepared to die-to-self in the process. Forget the whole “Oh that’s just me, I’m just like that” rubbish – marriage is about two people becoming ONE. Adjustment will be required.

Now, if another person who is like us can teach us such important stuff – then imagine what the Lord God Maker of heaven and earth can teach us as we get to know HIM. This is the real point of salvation – it is about getting to know SomeOne … and as a result we can progressively learn to rely upon Jesus in all kinds of circumstances. This is how He has taught me, personally and authentically, how wonderful He is. I experience Him, His thoughts, His ways, as I interact with Him in my prayer time, and by reading the bible, and when we obey Him. 

However, if I limit my interactions with Him, and live my Christian life spasmodically, in and out of what His Word says … I will end up with a limited view. He won’t quit on me, but I am distancing myself from Him. That’s when our relationship will become stunted and stiff and lack spiritual life. By engaging in this growth process, I have become aware that this relationship can be costly. I have had to give up my ideas and attitudes about this world and the people in it. Here’s a couple of examples:  before I met the Lord, I saw some people as enemies – but Jesus sees potential for a loving relationship. At other times when I am afraid, and try to hide or run away, He stands with me as I face whatever it is. He helps me conquer my fears. 

Father God’s view of love can seem upside down to what human beings think. Eve thought – “its just a bit of fruit and it looks OK – here you try it  Adam!” She thought her own wisdom was enough. King Saul thought looks and presence would put him over, as a king. But God wanted a man who trusted in Him, not appearances. Solomon thought that many wives meant He was a very important king. He ended up going the wrong way after those wives influenced him. Goliath thought being bigger, stronger and overbearing would give him victory. So God sent a kid to kill him with a round stone.

When we shrink God’s ways into a shape that suits US, we are making a god after our own image. Jesus Christ came to show us that He could live life as a human being like us and still have and maintain a God-obedient love-filled life. We simply need to continually study and obey God’s Word under His guidance, and let it change our minds and reactions. Then He will make that word alive inside us. This means to really live – we will have to choose to die. 👋🏻

“His divine power has given us everything we need for a godly life through our knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory and goodness.” 2 Peter 1:3 NIV

P 2391 Peace thieves.

/ DVH

It’s the little foxes that spoil the vines. (S of Songs 2:16.) And it is the little things that niggle and nag at us, that steal our peace. Today I want to talk about somethings I’ve noticed that steals MY peace. I hope this helps you as well. 

Unforgiveness is a thief – it steals peace, and it is destructive to relationships. It colours the way we see things – it maximises bad things and makes good things totally disappear. It is very easy for our faith in mankind to be battered, but in my observation that happens because I have let my focus on the Lord fade, and now all I can see is the mess in front of me. That blocks my view of other things … especially good things! And when somebody else is involved it becomes wa-ay too easy to dump the blame on them.

It is amazing how quickly I can forget my own missteps, and excuse them as whoopsies, whereas if someone else does something dumb toward me, I immediately suspect a dire plot to overthrow my spiritual life and ruin my day. And guess what? I am right!! There is a plot … but I am mis-identifying the source. It isn’t you! It’s the other guy. Nobody can make anybody else be snarky, that’s a choice – but the enemy of our souls is a master of setting all of us up for a fall. As well as pointing out other people’s failures and stupidity.

Then we start to think of the other person as our enemy and begin collating evidence to prove this is so – so that we can stay where we are and remain unchanged. IF WE ARE NOT CHANGING WE ARE NOT LIVING A SPIRITUALLY CHALLENGING LIFE. Here’s a red hot tip – people hate to change! Which is kind of sad because transformation involves change.

First things first, chuck out any evidence-against-others-files that you might holding onto! That stuff will shoot anyone in the foot faster than Wild Bill Hickok can draw his rifle. It is one of satan’s ploys … and it can only be defeated by reminding ourselves the temptation to SIN IS COMMON TO MAN. (1 Corinthians 10:13) I am a part of mankind so that remark applies to me as well as you. 

At times like this it is way too easy to think …‘That’s because they are not in tune with the Lord like I am … they have a wrong attitude.’ 😱 Hello pride – time for you to leave now! When I start to hear myself think like that …that’s when I realise I am circling the drain. My focus has come off the Lord and onto me and my feelings and whatever dumb thing you did accidentally, or even on purpose. I need to throw my car into reverse …pronto. I find humbling myself does that pretty quickly.

Now I have to start praying right away, instead of checking out my hurt feelings, and then I remind myself that I don’t forgive others because they deserve it, I forgive them because He forgave me first and I definitely don’t deserve that. I need to remember that this life is not perfect – instead it is about perfecting me … and to tell the truth … some days I just plain don’t like that idea!  So some things ARE my fault, not yours.

Here’s another little fox under the X-ray! What comes out of my mouth. Look, I know people have gone on and on about that, and to be perfectly honest with you I hated what they said because I am an external processor. I don’t often know what I think until it comes out of my mouth. It took me 50 years to pay attention, but I nowadays I agree that what comes out of our mouths does matter. To start with we can easily end up agreeing with those destructive thoughts about someone else’s behaviour. 

…That’s like getting ready to pour concrete. First you dig a hole, then you put in formwork, then you pour in the concrete and wait for it to set. Concrete is a permanent thing. I want to suggest that we don’t need to permanently think badly about other people. It makes it too hard to change your mind. Suddenly the other person has to prove themselves to us, to get back our good opinion of them.  In my observation, satan is delighted to get all of us saying the dumbest stuff to each other and about each other – he hates harmony. Let’s not help him!

Here’s what I have learnt … if I speak kindly and thoughtfully about someone else it encourages the Holy Spirit to hang around with me because He likes it. That’s a HUGE plus. The Holy Spirit knows good stuff about that other person that I haven’t even noticed and He’s really happy to share. I don’t have to make things up, with His help, I will get new eyes. I have personally proven in my life – this can be a learned skill.

We need to identify and deal with the peace thieves that invade our lives and our homes …a good place to start is to blame the enemy, not the person, and deal with satan, first. 👋🏻

P 2381 Out with the old and in with the new.

/ DVH

“Because of this decision we don’t evaluate people by what they have or how they look. We looked at the Messiah that way once and got it all wrong, as you know. We certainly don’t look at Him that way anymore. Now we look inside, and what we see is that anyone united with the Messiah gets a fresh start, is created new.The old life is gone; a new life emerges! Look at it! All this comes from the God who settled the relationship between us and Him, and then called us to settle our relationships with each other.”

“God put the world square with Himself through the Messiah, giving the world a fresh start by offering forgiveness of sins. God has given us the task of telling everyone what He is doing. We’re Christ’s representatives. God uses US to persuade men and women to drop their differences and enter into God’s work of making things right between them. We’re speaking for Christ Himself now: Become friends with God; He’s already a friend with you.”

I think the above scripture from 2 Corinthians 5:17 in the Message bible version is a pip … it’s the bomb! Meanwhile, those Message translators managed to get a whole lot of words out of a single medium-sized sentence in the King James. I think this very large translation is one of the very best versions of the gospel there is, and it is worth knowing and remembering what it says. It’s a fantastic summary of what happens when someone is changed by meeting Christ.

This new life we have now is not one of ticks and crosses. ✔️Tick, this is good behaviour, ❌cross, this is bad behaviour. This new life is an attitude of the heart followed by obedient, appropriately God-ordained actions. That’s why we need to take the time to get to know the Holy Spirit. He is our God-appointed Leader and Guide, as well as our Helper. After all, Jesus deliberately went away so the Holy Spirit could come here, so that ought to tell us something!  The Holy Spirit can be everywhere, with everyone, all at once …

The place this fantastic system falls down is on our watch. At this moment in His-tory WE are the only messengers of this gospel. Isn’t it amazing that God should trust you and I to be the people to tell everyone around us what happened in our life when we met Him? We can drag miserable, grumpy Aunt Minnie, to a thousand church meetings, but unless the Holy Spirit kisses that time — she will judge Christianity by the way we treat her. And that, my friend is a very sobering thought. One we should not take lightly.

We can pray: “Dear Jesus please save grouchy Aunt Minnie, Amen.” And then go away and think that we’ve done all we can to expose her to the gospel – because we prayed, and she’s so difficult and dangerous – just saying ‘hello’ is like running with the bulls in Pamploma! Some people are so nasty it is definitely a risk to life and limb just to get into their cage with them! So we blindly go along trying hard to be nice to her whenever we can, but she’s truly such a grouch it is almost impossible. However, this means we are basically leaving the responsibility we have to be Jesus to her … behind – and we are denying the power of His Word. No faith in that! I also think it is good to focus on the fact that tolerating Aunt Minnie is not the same as loving her. Holding in 4,000+ biting words when she rails on you isn’t either. I’m just saying … !!!

Because we are now in the process of being transformed, that life-style choice means someone who used to see grumpy Aunt Minnie as a matter of familial responsibility, now sees her as God’s gift in their life to give them opportunities for their transformation. After all, we have been told that Jesus loved the cross, He regarded it as a joy, because He saw what the result of the cross would be for this world. We need to learn to love the Auntie Minnies etc. in our lives, because they are now our personal tutors into His kingdom. It is incredibly easily for people like this to diagnose, and disclose our ugly hidden side.

In that process I will discover that the difference between Auntie Min and me, is that she is honestly horrid … however I think, and probably hope that I am not! The reality is, I just know how to hide my horrid far better than she does. Auntie M is actually my new best friend, and she comes complete with active provocation and mega annoyance. I don’t have to like her behaviour, but I must learn from my response to her behaviour, or my new life in Him will cease to flourish.

The Holy Spirit will use Auntie Minnie to show me sides of myself I never knew were there. But that only happens if I stop excusing myself and accusing her! So, because the gospel is always the issue … here’s a knotty question —  if your life was a gospel tract on witnessing what would it say? “I got saved, and now I have a Saviour Who answers my prayers?” Hmmm. A truly transformed and changed life is a powerful thing. 

It is time for us to take off the self-protective glasses and learn who we really are, so we can love the people who have been even more badly hurt than we have … and at the same time we need to pay attention to our responses and reactions so we can cultivate our new nature by walking with Him. 👋🏻

“We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making His appeal through us. We implore you on Christ’s behalf: Be reconciled to God.” 2 Corinthians 5:20

P 2241 Now where did I leave my peace again?

/ DVH

Losing our peace is a bad thing. To be honest with you, in the Western world, I am not sure we value inner peace from the Lord enough! Losing it is like opening the door to the bad guys and saying: “Come on in, and bother me with heaps of stuff that is not always true, because I want to live in anxiety, bitterness, turbulence and agitation!” Meanwhile if you turn that coin over you will suddenly discover if you actually have any of those greeblies I mentioned above – guess what? YOU LOST YOUR PEACE. Time to go and find it again!

Let’s start with what the bible says. Peace comes from and through Jesus Christ – however it is not a cessation of hostilities or trouble. Peace comes from the inside of our heart – out. Because we now have peace with Him – nothing else can disturb us. John 16:33 “I have said these things to you, that IN ME you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world.”Yeah, not so much with me liking the tribulation part of that verse(!) 😳 – But we can definitely have peace in the middle of any kind of terrible situation that can plague us in this world – because His peace is spiritual peace. Spiritual peace can be lost – by embracing the problem, and not the Saviour. (Help help!)

Jesus explains to us that the peace He brings doesn’t look like this world’s idea of peace. Anyone who has lived in a country where there is war, the threat of war, or even internal ructions of any sort, knows that this world’s kind of PEACE is not permanent. It often depends on the actions of others. But in John 14:27 it says: “Peace I leave with you; MY peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. LET not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid.”We can refuse to be drawn into all the guff going on around us – because we know the end of the story! This kind of peace needs to be embraced, appreciated and allowed to flourish. Treat peace as a priority, because a lack of peace is a slippery slide that often leads into doubt and unbelief.

Isaiah 26:3 says “You will keep us in perfect peace, when our mind is fixed on You: because we trust in You.” The biggest snare that leads to losing our peace is that our mind is not fixed. Renewing our minds daily help fix that problem! 😂 We are probably not trusting in Jesus, ALONE.  If we lose sight of our Saviour, and focus on our troubles instead – peace starts to become a vague idea, instead of the place we live in, internally. We might even blame other people for stealing it from us.

In those moments we need to drag our minds away from blame or trying to fix things ourselves. Or even going from one person to another, trying to find a solution. Peace came from Jesus and He can restore it for us. It gets reestablished inside us, first. Then the peace that is established inside us, affects everything outside us. So we do whatever we can, and then turn everything over to the Lord. Christians need to value their relationships with others above everything else but the Lord Jesus Himself, because anger etc. will rob us of our peace. 

In order to wrangle our emotions in desperate or difficult situations we will need His strength. ‘His strength is made perfect in weak people.So – admit your weakness! Pray – “I can’t, but You can.” In 1 Peter 3:11 it says: “They must turn from evil and do good; they must seek peace and pursue it.” Peace does not fall on us – we will have to treat it like a lost treasure and go after it. When we lose our peace, the first place to go is the cross – then PRAISE GOD! We go to the tomb!!

We need to value His peace. It’s a gift as well as a fruit. Romans 12:18 says: “If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone.” Sometimes it is just not possible to facilitate real reconciliation with someone else. Our job is to manage our end, not try to micromanage everyone else. This means all we can do is to restore our end of the relationship, and make sure we have arrived back at LOVE. Love is not about feelings, it is about being prepared to die for the other person!

Lastly, other people cannot steal our peace – but really motivated ones can give us loads of opportunities…!! 😂 God bless them! However, the reality is – we actually have to give up or relinquish our peace in order to lose it. It’s a choice. My advice is that we need to go back through the day in prayer, and revise what happened where, and with whom. Then repent for not valuing something so precious. Admit you lost it.

To sum up: if you are mad… you’ve lost your peace. If you are scared … you’ve lost your peace. If you’ve mislaid your hope that God is with you, helping you … you’ve lost your peace. That which is lost can be found again. 👋🏻