Saints

P 3011 He is a Merciful Father.

/ DVH

“Lord, You’re so kind and tenderhearted and so patient with people who fail You! Your love is like a flooding river overflowing its banks with kindness. You don’t look at us only to find our faults, just so that You can hold a grudge against us.” Psalms 103:8-9 TPT. This Psalm was written 1100 years before Jesus was born. Imagine that! Just spend a minute drinking in the knowledge of Grace that exists in David’s words. He had such a clear, wonderful picture of Who God is. Almighty God was this man’s singular focus. Not sin. Not what he did, or what I did, or even what some Philistine did! His focus was on God Himself. David knew God and His mercy so clearly.

It would be an utter tragedy if we became so obsessed with our failures, that we cannot see, or imagine the Niagara Falls of our Father’s Grace falling, falling, falling into our lives, day after day after day. Let’s always remember to thank Him for it! He’s such a good good merciful Father! We must continually chase after Him, longing to know more about His goodness and mercy toward us, until it fills our thoughts and eyes. If we look at our failures, we will end up obsessing over them and letting those things rule us. That is that kind of stuff that makes people hide from God.

What we need is balance. The ability to see His mercy-in-action in our own lives and yet not presume on it.  To do that we rely upon what the bible says and the Holy Spirit’s help and guidance. His singularity and purity of mind and heart is like our compass, pointing us to true north. So we press on hoping to be more like David, he treasured our God with so much passion. Let’s leave our sinful attitudes and actions at the foot of the cross and praise God He didn’t given up on us!

The letters in the Epistles were written so we can understand the comprehensive everydayness of God’s divine intervention into our lives. Like the people who followed Him then, we lay aside the weights that try to attach themselves, and keep thanking Him for His goodness. Always remembering we are never ever going to deserve anything He has done for us. The pressure to perform is a weight. These saints knew, firsthand, that they could not have done what was done without our Father’s Divine Love, plus His incredible intervention. They marvelled at what they were allowed to see and take part in – their joy, suffering, miracles and troubles. 

That’s the starting point for each one of us, giving thanks that He loves us. We cannot move past that. Then we will begin to understand our role in His plan and receive power from Him to do the works He has prepared for us to do before we ever arrived into this world. I like to cultivate, fertilise and weed the seed beds of my life with His totally engaged oversight. When God puts His finger on something, then it is important and it needs to become a priority … not a postponement. He does this with loving mercy, not accusation.

I often think about all those other people-today-who-don’t-know-Him-yet. The people who worship so-called gods that have no power to help their followers to change the very things that have driven them to find someone, or something, greater than themselves in the first place! And, how I love the Lord Jesus so much for coming here and illustrating what LOVE looks like in a Person. 

Mercy is a greatly underrated virtue, today. Many people think it means we go soft on someone who has terrible attitudes and actions. Actually, mercy means we don’t kill them for what they’ve done, we forgive them instead. But mercy is not about standing against a wall for someone else’s target practice – that’s giving that person the opportunity to abuse Grace. It is not just bad for you – it is bad for them! Grace was expensive. We need the Holy Spirit’s guidance to help us live in it and administer it. Jesus persevered with those who persecuted Him, but He did not excuse their behaviour. Mercy is no-one’s free ticket to punish someone else.

Our God is full of mercy:  “… that is, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not counting people’s sins against them [but canceling them]. And He has committed to us the message of reconciliation [that is, restoration to favour with God].”2 Corinthians 5:19. If you want to know more about what His mercy looks like in action – read the book. Bye for today, 👋.

ps For those who have asked about our trip: on this trip we gave away— nearly a hundred blankets. Plus donated tinned food, toothpaste, deodorants, baby clothes, baby bottles, nappies, toys, handmade bags, children’s books, bookmarks, pens, paintings, thank you cards, blocks of chocolate for the maids, prophetic words, plus nearly 300 bibles. That’s approx. 678 things in 8 days. We could have given away so much more, but our car was stuffed full, and we tied more to the roof! We had countless conversations talking about what we believe – many of the people we spoke to, wept. 

There are governmental agencies doing their best, but the funds are incredibly low for the sheer volume of misplaced, abused and over-looked people out here in the country. We met a worker in Nanango who had been a police officer for years. She had to give it up because of post-traumatic stress disorder. She looked at us with eyes filled with tears and said:“I couldn’t take the dead and abused children anymore. It nearly finished me. I couldn’t even talk to my husband about it for a year.”  Please pray for her, now she helps the homeless – you cannot stop a mercy gift and she has one!

The church needs the kind of mercy that stops seeing broken people as just someone we are meant to harvest for God’s kingdom and purposes, and simply see suffering human beings instead. 🙏

P 2927 God loves diversity.

/ DVH

Inadvertently, in Christianity, people have made some subjects into major things — stuff like the speaking gifts. Some things are entirely up to the perseverance of the individual and application. Things like speaking in tongues will help believers with their focus. It takes faith to step into this gift, but people should not drive themselves crazy because they don’t speak in an unknown tongue, or they haven’t so far.

Christians from all generations – people who came from all over this planet, have followed the Holy Spirit into this world’s darkest places. They died for what they believed. We know that they were devoted saints – yet they didn’t happen to speak in tongues and if they prophesied we weren’t told! Tongues, teaching, exhortation,  prophecy, any speaking gifts are not some sort of spiritual badge, they are spiritual GIFTS and those gifts have been given to us to benefit everyone else! Our aim should be to step into the flow of what the Lord wants, so we can carry it out. Every gift matters.

By the way, people who pray in tongues pray as the Holy Spirit leads them, but their minds may not understand what they are praying. That’s why we need to pray both ways, with the Spirit and with our minds. We have inadvertently divided His Body over things that were given to us to be a blessing, not a prerequisite or a qualifying mark of greater spirituality. Personally, I ask Him to help me pray, and I let Him choose how!

Those Christians who find that this precious gift is not part of their package from the Lord, are often people who are afraid of being blasphemous – their fear of hurting the Lord is blocking their faith in His ability to be faithful to us! That’s not SIN. It is a sensitive, badly-informed heart. When anyone prays in tongues, they have stepped into the stream of Eternal Never-ending Flow of what God is doing and saying, using their faith… We are speaking the Holy Spirit’s language, not necessarily ours!

The real test is the level of our humility, not our ability to look spiritual. Prophecy, for instance, should edify and build up everyone’s faith, as well as speak directly into the heart of the people who hear it. It is not a badge that proves one person is more spiritually attuned than someone else. It is a gift. It was giv-en to them — but the Person really responsible for all that beauty is the Holy Spirit! So when others hear Him speak, they will hear Him speaking directly into their hearts, their situations, their pain and joy. It touches them, sets them free, and makes them feel they are not a failure. Father God doesn’t see His kids as failures – He sees us through the shed blood of His darling Son! 

We need to honour what Jesus did for us over how we feel at any given time. Yes, we might have a good reason to be caught up in our feelings, but that’s often precisely when we need to step out in faith and tell the Lord that He is bigger than our feelings, and then do whatever it is, anyway! This means we are putting Him into His rightful place. Making Him our first and highest priority. 

Just like repentance and reparation are not optional extras, they are a part of a living faith. We get muddled up because we think those two things mean we need to feel something. Maybe we should feel sorry about what we have done. But actually these two things are about sheer, unqualified obedience to His Word, not our feelings. I have asked for forgiveness from someone and it was months later I realised what I had actually done! Think of this as being like an orchestra, when the instruments are not tuned together there will be disharmony. Only the conductor knows each part and how in tune to His composition accurately.

1 Corinthians 12:4-11 says: “God’s various gifts are handed out everywhere; but they all originate in God’s Spirit. God’s various ministries are carried out everywhere; but they all originate in God’s Spirit. God’s various expressions of power are in action everywhere; but God Himself is behind it all. Each person is given something to do that shows Who God is: Everyone gets in on it, everyone benefits. All kinds of things are handed out by the Spirit, and to all kinds of people! The variety is wonderful:”

These verses explain the main point of Spiritual gifts. The majority of Christians have gifts they have not activated, so they remain unaware of the power of letting Him operate through them. All His gifts showcase the glory of Almighty God to others. That’s why we were given them. Those gifts are all about HIM, not us. I really don’t care if anyone prays or exhorts others well, or prophesies so brilliantly that God’s glory comes down upon everyone, or teaches us so clearly, it is mind-blowing… They are still His gifts, for His glory. It’s about HIM.

We can elevate some gifts over others – but we should never underestimate the gifts that operate quietly, behind the scenes because that’s the Lord too! Jesus served humanity without capital letters on everything! (Unlike me! 🤣 –  I’m still being perfected!) There are no big or small gifts, only big or small human attitudes. Our God loves everything we do to honour, elevate and illustrate His goodness to others. Spiritual gifts are for everyone’s benefit – and God loves diversity.  Bye for now, 👋

P 2918 Know your place.

/ DVH

It is a very valuable thing to know your place in God’s plans. Who you are, and who you are not. Listen to the genuine humility in what John the Baptist says in John 1:19-23. “Now this was John’s testimony when the Jewish leaders in Jerusalem sent priests and Levites to ask him who he was He did not fail to confess, but confessed freely, “I am not the Messiah.”They asked him, “Then who are you? Are you Elijah?” He said, “I am not.” “Are you the Prophet?”

He answered, “No.” Finally they said, “Who are you? Give us an answer to take back to those who sent us. What do you say about yourself?”John replied in the words of Isaiah the prophet, “I am the voice of one calling in the wilderness, ‘Make straight the way for the Lord.’”

John had absolutely no problem with his role in God’s kingdom, and yet he had a lot to brag about! To start with, He was born under extraordinary circumstances. His parents were childless and too old to have children when God announced his arrival. This young man looked and lived differently, he was totally devoted to God’s purposes. He practically vibrated with passion for God’s ways. John was the youngest witness ever-recorded in the bible. He jumped up and down for joy, inside his mum, when his mother met Mary, who was carrying Jesus Christ inside her at the time.

This young man knew his place – he simply did whatever God told him to do when the Lord told him to do it. His entire life was devoted to preaching repentance. It still blows my mind that he had a huge personal claim to fame, after all – he baptised Jesus!!  Imagine – he could have founded the “I baptised Jesus movement!” Yet he never once traded on what he did, he simply was obedient to his own calling. Sadly this poor guy got his head cut off because he called sin SIN! Something we all seem loathe to do nowadays.

Today everyone seems to want a big glorious ministry – to be seen and known. While others have given up on any ministry because they don’t seem to be spiritually extraordinary enough. Where are the John the Baptists amongst us? The men and women who know their place and faithfully and humbly stand in what they were given to do. We live in a culture that says that we should become famous, so we can make the Lord’s Name famous. Like HE needs our help!! I love the scripture below, because it smacks ambition right on the head – hard!

“For who do you know that really knows you, knows your heart? And even if they did, is there anything they would discover in you that you could take credit for? Isn’t everything you have and everything you are sheer gifts from God? So what’s the point of all this comparing and competing? You already have all you need. You already have more access to God than you can handle…”1 Corinthians 4:7 MSG.

Another version says: “What do you have that was not given to you?”  Our answer to that should always be … nothing. Not one blooming thing. I’ve had 3 children, and I know each one was a gift from God. I also live in a safe place – the Lord gave me that too. Some other Christians live in anti-Christ cultures and they live with great fear. Because they know Jesus, and they love Him, but the Lord is not welcome in their country.They are living like His salt in a deadly stew, fearing a knock on their door.  

Looking at this world all around us and realising what we have been given, introduces gratitude and a sense of place and purpose. The pressure is off, we don’t all have to be big time evangelists … some of us live ordinary lives faithfully serving an extraordinary God! Yesterday hubby explained the gospel to a lady who had never ever heard it before. She asked what the gospel of John was about, and he left her reading the bible for the first time. Our faith has been designed to be active and vibrant — as well as love-filled and dripping in compassion. That’s the only criteria. Fame brings its own pitfalls.

Some of us get to practice love on people who have absolutely no idea or understanding of what they have been freely given. Many saints weep into their pillows in fervent prayer, because they know the fate of others around them. You and I might pass these people on the street and we wouldn’t even know that we are passing one of Christ’s passionate unknown soldiers.

Ambition is a deadly trap. The person imprisoned by it can never do enough, there always has to be more – preferably bigger and brighter. For these poor souls trapped-by-extraordinary-visible-results, the joy of salvation can be lost in the anguish of not-being-effective-enough. Or the need to have recognition. We must find our own place, and start being active and obedient to our heavenly calling — where He put us. Here’s a very old hymn, many may have sung in their childhood that reminds us of that calling:

“Jesus bids us shine with a pure clean light, like a little candle burning in the night. In this world of darkness, so we must shine – you in your small corner and I in mine!”   Bye … 👋.

P 2893 People need to see HIM in us.

/ DVH

Luke 13:10-17 “On a Sabbath Jesus was teaching in one of the synagogues, and a woman was there who had been crippled by a spirit for eighteen years. She was bent over and could not straighten up at all.When Jesus saw her, He called her forward and said to her, “Woman, you are set free from your infirmity.” Then He put His hands on her, and immediately she straightened up and praised God. Indignant because Jesus had healed on the Sabbath, the synagogue leader said to the people, “There are six days for work. So come and be healed on those days, not on the Sabbath.”

The Lord answered him, “You hypocrites! Doesn’t each of you on the Sabbath untie your ox or donkey from the stall and lead it out to give it water? Then should not this woman, a daughter of Abraham, whom Satan has kept bound for eighteen long years, be set free on the Sabbath day from what bound her?” When He said this, all His opponents were humiliated, but the people were delighted with all the wonderful things He was doing.”

Why were these people so delighted? Here’s my theory … instead of rules and regulations, theories and hypotheses about this or that … God’s Love for ordinary people, those who daily lived in pain and suffering, was being acted out in front of their eyes! Suddenly His Love was no longer a theory — it was on display! Something they could see and experience for themselves. People saw His love in action, through everything Christ did. Sometimes I feel that we have failed the Lord, by talking, talking, talking about this idea or that one, but we haven’t actually moved from theory into practice.

Romans 5:8:“But God demonstrates His own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”  Jesus is God’s love demonstrated. Let’s just think about that. He was kind to sinners and saints alike and He healed and delivered people who were trapped in terrible situations. He taught everyone around Him what God is like by the way He treated them. You and I meet people who need these demonstrations of His love every single day. They need His touch, whether it is an encouraging word, or a prayer for healing, or even food or shelter.

Our God chose to come here as a vulnerable infant, He lived among us, and … “Jesus Christ set a perfect example of kindness and love. Throughout His earthly ministry, He showed His love for others by blessing and serving the poor, the sick, and the distressed.” (Thank you Google!) Here’s my question for today – how do WE as in … you and I …choose to demonstrate our love for God to others? If we are not distracted, or weighted down by the cares of this life, and we are living vastly unaware of our personal contribution – we can think that simply avoiding sin meets His requirements. Sadly that kind of stuff will turn anyone into a legalist in a heart beat. Instead of peace flowing like a river … judgment will drown anyone who comes near it!

Here’s a revelation — trying to avoid sin is not the answer. Jesus already dealt with sin at Calvary and He expects us to use the power He bequeathed to us to deal with our own sin in our own lives using our OWN faith! There’s no point in sweeping junk under the carpet … that lump in the middle of the carpet is a dead-giveaway. Other people are bound to stumble over it. Luke 8:17: “For there is nothing hidden that will not be disclosed, and nothing concealed that will not be known or brought out into the open.” Sooner or later who we really are jumps out under pressure. What we do after that happens, hits everyone around us with a learning curve. Then we can’t continue to pretend that we are AOK, because it eventually becomes obvious we are not.

The people who live around us need God’s love demonstrated toward them – that’s why He has given all of us Grace gifts, now we can deal with this world without hating it, or avoiding it. These Grace gifts change other people’s lives – and awaken faith in His goodness in us. It is consistency that matters – so day by day – we need to choose to  live our lives for His sake. This is how we usher in His kingdom – we follow Him, and we see people through His eyes. Tolerated and/or hidden sin can make us deaf and blind to other people’s needs. However, His love causes our faces to shine the way Jesus’ face shone with the love of the Father. 

Father God knows how to go around other people’s fierce, disinterested faces and attitudes, and bless them with His Love – despite their postures of indifference. We just follow the Holy Spirit and obey His prompts.The glorious thing about God’s loving, fruitful kingdom is that even a little tiny bit of it released into someone else’s life grows. That’s because His kingdom is not of this world – or subject to the junk we tolerate.

Always remember, people need to see Him in us. Every single day we need to use our faith to move beyond this world’s thinking, and start thinking and acting like HE does. My last thought is this, make friends with the Holy Spirit, He knows how to reach people. Bless you. 👋

P 2747 We need Clarity.

/ DVH

Colossians 2:9-14 NIV: “For in Christ all the fullness of the Deity lives in bodily form, and in Christ you have been brought to fullness. He is the head over every power and authority. In Him you were also circumcised with a circumcision not performed by human hands. Your whole self ruled by the flesh was put off when you were circumcised by Christ, having been buried with Him in baptism, in which you were also raised with Him through your faith in the working of God, who raised Him from the dead.When you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made YOU alive with Christ. He forgave us all our sins, having canceled the charge of our legal indebtedness, which stood against us and condemned us; He has taken it away, nailing it to the cross.”

Oh man, God’s book is such an incredible blessing! I love it when seemingly complex subjects are written with this kind of clarity, that means I can sometimes understand what it is saying. You know, for many years, nobody ever told me that I am now dead. I listened to sermon after sermon about this interesting thing, and that glorious revelation, but how to live my life for Jesus and die to myself, never came up. OR – if it did I was too thick to hear it! I didn’t realise my bit was to die to what I want, and live for what He wants now. As a matter of fact, I thought the people who lived like that were special people – missionaries, pastors, evangelists etc. But for ordinary people like me – we just plodded along doing our best and failing – lots.

The enemy nagged at me: ’You are a failure, you are of no use to Jesus because you can’t live the perfect life. If you are sick it’s your fault, if God doesn’t help you, you must have some undiagnosed sin.’ If I was a donkey the load of weight to get stuff right, that was plonked on my shoulders was far too great to bear!! I was taught about what the right lifestyle looks like, how to pray properly, how to give, what my kids should be like, or how to live with difficult people. The answer was easy – just be nice to them now. HAH! How could I be nice to them when my instant response was to thump them?! 😱 No pressure!!!

Everybody has sinned – including the famous saints we think are perfect because they appear to get it right! They too have fallen short of His glorious ideal Jesus. His Grace is everyone’s equaliser. Sin is sin, it weighs us all down. And no matter how much we perfume sin, or cover it up with nice smiles and pretty responses, and appealing sermons, it still stinks. It smells of death!

After a while, I lost hope, I thought: ‘Maybe I’m just too broken and can’t be fixed.’  That happy little thought did not help me live with the aforementioned difficult people, and it didn’t make me very cheery either. BUT GOD IS FAITHFUL FOLKS… I’m here to tell you that every word in the bible is true, and if we choose to walk with Him, we can be transformed. It’s a process.  People may accidentally mislead you, but His book never will.  So we believe the book and then act on it. This means we will personally see God at work, every single day, when we act on what He says.  Meanwhile, the Beatitudes could keep us all busy for the rest of our lives.  He taught me about dying to self when I started living like His book says — plus, I desperately wanted to love others the way He loves them.

I use what the bible says, like a prescription from the doctor. And followed the instructions. Then I made my first assignment loving impossible people!  Boy does that keep me occupied!!  The book says: ‘all my flesh was put off when I came to Christ and was baptised…’ so I not only believe it,  I am daily living my life like it’s true. I realised that I didn’t have to sin anymore, I was making terrible choices that indulged my flesh! But Jesus paid for me to live free of my old ways and I have a HELPER.

Before anybody gets tangled up in the thought: ‘but I can’t hear the Holy Spirit’ … let’s make it clear. Try listening! Ask Him to help you recognise His voice. Don’t dismiss that quiet voice inside that says:”Don’t say that you will hurt someone.” The Holy Spirit speaks to me inside my heart. When I was a kid I would have called that voice my conscience. It seems I always had a place where God could speak to me, I just didn’t always like what He said! So I ignored it and did what I felt like. I was hardening my own heart by my refusal to listen and co-operate with Him. The truth is you and I are now dead, and we both daily choose to live that way on purpose.

Now, I walk in the power of my own God-given choices. The power of God is active on our behalf when we make that kind of choice. I had so much yuk stuff in my life that I was tolerating, thinking it was normal to struggle. I lived expecting to have to suck all the bad stuff up, buttercup!  I totally hoped my inner thoughts and behaviour didn’t show to others and that would kind of be OK. Hey, I still struggle! But now it is against my own flesh indulging itself, by having hissy fits and excusing its own bad behaviour.

If what you hear in your head is mean, nasty, spiteful, dangerous, and against what the bible says – deal with yourself and REPENT. It’s not somebody else’s fault – it’s ours! Pray and humble yourself. It’s the devil! he picks up on our weaknesses. If what you hear is kind, loving, supportive, helpful and it glorifies Jesus, and it’s IN the book – then that’s the Holy Spirit! Here is my advice on how to die daily — PRAY. Then find something you have never even tried to obey before, use your faith that God will help you, and go and do it.  We lack power because we lack the kind of faith that leads us into obedience.

This probably means we will have to fix things with our neighbour, or our mother-in-law, or someone we don’t much like. Transformation works in us as we do these hard things using our faith. He promised to help us. Believe Him – take Him at His Word. The more we obey His directives, the more our faith becomes living, and the bible will give us His clarity. Bye. 👋

P2734 “Let HIS mind be in us …”

/ DVH

People like the Apostle Paul wrote what they wrote to equip the saints, as well as to promote unity, and maturity. And most times today’s saints are scrabbling about in the dirt fighting over this perceived bit of turf or that pathway, or this verse interpretation, or that application! All our theories are just that – theories. We are more concerned about being doctrinally right, than we are about learning to love people – even when they are difficult.  One day – we will ALL know how wrong we’ve been. In the Presence of the Lord there is no room for anything but worship and awe, so what WE think won’t matter! 🙌 At that point, all our theories and ideas will be less than dust atoms.

The early church had skirmishes with each other and things weren’t always perfect. However I am so sad about the things that are not resolved in our churches today. Our sure foundation is Christ, we cannot build on the rubble of disagreement. Where we fall down is we are not working to restore people when things get broken and God is not pleased with our hard hearts. These men and women in the book could not live without Him – so they did whatever the Holy Spirit said, so they could stay in step with Him and others!  I am not trying to be rude, but YOU are not the Apostle Paul … we know that he had sound doctrine  … and neither am I! Let’s learn to walk in humility toward restoration.

I know so many precious people who are waiting, waiting. waiting for the next move of the Holy Spirit to come. They want Him to fix the mess we have made, because we’ve allowed opinions to become more important than people or God Himself! Human passion does not equal God’s passion. When we throw ourselves on the altar weeping, what do we do after that? Many of us want Him to transform us in a heartbeat, when most of us have had a lifetime to learn how to co-operate with Him! It’s time to repent of wasting the time He has already given us, and start pursuing living the way that He lived. 

Philippians 2:5-8: “Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus: Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God: But made Himself of no reputation, and took upon Him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men: And being found in fashion as a man, He humbled Himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.”Humility is not about what we say – it is designed to be demonstrated, frequently.

In these turbulent times I’m personally looking for prophets that will tell us that we need to repent and repair things in our own lives, today – otherwise I’m not very interested in what they say. All I know is that Jesus will come back – one day, maybe soon, maybe not!… And He’s coming back for a passionate people who will die for each other and what they believe. The Holy Spirit is looking for the heart of Christ in all of us. And what we aim at matters. Even if we miss the mark, we need to keep aiming at loving one another, promoting unity, as well as embracing repentance when we are wrong. Humbling ourselves and admitting our faults to one another is part of the way that happens!  

The Lord is looking for the harmony that comes from seeking His Face, personally and corporately. We’ve all been aiming too low, we are aiming at promoting our churches and their doctrines, not Jesus!  The Holy Spirit is the One Who would love to lead us into true unity. His Presence with us, in us and through us will be that Unity. Unity is not just agreement – unity is a heart attitude. Agreements can be broken. Read the book. 

Transformation, for individuals and for all of us corporately, is a process. Let’s choose to participate in that process, voluntarily, every single day, whether we think it is necessary or not. Unity in the Body of Christ does not begin with everybody agreeing – unity is when you or I would die for someone else just because God loves them. I don’t have to agree with their theology!

Day by day, we His help to see and know one another after the Spirit, not just by what is said. Let’s learn patience from Him when people aren’t all they can be. To display kindness and mercy like He would to those who are in need. We will need to live in self-control when someone else jumps all over our toes. Lastly we must consistently practice attentive faithfulness to His ways. As we do these things, the Holy Spirit will help us. Unity is the centre of Christ’s joy. 3 John 4. “I have no greater joy than to hear that my children are walking in the truth.”

The bible says things clearly. LOVE has to be our aim – our great quest. Love is not just another key – it is the way forward into UNITY. The Holy Spirit knows the way you should go, ask Him to help you walk that way. Let’s all pray for the same mindset that was in the Lord Himself … Bye. 👋

P 2726 When I get tired …

/ DVH

I have learnt to take a lack of Grace as a signpost that I am walking in the flesh again. It means I’ve been trying, all by myself – to access something that Jesus died to GIVE me. I am bound to fail, without His Grace. To start with I can get very tired of being kind to people who continually hurt me. At the same time, in my own enthusiasm, I can spend ages trying to figure out what to do … when God already has an answer.

My problem becomes something Jeremiah spoke about in Chapter 2, v 13.“Stand in shock, heavens, at what you see! Throw up your hands in disbelief—this can’t be!” God’s Decree. “My people have committed a compound sin: they’ve walked out on Me, the fountain Of fresh flowing waters, and then dug cisterns— cisterns that leak, cisterns that are no better than sieves.” I can exhaust myself trying to find answers using my own systems. At the same time, I am ignoring His powerful ever-present fountain-provision of Grace, by honouring and using my own strength instead. 

Self-effort leads to frustration with Him, myself and others. It’s incredibly easy to get angry, because I’m making all this effort and it looks like God is not helping me, and neither are you! Changing myself has limitations – my patience and human wisdom will wear out – v-e-r-y quickly! The Apostle Paul said in 1 Corinthians 14:9-10 “For I am the least of the apostles and do not even deserve to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. But by the grace of God I am what I am,and His grace to me was not without effect. No, I worked harder than all of them—yet not I, but the grace of God that was with me.”

This man understood that the way through everything that happened to him was to stay in the Grace of God. God’s Grace is our dwelling place. It is “the fountain of fresh flowing waters.”  We need to put aside our own human rationale toward others, as well as the excuses we often make for abhorrent behaviour, and instead …call SIN, sin … Then choose to forgive it or repent from doing it. This choice means that we are determined to partake of His freely flowing Grace, so we can walk through whatever is going on, without rancour or disappointment. Then we are eligible to give His Grace away to others from a position of fullness and humility – because we know WE also sin.  

Grace is Eternal. Self-effort, trying harder, making excuses, etc. wears out, quickly. Actually, I do not think we should sugar-coat any kind of sin. Sin killed Jesus. IT’S REAL. Our sin had consequences, and HE paid for them! The answer to sin is redemption, not avoidance, or working harder, or even excuses. These things are not just a difference in some sort of personal perception – this means we dare not pretend they don’t exist! Our job is to pray for Grace, Grace, and more Grace, and use our faith to walk in it. We all need to reach a saturation point when it comes to Grace. Grace needs to become normal in our lives.

We pray for the perpetrator, and also pray that we will be able to bear whatever is going on, by remaining in His Grace. Even if that other person simply will not quit behaving badly and they continue to deliberately hurt us or others. We all need His Grace to get through anything – we dare not use the try harder/make excuses for others system. So how do I get this Grace? I ask Him for it, and then I do whatever He says to me – either personally, or from His Word. God’s answers are not like our answers – because His Ways are higher than ours.

Our society today has currently adopted an ‘I can’t help it I had a hard life’ view of abhorrent behaviour. Instead of paying attention to accountability. Are we all three years old and everything is someone else’s fault? If we are old enough to sin, then we are old enough to own it. Unfortunately, we seem to have become a “now” society. Electricity on now! TV on now! And if it causes me pain, then it has to stop – NOW – because you are infringing on my rights, now! We have not learnt to suffer wrong. Jesus Himself chose that way, and Christians are meant to follow Him. Not our own personal code, or some self-help psycho-babble methodology. 

Every single human being needs His GRACE. Otherwise, blame becomes a way of life. Then my personally perceived poor activities, or heartache are the government’s fault – or my parents’ fault, or teachers, friends, or the pastor! When we think like that we are shrugging off our own responsibility. Our responsibility is to take everything to the cross and prayerfully access the Grace of God, as well as leave our sinful attitudes there. Sometimes the only way ahead is to go through our problems, to an answer. And that route may go through a desert or wilderness – where there is no water. This means we go back to the Source and ask for His Grace to bear things so we can keep on walking and following Him. 

Like the saints of old, we may suffer as we lay down the right to figure out man-made solutions – but that is nothing compared to the glory that lies ahead. We simply cannot afford to step out of GRACE. We don’t visit it occasionally, on a good day – WE LIVE THERE. Bye. 👋

“It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery.” Galatians 5:1.

P 2640 When you get stuck, ask for help!

/ DVH

The bible tells us over and over again that fearing the Lord is to be expected and embraced. Think about that for a minute – teeny, tiny man in comparison to incredible, wondrous, holy, pure and righteous God! He’s so astonishing, the Universe He made a long time ago – is still expanding!  In Proverbs 9:10 it says this: “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and the knowledge of the Holy One increases understanding.”We need both!

So now let’s take a peek at Romans 3:10-17 – this passage levels the playing field for everyone: “As it is written: “There is no one righteous, not even one, there is no one who understands; there is no one who seeks God. All have turned away, they have together become worthless; there is no one who does good, not even one.“Their throats are open graves; their tongues practice deceit.” “The poison of vipers is on their lips.” “Their mouths are full of cursing and bitterness. “Their feet are swift to shed blood; ruin and misery mark their ways, and the way of peace they do not know.” “There is no fear of God before their eyes.”That is the Apostle Paul talking, he lived in awe of Almighty God and His ways.

There is a school of thought that wants to render the Old Testament less relevant than the New. Actually, there is no truth in that idea. In the OT we see how men and women obeyed God and things changed, supernaturally.  They are a visual aid for us today. Personally, I think if it is in the book, then it is there to help and instruct us. Instead of diminishing the OT’s value, we need to ask questions, wait for answers, and maybe put some things in our pending file. He’s God – He has a timetable, the Old Testament shows us that!

The marvellous thing about Romans 3 is it is telling us that all of us stand upon a level playing ground. NONE of us get it right. We can see that the people in the Old Testament managed to muck things up! That thought alone throws competition out of the window. This life is not about striving to get things right, we are simply following Jesus! We live like He did, and we have written instructions about how He did it! As we follow Him, we will find we come into harmony with one another. He’s in you and He’s in me – and He won’t fight with Himself! If we fight – one of us is not listening properly – they are probably acting out of their heads. The first one to sincerely say sorry wins! That’s a joke BTW.

Paul, the writer of Romans, was a brilliant student of Gamaliel but back then as a student, he was full of information. Information puffs up – it makes you self-righteous. But knowledge of Christ and His ways will humble us. So much so, we end up loving our enemies!  So when Jesus stopped Paul in his tracks, this man was humble enough to realise he knew nothing and he said so. Paul was not interested in factions or parties – He simply followed Christ and was obedient. Later on in the book to Corinth, he dismissed the idea that people should follow him, or some other teacher. He made it clear we need to follow Christ … only. 

Our bible cannot be carefully digested unless we ask the Holy Spirit to explain it to us and show us how we are meant to ‘eat it.’ This book is for eating … as we do what it says, we become like it, through our obedience. It is not for information, so we end up thinking we know everything!! The same verse that turns out to be veggies on your daily plate, could be meat and potatoes for a month for me! That’s the beauty of this book – the Author sits with us to explain it personally!  This life of faith we lead operates by … wait-for-it  …  …faith!

There are times that the Lord’s timing won’t always suit us – we’ve lost our humility. The truth is, if we constantly push back against His instructions and our circumstances – and refuse to wait for His timing, then the other guy will be absolutely delighted to turn up and deliver his pack of lies and misdirect us. The bible is to be believed, its instructions are there for us to follow. It is not there to be critiqued by the likes of us, even if we did come from a High School up a hill, and we have more degrees than a thermometer! Sometimes the smarter we think we are, the dumber we actually are. Paul was a clever person, but he humbled himself and learnt from God.

The saints in the Old Testament have taught me so much about faith. They’ve encouraged me when I’ve wanted to quit. They’ve shown me that my mistakes are not terminal because, unlike them — I know I have a Saviour! Praise God!! Those men and women of old who served God, are fantastic illustrations of what our wonderful Father can do with someone who simply follows instructions. Almighty God gave them instructions and they went away and did stuff!! Many people go searching for this easy method, and that clever way to get God to do whatever they want …when the easiest way of all is to be obedient.

I have found that the Old Testament adds enormous depth to everything the New has in it. Let’s always remember – Jesus never read the New Testament – HE WAS WAY TOO BUSY DOING IT, while somebody else wrote it down! Romans 3 teaches us that nobody can ‘lord’ it over someone else. We stand on a flat plain, together. Now we choose to follow Jesus Christ – He IS the book come alive. Digestion is so much more important than knowledge! In our lifetime we can become His book to others by doing what it says. And when we get stuck – we ask for His help. Bye.👋

P 2628 “Don’t You care??”

/ DVH

“Jesus was in the stern, sleeping on a cushion. The disciples woke Him and said to Him, “Teacher, don’t you care if we drown?”  Mark 4:38. Of course you would never say that … and I would never say that either! 🙄 Hmmm… while we are all on this learning curve called life, I believe that there are times when we’ve all prayed, we’ve hoped, we’ve stood on the Word and …. and! … nothing changed. It’s what we do after that happens that matters. Fear makes a poor leader – yet we all know how it feels and what we sometimes do to avoid it!

We had one of those times recently. Hubby and I have been married for 37 years, and there are times, not often, 🙌 – when we disagree. That chaos, of course, is instantly replaced by something spiritual and peaceful…  we sing ‘Kumbaya’ and it is all fixed!! It is a wonder my nose is not in Pakistan by now … Me and Pinocchio, just like that.🤞

So, long story short, we argue just like everyone else. My primary reason for talking about it today, is that the only way for all of us to get to the other side, like the disciples wanted to – Is to be real about who we are and the fact that we aren’t totally transformed yet! I like to throw blame in the bin. However, there are also times when I can miss! … I always was a lousy shot!! That’s when I discover, all over again, that I still need His help and transformation badly.  I too, can get tired of cheerily singing: “I’ve got a new way of living”  … 😊🙌 … and instead I want to have a tantrum.

So I’m praying, with tears, of course! ‘God don’t you care??’ And somehow, in the back of my mind, I can see these 12 guys stuck in this boat going up and down, up and down, taking a violent seawater bath … Now, let’s look at this …Jesus is up the back of the boat taking a power nap. Yeah.I’m pretty sure I would have had a “Don’t you care Lord?” in me too.

Now let’s be clear. The Lord Jesus needed that sleep. He had just delivered an amazing sermon about planting seeds in good places and watching them grow. Of course, the disciples all thought they were getting a horticultural lesson! But the Lord was teaching them how to retain good seed and become fertile ground. Stuff like getting rid of rocks (of unbelief) and weeds (of fear and arrogance) as well as shoo-ing off the birds that want to steal and peck at your faith. (Other people’s anger, and rotten behaviour toward us.) 

These guys had had a great meeting, right before this. They learned lots … they took lots of notes … well, … probably not, … because they would have looked like nerds. Anyway!! The blooming boat starts to sink and things look pretty terrible …!! It’s not just a bit of a splash in the face, BTW, this boat starts taking water in. Boat in water OK! Water in boat NOT OK!! Anyone knows that. The disciples let their KNOWLEDGE of the sea drown out their FAITH.

These experienced fishermen were frightened out of their wits by the power of the sea and they knew a bad storm when they saw one.  So there were “we’re gunna die” shrieks and shouts … and then they remember that Jesus is up the back of the boat — and — “How on earth CAN HE BE SLEEPING??!!” Just like little kids run to their mum or dad and demand that they fix something that is broken – we too sometimes run to the Lord and drop our faith along the way. We simply can’t work out why He isn’t helping us.

In times like these we need to tell ourselves – one more time  … and press on, remembering that we are stretching ourselves a little bit further.  Do yourself a favour, try not to set false finishing lines. The bible teaches us: “WE STRIVE …WE STRETCH toward the goal …”  that doesn’t mean we always get there! Sometimes knowing where to run TO is everything —  especially when life produces chaos. Even though these men had just learnt about being careful about where to plant the seed of God’s Word, they immediately planted it in earthly fear instead. Don’t we all?!!  

Whatever we think we’ve learnt, is going to be tested. God is not interested in raising up a whole lot of people with fat heads and skinny, dried-up hearts. Pain will overcome our faith unless we cling to the SAVIOUR … not just focussing the result we think we need. It is not about finding the answer or not, it is about: ‘where is MY faith, right now?’ Sometimes my not-so-spiritual-answer is: ‘I dunno! I think it fell right down the well of my unbelief!”

If we want to follow Jesus with all our hearts, even though we know that we do dumb stuff, or sometimes we are oppressed by terrible things – then WE’ve won. Press on… !! We simply must stop throwing away our faith … or even other saints because people make mistakes or they are not perfected yet. None of us are. Redemption is a process. Half the time none of us know what’s IN our own hearts until we get squeezed tightly by circumstances. These fishermen walked with Christ and fear still jumped on them.

The bible wouldn’t teach us how to overcome fear if we didn’t need to learn it. Some awful thoughts attach themselves to Christians like rampaging elephants, crushing the life out of them. Those thoughts do not make us a failure. Hold on … if we can just hold on, and breathe, our faith will come out the other side stronger. When we cling to Jesus in the storm we are doing OK. Remember, the God of all LOVE stood up and HE CALMED THE STORM. We cannot begin to understand the Lord’s aim in whatever is going on in our lives… all we know is that He’s been there before us!

Here’s something to chew on …“the natural mind perceiveth not the things of the spirit.”  1 Corinthians 2:4. So we can’t trust what we think or feel, we must learn, progressively, by pressing in, to trust what He says. We know He cares. It’s in the book. 👋

P 2393 Those who have gone on before us.

/ DVH

“And consider the example that Jesus, the Anointed One, has set before us. Let His mindset become your motivation.” Philippians 2:5 TPT. Isn’t it marvellous that we have incredible, recorded, Godly examples to follow? Praise God we have what Christ did and said, in this book we read every day. Jesus made God’s will very clear! 

We have all of the New Testament to explain how the things of God unfold and transform, and how they worked for someone else. Whether it was Paul or Peter or Jude – they all lived this way… HIS WAY. All we need to do is to take what it says seriously and apply these things we read about into our lives! The sky is the limit when somebody starts living their life doing what God’s book says for Jesus’ sake.

Here’s something that Peter said: “Everything that goes into a life of pleasing God has been miraculously given to us by getting to know, personally and intimately, the One who invited us to God. The best invitation we ever received! We were also given absolutely terrific promises to pass on to you—your tickets to participation in the life of God after you turned your back on a world corrupted by lust.” 2 Peter 1:3 MSG. Peter knew that what he was given was also for others who would come after him – that’s you and I. 👏 We have been left an enormous inheritance by these great men and women of faith. 

Don’t fall into the trap of thinking that getting to know Jesus is a series of endless spiritual experiences. It is so much more than that – we get to live the way He lived and do what He did – we get to be like Him, in this world. His loving heart, His Character, His devotion to the Father. Jesus Christ shows us how to live a transformed life of devotion to God and He actively taught us what God wants from His kids.

Let’s look at His disciples, who totally relied upon the Holy Spirit for Christ’s guidance, and they too lived overcoming lives. They lived that way in a world that used Christians for target practice, lion chum and barbecue lights! Nothing much has changed today, many Christians are still paying for their faith with their well-being, lives and health. However  I can be inspired into action, when I read about the saints’ of old’s adventures, missteps, and godly actions in His book — and from there I get the courage to have some adventures with God myself. 

Both the Old and the New Testament tell us about people who gave up this life to gain the next. They watched Almighty God work on their behalf. I’ve written down some examples from the New. Let’s look at Ananias who got a word from God and was used to restore Paul’s sight. That man was scared to bits about his God-given assignment, but he did it in spite of his fear. He teaches me that fear does not have to win! Plus, I can simply go and do whatever God tells me, I don’t have to feel like it.

There was another Ananias – Ananias and Sapphira. That couple taught me that lying to God and others has a really really bad ending! Or Timothy, who listened carefully to his mother and his grandmother, and ended up as a companion to Paul. He had two whole books in the bible written for his personal edification. Timothy has taught me that godly mothers with faith are powerful people. 

Or Simon Magus the magician. He taught me the Holy Spirit cannot be bought. Grace can embrace the Holy Spirit but a lack of Grace, together with greed, sends Him away. Or there was Stephen, who waited tables and witnessed to the Sanhedrin, Jerusalem’s supreme rabbinic court. He recited the whole Jewish history from Abraham to Christ! I believe Stephen’s pure faith, together with everything the Holy Spirit gave him to say, had an effect on Saul as he stood and watched that stoning, and heard Stephen pardon his murderers as he died. This shows me that the word of God is a SEED – it has the power to change a life. Stephen died, but Paul eventually converted!

We have these witnesses in God’s book to help us to enrich our own faith. We don’t have to stay within the status quo, living our lives in dull little always-acquiring-new-things lives. We can be led by God Himself, the Holy Spirit, to “go into all the world and preach the gospel…” Acts 1:8. Hubby and I are about to go out again into Samaria, even though we preach the gospel where we live, to anyone who will listen. 

We go out there where the people are and to our amazement – Jesus is out there too!  Listen to what Jesus said about the Samaritan woman and her village in Samaria: “Don’t you have a saying, ‘It’s still four months until harvest’? I tell you, open your eyes and look at the fields! They are ripe for harvest.”John 4:34&35. What more do we need than… ‘GO?’ That was enough for the people in the book.👋🏻