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P 2778 Anybody got any oil?

/ DVH

“When my coming draws near, heaven’s kingdom realm can be compared to ten maidens who took their oil lamps and went outside to meet the bridegroom and his bride. But the foolish ones were running out of oil, so they said to the five wise ones, ‘Share your oil with us, because our lamps are going out!’ “ ‘We can’t,’ they replied. ‘We don’t have enough for all of us. You’ll have to go and buy some for yourselves!’ “But he called back, ‘Go away! Do I know you? I can assure you, I don’t even know you!’“That is the reason you should always stay awake and be alert, because you don’t know the day or the hour when the Bridegroom will appear.”Matthew 25:1, 8-9, 12-13 TPT.

I have heard this scripture preached about nineteen ways to the dozen … So much so, I can talk about the bridegroom, or the ten maidens, or the oil, or the lamps/containers, or living ready. You know it seems to me … and I could be oversimplifying a tad – that if we make sure we have a good oil supply, everything else will fall into place! At this point, I need to say that I see the Oil of the Spirit as God’s Love, released freely, to bless other people.

That thought kind of reminds me of something that happened to us ages ago when we were on one of our road trips delivering bibles. My story is not about oil, however, it is about petrol, but it was God’s Love that helped us! When you travel vast distances in a car, petrol stations become very important. Anyway, we were stuck in the back of Burke, literally! And the only petrol available was not the type of petrol our car needed. We eventually did the sensible thing, after freaking out(!) We asked the Lord what He wanted us to do about it. After all, they are His bible trips!  Yet, our love for Him, was greater than our fear. 

On the inward journey to Burke, the town with the wrong petrol, I had developed a nasty ulcer on my side. It kept getting bigger and bigger. As it got bigger, so did my rotten lousy attitude. I got grumpier and nastier toward my poor hubby as we travelled through miles of grain fields, with no hope of  help. No doctors or chemists. We had nothing on us to treat this wound, so arriving at our next destination was really important on a number of levels. God’s woman of paste and flour (me), kept explaining to her hubby, in a tearful angry voice, how he had no right to bring her out to the middle of nowhere when he knows how sick she is: blah blah blah, whinge whine whinge.  Between the petrol lack and the lack of a cheerful, supportive spouse, my hubby’s prayer life improved mightily! I eventually calmed down and joined in with him … after thoroughly repenting, of course.

When we set out, the territory ahead of us was just plain heavily-treed bush, filled with wild pigs and goats wandering about, and quite a number dead on the road. A road train and a beast aren’t really a fair competition. (See picture above.) We knew when we began the journey, that we definitely did not have enough petrol to get us safely to the next town. The needle was in the red.  So for 200kms we both tried extremely hard not to look at the petrol gauge! That’s the whole point of walking by faith, you don’t know what comes next…and it’s often scary! For all we knew we could end up camped by the side of the road waiting for someone to realise we were missing. As we travelled along, deliberately-not-looking-at-the-petrol-gauge, we noticed how very few cars were going in the other direction! That was not a comforting thought. 

Eventually, hubby said in an astonished whisper: “I think that there is more petrol in the tank now, than there was when we started out.” Boy that popped my eyes open! I leaned over and looked. He was right. The petrol gauge needle was up higher than when we started. We knew how much we needed, and we didn’t have it, and … now there was more. To make a long story much shorter, by the time we got to our destination – we had more petrol in the tank than we did when we started out!  BTW, the Lord healed the ulcer – which was still bad – a couple of hours after we arrived, it disappeared.  

I think that the church’s largest problem today is that She quite often runs out of oil. And our biggest enemy is indifference. The pastor or priest, or leaders might have oil, but most of the people in our congregations don’t! These women in Jesus’ story in Matthew are not leaders or religious folk. They are simply attendants waiting for the Bride and Groom to appear … and so are we! What this story Jesus told teaches me, is that WE – that is YOU and I – have a responsibility to make sure we have a living, lively, life-giving relationship with Holy Spirit! He’s our motivation and our source. We look to Him to supply our needs.

He is always ready to be our supplier. Human beings can run out of LOVE –  because they don’t know they will need it until they need it!  However, Almighty God Himself stands ready to supply our every need. We need to ask for fresh supply of His love, His oil, daily!  Then walk with Him. Stop expecting the leaders to be your only supplier and get your own relationship with Him. The Spirit of God will help us survive the next crisis at our house! The Body of Christ cannot afford to run out of oil. So, we need to ask … and keep on asking. Then we step out in faith and do what He says! The Holy Spirit never shuts down His supply of Love and that is exactly what we need. He is with us 24/7. Bye. 👋

P 2771 The kingdom of God.

/ DVH

In Isaiah 55:8-9 the Lord said: “My plans aren’t your plans, nor are your ways My ways, says the LORD. Just as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways, and My plans than your plans.” That kind of clinches it eh? Because it can’t get any plainer than that! We have not got a clue how God operates, and without the Holy Spirit’s help we never will … He is far too complex for us to understand. Aren’t we blessed that He reaches down to us, and shares how He wants us to participate? The Lord has plans for everyone’s good – not just mine. His plan is to save the world … one person at a time … and He wants to use us to do it.

Sadly, at least half of Christianity, at this moment in time, are not even trying to participate in His plans. We pray for His kingdom to come, and then we go out into the world and try to further our own kingdom instead! It is impossible for someone to live in two kingdoms. We are either living for His, or living for ours. And the sad fact is this – we postpone participation in His kingdom, in favour of organising our own. BTW, age does not factor in this reality, Moses was 80 when he started living the life God planned for Him. 

It seems like Almighty God is looking for “Onward Christian soldiers” but most of us want: “The Happy Song.” So, what do we do with the fact that we seem to like “The Happy Song” better? Here’s what I think — I think we can have the Happy Song AND Onward Christian soldiers, when we have learnt to stop allowing this world be the source of our happiness. And we make Jesus, together with obedience, our source of inspiration and action, instead. How do people know I am an Aussie? When I open my mouth! Kingdom people have a different focus in their conversations.

The bible says in Matthew 6:33 “But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and His righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.” Seek His kingdom first. That’s not hard to understand! There are apparently 46 scriptures that point out a facet of what God’s kingdom is like. Obviously I can’t list them here, but looking those verses up is worthwhile. If we are going to aim at something it will help us to know what it looks like! We are told to seek His Kingdom first, after that comes the righteousness that only Christ’s death and resurrection can give us. And after that we use our faith and believe what His book says … and …we step out using our faith. Participation in that process means we will get our needs met. 

Most of the time, I have observed when we pray, we feature our own needs. That’s backward. Start with the Kingdom. Seek the kingdom first. Pray like this: ‘Your kingdom come in me,’ OR… ‘I‘present my body as a living sacrifice.’ OR …’Your will, Your way, Lord.’ When we start with His kingdom, a whole lot of unnecessary stuff falls off instantly. It means we’ve put down our little list of needs and wants, and started to focus on Him and what He wants. We need to remember Christ’s position before His Father is now our position. So we live this life, the only one we have, like His kingdom is more important than ours … because it is. Our needs are temporal, His kingdom is eternal.

Here are a few examples of what His kingdom looks like in action: a/ righteousness, peace and joy. We can have these 3 things in the here and now, because they are part of living our new life IN Christ. b/ Being spiritually helpless and ignorant doesn’t cancel His kingdom – it gives us access to it. c/ His kingdom is activated by faith, not knowledge or wealth. d/ It’s a treasure and it’s often hidden. e/ The kingdom of God starts out small but then it grows. f/ It blossoms in us as we embrace it. g/ In His kingdom HE is the ruler. h/ This kingdom is not just a place per se, like heaven! His kingdom comes in a ‘people’ wrapping. You and I, we are kingdom carriers. i/ Final one for me, the kingdom of God is a treasure – it must be sought, dug for, paid for by surrendering every bit of our lives to the King.

Remember, His kingdom is now within us but it needs to be released through us by our obedience to His word. The Holy Spirit is our Helper, He will teach us which way we should go, and how to serve the King. So if we go to school, or work, or to the shops, etc. He goes there with us.  We carry the kingdom of God – what a privilege! Jesus wants to be wherever we are, because He loves us and…He wants to reach the people all around us.. Seeking His kingdom is like seeking the King – the rewards are out of this world. They are priceless. Bye. 👑

P 2763 Mo-ove along the car …

/ DVH

…nothing to see here, I’m coming through … and I’M BUSY!! 

Nehemiah 6:1-9 tells us a story: “When Sanballat, Tobiah, Geshem the Arab, and the rest of our enemies heard that I had rebuilt the wall and that there were no more breaks in it—even though I hadn’t yet installed the gates—Sanballat and Geshem sent this message: “Come and meet with us at Kephirim in the valley of Ono.” I knew they were scheming to hurt me so I sent messengers back with this: “I’m doing a great work; I can’t come down. Why should the work come to a standstill just so I can come down to see you?” Four times they sent this message and four times I gave them my answer.

The fifth time—same messenger, same message—Sanballat sent an unsealed letter with this message: “The word is out among the nations—and Geshem says it’s true—that you and the Jews are planning to rebel. That’s why you are rebuilding the wall. The word is that you want to be king and that you have appointed prophets to announce in Jerusalem, ‘There’s a king in Judah!’ The king is going to be told all this—don’t you think we should sit down and have a talk? I sent him back this: “There’s nothing to what you’re saying. You’ve made it all up.” They were trying to intimidate us into quitting. They thought, “They’ll give up; they’ll never finish it.” I prayed, “Give me strength.”

I’m starting to love this guy Nehemiah! He not only knows how and where to start … he knows how to finish too! God has given this man great wisdom as he went about his work. We can always ask the Lord for wisdom at any moment. I’ve discovered that we often want it at the beginning of a project, but we also need it in the middle, while we are being harassed, plus at the end too! The Lord likes us to follow Him, as He leads us – using our faith. Nehemiah knew to stay the course.

So, back to this man of God:  next news you know, the Israelites’ enemies have sent someone with a flattering message, to supposedly support him… … As we begin to prevail in our obedience to the Lord, our enemy is not above sending someone else along to give us reasonable doubt about what we are doing. Four times these men tried to engage the man of God as he laboured over rebuilding Jerusalem’s walls. The last time Nehemiah’s enemies used the fear of death to startle him into stopping. But he sent them away with a short, sharp word.

When we choose to do what the Lord wants – as we seek Him, He will guide us and protect us from the enemy’s lies. Nehemiah saw right through Shemaiah. This man wanted him to hide from his enemies and that meant he would stop building the wall God told him to restore. So Nehemiah went right back to prayer. You know it sounds to me like that man was praying as he was mending the wall!

Let’s be clear …Nehemiah had confronted a King about the Israelites’ plight. His courage and sense of duty caused him to make that request when he needed too – even though he was a minor player in the court. He was respectful, and clear, and dedicated to the cause. What he did was nothing short of miraculous, however, whenever Almighty God smiles on something you are doing – no-one can stop you … BUT YOU – and He will go around you, if He has to – His will, His purpose!

Nehemiah refused to be distracted. He called Shemaiah and his cronies, liars. You know sometimes we need to identify the spiritual opposition and name it! We can waste our time trying to be polite to our enemies in a difficult situation, when the reality is we need to confront them and tell them to take a hike. When God tells us to do whatever it is, it must be done no matter what, and Nehemiah kept on acting in faith. “And I am sure that God who began the good work within you will keep right on helping you grow in His grace until His task within you is finally finished on that day when Jesus Christ returns.”Philippians 1:6.

The thing I want to highlight today is that all these interruptions and distractions led this man of God into prayer – they didn’t make him give up or give in. Instead he went back to His source of inspiration. I can only speak for myself but I am sure in my life so far, there have been times when I have given in to fear, much too soon. Afterward, I dearly wished I had pressed on.  My fear of ‘missing God’ – which is an enemy accusation – made me vulnerable. At that time I didn’t have enough confidence to believe I could keep going, so that meant that I gave into the pressure around me. The nagging voice inside my head kept telling me over and over again – “you’ve got it wrong, see this and this has happened.’ I limited God’s ability to redeem my errors – sinful or not. 

Nehemiah is a fine example to all of us of perseverance and faithfulness. Once this man put his hand to the plow – he would not be swayed from his appointed task. Sometimes, at the first sign of trouble, we are so anxious to get the job done, we can bail out too early! We too can have Nehemiah’s confidence in our lives. Our confidence is not in our hearing, it is in our God getting us where we need to go despite our wrong turns, fear and inadequacy.  So, like Nehemiah, we tell our enemies to, ‘move along the car – nothing to see here, I’m busy, and I’m coming through!  We must put our confidence in God alone, not in our ability or lack thereof. Just keep swimming …!!

“And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love Him, who have been called according to His purpose.” Romans 8:28. The Lord God is so great, so mighty, that He can take our mistakes, and turn them into shining stars for His glory. Bye. 👋

P 2762 Who are we listening to?

/ DVH

“There are… times when I spend so much time listening to the voice of reason, I’ve forgotten to listen to the voice of LOVE.” (A line from ‘Call the Midwives.’) What a great thought-filled thing to say! I think it sums up an attitude that easily prevails in our society today. Our logic, our reasoning, can overcome our devotion to living a life of love – if we are not paying attention. We have received God’s love and His blessings freely. He commands us to give to others – freely.

We can easily talk ourselves out of doing whatever God says, when reason takes over. God says: ‘Go and see your neighbour they need help.” Reason says:  ‘I just saw my neighbour the other day and they looked fine to me!” Well now, would you look at that?! Everything is all sorted and I didn’t have to embarrass myself, or move an inch. I can still keep on watching the footie or tennis!  I might even pray for my neighbour, which is a good thing, but are we letting good, take the place of best? Or maybe, our reasoning has diminished our love for the Lord and others.

People call loving the unlovely or giving as the Spirit leads us – risk taking. Yes. There’s no doubt about that – it certainly is! But there is a far worse risk we take when we choose to wholeheartedly live this life, the only one we have, ignoring the needs of others. Love looks like something! It is concrete. To a starving person it looks like a bowl of rice. Sometimes we would rather distract ourselves with something else – something we think of as more fun, rather than choose to live this life, the only one we have, loving others. And it actually doesn’t matter what kind of person that other person is, because otherwise we are using our reason to stand in judgment.

Here’s a way to show love that we can sometimes try to avoid. Jesus showed us how love and generosity works. Mark 12:41-44.“Jesus sat down opposite the place where the offerings were put and watched the crowd putting their money into the temple treasury. Many rich people threw in large amounts. But a poor widow came and put in two very small copper coins, worth only a few cents. Calling His disciples to Him, Jesus said, “Truly I tell you, this poor widow has put more into the treasury than all the others. They all gave out of their wealth; but she, out of her poverty, put in everything—all she had to live on.”

Giving from what we have left-over, or what we think we can afford, probably won’t stretch our faith – love, on the other hand, gives sacrificially. If we are not prayerful about our own inner attitudes, we can end up limiting our love and subsequently our giving, because … reason says our need must come first. ‘We need money to pay bills, and school fees, plus we need a bigger car etc. God understands that we can’t afford to give any more than this.” 

This little widow woman in Mark 12 had learnt a great secret. She wasn’t selective in her devotion and she wasn’t just giving to the treasury, she was giving to God Himself. I think that’s why she gave all she had!  Colossians 3:23&24: “Work hard and cheerfully at all you do, just as though you were working for the Lord and not merely for your masters, remembering that it is the Lord Christ who is going to pay you, giving you your full portion of all He owns. He is the one you are really working for.” Your boss does not pay you, now you and I are living this life for Christ, and He gives us our daily bread. Our choice is what are we going to do with it?

In this bible story, God Himself, Jesus Christ, sat on a seat and commented on the way people approached giving. Galatians 5:25 TPT.“If the Spirit is the source of our life, we must also allow the Spirit to direct every aspect of our lives.” That’s a very big word at the beginning of that scripture. IF!! If God Himself is our source, then money – or the lack of it, or even plenty of it – is not the issue. REASON IS. We can end up thinking very hard when we are trying to figure out what is reasonable for us. I think the god of reason is greatly underestimated in the church today. That sneaky little devil knows how to stop us from doing many things by comparing what we do, with others, or using the words ‘fair and reasonable’ all over the place.

We desperately need to live in a place where His LOVE prevails, not reason. If I invest in something or someone else, I just sowed my heart into it.“For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also,…”Matthew 6:21. Christ invested His whole heart in us, unreservedly. To the point where our own questionable priorities broke His heart … and then He died. If we are not attentively prayerful, we can easily let reason drown out love’s still quiet voice. Bye.👋

““The one who faithfully manages the little he has been given will be promoted and trusted with greater responsibilities. But those who cheat with the little they have been given will not be considered trustworthy to receive more.”Luke 16:10.

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 2688 To grow faith – use supplements!

/ DVH

“So devote yourselves to lavishly supplementing your faith with goodness, and to goodness add understanding, and to understanding add the strength of self-control, and to self-control add patient endurance, and to patient endurance add godliness, and to godliness add mercy toward your brothers and sisters, and to mercy toward others add unending love. Since these virtues are already planted deep within, and you possess them in abundant supply, they will keep you from being inactive or fruitless in your pursuit of knowing Jesus Christ more intimately.” 2 Peter 1:5-8 TPT.

I love the way this version brings out a clear meaning to some quite complicated verses. I like to look at this progressive thought Peter has, as a way of walking with the Lord. If we look at these faith ‘pills’ then we can see that this kind of walking is not aimless. We are actually going somewhere when we deliberately add goodness to our fragile as well as sometimes wobbly …faith. Instead we are deliberately, step by step, walking toward unending love.

Instead of seeing these verses as a whole lotta words that seem to be joined together like beads on a string, it helps to read it as progressive instructions. Let us say my faith is lagging, I am living my daily life doing the same old, same old. My prayers seem dead and lifeless – and maybe a bit repetitious. My bible reading ends with the thought …“thank goodness that’s over with for today.” If things get difficult my first thought is nearer to: “the end of the world as I know it”  … than it is to: “what are You going to do with this Lord?” 

I may even start to think tithing is beyond me, maybe I will just give what I can afford until I have resolved my current financial crisis.. And I begin to avoid anybody who drives me crazy because I can’t cope with them. My faith is heading for a crash, and I don’t know how to stop it. Well, here’s the solution, thank you Apostle Peter!! First of all I pick up what remains of my dragged along faith, and repent. Then I start my new spiritual vitamin regime. That means I add other things into my basket to help, or supplement my faith. I am not stingy with these add-ons, I throw lots of each one in. (That’s what ‘lavish’ means!) 

Let’s look at goodness. How do I add goodness to faith? First of all I look at the source of all our goodness – Almighty God. I deliberately sit and think about my life, so I can notice how His goodness has been following me, quietly, and unobtrusively. I deliberately look for the signs of His Presence in the midst of my troubles. I start noting all the good things, and I choose to leave the disappointments behind. Then I find someone worse off than me and do something spontaneously loving for them!  After that is moving along, and I acknowledge that I can be good to many people, not just one! Then I take another supplement – understanding. My understanding is based on WHO He is, not whether my life makes sense or not.

He is the only way my life will make sense. I must discipline myself to understand that He is God, and this means I may not always comprehend what is going on. But I know He is good, so I start reading verses about how good He is. To do that I am going to need self-control … focus. In essence I have stopped seeing my problems as the centre of my universe and I have begun to let go of them giving them over to Him and leaving them there.  I will need self control to fix my mind on good things instead of rehearsing how hard my life is. 

Next I need patient endurance. That’s because I serve Him He does not serve me! Every now and then I also stop and remind myself of these intentional supplements. I need these things to get through the mire of how I feel, simply because now I want to arrive at unending love – not just to escape from difficulties. That means that I will need to be patient with myself as well! Endurance, holding our focus, helps us to let the Lord accomplish what He wants to do IN us. 

Ding, ding! Time for the next supplement. Now I need to add godliness to the previous supplements, otherwise I can easily become obsessed with how hard things are, instead of looking for His goodness in the land of the living now I am focussing on His promise that I can endure all things because He is strengthening me! To live aware of His godliness I am going to need to adopt mercy – for you, and for me, and anybody else who crosses my path. All judgment and condemnation does is chuck us out of the battle right when we are about to win it.

Last supplement, unending love. Each previous vitamin I have taken has reminded me that I am a recipient of His everlasting, unfailing love. Even though I may not feel like I have all these supplements, the bible says I have them! “Since these virtues are planted deep within.” So my faith needs to kick in. BTW the book says that I don’t just have some – I have lots.

The bonus buy in all this vitamin taking is that I will walk away from constantly staring at my problems, because I have a new focus —  now I wanna see His goodness in the land of the living!  Instead of going round and round, trying to find solutions, going nowhere – I have a purpose. I want to know the One Who rescued me intimately and my vitamin taking helps me REMEMBER Who He is. I know I can’t do anything without His help, but I can step out in faith by obeying what He says, step by step, from His book, and become a good old lady, who takes all of my vitamin supplements!  Bye. 👋

P 2516 Learn to recognise His love gifts!

/ DVH

“The fruit produced by the Holy Spirit WITHIN YOU is divine love in all its varied expressions:  joy that overflows, peace that subdues, patience that endures, kindness in action, a life full of virtue, faith that prevails, gentleness of heart, and strength of spirit. Never set the law above these qualities, FOR THEY ARE MEANT TO BE LIMITLESS.” Galatians 5:22-23. 

Imagine that! We have been given words, actions, attitudes, that are already within US – they came in when He came in. And those things actively show us all the time what His divine love looks like, toward us. This thought blew my mind. I think these verses are the most excellent description of what HIS LOVE looks like— and how we will know we are experiencing it, first hand. It starts to produce fruit in me, in you – everywhere we go. The Holy Spirit is relentless in His pursuit of good, and even if we get in His way, He will steadfastly continue His fruit production. And it is unbelievably fantastic fruit that does others good — but it also enriches US.

Thanks to Heidi and Rolland Baker of Mozambique – I have a really strong idea about what God’s love looks like through me toward someone else. My picture of what His love looks like IN us, begins with Jesus dying for us. He died to open up the door that was closed between the Father and all of us. I am aware that His love is not just about being blessed with earthly stuff … “…because He sends His rain on the just and the unjust…”  So understanding what He has, and is still giving to me, growing in me, every single day, needs to be recognised.

You see, because of His book, I know He blesses everyone – whether they are following Him or not!! God is so good His blessings overflow, everywhere all the time. That person who almost drowned, didn’t, someone was there to save them. That other person who lost everything has been anonymously given money to help them. That’s Almighty God motivating all kinds of people to help others with HIS LOVE. Personally, I think He can’t help Himself – He’s just THAT good. God is not like we are … keen on publicity! He doesn’t always sign His Name to stuff you know.

Think about this for a minute or nine …  everywhere Jesus went He blessed people. He didn’t just bless the spiritual people either. NO! He blessed people who had a need, when they came to Him to meet that need. His loving gifts were not discriminatory. He wore Himself out giving, teaching, caring and explaining God’s ways. At the same time, He was teaching US these attitudes are a hallmark of God’s people. His love inside us is a hallmark of His ownership of us.“…and the resting place of His love, will become the very source and root of your life.” Ephesians 3:17.

And BTW, FYI … Jesus wasn’t preaching to Christians! At that time He was preaching to Jewish people. He was telling God’s own chosen people that their destiny was to be a blessing. And He was showing them how it works! Jesus saw every need, and He cared about every single individual. Once Jesus preached for hours sitting on a hillside, and when He came down from that place His first response was to heal a leper! He lived His short life, taking in His Father’s love and giving it out. That is to be our experience, too.

On the few occasions I have had a tangible experience of His love … I just plain ran out of words to explain what happened! But when I read these verses this morning, I realised the Holy Spirit has given us clear signs of what the fruit/presence of His love looks like TOWARD US as well as in us, and through us. We need to pay attention to what He says. We should know what that love looks like — or we might miss it, like many of those Jewish people did. God’s love isn’t just His favour – His love contains tangible qualities that He has put inside us to share.

What I heard in the above scripture, is this: when I have joy I can’t contain, or peace that utterly calms my heart, or someone is patient with me with a patience that doesn’t run out, or even kindness that takes my breath away … when my life is full of virtue and my faith just won’t quit, and I don’t even want to think about hurting someone else,  I am also experiencing God’s love for me. He is present in me and with me in those times.

That love will flow through me to others, if I let it OUT. But I have to decide His love is like a river, not a dam! His system works like this – love in, love out. Sounds like breathing eh?The secret to living in and giving out the love of God is recognising it when it comes toward ME – FIRST. I have found it helpful to recognise those times and say to myself:  – “that’s God’s unconditional love coming at me!”  His love looks exactly like those things that are mentioned in Galatians Chapter 5 verses 22-23!  

These are things we simply can’t explain away, because we know, first-hand, that mankind cannot come up with them by themselves, or even endlessly maintain them. These God-given love gifts will never ever run out! And if that doesn’t make you happy, sit and think on those two verses. They will do it! Bye 👋

P 2480 Empty cups!

/ DVH

We have all been born, broken. There was sin in this world before we arrived here, and it will still be here … when we die. Someone once said that we come into this world with our little cups that need love, empty. Yet we all need love – some of us need it so badly we steal it!  The sad fact is we often wander around with our little empty cups from person to person, looking for someone that gets us … someone who sees us. Someone who will understand us, especially in our best or worst moments.

We may be fortunate to find a selfless person who gives freely, but for every selfless person there will be many many others who drain the cup of our hope and provision. So we need spiritual help and provision. Jesus never felt the lack of His Father’s Love, until He was in Gethsemane and He went on to die on that cross. That’s where He suffered that awful loneliness for us — if we need understanding we need to remind ourselves that the Lord Jesus understands. He entered into the human condition. We were designed to LIVE in the Presence of God. Go back to Eden, look at Moses, or Abraham … human beings were not designed to live without God and still flourish. Life batters everyone.

Sadly, many of the people around us that we choose to fill that cup, either leave, or they damage us further. Sometimes we even get married, with that huge thirsty need in the back of our emotions. We badly want to be fixed, but …. often so does the other person!!  And they too, see US as their answer. Human beings have a deep need to be loved … and those other people cannot fix you or I, because they have empty cups too. The ability to love others freely without limits, even the vile and the profane, is not found in people… that ability is only found in God Himself. We need His love to fill us and overflow in us and through us, then we will be giving away from abundance. If someone hurts us, most of the time they are not doing it for spite … it may well be that they are also hurting. I know this is trite – hurt people hurt people. But when we actively apply the truth into our lives it will set us free.

I believe the answer to filling this cup to overflowing is found in the 23rd Psalm. He prepares a table before us in the presence of our enemies. Even at our lowest moments that cup is there to be drunk, using our faith. Don’t search your feelings, simply remember God’s realm operates through faith. Sit with Him, discern your need for love in the middle of the chaos, and ask for Him to overflow in you. When we are tormented by the pain of lovelessness, loneliness and emptiness we also need to ask to be able to discern His cup, which is always available. We must take our eyes off the problem and fix them on Jesus.“He is the Author and Finisher of our faith …” Hebrews 12:2. Faith is always the source of provision. 

Other people cannot fill that void. Only Jesus can. He said: “The thief comes only in order to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have and enjoy life, and have it in abundance [to the full, till it overflows].” Human beings were designed to be loved and accepted for who they are and Jesus is the only Person I ever met Who does that!  We simply need to go directly to the source. Jesus did. He got alone with His Father in the midst of a busy schedule. We must stop badgering God for answers, answers are a temporary patch. Tomorrow you will need more! Just go and sit and be with Him. He is LOVE, and all the acceptance we will ever need.

Jesus  also said:“I am the way the truth and the life …” Did you get that? Our new life is in Him now – He is the way into that new life and He always speaks the truth. He is more alive than anyone else that has ever been on this planet! He has that vibrant life in HIMSELF – He paid an enormous price to get it, and He gives us His life for free. Our faith is the key to unlocking the door to love’s provision. Only our Heavenly Father, Jesus and the Holy Spirit can love human beings the way they need to be loved. Why? Because the Trinity are not needy. They have Each Other. Love is the language that flourishes between Them and They all love to share.

Just to remind you that He is our help with the empty cup pain that no-one else but He can fill: “… my cup overflows …”(Psalm 23:5) Remember this cup is to be found in the presence of our enemies … We need to take our focus off our feelings of emptiness, or the lack we feel, or even the people tormenting us—and focus on the overflowing cup …“The Lord is the portion of mine inheritance and of my cup … “Psalm 16:5. We are the people who never have to live this life with an empty cup – we have a Saviour. 🙌

P 2473 Leaky inner tyre.

/ DVH

In 1946 some bright spark invented a rubber tubeless tyre, which was a big blessing for dedicated cyclists. If you were riding along on a bike  … there were times that you could hear this noise … thunk thunk thunk! That meant that the cyclist had a flat tyre. Even Blind Freddy could tell when a bicycle tyre was flat because the metal rim started to scrape along the ground. What an awful noise that was!

If the cyclist was wise, then they carried a tyre patch kit with them. And if they were really really dedicated, they carried a spare inner tube. The new tubeless system was a huge blessing. But if the cyclist didn’t have either one, then they’d have to wheel their bike home with it going thunk thunk thunk, all the way! Upon arriving home, then they went to the bath, or the laundry troughs, and fill either one with water. The water was for diagnosing the leak in that pesky inner tube!

I can remember seeing my stepbrother standing over the laundry trough rotating the inner tube of a tyre and squeezing it gently. What was he looking for? BUBBLES. Bubbles were a sure sign that you had finally found the hole. Then he would X mark the spot, and fish the tube out of the water and dry it carefully. Sometimes he would even lay it on the ground for the sun to dry it out thoroughly. Then he’d bring out his trusty repair kit and patch the hole. 

I gave you that semi-interesting walk down memory lane to say this …Christmas can be like that inner tube – we can get flattened like a tack by our lack of Spiritual Air. Picture this, we are sailing along, managing our own lives pr-et-ty well, following Jesus, being kind to little old ladies, living contentedly in love joy and peace. As well as buying nice presents for people hoping they will like them … and wham! Dear old Auntie Lillian, who apparently loves everything you give her — gives your own gift back to you this year with these words: “Somebody gave me that but I didn’t like it, and I can’t use it, so I thought you could use it.” … Glurg, glurg glurg  … sigh …you can just feel the love, joy and peace draining out of your feet!

So you take a big breath, paste on a smile at Auntie and say thank-you, and eventually you send the stupid thing off to St Vinnie’s – where it can do no more harm!! Or there is Uncle Martin, who always gets drunk as a skunk and thinks he is funny. Or Cousin Bob who tells endless risque jokes – because he collects them!  Of course, he expects everyone to laugh at them. Right in the middle of all that, the kids start screaming at each other and you end up with a roaring headache.

Suddenly, just like the unexpected puncture above, there is a big fat hole in your goodwill toward men! You can see the bubbles from that leak from outer space. It is all very well to add self-control to your list of the fruits of the Spirit, but if that isn’t accompanied by the Holy Spirit helping you when you are under pressure … like my proverbial puncture… eventually, you will start leaking out Grace all over the place. And soon you’ll be riding along on the metal rim. That’s the place where everything everyone says grates on you. And you end up trying to say nice things through gritted teeth.

At the same time, you keep hoping somehow you will be able to find all that wonderful Grace you had before – where did it go?? Here’s a revelation … Grace comes from God, so we can’t manufacture it. Most of the time we can’t even find out where it leaked it out from … BUT now, here’s the good news, we can repent. I highly recommend repentance toward the LORD first. Then, go to other people after talking to Him.  HE is the source of Grace and it always comes freely toward us when we repent. BTW, try not to turn your repentance into a complaint’s office – it doesn’t help! The more irritated we get, the more we will leak out His Grace and find extra anger.

My advice is head straight for His living water, it will diagnose where the problem is! Ask Him for His help to find the hole … IE …repent from all the stuff you know you did, plus present your body back to Him. Then begin again, brand new and sparkly clean. That is the way to turn things around. Don’t patch your life with promises you know you can’t keep, they won’t fix the problem. Go to the source of all Grace and repent. Then ask for more Grace and more living water.  Just like that leaky inner tyre, a new start works better than a patch. Bye 👋🏻

Hebrews 4:16: “Let us then approach God’s throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.” Amen!

P 2466 Get soaked, and stay soaking wet!

/ DVH

“Now may God, the fountain of hope, fill you to overflowing with uncontainable joy and perfect peace as you trust in Him. And may the power of the Holy Spirit continually surround your life with His super-abundance until you RADIATE with hope!” Romans 15:13. Do you know how you get drenched by a fountain? You stand under it. Not just stand beside it playing with the water — you jump on in and enjoy it!

When things are difficult, no matter how awful they seem to be, we need to continue to choose to trust, and look for God’s unfailing goodness and love, even as we read the bible. More than anything else, we all need to know how much we are loved. Plus we can always ask the Holy Spirit for His help and encouragement. He is incredibly generous. He loves to be with people who want to be with Him. The Holy Spirit is God’s fountain of love here on earth. He needs to be cherished, appreciated and sought after.

This life is never going to make seeking God a convenient thing to do. Unexpected bad things happen all the time and they are a huge distraction. The main thing needs to be the main thing in our lives. Jesus loves mankind so deeply – that is the main thing! He is not just an add-on so we can have eternity afterwards! This life now is not about making money, or finding a mate, or earning a living, or having a job or house. As we follow the Lord the things we need will be added unto us. This life is about learning to love others, and spreading the acceptance and love we have been given, around. We have the love of Christ shed abroad in our hearts.

Humanity is slowly but surely stepping away from engaging in caring human interaction – we’ve reduced most things to sex. We’ve even got fancy, or sad-sounding names for the way we behave. It seems our enemy has taken our focus off enjoying the Lord, and walking with Him, and onto excuses about why we are not perfect. There are doctors with more degrees than a thermometer telling us we are OK when we behave badly, because sadly we can’t help the way we think or react to things … because we have this or that complaint. Or our past or parents did stuff to us that messed us up… Instead let’s call sin, sin – and forgive it and repent, then personally leave it behind us. Jesus died to make us perfect, we don’t need psychological  excuses for being broken! Sin will break anyone.

Did you ever once hear Jesus say to others that this or that person needed inner healing? Did He tell the Romans or the religious leaders that they were narcissists? Did He ever talk about sadness as being normal? No! He provided what people around Him needed when He demonstrated the love of God through what He said and did. That’s our mandate too. He knew His purpose and He did what He came here for. You and I are here for a purpose, to spread His love around to His needy hungry children around us, who don’t know how much He loves them.

We must learn to trust in God’s never-ending, always-present glorious and deeply engaged LOVE. He loves us and that love is a never-ending fountain. He hasn’t gone away just because some bad thing or other has happened in our lives …His love is powerful, and Jesus Christ Himself, is proof of how much God loves us. We all have a calling – even if we are rich, or poor, or fat, or thin, or clever, or not clever, or talented or not talented … our calling is to be His love to other people. Step up into the higher calling. Jesus is there. His love in us and for us is that fountain.

All of the Lord’s disciples had horrible lives in the natural. They suffered persecution for righteousness sake. Dreadful things happened to them. But their strength did not come from their circumstances. They held their hope in Who He is and what He did – fast. “Our help is in the name of the LORD, Who made heaven and earth.” Psalm 124:8. These brave souls lived this life as dead men and women walking. They didn’t have any agenda except to see His kingdom come. Almighty God was not just an alternate source of help … He was their ONLY source of help. That’s what faith is … faith does not have one foot in this world and its resources;  faith stands firmly, joyfully under the fountain of His love knowing that He is for us no matter what is going on around us. 

Christians have become apathetic and indifferent to the very things that are meant to sustain us. We think we don’t have this stuff because we don’tfeel it. But His love will sustain us. At the same time we are minimising the amount of heavenly water supply we have available. We do that to ourselves by withdrawing from Him… He will never withdraw from us. Jesus said, ‘love God FIRST, with all your hearts and souls, minds and strength.’ That’s how we stand under His fountain. Living this way is not just for a few people  who have special spiritual abilities. It’s for all of us, right here right now. Splash others who don’t know Him, with that living water from the fountain of life. 💦 👋🏻