Trials

P 3495 Don’t let the mountain be bigger than the Lord.  

/ DVH

In a lifetime, most of us face a great many spiritual mountains, and also some valleys. Some of these things seem easy, we just follow Jesus up the mountain of difficulties we face, and then stand at the top, arms uplifted, and grateful that we managed to survive that one. 

But then suddenly we might find ourselves facing a mountain that seems insurmountable. We know that He has led us here but we don’t understand why? For some reason, we can’t seem to find Jesus on this mountain. First of all, this situation is not about sin, it is about growing our faith. However, our question could easily be… are we on the wrong mountain? Are we facing something that was not ours in the first place? Is it possible we somehow staggered blindly around, with the sound of the last victory in our ears, plus the sweet smell of success yesterday still present … and we got lost? No!

Here is a scripture to think about carefully. “The Sovereign Lord is my strength; He MAKES my feet like the feet of a deer, He ENABLES me to tread on the heights.” Habakkuk 3:19. Without Jesus we can’t and probably won’t, try to face things. He knows that better than we do. So the first thing we must do is to remind ourselves that He will never leave us or forsake us, and then we have to move. It’s time to take a tentative faith step forward. Be like that deer, who just leaps about knowing it can manage the terrain. This is how faith grows. First we hear the word of God, and then we act on it. So we take our wobbly little foot and plant it in front of the other one. This is how we move up bigger mountains — prayerfully and carefully, one step at a time.

New things are scary. It is so easy to rejoice in everything He has already done, for us and in us, but then we hit that wall of … I’ve never seen this before … then we can feel flattened and frightened about what might come next. Why would the Lord send us here? … To strengthen our faith. If we already know what to do, then we don’t need to lean on Him, and we will lean on what we already know. Faith is a journey that requires ever increasing boldness, and a big heart that keeps going despite the circumstances. 

‘Faith that is not tested is not faith, it quickly becomes something unstable.’ Listen to Peter in 1 Peter 1:6,7. “In all this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials. These have come so that the proven genuineness of your faith—of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire—may result in praise, glory and honour when Jesus Christ is revealed.”  

So-oo-oo-oo, this stuff has happened to prove our faith is genuine – it is not just fair-weather, waiting-on-the-answers-to-our-prayers, faith … We want genuine faith that desires God to get all the glory for the great things He has done in our lives. Here’s a big thought. Dead people don’t need applause – living ones thrive on it.

This whole issue, every time it happens, reveals to me that I am not all dead yet. If I cannot hold fast when I cannot feel Him, see Him, or even hear Him, then my faith needs further perfecting. My faith is not about what Jesus does, it is about Who He is. What He does deserves our praise, acknowledgement and worship. Who He is, reminds us He is our living God embodied in a Man, for us to praise, worship, look at, learn from, and follow. 

Sometimes our grief and inability to believe, clouds His faithfulness to get us to where He said He will take us. When you find yourself staring at something so big you can barely comprehend it, then you have entered a possibility. When we read Hebrews 11 carefully, we will see that everyone mentioned in that chapter had faith that God would carry out what He said He would do. But most of them died before that promise the Lord made them was fulfilled. Faith is not about claiming promises, it is about taking God at His Word. It is not about the strength of our ability to hold on, it is about His ability and strength to hold us! Praise God we have a book full of His life-giving Words!

Bigger mountains mean that Father God has pruned, fertilised, watered and fed us, and now He is trusting us to press forward into what comes next without visible evidence. We are ready, whether we feel like it or not. Like Hebrews says, the seeing, the evidence, comes after we use our faith, not before it. “Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things NOT YET SEEN.” Hebrews 11:1. Our faith in action proves God is Who He says He is, and that has become our aim – not just our answers to prayers.

If you feel lost and that mountain seems too high, remember, God is calling you to unknown places – things you have not even thought about. Now is the time to focus on the fact that He’s good! This calling we have is not about miracles – or looking clever or even knowing what comes next. It is about finding out how much we love and trust Him. We take these steps because He asked us to. “Faith learns to see beyond the moment, to the work of God unfolding within it.” (Anonymous)

Don’t let the mountain be bigger than the Lord – He knows you can take that next step. We all love to follow Jesus and He climbs mountains every single day. Bye 👋.

P 3492 I know life can be difficult…

/ DVH

…it has not been so-wunnerful-at-my-house all the time either! However, Psalm 27:5-6 says: “For in the day of trouble He will keep me safe in His dwelling; He will hide me in the shelter of His sacred tent and set me high upon a rock. Then my head will be exalted above the enemies who surround me; at His sacred tent I will sacrifice with shouts of joy; I will sing and make music to the Lord.”

I wanted to talk about the subject of trials today, because I totally understand how this life can keep anyone — angry/busy/anxious/devastated — one way or another. Verses like the one I put above, are so comforting, but at the time, when any ‘stuff’ is happening, it seems like these things are just words. Sometimes I can barely find my faith! I learnt that we must stop looking for evidence, and start believing Him … simply because what He said is in the book!

I’ve realised that verses like these verses are not just beautiful words, they are lifelines. Something we grab hold of when the room starts whirling around us, and our world goes upside down. We can’t afford to read them and not use our faith. We need to walk around our house, and thank God that He is keeping you safe. Even when it looks like He has forgotten you. I think of things like Psalm 27 or Psalm 91 in difficult times, I have no idea what worse might look like, but I know He is protecting me from worse, and I thank Him. 

Psalm 91 has taught us: ‘I am a spectator, I am hidden in the secret place of the Most High God!!’  The glory of that verse lies in the fact that once you have chosen to hide yourself in Him, all the ‘sound and fury’ stays outside. However, first, you have to actively put aside what you feel, and believe what He said. The bible also says: “weeping may endure for a night but joy comes in the morning.”  Instead of checking on your situation, the things that are often dreadful – hold fast to the fact that if it is in the book, the Lord has preserved it for a purpose. Bit by bit, crawl into the place where He said it, you believe it, and now you are acting on it. 

I think we learn faithfulness by being faithful to Him, especially when we don’t feel like it and it seems like we have no evidence. HE’S GOOD WHETHER WE HAVE PROOF OR NOT. And we choose to believe what He said even when everything around us screams at us — “that is not true, God doesn’t care about you, otherwise He would heal you, set you free, help you, give you strength etc.” Our enemy uses the lack of physical evidence to distract us from Who Jesus is. The lovely things we are promised in His Word, belong to us, and we must use our faith and go after them. Then His peace takes over. 

Let me tell you what I’ve learnt, the very best place to be is:  in trouble, just getting into trouble, or just coming out of it. NO! I am not nuts! Plus, the only PEACE worth having is His peace, and we will have to fight how we feel to get it. We need the practice. We can learn more from our heartaches and failures than we do from anything else. Most people want a comfy, orderly, cosy life, but we are more like to scream out for His help when stuff starts landing on us.

Let’s remember, this life is not all there is. We need total transformation, intensive bible therapy, plus the kind of exercise that comes from doing what He wants and pushing through all the junk and grabbing hold of His goodness. If you are in a hole and you can’t get out, please remember Psalm 27, and Psalm 91. They are not impossible dreams, they are a reality you can cling to when everything is upside down. God’s peace is not in the absence of trouble – but His Presence is still IN US in the middle of it.

We all need to do this particularly if it feels like somebody accidentally shoved you into an armed forces firing range, and you can barely raise your head, because you keep hearing: “Incoming!!” The Lord is still there with you, and He has you sheltered under His wings. Even if you were to tell Him in anguish, “Make it stop, I can’t take anymore.” HE won’t go anywhere! His commitment to us is firm. He’s the Shepherd that goes after that sheep that got lost, or was chased by a wolf! God does things His way, and His idea of what we can do or take, can be very different from ours. We can underestimate our capacity to endure when we are under pressure.

Exhibit A! “Dear friends, do not be surprised at the fiery ordeal that has come on you to test you, as though something strange were happening to you.” 1 Peter 4:13. So, why are we often surprised when bad things happen? Yeah! I wish that wasn’t in there either. When we believe what He said, despite the awful evidence all around us, we  will begin to walk in faith … Our God is more loyal, more faithful, more good and kind that we can imagine – and moaning and groaning will not help us get free. Stand firm and hold onto His goodness.

We can rejoice in our sufferings because they teach us we can’t do a darn thing without Him!! … Life is difficult, but life without Jesus is impossible. Where would we go, without the love He freely gives us, when it is so undeserved? I urge you to do more than agree with the bible, stake your life on it. Bye 👋.

P 3480 More attainable than we think.

/ DVH

It can be hard to adapt to new ways of thinking, doing and being. But when we choose to live this life totally sold out to Jesus, living out His Will, His way, that choice is far more easily attainable than we’ve ever realised. It is worth anything, but it will cost us, comfort-wise. Nowadays, bad stuff happens all the time.

As usual, I have what I hope will be an illustrative story. A couple of years ago, my dear hubby began to develop osteoarthritis in his hands, feet, fingers, toes, back, shoulder etc. and he not only experienced awful pain, he had to have injections for that pain regularly. His ability to do ordinary things easily, just disappeared. It was very traumatic, as you know, we travel a lot. Hubby had just begun to enjoy watercolour painting and he loves to give his paintings away. He paints whatever God tells him to paint and it speaks to the other person.

Because of his lack of dexterity and the awful pain, losing the freedom to paint was very hard. Then the Lord gave me a word of knowledge – the skill to paint does not come from our hands and fingers or their co-ordination.. that skill comes from God and it can’t be taken away. It is a gift. A visual word of knowledge. I passed that on to hubby and suggested he try to paint with his other, non-dominant hand. At first he thought I had gone a bit loopy, but he trusts the LORD, so he began to paint with his other non-dominant hand, which wasn’t as painful. He had never ever done this before.

Lo and behold the pictures he painted with his left hand, were fantastic! Even more full of life than the original ones. The original paintings were beautifully done, but his left hand produced things that were much free-er. Now here’s what I think … hubby could always paint, with his left, or right hand, it didn’t really matter – but using his left hand to paint meant he really had to extend his faith. What we do in faith reaches into God’s kingdom and it creates miracles. Read John 21:6.

Over to my point today. For years the church at large has wandered in the wilderness, trying so hard to please Jesus, and follow Him. But we did not know what to do with the “stuff’ that continued to happen to us, every single day. Everybody wants to cope and remain victorious, but we don’t seem to have the skills to help us to stay away from the very things that were sent by the enemy to drag us down. So we often have no personal victory over sin. We promise God over and over again that we will not gossip, or drink too much, judge others, or watch risqué films  etc. but it seems we have no power to change.

However, because of what Jesus did, now we have inside us the very gift and power we longed for, it just isn’t going to manifest itself according to our knowledge and our rules. God Himself has a WAY to do things. The bible is full of illustrations of what His Way looks like. His way looks like total surrender and confidence in everything Jesus achieved on that cross. It operates in faith and splashes love freely all around it. It knows when to say yes, and when to say no. Now we need to lay aside our coping mechanisms and learn to live this life dead to what we want and think we need, and alive to what Jesus wants for us, every day.

It is easy to say that we want to do everything the Lord asks us to do … until we don’t — because suddenly it seems too hard. Sometimes what Jesus asks us to do, doesn’t suit our plans, or make sense to our natural minds. Acting in faith is not automatic, it is learnt by practising it. Living this way. I know I need to take what the Holy Spirit said in the bible seriously, and continually choose to act on it at every opportunity, even when my flesh is desperately screaming its head off. I do that by returning love for meanness, faith for doubt, exercise real joy because of what Jesus did, no matter what else is going on. As we are following Jesus we continually need to make faith adjustments. We pray – do whatever He tells us to do – and then we follow Him. Human beings  want to escape trials, but the Lord has promised to take us through them.

Humility is one of our greatest strengths, and we get it by humbling ourselves and admitting we need His help to die to what we want, and live for what He wants. When some awful trial or other seems to be much bigger than we are, we have an opportunity to lean on everything Jesus did for us, and learn to trust Him, no matter how it looks. Let’s use our faith to respond to trials differently. This is not a passive thing. We must grab hold of Jesus, just like Peter did when he thought he would drown. 

Jesus once said this to Peter when he began to berate the Lord for talking about His death. “Jesus turned and said to Peter, “Get behind me, satan! You are a stumbling block to Me; you do not have in mind the concerns of God, but merely human concerns.” Matthew 16:23. But this man had been following the Lord for over two years! Then Jesus explained what God wants: “…“Whoever wants to be My disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow Me. For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for Me will find it.” Verses 24&25.

In other words we have to be prepared to put down our own ideas, and agendas, and pick up the things of God, that are eternal. Returning love for hate. Faith for passive resignation. When we were born again eternity entered our hearts. Let’s begin to rely upon His ability to know what we can and can’t do and trust the Lord to get us through it. We can get through things we have never ever dreamt about because we have God’s Spirit in us, with us, to guide us. Just like my little illustration, we can paint with our left hand even though we can barely write with it! This new way of living is more attainable because of His Grace, than we realise. Bye. 👋.

P 3467 Our Joy needs to break out.

/ DVH

“Celebrate with praises the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, Who has shown us His extravagant mercy. For His fountain of mercy has given us a new life—we are reborn to experience a living, energetic hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. We are reborn into a perfect inheritance that can never perish, never be defiled, and never diminish. It is promised and preserved forever in the heavenly realm for you! 

Through our faith, the mighty power of God constantly guards us until our full salvation is ready to be revealed in the last time. May the thought of this cause you to jump for joy, even though lately you’ve had to put up with the grief of many trials. But these only reveal the sterling core of your faith, which is far more valuable than gold that perishes, for even gold is refined by fire. Your authentic faith will result in even more praise, glory, and honour when Jesus the Anointed One is revealed.” 1 Peter 1:3-7 TPT.

Did you see the bit at the beginning that says ‘celebrate?’ when I read that, I do it. Why? Am I pushed along by some sort obligation? NO! It’s an opportunity, not an obligation. I have just been reminded of how wonderful our Heavenly Father is, and how much He has done, and He will do, and is doing, right now in my life … and yours! That’s a really big reason to cheer wouldn’t you think? When I am in public I cheer inside. My “Yaaaaaaay Jesus,” can get a bit loud and I would probably scare other people. People find it hard to feel loved when they are scared. 

Did you get the bit where it says that His mercy is a fountain? That’s not a trickle, or a few squirts here and there, a fountain shoots water high up into the sky, and all over itself. It splashes anybody walking near it. Fountains remind me of freedom. There is nothing like running, leaping, flowing and bubbling water to illustrate that point. At the same time our hope isn’t just laying around, lethargically. No, our hope has energy it, moves  and gathers momentum. It is ALIVE. Well, of course it’s alive! JESUS CHRIST IS ALIVE forevermore and He is our living hope. Hallelujah!

The Holy Spirit says that… “We are reborn into a perfect inheritance that can never perish, never be defiled, and never diminish. It is promised and preserved forever in the heavenly realm for you!” If you ain’t smiling by now you are officially DEAD. Peter is telling us that our God is our constant guardian, so nothing can get into my life, that He and I can’t deal with. I hold fast to that. OK. Are you ready now? We just got to the jumping bit. Gird up your girdle Gertie … the Bride of Christ is going to get happy.

The whole world around us has been waiting for this … “For [even the whole] creation (all nature) waits expectantly and longs earnestly for God’s sons to be made known [waits for the revealing, the disclosing of their sonship].” Romans 8:19. The people around you are waiting for you to stand up and be His kid! We can sit about feeling sad because we don’t have this or that, or choose to get bogged down in the things that we haven’t done that we ought to have done … etc. Repent and repair stuff! And then we can go back to cheering and jumping, because Jesus took all our sins on Himself, voluntarily.

I like the way the bible acknowledges that trials do happen, that tells us they are normal, and we can be temporarily held by them. But there is a plus, the bible also reminds us that these times reveal how our faith is currently doing in spite of the strains and stresses. Our faith is subject to the difficulties of this world, just like everyone else on the planet — whether they-know-Jesus-or-not!

The idea that we are supposed to never have difficulties, or, if we have them, then somehow God is mad at us … is unscriptural. Jesus said:  “I have told you these things, so that in Me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.” John 16:33. Trouble is normal. It’s not the yardstick – but it is normal. The point of trials is to have PEACE in the middle of them … not just avoid them, escape from them, or pretend they don’t exist. It is always helpful to know the point!

These trials expose how our faith is doing, because our faith  is incredibly valuable to Almighty God. When we have faith we are choosing to reveal Him in a faithless world. Even more importantly our faith gives our Heavenly Father, God, the glory He deserves. Our faith guards and progressively reveals our full salvation, which is now, and … also … not yet. Our living faith, the faith that has been revealed by troubles and trials, gives the Lord glory, honour and praise, and we have to celebrate what we have been given. And look at that … we have arrived back where we started. We started with celebration and expanded into eternal glory and honour for the Trinity.

One day we will totally understand what we have been freely given and what a party we will have! Some people think about heaven as a quiet peaceful place, but maybe that is simply because they need a lot of peace and quiet down here… However these verses in Peter indicate that there might be also be a whole lot of jumping and shouting going on as well. The good news is, we won’t get tired of doing it, because every time the Spirit of God turns and moves, there will be a fresh revelation of the Father’s love and grace toward us all. “Divine revelation is dynamic not static.”  

All of this and far more, is ours. I think it’s time for joy to break out in our hearts and lives, simply because … while we were all sinners … He saved us.  We can have joy because He has us and we have Him, forever. Bye.👋. 

P3446 Let’s talk about Psalm 23.

/ DVH

“Because the Lord is my Shepherd, I have everything I need! He lets me rest in the meadow grass and leads me beside the quiet streams. He gives me new strength. He helps me do what honours Him the most. Even when walking through the dark valley of death I will not be afraid, for You are close beside me, guarding, guiding all the way. You provide delicious food for me in the presence of my enemies. You have welcomed me as Your guest; blessings overflow! Your goodness and unfailing kindness shall be with me all of my life, and afterwards I will live with You forever in Your home.”

This Psalm was written by David, who was a shepherd – so he knew what he was talking about! I sometimes wonder how a plumber or a taxi driver would write it? Moo-ving on … I enjoy watching a Scottish shepherd and his dogs at work on Youtube. The thing that hits me every single time I watch it, is that those dogs never take their eyes off their Master, and he never takes his eyes off the sheep, or the dogs.

David knew all about sheep, that was his job. His part in his large family was pretty minor compared to his big deal brothers who were allowed to join the army and help their Dad run the family property. The blessing of doing unnoticed things well, is a huge asset. It helps form character in us, when we are prepared to leave acknowledgement from others, behind us. It teaches me regularly how needy I am regarding praise!

David did what he did well. He knew how to care for his sheep, protecting them from harm, and when they needed a rest, he took them to a green, well-watered safe place. Jesus makes sure we are rested and ready for hard parts of our journey. Some tasks may look very small and insignificant but they teach us to rest. The Lord knows what comes next, and He will provide us with a safe place, right near Him. Jesus Himself taught us about faithfulness – it matters! “He who is faithful in a very little thing is also faithful in much; and he who is dishonest in a very little thing is also dishonest in much.” Luke 16:10.

Psalm 23 tells us we can learn about fear, whether real or imagined, WHILE we are walking through the valley of the shadow of death! Our Heavenly Father often ‘trains our hands for war and our fingers to fight,’ in difficult, dark places, where we want to curl up into a ball and hope we die. Why would He do that? Theory in the Body of Christ doesn’t benefit anyone … but using our faith changes our view of things. The bigger the resistance, the stronger the muscles. Faith is a spiritual muscle – it needs to be resilient, because bad things happen unexpectedly.

We can theorise all we want, but the truth is – when the stuff is going down, and all hell breaks loose, that is THE very best time to practice what we believe. When we feel paralysed by our circumstances, then we can choose to lean on Him. HE becomes our  hope – not our changed circumstances. Our God is training warriors, not Tinkerbell! Later on, David himself became a mighty warrior, but when he was a youth caring for sheep, he had already learnt to fight with God on his side. That’s why he ran at Goliath.

The Holy Spirit, daily walks with us, guiding us, teaching us … He does not leave us. Instead He says: ‘put your foot here, put your hand there … stand on this scripture … do that other thing now.’ Our Shepherd doesn’t only lead us, the goodness of God in Jesus and His Word, glows right in front of us, lighting up the way ahead of us. Today’s Word, from the bible is our light for this day. “Thy Word is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path.” Psalm 119:105.

The Lord releases His word to show us HIS pathway through our trials. When this happens, He is not punishing us, nor has He forgotten us. He took our punishment, once and for all. We can’t ever be forgotten because He carved us on the palms of His hands! This Psalm also tells us that the Lord prepares a table for us in the presence of our enemies.

So let’s look at 1 Corinthians 11:24,25 it says: “… and when He had given thanks, He broke it, and said, “This is My body, which is for you. Do this in remembrance of Me.” In the same way also He took the cup, after supper, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in My blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of Me.”” This is the Lord’s table! His broken body and His blood willingly poured out for our sake, made a way for us to survive everything that comes at us. In Jesus’ mind what we need is already done, and we have been given His mind. 1 Corinthians 2:16.

Christ’s death and resurrection on our behalf made a way for us to be certain that no matter how things look – God will not fail us. And then the Holy Spirit assures us that God’s goodness and mercy runs after us. He follows up our times of difficulties, to the point where we are so blessed we run out of words to thank Him! We won’t always feel it, instead we choose to believe what Jesus said, and live our lives depending on it. We are His people, and He knows when we need to lie down. Plus He knows the way through anything that comes against us to make us afraid and He will lead us through it.

Psalm 23 is an example of the Lord’s purposes in our lives, it is not just for funerals. It teaches us that He leads, guides, and travels with us every step of the way, every single day. He feeds us with Himself, and blesses us. His all-consuming desire is to walk with us, forever. Bye 👋.

P 3427 Let Him prune you.

/ DVH

Now there’s another happy thought. Most of us, if we are truthful, start backing up and going the other way when we see the Lord Jesus coming at us with the secateurs! Like I said: … let’s be honest!! We look lovingly at some little, hopeful, tender tendril, that has started to grow at the end of what looks like a dead stick on His vine and start to feel ….  a little bit proud of ourselves… ‘Look at what we’ve made … all-by-ourselves!’ And here comes Jesus, snip snip, snipping away. If we had legs in this dumb allegory, we’d run away.

It is unrealistic to continually tell people that our new life in Christ means we will grow a bunch of juicy grapes year after year. Grapes grow best when you prune them. You see, the Lord Jesus is the Master Vine-dresser and He knows exactly when and where to prune so that the vine produces only the best sweetest grapes … and He wants quality, not just quantity. To get that there must be sacrifice and that means even those things that have heaps of potential. All this happens so the sap in the vine will be channelled into less bunches of fruit, and produce better quality grapes in the ones that remain. This happens in winter, when the vine seems to be dormant.

What that means to us, is this — sometimes our most unfruitful seasons, our times of great difficulty and trials, are channelling the flow of God’s Spirit in our lives in certain directions. So we can see the tendrils of new growth in good things like worship leading, or preaching … yet the Lord says … ‘I don’t want fruit from those branches, I want fruit from this little nub down here.’ Then the fruit that will remain comes from the branches HE chooses. Maybe that means developing greater service to others, or deep empathy in our lives. We need to listen, step down from the platform, and follow the SAP!

Let’s make sure we are able to clearly identify what is the Holy Spirit’s work, and what is not! Sometimes our own good works can get in the way of what the Spirit of the Living God wants to do in our hearts and lives. We can be so enamoured with what He is doing through us, we don’t even want to know what He wants to do IN US. That little tendril we like so well could have come from a sucker that snuck itself in at the base of the vine. If it is left untended, it will draw all the goodness out of the true vine, and waste it on growing that sucker. Suckers don’t produce fruit – they are parasitical. They steal growth energy from the host. It seems to me that Jesus utterly understood this and lived by it.

I believe this is one of the reasons why the Lord Jesus said in John 5:19-20. “Jesus gave them this answer: “Very truly I tell you, the Son can do nothing by Himself; He can do only what He sees His Father doing, because whatever the Father does the Son also does. For the Father loves the Son and shows Him all He does. Yes, and He will show Him even greater works than these, so that you will be amazed.”

And then He said this in John 12:49: “This is because I have never spoken on My own authority or of My own accord or as self-appointed, but the Father Who sent Me has Himself given Me orders [concerning] what to say and what to tell.” The Lord Jesus laid aside His own will to manifest His Father’s will in everything He did and said. Think about it!  He LIMITED Himself. This is what He is asking us to do, limit ourselves to His plans for us, the same way He limited Himself to His Father’s plans. There are more instances where the Lord said the same thing: John 5:19; John 8:28 and John 14:10. 

Jesus prunes away every single bit of growth that will not profit us spiritually, because we need the energy and the zest of His life in us to be protected, and channelled in the direction He has chosen for our lives. This is why Father God gave gifts to the whole church. Because no human being is meant to have to hold up the entire weight of the vine. The Lord sent back His Spirit to help us achieve what He wants from us. 

“However, I am telling you nothing but the truth when I say it is profitable (good, expedient, advantageous) for you that I go away. Because if I do not go away, the Comforter (Counsellor, Helper, Advocate, Intercessor, Strengthener, Standby) will not come to you [into close fellowship with you]; but if I go away, I will send Him to you [to be in close fellowship with you]. “John 16:7.

The Lord Jesus knew what He could do and say, and He also knew when to be quiet. It doesn’t say He didn’t know stuff, the book clearly tells us that He chose to be limited by His obedience to His Father’s Will. We are asked to do the same. Let’s not get distracted by what this life demands that we do. Obviously we need to do normal stuff, like eat, sleep and take care of our families, but in everything we do, we must choose to go where the SAP of the Holy Spirit goes. That requires us knowing and recognising His Ways.

You know, we’ve all probably bought a bunch of grapes in the supermarket that looked fantastic, but they had no taste. For our personal spiritual fruit to be juicy and full of the flavour of Jesus, we must learn to “… throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us …” Hebrews 12:1a. Bye. 👋 🍇

P 3422 The bible.

/ DVH

I think the version of the bible is less important, to me this book is a springboard into hearing from Him. It’s His Word and He can take His Word and touch our hearts however He chooses to. The Lord makes a lot of statements in the bible that sound wonderful, but unless we choose to act on them, as the Holy Spirit brings a verse to our minds — we can easily forget them again.

The scriptures are given to us to be life and health to us — food for the weary soul. Let’s look at Jeremiah 31:25 TPT: “For I will refresh the weary soul and satisfy all those who have given up on life.” Here are a few more versions. Amplified bible:  “For I will [fully] satisfy the weary soul, and I will replenish every languishing and sorrowful person.” The King James version: “For I have satiated the weary soul, and I have replenished every sorrowful soul.” Last one, Easy-to-read version:  “I will give rest and strength to those who are weak and tired.”

So looking at all that, what can we do when we are full of sorrow, tired and weary? We’ve learnt that we need to REST and be REFRESHED by the fact that God has given us His Word. He will help us find answers. He will take care of … whatever it is! What the Lord is doing is far beyond our scope of our limited imagination most of the time. His timing is totally perfect, but it simply doesn’t always scratch where we are itching, when we are tired and sad. But He is still doing something.

I think the secret is this – don’t pre-decide how the answers to your prayers will look. When we do that, we can utterly miss His answers to our prayers. Resting on what He says in the book, is our faith at work. Fussing and fretting about what we can do about things when we are already worn out, is a misuse of our God’s freely given resources. Take a big breath, look up and give it all to Him and wait for Him.

The Holy Spirit is our primary resource and His Word is our reference book. If we start looking at other people, and comparing or judging what’s happening to them, we are living under the misunderstanding that we are all supposed to be in the same spiritual place at the same time. We aren’t. We learn His ways by walking with Him individually. This is the God who makes enemy armies fearfully run for their lives, when no-one is actually there!  What one verse means to me, may not be what it means to you.

It is so important to value the cross. Every now and then go back to it in your mind, and remember what He did for you. What He did then, He is still doing! And don’t forget that empty tomb either. Our faith is founded on these events. The bible teaches us how to live and respond to difficulties, based upon a war that has already been won. He won it for us.

If we don’t feel ‘fully satisfied,” like Jeremiah said, then don’t blame yourself, someone else or even the Lord. Instead ask for eyes to see what He IS doing. He’s God … He can do trillions of things at once. Maybe we are missing what He is actually doing because we are too busy meditating on our unhappy circumstances. Let’s choose to be singleminded about these things. Focus on what His book says. That’s a skill we can cultivate, and it involves trust. For our faith to be real it has to be tested. The bible tells us how to face and move through those tests.

“Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.” James 1:2-4. 

This verse reminds us that God is always doing something. At the very least, He’s testing our faith in His goodness. He wants us to know that when our faith is tested we are developing perseverance. So we decide to rest. That means we stop trying to figure it out by ourselves and just WAIT. We are on God’s assembly line and our tested faith will produce perseverance, but we need to hold fast to what He said in the book. Let’s allow Him to finish what He has started.

We are faithfully waiting and looking to see God’s goodness in the land of the living. (Psalm 27:13) Sometimes we can miss the answers to our prayers because the Lord is doing something so much bigger than we could ever hope or imagine. The thing to remember is that we are also doing something, when we choose to trust Him and His Word, instead of running about like a headless chicken. The Lord says: “That trouble is the exercise that will strengthen our faith muscles.”

The bible is a spiritual document. That kind of thing is often hard to read, but we are so blessed … we have the greatest Lawyer ever, praying for us, helping and teaching us. He understands the law and He operates freely in GRACE. This means He knows how to plead our case for us. Let Him. Bye. 👋

P3403  Let’s keep jumping in the river. 

/ DVH

Many people have been hypothesising about the type of fruit on the tree of life. The bible says that fruit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self control. I read 1 Corinthians 13, and it says “…the fruit of the Spirit is …” Huge hint there!! Right. Now that is clear, let’s choose to follow the Holy Spirit, deny ourselves, and take up the cross of whatever this life throws at us – and joyfully serve Him and His purposes, right in the middle of our strife and trouble. Keep your eyes on Jesus.

We often want to gather the strength to do what is good and right and profitable, before we jump into the stream of the Holy Spirit’s Love. Here’s my advice – JUMP IN FIRST. All that other stuff gets added unto you while you are in there! We can get so busy on the side of that river of life and love – trying to fix ourselves, our attitudes, our actions that sometimes we get stuck trying to figure out how to fix someone else. All that means is we never get around to actually jumping in! If our enemy cannot corrupt us, he will try to distract us with the things we can’t change. We need to utterly trust the Holy Spirit to finish what He started in us. He’s the One with the Plan.

Let’s use the fruit of self-control as an example. Our aim is for any self control in our lives to become a natural response. It’s good to know what you are aiming at! Clenched teeth, and yelling and shouting, kind of defeats our purpose. As we jump into His love, we need to repent and repair, then throw off blame, straining and striving – self control will flow out of us because self control is IN that river.

Like Jesus said, staying attached to the Vine produces fruit. We can’t produce fruit without the Vine, so let’s just grab hold of Him, jump into the river of His love and learn to float. If Jesus says “pruning” then we say “OK!” If He says “time for rest” then we say “OK.” Our task is to stay attached. Obedience to His Will – plus focussing on His Love which never ends – will keep us attached to Him and floating. Keep continually thanking the Lord for loving you, and teaching and helping you with this life.

We will begin to take on the Father’s characteristics toward us, as we deliberately choose to learn to obey Him – whether it is convenient or not. No matter what kind of fruit we are producing, that fruit develops and grows because of our obedient responses to God’s Word for us, today. Don’t excuse yourself from obedience, instead, be honest, tell Him ‘I can’t cope, it’s all too much’ – He’s kind and compassionate, He will help us. He knows we are all just glorified dirt.

Christianity is the way we’ve chosen to live now. Let’s learn to lean into His Ways and yield to Him, no matter how inconvenient it is, or how hard it seems to be. Obedience to His instructions facilitates His life in us. Read the Beatitudes, start there! Now there’s a lifetime adventure. Valuing the Father’s Ways above our own, also gives us glimpses into Who He is. 

Jesus was obedient to the Father’s Way even though it killed Him. He’s our Leader, our personal human illustration! The Lord Jesus had so much faith and trust in God’s goodness, He allowed Himself to fall into the hands of men who could not be trusted, because God told Him that was the way to complete His mission. 

Many other blessings will flow into our lives as we yield to the Lord, and let go of those things that are holding us back. Then those blessings start overflowing onto others. The point of Christianity is not sameness — it is about transformation. All kinds of individuals have been personally challenged, and then changed, by walking day by day with Him, daily jumping in the river of His never-ending love, while still doing the seemingly ordinary everyday things we usually do.

We will see the fruit of the Holy Spirit blossom and bear fruit, first-hand in our own lives, as we participate in doing things His Way. Jump into His eternal, unshakeable love and stay there. Hold tight to your birthright! We were born to live in the river of His love, and be washed, minute by minute in our fresh clean new life. We must learn to use our faith, because this is how we bear God’s fruit. Obedience to Jesus’ instructions, clearly written in the bible – will produce Almighty God’s life in us, as well as total transformation in our lives. 

Living for Jesus means we will release the Holy Spirit with every single step we take. We can’t know what He will do in that other person’s life, but we know it will be good. If eating the fruit of the knowledge of good and evil produced death —- then eating from the tree of His life in us produces His living eternal fruit. That life is not a feeling … it is the flow-on result of loving, walking and living with Jesus. All of the fruits of the Spirit are born out of His love.

We had trouble with our mango tree last season, the mango buds came in abundance, but the fruit didn’t ‘set’ and it fell off before it reached maturity. This tree that had dozens of mangos in previous years, but last year it had barely more  than a half a dozen fully formed fruit. Under pressure the tree dropped it’s fruit.  That was a big lesson for me. It can happen to all of us – we can let go of how much He loves us when we are swamped by this life all with it’s trials and sorrows.

Our God is so good- even these bad things have a purpose. Pressure and discomfort are potentially developing faith-filled resistance in us. These are the things we are going to need on the next stage of our journey as we walk with Him. They help set His spiritual fruit and keep it attached to the tree. Attachment to the tree is just total dependence on Him – we all know we can do “nothing without Him..” It also says in John 5:19: “Very truly I tell you, the Son can do nothing by Himself; He can do only what He sees His Father doing, because whatever the Father does the Son also does.”

Jesus chose to limit Himself, by simply obeying His Father. The fruit from the Tree of Life in our lives, will produce God’s life in us, for others. People will come and pick that fruit and take a bite out of it. The real question is — what will our lives taste like?  Heaven? Or unripe, unformed,  unpalatable fruit. Let’s just keep our focus on jumping in that river. Bye. 👋

P 3341 There is a bigger reality.

/ DVH

And it is not pie in the sky when we die … it’s right here, right now. Jesus died so we can live like He taught His disciples to live… in our own daily reality with all its ups and downs. When the Lord Jesus says: “Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven…”  He’s talking about you and I – here and now. We are the vessels He has chosen. Personally my vessel often feels like it can’t hold water, but when He steps in I find it can hold water and His love after all!

We’ve been chosen to usher in His will, His way. To bring His kingdom into this war-driven world, grasping for fuel, and clean air, and rapidly polluting oceans. And let’s not forget those people who live their whole lives struggling for clean water and food! Man’s greed has reaped it’s reward – for many people it seems like hell is already here. Which is what you get when you put satan in charge, and not Jesus!

As Christians – His Body – we are here to show the world, first-hand, that there is more to this life than the state of the oceans, or the lack of trees, or global warming etc. We are here to show them what God’s love looks like, live and in person, through US. We carry Him with us, everywhere we go. Our power is in our ordinariness. We choose to give others, who don’t deserve it anymore than we did, the kind of love that is patient and kind, full of faith, and does no wrong to anyone. Because each one of us is here to contribute something; then doing nothing, is simply adding to the problem.

None of us are here by accident. The greater the trials and tribulations we have had to overcome, … the greater God will be glorified. Sadly, we seem to think we can just float along going to church, paying our tithes – as well as praying and asking for what we think we need, and that’s that. The unspoken subtext is this: “of course, God knows we are way too busy with our daily lives to live for Jesus!” He’ll understand, He’s God, He’s supposed to be loving, nice and kind etc.

Jesus Christ is our LORD. Jesus says in Luke 6:46: “Why do you call Me Lord, Lord, and you don’t do the things I say?” What we say is not enough, what we DO counts. And there’s you and me with egg all over our faces. We were never meant to be alone, struggling along, trying to be nicer than we really are. He has given us new clothes, inside and out! (Colossians 3:12.) Our inheritance is God’s kingdom, and we, you and I, take it with us wherever we go. But there are times when we look a lot more like the Prodigal Son — who wanted everything, here and now to make his life better.

Our enemy wants us so busy watching our own backs, we stop caring about the poor sod next door who is going under for the third time. I’ve noticed that sometimes the greatest villains in our lives, turn out to be the best soldiers for Christ. Many times I have prayed for someone in my own family who was persecuting me. Did they all get saved? I dunno, there were really stubborn people in my forebears! Don’t give up on people because of their unredeemed behaviour —  our God can bring beauty out of ashes.

Let’s get this clear. He does not have to rely upon us to bring Him glory – HE simply IS GLORIOUS! And transformation in a lost life brings Him glory because only He can do it. Only God Himself can take someone who has lived their lives the wrong way, and transform them in a heartbeat on their death bed. I’ve seen Him do it. We think salvation means God will raise up great marvellous mighty men and women of God to lead us to victory —- yet we still see ourselves as passengers instead of participators. We lovingly sing “it’s all about You, Jesus” and then go away and live our lives like it’s all about US!

Job knew some stuff even in the middle of his personal, heartbreaking disasters. “Though He slay me, I will hope in Him.” Job 13:15 or “I know that my Redeemer lives” 19:25. And Job 1:21:“The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away: blessed be the Name of the Lord.” We seem to think our God is like Father Christmas, and He will bring me what I want when I want it. Let’s take the time to look at this man’s responses. The real blessing is in the way in which Job accepted what happened to him, with such enormous Grace. Yes, Job ended up better off – but that was a byproduct, not the aim!

There are days when I do not like laying down my life for others. I want to bam my renewed mind into a small space, and throw it into a safe place and lock the door! BUT! I have the Holy Spirit inside me and He never leaves me… The Lord Jesus died to give me the power to live a different kind of life – not just to get what I want. By all means let’s pray for bad stuff to go away … and sometimes it will … and sometimes it won’t. That’s because He’s God, and He’s good, and He knows stuff I don’t.

Inside me, where I really live, I know full well my excuses and actions are just emotional pity parties. I can’t afford to choose sympathy over real love. REAL LOVE IS ALWAYS COSTLY. Jesus offered mankind His precious life and death lived in love, and what He did will last forever. There is a bigger reality —you and I are now ‘kingdom people’ – and that will cost us too. Let’s make a quality decision, count the cost and jump in the river … Bye. 👋

P 3123 God Has Set Things Right.

/ DVH

Romans 3:21-26: “But in our time something new has been added. What Moses and the prophets witnessed to all those years has happened. The God-setting-things-right that we read about has become Jesus-setting-things-right for us. And not only for us, but for everyone who believes in Him. For there is no difference between us and them in this. Since we’ve compiled this long and sorry record as sinners (both us and them) and proved that we are utterly incapable of living the glorious lives God wills for us, God did it for us. 

Out of sheer generosity He put us in right standing with Himself. A pure gift. He got us out of the mess we’re in and restored us to where He always wanted us to be. And He did it by means of Jesus Christ. God sacrificed Jesus on the altar of the world to clear that world of sin. Having faith in Him sets us in the clear. God decided on this course of action in full view of the public—to set the world in the clear with Himself through the sacrifice of Jesus, finally taking care of the sins He had so patiently endured. This is not only clear, but it’s now—this is current history! God sets things right. He also makes it possible for us to live in His rightness.”MSG.

There are times we need to read, and reread, about what Jesus voluntarily did for us, otherwise we can become a bit offhand and take for granted what we have been given – the incredible cost our sins incurred on Jesus. Gratitude is a powerful tool against presumption. Not the absent-minded “thank -you Jesus” kind, but the kind that stands in wonder at what actually had to happen so we could be restored into God’s family, forever.

Righteousness isn’t something to be glossed over, because it is an anchor point of what we believe. Sadly, we can often work extremely hard to explain away our sinful attitudes toward ourselves—and others. Day by day, we privately struggle with this bad attitude, that nasty temper, and an attitude of neglect toward loving others the way He loved us. Instead we hide those things behind a happy smile, and we try to modify our behaviour according to our own efforts, Christianity calls that works. But works don’t WORK! So today I just want to pause everything, and look at something we all think we know: but I believe we have yet to appropriate the glory of what we have been given. We haven’t paid it enough attention.

God has given me something of Himself that makes my relationship with Him, and YOU work. He gave us the same status in His eyes that He has given Jesus. This incredible blessing was here before I got here, and it will continue to change this world long after I leave it. The Lord wants us to enjoy that gift He has given us, every single day. It is a totally restored relationship with Himself. However, problems of perception crop up, and old attitudes and habits drag us away. We might even live this life aware of what we have been GIVEN—but we are utterly lousy at giving it away to other people when they have hurt us. Yet, OUR SIN KILLED CHRIST. That is the thing that balances out what they did! … “that which is not love, is SIN.’

This righteousness we’ve received is free, but it will not free us if we insist on grabbing hold of our neighbour, or spouse, and demanding they recompense us for their sins. Free is free. And like the unforgiving servant in the parable Jesus taught – we are happy to receive pardon, but not super excited about giving it to others. They hurt our feelings so they should PAY. This means we hold onto resentments, past hurts, and act accordingly toward the person who hurt us. We have cleverly constructed reasons for this deceitful behaviour – and we take polls with other people to make sure we have a consensus to say that our behaviour toward them is only natural, because of what happened to us. Other people’s actions should not interfere with our responses – we have been given the power to respond differently.

So we distance ourselves from others for our own protection. When we do that we negate Love’s power to overcome every obstacle. We are happy to be forgiven, but when something bad happens we misuse what has been given to us, to make ourselves feel comfortable. We inwardly declare the other person has now crossed the border into the land of “too much,” and they’ve nullified our need to give away something that was freely given to us. I just want to point out that the overriding premise of this gift is that we will always give it away whether the other person deserves to get it or not! It is an essential part of receiving righteousness, to give it away freely. We didn’t deserve it either! We don’t just receive righteousness we have to give away righteousness.

We can quite quickly rabbit-on about the power of God being sent to change our lives and the lives of everyone around us, but the truth is God cares more for action than He does hot-air. Saying this, and singing that won’t even remotely change us, unless we ask for His help to transform our selfish, self-centred mindsets that choose to withhold love from others. The truth is, we can be stinkers too, in some circumstances – and we don’t ever deserve His righteousness or forgiveness either. It was a gift.

When we move IN and OUT of the flow of His righteousness to satisfy our own agendas, we are postponing  opportunities to learn to love others the way He loves us. Then the desire to maintain a pious appearance begins to take over our efforts. Yet that is why righteousness and forgiveness were given to us freely in the first place  – so that His LOVE can prevail. Love is the language of His kingdom, and it can’t be faked, it must be learnt. This life isn’t just about ME being free, it is about ME setting YOU free no matter what you did. Our God has set things right, forever. Bye. 👋