Unjust

P 3346 Persistence.

/ DVH

Hubby is my full-time carer, but recently he has been battling daily with arthritis in his hands, feet and back. Do we pray about it? Of course we do! We’ve been praying for ill-health in our lives for years, and we will continue to do so. However, we refuse to let those things stop us, because this life is not all there is — around 3 billion people haven’t heard about Jesus, even once.

Which brings me to today’s theme from Luke 18:1-8. V1:“Then Jesus told His disciples a parable to show them that they should always pray and not give up…” I’ll let you read the rest of these verses for yourself. Suffice to say, this lady was a real pest. She drove the resident judge crazy — yet Jesus chose this illustration as an example of how important it is to keep on persisting. It is His desire to bring justice for ALL. The fact that we are coming up against unfeeling, sometimes hardened people-who-don’t-know-Him-yet shouldn’t stop us. All of us need to put down the bat, and use our words, based on 1 Corinthians 13. Perseverance pushes through because it wants LOVE to win. 

We are assured that we’ll be heard when we cry out to God — and we can have faith He will make a way. This lady didn’t just sit home and sulk, or badmouth the judge, she banged on his door until he answered, and he answered because she wouldn’t go away. Jesus called that faith. I’d probably call her a pest – but Jesus did not! I am not suggesting we bail up people physically, or harass them – but  I am suggesting that we must engage with our problems. First of all, we speak to the Person who is ultimately in charge – God! Then we speak to the authorities or the people who can help us.

Many times in my life I have met real injustice. Each time I stood up and said ‘that’s wrong.’ Because I did so, rules were changed in favour of someone less fortunate than me. I’m not a lobbyist, or a politician – I’m a blogger, a mother, and a grandmother. I left school at 14… was married at 20. But because of the scriptures, when I met injustice, I knew God was with me, so I stuck with it. I prayed and kept banging on the door demanding for truth to prevail. Sometimes we need to prayerfully, politely, and firmly demand to be heard.

Second thought in Luke 11:5-13. Let’s look at verse 8. “I say to you, though he will not rise and give to him because he is his friend, yet because of his persistence he will rise and give him as many as he needs.” Again we have the Lord using the same word – persistence. For the second time He is saying:“Pray like this!” He follows on from this parable about stretching friendship, into two verses that are often quoted …Luke 11:9-10. “So I say to you, ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened.” 

Persistence is invaluable with faith. We can’t afford to pray, give up and walk away. We need to put our feet into our prayers, like the pesky lady who went to the judge, and the friend with a visitor who went to his mate’s house at midnight. We don’t have to be violent to be heard. That’s why we pray first. We pray until we are filled with Holy love, then we engage our feet. Over the years we’ve allowed Christianity to become  passive not active. So when you want to care for the poor find something to do. If you think a thing is unjust, speak up. Have a prayer meeting, get the Lord’s heart on it, and then go.

Let’s not just assume the Lord is on our side, instead, let’s remember that we are on HIS SIDE and find out what that is! When hubby and I go out to share the gospel and give away bibles etc., we meet all kinds of people, with all kinds of faith. We don’t talk at them – we demonstrate the love of God toward them. If we are not sure what that looks like then we listen and then act on James 3:17:“But the wisdom that comes from heaven is first of all pure; then peace-loving, considerate, submissive, full of mercy and good fruit, impartial and sincere.”

We don’t give up, instead we go after wisdom. We all need to show other people God’s love on purpose. Make a plan to demonstrate His love in action. When you can, pray for people in person. Keep your life clean, make sure you actively forgive those who despitefully use you. And find a way to feed the poor, heal the sick, raise the dead. If our faith is inactive it can easily seem like our faith isn’t big enough for this kind of stuff. We have to persist. It’s great to pray and give, but going grows your faith.

Bang on the Lord’s door, Jesus our Friend, He’ll open the door because He loves us. He sticks closer than a brother. We are always going to need fresh bread from the bible, for everyone we are going to meet today. Chew on the Word, for a bit and then go and live out what it says.“But how are people to call upon Him Whom they have not believed [in Whom they have no faith, on Whom they have no reliance]? And how are they to believe in Him [adhere to, trust in, and rely upon Him] of Whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without a preacher?” Romans 10:14. 

You and I are the Lord’s hands and feet, so wherever we are we need to:  “preach the Gospel at all times and if necessary use words.” His Love will fill us as we physically reach out to others, because we are doing what Jesus loves to do. Bye 🙏.

Our daily bible readings are our fresh bread.

P 3343 It’s always a choice.

/ DVH

Philippians 1:27-30: “Meanwhile, live in such a way that you are a credit to the Message of Christ. Let nothing in your conduct hang on whether I come or not. Your conduct must be the same whether I show up to see things for myself or hear of it from a distance. Stand united, singular in vision, contending for people’s trust in the Message, the good news, not flinching or dodging in the slightest before the opposition. Your courage and unity will show them what they’re up against: defeat for them, victory for you—and both because of God. There’s far more to this life than trusting in Christ. There’s also suffering for Him. And the suffering is as much a gift as the trusting. You’re involved in the same kind of struggle you saw me go through, on which you are now getting an updated report in this letter.”

I want to emphasise that we need to make sure that if we are suffering, it is not because we are unaware that we are being tormented by satan in a fake hat. If the Lord is allowing something for a greater purpose, then that is different, but a lot of what Christians put up with is sheer satanic attack — and the tragedy is they think they are suffering because it is about His kingdom, or their transformation, or they are just bad Christians and God is allowing this stuff to teach them something. 

Jesus suffered and died for our sins, but torment can quite often knock on our door especially if we’ve done something that we think can’t be forgiven. But the truth is our view of what Christ did, and what He allowed others to do to Him, is too small. We’ve made our sin bigger than Calvary. Our faith in God’s bigness, His love and His generosity toward mankind needs to grow by reading what the Lord Himself has said over and over. This will help to expand our faith levels and it goes from our heads to our hearts. It is literally, “life and health to our bones…”

Here are some scriptures to stew on: “For Christ [the Messiah Himself] died for sins once for all, the Righteous for the unrighteous (the Just for the unjust, the Innocent for the guilty), that He might bring us to God. In His human body He was put to death, but He was made alive in the spirit,…” 1 Peter 3:18. AND … Romans 6:9-10: “For we know that since Christ was raised from the dead, He cannot die again; death no longer has mastery over Him. The death He died, He died to sin once for all; but the life He lives, He lives to God.” Hebrews 2:9: “But we do see Jesus, Who was made lower than the angels for a little while, now crowned with glory and honour because He suffered death, so that by the grace of God He might taste death for everyone.”

Jesus suffered for us, so now we need to make sure that we are not deceived. That part is clear. But His suffering had a purpose and it was humanity’s total redemption. Sin separates us from our relationship with God Himself – He’s the Life giver! Sin renders us a pale shadow of who we can be. Because of it, we can become deaf, dumb and unable to see, receive, or accept His goodness. Meanwhile we can’t kill ourselves, we have to let others do it for us – our part is to yield. We resist the devil and yield to God. We fight what satan says, and take what the Lord says to heart and stand on it.

Sin puts us squarely into satan’s territory, a place where he rules, and please remember, he hates people! Human beings can easily be deceived and dragged away from our primary purpose, which is to present Christ to the rest of this world, by who we choose to be now, today. The power of choice is enormous! And thinking that living a neutral, quiet life will hide us from satan’s games is unrealistic. Now we all have the potential to be like Jesus, and so we need our Resident Helper’s help – He is Jesus’ gift to us in this new life!   

It was not just the Lord’s death that impacted our faith – it was also the way He lived while He was on earth! Those two things go together. Jesus has given us the same power to overcome that He had when He walked the earth with the Person of the Holy Spirit. However, you can’t have a new life without dying — you can only get a resurrected life if you are dead in the first place!  Sadly, most of the time we aren’t prepared to die to self to get it. Both things are needed — death to self and a brand new life in Christ. The power to walk in our new life comes from the choice to die. Not just a little bit dead, but all dead. Dead dead. That old life cannot walk with Jesus, it will fail so it has to go. 

Now we surrender our hopes and dreams to His purposes. After we have chosen to lay down the life that we have now, then we choose to live a life of love. We put aside what we need, and let go of all those daily things that can act as abrasions in this life. Our responses to other people, help us to diagnose the places we are still clinging to the old life. That minute by minute struggle against voluntarily choosing His way over our Way, can show us where we are not yielded to Him. Father God will not do this for us – because that would rob us of our freedom. It has to be our choice. 

Jesus Christ chose the cross – He prayed, and then He followed it through by His actions. This is the pattern WE follow. We pray and then we deliberately choose to submit to Him. At Calvary the Lord submitted to every dastardly plot of the enemy – the stuff that was sent to destroy Him. But He chose to stay in Grace toward others. He is our example. It’s always a choice.  However, let’s remember: “God (Himself) is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.” Our Helper lives to help us. Psalm 46:1 Bye. 👋

P 3213 Gird up yor girdle Gertie.

/ DVH

I try not to be negative on this page because, thanks to the Media – social or otherwise – there is enough negativity floating around. It is like some sort of malodorous stench that can saturate everything we see and hear. The thing I want to talk about today is that we seem to have forgotten that we were saved to serve others, no matter what creed, or religion they belong to.

Here’s a question – if someone else is from another faith, do we automatically limit our exposure to them, or discard their words as error – maybe because we are afraid? Isn’t that making our God too small? The Lord saved us and He can keep us. Are we comforting ourselves that we’ll be OK – after all we are in the ‘right group.’ Yet millions of people are tipping off the edge of this life going straight into hell. They are going there because they don’t know any better.

God is good to both believers and non-believers. He sends His rain on the just and the unjust, and we don’t get to decide who is who! Our job is very clear – we are to love the people around us with His love. We need to remember Jesus is always present to save, and those dear souls that seem to be the furthest way from Him, often turn around at the speed of light!

Hubby and I have had people in our lives that are absolutely not walking with Jesus, and they haven’t got a clue that He came to save them, but these people have blessed us. We have all kinds of friends who support us as we give away bibles, and help the poor, and they do not know the Lord – yet. I believe when this happens these people have been touched by God’s hand, so at the same time, they are not far from His kingdom. Many times someone like this has said or done something lovely, and I know it’s the Lord working in them, and through them.

I wouldn’t dream of following what my friends believe, because I know their beliefs are error, and some of them are from the pit. But how can they know any differently if I do not tell them? Ostracising people alienates them. We can call it respecting someone else’s space – but isn’t that just evasion? Doesn’t it justify our fear of being contaminated, and persuade us to ‘play it safe,’ and do whatever we do, within the boundaries of our own churches? 

This world has so many other faiths. Let’s choose to learn to love people who are of another faith, and not treat them any differently than we would treat our brother or sister at church. “… they will know we are Christians by our love…” That love needs to go outside of the church and reach out to everyone. The Lord Jesus is altogether lovely, and He can and will win anyone over.

At the same time, we are not only required to tell people the truth, we must demonstrate it to them. Sometimes over and over again. We cannot afford to throw people away because they don’t have the same beliefs we do – we are reinforcing false boundaries when we do that. It is time to stop dividing others into categories and deciding who is IN, and who is OUT. Speaking for myself, I have noticed that the Lord is not far away from anyone, so what is needed is prayer, not judgment! There are many people today – no matter what they seem to believe, who are not far away from His kingdom. If they have some other faith, it means they are spiritually minded. Maybe they just haven’t met the Truth yet.

There are two ways to approach life – the easy way and the hard way. Most people like the easy road, whether they are Christians or not! In Matthew 7:13-14 it says: “Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it.” Only our Shepherd Jesus, is the true gate and at this moment in time, He is out there amongst ALL His sheep, calling to them to walk through that narrow gate, and follow Him. Peter once thought he knew who was what — and then Jesus straightened him out! Acts 10:9-16.

How anybody comes to know Jesus is His business, not mine. No matter what god they have worshipped in the past – we are all still HIS sheep and every single sheep counts. We are commanded to live a life of love, and speaking for myself, that’s plenty to go on with! Let’s jump in and watch His love win all kinds of people that we thought would never come – no matter what idol lives at their house. Many people follow idols because of family, or tradition, or nationality. However, the greater One lives in us. 

Here’s the way God approaches even the people who deliberately sin against Him. Isaiah 57:16-19. “For I will not fight against you forever, nor always show My wrath; if I did, all mankind would perish—the very souls that I have made. I was angry and smote these greedy men. But they went right on sinning, doing everything their evil hearts desired. I have seen what they do, but I will heal them anyway! I will lead them and comfort them, helping them to mourn and to confess their sins. Peace, peace to them, both near and far, for I will heal them all.”  Interesting verses eh? We must never forget our God is GOOD and MERCIFUL. 

Like I said, ‘gird up your girdle, Gertie,’ we are in for a bumpy ride. You and I could end up talking to strangers at the shops! Father God has hungry people everywhere, even in the enemy’s camp. Bye. 👋.

P 2870 Stay available.

/ DVH

Luke 4:25-27 “I assure you that there were many widows in Israel in Elijah’s time, when the sky was shut for three and a half years and there was a severe famine throughout the land.Yet Elijah was not sent to any of them, but to a widow in Zarephath in the region of Sidon. And there were many in Israel with leprosy in the time of Elisha the prophet, yet not one of them was cleansed—only Naaman the Syrian.”

Can you see from these few verses that the Lord actually sent His servant Elijah to wherever the prophet would be listened to and obeyed? It is easy to see that God’s heart is always toward provision and healing, that means we must not limit Him. We can spend a lot of our time, deciding who is in and who is out, when we should be using our time to bring ourselves to Him – so He can fill us for whatever He chooses to do. He did the above things for people outside of the Israelites. Once for a widow, and another time for an important man. 

And if you read these stories carefully, you will see that the Lord was extremely patient with that important man for his own good. He’s patient with us too, He has things for each of us to do.. He waits for us to say yes, and put aside our opinions, our man-taught divisions, and go after HIS. The Old Testament clearly shows us how Father God dealt with mankind, personally, directly, for man’s own good. Stories like these in Luke teach us His ways and how important it is for His people to say available.

These verses explain how His very own people can be so pre-occupied with their own lives that they are not available for His loving kindness to touch them! Sound familiar? That also kind of whacks the concept  ’round the ear-hole that our church is the only church God cares about! We can easily think of His love as intentional, ongoing and indulgent toward US, but … barely tolerant towards some other denomination, or the-people-who-don’t-know-Him-yet. That’s not true – read the book!

We can get so busy proving or disproving our pet theories and theological points of view that we will utterly miss Who He really is and misrepresent Him with hate instead of love. God sends His rain on the just and the unjust – and that rain is a symbol of promise, growth and fertility. Here’s a thought – instead of waiting for it to rain at your church, why not find out where it IS actually spiritually raining – right now – and join in!

“Oh, but those people over there believe in speaking in tongues and we don’t … blah blah blah …” It gets kind of easy to see why Elijah ended up in Sidon and Syria eh!? With that attitude we might not even be able to see what the Lord is doing right next door to us!!  Let’s remember, Jesus Himself interacted with people who were not the ‘chosen people.’ This life is not a contest or a competition between us and our theological ideas and ideals. It’s actually all about HIM! Who He is, and how greatly He loves human beings.

I’ve counted at least 5 times when Jesus interacted with Gentiles. Faith is bigger than our borders and boundaries. The thing about listening and reading what it actually says is that His Word will broaden our outlook on Who He is and what He will do … and for whom. We need to stop cherry-picking verses and stories that suit our church’s personal agendas and GO BACK TO BEING NEEDY. Neediness attracts the Holy Spirit like a bee to a flower meadow.

The thing we cannot ever hide from Him is our hearts. He knows what readiness to change and preparedness to be transformed looks like – because He’s met lip-service before. Here’s a last verse to chew on and it’s a tough old piece of steak, so chew away! It’s from Jeremiah 17:9: “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?”Only God does.

And I put it to you, that we do not know what is in our own hearts, and so we need Him to reveal that to us. We must stay alert and available to His Word, and His daily  guidance, because that is the only way we will see what is really going on inside us. Instead of looking and searching about to find out what ministry I have, I need to ask Him: ”Is there anything inside me that might hinder what You want to do in me, and through me? I need to be ready and available for whatever You want me to do next!” Bye for today! 👋

P 2732 God loves to love on people.

/ DVH

“He sends His rain on the just and unjust.”Matthew 5:45. This morning hubby and I were talking about the Lord and how kind He is, and all the things He did for so many people while we were away this time. Today I want to share some insight into what happens while we are out there. 

For many people in this country, we are their first contact with the Lord – most of them haven’t even been to Sunday School or Children’s church! So our population is vastly UN-churched. The good news is that this means that they have no preconceptions about God and what He is like. Hubby and I are blessed to be the people the Lord has asked to give them an opportunity to have their first spiritual encounter with Him. We’ve found He doesn’t want to barrage them with words, He just wants to love on them.

We are seed-sowers. But this morning I came to realise that we actually do more than that with His guidance. Sowing a seed can be impersonal, but like the Samaritan woman at the well, we’ve been used by Him to be the person who tells them: “…everything they ever did.” People are astonished when we appear to know stuff that we can’t know. We simply tell them that it is Jesus, and He sent us to tell them that He cares so much about them. Lucky us! There are no kudos for doing it BTW, we just follow His instructions. I have to say that we never know where this stuff will lead us, it is always a surprise to us too!

There are people who could be puzzled by the fact that we don’t go out there to EVANGELISE our fellow Aussies as they go about their lives – instead we just talk to them!! I capitalised that word ‘evangelise’ to give it emphasis. We simply go out there and do whatever He says to do. This means that we wait on Him, with our heart and hands open, and our ears and eyes, ready to go! Today I have chosen a young couple who hosted us on our journey this time to illustrate my point – I have given them other names for their privacy.

Sam and Jenny live in a small seaside community, you can get to the beach through a little grove of trees that they own. Hubby went to talk to them both, as the Lord led him. Before he toddled off, I felt to tell him to give them the gospel of John. I just need to say that that very rarely happens, hubby usually picks out the bibles. At the same time, the Lord indicated to him that he should take a picture he had painted just recently of an older man holding a tiny child’s hand. At this stage there was no indication that any of that was right, we just had to act in faith.And I felt we should give them a photo book of ours that is all about comfort. Off he went, and I stayed behind to pray.

Hubby loves to let people talk. He had told this couple we had presents for them, and during their conversation, Sam started to share that the place we were staying in, had been built for Jenny’s Dad. Her Dad had died very recently. Jenny began to share through her tears what the loss of her father meant to her. So hubby’s standing there with a book of comfort to give them, and a picture of an older man holding a child’s hand!! … It gets better…!! Hubby gave them the comfort book, more tears, then the picture, and both of them are openly crying because Jenny’s Dad had been like a father to Sam as well. 

Then he gave them both the gospel of John. Jenny gasped, and said “Look Sam! Look at the title.” It transpired that Jenny’s Dad’s name was … yeah … JOHN! More tears again. Hubby prayed for them both for the Lord to comfort them. Later on as we were leaving Sam asked us to stay on with them for FREE! Sadly, we couldn’t stay longer, the rest of our trip was already organised at that time, and we had many other places to go, but the man was so impacted by God, that was his response. 

I said all that to say that the Lord is reaching into the lives of the people-who-don’t-know-Him-yet in profound ways. Over and over again, this happens to us. We have so many stories over the past 20 years, just like this one! This time we spoke personally to 60 people in 15 days and each encounter was a God appointment. In the time we have been going out we have gathered so much proof that God wants LOVE to be the vehicle that He rides in, not fear.

I want to conclude my explanation by pointing out that this particular encounter started with 3 words of knowledge and a whole lot of His love, toward that couple …long before we ever got there, He simply needed our participation. Actually, we never ever know what is going to happen – that’s part of the fun. Let me tell you, anyone with ears to hear can have a word of knowledge!  The ones He has given us, have no lights, bells and whistles attached to them. The Lord is not big on show or titles. That stuff doesn’t seem to matter to Him at all. So if you are looking for titles or spiritual brownie points, we don’t have any!  

Someone once said to us that we should write a book about these encounters – we just laughed and said: “we don’t have time, we are too busy doing it!”  We simply follow His prompts and then the Lord does what He does best – HE LOVES ON PEOPLE. My advice to anyone who wants to live this way is to make Love your aim, not imparting information! In conclusion I just want to quietly remind you that —“the fields are white!” 👋