Walking

P 2680 Walking free.

/ DVH

“I waited and waited and waited some more, patiently, knowing God would come through for me. Then, at last, He bent down and listened to my cry. He stooped down to lift me out of danger from the desolate pit I was in, out of the muddy mess I had fallen into. Now He’s lifted me up into a firm, secure place and steadied me while I walk along His ascending path.” Psalms 40:1-2 TPT.

I have this theory … the things that we consciously walk into, we often need to walk out of. What do I mean by that? When we are careless and wander off His path for us, it is highly unlikely that the Lord will sovereignly transport us back to wherever we wandered off! Instead we have to turn around and make our way out of the mess we’ve made. He will always help us, but it is our responsibility to repent and repair. An-y-w-ay, this man in the above scripture fell in a hole! I like this guy already, I’ve been down more holes in my lifetime than a gopher! 

Did you get the ‘waiting waiting waiting’ part? Nobody likes that bit. Why do we have to WWW? Patience grows as we stretch our faith by firmly holding on to HIS faithfulness. The secret is to keep looking at Him — it won’t help us to constantly revise how stretched we feel! Our spiritual predecessors knew all about waiting. Some of them died … still waiting!! Hebrews 11 – the great faith testimony chapter. There’s a whole big clump of people – whose names we all know and recognise – on that list, and it says – ‘by faith’ in it 20 times! When God repeats Himself, I pay attention.

The important part of these two verses above in Psalms 40 is this: “knowing God would come through for me.” See… I actually think that most people would think “stooping down” and “lifting me up” etc. are the important bits. In other words …we all want to escape from trouble. But the longer we stand still and wait for Him, and look at how faithful He is, the stronger our faith gets. Human beings focus on deliverance, while Almighty God focusses on growth. I’m not saying it’s wrong to focus on getting out of the trouble we’ve landed in, but there’s not that much growth on that path. In the end, it seems to me that it’s the wait, wait, waiting that grows us. And yeah, I don’t like that thought either!

The Lord wants us to know our own limitations, so we can continually enjoy His limitlessness. Everything good comes to us and meets us on the path of waiting and believing in His faithfulness. Christians are not meant to stay immature. We were born again to grow, and mature people know how to wait! BTW, did you also get that word “danger?“ Yup. Another thought no-one likes. But we will be rescued and grow — all at the same time. And that path leads UP, afterwards. I won’t have wobbly weak faith anymore, because God Himself will steady me. So the path I am on now, HE put me on! He has a purpose for me, for my life  — it isn’t just to continually test me, it is to show Himself strong and mighty on my behalf. Now I will need to live using my faith so I can see what He is doing.

Almighty God should not have to prove His goodness to us day in and day out by making our lives easier. His Personhood should be an established fact in our lives. This is not something debatable – His faithfulness is a pillar in the inner house of our hearts.  We are so blessed. We are living our lives on the other side of that cross. We have the writings of the New Testament, His living active will, to refer to. It is our check-list of who we are and where we are going. Otherwise the winds of change and tribulation will keep blowing us over, like the fierce wind speed of a hurricane. 

Psalm 103:4 says: “Who redeems my life from the pit”… Redeem doesn’t just mean ESCAPE … redemption makes things better than they were. It means transformation. Jesus bought my life back from destruction and healed me, changed, and transformed everything. My old ways to live, things like – being frightened, overwhelmed, nasty, spiteful etc. have gone. All that was killed off when Jesus took my sin onto the cross. Now I don’t have to live like that anymore.

We are blessed. We get to leave behind our grave clothes just as surely as Lazarus got rid of his! Now we have a new way to live – calling us up, higher and higher. Any tests or trials along the way are not our God being whimsical … He is not testing our loyalty – He’s preparing a table before us in the presence of our enemies! Now we can enjoy walking free of that old way of living, where we lived in fear that help wouldn’t come. We have proof in the bible that help has already come. Bye. 👋

P 2646 “Hope thou IN CHRIST!”

/ DVH

Hope is a sign our faith is healthy. If we are feeling hope-less then our situation has overcome our awareness of how Mighty God is! That’s bad. It’s bad, like not breathing is bad!! It means there is something we need to fix, first with the Lord, and then with others. Other people can be stumbling blocks – especially the ones who see no need to change, or they think they can’t, because they were just born this way! Christ knows how to walk with difficult, dumb people – He did it for three and a half years!

Here’s a revelation – everything God made is good, so if it is NOT good – then it’s NOT God. To clear that up we need to start with ME not the other guy. But sometimes the difference between not good and good is simply time! Just saying is all …

… The truth is clear, we can hang on to resentment, bitterness, anger, lying, hatred as much as we want to, but those things’ll drown ya! You end up snarling and snapping at others. It’s dumb to be lying in the muck and mire when SomeBody paid for you to live an overcoming life!

You know, I think that Covid did more than make a whole lotta people very very sick. It stole some people’s hope! We gotta watch out for that. Hope is our anchor. Hope holds us steady when the waves of this life get too big for us to cope. Actually, when a boat slips it’s moorings or loses its anchor, it floats away! Hebrews 6:19 says: “We have this hope as an anchor for the soul, firm and secure. It enters the inner sanctuary behind the curtain, …””  Hope anchors us into God!! Remember, we hope in what Christ is doing, not in our circumstances changing.

Jesus Christ is our hope anchor. What He did for us, and what His death gave us, anchors us into Almighty God’s kingdom. Jesus took us into the Holy place by what He did. Now we have Him as our priest praying on our behalf, before the throne, and that never ends. The Lord God Himself provided the ultimate Answer – Christ! And He is ever-mindful of our humanity. We are so blessed to have a Saviour Who is God and also a human being – He understands how tough this life is.

Sadly we sometimes forget what we’ve been given and we wander off into the wilderness, wondering where God went. Bleating: “Why is He not looking after me – He promised He would look after me?!”  In those moments we have become imitators of the Israelites in the wilderness… remember, the Good Shepherd always goes after a lost sheep! The Lord always looks after His own, He just has a different timetable than ours. That difference is meant to help us with patience and perseverance, not introduce doubt.

“There’s more to come: We continue to shout our praise even when we’re hemmed in with troubles, because we know how troubles can develop passionate patience in us, and how that patience in turn forges the tempered steel of virtue, keeping us alert for whatever God will do next. In alert expectancy such as this, we’re never left feeling shortchanged. Quite the contrary—we can’t round up enough containers to hold everything God generously pours into our lives through the Holy Spirit!” Romans 8:8 MSG.

When we lose sight of our anchor, our hope – Jesus Christ the HOPE of all mankind – we are forgetting who we are now. We do not have to grab, grasp, scheme, scream and connive to make life work. Now we trust God and let go of our own ideas, and pay close attention to His Word. His word is our strong fortress, our hiding place, our comfort, and our defensive position. Otherwise, we are running the risk of forgetting Who we belong to! Our strong hope is in what Christ has already done.

“But as for me, I watch in hope for the LORD, I wait for God My Saviour; MY GOD WILL HEAR ME.”Micah 7:7. We remain confident that if the answer we were hoping for does not happen, then we remind ourselves that our God has heard us and HE HAS A PLAN. That’s our anchor. Hopelessness takes over when we concentrate more on the problem, than on our ever-present, always loving, constantly praying for us, Saviour. Our problem being solved is a temporary relief –instead we need to refocus on Christ Himself,  He is the Answer. “Hope deferred makes the heart sick.”BUT!!! …“We can do all things through Christ because He strengthens us.”

As we learn to cultivate patience, and wait on the Lord, we will renew our strength. We are given the energy to rise above our problems and keep running the race. We are enabled to keep on walking without fainting. Holding onto hope stretches our faith so the next time we use it, we become aware that our faith has grown. We must keep a watch over our hope, it is the warning light on the overcoming dashboard of our lives. We do not have to live downcast lives …”SOUL, HOPE THOU IN CHRIST!”👋

P 2501 Keep in step with the Holy Spirit.

/ DVH

There is one sort-of-kind-of good thing about making mistakes – it is a great leveller. I can’t look down on you, you can’t look down on me, be-cau-se … we are actually in the same boat!  “This righteousness is given through faith in Jesus Christ to ALL who believe. There is no difference between Jew and Gentile, for ALL have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and ALL are justified freely by His grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.”Romans 3:22-24. I am utterly crazy about that word ‘ALL.’ 🥳 I don’t have to compare myself with you, I simply need to pour my love and energies into walking with the One Who saved me. What we have now, praise you Jesus … is the fellowship – the friendship of the Holy Spirit to help us. Don’t leave home without HIM!

Every single human being is included by that little word “all.” The idea is not to waste your energy over what you have done wrong – repent, and then repair – and then go on to focus on walking with Him, by staying in the light. When you wake up, ask Him to walk with you today. Ask Him to check you if you wander out of His light. Our God loves our obedience. Personally, I have observed He is so sweet and kind, He loves it even when we try – failure is not the issue – continuity is. Even when you are falling asleep at the end of the day – repent and repair, and then embrace Him.

I think the Christian life is hardest for perfectionists. When you give these dear people a list of stuff they could or should do or be, or even not be, they drive themselves batty trying to hit the mark every single time. And they beat themselves up when they don’t. I wanna grab them by the shoulders, and say: “Mate, where’s your faith? Just stay in the light. Confess your sin, let Him wash you and stay in the light of the Holy Spirit. He’s perfect – YOU ain’t …”  Striving produces either defeat or pride.

There are works that James mentions in chapter 2 of his book. These kinds of works begin and end in faith – not our own effort. So we ask ourselves, what we are focussing on right now? If the only thing we are focussing on is getting things right, then we’ve missed the point. Our focus is to be on following the Holy Spirit everywhere, prayerfully discerning what Jesus wants. Living this life with an unreachably high standard cannot eliminate us from God’s love – it will just make our lives appallingly hard – and then we will give up on ourselves, and walking with Him, too soon.

Surrendering to Him is the key. When I live this life surrendered to His will, I give up my will and place it under the direction of SomeOne else – Jesus Christ! He proved how much He loved me when He died in my place. At the same time I am believing, despite my circumstances, that the Person I have surrendered everything to – is trustworthy. That’s the daily battle we fight. DO WE TRUST HIM to do what He said He will do?“Without faith it is IMPOSSIBLE to please Him …” we need to stop hoping faith will fall on us, or God will give us a sign, and simply act on our faith. Faith will give what we do substance.

Because Jesus has already been punished for my sins I do not have to be afraid of being wrong. Our Lord is a Redeemer – He works miracles with very little!  He can take 5 fish and 2 little loaves of bread and feed thousands.   Instead I want the Holy Spirit to make His word personal to me, while I am reading it. That’s why I talk so much about reading the bible. We need to have the Word of God flowing in and out of our lives. To do that, it needs to be present in our minds and hearts. The Holy Spirit will use His word to check us when we move away from what He wants.

Finally, I want to remind you that this is what Father God says in the book about any flaws in us. ““You are altogether beautiful, my love;there is no flaw in you.“- Song of Solomon 4:7. That’s what we look like now, because of the blood of Jesus over our lives. “If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” 1 John 1:8–9. Well there’s a hallelujah!

OH, if we would only let go of our preconceived, or even badly taught notions, that our God is limited by who we are and what we do, and use our energy to learn to walk with the Holy Spirit instead!  The bible says: “Ah Lord God! Behold, Thou hast made the heaven and the earth by Thy great power and outstretched arm; and there is nothing too hard for Thee.” Did you get that? Nothing!!  You and I are not too hard for God – He has already dealt with our sin. 

Meanwhile comparing ourselves with ourselves, and others, is a waste of time.  Let the Word of God live in you, by acting on it. And remember our destiny is to keep in step with the Holy Spirit! 👋🏻

P 2467 A walking, talking, breathing TEMPLE.

/ DVH

“This means that God is transforming each one of you into the Holy of Holies, His dwelling place, through the power of the Holy Spirit living in you!”Ephesians 2:22 TPT. That’s you… and I.. whether we feel like it or not, we are becoming His temple! Christianity has nothing to do with feelings, and absolutely everything to do with FAITH. So, where is your temple off to, today? Mine is sitting here praying for you, at the same time I am writing this blog. Today, whether you are rich or poor, safe or in danger – I know that the Lord will take care of you, His precious temple – “May He keep you sheltered and safe in His arms.” Amen. 

Here is something the Holy Spirit pointed out to me about the building of the first temple in the wilderness. Exodus chapters 25-38. The amount of detail the Lord God Almighty put into this temple is staggering. “God chose Bezalel of Judah to be the chief artisan. He was filled with the Spirit of God, a designer, engraver,  and carver of metals, stone and wood, with ability and intelligence,  knowledge and craftsmanship, skilful in embroidering and weaving, inspired to teach.” Well that’s a pretty cool resume!! This man, Bezalel, represents what the Spirit of the living God did inside your mum and mine when He made us. Look at this …

“For You created my inmost being; You knit me together in my mother’s womb. I praise You because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; Your works are wonderful I know that full well.” Psalm 139:13-14  and Job 31:15: “Did not He who made me in the womb make them? Did not the same one form us both within our mothers?” Plus Ephesians 2:10: “We are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus…” Lastly: Genesis 1:27: “…wherein “God created man in His own image. . .” 

I don’t care where this world says you came from – we know you came from Him! You are a gift, a present, to this world and the people around you. A present that is hopefully stuffed to the top full of HIS love and acceptance, joy and hope! Before you freak out and remember your flat feet, or bad temper, or other odd family genetic traits … remember this … you aren’t done yet.  It says: ‘God IS transforming each one of us into His temple.’ Please note we have a part to play in cleansing ourselves, as we co-operate with the Holy Spirit’s loving help!

For those of us that use English as our primary language that’s called a present ongoing tense … in other words, you and I are in a process. A process is not the finished article. It is simply the means to get to the finished article. So let yourself off the hook, like I said, you are not done yet! However, at the same time we can’t let ourselves off the hook to the extent that we can just do whatever we like and live however we like! We need to continually remember our purpose is to be His temple – His walking, talking, breathing temple – a place where people can encounter the Living God! And that started the minute we were born again. 

“But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s special possession, that you may declare the praises of Him Who called you out of darkness into His wonderful light.” 1 Peter 2:9. As God’s special possession, we have responsibilities. That is what this blog is all about, those responsibilities and the way you and I discern them and work on them with His help.

Many times in the past the church has tried to diminish the individuality of people who are part of His body and it seems that we are all supposed to think the same and believe the same theology. I think that is a mistake. I only have to put the two oppositional halves of my face together to see that even the left side of my face is not the same as the right side of it – very very few people have perfectly symmetrical faces! We are all incredibly unique. People in the same family, coming from the same parents are entirely different from each other, in personality and looks. Each human being, I firmly believe, brings a unique aspect of God’s glorious character and Presence as they are transformed into Christ’s likeness. 

Remember it’s His power working in us … not our effort … that power is activated by obedience to His word. And this transformation will benefit everyone else around us. As we renew our minds to think like He does, we facilitate what the Lord Himself is doing. Our obedience to what He says in the bible, and to us personally, ushers in a particular aspect of His kingdom visibly. We’ve been re-designed to be His temple or containers, of the Holy Spirit. He is so precious, He does not despise our weaknesses, or growing points. Instead, in love, He transforms each of us with a light loving caring touch.

And we don’t have to look like each other either – instead He wants us to look like Jesus and obey like Christ would if He were still visibly here! The Holy Spirit is transforming us into Father God’s walking, talking, breathing temple. He wants us to undergo this transformation so we can express a unique part of Father God’s Ways and His nature to others. 👋🏻

P 2365 We need to pray for the veil of our ignorance taken away.

/ DVH

“And I pray that He would unveil WITHIN YOU the unlimited riches of His glory and favour until supernatural strength floods your innermost being with His divine might and explosive power. Then, by constantly using your faith, the life of Christ will be released deep inside you, and the resting place of His love will become the very source and root of your life. 

Then you will be empowered to discover what every holy one experiences—the great magnitude of the astonishing love of Christ in all its dimensions. How deeply intimate and far-reaching is His love! How enduring and inclusive it is! Endless love beyond measurement that transcends our understanding—this extravagant love pours into you until you are filled to overflowing with the fullness of God!” Ephesians 3:16-19 TPT

Verses like these ones are kind of a mouthful, and if we don’t stop and pray and WAIT for Him to open our eyes – we can easily end up hearing …blah blah blah blah blah …. ……’constantly using your faith’ … ‘transcends our understanding” Those phrases can unfortunately easily translate into – I must try harder!! 

Trying isn’t in it. Especially when the veil comes off and you realise Jesus Christ already did all the work. We simply need to keep walking alongside Him … like the disciples did. We give up our agendas and dreams for His sake because He died for our sake. It’s our choice. Will our focus be on ‘our day’ or ‘the day Christ gave us!’ Those 12 disciples in the Gospels did nothing to merit the honour of walking with Jesus! They were going about their daily business, when the very real Presence of God showed up in the Person of Christ.

But, sadly we sometimes try to fit our faith in around our already established ordinary lives. OUR LIVES ARE NOT MEANT TO BE ORDINARY. Jesus died to give us HIS LIFE IN US. However, life itself can quickly overwhelm us and we end up praying quick prayers at the beginning of the day, and tired half-asleep ones at the end.  And eventually our failure rate is bigger than our success rate, and we coast along not sure about what we believe, and if it works or not but well-meaning people keep telling us we are missing the mark. WE CANNOT MISS THE MARK – CHRIST BECAME A MAN TO HIT THAT MARK FOR US.

We were not reborn to FAIL. We were reborn to bring His kingdom into our ordinary everyday humdrum lives. We need that veil removed so we can see and comprehend everything Christ already did for us. satan will fight you over that veil. But we have the power now to win! Simply ask the Lord to show you what He wants you to do with your day. Don’t promise Him tomorrow, or Monday, give Him today. And keep reminding Him, (not because HE forgets but because WE need the reminder,) that today is about Him, His kingdom. Tell Him you are willing to listen to what He wants done. Then live listening for what He says next, AND DO IT.

We will actively have to choose to look for His way. The real secret to walking with Christ minute by minute is choosing to live in love. Be like a plant that has put its roots down deeply into His love and then make a quality decision to give it away at any opportunity, whether the other person deserves it or not. Just keep giving it away. Jesus died to give us His life, now we give Him ours, by choosing to live this life as a life of love toward others. That’s how you spread the kingdom of God that is in you. 

We, you and I, already HAVE everything we need for this kind of life! Listen to this: “Everything we could ever need for life and godliness has ALREADY been deposited in us by His divine power. For all this was lavished upon us through the rich experience of knowing Him Who has called us by name and invited us to come to Him through a glorious manifestation of His goodness.”  2 Peter 1:3. 

All this stuff in His book, is in a heavenly bank account with our name on it. We just gotta use our faith and go to that bank and make faith withdrawals. Our faith is not meant to be about having a new car, or house or holiday or staying safe when we travel – that faith was deposited in us so we can live a brand new life that pleases the Father. The Son’s blood now covers our lives so we can walk with Him unafraid.

That veil produces the rumour that a Spirit-filled well-lived life for Jesus, is only for some people. It is for all of us. This is something we have to value so much we go after it deliberately for ourselves. And that means we will end up taking risks – using our faith to obey what Christ said, and pouring out His unmerited love on other people.  👋🏻

P 2351 What smells good to God?

/ DVH

“Be imitators of God in everything you do, for then you will represent your Father as His beloved sons and daughters. And continue to walk surrendered to the extravagant love of Christ, for He surrendered His life as a sacrifice for us. His great love for us was pleasing to God, like an aroma of adoration—a sweet healing fragrance.” Ephesians 5:1-2 TPT.

Jesus is our own personal visual aid for our lives here on earth. It is a mistake to think we can serve Him and live the same sort of life that the people around us live. We are not from here anymore – we are travelling through this world representing SomeOne Else, with the Holy Spirit’s help. Our home is elsewhere. Now we have eternal eyes, not just eyes fixed upon the immediate. The thing is, to stay in those places we find challenging and difficult –  we must fix our eyes on Him, not our circumstances.

Walking surrendered to Christ’s extravagant love means no matter what goes on around us, or what happens to us, we must never ever forget we are dearly, over-abundantly, loved. As far as this life is concerned, realistically speaking, it is hard to feel loved, when people are being mean, or you are in pain, or your circumstances have gone awry. But the Cross changed everything. Christ’s freely-given Grace is our ever-present help in times of need. The difficulty is this, we must learn how to fight our enemy for our God-given rights, as well as yielding to the Holy Spirit’s leading. 

There is no room for striving in yielding. We cannot afford to berate ourselves for our dumb remarks and our accidental, or even intentional, lack of response to His Will. Jesus Christ understands humanity – and the Holy Spirit is now with us to continually remind us that we can be our renewed self – with His help. However, we cannot give Grace away if we do not take Grace in!There are times that the way to fight for victory over our circumstances and feelings is to refuse to entertain the thoughts that we are somehow exempt from that GRACE. 

When the day to day earthly realities remain difficult… and God’s goodness comes into question – our resting position is to hold fast to the fact that He is good. Even if we’ve prayed and prayed to no avail, and so have other people, we must learn to stand firm. At the same time we aren’t denying the reality of pain and heartache, rather we face them with the quiet confidence that the Lord has a way through our current circumstances.

I have had many increased physical limitations after those falls I had, now I get very tired. Some nights I barely manage 4-6 hours of very broken sleep. Let’s be clear, I’m still praying, hubby is still praying for me even at 2.00am when I can’t sleep for the pain in my arm. PAIN has a plus, it keeps you honest! Other faithful people are regularly praying for us, including both our families. Yet we are still stuck going round and round. WHY? I dunno but our God is doing something I can’t see …YET! 

I just know that in order to cultivate eternal eyes, I need to deliberately keep my eyes on Him. I know that God is not the Author or the sustainer of my discomfort, but, nevertheless, it is still daunting and exhausting. At these times I have to watch over my feelings and thoughts and focus on the God I know – Who is always good! I can drive myself batty trying to figure out why this has happened or what can I do to escape or … I can yield and wait. 

I have found great comfort in the Psalms because good old King David doesn’t seem to always be cheerful when things go bad for him either. However I cannot recommend the ‘smash them, get them, squish them, kill them all dead … mindset’  he had either. 🤪

Now let’s look at what smells good to God – a life laid down for Jesus’ sake, no matter what our external circumstances look like, and yes, we do that without lying! We need to remember that the Lord God called some things a pleasing aroma. Things like dead burning flesh from cattle, sheep, birds  (Genesis 8:20,21;  Exodus 29 :18;  Leviticus 1:9) —  my conclusion is this —HE DOESN’T LIKE WHAT I LIKE!  My death to self may hurt me, but HE is pleased by it.

Ephesians 5:2 says: ‘Jesus’ death was a pleasing aroma.’ That’s hard to comprehend, but true. If we tell Him “I want to know You more”  then we must remember the journey Christ took – ‘He learned obedience through suffering.’  Hopefully, right now, that is what I am learning too! 👋🏻