Building on the Right Foundation

Wow, it has been while since I last posted on here.   It just shows the capacity I have for having great intentions of doing something and then never following up on it.   However, the last few months I have been desiring to be an encouragement to others, so much so that my mind is overwhelmed with thoughts and decided today, that I would begin to write again. 
 First though I have to lay the groundwork of an amazing transformation that God has been and is doing in my heart.   This is the first time I have actually sat down and thought through this amazing journey I have been on with the Lord, and I wanted you to come along with me.  In it I hope you will be encouraged, be challenged, and seek God in your walk with Him.

The last five years have been foundation shaking.  Everything that I thought I knew and had been taught about God came crashing down around me, and it sent me reeling.   While I am not saying everything I was taught was wrong, but much of it was taught in ignorance of Scripture.

I have been in church for a long time, knew all the right words to use, knew how to conduct myself, and thought for the most part I was a good person.  I knew that I was covered by God's grace and that He loved me, oh so much and it didn't matter what I did--I could be secure in God's grace even when I was being willfully disobedient to his Word or what I thought I knew of His Word.  It didn't matter, His grace covered it all.  I was so conflicted though, as though there was a disconnect.   I began asking God to reveal to me what the disconnect was and He answered that prayer and used one of the most horrific events to bring to light, the issue of my own heart.

In Feb 2015, I saw the photos of 21 Egyptian Christians, kneeling on a beach, being demanded by ISIS fighters to denounce Christ and pledge their allegiance to Islam.  They refused and were beheaded for their profession of Christ.   I was horrified that this was happening for the world to see.  I knew Christians were being slaughtered for their faith in Christ, but to see it in real time happening, it left me horrified and so saddened.   I couldn't get those 21 men out of my mind.  I was incredulous to see such commitment and such courage.   As you can imagine, the disconnect I was feeling was heightened to a new level.  I began asking myself 2 questions.  The first question that I asked was what made those 21 men so committed to Christ that they would not denounce Him even if they died, and if I was in that same position would I be as courageous?  Those questions haunted me for weeks.  I prayed and I sought counsel from other Christians in my life,  but nothing brought me peace.
  A few weeks later, after many tears and much angst,  I had to admit to myself that I don't think I would have been as committed.  This then brought me to a crisis of faith like I have never experienced before.    I loved Jesus, and knew He died for me, so why wasn't I committed to Him as I should have been?

In the following months this realization was ever present in the back of my mind and actually caused me to work even harder at being a good Christian.  The problem was I never really did feel like I was good enough and I was on an emotional roller coaster of believing I was saved when in my estimation I was doing the right things and not so convinced when I was not.  Oh the angst that was going on my heart!   I was on the verge of desperation and was ready to walk away from faith altogether.

But God.  Those two words are the lifeline I hang onto these days.   God had never left me, and He knew exactly what He was doing and where He was leading me.   During this time 2 things happened, that I know was orchestrated by God.   Cary and I actually were walking through some financial issues at the time.  A friend of ours was walking his own dark road and it was decided that Cary and I would move in with him, not only to help him financially, but that it would be financial help to us also.

I smile now when I think back to this time.  I know it was a dark time for he and his wife at the time, but God was going to use him for good even in the midst of his own trouble. 
This friend was an Christian apologist.  He was concerned with scripture and doctrine and making sure that the Bible was taught correctly.   He was a Reformer at heart.  I  had been in charismatic churches my entire Christian walk, and when I thought about the reformers I thought they were very pharisaical and that their advocacy for doctrine brought disunity and division to the church.  That thought was never explicitly taught in the churches I was in,  but as I look back it was there in all of its subtle forms.

 During this time, he introduced me to the Five Solas--Scripture Alone, Christ Alone, Faith Alone, Grace Alone, and For the Glory of God Alone.  Learning what these 5 solas were and not only what they mean but what they mean for Christians everywhere has been life-changing!  I will get to these in another post, to due them the justice they deserve.  Suffice to say, God was still shaking my foundation and the next event would be the thing that would totally destroy the lies that I had built my faith on, send me into a crisis of faith,  but also begin change my heart.

One day Kristina and I were watching funny You Tube videos.   We had been watching for a couple of hours laughing and just enjoying our time together.   At this point I have to interject, that God in His mercy and wisdom, had also been working in Kristina's heart and she was on her own journey to find Truth.   As we were watching a video, another video popped up on our feed.  It was titled "Strange Fire Conference Q & A."  I noticed that it was being hosted by John MacArthur.   Since I was 18, I had been listening to John MacArthur on the radio.  I liked listening to him, but I did think that he was a bit dogmatic about things.  So I always listened and took the things I agreed with him, and just threw out those things that I didn't agree with.   Kristina clicked on the video and we began to watch it.   It was a video talking about why and what was being taught incorrectly in the charismatic churches.  Both Krissy and I looked at each other, surprised and instantly defensive, but continued watching it.  As we listened to each member on the panel, we were watching the face of this one pastor. They had been talking about how the Holy Spirit was being misused and and how what they were seeing in various churches was not Biblical.  As we both sat their, Kristina pointed out the grief on the face of one of the pastors-Tom Pennington.  He was clearly distressed about the state of the church and it caught both of us off guard.   Later that night, Kristina began to research this pastor, and came across his church's website.  On that website, she found messages he had done, and she began listening to them.  She told me,  "Mom, you have to listen to this pastor!"  She sent me a link to his series about the Hallmarks of a Biblical Church.  This was also timely as we had been church hunting, because at this point we realized that I wanted to be in a church that preached Jesus and Jesus alone. 

From that day, we have never looked back.  (Kristina has her own story to tell and I hoping that one day she will share from her heart.)  I left the charismatic church and have found a home in a reformed church that preaches the full counsel of Scripture.   Since, God has been the restoring and rebuilding t my foundation of faith.  I have grown exponentially in my faith in the past two years.  I attribute that change to truly understanding the full counsel of scripture,  truly understanding the depravity of my own soul, truly understanding the Holiness of God, truly understanding the Sovereignty of God, and truly understanding the cost and magnitude of Jesus' sacrifice on my behalf.  How precious is the cross!

Understanding all of that, has made me love Jesus so much more than I have ever loved him.  I can honestly say that now I understand the courage of those 21 Christian martyrs.  It wasn't courage at all that kept them from denouncing Jesus, it was their love for Him.   I understand that love now.  I understand that if the time comes for me to stand for Christ or die, I willingly choose Christ.    Jesus said those who were willing to lose their lives for His sake (and He is not just talking about physical loss of life but be willing to submit totally to Him in life also) that we would find our life.  What a glorious truth!   

Testimonies are meant to point to Christ and to give all glory to God.  I was once lost, but now I am found!  I am so thankful to God for Jesus and for the love and care He has shown me in this walk I have been on for the past 35 years.  His patience and His goodness is overwhelming at times.  For all my brothers and sisters in Christ I pray that the truth of Ephesians 1:14-21 will become tangible and real in each of your lives:  

For this reason, ever since I heard about your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love for all God’s people, ¹⁶ I have not stopped giving thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers. ¹⁷ I keep asking that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father, may give you the Spirit of wisdom and revelation, so that you may know him better. ¹⁸ I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in his holy people, ¹⁹ and his incomparably great power for us who believe. That power is the same as the mighty strength ²⁰ he exerted when he raised Christ from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly realms, ²¹ far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every name that is invoked, not only in the present age but also in the one to come..
In Jesus Precious' Name, Amen.

Trusting God's Goodness

 I had another of one those mornings that while in my devotions, God spoke so directly to my heart.  I have to say that over the past couple of weeks, I have been overwhelmed and anxious.  My heart can barely take in the times that we are living in.  Times when evil is called good, and good is called evil.
It has been such a weighty thing on my heart, that I am afraid to admit that I lost confidence that God was still in control and sitting on His throne.  I know, I know.  As a child of the most High God, I should never lose confidence in my Father, but I had, as the only the thing I can see is evil seemingly winning.

As I was reading in Scripture this morning, I was in 1 Samuel 3.   This chapter tells the story of the call of Samuel.  At this point in scripture, Samuel is but a child and really doesn't have an understanding of God.   God calls him, and when Samuel finally realizes who is calling him, he is given a message.  Not a message of good news, but a message of judgement.  The recipient?  Eli, the High Priest, who was Samuel's teacher and mentor!   Previously God had pronounced judgement upon Eli's sons and his house for the contempt that Eli's sons showed toward God, and Eli's refusal to deal with his sons for their sin.   (1 Samuel 2:27-36).

God gives the message and to Samuel, and with a very heavy heart Samuel relays the message to Eli, confirming God's judgement on his house.   His response is what caught my attention.  In 1 Samuel 3:18 it is written:  Then Eli said, "He is the Lord; let him do what is good in his eyes."   Wait, what?!!   At first I wondered how Eli could be so accepting of the decree of the Lord.   He was willingly accepting his fate?  No charges against God?  No pleading for mercy?  What?!!

Then the AHA moment came.  Eli was acknowledging God as Sovereign.  He was acknowledging that God was good, and that whatever God thought was best, then so be it.  In this moment, I realized  Eli spoke those words with a great attitude of humility.  He knew he had sinned.  He knew that his sin in light of God's holiness was punishable and that the punishment that had been pronounced on his family line was just.  He also knew and believed in God's goodness.  His goodness would always triumph over evil and because Eli knew God, he would surrender it to God and trust in that goodness.

My heart has been overwhelmed by this verse.  God is Sovereign.  Period.   He is the Lord and His goodness will not allow evil to triumph.  So all the anxiety and fear that I have harbored in my heart over the past couple of weeks, departed this morning.   God is in control.  I can trust that He is going to do whatever is good in his sight.  For His namesake.

  These words of Eli are really words of total surrender to God in everything in our life.   If you are struggling, take heart and be encouraged!  God sees all, knows all, and He is in absolute control of your life.  Instead of murmuring and complaining, or trying to manipulate and scheme to get what you think you need, just remind yourself of these words that were spoken by Eli:  "He is the Lord; let him do what is good in his eyes."  If you choose to believe this no matter the circumstances, peace that passes all understanding will enter your heart and give you the ability to continue running the race!   Lots of love to you all!

The Struggle of Being Still

A new year has dawned.  With everything new that comes, it is always in our best interest to pause and look back on the old.  But only for an instant, for if you linger in the past for very long, you begin to live there and then before you know it, another year has passed and there has been no great strides made for change or betterment.   So for a moment I pause to look at the past 12 months.

 In 2014 I heard in my heart that the Lord was asking me to quit my job and just be still.  But I did not.  I chose to still work and in the process my health began to fail, so much so that I was in constant pain.  For two years I struggled to maintain a balance in my life, but failing miserably.
At the beginning of 2016, I kept hearing from the Lord  "Be still and know that I am God."  Everywhere I looked that scripture showed up.  So much so I begin to think that the Lord was really serious in this directive for me.   At about the time I began to sense in my spirit that I was at a crossroads.  And it was an urgency to choose to trust in the Lord with all of my heart and not to try to understand or have a back up plan,  (as all control freaks, like me have).

The crossroads of complete and utter trust in the Lord or trust in myself and my abilities.  When I looked at the choice before me-- one scared me to death and the other choice while I was familiar with, had brought to me nothing but frustration, anger, depression, and failure.  The real struggle here was actually surrendering to God and His will or try to understand my life from my perspective and my emotion.    So I chose trust.  I quit my job even though it made no sense at all, and set about being still like God had asked me to be.   Yeah.  Right.  Being still means a whole lot more than just reading your Bible and praying.   Over the past year I have believed that I was being still just like I was being asked to do.  This is what being still looked like for me: worry about bills. Having enough money to buy what we need. Anxiety about the future and how we were going to live. Worry about being homeless.  Worry that I will not be able to go to Japan to see DJ when I need to go.  Worrying that I have not done enough in the service of my Lord Jesus, and that this being still gig was making me lazy.  These are just a few of the worries.   Then I realized even though physically I was not doing anything, mentally and emotionally I was not being obedient to God's directive to me.  At this point I cried out to God for the answer of how to be still and He led me to passage that has always helped me when I didn't understand what was going on in my life.  This passage has been the bedrock of my faith:  Proverbs 3:5,6:  TRUST in the Lord with ALL of your heart and lean not unto YOUR own understanding. In all of YOUR ways, ACKNOWLEDGE Him and He shall direct your paths.

This was an aha moment for me.  I realized I was being obedient to what I believed the Lord had called me to do and if I was in obedience than God will take care of all I need.  There was a battle for my soul for me to TRUST and Surrender to Him everything I am and have and try not to have it all figured out.    The Battle.  Some days I win, and I have failed on other days (by getting a job or 2, knowing full well I was not suppose to and then having to quit them)  but I guess the fact that I sit here still unemployed and waiting gives proof  to myself , that trusting what the Lord has for me is way better than anything I can figure out for myself.

As I write this, God has been faithful to me.  I am not homeless, I have not gone without a meal, and I am trusting that He is going to provide a way for me to go and see DJ in July to see him graduate college and to meet my new grandchild.

I am not writing this to give kudos to myself, for I surely know my failure in this battle of being still and trusting but to encourage anyone who has been directed by the Lord to do something or give up something, that while it is a very scary prospect, just know that the Lord is faithful and He rewards those who are obedient to what He has called them to do.  Is it going to be easy?  No way, but dying to self is always painful and fearful but the rewards are  more than you can imagine.

Have you ever read something in the Bible and you run across a verse and it captures your mind and heart?  You begin to meditate on it, and wonder why the verse is so intriguing to you and then you realize that the Holy Spirit wants to reveal a deeper truth.

I had been reading about the church in Acts and was struck by the power that was demonstrated throughout that book.  Knowing the theological thoughts that the power that was exhibited,was just for that day of the first century church, but I asked God a question:  "Lord if you are the same yesterday, today, and tomorrow then what we see in Acts should be happening in today's church, and why isn't it?

 As I asked this question my mind went back to the visit I had made to St Paul's Cathedral in London,  It was a beautiful church and was a great testimony to God or was suppose to be, but it was dead, the Spirit of God was not there and it made my heart sad,  People were coming in for mass but why?  To perform meaningless rituals and that day I saw what Jesus was talking about when He told the Pharisees that they were like white washed tombs, looking all beautiful and supposedly set apart for God's glory, but sadly God was forgotten and set aside.
 Then my mind went immediately to when Cary and I were living in San Diego.  We lived in a small community that was impoverished not only physically but spiritually.  In one part of the city there was an intersection and at each corner set 3 churches and  fourth church was down the street from this intersection,  It struck me that a place that had four churches in such close proximity, there should have been some change going on in that area, but sadly there was not.  I was sad and overwhelmed with grief.  I know I should have been different and spoke up but at that time I was just exactly like the people who attended those church.  I did not have an understanding of the power of the Holy Spirit in my life.

The verse Romans 8:11 captured my attention one day. This verse I have read many times but on this day last month the Holy Spirit wanted to show me something deeper.  The verse says that "if the power of the Spirit of him who raised Jesus is living in you...I stopped and thought "Wow, is that really saying what it is saying?"  It can't be!

 I love how God works....LOL  When I turned on the radio later that day,  I heard the song by Jeremy Camp  called the "Same Power".  In that song the chorus goes:

the same power that rose from Jesus from the grave
the same that commands the dead to wake
Lives in us, Lives is us!

WOW!  I thought I had heard every Jeremy Camp song as I love his music but had not heard this song before.  And from that moment I began to think about the power of the Holy Spirit in my life and in the Church.

 As you well know God always makes us take a look at our own hearts and our own sin before He allows us to look at others.  It was during this time of questioning about where that power was in my life and the life of the church, that I had to come face to face with the disobedience that was operating in my own life and rightly come to a correct understanding of who God really is!

During this time, I came across another verse that was just confirmation to what God was showing me in his Word and this verse has not only been done in my own personal devotion time but it showed up in the the Bible study material that we are doing in our women's Bible study about the Armor of God, which I find interesting.
In Ephesians 1:17-20 Paul is talking to the church at Ephesus and in this portion of scripture, it is a prayer he is praying for the church:  I keep asking that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father may give you the Spirit of wisdom and revelation so that you may know him better.  I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in his holy people and his (Now watch this!) incomparably great power for us who believe.  Did you catch that?!!  Paul is praying that we would know God's incomparable power!

For those who do not believe that the power of Acts is possible today here is the ending of that prayer:

 That power is the same power as the mighty strength he exerted when he raised Christ from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly realms far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every name that is invoked not only in this age but also in the one to come!! (Ephesians 1:19-21)

After reading this prayer and asking that the Lord would honor this prayer in my life, I prayed, " Lord we both know that your power is not fully operating in my life.  You will have to do what you need to do in my life. And as a human who always needs to do my part I asked my Lord, " Jesus what do I need to do?"

This is the question I woke up this morning on my heart.  As I was thinking about strengths and weaknesses that each of us have, the Lord led me to this verse 2 Corinthians 12:9:  My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.  WOW WOW WOW!  Did you catch that?  The power that the church and each of us need in our lives is found in our weaknesses!

Which leads me to bring light to a deception that the enemy of our souls wants us to believe. When we lead from our strengths why would we need God?   The strengths we have for ministry and for living our lives have been developed out of our weaknesses.  A strength can not be developed apart from a weakness.  It only becomes a strength when we allow the power of the Holy Spirit to use that weakness for his glory.  But when we forget and begin to rely solely on those strengths to guide us and help us live our lives and conduct ministry we leave out the power of God, because His power is made perfect in weakness and hence one of the many reasons why we are not seeing the same power that we see in the pages of Act come alive in the church today.  We need to take a step back and evaluate our lives.  Are we trying to lead from our strengths only?  We say we want to be real, but then we refuse to humble ourselves before God and admit we can't do anything apart from Christ and go with our own agenda based on the strengths that we have that were made strengths only by the power of the Holy Spirit in the first place.   Allow the Holy Spirit our lives and allow Him to show us where we are trying to lead in our own strengths, not in our weakness in conjunction with the Holy Spirit.

Lamenting of the heart

I want to preface this blog entry with this.  Everything that I am blogging about is not meant to point fingers at anyone, nor is it meant to be condemning.  Everything that I have written about in this post, are things I have been dealing with in my life.  I don't feel even remotely qualified to write on this issue, but it has been on my heart for weeks and believe I can share it with all of you.  I just want to experience deeper intimacy in my relationship with the Lord and I know that is the cry of many of your hearts.  God is asking us to allow Him to do a cleansing of His temple (our hearts).  This blog came from my reading of Jeremiah 7:1-11.  I hope you will go read it, and allow the Holy Spirit to speak to you.

Lately my heart has been lamenting.  It has not only been weeping at issues in my life, but in the lives of so many other Christians, and generally the world that we are living in today.  I am so overwhelmed by the evil that I see going on and it not only makes me weep, but I get so angry to see such blatant injustice.  I have watched the news and listened to people talk, and I am amazed at the deception that seems to have blanketed our land.   There are so much rhetoric going on, and it is easy for a heart to believe that humankind is lost.  That there is no good in this world any longer. It seems just absolutely hopeless.  Yet God reminded me this morning in His word in Jeremiah 7 that we are not to trust in deceptive words!  I was gently reminded that the war has already been won!  Jesus Christ is alive and sitting at God’s right hand!  He is the VICTOR in this battle with evil! 

At this point I have to make a confession.  I had begun to dislike the “church”.  Not the actual physical building that I go to on a weekly basis, but the spiritual “church” we all belong to when we accept Christ as Savior and Lord.  God began months ago, convicting me of my hypocrisy and the idols I had in my life.  As God began to deal with me in those areas of which I have mourned and repented  (and continuing to do so on a daily basis),  He began opening my spiritual eyes to the things around me.  The more I read scripture, the more I see clearly the deception of idol worship and what I see makes my heart weep.  

Then I was in scripture today and in Jeremiah 7, God is speaking.  He is speaking to His people Judah. Yes, I have heard the argument that the Old Testament is not for the church and that it was written solely for Jewish people that what God said them, we should not apply to ourselves, but God is the same yesterday, today, and forever.  He NEVER changes and if He is calling out the Jewish people on their disobedience and their sin, why wouldn’t we take notice as His church and listen to Him.  

God’s heart has, is, and always been for His people.  When you really dig into scripture you can hear his Heart.  He loves humanity so much that He was willing to meet us in our humanity in the person of Jesus.  So to all those who may say that what God says in the Old Testament cannot apply to us, His Church and His Bride are listening to deceptive words. 

In this passage God is actually addressing those who came to the Temple to worship God.  When I read this passage, I actually realized that those things that I have been lamenting are the same things that causes God heart to lament.  You see in this portion of scripture God is calling His people, those who call themselves worshipers.   As Christians we are called to be worshipers.  But in the day of Jeremiah, the worshipers of God were not worshiping Him.  Their hearts were hard, cold, filled with sin, and idol worship.   Are we so different today as then?

It says in Jeremiah 7:2  “Hear the word of the LORD”. I have to stop here for a moment and make comment here.   LORD spelled in all capitals, is the word Yahweh in the Hebrew.  Yahweh was the ultimate name of God and the Jewish people didn’t even dare to speak this name.  In all of His Holiness they knew they were undone in His presence because of their sin and didn’t address Him as such.  I thank God every day for Jesus who makes it possible for me to stand in the presence of Yahweh! 

Here is the LORD speaking to his worshipers, his people.   He continues, “Reform your ways and your actions and I will let you live in this place. Do not trust in deceptive words and say “This is the temple of the LORD, the temple of the LORD, the temple of the LORD.  If you REALLY change your ways and your actions and deal with each other justly, if you do not oppress the foreigner, the fatherless, or the widow and do not shed innocent blood an if you do not follow other gods to your own harm then I will let you live in this place,in the land I gave your ancestors for ever and ever …BUT look you are  in deceptive words that are worthless!   

Times may have changed, but the sin has not.  There are so many deceptive words that people are believing.  God is challenging his people to look at the things that we are believing and being told and match them up with His Word.   We are being told that God is a forgiving God and that as long as we confess our sin to Him we are forgiven.   This is truth but the deception that comes into play here, is that we can do whatever we want, and after we are done with the sin, I can go to God and tell Him I am sorry and I am forgiven.  It is a presumption upon His mercy and His grace to know full well what we are doing is sinful, choose to do it willfully, and then go back to God and ask for forgiveness!   How many times I have been guilty of this! 

Other deceptive words tell us that going to church, participating in all the glitz and programming that is intended make us to feel good, makes us feel safe, all the while we have blatant sin in our lives.  As you read through the Old Testament and the New Testament you see clearly that God is not interested in what we do for Him or our religious traditions, He is interested in our hearts and where in our esteem we uphold Him.    

The one thing that I have learned about God in reading His word is that He can NOT tolerate idol worship.   And as I look at the Church today, it abounds!  In my own life, it abounds if I am not careful to look after my relationship with the Lord and make a conscious and intentional effort to keep Him first place.  I get off track often, there is so much the world offers, how can I not?  But I have found over the last few months that NOTHING ABSOLUTELY NOTHING CAN COMPARE TO JESUS!

  

In His first Commandment, God addressed that HE was YAHWEH and we as His people are not to have any other gods before Him. But I tell myself I surely can't have idols in my life.  I love Jesus and He is sufficient.  Is He really?  When was the last time you reached for your Bible, rather than your cell phone?  When was the last time you spent time in prayer instead of on social media?  Have you give God the first place in your life today?   Idol worship is anything that takes first place in your life.  An idol steal time away from God, it takes up much of your resources whether it be your talent or money.  Idols demand your time and attention and oftentimes turns the worshiper of God into the image of the idol being worshiped. 

Idol worship comes in all forms:  entertainment, ministry, money, sports, relationships, worry, and fear and many other things.  Idol worship is anything that takes 1^st place in your heart and steals your time and attention in developing a relationship with our Lord.   Idol worship is a deception that can hide for a long time in our hearts.  We listen to the words in our ears that say that what we are doing is harmless and surely God doesn't mind, He is in fact the one that gave me all these blessings and I should enjoy them but God is saying, “but look you are trusting in deceptive words that are worthless!” (Jeremiah 7:8)

Now the next passage is where it gets personal for you and I as He asks a question of His worshipers, “Will you steal and murder, commit adultery and perjury, burn incense to Baal and follow other gods you have not known and then come and stand before me in this house which bears my Name and say, “We are safe”-to do all these detestable things?  Has this house which bears my name become a den of robbers to you?  

He is saying to his people (you and I) who have been called by His Name, and is asking us essentially:  You come into my Presence every week to worship but your hearts are not for me.  You come into my Church and say you are there to worship me, but while you are worshiping your mind is on whatever your hearts are worshiping-your idols.  You do not come into my house to worship in Spirit and Truth but it is all about the agenda and making yourself feel good about your sin and your idols.  You bring the things of the world your Baals and gods and are really worshiping them even while in the presence of my Holy Spirit!  Do you really think that if you do this, you are safe?

  He is calling us, His Church, to repentance just as He did in Jeremiah’s time.  He is crying for His children to return to Him with all of our hearts!  There is no more time to listen to the deceptive words that we are better than the world, looking at judgment upon others, and that somehow we have arrived. We are called to confess our sins and God is faithful and just to forgive us, because of the cross and the penalty that Christ paid on our behalf, and only because of that we can come before Yahweh and stand in His Holy Presence.  

Wake up Church, God wants to cleanse His temple (you and I) and wants us, as His church, to be lifted up to give hope to the world.  We can’t do that if we are dirty and stained by the world.  We need to really put God back in first place in our lives and really need to deal with the idols in our lives.  It is not going to be easy but God’s heart is calling us to do exactly that!  How can we refuse as His children to do that after all that He has done for us?  We actually do owe Him our lives, ALL of our lives.  When we have set ourselves apart for Him and choose Him over our idols and allow the Holy Spirit to purify our lives, we will see God’s glory in our lives, in our homes, in our communities and in our land.  We will see revival like we have never seen before, but revival can only begin if the God’s people’s hearts are right before Him.  

It is interesting that the verse that has been brought to the attention during these times that we are living in and most especially during this very important election year has been 2 Chronicles 7:14 in which God is calling out: if my people who are call  ed by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and I will forgive their sin and will heal their land. 

 Interestingly enough in this verse God is addressing his people, and in today's terms He is addressing His Church.  He is telling those of us who confess Christ as Savior and Lord that we need to pray, seek his face, and turn from our wicked ways.  We need to address the sin that is in each of our lives, repent of that sin and turn from it.  We can do all of that because of the Cross.  We can not have one foot in God's kingdom and a foot in the world.  When we turn from our sin, He promises to forgive us, and in the process He will heal our land, which will bring revival!  This revival must begin with the hearts of God's people and putting back where He belongs, first place.  

In Revelation 2 when Jesus is addressing the seven churches, He is giving commendations to each of the churches but to some of them He is bringing rebuke.  To the Church of Ephesus He commends their hard work and perseverance but the rebuke He brings to them is that they have forsaken their first love and to the churches of Pergamum and Thyatira He brings rebuke for allowing compromise and tolerating immorality.  And to the church at Laodicea, He brings the strongest rebuke when He tells the that church that they are either hot nor cold but lukewarm and He will spit them out of His mouth!  

Does this sound like a God who isn't serious about sin of His people?  He definitely is serious and in my heart I hear his call to repentance and His call to rid my life of idols and placing Him back in first place in my life.  I know that as a sinner that I can not do that without the power of the Holy Spirit.  So I take one day at a time.  His grace is sufficient for me in that day, and when I sin, I am immediately convicted and the Holy Spirit prompts me to go to the Lord and ask for forgiveness.  I battle the deceptive words of the enemy on a daily basis.  My heart longs for true intimacy with my Lord and that only comes from repentance and turning from my sin.  It comes from relying on Jesus and Jesus alone.  My heart's greatest desire is to see true revival in United States, to see God's power manifested and see people's lives radically changed.  Yet that revival comes at a great expense to you and me as God's people--we need to lay down our lives totally and completely before our Lord.  In true repentance, turn from our sins and walk each day in obedience to the Lord Jesus Christ.  This can only be done by sacrificing our idols for the True Living God, trusting in Him and obeying Him completely and without excuse.  

Wilderness Consecration!

If any thing a Christian learns in their faith walk, that their souls will end up in the wilderness eventually. It is the very place where our faith is tested to its limits and where our view of God is reworked and redefined.  It is a painful and a very lonely place.  You cry out for God to speak and move on your behalf, but oftentimes it is also the time when God is most silent.  I have found myself there over the past few months.  I am learning to be still and know He is God, even when He has been silent.  It has been here in the desert that I have relied on God's word and taken it to heart.  To believe it beyond my circumstances and my feelings.  I cling to it like a drowning man clings to a life preserver in the middle of rough seas.

In today's reading in 2 Chronicles 30 I read how King Hezekiah called for the people to consecrate themselves and submit to the Lord.  My question to the Lord then what does consecration look like for us today?  God had an answer and boy what an AHA moment it was!  In James 4:7-10 James writes:  "Submit yourselves then to God. Resist the devil and He will flee from you. Come near to God and He will come near to you.  Wash your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double minded.  Grieve, mourn, wail. Change your laughter to mourning; your joy to gloom. Humble yourselves before the Lord and He will lift you up."

Do you know where this is done?  In the Wilderness Place!!!!!   All this time I have been fighting railing against being in the wilderness, and all the time it has been a place of consecration to the Lord I have been going through!  This was God's leading and doing and I am so grateful!  Then today the Lord reminded me of the promise He gave me at the beginning of the year:   Forget the former things, do not dwell on the past. See I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it?  I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland...Because I provide water in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland to give drink to my people, my chosen, the people I formed for myself that they may proclaim my praise.  Isaiah 43: 18-21.     WOW!!  WOW!!   I can rely on God to give me the water I thirst for when all seems to have dried up in this wandering.

  So this is encouragement to those of you that are wandering in the desert.  God is consecrating you, setting you apart for His purposes.  Do not rail against where you are.  Be still and know He is God.  He is making a way where there seems to be no way.  He is good and his promise to never leave us nor forsake us is true, and even in the desert and the dark night of the soul He holds you with His right hand and is walking through it with you!  Take heart and allow Him to do what He needs to do in you!  It is so worth it.   Lots of love to you my fellow desert dwellers!  

Remove the Grave Clothes!!!

It is funny the things your mind turns to the instant your eyes open and the fogginess of sleep begins to clear from your mind.  Many times my mind goes to the worries of the day, or the things that I feel I must complete for the day.  Whatever your first thoughts of the day are, pretty much sets the tone for your day.  But then there are those mornings when you awake and scripture fills your mind, and how sweet it is to know that as David quoted in the psalms, “On my bed I remember you; I think of you through the watches of the night.”  (Psalm 63:6)  that even as I slept I couldn’t help to think of God and his promises throughout the night as I slept.  I know this to be true especially when I wake up and when there is a verse or a portion of scripture on my heart, I take notice.  I know that it is the Holy Spirit trying to convey a truth to me.   I had such an experience this morning as I woke up.  The portion of scripture I woke up was when Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead.  Jesus told Martha in John 11:25 that he is the resurrection and the life, then proceeded to raise her brother from the dead!  Can you imagine the scene?  What reverence and awe must have hushed the mourning party that was going on!  Then shouts of joy of looking at a life resurrected when all hope had appeared gone.  WOW!  I just want to make a statement at this point of the story.  No matter how dead things seem to look whether it is your marriage, your financial situation, your relationships, our culture, our country, and even your faith—we need to remember that Jesus is the Resurrection and Life.  He can call back to life those things that we have lost hope.  We have to trust Him and turn those things over to Him.  We need to stand on the truth of His word and not waver even when everything around us has seemingly died.  God is a good God.  He is good when things are alive and thriving and He is good when things seem to have died.  I just want to give those out there that are struggling the hope that Jesus is everything we need.  He can call back to life those things that are dead, and He can and will make good come from those things if we just allow him.  Which brings me to the second part of this post.   The 2^nd verse that came to mind immediately was in this same portion of scripture.   After Jesus had raised Lazarus from the dead and Lazarus came forth from the grave in John 11:43, Jesus says to the relatives and friends standing around witnessing this awesome event:  Take off his grave clothes, and let him go!”   This verse leaped out at me and this is why:  many Christians have been given resurrection life, but so many of us struggle with taking off our grave clothes!   Jesus said in John 8:36 that who the Son has set in free, is free indeed and in John 10:10 Jesus said that He came to give us life abundantly. Both of these verses just agree with Jesus words that He is the resurrection and the life.   But those grave clothes keep us from walking in that freedom.  Grave clothes were bound around a body with many different cloths, can you imagine the restrictions it imposed upon on Lazarus as he came from the tomb?  Jesus had brought Lazarus to life but he knew that he would have needed to be freed from those grave clothes.  You notice Jesus didn’t free Lazarus from those grave clothes?  He commanded that Lazarus community to help him.    Grave clothes take on many forms:  bitterness, fear, addictions of many kinds, un-forgiveness, depression, and myriad of other things that keep you from living life with joy, love, faith, and hope.   The key to obtaining that abundant life is allowing others to help us remove our grave clothes.  That means admitting that you are struggling and asking for help.   Allowing others to help you walk through the pain of whatever grave clothes you are trying to shed.  It is ok as a Christian to seek counseling, go to support groups, attend Celebrate Recovery groups or finding someone and just confessing your struggles.  I believe the church has to be much better in helping those who struggle with these and mental illness but it has to become an issue of dialog.  It is something that can’t be swept under the pews and not acknowledge.  I truly believe that Jesus can resurrect any life no matter what society says about that person.  When we receive Jesus we become new creations, the old is passed away and the new replaces it, but even Jesus knew that we needed to help one another in removing the grave clothes from the old dead life.  If you are struggling I implore you to seek help.  We were never meant to do this life on our own, and allow others to help you remove your grave clothes, so that you can walk in the freedom that Jesus promised we could have!  Have a great day everyone, lots of love to you!