Obedience training...

As I was walking my son's dog Bear, I decided to let him walk part of the way w/o being on the leash. I came to this decision b/c in my yard on a couple of different occasions he had proven to me that he could be trusted to come when called even when sorely tempted by other stimuli (namely other animals or people). Also, he is very friendly so I wasn't worried he would attack. I went for my morning walk, and decided to give Bear a chance off the leash. What happened was one really happy dog that had some freedom he had not had on a walk with me before. He was bouncing and jumping and running for joy b/c of the freedom he was partaking in. My son-in-law has a dog too, her name is Lisa and in our home with family she is a mild mannered dog. The difference between the dogs is Lisa cannot be trusted with obeying if distracted, and she is very aggressive with other animals and people she doesn't know. The direct result of this behavior is she doesn't get the freedom Bear has. It is not because I love her less, it is because she doesn't obey and I cannot trust her. So as I was noticing this I was thinking that God has probably felt the same way about me and you! If we don't have the freedom in our relationship with God we desire we might want to look at a couple of things. First, are we obeying Him, and second can we be trusted? Bear got to enjoy freedom just because he was obedient and trustworthy. How many of us in a relationship with the Almighty, can be trusted by God to be obedient? How many of us can be trusted to be kind and loving to His other kids? The sad thing is that most of the time, we are the ones that derail the freedom and blessing God desires to give to us. I want to be able to take Lisa out and have her enjoy the same freedom and happiness Bear did, but she has limited my ability to be able to bless her. How many blessings have we forfeited, how much joy have we missed just because God could not trust us? Obedience at the time can seem very stifling and limiting, and can feel the like it's the furthest thing away from what we consider freedom. When we have to lay our will down to do another's bidding, it can feel like we have no freedom, but that is not the case. Maybe we don't understand what freedom is. Freedom is not getting to do what we want to do when we want to do it. Real freedom is found in boundaries and basic laws that govern a home and society that create order. There is no freedom in chaos. God is a God of order and of freedom and these two work hand in hand. In order for a business to do well someone has to be in charge that tells others what to do, when to do it and how to do it. That brings about freedom to get a job done correctly, and doing the job right creates financial freedom b/c others want to employ your company. Real freedom is found in humble submission. Just look at Jesus, He is King of Kings and yet He humbly submitted Himself to His creation because He knew that the end result was freedom! The Word says Jesus learned obedience through the things He suffered. Well, if we are following Him, we are going to have to go down that same road and learn obedience through things we have to suffer through. This obedience will bring us freedom, exceedingly, abundantly more than we could ever ask or think, just like Bear experienced. We must show ourselves faithful to obey and faithful to be trusted in order to have our lives be the exceedingly abundant life God wants for us. If Bear had not shown me he could obey in my yard, he would not have had the freedom in the town green he was given. An exceedingly abundant life just doesn't happen to us. We have a free will that needs to choose to do what God asks us to do so we can be conformed to His image. We are not supposed to get God to conform to ours, people, yet that is what most of us try to do! So in order to have that abundant life, we have to show God we can be trusted to do things His way, when He wants it done, how He wants it done, no matter how we may feel about it. More later…..v

From the inside out

At church on Sunday a sermon was preached about Jonah, and it got me to thinking about this guy. Here he is, a prophet of God, yet gets mad at God, tells God off, and God let him do it! It's amazing to me how much God put up with b/c this guy is God's creation, yet he had the nerve to talk back to the Almighty and live to tell about it! Just goes to show that God never ever will give up on us. Jonah disobeyed, did what he wanted, and ran away trying to get away from what God told him to do. In Jonah's case God wanted him to preach to the capital of what was then Assyria, and these people did awful things to the Jews, so the Jewish people hated them. This is why Jonah was so mad at God—he thought that God should annihilate these people who were so cruel to God's chosen, but God's mercy prevailed. Thank God His mercies are new for us each and every day. Anyway, Jonah gets on this boat, and God sends a storm b/c He is not going to let Jonah go that easily. It's comforting to note that God ran after Jonah, even in his disobedience, because his love never fails. So Jonah gets thrown into the sea, and God arranges for Jonah to be hidden inside a huge fish, being bounced around its stomach as the fish navigates Jonah towards God's destination. All this time God is breaking Jonah down and he begins to pray in that awful place, crying out to God. Jonah finds God in that dark place, a place filled with stomach acid and other creatures being digested by it. A nasty, dark, stifling place constantly rocking to and fro, up and down, falling forward as the fish dived down, getting covered in slime. There were no benches to sit on, no stable place to rest. Everything was constantly shifting and moving and extremely uncomfortable. He had no idea how long he would be in there. He was broken in this place of misery and darkness and uncertainty. He acknowledges God did this, he doesn't blame the people that threw him overboard, or the fish, he knows God's hand is all over every nasty circumstance he is facing. Jonah says he is in the abyss which is a deep immeasurable space, a bottomless void that seems never ending. Jonah went to the very bottom and felt like he was in prison forever. His hope was gone, he felt crushed by the weight of his hopelessness and helplessness---then revelation comes---he earnestly and seriously remembered the Lord which made him remember who he was too. He repented and declares the truth that God is a savior who saves! He comes to his senses in the midst of the darkness, the cold, the hunger, the loneliness, covered in muck and mire, with nothing to hold on to---in the middle of all this he begins to thank God and surrenders his will to do God's will. Nothing changes for him until he bows the knee in surrender, and when that happens, God releases Jonah from the darkness and deposits him in the very place he ran away from. Jonah goes ahead and obeys even though he completely disagrees with God, and God is okay with that---He says in His word to obey is better than sacrifice. Even though Jonah's prejudices were still intact God is pleased with his obedience, so God uses Jonah in spite of what his attitudes are. This story gives me hope that if God can look past Jonah's obvious issues and still use him, that God will use me in spite of myself. The first step that Jonah took was surrendering to God. The next step was the attitude, and as we obey God (even if we don't want to) it is a fact that the act of obedience will bring about a heart change in us. I remember a teacher I couldn't stand the sight of, and my youth pastor told me to act out what love was upon her. I didn't want to, but he said to me that as I do the acts of love the feelings will eventually follow. So I did what he said, and he was right! God used that teacher to show me my musical abilities. I don't think I would be here today if not for her---and I did end up really loving her. So Jonah's obedience---our obedience---does change us from the inside out…-v

The Solid Rock

I have a friend who owns a pool company and when I called him this week, he said to me he was in the bottom of a pool and couldn't talk. That got me to thinking about what we are standing in or on in our spiritual lives. We may be standing in a pool of thankfulness that gives us buoyancy to float on the circumstances of life, or we may be in a pool of despondency that is like quick sand and sucks us down till we can't breathe. Every attitude can be a pool we sink or swim in depending on what we fill our thought lives with. We can build one of superiority, or humility, repentance or regret, resentment or acceptance. Jesus said our lives are like a house that can either be built on a solid foundation that won't give way during the storms of life or a poor foundation that falls apart when the winds of adversity blow. The deal here is the foundation will either cause the house to be saved or destroyed. Of course our foundation is to be Christ, but if we are standing on The Solid Rock, our attitudes will reflect that by conforming to His. If our attitudes towards each other are not based out of love, then we need to examine what foundation we are standing upon. If we are standing on Christ as our foundation, then the truth is welcome---we will have no problem with people speaking into our lives, we are teachable, reachable and repentant. We will see things from His perspective and throw off the things that bind us to the old man and reach forward to grab the clothing of the new man-----compassion, kindness, humility, forgiveness, to name a few. These things moving freely in our lives show us we are building upon His foundation. When things like anger, bitterness, jealousy, depression, impatience and disobedience move freely in our lives it shows us we are building upon quite a different foundation. The occasional fight with sinful attitudes is to be expected, but a life that does not deal with them quickly will cause them to become a foundation of belief and reaction, and then before we know it, we're stuck in the mire at the bottom of a cesspool. These attitudes get a life of their own, living it out through our thoughts and emotions, pulling us this way and that, until we feel totally out of control. The only answer is the Light of the World who came to destroy the works of the devil. Those works begin with the heart of the believer, submitting to everything that God throws our way with the humility of the clay that allows the Potter to shape and reshape, to cut away or add to, and to finally throw in the kiln where the fire tests all that has been done. God came to destroy the devils works and that must begin through us. Every stronghold of hate we tear down with love, every foothold of fear we overcome with truth, and every area where our will is being done that we replace with His will---this destroys the works of the devil. We are only in control of one thing on this earth and that is ourselves. So as we control our lives and make it obey God, we overcome the world in us, and therefore destroy the works of the devil being made manifest through us. The Light of the World is here to show us the way clearly and clearly can only come when we can see everything---all the obstacles in our way so we can overcome them, all the paths available good and bad so we can choose wisely. Let's not hide from the truth about what in us needs to change---let's become part of an army that will have the courage to destroy the works of the devil in our own lives first, and so be able to say---the rains fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat against the house, yet it did not fall because it had been founded on a Rock…….v

The fabric of our lives

Relationship is what the kingdom of God is all about. God wants our relationship with Him open, free, and honest, and He wants our relationships with each other to be the same. When God created mankind, He had in mind a relationship that was as equal as creation and Creator could get. He made us in His image, so all the emotions, desires for love and acceptance, our need to have things be balanced and rightly done around us---they all come from an image that He stamped on us that mirrored His own. Our emotions and reactions are not as crazy as they may seem b/c when you think about it, they are the same ones God has towards us, minus the ever present sin issue that brings a selfishness into the equation God simply does not have. Relationship is paramount to God and when relationship between brothers is broken, God's heart is broken. That should give us pause on how we feel justified in treating each other. In this society we live in it is okay to think of yourself first---as a matter of fact, it has become the new mantra of the day. To thine own self be true…..the problem with that is real love is not selfish. That does not mean you let people abuse you and walk all over you. It doesn't mean we don't set boundaries and decide who we give our hearts to with great care. It means that those people God has put in our lives need to have us demonstrate our love to them by putting their needs above our own. That sounds imbalanced and a little scary, but the scripture is very clear. This is what God does for us every moment of every day. We may not think that is the case when we lose a job for the 3rd time in a row, or when people let us down or don't keep their word, but in all the difficulties God is looking way ahead towards our future happiness. He is doing what is best for us and putting His need to be appreciated aside as we rail against Him for taking this or that away from us. While God is setting the stage for the very best to happen to us He willingly takes tons of abuse from His own kids! He puts our needs above His need to be loved by us just to make sure that our lives actually turn out the best they can be. God puts up with a lot from us, and He wants us to do the same with each other. He models patience and kindness on a daily basis. Losing a job may not feel much like kindness but believe me, it can be! God knows what our true hearts desires are. We may think we know, but I have been very thankful numerous times for prayers that went unanswered about things I was sure was the fulfillment of my hearts desire. I look back now, and see the wisdom of God in removing that thing from my life, or putting me in a position that I felt nearly destroyed me. What it really did was set the stage for what my heart was truly crying out for, and God knew the deepest cry of my heart and was answering that sound, not the surface stuff I thought I needed. Putting someone's needs first doesn't mean you give them what they think they need. It means you give them what they actually need, and that could mean taking stuff away instead of handing them things. Relationships make up the fabric of our lives---God Himself said it was not good for man to be alone. He created Eve so an entire human race could be born so we wouldn't be alone! God knew what loneliness was and didn't want that for us. Let's take care and guard the relationships God has allowed in our lives with love, honor, and appreciation, and in so doing we will actually be doing this to Him, b/c Jesus said:
"whatever you do to the least of your brothers you do it to Me" --v

Two kinds of Wisdom

Did you know there were two kinds of wisdom? Check out this definition in James 3:13-17 of what it is, and what it is not.
13 Who is there among you who is wise? Then let him by his noble living show forth his good works with humility which is the proper attribute of true wisdom.
14 But if you have bitter jealousy (envy) and contention (selfish ambition) in your hearts, do not pride yourselves on it and thus be in defiance the Truth. 15 This superficial wisdom is not such as comes down from above, but is earthly, unspiritual, and demonic. 16 For wherever there is jealousy (envy) and contention (selfish ambition), there will also be confusion (unrest, disharmony, rebellion) and all sorts of evil practices.
17 But the wisdom from above is first of all pure (undefiled); then it is peace-loving, courteous (considerate, gentle). It is willing to yield to reason, full of compassion and good fruits; it is wholehearted and straightforward, impartial and free from doubts, wavering, and insincerity.
Scripture says that we can either operate in wisdom that is earthly and demonic, or wisdom that is from above proceeding from God. How do we know the difference? By the fruit. Wisdom based on the unspiritual, fleshly responses to knowledge we may have, and experiences we have walked through will have corresponding fruit. The fruit we can expect from this type of wisdom are--- confusion, unrest, rebellion, pride and all sorts of evil practices. When the fruit of choices and paths we have decided to go down involves fruit like any one of these listed, be sure to know that the wisdom used to justify our choice is not from God. If we have unforgiveness, bitterness, or anger and try to make a wise decision, our defiled hearts can only lead us to the wisdom that is earthly. The wisdom from God is first of all pure, or undefiled. A defiled heart cannot make decisions based on Godly wisdom. If our hearts are defiled with the attitudes of the enemy, then we will be led to wisdom that is from the enemy. If we have given ourselves over to anything not of love, we will be resonating on satan's frequency, therefore we will be attracted to the wisdom that emanates from him. If our desire is to be led by the wisdom that is from God, we must have checks and balances around us with the Word of God, and people we make ourselves accountable to. Scripture says in the multitude of godly counsel there is wisdom.
It makes sense that God's wisdom has purity as the first thing on the list, b/c it is the pure in heart that see God! We need to have our eyes wide open and able to see clearly so we can make wise choices. A pure, undefiled heart is especially necessary when making any life decisions. Our destiny can be forever changed by ungodly wisdom. Just look at Saul. His unwise choice cost him his kingdom and his destiny. But Saul’s demise didn't begin with an unwise choice, it began with an impure heart. Keeping our hearts pure is very important to seeing the destiny for our life be fulfilled. Another powerful fruit of godly wisdom is Peace. Scripture says we shall go out with joy and be led forth by peace. Wisdom loves peace, b/c God leads us with it! It is a wise person that follows God's leading. He always leads us in triumph when we pick up His weapons and walk in the peace He guides us with. God's wisdom will also show itself when the choices we make show consideration of each others strengths and weakness, and we treat each other with gentleness and humility. The wise heart is teachable, and feels others pain. Wisdom gives its whole heart to truth---you never have to wonder where you stand with someone operating in God's wisdom, b/c this wisdom calls us to be straight shooters. God's wisdom is impartial, meaning that whoever or whatever is on the side of God and His truth will have wisdom's vote.
I think it is a good idea for us to examine ourselves on a regular basis to see what fruit comes forth from decisions we make. This will tell us what wisdom we are basing our choices on, and then hopefully, if you are like me and want only God's wisdom operating in your life, we can amend our choices to line up with the fruit that is only from above.---V

Wisdom

It’s amazing how eyesight changes over the course of ones life. Just a few years ago I could read everything without any help, and now I need glasses to read anything! In the natural realm, our eyesight gets dimmer, our ability to distinguish small letters fades, and we need more light to rightly observe things. But in the spiritual realm, if we are pressing in, our spiritual eyesight becomes better and better as we go through experiences that give us wisdom. Knowledge is good, but when you add experience to it you find wisdom, and wisdom is like reading glasses for the soul. It helps us see what is already there with clarity. Wisdom allows us to see beyond what is happening in the here and now, and respond to a future outcome. When we were kids, we had limited knowledge, and acted on what we thought was all there was to know. Many of us are still children in how we view the circumstances in our lives. We take the limited knowledge of certain situations we are involved in and run with it. Many of us will not allow ourselves to go through certain experiences especially if they are painful ones that will teach us the lessons of wisdom. We avoid them like the plague and thus end up knowing a lot about stuff but having no life giving application that wisdom brings. Wisdom is a forward looking revelation to the mind about our current situations. It helps us see a future outcome so we can act accordingly. Knowledge is a very right now kind of thing. It can only live in the today’s and yesterdays of our lives because it is limited to what it thinks it knows. It does not have the color spectrum wisdom brings with it. Black and white knowledge cannot understand the depth perception that the colors of experience bring. If we observe those who operate mainly by head knowledge we will find they are the ones the Bible describes as ---people ever learning but never coming to the knowledge of the truth. If we are looking for the truth and not just trying to be right, we will need wisdom. Knowledge alone can lead us astray. What we know (or think we know) can set the course of our lives but if we allow experiences to occur, wisdom comes in and shows us the deeper truth of the matter and will reset our direction if we let it. It was the fruit of the knowledge of good and evil that Adam and Eve ate. Eve believed the devils lie because she wanted knowledge. Instead of reminding herself of her experiences with God, and her knowledge of God, she ignored all that, cast wisdom aside----which made her vulnerable-----so she then received the lie as truth. We have to be very careful not to place ourselves in that same vulnerable position where we can exchange the truth for lies based on what we think we know. Humanity was set on a course that caused us to be on an unending quest for more and more knowledge! Satan doesn't care what we know because he can easily manipulate that. What satan is afraid of are Christians armed with wisdom! Wisdom knows what the truth is and that truth sets us free! Proverbs 3:15 "Godly wisdom is more precious than rubies and nothing you can wish for can be compared to her!" ---V

Words of Life

As I was reading in John 6, Jesus accuses the crowd of following Him just because He fed them. Then this crowd says to Him that Moses proved God was with him b/c manna came from heaven---what can you do to prove you are who you say? Jesus explains by going into the whole---I am the Bread of Life thing, and tells the people unless they eat my flesh and drink my blood they can't be my disciple. That was the test to see whose hearts really were after God or just after what God could do. At the end of the chapter it says the crowd couldn't handle what Jesus was saying so they all left Him. Then Jesus turns to the 12 and says—are you gonna leave me too? Peter replies—to whom shall we go? You have the words of life! Smart guy that Peter! Anyway, what struck me in this story is how God created this complicated situation. I am sure if we were to handle it today at a regular church service we would tell people how easy it is to ask Jesus in your heart---just pray a prayer and make it simple to understand and easy to do. This is why we have so many people calling themselves born again Christians that haven't the slightest idea of what that entails. Jesus Himself made it very complicated and even repulsive with the word picture of eating His flesh he presented. But all this was to weed out the true believers from the ones just looking for food……
So the question to ask ourselves is this----what are we looking for? Are we chasing after a relationship with God that can be complicated and uncomfortable to be a part of? Are we willing to hear stuff that sounds repulsive to our sensibilities believing that they are Words of life? These people were told by God Himself stuff that was exactly the opposite of what they wanted to hear. And they made a choice to walk away because what He said was just too hard to bear. God isn't kidding when He says He wants everything we are, everything we hope for, everything we think or do. He wants a relationship with us that will allow Him to say really hard to bear things, and us being able to receive them just by shear faith in knowing He has the words of LIFE. All life begins in darkness---the womb, seeds in the ground, in fact, in order to have life, a seed must go into the dark ground, die a solitary death, then and only then, does life begin. We have got to stop kicking against what God has allowed so our will can line up with His will. We have got to stop mourning over the Saul’s in our lives----let me explain. The prophet Samuel anointed Saul as King, and Samuel loved Saul. At one point, Saul was given a command to wipe out a city, down to the animals, and he didn't do it. God saw it, told Samuel to go tell Saul he was no longer going to be king because of his disobedience. When confronted, Saul insisted he had obeyed God even when proof was given. Only when he realized it was going to cost him his kingdom did he try to rectify the situation, but it was to late. Samuel loved Saul and mourned over the loss for a long while. Finally, God had enough and said to Samuel---how long are you going to mourn over Saul? Get up, wipe off your face, and get going b/c I want you to anoint a man named David as king in Saul's place. We do this a lot people---we mourn over the "Saul's" in our lives! Things and jobs, people and dreams that maybe once were a God thing, but disobedience has changed. God allowed Samuel more than enough time to mourn, and it's okay to mourn---for awhile. But there comes a place in our lives when we need to wash our face, and get up because God has a new future in store for us. A future that is earmarked with obedience and faith, one that is about a relationship with God and not about what or who He will provide for us. God often brings up hard things in an unpalatable way to see what we are really after. If we are after His heart, even if He presents us with difficult new paths to follow, we have to follow, because a heart in a relationship with God must say like Peter---where else could we go?—You have the words of life! V

The Creator's frequency

I've been learning a lot about energy these past few days. I have always known that the law of sowing a reaping (what you sow, or plant, you will reap a harvest of) is a universal law set up at the beginning by the Creator. I know a lot of people, saved or not, understand the principle of "what goes around comes around, or you call to you what you put out into the universe." These are just different ways to describe the law of sowing and reaping spoken of in the Bible. What I really didn't give much thought to was that we are beings made up of energy, in a world made up of energy---rocks, people, plants, animals---we all exude an energy frequency. Since God created the world, and everyone and everything in it, He made us all to resonate on certain frequencies. These frequencies can and do affect each other. In the world of radio's, cell phones and the like, we know certain frequencies are captured by other frequencies and communication takes place. God made His entire creation to resonate on His frequency so communication can take place between God and us, and you and I. When we choose to resonate on a frequency different from His by holding onto bitterness, shame, guilt, unforgiveness, etc. we end up communicating to that particular unholy energy frequency and connecting with it for a response. And a response will come. When we tap into the enemy's frequency, the longer we hang there with anger, blame, depression, fear, etc., the more we begin to resonate at his frequency. Then the communication from our spirit to God's gets really messed up because we are off. We become in sync with what energy we are most exposed to (you become like those you are around). My mom says there is an old Italian saying that goes like this---walk with a man with a limp long enough and soon you will begin limping. That is the way of this world God created---all energy is affected by the energy around it. Scripture puts it this way---bad company will corrupt good morals. If we are tapping into the wrong communication line we will end up out of sync with God's energy—the Holy Spirit! He is the life that is teeming about us, around us, within us, but the catch is to capture His life and communicate and connect with it. When we yield ourselves to the Holy Spirit, we call forth from all the energy around us---that God placed there----we call to us more of the Holy Spirit's life and power. The energy around us must bow down to the Creator's design. We must bow down to the Creator's design. We have a choice, every moment of every day to bow to the Holy Spirits energy and life force, or to tap in to the enemy's frequency and resonate with him. Choose you this day whom you will serve, as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord…… V

Pressure

I've been learning a lot about God's grace lately. I know that the main Greek meaning of this word is 'divine enablement', but I got a taste of that divine support in a new way while up in Minnesota……
When push comes to shove, who we really are comes out under pressure. That is when we see whether we've learned lessons God has been trying to teach us or whether we have just fooled ourselves into thinking we've learned them. Pressure is the test to see what's going on in that heart of ours. Pressure can come in many ways---from people's reactions---to circumstances changing around us. What God is looking for is our reaction so we can see exactly where we are (or are not) spiritually and then can address it. I find it helpful to look at what we don't want to do, what we don't like, and maybe even hate or dread to show us a glimpse of the placement of our heart in the spiritual puzzle of our lives. We are tricky beings, we humans---we have a way of deceiving ourselves into thinking we are something we are not---I know, b/c I have experienced this first hand. What tells us what is going on inside can be easily measured by the things we don't want to do, people we don't want to see, and places we don't want to go. Usually we look at the opposite—where you spend your time and energy shows you where your heart is—scripture backs this up by saying where your heart is there your treasure will be found. This is also a good way to see what is going on inside of us---I'm not negating using that tool, I am just saying lets look at it from another perspective and maybe we might get more insight. The point is to become more like God and release the things that keep that from happening, so we need to use every tool at our disposal. While in MN I had to do things I did not want to do and go where I didn't want to go. As I made myself do this, like I had many times in the past, I found out something about myself—my heart had changed, I mean really changed. I realized this by being in the middle of the dreaded people and places, attitudes and actions of those I would have rather avoided. It was this pressure that showed me my heart had finally changed, and God's love and grace was there in place of all the rampant emotions I had experienced every time prior. It was really cool to see God's grace at work and His love covering everything. It was like an out of body experience. God was living His life thru me in a way I could not imagine. I would recommend to anyone reading this to take stock in the things they dread and ask themselves why—what is it about this place or person or thing that bothers me so much. Maybe it is us that God is trying to change and not what or who we dread. When we run from the pressure we tie up a huge tool of God's that He uses to shape us. I used to run from lots of pressures---trying to find "peace". Little did I realize that the very pressure I was running from was actually the doorway to the peace I was craving so badly. Diamonds aren't made without pressure, they are just a lump of coal without pressure. If we run from the pressure we are not as useful to the Father as He intended for us to be. Coal is useful in its natural state, but its use is much different after becoming a diamond. In its natural state, coal is used as fuel, then becomes dust and ash. When pressure is brought to bear and a diamond is made from that raw material, you have something that will last forever, and fire cannot destroy it---in fact, diamonds are nearly indestructible. A diamond would never have been created if the coal would have refused the pressure that transformed it. The pressure transformed its value, usefulness, lifespan, strength, beauty, and desirability. People don't display hunks of coal on their fingers. God cannot display us the way He wants to until we submit to the pressure He has surrounded us with, walk into the fiery furnace and come out the other side changed forever. This is where I am headed, people, and I hope to see you all on the road peppered with pressures that transform us all into His image. --V

What's on the inside?

As I was reading in my morning devotions I came upon a scripture in Titus that caught my eye since we have been talking about pure hearts this past week or so. Titus 1:15&16 "To the pure in heart all things are pure but to the defiled nothing is pure; their very minds and consciences are defiled and polluted. 16. They profess to know God but deny, disown and renounce Him by what they do; they are detestable, unbelieving and disobedient, disloyal and rebellious, unfit for good work of any kind."
Whew! Kinda strong. As I was pondering this I thought of what Jesus said to the Pharisees---He called them white washed tombs that looked great on the outside but inside were full of deadness. It goes back to what I said a couple of days ago---God is looking for transformed hearts so what we do and say spring forth from that, instead of people who may do the right things and say the right words, but inside they are not really transformed—they are full of deadness. I think the scripture that says we will know true Christians by their fruit is backed up by this one in Titus. We can call ourselves Christians, but it is what we do that really tells who we are and who we belong to. Do we screw up and make mistakes? Absolutely. That is why God's mercies are new every morning---He knew we needed that cushion. The issue is the condition of the heart and what is ruling our lives. When the Holy Spirit is in control, and we are walking accordingly, scripture tells us we will not fulfill the lusts of the flesh. When we are the ones in control just the opposite is true—we give in to the lusts of the flesh. Galatians 5 gives quite a listing of what that includes. It's not just sexual issues, but also includes---impurity, immorality, strife, anger, selfishness, and division. So if we see ourselves giving into the flesh we need to take a hard look at ourselves, own that we have placed our will on the throne of our lives, repent of it, and go forward in the mercy that is new each day. If we want to be the ones that have hearts propelling us to do and say the right things, a lifestyle of repentance is the ticket. So how do we know what is an outward show and what springs from a transformed heart? Scripture says that anything hidden will eventually be exposed. We might get fooled for a while, or even fool ourselves, but who we are has to eventually show itself. Fruit is the best way to know if we are what we profess. This doesn't mean we expect every time in every situation that 'real Christians' will act accordingly. We have to give room for learning and growth. It all goes back to the heart and its deepest desires and our will to act out our choices. Our free will that God gave us can get us into heavenly places or into lots of trouble! Where our will is, our fruit will be, so if our fruit has a pattern of disobedience, disloyalty, rebellion, or anything mentioned in Gal. 5, we need to go before God, repent, and ask Him to purify our hearts. The decontamination process of purification is sometimes unpleasant, but if we are really serious about our relationship with God, we will submit to it. And submit is the right word to use here, because it is a most definite surrender of our will to His. We come back to 'nevertheless' once again. A heart wanting a deeper walk, a heart not satisfied with settling for just what is acceptable, but one that strains toward what is desirable will always find its way back to 'nevertheless'.

Love, the greatest weapon!

The weapons of our warfare are mighty. They will always win! It may not look like a win if you hold it up to the standards of the world around us----humility can appear like weakness to the less discerning, but it is one of the most powerful of our weapons---but the most powerful of all our weapons is love. This is because God Himself is love, and if we allow His love to flow through us, battles are already won before they are even begun. If we look at love as the arsenal, and all the particulars of love as the many weapons we can take from that arsenal, we can see that real love is indeed the most powerful of forces on this earth. In 1Cor 13, we are shown a variety of weaponry at our disposal. The chapter begins with telling us that no matter what we do or how gifted we are if we don't have love it is all nothing. This is how powerful love is. Everything amounts to nothing without love. If we want to win the battles of our lives then we've got to make acquiring love our greatest aim. In order for love to work for us as a weapon, we must learn to wield it like a sword. The swords back in the day were heavy and very difficult to pick up, never mind trying to use them as a weapon with any skill. It would take day after day, week after week of constant training to build the skill level and muscles to a point which would make the swordsman useful in a battle. Love sounds easy because this world has watered it down to just a feeling we experience, but real love is not as easy to walk out as we might think. It is indeed a powerful weapon that wins every battle all the time, and because of this, it can be very difficult to wield properly. It takes day after day and week after week of choosing to love when people have given us no reason to. When someone speaks hurtful things to us, love must cover in order to nullify the sting of the blade the enemy has just thrust at our hearts. That blade has the poison of bitterness and unforgiveness on it, and the only remedy is love that can wash away all that poison. Kindness in the face of cruelty, forgiveness in the face of brutality are powerful weapons for they nullify the results of the wounds the enemy inflicts on us. This battle to love is first waged in our mind and will. We must choose to will ourselves into agreement with God's will no matter how it may go against our nature. When we decide to do what God says to do and act upon it, then we are training our spiritual muscles to react and become strong in love. What happens next is the ability to wield the weapon of love with precision and balance. We begin to recognize what real love is and is not. Clarity comes, spiritual advantage is gained, and strongholds in our lives are destroyed!
Love wins. Always! more later…….

The weapons that Win!

We are in the middle of the battle of our lives for our lives. 2Cor.10:3-5 tells us our weapons are not physical but mighty for the overthrow and destruction of strongholds. What strongholds? The strongholds found in our lives. God has given us weapons to use that will guarantee our victory in every battle of our lives if we will just use them. Just what are these weapons? Humility, love, forgiveness, purity, peace, mercy, grace, patience, kindness, self-control, truth, unity, gentleness, joy, goodness, faith -----everything God is. So often we come up against pride in people and we try to fight it with control, or judgment---which are the weapons of our enemy. Even more often we have opportunity to become offended and instead of using our weapons of forgiveness, love, and unity, we wield the enemy's weapons of offense, fault finding and division. Whenever we pick up the enemy's weapons, they will always be turned back against us to tear us to shreds. It is not safe to use his weapons---it may feel good because it appeases our sin nature, but it will come back one way or another to hurt us. Satan's job is to try and take out as many Christians as he can with the weapons of his warfare. Every time we give into reactions of the flesh, we grab onto one of the devils weapons and use it for the furtherance of satan's kingdom. The devil actually has us fighting along side his army---and we don't even see it! Any unpurified heart response acted upon will cause us to pick up the enemy's weapons and help him win the battle. This is why it is so important to have a pure heart---because the weapons of our warfare that will actually tear down strongholds in our lives are found in the allowing of God to purify us. Each stony part of our heart that we give to God to be transformed allows more of God's weapons to be used to tear down these strongholds in our lives. We cannot fight fire with fire---all that does is make the fire bigger and stronger. No, we fight fire with water---it's opposite. We cannot fight pride with pride, anger with anger, frustration with frustration, meanness with meanness---all it does is further the devils kingdom. Yet far too often, that is what seems to happen---we use the enemy's weapons, and fight from a losing position. All this does is reinforce the strongholds living out their existence through our lives. These strongholds were meant to be destroyed, yet with every choice to wield the enemy's weaponry we strengthen their grip on our hearts and breathe life into them. The moment we pick up the enemy's weapons of annoyance, anger, disrespect, dishonor, irritation, sharp responses, impatience, wanting our own way---and the list goes on----we automatically put ourselves in a losing position. Only the weapons of God's warfare can win. God gives the victory to us and all we have to do is use His weapons! In order to use them He must increase and we must decrease. We must empty ourselves so God has room to fill up the empty places with Himself. You see, a heart contaminated with fear cannot pick up the weapon of faith---a heart contaminated with lies cannot pick up the weapon of truth, and here lies the problem with many believers. We become discouraged and defeated simply because we do not allow the process of purification to put us in a position to take up our weapons that will win the battles of our lives. The pure heart, the uncontaminated heart is the heart that can see the weapons God has placed before us so we can win every fight and say with the apostle Paul---Thanks be to God who always leads us in victory. More later……....

Places of the Heart

A pure heart is not something for the faint of heart to try and obtain. When God does His purifying, He has got to use fire to get our hard spots the right consistency to be cleaned and then poured out. Consistency matters in everything from making batters for cakes to how thick our oil is in our cars……wrong consistency, wrong outcome. What we are made of and how we are put together needs overhauling by the Holy Spirit. Most of us have a history, some worse than others, but we all have portions of our hearts that need remolding, renewing, and realignment. Underneath the umbrella of our heart is our mind and emotions. These are two huge areas that need continual work so the fruit from them lines up with and agrees with God. When God begins the work of decontamination of our heart, He is reaching into our minds touching all that we think about, choices we make, and memories we have. All these places of the heart need to be addressed one at a time. God has to work line upon line and precept upon precept b/c---for all you builders out there---you know unless the foundation is laid properly, the house will not be stable. God has to take what we give Him to work with. He is not going to cross our will—He is going to wait until we give the 'places of our heart' to Him to deal with. This enables Him to build the house properly so it is safe and useful. Our heart is His home. That means our thoughts are where He resides, our emotions are where He lives----so this begs the question, what kind of a house are we giving the Lord to live in? Are we telling Him, hey this is how I am, this is my personality, and You can come in, but don't change anything around in here. I am comfortable with the way all the furniture of my thoughts and feelings are arranged, so You adapt to me and my ways. If this is the case, we won't see God. Not clearly, anyhow. Maybe through the Word, or others, but seeing His heart and reacting to it at a moments notice will be out of our reach to us unless we allow Him to come into the places of our heart and make it to His liking. Where we can see Him and be available to say what He wants said in the middle of an argument, and reach out with a hug when your entire being wants to punch someone's lights out! When we see Him, we are able to observe in the spiritual plane what His reactions to each and every situation would be, and then do what He wants done in that situation. That is seeing Him, and that is impossible with a contaminated heart. A contaminated heart wants its ways over God's ways. It is a heart that may say with its lips—I love You Lord, all I want is You God and Your will for me, but it is far from Him. Jesus complained of this while here on earth. He said---"These people praise me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me". God is not looking for our mouths to say the right things; He is looking for a heart that is surrendered, piece by piece to Him, and out of the abundance of that surrender the heart will speak the right things. Out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks. We've got it backwards, people. We try to speak things into existence when God wants to change our hearts so we can see Him and then speak out what we have seen!
More later…..

Purity

Blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see God. Why is that? I was searching the scriptures and came upon a passage in 1 Thessalonians 4:3-8. I am going to zero in on verse 7 & 8 which are---"For God has not called us to impurity, but to consecration, [dedicating ourselves to the most thorough purity]. Therefore whoever disregards this disregards not man but God whose very Spirit He gives to you is holy chaste and pure."
I think that if I wanted to pour water in a glass, I would make sure it was clean. Its not that is would be unusable as a glass—even if it were lined with excrement it would still be a glass that could be utilized as a glass. Is it desirable? No way. Do I want the nasty bacteria in my body that could make me sick---or the nasty flavor in my mouth as I drink it? Nope. But it is still a glass and can be used as such. We are like that glass. God calls us to purity b/c it keeps us clean so when He pours the water of His Holy Spirit in us, we can pour it out uncontaminated upon others for their refreshment. If we are contaminated, we contaminate others. No getting around that one. This is why it is so very important for us to dedicate ourselves to a thorough purity. God wants a clean vessel so He is represented properly. The word pure means not mixed with anything especially that which is dirty or less valuable. It means free from anything contaminating. Our nature itself is contaminated by sin, handed down to us by Adam and Eve, but when Jesus came as the second Adam, He put things back spiritually the way they were before the fall. We then became able to identify the contamination of sin, confess it, repent of it, and become free from its power and influence. Purity is attainable through the blood of Jesus or God would not have called us to it. We have free will and can decide if we are going to put any effort towards purifying and cleansing our mind, heart and soul, but the scripture is clear when it says if we disregard this mandate of personal purity that we are going directly against God. Disregard simply means to ignore or neglect. We can ignore God's calling of purity by simply not paying attention to it in such a way that there isn't much of a difference in how we live our lives from the way those in the world do. There should be a noticeable difference in us, people! Not in a self-righteous way, but in a righteous way----a way that allows us to be in the world without being of the world. I think we get way to comfortable with this short life we have here on earth thinking it is everything there is, but that is a lie sent to seduce us from the best life God has waiting for us. Eternity is forever. This life is but a moment, and we live it like it is all there is. I don't know about you, but I want to SEE God. That takes a pure heart and means I have to be proactive and actually dedicate myself to keeping my mind, soul and heart CLEAN. It's not just gonna happen to us. I never saw a dish in my sink wash itself…..we have to do something. You don't get paid at work if you don't work. We cannot expect God's purity to suddenly overtake us. No, we have to commit, devote and set ourselves apart---that's what the word dedicate means. When we devote ourselves to a task, we are all consumed by it---it has our full attention. We need to give the call to purity by Almighty God Himself our full attention.
more later……….V

Times of Refreshing!

Acts 3:19 "so repent that your sins might be erased, that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord."

Times of refreshing---times of recovery and being revived, impartations of new energy and strength, times where we are filled up again, restored, and renewed. We all want this---rain when we're dry, money when there's need, rest when we're weary, strength when we're weak. Sometimes I dream of a place where it is all about refreshment of my body, soul and spirit, a place where all the cares are left behind and all at hand is focused on restoring and renewing. But you know what? That place is a Person---the place of His Presence. It's awesome how His Presence is a real place we can get to and hang out. And the cool thing is we can do it anywhere at anytime.
This scripture says that having our sins erased through repenting is the way to the refreshment our souls need. Repentance is the road to a pure heart and Jesus said blessed are the pure in heart for they will see God. They will see Him in the place of His presence, they will see Him in their brothers and sisters in Christ, and they will see Him in circumstance and situations. Purity keeps our eyesight clear to see God, but purity can only be maintained by an act of our will. Remember our will puts our decisions into action. Making a choice is impotent unless the will causes the working out of the choice to actually produce something. We can think we are repenting b/c our words say so, but unless our will kicks in with the fruit of an action that is noticeable, true repentance must be called into question. True repentance will produce fruit and it is this fruit that the enemy wants to stop. If he can get us to make decisions without any backup of action, he can get us to convince ourselves we are doing something productive when all we are doing is spinning our wheels. Being a doer of the Word and not merely a hearer is an instruction given to us for a reason. Satan uses our fallen nature along with whatever demonic strongholds that have attached themselves to our bad attitudes’, or woundings’. He then entices us to just do enough to make us feel like we are making progress when in fact we are not. The enemy doesn't mind if we think we are doing something, just as long as he keeps us ineffective. The effective fervent prayer of a righteous man/woman wields much power and it is this power the devil is afraid of. So what happens? The enemy lulls us into a false sense of security because we say the right words the right way, but all the time our actions tell the real truth of where our hearts are. God calls us to a lifestyle of repentance to maintain a purity that can see God and bear the fruit of His Spirit. If you wonder if you have really repented of something, just look at the results---fruit never lies. Where there is fruit, there is a root, and if you have repented of an issue, you change your mind and turn away from it, so the fruit will be evident to all. If you are just saying the words of repentance and still do the same things over and over, then true repentance has not been attained. What do we do, condemn ourselves, or just say forget it, this is just too hard? No, we fight the good fight of faith. We FIGHT! What makes us think it's gonna be easy to serve God and kill our flesh? it is a fight to the death---our death! The refreshment, restoration, and all the feel good stuff God wants to give us He will give to us, but we need to remember that repentance precedes refreshment. God is a wonderfully generous God and He has great joy in bringing restoration and reviving His children! He wants to do this for us---but His hands are tied if we cannot repent of the things He has revealed to us that need weeding out. Repenting is basically that----weeding the gardens of our lives. You can fertilize all you want with positive things, but if you do not couple that with weeding out the things that hinder us, then we become like the parable of the sower--and the weeds grew up and choked out the good seed and produced nothing. Let’s allow God to show us the weeds in our lives, and then use our wills to walk out the repentance that will lead us to the refreshment of His presence! V

Passionate love

Whew! This Deut 4:29 is certainly taking awhile to dissect. We are almost at the end though, people. We are on the soul portion of this scripture, and gonna talk about the passion part of our soul today. We have found that our soul is made up of our self, will, desires, and now our passion. Did you know that the word passion literally means suffering, to endure, a moving of the mind and soul? And it makes sense whether we are talking about sexual passion or passionate love or zeal for something or someone---because if we deny our passions we suffer and endure the hardship of going against our flesh. We endure the difficulty of doing just the opposite our desires may pull us, or we endure not being able to walk out the passion of a calling or gift being used or noticed. Either way, passion goes with suffering and endurance. What marathoner with a passion for running does not endure the pain that accompanies the joy of putting his passion into reality? the passion God has for us is SO big he allowed His child to be tortured, rejected, murdered--all for His passionate love toward us. So many times we love someone only to be rejected, but we are in great company. If that love is of pure origin, it will continue on in the face of all the pain, because love simply cannot help itself---it must do what it is. And this passionate love God poured out on us needs to be reciprocated by His kids so God can feel loved by us. God can feel hurt, and be grieved, and not showing Him love after all He has poured out on us is a very painful thing to Him. This passionate love that propelled God to suffer all He did for us is begging to be returned to Him by us. I’ve said before that Jesus didn't go through what He did so we didn't have to--He went through it to show us how to. This walking out of the 'how to' is the doorway of our passion towards God. God is calling for everything---all we are---He is requiring every single facet of our being if we really want to find Him. God is not looking for a 'cliff notes' type relationship--He is longing for us to be so extravagant in our love for Him that we are willing to endure anything that will bring Him pleasure-----and it PLEASED God to crush Jesus---and even more astounding is the passion Jesus had for the world propelled Him willingly to the most excruciating pain of His life. Passion is not just about sex, it is about intimacy that is boundless in its enthusiasm, and powerful in its execution. God yearns for us to have a passion for Him like He has for us. it is all a matter of laying down all that we are, all that we have, all that we hope for, no matter how hard it is---to just lay it down at His feet because our love is so extravagant, so passionate towards Him, that it is worth anything---just to be able to grasp a hold of it. We want to find God. We need to find God. Passion of heart and soul are necessary to find God. grasp hold of Him and do not let go unless He blesses you, people----you may have to limp the rest of your life like Jacob, but he got a new name out of the deal....... more later...V

Our Will ...

As we dive further into what our soul actually is, we come upon 'the will' facet of it. Our wills are the power behind the choices we make. What this means is that we determine and decide with our minds (which is in the heart realm) what we will do or not do, what we will accept as truth or lies, what we will think about or not---but it is our will that causes' those choices to be acted upon. Our minds can be thinking about something and may have come to a choice or decision on a matter, but until our will gets involved, there is no action or power behind the choice. We can choose and decide we are going to lose weight, or not sin in a certain area, but if our wills do not jump in on board 100% the choice has no strength behind it. Our wills' give us the power to carry out our choices---good or bad. That is why what we dwell on is so important, b/c when we get our minds engaged in thoughts, it activates our entire heart realm, and then either God for good or the enemy for evil will take those thoughts and get our soul realm involved. Our self (see yesterday's blog), if not totally submitted to God will be used to guide our will to do its bidding. It all begins with a thought, and this is why the scripture about taking every thought captive to the obedience of Christ is so powerful. Let me take a sec here to underscore the second part of that scripture. We hear it quoted all the time with the last part left out. we are to take our thoughts captive and make these thoughts obey Jesus. That takes an act of our will to accomplish. We choose to take the thoughts prisoner so we can contain them safely, but then we must use our will to make it obey God. Our wills will engage what our minds take a hold of----so it is very important our minds are grounded in what is true. if our mind believes a lie as truth, our will is then going to propel us to do just the opposite of what God's will is for us. the big question is, how do we know what we are believing is true? Jesus said you would know by the fruit. is the fruit in your life good—holy, pure, in line with God's Word, does what you believe cause unity or division, is there confusion or clarity, is love or self being served---these are all fruit to look at. Our fruit will reveal to us if our thoughts are actually dwelling on truth. Life---God's abundant life and truth go together. That is not to say that there is no pain in following what is true. Actually there can be more pain than you could imagine when following what is true. Look at Jesus---He followed truth all the way to the cross. But in following the truth there is always a resurrection, which is why I say life and truth go together. We cannot expect to walk in God's will for our lives unless the basis of our thoughts is founded in what is true. Our will gives the power of carrying out the choices our mind makes possible based on what we believe is true, so we had better make sure we know what is true. Jesus said….and we will know the truth, and the truth will make you free. It's in the knowing of the truth we get set free people!—free to will our will to do His will. More later….

So this is love!

I Cor. 13:5&6 Love, Gods love in us, does not insist on its own rights or its own way for it is not self-seeking.

Don’t you dare talk to me that way---don’t you ever treat me like that again!!! These are rights that sound reasonable to say or feel in the midst of certain circumstances, or in the presence of certain people.
If we allow this thought process to have its way in our minds, will, and emotions—if we allow this fleshly thinking to have any root in us at all, we oppose the law of love. Gods love does not insist on any rights. The question is-- where do we draw the line so we do not become trampled underfoot by others whims and desires? Well, to tell the truth, we don’t. He does. The secret is to learn to recognize the voice of God so we are only about the Fathers business. Jesus was surrounded by need and did not meet every one He saw. What he did do was whatever the Father told Him to do. This needs to be our mindset. When we are about the Father’s business He takes care of us and protects and defends us. He draws that line in the sand for us. It is imperative to be able to hear God’s voice and follow it and not be distracted by a need before us or a desire to run away from a situation because it is uncomfortable. When we know just what he is saying we will know just what our responses should be. If we are looking for a quick pat answer that will always be the default response in kingdom living we will be sorely disappointed. People and situations vary so we must attune ourselves to the sound of God. What does this sound like? His sound can strike the chord of peace in situations. His sound can strike the dissonant tones that create a tempest. His sound is always rooted in love, and will never cause us to be insistent about our rights. His sound does not look to appease self. His sound is patience and kindness, forgiveness and grace. His sound is righteousness, truth, and justice. When we know what He sounds like, instead of being run roughshod over, we will be the ones in control, like Jesus was with Pilate, and we will choose to lay our life down. It will be a choice we make, not something we are forced to do---compelled by love alone. We do not hand over our power to another person--no---we hand it over to God Himself, and then we walk in the power and authority of the choice we made to surrender to Him. Whether He leads us to turn over the money changers tables or leads us like a lamb going to the slaughter opening not our mouths, we are not under the control of any person. We have maintained our control and position by relinquishing it to God.
In 1Corinthians 13, love is defined. God calls us to operate in all of it—not just the portion of love we are willing to dole out to ‘deserving persons’. Real love costs us our lives. When we surrender to love, we surrender our rights. We surrender all our expectations, all our hopes and dreams. We surrender all our ways of doing and thinking, of acting and reacting. When we surrender, we replace self seeking with God seeking. We must look beyond our needs and wants, beyond our desires, and rights, and lay them down. You will find what has just been laid down will in fact create the bridge needed to span the chasm between His kingdom living and our lives. Transformation is a crossing over from our living to His Life. We cross over on that bridge of surrender. The slats on that bridge are formed when we lay down our will, desires, rights, knowledge, experience, emotions, education, expectations…..and only when we lay them all down can the way be formed for us that will lead to our true destiny. And what is that?—to impart life through His love.
This is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and GAVE HIMSELF. Let us therefore go and do likewise.

Acceptance with Joy

"For love comes into the heart not by trying to force it, but by accepting people as they are, and bearing all that they do against you." This is from the book Mountains of Spices

This will also magnify our love towards God—accepting each situation that comes upon us as from His Hand. And we are to accept them with JOY---not resignation. We accept joyfully because it will produce something. The seed, when left to die, always does! As we begin to accept what comes our way, bitterness and resentment, self-pity and despair will fly out the window of our hearts, for to accept is to surrender to the truth that He knows what is needed. And to accept with joy gives us strength for the journey.
When we surrender to trusting Him by accepting all things as from His Hand, and when we do this with the joy that gives us our strength, we can be assured our destination will be arrived upon. Constant and consistent surrender produce acceptance and constant and consistent acceptance produces peace—which we are to be led forth by—so therein lies the compass for our journey to the High Places—peace! And it is all rooted in what loves truest nature is---Acceptance with joy.

1-2-3 Go!

Judges 19:20
A man and his concubine were traveling back home to Israel and stopped in a city for the night. This city was a Benjamite city and they thought they were safe. While there, this man gave his concubine to some worthless men to appease them from attacking him. The mob raped and abused her so much she died. The man told the Israelites what happened and they tried to get the Benjamites to bring the men who did this to justice. The Benjamites refused so the Israelites inquired of the Lord if they should fight against them---and God said yes. God instructed Judah to be the first tribe to fight. Interesting choice since Judah means praise……

So the battle ensued and even though God said yes they were to fight, the Israelites were defeated that first day at their first battle. Then the Israelites went to fight a second time once again asking God if they should go. God said yes—go! And they lost again!! Then all the Israelites---the entire army---went to the house of God, wept, prayed and fasted all day long till evening. There they offered burnt offerings, and peace offerings before God.
Once again, they inquire of God about going forth to fight, and God said go and fight---again! And this time God said He would deliver their enemy into their hands.
So they went forth to fight, but (v34) the battle was very hard.

This story proves God can lead us right into the jaws of defeat! Defeated they were, indeed, but since we know the end of the story we know not defeated in their quest to triumph over the Benjamites in the end. God’s people inquired of Him—should we fight Lord? In essence they were asking---will You be with us so we can prevail over our foes? God told them to go and fight and the people thought –if God is for us who can be against us?
But the reality was that they lost and their enemy had the victory. How often do we run up against a wall thinking God was with us, that He was going to deliver us, and because it didn’t happen the first or even second time, we then quit? These people were sure they heard God. They actually DID hear God. God told them to go fight. God allowed them to be defeated. When Paul said in Corinthians—thanks be to God who always leads us in triumph—it was never intended to mean without a fight. It wasn’t about instant gratification. The triumph came, but God did not allow it to come easily. We get this notion in the millennium Christianity we are exposed to that if God says to us ‘go and fight’, our victory will be quick. We think that God will do all the work and all He requires of us is to just stand back and watch because “the battle is the Lord’s”. The battle is His. His to decide when and where the victory comes. But we are to do the fighting. We are His army. And make no mistake; you can have victory in your heart without the outward manifestation of it. It is delineated by a relationship built on trust. The Israelites knew about this. Why else would they continue fighting after all the loss? Because they believed in Him, not in their expectations of what they thought He should do. They trusted God with the final outcome.

After expectations of God coming to the rescue did not appear, what did the Israelites do? They wept before the Lord. And after the second defeat---huge losses of life might I add---they went to the house of God and lay before the Lord all day, fasting all day, offering sacrifices for their sin all day, offering peace offerings, all day. Then God says, go and this time you will have breakthrough. After the fasting. After the prayer. After the offerings of self. After the repentance of sin.

We think just saying the words the right way---just reminding God of what He said will give us the quick, instant “victory in a box” our microwave society is used to. No----it must cost us dearly. Battles will be lost, casualties will be high, faith will be assaulted and self doubting will begin. We may say to ourselves, ‘was that really God? It sure doesn’t look like everyone says it should if it really was Him. People are dead and two times in a row we lose the fight and now those watching us are laughing at us.’

So what is God saying to us where we are right now?
First of all we need to ask Him what we should be doing, to inquire of Him and His ways for us, and to only fight the battles He has chosen for us, in order to prevent needless casualties.
Then we need to praise Him. It was no accident Judah was the first tribe that God Himself chose to go forth into the battle. We do not realize the power of our praise! Not the praise that says ‘I praise you Lord for defeating this enemy’, like our carefully placed words are going to win this fight, no, rather it is the praise from our hearts that will say---“Who is like our God? He is mighty to save! There is nothing to hard for Him!”
Then we must believe and trust that no matter how it looks, ultimately victory is ours if we do not grow weary in well doing, as we are instructed in Galatians 6:9. In fact, Paul tells us that if we succeed in fighting without growing weary then we will reap a great harvest!
If the battle is not being won, then we need to take spiritual inventory. We get into His presence and weep, and fast and pray and repent, and give ourselves as peace offerings to Him, so He can cleanse us, strengthen us, and make us ready for breakthrough. . If we keep fighting battles that are consistently lost, we need to determine whose battles they are. When the Israelites inquired of God it was through a man. God still uses men to divulge His purposes and intent. Do not be afraid to ask the spiritual opinion of a Godly acquaintance.

Finally, we must put forth the effort that goes into the fight! They said the battle was hard. It IS hard! It can be quite difficult to fight against our wrong attitudes and actions, to fight through discouragement and fear. We must equip ourselves with the heavenly armor He’s provided us. It can be hard to hold up our shield and wield our Sword of the Spirit. You cannot hold a shield you do not have, and a dull sword will not cut through as it should. Faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the Word. We must spend time, daily in the Word so our shield will be strong, and our sword sharp and ready to defend.
Even when God said, ‘okay guys, go up one more time and this time you’ll have your breakthrough.’ The Word tells us the battle was hard. We seem to expect things to be easy if they are God. This is not always so.
Let us grow up in the faith, let us take courage and strengthen ourselves, and find God through prayer and fasting, to enable us to run the race He has chosen for us.
In the end, disaster came upon the Benjamites. Almost the entire tribe was wiped out, and all because they would not allow the sin in their camp to be dealt with.
Let us glean a lesson from these, and when confronted with sin in our lives, run to the altar, repent, inquire of God what He would have us do, offer ourselves as living sacrifices, holy and acceptable to God, for all this loss could have been avoided if the sin had been acknowledged and dealt with. And always remember that fighting the good fight of faith wins the day!