Quarter-Past Late O'Clock

I've been having this ongoing conversation with God about the areas of my life where I have had difficulty waking up to what is truly reality for me; in other words, areas in which I've been in denial. The conversation lately has generally looked like, "Father, please help me to walk in the reality of who you are in these areas of my life!" I believe His response has been "Keep crying out, keep moving forward, you're moving in the right direction!"

I had this discussion once more with Him this morning and true to His word He delivered within the span of a few hours in a discussion I had with a loved one. 

Sometimes His answers come as soft whispers or barely noticeable impressions; other times as a loud trumpet call. Without going into a whole lot of detail at this time let's just say this morning's call was more akin to tornado warnings, which is fitting in light of the horrific damage done in 3 US states in the course of one night just a week ago!

The basic message was simple, "Your need to wake up is absolutely critical! However you aren't even fully aware of what is at stake if you do not! Here are some reminders of why you should wake up and some practical steps to move in that direction." The overall message was exactly what I had asked of God. His timing to respond when He did was impeccable since I was already open to hear what He might say. As reluctant as I was to hear it, I recognized His voice in the midst of this discussion I had just a few hours later!

Was it what I wanted to hear? Nope!

Was it easy to swallow? Nearly impossible!

Was it what I needed to hear to continue to move forward? Absolutely!

One thing I have discovered in the way God works with me particularly in the area of my working with me in my will is that He does not magically tweak my will so that I suddenly and easily choose what He wants of me, rather He meets me in relational ways like good Fathers do confronting me with the truth and providing the ammunition I need to make better choices even when I still don't want to.

One jarring reality I have had to face is that I will never entirely stop wanting to do things my own way but God is gracious to provide the reality-check I need if I am open to to hear it so I am empowered to make the right choice even if when if feels uncomfortable or unnatural.

Getting out of bed after a rough night of sleep is never easy but the reality check of possibly losing one's job does help make that choice possible when you're already a quarter-past late o'clock!

The Snooze Button

When I started this blog it was under a strong and compelling belief that God was wanting to wake His people up from being half-asleep. 

I'm going to be honest. In many ways I fell back asleep just like I do when I hit the snooze button. I'm a pro-snoozer by the way! After much pain and heartache which resulted from the spiritual stupor I've been in, I am being stirred awake once more.

My friends the time to wake up is now. That can be hard to do especially if you're asleep and don't fully realize it.

Cry out to God even if from your "dream-state" just as I have also been doing. Cry out for His help to wake you up!

Can't you feel it and see it? Millions are asleep and dead to His reality, oblivious to humanity's great enemy, and blinded to the great delusion that is overwhelming the masses. Just because someone made a science fiction movie about it doesn't mean it has no basis in reality.

Revelation 3:2 (New Living Translation)

Wake up! Strengthen what little remains, for even what is left is almost dead. I find that your actions do not meet the requirements of my God.

Grace To Be

Holiness comes by grace through faith in the finished work of Jesus on the cross.

Grace provides forgiveness and cleansing from sin. Grace also provides power to walk in holiness which is not based in fulfilling the letter of the law but through love by the empowerment and inspiration of the Holy Spirit in response to the love of God. When I love I am living from the identity of who I really am. God says, “Be holy as I am holy.” Walking in holiness is about resting in a state of being. Jesus has already made me holy!

There is grace for the journey, for the mistakes, for the growing. Only I must not give up on the process of grace. I must not close my heart to that which God desires to give me. I must not persist in unbelief lest I miss out on the full inheritance of that which God desires for me to have—which is full unhindered fellowship with God and His children.

The outcome of faith is the evidence of that which is hoped for and has yet been experienced. Patience, endurance, hope which comes by faith will carry me through until I have taken hold of that for which Christ has taken hold of me.

I know that faith is not just a trick of the mind, for I have already experienced God's interaction with me in so many ways that should remove all doubt—though doubt persists! Though I have not experienced His empowering sustaining grace as of yet should in no way deter me from staking my life on it now!

I should not allow defeat, past repeated failures and associated shame, fear or despair to cause me to believe that I have somehow missed the grace boat. For I am not one who shrinks back from the mercy and grace of God! Though I have failed to fully apprehend its effective power in my life, I have never refused it.

I choose to accept the hardship and trials I have experienced thus far as the training ground ordained by a loving Father who intends for me to succeed and not fail no matter how long or difficult the journey into full surrender and holiness may be!

(Reflections from Hebrews 10-12)

Pearl of Great Price

I’ve come to believe that in the core of who I am, the ‘me’ that God originally made is still incredibly special and wonderful. I am fearfully and wonderfully made says the Psalmist—despite the fact that I have fallen short of God’s glory, His original plan for my life. God’s original intent was for me to be incredibly special and unique AND attached to God. Somewhere along the line that attachment was severed and my specialness lost its luster. So much so that there is nothing I can do on my own to fix the problem or work my way back into relationship with God. 

Thus enters Jesus, God’s uniquely begotten Son.

What Jesus has done for me and is continually doing is restoring me to the original ‘me’ that God intended which in essence actually becomes a ‘we’ as my spirit has become one with His Spirit.

I may not deserve His love, but I am worth it! God has and will always value each of us individually. 

How much value do we possess?

Let’s put it this way—if you were to lose something that was precious to you, we would know how much value it has based on how much you would be willing to pay to get it back!

How much was God willing to pay for you?

Freedom

Our greatest loss as Christians will not be the loss of religious freedom. The truth is nobody can take away your freedom to worship.

Nobody!

Rather our greatest loss will be that we would come to believe that such a loss is even possible and so surrender our freedom.

Resist capitulating to status quo, human laws and godless reasoning. Our Christian brothers and sisters are persecuted and slaughtered every day for their submission and love of Yeshua. We can be assured they're experiencing more freedom than those of us who barely face persecution.

Submit to God, know the truth and be truly free.

________________

Scriptures to Pray About

So Jesus said to the Jews who had believed him, "If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free."

John 8:31-32

It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery...

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law. Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the sinful nature with its passions and desires. Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit.

Galatians 5:1 -AND- 5:22-25

Averted Calamity

"And God relented from the calamity that He said He would do... "

Exodus 32:14, Jonah 3:10, Jeremiah 18:8

Such an intriguing phrase that was repeated enough throughout Biblical history that may in fact imply a Divine habit!

Peter said God is not willing that any perish (eternally) but that all should come to repentance. Jesus reminded us that God desires mercy not sacrifice. Jesus challenged us to go and learn what this means and said He came to save not the righteous but sinners.

I would imagine the best way to go and learn the meaning of this phrase would be for me to go and make a habit of showing mercy rather than insisting on getting what is justly owed to me.

I think there is still so much I do not fully grasp concerning the ways God's mercy continually overrides justice. I'm far less sure that God is as predictable as I had once thought in favor of scandalous grace.

May I be just as unpredictably scandalous.

Divine Memo

There are some in our world who have missed the Divine memo concerning God's love and forgiveness through our Savior Jesus. They are stuck on an old track of fear, judgment and wrath not reaIizing they themselves may be judged by their own merciless standard one day. I do not blame them. In fact, I feel sorry for them that they do not comprehend love, joy and peace.

My prayer is that God will grant me supernatural courage, peace and love that I may bless these ones in His name should such a one come knocking on my door, with their sacred text or even a weapon in hand!

Be merciful that your Father in Heaven may be merciful to you. Pray for your enemies and bless them. Bless and do not curse them.

Graven Images

Even a Biblical view of God can be idolatrous if it does not allow for God Himself to correct our so-called Biblical interpretation of who we believe Him to be. Never fall into the trap of believing you've got Him completely figured out.

God is not just an idea. He's a Someone.

God may be the same today, yesterday and forever but my understanding of who I hold Him to be in my heart continually expands and grows as I encounter Him in ways I never did before.

Blessings & Curses

A while ago I had a jarring reality-check,

"You keep wanting your President and other leaders to do well yet in your judgmental disgust at their failings you regularly curse them from your heart. How could you ever expect them to improve if you continually curse them?

Forgive them.

Bless them.

Trust me."

I urge you, first of all, to pray for all people. Ask God to help them; intercede on their behalf, and give thanks for them. Pray this way for kings and all who are in authority so that we can live peaceful and quiet lives marked by godliness and dignity (1 Tim 2:1-2)... Bless those who persecute you. Don't curse them; pray that God will bless them (Rom 12:14).

I Believe

There are several reasons I believe in Jesus as God's uniquely begotten Son through whom I have a relationship with God. It is true that I was taught to relate to God in this way by my parents, but I have had to come to my decision as an adult. There have been times I have had serious doubts and honestly there I times I still do. I can tell you that the biggest reason for the struggle is because knowing Christ (and even God Himself) always comes through the filters of my own natural experience which I feel is highly unreliable. But I continually return to this question, "How would the invisible God (and Christ) reveal Himself to me in the natural except through points of contact in the natural realm?" There really is no other way to understand and encounter God--it all comes through encountering Him revealing Himself to me IN MY BRAIN. I won't cover everything here as each point could expand into separate entries on their own, but there are several highlights that have become anchors to hold on to: I can't get away from the eye witness accounts as laid out in the New Testament. We're not talking about people who came up with a new philosophy for which they chose to die. People choose to die for all kinds of ideological assents, but Jesus' followers' experience was different. For Jesus followers, it was always first and foremost an eye witness encounter for which they chose to die, not just an idea. Seriously, why put your life on the line claiming something so outlandish as, "I cannot deny that I have seen, and touched and encountered the resurrected Jesus."? Saul also known as Paul's radically transforming change of mind toward Jesus from persecutor to martyr as a result of an encounter (actually multiple encounters) he had with the resurrected Jesus. The gospel message itself--God came in the person of Jesus to fix what we humans could not, to reestablish relationship with us. Jesus demonstrates what we could never understand, that God has always been for us and not against us. That God having no obligation was willing to identify with and endure our brokenness and suffering that He would through Jesus redeem and restore what we had lost. Fulfillment of Biblical prophecies through the life, death and resurrection (according to the eye-witness accounts). Fulfmillment of Biblical prophecies in our present day, ie: the restablishment of Israel as a nation. My own encounters with Christ: through uniquely answered prayer through divine coincidences through unusual foreknowledge I could not explain through miracles and healings through experiences of God's love which has almost always come through encounters with Jesus Himself (in ways I could not have cooked up on my own),  through continual progressive transformation through encountering God's heart as demonstrated in Jesus--finding more of a forgiving and gentle heart within myself as more healing and revelation occurs. When I consider who I know God to be as revealed in Jesus, I recognize I have no basis for understanding God in this way through any other path. Too much has happened in our world that would point to the contrary. For me, only a revelation of Jesus seems to make sense of it all--the good, the bad, the ugly and the glorious. I still have many unanswered questions. But I have finally come to a place of peace about it all realizing that if God is actually a person, then just like people, there is always more to learn. That's what growing in intimacy is all about. I'm no longer troubled by the questions in the same way I once was. You may not believe in Jesus. You may want to but have doubts and questions. That's ok. Just honestly tell the God you're not sure of that whom you genuinely want to know (if indeed the Creator exists and is knowable). There is a popularly quoted scripture which does a good job of summing up the heart of God whom the Bible represents. Jeremiah 29:11-13 For I know the plans I have for you," declares the LORD, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future." The next portion of that Scripture is often not quoted-- "Then you will call on me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart."