Words Of Encouragement To Start The Day (Friday 04/29/2011)

I Am Feeling Some Kinda Way…

1 Corinthians 4:4-5 (New International Version, ©2011)

⁴ My conscience is clear, but that does not make me innocent. It is the Lord who judges me. ⁵ Therefore judge nothing before the appointed time; wait until the Lord comes. He will bring to light what is hidden in darkness and will expose the motives of the heart. At that time each will receive their praise from God.

             Have you ever had a moment or an encounter in your life when something someone did or said made you feel some kinda way about it?  I believe we all have gotten to the point with people and situations that we were feeling something, but to articulate those feelings meant that we were actual responsible for them and that these feelings were now a recognized entity that needed to be either unleashed or dealt with and subdued.  In these times the emotion does not necessarily have to be a negative one, but in many cases in context they are.

            Recently I have been waking up heavy, God has been revealing things and I have been seeing many things, spiritually and naturally, God has been pulling back the covers and allowing things to be exposed and it has me feeling some kinda way about how things are going, who I allow to get to close to me and what God is doing in this season.  As I stated at the end of last year, God began to speak to me about this year 2011, and I began to study and God said there was going to be a revealing,  a separation of the wheat from the tare and He would identify who His hand was on.  I have been sitting back and watching just this.  My daughter has reminded me of the word God gave me, several times this year already, as things begin to identify themselves and people begin to expose themselves.  As I also watch my own life transition from a place of ruin to accomplishment, I again feel some kinda way about that.  There is a song we sing at church “Lord whatever you’re doing in this season don’t do it without me.”  I sat under a Pastor in Japan that taught us to be conscious what we sang and what we were asking God to do, because we needed to count up the cost, because we did not know what would be required, or what could ultimately come out as a result of it.  I understand that all too well in this season.  People are saying things, confessing things and asking God for things not fully understanding what it will cost them, or cause to begin in their lives.  We want the position without God or man really looking over our lives with a fine tooth comb, we want the trust without having to earn it and we want God and people to just go along with “our program,” without having to explain its validity or its relevance, or having first to come into obedience to Christ and His plan for our lives. The time has come that these things are being exposed and God is trying to tell us that He is feeling some kinda way about our lifestyles, actions, behaviors, attitudes, motives and words.

            My mother says to me every time I seem like I am feeling some kinda way and throwing a mini tantrum with God about something He is requiring of me or doing, “God doesn’t care anything about your tantrums.”  It is true, He is the one who has the final say, and no matter what kinda way we are feeling, He is God all by Himself and His word stands, His requirements stand.  We have been the one prioritizing our feelings and forgetting about God and who He really is and how He is supposed to be treated in our lives.  We have chosen to focus on the fact that God is loving and merciful, only without remembering that He is a jealous God and that He will not have anyone or anything come before Him, that He is a God of judgment, wrath and a God of war, and we cannot just do Him any kind of way and He not feel anyway about it.  Just like things affect us and cause us to feel a particular kind of way, they do for Him too, but the difference is He does not avoid what He is feeling and He does not have to hold back His reaction.  He is God and He can do as He please, He is the only one righteous enough to judge any situation, and to have an attitude, because He is the only one perfect; we forget at times that we are the ones created and He is the creator not the other way around.  We aren’t the boss of God and we cannot demand that He change the rules of the game just for us and it happen, we can say it all we want, but God is still in control.  It is time for us to stop feeling some kinda way and living any old kinda way and come into obedience and truth! Believe me when I say God is feeling something too!

Words Of Encouragement To Start The Day (Thursday 04/28/2011)

Why Now?

Judges 11:7-9 (Amplified Bible)

⁷But Jephthah said to the elders of Gilead, Did you not hate me and drive me out of my father's house? Why have you come to me now when you are in trouble?⁸And the elders of Gilead said to Jephthah, This is why we have turned to you now, that you may go with us and fight the Ammonites and be our head over all the citizens of Gilead. ⁹Jephthah said to the elders of Gilead, If you bring me home again to fight against the Ammonites and the Lord gives them over to me, [understand that] I will be your head.

Micah 4:9 (Amplified Bible)

⁹Now why do you cry aloud? Is there no king among you? Has your counselor perished, that pains have taken you like a woman in labor?

            I was asked a very important question last night concerning my future, as I pondered the question I had to ask, why now?  Over the past two to three months I have been watching God move in a very specific way and the words that he has been unpacking from the middle of last year to present have been so on the mark, and this is the first time in my adult life that I have not “officially been in ministry.”  So of course as I have been praying and I have been asking God why now?  As I have watched some things unfold, around me, I have asked Lord why now, allow this?  But moreover I have watched people and I have seen that as people get into a place and they need something or someone they will make a change or a transition that should have been made before and has been long overdue, but because they did not feel like they needed anyone to have their back or to be on their side they did not move to allow change to come, or align themselves with God or man.

If we have been out there doing our do and making a mess of our lives why now are we really having a come to Jesus meeting?  For me I must be honest, I knew my spiritual legacy and birthright for years and had one foot in and one foot out of the church, until at age 29 I had a mild stroke and I had two small children and was trying to recover because there was marital infidelity and I knew I was going to need to be able to raise my children and provide for them, possibly all by myself.  You see it was in those moments of lying in a room for four days, not eating, drinking or doing much sleeping just talking to God that I was aware that I needed Him, I needed Him to stand guard over my life and I needed Him, more than I had known all along, and that I needed to fulfill the mandate to minister in whatever way God saw fit in my life.  But for many of us we are not aligning ourselves with God when He is the one trying to get our attention, we are aligning ourselves with man, thinking that man has the power, the authority, the clout and the influence to keep us out of trouble, but it is not man, it is God, and only God that can do that! We all too often think that doing what is right in the eyes of man and making a show of ourselves in a public forum, will save us from God wanting us to repent, and come full circle into His will. We even think that it will circumvent our being exposed or having to reap what we have sown; I am sorry to inform some of you, that you have never been so wrong.  God’s law will always prevail. We have to sometimes walk the full length of the Via Dolorosa and become the sacrifice to find the truth of our joy and peace, our obedience and our true salvation and deliverance.  You see there is a saying that says you can fool some of the people all of the time, you can fool some of the people some of the time, but you cannot fool God any of the time.  An outward show does not a changed life make.  True conversion comes from the inside, it is a matter of the heart, and spirit not the mouth or the actions of the body.

            Many of us have known that God is calling us out of certain things, certain lifestyles, certain behaviors, certain mindsets, but we are not moving, don’t let God have to put you in a place where people are asking why now, because it is so evident that you need people to have your back, and to be on your side to validate us and to vouch for us.  People can never do what God can do, especially when we yield to Him on our own, without, having to be pushed or have our back up against the wall.  For some of us, that are in a place where God has been standing there waiting on us for a while and we are now all up in His face, the question is why now?  Are you there for the right reasons?  Are you there for Him to get you out of a jam or to deliver you from a tight or are you there because you know and realize what needs to be done in your life and you need a true relationship with Him, not just a God that is there when we allow Him, but a God that is truly Lord and Master of our lives? For the Bible reminds us, we can never serve two Masters for one we will love and the other we will hate.  It also says that one who is double minded will be unstable in ALL their ways!  So the question is if you are coming to man or to God WHY NOW?

Words Of Encouragement To Start The Day (Wednesday 04/27/2011)

You Can Get With This Or You Can Get With That…

Isaiah 29:9-12 (Amplified Bible)

⁹Stop and wonder [at this prophecy, if you choose, whether you understand it or not; soon you will witness the actual event] and be confounded [reluctantly]! Blind yourselves [now, if you choose; take your pleasure] and then be blinded [at the actual occurrence]. They are drunk, but not from wine; they stagger, but not from strong drink [but from spiritual stupor]. ¹⁰For the Lord has poured out on you the spirit of deep sleep. And He has closed your eyes, the prophets; and your heads, the seers, He has covered and muffled. ¹¹And the vision of all this has become for you like the words of a book that is sealed. When men give it to one who can read, saying, Read this, I pray you, he says, I cannot, for it is sealed. ¹²And when the book is given to him who is not learned, saying, Read this, I pray you, he says, I cannot read.

            We are in a season, that is more than unusual.  Many of us came into this year with expectation that all would be right this year because last year seemed as if we were watching a Shakespearian Tragedy.  We looked to all of the banners and themes over this year to say, it would be all too the good, but many of us lacked one little thing, and that was the ability to understand that we cannot lay hold to a blessing we have not earned.  We cannot get to jubilation without tribulation.  We cannot get to success without some suffering and sacrifice.  You see while many of us were being tested in 2010, others were coasting, and living there life, there way.  Then 2011 rolled in and we were proclaiming in a loud voice, “I’m Do’in Me,” thinking that we could remain under the radar, or continue to skate, roll and bounce right on passed what God said He need from us to enter into a place of rest and blessing.  Many of us are drinking our own Kool-Aid and reading our own press and thinking that we are above judgment, because we have been living a certain way so long we think that we have not been figured out and we have not been seen so we are going to continue, and plus God is merciful and He will continue to allow His grace over my mess.  Not so!

            We do not understand what season we are in.  God is soon to come, and we are claiming Heaven and living like Hell.   We want God to bless our jacked up behaviors, our bad attitude, our messed up mindsets and our lifestyles that are contrary to His will, in other words we are asking God to bless our mess…No, He won’t.  There is a way that seems right unto man, but the end of the way is destruction.  In Proverbs it says a man seems right in His own eyes.  Yes because we have told God by the way we live that we want Him to just go over there and sit down and we will call Him when we need Him, and we will use Him when we get into a tight.  God has been trying to warn many of us for far too long, that we have it twisted.  We have our ideology all wrong.  He told us that He has set before us life and death choose life.  You see we have a choice to get with Him or to stay with us (our flesh, our way).  Many of us are running around here saying it is us our ability, our talent and our anointing that is saving us or affording us to be where we are, that may be true, for a moment, (but not really), God is the only true sustainer and the only true life giver.

            In this season, what is in the dark is coming to the light. The truth of who we are is being revealed and the content of our character and our intentions are being revealed and manifested.  We can choose to keep getting with the “business as usual” mantra, or we can get to the “business at hand” which is the business of doing God’s business His way!  We have choices, we can get our Heaven down here in the earth living like Hell, or we may choose to go through a bit of Hell, down here, for the sake of Christ and receive our Heaven here and throughout eternity. The choice is ours to make.  For there is no thing hidden from the Lord, You can either choose the “Me” or the “HE!”

Words Of Encouragement To Start The Day (Tuesday 04/26/2011)

It Is Beyond Understanding…

Job 37:5 (Amplified Bible)

⁵God thunders marvelously with His voice; He does great things which we cannot comprehend.

            I am in one of the craziest seasons in my life.  Daily I have no clue what God will require of me, what He will reveal or what connections or encounters I will have with people.  I am watching my daughter’s business exploded and new ideas come flowing out of her like water.  I am watching God place me in people’s lives for no other reason than to help and push them into their dreams and destiny.  For many people this is confusing, because they think I am pushing my dreams to the rear, but they do not understand that God created me to be a help, to be the encourager, the cheerleader and the one that supports and undergirds the mission of others.  As I have learned more about who God is and how He works in my life I have been able to embrace that portion of myself instead of fight against, or run from it.  You see I don’t understand everything, admittedly I don’t understand most things, but I trust God with my life He has never yet failed me or left me when I needed Him.

            As I sat and thought about the whole plan of salvation of how absolutely crazy it sounded, to the human or flesh part of me, I understood in those moments that God’s way are not my ways nor are His thoughts mine, God’s is so far above me in all thing, that a lot of the ways and functioning of the God head are too wonderful to comprehend and to ever have a full understanding of.  It is all too often that we try to pull apart the word of God or even the inspiration of God to understand it as we would understand a system by which we do math, but God is not a man, He is not contained by time and space.  His thoughts are limitless, He is not as we are only using a third of our brain.  He is not limited in His doing He has all of eternity to function in, where as we function in the now. God is in the past, the present and He is the future that we have not even seen yet.  But the thing that is most mind boggling is that God would allow His most prized gift His son, to pay a debt for us that He did not owe and we obviously could not pay for ourselves, that is love beyond understanding, beyond comprehension and emphatically beyond our limited abilities.

            I think about if any of us were in God’s position how things would have played out as far as a plan of salvation.  I could just imagine us, head swinging, finger pointing when man fell in the garden, talking about, “oh, no they didn’t, don’t they know who I am, well they did the crime now they have to do the time”…or “I will just scrap this project and start over.”  Whew thank God, God is God and we are not.  He is merciful, and He is the God that will give us a second chance and then some.  But He is a just and righteous God that operates outside of all that is our reality and inside of it too. He manifest things out of nothing, just like He took us a grains of dirt and formed us into man, and out of man’s rib came a woman.  Out of just a word He spoke the world into existence.  He sent His Son that would live thirty three years, to die for sins that we would not commit until thousands of years later, wow, that is beyond any knowledge I have ever known…