“Have I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged, for the LORD your God will be with you wherever you go.” (Joshua 1:9)
Every day of our life we ALL are having to make decisions that will affect our future.
From the Hebrew biblical point of view, as they view the Scriptures, those decisions will either be leading us towards the light or towards the darkness; meaning they will lead us either closer to God, or away from Him.
It’s our choice which direction we go; either we follow our flesh, or we allow God’s Word and the Holy Spirit to rule in our life.
The Book of Joshua
by Max Lucado
Introduction
May I describe a few battles?
Let’s say that you have a problem with a person—a rotten person.
A scoundrel who has taken advantage of your kindness.
Because of him you have less money, more headaches, and a bitter heart.
Let’s also say that you’ve got the goods on this guy. Caught him. Aha! Red-handed.
You can turn him in. Make a spectacle. Get even and get out.
Give him what he deserves. But something won’t let you.
A verse from your past tethers your heart. “Vengeance is Mine,” says the Lord. “I will repay.”
Within you the battle rages. Let vengeance be mine, Lord, you pray.
Just once. Let me get even. But the Word won’t let you. And with time, you drop your fists to your side and just trust.
Here’s another battle. Let’s say you have a problem with money.
Every month you just barely make it. Each paycheck is spent before it’s cashed.
If just one month you could get a break. Just some cushion. That’s all you need.
Poof, your prayer is answered. Unexpected bonus. An extra month’s salary.
Finally, some breathing room. First, pay off the credit card, next repay my sister, then get the bumper fixed and . . . uh-oh—my giving.
“Surely God doesn’t want me to give 10 percent of the bonus? I mean, I give every month. . . . Surely, He’ll understand if I use this for something else. . . . ”
But the words challenge faintly yet firmly, “Honor the Lord . . . with the firstfruits of all your increase.”
Within you the battle rages. One side says, “Believe.” The other, “Be real.”
Finally, a truce is called and a white flag is waved and a check is written and placed in the plate.
But even as you give, you confess, “Doesn’t make sense, but because you say so . . .”
Let’s go one more. This time let’s really stretch it. Let’s say you are a general. A general in the Israeli army.
Moses is dead, the Jordan has been crossed, the mantle passed, and you are wearing it.
God has promised that you will take Jericho. But as you look at the city, you have to wonder . . . the walls are high.
The people are armed. The challenge is great. But God has a plan.
You can’t wait to hear it. “Surely, He’ll give us more soldiers, stronger weapons, mightier swords.
His plan must include this and more.” So you sit and listen as God explains.
As He talks you are stunned, “What? Walk around the city seven times, blow some trumpets, and . . . . Wait a minute, God, this doesn’t make sense.”
The Book of Joshua is a book of battles. A book for soldiers. A book for people who would dare to win God’s way.
What applied then, applies today. It is the faithful who conquer. Those who follow the strategy win, those who don’t—don’t.
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Certainly God’s ways are not our ways!
To follow God requires our absolute trust, that we willingly hang the total of our individual lives and our life’s circumstances upon His trustworthiness and reliability.
It also requires our absolute obedience and that we trust Him with all of our heart and lean not on our own understanding.
It requires that we let go and let God in every situation we face in life!
Know ye that the LORD He is God; It is He that hath made us, and we are His, His people, and the flock of His pasture.
Everything comes from God
Colossians 1:16
For in Jesus all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things have been created through Him and for Him.
1 Corinthians 8:6
But to us there is but one God, the Father, of whom are all things, and we in Him; and one Lord Jesus Christ, by whom are all things, and we by Him.
Who is Jesus the Christ (Messiah– Anointed One)?
The original plans, purposes and designs began with God the Father.
It was Yeshua (a.k.a. Jesus, whose name means Saviour), whom the Bible calls the “Living Word” (John 1:1,14) and the “Light of the World” (John 8:12), who is also the second person of the Godhead, who goes out and implements ALL that God the Father desires (Col 1:16), and it is the Holy Spirit, who is the Power Source, that makes it happen and then holds it all together (Gen 1:1–2; Job 26:13).
Everything the Father desires happens through Jesus
He is the Aleph and Tav, the beginning and end of all creation.
Romans 11:36
For of Him, and through Him, and to Him, are all things: to whom be glory for ever. Amen.
So what does it mean that Jesus “saves?”
He presented Himself, in our stead, as a propitious sacrifice, on Calvary’s cross, to provide a covering and forgiveness for our sins, that we may be reconciled back into God’s family.
Jesus humbled Himself to become a part of His own creation, then He voluntarily out of His love for the sons and daughters of Adam, presented Himself for this sacrificial death; and He did so when we were far too weak and rebellious to do anything to help ourselves.
And the truth is, even if we hadn’t been so weak, we wouldn’t have known what to do anyway.
We can understand someone dying for a person worth dying for, and we can understand how someone good and noble could inspire us to selfless sacrifice.
But God put his love on the line for us by offering His only begotten Son in sacrificial death, while we were of no use whatsoever to Him.
So why did He do this, you ask?
John 3:16-18
16 “For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life.
17 For God did not send His Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world might be saved through Him.
18 He who believes in Him is not judged; he who does not believe has been judged already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotton Son of God.”
Now that we are set right with God by means of this sacrificial death, by this consummate blood sacrifice, there is no longer a question of our being at odds with God in any way.
If, when we were at our worst, we were put on friendly terms with God by the sacrificial death of His Son, now that we’re at our best, just think of how our lives will expand and deepen by means of His resurrection life! (Romans 5: 6-10)
What’s behind all this, and where is it going?
God knew what He was doing from the very beginning, when He purposed from the outset to shape the lives of ALL those who would, through faith, accept and love Jesus; who would also be willing to be conformed to God’s purposes, to be shaped and molded into the image of His Son (Rom 8:29).
Jesus, the only begotten Son of God, the source of our creation, stands first, at the head of the line of all people everywhere; of all those He restored, who also have received Him, by faith, and have made Him Lord over their lives.
Through Jesus, whom the Bible calls the “last Adam” (1 Cor 15:45), we can now see the original intent and purpose which God the Father had for all of our lives, that we ALL should be can conformed into the image of His Son (Rom 8:29).
God then, through Jesus, fulfill His original purpose, in creating Adam, and He made the decision of what His children should be like, and then He followed it up by calling His children by name (Isa 43:1, Rom 10:3).
After He called them by name, He set them on a solid basis with Himself; and then, after getting them established, He stayed with them to the end, gloriously completing what he had begun. (Mat 28:20, Rom 8: 29-30, Php 1:6)
How do you not love a God like this, who has given so much for us?
Don’t you understand that it is because God is the Source of ALL creation that He gets to make the rules?
People often will get offended, when Christians proclaim the Gospel message.
They call us narrowminded because we say “Jesus is the ONLY way!”
We’re just the messenger’s folks, don’t shoot us, the message did not originate with us.
Access into heaven does not come by the will of man, for the Bible says, “For by grace you are saved and that not of yourself it is a gift of God (Eph 2:8-9).
Jesus said, “I am the Way, the Truth and the Life, and that no man may can come unto the Father, except through Me!”
In John 10:9 He said, “I am the door: by me if any man enter in, he shall be saved, and shall go in and out, and find pasture.”
What God is trying to tell us here is that our access into heaven is not multiple-choice.
As men and women of God’s creation, we don’t call the shots and we don’t make the rules; God does not bend to our wishes, but we must learn to bend to His.
Being a Christian is all about our learning to follow Jesus by faith, and our learning to walk as He walked (1 John 2:6).
This message is all about our getting ourselves out of this victim mentality!
Our culture and our pseudo-watered-down compromised faith has turned us, as individuals and as a nation, into a bunch of wimps, that are told what to think and how to think it.
Do you not see that you are being played as a fools?
Here we are once again, going through this political election cycle, every four years, looking for some compromised lying politician, instead of ourselves and our faith in Jesus Christ, to fix everything that’s wrong in our culture and in our lives?
Someone once said that the definition of insanity is when people do the same things the same way, over and over again, and yet each time are expecting different results.
It’s not gonna happen folks, not until we take responsibility, ourselves, for what’s wrong with our nation and for what’s wrong in our personal lives.
To begin with, what’s wrong with our culture and what’s wrong with our personal lives is not going to change until we change them; and that first is going to require that we are honest with ourselves, and that we are honest with God.
Now the world may not understand this or believe it, but as Christians we understand that the heavens above and this entire world, and everything in it, was created, including our very lives, through the person of Jesus – the Christ (Messiah / Emmanuel – God with us)!
Colossians 1:16
For in Him (Jesus) ALL things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things have been created through Him and for Him.
It is to God and to God alone that we are responsible, and as the Bible tells us, our lives are no longer are own – but that through the propitious sacrifice of Jesus, on Calvary’s cross – that we ALL have been bought with a price.
1 Corinthians 6:19-20
19 Or do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and you are not your own?
20 For you were bought at a price; therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God’s.
The road back home, into our proper relationship with our Creator, starts with the first step, in that we as individuals and also as a nation, humble ourselves before God and pray, that we each turn from our wicked ways and we seek God’s face, as per second Chronicles 7:14.
So what do you say, how about if we get real for a change, and we make the difference, and not look to some man to do it for us?
Come join the Adventure and commit your life to Jesus Christ!
Bitterness, anger, unforgiveness, all of these are choices that we make, that if we allow them to take their course, they will make our lives miserable.
We all need to learn to let go and let God, in every area of our life!
And this is particularly true when it comes to the subject of forgiveness.
I don’t care what the offensive is, anytime anyone starts to go down the path of unforgiveness, bitterness and anger, they are ONLY hurting themselves!
Give ALL your burdens over to God and trust Him to take them.
We are each instructed to put on the mind of Christ (Php 2:5); and in ALL of our affairs, here on earth, with Gods help and the Holy Spirit living inside of us, we are to exhibit the following attributes, as listed in Galatians 5:22-23:
Love – “And so we know and rely on the love God has for us. God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in him” (1 John 4:16). Through Jesus Christ, our greatest goal is to do all things in love. “Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails” (1 Corinthians 13:4-8).
Joy – “The joy of the Lord is your strength” (Nehemiah 8:10). “Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God” (Hebrews 12:2).
Peace – “Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ” (Romans 5:1). “May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit” (Romans 15:13).
Longsuffering (patience) — We are “strengthened with all might, according to his glorious power, unto all patience and longsuffering with joyfulness” (Colossians 1:11). “With all lowliness and meekness, with longsuffering, forbearing one another in love” (Ephesians 4:2).
Gentleness (kindness) — We should live “in purity, understanding, patience and kindness; in the Holy Spirit and in sincere love; in truthful speech and in the power of God; with weapons of righteousness in the right hand and in the left” (2 Corinthians 6:6-7).
Goodness – “Wherefore also we pray always for you, that our God would count you worthy of this calling, and fulfill all the good pleasure of his goodness, and the work of faith with power” (2 Thessalonians 1:11). “For the fruit of the Spirit is in all goodness and righteousness and truth” (Ephesians 5:9).
Faith (faithfulness) – “O Lord, thou art my God; I will exalt thee, I will praise thy name; for thou hast done wonderful things; thy counsels of old are faithfulness and truth” (Isaiah 25:1). “I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith” (Ephesians 3:16-17).
Meekness – “Brethren, if a man be overtaken in a fault, ye which are spiritual, restore such an one in the spirit of meekness; considering thyself, lest thou also be tempted” (Galatians 6:1). “With all lowliness and meekness, with longsuffering, forbearing one another in love” (Ephesians 4:2).
Temperance (self-control) – “But also for this very reason, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue, to virtue knowledge, to knowledge self-control, to self-control perseverance, to perseverance godliness, to godliness brotherly kindness, and to brotherly kindness love” (2 Peter 1:5-7).
“People will admire you for your success, but they will relate to you because of your pain.”
Anyone who has been abused, emotionally, sexually or physically, as a child, will relate to this video and this testimony…
The Victor Marx Story – When Impossible Is The Only Way Out
“Growing up, I suffered abuse.
I was left in a cooler to die at 5 years old. I was molested. I was tortured by a sadistic stepfather. His methods included suffocating, electrocution, drowning, sleep deprivation and extreme physical pain.
One time he held me under water, and I awoke to him breathing in my mouth to resuscitate me. He looked at me and said, ‘Boy, I am the one who gives you life—don’t ever forget it.’
I started drugs in sixth grade. I attended 14 schools, lived in 17 houses. My grandfather killed his wife and shot himself in public. My mom was diagnosed with multiple personality disorder. By the time I was in eighth grade she had married four men.
I never got help as a kid; I was taught to just move forward.
At 18, I joined the Marines to get away. While in the corps I received a letter from my biological dad. He said, I know I was never there for you as a father, and I know you think I am crazy—he’d spent time in a mental hospital for homicidal tendencies—but he said, I’m crazy for Jesus Christ.
The letter was very compelling. I flew to visit him. He invited me to go to church, and I heard a very simple gospel message that changed my life .”
In adulthood, Victor Marx was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder and mental illness; but, instead of remaining a victim, chained to his horrible past, he embraced new life and hope through Jesus Christ.
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It doesn’t matter how old you are, as an adult, unless you have been healed and delivered – by the Lord Jesus Christ – from your past childhood traumas, then that traumatized child is still there, very much alive, living inside of you today.
All those emotional scars, from your past, are still there and when under pressure they will manifest and erupt in your life through unforgiveness, bitterness and fear, which become footholds and strongholds of the enemy (Satan) in your life (Eph 4:26-27), in order that he might further torment you and make your life miserable.
Whether you will admit it or recognize it, all of these negative emotions are still affecting all of your horizontal relationships, with those around you, including your family; and it will remain that way until you are willing to confront all those demons and the fears from your past, acknowledge them and repent before the Lord, and then be set free.
You see what happens today, as an adult, when somebody touches those areas of your life that are still sensitive, there is inveritably an emotional eruption and outburst of anger, and it is that eruption of anger and all the past history that caused it, that God, if you let Him, will heal you of.
And the way you can know that you are free is the same way that you know when you have been healed from an old physical wound.
Many of us today are carrying in our bodies scars from injuries that we have received in the past, that were very painful when they happened, but today all we have is that scar; and even though the memory traces are still there, there is no longer any pain associated with it.
Likewise when you can see your past in that same way, and have someone touch those emotional triggers and find there is no longer any pain associated with them, it is then and only then that you will know that you are healed.
The first step is to be honest with yourself and then to be honest with God.
We have to be willing to admit that we have a problem and that we can’t heal ourselves.
We then have to be willing to admit and confess our faults, and
then through repentance, which means to change the way we think, we allow the Holy Spirit to come in through the washing of God’s Word and rewrite the corrupt programming of our past.
The truth is Jesus Christ is the ONLY one who has the power to change your life and make all things new!
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ΙΧΘΥΣ
Jesus Christ, God’s Son, Savior
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Ps 150:6
Let everything that has breath praise the LORD!
We all, as Christians, will be held responsible for how we used the talents that God has given to us…
1 Corinthians 6:19-20
Glorify God in Body and Spirit
19 Do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and you are not your own?
20 For you were bought at a price; therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God’s.
If you are alive, then know that God has a plan and a purpose for your life (Jer 29:11).
By virtue of the fact that we are alive and have been placed on this earth, by God, it then follows that we each have been given certain gifts and talents.
As we read in Genesis, in the beginning God the Father spoke everything into existence, by the Word of His mouth (who is Jesus), and when it says that He created Adam, it says that “the LORD God formed Adam from the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and Adam became a living soul” (Gen 2:7).
God has placed a seed inside of every life form and plant that He made, so that it may produce after its kind.
He also has placed a seed inside of man, and along with that He has placed in man the ability that he might use his God given gifts and talents, so that man, having been made in the image and likeness of God, that we might also be a creative force in the earth.
None of us are here to take up space, and this is where it all starts.
First of all, it is up to each one of us to first obey the Gospel’s message, receive forgiveness for our sins and be reconciled back into God’s family.
Having now made peace with God, by accepting the propitious sacrifice of His only begotten Son – Jesus – on Calvary’s cross (John 3:16), we are now what the Bible calls born-again (John 3:3).
This means that each of us, through Jesus’ sacrifice and our acceptance of that sacrifice by faith, we are now given access and relationship with the one who is both the Source and Author of our lives.
It also mean that after having received Jesus as our Savior, we must now make Him Lord over our life, as He cannot be our Savior without also being our Lord.
It is God’s purpose and design in all of this that we each be conformed into the image of His Son (Rom 8:29); and that we be about our Father’s business, using our gifts and talents to spread the Gospel and make disciples of all nations.
Come join the Adventure!
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ΙΧΘΥΣ
Jesus Christ, God’s Son, Savior
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Ps 150:6
Let everything that has breath praise the LORD!
‘Oscars So White’ Crowd: If You Don’t Want Segregation, ‘Get Rid of BET’
by JEROME HUDSON
20 Jan 2016
Actress and Fox News contributor Stacey Dash says it’s “ludicrous” for black entertainers to call for a boycott of the Oscars for not nominating black performers while simultaneously supporting the BET and NAACP Awards which only recognize black artists…
As a society we need to quit judging people based on the color of their skin and start judging them by the color of their character!
Discrimination based on race, color or creed is always wrong; and that’s particularly true and even stupid when you are basing it on the amount of pigmentation a person has in their skin. This is something none of us have any control over.
The Bible tells us that God created man from the dust of the earth, and coincidentally enough, wouldn’t you know that as many colors of dirt that we find in the earth, there is an equal number of skin colors.
Thank God we have diversity and we’re not all cookie-cutter images of one another!
As Christians there are no barriers at all, as we are ALL of one blood and are one in Christ!
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ΙΧΘΥΣ
Jesus Christ, God’s Son, Savior
—
Ps 150:6
Let everything that has breath praise the LORD!
Get a load of this, and see what our “Trader-in- Chief” president is doing now…
Ask yourself where did all this newfound wealth come from?
To find the answer to that question all you have to do is follow the money.
Article:
Top US Admiral Fired For Questioning Obama’s Purchase Of Mansion In Dubai
January 10 2016
A stunning new Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) report circulating in the Kremlin today states that one of the United States Navy’s top commanders was relieved of his command a few hours ago after he sent out an “email/posting” revealing that President Barack Obama was in the process of purchasing a multi-million dollar seaside luxury villa in the United Arab Emirates city (UAE) of Dubai.
According to this report, the Commander of the US Navy’s Carrier Strike Group 15, Rear Admiral Rick Williams, posted a “pointed” query on 8 January [since deleted] to the US Naval Institute’s “Readiness Kill Chain” “recipients/responders” list as to why Navy security and intelligence personal had been dispatched from Naval Support Facility Thurmont (aka Camp David) to Dubai on what he termed an “Obama house hunting mission”.
When further questioned by Russian Today journalists via email to provide more details about Admiral Williams firing, this report notes, the Pentagon failed to reply—but then began releasing “anonymous” stories to the US press that Admiral Williams had been viewing pornography on his computer. (And they still think Americans are so stupid that we haven’t figured out yet their standard modus operandi – hahahahah. No wonder China and Russia are so far advanced with their military weaponry, etc. The U.S.A. criminal NATO / UN cabal military, under direction of the aliens and United Nations, is still practicing with their childhood plastic tanks and plastic ships in their bath tubs. )
(The normal customary U.S.A. criminal cabal ‘reasons’ to ‘fire’ a top level military officer or ‘government’ employee: (1) pornography, and (2) illicit sexual affairs, neither of which would have to be true. The ‘affair’ was one of the major charges selected when Petraus was fired. See: http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2012/11/15/silencing-general-petraeus.html )
To such an absurd claim that Admiral Williams (or any US Navy officer or seaman in fact) could view pornography on their computers, SVR analysts in this report note, is an impossibility due to the US Navy/Marine Corps Intranet (NMCI), which not only blocks such sites, but also requires each single user to log in with their own unique password and username and whose records are meticulously kept and reviewed on a daily basis (thanks to Edward Snowden)—and which one would logically think one of the highest ranking officers in the US Navy would surely be aware of.
As to the “Obama house hunting mission,” Admiral Williams was making his query about it before being fired, this report continues, SVR intelligence “assests” in the UAE identified it as being a luxury seaside villa located in the Palm Jumeirah development of Dubai being offered for sale at the price of $4.9 million (18 million United Arab Emirates Dirham), and which a deposit on it was made this past week by the Washington D.C. based global public affairs company Podesta Group.
Important to note about the Podesta Group, this report notes, is that its leader is Tony Podesta who, aside from being one of the most powerful oligarchs in the US, is a close personal friend of Obama, too. (Podesta’s helping Obama exhibits poor decision making and choices. The day will come when he will regret his decision to help Obama.)
Too, if Saudi Arabia itself is behind the purchase of this luxury seaside villa in Dubai for Obama, this report doesn’t state—but to the cost of it being too high after it cost the job of one of America’s top Naval Commanders is beyond dispute.
(America does NOT want bozo, but America DOES want the Admiral.) FIRE bozo and REHIRE the Admiral.)
The UNITED STATES OF AMERICA – WASHINGTON D.C. CORPORATION, together with the International Bankster Cartel (including the Rothschilds and Vatican bank), who both oversees and controls our politics, our medIa – and therefore public opinion, these are the people who are determining the future of our country, while bought and paid for politicians, like Obama, make out like bandits, at our expense.
Jesus told us that we must take up our cross daily…
What did Jesus mean when He said we have to carry a cross?
I’ve heard people talk about a problem they have and say it’s a cross they have to bear, but is this what Jesus meant?
No, this isn’t what He meant—although it’s not necessarily wrong to refer to some problem we are having as a “cross” we must bear.
In Jesus’ day, a cross was a symbol of suffering, and we all have trials and afflictions that may be very hard for us to bear—even with God’s help.
But Jesus meant something far deeper than this when He told His disciples to carry their cross.
He said to them, “If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me” (Luke 9:23).
In Jesus’ day, a cross wasn’t just a symbol of pain and suffering; it was mainly a symbol of death.
What Jesus was telling them is that they needed to put to death their own plans and desires, and then turn their lives over to Him and do His will every day.
You see, Jesus doesn’t simply call us to believe that He existed, or even to believe that He can save us.
He calls on us to commit our whole lives to Him—to trust Him alone for our salvation, and then to follow Him as His disciples.
He said, “Anyone who does not carry his cross and follow me cannot be my disciple” (Luke 14:27).
Is Christ the master of your life?
Have you put to death your own plans and committed yourself to His will for your life?
Don’t be satisfied with anything less, for there is no greater joy in life than following Christ every day.
– Billy Graham
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The problems and obstacles in our life come not to defeat us, but to make us stronger in Jesus!
We need to start looking at these obstacles as opportunities for us to grow and be stretched, in order for us to be conformed (molded and shaped) into the image of Christ (Rom 8:29).
Each one is God’s invitation for us to draw closer and sink our roots deeper in Him.
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We Rise
by Graham Cooke
“If then you were raised with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ is, sitting at the right hand of God. Set your mind on things above, not on things on the earth. For you died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is our life appears, then you also will appear with Him in glory.”
– Colossians 3:1-4
Given the right mindset, everything that occurs to us in life is an opportunity.
The temptation is to see the positive and the negative as things that happen to us: just as we can encounter favor and gifts, so too adversity and strife can come to bite us when we least expect it.
It’s like we’re children, wandering cluelessly through a minefield seeded with beautiful flowers.
That isn’t the case, of course. The positive and the negative are creations of our brains, and how we choose to perceive the situations and circumstances that we find ourselves in will inform how we classify them for ourselves.
Obstacles in life are challenging, in the best and most brilliant meaning of that word: they set out a challenge to us to meet, to rise to in Christ.
They challenge us to increase our capacity for God’s fullness, to make the dream bigger in every respect.
We are in Christ, learning to become more like Him.
That’s our identity in the Kingdom: followers of Christ, subject to the furious love of God.
The church is the Lord’s Beloved, forever learning how to best accept that love, and that passion that God has for us provides us with our identity as Christians and as people, as individuals.
We are warriors. We are men and women who overcome: we do not simply endure, we rise up and overwhelm.
We have been provided with a place in the Kingdom, a place on high by the side of the Father, and we rise up to claim that place.
The action of that rising is the beginning of a spiritual journey.
In point of fact, it’s a Spiritual journey, as we partner with the Holy Spirit, our mentor in Christ and our sponsor in the Kingdom.
His vision becomes our vision as we set out upon the journey: and make no mistake, the road can be a bumpy one.
We’ll encounter blessing, no question.
We’ll meet the fullness of God, the joy of His anointing.
We’ll embrace His kindness and favor.
We’ll come to know the incredible rest that lies at the core of God’s being, that peace that He brings to us all.
There will be an experience of His Presence that will last our entire lifetime.
There will also be opposition. Warfare and persecution come hand in hand with living in Christ.
We’re children in the Kingdom, but we cannot afford to be naïve… we are opposed in our journey.
Negativity has declared itself our enemy. But just as the best and greatest way to destroy an enemy is to make him our friend, so the best way to conquer negativity is not to deny it, to turn our backs upon it, but rather to flip it around and see it from another angle, a loftier perspective. God’s perspective. It’s the art of thinking brilliantly.
The obstacles that we encounter are good for us. Adversity is opportunity in disguise.
Often it’s a very good disguise, of course—but that’s the point. If these things are here to challenge us, they have to represent a challenge.
There’s no Spiritual cache in overcoming when it’s easy, and each one of these stressful situations is specifically designed to provide a maturing experience in Christ.
We need to grow up to be the people that God knows we can be, and these confrontational circumstances are part of the ongoing conversation with Him that allows us to catch a glimpse of those people: to see how He sees, discover how He thinks, and sense His perception of us.
These things are necessary because, to be absolutely blunt, left to our own devices we would probably take every easy option there was.
We’d keep following the line of least resistance, coasting down in the same direction, specifically avoiding anything challenging.
Obstructions will slow us down: but that’s a good thing. It gives us time and space to stop and to think, to examine where we are in Christ and how to overcome this latest incidence of negativity.
Barriers in our way are useful, necessary pauses for reassessment and reevaluation.
It’s at this point that the conversation with the Kingdom must take place.
There are questions that must be raised with the Spirit: what is the obstacle intended for? What is its purpose? What can be released to us in the examination of this latest challenge?
We must always allow ourselves the space to receive what the Father is intending to give to us.
The Father’s vision for our journey isn’t just about the direction we’re intended to take, but also about the height at which we are intended to travel.
You’ll have heard it said before: everything there is to experience in Christ has an element of elevation to it.
We are seated with Him in Heavenly places. We seek what is above. God is on high, the highest, and that perspective is the one we’re intended to assume.
Once we imagine every obstacle, every adverse circumstance, as being a gift from the Father, our own perspective will shift and alter.
It must, because our old perspective was that of the obstructed.
Taking God’s perspective allows us to see the obstruction from a position of having already overcome it.
That challenge moves from tragedy to opportunity. That grief becomes our greatest gift, because it’s been designed, tailored and placed there specifically to assist us in becoming something magnificent… that thing He saw in us before we were even born.
The questions that we ask the Spirit are key here.
In Acts 2, at the Day of Pentecost, the first coming of the Holy Spirit that Jesus had prophesied, two of the truly great questions were asked by those in attendance that day:
What does this mean? and
What shall we do?
That’s inspirational.
Faced with the unprecedented, that first Act that would create a whole church, change the course of millions of lives, level and raise nations and kings, those experiencing the challenge asked the questions that would see them surf that tidal wave and experience the greatness to come.
On that day, they rose. When our time comes, we’ll rise with them.
During those times in your life when you feel like you have more than you can bear and your prayers are not getting through the ceiling, remember this…
God promised in His Word that He will NEVER leave you nor forsake you (Deut 31:6, Heb 13:5); that He will be with you always (Mat 28:20); and not only that, but He also promised to complete the work that He has begun in your life (Php 1:6).
Here’s the deal though, as Christians, we have to learn to live by faith, not by sight; and the Bible says that “without faith it’s impossible for us to please God” (Heb 11:6).
In other words, we have to learn to hang our body and the total of all our circumstances on the reliability and trustworthiness of both God and His Word; and we have to learn to do this in the face of any and all contradictory feelings, evidence or circumstances.
God has a plan, He always does, as we can learn from all the many examples found in the Bible.
He will come through and make a way – even when there appears to be no way – but He’ll do so in His timing and in His way.
Take the children of Israel, for instance, when God delivered them from their bondage of slavery in Egypt, He led them into a box canyon, with two scaling walls on either side and the Red Sea in front of them, with Pharaoh’s army barreling down behind them.
What did God do?
He did the impossible, He opened up the Red Sea so that the children of Israel could pass through on dry land.
He also use that same Red Sea to destroy all of Pharaoh’s army.
Jesus is the same yesterday, today and forever (Heb 13:8); and we’re told in first Corinthians 10 that these stories, that we find in the Old Testament, were written for our edification and admonition, as lessons that we can learn from and apply to our own life.
In Hebrews 5:8, we are told that Jesus learned obedience through the things that he suffered.
As His disciples, do we think things will be any different with us?
Jesus is the Prize that we are all running towards, and the goal is for us to be conformed into His image (Rom 8:29).
We all have those times when we feel as though God is a million miles away and hasn’t a clue about what’s going on in our life.
In these times this is God’s invitation for us to enter into a closer relationship with Him.
An Oak tree can take as much as 60 years to reach maturity, and during those years it passes through many dry spells, where the water is still there; but in order to reach the water the roots have to stretch down deeper into the soil, where the water is.
Likewise, during our dry spells we also have to stretch the roots of our faith deeper into God.
So we have a choice, we can either become a MIGHTY OAK; or if we want to take the quick and easy way, we can become a mushroom, which only takes about an hour to mature.
Come join the Adventure!
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ΙΧΘΥΣ
Jesus Christ, God’s Son, Savior
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Ps 150:6
Let everything that has breath praise the LORD!
SB SALT AND LIGHT MINISTRIES 