As a gardener I've often joked that there are some weeds whose roots go
as deep as hell. Spiritually, there is a root which grows from the
depths of hell: it's called bitterness.
Bitterness is a
condition of the heart which generally comes from a deep hurt or
disappointment. It’s often brought on by a bad experience with someone
or something and it becomes a root which is fertilized by
dissatisfaction and regret.
For bitterness to spring up,
there has to be an intentional decision to set aside the grace of God
that we are to extend to others - this provides the fertile soil needed
for the root of bitterness to grow (Heb. 12:15).
Bitterness is
a mindset or stronghold within us which puts up barriers to
relationship with God and other people. It turns a hurt into a platform
for vengeance and it seethes underneath the surface of poise, waiting
to pounce like a roaring lion. Bitterness is a motive which lurks in
wait to take opportunity to justify oneself at any cost. Medical
science suggests that bitterness leads to depression, cardiovascular
problems and a weakened immune system. It’s a consuming sickness of the
soul which spills over into the physical body, but there is a certain
cure in our loving Savior!
Repentance, forgiveness and grace
release us from the bondage of bitterness: forgive self, forgive others
and extend grace to destroy the root of bitterness! Completely repent
of and release thoughts of vengeance, self-justification, unforgiveness
and regret! Replace those thoughts with the goodness of God and His
Word - this retrains the heart and mind in God’s grace and love, and
chokes out bitterness. Grace extended not only destroys the enemy’s
opportunity to plant bitterness in us, but it melts the heart of the
person who is bitter against us and others.
Tend your garden: pull up the root of bitterness today and move forward in your life in Christ!
“Thank you for praying. Because of your prayers it was as though God raised us from the dead, because we faced certain death.”
This is Paul’s message of great gratitude to the Corinthians after his life was
spared when spreading the Gospel in Asia. Paul knew, without a doubt,
that the prayers of the saints were what spared his life. Their prayers
were the avenue through which God extended protection and deliverance,
which Paul calls a ‘gift’ in 2 Corinthians 1:11.
Daniel prayed
for understanding in Daniel 10. While the angel Gabriel set out to
deliver that understanding, the enemy’s prince battled with Gabriel to
such a degree that the angel Michael had to be sent to assist him. The
high-ranking demon who detained them was determined to keep revelation
from reaching Daniel-but Daniel’s prayers prevailed through the angels.
Our prayers are of utmost importance in this Christian life, and a
commitment to pray should not be taken lightly. This commitment is
equal to making an appointment with Jesus himself, who intercedes on our
behalf and opens the door to heaven’s participation (Heb 7:25). In
fact, one of the elements of prayer is to ‘bind oneself ‘ to the Lord in
continual supplication, worship and agreement with Him. This type of
determination to press through struggles and remain constant in prayer
opens a road to bring God’s will and empowerment into our circumstances.
As a pray-er, what ‘gift’ will you bring today? Through the prayers of
others Paul received protection and deliverance. Through Daniel’s own
prayers he received understanding. Mostly likely, through someone
else's prayers you received the gift of salvation.
If you are a pray-er, you are a giver!
If we have confessed Jesus Christ as our Lord
and Savior, we have an instant connection between others who have done
the same. However, there’s a deeper intimacy of relationship that comes
from consistency of worshiping together, pressing through struggles together and learning to live the life of Christ together day to day.
This relationship is called ‘fellowship.’ The Bible speaks of it as a
relationship with Christ by participation in the life of the members of
His Body, the redeemed. This fellowship requires vulnerability and
trust that go beyond worldly relationships. Fellowship is spirit to
spirit between the people of God. It’s a picture of the trinity and
their relationship to one another: love and dedication beyond human
capabilities. The hand cannot forsake the other hand; they are attached
to the same body. The mouth and the ears need one another: they
co-exist and are co-dependent, as ordained by God.
When Jesus
fellowship with the Father was broken because of our sins, He cried out
in anguish “My God, My God! Why have You forsaken Me?” His separation
from fellowship with the Father was agonizing. Such is the great
fellowship we share with the Father, but also with one another. It is
so intimate that we are spiritually a part of one another. When this is
broken there is great agony of the heart and soul within us and a
longing to repair the breach.
We are made for fellowship and
we yearn for it. When we don’t have true fellowship we are not able to
experience God’s fullness for our lives. We have been put on this earth
together to impact one another and the rest of the world for Him. Our
process of growth and sanctification is partially dependent on this
fellowship as the Body feeds and helps the rest of the Body to maturity.
Give and receive grace and love. Give and receive wisdom and guidance.
Walk through the dark tunnels with one another in honesty and
forgiveness. Keep the fellowship, called “Koinonia” in the Bible, on a
daily basis. Going to church is not fellowship in itself – that can
simply be a gathering of people. Fellowship is living this life
intimately intertwined with one another through the Spirit of God on a
daily basis.
Are you willing?
The voice that speaks out praise to God is a
mighty weapon of warfare. Psalm 8 tells us that even children and babes
in the Lord can still (silence, stop, put away) the enemy by praising
God! In fact, God has instructed us to do this in all circumstances.
Paul and Silas knew the importance of praising God in every
circumstance (Acts 26). While they were bound in chains in a cold
prison cell, in pain from being thrashed the day before, they praised
God. They first lifted their voices in prayer then praised God not for
what He might do or because they wanted something, but because He is God
and He is worthy. They purposely put their minds on the goodness of
God and their praise echoed throughout the entire cave-like prison.
Every prisoner awoke in the midnight hour and heard those two ‘lunatics’
singing and making joyous noises to the Lord of Heaven.
Then
the grips of hell suddenly broke loose and an earthquake shook open the
doors of the prison! The prison guard was so frightened and amazed that
he took Paul and Silas to his home, cleansed their wounds and became a
believer in Jesus Christ!
At the darkest part of night, the
time when there is no ray of light, the praise of God is ordained and
called for from out of our hearts and mouths. When the voice of the
enemy wants to silence our lives and our witness and bring defeat, God
ordains praise for His great love and faithfulness.
Praise
changes our atmosphere and brings the spotlight of heaven into our
situation; it shakes the foundation of those things that imprison us;
it draws attention to God and off of our concerns; it silences the
voice of the enemy and it makes an announcement that we acknowledge our
weakness in the light of the great God of the universe who is able to
save and rescue us!
“Rejoice in the LORD, you righteous ones; praise from the upright is beautiful (Ps 33:1).
Trials and stresses
of life can be overwhelming, leaving us feeling completely helpless and
hopeless, but David had a powerful approach to life's dire straits,
especially at the kidnapping of his family.
“...David encouraged
himself in the Lord his God” (1 Sam. 30:1-6). David fastened and bound
his heart to the Lords heart and became valiant through God. He
maintained his trust in God and his resolve was strengthened by God’s
constant love for him.
Be encouraged in the One who knows
every need and care you will face. He has already brought resolve to
them, before you were born He had them worked out. Lift your head today
and encourage yourself in the Lord. He has told us of His great love
for us – soak it into your spirit today as though it were warm sun on a cold
winter’s day!
-The Lord your God is mighty on your behalf. He rejoices over you with EXUBERANT GLADNESS and singing (Zeph 3:17).
-I THINK ABOUT YOU continually, says the Lord your God! I have
planned good things for you both today and in your future (Jer. 29:11).
-The Lord greatly delights and TAKES PLEASURE IN YOU, His people (Ps 149:4).
-The Lord our GOD HAS SENT MINISTERING ANGELS to assist us and come to our aid (Heb. 1:14).
-If GOD IS FOR US, who could possibly come against us – for they stand
against the Almighty if they stand against us (Rom. 8:31).
Blessed be the name of the Lord, who daily loads us with benefits! (Ps 103)
(All scriptures paraphrased)
As a man thinks in his heart, so is he…” (Prov 23:7)
The word ‘think’ in this scripture has two connected meanings:
1. to estimate oneself 2. to be a gatekeeper.
To estimate is to measure value or potential. There are two choices in
how we estimate ourselves: by human opinion or by God’s destiny for
our lives. God’s estimation of you is your destination and calling. The
most important thing you can do in obedience to God is to find out who
He has created you to be, believe it and live it! Your own estimation
could be wrong and it could take you in the wrong direction. Don’t
allow someone else’s estimation of you to stop you from following God’s
plan, either. Keep going in His direction for your life! Get
understanding of who He has made you to be and how you are to serve Him
and others. Agree with His estimation!
A gatekeeper guards a
gate and decides who or what gets entry or access. You are the
gatekeeper of your mind and heart. You decide what goes into it to form
your thoughts and direct your life. You can close the gate and you can
open the gate: the gatekeeper holds the key to his own development.
How much of God is allowed in as opposed to worldly influence? You must
open the gate of your mind to the things that help you fulfill God’s
estimation of you – don’t allow things that are contrary to the heart of
God!
As a man thinks in his heart....so he will become! Agree with God's estimation! Be a faithful gatekeeper!
There’s a hunger in much of the Church today for supernatural things
such as miracles, visions, angelic visitations and dreams. I would even
go so far as to say that many in the church have a desperate desire to experience these things.
Biblically, these are very much a part of the Christian experience.
They’re seen in a variety of circumstances in the Bible, and they’re
generally unpredictable in their appearance in Biblical writings. I’ve
heard many people say that these things no longer exist today, however
the Bible never called for an end to them. Additionally, the lives of
everyday people in Bible writings included these experiences as a means
of hearing God’s will and leading for particular callings and
circumstances in their lives. The Bible includes these examples as
possibilities of the ways in which God might move in our lives.
There is one common theme for every one of these supernatural
experiences in the Bible: the one receiving the experience never sought
it! In fact, most of these events occurred when people were simply
serving God through earnestly living His word, loving others and
fulfilling His purposes for their lives. They may have called out to
God for help or wisdom, but they never ask Him to give them one of these
supernatural experiences. We must be cautious not to seek these
experiences so desperately that the rest of our walk with the Lord comes
to a standstill, effectively stifling our sanctification process!
The reason I write this word today is to ask you to look at what God
has done in your life. There have been many miraculous things in mine
that didn’t come with a flash of lightning or being rapt in a vision,
but nonetheless they were miraculous. And there are times I’ve seen
things which I know my natural eye couldn’t have conjured up – it had to
have been supernatural. The point is that God is in every moment of
our lives and it’s His decision how he chooses to move in each moment.
Our openness to His possibilities is necessary, but when we over-stress
our own definition of ‘supernatural’ and hyper-seek these experiences,
we sometimes miss the voice of God and the way He wants to move in our
lives. It is also necessary to see that Biblically, there are some
giftings which experience these occurrences more regularly than others.
Remain balanced in God: just seek Him and stay in His Word. He knows
the best avenue to get you where He’s created you to go in life.
Recognize and be thankful for His participation, no matter how it comes.
Yet, don’t limit His means of moving for fear of how He might
supernaturally do it!
There's an old saying which asks the question "how do you eat an elephant?" The answer is "one bite at a time."
This is the same way we become accustomed to things which shouldn't
have any part in our lives as children of God. TV programs, unhealthy
relationships, ____________. You and the Lord can fill in the blank.
A little look here won't hurt.... and a little time there won't hurt....and before long we have swallowed the entire elephant.
Every once in a while we have to do a 'house cleaning' and get the
ungodly influences out of our homes. A friend of mine use to say 'get
the hell out' of your life! It's appropriate to say the same here.
You are the salt of the earth....don't lose your saltiness. You are
designed to bring the life of God into your home and the world. Get rid
of those things which conflict with this calling and draw your time and
attention away from God. It's time for a holy house cleaning!
God is willing to be your everything? Are you willing to let Him?
Life can have long and hard stretches: it
seems like a dirt road at times and we're walking barefoot. Every step
feels hard and dry and painful. We can certainly feel like the Pilgrim
in Pilgrim's Progress.
There will
be long, straight and dusty stretches in this walk, desert places so to
speak, but there is purpose even in the desert place. Take the
attitude that God has got you in the palm of His hand in that desert
place, speaking to you and forming you. Let the Son bake you until you
are perfectly cooked in Him - don't fight it!
Hope and vision
keep us going during this time. We call out to God, who has perfect
timing and never let's His word fall to the ground, and lift His word
of promise up to Him in thankfulness. Then we suddenly come around a
bend on that dusty, desert road and see things we couldn't see on the
long, straight stretch. Those things were there, but we couldn't see
them until we got around the corner. Somehow that long road changed our
ability to see. Turning the corner made things seem bright and clear
and there was relief and joy. Now we shake off the dust and keep
moving forward.
Jesus knew how to handle the naysayers and
accusers, and He often did it with irony and unconventional methods.
The Pharisees discourse with Jesus in John 8 is a perfect example of
this. Here was Jesus, teaching and
bringing life to the crowds at the temple, and the Pharisees drag in a
woman whom they’d caught in adultery. “Well Jesus, since you know the
law, tell us, what are we supposed to do with her?” What they were
trying to do was test Him to see if He would follow the letter of the
law. They saw the crowds following Jesus day after day and wanted to
discredit Him for fear of losing their power over the people, so they
tested Him with the very thing they represented: legalism!
This is what Pharisees do. They see the Bible as a set of rules, a
cause and effect answer book. A Pharisee looks for what should be done
to stay within the bounds of the Bible’s ‘rules’ instead of seeking
God’s answer for each individual circumstance through His Spirit. In
this way Pharisees remove the grace of God and the creativity of His
solutions.
Jesus means of dealing with both the Pharisees and
this woman were straight from the heart of God. God knew the motives of
the Pharisees and the heart of this woman, and because Jesus listened
to the Father’s wisdom, He brought the perfect solution. With a crowd
of people behind Him and the Pharisees in front of Him, Jesus stooped
down and drew in the sand, continuing to illustrate His lessons to the
crowd as though the Pharisees weren’t there. Some things just don’t
deserve our immediate attention! The Pharisees became more indignant
and demanded an answer. Jesus stood up and looked at the crowd, saying
“everyone who is without sin, pick up a stone and get in line to throw
it at her.”
This statement hit the hearts of the crowd!
Jesus could see into them! He knew their sins! But more importantly,
He exuded the love and forgiveness of God. He brought the grace of God
not only to this woman, but to everyone in the crowd, including the
Pharisees. But they wouldn’t receive it!
The plan of the
Pharisees backfired, just as it had with Daniel in the case of the
lion’s den. It was the same ploy of the enemy to discredit the servant
of God with manipulation - based on fear of losing status. The
Pharisees saw Jesus as a threat when He was actually the answer to their
fears. He was the freedom they longed for and the grace God desired to
give them. But they refused it. They stuck with the letter of the law
and discarded the grace of God, and once again walked away frustrated.
Pharisees are ‘anti-grace’ representatives. They misunderstand the
New Testament to be a continuation of the Old Testament Law. But God’s
answer to this shortcoming is GRACE! This is what He gave to each
Pharisee, the woman caught in adultery and each person in the crowd that
day. The irony of God’s answer to the Pharisee's sin of legalism is to
cover him with grace, the very thing he lacks. The sin of a Pharisee
is no different than your sin or my sin – it can be washed away by the
blood of Jesus and the grace of God. Give it and receive it today!
Every Christian can sharpen his discernment by becoming more intimately
acquainted with the Word of God. Paul exhorts us to get past feeding
on the milk of the word, as infants feed, who cannot discern
the world around them. He tells the recipients of Hebrews that their
lack of feeding on the meat of the Word has caused them to have delayed
growth, dull spiritual hearing and sluggish insight (Heb. 5:11, AMP).
This would be similar to feeding a child food which doesn’t have enough
nutrients for him to grow: he’d become malnourished and his body would
not function properly.
In Hebrews 5:13-14 Paul elaborates
more specifically the effects of being malnourished in the Word: our
thoughts, purposes and actions remain infant-like and immature. This is
because we can only think and do as the Word instructs to the degree we
have it inside of our hearts and minds. If there is no foundation of
righteousness within us, we can neither live righteously nor discern
what is righteous and what is evil. However, the person who is filled
with the Word, and is daily being transformed by it, discerns through
every sensory organ in his body (Heb 5:14). In other Words, once the
physical body is given over to the life of Christ and continues to feed
on the meat of the Word, it can be used to discern the world around us.
If we brush up against something we might discern either evil or good
from our ‘touch’ perception. If we see something, we can discern evil
or good with our ‘sight’ perception. Understand that our complete
physical bodies are part of the gift He’s given us to not only live on
this earth, but to discern the world around us for our benefit and
protection.
Another requirement of discernment is to love!
Discernment is not based on suspicion – it’s not looking for trouble or
trying to pick out people and circumstances that can be fixed. The
truth of the Word and discernment work hand in hand to examine and
approve the things that are of God and dismiss those that aren’t. That's
the job of discerning - to approve the things that are of God. It's
not a personal affront to anyone when we discern, but a necessary
element of the Christian walk and one of God's ways of protecting us.
The book of Philippians tells us that our love will abound to a greater
degree as we grow in the Word and discernment. In other Words, sharper
discernment is a means of excelling in love. Why? Because as we grow
in the Word we grow in the character of God and we are able to approve
and promote the things of God in others and in our world around us (Php
1:9-11).
I pray that your love for the Word of God will grow;
that you’ll have a passion to seek Him through His Word. This is a
sure fire plan to spread the love of God by discerning good and evil;
approving of what He approves!
When I was a child my Mom had a machine that
was supposed to shake away fat. The machine had a large motor elevated
on a stand to about waist height. A belt wrapped from one side of the
motor, around my mother’s posterior, to
the other side of the motor. When Mom turned on the fat shaker the
living room floor vibrated. It seemed odd to me at the time that a
person could shake free from their fat in such a manner, but she swore
by it, until the motor broke down.
The fat shaker wasn’t
effective because the concept didn’t coincide with the way God designed
our bodies to work. It was a short cut answer which circumvented God’s
design for not only our physical bodies, but the whole person.
Because God cares about the whole person, He’s not into circumventing
issues in our lives to bring easy answers. In fact, much of this life
in Christ is about learning to walk through difficult things and
removing the mountains instead of walking around them (Mark 11:23).
Consider the outcome of some shortcuts recorded in the Bible:
-Abraham and Sarah’s decision to have a child through Sarah’s handmaiden instead of waiting on God’s plan and timing (Gen 16).
-Simon the Sorcerer’s desire to buy the power to impart God’s Spirit as
opposed to seeking relationship with God and being filled with the
Spirit (Acts 9).
-David’s decision to carry the Ark of the Covenant
on an ox-cart (which resulted in the death of a friend) instead of
following God’s prescribed method of transporting the ark (1 Chron 13).
These shortcuts all have one thing in common: they show that God’s
perfect will is never accomplished by the flesh of man because true
faith is trusting God and obeying His voice. When God prescribes a way
of doing something He has in mind to work out what’s best for our
entire being; the whole body, soul and spirit of a person. If we invent
our own processes of completing His plan we may get to the destination
we want, but the casualties we leave amongst our friends, family,
finances, personal growth (etc.,etc., etc), can create worse problems.
There are people and circumstances that God wants each of us
to affect as we reverently work out our salvation at His direction.
Decide today that you will not have things done your way and seek
shortcuts to His plans, but you’ll submit fully to His direction and
receive the blessings that exist in God’s process of bringing us to His
destination!
There are definitely times when God allows us
to go through trials for our own benefit, and there are times when we’re
being attacked by the enemy of our souls and he brings a trial on us,
but there are many times when we bring
those trials on ourselves. In any of these cases, God can use the trial
to make us stronger if we are willing to hear Him and obey.
How often do we hear people tell us they’re going through warfare?
Certainly this is a reality for the Christian, battling the ploys of the
enemy in our everyday lives, and Paul expounds on this greatly in
Ephesians. However, we often bring on our own trials because of sin in
our lives and no amount of commanding or taking authority over the
situation is going to get rid of the problem in that case. The truth is
that we have to face our faults and examine ourselves through the Holy
Spirit or we’ll compound sin with neglecting to admit that sin and turn
from it.
Everyday life is full of opportunities to fulfill
our own desires and we can’t blame those desires on the enemy. The book
of James says “every person is tempted when he is drawn away, enticed
and baited by his own evil desire [lust, passions]” (James 1:14 AMP).
So blaming the enemy when you have no lunch money for your child is not
valid if you bought Starbucks on the way to work every day this week.
And crying out to God for your spouse to spend more time with you…when
you’re at a church event 4 nights a week while your better half sits
home with the kids… is not an attack of the enemy. The enemy will use
those situations and compound them, but you can command and speak to the
situation until your blue in the face and it won’t change anything!
It’s a condition of the heart that needs to be changed - it’s called
selfishness.
There’s a scientific law which states ‘for every
action there is an equal and opposite reaction.’ We have to see the
cause and effect of what we do in our lives. Even though God gives
great grace, we cannot take advantage of that grace. Its intention is to
teach us to say ‘no’ to ungodliness and live for Him (Titus 2:10-11),
in essence giving us numerous opportunities to repent even as we see the
effects of sin in our lives. This is why regular time alone with the
Lord in reading His Word, worship and repentance is so crucial to our
lives. God will stop us in our sinful tracks if we get our hearts
before Him and let the Holy Spirit convict us of our sin – this greatly
benefits us and advances the Kingdom of God as a testimony of His
goodness in our lives.
We must not be tools in the hands of the
enemy because of our own selfish desires! Make a choice. Be honest
with yourself. Get off of the merry-go-round of having the same old
problems pop up in your life and face those things which are your fault.
Stop the insanity and repent.
