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Take Hold Of Your Daily Adventure

Have you ever considered the adventure God offers us each day with the circumstances that arrive? An adventure is defined by ’a bold, usually risky undertaking’, an ’exciting undertaking’, ’a very unusual experience’ and ’hazardous action of uncertain outcome’. Doesn’t that sound like faith?! Then why do we think and speak of a roller coaster or treasure hunt as an adventure and not so much our everyday faith walk with Christ? Why do thoughts of that first big dip on an amusement park ride invoke such deep anticipation and enthusiasm while our spiritual journey of the highs and lows each day seem meager in comparison?

I received word late in the afternoon just three days ago that my job would be ending mid week. I had all kinds of questions for God at first and then sat back in my chair for a moment to ponder a deeper meaning within. My head lifted a little higher as I recalled His provision is never failing… my heart was glazed in peace.

As I laid in bed that night I couldn’t help but become giddy about the adventure He and I were about to take together! Its in these times of closed doors, that if we allow, our confidence in the flesh is surrendered to the faith that our Almighty Provider is going to open another (Matthew 7:7, Luke 11:9). Taking it further, we know its going to be good (Romans 8:28)!

Everything on this earth, all creation and life were created to give glory to God. He gives us these experiences to show Himself glorious, supreme to any measure of supernatural human strength we could possibly muster up. For it is only by the grace of God that we are even still standing!

He calls us to a place of faith and rest in Him that He will bring goodness to us if we believe. He goes before us and with us (Deuteronomy 31:8). Now that is some kind of adventure! Everyday we have this opportunity available to us if we’re willing to let go of the reins and hand over our hearts fully to God. This ’job loss’ has me excited with anticipation for the glory of God to be revealed! And when this adventure is over, I know I’m gonna stand up and say “Let’s do it again!” Daily living with ’no hands’ in surrender to Christ is the best adventure life has to offer! If its not an adventure to you, I dare say you’re not totally surrendered to Him.

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A Prayer Over Me and You

At a conference in Pennsylvania, Beth Moore prayed this prayer. I am passing it along  as proclamation and prayer over you too. Soak it up sister and let the marvelous Almighty God fill your cup overflowing with His wonder working presence!

“All powerful, All glorious God, Creator and sustainer of Heaven and Earth The One who loves, us, calls us, and graces us He who can do no wrong And for whom NOTHING is impossible

With everything in me this day I intercede for my sister This, Your beloved daughter Set Your love so steadfastly upon her that she feels the beautiful weightiness of it.

Stir up in her an unexplainable hunger for Your Presence and Your Word. Be her prized portion, Lord Jesus.

Awaken anything that has died an unnecessary death in her. Grant her tenderness toward You and compassion toward others. Pluck out by the deepest roots anything in her life that YOU did not plant. Make Yourself noticeable TO her and make Yourself noticeable THROUGH her.

Build her into a REMARKABLE servant That impacts her entire family line. When Your ways are hidden from her, Flood her with the supernatural comfort Of her absolute unhiddenness with You.

Convince her to quit hiding the things that need the most healing. Be her stunning strength in weakness. Lend her rapturous moments of exulting and dancing Even in much tribulation.

Be the best thing that ever happened to her relationships Lord. Give her favor with You and with man. Miraculously birth within her a love for her enemies And after her sacrificial love has come to full bloom, miraculously cause her enemies to be at peace with her.

Right now, Lord, even RIGHT NOW go to the depths of the darkness within her and dispel any hatred buried there. Bring her dramatically into agreement with You Over all her resentment and bitterness And all claims to entitlement Empower her to forsake her unforgiveness and to forsake every grudge and destructive self-comfort.

Fire her up in her a fury of spiritual giftedness and enable her to do what is verifiably impossible for her. Grant her great delight and true humility in serving others Slay every prejudice and fleshly partiality.

Whether or not she is gifted to speak or teach Grant her the supernatural unction to clearly communicate Christ Touch her lips with coals from Your altar And sanctify her to carry the Gospel into her sphere of influence.

Give her eyes to see the invisible and the sacred in the simple. Infuse her with a strong sense of purpose and an undaunted appreciation of adventure.

Make her intolerant of any area of personal bondage and urgent about her freedom. Be her ever-loving Defender and Deliverer.

If she’s in a desert, bloom something stunning and obvious there. If she’s drowning, plant the soles of her feet on the surface of the water. If she’s coldhearted, crack the shell around her heart and set her free to love.

Reveal to her the root of her fears Give her courage to forsake it Then astonish her with a freedom that is not of this world. Jesus, make her living proof. Blow her faith wide open.

In closing, Lord, I speak Your all-glorious Name over her In all the weight and authority it carries. I speak Jesus over her Spirit. I speak Jesus over her heart. I speak Jesus over her mind. I speak Jesus over her physical body.

In obedience to Your Word, I have prayed by faith and my willing sister has received by faith. As You accomplish these divine works according to Your will and to Your purposeful timing, Make her acutely aware that it is YOU.

Cause her to make her boasts in You alone. And cause her with much amazement to behold the miracle within And say, “Who is this You are making me? Who is in this body of mine??”

In Jesus’ wonder-working Name and matchless authority, Amen and So Be It.”

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To Be More Than Who You Are

We can only be ‘like’ Christ if we are ‘in’ Christ. A personal unification in Him will bring about a sanctification through us like Him.

The blessings that we have are all ‘in’ Christ (Ephesians 1). We have been crucified with Christ, raised with Christ, seated in the heavenly places in Christ. Our identity is in Christ.

When He calls us to holiness, He calls us to be who we are; which is profoundly encouraging and free. When we are born again in Christ, He calls us to be who we are in Him, not who we once were. It doesn’t mean the fight against sin is easier or that sin is not even a battle. The union with Christ is fixed and unchanging. It’s a ‘communion’ with Christ that ebs and flows (John 1) but still needs to be worked at.

The Christian life still entails obedience. It still involves a fight. But it’s a fight we will win. You have the spirit of Christ in your corner. There will be things that bring you to your knees, but if you are in Christ, it will never knock you out. You are no longer a slave, but free. Sin has no dominion over you. It can’t, it won’t because a new King sits on the throne. You serve a different master and salute a different Lord.

We often neglect the Spirit in our lives. We do not have a weak Spirit, but we have power in us strengthening us in the inner being (Ephesians 3).

Romans 6 says “you are dead to that.” You died to ‘that’ (sin) and are alive to something new. We need to tell ourselves this and not allow the devil to continue to whisper lies that say ‘This will never change’, ‘I will never show progress’… this is where people feel most defeated. The Spirit that is alive in you, working in us, says “you don’t have to be like this”. You may not be where you’d like to be in the full glorification of Christ…. you may take three steps forward and two steps back but by God’s grace, by Christ’s intercession we can be much more than we are.

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Gods Restoration For His Sake

Sometimes we get caught in the idea that if ’good’ things are happening to me, God must be blessing my walk. But when we examine the book of Ezekiel, we find God’s ’goodness’ isn’t for the people’s sake at all. In fact, in the Israelites rebellion, God was still restoring for HIS namesake.

In Ezekiel 36:16 is where we find God’s concern for His name. Israel’s restoration would be more than physical. God promised, I will sprinkle clean water on you and you will be clean; I will cleanse you from all your impurities and from all your idols. This cleansing will be followed by the impartation of new life. God will give the converted nation a new heart and a new spirit. In place of a heart of stone He will give Israel a heart of flesh. With God’s spirit indwelling them, they will be motivated to obey His decrees and laws.

God’s restoration will not simply be an undoing of Israel’s sin to bring her to a state of neutrality. Rather it will involve the positive implanting of a new nature in Israel’s people that will make them righteous. Jeremiah called this work of God the “new covenant” (Jeremiah 31:31). Implanting God’s Spirit in believing the Israelites will produce a new relationship between Israel and her God: You will be My people, and I will be your God. God will extend all His graciousness to His people.

Being delivered from their sin, they will experience the bountiful provision of the land including grain, fruit and crops without famine (34:29). When Israel reflects on God’s grace and her former character (her evil ways and wicked deeds), she will realize she does not deserve His favor. In fact, she will loathe herself because of her detestable practices, looking back in horror at them. The blackness of her past actions will contrast starkly with the light of God’s grace.

In the future, when Israel recalls her past actions, she would recognize that God had not saved her because of her merit. God was not doing this for her sake, but to magnify His own name. When Israel is restored and the land cultivated, people would note that this wasteland was like the Garden of Eden (v. 35). That’s amazing to think of right there! That God would take the waste they created and make it so pure again. Israel’s cities, formerly in ruins, would be fortified and inhabited. To the surrounding nations Israel would become an object lesson of God’s grace.

The people would be forced to acknowledge God’s sovereign power in restoring His people: “Then the nations that are left all around you shall know that I am the Lord; I have rebuilt the ruined places and replanted that which was desolate. I am the Lord; I have spoken, and I will do it.”

God also caused the nation to increase numerically, which was considered a sign of God’s blessing. When we look back at at all the mess we’ve left behind, its important not to consider God’s restoration and blessings today as a sign that we must be doing something right. The Almighty, Creator and Sustainer will not let His name be defiled by His people and will restore His namesake.

We, as believers, have a responsibility to God if we say His glory is our ultimate purpose. Our wicked ways and innocent intentions can tear down the name of Christ if we don’t remain mindful of those looking upon us… looking to us as an example of the Jesus we proclaim as our King. In the midst of our ways, we must not mistake God’s hand of restoration as a blessing for our walk, but rather a redemption to His name for His sake.

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To Give Him Glory

What if nothing less than the flagrant fame of Jesus Christ became your life ambition? What if the wholly surrendered life in Christ is captured for what it really is: the most exhilarating adventure available for human flesh and blood. It is the offer to live for something so much greater. It is the offer for a life that matters-where His glory is jealously guarded and His fame is generously spread.

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The Sting and The Salt

There are times when the things of the past, our former ways, come to the surface of our ’new being created in the likeness of Christ’. And in repentance of this old nature, we feel the pain and sorrow grieving God for the choice we made. 1 Corinthians tells us sin/death will ’sting’.

Today, God’s living word began to stir in my heart, revealing attitudes and ways of a former self in need deliverance. I crawled to my knees in abandonment as His mighty hand held my heart. A Godly sorrow poured out the pain in many heavy tears as I renounced this ’old’ self. And as each teardrop fell, I felt a literal sting slide down my face containing carried pain and burdens I’ve been harboring. One after another, my sorrows streamed across my cheeks like the sting of salt on a wound.

Two days ago, I received a medical chemical peel on my face. The old calloused and conditioned skin is now dead and has mostly peeled off, revealing a newer, fresh, more pure and sensitive face. I heard God say this: “Those tears represent each burden and pain of an old nature. The sting of those sins are felt only to the new creation I have revealed.”

You see, a man stuck in his ways cannot feel the sting of death carried in his sin; he is conditioned and calloused to its ’pain’-just as the outer layer of my face had become conditioned for those salty tears. But when a new creation is revealed, the ’sting’ of an old nature can truly be felt.

“The newness” of Christ has covered me. God didn’t create us for the sting of death/sin. When we are renewed in Him and “put off the ways of our former self”, we become more sensitive to the ’sting’.

For me, I am reminded of this: In each of those tears I shed, there were burdens… and there was the salt. Jesus IS the Salt. And this much i know, though it stings in the moment, Salt heals like no other! Amen!

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He IS faithful

He says when you’re tempted to lose faith because of your suffering, when things are really hard, rest on the power of God. Rely on the God, “who saved us and called us to a holy calling, not because of our works but because of his own purpose and grace, which he gave us in Christ Jesus before the ages began, and which now has been manifested through the appearing of our Savior Christ Jesus, who abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel” (2 Timothy 1:9-10).

Before a promise was ever broken or a friend ever betrayed or disappointed, before a dream or desire was ever left unfulfilled, our responses were intended, planned by God to make known the glory of his grace in Jesus. He drew us a real-life picture of his love with the body and blood of Jesus Christ, who suffered for us. When we’re feeling discouraged and defeated, we’re called to remember that God loved us from long before we were born. He revealed his purpose to save us and his grace to sustain us in these trials through the life, death, and resurrection of the Savior, his Son, Jesus, the Messiah. (Oh, God. Thank you. You are the breath in my lungs. The only good in me.)

Paul says he abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel. Immortality means a life that lasts forever. And life means much more than breath in our lungs and a heartbeat. It means a full life, an abundant life, a joyful life, a life worth wanting forever. We can’t pray long enough or prepare well enough for the things He works in our lives. But James reminds us “The prayer of a righteous man has great effectiveness.” In Jesus, not only will we not die, we’ll taste true life, the life we ache for now, and we’ll have it forever. No one can ever take it from us.

Our knees are down, our faces are up, and our Bibles are open but what we need is Heaven wide-open and grace spilled down in a drenching flood. We want God to reveal Himself in a way we can’t ignore or recover from anytime soon. i am praying with all my heart for a revival. He IS faithful. That I know. “He who is the blessed and only Sovereign, the King of kings and Lord of lords…To Him be honor and eternal dominion. Amen.”

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Everlasting God

I am in awe this morning of God’s love for me. I feel his touch soothing the hurts from what this world has offered. Though others may come and go, He always remains. As I walk one with the Father, hand in hand, He is heavy on my mind in every moment. My security rests in the unified identity developed in Christ. Though the wind may blow and the seas toss around me, this daily walk cannot be rocked because my foundation is in the solid Rock of All Ages. My joy is everlasting in His word and my love lived out in His obedience. My freedom I gain from His provision. When all is gone, I assuredly remain standing in the promises and hope, the joy and love that He so graciously gives.

“One thing I know that I have found Through all the troubles that surround You are the Rock that never fails.

You never change, You’re still the same You are the Everlasting God You will remain after the day is gone and the things of earth have passed”

What an amazing, everlasting God!

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What is love

John 15:13 “Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life”.

From time to time I will hear someone say “I would die for you” in a profession of love but the test of this statement does not come when faced with the literal grave. The test of Jesus’s living words were given to be lived out everyday of our lives.

So what does that mean “that someone lay down his life”? I believe its a spiritual death to our human desires that Jesus is referring to here. That if we say we love someone, then our wants and desires are laid to rest, put in the grave for the sake of those we love.

Not by your profession, but ’how’ have you laid down your life today? That is your testimony of this scripture lived out.

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The Far-Reaching Rivers of Life

He who believes in Me . . . out of his heart will flow rivers of living water —John 7:38

A river reaches places which its source never knows. And Jesus said that, if we have received His fullness, “rivers of living water” will flow out of us, reaching in blessing even “to the end of the earth” regardless of how small the visible effects of our lives may appear to be. We have nothing to do with the outflow— “This is the work of God, that you believe. . .”. God rarely allows a person to see how great a blessing he is to others.

A river is victoriously persistent, overcoming all barriers. For a while it goes steadily on its course, but then comes to an obstacle. And for a while it is blocked, yet it soon makes a pathway around the obstacle. Or a river will drop out of sight for miles, only later to emerge again even broader and greater than ever. Do you see God using the lives of others, but an obstacle has come into your life and you do not seem to be of any use to God? Then keep paying attention to the Source, and God will either take you around the obstacle or remove it. The river of the Spirit of God overcomes all obstacles. Never focus your eyes on the obstacle or the difficulty. The obstacle will be a matter of total indifference to the river that will flow steadily through you if you will simply remember to stay focused on the Source. Never allow anything to come between you and Jesus Christ— not emotion nor experience— nothing must keep you from the one great sovereign Source. -Utmost For His Highest