The World is (Not) My Oyster

A playground with 2 swings and a bouncy horse

compared to

Disneyland.

So is this world

compared to

the Kingdom of God.

The Way of Life, 2

As I was sitting, I began to think about how heat can destroy bug infestations, someone could burn their home and be rid of the pests. I then began to think about how people with yards and farmers often burn their yards/fields to start fresh. 

Then the verses that reference how some things are purified by water and other things are purified by fire, came into my mind. It was all so quick and spontaneous. It reminded me of how Mark Virkler speaks about how the Spirit communicates with us through spontaneous thoughts. 

I have often wanted what I have believed others have had in THEIR communications with the Lord - dreams, visions, audible voices - overt, 'can't be denied' communications. The 'still small voice' never seemed to be present with me but I know it has been. I just haven't understood that I needed to acknowledge it. If nothing else, these few years worth of blog posts should confirm Daddy Yah's dealing with me. 

Back to my spontaneous thoughts.

I then began to think about how the bible says that things that can with stand the fire, need the fire to be purified but things not as durable need the water.

I thought, 'hmm, how does this relate to people spiritually?'' I thought about how we are washed by the water of the Word. I thought of how Jesus said, now you are clean through the word I have spoken unto you.

 I  talked with my children and told them what I had been thinking on. 

I pondered with them on what things in a person need the water and what things need the fire.

I came to the conclusion that things pertaining to our character need the fire.

I determined that the fire are our difficult trials, traumas and bad situations and that it takes 'heavy' cleansing to forge characters that will shine like gold and silver, sparkle like rubies and diamonds.

My oldest son said that water can clean smudges off of window and glass. 

The water applied daily through application of the Word is sufficient for daily cleansing, like Jesus telling Peter that whoever has been made clean - and this would appear to be the initial cleansing of sanctification that occurs when we are "in Christ" - only needs his 'feet washed'. 

The Way of Life

We want Yah to be a Father to us, so then we must allow Him to  function as that Father.

It is quite easy to to say that every good and perfect gift comes from above from  the Father of Lights in whom is no variableness or shadow of turning, but it is harder to accept that whom the Lord loves he chastens and scourges.

But I would believe that this is the more important function of Abba's 'fatherness' --  the rebuking, chastening, the scourging.

We are so wayward and reluctant in our following of the way of righteousness that discipline MUST be a continual and constant companion of those who would see God.

Wise: from an ancient word that means "to see".
Dom: a suffix that can mean "a condition of".
Wisdom - the condition of being able to see.

Wisdom tells us to hearken unto her for she will lead us in right paths. To be wise is to be able to 'see'. See what? See how to 
discern and judge between what is good and right  according to how the FATHER estimates what is good and right.

Once we are able to 'see' what is good and right, and of course,
follow what is good and right, we are on the path of righteousness.

We are not to walk according to our own reasoning or how things seem.

The standard, the plumbline, for determining what the Father sees as good and right is the Word. Immersing ourselves and allowing the Word to saturate our spirit and soul will help our 'seeing'. 

Being attentive on a daily basis of Wisdom's call, with ears pricked up as an alert son, waiting to hear the voice of the Father, will guide us in righteousness' path. 

As we abide in Christ, and our hearts are intertwined with His, as we become One, as we let the Word of God rule in our hearts, we are purged, cleaned, made undefiled. 

And it is those that are undefiled, purged, made clean, that will see God. Our obedience to following the path, taking heed to the Word of instruction, allowing the correction and scourging to have its perfect work, it is that that will make us an abode of the Godhead. They will manifest themselves to us and through us when the temple is clean.

But we must yield ourselves to the corrective hand of the Father.

Father, help me to not only yield to your correction but to desire your correction! I want to be conformed to the image of my elder brother! I want us to be so intertwined as one that I am always seeing through your eyes and hearing through your ears - manifest yourself to me! Clean me through your word.

We are the Light, Love, Righteousness of the World

Gods is Light. In Him is no darkness at all.
God is Love, there is nothing 'not love' in his acts or ways.
God is Righteous..His actions are never wrong or not good.

God=light=love=righteous

When God spoke the Creative Act, he first called forth Light (Love, Righteousness)

Darkness, hate and all that is 'not good'(unrighteous) came forth from the fall.

Whenever we don't walk in Love we are not walking in the Light.
Whenever we  aren't doing/being ''righteous" we are not walking in Love.
To walk 'in the Light' is to walk in Love and Righteousness

We are in Fellowship with the rest of the Body when walk in Light (Love, Righteousness)
Our wrath takes us out of the arena of Righteousness (Love, Light)

The commandments were given to show the Father's nature and character of
Light, Love and Righteousness. Stephen Jones says that the commandments are
promises - 'thou SHALL NOT steal' - meaning that the inclination to steal (or whatever
unrighteous act we may refer to) will not be in our nature any longer. We partake
of the Fathers' Divine Nature (2 Peter 1:4) through these promises (commandments)
of Righteousness, which are in essence, promises of Love and promises of Light.

Leaning on our old nature, the nature that we call 'the flesh' ,which is one of lust, 
keeps us in darkness, hate and unrighteousness. The flesh is an enemy towards the
things of God and is in rebellion to what is Love, Light and Righteousness ever since
the Fall.

More to come...

Blessed Troubles

Troubles, problems, worries are the womb of our Destiny.

These difficulties that we  must overcome should be studied.

The role they are to play in our lives will most likely not be understood completely until we are on the other side of the difficulty but once we ARE on the other side, we should do more than to breathe a sigh of relief and consign them to a forgotten
'drawer' in our mind.

The Lord is and has orchestrated these events for us to overcome.

In being an 'overcomer' we can share in the Life of Christ and
see the setting free of the Captive and an emergence into
our life as those that follow the footsteps of Christ.

The Spirit's life

In thinking unto the Lord the other night, I thought about how the Holy Spirit is given to us in His fullness but yet it is still only a 'down payment'. We do not have the manifestation of the Spirit in His fullness, like Christ did, because of being in these vessels of clay.

In my thinking, it was likened unto the city's water supply. The large water tower tank in a city holds all of the water, this is the Holy Spirit in His fullness. The individual houses receive all of the water that can flow WITHIN THE PIPES to any given house. Home water pipes are not 10 feet in diameter! They are usually less than a couple of inches in diameter because a private residential home isn't built to receive large amounts of water at anytime, yet the water that can flow is more than sufficient for one family's needs. This is the Spirit being given to each born again believer. However, WE play a part in the manifestation of the Spirit in our lives.

If we only turn on a spigot or faucet partially, then we only get a small flowing of water. All the water that a private residential home can receive IS AVAILABLE to that home but it's POTENTIAL is realized only according to the amount of opening that a person allows through the spigot.

Father, I don't want to hinder, grieve or in any way prevent the Spirit from having His free flowing ministry through my life. Show me how I am not opening my spigot entirely. Help me to open it so that the Spirit may flow freely.

Death to anything not of the Lord

I have been thinking about 'giants' in the land of my flesh. I have read and heard ministers talk about how the spiritual application of entering the Promised Land, or Land of Promises and Art Nelson phrases it, is about doing away with the giants as represented by the things of the flesh - wrath, lust, fear, etc. 

In thinking unto the Lord about this, I could see that not only are we to destroy the 'giant' but the giants' provision - his dwelling, altars and even animals. in like manner we are to make no 'provision' for the flesh to fulfill its lusts. Anything that feeds, supports, cares for, nurtures our wrath, fear, lust, etc. must be destroyed.

Also, we must even kill the 'children' - the fruit of  wrath, the fruit of fear, the fruit of lust, etc. Wrath, fear and lust all  produces (bears children) of unrighteous acts and is not a manifestation of love.

Help me to mortify my members and put on Christ.

So goes the World

Humanity is 'seeing' and 'hearing' according to their desires (lust of flesh, lust of eye, pride of life) as well as the wounds that are imprinted on the soul. For example, in dealing with a person who has mental hindrances due to age, I have noticed that this person says a situation is a certain way when it is obvious that that is NOT the case. This person takes the conversations that are being brought forth and weaves them to fit their own needs - the need to feel superior, the need to be seen as a victim. Even though this person is mentally incapacitated, their condition is an object lesson of how the world is in general - seeing they do not see, hearing they do not hear.  We ALL have this tendency but as we renew our mind, as we come vulnerably before the Lord and seek healing of our inner man, we can begin to see/hear in truth which is reality.

In looking at this person, one can see what the end (fruit) would be of the sort of life that  has been lived. in the manner that this person has lived  A life of self indulgence, when they had been called to temperance, a life of bitterness and anger when they had been called to forgiveness and mercy, a life of physically not hearing well, reflecting spiritual deafness, a life of physically not seeing well reflecting spiritual blindness, a life riddled with fears when they had been called to faith and trust,
lameness where a walk of circumspection  and reconciliation was called for, a life of solitude and loneliness when they had been called to transparency and giving of self to others, a life with open access to tormenting from the evil one, when they were called to life in victory as an overcomer.

Manna

To eat the manna that is Christ is to receive all that He is. It is hard to be satisfied with Manna/Christ when our natural bodies and flesh nature has been overfed and allowed to exert itself with no restraint.

 This unrestrained nature is common to all so an intentional effort must be made to  curtail
natural inclinations 

Inclinations towards stubborn/stiff neckedness, ruthlessness, complaining, unsatisfaction, control, and anything else that does not look like the meek and lowly heart of Christ must be weeded out.

Externally, we can see our overfed bodies, weak minds, cluttered and/or overstuffed surroundings give testament to a disposition inclined towards indulgent, worldly excess.

Once we began to 'keep our body under and put it in subjection'' as was Pauls habit, we can begin
to delight in the Manna. It becomes our source and not the drawings of the flesh or this world. 

We have a greater chance at being an overcomer when we turn down the incessant volume and
neediness that our flesh and the world pour our way.

We "eat his flesh" by doing His will. Jesus said He lived by the Father and we are to live by Him. How did Jesus live by the Father? By doing the Father's commandments which were the Father's will. 

Jesus didn't literally eat the Father! It is symbolic language showing that He was ONE with the Father; whatever you eat becomes ONE with you. It is the same as abiding.

Many of us in the world have eaten at the altar of the world and altar of the flesh for so long that our spiritual senses are dulled beyond recognition. We partake of, eat, obey, and abide in the the dictates of the world and the flesh in how we navigate this life. It seems natural - and it is! But as called out ones we have a new Master to obey and we are now called to live above what is natural in this realm - super natural - no longer to live as mere men and women. This is how we can become overcomers. Help me Lord! Remove the veil from my eyes! Help me to allow your life to manifest through me as a faithful Bride that I may overcome my flesh and this world. 

As a Woman

In my 'thinking unto the Lord', I was pondering the role that women play in this natural realm. I thought about how a female 'program', if you will, has been plugged into my soul so that all my interactions in this natural realm can't help but be processed through the lens of the feminine. My 'spirit' is genderless and when I leave this mortal body, I won't be under the influence of the hormonal and flesh generated impulses of the feminine nature. But for now, I am assigned the role of a woman to carry out the object lesson both here in this realm and as a witness to the spiritual realm of Heavenly Father's purposes for this earth.

1 Peter 3:4 says that the inward heart character of gentleness and quietness/peacefulness are greatly valued by the Father. And these good qualities in the hidden, inner intentions of either gender is well pleasing to the Father. All persons that don't obey the Holy Spirit's influence tend towards harshness and the stirring up of strife.

Women would do well to focus on how the Father desires to develop these blessed qualities inwardly while not being overly focused on their external appearance.