IN DEBT to the Believer and the Unbeliever
"Both to Greeks and to barbarians
(to the cultured and the uncultured), both to the wise and to the foolish,
I have an obligation to discharge and a duty to perform and a debt to pay."
Romans 1:14 (Amp
)

28 October 2010

Faith and Patience Obtains the Promise

"For when God made the promise to Abraham,
since He could swear by no one greater, He
swore by Himself saying,
'I will surely bless you, and I will surely
multiply you.'
And thus, having patiently waited,
he obtained the promise."
Hebrew 6:13-15


God is faithful. Be strong in the Lord. Stand, and having done all to stand, stand. Do not throw away your confidence, which has a great reward. For you have need of endurance, so that when you have done the will of God, you may receive what was promised.

1 Cor 1:9; Eph 6:10,13,14; Heb 10:35,36

11 October 2010

Our Praise Creates a Throne for Him


"Yet You are holy,
O You who are enthroned upon the
praises of Israel."
Psalm 22:3

"And let them make Me a sanctuary,
that I may dwell among them."
Exodus 25:8


God wants to be with us.  He wants to dwell with us.
He says, "Draw close to Me, and I will draw close to You."   When we gather together corporately and enter into a praise, a worship of Him (the deepest part of us touching the deepest part of Him - our hearts touching His heart) it creates a spiritual throne, a place suitable and fitting for Him to come and sit upon, a place of honor and exaltation. In this God receives our heart-felt invitation and comes and sits and enthrones Himself upon our praises. The Spirit of God will come mightily yet in a measure when we individually worship Him in the private seclusion of our own secret place, but He will manifest Himself in an even greater measure in the corporate setting as we corporately join our hearts to praise and worship Him together and come into the sanctuary with an expectation of God coming by His Holy Spirit to sit and enthrone Himself upon our praises. 

When our hearts are in sincere worship, and we are sending our highest praises up to Him, God comes and fills the temple, the sanctuary with Himself, with His manifested presence, and the train of His robe fills the temple with His glory.  And it's in that glory that our spirit eyes may see Him seated upon the throne high and lifted up. And if we'll reach out in faith we can touch the hem of His robe, and His healing virtue will flow down through it and touch our bodies and our hearts or whatever area in our life we have that is hemorraging and needs a touch of the Master.  It's a flow of His anointing, His healing and redemptive grace that flows down through Him, through His robe, through His Holy Spirit and into you when you praise Him in adoration and worship Him in a heart of pure love and exaltation.

God loves us and wants to be with us. He's given us His Word and His instruction so that He can come and be with us. That instruction is to build Him a sanctuary that's dedicated to His presence, to Him alone, and for us to come together corporately to praise Him and worship Him, heart to heart. For it's then that God will come, and we will be touched and changed in His presence, miracles will happen, healings will manifest, and He will receive all the glory and honor and praise for the wonderful miracles performed there in His presence.

So Lord, we corporately join our hearts to create an atmosphere, a throne for You to come and rest upon, a throne created by our worship and our praise and devotion to You. We dedicate our hearts to seek You in the secret place of our private worship, but we join our hearts together corporately to seek You in the sanctuary of our churches to create with our heart-felt worship an atmosphere that not only invites Your presence but is worthy of Your presence. It's deep calling unto deep, Lord, the deepest part of us touching the deepest part of You. Come Holy Spirit. Hear our prayer, hear our heart cry. Come and visit our churches. Come and invade the sanctuaries that we have built for You. Forgive us, Jesus, for making them anything less than sanctuaries that have been made for Your presence. Clean the slate of our program-minded motives and purposes. Implant and impart Your pure and perfect will for Your house, Jesus. Help us to make the necessary changes so that our hearts and sanctuaries reflect Your perfect will and desire. Give us worshiping hearts that are hungry for Your presence, hearts that will not be satisfied with business as usual, but hearts that are passionately pursuing Your presence. Let our hearts cry out as David did,
"O God, You are my God,
Early will I seek You;
my soul thirsts for You,
my soul longs for You
in a dry and thirsty land
where there is no water.
So I have looked for You in the sanctuary,
to see Your power and Your glory."
Psalm 63:1,2

Amen


James 4:8, Is 6:1, Matt 9:20-22, Is 66:1

05 October 2010

The Power of His Presence

"In Your presence is fullness of joy;
At Your right hand are pleasures evermore."
Psalm 16:11

God wants to invade your circumstances. He wants to come in and invade with His love, His power and His grace. The Spirit is saying, "Turn your heart and attention back to God. Come back to Him in total surrender. Come and sit in His presence, empty and open, and ready to receive. Come as you are. Come with your baggage. Come with the weights of your worries and lay them at His feet. Then open your heart to receive..........His love is supernatural. His love will fill your soul with peace, and  it will rest on you like a blanket."

That is a miracle.
You come in totally weighed down, heavy, worn, broken and waisted, and you leave refreshed, strengthened and renewed in your faith and able to go back into your circumstances as a new man, empowered by God, by His Holy Spirit, with a fresh mindset and a new attitude. It's the attitude of Christ, a heart and mind that's been reshaped and molded by the very power and presence of God Himself. His presence is everything.  His presence works miracles, first in us and then in our circumstances.

We must take time to come to God, to come into His presence. We must take time to put Him first in our lives by coming to Him and waiting on Him, learning to hear His voice and receive His guidance. God is the One that knows all things. He is our Father. He is the One that created us and knows what is best for us. He wants us molded and made into the image of His Son, Jesus. He wants us to learn to live in this world but to live in it through another realm, the realm of His Spirit. He wants to invade this world with His light and love and make a clear definition and contrast of the two kingdoms, the kingdom of light and the kingdom of darkness, His kingdom here on earth as it is in heaven. It's heaven invading earth through broken vessels healed and made whole in the very presence of God.

We are imperfect vessels, but in His presence, as we sit upon the potters wheel, our Father places His hands upon our lives and He molds and shapes us, pouring the water of His Spirit and love upon us to soften the hardened clay of our stubborn and rebellious hearts and minds. It's supernatural. But it's the way of the Master. It's the way of God. We must surrender and give it all to Him. We must learn the power of His presence, the power of waiting on Him and being yielded to His reshaping and timing. God is making imperfect vessels into vessels of honor for His glory. Only He can do that. Only the hands of the Master and the love of the Father can change us and make us new and make us the vessels of honor that we are created to be. 

The Spirit of God is calling and drawing us today into His presence, to surrender all, to let the Father place His hands upon our lives and shape us into the image of His Son. Won't you hear and answer the call? Won't you respond to the Spirit and make practicing His presence a priority in your day. It's vital in this hour. We MUST have His presence in our lives.

Help us, Lord. Let this word from You go deep into our spirit and cause us to prioritize our time with You everyday. Help us to come to You and sit upon the potters wheel and let You complete Your work in us. Help us yield and surrender all and trust that You truly are working all things together for our good. We want to be like Jesus. We want to be vessels of honor fit for the Master's use. Amen

Phil 2:5; Matt 6:33; Jer 18:1-4; Rom 8:29