Last week, while letting my dog, Lexie, out once more for the night,  I heard a bird singing loudly. It was the only sound other than the sound of the wind blowing lightly through the trees and it was disconcerting. Disconcerting not only because it was late at night, not only because it was the only bird I could hear but because it was an eerie, desperate cry of sorts. I don’t know, maybe I was just being too imaginative for my own good, but it just seemed out of place in general to hear a song bird singing in the darkness rather than the light of day. The sound and the feelings surrounding it have stuck with me in the back of my mind for the week since.

Today in my quiet time I began thinking about it again. So, like every other distracting thought that comes into my head, I jotted it down on the notebook beside me to research later. The question “why would a bird sing at night?”, was repeating in my head over and over. To me, birds are creatures of praise. That is what I think of when I hear them. They just exist and worship, that’s it. Okay, back to my thoughts… birds usually are silent at night…sleeping or whatnot. So I googled the topic and began to read these threads about it. Here are the most common streams of thought.

1. A hungry cat has recently moved into the neighborhood causing the raucous

2. There is too much light in the area

3. Too much noise during the day so they sing at night. (mating calls, communicative singing)

So, here is what I felt drop in my spirit. We as believers are quick to sing our praises during the day, when we can see the light but when the darkness comes, we are often silenced out of fear of the hungry cat (roaring lion, enemy of our souls) or we are so busy during the day that the voice of God is drowned out by the noisiness around us. I know that I tend to withdraw my praises, not intentionally, but it just seems that when life gets really hard and I feel alone, I get quiet in my worship and prayers. It just dwindles until I am left cold, empty and fearful. I want to be like that bird. I want my song to be heard by God and the enemy even in the darkest moments of my life. I want to lift my voice loudly in prayer and praise when I hear the enemy coming. Lord, give me a song in the night, a word of praise during fear. Give me ears to hear in the midst of the storms around me. Help me to stay focused on you!! You are my deliverer, my refuge and my salvation!

2 Kings 4:1-7 A certain woman of the wives of the sons of the prophets cried out to Elisha, saying, “Your servant my husband is dead, and you know that your servant feared the LORD. And the creditor is coming to take my two sons to be his slaves.” So Elisha said to her, “What shall I do for you? Tell me, what do you have in the house?” And she said, “Your maidservant has nothing in the house but a jar of oil.” Then he said, “Go, borrow vessels from everywhere, from all your neighbors—empty vessels; do not gather just a few. And when you have come in, you shall shut the door behind you and your sons; then pour it into all those vessels, and set aside the full ones.” So she went from him and shut the door behind her and her sons, who brought the vessels to her; and she poured it out. Now it came to pass, when the vessels were full, that she said to her son, “Bring me another vessel.” And he said to her, “There is not another vessel.” So the oil ceased. Then she came and told the man of God. And he said, “Go, sell the oil and pay your debt; and you and your sons live on the rest.”

How do you raise a generation who fears God and seeks holiness? How do you teach that humility precedes holiness to a people of such independence and pride? How do you seek to have broken vessels filled with the spirit of God. The task is daunting and at times seems unattainable. I know this, it cannot be done by the ideas of man. It will not happen because we have some cool new way of presenting God. It will not happen by implementing some new program. When the widow went to Elisha, she had nothing to stop the creditors from taking her sons into slavery but some olive oil. I can tell you this, if someone told me that the mortgage company was coming to take my little one, olive oil would not be a comforting thought. I would probably panic, had a prophet given me those instructions! However, as a youth worker, I see the enemy taking our kids onto slavery on a weekly basis. As ministers, parents, leaders, we having nothing in and of ourselves that could snatch them back from becoming slaves to the enemy of our souls. However, we do have the oil of the Spirit of God. I am praying and asking The holy spirit to be released in a powerful way among the teens that I work with. I am asking for deliverance from bondage, freedom from fears and a group of teens who can say that they have seen God. I am not interested in a youth group full of kids who can play church, talking the talk and faking holiness, I want to see the fire of God resonating from them as they seek His face. Messy? Yes, but nothing worth having comes easily or without cost! What about you, have you come to the place where you have exhausted your man made efforts to see change in a situation? It’s time to seek the face of God…not just his hand and what He can do for us, but His face! That is my heart right now! I pray that you too will begin to come to the end of human resources so that all you can do it seek Him.

John 1:10-16 (emphasis added mine)
He was in the world, and the world was made through Him, and the world did not know Him.  He came to His own,  and His own   did not receive Him.  But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in His name:  who were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.
And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.  John bore witness of Him and cried out, saying, “This was He of whom I said, ‘He who comes after me is preferred before me, for He was before me.’”  And of His fullness we have all received, and grace for grace  For the law was given through Moses, but grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.

When you think about God, what comes to mind? Maybe you think he loves people, but he is often disappointed in you. Maybe he is like a morality cop, waiting for you to screw up. Maybe you think that God is a delusion that people created as a crutch.  For me, I  used to get this picture of an old man in white, with a long flowing beard, sitting on a huge marble throne. He was surrounded by clouds, so much so that I could never get a clear picture in my mind of His face. In this picture, I was often, bowing (cowering) at His feet in a nervous way. Oh, I was in awe of Him too, but still had this nagging suspicion that I was not in His favors. I never felt that I could measure up to the standard that I felt He had set for me. I was always “messing up”

There are many things that can shape our perspective of the Father God. Maybe we had an abusive father, maybe he worked all the time or was altogether absent. Maybe you had a great dad, but other men in your life were poor examples of what God is like.  Maybe you were in  a church that was legalistic. It took me a long time to sift and separate the many perceptions I had of God. Some were true but many were distorted.  One of the sources of my  distorted perceptions was the fact that I was raised in a very legalistic church. I came to believe that God was that policeman in the sky, watching for me to mess up so he could strike me down. Maybe not by a literal bolt of lightning, but in some sort of punishment He would surely get me back.    If I was not living up to par, then He would not bless me, he would not use me and would give me the silent treatment so to speak.

I have often struggled with the fear that I would never measure up to what  a “good Christian” should look like.  I am just too blunt,  too sad, too happy, too angry, to relaxed,   too poor, too rich, I don’t read the bible enough, I don’t understand the bible enough, I don‘t pray enough…. etc….   See I was placing all these rules and expectations on myself in order to avoid punishment from God. I was in essence trying to take the place of Jesus in my own life. I was determined (not knowingly) to be my own savior.  There is a scripture that Paul says basically, that if you are trying to earn your salvation by works, you are telling Jesus that His work is not enough.  That is so hard to swallow if you tend to be a performance based, people pleaser, like I have been. That is one of those verses that we glance over quickly moving on to something like, “work out your salvation with fear and trembling” only to interpret that through the lens of earning our keep!

I have now come to believe that God does not view me through the same “glasses” that I view my self. He sees me through the blood of Jesus. The one pure spotless lamb.  vs. 16 in the NKJV says it this way:
And of HIS fullness we have all received and grace for grace.  That word fullness translates as full measure, copiousness (present in large quantity), that which has been completed. It describes a ship with full cargo and crew.  Guys, we are complete in Christ.  Not because we are good enough, (because God knew we could never be “good enough”) but because Christ took our place. He is there interceding on our behalf to God the Father.
He is our portion, our fullness and our covering. His grace is enough. Enough to cover every imperfection. All we have to do is accept it, freely. That is harder at times than working for it. Especially to prideful people such as myself. I am always fighting to remain humble, not self sufficient. He never called me to be self sufficient. He called me to be God-dependent. I am not saying that we never have to do anything…I am saying that nothing we DO can make us any better in the eyes of God.

So, don’t get wrapped up in being “Good enough” Just abide in Him. Commune with Him. You are fully loved, totally forgiven, whole and complete in Christ. You have value, HUGE value because Christ the pure spotless one, loved you enough to die a painful, shameful death so that we could be free! Free from shame, guilt and Fear! Praise God!

Here is my promised blog. I have been working the details in my head and in my life. This is the hard copy of the talk I gave to our youth group tonight.

Hope it encourages and challenges you as much as it did me when I was studying for it!

Holiness that hurts the eyes. Holiness in the inward parts, is the fragrance of Christ on our very being. The life of Christ being exhibited in our everyday lives. In this day and age, it is often considered an outdated way of life, not politically correct or maybe intolerant but this is the way we who call ourselves Christians are called to live. We are called to be above reproach. Yes, we are under grace, but that is not an excuse to sin. The grace is there to cover the mistakes that we will make because we are not Jesus. We are mere humans but we are filled with the Holy Spirit of God who lives through us, giving us the ability to live up the challenge!

The first thing that I think we need to look at is pride and humility so that we can get a grasp on an accurate view of both! True humility is seeing yourself as God sees you. Pride obviously is the opposite. It is seeing yourself as either better OR WORSE that God sees you. Low self-esteem, is just pride in drag. Basically it is like saying that you know better than God what worth you really have. You absolutely cannot be a good leader if you are prideful. Pride will lead to ruin every time.

You may be extremely gifted but if you do not have character to match, it’s not of much use to the kingdom of God. Character is who you are when no one else sees. It is your thoughts, motives, attitudes, desires, habits and behaviors. It’s really easy to say all the right things in front of “church friends” but have a heart that is far from God. It’s called hypocrisy.

I want to clarify something. We are not SAVED by works. We are saved by GRACE! However, the bible says that a Christian is known by their love and their fruit! It also says that there will be many people who come before him and say Lord, Lord, I have done many great works in your name, and God will look at them and say depart from me, I never knew you! So it is about being in relationship with Him. Being immersed in Him. Are we so immersed in Christ that it changes the way we live and think?? Someone has to draw a line in the sand and say, even if culture tells me this is how I should live, I must live according to god. So, being saved by grace, does you life look like you are saved by grace??? Do you have godly fruit?

I peter 1:14-18 (the message)
14 So you must live as God’s obedient children. Don’t slip back into your old ways of living to satisfy your own desires. You didn’t know any better then. 15 But now you must be holy in everything you do, just as God who chose you is holy. 16 For the Scriptures say, “You must be holy because I am holy.”
17 And remember that the heavenly Father to whom you pray has no favorites. He will judge or reward you according to what you do. So you must live in reverent fear of him during your time as “foreigners in the land.” 18 For you know that God paid a ransom to save you from the empty life you inherited from your ancestors. And the ransom he paid was not mere gold or silver.

God is Holy. In Isaiah 6, when Isaiah saw the glory of God, he fell to the ground and cried out, Woe is me, I am unclean man with unclean lips, I live among unclean people. He was immediately aware of His own sinfulness in the presence of God. Exodus 33:18 Moses asks God to show him His glory. God tells him to hide his face because no man could live if they saw his glory. In the old testament only the high priest entered the Holy place and then only once a year on the day of atonement. Before he entered, a rope was tied around his leg and bells were sown into his clothing. So that if he suddenly died the bells would stop ringing and they other priests could pull him out without violating the law. NO ONE dared approach the Holy Living presence of God with out perfectly fulfilling the law. They would not even write his name. It was too holy. Then when Jesus came in the New testament and fulfilled the law. He became the sacrifice. So the apostles who KNEW the holiness of God‘s law and also knew the grace of the lamb of God.
Now because He already fulfilled the law we can come BOLDLY before him in the holy of holies!!

Let’s look at Pharisees for a minute. Most of the time we think of them as the bad guys, right? Actually they were the conservative, intellectual church leaders who defended the faith as they knew it. All they knew was the law and they had that down pat. The thing that Jesus despised was the pride and the hypocrisy of the Pharisees. We must truly understand that UNTIL WE ARE AWARE OF HOW DEPRAVED AND SINFUL WE REALLY ARE AT OUR CORE WE WILL BE NOTHING BUT A CHRISTIAN PHARISEE. HYPOCRITICAL AND SELF-RIGHTEOUS. Purity begins with our determined refusal to hide from the condition of our heart. From this awareness, will come humility and true holiness. A hypocrite is someone who sees their own private sin and makes excuses for it instead being honest with themselves, God and another safe Christian brother or sister and then allowing God to remove it. Our first step in this process of sanctification is seeing and admitting that we are not as holy as we like to think.

To see accurately how we measure up as a Christian, we must put our life up to the life of Jesus. Do we look like him? Do we live a fully unselfish, Never sinning, always intimately connected to God life?? Do I walk in utter humility? Do I live in complete honesty with myself and others at all times? Do I walk in total forgiveness or do I harbor anger or offense against someone?

We are called to holiness. Holiness means totally devoted or dedicated to God, set aside for his special use and set apart from sin and its influence. The bible teaches that our actions flow from what we have going on in our hearts. Outward sin always begins in our heart. That is why as Christians, we must begin to make a habit of searching our heart. (Read: II Cor. 14:5, Psalms 4:4, Psalms 139:23) Ask God to shine the light of His truth on any darkness in our hearts such as wrong motives, pride, anger, un-forgiveness, jealousy, greed, disobedience, or rebellion gossip, criticism. Remember that ears that listen to gossip and criticism are just as guilty as the one who spoke it. You ears are holy, don’t let them come into agreement with the accuser of the brethren, the father of lies! What are you listening to on tv, radio, conversations? Your eyes are Holy too, what are you putting before them? The bible says that our eyes are the lamp to the rest of the body. What are you looking at when you are on your computer late at night? This is not about condemnation, it is about holiness. We are called to be holy. A holy God lives within us, are we aware of that? The bible says that we will reap what we sow, the things we look at the things we listen to, the things we say will plant seeds in our hearts and out of that we will reap. Are you sowing to the flesh, or the spirit? You are doing one or the other at all times! There is no in between! If you are not feeding on Jesus then you are feeding your flesh! What is our flesh? Your flesh is EVERYTHING you think and feel that is not a result of the will of God and His word in you. Holiness is not what you DO it is a product of What you are BEHOLDING. Holiness is abstaining from Idolatry which is putting anything above Christ.. Even if it is a ministry, or a style of worship or what you feel that God has called you to do.

God calls us to be holy because He is holy. Out of respect, out of gratefulness because he saved us. In the old testament he told his people to be holy, to come out from among them and be separate, because he is the lord their God who brought them out of Egypt. Egypt was a place of bondage due to the disobedience of the Israelites. They refused to destroy their idols and God in his love for them allowed them to go into slavery so they could recognize their need for a deliverer! Today, Egypt can be a picture of whatever holds us In bondage. Sin, lust, greed, pride, busyness, partying, drinking, music, hobbies, tv, our cell-phones, our friends, video games, computers, anything that takes precedence over our relationship with God. What dominates our time, what we feel we cannot live without. Maybe it is friendships, or what people think about us that we worry about.

We must remember that it is not about performing good deeds to earn the favor and grace of God! The good works will naturally come from your life when you are in constant relationship with Christ because you will be exhibiting the life of Christ in you!

So I have been thinking about holiness again. For those who know me, I am fully aware of how often I come back to this topic! As one whose spiritual gifts are prophecy, discernment and exhortation, I am inclined to believe that is the reason why this topic is close to my heart! Anyway, I have spent this week in prayer and study only to find that the closer I get to God, the more aware I am of my own shortcomings! You see, the closer we come in proximity to God and his purity and glory, even our most “holy” actions will look dingy in the light of His holiness. Those things that we may have convinced ourselves were for God, will suddenly appear quite selfish. I am becoming aware that I may be blessed with many gifts but if my character does not reflect Jesus, than I am merely a clanging cymbal; harsh and abrupt. I am increasingly aware of my need to saturate my self in His presence, in order to become like Him.

There will be more to come on this topic later… I am still taking a bit of a spiritual beating from my heavenly daddy! : )

Have you ever really “felt” God? I am not talking about purely a feelings based experience either. I am talking about being in His presence in a way that the light of His holiness exposes every dark corner of your soul overwhelming you with your own humanity yet at the same time wrapping you in a warm embrace. I am a firm believer that we cannot base anything on how we feel but rather on the truth. However, the truth is that we are formed in the image of God which means that God has feelings. If we base our relationship with God on how we feel, we will very quickly become disillusioned by life and its circumstances! Sometimes when we have an awesome “mountain top” experience with God we will be zealous and serve Him gladly until when we are in a valley our zeal quickly fades into rituals and eventually our fire fizzles leaving only an ember.

The mountain top experiences that so many people talk of are those life changing moments that forever alter the way we see God and ourselves. I love the story of Moses, when he came down off the mountain, face all aglow with the manifest presence of God , people were afraid of him. I have often wondered about the reason they were afraid. Could it be that they were not so much afraid of the man whose face glowed, but that their hearts were laid bare before the spirit of God?? When someone, has been soaking in the presence of the Most Holy God, they seem to have the residue of God on their very person. These people are the most frightening people sometimes, because just being in their presence seems to expose my own secret sinful thoughts and behaviors. Light repels the dark, Simple as that. The tendency is to live in isolation from other people or at least from the people who live in the light, when we ourselves are hiding. However it really is not the person that is frightening, it is the conviction of the Holy Spirit.

I love those moments on the mountain top, but I cannot live on the mountain. I must eventually come down into the valley and “work out” what God did in me on the mountain. At the same time, I never want to lose the fragrance of God on me. I want that presence to so linger on me that others sense it too. Whether it is repelling, or drawing, they just sense something there.

Have you ever heard the expression : “So heavenly minded that they are no earthly good.” ? I have known a lot of these people, and if I am honest, I struggle with it myself. In my past, I lived a spiritual life that consisted of running from one mountain top to another, in search of that emotional high feeling. I truly believed that if I was in a valley, I was doing something wrong. If I did not live in that spiritual “high”, there must be an area of sin in my life. I even began to believe that my spiritual gifts would not “work” if I were in a valley. Like there was some cosmic switch that shorted out if I was not “feeling” spiritual. What a cop out! I now know that if God wants to use me, it has nothing to do with my feelings at all! If He can use a donkey to speak to Balem then He can surely use me! I love those times when I feel Him all around me, saturating me, convicting me, or just holding me, but I am learning to appreciate the valley when I feel like I am stumbling around in the dark all alone too. It is where I grow and mature. It is where I leap blindly and trust Him to catch me. I am learning to act out in faith the things that He showed me on the mountain. On the mountain top is where I meet with God, but the valley is where I live out day to day life. God is there, He is with me though I may not always feel that way. I know He is.