Revive Us! April 24, 2009

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.

Other side of the ocean October 8, 2008

I feel like I am being awakened from a society induced coma. It’s as if my eyes are being forced open to the state of the world. Global poverty, the slave industry and the AIDS/HIV epidemic are rampant. There is a group of missionary/musicians whose only reason for using their music is to make money for foreign missions…they are called Unnamed Servant. ALL of the money from their cd sales goes to missions. They and their families give their lives to foreign mission fields. I got the opportunity to meet them this month and was blown away by what I saw in them. Here are lyric from two of their songs from their latest album called Anthem.

On the other side of the ocean, people forgotten in commotion forged under blood red skies.
You’ve seen this world in pictures fly covered, starving children left to believe this is life.
The trash they live in eating the scraps their given, still not enough to survive
Disease and malnutrition false hope in the west’ religion, this is enough to make God cry.
From a distance, you can’t feel it, you can choose just to close your eyes
When you’re in it, you can taste it, you’ve got no choice but to give your life.
You’re home bound, can you imagine, sister raped, how can this happen, now there’s talk of genocide.
Society is all in a panic Mother cries from images too graphic and you thank God it’s not your life.
Go ahead change the channel watch a show where weight loss is a battle, so sad they had too many calories. Send your check to support a child, you did your part now you can smile and get back to your American dream.
Oh say can you see a world with out poverty, where the widow can eat, and the orphan can dream
Where the slave is set free, the oppressed find liberty, and avoid military and the farmer rewrites history?
From a distance you can’t feel it, you can choose just to close your eyes.
When your in to, you can taste it, you’ve got no choice but to give your life!

Your attendance twice aweek, your tithes and your offerings its vanity
Its not for me the worship you’re leading the sermons your preaching, it’s just noise to me

You can keep your cds the building your making, the money your saving in my name causes me so much shame, none of it matters, it just doesn’t matter.. People starving, dying,  and I’m the bread of life

Recognize, the face of God in slanted eyes, darker skin and foreign smiles. Recognize value of human life even when it’s not white. Recognize.

This cd is extremely controversial for most of us in the west. I have found that the young people who hear it, love it, it stirs them to a passionate desire to be the hands and feet of Christ. I have also found that a lot of the “adults” who hear it, tend to be less excited about it…saying it’s not practical..it’s too extreme…it’s too radical.

I will admit, that it was my first thought too…but my next thought was, but God, if I am wrong, please change my heart. Guess what?? My heart is breaking… I cry everytime I hear the songs…I cry when i see the hell that is reality for millions of people across our beautiful ocean! I believe that Jesus was pretty radical, extreme and impractical at times! I am beginning to see that in the American church we have made Jesus into this blonde haired, blue eyed gentle passivist who never got his hands dirty. How much further can we get from the truth??

What about you? After reading these few lyrics, what thoughts come to mind? Is it convicting?

It’s like wearing glasses August 29, 2008

Intercession is different than prayer.  When I pray, a lot of times, it is things that I think about, worry about, care about and just talking to Jesus.  For me, intercession takes place when Jesus communicates His heart for a  situation and causes me to identify with Him. Intercession is praying the heart of God,  it is praying in agreement with Him. I am an intercessor. That is something that God has called me to be. However there are times when the nature, problems, sins and losses of those I am called to intercede on behalf of can cause me to be discouraged. As a result of this, I have two choices, I can hide deeper in Jesus, or I can put on blinders and  hide away from it.  When I find myself depending on my own nature and strength to “pray” I quickly burnout!!  When I get so involved in people’s pain that I lose sight of God’s heart for that situation, I will burnout too.

See, it’s like wearing glasses. I was laying on my bed this afternoon, praying and I took off my glasses because my eyes just got tired of focusing on things. Sounds silly, I know, but I just wanted to gaze at the blur of my ceiling instead of the patterns formed by the double knock down ceiling. I was sort of thinking all this while praying and I felt God stop me. He helped me to see that there are times that I get tired of  focusing my spiritual eyes on the effects of this fallen world so I take off my “spiritual glasses” in order to get a break. I stop seeking the heart of the father, because the closer I am to His heart, the more I will begin to feel my heart breaking with His. So if I back away, I don’t have to “see it”. I can rest.  I become near sighted again.

There is an effect on my own life as well when I am pulling away from Jesus, I can become self centered, impatient, sullen, and withdrawn in my disillusionment. Sounds a lot like II Peter 1:5-10 to me. It says:

“5For this very reason, make every effort to add to your faith goodness; and to goodness, knowledge; 6and to knowledge, self-control; and to self-control, perseverance; and to perseverance, godliness; 7and to godliness, brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness, love. 8For if you possess these qualities in increasing measure, they will keep you from being ineffective and unproductive in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. 9But if anyone does not have them, he is nearsighted and blind, and has forgotten that he has been cleansed from his past sins.
10Therefore, my brothers, be all the more eager to make your calling and election sure. For if you do these things, you will never fall…”

How do you come to possess these things? By being intimate with Christ. It is a fact that those we are in closest relationship with, we begin to imitate…it’s just human nature. This applies to our relationship with Jesus too.
II Corinthians 3:17-18 says: “17 Now the Lord is the Spirit; and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. 18 But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord.”

I love the imagery of beholding as in a mirror, the glory of the Lord.  That just sounds so intimate to me. To have an unveiled face, to be laid bare before Him,  and to reflect back the image of Christ! That is so beautiful to me. I don’t want to be nearsighted when I gaze upon Him. I want to see clearly who He is, so that I can reflect accurately His heart for His people. I want to be laid bare before the lover of my soul!

So often I put myself in bondage to performance again, when I lose sight of the relationship and try to do the job myself. My prayers become fleshly…based on my own thoughts, feelings and beliefs… which are so discouraging!  Intercession works only when it is born of a right relationship with Christ…it cannot be duplicated!

How about you, do you find your self trying to do your “calling” out of your own strength? Does it lead you to burn out?

Maturity April 18, 2008

Often times as Christians, I feel that we focus on “saving souls” and not on Christian maturity. Jesus told us to go and make disciples of all men. A disciple was one who was chosen by a rabbi to follow them around and learn as much as they could from that rabbi about his yoke, or his interpretation of the scriptures. Rob Bell talks about this in his book Velvet Elvis… He says that a disciple was one who followed his rabbi so closely that the dust from the rabbi’s feet would cover the face and body of the disciple. That’s really close… I mean, I have issues with people being in my personal space and the feeling of someone walking right on my heals bugs the snot out of me but what if being a true disciple means being that close to the Lord? What if those people that God has placed in my life to be discipled to the best of my ability, means that my life has to be one that is worthy of being so closely inspected? What if every word that comes from my mouth is truly speaking life or death? That’s what the word says…the power of life and death is in the tongue. It also says that we will be judged for every idle word that we speak. That is a powerful statement to me. I am very opinionated and tend to be vocal at times about my opinions so this thought came to me this week… what if I speak my opinion about a situation and it is opposed to what God intends for that same situation? UGh… I am running circles in my head. I know that I am rambling a lot, this is a totally spontaneous blog…just wanted to get some of these thoughts out on “paper”… so this is my brain, jumbled and thinking.

SO back to what I was thinking. What if every action of mine, is catalyst in someones life for either help or harm? Obviously I am not God, I am not perfect, but I am called to be holy, for He is HOLY. I believe it was Paul who said***, it would be better to tie a millstone around my neck and jump in the ocean than to make a little one stumble. and by little one, that means a young, immature Christian. Oh, wow, how many times should I have just jumped into the ocean??

What are your thoughts out there in blog land?? Is any of this making sense to you?? what have you learned in your life about this??

CORRECTION-

*** It was not Paul it was Jesus who made this statement!

Like a child February 1, 2008

My daughter (8yrs old) came into the living room this week to ask me if we could cuddle. I said sure and put my laptop down to make room in my lap. As we sat there talking about her day at school she began to ask questions about God. Her main question seemed to be how did one get to know God better. I began to tell her the normal stuff, you know, read His word, pray to Him and listen to Him when He speaks back to you. She looked at me intently and said, well, i do pray and I do my devotionals…..but I have not heard Him speak back, HOW does that happen? I felt the Holy Spirit leading me as I picked up my bible next to me and began to read out of I Samuel 3:1-21. I love the story, so I am posting it:

The boy Samuel ministered before the LORD under Eli. In those days the word of the LORD was rare; there were not many visions.  One night Eli, whose eyes were becoming so weak that he could barely see, was lying down in his usual place.  The lamp of God had not yet gone out, and Samuel was lying down in the temple of the LORD, where the ark of God was.  Then the LORD called Samuel. Samuel answered, “Here I am.”  And he ran to Eli and said, “Here I am; you called me.”
But Eli said, “I did not call; go back and lie down.” So he went and lay down.  Again the LORD called, “Samuel!” And Samuel got up and went to Eli and said, “Here I am; you called me.” “My son,” Eli said, “I did not call; go back and lie down.” The LORD called Samuel a third time, and Samuel got up and went to Eli and said, “Here I am; you called me.” Then Eli realized that the LORD was calling the boy.  So Eli told Samuel, “Go and lie down, and if he calls you, say, ‘Speak, LORD, for your servant is listening.’ ” So Samuel went and lay down in his place.  The LORD came and stood there, calling as at the other times, “Samuel! Samuel!” Then Samuel said, “Speak, for your servant is listening.” Now Samuel did not yet know the LORD : The word of the LORD had not yet been revealed to him.

  And the LORD said to Samuel: “See, I am about to do something in Israel that will make the ears of everyone who hears of it tingle.  At that time I will carry out against Eli everything I spoke against his family—from beginning to end.  For I told him that I would judge his family forever because of the sin he knew about; his sons made themselves contemptible, and he failed to restrain them.  Therefore, I swore to the house of Eli, ‘The guilt of Eli’s house will never be atoned for by sacrifice or offering.’ “

  Samuel lay down until morning and then opened the doors of the house of the LORD. He was afraid to tell Eli the vision,  Samuel answered, “Here I am.”  “What was it he said to you?” Eli asked. “Do not hide it from me. May God deal with you, be it ever so severely, if you hide from me anything he told you.”  So Samuel told him everything, hiding nothing from him. Then Eli said, “He is the LORD; let him do what is good in his eyes.” And all Israel from Dan to Beersheba recognized that Samuel was attested as a prophet of the LORD.  The LORD continued to appear at Shiloh, and there he revealed himself to Samuel through his word. The LORD was with Samuel as he grew up, and he let none of his words fall to the ground.

I went on to explain to my daughter about how God can still speak to His people, if we will listen. It may not be an audible voice, but he speaks in many ways. I love that it says above in verse 3 that the lamp of the Lord had not yet gone out. The lamp of the Lord was supposed to burn all night. So that means that God spoke to Samuel in the night. It has been my experience that God does speak to me more often at night. My only reasoning, is that is the time when I am most still. Since I was about 13 or 14, God has given me prophetic dreams often revealing things to pray about for others or situations that need to be covered in prayer. I would always wake up right after the dream, with an intense concern for the situation. If you know me, you know that it would have to be God to get me out of bed in the middle of the night!

Anyway, I digress, the point is this, I have been really wondering If God was real to my daughter. I know it’s not my job to make God real, but I don’t want to make Him appear small to her either. I was beyond excited when this conversation ended because she got really excited too. She asked me to please pray for her to begin to hear the voice of God. That she would be open to dreams and visions from Him. Praise God!! I was able to lay hands on her and pray that her spiritual eyes and ears would be opened to God. I am just overwhelmed by God’s grace that He would woo my little girl into a relationship with Him. I don’t know what he has in store for her, but I pray that like Samuel, as she grows up, God will not let her words fall to the ground either!

How does God speak to you? Are you being still enough to listen to Him? There is nothing in the world more transforming to one’s soul than to hear the voice of God. Nothing more intimate than to have the secret’s of God’s heart revealed to you. He longs for this type of relationship with His people. He is not a stoic God who is detached from His children. He longs to be intimate. He longs to share what is on His heart with you! Seek Him and you WILL find Him!

sleeping January 8, 2008

Have you ever had a limb fall asleep? Maybe you fell asleep lying on your arm or maybe you sat on your foot for too long. You really don’t notice it…until you try to use it. Then it can seem as if small needles are pricking you from the inside as blood rushes to bring its life back into the slumbering entity. That to me is the most painful part of this whole sleeping limb thing.

There is a part of my spirit that fell asleep long ago. I remember when it happened. I remember choosing to cut the flow of life to that part of me because it was too overwhelming at times. So I chose to pretend it did not exist. I pretended that it was no longer relevant. I chose to ignore who I was created to be!

Recently, my loving Jesus began to bring to mind this sleeping limb. He is calling me to begin using this sleeping part of me. This part that I have buried beneath layers of fear of man and the unknown for so long that it lays dormant within me. The more I try to move, the more painful it becomes as life rushes back into my soul.

This sleeping part of me is one of the spiritual gifts that He imparted to me long ago. I am so broken hearted that I hid from it for so long, but I am so grateful that He loved me enough to wait until I can handle it. I don’t want to have to tell Him one day, that I buried it, No, I want to be a good steward of what He has given me. I want to use it to His glory!

Oh, for more thoughts on stewardship go check out Tam. She just wrote something about the same topic!

Cultural relativity? October 12, 2007

My heart is heavy right now. My daughter is in the third grade. Up to this year she was in a Christian private school but now she is in public school. She is loving the change. She has had a few questions like ” why are their no bibles or books about Jesus in the library?” Why don’t we say the pledge to the Christian flag?”  “Why don’t we have chapel in the mornings?”

I know this sounds a little crazy to some, but it was something we took for granted in a Christian school.  Both my husband and myself attended the same private school for the majority if not all of our school years.  Anyway, my daughter got in the car today after chorus looking very sad.  After a few minutes of winding down from the day, she came out with it. “Mom, I am sad today. They gave us a new song to sing and Mrs Jennings said that we had to change the phrase light of God to Light of the world.”   My daughter and her spirit sensitive heart were broken and angry that anyone would try to stifle or hide the light of the World. She kept saying, “don’t they know that there is no light in the world except for the light of the World, JESUS!”

You know, I actually cried with her. It breaks my heart. I am not a religious fanatic. I am however a lover of God. He is my friend, my healer, my redeemer. He is the air I breathe, the light in the darkness of my life. He is my hope, my lover and father. I feel a very real sense of anger and indignation, that anyone would try to hide Him. That anyone would try to silence my daughter from singing about Him.  That the enemy of our souls would speak his lies against the knowledge of God….the very God that the founders of this country built upon.  We call it cultural relativity, but I say what could be more relative to a culture so lost in the dark, than the light of a Holy God?

So there is my rant for the day…sorry for grammatical mistakes… this is merely a vent.

Holiness . August 31, 2007

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! : )

The presence of God August 15, 2007

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.