Month: November 2016

All the Strength We Need for Victory is Ours

Isaiah 40:29
He gives power to the faint, and to him who has no might he increases strength.
With so much going on around us that we are troubled by, but have no control over, it is easy to become frustrated at our station in life.  With so much evil in the world today, it is very easy to become despondent and depressed.  But how is this so?
How is it that we do not now trust in that which has been recorded throughout history and is prepared for our understanding in God’s Holy Word?  How have we missed being enlightened to the ways in which Almighty God has been forever with us when we have the experiences of good men through their own observation and the God-inspired writings of His apostles and His prophets to instruct us?  How have we not learned that the Maker and Former of all things, who upholds, governs and judges all that is under His kingdom, never tires of providing for and protecting the creatures that He created for His own glory?  Why do we continue with our foolish frets and fears and not find peace in the storm when the One who vanquishes all that comes against us is always with us?
We should not be surprised at our weakness or lack of understanding.  God was perfectly aware that we were not capable on our own to cope with the attacks of the flesh and the attacks of the enemy.  Through His immeasurable grace He sent His Holy Spirit to dwell with us.  For those that He knew were weak, He provided all the strength required for victory.
Prayer
Heavenly Father, we thank You for providing all that we need to overcome this world.  We bless the name of Jesus who died on the cross so that we might have victory over all evil.  We rejoice in knowing that Your Holy Spirit is always with us to provide peace, comfort and strength through all trials.  Father, we pray that our hearts and minds are put to rest with the certainty of Your presence and Your promises.  May those around us be comforted by the peace that they see in our lives during times of trouble.  We ask all these things in the name of our ever-present Lord, Jesus Christ.

Ordinary Labor With Supernatural Results

1 Corinthians 12:6
There are varieties of activities, but it is the same God who empowers them all in everyone.
Spiritual gifts are bestowed upon us for the sole purpose of spreading the Gospel.  These gifts are freely given to us by Almighty God for the salvation of others.  When we try to teach, preach or evangelize by our own strength and capability, we will be unsuccessful.  The power is not in us.  The power is in the Holy Spirit that is within us.  We must let the Holy Spirit lead us and let the outpouring of the Holy Spirit be our product.
It is not our job to convert people.  It is our job to have people drawn to us by the way that we live our lives in Jesus Christ.  Even though our labors may be ordinary, if they are done as works of faith, labors of love and with persistent hope in Our Savior, the Holy Spirit will carry on and complete the work of Our Heavenly Father in His children.
Once drawn to us by our walk with Jesus, the people around us will have Jesus revealed to them as the way, the truth and the life. The supernatural work of salvation will begin through our simple natural acts of obedience to the Holy Word of God.  Through our living testimonies, those around us will be able to receive every good and perfect gift of The Father.
Prayer
Heavenly Father, we thank You for revealing Yourself to the world through the obedient works of Your humble servants who are so undeserving.  We thank You, Lord, for assigning to us various gifts, administrations and operations for us to carry out in the name of Jesus.  We rejoice, Father, in knowing that the world can learn of Your good and perfect gifts by observing the lives of those who have already accepted Your gift of salvation and are obedient to You in the ordinary things of life.  We pray, Lord, that Your grace will fill our hearts so that the world will know You.  We ask all these things in the name of the Captain of Our Salvation, Jesus Christ.

Repositories of His Treasures

1 Corinthians 3:16
Do you not know that you are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in you?
We are vessels of the living water that dwells within us.  We are not the the stream or the rain shower that brings the precious water.  We are only the collecting places where the thirsty can come to be quenched.
We are the lanterns of the Light of the World.  We are not the sun or the moon that brings the precious light.  We are only the beacons that allow the light to shine into the darkness of the world around us.
We are the temples of Jesus Christ.  We produce nothing on our own, but we are the repositories of the gifts of the Holy Spirit – love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.
We are conduits of the perfect love and forgiveness of Our Heavenly Father.  Nothing that flows from us is of ourselves.  It is all the perfection of Jesus Christ within us.  God could have chosen angels to deliver His message, but He chose weaker vessels so that His power might be glorified and His treasures might be shared with all men.
Prayer
Heavenly Father, we thank You for choosing us to deliver Your treasures to the world.  We rejoice in knowing that You have pulled us from the pit, cleansed us with the blood of Your Son, Jesus, and made us worthy to be lamps upon a hill.  We pray, Lord, that You will reveal to us everything in our lives that hinders the flow of Your gifts.  May we live in the fullness of Our Savior.  May all the glory be Yours.  We ask all these things in the name of the Living Water and the Everlasting Light, Jesus Christ.

Gracious and Willing Participants in the Intercession Process

1 Thessalonians 5:24
He who calls you is faithful; he will surely do it.
The God who calls us to our Christian faith is faithful to fulfill His promises to us.  From the moment that we surrender to His Son, Jesus, as Our Savior, He commences a good work in us that He promises to finish.  He will be steadfast in His continuous work of sanctification in our lives.
New government authority, new boss, new co-worker, new neighbor, new acquaintance, new friend – not a single one is new by chance.  God has placed each of those that are around us to teach us new things about ourselves.  It seems impossible that such a plan could be put in place for each of us.  But our God is a God of the impossible.  He has no limits to His power and His authority.  He loves us so much that He goes to an extraordinary, nearly unimaginable, level to insure that we are surrounded by a host of intercessors.  These intercessors in our lives are placed there for one reason.  God in His mercy and His grace wants to insure that we are properly prepared to spend eternity with Him.
In the life of the believer, there is no such thing as chance.  Our sovereign God is always in total control of everything.  Do not miss the flip side of our relationships with our surrounding intercessors.  God wants us to join Him in the work that He is doing in the lives of those around us.  We are simultaneously the other half of all of these relationships in our lives – the new boss, new co-worker, new neighbor, new acquaintance, new friend – and again, not a single one is new by chance.  God has purposely placed us in each relationship to be a giver as well as a receiver of His intercessory work in our lives.
  
Prayer
Heavenly Father, we thank You for Your providence in our lives.  We rejoice in knowing that You understand our weaknesses and provide intercessory support through those that You place around us.  We pray, Father, that Your Holy Spirit will alert us to the intercession that You have planned for us.  May we learn to grow through the circumstances that engulf us from time to time.  May we be gracious and willing receivers of the intercession that You have placed in our lives.  We pray that in turn You will provide the wisdom that we need to be fruitful intercessors for others as we engage them in the journey that is life.  We ask all these things in the name of Our Most High Intercessor, Jesus Christ.

Does Everything Always Work Out for the Best?

1 Corinthians 1:19
God will do this, for he is faithful to do what he says, and he has invited you into partnership with his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.

It is likely that at one time or another that you have heard someone say, “I am not worried.  Everything always works out for the best.”  Of course, what you probably did not know when the person made the statement was whether that person had made the statement from a spiritual or worldly perspective.  Were they counting on continued good fortune because they trusted in the God that they loved to stand up to His promises or were they just feeling lucky?

There is temporal good and there is spiritual good.  Temporal good is what men usually seek.   When men seek God, spiritual good is what God bestows.  Through His grace the temporal and spiritual needs of the men who seek Him are worked out perfectly.

Through the grace of God, we as followers of Jesus Christ do not have to wonder or worry about whether good things are coming our way.  We have been promised by Almighty God that if we love Him and follow the calling that He has placed on our lives that all things will work for together for good in our lives.  

Does this mean that we will always live in riches?  Does this mean that we will always live without illness?  Does this mean that we will live trouble free lives?  No it does not.  What it does mean is that we will be broken from sin, we will be drawn closer and closer to Our Savior and in the end we will be made fit to stand before Our Heavenly Father and dwell with Him in our eternal place in heaven.  Now it just doesn’t get any better than that.

Prayer
Heavenly Father, we thank You for drawing us unto Yourself.  We exalt Your name for the perfect love and forgiveness that we receive through Your grace and Your mercy.  We thank You for the eternal blessings that are ours through the redemptive work of Your Son, Our Savior, Jesus Christ.  We pray that the world may know Your Son because we boldly proclaim the name of the One who brings us our eternal riches.   We ask all these things in the name of the Lord Over All, Jesus Christ.

Our Lives Are Meticulously Woven by Our Creator

1 Peter 4:13
But rejoice insofar as you share Christ’s sufferings, that you may also rejoice and be glad when his glory is revealed.
If we are to be used by God, He will allow us to go through a multitude of experiences that are meant to transform us into instruments of His good work.  Some of the experiences will be easy, but some of the experiences will certainly be difficult.  All will be meticulously worked into the fabric of our lives with the final product in mind.
We need to understand that the sufferings that we go through are not those of ordinary men and women.  We are being prepared for greater things to come.  While we view our lives in the fabric of time, God views our lives in the fabric of eternity.  While all we see is the weaving of one single thread at a time, God sees the final finished product all woven together in accordance with His will and plan for our lives.
Because God is who He is, the final product will be much more beautiful and useful than anything that we could ever even imagine or hope for.  We will realize it when the whole is complete and we stand before the Father in glory.
Prayer
Heavenly Father, we thank You for allowing us to experience life through many different trials.  We rejoice in knowing that when we are struggling in the tribulations that the world brings to our door that Your Holy Spirit is always there strengthening us and guiding us to the next experience that You have set aside for us.  Father, we pray for the patient perseverance to endure through all that You have prepared for us.  May we be transformed according to Your will and plan for our lives.  We ask all these things in the name of our Spiritual Rock, Jesus Christ.

Standing Against the Powers that Seek to Destroy Us

James 4:7
Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.
Satan is to be looked upon as an enemy, one who must be watched and guarded against.   Faith, humble prayers and heavenly wisdom are are our weapons of resistance.
Man without Jesus Christ is not capable of standing against the powers that seek to devour and destroy him.  In the darkness of the flesh, we are unable to see that we are being lead into lives that will never be totally satisfying.  We cannot see that our lives are much less than they could be, much less than they should be.
But when the light of Jesus Christ comes into our lives, we see how life can be, how life should be, how our lives are renewed in the spirit of Our Savior.  We come to recognize that the renewal of our minds and our spirits is only available to us through our submission to Our Savior.  We come to discover that the dominating power of the world, our flesh and Satan himself are defeated through the victory that Jesus Christ won for us on the Cross. 
Prayer
Heavenly Father, we thank You for allowing us to come to You to gain the armor that we need to defend ourselves from the enemy who comes to defeat us.  We thank You for the weapon of prayer, the sword of Your Holy Word and the shield of faith.  We rejoice in knowing that the victory is ours because Your Son, Jesus, claimed it for us forever when He died on the Cross for our sins.  We humbly come before You, Lord, to proclaim that we are laying aside our own strength so that we may dwell in the protection of Your shadow.  We ask all these things in the name of our Living Shield, Jesus Christ.

Bound to His Service

Philippians 1:1
Paul and Timothy, bond-servants of Christ Jesus, To all the saints in Christ Jesus who are in Philippi, including the overseers and deacons:
Paul and Timothy understood and taught that through the crucifixion of Jesus, because of what He did on our account, we are all bound to Him through His death, His burial and His resurrection. Through the fullness of His love and eternal provision, we are forever bound to Him.
In the days of slavery, the slaves were keenly aware of who their slave owner was and what their slave owner expected of them.  When the slaves had a good master, they understood the value of the provisions that they were given.  They would delight in pleasing their good master because their good master fulfilled their every need. They would serve their master faithfully each day because they had faith in the continuing provision of the one to whom they were bound.
As Christians, we not only have a good master, we have a good and perfect master.  We have Our Lord, Jesus, as our Master.  We should be in constant praise and worship for the provisions that we have received, the provisions that we will receive and the eternal provisions that have been set aside for us.  We should delight in meeting every calling that Our Master places on our lives.  We should purposefully sign away our own rights in order to be bond-slaves of Jesus Christ.
Prayer
Heavenly Father, we thank You for legally binding us to Your service for all eternity.  We rejoice in knowing that we will praise and worship You forever as our needs are met and satisfied beyond our imaginations.  We pray, Lord, for the wisdom and the strength to renounce any ownership that we seek to claim from this earth.  May we live in the comfort and triumph of Your grace.  May we live every day in surrender to Your Son, Jesus.  We ask all these things in the name of the Word, who became flesh and dwelt among us.

Free Flowing Vessels of His Redemptive Work

1 Corinthians 6:19
Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and that you are not your own?
As Christians, our bodies become sanctuaries of the Holy Spirit.  This is a certain sign that we have been washed clean by the blood of Our Savior, Jesus Christ.  Because God is holy, holy, holy, He cannot tolerate the presence of sin.  If there were any sin in us, the Holy Spirit could not dwell within us.  Thus the Holy Spirit is witness to the atoning work of salvation in our lives.
Because in the flesh, we still hold on to the sin nature, there is perfecting work ahead for the Holy Spirit.  Upon His indwelling, He immediately begins in us the process of regeneration and sanctification.  When He begins the good work of grace, He takes full possession of the body, mind and spirit of each of us.  He supernaturally influences our lives, our bodies and our conversations.  He works to insure our bodies are fit habitats for Our Savior King.
As we submit to the sanctifying process of the Holy Spirit, we can anticipate that there will be trials in our lives.  Jesus Himself told us that it would be so as we followed Him.  These trials that create brokenness in our lives are the experiences that the Holy Spirit uses to complete and perfect the our regeneration.
Prayer
Heavenly Father, we thank You for allowing us to be temples of Your Holy Spirit.  We rejoice in knowing that through shed blood of Your Son, Jesus, and through the indwelling of Your Holy Spirit in our lives that You can use us to be instruments of Your good work.  We pray for the aid of the Holy Spirit to build us up in Christ so that we can endure in faith all of our trials.  We ask, Father, that we may become free flowing vessels of Your redemptive work.  As the Holy Spirit witnesses to Our Savior in our lives, may we witness to Our Savior in the lives of those around us.  We ask all these things in the name of the Lord Our Redeemer, Jesus Christ.

Relying on the Holy Spirit for Discernment in Decision Making

Psalm 119:125
I am your servant; give me discernment that I may understand your statutes.
Discernment is one of the greatest gifts that we receive from the Holy Spirit.  It is surely discernment that allows us to function properly in this out-of-control world that we live in.  Without discernment we cannot recognize what is true and what is false.  With the enemy working overtime to make what is right appear wrong and what is wrong to appear right, we must rely on the Holy Spirit to provide the understanding that we need to make good spiritual decisions.
It is by the grace of God, and not by our experiences in life, nor in any human teaching that we are able to understand the Word of God.   We have the necessary enlightenment of God’s Word through our prayers, our study of the Scriptures and the indwelling power of the Holy Spirit.  It is in this manner that God allows us to discern the gradual shades of evil that are introduced into to our lives everyday by the media and the gullible public. 
I do not speak lightly of the gullible public because we are all part of it.  We accept our small doses of re-written history and contrived teaching via the media until we wake up one day and we find that we have accepted things to be true that simply are not in accordance with God’s Word.  Lord, please provide us with the clarity of mind to know Your truths.
Prayer
Heavenly Father, we thank You for the gift of discernment that You provide through Your Holy Spirit.  We bless the name of Jesus who has given us victory over the evil that tries to change our understanding of Your truth.  We pray, Father, that Your Holy Spirit will fill us with the understanding and discernment that we need to walk according Your statutes.  May we seek Your truth daily.  As we serve You, may the world know us by our living testimony to Your ways.  We ask all these things in the name of the Word and the Truth, Jesus Christ.