Author: Charlie Brignac

I am forever a student of the Word and a disciple of Jesus Christ, finding life applications in Scripture. I write about Christian themes, including bringing others to Christ, the matchless name of Jesus and various spiritual concepts like a penitent heart and overcoming darkness. I focus on Christian teachings, personal faith and reliance on the Holy Spirit. I invite you to read through my daily writings. Think them out for yourself through your study of God's Holy Word. Pray on the meaning of the message. Then let the message come alive in your life.

Making Jesus Our Master

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.

Let us surrender all that we are, all that we will ever be, all that we have and all that we will ever have to Our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Let us rejoice in knowing that we will be His bond servants day after day without end.

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. We ask all these things in the name of the Word, who became flesh and dwelt among us, Jesus Christ.

Prepared for Heaven

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 our regeneration.

Let us surrender to the perfecting work of the Holy Spirit. Let us seek the grace that we need to keep ourselves firmly on the path of sanctification that prepares us for our places in heaven.

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.

Understanding What is True in Today’s World

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.

Do not be fooled. We are all part of the gullible public. 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.

Let us guard against believing the supposed truths that the world is trying to deceive us into accepting as the new standards. Let us pray that we may see the truth through the inspiration of the Holy Spirit and the reading of the Scriptures.

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.

The Joy and Blessings of Giving Thanks

Nehemiah 8:10
And Nehemiah continued, “Go and celebrate with a feast of rich foods and sweet drinks, and share gifts of food with people who have nothing prepared. This is a sacred day before our Lord. Don’t be dejected and sad, for the joy of the LORD is your strength!”

Each year since the Pilgrims held the first Thanksgiving celebration feast in the early 1600’s, a day has been set aside in this country to take the time to come together to give thanks for all that we have been blessed with as a nation and as individuals. For followers of Jesus, it has been easy to give thanks and sincerely praise the Lord. As His disciples, we truly have been blessed. But more importantly, we have recognized/learned where our real blessings come from. We have continued to recognize our blessings and the source of our blessings as we went through pain, trouble, conflict and trials during different junctures in our lives. We may not have always been particularly happy about our circumstances, but we learned along the way that we could always find our joy and our strength in Jesus Christ.

On a national basis, the story is much different. As our nation has become more and more secular, a large portion of the population has spent their lives seeking happiness without any understanding of the true joy of living for Christ. Non-believers have bought into the idea that they can control their own happiness. It can be devastating to them when they realize that happiness is not something that they can create. It can be crushing to them when they realize that their circumstances are not something that they have control over. They have no place to turn when they hit their inevitable periods of pain, trouble, conflict and trials.

Let us take our thanks beyond the Thanksgiving table. Let us take time each day to give thanks for the source of our joy, Jesus Christ. Let us delight in Him. Let us praise Him for what He has done for us, how He is still working in us and what He promises us for all eternity. Let us show the world the powerful joy that is the source of our strength. Let us show the world how His joy transforms us and motivates us to serve Him. Let our joyful lives become a most appealing witness for a lost and hurting world.

Prayer
Heavenly Father, we thank You for the many blessings that You have poured onto our lives through Your grace, Your mercy and Your lovingkindness. We thank You for the trials that You have allowed in our lives which have deepened our trust in You. We bless the name of Jesus who provided the way for our eternal blessings. We pray, Father, that Your Holy Spirit will inspire us to take the joy that we have in Christ to share with those around us so that Your joy and gladness can be theirs for today and forever. We ask all these things in the name of the Joy of the World, Jesus Christ.

Comforting Presence of Jesus

Psalm 139:7
Where shall I go from your Spirit? Or where shall I flee from your presence?

There is no place that we can go to get away from God. He chases us no matter where we go because He loves us so much. He pursues us with an undeniable and unlimited fervor because He has so much invested in us. He created us. He gave up His Son on our behalf, so that He could derive value from us not only here on earth but in heaven for all eternity.

When we are at our lowest point and it seems that Satan is winning, God just smiles confidently. He is there with us. He gives us the strength for another breath and another step. He sets an unquenchable fire in us for Him. He knows that the victory is His and ours through Jesus Christ.

Yet He weeps at the same time because He sees us falling short of our potential of who we are in Christ. He weeps because He sees us allowing our flesh to pull us and tug us in the wrong direction. All along though, He can smile because He knows His steadfast grasp on our lives will soon enough lead to our surrender to Him. He is ready to build something enormous in us, something within the depths of our souls that will cause us to rise up and say, “I am not going there anymore for I am a new man in Christ.”

Thus through His constant presence and never ending love for us, we will reach a place where we seek Him and Him alone. The world will become but a distant memory as we settle into our place of eternal comfort in the hands of Our Heavenly Father who has always been there for us.

Let us be inspired by the Holy Spirit to walk in the fullness of our new lives in Christ. Let us seek the comforting presence of Our Savior at all times in everything we do. Let us show the world how He changed us.

Prayer
Heavenly Father, we thank You for Your relentless pursuit of our affection. We thank You for loving us first so that we could love You. We bless the name of Your Son, Jesus, who made it possible for us to live in the comfort of Your presence for all eternity. We pray, Father, that You set the fire in our souls that sends us running to You in full and immediate surrender. May every breath we take be used to turn our faces toward You and away from the world. May the world around us know us by Your presence in our lives. We ask all these things in the name of Our Omni-Present Lord, Jesus Christ.

When the Cost Seems So High

Matthew 26:42
Again, for the second time, he went away and prayed, “My Father, if this cannot pass unless I drink it, your will be done.”

Jesus Christ, the only perfect man to ever walk the this earth, fell on His face, cried out to His Father in heaven and asked to be freed of His upcoming duty. In the same overwhelming moment, Jesus fully surrendered everything to the will of His Father. In this same moment, we saw the two wills of Christ, the human and the Divine. Jesus could not turn from the supernatural plan that His Father had for Him, even though He knew how much it was going to cost Him in the flesh. Jesus knew He was submitting to God’s perfect plan for the salvation of all men.

It is certain that we will find times in our lives when we are nearly overwhelmed by the thought of what is ahead. Our flesh will be ready to give in to defeat. It is precisely at these times that we must fall on our faces before Our Heavenly Father and surrender to His will for our lives. At these times, there is no resource to us greater than our prayer for strength. It is in these times that we receive the supernatural blessing that we need to obey God’s calling on our lives.

Our Father in heaven has given us life. He sustains our lives everyday. God, Himself, made the ultimate sacrifice by sending His Son to die for our sins, so that He could grant us eternal life with Him. Our full surrender to the Father is the only appropriate response that we can offer to His calling on our lives.

Let us go to the Father in prayer for the strength that we need to surrender to His plan for our lives, especially when the cost to go on seems so high. Let us rejoice in knowing that we will receive all that we need to overcome anything that is blocking our way to our destinies in Christ.

Prayer
Heavenly Father, we thank You for giving us life in flesh, sustaining our every breath and granting us eternal supernatural life through the atoning sacrifice of Your Son, Jesus. We rejoice in knowing that the obedience of the Son to Your will paid the complete price for our salvation. We pray that we will find all the strength that we need to completely surrender to Your will. May we bear the fruit of Your will as we walk in obedience every day of our lives. We ask all these things in the name of the One without sin, Jesus Christ.

Overcoming Every Hard Thing

Philippians 4:13
I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength.

The apostle Paul knew what it was to receive God’s grace. Through his great faith he delighted in his weaknesses, he delighted in the insults that were tossed his way, he delighted in his hardships and he delighted in his persecutions. Paul knew the secret. He rested on God’s promises to perfect His strength in Paul’s weaknesses, in Paul’s trials and in Paul’s tribulations.

Our God in heaven is ready to do the same for us. Our Heavenly Father promises to provide all that we need to overcome every hard thing that we face and to provide all that we need to gain victory over the evil that surrounds us. He does not promise to take us out of the battle. Just as He used Paul’s thorn to keep him mindful of his needs in Christ, He will allow things in our lives to keep us mindful of how needy we are.

We will find victory when we learn to surrender like Paul did. We will find peace in all circumstances when we recognize God’s grace is sufficient. We will become stronger than we ever imagined when we allow the grace of God to be manifested and magnified in our lives.

Let us cast all of our cares upon the Lord. Let us trust in Him completely. Let us exalt His name as we confidently wait on our victory.

Prayer
Heavenly Father, we thank You for the all-sufficient grace that You promise us. We bless the name of Jesus who insured our victory on the Cross. We rejoice in the presence of the Holy Spirit, who guides us, instructs us and strengthens us through our trials. We pray, Father, that we will learn to have faith in You as Paul had faith in You. We ask for the courage to surrender to Your Holy Spirit through all the trials that we face. We pray that world will see and be drawn to the manifestation and magnification of Your grace in our lives. We ask all these things in the name of the Lord Mighty in Battle, Jesus Christ.

The Power of Our Prayer Life

Mark 9:29
And he said to them, “This kind cannot be driven out by anything but prayer.”

Jesus taught us, “And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.” He emphasized that this was the greatest commandment. It is the highest order in the kingdom. Our number one purpose on earth and in heaven is to love God, to praise Him and to bring glory to His name. One of the foremost ways that we can meet the requirements of this commandment is through our prayers.

When we are engaged in work that we consider to be the work of the Lord, we can lose sight of the fact that the work is being done out of the loving relationship that we have with Our Lord. If we let our relationship with God slip, He will withdraw the power that He gives us to do His good work. He is far more interested in our relationship with Him than He is in the result of our work. Our relationship with the Father is built and sustained through our prayer life.

We may be able to manipulate some things in the flesh, but all the things that provide real kingdom value will not endure under the burden of broken fellowship with the Father. Through regular prayer, we build on our relationship with Our Father and we insure that we are empowered to do the greatest works that He has called us to do, even to cast out evil.

Let us take our positions as anointed children of Almighty God. Let us claim our authority as those who have been set apart to do the work of the Father in heaven. Let us release our prayers to overcome all calamities, catastrophes and any hidden dangers that would attempt to come against us and our families.

Prayer
Heavenly Father, we thank You for Your perfect love in our lives. We thank You for allowing us the privilege of returning our love, our praise and our worship to You through our prayers. We bless the name of Jesus, who dwells within us, for making it possible for us to have victory over evil. Father, we pray that all that we do is born out of the intimacy of our relationship with You. We humbly ask for the grace to stay in constant fellowship with You through our prayers. We beseech You to grant us the power over the evil in our lives and the lives of those that surround us. May it all be for Your glory. We ask all these things in the name of the One who has has victory over all evil, Jesus Christ.

His Glory to be Seen by the World

Isaiah 60:2
For behold, darkness shall cover the earth, and thick darkness the peoples; but the LORD will arise upon you, and his glory will be seen upon you.

This passage in Isaiah is regarded as prophetic in nature, speaking to the end of times. It predicts the rise of Christianity out of the darkest of times. The first part of this passage certainly defines our times and our society across the globe. Oh, how sweet it will be when the Lord raises up the greatest revival known to mankind as He fulfills the latter portion of this prophecy.

Can things getting any darker? The ignorance, immorality, idolatry, superstition, false doctrine and false worship that we see everyday are surely forms of a very thick darkness. It seems as if light is unable to penetrate the darkness that continues to escalate and build around us. The world has been shaken and people are broken. We have all become victims of Satan’s plans of destruction.

But rejoice, even though the evil one is ramping up his lies and deceiving ways, Our Lord has different plans. He has promised to bring His glory to be seen by the world. We will be covered by a consuming fire. He will baptize us in a Holy Fire and everything will be different. Even though we will be experiencing darkness around us and tribulation in our lives, we will also witness Almighty God’s presence in our lives in the midst of it all. It is His glorious plan for us to overcome everything that comes against us. It is His glorious plan that His consuming fire will be a purifying fire. It will be a fire that cannot be quenched. It will be a fire without end. It will overcome darkness in ways that we have not seen in our life times.

Let us be aware of the working of the Holy Spirit in us and around us. Let us prepare ourselves as disciples of Jesus Christ for the greatest revival in history.

Prayer
Heavenly Father, we thank You for the abundant life that You have prepared for us as we surrender to the divine fire of Your Holy Spirit. We lift Your name up above all names as we come before You to seek the consuming fire that You have promised us. We pray that Your purifying fire will burn the darkness out of our lives. May our transformed lives bring light to the darkness wherever we go. May our living testimonies draw many into Your kingdom. We ask all these things in the name of the Living Flame, Jesus Christ.

Free Flowing Vessels of Redemption

John 14:4
but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again. The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”

Once we accept Jesus Christ as Our Savior, the Holy Spirit comes and dwells within us. The Lord begins using us as vessels that carry the Living Water.

Before the Living Water can flow, we must be free of those things in our lives which would hinder the flow. We must get into fellowship with Jesus Himself. Without His fellowship, we are of no use to God as vessels of salvation.

As we submit to the Lord, 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 will also create the cracks in the living vessel so that the Living Water can flow through unhindered. If but one heart can be saved because of our brokenness, let us thank God for allowing our trials to occur.

Let us rejoice in knowing that the Lord delights in using us as vessels of His Living Water. Let us endure our trials with joy as they prepare us to be worthy vessels.

Prayer
Heavenly Father, we thank You for using us as Your vessels of Living Water. 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, the sons of inequity, 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 in those around us. We ask all these things in the name of the Living Fount, Jesus Christ.