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.

Step by Step in the Spirit

2 Peter 1:5
In view of all this, make every effort to respond to God’s promises. Supplement your faith with a generous provision of moral excellence, and moral excellence with knowledge,
God sets the vision for our lives and puts everything in place for us to fulfill the plan.  We must, however, take all the small steps needed to move from one place to the next higher place that God has planned for us.  We must be obedient to the urgings of the Holy Spirit as we overcome the callings of our flesh.

Along the way, Satan will challenge each and every step.  And once we really start making progress, Satan will turn his evil on those around us, especially those close to us.  Built up by our faith and strengthened by the Holy Spirit, we will overcome.  Our tiny steps of obedience will take us to the awaited goal.

Prayer
Heavenly Father, we thank You for Your promise to complete Your good work in our lives.  Thank You for the faith that You provide us through the work of the Holy Spirit in our lives.  We pray that You will help us to build a relationship with Our Helper.  Help us to become tuned in to every tiny whisper from the Holy Spirit that reminds us of Your promises and guides us in faith on our journey of sanctification.

The Helper

John 16:7
Nevertheless, I tell you the truth: it is to your advantage that I go away, for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you. But if I go, I will send him to you.


From time to time, you may hear someone say, “I sure wish that I had lived in the time of Jesus.  It would be easier to know and follow Him.” 

Jesus, Himself, revealed  to the apostles that life with the Holy Spirit would be better than life with Him on earth.  The lives of the apostles confirms His message.  The apostles were slow in understanding the teachings of Jesus.  They were even slower in adopting His power and His ways.  They scattered like the wind at His death.  In fact, they were still in hiding even after the Resurrection.

It was after the appearance of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost that everything changed for the apostles.  Their knowledge of the teachings of Jesus became complete.  They were filled with the boldness to go out and proclaim the Good News, even under the threat of death.  And at once, they were able to exhibit the powers of casting out devils and healing the sick.

Everything that the apostles experienced after Pentecost is available to us today.  All we have to do is surrender to Our Savior and live in the spirit and not in the flesh.

Prayer
Heavenly Father, we praise You and thank You for sending the Holy Spirit to be our Helper.   We thank You that we do not have to stand alone against the torments of our own flesh and the attacks of the enemy.  We come before You to surrender to the work of the Holy Spirit in our lives.  In accordance with Your promises, we pray that You will perfect Your strength in our weakness.  Through this process, may we come to a full understanding of Who You are. May we become living examples of our relationship with You.  May we serve the world around us through the gifts that You provide us through the Holy Spirit.

In the Hands of the Potter

Jeremiah 18:4
And the vessel he was making of clay was spoiled in the potter’s hand, and he reworked it into another vessel, as it seemed good to the potter to do.

Jesus is the great potter.  He keeps His hands on us, His clay, at all times.  He is in no hurry to form us according to His purposes.  He knows that He will take whatever time is necessary to get us to conform to the purposes that He has for our lives.  He will even break us, the clay, if it is necessary for Him to see us reach His chosen form.

As the clay, all we have to do is surrender to the hands of the potter on our lives.  From the point of surrender, we should have no concerns for the potter will form us perfectly.  We simply wait on the glory of our finishing.

Prayer,
Heavenly Father, we thank You that You have good and perfect plans for our lives. We thank You for Your patience as You mold us into the good and faithful servants that will stand before You one day in the image of Your Son, Jesus. We pray for the grace to surrender to the hands of Your Son on our lives.  We pray for the strength to endure through the shaping process.  May we become the perfect vessels of Your love that You created us to be.

Freedom in the Word

Galatians 5:1
For freedom Christ has set us free; stand firm therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery.

We have all become slaves to political correctness.  We struggle to find the right words to say to others when we know they fall short of having a relationship with Jesus Christ.  In an effort to risk offending the other person, we may offer a watered down version of God’s Word.  When we do this, we do an injustice to the person we are speaking to and we do an injustice to ourselves.  There is no substitute for the perfect Word of God.  We should have faith in the power of transformation that is in the Word of God.  After all, Jesus is the Word made flesh.  The way, the truth and the life is in Him.

On the other hand, we should not become slaves to “converting” the world.  We should live our lives according to the standards of the only perfect man, Jesus Christ.  With patience and gentleness, but never with the watered down truth, we should go and make disciples for Jesus and not converts to our own view of personal correctness.

Prayer
Heavenly Father, we thank You giving us Your Holy Word and the Word made flesh, Your Son, Jesus.  We rejoice in the freedom that we receive when we live by the standards that You have provided.  We pray, Father, that You will teach us how to make disciples by first applying Your standards to our lives and then by patiently and gently sharing the truth with others.

Overcoming the Judgement of Sin

1 Peter 4:17
For it is time for judgment to begin at the household of God; and if it begins with us, what will be the outcome for those who do not obey the gospel of God?

For every man and every woman, the time of judgement will come.  There will be no comfort for those that come before the Lord on their final day still covered in the filth of their sins.  They will face endless torment.  

For those that have been washed clean of their sins by the blood of Jesus Christ, the keys to the kingdom of God will be given.  Their sins will have been judged and forgiven in advance by their Savior.  

All sin must be punished.  So those that have received the grace of salvation will be punished for their sins in this lifetime.  The Holy Spirit will reveal to us the past and current sins in our lives.  We must ask forgiveness and turn away from these sins.  Until we completely surrender to Jesus, we will suffer great trials and tribulations.  Our suffering will continue until ever element of our self reliance is slain at the Cross and we turn to the power of the Holy Spirit to overcome sin in our lives.

Prayer
Heavenly Father, we thank You for Your loving kindness, Your mercy and Your grace in our lives.  We thank You for opening our eyes so that we may see the sin in our lives that separates us from You.  We thank You for preparing our hearts so that we could receive Your Son, Jesus, as Our Savior.  We pray that You mold our hearts, Lord, so that we fully surrender to Your Son each and every day of our lives.   Prepare us, Lord, to stand before You in the image of Your Son. 

Our Lives and Not Our Words Impact Change

1 Peter 3:1-2
Wives, in the same way submit yourselves to your own husbands so that, if any of them do not believe the word, they may be won over without words by the behavior of their wives, when they see the purity and reverence of your lives.


God is a respecter of no man.  Therefore, what He directs to one, He directs to another.  Therefore, whatever He directs to the wives, He also directs to the husbands.  Therefore, whatever He directs to husbands and wives, He also directs for all relationships. 

What Peter is teaching us is that we do not change the lives of our mates, or others around us, by our words.  We change the lives of those around us by changing our own lives in accordance with the work of the Holy Spirit within us.  Through our new lives in Christ, and not through our words, all around us are drawn to the truth that is working within us.

As the Holy Spirit changes us, He will also change our spouses and others in our lives.  The Holy Spirit will work continuously to strengthen our marriages by making Jesus Christ the foundation of our union.  He will work continuously to open the eyes of those around us to the way, the truth and the life that is in Jesus.

Prayer
Heavenly Father, we thank You for the institution of marriage.  We thank You for providing us with mates who complete us in Christ.  We pray, Lord, that You will show us how to surrender our individual lives to the work of the Holy Spirit so that He can build the foundations of our marriages in Jesus Christ.

We thank You for providing us with friends and family to help build us up.  May our lives open their eyes to the wondrous work of Jesus Christ.  May He become the cornerstone of all our lives. 

Rebuke the Whisperer

Psalm 41:7
All who hate me whisper together about me; they imagine the worst for me.

Is the devil whispering in your ear?  He may sound something like this:
  • You are not good enough to minister to others.  Let someone else do it.
  • Why are you trying this?  You will fail.
  • Why would God have a place for a sinner like you?
  • You will be embarrassed if you do that.
The whispers of the devil may even come to you through the voices of those you know, you love and you trust.


We must take on the full armor of God when the enemy begins whispering defeat into our lives.  Our victory and our anointing in Christ has already been set.  We need to seize the anointing on our lives that will break off the yokes of insecurity, inferiority, fear, and unbelief.

When Satan accused Joshua, listen to how Jesus responded, “The LORD rebuke you, satan! The LORD, who has chosen Jerusalem, rebuke you! Is not this man a burning stick snatched from the fire?”  Zechariah 3:2  We need to respond in the same manner every time Satan accuses us.  We cannot accept or become familiar with his attacks.  Otherwise, we will become comfortable with the lies spoken against us.  The victory is ours in the name of the Lord, Jesus.

Prayer
Heavenly Father, we thank You for the armor that You provide us.  We thank You that the enemy cannot lead us astray when we take on the armor of protection that is ours in our Blessed Hope and Assurance, Jesus Christ.  Thank You, Jesus, for providing our victory over all evil.  Teach us how to live our lives in victory.  Strengthen us through our faith in Your promises.

Waiting on the Fullness of His Promises

Habakkuk 2:3
For still the vision awaits its appointed time; it hastens to the end—it will not lie. If it seems slow, wait for it; it will surely come; it will not delay.

The prophet, Habakkuk, was frustrated that God was not dealing with the iniquities that he saw in the world around him.  He was impatient because those that he prophesied to were not responding to the Word of God.  In this scripture, the Lord reminds Habakkuk that he must be patient because the visions and promises that God gives are sure to come.

This principle applies to us and to those around us, just as it did to Habakkuk and the people around him.  In accordance with the Lord’s promises, we all are as filthy rags in the eyes of the Lord until we accept Jesus as Our Savior.  Then through the sacrifice of Our Savior, we are clothed in perfect white garments and we become wholly acceptable unto the Lord.  This transformation process requires patience.

First, we must understand that we are on a journey of sanctification that is preparing us for the time that we will stand before the Lord.  We must be patient with ourselves as we mature from the state of filthiness we were in before Christ to the state of perfection that we will be in the day we stand before the Lord.  

Second, we must understand that those around us are all in different stages of their journey.  Some have not seen the light of salvation yet.  Others have seen the light, but have not surrendered to the power of the Holy Spirit in their lives.  We must be patient with them for the Lord’s promises are always fulfilled according to His perfect timing.

Prayer
Heavenly Father, we thank You for Your patience with us as You fulfill Your plans for our lives.  We pray that You give us the patience to wait on You as we grow spiritually and as we minister to those around us who are going through their own spiritual maturation process.  May the fullness of Your promises be complete in all of us.  





Vessels of His Presence

2 Corinthians 5:7
for we walk by faith, not by sight.

From time to time, we truly experience the exhilarating feeling of God’s presence in our lives.  These moments are precious.  These moments are important building blocks in the foundation of our faith.  These are the moments that will carry us through our daily duties and trials when we do not feel the presence of God with us.

Duty has a ring of boredom and tediousness to it.  Duty sounds like what we must do and not what we feel like doing.  This describes the duty of the flesh.

Duty unto God is totally different.  While it may be tedious at times, it is always filled with joy.  It is never boring because the Holy Spirit confirms that we are pleasing God in our work.  While duty of the flesh rarely leads to greater things, duty unto God always leads to greater fruit being borne.

Prayer
Heavenly Father, we thank You for the times that You allow us to experience Your presence in our lives.  We pray that You will use those moments to build our faith in You.  We pray that You will use those moments to strengthen us when our burdens are heavy and we do not feel Your presence.  We pray that we will be living vessels of those moments in Your presence so that the world around us may experience who You are.

Living and Loving in the Holy Spirit

1 Corinthians 13:4-8
Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.  Love never ends.

God is love.  His love is unconditional and without end.  His love  for us is expressed explicitly through the sacrifice of His Son, Jesus.  

We are able to love because God loved us first.  He created a spot in our hearts so that we could receive His love and return it to Him.  He gave us the capacity to share His love with the world around us.  He gave us the Holy Spirit so that our love could be an endless spring.

When we are living in accordance with the Holy Spirit within us, we are capable of extraordinary service to those around us.  When we try to live by the world’s standards, we will choose to serve ourselves first.  The spontaneity of our love and service will tell us where we are living.

Prayer
Heavenly Father, we thank You for loving us unconditionally.  We thank You that Your love flows to us endlessly.  Prepare our hearts, Lord, so that we may become vessels of Your perfect love.  Cleanse us, Lord, of anything in our hearts that would restrict the flow of Your love in our lives.  May we bear much fruit for Your kingdom through the spontaneous release of Your love to the world around us.