Tag: #beboldbebraveandkeepyourgodfocus

RECOVER ALL

David and his army had gone away to war. While the men were gone, the enemy came to their camp and stole their wives and children. They set all of Ziklag on fire. When David and his army returned to Ziklag, they were all distraught because their families were gone.

I Sam 30:6-8  (6) And David was greatly distressed; for the people spake of stoning him, because the soul of all the people was grieved, every man for his sons and for his daughters: but David encouraged himself in the Lord his God. (7) And David said to Abiathar the priest, Ahimelech’s son, I pray thee, bring me hither the ephod. And Abiathar brought thither the ephod to David. (8) And David enquired at the Lord, saying, Shall I pursue after this troop? shall I overtake them? And he answered him, Pursue: for thou shalt surely overtake them, and without fail recover all.

David was distressed because his men were upset and were talking about stoning him. He had no one to encourage him. He had to encourage himself in the Lord. We have all been there; sometimes, no one but God can understand what we are going through. Only God can help us.

How many times have we experienced a time when the enemy has attacked our camp? He has taken something from us and we are left with ashes. Our immediate reaction is to be human and weep bitterly until we are not able to weep another tear. This is when we find ourselves discouraged. We feel alone and like no one can help us. Tragedy and grief can be powerful motivators.  We can allow the grief to overtake us and we can wallow in our self-pity. The other choice is to cry out to God for strength to take back what belongs to us.

I like the eighth verse, God answered, “Pursue: for thou shalt surely overtake them, and without fail recover all.”

How much more power do we have as children of God than people in David’s time. We have a blood covenant with God. We have the Spirit of the living God inside of us. We should have more power to take back what the enemy has stolen in our land.

David and his men went to war and recovered all that was stolen. It is time we go to war and recover all that the enemy has stolen from us. Not with earthly weapons, but with the power of the Holy Ghost through prayer and faith.

Sometimes we must stand strong and, after the tears are shed, we must encourage ourselves. We need to ask God if it is time to take back what was stolen. He will tell us to go forth and recover all.

Many souls hang in the balance; they need to see victorious Christians. Are we going to sit still in the ashes of our lives or are we going to get bold and recover all? It is up to each of us to do what we can to accomplish victory on this earth.

Victory will be ours if we are willing to fight this battle on our knees, we will not only recover what was stolen, but we will also spoil the enemy.  David not only recovered what was taken, but he also ended up with the enemy’s possessions.

Go forth, my friends, in the power of the Holy Ghost and don’t let the enemy win. You can recover all.

BE BOLD, BE BRAVE AND KEEP YOUR GOD FOCUS

WHICH ROAD?

Pro 4:11  I have taught thee in the way of wisdom; I have led thee in right paths. Pro 4:12  When thou goest, thy steps shall not be straitened; and when thou runnest, thou shalt not stumble. Pro 4:13  Take fast hold of instruction; let her not go: keep her; for she is thy life. Pro 4:14  Enter not into the path of the wicked and go not in the way of evil men.

Most of us have stood at a crossroads of decision.  Not really sure what to do or say.  We pray for God’s guidance and direction. This scenario is sometimes a decision about which job to take or what city to live in normal life choices. Other times it is about fighting the temptations of our flesh. The path God tells us to go down is always the road less traveled, usually the rocky and steep path.  While what appears to be a smooth road stretches out before us. There is a danger with the smooth road many have gone that way before, it could be the way of the wicked. The word says that broad is the way that leads to destruction. It stands to reason that a smooth road is well worn.

If we are brave enough to do what God says and climb that steep hill; take that road less traveled.  Somewhere down the road, I am sure, thinking back, you will wonder why you ever wanted to walk that smooth road in the first place.  God always knows best.  It will be best for us when we take time to ask and listen at the crossroads.

God will always lead us down the path of righteousness and wisdom. Our flesh will always lead us down the path of the wicked. It is important that we always choose the road that points us toward God. That is the only direction that matters.

BE BOLD, BE BRAVE AND KEEP YOUR GOD FOCUS

TIMING

Ecc 3:1  To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven:

Capturing a beautiful sunset on camera is all about timing.  If the sun is out too much all you get is a white dot.  If you wait too long you miss it completely.

Opportunities to be in God’s timing to help someone is often the same way.  Do you ever wonder why he sends us to strangers so often.  So we will not interfere with his timing.  When trying to help a friend or family sometimes we get in God’s way.  But if we are going about our normal day and God places us in a situation that we know is his timing to help someone, it is easier to do so without all the things we do to get in his way.

For example: We may have been praying hard for a friend for family member. The subject may come around to Jesus in a conversation. In our enthusasism we can come on too strong with too much information and they may react the opposite way from how we had hoped.

But with a stranger, we will listen more to the prompts of God and only say what we need to say. This reminds me of a well intentioned man that I knew growing up. He would go out and pound on anyone that would listen about how they needed to be saved. He was right in his theology, his zeal and desire to help people. But he went about it the wrong way and often did more harm than good.

My grandpa tried to help him tone it down a bit. He would tell him, “No where in the word does it say, skin my sheep. No where in the word does it say drive my sheep.” Pastors are called to lead the flock as Jesus our good shepherd.

There is a time and a season for everything. I am excited about the season the body of Christ is about to walk into, it’s going to be amazing.

BE BOLD, BE BRAVE AND KEEP YOUR GOD FOCUS

THE WORLD NEEDS LOVE

I Cor 13:13 And now abideth faith, hope, charity, these three; but the greatest of these is charity.

In this verse, charity is another word for love. The greatest thing is love. God is the very essence of love. But sometimes love is painful. But Christ’s love for us was very painful for him.  He suffered horrific things out of love for all mankind. People committing sin and walking in evil need God’s love and truth. They don’t need our judgments, our doctrines, or our ideas.  They don’t need denominational bylaws and legalistic ideas. They need God’s love.

We need to love people despite their sins.  They need our compassion.  I am not saying we are to get in the pit of sin with them. Embracing people in love can be done without ignoring or accepting their sins. We need to be kind and share our faith. Sometimes it is a long process of small seeds being sown. Sometimes they just need to know someone cares about their situations or needs.

People think in order to love someone, we have to accept everything; we have to be inclusive of their sin. We can love people without embracing their sins. They need to know we love them in spite of their sin.

A friend of mine shared a dream with me recently. She dreamed that a homeless man entered the church and the pastor started yelling at him to repent.  This man had been homeless, beaten up and hungry.  He kept telling the pastor he didn’t understand, that he was in pain. Finally, in the dream, my friend went to him and told him that Jesus loved him and that she would help him.

I thought that was a good illustration. People don’t need us to be judgmental; they don’t need us to scream “repent” at them.  They need us to help them with their wounds and needs.  Like the good Samaritan.  He didn’t attack the guy with a judgmental attitude; he saw to his needs. If we gain people’s confidence, they will be more willing to allow us to share the gospel with them.

1 Cor 16:14 14 Let all your things be done with charity. Another word for charity is love.  As the children of God, we need to walk in love.  Showing people the compassion of God.

Make Love A Priority This Week

BE BOLD, BE BRAVE AND KEEP YOUR GOD FOCUS

NO ONE COMPARES

I Cor 12:14-18 For the body is not one member, but many.  15 If the foot shall say, Because I am not the hand, I am not of the body; is therefore not of the body.  16 And if the ear shall say, Because I am not the eye, I am not of the body?  17 If the whole body were an eye, where were the hearing?  Where were the smelling? 18 But now hath God set the members every one of them in the body as it hath pleased him. 

Notice verse 18 God hath set the members in the body the way he wishes.  We have to accept the perfect will of God. Sometimes we look at other people’s callings and they look more glamorous than our own. But when God was creating each of us, he made us with the talent and temperament to walk in our calling.

If you compare yourself to others, it is easy to get down on yourself. Sure, everyone would like to have the perceived glamour jobs in the body.  What people don’t often understand is the day-to-day, behind-the-scenes things people do. Every function in the body is important. We all needed to see this lost world saved. The harvest is ready; what if everyone wanted to drive the truck to the storage barn. No one wanted to pick the fruit of the harvest. Nothing would get accomplished. 

Life is better if we just do what God has asked of us and allow everyone else to do the same. The plan will all come together because God is a master at planning. We all have a task to do for the end-time harvest. What is yours? If you know, go and do it with all your heart; souls are depending on it. If you don’t know yet, that is ok too.  Seek His face and all will be revealed to you at the right time.

Comparing ourselves to others can cause harm in two different ways. One, if you feel like others are better than you, you are in danger of the enemy causing you to give up.  You may feel like you will never measure up.

Two, if you feel like you are above others, you are in danger of developing a superior attitude. You may feel like you have arrived and will quit trying. This could also make you judgmental. Life is best when we are just simply who we were created to be by God.

Remember, you are fearfully and wonderfully made; there is no one like you.  So don’t waste your time trying to be someone else.

BE BOLD, BE BRAVE AND KEEP YOUR GOD FOCUS

Acceptable In Thy Sight

Psalm 19:14  Let the words of my mouth, and the meditation of my heart, be acceptable in thy sight, O LORD, my strength, and my redeemer.

We have all said something unkind that we would like to take back.  The Bible says the tongue is hard to tame.  We have, at times, allowed our minds to get fixed on a goal or material thing.  But only in Jesus can we have true peace.

Only when we focus completely on him will all of our words and our actions be acceptable in his sight? He is so faithful to be there, to help us up when we fall.  Our strength comes from the Lord.  He is our Lord, Savior, Father and Friend.  He is the one who saw something special in each of us, enough to die to save us.

We were created to worship the Lord.  The word tells us to have a pure heart that worships the Lord in Spirit and truth. We need to worship Him with our whole hearts. If our words are acceptable in His sight, we will be speaking God’s love and truth.

If the meditation of our hearts is acceptable in His sight, we will have our hearts fixed on the things of God. We will be thankful and grateful for all He has done for us. Our hearts will be for the things of God. Our desire will be to see souls saved.

Every day we should wake with a grateful heart and ask for God to guide our day. If we put him first and focus on his direction, we will accomplish what is necessary for the day. This is a verse that we should pray every day.

Psalm 19:14  Let the words of my mouth, and the meditation of my heart, be acceptable in thy sight, O LORD, my strength, and my redeemer.

GET UP

You know, sometimes we feel like that; we are one mistake away from God doing a facepalm and saying, “Uh, I’m so done with them. They just make too many mistakes. They fall down too many times. They’re just not what I thought.” Because that’s how we get with people sometimes.

People often test our limits, and we’re like, “I just can’t deal with them anymore. Not one more thing can I deal with when it comes to them.” Then, we tend to walk away from people, which gets us to the point of being so exasperated that we just can’t take one more thing.

But God never feels that way about us. He sees the potential of what we can be. He sees our worth as far greater than we can see in ourselves. He never shakes his head and goes, “I just don’t know what I’m gonna do with them. I just can’t believe they have done that.” Again, He’s not surprised by anything. He knows everything. He knows why we make the choices we make. It’s because of some trauma or experience in our past. Most of the time, we have a tendency to react instead of stopping and thinking about what we should do? It is easy to just react. But sometimes, we lack self-control when those situations arise.

 But God has never been surprised. Nothing we do shocks him. And you know He says, if we are His child, “I will never leave you, forsake you, or fail you.”

 Deut 31:6 Be strong and of a good courage, fear not, nor be afraid of them: for the Lord thy God, he it is that doth go with thee; he will not fail thee, nor forsake thee.

Heb 13:5 6 Be strong and of a good courage, fear not, nor be afraid of them: for the Lord thy God, he it is that doth go with thee; he will not fail thee, nor forsake thee.

I am so grateful that God shows us grace when we fail. I am so glad he doesn’t give up on me. Over the years, many people have disappointed us, hurt us, taken advantage of us, and lied to us. It is a great comfort to know that we are in good hands with Jesus. We can trust his hands because they are nail-scarred for us.

James 4:10 10 Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and he shall lift you up.

There is not anywhere we can end up that God is to able to save us.  We cannot fall too far for him to pick us up. We often talk about how we are not supposed to judge God’s children. Have you ever stopped to think about how that includes yourself?

I have, at times, been very hard on myself. This is a trick of the enemy.  If he can keep us distracted by being hard on ourselves, then we will not be doing what we need to do.

Gal 6:1-2 Brethren, if a man be overtaken in a fault, ye which are spiritual, restore such an one in the spirit of meekness; considering thyself, lest thou also be tempted. 2 Bear ye one another’s burdens, and so fulfil the law of Christ.

If we do what God wants us to do when others fail or fall down, we pick them back up. Then we also ought to pick ourselves back up, when we fall.  God is not ready to give up on us.  We should not give up either.

Zeph 3:17- 17 The Lord thy God in the midst of thee is mighty; he will save, he will rejoice over thee with joy; he will rest in his love, he will joy over thee with singing.

He rejoices over us. He is not ready to throw in the towel and walk away as long as we try. He knows our hearts. I love this verse; it makes me think about how a parent rocks a baby to sleep. Holding them close and quietly singing over them. That singing brings peace to the child.

We have peace through Jesus Christ because He loves us. We can depend on him to be with us.

BE BOLD, BE BRAVE AND KEEP YOUR GOD FOCUS

LITTLE FOXES

Song Of Solomon 2:5 15 Take us the foxes, the little foxes, that spoil the vines: for our vines have tender grapes.

It is often preached how we must bear fruit.  The fruit is what attracts people to the gospel of Christ. But our fruit also attracts the enemy.  Just like in the natural when we grow a garden. We are growing it to sustain us and share with neighbors. But often we have critters that come along and destroy our garden by eating the buds before they can become fruit, or they eat the beginnings of the fruit.

The enemy wants to devour our fruit and to destroy our character. If he can get us to sin, it will hurt our witness.  Often it is not things that are considered the big sins. You don’t have to murder someone, get caught up in a lie or commit adultery for example. Maybe it is something small, the little things can destroy the entire vine.

A little fox will pull down the entire vine, breaking it and damaging the vine. A grown fox can reach the fruit and will not damage the vine. This is why we need to take this verse as a warning to watch the little things. They are capable of destroying the whole vine.

Take some time to check to see if there are any little things you can get rid of before they damage your life. Have a good weekend!

BE BOLD, BE BRAVE AND KEEP YOUR GOD FOCUS

TAKE IT BACK

My friend Bonnie and I recently took a drive looking at fall leaves and ended up in a beautiful town in West Virginia.  I was surprised at all the witchcraft and demonic stuff that was in that town.  I am not talking about Halloween decorations. (Although, that is another topic. God doesn’t want us to celebrate evil or put horror movies before our eyes to get into our spirits) I am talking about the items for sale in the bookstore, for example. We asked if they sold bibles, and the clerk informed us there may be one in the religious section. In that entire section of 4 racks of books, there were 3 small shelves about 3 feet long with Christian literature.  These books were placed with the back to the back of the shelves so that the front of the books was facing outward. And there was one watered-down version of the bible.

The rest of the religious section was all about the occult and witchcraft. These books were on the shelves with only the spines exposed because they had so many different ones. They had tarot cards and all sorts of demonic things. We cannot fully blame the bookstore because stores just stock what sells. They are all about profit. But I blame the church. We have let down and allowed the enemy to get strongholds in places.  People turn to witchcraft because they want power to not feel helpless.  They want the power to not feel worthless. In the absence of truth, they turn to the lies of the enemy. He tells them that they can control their lives and have power if they do this spell or that incantation.  He tells them that there is a difference between a white witch and the dark ones who do evil. I tell you, it is all evil.

Gal 5:19-21 Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are these; Adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness, (20) Idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies,  (21) Envyings, murders, drunkenness, revellings, and such like: of the which I tell you before, as I have also told you in time past, that they which do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God.

The enemy will always try to copy what God is doing. But God has power he will pour out on his children to equip us to feel strong in our weakness. We are strong in him. Power to walk out a life of victory and not defeat.  They need someone to show them that the only real power is the power of God, that lives in us. Then show them that they can have that same power too. But they are going to have to see us walking in victory.

It is possible for the church to turn this around, but we have to walk in the authority and power that God has given us. We have to be the church God created us to be for this time period. God knew how evil would abound. He is not shocked. He has a plan; we just have to trust in him.

We can take back our towns, city, state, country, and even the world through intercessory prayer. Our weapons are mighty through God. He empowers us to pull down the strongholds.

2 Cor 10:4-5 4 (For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strong holds;) 5 Casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ;

BE BOLD, BE BRAVE AND KEEP YOUR GOD FOCUS

GOOD BONES

I enjoy watching home improvement shows. I love to watch them take something that looks like it needs to be lit on fire and in the magic of television, within an hour, it is beautiful again. These old houses that need to be reclaimed and refurbished are often said to have good bones. As long as they have a solid foundation, there is nothing that cannot be fixed.

The church has been in a state of disarray. It looked like it was all over and sin was going to abound until it was destroyed.  But a fire is coming, not to burn the church to the ground but to get rid of all that is not of God.  It is time for “THE CHURCH” to be on fire for God. 

I often think about the valley of dry bones and how Ezekiel was told to prophesy to the dry bones. He prophesied to the bones and they lived again.  God is gathering the winds of change and will raise up his bride to be glorious, it is time for her to become without spot and wrinkle. We have to start speaking not about how bad things appear but about how God wants them to be in this time in which we live.

Do not believe everything you see; the enemy is out to deceive us into believing his agenda.  But I have read the back of the book and satan loses.  Tim Sheets calls him the “forever loser.” I often smile when I think about that phrase. It doesn’t matter what the enemy tries; he loses.  How frustrating it must be for him when one that he thinks would never turn to God suddenly breaks down in tears, under the presence of God and they cry out to Jesus. “Jesus save me from myself, save me from my sin, save me from the powers of evil.”

The defeated one, the forever loser, I am sure, gets angry every time he loses another one.  It is up to each of us to reach out and pull people out of his hand through intercessory prayer. We are called to reach the lost. The harvest is ready, it is time to go to battle.  Is your whole armor on? Are you asking the commander-in-chief about the battle plan? Are you ready to fight for the souls that are hanging in the balance?

II Cor 10:4-5  (For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strong holds;) 5 Casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ;

Where do we stand on a personal level? Each of us has to talk to the master builder and make sure we have good bones. When we ask him to refurbish our lives, he will take out everything that needs to be replaced and will make us new again.

Until next time, BE BOLD, BE BRAVE AND KEEP YOUR GOD FOCUS