Tag: #godfocus

A LESSON FROM JEHOSHAPHAT

Rejoice, for victory is ours. Just as in the days of Jehoshaphat, we can sometimes find ourselves surrounded by the enemy. He did something that, to the natural world, looks stupid. He put worshippers out in front of the army.

2 Chronicles 20: 1- It came to pass after this also, that the children of Moab, and the children of Ammon and with them other beside the Ammonites, came against Jehoshaphat to battle.

He received word that many others were plotting to come against him from beyond the sea. He feared and he started seeking God. He declared a fast throughout all of Judah. The people prayed and God honored their prayers.

God told them to go down before their enemy.

In verse 17 Ye shall not need to fight in this battle: set yourselves, stand ye still and see the salvation of the Lord with you, O Judah and Jerusalem: fear not, not be dismayed; tomorrow go our against them: for the Lord will be with you.

They worshipped the Lord for what he had said to them. The next morning, they rose early to start the march to the wilderness. Jehoshaphat stood before them and said (verse 20) ….Believe in the Lord your God, so shall be established; believe his prophets, so shall ye prosper.

21 And when he had consulted with the people, he appointed singers unto the Lord, and that should praise the beauty of holiness, as they went out before the army, and to say, Praise the Lord; for his mercy endureth for ever. 22 And when they began to sing and to praise, the Lord set ambushments against the children of Ammon, Moab, and mount Seir, which were come against Judah; and they were smitten. 23 For the children of Ammon and Moab stood up against the inhabitants of mount Seir, utterly to slay and destroy them: and when they had made an end of the inhabitants of Seir, every one helped to destroy another. 24 And when Judah came toward the watch tower in the wilderness, they looked unto the multitude, and, behold, they were dead bodies fallen to the earth, and none escaped. 25 And when Jehoshaphat and his people came to take away the spoil of them, they found among them in abundance both riches with the dead bodies, and precious jewels, which they stripped off for themselves, more than they could carry away: and they were three days in gathering of the spoil, it was so much.

God took the enemies of his people and turned them against each other. By the time they arrived, the enemies had destroyed one another. All that was left for Jehoshaphat’s army was to collect all the spoils of war. It took them three days to gather all the riches of the enemy.

God will take what the enemy tried to use against us and give us a blessing while destroying our enemy. Today we have an enemy that is determined to destroy us. He hates us because God loves us. He wants to take each of us to hell. He cannot harm us if we keep our focus on God. God has made promises to his people today just as he did in the Old Testament. He wants to prosper us and bless us. He will go before us and fight for us.

We need to remember how Jehoshaphat put his worshippers out front before the battle. In the natural, that seems like a ridiculous idea. They would be mowed down by the enemy without protection. But God told them to march, but they would not have to fight. Worship invites God’s presence. The word says he inhabits the praise of his people.

He will go before us and fight for us. We need to go to war on our knees. We need to first invite God’s presence to us through worship. Then we pray for God to destroy the evil in our country. America needs to be saved from an enemy that is not a country but satan himself. The pure evil that is consuming and taking over everything.

By faith, we can reach out and pull down the enemy’s strongholds in the land. By faith, we can ask God to allow the evil to be revealed so that it can be destroyed. We will not have to fight if we have prepared for battle with prayer and worship. God is calling for his prayer warriors to go to battle on their knees. He is asking for his worshippers to arise.

He will fight our battles if we keep our eyes on him. He is craving a relationship with us. He wants us to get back to the place where he is the center of our lives. He wants to have his rightful place and that is first. If we keep our God Focus, we have nothing to fear.

Have a good week, my friends.

BE BOLD, BE BRAVE AND KEEP YOUR GOD FOCUS

NO OTHER gods

The Old Testament is full of stories that say this king did what was right in the sight of God and the whole country was blessed. But when a new king would come to power, they would be less than enthusiastic about God. They would create false gods made of clay or even gold. They would build up the groves (a place to worship false gods). The whole country would suffer. America is in a state of things looking bad. Evil is in charge of making our laws and we are doing things that are not right in the sight of God. The darkness of evil is so smothering we do not have a clue just how bad it really is around the world. Idolatry and evil are out of control. Children are being harmed as a result of false idol worship.

But God can turn it around in a day. He is all-powerful. We have something to do about the state of our world. God has asked us to humble ourselves and pray. 2 Chronicles 7:14 If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land. I feel like the church needs to wake up. At least a large part of the body. This starts with me; it starts with you.

One of the first things we need to do is ask God to search our hearts. Psalm 139: 23-24 23 Search me, O God, and know my heart: try me, and know my thoughts: 24 And see if there be any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.

The only way we can point the way for someone else is first to be able to see clearly ourselves. Prayer for our country. Being humble before our God. Asking him to search us and help us find anything that is not pleasing to him in our lives. Once we have cleaned out anything that is not pleasing to God. The next thing we need to do is, encourage others to follow Christ. Encourage them to tear down the idols in their lives.

Some idols are obvious; you have an actor, actress, musician or sports figure that you think can do no wrong. People desire to meet them, and they make them seem more important than they are in reality. Other idols can be actual statues, like Budda or Morlock. Some people chose to worship the stars, the sun and moon. Wrong thinking and ideas can become a god. Like worshiping the earth. Idols are created when we allow the desires of the flesh to change our thinking patterns. We end up concentrating on the wrong things.

The definition of idolatry –extreme admiration, love, or reverence for something or someone:

God says he is to be first in our lives. Many of us have a hard time putting him in his rightful place. Anything we put between us and God is at risk of becoming an idol. Most of us are not dancing around a golden calf or bowing to Baal. (Although some in our country are doing such evil) We can make many things a god to us. Our spouse, children, our car, our home, our money, or even a job.

Some people make a god out of their church. They are more in love with their fancy buildings with their big screens and man-made programs. They are in love with the idea of community and all the busy things they do to feel good about themselves that they make it a god. I am not saying we cannot have nice church buildings or anything that I listed. We do these things because we love God and want to do his will in the earth. Just that the things we do for God can not become something that defines us, instead of our relationship with the ONE TRUE GOD. He should be the one who defines us.

Exodus 20 lists the ten commandments. Verse 3 Thou shalt have no other gods before me.

4 Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. 5 Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the Lord thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me;

We can make sure God has his rightful place in our life by keeping our “God focus” and magnify him in praise and worship. Having an active prayer life does a lot for our perspective on God. There is One God; Our Lord Jesus Christ. Even the devil believes there is one God and trembles. No substitution will do. We must worship Him in spirit and truth.

The church needs to get back to its worship of God. Allowing him into our services to move and operate as he sees fit. That is when we will see people saved, healed and delivered from the things that have them bound. As long as we are happy with our routines and the Christian things we do, nothing will change.

How hungry are we for a real move of God? How hungry are we to see people saved, healed and delivered? How much do we desire to go to the enemy’s camp and take back what belongs to us? Satan, for too long, has had possession of our country. It is time we got on our knees and took it back.

I encourage you to think about your focus. Is it a “God focus,” or is something in the way of your “God focus”. Remember, prayer and time spent alone with him is the key to seeing our country saved, not only from the present evil but people delivered from their personal spiritual wars.

BE BOLD, BE BRAVE AND KEEP YOUR GOD FOCUS

UNDOING LIES

Almost everyone has played the telephone game. It is where a group of people sit in a circle and one
whispers to another. This goes on until everyone has a turn to whisper what they heard. When the sentence gets back to the original speaker, it is rarely what they said to
start the round. This is what happens with a lie. Normally the lie seems small, some call them little
white lies, but by the time the lie comes to the end, it is blown up bigger. With this game, it is all fun
and everyone is trying to actually share the original words.

What happens if someone comes along and whispers lies? This is Satan’s most used tool. He likes to
plant ideas, fears and regrets into our day. Moses sent twelve spies to look at the promised land.
Ten came back with a bad report. They said the giants were big and they allowed fear
to overtake them and they gave up too quickly on what God had promised.

By the time they talked about it for a while, they were saying, “we are like grasshoppers in their sight.”
Think about that for a moment. Yes, the giants were larger in stature, but to say the Israelites were like
grasshoppers compared to them was a huge exaggeration. Did you notice the spies that came back with
a bad report didn’t even have proof they had been in the land?

Then came Joshua and Caleb. No doubt, Satan had tried to whisper the lies to them too, but they
believed God. The lies Satan tried to sell them, they ignored because their faith was bigger than the lies of the enemy.

They said things like we are able to take possession of the land. In other words, they
believed that God had given them the land. Yes, they saw the armies of those who were dwelling in the
land. Yes, they saw the giants. But they chose to not believe the lies.

The Israelites had been brought up in slavery. They were used to people controlling their lives. They were
the victims. The ten still had a victim mentality. Somehow, Joshua and Caleb just believed God. They also
brought back proof that they were actually in the land. They wanted to show the people how amazing it
was there, in spite of the obstacles.

But we cannot allow Satan to be our excuse for our failures, sins and shortcomings. We need to take
responsibility for our choices and lives. We need to own our past and put it there where it belongs in
the rearview mirror.

We have to change our thinking patterns. The church world is in need of determination like Joshua and
Caleb. We need to just believe God and walk by faith and not by how scary things look. We do not need
to allow the giants of fear, anxiety, depression and sin to keep us from our promise.
God wants us to undo the lies the enemy has told us. We need to renew and retrain our thinking to
simply believe God. He always has our best interest at heart. Even if there are some giants to fight, we
never fight them alone.

Prov 4:23 – Keep thy heart with all diligence; for out of it are the issues of life.

The things we think will eventually get into our hearts. They will become a part of our belief system. It is
important to not allow the enemy’s lies to get past our thoughts. We need to guard our hearts with
every tool we can find. Praying for God’s guidance. We need his word in us, in order to undo the lies of
the enemy.

Romans 12:2 – And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your
mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.

We may ask how we can undo the lies of the enemy. How do we transform and renew our minds?
Reading and studying the word of God will renew our mind. It will increase our faith and ability to trust
God. The more we trust God the easier it is to undo the lies of the enemy.

BE BOLD, BE BRAVE AND KEEP YOUR GOD FOCUS

INVENTORY

If anyone’s ever worked in a business or owned a business that handles inventory. You know, every so often, you gotta stop and take count of damaged or broken items? You write that off your list as being broken, and you get new. This helps to make sure the figures you show are correct.

I want to talk to you today about spiritual inventory. There are so many things in the Bible that we talk about Christians not needing in their lives. All the different temptations and sins, things that are contrary to what we should have as Christians. We are told to bear fruit and to love one another. We should be gentle, kind, good, humble and all these different things. This is a small list of the inventory we should have in our life.

There are times when we pick up different things which are contrary to what we need to have in our lives. Sometimes it’s important for us as Christians to slow down and ask God for help to take inventory of what we’ve got in our lives. We need to learn to not be swayed by people, sometimes they’ll come along and they’ll brag on you and they’ll brag you up. And if you let it go to your head, you can become self-righteous.

While other people come along and they’ll criticize and they will pick. That makes us self-conscious. We should never be self-righteous or self-conscious about anything. If we can get to the point where we walk in between those things, before God, we’ll be doing a pretty good job. It’s easy to look at people sometimes and compare ourselves, which God tells us not to do.

There are times when we find out things or suspect things that someone else is doing wrong. Instead of praying for them, we get self-righteous and judgmental. We start talking about it, “Well, I would never. I have never.” It’s easy to be judgmental of other people. Which falls into that being self-righteous, they go hand in hand. Be careful about what you say, because the very thing that you say, “I would never.” If you’re not careful, you will end up doing that very thing. But God is faithful, and God is good, and he is just to forgive us of all of our sins and all of our shortcomings and our failures. I’m so grateful for his mercy and his grace.

I was raised, in the Pentecostal church. In that denomination, there is not a lot of room for people to make mistakes. They teach you need to live right, live right, live right. You can’t. You can’t. You can’t. So much so that there is not a lot of room for God’s grace when we fall. Sometimes we forget about all the things that we’re told to do, because we’re so busy going you can’t, You can’t, You can’t. That we don’t tell people they can, they can, they can. They can walk humbly before the Lord. They can encourage one another. We can and should lift one another up.

I want to stand before God with a clear conscience. And I want to be able to say. Lord, I’ve done all I can to walk, the way you want me to walk. If he knows, we are sincere in our hearts. His grace is there to pick up the pieces. His blood cleanses all sins. The church, the body of Christ today, is just so easy to get wrapped up in the ideas of man and denominations. We get wrapped up in the number of people that sat in our pews last week. We get wrapped up in our programs and trips to amusement parks. Church, to many, is just a social club, a place to network business ideas over fried chicken.

Live right and do right. You know, love God and love people. And I mean, it boils down to that. Eccl 12:13-14 Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter: Fear God, and keep his commandments: for this is the whole duty of man. (14) For God shall bring every work into judgment, with every secret thing, whether it be good, or whether it be evil.

Spend time with him this week. Ask God to help you with your inventory. I pray you find only good things. But if you are not perfect and find areas that need work, then that is a good thing too. Because now that it has been brought to light, God can help you deal with it and remove it from your life. That vacated space in your life can be filled with new deeper and more exciting things from God.

BE BOLD, BE BRAVE AND KEEP YOUR GOD FOCUS.

WORDS

Romans 4:17 (As it is written, I have made thee a father of many nations,) before him whom he believed, even God, who quickeneth the dead, and calleth those things which be not as though they were.

Abraham called things that were not as though they were and it was counted as righteousness. In other words, he was exercising his faith. He would pray for something to happen, then would speak out of his mouth and talk about what he prayed for as if the prayer were answered. This is what the old timers called putting legs on your prayers. Let’s say for example, there was a drought and people got together to pray for rain. Who do you think God would answer? The one carrying the umbrella, ofcourse. Because they had enough faith to bring the umbrella. By doing this, they were saying, we are praying for rain, I am going to believe God is going to cause it to rain. I better take my umbrella.

Heb 11:6 -But without faith it is impossible to please him: for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him.

We look around at the crazy state of the world. Things seem impossible that they will ever change and be right again. This is what we see with our natural senses. If we go by sight, the world is full of evil and there is nothing we can do to stop it. This is the lie the enemy has been feeding to the church for too long. We need to look at things and take the authority given to us as Spirit-filled children of the MOST HIGH GOD. We need to call things out in prayer.

“Lord I thank you that you are turning around things in our nation. I thank you that right is right and wrong is wrong again. I believe you when you said, our words have power. We are pulling down the enemy’s strongholds in the name of Jesus. There is nothing too hard for you Lord. We ask that you set the captive free. Many are bound by addictions of all types, we thank you Jesus for breaking the chains and setting the captive free.” If we look with our eyes these things have not taken place yet. But we have to call things as not as though they were; we walk by faith.

II Cor. 5:7(For we walk by faith, not by sight:)

We do not realize how powerful our words can be; this is a lesson I learned when I was dealing with depression. Depression happens when we look at things in our lives and feel the negative emotions that come from negative thoughts. It is like a reel in our minds over and over again, like listening to a tape on continuous playback. Every time, we think about how hopeless we are, the deeper we dig and the worse things appear to us. In reality, things probably had not changed. With the enemy whispering in our ear constantly, negative things they will seem to be getting worse everyday.

Take heart, if you find yourself in a hopeless place, like depression or filled with anxiety or fear. The same principle applies to all. Start telling yourself it’s not as bad as it appears. Pray and ask God for help and then call things as not as though they are and say, I have peace and not anxiety. I do not have fear; I have courage. I am not in the pit of depression where I am surrounded by darkness; I walk in light.

It takes a little bit of practice to walk in faith and speak positivity. But it can be done, I promise you. Our words have the power to motivate, to encourage, to share hope. They can also have the power to discourage, teardown, make angry or cause those around us to be negative and depressed.

Prov. 18:21 Death and life are in the power of the tongue: and they that love it shall eat the fruit thereof.

Go out, make a difference by speaking life into someone’s day. You never know how much it may mean to someone that is bound by the enemy. It could mean the difference between literal life and death. I often tell the story of a friend of my husband. He worked at a convenience store in his early twenties. This friend was a Christian and decided he was going to be more bold about his faith. He started saying God bless you to some of his customers.

One day, he felt compelled to say to a man, “God loves you” the cashier went on about his day like normal. Two weeks later, he was working and that same guy was back. He reminded the cashier of what he had said to him and told him he was planning on committing suicide. Those words made him stop and think. He questioned if God existed and really did love him. He stopped in to thank the cashier for his kind words. The man found a preacher to talk to and had dedicated his life to Christ, all because that man said, “God loves you.”

Go make a difference in your world. Speak life and faith. Be bold, be brave and keep your God focus.

GREAT WISDOM

The book of Proverbs is full of wisdom. It is believed to be written by King Solomon. If you remember his story, he asked God for wisdom and God gave him vast wisdom. Many people in our lives have wisdom; these are the ones we want to spend time. We gain wisdom by being around wise people.

Proverbs 30:24-28 speaks of four wise animals.

Prov 30:24 There be four things which are little upon the earth, but they are exceeding wise:

Prov 30:25 The ants are a people not strong, yet they prepare their meat in the summer;

We can learn a lot of lessons from each of them; ants are very small creatures. They communicate and work well together. Their cause is greater than their individual needs. They know winter is coming and they need to store up for winter.

We need to be laboring to get souls saved before it is too late, and we cannot work. The harvest ready and the laborers are few.

Many things could be said about saving or storing up for winter. We try to save money for emergencies or for something we want to do, like a trip to the beach. The greatest thing we can store up is treasures in heaven.

Matt 6:19-20

19 Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal: 20 But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal:

Prov 30:26 The conies are but a feeble folk, yet make they their houses in the rocks;

Conies are small creatures that look like rabbits with short ears. They find holes in rocks to hide from the weather and get protection from larger animals and birds that may want to have them for dinner. They are wise in the fact that they make the rocks their home, their hiding place. We can be wise, too when we make “the rock” Jesus our hiding place. He will keep us safe from the storms and will protect us from satan who is like a roaring lion seeking whom he may devour.

Prov 30: 27 The locusts have no king, yet go they forth all of them by bands;

Locust are grass hopper like creatures, that are docile on their own but when they get in a swarm of others can be quite destructive to crops. The lesson we can learn from them is to band together. When we come together with a single purpose in mind, more gets accomplished than each of us can get done on our own.

Prov 30: 28 The spider taketh hold with her hands, and is in kings’ palaces

There is nowhere a spider cannot be found building her web; even kings palaces. One of the lessons we can learn from the spider is determination. They will build a web and you can sweep it down and by the next day there is another web in its place.

What if we were so determined to build the kingdom of God? What if every time the enemy knocked down what we were trying to do, we didn’t complain. What if we just got up and tried to build it stronger.

Another lesson is, what comes out of the spider is what gets it where its going. Sometimes it is what comes out of us that determines our destination. Are we talking defeat or are we talking faith? We can only go on if we have the faith that we will overcome the enemy and be able to build God’s kingdom.

The book of Proverbs is definitely worth reading, even if you have read it before today. Each time we read God’s word we gain new insight, strength and wisdom.

James 1:6 But let him ask in faith, nothing wavering. For he that wavereth is like a wave of the sea driven with the wind and tossed.

BEAUTY

The world has a definition of beauty. What the world defines as beauty is not anything more than superficial beauty. They want to look at what is on the outside. If you have wrinkles or spots they don’t define you as beautiful. They look at youth as being attractive. We all spend a lot of money to wash, moisturize and enhance our physical attractiveness. It is all for nothing, our fleshly body still gets old; youth fades.

God looks not on the outside but looks on the heart. God is looking for a bride without spot or wrinkle of a spiritual nature. He wants a pure heart and one that is covered by the blood of Jesus. A heart that is hungry for him. He wants the beauty of our love for him. Prov. 31:30-31. (30) Favor is deceitful, and beauty is vain: but a woman that feareth the Lord, she shall be praised. (31) Give her of the fruit of her hands; and let her own works praise her in the gates.

The fruit of the Spirit is beautiful; Love, Joy, Peace, Long Suffering, Gentleness, Goodness, Faith, Meekness and Temperance. When the church rises up and learns to walk in the Spirit the fruit will follow. Walking out a life full of God’s power and Spirit is the truest form of beauty.

God takes our messed up lives, our broken pieces and puts us back together into beautiful vessels. Ones He can use for His glory. When it is all said and done, true beauty comes from the Lord.

BE BOLD, BE BRAVE AND KEEP YOUR GOD FOCUS

GOOD THOUGHTS

Every day we are tested. Some days more than others. That reminds me of a quote. “I try to take life one day at a time, but sometimes several days attack me at once.” It is not accurate, in reality, but sometimes it feels like it is very true. Matt 6:34 Take therefore no thought for the morrow: for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof.

And it’s hard sometimes not to allow anxiety to overtake us. It is easy to worry about stuff so much that we miss today. Things can look grim. Many emotions can creep in and get the best of us if we allow them to take control. Self-control is the fruit of the spirit. It is hard to not allow our minds to get bogged down in details that want to overtake us.

Phil 4:8 –Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things.

Instead of worrying about things we cannot control, we need to focus on God. The word tells us to think on good things. Positive thinking can turn around situations. God doesn’t want us to be anxious or depressed. He wishes for us to walk in peace. He wants us to forget the past, it is gone and we cannot change it. Defeated people think about the past. Victorious people choose to believe the best is yet to come.

HUMBLE VESSEL

The potter makes a vessel. He creates it in the shape he wants and designs it with a specific use in mind. Let’s say he makes a vase. He fires it and makes it strong and to hold water. If we compare a natural vase to Christians as a vessel this will help us to understand pride.

The vase would have no business being prideful of the flowers inside. The vase didn’t make the flowers. People don’t look at someone who receives flowers and say,”Oh, look you got a vase.” They say, “Oh look, you got flowers.” The vase is just to hold the water to keep the flowers fresh.

In like manner, we do not have a right to be prideful when God uses us. We are simply a vessel that carries His Spirit. We carry his love. We are just empty vessels without Him. Because he uses us doesn’t mean we should feel superior to other vessels. After all, it is what God places in the vessel that has the beauty; His love and His Spirit. Just as the flowers make the vase pretty. A proud vase would say, “Look at me, I am so wonderful that God decided to place his Spirit in me.” A humble vase would say, “Don’t look at me, look at God’s Spirit, He is the one that needs the attention.”

James4:6–⁶But he giveth more grace. Wherefore he saith, God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace unto the humble.

Luke 14:11 –For whosoever exalteth himself shall be abased; and he that humbleth himself shall be exalted.

God gives grace to the humble, which is basically the opposite of pride. People that are full of pride have such a high opinion of themselves that they do not have room for God to move in their lives. Pride often comes with a religious spirit. Look at all the Bertha Better than you’s. They are judgemental and full of pride. While they are looking down their noses at others they are committing sin by being so full of pride and judgmental.

To be humble is to not brag or be self-important. God will exalt the humble. The prideful will be brought down. Humble people listen to others. They are not too proud to ask for help. Humble people are grateful for what they have been given. The humble are pleasant to be around and very helpful.

We are called to serve, but we cannot do that if we are prideful. Even Jesus humbled himself and became a servant. He had every reason and right to be exalted and prideful. But instead, he showed many acts of humility while he walked this earth. Jesus is our example, we need to check ourselves and see if we are a vessel that God can use.