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Archive for the ‘Under-the-Influence’ Category
Day 156, “Rusted!”
Posted in Under-the-Influence, tagged be shiney, free of rust on November 17, 2025|
Day 155, “The Struggle for Your Soul!”
Posted in Under-the-Influence, tagged being led by the Spirit, possessing your soul, the battle, who you serve on July 19, 2025| Leave a Comment »
“Do you not know that if you continually surrender yourselves to anyone to do his will, you are the slaves of him whom you obey, whether that be to sin, which leads to death, or to obedience which leads to righteousness (right doing and right standing with God)? Rom 6:16 AMP
“…Adam was a type (prefigure) of the One Who was to come [in reverse, the former destructive, the Latter saving]” Rom 5:14 AMP
“But now the righteousness of God has been revealed independently and altogether apart from the Law, although actually it is attested by the Law and the Prophets, namely the righteousness of God which comes by believing with personal trust and confident reliance on Jesus Christ (the Messiah). [And it is meant] for all who believe. For there is no distinction,…” Rom 3:21-22 AMP
“For the desires of the flesh are opposed to the [Holy] Spirit, and the [desires of the] Spirit are opposed to the flesh (godless human nature); for these are antagonistic to each [continually withstanding and in conflict with each other], so that you are not free but are prevented from doing what you desire to do.” Gal 5:17
The day the Lord saved you, you entered a struggle. You may not yet recognize it, or you may indeed sense the battle. You may even be like Rebekah, Isaac’s wife pregnant with twins and wondering why she was thus…
So, a little background to the struggle. When you were saved you were given a new heart and your spirit was made new and also the Holy Spirit came to dwell in your spirit. But your soul was not made new nor recreated. That would have made you a completely different person…
You are given the ability and charge to renew your own mind (in the spirit of the mind), by the word of God Rom 12:2). Furthermore, it is the task of your life to continually choose to follow the leading of the Holy Spirit, and to walk out in obedience what you are led to do. So then your own thinking that is renewed (your mind) will agree with and be in obedience to the Holy Spirit and the word of God.
So imagine it:
Kind of like the old cartoon pictures, with an angel on one shoulder and a devil on the other. Even though you are saved, you have two forces pulling at you to follow them. One is of the flesh, one is of the Spirit…
The flesh is your old man, or lower nature… your sensuality. The other is your new man, your new life in Christ by the Holy Spirit (Rom 6:5-6). They are opposed to each other!!! And if you sow to your flesh (meaning you listen and obey its leading), you will reap destruction, but if you sow to the Spirit (listen to the Spirit, obey His leading) you will reap eternal life. (Gal 6:7-8)
The pivot point is your soul. The requirement after salvation is for us to learn to possess our souls for the Kingdom of God, to actually allow the victory of Jesus Christ Who is the Overcomer to have His Way in us. We have been purchased with a price, we are no longer our own! We are called by faith to live a life of obedience to the Spirit of Life in Christ!!! (Rom 8:1-2)
So how does this all happen? In our soul there is a will, our intellect, and emotions… these are required along with your physical members to continually be yielded to Christ, as instruments of righteousness. This becomes a consecrated (set apart) life, a sanctified life for the Lord’s purpose. (Rom 6:11-14)
Let’s focus for a moment, on the functioning of the soul in each of us. Sometimes we are taught that your soul must actually die. Like, “I have been crucified with Christ” Gal 2:20. But words and their rendering can convey meaning that was not intended….
Watchman Nee makes a great case for agreeing with the word of God and the work of the Cross – that I must reckon myself as dead to sin, but alive to God. I can’t crucify myself, but I can agree and enforce the word of God over me that like Rom 6:14, sin shall no longer exert dominion over me, since I am now not under law as a slave, but I am under grace as a subject of God.
I bring myself in submission to the power of the Holy Spirit and habitually put to death (make extinct, deaden the evil deeds prompted by the body… and thus I shall live forever….(Rom 8:13). It is not me mortifying… it is me surrendering to the Holy Spirit and my agreement with Him to render my flesh as powerless…
In all of this regarding of soul and spirit and flesh, there is a paramount understanding that must be achieved in every believer. It even harkens back to the Garden of Eden where Adam and Eve fell. The understanding that is critical to success and living according to the Spirit is that:
“…while we recognize that, the soul has been seduced, led captive, darkened and poisoned with self interest, we do not regard it as something to be annihilated and destroyed in this life…” (T.Austin Sparks, What is Man).
Rather, as Watchman Nee weighs in, it is the independent action of the soul that must be destroyed. This independent action of the soul is what the serpent targeted to stir up in Eve, and is the reason for the fall in the Garden. Prior to the temptation and the fall, all of Eve and Adam’s right and wrong were perceived to be in the hands of God alone. With the apple incident, all this changed.
What must be seen for then and now is the most dangerous adversary!!! It is the component that tripped up Adam and Eve eternally and it is operative in the same way today!!!
Any believer who is trusting in their salvation, yet at the same time is operating and surrendering to their independent soul, making all their own decisions and choices according to their own faculties and members is deceived concerning their status.
God did not save you to then have you live life on your own terms, and according to your own desires and reasonings. He saved you that as a vessel you would demonstrate as a servant His ownership and authority over you… and glorify His Name! This is your witness of Him, even without words!
The enemy of our souls says to himself, “I can’t keep them from being saved, but I can nullify their testimony. I can cause them to come under judgement as ones who sowed to the flesh and will reap damnation, and show the world that the Christ is false.” (Maybe think about Balaam here…) All this happens if we fail as believers to live by the Spirit and walk according to the Spirit.
This is what happens when we retain independent action in our souls. Our soul is designed to obey the spirit and our spirit the Spirit of God. When our soul serves the Spirit as a steward, we are living as witnesses to the Kingdom! When our souls serve our flesh, we reap destruction and ruin our witness for the Lord.
Think of that old story of the stallion. The master must break him (the horse) of his independent will before he can be taken to war. Without that breaking, the stallion is untrustworthy, and dangerous. At the wrong time he will bolt or do his own thing, according to his old nature.
But with breaking comes the ability to obey the command of the master, and to be a known quantity and one that can be trusted.
Now, align this all with Matthew 7:21. It says that not everyone who says to Me, Lord, Lord, will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of my Father Who is in heaven…
He will tell those, depart from Me, I never knew you…..
These people professed to know Christ, and even did works in His name. But what they missed was a vital connection of having the life of Christ in them, and being in Him – a vital connection.
Yes they did miracles – but ultimately miracles prove nothing (Clark). Miracles can be granted through pretended believers. It is relationship that matters.
Spurgeon said, “That if preaching could save a man, Judas would not have been damned. If prophesying could save a man, Balaam would not have been castaway…”
Davis Guzik says:
“In the end, there is one basis of salvation; it isn’t mere verbal confession, not “spiritual works,” but by knowing Jesus and being known to Him. It is our connection to Him – by the gift of faith that He gives to us—that secures our salvation. Connected to Jesus we are secure; without connection to Him all the miracles and great works prove nothing.”
I would add here, the proof is in the pudding – if you truly know Jesus, you are being changed from glory to glory… and that is that you are being led by the Spirit and you are following! Your soul is not operating in independence, but it is like a butler with a napkin on his arm, ready to serve all things of the Spirit! (Rom 8:5-9)
Garcon! Come forth!
Day 154, The Very Highest Way
Posted in Under-the-Influence, tagged all about the way, the highest way on June 28, 2025| Leave a Comment »
“…I am the Way and the Truth and the Life; no one comes to the Father except by Me.” Jn 14:6
“He is the sole expression of the glory of God [the Light-being, the out-raying or radiance of the divine], and He is the perfect imprint and very image of [God’s] nature, upholding and maintaining and guiding and propelling the universe by His mighty word of power….” Heb 1:3 AMP
“…And as He loved those who were His own in the world, He loved them to the last and to the highest degree.” Jn 13:1b AMP
In the earliest days of the New Testament church, their path, their intention, and even the character of the movement and it’s inclination was called…THE WAY
Know Him in His Ways
We know from Ps 103:7 that Moses knew the Lord according to His ways (of righteousness and justice). But the children of God, the Israelites knew Him by His acts.
This distinction or limit of distance was their choice. The Israelites feared God in His frightening power, and back in Exodus 20 they asked that He would speak to Moses, and Moses would then speak to them. God would not violate this request. He would not push in…
Without realizing it, we can put the same obstruction between us and God, choosing to only know Him according to His acts of power, and having a religious official be our interface with God.
This is not what He desires. He wants to know you personally and for you to know Him directly. To have relationship with Him, unfiltered.
So, how do you know Him?
Have Your Way in Me
When we received the Lord in salvation, He came to live in us by the Holy Spirit Who comes to live in us and restores life to our own spirit. But think about this thought for a moment. Hebrews tells us that He (Jesus) is the sole expression of the Glory of God. He is the out-raying radiance of the divine…
This is Who has come to live in us by the power of the Holy Spirit. The very manifest expression of God…Jesus. But for some of us, He is still like a genie trapped in a bottle. We have not let Him have full occupancy as He desires…Instead, we continue to do our thing our way and life by our thoughts and desires and plans. We believe we are saved because we said a prayer. But there is no proof in the pudding of our life, no fruit so to speak, that testifies He is Lord in us… Emmanuel!
Now speaking of His way, you may want to understand the meaning of that word “way.” Used in John 14:6, it is hodos in the Greek (3598). It means a way, or traveled way, a road, travelers way or journey. Metaphorically it means a course of conduct, a way or manner of thinking, feeling, and deciding.
Now let me digress for just a moment to address the notion of sin. Most of us have a definition something like missing the mark, or falling short of the glory of God. These are not incorrect, they are just not specific enough to shape our understanding and concept of sin.
I want to direct you to something that the Lord impressed upon me from 1Jn1:9…
“If we [freely] admit that we have sinned and confess our sins, He is faithful and just (true to His own nature and promises) and will forgive our sins [dismiss our lawlessness] and [continuously] cleanse us from all unrighteousness [everything not in conformity to His will in purpose, thought, and action].” AMP
My point in this sidebar is to say, here we see a clear diagnosis of what it means to sin. I sin whenever I fail to conform to God’s will in purpose, thought, and action? What does it mean to conform? The pattern of my character and will become formed along the very same lines as the Lord Jesus’. But this is not me intellectually examining Him and then saying, “I got this Lord, I see what You want” – and then doing on my own.
This is instead, and inside job, Christ in me the hope of glory!!! He does it! He builds the house.
For me this opens a massive understanding of how often and how many various ways I have sinned against God!
For instance, I may have His thought about something, but because of a fleshly/soulish attitude still operating in me I devise a soulish plan and perform it according to a wrong spirit. Thus, I sin and reap destruction…(Gal 6:8).
Now God is extremely longsuffering and gracious, and is trying to communicate His will to us. As His ways (think His character, motivation, manner, habit, escentially His “Heart”) expand in us, an understanding and ability expands to do His will! (Phil 2:13)
The point: His way becomes our default setting!!!
Now as to the very Highest Way…
Choose the Highest Way!
From 1 Corinthians 13:13 we learn that faith, hope, and love abide…
From 1 Corinthinas 12:31 we learn that there is a more excellent way [one that is better by far and the highest of them all – love] – So how do we think we arrive at working in this highest of all ways?
From the way of Christ Jesus in us having His preeminent way…
“He took a servant’s towel”… Jn 13:1
Love to the highest and greatest degree is prefaced by having a servant’s heart, a willingness to deny yourself and follow the One we serve. For us it is discipleship, and sanctification.
For Jesus, Himself, it is sacrifice which He exemplified as He came into the world. He said, “Here I am, coming to do Your will Oh God…” Heb 10:7&9
As we yield to Jesus, and surrender to His way, we will have both the power and will to do according to His plan…
But what if you are one that has lost your way in this journey? That is a good thing!!! As long as you now submit and embrace His way and pursue His way and finding out what that is! Press into Him and allow His way to be formed in you, but this is not a passive thing. It is an active, lifelong, pursuit… from glory to glory which comes from the Lord , Who is the Spirit.
amen…
Day 153, “Entering His Stride, The Move to Light Speed”
Posted in Under-the-Influence, tagged Glory, Heaven out of this world, sanctification the ins and outs, the New Man on March 14, 2025| Leave a Comment »
Where are you going?
The other day a line of thinking dropped into my conscious, and I began to munch away at it.
When we get to Heaven, our identity will be different. We won’t be wives, or husbands, daughters or sons, grandmas or grandpas any more. At that time, we will be totally the Lord’s, and our identity will be entirely based on Him… our relationship with Him, in Him. We will be freed from all the identifiers of our earthly existence: status, wealth, position, education, wife, husband, child, etc. They will have been lifted from upon us like a yoke that gets replaced…
But our identity will not be less. It will be complete! We will be complete in Him.
I believe the Lord is moving upon our hearts, even in this moment, to embrace a freedom that transfigures us here on earth even while we await heaven. This being transfigured is a work of God that we can cooperate with. It has to do with sanctification.
I am greatly stirred by Oswald Chambers (My Utmost for His Highest 1992, July 22-23. He discusses the importance of sanctification for death and for life.
According to the death side, it is a stripping down of me of all things until just me remains. It it like me at the molecular level: the smallest bit of me that can be achieved and yet still be me. It is a scrubbed me. My naked self. It is the lump of me without all the worldly fallout. It allows me to become “free from being determined and persistent toward anything except God.” Before this action of working death on me, I was a highly charged particle with heavy attraction to the things of this world…
After being worked on towards death (sanctification), all the “load” in our soul/flesh (devotion to things that are temporal whether towards intellect, will, or emotions) loses its attraction and weight. We become neutral in a sense. Like Paul conveyed in Acts 20:24, “none of these things move me.”
There is also the installing of life side to sanctification, where we are not left in deficit, but rather the very qualities that are of Christ are imparted to us. His very nature is imparted to us, so we are not left to simply imitate Christ, but rather to express His nature that is transmitted to us by the power of the Holy Spirit (John 16:14). We are thus, filled….
Oswald Chambers reveals:
“The most wonderful secret of living a Holy life does not lie in imitating Jesus, but in letting the perfect qualities of Jesus exhibit themselves in my human flesh. Sanctification is ‘Christ in you…’ (Col 1:27)”
It is the “hope of glory!”
So let us pursue this understanding of glory for a moment…
It is a process. It doesn’t happen overnight, but over a lifetime…
It occurs because we continue… we go on continuously, beholding the image of the glory of the Lord….
Our eyes are fixed on the goodness of the Lord. His majesty, power, stellar and perfect goodness, awesomeness, qualities that defy imagination but that are found resident and embodied by our beloved Savior.
Now, look at this for a moment. We are sanctified and part of this process is a removal, a destruction, a dying out from our-self and our temporal baggage that is dead weight. Self blocks our capacity to believe… and more, it actually has “veiled” our capacity to apprehend truth without distortion in the word of God.
With all these elements left in us, without being sanctified, they are like the dross in silver not being cooked off and skimmed away. They cause the strength and purity of the silver to be diluted…
Not to leave us deficient, however, the Lord deposits within us His own perfect nature, His DNA, His very own life by which I can now live by a new life lived for God. (Romans 6:5-6; Col 3:10-14)
The point of this is, I don’t for a moment believe that our becoming and living according to the New Man Christ is to wait until we get to Heaven. I believe that this new nature begins to unpack, assemble, and manifest itself as we turn to God fully and search for Him.
Remember in 2Cor 3:18, when a person turns in repentance to the Lord, the veil is stripped off and taken away. Repentance works with sanctification to allow the death side to do a work in us… removing and stripping us down to that smallest molecule that is still essentially us.
At the same time, timbers of the “Old House” are being removed, New timbers of Jesus are being placed. The New Creation which has been present since new birth is being assembled as room is given to renovate – for it to operate.
So our identity in Christ, which will be fulfilled in Christ in Heaven, first gets underway here on earth. It is here, on earth, that the perishable puts on the imperishable, the mortal puts on immortality….(1Cor 15:53).
You see the perishable can’t enter heaven, so it must put on the imperishable before it enters into heaven – that is right here on earth!
You and I are both being transfigured into the last Adam, Who became a life giving Spirit [restoring the dead to life]. Yes, our physical life came first. And we have borne the image of the man of dust (Adam). But now more than ever, it is time that we bear the image of the Man of heaven, Christ Jesus (1Cor 15:45-49).
It is not something we make happen, but it is something that we cooperate with and moves into place as we behold the Lord’s glory as in a mirror…
Seeing His goodness, seeing His glory (and how far we operate from it) brings us to repent and it destroys the veil that blocks us from seeing Him in fulness. It is a wheel of beholding, and transfiguration, and glory, from one degree to another … emancipation from every bondage of our soulish life and perspective. Until one day, we are freed from the very last restraint… the last cord — death itself, and then we enter into the fulness of life in His full presence. No more mirrors!!! Just reality before us!
So really, where are you going?
Day 152, “The God Who Fills!”
Posted in Under-the-Influence, tagged all you need, destiny, Filled, perfection, Power, purpose on March 8, 2025| Leave a Comment »
“…that you may be filled with the full (deep and clear) knowledge of His will in all spiritual wisdom [in comprehensive insight into the ways and purposes of God] and in understanding and discernment of spiritual things –“ Col 1:9 AMP
“…that you may be filled [through all your being] unto all the fullness of God [may have the richest measure of the divine Presence, and become a body wholly filled and flooded with God Himself]!” Eph 3:19AMP
Pleroo (G4137) – to make full, fill up, to fill to the full
It is in our being made full that we can fulfil our destiny in Christ Jesus!
Back in 1998, my husband and I made our first trek to the Promised Land… Israel. As we toured the Temple Mount and the excavated grounds underneath the western wall, we arrived at the outer facing of what was believed to be the old “Holy of Holies.” Internally as a space it was unavailable, but on the outside the Jewish people would place prayer requests on small bits of paper in the cracks between the large hewn bolders of the Temple wall proper.
It was in this moment that God first showed me revelation of prophetic truth… in a very real sense, He “filled me.”
In other words, He “plerooed” me – brought to realization prophecies concerning the Jew and the Gentile being made one body.. Ephesians 2:14.
In a flash, the Lord showed me the image of Hebrew language being read from right to left. And conversely, English, which is read left to right. These two entities, these languages, these words came together in one binding, like bookends of the same book. Joined in the center, which is Christ – it is “(bound, welded) together harmoniously, and it continues to rise (grow, increase) into a holy temple in the Lord…” Eph 2:21
In 1992, the Lord first “filled me” with the Baptism of the Holy Spirit…. I had been in discipleship with a women solely for the purpose of receiving this Baptism, this filling. At the time I received, the Lord “Pimplemied” me, G4130. I was filled, and so what was to be fulfilled in me began to come to pass, to be confirmed.
I was the poster child for “difficult to receive” the Baptism. I had all the head learning, but the manifestation of being immersed into the Holy Spirit by the Lord Jesus Christ took many many times of my submission before Him. I was afraid, and locked up, highly reserved and controlled in my own soul. It seemed like a test of performance that I was doomed to fail over and over again. Being released to the Lord was difficult for me.
On this particular night, my husband, who was an Air Force Officer, was TDY, the kids were asleep in bed – I had no distractions. But the Lord is so so good! He saw my difficulty and made a way. He actually presented for me a visual picture of a ticker tape of what to begin saying… It was like a phenetic language aid… and as I forgot myself, and my fear, and focused solely on Him and His goodness, it was like I could put my hand into His and step off…
He then filled me, upon me, over me, a cascading of His Presence which diffused throughout my very soul. If He were a fragrance, you would have detected Him in all my thoughts, my emotions, and even throughout my will. In that moment, I was completely His… wrapped and covered in a divine fabric … I was endued, fully clothed in Him.
Again, the word is pimplemi (Acts 2:4, 4:8, 4:31, 9:17, 13:9). I was filled with the Baptism of the Holy Spirit. This is different from when I was saved and the Holy Spirit became resident within me in my spirit. This was Jesus My Lord taking the Holy Spirit and immersing me into the overwhelming Presence of Him. This was a different experience from salvation.
Years later the Lord continued to expand me in understanding as I began a new venture of discipling other believers. The Lord showed me an astounding thing! One of the great, foundational Scriptures for discipleship is Luke 6:40. As I launched this new discipleship group, the Holy Spirit opened my understanding concerning the significance of discipleship and how it is unique among training methods: how it is different from Sunday School, small groups, special presentations, and how it even excels pulpit ministry.
Luke 6:40 reads as:
A pupil is not superior to his teacher, but everyone [when he is] completely trained (readjusted, restored, set to rights, and perfected) will be like his teacher.”
Being Made Perfect!
There are many renderings between various translations for the concept of being completely trained, or made perfect. The word is: katartidzo – G2675. It reads as:
– to render, to fit, sound complete
– to mend (what has been broken or rent), to repair
– to complete
– to fit out, equip, put in order, arrange, adjust
– to fit or frame for one’s self – prepare
– ethically: to strengthen, perfect, complete, make one what he ought to be
So basically, to be discipled aligns you to a place, a Person… where you will be mended and repaired of what has been broken. It will outfit you (like an explorer or one having special clothing needs like a pith helmet or khakis – or like the clothing of the enduement of the power of the Lord). You will be strengthened, perfected, and made what you ought to be!!!
You will be made like your teacher – Your Lord, Jesus Christ.
No other ministry can compare with this. It is why we are called to make disciples of all nations. That is the mandate for the church and every believer in the Lord. It is where and how we reproduce spiritually, and bring the life of the believer into the perfection of Christ.
But guess what? If you haven’t first been “filled” yourself, first in salvation and the Presence of the Holy Spirit living in you, and then secondly, filled with the baptism of the Holy Spirit – actually enduing you with power from on high, you won’t have what you need to do the job…
Like one person said, “How can you teach me about Israel if you haven’t ever been there???”
How can we begin to foster new believers into the perfection of Jesus Christ if we ourselves have not been filled???
Can you truly say you are sold out and submitted fully to the Lord and yet not be filled?
Can you testify even of the lifechanging power of the Lord, without being filled?
Would not that be the very condition that 2Tim 3:5 warns us all about? To hold a form of religion but deny and reject and be a stranger to the power of it?
I will tell you, you cannot be perfected in Christ if you refuse His infilling at every level…
May the Lord overturn every lie and fear and distortion of the enemy that wars against and exalts itself against the true knowledge of God and His provision of “filling.”
Day 151, “Being Perpetually Renewed”
Posted in Under-the-Influence, tagged lies, lower provison, the deception of the enemy, underpowered on February 5, 2025| 1 Comment »
“For as he thinks in his heart, so is he….” Prov 23:7 AMP
“Therefore if any person is [in-grafted] in Christ (the Messiah) he is a new creation (a new creature altogether); the old [previous moral and spiritual condition] has passed away. Behold, the fresh and new has come!” 2Cor 5:12 AMP
“Strip yourselves of your former nature [put off and discard your old unrenewed self] which characterized your previous manner of life and becomes corrupt through lusts and desires that spring from delusion; And be constantly renewed in the spirit of your mind [having a fresh mental and spiritual attitude], and put on the new nature (the regenerate self) created in God’s image, [Godlike] in true righteousness and holiness.” Eph 4:22-24 AMP
YOU ARE IN CHARGE OF YOUR THOUGHTS!
Sometimes the Lord shows you exactly where you are missing it!
This happened to me last night at a small group session concerning freedom and deliverance. We were all sharing topics of where we had believed the enemy’s lie, and how to speak and embrace the truth instead.
After a lull in the discussion, I decided to share a lie that I had believed since childhood, and how that lie has impacted me throughout the years. The odd thing was, where before when I would share this it had so much impact that I could feel the pain of it. This time it felt empty of power to wound.
And yet, I didn’t give that emptiness much thought… until the Holy Spirit so politely reminded me… He had brought freedom and deliverance to this very issue just last October. In fact, He had precipitated my healing of this warped notion all on His own. I was not seeking healing at the time… that made it even more precious!
Yet here I was, a few short months later, expressing a lie as if it was still an operative thing, having forgotten the work the Lord had done!
I had to repent last night and ask forgiveness for that, for absolutely losing sight of the healing He brought.
But because of my failure, the Holy Spirit was able to show me a strategy that the enemy likes to use over and over, and how we are to overcome that.
THE DEALIO:
There is an instruction for us as believers in Ephesians 4:22-24 that is so paramount, but so often overlooked as to result instead in shipwreck and failure.
We are called to put off (strip ourselves of and discard our former nature – our ways of believing and thinking and doing) – which characterized our previous (before receiving Jesus as Savior) manner of life. This way of being becomes corrupt and leads to delusion!
We pursue being constantly renewed in the spirit of our mind [having a fresh mental and spiritual attitude].
And then we put on the new nature (the regenerate self) created in God’s image, [Godlike] in true righteousness and holiness.
This putting off, being renewed, and putting on is a cycle that we repeat over and over. It is like a water wheel of momentum and power and freedom. Being washed by the water of the word…
But it all has to do with your soul as it is reflected by your will, intellect, and emotions.
Now that you are saved, in your mind you have an intersection of the spirit and your flesh. So you have a mind of the flesh (your old natural way of thinking and believing), and the mind of the spirit (the place of kingdom thinking that agrees with the word of God and is in “G” with the Holy Spirit. God’s desire is that your spirit and the influence of the Holy Spirit will ascend to full authority over you and that you will live by the Spirit, not the flesh. It is you who must decide what mind you will default to!!!
When you struggle and flip back and forth between the two manners of thinking (spirit or fleshly/soulish) you are being double minded… That is not to be so!
So the application for what the Holy Spirit showed me about myself and my own thinking (visa vie the lie I had been freed from):
– the enemy cannot take away your salvation, but he can promote a thought at a level far below the truth of what you have been shown. In this way he perpetuates a bondage principal that operates according to the word of God.
— that is: “as a man thinks in his heart, so is he”
— he presents something that counters the full truth of God’s word, and if you receive it and accept it, you are ruled by it! (Rom 6:16). You become the slave of this thinking!
— even though the Lord had initiated my freedom from a lie, and brought healing from it, my loose wielding of that fact caused a default back to the lie as if it were still operative! In a sense, I had let the word of God fall to the ground – which it never should. This was on me! I had to repent and renounce that way of thinking!
The beautiful visual that was shared as a picture of this process was: “the enemy stands before you, his hand out and he blows a lie towards you like a puff of smoke, or a dandelion flower. If you receive it and believe it, it becomes your truth!”
You see the enemy constantly counts on us being lazy in a sense, not active, not apprehending fully, not remembering, not enforcing (exerting self-control), not vigilantly putting off, not rising to a new standard of truth in our hearts and minds, and not arresting those lies that he blows towards us.
Thus we fail to operate in the mind of Christ, and instead revert to our old man thinking mode of our pre-saved self!
Thus, the enemy keeps us living short of the glory of God that has already been secured for us. We live under the horizon of being an overcomer!!! Under the potential that Christ has for us!
Therefore we miss, as Oswald Chambers describes, a way where nothing remains of the “old life”. Residing instead in a place where the “old gloomy outlook disappears, as does our old attitude toward things.” Where we can live via “love that endures long and is patient and kind, believes the best of all” (and the rest of 1Cor 13:4-8).
Folks, it has to do at its core with the thoughts that you secretly allow to rest in your mind. Do they conform to the word of God, or to your old manner of thinking.
This failure to renew your mind according to the word, and put off other thinking that contests it will keep you in bondage to the lies of the enemy!!!
It may even be the same place Hosea recounts, where the Lord healed Israel “but they did not know that He healed them.” (Hosea 11:3)
May this speak truth to us all…
Day 150, “The Enormity of His Identification with Us”
Posted in Under-the-Influence, tagged 100% identified with you, His crucifixtion purpose, Your freedom on January 27, 2025| Leave a Comment »
“But stripped Himself [of all privileges and rightful dignity], so as to assume the guise of a servant (slaves), in that He became like men and was born a human being, and after He had appeared in human form, He abased and humbled Himself [still further] and carried His obedience to the extreme of death, even the death of the cross! Therefore [because He stooped so low] God has highly exalted Him and has freely bestowed on Him the name that is above every name,…” Phil 2:7-9 AMP
“For our sake He made Christ [virtually] to be sin Who knew no sin, so that in and through Him we might become [endued with, viewed as being in, and examples of] the righteousness of God [what we ought to be, approved and acceptable and in right relationship with Him, by His goodness].” 2Cor 5:21 AMP
He is Awesome!
In my previous post, Day 148, I touched on a subject that was revelatory for me and the Lord has continued to expand that topic. I discussed how, while God doesn’t change, we have the ability to move and impact God. Specifically I shared in reference to “Jesus wept” from John 11, that “this is about the event having an impact on Him personally, and it moving Him in His emotions, yet Him not allowing it to deter Him from the greater work that the Father wanted to manifest of Jesus being the Resurrection and the Life.”
The event I was referring to, was both Mary and Martha telling the Lord that if He had been there, their brother Lazarus would not have died.
In that moment, I believe Jesus could see the very limit of their faith and it’s force was able to wound Him… and He felt it just as we would have. But, He didn’t allow the force of that impact to divert Him from the greater goal – why He was actually sent by the Father. That goal was to do the Father’s will…. completely. In this case, demonstrate that He is the resurrection and the Life. But to do that required the suffering of Lazarus’ death.
So moving on from that baseline of Day 148, I want to take that notion, that Jesus is moved by us… He can hear our thoughts, knows our heart, and is moved by our needs and wants and cries…And yet, because He is 100% God and 100% man, He is going to fulfill God’s call, God’s will, and He will do it according to God’s perfect will in thought, purpose, and deed. This is because He is perfectly denying and laying down His own self as a man.
Ultimately, I believe Jesus came and did this, so that you and I could also deny ourselves, lay down our own lives, and instead walk out the spirit and not the flesh.
Now, the focus of the continued revelation is aimed at Psalm 22. This Psalm is a Messianic Psalm, one that King Davis penned but basically is where David is crying out a prophetic word that emulates Jesus’ experience on the cross (which was still yet to come).
Read through Psalm 22:1-31 slowly. Let the words and expression speak to you. From beginning to its end, it expresses the fulness of Jesus’ abandonment by the Father, His desolation, and an accounting of the depths of His progression through the misery of the crucifixtion. There is no denying His experience as being most horrific, and one which He had to go through as a man. 100% man to be exact. It was because of this, that He was qualified to be identified with us…
But what you may not initially grasp is that, the experience of His passion embodied every facet of every aspect of the suffering of mankind. Not one stream of what you and I suffer here on earth was left out of His suffering. And He was moved by it. He felt it all to the core of His being. But He refused to allow it to divert Him from the purpose for which He came.
He came to do the will of the Father, and then to purchase freedom and deliverance for you and I who were captive to sin, and darkness, and evil.
From Psalm 22:6 “But I am a worm, and no man; I am the scorn of men, and despised by the people.”
Here we may be tempted to read this only as from King David’s lips and account, but I want to share with you what the Blue Letter Bible’s interlinear rendering is for the word “worm” and it’s deepest meaning:
Worm, scarlet stuff, crimson
-worm- the female ‘coccus ilicis’
-scarlet stuff, crimson, scarlet
— the dye made from the dried body of the female of the worm “coccus ilicis”
Expansion: (Henry Morris. Biblical Basis for Modern Science, Baker House, 1985, p. 73)
“When the female of the scarlet worm species was ready to give birth to her young, she would attach her body to the trunk of a tree, fixing herself so firmly and permanently that she would never leave again. The eggs deposited beneath her body were thus protected until the larvae were hatched and able to enter their own life cycle. As the mother died, the crimson fluid stained her body and the surrounding wood. From the dead bodies of such female scarlet worms, the commercial scarlet dyes of antiquity were extracted. What a picture this gives of Christ, dying on the tree, shedding His precious blood that He might “bring many sons unto glory” (Heb 2:10). He died for us that we might live through Him!”
Friends, perhaps we are familiar with reading and studying the cross, and Jesus’ identification with us. We have maybe even studied Isaiah 53 and the things Jesus suffered. And yet, somehow, because He is also 100% God, we think His physical and emotional suffering was somehow less than ours… But I tell you, it was more, because He did carry the sins and suffering of the world. As the Son of Man He identified completely with us. He took all the suffering that was required freely upon Himself, that you and I could be free from it.
Not only that, but He felt and experienced every bit of it, to the deepest core of His being, and yet, He chose not to let that suffering move Him away from any and every purpose of the perfect will of the Father. He went though it all, that you and I would follow Him and live through Him!!!
The point::: You move Him! Your hurt moves Him. He is aware of it all… (in fact He has carried it all)so come to Him and enter into the healing and the Life that He has purchased for you in His identification with you that is both complete and perfect!
Amen!!!
Day 149, “To Pursue or to Lean/Rest?”
Posted in Under-the-Influence, tagged desire, find, He is, hunger for, or spirit, pursue, works on January 14, 2025| Leave a Comment »
One of the best strategies the enemy uses against us is to keep us in a “do loop” of pursuing God rather than resting or leaning on Him in faith. He causes us to rely on our sense of “being saved or having God at our center.” When we no longer sense the Lord’s presence we gear up to pursue again. I have seen this become the default setting of so many believers. This becomes a new lifestyle…always in pursuit, never apprehending.
This is different than the Lord hiding Himself so we will indeed press into His Presence and His word. Instead this is entering a traffic circle of activity to pursue Him and never coming to the exit: never coming to a place of resting or leaning on Him. It is a place where our confidence in ourselves and our actions reasserts itself over our faith in Him or His word. We trust in what we feel or experience instead of what is conveyed in the word about Him or His ways or character.
Second Timothy describes this situation as follows:
“… they are forever inquiring and getting information, but are never able to arrive at a recognition and knowledge of the Truth.” 2Tim3:7
We become like hamsters on an exercise wheel, a treat extended before us (of gaining a greater sense of His Presence), but we never recognize we have received it…but why is that? Because the basis for recognizing we have received something has moved from the realm of faith to something more tangible and temporal. It becomes something of the flesh that is under our control. It is an emotional zeal which leads us to deception. It becomes works.
The danger here is that the believer has actually moved from faith in God, to faith in themselves and their activity. It actually wars against the truth of God and muddies our perception of the spiritual realm!
Our focus should be to believe, rest, lean, and peace…
Here are just a few Scriptures to recalibrate and focus our faith that we can employ to be able to rest and lean on God.
Colossians 2:5
“For though I am away from you in body, yet I am with you in spirit, delighted at the sight of your [standing shoulder to shoulder in such] orderly array and the firmness and the solid front and steadfastness of your faith in Christ [that leaning of the entire human personality on Him in absolute trust and confidence in His power, wisdom, and goodness].”
Galatians 3:3
“Are you so foolish and so senseless and so silly? Having begun [your new life spiritually] with the [Holy] Spirit, are you now reaching perfection [by dependence] on the flesh?
Phil 2:13
“[Not in your own strength] for it is God Who is all the while effectually at work in you [energizing and creating in you the power and desire], both to will and work for His good pleasure and satisfaction and delight.”
Phil 4:7
“And God’s peace [shall be yours, that tranquil state of a soul assured of its salvation through Christ, and so fearing nothing from God and being content with its earthly lot of whatever sort that is, that peace] which transcends all understanding shall garrison and mount guard over your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.”
Isaiah 26:3
“You will guard him and keep him in perfect and constant peace whose mind [both its inclination and its character] is stayed on You, because He commits himself to You, leans on You, and hopes confidently in You.”
Two parting thoughts:
A favorite theologian, Oswald Chambers, once remarked that “when a person fails in his Christian life, it is usually because he has never received anything.”
It is so easy to get sped up in our Christian walk and forget our posture is one of continually receiving the redemptive life of Christ through the Holy Spirit. It is staying humble, and hungry, but realizing there is a flow and pattern to this Christian life. Like the river Jordan it is first flows into us, and then flows out as a witness and ministry. This is not a passive reception but an active engagement by faith with thanksgiving!!!
The second thought arose as I was meditating on Psalm 139:7-10…
“Where could I go from Your Spirit? Or where could I flee from Your Presence? If I ascend up into heaven, You are there; if I make my bed in Sheol (the place of the dead), behold You are there. If I take the wings of the morning or dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there shall Your hand lead me, and Your right hand shall hold me.”
Do you truly understand you cannot get away from God? Yet we become convinced He has left us. We are so enamored with our actions to pursue God… but wait, instead begin to claim Him as the God of your heart. Worship Him, draw near by faith, realizing you deserve nothing, but He has already made the way for you to enter in to His presence.
If you were an airplane… He has laid the runway, created the heading, structured your frame and set your flaps. He is the light before you on the runway, and He provides the loft and lift under your wings….
Simply come before Him and believe…
“Light is sown for the righteous and strewn along their pathway, and joy for the upright in heart [the irrepressible joy which comes from consciousness of His favor and protection].” Ps 97:11
Most importantly here, am I telling you to not pursue God…?
Not exactly, I am saying you will find Him when you believe, lean, and trust that He is there… near you, within you, and hopefully upon you. You don’t need to make it happen. He already has!
Day 148, The Heart that is 100% Man and 100% God…(and yet He allows you to move Him)
Posted in Under-the-Influence, tagged conform, eternity, His plan, Jesus is moved by you on January 7, 2025| 1 Comment »
There is a difference between us having the ability to change God in some substantive way, either by our righteousness or our sin, and our ability to move God.
We cannot change God. He is the Lord God and He changes not. But He is not impervious to our needs or wants or desires. It is important to note this distinction.
Scripture shows us over and over, God is moved by the prayers and cries of His people, even sometimes those who don’t technically seem to be His.
Recall how, in Genesis 21, the cries of Ishmael reached the Lord as he was about to expire as they were cast into the wilderness. Then the Lord caused Hagar, his mother, to see a well and to give her son water thereby saving their lives.
Why is it important for us to understand this distinction, that while we cannot change God, He is moved by us? I believe to not understand this causes us to take offense at God and what He chooses or does, and to even become hardened in our hearts because we think He is unmoved… please allow me to elaborate.
My daughter passed away from a brain tumor in October 2023 after fighting this tumor for 7 years. After three surgeries and chemo and radiation, what began as a slow growing category 2 tumor mutated into an aggressive stage 4 tumor, that took her life.
Complicating this battle was having hormone increases because of childbirth (she delivered two children during this timeframe, accelerating that tumor’s growth.)
As believers and prayer warriors we all , with friends around the nation and even world, prayed, petitioned, declared, strategized and beseeched the Lord for healing and deliverance from this adversary.
After such a lengthy battle with three different surgeries, our daughter passed and we were exhausted, confused, disappointed that our prayers seemed to go unanswered, and basically we felt like even after 25 years in full-time ministry we knew nothing! We were empty. We felt like we had failed to move God in our prayers. We were wrong.
By His grace, more than a year later He has restored us, revealed to us many things and has set us back upon our spiritual feet again. We are moving forward in Him.
From that time of breaking and crushing, we are changed greatly. In that regard I read the words of Mary and Martha in John 11:
“Lord if You had been here, my brother would not have died.”
Jesus was not unmoved by their words or their sorrow. In fact, He wept! But I do not see this as has been portrayed in many commentaries as Jesus being angry at the destruction and evil in the world.
I see this instead as Jesus, knowing all things and seeing all truth, realizing the limit of their faith in Him like a boundary set in stone. He faced their ignorance and unbelief and challenged it head on….
Yet He wept. For me this is about the event having an impact on Him personally, and it moving Him in His emotions, yet Him not allowing it to deter Him from the greater work that the Father wanted to manifest of Jesus being the Resurrection and the Life. I can’t imagine a more difficult time for Jesus (except for the Cross of course), in that the situation precipitated His full feeling yet also full obedience to the Father.
We see this type of situation unpacked in Hebrews 5:7.
“In the days of His flesh, [Jesus] offered up definite, special petitions ]for that which He not only wanted but needed] and supplications with strong crying and tears to Him Who was [always] able to save Him [out] from death, and He was heard because of His reverence toward God [His godly fear, His piety, in that He shrank from the horrors of separation from the bright presence of the Father].”
What was the singular motivation of Jesus in this and every situation? Certainly obedience was part, He said it Himself in Hebrews 10: 7,& 9…
“Here I am, coming to do Your will oh God…”
But also He shrank from any separation from the Father – that had to mean in any departure from the Father and His will.
Beyond any desire of His own to give comfort to Mary and Martha in their grief, He was called to strengthen and challenge the borders of their faith – without which no one can please God. He denied His own grief at their lack of faith and belief, and acted as the intermediary with the Father that He was called to be.
It was more profitable eternally, for Him to have allowed this loss, than to waive the opportunity to really stretch their faith to the specifications of the Father.
I see this same work having taken and still taking place in my husband and I. On so many levels we could justify our prayers as “giving the Lord the most glory’” if He healed our daughter. Only later could He show us many reasons why that linear plan was not in His will. And that is what all things have merged into for me, is understanding that I am called to be conformed to His will in purpose, thought, and deed.
That is the true litmus test of my servanthood and discipleship. Am I willing to be conformed like that…
May this short narrative provide a spark of understanding for each reading it…
God is moved by your heart and needs and prayers…He is moved, just as Jesus wept.
But, often, there is more being worked of eternal consequence than can be understood in the situation temporally.
But if we allow the Lord, he can expand our understanding as we allow our faith in Him to arise and take flight!
This year, 2025, allow that as never before! Take down every obstacle to believing Him by faith! To do so means an opening to pleasing Him, living by faith, gaining greater access to grace, making us well, restoring us, gaining credit as righteousness, and walking into the full destiny before you as a descendent of Abraham
Do a quick word study of faith and begin to see it is the umbilical cord of your Christian walk! And then be willing as Christ was to lay down your own perspectives and to pick up the very will of God in conforming to His will in thought, perspective, and action.
As it was in Jesus, this was the place where righteousness and peace kissed,
As He is, so are we in this world. Amen.
Day 147, Cornerstone Influence
Posted in Under-the-Influence, tagged Cornerstone, He is, Light, Straight on December 9, 2024| Leave a Comment »
“But be doers of the Word [obey the message], and not merely listeners to it, betraying yourselves [into deception by reasoning contrary to the Truth].” Jas 1:22“There is a way which seems right to a man and appears straight before him, but at the end of it is the way of death.” Prov 14:12
“To you then who believe (who adhere to, trust in, and rely on Him) is the preciousness; but for those who disbelieve [it is true], The very Stone which the builders rejected has become the main Cornerstone,…” 1Pet 2:7
“Because of and through the heart of tender mercy and loving-kindness of our God, a Light from on high will dawn upon us and visit us to shine upon and give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death to direct and guide our feet in a straight line into the way of peace.” Luke 1 78-79
The Dangers:
– Reasoning contrary to the Truth
– A way which seems right
– For those who don’t believe
– A Light that gives light to direct our feet
…(These are points to consider as we progress)
Is where we started our journey with the Lord different than where we are today? (Talking about the quality of your heart here and remaining tender.)
Like a race where a baton is handed off from runner to runner have we been handed a baton of error? A tactic of the enemy …? Am I in the wrong lane and running for the enemy?
It is time for the Body of Christ to understand that we have an enemy who prowls around like a lion, seeking whom he may devour – and he does not cease.
He wants you to become hardened in your heart by trials, and difficulties and to take offense.
He wants your mind to stop being renewed by the word of God, and instead for you to no longer go on with God, but rather be stuck!
More important than what you think you know in the word of God is the quality of your heart before God. Your trust in the character of God. Your willingness to submit….
The day you were saved your mind received the light of God, and thus you knew what you didn’t know before, because of His light.
But when life rushes in, deals with us harshly, when we are battered and broken…we can become hardened. We think we are just becoming savvy and careful, but truly we are becoming cynical, distant, and hard, not to only situations and people – but actually to God Himself.
Our greatest need at that time is to recognize we have become hardened. We have closed ourselves off and moved into independence. We need to repent and turn around and change our thinking, not only about our situations, but about our orientation and focus on God.
In that regard, I direct your attention to the Cornerstone Principal in Architecture. 1Peter 2:6-8 discusses the Chief Cornerstone, Who is Jesus Christ. But there are some things that will help us to apply this Principal…:
The architectual example of the Cornerstone in building had three distinct characteristics from other stones used in construction. Knowing these will open our understanding to this metaphor for Christ.
Historically, the Cornerstone was the very first stone to be set in the building process. Measurements were taken to ensure proper alignment of the rest of the structure. While in earlier times alignment was based on astronomical points of the compass, for sacred structures the alignment should be based on the word of God and the leading of the Holy Spirit.
The same principal then applies to the Body of Christ and being a abode for God. Our orientation always cues off of Jesus our Lord, and the Holy Spirit’s leading. This is something we never outgrow, but its absence can cause independent action and decisions which will lead us astray.
So as a Body of Living Stones being built up into the abode of God we never cast off or leave our Cornerstone! He is the continual Light that shines so we may not sit in darkness, and He guides our feet to the way of peace.
In ancient building rituals, often a sacrifice such as wine, grain, or water or even blood was poured atop the cornerstone as it was dedicated to the gods…. Even in later times, those stones were hollowed out and documents or literature was placed inside them. Sometimes the stones were inscribed with the name of the owner, or the builder and the year it was built.
Imagine now, as your are a living sacrifice, your life being laid down on the Cornerstone, so you can pick up His life and walk it out. He has chosen you and put His Name in you for His glory and identification. Inside you are hidden vital documents concerning His eternal word…! But is is important, to keep this Cornerstone continually before you, even as the focus of your life. All things are to proceed from His word and Spirit and His will!
There is not a day where we dictate to Him the plan or the action. This would be reasoning contrary to the Truth which would bring us into deception!
The concept of a Cornerstone was also to lead one into celebration. The cornerstone placement was one of prominence, leading to a recognition and valuing of the structure. In the same way, we recognize our Cornerstone, Jesus Christ, as our Head and Chief among Ten Thousand. He is the Alpha and Omega. The First and Last. He is the Firstborn among all creation, worthy of all our praise. We take our placement, our array, our position and orders from Him. Like a Divine Guide-on, we are arranged via Him. As He is, so are we in this world!
Think of the Tabernacle structure as it revealed the placement of the Tribes of Israel around the Arc of the Covenant. In the same way, we find our place and identity in Christ, in deference to Him.
It is not my gifting’s that determine what I do, but it is Him through the Holy Spirit that determines both my gifting’s and their subsequent divine opportunities for manifestation.
Most intriguing, concerning the Cornerstone, that is Jesus, is that it was the very builders of the Temple who rejected Him. I cannot imagine that occurrence during any building project of a natural, historical origin. The builders would simply set the cornerstone that was prepared.
Here, however, for the Temple of the Most High, the Jewish builders thought better. They were offended at Christ and would not put their trust in, or believe in Him. Sadly for them. He became the Chief Cornerstone regardless, and they had to deal with that spiritual truth, eternally.
There was a day when you and I became saved, and on that day Truth and Light entered our hearts. We thus began to know God.
But where are we today? Is that Truth and Light still fresh and welcome and present in our hearts in the same manner?
You see it is we that change. Our perceptions of truth, our openness to receive: these can change. We reflect the conditions of the Parable of the Sower in the soil of our hearts (Luke 8:12-15), and our very thoughts about those situations can either harden our hearts to God, or make us humble before Him.
The choice is ours, but it is a choice with eternal consequences that is borne out over and over again by Biblical examples.
Have I heard truth but it is being carried away by the devil that I may not believe? Have I fallen into trial and temptation because of not developing a root in the word of God and Christ? Or have I heard the word but it is being choked from bearing fruit for the Kingdom because of my attending and caring more for the pleasures and riches of this life?
Or against all others am I like the seed sown in good soil of the heart, holding the word fast in my heart and steadily bringing forth fruit with patience?
The diagnosis of all these soils can be readily seen when we look at what position and elevation the Cornerstone occupies in their heart. Given proper focus, belief, and obedience we will serve our Cornerstone with joy and gladness and not reject Him.
But there is always before me because of life situations, a danger that lurks. Will I try and slide into the seat of the Cornerstone? Or will I allow Him to take and retain His rightful place in my heart?
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- Day 156, “Rusted!”
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- Day 154, The Very Highest Way
- Day 153, “Entering His Stride, The Move to Light Speed”
- Day 152, “The God Who Fills!”
- Day 151, “Being Perpetually Renewed”
- Day 150, “The Enormity of His Identification with Us”
- Day 149, “To Pursue or to Lean/Rest?”
- Day 148, The Heart that is 100% Man and 100% God…(and yet He allows you to move Him)
- Day 147, Cornerstone Influence
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