Let It Flow

Luke 24:49 And, behold, I send the promise of my Father upon you: but tarry ye in the city of Jerusalem, until ye be endued with power from on high.

Shortly after WWI, Lawrence of Arabia was entertaining some of his Arab friends in Paris. He showed them the sights of the city: the Arc d’Triomph, the Louvre, the Champs Elysees. It was a remarkable irony to Lawrence that these amazing sights were not what most impressed his Arab friends — but rather the bathtub faucet of their hotel room. They were completely astonished that someone could turn a handle…and get all the water they wanted.

As they were preparing to leave Paris, Lawrence found his foreign friends in the bathroom with wrenches trying to disconnect the faucet. They said, “It is very dry in Arabia. What we need are faucets. If we have them, we will have all the water we want.” 

Lawrence had to explain that the water did not come from the faucets, but rather from the water supply to which they were connected. It doesn’t matter if you have a faucet if you’re not connected to the water supply!

Read the scripture above again. Think about how God endued those in the Upper Room with power from on high. They waited – and waited – and waited, for the promised coming of the Holy Spirit. They didn’t go forth proclaiming the gospel UNTIL they were filled with power from on high. Perhaps as they were in prayer in the upper room God was revealing different sins in their lives that He wanted them to deal with, so that He could fill them to overflowing. The Lord did not want these saints just to be faucets but rather, conduits of his power!

We need to spend time making sure all the obstructions in our own lives are cleared, a personal Upper Room experience, so that we can be the spirit-filled saints God has called us to be in these last days. We want clean lines between us and the source so we are not merely disconnected faucets but rather fully connected to the Living Water. It is no small coincidence, I’m sure, that water is a conduit for electricity. I doubt we can fathom the vastness of power and supply available through the Living Water. Let’s be sure we’re open to being fully endued with Power from on high!

Lord, I ask You to show me any obstacles in my life that may be blocking the Holy Spirit. I pray for an overflowing of Your power in my life so I may be useful to You in every way. Amen.

No Burger King Bible Here

This morning I pulled Jeremiah 6:16 from a box of scriptures I keep on my desk. It read as follows:

“Stand ye in the ways, and see, and ask for the old paths, where is the good way, and walk therein, and ye shall find rest for your souls.”

I pulled the whole chapter of Jeremiah up for context and commentary. I found the scripture quoted was only a part of verse 16. The following is the whole of the verse:

Stand by the ways and see and ask for the ancient paths, Where the good way is, and walk in it; And you will find rest for your souls. But they said, ‘We will not walk in it.’

The first part of chapter 6 warns of the destruction of Jerusalem because the people have turned their heart and ears away from God. He warns of impending doom as an enemy moves toward them yet they take no action to change or show conviction for their greed and evil ways after being warned.

The lesson we can glean from this chapter is one of repentance and returning to God’s ways; it’s a good lesson. However, the danger comes from taking scripture out of context. Entire denominations and/or religions have made a practice of basing their theology on bits and pieces of scripture taken out of context and used to make a point based in the bits they want to use. Some Christian preachers want to use the ‘pretty part’ of the scripture and ignore the harder part. This is how some have come to be called ‘cotton candy preachers’ because they only use the pretty parts, the ‘feel good’ stuff. If we believe God is the author of scripture and gave His Word to those who committed it to writing, does it not seem a bit presumptuous of us to edit out that which does not tickle the ear, please the masses or give the whole story?

Friends, that was the whole point of Jeremiah 6 in the first place! People chose to do their own thing, walk to their own drummer rather than listen to God and follow His precepts. Isn’t that what we see in America today? People picking and choosing the bits and pieces that fit whatever it is they want to believe from the Bible rather than taking it as a whole? We have federal and state laws based on that practice. I did that at one time in my life. I rationalized a whole lot of things by ‘selective believing.’ It’s scary to think about that time of my life now. It’s scary to see what is happening in our country.

God is good and faithful to us but He is not fooled by our careful editing of His Word. This isn't Burger King, Friends, we can't have it our own way. It was God who outlined the consequences of living outside His will for us. Listen up, America! In Jeremiah 6:10-19, God says it very plainly:

To whom can I speak and give warning? Who will listen to me? Their ears are closed so they cannot hear. The word of the LORD is offensive to them; they find no pleasure in it. But I am full of the wrath of the LORD, and I cannot hold it in.

   “Pour it out on the children in the street and on the young men gathered together; both husband and wife will be caught in it, and the old, those weighed down with years. Their houses will be turned over to others, together with their fields and their wives, when I stretch out my hand against those who live in the land,” declares the LORD. “From the least to the greatest, all are greedy for gain; prophets and priests alike, all practice deceit. They dress the wound of my people as though it were not serious. ‘Peace, peace,’ they say, when there is no peace. Are they ashamed of their detestable conduct? No, they have no shame at all; they do not even know how to blush. So they will fall among the fallen; they will be brought down when I punish them,” says the LORD.

 ¹⁶ This is what the LORD says: “Stand at the crossroads and look; ask for the ancient paths, ask where the good way is, and walk in it, and you will find rest for your souls. But you said, ‘We will not walk in it.’ I appointed watchmen over you and said, ‘Listen to the sound of the trumpet!’ But you said, ‘We will not listen.’ Therefore hear, you nations; you who are witnesses, observe what will happen to them. Hear, you earth: I am bringing disaster on this people, the fruit of their schemes, because they have not listened to my words and have rejected my law.

Retire? Not a Chance!

Acts 20:24 However, I consider my life worth nothing to me; my only aim is to finish the race and complete the task the Lord Jesus has given me—the task of testifying to the good news of God’s grace.

Zechariah 2:10 Sing and rejoice, O daughter of Zion: for, lo, I come, and I will dwell in the midst of thee, saith the Lord.

Two inspiration scriptures this morning! I can see with my spiritual eyes a scene of believers ablaze with the Holy Spirit singing, dancing and rejoicing around a camp fire as they commune with the Lord in their midst! It’s a joyful time of fellowship after sharing the message of God’s grace and salvation through Jesus Christ. What better aspiration than fulfilling the task with which we are commissioned? A celebration of divine nature between all that is Holy and the devoted worshipers determined to fulfill the call. Glorious!   

There is so much written on how to get organized, how to set and achieve goals and/or how to get rich and retire financially secure. All great tools for our time on this earth but they pale to nothingness when held up to the light of what is promised when we follow, honor and depend on God. In pushing forward to the goal of spreading the message of Jesus we are laying a foundation of faith that no man or economic downturn can touch. 

Retiring financially secure is becoming less and less attainable here on earth in this day but ‘retiring’ is not a factor in the heavenly realm. We will spend our time in worship and whatever assigned position we are given in God’s Kingdom. My thought is that we will not care about retiring from anything in heaven! The only ‘how to’ book we need is filled with all we need to know to reap the greatest reward of all, an eternity with Christ! 

O God, I want to begin this day You have given to me in worship and dependence on You. Help me keep my eyes on the goal of completing the task You set before me, my ears tuned only to Your voice and my heart in a constant state of worship so that I may reach others in Your name.

Ride of Your Life

Acts 4:31 And when they had prayed, the place was shaken where they were assembled together; and they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and they spoke the word of God with boldness.

The other day, I wrote about staying plugged into our Power Source. I read something this morning that gave me a different perspective of the same topic. Have you ever taken a balloon, blew it up real big and then let it go? The balloon will jettison around the room until it runs out of air before falling empty and depleted on the floor.

We have an opportunity to be like balloons, filled to entirety with God’s breath and then let go to experience the ride of our lives. Equally important is that we recognize when we’re running out of air — when we’re depleted of His power, anointing, and purpose and need to run back to Him for more. Receiving the infilling of the Spirit is not a single event, but a lifetime of refilling, so we don’t become useless for His Kingdom, trying to do things on our own strength.

This lead me to think about balloons filled with helium. I had a mental picture of Christians floating upward on the current toward the sky without any power to steer into a specific direction. We can be like, too. We can get so focused on reaching heaven ourselves that we are not useful to Him in taking the message to others. It’s all about us.

In the first example as balloons filled with God’s breath, that power is used to propel us forward. It is God’s power inside us moving us forward as it is utilized for His purposes. If we are content to float, inflated with concerns of self, we may think our ascent is purposed but is it God’s purpose for our lives?     

The Lord doesn’t entrust us with His power in order for us to sit around idly or float leisurely to heaven — but rather that we would boldly share the good news of the Gospel, and do great things for Him wherever He may take us. Let’s get filled again today! Ask, seek, knock, read, worship, meditate on His promises, and get filled with His power for His purposes.It's the ride of your life!

The Dance

Psalms 30:11-12 You have turned for me my mourning into dancing; You have put off my sackcloth and clothed me with gladness, To the end that my glory may sing praise to You and not be silent. O Lord my God, I will give thanks to You forever.

This is one of my favorite promises in the Bible — God turns mourning into dancing! He takes away the anguish of being clothed in sadness and replaces it with gladness. However, notice what God doesn’t do — simply stop your mourning and make it disappear. No, He transforms it…into joy! He turns your sorrow into gladness. He takes your failure and creates success! We serve an awesome and mighty God, who says, “all things work together for good to them that love Him, and to those who are the called according to His purpose.” (Romans 8:28)

Again, we are seeing the news showing video of all the families picking through the piles of trash that once was their homes and businesses prior to the tornadoes. It is devastation to life as they knew it and the loss of homes is nothing compared to those that lost family members. It all seems overwhelming and our hearts cry out for them.

Still, in the shadow of destruction, most are saying they feel blessed because they are still alive. Some may have cried to the Lord for the first time in the midst of the storm. My prayer for them is that they know and cling to the promises of God to turn their mourning into dancing. Those believers in the areas of destruction have that knowledge to hold on to but many will not have heard and/or taken to heart the scripture. For now, we can stand in the gap in prayer for revelation knowledge for them. The best help we can send to the area is prayer.

The rebuilding process will be long and costly. Look at New Orleans, there are still huge chunks of the area all this time later that look more like the aftermath of an explosion that neighborhoods where families’ voices filled the air and children played. Yes, rebuilding will be long and costly. However…aren’t you glad there IS a ‘however’ … the scripture applies to all who know and call on the Lord.  ‘You have turned for me my mourning into dancing; You have put off my sackcloth and clothed me with gladness, To the end that my glory may sing praise to You and not be silent. O Lord my God, I will give thanks to You forever.’ From the ashes of destruction our Lord can transform lives into a new thing.

Perhaps the ‘area of destruction’ in your life is not the result of a deadly tornado and tsunami but the aftermath still wipes you out emotionally, spiritually, physically and materially. This promise from the Lord is yours, too.

Let’s take time to dwell on this promise. Our sorrows, disappointments, tragedies and failures are very real — but they are also “raw material” for a divine transformation that our Lord will accomplish in His time for His glory. And we WILL dance! God will do His part. Our part is simply to wait…believe…and cling tightly to this wonderful promise!