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Tag: religions

  • Raised for such a time as this.

    Raised for such a time as this.

    Continuing in the vein of “O foolish Galatians, who has bewitched you?” churches are in trouble that they either do not see or ignore. As you find yourself in such an environment, do not be dismayed nor confused. At times our mission field is our very own church. Be that person that the righteous leaders can hold onto so they may do the work they are burdened with. You are called to hold up the hands of the man of God, similar to the account about Moses in the battle against Amalek. Remember that as long as Moses had his hand up the battle was for them, but when he got tired and his hand went down, Amalek would be winning. Aaron and Hur sat Moses on a rock while they each held a hand up. Victory was theirs because there was someone there to hold the man of God’s hands up. You are your pastor’s Aaron/Hur. Be prayed up and fasted to do this work because the enemy will come against you personally as he sees you steadfast in accomplishing your mission to keep the man of God strong and moving forward.

    There are plenty of preachers that have not bowed their knee to the devil. They preach the unadulterated word of God, thank God. These men surround themselves with those who have proven to be on fire for God and minister to God, enabling them to hold up the preachers’ “hands” so they can run this race they have been given. Not all is lost, but the fight just got real. Be real and lean not on your own understanding, rather put all your trust in the Lord. He will direct your steps, so you don’t miss a bit.

  • Flesh Issues?

    Flesh Issues?

    Lesson: You ever fall and just give in to that thing you know the Word says not to be in or even associate with people that are into that thing? Then guilt and shame overwhelm you when you come back to your senses? We all want to prevent the fall, but if you don’t, then what?

    The answer? ” This I say, Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh.” I’m guilty of thinking this verse is talking about sextual sins one can fall into only. But really it covers much more. The word clarifies what the deeds (lusts) of the flesh are; ” Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are these; adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness, idolatry, witch craft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies, envying, murders, drunkenness, raveling, and such like: of the which I tell you before, as I have also told you in time past, that they which do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God. We who are the sons of God once walked in such manner intentionally and joyously. But having been saved we now shun such behavior. When we do fall we know to pick ourselves up and remember that there is now no condemnation for them that are in Christ Jesus, enabling us to keep walking this narrow path we are on.

    To fortify our resolve to stay saved and stay away from all of the above that we are weak in, we have to learn to walk in the Spirit. But what exactly is walking in the Spirit? I used to think abstract was the way to go, you know basically meditating. But when meditating I would sit thinking, then get up and do what I thought. Am I the only one? Ok. But walking in the Spirit means going into the word each time you have a doubt, or wonder; or thinking what should I do in this case. You have to take the time to get your counsel from the word. It covers all things that we come face to face with and directs on how to handle the matter. In this way you will ” live a life guided and empowered by the Holy Spirit (Ghost). Reading what the word has to say about your situation is you actively seeking and following the Spirit’s lead. You no longer rely on your impulses or ideas to traverse this world. So confidently walk in the Spirit.

    Thought: today’s bible says God is a Spirit (confining Him). When I first learned that scripture it said God is Spirit, able to be everywhere at the same time. satan is a spirit, confined to being in a place like we as individuals—but not in every place at the same time like God. And I have heard some say God is not in Hell, but the word says He is everywhere. He is not consumed in what hell does. Ramblings? Think about it. The bible is being tweaked, words missing, words added. That is why it is important to have the Holy Ghost teaching you as you read the word. Ask old people to recite verses that they memorized as young people and see if this is not so.

  • Treasure

    Treasure

    Thought: Christianity is unique in that not only does it have a resurrected Savior, but its key is love of one another. Christ let us know that the world would recognize us as His disciples by the love we have for one another. Our walk is not an independent one , but rather one where actively carry each other’s burdens. Each Christ follower is his/her brother’s keeper. Who did you fast and pray for today? I mean really cry over and assist in anyway possible to help that person(s) navigate their road to our promise? Iron sharpens iron, we do that unselfishly for each other. Just a thought…..

    Lesson: If ye then be risen with Christ (are you? If not this won’t make sense), seek those things which are above….in other words, focus on those things the GOD head puts value in; truth (the Word)and worship of the true God. Focus on the Lamb of God and the washing by His blood.

    Be about prayer (constant communication with God)and telling those that don’t know truth about Christ and what He accomplished on the cross for them. Let these things be your treasure that you lay up in heaven.

  • Unity in the Body

    Unity in the Body

    I once tripped up on a story where the wife was waking the husband up so they could go to church. The husband responded “I don’t want to go”. The wife insisted he had to get up and go. He asked why, she said because you are the pastor. My take away? Those in ministries are not jumping at the chance to fulfill the call on their lives all the time. The times one does not feel like it are the times one finds out why they do what they do. As you can imagine it is how I am feeling today. The Spirit reminds me being called is not for fame or wealth, but the love of the Father being spread at no charge. Jesus spoke of leaving the 99 to gain that one…. Yes indeed ramblings…..

    Yesterday I left the post encouraging you to think about the gift of miracles being set in the very body of Christ where some individuals possessed the gifts of working those miracles set in the church. That in itself is a revelation. God repeated this combination with the next gift set in the body, the gifts of healings with the individuals given the ability to work healings. God did not only put healings in the church, he put individuals equipped to perform the healings.

    What we need is people to step up unapologetic, unfearful, focused and ready to do the will of the Lord by recognizing their gifts and engaging in their church. These gifts are to profit everyone in the body. We are so afraid of being out of order and out of favor with the pastor. Is the pastor the only one who hears from God like in the days of Moses? We should remember the Holy Ghost is the one in-charge of where, when, and how these gifts are used in the church. As long as you are yielded and following directions from the same Spirit that directs your pastor, there shall not be a conflict of interest. We have to remember that the Holy Ghost directs everything in the service. The Holy Ghost will let the pastor know what he is doing in you. The pastor then supports you and encourages you as you fulfill the assignment given by the Holy Ghost.

    Problem: the members of the body are not in one Spirit, not unified in the Spirit.

    Solution: engaging in prayer together under one roof to hear from the Lord, to become adapt at moving in the Spirit as one.

  • Untitled post 158

    Thought of the day: I am perplexed; I tend to think of thinks in the spiritual aspect first, automatically. I guess my “problem” (as I have been told) is that I think others view this spiritual walk the same way. One day as I was in a Christian group sharing, one of the individuals said “my therapist…”. I could not tell you the rest of the sentence cuz I got stuck at the first two words. I’m thinking what demon or disembodied spirit did you take to therapy? I’m thinking that as a Christian you either cast a demon out (or get help to do it) or you go toe to toe with a spirit spitting out “it is written….” We have changed the dynamics of fight the good fight of faith. I know, I know, I’m extreme (as I have been called).

    Continuing with the second set of giftings. This set starts with the people that have been given for the edification of the whole body. We looked at the “sent ones”, the apostles on a previous post. The next is “secondarily prophets”. When I think of prophets I think of the Jeremiahs, Samuel, Isaiah, Daniel, the ones who came with “thus sayeth the Lord”, They directly heard and had a conversation from/with God and re-laid a message to the people or specified individuals. We need such individuals to keep the body on track, With these people in place, much of the foolishness we witness in some of our churches would be eradicated.

    Thirdly are teachers given to help keep the body on track. These are the ones that spoon feed the flock the word of God. They make the word of God clear and simple for the understanding; thus, enabling the hearer to be a doer of the word, not just a hearer. There is no excuse for wrong living when these are in their place; the word is sent forth with power as a living word. Sound doctrine, you must agree is very blurry in today’s teachings. The pulpit is full of one’s interpretation of the word of God (“All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: that the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works”.)

    Problem: Prophets are hailed as Gods, some claim to be; teachers teach what they learned at religious institutions over what the word says. Most Prophets and teachers use the word for private interpretation and use.

    Solutions: Immerse yourselves in the word; be like Bereans of old, check what you heard—is it scriptural.

  • Are You a Gift to the Body?

    Are You a Gift to the Body?

    Thought of the day: It is a sad thing to go to a place week after week, and be hit with condemnation (there is therefore no condemnation for those in Christ Jesus), guilt, shame, and fear– church; it is before the word comes forth, at offering time. I wonder if the clergy realize they are not encouraging people with statements about how God will cut a person off from needs if they do not give. Ramblings as usual….

    Continuing with gifts given by the Holy Spirit to individuals within the body to benefit the individuals in the body. We looked at the gifts of word of wisdom, word of knowledge, faith, gifts of healing, the working of miracles, gift of prophecy, discerning of spirits, and the gift of divers kinds of tongues. All given by the Spirit. The last gift in this lineup is that of interpretation of tongues. This gift usually follows behind the gift of different kinds of tongues (languages) as it explains what the message was in the unknown language. I have seen where a person speaks in tongues and then interprets what they said. That should not be as the word tells us that the gift is given to separate individuals; one speaks in tongues, and another individual does the interpretation.

    There is another grouping of gifts in the body of Christ. The word tells us that God Himself has set (put in place) the following gifts in the church in a specific order. Placed first are the apostles. As we see these apostles are not the ones that walked with our Lord Jesus the Christ, but more like Paul in that they, like Paul, were called after Christ had ascended. Apostles are known as the sent ones. In many churches these are the ones sent forth to help establish either extensions of their churches; or those that are sent forth to start a church away from their home church; a method of spreading the word about Jesus the Christ.

    Problem: not much visibility of the gifts given to the church aside from people with titles.

    Solution: Prayer for us to hear from the Holy Ghost showing those with the gifts to utilize them for the edification of Christ’s body.

  • Do You Have one of these Gifts?

    Do You Have one of these Gifts?

    All of us in the body of Christ have been commissioned to go and tell the world about Christ. He gave us the Holy Ghost to accomplish this command. The Holy Ghost enables and equips us to not only tell about our Savior, but to do works even greater than Christ did. Most important these gifts benefit the whole body. How?

    The Holy Spirit gives within the body several gifts. We have looked at the gift of word of wisdom, gift of word of knowledge, gifts of healing, the gift of working of miracles, and the gift of prophecy– discussed in previous posts. 7) To another the Spirit gives the gift of discerning of spirits. How this is so needed in the churches making up the body of Christ. Let us begin by defining the term discerning–“someone with keen insight and good judgement, particularly when it comes to making careful assessments of quality or details. They can distinguish subtle differences and are able to evaluate things with a critical eye, often recognizing the nuances that others might miss.” In discerning spirits, the individual with this gift can easily see what spirit (disembodied entities) is operating on those around him/her. This person can accurately tell if the spirit of God is the one interacting within the group or if it is demonic spirits come to disrupt or misled. If people possessing this gift would rise up and be the voice when wolves in sheep’s clothing are at the pulpit and shut them down, my belief is that less people genuinely seeking the kingdom of God, would be misled.

    To another individual the Spirit gives divers kinds of tongues. Now this is a very debatable definition that I am going to give about tongue, but if you search in the bible, it is very evident that tongues is a language spoken is some part of the world, not babblings as we see in today’s church. My favorite verses to show this state “And they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance. And there were dwelling at Jerusalem Jews, devout men, out of every nation under heaven. Now when this was noised abroad, the multitude came together, and were confounded, because that every man heard them speak in his own language. And they were amazed and marveled, saying one to another, Behold, are not all these which speak Galilaeans? And how hear we every man in our own tongue, wherein we were born? Thus, the tongues spoken in church are a real language that the speaker does not know or has learned, but someone in the congregation will fully understand every word, thus interpret what was said. I must add that this is given by the Holy Ghost and perfected by the Holy Ghost; no man can teach another how to speak in tongues; teaching tongues is not in the bible. Am I then disputing the babblings that we hear? These may be for private use between the creature and creator; the ones heard in church can only be pure languages of a people in the earth.

    Problem: giving clergy powers that are not theirs. They cannot give you a calling on anyone, they can hand you the right hand of fellowship and pray over you and send you on your way once they recognize the call of God on your life.

    Solution: read the Word of God for yourself asking the Holy Ghost to make it clear to you. You cannot go wrong if the Holy Ghost is your teacher.

  • Giftings within the Body

    Giftings within the Body

    Thought of my today: 2 Corinthians 9:7 Every man according as he purposeth in his heart, so let him give: not grudgingly (nothing will flow back to you), or of necessity (if I give, I will get back so much more cuz I need bills paid this week), for God loveth a cheerful giver. This scripture hit home. I am usually motivated by what the preacher says when it is offering time; fearing that God will be displeased if I don’t—this alone puts me in the negative. God is looking for willingness and gladness from what I offer up (not so much specific amounts) — then it is sweet savor to His nostrils. The purpose of giving is one way to show adoration to God, worshipping God from the heart. Wow! That is why I never see a return, or if I do it is not as the preacher claims I will get. Ramblings I know…..

    Continuing with the Gifts given to the Body of Christ:

    These are given by the Holy Spirit for the edification of the body. 5) Working of miracles– “a surprising and welcome event that is not explicable by natural or scientific laws…” such as raising someone from the dead, commanding rain to occur, or calming a storm. These we see in work with Christ walking the earth, but none today. I know I hear pastors mainly saying at services they have seen the dead raise to life, but I have never seen filming of such events. Yet this is a gift given to people in the body of Christ!

    6)The gift of prophecy (message from God) given to one who does not walk in the “office” of a Prophet. Rember a Prophet is himself/herself a gift to the body. A prophecy itself is a message or directive from God to a person or a people. The dictionary states a prophecy is “a message that has been communicated to a person by a supernatural entity.

    Problem: we don’t acknowledge these gifts; we don’t see them in operation. Some who possess the gift may be afraid to be wrong in the use of the gift along with what will people think of me.

    Solution: ask the Holy Spirit what gift has been given to you and how to perfect it.