Have you ever found yourself the recipient of some critical advice? My Granddad would often offer his help in the form of critical advice. Looking back now, I would have to say in regard to me, he was most always right. I have come to appreciate every bit of advice the longer time goes by. A number of months ago someone sent me an e-mail offering me some help in the form of critical advice. I found myself at a loss for what to say or how to respond. I either didn’t respond or kept my response to something like, “thanks”. The e-mail bothered me greatly then and I saved the mail, but had done little with it until something made me remember that it was sent. I looked back at at the nearly 8 month old note only with the same continued loss for how to make any meaningful response to such a well intended criticism. I mean in my head I could think of all kinds of one liners and little zingers which could justify my solid position and the choices I had made, but none of them seemed the appropriate or Godly response. I continued on with my Saturday plan deciding to go for a bike ride in the morning hours. I had a planned route in mind, but as the ride progressed I was having second thoughts about going the full distance. Rather than turn back, I made a decision to continue my ride to endure the full course. Somewhere at 3/4 of the trip I began to go up hill; it was one with a long climb. I knew it was there but thought somehow I might be able to coast my way through some of it. It proved to be more a mind game than anything else and the thought to turn around going back the other way did occur to me. I heard the Lord say, ‘Come to Me‘! There is a word that has been spoken about you, it may be true, completely unfounded, or a half truth spoken out of wrong motives, but no matter, God says, ‘Listen to Me! God says reflect on Me…and I will give to you an abundance of wisdom.’ The exercise of ‘going up the hill’ brought forth some lessons worth learning; these offer insight into your trial. Have you ever felt like you were going up a hill? People had some advice for you, although you weren’t entirely convinced they understood your struggle. Don’t worry, God in His wisdom presents you with this trial, and He has answers meant for your overcoming. God revealed, this exercise before you is really a battle for your mind. On the basis of Proverbs 22:13, I believe God says, ‘the way of wisdom is in believing you will overcome not be overcome.’ Last I checked, we overcome because of the blood of the cross. God says based on Isaiah 55, ‘My thoughts are not yours and you don’t even think like Me, If it was up to your thinking, you would have turned around, missed the hill and with it My insight for overcoming.’ In Proverbs 22:17 God says, ‘apply your mind to My knowledge….’ You see, the hill not only tests your mind, but it tests your will. You are going to have to commit yourself completely. It is applying your mind to the body of God’s thinking, not taking a little dab of truth here and there as you want to apply it. God says, ‘your spirit is willing but your flesh is weak and you need the exercise the hill provides. So make up your mind and renew your resolve to trust Me up the hill and strength will be given to you that you know not.’ As Jesus faced the up-hill of the cross, He found strength there in the garden by surrendering His will to the Father’s good pleasure and obtained the will to overcome. God says to your hill, ‘I will that you overcome….Come to Me and I will give you My mind and My strong resolve and you will overcome.’ This hill you face may have come in the form of a rebuke, or personal attack. It may be be a trial that is very real or maybe even imagined. But God says to you, ‘this hill represents a clear place for your victory.’ ‘Come to Me and I will set your face like flint and give to you the understanding you need to respond to you friends, critics and enemies….It will be a glorious testimony of Me and My power to deliver you from what the enemy says, and I will make you to overcome.’ Psalm 37:5-6 (nlt) says, ‘trust in the Lord and He will make your innocence radiate.‘ So go ahead and trust Him, your victory has been assured!
Tag: victory
The House of God
Someone recently confessed they were presently walking through a fog, but in spite of deep hurts they were choosing to trust God. They went on to say, “When life doesn’t seem fair, the Word can give answers man cannot give and when you commune with God moment by moment you learn to hear His voice alone, even amongst the noise.” I have a question for you. Are you hearing God “amongst the noise”? Isaiah declares those who come to minister to the Lord find the house God chooses to live in. Jesus said in Luke 19:46; “My house shall be called a house of prayer”. Did you stop to think that God lives in a place of prayer. In a place where men would call on His name for refuge and strength. David says in Psalm 61:1-2, “Hear my cry, O God; Give heed to my prayer from the end of the earth I call to you when my heart is faint.” Are you about to faint on some things? Prayer is the address to God’s house. David’s prayer is not just any prayer; no, it is a cry–a prayer of desperation. He is saying, ‘Lord I am at the end of it all about to faint and I desperately need you to lead me to a higher plane of thinking–there on the solid place where you dwell. In Genesis 35, God tells Jacob to go to the house of God and live there, but doing that would require removing some things that were unwelcome in God’s presence. In Isaiah 57, God rebukes those disobedient children who had been so influenced by an idolatrous culture they had failed to understand God’s silence and their own subtile rebellion. His word came then as it does now to shake men from their numbness to understand only those who find a refuge in Him will have an inheritance. God says, ‘My house is a house of prayer and I dwell in a place of refuge and deliverance.’ In Psalm 32 David declares, ‘God You are my hiding place’. Colossians 3:1-3; reminds every believer to stand because our life is hidden with Christ. Simply put, life is found in a hidden place there in the presence of Christ when we stand and find His refuge. As I recall, the storm didn’t stop for the disciples, just because Peter chose to get out of the boat and come to Jesus. But there was clearly a place with Peter where the storm couldn’t touch him. This storm may have fogged you in, but you have God’s address, and He is refuge from the storm. There is a sanctuary in the inner place of God’s house and a song being sung by a heavenly choir. Can you hear it? God says I want you to hear it…Psalm 32:7, “You are my hiding place; You preserve me from trouble; You surround me with songs of deliverance.” If you understand the song it is more like a shout because living in the refuge of Christ produces victory–because He has already overcome and there in God’s House He lives and prays for you…
The Anointing of God
1 Jn 2:27 says, ‘You have an anointing you have received from the Father which abides in you.’ Think with me…this is the single most powerful concept that John reminds us of to combat the work of deception which daily presents itself to you. Just think, an anointing that instructs, promotes, and supports the work of your salvation in this present hour. What are you doing with the anointing? How are you treating it? Recently someone gave me an article entitled, “The Man God Uses” (He most surely has an anointing). You have an anointing, I urge you draw near to its application by the power of the Holy Spirit in your life and find a balm which can sooth, heal and restore your life exchanging your weakness for His strength. To every true believer there is given this anointing. It is an anointing that activates truth by informing me of His thoughts toward me. It elevates my relationship with the Father by seeing myself as a son with a rightful place at His table. It covers my life with His power to conform me to His image and enables me to practice victory rather than defeat. It is an anointing that actuates love in my life identifying me as His disciple. The Word says, by this love all men will come to understand that you are identifiably changed and uniquely His. I don’t know about you, but I need such an anointing that can take my feeble “want to” and make it a living reality for His glory to the restoration of others. You want the anointing? Ask for it and don’t stop asking until He gives what He has promised to every son who believes.
The Work of God in Prayer
Recently in prayer, I began to understand the source of my frustration with others. In my discovery, I realized how I had waited on men and not waited on God. I had waited on men to be my help; I had waited for men to have the answer. I was waiting on men for my next move. It was hindering my progress slowing me down and making me angry. I saw my failure to wait on God was causing me to miss His move and with it, His great provision. Bottom line, it was the fear of man and not the fear of God. I began seeing where the fear of man ensnared me and left me without a Godly mandate to move forward. That fear of men kept me from confronting my problems and issues with others. It left me without a voice that could speak as God to inspire true leadership that moves to victory. I did a lot of preaching at the problem, but was distant from confronting it head on with real solutions born out of relationship. The people were not my problem, but failure to wait on God was. Could it be God is calling you to a ‘relationship of waiting on Him’? In your frustations, your failure to wait is a failure to get a word from Him to speak directly with divine wisdom into the lives of others. You like me need to see the work of God in prayer. It is a work that reveals willingness to wait on God bringing rest from other men’s agendas. In prayer, the Spirit of God will cause you to find a ‘fresh wind’ to fill your sails and propel you forward to victory.
GraceLife 