The Filter of Virtue

“Delightfully loved friends, don’t trust every spirit, but carefully examine what they say^[a] to determine if they are of God, because many false prophets have mingled into the world”

I wonder over the years just how many lies and half-truths we have believed about other people just because rumors got started…or news stories got published/aired…or how many times a tale got repeated with a little “yeast” added to it in increments? How many people have had a stain permanently grafted onto their reputations because of spoken/written words which weren’t true but just a matter of conjecture? We put so much stock in what we hear or read because we put stock in what we perceive to be “reliable sources.” Unfortunately, perception, even false perception, becomes the reality to whoever buys into it. We would all do well to ask ourselves more often, when exposed to information, “But what if it isn’t…true?”

We are bombarded on all sides with too much information. It’s yet another reason why I’m spending less time around social media. I don’t want to hear the dirt on people or situations. I don’t want to have to decide, in situations which aren’t my business, whether what I hear is fact or fiction; and truthfully, fact or fiction, some things I just don’t need to know! I don’t want to hear things that violate the peace in my spirit, or invite unnecessary drama into my life–or even open doors for the enemy of my soul to have legal access. Not everything passes through the filter of Philippians 4:8: things that are true, honorable, right, pure, lovely, commendable, excellent, praiseworthy.

I’m trying to be more mindful of this. I have gotten swept into believing certain things before, just because I put confidence in “they” when I heard that “they” said or say. As I gasp at how easily people buy into believing horrible things and how anger and outrage and hatred explode, I’m reminded of times when I too have believed reports that weren’t true. It’s a time to pray daily for revelation and discernment so we won’t be deceived; and it is a time to pray daily for fortitude when we could find ourselves in the crosshairs of the accuser.

Persecution and opposition will come, believers…we haven’t had to see much of it here in this country, but we need to brace ourselves for the idea of being hated for what (and Whom) we believe…and a lot of it will come through people who believe lies. Be quick to repent, and be quick to forgive. Remember that the Word says to be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath…and it also says not to believe every spirit but to try the spirits to see if they be of God; but to try the spirits, because there are many false messengers in the world.

Lord, help me not to be deceived even in seemingly inconsequential things, because it never is inconsequential. Help me to shut down what I allow into the gateways to my soul–my eyes and ears. Help me to be courageous enough to tell people, “I don’t want to hear it. I don’t want to know,” instead of having to try to cleanse my spirit of what I’ve allowed in. Help us not to be deceived by false messengers, and help us not to be guilty of being a relay runner of false messages by passing on what is not true. Keep me pure in heart, in motives, in intentions, and in truth always! In Jesus’ name…

Cooling That Hot Button: Prayer to Set a Watch on Our Lips

Hot Button “My heart burned with a fire within me,
and my thoughts eventually boiled over
until they finally came rolling out of my mouth.” (Psalm 39:3 – The Passion Translation)

If the devil put people in Jesus’ path to try and trip Him up and cause Him to #speak in haste, don’t be so surprised that you and I have to guard our #words as well. I was just thinking today of times when I’ve been vulnerable over the years, and some lessons hard-learned. At times I still have to go back to retraining. 😉

There are people out there who will solicit your opinion about a matter or about another person and then later use your words against you. I wish it only happened in situations where the other person is an outright enemy; but folks, we know that sometimes it unfortunately happens among those we care about and trust. Even more unfortunate when it happens in the Church. Most of these situations you can steer out of if you’ll listen to the Holy Spirit; and other times you may be accused falsely and just have to trust Him to clear your name. Stick tight…this isn’t going in a negative direction…it has a positive conclusion that will hopefully help and encourage you!

When I was young, I had a person in my life who’d routinely bait me. That person knew when I was aggravated or under stress and how to push my buttons. When I couldn’t take any more and I’d speak my mind, it would come back to bite me in the way of trouble. I would also get pulled into conversations I didn’t want to be part of and get included just by being in the room, only to hear that my name was dropped in a collective, “Well, it’s like when Lisa and I were talking the other day, and WE feel that____.” Many times all I did was just stand in silence while the other person rattled off, but then I’d get named as an opinion accomplice to something I didn’t agree with at all! Sound familiar? It took a while for Miss Naive to pick up on this, but God used what was a bad situation to teach me a little wisdom. The Lord even helped me to forgive that person, even feel pity, but to be wary of the pitfalls of getting too close in conversation.

The people who bait you may or may not even realize that they’re doing it; and they may do it just to serve their own agendas with no malice intended against you. Others definitely do it on purpose and with wrongful intent. We see it happening all the time on TV–reporters asking a minister or leader his/her stance on hot-button sensitive questions of our current culture, so that the reporter or network or special-interest group can later brand the person a homophobe, racist, chauvinist, hypocrite, charlatan, heretic, etc., etc. The person in the crosshairs stands to then get accusation flung from both sides: one side accusing him/her of compromise or being too cowardly to speak the truth; then the other side accusing him/her with any kind of label that might destroy one’s livelihood and reputation. Entrapment. Sure, that’s the extreme instance of it, but we see that happening more and more as the public gets increasingly bloodthirsty for a good brawl. When it happens to a fellow member in the Body of Christ, oh how sad that we all gang up on the one who’s down and kick that person in the ribs! Peter knew there’d be times like this…and he urged us this way, “If you suffer, however, it must not be for murder, stealing, making trouble, or prying into other people’s affairs.” (1 Pet 4:15) And folks, we need to honestly speak with caution when we get BAITED into commentary by these “news” articles on the Internet and begin to judge one another unfairly. I’m trying a lot harder to avoid them entirely! I keep reminding myself of the times when the Bible says, “And Jesus answered them not a word!” or, “He was reviled, yet reviled not again.”

Either way, while we can’t go through life distrusting everybody, we can be, as the Word says, “Wise as serpents, harmless as doves.” (Matthew 10:16) I have friends who’ve taken some serious hits against their personal and professional lives, accused wrongly, even some convicted without cause. While I’m sorry that’s happened to you, I know full well that it could happen to any of us but for the grace of God.

I don’t know why all this comes to mind today, because I’m not in a situation like this right now; except perhaps the Lord wants that to be a focus in our place of prayer. An admonishment for days ahead as we deal with culture, with school, with workplace, community, church and home. You and I may have encounters in the future where we’re going to have to bow out of a conversation and just walk away if there’s no tactful way to say, “I’m sorry but I will not be part of this.”

Father, David talked in various Psalms about those who lay in wait to ambush him. There are many of us who’ve suffered by being in the wrong place at the wrong time, like Joseph. Others of us have taken the bait and sinned with our mouths, or at the very least, made some commentary we’d like to retract but cannot. Help us to remember that our battle isn’t at ground level, person against person, but a more diabolical force is at work to entrap us. We purpose today to set a guard on our lips. We will listen for You and trust You to order our steps. If someone were to ask our opinion about a matter or about another person, we will answer with our ears aimed heavenward. We will garrison up our minds and beware of our vulnerabilities when tired, stressed, aggravated–and we will give no place to the devil to use our words against us either in the court of heaven or down here on earth exchanged between those who gossip and manipulate.

Father, we likewise commit to pure motives in all we say and do; and just as we don’t want others drawing us into discussions we’ve no business being part of, we will not do that to other people either. We will not gossip. We will not spread innuendo or allow others to be misled by ambiguity on our part. We will let our yes be yes, our no be no, and we won’t be caught up in evil by all the tricky layers in-between. We will not betray confidences or look for opportunities to embarrass, demean, demote, or discredit others…not even when it’s to our perceived advantage to do so.

We confess Colossians 4:6 over our lives: “Let your speech at all times be gracious and pleasant, seasoned with salt, so that you will know how to answer each one [who questions you].” We will no longer say of ourselves, “Well, I was just mad, irritated, upset, having a bad day,” as a poor excuse to let our words run untethered. And we plead Your grace over the situations we’re still dealing with where in previous times we have spoken amiss and loosed hardship on ourselves. We draw on our heritage as servants of the Lord and we invoke Isaiah 54:17: “But in that coming day, no weapon turned against you shall succeed, and you will have justice against every courtroom lie. This is the heritage of the servants of the Lord. This is the blessing I have given you, says the Lord.” Thank You for mercy, for helping us to hear from heaven when we are treading in gray areas. Help us learn from past misjudgments, that we may people of integrity, not weakened by having undisciplined speech.

Finally, Lord, we release and forgive those who’ve ever used our words as weapons against us. We forgive those who’ve lied on us, twisted our words, taken advantage of us, and “pushed our buttons” to cause us to say and do wrong things. As we release them, we look to You to release and forgive us. We will let You vindicate us of false accusations, and we will trust You to restore multiplied favor for what was taken away by the enemy. You are always good. Always fair. We can trust You to keep us, so we plant ourselves firmly in the palm of Your hand and we refuse to budge from there!

We pray in Jesus’ name, Amen.

Repentance: Don’t Hide–HEAL

Don’t let the enemy guilt you out of your #destiny. If you have sinned or otherwise failed or fallen short, repent. Yes, I know there’s seemingly nothing profound in that advice, but it’s still true. I didn’t say resign; I said #repent.

#Repentance isn’t just being sorry for something you’ve done (or in some cases, haven’t done), it’s evaluating where you went wrong and making the necessary corrections to keep it from happening again: a change of heart and action. Maybe you’ve done something or allowed something and it’s wrinkled the fender of your reputation and distanced you from God. Maybe you’re just disappointed in yourself and it’s easier to bail than to humbly start all over. The first thing Adam and Eve did after they sinned was to HIDE. And may I even say, the more we are respected and admired, the harder it feels to get back up when we stumble because the accuser wants our shame to be very public.

Yeah, Satan’s goal is to take us out and damage as many people as he can in the process…but friends, when we’ve taken a faceplant, the world needs to SEE us recover, even if a few folks (and particularly some who are supposed to be on our “side”) hurl a few insult-and-accusation stones as we are picking ourselves up. Sometimes we privately recover, but truthfully, sometimes what we resolve to just do in private enables us to wallow a little longer in the mess–and kept hidden, sometimes we fix it, but sometimes we just choose to stay broken. Don’t stay in that place. It’s a rat’s nest.

There may be shame in failure but there’s no shame in turning to God to fix us when we have failed. Last night before I went to sleep, this verse went through my mind and I just meditated on it as I drifted off: “So now, those who are in Christ Jesus are not judged guilty. Through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit that brings life made me free from the law that brings sin and death.” (Romans 8:1-2 NCV) The KJV says there’s “therefore now no condemnation.”

Because of our trust in the redemptive power of the cross, we can machete our way through the choking, dense growth of sin’s effect on our lives and emerge back onto the right path intact. Paul realized the possibility of preaching to others but himself becoming a castaway–so he held himself accountable. So should we.

It’s just where we are. Sharing the good news is relatively easy. Being the “living epistle read of every man” part, not so much. The best thing to do is to keep ourselves holy, on guard, prayed-up, free from bondages. It’s a lot easier to maintain than to break down and repair. But if you are reading this from the cave where you went to hide after your embarrassing fall, please know there is HOPE for you. Sure, there’ll be a few who would remind you of your inadequacy, but there is a whole host of witnesses crying out just beyond your earshot, “Get up! Try! Finish! Keep going! You’re almost home!” There’s a Father checking out the window, pacing in the roadway, wanting to put a ring on your stinky, stained hand and restore you with full privilege instead of demoting you from sonship to servitude.

I remember once when I was still in school, one of my schoolmates wound up getting badly burned when he threw gasoline on a bonfire. The kid was ashamed/afraid to tell his parents because it was a foolish act of disobedience, messing with fire and flammables; and because he hid the terrible burn under his clothing without getting help, the burn got badly infected and became a serious, dangerous problem much worse than a parent’s chastisement for disobeying. No doubt the scars are still on that leg, decades later. We hide our burns too, sometimes, don’t we?

Peter had to repent when he fell. Yep, one of “the three amigos” whom Jesus kept privy to His most important missions actually betrayed Him in a most contemptible way when things got too dangerous. But Jesus WANTED him back. He even said to him, “when you’re restored, strengthen the others.” See, your recovery is never just about you. Jesus didn’t choose to just gloss it over and strengthen them Himself in Peter’s absence; He in essence told Peter, “YOU do it.” There’s going to be a visible restoration of the part of you that needs healed, friend, and the people who’ve been let down by your absence are also going to be strengthened…by YOU. It is this action that will bring you full circle and it will keep you accountable in the future because of its humbling quality.

As much as it feels to the contrary, you aren’t expendable. God needs you on that front line. Replacing you is not His ultimate will — redeeming you, however, IS! He saw in ages past where a you-shaped piece of the puzzle needed to go, and He created you to fit exactly right there in the big picture. He doesn’t have a bunch of spare you’s just lying around in case you malfunction! Repentance says you are willing to let Him rebuild you to keep doing what He created you to do. And sometimes, we need rebuilt not only because of our sins, but also even from just being battle-weary, worn-out, and hyperextended. Let Him.

Lay aside what’s holding you back. Phooey on what anyone might say or think, don’t you wallow in condemnation one more day. Your destiny is right where you left it, and Jesus can recalibrate the driving directions from WHEREVER this moment finds you…to make sure you arrive safely. Come home.

Bamboo Bicycles or Real Revival?

Remember watching Gilligan’s Island on tv, the episodes where Professor would rig up an invention to make their Crusoe-esque lives a little easier? My favorite is “Gilligan-powered” ingenuity. Gilligan is seated on a bamboo bicycle, those skinny legs pedaling furiously to generate electricity for a radio transmitter, or to agitate a paddle wheel in a washtub full of dirty laundry, etc.

In the Body of Christ, are we pedaling bamboo bicycles to generate power? Are we mobilizing programs solely on our own strength and ambition–or even worse, based on someone else’s perceived success in harnessing revival?

We are so trend-driven when it comes to our faith, and it ought not be. It’s one thing to come away inspired by someone else’s encounter with God; but we are more than a little foolish if we think there’s some magic formula for revival, soul-winning, and restoring miracles in the Church. We saw in the 60’s and 70’s a variation of this. If Apostle so-and-so wore porkchop sideburns and he had a following, suddenly all the up-and-coming young ministers grew big goofy sideburns. They held the mic the same way he did. Pulled their lapels wayyyy out. They parted their hair on the same side, mimicked his vocal inflections, got the walk down just-so. If the evangelist had people fall out when he laid hands on them, now all the young hopefuls wanted everyone at the altar to fall out for them too! Yep, I’ve had a couple of them try to tip me over when I didn’t fall out on my own.

I’m not trying to mock our Pentecostal heritage, not at all. I celebrate it and walk in the gifts and baptismal measure of the Holy Spirit. Looking throughout the Bible, and throughout church history, however, it looks like every generation has had its bamboo bicycles on deserted islands where the power connection didn’t quite reach. Perhaps it’s not so much laziness on our part, but not actually knowing that we can have our own encounter without having to do it like so-and-so’s church, like Reverend Powerhouse, or like our godly role models. We do want the fire to fall; but we are looking in the wrong direction, hoping someone else to our left or right has perfected the template–hoping some else’s proven method will save us from having to seek God’s revelation for our own prayer and fasting model. We are trying to house the Holy Spirit in recycled plastic milk jugs instead of paying the price to become stretchable wineskins ourselves. We will try on someone else’s armor only to find out it’s too big and bulky for our own frames.

Consider this: although God changes not, He will never make Himself known to us through a boilerplate format for the encounter. When we copy someone else’s method, even if it works for that movement and season, for us it becomes dead works. And if we don’t move with the cloud by day and the fire by night, what DID once work for us will suddenly become dead works, too. How many times has the Body of Christ failed the test when the Lord called us to follow him out of a particular season on to another level? God is never going to share His glory with man. Yes, once He has moved on, we are perfectly free to stay where we are; program it up, to try to keep it all going just as before. He’ll let us. He just won’t be the source generating the energy. He will never prosper our attempts to bottle and patent and copyright His glory!

Not every church is going to be a Brownsville. Brownsville can’t even afford to be labeled a ‘Brownsville-style movement;’ for such a label has the potential to become a judgment against us. If we are blessed to have God’s visitation in a phenomenal, supernatural season, and He chooses to move us out of our oasis and back on the travel path again, there’s great danger in choosing to try to remain in the move that He’s finished anointing. I believe, and I say this with fear and great respect, that even the leaders of these great awakenings which have birthed in these last few years would tell you to keep your eyes on Jesus alone, listening to His directive–and stop trying to market a particular style of worship as being the “next new thing.” If we are blessed to be under the deluge of His outpouring, and His power should suddenly moves in a different direction; or, if we are trying furiously to bring someone else’s revival recipe to our own little corners on the globe, then we’ll just be pedaling our little bicycles like madmen, doomed to fail in our human frailty! God’s will is that all of us have a supernatural encounter with Him; but we don’t get to define the parameters for that encounter. He may manifest as wind in one setting, as rain in another, as fire in yet another, or He may manifest as that still small voice. If it’s from HIM, all of it is good! It’s HIS prerogative to define the visitation; it’s our mandate to be merely, get this, obedient.

I’ve heard some irreverent commentary even in the Body, where this or that particular movement would be rumored to be taken in error in spite of at least a timed visitation from God. Frankly, it hurts my feelings, for I believe these visitations have been very real at least as long as we have remained under God’s directive. I don’t know each individual situation, nor do I want to; but after the rumors of mighty revival movements collapsing or “fizzling out,” suddenly a teaching emerged which warned of the dangers of strange fire. Then the Body of Christ became scared of any manifestation of the Holy Ghost being labeled strange fire, and so we went back to having no fire. Neither of those polar positions is God’s intent for us individually or corporately. I’m not even sure I fully understand what constitutes “strange fire,” but I do know that if something ventures beyond Christ alone, its fruit will not and cannot remain.

I would challenge us all today to radical obedience. Obedience, not as weighed against the methods of others; but drowning out the popular theories of church growth, and getting somewhere alone with the Lord to hear what HE would have us do in order to release that anointing in our lives, in our churches, over our geographical areas. Obedience to GOD, not a new 7-step bullet point program for stirring up an awakening.

Jesus scolded Peter for worrying about John getting an easier ticket to heaven than he was getting. Jesus as much as said, “John’s encounter with me is not your business, Peter. Follow ME.” Peter didn’t want that place of being led where he didn’t want to go, to that untimely demise, that suffering, persecution, that upside-down cross. If John’s encounter involves an easier burden–if it were to be perceived that John has more favor or is looked upon by the other 12 as holier–Peter is jealous for THAT encounter. We can’t busy ourselves with what works in Australia, in Pensacola, or in the big new church on the other side of town with a coffee shop and valet parking. Praise God for moving in such notable ways in those places; we rejoice for them! We will buy their worship tapes, listen to the preaching on our CD’s, read the books and let the zeal for the house rub off on us, too–but our job is still to look to GOD ALONE for our own visitation, whatever that visitation should look like for us. I can almost guarantee that it’s going to look a lot different here in the foothills of Appalachia than it does in Sydney, than it did at Mezuzah Street or at Murphy, NC. But…if God’s the one generating the power, we won’t have to build a single program or training center to keep it going.

Obey the Lord, pure and simple. He will not let it be said that the success of His Body comes from the neck down! Know this: if you obey Him only, instead of trying to power your own movement, you will never ever be in danger of deception. You won’t have strange fire, and you won’t have no fire. You will have HIS fire. And you won’t have to grow sideburns or pedal a bamboo bike! Just saying…

The Spirit’s Eye

“No one has ever seen this, and no one has ever heard about it. No one has ever imagined what God has prepared for those who love him. But God has shown us these things through the Spirit.” (I Cor. 2:9-10 NCV)

Years ago, my now brother-in-law Tommy had a poster on his office wall that, at first glance, just appeared to be a nice purple-and-blue pattern. I thought it was pretty but really didn’t see anything outstanding there. Eventually one day, I heard some of the others talking about the picture-inside-the-picture…and I was intrigued enough to press in closer. I saw nothing. It was one of those times where you wonder, “Should I be like the people in the Emperor’s New Clothes story, and pretend I see what isn’t there…or do I just admit that I don’t get it?”

Well, I ‘fessed up…I really didn’t get it. So Tommy said, “You’re trying too hard. You have to just relax and let your vision blur a little. When you stop trying to SEE it, you’ll see it!” And he was right. After a couple of tries, it was as if the hidden images materialized out of nowhere. Now, the theme of that particular poster turned out to be Star Trek…but after I discovered the whole “Mind’s Eye” picture series, I just became an instant fan. I sought out other similar pictures to peer into and enjoy.

As believers in Christ, many (probably most) of us breeze, at least in our fledgling years, right past situations that appear one way but have hidden spiritual undertones. It’s not a sin to be unable to read those signs; yet, we can miss some really important, even critical, messages God is trying to show us in the spirit realm. We can live a very superficial Christian life, saved as can be, but still not have a depth of understanding that will mature us and make our walk effective.

Now, to become spiritually-minded, we don’t have to become hermits, shave our heads, or adopt bizarre behaviors! However, our affections and appetites change as we draw closer to God. As we begin to savor the deep things in the Word, and as we spend time in prayer and just fellowship with our Father, a side to us is opened up which we didn’t know we had. Carnal mindsets start dying off, and we begin to understand a greater scope of what’s going on around us.

I’ll give you a little example, because becoming spiritually-minded has been and is an ongoing process with me, too. At one time, I might have looked at face values of situations which need changing, and might have only seen the visible problem instead of the hidden cause of it. The Lord has enabled me, over time, to become aware of the “picture-within-the-picture.” Rather than just seeing a geographical area full of drug-addicted people, and shaking my head at the astounding statistics, now I realize that there are territorial strongholds which exist on a different plane: addictive spirits which acquire dominance in a particular place…strongholds which can only be broken through prayer, through fasting, and through persistence. The problems we “see” in the natural realm are pretty much just the results, and not heart of those problems at all! So when we try to attack that growth from the stem up, it keeps coming back. We cannot do war against a spiritual entity by fighting against flesh and blood opponents! Try to rid your lawn of the clover and dandelions by mowing, and see how long they stay gone!

Now, there will always be a need for support groups,positive changes in the natural, etc., but until we see beyond the visible to the root of the problem, and begin to conduct warfare on the root-end of the situation, we will be at best just maintaining. We can clean out corruption by calling in the authorities, but unless there is spiritual deliverance—unless ground is taken by righteousness where once was wickedness—we will see different faces but the same problem, stemming from that original root.

There is a bit of a price to pay for becoming spiritually-minded. It comes right back around to time spent in God’s presence. You cannot think like God thinks if you aren’t willing to hang out with Him and let the mind of Christ rub off on you! Having His mind won’t make you weird, cultic, eccentric, or “out there;” although, folks may just not get you when you make observations from a perspective they can’t see. Being occasionally misunderstood is a very small investment, when going deeper into your relationship with God empowers you to pray and to see in a much greater way than before.

God doesn’t give us this ability just so we can feel “enlightened” above other people. No, that’s where we could dance a fine line of hypocrisy. It doesn’t make us superior to the average believer, so there’s absolutely no room to gloat in one’s spirituality. God gives us that deeper vision so that we can see as He sees–to respond as He responds, and so that we will be proactive to promote His righteous will on earth. To merely SEE on a deeper level would only drive us to despair, without God’s Word and without His instructions on what we are to do with the revelation He’s given us. Remember, the devil has his own counterfeit spirituality too, and some may confuse being psychic with the kind of spiritual sight I’m talking about. When Satan approached Eve in the garden, he said that God didn’t want them to eat of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil because God didn’t want their eyes to be opened to see what He sees. Why, that made the fruit even more delectable…to think, that she could become privy to something God was concealing from her; something with which she might then have a right to disagree! Therein lies the difference. When God reveals a matter to us, it’s to bring us into alignment with His will—not to consume our knowledge on our own greed, or form our own carnal opinions about it. Satan’s intent behind luring people into pseudo-spirituality is to cause them to think independently of God’s will. Eve managed to be duped into thinking that God was keeping her from something good. What she, and so many others have failed to understand over the years (to their destruction), is that outside of God’s will, nothing good exists in the first place.

With more understanding comes more responsibility. God doesn’t grant you the gift of discernment, for instance, so that you can peek into other people’s secret faults and frailties and use those weaknesses to harm them. It’s not given with the purpose of advancing you AT ALL. As a matter of fact, a person with special discernment may very well have to gird himself/herself up in the area of having judgmental tendencies. A person of discernment must also learn to be silent about what God does not choose to reveal to others. We must NOT reveal what God has confided in us, and certainly not with the motive of making ourselves look more spiritual to other people! There’s absolutely no room for a gossiping spirit or a manipulative spirit in the life of a Believer who walks on this level. Conversely, as our awareness of spirit realm is heightened, we must choose to become more humble, more consecrated, more surrendered to God. Our carnal nature, if not put under submission, will only make a mess out of what God’s wanting to give us for His good purposes. We cannot afford to try to use our gifts outside the realm of His Word and His will. We are called to prayer, and on one’s knees is the best place to remain when humility is paramount. Trust me…if you walk closely to God, there may be times when you discern things about other people which are going to disturb you, grieve you. You may enter places and sense the presence of a particular controlling spirit. Without holiness in your life, there are things you can’t bear! With holiness and a totally submitted-to-God’s-authority frame of mind, you’ll not only be able to bear these things, you can pray the prayer of faith against the influence of the enemy in the lives of people and over localities. We are not given the spirit of fear, but of power, love, and a sound, calm, well-balanced mind! Any time God reveals hidden things to you, it’s always either with yours or someone else’s protection in mind, or for you to know what type of prayer must be prayed to bring situations in line with His Kingdom and His will. And it’s not always about identifying the negative! God can use our sensitivity to His Spirit to reveal good, wholesome, encouraging, holy truths. Just as important as not walking through wrong doors is the discernment to walk through the right ones!

God will even test us early on to prove whether we are trustworthy to walk on another plane. He may instruct us to speak out over something we don’t want to address; or He may order us to keep silent about a matter even though we feel we have the “low down” on the situation. In these times, it may be very tempting to try to make ourselves look good in front of others. If we disobey His instructions, we disqualify ourselves from certain realms of spiritual authority. Just as you love some people you wouldn’t trust for a minute, God loves us even when He can’t trust us…but He’d rather be able to trust us! He wants to love you, to bless you, to promote you to do great and mighty things, but much of that depends on your obedience factor. Remember, no matter what kind of pretty pattern we display on the outside, God uniquely sees beyond the window dressing and straight into our hearts. May He be pleased with what He sees…

Pray with me today: “Heavenly Father, I desire to be closer to You, and to want those things which You desire. I have some carnal affections I’m already aware of, and some I may not be aware of. Prune me of those tendencies toward unrighteousness. Mature me in the things of God! Help me to have healthy appetites and goals, and help me to have a pure heart with right motives. There is another level I’ve not attained in my walk with You, and that level is where You will for me to come up to. You created me for purpose, and oh, how I want to fulfill Your will in my life. I want to be a vessel You can TRUST. Fill me with Your Holy Spirit; baptize me through and through, and give me power for service. Help me not to see the world around me through the eyes of the flesh. If I walk after the flesh, I’ll only fulfill the works of the flesh. I ask You to enable me to walk after the Spirit! When I’m confronted with the sin and the despair around me, help me to see through Your eyes. Help me see people, even the most difficult ones, through Your eyes. Prompt me to pray and to intercede for the lost, for the bound, and for the hopeless. I want to be transformed today. Help me renew my mind to Your Word, and help me to bear You much good fruit in this lifetime You’ve appointed me. In Jesus’ name, Amen.”