Unstoppable!

“We’re both, reservoirs and rivers.”

When God created man, He breathed His very breath into him in the hope that life would, in turn, flow through him. He would be fruitful, have dominion and multiply. Even after The Fall, His desire remains as unchanging as His character. Jesus was purposed into the plan of redemption, even before the foundations of the Earth. God, in His foreknowledge, knew everything, yet His Relentless Love towards us pleased Him to bruise His Son, Jesus in order that we may, in and through a relationship now accessible by the power of The Holy Spirit, be able to once again, walk in constant communion with Him. That’s His great delight, and I believe, ours too.

The question is what really happens in this Father-Child relationship?

I believe a relationship as sacred as this is forged through pristine Love. The Love that first found us now beckons us to go find others. But in order to do that, we need to be filled with The Spirit of God, The Love of God, The Wisdom of God. Psalm 23:5 puts it as simply as this,

“my cup runneth over.”

It is only from the abundance of what we forge in the vertical space, a space that is defined and sustained through Love, that the abundance of What and Who we experience and encounter can freely flow into the world around us, a horizontal space that when infected with the joy, love and grace we have to offer can most definitely result in the prophecy of The Cross fulfilled.

This is why we are first, reservoirs and then, rivers.

We are reservoirs to the extent that we have allowed God to access and fill us up with His Spirit. This surrender is precisely what allows Him to fill the God-shaped hole on the inside of us. But as we allow Him to work with us more and more, He will inevitably fill us up more and more, to the full until we overflow. Simply because He is a Giver, and His intention is to turn us into one too. Hence, He calls us “rivers of living water.”

As I write, Jesus’s encounter with the Samaritan woman comes to mind. She came to the well where Jesus, tired from His journey, found a seat. Having come with the sole intention of drawing water from the well, she almost missed the well of living water who sat right beside, until Jesus initiated the conversation and said,

“Will you give me a drink?” (John 4:7, NIV)

Being a Samaritan, she was stunned that Jesus, being a Jew, would even associate with her. But isn’t that what Our King was famous for? He did not come to condemn the world, but to save the world. And I believe, that needs to be our heart posture too.

Back to the parable. Looking for physical water to take back, Jesus was quick to shift her perspective from circumstantial gratification (temporal in nature) to spiritual fulfillment (eternal glory). To quote Our Savior Himself,

“Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again,  but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”

How often do we look for resolution in the natural, when we have access to Someone who is able to make, mend and mold circumstances in a way that is good for us and brings Glory to God? Someone who is more interested in growing us, developing us and bringing us up till we learn to walk in the fullness of who God calls us to be in order that we may do what God intends for us to.

That Someone is Jesus who once said to a certain Samaritan woman that HE was the source of the water that would quench her thirst forever. Today, as believers in Christ, that Source has taken up residence within us and as Bill Johnson would say, “He wants out!”

Friends, this journey is as exquisite as it is profound. It is laced with signs, wonders and miracles from The Heavens above. It is about encountering the Heart of God who calls us His Beloved. It is about receiving the fullness of His Love on a daily basis in order that the great reservoir of love, grace, power and majesty that is cultivated within us as a result, would organically flow as rivers of living water into the lives of those we come into contact with; causing a softening of hearts, an edification of lives and a transformation in families, communities and the nations.

We dignify lives that were once devalued. We embolden spirits that were once shattered. We illuminate hearts that were once hopeless. We guide souls that are seeking, and redirect traffic that is lost and searching. In short, we spread the aroma and fragrance of Christ wherever we go till joy is rekindled, passion is fueled and purpose is made manifest.

This is what it means to be a Child of The King of kings and The Lord of lords!

We are both, reservoirs and rivers. And we will not stop.

Selah.

When promises and plans collide!

“The Promise will unravel the plans.”

Our first radical encounter with The Lord provoked a response from us: we surrendered our lives to Him and received the Promise of Salvation. This first Promise however, is just the beginning of His very many promises in our lives. He promises to make His dwelling among us, and to never leave us nor forsake us. He promises that no weapon forged against us shall prosper and every tongue that rises against us, He will condemn. He promises to work all things together for our good and His Glory. He promises that He has plans to prosper us and not to harm us, plans to give us a hope and a future. However, it is important to note that these plans are traced back to what first began as a Promise.

Of the very many promises that I could write, the one that stands out to me is the following,

“For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers and sisters. And those he predestined, he also called; those he called, he also justified; those he justified, he also glorified.” (Romans 8:29-30, NIV)

My experience tells me that when God releases a Promise in our lives, it always has a higher purpose to it, that of our becoming, and our becoming more and more like Jesus. Jesus is the very embodiment of love, grace, mercy, kindness, compassion and sacrifice. As we begin to seek God for the plans that will unravel the Promise, I believe He takes us on a journey. He grows us up in the stature of the new man, and enables us to do so through the strength and the wisdom of The Holy Spirit. He shows us that the outcome is in His Hands and we can trust Him because He is Faithful. Our part, however, is to seek Him out to see what are the ways in which HE would have us grow so that we can become the person who can hold the weight and the glory of The Promise.

I would like to candidly confess that of late, I had begun to attach my joy to the fulfillment of that which He has promised. Spending time with Him revealed to me that my joy is to be found in Jesus, and Jesus alone. A solid foundation that is built on His Love and Joy towards us is the very thing that will release us from the bondage of expectations and free us to become all that He has called us to be, in this next time frame, a child of God who is now learning to respond to Love with joy, through every situation and circumstance that comes our way.

Yes, we do continue to believe, pray and prophesy. However, our joy cannot be tethered to anything but His Presence. The assurance of His Faithfulness to manifest that which He has promised is enough to rest our souls. We now operate from Heaven to Earth, which means that every situation and circumstance is only an opportunity for another conversation with Love that will allow us to manifest that which we have just spoken WITH, in order that we may speak TO that which needs our intervention, thereby turning every event into a Kingdom situation.

In the times that we find ourselves in today, I know we are all rather concerned about the plans that God has for us. However, to discover those plans, we will need to trace our way back to The Promise, which will inevitably lead us into other promises that will sustain us, build us, grow us, mature us, season us, develop us, as we wait upon The Lord. These would be promises that we can speak back to The Father such as, “You promised that He who began a good work in me shall complete it until the day of Christ Jesus.”

This, dear friends, is important so that when what we are believing The Lord to accomplish on our behalf in our lifetime, comes to pass; we will not only be standing in the integrity of having cultivated a deeper intimacy with The Lord, but will also have had a first hand witness to the power and authority that we have as believers in Christ.

Even Jesus, in His time on Earth, cried out to The Father with prayers and petitions. The garden of Gethsemane undoubtedly comes to mind. He knew The Promise that awaited Him on the other side of His radical obedience, but it was in the context of Him constantly communing with The God of Heaven and Earth that He left us a model to follow. A model that prayerfully, we may have the wisdom to pass on to all those that we are called to touch and transform, because when it’s all said and done, THAT is the big plan.

It’s a plan that will attract the divine, supernatural favor of Heaven. It’s a plan that will serve to outlive us. It’s a plan that will, beyond a shadow of doubt, be connected to the other plans that God has for us with regard to our specific and unique gifts and talents. It’s a plan that is birthed in purpose, but traces its way back to a Promise.

The Promise is between you and God, but the plans are for the world to witness. The Promise is our anchor, but the plans are vulnerable to the purpose of God. The Promise is as sure as it is sacred, but the plans are subject to being molded and brought into alignment with the passage of time.

Suffice to say, that at every step, the plans will be traced back to The Promise for it is The Promise that unravels the plans.

Selah.

The Love that inspires will always win.

“Love inspires trust.”

All of us who are following The Lord have undoubtedly had an encounter with Love. God made us in His own image, and knew that we would have to be won over by a radical revelation of and an encounter with Love, in order to trust Him with our lives. After all, we trust only that which we know is worthy of it. I believe that is what The Cross represents.

Jesus descended from Eternity to Earth, healed and delivered people, preached The Good News, and when it was time, unabashedly took The Cross, died for all our sin and shame, and then rose again on the third day, to simply demonstrate that He is worthy. We cannot trust that which has not won our love, but once it has, I believe we can trust. We can trust without borders because The Love that won us over has no borders either. The heights, the depths, the widths, the lengths – none can fully fathom, but we can grow in the revelation knowledge of it, with every step of obedience to His voice, inspired by trust.

It’s what we call a symbiotic relationship, but Love initiates and we respond. A commonly used yet highly profound Bible verse comes to mind,

“Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight.”

To lean not on your own understanding implies we need to trust the invisible, yet tangible made manifest through The Spirit of God. Once we encounter that which I don’t even have the words to articulate, we can trust. We no longer have to react to the state of our circumstances, rather we can tap into the privilege of responding to The Father. In every situation that seems beyond us, we are the privileged lot to be able to ask questions like, “Where are You in this, Father? What are you teaching me? How can I partner with You?”

Once we are in Christ, our lives are hidden in Him. Consequently, we may find ourselves at times speculating the uncertainties our journey entails. However, instead of trying to figure out what must be unravelled only in and through our walk with Love, we can find freedom in the perfect love of God that casts out fear. Instead, it breeds trust, faith and confidence which gives rise to an empowering, overcoming and victorious spirit within us. If we take the time to think about it, isn’t that what Jesus was all about? It is only natural for Him to want to make us more of that, and less of who we were before we met Him. He is forging His Character, and friends, THAT is something we can trust.

I believe that this really is the heartbeat of our faith. The Love of God cascading through the broken crevices of our heart, mind, soul; and transforming it all into a magnificent portrait of healing, wholeness and restoration is what causes us to transfigure. When we encounter those that we are called to, it is this transformation that bears witness to their spirit. They may not be able to understand it, but as long as they walk away feeling loved, heard, seen and valued, which is a result of an overflow of our relationship with Love; I believe we have just begun to manifest our own Identity as those that are rooted and grounded in Perfect Love.

It is abundantly clear that this journey requires us to be vulnerable to God; the goodness of God, the Love of God, the Power of God. We no longer have to hide that which has been crucified in Christ Jesus, but can boldly bring those areas into The Presence of God who promises to generously give The Holy Spirit to whoever asks. Most of our challenges find resolution when we no longer rely on our own strength, rather on the strength of The Spirit. Another promising verse comes to mind as I write,

“But we speak the wisdom of God in a mystery, even the hidden wisdom, which God ordained before the world unto our glory: … But God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit: for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God.”

To partner with The Holy Spirit in our quest to search out the “deep things of God” is our portion and our privilege. It sets the stage for our relationship with The Father to be built up into the next dimension, and as it does, it sets the stage for our Identity to be revealed in a fresh, new way; and as we begin to walk in the fullness of that which has been revealed; our circumstances, situations and relationships too begin to become vulnerable to the same Goodness , Love and Power that first found us.

Bedazzling, isn’t it?

If such are the consequences of yielding to the majesty of Love, then why resist? We can yield, surrender and walk in confident obedience. Simply because we have been won over by Love, and among the very many things that this inspires, it inspires trust. Trust in the goodness, wisdom and sovereignty of God who knows the end from the beginning, and has been extravagant enough to reveal what the end looks like.

Victory!

So be it.

Amen.

The Promise!

“That you’re in a wilderness is a sure sign that you’re a Child of Promise.”

There are times in our lives where we find ourselves in the midst of something completely unexpected. We didn’t ask for it. We didn’t pray for it. We didn’t see it coming. But came, it did.

A beautiful quote by Graham Cooke comes to mind,

“God allows in His wisdom what He could easily prevent by His power.”

What does this really mean?

I believe this means that in His infinite wisdom and sovereignty, God, at times allows us to go through seasons where He allows for certain situations and circumstances to manifest in our lives simply because He has a greater purpose in mind: to use those very situations and circumstances to not diminish us; rather to upgrade us, train us and develop us into the full stature of Christ which is His primary goal. These are wilderness seasons where we unlearn old patterns of behavior, bring the spiritual condition of our hearts into His Presence, and allow The Holy Spirit to slowly remake and remold our inner man till He comes into alignment with the divine reset that God is bringing in our midst. It’s a shedding of the old wine skin and ushering in of the new. It is letting go and laying hold of. It is surrendering that which no longer works and accessing that which does.

It is the story we are all living. It’s a story of valleys and mountains. The mountaintop view will come as sure as the breaking of dawn each day. That’s the Promise of Our Great God. But how we navigate our way through the wilderness shows what we are made of. Our success in paving our way through it depends not on our own wisdom and strategy, but that of Heaven. I firmly believe that if God allows for His Children who are His supreme delight to through such seasons, it is only because acceleration and expansion await us on the other side. However, to lay hold of such a blessing, I feel it is imperative that we learn to lean on Our Savior who will cleanse our spiritual lens so that we can see how He sees, think how He thinks and speak how He speaks in order that we may be quick to glean the wisdom this God-ordained season has to offer us and garner strength that will be our bridge into the next season – a season of growth, promotion and increase.

Friends, as I was writing, The Lord took me straight to Deuteronomy 8:1-10 (NIV):

“Be careful to follow every command I am giving you today, so that you may live and increase and may enter and possess the land the Lord promised on oath to your ancestors. Remember how the Lord your God led you all the way in the wilderness these forty years, to humble and test you in order to know what was in your heart, whether or not you would keep his commands. He humbled you, causing you to hunger and then feeding you with manna, which neither you nor your ancestors had known, to teach you that man does not live on bread alone but on every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord.  Your clothes did not wear out and your feet did not swell during these forty years. Know then in your heart that as a man disciplines his son, so the Lord your God disciplines you. Observe the commands of the Lord your God, walking in obedience to him and revering him. For the Lord your God is bringing you into a good land—a land with brooks, streams, and deep springs gushing out into the valleys and hills; a land with wheat and barley, vines and fig trees, pomegranates, olive oil and honey;  a land where bread will not be scarce and you will lack nothing; a land where the rocks are iron and you can dig copper out of the hills. When you have eaten and are satisfied, praise the Lord your God for the good land he has given you.”

It is so heartening to note that even in the wilderness, the Israelites received full provision, on a daily basis. The Lord fed them with manna, which would suffice only for a day at a time. He anointed their clothes so that they would not wear out. He preserved their feet and protected them from all harm. He went ahead of them, in fire by night, and in a cloud by day. He showed them the paths to take. For forty years, The Lord proved His Faithfulness to a people who were rather stubborn and rebellious, quick to grumble and complain as opposed to committing themselves to recalling and rehearsing all the wonderful miracles that God did right in their midst, an exercise that would have given them the courage required to go ahead and confidently inhabit The Promised Land.

Joshua and Caleb were the only exceptions who went on with great courage and boldness to lay hold of the Promised Territory. When others saw themselves as grasshoppers in their own sight, Joshua and Caleb had a different report. They proclaimed that the land was good and that they were well able to take possession of it.

And guess what?

They did!

And so can we. All we need is a shift in perspective. Instead of bemoaning the wilderness, we can lift our eyes to Jesus – the author and the finisher of our faith. We can yield our will to His, allowing Him to refine, purge, strengthen and fortify all that needs His touch. We can trust Him to teach us to steer our way through the valleys in order that we may inch closer to the mountaintop view, but simultaneously embrace the beauty of the journey we are on and the person that He is making us into through it. I will once again quote Graham Cooke, for he puts it so simply, yet beautifully as follows:

“If nothing can separate you from the Love of God, then nothing can separate your circumstances from the Power of God.”

I write this because I believe that everything we go through is in Christ. He is at the helm of our lives and gets to have the final say on every matter that concerns us. He will never leave us nor forsake us, rather reveal another dimension of Himself through every thing that He takes us through. It is in these wilderness seasons that we will have the privilege of meeting Him as The Savior, The Father, The Provider, The Redeemer, The Deliverer, The Healer, The Teacher, The Guide, The Comforter, The Friend, The Constant One. These encounters, friends, will mark us and change us forever. They will prepare a place within us where we no longer are daunted by our struggles, rather are delighted by His Presence; and it is the preparation of this place, I believe, that will bridge the gap between the current wilderness of the season we find ourselves in and the Promise that awaits us, on the other side.

So, if we are in a wilderness right now, I believe Heaven cheers us on to embrace our Identity as Children of Promise, for the presence of the wilderness is a sure sign that the promise is only drawing closer.

Selah.

Love wins.

“Why be controlled by fear when you can be led by Love?”

When God puts within you the seeds of greatness that can find expression in as many ways as we are unique, I believe that it is imperative for us to learn to remain true to our convictions even in the face of opposition. The degree to which we have allowed God’s Love to penetrate the deepest crevices of our being as His Sons and Daughters is the degree to which we will have the fortitude to withstand the voices of those that don’t necessarily understand our path, and hence don’t need to validate it.

I love the following verse from The Bible,

“For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, “Abba! Father!”” (Romans 8:15, ESV)

A sure confidence in Our Father’s Great Love towards us will help us to understand that our dreams, visions, goals and aspirations are a direct download from Him. They are good and perfect gifts from above, sent to serve the world around us even when those that are perhaps the nearest to us do not have the capacity to understand. The test is whether we will remain loyal to The Voice we knew before we were formed in the womb of our mother’s belly, or whether we will allow God’s plans and purposes for our lives to be thwarted by the lies of the enemy, or at times, even the opinions of folks who actually mean us well, but perhaps are being controlled by the spirit of fear.

While it is not in our place to change people (we can pray for them though!), it is definitely our responsibility to stand firm in the truth of God’s Word which declares that He has not given us a spirit of fear or timidity, but of power, love and a sound mind. I will venture to say that in fact, we have the mind of Christ. We can remain yielded and submitted to God simply because our obedience has been won over by Love.

Love liberates. Love empowers. Love invigorates. Love fortifies. Love leads well.

Love always has our best interests at heart, and as such is perfect in His leading. He knows our most intimate details, and continues to embrace us just the way we are, while simultaneously challenging us to grace broader horizons. Love has wide and open spaces for us to run, dream and create; and as we do, He cheers us on. We stumble, we fall, but He picks us back up again. Love knew us even before time began. He specifically placed certain gifts and talents in our midst, with an equally specific purpose for which we would wield them. Clearly, Love knows best.

And as we begin to know this Love, we begin to know ourselves. Equipped and empowered by revelation knowledge of our God-ordained Identity, Purpose and Destiny; we find ourselves strategically positioned to manifest those seeds of greatness that God put in us, in the first place. Good fruit however, is often produced in bad soil, I once heard someone say. So the very things that seem to be obstacles in our path when entrusted to God and viewed from His perspective serve as bridges that only take us further along our road to destiny.

At this point in time, I believe that many of us are at a crossroads that would have us make some pivotal decisions, decisions that can either catapult us directly into our destiny, or steer us away from it. Allow me to share what Michelle Obama has to say on this issue,

“Don’t ever make decisions based on fear. Make decisions based on hope and possibility. Make decisions based on what should happen, not what shouldn’t.”

In short, not fearful of what is not, but hopeful for what could be.

As I hasten to a close, I hope that we will learn to not only be led by Love in our own lives, but also point to Him to whoever has a seeking heart and a listening ear. I hope that we will find the courage to stand strong in the midst of the storms of life, simply because we have heard that still, small voice and understand that our lives are in safe hands. I hope that we will question ourselves at those times that we need to, and affirm;

“Why be controlled by fear, when you can be led by Love?”

Selah.



On Earth as it is in Heaven!

“My confidence is not in my ability, it is in Your Sovereignty.”

When we are walking with The Lord, we are walking in the strength of The Word that has been decreed over our lives, and the truth is that when He speaks, He creates. All that we get to do is to partner with Him as we walk out the spiritual reality that He has already spoken into being, and watch it manifest.

So, our confidence is not in our ability to make things happen, rather it is in His ability to make happen that which He has already purposed in His Heart. We do get to be co-laborers with Him on this grand adventure, but it is never a case of striving in the flesh that manifests the Victory already purchased for us at Calvary. Rather, it is a Spirit led journey that is truly triumphant. It is triumphant over circumstances of all sorts simply because it elevates the Truth of what God says over what the current state of affairs have to say.

I love dreams and visions that God has a propensity to birth in the wombs of our imaginations in and through our relationship with Him. They always serve a Higher Purpose which is in accord with His Will to use our lives in a way that leaves an impact on all those that we are called to. It can be quite a challenge to be a visionary or a pioneer of sorts. There are always voices that need to be ignored and impediments that need to be overcome. There are always nagging doubts or perhaps even, the fear of failure. But the good news is that if HE said it, HE is responsible to bring it to pass. Jesus’s flawless words come to mind as I write,

“My Father is always at his work to this very day, and I too am working.” (John 5:17,NIV).

Friends, if God is always at work to bring to pass that which He has promised, I believe we can rest. We can rest in the assurance that He who began a good work in us shall bring it to completion until the day of Christ Jesus. The work may be challenged by the tactics of the enemy, but a deep enough revelation of the Sovereignty and Majesty of Our King ought to put our weary souls to rest.

In my own personal experience, there are many times that I tend to get daunted by the state of circumstances I find myself in. I allow myself to feel that they aren’t aligned enough to make His Will come to pass in my life. Even as I write, a smile comes across my face as I recognize the hilarity of what I just confessed. Yet, I must ask how often do all of us tend to do just that?

God reminds me that HE is the divine orchestrator of the events and circumstances of our lives. As we allow a symphony of prayer to arise like incense to The Throne Room of Grace, I believe that the choreography of our lives has just begun to change. Not because He has suddenly been awakened, but because we have. God knows the end from the beginning, but it is for us to discover the glorious plans He has already written in the screenplay of our lives, the wonders He has hidden along the way, the surprises that are a part of The Father’s great delight towards us, the destiny that has yet to unravel ahead of us. This is not just our portion, but our privilege as those that have been sealed with promise. And no, He hasn’t left us alone in this endeavor. He has given us His Spirit who is faithful to not only lead us and guide us in the ways that HE has for us, but also to cultivate within us the character necessary to walk in the fullness of what He has already prepared for us.

Takes the pressure off, doesn’t it friends? After all, Jesus promised us that His yoke is easy and His burden is light.

Suffice to say that our confidence does not have to be in our ability, rather in His Sovereignty. A Sovereignty that is the author and the finisher of our faith. A Sovereignty that promises to never leave us nor forsake us. A Sovereignty that is alpha and omega. A Sovereignty that finishes what it starts. A Sovereignty that remains unmatched till the end of time. A Sovereignty that has strategically positioned us in the spaces and places that we find ourselves in, spaces and places that are saturated with purpose and promise.

Our job is to tap into The Father’s Heart, and manifest a piece of it wherever it is that we are at this point in the course of history.

So then we can not only say, but even see with confidence the truth of what I believe is the bedrock of our faith;

“On Earth as it is in Heaven.”

Amen.


Lost and found!

“A life that is found in You is also hidden in You.”

When we were lost, He found us; and when He found us, He also hid us. Making us dead to sin but alive to God, He hid our lives within Himself in order that we may seek Him, and as we do, we may find Him, all over again.

Colossians 3:3-4 (The Passion Translation) puts it like the best way ever,

“Your crucifixion with Christ has severed the tie to this life, and now your true life is hidden away in God in Christ. And as Christ himself is seen for who he really is, who you really are will also be revealed, for you are now one with him in his glory!”

There is so much to unpack from this, and I’m not quite sure if I can do justice, but what I do feel is the infallibility of the Truth that when Christ found us, He found us at our worst and His Unfathomable Love towards us compelled Him to take us just the way we were and make us His own. So, when we surrendered our heart to His, we were rendered dead to sin, and alive to God. Our old nature that saw us wandering about was replaced by a new nature that sees us as truly found. But as we were found in Him, we were also hidden in Him: Our Identity, Purpose and Destiny. I believe God did this so that the more we seek to know God in and through a relationship with His Son, Jesus; the more we will begin to understand Eternal Truths about ourselves, simply because our journey is so relational.

Jesus is The Savior, Healer, Redeemer, Deliverer, Comforter, Counselor, The King of kings and The Lord of lords; yet our best friend forever. As we begin to grow in the revelation knowledge of who HE is, we begin to understand who we are. As Children sealed through The Holy Spirit, we are now saved, healed, redeemed, delivered, set free, and have access to the constant companionship of Our Father. Our lives are hidden in Him, the plans He has for us and the paths He has chosen for us. God, I believe, is a God of Freedom. He hid our lives in Christ so that instead of being bound by the things of this world, we may remain tethered to His Presence, sensitive to His Voice and reign in life. Instead of meandering about, we now have The Holy Spirit dwelling in our midst, sensitizing us towards our next course of action. Redeemed from the world, we have now been set free to serve and love the world, the way Our Father in Christ has shown us. We now walk in the fullness of our Identity as Sons and Daughters chosen to make an Eternal Impact for The Kingdom of God, a Purpose as fulfilling as it is challenging. But, the fact that The Comforter, Counselor and Friend is constantly with us positions us to be precisely that to the sphere of influence we find ourselves in. Author and speaker, Graham Cooke calls us a “visual aid” to the world in order that they may catch a glimpse of The Father’s Heart and be naturally, wooed to know more, seek more and perhaps, be found in Him, forevermore.

So, He hid us. He hid us in the safest place ever: Jesus. Our life, now hidden in Him, is also revealed through Him as we faithfully abide in Him and walk with Him, allowing Him to unveil the redemptive story of our lives. I feel prompted to share a small snippet of my conversation with The Father as I was wrestling with the possibilities my future may hold. I told Him that I release my future to Him, and ever so gently, He responded by saying that He will release it back to me, bit by bit, and day by day.

Beautiful, isn’t it?

That’s how He loves us. He will never allow more on us than we can bear, and chooses to develop us as we walk with Him, in order that we may be mature enough to handle not only the weight of the blessings He has in store for us, but also the weight of Glory that comes with every breakthrough in The Name of Jesus.

Friends, He hid us only to reveal us, but in my experience, He does that in bits and pieces. Every step revealed only finds us back in His Presence praising Him for orchestrating that which happens only when Heaven is involved in our affairs. We thus, have the privilege of living a life of Faith, where we seek Him, heed His Voice, step outside the boat and watch His Glory manifest, as He comes through for us , every single time.

Even when we are disappointed or disillusioned, He never leaves us nor forsakes us, and promises to use EVERYTHING for our good and His Glory!

Pretty Mighty, I’d say.

And if that’s who HE is, then my friend, that’s who YOU are. A mighty man or woman of valor and virtue. Everything that Jesus modeled for us in his brief visit to the planet, God, by His Spirit, has made a way for us to become. Jesus is the Light of the world, but before He departed, He called us the light of the world. What does that mean, and how does one do it?

I believe to be the salt and light we are called to be in a world that is lost and hurting, we will be effective only to the extent that we have allowed God to forge the character of His Son within us and develop the fruits of The Holy Spirit. This journey will then empower us to demonstrate:

Love in the midst of hate,

Joy in the midst of sorrow,

Peace in the midst of chaos,

Patience in the midst of trials,

Kindness in the midst of hostility,

Goodness in the midst of evil,

Faithfulness in the midst of weakness,

Gentleness in the midst of harshness,

Self control in the midst of temptation.

So, we choose to remain hidden in Him so that when the opportunity arises, we will have it in us to manifest a piece of Heaven here on Earth. We will be the hands and feet of The One who calls out the stars and knows each by name. We will carry the aroma and fragrance of Christ to the world around and about us, and live lives that are truly triumphant in the way God would have it.

My exhortation, as I close, is that as God has hidden the plans and purposes of our lives in Christ, may we seek to know Him more, looking forward to each day as an opportunity to see another dimension of who He is unveiled so that we too, may tap into yet another dimension of who we are in Him.

That’s my hope. That’s my prayer. That’s my one aspiration.

Amen.

Glorious Fingerprints!

“A God dependent life is a God made life, and a God made life is a glorious life.”

In the world today at large, the idea of making it on our own terms and in our own strength is glorified. I believe this is at the core of why many young people are crumbling under the pressure of “making it happen.” While they see success at several levels and in different facets of their lives, I believe that true contentment and fulfillment is found only in being in the center of God’s Will.

If I know anything at all, it is this. It is never God’s intention to watch His Children fall to pieces in a vain attempt to bring all their gifting and talents together to try and create something that can give them a sense of worth and value. Rather, it is God’s passionate desire to watch His Children bring their varied expressions of God-given gifts and talents, entrusting them into the hands of their Father, and expecting Him to weave a beautiful tapestry of Grace through them that not only serves to advance their individual purpose, but that of the world at large.

This inevitably mandates an absolute surrender to God’s ways, will and timing. It is a response to a revelation of The Father’s Love that is so relentless that should we never turn to Him, He will continue to love us the same simply because that is who He is. When we get a grip of that, I believe we have been launched on a journey that will see us work, build and create from a place of Identity as Beloved Sons and Daughters of The Most High, a sure foundation that will never let us down, even should the world collapse, simply because Love has a grip on our lives, and He never quits.

Psalm 127 (ESV) puts it like this,

“Unless the Lord builds the house,
    those who build it labor in vain.”

1 Corinthians 15:58 (NIV) also comes to mind as I write,

“Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain. “

Interesting, isn’t it?

Putting the two together sheds light on the truth that unless what we build is founded securely on The Name of Jesus and The Word of God in order to advance purposes that go beyond the space of our own little lives, God is not obligated to sustain it. He sustains only that which He has called us to. So, if we are building that which we know beyond a shadow of doubt is from His Bosom and for his purposes, we can rest in the assurance that what He has begun, He is Faithful to sustain and bring to maturation. This is what a life surrendered to Him must look like, friends!

Fresh Fire mandates a fresh surrender. A fresh surrender requires a new found trust. A new found trust is grounded in fresh revelations of Love. Fresh revelations of Love, in turn, position us to surrender afresh.

It truly is a Father- Child relationship forged in and through Love that gives us the boldness and courage necessary to surrender and then, depend on Him. Depend on Him for everything: guidance, direction, resources, provisions. If God started it, He will do it. But the process will change us, simply because Our God is too loving to only give us things when He can grow us into them. Intimacy with Him will enable us to hear from Him, because our journey is purely relational. Our plans will be birthed from spaces and places that find us curiously asking of The Father, “Abba, what does this mean to me and how can I partner with You?”

As Christ followers, we begin from a position of Victory. We never have to work towards it, but we do get to partner with The Lord to watch that Victory manifest in every area of our lives, bringing redemptive answers and solutions to challenges that confront us in order that we may see outcomes and results that astonish the living daylights out of us!

As Bill Johnson often says,

“It’s not too good to be true. It is so good that it is true.”

In my experience thus far, I have seen that as we depend on The Lord, we begin to experience a new found freedom that nothing can take away from. We know where our hope lies, and it serves as an anchor in the fiercest storms and deepest valleys. His Faithfulness wins our hearts, time and time again; cultivating deeper trust which brings about a greater level of surrender and dependency. We witness Our Father taking every fragment of our life, and redeeming it for our good and His Glory. But He doesn’t quite stop there. In fact, He has just begun. He has just begun to write out a story of recreation that points to The Redemptive Touch of The Master which made it possible for our lives to come into alignment once again, with God’s original design and intention towards us. He does this to ensure that the legacy continues and the baton of Faith is passed on from generation to generation.

Therefore, a God dependent life is a God made life, and because the map of such a life has His Fingerprints all over it, it brings Him much Glory. As He brings together our strengths and weaknesses, our gifts and talents, our skills and abilities, our experiences and our desires; He begins to lay the foundations to a monument of Grace that will only point to His Highest Name. The lost will come seeking and those that seek, will be found. And to think that He chose you and me for a Purpose so grand should never cease to amaze us, humble us and draw us. As we yield to this divine design, the love and light that shines forth from the depths of our being will undoubtedly point to a Light that comes from another world, a world more real than the one we find ourselves in, a world that will endure forever and is the very substratum of the joy we find in our souls this day, today.

Should we choose to keep this joy to ourselves would be a sheer thievery that robs the planet of the Glory that awaits them. But should we choose to accept our assignment, we will have embarked upon a journey and an adventure that through the pitfalls , the detours and the setbacks; will always find ourselves rise back up again to pursue the Love that first, pursued us.

The rest shall be history, my friends!

Blessings.