Breakthrough series 13: My cup runs over

Taking the kingdom: Part 6 - Peter Whosoever

Taking the kingdom part 1: Rise up from the waters, reclaim your life

Leaving the desert part 3 - Sounds of Silence

Practical Christianity 2: So what comes first: practicality or spirituality?

Its a new Day

Prayer 7: Come boldly before God and be heard

At my right hand

Years ago I saw a drama in mime, in which Jesus was "nailed" to a man who assumed the configuration of a cross. On the other side of the stage, His father assumed the same position, alone - but as His son winced and reacted to every jolt, so did He.

Keep going until it makes sense

So much of life proves that waiting is useful. 

A top restaurant will insist that good food takes times. 

A mother with child knows that once her course is run her joy will be full. 

A student pushes through the years of learning, motivated by the prize beyond and the value of waiting for it. 

A farmer reconciles himself to the idea that what seems like nothing is happening will yet bear fruit. 

What we stop feeding, be it the lowest sin or highest faith .... will die

A facebook correspondent, Penny Pina, hit the motherlode today when she made the above statement. Interestingly, her surname, Pina, equates to a Hebrew word for substance as used in the Galileean town of Rosh Pina, which means, rock of substance or cornerstone. It was so named by Romanian refugees who started farming there in the mid-19th century. They established a Moshava and called their village Rosh Pina. Later Baron de Rothschild planted a garden in the village, which sits in the foothills of the Golan heights overlooking the sea of Galilee. 

A great African preacher said, "we need to move our faith a little bit down (from the head) and a little to the left (the heart)". It is the heart that feeds our faith, for it the essential common ground where we commune with God. Ours is not an intellectual faith. Although it is intellectually robust, it is a faith of the heart. It has to be felt not seen. But if it does not move the heart or fill our being with a revelation of God, whatever is conceived within us will be still-born and die. We feed our faith through the heart, just as we feed our bodies through the stomach or our intellect through the mind. Thus the same preacher said, "In our hearts are two dogs - a black and white dog. It is the one we feed most that thrives."

What advantage then has the Jew, Part 3

I once had to mediate in a school issue after a teacher was assused of racism. I asked the parent to state her complaint and then asked the teacher to respond, but the parent kept interjecting. Despite my appeals she kept on arguing, until I asked her, "How do you define racism?" She replied, "It is prejudice", to which I retorted, "Well then, by that same definition you are racist, for you are prejudging the teacher and affording her no opportunity to defend herself". The parent yielded and so became a loyal friend of the school.

I grew up in a racist context that distorted our thinking, so I understand how dreadful it is. However, now I see the reverse side of it. Those now in power are as racist, for anything they don't understand or perceive as unfair is automatically racist or attributable to the past. That is no recipe for reconciliation.

Rebuilding the walls

Darius’ decreed that Nehemiah should start restoring Jerusalem, became a significant prophetic marker, because the moment meant so much to God. Nehemiah enjoyed the favor, blessing and authority of God – a very important consideration, given that the same authority had sent once sent His people into captivity, some 70 years earlier.

Thus the Jewish Diaspora came full circle. They had been exiled for as many years as the Sabbath years that they had once dishonored, but with Darius’ decree the matter was closed and God moved on.

However, Sanbalat resented the Jews and did all he could to stop their recovery. Although Nehemiah had authority to take wood from the king’s forest and to quarry for stone, Sanbalat would have none of it. Guess who he characterizes?

So Nehemiah made rebuilding of the walls of Jerusalem, his priority. He knew that as long as they were exposed to Sanbalat, all other efforts would be fruitless. They were so single-minded about their approach that they built with their swords by their sides, ready to fight at a moment’s notice.

The story is analogous to our own human struggles. We also neglect truth and end up in exile. We are also taken captive by life and dragged off to work the thankless systems of this world. Yet when God redeems, He gives us the vital authority to rebuild our lives.

That rebuilding process will have its gainsayers. You will face detractors, often for no other reason than that your own progress highlights their crises. That is why you get tall poppy syndromes in various cultures – people are generally happier when you remain as dispossessed as they are, but they resent it when anyone rises above the average and starts to reclaim their lives, their dignity or their life purpose.

They say that there is only one thing worse than being spoken of, and that is not being spoken of – for indeed whenever we advance to recovery we will be spoken of, we will face our opposition. Satan works through others to keep us down and will put up a fight when we don’t comply.

So our strategy is not to start building outwards, until we have built upwards. We have to build the walls first. That implies a need to assert our divine position: a vital appropriation of your authority expressed through daily confessions of our rights of way and the favor of God over our lives.

As you resist the Devil, your walls will rise, your defenses will become sure and you will move to a state of relative rest - not behind insular walls, but walls of purpose and dignity. You will never be fully at rest, but the idea of being able to post a reasonable guard at the gates of your life, your home and your family, so you can redirect your resources into tilling the earth and building a future – is very desirable.

So, if you have faced crisis but feel you are headed towards recovery, stand your ground and see it through until your walls provide enough refuge for you to extend your life into other avenues of expression.

(c) Peter Eleazar @ http://www.4u2live.net/
Image courtesy of: http://thechurchofjesuschrist.us/wp-content/uploads/2009/07/ba5.jpg

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Is God in the demolition business?

Is God silent to our cries? Does He lead us into the wilderness to die there? Is He watching over our fall from a distance? Is He aloof to the crises of life and the heartbreaks here below? Or are we just seeing Him through our own hardened lenses and have we closed our ears to His voice? Maybe the clamor of life has just distracted us from a greater, albeit almost imperceptible reality, that whispers hope and life into our lost world.
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