Fire

On March 8, 2018   /   Word of the Day   /   Leave a comment

Matthew 3: 11

As for me, I baptize you with water for repentance, but He who is coming after me is mightier than I, and I am not fit to remove His sandals; He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.

Have you been baptized in the Holy Spirit and fire? What does a person who has been baptized in fire look like? Why does the prophetic word teach that Jesus’ baptism is not only in the Holy Spirit but also in fire?

Many days when I sit down to write the Word of the Day I ask the Father, “What can I possibly write that will ignite people? What will awaken their former zeal?” Too many of us have fallen asleep in our faith. I preach to myself as well. Am I aglow with the Holy Spirit as I once was? I believe Jesus wants us baptized in fire so that we will burn with devotion and passion. I keep thinking of people who are “on fire” for God. Where has our passion gone? Have we abandoned our first love?

This verse always reminds me of Moses and the burning bush. The bush was not consumed. It wasn’t a natural fire, it was the Holy Spirit. It got Moses’ attention and he turned aside to observe it. That is exactly what I think the baptism in the Holy Spirit and fire is supposed to do for us. We become those burning bushes which attract people. Look at this story more closely for a moment. “So Moses said, “I must turn aside now and see this marvelous sight, why the bush is not burned up.” When the Lord saw that he turned aside to look, God called to him from the midst of the bush and said, “Moses, Moses!” And he said, “Here I am,” (Exodus 3: 3 – 4). What an amazing encounter. Observe the dynamic though. The bush afire garnered Moses’ attention. When Moses took the time to turn aside and look at the bush, the next thing that happened is that God spoke to him. Wow!

We are to be those burning bushes. When we are on fire for God, people turn aside to attempt to discover what is so amazing. When they do, God speaks. We are called to be the catalyst though. When we burn brightly, people are drawn to God. I am concerned that our flames are beginning to go out. We just don’t seem to be red hot anymore. What does it take to get dying embers to burst into flame? Is it something I can give you? Is it something God needs to do? Is it something only you can do for yourself?

You have heard it said that Paul told Timothy, “Stir up the gift of God, which is in thee by the putting on of my hands,” (2 Timothy 1: 6). This is from the King James Bible and it’s a good word. However, many other translations, reflect back to the fire that was to come to us through the baptism in the Holy Spirit. This is how the Tree of Life version reads, “For this reason I remind you to fan into flame the gift of God, which is in you through the laying on of my hands.” The Passion version says, “I’m writing to encourage you to fan into a flame and rekindle the fire of the spiritual gift God imparted to you when I laid my hands upon you.” The fire and passion of Paul’s heart is heard in these words.

I wish I could lay hands on every single one of you and breathe upon the spiritual gift that has been imparted to you through Jesus’ baptism. However, I can’t, just as Paul couldn’t at the time he wrote to Timothy. We are going to have to fan the flames of the Spirit ourselves. I pray you become an inferno for God. I pray you and Jesus stir up those embers and rekindle the roaring fire you once were. And, if you have never been on fire for Jesus, if you have always been a bit lukewarm in your passion for Him, I pray right now, in the name of Jesus that the Holy Spirit touch you and love you into an unquenchable fire. Jesus, send your Spirit to breathe on each one of us. Refresh our anointing and our fire Lord. Amen!!

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Prayer for Wisdom

On March 7, 2018   /   Word of the Day   /   Leave a comment

Ephesians 21: 17

… that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give to you a spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of Him.

Here is a beautiful blessing that the Apostle Paul prayed over the Ephesian church. I pray the same thing for you this day. What greater blessing could I want for you but that you would have increasing revelation of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit? You do not need anything else when you have revelation knowledge of Him. He is all the answers you need as well as your comfort and peace. He is love so revelation of Him is going to reveal more of His tremendous love for you. He is forgiveness and kindness. He is our joy and our strength. He is all good things. So, my prayer today is that you increase in the spirit of wisdom that He has given to you and that you increase in your revelation of Him. May you be blessed in the love that is the Father, the peace that is the Son, and the power that is the Holy Spirit.

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Gathering Faith

On March 6, 2018   /   Word of the Day   /   Leave a comment

Romans 10: 17

So faith comes from hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ.

There is a common question, “How do we get faith?” This verse answers that question. What about hearing? What is it that we need to hear so that our faith will be built? Secondly, how do we develop our hearing?

The verse says that hearing, or the ability to hear, comes by the word of Christ. There are two readings of this that are worthy of consideration and meditation. First, Jesus is the Word and the words he spoke while in the earth are recorded in the Bible. Both of those facts lead us to conclude that there is great value in reading God’s Word, the Bible. In reading the Bible and hearing speakers teach from it, our faith grows.

Second, we need to hear Jesus speaking to us personally. We need him speaking into our lives and about the specific circumstances of our life. How do we develop that skill? Look at today’s scripture from that perspective. Hearing, the ability to hear Jesus’ voice, comes by the word of Christ. Faith comes from hearing and hearing comes from the word of Christ. Therefore, our ability to hear is developed through time spent with the word of Christ.

Look at this same verse but from the Passion version, “Faith, then, is birthed in a heart that responds to God’s anointed utterance of the Anointed One.” That is inspirational. Christ means the anointed one. Faith that moves mountains comes from yielding to the utterances of Christ. It is more than mere reading. This translation shows us that what we should seek is an active engagement with the Word. Those who read the Word, take it to heart and then endeavor to apply all they see there, shall mount up with wings as eagles because their faith shall renew daily.

This is an important verse because it shows us how to have faith. And we know, “Whatever is not from faith is sin,” (Romans 14: 23). Moreover, we all have mountains in our lives and faith is required to move mountains so get some faith from the Word and from hearing Christ speak into your life, and start casting those mountains into the sea.

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Who are We?

On March 5, 2018   /   Word of the Day   /   Leave a comment

1 Peter 1: 15 – 16

Like the Holy One who called you, be holy yourselves also in all your behavior; because it is written, “You shall be holy, for I am holy.”

This has been weighing on my mind quite a bit lately, so I am compelled to write about it. Few people want to hear holiness preaching and few pastors want to preach it. None the less, God calls us to be a holy people. What does that mean and how does it apply to everyday life? Is God calling us to give up everything that is fun in order to be His? The answer to that is, “No,” but He is calling us into a life with and in Him and that necessarily means a life which is distinguishable from the world, a life which has been transformed.

Romans 12: 2 tells us not to be conformed to this world but rather to be transformed. This is one of the most important lifestyle verses in the New Testament. The more you meditate on this scripture, the more application you find for it in your life. Jesus came to give you an abundant life (John 10: 10). However, that does not mean that he came to increase your appetite for the things of the world. He doesn’t mind you owning things. He is not depriving you of the good things in the earth. He is, however, trying to save our lives from the pitfalls.

Everything we are and everything we do should be offered up to Him. We should be living a life in which we put our desires on the altar so that He is in charge of them. Anything can become an idol if it occupies space in front of God. So, that may be television, games, books, social events, food, drink, sports, literally anything. If you are a coffee drinker and you have never put coffee on the altar and sacrificed it to God, you should. That does not mean He is going to take it away. It means that you choose to put coffee behind your passion for God.

We are called to be a peculiar people (1 Peter 2: 9 KJV). That is a strange statement. What it means is that we are different from people of the world. Ephesians 1: 4 reads, “He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we would be holy and blameless before Him.” That’s got to mean something. He has called us to be holy and blameless before Him. He provided the blood which cleanses us, but we have a role in this too. I don’t want to say it this way but . . . Jesus didn’t spill his blood so that we can run around like heathens. Do you agree? And yet, I find myself, my Christian friends and frankly, most Christians, looking no different than unsaved, unwashed, unredeemed Gentiles. I have to counsel myself that Jesus’ blood means more than that.

Can we get real for a moment? I have struggled with my weight, so, have I really and truly done as Romans 12: 1 commands, “Present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship.” What about alcohol consumption? I have never been one to preach abstinence, but I wonder, sometimes, if a beer with friends has become more important than the Word of God. Is our pleasure coming from the things of the world or the things of God? Only the things of God will satisfy. Things of the world tend to be addictive by which I mean, we always want another. That is why we binge watch TV. It’s fun but even after a weekend of watching television, we still want more. On drink, one piece of candy is rarely enough. We will never get satisfied and the more we try, the further God recedes into the background of our lives.

This is not about recrimination or condemnation. “Therefore there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus,” (Romans 8: 1). It is a call, however, to examination. Are we individually and /or collectively a people whose priority is God? Do we attempt to live lives which are holy before the Lord? Or have we been seduced by the world such that there is no distinguishing characteristic between the children of God and the children of the world? Have we put the pleasures and enjoyment of this world before our service to God? These are the questions we should be asking ourselves and praying about. I am convinced that the church needs a wake-up call but that will only come about as we join in praying for the body of believers we call Christians. Be united in holiness before the Lord. Worship Him with all you do. He is worthy.

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Power in Praise

On March 2, 2018   /   Word of the Day   /   Leave a comment

Acts 16: 25 – 26

But about midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns of praise to God, and the prisoners were listening to them; and suddenly there came a great earthquake, so that the foundations of the prison house were shaken; and immediately all the doors were opened and everyone’s chains were unfastened.

I am a participant in a Divine Conference Call on Thursday’s. Besides seeking God and studying His Word, we have also been taking James advice from James 1: 22 which reads, “Prove yourselves doers of the word, and not merely hearers who delude themselves.” Each week we perform a practicum. One week we focused on reading our Bibles every day. Another week we concerned ourselves with praying every day, and so on. This has proved a good experiment. We find our weaknesses and our strengths. We have learned the areas where we need to press in and the areas which come easily to us. The greatest thing I have learned comes from the week we determined to praise and worship God for at least five minutes every day.

First, I found that this was the most challenging of all the practices. We endevoured to lean into the worship side of things by which I mean, specifically, worshiping God for who He is rather than for what He has done. It was not a time of thanksgiving, nor a time of prayer. It wasn’t about what God has done for us but simply glorifying Him in His grandeur and majesty. The second thing I discovered from this practice was from my own experience. I found that nothing opened me to the Spirit mentally, emotionally and spiritually than worship and praise. I heard God better that week than any other week. Although I find worshiping God harder than reading my Bible, I also found that by pressing through, I learned more about glorifying Him with my words. Singing His praises releases something in me. It takes me out of my intellectual self and I connect with simply being a child of God.

God often, I could perhaps even say always, meets me over His Word. That is where we commune daily. However, this worship of God for who He is was the hardest and yet most successful of all the weeks of our practicum. I know that when I sit down with my Bible, the Father will sit right next to me. I guarantee the Holy Spirit will teach me something I did not know before. However, as I praised God, the Spirit was released in an entirely different way. All of a sudden, I was hearing God’s voice speak so much that I could barely continue for having to write things down. I began getting ideas. The flow of the Holy Spirit was exactly like the river of living waters.

You see, in today’s passage, how praise released the power of God into Paul and Silas’ situation. It can, and will, do the same thing for us, but we need to practice. We must learn how to open our hearts and let sincere praise flow forth, honoring the God of our hearts. We need to learn to connect with the intimate love we have for the Father. From that place of intimacy, it becomes a simple matter to let words of adoration and praise flow out. I adjure you to join us in our practice of the Word of God. Practice worshiping our God. Practice lifting worship up to Him. I believe you will find a new and deeper connection with Him when you do. Will you join us? Will you put feet to your faith and let God see and hear your Christian conviction?

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Living Water

On March 1, 2018   /   Word of the Day   /   Leave a comment

John 7: 37 – 39

Now on the last day, the great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried out, saying, “If anyone is thirsty, let him come to Me and drink. He who believes in Me, as the Scripture said, ‘From his innermost being will flow rivers of living water.’” But this He spoke of the Spirit, whom those who believed in Him were to receive; for the Spirit was not yet given, because Jesus was not yet glorified.

This verse is enlightening, and I believe it brings a certain amount of joy as well. It celebrates both Jesus and the Holy Spirit. What word jumps out at you from the passage? I am intrigued by the word “cried.”

As I read the gospels I perceive Jesus as very cool under fire. When put on the spot, he once simply knelt down and began to doodle in the dirt. This is not the person I think of “crying out.” It is no great leap to conjecture that this message was of keen importance to Jesus. Can you picture this scene? Apparently, everyone was seated because Jesus stood. They were feasting. Who was there? How many people do you reckon were gathered? In the midst of the feast Jesus stood up and cried out with a loud voice. Wow! That must have been a sight. One can certainly suppose that the message was vital for Jesus to interrupt the feast and to make such a spectacle of himself.

Interestingly enough, the message was not about salvation. It wasn’t even about sin. Why didn’t he jump up and say, “Come all you sinners. I will save your soul from eternity in hell.” That is what most of us would expect but only because we don’t know Jesus well enough. Jesus took care of the sin problem. He conquered hell. His real message is displayed in this cry. “Come to me all you who are thirsty. I will satisfy your thirst.”

How did Jesus plan to satisfy the deep and enduring thirsty within us? He already knew about the Father’s plan to send the Holy Spirit into the earth. God made the promise back in Joel 2: 28. Then John the Baptist revealed that Jesus would baptize us in the Holy Spirit (Matthew 3: 11). Now, here, in the early chapters of John we discover that those who believe in Jesus were to receive the Spirit. Right before Jesus’ exit from planet earth he gathered his followers and advised them. He was passing the torch to all who would follow him. He told them not to leave Jerusalem “but to wait for what the Father had promised . . . for John baptized with water, but you shall be baptized with the Holy Spirit,” (Acts 1: 4 – 5). Then Jesus was taken up in a cloud of glory. He was glorified in the earth and in heaven as his disciples watched.

So, Jesus’ essential message was come, receive the filling of the Holy Spirit so that you will never again thirst. The living water of the Holy Spirit is a river flowing in the spirit of those who ask and receive. The invitation was simple, “Come,” Jesus said. Anyone who is thirsty is invited to the well. As Jesus said to the Samaritan woman at the well, he says also to you, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is who says to you, ‘Give Me a drink,’ you would have asked Him, and He would have given you living water,” (John 4: 10). Receive the living water. Be filled and satisfied.

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18 = Life

On February 28, 2018   /   Word of the Day   /   Leave a comment

John 14: 6

I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father but through Me.

Jesus is the source of life. Everything which has life has it in Jesus. Whether or not a person chooses Jesus as his lord or not, his life force is only because Jesus lives. What is life though?

I think we tend to have a rather narrow view of what life means. We equate life with having a pulse. However, Jesus said, John 10:10 that he came to earth to give us life and that more abundantly. I don’t think he was just talking about abundant health. I know he was not referring to eternal life only. That wouldn’t even make sense. Eternal life with the Father will necessarily be abundant. That is the only way God knows how to do life. No, this that Jesus is talking about is in the here and now and it is much bigger than just having a heartbeat. Jesus came to give us a life worth living. A life as big as him.

I have a friend who has a Jewish background. He explained to me recently that Hebrew letters, and hence words, have numeric values. For example, the word “life” has a numeric value of 18. But wait, we are living in the year 2018. That went off in me like a gun. This is a year with a numeric value of life. Ponder that a moment.

When Jesus came to give us life, he had in mind something supernatural. The people in the earth already had physical life. He came to give us life in the Spirit, a life where all is rightness. Our health should be right, our finances, relationships and everything else you can think of. He came to restore our spiritual life as well.

We were separated from God. Jesus restored our spirits, made them new and restored the connection between us and the Father so that now we can walk boldly into Father’s office and talk with Him. Jesus restored our spiritual eyes and our spiritual ears. Because we are in Christ, because we dwell in him and pursue the life of Christ within us, we can now hear and see spiritual things. Most importantly, we can hear the Father’s voice using our spiritual ears. We no longer exist on just one plane, if we choose. We have entrance to the spiritual realm. Everything that was stolen from us has been restored by Jesus including our ability to walk in the cool of the evening with the creator.

Some people are concerned about what they will have to give up in order to be a Christian. Man, that is totally the wrong perspective. It’s what you gain that folks should think about. We gain everything, including real life, not this shadow of existence that most people experience. We can walk in true light and life right now, right here. Perfect health is part of our inheritance, abundant friends, adventures, riches; whatever you want but the most amazing life of all is the life in Christ which allows us admittance into the spiritual realm. He bought our ticket. He restored our rights. He is the invitation into a life which is above and beyond mere physical life. He will have us soaring on wings if we will open our eyes and ears to what the Spirit is saying to us right now. There are so many fascinating and wondrous things Jesus wants to experience with us, so broaden your definition of life. Imagine what a Jesus kind of life should look like. There is no brokenness in Jesus, no lack and no weakness. Rise up on your wings and breathe in life. Make this the year you embrace more life and more of what Jesus offers than ever before.

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