Author: Allen Forte

The freedom to choose the bondage we live in. Choose the bondage that frees us from bondage.

In Joshua 24:15, The Israelites had just finished conquering all the people in the Promised Land. Joshua had allocated their lands to each tribe.  Now they were ready to embark on a life free of oppression and free of enemies.  Joshua challenged them to make a life defining choice; how would they handle life when the only life they had to handle was their own?

The scripture says he said this to them. “And if it seems evil to you to serve the Lord, choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve, whether it be the gods whom your fathers served on the other side of the river, or the gods of the Amorites in whose land you dwell.  But as for me and my house we will serve the Lord.”

Joshua was saying to them, this is the moment.  Now you must make a decision that will last until and beyond your death.  Will you decide to live and die like your ancestors who, after God delivered them from the bondage of Egypt, they fell into self-made bondage of the wanting the freedom to do whatever they wanted?

This was the moment for them.  They would either serve the Lord or serve themselves.  They would either follow the Lord or they would follow their own desires.  They would either treat life the way God wanted life to be treated. or they would treat life the way they wanted.

This was the moment for them.  Would the freedom from a bondage lead them to a bondage of the freedom to have all they wanted?  It looked that way. Since they did not have a king at that time, every person wanted to do what they thought was right in their own eyes. Their own thinking and their own feelings were the standards by which they wanted to live.

They did not want to offend anyone or to be offended by anyone because of their beliefs.  They wanted the freedom to live as they pleased.  The freedom to is really bondage to the self.

Sadly, most of the Israelites chose what they wanted.  The removed God from the idea of marriage and did what they wanted.  They removed Him from intimate relationships and behaved the way they wanted.  They removed Him from being their King and decided they were king of their own lives.

Yes, this was their moment; they would either serve the Lord or they would expect the Lord to serve them.  Joshua tried to warn them of the danger in the choice they had to make at that moment.  The idea of freedom from oppression or from being denied individual freedom seems good but it can often lead to bondage to the idea of the freedom to make our own individual choices. The freedom to is not always best for us.

Adam and Eve had such a moment in the garden many years before the Israelites.  It was the idea of freedom from so they could have the freedom to.  They chose wrong.  The Israelites chose wron.

Tuesday, November 5^th is going to be a moment like this for us. Many of us will cast a vote for the next President and leadership of our nation. Will we see this as a moment where we choose the freedom to live the way we want or the freedom from living just for ourselves?

Just like it was with Adam and Eve and just like it was with the Israelites, the devil will always offer us the choice to be free to do whatever we want for ourselves.  But remember, nothing he offers you is good for you, even the idea of the freedom to choose your own way.

When you vote next week, and you should vote, be mindful of what you are really doing.  One of our parties offers us a choice for the freedom to live the way we want to live.  The freedom to make our own decisions; the freedom to have what we want to have; the freedom never to be offended by anything or anyone.  I could go on, but you should see.  For those of us who believe this way, this is the moment for us.

The other party offers us a choice for the freedom from ourselves. It offers us a moment to choose to have the freedom from living like we know good from evil; to have the freedom from living like we know as much as God knows; to have the freedom from redefining life to suit the way we want life to be for us.  For those of us who believe this way, this is the moment for us.

November 5^th will be our moment.  We will choose whom we will serve – those who say they will give us everything we want; or we will choose to serve those who will help us to live fully free within the bounds of how God has designed life to be for everyone.

Yes, our parties are offering us either a freedom to do as we want or a freedom from having all that we want. This is our moment.  Let’s not blow it.  The prosperity of your children and your children’s children and many generations that come after you will depend a great deal on the choice you make next week.

It’s not a good idea to think that over 350 million people can live happily together with everyone free to live as they want.  There must be a standard for life against which we all must stand before.  It is not my position over your position.  It is my position against the same standard as your position.  Look for the party that understands and represents more of the standard against which we should live.

Joshua made sure the Israelites understood that standard was God.  They would either live for or against Him.

I believe many of us should do something next week that we have never done.  We should stop voting for those who offer us the freedom to and cast our vote for those who help us to plainly see that what is best for everyone is to be free from wanting the freedom to have everything we want.

Don’t vote for anyone who promises to give you what they cannot give. You already have that.  Though some of us may not accept this, good is only good if it is good for everyone – not just you.  If it is possible to make things good and better for you it is probably true that what is good for you is not always good for someone else. If you always get your way in life, you will never grow to be better than who you are today.

God wants to give you the good that you do not have.  Only God can free you from your bondage to want the freedom to do all that you want; He can strengthen you desires to be free from the bondage of yourself.  And only He can develop your heart to be fully satisfied in the bondage you enjoy by the freedom you have in Him. 

This is our moment.  The freedom to do as we please is a slippery slope; the freedom from ourselves is solid ground; but freedom in Him is the best.  Cast your vote for the freedom we find in Him.

Live a Delivered Life. Love you.

Unbelief is the inability to disbelieve that your circumstances will never change and be better.

Mark 9:24 Immediately the father of the child cried out and said with tears, Lord, I believe; help my unbelief.”

I promised some time ago to do another message on our unbelief.  Unbelief robs us of the full joy of knowing the Lord.  The father in this scripture had a young son who had a mute spirit.  The father had taken his son to the disciples for help, but they could not help them.

In what was probably another of many acts of desperation, the father brings the child to Jesus and asks for help.  He actually says to Jesus, ‘If you can do anything, have compassion on us and help us.” Mark 9:23.

Sometimes our situations can be so dire that even as believers, we can act in the unbelief that is still present with us.  Peter did this when Jesus called him to walk on the water.  Peter did fine until he looked around at the waves.  Then he panicked.  The waves were stronger than his belief.

Thomas showed his unbelief when he said I will not believe Jesus has risen from the dead until I put my hands into his side.  Thomas was saying, I must see it for myself before I believe it.  Thomas’ natural sight was stronger than his belief.

The father of this young boy, Peter and Thomas all had this in common.  They believed Jesus was Lord, but they did not recognize the limit they lived by in their circumstances.

The father had probably been living with grief and pain of not being able to help his son all his life.  He had probably done everything he knew to do to help, but still his son was not healed.  His request for help from Jesus is a statement of unbelief, if You can do anything. He believed in the Lord, but he allowed unbelief to exist, and he didn’t even know it.

Peter, in his request to the Lord to call him to walk on the water was an unbelievable request.  He said, Lord if it is You, call for me to walk on the water.  Jesus did.  And Peter walked on water for a few steps.  But an unbelieving request will usually lead to unbelieving results.  Peter’s request was an unbelievable request.

And then there was Thomas.  When the disciples told Thomas they had seen the risen Lord, Thomas found that too hard to believe.  And though he was not speaking directly to Jesus, he was saying what I see for myself is stronger evidence of what is than what I believe can be.  His was an unbelieving statement.

The father’s unbelief was real in his lifelong circumstance.  Peter’s unbelief was real in his need to believe what was possible.  Thomas’ unbelief was real in his need to believe only what he could see.  You must never allow your circumstances, or the impossible, or what you see to dictate your belief.

So, you can see what is common in these three people.  You should be able to see yourself in them as well.  I’m sure we have all said or done or even live this way today.  The problem for us is the same as it was for them.  We do not recognize our unbelief as unbelief because we live with it in all our circumstances.

But the Lord is gracious.  Even though the father, and Peter and Thomas came to Him in a state of unbelief, He had compassion on them and grace toward them and Love for them and helped them.

Today, if you will look within yourself for the hidden unbelief that lurks with you, He will have the same compassion and grace and Love for you.  A bit of unbelief is in each of us.  Accept that this includes you too.  Ask the Lord to help you with your unbelief.  He will do it.

Do not be so willing to live by what you have come to accept and know that you block what you do not know that is better for you.  Just because you have always worried about tomorrow doesn’t mean there is something about tomorrow that warrants worry.

Learn never to pray from an unbelieving position.  Just because the Lord doesn’t change everything you face in life doesn’t mean He does not change the things in your life that need changing.  Sometimes He allows the sickness so that you will appreciate being well even more.

Lord, help us to believe so strongly that our unbelief has a hard time finding a place to work its ways into our lives.

Live a Delivered Life. Love you.

When God plants His garden in your life, He will till and tend your life for you.

Genesis 2:8 says this.  “The Lord God planted a garden eastward in Eden, and there He put the man whom He had formed.”  The bible says God wanted Adam to tend and keep it the garden.

I have often wondered how it is that God chose to put Adam into a garden.  Why didn’t He just build him a house along some river where Adam could live and thrive? Now, I’m not saying a garden was a bad idea.  In fact, a garden is great place.  And in this case, we know God Himself planted the garden.  So, we know that it was a great place that would be cared for.

But how come the choice was a garden?  I guess if we will call it a garden, the place must be an intentional place.  Gardens do not just spring up and grow in the wild.  There seems to be more here than God’s simple desire for Adam to tend and till His garden.  But what more?

Perhaps God knew Adam and eventually Eve, would need some help learning how to live in the world with each other and with others. They would need to learn how to care for children from birth to death. The garden is a perfect place for God to practice being a Father before Adam so that Adam could learn how to be a son and in time learn how to be a father himself.

Perhaps God did not want to see Adam and Eve struggle with life before they understood what was important in life.  Many of us do that today.  Before we really know what life is and what it is supposed to be, we pursue our desires before we know how to care for our needs.

So, a garden was a perfect place for God to do several things:

• Create a place of development and provision for Adam and Eve. Since any garden is intentional, it stands to reason, the person who plants the garden will care for all that is there. With the garden, God could keep them from developing a sense of self before they developed a sense for others. For sure, Adam and Eve would learn the benefits of working with their hands by tilling and tending the garden. But they also learned that God would till their lives there and He would show them how to be His children before they learned that lesson from social media.
• A garden teaches you that life is more about what you give than what you get.  The garden is perfect to teach you to do what is right so that you get the right result from what you do.  You learn to be dependent on what you cannot provide.  And you learn to be responsible for doing what you must do so you can have that benefit of what you do.  A lazy gardener will go hungry, but a responsible gardener would live as much as he was willing to give.
• A garden was perfect to teach Adam and Eve that they would need to be shepherds not only of the animals around but also of their children that would later come.  God used the garden teach them to think like sheep but to act like a shepherd.  Wouldn’t that be great today.  If we could see ourselves as sheep in the Lord’s pasture but shepherds of the Lord’s sheep.  The garden gave God the controlled environment to teach them this important life lesson.

Many years later, Jesus would come along.  He would spend most of His life teaching His disciples in and around the garden of Gethsemane.  In a way, He lived there.  It is from there He was taken to His death.  He was buried near there and so He was raised to life all from a place in a garden.  The garden is God’s way of teaching us the cycle of life in Him and the way we should live while we are here on earth.

We are born.  We live.  We die only to be born again in the life of Christ.  If you give your life to the Lord today, He will have a place to plant the garden of His life into you.  In this way, His Life in you becomes the garden of your life.

Live a Delivered Life. Love you.

This is what the kingdom of heaven is like.

In Matthew 5:3 Jesus says, “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”  Jesus is not saying – it will be theirs.  He is saying to those who are of a poor spirit, the kingdom of heaven is theirs.  They have it and are enjoying it today before they leave this world.

The Word makes it seem like an individual can have the kingdom. But how is that so? What is that like? Can more than a single individual have this promise? Sometimes, we do not have the things the Lord promises because we have a believer’s unbelief.

In our humanity, we are limited. Yesterday, today and tomorrow are temporal things.  They exist and then they do not exist. We live in time and space, and we are limited by time and space. And so, we wonder how it is that multiple people can have the same thing – in this case, the kingdom of heaven?

The things of God are not physical or temporal things like we are. They are Spiritual just as He is Spiritual. So, the kingdom of heaven is not a physical house in a physical place nor is it like owning the only gold coin of its kind. By the Spirit, we can own but not possess.  We can enjoy but not keep.

The kingdom of heaven is the spirit of the joy we get when we live knowing we have a room in heaven. It is like knowing that by living under God’s authority, we actually have more authority than those who seek to authority. Nothing can take away your joy when you realize joy is something to make your life better but not something to possess.

Matthew 13:44 is one of several places where the Lord tells us what the kingdom of heaven is like.  He says “Again, the kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and hid; and for joy over it he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field.”

Think of you being that treasure.  Think of that field being all the people of the world.  Think of the man being the Lord.  He finds you from among all the things of the world. To make sure He can have you, He goes and buys everything around you.  He is happy indeed.

But think of the joy this will be to you.  Knowing that you have been purchased by the Lord from among all the worthless things of the world.  In this way, the kingdom of heaven is really the attitudes by which we learn to live our lives in a world that wants us to waste our lives by having worldly attitudes.

Your attitude is a choice.  In this instance, you find it is joyful to be poor in spirit unlike those around you.  Being poor in spirit makes you mighty in spirit because God rewards those who choose to live poor no matter how much they have.

He chooses to reward those who live poor no matter how little they have.  He chooses to reward those who live with lack and want and with fullness with the same attitude of gratefulness and respect and hope for others.

This is what the kingdom of heaven is like. And this is why it can be yours and anyone else who chooses to live with the attitude of gratefulness with the things we have and endure.  It is a blessing for us when we learn to keep our emotions under control of our spirits. So we can choose an attitude that is ok with what life brings our way. 

The kingdom of heaven is like this.  You don’t have to thrive so that you can have a great attitude.  You learn that a great attitude is the reason you can thrive no matter your circumstances. Now isn’t that heaven?

Live a Delivered Life. Love you.

We are of little value until God claims us

A fifty-dollar bill, lost and blowing across the ground, is like any other piece of paper we find.  It is nothing but trash.  That is, until you or someone else finds and claims it. You give the fifty dollar bill its value when you pick it up and put it into your pockets.

While it is unclaimed, it is of no more value than the next thing we would throw away.  In many ways, you and I, until we are claimed by Jesus, are of no more value than an unclaimed piece of merchandise.  We cannot make anyone value who we are.

Now do not be offended by this. We actually refer to a thing that seemingly has no value as a piece of trash.  But with God, we are not trash. We are not helpless but priceless.

Why is that? Well, because God, is all His wisdom, made a way for us to become people of great value.  Scripture says in 1 Corinthians 6:18 “I will be a Father to you. And you shall be My sons and daughters, says the Lord Almighty.”  Only a living God can change you from being an orphan to dead parents to being alive again to a living God.

Value in life is something given to us more than it is achieved by us.  It is important for us to know from where we ultimately get our value. The people of the world look for their value from what they can get in having the things of the world.

People look to get wealth from the world. They believe wealth gives them value.  Children of God are given wealth by being a child of God.  Being a child makes them wealthy. By the world standard, wealth is caught up in what you have.  But by God’s standards, wealth is found in who you are.

People look to get position, status, place, and privilege from the world. This they believe gives them value.  But we are given position, status, place, and privilege by God when we become His children. This makes us priceless in His heart.

People look to find the gold and the pearls, and all the things of the world others seek after for their value. God makes us pearls and gold and all the things that are priceless even when no one else would own them.

People of the world get this all backwards. People want to claim what they cannot claim. Own what they cannot own. And show what they cannot show. God is not lost. He cannot be found and claimed by you or me. He finds and claims us. Only a living God can do that.

God is not made by our hands, so we can show our work on Him to others. God made each of us to show His greatness and His glory in the world that seeks this for itself.

God cannot be owned so He cannot be bought by us.  He is priceless, so we have nothing that is of sufficient enough value to trade for Him. He is the one who trades for us. Only a living God can do that.

John 3:16 says, “For God so Loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.” Just like we give a piece of paper its value when we claim it, God gives each of us the value of Himself when we are claimed by Him. Only a Living God can do that.

 My mother used to make beautiful comforting quilts by piecing together old scraps of unwanted cloth materials good for nothing but to be thrown out. My mom was following the pattern of value she learned from the Lord.  She made something of no value to be valuable in new ways.

Only a living God can piece together with Himself, the old scraps of our sinful lives and create in us new lives of priceless value in Him.   Our value comes to us from Him because He changes us from being the simple piece of unwanted paper to a priceless person claimed by a living God.  Only a living God can do that.

God makes the simple people we are to be special because He chooses to be our Father.   We don’t need a big house because we live in a house built by His hands.  We don’t need fancy clothes because we are clothed in His love.  We don’t need to have all friends because He has chosen to be our friend.

Only a Living God can do this. Let’s stop living like we are our own and learn to live like we are the one and only thing He owns. Only a Living God can do that.

Live a Delivered Life. Love you.

Before looking for what you need, seek Who can provide your needs.

There is a popular folk proverb that says, “God helps those who helps themselves.”  I say this is a folk proverb because it is not a Word found in scripture. To some people this saying may sound practical and sensible. But to the faithful, it should be a small little warning.

If you are out of work and need a job, people may tell you do not just sit around the house and pray. You must get out and seek a job and when you do, God will help you. If you want to stop a bad habit, then you should stop associating with people or things that promote that habit. When you do things like these, God will help you.

I find a little problem with the proverb.  It wants you to try to help yourself first and then seek God. But the Lord wants us to seek Him first and He will help us by directing our steps. So, the question is what do you seek first? To help yourself or to seek the One who can help you help yourself?

Matthew 6:33 says this. “But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness and all these things shall be added to you.”  So, what are the things Jesus reference here? Well, they are the practical things we all need in life – food, water, shelter, work, clothes and so forth.

Jesus is telling us that God knows that we have a need for many practical things in life. But to have those things, we should first seek after the kingdom of God and His righteousness. Then all those things and more will be added to our lives.

When the Israelites were wondering in the desert for 40 years, they did not lack for anything. Their clothes did not wear out. Their shoes did not become worn down. They were provided food from heaven. They were provided water from rocks. They were protected from their enemies. They were provided shelter from the elements.

God wanted them to learn to first seek Him. All that they needed was then provided to them. I know it’s hard for us to see this happening today. To many of us, our challenges, our enemies, our adversaries, our needs, seem closer to our lives than God is.

So, we feel compelled to try to solve our immediate needs before we seek Him for His help. But we must know this is all untrue. It does not matter how grave your circumstance is, the Lord is always closer to you than anything could be. So, what are you seeking?

Learn to first and always seek Him and His righteousness. Let this be your life. When you do that, you will learn that He is closer to you than you imagined.

If you need a job, you will find it more quickly and easily when you are seeking Him. He directs you to the work you need.

If you need healing, you will find it more quickly and easily when you are seeking Him. He will provide you a path to your healing.

If you need restoration in a relationship or deliverance from a sin, you will find it more quickly and easily when you are seeking Him. He has the fix and will provide the freedom you need for your broken relationships and from your bond with sin.

When you seek Him first, you are saying, Lord I am looking for You. Please find me and direct my steps and my paths. Life may be a struggle for you, and you may feel like you are going to drown in the waves and the swift cold waters of the things that keep you down.

But do not be discouraged. When you seek Him, you come to learn that the waters may be swift, but Jesus is the water. He is coming swiftly to you and carrying you to a place in Him of calm. Work may be difficult to find but Jesus is ahead of you directing you to the work that is best for you.

What are you looking for? Well, first let that be the kingdom of heaven and all His righteousness. Seek the work, healing, safety, food, relationships, and so forth that is found in His Kingdom and in His righteousness.

He is what you should be looking for. Find Him, and all other things you need will be provided to you.  Don’t just ask Him to help you find things you need here on earth.  Seek Him and His kingdom first and He will direct you to the things He has reserved for. Live a Delivered Life. Love you.

The Lord is careful never to address our feelings. But He will always respond to our persons.

The Lord will never ask you “how about that?”  That is my message for today.

When God told Moses to go to Egypt and bring His people out, He didn’t ask Moses how about that? When He told Mary she was going to have a baby, He didn’t ask her how do you feel about that?  When He told Paul to go preach the gospel, He did not ask Paul what do you think about that?

Moses, Mary and Paul were each asked to do something they had no experience doing before.  I’m sure they had feelings about what the Lord wanted them to do.  But they did what He asked without hesitation.  You and I will not be able to do the things the Lord asks us to do if we must sift all things through our feelings.

In Luke 5:5, Jesus had been sitting in Peter’s boat teaching the people on the banks of the sea of Galilee.  When He finished, He asked Peter to move the boat out to deeper waters to catch some fish.  Peter responded this way.  “Master, we have toiled night and caught nothing; nevertheless, at Your Word I will let down the net.”

Peter was saying, Lord I really don’t feel like fishing any more today.  There are no fish to catch.  But in spite of how I feel, I will do as you ask.  Of course, when they dropped the net, they caught so many fish they had to ask others to help bring them in.

Moses delivered the Israelites.  Mary had the baby Jesus.  And Paul preached the gospel all the way to Rome.  Many of us allow our feelings to rule our lives and because we do, we miss out on many blessings that come and pass us by.

Your feelings generally do not care much about what goes on around you.  Your feelings want others to care about how you feel about what goes on around you.  Your feelings will make you believe you must have more than a choice, but that you must be the choice in all that goes on with you.  Your feelings want to hear others say how about that?

You will hardly do the thing that you should do in the way that it should be done when you allow your feelings to be the standard for how you live. How about that? Others will hardly be open to you or be themselves toward you make them responsible for not hurting your feelings. How about that?

Your feelings are very shallow; they keep others from having deep relationships with you. Your feelings want to avoid pain and hurt but it will be painful and hurtful for others to connect with you because your feelings will prevent that.

Your feelings want to keep you safe from what you do not understand but they will keep you from understanding how safe it is to live while not understanding all that you want.

Your feelings will demand that you are considered in everything while they will fight to keep others from being considered in anything. Your feelings look for others to control as much as they are in control of you.

In John 21:19, Jesus says to Peter “Follow Me.”  Peter, seeing that John was also with Jesus responded by asking Jesus “But Lord, what about this man?”  Peter’s feelings were hurt because he wanted to be the only one Jesus asked to follow Him. At that moment, Peter’s feelings took over his life.

The Lord responded to Peter – not to his feelings by saying – “If I want this man to remain till, I come again, what is that to you? You follow Me.” John 21:22. In a way Jesus was now saying how about that Peter?

Don’t allow your feelings to have your life. The Lord will never respond to your feelings; He will speak to the person He created you to be but not to what your feelings want you to be.  He wants us to control our feelings so that our feelings will not control us.

Your feelings will make you live like you are the center of your world and ours too.  Your feelings will not allow you to feel like there is a reality greater than the one you live.

Your feelings don’t want you to feel like you have failed at anything.  But sometimes failing will help you learn to be better.

Your feelings will make you do the things you do poorly and with a poor attitude and for the wrong reasons.

Cain got his feelings hurt when God didn’t accept his offering, but He accepted the offering of Abel his brother.  This bothered Cain so much that he killed Abel. Cain wanted someone to sympathize with him. God is not going to do that with us. He wants us to grow up and control the one thing we can always control – ourselves.

How about that? How does it make you feel to know the Lord will not usually ask you how you feel about the things He wants from you? If you want to get beyond being led by your feelings to the place where you respond to the Lord with confidence you must learn to never want Him to ask you how about that?

The Lord does not ask us to agree with the things He wants us to be and to do. He wants us to be and to do what He asks because He is Lord. It is not likely He will ask how you feel about the things He wants from you.  You place a burden on relationships when you expect others to give in to your feelings.

God asks us to have no other God before Him.  He doesn’t get His feelings hurt and pout when we don’t do this.  How about that?

Yes, I know He says to us He is a jealous God. He tells us this so we will know He is after who we are and not how we feel.

Don’t get your feelings hurt when you learn your best friend does not have you at the top of their favorites list.  Amazingly, you will live through that.

Learn that things will be ok even if all things don’t go your way.  How about that?

Live a Delivered Life.  Love you.

Faith without fruit is like clouds that never rain.

I often wonder how it is that great amounts of rain can fall from the clouds.  Well, I have learned that clouds are actually made of water droplets. Within a cloud, water droplets stick onto one another, causing the droplets to grow. When these water droplets get too heavy to stay suspended in the cloud, they fall to earth as rain.

So, clouds carry the water that ultimately is needed to sustain all life here on earth.  No clouds – no rain.  No rain – no grass or trees or even you or me.  We need the clouds for the good that they bring to us. – their rain.

We are warned not to be people of faith who produce no fruit of our faith.  In the book of Jude, 1:12-13 it says this.  “These are spots in your love feasts, while they feast with you without fear, serving only themselves.  They are clouds without water, carried about by the winds, late autumn trees without fruit.”

For all the good we want to do in life, our good is really not much good at all if it is not the product of our faith. Jude is warning the people about others who talked about doing the good God wants but their lives did not produce the fruit of good.

A cloud that is swept around by the wind doesn’t have a chance to catch and then deposit the rain that should be its fruit.  Clouds like this are mostly dark times in our lives. Empty clouds may be beautiful, but they are of little value to us unless they produce rain.

Many of us are this way.  Our own faith is swept about by the things we face daily.  So, we produce little fruit.  And the fruit we do produce is not heavy enough to cause our faith to drop its fruit wherever we are.  We are clouds with rain that never falls.  What good then is the good we do when it is produced through our efforts but not produced by our faith?

For all their good, people like this are believers with faith that does not work.  They are believers with faith that does not produce.  They are clouds with water that never falls.  They are waves without an ocean to catch them.  They are wandering stars that do not know their place in the sky.

So, what should we do to build up faith that produces fruit?  Let’s be like those drops of rain.  A single raindrop will never be heavy enough to break through the cloud and fall to earth.  Raindrops must bind together to become heavy enough to break free of the clouds and fall.

A single faith encounter is never enough to produce the fruit of faith.  Live such that you look for daily encounters of faith.  Faith that is strong is faith that can wait for the Lord to do what you cannot do with what you have.  Look for times when you resist acting in your strengths as you wait for the strength of faith.  Faith looks like failure being changed to success.

Learn to resist trying to do for others what you have not learned to do for yourself.  This produces faith that is tested.  Tested faith will stick together and be strengthened.  The stronger the faith the faster it will fall from you to others.

If your faith does not produce fruit that falls, it will eventually dry up and die.  Remember, doing what you think is good is the enemy of faith that produces good as its fruit.  For all the good you want to do, do not let your good cause others to wonder about your faith.

If your life is not heavy with faith, you will not be able to produce the fruit of the faith that should fall from you to the earth around you to glorify God.  Don’t let weak or no faith make you like a voice without words our sounds.

Do not have faith with fruit that does not fall.

Live a Delivered Life.  Love you.

Don’t live alone. The Lord will walk with you if you ask. Seek His presence more than His miracles for your life.

When He shows up.  That is my message for today.

Moses had an encounter with God that I wonder if many or any of us have had anything like it.  Moses had visited God on the mountain and had returned with the two tablets containing God’s commandments to the people.  While he was away, the people had sinned and turned away from God.

Moses interceded for the people and asked God to forgive them.  Moses actually asked God to promise that His presence would go with the people if they were to leave the valley.  Luke 33:14-15 tells it this way.  “And God said, My presence shall go with thee, and I will give thee rest.  And Moses said to God, If thy presence go not with me, carry us not up from hence.”

Moses was very wise.  He knew that the people would be considered nothing unless God was with them.  And If God was with them, it would show all the people around at the time that they had the grace of God.  It would show all the people of the earth that they were God’s people, and He was their God.

We pray for many things.  But do we pray for the simple presence of the Lord to be with us wherever we are?  Do we pray for His presence to be so strong around us that the world would see the essence of His power and His glory?

Learn to ask the Lord sometimes for the simple gift of His presence to go with you where ever you walk.  You will be amazed at how things will change for you.

When He walks into the room of your life, sickness will have no place to stay. He will watch over those who would watch over your health.

When He walks into the room of your life, you may get burned by some things or by someone, but you will come through it never smelling like smoke.

When He walks into the room of your life, you may walk in the same shoes along the same road for many days, but your shoes and your clothes will not wear out.

When He walks into the room of your life, you will not be drowned by the storms of life that are sure to come your way.

When He walks into the room of your life, your darkness will be turned to light and your light turned to joy.

When He walks into the room of your life, some may claim a victory over you in many ways, but you will never be defeated in any way.

When He walks into the room of your life, relationships with others may come and go but Love for you will be with you always.

Moses had the sense to ask God to go with them.  In this way he knew God would be present to see all their needs before they had to pray for their needs.

For sure, there will be times when many of us will be sick, we may be mistreated by others, we may work hard but not have what we need for the things must have, we may have dark clouds all around us and many will attack us and claim victory over us.

Learn to pray that the Lord would walk with you in all things and in every way.  He is never surprised by anything happening with us.  When we ask Him to walk with us, people and things that are against us will be surprised that we are not moved or undone by the things that move and undo others.

When the Lord shows up, people and things that would oppose us will see the miracle of His grace living in us.  They will see that the fire that burns inside us will smother the fires they try to throw at us.  When He shows up with us, others will see the light we bring to  and around all the darkness that tries to cover us.

When the Lord shows up with us, we learn to walk with one hand in His and the other hand raised in praise to Him for the wonder of His grace at work in our lives.  Learn to ask the Lord for more than just the things you need to fix your problems today.

Ask Him for the presence of His presence to go with you.  Let Him know that if He doesn’t go with you, then you don’t want to go alone.  Let Him know you are hesitant to walk anyplace without Him walking with you. 

Learn to stop living and traveling through life alone and calling on Him only when you need His help.  Ask Him to walk with you.  That is the help we all need most but few of us ever think of asking.

When He shows up knowledge and wisdom will come to you while fear and a lack of understanding will flee from you.  When He shows up everything against you will fall back. Ask Him for the presence of His presence.

Live a Delivered Life.  Love you.

Feeding our flesh makes the things bad for us stronger than us.

A Willing Spirit

The spirit is willing.  That is my message for today.

A grandfather wanted to teach his young grandson an important lesson about life.  He said to the young boy, “I have a fight going on in me. It’s taking place between two wolves. One wolf is evil – he is anger, envy, greed, arrogance, superiority, and ego.”  The grandfather looked at the grandson and went on. “The other wolf embodies positive emotions. He is love, joy, peace, hope, humility, kindness, generosity, truth, compassion, and faith.”

He said, both wolves are fighting to the death. The same fight is going on inside you and every other person too.  The grandson took a moment to reflect on this. At last, he looked up at his grandfather and asked, which wolf would win? The grandfather gave a simple reply. “The one you feed.”

In Matthew 26:31, Jesus tells several of His disciples a similar story.  He asked them to watch and pray while He we off a bit farther and prayed.  But as He prayed, the disciples fell asleep.  Jesus saw this and said, “What!  Could you not watch with Me one hour?  Watch and pray, lest you enter into temptation.  The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak.”

In a way, Jesus was saying to them, there is a battle going on inside each of you.  It is played out between two people.  One is your flesh, and the other is your spirit.  Your flesh and your spirit are battling for dominance over how you live your life.  Will you live for what you want for yourself, or will you live for the things the Lord wants in your life?

Your flesh wants to live by having things that make it feel good.  It wants you to get satisfaction and fulfillment from the things you get from the world. The problem with the flesh is that it is weak.  The more you give it the more it is controlled by what it gets.  It can never be satisfied because it is controlled by the things it wants.

Jesus tells us our flesh is too weak to be strong enough to win the battle for our lives.  But your spirit wants to live in submission to the authority and to the Love of God.  It wants to teach you to satisfy someone else more than yourself by the way you live.  Your spirit wants to teach you to get your satisfaction from submitting your flesh and life to the things of God.

Jesus is telling us, in this battle for dominance, our flesh is too weak to win.  The more we feed it, the weaker it becomes and the stronger we make the things that will dominate our lives.  The more we want the greedier we will become.  The more we want what you have the more envy will dominate our desires.  The more selfish we are the more we will be dominated by things like resentment, sorrow, regret and the need to belong.

Your flesh does not know how to fight for dominance of your life.  So, it will always lose the battle.  But all is not hopeless.  Jesus says our spirits are willing.  Willing to do what?  Willing to fight this battle for us.  The spirit knows how to fight for dominance of your life.

Our flesh has no weapons to fight with because it fights for things more than it fights against anything.  But our spirit is a weapon itself.  All we need to do is allow the spirit to fight against what fights to have our lives.  The spirit uses the spirit of satisfaction to fight and win over our greed.  It uses the spirit of appreciation and respect to fight against becoming envious.  It uses the spirit of selflessness to fight and win against resentment, sorrow, regret and things like that.

For sure, there is a battle that goes on inside each of us.  It is not a battle against anything.   It is a battle for something.  Your flesh can never win a battle like this because it is deceived to believe it can have all that it wants.  Your spirit is fighting for you to give up more so you can gain more.  It will always win when you allow it to fight for you.

So, the grandfather taught his grandson a lesson on life.  Many of us can see the value and wisdom in what the grandfather taught his grandson.  We will probably say to ourselves, we would feed the positive wolf.

Jesus teaches us a life lesson.  The question is are we willing to hear His lesson the way we heard the message of the grandfather?  Living through the flesh only makes the things that are bad for us stronger than us.  Living through the spirit helps us discover the weapons we have to overcome the things that make the flesh strong.

Lesson taught.  Lesson learned. That’s the willing spirit.  Will we learn from what Jesus is teaching us?  Is the Yes of your spirit stronger than the yes of your flesh?

Live a Delivered Life.  Love you.