Jalousie, envie… Jealousy, Envy…

Don’t Be Condemned

We’ve all been there and experienced jealousy and/or envy whether on the receiving end, or the giving end. I suppose being human beings, there’s a level of understanding that these can be normal human emotions, and particularly as we are all trying to perfect our walk of faith and live according to the Spirit of God as we wrestle our fleshly human desires. To some degree, I am not sure that experiencing those emotions are the actual bad thing… However, the actual bad thing is when you recognise those emotions within yourself and then you choose not to submit yourself to God to rid those emotions from your life. It’s the difference between being aware of it and trying to rid yourself of it, and being aware of it and expanding space to accommodate it in your life because you think you have a justified reason for it.

This blog post is all about exploring and unpacking jealousy and envy, and what happens when you make room for it in your life, and the devastating and sometimes long-lasting, even fatal consequences it can have if left unchecked. This post is to raise awareness of jealousy whether in you or in your close relationships so that you can make intentional decisions on how you move forward. It’s not about condemnation because the Word of God is given to us as a tool for construction, building up – for correction and instruction in righteousness, not to cut us down when we miss the mark.

What’s Your Relationship Like?

One thing for us to be aware of at the outset is that it is pretty difficult for jealousy and/or envy to gain a strong hold over your emotions, if you are in an actual intimate and consistent relationship with God. Why? Because when you’re in an intimate and committed consistent relationship, you have regular communication. With God, you’re constantly communing with Him in your heart in your everyday life moments. Now i’m definitely not trying to hold myself out as holier than art… because i’m not. Like you, I’m human! I have those moments when ungodly thoughts present themselves in my mind and I recognise that I have to do that casting down and submitting every thought to the knowledge of God. It’s a habit that we have to consistently teach ourselves and exercise, and then eventually the brain does it as second nature. We do have to remember that any thought does not align with God’s Word is not from God.

Who Rules?

Whether we think we have just cause to believe it, even if we think that we can submit good and cogent arguments why that thought/emotion is actually justified, if that thought isn’t godly it needs to be cast down before it takes root in our lives. All we have to do is cast our minds back to the Garden of Eden… First trick of Satan, plant a seed of doubt by way of thought about what God really said. Adam and Even knew good and well what God said, but now the serpent came along and planted an ungodly thought, they tried to justify it because it fitted with the narrative in their own mind.

Lean Not To Your Own Understanding – This is at the absolute core of it all. If you’re in an intimate relationship with God, and truly trust His Word by FAITH not by sight, or even according to your own understanding, then you’ll have less difficulty in trusting HIM despite whatever you see in the natural world around you. Now I am not saying it is easy… Oh no! But God is not a man that He should lie, so if we trust Him at His Word, we have the blessed assurance that whatever happens, however it works out, it will surely SURELY all work together for our good – Why? Because we are called and living according to His purposes (Word), and not our motives or desires.

So now i’ve laid the foundation of identifying how this thing can take root (and if not checked form a very strong hold over your life), we can unpack what it looks like in everyday life.

WHISTLE-STOP TOUR OF SCRIPTURE:

1 Samuel 2 – One of the first things we can see from this part of scripture (echoed throughout the Bible I might add) is that God is divine and providential. He has His principles, but He is not confined to how we pattern Him or try and box Him in within our own minds. God will bless whomsoever He chooses to bless, He will promote whomsoever He chooses, and He will show favour to whom He desires. If we accept this, we will not be caught up in a legalistic approach to God like the Pharisees. No matter how well-versed we think we are, we cannot outsmart God or prove Him to lack integrity, or hold God to ransom because we think He owes us for religiously following His Word. If you find you’re struggling with this, it’s a good time to ask God to help you examine your heart and repent. We cannot be about the Lord’s business if we are trying to establish our own little lives and our own little kingdoms in our lives according to our own thoughts and will by manipulating the Word of God to fit our little constructs. Satan tried that. Satan knew the Word inside out and upside down. Ultimately his desire was not to serve God but to rival God and take the Angels that sang God’s praises down with him. So examine why you’re serving God. Is it because He is God, or is it a transactional relationship? Are you serving Him because He IS God, and out of an abundance of gratitude for Him calling you to salvation? Or are you serving Him because you think by obedience you’re storing up brownie points to get the blessings you want? God does not operate like that. He wants a relationship with us. He is not a genie. We cannot manipulate God. Remember, God weighs the heart in judgment. When we experience God’s goodness and blessings, it is by His grace, not by our works so that any man can boast.

God may have established certain systems, but if the system is no longer serving His purpose, He will change a thing up! He did this very thing in 1 Samuel. God had a system of ensuring that the Priesthood ran according to the son of the priest upon his death. However, Eli the Priest was observant and respectful of God. He trained up Samuel well. But of his own sons, Hophni and Phineas, they had no regard or relationship with God. They were so focussed on how life can serve them, not how they can serve God. They showed disregard to well-established godly forms of reverence and did life their way in rebellion to God, to the point that Eli actually told his sons that he’d heard about their badness throughout the people of Israel and was spreading abroad. One thing that God will not have you do is make a open show mockery of Him and think you’re going to get away with it. Nope God will humble you. Eli’s sons didn’t listen to their father, and long story short, God told Eli that He is raising up for Himself a faithful priest who would do according to the Lord’s heart and mind. You may be thinking okay but what does this have to do with jealousy? I’m trying to illustrate the point that if you’re heart and mind are not submitted to God and you’re not serving God from a wholesome place of gratitude, but have in mind your own little way, that’s the door through which jealousy, envy and sin generally can enter.

JEALOUS CHARACTERS WE’RE FAMILIAR WITH

So okay, this was the scenic route to labour the point, but I’m trying to drive it home how important it is to examine your heart and motives.

Saul – God chose Saul for the position of King. I really don’t want to digress but I’ll just say this. Be careful about being the ‘answer’ in the midst of rebellion. God’s providential will was for Israel to be ruled by a holy priesthood, but because Israel wanted to be like everyone else and fit in, they decided that they wanted a King, not a priesthood. So God acceded to their request in His permissive will. In appointing Saul, God via Samuel gave Saul specific instructions to follow. On more than one occasion, Saul disobeyed God and did what he thought was good in his own understanding, and thought he could buy God’s grace by making a sacrifice. His little plan didn’t work. God decided that He would find a man after His own heart, cue David. Here’s another little side-point, God will pluck up the most unexpected, seemingly unqualified by conventional standards person and divinely align them in position because it is His will to do so and that person’s heart is toward serving Him. David was a shepherd boy out in the fields and seemingly insignificant. You know the story, so insignificant that when Samuel went to David’s dad’s house, Jesse’s house to identify the one the Lord had chosen, Jesse called for all his sons except David! It got to the point when Samuel had to expressly ask Jesse “Haven’t you got any more sons?” and that was the point that he called for David, the last choice, yet God’s choice. We can’t think we know how God will do a thing. God will do His thing, we just have to be concerned about we are about doing His Kingdom purposes and our hearts are pure.

So, you’ll have to read the book of Samuel to get the gist of the ins and outs of this story as i’ll be here forever, but essentially, God in His providence made certain circumstances align so that David entered Saul’s life, and Saul needed David. David was the answer to Saul’s problem. David loved God and served Saul with excellence. In fact, David was conscientious about how he did things in his life, and God blessed David’s endeavours and caused him to have favour and rise in popularity. Actually it got to the point (and now I’m going to land this plane about jealousy) where David was doing so well in serving that Saul became jealous of him. Now, Saul could have stopped there and recognised this unhealthy emotion. But instead, he began to justify in his own mind why he was right to have that jealous emotion. Saul made room for jealousy and it took hold fast. Before you know it, the person that God sent to bless Saul and help him, Saul began to hate and resent. No sooner that, Saul began a relentless campaign of activity to try to kill David. But God protected David. Long-story short, unchecked envy and jealousy can be so destructive it can be murderous, both figurately and literally. They are dangerous emotions to accommodate in your life.

Cain & Abel – This comes from the book of Genesis. The children of Adam and Eve. They were brothers. (Side-point: Jealousy can raise its ugly head in any relationship no matter how close you are, this happened amongst blood brothers!). Cain was a farmer and Abel was a shepherd. Each of them gave an offering to God.

Genesis 4:4-5

The Lord looked with favour on Abel and his offering, ⁵ but on Cain and his offering he did not look with favour. So Cain was very angry, and his face was downcast.

Here’s that emotion again: So Cain was unhappy with how God showed favour. He had an idea in his head that he should have been favoured. He became angry and downcast/despondent/ low in spirit with loss of hope and courage. Seeing Cain’s heart, God checked him to make him aware of what was in his heart – He said to Cain:

“If you do what is right, will you not be accepted? But if you do not do what is right, sin is crouching at your door; it desires to have you, but you must rule over it.”

Back to the point I made earlier: The emotion of itself is not bad. It becomes bad when you allow it to take a hold and space in your life and begin to dictate your actions. Before he took any action God let Cain know that He could see his heart, and what would happen if he decided not to do the right thing, and open the door to sin. God told Cain that he had to rule over it. What does that mean? Be honest. Admit you have this emotion in your heart and ask God to help you deal with it according to His will. That means submitting yourself to God and being honest about what’s in your heart. If you don’t there’s no telling what that unchecked emotion may manifest and how it may cause you to sin.

Joseph’s Brothers – This well-known account of Joseph’s early life experience. God gave Joseph a gift to interpret dreams. It so happened that in his innocence, Joseph shared the interpretation of his dreams with his father and brothers. To Joseph it wasn’t a haughty and prideful expression and emotion. It was a more likely a wonder that he wanted to share. His brothers hated him. Not only did they hate him because God favoured him, they hated him because his father favoured him evidenced by giving Joseph the well-known coat of many colours. We won’t always understand why some people are favoured more than others. That’s not our job to work out. Our job is that if we notice it, we keep a pure heart and keep our focus on God and our heart pure. We should not be trying to compete for anyone’s position, attention or anything. What is ours is ours, and if we trust God, we are to live our lives in reverent obedience to Him, and keep our hearts pure, fully confident that He has already gone before us to prepare our way in life and at the right time we will experience the blessings that He has divinely prepared to bless us with. But Joseph’s brothers were not about the introspective self-reflective heart-checking lifestyle. They hated Joseph, hated his favour and sought to kill him.

THE THEME OF JEALOUSY AND ENVY

In the biblical accounts we’ve had a quick overview of, we can see certain themes that have emerged:

1. Heavy is the head that wears the Crown – God may choose to bless someone with a gift that’s quite simply outstanding. That gift is given because God knows that the person will use it to honour God. But the weight of that responsibility means that people may hate you, despise you, be jealous of you and may even try to kill you. You never ever know what sacrifices someone has had to make to carry that gift, or blessing. You never know everyone’s full story or even anyone’s full story. That gift may be the only thing keeping them going in life feeling that they have purpose and reason for being. It could be the most precious thing to them. You may see a gift, but to them it’s literally the oil in their proverbial alabaster box of life. Be very careful about messing around with the oil (anointing) in someone’s alabaster box submitted to the Lord’s purposes.

2. Unchecked Jealousy and Envy is a doorway to sin – We see in each of the three examples above, instead of the person feeling jealous submitting to God to begin work to resolve the condition of their hearts, they instead justified their emotions by accommodating space for it and not actively trying to rid it from their hearts and lives. That justification became the open door to sin. And just like James 1:15 says, sin when it is fully grown gives birth to death, whether it be murder, or the jealous person’s death.

3. Jealousy cannot abort God’s plan – Jealousy is a disease of the mind that really convinces a person that they can do something to stop God’s plan. Foolish. Saul couldn’t stop David becoming King. Joseph’s brother’s couldn’t stop God’s destiny for Joseph manifesting. God will ensure His plan and purposes prevail, but what He will also do is make an open show of jealousy and bring it to a low and humble place.

KEY TAKE-AWAYS

1. Prioritise above all else cultivating a committed and consistent relationship with God through reading and meditating (thinking in stillness and prayer) on His Word.
2. Be sensitive to the Holy Spirit when the Holy Spirit is checking you. If you continuously ignore the Holy Spirit you quench its fire, and your conscience will become seared and God will give you over to the power of your evil desires to rule you and your wicked actions. 1 Timothy 4:2
3. Be vulnerable before God. God knows your heart, for He made you. He sees right through you and there is no part of you that is hidden from Him. When you sin, don’t do what Adam and Eve done by running away and hiding – Your heart cannot be hidden from God. Practice humility. Standing before God sins and all and admitting you have these emotions, and asking God to help you to rid yourself of them. If you truly and sincerely mean it He will help you.
4. Don’t feel condemned, God is bountiful in grace. If you feel convicted of these emotions, approach God honestly and don’t feel condemned. Jesus didn’t come to condemn the world, therefore the Word is not to condemn, but to build each of us up in the most holy faith.
5. Be careful how you conduct yourself. If you know you’re struggling in this area, be very careful how you conduct yourself and try and spend more time with God to get your heart right. As we’ve seen jealousy and envy are very destructive emotions if left unchecked.
6. Be careful with whom you share yourself with. Not everyone will be happy that you have a crown. Each example shows it is the people closest to you that are more prone to have destructive emotions in response to the glory of God on your life.

Be very blessed.

If this blog post resonated with you, please do share the link with someone else! We all win when we are all whole and strive toward holiness.

You Just Never Know!!!

Life has a way of surprising us! No matter how well-intentioned and planned we are, life has a way of reminding us how little control we actually have. This blog post is all about the things we may have planned for, the things we desire, the things we may have lost and learning how to navigate our emotions in the midst of all that.

I’m focussing on the book of Ruth for this one. The main character starts out as Naomi. Naomi’s life was going good. She was married, they had two sons and when there was a famine, her husband led the family out from Bethlehem to Moab. I suspect that she was dutifully submitted to her husband and his plans for the family to ride out the famine in Moab, build a life there and at some point perhaps return to Bethlehem. At that time, having a husband and sons was a great surety in knowing that as a woman you were protected with a legacy of a man to look after you and protect you.

Then life happened. What happened? Naomi’s husband died. Tragic, absolutely tragic. Naomi has now found herself in a foreign land with no husband, and responsibility of her two sons. At some point, the sons marry local Moabite women. I’m sure this is of some consolation to Naomi, that despite her grief, her family is still somewhat in tact. Her growing family were living in Moab for some ten years. She probably found some strategies to manage the grief of losing her husband, and was settling into her expanded family dynamic with her two sons and her daughters-in-law. It seems almost cruel that life dealt Naomi another blow; Both her sons died. Now, in this foreign land she is alone with none of her original kinfolk and two daughters-in-law. How absolutely devastated and isolated must Naomi have felt inside. Then she heard that the Lord had returned to her homeland Bethlehem to provide food: The famine was over. Naomi decided to go back to her homeland. She tried to bid her two daughters-in-law goodbye. She had no sons so in her mind she had nothing to offer them. She was older and even with the best of plans if she had found another husband and married, any children, particularly sons would have to grow old enough for the daughters-in-law. That plan was long. Too long. Orpah eventually left, but Ruth refused to leave Naomi’s side. She went with Naomi to Bethlehem. The bible says when they went to Bethlehem, the town was stirred because of them, and people recognised Naomi and called her by her name. Naomi however was so struck by the magnitude of her loss that she decided to allow the pain of that season to define her. She told the women not to call her Naomi, but to call her Mara because “The Lord has afflicted me”. This is Lesson 1.

Lesson 1: Everything is temporary and life is full of seasons. We must not go defining our identity based on temporary situations. Yes, it’s painful and yes Naomi could see no way out now. She was no longer of child-bearing age, her husband had passed, as had her sons. In her mind she must have been thinking, what could possibly change for the better? This is the problem when we become comfortable and assured in our own plans and think we can figure everything out according to human ‘wisdom’. We think we have it all sussed out, but then life happens and suddenly we feel like the rug has been pulled from under our feet. We are in a position when nothing feels sure or comfortable. But one thing we must always remember, no matter what it looks like, as long as we are submitted to God, we can be assured that He is guiding our path and has in His own way and in His own time prepared our next chapter. God had providentially arranged for the time of Naomi’s return to Bethlehem to coincide with the time of the beginning of barley harvest. Trust God’s timing, no matter what it looks like. And definitely do not go defining yourself after a painful season. No matter what that season is, whether it is grief, or trauma, or loss. Whatever it is, our God is bigger than that event. God calls us His masterpiece for a reason. He sees us as the finished product and has allowed life’s seasons to refine us (sometimes by fire) to shape us to become the best versions of ourselves, which is how He sees us. We must not get stuck in a temporary event or season and define our identity by it. Note how Naomi has all this ‘Mara’ talk, but the bible doesn’t even pay her any mind – The bible continues to refer to her as Naomi. That’s God’s grace. Our words are powerful, but God is more powerful. Don’t speak termination of your life according to the growth process, because that’s all it is, an event in the process. It’s not final. The season that Ruth and Naomi have just walked into in Bethlehem was barley harvest.

The barley harvest was the exact requirement for the next phase of God’s plan to come into play. Ruth told Naomi that she will be heading out the field to pick up the grain behind anyone in whose eyes she found favour. Lesson 2. Do something.

Lesson 2: Do Something Productive! Don’t sit there in your unfortunate circumstances and wallow. God says faith is NOW. Now when we find ourselves in situations that we’d rather avoid, we must take action that would help us to meet our needs, and the next best step. Not only that, but as God’s Ambassadors we are to go out expectant and confident in the knowledge that God has already prepared our path. Ruth didn’t go out with a negative mindset. She went out expecting that God will provide someone in whose eyes she’d find favour to help her meet their needs for ‘daily bread’. We cannot just sit around ‘waiting for God’. We need to get out there with a positive mindset trusting that as we take the first step, God will provide the ‘ram’. And so He did. Ruth was noticed by Boaz. Who is Boaz? A man of status. A man with resources. We need to trust God that as we walk in faith, He will be faithful to reveal how He has planned to us provide for us at our point of need. Boaz not only noticed Ruth, but she found favour in his sight. He instructed his staff that whatever she needed, grain, water whatever, that they were to ensure she had it and not cause her any trouble. Now let’s pause. We are talking about a family that just lost everything close to them. Two women alone, vulnerable. Loss so overwhelming that Naomi lost her identity in it. To the human mind, no conceivable way out. BUT GOD! When they took steps of faith to meet their needs, God met them on the path and provided the resources and divine connections. Dr Martin Luther King said that faith is taking the first step when you don’t see the whole staircase. This is exactly the walk of faith with God. You have got to move. Ludacris said ”when you move, I move just like that!!”. When we move by faith, God moves to reveal how He already provided for us – But we have to take ownership of our faith moving by making the next best move! Next Naomi gave instructions to Ruth on how to secure Ruth’s future to try and ensure that she is provided for. This right here is Lesson 4.

Lesson 3: Have a servant’s heart. What is a servant’s heart? A heart that is focussed on serving the needs of others. A heart whose focus is not ‘self’ but self-less – less of self and more of service. Ruth went out to find food to serve her mother-in-law. Then, somewhere in the midst of her grief, Naomi recognised Ruth’s need for a life beyond what she could provide. Naomi took the focus of what she didn’t have and served Ruth by giving her some advice. She gave Ruth instructions on how to interact with Boaz. As a true servant, Ruth followed those instructions, and that put in motion the wheels of change. In Ruth 3:11 Boaz says to Ruth that he will do all she asks of him. If that isn’t favour i don’t know what is! When Ruth went back to Naomi she reported all that had happened, and Naomi responded ‘the man will not rest until the matter is settled today’. This is another important point: be careful from whom you take advice. Ruth didn’t just follow advice from Naomi because she was titled ‘mother-in-law’. I’m sure she followed the advice because she had spent years observing Naomi’s heart and character both as a person and also toward her. Based on that she was able to discern good fruit and wisdom and love. I suspect that was a large part of why she followed Naomi’s advice. We must be discerning from whom we give access to our ears and hearts. Look for fruit in their lives (is the advice they’re giving working for them?). Also look for the Fruits of the Spirit, don’t rely on titles alone for this is how you may be deceived.

Lesson 4: Trust God’s Timing. God has a way of doing things that we just could not have foreseen. I’m pretty sure that when Naomi gave Ruth those instructions, she didn’t exactly know how the conversation that needed to take place would come up. Naomi told Ruth to wait until Boaz slept. How are you suppose to find talking opportunities in sleep time? Yet in Ruth 3:8 the bible says ‘something startled the man; He turned and there was a woman laying at his feet [Ruth!] God knows how He is going to make something out of nothing to ensure destiny is fulfilled. We don’t need to worry about every single detail. All we can do is ‘having done all, is stand [in faith]’ Ephesians 6:13. There has to be a point when you’ve done all that you can, and then you have to stand in faith and leave room for God to act. And look at how God made Boaz notice Ruth – something startled him. Ruth thought she was being slick suggesting to Boaz that he was the Kinsman Redeemer of the family, because likely in her mind, that conversation would lead to both her and Naomi being looked after. After all, Boaz is a man of resources and she has found favour in his sight! Simple right? Yet Boaz responds that there’s actually someone more closely related to them to redeem them back into the family and look after them. This is one of those heart-sinking moments. You think your newly concocted plan is working, and then a spanner gets thrown in. Now Ruth might have had racing thoughts about who this other person is! Will he be as nice and kind as Boaz? Who knows? God. Because He arranged that the next morning just as Boaz went to sit down at the town gate, the Kinsman Redeemer that they just spoke about the night before came by at that exact moment! Ruth 4:1. Don’t ever EVER for a second allow the enemy to convince you that your circumstances are beyond God’s power. Is anything to hard for God? (Jeremiah 32:27). This bring us nicely into lesson 5.

Lesson 5: Trust God’s Plan. So now Ruth now has the opportunity for her thoughts to go wild. Who is this man who has the right to redeem her back into the family to become her husband? She may well have wanted security for the future, but i’m sure she wanted peace also and the kind of peace that i’m sure she imagined all day that Boaz could provide! This is the thing. When we entrust our lives to God, we have to trust that He has already worked everything out for our good, just as His Word says (Romans 8:28). God made sure that in Boaz he had a perfectly positioned learned man. Boaz had affluence, he knew how the law worked, he knew how the Kinsman Redeemer would likely think, and something suggests to me that he wanted no margin for error or backtracking in this important conversation; So Boaz ensured that he gathered the elders to serve as witnesses. Boaz explained to Mr Kinsman Redeemer that if he didn’t want to redeem Naomi’s land, that he, Boaz would be next in line. And in the sight of the witnesses Mr Kinsman who had the right to redeem Naomi’s land stated that he’d take up his right and redeem it. He seemed to have quite a portfolio of land that was worthy of protection. In fact so much so that when Boaz highlighted the fact that by redeeming the land he’d have to take responsibility of redeeming Ruth as part of the package, the kinsman backtracked all the way back. He said “Then I cannot redeem it because I might endanger my own estate”. Mr Kinsman Redeemer didn’t know Ruth. If he had any knowledge of her, he would have realised there was no risk. But that wasn’t God’s plan. So in all her goings out, God made sure that Ruth was covered from Mr Kinsman’s knowledge. God’s plan was to ensure that the one destined to redeem Ruth had all the necessary intel to joyfully make that decision to redeem her. The bible already stated that Boaz told Ruth that he’d already heard all about her from the first time they’d met – How she served Naomi since the death of her own husband and even left her homeland to stay with Naomi after all that. He thus knew that Ruth’s character was one of loyalty and faithfulness (Ruth 2:11-12). He knew that he who finds a wife finds a good thing. He was not about to play when it came to redeeming her, and God made sure that Boaz was appropriately positioned throughout that entire process to ensure that he was well equipped all round to redeem her at the right time, which he did. He redeemed Naomi’s land, and took Ruth to be his wife according to the rules (Ruth 4:13).

God’s Plan: Ruth 4:13 says after Boaz took Ruth to be his wife, ‘The Lord ‘enabled her to conceive”. This bit jumped out at me! Ruth 1 states that her two sons and her respective daughters-in-law lived in Moab for 10-years. Life back then wasn’t like life now. People were not about career-chasing ambitions. Women had babies and they had them without delay. The fact that they were married ten years and had no babies lends itself to the prospect that God shut up Ruth’s womb so that Ruth could bear no children whatsoever to Naomi’s son. It wasn’t God’s plan for Ruth to have babies by Naomi’s son. So this puts more context into the loss and vulnerability of their situation in Ruth 1. From a mindset of man it may have felt like God took Naomi’s husband, and took her sons and in all those ten years of Ruth’s marriage not even a child, especially not a son who could take on the responsibility of caring for the family – Was it all a waste of time and years culminated in sadness? NO!

Here’s why: God had a plan. Naomi and Ruth were divinely positioned in God’s master plan. He didn’t want Ruth to have just any child. He wanted her to have a son. Yet not just any son. When God ‘enabled her to conceive’ she bore Boaz a son. Yet not just any son. Ruth and Boaz were the parents of Obed. Obed as in the father of Jesse, and the grandfather to King David and therefore a very important part of the lineage to our Saviour Jesus Christ.

Lesson 6: God’s Plan For Your Life Is Divine. In closing I encourage you to set down any anxieties you have. Life may not be going the way you want it to, or even planned or expected it to. I know that feeling well, very well in fact. But we have a clear example here (one of many in the bible) of how God uses every part of our life journey to fulfil His plan and purpose. No experience, no matter how sad it feels, is wasted. It’s all for our good. We cannot get stuck on disappointing events or sad seasons. Yes we can feel the emotions, that is what they are there for, to feel. What we cannot do is submit to those emotions. Cry, weep, sleep whatever, but after a sensible while get up and be about God’s business by re-focussing your thoughts back into alignment with God’s Word. Lend your ear to wise counsel and take the next best step in the circumstances. And of course, all the while definitely Trust God throughout the process. His plans are for your good. And trust God that one day it will all make sense.

Be encouraged

x

Elections, Situations – & GOD!

2020 has been an unprecedented year for many reasons, and the US Elections was the world stage for the last was no different. Everything about it was unprecedented, and for many was a nail-biting experience with anxieties, hopes, dreams and emotions deeply vested in whichever way it would unfold.

I for the most part have tried to keep a neutral stance, for I have many Republican friends and have an equal number of Democrat friends. Both sets have expressed with impassioned articulation their reasons why their chosen party should prevail. I could see for both understand their trail of thought. And at points I found myself wondering whether I would choose to be a Democrat or Republican – Let’s be clear at this point, I am not a US citizen or resident so I had no right to vote and was therefore at a relatively safe distance to be an observer of the great debate.

As in all things, as Christians our yardstick of truth is the Word of God, and that is what we should endeavour to follow. So in this blog post, I am for the first time publicly going to share my thoughts on how one would do best as a Christian to approach the issue of the election – and not to come down on either side for support, or I hasten to add not for condemnation either. There has been enough emotive, divisive, hateful and disgraceful rhetoric throughout the campaign. I am simply using this global headlining issue as an example of how we as Christians – be you Democrat, Republican, White, Black, Hispanic or any other ‘label’ – how we should approach ‘life issues’ as Christians without losing sight of our faith in the emotion of it all.

Look Back To Look Forward

It is helpful to have a very quick whistle-stop journey of God’s elected divine pattern of governance, if only to appreciate everything in its correct context.

Divine Will For Governance – When God created the earth He set everything up in the order that He divinely willed for it to be managed going forward. He created Adam and Eve, gave them clear direction on the purpose (till the ground, be fruitful and have dominion). As the earth became more populated, God set up systems by His will and Word for governance. That system was a theocracy. A theocracy is is a form of government in which God is the supreme Authority who gives His divine guidance to His nominated authority on earth on how the day-to-day affairs of life and structures should be managed. We see in God’s Word that He chose Prophets, Priests and Judges to be the Authority of government on earth. That was His will. He gave His Word of revelation to the Prophet, the Priests had the responsibility of managing the performance and sanctity of that Word in the service of God in the temple, and the Judges had the responsibility of resolving everyday disputes in alignment with the principles of God’s Word. That was the structure of how God’s governmental structure worked. First there was Moses the Prophet, Aaron his brother was chosen by God to be the Priest and when it became apparent that Moses struggled to manage the exceedingly great daily affairs of the people, God gave wisdom to his Father-In-Law Jethro to suggest to Moses to choose capable men and appoint them as leaders to serve as Judges to manage affairs, with more complex matters to be escalated up for Moses to adjudicate (Exodus 18: 13-26). This was God’s governmental system and it worked.

However, as in all things, mankind’s humanity began to impair the perfection of the divine will. This showed up in the book of Samuel where the Children of Israel grew to complacent in their relationship with God. They took divine access and governance for granted and then began looking at other nations to see what they were doing. They then became envious and complained to Samuel ‘we want a King’. They wanted to be like everyone else, not recognising the divinity of their being different and set apart. (1 Samuel 8:6). Samuel did what every good Christian does in a crisis – he went straight to God with the problem, and God told him to go ahead and give the people what they want. They ended up with Saul as a King, and we all know very well how that ended up. He started off fairly well, but by the end he was so concerned about himself and his own image and spent much time pulling down (and even trying to kill) the very person that God had appointed to serve him, who in God’s providence was the next in line to be King – the great King David. Saul was so all about himself that he lost sight of God’s purposes and couldn’t see past his own reign and wanted to kill David so he could hold on to his position. (This is not me, this is Bible – God’s Word: 1 Samuel 19).

So, at that point God’s divine will for government went from a theocracy to His permissive will for government with chosen King David to reign. It was God’s permissive will for the King to be a person after his own heart, which obviously required that the King was submitted and obedient to God’s Word in their actions, following God’s Word closely in their decisions. This was King David. Yes he made some mistakes that would be scandalous in today’s church, but he had a heart for God which always drew him to repentance before God. Next up was David’s son Solomon. His heart wasn’t quite as sold out for God as David. In fact, Solomon’s weakness was women, and he had plenty of them. He not only had plenty, but also picked them from outside the boundaries of whom God said. In disobedience he married foreign wives and they led his heart away from God. That was the beginning of the split of the Kingdom of Israel. Mankind messed up following God’s divine will for government, and did it again in His permissive will for government. What then happened thereafter was a succession of Kings whose hearts were far from God that caused oppression and deep despair to God’s people the Israelites. And with every King it got successively worse until they repented and turned their hearts back toward God, when they were granted peace and joy. Sadly, like many of us today they got so caught up in that complacency and familiarity of being in a blessed state that the emotions of their humanity caused them to turn again from God, which resulted in a cruel King having dominion over them.

Today’s Society

These days we have in the world many different governmental structure, but as we are focussed on USA, we’ll stick with that. It has been designated by the US Constitution to be a democratic government, where the people are governed by elected officials.

Now, i’m going to really sprint through a very simplistic overview of my understanding of the US political history to understand the fabric of the two main parties – Democrat and Republican. The purpose of this is to get a clear understanding of the essence of each.

Republican referred to a term used to identify supporters of Thomas Jefferson who was in favour of a decentralised government with limited powers. One of the Republican party’s striking characteristics in its early days was its commitment to anti-slavery. They opposed the extension of slavery into Nebraska and Kansas. At the first presidential nomination in 1856, the Republicans nominated John Fremont with a mandate to call on Congress to abolish slavery. All very civil and noble. Some time after that in the subsequent election, Abraham Lincoln won as the Republican as there was in-fighting and division amongst the Democrats who were principally split over the slavery issue – should certain people remain as slaves, as they were good for the economy. However, by the time Lincoln was inaugurated there was a split in the states and that heralded the onset of the American Civil War. In 1863 Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation which effectively meant that slaves in rebelling states were free entities, and that was subsequently formalised in the US Constitution in 1865 by virtue of the 13th Amendment. Fast forward slightly and the civil war was prolonged somewhat which undermined Lincoln’s prospects of being re-elected. So he paired up and chose his Vice Presidential Candidate as Andrew Johnson, who was a Pro-Union Democratic Senator. They won in a landslide overwhelming victory, but sadly Lincoln was subsequently assassinated. Although Johnson tried to maintain the virtuous essence of the Republic Party, eventually the Radical Republicans won control over Congress in 1866 and although they failed in their bid to impeach Johnson, they succeeded in their implementation of the Reconstruction Program – A program which in essence was purely economically driven which meant that freedmen were not good for their economy, slavery was beneficial for them. They wanted protective tariffs and fundamentally their primary concern was to protect and enhance financial wealth, matters of humanity were secondary if at all relevant.

In the years that followed the Republican Party had a variety of leaders who in some part tried to uphold the essence of the virtuous principles held by Lincoln. However, as is life various happenstances such as the Great Depression meant that those initiatives proved unpopular. The upshot of that is that the Republican Party in a feat to promote the core value of economic buoyancy began to embrace more intrinsically to the party’s value system policies which promoted anti-communist ideals, a reduction in governmental regulation in the economy, lower taxes for the wealthy and resistance to federal civil rights legislation. Skipping forward to present times, it isn’t hard to see the parallels between the largely unchanged essence of the Republican Party from then to now. Trump represents far-right social positions and speaks with open hostility toward immigrants. It was his ‘Make America Great Again’ slogan that appealed to those Republicans deeply committed to these somewhat controversial ideals which are devoid of any semblance of the virtuous or communist principles that characterised Lincoln.

Against that backdrop, it is clear to see that the Democrats are the polar opposite in terms of the essence of their party’s core values – they promote equality, fair access and promotion of equality of civil rights.

In a society as deeply divided and torn as America is right now, with people having suffered the impacts of many different adversities, it is clear to see that the Democrats would have a clear appeal to the ‘everyday man’ who can identify on some level with the pain of adversity on whatever level in the quest to achieve The American Dream.

Yet, on the other hand it is clear to see that those who had the clear opportunity to accumulate wealth and benefit from the systems of slavery that benefitted the economy have a deep preference to see the core policies of the Republican party brought to the fore without dilution, which Trump offered in great abundance.

The question therefore is where do you see God stand in all of this? When we think of the Ephesians Fruit of the Spirit; Love, Joy, Peace, Patience, Kindness, Goodness, Faithfulness, Gentleness and Self-Control, those are the hallmarks of the Spirit of God.

Therefore, as a Christian the yardstick of Truth, God and Life is where you see evidence of His Spirit, and that should guide your choices and decisions.

And it’s all very well to take good regard to the noble efforts of the different parties that have policies to uphold and embrace the biblical principles, but it is absolutely incumbent to ask oneself this question – Does piety replace or supersede fruit of the Spirit? If that’s too vague and abstract a question, in more graphic terms, the question can be posed another way: If a Ruler governs in an oppressive and unempathetic manner, but takes measures to preserve the rule of God’s Word in society, does the latter action absolve the former and thus make the ruler a worthy candidate?

I’ll leave you with this thought – The Philistines captured the Ark of God and took it into into the temple of Dagon. The Philistines were the enemy of God because they didn’t live in accordance with His Word, were opposed to His people and sought to crush and overpower them. But they sought to preserve God’s Word and did so in a way they thought fit. God was not having any of that. Pious acts do not impress God, for His Word says ‘To Obey Is Better Than To Sacrifice – 1 Samuel 15:22.

For every time the Philistines put the Ark on a high place by Dagon, God knocked down the statue of Dagon. The Lord’s hand was heavy on the people of Ashdod and he brought devastation on them and afflicted them with tumors. When the people of Ashdod saw what was happening, they eventually recognised that the Ark had to be returned to Israel. (1 Samuel 5)

Again, God is not impressed by empty acts to preserve His Word, when those in charge are not living His Word – that caused Saul’s downfall, it caused King Solomon’s downfall and so too will it cause the downfall for any person who does not live with the Fruit of the Spirit evident in their life, whether or not they have been entrusted with the power to carry and/or preserve His Word.

In fact, the example above is with reference to the the Ark of the Covenant, but how much more are God’s people whose body is the temple of God that houses the sanctity of God’s Word in our hearts. If God will cause His Ark to be protected, how much more his human masterpieces. He will not allow His people to be crushed, oppressed and downtrodden under any leader who may hold the Ark but not act in accordance with it.

As I said at the outset of this blog, the purpose is to explore the two parties’ essence to help us understand where we see the Fruit of the Spirit of God, for that is what points to truth.

To all my global readers, please stay blessed and in LOVE, in GOD.

If you found this blog thought-provoking, please do share with your community and even let me know by leaving a comment or a like! With thanks and love.

What is faith?

Facing an impossible situation? Perhaps you’ve lost your job? Dealing with a diagnosis? Marital problems? Family issues? You manager is the devil incarnate? Not enough money? Losing sleep? Losing peace? Feeling entirely at your wits end? And in the midst of all of this you’re told “Keep the faith!!” What a well-meaning statement but what does that actually mean to someone going through critical hardship? How does that give real and practical answers to manage day to day life crises? How does ‘faith’ help us in our every day lives? This is what we need to know.

Faith is defined in the book of Hebrews 11:1 – Faith is the substance of things hoped for and the evidence of things unseen.

Still not terribly clear is it, so let’s delve deeper, and examine what the word means in the Hebrew language.

Faith is the word emunah, and it comes from the word ‘aman’.

Aman = to trust or rely upon.

Emunah = is an action word meaning support due to your belief in….

Therefore the meaning of the word faith is that your belief, trust and reliance on something causes you to take action which supports that belief.

As Christians our faith is in God’s Word and when we commit and submit our lives to God, our Lord is Jesus – The Word of God. Therefore, whatever we face in life, our answer can be found in the many principles found in God’s Word.

For example, you may be dealing with the boss from hell. Her every move and word is critical and undermining as she slowly tries to erode your confidence. Our responsibility is the do everything we do as unto the Lord, which means with the spirit of excellence. If you’re working with excellence and you’re in correct alignment with God, this boss may well be on an assignment to test your faithfulness to God’s Word. When she acts up, do you respond with a quick sharp word, or do you seek peace, indulge her with kindness and show love? God says we are to show our enemies love (Matthew 5:44-45).

The Bible is good at giving clear guidance on God’s principles for living, but if you’re anything like me, you like to know the ‘why’, and that is often not explained in the bible. Sometimes the knowledge of the why comes with revelation with the passage of time, and other times with knowledge or wisdom acquired through life. In the example relating to the unpleasant boss, it is likely that her own issues are so overwhelming in her life that her heart is filled with the issues of life, rather than thoughts of peace and love.

We are told to Guard our hearts with all diligence for out of it flows the issues of life (Proverbs 4:23). So when a person allows their heart (and mind) to be filled with issues rather than filling their heart with the meditations of God’s Word which brings guidance and peace, they often display a plethora of destructive behaviours that they then project onto the people around them. What they need is a kind encouraging word, love and definitely help to address their issues. People are often fighting battles we know nothing about, and in this world of feigning strength and having it all together, often the only sign we know that a battle is being fought is the outward behaviours one presents with. So in reference to the example, the principle of guarding the heart is in the bible, as is the need to love your enemies. Applying and living these principles is exactly what we need to do in this, but any situation. It may not resolve the situation, and perhaps that’s not the role God centred us in the situation for. He has already gone before us and prepared our way out of that situation. We don’t need to look for exits, we need to master the role that we have been given, which is to apply with diligence God’s Word for our given situations.

Applying God’s Word

This is the more challenging part. We live in a world where our humanity is celebrated and faith is barely given any airtime. Therefore in the context of this culture, it is very easy to fall into the habit of working out ones own life according to what ‘we think’. That’s not what God’s Word says – it says

Back to the root meaning of the word FAITH – Trusting in God’s Word, not leaning and depending on your own understanding but trusting in the principles and guidance of God’s Word for your situation and taking action that shows that you are trusting God – and then waiting for Him to direct the next steps of your path.

Faith then is not so much about a description or declaration of what you believe, but actually it is the demonstration of your belief through your actions in relying on God’s Word.

First Things First

Now, it is important to clarify that faith isn’t dreaming up some fanciful plans and ideals that we want in life, and finding scriptures to support what we want to believe and manifest in our lives. No, no and no! There is nothing in that which shows that God is the Lord of our lives, it shows that we want what we want and we’ll cherry pick from God’s Word ways to support why what we think should be right. Wrong.

The bible says when we desire something (or some outcome), in every situation instead of wrestling with thoughts and anxiety, we are to take our desires to God in prayer. We are to be open with God and make our requests known to Him, and then ask God to guide us into His will and give us wisdom to take steps into fulfilling His will for our lives. That means that we may desire some things, but God’s answer may not necessarily be the answer that we think is the right one, or even the one we want to hear. That is where the trust and depending action part of the word ‘faith’ comes into action.

Therefore, whatever situation we’re facing, no matter how dire it looks, we must go to God’s Word, examine the various situations where God showed Himself as Jehovah Nissi, God the Banner, the Deliverer into victory over the circumstance that is trying our faith. The more we examine how God consistently showed up for those who put their trust in Him, the more our own faith is encouraged and empowered that we too can do the same. God is faithful and our faith requires that we take action to show that we trust, believe and rely upon Him and His Word to be Lord of our lives. Contrary to popular culture, we don’t need to have it all figured out – we just need to having done all we reasonably can we stand on reliance of God’s Word and wait for Him to deliver us in our hour of need. God’s Word repeatedly show us that God is looking to show forth His glory on the earth, but how can God show forth His glory in our lives when we won’t trust Him? We have to trust, believe and rely on His Word and commit our hearts and lives to surrendering to however God wants to work out our life situations.

Whatever situation you’re facing please be reassured in your heart that nothing is too big for our God for He is Omnipotent – He has unlimited power! He created the universe and decided that you had a specific place and role on this earth. You are His masterpiece and takes great pride in you. In fact, He has already gone before you and worked out the very situation you’re dealing with (Isaiah 45:2) so He doesn’t want you to fret and worry about it, just do what He says in His Word and trust Him. God will NOT fail you. Do not worry or be anxious. Speak to God, trust Him and leave the issues in His capable hands, not blocking up your heart and mind. Sending love.

Thank you to all my global audience, I do hope this has blessed and encouraged your faith and walk with God.

Difficult Places & Needing To Hear From God

Now if we’re totally honest, we all have times when we don’t have it all together. Times when we’re downright in a tight spot having to handle some very difficult situations and we literally don’t know what to do! Sound familiar? Well believe me when I say this post is completely inspired by this exact season of my life.

It can be extremely difficult when we have been walking this faith walk for some time and there is no sign of ‘The Promise’. I remember early on in my walk with God I would have all these opinions about why did Sarah go and make Hagar get pregnant for Abraham, why couldn’t she just wait on God, “they knew they heard God, right!”… Yes I had thoughts and opinions for days! But when you’re in the hot seat of faith dealing with trials beyond all comprehension, it just hits differently. You suddenly have the grace to understand the miles that others have walked before you, and you learn the power of silence – learning that not speaking on a thing is far more mature than proffering opinions.

As I said this post in wholly inspired by my personal season of trials. I confess, this morning I cried out to God in total bewilderment wanting answers. I waited, and waited and waited – no still small voice. So I decided to do go to my bible and just randomly open it up in the hope that God would speak to me through the scriptures, and yes that He definitely did! I opened up to Jeremiah 13 and started reading until I got to verse 4 where God said:

Take the girlde which you have bought and go to the Euphrates, and hide it there in the cleft of the rock. Jeremiah 13:4

The only other time I recalled God telling someone to go to a cleft in a rock was when He told Moses in Exodus 33:20-22 when He was going to honour Moses’ request and show Moses His glory.

Now, it’s significant the circumstances that brought both of them to the cleft of the rock. For Moses, he had just been in a little back and forth with God who had had it with the rebellious, stiff-necked children of Israel. God had just told Moses that they’d been there long enough and they they should proceed to the Promised Land, but that He would not be going with them otherwise He might destroy them on the way (they were that rebellious!). Moses fully understood that he alone could not lead the rebellious lot along that path, so he pleaded with God to let His Presence go with them. Moses found favour in God’s sight and God granted him this request. To be really sure that he would know that God’s presence was really with them, Moses asked God to show him His glory (best and full manifestation of His presence). That is when God told Moses to go up to the cleft in the rock, and His glory would pass by. So for Moses the circumstances were that God had given him a hard task and Moses needed to be sure that God was in it with him so that he led the people properly and had the power to go through it.

Let’s look at Jeremiah. God had had enough of the people doing their own thing, following the desires of their own heart instead of submitting to God’s will for their lives. They were, like in the time of Moses, a rebellious and stiff-necked people. Jeremiah had experienced the brunt of it also having witnessed and experienced evil people seemingly thriving, ‘living their best lives’, people betraying him and essentially just living amidst a world where people were doing their own thing and seeming to do okay whilst he was trying to honour God and feeling the worst of it all. He had questions for God. This reminds me of a song I heard in the early days of my walk with God when I realised it was okay to legitimately have these questions about your journey of faith, when your heart is genuinely for God (see link below).

The point is if we’re really honest most of us have thought at some point in our lives, how is it that some people can go through life being scheming, evil doing deceitful things and amass great success, yet trying to live a noble and honourable life seemingly yields rewards in small measures! This was the point that Jeremiah was at. And like Jonah Jeremiah was growing quite impatient at God’s longsuffering and indulgence of patience and grace on the workers of iniquity. Jeremiah wanted to God to move and swiftly in a grand display that satisfied him that God was God. But like Jonah, Jeremiah had to learn a thing or two about God, which goes for any person whom God has destined to be a leader. To lead people effectively you need to lead with godly qualities. This means you need to have patience, forgiveness, you must passionately want people in their rightful positions to do well and not be so swift to abandon them, after all in any organisation the human resource is one of the most valuable resources. As much as the people were rebellious, God longed and still longs today for people to turn back and submit to Him to be rightfully aligned in relationship with Him. Jeremiah was done with waiting, time was going on and on and nothing seemed to be happening except evil cycles repeating themselves and Jeremiah witnessing the brunt of it. Seeing the paint of Jeremiah’s humanity, God led him (by His word) to the cleft and told him to hide a girdle there, and told Jeremiah to walk away. After some days God told him to return at which point Jeremiah found the girdle spoiled and decayed. God told Jeremiah that he must tell the people to repent and if they don’t repent what happened to the girdle would happen to them. Again, Jeremiah was in a difficult place in his life experiences and to get Jeremiah to a place away from all the drama and speak to him, reveal to him God’s heart and intentions, God led him to the cleft of the rock.

So it’s a good time to think about in our own personal lives whether we’re at a cleft moment. Has God been trying to call us away in solitude to speak to us in the stillness, but we’ve been so caught up in our emotions and life that we are at our wits end? Don’t worry for God is faithful and loving. He may be getting ready to lead us to a cleft-moment: to lead us into that small, narrow place were we can’t turn left nor right and there’s only one way out, and the only way He wants us to go is the way He wants to lead us. Maybe God is leading us to a cleft to speak to us or reveal to us. Sometimes we cannot hear him when we’re too comfortable and enjoying life with all its noise and distractions. Very often we only truly learn and thrive from trials when we are in the midst of difficulty because that’s when we’re paying full attention.

Most people don’t like feeling out of their depths, but that is the true posture of faith. When you surrender total control and lean entirely on God (no plan B and no way out other than how God leads) to pass the test and trial of our faith – all so that we may know God better. Sometimes it’s to know Him as Jehovah Jireh, the Lord My Provider or sometimes it’s any other way that God is the Great I Am!

Whatever it is, remember that God’s plans for you and all of us is for our good, so trust Him. We are His masterpiece! Of all creation, we are what God is most proud of and He calls us His children. So trust Him today. Think of all the great miracles He has done though the course of life and history intervening in all the most difficult human situations from parting the Red Sea to saving Daniel in the lion’s den.

I pray that we learn to surrender gracefully and have full confidence and peace that whatever is happening is happening for us not to us, to propel us into the person God has destined us to become and walk the path that He has prepared for us.

Stay blessed and in peace.

Checking Our Lives – Don’t Be Found Wanting!

This is short and sweet, based on how it dropped into my Spirit this morning.

We need to be living lifestyles that so honour God.

Our thoughts generate consequences in in spirit realm.

Our actions definitely create consequences in the spirit realm.

Whether those consequences will be positive or negative will depend on the substance and intention of those thoughts/actions.

If your thoughts/actions are negative toward someone or have negative intent, it has a consequence similar to murdering the life that God created.

For example if you have bad thoughts about or toward someone in the sense that thoughts of them create a stream of negative energy within you, then in the spirit realm each time you do this you sabotaging the spiritual life around that person and thus committing a form of murder.

That then creates what can be described as a  spiritual organ/body part in your spirit life store.

Each time that this negativity comes from within your heart without genuine repentance (evidenced by a turn around and changed behaviour) it keeps creating these sabotaged body parts that are kept in the spirit storehouse of your life.

The more unrepentant negative thoughts/actions that come from you the more the body parts in your spirit storehouse. This is why when we go to God in prayer you can’t pray to Him with all that murder in your spirit house. It is a stench to God and blocks your prayers. Therefore this is why the bible says that if are going before God and your brother has an offence on you (has a record of an unreported offence that you  are aware of – and God knows ehen you’re aware) you must  go and be reconciled first with your brother before being able to go before God.

At the end of days, just  as God did in the book of Daniel, God is going to weigh all those body parts against your virtuous intentions and good fruit borne of love intentions. Do not be found wanting because that determines your external destiny.

God has given us 2 instructions that sum up every principle in the bible:

1. Love the Lord your God with all your heart your mind and soul.

2. Love your neighbour as yourself.

That’s it.

So if we get these right we are set to be in right alignment with God. If your whole heart is devoted to and filled or mostly filledwith the love OF God, and FOR God then the thoughts of your mind and decisions of your will (soul) will be pleasing to God. I say mostly since none of us are perfect so we will fall short but if we repent because we are sorry for our wrongful a ton or thought then God is faithful to forgive us. That keeps our spirit life house clean. The bible talks about keeping it clean and filled with God’s spirit and if you dont and let other evil spirits in they come back with 7 worse spirits.

The next is to love your neighbour as yourself. When you love God and truly are humbled by your own fragility you can recognize it in others and nust be forgiving because like you they are working on something that either they have to deal with, or if they choose not to God will deal with. Our job is to be in humility and forgive and love.

We have to recognize there are truly broken people who operate out of their brokenness whose actions are unkind. They need love the most. We must be forgiving seeing their actions symptomatic of the state of their brokenness. And love. But if they become manifestly evil we must be wise to distance ourselves as God says we must walk with wise men and bad company corrupts good morals.

The goal of life is to become the person that God created us to be, fulfil our God given purpose and thus ensure our spirit house is clean pure and filled with God’s Holy Spirit. Then at the end of our days when God weighs as in Daniel  5, mene mene tekel God will weigh our spirit life and we do not want to be found wanting.

Be good, be aligned with God and be blessed.

Racial Abuse & Dehumanisation: What Would Jesus Do (WWJD)?

I have been so affected by watching the news reports of how George Floyd, an unarmed black man was killed by a Police Officer in broad daylight by comfortably sitting on George’s neck, hands in pocket whilst George lay handcuffed, not resisting lawful authority, face-down on the road with absolutely no power over his own person. George lay there on the road, head pretty much underneath the Police Car bumper, pleading for air, stating that he couldn’t breathe, and calling out for his mother in a plea of desperation – the Police Officer Derek Chauvin, and his three associates sat on the length of George’s body all at once whilst he was down, calm and handcuffed pleading for air to breathe. When Derek Chauvin’s comrades got off George’s body, they stood by and watched officer Derek Chauvin sit for over 8 minutes with his knee deeply lodged in George’s neck despite his pleas to breathe. For 2 minutes and 53 seconds, George laid unresponsive. Derek Chauvin sat comfortably knee deep into George’s neck, Officer Derek poised hands in pocket nonchalantly disregarding this crucial fact that George was unresponsive, that he had already killed George using this excessive and unlawful force.

The video footage captured by confounded passers-by, pleading for George’s life capture what is in fact a daily abuse of power by US Police Officers against black men in the USA. The number of black people, men women and children killed by Police brutality at an ever increasing rate is shocking. Their crime? Being black. Being black whilst riding a bike, being black whilst jogging, being black whilst in their own home relaxing, being black whilst driving. George Floyd had just left a store where the authenticity of note he used to pay for his transaction was called into question. Like so many of these black lives that have been brutally cut short, none of the victims were carrying any weapons, yet undeniably excessive force was used to mercilessly cut short their lives and forever affect the lives of their mothers, children, spouses. Despite peaceful protests, hashtag campaigns, civil conversations and cordial pleas for law reform, these savage attacks continue to occur against the black community. Deeply traumatised from unhealed wounds of the displacement and disenfranchisement from the days of slavery through Jim Crow, the torture, pain and trauma inflicted on the black race has never been acknowledged – and they certainly haven’t been welcomed as counterparts of the human race into the American society. Parents as a strategy to keep their children alive, have to ‘give the talk’ to their young black children about how to manage and comply with fearful encounters with US Police Officers, an incident that could very easily end their lives.

It is against this backdrop that the pain of George Floyd’s slow merciless death, video taped in graphic detail has ripped wide open a deep and painful wound from constant mistreatment, abuse and unlawful killing. And the rapid rounding up of an excessive number of officers to protect knee-to-neck killer Derek Chauvin whilst in his home was the disdainful pouring of salt in the wound in the face of a grieving nation.

Feeling helpless and voiceless that those paid to serve and protect are mercilessly and unnecessarily killing black lives of men women and children, many people of many races took to the streets across the US to protest – some peacefully, some not. A people wanting to be heard, noticed, and for the wrongs that have so vividly been captured to be acknowledged, not the perpetrator protected, the people were at a loss as to what to do to be acknowledged.

In the midst of all this, a CNN team comprised of news reporter and camera-crew were reporting live on the ground exercising their lawful right to broadcast to the nation the serious matters on the ground in the community. In the context of this highly sensitive situation, the Police arrested the one black member of the CNN Team – The News Anchor live on TV despite his calm professional repeated compliance with orders and showing and explaining his lawful presence as part of CNN. The white crew were left alone whilst the world watched the officers lead the black Anchor away in handcuffs with no explanation as to why he had been arrested. The difference between him and his colleagues? He was black.

All this injustice, abuse of power and extreme racism from the highest level at Presidency, to the level of Police who are paid to protect the community, begs the question that every black mother, father, child, sibling and relative asks “When will it end” and “What do we have to do to have the right to stay alive and be treated equally as human beings?”. It’s a hard if not impossible question to answer. If it was a wife getting beaten at the hands of her husband you’d tell her to leave, but what do you do when the perpetrator is a system largely comprised by people who hate you based on the colour of your skin? Where do you go for protection and what do you do when the trauma is re-inflicted day after day, week after week and year after year.

What Would Jesus Do?

The nice answer that makes everyone but the victims feel good is ‘turn the other cheek’, ‘leave it to God’, and other such bland and ineffective disproportionate responses to the violent attacks being routinely undertaken against the black community.

But we must ask ourselves, what would Jesus do? And then we do that, prayerfully believing God to supernaturally intervene and provide that faithful way of escape, preferably alive.

First of all, we must remember that Jesus loved  people, deeply. He was merciful and kind. When the prostitute Rahab was found to be in sin, Jesus empathised with her and protected her life from being stoned to death. Jesus intervened, He didn’t stand by and watch thinking “It’s their problem”. The Bible is very clear that we are all God’s children and so it is incumbent upon us as a human race to ‘pull up’ and come together united to deal with this problem, a humanity problem.

There are clear examples in the Bible of Jesus being emotionally affected by people’s maltreatment, and advocating on their behalf. Let’s recall how Jesus wept when he saw how little the people had faith in Him (John 11:35). But  there was a time that Jesus was so incensed at the sacrilege and sin of the people who were misusing the holy temple that was intended for prayer and communion with God, but instead were using it to trade at extortionate prices! When Jesus saw this, his love for God meant that the pain he felt could not be disregarded. In fact, Jesus was so incensed that the acute emotion of it caused Jesus to flip over the tables in anger. Jesus protested until the tables were cast upside down and the traders had fled. So we see Jesus can at the right time be gentle and give a cordial warning. However on another occasion, He cannot stand by and watch injustice and sacrilege happen. Jesus intervened by physically protesting.

The bible says that WE are the church and WE the people are the living stones, a chip off the Capstone – Jesus (Matthew 21:42). Therefore if Jesus were around on Earth today and witnessed these callous acts of violence against the oppressed, I am very sure that Jesus would have been moved to action. Jesus is the Word of God, and the Word says….

 

Jesus, I believe, would have actively got involved, most prayerfully. However his empathy-filled life would have likely led him to protest. So we need to take that Word seriously. Arm yourselves with the word, protest not loot, and take the side of Justice, not colour. Like Jesus on the mount/mountains of deep godly foundation, pray everyone for strategy. Then having done all, Stand in anticipation of God’s supernatural  move and let our faith and character  be blameless.

This is not  a time when white people, particularly in the church, can turn an eye and pretend they haven’t seen the injustice and abuse toward the oppressed. We all matter, we are humans and God’s children and should be treated with love and respect. It is necessary to bring such injustices to light and stand up against them, prayerfully.

Stay blessed and safe.

 

 

 

 

 

The CORONAVIRUS

Serious Times

Right now we are are literally living in a moment in history. What is happening across the world is unprecedented, and the widespread pandemic is of biblical proportions. There have been terrible atrocities across the world in the course of life, from 911, to World Wars I and II. Even in biblical days, there were the 10-Plagues of Egypt. But a global issue that shuts down the world in a way this Coronavirus has? I can think of little other than the biblical account of Noah’s ark. In those days, mankind began to increase in number and unlike their predecessors, Sarah and Abraham, these people were not inclining neither their ears nor their hearts to know God. Quite the opposite, God said he was not about to deal with the struggle of engaging mankind forever ‘My Spirit will not contend with humans forever’. (Genesis 6:3) You can just picture it, the human population was increasing and ‘taking over the earth’ with ‘great power and authority’ doing exactly what they want without reverence or thought to God and in spite of God grace and mercy they continued in their stubborness of will.

 

Character of God

Right now, we need to remember this – God is a loving God. He created us with love and purpose. We are His children. A loving father cares about his children and God corrects those whom He loves (Hebrews 12:6).  So when God sends His Holy Spirit to convict your heart because  you are entertaining wicked thoughts that are contrary to His Word, He is sending His Spirit to correct you and bring you back in alignment with Him.

This is what Jesus was talking about when he said the Advocate was coming to prove the world to be in the wrong about sin (because the world had defined sin in their own terms: sound familiar? “there is no right and wrong as long as long as you do good”) and righteousness (taking away God’s standard and making ‘right’ relevant to man’s standards) and judgment (defining what and who deserves punishment and who shouldn’t on immoral basis) – why?  As the scripture continues ‘because people do not believe in me’ (John 16:8-10).

So God sends his Holy Spirit to guide people into all truth, according to His Word that created and laid the foundations of the very earth we live on (John 16:12).

So what happens when God sends His Spirit to guide people but they just don’t want to listen, but carry on doing what they want? Their consciences become seared i.e. unable to receive or hear anything from God anymore because of the consistent wilful rejection of God and contempt for anything sacred unto God. They refuse and/or abandon the faith and follow other ways of ‘life’ and spirits. (1 Timothy 4:1-4)

 

God’s Will

We humans have been created by God as His masterpiece to fulfil the destiny that He prepared for us a long time ago before the foundations of the world were laid (Ephesians 2:10).  In fulfilling our destiny, we show the world the glory of God as witnesses to His presence and love and greatness.

So when people decide that they don’t want to follow God and decide to reject His Word, His Spirit and show contempt for anything pertaining to God and godliness, that is the point at which they follow the path of seared consciences. If people decide not to adhere to God’s Word and reject Him, then they are effectively rejecting God’s plan and destiny for their lives and thus cannot show forth His glory. They are not fit for the purpose. This is exactly what John The Baptist was referring to when He spoke of in Matthew 3:10

“Even now the ax of God’s judgment is poised, ready to sever the roots of the trees. Yes, every tree that does not produce good fruit will be chopped down and thrown into the fire.”

So let’s go back and reconsider the times of the world in Noah’s days – people were doing their own thing, not God’s thing and showing contempt for anything godly. God knew the wickedness of their hearts and regretted that He made them. Noah found favour in the eyes of the Lord – He was a righteous man, blameless among the people of his time, and he walked faithfully with God. What a light in a dark world he must have been. So when God decided that He wanted a human race with clean hearts, He decided to wipe the human race from the face of the earth and left only Noah and his immediate family.  What does this illustrate? God is a merciful God and He wants us to fulfil the great destiny He has created for us. But when people incessantly decide not to fulfil the purpose for the life for which they’ve been created, God draws the line. This is not a one-time rejection, or slip-up, this is the wilful determined rejection of God repeatedly. Such was the heart of the people in the world in Noah’s times – they rejected God and wanted to do their own thing, set their own rules and judgments. God said no.

 

God is Supreme

Where else do we see God showing that His purposes will supercede any human authority? Exodus 7 This is where God had a plan and a purpose for His people, and Pharaoh decided that He didn’t want to cooperate with God’s plan. God sent Moses and Aaron to warn Pharaoh to let God’s people go. In these times, Pharaoh was high, mighty and powerful in the great Kingdom of Egypt and had his own gods whom he worshipped and thought brought him great success. So when little Moses comes along [talking about the One True God] Pharaoh shows great contempt for God saying “Who is the Lord, that I should obey him and let Israel go? I do not know the Lord and I will not let Israel go.” Exodus 5:2

 

God is Supreme & The King of Kings and Lord of Lords – There is NO Higher Authority In Heaven or on Earth

Long story short, even though Moses and Aaron demonstrated all the miracles that God had instructed them to Pharaoh, he was not interested in hearing from God. He rejected every warning given, and pursued his own will thinking that He is King.

This is the relevance of what is happening now and then: The time that God had appointed to show forth His authority and power was the First Passover. It is called the Passover because that is the time that God told His people to prepare for a terrible event. Every person who was God’s child was told on the 14th day of the month to put the blood of the lamb on the sides and the tops of the door frames where they ate the lamb.

Exodus 12:12-13

 “That night I will go through the land of Egypt and kill all the firstborn animals and people in the land of Egypt. I will also punish all the gods of Egypt. I am the Lord.  But the blood will be a sign on the houses where you are. When I see the blood, I will pass over you. Nothing terrible will hurt you when I punish the land of Egypt.

Verses 14 & 28:

“… always to remember this day and celebrate it with a feast to the Lord. Your descendants are to honor the Lord with this feast from now on.”

“When your children ask you, ‘Why are we doing these things?’  you will say, ‘This is the Passover sacrifice to honor the Lord. When we were in Egypt, the Lord passed over the houses of Israel, and when he killed the Egyptians, he saved our homes.’” Then the people bowed down and worshiped the Lord.  They did just as the Lord commanded Moses and Aaron.”

What Has This Got To Do With Coronavirus?

This has everything to do with Coronavirus. We are living in a time when the world and its many leaders are doing things their own way. They are showing contempt for godliness, God’s authority and shun the very power and authority of God. As in the days of Noah, people are increasing across the earth and doing their own thing. God promised that He would never flood the earth again. But God has purposes that must be achieved in these last days. Mankind is destroying the earth in the name of money and power and greed. The heart of mankind is obviously desperately wicked in these days. People and leaders are turning race against race. Divisions are becoming more stark in the name of elitism, control and money. The most vulnerable are being forgotten. Whole communities are being oppressed, mistreated and suffering miscarriages of justice.

                                                 

 

God’s presence is here on earth even in the midst of this awful pandemic. God’s Holy Time – The time of Passover is fast approaching.

 

Lamentations 3:35-36  – To deny a man justice in the presence of the Most High, to subvert a man in his lawsuit, the Lord does not approve.

 

Quick Fire Points:

Corona = Latin – Crown

April = 8th – 16th April = Passover

8 = Letter ‘Chet’ in Hebrew – it looks like a wall or a fence or even a door frame.

Psalm 27:5 – For he will hide me in his shelter in the day of trouble; he will conceal me under the cover of his tent;

Job 1:10 – Hedge of protection

The Word Chai is short for Chayim (life) and the letter Chet can be seen to resemble a doorway where the blood of the lamb was put during the First Passover Exodus 12:7.

The lamb of the old testament is Jesus in the New Testament, the Precious Lamb of God who died for our sins so that we could have a relationship with God and live according to His Word and purposes.

God’s Purposes

God is a righteous Judge. We may not understand the whys and reasons of life, but we have to trust that God’s plans are for good and not ever for evil. The times we are living in is a moment in history. This is not just a time to marvel at the moment we are living in, but a time for each man to search his heart and repent for his sins. This is the time to reflect and take communion in remembrance of the body and blood of Jesus that was broken and poured at the cross of Calvary. Taking Holy Communion reminds us of Jesus’ suffering but also shows us the amount of love Jesus had for us, even unto death, on a cross.

                                               

The thoughts of God are higher than ours (Isaiah 55:8-9) and we cannot even begin to fathom why the world is suffering the pandemic that it is happening now. Or even the plague of locusts taking over vast land in East Africa. These are matters of biblical and godly significance. Whilst we have the opportunity, let’s get ourselves into alignment with God. We are to judge our own hearts and get them right before God, and remain on that godly path and commit our lives into submission to His Word.

                                                           

 

On A Personal Note

I am acutely aware that people are grieving at this time. Many have lost loved ones, or are bearing witness to loved ones suffering from this coronavirus. I have no explanation for why some are getting it and not others. I do know that we can love and pray for one another, offering strength, love and kindness to our neighbour, because now more than ever people need love – the world needs love, they need to see the face of God in our actions of love. And whilst none of us want to catch the virus, we must not fear. God knows the end from the beginning and whatever plan He has for our lives is for our good – all things work together for the good of those that love God and are called according to His purposes – Romans 8:28

If we are living with our hearts committed to God’s Word we cannot and should not fear when our lives on this earth come to an end. For to be absent from the body [when we have committed our hearts and lives in to submit and do the will of God and follow His Word] is to be present with the Lord – 2 Corinthians 5:8.

2 Corinthians 5:1 –  For we know that if our earthly house of this tabernacle [our body] were dissolved, we have a building of God, an house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.

There is no fear. Perfect love casts out all fear, and God is that perfect love. So do not fear. This is a time for great introspection, not just because of the Coronavirus, but because it is a season appointed by God to turn your attention to Him, for He is the King of all Kings and the Lord of all Lords and the holder of the crowns of life. There is no more urgent time to ensure our lives are submitted and committed into the Lord’s hands, and to continue on that path for the remainder of our days.

 

If you don’t know God and you haven’t accepted Jesus and your personal Lord and Saviour, I invite and urge you to seriously considering doing so now. If you say the following prayer from your heart and mean it, and confess Jesus to be the Lord of your Life, and that you will try with all sincerity of heart to try and obey God’s Word (yes you’ll make mistakes, but God will forgive genuine mistakes and shortcomings, He even forgave David in 2 Samuel 12 for his sins);

Imagine looking up and seeing a crown above your head – imagine that crown is God’s Word. If you want to please God and live as the masterpiece that God created you to be, and have eternal life, stay under that crown, which is His Word. He will help you and will never ever leave you or forsake you.

 

Finally, Common brought out a song a couple of years ago with John Legend entitled ‘GLORY’ and the Lyrics cited  it was America’s moment to come to Jesus.. This is a global Come To Jesus Moment... “COME!” The Lord is beckoning you to have a relationship with Him for the rest of your life! 

 

Your Enemies Need Your Prayer!

I was once completely baffled at two specific commands in the bible:

1. to love the neighbour and

2. to give thanks in all things.

Honestly, i sometimes really don’t like my proverbial neighbour.

I also sometimes despise some of my situations aka trials, and find myself  rhetorically lamenting “What’s to love or give thanks for?”.

Then one day it dawned on me…
Light is an absolute state of being. It just exists true to itself. But we wouldn’t completely understand light without experiencing darkness.

Darkness is NOT an absolute state of being. It is a condition entirely defined by lack, specifically the lack of light.

Now I understand it. With Christ, and when I am fully submitted and aligned under His authority I emit the light and love of Christ. His glory shines through without me realising, as I’m sure happens for you also.

Then when I get around people who are not in alignment the lack at the core of their being screams through in their behaviour. The lack, be it the lack of character/confidence/authenticity/sense of self, all falls under the label of darkness aka LACK. This perfectly explains why our enemies hate us, they are simply intimidated by being outshone by the light shining through  your presence. THAT is at the heart of the enemy.

“Enemy” has historically been dealt a raw deal. We label people enemy by the deeds of their heart, spoken or not, concealed or not, aware or not as the case may be.

Fundamentally, enemy is a condition, and specifically one defined by lack.
Just as sickness is the lack of health, enemy is the lack of light (truth/Christ/self-knowledge).

We often encounter enemy situations to test & refine our own godly character and/or have the opportunity for the light of Christ within us to shine, by loving, gracefully those we encounter who are without (in darkness). The critical and most important part is thay when dealing with enemies, we have to remember that they often don’t realise the extent of their darkness. In a world where people live under a mask, few ever really take the time to look alone face to face with their true selves. For if they did this they’d realise the extent of their lack, i know because I’ve lived it. It is a painful process to face yourself and all your deficiencies but that is the essential posture of humility before God – realising we NEED HIM and thus His Light. That posture is not limited to a physical position, but also doubles as a process…. one characterised by facing our own brokenness and then having the stubborn parts of us being broken by life situations as we surrender to God.

Sadly many of those in darkness don’t realise that this is their reality. They have no concept that they even lack anything much less the light of life itself.

This therefore can apply to professing Christians in equal measure –  without the operating Word within your heart, their lives are effectively lived in a state of darkness, and completely ignorant to this (Sometimes wilfully) their behaviours give them away – behaviours of insecurity, jealousy, envy. We are familiar with this in the Saul-David, Cane,-Abel, Joseph-brothers biblical accounts.

This is a time that doesn’t call for hate, it calls for love, and grace and prayers.

So now I understand… the life situations I sometimes despise are sent to help me grow in godliness and share my light and love with others.

Now I understand that those around me who are classically known as enemies are not people to hate; They are to be loved and given grace and prayed for so that they can heal and also joyfully & authentically emit Christ’s light through their own lives.

So yes, be thankful in all things, and love your enemies and pray for them.

 

Be blessed.

 

Jealousy & Insecurity

This is a really quick post following my read of 1 Samuel – for some reason  I saw things differently this time, which for the sake of time I shall highlight in point format:

●  Identity – we each have to find and accept with grace our own identity in Christ and in CHRIST alone. We know little about Saul’s former life pre-kingship, but what we can reasonably assume is that he was very comfortable in what he  had taken on to be his identity. The bible says he was loyal, committed, dependable and reliable. Those are very endearing qualities that most people not only admire but highly value in people. On top of that, the bible says Saul  was a most handsome young man. There was none finer—he literally stood head and shoulders above the crowd! So not only had he built up a reputation of good character, but he also was a bit of a looker with hood height which made him stand out amongst the crowd even more. I’m sure Saul must have got used to people’s adulation telling him how amazing he is. All that adulation if you don’t know your own identity from the outset becomes the basis of your identity. This is a dangerous thing- we cannot allow the opinions of Man  or in fact anything outside of God’s Word to define the essence of our being. I mean, what would it mean if opinions change? When looks fail? Then what? We cannot put the key to our identity and happiness in anyone else’s pocket or in things that are temporal- it’s fickle and has the power to send us to a crashing low in certain circumstances.

 

● Security – Saul was King. He probably felt rather special, and fair dues most would. However, again his kingship or shall I say, his TITLE/POSITION  as we read through 1 Samuel seems to have given him some subtle haughtiness. He didn’t feel greatly threatened when David killed goliath. He was just a boy that done good. Saul liked that he had a good one under his authority. In fact  David was consistently good – the bible says whatever mission Saul sent him on, David was so successful that Saul gave him a high rank in the army. This pleased all the troops, and Saul’s officers as well. Again, Saul is happy that his governance is going good. That is until David draws public praise and adulation which highlights David’s success. I am quite sure that the ladies singing about David were not trying to start some rivalry. They were probably freestyling their joy and shock that this young boy David done remarkably well for his little and slight physical stature to take on so much and do so well. However that’s not what Saul heard. Saul, took this entirely innocent song personally. His perception of himself is now under threat because the people who made him feel so special, and the title that gave him so much security are now celebrating the achievements of someone he considered beneath him. Instead of him hearing how remarkable David has done given his disadvantages (short and slight) all Saul heard is that the people now seem to love David more than him. This gets on Saul’s nerves. Then Saul honesin on the particulars… the numbers – thousands v tens of thousands. Instead of celebrating the joint win and victory, his own insecurities make him compare David’s accomplishments with his own. This angers Saul and the bible says that from that moment on Saul kept a close eye on David.

 

● Jealousy- when a person is not secure on their own identity they begin to feel threatened by other people’s successes. Just as the bible says Saul kept a close eye on David, people who feel threatened by your rise and God’s blessings on your life will not be genuinely and openly happy for you because they see it a threat to WHO they are – their worth, identity and their security.

 

● deception and manipulation of circumstances  – after David got such public praise,  Saul began to do things that would take David out of the limelight. He tried to have David killed.  How can admiration turn so ugly? Jealousy and envy are murderous emotions.

 

● BLOCK SUCCESD As with Saul, when someone is threatened by your success you become a target for their clandestine efforts to bring you down. They keep a close eye on everything you have, do, succeed and thus causes then to feel envious, counting YOUR blessings instead of their own.

So I say all that to say be careful of the people around you. A simple seemingly innocent statement that had David received, made Saul get irate. Thank God for Jonathan who  God positioned to protect David.

God is great. Be aware and place your identity in Him and focus on God and God alone.