God wastes nothing. When we see repetitive words, phrases, stories, in the Bible, it is God’s way of getting our attention. It is as if He is saying, “Pay attention,” or “warning,” or “take heed.” Because of our nature, we have to hear things more than once before it starts sinking into our souls and spirit.
In culture and how the world teaches things, they make us think we are dumb or not too smart if we do not get things the first time around. That is Satan attacking our self-esteem and who we are. God has given each of us a measure of gifts and talents. We all do not get the same, nor capacity or measure.
Fortunately, God has given each of us what we need individually to do what He destines us to do on the Earth while we are here. Additionally, it amplifies our purpose. Ultimately, we are here to magnify and glorify His name… Amen! Love & Blessings!
The Bible is filled with repetition. I know this to be true with New Testament accounts of Jesus’ birth and miracles. It is retold in the Gospels by the disciples as they are share their firsthand accounts. Warnings and blessings are also repetitive, too throughout the Bible. However, another discovery I have made is the Old Testament stories are retold in different books of the Old Testament, too.
As I am being obedient to God and reading the whole Bible from cover to cover, I am currently reading Isaiah 36. Historically, this story is about the king of Assyria coming against King Hezekiah and the children of Israel. I am thinking to myself, this story is sounding very familiar. This isn’t the only time I am having this impression as I have been reading the Old Testament. However, this time I am deciding to dive deeper and investigate. So, I am starting flipping back the pages in my Bible. Immediately, God is taking me to where I read this same story in II King: 18. When I am looking at the top heading of my Bible, and perhaps yours to if you are reading King James Version, it reads in both locations, “Rab-shakeh’s blasphemy.”
Unfortunately, we have a tendency to forget things, experiences, and encounters. Brilliantly, it is another reason why God repeats things in the Bible! God is weeding out those things we no longer have to be held captive by. Invariably, through His kindness and mercy to us He will send voices of repetitiveness through the Bible and through the people in our lives. Notoriously, Satan comes to steal, kill and destroy the life-giving messages God has for our lives. Thank you, God, for the gift of repetitiveness you have given us in our lives! Love & Blessings!
There is this mystery of what we speak with our lips and what are hearts are revealing to God. More often when you look at this world that we live in, you see professed Christians taking on the beliefs of the world and culture. Some of them do it without even knowing it or thinking about it. To this point, I heard a TV minister say about abortion rights everything is not black and white and there are crisis type situations in the world.
Well, isn’t the Bible full of crisis situations, from Noah, Job, Shadrach, Meshach, Abednego, Daniel, Paul, and the Disciples? I can go on and on where people were in crisis situations. Courageously and confidently, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego refused to bow to the king and his idols. They boldly stated we know that our God is able to deliver us, but even if He doesn’t we will not bow.
Why do you think these stories are put in the Bible? They were put there for US. We need guts and grit and to Christians. Because we know all of us will face crisis type situations, life is not easy. It is hard and it is difficult. It can be complicated and messy. But through it all we have a God who loves us with an everlasting love. Invariably, He will give us strength to do His will. Additionally, the Bible states on more than one occasion that people died because of their faith. Furthermore, this is still going on today in some parts of the world. So, I ask you, where is your heart? Are you willing to serve Christ no matter the cost? Love & Blessings!
Isaiah 29:13 is a striking scripture. God was speaking. He was saying these people honor me with their lips. Yet, their hearts are far from me and their fear of me is what has been taught to them by men.
Similarly, Jesus is speaking this same ideology. In Mathew 15:8, he says these people serve me with their lips yet their hearts are far from me. Undoubtedly, one could say Jesus had the same sentiments of our Father God. Invariably, they are one.
There is this mystery of what we speak with our lips and what are hearts are revealing to God. Introspectively, when we look at this world that we live in we see professing Christians taking on the beliefs of the world and culture. Unsuspectingly, some of them are doing it without even knowing or thinking about it.
Truthfully, in our humanity we do not like everything God is asking us to do. Unquestionably, there is some tough stuff He asks us to do. If we are constantly getting upset on what God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit are asking us to do, maybe we are serving God with our lips. As a result, maybe our heart is far away from Him… Go DEEPER! Love & Blessings!
The Trinity is a mystery. God in three persons as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. So we know Jesus, the Son, was God. On the Earth, in Jesus’ humanity goes through many trials and tribulations. Ultimately, he is murdered by religious leaders who did not get him; they did not understand him. However, Jesus knows it is in God’s plan that he must die to save the world from our sins.
In Jesus’ humanity He does not want to do it. He asks the Father God three times if this cup could pass; nevertheless, not my will, but thine be done. Folks, that’s enough to shout about! He serves as an example for us.
Jesus studied the scriptures. This happens as a boy and in His hidden years before He starts His ministry. Ultimately, He is preparing himself for His ending task. Once Jesus starts His ministry He will often quote scripture from the Old Testament. He skillfully uses it against Satan when he attacks Him in the wilderness, which by the way, the Holy Spirit leads Him into.
Currently, the ladies I am ministering to are in a program called, Nurture Block. Surely, this is just what is says. Volunteers come in to share the gospel, nurture, encourage, and inspire inmates. Now, for those of you who have read my book, Where Is God, you know I have a journal section in the back of the book. Wonderfully, journaling is a beautiful way for us to cultivate our relationship with God. As an example, I have demonstrated journaling to the ladies each week by bringing my personal journal specifically for this ministry into the jail with me and share my entries each week. It is a reflection of our meetings, and the impressions God has given me as to what He next wants me to share with the ladies.
The ladies love the transparency. They enjoy me sharing my journal entries. I have encouraged them to start journaling. I have challenged them to write their strategy and plan of what they will do differently once they are no longer in jail. They are to identify people, places, and things that are triggers for them that causes them to make poor choices and that inevitably led them to jail. I inspire them to look forward to their NEW BEGINNINGS and inject some excitement about that for them. The journal is also used for them to document their prayers, requests, growth, and progress.
After 12 weeks, the ladies graduate from the program. They have a graduation ceremony with lunch from an outside vendor and cake! So, it is a special occasion for them. The ladies have an opportunity to share their testimonies. It is another step closer to their release date and to face the world once again. I see my role as also arming the ladies with their spiritual weapons and pointing them to the light of Jesus Christ.
Please continue to pray for these ladies as they have many challenges before them. But God… He is our help in ALL things! Prayers are need for all inmates, jails, prisons and staff. The recidivism rate is high among inmates. Let our prayer be that these men and women who participate in jail ministries across the world will become the example of how God can change and transform lives.
I love David’s professions to God in the Psalms. Psalm 143 really shows his confidence in God and his intimacy with Him. Boldly, he once again cries out to the Lord for Him to hear his prayer and asks not to be judged because no man can stand before our God and be justified in His sight. Astonishingly, he spews on his enemies and how they are treating him. Afterward, this causes David to feel overwhelmed and his heart is desolate. Admittedly, I have felt that way when the enemy has come after me. I can relate… Can you?
I have had moments where I felt I had been squashed by the enemy. As a result, it was all I can do to push and move forward even though I did not have the desire to. Subsequently, it forced me to make a choice. Am I going to let the enemy break my spirit or will I continue to focus on the goodness of the Lord? Amazingly, meditating and remember the things of God gives us the confidence, like David, to push on and to move forward. Undoubtedly, we serve a God of progress! Satan wants to kill, steal, and destroy. Contrarily, he hates progress.
David finds his strength in the Lord. Emphatically, he reaches out his hands. He searches for God’s lovingkindness. David decides to trust in God. He delivers his soul unto the Lord and asks for deliverance. There are more requests for God to cut off his enemies and destroy them… Wow! We see David’s humanity and boldness. We, too, can use David’s display and example of expressing our confidence in God. Love & Blessings!
Psalm 141 reads like a person who has a settled heart, a settled mind, and settled soul toward our God. It humbly starts with when I cry to you oh God immediately hear me. Let my prayers be incense to you and the lifting of my hand as a sacrifice. What a posture to put ourselves in when we come before the living God!
Next, it asks God to watch over his mouth and keep the doors of his lips. I presume this is to not say anything bad about anyone to someone else. Further, the next sentence is asking for his heart not bend toward any evil thing. As to not to practice wicked works with people who work in iniquities or sin. Furthermore, he does not want to partake in any of their schemes. What good advice for us, right?
As this Psalm concludes it asks to be corrected and reproved by the righteous in kindness as it should be an oil of excellence for him. This gives us an example of our hearts, mind, and soul being open to correction especially when done in kindness, which is a Fruit of the Spirit. When corrected in kindness our hearts, our mind, and our soul should be open to hearing our faults and errors.
Lastly, this Psalm ends on keeping our eyes upon on God. We cannot go wrong when we keep our eyes on God. It is when we start gazing at the world and what it is doing that we start sliding on a slippery slope. As this Psalm indicates when we do this it keeps us from the snares which the enemy lays before us. Ultimately, the wicked will fall into their own nets while we will escape free when we stay humble and keep our eyes on our living God. This is a Psalm to live by! Love & Blessings
Last week I talked about Psalm 71. This passage in the Psalm was so powerful that I will continue talking about the amazement of this Psalm. As I shared last week, it is a prayer of deliverance from the wicked. I believe it is a detailed description of how we should handle the wicked, evil, cruel, unrighteous, toxic people we encounter in our life.
First of all we have to realize we are not dealing with flesh and blood but against principalities, powers of the darkness and wickedness of this world (Ephesians 6:12). Furthermore, what we are experiencing is real. Regrettably, the mistake that most of us make is we want to fight against the flesh and blood, the people, we see in front of us that are causing our problems. However, spiritual warfare is a higher level and how we should be handling the wicked. Thus, if you did not read last week’s blog, I encourage you to go back and read it. Thereupon, you will be up to speed with the half of how we should conduct ourselves.
As we progress through this Psalm, it further instructs us on how we should exercise spiritual warfare and fight like a Christian. Once again, it says our mouths should be full all day long with praise and honor for God. This is how we fight the wicked! When the wicked speak and conspire against us, we ask God for strength and to stay near unto us.
Well, He has already promised He would never leave or forsake us; therefore, what a wonderful way to pray. Further, we ask God to confound and consume our enemies… Confuse them, Lord who try to hurt me! This is powerful! Additionally, pour out more and more praise unto our God by talking about His righteousness and salvation all day long. Moreover, it reminds us we do all of this in the strength of the Lord. Again, this is a high level of fighting our battles.
This is spiritual warfare against our enemies. Then we remind God of how he has taught us and for some of us it has been since our youth. Wherefore, again we rely on those things God has taught us in the past. But then it goes on to say now that I am old and perhaps gray head how we are still relying on our God.
This prayer ends in a masterful way. We not only continue to praise God with our words, but we use our songs to sing his praise. If you have no words to say, go back to your childhood songs such as, “Yes, Jesus Loves Me.” If you play a musical instrument, play your instrument unto God. Yes, this is spiritual warfare to fight the wicked.
The beauty of this prayer of asking God for the destruction of the wicked is our tongue is never used to TALK ABOUT THE WICKED. Sometimes we want to go into details of what somebody did to us. Grant it, it you must get it off your chest and you need a human to tell, find someone you trust explicitly who can keep your confidences. In honoring God, our ranting is best to be taken to the Lord. He knows. He sees. And He has already said vengeance is mine (Romans 12 :17-21).
The last verse in this Psalm reiterates, as throughout this Psalm that our tongue should talk about God’s righteousness and when we do this… the wicked, our enemies are confounded and brought to shame who tries to hurt us. Psalm 71 tells us how to pray for the destruction of the wicked. This is spiritual warfare! Love & Blessings!
My journey of reading the Bible has taken me to the book of Psalms. Surprisingly, I am finding much of what I am reading is my sentiments EXACTLY. Additionally, I must admit, it does make for fascinating reading compared to some of the other books in the Bible. Undoubtedly, Psalm 71 is a prayer for the destruction of the wicked. Whether we want to acknowledge it or not, we do have wicked people in the world. They are all around us… SMILE! In all seriousness, wicked, evil, and as Psalm 71 says, cruel people in the world.
This is a powerful prayer on many levels. First, this prayer is powerful because it is asking God for deliverance from these toxic, dark people. Second, it acknowledges God as our strong habitation, our rock and our fortress. Next, it talks about our hope in God and how we have trusted and relied on him, for some since our youth. Then we establish that our praise shall continually be in HIM! How powerful are these verses!
Verse 7 in the Psalm was so striking to me… It confesses that I am a wonder unto many! As Christians we should immediately relate to that. I have felt like a wonder to many. Have you? I remember my travels in Kenya. I was traveling alone on a safari. My driver and guide, James, said to me midway through our travels throughout Kenya, “You are different.” I quipped and asked him what he meant. He said to me you are peaceful and don’t use any curse words. I laughed out loud.
The Holy Spirit spoke to my spirit and said that is because you are representing me. That is our purpose on the Earth. We are God’s ambassadors. He uses us to get His work done on the Earth. As I have said before, it is a very humbling experience to know that the God of the universe can use us. It is truly a privilege. Be a wonder in the world. Be a wonder for God. Love and Blessings!
