Filed under: Communing with the Holy Spirit, Humility, Jesus, Maturity, The Cross, Trust
To be like Jesus means we embrace humility and love those who deny and despise us. We see His heart open wide and weep for Israel as they drive Him out of cities and attempt to stone Him. We see how he reacted in love and tenderness towards Peter’s denial of Him. As He hung bleeding from the cross, arms open wide, taking upon Himself the sin of us all, He loved from the depths of His being, feeling the pain but not reacting out of it. In the cross He won our battle and succeeded but He succeeded by walking through disgrace. He was not pretentious but was truth itself. He healed the sick. He raised the dead. He did not withhold the gifts the Father gave Him. He was not self-sabotaging but came as an example to us of true Life. He did only what the Father told Him to do and did not withhold out of insecurity or pride. In the midst of rejection, He spoke truth boldly yet lived to serve humanity.
To be like Him means that we end the self-sabotaging, self-deprecating and false humility. We walk out our gifts not to esteem ourselves but to serve Jesus and man. We don’t shrink back because of our fear of failure but in meekness within the bounds of intimacy we offer all that we have.
Last week my mom called me in a rage explaining that she and a friend got into an argument. She and this friend have known each other for years now but one day, her friend, out of nowhere declared that Jesus was in fact not God. “God wouldn’t die for me”, she responded, “that’s ludicrous!”. My mom was indignant. How could this woman say that? Her friend had grown up in a very conservative denomination. My mom pointed out the famous John 1:1… “1In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” I mean… that’s pretty self-explanatory. I’ve had some pretty stiff disagreements with people who have said that you can still be saved and not believe Jesus was God. WHAT???
Yesterday, I was meditating on this verse and hope began filling my heart. We cannot be saved unless we believe that God, Himself, came to earth as a human because He loves humans and wanted to identify with humans. Only God can be perfect as Jesus is perfect and in order for us to be saved we had to have the perfect sacrifice for our sins. Nothing can remedy and restore our souls but the perfect blood of the perfect God-man. The blood of bulls and goats was not enough. And not only this but the blood of Jesus has supernatural elements that empower us to walk in holiness. It has allowed us access into the very presence of God, to have communion with Him and to allow Him to speak to us and teach us and empower us to walk worthy before Him. Jesus did not stay in the tomb. That was not the end of the story. We cannot have relationship with Him unless He had risen. He cannot speak to us unless He is alive.
I love the rest of the passage as well: John 1:1-5 ” 1In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2He was with God in the beginning.
3Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. 4In him was life, and that life was the light of men. 5The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood[a] it.”
Jesus was the very Word of God. He was the method the Father used to communicate to His beloved ones. He loved and desired us to such a great extent that He sent His beautiful Son to come and teach humanity truth. The Father and Son had such wonderful fellowship, even from the beginning of all things. Before the earth was formed, they were in relationship. Jesus, the Word of God, breathed life into every living thing. He is the source of life. The source of light and truth and darkness cannot overcome it. This Light is so powerful that darkness has no chance against it. Even when the wicked rages against the Light and goes to battle against it, there is no defeating the light. The source of life cannot lose the battle with death.
The darkness does not understand the light… mainly because it’s deeds are evil and it does not want to turn to the Light. The darkness loves to remain the way it is. If Light challenges darkness (and it will), the darkness will hate the Light.
Walk in the Light while it is still day.
Filed under: Communing with the Holy Spirit, Healing, Intimacy with God, Jesus Loves Me, Prayer, Prophetic Dreams, Thankfulness, The Cross
I feel as though I’ve been buried under rubble all of my life and in the last couple of weeks hope has come and lifted off of me the weight of the world and the even greater wait of hopelessness that has been the tiger on my back all of my life. Part of this lifting began as I hid myself in the secret place; a dark bedroom with a dim lamp, a few candles and the Holy Spirit. Instead of repeating to myself over and over (like I have my entire life) “you’re so stupid”, “you’re worthless” , “you can’t do anything right”, “you’re ugly” and even the weird conundrum of “all you are is a pretty face”… I’m actually praying scripture… truth about who God is… that He is kind, patient, mighty to save, good, generous, attentive, caring and loving. I’ve been praying scriptures about who I am to Him with truth such as “His delight”, “separated and kept”, “dark but lovely”, “the object of His desire”, “belonging to Him”, “recipient of His loving devotion”, “the joy set before Him”, “the apple of His eye”, His special treasure”.
I use to have doubts that tongue held so much power as James 3 speaks about but it really does. Speaking forth truth to a precious God who is attentive and loves hearing our voices does wonders for identity issues. And when we speak these things out and wait to hear His observations on this truth… that’s when He comes. This is when He makes His love known and whispers mysteries that shift things in our hearts. For the first time in my life I’ve been able to separate the truths from the lies as He speaks to me about how He is making me strong. He speaks to me about His great passion to make tragedies into something profoundly breathtaking and glorious and He does not withhold this from anyone who comes to Him in faith. NOT FROM ANYONE (even from me). He loves the great exchange of His life and love for our pain and despair. And He loves weaving it into an ornate tapestry of the charecter of God and His tenderness and kindness and compassion toward human beings.
To end I will share a rather tender dream that I have been holding onto for awhile. In it, I was standing in the back bookstore office talking to a friend and co-worker. There were other people in the room which gave it a “public” feel (which I realized now represents the prayer room). She was rebuking me for speaking rudely and unkindly to someone she loved. In that moment I felt the grief of having caused someone else pain. I repented for my behaviour and became frustrated with myself. I began telling my friend that I was so sorry and explained to her various things that had happened in my childhood and how I still sometimes act out of that deep pain. She started walking out of the room and beckoned me to come follow her. We walked into a hidden storage area (that actually does not exist in reality). She turned around to get something behind her and when she stood to face me again, I could see tears running down her face. She was weeping for me. I could see the compassion in her eyes as she understood and knew the things that I had experienced. She felt my pain. In her hands were a pair of pants and on top of them was my Bible. The dream ended.
I woke up wondering at first what in the world the pants were for. What did all of this mean? As I met her (representing the Holy Spirit) in the secret place she was covering my shame… with TRUTH. I was seeing the Holy Spirit’s compassion over my life and identifying with it in a deep way. Yes… He is wild and untamed but He’s also gentle and tender with our hearts. He “knows we are but dust”. He’s been there and experienced pain much more profoundly than anything we have experienced.
I was meditating on John 17:23 this morning.
23 I in them and you in me—so that they may be brought to complete unity. Then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.
It is astounding to think that God the Father loves us as much as He loves Jesus. Jesus is perfect and obedient and beautiful and has never once turned His back on the Father yet the Father loves us as equally as Him.
I thought of the parable of the lost sheep and how the Father left His Son to hang on the cross. He left Him… so that the Father could come after us. So that the Father could be in relationship with us… the mangy, lost, disobedient, unruly sheep….
Filed under: Biblical love, Faith, Forgiveness, Jesus Loves Me, Sin, The Cross, Trust
Last night I had a long talk with my (earthly) dad about a very hurtful situation that is happening right now. I’ve had two moments of significant betrayal in my life. One when I was twelve years old and another when I was 23. For the first time, my dad and I were able to sort through the situation that happened when I was a kid. For the first time I was able to hear the whole story and I was able to share with him some things that happened to me in the midst of that in which he never knew about.
I was up last night weeping about the trail of blood that has been left behind in the aftermath of this current situation. Not just my own minor feeling of betrayal but the pain many others must be feeling, namely a certain family. I was up until about 5am as Jesus walked me back through that original moment of betrayal as a child. The Lord spoke to me that all of the reactions I’ve had to pain from others or even perceived affliction from others were actually reactions from the incident when I was 12 years old. As I allowed the Lord to meet me in that time and space when true anger and rage built a well in my heart and a wall around my spirit… I made a decision. I chose to forgive. I chose to love. To subconciously still be living in that incident 17 years later had been a waste of my heart.
To extend mercy is compassion. It’s not our own shallow version of subconscious, self-seeking humanitarianism. True compassion says to a repentant soul: “Jesus poured His mercy on me, and in turn I want to be like Him and extend the same gift to you. He has forgotten my sin and now I will forget yours.” There is grace for the process of forgiveness depending on the depth of the wound inflicted. Jesus is patient as we sort out the dilemmas of our broken hearts. And most importantly, He clearly promises to redeem ALL things. This is where true hope lies. No matter the weight of darkness that surrounds us. No matter the depth of sin we’ve been victimized by. No matter the pain of knowing of we have hurt our loved ones in the greatest ways imaginable….
He is our hope. The only true hope. And one day He will remove pain and destruction and sin and He will wipe it from this planet forever.
Last night I had one of those simple concepts in the gospel come alive to me in a way that it never has before. Some of us know in our head that Jesus was a man (who was also God) but do we really realize that he actually felt the pain and rejection others inflicted upon Him? He didn’t identify Himself through the deceptive lense or react in a unhealthy way to this rejection and insult but he felt and contained in His heart the pain of it… yet He still loved the people that murdered Him. In fact He let them murder Him BECAUSE He loved them.
How in the world did He do this?
About a month ago I did a very stupid thing. I let my car insurance lapse for ONE NIGHT. I thought: oh, I’ll drive down to the office in the afternoon and pay for it. I won’t get in a wreck before then. I never get in wrecks… at least wrecks that are my own fault, so I didn’t think much about it. Well, upon trying to squeeze my big lug of a mini-van into a parking space at IHOP around 10 the next morning, I dented the corner of the bumper next to me. THIS NEVER HAPPENS. I could have done the really dishonest thing and pretended like this hadn’t happened, but I apparently have enough fear of the Lord to realize that some day I would have to answer to the King of Kings for what I had done. So I left a note on the girl’s car with a phone number. Of course the insurance company recently decided they weren’t going to cover it. I knew that it was all due to my irresponsibilty and deserved to pay for my sin, though I didn’t know where the money was going to come from to pay for that sin. You see… I work for the International House of Prayer. That should be enough to explain the dire circumstance.
Before I give you the next bit of information, I should also share what happened last night to explain just how amazing and kind our God is. Last night was confession night in my inner healing group. I had to sit in front of several women and share with them all of the unconfessed sin in my life. It was terribly beautiful but mostly terrible. But His mercy is so vast that in the end I was able to get through the process while leaning into Him.
Well, this morning I came into my office and checked my e-mail only to find a message from the girl who’s car I had inflicted a $1,000 dollars in damage upon. In the e-mail she explained that her Dad believed that the Lord wanted to bless me and that I didn’t have to pay for the damage that I had done. It was covered.
Do we have a gracious God or WHAT? It was a perfect picture of his unchanging, merciful nature. I totally deserved to pay for what I did. I had sinned big-time yet God, in his mercy covered my sin and took it upon himself just like this earthly dad did for some girl he’s never even met.
The only thought of mine that is worthy of broadcasting to the online world is: MERCY TRIUMPHS OVER JUDGEMENT… and well let’s be honest… it’s not really my thought but an expression of His very heart.
Thank you Jesus!
The other night I was having some quiet time with Jesus when I heard Him tell me to be “blunt and intrusive”. I hope that’s God, because it sounds pretty risky. I had a feeling that Jesus was going to be giving me an oppurtunity to be “blunt and intrusive” without being a jerk but speaking the truth in love. I have a reputation for speaking my mind too easily and sometimes it doesn’t come off very nicely. Suprisingly, I got a word a few months ago that God was going to be giving me even more boldness, but in a way that is actually pleasing to the Lord.
Well tonight I was given that really… strange… oppurtunity. I went out to eat with a girl I had just met at church and as we were talking, alarms started to sound in my head. The girl quoted things from scripture that were completely out of context and seemed to think that the cross was a license for sin. I felt sick to my stomach and firmly but gently looked her in the eye and spoke truth to her. Our mutual friend decided to interrupt after that because she could see some serious fireworks about to go off but I’m hoping that my words stick with this girl.
I guess it affected me so strongly because I use to be that girl. I didn’t like others to tell me what I was doing wrong. I thought I could mock the love of Jesus by continuing in my sin without consequence. Isen’t it funny when we see how God can use even the sin from our past for something good? It almost helps me to laugh at the enemy when he lies and tells me that I’m still the same girl. I hope that this girl starts to get a revelation that the power of the cross is not to be mocked but to be accessed to stay away from sin… not to make excuses for it.
Filed under: Communing with the Holy Spirit, Eternity, Fear of the Lord, Intimacy with God, Jesus, The Cross
The other day, for the first time since I’ve been at IHOP, I found myself asking the question: what am I doing here? Everything in me wants to run out and get a normal job with a normal paycheck. Somehow each month I seem to have the money to pay my rent and buy food and I don’t know how it happens… it just does and it just affirms the fact that this is where I’m suppose to be but other times I feel like beating my head against a wall. I want so much to have control over my own destiny but Jesus keeps saying, “just sit here and receive. This is how it’s gonna happen, Brooke. This is it. This is what you’re here for.”
I’ve honestly had a lot of grace in my prayer times in the morning but then I go home and everything hits the fan. I’m confronted with the reality of my weakness every second I’m out of the prayer room and I am getting frustrated the more God seems to be asking for more of me. Am I willing to give Him everything? I don’t know…. EVERYTHING??? That’s so scary! I want the revelation that I’m here for something much greater, that I’m living for eternity. It is so painful being in this place of waiting on Him. As He exposes those hidden hurts, the blatant weaknesses and sin, it is almost unbearable. I just keep hearing from Him, my grace is sufficient for you and I do believe it. I know that I have access to a life of abandonment because of the cross, because He has poured his grace upon me, because His Spirit lives inside me. What’s absalutely killing me is the fact that I have to take steps to get there and what’s killing me even more is that the step is as simple as sitting before Him outside of my sacred trust I can’t even seem to give Him that. I know that’s what He’s asking of me. Jesus, do whatever it takes to get me there. We need you, Lord. We cannot, CANNOT do this without you. Help!!
