I love to express what I feel called to say. Writing helps me to open up my heart and do that. I hope that what I write helps you in some way. I hope it makes you think, encourages you, or inspires you. If it challenges you or if you disagree, I hope you know that I respect your right to have a different point of view.
“All the world’s a stage and all the men and women merely players.” Life’s most important question is: Do you write your own script, follow your own program, and do your own thing or do you surrender to and obey the Spirit of the living God?
Too many Christians ghost the Holy Spirit and act like He doesn’t exist. The Holy Spirit is God, not a force. He teaches. Let Him teach you. He reminds. Let Him remind you. He leads. Let Him lead you. The Holy Spirit reveals. Let Him reveal things to you. The Holy Spirit empowers. Let Him continually empower you. He comforts. Let Him comfort you.
The Holy Spirit flows through surrendered hearts like a river. He moves through humble hearts like the wind. But proud, hard hearts shut out His activity and live unaware of His presence and reality. The Holy Spirit can be quenched, ignored, and pushed away. It’s best not to do that.
The Holy Spirit speaks spontaneously through Christ-followers. Let Him spontaneously speak through you.The Holy Spirit produces fruit. Let Him bear His fruit in and through you.The Holy Spirit gives gifts. Let Him manifest His gifts through you.
The Holy Spirit gives the gift of faith. Let Him overcome your unbelief. The Holy Spirit gives words of knowledge and wisdom. Let Him speak them through you. The Holy Spirit prophesies. Let Him prophesy through you. The Holy Spirit heals, let Him heal through you. The Holy Spirit works miracles. Let Him work miracles in and through you.
The Holy Spirit gives people supernatural discernment so that they can recognize what is from God and what isn’t. Let Him release His discernment in you. The Holy Spirit empowers people to pray in languages they don’t know. Let Him give you supernatural utterance so you can pray in the Spirit and interpret what you say.
The Holy Spirit wants to demonstrate His power. Let Him demonstrate His power in you. Walk in the Spirit. Live in the Spirit. Let your mind be set on what the Spirit desires. The Holy Spirit gives life. Let Him be the never-ending source of life in you.
The Holy Spirit testifies to our spirit about Jesus. He glorifies Jesus. Let Him always testify and glorify Jesus in you so that you can continually experience the risen Jesus in greater and greater measure.
May God overshadow our plans and programs and take full control of His gathered people? Spiritual awakening occurs when the Spirit of God is allowed to overshadow our religious programs and to take direct control of an assembly of His people. When we rely on and lean on our own understanding, opinions, and plans the Spirit is quenched. Jesus told the Pharisees: “You nullify the word of God for the sake of your tradition.”
We Christians can also lose our first love and become lukewarm. But when the God’s Spirit is surrendered to by a group of believers and those present begin to obey His inner promptings, the Son of God demonstrates His presence and reality in our midst! A sense of awe fills all present as individual people hear, obey, and speak a word from God that was spoken in their heart.
God’s overshadowing is marvelous! Jesus is knocking on the door and saying “Awake you sleeper” so that He can release more of His life in and through us. Awake to the awareness of “Christ in you.” Notice how He is nudging your heart. Surrender and obey! You’ll soon find yourself surrounded by marvels!
Then don’t just keep God’s inner marvels to yourself. Testify! Gather with other Christ-followers and let the risen Jesus overshadow you all, as you each one notice, obey, and share the Spirit’s inner nudgings. “For no word from God will ever fail.”
Biblical Christianity isn’t a Sunday spectator event. It isn’t a sport to watch in comfortable seats. It’s about full-contact, heart-to-heart interaction with the risen Jesus. Christianity is inherently interactive and participatory. “For those who are led by the Spirit are the children of God.” (See Romans 8:14.)
Fans aren’t team members. They watch and sometimes cheer but never get in the game. Be a spiritual athlete on Christ’s team. The body of Christ is called to be and to meet as a participatory culture.
If Christianity isn’t participatory with people being directly led by God’s Spirit, it has moved beyond the New Testament and become formalized. It’s not supposed to be about being a passive part of a religious audience. Christianity is the life-long participatory project of ceaselessly following and obeying the resurrected Jesus.If you aren’t daily following Jesus in a participatory way, you’re just being a religious audience member.
A Spirit-led participatory environment will shift church attendees from focusing on a pastor to community interaction that focuses on the risen Jesus. The more a church services allows and encourages spontaneous, Spirit-led participation the more Jesus is able to personally direct it.
It’s now time that Christians gather As Spirit-led Participants So Christ can be The actual Head Of His body.
This world is desperate for genuine, heart-felt hope. I admire people who keep their inner ear tuned to hope and transcribe what they hear so others can be comforted and inspired by it.
I love to hear and transcribe the words that I sense God putting in my heart so that I can share them with others. Words, spoken as prompted by God’s Spirit, speak louder than human actions.
Don’t ignore God’s greetings that spontaneously come to your heart and mind. Do not be afraid to observe and obey the Holy Spirit’s promptings within you! Instead of doubting, wonder with awe at what God is saying and doing inside of you. Let God’s life develop and flow from your innermost being like rivers of living water.
When God’s still small voice appears in your heart, He’s not giving you obstacles. He’s giving you miracles! Don’t demand the full picture from God. Simply follow Him in faith — being led by the Spirit one prompting at a time.
The Holy Spirit has come to comfort, teach, and lead the people of God from within them. Align your heart, obey, and be transformed! The priesthood of the believer means pastor or plumber, physician or painter, professor or puppeteer, paralegal or pharmacist, psychiatrist, or parking attendant can all hear from God, be directly led by His Spirit, and speak His very thoughts.
Biblical Christianity is about experiencing heart-to-heart intimacy and ongoing community with Christ and His followers. It’s not a religious organization!
Words, spoken or written (and obeyed) as prompted by God’s Spirit, speak louder than human actions or opinions. Continually ask yourself this question: WIJTMTSAD? What is Jesus telling me to say and do? Then obey.
I smile and enjoy life without cartoons. What I watch, look at, think about, and behold lights up my heart and makes me joyously ponder and live in awe and wonder.
Passing by God’s presence, Overlooking the bushes Ablaze with testimony About their Creator And the glorious sky That declares His greatness, We humans tend to walk Relying on our own shoes, Trusting our own feelings, Opinions, and desires To lead and direct us, Instead of the Spirit Of our Emmanuel, Jesus Christ, “God with us.”
It’s a wonderful life To surrender to Christ And let Him take control So He can make you whole!
Being born again Is to awaken to The awareness of God And become so conscious Of the presence of Christ That you let Him come And live His life In and through you As your hope of glory.
Spiritual growth is Little by little, Moment by moment, Step by step, Becoming more and more Like Jesus Christ As you let Him Work within you To overflow your heart With the fruit Of His Spirit.
When Jesus is presented As distant, dead, or in Heaven It can be rather boring, But when He is presented And demonstrated to be Active, living, and present There’s life changing excitement!
————-MCPA!———— Make Church Participatory Again! (See 1 Corinthians 14:26.) (Google: Beyond Church Ekklesia.)
Don’t just go to church. Head directly to the Head of the body of Christ and say and do what He tells you to! If you’ve got the notion and it aligns with the Bible, it’s most like from God.
A Spirit-prompted notion Is more than an emotion. If you’ll truly obey it, It leads to pure devotion.
I want less darkness in my life and more light. I want less self-focus and more love for others. I want less ego and more humility. I want less defensiveness and more kindness. I want less sin and more purity.
There’s enmity between sin and sanctity. You can’t welcome both sin and the Holy Spirit in your heart at the same time. Focusing on one will distance you from the other.
Sin embraced is Christ denied. Christ embraced crushes the sin that’s in your heart and drives it out. The one you host the most will win the day. “Set your mind on things above, not on earthly things.” Spend your time and energy “looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith.”
Sin brings shame and shame makes us lame. Instead of limping through life in the shadow of sin’s shame, Jesus invites people to soar in the strength of His Spirit.
Focus on, welcome, and embrace God’s inner voice, not sin’s temptations. Welcome and obey your conscience, not your cravings and compulsions. Fight the good fight of faith — so that you can truly rely on and totally depend on the presence and power of the risen Jesus throughout each day. Be persistently led by the Spirit, not by sin.
Nothing can compare to the wonder of keeping your heart and mind centered on the living Jesus. These words — happy, blessed, high, thrilled, delighted, jubilant, elated, and enraptured — can’t begin to describe how keeping my attention focused on Jesus makes me feel!
Staying focused on Jesus requires much more than passive church attendance. It requires ongoing concentration and yearning for His presence. (In fact, with so much attention in a church service focused on the person upfront, it makes it hard for me to zero in on the presence of the risen Jesus during the Sunday program.)
There’s enmity Between sin And sanctity. Sin produces shame. Shame makes us lame. Learn to live and walk Throughout each day Led by God’s Spirit. Walk a pure walk Don’t just talk the talk.
There’s a song in my heart that grows stronger and more joyful every year. It overflows with hope and positive words. The beautiful melodies in my heart strengthen and empower me. I try to unceasingly listen to them and let them lift me up. My inner song comes from: “Christ in you, the hope of glory.”
Christ came to “enable us to serve Him without fear in holiness and righteousness.” (Luke 1:74-75.) He came to “to shine on those living in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the path of peace.” (Luke 1:79.) Jesus came to give us light and to guide us from within by supernatural revelation!
Christianity is about the living Jesus Christ healing and revealing Himself to human hearts. It’s not about a religious institution.
“God who commanded the light to shine out of darkness has shinned in our heart to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.” (2 Corinthians 4:6.) Are you continually receiving and living in Christ’s light of revelation?
The foundation rock of Christianity is neither a religious institution nor theological information. It’s the light of Christ’s supernatural revelation shining brightly in your heart. It’s so much more than human organization or doctrinal explanation. “You must be born again.”
Let the risen Jesus Revelation-ize And revive your heart With attentive ears That hear what the Spirit Is saying within you And supernatural eyes That see the Lamb of God.
Jesus is the Light. The closer we get To the risen Jesus The more the darkness Is exposed in our heart. Too many Christians Use religion to avoid Getting too close to Jesus.
The beauty of nature (both plants and animals) amazes me! However, there is another beauty that amazes me even more. That’s the beauty of seeing the reality of Jesus Christ living in and flowing through everyday people.
When people are filled with awe and wonder in the presence of the living Jesus Christ, they can’t stop exuberantly talking about Him and how He wows them. That is contagious Christianity and it’s a super-spreader!
I believe (and the book of Acts seems to indicate) that overwhelming awe that causes people to daily live undone and surrendered to the presence of the risen Jesus is the missing ingredient in contemporary Christianity. That lack of awe often keeps Christ-followers from openly and enthusiastically proclaiming and demonstrating the presence, power, and love of Jesus.
When the risen Jesus Is the one true Header Christianity is A super-spreader And a doubt shredder That wakes people up To the presence of Christ.
When Christianity Shifted from mystical (From being Spirit-led With Jesus as the Head) To analytical And statistical, It became logistical And egotistical.
Set your pride To the side So that Christ Can reside Within you And be your Inner Guide.
For joy unspeakable: Let God be your inner Guide. Live in rhythm with Jesus. Stay in step with the Spirit.
A dead God needs a religious organization to speak for him, but the risen Jesus can speak for Himself. “My sheep hear My voice.”
There is a book that is very special to me. When I read it, it inspires me and transports me to my favorite place. Reading it with my heart wide open fills my consciousness with the awareness of God and places me in the presence of the living Jesus Christ.
The Bible can overpower your doubt and release God’s wonder and awe within you. “Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God.”
Sometimes, when I feel prompted to tell a group of people about the importance of the Bible, I’ll have it hidden close to me. Then I begin to talk and suddenly I start to shake, squirm, and stammer as I excitedly say, “It’s alive! It’s alive! My God, it’s alive!”
Then I quickly pull out the Bible, hold it up for all to see, and say: “It’s the Word of God and it’s alive!” People are a bit stunned, so I say, “The living words in this book can burn in your heart and make you aware of the presence of God.”
Jesus told His disciples that the Holy Spirit “will remind you of everything I have said to you.” I’ve discovered that the Holy Spirit often reminds me of a Bible verse. There is a big difference between me trying to remember a Scripture (like trying to remember someone’s name) and God bringing a Bible verse to my mind.
When the Holy Spirit reminds me of a Scripture, I hear the miraculous. It goes beyond my human understanding and speaks directly and profoundly to my heart. That isn’t supposed to be something rare. It should be a common experience for a Christ-follower.
So how can you experience the Holy Spirit bringing a Bible verse to your remembrance? Well, first you have to have read or heard something from the Bible. (You can’t remember something you’ve never read, heard, or experienced.) The more you read the Bible the more of it the Holy Spirit can remind you about.
Next, ask God to remind you of a Bible verse. (“You have not because you ask not.” So, ask.) Then don’t try to use your mind to come up with a Scripture. Instead, simply quiet your mind and wait for one to appear. When a Scripture comes to you, refuse to analyze it with your brain. Rather let it touch your heart. Then you will notice that when an unanalyzed Bible verse is allowed to go deep into your heart it will have an amazing impact on you. Try it and see for yourself!
Asking the Holy Spirit to prompt you with Scriptures will revolutionize your life. Doubting the Spirit’s ability to do that (and only reading the Bible with your own understanding or with the analysis of a Bible commentary) will confuse you. Because we modern day Christians have been trained to merely read and analyze the Bible with our mind (or listen to a preacher’s analysis of it) and not to open up and surrender our heart to it, we tend to be “silent and not able to speak” from our heart about what Jesus has done and is doing within us and through us.
A closed heart closes the door on the power of Scripture and the Spirit’s ability to bring it to our remembrance. Then we can’t see the wonder that is staring at us when we read or hear the Bible speaking deep within us.
Perhaps it’s time to let God prophesy over you directly from His Word. Don’t dissect the Bible verses that come to your mind. Savor them! Obey them!
The Bible can overpower your doubt and release God’s wonder and awe within you. “Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God.”
Sometimes, when I feel prompted to tell a group of people about the importance of the Bible, I’ll have it hidden close to me. Then I begin to talk and suddenly I start to shake, squirm, and stammer as I excitedly say, “It’s alive! It’s alive! My God, it’s alive!”
Then I quickly pull out the Bible, hold it up for all to see, and say: “It’s the Word of God and it’s alive!” People are a bit stunned, so I say, “The living words in this book can burn in your heart and make you aware of the presence of God.”
Jesus told His disciples that the Holy Spirit “will remind you of everything I have said to you.” I’ve discovered that the Holy Spirit often reminds me of a Bible verse. There is a big difference between me trying to remember a Scripture (like trying to remember someone’s name) and God bringing a Bible verse to my mind.
When the Holy Spirit reminds me of a Scripture, I hear the miraculous. It goes beyond my human understanding and speaks directly and profoundly to my heart. That isn’t supposed to be something rare. It should be a common experience for a Christ-follower.
So how can you experience the Holy Spirit bringing a Bible verse to your remembrance? Well, first you have to have read or heard something from the Bible. (You can’t remember something you’ve never read, heard, or experienced.) The more you read the Bible the more of it the Holy Spirit can remind you about.
Next, ask God to remind you of a Bible verse. (“You have not because you ask not.” So, ask.) Then don’t try to use your mind to come up with a Scripture. Instead, simply quiet your mind and wait for one to appear. When a Scripture comes to you, refuse to analyze it with your brain. Rather let it touch your heart. Then you will notice that when an unanalyzed Bible verse is allowed to go deep into your heart it will have an amazing impact on you. Try it and see for yourself!
Asking the Holy Spirit to prompt you with Scriptures will revolutionize your life. Doubting the Spirit’s ability to do that (and only reading the Bible with your own understanding or with the analysis of a Bible commentary) will confuse you. Because we modern day Christians have been trained to merely read and analyze the Bible with our mind (or listen to a preacher’s analysis of it) and not to open up and surrender our heart to it, we tend to be “silent and not able to speak” from our heart about what Jesus has done and is doing within us and through us.
A closed heart closes the door on the power of Scripture and the Spirit’s ability to bring it to our remembrance. Then we can’t see the wonder that is staring at us when we read or hear the Bible speaking deep within us.
Perhaps it’s time to let God prophesy over you directly from His Word. Don’t dissect the Bible verses that come to your mind. Savor them! Obey them!
(I don’t believe that God intended for Christianity to become a non-prophet organization. He wants it to be the Spirit-led body of Christ where “you can all prophesy in turn so that everyone may be instructed and encouraged.” See 1 Corinthians 14:31. True worship isn’t a “service,” a sermon, or a Bible study. It’s a human heart overflowing with honest sincere adoration of God. “A time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks.” See John 4:23.)
Fact: Throughout history multitudes of people have been willing to kill and be killed in the name of their country, but very few have been willing to love their enemies in the name of Jesus. Perhaps we should listen to Christ and begin to honor, recruit, train, and send huge armies of nonviolent peacemakers to love their enemies in the world’s troubled places.
Nowadays our modern media through the violence it portrays is brainwashing ordinary people to kill and be killed and exposing our streets, shops, and even our schools to lethal violence.
Free Gas for Your Think Tank -- Fill Your Mind and Your Heart With Hope 