Re:The Kingdom of God In You & A Whole Lot of Shakin' (635 Views)
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Anonymous User
Re:The Kingdom of God In You & A Whole Lot of Shakin' (635 Views) June 30, 2009 10:44AM |
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A few days ago I responded to a post in another site entitled:"The Kingdom of God In You & A Whole Lot Of Shakin'" I hestitated posting it here but have decided to do so. I believe the message is important and we must be open and willing to what God wants to do in the days ahead. God bless!
RE:The Kingdom of God In You & A Whole Lot Of Shakin'
Amen and amen!
And I can sure say a lot more than that :-) This morning as I lay in bed trying to sort things out in my head I said to the Lord, "I have never passed this way before and I am not quite sure how to proceed. How does one grieve the passing of one you have loved and shared your life with for 40 years and yet still glorify God? Even to share this here is a step of faith, believing God has asked me to respond to your post. Writing is so difficult for me for it requires going deep into the heart and I am not ready to quite yet. But out of obedience, with tissues at the ready and tears blurring the screen, go I.
The word you have shared is spot on! Jesus said, "Seek ye first the kingdom of God and His righteousness and all these thing shall be added unto you" (Matthew 6:33). And, as you have shared here, His kingdom abides in us. I must confess that even in my prayers I have asked the Lord, "Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven" as if God would be persuaded to bring His kingdom here. Well, duh, look at these two verses together - His kingdom already is here, in us, and He is waiting for us to walk in His kingdom truths and power! All that was needed for us to do so was done by Jesus. At the cross He said, "It is finished." Now we are to reap that which our beloved Lord has sown and then, as His followers, sow it into the hearts of others. Now I must admit, it sounds a whole lot easier than it appears. Oh, how I wish it were easy. Then again, maybe it is easier than we know, "only believe."
I am coming from a place of great vulnerability as I share this with you. During the past several months of Billy's illness I sank my teeth into God's Word and promises like a pit bull. Even though circumstances were contrary to what the Word said I ran to God and said, "Father, Your Word says..." and hung unto that. Can't count the times I said, "Lord, help my unbelief," or, "I need Your strength, Lord, I can't do it anymore. I need help." And there were times when I would cry out, "Lord, I don't understand! Your Word says....." and then I would share what applied at that moment. Lot? Oh, I am sure many can relate to his story, right? As weak as I knew I was at times and when I felt I could not go on anymore, the Lord was faithful each time, providing help and strength as it was needed. Thank You, Lord. Bless His Holy Name!
Visiting nurses, doctors, spiritual counselors looked at me with compassionate but concerned eyes as I held fast to God's Word and looked to Billy's healing to manifest in the natural. In my being I knew that I was have faith in God's Word. God is not a man that He should lie. Each day I expected Billy to rise from his sick bed and be whole. There would be thoughts that would come my way, thoughts that were contrary to what I believed the Lord was saying for me to do, to believe Him at His Word. Several times the thought of King David praying and fasting for his sick child, crying out to God that his child would be healed. Then healing did not come and the people were astonished that after the child's death David ceased his vigil and began to eat again. Were these thoughts coming from the enemy or from God??? I did not know. What I did know was that my assignment was "to believe God at His Word." And that is what I strived to do though I had major moments of weakness and some doubt but how faithful was the Holy Spirit to bring me back on track. Thank You, My Friend!
What does this have to do with your post, you might ask? Much I believe. It just hit me that over 2,000 years later all that Jesus came to do and fulfill has not yet reaped. In our world there is a time frame. In His there is not. Jesus was not deterred from His mission because of the darkness in the world He walked in. Rather, He knew that He was bringing Light into its midst and that is how we are to see things. We have Christ in us, the hope of glory, praise be to God! We are not to walk by sight but we are to be walk by faith, declaring those things that are not as though they were. We are not to be moved by the circumstances that is around us but we are to move the circumstances so that they line up with God's Word. How do we do that? By faith in Him which He sent and taking Him at His Word, seeking Him for our small part in His big plan and then moving forward in it.
The prophetic words spoken through a teenage girl many years ago during intercession still ring strong in my spirit, "Do not be surprised when I answer your prayer and it does not come forth the way you expect." I believe God is answering the prayers of many intercessors that have gone up over the years, decades and even centuries. With all that is in me I know that I know that God is going to move mightily in America - not because we want Him to but because that is His will. He has placed stakes into this land through those who claimed it for Him and the fulfillment of those prayers and declarations is about to take place if we only "believe." Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of that which is unseen. Without faith it is impossible to please God. We are not meant to be men pleasers but God pleasers no matter what appears to be happening in the natural. This world is not our home. We are but visitors here meant to bring His kingdom into the earth through Christ in us, even if it comes at personal pain to us. I find comfort in the fact that even our precious Lord asked our heavenly Father to "take this cup from Me." Yet even more inspirational is His Words, "not My will but Your will be done." Wow! This is Him that we are to follow after. Not my will, Father, but Your will be done, even at the cost of our very lives. Dear saints, our Beloved spoke this words to us an example, " Most assuredly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the ground and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it produces much grain." Jesus showed us that His very death would bring forth much grain/fruit and here we are as His followers complaining when we see some of our comforts taken away! This shaking that is taking place is for our own good, so that we and others will run to Him and not seek the things of this world as our all in all. Christ Jesus alone is to be our All in all. In the midst of this darkness that is now present in this world, His light will shine brightly! Glory to God! Being vessels of His light it will come at a price and He is seeking those who are willing to pay it.
I asked a dear brother in Christ to do the memorial service for Billy. Tim, being both a pastor and worship leader, shared how Billy had touched him and changed his life through his singing of "All For Jesus" which is one of Billy's favorite songs. Tim went on to say that though Billy would not have won American Idol, it was his heart and passion for His Lord that touched both the Lord and others. Dear Saints, you don't have to have a good voice (or great skills) to be used by God. True love for Him will ignite His Spirit within you, touching others. That is what God is looking for.
Tim went on to sing "All For Jesus" in honor of Billy and as soon as the words began I knew I had to stand, not in honor of Billy but in honor of our Lord, Jesus Christ. I could feel His presence so strong and amongst shaking and tears I surrendered my precious Billy into the arms of our Lord, knowing that he truly was a gift from God. I also surrendered my disappointment in Billy's not receiving his healing in this world, knowing that it had come to him in heaven. The next day I went to look to see if I could get the song "All For Jesus" as a ring tone for my cell phone. I listened to it several times before realizing that the Lord was not only asking me to surrender my precious husband to Him without bitterness but that He was also asking me to surrender "all my ambitions, hopes and plans" which I believed Billy and I would accomplish side by side. Please understand that I am not sharing this to shine a light on me. Right now I feel so totally broken that I cannot even imagine the Lord using me. I am so needy of Him and so grateful for His faithfulness, for the saints who have, and are, upholding my family and myself in prayer, grateful that my husband is not suffering anymore and missing him as much I will allow myself to miss him before the pain becomes unbearable. I truly do not know what life holds ahead of me. I can't go there now. What I can do is strive to rest in Him who holds our lives in His hands.
Through all of this trial and tribulation I have come to know that God is wanting us to "take Him at His Word." The enemy is striving to do everything he can to take our eyes off of Jesus, the Living Word, and place them upon the things that are happening in the world. If we are called to be overcomers does it not sound reasonable that we will have in our lives something to overcome? And if we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us does that not indicate that there is something to conquer? 2 Corinthians 5:7 says we live by faith, not by sight. We must ask ourselves if we are doing this. If things in the natural are more real to us than that which is in God’s Word and that which He has placed into our hearts then we need to check our hearts and our motives. We are called to be believers then let us believe no matter what we see before us! I am also coming to understand that sometimes our very lives are to be used as that "grain of wheat that falls to the ground, withers and dies" so that great fruit can come from it. Can’t say that I understand it all but do we not know that God’s Word does not return void? Now, do I believe that God caused Billy to die? No more than I believe that God caused Jesus to die. Cancer took Billy’s life, just as sin brought Jesus’ death - but only for a moment! The grave could not hold Him nor can it hold us who are in Christ Jesus. Hallelujah!!! That is reason for shouting!!!
I also know that God will take that which the enemy meant for harm and will turn it to good for those who love Him. Saints, we are in a war and there is casualties in war. The apostles are proof of that! Yet what they sacrificially gave of themselves to spread the kingdom of God upon the earth continues to multiply to their account even today. Many might look at Billy’s death with great sadness and even possibly think that he lacked the faith to receive his healing upon the earth. But knowing my Sweetheart he trusted the Lord to the end, having already surrendered his life to Him, saying "not my will but Your will be done." Now I don’t know if that is why Billy passed from this world into the next. There is much I do not understand but I do know he poured his life out for others for the glory of God. The very day Billy’s body was laid to rest one of our sons-in-law was touched by the Holy Spirit and he told his wife that night, "I get it! I get it? You're not all a bunch of fruit loops! Your dad got me. He got me. He put the Word into my heart and now I get it. He didn't have to go to such extremes, but he got me. I want to raise our children the way God wants us to raise them. I want you to teach me God’s Word!…" This is paraphrasing some of what he said to our daughter but I can tell you that this man became transformed through Christ Jesus. A new light came into his eyes, he is seeing things differently and honestly, he has become a new man! It is really a miracle to behold. I’ve never seen anything like it before and I find myself going from great joy in this life added to the kingdom and to the sadness I feel cause Billy’s not here physically to share this joy with. I know he knows but, wow! And that is but one of several things that is happening through Billy’s life and passing that is glorifying the Lord. Just yesterday I was amazed to hear by a neighbor who runs an abused women’s group that a man came and gave a testimony about sharing about a funeral he had just gone to of a man who had a brain tumor, a man and that he had only known for a short time, visiting him in the hospital and at home and then attending his funeral when he passed on. He shared the testimony of this man’s life, that throughout the suffering he endured never did he complain or say an evil word. He continued to trust God for His promises and held close to Him even to the end. It wasn’t until later that my neighbor found out that the man who’s testimony was being shared was Billy! Praise be to God. How that so deeply touched my heart as God let us know that Billy is still serving Him even though he is with the Lord. Cool, huh? Is that not how it should be with all of us? The seeds that Billy planted in the lives of others is already sprouting forth. And I fully believe that when we hold fast to God’s Word no matter what the circumstances around us looks like, it produce seed in the spiritual realm which grows in the natural realm as well.
I thank for your indulgence as I know this is long and a bit disjointed. I pray the Holy Spirit speak that which is needed for each of you in your journey with the Lord. We live in the best of times and in the worst of times, depending on whom we believe and whom we serve.
Let us allow the Kingdom of God in us to arise and let us trust that His Word is yea and amen. Remember the enemy is a liar. God is faithful and true. Jesus is The Way, The Truth and The Life. Let us set our lives down that He might arise and move through us. Amen? God bless you all and may He brings perfect peace be your constant companion, in Jesus’ name I pray. Amen.
May His will be done through us,
Joan
RE:The Kingdom of God In You & A Whole Lot Of Shakin'
Amen and amen!
And I can sure say a lot more than that :-) This morning as I lay in bed trying to sort things out in my head I said to the Lord, "I have never passed this way before and I am not quite sure how to proceed. How does one grieve the passing of one you have loved and shared your life with for 40 years and yet still glorify God? Even to share this here is a step of faith, believing God has asked me to respond to your post. Writing is so difficult for me for it requires going deep into the heart and I am not ready to quite yet. But out of obedience, with tissues at the ready and tears blurring the screen, go I.
The word you have shared is spot on! Jesus said, "Seek ye first the kingdom of God and His righteousness and all these thing shall be added unto you" (Matthew 6:33). And, as you have shared here, His kingdom abides in us. I must confess that even in my prayers I have asked the Lord, "Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven" as if God would be persuaded to bring His kingdom here. Well, duh, look at these two verses together - His kingdom already is here, in us, and He is waiting for us to walk in His kingdom truths and power! All that was needed for us to do so was done by Jesus. At the cross He said, "It is finished." Now we are to reap that which our beloved Lord has sown and then, as His followers, sow it into the hearts of others. Now I must admit, it sounds a whole lot easier than it appears. Oh, how I wish it were easy. Then again, maybe it is easier than we know, "only believe."
I am coming from a place of great vulnerability as I share this with you. During the past several months of Billy's illness I sank my teeth into God's Word and promises like a pit bull. Even though circumstances were contrary to what the Word said I ran to God and said, "Father, Your Word says..." and hung unto that. Can't count the times I said, "Lord, help my unbelief," or, "I need Your strength, Lord, I can't do it anymore. I need help." And there were times when I would cry out, "Lord, I don't understand! Your Word says....." and then I would share what applied at that moment. Lot? Oh, I am sure many can relate to his story, right? As weak as I knew I was at times and when I felt I could not go on anymore, the Lord was faithful each time, providing help and strength as it was needed. Thank You, Lord. Bless His Holy Name!
Visiting nurses, doctors, spiritual counselors looked at me with compassionate but concerned eyes as I held fast to God's Word and looked to Billy's healing to manifest in the natural. In my being I knew that I was have faith in God's Word. God is not a man that He should lie. Each day I expected Billy to rise from his sick bed and be whole. There would be thoughts that would come my way, thoughts that were contrary to what I believed the Lord was saying for me to do, to believe Him at His Word. Several times the thought of King David praying and fasting for his sick child, crying out to God that his child would be healed. Then healing did not come and the people were astonished that after the child's death David ceased his vigil and began to eat again. Were these thoughts coming from the enemy or from God??? I did not know. What I did know was that my assignment was "to believe God at His Word." And that is what I strived to do though I had major moments of weakness and some doubt but how faithful was the Holy Spirit to bring me back on track. Thank You, My Friend!
What does this have to do with your post, you might ask? Much I believe. It just hit me that over 2,000 years later all that Jesus came to do and fulfill has not yet reaped. In our world there is a time frame. In His there is not. Jesus was not deterred from His mission because of the darkness in the world He walked in. Rather, He knew that He was bringing Light into its midst and that is how we are to see things. We have Christ in us, the hope of glory, praise be to God! We are not to walk by sight but we are to be walk by faith, declaring those things that are not as though they were. We are not to be moved by the circumstances that is around us but we are to move the circumstances so that they line up with God's Word. How do we do that? By faith in Him which He sent and taking Him at His Word, seeking Him for our small part in His big plan and then moving forward in it.
The prophetic words spoken through a teenage girl many years ago during intercession still ring strong in my spirit, "Do not be surprised when I answer your prayer and it does not come forth the way you expect." I believe God is answering the prayers of many intercessors that have gone up over the years, decades and even centuries. With all that is in me I know that I know that God is going to move mightily in America - not because we want Him to but because that is His will. He has placed stakes into this land through those who claimed it for Him and the fulfillment of those prayers and declarations is about to take place if we only "believe." Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of that which is unseen. Without faith it is impossible to please God. We are not meant to be men pleasers but God pleasers no matter what appears to be happening in the natural. This world is not our home. We are but visitors here meant to bring His kingdom into the earth through Christ in us, even if it comes at personal pain to us. I find comfort in the fact that even our precious Lord asked our heavenly Father to "take this cup from Me." Yet even more inspirational is His Words, "not My will but Your will be done." Wow! This is Him that we are to follow after. Not my will, Father, but Your will be done, even at the cost of our very lives. Dear saints, our Beloved spoke this words to us an example, " Most assuredly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the ground and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it produces much grain." Jesus showed us that His very death would bring forth much grain/fruit and here we are as His followers complaining when we see some of our comforts taken away! This shaking that is taking place is for our own good, so that we and others will run to Him and not seek the things of this world as our all in all. Christ Jesus alone is to be our All in all. In the midst of this darkness that is now present in this world, His light will shine brightly! Glory to God! Being vessels of His light it will come at a price and He is seeking those who are willing to pay it.
I asked a dear brother in Christ to do the memorial service for Billy. Tim, being both a pastor and worship leader, shared how Billy had touched him and changed his life through his singing of "All For Jesus" which is one of Billy's favorite songs. Tim went on to say that though Billy would not have won American Idol, it was his heart and passion for His Lord that touched both the Lord and others. Dear Saints, you don't have to have a good voice (or great skills) to be used by God. True love for Him will ignite His Spirit within you, touching others. That is what God is looking for.
Tim went on to sing "All For Jesus" in honor of Billy and as soon as the words began I knew I had to stand, not in honor of Billy but in honor of our Lord, Jesus Christ. I could feel His presence so strong and amongst shaking and tears I surrendered my precious Billy into the arms of our Lord, knowing that he truly was a gift from God. I also surrendered my disappointment in Billy's not receiving his healing in this world, knowing that it had come to him in heaven. The next day I went to look to see if I could get the song "All For Jesus" as a ring tone for my cell phone. I listened to it several times before realizing that the Lord was not only asking me to surrender my precious husband to Him without bitterness but that He was also asking me to surrender "all my ambitions, hopes and plans" which I believed Billy and I would accomplish side by side. Please understand that I am not sharing this to shine a light on me. Right now I feel so totally broken that I cannot even imagine the Lord using me. I am so needy of Him and so grateful for His faithfulness, for the saints who have, and are, upholding my family and myself in prayer, grateful that my husband is not suffering anymore and missing him as much I will allow myself to miss him before the pain becomes unbearable. I truly do not know what life holds ahead of me. I can't go there now. What I can do is strive to rest in Him who holds our lives in His hands.
Through all of this trial and tribulation I have come to know that God is wanting us to "take Him at His Word." The enemy is striving to do everything he can to take our eyes off of Jesus, the Living Word, and place them upon the things that are happening in the world. If we are called to be overcomers does it not sound reasonable that we will have in our lives something to overcome? And if we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us does that not indicate that there is something to conquer? 2 Corinthians 5:7 says we live by faith, not by sight. We must ask ourselves if we are doing this. If things in the natural are more real to us than that which is in God’s Word and that which He has placed into our hearts then we need to check our hearts and our motives. We are called to be believers then let us believe no matter what we see before us! I am also coming to understand that sometimes our very lives are to be used as that "grain of wheat that falls to the ground, withers and dies" so that great fruit can come from it. Can’t say that I understand it all but do we not know that God’s Word does not return void? Now, do I believe that God caused Billy to die? No more than I believe that God caused Jesus to die. Cancer took Billy’s life, just as sin brought Jesus’ death - but only for a moment! The grave could not hold Him nor can it hold us who are in Christ Jesus. Hallelujah!!! That is reason for shouting!!!
I also know that God will take that which the enemy meant for harm and will turn it to good for those who love Him. Saints, we are in a war and there is casualties in war. The apostles are proof of that! Yet what they sacrificially gave of themselves to spread the kingdom of God upon the earth continues to multiply to their account even today. Many might look at Billy’s death with great sadness and even possibly think that he lacked the faith to receive his healing upon the earth. But knowing my Sweetheart he trusted the Lord to the end, having already surrendered his life to Him, saying "not my will but Your will be done." Now I don’t know if that is why Billy passed from this world into the next. There is much I do not understand but I do know he poured his life out for others for the glory of God. The very day Billy’s body was laid to rest one of our sons-in-law was touched by the Holy Spirit and he told his wife that night, "I get it! I get it? You're not all a bunch of fruit loops! Your dad got me. He got me. He put the Word into my heart and now I get it. He didn't have to go to such extremes, but he got me. I want to raise our children the way God wants us to raise them. I want you to teach me God’s Word!…" This is paraphrasing some of what he said to our daughter but I can tell you that this man became transformed through Christ Jesus. A new light came into his eyes, he is seeing things differently and honestly, he has become a new man! It is really a miracle to behold. I’ve never seen anything like it before and I find myself going from great joy in this life added to the kingdom and to the sadness I feel cause Billy’s not here physically to share this joy with. I know he knows but, wow! And that is but one of several things that is happening through Billy’s life and passing that is glorifying the Lord. Just yesterday I was amazed to hear by a neighbor who runs an abused women’s group that a man came and gave a testimony about sharing about a funeral he had just gone to of a man who had a brain tumor, a man and that he had only known for a short time, visiting him in the hospital and at home and then attending his funeral when he passed on. He shared the testimony of this man’s life, that throughout the suffering he endured never did he complain or say an evil word. He continued to trust God for His promises and held close to Him even to the end. It wasn’t until later that my neighbor found out that the man who’s testimony was being shared was Billy! Praise be to God. How that so deeply touched my heart as God let us know that Billy is still serving Him even though he is with the Lord. Cool, huh? Is that not how it should be with all of us? The seeds that Billy planted in the lives of others is already sprouting forth. And I fully believe that when we hold fast to God’s Word no matter what the circumstances around us looks like, it produce seed in the spiritual realm which grows in the natural realm as well.
I thank for your indulgence as I know this is long and a bit disjointed. I pray the Holy Spirit speak that which is needed for each of you in your journey with the Lord. We live in the best of times and in the worst of times, depending on whom we believe and whom we serve.
Let us allow the Kingdom of God in us to arise and let us trust that His Word is yea and amen. Remember the enemy is a liar. God is faithful and true. Jesus is The Way, The Truth and The Life. Let us set our lives down that He might arise and move through us. Amen? God bless you all and may He brings perfect peace be your constant companion, in Jesus’ name I pray. Amen.
May His will be done through us,
Joan
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