There Is No Chain This Love Can’t Break

 

To really know the Lord is to turn from your own desire and be filled with His desire.
His desire to love the unloveable. To be kind to difficult people. We all have difficult people in our lives who have strategically been placed there by God.

God trusts us. He needs people of every generation who will be patient in the face of ugly impatience and bless those who are cruel. He created us to love. To love not only those who love us back, but love the people who are the furthest from us.

He trusted that we would allow His glory to shine out of us into the darkness of people’s souls. We will only be able to do this when we decide we want to be like Jesus. Only then will our desires change and our hearts change and we will be transformed.

His way is so much better than our way.

♫ Stay and Wait Hillsong United

The Exchange

I walked down to my basement at the end of the day. I sat there wondering how someone could still forgive and love me time after time. Disappointment after disappointment. He is still there. I sat on the floor in front of my couch with my hands covering my face. I begged God for forgiveness about some decisions I made throughout the week. I cried. I cried for over an hour. I remember sitting up, moving my hands from my face and just looking straight out and thinking, ” I know that you’re here.” Then I spoke it out. “I KNOW you’re here.”

I felt an overwhelming sense of peace come over me. You see, I felt His presence in such a mighty way that I’ve never felt before. It was like He was right there. Comforting me. Making sure that I knew everything was okay and His love was never ending. I thought back to a message I heard by Francis Chan where he spoke about a fathers love. The amount of love and intensity you may have for your own children, or the love you have for a spouse. This could NEVER compare to the love that God has for us. Let that settle for a moment. Can you even fathom that? The amount of love we feel for our children, our parents, our siblings, our friends could never even come close to the love God has for us.

In this moment everything was right. I was at peace with everything. I remember opening my eyes and my body was slightly leaned to the right. As if He were right there with His arm around me and I was just pressed into Him, crying and confessing, and apologizing. I thought about the week that had just passed. The remarks I made to people, the emotions I let get the best of me, the lack of prioritizing for God, and so many other things. I sat there and thought how could I let anything come in the way of what I am feeling right now? How could I let anything replace this feeling.

We’re exchanging His perfect love and peace for momentary THINGS. Momentary feelings. These things mean nothing. When you’ve felt what it is to be loved and to love God with all you have it becomes so clear. All I want to you, Lord. Not these things that I’ve put in your place, or the moments I feed into sin. Nothing can replace our God. Its like taking the perfect gift and exchanging it for something less than.

The gospel is so clear, we must die to ourselves to live. We must fall to rise. Give Him everything, I promise once you do there will be nothing you want more.

Walk in Consistency

When you think about having consistency what do you think of?
I believe it’s about letting God into every aspect of your life. Allowing Him to work through you. Without fail, let yourself be His vessel. Without fail, give yourself to Him every single day.  There may be parts of your life where the holy spirit is missing. Think about the potential of those parts. Ask God to take over those parts of you, and watch your life transform. Understanding and knowing what needs to be done is one thing, implementing those changes is where miracles happen.

Loneliness Is a Lie

Loneliness can be one of the most destructive emotions. If Satan is not able to distract you or destroy you with worry and fear, he will try to alienate you from healthy relationships. Even Satan knows the power of two. 

“When your heart tries to tell you that you’re alone and that no one cares about you or your life, your heart has been communing with Satan and listening to his dastardly lies.”

Sometimes our feelings become pitiful. When it comes to feeling lonely or depressed, we have to open our Bibles and agree with not the lies of Satan but what the Word of God says.

I’m reminded of that last words that Jesus spoke to His disciples. He reminded them that even though they wouldn’t be able to see Him anymore, that He would ALWAYS be with them. “I am with you always, even to the end of the age” Matthew 28:20

We never walk alone. He is with us in our worst moments, our best moments, and everything in between. The Biblical reality is that we are surrounded by God’s love and care every single day.

Loneliness is a lie – a spiteful and hateful lie that will cause you to question the truth of God’s infallible Word.

“When you begin to respond to Jesus as you would a friend, your loneliness will ebb away, I guarantee.”

You’ve been set FREE.

♫ Housefires – Open Space

Satan Wants To Take Your Crown

We were created to rule. The Bible says that the grace of God gives us the ability to reign. When He rose from the dead, He guaranteed our victory. Thats why the Bible says we’re more than conquerors in Christ.

Scripture says grace has seated us with Him in heavenly places, and where is Jesus seated? On a throne on the right-hand side of His Father. Only ruling kings sit on thrones.

If you belong to Christ, you’ve got a crown.  To experience that crown and the grace that God has to offer has no comparison. There is nothing too big, or too messy that Gods grace cannot cover.

♫ Hillsong United Scandal of Grace

Seed Of Purpose

You wouldn’t compromise just to fit in, would you? What is your life built on? The desires of this world? The approval of your friends? Or is it built on trusting the Word of God and following the path He has for you?

God has placed a calling on each of our lives. Each full of idiosyncrasies. Psalms 139 says He knew us in our mother’s wombs. He knew all the small and big details of our story before it began to unfold.

He plants a seed of purpose in our hearts, but why? He called us because He loves us.
God has our days ordered. So, tell your story. Let someone know just how magnificent God is and what He has done in your life and allow Him to work through you and start unfolding your calling.

♫ Pat Barrett Build My Life

Guard Your Heart

A known saying, “Everyone is entitled to their own opinion.” But what does the Bible say about expressing every opinion you have in your heart? Did you know our emotions travel 80,000 times faster than our thoughts travel?

Makes sense why when something bad happens we immediately feel raw and uncensored emotion, but we aren’t able to think clearly enough to make a decision on who to call or what to do. All reasonable and practical thinking arrives in our nerve center long after the emotion has already expressed itself. It’s hard to take a second to make a conscious decision in the heat of an emotional moment.

We have to make the decision to submit to the fruit that is only found in the Holy Spirit. Most people tend to make decisions out of feeling rather than out of principle. I think we live in a time where its easier to base your decisions on your emotions, because “If we feel it, it must be true.”

It’s not comfortable to make the decisions day to day based off what is biblical and what God wants for us. It isn’t always easy. There is little in life that is of more importance than securing control of your heart issues.

“Your heart does not want to be guarded. It desires to loudly express itself and all of its opinions. Your heart is passionate about ventilating, vomiting and vocalizing every little feeling it has ever experienced. The Bible never says that we are allowed to express everything that is in our heart- it simply says to guard it.”

♫ Pat Barrett and Steffany Gretzinger Sails

Take Me Back To The Garden

The truth is we were placed here, strategically. God needed someone just like you. Someone to love the unloveable, bring joy to a dark work, and be peace in confusing situations, and to be kind when our culture is cruel.

Unfortunately, we have acquired many worldy characteristics. Lies, cheats, blasphemy. We would rather have it our way, than His way. He intended for us to do His good works. This is why he sent you and me.

“The magnificent and heart-stopping truth is that you can have as much of God as you could possibly want. The question has never changed from the Garden of Eden until today, how much of Him do you want?”

♫ Maverick City TRIBL Communion

Canvas & Clay

Jeremiah 18:1-6

“O Israel, can I not do to you as this potter has done to his clay? As the clay is in the potter’s hand, so are you in My hand”

The question is will we allow God to mould and shape us the way He hopes and desires? We have to be in complete surrender. Whatever He desires let it be. Disregard what we think is good for us and let the Father give us what He knows is good for us.

Surrender may not always be comfortable, or feel good but it is necessary.
Surrender is humility, faith, and trust that God is able to do something of magnitude through us.

Theres a beautiful song about us being the canvas and the clay and God being the painter and the potter. It illustrates exactly what God speaks about in Jeremiah.

♫ Pat Barrett; Canvas and Clay 

Make Room For Me

I sat listening to Steffany Gretzinger speak on becoming undone and was struck with a burning desire to dive into the word. I quickly got up from my chair and grabbed all my bibles and my journal. I was ready to sit and have some time with the Lord. I sat all my things on my vanity. Now, I wasn’t ever someone who felt I could hear the Lord. So many people spoke about that quiet still voice, or having heard Him clearly tell them to do something. I never have had that experience. Until that day.

I had so much stuff on my vanity I could barely sit everything down. Then it happened. A soft but strong voice. “Make room for Me”. I was overcome with emotion and just cried.
I have never felt so close to Him. I finally understood what everyone was talking about. It was an experience I’ll never forget.

I began diving into sections of my bible that had any information on “room”. Which may sound silly, but I had no idea where to start. I wanted so badly to be obedient to Him, and figure out what I needed to do to make this “room”. Then it was so evident. He wants time. He wants me. He wants me to make him a priority. Not all the things. Make room for Him in my home, in my life, in my heart. Thats all.
Thats all He ever wanted.

Revelation 3:17-20

For you say, I am rich, I have prospered, and I need nothing, not realizing that you are wretched, pitiable, poor, blind, and naked. I counsel you to buy from me gold refined by fire, so that you may be rich, and white garments so that you may clothe yourself and the shame of your nakedness may not be seen, and salve to anoint your eyes, so that you may see. Those whom I love, I reprove and discipline, so be zealous and repent. Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and eat with him, and he with me.

♫ Maverick City Music Refiner