DWELLING IN OUR SECRET PLACE.

DAILY DEVOTION.

DAY THIRTY SIX.

PSALM 91:1-2.  He who dwells in the secret place of the Most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty, I will say of the Lord, "He is my refuge and my fortress; My God in Him will I trust."

So, where is that secret place? and how do we dwell there? David says that God is his refuge and his fortress, dwelling in that secret place is a place of safety, David in Psalm 91 goes on to speak of God's protection and of God's salvation, so it is vitally important that we know what it means to dwell in that place. 

PSALM 31:20  You shall hide them in the secret place of Your presence from the plots of men; You shall keep them secretly in Your pavilion from the strife of tongues. This verse shows us that our secret place is found in the presence of God, in God's presence we find safety and security. So, as Christians how do we apply these scriptures to our own lives?

EPHESIANS 2:4-6. But God who is rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He love us, even when we were dead in trespasses, made us alive together with Christ, by grace you have been saved, and raised us up together, and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus.  Because of God's mercy we can now receive His grace, we are saved, born again because of His grace through faith in what Jesus did for us on the cross. We have been made alive in Christ, and we are raised up with Him and are now seated in heavenly places in Him, This is now our true spiritual position, this is now our place of spiritual authority, our secret place.

COLOSSIANS 3:1-3.  If then you were raised with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ is, sitting at the right hand of God, Set your mind on things above, not on things on the earth, for you died, and your life is now hidden in Christ in God.  These verses confirm what we have just seen in Ephesians 2, we know that we have been raised up with Christ, we know that we are now alive in Him, as Paul said in Galatians "I have been crucified in Christ, it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me, and the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me" Yes the old man is dead, crucified with Christ, we now have a new man living on the inside, new creations in Christ. Note what Paul said in verse 3 of the Colossians passage, Our lives are hidden in Christ in God. Christ is our secret place. 

PSALM 91:9-10.  Because you have made the Lord, who is my refuge, even the Most High your dwelling place, no evil shall befall you, nor shall any plague come near your dwelling.  These verses show us that we can claim God's protection when we are dwelling in the secret in place, when we continue to abide in Christ and in His word we can be assured of God's protection over our lives.

PSALM 91:14-16.   Because he has set his love upon Me, therefore I will deliver him, I will set him on high, because he has known My name, he shall call upon Me and I will answer him, I will be with him in trouble, I will deliver him and honor him, with long life I will satisfy him and show Him My salvation.  These verses here are God's response to the one who chooses to dwell in the secret place, if we choose to dwell in Christ, to stay there, we can again know God's protection and His blessing over our lives and have the greater revelation of our salvation in Christ. Our salvation is far more than just being born again, it is wholeness, health, prosperity, victory, deliverance and freedom in every area of our lives.

COLOSSIANS 1:13.  He has delivered us from the power of darkness and conveyed us into the Kingdom of the Son of His love.   Remember we are now seated in Christ in heavenly places and this verse shows us clearly that Satan no longer has any authority over us, so seek the things that are above, seek the Kingdom of God, choose to dwell in your secret place, remain in Christ, stay in His word and in His love. as Jesus said in John 8:31-32 If we abide in His word then we are truly His disciples and we will know the truth and the truth will set us free. We cannot know the freedom that Jesus offers unless we abide in him and in His word. So this is my challenge to us all, myself included that we continue to abide in Christ, that we live in that secret place.  

KEYS TO OUR HEALING.

KEYS TO OUR HEALING.

Isaiah 53:4-6.

This passage is Isaiah’s prophetic vision of what Jesus was going to accomplish on the cross.

We must note here that on the same cross, on the same day Jesus not only paid for our sins

to be forgiven, he also paid for our emotional and physical healing.

Note in verse 5 it says that by his stripes we are healed. In the old testament all the covenants

that God established with his people, from Adam to Abraham, Moses, the law and the prophets

were all given for one reason, to point his people to the promised Messiah (Jesus). See Romans 3:21-26 and Galatians 3:24. God had promised them that if they walked in his covenants and in obedience to them they could have good health and that none of the diseases that they had seen in Egypt would effect them (Exodus 15:26). What Isaiah is saying is that ultimately their healing is the result of what God is going to do through the Messiah but that they can now claim that healing through the covenants that God has established with them.

1 Peter 2:24-25.

In this passage Peter quotes from Isaiah 53 but note that he says that by his stripes you were healed. We must realize that the work of Christ on the cross was a complete work. There is nothing more that God can to do to secure our healing. As far as God is concerned we are healed. It is up to us to receive that healing. In the same way that we receive Christ for the forgiveness of our sins, we receive our healing.

Mark 11:24.

Jesus tells us in this verse that when we ask for anything in prayer, we must believe that we receive and when we do we will have the thing we have asked for. This is how faith works, we pray, ask God and believe. In verse 22 of this chapter Jesus says “Have faith in God.” Then in verse 23 he goes on to show us how to remove the obstacles that come against us. The key to it is to believe when you pray that you have received what you are praying for and not to allow doubt to rob you of receiving your answer.

Hebrews 11:1.

“Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.”

Faith is the currency of Heaven and it operates in the now, it brings into substance the things that we hope for. Hope here is not some half hearted belief that maybe something will happen or maybe it won’t. Biblical hope is based on the inner assurance that Gods word is true and reliable and that all his promises are yes and amen in Jesus. In the case of our healing the hope is “By his stripes we were healed.” Faith takes a hold of that spiritual truth, that inner assurance that we know this to be true and causes that healing to be manifested in our physical bodies.

BAPTISM OF THE HOLY SPIRIT.

THE BAPTISM OF THE HOLY SPIRIT.

PSALM 8:3-5.  

When I consider Your heavens, the works of Your fingers. The moon and the stars, which You have ordained, what is man that You are mindful of him, and the son of man that You visited him? For you have made him a little lower than the angels, and You have crowned him with glory and honor. You have made him to have dominion over the works of Your hands; You have put all things under his feet.

These verses are David’s revelation of Genesis 1:26-28 where God creates man in His own image and according to His likeness and gives him dominion over creation. Note in verse 5 how David says that God crowned man with glory and honor. Man is crowned with God’s Spirit and holiness. It is through that anointing that man is meant to walk in the authority that God has given him.

GENESIS 3:6-7.

So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, that it was pleasant to the eyes, and the tree desirable to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate. She also gave to her husband with her and he ate. Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they knew that they were naked; and they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves covering.

At the fall of man in the garden, Adam and Eve see themselves for the first time in the flesh. The glory and the anointing that they walked in previously has now departed.

JOEL 2:28-29.

And it shall come to pass afterward that I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh, Your sons and your daughters shall prophesy. Your old men shall see dreams and your young men shall see visions. And also on My menservants and My maidservants I will pour out My Spirit in those days.

This prophecy in Joel is pointing to the outpouring of the Holy Spirit at the beginning of the last days, and that God would baptise His people in it.

MATTHEW 3:11.

“i indeed baptise you with water unto repentance, but he who is coming after me is mightier than I, whose sandals i am not worthy to carry. He will baptise you with the Holt Spirit and with fire”.

John the Baptist is here pointing to the fact that Jesus would be the one who would baptise with the Holy Spirit.

JOHN 1:29-34.

The next day John saw Jesus coming toward him and said, “Behold the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world! This is He of whom I said; After me comes a Man who is preferred before me. I did not know Him; but that He should be revealed to Israel, therefore I came  baptising with water.” And John bore witness saying, “I saw the Spirit descending fro heaven like a dove, and He remained upon Him, I did not know Him, but the One who sent me to baptise with water said to me, “Upon whom you see the Spirit descending, and remaining on Him, this is He who baptises with the Holy Spirit. And I have seen and testify that this is the Son of God.”

John confirms that Jesus is the Son of God and the One who will baptise us with the Holy Spirit.

LUKE 3:21-22.

When all the people were baptised, it came to pass that Jesus was also baptised; and while He prayed, the heavens opened. And the Holy Spirit descended in the bodily form like a dove upon Him, and a voice came from heaven which said, this is My beloved Son, in You I am well pleased.”

Jesus is baptised in the Holy Spirit at the time of His water baptism.

LUKE 4:1.

Then Jesus, being filled with the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit into the wilderness.

LUKE 4:14-15.

Then Jesus returned in the power of the Spirit to Galilee, and the news of Him went out through all the surrounding region. And He taught in their synagogues, being glorified by all.

These two passages show us that Jesus needed that infilling of the Holy Spirit, we know that while He was in the wilderness He went through the temptation of satan, and after His return He is ministering in the power of the Holy Spirit, if Jesus, the sinless Son of God, needed the power of the Holy, how much do we. Jesus was actually walking and ministering in the same anointing that Adam walked in before he sinned.

LUKE 4:18-19.

“The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me, because He has anointed Me to preach the gospel to the poor; He has sent Me to heal the broken hearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed; to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord.”

Jesus here has gone into the temple on the Sabbath and taken the scroll, opened it to Isaiah 61 and read this passage out, He says that it is because the Holy Spirit is upon Him that He can do all those things.

JOHN 17:22.

“And the glory which You gave Me I have given to them, that they may be one just as We are one.”

This is part of the prayer that Jesus is praying for His disciples and for the church. He says here that we will have the same glory that He had, we will have that same anointing, and out of that anointing we will be able to be one with one another, just as He and the Father are one.

JOHN 20:22.

And when He had said this, He breathed on them, and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit.”

This is when the disciples are born again. Jesus here breathes spiritual life into them, in the same way that He did when He created Adam in the garden and breathed into him in  Genesis 2:7. When we accept Jesus as our personal Lord and Savior and acknowledge Him, He does the same to us, He breathes spiritual life into us and we are born again.

ACTS 1:4-8.

And being assembled together with them, He commanded the not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the promise of the Father, “Which,” He said, “you have heard from Me; for John truly baptised with water, but you shall be baptised with the Holy Spirit not many days from now.” Therefore, when they had come together, they asked Him saying, “Lord will You at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?” and He said to them, “It is not for you to know the times or the seasons which the Father has put in His own authority, but you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be witnesses to Me in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.”

This is at the time when Jesus is taken back up into heaven, note that He commands them not to leave Jerusalem until after the Holy Spirit has been poured out and they are baptised in the Holy Spirit. He tells them that they will receive power when they are baptised in the Holy Spirit, remember when Jesus returned from the wilderness, He came in the power of the Holy Spirit, we cannot be effective witnesses for Him without that power that only the Holy Spirit gives.

ACTS 2:1-4.

When the day of Pentecost had full come, they were all with one accord in one place. And suddenly there came the sound from heaven, as of a mighty rushing wind, and it filled the whole house where they were sitting. Then there appeared to them divided tongues, as of fire, and one sat on each of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak with tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance.

The day of Pentecost was the fulfilment of what Jesus had promised before His ascension back into heaven. The Holy Spirit has now been poured out into the world, and the disciples are now baptised with the Holy Spirit. Note there that with the baptism of the Holy Spirit came the ability to speak in tongues. Everyone in Jerusalem heard the sound of the wind, they all came together and they heard the disciples glorifying God and they heard them in their own language. Peter stands up and then proceeds to explain what is happening, he quotes from Joel 2, showing that Pentecost is the beginning of the last days, he then goes on to say in Acts 2:38-39 that they need to repent, to be baptised in the name of Jesus Christ, that as they do their sins will be forgiven and that they too will receive the gift or baptism of the Holy Spirit. We know that 3,000 repented that day and were added to the Kingdom.

Note what Acts 2:2-3 says; it says that the disciples were sitting in the upper room and when the Holy Spirit came, He came and sat upon them, many pictures depicting this event show the Holy Spirit as little tongues of fire above the heads of the disciples. This is not what happened. If someone is sitting down and you sit on them, where do you sit, you sit on their lap. Note what Ezekiel 8:2 says; “Then I looked, and there was a likeness, like the appearance of fire; from the appearance of His waist and downward, fire; and from His waist and upward, like the appearance of brightness, like the color of amber.”  This is what it would have looked like that day with the disciples, they were totally immersed in the Holy Spirit. The word baptise means just that, to totally immerse something.

ACTS 4:29-31.

“Now, Lord, look upon their threats, and grant to Tour servants that with all boldness they may speak Your word, by stretching out Your hand to heal, and that signs and wonders may be done through the name of Your holy Servant Jesus.” And when they prayed, the place where they were assembled together was shaken; and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit, and they spoke the word of God with boldness.

This is prayer of the disciples after Peter and John had healed the guy at the temple gate, and they had been threatened by the religious leaders not to preach in Jesus name. They prayed for boldness and that they would continue to see miracles and signs and wonders performed in Jesus name, the result of their prayer is that they are filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke Gods word with boldness. This must be our prayer as well, knowing that we cannot do anything without the power of the Holy Spirit, they knew that their boldness only came from Gods anointing.

ACTS 10:44-48 ; ACTS 19:1-7.

The first passage is in the house of Cornelius, and the second is at Ephesus, on both occasions we see that the Holy Spirit is poured out and they are baptised in the Holy Spirit and spoke in tongues.

There are two manifestations of tongues in the Bible, Paul deals with this in 1 Corinthians 12 through to 14. There is the public gift that is used in a meeting, this is accompanied with the interpretation, one person speaks out in tongues and then someone else will bring the interpretation of the message, this is used to edify or build up the body. There is also tongues that we use in our own prayer life or in worshiping God. Paul says in 1 Corinthians 14:4 that he who speaks in tongues edifies himself, this is our own prayer language or can be used in worshiping God, Paul says in that chapter that when we pray in tongues our minds or understanding are unfruitful, we are actually praying from our spirit. Paul said that he would sing in tongues, this is obviously an act of worship. He also said that he would sing in his own language. Paul understands the significance on his own life of praying in tongues when he says in 1 Corinthians 14:18 “I thank God that I speak in tongues more than you all.” Romans 8:26-28 deals with the issue of praying in tongues as well, it says there that when we don’t know how to pray as we ought about something that the Holy Spirit intercedes for us, with groans or words that we cannot utter, words we don’t understand. And in doing that He prays in the perfect will of God regarding that issue. 

I know in my own personal walk with Jesus I could not do what I do without the baptism in the Holy Spirit. When I was baptised in the Holy Spirit I got the fire experience, it was like I was on fire from head to toe. My wife had prayed for me to be baptised in the Holy Spirit, it didn’t happen that day, but the day after as I was praying and reading the word.

So how can you be baptised in the Holy Spirit? Jesus said Himself that if we ask the Father for the Holy Spirit He will give Him to us, I suggest that you find a time when it is quiet and you can be on your own, begin to pray and even have a time where you can worship God, during that time ask Jesus to baptise you with the Holy Spirit, to fill you and to give you the gift of tongues. Don’t try to force it, just relax in His presence, what people find is that they will start to get syllables forming in their minds, words they don’t know, that they have never learnt before, as they begin to speak these out other words come. It is a bit like a baby beginning to talk. You have to realise one thing though, your natural thinking may to try and get in the way. The one thing that I can assure you of is that when you are baptised in the Holy Spirit your spiritual life, and your walk with Jesus will definitely go to the next level. You will get greater revelation out of the word and greater clarity in what god is wanting you to do because you become more aware of the presence and the power of the Holy Spirit in your life.    

COME OUT FROM AMONG THEM AND BE SEPARATED UNTO ME.

CALLED TO BE SEPERATED UNTO GOD.

I the Lord, am calling My people to be a holy, separated people, separated unto Me so that the world system shall in no way influence their lives. We are heading rapidly into the end times and Satan will endeavour to creep into the Church to influence My people, but I am calling My army to close ranks, to walk in unity of love, unity with Me in My Spirit, unity in spirit with one another. Having one mind, one heart, and one purpose, to see the gospel preached. My army must march in rank and in order so that the enemy cannot get in and cause havoc and bring about disharmony. My people it is time to stand up in the armour that I have provided for you. I have supplied all you need to go to war, to have the victory that Jesus has won for you on the cross of Calvary, but you must march in harmony, and in love. It is time to put off all desires of the flesh, to lay aside all spiritual pride, and submit yourselves to the Lordship of Jesus in a new and deeper way, allowing the fire of the Holy Spirit to burn out all the hay and stubble that is choking so many of your lives. You must begin to walk in faith, totally trusting in Me and My word. For too long the Church has relied on religion and religious ceremony, but I am not the God of religion, but the God of relationship. Religion brings division, it brings bondage to the law, the law that separates men and women from Me. Relationship brings unity and oneness that comes through love for me and for one another. As you walk in My love I will cause a unity to come that will tear down the barriers that have been built up over the years. Barriers based on fear, fear of Me, fear of one another, fear of being open and honest with Me and with each other. But it is My desire that you walk in total freedom. My perfect love will cast out all that fear so that you can truly be honest and open with Me and with each other. You seem to forget that I am a God of love and that I desire to do you good, to bring healing to you as individuals and as a body. How can My body operate properly when parts of it are being stifled and held back by fear. Oh My people open up your hearts, allow Me to minister to you. Allow My love to come and break down every yoke and bondage in your lives so that I can bring My healing and restoration to your lives.  

 You pray for revival to come to this land, but revival starts in the house of God, I must revive My people before you can take revival to the world. You  My people are My body here on earth, you are My hands, My feet, My ears, My eyes, My mouth, you are My chosen vessels by which I will operate through. My presence dwells in you through the power of My Spirit, open up the flood gates of your heart, allow the rivers of living water to flow through your lives and as you do it will bring cleansing and healing to your own lives. But as the water flows out from you it will bring refreshing to the dry and arid land around you. People will be bathed in My presence and you will see revival in your land. And as My word says, signs and wonders will follow the preaching of My word. Yes I will confirm My word with signs and wonders, this is My way, as it was in the early Church, so it will be again.

AMEN.

OUR GARDEN OF GETHSEMANE.

DAILY DEVOTION.

DAY THIRTY FIVE.

LUKE 9:23.  Then He said to them all, "If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me".

Being a disciple of Jesus is not about us, not about what we want, but about us losing our lives, or our own desires to follow Jesus. in our verse today we see the sequence of events that need to take place in our lives in order to follow Jesus, Firstly we must have a desire to follow Him, is that your hearts desire? if it is then we must be willing to deny ourselves, to lay our lives down, this can be the hardest thing to do, and we will come back to this one. Then we need to take up our cross, the cross speaks of the work that Jesus accomplished for us through His death on the cross and that we can only fulfill what Jesus has called us to do because we have been crucified with Him and it is now His life in us, this is a daily thing that we must do because each day has its own challenges and and each day we are called to walk in the will of God for our lives, it is as we do this that we can follow Jesus, knowing that He will lead us every day in His purpose. So what is our garden of Gethsemane? If we look at the life of Jesus we can get an understanding of this from Him. Jesus knew, even from a very early age, what He had come for. At twelve in the temple He said to His parents, "Did you not Know that I must be about My Father's business?" During His ministry He spoke many times of His death and suffering and resurrection. He was fully aware of what He had to go through for you and I. On the night of His betrayal He went to the Garden of Gethsemane to pray, He knew that this was the night that He would be betrayed even before it happened and that He faced certain death the next day on the cross, this was the fulfillment of what He had come for. In Luke 22:42 we see the prayer that Jesus prayed in the garden, "Father, if it is Your will, take this cup away from Me; nevertheless not My will but Your will be done" We see in the next verses the agony that Jesus went through as He struggled with what He knew He was about to face, yet He knew what was about to happen and what must happen. We obviously will never have to face what Jesus had to face that night, yet we will face our own Gethsemane experience every day, everyday we have to decide whether we are going to do the will of the Father or to do our own thing, Jesus said in Luke 9:24 that if we desire to save our own life will ultimately lose it it is only as we lose our life that we can have the life of Jesus. We all face on a daily basis the struggle between the flesh and the spirit, our flesh cries out to have its own way, Paul shows us this in Romans 7:13-25. As he said the things he did not want to do he did and the things that he wanted to do, he didn't do them, but he knew that it was only through Jesus that he could be set free from the life in the flesh. Paul summed up the importance of knowing the power of the work of the cross in our lives in Galatians 2:20 when he said that he had been crucified with Christ, the knowledge that his old life was dead, when Jesus hung on that cross we were in Him, as it says in Romans 6, the old man has been crucified, Paul goes on to say in the Galatians verse even though he has been crucified he still lives, he now has a new life, and that new life is now in Christ, it is the life of Christ in him that gives him life and that it is by faith that he knows that. It is vitally important that we also know this. This is such an important key in the process of self denial, knowing that the old man has been crucified, that there is no life there, pursuing our own desires and our own will can only lead to death. Once we truly come to the point where we can deny our selves, lay down our will we can then take up our cross. Taking up our cross is knowing that we can walk in the life that Jesus has given us because of what He did on the cross for us, our cross represents the fact that we are totally dead to ourselves. When we look at the life of Jesus and what He came to do we realize that the cross was the ultimate will of the Father for Him, so it is with us, taking up our cross will bring us into the will of the Father, it will allow us to then follow Jesus. To follow Jesus on a daily basis, as our verse says, is to live our lives as His disciples, as ones who desire to bring Him glory, to be lights in a darkened world and to reflect the glory of God, through the love of God, to those around us, and to live a life that pleases the Father, even when others are not around to see what we are doing because ultimately what we do in secret will be brought out into the light. So my prayer for each and every one of us is that we get the revelation of what it is to deny ourselves, to lay our lives down through what Jesus did on the cross for us, to be able able to pick up our cross, knowing that it is not I who lives but Christ who lives in me, and the life that I now live, I live by faith in Him, and because I am in Him I can now follow Him and walk in His will for my life. AMEN.  

KNOWING THE THOUGHTS OF GOD.

DAILY DEVOTION.

DAY THIRTY FOUR.

JEREMIAH 29:11.    For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, says the lord, thoughts of peace, and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope.

So can we know the thoughts of God? This verse says that His thoughts are thoughts of peace, He doesn't think evil thoughts about us but that His thoughts are directly linked to our future and to give us hope. So if we compare this verse with Isaiah 55:8-9 "For My thoughts are not your thoughts, Nor are My ways your ways," says the Lord "For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways, and My thought higher than your thoughts". So do these verses in Isaiah mean that we cannot know the thoughts that God has towards us? I have heard many Christians express that thought, that we can never really know the thoughts and ways of God based on these verses out of Isaiah. So let us take a closer look at the context of these two verses. Isaiah 55:6-7 Seek the Lord while He may be found, call upon Him while He is near, Let the wicked forsake his ways, and the unrighteousness man this thoughts; and let him return to the Lord, and He will have mercy on him, and to our God, and He will abundantly pardon. We see here that the call of God in these verses is for the man who is walking away from God to abandon his ways and his thoughts and to come back to God and to call on Him and that God will have mercy on him and forgive him, it is a call to come back to the ways and thoughts of God. Verses 10-13 show us the result of returning back to God, coming back to His word and His ways, we will know the peace and joy of God, His word will not return back to Him but as we submit our lives to Him it will accomplish the things in our lives that it was sent to do. So we see from this passage in Isaiah that we can know the thoughts and ways of God and that He wants us to know these things so that we can walk in His word and in His purpose for our lives. In Psalm 119:11 David said, "Your word I have hidden in my heart that I might not sin against You" in verse 105 he said, "Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path". God's thoughts and His plans for us are weaved into His word, apart from His word we cannot know the thoughts that God has towards us. In James 1:21-25 James says that we are abandon sin, we are to receive the word of God with humility as it is the word that will save our souls and that we are to do what the word of God says about us because if we don't then we deceive ourselves, and he goes on to say that the man who sees what the word says and then does it will walk in the blessings of God. Paul in 2 Corinthians 10:3-5 shows us that while we walk in this flesh body we do not war in the flesh, it is not a fleshly battle that we are involved in but a spiritual one and our weapons are not carnal or fleshly, but spiritual and that in God they are mighty to pulling down the strongholds that Satan wants to establish in our minds through our thinking, this is why we must take every thought captive and bring our thoughts into obedience to what the word of God says, in other words abandoning our thoughts for God's thoughts. In Romans 12:1-2 it says that we are to offer ourselves to God as living sacrifices, in other words dead to ourselves and alive to God, and that we are not to live our lives conformed to the world but that our we are to be transformed as our minds or thoughts are renewed to the word of God so that we can walk in His ways, in His good, acceptable and perfect will. So can we know the thoughts and ways of God? Yes of course we can, and it is actually imperative that we do know His thoughts and His ways, so that we can live the lives that Jesus died on the cross to give us. AMEN. 

LIVING WORTHY.

DAILY DEVOTION.

DAY THIRTY THREE.

EPHESIANS 4:1. I therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you to walk worthy of the calling with which you were called. 

In the verses prior to this Paul had been praying for the church at Ephesus that they would have the revelation of the power of the love of God, that they would know what it was to know the fullness of God's love irrespective of what situation they were in. He went on to say that as they did this that God would be able to do things way beyond what they could even ask or think and that He would be glorified. In this verse Paul is pleading with them that they would walk worthy of their calling, that their conduct and behavior would reflect the love of God, that they would continue to walk in the Spirit. The concept of walking worthy there speaks of the responsibility that we have to be aware of what Christ has done in our lives through the work of the cross, it is not walking in our own worth, it is not reliant on how we see ourselves but how God sees us in Christ, God sees us as His sons, accepted in the Beloved, accepted in Christ because of what He did on the cross. It is so important that we understand that when Jesus went to the cross He paid the full debt for us, there is nothing that we can do to earn God's love, we can't add to the worth that Christ has placed in our lives through His love. To often Christians think that we somehow have to prove our worth, to show that we are worthy of God's love, no you can't do that. It says in Romans 5:8 that God demonstrated His love towards us that while were still sinners Christ died for us. He knew you before the foundation of the world, God knew what you would do  before you even thought of it and He still loved you and placed your destiny in Christ. You were in Him when He went to the cross. It says in Ephesians 2:10 That we are His workmanship in Christ, created for the good works that God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them. We are His workmanship created in Christ, we are who we are in Christ because of what Christ did on the cross and because of who He is in us, we are being transformed into His image, from glory to glory through the Spirit of the Lord. The good works are walking in His holiness, walking in such a way that we bring glory to God, fulfilling His purpose and desire for our lives. It is in this, as we walk in this that we will walk worthy of the calling that God has on our lives, that our lives will bring glory to God and we will reflect the love of Christ to those around us. AMEN. 

THE OLD MAN CRUCIFIED.

DAILY DEVOTION.

DAY THIRTY TWO.

ROMANS 6:6.  Knowing this, that your old man was crucified with Him, that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin.
This is such an important verse for us as Christians, the revelation of this verse and what Christ has done for us on the cross will transform our lives and help give us victory over the power of sin in our lives. When Jesus went to the cross and died for our sin through His broken body and shed blood He not only opened the door for our sins to be forgiven but He rendered the sin nature powerless. As it says in 2 Corinthians 5:21 He became sin for us that we might become the righteousness of God in Him, we are no longer dead spiritually, cut off from God but we are now new creations in Christ, there is now a new man living on the inside, your spirit is now been born again or rejuvenated, brought back into relationship with your Heavenly Father and as it says in 2 Peter 1:4 we are now partakers of God's divine nature, His Spirit lives in our spirit, God has removed the heart of stone and given us a heart of flesh. So how does this help us in our daily walk? How does this help us in dealing with sin and the flesh? As Paul said in Galatians 2:20, "I have been crucified in Christ, it is no longer I who lives but Christ who lives in me, and the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave His life for me." Through the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of Christ, which lives in us we now have the ability to surrender our lives to Him, we have the authority within us, not within our own flesh, but in the power of the Spirit, to know that sin no longer has any power over us and we can walk free from it, yielding our lives to Christ as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable. We now know, when temptation comes our way, we can boldly say no to it, we can stand in the righteousness of Christ and say with all assurance, "I am free from the power of this, The cross of Jesus has set me free and given me authority over every work of the flesh and every temptation that the enemy will try to bring against me". As Paul said in Galatians 2:20, it is by faith that we are in Christ, we are seated in Him, this is our spiritual position, our place of authority, we are seated in Heavenly places in Christ, far above all power and dominion and authority that would try to come against us. The old man was a slave to sin, under the power of satan with no real power to resist the pull of the world and its temptations, as hard as we could try to in the flesh we would ultimately walk in rebellion to God and fall into sin. Praise God for the cross of Christ and what it has done in our lives, Let us all be like Paul and say, as he did in Galatians 6:14, "God forbid that I should boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world" My prayer is that we would all get a greater revelation of the power of the cross in our lives, it is only through the power of the cross, what Jesus did on that cross for us, that we can truly know the power of the Holy Spirit in our lives, that we can truly know that we don't have to live in the strength of our own lives, but that we can know that it is Christ in us, the hope of glory, that gives us the power to live victorious lives. AMEN.   

AUTHORITY OF THE BELIEVER.

DAILY DEVOTION.

DAY THIRTY TWO.

MATTHEW 28:18-20.   And Jesus came and spoke to them saying, "All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth, Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you, and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age."Amen.
Jesus here is now commissioning His disciples to go out into the world to take the gospel to all nations and to make disciples. He tells them that He now has all authority both in heaven and on earth and it is in this authority that they are to go, He is giving them His authority, the right to go out in His name to share the gospel. When He tells them to baptise people in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit He is referring to the complete authority that is found in the Godhead. So on what basis was Jesus able to do this? in Colossians 2:14-15 we see that through His death on the cross He totally deals with the issue of sin and takes back the authority that was handed to Satan by Adam at the fall, Satan now legally has no authority over your life and mine, as Paul said in Colossians 1:13 "He has delivered us from the power of darkness and conveyed us into the kingdom of the Son of His love." In John 17:15-16 Jesus is praying for the disciples and He asks that the Father would not remove them from the world but that He would protect them from Satan because as He was not part of the world, neither are they. We are no longer part of this world system and Jesus has given us His authority or delegated power to live as His disciples through the Holy Spirit. So how do we receive that power? Firstly we must be born again, the disciples were born again in John 20:22 when Jesus breathed on them and said, "Receive the Holy Spirit" at that point He imparted Spiritual life back to them, the Spiritual life that Adam lost when he sinned. We are all born dead in sin as a result, spiritually cut off from God,when we are born again the Jesus breathes on us and imparts His Spirit into our spirit and we receive that Spiritual life back again. In Acts 1:4-8 Jesus here commands his disciples not to leave Jerusalem until they have received the promise of the Father, until they are baptised in the Holy Spirit. He tells them that at that time they will receive the power to be His witnesses as they go out into the world. The word power there is "Dynamis" in the Greek and means the ability or abundance of power, also implies the ability to work miracles. It is through the Baptism of the Holy Spirit that we receive the ability to walk in the authority that Jesus gives us. We see in the life of Jesus Himself that He walked and ministered out the power of the Holy Spirit, at His baptism the Holy Spirit came on His life and we see that when He came out of the wilderness after the forty days in Luke 4:14 it says that He returned in the power of the Holy Spirit. If the ministry of Jesus was dependent on the power of the Holy Spirit how much more is ours? If we want to know and walk in the authority and the power that Jesus has given us through His death and resurrection our desire must be to know the fullness of the Spirit. Paul in 1 Corinthians 2:1-5 said that when he was among them he was determined to preach nothing but Christ and Him crucified, He did so in much fear and trembling, realizing the importance and responsibility that he had not to rely on his own wisdom or power but that he had to preach in the power of the Holy Spirit so that their faith would not be in mans wisdom but in the power of God, Sadly today too many Christians do not know or understand the power and authority that we have in Christ, not in our own wisdom or our own ability, but in Him, through what Jesus did for us at the cross. It is time for the Church to rise up and begin to walk in the authority and the power that Jesus has given us, to take the Gospel into the world with the demonstrations of power of the Holy Spirit through the preaching of the Gospel of Christ and Him crucified. AMEN.   

HIS WORKMANSHIP.

DAILY DEVOTION

DAY THIRTY ONE.

EPHESIANS 2:10.   For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.
My question today is this; What are we here for, what is our purpose? This verse shows us that God has done a work in us, we are now His workmanship in Christ, 2 Corinthians 5:17 tells us that we are now new creations in Christ, There is now a new man living on the inside, God has removed the old dead spirit and given us a new heart, and He has put His Spirit within us. So what is the purpose of that? Yes it is to bring us back into relationship with God as our heavenly Father, but it is for more. The rest of Ephesians 2:10 says that we are in Christ for good works, the works that God has prepared for us, even before we were saved and born again. In Christ we now have a new destiny, a new hope, Jeremiah 29:11 says that Gods thoughts are towards us, thoughts of peace and not for evil but to give us a hope and a future. God is continually thinking about you and the plans He has for your life, David said in Psalm 139:17-18 "How precious are you thoughts to me O God! how great is the sum of them! If I should count them, they would be more in number than the sand; When I awake, I am still with You" This such a powerful concept, that you and I are never out of the mind of God. He is continually wanting to reveal to us on a daily basis His plans and purpose for us. Jesus said in John 15:5 that He is the vine and that we are the branches, that apart from Him we can do nothing. He is our very life source, what happens if you separate a branch from the vine? it will surely die. We must continue to abide in Christ, in His word, in His love, in His Spirit because if we don't we will die and not achieve what He has created us for. As Christians, as ones who have been purchased at an amazing cost, through the blood of Jesus through His death and resurrection, we now have a huge responsibility to serve God, to fulfill what He has called us into. In Ephesians 4:1 Paul says that we are to walk worthy of the calling with which we were called, He goes as far as to say that he beseeches us to do this, there is a real urgency in what Paul is saying here. To walk worthy here comes out of the knowledge and the understanding of what Christ has done in us, it does not come out of our sense of self worth, but the realization that it is Christ in us, His life in us, as Paul said in Galatians 2:20, That it is no longer him who lives, he has been crucified with Christ, and the life that he now lives he lives by faith in Christ, Paul's faith was in the fact that his life was now in Christ because Christ had been prepared to give His life for him. This is such an important point to realize, that we can only have the life of Christ in us because of the fact that Jesus was prepared to lay His life down for us and go to the cross. You might say at this point; "But you don't know my past, you don't know what I have done, how could God want to use me?" Well again Paul's life gives us an answer to this. We are all aware of the life of Paul, as Saul he was a Pharisee, a teacher of the law and a staunch opponent to the Gospel, to the point he went out and persecuted Christians and was present at the stoning of Stephen, yet in Philippians 3:12-14 he is able to write that he was aware that he had not yet attained perfection but that he must press on, that he would take a hold of what Christ had called him to do, he would not look back, he would forget the self effort and mistakes of the past and continue to press forward to the high calling that was on his life in Christ, realizing that the prize was in that calling, in his fulfillment of what God had called him to do. If we doubt that God has a purpose or a calling on our lives let us come back to the original verse, We are His workmanship in Christ Jesus, it is not about us, but it is all about Christ in us and what he wants to do in us and through us. AMEN