Tuesday, January 6, 2015

Be Careful Who You Sleep With


Be Careful Who You Sleep With


Now the Spirit expressly says that in later times some will depart from the faith by devoting themselves to deceitful spirits and teachings of demons, through the insincerity of liars whose consciences are seared, who forbid marriage and require abstinence from foods that God created to be received with thanksgiving by those who believe and know the truth.  For everything created by God is good, and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with thanksgiving, for it is made holy by the word of God and prayer.”
                                                     1 Timothy 4:1-5

The bible is very specific about sin – do you take it literally or do you allow the Holy Spirit to continue to draw you into a deeper revelation of the things of God?  Once you move past the baby steps of taking things literally, God will start moving you into things that open up a whole new realm of understanding, and an opportunity to get even closer to him and grow in your faith.  One of those moments happened to me that caused the birthing of this blog.  Who are you choosing to sleep with?  As believers, we are called to
“love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.  Matthew 22:37 Have you ever considered that doing anything otherwise is considered adultery?  Love the Lord God with your heart… The emotional form of love that takes place within what we call our heart.  Love the Lord with your soul… “the spiritual or immaterial part of a human being or animal, regarded as immortal.”  (oxforddictionaries.com), Love the Lord with your mind… Your thoughts, your speech…
When you are loving the Lord with all of these things – you are far removed from the enemy of our souls – and you are most Christ like.  We know what it is like to love with our hearts, and loving the Lord with your soul means that you take care to clear out wounds that are left over from old sin, wounds that cause us to live in issues of our past.  But have you ever considered that your mind is one of the most important things to love the Lord with?  Loving God is not just an intellectual thing you can do – it’s an active, constant growth in renewing your mindset.  When your mindset is renewed and you are properly judging each thought against the truth of who God is, you will be in alignment with the kingdom of heaven – and fulfilling the greatest request that he has for us – to bring heaven to earth.  He’s ready to expand his kingdom – and it’s time to clear out the darkness that rules – and the only way to start doing that is by making sure that you personally are removing all of those planks out of your eyes so that others can see the example of who Jesus is – shining through you.

So do you want to see an example of how this works?  This is how God revealed this issue to me.  My FiancĂ© and I are just a few short months away from our wedding.  After our divorces, we both decided that we would be single for a while – pouring ourselves into our work – and for me, my kids.  We didn’t know what real love was – wounded by relationships that left us hard hearted.  It was in that hard heartedness that we were deceived into thinking that our lives would be better off lived alone.  We were being deceived by a deceitful spirit.  And this… is where I was brought to ask – Who are you deciding to sleep with?  What thoughts are you deciding to hook up with?  Are you sleeping with the enemy, or are you keeping your marriage bed with God pure and holy?  Are you taking every thought captive or are you allowing yourself to be comforted by the hardness of your heart, and believing lies that Satan is putting in your head?  God never intended for any of us to live life alone.  Jesus certainly didn’t do it and neither should we.  Even in his 40 days in the desert when he was allowed to be tempted by Satan, Jesus kept in perfect communion with the Father.  Because Jesus knew God and loved him with his mind, body, soul and spirit, he was able to take the pressure of being in the same room with the prince of darkness, and passing the test with flying colors.  He was the perfect bride here on earth so that we could become the perfect bride to a perfect king – God. 
A marriage is special because it is supposed to be your most intimate relationship.  When you strip your clothes off – are there any surprises?  Are you hiding things from your spouse or do you allow him/her to know you intimately – every detail.  If you haven’t guessed yet, I’m not even talking about sex.  I’m talking about letting your spouse know the true you.  Are you brave enough to let your partner in on all of your scariest thoughts, your biggest fears?  What about when those demonic attacks hit and you’re thinking negatively about your spouse – or yourself.  You know what I’m talking about – those moments when doubt hits and negative thinking starts allowing the enemy to mess with your head, and fear starts gripping you.  Are you brave enough to ask your partner to pray for you?  You are a team right?  I don’t mean for any of you to feel condemnation – for any of you reading this that is married to an unbeliever – I know this is a really touchy subject but do you have a friend that you can go to for help?  I’ll be raw honest here in saying – that I’m still on the journey of working on my thought life – I used to have PTSD and it’s not been an easy journey to heal from – but with God’s help it CAN be done.  I know what it’s like to be broken, to have low self-esteem and battling depression.  But God – who is my true love, called me wonderfully made changed all of that.  I am wonderfully made – you are wonderfully made – and to think otherwise is blasphemy against God.  Yes blasphemy – you are calling God a liar when you don’t love and approve of yourself.  So who is it again you’re choosing to sleep with when you evaluate yourself – the Liar – or your husband God.  Who are you letting in to the most intimate parts of your life?
Take time for a moment to imagine having a completely open and raw conversation with your spouse.  Can you imagine telling them that you are having an issue in dealing with sin and you need help?  The bible does say "Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed."  James 5:16
Instead of struggling in your independence and silence of trying to heal from whatever issue you’re dealing with, can you imagine sharing your issue with your partner and the two of you praying about it together and becoming healed?  If you don’t have a relationship like this, it’s time to start cultivating one.  The Holy Spirit will guide you in your conversation.  Prayerfully approach the issue under the covering of prayer and ask the Lord to give you unconditional love from your partner or for your partner so that you can start walking out a transparent relationship with him/her.  Here’s one way to look at it, if you’re hiding parts of yourself from your partner, you’re allowing yourself to be under a demonic spirit that wants to shame you away from Gods love and joy that has been ordained for you and your spouse.  Think back to Adam and Eve – they had no one but God and each other to share their entire lives with.  They really knew each other completely.  Nothing hidden.
Again, don’t read into this as a sexual reference.  Let your eyes be opened to see that this type of intimate marriage is what God wants for you.  Adultery in this reference is moving away from God to pursue worldly doctrine, because it appears better and easier to digest.  Just take a pill and you’ll feel better… Fornication is allowing the spirit of darkness to take up residency inside you and cause separation between you and God, and possibly you and your spouse.
He answered, “Have you not read that he who created them from the beginning made them male and female, and said, ‘Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’?  So they are no longer two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together let not man separate.”  Matthew 19:4-6  We read this verse all the time and think of it as meaning an outsider, but what about the outsider you’ve been messing with that doesn’t belong in your head.  Don’t let the devil mess with your heart, mind or emotions – keep him away from those sacred things that belong to God.  You don’t want him in your church do you?  Then why do you allow him to reside in your temple?  The body after all is the temple of the Holy Spirit.
God joins a man and a woman together in marriage to be one with them.  The demonic knows this and tries his best to allure us away from God, and from being open and honest with each other and with God.  In essence, drawing us away into in adulterous affair and fornicating (through words and actions) pulling us off the foundation of Christ and His word, to entice us into the darkness under the premise of light.
Are you wondering why I’m calling it fornication be in alignment with the enemy?  In Hosea, God asks the bride to turn away from her lovers, her idols.  He called her a whore for loving other things besides Him.  It’s such a strong way to put it – but God is a jealous lover – he wants you – all of you – and he’s not willing to share. 
Wouldn’t you rather have a love like in the Song of Solomon – so full of passion and healthy lust for your lover that you can’t stand to be without them?  Or what about the kind of love demonstrated in Psalm 42:1  “As the deer pants for streams of water, so I long for you, O God.  I thirst for God, the living God”.  Can you imagine lusting after God in such a way that it’s like being parched without his presence in your life?  I know this love affair is what I desire.  The benefits of God and his kingdom far outweigh the benefits of the world.
Enough sleeping with the enemy (Satan)– he is the greatest adulterer in the world – so in love with the things of the world that he is cursed by God to hell.  Besides – who wants to sleep with someone whose trying to sleep with everyone else too?  He’s a murderer, a thief, and a liar – he will take you for everything you’ve got AND bring you to hell with him.  That’s a prison sentence none of us can afford.

Father God, thank you for piercing our minds with the power of the cross.  I pray that my mind is taken captive by you and you alone, to think the thoughts you think and to speak the words you speak.  I pray Jesus that when I open my mouth, prophecy is on my tongue to edify and build up your body.  Help me on this journey to understand and learn how to renew my mind to your thoughts.  Be my teacher and guide me into your truth.  Set me free from the thoughts of this old mindset and build within me a new foundation and infrastructure so that I may house your holy spirit to its fullness and power.  In Jesus name Amen!