The Best Diet Ever!

Did you hit your brick wall yet?  Don’t look around – yes I’m talking to you.  The one holding the remote, diving your hand into those high calorie snacks, having your little pity party because you’ve tried everything and nothing seems to be working?  Yes – I’m talking about the D word… Dieting.  We’ve seen the infomercials, read thousands of articles, commiserated over our weight loss woes with friends and co-workers, but maybe there’s a diet you just haven’t tried yet… What if dieting became less about how you look in the mirror, and more about causing your body to worship God?  Psalms 103 says, “Praise the Lord, O my soul; all my inmost being, praise his holy name.  Praise the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits – who forgives all your sins and heals all your diseases, who redeems your life from the pit and crowns you with love and compassion, who satisfies your desires with good things so that your youth is renewed like the eagles.”

Remember the days of your youth, when life was carefree – you ate what you wanted and just felt great?  Wouldn’t it be great to feel like that again?  In this Psalm, it tells even our inmost being to praise the Lord.  Our inmost being – our insides – not just our heart and our mind – but all that is within us is to praise God.  When the spirit of God is living within us, we have the power to heal, and we can co-labor with God in worshipping him by taking steps to improve our health and begin healing.  What the devil has stolen, it’s time to take back my friends.  Is there an organ in your body that isn’t working the way it should?  Do you have high cholesterol or blood pressure?  Or are you simply frustrated by those pounds that aren’t shedding – and you’ve tried – and tried again to lose them.

Let’s start with the matter of your heart.  Pull out a sheet of paper for this one – I want you to look inside yourself to pull out the answers to this.  Ready? 

Why are you wanting to lose weight?  Health reasons, you don’t like who you see in the mirror, your loved ones complain about your size, be honest with yourself – God knows your honest answer – be honest with him – he doesn’t mind.  In fact, the more honest you can be with the one who created you, the more you’ll discover how much he cares about you and wants to hear from you.  Weight can be such a sensitive subject – but God knows all about how you feel – he created you – he created your feelings.

Ok, so enough with the psychology chair for now… pull yourself up by your bootstraps and lets get working on the best new you ever!

Your Mind:

Love the Lord your God with all your mind – and love yourself too.  The mind is the hardest thing to force into compliance with Gods word.  Sometimes it takes a lot of work, and a lot of reminders to make your brain do something that it’s not used to.  Start by getting bossy with your mind – In the name of Jesus – I declare my mind has come into compliance with the Holy Spirit, and I am a child of God, an heir to the throne.  I have the mind of Christ and I am determined to follow after and worship him.  Your mind can be the biggest hurdle in weight loss.  The not wanting to work out, the not wanting to change eating habits etc.… you know your excuses.  Give yourself a reason to change – and be reasonable.  Start out with a weekly goal – and don’t be discouraged if you miss it – just move the deadline and make sure you follow through.  Get an accountability partner to help spur you on – especially in your moments of weakness.

Your heart:

Love the Lord your God with all your heart.  Loving God with your heart is the most basic form of worship to him.  When you love God with your heart, you radiate his glory – you glow.  Take a moment and just close your eyes, tell God how much you love him and feel how you glow in the moment.  Note how good you feel when you do this.

All that is within you:

Can you imagine if all of your organs started worshipping God in the same way that your heart can?  Can you imagine how good that would feel?  Close your eyes again and imagine that – imagine your kidneys and your liver – worshipping the Lord because they are full of health and life.  Can you feel the radiance of health and life that could be flowing from every cell within you?

How, you might be asking, can you create something within yourself like this where every part of you worships the Lord?  How can you take that step forward and say Yes to God and his desire for you to be healthy?  Stand up and declare it today – that from this moment forward, you are going to worship God by getting healthy.  Start by taking control of what goes in to your body and start becoming aware of the toxins that are in the direct and indirect things that you ingest.

Step 1:  You are what you eat… have you ever taken time to consider what you wash your dishes with?  I looked on the label of my dishwashing liquid to find that it was made with sodium silicate and Chlorine bleach.  Have you ever run a load of dishes and had a nice cold beverage – in a nice clean glass – and tasted the leftover remains of soap that remains on the glass?  I have, and one day it gave me an awful headache, my heart started racing, and I was dizzy – I had been poisoned.  Our organs are taking in that poison and dispersing it throughout our bodies – that’s definitely not a healthy way to worship God.  But never fear there are organic products out there.  Find one that is biodegradable and made from plant-based products - just Google it.

What other kind of poisons are you putting into your body?  Are you a smoker?  A heavy drinker?  Or use some other kind of poison?  How are those things worshipping God, when you know that they’re poison?  Yes these things are hard to put down – especially when you have had them as a habit – but God is greater than any weakness that we have – and he can help you get healthy, but you need to take the first step.  He’s not going to do it for you – but he will be with you every step of the way.

"Read Measurement Markings from Above"
Let God show you how he sees you

How is this all tying into the best diet ever?  Because the best diet to have is really not a diet – it’s a healthy lifestyle.  It’s a mindset of realizing that your body is a temple that the Lord longs to dwell in – and everything that you do to abuse your body – is abusing the Holy Spirit that lives inside of you.  Take a moment to think about that.  When you go into a church, or a holy place – what do you do in there?  How do you act?  Why?  Think of your body in the same terms as you would think of the church – holy.  “Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God?  You are not your own; you were bought at a price.  Therefore honor God with your body.”  1 Corinthians 6:19-20

As Christians, we are commanded to honor God with our bodies.  Let that work itself into your brain and allow it to renew your mindset.  Would you bring garbage to a temple and leave it there?  Or do you bring only the best to the temple?  The choice really is yours to make – but I truly believe that once you start to have a reverence for your body as being a temple for the Holy Spirit to reside in, making healthy life choices will become as natural as breathing.

Becoming aware of what we put on and in our bodies is becoming increasingly important in a world where pesticides, harsh chemicals and environmental toxins are unavoidable.  We can’t control the world but we can filter what goes in to our temples by being diligent to be aware of the things we consume.  It does take work – and it takes a conscious effort.  But isn’t your health – and God, worth all the effort it takes?

Step 2:  Quit eating or at least cut back on processed foods!  Look at the label – what do you see?  What kinds of ingredients are you ingesting when you eat those items dubbed as “healthy”?  I was shocked when I took a nutrition class for college.  It opened my eyes to realize how blind society has become to believing what we’re told.  Foods that are labeled or advertised as being good for you – Don’t be a sheep and follow the herd on this one.  Those preservatives and additives that they put in processed foods – are not really what they’re cracked up to be.  Honestly – we read the labels looking for sugars and fats and fibers – but have you ever dissected the ingredients on the back of those labels and what they mean?  What is ascorbic acid – or guar gum?  What do they do?  Are they really a healthy item to be putting into our bodies?  Does it gross you out to know that some of the fillers that go into foods derive from sawdust?  Now that’s some serious fiber right there!  Linked to this blog is a fabulous website that allows you to print and read about many additives in our foods and their safety levels and what should be avoided.  It may change the way you look at what you are eating – check it out at www.cspinet.org/reports/chemcuisine.htm

Other great resources that I love are tracking sites.  You can log in to these and enter in the foods that you’re eating, track your exercise, and they will give you a picture of the amount of calories and nutrition on your intake, as well as the calories burned during exercise.  With these tools, you can begin to monitor how – what you are eating effects the amount of exercise you need to reach your goal weight.  A “watched pot may never boil” – but tracking numbers like these lead to results.  My personal favorite of the two websites is WWW.Livestrong.com/myplate, or www.supertracker.usda.gov/default.aspx will offer you similar functions.

It’s so easy to get caught up into the zombie zone of weight loss – and kudos to you for deciding to make a change and becoming a healthier you – but don’t forget that the one who created you – adores you – and he wants you to know how much you are loved every single day – just as you are.  View yourself through God’s eyes, worship him and love him – and he will give you all the help you need to reach your dreams.

Daddy, You created us to be healthy and happy and loved.  In the name of Jesus, I pray that we be blessed with your strength and power to change things in our lives that are making us unhealthy, and allowing negativity into our lives.  Help us to heal, help us to grow, and most of all, help us to feel your love radiating within our hearts as we grow closer to you – I declare over my body that it is a temple of the Holy Spirit and I will honor you by co-laboring with you to make myself healthy and whole.  Enlighten me to make good choices, and bring me peace.  Help me to view myself from your eyes daddy, you call me beautiful, you call me perfect, you call me beautifully and wonderfully made, help me to believe those words.  In Jesus name Amen!

The Ultimate Merger

“Therefore what God has joined together, let no one separate:  Mark 10:9

An inseparable team.  Isn’t that the way we envision love?  Isn’t that how love should be?  So in the era that we live in where the divorce rate is beyond a 50% failure rate, and church attendance is low, is there any wonder why marriages are failing?  Man is putting marriage together in our own carbon-copied image of what we think love is.  Distorted views and broken homes create the images that our children are watching, and broken, hurting, imperfect people are marrying out of images that are short of the ordained blessed life that God created when he brought Adam and Eve together in the garden.  What does it look like to be joined together by God?  Look at the holy trinity for a beginner’s lesson.  John 10:30 says that “I and the Father are one”.  Jesus – God, and the Holy Spirit are all one man that makes up the triune spirit of God.  You can not separate God from the Holy Spirit, You can not separate Jesus from the Holy Spirit, and you can not separate God from Jesus… all three are connected, inseparable.

So then what is the image of marriage as God puts together when he causes two spirits to unite as one?  It is the perfect image of the bride of Christ.  There is God, there is man, who is to love his wife as Christ loves the church, and there is woman… I may be going out on a limb here by representing her as the Holy Spirit in the trinity of marriage, but I will explain my train of thought for that.  The Holy Spirit is a helper; the wife was created to be a “help meet”.  “And the Lord God said, It is not good that man should be alone; I will make a help meet for him”.  God didn’t want us to live life alone – so he created another to be our help, what completes us and fills us, and makes us whole.  So why cant just any woman or man be that other half that is missing?  God created a certain and special, unique person to be Adam’s wife.  He put Adam to sleep and created her out of him.  “So the Lord God caused the man to fall into a deep sleep; and while he was sleeping, he took one of the mans ribs and then closed up the place with flesh.  Then the Lord God made woman out of the rib he had taken out of the man, and he brought her to the man.”  Genesis 2:21-22.  Can you imagine a partner made so intimately for you that she was made from something so close to your heart as a rib bone?  What does that look like?  For a start, God knows your heart.  He knows you intimately.  “For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb” Psalm 139:13.  God knows you – and has known you since before creation.  He knows your likes, he knows your dislikes, he knows what makes you happy, he knows what makes you sad, he knows the most intimate details about you, and he wants to bring you a wife that will compliment those details and bring out the best in you through her. 

Your impatience to make life happen on your own terms could be the reason that God hasn’t brought her to you yet.  Sometimes it takes the trial and error, and the pain and heartbreak of trying to make it happen in your own strength for you to come to your senses and realize that only God knows the perfect woman for you – and he’s been hiding her from you until you’re ready to give him the reigns and allow you to have her.  “I will give you hidden treasures, riches stored in secret places, so that you may know that I am the Lord, the God of Israel, who summons you by name.”  Isaiah 45:3  Or ladies – turn it the other way around – that God has hidden him from you…  “But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.”  Matthew 6:33

Where can you come close enough to the heart of God to find your hidden treasure?  Start by living your life from a position of authentic worship, thankfulness, forgiveness, and humility.  Ask God to start revealing the dirt of your past to you – to bring it to the forefront so that what is brought to light, you will become set free, delivered and healed from.  God doesn’t want to give you a broken wife – and he loves her enough to not give her a broken husband.  Seek after wholeness and healing, seek after God.  Replace the head of the household with the one who created home.  Renew your mindset on what you picture a family to be like.  Are you caught up in an old mindset where you (men) are the head of the household and your wife is supposed to be submissive to you?  That makes you a deity – it doesn’t make you a husband – and she was NOT created to be your doormat – or your servant.  She was created to be your help meet – the one who comes along side you, she comes up to bat with you, the one who whispers in your ear “we’ve got this” when you’re not feeling so confident.  She is your help meet, the one that loves to laugh with you, loves to love you, and is there by your side – because you – love her like Christ loves the church.  Now there’s another image to dissect.  How would Jesus love your wife?  “Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her” Ephesians 5:25.  What does it mean to give yourself up?  To come to the end of you?  Would it mean to turn away from the things of the world – the pornography that you look at that makes her feel insecure about herself?  To escape from the gambling addiction that makes her insecure about your finances?  To let go of a demanding job that robs her of your time and makes her feel second class to the desire to be successful and wealthy?  Look in to your heart and see what God is calling you to be.  If you’re single, love the unknown, unrevealed treasure of your future wife by making steps now and deciding that you are going to be the man of God that she deserves to have.  Do you want to continue in the worldly way of doing love?  Having sex with any girl that will sleep with you?  Or do you want to have the kind of love that would fight to the death for you – and passionately love you like nobody’s business? 

~ It’s time to man up! 

~ It’s time to get real and find out what real love is.

~ It’s time to learn about the man that you should be by becoming like the one you are commissioned to become more like.  

Discover who Jesus is – become his reflection.  Do you picture Jesus as a docile, emasculated man who goes with the flow and doesn’t stand up for himself?  That’s not the Jesus I know.  “His eyes are like blazing fire, and on his head are many crowns. He has a name written on him that no one knows but he himself.”  Revelation 19:12  His eyes are like blazing fire, he wears many crowns – in our modern society how are those things achieved?    Why are his eyes on fire?  What does it do to you when you look into a fire?  You can’t look away can you? Can you imagine being so filled with love and passion that your wife – when she sees you – she sees only you – and not the man at work who is trying to get her attention?  Be that man… Wear your crowns of royalty that God has placed on your head, you are after all a king – and she is to be your queen.  Act in a way that is honorable and noble, be gentle with her, respect her, and be transparent to her.  Don’t allow walls to be put up that she can’t see over, or she’ll feel shut out.  Be as naked with her mentally and spiritually as you are when you’re making love to her.  Bring yourself to her and let her build you up and encourage you – let her know your hopes and dreams – and be vulnerable enough to tell her your fears and insecurities.  Yes guys – it is manly to let her see what makes you vulnerable.  Women have so many transparent vulnerabilities that sometimes it makes them feel like a weaker half. By showing her that you have vulnerabilities too will empower her to get stronger in the areas where she is weak – and in turn, she will stand by your side where you are weak.  Wouldn’t you rather take those weak spots and strengthen them, rather than hide them?

Can you see how this is all starting to tie in to becoming one?  By putting God as the head of yourself, and growing in your walk with Christ, becoming more Christ like will draw the perfect godly woman to you – God will bring you the woman that will be the piece of you that you have been missing.  This is your call to wake up – “ This is why it is said: “Wake up, sleeper, rise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you.”  Ephesians 5:14.  Wake up and start becoming the best man of God that you can be – so that you will be given the bride of Christ.  And when he brings her to you – encourage her, love her limitlessly – be the reflection of Jesus that she needs you to be.  Be willing to fight for her, be willing to change for her, be vulnerable, be real, be a real man.  Draw a line in the sand and decide that today you are going to step up and change your future by becoming who God is calling you to be… pray with me

Dear God – Abba Father – I declare over the spirit life reading this to WAKE UP in the Name of Jesus Christ!  Put a new fire in them, a new passion, a new understanding and drive in them to become the man or woman of God that you had in mind for them before creation.  Bring a kingdom mindset and ground it securely within them that cannot be removed or stolen.  Bring healing and wholeness to the body, mind and spirit and help them to be one with you Lord.  Purify them and make them holy in your sight.  Give them strength and determination and patience for their journey.  Enlighten them with hope and truth by providing them with glimpses of their future.  Thank you daddy for a culture of new men that will be to women a direct representation of Jesus, and thank you for women who have a heart after yours God, that they will be empowered to be the women of God that you long them to be.  Remind them of their royalty and help them to walk in new strength and power as they fulfill your call.  In Jesus name Amen.

A Godly Inheritance

“Houses and wealth are inherited from parents, but a prudent wife is from the Lord.”  

 Proverbs 19:14

In today’s world, we think of an inheritance as a financial windfall when a loved one passes.  Physical gifts of cars, furniture, houses get left behind.  What do any of those things mean in the long run?  What do they mean in the grand scheme of life?  What if the inheritance we should be leaving is a demonstration of the godly way that a husband should love his wife, and a godly wife should love her husband?  We all grow up in brokenness.  It’s a fallen world that we live in, broken is normal… but it doesn’t have to continue to be the inheritance that we give to our children by demonstrating a home that is filled with conditional love or abuse. 

“Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her…  In the same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies.  He who loves his wife loves himself.  After all, no one ever hated his own body, but he feeds and cares for it, just as Christ does the church”.   

Ephesians 5:25&28-29

Can you imagine taking care of your husband or wife, as well as you take care of your own body?  Think about all of the things you do on a daily basis to take care of yourself.  You put on clothes that make you feel good; you prepare food that satisfies excited taste buds.  You prep yourself just so.  How about the next level of self-care – those little things you buy yourself to make yourself feel good.  The latest magazine or whatever trinket it may be that makes you happy.  Take it to the next level – and think on the more expensive something’s that you buy for yourself… are you willing on a daily basis to love your husband or wife with that extent of love?  I’m not saying that love is about giving gifts, what I am saying is that I want you to take a look at your current situation – and evaluate.  Are you giving your other half the same amount of love and affection that you give yourself?  If not – why not?  What’s holding you back from loving them like that?  The verse in Ephesians is Gods request of us as husbands and wives.  He didn’t ask us to love each other like this so that we could leave an inheritance of brokenness to our children.  Obviously something went wrong and brokenness is the inheritance that has spread like a disease throughout our societies.  I know when I was married to my first husband, the pain of an emotionally distant husband hurt all the time.  I prayed for a love like Jesus talked about.  I wanted to be loved and valued and cherished.  But rejection was how I felt 99% of the time.  This was the inheritance I was demonstrating to my children.  My broken and hurting marriage was their reference point to what love is and how it should be.  The mirror image of my marriage was to be their inheritance and I knew deep down in my heart that they deserved better – so I chose to be a generation changer.  I chose to let go of the reigns I was holding on to and let God become my husband.  So I started dating him.  Yeah I know that sounds weird – but just listen anyway… I’ll give you a couple of for instances.  In dialogue with God one day as I was on my way to meet a friend for lunch, God started whispering to me about my value to him.  He started wooing my heart; he told me that I was more valuable to him than all the diamonds in the sky.  He then went on to say that I didn’t need to worry about paying for lunch that day, he had already taken care of it for me and someone would be picking up my check.  I knew it couldn’t be my friend – I owed her some money that I hadn’t repaid yet.  Once I got to the restaurant with my friend, I was looking over the menu and being sort of selective because I didn’t think what I had heard in the car was anything more than myself whispering wishes to myself.  But God is not a man who lies… briefly after getting our menu’s, my friend told me that she had a gift certificate and was going to be taking care of my check for the day.  It was all I could do to hold back the tears that flooded my eyes.  It was my God – and he was really saying those things to me.  Fast-forward a week, God asked me to meet him for a date at the bookstore at 9am the following morning for coffee.  In the morning I woke up and got ready, and on the way there I heard him say that he wanted me to be first in line.  I thought that was a strange request – it didn’t make much sense – what’s the point.  Shrugging it off, I pulled in to the parking lot, walked in and went straight to the coffee bar.  The server was just pulling out from the oven, fresh, hot, blueberry muffins – one of my favorites.  So I ordered my coffee – and added a muffin and shortly after there was a line behind me of another three people.  She handed me my coffee and a muffin, and then asked if I wanted a fork  (which in my head I actually was wondering if they had any).  I quickly said yes to the fork and she gently handed one to me served on a folded napkin.  I sat down and just took in my surroundings.  Thanking God for the food and the date, I wondered what he had in store for me with our appointment.  Halfway through my muffin I looked around and asked him – why did you want me to be first in line daddy – I don’t get it.  And he responded – “Because I wanted you to be served first – like a queen”.  It warmed my heart and like a bubbling teapot, I could feel the joy within me rise up and glow out from every pore in my body.  A queen… he wanted to treat me like a queen.  Now isn’t that the kind of inheritance we should be demonstrating for our kids?  If you’re in a difficult marriage – I know that reading this can be like swallowing sandpaper.  I’ve been there.  And I know your pain. But can you imagine the kind of marriage ~ and the kind of inheritance we could give our children if we started loving our spouses the way God intended for us?  It could change the world!

What holds you back from cherishing your spouse?  One thing that I constantly see is the value that we put on our jobs, our TV shows, our to do lists.  The saddest thing I saw recently was a couple on their anniversary.  They were trying to make plans to go out to dinner to celebrate, but there was a football game on midday – and so the celebration was going to have to be postponed.  What kind of perceived value does that leave the other half with?  Guys – if you are valuing your football team or job etc.… more than you’re valuing your wife – shame on you!  Are you getting kickbacks from your beloved team?  Does your job fulfill you and give birth to your children?  If the answer to those questions is no, then its time to re-evaluate your priorities.  The chatter around the water cooler on Monday morning shouldn’t be about the latest TV drama or latest office gossip.  What if your chatter revolved around bragging about what your spouse did for you (not sexually) or what he or she bought for you.  What if your relationship became something others started to crave and want in their lives.  It’s so common to tear our other halves down – and that’s certainly not loving like Christ. Someday I will be the kind of wife that causes my husband to be respected and envied because of the way I talk about and love on him.  And I certainly desire to get the same kind of love in return.  With God as my date, He is showing me what it is to be treated like a queen.  And for my future husband, I expect nothing less.  I’m not asking for perfect, but I am striving for the best God has to offer, and in return I will do the same.

If you’re divorced, start loving your future spouse now by asking God to reveal your brokenness and begin your healing journey.  You cant bring an unhealthy, baggage laden life into a new relationship – your new husband or wife doesn’t deserve the dirty you may be carrying, just as you won’t want their yuck. 

Dear Jesus; I pray for a world of generational changers for your kingdom.  I pray that the person reading this will have a love like yours in their own homes, and that their hearts will be healed, and wholeness and pure authentic love with be the inheritance of their home.  Bless them with the strength to heal, the willingness to change, and the heart to never give up on their pursuit of you Lord.  Break off the chains that bind, and take down the walls that separate, in Jesus name…

Amen

He's not mad at you...

"And a voice from heaven said, "This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased.""  Matthew 3:17

      Well pleased... are those words that you have longed to hear from your dad?  Words that just reading about makes your heart rage with jealousy at the pain of never having them spoken to you by your own dad?  I don't need to tell you that we live in a society full of broken and hurting men.  Men that have been raised by other broken and hurting men, many of which have longed to hear the words "I love you", "I'm proud of you".  I can't make excuses as to why you never got the chance to hear those words, but what I can do is offer you some truth and hope that you receive it.  I believe that people in general have trust issues with God because of the earthly relationships that we've been given with our own fathers.  Cold, distant, maybe neglective, abusive or a substance abusive dad.  Do any of these sound familiar?  A father should be a direct representation of our father in heaven, and unfortunately many fall short of who they have been called to be.  But who your father on earth is, is not the same character as who your father in heaven is.
     "For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.  Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because he has not believed in the name of God's one and only Son."  John 3:17-18  I know to you that this verse may not make any sense - in fact you're probably reading this and wondering why you're forcing yourself to read through scripture, but hold on for just a minute and let me share my heart with you.  This verse in John - is telling you that God sent Jesus to rescue you.  He saw you where you are today - right here in this very moment in time.  He saw all the pain you're in and he wants you to know that you are loved and valued beyond measure.  You read that right - your daddy in heaven is so proud of you!  Believing in God doesn't have to be a scary thing.  He's asking that you believe that he sent his son - and for you to believe in his son Jesus - not so he can punish you - but because he loves you.  It's those of you that are too stubborn to believe that will be punished.  When  you breathe your last breath, if you have refused to accept that Jesus came to this world to save you, the death that you fear will be far worse a death than you could ever imagine.  A life in Christ saves you from having to spend an eternity in hell.  I'm not just saying this because I'm a happy go lucky - fake smile plastered on christian, I'm saying this because I have lived through hell.  I have lived through the heavy hand of a father, spinning my wheels trying to please him - to get quality time with him and hear - "I'm proud of you".  Please don't turn me away - I know that this is not an easy subject... I know your pain and how much it hurts, and what I'm hoping you'll hear is this - none of the perceptions about who God is as a tyrannic, mean, punishing God are true.  The God of the universe had only one son - and he sent him to earth because he saw us here dying.  So he sent Jesus to die so that we cold be reclaimed to him and spend an eternity with him in heaven.  He loved YOU enough to do that.  Could you do the same with your only child?  Send them light years away from you - to suffer and be hated?  But God did that for you!  He couldn't stand seeing you hurting like you are - His heart broke and he had a plan.
Maybe you think that none of this is for you - who cares about a stupid god - and who cares about religion or church.  This isn't about religion or church... it's about you - its about getting you out of the rut that you're in and showing you that there is life beyond the pit that you're in right now.  God is NOT mad at you - he doesn't hate you - you read that right - GOD DOES NOT HATE YOU!  The raw deal you may have been given in this life is not because God did that to you - it's because our world is a fallen world that needs Jesus to make it better.  The character of God is love - so if what you're receiving from the world isn't love - then it's not from God.  It's time to get yourself back in right standing with God - will you take my hand and pray with me - let me help you get out of your pit.
     Heavenly Father; Daddy, Abba, we cry out to you... the pain i've suffered has tormented and tried to destroy me, but God today is a new day and a new beginning.  I choose to accept Jesus Christ as my savior.  I want to be your child - adopted into your kingdom and treated with love like a good daddy does.  Heal my broken and wounded heart and teach me the truth of who you are Lord.  In the name of Jesus I declare that I am set free from the bondage of pain and shame that I have carried.  Let me be at rest in your presence and shown your love.  In Jesus name Amen.

Discover more of who you are and your value by going to WWW.Laughingatyourreligion.com

Wimp or Warrior - Part II - Slave Mentality

Freedom in the hands of Christ
He brought us home, he paid the price

Free, we are free... paid with blood by the lamb of God - Jesus.  He was our ultimate sacrifice, freeing us from the laws of sin and death.  Nothing could stop him, nothing could get in his way.  Because of his courage - we are free.  God didn't free us so that we would chain ourselves into service for him, God set us free so that we could become rulers in the kingdom that he has created here on earth.  Become like minded with the mind of Christ and you can see what I mean.  We were prisoners because of the fall of Adam, but Jesus came to our rescue.  We are kings and queens in the court of the most high God - and he is calling us to rule with him - not to be ruled by the earth.  "It is for freedom that Christ has set us free.  Stand firm then and do not let yourselves be burdened by the yoke of slavery."  Galatians 5:1.  Have you ever seen a picture of early farming?  How the Oxen carry upon their necks a yoke, chained up and reigned, held by the one directing them as they plowed the hard rocky soil?  The weight of burden carried around their necks as they pull and stress against the ground to do as their master commands.  Is this how you are living out your faith?  As a martyred, miserable, exhausted christian?  Beaten down by "ministry" and dry in your bones?  Why do you slave for the Lord like a shackled prisoner?  Let life speak into your soul.  Let it resound within you like an earthquake, bringing healing to the depths of your being.  Slavery is NOT God's desire for you.  "The Lord sets prisoners free"  Psalm 146:7, "So if the son sets you free, you will be free indeed"  John 8:36.  
So you may not be in a prison right now, but are you in bondage?  Are you sacrificing something because you feel it is your duty to God?  Maybe you're a sunday school teacher out of obligation, maybe you're a nursery worker because you were asked and felt it was the "right" thing to do.  Maybe you're pursuing some type of ministry and finding it to be a lot more work than you were thinking it should be, or finding the road that you're on is too difficult to break into - maybe you're tithing your 10% as the rule book says to do - but missing the mark because you're not listening to how God wants you to tithe... or maybe your chains go deeper than simply trying to do what's right - caught in a trap that you cant seem to figure out how to escape from.  Maybe this is your wake up call... it's time for you to see the chains you've put on yourself.  Before I move on I will clarify this... I am certainly not saying that pursuing God is wrong - and tithing is not wrong, what I am saying, is that Christians tend to put ourselves into some difficult positions trying to become the perfect christian that often times they're forgetting to listen to God and His direction for our lives.  Time gets wasted in ministries and people get hurt when things are done in the flesh.  Well meaning christians pursue healing ministries that they are not cut out for in the name of doing the "right" thing.  Maybe it's time to rethink what you really feel serving God is all about.  It's time to do a mental 180 and open your eyes to see the goodness that God has in store for you.  It's time to rule with God!
One of the first steps to becoming a ruler in the kingdom, is to decide to cross the fence between slavery and living life your way, and deciding that following God is how you truly want to live.  What's your focus point?  What are you currently doing that you know is wrong?  "Live as free men, but do not use your freedom as a cover up for evil; live as servants of God."  1 Peter 2:16.  For many years I kept pushing and trying to become who God said I was going to be.  Prophecies spoken over me were powerful and great, and pursuing them in my own flesh led me into traps that cost me not only time but a lot of money.  I fell into sin and used God's grace as a way to justify what I was into... trapping myself into a cycle of sin and repentance.  I was mocking God, and he was not amused.  Finally I became disenchanted with what I was doing and the ugly person I had become.  I did my 180.  I shook off the wrong I was doing and I put back on the robes of righteousness, and the moment God saw me returning, he met me in his power and lavished on me some amazing gifts - gifts of the spirit - and physical gifts.  It's not easy to shake off the old you.  People won't understand - I had to push away some really unhealthy relationships to put my royal robe on.  It was hard, but I saw a promising future in the glimpses that God gave to me.  God gave me a focal point that gave me the drive and desire to push forward and shed off the old - so that I could have the new.
"You have been set free from sin and have become slaves to righteousness"  Romans 6:18  Wait, why am I talking about becoming a slave again?  I thought you said God doesn't want me in slavery.  God doesn't want you in the kind of slavery that causes you to lose the life and the future that can only be found in him.  Have you ever heard the saying - when you love what you do - you will never work a day in your life?  That's what it's like to be a slave to righteousness.  You're working for the Lord, but you're working through the skills and strengths that he has given you, and the passions you have.  You become a slave to righteousness because you will love what you are doing - and through that you will joyfully give your all to fulfill what he has called you to do.  God loves and adores you.  Just as you want to see your child happy, He wants to see you happy.  What is it in your life that when you think of it, causes you to feel happy and excitement?  What is it that's blocking you from that type of life?  What are the reasons that are holding you back from pursuing the kind of life that you feel your heart calling for?  I challenge you to write all of these fears down on a piece of paper and ask God to show you what his thoughts are.  I dare you to ask him to show you which items on that list are lies from the devil... because in case you didn't already know - the devil wants to make you afraid to pursue your destiny.  He doesn't want you realizing your potential because he already knows that his time is short, and he has been warring to keep God's kings and queens in bondage. 
 "It pleased the Lord for the sake of his righteousness to make his law great and glorious.  But this is a people plundered and looted, all of them trapped in pits or hidden away in prisons.  they have become plunder, with no one to rescue them"  Isaiah 43:21-22 
In the old testament, Moses went up on the mountain and was given the law of the ten commandments.  The law, impossible to not break, becomes death to anyone trying to fulfill it.  "because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit of life set me free from the law of sin and death.  For what the law was powerless to do in that it was weakened by the sinful nature, God did by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful man to be a sin offering.  And so he condemned sin in sinful man, in order that the righteous requirements of the law might be fully met in us, who do not live according to the sinful nature but according to the spirit.  Those who live according to the sinful nature have their minds set on what that nature desires; but those who live in accordance with the Spirit have their minds set on what the Spirit desires.  The mind of sinful man is death, but the mind controlled by the Spirit is life and peace"  Romans 8:2-6  If I were to put these two verses in a blender to simplify them into lamens terms, I feel that they would simply say this... God made the law, knowing that it was law that we could not fulfill.  So he sent Jesus to fulfill the law perfectly - not so as to be an example, but so he could crucify the law of sin and death.  The death of our savior on the cross, broke us out of the prison that the law kept us bondage to.  When you can become free from religiosity, and start living life by the spirit, you will discover the freedom of no rules.  Why no rules?  Because when you live life by the spirit, the spirit will guide you between right and wrong.  God is the ultimate authority - and he along with his Holy Spirit, are constantly advising and guiding you along your journey.  God is always with you - way more than you will have access to your bible - so listen to him.  Listen to that voice you hear within you where it's guiding you to go.  But just as Jesus willingly laid his life on the cross to save us, you need to willingly put your life on the cross to receive new life.  You need to be willing to draw a line in the sand and cross over it and never look back again.  You were born to be a warrior - and this is your day.  This is your new beginning.. You are set free!  Take a few minutes to check out this video sung by Casting Crowns - "Set me free" dramatized by The Circuit Youth...

                                     https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r7olqJtW8EI

      Dear Jesus, You were the ultimate sacrifice.  You fulfilled the law to free us from slavery to it.  I pray that the wells of the ears and the spiritual eyes be opened for each and every reader that has been with us today.  Open them and cause them to flow with new waters of discovery and understanding in the spirit.  Give them the course they need to follow to pursue after you, and to become who they are pre-destined to be.  You have directed their path.  Let nothing stop them from finishing the race they have started.  I declare in the name of Jesus that their chains are broken!  They are set free!  Release them into their destinies.  In the name of Jesus we pray, we give you all our worship Lord, Amen!