The time is coming, the time is near...

The time is coming, the time is near, for the children of God, His followers, to receive a powerful anointing that shall pour forth for such a time as this.

An anointing of power, filled with the miraculous flow from the showering flood of the Father's glory...                    

He is pouring out His heart to His creation - come back to Me with your whole heart my children for I have loved you with an everlasting love.

A powerful wave of redemption, restoration, healing, reconciliation, renewal...abundant new life in Christ Jesus. 

The First Gift of Christmas…

What is the first gift of Christmas?

His presence!

The promise fulfilled…

Emmanuel - God with us…

His glory revealed to all mankind…the veil torn asunder…

The unfolding of God's gift of redemption and restoration…

 Salvation!

Rejoice…for the Lord has come!

May your Christmas be filled with joy and hope and love as we celebrate the greatest gift of all......Thanks be to God for His indescribable gift! 

The Light has come...

The Light has come and His glory has risen....may we allow His glory to shine through us.

Arise, shine; for your light has come,
And the glory of the Lord has risen upon you.
For behold, darkness will cover the earth And deep darkness the peoples;
But the Lord will rise upon you
And His glory will appear upon you.
Isaiah 60:1‭-‬2 

a bright and glorious light...

We talk about the glory of God and how it's amazing and awesome...

Do you believe that His glory can shine through us similar to how His glory shown from Moses' face?

Lord I want Your glory to shine through me so that those around me, all those whom I come into contact with, would know that You are a truly amazing God…that they would not only see but believe in Your lovingkindness and the grace that You desire to lavish upon Your creation...

Shine Jesus shine through me...

Holy Spirit use me as a bright and glorious light - a beacon of Your grace shining in this darkness - especially as we celebrate the glorious Light that has come into the world….

the glory of Your presence...

As we approach the celebration of the Glorious Light that has come into this world might we ponder upon the following:

I desire the glory of Your presence in my life so that the presence of Your glory will radiate through me to this lost and hurting world...

with thanksgiving....

With thanksgiving
With praise
We magnify Your Name O Lord with all of our heart...
May we intentionally dwell upon Your lovingkindness and purposefully, with whole heartedness, give thanks as we approach this coming week's Thanksgiving celebration...

Now therefore, our God, we thank You, and praise Your glorious name. 
1 Chronicles 29:13 

Enter His gates with thanksgiving 

And His courts with praise. 

Give thanks to Him, bless His name. 

For the Lord is good; 

His lovingkindness is everlasting 

And His faithfulness to all generations.

Psalms 100:4-5

a life of faith...

...the life which I now live in the flesh
I live by faith in the Son of God,
who loved me...      

Galatians 2:20

Do we live by faith or do we live by the world?
The life of faith is our calling as believers in Christ Jesus.
A faith that believes all things just as He has said,
a faith that overcomes the world,
a faith that lives in the righteousness of Christ,
a faith that dwells in His presence,
a faith that is grounded in His grace and truth by the power of the Holy Spirit,
a faith that shines the Light of hope,
a faith that lives a life of love as He loves us.
A miraculous life of faith in a miraculous Lord...

To know Him and to testify...

...we speak of what we know and testify of what we have seen...   John 3:11 

To know Him and to testify - 
of His amazing grace and truth...
of His marvelous redemptive sacrifice...
of His miraculous power...
of His awesome glory...
of His wonderful kingdom...
of His never ending love...
This is what we are to be about as the Spirit fully indwells in us and through us...

be it unto me...

Be it unto me
According to Your Word oh Lord... 

How I struggle, how I fall, how I miss the mark...
Yet, Your mercies are new every morning...Your grace is exceedingly abundant...Your lovingkindness never fails...great is Your faithfulness...
You are faithful even when my struggles leave me flat...even when my fall hinders the way...
Lord, You are my redeemer, my restorer, my life, the lover of my soul...
Be it unto me according to Your word oh Lord...

...be it unto me according to thy word.
Luke 1:38

somebody...

I wanted to be a somebody to this world but I have found that to the world I am nobody. 
Yet, even though I am nobody to this world, I am somebody to the One who created and saved me. 
And nobody should reject the One who created and saved me to be somebody to this world.

Yes, I will wait for the Lord...

Wait for the Lord; 
Be strong and let your heart take courage; Yes, wait for the Lord...
Psalms 27:14 

Waiting is not a thing we like to do in our day...when microwaves are not fast enough...when same day deliver is now a must...when it is troublesome that we must wait for our cell phones to charge...
How fast is fast enough? 
Yet waiting is part of the fabric of life. And our measurement of time is quite different than God's. 
I know, I have been in His holding (waiting) pattern for some time now and even though this verse gives me hope and encouragement it is still difficult to wait...
But with the help of the Holy Spirit we can wait upon the Lord...wait for His answer, wait for His direction, wait for His rescue.
Yes, I will wait for the Lord...

pump us up....

How can we get excited for our mission to this world? And yes we all have a mission and a calling!

What pumps us up to be radical about fulfilling our mission?
How can we be ready, willing and able to share the grace and truth of Jesus through our spiritual gifts with all those that we come into contact?
Holy Spirit get us excited, pump us up...may we be always ready and willing...available for Your service Lord to minister today to this world that is so lost, confused, angry, hopeless, selfish, and even wicked to fulfill our mission that You have called us to - sharing Your love for us through Your grace and truth. 

That brightly shining light set on a hill that cannot be ignored.

God's love for us through Jesus Christ...

God's love for us through Jesus Christ is an overwhelming display of His amazing grace while standing firmly on His truth.

And we are called to love others in the same way. And we can only do that through the power of the Holy Spirit working in and through us...
Holy Spirit saturate our lives like we are a sponge that we might be emptied out for the blessing of grace and truth upon others and then saturated and emptied again and again and again...

where is the power....

We put so much emphasis on the power of our flesh when in reality the real power comes from the Spirit. 

other's disbelief...

Joshua and Caleb had to endure the cost of eight other's disbelief in God’s word and power. 
Forty years of wandering in the desert. 
Forty years of waiting to enter into the promised land. 
This is a lesson for us today.
Let us not allow those who do not believe in the amazing, awesome power of God and His Word keep us from moving forward in the word and power of our almighty and loving God.

be strong...

With so much going on around us these days - hurricanes, fires, earthquakes, division, strife, enmity...

An admonition for today:
...be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus.   

2 Timothy 2:1

lost and wandering...

I wrote this early morning Wednesday August 30^th...

I am lost and wandering
Wasting days as they go by
Not knowing what to do
Another month comes to an end
Struggling with the silence
Lord, I have not heard from You
There has been no revelation of the next step on this path that You have me on
It has been a very long and trying journey...

Then my attention was brought to the following verse -

I know that there is nothing better for them than to rejoice and to do good in one's lifetime...Ecclesiastes 3:12

I have been really struggling with what I am to be doing these days...and answers to my struggling have been difficult to ascertain….

And as the path (my path) that I have been on has ended, I do not know what comes next...

Yet here I believe is the Lord's answer to me in this time:

Rejoice in the Me and walk in My ways...

Sharing My goodness and loving-kindness for all of your days...

Will it be easy? I am guessing no…but I know and can be sure that the Holy Spirit will lead and empower me if I seek after the fullness of His indwelling within me.

how amazing is that...

When the Hebrew nation was redeemed from Egypt the people saw the Lord's hand, saving them from the bondage that had enslaved them, yet even in their deliverance they looked back!

They had the pillar of fire by night and the cloud by day to show them that their loving God was with them as they traversed the wilderness and yet that was not good enough for them, they murmured and complained.

The Lord brought them to the edge of the Promised Land and instead of praising God for His continued providence in providing the promise they had disbelief and sent spies into the land and decided that the God who had delivered them was not big enough to complete His promise…they relied on their own limited vision and fear even though they had experienced God's powerful hand upon them in their wanderings.

What love He has for us…yet we would rather follow our own limited vision and live lives that are incomplete in Him…placing Him in a box of our own making…the Romans' placed Jesus in a tomb but we place Him in a box…the creator off all things, the most powerful, omniscient loving Lord and we live our lives limiting who He is and what He can do.

Because of His great sacrifice we have the most amazing privilege and honor and opportunity to have a relationship with the Almighty God…to walk and talk with Him…to sit at His feet and enjoy His presence…the veil was torn from top to bottom so we could enjoy His intimate loving relationship that He desires of and for His children.

He calls us to cultivate our relationship with Him, to draw close to Him, to abide in Him, to see and experience Him as our heavenly Father and faithful friend.

He was given us His Holy Spirit to live within us, how amazing is it that our Lord should want to share a part of Himself with us…and what do we do with that? For the most part we ignore the Spirit of God living in us, we keep Him on the edges for times of need, we overlook and even dispel His power to work in us and through us, to change us, to conform us into Christ's image, to do the works that the Lord has planned for us to do, to be different from the world - set apart for His glory. And why do we do this? I believe that it is because we are comfortable living in the physical but afraid of walking in the spiritual!

May His grace abound...

As we walk through these days of the ever present darkness and violent struggle and growing tribulation, might we earnestly desire that -

The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ be with our spirit.  (Philippians 4:23)

May His grace abound through us as we boldly and unashamedly allow His amazing light of grace and truth to shine forth in this darkness...

amazing...

It is truly amazing - 

...the riches of His grace which He lavished on us...

unfathomable riches....

Is His grace showing through us?

Sharing the unfathomable riches of Christ!

Ephesians 3:8

who are we

Who are we: 

a new creation...

in Christ Jesus...

living and walking by the Spirit...

our faith working through love...

full of grace and truth...

a light shining in the darkness...

the love of Christ

The love of Christ controls us

The love of Christ compels us

The love of Christ encourages us

The love of Christ leads us

The love of Christ fulfills us

The love of Christ redeems us

The love of Christ renews us

The love of Christ restores us

The love of Christ frees us

The love of Christ provides for us

The love of Christ heals us

The love of Christ is our life 

The love of Christ is the air that we breathe

And the love of Christ does not fail....

Lord...

Lord I am seeking Your favor...
For You know my need...
You are aware of my frustration...
You understand my struggle...
You are not blind to my distress...
And it is written that You are a rewarder of those who seek after You...
So Lord, I seek after You...
For those who love You and seek after You will not be disappointed...
Because it is written that You love me with an everlasting love...
Praise be Your Holy Name

a cancerous virus

The cancerous virus of deception has metastasized in our country…

and the father of lies laughs at us and rejoices in his conquest…

Woe to her who is rebellious and defiled, The tyrannical city! 

She heeded no voice, 

She accepted no instruction. 

She did not trust in the Lord, 

She did not draw near to her God. 

The Lord is righteous within her; He will do no injustice.

Every morning He brings His justice to light; He does not fail. 

But the unjust knows no shame.

Zephaniah 3:1‭-‬2‭, ‬5 

I Am...

Fundamentally, our Lord's message was Himself.

He did not come merely to preach a Gospel; He himself is that Gospel.

He did not come merely to give bread; He said, "I am the bread."

He did not come merely to shed light; He said, "I am the light."

He did not come merely to show the door; He said, "I am the door."

He did not come merely to name a shepherd; He said, "I am the shepherd."

He did not come merely to point the way; He said, "I am the way, the truth, and the life."

J. Sidlow Baxter 

the Holy Spirit...

"I baptized you with water; but He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit."   

Mark 1:8

Brothers and sisters in Christ,
I write this to you from a heart that seeks your forgiveness. Over the last seven years I have been on a travail through a desert wilderness and I spent way too much time focusing on the problems with the church instead of seeking after where the Lord was working and joining Him in His amazing works.
I have already repented and asked the Lord for forgiveness. Now I come to you and seek your forgiveness.
Thank you for your graciousness.

paul

word for today...

The Great I Am

I Am Who I Am…..

I Am your Savior

I Am your Redeemer

I Am your Righteousness

I Am your Provider

I Am your Healer

I Am your Fortress

I Am your Defender and Protector

I Am your Creator

I Am your Amazing Grace

I Am your Truth

I Am your Blessing

I Am the Almighty Powerful One

I Am the Alpha and the Omega

I Am your Everlasting Father

And the Great I Am loves you with any everlasting love…

Great I Am - Phillips, Craig & Dean

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y_VR-zwp2KA

Word for today...

I will give You thanks with all my heart

I will sing praises to You And give thanks to Your name for Your lovingkindness and Your truth

On the day I called, You answered me; You made me bold with strength in my soul

Though I walk in the midst of trouble, You will revive me; You will stretch forth Your hand against the wrath of my enemies, And Your right hand will save me

The LORD will accomplish what concerns me

Your lovingkindness, O LORD, is everlasting

Psalm 138

Word for today...

You, O LORD, are our Father

Our Redeemer from of old is Your name

For You LORD delight in us....