The Tale of Smiling Jack
So what can I say bout my little Smiling Jack, his tongue as sharp as a razor and his whit as sharp as a tack.
A Doctor, a Lawyer, a Chef or a King, all these are possible for this kid of who’s praises I sing.
I can hardly be mad for my amazement at his skill, for telling such a straight face story, of solid Bull Ship at his will!
Now some qualities I can claim, Green Eyes an a Easy Smile amongst many others, but this skill for telling tales so well, well he got that one directly from his Mother! (don’t tell her I said so)
Love him oh I do, and I‘ll always have his back, he’s still my little Andrew, he’s still my Smiling Jack!
HAPPY 18TH Birthday Andrew
Tuesday, March 23, 2010
Friday, March 12, 2010
A Handful of Pungent Treasure
I was thinking about how so many people are desperately trying to please God by jumping through all sorts of flaming religious hoops, if you think about it, our efforts to earn God’s favor by doing all these religious or “good things” could be perfectly equated to the story of the little boy and the handful of Treasure;
This little chubby face two year old was out in the back yard one day with his Daddy, as the father worked on the yard the little toddler was wandering about exploring his vast domain, when all the sudden he came across a very interesting formation, so as any little boy would do he picked it up, the texture was fascinating a little hard on the outside but still soft on the inside, and what was even more amazing was the wonderful pungent aroma that was released when he broke through the crusty outer surface, this was really a find. He had smelled something similar before, but not quite the same, well needless to say, after taking a small bite, as any sensible two year old would do, he realized this was not a good food source, but still felt he had to show this incredible find to his Daddy as soon as possible! Walking over to his father filled with joy and pride over the great discovery, he reached up his pudgy hand, offering the aromatic treasure over to his proud father and then in perfect innocence, the chubby face little guy said, “Mell Dits Daddy” then looked on anticipating the mutual appreciation.
His father, after receiving the semi hardened log of dog poop smiled and kissed his Boy on the forehead and then proceeded to bury this handful of laughter, this joyful eternal memory in the backyard flowerbed,… (for safe keeping), that’s what he told his little explorer, his little delight.
As I thought about this, I wondered how often we come before God, our Loving Father, and with good intentions, bring all kinds of offerings of… for the lack of a more fitting term,… piles of Poop?! The Father just smiles, kisses us on the forehead, and sets the gift aside. Our wonderful God is always anticipating the day we realize that all the stuff we think we need to do to appease him, is really just piles of proverbial Poop! All the little laws and rituals, are not even as valuable as that pile of dog doo, at least the dog doo was good for fertilizer!
Gregory J.
This little chubby face two year old was out in the back yard one day with his Daddy, as the father worked on the yard the little toddler was wandering about exploring his vast domain, when all the sudden he came across a very interesting formation, so as any little boy would do he picked it up, the texture was fascinating a little hard on the outside but still soft on the inside, and what was even more amazing was the wonderful pungent aroma that was released when he broke through the crusty outer surface, this was really a find. He had smelled something similar before, but not quite the same, well needless to say, after taking a small bite, as any sensible two year old would do, he realized this was not a good food source, but still felt he had to show this incredible find to his Daddy as soon as possible! Walking over to his father filled with joy and pride over the great discovery, he reached up his pudgy hand, offering the aromatic treasure over to his proud father and then in perfect innocence, the chubby face little guy said, “Mell Dits Daddy” then looked on anticipating the mutual appreciation.
His father, after receiving the semi hardened log of dog poop smiled and kissed his Boy on the forehead and then proceeded to bury this handful of laughter, this joyful eternal memory in the backyard flowerbed,… (for safe keeping), that’s what he told his little explorer, his little delight.
As I thought about this, I wondered how often we come before God, our Loving Father, and with good intentions, bring all kinds of offerings of… for the lack of a more fitting term,… piles of Poop?! The Father just smiles, kisses us on the forehead, and sets the gift aside. Our wonderful God is always anticipating the day we realize that all the stuff we think we need to do to appease him, is really just piles of proverbial Poop! All the little laws and rituals, are not even as valuable as that pile of dog doo, at least the dog doo was good for fertilizer!
Gregory J.
Tuesday, March 9, 2010
The Journey
Introduction
Dear Disillusioned,
Have you ever felt that this Christian life was falling short of what you see in the scriptures, have you come to the point in your walk with the Lord where something has to change, where you’ve always felt there was more, you knew it and you wanted it! No more books, no more sermons, no more empty promises. That is exactly where I found myself not so long ago, and if you will lend me your ear for a few pages, I think you will start to see a light at the end of the tunnel a light that you have been longing for and more important a light that the Lord has been longing to share with you all of your life. So join me for this wonderful trip out of the darkness and into the light, on the road to understanding and becoming who you really are in Christ! And ultimately walking in the complete Power and confidence of our Glorious Lord and Savior, Jesus the Messiah!
Over the next few pages you will be exposed to some Scriptures verses, and some thoughts and ideas that you may not have ever looked into before, or you may have never even knew they were there, either because you were never taught by your Pastor, (for whatever reason), or more likely because the both of you, as well as most of the entire Church (myself included) has been blinded by the enemy of our Souls! His plan is to keep the children of God in a state of defeat and ineffectiveness by deceiving us concerning the gifts, dominion, authority and power that was given to us in the garden and then reclaimed and bought for us at the Cross! And it goes without saying that satan has been very successful with his strategy over the last few thousand years! I myself lived most of my Christian life in this state of deception, fear and failure! It was only after years of pouring through His Word and asking God for wisdom and understanding concerning all these things, that my eyes were finally opened and the powerful light of God’s Word, so plain and clear was right there before my eye’s waiting for me to wake up and act on what His Word say’s!... Praise His Name Forever!
My friends, if even a small portion of the true body of Christ ever gets a hold of this, it would wreak havoc in the kingdom of darkness, and we would see what the scripture means when the Lord said, “the gates of Hell Shall Not Prevail against us!
Chapter 1
From Relationship to Religion to Relationship & Rejoicing!
So I am 20 plus years into this… this surrender, this wondrous treaty with God, the incredible King of all Creation, the all consuming Holy Presence that I’ve sensed and spoken to all of my conscious life. You see I had known Him and believed in Him sense I was a small child, He revealed himself to me many times but one in particular was when I was imprisoned in my bedroom by the evil warden Mom to take the dreaded nap, I was lying in bed that morning and looking out my window, I saw a big beautiful full moon in the day light, as I laid their I thought, that is just a big ball of dirt, floating around in this black stuff called space, and it’s suppose to be floating around the bigger ball of dirt that I live on, and were both floating around this huge ball of fire in this black stuff called space? Well first of all I thought, there is NO SUCH THING as Black Stuff Called Space! And there is no such thing as floating dirt balls, and just then as clear as a bell God put it in my heart that the only way there is floating dirt balls and black stuff called space is if He made it, and He let me understand very certainly that He did Make it and He made it all for us! I remember lying their letting this soak in and thinking how foolish it was for anyone to think it could have happened any other way, I mean there is no such thing as black stuff to float in! I really understood this and was in awe of God! This was BIG NEWS, so I got out of bed and ran out to tell my Mom that there is no such thing as black stuff called space unless God made it! I remember standing their thinking my Mom would start rejoicing with me over this incredible revelation and that it would change the world!, but she just made me go back to bed? You would think that if she suspected this to be just a ploy to get out of bed, that I, being only 4 years old would have at least gotten some kind of reward for coming up with this masterpiece! You got to admit this should have gotten me something, ice cream, early release for good behavior, or at least an, at a boy Greggie! Whats more amazing is that even after understanding this powerful word from God, I still never surrendered to Him till I was in my mid twenties.
Well in 1987 I was powerfully saved out in southern California several months after a childhood friend shared the simple Gospel with me. I was Born Again while I was out running one hung-over Saturday morning, and I have never looked back! (I had already been there and it wasn’t all that it was cracked up to be!)
So after 20 something years of this Journey with God, I realized I was dying inside, something was missing, I was completely disillusioned, not seeing any likeness between the believers in my Bible and the believers in my life! I had kind of drifted off into some kind of stupper, into this dead complacent Christianity, I now found myself desperately trying to do religious things to re-kindle the raging fire I had known and experienced, and then forgotten so many years earlier when I first surrendered my life to Jesus. Now all of the sudden it was like I was waking up out of some kind of fog, and I started remembering little moments of that terrifying exciting time with God when I first realized that the Spiritual realm was really true, even more true than this physical world which were imprisoned in. (for our 20 to life sentence) You see in the beginning I was willingly possessed by God and filled with His Holy Spirit!, it was all new and powerful, almost enchanting! My first few years of walking with Jesus were just me and His Word and the Holy Spirit, (I had not started going to any church yet) that honeymoon period was full of excitement and wonder, I experienced visions and revelations and powerful encounters with the Holy Spirit that would last for hours, and this was on a regular basis!
Just by the way, don't let anyone ever tell you that the so called honeymoon experience is ever suppose to end! This is an Eternal Adventure and the joy and Power and the excitment experienced during this Journey never ends whan you are walking in the dust of the Rabbi!
So with that said, approximately a year or so after I surrendered my life to Jesus I had to return to California to do some jail time in a county facility for some things I had done before becoming a believer, (I had moved to Georgia a few months earlier) I probably wouldn’t recommend this for everyone but the time I spent in jail was one of the most incredible times of spiritual growth I could ever hope for. If it wasn’t for the daily strip searches and constant concern of getting shanked by a certain Hispanic gang member that I had crossed swords with, it might of even been enjoyable! After getting out and going back to Georgia, and after visiting dozens of churches I ended up finding a little church where the youth group, (even thou I was older than all of them) kind of adopted me, I guess they thought the leathers and Harley were cool, anyhow I started attending on a regular basis, even thou I didn’t quite fit in right away (most of these folks didn’t even know anybody that had ever smoked cigarettes before, much less a pot head that had come from a life of drugs, alcohol and adult entertainment) but eventually I started doing what I saw everyone else doing, I thought that was what Christianity was,… go to church Sunday morning and evening and then again on Wednesday, and an occasional Christian concert or a revival meeting. Certainly these good people knew more about being a Christian than I did?!?,… or did they?
I learned about tithing, and not working on Sundays and someone said I shouldn’t dance or ware jewelry, others said that the women shouldn’t cut their hair or wear long pants? Other churches I visited before I settled into mine said we had to keep the Saturday Sabbath, or we weren’t saved, and still others said we shouldn’t play musical instruments and if we did we weren’t saved either? Some said we needed to light candles, pray to the saints and say 100 hail Mary’s! While others said I needed to go on a two year missionary trip and do some temple ritual? And then there were a few that I have no idea what they were saying because ah, they were ah, screaming so loud ah! (not to mention the sweating and spitting) The most amazing thing was that all these churches called themselves “Christian” and were all supposedly looking at the same book? Now I had been reading that Wonderful Book for thousands of hours and couldn’t figure out where the heck they came up with 99% of that garbage ah!
I guess the church I was going to looked a little closer to the New Testament church than some of the others… but still… NOT! And another thing I noticed, most every believer I ever met could barely afford to even live a modest lifestyle, while the New Testament 1st century church was described as “lacking nothing” and had all things in common and were able to give to the needy whenever necessary! While most of our churches were trying to support only a small handful of missionaries with money from bake sales, and car washes, it seemed the enemies faithful servants (Islamic Shake’s, & all the Buffet’s, Turner’s, Chavez’s and Heffner’s of the world) seemed to have all the money they needed and were hoarding Billions of dollars and funding all sorts of wickedness! Not to mention None of the believers I knew, or churches I went too seemed to walk in any of the Power that the New Testament believers walked in!
This should Not be so!!!
My Bible said; and these are the Miraculous signs that WILL Follow Believers! And when the Holy Spirit comes upon you, You SHALL be endowed with POWER! And that; The wealth of the wicked is laid up for the just! And; My God shall supply ALL my need’s according to HIS Riches an Glory! And…and…and! I knew it was true, I had experienced it!
Well after getting thoroughly “Churchnotized” I soon conformed to the Borg and drifted into that lukewarm fog I had mentioned. I am not sure how it happened nor when but I guess it was a combination of me just closing my eyes and starting to listen to those that taught us that these verses weren’t for us anymore, and then on top of that, I was thinking that maybe I wasn’t holy enough to earn that kind of life, or maybe I needed to repent some more or something? However it happened, the end result was, the cares of the world crept in and all those verses just went away, and faded from my mind! The devil had successfully snatched the seed away that had been planted in my heart.
The exciting powerful relationship I had with God was now completely sanitized and neutralized, then, the 20th century American Christian lifestyle,… the lifeless, powerless, monotoness, let’s just play church life kicked in, I got married and started having children and then,… it was 20 years later and I was here dyeing inside, under self imprisonment buy manmade law’s of Sunday worship and tithing as well as a bunch of other junk! By the way, we are gentiles and were never put under the law of Moses! Still there I was trying to keep law’s and living in absolute defeat, not realizing that the all powerful Glorious Savior that had radically changed my life, Jesus Christ was now made of no effect in my life!
Dear friend, please don’t do another thing until you go read the book of Galatians, read it five or six times if you need, and pray over it, this is key to what is keeping you and the church in bondage! Read it and you will see what has happened to the 21st century church! Gal 3:1-5 vs. 13-14 vs. 4:9 vs. 5:1-5
Dear Disillusioned,
Have you ever felt that this Christian life was falling short of what you see in the scriptures, have you come to the point in your walk with the Lord where something has to change, where you’ve always felt there was more, you knew it and you wanted it! No more books, no more sermons, no more empty promises. That is exactly where I found myself not so long ago, and if you will lend me your ear for a few pages, I think you will start to see a light at the end of the tunnel a light that you have been longing for and more important a light that the Lord has been longing to share with you all of your life. So join me for this wonderful trip out of the darkness and into the light, on the road to understanding and becoming who you really are in Christ! And ultimately walking in the complete Power and confidence of our Glorious Lord and Savior, Jesus the Messiah!
Over the next few pages you will be exposed to some Scriptures verses, and some thoughts and ideas that you may not have ever looked into before, or you may have never even knew they were there, either because you were never taught by your Pastor, (for whatever reason), or more likely because the both of you, as well as most of the entire Church (myself included) has been blinded by the enemy of our Souls! His plan is to keep the children of God in a state of defeat and ineffectiveness by deceiving us concerning the gifts, dominion, authority and power that was given to us in the garden and then reclaimed and bought for us at the Cross! And it goes without saying that satan has been very successful with his strategy over the last few thousand years! I myself lived most of my Christian life in this state of deception, fear and failure! It was only after years of pouring through His Word and asking God for wisdom and understanding concerning all these things, that my eyes were finally opened and the powerful light of God’s Word, so plain and clear was right there before my eye’s waiting for me to wake up and act on what His Word say’s!... Praise His Name Forever!
My friends, if even a small portion of the true body of Christ ever gets a hold of this, it would wreak havoc in the kingdom of darkness, and we would see what the scripture means when the Lord said, “the gates of Hell Shall Not Prevail against us!
Chapter 1
From Relationship to Religion to Relationship & Rejoicing!
So I am 20 plus years into this… this surrender, this wondrous treaty with God, the incredible King of all Creation, the all consuming Holy Presence that I’ve sensed and spoken to all of my conscious life. You see I had known Him and believed in Him sense I was a small child, He revealed himself to me many times but one in particular was when I was imprisoned in my bedroom by the evil warden Mom to take the dreaded nap, I was lying in bed that morning and looking out my window, I saw a big beautiful full moon in the day light, as I laid their I thought, that is just a big ball of dirt, floating around in this black stuff called space, and it’s suppose to be floating around the bigger ball of dirt that I live on, and were both floating around this huge ball of fire in this black stuff called space? Well first of all I thought, there is NO SUCH THING as Black Stuff Called Space! And there is no such thing as floating dirt balls, and just then as clear as a bell God put it in my heart that the only way there is floating dirt balls and black stuff called space is if He made it, and He let me understand very certainly that He did Make it and He made it all for us! I remember lying their letting this soak in and thinking how foolish it was for anyone to think it could have happened any other way, I mean there is no such thing as black stuff to float in! I really understood this and was in awe of God! This was BIG NEWS, so I got out of bed and ran out to tell my Mom that there is no such thing as black stuff called space unless God made it! I remember standing their thinking my Mom would start rejoicing with me over this incredible revelation and that it would change the world!, but she just made me go back to bed? You would think that if she suspected this to be just a ploy to get out of bed, that I, being only 4 years old would have at least gotten some kind of reward for coming up with this masterpiece! You got to admit this should have gotten me something, ice cream, early release for good behavior, or at least an, at a boy Greggie! Whats more amazing is that even after understanding this powerful word from God, I still never surrendered to Him till I was in my mid twenties.
Well in 1987 I was powerfully saved out in southern California several months after a childhood friend shared the simple Gospel with me. I was Born Again while I was out running one hung-over Saturday morning, and I have never looked back! (I had already been there and it wasn’t all that it was cracked up to be!)
So after 20 something years of this Journey with God, I realized I was dying inside, something was missing, I was completely disillusioned, not seeing any likeness between the believers in my Bible and the believers in my life! I had kind of drifted off into some kind of stupper, into this dead complacent Christianity, I now found myself desperately trying to do religious things to re-kindle the raging fire I had known and experienced, and then forgotten so many years earlier when I first surrendered my life to Jesus. Now all of the sudden it was like I was waking up out of some kind of fog, and I started remembering little moments of that terrifying exciting time with God when I first realized that the Spiritual realm was really true, even more true than this physical world which were imprisoned in. (for our 20 to life sentence) You see in the beginning I was willingly possessed by God and filled with His Holy Spirit!, it was all new and powerful, almost enchanting! My first few years of walking with Jesus were just me and His Word and the Holy Spirit, (I had not started going to any church yet) that honeymoon period was full of excitement and wonder, I experienced visions and revelations and powerful encounters with the Holy Spirit that would last for hours, and this was on a regular basis!
Just by the way, don't let anyone ever tell you that the so called honeymoon experience is ever suppose to end! This is an Eternal Adventure and the joy and Power and the excitment experienced during this Journey never ends whan you are walking in the dust of the Rabbi!
So with that said, approximately a year or so after I surrendered my life to Jesus I had to return to California to do some jail time in a county facility for some things I had done before becoming a believer, (I had moved to Georgia a few months earlier) I probably wouldn’t recommend this for everyone but the time I spent in jail was one of the most incredible times of spiritual growth I could ever hope for. If it wasn’t for the daily strip searches and constant concern of getting shanked by a certain Hispanic gang member that I had crossed swords with, it might of even been enjoyable! After getting out and going back to Georgia, and after visiting dozens of churches I ended up finding a little church where the youth group, (even thou I was older than all of them) kind of adopted me, I guess they thought the leathers and Harley were cool, anyhow I started attending on a regular basis, even thou I didn’t quite fit in right away (most of these folks didn’t even know anybody that had ever smoked cigarettes before, much less a pot head that had come from a life of drugs, alcohol and adult entertainment) but eventually I started doing what I saw everyone else doing, I thought that was what Christianity was,… go to church Sunday morning and evening and then again on Wednesday, and an occasional Christian concert or a revival meeting. Certainly these good people knew more about being a Christian than I did?!?,… or did they?
I learned about tithing, and not working on Sundays and someone said I shouldn’t dance or ware jewelry, others said that the women shouldn’t cut their hair or wear long pants? Other churches I visited before I settled into mine said we had to keep the Saturday Sabbath, or we weren’t saved, and still others said we shouldn’t play musical instruments and if we did we weren’t saved either? Some said we needed to light candles, pray to the saints and say 100 hail Mary’s! While others said I needed to go on a two year missionary trip and do some temple ritual? And then there were a few that I have no idea what they were saying because ah, they were ah, screaming so loud ah! (not to mention the sweating and spitting) The most amazing thing was that all these churches called themselves “Christian” and were all supposedly looking at the same book? Now I had been reading that Wonderful Book for thousands of hours and couldn’t figure out where the heck they came up with 99% of that garbage ah!
I guess the church I was going to looked a little closer to the New Testament church than some of the others… but still… NOT! And another thing I noticed, most every believer I ever met could barely afford to even live a modest lifestyle, while the New Testament 1st century church was described as “lacking nothing” and had all things in common and were able to give to the needy whenever necessary! While most of our churches were trying to support only a small handful of missionaries with money from bake sales, and car washes, it seemed the enemies faithful servants (Islamic Shake’s, & all the Buffet’s, Turner’s, Chavez’s and Heffner’s of the world) seemed to have all the money they needed and were hoarding Billions of dollars and funding all sorts of wickedness! Not to mention None of the believers I knew, or churches I went too seemed to walk in any of the Power that the New Testament believers walked in!
This should Not be so!!!
My Bible said; and these are the Miraculous signs that WILL Follow Believers! And when the Holy Spirit comes upon you, You SHALL be endowed with POWER! And that; The wealth of the wicked is laid up for the just! And; My God shall supply ALL my need’s according to HIS Riches an Glory! And…and…and! I knew it was true, I had experienced it!
Well after getting thoroughly “Churchnotized” I soon conformed to the Borg and drifted into that lukewarm fog I had mentioned. I am not sure how it happened nor when but I guess it was a combination of me just closing my eyes and starting to listen to those that taught us that these verses weren’t for us anymore, and then on top of that, I was thinking that maybe I wasn’t holy enough to earn that kind of life, or maybe I needed to repent some more or something? However it happened, the end result was, the cares of the world crept in and all those verses just went away, and faded from my mind! The devil had successfully snatched the seed away that had been planted in my heart.
The exciting powerful relationship I had with God was now completely sanitized and neutralized, then, the 20th century American Christian lifestyle,… the lifeless, powerless, monotoness, let’s just play church life kicked in, I got married and started having children and then,… it was 20 years later and I was here dyeing inside, under self imprisonment buy manmade law’s of Sunday worship and tithing as well as a bunch of other junk! By the way, we are gentiles and were never put under the law of Moses! Still there I was trying to keep law’s and living in absolute defeat, not realizing that the all powerful Glorious Savior that had radically changed my life, Jesus Christ was now made of no effect in my life!
Dear friend, please don’t do another thing until you go read the book of Galatians, read it five or six times if you need, and pray over it, this is key to what is keeping you and the church in bondage! Read it and you will see what has happened to the 21st century church! Gal 3:1-5 vs. 13-14 vs. 4:9 vs. 5:1-5
The Awakening
Transitioning Back To The Light
It’s only when you are willing to hear and deal with the truth that you are able to see the lie and deception you were under! When I was willing, God opened my eyes!
Thank God I didn’t go to church when I got saved! Yep that was the best thing that could happen to me after I surrendered my life to the Lord! During that time it was just me and my Bible and the Holy Spirit. I learned to depend on the Lord, and learned to hear the voice of the Spirit instead of the voice of man. Thank God for those first few years where I just spent time with Him! Now don’t get me wrong, I love church, but you better know your stuff before you walk into one of those places, it could really mess you up!
What would have happened to me if I hadn’t already known the Scriptures? What would have happened to me if I had not already experienced those wonderful powerful encounters with God? If after all that, I was still so completely confused, so shortly after walking into a church, what if I had ignorantly just went to church after getting saved?!... or worse yet, what if I got saved at church, talk about the blind leading the blind! Approximately 80 or 90% of the leadership of the so called body of Christ don’t even believe in the working presence of the Holy Spirit in their own life, so they certainly aren’t going to tell a new believer about Him. A new believer could go through their entire life in church and never hear about the power of the Holy Spirit that is available to all of us! I was so fortunate I had experienced the things I had with God, and was basically grounded in the Word before I ever set foot in a church. The Holy Spirit had something to work with, to bring back to remembrance, yet I was still mislead for years, and the devil was still able to steal the seed that was planted in me, how much more dangerous is it for a new Believer! That’s why Paul said that we need to be like the Breans, “searching the scriptures daily, to prove, what is the truth”! We are instructed over and over to “study His word to show what we are approved for”, “Thy Word have I hid in my heart that I might not sin against you”!
I truly loved God’s word and had many wonderful encounters with the Word during those powerless years but as I look back I really wasn’t desperate, I wasn’t totally willing to hear the truth, but I started remembering little glimpses of the Glory I had experienced. It was like I was waking up from getting hit on the head, like having amnesia, and starting to remember little bits and pieces, this here and that their. I think I was listening to Mark Ruttland, and he mentioned a verse out of the gospel of Mark, I really don’t even remember the verse, but it had been a while sense I read Marks gospel so I just dug in and started reading. It was as if I had never read the book before in my whole life! In the very first chapter the Lord is casting out demons on two different occasions and it never stops the whole way through. Cast a demon out here, cleanse a leper there, give sight to a blind man and then fuss at the disciples for not performing a miracle when they had the chance! It was amazing, how did I ignore all this for so long and not even question it? Why did I never hear a sermon on casting out demons, (Luke 10:17) or believers walking in the full power and authority of the resurrected Lord of the universe! From the first chapter of Mark to the last chapter Jesus was not just displaying miracles himself, but instructing the disciples to do the same, and rebuking them when they didn’t, (oh ye of little faith have I been with you so long and still you don’t believe!) Jesus was commanding them to force the demons out of people and heal the sick, to pray in spirit (tungs) and raise the dead! This was there marching orders, there blueprint on the everyday life of the believer, this is what the church is still called to do! Do we think we can just censor large portions of the Word of God in the New Testament that we aren’t comfortable with and still see the power and blessings of the Lord manifested? Can we ignore the Lords constant instructions and just “have it our way”, as if we get to say that we prefer our plan over God’s! Well that is exactly what satan has had us doing for the last two thousand years, and the church is completely without power and effect as it should be.
So now my eye’s are starting to get readjusted to the Light and after a few weeks of the Lord reacquainting me with His Whole Word, I started looking at the 21st century church and couldn’t find anything that was even close to the 1st century model that the Lord and the Apostles died to establish and will to us! So what had happened, how did we get so twisted up? I started talking to friends about what the Lord had been revealing to me and you would have thought I was telling them I was kidnapped by little green men! The leader of my small group Bible study’s head started spinning around and was ready to punch me out when I brought it up as the topic of my lesson one night when I was leading! And then as always, God started sending books and tapes and other people across my path that were waking up to the very same verses. I was seeing light on top of light and glory on top of glory, oh what a relief it was to be able to talk about these things and share what we were seeing! The more I died to me, the more Glory I could see manifesting all around! This thing I know as a fact, Surrender is the only way to discovering the incredible riches that God has for us in this life, this world right now! Surrender is the only way to this ever brightening Light and Glory, this wonderful freedom and power this thirst quenching Joy! Surrender ALL! Surrender ALL! Surrender ALL!!!
My life for years had been powerless, yet I knew deep down inside that there should be more, more of something, more of anything! I had prayed and prayed about all sorts of different things thru the years but saw ZERO results. What was I doing wrong, or was I so wicked, that God didn’t even hear my prayers? Now I know that there are basic laws and rights that I should have been informed of as a baby Christian, but I was ignorant of these teachings and apparently so were my elders.
Gal. 14 For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God. 15 For you have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear; but ye have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father. 16 The Spirit itself bears witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God: 17 And if children, then heirs; heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ! (and entitled to all the rights of the Son)
It’s only when you are willing to hear and deal with the truth that you are able to see the lie and deception you were under! When I was willing, God opened my eyes!
Thank God I didn’t go to church when I got saved! Yep that was the best thing that could happen to me after I surrendered my life to the Lord! During that time it was just me and my Bible and the Holy Spirit. I learned to depend on the Lord, and learned to hear the voice of the Spirit instead of the voice of man. Thank God for those first few years where I just spent time with Him! Now don’t get me wrong, I love church, but you better know your stuff before you walk into one of those places, it could really mess you up!
What would have happened to me if I hadn’t already known the Scriptures? What would have happened to me if I had not already experienced those wonderful powerful encounters with God? If after all that, I was still so completely confused, so shortly after walking into a church, what if I had ignorantly just went to church after getting saved?!... or worse yet, what if I got saved at church, talk about the blind leading the blind! Approximately 80 or 90% of the leadership of the so called body of Christ don’t even believe in the working presence of the Holy Spirit in their own life, so they certainly aren’t going to tell a new believer about Him. A new believer could go through their entire life in church and never hear about the power of the Holy Spirit that is available to all of us! I was so fortunate I had experienced the things I had with God, and was basically grounded in the Word before I ever set foot in a church. The Holy Spirit had something to work with, to bring back to remembrance, yet I was still mislead for years, and the devil was still able to steal the seed that was planted in me, how much more dangerous is it for a new Believer! That’s why Paul said that we need to be like the Breans, “searching the scriptures daily, to prove, what is the truth”! We are instructed over and over to “study His word to show what we are approved for”, “Thy Word have I hid in my heart that I might not sin against you”!
I truly loved God’s word and had many wonderful encounters with the Word during those powerless years but as I look back I really wasn’t desperate, I wasn’t totally willing to hear the truth, but I started remembering little glimpses of the Glory I had experienced. It was like I was waking up from getting hit on the head, like having amnesia, and starting to remember little bits and pieces, this here and that their. I think I was listening to Mark Ruttland, and he mentioned a verse out of the gospel of Mark, I really don’t even remember the verse, but it had been a while sense I read Marks gospel so I just dug in and started reading. It was as if I had never read the book before in my whole life! In the very first chapter the Lord is casting out demons on two different occasions and it never stops the whole way through. Cast a demon out here, cleanse a leper there, give sight to a blind man and then fuss at the disciples for not performing a miracle when they had the chance! It was amazing, how did I ignore all this for so long and not even question it? Why did I never hear a sermon on casting out demons, (Luke 10:17) or believers walking in the full power and authority of the resurrected Lord of the universe! From the first chapter of Mark to the last chapter Jesus was not just displaying miracles himself, but instructing the disciples to do the same, and rebuking them when they didn’t, (oh ye of little faith have I been with you so long and still you don’t believe!) Jesus was commanding them to force the demons out of people and heal the sick, to pray in spirit (tungs) and raise the dead! This was there marching orders, there blueprint on the everyday life of the believer, this is what the church is still called to do! Do we think we can just censor large portions of the Word of God in the New Testament that we aren’t comfortable with and still see the power and blessings of the Lord manifested? Can we ignore the Lords constant instructions and just “have it our way”, as if we get to say that we prefer our plan over God’s! Well that is exactly what satan has had us doing for the last two thousand years, and the church is completely without power and effect as it should be.
So now my eye’s are starting to get readjusted to the Light and after a few weeks of the Lord reacquainting me with His Whole Word, I started looking at the 21st century church and couldn’t find anything that was even close to the 1st century model that the Lord and the Apostles died to establish and will to us! So what had happened, how did we get so twisted up? I started talking to friends about what the Lord had been revealing to me and you would have thought I was telling them I was kidnapped by little green men! The leader of my small group Bible study’s head started spinning around and was ready to punch me out when I brought it up as the topic of my lesson one night when I was leading! And then as always, God started sending books and tapes and other people across my path that were waking up to the very same verses. I was seeing light on top of light and glory on top of glory, oh what a relief it was to be able to talk about these things and share what we were seeing! The more I died to me, the more Glory I could see manifesting all around! This thing I know as a fact, Surrender is the only way to discovering the incredible riches that God has for us in this life, this world right now! Surrender is the only way to this ever brightening Light and Glory, this wonderful freedom and power this thirst quenching Joy! Surrender ALL! Surrender ALL! Surrender ALL!!!
My life for years had been powerless, yet I knew deep down inside that there should be more, more of something, more of anything! I had prayed and prayed about all sorts of different things thru the years but saw ZERO results. What was I doing wrong, or was I so wicked, that God didn’t even hear my prayers? Now I know that there are basic laws and rights that I should have been informed of as a baby Christian, but I was ignorant of these teachings and apparently so were my elders.
Gal. 14 For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God. 15 For you have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear; but ye have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father. 16 The Spirit itself bears witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God: 17 And if children, then heirs; heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ! (and entitled to all the rights of the Son)
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