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Archive for the ‘Christian Walk’ Category

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Scripture reading: Matthew 13:5-9

Let us look at Matthew 13:5-6 today. Jesus says here that the Word (the seed) will fall on a certain soil, and it will spring up strong and powerful but when the sun comes up, it withers and dies. Why? It was because it was on “stony” ground. We have to understand that Jesus is talking about the heart condition. If your heart is a stony place and it does not have any depth of earth, you will not be able to bring forth fruit. What do we mean when we speak of “fruit” coming from the Word? “Fruit” is when you hear the Word of God, and the Word of God changes you inside! If the Word of God does not change you, it is wasted word.

Now, the Word says further in Matthew 13:7-8 that there is another seed that “fell among thorns.” Presently it grew strong and beautiful, but the thorns were also growing; and then the thorns grew up and “choked” the Word. It brought forth no fruit. What does it mean? Do you have a thorny heart? You come to the meeting to get a blessing, and as the word goes forth, you receive it with gladness. Your heart witnesses that it is the truth, but you have some unfulfilled business with somebody who you have hated bitterly. You just cannot love that person. That is a “thorn.” It will grow up and choke the word, and you will not be able to live a Christian life and grow in the Spirit; and you will wonder, “Why am I not growing in the Spirit?” It is because there is a thorn bush growing in your life.

The thorn might be something else. It might be a “love” affair. I hate to call it love. It is not really love at all. It is an “emotional dysfunction.” You have an emotional dysfunction wherein you think you are in love with somebody, and it continues and disrupts your life. It disrupts the life of God inside of you, so that when you receive the Word of God you cannot bring forth fruit. There is something wrong in the emotions.

Another thing I have noticed is that the young people do not seem to have the “will” to serve God. It blesses me when we sing the song, “Thou lovest righteousness and hatest wickedness….” Do you hate wickedness? Do you really, really hate wickedness? Do you hate wickedness so much that you say, “God I do not want to have anything to do with wickedness! If this thing is wickedness, I will not do it!”

A “little white lie”—this is what we call it. WICKEDNESS! A yellow lie, a pink lie, a blue lie (whatever we would call it)—it is wickedness! We give it all kinds of names, but it is wickedness! Just a little bit of dishonesty here, just a little deception there. You say a word that is meant to deceive the other person to make him think so and so, but it is not what you meant; and you say, “I spoke the truth!” Sure, you did speak the truth, but you fixed it in such a way that it deceives the other person. It is wickedness!

“Thou lovest righteousness and hatest wickedness” (Psalm 45:7).

I say, “My God, I LOVE righteousness! I HATE wickedness! Let me hate it more! Let me hate it! Let me so despise it, that if I am touched by it, I must get cleansed immediately!”

If you take up a sheep and throw him into the mud, he gets up and is uncomfortable. He is rubbing himself everywhere, trying to find some way to get the mud off of him. He is not a mud creature. But if you take a pig and throw him in the mud, he rolls over and says, “Thank you.” He loves it! He could stay there all day. He has a different nature. But we have to remember: God loves righteousness and hates wickedness!

(Excerpt from The Omega Message, December 1997, pg. 3-4)

Thought for today: Let this be our prayer today: “My God, I LOVE righteousness! I HATE wickedness! Let me hate it more! Let me hate it! Let me so despise it, that if I am touched by it, I must get cleansed immediately!”

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Scripture reading: Matthew 13:3-4

We thank God for bringing us all through so many days of problems, days of suffering, and days of hope. The Spirit of God has brought us from many circumstances that could have been disastrous for us; from accidents that did not happen. Some of us have even been brought through accidents. But we thank God.

I was touched by the prayer of a brother one time where he thanked God for the little things—for the bread that we get to eat, and for the sun that shines. It was kind of a revelation to see that sometimes we take God for granted, and because we have these things so freely, we never seem to realize that we need to thank God for them.

Today, I want you to carefully assess how you have received the word. You see, while the word is going forth, there is an “anointing.”  By “anointing” we mean that the Spirit of God is touching your mind and saying something to you. So remember how you have received the word. Paul spoke of it, that you must remember how you received it, because when you step out, there are some agents that come into play. These are agents of deception, agents of the devil, thieves!

Do you know where the chief thief lives? The chief thief lives inside of you! Upstairs, in your mind! The chief thief of the Word of God is in your mind. It is human reasoning! Logic! Logic says, “Well, if this is this, then this is supposed to be that.” With logic you will come to a logical conclusion, which may turn out to be a lie.

Have you ever heard of a logical conclusion being a lie? You have a person saying, “Jesus Christ is the son of Mary. Mary is the mother of Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ is God, and therefore Mary is the mother of God.” The conclusion is a lie, because God was before Mary, and God made Mary, so Mary could not be God’s mother. Nevertheless, logic says, “Yes, she is.”

That which is “true” is not always “truth.” Truth is Christ! It may be true that a brother cheated on his income tax, but publishing the fact does not glorify God. It is not truth.

Matthew 13:3-4 says, “And he spake many things unto them in parables, saying, Behold, a sower went forth to sow; 4 And when he sowed, some seeds fell by the way side, and the fowls came and devoured them up.”

The word is in the mind, delivered by the messenger, but the black birds come in and take away the seed. I have known some people who act as these black birds. Read Leviticus 11 and you will find out that when it makes mention of predator birds, it is referring to people. Birds defy the forces of gravity and fly above earth, so they are a type of spiritual people. This chapter in Leviticus mentions the hawk, the cuckoo, the eagle, and others, and it says to us concerning these birds, “Do not eat them!” The word “eat” in Scripture means “become one with.” In John 6, Jesus said, “Eat Me, for My flesh is meat indeed, and My blood is drink indeed.” When you eat Jesus, you become “one” with Jesus.

So, let us not become one with those who take away the seed of the word from us, but let us eat Jesus so that we would become one with Him.

(Excerpt from The Omega Message, December 1997, pg. 1-2)

Thought for today: Remember how you have received the word and don’t let the birds steal it from you.

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Scripture reading: Romans 5:1-5

One day I said to God, “God, I see Your people. I see the “Holy of Holies”, the spirit realm where God and man walk as one; and I also see the “Outer Court” realm. How are You going to get us from the “Outer Court” into the “Holy of Holies”? How are You going to get me from being natural, carnal—from planning my own business, from planning the meetings, from doing my own thing… How are You going to get me from one place to the other? And not me alone, but the whole church? For the whole church must be one with Christ before the end comes, and I see the end coming down on us like a fast-moving train! Oh God, how are You going to get us out?”

I asked God this and He answered me. Of course, when I say that God answered me, I am talking about after many, maybe fifty, years. So do not believe that I asked this and God answered me right then and there. No, no! However, eventually, God did say to me, “I am going to do it by tribulation.” I said, “Oh, God! What kind of tribulation would there need to be to bring that pastor from his ‘pastoring’? To bring him from his situation of loving God but at the same time taking the place of Jesus Christ in the congregation? How are You going to bring him from there to the Holy of Holies? How are You going to bring me from where I am to the Holy of Holies? It must be terrible tribulation!”

But then, I did not understand tribulation. If God tribulated all of us at one time, none of us would be able to help the other. Can you understand that? We need a certain amount of tribulation to bring us into perfection. But if God tribulated all of us at one time, what would our condition be? We would be in a terrible condition! So He is very nice to us and tribulating us piece by piece, part by part.

For example, there is a hand that isn’t working right, and God starts beating on the hand. But the other hand comes and holds it up until that hand learns to obey Christ. Then He takes the other hand. Brethren, I see us going into tribulation one by one, little by little. Some of us think we are going to have a picnic. We decide to go on a picnic and we pack our lunch to take with us, but God has another plan for us. He starts to bring tribulation down upon us one by one, two by two, four by four… And it is increasing. I thank God for tribulation! That is a terrible thing to say, but I thank God for tribulation because through the tribulation He is doing a work in our midst.

(Excerpt from The Omega Message, December 2002)

Thought for today: Let us thank God for tribulation knowing that through the tribulation He is doing a work in our midst.

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Vacancies in Our Lives

Scripture reading: John 6:63

In John, chapter 6, Jesus Christ made a revelation to us. This revelation is far-reaching because we do not seem to understand what is happening when we are doing certain things.

In verse 63, Jesus said, “It is the spirit that quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing: the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life.”

Jesus said, “The words that I speak unto you are spirit, but not just spirit, they are also life.” In other words, there are words that are “spirit” but they are not “life.” Take your Bible, turn it in the converse, and you will begin to understand a lot of things that you did not understand before. You will notice that in everything you do, you are issuing out spirits; spirits are coming from you to another person.

I remember in my young days, I was addicted to violence and would get mad very easily. I would just want to do destruction. When I came to Jesus, and He delivered me, I was so glad because I thought that now all that madness was gone out of my soul. Little did I know that certain compartments in my soul still retained some of the old man.

At that time, I was working on a farm. One day, two men started to fight. I could not stand to see one person beating up on another who was helpless; I could not stand the “bully” spirit. This man knocked the other man down, then picked him up and knocked him down again and again. I rushed in and called, “Hey, you are going to kill him! Stop this!” Instead of obeying me, the man turned against me and began to shove against me. Suddenly, a spirit from that man came into me. In other words, I had a door open; I had a vacancy and he ministered the spirit of violence to me, which I had no desire or reason for. I was not vexed with anybody, I was not mad with anybody, but I began to manifest the same madness, the same shortness of breath. I began to manifest vexation without being vexed. Furthermore, what I did was worse, because I acted just like I would if I were out in the street again fighting. But now I was a Christian, I was preaching the word of God; yet all of a sudden, I used a tactic that came down from my street fighting days, a tactic that was from the other life. I got the man over my shoulder, ran with him, and slammed him down on the wall. I thought to myself, “Why am I doing this? I am not mad. I am not vexed with anybody.” I realized that a spirit of violence was ministered to me.

I tell you all this because God is doing something special for us. We all have vacancies in our lives, but God is closing them up by putting us into circumstances in which we can submit to the words of life.

(Excerpt from The Omega Message, December 2002)

Thought for today: Jesus said, “The words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life.”

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Scripture reading: John 16:13

John 14:26, “But the Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in my name, he shall teach you all things, and bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you.”

When we read in John, we realize that there is no reason for us to have false doctrines. You should be able to listen to the worst and most powerful preacher of falsehood and not be taken by him because your insides cannot accept his doctrine; you will vomit it up. This should be the condition of the children of God because the Holy Spirit is in us and He will reject the things that are not of Him; unless you especially want it and put Him aside to take it.

Where did Jesus say that the Holy Spirit was going to lead us? “He will lead you into all truth.” (John 16:13) Lord have mercy upon us! If the Holy Spirit came into us to lead us into all truth, then what is wrong with us? Why do so many people have the Holy Spirit but are not being led into truth? It is because they are all going after lies and errors.

Let us look at the following situation: Here is a human being having a desire inside of him – he wants to preach. It is a righteous desire, a good thing. He wants to bless others. He wants to see people lifted up and praising the Lord. But lo and behold, the desire to preach becomes number one in his life and God loses His place to the desire to preach. So who takes over? The man takes over, but let me tell you, a religious spirit will never allow him to be the boss. The religious spirit is going to take over because that is his territory. The man becomes a preacher, and a lot of people get blessed. But while he opens his mouth, one little piece of the religious spirit gets into it. If you continue to listen to him, you will find yourself more and more having the same desires. You might not want to preach, you might want to do something else, but it will all be a religious exercise.

Do you see the danger? Lift up your eyes. Look around. Where are the people growing in the Spirit? If the Holy Spirit came to lead us into all truth, we are going to get better and better for God every day, no matter how dumb we are, because the Holy Spirit is setting little traps here and there for us to go into truth. You may get your head bashed in and you may think something bad is happening, but it turns out to be the Holy Spirit Who has set a little trap for you to bring you the words of truth. We have to remember that the Holy Spirit is always working little things to get us into the truth.

(Excerpt from “Led of the Spirit”, Foundational Teachings #077)

Thought for today: The Holy Spirit came in order to lead us into all truth.

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