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Hungry for Righteousness

Posted in Christian Walk, tagged , , , , on March 10, 2022| Leave a Comment »

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Scripture reading: Matthew 5:6

I remember one time listening to the devil, and thinking it was God. How does that happen? How could you listen to the devil and think that it is God? Has that ever happened to you? Have you ever heard the devil and thought that it was God speaking to you? Well, God showed me that what happens is that when you have something wrong inside of you, wrong concepts, wrong desires, wrong thoughts, the devil can speak to you and you will accept it. You have got to be wrong. Let me show you a scripture where God says He will protect you from that. Turn with me to the gospel according to our Brother John 7:17, “If any man will…” The King James says “will” but it means “desires.” “If any man [desires to] do his (God’s) will, he shall know of the doctrine, whether it be of God, or whether I speak of myself.” Look at that verse again. If you have a godly desire, if you have a heart-felt desire, if you have a heavenly desire to know anything and question in your heart, “God, is this You, or is this something else?” the Bible says that God’s responsibility is to make you know. God has a responsibility to you, and when He says “you,” He doesn’t care who you are. He doesn’t care how many sins you have fallen into. He doesn’t care what your condition is. If you will cry out to God, “I want to know, Lord,” and the reason that you are wanting to know is that you might serve God, this desire of yours throws the responsibility back on God. Do you understand that?

Let me show you another verse where God must move toward you in righteousness. Turn to Matthew 5:6, “Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled.” Meaning to say, there is no doubt, there is no maybe. It doesn’t say may be filled, it doesn’t say it might happen. It says it SHALL happen. Hallelujah. It says, “…for they shall be filled.” So, if you want to be filled, what do you do? You get hungry. I want you to notice it very carefully that there are certain things that God must do according to His Word and that there are certain conditions under which God will do these things. One of these conditions is the condition of hunger. God MUST fill you if you hunger and thirst after righteousness. There are some people who say, “Well, I’ve been calling to God, I’ve been praying to God, I’ve been crying to God for such a long time and God does not answer me.” It couldn’t be true. Something is wrong about your calling, something is wrong about your praying, something is wrong about your hunger. You probably wanted to make yourself great or whatever. Examine yourself! If you ask for something and you don’t get it, examine yourself. Don’t examine God, for God has already laid down the condition. He said, “If you are hungry.” This is one place where hunger becomes a blessing. He said, “Blessed are the hungry for they shall be filled.” For God will fill them. It is God’s desire, God’s plan to fill them. So, you do not have to fear as far as that is concerned.

(Excerpt from Keeping in Touch, December 12, 2004)

Thought for today: If you want to be filled, get hungry. God MUST fill you if you hunger and thirst after righteousness.

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The Still, Small Voice

Posted in Christian Walk, tagged , , , , on March 9, 2022| Leave a Comment »

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Scripture reading: 1 Kings 19:1-12

Today I want to speak to you a word that pertains to our ability to be focused upon God. Everything around us is designed to distract us, to turn us aside, to get interested in this, to get interested in that. Some people have a hobby and that hobby becomes more important to them than God. Even during meeting times, some people are pursuing their hobbies instead of seeking God. One of the great tools in Satan’s arsenal is distraction. I want to talk to you a little bit about this distraction. When you turn to 1 Kings 19, you will see that this portion of scripture comes just after the great victory that Elijah had over the priests of Baal. But it also reveals that this was a low point in Elijah’s life, when he, after his great victory, was still afraid of Jezebel. It is difficult to understand, but I think that we are able to relate, being as we have some of that problem, too. Many of us feel that we are the only thing that God has here. What a poor God it would be if we were all that God had! The fact that you feel that you are a true Christian, the fact that you feel that you are 100% for God, should indeed be proof to you that there are others like you. What I am saying is that if you believe that you hear God, that in itself should indeed be proof to you that others are hearing God, also.

Of course, we are reading about Elijah, a man who did not know Jesus. Elijah knew God, but he didn’t know Jesus. Isn’t that something? Elijah did not have what we have – the living God moving through and through our being. You know, I sit in a meeting, I hear the singing and I can see God just seeping into us. We open our mouths to sing and the breath of God is breathed into our very beings. Hallelujah. This is proof of God. Hallelujah. So, here is Elijah talking to God saying, “I’ve been jealous, Oh God, and I have been a wonderful fellow and You lost everybody else besides me.” What a wretched thought. What an awful thought. “Everybody else is gone, everybody else is dead, nobody else is serving God, nobody else has the message. I alone, Oh God, am the only one that is left and all You have to depend on is me.” Do you see how preposterous it is for us to think that way? God is providing, preparing an army. We are just a little speck of it. Amen! We must realize that without the rest of this army, we are nothing, we are finished! Don’t you understand? God is preparing a first-fruits company, an Elijah company, I could call it thirty other names company, to save the rest of the church. Our duty is to be servants to the rest of the church! It is like you have a mouth, and the mouth takes in some honey, and the mouth says, “I love this honey, this honey is so sweet, I’m going to keep it for myself,” and the mouth decides to hold on to it, “I am not swallowing it, I am not giving it to any other part of the body, I am just keeping it for myself!” That mouth would soon be useless.  We must realize that without the rest of the Body, we are nothing. We should be grateful, thankful to God that we are privileged to be a part of this magnificent thing that God is doing in the earth today. Amen.

So here is poor brother, Elijah, in a very low, low part of his life. He says in 1 Kings 19:10-11, “I, even I only, am left; and they seek my life, to take it away. 11 And he said, Go forth, and stand upon the mount before the LORD. And, behold, the LORD passed by, and a great and strong wind rent the mountains, and brake in pieces the rocks before the LORD; but the LORD was not in the wind.” What happened? In the midst of the manifestation of God, the devil was right there. Because if God was not in the wind, who was in the wind? Have you noticed it? I mean, if you were not keen, you would not notice that passage, that God did pass by. But then, before God, rushed the devil breaking up rocks and carrying on. I am telling you, without the discernment of God, you and I would say, “God did it. It was God that did that. It was God.” God was not there.

Now, let’s read a little more. “…and after the wind an earthquake; but the Lord was not in the earthquake.” We are talking about manifestations now. Manifestations. Some of the manifestations that we see are not God. God did come, God did do something, God did speak, but that one wasn’t God. Verse 12, “And after the earthquake a fire; but the LORD was not in the fire: and after the fire a still small voice.” Who must recognize it? Who must discern it? Do you see the problem we have? The onus, the responsibility, is on you to discern who is doing what and when. If you do not know who is doing it, you are in trouble, but why did God put such an awful responsibility upon us as Christians? I can tell you why. It is because inside of you, you have God. The Spirit of the living God in you must make contact with the spirit of whatever is doing that. You must be able to say, “This is God, but that is not God.” Right in the meetings! Right in the middle of your meetings you see God working and you see another spirit working. The other spirit is always trying to distract.

Satan always brings in a distraction. In your lives, you have to look out for that. But then, the still, small voice came. You know, you have that voice inside you. For Elijah, it was out there. He was hearing with his ears. You don’t have to hear God with your ears any more for the God in you will give you that strong, still, small voice that quickens you inside.

(Excerpt from Keeping in Touch, December 12, 2004)

Thought for today: You don’t have to hear God with your ears any more for the God in you will give you that strong, still, small voice that quickens you inside.

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“Persuaded Better Things of You”

Posted in Christian Walk, tagged , , , on February 21, 2022| Leave a Comment »

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Scripture reading: Hebrews 6:3-20

Let us look at Hebrews 6:3-6, “And this will we do, if God permit. 4 For it is impossible for those who were once enlightened, and have tasted of the heavenly gift, and were made partakers of the Holy Ghost, 5 And have tasted the good word of God, and the powers of the world to come, 6 If they shall fall away, to renew them again unto repentance; seeing they crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh, and put him to an open shame.”

What are we saying? I am going to put it in short words for you. If you reject the Holy Ghost, you are lost. If the Holy Ghost ever leaves you, you are finished. The Holy Ghost will never leave you unless you are totally condemned to hell. Have you ever seen anybody who was baptized with the Holy Ghost backslide? Yes, you have. We see them all the time. Well, the Holy Ghost will not leave him, unless he gets to the stage where he has totally, categorically, deliberately rejected God. If the Holy Ghost lifts from him, he will be an atheist and he will be happy, glad, free and no problem anymore. He is already in hell. Do we see the Word of God?

Verse 6 says, “If they shall fall away, to renew them again unto repentance; seeing they crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh, and put him to an open shame.” Verse 9, “But, beloved, we are persuaded better things of you, and things that accompany salvation, though we thus speak.” In other words, we lay down principles and thoughts of what can happen, BUT we don’t expect it to happen to you. I don’t expect one person reading this article to come under the category of one who would reject the Holy Ghost, reject Jesus Christ, turn your back on Him and be lost.

Verse 10, “For God is not unrighteous to forget your work and labour of love, which ye have shewed toward his name, in that ye have ministered to the saints, and do minister.” This is such a marvelous God that we serve, that He is not going to allow you to go to hell. He will kill you before you go to hell. Isn’t He a wonderful God? Tell me now. Isn’t He a wonderful God? He is a God Who would rather let your body perish and your soul live, than to allow you to go down into hell. This is the confidence that you have in God, isn’t it? So, why do you not understand God when you see some of us dying? God will destroy the body that the soul may live. You have made a commitment. You have made a covenant. You are part of God’s Body and He said, “If your right hand offend you, cut it off” (Matthew 5:30). Yes, if a person is going to lose his life spiritually and go to hell, I would rather see him dead, see her dead. Whoever it is, I would rather see them dead and with the Lord than see them go into hell. Is that your consciousness, too? Praise be to God.

Verse 18, “That by two immutable things, in which it was impossible for God to lie, we might have a strong consolation, who have fled for refuge to lay hold upon the hope set before us: 19 Which hope we have as an anchor of the soul, both sure and steadfast, and which entereth into that within the veil; 20 Whither the forerunner is for us entered, even Jesus, made an high priest for ever after the order of Melchisedec.”

(Excerpt from Keeping in Touch, December 2007, pg. 9)

Thought for today: He is a God Who would rather let your body perish and your soul live, than to allow you to go down into hell.

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A Christian Does Not Commit Sin

Posted in Christian Walk, tagged , , , , , , , on February 18, 2022| Leave a Comment »

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Scripture reading: Romans 6:23

Do you believe in the doctrines in Hebrews 6:1-2? They are so simple and so basic that you must believe in them. If you don’t, go repent, get them and make sure you have them stored in your heart, because these are your basic foundation. You are going to be called to stand upon them in the midst of battle. You must get the resurrection of the dead and the eternal judgment right. You must know that everything you do, EVERYTHING you do will appear in the judgment. Every thought you had will appear in the judgment. You get forgiveness of sins if you pray to Jesus and ask Him for forgiveness. Now, can you pray about something that you did deliberately? Yes, you can, but you mustn’t do it again. In other words, you are supposed to be changed.

Do you know that a Christian doesn’t sin and a sinner doesn’t do righteousness? That sounds rough, doesn’t it? I am just quoting our Brother John. You have to decide whether John is right or wrong, whether he was in the Spirit when he wrote that. “Whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin” (1 John 3:9). Now, the key word here is commit.

You get together and say, “Brother, let us rob the bank tomorrow.” You lay out your plans to rob the bank and execute the robbery. You are NOT born of God. If you were working on the roof of a bank and the roof gave way, you fell into the vault, picked up a few coins and put them in your pocket, then you might be able to go and repent, and say, “Lord, forgive me.” But what I am saying is that he that is born of God, that is a son of God, cannot deliberately, willfully sin. No one that is born of God can willfully sin. NO ONE that is born of God can continue in sin. You can fall into sin, but you cannot continue in it. If a person is continuing in sin, he needs repentance from the beginning. He has to go back and repent from some dead works.

There is a judgment on sin. The judgment on sin is already pronounced, “For the wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23). Now if you believe that, you will not sin. Unfortunately, we sin both in thoughts and in deeds.

(Excerpt from Keeping in Touch, December 2007, pg. 8-9)

Thought for today: You must know that everything you do, EVERYTHING you do will appear in the judgment.

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“It Is Good”

Posted in Christian Walk, tagged , , , on February 11, 2022| Leave a Comment »

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Scripture reading: Genesis 1:31

I have been thinking and meditating on Mary Magdalene. She was very close to Jesus in her whole heart and soul. Her heart leaned toward Him so much that when she saw Him crucified, she couldn’t think of herself. A lot of the disciples ran away. Peter cursed and lost it. Mary Magdalene was with the other Marys, maybe about five Marys; they stood right there. They didn’t care if there were any there that wanted to kill them. Did you ever think of it? They stood, right there, beneath the cross. They never thought about whether they would lose their lives or not.

After He was crucified, they were the ones that remembered He had said that He would resurrect on the third day. So, they took ointment and spices to the tomb. I personally believe that they used that as a pretext to go to the grave and see what they could see. The Bible says that when they got to the gate, there was an earthquake accompanied by an angel of a very bright countenance (Matthew 28:2). That was the time of the resurrection – you know the whole story. Mary Magdalene wouldn’t leave there. She wanted to see Him. She saw a man and she went to talk to him. She talked with who she thought was the gardener, but it turned out to be Jesus Himself. The message He gave her was the first resurrection message that was given to the Church (John 20:17). It was given to a woman whose heart and soul was totally sold out to God. She took the message to the disciples, but they didn’t believe her.

She said, “He is risen, as He said” (Matthew 28:6). He is risen as He said, and we, when we think of Jesus Christ, we think of our risen Savior. He appeared to them many times, but there was only one time He appeared with wounds in His hands and in His side and He only appeared that way to convince the doubters (John 20:25-29). Amen?

Now, it is 2,000 years since that has happened and Jesus has been coming closer and closer and closer in the revelation of Himself to the church. His plan is not to reveal Himself to you so that you could go and preach. His plan is to reveal Himself in you, so that when you see Peter, you see Jesus, so that Jesus would have many faces, millions of faces. We will all look the way that we look, but it will be Jesus Who will be seen. That is, your mind will be the mind of Christ. Once your mind becomes the mind of Christ, you begin to think like Christ, you begin to act like Christ, you begin to walk like Christ and you begin to behave like Christ!

Now, for last 2,000 years, we have been working on the church, and if God wasn’t God, He would be disappointed. You know, I look at God sometimes and wonder why He isn’t disappointed. Do you know why? Because He is seeing something that I am not seeing and He is hearing something that I am not hearing.

God made this man, a magnificent creature, and He let him loose to walk. And as the man walked along, God said, “It is good” (Genesis 1:31). Now, God said, “It is good,” and God saw you. God saw what Adam would do, and God said, “It is good.” What is good? Deterioration from a magnificent, mighty creature down to little people like we are now? We deteriorated not only in the body but we have deteriorated in mind. We have deteriorated in every way from Adam, except in Christ. And Christ’s intention is to come forth in Adam.

(Excerpt from Keeping in Touch, December 2007, pg. 4)

Thought for today: Once your mind becomes the mind of Christ, you begin to think like Christ, you begin to act like Christ, you begin to walk like Christ and you begin to behave like Christ!

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