He's turning over the tables in the synagogue.
It's a spiritual battle.
God wants our devotion and (for generations) everywhere we look our attention has been divided.
We set up idols – hundreds of them – and when people don't worship them we demand they do.
We don't even recognize an idol anymore because it's decorated as just “What Everybody Is Doing.”
Even in trying to find answers for this present world condition people are turning to everything BUT God.
Can you hear me?
I'm not even trying to talk to the ones who think what I'm saying is silly.
I'm talking to you if you can hear this.
Nobody can make anybody else listen.
This isn't for ones who are still projecting onto others; who won't work on their own stuff.
God will deal with people His way.
This is for you if it's making any sense to you at all.
God says the foolish will shame the wise.
If I sound foolish right now I think I'm really okay with that.
"But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong" (I Corinthians 1:27).
And I don't think He's laughing right now.
... When you're doing stuff you shouldn't be doing and Dad comes in and you are caught with your talents hidden and a golden calf on the shelf and complaining about manna...
His presence WILL be acknowledged.
I don't know how long it will take. But
He doesn't always speak to people when it's convenient for them.
Until we fight this worldwide sickness battle with spiritual weapons all the distancing and washing hands and panic and chaos and control and worry is like going into a battle of the bands with clanging cymbals.
It's like we're trying to fight a gun battle with a teaspoon of butter.
While we do serve a God who uses foolish things like walking around a city to make the walls fall and dipping in a river to heal someone's skin, and casting the nets on the other side of the boat,
It's about OBEDIENCE to Him.
How do you know what to be doing today if you don't ask Him?
You can read all about Him and still not know Him.
God says to obey Him above all else.
Only Jesus can do that.
Until we fight on our knees in prayer AND give up the idols I'm not sure what all He'll do to get our attention back on Him where it belongs.
I read that when Pharaoh didn't do what God said to do He sent plagues over the land... until people heard Him AND obeyed. God hardened Pharaoh's heart. He knew he wouldn't listen.
God WILL be acknowledged. Make no mistake about that.
And He can replace a hard heart of stone with a heart of flesh, soft and tender toward Him.
God knows who believes and who doesn't. There's no hiding it. And He knows who will choose Him and who never will.
Our lives will surely show where our focus really is.
What does God have to do to get your attention?
I have some ideas about some things that need to change.
Pornography must end. Prostitution and pornography and sexting and worshiping "consent" is not honoring the marriage bed and keeping it holy and if you think I'm joking around here it seems God will go to great lengths to get our attention.
Period.
Everyone has a choice to surrender everything every day to God.
From the "actors" to the producers to the consumers of pornography keeping people enslaved by sexual sin, ALL will answer to Him.
I know this may come as a surprise to some because it's been a long time since anyone told you that selfishness is not okay or healthy.
People were not created for your depraved pleasure.
And addiction is not your God. No excuses will stand.
Abortion must end. Children are not in your way. The Bible says,
Stop trampling on His gifts.
And when He said give your worries to Him, He meant it.
We've been casting our cares on everyone else all over the place – like vomit. It's like fishing line and Christmas lights, all tangled up, with the mess we've made doing things the way they aren't supposed to be done.
He said these worries belong with Him. When you try to dump them anyplace else it won't work.
One more god we made is that we've been worshiping a paper marriage certificate instead of caring for the health of the people inside the marriage.
Broken marriages are all over the place and trying to be polite by not letting people into our lives to pray with us and for us is not working.
God sees all the bullying that goes on behind closed doors; even you covert passive-aggressive people. Yes, He sees what you're doing. You may fool some people but nothing is hidden from Him.
Church leaders who tell you that a toxic marriage must stay together – or else – aren't the ones ducking the fights in your bedroom. I am not talking about occasional disagreements; I'm talking about poisonous marriages that are choking the life out of wives and children and sometimes out of the husbands.
Stop worshiping the marriage certificate. People are physically and emotionally dying inside unhealthy homes.
The god of “What I Want To Do” must come down.
The way we spend our time matters.
The time every single day and night that God gifted to you – is to be used FOR HIM. He didn't tell you to control it all. He says to submit everything to Him and not to even lean on our own understanding in Proverbs 3:5-6. And WHEN we do this He WILL make our path straight.
What does HE want you to do today?
Forget for a minute what the world told you to do today (for school, for work, for whatever...)
ASK God what your day should look like. What does HE want your kids to learn today?
When we seek HIM FIRST; not a job first, HE WILL take care of what we need.
Maybe the job seems never-ending and unsatisfying and completely empty or stress-filled because it's not actually where or how you're suppose to be spending the time God gave you.
Did you ask Him?
When you pray for bread and He provides you with food, the very next prayer is “Lord, how do You want me to use this bread?” Instead we've been praying for bread and then, “Thanks, God, I've got it from here.”
He says He will hear when we call to Him.
He says He will draw near to us when we draw near to Him.
He says He will never leave us.
He says that even if only 2 or 3 are gathered together in His Name, He is with us.
He's not messing around.
Every knee will bow and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord.
Please pray and seek Him.
He says if we will seek HIM FIRST; not school, not work, not approval, not sex, not fake empty thrills, that HE WILL take care of us.
People are desperately trying to hang onto “school” and worshiping it as a god when God is clearly saying HE is God.
A 40 hour work week (32 hours?) is not to be our God.
Where does HE fit? And I never read where Jesus says, "It's just business."
Every interaction matters all the time.
We were not created to be consumers of products.
That employee or co-worker who has been searching for answers needs prayer with you. Are you so arrogant to think that God won't support you in praying with someone?
Worried that your boss won't allow this?
God even says that when people are arrested HE WILL give the words to say.
There's nothing like The Lord speaking through someone. (He's even been known to speak through a donkey. He can use anything or anyone.)
When was the last time God woke you up and you spent time with Him in the quiet of the morning, just the two of you? Without complaining..... without controlling...
We have allowed control to be our god for such a long time we don't remember what it would look like for it to not be.
That's what's got us in the mess we're in now.
Give God the FIRST of everything we are and all we have because nothing is to take His place in our hearts.
Have you ever been in a relationship and it's very clear to you that your lover's devotion is not to you? It just doesn't work that way.
Everybody wants the credit for everything – but we cannot even take a breath without the lungs or the air He gave us.
We are His.
We are made IN HIS IMAGE.
You might not be able to stop the chaos all around you but you CAN take a knee and acknowledge Him and He can find favor on you and your household for anointing your doorway.
When God says to confess our sins to each other, do you remember WHY?
SO THAT
James 5:16
"Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective."
It's time to do some confessing.
2 Chronicles 7:14
"if My people, who are called by My name, will humble themselves and pray and seek My face AND turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and I will forgive their sin and will heal their land."
Kerri and her daughters are currently waiting in faith in Northwest Washington for God to open doors to Alaska. Once there, they'll be working towards the development of a homeless shelter for domestic abuse and sex-trafficked survivors.
They welcome your prayers, as well as financial partnership, to bring to fruition the shelter God has pressed upon their hearts to create: https://itisallaboutfaithblog.wordpress.com/
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