alan1704

Word Whispers – Luke 3:21-22

Now when all the people were baptised, and when Jesus also had been baptised and was praying, the heavens were opened, and the Holy Spirit descended on him in bodily form, like a dove; and a voice came from heaven, ‘You are my beloved Son; with you I am well pleased.'”
Luke 3:21-22

The truth is that delighting in the Lord is important. Delight is at the core of our very existence. The infinite delight of God the Father in his only-begotten son, is an infinite delight in every member of Christ’s spiritual body. For when God accepted Christ my head, he accepted me and when he praised and glorified my head, he made me a partaker of that glory through Christ’s finished work at the cross.

It’s very easy to believe that if I feel and experience something then and only then does it become good, but the truth of the power of Christ’s resurrection is the indwelling power to become flooded with the delight by the assurance that I am accepted, beloved, and delighted in by God.

The evidence is there for me to reach out and take. The resurrection power of Christ in me will make my heart dance for joy as I see myself in Christ fully pardoned, justified, and accepted into the Father’s heart.

Delighting in God is the overwhelming knowing and confidence that my relationship with God is rooted and grounded in the Father’s overwhelming delight and acceptance of his son, “’You are my beloved Son; with you I am well pleased.'”

October 22, 2016 0

Grace is God’s Overwhelming Chance.

“This is real love—not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as a sacrifice to take away our sins.” – 1 John 4:10

We are devoted to filling our lives with distractions and amusements to captivate our every waking hour. The media circus that fills the air is a constant stream telling us our lives need something new. We need better things, brighter things, things that will make us complete, things that we cannot live without, things that will add value. Somewhere created inside of us is a longing for newness, new beginnings, fresh starts, second chances.

Many evangelists, preachers and song writers boldly proclaim that God is a God of second chances. That no matter how many chances it takes, he is always ready to welcome you back. He is waiting there for you, arms wide open, ready to receive you when you have blown it for the umpteen time.

While this is wonderfully true it is not the whole story because God is much more glorious and wonderful than that picture. He was so moved by love that to keep us in his embrace once and forever he did something unimaginatively big. He prized us so greatly that he entered into our world and committed himself to our grief.

God gave the world his son. He gave of his own family, of his own heart, the son of his cherished love. His one and only begotten son, he willingly gave up for each one of us. He gave up the best he had, without us having to be anything or do anything, he gave his one and only son.

God’s love is so immense, so overwhelming, so encompassing that even the worst person could be reached. For God doesn’t just love good people, he doesn’t just love those that are worthy, he doesn’t just love those that are seeking him, doesn’t just love those that are repentant or those that turn to him or those that are committed to him. He loves the world. He loves people who are running from him, who hate him, who rebel against him, who do not want anything to do with him.

He prizes and loves each of us; he loves a godless world who values things and amusements over the love of himself.

He is a God of the overwhelming chance, a God that with divine love will keep you, hold you, embrace you, love you, cherish you, commune with you, whisper to you, enjoy you, desire you, all you need is to see him in his beauty and loveliness and accept his wonderful gift of grace.

He desires to lavish the glory of heaven into your every waking hour.

His life is an eternal life, an everlasting life, once received he welcomes you in and keeps you. You do not need second, third, endless chances, for the loving embrace of God is so infinite that once you are united into him; you are united into eternity, once and forever.

October 8, 2016 0

Grace is the Tearing Down of Walls.

“Look! I stand at the door and knock. If you hear my voice and open the door, I will come in, and we will share a meal together as friends. “– Revelation 3:20

Most people feel there is a wall, a barrier of separation between them and God and this wall is something they have no control over. But this wall is in reality a barrier created in our minds, by the shame and guilt of our wrong actions.

There is a fantasy that God has a shadow of disappointment over his face that causes us to worry that he is willing to withdraw from us or that he would distance himself from us, because we feel the shame of our wrong choices our minds logically compute that God must also feel the shame.

All right that sounds reasonable, a holy God would withdraw from his creation when it indulges in unholy acts.

Only there is one thing that punches a massive hole in this wall of withdrawal. Christ took away the wall forever! From God’s side there never was any distance or barrier between him and us. He was always there ready to welcome us, to accept us, to interact with us. It was our sin that created the barrier and that was in our minds, where we associate our actions with guilt and shame.

Jesus removed our sins, and therefore our consciousness of sin is gone and the wall has been taken down. The feelings we have of distance from him are all lies and illusion. Jesus took away our sin and brought us into perfect relationship with God where nothing can ever come between us.

No sin can make us go out of fellowship or lose connection with God because our relationship is based on Christ and his perfect work, not our own works. Christ has given us the gift of righteousness, his sacrifice dealt with all our wrong choices, every wrong choice, past, present and future was put into Christ on the cross and eternally forgiven.

Your relationship with God is perfect and unalterable. God himself is satisfied with this perfect union fellowship he placed inside of you. There is never a wall separating you from God, there are no barriers in your relationship with the father. You have been given the very relationship that Jesus has with his father, for you have been put In Christ and you have been given his own perfect, eternal, righteousness.

October 2, 2016 0

God is a Consuming Fire

“The people of Israel will be a raging fire, and Edom a field of dry stubble. The descendants of Joseph will be a flame roaring across the field, devouring everything. There will be no survivors in Edom. I, the Lord, have spoken!” – Obadiah 18

Imagine that you are a raging fire consuming a dry stubble land void of moisture. You need to burn everything. If you falter, if you cease, the monsoon rain may suddenly appear and all your brilliance will fade into the dust. If, however, your passion ignites the desert, everything will be cleansed, purged in the molten glory of your flames.

God is that consuming fire, God is full of holy passion, and God is a cleansing flame.

His raging fire destroys all the residue of the world and sin that stains your mind and emotion. His holy passion ignites your new creation life into a furnace of his power. His cleansing flame purifies you from every effect of evil and cremates the sin that reminds you of your dead nature.

You make decisions every day that influence your future. These may occur in the most mundane of circumstances, but they give you the opportunity to let the fire and passion of God burn within you or let the floods of the world stifle the fire of God.

The way to stay in the tangible presence of God is to burn with his love and to dive into the furnace of his finished work. For it is in the heat of the fire that Christ appears and his glory protects, leads, holds, sustains and saves you.

You cannot control the raging fire, you cannot contain the heat of the furnace, you let it consume everything the world would want you to value and destroy everything that would diminish the work of Christ.

For as the fire of God burns within your heart, your thoughts are renewed, your hope is complete and the glory of God shines through your life, as you let the finished work of the cross consume you.

September 25, 2016 0

Grace is the Realization that Everything is a Gift from Christ

“I tell you the truth, you will ask the Father directly, and he will grant your request because you use my name. You haven’t done this before. Ask, using my name, and you will receive, and you will have abundant joy.” – John 16 : 23-24

When you dig down into the very foundations of God, you will discover in the depths of his eternal character that God really is a good gift giver.

He gives gifts with no strings attached. Regardless of our performance, our actions, our works, our effort, no matter how disconnected we feel, he even doesn’t require us to do anything after we get them either, like improve or pray more or sacrifice all our plans and desires and commit ourselves to his cause or do good things to show how thankful we really are. His gifts are given free.

The most awesome gift that we have been given is eternal life.

This eternal life is ours in his son. When we receive the son, we automatically have eternal life, and this life is made manifest inside of us, as the very life of Christ comes and dwells within us. This life is Christ’s life in all its fullness.

God who was before time, immeasurable and infinite the source of all life, the everlasting creator, the fountain of eternal life was glorified in the resurrected Christ and because God’s life is eternal, receiving the son is receiving eternal life.

The essence of God’s eternal life knows Christ. Our fragile, dust frames have become the home of the vast, glorious God. We have been made alive by the Holy Spirit and our finite frame is now immersed into the infinite God.

This gift of eternal life is the imparting of all the son is, not just living forever but joy, holiness, peace, hope, love, faith, strength, freedom, authority, kindness, wholeness, security, long-suffering, faithfulness, goodness, righteousness, purity, everything that is of Christ is now made in me.

How do I receive this free gift by simply seeing what is true and saying thank you. Thanking God for all he has done for me makes it come alive in my experience and makes me come alive to God’s reality.

Grace is the realization that everything is a gift from Christ, given because he loves me, because he is a good giver and he takes pleasure and delight in overwhelming his children with every good gift from his heart of love.

September 18, 2016 0

Grace is Flourishing in Christ.

“But the godly will flourish like palm trees and grow strong like the cedars of Lebanon.” – Psalm 92:12

God created you to flourish – and ransomed you to set you free to flourish – so you could be a living, vibrant, remarkable shining light in a world of blindness and darkness.

All creation is waiting for the sons and daughters of the Father of creation to display their glorious, wonderful, beautiful, pure new creation life.

Christ’s wonderful sacrifice at the cross made it possible for the living powerful, resurrected Spirit of Christ to dwell inside us. The passion of His heart is to see everything in creation flourish in new creation life birthed within each redeemed heart.

King David expressed it well when he wrote from the overflow of his heart in Psalm 92 – “But the godly will flourish like palm trees and grow strong like the cedars of Lebanon.”

As the Psalmist sings in this verse about the abundant strength and magnificence, he paints a picture of fruitfulness, uprightness, steadfastness, health and longevity.

The significance of the Palm Tree lies in the fact that a palm has only one, above ground growing point. This is located at the top of its trunk, and if this terminal bud is injured, the palm often dies. This deep rooted tree is able to withstand the most violent storms and blossom, bud and produce fruit all the year in the most arid of deserts. We are being reminded in this beautiful, creative picture of all God has made available and provided for us, and what will inevitably take place when we are rooted and established in him.

We can flourish in him because our new creation life inside us is rooted in the finished work of Christ. Christ now is our one and only growing point, and because He won the victory over death in His resurrection, we will never stop growing and blossoming into all He dreams for us.

When God wanted to grip the hearts of the Children of Israel, He gave them a portrait of his overwhelming love and goodness. He wanted to change how they thought and felt and lived, he wanted to captivate their entire individual existence with the wonder and majesty of his passionate love for them. He wanted them to believe in Him and all he could accomplish for them. Their liberation from Egypt into the glorious freedom of the Promised Land, a land so lavishly abundant he described it as overflowing with “milk and honey”, was a journey of discovery into the grip of His grace.

Palm trees flourish by the grace of God, and from the dates of the tree, dark brown syrup is harvested that is rich and sweet. It was this preserved syrup that was also referred to the “honey” of the Promised Land. God’s promise of honey was open for all to see in the comprehensive blessing of every Palm Tree established throughout the land. When hearts started to question, just looking and focusing on a flourishing tree reminded every soul that God is faithful and is to be trusted.

The vastness of God’s love is contained in His promises and sometimes it feels like these are beyond our human understanding and experience. But they are all there, they are all ours, they have all been showered upon us in Christ and God wants us to encounter him, be immersed in him, be filled with the abundance of him and like Palm Trees in the desert, be rooted and flourish.

September 6, 2016 0

Grace is God’s Orchestrated Provision.

Now the Lord had arranged for a great fish to swallow Jonah. And Jonah was inside the fish for three days and three nights. – Jonah 1:17

Here in the book of Jonah is a remarkable outpouring of the heart of God. Within these few short chapters you can witness the compassion of God for his children and his overwhelming love for his creation.

In the story of Jonah, he ran away from the task God had given him, caught a boat in the opposite direction and completely disobeyed the commandment of God. God however in a show of unfailing love orchestrated the fish of the sea to become a source of unmerited favour and Jonah’s salvation. God moved in love and provided a fish of grace. In the midst of disobedience God acted in grace. For deep within his heart Jonah trusted in the goodness of God, “I cried out to the Lord in my great trouble, and he answered me, I cried to you from the land of the dead and Lord, you heard me.” Jonah 2 : 1

A powerless and helpless man, unable to do anything for himself, at the lowest point of his life, tossed into an ocean of despair, death and desperation encountered the overwhelming grace of God. His rescue had already been orchestrated and provided by God.

Christ is our fish of grace. For while we were sinners, ungodly, he died for us, he died in our place. He entered our world of despair, death and desperation and rescued us, before we even took our first breath or our heart took its first beat.

We were running away, going in the opposite direction, but God in Christ had orchestrated and provided our eternal redemption.

God has demonstrated to us, the helpless and the ungodly his infinite unconditional love. For his love is bigger, more self-sacrificing, more amazing and more abundant than any other love. His love found us at our worst and does not condemn us but rescues us and places us into Christ.

Just as Jonah was placed into the fish, you have been placed into Christ. You are now totally covered, totally safe, totally secure and supernaturally sustained in the embrace of Christ. Before you were born, God provided his son to die in your place so that you could receive the fullness of God and live in the embrace of Father and receive all the riches of heaven.

God is for you, He has already moved to help you, He loves you unconditionally, and you are the treasure of heaven.

August 29, 2016 0

Grace is being grafted into Christ.

“But some of these branches from Abraham’s tree—some of the people of Israel—have been broken off. And you Gentiles, who were branches from a wild olive tree, have been grafted in. So now you also receive the blessing God has promised Abraham and his children, sharing in the rich nourishment from the root of God’s special olive tree. “ – Romans 11:17

Since you have been grafted into Christ the fullness of Christ has been deposited inside you and the Holy Spirit resides in you.

That is an amazing truth to take in. The life of Christ, his spirit is now the power which flows in your veins. You now draw your life from His roots, you draw from His life. His infinite roots are established in eternity, intertwined in the plans and purposes of the Father, filled with the power of heaven, alive with divine glory and are secured in the will of the God.

Life now becomes a realisation of all that you are. As the life of Christ flows inside you, your heart finds its anchor in the foundations of the divine influence of God. This amazing deep bond brings an eternal perspective to your life. Little by little it dawns on you that no effort, no work, no selfless acts can make you any closer to Christ, you just receive because he abides in you.

I know from personal experience how amazing it is when I realised that it was not up to me to abide in Christ, because he had already taken up permanent residence in me. I remained in him because he remained in me. And unlike all other relationships, this was eternal; it would last through the limitless, boundless ages of time.

Having his life poured into us means that we are united into the glory of God and as we delight, acknowledge, revel in his presence his power ignites our souls and burns away all the stubble of the world that tries to weigh us down.

The wonderful thing is that this is effortless, because he has aligned us to heaven and devoted himself to our fulfilment and joy. He has placed a banquet inside us and has invited us to join in with the party.

You are never the same again, when you discover that you have been rooted and grounded through Christ into the eternal destiny of God.

August 27, 2016 0

Egypt