Faith – Living in the Fullness of God

October 25, 2023

It’s ALL Free

So, I just learned something new!

I’ve always thought of Psalm 91 as a perfect example of God’s promises for us, His people! Listen to these verses:

Psalm 91:1-3 AMPC—He who dwells in the secret place of the Most High shall remain stable and fixed under the shadow of the Almighty [Whose power no foe can withstand].
I will say of the Lord, He is my Refuge and my Fortress, my God; on Him I lean and rely, and in Him I [confidently] trust! For [then] He will deliver you from the snare of the fowler and from the deadly pestilence.

This Psalm is a perfect example of the “If I do this…THEN God will bless me with that” promises. But what I didn’t realize is that it’s a perfect example of the Law being lived well.

Only problem with that is that we’re no longer living in the under the Law, but under Grace. Just as Romans 6:14 AMPC tells us—For sin shall not [any longer] exert dominion over you, since now you are not under Law [as slaves], but under grace [as subjects of God’s favor and mercy].

God’s “If you do this—then I will do that” statements under the Law became a series of “I will” statements…without the “If you first” statements, under Grace.

Take a look at these 5 “I will” statements from God to Abram found in Genesis 12:1-3 AMPC:

1️⃣ I will make of you a great nation
2️⃣ I will bless you with abundant increase of favors
3️⃣ I will make your name famous and distinguished
4️⃣ I will bless those who bless you
5️⃣ I will curse him who curses or uses insolent language toward you

(By the way: Five is the number for grace in the Bible.)

Notice that there’s no longer any “if you, then I will” statements. It’s strictly “I WILL” from God. There was nothing that Abram had to do to earn these blessings.

Read through the New Testament carefully and see how many times you read about God’s graciousness toward His people. How many times Jesus says, that you will receive what you have asked for. How many times Paul talks about God’s provision and Grace.

Did you know that Grace is God’s provision for your every need? Just as it says in 2 Peter 1:3 AMPC–For His divine power has bestowed upon us all things that [are requisite and suited] to life and godliness, through the [full, personal] knowledge of Him Who called us by and to His own glory and excellence (virtue).

Notice that you didn’t earn any part of that. It’s God’s Divine power that’s given “all things” to you as a gift. Bestow means to give an honor, right, or gift. God has given you the gift of ALL THINGS…and just so you know…that word “ALL” really means ALL, everything.

You can’t earn the gift of Salvation. You can’t earn the gift of healing. You can’t earn all the blessings that Jesus’ death released for you. You can only receive it. Jesus is the One Who’s spotless, sinless life earned it for you. Jesus is the One Who satisfied the justice that the Law demanded.

The Law showed you clearly that there’s no way you can fulfill any of it, in and of yourself. You needed Jesus, the spotless Lamb, to do it for you! And now that He has—Grace has been afforded to you and you became the righteousness of God IN Him (2 Corinthians 5:21).

For you to try and do anything now to receive His Grace and Favor is to say “Christ’s death wasn’t enough for me! I need to add my fleshly and sinful actions to ensure I receive His promises.”

It’s not Jesus’ death plus your goodness! It’s Jesus’ death that results in your goodness. It’s only as you stand in His finished work on the cross that you are righteous. Nothing you can do will ensure righteousness for you. It’s ONLY WHAT JESUS DID THAT MAKES YOU RIGHTEOUS!

Psalm 91 was written in the age of Law and it showed the heart of the man God loved…King David. But because Jesus died for you, you no longer have to earn your righteousness and God’s Favor. It’s already yours…because Jesus paid the price for you!

It’s God’s Love shed abroad in your heart, His Grace and His Favor poured out in abundance into your life that now causes you to say of the Lord, “He is my Refuge and my Fortress, my God; on Him I lean and rely, and in Him I [confidently] trust!” Psalm 91:2.

You don’t “speak” because you want to earn and deserve His Favor but because His Favor is so abundantly and freely poured out into your life.

Don’t try to earn what God’s already paid for. Accept the free gift and learn to live in, and enjoy, all the blessings He wants to pour out into your life!

October 4, 2023

Want to Live a “Greater Life”?

Receiving Is An Action Word…

The Bible is filled to the absolute brim with thousands of promises that God meant for us to take as our own. I’ve heard it said that there are 7,147 promises from God to man in the Bible. That means that you could read a new promise from God to you daily for the next 19.5 years before you’d start reading them for a second time!

Let me say that again. For the next nearly 20 years of your life…every single day…you could read a new promise from God to you! 😲😲😲

I don’t know about you but when someone promises me something good if I will just take it from them…something that I KNOW I’m going to love…something that will improve my life and make it better…I’m going to make sure I get it from them…even if I have to race against others to get there first!

I’m so glad that with God’s promises there’s always enough supply to go around! We don’t have to fight others to receive our share. God has enough power in each one of His promises for every living soul to receive a blessing through them!

Here’s one of His promises that I bet you’ve read many times…but never really stopped to meditate on it or pay close attention to the words…

So many times we just spiritualize the promise right out of God’s Promises!

Romans 8:11…

But if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you.

According to Strong’s Concordance Give life—means to cause to live, make alive, by spiritual power to arouse and invigorate, to restore to life, to give increase of life…physical life; endued with new and greater powers of life.

Mortal—liable to death, our human body Body—the body both of men or animals, the physical body

When we have the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead living in us…that Spirit will endue our physical, and very mortal, body with new and greater powers of life.

Don’t those 2 words: New and Greater just catch at your heart? They are bigger than our minds are thinking about when we read this verse.

New = not existing before, discovered recently or now for the first time Greater = an adjective that describes the noun “power”; ability, quality, or eminence; amount or intensity considerably above the normal or average.

God never does anything in a minimum or skimpy fashion! Just a take a look at the beauty and variety of nature, the vastness of the universe, the intricacies of the human body!

God is not human and flawed like we are! Everything He does is “abundant, super abundant, full and overflowing, over and above, exceedingly abundantly”!

Even in this…quickening and giving life to our mortal bodies—we are not only given life—we are given an amount or intensity of life that is considerably above the “normal” or “average” quality of life!

Think of it “if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you,” that same Spirit “who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you.”

We are promised that God WILL…not might, not maybe…but WILL give us new and greater powers of life than we’ve ever had before! Wow!😲

Look at what Jesus also said about greater power in John 14:12…

“Most assuredly, I say to you, he who believes in Me, the works that I do he will do also; and greater works than these he will do, because I go to My Father.”

Notice, that again here, God says we WILL do…not might…not maybe…but WILL! We’ll be given an abundantly alive body that is able to do “greater works” than Jesus did… because He went to the Father and sent back His Holy Spirit to live in us!

Reading these verses made me realize that we have such limited and small minds. We think small—even when we think we’re thinking big—we’re still thinking small compared to God!

When we think of something being renewed—we think of it being brought back to “like new” condition. But our God is not the God of halfway, just enough, or “like new”! He’s the God of “more than enough” “exceedingly great” “super abundant” “exceedingly abundantly” and “immeasurably more”!

He freely gives us W-A-Y B-E-T-T-E-R than new!

Ephesians 3:20

Now to Him who is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that works in us,

Exceedingly—over, beyond, more than, very highly, extremely Abundantly—plentifully, very highly, in large quantities Above—over, beyond, more than, very highly

The Holy Spirit wasn’t content to just say it once…He said the same thing three different ways…and when He does that it means we are supposed to take note and KNOW that He means what He’s saying! He’s emphasizing it just in case we missed it the first time or two.

The Holy Spirit is repeating Himself so that we don’t overlook this very important and life-giving FACT!

God, through His Holy Spirit has said that He WILL give us new and greater powers of life than we’ve ever had before! It’s a done deal. It’s already been done and completed in God’s eyes.

All that needs to be done now…is for us to receive these new and greater powers of life, to believe God’s promise, receive it as our own, and walk in it!

If God says we have it—then we have it! If God said it—then it is!

Selah—pause and think about that for a bit! Seriously! Stop right now and think about this… ponder it, roll it over and over in your mind till you get a revelation of what this means for you!

If meditating on the incredible, exceedingly great, superabundant, and immeasurably more… life that God has ready and waiting for you to receive it…doesn’t bring joy and excitement to your heart… then I would strongly suggest you check your pulse and call 9-1-1! 😉

Be a good Berean (Acts 17:11) and search the scriptures for yourself…with your concordance…to see if this is True or not!

What have you got to lose…and just think…how much could you gain?

October 4, 2023October 4, 2023

Here’s a Cheque You Can Take to the Bank!

Today I wanted to share with you an example of how I meditate…using some verses from God’s Word. I’m still learning and experimenting in this area…so it won’t be perfect…never will be actually!

If you’re anything like me you like to see examples so you have some sense of where you’re going…so I thought I’d share mine from today.

As I was reading this morning certain verses kind of jumped out at me…so I took a screenshot of each of them and then typed them out in my journal on my computer so I could see them all together and see what picture they painted.

Here’s what I wrote down—you can follow along with my thought process as I waited before the Holy Spirit to show me what point He was trying to make.

Proverbs 31:

20—She extends her hand to the poor, Yes, she reaches out her hands to the needy.

26—She opens her mouth with wisdom, and on her tongue is the law of kindness.

27—She watches over the ways of her household and does not eat the bread of idleness.

30b—a woman who fears the LORD, she shall be praised.

31—Give her of the fruit of her hands, and let her own works praise her in the gates.

Psalms 1:

1a—Blessed is the man who walk not in the counsel of the ungodly…

2—But his delight is in the law of the LORD and in His law he meditates day and night.

3—He shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that brings forth it’s fruit in its season, whose leaf also shall not wither; and whatever he does shall prosper.

Proverbs 31 & Psalms 1 are like the male and female version of the same thing—those with ears to hear…with a God-listening, God-honoring heart…prosper and receive praise. They don’t shy away from work and have learned to discern the difference between good and evil… Their heart is to Love and Serve others just as Jesus did when He walked the earth!

In my eyes Psalms 1 and Proverbs 31 echo each other and fill each other out… it doesn’t matter whether the pronoun is he or she…they fit together and create 2 sides of the same coin!

The man or woman who doesn’t walk in ungodly counsel but rather delights in and meditates day and night on God’s Word…will be like a lush, fruitful, and bountiful tree that is planted and rooted deeply into the Source. This tree continues to produce a prolific amount of fruit…each in its own season.

Fruits of Wisdom, kindness, and provision for the spiritually, physically, mentally, and emotionally poor and needy…s/he continually provides for the needs of those around her/him…directly from the Source—the River of Living Water—Jesus Himself.

John 7:38—He who believes in Me, as the Scripture has said, out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.

This Living Water brings life, healing, and health to all the parts—spirit, body, and soul—the mind, will, and emotions.

I want to pause and meditate and think on this last verse for a moment…because there’s a promise here that I can take and make my own. He who believes in Me… well that’s me! I believe in Jesus with all my heart!

As the Scripture has said… and if the Scripture says it, it is a FACT. We can take that to the bank and cash it!

The King James Version says out of his belly will flow… Belly = the innermost part of a man, the soul, heart as the seat of thought, feeling, choice.

Out of his heart will flow rivers of living water… this doesn’t say that it might flow…but that it will flow! And that’s not just a trickle either. Look at how Strong’s Concordance defines “flow”…the Greek word “potamos” …a torrent, floods, freshet—the flood of a river from heavy rain or melted snow.

This isn’t just a trickle of water…this is a raging river of “living water” = having vital power in itself and exerting it upon the soul, to be in full vigor, strong, fresh, efficient, efficacious, powerful, to live.

When you take this verse… John 7:38—”He who believes in Me, as the Scripture has said, out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.” …and put it alongside the other verses I shared from Psalm 1 and Proverbs 31 you get a wonderful picture.

The man or woman who delights in and meditates day and night on God’s Word…will be like a lush, fruitful, and bountiful tree that is planted and rooted deeply into the Source …the Living Water! This bounty-filled tree continues to produce a prolific amount…a flood of fruit…each in its own season.

Out of his heart will flow rivers of living water… this doesn’t say that it might flow…but that it will flow! And that’s not just a trickle either. Look at how Strong’s Concordance defines “flow” …the Greek word “potamos” = a torrent, floods, freshet—the flood of a river from heavy rain or melted snow.

This creates an amazing picture! And then add in this verse from Isaiah 55:11 and you have a Word of tremendous POWER!

So shall My Word be that goes out from My mouth; it will not return to Me void, But it shall accomplish what I please, and it shall prosper in the thing for which I sent it.

W-O-W! That is so powerful!

God said that His Word will accomplish and will prosper in the thing for which He sent it! Here is a cheque…written by God’s Own Hand, that we can take to the bank and cash. This is currency!

When we delight in and meditate on God’s Word day and night out of our heart will flow torrents of Jesus’ Living Water! And it brings life, health, healing, and fruitfulness wherever, and to whomever, it flows!

I don’t think it can get any more clear than this! God has said…and therefore it will be! This is His unbelievably incredible promise to us when we choose to meditate on His Word day and night! When we keep God’s Word forefront in our minds He promises to bless that Word and do amazing things through our hands, words, and life.

And what’s really cool… We don’t have to be perfect! God isn’t expecting us to perfectly remember at all times to keep His Word in our hearts and minds. God sees the intent of our hearts and He blesses it…and He blesses others through us!

When we set our hearts and minds to follow after Him…to get to know Him through His Word…to take that Word with us throughout the day and let it guide our thoughts and actions…then He promises to use that Word and cause Rivers of Living Water to flow from us to others!

I don’t know about you…BUT I can’t think of anything more exciting than this!

September 27, 2023September 27, 2023

Do You Have Faith Like a Child?

Have you ever wondered how you can have faith like a child?

I know I have! That’s why today I’d like to share a growing understanding I have that’s really helped me…so I thought it might just help you too!

In Matthew 19:14 we are told…

But Jesus said, “Let the little children come to Me, and do not forbid them; for of such is the kingdom of heaven.”

“For of such”—the kingdom of heaven is filled with this “kind or sort of character” according to Strong’s Concordance. That means that the kingdom of Heaven is filled with those who have the same simple trust in their Father that a child has in their daddy!

Think of that…🤔 Having the same absolute faith in the Word of God as a child has in their parent. When a child’s daddy says something–then that’s what it’s going to be.

Just like a child we need to take God’s Word at face value. We need to read the Word and know that it means what it says and says what it means. To take God’s promises literally—just as a child takes their parents at their word!

When God says it—then IT IS! And that’s all there is to it. No wondering if it is so! No doubting! No worrying! No unbelief!

God said it—therefore it is!

For a child—when daddy says he will do something—then it will be done. For a child—their daddy can protect them from anything.
For a child—their daddy is stronger than the strongest person in the world.
For a child—their daddy is superman and their mommy is superwoman.
For a child—as long as dad or mom are around everything is right in the world.
For a child—they can play without worry because they are always safe.
For a child—if daddy or mommy says it—then it simply IS

It’s no different for us…as adults. If our Daddy—God—says it in His Word—THEN IT IS!!!

We MUST learn to take God’s Word at face value! When He promises us something we can take it to the bank!

BUT we have been taught to doubt and distrust God’s Word…

Ever had these thoughts?

Maybe that promise isn’t for you
Maybe that promise isn’t meant for today
Maybe you’re not understanding it correctly
Maybe God didn’t mean it to say what you think it’s saying
Maybe God wants you to suffer through this because you need to learn something
Maybe that’s for others but “I’m not good enough” to deserve that

And so we talk ourselves out of hope and as we do so we take the power right out of God’s Word—making it of no effect in our lives. We strip God of His power and then we wonder why He isn’t answering our prayers, cries, moans, fears, and tears.

Unless we believe—how can God do anything in our lives?

Our unbelief can keep God’s Promises at arm’s length

Here are just 3 of many Scriptures that give a pretty good picture of just what doubting and unbelief can do to our faith…what they can cost us…

Hebrews 3:12-15, 18-19

Beware, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief in departing from the living God; but exhort one another daily, while it is called “Today”, lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin. For we have become partakers of Christ if we hold the beginning of our confidence steadfast to the end, while it is said: “Today, if you will hear His voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion.

And to whom did He swear that they would not enter His rest, but to those who did not obey?

So we see that they could not enter in because of unbelief.

Hebrews 11:16

But without faith it is impossible to please Him, For he who comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him.

James 1:6-8

But let him ask in faith, with no doubting, for he who doubts is like a wave of the sea driven and tossed by the wind. For let not that man suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord; he is a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways.

We must have that same faith that a little child has in his/her Daddy!

The… “My Daddy can do anything!” kind of faith.

We need to display the “MY Daddy is bigger than yours and he’ll beat your daddy up!” kind of faith—when we come face to face with our enemy! Why? Because it’s True. Search God’s Word to see if it isn’t so!

I dare you to Google “God’s promises in the Bible” and start meditating on the verses you find there. Here’s one source to get you started: https://www.biblestudytools.com/topical-verses/gods-promises-verses-in-the-bible/

Meditating on God’s Word increases our faith

Meditating means to roll it over and over in your mind. To read it again and again and again. To think about what you are reading. To ask the Holy Spirit to reveal His Truth to you from that promise.

Write it out over and over again. Speak it out loud. Write it down on a recipe card and carry it in your pocket or purse and pull it out to read and think about while you’re waiting at a red light. During your commute to work—if you’re not driving of course. During your lunch break… coffee break…at bedtime.

Every free moment you have—pull out that card and think about what it says and how God will bring it to pass in your life. See yourself living this promise in your life. Imagine it happening in your life. Praise God for working out His promise in your life.

Praise Him even when you don’t yet see it happening in your life!

If it’s in the Bible then it is true!

It’s as true for you today as it was in the time that the Bible was written. God doesn’t change with the passing of time (Read Malachi 3:6, Hebrews 13:8, James 1:17). His Word is as True and as accurate today as it was in the time of the Disciples.

Trust Him in the same way as a little child trusts her/his daddy—and then watch and see what He will do for you. His Word is Truth.

Isn’t it about time we start believing that God’s Word says what it means and means what it says?

If someone you love could use help or encouragement in this area of their lives…please share this article with them!