Between these two times Peter denied Jesus with oaths and curses (see Matthew 26:69-75). But then he came completely to the end of himself and all of his self-sufficiency. There was no part of himself he would ever rely on again. In his state of destitution, he was finally ready to receive all that the risen Lord had for him. “. . . He breathed on them, and said to them, ’Receive the Holy Spirit’ ” (John 20:22). No matter what changes God has performed in you, never rely on them. Build only on a Person, the Lord Jesus Christ, and on the Spirit He gives.

All our promises and resolutions end in denial because we have no power to accomplish them. When we come to the end of ourselves, not just mentally but completely, we are able to “receive the Holy Spirit.” “Receive the Holy Spirit “— the idea is that of invasion. There is now only One who directs the course of your life, the Lord Jesus Christ.

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January 5, 2011

Journal Entry for Today-JDV

I seem to keep learning the same lesson over and over… about getting to the end of myself….actually letting go of a particular area or concern or issue. I go through this process over and over until I realize I should have truly given you all of the issue,  and or circumstance in that area of my life.

Don’t try to get out of your trials too early because you have a great deal to learn inside of them. Unfortunately you often do not turn over an area or issue or circumstance of your life until you discover you cannot handle it. And often you do not do this until you have exhausted every option available to you. You are learning to come to the end of yourself earlier after many lessons. But they are lessons you learn through experience.

 It would be much, much easier if you were able to immediately turn your entire life over to Me and allow the Holy Spirit to live every moment through you. But easier is not necessarily better, and that is not your nature, nor do I want you to be a preprogrammed follower. I want you to choose to have a relationship with Me in every area of your life. I want you to understand and know that you will always arrive at the end of yourself, as long as you trust your own devices, and you will continue to trust your own devices as long as they work for you. I give you my peace and joy in the midst of your life, trials and all, as you no longer rely on yourself. Trust in Me with all your heart and do not rely on your own devices and I will make your paths straight. Do not worry about anything but pray about everything…..and you shall have peace that passes all understanding.

There are times when you can’t understand why you cannot do what you want to do. When God brings a time of waiting, and appears to be unresponsive, don’t fill it with busyness, just wait. The time of waiting may come to teach you the meaning of sanctification— to be set apart from sin and made holy— or it may come after the process of sanctification has begun to teach you what service means. Never run before God gives you His direction. If you have the slightest doubt, then He is not guiding. Whenever there is doubt— wait.

At first you may see clearly what God’s will is— the severance of a friendship, the breaking off of a business relationship, or something else you feel is distinctly God’s will for you to do. But never act on the impulse of that feeling. If you do, you will cause difficult situations to arise which will take years to untangle. Wait for God’s timing and He will do it without any heartache or disappointment. When it is a question of the providential will of God, wait for God to move.

Peter did not wait for God. He predicted in his own mind where the test would come, and it came where he did not expect it. “I will lay down my life for Your sake.” Peter’s statement was honest but ignorant. “Jesus answered him, ’ . . . the rooster shall not crow till you have denied Me three times’ ” (John 13:38). This was said with a deeper knowledge of Peter than Peter had of himself. He could not follow Jesus because he did not know himself or his own capabilities well enough. Natural devotion may be enough to attract us to Jesus, to make us feel His irresistible charm, but it will never make us disciples. Natural devotion will deny Jesus, always falling short of what it means to truly follow Him.

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January 4, 2010

Journal Entry for Today-JDV

Waiting is hard! I sometimes confuse waiting on the Lord with doing nothing. I was taught that to have a goal and to take no action is laziness. If you want it then you must go out and get it! I often worry that I am being lazy if I am not engaged in it bringing my goals to reality.

And God says…”Oswald Chambers wrote it exactly as directed; “If you have the slightest doubt, then I am not guiding. Whenever there is doubt— wait.” You cannot finish a work I began in you, it is my work and I will finish it, if you wait for Me. You will know it is Me working and My will for your life, when there is absolutely no doubt in your mind. You will know which steps to take when you are absolutely certain it is Me leading your way. Until you know that certainty, be still, pray without ceasing and be at peace knowing that I am working it all out for your good because I love you. If I gave you My son why would I not give you every good thing? Trust in Me with all your heart and do not rely on your own understanding…..delight yourself in the Lord and I will give you the desires of your heart.”

My Utmost for His Highest. “. . . my earnest expectation and hope that in nothing I shall be ashamed . . . .” We will all feel very much ashamed if we do not yield to Jesus the areas of our lives He has asked us to yield to Him. It’s as if Paul were saying, “My determined purpose is to be my utmost for His highest— my best for His glory.” To reach that level of determination is a matter of the will, not of debate or of reasoning. It is absolute and irrevocable surrender of the will at that point. An undue amount of thought and consideration for ourselves is what keeps us from making that decision, although we cover it up with the pretense that it is others we are considering. When we think seriously about what it will cost others if we obey the call of Jesus, we tell God He doesn’t know what our obedience will mean. Keep to the point— He does know. Shut out every other thought and keep yourself before God in this one thing only— my utmost for His highest. I am determined to be absolutely and entirely for Him and Him alone.

My Unstoppable Determination for His Holiness. “Whether it means life or death-it makes no difference!” (see Philippians 1:21). Paul was determined that nothing would stop him from doing exactly what God wanted. But before we choose to follow God’s will, a crisis must develop in our lives. This happens because we tend to be unresponsive to God’s gentler nudges. He brings us to the place where He asks us to be our utmost for Him and we begin to debate. He then providentially produces a crisis where we have to decide— for or against. That moment becomes a great crossroads in our lives. If a crisis has come to you on any front, surrender your will to Jesus absolutely and irrevocably.

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January 1, 2011

Journal Entry for Today-JDV

New Year’s Resolutions Rolled into One

While praying and getting connected first thing this morning, I thought about my resolutions for the year; what I will “give up” and what I will resolve to do. …Be a better person, a better father, son, brother, friend. And of course I resolved to be a better Christian….

…….and then I was stopped in my tracks by a still small voice that reminded me I cannot become a better Christian……….. I cannot choose the higher road, I cannot do more. And in deference to Oswald Chambers, I cannot resolve and then deliver My Utmost for His Highest. I can try, I can make promises, and then I fail; sometimes at the small things and at other times at the very big things. But fail I will, nonetheless. I have a long, long history of these failures.

But I believe I can deliver My Utmost for His Highest when I simply present myself to Jesus and ask Him to live through me; when I ask God to change me from the inside out, to make me a man after His own heart.

And God says…..”It is My hope and plan for you to understand that you can do nothing apart from Me. It is not a partnership….where you do your part and I do mine; if you give Me your utmost I will then give you my highest. I gave you the highest, and He was brought lowest……there is no “your part, or your utmost”.  I do not want your work, your church attendance, or your help for your fellow man. I do not want your very best……I want you, all of you. And that occurs when you realize that the very best you can deliver cannot and does not measure up or justify the sacrifice of Jesus. Do not promise to do the work that can only be done by the Holy Spirit. Do nothing trying to earn my love, do nothing out of obligation or with your own effort.  

 Resolve to surrender…… and rejoice that the work in your life has already been done by Christ Jesus. Your utmost is to simply allow Me to deliver my highest in your life. All else will follow. Resolve to let Me be God in your life……

2 Corinthians…. 3:18 (MSG)  ^16-18Whenever, though, they turn to face God as Moses did, God removes the veil and there they are—face-to-face! They suddenly recognize that God is a living, personal presence, not a piece of chiseled stone. And when God is personally present, a living Spirit, that old, constricting legislation is recognized as obsolete. We’re free of it! All of us! Nothing between us and God, our faces shining with the brightness of his face. And so we are transfigured much like the Messiah, our lives gradually becoming brighter and more beautiful as God enters our lives and we become like him.

Security from Yesterday. “. . . God requires an account of what is past” (Ecclesiastes 3:15). At the end of the year we turn with eagerness to all that God has for the future, and yet anxiety is apt to arise when we remember our yesterdays. Our present enjoyment of God’s grace tends to be lessened by the memory of yesterday’s sins and blunders. But God is the God of our yesterdays, and He allows the memory of them to turn the past into a ministry of spiritual growth for our future. God reminds us of the past to protect us from a very shallow security in the present.

Security for Tomorrow. “. . . the Lord will go before you . . . .” This is a gracious revelation— that God will send His forces out where we have failed to do so. He will keep watch so that we will not be tripped up again by the same failures, as would undoubtedly happen if He were not our “rear guard.” And God’s hand reaches back to the past, settling all the claims against our conscience.

Security for Today. “You shall not go out with haste . . . .” As we go forth into the coming year, let it not be in the haste of impetuous, forgetful delight, nor with the quickness of impulsive thoughtlessness. But let us go out with the patient power of knowing that the God of Israel will go before us. Our yesterdays hold broken and irreversible things for us. It is true that we have lost opportunities that will never return, but God can transform this destructive anxiety into a constructive thoughtfulness for the future. Let the past rest, but let it rest in the sweet embrace of Christ.

Leave the broken, irreversible past in His hands, and step out into the invincible future with Him.

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December 31, 2010

Journal Entry for Today-JDV

The last day of the year and is it me or is God really organizing my thoughts and vision of a fresh look at life in the New Year? Is He sorting things so that I see and feel His hand on my past and on my future?

And God says…”Your culture and the pervasive communications around the New Year event have prepared your mind for the fertile seeds of hope for tomorrow. It is right inside this cultural field of hope that the Holy Spirit can operate inside your heart and mind and that of many, many others. Be aware that many are looking for the very hope that lives within you and shines on your face. Be sensitive and available to share your hope. The hope you have found in Christ Jesus.”

Our Lord never “patches up” our natural virtues, that is, our natural traits, qualities, or characteristics. He completely remakes a person on the inside— “. . . put on the new man . . .” (Ephesians 4:24). In other words, see that your natural human life is putting on all that is in keeping with the new life. The life God places within us develops its own new virtues, not the virtues of the seed of Adam, but of Jesus Christ. Once God has begun the process of sanctification in your life, watch and see how God causes your confidence in your own natural virtues and power to wither away. He will continue until you learn to draw your life from the reservoir of the resurrection life of Jesus. Thank God if you are going through this drying-up experience!

The sign that God is at work in us is that He is destroying our confidence in the natural virtues, because they are not promises of what we are going to be, but only a wasted reminder of what God created man to be. We want to cling to our natural virtues, while all the time God is trying to get us in contact with the life of Jesus Christ— a life that can never be described in terms of natural virtues. It is the saddest thing to see people who are trying to serve God depending on that which the grace of God never gave them. They are depending solely on what they have by virtue of heredity. God does not take our natural virtues and transform them, because our natural virtues could never even come close to what Jesus Christ wants. No natural love, no natural patience, no natural purity can ever come up to His demands. But as we bring every part of our natural bodily life into harmony with the new life God has placed within us, He will exhibit in us the virtues that were characteristic of the Lord Jesus.

And every virtue we possess
Is His alone.

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December 30, 2010

Journal Entry for Today-JDV

I heard from a believer today that people were “fleeing” her church. She said her pastor has started telling the congregation that it was his job to dispense harsh messages and if they left feeling guilty it was probably because they were doing something that was wrong. He was pointing out the right way they should live, and if they were not living according to the Bible preaching he was delivering ….then it was alright with him if they got angry and left the church. Since their pastor has been on this tack, about 6-7 months, the parishioners have been fleeing services and attendance has been falling dramatically. How can I help? How can I help the pastor and what can I tell the members of the church that come to me with questions?

And God says…” It is not unusual for God seekers to fall into the trap of the Pharisees and forget the most important commandments of Jesus; love your God with all your heart, mind and soul, and love your neighbor as yourself. When you follow these commandments God can change you from the inside out. The “trying to be good for God” changes into “being in a relationship that manifests itself by a transformation over time”.

 “You cannot help the pastor; you cannot help him see he is driving away his parishioners by telling them they must live under the law. But you can be available to share the message of love, grace and transformation as it applies to your life and experience. You can be available to share your experience and remind people that any and every virtue you posses is  because of the completed work of Christ. And although His work is completed, He is still working out the completion in you… and it is His work, not yours.

When God, by His Spirit through His Word, gives you a clear vision of His will, you must “walk in the light” of that vision (1 John 1:7). Even though your mind and soul may be thrilled by it, if you don’t “walk in the light” of it you will sink to a level of bondage never envisioned by our Lord. Mentally disobeying the “heavenly vision” (Acts 26:19) will make you a slave to ideas and views that are completely foreign to Jesus Christ. Don’t look at someone else and say, “Well, if he can have those views and prosper, why can’t I?” You have to “walk in the light” of the vision that has been given to you. Don’t compare yourself with others or judge them— that is between God and them. When you find that one of your favorite and strongly held views clashes with the “heavenly vision,” do not begin to debate it. If you do, a sense of property and personal right will emerge in you— things on which Jesus placed no value. He was against these things as being the root of everything foreign to Himself— “. . . for one’s life does not consist in the abundance of the things he possesses” (Luke 12:15). If we don’t see and understand this, it is because we are ignoring the underlying principles of our Lord’s teaching.

Our tendency is to lie back and bask in the memory of the wonderful experience we had when God revealed His will to us. But if a New Testament standard is revealed to us by the light of God, and we don’t try to measure up, or even feel inclined to do so, then we begin to backslide. It means your conscience does not respond to the truth. You can never be the same after the unveiling of a truth. That moment marks you as one who either continues on with even more devotion as a disciple of Jesus Christ, or as one who turns to go back as a deserter.

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December 29, 2010

Journal Entry for Today-JDV

I do not know if I have ever waited for the “Heavenly Vision” to become crystal clear before taking hold of it and running off to “help” with the completion. I often evaluate circumstances and my environment intensely and I interpret any change or movement inside my circumstances as God’s will. As soon as I see the circumstances in a way to suggest God is moving, l grasp the change “as a sign” and run with it. But after a while, when the end result does not turn out as I imagined, I wonder if it was God’s heavenly vision or not, and I am left more confused than ever.

And God says…”I am not the author of confusion. There is no uncertainty in My will for you or your life. My heavenly vision is clear in the scriptures, and the Holy Spirit will lead you into all truth. When and if you are uncertain and or confused about My will or heavenly vision it is because you feel the need for urgency as you look at your circumstances. When you look to Me and wait for Me to clearly provide a heavenly vision, there is absolute certainty about My will for you and your life. Your heavenly vision comes alive when you wait on Me. Wait on your heavenly vision knowing that I will never leave you or forsake you. When you wait upon the Lord, your faith is strengthened and I can work in your life. When you take hold of the vision too early, it is because you are afraid. I cannot move in your fear, I can only move in your faith. When you are anxious and fearful, pray and wait on Me. When you are uncertain, pray and wait on Me. Your uncertainty fades and turns to certainty as you stay connected and look to Me, and not your circumstances or your beliefs about the timing.

When you are certain of your heavenly vision, quite certain, absolutely certain, then you shall move in confidence, even though you may be moving only one step at a time. Let Me open your eyes to the certainty one step at a time as you wait for Me at every step.

Trust in Me with all your heart and do not trust your own machinations, and I will make your paths straight. Delight yourself in the Lord, and I will give you the desires of your heart^.……those who wait for the Lord [who expect, look for, and hope in Him] shall change and renew their strength and power; they shall lift their wings and mount up [close to God] as eagles. You shall run and not be weary; you shall walk and not faint or become tired.  I know the plans I have for you,” declares the LORD, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, a plan to give you hope and a future.

Our battles are first won or lost in the secret places of our will in God’s presence, never in full view of the world. The Spirit of God seizes me and I am compelled to get alone with God and fight the battle before Him. Until I do this, I will lose every time. The battle may take one minute or one year, but that will depend on me, not God. However long it takes, I must wrestle with it alone before God, and I must resolve to go through the hell of renunciation or rejection before Him. Nothing has any power over someone who has fought the battle before God and won there.

I should never say, “I will wait until I get into difficult circumstances and then I’ll put God to the test.” Trying to do that will not work. I must first get the issue settled between God and myself in the secret places of my soul, where no one else can interfere. Then I can go ahead, knowing with certainty that the battle is won. Lose it there, and calamity, disaster, and defeat before the world are as sure as the laws of God. The reason the battle is lost is that I fight it first in the external world. Get alone with God, do battle before Him, and settle the matter once and for all.

In dealing with other people, our stance should always be to drive them toward making a decision of their will. That is how surrendering to God begins. Not often, but every once in a while, God brings us to a major turning point— a great crossroads in our life. From that point we either go toward a more and more slow, lazy, and useless Christian life, or we become more and more on fire, giving our utmost for His highest— our best for His glory.

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December 27, 2020

Journal Entry for Today-JDV

The line in the song….”To know You is to know You will always be enough” resonated with me this morning. I know that I often question God’s willingness to be enough in my life when circumstances are crowding in on me and it seems as if there is not enough time, plans or activities in place to “meet all my needs according to His riches in glory.” Because I cannot see Him at work in my circumstances I often question His faithfulness and or my worthiness or whatever else is between me and complete trust and faith that God is meeting me at the very point of my needs.

And God says…”You must come to trust Me regardless of your circumstances, and as Oswald Chambers writes, it may be difficult ( although all things are possible with God) to do this when you come to Me with intensity only in the middle of a crisis. Come to Me with an intense desire to know Me more outside difficult circumstances, so that you can look beyond the temporary and know that I am always with you. However, when you do come to Me in difficult circumstances, know that you can find Me working beyond the ordinary. I know what I’m doing. I have it all planned out—plans to take care of you, not abandon you, plans to give you the future you hope for. (Jeremiah 29:11 MSG) “