Worshiping in Everyday Occasions. We presume that we would be ready for battle if confronted with a great crisis, but it is not the crisis that builds something within us— it simply reveals what we are made of already. Do you find yourself saying, “If God calls me to battle, of course I will rise to the occasion”? Yet you won’t rise to the occasion unless you have done so on God’s training ground. If you are not doing the task that is closest to you now, which God has engineered into your life, when the crisis comes, instead of being fit for battle, you will be revealed as being unfit. Crises always reveal a person’s true character.

A private relationship of worshiping God is the greatest essential element of spiritual fitness. The time will come, as Nathanael experienced in this passage, that a private “fig-tree” life will no longer be possible. Everything will be out in the open, and you will find yourself to be of no value there if you have not been worshiping in everyday occasions in your own home. If your worship is right in your private relationship with God, then when He sets you free, you will be ready. It is in the unseen life, which only God saw, that you have become perfectly fit. And when the strain of the crisis comes, you can be relied upon by God.

Are you saying, “But I can’t be expected to live a sanctified life in my present circumstances; I have no time for prayer or Bible study right now; besides, my opportunity for battle hasn’t come yet, but when it does, of course I will be ready”? No, you will not. If you have not been worshiping in everyday occasions, when you get involved in God’s work, you will not only be useless yourself but also a hindrance to those around you.

God’s training ground, where the missionary weapons are found, is the hidden, personal, worshiping life of the saint.

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September 10, 2010

Journal Entry for Today-JDV

During a conversation very early this morning I became aware that whatever the circumstance, worship will bring it all into focus. I may not see the circumstance clearly through my worship, but I will see my God more clearly.

And God says …”Seek first the kingdom of God….delight yourself in the Lord….acknowledge Me in all your ways and I will make your paths straight. When you worship and give Me the glory for the unseen victory, reflect on your state of mind. Your hope and faith are restored and refreshed as you worship. When you are truly in communion with Me, you are at peace knowing I will never leave you nor forsake you, and if I am for you who or what can stand against you?”

Determinedly Discipline Other Things. This is another difficult aspect of the strenuous nature of sainthood. Paul said, according to the Moffatt translation of this verse, “. . . I take every project prisoner to make it obey Christ . . . .” So much Christian work today has never been disciplined, but has simply come into being by impulse! In our Lord’s life every project was disciplined to the will of His Father. There was never the slightest tendency to follow the impulse of His own will as distinct from His Father’s will— “the Son can do nothing of Himself . . . ” ( John 5:19 ). Then compare this with what we do— we take “every thought” or project that comes to us by impulse and jump into action immediately, instead of imprisoning and disciplining ourselves to obey Christ.

Practical work for Christians is greatly overemphasized today, and the saints who are “bringing every thought [and project] into captivity” are criticized and told that they are not determined, and that they lack zeal for God or zeal for the souls of others. But true determination and zeal are found in obeying God, not in the inclination to serve Him that arises from our own undisciplined human nature. It is inconceivable, but true nevertheless, that saints are not “bringing every thought [and project] into captivity,” but are simply doing work for God that has been instigated by their own human nature, and has not been made spiritual through determined discipline.

We have a tendency to forget that a person is not only committed to Jesus Christ for salvation, but is also committed, responsible, and accountable to Jesus Christ’s view of God, the world, and of sin and the devil. This means that each person must recognize the responsibility to “be transformed by the renewing of [his] mind. . . .” (Romans 12:2 ).

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September 9, 2010

Journal Entry for Today-JDV

And I wonder how long I must be patient and hopeful before God answers my prayers? I wonder how long it will take before He sees my need and responds.

And God says…”Let patience have its perfect result. I see your need and I also see your need to be right where you are in the very perfect circumstance for your growth and maturity. I see you right where I put you; in the midst of circumstances designed to help you and others. How you respond inside these circumstances will have a significant impact on many others.”

“Remember that nothing can touch you that has not first touched My hands, and understand that I have a good future for you. I know you are impatient and eager to move on, but then patience and hope could not work an important result in you.”

“While you are waiting and hopeful,  remember; delight yourself in Me, and I will give you the desires of your heart.”

Determinedly Demolish Some Things. Deliverance from sin is not the same as deliverance from human nature. There are things in human nature, such as prejudices, that the saint can only destroy through sheer neglect. But there are other things that have to be destroyed through violence, that is, through God’s divine strength imparted by His Spirit. There are some things over which we are not to fight, but only to “stand still, and see the salvation of the Lord . . .” (see Exodus 14:13). But every theory or thought that raises itself up as a fortified barrier “against the knowledge of God” is to be determinedly demolished by drawing on God’s power, not through human effort or by compromise (see 2 Corinthians 10:4).

It is only when God has transformed our nature and we have entered into the experience of sanctification that the fight begins. The warfare is not against sin; we can never fight against sin— Jesus Christ conquered that in His redemption of us. The conflict is waged over turning our natural life into a spiritual life. This is never done easily, nor does God intend that it be so. It is accomplished only through a series of moral choices. God does not make us holy in the sense that He makes our character holy. He makes us holy in the sense that He has made us innocent before Him. And then we have to turn that innocence into holy character through the moral choices we make. These choices are continually opposed and hostile to the things of our natural life which have become so deeply entrenched— the very things that raise themselves up as fortified barriers “against the knowledge of God.” We can either turn back, making ourselves of no value to the kingdom of God, or we can determinedly demolish these things, allowing Jesus to bring another son to glory (see Hebrews 2:10).

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September 8, 2010

Journal Entry for Today-JDV

Sometimes I wonder where God has gone. I cannot sense His presence. It is like He has taken leave of me, and my first thought is that well, I finally did it; I finally wore out His patience. The lesson I was supposed to have learned keeps popping up again and again. My prayers are filled with far too many I, me and mines. And I have become so focused on my own wants and needs that I cannot remember reaching out to touch anyone else.

Where is my peace and joy?

And God says….”Let me remind you that you may be a blessing and not even know it. It is not in your best interest to know the blessings you have delivered for Me. You cannot handle the glory. Glory is toxic for you and other believers, that is one of the reasons glory always belongs to Me.”

“You have been hearing  the accusations of the enemy. Those accusations have no value or substance. They are simply the enemy’s way of trying to steal your peace and joy.”

“Listen to My voice; I give you love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.  I am the voice of truth. Any voice that does not reinforce your demonstration of these gifts is not from Me.  Remember, you are mine and nothing can separate you from MY love.”

“Do not listen to any voice that does not remind you of your worthiness in Jesus Christ. “

The picture our Lord described here is not that of a simple stream of water, but an overflowing fountain. Continue to “be filled” ( Ephesians 5:18 ) and the sweetness of your vital relationship to Jesus will flow as generously out of you as it has been given to you. If you find that His life is not springing up as it should, you are to blame— something is obstructing the flow. Was Jesus saying to stay focused on the Source so that you may be blessed personally? No, you are to focus on the Source so that out of you “will flow rivers of living water”— irrepressible life ( John 7:38 ).

We are to be fountains through which Jesus can flow as “rivers of living water” in blessing to everyone. Yet some of us are like the Dead Sea, always receiving but never giving, because our relationship is not right with the Lord Jesus. As surely as we receive blessings from Him, He will pour out blessings through us. But whenever the blessings are not being poured out in the same measure they are received, there is a defect in our relationship with Him. Is there anything between you and Jesus Christ? Is there anything hindering your faith in Him? If not, then Jesus says that out of you “will flow rivers of living water.” It is not a blessing that you pass on, or an experience that you share with others, but a river that continually flows through you. Stay at the Source, closely guarding your faith in Jesus Christ and your relationship to Him, and there will be a steady flow into the lives of others with no dryness or deadness whatsoever.

Is it excessive to say that rivers will flow out of one individual believer? Do you look at yourself and say, “But I don’t see the rivers”? Through the history of God’s work you will usually find that He has started with the obscure, the unknown, the ignored, but those who have been steadfastly true to Jesus Christ.

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September 7, 2010

Journal Entry for Today-JDV

I woke up this morning and yesterday morning with the words to a contemporary Christian song rolling around in my head; “He’s not mad at you, He’s not disappointed. His love is greater than all your wrong choices”. (Come As You Are Pocket Full Of Rocks).

I was beating myself up a bit wondering what I did or could have done to have stopped the flow of living waters.

And God says…”You could not do anything to stop the joy and abundant life except to stop believing and trusting in Me. You are mine, and nothing can separate you from Me. You can however, stop experiencing the day to day joy and an abundant life if you believe the lie that you are undeserving because of something you did or did not do. My love and my grace cover you forever.

Trust, rest in Me and let My love flow from you to others. You will experience the joy and abundant life when you simply focus on Me. The joy and peace I give you becomes a river, as you give your life away to others.”

“Focus on Me and then others. This is how to live the abundant life and experience fountains of blessings”

A river reaches places which its source never knows. And Jesus said that, if we have received His fullness, “rivers of living water” will flow out of us, reaching in blessing even “to the end of the earth” (Acts 1:8 ) regardless of how small the visible effects of our lives may appear to be. We have nothing to do with the outflow— “This is the work of God, that you believe. . .” ( John 6:29 ). God rarely allows a person to see how great a blessing he is to others.

A river is victoriously persistent, overcoming all barriers. For a while it goes steadily on its course, but then comes to an obstacle. And for a while it is blocked, yet it soon makes a pathway around the obstacle. Or a river will drop out of sight for miles, only later to emerge again even broader and greater than ever. Do you see God using the lives of others, but an obstacle has come into your life and you do not seem to be of any use to God? Then keep paying attention to the Source, and God will either take you around the obstacle or remove it. The river of the Spirit of God overcomes all obstacles. Never focus your eyes on the obstacle or the difficulty. The obstacle will be a matter of total indifference to the river that will flow steadily through you if you will simply remember to stay focused on the Source. Never allow anything to come between you and Jesus Christ— not emotion nor experience— nothing must keep you from the one great sovereign Source.

Think of the healing and far-reaching rivers developing and nourishing themselves in our souls! God has been opening up wonderful truths to our minds, and every point He has opened up is another indication of the wider power of the river that He will flow through us. If you believe in Jesus, you will find that God has developed and nourished in you mighty, rushing rivers of blessing for others.

His!

September 4, 2010

What has been like “water from the well of Bethlehem” to you recently— love, friendship, or maybe some spiritual blessing (  2 Samuel 23:16 )? Have you taken whatever it may be, even at the risk of damaging your own soul, simply to satisfy yourself? If you have, then you cannot pour it out “to the Lord.” You can never set apart for God something that you desire for yourself to achieve your own satisfaction. If you try to satisfy yourself with a blessing from God, it will corrupt you. You must sacrifice it, pouring it out to God— something that your common sense says is an absurd waste.

How can I pour out “to the Lord” natural love and spiritual blessings? There is only one way— I must make a determination in my mind to do so. There are certain things other people do that could never be received by someone who does not know God, because it is humanly impossible to repay them. As soon as I realize that something is too wonderful for me, that I am not worthy to receive it, and that it is not meant for a human being at all, I must pour it out “to the Lord.” Then these very things that have come to me will be poured out as “rivers of living water” all around me ( John 7:38 ). And until I pour these things out to God, they actually endanger those I love, as well as myself, because they will be turned into lust. Yes, we can be lustful in things that are not sordid and vile. Even love must be transformed by being poured out “to the Lord.”

If you have become bitter and sour, it is because when God gave you a blessing you hoarded it. Yet if you had poured it out to Him, you would have been the sweetest person on earth. If you are always keeping blessings to yourself and never learning to pour out anything “to the Lord,” other people will never have their vision of God expanded through you.

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September 3, 2010

Journal Entry for Today-JDV

If I think about my connection to and with God being a conduit through which He can flow to and through me, I can picture in my mind blessings flowing through……not to. Considering Oswald’s devotional for today, I can understand what can happen when I hold onto the blessings……..they can clog up the conduit.

And God says…..”When you give yourself away, and allow all your blessings to flow through to others, more blessings can flow through you. 

Jesus did not say, “He who believes in Me will realize all the blessings of the fullness of God,” but, in essence, “He who believes in Me will have everything he receives escape out of him.” Our Lord’s teaching was always anti-self-realization. His purpose is not the development of a person— His purpose is to make a person exactly like Himself, and the Son of God is characterized by self-expenditure. If we believe in Jesus, it is not what we gain but what He pours through us that really counts. God’s purpose is not simply to make us beautiful, plump grapes, but to make us grapes so that He may squeeze the sweetness out of us. Our spiritual life cannot be measured by success as the world measures it, but only by what God pours through us— and we cannot measure that at all.

When Mary of Bethany “broke the flask . . . of very costly oil . . . and poured it on [Jesus’] head,” it was an act for which no one else saw any special occasion; in fact, “. . . there were some who . . . said, ’Why was this fragrant oil wasted?’ ” (Mark 14:3-4 ). But Jesus commended Mary for her extravagant act of devotion, and said, “. . . wherever this gospel is preached . . . what this woman has done will also be told as a memorial to her” ( Mark 14:9 ). Our Lord is filled with overflowing joy whenever He sees any of us doing what Mary did— not being bound by a particular set of rules, but being totally surrendered to Him. God poured out the life of His Son “that the world through Him might be saved” ( John 3:17 ). Are we prepared to pour out our lives for Him?

“He who believes in Me . . . out of his heart will flow rivers of living water”— and hundreds of other lives will be continually refreshed. Now is the time for us to break “the flask” of our lives, to stop seeking our own satisfaction, and to pour out our lives before Him. Our Lord is asking who of us will do it for Him?

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September 2, 2010

Journal Entry for Today-JDV

When I say to God, take my life, that must mean I give up my right to my own ideas about what, where and how my life is to be lived. On the one hand I can say that I want to God to have complete control of my life, but am I ready to give up my own ideas about the what, where and how of my life?

And God says….”Remember, I made you, and breathed life into you. I know you better than you know yourself. I know the desires of your heart that are good for your life, and what makes you truly joyful. And you know the magnitude of My sacrifice for you. I will do more in your life than you could ever imagine. Your abundant life in Me has been and is always available. Simply give up your “right” to your own life and experience the extraordinary and fulfilling life I want to live through you.”

We must continually remind ourselves of the purpose of life. We are not destined to happiness, nor to health, but to holiness. Today we have far too many desires and interests, and our lives are being consumed and wasted by them. Many of them may be right, noble, and good, and may later be fulfilled, but in the meantime God must cause their importance to us to decrease. The only thing that truly matters is whether a person will accept the God who will make him holy. At all costs, a person must have the right relationship with God.

Do I believe I need to be holy? Do I believe that God can come into me and make me holy? If through your preaching you convince me that I am unholy, I then resent your preaching. The preaching of the gospel awakens an intense resentment because it is designed to reveal my unholiness, but it also awakens an intense yearning and desire within me. God has only one intended destiny for mankind— holiness. His only goal is to produce saints. God is not some eternal blessing-machine for people to use, and He did not come to save us out of pity— He came to save us because He created us to be holy. Atonement through the Cross of Christ means that God can put me back into perfect oneness with Himself through the death of Jesus Christ, without a trace of anything coming between us any longer.

Never tolerate, because of sympathy for yourself or for others, any practice that is not in keeping with a holy God. Holiness means absolute purity of your walk before God, the words coming from your mouth, and every thought in your mind— placing every detail of your life under the scrutiny of God Himself. Holiness is not simply what God gives me, but what God has given me that is being exhibited in my life.

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Journal Entry for Today

September 1, 2010

Very early this morning we were talking and you reminded me that when I ask you to respond my prayers, that I may be allowing my limited understanding and natural eyes to restrict my faith and get in the way. It then occurred to me that when I seek my “natural answers” …only those answers and solutions I can fathom, that I might be in the way of the miracles You want to provide.

And God says…”If I already know your needs before you even utter them, and if I can and do answer your prayers before you ever pray them, then why do you pray? Why have I commanded you to pray? Because it is a living dialog that helps create and sustain our intimate relationship.”

“When you pray with your expectations as narrow as your natural mind can understand, your faith is as narrow as your expectations. And I respond to your faith. When you pray with expanded supernatural expectations I can respond to that faith. Pray for “eyes” that expect miracles, and the faith to wait on Me while living and becoming holy, by allowing Jesus to live through you. Focus on Jesus, be transformed ……….holy and expectant.

What was the joy that Jesus had? Joy should not be confused with happiness. In fact, it is an insult to Jesus Christ to use the word happiness in connection with Him. The joy of Jesus was His absolute self-surrender and self-sacrifice to His Father— the joy of doing that which the Father sent Him to do— “. . . who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross . . .” ( Hebrews 12:2 ). “I delight to do Your will, O my God . . .” ( Psalm 40:8 ). Jesus prayed that our joy might continue fulfilling itself until it becomes the same joy as His. Have I allowed Jesus Christ to introduce His joy to me?

Living a full and overflowing life does not rest in bodily health, in circumstances, nor even in seeing God’s work succeed, but in the perfect understanding of God, and in the same fellowship and oneness with Him that Jesus Himself enjoyed. But the first thing that will hinder this joy is the subtle irritability caused by giving too much thought to our circumstances. Jesus said, “. . . the cares of this world, . . . choke the word, and it becomes unfruitful” ( Mark 4:19 ). And before we even realize what has happened, we are caught up in our cares. All that God has done for us is merely the threshold— He wants us to come to the place where we will be His witnesses and proclaim who Jesus is.

Have the right relationship with God, finding your joy there, and out of you “will flow rivers of living water” ( John 7:38 ). Be a fountain through which Jesus can pour His “living water.” Stop being hypocritical and proud, aware only of yourself, and live “your life . . . hidden with Christ in God” (Colossians 3:3 ). A person who has the right relationship with God lives a life as natural as breathing wherever he goes. The lives that have been the greatest blessing to you are the lives of those people who themselves were unaware of having been a blessing.

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August 31, 2010

Journal Entry for Today-JDV

I have discovered a difference and a connection between my prayers and my joy. When I focus on prayer as a means of worship and a way to have a more intimate dialog with God, I experience peace and joy.

And God says…..”When you seek a more intimate relationship with Me you will have it. When you worship and bring Me glory, you are more complete. As you look to Me, your life comes into focus and you have an entirely different perspective; your life is hidden in Christ, and He can live through you. You no longer live; it is Christ in you that lives.”

“Regardless of your circumstances, when you live like this, you live in joy, and you come to know that it is the joy of Christ.”