the arch-nemesis.

Every Christian has two arch-nemesis...

Discouragement and condemnation.

Every other sin can be redeemed and forgotten, but if either of those two are creeping around like a monkey on your back... Well, let's just say that everything that was ever did will not be forgotten.

Nevertheless, Scripture tells us that we are more than conquerors (Rom 8:37). In the Greek it says that I overwhelmingly overcome. Therefore discouragement is really a lie. Yet I eat it up like a yummy piece of tres leches cake. Well, that cake darlin', was made with sour milk.

My Bible also says that there is nothing I can do that can cause Him to love me more, and there's nothing I can do that can make Him love me less. It also tells me that there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus (Rom 8:1). So, once again, condemnation is a lie. It's how the enemy keeps us away from God. But once again I eat it up like a starving child who doesn't see the feast before her.

So, what is going on with me? Why do I buy into this garbage?

Truth is, personal circumstances often overshadow the Word of God within us, and it causes us to worry and become discouraged, anxious and condemnation that we are just not good enough.

But I have become convinced that what is really missing is an aerial view of what the Spirit of God is really saying and doing. We tend to look at our circumstances through carnal eyes instead of having the eyes of Christ; we view life with our mind and our knowledge instead of having the mind of Christ (1Cor 2:16).

If only we would set our eyes on eternity and on things above we would not be tossed to and fro by impossible circumstances (Col 3:2). If only we knew that our God was truly bigger, we would not even bat an eyelash at the task set before us. And if we knew that He took on our nature so that we may take on His, all obstacles would be made flat before us, and we would believe Him to be our Conquering King (Songs 2:8).

I read a quote this week, and I believe it is a key in defeating the arch-nemesis of our souls.

"How incredinle and humbling that Jesus would take our nature upon Himself, and by the Ressurection would give us His!"

So, this is a challenge to put on the mind of Christ, contend for the eyes of Christ and defeat that mean old pair that seeks to steal, kill and destroy.

what I learned from wasps

In the last month there have been four wasps that have somehow gotten into my home. I have no clue where they came from!

My windows are often open but they're screened, so the possibility of them getting in through there is a little impossible.

Where are the pesky wasps coming from?

The first time it made its ugly appearance was during prayer time. I prayed and it "disappeared." It made its second appearing when Caleb was there (phew!) and he locked it between the screen and the window, leaving it to starve to death. Muahaha. The second appeared from our air vent, and in the process of killing it our kitchen light was killed right along side it. The third was with the starved one and the last one showed up today as I was folding laundry and praying.

Hmm. Wasps in dream dictionary mean demonic attacks.

And then, in a moment of stillness, as I'm reading The Excellent Wife (more on this amazing book to come!), I see the pesky wasp, again. So skillfully I too locked it between the screen and the window so that it may starve to death. Go ahead, call an animal cruelty hotline.

But then, I realized Jesus was telling me something...

We are living in a day and an hour where temptations and attacks are being released at an unprecedented rate. In the words of the amazing Laura Hackett, "The battle is raging, the devil is raging."

Ladies and gentlemen, this just in. We are officially in a war. And if we are to be good soldiers, we are to self-examine and ensure we are well prepared.

Many are like my home... The windows to our heart are open, but we justify it and are completely convinced that it is impossible to have such an ugly attack or soul tie or addiction because we have screens or filters within our heart. We are mature enough to handle having our windows open to whatever dust, wasps or robbers there are out there, because the screen is up and it is invincible.

Yeah?

"Watch your heart with all diligence, for from it flow the well springs of life." -Prov 4:23

It's time to close the windows of our heart and rely on The Ultimate Guardian of our heart instead of our man-made screens.

Oh, by the way... There's a crack in my screen.

circumstances and sin

"Behold, You desire truth in the innermost being, and in the hidden part You will make me know wisdom." - Ps 51:6

I have continued on this journey through the inmost chambers of my heart and I must say, things are not looking pretty. After last Tuesday's message, I have been stirred and the Lord, through a series of dreams and circumstances, He has shown me how truly wicked my heart's ways are, but that in that darkness, He still desires me and He will complete the work He has started in me.

"Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; it is too high, I cannot attain it."

-Ps 139:6

Often times, we justify our sin by our pain and our hurt. We convince ourselves that He knows our hearts and knows what has happened to us, therefore, He understands why we're unforgiving and bitter, why we drown ourselves in drugs and alcohol or romance and sex. He knows why... He understands... He sees our heart.

This is a fact. God does see our heart. Actually, God sees the whole picture. He has "searched us and known us" (Ps. 139:1). "He has understood our thoughts from afar." (Ps. 139:2). In fact, He is "intimately acquainted with all our ways." (Ps. 139:3)

• (def) intimate: very private; closely personal. detailed; deep. inmost, deep within. of, pertaining to, or characteristic of the inmost or essential nature; intristic.

Yeah, I'd say He knows our heart pretty well. But the time has come for us to stop blaming our circumstances for our sin. In His mercy, though He knows our heart, our circumstances, our pain in a very private, closely personal, detailed and deep way, He still shows us our sin that we may be like Him and reflect His glory. So that, "we all with unveiled faces, beholding in a mirror the glory of the Lord, [can be] transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as from the Lord, the Spirit." (2 Corinthians 3:18)

We must have unveiled faces and hearts before the Lord and ourselves to be able to behold His glory, and be transformed into His likeness. He desires that we may be cleansed from the inside out, instead of cleaning just the outside of our earthen vessels, like the Pharisees in Luke 11:39-42. The Pharisees had the outward manipulation and show of "pure and undefiled religion" yet had hardened hearts who did not recognize the time of their visitation.

This is my time of visitation. This is when the Lord is teaching me the beginning of wisdom. It is in this painful time, when I'm seeing the depths of darkness within me that I know He is God and He is good. I pray that I may be the good soil, which "hears the Word in an honest and good heart, and hold it fast, and bear fruit with persevarance." (Luke 8:15)

A true story in the exposing of my heart...

Tuesday noon-ish, Mike Bickle, the director of the International House of Prayer (IHOP-KC) made an announcement in the prayer room that there was to be an "emergency meeting" of sorts that same afternoon at 4p/Central Time.


I get calls and rumors start flying. Even though everyone had a positive notion, I was filled with "fear and trembling..." I knew whatever was to happen would not be good for me (as in, my flesh, every vain ambition and selfish conceit). When I began texting a friend of mine, who was in OHOP's Prayer Room, she confirmed that those who were there were sensing and feeling the fear of the Lord in a deep way.


Yikes! I knew I was in for it. :l


Sure enough, a pastor from Uganda, Africa came... and shared an encounter with the Lord that He had. Although he had the outward form of Christianity (having seen signs, wonders, miracles and preaching the gospel), according with what this man shared, his ways were not the ways of the Lord. He carried immorality and other sins in his heart, and the Lord rebuked him. The LORD, also, in His graciousness showed this man how he was not ready for the coming storm nor the great and terrifying Day of the Lord.


Yikes... again! I'm crying and panicking (in a godly way) at this point. Sighhh...


And then... after the Word, I became angry and offended. I began to scream and God and ask "Why?" Why God, did You choose me to live in such a time as this? We both know I'm weak and I'm a coward. Why couldn't I have been born in an era where things weren't going to hell in a handbasket (as though such a time has existed? HA!)? Why Lord, why? I'll never get to play dress-up with my daughter or put bows in her hair (because currently, she's closer to bald than to bows)... Why Lord, why, why why? And then, the thought came, exposing the very whisper of my heart and betraying my fears and darkness... "Why do I have to live in a time where You require it all, all of the time and to refuse so is death?"


Yikes... times infinity... Yikes!


I repented and bowed my head low... So very low... Lower than low... Beyond low...


I love God, but still cling to the safety of worldliness. My heart desires Him but it desires me too...


Can such a conflict exist?


That night I prayed that the Lord would speak to me in a dream...


Personally, I was hoping for a sea of lilies and a lion named Aslan to come and tell me I am His Beloved.


Instead, for the last two nights, I've gotten chaotic dreams where the inner-most depths and sin of my heart are exposed. Yep, in its fullness. At first, I wasn't sure of the significance of the dream... But after last night, the common thread seems to be my darkness...


So, what do I do now?


I break the ties with such worldliness and evil. And I repent.


I set my gaze and my heart on the Holy One of Israel who is Perfect, Holy, Mighty and Faithful.


And, I set my feet to diligently walk in the fruit of repentance.


I purposely change my mind with the Word of God about my darkness, that my heart may be prepared in the coming storm.


Take a moment to self-examine. Can you truly say you are ready?

He's declaring war!

"To whom then will you liken God?
Or what likeness will you compare with Him?"
- Isaiah 40:18

The last few days during my time with the Lord I have gained a sense of His ever-faithful Jealousy. I believe the Lord is highlighting His Jealousy at this time in history. In Isaiah 40, there is a stunning description of Almighty God, the Creator and the mighty One. He is unwilling to share the reward of His suffering with anything. That includes entertainment, money, material possessions, our various relationships, comfort, romance, Muhhamed, Buddha or any other self-proclaimed god in our lives. This is the time to pursue and to seek the Lord. His jealousy will not go unfulfilled, and He will strip us if we do not repent now.

I have embarked on a journey to lay waste everything and to see that "all is loss compared to the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus." (Phil 3:8) The time is now to lay aside and to dwell in radical communion with the Spirit of God. He is Jealous and He will not relent! He will be exalted and He will finish the work He began in us. I exhort you to seek Him, to give yourself wholy unto Him. Fast media for this year and see if the Lord doesn't reward you. Remove yourself from distraction, live simply and see if the Lord doesn't come near is made manifest in your life ever more. He desires you and longs for me in an intense way, and He is declaring war against the worthless, dead idols that have stolen our hearts for way too long.

"But you trusted in your beauty and played the harlot because of your fame, and you poured out your harlotries on every passer-by who might be willing." -Ezekiel 16:15

Nahum declares severe judgement over Nineveh, "all because of the many harlotries of the harlot." (Nah 3:4)