Listening to God.

I have been reading through Joshua and it has been a great inspiration to me in some areas of leadership.  One area that I notice that Joshua was so strong in was listening to God.  Joshua had a knack for hearing what God was saying.  Do you?  15 times in Joshua the phrase "the Lord said" appears.  I don't know whether that was an audible voice or a small, still voice inside, but Joshua was hearing from God.

How well do you hear from God?  Think about your prayer time.  Do you take the time to hear from God or are you the one doing all the talking?  I believe God wants to speak to us.  The Lord wants to direct us so we can grow in Him and see His kingdom grow around us.  God wants to use us to defeat the enemy.  We have to learn to train ourselves to hear the voice of God.  We have to stop and take the time to allow God to speak and then listen to what He lays on our heart.  Communication is a two-way street, and yet too often in prayer we make it a one-way street - only us doing the talking.  We need to allow room for God to speak.  We must learn to develop a sensitivity to when God is wanting to speak to us.

As a leader in your home or at your church, I hope you purpose in 2011 to spend more time to listening to God and see the great opportunities and victories that God has in store for you!

Are you hungry for revival?

I want to start of this article by saying I take no credit for the ideas that are listed.  This was an article I read today by Ken Horn.  He is the editor of the Pentecostal Evangel and I thought this was such a powerful article I wanted to pass on his ideas.

As Pentecostals we talk a lot about revival.  We say we want another revival.  We say we wish God's Spirit would move like it did in the past.  I am convinced in order to see another revival we have to get hungry about prayer and reaching the lost.  When God's Spirit moved powerfully in the Bible it produced a hunger in people for more of God and lost souls came to know Jesus as their Savior.  As I read Ken's article I was convicted and challenged by his list of what it will take for us to see another move of God.

In his article, Ken Horn posted this list as a way of determining if you really want to see a revival.

• You have a daily, regular prayer life in which you pray, almost w/out exception, for revival and the salvation of lost souls.
• You are a regular at your church's prayer meetings.
• You are burdened for the lost.
• You are grieved by immorality of society and a lack of holiness among believers.
• You are more like to see the need in your own life than criticize others.
• Hard, truthful preaching doesn't offend you.
• You don't watch the clock, instead preferring extended time in God's presence.
• You have a sense of urgency.
• Worldly things and entertainment seem shallow and unfulfilling.
• You long to hear a word from God.
• You wonder if everyone you meet (pizza guy, the grocery clerk, everybody) if their soul is right w/ God.
• You long for Holy Spirit power.
• You find yourself praying for eternal things far more than material and temporary matters.
• Your heart is tender and you don't shrink from conviction

Tough list to read.  It's even harder to live.  I realize I have some work to do still in my life.  I haven't arrived at a place I feel I need to be in order to see God move like He wants to. 

Are we really hungry for revival?  Are we willing to pay the necessary price and make whatever sacrifices we have to in order to see God move in a powerful way in our lives?

Too complicated or too simple?

Last night I was on my way to church with Nate and Skyelynn when we experienced a God moment.  Out of nowhere Skyelynn began asking questions about heaven and hell and what it means to be saved.  I purposely chose to ask her questions instead of just answer her questions to see what she really understood about it all.  Once I realized she had a grasp of what it meant to be "saved" I ask her if she wanted to ask Jesus into her heart.  She responded with an enthusiastic yes.  So, in our Explorer on the way to church, Skyelynn asked Jesus to be Lord of her life.

In that moment I felt like the Holy Spirit revealed something to me that isn't deep or profound, yet I tend to forget it.  The Gospel message of Jesus isn't a complicated thing.  It's simple.  We make it complicated.  In fact, it's so simple that last night my six year old daughter explained to me salvation and made a decision for herself to live for Jesus.  Why is it a six year old can get it, but someone who is twenty six or forty six cannot?  Maybe we have made the Gospel too complicated?  Maybe others struggle because it seems too simple?  God spoke to me through my daughter's life last night and reminded me that we need to simply present the message of hope and salvation that is offered to us because of the sacrifice Jesus made for us.  God through the power of His Holy Spirit will take care of the rest. 

It's simple.  Don't make it to complicated. 

No perfectly perfect people?

At times I think we all place these unbearable standards on ourselves as Christians.  We somehow think if we could just be as good as __________ (you fill in the blank) than I would be the kind of person God would be proud of.  We just have this tendency to place people on a pedestal.  Like they have somehow reached this level of perfection that maybe just maybe one day I could reach.  I hate to burst your bubble, but that perfect person will never exist here on earth.  There really is "no such thing as perfect people" as one music artist has recently made famous.

Of all the people who could boast about how close to perfection they are it would have been the Apostle Paul.  The man wrote over two/thirds of the New Testament.  If there is Hall of Fame in Heaven, I would think the Apostle Paul would have been one of the first ones inducted.  If there was ever someone we could look up to and say, "If I could only be as good as he was," than Paul was it!  Yet listen to what Paul says of himself.  Philippians 3:12 Paul says, "I don’t mean to say that I have already achieved these things or that I have already reached perfection. But I press on to possess that perfection for which Christ Jesus first possessed me."  Paul says I am not perfect.  What a relief!  If Paul wasn't perfect and yet God used him to do so much for His kingdom, than God can use you and me to accomplish great things for His kingdom!  The key to Paul's success was that he never stopped pressing on in his relationship with Jesus.  He may have failed and made mistakes, but he kept pressing on in spite of what he did wrong.

Let me ask you this.  Do you keep pressing on when you make mistakes?  Or, do you just quit and give up?  The only way we can have a strong relationship with Jesus is to keep pressing on and trying to draw closer to Him even when we mess up and sin.  What made great men and women in the Bible was not that they were perfect, but that in spite of all their imperfections they kept pursuing their relationship with God.  Don't let your past sins and failures keep you from becoming what God has designed you to be.  Allow them to motivate you to seek and trust in Jesus more to help you become what He has destined you to be!  Remember 2 Corinthians 12:9 - "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." 

God, may you help me see that in spite of my failures you love me.  May I not strive to be perfect because I never will be here on earth.  May my greatest desire be to press on when I fail.  May I press on to know you more and may the desire for my relationship with you to grow stronger and stronger.

The measure of your life.

I read Luke 12:15 in part of my Bible studies this morning.  Jesus says this, "Beware! Guard against every kind of greed.  Life is not measured by how much you own."  I felt glad for a moment that my life's true measure isn't made by the things I own otherwise I wouldn't measure up to much.  But it really got me to thinking.  How would I measure my life?  What is the measuring stick that I would use to measure against?

I think for those that call themselves Christians that this would be the point we through out all those religious cliches so that everyone thinks we are worthy of the title "Christian".  We would say we use Jesus life as our example or maybe God's Word and how well our life lines up with it.  While all those answers are good answers I would question just how well we actually live up to those answers we give.  I can't speak for everyone else, but I will speak for myself.  I know at times I don't look or act as much like Jesus as I should.  At times I get too caught up in my work and the things I want that I miss out on opportunities to reach out to those in need.  I seek after too many things that really aren't that important in the eternal view of things.  Really Jesus tells us how to make sure our life measures up the way He wants it to.  Jesus said in Matthew 6:33 "Seek the kingdom of God above all else, and live righteously, and he will give you everything you need."  Make God the #1 priority in your life and seek to live a life that honors God and I promise your life will measure up to exactly what God destined you to be!

If you were to honestly evaluate your life today, how would your relationship with God measure up?  Is God truly the #1 in your life like you say He is?  Or is work, a career, material possessions, or hobbies really #1 and God falls out somewhere below?  Look at your life and see where you invest your time and money and if God doesn't rank high enough than maybe it's time to do some remeasuring.

Lord, help me to make the measure of my life be found solely in you.  I can pursue so many things, even things that would qualify as important.  May I make living for You, loving You, and pleasing You my measuring stick for my life.

In pursuit of what?

I was on my way to the office today and I was listening to a podcast by National Community Church.  One line of the message really stuck out to me.  The speaker said sometimes we spend more time in pursuit of the promises of God instead of the person of God.  I thought for a moment, and realized just how true that statement really is.  We want God for all the blessings and promises He has to offer us, but do we really pursue God Himself in our life?

I have been wrestling in prayer with God over some things in my life.  I have been reminding myself of all God's promises and how true and great they really are.  Today, the Spirit put Jeremiah 29:11 on my heart, and as I read that verse, I couldn't help but be encouraged.  But at the same time I felt convicted as I read on past verse 11.  Verses 12-14 promises us God wants to be found and that He can be found.  The catch is those that find Him are those who are seeking HIM WHOLEHEARTEDLY.  I realized at times I have been seeking more of God's promises than I really have been seeking Him.  I think we will live in God's promise of a bright future and hope when we pursue Him with all we have instead of just His blessings.  As someone else has put it, I think too often we seek the hand of God instead of the face of God.  We seek what He can give us instead of what we can offer Him.  The question is what are you pursuing?  Is it just the blessing of God?  Is it your own personal self-interests?  Or, is it God and His personal agenda for your life?  When you connect with God and find His heart for your life than you will find the promise of a great hope and future!

Real faith, real results.

Today's Bible studying really got me thinking about what it means to have real faith in God.  Matthew 17:20 Jesus said "...if you have faith...you can say to this mountain, 'Move from here to there' and it will move.  Nothing will be impossible."

Real faith says that I can speak to a mountain, tell it to move, and it will move.  Jesus is trying to tell us that real faith produces real results in our life.  I believe Jesus is disappointed when our faith produces nothing (Vs. 17). Our faith in God should become something tangible that can be seen.  Faith in God is more than just a faith in some mystical force.  Faith in God has to play itself out in our life and become something real and tangible.

I was reading in Genesis 24 about Abraham and his servant.  Abraham sent his servant back to his father's land to find a wife for Isaac.  Abraham's servant found Isaac's wife because his faith in God became a reality in his life.  He prayed to God for guidance and direction.  God lead him every step of the way.  Rebekah came out to the well and as they say "the rest is history".  Abraham's servant could have tried many different ways to find a wife for his master's son.  But, his choice was to pray and have faith that God would move on his behalf.  Listen, we can choose to try to tackle our life problems in our own ways and our strength.  Or, we can choose to put this faith we claim to have in God into action.  When we try to live out our faith and make it more than just a belief, but instead make it a reality, God will move in a real way in our life.  Maybe God doesn't show up in our life like we want Him to because we fail to put a real faith and trust in Him?

Lord, help me to have a real faith.  I want to live out my faith in my real life circumstances so I can see you move in a real way.  Help me to make my faith a reality so you I can see tangible results in my life.  I want to personally experience that "Nothing is impossible".  Nothing!