Archive for the ‘Devotions’ Category
Posted by appolus on August 2, 2021
Hos 6:1 Come, and let us return unto the LORD: for he hath torn, and he will heal us; he hath smitten, and he will bind us up.
The same God that brings us to our knees, also raises us up. Oh that we had no need to be broken, no need to be smitten, yet in the depths of who we are we are fatally flawed. Adam in us. In the flesh we bear the sin of Adam, we stood guilty before a Holy God. Yet in us too was a light, a smoldering ember in the depths of who we are. It speaks of our guilt. When the wind of the Spirit blows upon this tiniest of embers, the God given conscience, then it bursts into flames. “You crucified the Christ,” Peter cries out as he spoke with the power of God. Men’s hearts were rent and their blindfolds fell to the ground as they gazed upon their crime and saw that their very own sin crucified Jesus. He bore their punishment.
Imagine this. You are driving down the road and you check your phone, or you text someone. And in that split second a child runs out and is run over and killed by your car. The child is dead, and you are guilty. There is no doubt about your guilt. You are racked with that guilt. You cannot think, you cannot concentrate, you cannot live. You come before the judge and you plead guilty and you desire that he throws the book at you for you know you deserve to be punished because you killed an innocent child. Nothing can deliver you from your agony. Now imagine another scenarios, your eyes are opened by the wind of the Spirit. You see that it is indeed your sin that killed a willing and innocent Jesus upon the cross. And why was He willing? To fulfill the will of the Father that He should suffer in your stead. And in the very midst of your guilt, you “know,” that despite this, He loves you. “What must I do,’ you cry out as you heart is ripped open and you are smote with the sure knowledge of your sure guilt and the agonizing realization of His love.
“Arise in repentance,” the Lord would say “and I shall give you life”. I will bind up your wounds and set you free from the captivity of this guilt. I will raise you up from death to life that you may live. For my going forth is established as the morning and I will come like the rain, the latter and the former rain. Brothers and sisters, this is how we were saved and this is how we shall live. He still tears and He still heals. He molds us in the fires of sanctification. He scourges all those that He loves and the flesh is burned up in the fires and in this He raises us up in Holiness. Who may abide the day of his coming? and who shall stand when he appeareth? for he is like a refiner’s fire, and like fullers’ soap (Mal 3:2) He purifies His sons and daughters and purges them like gold and silver. Come brothers and sisters, let us return to the Lord.
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Posted by appolus on July 29, 2021
Hos 2:14 Therefore, behold, I will allure her, and bring her into the wilderness, and speak comfortably unto her.
This is a truly remarkable scripture and a remarkable promise from God. All through the second chapter of Hosea we see threats and declarations from God. “She is not my wife……..Lest I strip her naked and expose her as in the day she was born…….. Make her like a wilderness and set her in a dry land and slay her with thirst…………I will hedge up her ways with thorns and wall her in so that she cannot find her path…………..I will uncover her lewdness in the sight of her lovers and no one shall deliver her from my Hand.” And it goes on. This is powerful threats from God, And after all of that “She decked herself with earrings and jewelry and went after her lovers, but Me she forgot.” Wow, can you imagine what can only come next?
And here we see for a fact that Gods ways are higher than our ways for He says “behold, I will allure her.” not judge her or condemn her, but rather entice her. Now the place of His wilderness enticement will not be a dry land where she will die of thirst but rather a place that she will discover comfort in the valley of Achor. A place of troubled waters and tears which will produce fruit from the vineyard that will blossom from that place. Is this not the story of our salvation? Was not our sins exposed to us? Did we not see ourselves as we truly were? And were horrified. Was the world not our wilderness where we were starving to death and dying of thirst? We were hedged in and held down by the thorns of our own rebellion and sin and there was no way forward for us, only down. And instead of judging us the Lord redeemed us and raised us up.
He became so beautiful to us, the very one we ran from for so long. All of our lewdness became apparent as He came close to us. His magnificent beauty reflected upon our ugliness. I remember crying out for the Lord to look away from me for I was an abomination in my own sight, in the light of the conviction of my God, the lover of my soul. And in this place, this Godly wilderness, we were transformed. Now listen to what God said to us in the last verses of Hosea. “I will betroth you to me forever………..I will betroth you to me in righteousness, in loving-kindness and mercy…….. I will betroth you to me in faithfulness and you shall know the Lord….. then I will sow her for myself in the earth and I will have mercy upon her who had not obtained mercy. Then I will say to those who were not my people, you are my people! And they shall say, you are my God.” Praise Jesus. Our God is the lover of our souls. He has redeemed us from the miry places to lay down with Him in heavenly places. Give Him glory today brothers and sisters!
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Posted by appolus on July 28, 2021
Psa 32:10 Many sorrows shall be to the wicked: but he that trusteth in the LORD, mercy shall compass him about.
For the saints, the favor of God is the wellspring of all happiness and blessings as opposed to the wealth and wisdom of the world. It is wise men and women who trust in God and follow His instructions. Blessed is the man in whom there is no deceit. Here the Lord instructs us to be honest in all of our ways, before Him and before men. And if we are, there is a blessing in God. David says that when he kept silent his bones grew old and the hand of God lay heavily upon him causing him to moan and to groan in the midnight hours. His vitality, he says was “turned into the drought of summer. “The solution and the blessings lies in not remaining silent. Speak of Him and His mercy while it is yet day, for in this there is great joy.
He instructs us to acknowledge our sins to Him, and not to “hide” our iniquity. “Confess your transgressions to me,” says the Lord. And in this confession you find wonderful pardon, your feet are washed from the filth of this world. When we do this, we are praying to Him while “He might yet be found.” This is instruction from God. If we do this then even in a flood of great waters, even when the sin of this world rises up like a mighty tsunami, it shall not come near you, for He will have raised you up to higher ground and surrounded with you with songs of deliverance. He shall be to you a hiding place in the day of calamity.
He instructs us not to be like the horse or the mule which has no understanding. They require to be harnessed with a bit and a bridle, reigned in so to speak. Rather, simply follow the instructions of our Lord and be led of Him. There is great blessing in this. And finally we are instructed to trust in God. The greatest blessing of them all. Many are the sorrows of those who do not and they are pierced daily with the cares of this world. Death by a thousand cuts. Yet for those who trust in Him, they are surrounded by mercy. Their hearts are glad and they shout for joy. Let your hearts be glad today brothers and sisters. Trust in the Lord and be instructed by His Word and by the Spirit of God. In this you shall see that goodness and mercy shall follow you all the days of your life.
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Posted by appolus on July 27, 2021
In every trial there comes a moment when we lose sight of the bigger picture. We believe that we have blown it. We believe that we have chased God away and now we feel forsaken and alone. Even our Lord Jesus cries out from the cross in a moment of despair “My God, My God why has thou forsaken me.” Scripture tells us that just before this a great darkness had come across the land from the sixth hour until the ninth hour. Three full hours of what I can only assume was a satanic darkness. A gross satanic darkness had covered the land when the Father gave His Son over into the hands of His enemies. Sometimes, we can feel consumed by the darkness around us and in the midst of certain situations.
Some time later the Lord Jesus speaks His final words from the cross “Father, into thy hands I commit my spirit.” Now He was referring to His Father, a much more intimate term than God. Praise the Lord. He had went from a time of despair to a time of intimacy. And with His last breath He committed His Spirit into the hands of His Father. The answer always lies in the hands of our Father. In Psalm 31:5 we see that David makes the same cry. He is surrounded by enemies. He said that he would rest in the mercy of God and be glad because God knew about his troubles, God saw the adversities of Davids soul. He sees your troubles brothers and sisters, He sees the afflictions of your soul. Wont you too rest in the mercy of God? When we are tempted to run, then instead we must hide under the shadow of His wing.
There is no doubt at all as we journey through this life along the narrow path that we will have many such moments. Moments of doubts and moments of despair. We wonder if we have been forgotten and then suddenly we are back in the arms of our Father in heaven, glory to God. Maybe you are having doubts today about your walk? Perhaps you feel abandoned? Yet the Lord has promised His own, that no matter what kind of situation that we find ourselves in that He would restore us and heal our wounds. Even in the valley of the shadow of death we find that there are green pastures. We have been called to lie down in them. And in that place we come to realize that goodness and mercy shall surely follow us all the days of our lives, especially, in the many dark valleys that the narrow path takes us through.
Psa 31:5 Into thine hand I commit my spirit: thou hast redeemed me, O LORD God of truth.
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Posted by appolus on July 26, 2021
The heart of those who receive the word with gladness, in whom thy seed finds a ready and deep soil, is the tree planted by the rivers of water. The good tree is good in any season by virtue of its closeness to the eternal resource of the river of the living God. Dear saint, do you meditate on the Word of God every day? Do you hide it away in your heart and absorb it into your very soul until it becomes a very part of you? Are you like the branch abiding in the vine? Jesus tells us in John chapter eight that if we continue in the Word, which means to abide in it, remain in it, stand on it, endure with it, dwell in it, then you shall know the Truth and the Truth shall set you free.
The word “know,” here is of particular interest. In order to be free we must daily walk in and with the Word, and when we do that we shall “know.” To know Christ is to be free. It does not say to know about Him or to know off Him, it says to know the Truth. We must be intimate with the Lord if we are to walk in the freedom that He had gained for us on Calvary. Jesus gave us many instructions. We were to take up our cross daily if we were to be His disciples. We were to abide in His word daily if we were to be His disciples. And so, when we do these things we begin to grow in maturity. We are able to draw from an inexhaustible source of power and love and mercy and forgiveness. We are able to draw from it because of our proximity to this power for we are like a tree planted by the rivers of life.
Because of this, we become a source of blessing for others in season and out of season, for we are evergreen trees. In the darkest coldest winters we still retain our foliage. We saints whose delight is in the Lord and His Word and His commands, become vessels that hold and retain grace and love and mercy and forgiveness because it is flowing in and through us directly from Christ Himself. He waters us that we may water others. He comforts us so that we may comfort others with that very comfort He comforted us with. It is the cycle of our Spiritual life in the Kingdom. He invests in us all these things, not to bury them or greedily keep them to ourselves, but to gladly and with great joy share them with others. Freely you have been given and now freely you must give.
Psa 1:3 And he shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that bringeth forth his fruit in his season; his leaf also shall not wither; and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper.
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Posted by appolus on July 26, 2021
Psa 9:10 And they that know thy name will put their trust in thee: for thou, LORD, hast not forsaken them that seek thee.
What a mighty promise. The Lord never forsakes His own. Can you see how the Scriptures tell us that those who know His name and put their trust in God are those who seek the Lord? Knowing and trusting and seeking. The trinity of relationship with God. And for His part, the Lord never leaves us nor forsakes us. Now what does it mean to seek the Lord? It is one of those magnificent paradoxes. To know and yet to seek. And not just seek the Lord, but to seek Him with our whole hearts. With everything in us, we seek first His Kingdom and His righteousness. To seek the Lord with our whole hearts is to remove any and all obstacles that stand in our way. Fear must go, anxiety must vanish.
Do not be fooled saint, we have work to do. Obedience. Discipline. Responding. Abiding.Loving. Forgiving. Sacrificing. Taking up our cross daily. Laying down our offenses. If you are the Lords you have been empowered to do all of that and more. You have been empowered to possess that which was given to you, another mighty paradox. This is the work, to do the will of your Father in heaven. Those who are determined to walk with their whole hearts, they will bear the marks of such a pilgrimage. They will praise Him with everything that is in them. Not just on the high mountains of blessings but also and particularly in the depths of the deepest valleys of afflictions. They will testify of all His marvelous works to anyone who will want to listen, and also to those who don’t. They will be glad in the Lord and their joy will radiate from their countenance.
In all of that, in the presence of our glorious God, our fears and our anxieties perish. The destructive aspects of our characters are vanquished forever. And the Lord our God endures forever in their place. The Lord becomes to us a refuge in times of trouble. He is our ever present high tower and when trouble comes we run into it and we are safe. He has created in His children, a fragrant band of priests who are humbled and contrite. And He always hears the cries of the humble, and He dwells in High places with the broken and the contrite. The expectations of the poor in spirit shall not perish. We know the end of all things and we know that the nations and the powers that be are but men, but we serve the God who brings all men to their knees, one way or another, in the end. Will you praise Him today saints?
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Posted by appolus on July 23, 2021
Psa 3:3 But thou, O LORD, art a shield for me; my glory, and the lifter up of mine head.
The context of this psalm is that David is fleeing from his own son. David is not a young man anymore. In his lifetime, David has seen much trouble. And one would think that when you get to a certain age and have battled many battles that you get to retire into your dotage and leave all your troubles behind. If you are reading this and have lived long enough, you will know this not to be true. David cries out to God that he is surrounded by those who trouble him. They rise up against him, even from his own family and would seek to do him harm. He is mocked for his troubles and people say out loud that there is no help for him from God, surely God must have abandoned him.
They are all wrong of course. David would indeed once again flee just as he had fled from Saul but it is a very different, older, wiser David. He acknowledges God in the midst of his troubles. He testifies that God is a shield to Him, the glory and the lifter of his head. He lays down and sleeps. He awakes with the morning and he is sustained. He says that even if ten thousand people set themselves against him, he will not be afraid for his faith is in a God who hears him.
Maybe you had thought all your troubles were behind you? Maybe you have fought many battles in this life and thought that they were also behind you? Yet here you are, in the middle of maybe one of the greatest battles of your whole life. Sleep is a luxury that you know little of. You wonder if God has abandoned you. You have cried until there is no tears left to cry, as David once did. And you know people whisper and wonder “where is his/her God.” I want to assure you today that “from His holy hill,” the Lord has heard your cry.
He is a shield for you. You stand because of Him. He has picked you up more times than you care to remember. He is the glory of your life. His glory and His majesty lies at the very core of who you are. He is the lifter of your head, He has lifted it a thousand times and He will lift it again. You will lie down and sleep, even this night for you are lying down in the very palm of His hand. It will not go well, in the end, for those who oppress you and would see you fall. Remember this saint, and it is more costly than any earthly treasure, His blessing is upon you. Stand strong in the Lord today, for great is your reward in heaven.
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Posted by appolus on July 20, 2021
Psalm 46:1 God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.
That is a wonderful promise. God is our “very present,” help. This word present means in the translation, to appear. In another context we would say of someone “he presented himself to her.” It means to make yourself known, to step forward so to speak. And remember saints, He is not just a present help, he is a very present help. When we add the word “very,’ it is intended to intensify the subject. And so we see that in times of trouble, God presents Himself to us by His manifest presence. He manifests Himself to us in very tangible ways which leaves us in no doubt that He is with us.
When we realize He is with us in our very present circumstances, then our fears are allleviated. Our circumstances may not have changed, but when our Lord has presents Himself to us and manifests His presence to us then we know we will stand. Imagine the three Hebrew Children in the fire and suddenly there is a fourth. Imagine Daniel in the Lions den and the presence of God enters. Imagine Paul and Silas in the dark dungeon and the manifest presence of God rains down.
I know a woman who was crying out to God as she stood on the beach contemplating a terrible set of circumstances and feeling alone and not being able to sense the presence or the promise of God. The waves were coming in and rolling back out literally and figuratively and suddenly before her feet appeared a cross in the sand, created by some drift material. One minute it was not there, the wave rolls out, and God speaks to her heart and it profoundly moves her to “know,” that God has heard her cry and that He is with her in her struggle.
Brothers and sisters, if the whole world is crumbling underneath your feet. And the mountains are tumbling and falling down all around you. And you find yourself surrounded by troubled waters. Hold on, for when God moves, when God speaks, right there in the midst of it all, then peace shall flow like a river, directly into your troubles and will make that troubled heart glad. Be still and know that He is God, He is your refuge and your strength.
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Posted by appolus on July 19, 2021
Psa 91:1 He that dwelleth in the secret place of the most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty.
Saints, the Lord has set His love upon you. Therefore He shall deliver you. He will raise you up to the high and holy places because you know Him. This is where He dwells with the humble and the contrite. This is where He revives your spirit and and revives your heart. You shall call upon the Lord and He will answer you. He will be with you in the midst of trouble and He will deliver you. He will satisfy all of your needs, He sees what you lack, He sees into the depths of your soul. He is your refuge and your fortress and in Him you shall trust.
Brothers and sisters, these are marvelous promises from our heavenly Father. They are realized to their greatest depths in the midst of your troubles. His grace is sufficient for you. So when the waters threaten to overwhelm you, His grace raises you up to higher ground. When the fires threaten to consume you, He stands right there in the midst of the flames with you and rivers of grace surrounds you and keeps you. As the Royal priesthood enters into the darkest period of all mankind, then the world will see the greatest expression of light it has ever seen. Because of the darkness of their hearts they must try and consume the light that you bear, but this only produces more light.
The author of anarchy and chaos is on the march around the world and death follows after him. The horses of the apocalypse are riding with all their might through the night. Hell follows after them. A thousand shall fall at your side, ten thousand shall fall at your right hand, but you shall stand. The great falling away will sweep millions away in its mighty current, but you shall stand and the promises of God will dwell richly in your heart. Do not fear saint, for you have made the Lord your God your dwelling place, and in this dwelling place, in this secret place that no eye can see, you will find refuge under the shadow of the Almighty. And having done all, stand.
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Posted by appolus on July 17, 2021
The bedrock of Jesus Christ’s kingdom is poverty, not possession. It is not “decisions for Christ,” but a sense of absolute futility. “I cannot begin to do it.” Then, says Jesus, you are blessed. It takes us a long while to believe we are poor, but that is the entrance. The knowledge of our own poverty brings us to the moral frontier where Jesus Christ works. (Oswald Chambers)
Oh how this flies in the face of almost everything we think we know. We spend a lot of time and energy engaged in sophistry. We feel the pull of one camp or another. Our preconceived notions are the high places of our spirits. We make virtues out of words and ideas and notions. We promote and defend what we call virtues and in the end it is all Babylon. It is is either “Jesus said,” or its merely vacuous noise. Cultures are mere reflections of ungodly people. All cultures. We have not been called to appease cultures. We stand as an expression of the Lord Jesus Christ to a dying world. Christ in us should shine a light into the darkness of this dying world.
This knowledge of this kind of poverty comes from encounter. “Who can understand his errors? (Psalm 19:12) There is a light that illuminates the heavens. God set it in its tabernacle. And there is a light that illuminates the hearts of men. God set that light upon a hill upon a cross. It has shone out like a beacon down through the ages. The revelation of our own personal poverty, commonly known as “the end of myself,’ is the beginning of Jesus. I have crossed the frontier and been swallowed up by the landscape of the Kingdom of God when I journeyed to the end of myself. Isaiah cries out “woe is me for I am undone.” And he is swallowed up by fire on his lips and majesty. It sets his course. Who will cry out “oh wretched man that I am, who will deliver me from this body of death?”
The carnal mind is death. So much of our speech is carnal. The camps within the camps within the camps. Each pushing and pulling and all the while being blind to our own personal poverty that is wrapped up in the high places of our preconceived notions. Its all death and it is all wretched. Yet, if you are privy to revelation and you can see your own poverty and the coals of fire are bought forth burning the dross away, then the spirit is refined and finds life and peace. And that very life and peace shall quicken your mortal bodies, empowered by the Spirit of God.
The Spirit of God bears witness that we are the children of God. We are the sons and daughters of the living God, a royal priesthood, very much apart from and above the sophistry and the noise of this world and all its ways. We are joint-heirs with Christ and we shall suffer as our Lord suffered for His own cause and we shall bless those who curse us and do good to those whose aim is that we should stumble. For we know that the sufferings of our day cannot be compared to the glory that is to come. It’s is for Christ’s sake we gladly suffer. For righteousness sake. If God is for us brothers and sisters, who can be be against us? For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord (Rom 8:38-39)
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Posted by appolus on July 16, 2021
Psa 19:1 To the chief Musician, A Psalm of David. The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament sheweth his handywork.
The Lord turns the whole of the heavens into a tabernacle for the sun. It rises out of the darkness and brings light. Our God brought light into the darkness. When we were without form, when all was void and dark the Lord commanded that there be light and He lit up the universe. There was nothing hidden from its heat and He created it so that nothing would live without its light.
The heavens testify to His glory. The earth testifies to His glory. It shouts it out so loudly that one only has to look up to see the glory of God. The law of the Lord is perfect, the testimony of the Lord is sure, the statutes of the Lord are right, the commandments of the Lord are pure. The fear of the Lord is clean, the judgments of the Lord are true. He converts the soul, He makes wise the simple, He causes the heart to rejoice, He enlightens the eyes of those who see, He endures forever, He is true and righteous altogether.
When the Lord our God is acknowledged, His attributes are revealed to us. And we are rich in His mercy. The things of God are desired more than all the riches of this world. They are sweeter than honey on my lips. They feed the very depths of my soul. I am alive and dwell in the heat that comes from His unadulterated light. This light illuminates any darkness that dwells within me, how could I have known without this Light? Let me never presume upon the riches and the mercies of my God. Let my proud heart remain humbled by His majesty.
Out of the abundance of our mouths let the heart speak. Let that abundance be formed in the meditations of my heart as my thoughts are towards you. Let the words that flow from my mouth glorify you my Lord and be acceptable in your sight. And may I find strength oh Lord, your strength and your assistance as I seek to serve you all the days of my life.
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Posted by appolus on July 13, 2021
Mat 6:34 Take therefore no thought for the morrow: for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof.
Imagine brothers and sisters, if we simply took the Lord at His word and obeyed that command. After describing all the things the “gentiles do,” He told us not to do them. We have not to worry what we shall wear. We are not to worry what we shall eat. He is talking about life in general. We often quote that we cannot serve two masters, and we have in mind God and “mammon.” And yet, that was only a part of it.
Jesus goes on to talk about what ails most of us and He begins with a “therefore,” meaning given everything I have just said do not do ………….the rest of the chapter. For if you do, you are assuredly trying to serve two masters. If you are taken up with worries about tomorrow then this is self-serving. You cannot serve yourself and serve God. You cannot be taken up with worries about tomorrow and seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness. It is not possible. Something has to give.
The thing about being your own master, you are a tyrant. Your feelings are tyrannical. Your heart is deceitfully wicked. A beautiful woman can look in a mirror and see something ugly looking back. A good man can look in the mirror and and see a vile worm. Remember saints, the light of the body is in the eye. If the eye has a single focus on God, then your whole body will be full of light. If your focus is on the things of this world then it cannot be on God, you cannot possibly be seeking God and His righteousness. It is time to take Jesus at His word. Focus on God and not tomorrow, only then will you be able to seek first His Kingdom and His righteousness and walk in that Kingdom and in that righteousness.
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Posted by appolus on July 11, 2021
2 Cor 12:9 Most gladly therefore will I rather glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me.
What drives us deeper into the arms of our Lord and plunges us into the depths of the Father’s heart? Not the delights of this world and its so called blessings but rather when the darkness comes and touches us. We discover that the light pierces the darkness and is as a lamp unto our feet.
Can someone who is so hopelessly lost do anything other that cry out when he is found!! When the waters of life overcome him and he is to drown and the hand of God reaches down and pulls him up. What joy, what glory! The closer the saint is to death the closer he is to life and that more abundant.
When he is stripped down and left naked and emaciated by this world and he is redeemed from the market place and his nakedness is covered, what absolute joy in the depths of ones soul! When by the power of God we can kiss the rod that strikes us and love the one who bears it then we know, then we absolutely know, that the power of Christ rests upon us.
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Posted by appolus on July 8, 2021
Rom 12:20 Therefore if thine enemy hunger, feed him; if he thirst, give him drink: for in so doing thou shalt heap coals of fire on his head.
John Bunyan said “let us learn like Christians to kiss the rod, and love it………many of our graces are kept alive by those very things that are the death to other men’s soul.” Speaking for myself, I can imagine, perhaps, on my best day, kissing the rod, but loving it? It is just as well it is not my best efforts that empowers me to truly love my enemy. To walk in such a way, empowered by the Spirit of God, is to know that we have truly turned the corner on this world and see only the Kingdom perspective.
You simply cannot be walking in the world and be dictated to in anyway by the flesh if we are to kiss the rod that wounds us and greater still, love the unrepentant one who wields that very rod. Yet Bunyan would argue that many of the graces we enjoy and walk in are empowered by the very testing of our souls by the cruel actions of our enemies. Outside of the Spirit of God the actions of such cruel enemies engender rage, hatred and revenge and leave the soul embittered and dying. So to one it means death and to another, life. Shall we live brothers and sisters or shall we die? Our chains were broken and our fetters loosed on the cross, let us cling to that very cross and say with Christ “forgive them Father for they know not what they do.”
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Posted by appolus on July 7, 2021
For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the LORD. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts (Isa 55:8-9)
The context of these well known verses comes in the verses prior. It is an appeal to the wicked to repent and He will “abundantly pardon.” Imagine that, God calls you to repentance with a promise of an abundant pardon. It is hard for us to imagine that in our earthly minds. If someone consistently sinned against us, over weeks and months and years, decades even, it can be almost impossible to think that we could so forgive them as to never even give all the previous crimes against us a second thought. To have the slate so wiped clean as to be brand new. This is miraculous. We could, in and of ourselves, never do this.
Yet, out thoughts are not His thoughts. His ways are so much higher than our ways. In our own power it would be beyond our ability to grasp. You might as well throw punches at the moon. Yet we do not stand by our own power. Those who know Jesus stand by the power of God, by His Spirit. Now, if the Lord our God offers such an abundant pardon to the wicked what does He offer to His children? “For if, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life.” An abundant pardon leads to an abundant life. You may think that you have blown it with God but His thoughts are higher than your thoughts saint. If you have been hiding behind the tree with some fig leaves, it’s time to emerge from there and to stand before God.
The rain that falls from heaven falls also upon your head. And the snow that falls from heaven and waters the earth waters you too oh child of God. It causes the buds to bloom and the seed to come forth and gives bread to the hungry and water to the thirsty. This is the Word of God and it does not return to Him void. It speaks life to you and prospers your soul. You shall go forth from here with joy and His peace shall lead you as the mountains and the hills break forth in praise and worship and the trees of the field shall clap their hands in wonder at His ways. A word to one of His children today.
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Posted by appolus on July 5, 2021
2Pe 1:2 Grace and peace be multiplied unto you through the knowledge of God, and of Jesus our Lord,
Grace and peace, multiplied to us adds up to an abundant life in Christ. Multiplied by many factors. In the very next verse we see that we have everything that we need to to live this abundant life, it is through the knowledge of God. The word is Epignosis, to acknowledge God in all of your ways. When we acknowledge God in everything, recognize Him in every part of our lives and seek Him first and His righteousness then we shall live in Godliness, Godliness meaning a continual awareness of Him which leads to holiness.
The enemy of our soul knows well that if saints begin to walk in Godliness then this is a tremendous threat to his kingdom here on earth. So, he must distract us. That is one part of the struggle. Life itself is the the other and may even be the greatest distraction of all. How many plates do you have spinning in your life saint? All of them demand your attention. All of them are a distraction away from this Godliness that walks hand in hand with a multiplied peace.
Our marriages, our children, our parents, our careers, even our walk with the Lord can be tyrannical distractions and we run to and fro, exhausting ourselves trying to keep these things altogether. And in the end many of the plates fall and break despite our valiant efforts. They have to be surrendered and vanquished. We cannot hold onto them and walk in the abundant life of grace and peace if we do not surrender all these things into the hands of God. We must commit our very lives, our soul, into His hands and that includes everything that occupies our hearts and minds and souls.
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Posted by appolus on July 2, 2021
1Pe 4:19 Wherefore let them that suffer according to the will of God commit the keeping of their souls to him in well doing, as unto a faithful Creator.
How is it that the saints of old and the martyrs were so able to withstand the sufferings they endured for the cause of Christ? How could Paul and Silas sing praises to God at the midnight hour in the depths of a dungeon having been scourged to within an inch of their lives? How could Stephen have a vision of God’s glory in the midst of being so cruelly stoned stoned? In order to stone Stephen unencumbered, those wicked men laid down their coats at the feet of Saul. They laid down their coats and they picked up their stones.
When we lay down our lives, when we commit our very souls into the hand of God, then we are free to pick up His glory. When the very essence of who we are is given over to God, committed into His hands then we find a tremendous freedom in this, its called the Spirit of glory. It falls upon the unencumbered soul. It strengthens the inner man. Our “outer garments,’ the cares of this world are cast aside and we are filled to overflowing. So much so that we can sing songs of glory in the midnight hour of our trials. We can praise the living God as we are cruelly treated by man, so much so that we can love our tormentors.
Are you suffering today saint? Have you cast off your outer garments? Have you committed your very soul into the hand of God? When you deliver this into His hand, He delivers you from the torment of your circumstances. He shuts the lions mouth and He stands with you in the midst of the fire in a very real way, it is His manifest presence. It will lift the hands that hang down. It will feed the hungry soul. It will quench the thirst of those in drought. So, suffering saint, while outwardly you may be perishing, there awaits for you a crown of glory in the kingdom to come. This presence is you exceeding great reward.
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Posted by appolus on June 30, 2021
Heb 12:2 Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith;
Only that which flows from an uninterrupted gaze on the Lord Jesus is real. Everything else is the shadow of the object. Granted, the shadow of the Lord is more powerful than all that can be seen, and one can even enjoy the heat from the sun in the shadow. Yet the glow from the face of Moses was not the glow of a man who stood in the shadows. I believe that the Lord can pour out his unadulterated light if it is not diffused by the efforts of self appointed middle men or intermediaries.
Can it be that simple? Can we simply come into His presence and be changed? Does everything begin and end with the Lord Jesus? How does one continue to look to Jesus? It is a conscious act of the will to take our eyes off our circumstances and cast them upon Jesus. This is the great battle of our lives, not our circumstances. Our circumstances can simply be doors that if walked through leads directly into His presence. It is in that place, looking unto Jesus, that we are changed. Trust is the key that opens the door. To trust in God is to walk through the opened door of our circumstances into the throne room of God.
There are two Kingdoms. The kingdom of the world and the Kingdom of God. One is seen and affected by our senses and circumstances. The other is unseen and if walked in, relegates our circumstances to mere opportunities to go deeper into its depths. Now these two kingdoms compete for our attentions. You must cry out to God every day to bind up the reality of the kingdom of this world and to loose the reality of the Kingdom of God in your life. Cry out to God to give you eyes to see what He sees and how He sees it. Can you imagine the prospect of every situation you face being an opportunity to grow in grace and power? This is the Kingdom reality, will you walk in it today?
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Posted by appolus on June 27, 2021
2Co 2:14 But thanks be to God, who in Christ always leads us in triumphal procession, and through us spreads the fragrance of the knowledge of him everywhere.
Every triumph we have we have in Christ. He is our victory and in Him we have victory. If we overcome it is because He overcame. If we love it is because He first loved us. If we forgive it is because we are forgiven by Him. When we weep, we know that He wept first. And when we give comfort to others it is because we ourselves were first comforted by Him. Every good thing, every triumph we have we have in Christ. This is why He leads us in a triumphal procession. And as we follow Him in victory then the world gets to witness the knowledge of Him and His victory over hell and sin and death.
They get to see how He broke every chain and how He healed our broken hearts. Every obstacle removed. They see a new creature in Christ who in Him has taken captive that which had formerly held us captive. We are more than conquerors in Christ Jesus. You see that phrase “in Christ.” This is the key to everything. We must be found “in Him.” Paul suffered the loss of all things to be found “in Him.” And when we are found in Him, then and only then is the fragrance of His beauty and glory and majesty and knowledge spread abroad in the hearts of man everywhere.
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Posted by appolus on June 24, 2021
Eze 47:3 And when the man that had the line in his hand went forth eastward, he measured a thousand cubits, and he brought me through the waters; the waters were to the ankles.
There is a river that flows from heaven itself. It flows through our hearts and beckons us to come deeper. This river is spoken of in many places in Scriptures. It is the presence of God and it brings us deeper into the heart of the Almighty. There are trees on either side of this river and their roots are directly connected to the river and they are perpetually green, evergreen trees for the healing of the people and the nations. The river itself brings healing everywhere it goes. To be walking in the Spirit is to be swimming in the river of life.
As we see in Ezekiel 47, the Lord brings us to through the waters. Always the Lord, compelling His children to come deeper into Him. Not ankle deep, not knee deep or even waist deep but fully immersed in a river so vast that it cannot be crossed, it can only be swum in. We must give ourselves to the river, let go and give way to the current of the Holy Spirit. Whether you are ankle deep, knee deep or even waist deep, you are still standing on your own two feet. In many respects you are still in charge. Yet to give ourselves completely to the river we are no longer standing.
When we are fully given to our Lord. When we are yielded to the depths and the power of this vast river, the power of the Holy Spirit, only then can we truly be led. All resistance is gone in its depths. It is carrying you towards the sea, the vastness of God Himself. Ever closer, ever deeper into the Father’s heart. And the Lord says to to you “come, I will bring you through the waters into the deep.” “Seek me with your whole heart and I shall be found and you shall be rewarded for your diligence, I am your exceeding great reward.”
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A Call To The Remnant 