“I appeal to you, brothers, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that all of you agree with one another so that there may be no divisions among you and that you may be perfectly united in mind and thought.” 1 Corinthians 1:10 (NIV)
Picture This:
You and some others from your church are in a field in your community praying for the needs of your congregation. You all have joined hands in a circle and, with heads bowed, are in prayer. Near you is another church of another denomination praying for the needs of their congregation. They are dressed differently in traditional attire of their religion and are joined, hand in hand, in a prayer circle as you are. Over from them you notice another church, also in a prayer circle praying for the needs of their people. Actually, there are churches all over this large field in circles praying for their own needs.
As you and your church are praying, you’re not eavesdropping, but you hear the church next to you praying for a serious situation in their church. You are filled with compassion for them and want to do something. So you drop hands with the one next to you and say to the person nearest you in the next circle, “Excuse me but I overheard you praying for your great need and we want to agree with you for that need. May we join you?” The person asks his church if it would be OK and they agree. So they drop hands and join with you and your church in a bigger circle. You pray for their need and they pray for your need all in one unified circle.
After awhile someone from the circle does the same with the church next to them and they join the ever widening circle of prayer. This continues until every church circle in the field is joined together in one large unified circle all praying for the needs of the Family of God. They did not ask the details of what each others denomination believes. It did not matter if others were dressed differently, had different color skin, or prayed differently. All were joined in love for each other as the body of Christ.
The last picture is of God looking down with a big smile on His face at the large circle of prayer and says, “That’s my people who are called by my name seeking my face and praying for one another. I will heal their land.” (2 Chronicles 7:14) The result? The devil and his crew has to pack up and leave town.
A Christian man or woman praying. They are thanking God for their status in life; for their education, training, job, and the things they’ve accomplished. They are pretty proud of what they’ve done and are thanking God for His part in their life. They’re feeling pretty good.
God replies, “Yes, you’ve done pretty well for yourself but that’s not exactly the way I would have done it.” God’s response hits them hard and they realize they had spent most of their efforts on education, employment goals, home building, and other tasks that define what the world sees as success. They immeditely drop to their knees before God and repent saying,”Father, I’m sorry for building my life the way I thought it should be. I now fully surrender to you and ask you to break me and re-make me the way you intended even before I was born.” “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you,before you were born I set you apart; ” Jeremiah 1:5.
When the person asked to be broken before God, the next scene shows them instantly being zapped into a pile of grey/brown dust. God stands beside the pile with a bottle of oil. He pours the oil onto the pile of dust and begins forming and shaping the dust into His image. That’s the way He wants to do it. “The sacrifice you desire is a broken spirit. You will not reject a broken and repentant heart, O God.” Psalms 51:17. Are we really broken?
You see a man or woman walking along a road carrying a large, heavy sack. The sack is dark in color and full of something because you can see the misshapen size of it. You know it’s heavy because the person is struggling with it, occasionally shifting it from their arms to their shoulders and back. They are walking slowly and are having a hard time with this load.
They meet a man going in the opposite direction. This man is tall, dark hair and beard, wearing long white robes and sandles. He appears to be very nice and kind with a loving smile on his face. They stop to talk as the person looks up under the load of their big sack. The man says, “That’s a big load you’ve got there friend. Here, I’ve got something for you.” He reaches into his robe and pulls out a very ornate and beautiful box and offers it the the person. They say, “What’s this, what’s in there?” The man opens the box and the person’s eyes get big as they see unimaginable good things inside. “Wow,” they say, “that’s for me?” The man says, “Yes, but you have to do something. You have to lay down that load you’re carrying and take it.”
The person looks at their sack as they shift it to the other shoulder and says, “I’ve had this thing for a long time and it’s a part of me. Can’t you put the box in my pocket or just set it on top of the sack?” The man says, “No, I’m sorry, you have to let go of that stuff to take this.” The person looks back at their heavy sack, pauses for a long few seconds, and finally says, “Well, I guess I’ll have to pass. But thank you anyway.” They then hobble on down the road carrying their heavy load as the man watches them go, shaking his head in sorrow.
What are you holding on to? “Then Jesus said, “Come to me, all of you who are weary and carry heavy burdens, and I will give you rest.” Matthew 11:28. ” Give all your worries to him, because he cares about you.” 1 Peter 5:7.
A person is standing on God’s created earth dirty and dressed in rags. They are bent over with the weight of sin and all that goes alone with it. There are people all over the earth like this. It seems hopeless.
God and Jesus are in Heaven looking down on the scene. God says, “Jesus, I want to do something for them. Satan has deceived them out of the blessings I gave them all in the Garden.” “I need someone to go down there and make things right again.” Jesus says, “Father, I’ll do it.” God says, “Son, you know what that means. You’ll have to take the mess off of each of them onto yourself and die with it.” “I know,” Jesus says, “but I love them. I’ll go.”
So Jesus, dressed in His shining, royal robes, leaves Heaven and appears on earth standing next to the person bent over in the dirty rags. Jesus is standing there tall and strong in stark contrast to the person bent over in their dirty, smelly rags. The person looks up into the loving eyes of Jesus as He says, “Child, I’m here to save you but you have to do something. Take off your rags and take my robes.”
The person doesn’t really understand but they respond with trust to this man. As they put on the Kingly robes, they straighten up, suddenly becoming clean and whole. They look themselves over as their joy increases realizing they are free from the weight of sin. They look back to Jesus to thank Him and what they see stuns them! He has put on their old dirty rags and is now bent over as they were and burdened with the weight He took from them. They say, “Jesus! What….” He replies, “It’s OK, it has to be this way. I love you.”
“For ye know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that, though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor, that ye through his poverty might be rich.” 2 Corinthians 8:9. He did this for us. “For he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him.” 2 Corinthians 5:21. Can you picture the exchange?
Picture ThisA believer is at home and all kinds of trouble has broken loose. This trouble is caused by several little demons who are running around making a mess of the house and the believer’s life. For some reason, the believer has opened the door to this harassment and something has to be done. The believer cries out, “Jesus HELP!”
Suddenly Jesus appears in the living room and the demons stop their ransacking. They know they’re in trouble now and stand there before Jesus trembling. Jesus points His Holy Ghost gun at them and blows them away. No more demon problem. The believer is overjoyed and thanks Jesus profusely. Jesus looks the believer right in the eye and says, “Child, I’m leaving this gun with you, fully loaded with the power of the Spirit. I’m giving you the power to do like I did today if any demons try to bother you again.”
The believer thanks Jesus again and puts the gun over the mantle in a place of honor. Every so often, he gets it down, dusts it off, and admires this treasure from Jesus. Then one day…the demons return causing trouble in the believer’s life again. He cries out to Jesus again but this time Jesus only speaks. “Child, I left you My gun to handle the demons. What did you do with it?” I want you to use My power and My name to deal with these demons this time. Go ahead, do it.”
The believer goes and gets the gun off the mantle as the demons are tearing his house apart. He points the gun and says, “In the name of Jesus….STOP!” The demons hear the name of Jesus and stop. The believer gets them in his sights and, just as Jesus did, blows them away. They’re gone! The believer is stunned. Then, joy returns as he realizes he did as Jesus did with the power Jesus had given him. “Behold, I give unto you power to tread on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy: and nothing shall by any means hurt you. Luke 10:19.
Today will be the first installment of a series of posts called “Picture This”. Our minds have the ability to form images of things we read, hear, or smell. “In the last days, God says, I will pour out my Spirit on all people. Your sons and daughters will prophesy, your young men will see visions, your old men will dream dreams.” Acts 2:17. Over the years, I have “seen” various video-like visions and scenes depicting situations from scripture. Granted, I’m not a young man, but I still see visions. Over the next few weeks I will share some of these in the hopes they will encourage, edify, or enlighten those who read and “picture” them.
Picture this: You are in a courtroom. The judge, God, is sitting behind the bench which is almost eye level to the court participants, one of which is you. On your right is Jesus and on your left is the devil, the accuser of the brethren, Revelation 12:10. You have a medical condition in your body that you want to get rid of. You have asked God to help you with this and here you are before Him in court. From your left you hear, “You’re sick, you have pain, you have to live with it.” You feel the pain, you know you are sick but can anything be done about it? From your right you hear Jesus say, “By my stripes, you are healed!” The devil is telling one thing, the Word of Jesus says another. Which is it going to be. Who will decide?
We read in the Bible, “Every accusation must be verified by two or three witnesses.” 2 Corinthians 13:1. On one side we have a witness saying you’re sick. On the other side, a witness is saying you’re healed. Which one is right? YOU are the deciding witness. Who are YOU going to agree with? You tell the judge, “I agree with Jesus, I am healed!” God pounds His gavel and declares, “The matter is established. He is healed.” Can you picture it?
The Bible says, “The good man out of the good treasure of his heart brings forth what is good; and the evil man out of the evil treasure brings forth what is evil;for his mouth speaks from that which fills his heart.” Luke 6:45. This means that whatever there is more of inside you, is what will come out in casual conversation, in your thoughts, or when you are under stress. I’ve heard it said that whatever your full of will slosh over when you get bumped like a full glass of liquid. What are you full of?
When you’re in traffic and someone turns off without giving a signal and you almost hit them, what comes out of you? When your computer locks up and you haven’t saved what you were working on, what do you say? When something doesn’t go your way AGAIN, what happens? I’ll confess, goodness is not what always comes out of me. But I’m working on emptying the bad and filling up with the good. “Do not get drunk on wine, which leads to debauchery. Instead, be filled with the Spirit.” Ephesians 5:18. This is good advice…no, it’s a command!
I have a friend who was treated very unfairly by those he worked with. He was really done wrong. We used to have lunch together and enjoyed good food and conversation. But after this happened, the whole lunch was a re-hashing of what had happened to him. I had to hear the same story and how he would not forgive them. My friend was definitely full of unforgivenness and bitterness and it came out! How sad. My friend used to be a minister and now, he has left the church.
Being filled with goodness doesn’t just happen, you have to work at it. We are not completely filled with a lifetime supply of the Spirit at salvation, we need to be refilled daily. And that takes effort. I encourage us all to pay attention to what comes out of us daily and see if it’s what would be pleasing to God. And if not, repent, ask forgiveness, and go to the Spirit filling station.
I was sitting in the church service at Riverside Campground in Sevierville, Tennessee this morning and heard the preacher, who is the owner of the campground, mention the solid foundation that God is for us. He mentioned that life will knock us down but if we have a good foundation, we will get back up. For some reason I remembered a toy my sons had years ago called a Weeble. Do you remember those? The catch phrase was, “Weebles wobble but they won’t fall down.” The design of the toy was that they had a heavy rounded base so when you tipped them over, the heavy base caused them to right themselves. They would wobble back and forth but would never stay down because of the way they were made.
It made me think of my life, our lives, in God. If we have God as our solid foundation, the devil may whack us and knock us down but our solid foundation will cause us to pop right back up! The devil can’t keep us down if we depend on God’s foundation. We may wobble and go down but we won’t stay down. “Nevertheless the foundation of God standeth sure, having this seal, The Lord knoweth them that are his.” 2 Timothy 2:19. I can just see the devil now, trying to knock us down but we just keep popping back up. It must be frustrating to him and he’ll quit trying after awhile. Glory to God!
Envision the scene in Luke 8 where Jesus is going to Jairus’ house to heal his daughter but has an encounter with a woman who had a bleeding problem. As with everywhere Jesus went, there was a large crowd surrounding him, bumping and tugging at him but suddenly He stops. He looks around and says, “Someone touched me; I know that power has gone out from me.” Luke 8:46. With all the people in the crowd touching Jesus, what was different about this woman?
Think about this: she had had this bleeding problem for years and had spent all her money on doctors who hadn’t helped her at all. She was considered unclean by Jewish law and wasn’t even supposed to be out in public. But she had heard of this man Jesus who was doing wondrous things and risked everything for the chance to see him. I’m sure there were other people in the crowd who had needs so what was different about this woman?
In Mark 5 it says, “she thought, “If I just touch his clothes, I will be healed.” (verse 28). This statement gives us a glimpse of her faith. She thought, “I don’t have to talk to him, get His attention, or tell Him what I need. If I can just get close enough to touch His clothes, I know I’ll be healed!” That was different than all the other people in the crowd. And what did Jesus say to her? “Daughter, your faith has healed you. Go in peace and be freed from your suffering.” (verse 34). Her faith. That’s what was different. She touch Jesus with her faith.
During morning devotions and prayer on this morning, I was praying for my pastor as I ususally do. I asked God to give him favor in what he was doing in our church. I believe God has a plan and purpose for each of us and we are to seek out what that plan is and follow it. I believe our pastor is doing just that and we are seeing wonderful results. I have to admit I didn’t always totally agree with some of the choices Pastor made but God showed me that our pastor was His chosen man and He was directing him. So it really didn’t make any difference if I disagreed or not. I had to say, “OK God, you’re right, I repent.” I’ve been cool with it ever since and fully support and agree with the plan. Pastor is following God’s lead, things are going well, so I follow both of them!
But on this morning, the Holy Spirit revealed something else to me. As I prayed for favor for our pastor, God showed me that IF Pastor Wayne was following God and His plan for our church, and not pastor’s own plan, he already had God’s favor. God’s not going to lead anyone into failure; His plan is for success and He will get the glory. “Lead us not into temptation…” Matthew 6:13. And another thing, God will take care of financing His plan too. If we follow Him, He will lead us the right way, show us what to do along the way, and pay for it as we go. What a deal!
Today, ask God what His plan for you is, get in it, and you will automatically have favor. “But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you as well“ Matthew 6:33.
