The Power Of Forgiveness

  
    You know, you can shout at the mountain, curse the fig tree and pray your greatest desire, but if you have offense in your heart toward your brother or sister, you are just blowing hot air.   Why?  'Cause if you don't forgive, neither will your heavenly Father, and if He doesn't forgive - quit praying and save your breath.  At that point, if you are going to pray, pray for forgiveness for your sin of un-forgiveness.   Now, with un-forgiveness in your heart, what your brother or sister did, or did not do, becomes irrelevant.  Your problem isn't with them any longer.  It is with God!  When you suspend yourself from His forgiveness, with your petty problem, you have suspended yourself from grace, the substance from which prayers are answered. And, before  you tell me your problem isn't petty, measure it against the loss of God's forgiveness, the absence of His grace and then tell me about it. With your unforgiveness, you have stopped faith which works by love, love best expressed by forgiving those who deserve and those who do not deserve it
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    Over the years in the ministry, I have seen people sacrifice the grace of God, their relationship with Him, answers to prayers and valuable family and church relationships for some of the stupidest, dumbest, petty things. I have known of churches to split and people to risk everything over a disagreement of the color of the carpet.  Really now, compared to what they lose, how important is the color of the carpet?  Instinctively I would love to deal with such folks like dealing with a Missouri mule - which is a thumping over the head with a 2X4 until they pay attention.  Oh, I know, I can't do it but you see, I know it would shorten their misery considerably.  And, they are going to have misery.  Sooner or later, you will hear them say, "Oh, I just don't know why God isn't answering my prayers".  Or, "the devil is really giving me a hard time".  Or, "things are falling apart".  Or, "everything is going wrong".  Or........(should I go on?)

   I dread the day (if I am still on earth) when persecution comes, and it may well come.  Jesus said it would and it already has for a lot of Christians around the world. I am afraid that in the modern church, there may not be a lot of leaping and rejoicing as God expects from those persecuted. We can't even handle a cross-eyed glance from the fellow Christian on the same pew without a fuss and possible a changing of churches. A small inconvenience is likely to cause us to disown friends and family.  Somebody calls us a  bad name and we return the favor with whatever name we can think of that is worse. Somebody slightly inconvenience us, insult us, neglect us and we are DONE WITH THEM!   Yessiree Bob!  DONE - cut them off.

   Seriously, was it worth it?  Do you know the risk in being so easily de-chipped (having chip knocked off shoulder)?  Is it worth separation from the grace, mercy and forgiveness of God just so you could feel bad toward someone?  Having to get even, having to win a struggle is a curse on people that Christians should not be under.  If we our life having to always be right, always win, always be treated fairly as we see it, we exclude God from so much of our life.  For me, no sun is going down on whatever petty wrath, grievance, hurt feelings, inconvenience, etc., that I might have.  It is not worth it to me!  I value being able to walk in the grace of God.  I value having my faith be effective.  I value having God fight my battles and not have to fight them on my own.   There are two pieces of advice I would give to you Missouri mules:  One, forgive quickly, no matter what the other party says or does.  God is more important than them.  Two, stop getting your feelings hurt so easily.  Grow up and toughen up.  Just sayin!

Tunnel Vision?

  

   Have you ever heard the term tunnel vision?  It is a real physical condition.  It is even a condition some creatures have genetically.  For example, a dove has little or no peripheral vision and "dove's eyes" for God is a wonderful condition and phrase used in the Bible (Song of Sol.) which means you have eyes only for Him.  However, to have tunnel vision spiritually, beyond that, is not a healthy condition, yet it is a condition that is quite common in the church.  It is a condition that divides and ultimately denies the blessing of God to so many of His people.

   What the enemy does, without us seemingly being able to resist, is that he gets us fixated on one concept, one truth, one way of looking at things and traps us in that view - hence tunnel vision.  It works like this:  suppose you are in your house, looking out the north window.  You see quite well all the details, the trees, the grass,etc., everything in your field of vision out of that north window.  However, you see nothing out of the south, east and west window. What is seen out those windows is just as real as what you see, but in your fixation, you don't believe it.  You start a denomination that only views things thru the north window vision and by that vision, resist all other visions, judging and rejecting all who do not look out the north window.

   What you see out of that window is good and true but what you miss is three times bigger.  What you receive is good, but what you missed is three times more.  My friend, this describes much of modern Christianity.  Those looking out that north window see that Jesus saves.  "Wonderful, wonderful"  they shout and build their whole denomination around that vision, that one truth.  Do not tell them that God baptizes with the Holy Ghost, a view from the south window, or that He heals, a view from the west, or that He prospers, a view from the east.  "No, No!" they will shout defiantly.  "Jesus saves, Jesus saves...that is it!" defending their view from that north window.  Though they have absolute truth on their side, they are being robbed of other equally wonderful absolute truths.  They cling to that north window view with white knuckle tenacity.  Others, looking out a different window, do the same with their view.

  God saw this coming, which is why Paul prayed that the eyes of our understanding would be opened so that we would know the "hope" (what to expect to come with our calling) and that we would know the "riches" of our inheritance.  We are to know, not just some part of our inheritance, but the riches of our inheritance.  The opposite of understanding is ignorance and the same Bible book tells us that ignorance blinds the eyes and by that alienates us from the life of God.  I found myself praying for the church (and not just my church) would have eyes opened to the riches of God.  That it would begin to lift up its eyes and look to every direction and see the rain of God coming from every direction

Study How?

   How do you study the Word, the Bible?  To just study is a good thing, but don't be surprised if along the way,  how you study and what you seek to know as you study changes.  As a young Christian, I just read the Bible, I didn't study.  Later, as I grew, I started studying, memorizing, trying to understand the things of God.  I started studying to know the principles of God that run thru the whole Bible.  Then, I started studying to know the promises of God that were for me.  Then I started studying to know how to minister the Word and the Spirit  to people.  Good!  All good!  Along the way, I also studied to find out what God was looking for in me and what was missing in me.  Painful, but good!  All good!

    In in the last few decades have I began to study to know God, not just know about God, and in a different way.  I know you are thinking, "he is getting a late start", but, not so fast my friend. Knowing God is multi-dimensional, lifetime endeavor.  In these last few decades, God has taken me back over all those previous studies, and taught me to see it all through His eyes.  Same lessons, different viewpoint.  In some cases, I saw my previous conclusions were not so great. In some of those studies, I only saw "me" and what was in it for "me".  In some cases, what was a seed of information became a tree of knowledge. Some were "ah ha!" moments.   In every case, as God put me back in class, I saw seen things I had never seen even though I had studied the subject before.  Here is what I have learned:  you can know about God and even know God, but not really know Him at the highest level (and I am not yet sure I know what the highest is).  However, what I do know is that knowing God at a higher level requires seeing what you see, in the Word and then in living, through His eyes.  Being "seated" in heavenly places, for me, has become about vision and maturity of vision.  From there, in the Spirit realm, you begin to see what God sees and only then can you sort of begin to understand what God was, or is, desiring, wanting, aiming toward. And in that, your knowledge of God increases.

   Here is another interesting conclusion:  in all those previous studies, what I learned was not wrong or false. They were truths, but lower level truths. Example?  I learned that God saved me by grace (lower level truth) then I learned why He saved me which was to worship Him (higher level truth).  Both true, both good, but from very different views.  Through my eyes, I was glad to just be saved and miss hell.  Through His eyes, I began to see there was more here than just missing hell. I began to have understanding.  It is easy to have knowledge without having understanding but as we grow in God and His Word, seeing from His vantage point, so does our understanding grow.  Nothing changed in those studies, except my understanding.

   Here lies the problem: The spirit of religion will do all it can to get you to hold fast to one understanding while rejecting all others.  Result?  Babyhood, meatless, infancy.  These are those Paul wrote of who should have been eating meat but were only able to take milk. Problem?  In spiritual infantile thinking, we adopt a one-size fits all mentality.  Everything for everybody has to be exactly the same, and then of course, we have then established ourselves as judges responsible for making sure we all have the right size truth.  From this comes group think, denominational-ism, traditional-ism and collective salvation.  As a result, any true forward movement in understanding gets rejected by men for it means different size truths for different folks, and that then ends men's ability to judge one another. And, that would means, to religious folks, a loss of control, something people don't want to give up. We love playing God and judging others.  Problem?  If our understanding does not grow, then our knowledge of God does not grow.  Problem?  If we do not graduate in our understanding, we demote ourselves to tradition.  What we believe then becomes just our tradition.  Our truths may have come from and started with God, but we made it our tradition.  Suffering a plague of snake bites, God told Moses to put a brazen snake on a pole and all who looked on it would be healed.  Soon the plague was over, no more problem, except, it took 900 hundred years to get those people to quit worshipping the snake on the pole.  That snake on a pole started with a Word from God but those folks turned it to tradition.  According to Jesus, the one thing capable of making the Word of God "of none effect", without power,  is "traditions".

   The ultimate problem?  The ultimate problem is that failure to grow in understanding eventually eliminates a true relationship with the Spirit of God.  The job of the Spirit is to reveal, to bring understanding, to give us God's view, to reveal the "deep" things of God.  However, if we are totally convinced we already have the deep things, then we get no more deep things of God revealed to us.  We put the lid on!  You are then back in the same shape the Pharisees were when they encountered Jesus. Your traditions and traditional thinking keeps you from having an ear to hear what the Spirit of God is saying and is saying.... NOW!   The Bible says of itself that the "letter" kills but the Spirit give life to the letter.  The way the letter kills is that you make it a tradition and refuse to grow in understanding.  Our life with God is to be from truth to truth, faith to faith, glory to glory, change to change.  Tradition digs a rut and there you plunk yourself down and go no more, grow no more.  Of course, a rut is a grave with both ends kicked out.  You can escape, but you have to move.

   

   

Has God changed?

  

     Has God changed?  The answer is emphatically "NO"!!!!  But, how He feels about things can change, that being a part of His being.  How He relates to man may change, hence the various covenants in the Bible including this "new" and better one we are in.  Most importantly, how He relates to us, in this covenant versus the old covenant has changed and if you do not know the difference, you are, right now, being robbed.   The unchangeable God has within Himself the ability to be righteously angry. Being a just God He had within Him a demand for justice for the sin of a perfect man, Adam.   When Adam sinned, God was made angry.  That wrath stayed in Him until the cross.  When precious Jesus blood was shed on the cross, that anger, that wrath was propitiated.  Propitiation is a wonderful word which means an act that turns wrath to mercy.  By precious blood we have been redeemed from the wrath of God.  A price we could not pay was paid by one who could.  God did not change, but his wrath was propitiated when a sufficient price was paid.  The capability of wrath is still in Him should there be, or had there been, another perfect man who could and did sin original sin as did Adam.  However, thank you Jesus, that is over and done with.  

    When you read the Old Testament, and you see what you consider the most wonderful picture of the goodness of God, it is exciting to know, that the best He was then, He is better now.  As good as He is seen there, He is more "gooder" now. There was a shadow over God then.  Justice had not been met, wrath was in Him.  Now, halelujah, glory to God, the best promise you see in the old covenant, is better now.  Has He changed?  No, but his wrath has been turned to mercy. The shadow of His wrath is gone.  All the good promises you see in the Old Testament, were promises made with a cloud of wrath over God. They were made without the demanded penalty of sin being paid.  Reading this, you might not fully understand if you do not know how great was the wrath of God about the sin of a perfect man that roped all man-kind into one doomed family. His wrath was fierce beyond words.   As good as God was, all through the Old Testament, He wanted to be better and is better now.  No, He has not changed, but his unchangeable demand for payment of the sin of Adam, has been met.  Now, glory to God, we have a new and better covenant that our unchangeable God wanted to have with us all along.

     The amazing thing to know, once you know we are in a new and better covenant, is how good God was, in the old covenant, even though His wrath was unrequited. Those promises of His love and goodness found there, were made by God, still unsatisfied over the fall of man, yet so willing to be merciful, even in His wrath.  For Adam's sin, God cursed all man-kind, yet showed love, mercy and goodness to the very people He had cursed.  How could He?   I don't know.  I know at times He was on the brink of starting all over, He was so exasperated.  He told Moses that at one juncture.  But, He didn't.  Whew!

    Maybe it is a stretch to compare anything about us with God, but have you ever carried a grudge, an anger or sense of injustice in your heart for a long, long time with it getting heavier and heavier with each passing day?  Maybe not, but if you did and then one day, justice transpired, the anger lifted, the burden passed. "Glory to God"   you shouted with great relief.  This was God's life until Jesus paid it all.  When Jesus paid the price, a burden was lifted in the realms of glory. When Jesus whispered from the cross "it is finished", I don't think He was thinking of us.  He was thinking of His Father, carrying a burden we can only imagine, suddenly made free.  The price had been paid!  All of heaven must have echoed "it is finished..it is finished...it is finished!.   Now, and only now, God could sweep the ugliest among us imperfect beings, descendants one and all of Adam, into His arms and say "Welcome".   Now, and only now, God without wrath could say to us frail, imperfect beings "Oh yes, I forgive".

    Has God changed?  No!  If He could be loving and forgiving then, without the cross, with unsatisfied wrath in His being,  how much more can He be loving and forgiving now.  He always wanted to be this way, that was His unchangeable self, but He couldn't until the cross.  But, but, but HE CAN NOW!  Now, to whosoever will, He says "I love you" and He started the conversation while we were yet sinners. Before we even cleaned up one stain, He commended His love toward us (Ro. 5 :8)

  

Prosperity boundaries

     
    If you observe the boundaries God puts on prosperity, as found in the New Testament, seeking godly prosperity is a safe thing, even tho' the love of money is a root of evil and riches are specifically said, in the Bible,  to have deceitfulness within.  When we miss the boundaries, deceitfulness of riches takes root and a good word can become a wrong word.  One important New Testament boundary put on the idea of prosperity is that we are to prosper as our soul prospers, (3 Jo. 2).  Notice this is your soul that is to be prosperous?  This is soul, not spirit and not body. Your soul is your rational, emotional, logical being.  It was not born again, as was your spirit, and it requires saving through the "engrafting" of the Word of God.  In terms of prosperity, your rational, emotional and logical being needs to be in healthy condition in order to handle money and not have money handle it.  In other words, you don't need any more riches than your soul can properly handle.  That is a boundary.   You don't have to be a genius to see that some folks get the prosperity message a little too early in their Christian walk and instead of them getting money, money gets them.  And, they make a mess of the message. Chances are, eventually, they will make a mess out of themselves as well.

  
     A soul that is not prosperous, who hears the message too early or in the wrong condition, will soon have nothing to talk about, except money.  He will pick up the Bible and every verse to him will be about money.   He will follow the money trail in every way he can.  If in the ministry, he may very quickly become a prosperity specialist. A soul that is not prosperous will hear this pitch, maybe from his television,  "send money and God will give you three times more money, more anointing, more of everything.  No wait...if you call now....He will give you ten times more".  Off his money goes and one of two things will happen, both terrible!  One, he will grow old and gray and his seed will never come back. And, he will forever bare the bruise of disappointment. Two, and maybe worse,  it will come back and he will forever think that the things of God can be bought with money.  Everything wrong about his concepts of prosperity will be affirmed. He will begin to sound like this one prosperity specialist I heard who declared to a bunch of preachers, including myself, "you don't need more God, you just need more money".  That tells you everything wrong about that man's concept of prosperity. His money had satisfied his soul. His hunger for and dependency upon God was over. All he wants is mo' money!!!

    
    The lack of prosperity in man's soul will cause his money, for a time, to satisfy his soul.  He will begin to feel that the presence of money is somehow spiritual affirmation. How much money, mammon, stuff he has becomes his boundary line.  And, that is a faulty measure.  Hear it?  "Look here, I have a Mercedes, airplane and a ton of gold.  I have great faith and am God's favorite son".  This is the condition a lot of folks, having heard just such a pitch, or something like it, find themselves in.  They yielded to the pitch, gave money and it seemingly worked. They got money back and deemed it to be good.  The noose tightened as they began to identify God with their money. Instead of a conduit through whom God can flow, they soon become a vault stuffed with "stuff".  Instead of being a river, they became a pond.  I shudder at some of the schemes going on that seem to work and at the willingness of participants to call it as being of God, though it has zero Bible basis.  Their proof of validity is the money in their pocket, not the Bible, not the voice of the Holy Ghost, and not even the flow of giving.  "It worked - so it must be God"  they say. I questioned a pastor once, who had given in to one of these schemes, so blatantly inconsistent with the New Covenant.  It had worked for him, in that money did seem to roll in. When questioned about a New Testament basis for the scheme, his attitude was "don't care...it worked".  My, oh, my is that a prescription for deceit or what?    That a perfect definition of iniquity.

    My advice is that we must never forget that the true measure of success for any prosperity plan, a boundary to be observed,  is not does it work to bring you money or "stuff", but does it work to make you a giver.   Does it fit  in the New Testament covenant we have with God?  Can we teach it to others, using words from our new covenant?   And, another measure of success is not how much flowed in, but how much flowed out.  God does not particularly love "cheerful" rich people but He particularly loves "cheerful" givers, be they rich or poor. Believe me, the devil uses the love of money and knows that if we accept money as a God thing, he has a handle on us and will begin to manipulate us away from God. He knows we can be bought.

    My friend, you cannot buy the things of God.  You cannot buy anointing.  You cannot buy riches, healing, gifts.  You cannot buy more Holy Ghost.  If you could, Bill Gates could become the Pope of the church world wide.  But, you can't.  What you can do is involve yourself, including money, service, praise, love, spiritual gifts, knowledge, giftings, and anything and everything you have with God. At every chance, give.  Listen to the Holy Ghost, and when He says "give", give.  His voice is another safe boundary for prosperity.   Know what you are doing.  You are showing grace.  You are sowing grace.  And, what you get back is grace.  Priceless grace. For involving yourself in the affairs of God (grace), He involves Himself in your affairs (grace). And, His grace comes back "abundant".    What you can do is work on having a prosperous soul, so that when and if success / riches come, it won't make much difference to you as a Christian person.  Have you seen a person go from rags to riches and become a different person in the process?  It is a sad sight.  Have you seen that poor person, whining and groaning because he was broke, get money and then become radical in his praise?  That too is a bit sad. 

    A prosperous soul?  One that values God and the touch of God above all.  One, that with or without money, abased or abounding, finds satisfaction in God, not in the things of the earth.  One that looks at "stuff" and says  "I would like to have some of that stuff so I could give it away". A prosperous soul is one emotionally free to enjoy God and the things of God, with or without money.  Like the Apostle Paul, he knows how to be abased or how to abound and in whatever state he finds himself in, he is satisfied. His sustaining strength comes from Christ, not his stuff nor lack of stuff (Phil. 4:11-13).  Money will not satisfy this man's soul.  It is too healthy to be decieved by money.  A prosperous soul never falls in love with his mammon (stuff). He knows the boundaries. He knows Jesus said you "cannot" (meaning impossible) serve both God and mammon.  It is not forbidden, it is just impossible, even if you wanted to.  God will not compete with man's "stuff".