Signs, Signs, Everywhere are Signs!

This morning I had a dream that woke me up.  It's been my experience, when I dream and remember it upon awakening, it is something the LORD is trying to tell me.  So I prayed and asked what it meant and the Holy Spirit revealed to me something so simple, yet so profound.
You're probably wondering what my dream was. so I'll share.

I dreamed that my Dad had a trophy that was very dear to him and it somehow had gotten broken.  I told him that I knew how to fix it and I would take it with me to repair. 

However, as soon as I looked for the glue to repair the trophy, I found the glue was all dried up, so I kept searching until I found NEW glue that hadn't been opened. 

I began to glue the broken piece on and the piece I had been touching started to crumble in my hands.  So I had to glue that piece back on, and then another piece began to crumble.  It seemed that each piece I touched to secure the broken piece would begin to disintegrate and I realized I was running out of glue.

As I said, I prayed and asked the LORD to help me to understand.  He stated, "the past is gone, even if there are broken pieces in your past, you can not fix them by holding on to them, you have to let them go.  Also, stop building trophies to the past, it can not be undone. New glue on old pieces won't hold; the integrity has already been compromised."
I decided to study it out and I found in the Word, several scriptures that show us that the NEW and OLD don't mix.  In fact, if we focus too hard on the old, we may be in danger of  not recognizing the new when it comes.  In Isaiah 43:19 AMP we see:

Behold, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs forth; do you not perceive and know it and will you not give heed to it? I will even make a way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert.

In Matthew 9:17 AMP we see that NEW wine is so potent that it will destroy OLD wineskins:

Neither is new wine put in old wineskins; for if it is, the skins burst and are torn in pieces, and the wine is spilled and the skins are ruined. But new wine is put into fresh wineskins, and so both are preserved.

In my study I also found that there are 32 scriptures speaking of NEW WINE.  I found that interesting and I don't know about you, but I am sensing that the LORD is getting ready to do something NEW and it is something that we have NEVER seen before.  There is a sense of urgency to be prepared and ready to receive what the LORD is getting ready to pour out.  I don't want to be caught up in the past and the ways things were done and miss out on what the LORD wants to do TODAY! 

How about you?

  

Sneaky Snakes and Fiery Serpents

 Recently, I was at a ladies event at my church when the Holy Spirit began to deal with me about my current situation.  Here's the back story...This past year I was unemployed for 6 months, and it was a definite faith walk, but I'm happy to say that my prayers were answered and I landed a job that paid better than my last position. Hallelujah!
I've been at my new job for a few months and as with any new job, there is stress. Unfortunately, this past week the stress went to a whole other level and I left work feeling overwhelmed and utterly defeated...in fact, I cried. 
In my car, I cried out to God in frustration that "all I had wanted was a job that I could enjoy and get paid well!"  Forgetting in that moment, that is EXACTLY what I already had!
How did it get to this point? The job that I had been rejoicing over, was now causing me to cry. 
Two words...murmur and complain.
Oh, it started subtly enough and sitting at the Ladies Event I began to wonder "how subtle was the complaint that Eve had in the garden of Eden that the enemy was able to disguise himself as a serpent and sidle up to her and convince her to disobey the only command she had been given?

In Genesis 3:1-3 MSG we see the serpent ask her about what she did NOT have:

The serpent was clever, more clever than any wild animal God had made. He spoke to the Woman: “Do I understand that God told you not to eat from any tree in the garden?”

^2-3 The Woman said to the serpent, “Not at all. We can eat from the trees in the garden. It’s only about the tree in the middle of the garden that God said, ‘Don’t eat from it; don’t even touch it or you’ll die!

This is how easy it is to fall into murmuring and complaining.  It begins with a mere thought about what you don't have or a perceived slight, and the more you dwell on it, the more it slithers from your mind down into your heart, twisting your perception so that you start to murmur. 

By definition a murmur is a soft indistinct sound and it is also a condition in which the heart produces or is apt to produce a recurring sound indicative of disease or damage.  I found it interesting that a murmur is used to detect a "heart" condition.  OUCH!

The speaker had us turn to Numbers 21:4-9, where we read about the "fiery serpents" that were sent forth among the Israelites while they were in the wilderness because they began to murmur and complain about God and Moses.  Imagine having to pay for complaining with your life!  With the results of their sin slithering between their legs and wreaking havoc, the people repented for their words and cried out to Moses and God.  The Father was faithful and did not leave them in their distress, he instructed Moses to fashion a serpent out of bronze and place it on a pole and all who looked upon it would be healed.  
This definitely puts a new spin on how important our words are and how deadly they can be!
James 3:4-6 MSG further shows us the power of the tongue:

A word out of your mouth may seem of no account, but it can accomplish nearly anything—or destroy it!^5-6 It only takes a spark, remember, to set off a forest fire. A careless or wrongly placed word out of your mouth can do that. By our speech we can ruin the world, turn harmony to chaos, throw mud on a reputation, send the whole world up in smoke and go up in smoke with it, smoke right from the pit of hell.

Thank God, it only took a moment in the presence of my Heavenly Father to make the heart adjustment and to choose to set my eyes on all that He had done for me.  It only took a moment to choose to be grateful for the job I had and to pray for wisdom to handle all that it would entail.  The next day I went to work surrounded by the peace of God and was greeted with this verse on my daily calendar, found in Proverbs 16:3:

"Commit your actions to the Lord, and your plans will succeed.

That's exactly what I will choose to do and when those sneaky snakes start to slither their way between my legs, urging me to voice my complaints, I will choose to focus on the one thing that will heal me...the Word made flesh who dwelt among us and was lifted up on a pole to heal a dying world.  I will look unto JESUS, the author and finisher of my faith and I will rejoice in all He accomplished for me.

Can you take a punch?

Just the other day, my brother and I were talking about our prayer walk and how when you first start out with the Lord, everything seems easy.  You pray, He Answers...BOOM, it's Done!  It galvanizes your prayer walk and you can't wait to pray again!
Then as more time goes by and you pray, it seems as though the LORD answers back and says things like, "umm, you need to get that right first."  So we repent, and as soon as we get our heart right, we see the manifestation.
Then more time elapses, and as you pray, you hear....NOTHING!  You feel....NOTHING!  So you get before God and check your heart and wait to hear if there is some area that needs adjusted and you wait.  You wait. You wait and Y.O.U.W.A.I.T.
Then you start to question.  "Daddy God, is everything all right?"  Did I do something I'm not supposed to be doing?  "Can you hear me Lord?" 
Crickets are chirping and your heart is falling flat and you feel as if you are drifting alone in this wilderness called life.

I likened it to a boxer learning the ropes.  Now, I don't know much about boxing, only what I've seen in the movies but it's enough to illustrate my point.  The boxer doesn't start in the ring, he starts his training on a bag...it doesn't hit back.  Then he graduates to a sparring partner, who hits back, but the boxer has on a helmet so the hits sting but don't usually take him out.  He learns to take a punch before he finally steps in the ring with an opponent and the pads are off and he is on his own.  His trainer is in the corner yelling out encouragement and will be there to fix his cuts and send him back into the fight. And finally, if he trained hard enough, he will be the last one standing when that final bell dings.

Our faith walk is like a prize fight.  We have the Holy Ghost in our corner, but we are in the ring by ourselves and the enemy is going to be throwing his best combinations at us to take us out.  The best fighters seem to be the ones with a plan.  They don't swing aimlessly and wear themselves out.  They are meticulous in their punches.  Sometimes, they even take a few because they know that this will wear their opponent out. The best fighters seem to know when to duck and when to cover themselves under the protection of their gloves. The best fighters also believe that they will be the one still standing, regardless of what they see coming at them.  That is what Faith is according to Hebrews 11:1 NLT

Faith is the confidence that what we hope for will actually happen; it gives us assurance about things we cannot see.

Walking things out in Faith is not for the faint-hearted.  I always laugh when I hear non-believers refer to being a Christian as a crutch, like it's a bad thing.  Years ago, I broke my leg badly and believe me when I tell you, that crutch was a life-line.  It was hard at first; but eventually I got the hang of it and I was grateful for it.  Trust me when I tell you that when something is broken in your life, you lean on your Faith with all your strength and you rejoice that you have something that holds you up so that you don't end up flat on your face, more injured than you were before.  Paul explains it well in 2 Corinthians 12:9 NLT:

Each time he said, “My grace is all you need. My power works best in weakness.” So now I am glad to boast about my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ can work through me.

When I am weak in my own ability, I lean on my Faith in God and I use it to carry me through until I am strengthened and I can make it to the next mark in my journey. Because my friend, life is about the journey and we are to continue to keep pressing forward, despite the pain, despite the loss and as we continue each leg of the journey we celebrate the small victories because in reality, there are no small victories in Christ.

I love this time of the year! It enables me to reflect on what our Lord accomplished for us.  He began this week with a triumphal entry into Jerusalem with shouts of "HOSANNA" ringing in his ears and he ended it lying buried in a borrowed tomb, after suffering the death of a criminal.  To the world, he had failed miserably. He had been abandoned, by all but a few.  I don't know about you, but I can relate to his sorrow.  I have failed.  I have been abandoned.

However, we know now that it was NOT over.  The best was yet to come! On the first day of the new week, the Earth trembled, the stone rolled away and Jesus conquered Death, Hell and the Grave!

He did it for me.  He did it for you. He did it for all.  I remember hearing years ago, a song by Carman called, The Champion.  It had a huge impact on me.  (If you have never heard it, click on the link.)  By the end of it, you will be cheering and declaring the Victory won by the Champion of the Ages...

“Death is swallowed up in victory. O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting?” I Corinthians 15:54-55 NLT