Spirit Anointed Prayer

Ephesians 1:17-22
I keep asking that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father, may give you the Spirit of wisdom and revelation, so that you may know him better. 18I pray also that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints, 19and his incomparably great power for us who believe. That power is like the working of his mighty strength, 20which he exerted in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly realms, 21far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every title that can be given, not only in the present age but also in the one to come. 22And God placed all things under his feet and appointed him to be head over everything for the church, 23which is his body, the fullness of him who fills everything in every way.

Spirit Anointed Prayer

The apostle Paul prayed a spirit anointed prayer over the church of Ephesus and I am sure over all the churches who made up the body of Christ in that day. It is a prayer that we need to have memorized and needs to be our heart felt prayer to the Father for those in the body of Christ in this hour as well as our family and ourselves. It is a prayer that I often pray in behalf of the family because it represents such power and depth of what we need in this hour to come into the fullness of what Father is doing in us His people. This prayer is for the lifting of that veil of our natural mind, reasoning and religious thinking so that we might truly have a spirit of wisdom and revelation into what is God’s purpose and calling for us His saints. Paul is praying that we may get a true revelation of who we rightly are in Christ and the tremendous power that works on our behalf. He is saying that it is that same power that raised Christ from the dead and seated Him at the right hand of the Father in heavenly realms. Paul shares the revelation with us of where we are positionally in Christ Jesus in Colossians 3:1-3, “Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. 2Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things. 3For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God. 4When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.” Romans 8:11 reinforces this truth as it tells us, ” And if the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit, who lives in you.”
There is an exceeding great power at work on our behalf, but it is so often veiled from our view because we are still seeing and comprehending our world after a natural mindset. We don’t understand why God didn’t do this when we prayed and why that didn’t happen and why we seem so powerless at times. Not all things are yet made manifest in this realm. As a result our faith is quenched and we become discouraged. Know that even the early church was subject to great persecution and deliverance from the evil that was perpetrated against them was not always stopped. Many lost their livelihood, their possession, their families and their very own lives also. Where was God? Christ was in the midst of their suffering and persecution. He was still mighty in them and being glorified through them because even their very death and persecution fueled the growth of the church in that day. It is not this earthly life that is our most valuable possession. It is our spiritual life and the hope we have in Christ Jesus. All that we possess in this world we may lose, including our own lives, but the important thing is that we have a revelation of the “Pearl of great price” that we are willing to sell all that we have that we may obtain it. That is the Christ in You, your hope of glory!
God is still on the throne. Christ is still at His right Hand and we are still seated there in Him “far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every title that can be given, not only in the present age but also in the one to come.” All things are coming under His feet even as He has declared it and we are the feet of Jesus. We are the overcomers through which His life and power is destined to triumph.
Listen to what is declared in these last two verses. It is so powerful that is it hard for us to truly fathom. “22And God placed all things under his feet and appointed him to be head over everything for the church, 23which is his body, the fullness of him who fills everything in every way.” Who does the Word declare is the fullness of Him who fills every thing in every way? You are and we are as the body of Christ. We are the fullness of Him! Can you comprehend that? That is hard for me to wrap my mind around. That is why we so need the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him. We have to know who we are so that we know what our identity is. It is Christ Jesus. His name rest upon us and we are the body of His expression. The same power that raised Christ from the dead abides and is activated in you. We can not let the facade of the outward things cloud our spiritual vision and insight. The Lord gave Sharon a quote once that goes to the effect that, “Today’s problems often cloud the sunshine of tomorrows victories.” Even when the clouds come to obscure the light, the sun never fails to shine and so it is with Christ, His Word and His promises. He shall do and accomplish all that He has declared He would and we are the agents of that fulfillment. Stand strong and stand encouraged, “Ye are of God, little children, and have overcome them: because greater is he that is in you, than he that is in the world. (1 John 4:4).

Blessings,
#kent

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Be Kind to One Another

 

Be Kind to One Another

Ephesians 4:32

And be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ’s sake hath forgiven you. 

It occurs to me that simple acts of kindness are perhaps one of the greatest expressions and testimonies of the love of God working through us.  Think about the example of marriage for a moment.  Two people start out deeply attracted and hopelessly in love with one another.  There isn’t anything they wouldn’t do for each other.  What changes?  Through time we tend to become more involved with life outside of each other, little irritations and annoyances begin to eat at us, our familiarity with each other begins to give place to disregard and sometimes even contempt for each other.  What was so special becomes more and more common and less and less special and appreciated.  Soon we begin to give expression to annoyances, irritations and dissatisfactions.  In defense and hurt the spouse releases their own barrage of complaints.  Little by little, what was so perfect and beautiful can become a battleground of insults, hurts and offenses.  The relationship becomes divided; each party withdraws from the other more and more till often the end result is separation and divorce.  

One of the givens in life is that even the people you love the most will sometimes offend and fail to meet your expectations and likewise you will do the same to them.  The greatest antidote to these shortcomings is love, forgiveness and kindness.  Let’s back up for a moment and see what precedes our scripture on kindness.  Ephesians 4:24-31 says, “But ye have not so learned Christ.  If so be that ye have heard him, and have been taught by him, as the truth is in Jesus: That ye put off concerning the former conversation the old man, which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts; And be renewed in the spirit of your mind.  And that ye put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness. Wherefore putting away lying, speak every man truth with his neighbour: for we are members one of another. Be ye angry, and sin not: let not the sun go down upon your wrath: 

 Neither give place to the devil. Let him that stole steal no more: but rather let him labour, working with [his] hands the thing which is good, that he may have to give to him that needeth. Let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth, but that which is good to the use of edifying, that it may minister grace unto the hearers. And grieve not the holy Spirit of God, whereby ye are sealed unto the day of redemption. Let all bitterness, and wrath, and anger, and clamour, and evil speaking, be put away from you, with all malice:” Right here some of us may see our relationships and where they have come too.  If we find ourselves here, we are not only grieving that person we are in relationship with but we are also grieving the Holy Spirit.  You may say, “but you don’t know how much this person irritates me, failed me and disappointed me.”  You may not realize how much you have irritated, failed and disappointed the Holy Spirit.  If God dealt with us, as we deserved we would all be toast.  The Lord sees beyond our faults, shortcomings and the attributes of irritation and sees our heart.  He has determined to love us in spite of ourselves and He operates in our lives for our highest good, not His.  If the Lord were only looking out for His interests He would have never laid down His life for the undeserving creatures that we are.  In Christ, we must adopt this same mindset, where we are no longer responding and acting from our feelings, but out of the mind and heart of God.  This is an attitude in life where we are not easily offended through the hurtful comments and actions of others, where we return good for evil, where we bless those who curse us, give beyond that which others may take from us, go the extra mile and act out of kindness, tenderheartedness and forgiveness.  These are the love and actions that the world can’t understand, because it so supersedes any kind of love we find in the world.  

Our place to develop and practice this love and kindness of Christ is first in our own homes and relationships.  Most of the time the hardest people to be kind, tenderhearted and forgiving too are those of our own household.  This is most often where we will see the reflection of the true nature that is working in us.  Do you like what you see?  Is it what you want and hope to be?  

As we learn to bring every thought and action under submission and obedience to the Holy Spirit we may find ourselves speaking and acting, not out of what we feel in the natural, but out of what we know to be the mind and love of God.  As we plant these seeds of kindness, tenderheartedness and forgiveness, we may find our harvest much richer than we ever imagined.  We can’t change the heart and actions of others.  They alone are responsible for those.  The way we can change them is by first changing us.  Perhaps they aren’t really the problem; they are only a symptom of a problem that may have its root in us.  Let God have His perfect work of grace in you today.  Speak the words of kindness that bring grace to the hearer.  Let random acts of kindness fill your day as you bless even those who may not deserve it, even as the Lord has blessed you.  Take this to heart concerning your former nature, “But ye have not so learned Christ. If so be that ye have heard him, and have been taught by him, as the truth is in Jesus: That ye put off concerning the former conversation the old man, which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts; And be renewed in the spirit of your mind; And that ye put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness.” 

 

Blessings,

kent