Those Who can Hear

Luke 19:41-44
As he approached Jerusalem and saw the city, he wept over it 42and said, “If you, even you, had only known on this day what would bring you peace—but now it is hidden from your eyes. 43The days will come upon you when your enemies will build an embankment against you and encircle you and hem you in on every side. 44They will dash you to the ground, you and the children within your walls. They will not leave one stone on another, because you did not recognize the time of God’s coming to you.”

Those Who can Hear

This morning as I read these words I saw how they will apply to the Christian religion like they did to Jerusalem. The Christian religion is often the Saul that seeks to kill their David and the Jews that kill their Messiah. They call good evil and evil good. They have their established path and doctrine and they so often dogmatically refuse to move from it, truth or not. Many in this hour are catching the vision of how God is taking so many out of a dead form that has been largely shaped and molded by the ideologies and agendas of men with enough truth and Jesus to make it look of God. God is saying this is time for the former things to pass away that all things may become new. God is no longer in our temples made with stone. That is not to say that there are not precious saints still within their walls. It grieved the heart of Jesus because when He saw what was to come upon Jerusalem and because He was their peace and He was hidden from their eyes as a whole. He saw and prophesied the destruction of Jerusalem because it represented the former covenant that was passing away that the NEW covenant might come in. This parallels much of what is happening in this day when many in the throes of the Christian religion fail to see that this is the day of the Kingdom. As Christ is ushering in His Kingdom through a people who are learning their identity in Him, there will be those in Christianity who will be jealous, envious and will rise up to resist this coming move of God. Just as the Jews, as a whole, missed the Messiah many who regard themselves as Christians will miss Him again.
The word of the Lord is going forth to all those who have an ear to hear. It is not your theology of the rapture that will save you, it is your entering into Him now. His presence is already here in such a powerful way moving among those He is raising us up in this hour. Many are looking up into the heavens and into the outward realms for Christ to come and Jesus says what so many fail to hear in Luke 17:20-21, “Once, having been asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God would come, Jesus replied, “The kingdom of God does not come with your careful observation, 21nor will people say, ‘Here it is,’ or ‘There it is,’ because the kingdom of God is within you.” Many will miss the coming kingdom because they are looking in the wrong place and are still focused on the outward.
Even now these words will be hard for many to hear. Your safety is not in the walls and gates of Jerusalem or the walls of your theology and religion. Your safety is in the mighty fortress of your God and in the power of His Spirit life within you. You must learn where His hiding place is for you and what it is to be hidden under the shadow of His wing. You will find it in the rest of God, not in religious works and efforts. The only one that will bring us peace and safety is Christ and the intimate relationship of knowing Him. He gave warning to the people that truly knew Him and rescued them out of Jerusalem before destruction came, but those who put their confidence in the walls and bulwarks of their tradition and religion that they thought God would protect, found that which they had built and relied upon utterly torn down and destroyed with not one stone left standing upon another. If you are resting and trusting upon the walls of your Christian religion, denominations and traditions you may well perish with them for the Kingdom of God is being ushered in and the former things are passing away with violence.
Hear the Word of the Lord in Luke 13:34, “”O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you, how often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing! 35Look, your house is left to you desolate. I tell you, you will not see me again until you say, ‘Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.'” So it is in this day and this hour. Hear what the Spirit of the Lord is speaking!

Blessings,
#kent

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A New Song

Isaiah 42:13

The Lord will march out like a mighty man, like a warrior he will stir up his zeal;

with a shout he will raise the battle cry and will triumph over his enemies.

A New Song

What is it that causes the Lord to perform this scripture in Isaiah?  What is it that brings forth the warrior and mighty man in our Lord?  What is it that causes us to triumph over our enemies, because the Lord does battle for us?  

Isaiah 42:9-12 prefaces this scripture by saying, “Sing to the Lord a new song,

his praise from the ends of the earth, you who go down to the sea, and all that is in it,

you islands, and all who live in them.  11Let the desert and its towns raise their voices;

let the settlements where Kedar lives rejoice.  Let the people of Sela sing for joy;

let them shout from the mountaintops.  12Let them give glory to the Lord and proclaim his praise in the islands.”  It is the “new song” that the body of Christ raises unto the Lord.  It is the song of praise that declares His glory and honor and majesty.  It is the united voice of the bride as she sings praise to her Bridegroom who is her protector and defender.  Perhaps one of the greatest weapons and instruments of spiritual warfare we can weld is the instrument of true praise and worship birthed out of our spirit by the Holy Spirit.  It is the Spirit of God moving through our spirits as we offer them as these instruments of praise and worship that stirs up the Lord on our behalf.  It is our praise and confidence in Him that stirs up His zeal and causes Him to be jealous over His people.  Then will the Lord come forth to do battle for us as we enter by the Spirit, as one body, into the “new song” of the Lord.  

Is this not what Jehosaphat experienced in 2 Chronicles 20 when “Moabites and Ammonites with some of the Meunitesa came to make war on Jehoshaphat”?  He is the example of what the Lord can do for us if we cry out to Him and trust Him with all of our hearts.  

The Spirit of the Lord came on Jahaziel, son of Zechariah. “He said: “Listen, King Jehoshaphat and all who live in Judah and Jerusalem! This is what the LORD says to you: ‘Do not be afraid or discouraged because of this vast army. For the battle is not yours, but God’s. 16 Tomorrow march down against them. They will be climbing up by the Pass of Ziz, and you will find them at the end of the gorge in the Desert of Jeruel. 17 You will not have to fight this battle. Take up your positions; stand firm and see the deliverance the LORD will give you, Judah and Jerusalem. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged. Go out to face them tomorrow, and the LORD will be with you.’”

 18 Jehoshaphat bowed down with his face to the ground, and all the people of Judah and Jerusalem fell down in worship before the LORD. 19 Then some Levites from the Kohathites and Korahites stood up and praised the LORD, the God of Israel, with a very loud voice.

 20 Early in the morning they left for the Desert of Tekoa. As they set out, Jehoshaphat stood and said, “Listen to me, Judah and people of Jerusalem! Have faith in the LORD your God and you will be upheld; have faith in his prophets and you will be successful.” 21 After consulting the people, Jehoshaphat appointed men to sing to the LORD and to praise him for the splendor of his holiness as they went out at the head of the army, saying:

   “Give thanks to the LORD, for his love endures forever.”

 22 As they began to sing and praise, the LORD set ambushes against the men of Ammon and Moab and Mount Seir who were invading Judah, and they were defeated. 23 The Ammonites and Moabites rose up against the men from Mount Seir to destroy and annihilate them. After they finished slaughtering the men from Seir, they helped to destroy one another.

 24 When the men of Judah came to the place that overlooks the desert and looked toward the vast army, they saw only dead bodies lying on the ground; no one had escaped. 25 So Jehoshaphat and his men went to carry off their plunder, and they found among them a great amount of equipment and clothing and also articles of value—more than they could take away. There was so much plunder that it took three days to collect it. 26 On the fourth day they assembled in the Valley of Berakah, where they praised the LORD. This is why it is called the Valley of Berakah to this day.

 27 Then, led by Jehoshaphat, all the men of Judah and Jerusalem returned joyfully to Jerusalem, for the LORD had given them cause to rejoice over their enemies. 28 They entered Jerusalem and went to the temple of the LORD with harps and lyres and trumpets.

 29 The fear of God came on all the surrounding kingdoms when they heard how the LORD had fought against the enemies of Israel. 30 And the kingdom of Jehoshaphat was at peace, for his God had given him rest on every side. (2 Chronicles 20:15-30)”  

Here we see the power of that “new song”  that is based in praise and worship.  It is the power of praise that sets the spiritual armies of God in motion and destroys our enemies.  

Add this weaponry to your spiritual arsenal.  For through the praises of His people the Lord is mighty to battle on our behalf.  This “new song” is a spiritual song of praise and power.  Let us unite our voices in one accord to lift up the praises of our God and by the Spirit sing to Him a “new song” that brings about the destruction of our enemies.  We never lift a finger to fight.  It is the Lord that goes before to battle for us.  How great is our God!  Praise His awesome name!

 

Blessings,

kent

Lust

Lust

Psalms 81:12
So I gave them up unto their own hearts’ lust: [and] they walked in their own counsels.

Lust is an area where we all struggle. Many of us automatically associate lust with sexual lust and while that is one arena that it greatly works in, it is by no means that only one. Lust, is much the same as covetousness. It is the strong desire, passion and delight in a desirable thing or object. Typically, what do we have a strong passion and desire for? Usually it is for the things that we can’t have or that we ought not to have. This is what we commonly phrase, “lusting after the flesh”. It is our flesh that is at enmity with God or at war with Him. It is a battle that we fight in our souls, but finds expression through our flesh. Now, lust could have a good connotation, in that “I lust after the Spirit”, or have a strong passion and desire for God. Certainly this is the direction we would want our lust to take us, but more times than not it is taking us in another direction, the way of the flesh.
In our scripture today the context of what is being talked about is when God brought the children of Israel out of Egypt and was leading them through the wilderness. Lust was a condition of their hearts that led them away from God and the higher purposes that He had for them. It continues on after our theme verse to say in Psalms 81:13-16, “Oh that my people had hearkened unto me, [and] Israel had walked in my ways I should soon have subdued their enemies, and turned my hand against their adversaries. The haters of the LORD should have submitted themselves unto him: but their time should have endured for ever. He should have fed them also with the finest of the wheat: and with honey out of the rock should I have satisfied thee.” If we want to be fed with the finest wheat (the bread of Life) and the honey out of the rock (the truth and revelation of Christ), then we have to hearken unto the Spirit and not unto our flesh when the lust of our desires and want to’s conflict with the Spirit within us.
What is the first thing we want to do when our desires or lust conflict with our spirit? Typically we begin to reason, justify and compromise. Let’s put the old mind to work on it, he’ll come up with a way to make it all right. Isn’t that how we generally try and find peace with ourselves, by rationalizing something in our mind? Or we compartmentalize it and justify it by saying to ourselves, “this is okay in this area of our lives, but not okay over here.” We develop different standards depending on whether we are dealing with family, or business, or social engagements, or spiritual activities. The truth is, God has one standard that applies to every area of our lives. Daniel, in the Old Testament, didn’t cease to pray routinely, just because it wasn’t the politically correct thing to do. He was consistent in every area of his life. We must be no different.
What happens when we start shutting the voice and the conviction of the Holy Spirit out and continue on in the way our flesh wants to go? For one thing, we grow hard of hearing and hard of heart. We have a free will and God will let us go our own way, but the more we go our way the more estranged we become with Him and the less clearly we hear His Spirit’s leading and direction.
Temptation is merely the incitement of my passion, desire or lust for something. James, deals with this issue in a very straight forward way when he says in James 1:12 -16, ”
Blessed [is] the man that endureth temptation: for when he is tried, he shall receive the crown of life, which the Lord hath promised to them that love him. Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God: for God cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempteth he any man: But every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust, and enticed.
Then when lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin: and sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death. Do not err, my beloved brethren.” He lays out the progression of lust from beginning to end and then exhorts us, “don’t fall for it precious saints.”
Again, James deals with lust in James 4:1-5, “From whence [come] wars and fightings among you? [come they] not hence, [even] of your lusts that war in your members? Ye lust, and have not: ye kill, and desire to have, and cannot obtain: ye fight and war, yet ye have not, because ye ask not. Ye ask, and receive not, because ye ask amiss, that ye may consume [it] upon your lusts. Ye adulterers and adulteresses, know ye not that the friendship of the world is enmity with God? whosoever therefore will be a friend of the world is the enemy of God. Do ye think that the scripture saith in vain, The spirit that dwelleth in us lusteth to envy?” It is the lust of our hearts that entices us away from God to pursue our own passions that are in opposition to His will for us; thus we become His enemy rather than his friend. Our desires become our idol and God is saying, “Don’t you know how jealous I am over you?” God is envious and desirous of us, of our hearts, our affections and our faithfulness to Him. We become like the adulterer that forsakes his relationship to pursue another lover. We grieve the Holy Spirit in doing this.
The apostle John gives us this exhortation in 1 John 2:15-17, “Love not the world, neither the things [that are] in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him.
For all that [is] in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world And the world passeth away, and the lust thereof: but he that doeth the will of God abideth for ever.” Peter makes the remark that the corruption that is in the world is the result of lust and the whole reason that God has given us such wonderful and divine promises is to help us escape out of that snare and stronghold that is taking the world to judgement. He says in 1Peter 1:4, “Whereby are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises: that by these ye might be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust.” God desires that our desire be first for Him. He loves us with a jealous love and desires that we are faithful. He wants to give us a divine nature that has escaped the corruption that lust brings to our hearts and lives. It is for freedom that Christ has set us free so that we would no longer be in bondage to our lust and former desires. We need the Holy Spirit’s power to help us break the strongholds of lust off of our lives. The more our eyes are fixed on Jesus, the more our hearts are set upon Him and the more we are walking after the Spirit, the easier it will become to overcome these areas in our lives. The Holy Spirit will help us, but He will not act against our will. Only we can submit our will to His.

Blessings,
kent