Hello World!

I will not be updating this blog (most likely) I simply updated my old blog:  www.liveholy.blogspot.com

If you want to check out my new blog go to: www.truthisaperson.wordpress.com

 

Blessings…

The Pursuit of God

“The modern scientist has lost God amid the wonders of His world; we Christians are in real danger of losing God amid the wonders of His Word. We have almost forgotten that God is a person and, as such, can be cultivated as any person can. It is inherent in personality to be able to know other personalities, but full knowledge of one personality by another cannot be achieved in one encounter. It is only after long and loving mental intercourse that the full possibilities of both can be explored.

God is a person, and in the deep of His mighty nature He thinks, wills, enjoys, feels, loves, desires and suffers as any other person may…He communicates with us through the avenues of our minds, our wills and our emotions. ” -A.W. Tozer The Pursuit of God

He goes on to say, “Because we are made in His image we have within us the capacity to know Him, but in our sins we lack only the power! The moment the Spirit has quickened us to life in regeneration our whole being senses its kinship to God and leaps up in joyous recognition. Without that heavenly birth we cannot see the kingdom of God. It is not an end but rather an inception, for now begins the glorious pursuit, the heart’s happy exploration of the infinite riches of the Godhead. That is where we begin, I say, but where we stop no man has yet discovered, for there is in the awful and mysterious depths of the Triune God neither limit nor end.”

Well said.

The God of Great Patience

God, who possesses everything, has something He waits for…His inheritance in us! (Ephesians 1:11,18) This is the Eternal, Uncreated King of Glory and He waits for us to come to Him!
WOW!

But He’s not just passively waiting for a few people to buy an insurance policy from Him so they can stay out of Hell. He wants us to be fully equipped and prepared to share His throne with Him forever! We sometimes think that He is just here for our pleasure…like somehow He only exists to make us happy or comfortable. But, to the contrary, He desires a pure and spotless bride to have forever for His inheritance and will not be satisfied until He has her!

We must begin to walk in this. Jesus is tired of a comprimising, impartial church and is intent on having a mature, lovesick bride that can rule with Him for eternity. This is not the day or the hour to be undecided or lethargic. We must say YES to Christ today, so that He can begin to work in us and accomplish His purposes for our lives.

Remember: He waits on us. He is a Gentlemen if there ever was one and He respects our dignity as humans. He has given us free will because He desires voluntary lovers who, “live this life trusting in the Son of God who loved them and gave His life for them.” (Galatians 2:20)

The Grace of Fasting

I feel the need to talk about fasting. I can’t say everything I want to say about this gift of God in one post, but this book does an amazing job of explaining “The Rewards of Fasting”.

I am aware that this is the last thing many of you want to read about and many of you will be confused, but that is why I am writing about it. We must start asking the questions that come up in our lives. How long will we continue in ignorance as the world continues to fade away?

We must know what God has given us as weapons so we will be prepared when the time comes to use them. We have a messed up view of many things in America, one of them is the grace of fasting. Just because we think backwards, and believe that we must pamper ourselves in order to be satisfied, we should not make the mistake of believing God thinks that way.

We must, as children of the One who is accomplishing His purposes on the earth, press into Him and contend for the fullness of what He has for us. God is wanting to bring His people nearer to Him and reveal to them the mysteries of His Kingdom. But He will not just throw us the secrets that have been sealed up from eternity past as we run by waving our hands and continue on with our “busy” lives. His strategy is the same today as it was yesterday, He never changes. If we want to know more of Him, we must do it His way. This is one of many ways we contend for more of God, but without a wholehearted repentive heart, fasting will accomplish nothing. Many of the false religions practice the act of fasting, but they don’t release the blessings of God. So, I say that if you haven’t totally given over your heart to the One who made it…the One who died for it, then you must take care of that before you take this next step. For those of you who have said yes to Jesus and are curious about fasting & prayer, I pray that this will help you.

FASTING:

First of all, let me say that the act of fasting should never be separated from the act of prayer. The two go together like peanut butter and jelly. It is a mystery of Heaven that; when the children of God come to Him in wholeheartedness and say to Him the words that He has told us to say, it provokes Him to act.

Hear what the Spirit is saying though: fasting doesn’t move God. He doesn’t say, “Well, if you fast just a little while longer, then I’ll know your serious.” Fasting, under the grace of God moves our heart. Fasting increases our capacity to receive from God…fasting increases our capacity to give ourselves back to God…fasting, in the context of intimacy with God moves our hearts, this, in turn moves His heart.

We don’t earn a thing by fasting; we position ourselves to receive an increase of capacity at the heart level. The call to fasting is the invitation to wholeheartedness, not at all about earning something.

The call to fasting is the call to the grace of wholeheartedness. Remember, every prophetic invitation is a promise of the enabling. And God is calling us to wholeheartedness (characterized and intensified through fasting and prayer), so He will give us the grace to do it.

-It’s A Gift-

The grace of fasting is a gift of God that leads the human spirit into fascination and exhilaration before Him. Unless we have a vision or hope for attaining more in God, we will not fast. God has given us the gift of fasting to position our hearts in a position to receive more of Him. If we don’t view it in that way, we will not fast. Fasting is not intended by God to be something we hate. It is a gift meant to tenderize our hearts and bring great change in our lives! We fast because we know that the Lord desires to give us more of His heart and we know that fasting expresses our desire to have more of God and our pain of recognizing how little of Him we actually have. We fast because we cannot endure living in spiritual barrenness.

The deeper we go with God, the more we realize our intense need for Him and how little we actually possess. That is why Paul could say that he was the “chief of sinners” (1 Tim. 1:15). The more light of God we have in our lives, the more easily we can see the darkness in us. As we press into Him with fasting and prayer, He will begin to reveal the secrets of His heart to us and we will be more and more fascinated with Him and disgusted with the wickedness in our own lives, which, in turn, will produce in us an invigorated (uncompromising) spirit that will willingly say no to all that hinders more of His love from entering into our lives. We will radically “rend” our hearts from this world and intentionally position our hearts in alignment with His. (And that’s the whole point!)

Fasting is embracing voluntary weakness and esteeming God’s sovereignty as the only answer for our problem (whether it is a disaster/crisis or just our lack of Him in our lives). We do this in order to experience more of God’s power and presence. It’s a paradox that we become weak in the natural to receive strength from the Spirit! Remember what Jesus told Paul, “My grace is sufficient for you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness.” (2 Corinthians 12:9) When Paul was struggling with God’s call to walk in weakness, Jesus encouraged him by revealing that the release of God’s power in his life was connected to his willingness to embrace weakness.

There is something in the realm of weakness that God will not let us avoid. He knows that we must be weak in order to receive His strength, because we would boast in our own abilities if he gave it to us too easily. Western culture hates weakness; however, God has made weakness mandatory for those who desire spiritual strength (1 Corinthians 1:27, 29). These are the paradoxes of God’s kingdom. He never seems to do things quite the way that the world would anticipate.

• The most challenging issue with fasting isn’t even the hunger; it is the physical weakness it produces. We become physically weak and can’t function in the way we normally do. Even David, the great warrior recorded the weakness he felt from fasting. “My knees are weak through fasting, and my flesh is feeble from lack of fatness.” (Psalm 109:24)

God gave fasting to weak and broken people because we are ALL weak and broken. Everyone can do this. Fasting is voluntary weakness. Weakness and wilderness are nearly synonymous terms. In saying yes to the fasted lifestyle, we are saying yes to the wilderness. One of the mysteries of God is that in our weakness in the wilderness we can find doorways into His strength. This is revealed at the end of the Bride’s journey in Song of Solomon. She has discovered the secret of His strength being made perfect in her weakness as she arises from her passage through the wilderness and ascends from this journey called life victoriously, leaning on her beloved, Jesus. “Who is this coming up from the wilderness, leaning upon her Beloved?” (Song 8:5)

• The wilderness of fasting strips us of false comforts, strengths and securities and we come to grips with how much our souls are propped up by a thousand things other than God. As we are stripped of all other lovers, He transforms us into lovers of Him. Are our hearts bloated and lethargic from too little of the Word of God and too much of worldly comforts? Most likely, the answer is yes and the only solution is to enter the voluntary wilderness of prayer and fasting

We must answer this call to wholeheartedness that Jesus is offering to us. If the world is ever going to take Christianity seriously, we must start acting like Christ! I challenge you right now to say no to the lies of this world that tell you your comfort is the most important thing. I break that off of you in Jesus’ name. We must act in obedience to the Soverign Lord of Lords, the one who is coming to establish His Kingdom on this earth. Say no to the pleasures of this age and yes to abandonment to Jesus.

We’ve been taught that we will experience more life if we pamper our bodies. This is wrong even from a natural point of view. Nutritionists tell us that the more we eat the less sensitive our taste buds are. We actually taste less when we are not hungry. Moderation in the physical realm actually increases the pleasure we gain from physical activities. (example you eat less, you receive greater enjoyment when you do eat) Remember: Though our soul lives in a physical body, it was not designed to be a slave to physical pleasures and passions. We must deliberately silence the compulsions of our natural man if we want our spirit man to have the upper hand.

God created us to fast. It’s not easy right away, just like a guy who hasn’t lifted a single weight in years can’t lift hard his first day back without hurting himself or someone depraved of sunlight for years (although they crave the light) can’t be brought into the brightness without it hurting them. We crave intimacy with God, we desire more of His presence, but we haven’t cultivated the very tool that He has given us to access more of Him. So, even though we desire it; wholeheartedness (fasting) is hard and even painful at times. We must start small and allow God’s grace to give us the ability to enter into the deeper realms of intimacy through fasting. Start off by asking Him to give you the grace to want to want to fast! Then as time goes by you’ll start wanting it, but you still won’t be able to do it. So, then ask Him for the grace to actually fast! He wants you to receive more of Him. It’s not Him holding it back from you. He did say, “We have not because we ask not.” (James 4:2)

Remember: It’s only by His grace that we can enter into the deepest things of Him anyway, why would this be any different?

Just a Reminder

We receive mercy based on what Jesus did on the cross, not on what we have accomplished. Jesus, the innocent One, became guilty so that the guilty ones who believe in Him may become innocent. God’s mercy forgives us and assures that what would disqualify us from our destiny is removed, if we will receive God’s grace.

“Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new…For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.” (2 Corinthians 5:17-21)

Eternal Weight of Glory

Don’t fret beloved, these momentary light afflictions are working for an eternal weight of glory! (2 Corinthians 4:17)

Just remember that this peanut of an earth and all that is in it will pass away in just a minute. Whether it is 70-80 years, our life is just a minute…and then what? What are we serving on this planet? What are we seeking? Press on, lay claim to the rewards you are storing up in heaven. Don’t listen to the prince of this world who only confuses and condemns.

That’s why we must be in the Word of God consistently and surrounded by a community of believers…so we will know the voice of our Shepherd and we will not be confused when the enemy is trying to distract us (John 10:5).

Let’s live totally abandoned to the only thing that remains after our days are up on this peanut of an earth.

Galatians 1:3-5,

Dave

The Lover of My Soul

Our God is amazing…Growing in love with Him is unbelievable. I am in awe of His leadership, goodness and kindness. He is all that I want and need.

He is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness and He relents from doing harm. (Joel 2:13) He is the One pursuing you this very moment and desiring to know you in a personal and intimate way. It’s your heart that He is after, it’s your love that He craves.

If this doesn’t sound like the Jesus you’ve heard about, I would encourage you to actually open your Bible and check it out…He will show you how He views you and what He was really after when He came to this earth to die-for you. He didn’t leave His glory in heaven to die as a weak human so that we could ’stay out of hell’, He wants a relationship with you. Of course He wishes that none shall perish (2 Peter 3:9) but that’s not why He was crushed under the wrath of the Father for our sins. He desires YOU. Wherever you are and whatever you’re going through, He wants YOU.  Why don’t you give it to Him?  (Romans 12:1)

Romans 5:8,

Dave

Jesus and Muhammad

This is an amazing book comparing what Jesus and Muhammad actually stood for. No longer can we let our ignorance shine brightly as we try to say that these two “teachers” were speaking about the same God.

It won’t take you long to uncover the: bloody history (even until now), cruel and degrading treatment of women, contradictions and falacies that are found in Islam.

This book is a very easy read from an extremely intelligent man. If you have questions on what Muhammad taught about certain topics such as, holy war, the treatment of women, proper Muslim conduct and even Jesus Himself, check it out.

Why Do We Doubt?

“Why do we doubt? Glory, power, victory, salvation and honor are due to the Lamb who was slain and rose again, and with Him to us also, who believe that He was slain and rose again.”
-Martin Luther

Why are we afraid? Why do we doubt or fear anything? It is the liars job to doubt and fear. Because it is impossible to defend an open lie against the manifest truth that is found in the Bible.

Jesus desperately wants us to be with Him wherever He is! We don’t have to fear anything as a child of God! What a great reward we have, what a loving Savior we have.

Smile,

David
1 Thessalonians 5:18

Can I Vent?

I was thinking and since I have a blog, I have a chance to vent.

This world (and even the church to some extent) is filled with spiritually barren people. Everyday I see people trying to find substance for their lives in the things of this world. And, of course, they are coming up short. The reason??? Their life was never meant to be filled by the things of this world. There is only one thing that can truely fill and bring meaning to our lives…His name is Jesus Christ.

I don’t want to come off overbearing or judgemental, I know first hand what it is like to seek the things of this world and come up empty-handed and I want to expose this lie that corporate America is force-feeding us. The millions of advertisements, movies and T.V. shows that are being pumped into our minds are dictating how we live our lives! Why do you think Jesus warned us to be careful of what we allow into our bodies through our eyes (Matthew 6:22). For whatever is in your heart determines what you say (Matthew 12:34c).

We truely are like sheep without a shepherd (Matthew 9:36). Wondering around aimlessly being herded wherever the next person with persuasive words tells us to go. THINK FOR YOURSELF! I am tired of watching those who are too lazy to think for themselves just believe whatever sounds smart! It truely sadens me.

I am also sorrowful for those who think this life is all there is. What a hope, huh? Eternal nothingness! Sign me up for an eternity of that. Of course that sounds good to most, it aligns with your flesh. You can do whatever you want and you believe you will never be held accountable. Humans are sinners and humans like to sin. Coming to a Pure and Holy God does not line up with our sinful desires. So humans will run for as long as they can before turning to the One who won’t allow sin in His presence.

The funny thing is, He will let you run for as long as you want to. He is very patient! I know it took me 3 separate times (I can see them clearly now) before I finally submitted myself to Him. And that’s another thing, we in America don’t like the word submit or even obedient or humble. Because what does corporate America tell us to be? Everything but; submissive, obedient and humble. This is where you as an individual need to ask yourself, “Who are they really looking out for: me or their wallets?”

Trust me, I am a Marketing guy and all that I have been taught is how to make somebody want something they don’t need. That is all they are doing. Playing off of your emotions to get you to do what they want. Think about this stuff, don’t just blindly fall victim to their schemes. Why do you think the savings rate in this country is in the negatives? Because the advertisers and producers are doing a great job of convincing you that you need something so badly that you must get it, even when you don’t have the money for it!

I am not a cynical person at all, just tired of watching millions of Americans fall into traps every day. It’s really not your fault. Who are you to look to in the world? There is no guidance, no leadership, no direction. The leadership in this country is only concerned about keeping America the wealthiest country on the planet, even at the cost of their own citizens souls.

Final thoughts:

• If you don’t have the $, don’t buy it!
• Just because you see someone famous do it, doesn’t mean your supposed to do it. They are people just like you and I and they fall victims to the same traps that you and I do.
• Don’t blindly follow! God doesn’t ask us to do that with Him, why should you do it with humans?!? Ask questions, the more the better.
• If you don’t agree with something, say so or at the very least don’t go along with it.
• Finally, if you don’t have a loving relationship with the only God of the universe, you have more to worry about than your credit card debt.

broken and humbled,

David