When we marry God He gives us many gifts.
The main one is a new heart.
Another is the gift of tongues.
What?
A new tongue?
Even more than one?
Well not exactly.
Unless you literaly need a new physical tongue.
He can give you that as well!

The tongues I am speaking about here is a new language.
It’s supernatural and not one you can learn through study.
Also you can’t understand it even when you speak it.
Now what’s the point of that right?
Actually you can learn to discern the meaning of it but that’s a separate gift.
You can speak it without understanding and still benefit from it.
So how does that work?

Speaking in tongues is one of the tools God gave us to become more in tune with our (new) spirit we received when we became believers. (see “Vows”)
The bible teaches us that someone that has control over his tongue, over what he speaks, is perfect. Without sin.
Now how can we live without sin?
Only when we totally surrender to God.
To his Holy Spirit that lives inside of every believer.
How do we do this?
Speaking in tongues is one way.
When we speak in tongues we submit our speach to the Holy Spirit.
It bypasses our mind which is probally a good thing because it’s often in the mind that we start to sin and wander from the right way.
You see we can’t contain God in our thinking. If we could we would be God.
So by surrendering our ability to understand with our natural mind we acknowledge his lordship above us.
That we are not God.
The root of sin is that we put ourselves above him.
Because when we don’t obey God we basicly say that we are higher than him.
That the last word does not belong to him but to us.
By speaking in tongues we overcome sin and give God the rightful place in our lives again.
This softens our hearts so we can hear him more clearly when He speaks to us throughout our day.
It can give us more understanding of scripture (the bible) and insight in problems we deal with.
Also it can overcome addictions.
It strenghtens our faith and makes us more aware of his love for us.

So how do we speak in tongues?
First we have to be believers: committed our lives to God. (see Free Gift)
Then we have to believe the gift of tongues is for all believers.
Just ask the Holy Spirit to fill you.
Then start speaking.
Yep that’s right.
Surrender your mind to him and trust that you have received this gift.
Just start speaking sounds and syllables.
Don’t think about it!!
Just let it flow.
Speaking in tongues is a prayerlanguage and it comes from our spirit.
It can be worship (expressing our love to God) that comes from our heart but it can also be intercession (prayer).
When we pray in tongues we pray perfect prayers because it’s led by the Holy Spirit and our own flawed thinking and understanding can’t interfere.

To get started it can help to listen to others speaking in tongues so you get a feel of what it sounds like although it may sound different for every believer.
Here’s a video to get you started. Just relax and start releasing sounds and syllables.
God is not going to take over your tongue so you do have to start speaking yourself. In trust that He inspires what you speak.
It’s oke if you don’t get it right at once. It may take you some time to get over the awkward feeling. You have to get over yourself…

Speak it daily and you will see things in your life start to change. You start to change.
Your character becomes softer. You become patient. You have more self-control.
And you start feeling God’s love.

Be blessed!

Free Gift

Sequel to God with us

It gets even better.
The picture I described in the last post from the tabernacle which shows us the various degrees of access and intimacy we can have with God is all a place that’s inside of us.
It’s a place we can enter through faith but we don’t have to stick with visits.
Even daily visits in his presence are great, yet God invites us to make him our habitation.
When we move in permanently He moves in permanently in our lives.

Our relationship with God is a dance, were one partner responds to the movements of the other and on and on it goes.
He moves, drawing our hearts to him by making us desire him.
We then can move in response by accepting his invitation to draw near.
He then shows up in our lives again and again.
Because He is welcome and wanted.
No such thing as a forced dance.
That’s no dancing.

YOU are most invited to dance with him.
The God of the universe.

How do we move in with God though?
We may have been dating him our whole lives.
We may have married him (accepted his sarifice on our behalf and submitted to him)
but stayed in our own mansion.

Intimacy with God starts with marriage indeed. A covenant.
A commitment we make in turn of his commitment to us.
It’s a two way stream but you can be assured that He is the one holding it together.
Drawing us closer again and again.
It requires a pure heart but He cleanses us first and enables us to be faithfull.
Then, after He enabled us, we get to choose daily wether we keep the covenant and don’t start any affairs. Worship any other gods. Putting our own will above his.
Keeping the passion burning and truly sharing our lives with him.
Every aspect of it.

But it’s his ability in us. You do not have to walk on your toes in order to please some demanding God.
It’s easy because he gives us the Holy Spirit inside of us.
We do have to trust him though.
If we try to stay faithfull to God and try to live holy in our own strenght we will utterly fail and be frustrated all the time.

There is a battle going on in our mind (see also “Lies and Truth”) and the way we move in with God is by putting our continual trust in him.
Staying faithfull is important but no relationship works without trust.
Faith is trust in God, that’s why it’s so important. Without it we cannot have a relationship with him.
Only when we trust him we can stay faithfull and He is not going to move in with someone that has affairs. Even when they are married to him.

God still remains faithfull to us even if we don’t but of course there can’t be much intimacy if we give our heart in part to other things above him or alongside him.
That doesn’t work. No marriage works properly that way.
You might agree to a marriage like that with someone but God never will.
He’s not going to draw close if you are not and are witholding you heart from him.
He doesn’t let himself be mocked. You wouldn’t respect him either if He did.
Now don’t get me wrong He’s not going to abandon you all of a sudden.
When you give your life to him his Holy Spirit comes living inside of you and He doesn’t leave.
But as we have seen in the former article there are different degrees in which we can experience him.

There is an amount of surrender and trust available where the Father himself with Jesus and the Holy Spirit come living in and on you.
A place were you always hear his voice when He speaks. Where you always sense his guiding.
Always are aware of his love. Always are in touch with his presence and power.
A place were you are never sick. A place were you are protected from anything.

(see psalm 91, read also “Saved from what?”)

That may sound like an unreachable utopia but why would God not
be able to let you stay healthy all the time?
Why would He not be able to protect you?
Why would He not want you to hear his voice and feel his love all the time?
Yes He uses all of life’s afflictions (that doesn’t mean He causes them)
to build trust in us since that is what relationships are built upon.
But once we have that trust why would He allow for one second any harm to be done to you?
To trust him basicaly means that you take refuge under his umbrella.
If you don’t get under that umbrella you become wet although that’s not his will or desire for you.
But you choose were to go and hide in the midst of trouble.
Your choice doesn’t influence his love for you but it does impact your life and the protection you have.

To move in with God, to stick with him all the time so that He comes in all his fullness in our lives  (and not just mere drops of his presence, a word here or a vision there) comes through abiding in his words.
It comes through believing him all the time and not just now and then.
We tend to believe him one moment but doubt him the next when adversity happens.
But when we trust him in adversity He will actually turn that adversity in such a way that it will work for our good.

It’s still not our own ability though.
Even faith is a gift.
But we can choose wether we receive it or not.
Nothing delights his heart more than when we trust him wholeheartedly.
Don’t you love it when your child trusts you completely and brags about you among their peers?
How strong and big you are? How smart you are etc.?
Don’t you just want to hug them and cover them with kisses when they do that?
God is like that too!
It so delights his heart when we trust him.
That leads to intimacy with God.

That is when He starts running towards you and covers you with his love and presence inside and outside. That’s when He can’t help himself but comes living with you in all his fullness, holding nothing back. That’s when He knows you truly want him. That’s how you give him permission to move in with you.

THAT’S WHEN HEAVEN COMES TO EARTH!!

(In your life anyways but it will affect others around you)

Free Gift: read here how to get married to God

Thankfully God is not some impersonal power far away.
His name is not merely The Universe, although this name does reflect well that there is something higher and greater than us.
This something  is a Person though.
The bible tells us that God exists of three persons, and yet He is one.
These are The Father, the Son which is Jesus Christ, and The Holy Spirit.
Maybe they can be best described as the three faces of God.
Like a cube has different sides and yet it’s one object.
And yet it’s not the same because these three Persons interact with each other and seem to have different roles.
Yet their nature is the same. They love the same. They are holy the same.
There is one God. Yet they are three Persons.

In the biblebook Exodus God meets with Moses and tells him to make a tabernacle so He could dwell among them.
God always wanted to dwell with people and He still does.
In him we live and move and have our being says the book of Acts in the New Testament.
Yet there seem to be different levels in which we can encounter and experience God.
To a degree we all experience him no matter if we believe in him because we exist through him and in him.
In Genesis it says that the breath of God is in all living beings.
So when we are alive we experience God. Just through living. Just through being.
It’s not even possible to be away from his presence.
He is always with us.

That does not mean we are always aware of him.
Neither does it automatically mean that we have a personal relationship with him where we share our lives with him and surrender to him, to his lordship.
Yet He is good and never leaves us.
It seems to be the Holy Spirit who always works on drawing us to God.
Who gives us an awareness of “something more”, like when we marvel at the beauty of nature.
Or when we look into the face of a newborn child.
He won’t stop doing that as long as we live.
He won’t stop blessing us with the gift of live itself.
Until…yes until we die.
And then we might experience even more of his glory, of his goodness.
Depending on wether we accepted him or not.
His love never changes.
We choose our own destination though. He doesn’t do that for us.
He doesn’t violate our will.

Read also “Choice”.

It’s all about relationship with God if we want to experience him in a deeper, more personal way.
In the tabernacle God told Moses to make there were several places.
There was an outer court, and a holy place, and the most holy place.
And of course there was the place outside the outer court.
Which is were most people live.
It’s the place were we live in this world, in the midst of his goodness yet without having a personal relationship with him.

Read also “Saved from what?” about the origin of sickness and destruction.

God invites us to draw closer.
He’s not going to force you to live with him. What kind of relationship would that be?

See also “Bride of Christ”.

So we can come closer.
We can have a relationship with God and experience his love and guiding in our lives.
His wisdom for decisions.
His nearness so we never feel alone.
His healing for our body and soul.

It starts with entering the outer court.
This is the place of washing and were sacrifices were made.
The sacrifices were a picture, a foreshadowing, of the sacrife Jesus would make for us with his own life.

See “Justice and forgiveness” for why Jesus had to die.

Once we accept the sacrifice of Jesus we are made clean.
The dirt of our sin is erased, we have been given a new heart (see also “Free Gift”)
And now we can approach God boldly without cringing in shame and fear.

So we enter the holy place.
(don’t stay in the outer court, we have access to come close!)
That’s were relationship starts.
Relationship with Jesus and the Holy Spirit.
There are a table with bread which is a picture of Jesus who is called the bread of life.
It’s his body that is the bread which sustains us when we eat it.
This is symbolical language and it simply means that we accepted Jesus sacrifice of his body for us.
Like with any gift, you have to accept it in order to receive it.
In the holy place we meditate on the meaning of the cross.
We partake of every benefit it can give us by consciously receiving it again daily.
It’s called communion. Through it we experience his presence and nearness.
Through spending time with him we receive more and more healing and we become more like him.

Read also “Beloved”.

There’s also a candlestand with seven arms which speaks of the Holy Spirit that stands before the throne of God and consists of seven spirits.
Jesus is called the Light of the World because the Spirit of God is on and in him.

“The Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him,
the Spirit of wisdom and understanding,
the Spirit of counsel and might,
the Spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the Lord.”

Isaiah 11:2

We get to partake of all these aspects of his Spirit when we draw near.
Keith Miller wrote an amazing book about this called “The Seven-Fold Spirit of God”.
You can find it on amazon.

But that is not all.
Between the holy place and the most holy place was a most sacret veil.
It separated the two places and only the high priest was allowed to enter past it once a year.
The high priest in the old testament of the bible is a picture of Jesus.
He is now our high priest.
Only through him we can enter.
However we don’t just have access once a year.
When Jesus died on the cross the veil in the tempel was torn from top to bottom.
It was very thick and would have been impossible to tear with the strenght of human hands.
But God himself tore it in pieces.
Saying: you now have access, the barrier is gone.
You see Jesus was that veil.
His body was torn on the cross so we could have access to God the Father.
To a degree God had been showing himself on the earth through his Spirit and through human appearances, probably of Jesus.
(eg read the encounters of Abraham in Genesis and Moses in Exodus to whom God appeared in human form or in the form of a “messenger” which is usually translated with “angel” but was probably Jesus because he accepted worship and angels don’t do that)
And in the spirit-realm prophets had encounters with God on the throne.
But now access is granted to all people.
All who go through the door which is Jesus.
Our sin was a barrier because God is holy and good and can’t look upon evil.
And since we all have evil inside of us we needed a Saviour. A mediator.

Read also “Mediator”.

Jesus broke the barrier.
He took our sin upon himself and died because of it.
He took our place and now we have access.
Our slate is wiped clean.
The price for our sin is paid.
We are in rightstanding with God.

WE MAY ENTER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Free Gift: learn here how

Do we resist the blood of Jesus or do we accept his life within us through forgiveness?

There are many things in life we get to choose.
One of those things is our acceptance of God.
Our acceptance of his acceptance of us.
This goes both for believers and unbelievers.
Once we’ve given our lives to God, and maybe we’ve been believers our whole lives, we still can choose to what degree we let his mercy affect us.
We still get to choose whether we release ALL our sins to him and receive his forgiveness or if we tenaciously hold on to our mistakes and want to pay the price we deserve. To deserve forgiveness so to say.
Of course that isn’t possible. You can never undo your wrongs. Not by a thousand rights.
It might feel like you can recompense for them but you can’t undo them.
That’s why we need the blood of Jesus so much.
To cover our sin. He’s the only one that was able to pay the rightfull punishment for our faults. We cannot do that ourselves. We don’t have that ability.

Two things can prevent us from receiving his forgiveness freely.
And not trying to earn it, to pay back for what Jesus did for us.
If He had to die for it so that righteousness was done then surely there is no way we can make our wrongs right and pay the rightfull penalty for our sin ourselves.

One obstacle is pride.
It takes humility to receive his mercy.

Read also “Pride” and “Humility”.

Another obstacle is a wrong view of God.
Possibly because others that should have reflected God’s character to you didn’t.
Maybe because they didn’t quite have a right view of God themselves.
You can’t give what you don’t have.
A father is supposed to reflect the image of God as our Father.
Remember we are made in his image.
Because many fathers don’t know God or what He is like they can’t reflect Him to their children and this can lead to a wrong image of what God is like.
You can see that many things in live are twisted and defiled when we don’t have a proper (right) view of God.
It affects everything.

Many things in life we don’t get to choose.
Like our parents or where we are born.
Yet the things we do get to choose influence everything else.

God gave ALL people free will, including those that hurt us.
If He had to end all pain He would have to take free will from every single person.
Including you and I.
We all have hurt others and did wrong.
That’s why Jesus had to die.
To pay the rightful punisment for all sin so that righteousness would be done.

God loves us the same if we don’t receive his forgiveness through the shed blood of Jesus.
His life that was given in our place so that we could live and not die.
Yet like all choices, our choice to receive his mercy through the sacrifice of Jesus does have consequences.
If we don’t receive it He will not give us eternal life. By which I mean that we won’t have a relationship with Jesus, who is the source of our life. The one through whom we fully come alive and are cleansed from all sin and are enabled to live righteous.

Receiving Jesus death as payment for our sin is not only about forgiveness.

It’s also about taking evil out of us so that one day, when we fully have surrendered to him, (which even for believers is something that is an ongoing process), the world will be delivered from evil.

See also “The Kingdom of God”.

It’s because God doesn’t want people to keep being hurt and do evil that He is not allowing those who haven’t submitted to him to live on forever and being enabled to continue to do evil.
You will be separated from his presence forever, the very thing that gives us life, if you don’t accept Jesus Christ as Lord.
Not because He stops loving you one day but because one day He won’t allow evil to continue.
Right now the earth is filled with the glory of God. To a degree. Just look at the beauty of nature.
Much more glory is coming.
But if you don’t submit to him and let God transform you, you will spend eternity seperated from his glory and beauty.

Your soul will long forever for the One it was made to love and have relationship with.
I could call it hell, and that’s indeed what the bible calls it, but I believe that the main suffering of hell consists of being separated from God.
The beauty and glory you now can enjoy because God loves us equally and wants to bless us even when we don’t believe in Him, won’t be accessible to you anymore.
This is not God’s will for you, to be apart from him and to suffer forever.
He longs for you even more than you long for him.
That’s why Jesus died in your place.
So that righteousness was done but you didn’t have to suffer.

Don’t let him waiting and longing…
Longing, for a son or daughter.
Give him a chance.
Converse with Him.
Ask for a sign if that’s what you need.
He will pursue to win you heart the rest of your life.
Let him love you.
Let him hold you.
Let him comfort you and heal every hurt and disappointment in your heart.
You’re worth it, not because of anything you did or didn’t do but because He made you.
To be His.
His beloved child.

Read also “Creator’s joy”.

Free Gift: read here how you can become his child.

Sequel to “Light of the World”

But there is more.

More of Jesus I mean.
Jesus is not only our Saviour.
It is through Jesus that God showes us his love.
The bible says that God is our Husband.
God made the world through Jesus and like his Father He is our God and Creator.
Jesus is the Lover of our soul.
He is the one that loves us like no one else can.
God gave us loving relationships to enjoy, but they never were to replace Him.
We all have a place inside of us, a deep longing for love and fulfillment, that only God and His Son Jesus and His Spirit can fulfill.
The bible calls this a mystery. It’s something that is not quite revealed yet.
Our love-relationship with Jesus is compared to the love between a husband and wife.
This is not physical but spiritual.
The intimacy we have with Jesus is way more satisfying then the intimacy we can have with any human being.
It’s like in this picture, were you see how lovesick the bride is, longing for and leaning on her groom.
And the groom supports and strenghten’s her. Because we were never made to live without His love.
She is his delight and he is so very proud that she is to become his.

It’s like that with Jesus.
But like in a love-relationship intimacy and trust are to be developed. It comes through spending time together. Through enjoying each others presence. Setting time apart for each other and talking, sharing  hearts.
We can have this kind of relationship with Jesus if we want.
It doesn’t happen over night. It’s a daily interaction with Him that satisfies our soul more than anything else can.
Just speak to Him.
Tell Him what’s on your mind and listen for his reply.
Put on some soothing worship music that helps you relax and quiet the noise and business in your mind, so you can hear HIS voice. (See also “you are Mine”)

I can really recommend music from Julie True for this.

And do you see the beautiful weddingdress?
God didn’t just give us undergarments to cover our shame barely. (see “Unashamed”)
He gave us beautiful clothes to wear. This garment He gave us is the righteousness of Jesus.
The bible says our own good deeds are like a filthy garment (a menstrual cloth, disguisting right?!).
We do not have the ability to live righteous apart from God. So don’t even try.
That’s called religion. Not the definition that is mostly used of religion, but what I mean here is what all religion has in common: striving to earn something from God, through good behavior.
But this is not possible. All our abilities come from Him (see “Free Gift”) and we don’t have to earn his love and approval. We already have his devotion for us since birth.

Like a bride adorns herself for her husband so we can adorn ourself for Jesus.
We do this through putting on the garment He gave us. We do not have to and are not even allowed to make one ourselves. Because all we have comes from Him.
You put it on by trusting and believing that He indeed is your righteousness and you do not have to be righteous in your own strenth. (see “Identity in Christ” and last paragraph from “Free Gift”)

So because of the blood of Jesus our shame that came through sin is covered and He doesn’t treath us based on our sin anymore. But because of the righteousness of Jesus we now look radiant and pure to Him like being clothed in a white weddinggarment.
We have to choose to put on this garment though by believing and confessing that we have it so it won’t be just that we are accounted as being righteous because the righteousness of Jesus is accounted to us, which is true as well, but that we live out that righteousness. That our life and deeds become rigtheous, holy and pure. THAT is adorning yourself for Jesus your groom.

He’s not going to marry a bride in filthy clothing.
There’s a parable in the bible Jesus tells about 10 virgins waiting for the bridegroom to come.
(matthew 25)
Five have extra oil in their lamps to sustain them during the delay.
Five don’t.
They are all ten virgins (which speaks of their purity and devotion to Jesus).
But only the ones with burning lamps get access to the weddingfeast.
To the others He says He doesn’t know them.
They may have served Him their whole lives but Jesus is not after slaves.
He is after relationship.
The oil symbolizes that.

I’m not saying you won’t be saved if you don’t have an intimate relationship with Jesus.
But that would kind of be like getting married and then both living in another house and not speaking to each other.
You might live on God’s property, but He wants you in His mansion!
His love for you is passionate, not distant.  
He invites you to come closer and experience His love for you.

Free Gift

The whole history of mankind since the fall is about men restoring God to his rightfull place in their lives.
I think it’s amazing that God doesn’t force himself upon us, like human leaders force those that are beneath them to obey.
God is not like that. He wants a loving relationship with us and this can never be attained through force.
God is good to all people also to those who will never believe in Him and acknowledge Him as God.
He loves us equally and gives us all the gift of life.
The rain is for all. The sun shines for all.
We can all enjoy his beautiful creation and the pleasure of having loving relationships with others.
The pleasure of having pets.
You name it, why don’t you make a list of all the good things in you life. (don’t forget having warm water, heating, or water at all…)
There might be more then you realised!
Don’t forget the blessing of having two working hands even if your legs don’t work, or perhaps it’s the other way around. But despite disabilities and suffering we still have many things to enjoy and be thankfull for.
Try being aware of them for a while. And then for the rest of your life…if you liked the result. It might just change your life.

When men rebelled God did not stop giving them good things.
However the result of their rebellion was corruption and suffering.
It’s easy to blame God for these things but like I mentioned in “Saved from what?” we chose another god, another ruler over us when we turned away from Him.
And this one does not have our good in mind.
So how do we get restored to the place were life started for us? To a garden were everything was a delight and no suffering existed?
I believe its starts by submitting ourselves to God again. The one who is the source of our life and therefore perfecty able to restore all things.
Of course this is only possible through the sacrifice that Jesus made for us, by paying the price for our sin so that righteousness was restored. (see article “Creator’s joy”)
But even as believers who have acknowledged God, we still need to give Him his rightfull place in our lives in practicality. In ALL the parts of our life.
I think we often don’t even realise we are still sitting on the throne in so many area’s of our lives.
One of these area’s is whom we go to for finding acceptance and gaining a sense of worth.
God is the only one who defines worth and gives it to us.
When we let our sense of worth be determined by other people and by how successful we are in what we do then we basicly don’t acknowledge God in that moment but reckon ourselves to be god instead, because we let others and our own achievements determine what only God can determine.
So we gives others and ourselves the place of God.
The only way to change this, since we do need to know our worth, is by having a relationship with God and asking HIM how He sees us and feels about us.
If we don’t come to Him and let Him give us a sense of worth we are still on the throne of our lives.
And when God is not on the throne we suffer because no one can give us what only He can. It will never be enough. (see also “Identity”)
God truly is enthroned on our praises like the bible says. He rules in the area’s where we let Him rule.
He gave us the earth and life but does not enforce himself upon us.
The only way we can see an end of suffering is if we give Him the rightful place in our lives.
That’s how kind He is.

Free Gift

The Shelter

We all have things we want to be saved from.
Covid, any other sickness, too warm or too cold weather, annoying habits from our partners, the noise of our children, you name it.
Make a list from all the things you want to be saved from. Write them down before you read further.

When Jesus the Saviour, the Messiah, came into the world the Jews expected Him to save them from the Roman oppression they were under.
Throughout their whole history, in fact since the whole history of mankind recorded in the bible, since the rebellion of men against God He promised them a Saviour.
But what did we need saving from? The last sentence provides the answer: for our rebellion against God. We needed to be saved from our sin, which now had taken over the nature of mankind.
When we (the first men) first sinned we lost our ability to obey God. We lost our ability to have a free choice in how we live when it comes to moral living.
Men were not made to be independent beings. Therefore there is always someone above us.
Initially this was God, our Maker, the Creator of the world, who always has our good in mind.
But when we rebelled against Him we submitted ourselves to satan, the accuser of our souls, the fallen angel that was jealous of God and wanted to be like Him. That wanted to be God.
Satan was jealous at God’s children, mankind, as well. We were made in God’s image after all but he was not. The beauty and power God had given Him was not enough for him.
When he couldn’t get what he wanted he went after God’s children, trying to destroy them and separate them from the One that made them and loved them deeply. Out of pure spite.
And he succeeded. In part. Temporarily.
But God promised men a Saviour right after they had fallen away from Him by giving in to satan’s temptation.
And that’s what we are saved from when we give the autority over our lives back to God.
When we let Him be our Head, the One we submit to.
We are saved from the power of satan over us that always tries to destroy us though sickness and disasters and deception.
And we are saved from our sin. Our sinful nature that is not able to obey God and brings destruction in our lives and that of others.

When we think about God, we often think about the things we want to be saved from but are not saved from. But we have to be honest and ask ourselves what it really is we need saving from.
God is more interested in the eternal well being of our soul than in our temporary comfort.
And many of the things we suffer have their root in sin. That does not mean that all suffering like disease are the direct result from specific sin in our lives but sickness came into the world through men’s rebellion against God.
Thankfully He gave us a cure, which is only found in Jesus Christ.
Through faith in Him our sin is reckoned to have been punished by Him. He himself paid the price for our sin when He died on that cross so we don’t have to bear it anymore.
We can now be in rightstanding with God if only we accept what Jesus did for us and the result will be that we are delivered from many of the consequenses of our rebellion against Him. Sickness is one of them but also protection from other things like the heat of the sun.
However certain protection is only found “under His wings, in the secret place”.

Because you have made the Lord, who is my refuge,
even the Most High, your dwelling,
there shall be no evil befall you,
neither shall any plague come near your tent;

Psalm 91 Read here more about this Shelter

When we become a believer we don’t automatically experience all the benefits we have been given through the substitutional death of Jesus for us.
Like I mentioned before, life is a journey, and when we become believers we haven’t reached the end of our destination, rather we just started to go into the right direction.
And the right direction is all about growing in our surrender to God and acknowledging His rightful place. Coming to the acknowledgment of who He is once in our life is not enough. We need to make this practical by appling it to all the specific parts of our lives. Are we willing to obey Him when it comes to choosing our daily activities? Or are there some things we are still not willing to let go of?
There probably are…and willing to surrender these things is a journey we are walking the rest of our lives. And the more we surrender to Him the more He can protect us. That makes sense right?
Parents cannot protect their children if they don’t obey and cross the street without looking. The same goes with God.

So what is this “secret place” (as some translations call it), this shelter?
It means we put our complete trust in Him, just read the psalm it’s pretty clear.
As believers we can still live in fear. Or…we can choose to trust Him and stay connected with Him and then we are protected. We often prefer it the other way around: to see God first and then to trust Him.
But God gave us enough prove that He is trustworthy and good when Jesus died for us.
One way to regain and grow our trust in Him is by looking again to what He did for us and keep reminding ourselves of this daily through taking daily communion. You do not have to go to church for that but you can do it in your own house either with others or “alone”, just you and God.
Just take some red juice or whatever drink works for you and some food preferably something you can break like bread or crackers as a reminder that the body of Jesus was broken for you. Ask God to bless it so it won’t be just food but that you might experience the benefits of Jesus death while eating it. Like healing, peace, and a sense of his presence. Since Jesus died to give us all these things.
The main thing I think is that we stay in his presence and like the word says, to have communion with God.

Because he (or she) has set his love upon Me, therefore I will deliver him;
I will set him on high, because he has known My name.
He shall call upon Me, and I will answer him;
I will be with him in trouble,
and I will deliver him and honor him.
With long life I will satisfy him
and show him My salvation.

Psalm 91

So we live in this Shelter when we trust Him, obey Him, and stay in communication with Him throughout our day. It’s through being connected with Him that He protects us.

Peace!

You are the treasure He came to find.
Read here how to become His:

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Renewing the mind

We are God’s beloved sons and daughters if we give our lives to Him and accept His acceptance of us!
We may have had an encounter with the love of God for one moment in our lives and even given our lives to Him as a result of it.
Hopefully though we keep experiencing his love on a daily basis. But often we don’t even if we somewhere deep down know this love to be true, we don’t feel it all the time. Why?
Because our minds need to be renewed. We are used to thinking we are rejected, abandoned, not loved at all. In part because people hurt us and fall short of loving us the way they should. And in part because we often don’t understand the reason of pain and suffering in our life and in the world and therefore we blame God and don’t believe He truly loves us. At least not at that moment when we are in pain.
But truth is that He loves us all the time. His love for us does not depend on how we feel or how we have been doing that day. We can’t earn it and therefore we can’t loose it.
It’s a choice we daily have to make to keep believing in his love for us even if we don’t feel it. Even if we are in pain. Even if we messed up. Even…you fill it in…It’s there all the time!
It takes an intentional effort to do this. Maybe a thousand times a day. To stand up against the lies that come into our minds due to people and circumstances and failures, lies that say we are not loved, we are not wanted, we are not accepted. But we are loved by the God of the universe who is our Father, and He is a good father no matter what other’s are saying.

Another thing that we need to do to stay aware of his love for us is to come into God’s presence daily by which I mean we take time to become still and acknowledge his presence. We focus on him the way you focus your attention on someone you are speaking with. It’s kind of hard to experience his presence if your mind is wandering of, thinking about the things you need or want to do, or keep repeating in your mind how much someone hurt you, or how much you failed at something. You can’t have proper communication with someone if you don’t turn your attention to them. You have to be present in the moment, and the same goes for communication with God.
Yet with God we don’t seem to be used to do this since, after all, God is omnipresent and with us all the time, which indeed He is. But still an awareness of this presence is not likely to come if we don’t intentionally turn our attention to him, and him only, without having other occupations in the back of our mind. Hurts, activities, how we can fix things and what we can do to be seen and loved by people.
Yet the lover of our soul is always right there with us by our side. We only have to turn our face to “see” him (we can see God in the spiritual realm) and to listen so we can hear him speaking to us, often through a subtle tought in our own mind, that’s how he usually speaks. He doesn’t have to shout with a booming voice (although he still might, if needed) because He is near to us. And we can have a conversation with him like we can with everyone else. Just quiet all the other voices in your mind and listen. You will hear him.

Another way to renew our mind is to read the bible (you might want to start with the new testament, the book John is a good place to start and then the other gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke and the rest of the NT).
But although everyone can read the bible you can only understand it through the Holy Spirit, who is the spirit of God that lives inside every believer.
So when I read it I take time to listen to the Holy Spirit to reveal to me what it means and how it speaks to my own life. I do this through meditating on it, so He can bring thoughts to my mind about what it means so it comes alive and is not just some dead meaningless book I’m reading.

The thing that mostly speaks to me though about God’s love for me is when I ponder the cross.
That’s the moment in time where God revealed his love for us more then anywhere else.
I was just reading in the (bible)book of Luke about the last supper Jesus had with his disciples before He was crucified.
It speaks about two cups of wine Jesus took and told the disciples to drink and keep doing that in the future as a reminder of what they stand for. I believe the first cup is a picture of the forgiveness of sin we have through the blood of Jesus that was shed in our place and therefore erased every guilt we have.
Then in a similar way it speaks of the bread Jesus took and broke and gave to his disciples as a picture of the body of Jesus that was torn for us on the cross so we could be forgiven and did’t have to pay the penalty of our sin ourselves. He did that for us.

God is like a judge that gives someone a sentence to pay a huge fine because that is what justice requires. He also knows though that this person is not able to pay this fine in his whole life no matter how hard he works.
Then the judge, after pronouncing the punishment, takes out his checkbook and pays the fine himself. God is like that judge!
The dead of Jesus, the son of God who came down from heaven to us, was the payment of the punishment we owed to God.
And God now sees us as someone who’s debt is payed and we are now in rightstanding with God.
Jesus was our ransom. The price that was paid so we could be delivered from the consequences of our sin.

The second cup is called the cup of the covenant. We are not just debtfree to God but He now makes a binding agreement with us. A treaty, a covenant that cannot be broken. Like a marriage that is to be for a lifetime. Except that God will never divorce us.
It’s called the blood of the covenant because the blood of Jesus is the assurance that it won’t be broken. This covenant is not based on our good works but based upon what Jesus did for us. Upon the death He died in our place of which the blood speaks since it was poored out when He was killed.
When this truth, the meaning of the blood of Jesus that was poured out for us, truly sinks in so we understand it with our heart and not just with our head, then at last the light of truth shines through all the darkness of the lies and we can truly say: indeed I am God’s beloved. And the more it sinks in, the more we become rooted and grounded in love. Then we start to blossom, and become the person we were made to be. The person God was seeing all along when He looked at us. And then the world and we ourselves start to see the beautiful person God made us. It may have been covered by dirt like a rough diamont, but God is not fooled by the dirt and He sees our true beauty and worth, that no amount of sin can ever erase.

You are God’s beloved

So BE loved

You can’t earn it and therefore you don’t have to

Just be and receive his love

Let him wash you clean and remove the filth of you

You cannot do that yourself

Enjoy the bath, it smells great

Be blessed!

Love
Hanna

Read here how to become God’s beloved child: Free Gift

I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me.
Galatians 2:20

All very well, we repented of our sin, which is obvious we all have, but how do we keep from sinning again? Is that even possible?
Yes and no…
The bible says no man is good but God. To a degree bad men can still do good things btw, but at it’s core we are sinful and even our good deeds are stained with wrong motiations, pride and selfishness.
So our core nature is corrupt, our very essence.
How then do we live holy lives? How do we submit to the will of God and not continue to put ourselves above God and others?
There is only one way we can do that. When we repent and start believing in God our sins are not only forgiven but He changes us from the inside. He gives us a new heart.
Jesus Christ (his spirit) himself lives now inside of us and because of that we are able to surrender to God and live according to his will and standard.
God does not fix our old sinful nature. Rather He reckons it to have been killed when Jesus was killed on the cross. Because that is what we deserved. So Jesus died in our place and now sees us as having paid the penalty for our sin, which is death.

He does not leave us death though. Just as Jesus rose from the death and He looked totally different after that, so in a sense we are raised from the death and we are now a totally new person. The bible even calles it born again. So we now have the perfect nature of Jesus, because as the bible says our spirit is now united with His spirit. And rather than God becoming defiled by us the opposite happens: we are made pure because of our unity with The One that is pure, God himself.
So we don’t have to anxiously strive to start living holy in our own strength all of a sudden and walk on our toes for the rest of our lives. Instead God gave us a new heart, a new spirit that is perfect and good. The only thing it takes to conform our behaviour to that new nature we now have inside is to lean on God. To trust that He indeed is now our righteousness. That we are holy and can live holy because He is holy and we are one with Him.
It can take time to learn this and we might be working on doing this to an increasing degree our whole lives. The christian live is a journey that we walk with God and the more we spend time with Him the more we become like him in our daily living. Our spirit is now saved and made perfect but we still have to surrender our soul (mind, will and emotions) and body to this spirit because we still have sinhabits so our mind needs to be renewed by the truth of who we are now and who God is for us daily.
But we don’t have to do this on our own. He guides us in doing this and we get to do this together with other believers so we can encourage eachother and be reminded of the truth every day.

Free Gift

The Spirit of God jealously yearns
for the spirit that’s inside of us!

Yes you read it right
God longs for us
We are His desire!

He is jealous of all the things
That we place above Him
And that fill our heart
So that there is no room
For Him

It’s not that He needs us
He WANTS us!

Once we give our lives to Him
He passionately calles us His
His son, his daugther
His beloved
His own

He longs to daily have interaction with us
To woo our heart
To heal it from every hurt
Of the past, or present

Just take a moment
Every day
To stop what you’re doing
To stop trying things
To stop earning and performing

Just rest
In His arms of love
Be still
And know that He, God
Loves you
And is with you
Right now!                                

You will start hearing his voice
You will start feeling his love
He will start healing you
And you will never be the same

You will start experiencing his guidance
Through the day
And He will give you solutions
Of the problems that you face
Creative idea’s will come up

You become
Who you were made to be
And already are
It just hadn’t manifested yet
But now it does

You were never meant
To figure it all out on your own
You were never meant
To be alone

And you never will be
He is always right there
By your side

Just talk with Him
And you will hear Him
talking back to you

You were always loved
And you always will be

Choose to believe that
You might not feel it right now
But if you persevere
In seeking his face
And hearing his voice
It will change you
And the feelings will come

You just have to remind yourself
When you feel alone
Or rejected
That this is not the truth
And you are His forever

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