Moving to a New Site

Hello,

After using Blogger for several years I have decided to make the move to another site. Please come follow me here. https://bigpapasheart.wordpress.com/ I have imported all of my blogs over to the new site.

Unified

A friend posted something earlier that I read about how John and James wanted to be seated at the right hand of Jesus, a place of honor. And Jesus told them "no", he then went on to explain how He wanted to be closer to them and us than sitting next to Him. His desire was and still is to be united with us. After reading this I ended up reading John 14 (several times through) which pretty much lays out not only His desire to be united with us, but also how it looks, and how we benefit. In the beginning of the chapter he deals with Thomas and his need for details, and Philip with his inability to see what's been in front of him the last three years. He then goes on to explain how He is in the Father and that through the Holy Spirit we are in Him, because He is in us. Abba has been talking to me so much about "on earth as it is in heaven" and this lays out how it works. You see Jesus didn't just set the example for us to follow He is in us, speaking to us, guiding us, giving us the power and ability to do whatever He asks of us. His desire to become fully united to us happens when we accept Him as our Lord and Saviour. When we say "yes Lord" He enters in and there is a change that happens in us, in that moment we become a new creation (2 Corinthians 5:17) that is worthy and able to be His dwelling place.

Don’t you believe that the Father is living in me and that I am living in the Father? Even my words are not my own but come from my Father, for he lives in me and performs his miracles of power through me. Believe that I live as one with my Father and that my Father lives as one with me—or at least, believe because of the mighty miracles I have done. “I tell you this timeless truth: The person who follows me in faith, believing in me, will do the same mighty miracles that I do—even greater miracles than these because I go to be with my Father! For I will do whatever you ask me to do when you ask me in my name. And that is how the Son will show what the Father is really like and bring glory to him. Ask me anything in my name, and I will do it for you!” John 14:10‭-‬14 TPT

Because He loves you

As I was sitting here this morning and pondering the impact of Resurrection Day Abba brought something to my mind. A few years ago when we were still in Iowa I was out to lunch with a young man. While we were sitting there a young lady walked in and He "highlighted" her as she walked by. I prayed a little in my head but went back to the conversation at hand. As we were preparing to leave and were paying for lunch I felt Holy Spirit whisper "tell her that I love her". I had a little conversation in my head and He finally said "just do it". So I walked over to her table there was another man sitting there either a dad or uncle. I excused myself for interrupting their lunch and proceeded to tell her that God really wanted her to know that He loves her. She responded with a "I don't believe in God." My reply "well He believes in and loves you, have a nice day and enjoy your lunch." And we left. Occasionally Abba reminds me of this encounter and I pray that the planted seed will germinate and come to life.

This whole encounter was a picture of what Jesus did for us through His death and resurrection. He not only died for us but also as us. He took our place as a final sacrifice, solely because Abba Father loved us so much that He wants us to be back in relationship with Him. Jesus did this for us before we knew Him, before we said yes to Him. He made the ultimate sacrifice so we could make that choice.

For this is how much God loved the world—he gave his one and only, unique Son as a gift. So now everyone who believes in him will never perish but experience everlasting life. “God did not send his Son into the world to judge and condemn the world, but to be its Savior and rescue it! John 3:16‭-‬17

Y'all have an amazing day and be blessed.

Entwined

So we have this picture hanging in our bedroom of an old barn. Instead of hanging it from a regular hanger we hung it with a piece of twine instead kind of gave it a rustic type of feel. We had gone a way for a few days and when we got home the picture had slid down the wall behind the dresser, the single thread of twine could not support the weight of the not very heavy picture over a period of time. Then discussion ensued do we try thicker twine or use a regular hanger. In passing one of daughters mentioned you should braid the twine and this stuck in the back of my head. So we found the same spool of twine that we took the single, failed strand from and cut three strands. I took these strands knotted them on one end looped them on a door handle and proceeded to braid them. Being the dad of three girls I have had a lot of braiding experience, I brushed and braided their hair on a regular basis.

Anyway as I was braiding the three strands together I could feel the imperfections of each single strand as they worked through my fingers where one of the natural pieces was joined with another to make it one long spool. As I worked to tightly work these three strands together Abba started talking to me. First I was reminded of: Ecclesiastes 4:12 Though one may be overpowered by another, two can withstand him. And a threefold cord is not quickly broken. Which is where you probably thought I was going with this, but He started to show me more.

As those imperfections of each thread which on their own were potential weak points or break points once I was able to tightly intertwine them the imperfections disappeared the weak spots became strong. He started showing me how He intertwines our lives with others and how when we focus on the strength of that unity and when He is the core that strengthens that unity that the imperfections that make us weak as individuals are strengthened and fade into the chord. They actually have certain ropes that have a core sometimes of steel that run through the center, this design gives incredible strength. In John 15:5
“I am the sprouting vine and you’re my branches. As you live in union with me as your source, fruitfulness will stream from within you—but when you live separated from me you are powerless. His desire is for us to be in unity with one another, with our lives intertwined and Him as our core. Following His commands obediently to love, heal and set free, making disciples that expand His kingdom.

Bless y'all.

Expectations

So this morning I was laying in bed and I started thinking about how we set expectations on almost everything but I was specifically thinking about how we do it with God. Many times in doing this we set ourselves up for disappointment because we expect the infinite creator of the the universe and who knows what else to perform within our limited view. You see we tend to focus on the symptoms, you know the higher level stuff that we can touch and control. He deals with the root cause. He started reminding me of examples of this that I have encountered.

The most recent one had to do with me starting to have "stomach issues" (I'll spare the details), at one point I lost about 15 lbs. in 5 days, got that under control after seeing the doctor and then it started again and again got the symptoms under control. Then a few weeks ago I got hit with horrible abdominal pain accompanied by nausea and all the fun stuff that goes along with it. Needless to say my wife took me to the ER at 3am and later that day I was in surgery having my gallbladder removed. You see I was having some symptoms but there was nothing until the pain hit that pointed to the deeper issue of the gallbladder, even the ER doctor was surprised because of where the pain was and I hadn't really had any other painful flare ups. But through various tests that went deeper they were able to find the cause.
Some other examples come from times of ministry. My wife and I have been involved in a couple of different Healing Rooms and other ministry opportunities. In these there have been countless times where people would come to get prayer for one thing and Holy Spirit would lead the team to pray for things that had nothing to do with their request, He would lead us to something deeper and once that was dealt with whatever it was they wanted prayer for went away.

And how many times have we prayed "but God if you only give me this one thing and it will make all these other things go away "? And He comes back and says "hey I want you to go serve this homeless guy" you come up with excuses not to are finally obedient and He blesses you anyway and the next thing you know your master plan for fixing stuff is no longer relevant and the things you thought needed fixing start to disappear.

I guess all of this is meant to be a reminder and an encouragement to let God be the Lord of your life, He knows more than you do and His plans are way better than ours. So why don't we partner with Him, be quickly obedient and let Him help us work out the root causes of what causes us pain and discomfort isn't He the Great Physician after all?

Early Morning Pondering on Healing and Stuff

Last night we had a friend come by who os in town for a few days. We had supper and she was telling us about the journey Abba has her on and it has been pretty cool. She brought up something she sent out on a group post a couple of weeks ago that I had commented on and wanted to discuss it further. So some time, way to early this morning, Abba started talking to me about it again. Essentially what had happened is she was at a cafe or something and the owners were there the guy has an amputated leg and felt like Abba prompted her to pray for their business and restoration of the limb. (I would be lying if I said seeing Abba grow a limb out wasn't on my bucket list). So when she felt rhe timing was right she approached them and they welcomed her prayers. She had an expectation that the limb was going to immediately grow out and felt bad that it didn't and was a bit frustrated. I explained that healings and instant right now miracles are always the same thing. That sometimes when you pray for healing you don't know where you are in their process and that sometimes there ends up being words of wisdom of something else that might need to be done for the healing to be completed. Some examples would be in John 9:6-7 "Then Jesus spat on the ground and made some clay with his saliva. Then he anointed the blind man’s eyes with the clay. And he said to the blind man, “Now go and wash the clay from your eyes in the ritual pool of Siloam.” So he went and washed his face and as he came back, he could see for the first time in his life!" There are other times too like when He told people to get up and walk, etc.. Also I have seen many times when there is healing that has to happen in the spirit man or the soul before physical healing will manifest.

So in our conversation I also said that Jesus told us to heal the sick, not pray for them (see Matthew 10 and Mark 16). That many times we get caught in trying to say the right thing or conjure something up many times to stir emotion etc. Don't get me wrong sometimes what we pray will help build our faith and the person we are praying for faith, but we we should only say what the Holy Spirit is telling us. As Abba was going over this with me this morning He said "there is no reason to put spit shine and show on what He is doing. Do we really think that we can improve on the presence of the All Powerful and the All Glorious?" An example of this is a while back I was at a conference and after the service part was over there was a group of about 6 people gathered around a lady "praying" for her leg to grow out (one was obviously shorter than the other) I walked by them and went to talk to a friend on the other side of the venue I came back about 20 minutes later to get my stuff and they were still praying. Something inside of me got super frustrated and I stopped to ask what was going on. They told me they were praying for her leg ro grow out and I said you don't need to pray for it. Then I said in Jesus name leg come out and immediately it was equal to the other. Abba immediately touched her leg, I kept walking and the 6 sat there like what just happened.

Some things I have learned along the way is that being prayed up (the whole pray without ceasing thing) before we get into situations where Abba wants us to heal, prophecy or whatever. That we need to be quickly obedient (delayed obedience is disobedience). That we need to say or do exactly what He tells us, no more no less. We don't need to try and make Him look good He's already beautiful. And we need to always show His love because that's what it's all about.

Betrothed - A Christmas Pondering

Now in the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent by God to a city of Galilee named Nazareth, to a virgin betrothed to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David. The virgin’s name was Mary. And having come in, the angel said to her, “Rejoice, highly favored one, the Lord is with you; blessed are you among women!”
Luke 1:26‭-‬28 NKJV

The whole betrothed thing has had me thinking this Christmas season. Back in those days being betrothed meant so much more than an engagement in today's terms. You actually entered into a legally binding contract of marriage the wife was given a ring or other gift as a token of the betrothal. The betrothal period on average was about 12 months during which the bride started gathering her things and preparing herself for part two of the process, the wedding day. This is when she would actually move under her husbands roof and became fully his wife. The groom during this time period was also doing things to prepare his biggest task was to finish his house and ready it for his bride. So when Abba decided it was time for the arrival of Jesus, His timing was interesting. You see Mary by law was Joseph's wife, but it had not been fully consummated. There are some things that are key here, it wasn't unheard of for betrothed couples to have sex prior to the final ceremony, but both Mary and Joseph held themselves to the highest standard waiting for the final ceremony. And Abba decides to enter into their lives with an unexpected gift. He chooses a time between the start of a legal contract and it's consummation (the Law and the new covenant). He gives Mary and Joseph an opportunity to partner with Him and His plan for salvation of the world and they both said yes.

Thinking about all of this also got me thinking about our position as "the bride" of Christ and where we are in that process. Many would say that we are in the betrothal stage preparing for some future event, but I think that sets us back and keeps us from the fullness of all He has for us. I believe that when we say yes to Jesus and agree to make Him our Lord we are also saying yes to Him as our groom, where we can step into full intimacy with Him, where we are full partakers in this new covenant that He provided, where we allow Him to indwell us and we function and partner together. You see before the betrothal process even happened He placed gifts in each one of us, for all intents and purposes He has impregnated us even before we were born. And being born again and coming into full relationship with Him allows for those things that He placed in us to fully come to life and be released to share with others so that they too can enter into their bride relationship with the Groom.

So as we celebrate Christmas we should take some time to look at where we are in our relationship with Abba. Are we in the pre-stages of entering into this relationship unsure if we are ready to commit? Are we in the betrothal stage where we have said yes but have not fully committed to making Him Lord? Or are we fully committed where we have jumped in being fully submersed into all He has for us? And we need to look at what gift has He placed inside of us that needs to be opened and released to bless others.

He has given us the greatest gift of all because He loves us in ways that we really will never fully comprehend.

So now I live with the confidence that there is nothing in the universe with the power to separate us from God’s love. I’m convinced that his love will triumph over death, life’s troubles, fallen angels, or dark rulers in the heavens. There is nothing in our present or future circumstances that can weaken his love. There is no power above us or beneath us—no power that could ever be found in the universe that can distance us from God’s passionate love, which is lavished upon us through our Lord Jesus, the Anointed One! Romans 8:38‭-‬39 TPT