Freedom

And here is another:

As we push forward striving for the goal, the yoke of the world comes upon us to try and make us slow, to keep us from attaining what has already been given, and then He comes...and makes a trade gives us His yoke so we no longer need to slave, for His yoke is freedom and fullness of life and though we strive we don't have the strife...the negativity of the world that wants to hold us back has been broken off of us and now we are on the attack!!!!  

The Beginning

This is something I wrote a while back.

The Beginning
as i sit in the sunshine preparing for bed a flow of words starts to stream into my head a reminder of a gift long ago wasted a gift that was tainted with the darkness of my youth but now as the Light has burned that darkness away there's a stirring of something I thought was buried to stay...this time will be different I hear in my sprirt becasue as the flow starts the enemy will fear it he will run he will flee he can not stand against me becasue of the power of Jesus and the dominion HE has given me...His Word is a light that illuminates my path no longer do I have to suffer from the enemy's wrath...why??? do you ask ...because I have been set free at last free from my sin and free from my past as long as my focus remains on my Lord, I will move forward, forward to the goal He has set for me

The Stuff Dreams are Made of

So the other day I had a saying that kept running through my head it was “This is the stuff that dreams are made of”.  If you are a fan of old movies you may recognize this as a quote from Humphrey Bogart in The Maltese Falcon, but what many don’t know is that in the movie this was actually a misquote from Shakespeare’s The Tempest; which actually says “This is the stuff that dreams are made on”. So anyway let’s get back to what was going through my head; “This is the stuff that dreams are made of”. This was followed by “your dreams grow out of the desires of your heart.” So then I think “what’s the difference between a dream and a desire, and just what is stuff?”

So… just what is stuff I guess the best way to describe stuff is that it is in fact stuff. It’s matter; it’s tangible, there is good stuff and can be bad stuff. This is what Merriam Webster Dictionary says about stuff: 1) materials, supplies, or equipment used in various activities 2) material to be manufactured, wrought, or used in construction 3) fundamental material : substance. Ultimately if it wasn’t for GOD there wouldn’t even be any stuff.  In Genesis it says that He spoke and created stuff where there was no stuff, so all stuff is GOD’s stuff.  And all of the stuff that He spoke into existence 7k-10k years ago is the basis of all the stuff we have today. When He created us He used His stuff and made us in His image, then He breathed life into His stuff.  Part of Him making us in His image is that He made us to be creative, so we have the ability to make stuff too.  There is a difference though, He gave us the ability to make stuff out of the stuff that He created, but we are not able to make stuff out of no stuff. This is one of the things that separates us from GOD. When we come together and create in unity we are more powerful and stuff has greater potential. And because of His breath in us when we speak our words have the power to affect stuff, to shape stuff, move stuff, build stuff up or tear stuff down.

Matthew 17:20 (NLT) “You don’t have enough faith,” Jesus told them. “I tell you the truth, if you had faith even as small as a mustard seed, you could say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it would move. Nothing would be impossible.”

Next is dreams, dreams are important many times GOD will speak to us in our dreams, in his first great oration Paul reminded the people that the prophet Joel said that “old men would dream dreams”.  Sometimes dreams can be weird and make you think twice about whatever you ate the night before.  But these aren’t the dreams I’m talking about here.  I am talking about our waking dreams, the things that consume our thoughts; they are our goals, the things we want to achieve in life.  It could be where we want to live, what our careers will be, a place to go visit, a ministry idea, a relationship. Good ol’ Merriam Webster says: Dream = a: a strongly desired goal or purpose b: something that fully satisfies a wish. Many think that dreams come from the head, I disagree I say they come from the heart. Your heart contains the well spring of life that feeds your dreams and gives them life and the fulfillment brings joy. When dreams are realized and accomplished we are able to use that as a milestone or marker in our lives that we can look back upon as a testimony to how far we have come and of the things that GOD has done on our lives.  It also lends to the heritage of those that come behind us, our children and grandchildren and the generations to come.

Psalm 37:4 (NASB) Delight yourself in the LORD; And He will give you the desires of your heart.

Finally we get to desires; you may say dreams and desires are the same thing but I don’t believe so. Believe it or not I looked up desire on the Merriam Webster website too (do you see a pattern here?) Desire = 1) conscious impulse toward something that promises enjoyment or satisfaction in its attainment 2) Longing, Craving.  To me desires speak of passion and the development of a fierceness that drives you to attain your dreams, especially the dreams that come from the deep places of your heart. Your desires are stirred up in your heart, we then realize these desires and in their realization stuff starts being formed this stuff is the basis for our dreams.  In our creative abilities we take this stuff that is being formed and we speak life into it, we declare its existence and its outcome.  Our desires give us the passion to speak the stuff of our dreams into something that we can obtain.

Prospero:

Our revels now are ended. These our actors,

As I foretold you, were all spirits, and

Are melted into air, into thin air:

And like the baseless fabric of this vision,

The cloud-capp'd tow'rs, the gorgeous palaces,

The solemn temples, the great globe itself,

Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve,

And, like this insubstantial pageant faded,

Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff

As dreams are made on; and our little life

Is rounded with a sleep.

The Tempest Act 4, scene 1, 148–158

Saul’s Conversion and Hearing God

Acts 9: Saul’s Conversion and Hearing God

During my journey through the Book of Acts I read through Chapter 9 a couple of weeks ago, I thought that I had posted this blog already but after talking with my friend Tony I discovered I missed it. So here it is.

The first part of this chapter deals with Saul and his conversion experience. While the conversion is important there are some other things that really stood out to me.  One of them is the difference in how God spoke to both Saul and Ananias, and their subsequent reactions. The other is how God used this situation to change Saul’s vision and perspective.

Acts 9:3 As he journeyed he came near Damascus, and suddenly a light shone around him from heaven.

·         There was something significant about the light. During those days people didn’t normally travel at night, this means that when Saul and his men had this encounter with Jesus it was during the day.  The light that came from heaven was so bright that it could be seen during the light of the day.

·         It would also seem that the light had some weight to it, it carried the heaviness of God’s glory.  Evidence of this is that Saul fell to the ground because of the presence of the light.

Acts 9:4-9

Saul even though he was a Pharisee and knew the letter of Law and the Scripture, did not immediately recognize the voice of the Lord. Even though he was knocked to the ground under the heaviness of God’s glory the recognition still wasn’t there. But when Jesus spoke and identified Himself, Saul did not question Him as He knew it was Him. Then Jesus set Saul up for some changes.

·         Jesus questioned Saul’s mission

·         Jesus identified Himself and expressed His pain that was caused by what Saul was doing.

·         Saul turned his heart to the Lord’s

·         Jesus removed Saul’s vision, so that it could restored with a new vision that came from Him

In verses 10-19 we are introduced Ananias and his ministry to Saul.

Acts 9:10 Now there was a certain disciple at Damascus named Ananias; and to him the Lord said in a vision, “Ananias.” And he said, “Here I am, Lord.”

This verse shows that unlike Saul, who was a religious leader and scholar and didn’t recognize God’s voice, Ananias immediately knew Who it was that was speaking to him. This tells me that Ananias had, had previous conversations with the Lord and that he knew His voice. More evidence that Jesus and Ananias had a relationship was that Ananias questioned Him on His instructions.

Acts 9:13-14 Then Ananias answered, “Lord, I have heard from many about this man, how much harm he has done to Your saints in Jerusalem. And here he has authority from the chief priests to bind all who call on Your name.”

At some level he was saying, “Don’t You know who this guy is and what he has done? Really? You really want me to go and see this guy? Are you nuts?”

Notice that Jesus didn’t strike down or even rebuke Ananias for this questioning.  The fact is that Jesus knew exactly who He needed to talk to, to get the job done, vs. 10 said “there was a certain disciple” He knew why He picked Ananias; He knew that he would be obedient to His request.  My guess is that he had a proven track record of doing what Jesus asked him to do.  The short version of Jesus’ reply to Ananias is “I have chosen Saul to reach many and he will suffer many things for My name’s sake.” (vs.15-16) I can almost guarantee that what Ananias heard in Jesus’ reply was “I have chosen him” and “he will suffer”, regardless he was obedient and went to Saul.

Assumed Expectations: So it says in Acts 9:17 And Ananias went his way and entered the house; and laying his hands on him he said, “Brother Saul, the Lord Jesus, who appeared to you on the road as you came, has sent me that you may receive your sight and be filled with the Holy Spirit.”  Nowhere in the recorded conversation between Jesus and Ananias do He tell him to get Saul filled with the Holy Spirit.  However this is what I like to call an assumed expectation.  It was such a normal part of the conversion experience in those days.  People accepted Christ, were filled with the Holy Spirit and baptized in water. There were no special new believer’s classes that had to be attended and sometimes all three happened simultaneously in the same day even.

So here is a re-cap of Saul’s conversion experience:

1.      He was on the right road on his way to do the wrong thing

2.      He encountered Jesus and his vision was removed

3.      He accepted Jesus

4.      He fasted and prayed for three days

5.      Ananias cam and laid hands on him

a.      He received his sight and gained new vision

b.      He was filled with the Holy Spirit

c.       He was baptized in water

6.      Shortly after his conversion he started preaching Christ instead of persecuting the Church