A Purposeful Life

“And it came to pass, when David and his men were come to Ziklag on the third day, that the Amalekites had invaded the south, and Ziklag, and smitten Ziklag, and burned it with fire” (I Samuel 30:1).

As David’s exterior world collapsed, he returned to his interior, rebuilt his primary identity, recovered his base. David had escaped Saul, duped the Philistines, now endangered by his own men, and God brought David back to Himself and reliance upon Him.

What do you do when your world collapses? You return to your interior, the interior of where God lives. God allows trouble to bring you to where we belong. We are united and in planted in Christ. Allow God to work. Allow His discipline to take hold.

Christ is capable of living the Christian life, for the obvious and simple reason that He is the Christian life. Allow the grace of God to work in your bad situations and good situations.  As David faced much we are grateful that the Christ who lives in us is more than able to face anything and conquer

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  • The Feast of Tabernacles

    “And on the third day eleven bullocks, two Rams, fourteen lambs of the first year without blemish” (Numbers 29:20).

    There is coming a day of remarkable position for the nation of Israel. The Feast of Tabernacles prophesy to the day when the Kingdom promises and the beautiful bountiful land of Israel will be fully restored and enlarged.

    All promises and prophecies of Scripture are fulfilled in Christ. God’s blood accomplished what the animal sacrifices could not. All sin is forgiven and God is able to move in and make a way.

    You and I cannot live without the intercession and ministry of our Great High Priest, the Lord Jesus. He represents us before the Father. He is our advocate, mediator, and intercessor. As the day approaches to the coming of the King we need to spend much time in His presence depending upon Him for His work in us and through us.

    The sacrifices given during the Feast of Tabernacles were expensive. The grace of God is given to us because of the great value and expense of God’s sacrifice of His only Son. We should be thankful and offer all we are and have up to Him.

    May we not give to the Lord that which costs us nothing (2 Samuel 24:24; Malachi 1:6-11). What great joy to know the Lord of lords and the God of glory is going to return to set up His Kingdom forever!

  • Be Wise and Listen

    “And Jonathan said unto David, O Lord God of Israel, when I have sounded my father about tomorrow any time, or the third day, and, behold, if there be good toward David, and I then send not unto thee, and show it to thee” (I Samuel 20:12).

    The son of King Saul, Jonathan, spoke to David in the presence of God’s hearing and seeing, and brought out to David that he would speak to his father about David and get his father’s true opinion of what he thought of David. He promised David to find out once and for all.

    The rest of the story is known to all Bible students. King Saul wanted David dead. He chased David all over the countryside trying to murder him and get him out of his life and kingdom. The result was disastrous for King Saul and Jonathan.

    Today many reflect the way they think of King Jesus by their action. There are no gray areas when it comes to Christ. Either we are for Him or against Him, wanting Him or driving Him away, crowning Him or crucifying Him. The Lord did not send peace upon earth but a sword to divide and to cut through.  

    The heart truly reveals what we think of David’s greater Son. Our motives, methods, and hidden thoughts will reveal what we imagine of God’s only begotten Son. The Word of God tells us, “To kiss the Son, lest He be angry, and you perish from the way, when his wrath is kindled but a little. Blessed are all they who put their trust in him” (Psalm 2:12).

    God runs this universe by decree, not by democracy. God’s decrees will succeed. Puny, foolish men with their godless living will not eradicate or hinder His work. God’s scepter of righteousness will sound forth and what we think of Him really does matter.  We will either cry out in repentance or cower in rebellion. Listen and be wise to the Spirit of God for He is sounding out what we think of God’s Son.

  • An Independent Spirit

    “So you also, when you have done all that you were commanded to do, say, ‘We are unworthy servants; we have only done what was our duty” (Luke 17:10).

    God’s people are called to be together and to serve together. One of the most respectable sins that is taking place today is the sin of individuality – the pride of an independent spirit.

    This spirit of independency is killing our country and our communities. The church is not strong. Why? Because the church is the one organism God has brought together. When one part of the organism begins to withdraw from the body of believers as a whole then cancer begins to show up. And it will metastasize to the point of corrupting other parts of the body.

    When the human spirit expresses itself apart from the body of Christ, then we can be sure that it will cause harm to the family of God and to the person’s family. The spirit of independency expresses itself in two areas: a resistance to authority, especially spiritual authority, and an unteachable attitude.

    When we are young, we tend to think we know it all. When we are old, we tend to think we are not needed. God has given the family so that we will learn to submit to one another in love. God has given the church so that we will learn to obey God’s headship and to do it with joy and not with joblessness.

     

  • Want to be Great? Learn to be Small…

    “Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus…” (Phil. 2:5a).

    Think of how the Lord Jesus let go of all–status, position, respect. He
    gave up his rights to be respected, waited on, and adored.

    Jesus walked and lived in “Glory Town.” He gave up the praise of angels, who
    prostrated themselves and covered their faces with their wings when he
    walked by, and they sang harmoniously that reached the furtherest star when
    they found him near. Jesus humbled himself and became small for us.

    Dress yourself in modesty. Fall off the pedestal others and maybe you have
    placed yourself upon. There are a lot more important things to think of than
    to think of yourself subconsciously.

    Look at others. Look at the poverty around you–not just financial poverty,
    but also marital poverty–broken families and families abused. Dress for
    success by putting on the Lord Jesus Christ. Even next to you in church
    there are hurts and pains. Do you see them?

  • Time to Leave

    “And it was told Laban on the third day that Jacob was fled” (Genesis 31:22).

    Jacob’s father-in-law was a full-length mirrored-image of Jacob himself. Laban was a deceiver, a conniver, a cheat and he worshipped at the image of other gods (Genesis 31:10). Jacob was a deceiver, a conniver, a cheat, and he worshipped the true and living God, but he did not see himself as God saw him. So the Lord gave him a reality check for several years. Sometimes it takes a long time for people to get rid of themselves.

    Do we realize that God places within our person those to whom we work with, talk to, come into contact with, who come alongside of us to make us miserable. Why? It could be to reveal to us what we are really like. When their glaring faults are detestable and obvious to us we can be sure that we have also have a flawed character trait that we are blind to. Our assessment of them is really God’s assessment of us.

    We become our biggest enemies. Even if we did not have the sinister minister of deceit, Satan, in the world, the flesh we have will continue to deceive, corrupt, and judge. So how does God get this out of us? He places a Laban before us to reveal and causes us to feel the burn of what we are like to others.

    After the third day Laban came for Jacob. But God revealed to Jacob it was time to leave and go home to the house of God where he first met the Lord. Laban never learned what it meant to bow before the God of Jacob. Laban never changed.

    Jacob bowed at the feet of the God and he learned to allow God to surgically remove the blemishes, the faults, and the blindness of his own life. His crookedness, maneuvering, judgmental flaws were washed away over time and God removed much of what was holding him back.

    Thank God for the third day. One day God will take away all that holds us back from being what He is like. One day we will awaken into His likeness.

  • As It Was In the Days of NOAH

    “There is no fear of God before their eyes” (Romans 3:18).

    In Noah’s day the creation of the Creator chose to choose against God. They lived as if He wasn’t there. They were devoid of God. They were detoxing themselves from all that reminded them of the true and living God. They unanimously voted God off the island, eliminating Him completely from earth’s equation. Humanity hung by a thread of a thin, godly line. Though outnumbered by millions, Noah’s little family is the “why” God held back His judgment for 120 years.

    We see a sneak preview of things to come, an advance viewing of humanity in the last days. That generation was a God-hating breed, and their kind has returned in this generation. Noah’s contemporary message was ignored by the masses and the messenger was maligned and hated. They ate, drank, and pursued relationships without the acknowledgment of God at all.

    God was not in their human hard drive, erasing Him from their collective conscience and culture. They produced after their own kind, making more degenerates, just like them. They flocked together, sinned together, and hated together. Rejecting the words of a man who gave them the Words of God, they chose to suppress the truth and avoid all witnesses.

    We as Christians are, by nature, salt and light, we’re also masters at hiding in the salt shaker and hitting the dimmer switch. We must allow God’s Spirit to lift us and load us for love. For it is God’s people who again are postponing inevitable judgment. Noah’s world did not begin without God, but it sure ended up that way.

    Look around. Which way do you think we’re headed?

    And what are going to do about it?