 James 5 verse 16 “Confess your faults one to another, and pray one for another, that ye may be healed. The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much.” God says, Confess our faults one to another. How many of us like to admit that we are wrong? Probably not very many. That makes it a little difficult to confess our faults one to another. It is okay. No, it is not okay, but it is human nature, Satan’s nature, to protect ourselves and our feelings. Satan is very good at his job, but God is our protector, our provider, our shelter, and our salvation. The remainder of James 5 verse 16 tells us why God tells us to confess our faults one to another: Confess your faults one to another, and pray one for another, that ye may be healed. I am sure we all want to be healed, healed physically, emotionally, spiritually, body, mind and soul. Healed from years of Satan’s influence in our lives, beating us down, whispering in our ear that we can’t, we aren’t good enough, or telling us we are too good! Not too long ago, the Pastor at our church asked for testimonies, and I had this testimony with me, but when he asked, I shrunk back and hid the paper. Sly as a fox. Who else was sly? Satan! So, I did not get up and give this testimony; I’m a coward. Satan won that round, and after hearing the lesson that night, of course, I wished I had given it, because it was about sweeping Satan under the rug. Anyway, the reason you will see that I did not want to give this testimony, basically ever, is because I will be confessing my sins, my faults, one to another. God’s Word is alive, and it is written for us. His Word says, Confess your faults, and pray for one another that you may be healed! So, here goes. First, just know that I love children now. Around April 2022, Holy Spirit revealed to me how Satan operates in our lives, to keep us from fulfilling God’s Will and God’s plans for us. More specifically, He showed me how Satan has operated in my own life, basically grooming me with bad quirks, bad habits, dislikes, even hates, illnesses, and other behaviors and physical attributes that Satan thinks, hopes or counts on preventing me from obeying or freely serving God’s call now. Remember, Satan’s goal at all costs is to keep us from our rightful inheritance, and to keep us from our blessings. To see how Satan operates generally, let’s look at Genesis 3:1: “Now the serpent was more subtil than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made.” Subtil means cunning, wily, crafty, deceitful, using trickery, underhanded. THAT is Satan! Still looking at Genesis 3 verse 15 “And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel.” So, we can bruise Satan’s head, but he can only bruise our heel. Satan is under our feet, to be stepped on, trampled on. Some translations have it as “crush Satan’s head.” Personally, I prefer that translation: We can kill Satan in our lives; remember, resist the devil and he will flee from you. Satan cannot kill us; he can only tempt us, with worldly, material things, and evil, fleshly vices. 1 Corinthians 10:13 “There hath no temptation taken you but such as is common to man: but God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will with the temptation also make a way to escape, that ye may be able to bear it.” Amen and amen. Satan is only able to tempt us with these worldly things, and he is able to tempt us only so much, because God will not allow us to be tempted more than we can withstand: Our God is amazing and good - all the time. Amen. Following are two examples of how Satan has tried to work in my life, and has done a pretty good job until about four years ago. Perhaps, confessing out loud will give others the courage to recognize some of the ways Satan may be holding them back from freely fulfilling God’s Plan in their lives right now. After all, knowing is the first part of doing, or overcoming. In May of 2020, I wrote my first Testimony to God’s Power, and in that Testimony, I tell how one of the first things God put on my heart in 2019 was to quote “help the children.” Easy enough, right? Except for as long as I can remember, I would tell anyone who asked or who would listen: I don’t like children. I know, right? Who doesn’t like children? Satan! So, Satan whispered in my ear most of my life, You don’t like children, and this was one of my life’s mottos, or Satan’s mottos for my life. So, if any children are listening right now, I love you all now. God is good. Amen. Satan is evil. Now, lo and behold, decades later, after I am firmly planted in Satan’s motto for my life, and loving it, God tells me to “help the children.” You cannot make this stuff up. Do you see how God called me to do the one thing that Satan thought he had prepared me my whole life to dislike? I did help the children by donating money to various charities, and by spreading God’s Word on social media to pro-choicers for about a year and a half during lockdowns, until social media became social(ism) media. Before God called me to this service, I had no problem with abortion. I thought: there are too many unwanted children already; too many children not being raised properly; my body my choice seemed reasonable. I now despise abortion with a vehement dislike. Jesus said, Hate evil. Abortion is evil; abortion is an abomination, and nowhere in the Bible does God, the Father, tell us to murder or kill our babies, born or unborn. Bless the unborn babies, Lord, bless the little children. In Jesus’ Name. Amen. The next life motto Satan whispered to me over my lifetime, and sadly has apparently whispered to a lot of people, because I hear people say it often is: I don’t like people; I hate people; or even, I like animals more than I like people. Jesus had only two commandments: Love God and love your neighbor as yourself. Nowhere did Jesus say to hate people. To the contrary, He said love them, pray for them, bless them, feed them, give them something to drink and clothes to wear, love them as if they are you. We are in a time of refreshing by God right now, hallelujah! when our sins may be blotted out . . . if we repent of them. Acts 3:19 “Repent ye therefore, and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out, when the times of refreshing shall come from the presence of the Lord;” How else does Satan work in our lives to try to keep us from reaping our blessings from God? Many people, including me, while we are sleeping, make grand plans of things we want to do around the house, or in life, maybe how we want to serve God, or a ministry we want to start. And, then, we wake up, and the reality of who we are, who we have become in this life, sets in. Fear sets in. Satan sets in. Then, we start talking ourselves out of it. We hear Satan there in the background saying, You can’t do that; you don’t even know where to start with something like that; no one will help you; it’s a lot of work; that’s not who you are; you have too many responsibilities already; you can just serve God another way? Man has a sinful nature, courtesy of Adam, Eve and the serpent in the garden of Eden. We must combat this sinful nature every day; we must resist Satan every day and he will flee from us. James 4:7 Amen. God forgives us for the sins for which we ask Him to forgive us. If, then, we have a sinful nature, it stands to reason we must repent to God, turn away from sin, and pray for forgiveness every day. This is why it is important to have God’s Word stored in our hearts. The more God’s Word is stored in our hearts, the less the devil will come around, and be able to steal our blessings. With God’s Word stored in our hearts, God Always Wins, and We Do Too! Amen. In 1 Corinthians 15, Apostle Paul wrote that he dies every day. How could he die every day? Because we have a sinful nature. Yes, we have the Power of God’s Spirit, God’s Word, and the blood of Jesus Christ, by which we strive to become more like Jesus on a daily basis, to overcome this sinful flesh and sinful, evil world, as Jesus overcame, but we are still human, and we still have a sinful, human nature; God’s forgiveness does not remove our sinful, human nature. 1 Corinthians 15:31 from the Amplified Bible “I assure you, believers, by the pride which I have in you in [your union with] Christ Jesus our Lord, I die daily [I face death and die to self].” There are many ways we can sin against God talked about in His Word. Our lukewarm to cold society and churches have caused people to sin by teaching that because we believe in the blood sacrifice of Jesus Christ, we can do whatever we please and are forgiven. No. This is a fallacy, an untruth, not even supported by God’s Word. To the contrary though, it is not that now we can do whatever we please, but because we have the blood sacrifice of Jesus Christ, now we no longer desire to do those sinful things we used to do. Amen. There are many sins talked about in the Bible. One of the greatest sins is pride in oneself, to which Apostle Paul is referring in 1 Corinthians 15:31: Because he had pride in [himself] for bringing these unbelievers in Corinth to Christ, and he is saying he sins every day and dies because of that pride. We also see the sin of pride at work in the book of Esther, where Haman’s self-pride got him executed on the hangman’s gallows that he had built specifically for Mordecai the Jew to die on, because Mordecai would not bow down to him as commanded. Haman was instead hung on the hangman’s gallows, and Mordecai, a humble servant to God, took his place, and became king Ahasuerus’ second in command. So, there are many ways a man can sin against God every day, and we can only combat those sins with prayer and His Word. Amen. In Job 33, Elihu, the only friend of the four who spoke to Job, whose words were not condemned by God, Elihu is basically telling Job to stop complaining against God; that God speaks but no one listens. Job 33 from the Amplified Bible Verse 13 “Why do you complain against Him? That He does not answer [you with] all His doings. 14 For God speaks once, And even twice, yet no one notices it [including you, Job]. 15 In a dream, a vision of the night [one may hear God’s voice], When deep sleep falls on men While slumbering upon the bed, 16 Then He opens the ears of men And seals their instruction, 17 That He may turn man aside from his conduct, And keep him from pride;” God speaks once, even twice, and no one listens. It doesn’t say, Maybe He speaks. It says, He speaks. He opens our ears and seals our instruction, so He can turn us aside from our conduct: our thoughts, words and actions, and keep us from self-pride, thinking we are better than our neighbor. God seals our instruction in the wee hours of sleep, and then we wake up, and Satan’s lifetime of training kicks in: sickness, fear, doubt, unbelief. Some people feel persecuted on a daily basis, oppressed, beaten down, sad - persecuted, as if they are guilty of something, of which they have no earthly clue. When we feel that way, we should go into prayer with God. Repent of our sins, cry out to Him, tell Him that we turn away from our sins, and that we surrender in full obedience to Him. Pray for forgiveness. Ask for His Will to be done in our lives. Amen. The words in the Bible are not just words. They are active and alive and powerful, and written for us. Hebrews 4 verse 12. God cannot repeat it enough: If we pray fervently, without ceasing, and meditate on His word, worship Him, give all glory, praise, honor and thanksgiving to Him, day and night, every day, it will activate enormous blessings in our lives, and we will know that He is real. Praise God. Thank you, Jesus. Amen.
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 "But ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people; that ye should shew forth the praises of him who hath called you out of darkness into his marvellous light;" 1 Peter 2:9 Heavenly Father, thank you for our many blessings. Thank you for the Power of Your Word, Your Spirit in us, and the blood sacrifice of Your only begotten Son, Jesus Christ, Powers that are specifically for us. Transform us into Your Glory, Lord. In Jesus' Mighty Name. Amen. Around 2020, God told me, "If you touch the feet of a righteous person, they will be healed." Now, I was a baby Christian at the time, still am, but then I had only been studying God's Word for a year or so. Honestly, I didn't even know what "righteous" meant. Around that time, I looked at my husband and said, What does righteous mean? Are you righteous? Am I? A couple of years later, 2022, and I now know righteous to mean that we obey God, because if we obeyed God, then we would not sin, and we would be righteous. Around the same time, God gave me a vision of my husband and me participating in a tent revival, at which I was healing people. When I received this word and vision, we were not even attending a church. What on earth was I going to do with that information? Until we started attending our current church around August 2021, I had not told anyone about healing except my husband, and then our new pastor. Pastor David always has the right answer from God, and when I asked him what I am to do with this information, he said the Holy Spirit will tell you when the time is right and what to do. He was right! Almost a year later, and CalledOutOfDarkness.One Tent Revival Meetings came to our church, and set up a tent on the church property. My husband and I attended one of the two nights, and it was a very spiritual event, but the thought of healing, or the vision of healing in a tent, never crossed my mind, or may have crossed my mind, but not seriously. What did cross my mind was another vision I had after we started attending church: It was a tent revival at the church, with the parking lot full, and shuttles shuttling people back and forth, and I thought maybe the current tent revival was a precursor for those future tent meetings. This is so crazy. Our God is a supernatural God, right? A few months later, and a church member from the Called Out of Darkness tent meetings started attending our church, and asked me to go to another tent revival meeting in a couple of weeks. I agreed, but we failed to exchange phone numbers, and she did not come to church the next two Sundays. A few days or so before the tent revival, in my sleep, I was thinking, dreaming, having a vision, Oh well, I guess I don't have to go to the tent revival, because I'm not even sure if the person who invited me will be there. And, Holy Spirit said something that made me laugh in my dream, something like, What is wrong with you? You SHOULD GO to the tent revival meeting ANYWAY: I told you, you are going to heal. And, the light bulb went off, as it usually does, and still in my sleep, thinking to myself, I was like, Oh yeah, I should go anyway, and talk to the prayer leader about healing. Once we hear Holy Spirit speak clearly, our resolve to obey is deepened. So, I went to the tent meeting; the woman who invited me was not there, but I started talking to the prayer leader for the event, and told her that the Holy Spirit had moved me to heal, and really moved me to the event today. She said they usually vet people before letting them heal, which I understood; I told her what church I was from. She said she would let me help healing one of the tent meeting team members, who specifically had problems with her feet. So, we went up front in the tent, in front of the band, and three or four people placed hands on the person being healed, and I stooped down and touched both of her feet. The music was really loud; I don't know if it was louder because I was stooped down, but it was really loud. From the moment I touched her feet, it was like it was just her feet, not even her, just her feet, and Holy Spirit and me in the room, and the loud music, and Holy Spirit wanted to be heard above the music, and I started praying out loud in spirit, very loudly, in tongues. I don't know how else to describe it except it was loud; I could hear that it was loud. I suppose it could be called "fervent," or with intensity in spirit. It was a surreal experience, and when I was finished praying, it was like it never happened in my mind; like I had done nothing wrong; like no one heard me because no one was there. I stood up, and the prayer leader was smiling at me, and I smiled back at her. The person who was being healed was crying, and later, she hugged and thanked me. Praise God. It was not until literally three days later when I snapped out of the surreal feeling about the experience, and Holy Spirit told me that I was there that day, at that tent meeting, to heal that person, at that moment, in that very manner! Hallelujah! Praise God. Thank you, Jesus. All glory to God, the Father, all glory and honor and praise and thanksgiving. In Jesus' Mighty Name. Amen.  Heavenly Father, Father of Lights, thank you for Your Word, and Your words through me. Let Your words and Your Will always be mine, and let Your children hear. In Jesus' Name. Amen. Why do some people hear from God and many others do not. I mean, it cannot be solely because some people read chapters of His Word everyday. Many people do that, and pray, and perform deeds, far greater than that. Well, everyone hears from Him if they read His Word and pray. Everyone hears from Him; not everyone listens to or obeys Him. Around the end of August, Prophet Julie Green said that she started hearing God when she got mad at all of the corruption and injustice happening, or something like that. The morning of September 1, 2022, God gave me two words: Righteous Indignation. God is having righteous indignation right now, and His Spirit is being poured out into His children, His warriors, His soldiers. What is righteous indignation? I really just love saying the words, righteous indignation. They have such a powerful ring to them, don't they? But what does it mean? It means righteous, or godly, anger at injustice. Christians are so afraid of being angry, or showing anger, because there is scripture that clearly says do not be angry, and do not even associate with angry people, but did you know Jesus said: Be angry but sin not!? Ephesians 4:26 "Be ye angry, and sin not: let not the sun go down upon your wrath:" So, get angry at injustice; turn over the tables of the money changers in the temples. Be ye angry at the injustice against God's children, and by God's children. Stand up and speak out, but find peace in Jesus Christ, repent and pray for fogiveness, before you go to sleep. God does not tell us things to intimidate or scare His children; they are said for our benefit, so we know what is coming, and can prepare ourselves. God is our Savior, and no one but He can save us. Get into His Word, and know Him, hear Him, listen to Him, obey Him! He will tell us what to do; what He tells one may differ from what He tells another; He knows what we need. Listen to Him. Everything we need to know is in God's Word; read His Word. Jesus said at Matthew 10:27, "What I tell you in darkness, that speak ye in light: and what ye hear in the ear, that preach ye upon the housetops." Amen. What is Jesus telling you in the darkness? What are you hearing in the ear? In Ephesians 5:11, Apostle Paul tells us, “And have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather reprove them.” "Reprove" from dictionary.com means to criticize or correct, especially gently, and/or to disapprove of strongly. Righteous indignation. Before continuing, I want to point out that merriam-webster.com used to be my go-to dictionary until merriam-webster made an ill-fated decision to start changing definitions to suit demonic abominations, such as abortion. This year, I commented on a rumble.com video about Roe v. Wade, and then got into a chat with someone about abortion, the Constitution, and God. You can read that blog titled, "Delight God Today," by clicking here. So, in this chat, the other person wrote that basically morals are a matter of perspective. And, they had quoted the definition for a "parasite," implying that an embryo and/or fetus were parasites, which is many pro-choicers' preferred go-to when discussing abortion. Of course, until now, their claim did not hold water, because Science proved long ago that a parasite feeds off of, and potentially harms, its host "of a different species," which clearly does not refer to an embryo or a fetus, which are of the same species as their host: human. Sometime in the last year, however, merriam-webster has apparently decided that it knows more than Science, and has changed the definition of "parasite"; it no longer includes the words, "of a different species." Now! pro-abortionists have something to back up their claims! Now, they can label an embryo and/or fetus as a parasite, and show the merriam-webster.com definition to back it up. It is passed time for Christians, or anyone with an ounce of morals, to have some Righteous Indignation. Jesus said, "So then because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spue thee out of my mouth." Revelation 3:16 So, it is time for Christians to get hot for Jesus, to hear God, listen to Him, and obey Him. He is calling His warriors to stand up and speak out with God's Righteous Indignation. In Jesus' Mighty Name. Apostle Paul says in 2 Timothy 4:2, "Preach the word; be instant in season, out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort with all long suffering and doctrine." We already know what reprove means. Let's look at "rebuke." Again, from dictionary.com: to express sharp, stern disapproval of; reprove; reprimand. So, reprove and rebuke mean basically the same thing, except rebuke is solely on the stern side. Since we have looked at those two, let's finish it up and see what "exhort" means as well: From dictionary.com: Exhort: to urge, advise, or caution earnestly; admonish urgently. This means that Christians should be criticizing, correcting gently, if appropriate and received, but if not, disapproving strongly, sharply and sternly, urging, advising, and/or cautioning earnestly, and admonishing urgently, all unfruitful works of darkness. This is a difficult word to write, but something God has been piecing together for me since the beginning of 2021, with my first blog on the subject in March 2021, titled "Algorithm is Not Man's Rhythm," Click here for Part 1 on this word, and here for Part 2. If the following information presented is true, then truly only God can save the world. Amen. The first two items below, Elon Musk, and mRNA covid vaccines from the CDC website, have been around for awhile. I first saw them about a year ago. Following is a video of Elon Musk saying you can turn someone into a butterfly with mRNA: When I mentioned this to a family member, who is a Christian, their reply was, I wouldn't mind being a butterfly, or something to that effect. My reply back was something like, Why? God created you perfect the way you are! Of course, they immediately replied with, "joking," or some such thing.
Our words are alive, and God is listening! Jesus said, "By your words you shall be justified; and by your words you shall be condemned." Matthew 12:37 Click here for a link to the CDC.gov page that shows that mRNA is in covid vaccines. Just recently, this week, I stumbled upon the video below from rumble.com about the 144,000 in Revelation 7, and the number of the beast, and the number of a man, in Revelation 13:18. Everything is in plain sight. "They" don't even try to hide their abominations. Before you watch the short videos below, know that God has said through His prophets that nothing they have planned will go as "they" have planned; it is not yet their time. He has also said that we will see undeniable miracles, miraculous healings and births, signs and wonders from Jesus Christ. Amen. Click here to watch the short video from rumble.com about the mRNA covid vaccines, and God's 144,000 in Rev. 7, and the number of the beast in Rev. 13:18: To recap the video: The human genome is 144,000 genes, 72,000 each from mother and father. mRNA in the covid vaccines changes, or can change - I'm no expert, but none of it can be good - It changes the human genome to 216,000 genes, instead of our God-given 144,000 genes; it literally turns the double-helix strand of the human genome into a triple-helix strand. As told in Revelation 13:18, “Here is wisdom. Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast: for it is the number of a man; and his number is Six hundred threescore and six.” Count the number . . . Six hundred threescore and six; or, 600 times 60 times 6; or, 6 6 6, "the number of the beast," "the number of a man"; or, 600x60x6 equals 216,000 genes. No longer human; now called "transhuman." No longer God's creation. Click here to watch a short video from rumble.com of yuval harari, false prophet to globalist elite klaus schwab, saying the new, changed genome is the way of the future: "humans are now hackable" mRNA is in the covid vaccines; Elon Musk says you can turn someone into a butterfly with mRNA; false prophet yuval harari says, "humans are now hackable." People will be lining up for it! It is Biblical! Prophets have said, and Holy Spirit has shown me, that we are in a time of refreshing now: Acts 3:19 "Repent ye therefore, and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out, when the times of refreshing shall come from the presence of the Lord." The presence of the Lord is here now; times of refreshing are here now. Every day. We must repent to God, tell Him we turn away from the sin in our lives, even if we do not know or think that we have sinned, and that we turn to Him, in full surrender and obedience to His Will. And, pray for forgiveness of our sins. Every day. Click here to see my blog titled, "Overcomers," about repentance and forgiveness. God will not overlook sin. But God . . . But God gives us a way out. Reach out and grab it before it is too late. That way is His only begotten Son, Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior, the way, the truth and the life. The time is at hand for . . . God's Righteous Indignation. Stand up and speak out. Hallelujah! Praise God. Thank you, Jesus. Amen.  Heavenly Father, thank you for our many blessings. Thank you for Your Word, and Your words through me. Let Your words always be mine, and let Your children hear them. In Jesus' Mighty Name. Amen. Before I get into the subject of today's word, I wanted to talk about God's Prophet Isaiah. For me, Isaiah's prophetic words in the Book of Isaiah became all the more profound and meaningful when I learned that Isaiah came into his calling as a prophet when he prophesied the coming of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, some 700 years before Christ's birth! Simply amazing. In Isaiah 50:4 above, we learn that the words we speak about God to the unbelievers, the downtrodden, the oppressed, the poor in the spirit, the "weary," come from God, and that He speaks to us in the morning, and wakens our ears to hear Him, like one being taught, the "learned." Hallelujah! Praise God. Isaiah Chapter 50, the entire chapter, is about the LORD providing "comfort to desponding saints and terror to presuming sinners" (from biblestudytools.com, Matthew Henry commentary). What does that mean: comfort to desponding saints and terror to presuming sinners? Well, "desponding" means losing hope, so "desponding saints" are believers, us, who are losing hope, as many are today. And, "presuming sinners," like the Pharisees whom Jesus admonished in Matthew 23:28 "Even so ye also outwardly appear righteous unto men, but within ye are full of hypocrisy and iniquity." And, why did the Pharisees appear outwardly righteous? Because Jesus said, "This people draws nigh unto me with their mouth, and honours me with their lips; but their heart is far from me." Matthew 15:8 In other words, the Pharisees were like Cain, who thought he could climb into heaven some other way than through the door. Jesus said in John 10:1 "Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that entereth not by the door into the sheepfold, but climbeth up some other way, the same is a thief and a robber." See my blog titled, Cain and Abel by clicking here. We should walk the walk, not just talk the talk. We should be like Jesus, and walk the walk like Jesus, if we want to be "overcomers," like Jesus. As often happens, I did not know how this was going to tie into the word I am writing about from Holy Spirit today until I typed the previous paragraph. One of the main ways we become overcomers like Jesus is by listening to God. Amen. On September 21, 2022, around 3 to 5 am, still asleep, Holy Spirit showed me why He tries to speak to us in the early morning, the wee hours, in our sleep if He has to, because that is when we are the most sinless, guiltless, righteous. How many of us, in our sleep, make grand plans of things we want to do around the house? Or, in life? Or, maybe even how we want to serve God? a ministry we want to start? And, then, we wake up, and the reality of who we are sets in, who we have become in this life. Fear sets in. Satan sets in. And, then, we start talking ourselves out of it. We hear Satan there in the background, whispering in our ear, You can’t do that; you don’t even know where to start with something like that; no one will help you; it’s a lot of work; that’s not who you are; you have too many responsibilities already; you can just serve God another way. Man has a sinful nature, courtesy of Adam, Eve and the serpent in the garden of Eden. We must combat this sinful nature every day; we must resist Satan every day and he will flee from us. James 4:7 Amen. God forgives us for the sins for which we ask Him to forgive us. If, then, we have a sinful nature, it stands to reason we must repent to God, turn away from sin, and pray for forgiveness, every day. This is why it is important to have God’s Word stored in our hearts. The more God’s Word is stored in our hearts, the more second-nature it becomes to us, and the less the devil will be successful in tempting us every day, so the less he will come around, and the less he will steal our blessings through our disobedience to God. Amen. In 1 Corinthians 15, Apostle Paul wrote that he dies every day. How could he die every day? Because we have a sinful nature. Yes, we have God’s Spirit, God’s Word, and the blood of Jesus Christ, by which we strive to become more like Jesus on a daily basis, to overcome this sinful flesh and sinful, evil world, as Jesus overcame, but we are still human, and we still have a sinful, human nature; God’s forgiveness does not remove our sinful, human nature. 1 Corinthians 15:31 from the Amplified Bible “I assure you, believers, by the pride which I have in you in [your union with] Christ Jesus our Lord, I die daily [I face death and die to self]. “ There are many ways we can sin against God written about in His Word. Our lukewarm-to-cold society and churches have caused people to sin by teaching that because we believe in the blood sacrifice of Jesus Christ, we can do whatever we please and are forgiven. No. This is a fallacy, an untruth, an outright lie, not supported by God’s Word. To the contrary though, it is not that now we can do whatever we please, but because we have the blood sacrifice of Jesus Christ, now we no longer desire to do those sinful things we used to do. Amen. One of the greatest sins exhibited in God's Word is pride in oneself, to which Apostle Paul is referring in 1 Corinthians 15:31: Because he had pride in [himself] for bringing these unbelievers in Corinth to Christ, and he is saying he sins every day and dies because of that pride. Of course, Christ is the only one who can save us. Not Apostle Paul, right? We also see the sin of pride at work in the book of Esther, where Haman’s self-pride got him executed on the guillotine that he had built specifically for Mordecai the Jew to die on, because Mordecai would not bow down to him as commanded by the king. Because of Haman's pride in himself, and being unable to let Mordecai's perceived slight against him go unanswered, Haman was instead hung on the guillotine, and Mordecai, a humble servant to God, took his place, and became king Ahasuerus’ second in command. So, there are many ways a man can sin against God every day, and we can only combat those sins with His Word and prayer. Amen. In Job 33, Elihu, the only friend of the four who spoke to Job, who was not rebuked by God, is basically telling Job to stop complaining against God; that God speaks but no one listens. Job 33 from the Amplified Bible, starting at verse 13, Elihu says to Job: 13 “Why do you complain against Him? That He does not answer [you with] all His doings. 14 For God speaks once, And even twice, yet no one notices it [including you, Job]. 15 In a dream, a vision of the night [one may hear God’s voice], When deep sleep falls on men While slumbering upon the bed, 16 Then He opens the ears of men And seals their instruction, 17 That He may turn man aside from his conduct, And keep him from pride;” God speaks once, even twice, and no one listens. It doesn’t say, Maybe He speaks. It says, He speaks. He opens our ears and seals our instruction, so He can turn us aside from our conduct: our thoughts, words and actions, and keep us from self-pride, or thinking we are better than our neighbor. God seals our instruction in the wee hours of sleep, and then we wake up, and Satan’s lifetime of training kicks in: sickness, fear, doubt, unbelief. How many of us feel persecuted sometimes? Maybe even on a daily basis. Oppressed, beaten down, sad - persecuted, as if we are guilty of something, of which we have no earthly clue? If we ever do feel that way, we should immediately go into prayer with God: repent of our sins, cry out to Him, tell Him that we turn away from our sins, and that we surrender in full obedience to Him. Pray for forgiveness. Ask for His Will to be done in our lives. And watch the oppression and/or sadness leave us. Amen. Something the Holy Spirit wants us all to think about is, Have we sinned today? If your answer was "no," that you have not sinned today, then we should refer to scripture: “As it is written, there is none righteous, no, not one.” Romans 3:10. And, 1 John 1:10 “ If we say that we have not sinned, we make [God] a liar, and his word is not in us.” If we do not know that we are sinners, then God's word is not in us, because we have not read it. Amen. So, we are all sinners; there is none righteous! Now, ask yourself, have you repented to God of your sins and prayed for forgiveness today? Holy Spirit showed me that this is where we, believers, are falling short. The Holy Spirit cannot come into an unclean vessel. Amen. THIS is why He speaks to us in the wee hours of the morning, when we are most righteous, or free of sin and guilt, before our mind wakes up and starts having sinful, human thoughts. 1 Peter 2:5 “You [believers], [you believers, that’s us, everyone who believes in the blood sacrifice of Jesus Christ]- you believers, like living stones, are being built up into a spiritual house for a holy and dedicated priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices [that are] acceptable and pleasing to God through Jesus Christ. To offer spiritual sacrifices means to offer ourselves to God through our prayers, fervently, without ceasing, to sacrifice ourselves, surrender our will to God's Will, in full obedience, by offering our sacrifice of praise to God continually. Hebrews 13 15 "By him [Jesus Christ] therefore let us offer the sacrifice of praise to God continually, that is, the fruit of our lips giving thanks to his name. 16 But to do good and to communicate forget not: for with such sacrifices God is well pleased." Excerpt from biblehub.com, Ellicott's Commentary on 1 Peter 2:5: Quote: "Whereas, before, only Aaron’s sons were recognised as mediators and intercessors, now all Israel, all the spiritual Israel, all men everywhere are called to be mediators and intercessors between each other and God." End quote. We, believers, are now the mediators and intercessors between each other and God. Amen. 1 Peter 2:6 “For this is contained in Scripture: “Behold, I am laying in Zion a chosen stone, a precious (honored) Cornerstone, And he who believes in Him [whoever adheres to, trusts in, and relies on Him] will never be disappointed [in his expectations]. 7 This precious value, then, is for you who believe [in Him as God’s only Son—the Source of salvation]; but for those who disbelieve, “The [very] stone which the builders rejected Has become the chief Cornerstone,” 8 and, “A stone of stumbling and a rock of offense.” In other words, the unbelievers reject Jesus Christ, the chief cornerstone, and He is the only one that can save them. Sadly, the Spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak, so to the unbelievers, He is a stone of stumbling and a rock of offense, a stumbling block. Their path to heaven is crooked, not straight. Every day when we wake up, the effects that our past sins have caused in our lives, Satan has caused in our lives, sickness, fear, doubt, unbelief, are there waiting for us, waiting for us to think about over and over again, or maybe even to repeat again and again. That is our sinful, human nature. Now, again, if we have asked Him, God has already forgiven us of those past sins, and once God has forgiven a sin, it is forgotten to Him. Satan, however, LOVES to dwell in the past, right? If Satan can keep us in our past, keep us thinking about our past sins, then we cannot bring into captivity every thought to obedience of Christ, and we cannot move forward in our Victory in Christ Jesus, and Satan knows that better than anyone. We combat the power of our sinful nature, and Satan’s influence in our daily lives, with God’s Power, His Word, which tells us, among many other things, to pray fervently, without ceasing. And, more importantly, because our sinful nature is ever present, to turn to God in repentance and pray for forgiveness every day, for the sins we commit every day, mostly unknowingly and/or unwittingly, or involuntarily, in our thoughts. In Genesis 3, we see how Satan operates: Genesis 3:1 “Now the serpent was more subtil than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made.” The serpent was more subtil than any beast. Let’s see what “subtle” means, from Dictionary.com: “subtil” (subtle): cunning, wily, crafty And, the definition of “cunning”: skill employed in a shrewd or sly manner, as in deceiving. And, the definition of “wily” (wiles): a trick, artifice, or stratagem meant to fool, trap, or entice. Yikes. And, the definition of “crafty”: skillful in underhand or evil schemes; cunning; deceitful; sly. THAT is Satan! Subtle, cunning, wily and underhanded. So, “. . . the dragon, that old serpent, which is the Devil, and Satan. . . “ uses trickery to ensnare or deceive us, all the while evading our grasp or pursuit, and, to top it off, he is really good at it. Satan’s sole desire is to drive a wedge between God and His Chosen, and he will take a man’s lifetime to do it if he must. At Genesis 3:15, we see that Satan is not able to kill us: “And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel.” So, we can bruise Satan’s head, but he can only bruise our heel. Satan is under our feet, to be stepped on, trampled on. We should stomp on Satan every day, with prayer and God's Word. Amen. Some translations have it as “crush Satan’s head.” Personally, I prefer that translation: We can kill Satan in our lives; remember, resist the devil and he will flee from you. Satan cannot kill us; he can only tempt us, with worldly, material things, and evil, fleshly vices, such as sexual immorality, or fornication. Satan can bruise our heel, and keep us from walking for, or serving, God. Amen. 1 Corinthians 10:13 “There hath no temptation taken you but such as is common to man: but God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will with the temptation also make a way to escape, that ye may be able to bear it.” Amen and amen. Satan is only able to tempt us with these worldly things, and he is able to tempt us only so much, because God will not allow us to be tempted more than we can withstand: Our God is amazing and good - all the time. Amen. So, God is moulding us, and we need to let the pieces that Satan has defined as us fall off. Literally, we need to tell Satan to, Get behind us, or better yet, get under our feet, so we can bruise or crush his head. Satan is down at our feet, under our feet; and, we are up in the clouds with Jesus Christ. Amen. We only have two choices of whom to follow in this short life; if we do not choose God, then we are following Satan. There is no gray area. Make no mistake, Satan is trying to groom each and every one of us, and our children as well. If we are not protected by God’s Word, and prayer, then we will not know sin when Satan puts it in front of us. We need to make our first response to Satan's temptation, Godly. Amen. So, my hope and prayer is that we all begin to listen to God’s Word, and pray fervently without ceasing. Repent, surrender to God, and pray every day for forgiveness of our sinful human nature. Start talking to God. I personally pray any time throughout the day, out loud, just walking around the house, or working in the yard. If I’m working on something, I’ll just say, Lord, protect my tomatoes, or we really could use some rain today, Lord, please, if it is Your Will, not my own, in Jesus’ name. Amen. Or, if it gets really windy outside, do as Jesus did, and say, Calm, peace be to you wind, in Jesus’ Name, and watch what happens. Something else along those lines happened to us this summer: We had removed some vines that were growing up the fence in our front yard. Apparently, we unknowingly destroyed a Robin’s nest. Poor thing; she put one of her eggs in a flower pot I had sitting in the driveway, pretty little blue eggs, and the other not far away. We felt so bad. The next day, I was sitting at the computer and I heard this loud racket like something was attacking the house, first at one corner and then the other, and I just knew it was the Robin. I didn’t see her, but I knew it was her. She was angry because we destroyed her home, so she wanted to destroy ours, I guess. I don’t think she could have done much damage to the eaves, but the noise it was making was loud and frightening and intimidating. The first thing that came to my mind was Jesus - thank you, Jesus - so I threw my hands up in the air, and cried out loudly, We didn’t do it on purpose: Peace be to you, robin, calm! In Jesus’ Name. Amen. And, the noise stopped. You can’t make this stuff up. I heard one tiny noise like far away after that, but it stopped, just like that. Hallelujah! Praise God. Thank you, Jesus. Amen. We just noticed the other day that she built a nest on top of the garage door opener. Poor thing was so confused. So, God’s Word is alive, and written for us. There is power in prayer. There is power in God’s Word. These powers are for us. Jesus said we will do even greater things than He did. If we have faith. If we believe in Him. Amen. Our prayers do not have to be specific or elaborate. God is not judging us on our grammar. Meditation on His Word, prayer and worship can, and should, be done all day long, every day. When asked by His apostles how to pray, Jesus replied, pray in this manner: Matthew 6:9, the Lord’s Prayer. “Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done in earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, And forgive us our sins, as we forgive those who sin against us. Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil, for yours is the kingdom, the power and the glory, for ever. Amen.” Memorize the Lord’s Prayer; pray it often throughout the day; and eventually you will move into a closer relationship with God, and the words will come more easily. If we prayed just this prayer every day, as instructed by jesus, we would be repenting and asking for forgiveness each time. Amen. Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil: THAT is surrendering to God, repenting, which means to turn away from [sin], and turn to God. Amen. When I first started praying a few years ago, I prayed the Lord's Prayer every day, many times per day, in my head usually, not necessarily out loud, but standing in the kitchen, driving, watching TV, lying in bed, whatever I was doing. When I first started praying it, I could not complete the prayer without worldly thoughts creeping into my head while I was praying, and I would start over from the beginning repeatedly so that I could complete it without interruption. Eventually, I could finish it all at once without other thoughts interrupting. This is called meditation. Repeating something over and over to yourself, until those worldly thoughts no longer creep in, until you can repeat the whole prayer in your head without interruption. This is bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ: when you can think about His Word above all other thoughts. It is possible. Bring Him into your life, into your thoughts, into your jobs, your cars, everywhere, through specific petition and urgent supplication, which simply means specific and urgent prayer, fervently and without ceasing. “Let the words of my mouth, and the meditation of my heart, be acceptable in thy sight, O Lord, my strength, and my redeemer.” Psalm 19:14 We need to begin to resist the devil and he will flee from us. We resist him by meditating on God’s Word, repenting, and praying for forgiveness. We become "overcomers" when the Holy Spirit has a clean vessel in which to enter. "God speaks once, twice, and no one listens." Be an overcomer today. Praise God. Thank you, Jesus. Amen.   Yesterday, Labor Day, I was looking at rumble.com, and I noticed that my "rumbles," which are the same as "likes" and "dislikes" on other social media platforms, my "rumbles" were exactly 2,222. I thought it was interesting, and showed my husband, and thought no more of it. Then, we went out to eat, and to Wal-Mart. Our grocery bill was exactly 222 and change. Now . . . it is starting to get my attention. When we got in the car, I told my husband, half jokingly, that we should play the lottery with 222 and 2222. Yes, I am not perfect, and my mind and thoughts still jump to worldly things. Forgive me, Lord. This is why it so important to have God's Word hidden in your heart, so you do not sin against Him. Psalm 119:11 Later, after we got home, I was checking my email, and there was an email from a prophet that I haven't seen in quite some time. So, I read the email, and God told him to help people move to a new level in their lives in God by sowing seeds into the prophet's training center. By now, you can probably guess how much of a donation he was asking for. Drum roll please . . . $222. You cannot make this stuff up! Now, just a week or two before, God had told me to donate $100, and I was still trying to accomplish that. I had tried at a couple of sites that oddly would not go through, and then this happened with 222. So, let's all strive to be like Jesus: Love your neighbor as yourself, as Jesus loved, with unselfish concern. Do unto others as you would have done to you. And, most importantly, give, and it shall be given unto you; good measure, pressed down, and shaken together, and running over . . . Luke 6:30 As I was finishing this blog up, and looking for an image to put at the top, I wondered what, if any, significance there was to the numbers 2222 and/or 222. Following is an excerpt from biblestudy.org. This website says, among other things, that "The overall meaning of multiple number twos (e.g. 222, 2222, 2:22, and so on) is somewhat unclear in Scripture. They are related, however, to not only the creation of Eve and the first marriage but also to Jesus' return to earth! They additionally reveal how rewards will be distributed upon entering the kingdom of heaven and how we must deal with temptation." The website goes on to say further: Quote: Multiple number twos: "One of Jesus' greatest, yet often misunderstood, use of symbolism is found in Matthew 18. He warns, in verses 8 and 9 of the chapter, that it is better to lose a hand, foot or eye than to have two hands, two feet or two eyes (222) condemn us. Since sin is generated out of thoughts and choices (Matthew 15:18-19), the Lord is not condoning self-mutilation as a way of dealing with sin but rather admonishing us to decisively deal with the temptations that lead to it. Jesus, in Matthew 25's parable of the talents, uses 222 in verse 22 to teach an important lesson about those who enter God's kingdom. And the one who had received two talents also came to him and said, 'Lord, you delivered to me two talents; see, I have gained two other talents besides them' (Matthew 25:22). The man who received two talents doubled his master's money just like the person who got five talents (Matthew 25:16). The Lord rewarded both men equally, showing that he judges and rewards fairly based on what a person does with what he is given (verses 21, 23). Lastly, Jesus uses the example of two men in bed, two women grinding, and two men in a field (222) to warn that many people will be arrested and killed prior to his return to earth (Luke 17:34-36, see also verse 37)." End quote. I have a feeling that this word from God is not yet finished, but I was so excited about how He works in our lives, I could not wait to share it! This is in line with God's words to me: The Millennial Reign, Seventy Years, and others. God truly works in mysterious ways. How does He work in your life? Praise God. Thank you, Jesus. Amen  I did not think to screenshot the "rumbles" on my account until September 8, and by now, the rumbles are up from 2,222 to 2,269, but I wanted to post this screenshot anyway. See next image below from our bank account that shows we spent $222.43 at Wal-Mart on September 6.  And, finally, a screenshot of the email I received the same day, asking for a $222 donation.  I heard evangelist, Mario Murillo, say recently, |
Melanie GarciaFaithful and humble servant to our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Archives
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