Month: February 2023

When you haven’t been invited to be in the spotlight, when you come into a church, community, family, it is important to remain in the lower seat. It is not your show, your event, your gig. Having lived through many years of a bona fide revival that began in March 1996 and continued legitimately into 2010, we saw and heard many things. We saw the power of God restore marriages, heal bodies, supernaturally increase finances, but we also saw people who were prophets try to come in and prophesy, people who thought their ministry was flags so tried to take over the service with their flags or dancing, we had people that were called to be prayer warriors so wanted to pray for people, we even had one man come in who said he was Jesus and he even dressed the part.

I saw and heard both sides of revival, but it does not just happen in revival in happens in churches, communities and cities all over the world. If someone has a gift/calling, they believe they should be able to have the microphone, sing on the worship team, lead this, do that. It is truly an epidemic in the charismatic church. Therefore, when my dear friend Marcella Mitchell said the other day, when I asked her why she was not showcasing at this birthday party how well she can dance, she said, “I wanted to be present, but not prominent!” I was so blessed by these words she spoke, I have been meditating on them for days. The wisdom, the truth, the power of these words have penetrated me and I believe they are words the body of Christ needs to hear.

We as believers, no matter how gifted, talented, anointed, appointed, titled, called we are, if we cannot enter a room, a church, a community, a city, and be present without having to be prominent we have missed the heart of God. Jesus came to earth and as Marcella said, He was being present, but not prominent. Jesus never demanded a certain seat, a specific title, a microphone, a ministry opportunity, He was truly present, but not prominent. Oh church, may we hear the words deep inside of us that my friend shared, may we remember we are called to be present, not prominent no matter how good we may be at something. Thanks Marcella for espousing wisdom we all need to hear.

Once a month our church does, what we call Hope at Home. Our whole church gathers in homes once a month to worship, take communion, have discussion and fellowship together. This month our senior leader did a video message from Revelation 2 and gave us three points to discuss: remember, repent and return. He wanted us to remember why we decided to join this church, he exhorted us to repent of the sins that sought to destroy our community, and he invited us to return to our first love of God and this community. It was a simple yet powerful message.

I am the discussion group leader for our home and we all shared why we joined Hope UC Nashville, the reasons given created a tapestry of community that made me so thankful for our church that truly does life together. Next we discussed, what the Lord had me call “the little foxes” that were seeking to destroy what God is building among us. We named the “little foxes” so we could shoot them down in sniper prayer, for if that little fox was messing with one we knew it was messing with us all and we were going to have none of it. We ended by getting in a circle, holding hands and sniper praying to take out the little foxes. It was our way of returning and return we did, some with tears, others with smiles, but all knowing we are here to protect what God has given us.

This is the context of what the Lord spoke to me this morning in prayer and I hope it helps you with your own little foxes in your own communities. Historical voices are not current realities. Historical voices are speaking past hurts into current realities and all they are is a little fox trying to destroy the new vineyard. Shoot them down in prayer with the word of God. Don’t let them ruin your current vineyard. The historical voices are returning because they see what is blooming. The little foxes see the fruit of the new vineyard and they want to destroy the vine, before it can release the new wine. Guard your vineyard, shoot down the little foxes.

Song of Solomon 2:15 “Catch us the foxes, the little foxes that spoil the vines, For our vines have tender grapes.”

I awoke with a strong sense this morning that I was to take communion and was to make it something I do daily again. I used to take communion everyday in my personal prayer time, but with many transitions and changes happening for some reason that got dropped. This morning the Lord brought it back and what He showed me today is what I sense I am supposed to share with you.

People remember what others say, but most do not reflect upon or remember what they say. We can quote other peoples complaints, concerns, comments, but we tend to not have such a good memory of what comes out of our own mouths. Jesus said, “For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks” (Matthew 12:34). We learn what is in our hearts by what we say, we learn what is in other peoples hearts by what they say. If you are a good listener to what others say and what you say, then you can hear what is in their heart and your heart.

I was reflecting on somethings I have spoken over the past couple days and what the Lord showed me was something in my heart I did not congnitively realize was there. When I listened to what I said, I realized it revealed to me what was inside of me. I cannot change anyone but me, so once this realization was in front of me, I knew there was something I needed to deal with, so I did with communion.

The Lord showed me this morning that the bread of communion represents the pierced body of Jesus, so the hurts we have felt, are patched when we take the bread. It is like the bread of communion is mortar that patches the piercings in our heart. Then as I took the juice of communion, the Lord showed me the blood then seals the patch, so the piercing can heal properly and so no more words are released from that pierced place. It was a powerful, practical example the Lord showed me of the power of communion to heal a pierced heart. Communion heals the hurts in our heart.

Watching what is happening around the country and world; listening to what people are saying from experiencing what is happening; and hearing the names people are attaching to what they are seeing is both fun and familiar. It is fun to see schools and students experiencing the presence of God; it is fun to be sent free tickets to a movie; and it is familiar the labels we are placing on what is happening (another revival; another Jesus revolution). I am not opposed to those thoughts, but I see something much different happening. I do not see something we have seen before, I see something new taking place.

Isaiah 43:18-19 says, “Do not remember the former things, Nor consider the things of old. Behold, I will do a new thing, Now it shall spring forth; Shall you not know it? I will even make a road in the wilderness And rivers in the desert.” It is familiar to remember the former things, both good things and bad things. The apostle Paul even said, “Brethren, I do not count myself to have apprehended; but one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead, I press toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.” What God is doing in our generation is new, it is not familiar, it may look similiar in ways, but it is something new.

I keep seeing the Lord putting an IV in the arm of the body of Christ and He is injecting abundant life into her. With every infusion the cellular level of the body of Christ is beginning to pulsate with life, abundant life and death is literally being pushed out of the body. Life, light, joy, peace, it is all being injected into us at this time. The students are getting oxygen from the presence of God, it is as thought living air is being breathed into their nostrils so they can live, really live. It is another aspect of the pulsating life God is pouring into His body. I see it so clearly, it is going to cast out all death, disease, discontentment, discouragement, divorce, debt, and demonic spirits. The life of God is healing the body of Christ and all we have to do is agree to live. This is what I see, a body fully alive, speaking life, living life, doing life with our King Jesus and one another. I see abundant life!

There is so much good news coming from the throne of God. There is so much celebration surrounding the voice of God and what He is saying. Oh that we could see the invisible, hear the inaudible, understand the heart of the One we call God. He is doing a work in our day that even if He told us we would not believe Him, because His goodness is beyond our comprehension. His passion for people is beyond anything we have ever understood. His desire for nations to be saved is stronger than we can even imagine. Our God, Yahweh, Yeshua, the Holy Ghost is for us and not against us. The trumpets of heaven are blowing in celebration to gather God’s people together on earth to see, to hear, to know He is for us, He is for us, He is for us.

I was praying Psalm 53 this morning and the Lord spoke to me and said, “There is fear in the camp of the wicked, the workers of iniquity, but there is faith in the camp of the righteous, for they will do great exploits.” Two camps, one camp is in fear, the other camp is in faith. I know many do not feel like their faith is “strong” but as God looks at His people He sees faith in the camp of the righteous and He wants us to know, there is fear in the camp of the wicked. They are scared, for the voice of God has roared in the midst of their abominations; the Light of God has shown in the midst of their darkness and they are scared.

Psalm 53 says it this way, “Have the workers of iniquity no knowledge, Who eat up my people as they eat bread, And do not call upon God? There they are in great fear Where no fear was, For God has scattered the bones of him who encamps against you; You have put them to shame, Because God has despised them. Oh, that the salvation of Israel would come out of Zion! When God brings back the captivity of His people, Let Jacob rejoice and Israel be glad.” My friends, the Lord said, “There is fear in the camp of the wicked, the workers of iniquity, but there is faith in the camp of the righteous, for they will do great exploits.”

Power comes in many ways, it is seen in miracles, it is heard in testimonies, it is experienced in salvation, but it is also manifested in remembering. I think one of the ways the enemy wears us down is by cluttering our lives with present realities so we do not remember what God did for us. When John wrote the letters to the churches in the book of Revelation one of the churches were indicted for falling from their first love. They were exhorted to repent and return to the place from which they had fallen. First love is a very high place in the spirit, it is our salvation day, our covenant moment with the Lord. Jesus even alluded to forgetting this when He said to the woman caught in adultry who poured oil on His head, saying, he who is forgiven much loves much. If we ever forget where we came from, we will fall from our first love and that fall is greater than we realize.

Today, I was reading Ezekiel 16 and the Lord reminded me of what He did for us when He saved us. Today the power of remembering is on God’s mind. Listen to what the Lord said in Ezekiel 16 “When I passed by you and saw you struggling in your own blood, I said to you in your blood, ‘Live!’ Yes, I said to you in your blood, ‘Live!’ I made you thrive like a plant in the field; and you grew, matured, and became very beautiful. When I passed by you again and looked upon you, indeed your time was the time of love; so I spread My wing over you and covered your nakedness. Yes, I swore an oath to you and entered into a covenant with you, and you became Mine,” says the Lord GOD. Then I washed you in water; yes, I thoroughly washed off your blood, and I anointed you with oil. I clothed you in embroidered cloth and gave you sandals of badger skin; I clothed you with fine linen and covered you with silk. I adorned you with ornaments, put bracelets on your wrists, and a chain on your neck. And I put a jewel in your nose, earrings in your ears, and a beautiful crown on your head. Thus you were adorned with gold and silver, and your clothing was of fine linen, silk, and embroidered cloth. You ate pastry of fine flour, honey, and oil. You were exceedingly beautiful, and succeeded to royalty, says the Lord GOD.”

What a great day to remember how the Lord called you, clothed you and made you royalty. It’s time to remember your first love!

I was praying in the spirit this morning during my prayer time, no agenda, no thoughts, just praying in tongues, when the Holy Spirit began to speak so clealy to me about the body of Christ. The truth the Spirit was speaking to me was potent and the Lord reminded me of John 16:13 saying, “When He, the Spirit of Truth, comes, He will guide you into all truth; for He will not speak on His own initiative, but whatever He hears, He will speak; and He will disclose to you what is to come.” I have heard the Spirit of Revelation, I have heard the Spirit of Life, but today, I heard with such clarity the Spirit of Truth and it had me standing amazed at our God and how much He is for us and how much He wants us to live, really live! We know God is love, but we are about to encounter in a powerful way the God of Life, Abundant Life.

The Spirit of Truth began to speak to me about Traumatic Theology, the word traumatic I had to look up for I did not want to assume the definition and here is what Webster’s and Cambridge Dictionaries define traumatic as: 1. Psychologically or emotionally stressful in a way that can lead to serious mental and emotional problems; 2. Causing distress or anxiety; 3. Causing severe lasting emotional shock and pain; 4. Causing worry or upset. Do you realize how many people in the body of Christ struggle with anxiety, fear, distress, discouragement and disease? Yeah, way to many and the Spirit of Truth is saying it is because of traumatic theology.

The Spirit of Truth began to share with me that the body is Christ is more comfortable with wars and rumors of wars than they are with peace; He said, we love to talk and preach about the cross, but we are not engaging the empty grave; He went 0n to say we preach we have to die to ourselves but we are not taught how to live for Him; He continued by saying, My people know how to live in darkness, but don’t know how to live in light; My people understand debt and poverty, but they don’t know how to handle prosperity. He concluded by saying, they’ve been traumatized by theology. I was stunned at the truth of all that was said, I never noticed how pervasive this is, but it is absolutely the truth.

When the Spirit of Truth was done speaking, I prayed the Lord would turn the body of Christ completely around, so we would begin to live, really live the abundant life, speak, honestly speak about the empty grave and the never ending kingdom and that the Lord would heal us of our traumatic theology and give us an infusion of life and life abundantly. Oh my friends, God is up to something so much bigger than we can even see at this moment. We are headed into a revolution of the likes we could not even think or imagine, but this I know, it is going to be pulsating life coming from the Spirit of Truth!

I woke up this morning hearing the words, “BOUNDARY LINES NOT BATTLE LINES”. My first thought was this has something to do with nations, so I start researching boundary lines in scripture to see what the Lord is saying, the couples verses that stuck out to me were, Acts 17:28 “He made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth, having determined their appropriate times and boundaries of their habitation”; and Dueteronomy 32:8 “When the Most High gave the nations their inheritance, when He separated the sons of man, He set the boundaries of the peoples according to the number of the sons of Israel.” God loves national boundaries, He set them for a reason and Proverbs 22:28 is crystal clear when it says, “Do not move the ancient boundary.”

I know I have biblical precedence for what I heard waking up, but what is God trying to say to me, this I did not know. I spoke to a friend this morning and she said you may not know what that means for you, but that was a confirmation for me as God is having me draw boundary lines right now. I thought yes, I can hear that for you and see that and celebrate that, but what is God saying? Was it personal boundaries, could be, but it felt like national boundaries to me, so I have been sitting on this all day. Then I am driving home minutes ago and a news alert pops up on my phones and says, “China and Russian nearing a cooperation agreement for Ukraine.” Immediately the Lord said, “Boundary Lines Not Battle Lines, I am setting national boundary lines not drawing battle lines, there is no war coming.”

I do not usually get these kinds of words, but I know the Lord was clear they are not drawing battle lines, but boundary lines, so I am not sure all that is going to look like, I just know what the Lord said. All this fear based talk of war is media propaganda, it is not what is really happening, so fear not, the report of the Lord is, “boundary lines not battle lines.”

A common weapon of the enemy is that of fear. Fear of missing out, fear of the unknown, so many fears. Fear is a weapon that erodes confidence, creates discontent, opens up space for mental illnesses, and even destroys relationships. Jealousy, anxiety, depression, suicide, stress, all are rooted in fear. But the enemy stole something God gave us and twisted it, so when people hear the word fear of anything, they assume something negative. With this being said, when people hear we are to fear the Lord, they say why would God want me to be “afraid” of Him, this is a great example of the enemy hijacking the word fear of…

I was reading Proverbs 19 this morning and Solomon said, “The fear of the LORD leads to life, And he who has it will abide in satisfaction; He will not be visited with evil.” There is nothing scary about this verse and it calls for us to fear the Lord. The fear of the Lord is actually healthy for us, it carries great benefits and supplies us with things we need and desire. Solomon says, the fear of the Lord leads to life, satisfaction, and is a protector against evil. Now that sounds like God’s idea of fear.

What is the fear of the Lord? John Bevere wrote a whole book on it called The Fear of the Lord, so read that if you want a deep dive, but for a simple definition, the fear of the Lord is obedience to God. When I obey the Lord I am revealing I trust Him and it is called the fear of the Lord. The fear of the Lord is in its simplest form, trusting God. Trusting He is in charge, He knows what’s best, He is a protector, provider and promoter. There are so many benefits to the fear of the Lord and I believe as we move away from the fear of the enemy and his voices, we will find many health and wealth benefits to the fear of the Lord. Solomon also says the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom and we need that in our generation. My friends, I pray you repent of the enemies fear tactics and turn to the fear of the Lord, the benefits are undeniable.

Words are more powerful than we realize, words have the power of life or death in them. Our words are either building people up or tearing them down, there is literally no inbetween. Words are what created everything we see. Genesis 1 says, God spoke and it was. We are created in the image of God and our words have power, life giving power or death destroying power. It doesn’t matter the situation that caused words to come out, if they release death, death is seeded and if they release life, life is seeded. Seeds grow and either produce life or death in people.

It is amazing how many people think if you are a life speaker you are not realistic about what is happening. The truth is, when you know the power your words carry you do not echo the narrative of death and destruction and call it information sharing, you reverse the curse of death and speak life into every situation. Everyone of us is a manifestation of words. Words others have spoken over us and words we have echoed based on what others have said. We must get a revelation of how powerful our words are and how powerful the words we hear are.

Proverbs 16:24 says, “Pleasant words are like a honeycomb, Sweetness to the soul and health to the bones.” If we want to see a healing movement sweep our nation and the nations, we must begin with what we speak. Our words have the power to heal the sick, raise the dead, cast out demons, and restore the soul, but we must speak life. Why the connection to words and honey? Solomon knew things we do not know.

Did you know one of the first coins in the world had a bee symbol on it? Did you know there are live enzymes in honey? Did you know this is why the best way to eat honey is with a wooden spoon? Did you know that honey contains a substance to make your brain work better? Did you know that honey is one of the rare foods on earth that alone can sustain human life? Did you know that honey has no expiration date? Did you know that propolis that bees produce is on the of most powerful natural antibiotics?

Now take honey and switch it with the words of life we speak. Our words are to be healing, to be honey to the hearer. Our words heal, they do not expire. God knew what He was doing when He tied our words to honey and now we are speak sweetly to one another, it will make us stronger, healthlier and smarter, not the opposite. It’s time to speak pleaseant words no matter what you see or someone else says.