Month: July 2024

Droughts drain resources which results in famines that cause people to move in order to be positioned for the next outpouring. No one likes a drought, no one wants a famine, no one wants to move, this is why we resist the ways of God because we do not understand them. We only see in part, the part we are in, we struggle to rise above our current situation to see a big picture reality. We get stuck in the frame we are currently in and cannot see the movie that God is playing on a screen we do not see. We want out of the drought now, we want the famine to end, we do not want to move, because we are uncomfortable and in our discomfort we do not realize we are being brought to a place of abundance that will blow our minds. We grumble, we complain, we cry, we fight, all because we cannot see past our noses. We all do this, but thank God for His mercy that is new every morning, truly great is His faithfulness, that despite us, He is moving us into something we cannot even fathom is possible.

James 5:17-18 says “Elijah was a man with a nature like ours, and he prayed earnestly that it would not rain, and it did not rain on the earth for three years and six months. Then he prayed again, and the sky poured rain and the earth produced its fruit.” We have been through a 3 1/2 year drought, that many know personally the financial drain, the emotional strain and the spiritual pain of this past season, but the drought is ending and the rain has begun to fall. Fields are starting to receive rain; people are beginning to see this was not to harm us but to help us come out together into a wide open space.

Friends, this is the word for now…Psalm 66:12 “Then you put a leader over us. We went through fire and flood, but you brought us to a place of great abundance.” We are on the edge of a place of great abudance, fear not, I can see the land of abundance and it is so great, we will forget the pain of the last seasons, for we will be so busy rejoicing in our God and how good He truly is.

Can you imagine being a well that never runs dry? Can you picture yourself being a river of resource that never runs out? Have you ever considered the idea of an eternal fountain of grace springing up out of you that distributes to all who God places on your path? It sounds so foreign to us because we have been taught limitations rather than expansive dimensions. We have been raised small and told big dreams don’t come true, at least not for me, not for you. But what if I told you, everything is about to change and for it to change you just need one thing? Would it be too good to be true?

The Lord has been speaking to me about love, not human love, I mean the love of God. God’s love that is an eternal well inside of us; a fountain of grace that springs up and out of us. He has been showing me that when I do things for love not money, I am a river of resource that never runs out. However, if something is done for money, then it is limited. Think about it, how much are you really worth? Are you paid what you are worth or do you settle for the amount someone else thinks you are worth and then build your life around that amount? In the Bible, Judas valued Jesus at 30 pieces of silver, that is what Judas and the Pharisees deemed Jesus was worth, 30 pieces of silver.

If Jesus operated from the worth people placed on Him, He would have never went to the cross, He never would have declared Father forgive them for they know not what they do. Jesus operated out of love, so there was no end to what He could give, even His own life. Love gives far more than money ever could or would. Money has limited us, but love is what liberates us. Love never runs dry, but if it grows cold, every resource it used to give dries up and quickly. You know what you love by what you resource. We are called to be an eternal resource, but to be that, we must be lovers. Money increases and money decreases, but love is an ever flowing stream that never runs dry. Keep your love on and you will never cease to be a fountain of grace, a river of resource. Love never runs out!

Love is not love! Not all love is created equal. Jesus said, No greater love than this, than he lay down his life for his friends (John 15:13). Then in Proverbs 7:10, 18 says, “Behold the woman meets him, dressed as a prostitute, wily of heart…come, let us take our fill of love till morning; let us delight ourselves with love.” Friends, love is not love. One love is to lay down your life for another person, another love is transactional and they are not the same.

I was reminded this morning of the phrase, “Do for love, what you would not do for money.” We have been so dipped in a value for money, we have lost our love for God and people. Love that lays down its life, like John 3:16 says, “For God so loved the world He gave His one and only begotten Son…” this kind of love is the highest value in the world. But money, transactional love, has so dipped us in its system of control, we do not even recognize it, but many lives are ruled by it.

The move of God happening right now is a move of love of the likes we do not even comprehend. It is a pulling us out of a system of transactions and inviting us into a system of love that lays down its life for one another, no strings attached. We are so suspicious of this kind of love, because it is foreign to us. We don’t know how to love without transaction and we don’t know how to receive a love that is not transactional. But God!!!!

We have grown cold, distant, exhausted and anxious because we have valued a transactional love, not a lay down our lives love. Love is not love, one is transactional and the other is laid down, no strings attached, just because of who you are as a person kind of love. Friends, the love revolution of the 70’s was transactional, but the love demonstration of the 2024’s and beyond is going to heal places and people in ways nothing else can. Faith, hope and love remain, but the greatest of these is love.

I have been following the bread crumbs this week and it is leading me to the same word God has been speaking to me for years now. I would love for this word to be another word, but if it is what God is saying, it is what I am saying. One of the things about the prophetic, is that we love to hear prophetic words, but we do not linger with them until they are fulfilled. God is not in a hurry to fulfill what He speaks, but He sure does love to tell people who will listen what He is thinking and doing. Think of it as a friendship. Your best friend wants to share their heart with you, not because what they shared they are going to do right at that moment, but they wanted you to know what they are thinking. When we listen to someone else’s heart, they love to share what is on the their heart. For me the prophetic is hearing the voice of God, listening to the heart of God and obeying the voice of God. It is a friendship with God.

What the Lord has been sharing with me all week long is that Babylon is falling, but He has added and falling fast. It started with a countdown that He showed me in three separate flash dreams; then he brought me to 2 Kings 13 and said “Strike the ground and it will be defeated once and for all!” Another day I was brought to the book of Haggai and He said, “I am shaking everything so the treasure can come into my temples. Remember you are the temple.” Then this morning, I hear “follow the bread crumbs” and immediately I think Hansel and Gretel. Hansel and Gretel are siblings who are abandoned in a forest and fall into the hands of a witch who lives in a bread, cake, and sugar house. The witch, who has cannibalistic intentions, intends to fatten Hansel before eventually eating him. However, Gretel saves her brother by pushing the witch into her own oven, killing her, and escaping with the witch’s treasure. (Wikipedia)

You may say this is whatever, but I know Babylon is falling (Revelation 18) and falling fast. I am striking the ground; agreeing with the shaking out of the heavens and the earth so His temple can be filled with glory and that the bread crumbs are leading to the killing of the spirit of witchcraft and the plundering of her house (Proverbs 6). It won’t be long now, but I just wanted to remind you, Babylon, Babylon is falling and falling fast!!!! Follow the bread crumbs they lead to the Bread of Life who will never let the righteous be forsaken or their children begging bread.

One of the many reasons the Word of God is my favorite book to read, study, pray, preach and meditate on is because it always raises the bar and invites you to come up higher. The Word of God will not dumb something down so you can get can get a participation trophy, it will maintain the level and strengthen you, train you and equip you to reach the standard it has set. The reason this is because nothing short of you expereincing abundant life, freedom and power is the goal of the Word of God for everyone of us.

Reading Proverbs 3 this morning revealed a standard God will not lower for anyone, but so few people pursue God’s standard because they love the world’s standard. Here is what Solomon, the richest man to ever live said, “How blessed is the man who finds wisdom And the man who gains understanding. For her profit is better than the profit of silver And her gain better than fine gold. She is more precious than jewels; And nothing you desire compares with her.”

The world’s standard is called the gold standard and with a shaky financial system, people are clinging to and buying gold and silver, hoping to escape a financial collapse. But Solomon says, we are not blessed if we have silver and gold, we are blessed if we have wisdom and understanding. He goes on to say they are more precious than jewels. What? Selah. Here we are working our tails off for silver and gold, but who is pursuing wisdom and understanding? Silver and gold may buy you stuff, but wisdom and understanding will set you free, will make you a distributor of truth to others and will infuse you with a peace that passes all understanding.

The choice is yours as to what you pursue, but I can tell you this one thing, the Word of God is not lowering the standard to silver and gold when it comes to who is blessed. The blessed have wisdom and understanding and if you have those two things, silver and gold will follow you, so you don’t need to pursue them for they are pursuing you. This is what freedom feels like.

Culture it is so much a part of who you are you do not even recognize it until you are in someone else’s culture. When people get married they have culture shock, because they never lived in a man’s or woman’s culture. Missionaries have culture shock when they live, not just vacation, in another country, because they realize how much they are the culture of their nation while living in another nation. We love our culture so much, we do not even realize the hardest thing to let go of is our culture, for the kingdom of God is a culture all of its own and most people do not enter into it, because they cannot let go of their own culture, whether genderly or nationally.

Paul said it this way, “There is neither Jew nor Greek; slave nor free; male nor female, for you are all one in Christ.” (Galatians 3:28) If you are debating whether women can preach or not; if you think your race is superior to another race; or if you think you have dominion over another human being, you have not entered into the kingdom culture, because the kingdom culture is not your culture nor is it my culture. The Lord invites us all into kingdom culture as children, for children are teachable, children are playful, children are God’s choice for His culture.

American culture does not honor the wise and older, they exalt the young and immature. So when you read in Psalm 92 “The righteous flourish like the palm tree and grow like a cedar in Lebanon. They are planted in the house of the LORD; they flourish in the courts of our God. They still bear fruit in old age; they are ever full of sap and green, to declare that the LORD is upright; he is my rock, and there is no unrighteousness in him.” Because of culture we don’t realize one of the reasons we have luke warm messages, we have identity crisis, and acceptance of unrighteousness is because culturally we have let the youth lead and have not let the older bear fruit among us and declare who the Lord is. The kingdom honors everyone for it is a culture of honor.