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In America we call April 15th, “Tax Day”. A day people dread, a day people say we will have every year of our adult life. A day of remembering what we have had taken out of our work wages, but today is remembered differently in history.

On this 17th day of Nisan in 33AD, on this day, Jesus Christ was risen from the dead. Two women went to a gravesite only to find an empty tomb. They thought it was a day to mourn, little did they know it would be the first day of a new life.

I do not know what is dying in your life. I do not know what battles you are facing. I do not know what price you have paid, but what I do know is that on God’s calendar, today is resurrection day. Today is the day the stone was rolled away. Today is the day the linen wrappings were folded nicely in the tomb, but there was no body in there. Today is resurrection day.

Today may be a day when the enemy was to scream in your ear, “I am going to finish you.” But the truth is, today was the day he was defeated once and for all. Today, marks the day of dead things coming out of their graves and being fully alive.

Matthew 27 says, “The tombs also were opened. And many bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep were raised, and coming out of the tombs after his resurrection they went into the holy city and appeared to many.” Today is a tomb shaking, tomb breaking, tomb opening day.

I know it has been a long three days, I know dreams died, I know hope has waned, I know disappointment fatigue has set in, but friends, today is resurrection day, the day in history when Jesus Christ the savior of the world, rose from the dead and we are alive just as He is alive. Wave good bye to that tomb, everything is coming alive right now, on this resurrection rememberance day. He walked out of the tomb and so can we. Get up, He is calling you, we got things to do. Let’s go!!!!!

I keep hearing the Holy Spirit say the next move of God is going to be…

EVERYBODY

EVERYWHERE

EVERYDAY

This is not going to be a church revival.
This is not going to be a national awakening.
This is not gonna be anything we’ve ever seen before.

We are about to experience a visitation of the likes that Noah experienced when he got out of the ARK; that Abraham experienced with the ram in the thicket; that Israel experienced in the crossing of the Red Sea; that Daniel experienced in the lion’s den; that Esther experienced in going before the king and having the golden scepter extended; that Elijah experienced on Mount Carmel; that Elizabeth experienced when Mary entered the room and John lept in her womb; that Peter experienced when he walked on water; that John experienced on the Isle of Patmos. We are about to have a holy visitation.

This holy visitation is going to demand everyone everywhere, every day be unlocked with the gifts inside of them, and the presence of God in them being activated, so you can lay hands on the sick and watch them recover; so you can speak truth to power and they bow their knee to Jesus; so you can declare peace in the midst of chaos and it responds immediately; and if you need something financially, you will find a coin in the mouth of a fish.

This holy visitation is gonna unlock believers in Jesus Christ to finally do the work of the Ministry and the joy is gonna be so comfortable. It’s gonna spread out into the streets and people are gonna grab you and say, tell me who is your God. Ready or not here it comes a holy visitation of biblical proportion.

Have you ever felt like people who do nefarious things always have enough or more than enough money, opportunity, authority? Have you ever tried to understand, why the word of God says those who pursue wisdom will prosper, but the wise don’t seem to be leading the way, the wicked are?

I love how real and raw the Bible is. It is does not cover up people’s mistakes, it does not tip toe around who people really are, it is not a politically correct book. It uses words like fool, wicked, evil, and that is describing people. It speaks of even Jesus calling the religious leaders a brood of vipers, white washed tombs and open graves. No mincing of words in the Bible that is for sure.

I was reading Psalm 73 this morning and the Psalmist is grappling with how the wicked can prosper when the Torah is so clear they are to be cursed not blessed. “Behold, these are the wicked; always at ease, they increase in riches. All in vain have I kept my heart clean and washed my hands in innocence.” This may be too raw of truth for you, but the Psalmist is pouring out his heart to God saying, I keep your word, they don’t but their blessed and I don’t understand.

I love how real we can be with God with our thoughts, our questions, our I just don’t understand God comments. But I also love how God answers. The Psalmist goes on to say, “But when I thought how to understand this, it seemed to me a wearisome task, until I went into the sanctuary of God; then I discerned their end.” God revealed His holiness in the sanctuary and it brought all those questions into context.

Friends, God is holy, He does not change. No matter what we see and how we perceive it, God has not changed. The wages of sin is still death, the gift of God is still eternal life and as we go into the sanctuary of God today, this is just one of the many reasons to thank God that He saved us. But remember, He does not delight in the death of anyone, so our job is to access glory and then go out and tell His story, because honestly, we were wicked once before and apart from Jesus we cannot be called righteous. I thank God!

As a pastor, counselor and friend, I hear a lot of people’s stories and many of them are heartbreaking. Listening to people is a needed art form in our world, for many people are suffering in silence and we don’t know it for they look so polished behind the pulpit; so professional in their suit and tie; so beautiful in their make up and cute outfit; so fresh in their youthful zeal. However the truth is, many people are struggling and they need people who will not just hear, but will give them a hand up.

Our culture has become one of counseling language which sounds right, but is not helping as much as we may think. Talk shows do group therapy sessions; Instagram has mini videos telling us how to set boundaries; churches have become life coaching sessions; and companies are doing trainings in diversity and community. But people are learning but not being transformed. We have a lot of knowledge but very little identifiable change.

The reason for this is because the word of God is the only thing that can transform us. Knowledge puffs up, but only love builds up. We have so much knowledge and so little love, which is why we are still hurting so badly. The word of God is a love letter not a theological thesis. For God so loved the world, He gave His only begotten Son. Jesus Christ said, I am the way, the truth and the life. John 1:1 says, “The word became flesh and dwelt among us.” Jesus is the word, He is not a doctrine. He is love, He is alive, and He is the only one who can heal us internally and externally.

Friends, we have love available to us in the word of God. Open the love letter and read. The word of God is medicine, it heals you in ways nothing else can. It still transforms us from the inside out. It is still powerful; identifiable; and accessible. Jesus is the word, He is not a doctrine, He is a person and He wants a relationship with you. Stop chasing people’s ideas, thoughts and self-help narratives, read the truth and the truth will set you free. Delight yourself in the Lord and He will give you the desires of your heart. He is God and He is the best soul food.

Everyone is looking for their breakthrough. Many are waiting for the dam to break and the river to begin to flow freely. Much waiting has created a sense of hope deferred that has made the heart sick. Oh how time can be such an enemy for those who use the clock rather than the prophetic word as their barometer for what God is doing right now.

Prophetic words are like time capsules, the challenge is there is not date nor time stamp on them. This is because we are called to trust the giver of the word, not the timing of the word. The duration called time between the delivery of the prophetic word and the manifestation of the prophetic word is what reveals to us who we really are not who we think we are.

When the stock market is rising, when the marriage is thriving, when the kids are in alignment, when we are in our assignment, all is well and we believe we are trusting, loving, giving, serving and living our best life. But character is seen in the challenges of life as much as in the prosperity of life. For most people character is hard to see when someone is prospering and easy to identify when life is challenging.

The truth about our character is that it does not change no matter what season we are walking through. There are two women in the Old Testament, one is a widow of Zarephath found in 1 Kings 17 and the other is the wife of Manoah in Judges 13. Neither woman is named, but both exemplify incredible character. The widow was on literally her final loaf of bread before death, due to a famine, yet she believed the voice of Elijah as he prophesied to her if she baked him a cake first, the oil and flour would not run out until the famine lifted. The wife was barren, for how long we don’t know, but when the prophetic word came and declared she would bear a son, but she needed to not drink wine, nor eat anything unclean, she believed the prophetic word and did as she was instructed.

Two unnamed women, both in really hard situations, and both revealed stellar character through their obedience to the voice of God through the prophets they encountered. Friends, it’s not your name that will be remembered, but your character which is seen in your obedience to the voice of God no matter the circumstances you are facing. Who you are in character is more valuable than you realize. Make character a priority and you will not be moved in any season you find yourself in.

You won’t look to be NOTARIZED when you know you have already been AUTHORIZED and DEPUTIZED to do the work of the ministry.

I was walking the dog this morning and the Lord and I were discussing the narrative of the nations. This led to a phrase from the Lord and a discussion about people’s need to be notarized. Pastor Dustin Smith says to us as a church all the time, “we were not created for fame”. Living in Nashville, the place where people come to become famous in the music industry, those are fighting words, but they are the truth.

Ministry in the church has become about being celebrity Christians, people love the notoriety. The challenge is, notoriety is the seed of idolatry and we know very well what the Bible says about idolatry. Jealousy, jockeying for positions, titles and microphones; platforms, stages and pulpits; it is prevelant in the church today and it reveals that we don’t know what we have been given.

Psalm 115 says, “Not to us, Yahweh, not to us, but to Your name give glory because of Your faithful love, because of Your truth.” The only famous one is Yahweh, the only one worthy of glory, honor, power and praise is God alone. We are not made for notoriety, but we have been given authority. Jesus said in Mark 16, “And these signs will accompany those who believe: in my name they will cast out demons; they will speak in new tongues; they will pick up serpents with their hands; and if they drink any deadly poison, it will not hurt them; they will lay their hands on the sick, and they will recover.”

People who want to be notarized, don’t recognize they have been authorized to do the work of the ministry. Once you know who you are as an ambassador of Christ (2 Cor. 5) then you will walk in the truth that you have also been deputized (Matthew 28) to go into all the world and make disciples of nations. We were not made for notoriety, we were made to carry authority and we have been deputized to do it. Stop seeking notoriety and start manifesting authority, this is what you were made for.

WAITING IS WARFARE!!!!

People call it impatience, I call it a battle many do not want to fight. People stay busy, occupied, entertained, self-promoting, all because waiting is warfare and most people are not interested in the fight. This is not an inditement on anyone, it is a truth we don’t talk about and don’t teach people how to do.

When I was newly married, my husband used to tell me I was impatient. He said you want everything right now. I did not see it, he saw it, but I heard him and realized he was right. I did not know how to wait. This is not about getting irritated at a long red light, or being frustrated with being on hold while waiting for the bank to pick up your call. This is the need to make something happen now, because I did not know how to wait.

The wait is hard, it develops patience yes, it develops perseverance for sure, it develops much need character qualities, but the wait is about trust more than what you are waiting for. I thought waiting was about development, but waiting is a war of trust. The enemy does not want us to wait, for the enemy does not want us to trust God.

Trust is a weapon we gain in waiting, it is a weapon that defeats the devil ways we do not understand, for trust is powerful. Is it any wonder people struggle to trust God or trust people? Trust is what the enemy steals from us when we are young and then keeps convincing us we cannot do over the years of our life. Why? Because trust is a weapon.

The Lord has us waiting not to punish us but to teach us to trust Him. Psalm 69:1-3 says, “Save me, O God! For the waters have come up to my neck. I sink in deep mire, where there is no foothold; I have come into deep waters, and the flood sweeps over me. I am weary with my crying out; my throat is parched. My eyes grow dim with waiting for my God.” Waiting is warfare, but the reward of waiting is trust and trust is a weapon that once you get it back, you will never let go of again.

We are trust deficient, so the waiting is giving us an abundance of trust that will cause us to win wars with ease. Our sword of trust will be sharp and we will have learned in the warfare called waiting that we learned to trust God and trust people. It will be worth the wait.

The word of God is rich in imagery, much of which we do not understand since we live in the West not the East, or in the East but not in Israel during the days of Jesus. However, the imagery is like a fossil, imprinted in the foundation of the earth waiting for us to discover it and marvel at its rich history and classic beauty.

I was praying Psalm 68 this morning and it says, “The chariots of God are twice ten thousand, thousands upon thousands; the Lord is among them; Sinai is now in the sanctuary. You ascended on high, leading a host of captives in your train and receiving gifts among men.”

The imagery of chariots is amazing in and of itself, horses by the tens of thousands, screaming of a king and His kingdom rushing towards us taking out every enemy that is against Him. This alone is marvelous, full of awe and wonder if we actually realized how valuable we are to the Lord.

Then you add the words “in your train”, most of us have no idea what this means. It is the same language used in Isaiah 6 where it says, “The train of His robe filled the temple.” The train of a kings robe is like the train of a bride’s gown. It is on display for all to see. The truth about a king’s robe is that they would attach every enemy to their train, so other enemy kings would know how victorious the king they were coming to fight is.

The King of kings, the Lord of lords, has a train that fills the temple. He has never been defeated, He only wins, He only has victory after victory. This is our God. His train is His trophy case over every enemy. Even death is now attached to His train for He even defeated that enemy.

Next time you are in a battle, take a look at His train, He has already defeated that enemy and you are His child, so His victory is your victory. When we overcome, He adds another enemy to the train of His robe and the enemy flees at the sound of Psalm 24 that says, “Who is this king of glory, He is the Lord, strong and mighty.” The enemy knows what His train looks like and flees, we are to know what His train looks like and rejoice, for He is our God.

Yesterday during worship at church, the Lord invited me to lift up my arms in worship, which I do all the time, but this was a specific invitation. As I raised my arms, I felt a lightness and as I sang, there was no sense of my arms even being raised. The song went on for close to 4 minutes and I kept my arms raised the whole time without effect. At one point, there was slight soreness from keeping them raised so long and I wanted to put them down, but I heard the Holy Spirit say, “Keep them raised, the battle is being won!”

Immediately, I knew this was the story of Moses in Exodus 17, when Aaron and Hur kept the arms of Moses raised for when he put them down the enemy would prevail over Israel, but as long as they were raised, Israel prevailed over the enemy. Church ended, I went home, but this experience is still with me, so I opened to Exodus 17 to hear what the Lord would say.

Exodus 17 tells us that the enemy Israel was fighting were the Amalekites. This enemy came after Israel, unprovoked and the Bible says they are the same enemies that King Saul defeated but did not destroy, which is what caused him to lose the throne. It was King David who destroyed this enemy of Israel. But listen to Exodus 17, “Then the LORD said to Moses, Write this as a memorial in a book and recite it in the ears of Joshua, that I will utterly blot out the memory of Amalek from under heaven.”

What our forefathers only defeated, we are called to destroy, so their memory is blotted out forever. We are living in this time. Enemies of the nations have been defeated by our predecessors but not destroyed. God is in the middle of destroying enemies we are not going to see any longer nor have any memory of on earth. This is causing great shaking and many are in transitions of the like they have never been in before. Fear not!

Thus says the Lord, “Keep your hands up, the battle is being won!” I would add, fear not, for the Lord our God is with us and we are seeing the glory of God on earth as it is in heaven and it is happening everywhere with everyone, this is global glory we are experiencing.

When the idea of obtaining abundance is only about money in our minds, we are not willing to go through the challenges it takes to access it. Biblical abundance is more about wisdom, revelation, understanding, people, and the fear of the Lord than it is about money.

I sat with a group of older adults the other day and listened to them tell stories about their neighborhood. They shared the joys, the pains, the challenges and the blessings. Their love for the land was obvious and their wisdom was incredible. I learned that there are three generations on the land in this neighborhood right now. This identification brought about the declaration that they live on legacy land.

When we realized the legacy land they are living on, we spoke about the wisdom that comes from the elders on the land and the need for those who are younger than them to unlock the wisdom they carry by honoring them. Honor is the key to unlocking wisdom which is what real wealth is all about.

Sitting with them enriched me in so many ways, then when I was praying Psalm 66 this morning, it reminded me that their wisdom did not come without a price. “For you, O God, have tested us; you have tried us as silver is tried. You brought us into the net; you laid a crushing burden on our backs; you let men ride over our heads; we went through fire and through water; yet you have brought us out to a place of abundance.”

To obtain the wisdom of these men and women, you must go through some things, but what they went through made them wise. One woman, Mary, told of how she was not going to let her husband die, so she decreed over him the word of God with authority. We all rejoiced as she shared how the next morning he was sitting in the chair in ICU not knowing what happened, but she knew.

Friends, we need to unlock the wealth called wisdom in the generation above us. They have walked through some things that have made them wealthy in wisdom and our honor of them will unlock the treasure they are and will enrich us in ways we did not realize we were poor. No wonder the Bible says, sit with the wise and you will become wise. I am richer today than yesterday because of this council of elders in Waco, TX.