Monthly Archives: April 2012

Whose report do you believe?

April 30, 2012

There it is. Written in black and white. You have but a few months to live. You are left in a state of shock. Is this what I’ve been fighting for? Is this what I’ve been praying for? God what happened?

There it is. Written in black and white. All of them actually. Bills. Bills. Bills. How’d it get this far? How did my life become like this? Am I not a child of God? God, what is this?

There it is. Written in black and white. Well, blue too. “__________ is engaged to_________”. “______ is married to _______”. Oh and how can you forget the beautiful baby pics that keep getting posted every 20 mins on Facebook. God what’s happening to me? Am I not good enough? Will I ever have kids? Will I ever find the right person? Will he ever come (back)? Am I to live a life alone?

There it is. But really, it isn’t. God has given you a word. But for some reason, it seems that the total opposite of that word is happening. All of hell breaks lose and there are reinforcements that are not on your side. You question what was spoken to you. Is it really from God? Did you ‘miss’ Him on this? Because, nothing seems to be working the way it should work.

Have you ever had a “there it is” season? Is this it? Did you wake up this morning feeling “when will all this fighting and struggling end?”.

A recent issue that happened in my life had me feeling close to this. It’s as if I kept doing what I felt the Holy Spirit told me to do, but yet, I got no results. I got what I call a “Holy Ghost slap” while driving on the 401 this weekend. ( I promised you that I would be real, sooo…don’t judge me for what I am saying, ok? )

“Hypocrite! Pull over!”

“What did I do?” I said, trying to find a spot to pull over.

“You’ve been talking about faith all this week. But yet you’ve been doubting!”

I got it. No need for further rebukes. But my Loving Abba began to show and teach me faith from another perspective.

“Whose report do you believe?” Were the reminding words of the Holy Spirit to me over the last few days. “Are you going to believe what is written in black and white? Or are you going to believe what I have written?”

Remember the story of Joshua and Caleb? Caleb told Moses that they should go up and possess the land that God had promised. But when some had examined the land, after having seen the size of the people they would have to fight, they came back with a report that it was impossible to possess that land. And so the whole lot of Israelites were discouraged because of a ‘report’ that they had gotten. A report that went against the very grain of what God had spoken to them.

When trials come, when the situation looks hopeless, when the Word that God has given you seems like it’s not ever going to manifest, whose report do you believe? You see, we’ve got two choices when it comes to faith. We can either believe the ‘black and white’ reality that we see or hear, with our natural eyes, or we can believe what God has said according to His Word.

Don’t be moved or shaken by what you see. No matter how it looks, hold on to the Word that God has given you. See it. Let it become your hope. Continually speak it so that you can hear it and override the doubtful reports that you are seeing and hearing. It doesn’t matter what it looks like. Hold on to what He has promised.

To conclude, earlier on I wrote a set of scenarios that began with ”There it is. Written in black and white”

Well, do you know that God’s Word is also written in black and white? So let’s revamp those reports with this one Word from God (There are others. Just use find the scripture that supports what God has spoken to you. And if you can’t, feel free to drop me a comment or an email asking me to help you find a scripture reference).

There it is.. Written in Black and White. “God is not a man, so he does not lie. He is not human, so he does not change his mind. Has he ever spoken and failed to act? Has he ever promised and not carried it through? (Numbers 23:19)

Hold your position in faith. Stand your ground. Believe ONLY the report of the Lord.

Posted by schadah in Uncategorized Tags: believe, Christian, Christianity, encouragement, God, hope, relationships

No Really! What are you saying?

April 27, 2012

If I could summarize what I’ve learned about faith over the last few days I would say that

Faith is determined by what you see.
Faith comes by what you hear
Faith is operated by what you say

Yesterday I starting talking about the power of words, and I branched off into a direction about how words work. But today, I want to talk about how what you say puts your faith into action.

I thought about the whole faith thing, and I guess I visually compared it to a cycle (this is drawing from my Biology background, lol). Here is the cycle (PS: You may not see this if you’re looking at it from email, so go to the site.)

THE FAITH/FEAR CYCLE

Step 1: The word of God declares in Hebrews 11:1 that faith is the ‘substance’ of things hoped for (seen in the future). That’s the green part. So if we are to have faith, then we must be able to visualize something (what we desire, according to God’s will). If we cannot see what we want in the future, there is a problem. Because that’s how faith starts. But if we do see it, then we can move on to the second step.

Step 2: Faith for the things that we are hoping for then comes by what we hear (I think that’s the turquoise colour in the diagram). If we hear things that oppose what we believe for, we are building fear (e.g. you’re never gonna get that). NB. The opposite of faith is fear. We’ll get into that next week. But if we hear things that support what we believe, we are building faith (e.g. you’re gonna get what you’ve prayed for). It doesn’t matter if voice we hear is an external one from society or media, or from within ourselves (the devil does talk to you too). What matters is that what we hear determines if we’re building faith or fear.

Step 3: Whatever is heard must also be spoken (Purple part of diagram). So words are the framework for establishing or facilitating faith. The question is: whose words are we allowing to impact us?

If you think about it, two thirds of what we allow to come into our spirits through our ears are the words of people. We live in a time when we have what I call ‘passive communication’. Do you realize that for the majority of the day we have passive communication through texting, typing, bbming, whatapping, even reading this blog. Can you imagine how much information from the external word comes into your mind and spirit, and becomes part of your faith cycle?? We have not yet used our VOICES to speak. We even pray within our minds. Why is that? I don’t want to say its a demonic conspiracy, but…well. if God created us as speaking beings to creatively frame what we want to happen (Gen 1:26), what do you think the enemy’s number one goal would be? To steal the Word.

Mark 11:23 says this:

For verily I say unto you, That whosoever shall say unto this mountain, Be removed, and be cast into the sea; and shall not doubt in his heart, but shall believe that those things which he said shall come to pass; he shall have whatsoever he said.

Once upon a time, I used to be ‘vulnerable’. For years, because of my quietness and timidity, I allowed everyone around me to tell me what my life was going to be like. I don’t mean just family and friends. I mean, the news, the statistics, the movies (I watched this movie one time-500 days of Summer…good grief. That did a number on my hope for falling in love again!). But I couldn’t really blame any of these things. Why? Because the truth is I was letting them do all the talking. I wasn’t talking! I was just allowing their words and what I saw to impress upon my spirit. I kept praying (in my mind) for things to change. But there was no point really. Because I had very little faith in what I was praying for. And whatever faith I had, was being deteriorated by my negative words (when you’re down, you could really say a lot of foolishness). Then I got hold of the verse above: You shall have whatsoever you say. I thought about it. ‘Whatsoever’ I SAY. Well if I wasn’t saying anything, then I couldn’t really have what I say. But Jesus’ principle of Mark 11:23 is true! And because I believed what other people were saying, their words became the operating system of my life building false faith (fear). I then fell into a rut where all I saw for myself was a lonely life of misery where I’d never amount to anything but a piece of seasoned meat; where I wasn’t smart enough, good enough, forever broke, forever hurt by people coming into my life. The more they spoke, the more these ideas got into my spirit and the more I allowed their words soaked in, the more I saw it manifested in my life.

Point to note: Sometimes people say things that are not really intended to be harmful. But because of the state you’re in, the enemy uses what they say and fuels it to mean something worse. The more you meditate on it, the more it sounds like what you want to hear. Sooner than later, those thoughts impact you negatively.

So…what have you been sayin’ Lady? Sir? About your situation? What have you been saying in your prayers? Have you been a ‘Job’, complaining about the problem, rather than speaking life?

Have you been praying to God for your relationship to change, then confessing to others that it won’t?

Have you been believing God for something, but you believe and see something totally opposite for your future?

Or have you just been silent, allowing everyone and the devil to tell you how your life’s going to be?

Change your talk! You will have what you say.

Posted by schadah in Uncategorized Tags: believe, Christian, Christianity, encouragement, faith, God, hope, jesus, prayer

What are you saying?

April 26, 2012

Words are powerful things.

When God framed the foundation of the earth, everything that he did was created by what he said. That means, every bit of nature, and every human being that we see here today was created by words he spoke. Interestingly, when He created man, His mandate was for man to be like Him. Why? So that he (man) can have dominion on the earth (Gen 1:26). There would be no reason to make man in His image, unless he had to continue the same work that God did. So, when God created you and me, his intention was for us to use our mouths to speak creatively-changing things (‘darkness into light’), naming things (calling dry land ‘seas’) forming things (inventions), etc, just as He did.

What am I getting at? Our words have creative power. The Scriptures say “Life and death are in the power of the tongue” (Proverbs 18:21).

I got to thinking and talking to God about this. And I asked God, “how much of what I say during the day is creative?”

“All of it.” He said.

“All of it??”

“Yup.” (This is how God communicates with me when we’re talking. He doesn’t speak Roman, because I don’t.)

As I continue to have this chat, I reminisced on all of the things that I talk about during the day. The truth is whether or not they are productive to my life or not, the words that I speak are creating…something. Why? Because when God said “Let us make man in our image”, His words became legally binding, such that, I was made a creative speaker just as He. So when I speak something…anything…., my words create either death or life.

Well S how does that work? Have you ever said “I feel like crap”? Or “My car is a piece of crap”? When you did, what was the result of it? It might not happen right away, but what you say ends up being what you get. Now, don’t get me wrong. If you’re not feeling well already, then you’re not feeling well. But when you SAY it out loud, your ears hear what you say, and the same ‘messengers on the bus’ take back what you spoke into your spirit. In short, you’re making yourself sicker every time you say it.

The same thing with the car. I heard a woman testify that she used to cuss out her car on a regular basis because it won’t perform the way she wanted. But the more she cussed, the worse the car got. One day, God said to her, “why don’t you use your mouth to speak what you want the car to do?” She had never thought about it, but after repenting to God (and her car), she laid her hands on the car and said “Momo, you’ve been faithful. Thank God for that. I can’t afford another car right now, so I need you to work for me until I can. Father thank you for making Momo work well, IJN” The car worked until she got a new one. Never gave her a single problem.

I want to stop here because I feel God wants to say this to someone.

Husbands/Wives/BFs/GFs. It’s important that you tell your mate that you love them daily. Don’t assume that they know. Your words create peace and stability in your relationship. Also, speak positively about him or her. None of that “you’re such a moron” bit. Pay him a compliment. Tell her she looks amazing. “Pleasant words are sweet as a honeycomb-Sweet to the soul and health to the bones” (Prov 16:24). When you say them they create healing.

Mothers and Fathers. Speak good success to your children. If they are not doing well in school, don’t tell them “what the hell is wrong with you?” Your words can create depression and low self esteem. I can’t tell you how many men I know now that are messed up because of ill words spoken. Tell them that you believe in them, that have intelligent abilities. Your words create hope. My mom used to say to me regularly “you’ll look good in a paperbag!”. Until today, I am convinced that I can put on anything, and I will rock it!

Sisters and Brothers. Sibling rivalry is common. But tell your sibling that you thank God for them even if they choose to cuss you out. Your words are seeds of unity and restoration.

Friends…especially the ones that have been messed up for whatever reason. If there is a nudging in your heart about a friend in your life, that God trying to tell you to make that relationship right. You probably think that God wanted that relationship to end, but the mere fact that it’s coming up so strongly in your Spirit, it means that it was not God that ended it. Say you’re sorry. Even if you don’t think you’ve done anything wrong, say it. Your words dismantle anger and bitterness. Saying you’re sorry is one of the most powerful things I think. It breaks pride, it brings love, it heals, it restores.

People…in relationships who think that you should not say anything to the other person, because you don’t want to hurt, mess things up, etc. There’s a spirit of avoidance at work that you need to bind. God is the God of relationships. Your silence is being misinterpreted. If you think that if you speak you will do damage, then you need to practice speaking positively. So open your mouth and sow a seed of positive value. You don’t need to do a whole lot of talking. A simple “thank you for being you” will do. Lol. When in doubt, text, email, Whatapp a scripture verse. Nothing has more power than the word of God. Your words break confusion and brings reassurance.

Now I know we’re talking about faith this week, but I just felt that was the direction that God wanted me to go this morning. I’ll pick up on how words bring faith tomorrow.

Have a great day. And remember Speak Life.

Posted by schadah in Uncategorized Tags: believe, Christian, Christianity, encouragement, faith, God, Heart, hope, hurt, jesus, love, peace, relationships, restoration

What are you hearing?

April 25, 2012

If there’s anything I have learned in the past few months, it’s that God has a protocol for everything. We saw a little bit of the protocol for answered prayer a few weeks ago. So what is the protocol for faith? I’m sure I’ll publish a book on these protocols some day (along with the many other books I plan to publish), but for now, I just want to touch on one that the Holy Spirit gave me this morning.

Romans 10:14-17 says

¹⁴How then shall they call on Him in whom they have not believed? And how shall they believe in Him of whom they have not heard? And how shall they hear without a preacher? ¹⁵And how shall they preach unless they are sent? As it is written:

“How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the gospel of peace,
Who bring glad tidings of good things!”

¹⁶But they have not all obeyed the gospel. For Isaiah says, “Lord, who has believed our report?”

¹⁷So then faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.

The moment I asked God to show me how to get faith, this scripture came to mind. In this text, Paul was referring to people who didn’t believe the gospel simply because they had not heard it.

I think that we humans are an absolutely amazing creation. God created our eyes, ears, mouths, skin and nose as the smallest external parts of our bodies and even though they are so seemingly irrelevant they are among the most powerful tools that he has given us to connect with the world around us. The ears are particularly special (so are the eyes), because they are an integral connector from the natural to the spiritual realm. How’s so?

Have you ever given thought to the things you hear everyday? Have you ever wondered about how it is that you can hear the same song as you drive to work everyday, and without even trying, you subconsciously start singing the song as if you wrote it? That’s because your ears have taken words out of the airwaves, and through an intricate audio system, transferred them to your brain, which then transfers it to your mouth.

Here’s what’s even more interesting.

Let’s say you hear a song…the same song everyday on your way to work. “Lonely, I am so lonely, I have nobody to call my own”. You’re hearing this song EVERYDAY. Your brain sends out these little ‘buses’, that picks up every word that you routinely hear and brings them back to your ‘brain base’. When you hear it again, your brain will send out other ‘little buses’ with these words…as many words as it can, that matches the song you are hearing, so that you can sing bits of it. Every time a ‘bus’ transfers messages (bus’ passengers) to your mouth, it also deposits some of the same message to your spirit (I’m really not pulling this out of thin air, I once took Psychology as a concentration. But if you’re in doubt, Dr Caroline Leaf is Christian psychologist/communication pathologist that studies these thought processes and how they work. Look her up). Every time you hear the song, you deposit bits of what you hear into your spirit.

Now think about this! We human beings are hearing things every second of every minute of every day! We hear the fridge at night when we sleep, we hear the car engine revving, we hear birds chirping. But we also hear WORDS that people say. We hear “you look beautiful today”, “great job”, “Wow you’re amazing”. We also hear “you’re such a donkey”, “what an idiot”, “you’re not good enough”, “the economy is hard. You won’t get a job now”. We hear words through our songs, through the TV shows we watch because they exemplify our lives, from our close friends and family. And for every word you hear, there is a deposit into your spirit.

Here’s my personal story. PS: I am not writing this for sympathy. It’s really part of my testimony.

I once dated a guy that I loved very much. We broke up. I was heartbroken for a loooooooong time. So much that I fell into a depression that I felt no one really understood. During that time, I found that all these sad love songs and romantic movies exemplified where I was. I found comfort in them: Tony Braxton-Unbreak my heart, Whitney Houston-Why does it hurt so bad, It must have been love…and others I really can’t remember. One Tree Hill, 90210, and other relationship ‘dramas’ were my faves. I also had a group of ‘friends’ who comforted me with ‘men are idiots’ or ‘maybe it’s this quality that he didn’t like’. My depression period went on for about 2 years. I did fight as best as I knew how, but the fact is, all I was listening to was hurting me. Were these things bad? I dunno. It’s not my place to judge. But what I was hearing was making me stay in a place of hurt and excruciating emotional pain for a long time. More than that, it made me make some really bad decisions. The full testimony is yet to be told, but I had to make a stringent effort to block my ears from hearing these things, if I wanted to heal. So, I changed my mp3 play list. I started to listen to “Yes, Jesus Loves me”, “I’ve got the victory”, “Yet, Still I rise”, “I’m coming out (Aretha Franklin’s version)”. I stopped (literally) watching any sitcom or movie that would make me cry and reminisce on him. I also had to cut out friendships that insisted on being negative about men; they needed as much help as I and they were only making me hate him, or doubt my worth. I didn’t want that as a Christian. Bottom line, today I’m here. (Smile, Smile, Smile) Healed from the hurt. God did that.

Was I being extreme? Probably. But I needed to get out of the frame that I was in, and what I did worked.

What you hear is imperative to your faith walk. If you constantly listen to things that will make you depressed, broken, miserable, selfish, FEARFUL (that’s one we’ll address later this week), non-progressive, doubting your worth- it will be very difficult for you to have faith in God for the good things He’s promised. These things will seep into your spirit and keep you from receiving God’s blessings for you. It is no wonder Jesus said “take heed what you hear” (Mark 4:24).

On the other hand, if you listen to things that are ‘good, true, lovely, noble, of GOOD REPORT’, your faith will be strengthened. Don’t take my word for it. Try it. Write a list of all the negative things you hear and the media you get them from, in a week. Then cut them out of your life (call it a fast if you want). Replace them with an audio bible in a version that’s practical. Listen to songs that are positive, that celebrate victory. Tune into a TV show that will build you up (good luck with that. I tend to just watch Vision TV or the Food network or TBN). Try that for a week. See if you don’t notice your faith increasing.

Talked enough for today. Be blessed. And take heed what you’re hearing.

Posted by schadah in Uncategorized Tags: believe, Christ, Christian, Christianity, discouraged, encouragement, faith, God, hearing, hope, hurt, jesus, love, relationships, words

What do you see?

April 24, 2012

Have you ever been sky diving? Probably not. But, in the first minute of sky diving is the act of free falling. It’s the time when a jumper exits the airplane or helicopter or whatever, and allows himself to fall into the atmosphere.

If you’ve ever seen someone free fall (on tv) you’d agree that it’s one of the most spectacular things that a human being can do. For someone to jump from a plane into absolute nothingness, defying the thoughts of his mind, defying the nervous pangs of his gut, and all other fears, is an amazing thing. Free-falling proves the impossible- that humans can also fly! But to do that, he needs a mind shift. He needs to shift his mind from believing in the support of the plane (the tangible tangible), to believing in the support of the atmospheric pressure (the intangible tangible). So how does he shift his mind? I’ve been told, that trainers tell their students to ‘think of the air as your friend’. The free faller must hold on to a vision of himself being supported by the atmosphere. Whatever he imagines becomes his hope.

God wants us to jump from the realm of ‘tangible airplanes’ to the realm of ‘intangible air’. Now please don’t go deciding to free fall from an airplane. It’s a metaphor (lol). Having faith in God, means jumping from the things we normally believe in, whatever they are, and plunging into Him even though we can’t see Him. He is the air that supports us when we ‘free fall’. “But S, how do we do that?” you ask. Well, one of the ways to do that is to change our way of thinking. Having faith is not impossible. As the Word of God tells us, we all have a measure of faith. To change our minds to faith, we need to have a vision of what God can do for us. We need to have hope for something. When Abram was frustrated about not having a child, God told him to ‘see’ something (Gen 15). When God spoke to Ezekiel about Israel, He asked him to ‘see’ something’ (Ezekiel 37). The move to faith is determined by what we are hoping for.

Now faith is the substance of things…hoped for- Heb 11:1

Now, close your eyes (well, after you read this). And think of all of the things that make up your belief system. These are the things that you’ve been having faith in. They may include your car, your husband, your degree, your pay check, blah, blah. But now think of the God that is your Father. How much more can He give you than these things? Your car has a shelf life. Your husband can change his mind about things, your degree may not get you the greatest job, your pay cheque might come late. But God….God is CONSTANT.

Now open your eyes. If you have envisioned totally thrusting yourself into the God that is constant, like the guy who holds on to a vision about the air supporting him, you are also ready to take that leap to faith.

I feel that God is saying to someone today, “Jump, and I will catch you.”. (Again, this is not a suicide mission!). But God wants you to stop holding on to the things that you’ve been holding on to, and just depend totally on Him. Are you holding on to your money because you’re afraid it will run out? Envision the God who provides, and have faith in Him. Are you holding on to your heart or because you’re afraid that you’ll get hurt? Envision God as Father, who will always be there to comfort and guide you, and have faith in Him. Are you holding on to something, because it’s all you know? Envision the God that wants to give you more than you know, and have faith in Him.

We believe in things that we have ‘seen’ or have proven. But God wants us to believe in the future He has for us. Faith is the substance of things…hoped for (seen in the future). Instead of being afraid, have hope. See the glorious future that God has for you! Have a vision of what He can do for you: Relationships that He will restore! The most fruitful career that He will give you! Your complete health that He’ll restore! Wealth beyond measure that He’ll provide! Have a vision of these things and then jump into Him!

Posted by schadah in Uncategorized Tags: Christian, Christianity, encouragement, faith, God, hope, inspiration, vision

The Faith Thing

April 23, 2012

Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen- Heb 11:1

Good Monday morning y’all! It’s about time we talk faith.

Last week, we talked about believing in the works of Jesus Christ and what God has done for us. This week, I’ve challenged myself to dig deeper into the whole “belief” bit.

So what exactly is faith? Is “believing” the same as “having faith”? To be honest, I really don’t know. But I hope that God can give us a few tidbits concerning this. Whatever faith is, it’s imperative to living life to its fullest, the way God intended. So what is this faith that Christians are always talking about.

1. Faith is the substance of things…

If any ‘scholarly’ or ‘scientific’ person reads Hebrews 11:1, he’ll say that faith is not real. And that this scripture is a circular argument. But thank God, He uses the foolish things to confound those that think they are wise. Faith is a substance. It’s a ‘tangible intangible’, meaning even if we don’t see it, it’s there. The word ‘faith’ comes from the Greek word “hupostasis”, which means a support ground work, a framework, subsistence, reality or essence (Strong’s Concordance). I’ll put it like this: faith is the mental framework that makes you do the things you consider as positive.

We have faith in all sorts of things. All sorts. I gave this some thought last night, so here goes…

You know how you get on an airplane, even though you’ve never seen the pilot, know his background or if he even qualifies to fly the plane? That’s faith.
You know how you get into the car, and turn on the ignition and drive to work, believing that your car will get you there alive and won’t blow up? That’s faith.
You know how you turn on the alarm at night, and then drift off into ‘la-la’ land, without even thinking about whether a robber will break in and shoot you? That’s faith.
You know how you go to the grocery store and purchase your salads, and your meat, and your veggies and all the processed foods, and then go home and make a fantastic dinner for you and your friends, and then you all sit and eat, without thinking you will die?…Faith.
You know how you go to school for 4 years, or even more, and you sacrifice things that used to matter to you, because you think that at the end of it all, your hard work will pay off and you’re going to make millions? That’s faith.

Why do we make those dangerous moves (and yes, they are dangerous, if you give it some thought)?Because we somehow ‘know’ that we’re gonna be okay when we do them. That ‘knowing’ is faith.

Faith is what makes us do the things we do. It’s the belief system which serves as the support framework or the confidence for making the decisions that we make. Many times we have faith for natural things, particularly when we know that it has worked for others who have received the same natural things before. But believing or having faith (I will use the two terms interchangeably until I figure out if they are different) for things that we know work, is only a small part of the faith pack. A teensy-weensy bit, I think.

See if faith was just based on what we’ve ‘seen’ or what we ‘know’ works, then God won’t be Sovereign God. We would be. God would just be a dumbed down God with no power. God will not share His glory with any man. So He says “have faith in Me”.

As believers, we can’t put our trust in man, or what we’ve seen or heard in the world. Believe it or not, when we do, we exalt the world. We exalt the things that we’ve seen, and heard and the people that do them. When we do that, we’ve essentially ‘dissed’ God and placed ‘things’ and man above Him.

So, in sum, faith is real. And everybody has it. It’s just that we all use it in different ways.

Wanna challenge everyone today. What do you have faith in? It’s not a condemnation. But if you can, think of all the things you do on a daily basis. Now ask yourself, “when I do these things, is it because I have faith in God, or faith in the thing itself?” “Does God get the glory for everything that happens? Or am I subtly putting my trust in man and things?”

If it’s the latter, perhaps you should take some time to pray for a faith realignment.

See ya tomorrow.

Posted by schadah in Uncategorized Tags: believe, Christ, Christian, Christianity, faith, hope

Leap to Faith

April 20, 2012

Then Jesus said to the disciples, “Have faith in God.- Mark 11:22

By nature, we are very stubborn human beings. Although as believers we’ve already confessed Christ as Lord and Saviour, there needs to be a process of bringing the rest of our souls (our will, mind and emotions or heart) and our bodies, to the Lordship of Christ. What does that mean? Declaring someone as the ruler of your life, is one thing. Actually accepting him as the one who governs your life is another. When I fully believe that Jesus is Lord of my life, I come into agreement with everything God is doing and has done through Jesus. I surrender fully. And as is written in John 15:7, I abide in Him and I let Him abide in me. If I don’t fully believe in Christ, it’s pretty darn hard to receive from Him. I need to have faith in Him to receive from Him.

But how do I get that faith? See, we talk a lot about keeping the faith but not about how to actually activate the faith. Romans 10:17 provides part of the answer: “… faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God; but it doesn’t tell us how to activate faith. Let’s be real. Sometimes, it’s not that we don’t want to believe, but it’s just that taking that initial step of faith is really difficult because of our stubborn human nature. Well I asked God this morning to tell me how to activate faith. This was the tidbit I got in my imagination:

I’m in a battle and I am the only one on my side. I am being attacked by a bunch of people with guns and spears and all that (metaphoric representation of all the nonsense in my life), and I am fighting them off as best as I know how. But I am tired. I am afraid that I’ll lose if I stop fighting, so I keep fighting… on my own, even though I know I’m going to lose anyway. But the truth is I am tired. Tired of the fear I am feeling. Tired of the physical energy it is taking me to fight, Just then, a helicopter sounds above my head and a man tosses me a rope. “Take it” he says. “Who are you?” I ask. “Just trust me and take the rope. We’ll have time for questions later”. I’ve come to a crossroad: I can either die trying to defend myself against these hooligans, or I can take a leap of faith and take the rope from this stranger I have yet to know. It’s right about now that I have to make a decision to trust…to activate my faith.

When I received that bit of info, I zoomed in on the word “activate”. If I am to activate my faith, it means that I already have faith somewhere deep down inside of me. Romans 12:3 confirms this.

For by the grace given me I say to every one of you: Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment, in accordance with the measure of faith God has given you.

Each of us already have faith molecules inside of us. It’s the makeup of our spirit (Don’t over-process this). But God has given each of us faith. Activating your faith in Christ is as simple as it is profound: you have to take a leap. Let’s face it! The only way you will move into the realm of faith is if you leap. You have to make a conscious, split second, decision to take a leap from fear to faith. You can’t over process it – “Well, gee.. if I take the ladder, then what? How do I know that the ladder will hold? What if it breaks?’ No. the amount of time you spend thinking about these things, your enemies are advancing and you are placing your life in more danger. Every minute you spend trying to ‘figure out if the God thing is real, you are wasting an opportunity to live in victory. And more than that, you’re making your fear and your unbelief a lot worse.

It’s time for you to come to the Checkpoint. I’ve asked all week if you really and truly believe in the Christ that came. If we truly believe that He came, we wouldn’t do a lot of the stuff that we normally do. We wouldn’t allow fear to dominate our lives. We wouldn’t allow depression to rule. We wouldn’t allow the craziness of this world to overtake us. Why? We’ve got a way of escape (1Cor 10:13).

Isn’t it a low down dirty shame how much time we waste doing things that we need not do, fighting battles we need not fight, all because we don’t have (complete) faith in God?

How’s your faith? Does it need to be activated? Or re-activated? Take the leap to faith. In one quick second, make a decision with your spirit, soul and body that you will have Faith in God and the works of Christ.

Posted by schadah in Uncategorized Tags: believe, Christ, Christian, Christianity, faith, God, hope, jesus, love, peace, prayer, trusting god

Setting the atmosphere of Faith

April 19, 2012

All of the things that we discussed in the last few days have one thing in common- the need to believe.

Experience may have taught us that going into a relationship without trust and belief can be very problematic. These two things need to be established at the very beginning of the relationship. Can you imagine committing to a relationship with someone that you don’t trust?

For us, Salvation is the first commitment into a long life relationship with Christ. It’s a relationship that Christ asks us for, and we commit by saying “yes”.

If you declare with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. (Rom 10:9)

But saying “yes” to Christ cannot just be lip service. Like any relationship, when we say “yes” to Him we are saying “I am willing to trust you”, “I believe in the work you did for me on Calvary and I am totally ready to commit to you”. In saying “yes” to Christ we not only declare with our mouths, but we believe in our hearts whatever He says and whatever He promises us.
Now, many of us have a problem with believing in people. People have made promises and have broken them. There have been experiences where trust was lost and they have hindered us from opening up to others in the future. We do this to safeguard ourselves from being hurt, and that’s understandable. But many times, in shutting people out, we also shut Christ out. It’s subtle, because we’ve never seen Him and so we don’t really feel the impact of shutting Him out. But somehow, the enemy convinces us that we also can’t trust this Jesus and God that we haven’t even seen. And just like the rest of people who have hurt us, we place God and the rest of the Trinity in the same boat. Why do I say that?

When you have a good relationship with a friend, you are likely to do three things.

1. talk to them

2. boast about them

3. bring them into your private space (e.g. your home, your heart, etc)

But when the friendship goes sour, you do the reverse:

1. you stop talking to them

2. you stop boasting/ talking positively about them

3. you shut them out of your space.

Why? Because you stop believing in them.

Does that sound like our relationship with Christ? That’s how subtle it is to stop believing in Him.

The Holy Spirit has been challenging me in this area. He showed me that there have been times when people have hurt us, and we’ve allowed those sour relationships to dictate our relationship with Christ. As a result, there are parts of us that have stopped believing in Him even though we’re saved. There are even times when we feel like God has hurt us because we haven’t seen Him answer a prayer, or do something we thought He should do. And so we pray, but we don’t really believe that He will answer. Sometimes we even stop talking to Him. We’ve stopped talking about Him the way we used to. We’ve cut Him out of our private spaces.

At the beginning of this week, I had no idea what God was doing when He took me back to the Cross. But I now submit to you that if we do not totally believe in the Christ that came to give us a better, victorious life, we also cannot receive from God the things that He has for us. An atmosphere of faith must be established so that God can move. Hebrews 11:6 says

“they that cometh to God MUST BELIEVE that He is, and that He is a rewarder of them that diligently seek Him.

We have to believe. I have had to deal with this in my own life, because although I said “yes” to Christ long ago, there are times the rest of me says “no”.

As a Christian, your mouth must have declared that you believe Jesus Christ is Lord. But now it’s time for the rest of you (your heart, your mind and your will) to say “yes”. Ask yourself these questions:

1. Does my heart believe that Jesus Christ is Lord and that He was raised from the dead?

2. Does my mind believe that Jesus Christ is Lord?

3.Is my will totally surrendered to the belief of my mind and heart that Jesus Christ is Lord?

When these three parts of you can align with what you’ve said with your mouth (that Jesus is Lord), you will have activated an atmosphere of Faith that is ready for God to move greatly in your life.

Pray for your mind, heart and will to align with the salvation of your mouth.

Posted by schadah in How Great is our God, Uncategorized Tags: believe, Christianity, faith, God, Heart, hurt, jesus, love, Pray, prayer, relationships

Soteria life.

April 18, 2012

The last two days, the Holy Spirit has been ministering to me on why Jesus came to earth, and I shared that with you. When you can truly lay hold of why Jesus came, it becomes easier to grasp why it means so much. His whole experience is relevant to your existence. He came to show us how to walk on earth, not as men, but as God’s son’s and daughters. He came to show us what we could do on earth as King’s kids, He came to give us eternal life. Because of Christ, we are strong, we don’t have to live in fear. We don’t have to live in depression. We don’t have to be without peace and joy. We don’t have to live in defeat.

Can you imagine a child, whose father was a King, and he lived like a pauper? Oh wait. That story has already been told:

Jesus continued: “There was a man who had two sons. The younger one said to his father, ‘Father, give me my share of the estate.’ So he divided his property between them. “Not long after that, the younger son got together all he had, set off for a distant country and there squandered his wealth in wild living. After he had spent everything, there was a severe famine in that whole country, and he began to be in need. So he went and hired himself out to a citizen of that country, who sent him to his fields to feed pigs. He longed to fill his stomach with the pods that the pigs were eating, but no one gave him anything. (Luke 15:11-16)

This Prodigal son, had gone astray from his father and somehow found himself becoming a slave to the system. But his father was King! And here he was, miserable and unhappy in life. Living as a victim and not a victor. What an insult to his father! And how ironic for Him. This story doesn’t necessarily have to be about money. it could be about anything that is making you live a life of defeat. But I love how the story continues:

When he came to his senses, he said, ‘How many of my father’s hired servants have food to spare, and here I am starving to death! I will set out and go back to my father… (Luke 15:16-18)

It’s time for us to come to our senses. Do you know who your Father is? Do you know what He did for you? I had to come to terms with the fact that as a Christian, I have sometimes made the work of Calvary of no effect. How? For a long time, I allowed myself to live in the land of ‘Woe is me’. I camped out in ‘Defeat Valley’ quite often when situations came. As a result, I got no answers for my prayers, and the less God answered, the more I felt fatherless. But it wasn’t because God wasn’t being a good father to me. I just didn’t fully understand the power of the cross. If we truly understood Calvary, we would get that God wants what is best for us. He doesn’t give us stones, when we ask for bread. God allowed Christ to die so that we might receive salvation.

Now, pause right there! Because salvation is a word that we often undermine. Salvation comes from the greek “soteria”. Soteria means to be delivered, preserved, kept safe and saved from all things; deliverance from the molestation of enemies; in an ethical sense, that which concludes to the soul’s safety or salvation. It is also the sum of benefits and blessings which the Christians, redeemed from all earthly ills, will enjoy after the visible return of Christ from heaven in the consummated and eternal kingdom of God.(Strong’s interpretation)

Many times as believers we say “I am saved!”. It’s true. But do we really get that? Or is it just lip service? Salvation is a full package- a VICTORY package. It would be like winning the lottery! All of your impossible needs, wants, desires become possible when you receive Christ’s salvation. This is why He kept stressing that we could ask the Father anything in His name and it would be done (John 15).

I’ve come to understand that my salvation because of Christ has to be as sure as my name. My salvation defines my new status in God, as an heir, as a King’s child and as one who receives all good things from Him when I ask Him. If I am not certain about what Christ did for me though, the Cross and Jesus Christ’s purpose for coming to this earth is worth absolutely nothing. Simply put, God plan to crucify His own Son, would have been a complete waste of time.

So, again. Do you believe in the Cross and what it has done for you?

The success of what you’re asking God for hinges on that.

Posted by schadah in High, Healed, Delivered, Hunger, Uncategorized Tags: Christian, Christianity, God, jesus, pea, prayer, religion, salvation

Why did Christ really come? pt 2

April 17, 2012

For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. (John 3:16)

I recently heard a Pastor recall an encounter he had with God. He said he once thought that once he got out of the world, it wasn’t really much of his business to save the world. But then God spoke to his heart. In essence this is what God laid on his heart:

You weren’t there when then they cursed My Son, called Him a liar, spit on Him. You weren’t there when they nailed Him to a tree even though He had no fault before the courts; you weren’t there when they beat his head till it bled, whipped him with a thornball thirty nine times, gave Him vinegar to drink and then pierce Him in the sides to make sure he was good and dead. You weren’t there when He cried out “Father, Father, why have you forsaken me?” You weren’t there. But I was. And I had to standby and WATCH them do everything to hurt my ONLY begotten Son and do nothing. Why? Because I had to allow His blood to be shed so that the rest of this world could have access to me. So that you could all know that I loved you enough to give my only Son; so that you could have a triumphant and eternal life.

I thought it was a grand story. But more than that, I received this revelation. Do you know how absolutely pointless it would have been for God to send His Son to go through all of that, if there was nothing to gain from the experience? What did He gain? He LOST a son. What did Christ gain? The dude was crucified! Really and truly, the beneficiaries were us. Think about it this way: Let’s say you can see the future and you can see that if you sent your child to a particular store for food, a lunatic would come in and start shooting everyone including your son until everyone in the store was dead. Having this knowledge, would you send your son to that store? No. But God, omniscient God, sent His Son to die. Why? It was the only way to REDEEM man to his original position in God. If we could not be redeemed to God, then the whole coming and dying of Christ was absolutely pointless.

Let me explain. Because of the sin of Adam we fell under a curse in which we had lost every inheritance and connection to the Father. But when Christ came, He paid the price with His blood so that we could once again be heirs of the Kingdom. If you think about it, the only way anyone could gain an inheritance, is if someone dies. When Christ died, all that was His because He was the sole inheritor to His Father’s Kingdom, became transferable to us. What did we inherit? Everything that Christ received from the Father.

Believe it or not, I am still very much on the subject of prayer. But here’s something to tease your brain? How real is your salvation to you? See, when Christ lived on the earth, He came to show us that whatever He asked the Father for, His Father would give Him (John 14:13). He assured us that we would be able to do the same once He had died. However, I think the realness of receiving from God the way Christ did, comes with the understanding of what He did for you. The cross that we cling to is much, much more than not going to hell, although that is a great and awesome deal. But if we can understand that God really sent His Son so that we can rightfully lay claim to all of the blessings that He had intended for us, then it becomes easier to receive.
So I ask again. How real is Christ to you? Why do you think He came? And what was the point of His death? If you can truly believe that He came so that you can have access to everything that God has for you, then your prayers are ripe for answers. But do you truly believe?

Posted by schadah in Uncategorized Tags: believe, Christ, Christianity, faith, God, jesus, prayer, praying, trusting god

Monthly Archives: April 2012

Whose report do you believe?

No Really! What are you saying?

What are you saying?

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The Faith Thing

Leap to Faith

Setting the atmosphere of Faith

Soteria life.

Why did Christ really come? pt 2

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