Author: jma47

Beware Of Distractions Part Two

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One verse I like to keep in mind is 1 Samuel 12:21. It says, “And do not turn aside; for then you would go after empty things which cannot profit or deliver, for they are nothing.”
 
Every response or reaction hinges on our thoughts. It can happen so fast that we don’t recognize this truth. We might think it is instant, but it was birthed in our thoughts.
 
I want my life to count. My desire is to be effective. Yet, negative thoughts can be a means to derail us. Let’s take trials for an example. Trials are God’s design to hone our faith and make it strong and resistant to satan’s ploys.
 
Have you ever resisted a new trial? Let me say it another way. If you ever thought, ‘I can’t take this anymore’ then in your thoughts you were resisting. The one we NEED to resist is the enemy of our soul!
 
I know from my own experiences about unknowingly accepting fiery dart-lies. Since the destructive thought usually is couched in first person ‘you’ we take it as our own. Fiery dart-lies can lure us off the track the Lord has set our lives on.
 
I also remind myself of the JB Phillips translation for James 1:2. It says, “When all kinds of trials and temptations crowd into your lives, my brothers, don’t resist them as intruders, but welcome them as friends!”
 
Our trials are a gift to help our faith. Knowing that it is our faith that pleases the Lord, the enemy sets it as his target. Fiery darts are designed to get past our radar and bury themselves in our heart. It is sabotage warfare.
 
1 Peter 5:9 says, “Resist him, steadfast in the faith…” Ephesians 6:13 uses the word ‘withstand’ which means to vigorously oppose. The battle is in our mind. I love Isaiah 28:6 which says, “…strength to those who turn back the battle at the gate.” Our mind is the gate. Vigorously oppose every thought and feeling that does not line up with the truth of God’s word.

Beware Of Distractions

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Distractions can be a means to derail us. If we are walking in awareness, we will be able to stay our course. I’m reading through Acts. Yesterday I came to the account of Stephen.
 
Acts 6:8 says, “And Stephen, full of faith and power, did great wonders and signs among the people.” Then opposition arose. Verse 9-10 says, “….disputing with Stephen. And they were not able to resist the wisdom and the Spirit by which he spoke.”
 
His calm assurance and steadfastness only stirred them up further. They brought him before the council and produced false witnesses. Verse 15 says, “And all who sat in the council, looking steadfastly at him, saw his face as the face of an angel.”
 
I noted how that Stephen’s demeanor was not changed even though he was falsely accused. He never reacted in his flesh. He exemplified the Lord in word and body language.
 
When the high priest asked if the accusations were true, Stephen rehearsed an excellent recap of the history that they all knew. He had their attention. Then in chapter 7:51 he addressed them. “You stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears! You always resist the Holy Spirit; as your fathers do, so do you.”
 
They were infuriated and gnashed their teeth at him. I love verse 55. It is a model for us to follow when other’s flesh vehemently rises up against us. “But he, being full of the Holy Spirit, gazed into heaven and saw the glory of God…”

Staying The Course Part Two

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A train is designed to run on a track. If it gets derailed, it ceases to operate as intended. The Lord has designed us to endure that we may glorify Him.
 
Let’s go back to the garden of Eden. God specifically said that they would die if they ate the fruit of one particular tree. What did the serpent say? He countered God’s words with a lie. Genesis 3:4 says, “…You will not surely die.” The serpent’s cunning derailed Adam and Eve.
 
COVID has derailed the world. It has thrown us off our natural track. It has also caused hidden, smoldering angers to ignite. The enemy of our soul is using it to destroy from within.
 
It is imperative to remain steadfast and stay the course. It is a season of untold opportunity to share the gospel, to lean into this time and embrace it. There are lessons to learn and insights to gain that will strengthen and anchor us.
 
Romans 12:3 says that we all have a measure of faith. 2 Peter 1:5-7 are the additions to our faith. It is not a one time addition. It is a lifestyle of progressive sanctification. Virtue, knowledge, self-control, perseverance, godliness, brotherly kindness, and love are like building blocks. They are built on our sure foundation. When everything around us is shaking, our wall of faith will stand.
 
Colossians 1:10 gives us further instruction for this season. It says, “That you may walk worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing Him, being fruitful in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God.”
 
The word of God is our track to run on. Don’t let satan derail you from God’s purpose for you. As we read His word, observing to do it, gaining wisdom and understanding, it will fortify and strengthen us for the good works preordained for us to walk in. Opportunities abound. Let us be watchful and seize them in the moment they are set before us.
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Staying On Course
 
The other word I wanted to bring to your attention is derailed. My grandpa was the roundhouse foreman for the Southern Pacific Railroad. They had to bring the trains into the roundhouse in order to switch tracks. Why? Trains only run on tracks.
 
What track does an authentic follower of Christ run on? His word. His word charts our course. Proverbs 4 is so good. I encourage you to read it. Here are a few highlights. Vs. 4 – our heart is the receptacle for His words. Vs. 5 – don’t turn away from His word.
 
Vs. 14-15 – turn away from the wicked’s ways. Vs. 21 – keep His word in your heart and not depart from it. “Verse 22 says, “For they are life to those who find them, and health to all their flesh.”
 
Verse 26-27 says, “Ponder the path of your feet, and let all your ways be established. Do not turn to the right or to the left; remove your foot from evil.”
 
Have you ever started a sentence and lost your train of thought? It’s called distractions. Matthew 15:19 says, “For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts…” What? How can the heart of a true believer have evil thoughts? We get off the track. Derogatory, negative, complaining, bitter, judgmental, and faultfinding thoughts derail us. They take us into enemy territory.
 

The Implanted Word Part Two

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The Implanted Word Part Two
 
The word ’embedded’ floods my mind with two childhood memories. My friend’s father had a big motorcycle. He laid it over one time in a gravel patch. He had pieces of gravel embedded in his forehead, arms, and legs. Another was a car accident. The man was thrown from his car and his legs were embedded in the soft dirt.
 
Our hearts are creatively designed for God’s word to be embedded into the fabric of our thought processes. Here is one verse. Matthew 5:8 says, “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.” When that verse is embedded, it will be like an alerting sentinel each time a fiery dart of impurity is sent.
 
The embedded word is like a governor. In my school years, school buses had a governor. It could not go over 45 mph. How many verses have you embedded that govern your thoughts and actions?
 
Action plan: think of your areas of weakness, ingrained bad habits, not Christ-like behavior, or destructive thought patterns. Take the word that addresses that issue. Embed it through memorizing the verses and meditating on them. Once they become part of your thought processes, they will enable you to overcome. Why? Faith comes by hearing the word. All temptations to evil are an attack against our faith.
 
1 John 5:4 says, “For whatever is born of God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that has overcome the world–our faith.”

The Implanted Word

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The Implanted Word
 
James 1:21 says that it is the implanted word that saves our soul. Ephesians 1:13 illustrates this. “In Him you also trusted, after you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation; in whom also, having believed, you were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise.”
 
The seed of the word that you heard was received into your heart. It was planted in fertile soil. James 1:25 helps us understand how that seed of salvation grows. It says, “…and is not a forgetful hearer, but a doer of the work, this one will be blessed in what he does.”
 
Memorizing and meditating in God’s word is spiritual looping that increases our brain connections. The neuroscientists say that the things that wire together stay together.
 
As a child I filled my heart reservoir with lots of verses. I learned whole chapters, and many of the Psalms. They are still there. When I would teach Bible studies, they bubbled up as I was speaking. They were my ready-reference that the Holy Spirit drew from to form my thoughts. They are there when I am writing this post, and in my books. Why? They were implanted.
 
That is why we must take every thought captive. A fiery-dart negative thought can easily become implanted IF we receive it, rehearse and replay it over and over. Negative looping or replaying is satan’s counterfeit. He will do anything to capture our mind. He wants to grove it with destructive thoughts that will affect every aspect of our lives. If he can get us to believe a lie, he will use it to control our lives.

Our True Design Part Two

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We have such an amazing body. Understatement! The Lord has everything in place for our bodies to live, adapt, and thrive. This morning I want to focus on our digestive system, and relate it spiritually.
 
When we are in fight or flight because of danger, our digestion system diminishes or shuts down in order to allow our body to concentrate on the need at the moment. Our heart rate and our breathing increases.
 
Thoughts of fear, worry, or anxiety still create the fight or flight reaction even though there is no danger. As we continue to entertain, rehearse, and loop these negative emotions, we are compromising our digestion. Our gut is the seat of our emotions. Have you ever had a gut feeling? Have you ever had a stomach ache when you were tense with fear, anxiety, or worry?
 
Now let’s connect our physical digestion with our spiritual. Poor digestion can result in malabsorption issues. Here is a paragraph in a book I’m working on: Victorious Living.
 
The digesting begins with the chewing. In the spiritual, we begin to digest His word as we meditate on it. We carefully chew each thought until we have a better understanding. As we begin, the Holy Spirit empowers. It is not our effort, it is His working the word that will transform our way of thinking.
 
Malabsorption occurs when the food we eat is not digested. The nutrients, enzymes, vitamins, etc. are not absorbed and processed as God designed our body to function.
 
Spiritual malabsorption is described in James 1:21-25. Verse 21 uses the word ‘implanted’ to help us understand the other verses. Verse 23 says, “For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer…” He used the picture of a man who looked into a mirror but did not discern who he really was.
 
Verse 25 says, “But he who looks into the perfect law of liberty and continues in it…” That is the key to absorbing the transforming power of God’s word.

Our True Design

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We are made in the image of God. We have a spirit, and we live in a body that has a mind, will, and emotions. We commune with the Lord through our spirit.
 
Of course, satan will seek to counterfeit all that the Lord has designed in order to capture and control our thoughts. That is why Paul said in 2 Corinthians 10:5 that we are to bring every thought captive.
 
I learned in 1993 that not every thought I have is of my own origin. It radically changed my life. Remember, it is God’s word that discerns our thoughts and intentions.
 
Therefore, not every thought, emotion, feeling, or impression is from us. The enemy sends fiery dart-lies through each of the above. Always they are in the first person, or felt as though personal.
 
Let’s take fear for instance. We know from 2 Timothy 1:7 that we are not given the spirit of fear. All of a sudden we have a feeling or emotional reaction of fear. Yet, there is no danger. That is a lie! We need to capture it and render it null and void by NOT giving it another thought. Our next thought must be truth to counteract the lie.
 
Back to ‘looping’ or rehearsing. Here is our design. The Holy Spirit gives us a rich insight. At that moment our spirit man rises up. It is like a spiritual kaleidoscope. Verses come to mind that surround the insight. The Holy Spirit draws them from the reservoir in our heart. We see them with new eyes. They illuminate our heart with broader understanding.
 
1 Corinthians 2:13 says, “These things we speak, not in words which man’s wisdom teaches but which the Holy Spirit teaches, comparing spiritual things with spiritual.” That is spiritual looping. As we loop the verses together, they are forming new strong connections in our brain. Verse 14 says that the natural man cannot know them because they are spiritually discerned.

Heart-Husbandry Tools Part Two

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Colossians 2:11 says, “In Him you were also circumcised with the circumcision made without hands, by putting off the body of the sins of the flesh, by the circumcision of Christ.”
 
Thorns thrive in fallow ground. Jeremiah 4:3-4 says, “…Break up your fallow ground, and do not sow among thorns. Circumcise yourselves to the Lord, and take away the foreskins of your hearts…”
 
The scar tissue (fallow ground) in our hearts protects the buried emotional pain. It diminishes our capacity by taking up room in our hearts. It is like debris swept into the corner and left.
 
As we submit to the Lord’s scalpel (His word), He will divinely orchestrate a heart-circumcision made without hands. It is a deep work of the Holy Spirit that cannot be accomplished by man. Our part is to yield.
 
Last night I read a chapter in a book about brain function that was the catalyst for my circumcision made without hands. I humbled myself before the Lord and repented. He is doing the work.
 
The book is copyrighted so I can’t quote it, but these are my words. When we rehearse our emotional traumas, we are ‘looping’ or replaying every detail. ‘Looping’ has been a hidden sin in my life. It is not who I am nor how I was designed.
 
Negative dialogue causes caustic chemicals to drip onto our myriad brain connectors and eat them away. It causes good gut bacteria to die off, leaving a weakened immune system.
 
(The book is “Create A Better Brain through Neuroplasticity” by Debi Pearl. It starts in the womb. Last night I reached the 20-25 year old part. Debi’s book had me riveted from the first page.)
 
Our heart is designed as a reservoir to hold God’s word. We sin against the Lord when we use it to store all manner of hidden emotional pain. Our fleshly self-preservation creates scar tissue to protect it. All we do is leave debris to rot in a corner. It diminishes our capacity to enjoy the Lord through intimate communion.

Heart-Husbandry Tools

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I had a dream last night. There was a large crowd of people. The speaker didn’t show up and I was asked to speak. As I took the mic, the Holy Spirit brought Hebrews 4:12 into my mind. As I began to quote it, some of the crowd left. I said something like: “The word of God is the essential tool that brings healing to wounded hearts. It is His word only”…more people left.
 
There was a group of folks huddled in the back of the building cringing from fear. Then someone came up and grabbed the mic to divert what I was saying. Someone else grabbed the mic from them and again sought to divert the people.
 
The key heart-husbandry tool is God’s word. It is a scalpel that penetrates deep into the heart to pierce through the emotional scar tissue.
 
Picture this. The Surgeon is the Lord. His word is His operating table. Our heart is the patient. There is no surgery without the patient on the operating table.
 
Joshua 1:8 says that we are to observe to do. We read it daily and make personal application from what we have read. I finished the book of Proverbs last night. I would encourage you to read a chapter a day according to the date on the calendar.
 
Today is the 4th. Proverbs 4 is great. There are many verses that speak about the heart. Verse 23 says, “Keep your heart with all diligence, for out of it spring the issues of life.” As you read the verse, ask yourself: Am I guarding my heart, or am I hiding emotional pain instead of releasing it? Am I allowing God’s word to pierce into my heart or am I resisting His work through His word?
 
Psalm 119:5-7 says, “Oh, that my ways were directed to keep Your statutes! Then I would not be ashamed, when I look into all Your commandments. I will praise You with uprightness of heart, when I learn Your righteous judgments.”