I finished reading through the book of Numbers. One last thought from that book. In Numbers 32:9 it says that the ten spies who gave the bad report, “…discouraged the heart of the children of Israel, so that they did not go into the land which the Lord had given them.”

Discouragement is another key weapon that the enemy of our soul uses against us. He is determined that we will not fulfill God’s purpose for our lives. If you will remember, the children of Israel heard two reports.  

Numbers 13:30 says, “Then Caleb quieted the people before Moses, and said, Let us go up at once and take possession, for we are well able to overcome it.” The ten spies immediately refuted his words.

Verse 31 says, “But the men who had gone up with him said, “We are not able to go up against the people, for they are stronger than we.” Notice the two different focuses. Caleb was looking to God’s promise. The ten spies were looking to their own strength.

We are never a solo match against satan. John 15:5 is a constant reminder to me. It says, “…for without Me you can do nothing.” Yet there is another verse that should undergird our faith in every circumstance. Luke 1:37 says, “For with God nothing will be impossible.”

When we take our eyes off the Lord, we fall prey to the temptation to be overwhelmed and discouraged. David wrote Psalm 61. Read his words in verse 2, “…when my heart is overwhelmed; lead me to the rock that is higher than I.”

The wheels of a train are designed to groove into the train track. Our hearts are designed to groove into God’s word. I have discovered, with these injuries to my brain, that it takes a little time to learn something new. The new patterns need time to groove in. 

How do we first get derailed? Keith Green wrote a song and a book entitled, “No Compromise.” I like to put an exclamation point after those two words when I think about them. Compromise creates gaps, which the enemy specifically widens, through strategic temptations designed to entice and entangle us.

Song of Solomon 2:15 says, “Catch us the foxes, the little foxes that spoil the vines, for our vines have tender grapes.” The little foxes are seemingly insignificant compromises. The Holy Spirit will check us, but if we ignore Him, we will become derailed. 

The little foxes get inside a vineyard through a gap. At my former house I had chickens. Little did we know that there was a gap being formed. The chickens would go near the fenceline and bathe in the dirt. They made indents. A fox then was able to dig through from the outside, using the indent to gain entrance. 

One morning several were missing and many dead. The chickens unknowingly set themselves up. That is exactly what happens when we compromise. Proverbs 2:9 says that discretion will preserve us.

Proverbs 7:21-23 was about the young man who was enticed by the harlot. Verse 22-23 says, “Immediately he went after her…he did not know it would cost his life.” Beware of the little foxes of compromise.

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Guarding Our Heart

Proverbs 4:23 says, “Keep your heart with all diligence, for out of it spring the issues of life.” James 1:14 is the template that reveals the inner workings of a gap. It says, “But each one is tempted, when he is drawn away by his own desires and enticed.”

Our freedom was bought by Jesus’ shed blood. Ephesians 1:7 says, “In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of His grace.” In Romans 6:1 Paul asked his readers, “…Shall we continue to sin that grace may abound?”

Verse 2 says, “Certainly not! How shall we who died to sin live any longer in it?” Ask yourself: Do I live like I am encapsulated in true grace? When a ‘live’ tempting thought flits into our mind, we must instantly fight it through the truth of verse 11. It says, “…reckon yourselves to be dead indeed to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

We can only effectively guard our heart when God’s word is hidden in it. His truth within is like a sentinel on duty 24/7. The moment the temptation comes, the sentinel alerts us through the work of the Holy Spirit. 

Galatians 5:16 says, “…Walk in the Spirit, and you shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh.” That is why James said that we are enticed through the sin hidden in our hearts. It is illegal for an authentic follower of Christ to flirt with fleshly temptations. Flirting is synonymous with entanglement.

1 Peter 2:16 says, “As free, yet not using liberty as a cloak for vice, but as bondservants of God.” Galatians 5:1 says, Stand fast therefore in the liberty by which Christ has made us free, and do not be entangled again with a yoke of bondage.”

How do we become entangled again? Paul wrote to Timothy about this very subject. In 2 Timothy 2:3 he told Timothy, “You therefore must endure hardship as a good soldier of Jesus Christ.”

Verse 4 says, “No one engaged in warfare entangles himself with the affairs of this life…” We are satan’s target. He seeks ways to entangle us. He sets up ‘gaps’ through his fiery darts. 

Though this is speaking about warfare against Judah, we can apply this to our lives. Isaiah 7:5-7 says, “…Syria, Ephraim, and the son of Remaliah have plotted evil against you, saying, let us go up against Judah and trouble it, and let us make a gap in its wall for ourselves…”

A gap, in our freedom in Christ, is made by a seemingly innocuous suggestion ~ a fiery dart. If we do not block it with truth from God’s word, the gap will widen. Remember that we are bondservants, our will is to do the will of the Father.

When we lose sight of that, our derailment is set in place. Romans 6:13 says, “And do not present your members as instruments of unrighteousness to sin, but present yourselves to God as being alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness to God.”

I recently read about F. B. Meyer. I am going to paraphrase what he said. He was a young pastor at the time. The Lord had laid it on his heart to minister to those recently released from jail.

The pattern was for those men to go right back to what held them in bondage. F. B. Meyer’s zeal was aroused. He knew they could be free. He hadn’t learned at that time what is was to be a slave of Christ.

His definition penetrated deeply. It is a condition of our mind in which we are oblivious to what others might say or think. Our desire would be that the light of God’s approval was warm and fresh upon our heart.

Ephesians 6:5-7 says for the bondservant to be obedient, “…with fear and trembling, in sincerity of heart, as to Christ; not with eyeservice, as menpleasers, but as bondservants of Christ, doing the will of God from the heart, with goodwill doing service, as to the Lord, and not to men.”

According to Ephesians 1:5 we are already accepted in the Beloved. There is nothing that we can do or should do to be accepted. When we look for man’s approval, we become a man pleaser, and cease to serve the Lord from our heart.

When seeking to please others, we fall into the trap of not being able to say ‘no’ when asked to do something. We must stay in the groove that the Lord has called us to walk in. If we follow after others, or we seek others approval, we have ceased to follow in the Lord’s footsteps.

Isaiah 42:13 says, “The Lord shall go forth like a mighty man; He shall stir up His zeal like a man of war. He shall cry out, yes, shout aloud; He shall prevail against His enemies.” Let me capture a scene of His zeal.

John 2:13-17 was the scene. Jesus saw what was taking place in the temple. Verse 15 says, “When He had made a whip of cords, He drove them all out of the temple, with the sheep and the oxen, and poured out the changer’s money and overturned the tables.”

At that moment He fulfilled Psalm 69:9. It says, “Because zeal for Your house has eaten me up, and the reproaches of those who reproach You have fallen on Me.” The fleshly activity in God’s house brought reproach.

Jesus bore the reproach of our sins when He hung on the cross. Romans 15:1 is our mandate for this hour in history. It says, “We then who are strong ought to bear with the scruples of the weak, and not to please ourselves.”

Verse 3 says, “For even Christ did not please Himself…” Paul then quoted Psalm 69:9. The Lord’s name is being reproached by those who have set themselves against this country—from within and without.

Will we take up His mantle to intercede? In Galatians 1:10 Paul set an example for us. It says, “For do I now persuade men, or God? Or do I seek to please men? For if I still pleased men, I would not be a bondservant of Christ.”

Today our nation votes. This was written last week. I love His timing. Let us unite to intercede for our country in this crucial time. Daniel 2:21 says, “And He changes the times and the seasons; He removes kings and raises up kings; He gives wisdom to the wise and knowledge to those who have understanding.”

I noticed something when I read a very familiar passage in my daily reading. Here is my preface. The king of Moab hired Balaam to curse Israel. God instead blessed them through the words He told Balaam to speak.

The next scene was what took place at Baal Peor. An Israelite man and a Moab woman were speared through by Phinehas. My focus is on what he did rather than the reason he did it. Through his intercession the plague was stopped.

Numbers 25:11 says, “Phinehas…has turned back My wrath from the children of Israel, because he was zealous with My zeal among them, so that I did not consume the children of Israel in My zeal.”

Pause and think about this in terms of our country’s present state. Ezekiel 22:30 was God’s call for an intercessor. It says, “So I sought for a man among them who would make a wall, and stand in the gap before Me on behalf of the land, that I should not destroy it; but I found no one.”

Psalm 106:29-31 says, “Thus they provoked Him to anger with their deeds, and the plague broke out among them. Then Phinehas stood up and intervened, and the plague was stopped. And that was accounted to him for righteousness to all generations forevermore.”

We exemplify the Lord when we intercede on the behalf of others and for our nation. He is right now in heaven interceding for us. Romans 8:34 says, “…who also makes intercession for us.”

Do you exemplify Him in His zeal?

While I was talking to a friend, these words came out of my mouth. ‘We often get emotionally tangled up from our thoughts about our past.’ The Lord has a way so that we can instantly bypass that entanglement.

Think of why they perform bypass surgeries. Arteries have narrowed or become blocked. It causes the heart muscle to be short of blood. Let’s take that into the spiritual sense. We keep our past alive through our negative fears or thoughts. We jam up our lines of communication with the Lord and with others.

Our worship comes from our heart. Worship flows when our focus is on the Lord. It stops when we look back. Our spiritual bypass surgery is praise. It is performed with a thought rather than a scalpel. 

Psalm 22:3 says, “But You are holy, enthroned in the praises of Israel.” Enthroned in the Hebrew means to dwell, remain, sit, and abide. The Lord is always present. Yet He uniquely presences Himself in our praise. 

Our praise is like an open invitation to Him, an expression of love from a free flowing heart. His enthronement leaves a fragrance that cannot be compared to anything on this earth. Mary’s act of worship filled the house with, “…the fragrance of the oil” according to John 12:3.

The next time you have a fearful or negative thought flit into your mind, bypass it through praise. Psalm 34:1 says, “I will bless the Lord at all times; His praise shall continually be in my mouth.” Psalm 146:2 says, “While I live I will praise the Lord; I will sing praises to my God while I have my being.”

When I think about the word ‘transform’ my mind goes to Romans 12:2. It says, “…be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.”

Encapsulated, the verse was emphasizing mind renewal through the truth of God’s word. Then our thoughts, words, and actions will be living proof of our conformity to His will.

Transformed~metamorphosis. 

I love to think about how the crawling caterpillar eats leaves. It is all it knows. Until metamorphosis~then a butterfly that flits from flower to flower. Leaves are nowhere in its mind. It delightfully drinks rich nectar. 

When we renew our mind with truth, our old thought patterns metamorphosis. They die to give way to life-giving thoughts. I used to dwell in negative thinking about myself. I renewed my mind through verses like Psalm 119:73 and Jeremiah 1:5. I daily rejoice in God’s creative ingenuity of how He made me.

Adam was formed out of the dust of the ground. When God breathed into his nostrils the breath of life~metamorphosis. Adam became a fully functioning man. He creatively named all the animals. Think about it~ the zebra, gorilla, starfish, and butterfly all received their names as soon as they were presented to him.

As we gaze upon the Lord of glory, our innermost being is transformed. We no longer think as we did. The veil from lies is stripped away. We behold Him through a new spiritual lens. Joshua lingered. Let us linger until we see ourselves as He sees us~redeemed from the cocoon of our negative past thoughts.