GRACE's PERSONAL NEWSLETTER PAGE
Archives - INDEX to Personal newsletters
GOD CONTINUES TO BLOW MY MIND!!!!!!!
+ INTRO
+ THEMES THAT GOD HAS BEEN PUTTING ON
MY HEART
The Gospel of the Kingdom/The Good News/Discipling the Nations
God's
Original Intention
The
Wilderness - Becoming Fruitful in the Kingdom of God /
See PART
TWO for the rest
· Waiting
on the Lord / Resting in Him / Will
You Trust Me? / Restoration
/ Make
Ready a People Prepared for the Lord / Ministry
Flows out of Relationships / Home
is My Ministry Center / God's
Promises - Worship
& the Word / He
is Our Strength in Our Weakness / Dreams
+ QUICK
REVIEW OF PAST YEAR
Finances
/ Health
+ MINISTRY
DEVELOPMENTS
Chris's
visit / Potential
summer team 2005 / G___'s
visit / Incorporation
of Gat*eway Cre*ation Arts Centre Ltd. / Steve
& Theo's 'Scouting' Trip / G___
returns / Jan
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How are you all doing and how have you been?? I think about you so much and you remain in my heart and prayers! I am soo grateful for your friendship and visits (those who are able), for your prayers and for being a part of my life in the various ways that you are involved! It is a joy to be a part of your lives, too!! For those of you that I've been so far behind on communicating with, I am so sorry, and I do hope that in the future I will be able to get caught up and keep connected more frequently again! I'm still working on it! The health delays I keep having keep putting delays on other aspects of life as well, but I'm so glad my office is in my home so I can at least keep up to some degree! : )
Once again it has taken much longer to get this out than I had intended! It seems that the more time that passes, the more God keeps blowing my mind with all that He is doing in these days - around the world, in our region, in my life, in your lives, in those around me, etc.!!!
It is an incredibly exciting time to be alive!! We are in major transition in the world today, in our nations and in the Church!! I'm sure you are all feeling it, big-time, too!! Even in the past month or so it seems the spiritual battle has increased...many others I've been talking with this month have been getting that sense, as well! Do you, too?
Many, including myself, believe God is in the process of bringing restoration into our lives as we whole-heartedly seek Him and are led by His Spirit, as we repent of the things the Holy Spirit reveals to us and as we increasingly obey Him with every aspect of our lives. He is in the process of preparing us so He can present us to Himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless. (Eph 5:27). We as the Church have also been a sleeping Church in many ways for generations, but I believe firmly that God is shaking us awake in these days and encouraging us to 'keep our lamps trimmed' because He will soon be here!
In the past number of years, but especially this past year or so, there have been a number of themes which God has kept bringing up to me from the Word, in prayer and from various angles, and I keep hearing them coming up from others in the Body of Christ all over the globe, as well, so that has been affirming and encouraging!
I would like to share these things with you in hopes that they will also encourage your hearts and minister His Life to you as He perhaps confirms these things to your hearts! This section is pretty extensive so I'm posting it in such a way that you can read it when you have a chance...perhaps in sections...sorry it got so long but this has been bursting in my heart for so long I finally had to get it out!!
It has to do with the Kingdom of God, His current restoration process, His making ready of a people prepared for Himself, and numerous other main themes He's been increasingly putting on my heart which I've not had a chance to share with you yet.
This is a lot longer than normal because it includes a lot more than my normal updates do, but I have put it in such a way that you can click on whichever section you wish to read further in case you don't have time to read it all. Thanks for your patience and I hope it is a blessing to you! May God be glorified because HE IS MY HERO!!
A number of these themes have been:
THEMES THAT GOD HAS BEEN PUTTING ON MY HEART
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+ To sum up... a major theme has been a growing understanding of not only the KINGDOM OF GOD - and what it means to live as true Kingdom citizens and to know Him as our KING - where EVERY aspect of our lives (whether it means our relationships, how we eat, what we do for work or play, how we respond in traffic, how we operate in business, the way we live out His life as students, how we wash the car, how we treat the poor, how we stand up for injustice, how we love God, how we give to God, the attitude with which we vaccuum the living room rug, our schedules, our attitudes, our decision-making processes, how we respond in trials, etc.), is submitted to His Lordship and led and empowered by the Holy Spirit.
Having been raised in a democratic society, it is difficult for us to really grasp what kingdom life and the relationship between a King and his subjects is like, or to understand the type of community involved in a kingdom...
Although BIBLICAL Christianity involves seeing Christ's life lived out through every aspect of our lives as an outflow/overflow of our love for Him, traditionally our 'Christian' lives have tended to be kept mostly within the confines of our church walls or have tended to be kept quite personal and largely kept to certain aspects of our lives. Even in our homes He was often seemingly largely relegated to certain aspects only...
However, THANKS BE TO GOD that in these days He seems to be 'breaking out of the boxes' that we perhaps thought we had put Him in (of course He was never in them!! : )) and all over the globe people are re-visiting the biblical reality of seeing God impacting the marketplace as they increasingly understand His KINGDOM vision and realize that loving Him wholeheartedly with our TOTAL LIVES as we come to live increasingly in His Presence, is what He's after! (Ps.89: 15 Blessed are those who have learned to acclaim you, who WALK IN THE LIGHT OF YOUR PRESENCE, O LORD". (You are probably aware of the book THE PURPOSE-DRIVEN LIFE which is being embraced by many and which is also helping to give God's people a greater awareness of the REALITY and VITALITY which He wants to have flowing through our lives in increasing intimacy with Himself!)
After all, has HE not taught us to pray...YOUR KINGDOM COME, YOUR WILL BE DONE ON EARTH AS IT IS IN HEAVEN..."??!! This has become one of my main prayers in the past year as I've sought to pray for various situations. By praying the prayer/s which He asked us to pray, we can be confident that we are praying in line with His will!!
The Kingdom of God is within us and EVERYWHERE that we are being led by the Holy Spirit, Jesus' Presence in and through us is able to impact the situations and people around us - and so this IS GOOD NEWS!!! He is not restricted to our church services or our devotional times! He is not restricted to our 'spiritual lives', because a biblical worldview means that His life is to be lived out in EVERY aspect of our lives - our lives in their totality are to be vessels where His life in us is to be constantly lived out - flowing out of us as rivers of Living Water.
I personally believe that one of the major reasons that people such as Mu*sl*im*s and H*in*dus, for example, have not grabbed a hold of Christianity for the most part, is because in their religious perspectives/worldview, I*sla*m and Hi*ndu*is*m are supposed to, and do, affect every aspect of an orthodox Mu*s*li*m or H*in*du's lives....like BIBLICAL Christianity is to affect our lives...HOWEVER, since this has so often not been the case in western Christianity, (ie. we - as mainstream Christians - {this is a generalization} - we have often kept our business practices separate from our 'spiritual' lives, or our forms of entertainment, etc.), and this has caused no end of confusion and disdain among people of other religions where they see our Christianity as being relegated to only some areas of our lives. It looks like a religion which is unable to meet the very real needs of a whole life, and indeed I believe many believers have also felt that Christiantiy has not truly met the very real needs of their lives as it has been lived in only segments of life. But I believe that as we as disciples of Jesus truly live as whole-hearted, total-life disciples of Jesus, people of religions such as these will also begin to take notice and find Life in Him as God's children truly begin to increasingly experience the TOTALITY of the ABUNDANT and holistic life that He came to bring! This does not mean we do not have suffering and sorrow and trials, because, clearly, they are a very real part of the 'package deal' to help conform us into the likeness of Christ.
But it seems to me that the more we really learn to live according to the simplicity of the two great commandments - to love God with ALL our hearts, souls, minds and strength, and as we LOVE our neighbours as ourselves (all of which is worship to God), our lives will automatically be increasingly impacting those around us in every aspect of life as our minds and hearts are continually being renewed by His Word and His love.
It is so exciting to see more and more of God's family begin to find great joy in their relationship with Him as they are experiencing Him in their lives as He desires to increase in all areas of their/our lives!
Though many are falling away in these days, God is also raising up His remnant (which He has always done) in the midst of it.
Many times through my lifetime I have wondered what the GOOD NEWS of the Gospel, or the GOSPEL OF THE KINGDOM really was...Although I knew there was much Good News that I was aware of and had been taught - for example His love, salvation, heaven, forgiveness, etc., I thought there must be more that I wasn't really aware of because it seemed that generally believers were pretty bored, or burned out, and not seeming to really experience the God of the Bible the way we see in Acts or in many of the other books of the New Testament (or His very amazing character expressed throughout the Old Testament). It seemed that so often we had moved from being in the world into the 'duties' of religion instead of into a life totally wrapped up in HIM, and before long our first love had all but dwindled to a mere smoldering ember.
I also often wondered why, if Jesus kept saying that the message He came to share and the message that He wanted US to share was the message of the GOSPEL OF THE KINGDOM OF GOD, why I couldn't REMEMBER having heard a message on it (until the past couple years) - so I began doing my own Bible study on that over the years and increasingly began to see why this really was/IS GOOD NEWS!! Interestingly, it seems like, the past few years, many more are thinking and speaking/teaching about the Kingdom of God...I think the timing of this is very interesting, but more on that later.
So often, traditionally we have become believers - focused on the salvation message, and so it's like we were led through the entrance at the gate at the castle wall - we just got inside the door of the Kingdom, through THE DOOR/GATE (Jesus) and there we have often ended up sitting/staying, for years...thinking this is all there is...or perhaps we knew there was a relatioinship to develop, but have not really been sure of how to go about moving in those directions beyond a certain point.
Tragically, however, it seems that often we haven't really experienced LIFE as a Kingdom citizen - in it's totality or often even less than that; or we've not experienced relationship with our GOOD & loving King/Father, and often have barely gotten below the surface with other believers who we are supposed to be part of the 'family' of God with - but do we really feel like FAMILY? DO WE REALLY FEEL LIKE WE BELONG? Or perhaps we haven't become vitally involved in Kingdom business because we've not really been aware of the vision of the King - and so we have gotten bored and wondered if this is all there is!?
Although we were made new creations and were sanctified in what Christ did for us on the cross, His resurrection life/power must continue to be appropriated and our hearts must be 'santified THROUGH AND THROUGH' (Thess) as our hearts and minds need to continue to be renewed (Heb.) and as we continue to 'put off' the old self and 'put on' the new as we remind ourselves daily that we are dead to sin and alive to God! We must continue to focus on His Resurrection power and Life which enables us to live the life He died to give us - this is part of our inheritance! It HONORS HIM for us to walk in increasing fullness of that!
And so, though we became new creations (our spirit was brought from death to life), we brought in with us the systems and thinking of the world, and if our minds and hearts haven't been renewed and aren't continually being renewed by the Word, we have never really learned to live as Kingdom citizens as a true community of believers because our thinking (and resulting life) is still 'of this world'.
Therefore, so many believers even today have often continued to feel like they have been on-lookers and not felt like they fit in even though they have been believers for many years!...but they haven't known differently because this is a way of thinking that has been handed down to us for many generations! And so there has been increasing disillusionment in the Church and droves of believers who love God have been leaving the churches over the past years, and more are leaving every year...often not because they don't love God, but because they want to experience God more intimately and more of what true LIFE in the KINGDOM OF GOD is all about! They don't want to be spectators...they want the rivers of Living Water to flow out of them and to see the Presence and Life of Jesus bringing life to those around them - WHEREVER THEY ARE.
Like many of you, over the years I have also experienced many of these kinds of questions, discouragements and disappointments, and thanks to God's grace and mercy have been increasingly finding the kind of life that our hearts have been longing for as He has been revealing more about what His Kingdom is about and how fulfilling it is to live out all of life with our Loving King!
The GOOD NEWS is that our King longs for us to find intimacy in Him and fulfillment in being vitally involved in His Family and Kingdom vision/business; and He longs to have us experience true community/family with EACH OTHER in this Kingdom! Many of us have never touched more than the fringes of the depths of the intimacy in relationships that are possible in Him! Thankfully we are all in process and He is our faithful God, taking us from precept to precept!
The GOOD NEWS is that the Kingdom of God can/should affect every aspect of our lives and society as we are constantly in submission to the King of Kings and living as Kingdom citizens out of a relationship of love with Him which is overflowing with His love and character.
The GOOD NEWS is that His Kingdom is the Overcoming Kingdom and greater is He that is in us than he that is in the world....etc. There is much more to it but this is just a little bit of what He's been stirring in my heart the past few years.
A very helpful article about this is located here, and it talks about the seven influential sectors of society that begin to be impacted as believers live out His life in every aspect of their lives. (Discipling the Nations ) - this is not the same as what some are talking about today in terms of setting up God's kingdom on earth as the disciples had thought of doing when they wanted to crown Jesus as king..where Christianity is legislated, etc. as in the days of Constantine, etc.
We should increasingly be living out our lives in the Kingdom of Light instead of how we were used to living in the Kingdom of Darkness - Col. 1: 12...giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified you[4] to share in the inheritance of the saints in the kingdom of light. 13 For he has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son he loves - " (NIV)
The more our minds and hearts are renewed, the more we experience His Life in the Kingdom - Interestingly it says in Matt. 24: 14 And this GOSPEL OF THE KINGDOM will be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come." (NIV)
I find it interesting that as we look at the biblical timetable of where we're at, that it seems that God is revealing to the Church a deeper understanding of what His GOSPEL OF THE KINGDOM is about at this time! (Kingdom of God - Articles), when it appears to be very soon that the end is about to come...more about that next time
We have been taught the Great Commission in Matt.28: 19 Therefore go and make DISCIPLES of all nations, baptizing them in[1] the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age." (NIV)
But when we look around us at our neighbourhoods, cities and nations, in spite of the fact that missionaries, ministries, churches have been around for so long in the west, can we honestly say that we have 'discipled' our neighbourhoods, let alone our nations? How many of them are even saved, let alone true disciples who are discipling others? How many that have become believers and responded to the salvation message are still following the Lord? How many have known that living as a disciple will mean SUFFERING as well and that they need to count the cost, so that when the trials come they are able to stand firm? Why is that this hasn't happened (DISCIPLING OF OUR NATION/S) in spite of the fact that Canada and the US (for example) used to be considered 'Christian' nations? Sadly, the fact is that we have been LOSING GROUND big time! So if we don't want that to continue, we need to change or we'll keep seeing the same results...and I believe God is in the process of transitioning His Church so that HIS purposes CAN be accomplished in these days AS WE ARE LED BY HIS SPIRIT and trusting in HIS POWER, since it's not by might or power but by HIS SPIRIT...
I venture to say that, in addition to other reasons for this decline, we have not traditionally understood the type of biblically-holistic/total-life discipleship style/Kingdom of God mentality/lifestyle that Jesus modeled, in which He lived with the disciples and impacted every aspect of their lives.
In His own life, He did only what He saw His Father doing as He was in constant close communication/relationship with Him.
That is also the biblical way to effectively disciple others...to be in close relationship with God, first, and with each other and have every aspect of life be addressed as life is lived out together on a very relational basis...like in a family that spends a lot of good time together.
I would think that if we as the Church lived that way today, we would be amazed at the increased persecution we would receive, as well, because the power of the Gospel of the Kingdom would be stirring up all kinds of opposition as it did in the New Testament. I also think we would be amazed at the massive harvest God would increasingly bring in! I believe this is what He is in the process of doing in our lives as He is continuing to increasingly transform us into His likeness because of His faithfulness and eternal purposes which will not be stopped by the enemy...