Moses’ parents saw that he was a beautiful child. The NIV says “because they saw he was no ordinary child“. This means that they saw he was exceptional. He was special.
They perceived his exceptional beauty as a divine sign that Moses would be used for some extraordinary service to God’s people or that he was destined to some great purpose.
Nowadays, people look at their children and see a future lawyer or doctor. Or a famous athlete. They have cute little outfits they dress them in to indicate the grooming to come.
Just think what it would be like if the people of God primarily had the kind of vision for their children as did Moses’s parents. Foundationally and primarily seeing a God-purpose in and for their child’s life.
Do you think this vision for our children would change how we raise them and pray for them?
This is why we have to understand that our children are gifts to be stewarded, not possessions. We don’t own our children. We are gifted our children to raise them in the nurture and admonition of the Lord with the Kingdom in mind.
Moses’s parents perceived with his future in mind. This is what faith does for us. It allows us to perceive life with the future in mind. But moreso, with the end in mind — the beginning of our eternity.
We are not building our own kingdom. We’re building the Kingdom of God as we raise our children in the Lord.
Moses’s parents didn’t just see a beautiful, little baby boy. They saw the Kingdom. And they saw a future man with Divine purpose.
This made me think about the fact that as parents, potentially, we’re raising someone’s husband, wife, father or mother. And moreso, we’re raising the future generations of the Church. Developing members of the Body of Christ.
In doing so, one day, they will be entrusted to lead and guide people. They will become influencers in their families, on their jobs, in their communities and in church.
So we should keep this thought in mind as we lead the ones we’ve been entrusted to influence. It’s never just about others endearing themselves to us. It’s about us pointing them to Jesus and the Kingdom of God.
I knew a young lady years ago. We were pretty close. But I knew she had some issues that I really didn’t understand. From what she told me, she dealt with some private stuggles with depression and suicide when she was a teenager. And once she graduated from Highschool, that didn’t change. Soon after, she met what would be her 1st love. About 2 years into the relationship she got pregnant. During this relationship, she started going to church consistently for the 1st time in her life. She obeyed the gospel when she was 7 months pregnant. Then a few weeks later, with her new found walk with the Lord, she got married to try to right her wrongs. She understood that she couldn’t be fornicating anymore since she had given her life to the Lord. That marriage didn’t last and she was a single parent.
And she would be so, for about 4 or 5 years until she met her 2nd love interest. By this time, she had really grown in her walk with the Lord. And as faithful and committed as she was, she found herself fornincating again. She knew better and felt so ashamed. Particularly, because she knew so many people at church respected her. So to right her wrong once again, she married. And soon after, they planned and had a baby. This marriage was short and full of trauma and drama because her new husband was a drug addict. Before she could divorced him, he was killed in a car accident years after they had separated.
But God used the trauma she experienced in this marriage to introduce her to herself.
Anybody been there…where God had to introduce you to yourself. You thought one thing about yourself, but it took God to show you the truth about you.
She didn’t realize that she had been living her entire life wearing a mask, pretending to be something she wasn’t.
And it literally took an encounter with God before she was ever aware that she had been wearing a mask..
She wore a mask of strength when she was really weak.
She wore a mask of confidence when she was really insecure.
She wore a mask of “living her best life” when she was really in a dark place.
Even her marriages were masks to hide her insecurities, struggles and sin.
And she had to learn the hard way that when you try to cover up brokenness, dysfunction and sin, you make things harder for yourself.
That young lady was me. And sometimes, even today, she’s me.
And ever since I’ve taken those masks off, the enemy is always trying to put them back on. If not those, he’s trying to give me some new ones.
To some degree, we’ve all put on masks to hide parts of who we are. We may not be aware of it, but we have. We may not be willing to admit it, but we have. We may even think that we’re above the temptation of hiding behind masks.
Sometimes people wear masks to intentionally deceive others.
But other times, it’s to protect themselves. It becomes a defense mechanism.
This is why we need God to help us figure us out. Because some of us don’t even know that we have on masks.
Search me O God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. See if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting. Psalm 139:23
When we deny, try to hide or try to cover up the issues of our hearts, we develop a false sense of security within ourselves. We think we’re alright, when we’re not alright. We think we’re fooling other people, but we’re really fooling ourselves. And truth be told, most of the time, people can see right through those masks.
People know when you pretend to be holy, when you’re not. They don’t have to see what you do behind closed doors. All they have to do is talk to you long enough. Your mouth will tell on you.
Matthew 15:18 The things that come out of a person’s mouth come from the heart.
They know you are not over it like you say you are, because it bleeds out in how you talk about that other person. Your conversations are full of bitterness, unforgiveness, jealousy and criticism.
They know that your self-esteem isn’t as high as you claim it to be. I don’t care how fly your hair, nails, makeup and clothes are. They see the people you keep yoking yourself up to and how you seem to be drawn to dysfunction and drama all the time. You say your esteem is high, but you’re living low.
And as a child of God, if you can’t be honest with yourself, you can’t be honest with God.
And so we put in all this effort to hide sin, shame, sickness or whatever else, thinking we’re protecting ourselves; protecting our reputations; protecting our egos; protecting our name — when in actuality, the mask we wear makes our condition worse.
We add more sin on top of sin. We add more shame on top of shame. We add more sickness on top of sickness. We add more regret on top of regret. And guilt on top of guilt.
We live life carrying all of this weight in our hearts and in our minds — struggling to breathe because we’re constantly in performance mode – not living authentically. This is exhausting!
And this might explain why so many have such bad attitudes. Tired of faking it, but don’t want to admit it.
And instead of removing the mask, we just attempt to adjust and manipulate the mask to feel better about ourselves and where we are in life. And we focus on the flaws of other people so we don’t have to give attention to our own flaws. This is exactly where the enemy wants us. He wants us to wear the mask. And he wants us to get really comfortable in the mask because he knows that it’s like a veil that stands between us and the liberty we have in Christ Jesus.
Free from sin, shame, regret. And free from being consumed with what others think about you.
The masks will keep us from admitting the degree of our ugliness. Masks will have you in denial about how messed up you are. When I was living in sin in those dysfunctional relationships and marriages, I could have consumed my time focused on all the wrong they were doing. Doing that, I would have never found the “me” in my own mess.
The masks will keep us from working on bettering ourselves for the Lord. We get caught up in other people patting us on the backs and esteeming us, that we forget that God is not pleased or impressed with you or your lifestyle. When I was caught up, I think I was more concerned about church folk finding out, than I was about the fact that God already knew.
Then the masks will keep us from true repentance. Why would you repent when you’ve deceived yourself into believing that you’re in a good place? I sure nuff had to have an encounter with God to see this for myself. I was crying out to God about all the stuff husband #1 was doing against me and God stopped me where I was and said “Yeah…Yeah….yeah….but what about your stuff?” All the while, God was using the dysfunctions I was having in my marriage to show me the dysfunctions He was having with me. Tressa you’re not loyal, faithful or consistent. Now you know how I feel.”
There’s no way in the world I would have been able to remove my mask without God intervening.
The world won’t even tell you that you have a mask on. The world glamorizes the masks that keep us blind from the truth of who we are. And it calls it everything except what it is.
The world says that becoming a better version of yourself is the goal. And those standards for becoming a better version of yourself have nothing to do with pleasing God. It’s all about you being happy and living your “best life”. But it’s 100% impossible to live your best life outside of the will of God. This is deception on top of deception. And a lot of us are deceived that living our best life is what God wants most for us. God wants to give you a blessed life, full of His will, way and Word.
The world is pushing that we all stand for our own truth. This is why there are so many different identities you can wear. It’s no longer about who God says you are or should become. All you have to do is be unapologetically who you are. And if the world is pushing this agenda, you can guarantee that you’ll be outside of God’s will. But the world leaves out the spiritual consequences. It paints a picture of being liberated and free to be yourself. But it eliminates the need to face the problems we have within yourselves and with others. There are always consequences that come with abandoning the design in which God created you to be that the world will keep quiet about. God created you to be holy, for He is holy.
God instructs us not to be conformed to this world, but to be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Rom 12:2
There’s a big difference in standing in your own truth and standing in the the Truth of God.
John 8:23 Know the truth and the truth will set you free.
Notice that it didn’t say knowing your own truth will set you free.
This is what the world is telling us. This is why when God saves us, He saves us from sin, shame and our very own selves. Because we can be our own worst enemies.
The masks we wear are covers. But they don’t have the ability to change our condition or our position. Only God can do that.
Have you ever spilled something on your sofa or chair and it left a stain? And you knew you were having company and you decided to put a nice throw over the stain. And you get all of these compliments about how nice everything looks.
But it wasn’t what they thought. You just covered up what was wrong. You didn’t clean it up.
If you remember, Adam and Eve made coverings for themselves because they realized they were naked. And they tried to hide it. But God saw right through that. As a matter of fact, that covering didn’t conceal their condition. It actually exposed their true condition.
It’s the same for us. Our masks, our coverings make us feel secure and better about ourselves. And as long as we keep fooling ourselves, we’ll never get to the place God is calling us to be.
We’ll be like those silly, weak women mentioned in 2 Tim 3:6-7
…weak women weighed down with sins, led on by various impulses, always learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth.
And veres 5lets us know that we can have a form of godliness, but deny its power.
So we put on a mask of strength when we’re weak. We put on a mask of deliverance when we’re still in bondage.
We continue to live lives that habitually deny the truth and we grow more and more impressive with people. But we grow weaker and weaker in the spirit and less pleasing to God.
So how do we take off these masks?
How do we experience the freedom we have in Christ Jesus without the shame and regret?
How do we get to a place where we are so free in Christ that even our struggles become a place God can be glorified?
The answer is found in walking in the identity God has assigned you as His Child.
Walking in your Christ identity liberates you from being a slave to the masks:
being a slave to the shame of the sins of your pasts
being a slave to other people’s acceptance and approval
and definitely being slaves to hypocrisy.
Instead of us consuming our lives chasing to hear “well done” from other people, we’ll consume our lives chasing to hear “well done” from God. Because, ultimately, this is the only “well done” that matters. We need to understand that man can smother you with “well dones” when God has turned His face away from you in displeasure.
Our ability to remove the mask does not depend on our ability to avoid the ugliness of who we are or our ability to deceive or fool others. Removing the mask depends on our willingness to submit to God — to allow God to expose us to the ugly within ourselves
And then allow God to transform you so that you can live a life that pleases Him.
And only then, will we be able to walk fully in the identity God has assigned us as His children. Our past and even our present-day struggles will transition from holding us hostage in a place of shame and regret, to being testaments of the transforming power of God.
Proverbs 10:22 The blessing of the LORD is rich, and He adds no sorrow with it.
This reminds me that as I commit myself to striving to be who God has called me to be, that with His blessings in my life, though they may come with struggles, they won’t come with sorrow. I WILL NOT regret giving my life to God in total submission.
2 Corinthians 5:17 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation: The old has passed away; behold the new has come.
God makes us new.
Can you imagine being loved and accepted and not having to do anything to get it?
You know we live in a transactional world. You do this and I do that?
But Jesus’ love for us not like that and it doesn’t change.
Romans 8 teaches us that there’s nothing that can separate us from the love of God.
Not even if you take your mask off and you come naked before the Lord with all of your hurts, habits and hangups.
As a matter of fact, He wants us to come this way.
He wants us to come to him authentically, bare, naked and honest.
With Jesus, you don’t have to pretend to be anything that you’re not. You don’t have to pretend to be healed when you’re still broken just to protect yourself or to make sure people want to be around you.
You don’t have to pretend to be brave and secure, when you’re really scared and insecure.
Not only can you be transparent with God, but you can be 100% authentic with God.
No mask and no makeup!
I know, as women, we wear makeup to enhance our beauty, but Jesus is saying to us that what makes us beautiful is seeing Himself in us.
Why don’t I have to pretend?
Because He’s given us a new identity in Him.
If you can remember who you are in Christ Jesus, you won’t feel the need to wear a mask.
If you allow God to transform you, you’ll become a person that God will be pleased with, even if others keep trying to hold your past and mistakes against you.
You know we live in a time when society will try to cancel you when you do something they don’t like. They try to make you irrelevant and encourage society to ignore you.
But God is letting us know that even when you fall short, you’re still relevant and loved in His eyes.
You have nothing to hide behind a mask because your past doesn’t matter. Jesus did something for us that we could not do for ourselves.
Now I started out with a story about myself. And I told it the way I did for a little creative appeal. But I have no issue with telling my story. And because of that, it has taken away some people’s voices that would rather be able to dog me out. Why? Because I was in a low place. And the fact that I was down, made them feel better about themselves.
And God literally had to have an encounter with me for me to even realize just how low I was. I struggled because I was looking to the world to discover my value and worth. I didn’t have the ideal body or figure. I didn’t have the money. I didn’t have the education. I didn’t have the relationship status.
But with all of that, I have no shame of where I’ve been because I know where I’m going.
I know how church folk whisper about divorced women, women that have been married multiple times and women that get pregnant outside of marriage.
I’ve been all of that!
But I know what God says about who I am in Him. And that’s where I strive to live my life daily. In Him! The enemy fights me hard to pull me away from my Christ identity.
But who I became in Jesus, was a game changer for me. I’m not the same person I used to be.
I know there is someone that could testify of the broken little girl I used to be back then.
Sometimes, I think about the “Tressa” back then and it brings me to tears. I look at her and wish I could have given her some of my strength. She was so broken. And she attached herself to individuals that took advantage of her brokenness and weakness.
But then I start to smile, because God reminds me that that “Tressa” was necessary to get to this Tressa.
I started out by telling you who I was then, but now I want to tell you who I am now.
Now let me introduce myself to you mask-free, in Christ Jesus.
I am forgiven by God.
You can hold my past against me if you want to. But God doesn’t. That’s who I am.
I am loved.
You can cancel me and shut me out because of my mistakes. But God says nothing I have done or ever could do, can separate me from His love. That’s who I am.
I am chosen.
You might not want me. But God wanted me so much that He gave His only Son to die for me so that I could live. That’s who I am.
I am justified.
You might not think I’m good enough to hang with or be around. I’m not popular enough or good enough for you. But Jesus made it possible for me to stand in the presence of God. I walk with Jesus daily. That’s who I am.
I am redeemed.
You might not think enough of me to want a relationship with me. But God made sure He made it possible for me to come back to Him. I’m that prodigal daughter he threw a party for when she came to her senses. That’s who I am.
I am reconciled.
Your perception or rejection of me is your business — not mine. God accepts me completely. That’s who I am.
I am sanctified.
You separated yourself from me because you didn’t want to be guilty by association. But God separated me from the world so that I can be associated with Him. That’s who I am.
I am holy.
I know you prefer to only see me as my mistakes. But the Holy Spirit of God lives in me. And everyday as I submit to His Spirit, I look more and more like my Heavenly Father. I’m holy. That’s who I am.
My journey might not look like your journey. And we may not have worn masks for the same reasons. We don’t have the same story. But who we are in Christ Jesus is the only identity we’ll ever wear that matters.
Not your position at work
Not being the wifey.
Not being the mom.
Not being the boss.
Not being the CEO.
But who God says you are in Him.
And when I finally embraced the truth about who I am in Christ, I also embraced the assignment and purpose He has for my life.
I made a mess.
That mess caused me misery.
I took that misery to the Master.
The Master had mercy on me.
Then He gave me a ministry.
I don’t know who God has used me to speak to through this blog. But my prayer is that you start walking in your identity in Christ Jesus and be freed from the masks. Be who God has called you to be. There’s no shame in that.
I once worked with a man that was a non-believer. His god was this man that wrote a book that he read like it was his bible.
The foundation for his “spiritual” beliefs were the things the author said in his book — not what God of the Bible says.
He would say, “I’m not a religious person, but I’m very spiritual.”
When we consider what kind of spiritual person we are our what kind of spiritual appetite we have, we have to understand that there are other spirits that can lead you, other than God’s spirit.
And when this happens, our spirituality becomes rooted in things other than the word of God. This disqualifies us from having the faith that pleases God. The faith that pleases God is rooted in His Word. Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God.
Not in sage.
Not in the universe.
Not in crystals.
Not gods and goddesses.
Not zodiac signs.
Not in horoscopes.
Not in your ancestors.
Not in your inner-self.
But the faith that pleases God is established, founded and rooted in His Word.
We need to understand that the devil is a deceiver.
These things may seem harmless because they help us feel better about ourselves and may even give us a sense of community, belonging and individuality. They may even help us feel connected to a higher source of power.
The thing about these pseudo approaches to faith, is that they don’t require you to repent or change your ways. They don’t expose you to the parts of your heart that displease God. Only God and His Word can do that.
As a matter of fact, they have you believing that you are good within yourself. You’re beautiful. You’re powerful. You’re strong. You determine the path for your life.
And while this sounds great in this era of self-love and mental health awareness, this is extremely spiritually dangerous.
It’s dangerous because it draws people further away from relying on God, to relying on our own perceived strength and abilities. In essence, we don’t realize that following these pseudo forms of faith provokes us to become our own god.
We’re trying to look within ourselves for our own sufficiency.
Paul said it’s in God that we live, we move and we have our very being.
We don’t have the ability to give ourselves life. Neither do we have the ability to guide our own lives.
The devil sends these deceptive spirits all the time. And if we’re not rooted in the Word of God, which empowers us to discern these ungodly, deceptive spirits, we’re going to fall prey.
Whenever and wherever there’s Word deficiency in our lives, there is a faith deficiency in our lives.
This made me think of Nadab and Abihu, the sons of Aaron in Leviticus 10. They offered up what the Bible calls “strange fire” to the Lord.
The fire was strange because it wasn’t approved or authorized by God.
Leviticus 10:2 says that as they offered up this unauthorized worship to God, fire came out from the presence of God and consumed them and they died.
This communicates a few things to me.
God determines what He wants us to offer Him. We don’t get to determine what pleases God.
God determines if what we offer pleases Him. We can’t assume that just because we offer it, that God is pleased.
The unauthorized thing that we offer to God, can be the same thing that ends up consuming us.
And this is exactly what happens. These pseudo faiths are consuming and destroying us because they’re pulling us further and further from trusting in the true and living God.
Nadad and Abihu were consumed with fire on the spot. We won’t necessarily be consumed this same way, but we will still be consumed in other ways. Mentally, emotionally, physically, financially.
And more importantly spiritually.
The bible teaches us that warning comes before destruction.
One way that Satan deceives us is to make us think that we are weak in the faith when we’re actually strong because we’re rooted in the Word of God. And he does this when we’re consumed by how we feel, and not by what we know what is true about God.
The flip side of that is…
Then he deceives us by making us think that we’re strong in the faith, when we’re actually weak because we’re not rooted in the Word of God. And he does this when we’re consumed by how we feel.
And the scariest part of being driven by how we feel is:
We can feel saved when we’re not.
We can feel like we’re walking in God’s will when we’re not.
We can feel like we’re pleasing to God when we’re not.
We have to understand that we are only as strong as we are committed to studying the Word of God. No Word. No strength. It doesn’t matter how strong we feel.
Every other source of strength is a pseudo strength.
It’s serious in the Old Testament and it’s serious in the New Testament.
1 John 4:1 Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God…
It’s interesting that we want to know when the news reports are telling the truth. We want to know if the statistics and all the facts are legit. So we verify the information to know if it’s true or not.
Hopefully, we’re not too quick to believe everything we see and hear in the media.
Nowadays, we call this “fact checking”.
Theses things aren’t as important as our souls. So we should be just as diligent, if not more, in checking the facts and verifying information when we choose to buy into certain things that are spiritual in nature because they can be spiritually detrimental.
How do you test a spirit?
We test the spirit by the Word of God.
We ask ourselves does it align with the Word of God?
Not does it align with how you feel or how I think.
Not does it align with how I personally choose to express my faith.
Not does it align with popular culture.
Not does it align with what others are doing.
But does it align with the Word of God?
Be not conformed to this world. But be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Rom 12:2
In order to experience this transformation, you need the right information. And the right information comes from the Word of God.
If you don’t have the right information, you will not have the right transformation.
Therefore, by default, you’re still conforming to this world.
Meaning, the world is still programming your thoughts, your ideas and your understandings.
And if the world is programming your thoughts, it is programming your life.
You must realize that Satan is going to make sure that it doesn’t dominate you with any major degree of feelings or emotions that will provoke you to have any urgency to repent. In other words, he does not want you to feel bad about being outside of God’s will.
And he’s going to make sure that you have plenty of company.
And another thing is, he’s going to make sure that these wayward beliefs don’t interfere with you advancing in this life.
What profits a man to gain the whole world and lose his soul?
So we can be worldly successful and still have spiritual failures.
We don’t just need life goals. We need eternal life goals.
This is what this faith journey is all about. We need to make sure that the fire that we offer up to God is approved and authorized.
1 Keep me safe, my God,for in you I take refuge. 2 I say to the Lord, “You are my Lord; apart from you I have no good thing.” 3 I say of the holy people who are in the land, “They are the noble ones in whom is all my delight.” 4 Those who run after other gods will suffer more and more. I will not pour out libations of blood to such gods or take up their names on my lips. 5 Lord, you alone are my portion and my cup; you make my lot secure. 6 The boundary lines have fallen for me in pleasant places; surely I have a delightful inheritance. 7 I will praise the Lord, who counsels me; even at night my heart instructs me. 8 I keep my eyes always on the Lord.With him at my right hand, I will not be shaken. 9 Therefore my heart is glad and my tongue rejoices; my body also will rest secure, 10 because you will not abandon me to the realm of the dead, nor will you let your faithful one see decay. 11 You make known to me the path of life; you will fill me with joy in your presence,with eternal pleasures at your right hand.
When we read the Psalms 16:1-11, we’re reading David expressing his heart of gladness as he reflected on all the hardships he had endured. It was about 15 years between the time David was anointed king and when he actually became king. (that’s a lesson all by itself right there). And over the course of his life, he had lots of people that wanted him dead and that did not want him as king.
We know that David wasn’t a perfect man. He sinned. And still, God recognizes David as being a man after His heart. He had a sincere heart for God and he had a heart of repentance. He was sorrowful when He sinned and sought God’s forgiveness and restoration when he fell short.
Throughout David’s life, we see how he trusted God in every season. He trusted God when he was scared for his life. He trusted God to restore him when he fell short. He trusted God in his hour of grief. He trusted God to lead him. And he trusted God in his victories. So David learned that he could trust God in every season, because he realized that God had sustained him in every season.
He had a relationship with God and as we read through the Psalms, we see how passionately he would pour out his heart to God. Crying. Begging. Praising. And everything in between.
So here in Psalms 16, we see David recognize just what God had done for him. David spoke directly to God in prayer.
Verse 1 David recognizes that God is the One that keeps him safe from all his enemies. And that God is his safe place.
Verse 2 David in letting God know that without having God in his life, he has absolutely nothing.
Verse 3 David is honoring God for the body of believers, the holy people of God, he’s a part of.
Verse 4 As he reflects on the benefits of being in the body of believers, David states the fate of those that are not part of the holy people of God that serve other gods. He says that their end is suffering.
Verses 5-6 Davd is saying that God is the reason he’s had such a full and wonderful life.
Verses 7-8 David praises God for counseling him with guidance and instruction. And because of this, he couldn’t be shaken.
Verse 9 Because of how God had taken care of him, David expresses that he has peace on the inside and the outside.
Verses 10-11 David shifts from praising God for taking care of him in his life, to praising God for taking care of him even in his death. David blesses God for the heavenly eternity that he hadn’t even entered into yet. But He believed God for it.
David is saying that just because I die doesn’t mean that God will stop taking care of me. Just because I die doesn’t mean that I lose fellowship with God. Just because I die doesn’t mean that God will abandon me.He has me in life and He has me in death.
Death posed no threat to David because he took comfort in his relationship with God. And he knew that not even death would interfere with the fellowship he had with God.
When Jesus was resurrected from the grave He conquered death. The prophecy written in Hosea 13:14 “O death, where is your sting?!” was fulfilled. Satan thought that Jesus’ death would be an end to Him. He thought that when Jesus was buried in a tomb that He would live no more. Satan thought he won. But he was wrong! That’s why the tomb was borrowed. Jesus knew that it was temporary and that He’d be giving it back.
1 Corinthians 15:56-57
56 The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. 57 But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.
Understand….We have victory over death through Jesus Christ. Jesus was the only one that could accomplish such great, eternal victory. Jesus was the perfect sacrifice. Jesus had no sin. Therefore, not even a physical death could conquer Him.
This verse is talking about those that belong to Christ. Those that have obeyed the saving gospel and have been covered by the blood of Christ.
If we die in sin, outside of a relationship with Jesus, death conquers us. But dying in the Lord, saved from our sin by the perfect, sinless blood of Jesus Christ, death has no power over us. We conquer death.
Through faith in Jesus Christ, we have the same victory over death and sin that Jesus has.
Romans 8:37 declares that we are more than conquerors in Christ Jesus. Death is not an end for the child of God. Death is the beginning of our eternal fellowship and life with God.
2 Corinthians 5 For we know that if the earthly tent we live in is destroyed, we have a building from God, an eternal house in heaven, not built by human hands.
When Paul says “we have a building from God” he’s not including everybody. He’s talking about those that belong to the Lord.
Are you part of the “we”?
Sometimes get caught up in how people die. We want to know did they suffer? Were they sick? Was it unexpected? We want to know all the details. And somehow the answers to these questions determine the depth of our sorrow and grief. Or even our ability to have peace in their death.
But Paul tells Timothy that we can celebrate in death no matter how a person dies, when they are in the body of believers that have been saved through faith by Jesus.
Paul knew his time to die would be soon. He was beheaded!
Look what Paul tell Timothy.
2 Tim 4:6-8
6 For I am already being poured out like a drink offering, and the time for my departure is near. 7 I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. 8 Now there is in store for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, will award to me on that day—and not only to me, but also to all who have longed for his appearing.
In other words, Paul is saying, I will die soon. They’re going to kill me. But it’s not over for me. I’m going to be with the Lord. So don’t get caught up in physical suffering or how we die. But rejoice that we’re going to be with the Lord for eternity.
As a matter of fact, later in this same verse he says, “For our light and momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond comparison”.
Paul lets us know that if we are to be with God in eternity, we’re going to have to shed this old body to get a new one.
1 Corinthians 15:50-54
50 I declare to you, brothers and sisters, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable.
Your physical body cannot be with God in heaven.
51 Listen, I tell you a mystery: We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed
When we die, God is going to give us an immediate total makeover to prepare us to dwell with Him in eternity.
52 in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed.
God is going to give us a new body that cannot be destroyed by sickness, by suffering, by disease or by murder. It will be an imperishable body, a body that will live forever, untouched by the world and satan.
53 For the perishable must clothe itself with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality.
But not everyone gets access to this imperishable body that will live forever. You must be clothed in the garment of salvation through faith and obedience in Jesus Christ.
54 When the perishable has been clothed with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality, then the saying that is written will come true: “Death has been swallowed up in victory.”
In Christ Jesus, death cannot defeat us. In Christ Jesus, death cannot destroy us. Death has no victory or power over the child of God. Physical death is a friend to those that belong to Jesus because it gives way to eternal life.
But physical death is an enemy to those that do not know God through faith in Jesus Christ because the bible says that after death, comes judgment. There will be no more do-overs or second, 3rd or 4th chances to repent and give your life to God.
Brother Paul speaks to the believers in Rome and to us today.
Romans 14:8-9 If we live, we live for the Lord; and if we die, we die for the Lord. So, whether we live or die, we belong to the Lord. 9 For this very reason, Christ died and returned to life so that he might be the Lord of both the dead and the living.
So I leave you with these questions:
Do you have faith that Jesus is the Son of God?
Have you obeyed the saving gospel of Christ?
When you die, will death have victory over you or will you have victory over death?
When we consider what kind of spiritual appetite we have, we have to understand that there are other spirits that can lead you, other than God’s spirit. And when this happens, our sense of spirituality becomes rooted in things other than the word of God. And this disqualifies us from having the faith that pleases God. Because the faith that pleases God is rooted in His Word. Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God.
Not in sage. Not in the universe. Not in crystals. Not gods and goddesses. Not zodiac signs. Not in horoscopes. Not your ancestors. Not in your inner self.
But the faith that pleases God is established, founded and rooted in His Word. We need to understand that the devil is a deceiver.
These things may seem harmless because they help us feel better about ourselves and may even give us a sense of community and belonging and individuality. They may even help us feel connected to a higher source of power.
The thing about these pseudo approaches to faith, is that they don’t require you to repent or change your ways. They don’t expose you to the parts of your heart that displease God. Only God and His Word can do that.
As a matter of fact, they have you believing that you are good within yourself. You’re beautiful. You’re powerful. You’re strong. You determine the path for your life.
And while this sounds great in this era of self-love and mental health awareness, this is extremely spiritually dangerous. It’s dangerous because it draws people further away from relying on God, to relying on our own strength and abilities. In essence, we don’t realize that following these pseudo forms of faith provoke us to become our own god. We’re trying to look within ourselves for our own sufficiency.
Paul said it’s in God that we live, we move and we have our very being. We don’t have the ability to give ourselves life. Neither do we have the ability to guide our own lives.
The devil sends these deceptive spirits all the time. And if we’re not rooted in the Word of God, which empowers us to discern these ungodly, deceptive spirits, we’re going to fall prey.
Whenever and wherever there’s Word deficiency in our lives, there is a faith deficiency in our lives.
This made me think of Nadab and Abihu, the sons of Aaron in Leviticus 10. They offered up what the Bible calls “strange fire” to the Lord. The fire was strange because it wasn’t approved or authorized by God.
Lev 10:2 says that as they offered up this unauthorized worship to God, fire came out from the presence of God and consumed them and they died.
This communicates a few things to me.
God determines what He wants us to offer Him. We don’t get to determine what pleases God.
God determines if what we offer pleases Him. We can’t assume that just because we offer it, that God is pleased.
The unauthorized thing that we offer to God, can be the same thing that ends up consuming us. And this is exactly what happens.
These pseudo faiths are consuming and destroying us because they’re pulling us further and further from trusting in the true and living God.
Nadad and Abihu were consumed with fire on the spot. We won’t necessarily be consumed this same way, but we will still be consumed in other ways. Mentally, emotionally, physically, financially. And more importantly spiritually.
The bible teaches us that warning comes before destruction. One way that Satan deceives us is to make us think that we are weak in the faith when we’re actually strong because we’re rooted in the Word of God. And he does this when we’re consumed by how we feel, and not by what we know what is true about God.
The flip side of that is…
Then he deceives us by making us think that we’re strong in the faith, when we’re actually weak because we’re not rooted in the Word of God. And he does this when we’re consumed by how we feel. And the scariest part of being driven by how we feel is we can feel saved when we’re not. We can feel like we’re walking in God’s will when we’re not. We can feel like we’re pleasing to God when we’re not.
We have to understand that we are only as strong as we are committed to studying the Word of God. Every other source of strength is a pseudo strength.
It’s serious in the Old Testament and it’s serious in the New Testament.
1 John 4:1 Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God…
When Paul spoke of his own level of contentment in Phillipians 4, he didn’t compare his life with someone else’s life. He didn’t assume the worst about someone’s life in order to be ok with his own. Paul considered God’s goodness and His ability to sustain him in any season – seasons of need and seasons of abundance.
What is within us that seeks to find our own contentment by assuming the worst in someone else’s life? Why do we say to ourselves and others when observing the lives of others from a distance, “You don’t know what they’re dealing with. So don’t look at them and feel bad about what you’re dealing with.” Why do we have to look at someone’s “good” from the outside and assume the worst on the inside just you feel better about our lives? Why can’t be see their “good” and simply we happy for them without knowing all the details?
Why are we getting a sense of satisfaction in our lives assuming the worst in someone else’s life? This is not ok! Neither is advising another person to do so, just to feel better about their lives. Comparing ourselves to others then feeling bad about our lives is not good. Comparing ourselves to others to feel better about our lives is not good either!
You see a snapshot of someone’s happiness on social media or otherwise, and you choose to dismiss it and assume the worse or focus on the possiblity that something could still be wrong. Instead of celebrating or expressing some form of happiness for them, your first response is to dismiss the idea of celebrating or being genuinely happy for them in that moment because you choose to assume and focus on the potential of trouble they’re having behind the scenes that you know nothing about.
Here’s the truth: If this is the case, you’re being provoked by a spirit of jealousy, envy, discontentment and/or pride. Some of us need to learn contentment and humility. We need to learn how to have genuine happiness for others even when it’s not our turn. And we don’t gain that by trying find reasons not to be happy for others in order to be ok with our own lives.
So… No! It’s not ok to feel better about your life assuming the worst about someone else’s. If that’s your method, you’ll only become more discontent with your own life and more critical of others. This may be the reason some of us aren’t progressing in life the way we want to. We haven’t learned to be content with our own lives. And we don’t know how to be happy for others while we’re in the waiting room. And until some of us learn this, we may have to spend longer than we want in the waiting rooms of life.
We need to learn contentment. We need to focus on God’s ability to sustain us in EVERY season of life. And we need to learn to be happy and rejoice with others.
Not that I speak from need, for I have learned to be content in whatever circumstances I am. I know how to get along with little, and I also know how to live in prosperity; in any and every circumstance I have learned the secret of being filled and going hungry, both of having abundance and suffering need. Philippians 4:11-12 NASB2020
Trying to seek yesterday’s peace in today’s reality can be one of the most self-defeating things we do to ourselves. Many of us have gone thru major hardships in life. Before the hardship in your life, your comfortability and peace of mind came from a certain level of familiarity, accessibility and manageability of specific things or specific individuals in your day to day. But after your hardship, those comfortabilities where compromised–if not all together eliminated.
Now the new normal of your today seems outside of your control and reach. You want to feel the same joy you felt yesterday. You want to have the same access and comfort today as you had yesterday. But the fact that you’re trying to hold on to yesterday’s peace is the very reason you can’t take possession of today’s peace. That relationship is over! You can get that job back! You can’t reverse time to avoid those experiences! It is what it is!
Today comes with new mercies and new blessings. God will give you new peace for your new normal. But the only way for us to obtain this new peace is to stop chasing old peace that no longer exist.
The ability to move on in life depends first on us realizing that there is a time and a season for everything. And the second thing is understanding that God controls every season.If you’re struggling with embracing the new peace in your new normal/season ask God to help you let go of the old season so that you can take hold of the present. He wants to give you new peace for your new normal. But you have to let Him.
I don’t have an issue with anyone’s desire to use cosmetics or any other beautification techniques. But the truth is, society has had a major influence on how women view themselves.
What’s attractive? What’s acceptable? What makes me a real woman? What do men find most appealing?
We are bombarded with advertisement for women all the time. Body shapers that make your waistline appear smaller and your hips rounder. Lipsticks that make your lips like fuller. Products that make your hair and skin look healthier (even if it doesn’t make it healthier). Manicures and pedicures. Eyebrow arches. Eyelash extensions. The list goes on and on.
There’s nothing wrong with doing something that helps you feel better about how you look and feel about yourself. We should take care of ourselves and want to carry ourselves in a way we can be proud of.
But for many, their external beauty gets invested in way more than their inner beauty. And when this happens, a woman will determine her worth by how she looks instead of who she is. Moreso, who God says she is.
God forbid she’s not able to get her hair done, her nails done or her feet done. It will affect how she feels about herself. It’s not because anything is wrong with her if she doesn’t do all these things, but because society says in order for you to be accepted by others, you should do all these things.
It even affects how others see her. “What’s wrong with her? She needs to fix herself up. Why did she come out of the house looking like that?” When she doesn’t do all those things, somehow she becomes offensive to society — as if she’s supposed to make it a priority to make sure she’s appealing to everyone she comes in contact with.
But we have to ask ourselves, does the fact that my hair and nails being done affect how God sees me? Is He checking for my hair or is He checking for my heart?
I recently read “Whatever you can’t go without, you become a slave to.” Can you be seen without xyz? Why not?
The reality is, others can be blown away and enamored by your beauty on the outside, when God is displeased and disappointed with the condition of your heart towards Him.
Look what God says concerning King Saul.
1 Samuel 9:2 (AMP) Kish had a son named Saul, a choice and handsome man; among the sons of Israel there was not a man more handsome than he. From his shoulders and up he was [a head] taller than any of the people.
Can you envision Saul? He would probably be considered a major looker today. We would call him “Fine!”. He was tall and handsome. Put him in a nice suit and shoes and give him a nicely groomed beard and a nice smile, and we’d probably see him on the cover of a magazine as the “Sexiest man alive”. And ladies all around the world would become his fans and fantasize about him simply because of the way he looks.
Although, Saul was very tall and attractive, his looks and stature wasn’t enough to please God.
1 Samuel 16:7 But the LORD said to Samuel, “Do not consider his appearance or his height, for I have rejected him. The LORD does not look at the things people look at. People look at the outward appearance, but the LORD looks at the heart.”
The people received Saul as the anointed King of Israel. In spite of Saul’s status, his position, his good looks or how others looked at him, God had rejected him because of his disobedience.
As women, our beauty shouldn’t become a bad thing. It can actually work to honor God, not honor us. The world wants us to consume ourselves with looking a certain way and seeking vanity to gain personal favor and to appeal to the world. The world wants to use and consume the beauty of women. It’s sexualized and monetized. But if/when God blesses us with physical beauty, it’s about His glory — not our own.
Consider the Old Testament book of Esther. Esther was favored and became queen because of her physical beauty. But it was her character that enabled her to be used by God to save the Jews from being destroyed.
Esther 2:17 says that the king loved Esther more than any of the other women and she had more favor and kindness from the king than all the others. She was beautiful, but she wasn’t self-absorbed. Esther had an obedient heart and cared about her people. Her beauty was a gift from God to serve the His people. She had beauty, but she also had an inviting demeanor that discerned how she was to approach the King with her request.
Then the king said to her, “What is troubling you, Queen Esther? What is your request? It shall be given to you, up to half of the kingdom.” – Esther 5:3
In this moment of favor, Esther didn’t make it about herself. She could have requested things that would satisfy her and make her more comfortable. She could have been selfish. But she used this opportunity to work a plan to save the Jews. Even in this moment, she was thinking about others.
Esther and her God-given beauty was purposed and prepared for such a time as this.
For if you keep silent at this time, liberation and rescue will arise for the Jews from another place, and you and your father’s house will perish. And who knows whether you have not attained royalty for such a time as this?” – Esther 4:14
Just like Saul, God can reject us in spite of our outer appearance and other’s acceptance of us. And just like Esther, we can use our beauty for great things for such a time as this. Don’t let the enemy contaminate your gift of beauty from God. Allow Him to use it for His glory.
It’s one thing when that man calls you beautiful or they call you beautiful. But it’s something totally different when God calls you beautiful.
Charm and grace are deceptive, and [superficial] beauty is vain, But a woman who fears the Lord [reverently worshiping, obeying, serving, and trusting Him with awe-filled respect], she shall be praised. Proverbs 31:30
I wonder what would happen if we embraced God as He is, El Roi (the God who sees)? God sees everything you’re doing at this very moment.
We love to consider that God sees us when where struggling and need Him to intervene. It brings us comfort knowing that God knows all the details of our struggle, problems and circumstances. We believe and hope that He’s getting ready to deliver us.
But how often do we consider that He’s watching us, not just when we struggle, but also when we sin? He sees us in private corridors of our homes, when no one else is able to see us. Not only does He see what we do, but He also sees what we think. God knows when we make those plans and those phone calls. He knows all the efforts we’ve taken to do whatever it is that we’ve planned on doing. Her knows our very thoughts, even before we think them.
He’s knows all of this. Do we believe that He’s going to respond to our sin and rebellion just as intentionally as He’s going to respond to our struggle? Do we expect Him to see us in the lowest of our circumstances, but not see us in the lowest of our sin? Do you expect God to keep delivering us from trouble, but not deliver us from our sin?
Would you change where you plan on sleeping tonight? Would it change what you’ve been watching on television? Would it change the content of the conversations you’ve been having with others? Would it charge how you’re looking at or the thoughts you’ve having about her/him? Would it change the recreational plans you have for later on? Would it cause you to go back to the closet and pick out a different outfit? Would it make spend your Sunday differently? Would it cause you to be more focused and intentional when you assemble to worship today?
What would you do differently knowing that God is watching your every move and monitoring your every thought?
Lord, deliver us from evil, from without and within. Amen
“Being” the church has more influence in the lives of your children than “bringing” them to church.
Be an example, not a sample. Pursue bringing God glory in EVERY area of your life, not just the areas that are easiest or comfortable.
Children have a tendency to do excessively what we as, parents do in moderation — be it good or bad.
When we aren’t obedient to God, but require our children to be obedient to us, we produce complaint children, instead of obedient children. Meaning, they will do what they’re “supposed” to do or what’s right, as long as you are around. But they won’t necessarily develop the heart to do the right thing simply because it’s the right thing to do (no matter who’s around). Obedience is from the heart.
The ultimate gift you can give your children is to model for them what it means to love the Lord. The world only requires you to provide for and protect your children. But being a Kingdom – a godly parent – is much deeper and weightier than that. It’s a call to ministry and stewardship to raise Kingdom children – to raise our children to have hearts for God. It’s one of the most up close and personal assignments to “making disciples” we could every have.
What an awesome privilege it is to help guide someone in the ways of righteousness. Even moreso, the little people God blesses us to have and influence.
The beautiful thing about God’s grace is that even though we may not have been intentional about raising our children to be Kingdom children, and not just good children, is that God is giving us another chance. He’s affording us this opportunity to right our wrongs.
It starts with us. We can’t raise children submitted to God when we’re not submitted to God. We must pour into our children what we want to pour out of them. Children will do what they’re told, but they’ll grow up and model what we show them — what we show into them.
Let your children know why things will be different. Tell them that you’re trying better to live for God. Be honest about how you’ve fallen short. Show them repentance. Show them commitment and servitude. Show them what it means to love God with your whole being. Be a Kingdom parent.
Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. Matthew 22:37-39 KJV
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