Planting Comes Before Harvest

I wonder what it truly means to be blessed by God.  Is it a nice home? The ability to travel? Obedient children? Right standing in a religious organization?  A place where a group of people admire you?  Or could God’s blessings look entirely different?

What if being blessed by him doesn’t always mean comfort. What if his blessings lead you to walk over jagged rocks and down treacherous paths? What if you are lead into a dark place that forced you to deal with the idols in your heart?

I say God’s blessings can be in the form of comfortable things, but I believe there is another facet to them that will make your flesh very uncomfortable. 

Uncomfortable as your flesh may be, the dark places in which you are led Could very well teach you to leave the lusts of this world and enter into a Holy place. The place where God is. 

To obtain anything of worth it must be forged in the fire.  The fire of a trial is where the impurities are identified. The fire of a trial is where we decide if we will continue on with God, or not.

This morning I was reflecting on one of my own blessings.  This blessing has been comfortable and enjoyable…but has also been where I would surrender myself the most. 

I decided to hang in there with God when my blessing stretched me. When my blessing turned into a trial I decided not to run away. God was teaching me to trust Him.  He was allowing my roots of faith to sink deep into the soil of life.  He wanted me to meditate within his word and look deeply within.

Who was I really? What made me a “Christian”?  What made me gravitate toward physical comfort in all its forms before I allowed Christ to soothe me? Why did I need to make hasty decisions? Why couldn’t I just allow my flesh, my bank account, my love life, and my appearance before men to be on hold in order for God to accomplish His purposes and plans for me?  Why did I fight God when I was supposed to wait on him?

All of these questions were dealt with and abundantly answered as I purposed to obey Him and wait on Him in my fiery trial.  When I stopped grasping for what I could physically see and directed my whole hearts worship toward what I could NOT see is when the answers started to unfold.  Its when I started to experience true change in my inner man, and eventually more of the “comfortable” blessings started to manifest physically.

You must plant the new seeds of trust and obedience before you harvest.

I learned to go onto the jagged rocks and narrow paths that looked like they had no purpose if that’s where God was taking me in that season.  But it was there that I actually found my purpose and saw that God could really do more than I ever anticipated. 

Because I will always be in the flesh and live on this earth I will keep experiencing the trial side of blessing as long as I am alive.  But the beauty is in knowing that in Heaven, my final destination, is where all sin and trial will be no longer.

But not yet… earth is where I wait, where I press into Christ, and submit myself to Him in faith of whats to come.

Flip the Script

Sometimes my life feels like a scene from a movie.  Right now I would say that I am on the edge of something great.  But this is a literal edge, and something evil is pursuing me.  I must jump off the edge and believe flight is possible in order to get to a place that I was destined to be.  I cannot stay lazy in this moment.  I cannot stay selfish, or lose precious time sitting on the sidelines doubting.

This destiny has been spoken over me but I have to put in the hard work to make it a reality, if that makes any sense. My first daily task is to believe.  I must believe that I can accomplish greatness as I allow Christ to work through me.  I must believe that he wants to use my talents to bless others.  My belief has been sideswiped by doubt many times, the doubt that says I cannot make a huge attack on the gates of hell.  These gates are strong and the gatekeepers come against me relentlessly. They attack my health, my finances, my marriage, and the worst attacks are the ones on my mind.

But I know how powerful Jesus truly is despite my failure and weakness.  He has told me he would do this great work through me.  I have his promise so I continue to get back up through the assaults. He has shown me clearly that all the powers of hell cannot overtake me.  They are like having a nightmare…they can only scare you for a moment, but they can go no further.

God is in the business of glorifying himself.  He allowed his servant Joseph to be mocked and taken into slavery only to later be risen to royalty because God was on his side.  So many times in scripture when people exalted themselves against others, it was those “others” that God rose up.  God likes to flip the script.  

When you struggle, and hell is coming against you, and you decide to stand and not cower, walk forward and not waiver, believe and not doubt, you should be prepared because God is up to something.

*The future will be revealed to the humble and not the proud*