Awakening Audio

The proof of the Christian life is in the fruit, not in what we are like we originally come. A person must come in repentance and faith. When one comes to God they are giving up their former ways. One must leave behind their former ways and put them to death. The Gibeonites represent the majority of people before they come to Christ. When we come to Christ God makes us new. We become a new creation. The Christian life is purged and made new by faith. Gibeonites are those who humble themselves and put faith in God because they acknowledge there is none greater than Him. Israel represents those who have already entered into a Covenant with God through faith. There must be a sacrifice, there must be atonement, and there must be faith in Christ. The Canaanites are the depraved. They are consumed with carnal desires and passions that must be destroyed. We must put the will of God first and by grace all these Canaanite attributes must be put to death. We must persevere by faith for this to take place. Gibeonites were different from the Canaanites. They were afraid of God and they saw something in Israel they wanted. The Gibeonites came in the wrong way, but why they came was not wrong. They were a type of new believers who come to God. They wanted to appear to be something they were not. God answers every penitent individual by making them His servants. When we are faithful with a little He will give us more. We must be renewed in the Spirit of our minds to be transformed from being who we are when we come to God to those He wills to transform us into. Are we faithfully serving and ministering to God? God desires to make all of us His children, even if we start as Gibeonites. Click here to listen: The Christian Life

Jesus and His disciples are on their final journey to Jerusalem. Christ is on His way to die and the disciples walk behind Him, amazed and afraid. Jesus takes His disciples to the side and for the third time predicts His coming death. The first time He had done this Peter had rebuked Him. This is because Peter was unwilling to take up his own cross and follow after Christ. The second time Christ had predicted His death the disciples did not understand but were too afraid to ask Him about it. The disciples were unwilling to reveal their ignorance and humbly ask Him what He meant. The disciples were in many ways showing their immaturity, but yet at the same time they were arguing among themselves about who among them was the greatest. James and John ask Jesus to grant them that they may sit on His right hand and on His left hand. Yet the whole time they were unwilling to enter themselves! They wanted Christ to go through His baptism of suffering and they wanted only the benefits of it. They wanted to sit in His glory. Jesus responds by asking them if they were willing to drink the cup He was already drinking or be baptized in the baptism He was already being baptized in. Christ was drinking the cup and baptized with this baptism from the manger to the cross! All Christians must drink of the cup and be baptized in this baptism individually! All must individually enter in! All Christians must deny themselves take up their cross daily, and follow Christ! All Christians must be baptized into His death! All Christians must be baptized in the Holy Spirit and fire! But each must enter in individually. Not at some obscure, future, time, but now! And God has prepared a cup to drink. [The Baptism and the Cup ]

There is a time when the people of God have an open door set before them and they could cross over and enter in. God sets an open door before every generation. This open door is the finished work of Calvary. We can no longer draw back! We must press on and possess the land! God has opened the door to maturity, strength, and faith. Now is the time to enter in by faith! The way has been opened; the Accuser of the Brethren has been cast down. Do you want to be made well? God had brought the people of Israel to the entrance of the Promised Land for a second time. The first time they refused to enter so they were brought through years of refinement, trial, and purification in the wilderness. God has purified them of their former lack of faith. God reminds them at the border of the Promised Land of all that He had done. But it comes down to a trial of the will. Are they willing to enter in? We must remember what God has done and enter in by faith! We must be free of our self-sufficient attitude! We must live by faith and completely depend upon the Lord! To live by faith is to acknowledge that God is our only provision. We must come to Him in weakness and humility! The land that the Lord has promised is a land of provision of all things they need. They will lack nothing. But even in this there is a danger and a warning. Be sure to bless the Lord and do not forget. Remember what the Lord has done and do not forget His works. God is working in us through what we face. Remember the times of refinement, trials, and failings. Do not go back to the former ways! When we set up an altar of consecration we must not forget. Walk by faith in the victory that the Lord has granted. [An Open Door ]

Joel is most likely the earliest of the Minor Prophets. He prophesied during a plague of locusts. God raised up Joel for a reason, to call the people to repentance. He called upon the people to make a decision. He preached to the people to keep and follow the command to love the Lord. All Christians must be fully resolved to keep God’s commandments. Respond when God speaks! Turn to the Lord with all your heart, humble yourselves and repent for withholding any part of your heart from the Lord. We must be broken and contrite before Him! We must tear the inner man. Rend your hearts and return to the Lord by faith. Beware of having a careless attitude. God is gracious and slow to anger. He relents from doing harm and does not enjoy judgment and destruction. This call comes at a cost. The Church in our time focuses on the outward and ignores the inward. The Church is a reproach as long as it does not take seriously the call of the Lord. The people must show their seriousness and desire for the Lord. When the people turn to the Lord He will respond to them. If God’s people respond, pray, and seek God’s face they will be restored. God heals and mends! Do not become distracted and comfortable or settle for anything less! God calls us to rise up in faith. Trust God for something greater. Perfect love prepares us for judgment and death. Fear not! God has not given us a spirit of fear. We must lay our fears down and turn to God once and for all. Once you were in bondage but now you are free! All the former things will be made new. May we labor to know God living by faith and love! May we know Him and see His work around us. Turn to Him with all your heart. [Fear Not]

Christ’s followers are faced with trials, just as He was. But they continue to live out their faith in God through the trials. The disciples of Jesus are promised entry into the Kingdom of Heaven if they continue in their own trials with Him. Jesus speaks to Peter before His arrest, trial, and crucifixion and assures him in the midst of the terrible trial that was at hand. Jesus tells Peter that he will be sifted as wheat in the trial ahead. As Satan had asked God to try Job he is also going to try the disciples. Judas had already been tempted and the Devil had won him. But God alone sets the boundaries and sets a limit to the extent of the sifting that takes place in the life of a believer. Jesus prays for Peter that his faith would not fail. The sifting of Peter is the same sifting that all Christians go through as an ongoing process until all desires, passions, appetites, and emotions are converted and changed to be like Christ. The souls of mankind are influenced by the natural, satanically, and spiritually as they go through this sifting process. Peter and Judas were sifted as wheat. Peter continued to persevere by faith in Christ, but Judas decided to return his own way and betray the Lord completely. The results for Judas were very different than the results of Peter. Peter repented and sought the Lord for forgiveness, Judas never asked the Lord for forgiveness. When disciples are sifted as wheat it is not their end. Christ came to baptize believers with the Holy Spirit and clean out the threshing floor. But Christians are not simply refined by the passing of years, but by walking in obedience to the Lord. [Sifted As Wheat]

This is a prayer to the LORD by the prophet Jeremiah as he reflects upon the destruction of Jerusalem and the burning of the Temple. His reflection leads him to humble himself under the mighty hand of God. There is no better place to be during a time of trial or affliction than to be humbled before the LORD under His mighty hand looking to see what He wills to show and teach through the situation. Jeremiah makes it very clear that it is the rod of the wrath of God that has brought the people of Judah to this place. It has all taken place in response to sin and rebellion of the people. The entire calamity caused their hope and their strength to perish. It is from this place of humility and lack of strength and hope that Jeremiah finds hope. Jeremiah sees that all of this has come about not for their destruction but for their salvation! God is merciful and compassionate! God has an end and a purpose for the entire situation! The end intended by the LORD is the salvation of the people. This leads Jeremiah to wait on the LORD, seek Him, and look to Him as his portion! God chastises those He loves for the sake of their refinement and their sanctification. During times of chastisement we must submit to God by faith. God’s chastisement produces righteousness, holiness, and eternal life. We must submit, surrender, and consecrate ourselves to His ends and His purposes! He is worthy of our trust because He is perfectly just! He will never act contrary to His attributes! And God is Holy Love! God is the Potter and we are the clay. He will mar us in His hands and make us into the image of His son. Let us not resist His work but consecrate and surrender entirely to His work. [The Chastening of the Lord]

The treasure that Paul writes about here is the Gospel of Jesus Christ. The life changing power of the Gospel is the only hope for any person and the only hope for this fallen world! The treasure of the Gospel is placed in earthen vessels to prove and illustrate that the power is of God and not of the vessel. The treasure is placed in vessels that are insufficient, but God makes them sufficient by His power. This is to show that the excellence of the power is of God and not of us. The weaker the vessel the more of an opportunity God is given to show forth His power. That is why Paul boasts in his infirmities and weaknesses. These earthen vessels are hard pressed, perplexed, persecuted, and struck down! But by the power of God are kept from being crushed, in despair, forsaken, and destroyed! God allows His earthen vessels to go through this so the work of refinement and sanctification may be done in their lives. The Christian is also always dying through repentance and always delivered to death for Jesus sake through consecration. It is through repentance and consecration that the work of sanctification takes place in the life of the Christian. This is how one receives life. This is how they become like Christ and become like Him in the resurrection. The only way one can persevere in these things is through faith. The ultimate purpose is for others and for the glory of God. We must not lose heart. If one loses faith they will focus only on the outward man that is perishing and will lose sight of the inward man that is being renewed day by day. By faith we see that our affliction is light and for a moment compared to the exceeding and eternal weight of glory! [Weight of Glory]

There are two categories of people described in the Bible. Those who obey the word of their Lord and live in victory as a result and those who do not obey the Lord but instead resist the truth. Those who resist the truth are like Jannes and Jambres. They are evil people who resist God and the servants of God. They have corrupt minds and resist the teaching of God. These are full of false thoughts that keep them separated from God. For a Christian to remain undefiled in his way they must delight in the law of the Lord and meditate upon it both day and night. They must remain undefiled in their ways and walk in the law of the Lord. They also must not do any iniquity. The heart of every believer is a throne where God alone sits and reigns. This is the treasure of inner knowledge of the glory of God that comes to one when God is rightly seated upon the throne of their heart. The amount of power each believer receives is based on the amount they treasure God’s Word. God alone must be seated upon the throne of the heart! Everything that exalts itself against Christ must be cast down! Because in Christ is hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge! Christians must confess Jesus Christ as Lord. This is the way to discern between the spirit of truth and the spirit of error. Beware of demonic influence and false doctrines. Christians must have their minds filled with God’s Word and they must be filled with the Spirit of God. Because He that is in you is greater than he that is in the world! We must make a choice that He is greater! Whatever is born of God overcomes the world! Do you have the victory today? [Filled With the Holy Spirit]

The message of Christ is still misunderstood by those who claim to be Christians everywhere. The joy of a disciple is not based on circumstances but on likeness to Christ. As a woman is in labor pains before the death of a child so is the disciple who is having Christ birthed in them. This produces holiness and likeness to Christ. Those who go on by faith through sanctification have a similar “near death” experience. Each believer is brought to sanctification and fullness of joy by continuing on in faith in God. In order for a Christian to experience this they must adapt to God’s standard, consecrate themselves to His sovereignty, and remain completely His. The standard of God is to be like Christ. We must be doers of the Word. God will render to each one according to his deeds. Jesus always did what the Father commanded Him. Christ is our teacher and we should do what He says. As a Christian God is the head of my house, Christ is my Lord and Master, I do not listen to the advice of the world, and I live by faith. I press on and Christ will not let go of me. I forget what is behind and reach toward what is ahead. I press on and reach forward. We need a change of mind so we do these things. We must walk in a place of thoughtless dependence upon His sovereignty. We must cleanse our minds of doubt. The Lord goes with us and He enables us. Do not let any thought distract you from the sovereignty of God! We must obey God’s Word in every aspect of our lives. The fruits of the Spirit are signs of regeneration. May Christ reign upon our hearts! We must first see Him on the cross and then allow Him to reign upon our hearts in order for His image to be formed in us. [Completely His]

John is encouraging believers to become established in the truth. Because of what Christ has done we have been offered the way of salvation, sanctification, and hope in the cross. This is all based on faith. All assurance is based on faith in what Christ has done! We must lay hold by faith onto what Christ has done. Many antichrists have come. The Church has lost its vision and reality of the heart. Society is unstable but we must be stable in Christ by faith. We must be consistent, strong, and stable. God is calling us to maturity and perfection! We must have faith in confidence in the cross of Christ. True security only comes to those who decide to give themselves entirely to Christ. God has granted to us in Christ to know Him fully. This is the way to peace with God. The Holy Spirit will guide us into all truth, but will we follow? Rest in the simplicity that is found in Christ! Do not entertain thoughts that will lead you away from the truth. Do not look for a quick and easy way. The cross alone is the way to our salivation. We must persevere in the truth we have received. The failure of the Church has been not to obey what has been given them to obey. This is how heresies are born. We must give ourselves to truth and doctrine. Do not look for new or exciting things. Christ must be everything. Allow nothing to come along that will dislodge the truths found in Christ. Continue in what you know to be true. Abide in Him that we may have confidence at His coming. Let us purify ourselves as He is pure and be holy as He is holy. Let His work be the foundation of our life in the cross. Let us have confidence that this work He has begun He will complete. [Steadfast and Immovable]