Crosslines

Have you ever realized we follow people based on the amount of conflict they have successfully been through? Each of us is judged by how much conflict we handle. We choose our path based on the amount of conflict we are willing to go into with the Lord. The more conflict, the shorter the path to the destination. 

Are you missing out on good in your life because you refuse to confront? In the church world, we act as if it's "humility" to avoid conflict. But in Matthew 18 Jesus clearly tells us how to confront our brother. Truly the ones we love the most, we will confront the most. Biblical confrontation is not selfish it is an art to be learned. Confrontation is a partnership with Word to save a brother's life. 

What is ours by promise is not always ours by experience.  We are often too stubborn to receive the promise of God's goodness. All the children of Israel that God delivered out of Egypt were promised the Promise Land but only two entered. Only Joshua and Caleb had the courage and were able to enter in. Good truly tests us more than evil. And a lot, if not all of what God promises you, you must fight to possess. The harvest and entering the Promise Land is a lot of hard work. 

The past sets the standard for the future. God sets a standard through history for the next generation to build upon. We live in times where everything in the world is trying to tear down past precedents instead of building upon them. Precedence is what we are judged by, but it is also a ladder that takes us to the next level. It makes you responsible to past miracles that God wants and wills to do through your life today. We must mix faith with precedence to pull down the reality that with God all things are possible. 

It takes true wisdom to work around people who are only about themselves, people who are in the flesh. Abigail chose to act even though by the definition of the roles she should have "submitted."  In today's world what we call submission is our excuse for doing nothing; God is calling us to act. Abigail acted and even prophesied to David before he was king to keep things from ending badly. True submission has strength and courage to it. It is not weakness masquerading as a virtue. 

Are people who care about you having to work around your flesh? Are you having to work around other people's flesh? Nabal, Abigail's husband is the definition of a flesh workaround. Abigail understood Godly submission is to God and HIs Will first, and then to the leadership over us. If someone in leadership makes disastrous mistakes and we do nothing because we are "submitting," we are in trouble because we see the problem and do nothing. 

When we take what the enemy is doing and put God's name on it, that is suffering teaching. There is a type of suffering that is biblical and there is a type of suffering that is non-biblical. When we intentionally suffer to further the gospel or die to our flesh to get a breakthrough in prayer, that is Godly suffering. But suffering from the enemy: stealing, killing, and destroying is not of God. God is always working to protect us and save us. He never works to harm us.

Prophecy opens you up to see what you are not seeing—especially what you don't want to see. God's correction is a deep form of love. It is truly a sign God is your Father. But we must sustain the change God is doing in our hearts. Only dead things refuse to grow. The Word of God is living and active and meant to change us into a different man.

A testimony is not how much we can suffer in life. A testimony is when you overcome the test by the Blood of the Lamb. It's when God comes in, takes your story, and gives meaning to it. Your testimony is evidence to the world that a living God exists. 

You can still choose to believe God even if things haven't gone down right in the past. A lot of times things that we view as "out of reach" we deem as sour and undesirable not truly knowing what God has for us on the other side. It is more difficult to face the truth after the fact but if you keep loving the truth it will always set you free.