The Housetop

Throughout our entire Christian walk, it is pertinent we continue to put on the mind of Christ, be renewed in the spirit of our minds, and change our thought patterns. This is repentance. It is the understanding that our minds need to change in order to have faith.

If not dealt with properly, the trauma that comes with the grief can disrupt the natural patterns of our brain. Prolonged distress that has no end is problematic. The side effects of prolonged stress can create every kind of malady in your body that you can imagine. But the blood of Jesus Christ is not just for the forgiveness of sins. It is also for healing. With repentance, we can see the power of God begin to heal the brokenhearted.

During grief, there comes a point where you must either choose or refuse comfort. In this teaching, we go through 3 passages that give examples of those who either chose or refused comfort.

The cure and the basis of all hope for the Christian is the resurrection from the dead. This hope takes our worldview way past the temporal. With this hope, we can stabilize and encourage ourselves.

The same Spirit that raised Jesus from the dead is working in the Christian life. And you may be in sorrows wild, uncontrollable sorrow that you don’t think you could ever recover from. But at some point, you remember the miracle of your new birth and worship your way out of the heaviness of grief.

God is the God of life; He’s not the God of the dead. God wants you to live, not mourn yourself right into death.

There’s some of you right now with a void so big in your mind, heart, and emotions. The void is the place where that cherished person or thing that is now gone used to occupy.  God wants to bring His presence into your void. We can let the Holy Spirit occupy the void and be comforted.

This is the picture of really solidifying our covenant in Christ right in the middle of hurt. Jesus Christ is our healer.

Isaiah 40:1-8

Grief, whether it’s godly or worldly, has some uncontrollable moments because of a great loss. The bottom line is that somewhere in there we can regain faculty. We can begin to turn this around, to change it, to repent, to change our thinking. Godly sorrow works repentance to salvation.

There are many people who suffered loss and never found their way into a godly sorrow.  The worldly sorrow moves God out of your grief.  You stay sad, angry, depressed, hurt, and finally death has its way in you.

But when we are wild with sorrow and grief, in an uncontrollable, emotional state and spiritual condition, and say, “I have suffered loss, and I don’t know what to do with myself. My soul was bound up in what was lost and now I'm lost.” And we bring God into that. “God, I need you more now than ever. God, I need you right now. I may want you all the time, but I have never needed you like this. Come and heal my broken spirit. Come and heal my fractured mind. My emotions have been damaged. I have been traumatized.” This is godly sorrow that bears fruit and will cause you to come back to life after major traumas.

Every valley shall be exalted, or filled: When I think of valleys, I think of depression. We have been laid low. So many are in depression. The Bible says anxiety in the heart of man causes depression. There is a cure. There is healing in the name of Jesus for depression. A good word will lift you out. He sent His Word and healed them.

Every mountain and hill shall be made low:  Pride will be brought low. Every proud, arrogant posture humbled. Sometimes when you’ve been hit hard enough, you have to lay low, call on God, and be healed.

The crooked shall be made straight: There are many people who have twisted the path of God, and twisted their thinking in the middle of grief, rage, hurt, and pain.

The rough places shall be made smooth/plain:  Sometimes we have so hardened our thinking, hearts, and emotions that it’s impassable. Our thoughts can't pass the same way they used to until they are rerouted by the mercies of God.

When we get in our grief and we allow God to begin to bring the depression up, the pride down, the crooked straight and the rough smooth, then the glory to the Lord can be revealed in us.

Everything you have access to on this planet is temporary except for the Word of God, the blood of Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit. Those are the three accesses we have into eternity. When we consider that access to eternity, these endure forever.

So many today are so wrapped up in the relationships in the temporal that we cannot rejoice in the hope of the eternal. We have wrapped our lives, bound our lives together with such temporal things, that when we lose the temporal thing, we can't recover because it took some of our soul. We have a soul tie to it. Now we are bound to death.

Bring God into your grief. Let the glory of the Lord be revealed and watch the hope come back alive that’s in Christ Jesus. The Sprit of God will literally fill the void that’s left in your heart.

When we strengthen ourselves in the covenant with God, we can be healed, and move on, and live, and love.

If you are in a place that needs healing, you need the godly sorrow to bring repentance unto salvation. Let is work a healing in you. He still heals the brokenhearted.

Continuing Spiritual Loss, we discuss the belief that one cannot lose their soul. This belief has permeated our society and the religious cultures today.

In Matthew 10:5-7 we see God sent Jesus onto the scene specifically to talk to His covenant people who were lost.  

“Lost,” means to destroy fully, to perish, to die, and to render useless. There are people very religious who are lost. This is something the modern thinker cannot wrap their brain around because of the false prophets and the false doctrines we will call once-saved-always-saved and eternal security. Many people believe you just have to say a sinner’s prayer and then there’s nothing you could ever do that would endanger your soul of hellfire. This is a terrible theology and doctrine. It’s not consistent with Scripture.

All life originates from God. In the day we begin to go our own way, we separate ourselves from God. This separation leaves the man in a two-dimension situation. He has a soul and a body, but he has departed from God. That soul is always trying to affix itself to something that looks alive. When you are in that condition, you are lost, utterly perishing, and fit for destruction. There are so many people right now who are perishing. Your minds are literally being destroyed. Your emotions are a wreck. This is lost.

How’s your soul? Are you alive? Or are you trying to affix yourself to something that seems to have life in it?

What does it profit a man if he were to gain the whole world but lose his soul? Is this possible? Do you realize how much time, effort, energy, airways, and pulpit time is spent on your gaining the world?

What will you give in exchange for your soul?  Think this through. How cheap are we? Over a drink of whisky, over a glance at pornography, over a sexual tryst, money, lies? What are you exchanging? When you step into the eternals, you’re going to want them all back because you’re going to say there’s nothing more valuable than your soul.

Begin to search it out. Has your quest to gain the world cost you your soul? Is this the reason you are miserable within? Is this the reason for the problems in your head and your feelings. Is this the reason you can never find peace?

Our society is permeated with the idea that God loves everybody so much that nobody is going to go to hell. There is only one remedy for the lost condition inside a man. That is literally faith in the blood of Jesus appropriated into one’s life that sets you aright with God. It justifies you and sets you at peace with God.

Spiritual loss is the greatest loss there is because you lose you. And some of you don’t even know to mourn your own death until you find life. Seek Jesus with everything you’ve got.

Marriage is a powerful proclamation. We pledge before God and witnesses, “Unto death do us part.” We promise on our very life to do all that’s in the covenant vows; and it’s not to be taken lightly.

We have failed in traditional churches and in relationships because we have had flimsy foundations and flimsy vows.

If our marriage doesn’t revolve around Christ Himself, how can we be called Christian? We need to make sure we are not just participating in religious practices. The first thing we have to be able to do as a Christian is walk this out with our spouses. Our marriage is the first test of our witness. If we can’t do this at home, we are just playing a religious game. It’s easy to make a quick statement but living for somebody is a big deal.

We can only love because we have first been loved. When we receive the love of God, we become a conduit and the love of God can flow through us. It starts with your spouse who is the first beneficiary of true, agape love in the home.

Marriage is designed with a permanency in mind. When the New Covenant tells us about marriage, it starts with our relationship with Jesus Christ. What is emphasized is the Lordship of Christ in each one of our lives and the blood covenant we have with Him.

Home is a church. The two become one. Christ is in us and we in Christ. The three-fold cord is not easily broken. The two can have powerful prayer agreement. There’s power in the ability to reach God when we are walking in agreement in the right way with God. We have to keep it right with one another because when we get it right with God and one another, God is powerful to work through that.

We need to seek the new birth with all our heart, mind, soul, and strength, and with persistence say “I won’t let You go until I find this and You bless me.” You pursue until you come into the new birth. If this happens to one person, God will set your home in divine order. The whole place can be saved, sanctified, and filled with the Holy Ghost. The Kingdom can come, and everyone can get healed.

We are not in a bondage of fear again. There’s no fear in love because perfect love casts out all fear. The new covenant is based on love. God laid down His own life in our place to save us. That should so impress us that we are not driven by fear but by love. If we are not walking in love, we are walking in rigid disciplines. Enjoy it. We are not in bondage to death but in a covenant of life and love. We are in a higher law, the spirit of life and grace; the life of God enjoyed by each other.

Your love could be the Garden of Eden if you do this right. It can be a beautiful thing as you walk in the covenant of grace and peace with one another, your home full of love to the glory of God.

We were made for productivity, and God has redeemed us for good work. Part of this good work is when the character of God comes out of us because of the New Birth. Reflecting His glory and shining the light of Jesus is a good work.

God has put you in a place, set boundaries, and given you something to do. If you understand that, you will be productive all your life with fun, life-giving productivity.

Whatever your occupation may be, you need to let your life be surrendered to the Lordship of Christ. As a Christian, we work out of the Lordship of Christ. We are not working to get saved or to get right with God. We are working because we are saved, and God has made us right. Out of that, we are to produce for God.

As a Christian, everything about us is about Jesus. Wherever we go, whatever we do, we are working for Him. It changes every perspective.

There is an economy God has, and it is different than man’s economy.  Proper stewardship is right on the top of that. We need to get foundationally right here and deal with our household economy in a good way.  There is a lot of marital strife because of poor financial stewardship. Most of the failure in your home economy is setting up outside of God’s parameters. We squander money and do foolish things. This leads to conflict in marriage, and many marriages derail here. It’s financial adultery against God and your spouse.

True riches are not found in money. True riches are found in contentment. It’s when God fills your heart and you’re so full of Jesus that you have peace. There’s peace with your spouse and your children, and there’s joy in your home. We need to settle this in the foundation of our marriage.

Can we vow to our spouse that we will keep ourselves free from all vice and addictive behavior? It is such a negligence if we take marriage vows today and leave this out.

Made in the image of God, man is a triune being:  spirt, soul, and body. There is an issue when people stop taking care their whole person. It is crucial within marriage that we maintain what God has given us and not neglect to take care of our spirit, soul, and body.

We need to understand that in Christianity people are God’s dwelling place. God bought your physical body through the price of His Son.

There are many who are married yet are destroying the temple of God. In marriage, we are two enmeshed into one. People are destroying their homes because they are destroying themselves through feeding their vice.

There is so much healing for the mind and emotions afforded to us in Jesus Christ. It is not just forgiveness of sin; but it is healing. God wants to heal your spirit, soul, and body. There’s freedom to be found in deliverance and discipline.

We must get to the point where our mind, will, and emotion are subjected to God’s Word.

Christ, our Righteousness, has fulfilled all the righteousness of the law so we can cease from our labor to bea right with God and live in total rest. As we can discipline ourselves to still our minds, be still with God, we then allow God to use the quietness to speak into your soul.

It is so vital in our marriages for us to be able to walk together, free of vice and sin, eat good food that we use for fuel to do good works for the glory of God.  Where we can look at the end of the week and say, “It was good,” take off our labors, let the soul heal and refresh, and rest.

The subject of male a female is a hot topic right now in the press. A biblical perspective of this topic is fitting for such a time as this. God invented marriage because He wanted one man and one woman to live together in one lifetime with Him right in their midst reflecting His glory through them.

God created us male and female, both in His image. The same, yet also different spiritually, physically, mentally, and emotionally. We have fallen from this ideal, but the problem is not with God’s design. The problem is in the deception of the heart and mind of so many. There are a lot of marriages that are not extracting the joy of what God designed for them. To do this and have fulfilment in marriages, it requires getting back to our created purpose.

The distortion of male and female has been going on for some time. There’s a current celebration of the same perversion that brought the destruction of Noah’s world and Sodom and Gomorrah. This physical perversion started with spiritual perversion. In this study, Teryl Hebert discusses the progression of perversion found in Romans 1:18-32 that has darkened many hearts and caused them to be given over to their sinful desires and shameful lusts.

Teryl also discusses the route to true spiritual intimacy available to husband and wife as their hearts are completely exposed to one another. There’s a healthy communication to be found as we exchange hearts, study each other, enjoy an undefiled marriage bed, and experience the power of unhindered prayer.

For marriages that need repair, repair can start so easily. We need to lay our heart out to God, repent, go to the cross, weep our way to humility, begin talking to our spouse, submit to God and to one another. We need to pray the Lord will recreate us in Christ Jesus and then recreate our marriages to God’s original intent. God will meet us there.