The Lightroom

Mind if I tell you a secret

A few simple truths about me

Might be hard to believe

Guess I'm just trying to come clean

Sometimes I don't know where I'm going

It's hard to admit where I've been

When I come to the end of myself

This is where I begin, again

I am here,

I am loved

God is good,

and that's enough

Finally brethren, whatever things are true, whatever things are honest, whatever things are just, whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things.

Friends, never trust your feelings over God's truth.

Have a blessed day friends.

But David stands up to face that Goliath

A Goliath is some situation, some circumstance, a pain or problem that is overwhelming

I mean in verse 4 of First Samuel chapter 17, the Bible tells us that Goliath was 9 foot and 6 inches tall

That's some height

In verse 97 it tells us that Goliath had a hundred pounds of armor

A Goliath is that thing that is so big that it is overwhelming your existence

It intimidates you when you think about it, when you look at it, knowing that you have to deal with it

It produces emotional insecurity and instability

And the goal of Goliath is to control you and defeat you

To make you act in fear and live in bondage

Goliaths come in all shapes and forms

There can be medical Goliaths, financial, relational, circumstantial and career Goliaths

The problem with this one thing is that it affects everything else

And it just won't go away

The Bible tells us in verse 16 that Goliath kept coming at them day after day for 40 days

Friends, you either have faced a Goliath or you're facing a Goliath or you're about to face one

And I've called it a Goliath so at least you know how the story would end

It's not enough to have a covenant with God

The question is are you living under that covenant?

All of Israel had a covenant with God but David was living under that covenant

Sometimes the problem is not the absence of power or the absence of connection to the source of power

It is actually the absence of alignment

David to defeat Goliath first of all came in alignment with God

God is not saying that you won't have a Goliath

God just doesn't want Goliath to rule you and run your life

And so David was seeing the problem from the lens of the covenant

David said this Goliath is an uncircumcised Philistine

You need to realize that circumcision was a covenant issue

David was simply saying that this Goliath has no covenant or covering that empowers him over me

If what you see is all you see then you haven't seen all that there is to see

David could see the problem through the lens of his covenant with God

The second thing David did was to recount God's faithfulness He said God gave me victory over a bear and gave me victory over a lion

David recounted God's faithfulness because God's faithfulness is offensive to your circumstance

God sometimes will require that you take an offensive posture to your Goliath

God told Moses to hold out his rod and tell the people to start moving forward before he even opened the Red Sea

God told Joshua tell the priest to put their food in the Jordan before he ever held back the water

God told Peter to cast on the other side of the boat his net before God ever filled the net

God told Martha to move the stone in John 11 before he ever brought Lazarus from the dead

God wants to see you walk by faith and not just talk about faith

Then in Psalm 25 verse 12 to 14 the Bible tells us that the ones who are in God's covenant shall know his ways and he will show them his secrets

So in defeating a giant God gives you a divine strategy

David says I come in the name of the Lord

What he simply did was to give a revelation of the bigger one

What David is saying to Goliath is that you are big but I have come with someone who is bigger than you

Remind your situation of how big your God is

Friends giants do fall and giants are still falling

Your own giant is coming down

God bless you and have a great day friend!

Everyone is seeking for something

I mean people go out each day for a reason

And people wake up each day seeking for something

Fulfillment and satisfaction is at the top of the list of what the world is searching for

I read in an article a while ago that a rising 85% of the world's population moves around dehydrated

You are dehydrated before you're thirsty

And the best way to beat dehydration is to drink before you get thirsty

Water is humanity's most precious commodity

And Jesus calls Himself living water

And it's because He knew we would understand water to be the most precious commodity and without it we would not survive

Water is the most basic needed thing in the entire world, so when Jesus comes He says I'm the living water, I'm your most basic need and without me you do not survive

And God always wants to fill us

So He introduces Himself as the bread of life and now as the living water and when He fills us with His Spirit it's called the infilling of the Holy Spirit

So we become like Him when we let Him fill us with Himself

He cleanses us when He fills us up

He directs us by the current of the living water flowing in us, fulfilling purposes tied to Him filling us

We have this treasure in earthen vessels, the treasure is eternal the vessel is temporary

So if there's anything good in me it has to be God - God in clay, God in humanity

So He fills us up So He can flow into others around us

He fills us up and our cup run over So the inflow becomes an overflow and then it flows out of us into others

So for example God comforts us to make us comforters and not to make us comfortable

In a world filled with darkness expressed in violence, wickedness, intentional and willful wickedness against mankind

Jesus says in the midst of the darkness I am the light of the world

His very expression at the beginning of creation Let there be light simply means let Jesus have His way here

Because God made the sun, moon and stars Three days after He said let there be light

Jesus was that light Jesus is that light

The darkness you see around you is an opportunity for Him to shine in you and shine through you

Shine in you so that the darkness around you doesn't get inside you and shine through you Because you also are the light of the world

Three days of unexplainable light before the sun, moon and stars

Jesus is that light

Have a blessed day friends!

So Jesus stands up at a feast in a house and then he extended an invitation

If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink

Timeless invitation to the river of God

The water of life is given freely to anyone who thirsts

Now the world makes us dead to his longing to fill us with himself

So we begin to fill up God's space with things so things become God to us

We miss out on the highest delight, the highest pleasure

So God becomes a chore to us, a slave master

When he wants to be Lord, he wants to be enjoyed

So Jesus calls us to think less and drink more

To surrender your mind and open your heart

Jesus didn't come to the earth because everyone was seeking him and needing him

He came because no one was seeking him And he gave himself so everyone can see him, seek him

And then we can see that he is the desire of the nations

And what he does is that he will make you what you need to be Instead of telling you what to do

He is giving us a new covenant and the new covenant produces new desires

So when everyone is chained to the things of the earth

You fly to heights, you leave from a higher realm

You are bound to first love, your very first love, Jesus

And yet there is this yearning to give yourself to him in prayer

That you don't know how to express with words

Groanings that are beyond words

Oh Lord, I can't even want you without you

Your thirst is your recognition that you need him

And sin is what you do when you are not satisfied with God

When you want something more than what God gives

For he gives himself

Lord, free me from the need to have anything else

I can't even obey you by myself

Working on myself will not work But you work in me both to will and to do of your good pleasure

You have installed your spirit in me

And you give me a new understanding of life

And a new value system

I come to you, oh God, my King

The one who says Come to me If you are thirsty

Now I give you to drink

I come to you So I can abide in you

I refuse to depart So I can be fruitful So I can be fruitful

Friends, remember this

That to seek God means That God has your attention, your affection and your desires

There is a well that never runs dry

You don't have to thirst anymore

Come to me, says Jesus

Have a great day friends!

Satan controls people through his lies.

Deception, strongholds, begins with lies.

Now his lies have an intense grip in your mind because they are sown as seeds in your thoughts.

You take ownership of Satan's thoughts when you voice them as yours.

The Bible says in Matthew chapter 16 verse 21 to 23 an interesting account of Peter and Jesus. Jesus had just mentioned to his disciples the things that he must suffer and the Bible says that Peter calls him aside and rebuked him because of the things that he said.

And Jesus turned to Peter and said, Satan, get thee behind me.

So Jesus was talking to Peter but he was addressing Satan because you can voice Satan's thoughts thinking it's yours.

And how many people today have done Satan's bidding thinking it was God's leading.

The way to live wisely is to know the will of God. Paul tells us in Ephesians chapter 5 verse 17 that we must understand the will of God to live wisely.

The knowledge of God's will is an empowerment to the believer.

The will of God renews your mind because the mind is either at war with God or it is being renewed. There's no middle ground.

Have a blessed day friends!

Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor stand in the way of sinners, nor sit in the seat of the scornful. But his delight is in the law of the Lord, and in his law he meditates day and night Psalm 1 verse 1 to 2.

Now you need to realize what the Psalm shows us here is two different systems of learning;

And what you need to realize is that no information is innocent, every information that comes to you is trying to mould you into something and trying to teach you something.

Everything that you allow into your mind is leading you somewhere.

The man goes where his mind goes and he eventually becomes like his thoughts.

The regenerated spirit needs a healthy mind to thrive. It is not enough to have the spirit of Christ in you, you must also allow that spirit through the nourishment and nutrients of sweet fellowship produce the nature of Christ in you.

Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ. If you have his mind, you can think like him and live like him.

Remember, everything that you allow into your mind is leading you somewhere. No information is innocent.

Have a blessed day friends!