PREVIOUS BLOGS
Five themes for encouragement and inspiration
The Priority of His Presence - The Discipleship Process - The Divine Purpose - The Heavenly Perspective - Growing Personally
These five themes are Jim’s ministry emphasis, the focus of his study and the passion of his heart!
Have a browse or search a subject in the search bar below!
The Priority of His Presence- Understanding why every thing must begin with Him
We don’t know her name only her love. When Jesus was in Bethany at the house of Simon the leper, a woman came to Him with an alabaster flask of costly fragrant oil and poured it on His head. Set free from torment and now living with new hope, she came to pay her debt the best she could. But some disciples including Judas asked why the fragrant oil was “wasted?” GK Apoleia” Literally “ruined to perdition.”
300 denarii was close to a year’s wage. That is extravagant worship. You can’t accurately ladle out worship, so she poured it out. Worship is wasteful; it is always excessive, even over the top. You can only pour it out unmeasured. Extravagant worship always exposes the hard, pragmatic, selfish or merely natural mindset
Judas also asked why her passion and devotion were not used to help the poor. But worship is not about being helpful or alleviating need. Meeting a need is a good thing to do at any time but it is not worship. Worship is given to the One who has no need - we worship because it is we who have the need to worship.
Tellingly, when Jesus was describing Judas later, as the “son of perdition”, he used the exact same word "wasted", meaning “ruined to perdition.” When a man calls wasted a thing that God esteems, God who wishes to esteem every man's life, may call it wasted.
Friends, the extravagance of our worship and how we rejoice in extravagant worship by others, is a good indicator of our heart and our future.
Worship is the gyroscope of the soul. Worship is a sign of right order in the universe. When men and women worship God they begin to find out what they are born for and the benefits that God plans for them. Worship is all about God, but it benefits us.
Worship lifts a man out of obscurity. Of course, God knows every person and loves them, but people don’t really appear on His “radar” until they begin to worship Him. Worship will lift a man to his place in history. Gideon worshipped God and discovered he was a mighty man of valor. Moses was unknown till he bowed at the flaming shrub and Isaiah was just the son of a rich man until he saw the Lord high and lifted up. When people worship, they become what they were intended to be.
Worshipping Jesus is the only way to get the best from our life and our day. When Jesus was visiting His friends in Bethany, Martha was busy in the kitchen but Mary sat at His feet. When Martha later complained to Jesus that Mary wasn’t helping her, Jesus said that Mary had chosen the best part. On an average day, there are tasks to complete and people to relate to, but they can never become the best they could be, till we have done the best part of the whole day, which is to worship Him. Without the best part of the day in place, all other parts are ill-placed and unaligned. We may have a wrong perspective, or life’s priorities may become distorted like Martha’s. She believed that love was best shown by industry, not intimacy even in inactivity.
Being “unproductive” is not a virtue in the world or even in the kingdom of God but imperative in the very presence of Jesus. Our importance and what we can do for Him, is zero compared with what He can do for us as we worship.
Friend, to become the person, the father or friend, we were intended to be, and even to have the day God intended, choose to be a worshipper.
The Discipleship Process- How Father creates the image of His Son within us
Gideon’s men quietly picked their way in the darkness around the Midianites’ camp. At the signal, they broke their clay vessels, revealing their flaming torches. The Midianites felt outnumbered by the great army that they thought had come upon them. It's amazing what God can do with people who have the lamp in their vessels and are willing to obey and break it in the battle. (Judges 7:19). The Word of God is the lamp (Psalm 119:105). And that lamp can be hidden inside our hearts (the vessel). David said he hid God’s Word in his heart so he might not sin against God. If there is no Word stored in our heart, there will be no victory in the field. It is the Sword that works, not garlic. How many of us still memorise scripture? The Bible has to be more to us than an App on our phone next to Instagram and Facebook.
When Paul and Silas, vessels for God, were broken by imprisonment, they sang. Their faith-filled songs sounded so good, God turned up and every prisoner's bands were loosed - not just the Apostles. When a woman broke her alabaster vessel to worship Jesus, the room was filled with the fragrance of devotion.
Friend, today, we may find someone who is sick, or who needs our prayer of faith, or we have the opportunity to share the good news with them. Breaking our vessel is taking the risk to step out and to do it. Whenever we allow the Word of God and our devotion to shine out of our lives, there will be a breakthrough. In our lives and theirs!
Blind Bartimaeus heard that Jesus was passing by. He reached out and received his sight. He left behind his mat, his garment and his begging. Others in the Bible had their lives changed, too, because they received something from Jesus. The adulterous woman couldn't believe what happened. She was brought before Jesus to receive judgment, but she received mercy instead. (John 8) Zacchaeus received value, and Peter received forgiveness.
Jesus is not trying to take something from us, He is always trying to give something to us. What do we have, and what will we ever have that we do not receive? We have nothing valuable that never came from Him.
We need to be good receivers. It is the hungry, the thirsty, and the needy that receive from Him. The only thing that hinders us from receiving is not knowing our need, not knowing He is close by, or not asking. Everyone who received knew there was no life in temple programs or rote prayers, but only in a Person. When we receive from Jesus, we receive Life. God is so good that it always brings Him more joy to give to you than to receive from you. Blind Bart received sight and followed Jesus in the way. The more we see of Jesus, the closer we will want to follow. Not as beggars but as sons.
Friend, when you receive from Jesus, your words, your position and your garments change. If you are ready to follow Him, call out to Him, "who is coming your way" and receive.
The Divine Purpose - Seeing Fathers purpose to form a bride for his Son and mature offspring for His Kingdom
Elijah had a very big day but after confronting the king of Israel at Mt Carmel, Elijah ran on foot and still got to the city of Jezreel before the King! Did the king lose his way, or did his horse stumble? No—the hand of the Lord was upon Elijah (1 Kings 18:46). God’s power enabled Elijah to do what was beyond human ability, and positioned him in life where he could never have reached on his own.
The hand of the Lord represents divine intervention by the Spirit of the Lord—the way God ensures that His people accomplish His purposes. It supernaturally enables us to do what we could never achieve by our own strength. In the book of Acts, ordinary disciples became mighty when the hand of God was upon them (Acts 11:21). . When the hand of God was upon Ezekiel, he was carried into the Spirit, receiving visions beyond human perception (Ezekiel 37:1). David testified that in every attack from the enemy, he was delivered by the hand of God (Psalms 118:15-17). When the hand of the Lord rests upon you, you can endure where others falter.
God is laying His hand upon His church, not just so we can survive hardships, but so we can fulfil His purpose in the world. When the hand of the Lord is upon you, you can accomplish the impossible, perceive the invisible, and overcome the incredible. It’s time to run in the Spirit, work by the Spirit, and see through the Spirit. Whatever dreams or challenges lie ahead in marriage, life, or ministry, let’s humble ourselves beneath His mighty hand and hunger for His presence to rest upon us. Let’s be living testimonies of what He can do through those who surrender to Him.
Friends, His heart is in us for our sake, but His hand is upon us for the sake of others.
The land before them stretched endlessly, as far as the eye could see. This was their Promised Land and although it was promised to them, they still had to fight to fully possess it. Joshua encouraged them "Be strong and courageous, for you shall divide this land among the people as their inheritance, just as I swore to their ancestors" (Joshua 1:6-7).
In the New Testament, our inheritance is not a place but a person. Everything God has given us in Christ is our true inheritance. This includes the blessings He purchased for us—His salvation, forgiveness, atonement, and adoption into God’s family. Gifts like the Holy Spirit, peace with God, and the power to pray for miracles in Jesus’ name are all part of our inheritance in Him. But likewise, our inheritance in Christ is not automatically enjoyed; it requires a spiritual battle to possess it fully. So after describing the glorious inheritance believers have in Christ, Paul exhorts them to “be strong in the Lord” (Ephesians 6).
Being saved is like being given the key to a many-roomed mansion, and every room is filled with more of Jesus. We often stand in the lobby with a whole house yet to be explored and lived in. Our inheritance in Christ is much more than going to heaven when we die, but it takes the desire to fully experience what is ours in Christ and faith to believe in His promises.
Friend, our inheritance is complete in Jesus—He paid the price so fully, He could enter heaven and take His seat, but our happy fight to enter and enjoy Him, continues
The Heavenly Perspective - The power in being able to see our lives from our loving Fathers point of view
Elijah arose quickly and left town, heading south for Beersheba. He hoped that his early exit had discouraged Jezebel from pursuing him, but he was worried. He had already faced forty knife-wielding false prophets, yet on this day, he was afraid of a woman and ran a marathon.
Elijah was burnt out, overextended and depleted from ministry. He was coping with apparent failure, withdrawal and tendencies toward self-destruction. He was finished.
Jezebel may never have sent an assassin after Elijah, but her intimidation had worked. If the enemy cannot kill us physically, he seeks to kill our future, tormenting us with tomorrow’s fears or yesterday’s failures. In the desert, Elijah fell back against his tree and said in despair to God “It is enough!” But God is never finished with you until you finish. Whenever we think it is too hard to go on, God sees and understands our struggles and He provides the strength and the food we need for our next journey.
Friend, when you’re in the desert thinking “It is enough!” think about Him, who stayed on the cross, until he could say “It is finished.” Because He finished, we can lean on the cross and receive strength from God and know that “It is enough.”
Jesus took His disciples on an educational tour of pagan Caesarea Philippi, where He asked His disciples, "Who do men say that I am?" They told him that the people thought He was a prophet but Jesus asked, "But who do you say that I am?" Simon Peter answered and said, "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God." Jesus replied "Blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jonah, for flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but My Father who is in heaven. And I also tell you that you are Peter, and on this rock, I will build My church, and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it.” (Mat 16:13 -18 ) Both Peter and Jesus declared who the other person was. Peter said Jesus was the Christ and Jesus said Peter, was a rock. Both revelations are necessary before the Church can be built. Jesus was saying “You perceive me rightly, and you must perceive yourself rightly too!” The church can be built when we see ourselves rightly.
Have you seen yourself lately? You’re a world changer! God doesn’t see your limitations for He knows what He can do through you. At Jacobs well, in Samaria Jesus did not see the women as dirty but thirsty. Not as a powerless immoral woman but an evangelist; a divine witness and a well springing up into a river of life into her community. She came for a bucket full and left as a river full.
Friend, Jesus always sees you more correctly than you see yourself. When we see Him correctly, He will help us see ourselves correctly. When we leave Him who sits on His “throne well,” we will see ourselves as a river of life ready to flow out to the lost, as He builds his church.
We love the story of the prodigal son because we too were welcomed back with a robe and a ring. But sometimes we don’t feel like He is celebrating us each day" We know Jesus said He would be with us and that God’s unmerited favour is upon all His children, but we don’t feel it.
Once when I felt like this, I discovered the problem was in my imagination and not with God. Our imagination creates our feelings and affects our behaviour. The Bible says, "As a man thinks in his heart so is he." The imagination creates its own reality, and even if something is not true it can still affect you. If you think you are a grasshopper in the face of giants and therefore can’t enter the Promised Land, you will be right. Or even if God is favouring you but you don’t think He is, you will live in fear and insecurity- a crippled and stilted life. Our wrong thinking doesn’t change the fact that God is with us, but it changes our ability to feel it and enjoy our Father. But if we imagine the truth; that He is in us and walks with us and has His loving arms about us all day, we are confident and enjoy beautiful fellowship with Him.
God gave us our imagination to be a meeting place with Him, so the enemy of our soul tries to fill it with memories of inadequate fathers, wrong images, or seeing our lives as small and inconsequential. In the end, the One who gave us the imagination as a sanctuary in which to meet God and walk together with Him, is squeezed out of His meeting place.
Friend, reclaim your imagination and fill it with true thoughts of our Father’s presence and favour toward you. Close your eyes and imagine Father favouring you, loving you, coming to you, embracing you and helping you. For that is all true; anything else is a lie - imagine the truth and let faith arise.
Growing Personally - On becoming Spiritual people
What a blessing children are and what a miracle birth is. In the weeks following, they will begin to recognize their parent’s faces. They look up and because they are content with the sight of their father’s familiar face, they feel that all is well in their world. A child’s identity is related to their father and mother. Identity is about, who we are, who we are related to and the value we have to them.
Our identity first comes by seeing our father’s approval in his loving face, as we were growing up. The images in our hearts and minds, of his smile, encouragement and love, even when we failed, stamped us with inner security and worth, giving us the strength to live life courageously. This is important as our identity will always express itself. If you are a postman, you do things that postmen do. If you are a policeman, you act like a policeman. And even if you think you are a policeman and you are not really a policeman; you still act like one! If we feel we are worthless we may begin to do worthless things or crave the approval of others to validate ourselves in some way.
As we see God our Father’s face and His love for us in the Word, we develop a new identity that will determine what we do and what we act like. When we know He has declared us to be His holy children, we can more easily live as we want. When we know we are accepted by Him we are more able to live acceptably.
Friend, our Father has revealed Himself to us in Jesus and He wants us to look into the realm of Spirit and see His look of love and approval.
In the garden, Adam became conscious of himself instead of God. His conscience was ignited. Shame became a reality for the first time. “I’ve not done right; I made a mistake there, I messed up. I’m embarrassed by that. Satan awakened the knowledge of good and evil -that was good that was bad. And while we are dealing with the conscience (that was good or bad) we are far from the tree of Life. After the confession of our sin, we have a clear conscience with God and with men.
When we receive Life from Him, we leave Gods presence with joy, direction, confidence, and authority. So Satan tries to keep us from Life in God's presence by bringing an accusation to us whenever we approach Gods presence. His favorite weapon is an accusation
Jesus said “I come that you might have life, but Satan comes only to steal and destroy. To rob, steal and destroy what? Life! Those precious, holy, inspiring moments when God speaks to our spirit. He comes to rob that life!
Maybe this week you have been robbed by condemnation but it won’t be your conscience accusing you any longer - It is only the devil.
Heb 9:14 how much more will the blood of the Messiah, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself unblemished to God, cleanse our consciences from dead actions so that we may serve the living God!
Christ has purged our conscience from an evil conscience. We are to be only conscious of God now. Satan seeks to deceive us into thinking we should be still conscious of our past struggles.
Friend our conscience is purged of all the past dead works of the flesh we have done. We are not conscious of ourselves but conscious of Him. We are no longer sin conscious but Son conscious.
God forgives and He forgets. God's forgiveness is full, it's free and it's final.
I will remember sin no more, for I will be merciful regarding their wrong deeds, and I will never again remember their sins." Hebrews 8:12
Satan wants us remembering and feeling bad about the sin which God does not even remember. God is over it. He's moved on- it’s a new day. He only has mercy for you today, no thoughts of yesterday, He does not remember past mistakes and failures. As distant as the east is from the west, that is how far He has removed our sins from us. Psalms 103:12
God has dealt with our sin and our shame. Oftentimes we confess sins and we believe we are forgiven but we still feel some sense of shame. Shame hangs over us like a cloud. Many times we know we are forgiven but we don't feel cleansed. That feeling of failure and unworthiness Satan will seek to exploit. Regrets can be about what you think of your past. But God has made provision for not only our guilt but our shame too. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. 1Jn 1:9
God only sees our failures as a lesson. A lesson in Love!. When Jonah failed God in his mission to Nineveh, the lesson God wanted him to learn was the lesson of love. When the gourd grew overhead then died, Jonah was miserable for himself, but Gods point was - shouldn’t I have had compassion on these people? Jonah couldn’t be a success until he learned to love like God.
When Peter failed three times, Jesus asked him “do you love me?” three times. The declaration of love was necessary to undo the sense of failure. When Peter was asked to feed the sheep it was to show love. The essence of success is love.
Friend failure is only ever a failure if the lesson of God love for us and others is not learned. Love never fails and love re-stores failure.
Some anger is caused because our goals and possessions have become idolatrous. Bill Gothard said it is because we haven’t yielded our rights. Think about that. If we get angry because another has wrecked our coat, it's because we never yielded that coat up to God; we saw it as our own and not belonging to God.
When we are angry at a person for not doing what we wanted them to do, its sinful because anger says you believe that this person is in charge of your future and life. Somehow you believe that they are determining what you can be. That their cooperation is key to your life becoming happy and successful. No, your life and fulfillment is not determined by anyone else but you and God. Whose goals in life are you pursuing; whose will do we want to do? |If God gave you the goal, no one can stop it.
And here is the one goal God has for all of us.... to be conformed to the image of Jesus. So traffic jams, screaming kids, etc are all working toward His goals as we need to develop patience and character. That is why the lady Elizabeth young wrote disappointments are his appointments!
Friend, when our goals become more important than His goals, it is an idol and we will tend to become angry!