Post by AutumnGrace on Dec 17, 2021 12:16:06 GMT -5
Yesterday God burdened my heart with a direction he had for his Church and i thought i should share it here.
We often mistake the word JOY for a feeling of exuberant ecstasy, resulting in a high party type feeling. We experience this at times of singing great praise. At time of giddiness. We associate laughter with joy. However, the Joy of the Lord is my strength. It is an inner feeling of knowing and trusting the Lord thru stormy times as well as day to day endeavors.
God has not called us to ignorant bliss but to deep reality that will endure when the music stops. A JOY that will be there when persecution comes. That will give us hope in gloomy times and will strengthen our faith to believe the impossible.
As for these days we have moved into the times of putting on sackcloth and ashes and weeping for the lost and the fallen. For the hurting and the abandoned. It is a time of grieving for our enemies and having the heart and mind of God for them.
God says our compassion has run dry. Our hearts callous and our tears turned into disgust. We have a superficial concern for these. We pray comfort, blessings and safety. We ask for changes but are not willing to lay down our own lives for them. Our words become dead and not felt with the deep grieving and love the Lord has. We have become satisfied with our own religious experience. He asks when have we laid on the floor and cried out for one who is lost? If you do not say today or yesterday, then you are not in His will of heart. Most, He says, will not remember when the day was, even if there was a time in our history it happened.
The Church is called to spread the Gospel of Jesus, but if our hearts do not grieve for these we are telling, we are a clanging symbol in their ears. We need to look deeper at them and see their condition. We cannot know what God does not show us but when our hearts are breaking for them, He will give us insight and we will be weeping. We can make a difference once we have God's heart and not our own working in this delivery.
What about your enemies? Do you care, really care deeply about where they will spend eternity? what about that politician you don't care for? Or the neighbor who has caused you great grief? Or the person who hurt your loved one? What about your boss or coworker who has cost you your job? There are many situations, that the people who call themselves Christian, have opinions about. We need to look deeper into the heart and eyes of these and find God's love for them. His hurt. In doing this we will see how much our own apathy and coldness have hurt Him just as deeply.
I do not know if i explained this correctly but i pray it will lead you to the Ephesus Church in Revelation 2. for we must all come to the place of coming back to our first love. The place when we laid it all down to have Him. How great our love was with these tears of surrender. Come back child of God.
In the following replies i will place some scriptures the Lord gave me after he gave me this message. Hope they will be helpful to you as well. We have come to the time to trade our laughter for weeping tears.
We often mistake the word JOY for a feeling of exuberant ecstasy, resulting in a high party type feeling. We experience this at times of singing great praise. At time of giddiness. We associate laughter with joy. However, the Joy of the Lord is my strength. It is an inner feeling of knowing and trusting the Lord thru stormy times as well as day to day endeavors.
God has not called us to ignorant bliss but to deep reality that will endure when the music stops. A JOY that will be there when persecution comes. That will give us hope in gloomy times and will strengthen our faith to believe the impossible.
As for these days we have moved into the times of putting on sackcloth and ashes and weeping for the lost and the fallen. For the hurting and the abandoned. It is a time of grieving for our enemies and having the heart and mind of God for them.
God says our compassion has run dry. Our hearts callous and our tears turned into disgust. We have a superficial concern for these. We pray comfort, blessings and safety. We ask for changes but are not willing to lay down our own lives for them. Our words become dead and not felt with the deep grieving and love the Lord has. We have become satisfied with our own religious experience. He asks when have we laid on the floor and cried out for one who is lost? If you do not say today or yesterday, then you are not in His will of heart. Most, He says, will not remember when the day was, even if there was a time in our history it happened.
The Church is called to spread the Gospel of Jesus, but if our hearts do not grieve for these we are telling, we are a clanging symbol in their ears. We need to look deeper at them and see their condition. We cannot know what God does not show us but when our hearts are breaking for them, He will give us insight and we will be weeping. We can make a difference once we have God's heart and not our own working in this delivery.
What about your enemies? Do you care, really care deeply about where they will spend eternity? what about that politician you don't care for? Or the neighbor who has caused you great grief? Or the person who hurt your loved one? What about your boss or coworker who has cost you your job? There are many situations, that the people who call themselves Christian, have opinions about. We need to look deeper into the heart and eyes of these and find God's love for them. His hurt. In doing this we will see how much our own apathy and coldness have hurt Him just as deeply.
I do not know if i explained this correctly but i pray it will lead you to the Ephesus Church in Revelation 2. for we must all come to the place of coming back to our first love. The place when we laid it all down to have Him. How great our love was with these tears of surrender. Come back child of God.
In the following replies i will place some scriptures the Lord gave me after he gave me this message. Hope they will be helpful to you as well. We have come to the time to trade our laughter for weeping tears.
