Hey, Sweet Things!
I’m writing this post to you on Saturday night from the seat of a gigantic United Airlines plane on my connect flight from DC back to Houston. The Living Proof Live team and I had the tremendous privilege of serving in Providence, Rhode Island and God worked in such a distinct way that I will remember it for many years. I hope forever. God is doing something different this year at LPL. I don’t quite know how to define it but I have been flat-on-my-face grateful that He is not only still in it but stirring the pot. Not one of us on the team wants to be there a moment longer than Jesus is. We don’t even want Him to make an obligatory “appearance” because He loves us and feels sorry for us after we’ve scheduled all of this. We want the event to be proactively Jesus for His own sake and for His own glory and because it is a delight to Him and because He looks forward to it. Nothing less than that and, if it’s not that, we want Him to move us each elsewhere.
It’s so strange. We began this year looking back to the previous 15 but, by our 3rd event, it was like we all fixed our faces forward as if nothing in the world mattered but what was in front of us. No “yesterday’s plan.” No “yesterday’s work.” This is today. Something is up. Something new to us. There is something liberating and also a little frightening about just saying to Him, “Do what You want, God. Anything You want. We’re in it with You or we’re not in it at all. All bets are off.” Anyway, I’m not sure why I went off on all of that. God just really has my eyebrows high on my forehead right now wondering what He’s doing.
I have a group of about 30 of you Siestas fresh on my mind because we met up quickly after the event for our group picture. These were your northeastern sisters and the cutest things you can imagine. Well, just like all of you are. All ages and types, with this one glorious bond: the lively love of Jesus Christ. I am so crazy about you guys. I cannot fathom the grace of God to have stirred up a community of encouragement in Christ where relationships really do seem to have some substance to them. It’s an anomaly that still isn’t wasted on me.
You have marked my journey of faith. You’ve encouraged me and made me want to keep running my race energetically and earnestly. You’ve helped me get back up even at times when you didn’t know I was down. You have been a harbor of joy, peace, and laughter in an online Christian world that can be astonishingly fractured. You are a corner of courageous gentleness in a culture that has lost its manners.
And, good grief, you guys have impacted my Scripture memory life so dramatically that I hardly have words. After every Living Proof Live when we meet up for our (clandestine) Siesta picture, I always ask, “Will I be seeing any of you in January at our SSMT celebration?” Invariably there are those who answer with infectious enthusiasm, “YES!” It makes me so happy. The previous celebrations have been like a family reunion on steroids. I hope so much you’re staying up with your Scripture memory, saving your money, and planning to head to Houston that weekend. We aren’t really a beautiful city but we’re a happy one and a hospitable one, I believe I can confidently say. And we can offer you Tex Mex at virtually every four way stop. I mean, what more could you want, people?
The verse I’ve chosen this time around is one God seemed to lift from the page of my early morning Scripture reading last Monday. I continued to say it and pray it throughout the week and referenced it several times this weekend in Providence. It’s easy to memorize and it puts a concept in a nutshell that is as vital as breath to us in this believing life we’re living. Here it is:
Beth, Houston. For the kingdom of God is not a matter of talk but of power. 1 Corinthians 4:20 NIV
God is using it to remind me that this thing isn’t about incessant chatter and nonstop Twitter noise and learning to speak fluent Christianese. It’s not tantamount to Bible banter and doctrinal debates and holy hair-splitting. It’s not about getting together at church and threatening week after week to live changed lives and think renewed thoughts. It’s not about getting all lathered up and sweaty-headed at events over theories of effective, influential, and abundant lives. This Christ thing to which we’ve been called is about actually doing it and through an unction not remotely our own.
When the Holy Spirit comes, He comes with power.
Where the Holy Spirit goes, He goes with power.
Whom the Holy Spirit infiltrates, He infuses with power.
Our lives were meant to be powerful. Less talk. More demonstration. Through things like a love that we know good and well is utterly beyond us and a faith that emerges in tact from a minefield soaked in blood and strewn with flesh. We were meant to be able to do what we can’t, like who we don’t, bless who we’d curse. We were promised strength in weakness and extravagant grace in our deprivation.
We were meant to wonder what has derailed or gone awry when a season of our lives persists in powerlessness for weeks on end. We were promised more than this. We’re not meant to write our own personalized chapters in a revised standard version of The Emperor’s New Clothes so the world could have a harder laugh at us. We who have placed our trust in Christ Jesus, the living, breathing-on-us Son of God, have been clothed with power from on high. (Luke 24:49) And it’s supposed to show.
Every limb of our lives where we welcome the Holy Spirit can be infused with strength not of this world and, yes, even in continued weakness or infirmity, should that be the case of our present calling. The coexistence of the two is the mystery of it. We’re not superwomen. We’re a long shot from perfect. But we were meant to be vividly powerful through the One who saved us and made Himself at home in us. Let’s not forget that today. Let’s not be satisfied just to talk about it. Let’s not just clap and cheer during that part of a service when a pastor or teacher tells us we’re called more than conquerors. The New Testament is not the theory of Christianity.
You may feel powerless right now, Sister, but, if you are in Christ, make no mistake: you are not. Get some backbone back in your prayer life if your spiritual spine has deteriorated. With reverence for His holiness and with the boldness He said we could bring to the Throne of Grace, read to God from His Word where He promised His people victory as they looked to Him alone…
…and where He promised to clothe us in power
…and where He said He’d make Himself conspicuous through our spiritual gifts and through supernatural works in His Name.
If you don’t know where those places are, go hunt them down. (But you could start in Romans 8, Luke 24, Acts 1, Acts 2, 1 Corinthians 12 and Hebrews 4.)
Tell Him you’re going to ask for it and ask for it and ask for it in His great Name and for His glory until He gives it to you and frees you from whatever this present powerlessness is. And then DO IT. Ask and ask and ask and tell Him you will do whatever it takes to cooperate and mean it! Throw your hands out to receive. And, then, when He gives it – and He will – don’t take credit for it. Appreciate it. Thank Him and thank Him for it. Know that it’s grace. Use it audaciously to bring Him attention.
Sister, you cannot fulfill your foreordained purpose without power. Go back after it but, whatever you do, don’t try to get it without Jesus coming with it. Power for power’s sake will blow you up. God-given unction isn’t meant to just come and go with periodic personal revival. We were meant to live powerful lives. Let’s get to them. If you’ve got an area of carnality that is quenching it, I promise you it’s not worth it. Believe me, I’ve been there. Repent, turn from it and get on with it. You’ve got a calling. And it takes divine power.
You mean so much to me. Hold tight to Jesus.
Tags: Scripture Memory 2013
Linda
Belton, Tx
Trust in him at all times,
O people pour out your heart before him
God is a refuge for us.
Psalm 62:8. (NIV)
Eccl 1:18 KJV
For in much wisdom is much grief & he that increaseth knowledge increaseth sorrow.
Terry in Louisa, VA
Psalm 103:8-10
“The LORD is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in love. He will not always accuse, nor will He harbor His anger forever; He does not treat us as our sins deserve or repay us according to our iniquities.”
Linda G. Richmond, VA
Therefore, as we have opportunity, let us do good to all people, especially to those who belong in the family of believers.
Galatians 6:10 (NIV)
Tammy, Platte City
We have this hope as an anchor for the soul, firm and secure. (Hebrews 6:19 NIV)
Ruth, Goose Creek, SC
For the word of God is alive and powerful. It is sharper than the sharpest two-edged sword, cutting between soul and spirit, between joint and marrow. It exposes our innermost thoughts and desires.
Hebrews 4:12 (NLT)
MiChal, College Station, TX
“Unfazed by rumor and gossip,
heart ready, trusting in God,
spirit firm, unperturbed,
ever blessed, relaxed among enemies.”
Psalm 112:7-8 (The Message)
Norma
Leander, TX
Who forgives all your iniquity, who heals all your diseases, who redeems your life from the pit, who crowns you with steadfast love and mercy, who satisfies you with good so that your youth is renewed like the eagle’s.
Psalm 103:3,4,5 ESV
Charlotte Good
Mesquite, Texas
For God did not give us a spirit of timidity, but a spirit of power, of love and of self-discipline.
2 Tim 1:7 NIV
Stephanie
Madison, Ms
Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us.
Ephesians 3:20
NIV
Alicia, Riverton Utah
Deuteronomy 7:6, ESV
“For you are a people holy to the LORD your God. The LORD your God has chosen you to be a people for his treasured possession, out of all the peoples who are on the face of the earth.
Janice Coulter Russellville, Arkansas
” For the kingdom of God is not a matter of talk, but of power.” 1 Cor. 4:20
Brea B. Gardendale, AL
My eyes are ever toward the LORD, for he will pluck my feet out of the net.
Psalm 25:14 ESV
Sharon Modesto, california
Ps 29:1 NIV
Ascribe to the LORD, O mighty ones ascribe to the LORD glory and strength.
Shaunna
New Strawn, KS
Jesus said to her, “Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again. The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” (John 4:13, 14 ESV)
Patti from La Porte
“One thing I ask from the Lord,
this only do I seek:
that I may dwell in the house of the
Lord all the days of my life,
to gaze on the beauty of the Lord
and to seek him in his temple.”
Psalm 27: 4 NIV
Cindy Gandy
Hazlehurst, MS
Philippians 4:4 NIV
Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice!
Bonnie Wallace, Charleston SC
“The Lord will fight for you; you need only to be still.” Exodus 14:14 NIV
Nicole Hudnall, Lynchburg, VA
Seek the Kingdom of God above all else, and live righteously, and he will give you everything you need. Matthew 6:33
Angie, Belleville, IL. Esther 4:14b NIV (Chiastic Structure ^_^)
“And who knows but that you have come to your royal position for just such a time as this?”
Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. James 1:2-3 NIV
Lisa from Leesburg “We love first because He first loved us.” – 1 John 4:19 NIV
Vickie, Spokane, Wa.
Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with
thanksgiving, present your requests to God.
Philippians 4:6 NIV
Rose in Dallas
1 John 1:7, ESV
But if we walk in the light as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, cleanses us from all sin.
Julie, Sugar Land, TX
Psalms 33:22 NLT
“Let your unfailing love surround us, Lord,
for our hope is in you alone.”
But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be added to you. “So do not worry about tomorrow; for tomorrow will care for itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own. (Matthew 6:33, 34 NASB)
Michele Meridian Idaho
Trust in him at all times- O people pour out your heart before him. God is refuge for us.
Susan, Tallahassee. “”For the word of God is alive and powerful. It is sharper than the sharpest two-edged sword, cutting between soul and spirit, between joint and marrow. It exposes our innermost thoughts and desires.
Hebrews 4:12 (NLT)
Allison Moldenhauer – Huntsville, TX
James 4:1-3 NIV
What causes fights and quarrels among you? Don’t they come from your desires that battle within you? You desire but do not have, so you kill. You covet but you cannot get what you want, so you quarrel and fight. You do not have because you do not ask God. When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures.
Jen (Prosper, TX)
In peace I will lie down and sleep,
for you alone, O LORD, will keep me safe.
Psalm 4:8 (NLT)
“This book of the Law shall not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate in it day and night, that you may observe to do according to all that is written in it. For then you will make your way prosperous and then you will have good success.” Joshua 1:8 NKJV
Pamela Williams, Olive Branch, MS
I came to you in weakness with great fear and trembling.
1 Corinthians 2:3 NIV
Sonya Dickerson, Chesterfield, VA
“For God is not the author of confustion but of peace, as in all the churches of the saints.” 1 Corinthians 14:33 (NKJV)
Janet from Huffman
For the kingdom of God is not a matter of talk but of power. 1 Corinthians 4:20 NIV
Stephanie Jo
Corvallis OR
For the Kingdom of God is not a matter of talk but of power.
1Corintians 4:20 NIV
Pam, Apple Valley, MN
Get rid of all bitterness, rage and anger, brawling and slander, along with every form of malice.
Ephesians 4:31 NIV
Cherilyn M., Colfax NC
“If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal.” 1 Corinthians 13:1 NIV
Rochet, Kennesaw, GA
If only I touch his cheek, I will be healed. Jesus turned and saw her. Take heart, daughter, he said, your faith has healed you. And the woman was healed at that moment.
Matt 9:21-22 NIV
Marla from Bolivar, MO
“For He Himself is our peace, who made both groups into one and broke down the barrier of the dividing wall,”
Eph 2:14 NAS
~Suzie
Fort Mill, SC
“From of old no one has heard
or perceived by the ear,
no eye has seen a God besides thee,
who works for those who wait for Him.” Isaiah 64:4
1 Sam. 17:37
The Lord who rescued me from the claws of the lion & the bear will rescue me from this Philistine!
NLT
You could certainly see your skills in the work you write.
The arena hopes for more passionate writers like you who are
not afraid to say how they believe. Always follow your heart.
May the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be pleasing in your sight, O Lord, my Rock and my Redeemer. Psalm 19:14 (NIV)
Dawn lafayette, LA
I Timothy 6:17-18 NIV 1984
Command those who are rich in this present world not to be arrogant nor to put their hope in wealth, which is so uncertain, but to put there hope in God, who richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment
Command them to do good, to be rich in good deeds and to be generous & willing to share.
Love The Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, & with all your strength. Deut. 6:5
(Holman)
Heidi~Lindale, Texas
Hebrews 13:20a & 21
“May the God of peace…equip you with everything good for doing His will, and may He work in us what is pleasing to Him, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory forever and ever.”
Steohanie – Tampa, FL
Titus 2:11-12 For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men. It teaches us to say “No” to ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives in this present age. NIV
Kathy Carenza New Port Richey Fl
Isaiah 53:1 Who has believed our message
and to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed?
Sherry Youngblood, Jay, OK
If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
1 John 1:9 (KJV)
Ann Lexington, TN.
Dear brothers and sisters, when troubles come your way, consider it an opportunity for great joy (James 1:2 NLT), because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything. (James 1:3-4 NIV)