I often wonder...

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Permalink Reply by dean burrows on July 14, 2012 at 11:08am

John 14:16  Jesus was speaking of The Holy Spirit. In light of His request on the Cross for forgiveness of all He was sending The Spirit that all may recieve Him. 

Eph: 6:12  I believe this to be quite self explanatory. We as people (humans) spend a great deal of time looking at the physical and measure sin by the physical. Where in fact there are unseeen powers which tempt us to these physical activities.  If we with the help of The Holy Spirit become aware of these powers we can with His help battle them thus not becoming involved in activities which ultimately cause us to commit the sin of hiding from our Heavenly Father.  The sin of being found naked. Without the Fathers covering.

We as people spend a great deal of time in our works trying to perfect our walk. Whereas I believe we should be spending time in our walk perfecting our works. Our walk being prayer scripture- prayer listen-prayer doing- prayer listen-prayer scripture. And of course fellowship and understanding with brothers and sisters in Christ.

Permalink Reply by a servant (Chris) on July 14, 2012 at 11:20am

Amen Dean

    The first verse tells us clearly we have Power.  What we spend our time focusing on is empowered.  If you spend time on problems, they will get Bigger!  For me if I think about my pain, it gets Worse!  I must; we must spend time on the Solution, the problems get solved.

    The more we think in the flesh, the enemy dances.  When we fight with one another, we are Losing!!!!  We have the Victory!!!  On what do you spend your time on???   As Dean shared we must spend it in Prayer and Spiritual Warfare.  Since we have Power, and if you know you have Holy Spirit, {and we Do} then we are Powerful!!  It will always come down to what you spend your Power on. 

Permalink Reply by dean burrows on July 14, 2012 at 2:34pm

The thing I find amazing Chris is that we read scripture and parts of scripture seem to get elimenated.  In Genesis LGod gave us Dominion. Even when you look at the history of the wording you find He gave u;s great power. Of course it is power we can abuse and have done so .  As we go through scripture we see Job all his trials  and the whole time Job is looking to God. God speaks to Job and makes it clear He has not put any affliction on Job. In fact God  tells Job the enemy attacking him he can not defeat alone. Then God asks when Job will ask Him for help.  And will notice ask God for help. Not for God to do it for him . But for God to help him. All the way through scripture this is the scenario. Look att the disciples what did Jesus say to them. They would go out and heal they would do works greater than Jesus. Yes with the HELP of The Holy Spirit. Yet even before that when the disciples were dismayed that they hadn't succeeded in healing the boy Jesus told them it was because of lack of belief. 

    Could you imagine a group of Christ centred brothers and sisters with total belief what power they would have.

    I truely would like to say I am there yet I do have my doubts. I pray for help with those.  

Permalink Reply by a servant (Chris) on July 14, 2012 at 5:42pm

Brother

   Doubts as you know are countered with Faith.  I am FAR FROM PERFECT of my own.  Yet, I do not depend on what I can do.  I Depend only on what He Does through me.  We have Grace and Mercy MOST of all we have LOVE!!!!  Nothing is STRONGER.  In Him we are able to do all things, for HIS PRAISE.  As I know you know and live.

Lord Bless you

Permalink Reply by dean burrows on July 14, 2012 at 6:47pm

thankyo and Amen

Permalink Reply by Rita Cullimore on July 15, 2012 at 5:39am

Christine...

Very well said, my Sister.

Blessings...

Rita

Permalink Reply by a servant (Chris) on July 15, 2012 at 5:51am

We have Power from and through Holy Spirit, Jesus, and Our Dad in Heaven.  We must learn to focus on the enemy, not with each other, nor with problems in human terms.  That is in dealing with them in human strength.  Do we go to the Doctor?  Do we take medicine?  Yes.  Do we work towards different operations?  Yes.  God knows where we are.  He also Knows where we Need to be.  Let it be that we yield and become who and what God Desires and has Planned for us to be.

Permalink Reply by a servant (Chris) on July 17, 2012 at 10:40am

One of the points I was trying to make was this.  When believers are armed with this Knowledge, we do not fight against each other.  It becomes clear who are what the enemy is, and that we are able to fight for we are empowered by Holy Spirit.

Permalink Reply by dean burrows on July 17, 2012 at 12:08pm

This is so true Chris.  I over the years have come to realize this  and in doing so have been protected and able to ward off some nasty attacks.  Another thing I have come to see is people who attack usually are the ones hurting and in their attack they show a keen interest, want and/or desire to get out of that hurt. Unfortunately in listening to the wrong spirits they find themselves caught in the midst of pain attacking anything that doesn't appear to be sympathizing  with them.

         Being empowered by the Holy Spirit allows to see that although their words are directed towards us  they have know meaning. They hold no power but that which we give them. 

 

    In this we are empowered to do the work of  our Lord each and every moment of our lives here in this world. 

Permalink Reply by a servant (Chris) on July 19, 2012 at 11:20am

John 7:37-39 37 On the last and most important day of the festival, Jesus was standing [in the temple courtyard]. He said loudly, "Whoever is thirsty must come to me to drink. 38 As Scripture says, 'Streams of living water will flow from deep within the person who believes in me.'" 39 Jesus said this about the Spirit, whom his believers would receive. The Spirit was not yet evident, as it would be after Jesus had been glorified

Barnes' ...Out of his belly - Out of his midst, or out of his heart. The word "belly" is often put for the midst of a thing, the center, and the heart, Matthew 12:40. It means here that from the man shall flow; that is, his piety shall be of such a nature that it will extend its blessings to others.  For me I like the way this flows.  The Spirit, "... will flow from deep within the person who believes in Me.'  As we yield, to the lifestyle spoken of here.  That we are vessels from and through the Spirit is able to flow, without interference.  That we openly and willing give ourselves over to the Spirit, and unto the Lord.  And, to be used how best suits the Will of the Father.  I just Love how all this fits and offers the image of "Living Water" coming from us to others, via the Spirit

Permalink Reply by Charles Burwell on July 21, 2012 at 9:42am

Chris

 

      The scripture in Eph. 6:12 reminds me of a seminar I attended long ago in Arlington , Va.  The title of the seminar was " Friendship Evangelism " .  2 of the main emphasis' were  . We must" earn the right" to speak to people about Christ.  By that they simply meant to follow Jesus example of meeting their physical need ( food , clothing , a listening (non judgemental ) ear , etc. ) . We must first show we care about them as a person before we can present the gospel to them in an effective way. 

 

The second , and ( in my opinion ) the most important was " sinners and all who oppose us in our walk are not our 'enemies' they are " the victims of our enemy " .  This to me was a radical revelation ( hope that was too dramatic , but it's true ).  We too many times look at sinners and our opposition as enemies and go after them as people and not after the ' deception ' that they are being bound by.

 

Paul mentions in 2Tim.2: 25-26

 

   "  In meekness instructing those who oppose themselves ; if God per adventure will give them repentance to the acknowledging of the truth:

  

       A nd that they may  RECOVER THEMSELVES OUT OF THE SNARE OF THE DEVIL , who are TAKEN CAPTIVE BY HIM  at his will . "

 

  I hope that I have not wandered off the subject too far .   I' m simply trying to emphasize that our focus needs to be fighting against  ( as Paul stated here )  the powers that influence and " take captive " these people and not the people themselves . I believe that the scripture you gave and the one I mentioned go hand in hand to complete the same idea.  That is to keep our focus on the right enemy .

 

We need the wisdom and power of our ' eternal advocate' to deal with the true ' enemy ' and not unduly destroy the ' victims' of his deceptive practices.  Only our Teacher and guide can allow us to understand this in times of the testing and trials we must go through in dealing with people.

 

God bless.

 

    

Permalink Reply by Rita Cullimore on July 22, 2012 at 6:55am

Chris and posters,

This is a great learning lesson. Thank you for all your responses!

Blessings....

Rita