Nae

I’ve been hearing a lot of messages like “Don’t let religion keep you from God” or “Religion never answered anyone’s problems.” The list goes on and on. Christians who have discovered that Christianity is a relationship rather than a tradition or routine cry out against religion as defined as a set of do’s and don’ts as if the do’s and don’ts are a plague themselves.

It makes me mad.

A child does not have a concept of commitment or relationship. From birth it’s sole instinct is pure survival and pure selfish. How does this differ from when a person is ‘born again’ into the kingdom. Motives are the same – what he or she can get out of God. Just like parents who set the rules and regulations of the home for the child to abide by, whether they understand or agree with them or not, parents are often ridiculed and scoured for enforcing these rules. It takes MANY years of GROWING UP and maturing to comprehend and appreciate what our parents did for us as children. We all so often find ourselves saying the exact same phrases in the exact same tone as our parents – things we swore we’d never say to our own children. Never say never.

I grew up in the home with some very strict rules. I can’t even begin to imagine what kind of hardship and heartaches I was spared because I was so ‘different.’ I was never invited to parties during high school. How many times did I get passed by for an invite to a party where alcoholic beverages were present? Only God knows that number but I’m certain each and every time the temptation to drink or even drink and drive was bypassed. Would I have been mature enough to say no? I don’t know but God does and He spared me through the ‘rules and regulations’ that my parents set over our house.

Do we have and enforce rules at our home? Absolutely. Do our children know or understand why we say no? Absolutely not. Does that change my duties as a parent. Never. BECAUSE of my LOVE for them, I set rules in our home in order to TRAIN UP our children in the way they should go so they will never depart from it. They don’t understand why I said no, but it’s really irrelevant. When it’s appropriate, I explain and train but other times the answer is the answer period. One day, just like me, they’ll understand and appreciate what I’m doing and find themselves doing just the same.

It’s not Religion VS Christianity, it’s Religion is the Discipline to discover it. After all, to be a disciple of Christ is not just to be His friend, but it is to work and live for Him as His disciple. To be His disciple requires discipline, whether you’re mature enough to appreciate it and administer it or a babe that must be corrected by it who will also come to maturity as long as the parents do their duties.

Understand this: you are where you are in Christ BECAUSE of where you’ve been and what you’ve come through. Don’t shake your fist at religion as if it’s from the devil himself. Religion was the discipline that kept you when you were too immature to understand and too hardheaded to hear when you were finally old enough to understand. The Bible says not to despise the days of your youth – appreciate it and honor your father and mother for this is right in the eyes of God.

You hear people debating the difference between the permissive Will of God and the Perfect Will of God.  They go on to describe what house they are to buy, what car they’re supposed to drive when the Will of God has absolutely nothing to do with anything materialistic.  In the words of Pastor Tony Miller “If He hung the stars, your car payment isn’t a big deal.”  When Pastor Miller made that statement, he was talking about our lack of trust in God.  I say we have a lack in relationship with God because to have a real relationship with the Father means that you know you are His child and just like any parent, He will take care of the needs (not wants) of His children.  My children have a lot of wants that are not good for them and so I do not give them their wants that would be to their detriment.  I give them what they need.

But when my daughter wants to put on a pretty dress for church, does it really matter which one she puts on as long as it fits and is decent and modest?  Her motive for the dress is the dance.  She wants to wear a “sha” as she calls her dresses so when she dances during the Praise and Worship, the dress will “spin” (flair out) while she dances.  She wants it to be pretty while she worships.  My four year old daughter knows a lot more about worship than I do.  She wants it to be beautiful for Jesus and that’s the only way she knows how and she’s completely not inhibited in her worship either.  She goes to the front of the church and dances at the altar during both Praise and Worship time.  She allows what’s in her heart to come out before Jesus, who she knows lives in her heart.

Why did I bring up my daughter’s dress at church?  Because it’s a simplified version of the needs and wants of us so-called adult Christians.  Does it really matter which house we buy as long as it’s within our need (not luxurious wants) and gives God glory?  I’m tired of Christians seeking God for answers concerning which car to buy or what does God really want me to drive.  “He loves me enough to buy me a Benz!” is NOT the heart of God.  The heart of God is salvation, the restoration of a loving relationship with Him!  God’s perfect Will does not lie within the materialistic wants of children, it lies within His heart in us being extended to others.

God’s Perfect Will is a perpetual state of giving our free will choices over to His Will of spreading salvation and love to others.  God’s permissive will is when we are saved from our sins and have a relationship with Him but have not completely given up all of our selfish desires to make God’s Will here on earth our heart’s desire.  Any time we say we live for Christ but follow after selfish desires, we live in His permissive will rather than His perfect will.  When our thoughts and our minds are more consumed with money and things than the love and care of our Lord Jesus, we are in His permissive will and He allows us through His grace and mercy to live in permissiveness in hopes that we will soon see the truth about His will.   We are truly children in our maturity with God while living in this state of permissiveness.

The condition of our heart’s desire and intent influences every decision we make, even our interpretations of dreams and visions. How do I know these things?  Because God has given me visions, and I, like others, have completely interpreted them wrongly. We all interpret the dreams and visions we have from our own heart’s desire. In other words, a person could receive a vision of materials falling out of a window in the sky and a six month calender, semi-transparent so that the person is seeing the stuff fall from heaven through the six month calendar. What does it mean? From a selfish heart, it’s interpreted as being debt-free in six months. But from a heart whose free will is completely turned over to God, would see a warning about the economic turn in six months. How do I know? Because I was guilty of this misinterpretation. Exactly six months after I had this vision, the stock market took it’s plummet – the 777 points down that began the economic turmoil we currently live in. The good news about this though, is that this vision was given to me at the Jewish calendar of First Fruits and I was able to deliver a message of sowing that would cause not only me, but others, to sow seed that would sustain us in these hard economic times. I may have missed the ‘debt-free in six months part’ but God still honored all those who sowed seed in storing up for these hard times by sustaining us.

The Perfect Will of God means to live in a state of perpetual giving over of one’s free will to serve God’s Will: the salvation of souls and building the Kingdom of God, even if it means complete-self-sacrifice, like Jesus demonstrated on the cross. We are supposed to take up our cross daily. God’s perfect will has nothing to do what house you live in, the car you drive, the restaurant you frequent the most. These are materialistic things that are completely detached of God’s agenda. Sure, we use these things to serve the kingdom, but one must evaluate the motive of the heart when they ask God for something. Are you asking for that house so you can do Bible studies in it? I mean, really? Or are you asking God for it so you can slap a flag on it “God Did It!” and all your motive for it is simply so you can have it. Do you really care how you got it just as long as you got it? Wouldn’t giving God the credit for it only be a small price to pay just as long as you have it?

I recently saw a car with “God Did It” on the front of it as she whipped in front of someone and took the parking place without any regard to the people around her. If God did anything at that moment it was grimace and be in disgust as one of His so-called children just acted out in selfishness with His name tagged on the front. I’m sure a good spanking would surely follow and then we ask ourselves why are we going through the things we go through? The truth is that we brought it on our ourselves by our selfish actions. When God said in the garden that if you eat of that fruit you will surely die, it didn’t necessarily mean that He would kill us. Our desire to be God, through independence and selfishness, kills us. When will we learn that true life and true freedom is found in the dependency upon and relationship with God?

We all have a tendency not to want to think that the things we go through, we brought it on ourselves. We are pathetic at taking responsibility for our actions, so much so, that we either blame the devil for things we do and God as well. Sometimes we make a decision and we say “the Lord led me in that direction” and the Lord had nothing to do with it. We hide our selfish actions behind the guise that the Lord is leading us when the truth is, God was far from the decision.

My husband and I were prophesied to that we would live in a four bedroom house. Not too long ago, we had that opportunity. The bank was going to lend us the $250K to purchase the house that was closer to our church and work and make our lives much easier, or would it? After careful prayer, we decided not to buy the house but to refinance the duplex we were in simply because we felt it was just wise. I mean, does God really care what house we live in as long as our heart’s desire is for His Will? If my husband and I had purchased that house, we would live daily struggling to work longer hours, missing time with our children – which is not God’s Will. The underlying decision must be made with Kingdom Principles in mind. We could have purchased the house and said “God Did It” and He would be sorrowful that I’m sacrificing valuable time with my children daily in order to pay for it. By deciding to stay where we were, we chose the Kingdom over our personal wants, even though God said it through a prophetic word which we believe was from God but for purposes of testing us, which happens you know. Sometimes God will test you to show you the condition of your heart. Not every prophetic word from God is meant for you to follow, it’s a test. Did you pass?

Are you living in the Perfect Will of God or His Permissive Will like a child who knows nothing except selfish desire? Are you living every day to the fullest by sacrificing all of your self will to His Will? Are you looking for the answers to your decisions that will most benefit the Kingdom of God? Are you looking for recognition of your sacrifice? If so, what was the point? If you can live your life with your true heart’s desire as His desire and not seek recognition or reward for it, you have found the heart of God and His Perfect Will.

What was it originally? Freedom of religion, freedom from religion, freedom to religion, or freedom to create our own religion?  What has the Great American Dream become?  What is a dream anyway?

I’ve been saddened to hear the messages from the pulpit in general lately that I’ve been hearing, except for yesterday.  I listened to a man that I had never heard before preach a message on being real with oneself.  “Quit lying to yourself about your situation, get real with God and Be Made Whole.”  The message was one that compelled us to get real with ourselves about our realities: the things that live deep within us and most often that we ignore.  The truth that most of us seek a religion for selfish gain and purposes.  Rather than being a Christian to serve our God and have a deep relationship with Him, we serve Him because of what He can do for us, give us, spoil us with; a cheap bribe if you will allow me to be so candid.  We all do what we do because of what we can get out of it.  Pure selfish intent.  When was the last time you wanted something so badly, for someone else, knowing it wouldn’t benefit you at all?

How often do we see the newly engaged lady sporting around her diamond, showing everyone that will look, what he gave her, what he took time out to find and then use his hard earned money to purchase or worse, sign his good name on the dotted line of debt, only to eventually call him a loser because five years down the road when the economy turned he lost his job, no one is hiring, and he hasn’t been able to buy her another one, or rather out-do the first one with a new better version.  She needs another one you know, the first one’s newness wore off and now it’s time to satisfied her “needs” once more.

That’s exactly what the church has become, a complaining woman who forgot that she committed to be there for Him no matter what; in sickness, in health, for richer, for poorer.  The truth is surfacing about how her commitment was only conditional based upon her fantasy that life would always be a bed of roses, always allowing her to spend money on whatever her heart desires.  I mean, after all, the scripture says:

Psa 37:4 Delight thyself also in the LORD; and he shall give thee the desires of thine heart.

Unfortunately, the bride is only ‘happy’ if she’s spoiled.  Remove the bling and all there is left is a hateful, manipulative woman who is full of selfishness.  She cries out “Pray for me, please pray for me!  I need God to intervene!  My stuff is gone!  I need to take back what the devil stole from me!” and dances around the front of the church, putting on a worship dance which is nothing more than a fleshly display of begging.  All the while, God is trying to show her the hidden, secret things of her heart.  If she had a first love, it’s long gone and the true desires of her heart lie in the pit of selfishness.   God has to take away her ‘stuff’ so that she can see that she has nothing once it’s gone, nothingness exists in selfishness.  The one thing that she had hoped to purchase: unconditional love, security, warmth, is completely missing because she lost her relationship with the Guy she fell in love with.  She followed after the creation trying to fill the void rather than the Creator, the Truth, the Life, the Way to True fulfillment.

Our nation was founded on the right to exercise religion without force.  England was forcing religious principles down the throats of their constituents and some “rebellious” people decided to leave, holding onto the right to worship their God without being forced, which after all, is one of the most profound, yet simple principles of the Bible – free will.  God has given every soul free will.  Although He is most powerful to overstep the rule, it is one that He set and if He set it, no man or woman has authority to overthrow it.  The whole point of this “create humans and see what they chose” thing we call existence, is based upon the principle of free will, free choice, to have or not to have a relationship with God and enjoy or suffer the consequences thereof.  The bottom line is relationship and ones true commitment to it.

The American Dream was based upon the free choice to have a relationship with God.  While these particular people probably never thought that their could be other gods that man would attempt to serve, they nevertheless founded this nation on free will religion, the right to serve and live in existence under God as they chose to do according to their commitment to Him.  The Original American Dream was to live in a location, free of forcefulness, to have a relationship with God and exercise the free will choice to think, breathe, and live in God.  Today, the American Dream is completely materialistic:  a house with a white picket fence, a car, and two and half children.  Where did we go wrong?    It breaks my heart to know that much of the church has misinterpreted God’s goodness in giving as the relationship itself.  It’s the equivalent of the lady who owns the diamond to believe that relationship lies within the diamond, not the heart of the giver.  We call that type of woman a ‘gold-digger.’  It’s sad to say but something that I believe is the truth: the bride has become a gold-digger.

What is the real motive at work here?  The diamond was supposed to be a representation of His love to her, His never ending commitment to her and her acceptance of that ring, signified her reciprocated commitment.  Is she committed only for as long as He continues to provide luxury or is she committed even though her lights may be turned off, she holds the attitude that we’ll make it through this together as long as we work together and communicate and continue to love each other.  Love is a commitment, not a temporal feeling.

These economic times are putting the bride of Christ to the test.  Are you only happy when He’s paying your bills or does His presence and glory in the middle of an empty kitchen flood your soul with peace and joy? If He doesn’t pay your bill on time, do you love Him still?  God’s deepest desire is to have a real relationship with His bride, each of us, individually, of our own free will and no matter how times get hard, for Him to know that we are in this for the long term no matter how rough the journey gets.

What is your dream?  The Great American Dream of materialism as it has become or the Original American Dream, A Free Will Offering of your Commitment and Dedication to a Deep Relationship with Him?