Category: From Our Fathers Heart

“Everything that you see happening is about lies and truth. It is the continuing battle that will bring forth the culmination of My plan, just as I promised it would. As the elements of the plan unfold and the players come and go, you will see blatant deceptions and half truths. You will see right-sounding agendas and seemingly pure motives—designed to move the battle lines one way or another—achieving small, temporary victories that will fade with the next encounter.

“Little by little, every nation will be affected and involved as the battles escalate, until a cry for peace rings throughout your world. There will then be what looks like an answer, but there will still not be truth. I am the only Truth. I always was. I always will be. Your temporary battles are an infinitesimal portion of the absolute truth that governs the heavenlies and is, at present, overcoming the father of lies for all eternity. My truth will continue on for eternities upon eternities.

“In the times ahead, when the battles rage, you will be asked to pick sides. You will be asked to choose between one agenda or another. You would be wise to see through the smoke and the fire and look to My Word. Choose My plan and overcome the battle lines. I am asking you to bring others to Truth. That is My plan for you. He is Jesus.”

John 4:34 NIV

”My food,” said Jesus, “is to do the will of him who sent me and to finish his work.”

Joshua 5:13-14 NIV

13) Now when Joshua was near Jericho, he looked up and saw a man standing in front of him with a drawn sword in his hand. Joshua went up to him and asked, “Are you for us or for our enemies?”

14) “Neither,” he replied, “but as commander of the army of the Lord, I have now come.”

 

An overview of all of recorded history shows nations rising and falling, wars in diverse places, men coming to power, only to fall to the next person more powerful; and generations of people raised up only to cease to exist. From His heavenly post, Father God - although concerned about each and every hair on every head that ever existed - moves and directs, guides and leads every person and every nation, all for the eventual outcome of His completed plan. Our days are in His hands and for His use. The final generation will see a world leader emerge out of the revived, old Roman Empire. This leader will be the predicted antichrist, who is determined to establish himself as God. He will lose one final battle with the Lord.

History, however, is also about people - people just like you and me - with very real lives, who are living in our apportioned time in God’s timeline to accomplish our portion of God’s overall plan. Once we are born, all the mechanisms of God track and direct our lives, giving us every opportunity to make the choice of committing our way to God or rejecting Him for all eternity. In more recent generations, once we choose God through Jesus Christ, the only access provided, we have the privilege of seeking the heart of Father God and obtaining our individual part in His overall plan. We have the opportunity to become players, moving with God to implement His wishes; or non-players, going along for the ride and clueless to what is really happening.

As players, we have the honor of setting aside all that hinders His will to be accomplished in us, eagerly flowing with His unfolding plan. Our concerns are not earthly, our war is not with people, our hearts are not on the material. Our eyes focus on the spiritual and see God’s truth unfolding above every earthly situation.

As non-players, everything we see is carnal. Our deepest concerns are for the immediate, our time is spent in providing protection for our little area in life; and our hearts are for safety and comfort for ourselves. When our small world is threatened, we have little wisdom to embrace the overall plan of God. Unable to see God’s truth, we hope that we will win over any threat to our lives. Success is attained only if, after any conflict is resolved, we emerge unscathed, and continue our selfish little lives of pursuing personal safety and comfort. We cannot envision God’s truth as harming our small perspective of life in any way. We are short-sighted fools, living fruitless lives.

Our generation of believers is at a crucial juncture. Each of us must set aside our own desires for protection and safety and focus our attentions toward God’s truth. What is He doing? Why are the things happening around us happening? What are the daily headlines all about?

If we don’t focus all our attentions toward finding God’s perspective in every situation, our prayers will be selfish and self-serving, our actions will be carnal, and our witness will be nullified. We may even be fighting against the overall plans of God without knowing it. What a horrible prospect!

Show me Your truth, Lord.

Jim Corbett

“Do you know that your job is simply to trust Me to do whatever is necessary in your life? When you have a need, turn to Me. When I show you who you are not, submit to Me and surrender to Jesus that He might live His life through you.

“Why do you try to live this life in your own strength? Turn to Me for your every need. Turn to Me for the changes that are needed in you. Trust Me to do what is necessary to make you who you are to be in Me. All this is My idea. Allowing Jesus to live through you is My plan. Trust Me to perform what I have promised. I am faithful.”

Gal.3:3 NIV

Are you so foolish? After beginning with the Spirit, are you now trying to attain your goal by human effort?

Gal. 5:22-23a AMP

22) But the fruit of the [Holy] Spirit [the work which His presence within accomplishes] is love, joy (gladness), peace, patience (an even temper, forbearance), kindness, goodness (benevolence), faithfulness,

23a) Gentleness (meekness, humility), self-control (self-restraint, continence)…

 

Most of us really love to play the Holy Spirit in our own lives. We love to participate in our own getting better before God, when God has always said that our place is to die. We are to die to our own strengths, our own abilities; and most of all, our own attempts to be like Jesus. This is all God’s work, not ours. The sooner we believe this fact and choose to walk in it, the sooner we will have freedom to overcome our doubts and needs and rest in the Jesus Who loves us.

Teach me to rest in You, Lord,

Jim Corbett

“Properly overcoming in the spiritual realm has less to do with your understanding of the power that I have given you, and much more to do with your submission to Me. Many of My children know the Word and the authority that they have in the Name of Jesus, but few of them are really accomplishing My will because they haven’t learned to listen to Me. They bind this and cast that, thinking that they are doing My will; but they are far from what I desire.

“You - those of you who have been in My special training fires - you are gaining My strength, My unlimited power, and the fullness of My resources because of your thorough understanding of your weakness when you are not in My will. That understanding gives you what is necessary to be truly strong. Your covenant authority imparted to you through My Word, combined with learned submission to Me, brings the fullness of your authority into proper order and focused power.

“When others flail about, using the Name of Jesus to accomplish what they need for themselves, you wait with Me until I tell you when and where to move. When you move with Me, My presence is with you. That is good!”

Exodus 33:15-16 NIV 

15) Then Moses said to Him, “If your Presence does not go with us, do not send us up from here.

16) How will anyone know that you are pleased with me and with your people unless you go with us? What else will distinguish me and your people from all the other people on the face of the earth?”

Matt.16:19 AMP 

I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven; and whatever you bind (declare to be improper and unlawful) on earth must be what is already bound in heaven; and whatever you loose (declare lawful) on earth must be what is already loosed in heaven.

Matt. 7:21-23 NIV 

21) “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven.

22) Many will say to me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and in your name drive out demons and perform many miracles?’

23) Then I will tell them plainly, ‘I never knew you. Away from me, you evildoers!’”

Luke 10:19 KJV 

“Behold, I give unto you power to tread on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy; and nothing shall by any means hurt you.”

John 4:34 NIV 

”My food,” said Jesus, “is to do the will of him who sent me and to finish his work.”

Most of us rarely consider the damage that we do if we use our authority without consulting with the Lord before we use it. We use logic, need, fear, and many other reasons to push aside the evil that we believe is hindering us, but do we spend enough time with our Father in heaven to have Him direct our steps?

Sometimes, repenting before Him in true remorse for our sins accomplishes much more than all of the huffing and puffing against perceived weapons formed against us will ever do. Wow!

Do I ever need you, Lord,

Jim Corbett

“There is a separation that is occurring within My church. Often, and in many ways, I have revealed My desire for you to seek Me with all of your heart. Some of you have done so. Others of you have continued on your way, acknowledging My calling; but wandering in your own way and denying My heart. To you, I say, “You have set your own course; I will allow you to follow it to its end. The path that you have chosen is full of briars and thorns, all designed to purify your heart.”

 “To you who have responded to My calling over the years, even though you see little progress in your life, I know your allegiance. I am blessed by your sincerity and will honor your feeble attempts to heed My call. Soon, I will equip you beyond your wildest imagination. You will become who you have desired to be. You will be made holy. You will be empowered to proclaim My glory, free from any hindrances that you possess at present.

 “I will have a people. Because you have sought Me with all of your heart, because you have not given up even in your times of weakness, I will make you My mouthpiece. I will bring you to intimacy. I will pour My life through you so that others can embrace Who I am.

 “You will walk above the ways of the world, and into the ways of the Spirit and overcome. You have given Me all that you have. In your eyes it was very little. In My eyes, it was enough to hold you with high esteem and trust you with much. Keep pressing in. I am with you. I am about to move on your behalf.”

Acts 4:13 AMP

Now when they saw the boldness and unfettered eloquence of Peter and John and perceived that they were unlearned and untrained in the schools [common men with no educational advantages], they marveled; and they recognized that they had been with Jesus.

 

Over the years, I have had the privilege of meeting many people in different stages of their walk with Christ. I have seen those who appear mighty in the Lord, those who look as if they have little to offer Him if anything, and many in between. In my foolishness, I have often judged who is most “holy” by what they have and how much they seem to be blessed. In my infant days, some of my friends and I would follow “anointed” ministers, hungering to find truth and a firm grasp on what Christianity really was. We longed for power, miracles, and the presence of the Lord. Sometimes we saw it manifested.

Over the years, I have learned that the Lord judges what is in a person’s heart, not what is evidenced by his abilities. To do otherwise would be unfair to those of us with limited resources. It would mean that He is selective in His process of bringing us to Him.

I am convinced that He responds in favor of those who cry out in their weakness, rather than those who believe that they are progressing steadily and have no need of being brought low. It has become evident that the humble heart is the heart that can receive the Lord in His fullness and the independent heart has little room for His presence.

In the times ahead, I believe that the Lord will manifest who He really is, as He has always done, in those who have little to offer in their natural abilities. To do otherwise would confuse the message with the messenger. The time for the slick evangelist, the charismatic preacher, and the well-oiled, highly practiced presentation is over. The presence of the Lord will be manifested through those who have no ability within themselves. Their desire for intimacy with God as a priority will generate the presence of the Lord in their lives. Absence of self will bring the character of Christ to the forefront. They will disappear; Jesus will be seen.

Jesus, make me invisible so that You are visible,

Jim Corbett

“You, My people, have missed some steps in your walk with Me. You have avoided the cross, fled the grave, and attempted to live a resurrection life without My life-giving hand upon you. When Jesus returned from My presence, He was flesh and bone. There was no blood or humanness in Him. That blood was shed so that you don’t have to shed yours to be like Him. Your inner being has been renewed into the likeness of Jesus. It has been born alive to the Spirit and responds only to the Spirit.

“Pray that your inner man is endued with power and might by the power of My Holy Spirit to be free to respond to My ways. Pray for the determination to no longer walk in the futile life of your flesh. Pray for the power to become dead to all that resembles the world and its ways, so that you will be aligned with My ways and in My perfect will. It is the way of the cross. It is the way of Jesus.”

Luke 24:39 NIV

“Look at my hands and my feet. It is I myself! Touch me and see; a ghost does not have flesh and bones as you see I have.”

John 20:17 NIV

Jesus said, “Do not hold on to me, for I have not yet returned to the Father.”

1 Cor. 15:50 NIV

I declare to you, brothers, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does the perishable inherit the imperishable.

Ephesians 3:16 AMP

May He grant you out of the rich treasury of His glory to be strengthened and reinforced with mighty power in the inner man by the [Holy] Spirit [Himself indwelling your innermost being and personality].

 

Many of us attempt to approach the things of God by using our own reasoning and strength. That is one of the main reasons that our attempts to approach God and affect our world fail. The things of God are spiritual, not religious - and certainly not of the flesh.

The removal of our flesh and the entering into the power of our covenant with God, in any equation with God for that matter, always follows the pattern established by Jesus. It is first the cross - an initial submission of our entire being to the Lord with subsequent submissions each time our flesh intrudes upon our new life. Then comes the tomb - the waiting on God as if dead, so that Lordship is completed in us. Finally, there is the resurrection - the empowering of our spiritual being by the Holy Spirit, that new inner man receiving spiritual power and might, responding in spiritual ways. The result is the ability to flow in the compassions of Jesus through the perfection of God’s established ways.

Do it Your way, Lord,

Jim Corbett