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7/23/21 Helping Hands to One Another

“Joyfully follow the leading of My Holy Spirit. Move in concert with His desires. Delight yourself in Me and I will place desires in you that sometimes are illogical by the world’s standards. I will ask you to love deeper, give more, and worry less. I will join you with others who have the same heart that you have. You will walk together for no apparent reason other than it is My will for you to do so. Each of you will have a part in reaching My people for this end-time season. You will be helping hands to each other and to those to whom I send you. Invest in each other unashamedly. Love without reason other than I have called you to love as Jesus loved. Be My hands! Be My heart! Be the example of Jesus. He was not limited by the conventions of the day. He just loved until there was no more to give. Then He gave more. Now He continues to give, just because He can!”

Matthew 6:19-21 NIV

19) “Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal.

20) But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven where moth and rust do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal.

21) For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”

Matthew 16:22-23 NIV

22) Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. “Never, Lord!” he said. “This shall never happen to you!”

23) Jesus turned and said to Peter, “Out of my sight, Satan! You are a stumbling block to me; you do not have in mind the things of God, but the things of men.”

Matthew 16:24-25 AMP

24) Then Jesus said to His disciples, If anyone desires to be My disciple, let him deny himself [disregard, lose sight of, and forget himself and his own interests] and take up his cross and follow Me [cleave steadfastly to Me, conform wholly to My example in living and, if need be, in dying, also].

25) For whoever is bent on saving his [temporal] life [his comfort and security here] shall lose it [eternal life]; and whoever loses his life [his comfort and security here] for My sake shall find it [life everlasting].

 

The above verses make no sense to the world! In each one of them, the Lord shows us a way of living that is only for kingdom subjects, those aspiring to live as Jesus lived.

I love the verses in Matthew 16 above. Good ol’ Peter! Doing what would be the right thing to do if he was supposed to walk in logic and typical thinking. He could only see the carnal and how the normal person would love someone. He was limited to his earthly way of doing things.

God has given us heavenly, Holy Spirit ways to love, live, and walk out our portions in life. He has His own set of rules for us. He says that we should never limit our love to one another. He says that we should be joined with those to whom He sends us because we are called to work together. He says that there should be no limit to our service to Him and to them. We are to treasure the things He treasures.

In these end times, our Lord is joining together those who desire the deeper, more Christ-like way of living. He is asking us to function as Jesus functioned toward one another and toward those who need to know Him. He is placing us in positions where we can pour out the resources that He has given us – love, time, talents, comfort, finances, (the list is endless) - with joyous freedom as led by the Holy Spirit. There is no limit to His love toward us. He is asking us to live the same way toward others, no matter how silly or foolish it may appear to those who can only see with carnal eyes.

Teach me to love as You love, Lord,

Jim Corbett

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7/23/21 Be Holy

If the picture you have in your mind of someone who is holy includes a halo, a Caspar Milquetoast demeanor, and a mentality that flees at the onset of any conflict, you are way off. A holy man of God is a mighty warrior for the kingdom of God, his marriage, and his family.

To be holy means to be totally separated from the world, its siren songs, and its attachments. It means to be unashamedly dedicated to the Lord, focusing solely on living out the life of Jesus in daily life. A holy man is, therefore, untouchable by the world, unavailable to any fearful distractions, and unreachable when called upon to violate any portion of the heart of God.

If you desire to walk in Holy Spirit power as a husband and father, seek holiness. Seek an intimate, loving relationship with your Father in heaven. Be determined to know the heart of Jesus and live it out on behalf of those you steward. Allow nothing to stop you from walking and conducting yourself as Jesus did. Live a holy, separated life above the world and all its ways. It is your heritage. It is your calling. It is your covenant promise if you seek it with all your heart.

Man of God, be holy as He is holy!

Let’s talk more!

Jim Corbett

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7/22/21 Priorities That Count

“How many beats are left in your heart? How many moments are there before you see Me face to face with the unchangeable product of your life in your hands? How many crowns do you have to lay at the feet of Jesus? Let’s talk! What are you focused on today that has little eternal effect? What concerns your time that will mean nothing on that day? Why are you placing top priority on it if I haven’t asked you to do so? I consider that foolish!”

Hebrews 10:32-36 NIV

32) Remember those earlier days after you had received the light, when you stood your ground in a great contest in the face of suffering.

33) Sometimes you were publicly exposed to insult and persecution; at other times you stood side by side with those who were so treated.

34) You sympathized with those in prison and joyfully accepted the confiscation of your property because you knew that you yourselves had better and lasting possessions.

35) So do not throw away your confidence; it will be richly rewarded.

36) You need to persevere so that when you have done the will of God, you will receive what he has promised.

 

The Word says that only a fool says in his heart that there is no God. How foolish is it, then, for those of us who are convinced that God does exist - knowing that He has sent His Son so that we can spend eternity with Him if we accept the sacrifice given and having an awareness that we will stand face to face with Him with our life’s work in our hands - to waste our time on things that have no eternal value? What is important enough to get our eyes off Jesus and His desires for our lives?

Create proper priorities in me, Lord,

Jim Corbett

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7/22/21 Old Habits

“Sarah, that’s my daughter,” Barry responded. “Well, Sarah was on a road to some pretty dark places. Somehow she had changed. When she was young, she was an incredibly bright, beautiful girl, full of smiles, love, laughter, just a good kid.”

Barry shifted his position and leaned back on the bleacher above the one on which he was sitting.

“But then things went bad. When she started seventh grade, she went behind some kind of cloud. She isolated herself, kept secrets from us, and hung around with some unsavory friends. They weren’t real bottom dwellers, but they just had a bad influence on her. We even found small items missing from our house after they came over and money began to disappear from Connie’s purse.” Barry sat up, tracing his index finger over his racket strings as he chose his next words.

“Over a period of time, things kept getting worse. I’ll spare you the details, but she started lying to us about everything and would get angry whenever we asked any kind of question regarding her life. Connie and I knew we were losing her. There was no talking to her about her friends. She wouldn’t hear it. All she wanted to do was listen to her music - man, I hated those ear-buds, and be on the phone with her friends. There was so much more. Making a long story short, she was in deep trouble and something had to be done.”

“What did you do?” Nick asked, sitting up straight as he looked piercingly at Barry.

“Well, we prayed long and hard, asking the Lord how we could get Sarah to change.” A small chuckle escaped his lips. “We were pretty surprised at the answer He gave us.”

Nick couldn’t wait for the next words to come out of Barry’s mouth.

“The Lord showed me that one day I would answer to Him for her life, because He placed Sarah under my care. I would be asked if I had done all that I could to provide a fertile place for Sarah to grow in Him.” Barry looked down and twirled his racket a few times.

“That shook me up pretty good,” he recalled. “I mean, I knew that God had given Sarah to Connie and me, but I guess I never thought that God was actually holding me accountable for her.” Barry looked purposefully into Nick’s eyes. The two men briefly stared at each other before Barry continued.

“I thought that my job was to provide a good home, keep food on the table, and give my kids what they needed to stay on top of everything. I thought that by having a big house in a great neighborhood I was doing my job. Connie was working. I had a thriving business. We had everything we needed. I thought we had made it, ya know? The Lord showed me that while I was busy working and playing so hard, I lost my daughter in the process.”

Nick waited for a few seconds before he asked the question that burned in his heart.

“What did you do?”

“Well, that’s why we’re here,” Barry answered. “God showed me that Connie and I were the ones who needed to make some changes so we could rescue Sarah. He showed me that she wasn’t capable of making proper decisions at that time, and that we needed to help by creating a place of safety for her. She needed a protected place where she could rest from the things that were harming her while she was being healed. It was really important to God that we did what was necessary to bring her around, so that she could grow up strong and straight, spiritually sound in Him.”

Nick became really interested now, and moved onto the bench, seating himself next to Barry.

Barry continued. “Connie and I prayed together quite a bit, but I knew that because I functioned in the offices of husband and father – something very important God gives to men - I was responsible to Him. I would answer to Him for Sarah’s life. He showed me that I was incapable of helping Him to reproduce the life of Jesus in Sarah, because I had been distracted by my own needs and wants. I wanted the successful business. I wanted the big house, the new car, money. I never even gave much thought to the fact that Sarah was on her way to throwing her life away and then burning in hell for eternity because I was too busy with my own life to stop her. That really scared me. It scared Connie, too, when I told her.”

“So, what did God tell you to do?” Nick asked with great anticipation.

“Well, things became pretty clear after a while. The stuff that we treasured for so long became pretty useless to us once we surrendered everything to Him, especially in light of Sarah’s need. We looked around, and then looked at Sarah and her pain, and the path was pretty well laid out for us since we were going to answer to God for her life.”

Barry got up to stretch, then sat down again. Nick didn’t move. He couldn’t wait to hear what steps Barry and Connie took.

“Within a matter of a few months, I sold my business, Connie quit her job, we sold our house, and moved here.  I took a job which allowed me to spend time with my family. We bought a much smaller house, traded in our cars for really good used ones; and now Connie home schools Sarah.”

Nick was dumbfounded. His mouth dropped open and he just stared at Barry. “You must be kidding,” was all he could muster as his mind reeled.

“No, we got Sarah back,” Barry said with a smile. “She hated us for a little while. We had to build some pretty strong “love fences” around her in the beginning —move her away from bad influences, take away her headset so she’d start to communicate, monitor her computer and phone time, you know, stuff like that, all the time praying real hard for her. It was pretty much touch and go at first, but we got her back. Now we live in a family fortress of love and compassion designed by God—one that the world can’t touch. We laugh, love, communicate, and have a great relationship. She’s in tune with the Lord and wants to reach out to kids her own age. She’s really happy again and our times together as a family are special no matter what we do.”

(Taken from the book, The Father Factor, by Jim and Merry Corbett)

Rarely do we consider the daily routines of our lifestyles as a series of habits and demands that hinder the power of the Lord to move freely in our lives. What are you willing to do to have God move on behalf of someone you love?

Let’s talk more!

Jim Corbett

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7/21/21 To the Rescue

“When this life is over for you, will it have counted for much? I don’t mean, are you a good mother or father or a good friend? I mean, will there be others with Me because of you? Some of you say, ‘That’s not my anointing,’ or ‘I don’t have time because of my world.’ I say, ‘I need your heart to care for souls.’ Let Me explain what is important to Me. I have given you a specific period of time to accomplish My tasks through you. Each of you has a specific calling. You must have peace in following through with that calling, whatever it is. All of you, however, have the calling to desire that souls do not perish. That is the heart of My Son; that is My heart.

"As you fulfill your present circumstances, I desire that you cultivate a heart for those around you. I call that love. You can love all the time, wherever you are, and during whatever else you are doing for Me. My kind of love comes from repenting of your ways and turning to My ways. If your days are busy, you can still love deeply enough to bring those who are lost to Me in prayer. You can care enough to seek Me on their behalf, and receive the wisdom needed to stand in the gap for them. You can decide to notice who I notice, just by determining to flow with Me. I will tell you who I am preparing to meet My Son, if only you would choose to listen. You may be surprised when I tell you who they are. Once you know My plans for them, We will move together under My anointing with My power for their benefit. Start now.

"Have you really cared about who will spend eternity with Me? If not, repent of your unloving heart, and come to Me to gain My heart for them. I will give it to you. Then you will really begin to have fun as you see My way of loving others!”

Eph. 2:6-10 NIV 

6) And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus,

7) in order that in the coming ages he might show the incomparable riches of his grace, expressed in his kindness to us in Christ Jesus.

8) For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God–

9) not by works, so that no one can boast.

10) For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.

Col. 3:1-3 NIV

1) Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God.

2) Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things.

3) For you died and your life is now hidden with Christ in God.

 

Before I was saved, still living in filth, I pulled up to one of my construction sites where a crew of black mason contractors were doing their work. One of the men saw a daily planner in my hand and mistook it for a Bible. Commenting on it, he turned away graciously and went back to work when my response to his kind inquiry included a foul expletive and an insincere offer to pray for them. I thought I was being funny.

Several years after I met the Lord, a man came up to me and said he’d heard that I was now a Christian. When I told him that he was correct, he reminded me of the incident at the construction site. You see, he and the other workers were inner city pastors, who earned their living as mason contractors rather than taking money from their congregations.

He related that after I left the job site, those humble men dropped to their knees for me- a foul mouthed, pompous, dope-smoking, beer-guzzling fool. That moment, in the middle of a raw construction site, they covenanted with each other to pray for my soul. They did not stop praying for me until they knew that I had come to the Lord. It was the first time that I literally saw God’s kind of love in action.

They loved in the midst of their incredibly busy lives. They prayed in spite of me. They loved when I hated. They were in union with the Lord for my soul, and my rebellion didn’t stand a chance from that point on. God’s agents were at work on my behalf. It was over and above their “ministry,” but it was the heart of God in action.

Wanting to be continually flowing with God,

Jim Corbett

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