Tag: Christianity

“You need to never fear. I have always taken care of those who are called by My Name. I hover over you with a jealous love, one that can never be extinguished. In time, you will understand the fullness and depth of that love. For now, however, I am able to reveal only portions that you can comprehend. Under no circumstances should you think that I have left you. That is impossible for Me to do. I have placed My Spirit within your inner being. I am part of you.

"With that confidence, you can overcome any and every circumstance that comes your way. You can be assured without a doubt that all works together for good, even those things that look bad at the time. One day you will see My love at work in them. One day you will be able to comprehend the fullness of My plan. One day you will understand your part as I reveal why things unfolded as they did. You will see My love at work. For now, you become obedient to My Word. You walk in My precepts. You live the life that I have planned for you. I will be with you every step of the way. I love you.”

Isaiah 38:17 NIV

Surely it was for my benefit that I suffered such anguish. In your love you kept me from the pit of destruction; you have put all my sins behind your back.

Jude 21-23 NIV

21) Keep yourselves in God’s love as you wait for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ to bring you to eternal life.

22) Be merciful to those who doubt;

23) snatch others from the fire and save them; to others show mercy, mixed with fear-hating even the clothing stained by corrupt flesh.

 

Walking in God’s love means something very different to me the longer I study the Word. When I first came to the Lord, His love was all about my freedom, comfort, safety, and pleasure.  His love was a tickly, feely, emotional kind of thing that I used for my benefit and hung onto because of my desperate need for a reminder of my physical safety in Him. Although I do believe that I was allowed to experience that portion of His love to help me through my brokenness, limiting the Lord to that perspective throughout life would condemn me to the milk of His character and His Word.

I believe the strong meat of His Word only comes through an understanding that the love of God has little to do with the safety of my flesh. In fact, my flesh cannot survive the love of God. It is doomed under His Lordship.

My understanding of walking in God’s love certainly includes the uplifting, emotional aspect; but also the confidence and trust that He cares, no matter what circumstances result as I walk in obedience to Him. I can be confident that His love brought me to a relationship with Him through Jesus Christ. I am safe forever. In that relationship, however, my part is His purpose and His purpose alone, no matter what that might bring.

Wanting to understand more each day,

Jim Corbett

“In your darkest hour, I am with you. As you walk through the most dangerous place, you are not alone. You need to stop walking in fear. You need to trust Me. You also need to begin to do what I tell you to do for My reasons, not so that you benefit. Your reasoning mind cannot interpret My heart. Step out in faith without consideration of the consequences. Even if you look like a fool, even if it appears as if you have failed, trust Me to determine your success. I am with you because you are Mine. Eternity will be the judge of what is successful and what is a failure, not immediate appearances. Be bold in Me. I am with you.”

Isaiah 43:21 NIV

“the people I formed for myself that they may proclaim my praise.”

Isaiah 55:8-9 NIV

8) “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,” declares the Lord.

9) “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.”

Jeremiah 10:23 AMP

Oh, Lord [pleads Jeremiah in the name of the people], I know that [the determination of] the way of a man is not in himself; it is not in man [even in a strong man or a man at his best] to direct his [own] steps.

 

God is calling for the mature bridal heart to be accepted by each of His children. He is bringing to those who will hear a desire to sell out completely, so that the passionate life of Jesus can function through us, exhibiting His character to a dead and dying world.

Whatever you do, don’t allow the enemy, or even your friends, determine whether any move you have made in obedience to God was of God. He is the One to determine success or failure. He is the One to plan your steps. Your response is to be obedient. Outcome is His responsibility.

Love deeply. Walk in His Word, making sure that you are in line with His Word. Seek wise counsel. Then do what you know to be right in your heart. Get up if it looks like you have fallen down. Dust yourself off and prepare for another opportunity to serve your Lord. If you seem to have fallen again, allow the Lord to minister to you. He loves you. This life in Christ is exciting. Go for it!

Hold my heart as I follow You, Lord,

Jim Corbett

“I desire that you relate My Word with an urgency in your heart. Become aware of this. I am calling you to move from religious activity and maintain a walk of integrity as you present Jesus to others. Align your life and your words with My Word. Before you will be able to do that, you must align your heart with My heart. That is a logical decision, not an emotional, religious concept. Shake off foolish teachings and traditional habits and open your life to My desires.

"Draw close to Me and realize what I am doing in your midst. You will see that I am calling your generation to pattern yourselves after the life of Jesus, as I have done with every generation before. You, however, can look back through the corridors of time and see that little is to be done before all things are completed. Grasp the importance of that knowledge. Now move as if you were living in urgent times. You are.”

John 5:19 AMP

So Jesus answered them by saying, I assure you, most solemnly I tell you, the Son is able to do nothing of Himself (of His own accord); but He is able to do only what He sees the Father doing, for whatever the Father does is what the Son does in the same way [in His turn].

John 15:5 AMP 

I am the Vine; you are the branches. Whoever lives in Me and I in him bears much (abundant) fruit. However, apart from me [cut off from vital union with Me] you can do nothing.

I Cor. 11:1 NIV

Follow my example, as I follow the example of Christ.

Eph. 5:1 AMP

THEREFORE BE imitators of God [copy Him and follow His example], as well-beloved children [imitate their father].

 

Being a true Christian is not really very complicated. We are to simply embrace the life of Jesus and go to our Father in heaven and trust Him to make our lives like His.

As simple as that may sound, at first, few of us ever really learn how to do it. We love to read about Jesus and understand the importance of being like Him. Then we make a big mistake. Somewhere down deep within our carnal self, we say, “I can do that,” or at least, “I can look like I’m doing that.” Once that is in our hearts, we cast aside the humility needed to really become like Jesus. We become a religious façade, rather than a humble, teachable tool in the hands of our Father.

Each of us needs to go back to basics with our Father and humble ourselves. We need to admit to the truth and say, “I can’t do that. Only You can do that in me.”

Think of the arrogance of the “I can do that” statement and compare it with the “I do nothing of myself” words of Jesus. He relied completely on His Father for everything, doing nothing of Himself. How can we have the audacity to think that there is something in our flesh that is capable of helping God?

Armed with a working understanding of our desperate need for the Lord to accomplish any good thing in us, we can approach this life of being a Christian with a clear head and an honest heart with God. Having allowed the Lord to demolish the arrogant wall of self sufficiency, we can begin the journey of allowing Him to work other truths in us - by His power, not ours. Along the way we will begin to really know Him, His heart, and the urgency of the times that He wants to impart to us.

Please do it in me, Lord,

Jim Corbett

“I call all of you, My children, to embrace the cross of Jesus Christ. Then I ask you to take up your cross and follow Me. Most of you misunderstand what I mean. I plant some crosses for those of you in the desert. Others I plant when you are on a high fertile hill. Some crosses are in humble surroundings. Others are in mansions. The cross that you are supposed to embrace is in your place of full surrender over a specific area of your life. It is where the death of your ownership of that area takes place. It is one step on the way to the place of full surrender to the Lordship of Jesus Christ over your entire existence.

"No two crosses are the same. All, however, produce a death that brings forth abundant life in you. All produce rich fruit that is fragrant to Me and nourishment to everyone you touch. Find where your particular cross is planted for every specific work I desire to accomplish in you. Most likely it is somewhere near where you are right now. Pick it up and walk the path that Jesus did. Others will need who you will become.”

Proverbs 20:24 AMP

Man’s steps are ordered by the Lord….

Matthew 11:12 NIV

“From the days of John the Baptist until now, the kingdom of heaven has been forcefully advancing, and forceful men lay hold of it.”

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].

Rev. 3:19 AMP

Those whom I [dearly and tenderly] love, I tell their faults and convict and convince and reprove and chasten [I discipline and instruct them]. So be enthusiastic and in earnest and burning with zeal and repent [changing your mind and attitude].

 

The cross of Jesus Christ is the central point of all eternity. Eternities past looked forward to the cross. All of eternities future will look back to the cross. It will have produced the reigning priests and kings. Without the cross, there is no salvation. Because of the cross of Jesus Christ, eternity continues.

Throughout our lives, the Lord uses the completed work of Calvary, but also provides individual crosses for each of us to carry. Each of them is tailor-made to put to death specific areas of our nature that are not like the nature of Jesus. All of them bring forth His fragrant life after the required death that they produce. Some of them produce the spiritual richness needed for our specific calling in life.

The wise follower of Jesus embraces each work that the Lord desires to accomplish through His initial work on the cross and upon the death sentence to his carnal nature. He takes up his cross. The foolish person fights each work being done in him, resists the cross, and remains a spiritual infant - uninterested and unable to flow in the plans that the Lord has for his life.

 Make me willing to embrace what You are doing in me, Lord,

Jim Corbett

“There is more. I have so much more for you, but you do not care enough to find it in Me. If you only knew the depth of fellowship that I desire for you. If you could only understand how far you are from Us walking so close together that there is no difference in Our thoughts, ideas, and ways of doing things. Jesus did have that kind of communion as an example for you to follow. His example was not there to tease you; it was to encourage you to desire the same kind of relationship with Me. Most of you have never desired to enter into that kind of interaction. Most of you feel that if you got that close, My intense light would consume you. That is not true. Because of your acceptance of the work of Jesus, you have been formed into the kind of being that is at home in My presence.

"You don’t come, however, because you will not lay down all the other loves in your life that would be consumed by Me. You would rather hang on to those things that separate Us than really be together as I have made Us to be. How foolish! By hanging on to your carnal needs that cannot come into My presence with you, you miss the very life that would set you free from them. You need to shake off all of your old nature by My power. You need to desire only My presence as you did when We first met. Return to your first love of Me. Intimate, total fellowship is your heritage. Let go of foolish loves. Come to My love. I am waiting.”

 Rom. 2:4 AMP 

Or are you [so blind as to] trifle with and presume upon and despise and underestimate the wealth of His kindness and forbearance and longsuffering patience? Are you unmindful or actually ignorant [of the fact] that God’s kindness is intended to lead you to repent (to change your mind and inner man to accept God’s will)?

 

There is a story often told on how to catch a monkey. I am not sure if it is true; but accurate or not, the example fits very well here.

First, you hollow out a tethered coconut with a hole that is just large enough for a monkey to fit his hand into.  Then, you place food in the coconut shell and the monkey will be caught. When he puts his hand in the hole to grab the food, the monkey will form a fist that will be impossible to extract from the hole. Since he will not let go of the food for fear of losing it, the monkey will remain with his hand in the coconut until he is captured. If he would simply let go of the food, he could be free.

That is so much like each one of us. We are so deceived by the brightness of our sin, that we will even miss true fellowship with God in order to keep holding on to it. We choose to remain weak, confused, vulnerable to the enemy; and most horrible, unavailable for the Lord’s use. He wants people who can represent Him because they have been with Him often. Our heritage is the wonder of being with our Lord so often, that to move away from Him, even a little bit, would be the worst thing that could happen to us.

Take notice of your life. Allow the Lord to observe it with you. As He points out everything that separates the two of you from complete fellowship as He intends it - and there could possibly be a ton of the stuff - repent of them one by one. Keep repenting of them until they are no longer part of your existence. Make your life a life of joyous repentance while walking as close as you can with Him. Join Him in the war against your rebellion. You will be washed and washed and washed until you have no hindrances to your fellowship.

As you keep talking and walking and gladly repenting, you will notice the constant forgiveness and astounding kindness of the Lord as He walks closer and closer with you. This kindness will draw you back over and over again. Each encounter allows you to release the “food” a little more and loosen your “hand” so that you will be free from the bondage of the “coconut.” His power changes your desires.

 Wanting to let go of the “poisonous food” completely,

Jim Corbett