Last night I woke up with 3 spirits, like glowing blankets, hovering above me saying be of good cheer for God is always with you.
And be sure of this: I am with you always, even to the end of the age.” Matthew 28:20 The Holy Bible, The New Living Testament
Later had a dream about rats trying to viciously attack me but there was a red blanket hovering above me protecting me.
Whenever I saw or dreamt about rats in China something bad would happen that day.
Then read this verse with morning devotionals.
Though I am surrounded by troubles, you will protect me from the anger of my enemies. You reach out your hand, and the power of your right hand saves me. Psalm 138:7 The Holy Bible, The New Living Testament
But God shows his anger from heaven against all sinful, wicked people who suppress the truth by their wickedness.They know the truth about God because he has made it obvious to them.For ever since the world was created, people have seen the earth and sky. Through everything God made, they can clearly see his invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature. So they have no excuse for not knowing God. Romans 1:18–20 The Holy Bible, The New Living Testament
As well there was a verse that said that Gods promises are always true.
God will do this, for he is faithful to do what he says 1 Corinthians 1:9 The Holy Bible, The New Living Testament
Wait patiently for the Lord. Be brave and courageous. Yes, wait patiently for the Lord. Psalm 27:14 The Holy Bible, The New Living Testament
Another devotional said to wait upon Gods time for His promises to come true. There are promises He made to me five years ago that have no fruition.
If you need wisdom, ask our generous God, and he will give it to you. He will not rebuke you for asking. James 1:5 The Holy Bible, The New Living Testament
The last devotions was about asking for wisdom. This is one of the important requests made in every morning prayer ( which is the best course first thing in the morning instead of waiting for circumstances to occur where we cry out for it.
Gee, I wonder if Poppa was trying to tell me something? What do you think?
Selah: Stop and think about it. Prayer: Thank you Jehovah El Shaddai (Genesis 17:1,2, Ezekiel 10:5 Almighty GOD ) that no one nor nothing can stand before You nor above You with wicked intent.
Thank you that You are a God of integrity and are always true to Your word. Even though many times it is difficult to wait I have learned that it is best to wait upon Your time for Your promises to come to fruition. To do otherwise invites disaster.
I praise You in the name of He who is above all other and is truest to His word Jesus Christ. Amen
This photo and article @ Joseph- Anthony a son of Jehovah 2023 Anyone is free to use this material and distribute it, but it may not be sold under any circumstances whatsoever without the author’s written consent.
Will you not revive us again, that your people may rejoice in you? Psalm 85:6 The Holy Bible, The New International Version
How can we have a revival?” someone ask the great evangelist, Gypsy Smith.
The wise old preacher replied, “take a piece of chalk, and draw circle on the floor. Then step inside the circle, and pray: “Lord, send a revival inside this circle.”
Prayer: Oh please Jehovah Yotsero (God our maker Psalm 139:13-16 ) bless me that You send The Holy Spirit to revive my devotion to You every day. May this attitude and behaviour be a brilliant light that guides the lost souls to You like moths to a bright light in a dark night. I humbly request this in the name of the Light of the World, Jesus Christ. Amen
Seleh- stop and think about it.
This photo and article @ Joseph- Anthony a son of Jehovah 2023
Anyone is free to use this material and distribute it, but it may not be sold under any circumstances whatsoever without the author’s written consent.
Jesus said, “I tell you the solemn truth, unless a person is born from above, he cannot see the kingdom of God” (John 3:3 NET).
The Bible teaches us that we become a child of God only through the new birth. Those who believe on Jesus Christ become God’s children. “As many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, even to those who believe on His name, who were born not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God” (John 1:12-13).
By whose authority do we become the children of God? “As many as received Him, to them He gave the right . . .” It is the authority of Jesus Christ. Those who believe on Him have the right to become the children of God.
It is clearly not a physical birth, but a spiritual birth that is in mind, and it is something that is received by the person who believes in Him (1 Pet. 1:23). The initiative in the new birth is with God.
Without Christ we are spiritually dead in trespasses and sin (Eph. 2:1-3). Every individual must be born again because the natural man is altogether void of spiritual life. We need divine life, and that is what God provides through the new birth.
“He who believes in the Son has eternal life” (John 3:36, 16). He has it right now (1 John 5:13). Clearly the individual who believes on Him receives God’s kind of life (6:40). It is the teaching throughout the New Testament (Eph. 2:8-9; Rom. 10:9-10).
The biblical doctrine of the new birth takes all the glory and initiative away from man and gives it all to God the Father. He alone is responsible for our salvation; therefore, He alone gets all the glory. He creates the new spiritual life within us and causes us to believe on Christ. God chooses to give us eternal life (1 Jn. 3:1; Eph. 1:5; Jas. 1:18; 1 Pet. 1:23).
We become a child of God when God gives us His life. It is an act of God. We receive that life the moment we believe on Christ. It comes from God and is received only on the basis of God’s grace. Those who believe become God’s children. Only by receiving Christ do we gain the right to become a child of God.
How do we not become a child of God? There is absolutely nothing that man can do to contribute to his spiritual birth. This is made very clear in John 1:13, “who were born not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.” No amount of human activity, religious cultivation, or moral teaching can change the essential nature of man. Therefore, it is imperative that man’s deepest need is to be born again.
In the Jewish mind “blood” is equivalent to human life. Spiritual birth cannot come about as a result of any human process or achievement. Man is not by nature a child of God. We are by nature sinners. No human agency can achieve the new birth. All human effort is powerless and superficial in regard to spiritual life. There is nothing in our human nature or character that can bring about a spiritual birth.
“Born of the water and the Spirit” does not refer to baptism regeneration (John 3:5). From the context “water” here is referring to the water bag broken at physical birth of a baby. Water here is symbolic of a spiritual birth. From other passages of Scripture we learn that baptism is in no wise essential to salvation. It does not form one of the conditions which God requires the sinner to meet. If baptism were necessary then man would be saved by his works.
The Bible teaches we are saved by grace through faith in Christ and not of works. It is the free gift of God. “What must I do to be saved?” The Bible says “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and you shall be saved” (Acts 16:31).
The Holy Spirit uses the Word of God to bring about regeneration (1 Pet. 1:23). No sinner is born spiritually apart from the Word. The “children” are those who believe on Christ. Men are God’s sons only as they respond to what He does for them in Christ. They are born into God’s family when they receive His Word.
The new birth is an absolute miracle. All human initiative and effort is ruled out. Men are “born of God.” There is no other way to become a child of God. It is the work of the Holy Spirit within the person. It is life in Christ and is divine in origin. The whole emphasis in this verse and in John chapter three is the activity of the Spirit of God, not human effort, works or merits by demanding the sinner to be “born again.” He excludes any possibility of human effort in salvation.
The word “believing” and “receiving” refer to the same operation of the Holy Spirit when a person ceases trusting in his own human merits and trust in Christ Jesus alone for salvation.
Are you enjoying the things of God, spiritual things, which are discerned and enjoyed by spiritual regeneration? Are you enjoying the privileges of being a child of God? In order to have spiritual discernment we must be born again (1 Cor. 2:10, 14).
The Holy Spirit gives us a new spiritual nature. When He gives us this new nature we are “born again” (2 Pet. 1:4). It is an act of God.
Because of this new birth the individual is a changed person who loves the things he once hated, and hates the things he once loved. A radical change takes place in the heart of the believer. “Therefore if any man is in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new thing have come” (2 Cor. 5:17). The NET Bible reads, “So then, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; what is old has passed away–look, what is new has come!”
SELAH! Pause – reflect- just think of that!
Message by Wil Pounds (c) 2006
Anyone is free to use this material and distribute it, but it may not be sold under any circumstances whatsoever without the author’s written consent.
The Christian life is a daily putting off all that belonged to the unregenerate old self and constantly putting on all that belongs to the new life in Christ. The cross and the resurrection extend their power and influence over the believer’s entire life.
The Christian life is constantly producing new life. This new life in Christ through His Spirit must be daily replacing within the soul what our daily crucifixion of the flesh is taking away. This new life in Christ fills the emptiness created by self-denial with some new likeness of Christ. In place of the natural affection, there comes some new divine affection (Eph. 4:17-32).
“You are dead . . . . you are risen with Christ” (Col. 3:1, 6).
The flesh will never produce a strong spiritual life that pleases God and looks and smells like authentic Christianity. The flesh will always disgrace the Lord Jesus Christ no matter how you try to dress it up in legalism.
The Holy Spirit is busy making real in the believer’s life what is already true of him doctrinally.
The believer has not only died, but is to “die daily” with Christ as long as we live in this present life because we are in “an irreconcilable enmity” between the flesh and the spirit (Gal. 5:17). We have no option but to take up the cross daily in following Christ. The flesh can only reproduce itself. It holds no possibility of a divine life. This dying to self and sin is something we do daily.
Our life-long growth in Christ-likeness is a determination to deliver us to death for Christ’s sake all that is kin to our old life before we gave our lives to Christ. It is also a commitment to put on Christ daily.
It is each believer’s responsibility to submit to the work of the Holy Spirit in mortifying the flesh and therefore bring our body under the dominion of the cross of Christ.
Moreover, the Christian life is not just a life of crucifixion; it is also a new life in Christ Jesus.
“You are risen with Christ.” This is the second part of this essential doctrine of Christian living. Our progressive sanctification includes both “taking off” the old self and “putting on” the new. Since “you are risen with Christ” keep on “seeking those things which are above.”
Yes, we “die daily,” but we were also made a “new creation” in Christ and our inward person is being “renewed day by day.”
The apostle Paul wrote, “I live, yet not I, but Christ lives in me” (Gal. 2:20).
The daily spiritual growth of the Christian towards perfection lies always in these two opposite directions. The believer is always subjecting, repressing, and mortifying the natural man on the one hand, and nourishing, developing, and renewing the spiritual man on the other. It is not one or the other; it is both principles and activities working in conjunction with one another.
It is our responsibility to daily judge and mortify all that we find in our attitudes, behaviors and values that are in the flesh and contrary to authentic Christian living. Yes, there must be a daily denial to anything that is not Christ-like.
A negative process is never adequate to accomplish a positive goal. And no amount or kind of self-denial can make a person holier, or sinless. What is needed is the means of bringing him into more intimate fellowship with Christ. Every retreat from the life of the flesh must be followed by a deeper entering into the life of the Spirit. We take off the old man, and we put on the new man in Christ.
As we abide in Christ, we walk as our Lord walked.
SELAH! Pause – reflect- just think of that!
Message by Wil Pounds (c) 2006
Anyone is free to use this material and distribute it, but it may not be sold under any circumstances whatsoever without the author’s written consent.
Yet God has made everything beautiful for its own time. He has planted eternity in the human heart, but even so, people cannot see the whole scope of God’s work from beginning to end. Ecclesiastes 3:11 The Holy Bible, The New Living Translation
Prayer: Please Jehovah ELOHIM YAKOL (God, the Most Able)2 Corinthians 9:8 ) bless me to be able to slow down and enjoy all the wonderful beauty You graciously provide for me each and every day.
It is so easy to get caught up in the rat race where everyone is rushing to do nothing as important as spending time enjoying Your creation You desire to share with us.
Please bless me with The Holy Spirit to softly speak with me and guide when and where to sit down and enjoy companionship with You in Your beautiful creation.
Please bless me with the opportunity to teach others the amazing blessing of spending time with You in Your creation. and slow our pace to prayerfully notice You in all transitions.
Help us to pause, and teach our children to pause, in order to reflect gratefully on all we have to fill our days.
I do not want to get to the end of my days and have the greatest regret of my life in not spending enough time with You or introducing others to You in Your wonderful creation.
I humbly request this in the name of He with whom I deeply love spending time in Your amazing garden, Jesus Christ. Amen
This photo and article @ Joseph- Anthony a son of Jehovah 2022
Preaching is preaching only when the messenger is anointed with the Holy Spirit.
The apostle Paul tells how he arrived in the city of Corinth not dependent upon self-assurance, self-assertiveness, or a powerful personality, “but in demonstration of the Spirit and power” (1 Corinthians 2:4). In fact, Paul stresses the contrasting difference, “For I determined to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ, and Him crucified. And I was with you in weakness and in fear and in much trembling. And my message and my preaching were not in persuasive words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and power, that your faith should not rest on the wisdom of men, but on the power of God” (vv. 2-5).
Only the anointing of the Holy Spirit can make great preaching. Paul was concerned that nothing distract from the message of Jesus Christ and Him crucified. We live in a day that puts much of the emphasis on the attractiveness of the clever mind and entertainment.
Lloyd-Jones was a prophet when he wrote in Preaching and Preachers, that we take “so much time in producing atmosphere that there is no time for preaching in the atmosphere!” The church has turned to entertainment “as she has turned her back upon preaching.” The first century preachers “refused to pander to the tastes of their listeners.” They did just the opposite by admonishing, warning, rebuking, and reproving their listeners.
Over and over again in the book of Acts we are told of the preachers “being filled with the Holy Spirit.” They proclaimed their message as the Holy Spirit enabled them. Their message and deliverance were under the control of the Spirit. The Holy Spirit had baptized them when they first believed, and they had been filled on many occasions since then. One baptism, many fillings is still a Biblical truth for every preacher.
Biblical preaching is still the greatest instrument the church possesses. Every preacher should ask himself, “Do I have the anointing?” And “if not, why not?” Unless we have the sweet anointing of God’s Spirit we cannot bring the message of the Gospel with authority and power. “Am I anointed by the Holy Spirit?”
When we come with the holy anointing we will be as John the Baptist saying, “I must decrease; He just increase.” “I am a voice,” and nothing else.
How do we know when we have the anointing? The apostle Paul said, “Our gospel came not unto you in word only, but also in power, and in the Holy Spirit, and in much assurance” (1 Thessalonians 1:5). Who gives the assurance and the power? Only the Holy Spirit can do that.
But it is not just the preacher who needs to be under the control of the Holy Spirit. His desire is to fill ordinary people with extraordinary power. Every anointed preacher longs to have anointed listeners!
We need the continuous infilling of the Holy Spirit in our lives. Men will listen to what we speak, souls will be saved, and saints edified when we are “filled by the Holy Spirit.”
“It pleased God by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe” (1 Corinthians 1:21), and it still does.
The anointed preaching God uses is preaching that is centered in the Bible. It let’s the Bible tell its own eternal message. On the road to Emmaus the resurrected Jesus explained to two disciples that He was found in “all the Scriptures.” Thus Biblical preaching is Christ-centered. Since the sermon is biblical, and the Bible is Christ-centered, then a biblical sermon is filled with Jesus Christ. Because Christianity is Christ, all anointed preaching is centered on the person and atoning work of Jesus Christ (John 15:26; 16:14). The Spirit of God is at work whenever and wherever men are being pointed to Jesus Christ. Anointed preaching declares that God sent Jesus to die for our sins and calls men and women to turn and put their faith in Him for salvation (1 Cor. 15:3-6). We need bold, biblical, Christ-centered preaching in our day. That is anointed preaching.Selah!
Message by Wil Pounds (c) 2006
Anyone is free to use this material and distribute it, but it may not be sold under any circumstances whatsoever without the author’s written consent.
Everyone tried to touch him, because healing power went out from him, and he healed everyone.Luke 6:19 The Holy Bible, The New Living Translation
Prayer: Jehovah Rapha (God my healer Jeremiah 33:6 ) You are my healer
The greatest reflection of Your healing love was Jesus coming down from Heaven, not only to be present among us, but sacrifice His life for us on the cross.
Through His gift of grace, I am able to be healed beyond what is possible on this earth.
Sometimes, in the depths of the most agonizing emotional, physical or spiritual agony, You bless me with The Holy Spirit to softly, gently touch me and make me whole again.
I pray for healing in the depths of those I know who are suffering.
May I use this experience to share Your wonderful healing love with others.
I pray for healing from ailments and sickness that I can see and feel now, and from the sin that is hidden in me which infect my spirit. You know all, see all, and care for all in Your perfect love, You heal all.
I humbly praise you and request this in the name of the greatest Healer, Jesus Christ. Amen
This photo and article @ Joseph- Anthony a son of Jehovah 2022
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