God's sovereignty and our responsibilty

Sovereignty of God continued
I would like to continue on the topic of the sovereignty of God, thinking through some of the implications of what I wrote last week and applying it to our lives. Clarifying these issues is critical for a healthy spiritual development, as we are growing up into Christ. If God is not controlling every detail of our lives and the lives of others, if there is great scope for freedom in both directions, obedience and blessing, but also disobedience and rebellion, then we have a critical role to play in God's economy here on earth.
He is relying on us to learn, grow and develop, so that we can act as true sons and daughters of God, bringing in the kingdom of God into the world around us and driving back the kingdom of darkness. Knowing and believing the truth of the bible, of how things really are, - and then acting on it in a persistent and deliberate manner, is key if we want to really learn how to walk in the new identity that we have as believers and do what Jesus did.

I haven't arrived 
God often speaks to me through memories and analogies from my own experience. This is how my brain works, I guess. Well, anyway, as I am writing about these things on my blog, I am painfully aware of the fact that I am still not able to demonstrate a lot of it in my own life. I haven't seen a major healing miracle occur in my ministry yet, I am not walking in the financial abundance and provision that I believe God has for me yet... my life is far from being perfect. In my former paradigm of thinking I would have blamed it all on God and his sovereignty. And I would complain in prayer and ask God to pour out his Spirit, to give me a breakthrough, to bless me and change my situation. Or I would just decide to "Don't worry and be happy" and accept it as God's will for my life. - But recently God spoke to me through a memory of my childhood to explain, why I am not seeing the results that I am believing for.

An analogy from my childhood
Here's the story: When I was still very young, about 5 years of age maybe, my granny sent me to the shop to buy a loaf of bread. That was the first time I would purchase something on my own. She apparently couldn't leave the house and she needed the bread, so she asked me if I could do it. I agreed. So she counted the exact amount of coins into my hand - I think it was 25 kopecks, the equivalent of 25 cents. I got two small silver coins of 10 Kopecks and one large copper coin of 5 kopecks. At that age I wasn't used to handling money. Remember, it was my first time ever to purchase anything on my own. She instructed me to ask for a certain loaf of bread and then to give the money to the person behind the counter. So I went, shaking and trembling inside. When I arrived at the shop, I asked for the loaf of bread and then reached into my pocket, took out the large copper coin of 5 kopecks and offered it to the man behind the counter. He looked at the money and said that it wasn't enough. At that stage I was so frightened and shy that I was dumbfounded. I froze with this coin in my hand, looking at the guy and not able to say a word. I don't know why I didn't reach down into my pocket and got the rest of the money out. For some reason, I couldn't do it. And the guy behind the counter couldn't give me the bread for that amount. So I gave up, ran out of the shop crying, and went back to my granny without the bread, but with the coins still in my pocket. I had all I needed, to purchase that bread, but my own shyness and childish stupidity prevented me from experiencing the result that my granny intended for me to have. I just messed up, I still had to learn some things. It wasn't long after that experience, that I actually did buy something on my own and it worked. I learned to overcome my shyness and fear and just buy what I needed and have the money for.

We've already got everything we need
The analogy that God showed me was: I was given everything that I need to see the power of God manifest in my life. God has already provided for me all that it takes to live an absolutely victorious, joyful and abundant life. My problem is, I am not using all that I've got yet. I am not playing with the full deck. I have still to learn some things, to act on truth and get this going. The problem is not with God. It is with me. I need to grow up into Christ (Ephesians 4:15). And I firmly believe that I will be able to walk like Jesus and do what He did.

God's design for my life and for that of every Christian is that we live as sons and daughters of God, be like Jesus in this world, do what He did. And He has given us everything that we need in His word, to learn that.

John 14:12-14 "Very truly I tell you, whoever believes in me will do the works I have been doing, and they will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father. And I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son. You may ask anything in my name, and I will do it.

Mark 16:17-18 "And these signs will accompany those who believe: In my name they will drive out demons; they will speak in new tongues; they will pick up snakes with their hand; and when they drink deadly poison, it will not hurt them at all; they will place their hands on sick people, and they will get well."

1 Corinthians 2:4 "My message and my preaching were not with wise and persuasive words, but with a demonstration of the Spirit's power..."

What if it doesn't work?
The problem with such scriptures is - that often our own experience seems to disprove them. We all have probably tried at one time or another to pray for healing of some person, and nothing happened. Or worse, the person died. We tried to believe for some breakthrough and it didn't happen. So the usual explanations often go like this: "It must have not been God's will... God's ways are higher than our ways... You never know what God is going to do... This is not my calling and not my gifting. I am just normal and ordinary..." And most Christians just give up, settle for a substandard life and wait for heaven, when we all will experience God face to face.  With this childhood memory God encouraged me to keep going, keep seeking God, keep searching until I experience the truth of God's word. I have all it takes already. God has given me everything. I just need to learn how to use it. That's all. And I am adamant to not give up.

The bible is true. God's word is true. So maybe it is time we stopped elevating our own experiences and the experiences of others above what the Word of God says and just trust his word and pursue it until we experience the truth of it in our own lives?

An encouraging example
I have been greatly encouraged by the story of Curry Blake, a man who is teaching a lot of people around the globe the truth about healing, and how to minister God's healing power to the sick. You can look him up on the internet. When Curry was a young man, not long married, he and his wife got a daughter who was born with a tumor in her tongue. The tumor was gross and the doctors could not operate it, because of the blood vessels that were intertwined in that tumor. So Curry and his wife started to pray, to seek God for healing and to do all they could to see their daughter healed. And they were seeing progress, things were improving with her. But at the age of two or three the little girl died of that tumor. Now the average Christian would conclude - it must have not been God's will for that girl to live. Or some other explanation, why the prayers went unanswered and the girl wasn't healed. You would have expected Curry and his wife just to accept it or to get bitter at God. Instead, he decided to pursue healing until he really understood it. He didn't blame God and his sovereignty on that. He had the courage to admit, that although he was doing everything he could, he probably just didn't know enough to see his daughter healed. - And God has given him understanding and revelation since. Curry is now seeing countless people healed through the power of God, and he is teaching believers all over the globe how to walk in this power and to have faith for healing.
He learned how to use all that God has given him in the bible. You and I can do the same.

The downside: we have responsibility
There is a downside to that truth, though: It puts a huge responsibility on us, right? If we don't believe God and learn how to walk in His power, it won't get done. Many people will die, who could have been healed through our hands. Many people will go to hell, who could have been reached with the Gospel through our witness. This is just a daunting thought, isn't it? And it can be taken as condemning and hard. Does that mean that it is my fault that this person didn't get healed? ...

No condemnation 
For me it is a great comfort to know that there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus (Romans 8:1). God does not condemn us if we don't get it right, if we fail and mess up. He is like a loving father. When I came back to my granny without the bread and told her the story, she didn't get mad at me and tell me how useless I was. She encouraged me, explained what I missed and let me try again. That's how God is. He won't condemn us for our past failures. And when we seek him with our whole hearts - we will find. He will explain to us things in His word, He will give us revelation and knowledge until we learn how to walk in all the fullness of God. That's what revival truly is - God's people bringing God's light and power into this world, building His kingdom.

I want to learn to do that. No matter what it takes and how long it may take me. I want to go for it. How about you? Until next week.

The Sovereignty of God - one of the biggest misunderstandings in Christian thought

Today I want to start dealing with a faulty paradigm that has caused an awful amount of damage in the lives of Christians and unbelievers alike. It is commonly referred to as the "sovereignty of God". Now, before you stop reading and write me off as a heretic, let me state right at the start: I firmly believe in the sovereignty of God. The Bible teaches it and I believe it with all my heart. He is the highest authority in the universe, all things are subject to him and He reigns! There is no doubt about that. And yet, my understanding of the sovereignty of God has dramatically changed within the last two years, which has brought great liberation into my life and has caused my love for God and trust in him to soar to much higher levels then before. It all depends on how we define the word sovereignty.

Dictionary definition of sovereignty
The dictionary defines the word sovereignty as follows: a). supreme power especially over a political body, b) freedom from external control: autonomy and c) controlling influence. The bible teaches that God is sovereign in this sense. He is the supreme power over the universe. Everything is subject to him. And he is free from external control. Nobody tells God what to do. He is independent and autonomous. And he has potential controlling influence over everything that exists. In the bible God is very often referred to as a king. A very good and wise king who runs a kingdom. As King he is the highest authority over all his subordinates. I agree with this kind of sovereignty.

Faulty understanding of sovereignty
Unfortunately, in the minds of many Christians the word sovereignty has taken on the meaning of absolute control. Many Christians believe that nothing happens, unless God either actively wills it, or passively allows it. This is taught in many churches. After all, he is God. So he can do whatever he likes, and he can stop whatever he likes. This is not true and this is not biblical. If you think that, you will end up believing in a God who is ultimately responsible for all kinds of atrocities, murder, violence, rape, torture and the like, because he allowed it. It is very difficult to completely trust and fully love such a God. But God is not like that. He does not control everything and he does not allow everything! He has limited himself by his word. Psalm 138:2 "for thou hast magnified thy word above all thy name". He has organised the universe according to certain laws that he set in motion by his word, and he himself never breaks his own word. That's why bad things happen in our world, things that God never intended to happen, things that break his heart, and yet he can't stop them just like that, because he has limited himself by his word. The only way he could stop them would be by total judgment - by calling it quits and stopping the whole course of history. One day he is going to do that. But until that day, we, other people and Satan have freedom to go against God's will, and he won't stop us or intervene in most cases.

God is ONLY good
Only good things come from God: James 1,16-17 "Don't be deceived, my dear brothers and sisters. Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows."

Four factors that are potentially involved in everything that happens
So instead of believing that God controls everything, the biblical truth is that everything that happens here on earth is determined by at least 4 factors:
1. You and I as an individual have been given free will by God. We can choose our actions and thoughts. That makes us responsible creatures that will be judged for our choices and actions.
2. Other people with their freedom of choice influence us or intervene in our lives. They have been given freedom of choice as well.
3. God with his good will, wanting to bless us and pour goodness into our lives. He does not do it without our consent and cooperation. He has limited himself and he respects our choices.
4. Satan with his intention to kill, steal and destroy all goodness (John 10:10). He wants to destroy our lives but his power is limited as well. He gains access to our lives through lies and deception. He needs our cooperation as well to be able to come in and destroy our lives.

We play a much more active role than most people think
This means that we play a much more active role than most of us like to admit. God does not just do what ever he pleases. He has given us freedom to choose and also authority and responsibility. As we recognize this authority and learn to cooperate with God, our lives get increasingly free from Satan's deceptions and bondage and we learn how to live in the victory that Christ has won for us. That is an awesome truth.

Resisting the devil
Understanding this will also enable us to resist the bad things that Satan tries to bring into our lives instead of attributing them to God and thinking that God wants to teach us something through them. Sickness, poverty, depression, defeat, discouragement... all this is not from God. He didn't want it for our lives and he didn't allow it. He wants to set you and me free from all that junk and give us an abundant, free and joyful life! But we need to learn to cooperate with him. And then we become his agents for liberating other people and bringing his goodness into the life of others.

Becoming like Jesus
We will be like Jesus. Acts 10:38 "How God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and power, and how he went around doing good and healing all who were under the power of the devil, because God was with him."

Will you believe it?
Maybe this leaves a lot of questions for some of you unanswered. This post is far too short to be able to exhaustively deal with this subject. But if you study the bible with an open heart you will see that this is exactly what God's word teaches. We are in a war. God is good and the devil is bad. We are in between. We can choose to cooperate with God, resist the devil and he will flee from us. (James 4:7). We are called to bring the kingdom of God into the fallen world that we live in, in the authority of Jesus Christ. You are an "ambassador for Christ" (2 Corinthians 5:20) if you are born again. You have the power inside of you that raised Jesus from the dead. (Ephesians 1:20). But this does not happen automatically. It has to be activated by faith.

Until next week. And be encouraged everybody. God has ONLY good things for you. He loves you so much that he sent Jesus to die for you. He wants your life to be absolutely awesome! Will you believe it?

THINKING AND ACTING - FAITH AND WORKS

So far I have been highlighting the importance of paradigms of thinking and how they affect our lives. Before I go on and describe some of these faulty paradigms, I felt that I needed to insert a post on the importance of our actions. Correct knowledge, right paradigms of thinking are extremely important. But they are only half of the deal. Knowledge needs to be acted upon to become effective in our lives. Faith without works is dead. Once we get hold of the truth in the Word of God, we need to start living it out; otherwise it will do us no good.

Rich without knowing it

Let me illustrate what I mean with the following story that I read in one of my devotionals: There was this uneducated, simple lady, living in Europe somewhere, about a hundred years or so ago. Her son went off to America and became rich and successful. He kept in touch with his mother, sending her kind letters. In the letters there were always included some nice looking pieces of paper with pictures and numbers on it. The lady treasured the letters and the pictures. One day her pastor was visiting and she showed him the letters and the pictures. When he saw the “pictures” he exclaimed: Woman, you are rich! This is American money. You can exchange that in the bank and buy whatever you like! – She was rich, but she didn’t know it. She was ignorant of it, and so all these riches didn’t really change her life for the better until somebody came along and told her the truth.

My story

In so many ways this is my story. I always had the bible with its great and exceeding promises. I knew that the bible was the love letter of God to me. I loved His letters of love and kindness, acceptance and forgiveness. But I didn’t know that enclosed in that love letter was much more than words of love. I didn’t know that I was rich as well. Well, let me rephrase it. I think I was even aware of the fact that these riches are somehow there for me. The problem was I didn’t know how to cash them, how to make them work in my life. The Freedom in Christ Course started to open my eyes as to how I could actually start to avail of the riches that are ours in Christ. The main thing is FAITH – accompanied by ACTION. Although this story involves money, this is a parable. I hope you can see that I am not writing about getting selfish and covetous. I am talking about the blessings that are promised to us in the Bible by faith.

A parable on knowledge and action

I think this story is a great parable about these paradigm shifts that I am writing about. Our thinking and acting determines if we can ever get into the will of God for our lives and walk in it. We don’t accidentally “slide” into it. We have to “know” certain truths and then we have to “act” in a certain way in order to get the full benefit of the Gospel.

This woman knew that her son loved her, that he was doing well there in the states and that he wanted her to do well too. He sent her American money. Obviously, he wanted her to cash the money and buy stuff of necessity for herself and others. But here was her problem. She was ignorant of the fact that the “pictures” in the letters were really money. Somebody had to tell her that. She needed revelation on that truth. – However, that was only the first step. Knowing that she was rich would not have helped her one bit if she wouldn’t go and find out, how she could actually cash this money and make it work. She could have gone with the money to a grocery store and try to buy things. But that would lead to a disappointment, because the grocery store would not accept foreign currency. So she needed more knowledge. She needed to find out how to turn this foreign money into the local currency. The teacher told her that she would need to go to the bank for that. But even all that correct knowledge – the correct paradigm of thinking would not have done her any good if she would have remained passive, sitting at home. What would have made this money work in her life would be correct knowledge + correct actions. She would have to go to the bank, hand in the Dollar notes and exchange them for the local currency. And with that local currency she would be able to avail of the good things that her son had been sending her.

Laws in the spiritual realm

This is a simple and straightforward story. And it makes sense in the physical realm. This is how things work. You need correct knowledge and then you need to act on that knowledge. Every Christian, I believe, would agree with me on that. But when it comes to spiritual things, we somehow change our approach (speaking of me and many others that I encountered, maybe that does not apply to you). We think that God “sovereignly” controls everything. In the spiritual realm God just acts unpredictably, and you never know what He’s going to do next. It’s all a mystery and an enigma. But nothing could be further from the truth. God is a very consistent and organized God. Just as the physical world functions according to very precise laws, the same is true about the spiritual realm. And He has revealed to us all that we need to know, in order to be able to avail of the good things that He has for us. God has given us the Bible as a love letter to us. And enclosed in that letter there are immeasurable riches, blessings, goodness and provision, protection and victory. We are incredibly rich, blessed with “every spiritual blessing in the heavenly realms” (Ephesians 1:3). We are given “exceeding great and precious promises: that by these we might be partakers of the divine nature” (2. Peter 1:4). Wow. That sounds great.

What if it doesn’t work?

But then we go and try to “cash” some of these promises, and we get disappointed. It doesn’t seem to work. So we try to explain why it didn’t work. “It must have not been God’s will. God is trying to teach me something through this failure. Or maybe one day in Heaven I will experience all this, but here on the earth I will have to put up with lack, mediocrity, failure and defeat.” This is not true! You and I - we can live an absolutely blessed and victorious life. Every Christian is called to become like Jesus, to grow up into Christ. But it does not happen automatically. We have to believe the Word of God to be what it says it is. And then we need to get knowledge about what God has for us. We need to change our faulty paradigms of thinking to the correct ones of the Word of God. And then we need to act it out. We need to start living it and applying it in our lives.

An example from history

A great example from history out of the evangelical realm that comes to mind would be George Mueller of Bristol. As a young man He determined that He would believe the bible and act on it, no matter what. He would pray to God and trust Him with all his needs. God called him to take care of orphaned children in Bristol. So he took these Children in and fed them and gave them an education. But he would not ask people for financial help. He would just pray and believe that God would provide all his needs. When He started out, he had some real difficulties to get this going. He was learning by doing. But with tenacity, faith and perseverance He learned how to actually “cash” the promises of God. He lived to be over 90 years old and several million Pound Sterling went through his hands throughout his life – all given to him as an answer to prayer and God’s provision.

Ordinary people doing extraordinary things

We tend to glorify such persons and put them on a pedestal, thinking that they must have had a great “spiritual gift of faith”. They were somehow out of the ordinary, we think. But that is not true. They just dared to believe God and act on what they believed. And they saw very powerful results. They would not give up when things seemed not to work. They would just stick with it until they got the revelation they needed. You and I can do the same. Until next week! Be blessed and encouraged everybody!

More on the Reality of our Spiritual Identity

Hello again. Happy New Year to all of you! I don't know how my last post impacted you. Was it a new idea for you that you have a completely new identity in the Spirit, if you have been born again? That you are no longer a sinner by nature, but a saint, holy, justified, blessed and accepted in Jesus? And these are not just figurative or symbolic statements but realities, albeit spiritual realities that have to be believed in order to be fully experienced and activated?

A lost truth
The full impact of the biblical truth about the spiritual identity of the believer seems to have been lost in the body of Christ for the most part of church history. These truths are now spreading very rapidly throughout the body of Christ, so chances are that many of my readers are already familiar with this paradigm of thinking. When I first encountered it a few years ago through the Freedom in Christ course, I didn't realize how far reaching and tremendous the implications were. This has the potential to completely revolutionize your Christian walk. That's what it did for me. It has literally set me free and has given me access to the life of abundance and victory that I always sought but never seemed to be able to find. I want to take some time to spell out the implications of these truths as I keep writing.

Too good to be true?
But maybe some of you think - this can't be true. It sounds too good to be true. Such a vital truth cannot have been hidden from the body of Christ for centuries. This must be heresy. Well - just think of Martin Luther and the great reformers. The biblical truths of salvation by grace alone through faith had been lost for over 1000 years until they surfaced again at the time of the Reformation. I believe something of similar proportions is happening in our day and age. As today's believers are receiving revelation about who they truly are in Christ, they are increasingly able to walk by faith in a similar degree of authority, victory and power as the first Christians were, whose accounts we read in the Bible. Throughout Church history there were times that this kind of power and authority came to the surface in limited pockets in the Church around the globe. We call these times REVIVALS.

The new identity surfacing in revivals
I was always fascinated by the stories of revivals. During those times believers often seemed to be able to do the same things that Jesus and the Apostles did in the Bible. One such move of God took place in Indonesia during the sixties and seventies of the last century, and the impact of it is still felt in that area. It began by a mighty outpouring of God's Spirit on the Isle of Timor in a little town called Soe, and also simultaneously on many other islands of this huge country. I warmly recommend two accounts of that revival: "Like a Mighty Wind" by Mel Tari. And a German Book by Otto Riecker, called "Ruf aus Indonesien" (A Call from Indonesia). Two German missionaries were involved in that revival - Detmar and Volkhard Scheunemann. They visited Germany in 1970 and gave an account of what was happening in Indonesia. Dr. Riecker published the sermons in the little book mentioned above. It is out of print but some used copies are still available in retail.

A movement of ordinary people
What is so fascinating about the Indonesian revival is the fact that there was no single one "anointed" leader or apostle. It was a revival of ordinary people who heard from God and obeyed. They went out in teams to preach the Gospel where God sent them, and they experienced the same provision, protection, power and anointing as the first Christians did. There are accounts of people speaking in Languages they never learned, like English and French. Accounts of healing incurable diseases through the name of Jesus, dead people raised to life, turning water into wine, walking on water over a swollen river, commanding the weather, multiplying food, calling fire down from heaven just like Elijah did... The German theologians recall that prior to the revival a move of prayer and repentance went through their bible school, a turning back to the Bible as the fully inspired and infallible word of God, a cleansing from sin and deliverance from demonic bondage... And then they were able to walk by faith in their new identity as sons and daughters of the living God.

A problem with my thinking
I always believed that these accounts were true. My problem was that I had a paradigm of thinking that prevented me from seeing the significance of these accounts for me. I thought that God in his sovereignty poured out His Spirit here and there and refused to pour Him out in other places. But this is not New Testament thinking. The New Testament does not speak of God taking His Spirit back anywhere. Jesus won ALL authority in heaven and on earth through His redemptive work on the cross. And He sent His followers to go into all the world in HIS authority and preach the gospel and disciple nations. So God was never the problem. When things got bad in the church it always happened because His people lost sight of His promises, followed deceptive philosophies and teachings and turned away from the simplicity of the Gospel. God never ever took His Spirit back. We have quenched Him, we have lost sight of the walk of faith, we have allowed our hearts to be hardened by sin and unbelief.

Revival starts with me
This is a very liberating truth. Because if I am the problem - then I can do something about it. I can change. If it was up to God then I would have to just beg and plead and hope that He would change. This is what I had been doing for years. Begging God to pour out His Spirit and thinking that He somehow had to be changed. But if it is up to me, I can start changing, I can start believing, I can start repenting, changing my thinking and my actions. Revival always starts with me. It is personal.

Believing God
So instead of asking God to pour out His Spirit again I needed to start believing God and acting on what His word said. This is how revival comes. God flows through people. The founder of the Salvation Army, William Booth, allegedly said: "I am not praying for a move of God, I am a move of God!" There is a deep truth in His saying. You and I, all born again believers, have God living inside of us. We are saints, anointed with the Spirit of God, our lives hidden in Christ. The power that raised Jesus from the dead is at work in us (Ephesians 1:20). We are one with God in the Spirit. We have the same authority over all evil, over sickness and disease and over nature as Jesus had. This is what the New Testament teaches in absolutely unambiguous terms (John 14:12). But this authority is a SPIRITUAL reality. It must be believed and activated  by faith before it can be seen and experienced in the physical realm. And the enemy has brought in a huge amount of lies, deception, philosophies, theologies and the like into the church in order to prevent Christians from seeing it and walking in it. To the degree that we change our paradigms of thinking - to the degree that we renew our mind by the word of God  (in other words: repent) - to that degree we will be able to walk in the power, freedom, victory and authority that the New Testament is speaking about. Isn't that just an AWESOME truth?

Be blessed and encouraged everybody. If you have been born again, you have God Almighty living on the inside of you! You are a son/daughter of the living God. Deeply loved and cherished! Equipped with everything you need to live an absolutely victorious, free, joyful and abundant life in Christ. Will you believe it? Until next week.