Getting To Know God Better 33

"Psa_40:5  Many, O LORD my God, are thy wonderful works which thou hast done, and thy thoughts which are to us-ward: they cannot be reckoned up in order unto thee: if I would declare and speak of them, they are more than can be numbered." 

Are you of the persuasion that God thinks thoughts of you and toward you? 

What a time we live in. God is not much on peoples mind. Don't mis-read what I am saying. There are plenty of people going to Church, plenty of religious ceremonies, plenty of programs for all kinds of things. There is even some spiritual talk among believers and unbelievers. Unbelievers act like they know as much as believers. So the unbelieving world not only co-mingles with the believing world, but they are bent on teaching the believing world how to believe correctly. 

All the religious dribble that I have heard doesn't add up to hardly a moment with God. There is all kinds of religious talk that leads to more religious talk, but the end result is more talk. A spiritually watered down society of misfits we are. Any time someone really hits on something truly amazing concerning God and man, they are kind of considered a little goofy. The unbelieving and the poorly trained Christian judging the man or woman of God with something to say. That's where we are right now. 

There is nothing wrong with being holy, living holy and operating under the direct leadership of the Holy Spirit as lead by the inner man. Mention holy living today and even the pastors cringe, because worldly living has become acceptable in the inner circles of organized religion. In order to keep the coffers filled many pastors will say anything, whether lead by the Spirit of God or not. I'm not calling out for new leaders. I am calling out for individuals that are willing to take God seriously and find the gems of truth under the rocks of mystery: Individuals that aren't satisfied with a mediator between them and God; someone that demands of themself to be honest with God and go to God to partake of God and offer themself to God without conditions. 


The bottom line: Stop looking for someone to follow that knows God better than you. You be the one. Get to know God better yourself.

Getting To Know God Better 32

You may have thought, "if God is sovereign, omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent, why is it that so many people have a different understanding of how God operates among mankind or even who God is?" 

There is only one answer, free will.  You might not like it but God created us to have the power to reject or ignore God. You have been designed to co-create with God, communicate with God, hear from God and interact with God in the every processes of life. You choose. You can initiate interaction with God and you can deny God access to your inner man, that part of you that corresponds with God.

It is not complicated, nor is it cumbersome and it is immediately available. Here's the part that many people don't like. The creator designed you to operate in full self-power mode without access to or integration with or communication with God.  In every way you can be free from any influence of God. That's the idea behind free will. Free from or free to engage with. You choose.

Now you might be thinking that if left to our own devices we would all choose not to communicate with God, because if God does not initiate the conversation, communication, connection then it must not be very important. You are absolutely right. The problem with that theory is that God implanted in every human His image. This image is always there whether you initiate any desire to meet, see, understand or communicate with God. This image is in the inner man.

Your inner man was made in the image and likeness of God. . The mind will grow old and become dim, the body grows old and comes to an end, the soul continues on forever and the spirit continues on forever, but the spirit is activated, made alive by accepting the gift of God and that is done through the inner man. There is no spiritual connection to God without being activated by the inner man.  There is body, mind, soul and spirit. The inner man is the mind of the spirit and soul. Everything spiritual is initiated via the inner man. If you are a woman, the inner woman.

Eph 3:8  Unto me, (Paul the Apostle) who am less than the least of all saints, is this grace given, that I should preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ; 
Eph 3:9  And to make all men see what is the fellowship of the mystery, which from the beginning of the world hath been hid in God, who created all things by Jesus Christ: 
Eph 3:10  To the intent that now unto the principalities and powers in heavenly places might be known by the church the manifold wisdom of God, 
Eph 3:11  According to the eternal purpose which he purposed in Christ Jesus our Lord: 
Eph 3:12  In whom we have boldness and access with confidence by the faith of him. 
Eph 3:13  Wherefore I desire that ye faint not at my tribulations for you, which is your glory. 
Eph 3:14  For this cause I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, 
Eph 3:15  Of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named, 
Eph 3:16  That he would grant you, according to the riches of his glory, to be strengthened with might by his Spirit in the inner man; 

You have within you the power to co-create with God or to deny God. That's a lot of power. If you choose to co-create with God there is only one way; Talk to God from your inner man/woman. Transcend your own understanding and dig real deep inside yourself and talk to God. Tell God about your dilemma and listen carefully as God will speak to you with a still, small voice.

1Ki 19:11  And he said, Go forth, and stand upon the mount before the LORD. And, behold, the LORD passed by, and a great and strong wind rent the mountains, and brake in pieces the rocks before the LORD; but the LORD was not in the wind: and after the wind an earthquake; but the LORD was not in the earthquake: 

1Ki 19:12  And after the earthquake a fire; but the LORD was not in the fire: and after the fire a still small voice. 

It is the way it is. So many people leave so much on the table when it comes to God because they don't like the way God does things. Most rebellion to God's ways come from those who haven't even considered God's ways. But don't think that it will be because you didn't know how. It was embedded in your inner man, before you were born. Jer_1:5  Before I formed thee in the belly I knew thee; 

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How do you trust God when it really looks like there is just no heavenly intervention or participation in your current situation?

You don't. Oh, your surprised at that? Quit trying to be something you are not. If you are feeling like God is not on the scene, you need to be true to yourself and acknowledge that you aren't currently trusting God right now. If you are thinking that acting like you are trusting God, to keep up the facade, is working, you will be greatly disappointed.

It is in your everyday real-ness with God that true relationship ensues. God is above all the fray, the din, the facades, the acting. God recognizes when you are down, depressed, feeling lonely, feeling abandoned, crushed or disillusioned. God made you. Every great thing about you and every fault is known to God. You can't say or do anything to make God angry at you or to make God think you are wonderful in every way. You were created, not self enlivened.

What God wants from all of us is to be real. When you believe with all your heart you should shout it out and let everyone know.  And even though when you have no faith at all, you might not shout it out on the rooftops, you needn't fake it either.  You were designed with emotions. Those emotions, just as important as your skills were designed by God for the purpose of co-creating your life together. You and God, not only co-habitate, "God in you, the hope of glory," you co-create your life with God. Ignoring who you are or what you feel does not make you faithful and strong, it makes you foolish and pliable. The only hope is to be real with God. Get to know God better and be open with God about your current condition, about the depth of your faith or the lack thereof, about the inner man's leading, what's really inside the depth of your soul. You are wonderfully made As Is.

Quit trying to climb the ladder that leads to religious Nirvana. There is no ladder. God is right next to your side and lives within you. Everything you do is a lateral move. You were already created and you are sustained to co-create life with
God. God is not like any of the people you know. God understands you and loves you right now, as you are, in your liveliest spurts of faith as well as in your deepest despair. You can fake people, but you can't fake God, because God is in you. Seek higher ground, aspire to be great, reach for the sky, but understand clearly that God loves you right now, just as you are.

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What have you done to get to know God better?

You are in charge of this issue; not your pastor, rabbi, Sunday School teacher, and especially not your Priest. These men or women are seeking and finding just like you, but most of the time their search for the hidden Gems of magnificence that propels your faith from barely hanging on to excited to be with God is stymied by denominational polity/dogma.  For your pastor, rabbi, priest or anyone else, including yourself, to make forward progress they/you will have to apply your God-given co-creating power and draw closer to God.

If you are not familiar with the term co-creating with God it is probably because religions have tried diligently to keep everyone on the same playing field, releasing a kind of generic teaching that keeps everyone at odds with God. Kind of like having a baseball team with all first base players. It is easier to manage the lemming-like behavior of the parishioners if everyone is strained through watered-down teaching and powerless leadership, promoting obligation and duty, but not promoting self-learning, unlearning or God-thinking.

Personally I think your pastor would be delighted to see someone reach higher and draw closer to God, but the parliamentary procedures of the church board will eventually ferret out any serious spiritual Gem finding person attempting to be like Christ and brand them as a goofball or heretic or simple minded or simply ask them to leave. 

I hope you can say without a doubt that your understanding of God is better than "I believe in intelligent design".  Recently I had an in depth discussion with someone who acknowledges that there is intelligent design behind creation, but will not acknowledge that the intelligent designer is God. In this person's mind there does not need to be a God to believe that there is intelligent design. Wow!!!
OK, so you don't want to say the word God, but you don't have any problem with intelligent designer? There was much discussion about the intelligent design idea and the main reason that this person believes that there is an intelligent designer is because we have eyes. OK, good a reason as any to start with. I mentioned that we do have eyes that see, but we also have spiritual eyes that see. I mentioned that the eyes in our head are tangible and give us recognition of our surroundings and that spiritual eyes give us recognition of the intangible world.

When I have a discussion like this I don't have to be right. I am not always right. I do not have all the answers. What I believe I have confirmed with my eyes and my spiritual eyes, otherwise it is still in the undecided category. I don't blindly believe anything, neither do I reject everything that I cannot see with my eyes. I do believe that the balanced soul has a good understanding of both the physical eyes and the spiritual eyes. 

Bottom line; the best way to get anyone even mildly interested in Christianity is to get them to ask themselves questions. You telling them anything goes into their God-filter. They not only don't really hear you, in their mind they already have built their concept of God or non-god. You would serve your family well to be a little mysterious, subtle, sometimes even silent on the issue. With this new generation of non-believers, up in your face Bible-thumping might make you feel good, but you will not win this generation over with that method. Even more so, this generation wants better, more defined and conclusive information than before. If you show all your cards in the first deal, there isn't any reason for someone to ask pertinent questions about your hand. If someone sees your hand they don't really have anything to ask questions about.

Getting To Know God Better 29

If you are a believer you probably have friends or family that are agnostic or atheist. There's not much difference between agnostic and atheist. Neither has a relationship with the Christ, the Son of God.

It's going to happen that in our times, as in all times, there will be those who have not recognized the creator nor God's plan for salvation, nor God's economy. They live in it, they are blessed by it, they benefit from it, but they do not participate in recognizing it. I specifically want to speak to those who have this situation and might be wondering what might be the best way to deal with it. 

First of all, Christianity is and was always meant to be a personal relationship with God. With that comes the many accoutrements, sacraments, faith, the indwelling Holy Spirit and spiritual understanding. This was always meant to be for you personally. All of this was/is a gift from God, not for your many years of service, your fancy prayers, your grand behavior, your community service, your faithful tithing or any other thing that you have said or done. It was a gift from God to you because God created you. You deserve all that God has for you because God has it for you and has nothing to do with your anything. You have not earned one notch in your spiritual belt for anything you have ever said or done. You are loved by God because of who God is, not because of who you are. 

Getting this straight helps when trying to navigate through the confusing array of religious experiences/denominations/faiths. Once you are fully aware that any and all religious experience was and is for the benefit of you personally getting closer to God, then you can make full use of your personal preference for religious expression, your denomination or faith. Without the personal experience, the religious experience is superficial, powerless, empty, void of efficacy, non-existent in the realm of God's economy.

Agnosticism, atheism and secular humanism are religious experiences void of a relationship with God. These groups try to pawn themselves off as non-religious, but they are most religious in every way.  If you can personally make the distinction of having a personal relationship with God apart from or in correlation with your denominational religious experience you can get to know God better, but if your denominational religious experience is in lieu of a personal experience with God you can only get to know your religion better. You might never get to know God at all. 

Don't be afraid to talk to your pastor about this. More than likely he or she will agree and urge you to seek the face of God and still participate in your denomination/church. You might be surprised to find that many pastors are terribly frustrated with this concept because their denomination has morphed over the years and the need for personal relationship has been downplayed, because that's what the people wanted. Still today many pastors want to teach others about this most wonderful and personal relationship, but their denomination/polity/dogma still represents the dark ages. 

In the end you are responsible to make this happen in your life. Get to know God better because you want to. You might be surprised to find just how many people are starving for some one on one time with the creator. It is available and free and reserved for those who can break through the barriers set by those before them.   

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If I were to say to you that there is nothing that you think, do or say that God does not know of, do you believe that? If you do believe it than you fully understand that there is nothing that God does not know about you.

I am going to discuss one of the most profound components of your relationship with God. The unveiling of oneself.

You are unveiled before God even before you think the thoughts or do the action or say anything. But for the power, strength, action and supernatural intervention of God to work on your behalf in any given situation, you must unveil yourself before God. God already knows what you have done and what you are going to do, but in order to align yourself with the benefits of God's supernatural intervention in this life you will have to unveil yourself before God. God already knows but you have to purposefully unveil/reveal yourself to receive the blessings accompanying God's work in your life.

Let's say you have some form of indiscretion in your life. You are dealing with it and you have it under control, but it is keeping you back from moving forward. You can sense that there is a better chance for your overall success in life if you were to quit or deny this thing or abandon it altogether. It is a struggle and maybe it has been a struggle for a long time. You manage it well and you have found a way to integrate it into your daily life without much upset. But you know that without it things would be better. In order for God to empower you to overcome you will have to go before God and reveal it openly. You will have to unveil yourself before God. You have to initiate this event. You must consciously go before God and be seen in your entirety unveiled, nothing hidden.

Even though God knows everything, in order for faith to be effectual it must be initiated by you. God knows but you must tell God about yourself before your faith is activated for use in this arena of your life. That's right. You can go on and on and fight this thing, manage it, maybe even enjoy it to some degree, but to overcome it you will needs God's supernatural intervention and you cannot get God's supernatural intervention unless you completely expose/unveil/reveal yourself before God.

God gives you faith, but only the use of that faith brings to pass what can only come to pass by that faith. The fact that God gives you faith does not accomplish the tasks at hand. It is in your personal acknowledgement of and conscious unveiling of a thing to God that activates the power to accomplish what your faith believes for.

Bottom line: God knows everything already, but you must, by faith, come to God and reveal yourself, unveil your situation to God without reservation in order for the power to overcome to be activated. In essence once you do this you can then co-create with God your new situation.

 

Getting To Know God Better 27

Psa_14:1  To the chief Musician, A Psalm of David. "The fool hath said in his heart, There is no God..."

Where does the fool say there is no god? In his/her heart. 

Quite often we get the idea that we understand the position of someone concerning their relationship with God by what that person says. The person might say they don't believe this or that or they don't believe the Bible or they don't believe that Jesus is God or they don't believe the stories of the Old Testament and we who are more astute, those of us who now very well that there is a God and that that God is Jesus, Jehovah, Yahweh, the I am, that we somehow know what is in the heart of the professed agnostic/atheist simple by accessing their remarks against our +professed faith.  

It's really not that easy. I have learned that more times than not people says outwardly what they do not believe inwardly. Emotion or a pressing situation can often make a person say something that they do not believe in their heart. I contend that many people who stand against a solid biblical background and who deny many of the truths of the Bible and who even stand against some of the tenants of faith that you and I have come to understand, well they are just blowing smoke. 

You might wonder, why would anybody make light of the fundamental truths of the scripture unless they were absolutely an unbeliever? Pride and ego is the answer. Many people who have not allowed the Holy Spirit a place in their life have done so because of closely watching those who say they have; deceive, lie, cheat, hurt, punish, steal, make false witness, talk Christianity and live like the devil, abuse others, destroy lives, commit crimes and on and on. That's right, many people that go to church and profess one thing live out their life in another manner entirely. Young people grow up watching the so-called holy people do all the things listed above and they begin to question a god with no power over His people, a god that sets rules that do not need to be obeyed, a god that has no expectations of its people, no apparent consequences. The sing hallelujah, they tithe, they lead programs, they play church while making plans to ruin someones life, someone they are close to, someone they go to church with. 

I would venture to say that there is not one Christian that has been a Christian for more than ten years that has not seen this happen and in some cases over and over again.

If you were one of those young people growing up in that environment you might be skeptical also. I don't blame those who have come out of church with an attitude about Christians and having their back up about Christianity and even denouncing Christianity sometimes. What they have seen does not line up with what they have learned in their inner man from the Holy Spirit. They have inner conflict about the kind of Christian behavior they have witnessed and the truths that have been revealed to them in their inner man by the Holy spirit. There is a conflict. It is real. It was earned through witnessing the behavior of the leading the way, setting the example, establishing the faith in a less than honorable way. 

So what do we do about it? First of all I am suggesting that just because a person verbalizes something negative concerning Christianity or even speaks adversely about what Christianity stands for that the speech alone is not an indicator of the heart.