God is better than we think. So it is time to change how we think.

Jeremiah 29:11
I know the thoughts that I think towards you, to prosper you and to give you a future and a HOPE.
 
These scriptures have been resounding in my heart recently.  God has us on His mind.  Let me say it this way He is thinking about YOU! In fact by Jeremiah we can conclude that God is not only thinking about you, but He is thinking GOOD things about you.  He is thinking about blessings and promotions that He wants to bring across your path.

The problem is that so often we don't think that God is dreaming up good things for us.  Jeremiah writes this scripture to let us know that God is so much BETTER then what we think! He is a GOOD God who desires to do GOOD things in our life!

If we could grasp this simple concept how our life would change!! If you woke up every day knowing that: If God be for you WHO can be against you? (Romans 8:31) You would begin to stop climbing the mountains that you are anointed to move!

Let me put it this way:
YOU and GOD make a MAJORITY!

With God on your side there is no economic downturn that can set you back.  No disappointment too BIG.  No obstacle too tall!  God is GREATER and HE is on your side! In fact you are on His mind.  While you are going about your day, God is thinking about you and working on your behalf!

You have an UNDEFEATED King that is fighting on your side.  A king who has never lost a single battle is on your side.  What a good team you and God make!

Romans 12:2 

.... but be transformed by the renewing of your mind SO that you might prove what is the good and acceptable will of God 

Jeremiah lets us know that God is better than we think, then Romans lets us know that we must change the way we think!

Can I tell you today that we need to change how we think about God so we can see His plans revealed in our life?  You will never see God's best in your life as long as you are going around with a defeated attitude.  Thinking that there is no way you are ever going to overcome this problem.  That you don't know if God can prosper you.

It is time that we realize that God is on our side! He is thinking GOOD thoughts toward you!

Prophets & Scribes

1 John 1:1-4

That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, concerning the Word of life— 2 the life was manifested, and we have seen, and bear witness, and declare to you that eternal life which was with the Father and was manifested to us— 3 that which we have seen and heard we declare to you, that you also may have fellowship with us; and truly our fellowship is with the Father and with His Son Jesus Christ. 4 And these things we write to you that your joy may be full

When you read the Bible it should be noted that there were scribes. So as Paul was in prison he was telling someone what to write.  This person would write out what Paul would say and he would tell them what he had seen, heard, and experienced.  Although the scribe would learn a lot about God through Paul he didn't have an encounter of His own to write about.   

Then in the Bible there are prophets  The scribe would write what the prophet would tell them.   Here we are hearing the account of John.  He is letting us know that this isn't something he had heard about at a church service or by his friends.  He is letting them know the Jesus he had encountered for Himself.  

The difference in the prophet and the scribe is as wide and vast as the sea.  I long for this generation to become prophets. Telling a lost and dying world their own experience with God.   

I am troubled by people's ability to fall in and out of love with God so very easily.  Then I realized the other day that my frustration is with scribes.  See, you can't be talked out of something that you have experienced for yourself. I know that chocolate is good because I have tasted it for myself.  I have tried lots of kinds of chocolate and with that I can tell you my favorite ones to eat and my lesser favorites.  

Most people have never truly tasted of God's goodness and His presence.  That is why it is so easy for them to be talked into following someone else.

One of my favorite scriptures is when Jesus looks at the disciples and asks them "Are you going to leave me too?"  then Peter shouts out "To whom else would we go?  Your words are the words of eternal life!!" 

(John 6)  

Peter understood that he left Jesus then he would then give his life to someone else.  He had experienced too much of Jesus to leave.  It was too late to leave.  He was too far in.  He knew too much.  He knew nothing else compared.  No one else could satisfy.  

Can I just challenge you to become a prophet in this world!?  

Experience God for yourself.  Stop talking about the stories of others encounter and get an encounter for yourself.

How to respond when people don't like what you are doing.

Nehemiah 6 Now it happened when Sanballat, Tobiah, Geshem the Arab, and the rest of our enemies heard that I had rebuilt the wall, and that there were no breaks left in it (though at that time I had not hung the doors in the gates), 2 that Sanballat and Geshem sent to me, saying, “Come, let us meet together among the villages in the plain of Ono.” But they thought to do me harm.

3 So I sent messengers to them, saying, “I am doing a great work, so that I cannot come down. Why should the work cease while I leave it and go down to you?”

4 But they sent me this message four times, and I answered them in the same manner

Here Nehemiah is building the wall.  He is closer than ever to completion when there is an invitation for him to come.  However he discerns that this friendly invitation is with ill intent. 

We must always realize that sometimes even friendly invitations must not be acknowledged.  They are sent by the enemy to do one thing and that is to distract you and hinder you from your purpose. You must be so lead by the Holy Spirit that it isn’t by what the person is saying to you that determines whether or not you trust them but it is by what the spirit of the Lord shows you.

In my own life I have had so many people come my way with “suggestions” on how I should be different honestly if you could name it I have at some point heard it.  Everything from the following:

You look too much like Barbie no one will 
ever take you seriously when you preach.

Women’s ministry would be better at our 
church if you didn’t minister every time.

You say you are girly but you 
don’t wear dresses.

Then I wear dresses and they would 
say your pants are too tight.

Then there is the comments of you are 
too girly so I can’t receive from you.

Your preaching is too practical.  
I need something deeper.

All these suggestions are sent by the enemy to try to distract me from what God has called me to do.  No matter what you are building in life the enemy will send people your way that are friendly…in fact some of these people you may call friends.  They will begin to spew the plan of the enemy into your heart, and if you let it, it will begin to poison your destiny.

I LOVE Nehemiah’s response.  Let’s read that again.

3 So I sent messengers to them, saying, “I am doing a great work, so that I cannot come down. Why should the work cease while I leave it and go down to you?”

Man that gets me excited!!!! I long for a people to be so tied to their purpose that they refuse to be distracted by the critics that come their way.  I long for a people to have their identity so deeply embedded in the cross that they are unmoved when things come to oppose what Christ has already settled. 

Each time you fight the critics you loose and they win.  You may have read the above comments and asked what did I say in response. 

I said nothing.  Some were to my face.  Some were via email.  Some were by text.  I never replied.  To reply is to magnify what the enemy has sent in my life to hurt me. 

I love what Nehemiah pens in verse 9:

For they all were trying to make us afraid, saying, “Their hands will be weakened in the work, and it will not be done.”

The things that the enemy sends into your life; the criticism is to make you weakened in the call of God on your life.  If I allowed those words that were spoken I would have looked at my life and questioned the gifting that God had placed inside of me.

God called me as a girly girl and He is going to use me as that girl. 

You don’t have to change to be used.  In fact it is the opposite.  You have to FIGHT to be who you are.

When you begin to change who you are to make others happy that is when the anointing that is on your life becomes tainted, and you begin to live for the applause of many instead of the applause of one  Who is Jesus. 

Criticism has allowed me to learn that it only hurts when it is the areas that I was still yearning for the approval of others.  When you die to the longing for acceptance in that area then you will no longer be troubled when the bad things are said like you used to.  Remember a critic knows how to do one thing: CRITICIZE!!! If you changed what they are complaining about there would always be something else they didn't like.

Daughter can I just tell you that God not only is very proud of you….. He has called you.  Equipped you.  Anointed you for such a time as this and for THIS very occasion.  Don’t change who you are or what you stand for.  The only thing you will ever be good at being is YOU. 

There is a city that is looking to you to do the work the Lord has for you to do.  You don’t have time to respond and get shaken up by the nay sayers.  You just keep building your wall and watch God take care of your enemies!