The Anguish Of Anticipation

I had to have a very unpleasant medical procedure done this morning.

As I laid in the room on the narrow examination table, waiting for the procedure to start, I began thinking about what was about to take place. The pain I was going to experience, the tools that would be used on my body— the needles and the scalpels. I knew what was coming and I knew that it was something that had to be done. As I laid there and tried to mentally prepare myself for the inevitable, I thought about Christ and the emotional and mental challenges He must have experienced as His crucifixion loomed closer and closer.

Jesus knew what was going to take place. He knew that He was going to experience physical pain on level that is truly incomprehensible to everyone, other than those who actually go through it. He knew the tools that would be used on His body— the flog, the hammer, the nails. He knew it was coming and He knew it was something that had to be done.

The only window we have in the Gospels of the emotional thoughts of Christ in regard to His impending crucifixion, is the description of His anguish in the Garden of Gethsemane. We don’t know all of what Jesus thought and felt that night, but we do know that He endured much emotional trauma and mental agony before He ever actually laid on that cross. He knew that His body was about to be torn to shreds to pay for the wrongs of others, He knew the shame and suffering that was about to poured out upon Him, but He also intimately knew and loved every single person that would accept His sacrifice and be eternally saved by it.

After my procedure was done, the doctor left the room so I could re-dress. I looked down at the crimson-stained area where the procedure took place, and I thought of the precious blood of our Savior which stained His cross. As I looked at my own blood all over the procedure area, I thought to myself, “My blood has been spilled for my own healing, but His blood was spilled to heal us all.”

If you have never done so, I encourage you today to turn away from this world and away from sin and turn towards the Savior of mankind who gives us eternal life and abundantly pardons. Today is the day of salvation.

(Heb 12:2) Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, Who for the joy set before Him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.

(Luke 22:44) And in His anguish, He prayed more earnestly, and His sweat became like drops of blood falling to the ground.

(1 Pet 2:21-24) For to this you were called, because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, that you should follow in His footsteps: “He committed no sin, and no deceit was found in His mouth.” When they heaped abuse on Him, He did not retaliate; when He suffered, He made no threats, but entrusted Himself to Him who judges justly. "He himself bore our sins" in his body on the cross, so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness; "by his wounds you have been healed."

(Isaiah 53:10,11) Yet it was the Lord’s will to crush Him and cause Him to suffer,
and though the Lord makes His life an offering for sin, He will see His offspring and prolong His days, and the will of the Lord will prosper in His hand. After He has suffered, He will see the light of life and be satisfied; by His knowledge my righteous servant will justify many, and He will bear their iniquities.

The Imprint Of Presence

My husband has a habit of randomly belting out the Star Spangled Banner as he’s walking through the house. Or the yard. Or Home Depot. It’s just a weird little thing he does that we’ve become accustomed to— my husband walking outside to feed the dogs singing in a loud, baritone voice, “Ohhhhh, say can you seeeeee by the dawn’s ear-lyyyy liiiiiiight...”

Today, as I was cooking supper, my two youngest were downstairs playing and I heard my little five year-old’s voice from the living room, “Ohhhh, say can you seeeee by the dawn’s ear-lyyyyy liiiiiight....” For no reason at all, she just randomly started singing our national anthem. She did this because it’s something she learned from her dad. She spends so much time in her father’s presence, that his behavior has affected her behavior. There are times where she can choose to imitate her father’s behavior and times when she does it without even thinking about it, because it has become so ingrained in her daily experience.

 
This is a lot like what happens to us when we pursue daily intimacy with Jesus Christ. His Spirit teaches us what is good and what is bad. He teaches us how to rightly understand the truths we are given in Scripture. Just being in His presence through His word and prayer, begins to affect and transform the way we think and act. Just like my daughter’s behavior is affected by both the presence and actions of her father, we too are affected by both the presence and words of Jesus Christ.
If my husband were not an integral part of my daughter’s life, he would have very little influence upon her behavior. My daughter’s behavior would not be impacted by her father if she simply thought about him or talked about him. It is only because she is around him on a regular basis, that he has imprinted himself upon her to any degree.

This is the kind of relationship that Christ wants to have with each one of us. You can get to know someone to a certain degree by writing letters back and forth, but there is a level of “knowing” someone that can only be reached by being around them— by getting to know them through being in their presence. May we endeavor to know our Savior in this way, because it is our relationship with Him by which all others are measured.

 
(John 14:6,7) Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me. If you had known Me, you would know My Father as well. From now on you do know Him and have seen Him.”

(Psalm 139:1-4) O Lord, You have searched me and known me. You know when I sit and when I rise; You understand my thoughts from afar. You search out my path and my lying down and are acquainted with all my ways. Even before a word is on my tongue, You know all about it, O Lord.

 
(John 14:26) But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things and will bring to your remembrance all things that I have said to you.

(Matt 7:21-23) Not everyone who says to Me, “Lord, Lord,” will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only he who does the will of My Father in heaven. Many will say to Me on that day, “Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name, and in Your name drive out demons and perform many miracles?” Then I will tell them plainly, “I never knew you; depart from Me, you workers of lawlessness!”

Dialogue Of Discipleship

I used to constantly fuss at my kids, always telling them what they were doing wrong. Until eventually, they just stopped listening.

And if I be completely transparent, I used to do the same thing with my husband. I will never forget one day I was griping at him and he looked at me and said, “Why should I try to change, when you’ll just find something else I’m doing wrong?” God had to teach me through some very hard lessons that when you are just constantly telling someone what they are doing wrong and giving them nothing to build with, you are damaging relationships instead of building them. Human beings need dialogue to build with, we need exchange, or we will tune each other out.

 
I did the same thing when I first started ministry. Until one day, the Holy Spirit showed me that I was doing the very same thing that made me not want to go to church anymore when I was a teenager. I didn’t want to go sit and listen to someone bark at me for an hour, rather than teach me. I’m just being brutally honest here, and I know that there will be a lot of people whose knee-jerk reaction will be to defend themselves, but the reason I am sharing this is for the sake of transparency. I am simply being truthful. What I needed at that time, was someone who could teach me how to relate to Jesus, someone who could meet me where I was in the darkness and show me the way out. Not someone who yelled directions at me from their mountaintop of righteousness.

The people who the Holy Spirit used to help me, were those who were honest about their struggles. Those who said, “I was an alcoholic too, but here are the things He taught me about debauchery and drunkenness…here are the mistakes I made and the lessons I learned. And here are some of the thoughts that I still struggle with, but here are the ways He has shown me to resist them.” That is true discipleship. John tells us that those who abide in Christ ought to walk in the same manner as He also walked, and beloved, Jesus related to people (1 John 2:6). He met them where they were at, He sat with them and ministered to them in ways that they could relate to and understand: agriculture, light/dark, fish, bread, water. The Gospels vividly depict a Savior who sinners seemed to find more approachable, than those who felt they had no sin.

I’ve also learned that if someone wants their sin more than they want to obey Jesus Christ, there is no amount of preaching that will change their heart. The only person who can deal with someone like that is the Holy Spirit, so the most helpful thing you can do for someone in a situation like that is to pray for God to give them eye salve so that they may see and to give you the words they need to hear at the proper time, once He’s dealt with their heart. We must be willing to pour out our hearts in prayer for the very souls we are trying to reach. Through my own mistakes, the Spirit has shown me that there are two ways we can have hardness of heart: a hardness of heart toward sin, and a hardness of heart toward sinners. One keeps us in our sin and the other causes us to sin, even in the midst of our fervent pursuit of righteousness.

 
And beloved, I will share with you one more very important thing God had to teach me by His own Spirit: He has not called us to be conformed to the image of the prophet Elijah nor John the Baptist, He has called us to be conformed to the image of His Son.

(Romans 8:30) For those God foreknew, He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son, so that He would be the firstborn among many brothers.

 
(Rev 12:12) They have conquered him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony.

(Mark 3:3-6) Then Jesus said to the man with the withered hand, “Stand up among us.” And He asked them, “Which is lawful on the Sabbath: to do good or to do evil, to save life or to destroy it?” But they were silent. Jesus looked around at them with anger and sorrow at their hardness of heart. Then He said to the man, “Stretch out your hand.” So he stretched it out, and it was restored. At this, the Pharisees went out and began plotting with the Herodians how they might kill Jesus.

(Eph 4:17-19) So I tell you this, and insist on it in the Lord, that you must no longer walk as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their thinking. They are darkened in their understanding and alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them due to the hardness of their hearts. Having lost all sense of shame, they have given themselves over to sensuality for the practice of every kind of impurity.

(Posted on Facebook 2/19/2021 Talitha Koum)

Faith Not Feelings

Some days I go out to my barn to feed the horses and pray. And other days I go to pray and feed the horses. Let me explain.

Some days I don’t feel like praying. I don’t feel like putting my rubber boots on, and walking all the way out there to sit in my dirty, dusty barn. I don’t feel like sitting on the hard, narrow hay loft steps and staring out the window at the big pile of dead limbs that’s been sitting by the back door since July. And I especially don’t like to go out there when it’s very very cold, like today or when it’s very very hot, like the end of August. So on days like that, the reason I go out there is to feed the horses because they need to eat. And while they are eating, I pray. I do this not because I feel like it, but because I know it is the right thing to do.

 
Other times, I rush to get dressed and put on my rubber boots, because I feel a pressing need to be with my Lord. I’m hungry for His presence, I have a lot to pour out to Him, a lot to talk through and I feel a very strong sense of Him drawing me to Himself, to sit at His feet. So the reason I go out to the barn is to pray, but before I pray, I feed the horses.

 
Either way, whether I feel like it or not, I do the right thing and go out to the barn. I pursue intimacy with My Lord in a way that is not controlled by my emotions, but by what my free will knows and understands is right and good and profitable. Sometimes my emotions are in line with what I know is right, and sometimes they are not. And beloved, this is the very reason we cannot base our relationship with Christ on our emotions instead of what His words teach us are the right things to do and the right choices to make.

 
You see, when we are done with this life in the flesh, we will all stand before the One Who created us and give an account of our choices. Our conscious existence does not end when our bodies wear out. Our flesh is a “vessel”, but our consciousness is an “entity” that has been infused with a perpetuity that our flesh does not yet have. Thus, as our basic laws of physics show us, this perpetuity— this energy that makes up our consciousness— does not die, it merely changes form.

 
And one day, every conscious, sentient form will stand before its Creator and give an account of the choices we made with the time and resources we were given. And beloved, there is only one choice that will matter more than all the others: Did we choose Him?

(John 11:25,26) Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in Me will live, even though he dies. Everyone who lives in me and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?”

(John 14:23,24) Jesus replied, "Anyone who loves me will obey my teaching. My Father will love them, and we will come to them and make our home with them. Anyone who does not love me will not obey my teaching. These words you hear are not my own; they belong to the Father who sent me.”

(2 Cor 5:10) For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may receive his due for the things done in the body, whether good or bad.

(Matt 10:28) Do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Instead, fear the One who can destroy both soul and body in hell.

(Matt 21:28-31) “But what do you think? There was a man who had two sons. He went to the first one and said, ‘Son, go and work today in the vineyard.’ And the son answered, ‘I will not.’ But afterward, having repented, he went. Then the man went to the second son and told him the same thing. ‘I will, sir,’ said the son, but he did not go. Which of the two did what his father wanted?" "The first," the chief priests and elders answered. And Jesus said to them, "Truly I tell you, the tax collectors and the prostitutes are entering the kingdom of God ahead of you.”

(Posted on Facebook 2/12/2021 Talitha Koum)

Trust The Path

Sometimes I get frustrated.

I live in a culture where sin is rampant. People are wallowing in it, even people in the church, and my flesh wants to rail against it. My flesh wants to stand up and shout and shake my fist against it. I have moments where I’m overwhelmed with anger and I ask God, “Just let me exegete, let me make my case with Scripture, let me crush this tide of unrighteousness with my pen.” But the Spirit keeps saying, “No. You will focus on My Son. You will focus on the Redeemer of unrighteousness. You will do it My way, not your way.”

It sounds bizarre to say that for me to preach against sin right now would be to indulge my flesh and to resist the leading of the Spirit. It just doesn’t make sense. As I prayed out in my barn this morning, I asked God, “Do not allow me to serve You based on my own reasoning, on what I think is needed by people or desired by You, because Your ways are so often not our ways. So often, Your ways go against our reasoning, against our well-thought out plans and our intellectual inferences.” I think of the grief Jesus must have endured during much of His ministry because many of the things He did went against others’ reasoning, even His own Apostles. There are many accounts in the Gospels where you can sense the tension of the situation among those who were surely thinking, “Jesus, what are you doing? This doesn’t make sense.”

In no way am I implying that we shouldn’t teach righteousness. What I am saying is that all things must be done only as the Spirit instructs us. And what the Spirit has been teaching me lately, is that when we focus on righteousness, as in “righteous actions”, we put the focus on us and our righteous works—what we’re doing right and what we’re doing wrong. We become obsessed with ourselves. But when we focus on Jesus as our righteousness, and thus describe to people His character and His ways and we share His words, we rightly put the focus upon Him. We focus less on ourselves and become entrenched in Jesus Christ as a real person. It is a subtle distinction, but it makes all the difference, because it is Jesus—the person—Who alone makes us righteous according the Father’s standard.

However, a bullet-point list of rules is much easier for us to deal with, rather than pursuing true depth of relationship with Jesus Christ. That is because depth of relationship with Jesus Christ forces us to look at our own heart, more so than our working hands. He forces us to face who we are, rather than allowing us to focus on what we do. As we grow in knowledge of Jesus Christ, He deals with our inner man, and beloved, that is inconvenient and very unpleasant indeed. But it is only this sanctified inner-knowledge of Him that will bear lasting fruit in His kingdom. Even so, it’s just so much easier for us to say, “Here are all the things you need to do,” rather than for us to say, “Let me share with you the person you need to know” based on our own personal knowledge of Him.

So, currently the Spirit has given me a choice: preach righteousness, or preach His Son. Preach what we must do, or preach Who we must know. Speak according to the leading of my own reason, or speak according the leading of His Spirit. Even. Though. It. Doesn’t. Make. Sense. Even though sometimes I feel frustrated as I hearken to His question that is ever ringing in my ears, “Do you trust Me?”

(Prov 3:5,6) Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight.

(Psalm 32:8-10) I will instruct you and teach you the way you should go; I will give you counsel and watch over you. Do not be like the horse or mule, which have no understanding, they must be controlled with bit and bridle to make them come to you. Many are the sorrows of the wicked, but loving devotion surrounds him who trusts in the LORD.

(Jer 17:7,8) But blessed is the one who trusts in the Lord, whose confidence is in Him. They will be like a tree planted by the water that sends out its roots by the stream. It does not fear when heat comes; its leaves are always green. It has no worries in a year of drought and never fails to bear fruit.

(Isaiah 26:2-4) Open the gates so a righteous nation may enter—one that remains faithful. You will keep in perfect peace the steadfast of mind, because he trusts in You. Trust in the Lord forever, because God the Lord is the Rock eternal.

(John 14:26,27) But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have told you. Peace I leave with you; My peace I give to you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled; do not be afraid.

(Posted on Facebook 2/11/2021 Talitha Koum)

Repentance For Righteousness

After God allowed me to go down the path of religious striving for a while, He finally brought me to a place of repentance. It may sound odd that God would bring someone to repentance who endeavored so “valiantly” to preach and teach righteousness, but He did.

 
God is able to use all of our circumstances as potter’s hands, even our misunderstandings, mistakes, and wanderings. And to even speak such a thing may cause many to feel uncomfortable, even a knee-jerk reaction to defend God and His narrow path, “Never should we wander! Never should such a thing be done among God’s elect!” But we do. Oh beloved, the truth is that sometimes we do wander off that path, but that is not the true tragedy. The true tragedy is that when we do, we still think we are on it because we are doing all the things right.

What I am confessing to you today, is that one of the hardest areas for me to put my faith in, was God’s sovereign dealings with His own children. But once I did that, I found true rest in my Lord. A rest that is promised when we trust in Him utterly and completely, and that includes His sovereign ability to build His own church—as He teaches us the ability to wait on Him, on His direction, His words and instructions—in utter faith that He will give them to us. And it is not God’s will for us to wander from the very narrow path, no indeed, but that narrowness involves much more than simply our death to sin and its decreasing appearance in our lives. The narrowness of God’s path is defined by the measurement of one crossbeam of wood, and the crucifixion of our flesh includes everything—even our own notions of goodness.

At Matt 19:16-26, the rich young ruler asks Jesus what “good thing must I do” to have eternal life? And Jesus gives him a two-part answer that has more to do with the young man’s heart, than his actual physical possessions. The first part of Jesus’ answer is, “There is only One Who is good, but if you wish to enter life, keep the commandments.” That is because the entrance to the way of God is to recognize our sin and desire to turn away from it, and we do that by repenting. Jesus is indeed the door, but we walk through that door by an act of faith-motivated repentance.

 
However, when we turn away from something, we must necessarily turn toward something else. And that is the second part of Jesus’ answer, where He says but “if you wish to be complete, go sell all you have…and come follow Me.” The willful desire to turn away from sin is merely the first step, the rest of the narrow path is the death of self as we follow Jesus Christ and He forms Himself and His own goodness in us to make us complete in Him. And that means we can bring no possessions with us, including our religion, our opinions, and our flawed reason—everything is put to death on that cross, and I do mean everything.

Oswald Chambers says it this way: “ ‘Sell all that thou hast’ — undress yourself morally before God of everything that might be a possession until you are a mere conscious human being, and then give God that. That is where the battle is fought — in the domain of the will before God. Are you more devoted to your idea of what Jesus wants than to Himself?” When God brought me to a place of repentance, He showed me that I was more rich in my notion of what I thought Jesus wanted, rather than Jesus Himself. But Jesus tells us what true riches are according to heaven: “Sell all that you have—all that you are and all that you think you are—and die on this cross with Me, let Me complete My holy work in you, let Me tell you who you are, let Me teach you what I want, and then pour yourself out to the spiritually destitute.” (Matt 19:21).

 
Beloved, we mustn’t make the mistake that God’s religious teachers made the first time Jesus came, which was to assume that when He called for repentance, He was speaking to everyone but us.

(Gal 2:20) I have been crucified with Christ, and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me.

(Phil 3:7-9) But whatever was gain to me I count as loss for the sake of Christ. More than that, I count all things as loss compared to the surpassing excellence of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for Whom I have lost all things. I consider them as rubbish, that I may gain Christ and be found in Him, not having my own righteousness from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God on the basis of faith.

(Jer 9:23,24) This is what the Lord says: “Let not the wise man boast in his wisdom, nor the strong man in his strength, nor the wealthy man in his riches. But let him who boasts boast in this, that he understands and knows Me, that I am the LORD, who exercises loving devotion, justice and righteousness on the earth—for I delight in these things,” declares the LORD.

(John 15:4-6) Remain in Me, and I will remain in you. Just as no branch can bear fruit by itself unless it remains in the vine, neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in Me. I am the vine and you are the branches. The one who remains in Me, and I in him, will bear much fruit. For apart from me you can do nothing. If anyone does not remain in Me, he is like a branch that is thrown away and withers. Such branches are gathered up, thrown into the fire, and burned.

(Posted on Facebook 2/9/2021 Talitha Koum)

Cleaning Our Cup

When I got up this morning and walked into my kitchen I was greeted by a sink full of dirty dishes and 3 days of accumulated countertop clutter.

I am often greeted by messes like this because even though I adore my precious little family, they are gross pigs who do not pick up after themselves. I used to constantly feel overwhelmed and discouraged, like I could never keep up with the pace of their mess, sorta like trying to brush your teeth while eating Oreos...you’re not really making any headway.

I used to also feel like this about my spiritual life. When the Holy Spirit began to convict me of sin and began to work on what the Bible refers to as my “inner man”— my thoughts, my emotions, my understanding and my character— there would be times when I felt like there was no way God could fix all the things in me that needed to be fixed (2 Cor 4:16; Eph 3:16). But what I found out was that God works within us much in the same way that I work when faced with a colossal mess in my kitchen sink— I start with one dish, clean it, rinse it, and move on to the next one. Over and over, I pick up something that needs to be washed and cleaned, I wash it and clean it, and then I move on to the next one. It is tedious work and it takes patience, perseverance, and commitment. And this is how the Holy Spirit works in each one of us, until eventually everything is washed and put in its proper place.

The first picture is of my colossal mess. The second picture is what that same area looks like after it’s been cleaned. But the third picture is all the things I moved out of the way to make the second picture look good. This too, is how we often are when God is doing His work in us. We show people the parts that have been cleaned, but off to the side is all the hidden stuff that is yet to be done. That is why we must be careful not to judge by appearances. We often times judge people by the size of their mess or by the clean parts we can see, but what we must understand is that it’s neither the size of the person’s mess nor how much has been cleaned, but their willingness to yield to the ongoing work that is being done. What matters is that the person is perpetually and increasingly yielding to the Spirit of God Who is at work within them.

 
Beloved, God is in the business of cleaning up His children’s mess, and that is often an ongoing, tedious work of His Holy Spirit. May we be gracious to each other and patient with each other as He carries out that holy work in each one of us, and may we fight for each other in intercessory prayer and yearn for each other to reach the fullness of our most holy and precious Redeemer, Jesus Christ our Lord.

 
(Phil 1:4-6) In every prayer for all of you, I always pray with joy, because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now, being confident of this, that He who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.

(Phil 2:12,13) Therefore, my beloved, just as you have always obeyed, not only in my presence, but now even more in my absence, continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling. For it is God who works in you to will and to act on behalf of His good purpose.

(Heb 7:25) Therefore He is able to save completely those who draw near to God through Him, since He always lives to intercede for them.

(2Thess 2:11-13) For you know that we treated each of you as a father treats his own children—encouraging you, comforting you, and urging you to walk in a manner worthy of God, who calls you into His own kingdom and glory. And we continually thank God because, when you received the word of God that you heard from us, you accepted it not as the word of men, but as the true word of God—the word which is now at work in you who believe.

(Eph 4:11-13) And it was He who gave some to be apostles, some to be prophets, some to be evangelists, and some to be pastors and teachers, to equip the saints for works of ministry and to build up the body of Christ, until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God, as we mature to the full measure of the stature of Christ.

(Posted on Facebook 2/7/2021 Talitha Koum)

Solution To Sin

I recall recently reading somewhere that the thing Satan hates most, is for us to expose wickedness. And that is untrue. The thing that Satan hates most is for us to preach Jesus Christ as the answer to wickedness. Satan is not bothered by our preaching righteousness, he is bothered when we preach that there is no righteousness outside of Jesus Christ. Satan could care less about human righteousness, but what he abhors is for us to walk in the imparted divine righteousness of God’s only Son.

 
You see, we are still not living the Gospel of Jesus Christ when we strive in our own righteousness, because the cross of Jesus Christ offensively proclaims, “Lest you put your faith in this macabre spectacle of atonement, you will remain a slave to sin. You cannot save yourself, you can never do right always, therefore you must die here, with your hands and feet pinned down until the life of your flesh is utterly spent. You must look to Me, and away from yourself, and be healed.” But we don’t like that, because we prefer the comforting notion that we are pleasing God because we are doing all the things right. However, that is merely a well-disguised seed of pride.

 
We must turn away from the concept that we can please God with our own righteousness, and instead, turn toward His Son Who gives us His. The only righteousness that is, and will ever be pleasing to God, is the righteousness of His crucified Son. That is the true Gospel of Jesus Christ: Christ crucified as the payment for sin and for the sake of effecting the manifestation of Christ in you, the hope of glory. The answer to sin, is to continually and willfully put your faith in the truth that you are now dead to sin and to yield to the righteousness of Jesus Christ which is put within us by faith, and manifested by the work of His Spirit, not ours.

 
Satan is not particularly bothered by our self-mustered boldness either. But what truly intimidates him is our willingness to die to ourselves and put on humility. To crucify our pride and bow down before the living God and confess, “Here is where I failed, this is what I’ve done wrong. I am spiritually destitute and I need a Savior.” Satan isn’t intimidated by our strength, but our willingness to embrace our weakness. And the cross stands as an eternal witness which proclaims both human weakness and divine mercy. The cross is where God chose to meet mankind with His eternal solution for sin. And that is why the cross of Jesus Christ is the one place where Satan is utterly powerless.

 
Therefore, beloved, it is not our exposing wickedness, but it is the cross of Jesus of Nazareth that Satan hates most.

 
(1 Cor 2:1-5) When I came to you, brothers, I did not come with eloquence or wisdom as I proclaimed to you the testimony about God. For I resolved to know nothing while I was with you except Jesus Christ and Him crucified. I came to you in weakness and fear, and with much trembling. My message and my preaching were not with persuasive words of wisdom, but with a demonstration of the Spirit’s power, so that your faith would not rest on men’s wisdom, but on God’s power.

(Gal 2:20-3:3) I have been crucified with Christ, and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me. I do not set aside the grace of God. For if righteousness comes through the law, Christ died for nothing... Before your very eyes Jesus Christ was clearly portrayed as crucified. I wish only to learn this from you: Did you receive the Spirit by works of the Law or by hearing of faith? Are you so foolish? After starting in the Spirit, are you now finishing in the flesh?

(Posted on Facebook 2/6/2021 Talitha Koum)

Solution To The Storm

A precious sister in Christ is reproducing this painting by Rembrandt entitled, “The Storm on the Sea of Galilee,” which he finished in 1633.

 
After reading her Facebook post this morning as she chronicles her meditations upon this work, I pulled out one of my old art history textbooks I’ve kept all these years and I silently meditated on Rembrandt’s original depiction of the account we are given in Scripture. As I contemplated the scene, words began to come forth from my spirit and I wrote them down. This is what I have to share with you today:

I am stuck on a boat in a dark, stormy sea
As I look all around, I see it’s not just me
There are others on this boat who tremble and fret
Who stare at the waves and dread getting wet

 
We stare at the loud crashing sea all around
We wonder, if lost would we ever be found?
The waves, the waves— the spray and the draught!
What if we die here and our faith is for naught?

We look to the rigging, as it tangles and sways
We wonder with angst, “Is it about to give ‘way?”
Will it snap, will it seize, will we be set adrift?
Will all hope be lost as we are snatched from His fist?

We lift up a cry as we look to the sails
As they whip and they rip, thinking surely they’ll fail
We grip as they strip, we have direction no more!
Oh where is our God who tends the needy and poor?

In terror we shrink from the dark angry sky
The hope held so long in our hearts seems to die
We buckle, we flail, we wail, “We are done!”
And then from below deck, appears God’s only Son

“Oh you of little faith, why ever did you doubt?
I warned you many times this day would come about
You focused on sails, rigging, and dark stormy seas
When all of this time you should have focused on Me

“You focus on each other, on who falls and who stands
You focus on whether your brother keeps all My commands
You focus on the boat, and the size of the waves
But you must focus on Me, the only One Who can save”

(Matt 8:23-26) When He got into the boat, His disciples followed Him. Suddenly a violent storm came up on the sea, so that the boat was engulfed by the waves; but Jesus was sleeping. The disciples went and woke Him, saying, “Lord, save us! We are perishing!” But He said to them, “Why are you fearful, O you of little faith?” Then He arose and rebuked the winds and the sea, and there was a great calm.

(Mark 4:39-41) And He got up and rebuked the wind and said to the sea, “Hush, be still.” And the wind died down and it became perfectly calm. “Why are you so afraid?” He asked. “Do you still have no faith?” Overwhelmed with fear, they asked one another, “Who is this, that even the wind and the sea obey Him?”

(Matt 5:9) Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called sons of God.

(Psalm 120:6-121:3) Too long have I dwelt among those who hate peace. I am in favor of peace; but when I speak, they want war. I lift up my eyes to the hills. From where does my help come? My help comes from the LORD, the Maker of heaven and earth. He will not allow your foot to slip; He who watches over you will not slumber.

(Photo “The Storm on the Sea of Galilee” by Rembrandt)

(Posted on Facebook 2/5/2021 Talitha Koum)

Ministry Of Mourning

This morning as I prayed with tears for my friend who just lost her mother, I thanked God for mourning.

 
I thanked Him for teaching us the sorrow of death. For allowing us to have tears of great sorrow and mourning. For allowing us to experience loss. As I wept and prayed, I thanked Him for bringing us to the depth of conscious experience, the valley of anguish. It is here that we begin to understand value. Value is typically understood in the context of loss or gain. To understand the value of something, you must understand it’s worth, and to understand its worth, you must know variance relative to a certain mean.

 
That is what sin has taught us. It has taught us of loss and brokenness, of sorrow and mourning, of not having and not understanding. Because we have experienced these things, we are able to truly comprehend the value of gain and healing, of joy and peace, of having and knowing. It is in this variance that we are able to comprehend and appreciate true worth.

 
As I prayed this morning, I also thanked God for His promises to us of eternal life. Because I have experienced the loss of loved ones, I comprehend the great value of God’s promises to us of eternal life through faith in Jesus Christ, which means that all those who have died in Christ will see each other again. Because I have experienced sickness and because I have watched loved ones die of sickness, I comprehend the great value of God’s promise to those in Christ of our resurrection in new bodies that will never be sick and will never die.

 
Because I have despaired, I have been able to exercise hope. Because I have wept, I have been able to receive comfort. Because of sin, God has taught us His unfathomable mercy. Because we die, we are not only able to rejoice in God’s promises of new life, but we also are able to comprehend the devastating cost of sin. It is this gamut of human experience that God has used to teach us value. As odd as it may seem to us, God has used our sin to teach us not to sin— to teach us the true value of righteousness through the consequences of sin.

 
Oh Lord, how unsearchable is Your wisdom and unfathomable Your ways! May we truly tremble before You in Your utter sovereignty over the works of Your hands!

(1 Thess 4:13,14) Brothers, we do not want you to be uninformed about those who sleep in death, so that you will not grieve like the rest, who are without hope. For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, we also believe that God will bring with Jesus those who have fallen asleep in Him.

(Rom 11:32 ) For God has consigned everyone to disobedience so that He may have mercy on everyone. O, the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgments, and untraceable His ways!

(Titus 2:11-13) For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation to everyone. It teaches us to say "No" to ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives in this present age, as we await the blessed hope and glorious appearance of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ.

(Phil 4:4-6) Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice! Let your gentleness be apparent to all. The Lord is near. Be anxious for nothing, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God.

(Posted on Facebook 2/1/2021 Talitha Koum)

Ministry Of Mercy

Can your heart be broken for the sinful pedophile
Or one who abuses your fellow man?
Can you weep with tears over the backslidden sinner
One who ignores all God’s commands?

Can you stand in the gap before the throne of heaven
Offering up the incense of prayer
For those who mock both you and God
With hearts full of rebellion and spiteful dare?

Can you stoop to your knees and wash the feet of Judas
Swallowing your pride and becoming meek
Serving the one whom you know will betray you
Putting a knife in your back swift and deep?

Can you pray against sin with fasting and sackcloth
Or do you prefer to shout from your box?
Can you ask God to soften your heart for sinners
To give you compassion and mercy for those who are lost?

What sort of God do we portray to others
What sort of Spirit fuels our work?
What remains hidden deep within our own heart
Where all our own blindness often lurks?

Oh Father may we bring our own hearts before You
May we humble ourselves as You lay our hearts bare
May we pray “Father search me and try me
That I may show others Your true Holy care.”

 
O Lord, as You ask these questions and examine our hearts
As you search our ways from so high above
May we yield to Your hand and tremble before You
As You teach us the true meaning of Calvary love

(Psalm 139:23,24) Search me, O God, and know my heart; Put me to the test and know my anxious thoughts; And see if there is any hurtful way in me, And lead me in the everlasting way.

(Psalm 19:12) Who can discern his own errors? Cleanse me from my hidden faults.

(Hosea 3:1) Then the LORD said to me, “Go show love to your wife again, though she is loved by another and is an adulteress. Love her as the LORD loves the Israelites, though they turn to other gods and offer raisin cakes to idols.”

(John 13:34 ) A new commandment I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you also must love one another. By this all will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.

(Matt 5:43 ) You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor’ and ‘Hate your enemy.’ But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be sons of your Father in heaven. He causes His sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous.

(Posted on Facebook 1/29/2021 Talitha Koum)

Ministry Of Redemption

It is one thing to be set free from the bondages of sin, but it is quite another to learn how to live set free. It is one thing to mentally apprehend a truth of God, a truth of your salvation, but it is quite another for God to work that truth into the very core of your being, to set that truth into the quick of your soul as it completely redefines who you are.

A couple years ago, I was sitting in the waiting room of a clinic, waiting for my daughter to get out of her oral surgery procedure. I was wrestling with some things that morning. I was hurting. I was mourning some of my wrong patterns of thinking, some of my character weaknesses and flaws, and that morning, hopelessness paced the doorstep of my heart like a hungry cougar. Watching and waiting for the opportune moment to strike. It wanted to have me, it wanted to set up camp in my heart as I contemplated some of the sinful tendencies that I continued to struggle with. As I sat there that morning and cried out to God with my whole heart, I wrote a poem.

Beloved, I want you to know today that there are times that I struggle against sin in my life. Not so much outward sins, things that you can see, but the inner ones—the work that God is still performing on the inside of me—my thoughts, my emotions, my perceptions. What you need to understand is that our struggle is part of our shaping. God uses our struggle to mold us, to teach us perseverance, persistence, faithfulness, and determination. It is not okay to sin, but it is okay to struggle against it, because that is what we are supposed to do. Crucifixion is a writhing struggle, the body of flesh fighting for each breath as the life is slowly suffocated out of the one crucified.

When we put our faith in Jesus Christ, we join Him in His death, and it is at that point in your existence that the glorious work of the Spirit begins. Your spiritual truth is that you are dead to sin from that moment on, but it is the Spirit’s work to show you how to live that way, how to think that way, how to walk that way, and beloved, that is a glorious struggle. Brother or sister, if you are struggling today, I want you to know that I am right there with you. I want you to know that He is right there with you. Oh beloved, we don’t die on that cross alone, we join Him on it in His embrace.

“I Need”
Written 12/9/2019

I need You this morning
As I sit here
Confronted by my ugliness
My broken nature staring back at me, saying:
"You'll never escape from me,
You will always be in my grip
No matter where you run
I will be there waiting for you."

I need You this morning
As I sit here
Contemplating Your promises
Your holy nature says to me:
"You are safe in Me,
Nothing can snatch you out of my hand
There is no need to run
You have not received a spirit of fear."

I need You this morning
As my heart aches for healing and my soul thirsts for truth
And yet
My heart is satisfied with wholeness and my soul is sated with Your presence
I need you this morning
As my flesh demands its own way and my will struggles against Yours
And yet
My flesh humbles itself and my will surrenders to Yours

Back and forth I amble
Swayed one way and then the next
As my hope rises and falls like the tide
As my faith stands and buckles like the rising and setting sun
As my trust blooms and wilts like the spring and fall flowers
I wonder this morning
Do you see me being torn apart?
Do you see this collision of natures within me?
Do you see these laws at war in my innermost being?
Do you see me in torment?
Do you see?

"Yes child, I see.
I see My provision of grace: forgiveness replacing condemnation
I see you justified by faith: righteousness replacing sin
I see My Son being formed in you
I see you filled by My Spirit and shaped by My hand
I see."

Yes, You see
And yet, I wonder this morning
How do we walk in a faith that brings both death and life?
How do we both die and live?
How do we trust in a hope of both slavery and freedom?
How are we both submitted and set free?

"Child, listen to Me this morning
Your faith makes you dead to sin but alive in Christ
That is how you die and yet live
By My Spirit you are a slave to all that is right and good, set free to bear My image
That is how you are both submitted and set free
Submitted to my Spirit and set free from the letter
Crucified to your flesh and raised to life in the Spirit

"I am here this morning
As you sit here
Bending your knee to grace, and bowing your head to blood
As your heart both aches and is healed
As your soul both thirsts and is filled
You will always be in My grip
No matter where you run
I will be there waiting for you"

(Rom 8:1-4) There is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit Who gives life has set you free from the law of sin and death. For what the law was powerless to do because it was weakened by the flesh, God did by sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh to be a sin offering. And so He condemned sin in the flesh, in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fully met in us, who do not live according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.

 
(Rom 6:11-23) ...count yourselves dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus...offer yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life; and offer every part of yourself to Him as an instrument of righteousness. For sin shall no longer be your master, because you are not under the law, but under grace...you have been set free from sin and have become slaves to righteousness...But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves of God, the benefit you reap leads to holiness, and the result is eternal life. For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.

(Posted on Facebook 1/28/2021 Talitha Koum)

Ministry Of Reconciliation

One of the greatest lessons the Lord ever taught me was when my brother and I were barely on speaking terms for almost 6 years. We had a falling out because he did some things that were morally reprehensible. I was disappointed in him as his big sister, and I called him out for his wrongs. For almost 6 years I held my ground that I was justified in calling out my brother’s sin and believed that I was the one who was standing on the moral high ground, suffering his rejection for my righteous perception and willingness to honor God by calling out my brother’s sin.

But one day, as I was preparing a message from the Sermon on the Mount in regard to Matthew 5:23,24, the Holy Spirit said in my mind, clear as day, “Apologize to your brother.” I immediately felt righteous indignation and began to defend myself and justify why I was right and he was wrong and if anyone should be apologizing, it should be him. After all, he was the sinner, not me. He was the one who was breaking God’s laws, not me—I was serving God, I was teaching His word, I was willing to call out sin as sin and stand on my convictions. But on that day, God showed me that in my heart, I saw myself as morally superior to my brother. He showed me that I held contempt in my heart toward sinners. He showed me that when I called out sin, I did it with anger in my heart. I was angry at people for their sin. And instead of interceding for them, as a priest of God’s kingdom should do, I was bringing them before His throne like Satan and accusing them (Zechariah 3:1; Rev 12:10).

On that day, God showed me what He could see but I could not: that I had been unmerciful toward my brother and that I had contemptuously wanted my brother to feel shame for what he did, I wanted my brother to be judged. But what God showed me on that day, was that He took far more issue with what was in my heart toward my brother, rather than what my brother did in his flesh in ignorance and immaturity. The Sprit told me to apologize to my brother for shaming him and for my harshness and to not defend myself or try to justify why I did it, but to simply die to my pride, humble myself, and show my brother the true, reconciliatory love of Jesus Christ.

A few days later, when I met my brother for lunch, I could tell that he was expecting me to come at him with both holy-shotgun barrels a’blastin’. And I will never forget the look on his face when I simply told him that I loved him and that I was sorry if I hurt him. His eyes filled with tears and it was like a huge weight had been lifted from us. In an instant, all the bitterness between us melted away and everything was healed. It wasn’t me calling out my brother’s sin that had healing power, it was my willingness to die to my own reasoning and pride and reach out to him in meekness and mercy.

(Gal 5:21,22) But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. Against such things there is no law.

(Col 3:12) Therefore, as the elect of God, holy and beloved, clothe yourselves with hearts of compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience.

(Eccl 7:8) The end of a matter is better than the beginning, and a patient spirit is better than a proud one.

(Luke 9:53- ) But the people there refused to welcome Him, because He was heading for Jerusalem. When the disciples, James and John saw this, they asked, “Lord, do You want us to call down fire from heaven and consume them?” But Jesus turned and rebuked them and said, "You do not know what kind of spirit you are of.”

(1 Peter 2:6) .. you also, like living stones, are being built into a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood, offering spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.

(Heb 7:25) Therefore He is able to save completely those who draw near to God through Him, since He always lives to intercede for them.

(Heb 12:14,15) Pursue peace with all men, and the sanctification without which no one will see the Lord. See to it that no one comes short of the grace of God; that no root of bitterness springs up to cause trouble and defile many.

(2 Cor 5:18-20) All this is from God, Who reconciled us to Himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: that God was reconciling the world to Himself in Christ, not counting men’s trespasses against them. And He has committed to us the message of reconciliation. Therefore we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were making His appeal through us. We implore you on behalf of Christ: Be reconciled to God.

(Posted on Facebook 1/26/2021 Talitha Koum)