Jeremiah 24:8-10

But thus says the Lord: Like the bad figs that are so bad they cannot be eaten, so will I treat Zedekiah the king of Judah, his officials, the remnant of Jerusalem who remain in this land, and those who dwell in the land of Egypt. I will make them a horror to all the kingdoms of the earth, to be a reproach, a byword, a taunt, and a curse in all the places where I shall drive them. And I will send sword, famine, and pestilence upon them, until they shall be utterly destroyed from the land that I gave to them and their fathers. 

In the context of this chapter, there is quite a bit to be discussed. First off, there is a relationship between bag figs and the ground. If you don't know one of the reasons that figs, as well as other citric fruits, go bad is because of their relationship with yeasts that find their way into open wounds on the fruit of the figs. Often times these yeasts that cause disease ends up spreading to other fruits on the tree, and can eventually contaminate an entire grove of trees if you don't catch it early. Just as the open wounds on the tree allow for sickness and death to infiltrate the fruit, so it is with humans, which is why God is making the comparison in this passage. The LORD wanted so badly to keep this infected people from the Land that He called blessed and Holy that He drove them away from Jerusalem and only allowed the people who were clear of infection back into the land with an open invitation. I think this also speaks to the ill effect that humans can have in the land, and as such. What I also find interesting is the directions on how to take care of a diseased fruit in your garden, found here. Seemingly the gravest direction to follow is this one: "If you see one fruit beginning to sour, remove it and any adjacent fruit." with the general warning saying "you cannot save a fruit once the rot has begun."

Fascinating, no? The command given by this person who seemingly has experience in gardening is to rid the garden of the fruit that is rotten and drive it to a foreign land. This purging process that the Lord had started with Ahab in 1 Kings 22, and then showed up with loudness in 2 Kings 24:18-20 as Zedekiah is first seen in the court of the King, and then later promoted to the king even though he was the one who slapped the known prophet in the face. This gives you a good picture of the political and corrupt nature of the Israeli government at the time. It was so corrupt that God forbade them from walking again on the land because of the inherent toxicity that would follow them if they walked in Jerusalem again. 

I'm going to take it a step further and say this: the biggest reason there was an exile of the Israeli people is because the Lord needed to cleanse it on His own terms. It's often spoken about the prophetic nature of the fact that there were seven 70's of rest for the land to be had, according to Levitical law. However, it's even more important to consider that the people of Israel needed to be cleansed in a land other than their home so that they could go back and not continue to hurt what God had called Holy. The figs needed to be separated, and then the good figs needed to be recognized and called back to Jerusalem where the Messiah would establish His righteous rule and hegemony. In revelations, it will be considered idolatrous and dishonorable if one does not send their righteous people back to Jerusalem. 

Assess where you are

Assessing things implies that you are able to see, usually. With such a subject as this though it requires you to think conceptually and maybe even theosophically. Here are some steps to hopefully aid in your journey of assessing where you are, and what God is doing in your life.

First, ask the Lord. Each of these takes in the assumption that you have an active relationship with God, and are eager to grow more with Him. If this assumption is not true, this post won't work for you and I'd really suggest moving forward with that first. The first question is this: is there anything in my life that I need to confess, any sin to make me right with you Lord? Anything in my life that you wouldn't call "good", oh Lord? If you do not hear anything, listen again. Wait. If you hear "good to go" or something of the sort, then keep reading. If you hear something else follow that rabbit hole until you hear "good to go". As with each step, these steps are also repeatable. However, most of the steps should open a dialogue between you and the Lord. 

Next, ask how the Lord sees you, and how He sees where you are. There's no wrong answer here, but if you're in a dark place you can either ask the Lord how to get out of that, or if you see yourself in a different location, ask about what you see. How each thing affects you, and why you are there in the first place. 

After that, ask how and what to eat to stay nourished on God, yet famished for His word. 

Then listen, and hear. 

Sacrifices, Gifts, and Souls

What are you willing to give up?
To holistically follow Jesus.

The first stop He usually makes in my experience is our relationships, especially of those that we have over or undervalued. When you've invited the Holy Spirit to judge your heart and to know you. All of you in a way that only He can.

You can study Love forever, but until you've known what it is like to be loved and known, and judged by the humble creator of you, who knows your downfalls and your pick-me-ups, who knows how to encourage you and break you down, and who knows what He's doing when He leaves you in a desert, then I'm afraid that I cannot say you've experienced love. True love is this, that a brother would lay down his life for the sake of others, so that others may receive gain by his loss. By God, how great a love is that. This is what true friendship is, what true relationship is.

The second stop He usually makes is our own works and deeds. Some things are simply harder to get rid of than others, and the steps might be in a different order for you. Yet a big problem of mine was the fact that I thought I could earn my way to God through sacrificing enough time, doing enough things to earn his attention, or Love. Yet as it expresses in Job, Psalms, even minor prophets "who can repay the Lord, and who can He be in debt to?"

You may sacrifice as much as you want, as often as you like, yet it will never ever come close to the sacrifice that God made when His son was lost. Not only that but through a series of covenants and vows the Lord has made, He has sacrificed His own will to a system that is constantly tried by evil forces to be abused and He has chosen to (as far as I can tell) continue to only work through His creation. 

The Third stop He makes is your motivations. The deep desires and drives you have within your heart. Some of them programmed by the world you live in to be within you, and others created by God for you to have. Why are you doing things for Him when your heart is far from Him? He does not require simple acts or sacrifices, He requires your life. You must be willing to give back to the Lord Most High the life that He gave you, else it will never amount to anything in terms of eternity. Most likely, it will be forgotten by all. He requires complete allegiance and loyalty to His kingdom. To His truth. You do not serve governments of the world, you do not serve businesses, and you do not serve yourself until You have done what you do unto the world. 

If we are all warriors, you must consider at some point how willing you are to lose your life to the enemy's tactics. You must realize that our ultimate gift is that of eternal life, the life that we can live in the reality of right now, and know deeply that there is a very great demand on our heads. If you truly want to see the expansion of the kingdom, practice the power of presence, and walk with boldness against all foreheads, proclaiming truth no matter what. You must be willing to die yourself, as this is what the King demands. We are in war.  It is time to start living like it.

My Spirit is your Spirit

I was sweeping the cobblestone floors of that ancient house that I live in here in France this afternoon, sweeping the gravel and loose leaves into a large metal bin, listening to a testimony about how God is in the small things. About how the glory is in the details. Ever wondered why the phrase goes like "the devil is in the details"? Well, I'll tell you, it's because the devil is trying to steal the details from God, and it's frankly quite disgusting. The small details matter, the words that person said, the dynamics of the spiritual gifting of the land that you are roomed right over, the people you come into contact with at the grocery store, on your walks. The color of your toilet paper. These details don't necessarily matter to me, but they matter to God, and that's sort of the only thing that matters

This specific testimony was a story about how God changed 6 timeline events by causing a countless number of things to fall into motion, far too many to count because each item that the person interacted with was only one side of what God was moving into action. I am compiling quite a few memories of how God chose to move in a direction without me knowing leaving me to be surprised by His wonderful actions, only to go back to Him and ask Him to not surprise me like that. Later I rescinded that prayer because I realized that as much as I loved knowing what He was going to do next, I was far more interested in hearing about what He WAS in, rather than what He is going to be in. Although, I'm learning how to have a good mix of both in my life, and that's cool too.

There are also small things that really really irk me, and I can't help but think that God feels the same way about many of the things humans do. We don't just please God just because we are, in fact, it is almost never that easy. You can be saved, and still have your Heavenly Father with an account of things He has against you because you haven't asked for forgiveness, or realized the hurt of that specific sin. Often times we ignore that cancerous anxiety in our chest in favor of listening to feel good Bethel or Hillsong music about how God never is irritated, always has our backs, would never ever do anything to hurt us all the while the doctrine that these songs are teaching is far from biblical. What's worse is that we turn a blatant eye to His open hands saying "Son! Please! Yes, you offend me, but even more so you betray me! But we can work this out. Trust me." When we do this, listening to songs about Holy Spirit, or acting all spiritual we not only succeed in backstabbing the God we proclaim to love so much, we quench the Spirit. It is blatant sin and downright idolatry. The Spirit that is your spirit, and the Holy Spirit that when you asked God to be one with you and to make you His, your spirit became one with. Not only do you miss out on the beauty and Holiness that the Lord offers all of His children to see, but you miss the satisfaction of seeing His work come through your hands. 

As a church, we should be Kingdom, Yahweh, Spirit first people. Instead, we're production, sound, sermon, pastor, prophet, apostle, missionary, lost sheep, church, well digging, revelation giving, comfort, money, material, Bible first people. The problem is not these things, the problem is that they are first. The Kingdom will outlast each and every one of these things. Heaven will be far more real than your salvation ever could be. Ever thought about that one? Well do it, and then live like it. Live as if it is, and it will be. But don't take that sentence out of context, because we don't need your proclaim it and name it prayers around here, we need warriors willing to fight for the greater good of the kingdom. The numbers will be lost. People will be sacrificed unto the Glory of God. 

But then again, God is in the small things. 

Total Depravity

Unfortunately, these two words have a totally different notion attached than what I'm talking about, however, it does add to the point that I would like to make. Often this phrase is used with the focus on the man. There is almost never a context with which it is used without comparison, and even less frequently is it heard being used to honor God and the way that God describes man in places like Psalm 8, or 82. In my experience, it almost never conjures the effect of repentance, rather, it conjures feelings of worthlessness, self-hatred, and doubt. Often it is attached to the predisposition that a man could never be righteous, and even more frustratingly is used by pastors and preachers to make someone feel awful about themselves. 

All this is done whilst keeping the focus on the man, and forcing the person to look into themselves. Jesus wasn't just building self-awareness in his disciples though, He was building awareness of what He was doing in them. To me, what Jesus is doing inside of me is infinitely more valuable to me than knowing how bad of a person I can be. I think the way that this function is designed goes a little bit like this: You look inside yourself, you see the purity, the God-honoring thoughts, and processes that you have started to live and have, and then you turn your focus to the Person who put those thoughts and ways inside of you and worship with abandon and awe. In many ways, we were meant to build up our activity of judging and discerning, yet there is a redemptive version of judging, and then there's the version that the enemy does. The enemy of God only looks at the bad things, only discerns the hurtful ways within you. Then there's the positivity movement that only looks at the good things inside of you. They're both wrong, but they both need each other to be fully truthful. 

As far as I'm concerned being "good" according to Jesus is a title only God gets. I think "being right" is the exact same, and to be good is to be right. Very few people are ever 'right' and far fewer are 'always right.' I would even go so far to say that it is impossible to always be right, but Jesus says that with God all things are possible. So to me, the only goal we should have is to be with God. With God, we can judge righteously. With God, we can have the perspective that is wholesome and true. With God, we can see people the way He sees them, and see ourselves the way He sees us.

God is capable of anger and wrath. God is capable of being mad at you. God is much more prone to being radically in love with you, and as such is the single most attractive being ever. Just learn to live in that.

Discernment of Spirits

So to get in line with what I'll be talking about, I'd recommend that you begin to study the different categories of "spirits". I could try to list them off here but to me, there are only two truly important spirit categories; that is the Spirit of God and the spirit of man. You need discernment for both, for the first to know the thoughts, the actions and the way the wind blows of God, and the second for the sake of knowing what God has stored in you, and in others. Part of the responsibility we have here on earth is not only to unpack our birthright but to also unpack the birthright of others.  You need discernment to be able to see into a portion of the birthright people have within them.

I currently work with a school of people who practice prophesying frequently. The topics are broad and plenty, and the methods are few and concentrated. From what I can tell one of the easiest questions to ask God when you want to prophesy over someone is "what do you want to say to this person, Lord?" Sometimes, if you've grown further in trusting your heart with the Lord, you'll already have something about the person on your heart before you even know you are going to prophesy over them. This comes first and foremost with the discernment of the thoughts of the spirit of God. Yet there are certain things that you can ask God, and as you continue to grow in trust of His voice for you, you'll know when He answers questions and when He leaves it up to you to decide. There's an infinite expanse of questions you're able to ask, and I'd definitely recommend things akin to "what do you want to do in this person's life about work? About their business?  About their spirit? About their walk with you? To me, the most helpful way that I've found to get to know God's voice is just by expecting an answer when I ask a question. Reflecting on the kind of person I have tended to be over the past while has been a person who mainly talks in questions. If you know me, you'll know that that tends to be the case. There are lots of different types of questions, but there's no real spirit attached to each category, just the questions that the spirit asks. These questions can be asked by any other entity though. 

On the other hand, discerning the spirit of a human is a far more other-worldly subject, and the ministry I owe the most revelation and appreciation toward with this is Arthur Burk with Sapphire Leadership Group. They have been into ministering to the Human Spirit far longer than even I've been around, and as such have an expanse of materials with layered approaches to blessing, loving, and unpacking what God has placed in us. Furthermore, he's one of the most biblically grounded preachers I believe I've listened to, without all the systematic theology that often gets attached to those proficient in the Bible. Part of the reason I love the Bible in the first place is because of the sheer amount of mystery that it contains. If you can explain to me why the Israelites ran in 2 Kings 2, I'd probably give you a hug, and maybe even send you a blessing. Then again, if you want a blessing, just ask.

All this to say that there are things that have helped me with discerning the human spirit, and this ministry has been the biggest contributor by far. But I'm working on becoming proficient on my own, and if you do go down this road you'll learn that it's not just some on-ramp and then you're going. It's a very long country road with bends, and winds, curves, and places where you must slow down to avoid the cars coming from the other side. Your discernment grows the more you travel the road, but just as if it were an infinitely long road in an infinitely grand mountain range, you'll never travel the same mile twice. As such, handling the road with the intuition you receive from driving the car is just about the only thing you can count on. That and being able to see ahead much farther in some cases, and being willing to look ahead to other curves in the distant future that will eventually get hidden behind the next curve. 

Beloved, I call your spirit forward and bless you with the foreknowledge and intuition to look ahead at the curves that are coming on your road. I bless you with a comfortableness and familiarity in your mode of transportation, and I bless you as you continue to grow in confidence with handling the road with the necessary skill and forward motion to continue your momentum. I bless you with knowing when to take a side road off the main route, and when to continue on the path that you had been on. I bless you, spirit, with the ecstatic joy that you may have in the process of your driving. In the name of Jesus, I bless you. Amen.

Kingdom Debt Collectors

The concept plays in hand with the fact that Jesus both paid all of our debts with a king's ransom, and that he spent his life so that everything that was taken from us by being in debt to the enemy was to be collected by the angels of the Lord. Yet there are also certain debts we have to God, as He has embezzled certain things from the treasury of Heaven and stored them into us in secret. 

Proverbs 25:2 It is the glory of God to conceal a matter; to search out a matter is the glory of kings. 

I think this proverb captures the idea quite nicely, and as such a "matter" is not just an idea or a concept, but a real gem, a treasure that you can hold and interact with. It's also the word used for phrases, words. Words that God has spoken for, and about, His kings. Take into consideration that if Kings are glorified debt collectors, all we are really doing is discovering what we are in debt to our God for, and claiming it as our own as we discover who God says we are. However, rather than building anxiety and terror into us for being in debt, we discover that we can grow in awe and wonder at what God has created, and instead thank Him and stay in a place of gratitude as we unpack the things He's placed inside of us.

Let's take it a step further, collecting these debts is your kingdom, God-given, duty. Each of us has this one duty, yet there are many different mediums of which you will be able to find treasures God has embezzled. The medium of art, land, time, community, nature. There are so many things that God has hidden in every circle of society, and purposes to each of these gems that He has placed in them. Holy, good, and whole purposes that are ultimately fulfilling. There are also people designed to discover the different matters that God has placed in different places. I'm beginning to think that the church itself isn't supposed to be its own sphere of society, but that it is to be so integrated into the culture of the world that it is indistinguishable from the boundaries that we have around it today. Not to say that the people wouldn't need to be holy, but other than gems in the community that we're still discovering in the church, we need to understand that as the church we are to discover gems in every portion of the world and subdue it as we learn the principles and God-given purposes to each and every particle of the world around us. 

I used this language to make it a little mischievous on purpose. Mostly because it makes me laugh and I enjoy the sense of mystery behind it, and to me, God hasn't truly stolen from anyone, He just hid what He made from what He made. He has every legal liberty to do that, yet the embezzlement property would technically imply that He's stealing from Himself. That's a concept that you can expunge biblically, yet this is not the post for it. Look forward to the next one where that is talked about.

For now, take some time with the Lord, be silent before Him and enjoy His presence, Beloved.