The High Calling of God

 "For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places. Therefore take up the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand." Ephesians 6:12.13 Recently, I have heard several people, including myself, say that they suddenly found themselves in a battle. They were almost blindsided, and before they knew it- BAM! Hit by the schemes of the enemy. Just before this, our Church experienced a visitation of the power of God two weeks in a row. In the fist service, the Spirit took over and we were in worship and praise, bowing before Him. There was confession, repentance, intercession, manifestation of the gifts. The Lord was really dealing with us as a body of Christ. The following week, without us trying to duplicate  the previous week-(because you can't duplicate the moves of God

Romans 8:18-23    V s. 18- 19 "I am convinced that any suffering we endure is less than nothing compared to the magnitude of glory that is about to be unveiled within us. The entire universe is standing on tiptoe, yearning to see the unveiling of God's glorious sons and daughters! "      Vs. 23 "And it's not just creation. We who have already experienced the firstfruits of the Spirit also inwardly groan as we passionately long to experience our full status as God's sons and daughters-including our physical bodies being transformed."   Full status or status quo? According to Webster's on-line dictionary "status quo" means "the existing state of affairs."  "normalcy", "normality".  It means never wanting change- just leave things the way they are. In the scripture above- those Christians who want to go further with God, those Christians who long for more than just the status quo- those who long for more of Chr

2 Corinthians 3:18       "And we all, with unveiled face, continually seeing as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are progressively being transformed into His image from (one degree of) glory to (even more) glory, which comes from the Lord, (Who is the Spirit)." (Amplified Bible ) Wow! This sounds so exciting, doesn't it!  To be constantly changed by the Lord from one level of glory to another! You might say- I want this!  But hold on a minute. Not so fast. These levels don't just change automatically. If you read on into the next chapter, you will see that there is a process. There is no price for salvation. Period. It is that free gift from God through Christ's redemptive work and power on the cross and His resurrection. But, after that- there is a life to be lived for the glory of God. 2 Corinthians 4:8-18 talks about all the things that life entails: hard-pressed on every side- but not crushed. Perplexed but not in despair. It goes on: persecuted but not fors

Message begins at 19 minutes and 55 seconds-- after worship  

 Preaching starts about 12 minutes in after worship 

  Waiting on God. I hear a lot today about "moving forward" but not too much on "waiting". Many Christians don't want to wait. The trendy teaching today is: "Go for it!" Go for your dreams!  Find your purpose- your calling. Fulfill your calling, Find your purpose, your destiny. Bookshelves are full of these kinds of books, but just look for a book on "Waiting on God."  Hard to find. All these topics are not wrong in themselves- but sometimes, I think, we put too much emphasis on getting to where we think we should be, without a true Word from God. We spend so much time on what we want to "do" for Christ, instead of establishing a relationship with Him first- allowing Him to refine us, decrease us, purge self out of ourselves- so that we will be full of Him when we do go out. We absolutely must know our purpose and our destiny, but in order to find that, there is a certain place we must be in first.  I may be in the minority here, bu

    This is NOT a national prayer, as many today have made it out to be. It is a prayer that the Church should be praying for the Church. When Solomon wrote this, it was for the nation Israel. But God is telling His CHURCH- that we must obey this command    2 Chronicles 7:12-22   The following contains excerpts of a message I preached on Sunday, July 7, 2024. God had woke me up in the middle of the night and gave me this message. I had already had a message prepared and ready to go, but God changed it. With all that is going on in the world and our nation today- this message is, I can say, directly God's desire for His people. It isn't anything new and many have spoken, preached and written about it. But it is time for the Church- God's people- who are called by His name, to repent- to humble ourselves, seek Him and His will, pray and turn from our own individual ways- and He will- and does- hear from heaven. He will heal us as a Church- and He will bring healing into our