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Thought of the day: November 18, 2023: Genuine or Counterfeit: Led or Driven? Fear or Faith?
Beloved,God has not given us a spirit of fear, for fear has torment with it. Perfect love cast out all fear. God says, Fear not, I am with you, do not be dismayed, for I a your God. I will strengthen and help you (RIGHT NOW) and I will uphold you with my right hand (RIGHT NOW).
God is with us through every trial, through every storm, every failure, and every victory. God changes not. We must trust Him.
These past few years have been the severest testing of our faith we have ever gone through. Through the tears, the heartaches, the losses, the failures, the emptying, until absolute dependence and surrender came forth in our heart it was so tough, BUT GOD in our WEAKNESS is our STRENGTH.
I would never have chosen these things to walk through and you would not either, but God is wise and sometimes the wilderness is a place we must walk for God to refine us like fire and fuller soap.
Our faith must be proven, and our love made pure that no matter what, when or how, we must always trust in the Lord with all our heart and lean not on our own understanding.
For our understanding will fail us, our wisdom will be nothing, our strength will produce nothing for apart from him we can do nothing.
A NEW SEASON:
This is a season where God is perfecting us. He is desiring to turn everything that is wrong in us to be made right. He is here to remove every spot or wrinkle to make us a glory filled bride ready for our entrance with him.
The spirit of burning and the spirit of Judgment of Isaiah 4 is upon us and it is burning up the vanity and pride of all our self effort and every place we have tried to fix ourselves.
The only way we are going to make it and be finished is to keep our eyes fully on the face of Jesus as in a mirror. His reflection will change our appearance and nature when we behold him.
I have told people these last few years have been the most difficult hard to deal with and hard to bear time in our lives.
There were times I couldn’t breath or move, but in the darkest of times then and now one thing is for sure, GOD IS GOD!
We walk by faith and not by sight. We walk by faith and not by fear. God has given us the spirit of love, power and a sound mind if we trust in His perfect love.
So many things need to change. So many things have to still be dealt with in me and those hungering for God. We have not arrived, but I pray we are pressing on toward the high calling of God to run the race set before us.
WE MUST STOP BEING DRIVEN:
One of the things that God has to do in us is stop being “driven by a lying spirit.” I see this in so many because they can never enter the rest of God.”
They feel if they are not doing something their value is diminished so they work harder and harder to fit in, try to gain approval and acceptance.
ARE YOUR THOUGHTS FILLED WITH THAT IF YOU TRY HARDER YOU ARE GOING TO MISS IT, FAIL GOD, NOT MAKE IT IN, NOT HEAR WELL DONE GOOD AND FAITHFUL SERVANT?
If so that is fertile ground for the enemy to FILL YOU WITH A LYING SPIRIT THAT WILL DRIVE YOU TO DO, INSTEAD OF ENTERING THE REST OF GOD AND BE WHO GOD HAS MADE YOU.
Beloved, early in my walk God spoke to me a word that changed my life. He said, “Henry, what I am making you is more valuable to Me, than anything you will ever do for me.”
Beloved, that Word from God set me free in so many ways. Our contentment must be In Christ alone, not working for him. If working is our priority we will be driven by a lying spirit and function under a counterfeit anointing which so many cannot discern.
WHO HAS BEWITCHED YOU?
Many think that if they work harder to perfect themselves by reading more, praying more, fasting more they can reach maturity like the church at Galatia.
Paul had to rebuke that church for they came under a lying driving spirit that caused them to trust in their own power to achieve then through God who started that good work in them.
Galatians 3 amps
1. Oh you poor and silly and thoughtless and unreflecting and senseless Galatians! Who has fascinated or bewitched or cast a spell over you, unto whom—right before your very eyes—Jesus Christ (the Messiah) was openly and graphically set forth and portrayed as crucified?
2 Let me ask you this one question: Did you receive the [Holy] Spirit as the result of obeying the Law and doing its works, or was it by hearing [the message of the Gospel] and believing [it]? [Was it from observing a law of rituals or from a message of faith?]
3 Are you so foolish and so senseless and so silly? Having begun [your new life spiritually] with the [Holy] Spirit, are you now reaching perfection [by dependence] on the flesh?
4 Have you suffered so many things and experienced so much all for nothing (to no purpose)—if it really is to no purpose and in vain?
5 Then does He Who supplies you with His marvelous [Holy] Spirit and works powerfully and miraculously among you do so on [the grounds of your doing] what the Law demands, or because of your believing in and adhering to and trusting in and relying on the message that you heard?
A LYING SPIRIT PRODUCES WRONG RESULTS:
A lying spirit will drive you away from those who God has truly knitted you with, because you can never be content because you need an approval of those people in an ungodly way.
When you look to them or leaders to fill that need, you will see them as not understanding you, accepting you or seeing your worth. You will not receive their counsel, instruction or even discipline you need to correct this error.
That is when you will make great errors by relying on your own wisdom and make unilateral decisions based on your “need” or “need led” instead the Spirit and being Spirit led.
That is when you can never get your roots down anywhere. You will bounce from church to church or ministry to ministry trying to fill a void convinced you are trying to find where you belong.
So many leave the place God has put them because of a lying and driving spirit that never lets you rest or be content.
With that said, it is true you can be in the wrong place, with the wrong people, or the season of where you are at is over ,and the Spirit is leading you in a new direction.
The question is can you tell the difference from the enemy taking us out of where you belong or God leading us to where we belong?
The enemy will offer you the countefeit of what you want as long as you bow down and worship him at the alter of need led of your own needs instead of worshipping God and meeting God’s needs. “I am my beloved, and His desires are towards me.”
GOD HAS A GUIDANCE SYSTEM:
Beloved, knowing the difference between these two voice takes great maturity, wisdom and seasoning.
As believers, we must all understand and use the true Guidance system of God including seeking Godly counsel before we do anything and to let every word be established by two or three witnesses, a hear a direct Word from God and then gainHis peace!
Beloved, when a demonic spirit of rejection grips a believers heart that is where a lying spirit will come to cause you to believe you must live a success and purpose driven life.
It is that lying spirit that will lead many astray to operate under a counterfeit anointing verse the Spirit of God and lead them out of where they should be to a “counterfeit place” by a “counterfeit peace.”
Again can we tell the difference? The counterfeit today almost looks exactly like the genuine in these last days. Jesus said, “if he did not shorten the days even the very elect could be deceived.”
A STRONG DELUSION:
That is how strong the delusion is being release in the nations, we must check our hearts and spirits before God on who and what is leading us?
Ministers and people who are driven by a lying spirit can’t see their worth or value and they become success driven instead of Spirit led. They base their life on how others see them or welcome them. They base their ministries on being needed and accepted.
They are prone to people who will fill that void in their life by needing them and a co-dependent un-godly soul ties form in which a mutual need to minister and to be ministered to is birthed, and a counterfeit anointing will build it.
A counterfeit anointing must be seen or heard when it affects someone. It boast of what it knows. It always has to add something to what others say or do and boast of the revelations they have gotten.
That driving spirit to be accepted causes people to error in judgment and in wisdom for they take things in their own hands and understandings and try to build a ministry or work from that spirit.
Fear never lets you rest that is why it is driving. A fear that drives a Christian can never walk in true faith because the thoughts of failure torments them.
A WOUNDED HEART IS OPEN TO THAT LYING SPIRIT:
Many who have been so wounded and rejected by name calling, bullying, abused by parents, teachers and friends as not being good enough, or even called names our labels the enemy wants to put on them and they wear them because of fear.
The only label we need is this, “as for many as receive Him, they are permitted to be called the “sons of God.”
The one thing Jesus brings to a heart that is born again is acceptance by love. The rejection is removed by the love of God where he fills the void in your heart where you don’t have to prove your worth anymore.
That is what as believers we must fight to maintain. It is a fight especially when trials and pressures come. Especially when we fail, sin and fall short of the glory of God in the pressure.
It is there, I am a dirty dog syndrome of rejection” tauments so many believers forcing them “to try harder, or do more” to gain God’s and peoples acceptance. It is here the enemy lays a counterfeit anointing in their lives and ministries rooted in giving God Cains’ offering.
Beloved, God has not given us a spirit of fear, but love, power and a sound mind. In the midst of the fire God has to remove all fear, all doubts, all self-efforts, self-works and self-centeredness of pride or condemning dirty dog syndrome.
LET GOD EXAMINE OUR LIVES FULLY:
In the fire, God exposes our true motives and intentions. We must see why we are doing, acting or behaving the way we are.
If we don’t feel loved, accepted or valued and we are angry with others, hold things against them because of how they treat you, you are prime to be driven by the enemy.
Many who are driven always have to defend themselves when they are corrected. It is our human nature to do so. That is why David a man after God’s own heart prayed for God to search his heart, try his thoughts, to see if there is any wicked way in him.
It is time for us to have a sober estimation of where we really are with God. Why are doing what we are doing? Are we driven to do something? Are we trying so hard to get others to notice us, respect us or need us?
Where are we beloved before God today? Are we content just to be His, or are we driven to prove our ministry to please his heart?
WHAT ARE WE BUILDING AND WHAT ARE WE BECOMING?
Are we building an Ishmael ministry, or are we an Isaac the promised child of the Lord.
We must let God examine our motives now. We must slow down and even pause what we are doing to bring everything into the light of God’s love.
Are you willing to let God search us today, to try our hearts, to see what He sees and if there are any wicked ways in you?
Are you willing to ask God am I being driven by a lying spirit trying to gain your acceptance, the ministry acceptance, the brothers and sisters acceptance, my leaders acceptance, my spouse, or children’s or am I led by your Spirit?
A lying spirit makes you always to be need led and not spirit led. A lying spirit drives you to be “perfect.” It is so ugly because you can’t be perfect, our perfection is in Jesus alone. The more you fail at being perfect the worse you feel,and the worse you think others see you.
5 FOLD MINISTERS MUST KNOW THE DIFFERENCE:
I have been in so many meetings of 5 fold ministers where the need to be seen and heard is front and center. They never make room for others to speak and need to be the center of attention.
The 5 fold Leaders who have that rejection still in their heart causes that lying spirit to operate and they can never rest.
They can never be content in their own skin God made them and then they push others to be driven to be perfect like them.
Success driven is not Spirit led. Purpose driven is not Spirit led. We are not to be driven by a lie, but to be led by the Spirit of truth that is always at rest.
The battle these last few years is for God to remove the fruit of that lying spirit that got implanted in the church age in His House.
He has to purify the motives of why we are doing what we are doing. He has to throughly examine our heart motives and desire to prove what they are rooted in, faith of fear, love or torment?
Beloved, is what we are, what we are called to do, and what we are doing being done by a lying spirit driving us or the Spirit of God leading us.
If there is no rest in your heart or peace while doing these things before, during or after and you are sweating in your efforts to do them, than most likely you have been driven by a lying spirit maquarding as the Holy Spirit.
WORK AND NOT REST:
The lying spirit tries to get your roots down in your work, your efforts, your sweat, and your own success to gain acceptance of men to fill that void and not by God.
That lying spirit can be in every single believer as chaff amongst the wheat. That doesn’t mean that the genuine is not in you, and that everything you said or done is by that lying spirit, but it could be there in areas you can’t see or even that you can.
How can you tell the difference? Are you willing to truly see if it is there or not? How do you let God do that, by being willing to burn the ships of where you are at today.
If you will lay your life on the alter of God, all that you are, all that you are doing in your life, home, family, work or ministry for God to examine it He will.
If you are willing to hear that what you have been doing is by that lying spirit and are willing to repent, He will burn it up and remove it from you so that you now can walk by faith and not by fear, or by the Spirit of God and not a lying spirit.
It is ok for God to show you this. He is not rejecting you. He has come to rescue you and to refine you as priest like pure gold and silver so you can bring offerings of righteousness to God and give him what he ask for to please him.
Beloved, it is better to find out now if we are truly being led by the Spirit or driven by a lying spirit that needs approval, acceptance, to build something or do something that makes you feel your life is valuable.
That is the lie. You having to prove your own worth and value, when your live is already worth His love and value for you were fearfully and wonderfully made. You were created for His pleasure.
You can’t earn your worth by works. You can gain acceptance by being pleasing to everyone and what you think they want of you. Yo can’t earn a reward or place near Jesus being driven by a lying spirit.
ENTER INTO THE TRUE SABBATH DAY REST:
We must strive diligently as Hebrews says to enter the rest of God. We must enter the true rest of God.
The Sabbath Rest Hebrews 4:10-12
…10For whoever enters God’s rest also rests from his own work, just as God did from His.11Let us, therefore, make every effort to enter that rest, so that no one will fall by following the same pattern of disobedience.
12For the word of God is living and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it pierces even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow. It judges the thoughts and intentions of the heart.…
That is what this post is about in verse 12, for the word of God is living acting sharper than a double edged sword, it pierces to divide soul from spirit and joint from marrow, the counterfeit from the genuine, the false from the truth, that which is being driven by a lying spirit from the spirit of peace that brings you into the rest of God.
Do you want to remain in fear and be driven by a lying spirit to prove your worth, or walk by faith and not by sight knowing you are already accepted by the blood of the lamb and you need not prove your success?
Our success, our purpose, our life, our value, our worth, all that we are and will do is HIDDEN IN CHRIST WHO IS OUR LIFE.
LET US STRIVE DILIGENTLY TODAY TO ENTER THE TRUE SABBATH REST OF GOD.
SELAH
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