Finding Spiritual Healing

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Today I want to introduce to you my book, Spiritual Healing:  The Surrender That Brings Victory.  The message of this book is the inspiration of this blog.  If you haven't listened to the video, please do.  It will give you an overview of the precepts found in Spiritual Healing.

You might find yourself wondering why you, as a believer in Jesus Christ, have need for further spiritual healing.  The answer lies in understanding that when you first believed in Christ, the penalty of your sin was removed.  You no longer would be held accountable for the wickedness of your heart and flesh.  But I am convinced that it didn't take you much longer than it did me to realize that the practice of sin was still very much a part of your life.  You were still quite capable of sinning.  This is why you and I need a spiritual healing of our sin-filled hearts.  We need to learn how to overcome our sinful tendencies.  We all need to discover the way to gain victory over our flesh and sin life.

As believers you and I now have the opportunity to choose how we will live.  And there are only two real choices.  Either we will live in the comfort of the status quo, ignoring the sins we commit on a regular basis, thus, becoming complacent in the sin lifestyle.  We will profess Christ as our Savior, living solely in the expectation of salvation in Christ (our "ticket to Heaven").  The only other choice would be to press into our relationship with Christ and press through the temptation to sin, on to the abundant life in Christ where we will walk in obedience to the Spirit's whispers, overcoming what used to be the constant sinful tendency of our flesh.

After walking in my belief for the last 37 year, I am convicted of the sin that remains in my life.  Are you?  Is it possible that God is preparing this generation to rise up against our own fleshly wills and surrender to Him, so that we might be a light to this lost world?  Our hearts are where this battle rages--in the very home of the the Holy Spirit.  He has a job to do in our hearts.  It is to transform our hearts and lives into the very image of Christ.  But we constantly prevent Him from building a pure home for Himself in us because we refuse to surrender to the work He is designed to do in us.  

Are you passionately seeking a transformation of your heart?  Do you want to experience Spiritual Healing?  It is available to you, but only through the Spirit.  If you sense that the Spirit is speaking to you right now, and your heart is racing in anticipation of the life that lies just beyond the veil of your flesh, you might well be on a pathway to the holy and pure life that is yours in Christ.

Would you like further instruction on this topic?  Spiritual Healing:  The Surrender That Brings Victory is available on this blog.  Look for the "Buy Now" button and purchase a copy today!  Say good-by to your complacent walk and fix your eyes on the journey to victory!

In The Valley of Affliction

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Job was a man who had been truly blessed of God because he walked with God in a way that was considered to be holy.  God Himself called Job blameless, upright, God-fearing, and repentant of evil found in his life.  And then the greatest storm of his life came crashing upon him.  In a very short amount of time all of Job's servants were killed, his animals were slaughtered, his children died together in a cyclone that collapsed the house in which they were celebrating a birthday,,and if that wasn't enough, Job himself was covered with boils from the top of his head to the soles of his feet.  He had clearly been standing under the "anvil tree," and it had dumped all of its "fruit" on this holy man of God.

What followed was an attack on his emotions and spirit.  His wife told him to "curse God and die" (what a woman), and three of his friends told him over and over that his afflictions had come upon him because he had been a prideful, sinful man!  In an instant Job's life on the mountaintop of blessedness took a very sudden turn.  Now he found himself in the valley of affliction, with no end in sight.  The holy man, in his suffering, lost sight of the God he loved and served.  He argued, "tit for tat." with his friends, asserting that he was a blameless man, not being punished for some undisclosed sin.  But that became his sin.  Job never defended God to his three friends.  Instead, he only defended himself.   In doing that, Job began to speak too many words and some of them spewed forth lies about God, lies he was certainly hearing whispered into his ears from Satan's warriors.

After many days of suffering, another man by the name of Elihu spoke up.  From him came words that defended God, words that were setting Job up for his confrontation with God.  Elihu gave great counsel to Job, counsel that is good for us to hear as well.  He challenged Job to:

1. Stop allowing his affliction to cause him to scoff (speak unintelligibly--like a description of how a foreigner would talk)
2. Turn from seeking to die (or in our case, to run away from our affliction)
3. Cease turning to evil (de)vices to bring comfort in his pain
4. Praise and worship God's characteristics and creation
5. Listen for God's voice, for it would be his shelter from the storm
6. Meditate on the GOD of all the wonders on earth
7. Exalt God!
8. Fear God, giving Him his full reverence and respect

In the trials, afflictions, and suffering that will surely come in our lives, this is truth we must face..  God uses our afflictions and trials for good, not to harm us.  While it may not seem good to us, and we might even call it harmful, we would be wise to come to grips with the fact that God's definitions of "good" and "harm" are very different than ours.  After all, His thoughts, His ways, His plans and purposes are exceedingly higher than ours.  And He is God, and we are not!

 If you are going through a very dark valley of affliction, do not believe the lies of the enemy who would discourage you.  He desires for you to come to hate God for what you are experiencing.  Remember, God will is for you to be made into His Son's likeness.  He wants to perfect you.  He wants to bring you to the end of yourself.  In the end, He wants to humble you so that you can be exalted with Him in Heaven.   Is this a difficult medicine to swallow?  Absolutely!  But once you do, it will surely bring spiritual healing to your heart!

The Burning Fire of Lust

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Cravings . . . we all have them, don't we?  I was not one of those pregnant women that had the strange food cravings common in pregnancy.  But I certainly know what it feels like to crave something.  You know what I am talking about!  The inner urgency to have what you want, and right now!  Here is the simplified pattern of a craving.  You look at something or just think about it, then you desire it so strongly that you just have to have it.  It can take several days, weeks, months, or even longer, for the process to be completed, or it may take a mere matter of seconds.  Either way, one way or another, you will satisfy the craving, not matter what.  If you can relate to that because you have experienced it (and we all have!), then you know what it is to lust after something.

LUST . . . it is a topic most Christians want to avoid talking about, yet every one of us struggles with it. We usually attach a sexual connotation to the subject, yet most of our lust issues have nothing to do with sex.  They have to do with trying to remove God's rightful place on the throne of our lives with things that we consider far more self-satisfying and flesh-feeding.  Since we dethrone God in order to place a higher priority on our lusts and to enthrone them, we can also call our lusts both 'gods' and 'idols.'  Lusting after anything but God and the things of God, and chasing after them until we get what we want, is ultimately about placing ourselves on the throne of our own lives.

Your lust may not seem like an earth-shattering sin.  It might not even be sinful.  But in the beginning, lust spreads through our hearts like a wildfire.  It starts with just a little spark of fire, but has the potential to destroy thousands of acres of fertile ground, charring and blackening everything in its path.  And its path is not a simple line; it is far-reaching and in every direction.  

Lust is a fire in the soul that seeks to burn up every good thing found there.  One lust that begins as the spark of one simple action, if continually practiced over and over will, given enough time and attention, begin to destroy in your heart the good workings of God.  Your walk with Him, that once seemed so intimate and precious, soon will take on the stench of smoke.  If you take a closer look , you will likely see where the fire has already been.  You once green vine is now charred  and your fruit has burned up.

The fire of lust can be kept outside of the Christian heart, but it only takes one tiny opening for a spark to enter and set ablaze the house of the Holy Spirit.  Our hearts are to be set on fire, but by the Holy Spirit, who calls us to walk in holiness and righteousness, crucifying our fleshly desires, and establishing Christ as our only ruler on the throne.

What does your heart look like?  Are you faithfully keeping the world's flames at bay?  Do you smell smoke?  Where there is smoke, there is fire!  Surrender your lusts.  Lay them down at the foot of the cross.  Now, let the fire of the Holy Spirit ignite your heart!