This Is Your Eviction Notice!

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God's commandment was clear.  Moses would not be leading the Israelites into their Promised Land.  He would not be allowed to take them over the Jordan into the land God had promised long ago to Abraham and his sons.   Courageously he spoke these words to the enormous family whom God had placed in his care,

"The LORD your God Himself will go over before you.  He will destroy these nations before you, so that you shall dispossess them . . . And the LORD will give them over to you, and you shall do to them according to the whole commandment that I have commanded you.  Be strong and courageous.  Do not fear or be in dread of them, for it is the LORD your God who goes with you.  He will not leave you or forsake you. "  (Deuteronomy 31: 3, 5, 6)

Though these men would go into the land with the purpose of removing all the nations that lived there, it would not be by their own strength that it would accomplished.  It would be by the very hand of the Lord that these god-worshiping people would be run out or destroyed.  This would happen so that His people could possess the land.  The men of Israel were the agents who would present to these ungodly nations their eviction notice, but it would be by God's almighty strength that Israel would take possession of the land.  Both God and the Israelites had their part to do.

While this may seem like an unimportant Old Testament story that is completely irrelevant to the Church Age believer, I challenge you to take a closer look at these verses, and few more, with me.  All of God's word is relevant to us, and this passage is no exception.

We, as believers in the Lord Jesus Christ, have ungodly "nations" that need to be evicted, even removed with force, from our hearts.  We, too, have a journey to make across the Jordan into the abundant life (our promised land).  It is only then that we will experience the life that awaits us.  It is the life that lies just on the other side of cleaning out those places in our hearts that are not in line with the "whole commandment" of God.

Whatever your sins are that remain in your heart, sins that are active in your life today, it will be the Spirit within who will drive them out, but you must be willing to serve them their eviction notice.  Without your compliance to serve notice to your sins, the Spirit is hand-cuffed in removing them from your life.  If Israel had not crossed the Jordan, had they stayed on the other side, God's mighty arm would have no reason to go in and annihilate the idol-worshiping Canaanites of the land.  But Israel did cross over, and through them, God gained the victory.  To the degree that Israel pressed in to remove all evil from the land, to that same degree, the land was purified.  Are you beginning to make the connection?

God will give us victory over our "enemies" (our sins) when we surrender ourselves to His commandments that tell us of the necessity of removing them from our lives.  If we align ourselves with His purposes, and take a step forward by telling our sins and idols that it is "time for them to go," and truly desire it and mean it, then the Lord Himself by the Spirit within us, will accomplish this.  This is how He purifies our hearts.

Consider these two verses as you contemplate your own need to dispossess and destroy the evil "nations" in your own heart.  They reiterate both your need to "cross the Jordan" to a purified heart, as well as how God has designed it to happen within you. 

"Draw near to God and He will draw near to you.  Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded."  (James 4:8, written to believers, not the unsaved)

"As obedient children, do not be conformed to the passions of your former ignorance, but as He who call you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct. since it is written 'You shall be holy, for I am holy' . . . having purified your souls by your obedience to the truth . . ."  (I Peter 1: 14-16, 22b)

"Not by (your) might, nor by (your) power, but by MY SPIRIT, says the LORD of hosts."  (Zechariah 4:10)

Are you ready to tell your heart-inhabiting sins that it is time to go?  Remember, to the same degree that you press in to God to evict your sins from your life, to that same degree you will be purified.  No eviction notices served . . . no purification in your heart.  Serve your sins notice that it is time for them to go from your heart and life, and obeying God and His Word  . . . Victory over your sin!

The God-Centered Life

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Is God in the center of ALL of your life?  The Israelites knew how to live with Him in the center of theirs long before they reached the Promised Land.  As they moved through the wilderness for 40 years the very layout of the "campground" had the Ark of the Covenant in the center.  But it would be different as they spread out in the Promised Land.

"This was God's plan--for His children to live in the land He freely gave them and to worship only Him.  The same is true for you.  Your Promised Land, having had all of your false gods removed, will be like living intimately with your God--in the Holy of Holies--alone, with no other gods but the one true God.  Do you see that?  Do you understand how you fit into the picture God gave us from the journey the Israelites made from Egypt to the Promised Land?  We are to journey from our bondage all the way to the presence of the Living God!  The goal of the tabernacle is to reach the Holy of Holies, to have been made holy and like Christ, to be living maturely by the purity of our hearts.  The god of the Israelites, who were set free from their bondage in Egypt, was to live in the Promised Land, a land with its idols removed.  The Promised Land was a picture of God in the center of the lives of His chosen ones who walk in unity with Him and Him alone.  It is a picture, as well, of the godly, sin-healed heart of a Christian!

But most of us are still either in the Outer Court of our salvation of the Inner Court of our sanctification (the process of being made holy).  Either way, we are being prepared to enter into the Holy of Holies, our Promised Land, the land of our truest and deepest intimacy with our God.  And if we want to step through the veil into the most intimate place with God, we must clearly understand the next point.

POINT #2:  We must be fully armed when we cross into that place in our journey called the Promised Land, into the Holy of Holies where our gods will be dispossessed.  We must be prepared for this battle, and we must know what God's battle plan is."

More on that tomorrow!

The Promised Land: Another Picture of Our Spiritual Journey

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POINT #1:  God wants our complete and full compliance to His words and commands.

"Now, let's make POINT #1 relevant to us.  Consider this concept that I want to share with you.  This is another picture of the journey to the complete healing of your broken spiritual heart.  It is very similar to the picture of the Tabernacle that we viewed and studied in Chapters 1-4.  Let's look at Israel's journey from the bondage of Egypt to their life in the Promised Land.

You hopefully have walked through the door of the Tabernacle into your salvation.  If you have, then at that very moment, you also walked out of your Egypt, the place of your spiritual bondage.  Now you are set free from the penalty of your sin, but you may have not yet arrived at your Promised Land, living in the moment to moment blessing and presence of Almighty God.  You have entered the Outer Court where you have been reveling in your salvation and are following God, but you not likely to have been constantly obedient to Him and His commands.  You, in a sense, are wondering there in a wilderness, not quite understanding how to consistently obey.

Then, when you purposefully stepped into the Inner Court (if you have), you found it to be a place where you began to remove (dispossess) the gods and sins that were in your "land"--your hearts.  This can be likened to the 'crossing of the Jordan into the Promised Land,' where the Israelites began to remove the inhabitants because they were idolaters that worshiped other gods.  Sanctification takes place in you in the Inner Court where you begin to experience the Promised Land by systematically removing all that is in opposition to the God of your heart.  A similar cleansing of idol worship took place in Canaan, the Israelites' Promised Land, before God would  allow them to live in His Land of Promise.

Once all of the people of the land (the Canaanites) and their false gods were removed, then Israel could live daily in the constant and abiding presence of their God, in His blessing and favor, without the influence of false gods.  This is why it is called the Land of the Promise.  If Israel would do everything that God would command them to do, by removing all who were in opposition to Him, they would live in paradise on earth, in obedience to God and His blessing upon them.

God has a 'promised land' for Christians today. That promised land is on the other side of the veil of our crucified flesh. That promised land is the spiritual practice of obediently resting in God. The promised land, for us, is in the Holy of Holies, right here on earth!

Stuck in the Mud

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 Israel was preparing to enter into the Promised Land. Only the rain-swelled Jordan separated them from it. Under the wise direction of Joshua, the priests and the ark of the covenant entered the river first. A thousand yards behind the ark the 2 million plus group crossed over on dry land with their eyes firmly fixed on the Presence of God, the ark. If you are in a raging river, who are your eyes fixed on, yourself and your circumstances, or the Almighty God?

God has a "promised land" for you and me.  It is called the abundant life of Spirit.  It is a life in which we are to walk in the power of the Spirit and leave our crucified flesh on the altar of surrender.  The Israelites are such a great example for us today.  The spring rainy season was occurring, and the Jordan River constantly was out of its banks.  Yet, this is the very moment that God chose to bring His people into their new land--2 million people and all of their animals and belongings!  But Joshua, their new leader, trusted God and called the priests to bring the ark and set out across the river.  The very moment they exercised their faith, the dangerous river pulled back into on big heap upstream.  When the priests feet hit the riverbed, it was completely dry, as well!  One by one, the entire company crossed over on dry ground. 

So why do we struggle so with our faith in God to take us through our journey to that "impossible" heart transformation that He desires in us?  Why is it that we refuse to see that God is waiting for us to put our full focus and trust in Him so that He can do that "impossible" work in our hearts?  He is capable of helping us cross the great divide between walking in the flesh and walking in the Spirit.  He has the path laid out for us and He wants His Son to lead us to that abundant life by His Spirit within us.  Yet, we continually attempt to "cross the river" in our own strength and power.  Consistently, we keep drowning in our self-efforts to accomplish what we were never fashioned to do.

The Israelites were not to just sit on the banks of the Jordan, though, as if waiting for God to pick them up and move them.  On the contrary, when it was time to walk across, they were expected to walk!  But they could never have pushed the water back into a heap, and they likely would have drowned had they attempted to swim across.  God did the impossible so that it would make the "walking" easier.  The same is true in our journey to holiness.  God awaits your surrender to His will and His way.  He awaits that trusting gaze upon Him with a heart that says, "I believe YOU can do this in me; and I know that I cannot; so please GO AHEAD!"  When you get to that kind of surrender, watch out!  You might just see the "water" rolled back and the way become very clear--AND NO MUD dried up so that you do not get stuck along the way! 

The Idols Of Our Hearts

Pin It Originally: How To Add a Pinterest (Pin it) Button to your Blog/Website http://cs-doon.blogspot.com/#ixzz1ryXJUBEC Israel had seen God execute His judgment on the Egyptian gods by the plagues He sent. Now Israel was being sent into Canaan, their Promised Land, to drive out the wicked Canaanites, their pagan gods, and demonic worship practices. Israel was to go in and utterly demolish every evil thing in order to possess the land God was giving them.  He asks us to do the same thing with every evil thing in our hearts.  (Numbers 33: 4, 50-55)

God will always judge what is wicked.  While we may not always understand how a loving God could orchestrate the annihilation of people, we must grow up in our understanding so that we can discern that God knew the hearts of those He was about to destroy.  He knew that they had already chosen to be anti-God.  He knew the evil of their "worship practices."  And He knew that they would not be converted to a faith in Him.  As a matter of fact, He knew that they would lead His people astray.  Therefore, God, in His infinite wisdom, used His own people Israel to execute His judgment on the people living in the Promised Land.  He did this so that Israel would have a pure nation to dwell in, one that was rid of pagan worship.

In God's direction to His people we clearly see the battle plan:  cross over the Jordan into the land, drive out the people by force, destroy all of their gods and idols, demolish their high places (altars of worship), and take possession of the land.  God certainly did not want any corrupt practices to dwell among His people and lead their hearts astray.  Now can you see where WE are heading?

Inside each of our hearts there camps many gods and idols.  These very gods are not set on a mantle and worshipped.  Instead, they are part of the sin in our lives.  All of us have attitudes that we default to.  We have sins that we practice that are more important to us than God.  Oh, we don't like to say that is true, yet it is.  Many of us can see what the god of our heart is by merely looking at our checkbook, taking note of what we spend our money on.  Many more of us will realize what our god is simply by listening to what pronouns we speak the most:  I, me, my, mine!  The priority of self points to who is really the god of our life! 

If you think God is the only authority in your life then it might be a good thing to consider this list:

Self-sufficiency, self-reliance, self-absorption, selfishness, impatience, hatred, unforgiveness, depression, anxiety, worry, bitterness, self-superiority, argumentative, self-deprecating, gossip, pot-stirring, envy, jealousy, hypocrisy, deceitful, lying, malice, abusive speech, coarse speech, partiality, bigotry . . .  The list is endless!  But we must begin to think in terms that identify these as the very evil practices that they are!  God's Word says they are the evil in our flesh that battles against the Spirit of the Living God in us!

Since God is an unchanging God, then His view of evil practices has not changed either.  If He charged the Israelites to destroy all evil practices so that they could live in purity instead of sin, what do you think our unchanging God will want our battle plan to be?  Of course, He wants us to destroy the very things inside our own hearts that lead us astray and away from Him!

In my forthcoming book (May 1, 2011) God has given me a great way to get these idols and gods into His hands and off of our backs.  It involves first identifying what is really in your heart, and then taking full vengeance on what He reveals to you.  This book, Spiritual Healing:  The Surrender That Brings Victory, can be purchased right now on Amazon.com, or directly from me (and I will sign your copy!).  Request your signed copy by contacting me at cherylgnagey@gmail.com or at www.cherylgnagey.com.