Phil 4:7: “And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.”
Every month I give Hamish ‘frontline plus’ which is a topical application, to protect him from fleas and ticks. According to ehow.com frontline is absorbed through the skin and goes to the oil glands, where it is stored for up to a month. Every time the oil glands are activated, frontline is released to the skin and hair follicles. Then any flea or tick that comes into contact with your pets coat will die.
I thought it was a bit like when we are continually filled with the Holy Spirit, walking with God.
For when we have surrendered to God everything and are walking in faith with Him moment by moment, then the Holy Spirit our comforter protects us. It doesn’t mean that nothing will touch us or can hurt us. Other people can hurt us by what they say or do to us. But when we are walking with God, attacks or hurts will die on the surface.
To allow that to happen, like frontline, we have to ‘activate’. By reading the bible, praying and giving over to God the problem – surrendering it to him -we allow the Holy Spirit to comfort us and give us peace while God is dealing with the problem. When you forgive someone in your heart, it doesn’t mean that what the person did to you was OK, rather that you are allowing God to deal with the problem, releasing you from the toxicity that not forgiving brings.
Forgiveness brings peace to you. So yes it hurts but it doesn’t get to the core, giving it a chance to burrow deeply and cause bitterness or disillusionment in our walk with God.
But if we choose to not give it over to God but to nurture our hurt and replay it in our mind we are not forgiving that person. We are quenching the Holy Spirit; we are choosing not to release God into that area to heal. I can be walking close to God and something happens in a moment, and in that moment I have a choice with how to respond. Frontline is activated automatically by the oil glands, but it is up to us in that moment how to respond.
We can quench the Spirit by our choice. But if we have been continually talking with God and setting our mind on Him, we can choose to see it for what it truly is. It doesn’t really matter! When we view it against eternity, and how we have such a short period of time on earth to tell others about God we realise this. How Satan would love us to take our eyes off God and onto the problem. How he loves to try and stir up trouble!
I was giving an example of hurts done against us, but it can be anything in our life. Sometimes the process of lifting our eyes away from the problem, long enough to fix our eyes on Jesus is the hardest thing. As we think God doesn’t know all our hurts or concerns about something, and we have to make sure He knows everything before we give a situation over to Him.
He knows, He cares! That is why He wants you to give it over to Him. As when we deal with it, it’s like toxic waste slowly seeping deep into our lives. So give it over to God, then it doesn’t go deep into our lives and it is killed there and then.
- Any potential for bitterness is killed before it even starts.
- Hate or the potential for hate is killed.
- Any cracks for potential strongholds from that situation, for Satan to get in and tempt us and cause havoc with us is killed.
It’s only through God working in us that we can do this. But we have to allow Him to do so, surrendering to Him and allowing Him to work in us. We have to be *continually filled with the Spirit it’s not like frontline that it’s a once a month thing and forget about it. When we are walking with God, He is seeping into every area of our lives bringing good things and the result is good fruit.
(*Greek scholars will tell you that Ephesians 5:18 means a continuous filling.)
The whole of 2 Corinthians 4 is a wonderful blessing and promise when we are discouraged.
“Therefore we do not lose heart.. For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.”
2 Corinthians 4:16-18
Turn your eyes upon Jesus (link to song)
Every month I give Hamish ‘frontline plus’ which is a topical application, to protect him from fleas and ticks. According to ehow.com frontline is absorbed through the skin and goes to the oil glands, where it is stored for up to a month. Every time the oil glands are activated, frontline is released to the skin and hair follicles. Then any flea or tick that comes into contact with your pets coat will die.
I thought it was a bit like when we are continually filled with the Holy Spirit, walking with God.
For when we have surrendered to God everything and are walking in faith with Him moment by moment, then the Holy Spirit our comforter protects us. It doesn’t mean that nothing will touch us or can hurt us. Other people can hurt us by what they say or do to us. But when we are walking with God, attacks or hurts will die on the surface.
To allow that to happen, like frontline, we have to ‘activate’. By reading the bible, praying and giving over to God the problem – surrendering it to him -we allow the Holy Spirit to comfort us and give us peace while God is dealing with the problem. When you forgive someone in your heart, it doesn’t mean that what the person did to you was OK, rather that you are allowing God to deal with the problem, releasing you from the toxicity that not forgiving brings.
Forgiveness brings peace to you. So yes it hurts but it doesn’t get to the core, giving it a chance to burrow deeply and cause bitterness or disillusionment in our walk with God.
But if we choose to not give it over to God but to nurture our hurt and replay it in our mind we are not forgiving that person. We are quenching the Holy Spirit; we are choosing not to release God into that area to heal. I can be walking close to God and something happens in a moment, and in that moment I have a choice with how to respond. Frontline is activated automatically by the oil glands, but it is up to us in that moment how to respond.
We can quench the Spirit by our choice. But if we have been continually talking with God and setting our mind on Him, we can choose to see it for what it truly is. It doesn’t really matter! When we view it against eternity, and how we have such a short period of time on earth to tell others about God we realise this. How Satan would love us to take our eyes off God and onto the problem. How he loves to try and stir up trouble!
I was giving an example of hurts done against us, but it can be anything in our life. Sometimes the process of lifting our eyes away from the problem, long enough to fix our eyes on Jesus is the hardest thing. As we think God doesn’t know all our hurts or concerns about something, and we have to make sure He knows everything before we give a situation over to Him.
He knows, He cares! That is why He wants you to give it over to Him. As when we deal with it, it’s like toxic waste slowly seeping deep into our lives. So give it over to God, then it doesn’t go deep into our lives and it is killed there and then.
- Any potential for bitterness is killed before it even starts.
- Hate or the potential for hate is killed.
- Any cracks for potential strongholds from that situation, for Satan to get in and tempt us and cause havoc with us is killed.
It’s only through God working in us that we can do this. But we have to allow Him to do so, surrendering to Him and allowing Him to work in us. We have to be *continually filled with the Spirit it’s not like frontline that it’s a once a month thing and forget about it. When we are walking with God, He is seeping into every area of our lives bringing good things and the result is good fruit.
(*Greek scholars will tell you that Ephesians 5:18 means a continuous filling.)
The whole of 2 Corinthians 4 is a wonderful blessing and promise when we are discouraged.
“Therefore we do not lose heart.. For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.”
2 Corinthians 4:16-18
Turn your eyes upon Jesus (link to song)
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