I heard a radio commentary about whether Christians should be in government or on school boards or in protests or….
The answer was – sure if you like.
There are times we need to have Godly counsel in those places. There are times where our voice must be heard. Yet if we looked through the Bible it gives us the following scripture to be our order of priority.
“Seek ye first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness and all these things will be added unto you.” Matthew 6:33
The speaker said that the world is right now run by satan, it is his kingdom and the kingdom of man. God does not need to fight it because God does not fight – He does not have to, He always wins. We should remember this.
Saying that, are you seeking God’s Kingdom first? God’s kingdom is not on earth. God’s kingdom is spiritual kingdom.
The Lords Prayer says this: "Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven...."
God does not fight earthly kingdoms – people do that. We will never change the world by fighting with the world and doing it the world’s ways, so why are we?
God has called us to partake with Him in His heavenly kingdom and this is our commandment: seek first His Kingdom….
What does that mean? Is it that we should all just die and go to heaven to be with Him? No, although eventually we will all die, but please listen carefully:
God calls us to walk and participate in His Kingdom (spiritual) so that we can bring that kingdom, His kingdom, to the earth. Doing this will change everything. "Thy kingdom come, they will be done, on earth as it is in heaven."
Many people say, ”the church is so ineffective” or “the church is powerless and outdated.”
Oh, my friends, that is true only if you have not learned how to walk in God’s kingdom each and every day. If we do the same thing over and over hoping for a different result – nothing will change and that is the definition of insanity and probably describes this earth more than anything. It is little crazy out there.
A lot of churches have been doing the same thing over and over and so have most of us if we are honest, riding the wave with it. But what if…. what if…..we studied and learned what God really meant : Seek ye first the kingdom of God….
Most of us pray asking God to come and rescue us but God says – I already did and I gave you the tools – use them.
Most of us pray begging God to do something or fix something and God says – I gave you the tools – use them.
Jesus told us when He left and went up to heaven that He would send us “the counsellor, the Holy Spirit” to come and be with us and in fact live in us, if we ask Him to. The power of the Holy Spirit is the power of God Himself. Jesus said, “very truly I tell you, whoever believes in me will do the works I have been doing, and they will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father.” John 14:12
Do we turn into “God”? Heck no, but we have the living God and the power of God available to us to walk as God commands us. He has given us the tools. This is why healings can happen, this is why even the dead can be raised, miracles are available. There is hope in no hope situations.
Along with the Holy Spirit come the gifts of the Spirit: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control are just some of the gifts mentioned in Galatians 5:22-23
Are you using those gifts? Did you realize you were suppose to be using those? If you have the Holy Spirit those are your gifts as well. There is more gifts listed in the Bible that it says the Holy Spirit gives to men as He wills. Find out what is available to you.
We, born again, people of God, who have the living Holy Spirit inside of them have so much more. We are the hope of the nations – us and God are the only hope. The nations will not fix themselves – men will always want more, fight more, control more – it is the way of man and we would be foolish to become like them and think it will be different.
“Seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness…” Matthew 6:33
The apostle Paul says..”my message and my preaching were not with wise and persuasive words, but with a demonstration of the Spirit’s power so that your faith might not rest on human wisdom, but on God’s power.” 1 Corinthians 2:4-5 Paul demonstrated God's power by partnering with God, through the Holy Spirit.
He goes on to say:
“No one comprehends the thought of God except the Spirit of God. Now we have received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might understand the things freely given us by God.” 1 Corinthians 2:12
What things freely given to us? The Holy Spirit is one, the gifts of the Holy Spirit are another, Salvation is another, God’s love is another….. so many things God has freely given to us.
1 Corinthians 2:16 says we can have the mind of Christ – the mind of God, that we have access to know what God would do in a situation, we have access to know what we should do in a situation, we have the mind of Christ. You must spend the time getting yourself into the posture of hearing God speak to you. He speaks, every day. To be honest, what good is it to have the mind of Christ, if you cannot hear what the mind of Christ is saying? It takes practice to hear God speak to you, but practice like anything else is how you learn to hear Him. God speaks to us every day, we must learn to listen for His voice. Are you practicing?
I have heard God speak to me from the beginning of my walk with Him over 40 years ago, however last summer I was challenged to add a new layer. In a course I was taking it said that God made all our senses: hearing, sight, smell, touch and taste. The speaker stated that if God made our senses it would be just like Him to use them to talk to us. So I spent a great deal of time asking God to speak to me in different ways, using the 5 senses. It was exciting and fun to learn new and creative ways that God wants to speak to me. Did it come right away? No, it took practice over a period of time. If I want to play the piano, I have to practice, if I want to run 5 km (which I don't) it takes practice. In order to hear God clearly, it takes practice, kind of a theme going on here....
Put another way, if I spend 5 mintues with God a day, what kind of relationship is there, not a powerful one, how much time do I give my phone or the tv?
How does God fight the enemy? He doesn’t. God is the creator of everything – He does not fight His own creation. He simply commands them to stop or stops them.
How do we fight the enemy? We don’t. God does, because we have the mind of Christ and the words of Christ on the earth, we command it to stop. We use our words. Sounds way to easy right?
How did God create the world? He used His Words.
The power of our words is extreme – for good and bad. If I continuously say with my words that I am a looser, I am no good, I can’t do anything right – my words will come to pass. The words we use on others can also produce good or bad, and we get careless with our words especially in our families.
If I use words that God gave to me, the ones He says about me, like His child, His chosen, His priesthood, His friend, His minister of reconciliation, then I can start to walk in that way.
What would happen if I believed that I truly had words that could change things? Perhaps I would start using them….
Have you ever heard of a proclamation or a decree? Those are words that declare what will happen. When we learn what and who God is, we can start using His words to proclaim and declare things to happen. For example:
When we start bashing the government, saying those guys do nothing....these are power loosing words, these words give the power away. How about: I declare that this land is God’s property, He created it and God has declared that He will put governments in charge therefore I declare that Godly men and women will be put into place. (Romans 13:1) A much more powerful mindset.
My children are a gift from God and I claim their salvation based on God’s word that He wants all people to be saved, (2 Timothy 2:4) I proclaim that over my family. Now those are some words to get going with!
Start to quote God’s words back to Him. Of course you have to know God’s word first which is the Bible before you can start to quote it. Are you reading your Bible? God’s says in the Bible that His Words will not return void, (Isaiah 55:11) in other words, Gods words are a powerful force that will have an impact on our situations. For instance a couple of my favourite scriptures are: Deuteronomy 7:9, Exodus 20:6
“God you said, that you would bless to a 1,000 generations those that love you, I love you so please start with me.” My words have the ability to reach 1,000 generations of my family, who would not want that?
I think we get caught up in our human emotions so quickly and they can over take our thinking if we are not careful. We get angry, we get frustrated, we get revengeful and pride can start us thinking that “we” can make the difference. If we partner with God, and know how to use God’s word accurately to invite Him into the situation, mightly things can happen.
You have been given the gifts and it is totally up to you and your will, if you will step out and obey God to use them. It reminds me of the story in the Bible of the “talents”.
The owner of a business was going away and he called his 3 managers in, he gave them some money to use while he was away to invest and make him more money. To one he gave 5 talents (money), to another 2 and to the last he gave 1. You probably remember the story in Matthew 25:14-30. The one with the most money earned just as much or more to give back to his master. The second did the same but the last one, was afraid because his employer was a hard man so he hid his talents in the ground.
We are like that last man if we do not take God at His word and start using the gifts, the talents that He has given us. We can no longer do the same old things, those begging God prayers are not working. Let us not bury our heads in the sand and hope it will all magically get better. You have gifts to use. God wants us to partner with Him in work down here on earth and we can only do that if we are operating in His Kingdom, with the gifts that He gave us already. He did not give you gifts for you to simply think – that is nice and put them on a shelf and forget about them. What is the sense in that? When someone gives you a gift – you are supposed to open it and use it.
Here are a couple other examples of what we can pray:
Jesus is the Prince of Peace and based on His proclamation, not mine, I declare and ask the Prince of Peace over the region in which I live, or my home or my work place, no weapon formed against it shall prosper. These are Biblical words.
We start proclaiming Gods words (right out of the Bible) over the things around us. We do not wait for God to come and “make it right”. We open our mouths and make God’s will known on the earth and He makes it right.
That is what a fighting force of God looks like. Let us not be shy to take God at His Word – He gave them to us to use after all, in fact He is waiting for us to use them.