Prayers without substance is as useless as  Jack-O-Lanterns warding of evil spirits

 

The Celtic pagan practice of hollowing out a pumpkin, carving a grotesque face and illuminating it  on October 31  was believed to ward off the evil spirits of dead people would come back that night and wreak havoc on those who did them bad during their lifetime.  Obviously, it's based on a faulty theory that dead spirits can actually return to earth, when we know from the parable Jesus told of Lazarus and the rich man in that they most certainly cannot return to earth.

If you know me, I always use metaphors to describe the life of a believer.  I find pumpkin carving a good metaphor for the prayer life of a believer not rooted firmly in the Whole Counsel of GOD.    In its natural state it is attached to the vine which is firmly rooted in the fertile soil and full of what GOD put in it, i.e., seeds and  the leafy veins that feed the pulp of the pumpkin that cause it to grow. When you carve a pumpkin, pull out all the seeds and that slimy stringy substance all you have is an empty shell. You don't really have a thriving vegetable anymore, you just have a mess that will rot away in a very short time.  By the way, if you've ever gutted a pumpkin, all that slimy stuff in the middle can be kind of gross.  Well, the historicity of GOD's people is likewise unpleasant, as well as some of the commands He gave them.  For example, 1 Samuel 15:3.  Look it up. It's not something we can stomach, but it did have purpose. 

There seems to be this growing trend of prayer teams popping up with a party line of prayer calls on a weekly basis.  Likewise struggling believers seeking prayer support from strangers has flooded social media.  I really wonder how many of those who respond actually stop and pray for that person.  How do they pray, what do they pray?  How does that person know that those prayers are doctrinally or Scripturally sound? Some cancers and sickness are send by GOD to refine a person.  I know, it happened to me.  Some diseases are GOD's way of taking someone home. We all have to die someday. 

Everyone is seeking the mystical more these days without seeking Scripture or the historical context of those Scriptures.  The answers that some responders give are usually some worn out verses  that  carry no weight.  How can Scripture carry no weight?  They can simply by being used in the wrong context with the wrong historical context.  Not all Scriptures are meant for every believer, however, the principle behind the Scripture usually can be.  A perfect example is the one Scripture I hate the most.  How does one hate a Bible verse?  One can hate how it’s over-used and used incorrectly.  Jeremiah 29:11, is that one Scripture that irritates the heck out of me.  Jeremiah gave that Scripture in context to the Jews and the 70 year exile that He had ordained for them to bear for their disobedience in idolatry. What exactly is idolatry?  It is mixing GOD’s formula for worship with man’s own ideas and made-up traditions for worship.  In my one of my previous posts, I used Christmas as a perfect example of that practice of idolatry.  The church loves Christmas, because they have their own man-made traditions regarding its practice, but it was never ordained by the LORD as a spiritual act of worship.  (Romans 12:1.) 

In the book of Jeremiah, the prophet was letting GOD’s people know that after their exile, He had a plan to use them, again.  The principle behind that Scripture is true, for the most part, however, it is not for everyone.  Who is it not for? It is not for the person who has turned his back on GOD and walked away to the point of being of no use to Him, anymore.  It is not for the believer who is Christian in name only, doing his own thing, worshiping GOD in his own way, whether it is agreeable to GOD or not, because he feels good about what he’s doing.  Folks, it isn’t about us feeling good about worship or service to GOD.  Usually, the church goer is  not interested in learning anything new.  What his pastor has told him is good enough for him, and seeking out the historical context to Scripture is unimportant to him because he already knows as much as he wants to know about the Lord that he is allegedly worshiping.  Many times, it’s isn’t even YHVH GOD, but an imagined one, one who thinks like he does.

There are some real whacko's out there, self-proclaimed prophets who have decided in their own minds that YHVH has appointed them prophet to the nation.  All you have to do is go to YouTube and in the search box type, "Rapture dream," and every self-proclaimed Joe-apostle/prophet has a video describing some kind of cataclysmic tidal wave or atomic/nuclear war.  It's chicken-little times a million or more. Listening to most of these people, you know that they are not Biblically grounded, but they are mystically assured of their calling.  In other words, they do not realize that what they are saying is not supported by the Bible, as a whole, but the select verses that they choose to support their mystical experience.  Many of them are listening to deceiving spirits that boost them up to prophet status when it was never GOD who called them as prophets, but their own inflated sense of importance in the Kingdom of GOD. 

Now, I'm not saying that GOD doesn't speak to us in dreams, we have Biblical examples that He did, but really, people, do you suppose He is really visiting as many "self-proclaimed" prophets as is on YouTube and other social media sites?  The Bible covers a span of approximately 4,000 years give or take a millennium, and how many times did and Angel of the LORD actually appear in the dreams of His servants?  A handful of times, I would say, and look who He appeared to, what they accomplished, and for what purpose?  I mean there must have been at least a couple of million  of GOD’s people on the earth during those years, and he only appeared to a handful over a 4,000 year span. So what's the chance that He is popping in and out of dreams, sending telepathic cryptic messages to every Joe-YouTube-Prophet? 

I once calculated how many false self-proclaimed prophets might be out there, based on 450 to 1 in 1 Kings chapters 19 and  22. Now, today, if there are 4 billion Christians, using those statistics,  then less than ten thousand or so would-be bonafide authentic people holding the true office of a prophet, called specifically of GOD.  (See To Be or Not to Be a Prophet )

How does this relate to empty pumpkins?  Let me explain. The pulp, the vein and the seeds could symbolize the Whole Counsel of GOD.  The veins and pulp are the people, events, and theme of sin and redemption that interconnect all people, typology, doctrine, and history, in the Bible, and the seeds are the actual Scriptures.  You have to have a perfect balance of pulp, veins, seeds to outer shell and stem rooted firmly into the vine which is nourished in the fertile soil to have a perfectly balanced pumpkin. Once you cut the pumpkin from the vine, you still have a whole pumpkin, which is a useful fruit, but when you hollow it out, taking out the most important parts, then all you have is empty shell. That is the prayer life of a believer not rooted firmly to the Vine with all its parts intact, working properly to balance out the believers knowledge of GOD.

If we don't know the Word of GOD, backward and forward, then our prayers do not carry the power that they are meant to carry.  Do not get me wrong, I’m not saying that I do not believe in prayer, but what I’m saying is that prayer NOT based on the truth in the WHOLE counsel of GOD does not carry the same power. 

Far be it from me to tell anyone something so unScriptural as to stop praying, or that our prayers are not heard by GOD. What I am saying is that if one's prayers aren't bathed in the full knowledge of Scripture, based on solid doctrine in Scripture, with historical context in the content of those prayers, then one might as well be praying to the tooth fairy. Yes, GOD hears our prayers, but is that always GOD answering?  The Spiritual Realm is a very real and very dangerous place if the wrong people enter it through their prayers. (see So You Want to GO Swimming) May I suggest that the devil’s minions assigned to us hear our prayers said out loud?  Do you think it may be possible that they know who is Scripturally inept and who can be deceived? 

Satan is so crafty that even those who are well-endowed with the knowledge of Scripture can find it difficult to discern what is from GOD, what is our own concoction, and what is the enemy feeding our egos and flesh with some kind of nonsense that does not agree with Scripture?   A true prophet of GOD is going to know Scripture like the back of his/her hand, because surely GOD would NOT send out any prophet to preach or be a voice for Him if they were not fully bathed in the full comprehensive knowledge of Scripture and the historicity of GOD’s dealings with His people. .

I've heard some nutty "famous prophets" capitalizing on their 15-minutes of fame, spewing off the craziest stuff, claiming that GOD gave them these prophesies to write down.   They even speak in first person proclaiming to be representing GOD Himself, as did the true Prophets in the Bible.  To be truthful, this man's  prophecies, sound more like Dr. Seuss  on religious psychedelic drugs. I can assure you that  GOD will not give anyone any new prophesies that are not already written in the canon of Scripture.  Whenever you hear anyone prophesy saying that they operate in the prophetic, that should raise a red flag, as that concept is a man-made doctrine, not straight from the Word of GOD.  If he says, “The Spirit of the LORD says,” you can be sure he is not quoting exactly from the Word of GOD, it did not come from GOD. Likely, it came from some snake oil salesman who did a seminar on dreams and made a cool million before GOD took him out of this world because of the damage he has done. I won't mention any names, but you can do some research and find him yourself.  Unless what a prophet  says is and exact quote from the Bible, it’s not from GOD in the context that he is using it. 

Back in the days before Christ, the Holy Spirit fell upon GOD’s ordained prophets, and they became a prophet to the nation, however, we are living in the last days where the Holy Spirit dwells within each believer, so national prophets proclaiming that they have a message, (outside of Scripture) for the nation are not of GOD.  If there is a national prophet, he/she will speak ONLY the Words straight from Scripture that applies to the spiritual condition of the church. If a stranger comes to you and tell  you he has a message from GOD for you, thank him and let him know that you also have the Holy Spirit, and he doesn’t need an interpreter to give you a message.  He will speak directly to you through your study of Scripture.  In other words, if you aren’t studying Scripture, then more than likely you are not hearing from GOD.  Does GOD give personal revelation? Yes, He does, but for the individual  believer only, one on one, not for the believer to send a message to a nation or an individual.  Sometimes, I will come across a person in whom I sense the Spirit of GOD working, and I let that believer know that I believe GOD is going to use in the future.  I never give details, because I do not claim to know that person’s personal walk with the LORD or the detail of his life.  I just let them know that I have a feeling, and that’s all it is, a feeling, not necessarily fact. I direct them to the Whole Counsel of GOD and I advise them to seek out GOD for their own revelation from Him.

What I am trying to say to you is that the easiest way to tell a hollowed out pumpkin and a fully intact one is the by the weight and mass of the pumpkin when examined.  Careful analysis of what is being said compared to Scripture and the history of GOD's dealings with His people is how one can correctly scrutinize another's "prophetic ponderings."   The only way to be able to weigh the pumpkin and prayers is to know all that there is about what's inside both the pumpkin and the Bible. Therefore, if one is not fully equipped in their knowledge of the historicity of the Whole Counsel of GOD, one can easily be manipulated to believe any deceiving spirit that comes along, and let me tell you, those deceiving spirits are quite cunning and crafty sounding very Scriptural.  Remember, the devil knows way more Scripture than you and I do, and he know just how to use them to trip us up.  He even tried to use them on Jesus to trip him up. 

 I’ve spent over a decade in the fiery furnace of affliction and my only means of survival hasn’t been prayer only, but prayer combined is careful study of GOD’s people, especially those who have spent some serious time in the furnace of affliction, where GOD refines the dross out of the sinner and his flesh.  I study every aspect of their walk with GOD and how GOD directed them and the fruit that they bore.  I also study their mistakes because our Gracious and wonderful GOD left those in the story to show us that being human means if there is a way to mess something up, we'll find  it. 

Someone needs to speak for those who cannot!

 

 I have no husband, to speak of, so I know what it's like to be misunderstood, misinterpreted, misnamed, dishonored and labeled or black-listed.  Rumor has it, I have been black-listed among the pastors of my small town.  How bad can a woman be who is black-listed among alleged men of the cloth?  I cannot tell you why, but I can tell you this, I know the Bible, front and back. Am I an expert? Heck no, but I know more than many.  I say this not to boast, actually, these days, if you are a woman who knows the Bible, you are not liked among men.  I didn't read it to become holy, I read it because I hurt, and hurt a lot. So, a woman who knows what the Bible says is  black-listed, because of sinful human pride, something that comes so naturally, we don't even know it's there.  

My first blog that I ever wrote was titled, "The Woman at the Well was no Ho!"  It goes on to explain how it is that we with 21st Century eyes have labeled what could have been a very a holy woman as a "whore."  That poor woman was not an immoral woman, she was set apart. Oddly enough, the actual definition of the word holy means to be set apart.  She was set apart to be the first missionary, and now, because of the misogyny bigotry of men,  she has a bad rap.  She was a holy woman.  She had  rough life.  She was married five times, and the man she is living with is not her husband, said Jesus.  Now, let me ask you, besides being described as  Samaritan woman, where in Scripture does it say that she was shacking up, sleeping around, spreading herself thinly among the men of the town? I will tell you where, NOWHERE! 

In order to understand the context, one must know the historical context. It was a patriarchal system back in those days, a woman could not live alone. A woman could not work, unless she was a harlot, the oldest profession.  Even those women weren't there voluntarily, no more than the ones of today.  They were forced into it, because either they were abandoned, or had no other way to make an income, because people did not hire women for anything back in those days. Maybe she had no male relative to take her in and care for her.  A woman could become a slave, or servant, if she could find someone to take her in as one. 

 She had five husbands, that doesn't mean she fooled around on them, that means she had five husbands. Back in the day, if a woman made a bad meal, a man could toss her out, and without a family of her own to take her in, her only option would be to become a concubine, find another husband, or become and indentured servant.  Also, the lifespan of a man was somewhere in the mid 40's or 50's.  She could have been widowed one or more times.  

Maybe she was dumped by five husbands, because she was barren. A barren woman in those days were shunned. They were shamed, second only to lepers. This woman could have been one who was taken in as a servant, by a man, thus she was living with a  man who was not her husband.  Maybe she was living with a brother or son-in-law, or a brother-in-law. Here's something else to really consider, no one knows how old this woman was. She could have been 85 years old for all we know. Maybe she was  too old, not of child-bearing years, or she had a reputation of being bad-luck for a man.  

A woman who had been widowed several times was considered a holy woman, believe it or not.  It was said of her that GOD had set her apart to be holy, to be His.  I get this, believe me, I get this.  I was set apart.  Set apart for what remains to be seen, but being set apart means being put through the fiery furnace of affliction for many years, even decades.  She was burned all right, and to this day, she is still being burned, as a woman who was immoral when GOD favored her.  My husband left me.  Does that make me an immoral woman? Let's not just assume things about people, because we can't see people through GOD's eyes, we have human eyes, flawed as they are. 

      So why do I think that she may have been set apart, a holy woman, not immoral? Simply by her conversation with Jesus. She knew Scripture.  She knew what to look for in the Messiah. She understood the significance of Jacob's well, and she knew the controversy between where the Samaritans worshiped and where the Jews worshiped.  She quoted Scripture.  Let me ask you, how many prostitutes do you know that can quote Scripture? Not too many.  

Last but not least, this woman was believable.  This woman was bold enough to bear witness to Jesus. Respectable men back then didn't follow prostitutes when they bore witness about a holy man or a prophet.  Would you follow a prostitute who came up to you in the town square and said, "Come and follow me, I have found the Messiah!"  I am going to gather that you would not.  Neither would I.  However, if a woman who knew Scripture, who was reputed to be set apart by GOD, said, "Come and see what the Messiah has to say," Would you follow that woman? If you were set apart, you'd go to where that woman pointed you. If you were a proud seminary-taught man, you would black-list her and call her a trouble-maker. This I do know, by experience.

So, please, let's cut this poor woman some slack and stop referring to her an immoral woman. She was GOD's chosen instrument to bear witness to the town of Samaria to the Christ, the first one to do so. That's an honor, not a reason to be black-listed as a "ho!"

 

 

 Oh, Not So Holy Night!

 

I have held this off as long as I could, because I do NOT enjoy bursting the bubble of Christians, but once I learn a truth, I’m obligated to share it.  You are free to disagree with me if you like, or you can take the next 363 days, to pray, research, and search the Scriptures to either prove me right or wrong in your own minds, hearts, and conscience.   I don’t answer to GOD for what anyone else does in their relations and worship of Adonai, I only answer to Him for myself and my actions.  I have to do what I’m led to do, based on the truth YHWH reveals to me through Scripture, revelation (Rhema’s), and what I can discover based solely on historical facts.  Believe me, this was NOT an easy decision for me to make. 

We had a very toned down Christmas this year, because to spring this on my children that quickly, so near to the Christmas season, I felt would be unreasonable as a parent. After all, I’m the one who taught them from birth that Christmas was indeed a holy event, because we said it was, but not because Scripture said it was.  We followed the traditions of men, and one man decided in order to coaxed the pagans into this new state religion called Christianity, it was best to adopt their pagan practices, "baptize it into Christ," the pope said, or rather slap a Christian title a pagan celebration to a pagan god and declare them holy.  The people back then were told that these men were vicars for Christ, and infallible when it comes to revelation from GOD, so the people followed their religious leaders, because they did not have access to the Scriptures.  A priest named Jerome translated it into Latin so the average person could never have access to GOD's Word. 

This realization of the truth hasn’t been easy for me, either. Heck, I love those traditional Christmas songs from “Last Christmas,” to “Walking in the Winter Wonderland,” (which has NOTHING to do with Christmas, actually) to “Jingle Bells,” (again, Christmas not mentioned), to “Rockin’ around the Christmas Tree,” to “Away in the Manager,” to my absolute favorite of all the hymns, “Oh Holy Night.”  I didn’t sing a single one this year, nor were any of them shaking the paint of the walls of my bedroom while me and the girls belted out our favorites with my speakers jacked up to full volume as we danced around the room, having the time of our lives, doing what we do every Christmas.  It was a difficult decision, and I missed the fun of it.  Sometimes, we have to sacrifice the traditions of men to prove our loyalty to YHVH GOD, like Jesus said in the Bible. 

 The roots of Christmas are in ancient events like Saturnalia to the German celebrations of Yule, which served the Norse god Odin. Christmas actually comes from pagan celebrations and fertility rites. Once, I learned of just how offensive the whole Yuletide season was to GOD Elohim, I just could not enjoy doing it anymore. The kids really put up a fight about the Christmas tree, and I must say, I caved and let them put one up this year, unbeknownst to them, it’s going out in the trash the next day Rumpke comes to haul away the torn-up gift wrapping paper.  Yes, we did gifts, but there was no Christmas dinner, no holiday music, just gift giving, because they had their gifts picked out before all this truth came in and wiped away fifty-six years-worth of Christmas celebrations and traditions. 

Included for your reading enjoyment is the Twelve Christmas Traditions rooted in Pagan Culture  that the Roman Pope decided, “if you can’t beat them join them,” and slapped a “Christian” title onto these pagan-god worship traditions.  Feel free to take this link, do your own research, and come up with your own conclusion. Again, you answer to GOD for your holidays, and I answer to GOD for my festive days I celebrate in honor of Adonai.  For example, we celebrated Hanukkah this year for the first time. It’s a Jewish tradition based on the celebration of the Maccabees defeat of the first anti-christ, type, (or example) in Antiochus IV of Epiphanes.  That was one cruel anti-semite, who paid and placed his own high priests in the Jewish Temple, and who tortured into submission the majority of the Jewish nation that was left after the rebuilding of Jerusalem and the Temple around 3-4 centuries before him.  Even Jesus honored that Festival of Lights in John 10:22, as he went up to the Temple in the winter to acknowledge the deliverance of GOD’s people from a tyrannical murderous demon covered in human skin.  It is not one of the Hebrew feasts that the LORD ordained in Leviticus, as none of those six feasts are observed by the church today.  That’s a whole new topic on the anti-semitism in the gentile church, which they will emphatically deny is practiced, but yet, is so clearly practiced by gentile Christian church, replete of all signs of any Judaic traditions, lest they be called out as Judaizers and heretics, bring up the Torah in the church.  How dare they do that? Another blog post in the future will be titled, “Oh Where Oh Where has the Torah Gone? 

If the LORD elected to choose a people to Himself, then only, He should be able to ordained that which is  an acceptable practice to worship Him.  Copy-cat worship is not something He is okay with, because He is GOD and there is no other.  Every time I mentioned this new conviction to someone this year, I got the same argument that I used to give, that we are honoring the birth of Jesus, and yes, you are, but on the wrong day, in the wrong season, and with traditions seeped in idolatry.  GOD’s definition of idolatry in the Old Testament was for His people to adapt the religious practices and false gods of the pagan nations into their worship of the Most High. That was the sin of the high places that the divided nations were guilty of, instead of doing worship exactly how it was prescribed in the Torah.  It was what got them divided as a nation, then the ten tribes of Northern Israel virtually annihilated, and the tribes of Judah and Benjamin sent to Babylon for seventy years of exile, until they learned their lesson.  Let me tell you, when Elohim sends you into a 70-year time out, it’s highly unlikely that you’ll want to repeat the offense, by worshiping Him the way the pagans worshiped their false gods. It is most assuredly offensive to the Most High.

Someone who is truly adept at the New Testament will bring up Romans 14, when Paul declared one man’s unholy day an another man’s acceptable holy day. At least, I would have, and did, until I read the Scripture more closely, and realized that there was an exception in that rule was ( 10 For if someone sees you, the one who has knowledge, dining in an idol’s temple, will his conscience, if he is weak, not be strengthened to eat things sacrificed to idols? 11 For through your knowledge the one who is weak is ruined, the brother or sister for whose sake Christ died. 1 Corinthians  8:10-11)   Likewise, in 1 Corinthians 10, the example Paul used referred to the eating of foods sacrificed to idols which was an abomination to GOD.  The details are different, but the principle of the practice is there.  When Jesus came to earth to fulfil the Law, he did not abolish it, he just took the principle of the Law to a whole new level of understanding.    He taught the depth of the Law, the meaning behind the Law. 

  Scripture must verify Scripture and one text taken out of text does not nullify or justify and action that may or may not be ordained by GOD.  With YHWH, it’s is always a heart thing, and never a performance thing.  So, celebrating a pagan’s traditional worship to their pagan gods is essentially the same thing eating foods sacrificed to idols.  Paul said that if they knew the food was sacrificed to an idol or a false god was strictly forbidden, then in essence  us knowing that holly and mistletoe and Christmas tree in your home is doing the exact same thing.  

Once the LORD pricks my conscience in this manner, like He did this year, then, I just could never see Christmas the same way ever again. It went from a sacred event in my mind to a very unholy night/season, and for the rest of my life, I just cannot perceive it as a joyous event if the LORD says in Scripture that it is an abomination to Him.  What I thought for five decades was worship, now I know was an offense.  We are responsible for what we know at the time and what the LORD teaches us, when we are taught it, not before.  My  more than five decades of celebrating  Christmas was not a sin, because we are only sinning when we know it’s a sin. There are unintentional sins in which we will not be held guilty of, and then there are the outright rebellious sins we know to be wrong, in which we will stand and give an account. 

I just can’t do it anymore, knowing what I know, now,  because my conscience before GOD won’t let me.  I would rather offend man, even though it’s NOT what I like to do, than to risk  offending GOD.  If I have to choose between GOD and man, well then man  loses out.   My children will answer to Him themselves as He teaches them in the same progressive revelation He taught me.  As I advise all parents of adult children, they are not your children when they are adults, they are GOD’s, and you have to give them back. They now become just your offspring and any advice or counsel you want to give them must be sought out by them, not offered freely or oppressively, because you are not their mommy anymore. You do not answer to GOD for what they do as adults. You are only obligated to the LORD for teaching them what you do know while they are still under your stewardship. When the LORD teaches us new things, it’s because we have come to him to seek new things to be taught. He never oppresses a man into morality, it is always a choice on our part out of the love in our hearts for Him. For that is your bodily act of worship, and the only kind of sacrifice he wants from us.

When the pain is blinding.

I have had something like fifteen surgeries. Seven of them have been cesarean section births, two new feet, some corrective plastic surgery, hand surgery, and oral surgery. The worse by far was the parotidectomy. Your parotid gland incorporates nearly the entire side of your face.  One day I found a tumor right next to my right ear.  Everyone told me it was nothing, probably a benign cyst, that I shouldn’t worry, but I knew different. This was one of those times when the voice in the back of your head says, “God’s got a work for you to do. Be prepared, He’s turning up the heat.”

That voice is almost always the voice of the Holy Spirit guiding or convicting us.  Almost two agonizing months after I found the tumor, I lay on an operating table for near six hours while my gifted oncologist, with great precision, removed the tumor which did have some nerve involvement.  Because the nerve was involved, I was supposed be left with anywhere from minor to major facial paralysis. to completely unable to even blink or smile.   Best case scenario would have been Bell’s Palsy as a lasting effect for the rest of my life. By the gracious and miraculous hand of GOD, and complete surprise to all medical personnel, I experienced none of the above.  The story doesn’t end there. After proving to be a stage one malignant tumor, my oncologist recommended daily radiation therapy for a period of six weeks to burn out any remaining cancer cells in the area

I foolishly assumed that the recovery from that surgery was the most painful experience in my life, however, it was a scratch on my cheek compared to what came next. For ten weeks, I endured swallowing razor blades, radiation burns, radiation sores, complete loss of my ability to taste anything, and fatigue like I’ve never known, even after having birthed and raised eight babies. I was supposed to lose all my teeth and very little hair, but GOD had a different plan.  I lost no teeth at all, but half a head of hair. I was bald as an eagle from the middle of my scalp down, but no one knew because the top layer covered it.  I had to walk around with a mullet hair style for over a year, but considering I wasn’t supposed to keep my teeth, I was all too happy to be out of style, looking like that achy-breaky, country artist from the early 90’s. 

 The last difficult ordeal, and I use that term loosely, was pain-med withdrawal.  The fool that I was, about two weeks after my last treatment, when I figured I could stand the physical pain, I just removed the pain patches and threw them away. Let me suggest, NEVER to do that!  I wasn’t interested in tapering down, I was interested in getting back to work and normal life.  The withdrawal I experience was similar to the kind of withdrawal a heroin addict experiences. Now, don’t go assuming I was high and having a ball all that time, because when narcotic painkillers are used properly for pain, there is no high as a kite. There is only pain-relief to a degree, enough to live, but not enough to forget the pain that was ever present.

 All during those months, I had lost sight of the reason for the pain. I had forgotten that it was all for a greater purpose. I grew angry, bitter and near impossible to live with, a time of my life of which I greatly grieve. It’s a funny thing about pain, sometimes it can be so severe and life-draining, that the only thing we can focus on in our daily life is the pain. Everything else becomes a blur, and we think is this the way it’s always going to be?  We wonder what if felt like to not be in pain.  We can’t remember life without it. It drains our energy, saps our joy, and steals any happiness or hope we have for the future. Compassion and agape love are gifts given to us by GOD, some get more some get less, while empathy is an equal opportunity employer of our future work. 

That year my husband and I both survived dual cases of cancer, however, our three decade old difficult marriage did not.  The physical pain was over, but the heart pain was only to get worse.  I do thank GOD for every dark, dreary, bleak, hopeless, despairing, oppressed and painful moment in my life, because good will come from all of this. I’ve heard over and over the amount of difficulties and obstacles a person has to endure is in proportion to the size of the ministry GOD has planned for us after we have survived it all.  I hope that is true. 

Currently, I am in one of those extremely emotionally painful times where my back is against the wall and there is no way out of my situation, short of the Hand of GOD. There is no easy way out of this one, and sometimes, I get so lost in the pain, I can’t remember the thousands of promises GOD gives us in His Word.  One of them is what GOD gave me the weekend before my cancer surgery. This one is in Exodus, when the Israelites were at the Red Sea, with the Egyptian army closing in on them. There was no way out for them, or so they thought

Sometimes I lose focus, and I look too much at the circumstances, the storm, the waves, and not the LORD who just told me I could walk on water.  Sometimes we fall into the devil’s trap of only seeing and feeling the pain.  This is the time that GOD uses not to test us, because He knows if we will pass, but to prove to us that, yes, we can endure it. We have two choices in pain, grow a deeper love for GOD or withdraw from Him. I choose to grow deeper in love, my husband on the other hand, chose the opposite road. People tell me everyday that GOD would never end a marriage. People who say that don't know GOD very well, because in His Grace, He did.  We were both drowning in a sea of despair. I was on the top trying to keep my head above water, while he was under the water, trying to pull me under with him.  

I thought being free from the trap of a dying marriage would make it better, it only caused more grief, because daily, he is a reminder that it didn't work.  I am in constant daily heart pain from that and a few other heart-crushing events since then, but I march on, or as I tell my children when they are in physical pain, "Kerri-Strugg-it. If she can do a perfect vault and win the gold for her team on a broken ankle, then you can do whatever it is you have to do while smarting a little, or even a lot.“

Recently, I learned that I focused too much on Psalm 27:13, the promise that life would get better and that I would see the "goodness" of the LORD in the land of the living, and that made it worse.  NOW, I focus on the character of GOD, because that is always good, always gracious, always faithful, and always for my good and the good of His Kingdom.  That is where the numbing agent really is. 

STOP Trying to Be Just Like Jesus. 

Go for the Next Best Thing!

I know what you are going to say. There will be those who shoot for perfection who tell us that we are COMMANDED to be like Christ, (which we are not) Or some will say, "That's right, we should be like Paul."    Ehhhhh!  Both are wrong.      You have to know how I think to know who I'm going for here, and if anyone has read any of my blogs, they'll know I'm shooting for David! Let me explain.

Do you think that Jesus knows that we cannot be like him or think like him? (Isaiah 55:8-9) Jesus did NOT have a sinful nature. He was fully human but without a sinful nature. Well, maybe he had just a tiny bit inside just so that he knew the battle. Theologically speaking, many say that GOD put Jesus in Mary's womb because the sinful nature comes from the father. I tend to believe that. Who was called on the carpet first, and who took the first bite? When did Adam and Eve realize they were naked, after her bite or his? Case closed. Now Jesus had to be the seed of a woman, like Genesis 3 tells us, therefore he had to be from an egg in her ovaries. Now, Mary had an earthly father, thus, she had a sinful nature. So, if we are going to get technical here, like DNA and stuff, yes, Jesus could have inherited just a tiny bit of a sinful nature, yet he NEVER acted upon it. This is very controversial, because many say he was perfect and without sin because he was created pure, but Grampie Heli’'s seed was in that ovary, so, he was FULLY human. The point is that Jesus NEVER sinned. It wasn't because he couldn't, as in not physically able, it was because he couldn't in order to fulfill the purpose for which he was sent.

In my personal opinion, and I’m NOT quoting any Bible Scripture, this is just my opinion, although I love Paul as a brother in Christ, if I was going to church with him, we would NOT be friends. You can love your sibling in Christ and not be buddies that hang out.  I surely would NOT hang out with Paul.  I appreciate the fact that GOD chose him and trained him, and used him to write 1/3 of the New Testament, but I think we Christians have taken Paul way out of context and follow him as if he was as perfect as Christ.  Every word he says, we hang on to it as if it were LAW, to be strictly followed, NO exceptions, lest we become heretics.  If you want to be like that, feel free, but don’t expect us to be friends either.  People who attain to be like Jesus or Paul are looking for perfection in themselves and demanding it from themselves and others, thus when they “achieve” as much as Jesus or Paul in them to their own standards, that ugly little pride virus attacks their heart, and it’s damaged sometimes for good.

Paul’s words are for sure Divinely Inspired, but they are NOT Leviticus, and many if not most New Testament Christians treat his epistles as if it was the New Testament’s version of Leviticus. (The book of Mosaic Law in the Pentateuch)  Those people drive me nuts, and do you want to know why they drive me nuts?  I will tell you.  It’s because I am a freaking mess.  I am a total failure, a dweeb, a woman subject to my hormones, menopause, which is PMS on steroids.  I’m alone, a reject, been one all my life, therefore, I am subject to the devil screaming in my head that I’m a loser and always will be.  The devil screams but Jesus whispers using the Holy Spirit, that’s why it’s so hard to hear him sometimes.  You know we, like our children, have selective hearing as much as they do with our Heavenly Father as they do with us. We choose what to hear from Jesus, most of the time, it has to be to our liking, or we ad-lib a little and throw our opinion in there.  People have said they find comfort in Paul’s epistles.  Well I don’t, I never have.

People say that Paul suffered greatly, and he knows how weak we are, he knows the trials and temptations of a sinful nature.  (Does this sound like anything you’ve heard before only substitute the name JESUS instead)  Do you see what I mean?  Yeah, Paul suffered, he was brilliant, he had a sinful nature, he despaired at times, (although he barely mentions it), and he triumphed through GOD grace which was sufficient for his weaknesses.  But let me tell you what Paul did NOT have.  He did not  have a XX chromosome.  He has NO clue what it’s like to be a woman, a wife, or a mother.  Jesus does though, because he’s GOD.  I think enough has been said here about Paul, with respect, of course. 

So, who is the next best thing if it’s not Paul?  Duh, it’s David.  The Bible is full of screw-ups that GOD used to prove His grace and power to work through humans who were a freaking mess.  Jacob is my favorite mess, because it took 100 years for him to get it right.  If I was going to live that long, it would take me longer.  David, on the other hand was a bit more of a mess than Jacob.  Buckle your seat belt, because I’m going into the deep dive of David’s sewerage. 

David, besides being an adulterer, and a really bad commander-in-chief, setting up an honorable guy in the front lines in order to hide the fact that he was a man, and well,  I won't go there, but let your imagination picture what I'm thinking, was an adulterer and murderer LONG before Bathsheba, because before he got to Ziglag, on his prodigal road, he already had three wives. He collected more after taking the throne, and even had concubines.  Ask Absalom.  That makes him the adulterer.  Stealing another man’s wife, they makes him a creep. As far as fatherhood, well, shoot, you can’t get worse than David, ask Tamar and Absalom, again.  Well, maybe King Manasseh, but David was a horrendous father.  David fell into despair so many times, we can’t count them all, but the Book of Psalms exhibits quite a few of them.  Thank GOD he wrote those times down, or we’d never make it.  David had a prodigal road, yep, he left GOD.  I know, you don’t believe me. Well check out 1 Samuel 27, the very first verse and tell me what you see.  Go ahead, I’ll wait.

David was promised the throne by GOD and anointed by Samuel one of the great ones, and yet, he believed that Saul would kill him so he hid behind enemy lines.  He became a traitor. He was a traitor for 16 months.  He lived with the Philistines, he answered to a Philistine general and he conquered land and goods for the Philistine king.  In our constitution, that constitutes TREASON, and is punishable by death.  But, if you want to know the very very very WORST thing about David, read that entire chapter 27.  Read it very carefully.  Go ahead, I’ll wait.

What did David do that was despicable?  He murdered for profit and he made sure that NO ONE was alive who could fink on him to the Philistine general, who was his commander, thus he kept quite a bit of the take for himself.  So, to put it mildly, David was a MASS murderer, killing innocent babies, women, children, and men who were minding their own business, just trying to make a living and take care of their families.  Albeit they were pagans, however, and HERE is the clincher, GOD never instructed David to take over those villages, he was acting up on his own desire to whip up quite the fortune for himself, and to prove himself a great warrior for his PHILISTINE general, and he became quite prideful.  He was so prideful, that he was even to willing to go to war with the Philistines against his own people.  GOD’s people.  Think on that right now.  Considering what’s happening now, and who are the treasonous traitors running their shadow government, who have done their best to overthrow a duly elected and loved by tens of millions, President, the best one we've ever had, where does David measure up?  How do you like those people?  Say, like the Clinton's who are reputed as expert suicider’s.

  There is a LONG list of Clinton dead floating around, and thank GOD we don’t know the half of it.  SO, now what do you think of David?  Not the stellar guy, huh?  So, if he was like that, why should we attain to be like him?  That’s simple, what did GOD call him, “ a man after My own heart,” and in the book of Acts 7:46 it says that David enjoyed favor with GOD.  That’s the ticket for me. 

Every time I feel like crap about myself, and that is VERY often, I take a visit down David’s memory lane, and I shoot for being a woman after GOD’s own heart, knowing fully just how far down in the bottom of the barrel David had to climb back up.  GOD doesn’t treat us as our sins deserve, but he did give David a piece of his own medicine when He allowed Ziglag to be burned and ALL of the women and children to be taken hostage.  That’s in chapter 29 of 1^st Samuel.  Check it out.  That was when David “came to his sense,” like the prodigal son in Luke 15. 

So, now after this great revelation, I feel so much at peace, because I’ve stopped making Paul and Jesus my example of how I should perform, and I’ve made David my example of how I should seek after GOD’s heart with all my heart, all my soul, all my mind and all my strength, because I want to love Him that much. There was one other thing that David had that I have, crazy faith that believes that if I can hold out long enough, I can take down that 1,000 foot giant, because Allen means stone. I've lost a lot of friends over that crazy faith, and I've given up on it more times than I can count. Every once in a while GOD will do something that will fill my faith bank back up to full and over-flowing. 

Cancer,  Death , 
and Good Humble Pie 

~Among Others~

   Eight years ago, I remember GOD calling me to begin a writing career. Of course, I thought that was the most ludicrous notion that I had ever heard. After all, I don't think I received higher than a D in any of my college writing classes. So, I said to GOD, "But GOD, I'm not a writer, I'm not a novelist, I haven't a clue how to do that." I distinctly heard in my spirit, before those frightful words of rebuttal left my lips,

   "Kristina, you are who I make you to be." Oh, yeah, that did it. I had no argument with that.

     You see, we can argue with GOD all we want, but we will never win. Here's the beauty, He doesn't mind how much we do it, until we learn that we aren't going win, and we can trust Him with that which we know we can’t handle. Eventually, we realize that He has been trying to teach our slow brains that we can’t handle it, but He can. 

    Another day, I remember being on one of my five-mile autumn walks, and  I saw in my head in the future, a very successful author who had my face. The terror that ran over me on my walk nearly face planted me right there and oddly enough, right in front of the local library. GOD has a funny sense of humor. That fear gripped my heart because I know just how much of a screw-up I have been and still am. Again, I had a rebuttal for GOD, and before the words,  

    "Oh, no, GOD, what will I do if I am successful. I'm sure to ruin it. That kind of success like that ruins everyone. What if I get too full of myself? What is to stop me from making it all about me?

    Again, the answer was swift and only took two nouns and a conjunction, "Cancer and death." 

   “Oh, yeah, that'll do it." The Bible is clear, storms come from GOD’s permissive and sometimes planned will. The crook in your lot that totally messed you up came from GOD. He may have used other people to put the bend in the road that caused you to crash and burn. He did it because you were probably going the wrong way at warp speed and didn't see the train wreck coming right at you.

   Two years later, I was knee deep in radiation hell, having all pride I had built up in my first book, finished, with “rave” reviews. (I sometimes wonder if there was more wrong with those who reviewed my book than me in the intelligence department.) burned out of me.  So, one book down, another started and an amazing one at that. God gave me a story that was sure to be an epic. Right after I finished the rough draft, I spent the next six months in radiation hell getting the snot burned out of me, literally. 

   Sadly, though, GOD had more sense-of-self I needed to be rid of, because having bounced back beating cancer and surviving radiation hell, I still had a garden needing to be weeded after a longest winter of my life. So, he ruffled up the garden paradise of my home and family life. With a stroke, dual cancers, a few days past the pain of radiation hell, I was basking in victory. With no real warning, none that I paid attention to, because I never thought divorce could happen to me, my husband informed me during the last few weeks of my cancer treatments that he was filing for divorce when my treatments were over after twenty-nine years of marriage. 

    A year after that, another major heart crushing rejection came along to seriously send me under the bed hiding behind my cat afraid to even come out of my room, lest something worse happen. Rejection is one of GOD's greatest tools, not only to protect us from those who are not good for us, but to protect us from ourselves and that ugly human disease called, P-R-I-D-E. It is so sneaky. Even in all that, it still snuck up on me. You'd think I would have had my fill of humble pie with my family shattered, dual cancers, divorce pending, and a crushed and broken heart should have humbled me, but nope. He had one more lesson. Vindication!

   You see, the Bible promises us that He will vindicate us from those who do us harm, even if sometimes He was the one who sent them to do just that. Boy, I surely needed some vindication, or rather thought that I deserved vindication. Do you see it? Pride entered even through my brokenness. I was so broken by those who GOD sent in my life to hurt me, on purpose, to keep me humble, but now as the "victim," I felt I deserved some Heaven sent vindication, and some serious justice to feel satisfied. There is a difference between seeking justice for a person’s well-being, and seeking vindication for our bruised egos. When we plead for justice, it must be with an attitude of needing deliverance from something that is oppressing us, with the Father-forgive-them-for-they-know-not-what-they-do attitude and heart behind it. When we seek the self-satisfying kind of justice and vindication, that is usually nothing but pure anger and bitterness coated in pride.

    Now, I am cancer survivor who is well aware that just like the winter, cancer always comes back, especially the rare kind I was gifted with, even if it takes decades. Yes, cancer was a gift, and anyone who drew closer to GOD during theirs understands that. It is, however, a permanent, unwelcomed guest that never really leaves, but lies dormant in my cells, ready to leap at a moment’s notice, and all just to keep forcing that humble pie down my throat. 

     

  So, here I am eight years later, working on my eighth book, (eight meaning new beginning in Hebrew numerology) Google-able, yet, still a nobody. As a mother of eight in a small town, my house isn't all glass, but still too much of it is. I can't walk down main street without one of my children's friends letting them know that they saw me tripping over my own two left feet on that sidewalk, again. Failure in obscurity is fine with me. After eleven years in the fiery furnace of affliction, with the heat turned up to broil, I've learned that failure is the flour in humble pie, and it is way easier to deal with, and much more preferred than success. I know how to do failure very well, but I've never done success. Believe me when I say this, I'm scared to death of it! PUN intended. I'd almost rather fail my entire life, and let my work succeed after I am gone. That way GOD gets all the credit, all the glory and I'm just a stone in the ground. After all, Allen means stone!