Doubt the Doubter

Revelation 3:15-16 “I know all the things you do, that you are neither hot nor cold. I wish that you were one or the other! But since you are like lukewarm water, neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of my mouth!

If you look at a battery for any appliance you have, you’ll see that the positive and negative posts are very far apart so that they cannot touch. If they touch there is destruction by way of explosion.
When we are HOT, on fire for God, we are not only believing and loving him, but we trust him beyond anything or anyone that we would trust on earth. We do not just believe that He can do what he say’s that He will, we are trusting that He will do that thing.

Many times we will believe God for something but we may say something to the effect of “Well, I know that He can do it, but he probably won’t do it for me.” When we do this we are mixing a positive and a negative which is a dangerous mix. Have you ever noticed that when this happens it ends up being a relatively painful experience? Not only don’t we receive what He has for us because we doubted, but we have actually allowed ourselves to become the one thing that the Lord despises and that is lukewarm. It is better to be a non believer than it is to be a believer that doubts Him. At least the non believer doesn’t know God, and never had a relationship with Him, but to have a relationship with Him and to know Him but not trust Him or doubt Him is one of the worst things a Christian can do.

I pray that you never experience being lukewarm for God, but if you ever do it can feel like nothing good will ever happen again. You begin to feel like you’ve breathed your last breath in God’s favor. Questions like “will I ever feel close to God again?” will pop into your mind. Know that this is the devil trying to gain total victory over you; it is a time when you don’t feel like praying, worshiping or doing anything to help yourself. Again this is satan trying to gain a total victory over you. It is a time when you have to force yourself to pray, to worship, and to get in the Bible and just read. It will help you to hold on until you get breakthrough. I have experienced this first hand and I never want to experience this again.

This is not to say don’t question God. Questioning God is a good thing and encouraged because when we do we’re often seeking confirmation for something he said. We have got to stop doubting the one we should believe, and we need to stop believing the one that we should doubt. Many have this backwards and in this New Year, there is no better time then the present to clean out some bad habits.

I have lost count as to how many times I have heard someone say that God said He’d do something but the person doesn’t believe it can happen for them. This is because When the Lord said He would do whatever it was; the thought process didn’t stop there. The devil sneaks right in and tells us that God won’t do what he said and sometimes we agree with that for whatever reason.

The best thing we can do is to doubt the doubter. When God say’s he’ll do something, we need to receive it and go into prayer and thanksgiving for that thing. When the devil comes lurking around trying to tell you that God can’t or won’t do what He said, just tell the devil I doubt that. If you want to confuse the devil, that’s how to do it. He’ll go off talking to other devils (can you believe that I just told this Christian that I doubted God and the Christian doubted me right back? Can he do that? That’s not fair!! Now what do I do?

Let’s start putting a hurting on the devil. Let’s start kicking him around instead of letting him run rampant in our lives.

Lord God I thank you for this message. I thank you God for reigniting the fire within my spirit for you. I pray father that with the wisdom I have gained from the difficult times I’ve experienced, that you would send me to those that are experiencing a dark time in their lives, so that I could impart the peace and love that you have so generously given to me, into them. Father God I’m asking for a special blessing for all of the readers of this blog, that they and their families would experience your supernatural love, favor and compassion all through 2007. May this year be the year of revival fire here in the United States!

I ask this in the name of your son Jesus Christ.

God Bless You All

“The Sharpshooter”

Service To The Lord

Luke 17:7- 8 “When a servant comes in from plowing or taking care of sheep, does his master say, ‘Come in and eat with me’? No, he says, ‘Prepare my meal, put on your apron, and serve me while I eat. Then you can eat later.’

The North American Church unlike other countries seems to have twisted the meaning behind this scripture. Many Christians today go to church to be feed a great message that lifts them up to make it from Sunday to Sunday. Often times if there isn't a meaty message, people will move on down the road going from church to church until they find a message that feeds their spirit. Church is not for feeding our spirits and our wants and desires and it was never designed for that purpose.

Jesus said in Matthew 21:13 "It is written," he said to them, “My house will be called a house of prayer. Church has always been known as a house of worship." When we are there, we are there for one purpose. We are there to give thanks and praise for all that the Lord has done and continues to do in our lives. We give Him glory. The idea that we are going to go to church and come out all filled up is wrong. We might come out with our spirits filled up because something the pastor said in his message put us in a positive space, but that was not the sole purpose. We feel good mostly from the overflow from our praises to God.

Our receiving comes from our giving. I don't mean money. I mean praise and thanks. When we honor the Lord, we prove worthy before him. He loves when we praise, when we show faith, when we give to him or to others in need. The good feeling we are all looking for should come from our giving of ourselves. Having our hearts and minds in the right place and focusing on the things of God. That is where the great feelings come from.

The Pastor is not there to make us feel good. Preaching is all about getting us right with God. The pastor leads us through the dark areas of life and into the light, using the word of God, drawing us closer to that place where we are in communion with the Lord. The pastor's message should draw us closer to God. It should convict our spirit of anything we have done wrong in thought or in action, so that we can repent for that thought or action and become able to be forgiven and washed white as snow by the blood of Jesus.

I long for the day when the fire of the Holy Spirit flows through the hearts all of us, so that we can really see what God can do. There are many churches in the United States, but unfortunately many of them will never actually see God move. So many churches just go through the motions of a service or mass and they stick to a structured routine. There is nothing structured about God, belief, faith, praise, or miracles. I can’t endure sitting through that type of service anymore and I cringe whenever I have to go to a church that is like that, I thank God that those occasions are rare. If you are in a church like that and you’re content with it, you couldn’t have experienced a move of God. Anyone that has seen something happen that absolutely no question had to be a supernatural move of God could not be content to do church like that once they had.

I actually refer to those kind congregations as “churches” and the places where the spirit of the Lord resides as “houses of worship”. The difference is like night and day. It is just a whole lot more fun to give praise, worship and glory to the Lord in great abundance. If prayer is the thing that moves God, then “Houses of worship” are the place to be, because there is nothing like seeing the result of God performing a miracle or healing someone or giving favor to someone. My heart skips a beat every time I see something that God has done. I love just hearing the testimonies from people that have received a blessing from God.

So be joyous in all of your giving. Serve the Father the way he deserves to be served, with all of your heart, soul, mind and spirit. With everything you have serve Him. In everything you do serve Him. Spending our entire lives from the womb to the tomb serving God wouldn’t be enough. We owe him for everything we have.

1 Peter 2:21-22 (The Message) This is the kind of life you've been invited into, the kind of life Christ lived. He suffered everything that came his way so you would know that it could be done, and also know how to do it, step-by-step. He never did one thing wrong, Not once said anything amiss. They called him every name in the book and he said nothing back. He suffered in silence, content to let God set things right. He used his servant body to carry our sins to the Cross so we could be rid of sin, free to live the right way. His wounds became your healing. You were lost sheep with no idea who you were or where you were going. Now you're named and kept for good by the Shepherd of your souls.

I invite you to pray this with me

Father God, I thank you for all that you do for us. We are not worthy of your grace, and forgiveness, but you do it anyway. If only we could show you the unconditional love that you show to us God. You deserve our best, your word teaches us how to live and how to serve you. Help us God to be better servants to you. I ask you to take control and guide us all into the place you desire for each of us. Lord Jesus come. Come upon us and fill our hearts, help us to be better at giving away the love, compassion, and blessings that you bestow upon each of us. Teach us how to do your will better so that we get into the place where we can see you performing miracles as an everyday occurance.

I ask this in your most Holy name

Amen

God Bless You All

“The Sharpshooter”