"Leave this filth and pain in the past. Leave the darkness behind"

This quote comes from a song from the band Sleeping Giant, the name of this masterpiece is Whoremonger. Every time I pay attention to this song and it's lyrics I see a testimony of a man who once was wrapped with Satan's deception. This testimony is so beautiful and it states one way to be released from the deception of the enemy. The one and only way to be freed from the hurting pain and lies of the enemy is by DEATH.

This death that I am talking about is not the same death that Jesus Christ went through on the cross. Nor a brutal death, this death is a death that is unlike any other. Although, it does require some pain and suffering, just as a regular death would. This pain that goes along with this death will ultimately lead you to a life of fulfillment, once it is all done with.

Dying to your self is the death that I am talking about here. What Paul says in Romans 8:5 is the exact death that is needed for a life of fulfillment:

"Those who live according to the flesh have their minds set on what the flesh desires; but those who live in accordance with the Spirit have their minds set on what the Spirit desires. The mind governed by the flesh is death, but the mind governed by the Spirit is life and peace. The mind governed by the flesh is hostile to God; it does not submit to God’s law, nor can it do so. Those who are in the realm of the flesh cannot please God".

Paul tells us that we cannot please God when we live in the realm of the flesh! Dying to our self is the same as dying to our flesh! The daily call of dying to ourselves is a hard, yet an obtainable goal in any Christians life.

I challenge you, just as I challenge my self everyday, to die to your self! It will not feel good the first few times, and trust me when I say it won't feel good, but if you truly care about God more than your flesh then you will join me on this challenge to say, "NO" to the things in life you know that aren't right for the life of a man or woman of God. 

JOIN ME.

Say, NO!

Walk away.

Refuse to obey what your flesh desires and run to the desires of God's heart!

FIRE RAIN DOWN!

*Beware I may use some terms that may not attend to your spiritual beliefs but know that all is said are not my words being typed but His words. Let His words, my God Almighty's attend to your heart. Where they belong.

Recently I was at Starbucks listening to a song by Ron Downing, called "I Will Follow (Psalm 23)". At the time I have not yet listened to this song not even once! At the first sight of this song I instantly clicked on it. While waiting for the song to start and to pass the intro and the simple verses, I looked at the song name and noticed Psalm 23. When my eyes glanced over the screen on my computer towards the address of the scripture, right away I KNEW that God was calling me to read this. I laughed at myself and my thought of God wanting me to read a stupid Psalm. 

So then I got over my selfish desire of not obeying God's intention for this song for and opened up my bible. If you would turn to me to Psalm 23:1. 

During the turning of my pages of my Bible I noticed seeing a big group of young people entering in the courtyard of Starbucks. As my laptop is blaring this song as loud as possible and my bible is open right outside of a coffee shop. I was scared out of my mind! The enemy right then and there tried to attack me by making me try to lower my music volume and close my bible! But right then and there I said out loud in a faint whisper, "I cut the head off of my traitor within's head. Enemy back up! Cause I know my God wants to use this verse somehow within my life!"

Immediately as I said this I began getting the Holy Spirit goosebumps as I would say and my heart started warming! Then I read Psalm 23:1. As it reads in the NIV translation: " The LORD is my shepherd, I shall not be in want." I read it and I kind of laughed to my self... well that's easy. Do not be in want. Cool. Then God told me to go deeper. I then looked up the words Shepherd and Want in the Hebrew Lexicon. The following were the translations of each;

Shepherd = The Hebrew word "Mishkan". This word entirely means;  a residence, also the Temple.

Want = The Hebrew word "abowy (ab-o'ee)". This word actually means; In the sense of desiring, Sorrow.

So in the sense of this scripture if we replace the word Shepherd and Want with the original Hebrew translations we get the following verse that is located in Psalm 23:1 ;

" The LORD is my RESIDENCE, I shall not be in SORROW! "

Because God is our place of resting and our "Go-to Guy" we shouldn't be sad or sorrowful whatsoever! It says it right here in David's Psalm! He states that we must not be full of sorrow therefore because our God loves us enough that we can use him as a resting place, or a place of prayer or worship! We shouldn't be sorrowful because God is God, that is all. Period.

Real Men Cry?

Tonight I am going to state in my opinion, the worlds greatest, yet so greatly overlooked bible verse to ever exist. This reason for the overlooking of this bible is verse is that because it has no importance, nor that it is not profund, because oh it is both profound and important. The reasoning behind the overlooking of this verse is that because it is the shortest bible verse in the whole entire bible. This verse is only two words, yes 2. This verse can be found in the gospel of John.

John 11:35 says, "Jesus Wept."

When Jesus found out that Lazarus was dead he wept with Mary and Martha. Our Jesus sat there and WEPT! CRIED!!!

Some times during prayer or worship or even a sad time I feel a tear coming, and all too often do I see myself holding it in.

Jesus cried. Our Jesus, the man that died on the cross for our sins, the man who was beaten cried! And the best part about this? He didn't cry over pyhsical pain of himself, he cried for what broke his heart. When he heard from Mary and Martha that Lazarus was dead he cried because his heart ached with an emotional pain that was worth crying over. 

This is how we should feel and act. When we see something that would hurt God's heart we should weep out of sympathy. This does not mean a physical cry, it could be a eternal cry. But, our heart should break for what breaks his heart!

Just as the song "Hosanna" says, "Break my Heart for what Breaks Yours". This should become a daily prayer. We should break down and either physically cry, or mentally cry for something that would break our creators heart. 

So to conclude... Yes a real man cries. A real man cries and weeps and lets his heart break for what makes our creators heart break and cry.

BREAK MY HEART FOR WHAT BREAKS YOURS JESUS! AMEN AND AMEN.

How Do We Determine if Worship is Good or Not?

We hear it said every week after the worship set is complete..."Dang, that was off the hook!"..."Worship was so good tonight"..."Wow! Worship was awesome tonight!"... We hear this every week with our own tongues or even being said by other followers and believers around us. 

I tell you now that worship is not determined by us!! How could it be that we as humans worship God and then by the end of the worship set we determine if it was good enough... Our society nowadays, even in the church, has a wrong approach on worship. Worship is supposed to be from the heart. To the one and ONLY God of this universe. It's a time where God intercedes into our world and we encounter him, right then and there. He doesn't only intercede if the song is good, or if the band is building up, or even if it's his favorite jam. God will ALWAYS and forever be present during worship of music! Whether how bad it may sound or even if the band is completely off tempo God is still going to show up! 

The reason I bring this to you is because I recently have been convicted about the sound of worship. Some of you may not know, but myself and Aly Phipps have recently taken over Remnant J:High Worship. This concludes everything from the songs, the keys, the band members playing, to everything a director would do. 

After the first night of Remnant J:High of Aly and I putting our plan into action I went home and thought to myself how rough the night went. Then right then God himself proclaimed that worship isn't about how good it sounds, because in the end he has the say in the worship that was being played. He points if the worship was good enough. Not us!

With this said we all, myself included, have said the following..."Worship was super good tonight"... I believe that God wants to tell us all that when we make this statement we are stating that worship is all about our self and how it made us feel! When in reality it should be about God, and how great we made him feel.

Let I never say these types of phrases again... because worshiping my God is much more important than worshiping myself. He has gifts, talents, and treasures that I will never receive if I do not worship him for who he is, and not the sound of worship!

Let's worship our God as if he were in the room! Not depending on whether or not the sound is terrific! Cause he could careless how it sounds! It's our time to shine!

Oh Word?

It's about time. I have been debating on whether or not to create a blog and be a civilized college student or not. Obviously I have chosen to finally create one. I'm so excited to blog all this knowledge that I have been obtaining lately. Whether through life, school, or experiences. I am filled with knowledge and cannot wait to blog. I will try and update this thing as often as I can with not just non-sense, but with life changing words of wisdom. Cannot wait.
Far well.
For now.