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fear not

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My dear friends,

In a world full of fear and fear-mongering, many believers are searching for answers, guidance, and comfort. The Lord has spoken to me and told me to address this issue on social media as well as in my blog. So here we go.

We are in the midst of great spiritual warfare; the times are very heavy and many believers are feeling alone and sometimes defeated in this battle. I struggled with these feelings myself, until the Lord spoke words of Life into me and reminded me who I am and WHOSE I am. So I am here to tell you that YOU ARE NOT ALONE. God has heard your prayers, and He is still fighting for us. He is tarrying before Returning to give US more time to be saved by His grace and our true repentance.

Church, there are two things we need to stop and do right now.

Step 1: Pray for God to tell us what He wants us to know.

“Father God, I pray that you would open the eyes and ears of all your true believers today, that we would understand Your Words, and receive them as You intended. Please strengthen us and give us wisdom by increasing the presence of the Holy Spirit in us today. Give us discernment and a thirst for Your Will to be done, in Jesus’ name. AMEN!”

Step 2: Choose to be His faithful servants by digging into the absolute Truth of His Word.

The Lord says: “Call to me and I will answer you, and will tell you great and hidden things that you have not known.” -Jeremiah 33:3

JEREMIAH 33:3

If we earnestly seek His Truth, we will find Him. Every word of the Bible is God-breathed, and designed to help us understand how to live our lives in order to be pleasing to God, and to be blessed by Him. In my quiet time, I recently discovered the power of Psalm 91, and its perfect relevance to the tribulations we are facing today.

PSALM 91:1
Psalm 91 (NIV):

Whoever dwells in the shelter of the Most High
will rest in the shadow of the Almighty.
I will say of the Lord, “He is my refuge and my fortress,
my God, in whom I trust.”

Surely he will save you
from the fowler’s snare
and from the deadly pestilence.
He will cover you with his feathers,
and under his wings you will find refuge;
his faithfulness will be your shield and rampart.
You will not fear the terror of night,
nor the arrow that flies by day,
nor the pestilence that stalks in the darkness,
nor the plague that destroys at midday.
A thousand may fall at your side,
ten thousand at your right hand,
but it will not come near you.
You will only observe with your eyes
and see the punishment of the wicked.

If you say, “The Lord is my refuge,”
and you make the Most High your dwelling,
no harm will overtake you,
no disaster will come near your tent.
For he will command his angels concerning you
to guard you in all your ways;
they will lift you up in their hands,
so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.
You will tread on the lion and the cobra;
you will trample the great lion and the serpent.

“Because he loves me,” says the Lord, “I will rescue him;
I will protect him, for he acknowledges my name.
He will call on me, and I will answer him;
I will be with him in trouble,
I will deliver him and honor him.
With long life I will satisfy him
and show him my salvation.”

Friends, if this passage does not speak volumes to you in these trying times, then your ears have been shut by the enemy, and you are in danger of being held captive by the great delusion.

Did you know the “fear not” message is found in 365 verses of the Bible? Why would God put the same message in the Bible on so many different occasions unless He was absolutely serious about it? Living in a spirit of fear can affect our faith. Fear is not a fruit of the Holy Spirit, and therefore can only have one other origin. Do not be deceived!

95% of what the media is telling you is simply propaganda to spread fear. TURN IT OFF. Turn on the Word of God in your homes and in your heart! Let it be a Lamp to light your path. Carry it with you each day. Let it live on your lips and on the lips of your spouse, your children, your grandchildren, etc. until the Lord calls us all home at the end of time.

Absolutely nothing in this world nullifies the rich and living Word of God. Nothing can touch us without God’s permission. Not one single thing! In chapter 1 of the book of Job, we see that the enemy himself had to ask God’s permission to touch Job: 

Now there was a day when the sons of God came to present themselves before the Lord, and Satan also came among them. 
The Lord said to Satan, “From where have you come?” Satan answered the Lord and said, “From going to and fro on the earth, and from walking up and down on it.” 
And the Lord said to Satan, “Have you considered my servant Job, that there is none like him on the earth, a blameless and upright man, who fears God and turns away from evil?” 
Then Satan answered the Lord and said, “Does Job fear God for no reason? 
Have you not put a hedge around him and his house and all that he has, on every side? You have blessed the work of his hands, and his possessions have increased in the land. 
But stretch out your hand and touch all that he has, and he will curse you to your face.” 
And the Lord said to Satan, “Behold, all that he has is in your hand. Only against him do not stretch out your hand.” So Satan went out from the presence of the Lord.

The enemy took Job’s family, his servants, his house, his livestock, his fields… and what did Job do? He WORSHIPPED and PRAISED God.

JOB 1:20-22
Then Job arose and tore his robe and shaved his head and fell on the ground and worshiped. 
And he said, “Naked I came from my mother's womb, and naked shall I return. The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord.”
In all this Job did not sin or charge God with wrong.

Job understood that everything he had been given belonged to God. He recognized that God had blessed him with many things, and that God could also take away those things because He IS GOD, and does not need to explain Himself to us. Job was indeed a faithful servant of God.

Brothers and sisters, each of us has a number of days set aside by God, and not one thing can take away a single second of that time. NOT.ONE.THING.

In Job 14:5, we read: “…his days are determined, and the number of his months is with you, and you have appointed his limits that he cannot pass…”

Knowing that God has numbered our days and that He is forever faithful to His Word, we can walk securely in the knowledge that He truly is our shield and refuge. Nothing can touch us without His permission. If He does allow something to cross our path, we must trust that He has a great purpose for it! He will either get us through it and use it to correct us or grow our faith and bring us closer to Him, or He will bring us home to glory because we have fulfilled our purpose and it is our time to rest. We can believe and trust in this good word from Him today!

No matter what you are facing today, PRAISE God. TRUST in Him. Walk by FAITH, and do not fear!

Be awakened to His Truth and stand firm in His Word! AMEN and AMEN!

Blessings,
Emily

suffering and trusting Him to make it right

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A recent devotion in my “Bible In One Year” plan (by the YouVersion Bible app) broached the very hard subject of “suffering”.. and our lack of understanding surrounding it.

When we are in the middle of suffering, it is often tremendously hard to trust God. We forget that He suffers alongside us. We forget that He uses trials and difficulties to test and strengthen our faith, and develop our character. We forget that He intends it ALL for good. For example, in Genesis, God used Joseph’s suffering to save an entire nation. And in the New Testament, God used Jesus’s suffering to save US ALL.

Yeshua (Jesus) told us Himself that the fruitful branches would be pruned in order to bear even more fruit. Our pruning is often painful but necessary in order for us to grow even stronger in Him.

“I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener. He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit he prunes so that it will be even more fruitful.” -John 15:1-2

This devotion about suffering made me think of my mother, and how she suffered so much for 3 years with her terrible cancer. I know she struggled at times to understand why God allowed her to suffer so much, and perhaps she even questioned what she had done to deserve such suffering. But God doesn’t allow us to suffer because He has a score to settle. In the book of Job, we see that Job is a righteous man who God allowed to suffer immense turmoil in many different forms, before making everything right for Job. In fact, God restored to him even more than he had before his suffering began! We can look at Job’s response to his suffering as a model for our own behaviors when we’re facing trials; Job never once lost his faith. Job never cursed God or turned his back on God. He remained faithful (albeit lamenting) even in his suffering, and God made everything right for him.

But what about those who suffer and don’t get restored in this life? What about my mother? After a miserable 3 years, my sister and I spent an agonizing final week with Mama in hospice, before she passed into eternity. The healing we had prayed for her never came–well, at least not in this life. I have often struggled with God’s decision to not heal her cancer, after the multitude of prayers that she and so many of her loved ones sent up in good faith for that outcome. For a year and a half, I have asked the question, “WHY?”

And then, a story in my daily devotional completely changed my perspective.

A one-year-old boy shattered his back falling down a flight of stairs. He spent his childhood and youth in and out of the hospital — 13 long years of surgeries and treatments. At age 17, he was interviewed by a bishop in his church, and the boy remarked, “God is fair.” The bishop asked him if he thought what had happened to him was fair, and the boy’s response was astounding: “God has got all of eternity to make it up to me.”

We live in a world of instant gratification that has almost entirely lost its eternal perspective. But this boy had amazing insight into eternity with his enlightened response. Even if we never see our prayers for healing or relief come to fruition in this life, God is not done. He is not limited to the boundaries of this earth or our temporary lives here. He has ALL of eternity to fulfill His promises to us, and answer our prayers.

There are some things that we will never understand this side of Heaven, but we can rest assured that God is GOOD. His goodness and mercy can be seen throughout the whole Bible! He uses everything for His good purposes. We are simply asked to have faith and trust in Him above all else.

I keep this verse in mind whenever I don’t understand the things that happen in this world, and somehow, it always provides comfort:

The secret things belong to the Lord our God, but the things revealed belong to us and to our children forever, that we may follow all the words of this law. -Deuteronomy 29:29

I hope this message blesses you today, and that you might recall it when you’re in the midst of suffering.

Love in Christ,
Emily

let in the light

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The first thing I do each morning when I walk into my living room is to open up all of the blinds and let in the light. It’s second nature. I am drawn to the light. It’s warm, inviting, and lovely. I want it to fill my home and brighten everything it touches. I want to sit on the window bench in my breakfast nook and soak up every drop of sunshine, while holding a warm cup of good coffee and counting my blessings.

It’s hard to imagine anything brighter than the sun. Every day, the sun warms the Earth and gives life to everything it touches. The plants, animals, waterways, and humans all need the sun in order to survive. Our Creation was designed in this way. Everything needs the light.

But there is one light that is even brighter and more life-giving than the sun!

“This is the message we have heard from him and declare to you:
God is light; in him there is no darkness at all.”
~ 1 John 1:5

Can you imagine how bright God’s light must be, if there is NO darkness in Him at all?? No shadows, no clouds, no haziness. His light is SO bright and He is SO holy that man cannot look upon Him and live. (from Exodus 33:20)

But how do we gain access to a God this holy? How do we approach Him? How do we get to know Him? How can we possibly spend eternity with Him? There are many things to learn about His ways, but the most important point to understand is this:

“Jesus answered, ‘I am the way and the truth and the life.
No one comes to the Father except through me.'”
~John 14:6

No one enters the gates of Heaven except through Yeshua (Jesus). But what does this mean? Many things in the Bible are a great mystery, and there are some things we will never understand on this side of Heaven. However, this passage is one that we can easily break down and translate because we must — it is the KEY to understanding salvation.

The WAY: Believing in Yeshua as the Son of God is the ONLY WAY to God. He is the perfect High Priest and the Lamb of God that is without flaw. By first studying the Old Testament (particularly Leviticus), we gain an understanding of what it takes to be seen as holy to God (and WOW, do we ever fall short of that endeavor).. And when we do fail to remain holy, we see that the way to atonement for sin is through blood sacrifice, as defined by God in unmistakable detail. God makes it abundantly clear to Moses and his people how they can make atonement for their sins; He tells them what types of sacrifices are acceptable and exactly how to present the offerings in order for them to be holy and pleasing to God. God is perfectly thorough in His instructions; He does not leave out any details or room for error. Therefore, by first understanding these Old Testament laws, we can see why Yeshua’s birth and death was absolutely necessary in order to restore our relationship with God, and save us from eternal death in sin. In this way, God essentially wrote the check HIMSELF for the payment that was needed to make atonement for OUR sins.

The TRUTH: God’s Word (the entire Bible) is the Truth. Yeshua is the Living Word of God. He is the Wisdom of God. Yeshua is the embodiment of God’s holy Word. His ways are perfect. He came to fulfill the law of God, not to abolish it. Yeshua is the true and perfect example for us in how we should live according to God’s laws. John 1:14 says, “The Word became flesh and made His dwelling among us. We have seen His glory, the glory of the one and only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.” And from John 1:17, “For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.” AMEN!

The LIFE: For this one, we can flip back to John 1:4 which says, “In Him was life, and that life was the light of men.” Now we’ve come full circle back to the light. Yeshua as God’s Son is the life and light of men. Through Yeshua, we can now receive eternal life with God the Father in Heaven.

I encourage you to let in the light today, and every day. Open all the blinds and curtains. Grab a good cup of coffee, and dig deep into God’s Word. Spend time with Him every day. Study the Truth, so that when you encounter false teachings (and you certainly will), you will be able to discern them from the Truth.

If you’re like me and need some guidance on where to start and how to study the Bible, take a look at the free study plans that are offered on the free YouVersion Bible app, which is available in both app stores for your mobile device.

Friends, we are living in dark times. Many believe that we are the last generation before the return of Yeshua the Christ. Although no one can know exactly when He will return, by studying God’s Word, we will be armed with the Truth and we’ll know what signs to look for so we can be ready.

Blessings!
Emily