Identity and Ego: A Pruning

I just concluded a day-long struggle with Jesus. Like Jacob as the Lord broke his hip, I had wrestled with God, thinking that I was okay, and that everything that caused this pain was more of the externals: whatever that other person did, whatever that other person thought, demons... I attributed the pain to everything but my own sin months ago, when I dared God, much like Bruce Almighty.

After going through half of Secrets of the Vine the audiobook... I finally realized what it was all about. Not trusting that God was doing this for my own good; not trusting that God was all-wise and almighty in how He had shaped some things in my life that I had no control over.

I know that it’s not yet perfectly over, I still hadn’t broken through to the point as in Forrest Gump when Lieutenant Dan had swam peacefully in the sea, after the storm wherein he shook his fist at God and dared Him, but I know that it’s only going to be an inch yet, and I’ll stop grasping for the things I hold onto so dearly. Partly for self-protection, and partly because of, as I said, an innate mistrust that God would level mountains for me and break clouds for me.

I am thankful that He shook me today. No wonder I was craving for Secrets of the Vine (sadly my copy is with a friend). Good thing that themannareserve.com is there; I was able to download the audiobook, at the very least. What would have taken days of reading the book itself took at least just a few hours of my night to listen to. :)

I miss God's thicker presence.. :) Thankfully it’s nearly Sunday. :) He is soo good. :)

I'm So Happy!

My book is finally out...... Coz I got tired of the slooooooooooow publisher I chose! I need to eat too, and Patience isn't exactly one of my most marked virtues. Heheh.

So if you want to download my products as I churn them, when the promos are over (I aim to raffle out the first 50 electronic copies of each book as soon as I put it out), do come over to my Lulu.com store!

Lorie's Lulu.com Store

For 12 Hours Only! E-Book Promo!

Okay, so I got tired of waiting for the publisher to get a move on, coz they get so many submissions, so I thought I'd make use of my Multiply "Fan Base" so that I could get to distribute a "first peek" of the book I finished. I'll be giving away 50 full copies for free, to be sent by email. The conditions are: answer this one question that I'll post below this, and the top 50 answers get my book for free! Promo runs from 10:30 PM tonight to 10:30 AM tomorrow! Time stamps later than 10:30 AM tomorrow will no longer be qualified. :)




Now, are you ready?




Question:

What is it that you love doing the most?



First 50 BEST answers win for yourself this e-book!



Sample:


Oh my gosh. And the world crumbled beneath my feet. I thought all I needed to be was to be thinner and to have clear skin. I thought I would be content when I got thinner, when I got the curves and my face's bone structure had emerged. At that moment, it was then that I finally got hit with the realization that there is no wonder why even beauty queens profess that they struggle with self-esteem issues too. That moment with the mirror taught me that even as everyone around me praised me, and even as I had seen how beautiful I got, physical beauty should never be my yardstick for my self-esteem. Because like a black hole, vanity never gets satisfied...


You like it? Answer the question now! :)

What took you so long, Lorie?

Just an update: I'm still alive. I was just busy running around trying to make a living and trying to find a source of living. I finally got tired of twisting people's arms to get what I want. I forgot that the weapons with which we face the battles we slug on throughout our lives isn't similar, AT ALL, to the way things are fought in literal battles.

If an enemy throws you a stone, throw him back a piece of bread... In love.

What took me so long to learn that?

What took me so long to learn that deception, suspicion, etc., fear, are not the weapons I should fight with? What took me so long to realize that I have to obey God and be like Him: react like Him in every which way I could muster? And even then, I could only react like Him when He ENABLES me to..

What took me so long to shed my ego?

What took me so long to stop performing?

I asked the Lord before whether any of these pains I bore were in vain. He told me that not one of these pains were wasted.

It took me a while to realize why He said that none of my pains and travails were wasted...

Right now I realize: that my pains were dealt me in order to glorify Him.

In my wounds and my recovery from them, He is most glorified. Because I had not overcome on my own. He carried me. He healed me. Changed my heart of stone into flesh.

From my scars, people can learn and realize that someone else went through these things too.

Thank You, Lord that You didn't let me go through what I could not bear. But thank You that every single thing that ailed me, that pained me... You will use all of them.

Thank You, Father, that You are turning me more like Your Son, perfect in every way.

Each overcoming, each moment that I get driven closer to being like the Lord is such pain for me, because His character is so unlike mine. In moments of calm like this... I appreciate having been born.


LOVE YOU LORD!!!

Gossip, Fault-finding, Witchcraft Prayerz... Jezzie, is that you?!

We women want the best for each other, and in so doing, we tend to urge each other to do the things we wish we were doing.

I was recently listening to an mp3 about Overcoming the Spirit of Jezebel. But before you declare that this is another loony mystical chuvaness, I would like to emphasize how practical this actually is.

If you are struggling with:

• fault-finding
• having a pattern of creating a small following for yourself and ensuring that the dependence is on you
• initiating and letting gossip proliferate
• dishonoring your parents and other hallmarks of disobedience and lawlessness/despising authority
• using your feminine charms to reassure yourself of your worth
• trying to control the situations and the people around you (which is borne out of fear)
• witchcraft (if not explicit witchcraft, trying to direct God’s hand by praying directive prayers for the ones you love, instead of asking for His will to be done)
• opening up to the seductive nature of media and of people, men and women, around you
• willful deception
• immorality
• compromise
• the “Ahab nature” which is turning a blind eye to injustice and sin,

...then you may well have, or be affected by, or attacked by the Jezebel spirit also.

It was so weird because I had “carried” this spirit for so long, and I wasn’t aware of it until my last Victory Weekend. Then in recent weeks, God had been leading me to Revelation 2:18-29, and I’ve been noticing how severe the Jezebel spirit had been affecting me, and the people around me.

We cannot pray it away, folks. As long as Hollywood and media agree with and perpetuate it, and people sin because they think it’s okay, Jezebel and her minions will proliferate. If we walk blindly into spiritual battles then be caught unaware, then we will always be at the losing end in the wrestling match with that principality.

If you note that there is conflict around you, and that you seem to be in the middle of it, if you note the above traits in yourself, then you can be sure that either you are under attack, or are condoning that spirit.

Unlike other spirits, it cannot easily be bound and cast out. You have to make a decision:

• Not to accuse your brethren (cellmates, friends, family).
• Not to start with fault-finding.
• Not to agree with sins that defile, and separate you from God.

I cannot be a Pharisee-hypocrite hybrid and say that I was fully delivered from this. I can only say that I was devastated recently by how seriously flogged I’ve been by this spirit. Worse was that until I had my awareness today, I had actually agreed with it. Which makes me all the more grieved about it.

The only solution is to:

• repent
• pray
• pray more for others around you
• pray for protection for you, and others around you
• put on the Armor of God (references: here and here)
• fast if you need to
• recognize where Jezebel operates in your life.

And when you sin, repent, put on the Armor, then ask Jesus to be a Seal upon your heart and your life. “Jezebel bleeding,” in my experience, is manifested in accusation and in talking way too much. For this, I notice that when I repent and ask for the Armor of God, these are not enough. In these cases, I ask Jesus to be a seal upon my heart and seal my spiritual wounds once more.

Sin is like a spiritual wound dealt upon you. Because of sin, you lose your boundaries, and you lose self-control. When things get too out of hand, and no amount of prayer seems to work, or it just seems laborious, I pray that someone listens to my tip with asking Jesus to be a Seal upon your heart and life once more.

Spiritual warfare necessitates that we make use of the weapons God gave us: the Word. There are Words He’s said that could be used as tools to help keep us sane in this crazy unreal reality of existence. I pray you take heed.

Also, let’s avoid praying “witchcraft prayers” for each other. Let God and the person deal with the details in their lives. If you are a cell leader, make sure that you pray for the Fruit of the Holy Spirit (character and humility) and Christ’s love and likeness to be manifested more in their lives. These are what matter. The rest are shadows and not yours to intrude upon.

Let's also remember that only Praise for Jesus would infinitely chase those clouds of doom that Jezebel brought. Psalm 149 is what seems to be the prayer of the season for me. If you got shot down, get up. Get up and praise God! Do not give in to those feelings of discouragement, those are not your own feelings! Separate yourself from that and hold on to the fact that Jesus loves you and would never leave you nor forsake you, and neither is there condemnation in Him.

God bless your day.

My Beloved

Every time I fall short, stumble, fall, the line, "I see no stain on you, My child" always comes to mind. It breaks my heart to remember that, every time, and I'm reposting so you could read and appreciate too. I first heard the song on ElijahStreams.com. Hope I can get a copy to share with you soon.

This is the true essence of our belief in Jesus, the Son of God, that we have been washed, and the Father sees the stain on us no more.

My Beloved

By Christ for the Nations

Verse 1:

You're My Beloved

You're My Bride

To sing over you is My delight

Come away with Me

My love


Verse 2:

Under My mercy

Come and wait

Till we are standing face to face

I see no stain on you

My child


Chorus:

You're Beautiful to Me

So beautiful to Me


Verse 3:

I sing over you

My song of peace

Cast all your care down at My feet

Come and find your rest

in Me


Bridge:

I'll breathe My life inside of you

I'll bear you up on eagle's wings

And hide you in the shadow of My strength

I'll take you to My quiet waters

I'll restore your soul

Come rest in Me and be made whole

Repost: "Christian Hedonism" ; )

I am increasingly learning that delighting in the Lord is in and of itself a great reward. But over and beyond that, being loved of God and falling recklessly in love with Him brings so much more than peace and security. Over and beyond provision that just comes from the unexpected, there is a degree of certainty that He will deliver. Though I am not perfect in the latter (having complete peace that He will deliver at the right moment), I know that He does not fail. It just has to get through my thick skull and hardened heart to understand this.

But either way, I am seriously learning that loving God is such a delightful exercise, that I am not exchanging this for anything else. If ever, I only want to be rewarded with the things I want, as add-ons to His love..

After a rough night, this article sure made my morning. :)

We Want You to Be a Christian Hedonist!

What Is Christian Hedonism?

My shortest summary of Christian Hedonism is: God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in him.

We all make a god out of what we take the most pleasure in. Christian Hedonists want to make God their God by seeking after the greatest pleasure—pleasure in him.

By Christian Hedonism, we do not mean that our happiness is the highest good. We mean that pursuing the highest good will always result in our greatest happiness in the end. We should pursue this happiness, and pursue it with all our might. The desire to be happy is a proper motive for every good deed, and if you abandon the pursuit of your own joy you cannot love man or please God.

The Difference Between Worldly and Christian Hedonism

Some people are inclined to believe that Christians are supposed to seek God’s will as opposed to pursuing their own pleasure. But what makes Biblical morality different than worldly hedonism is not that Biblical morality is disinterested and duty-driven, but that it is interested in vastly greater and purer things. Christian Hedonism is Biblical morality because it recognizes that obeying God is the only route to final and lasting happiness. Here are some examples of this from the Bible:

Luke 6:35 says, "Love your enemies, and do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return; and your reward will be great." It is clear when Jesus says “expect nothing in return” that we should not be motivated by worldly aggrandizement, but we are given strength to suffer loss by the promise of a future reward.

Again, in Luke 14:12-14: "When you give a dinner or a banquet, do not invite your friends or your brothers or your kinsmen or rich neighbors, lest they also invite you in return, and you be repaid. But when you give a feast, invite the poor . . . and you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you. You will be repaid at the resurrection of the just." That is, don't do good deeds for worldly advantage; rather, do them for spiritual, heavenly benefits.

Should Duty Be Our Main Motivation?

But some will say, "No, no. These texts only describe what reward will result if you act disinterestedly. They do not teach us to actually seek the reward."

Two answers to this objection:

1) It would be foolish to say, "If you take this pill, I’ll give you a nickel," if you expect the desire for the nickel to ruin the pill. But Jesus was not foolish. He would not offer blessing to those who obey him and then hold it against us if these blessings motivated our obedience.

2) Even more importantly, there are texts that not only commend that we do good in the hope of future blessing, but command it.

Luke 12:33 says, "Sell your possessions, and give alms; provide yourselves with purses that do not grow old, with a treasure in the heavens that does not fail." The connection here between alms and having eternal treasure in heaven is not a chance result—it is the explicit purpose: "Make it your aim to have treasure in heaven, and the way to do this is to sell your possessions and give alms."

And again, Luke 16:9 says, "Make friends for yourselves by means of unrighteous mammon, so that when it fails they may receive you into eternal habitations." Luke does not say that the result of using possessions properly is to receive eternal habitations. He says, "Make it your aim to secure an eternal habitation by the way you use your possessions."

Therefore, a resounding NO to the belief that morality should be inspired more by duty than delight.

Don’t Be Too Easily Satisfied

Hebrews 11:6 teaches, "Without faith it is impossible to please [God]. For whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him.” You cannot please God if you do not come to him looking for reward. Therefore, faith that pleases God is the hedonistic pursuit of God.

As Christian Hedonists we know that everyone longs for happiness. And we will never tell them to deny or repress that desire. It is never a problem to want to be satisfied. The problem is being satisfied too easily. We believe that everyone who longs for satisfaction should no longer seek it from money or power or lust, but should come glut their soul-hunger on the grace of God. We will bend all our effort, by the Holy Spirit, to persuade people

• that they can be happier in giving than receiving (Acts 20:35);

• that they should count everything as loss for the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus their Lord (Philippians 3:8);

• that the aim of all of Jesus' commandments is that their joy be full (John 15:11);

• that if they delight themselves in the Lord he will give them the desire of their heart (Psalm 37:4);

• that there is great gain in godliness with contentment (1 Timothy 6:6);

• and that the joy of the Lord is their strength (Nehemiah 8:10).

We will not try to motivate anyone with appeals to mere duty. We will tell them that in God’s presence is full and lasting joy (Psalm 16:11) and our only duty is to come to him, seeking this pleasure.

(Adapted from John Piper’s article, Christian Hedonism: Forgive the Label, but Don't Miss the Truth.)

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