My Utmost - Oct 30, 2009

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Faith

Hebrews 11:6
“Without faith it is impossible to please Him.”

Key Passages

• Faith in antagonism to common sense is fanaticism, and common sense in antagonism to faith is rationalism. The life of faith brings the two into a right relation.

• Nothing Jesus Christ ever said is common sense, it is revelation sense, and it reaches the shores where common sense fails.

• To turn head faith into a personal possession is a fight always, not sometimes.

• God brings us into circumstances in order to educate our faith, because the nature of faith is to make its object real.

• Faith is the whole man rightly related to God by the power of the Spirit of Jesus Christ.

My Own Thoughts

“To turn head faith into a personal possession is a fight always, not sometimes.”... That really feels like the fight I have been in for about 3 years now. Taking all this stuff I was told and taught and making it my belief. Not just something I say I believe, and regretfully do not live. I can see God working in lots of circumstances in my life, which makes it all the more amazing that I struggle so much... I know He's there, I see Him moving, I see Him acting, and yet I fail miserably at living the life He wants me to live. The life of bringing the kingdom to those around me and those I come in contact with in any way... I love that line “... the nature of faith is to make its object real.” I can feel that. I no longer sense a desire to believe, but I sense an amazing to desire to see what I have believed in. I know its there, I just want to see it clearly, without the veil. Even if its just the edge of his robe, the train of His glory as He passes by me...

The other night I was at a worship event at my church and it had to be one of the most intense worship experiences I have been a part of, at least in a very very long time. I had trouble settling into the service for a while because I felt like I needed to get something out of it. Like I needed to be ministered to. Then about 3 songs in, something in my head snapped. I realized suddenly that I was there to worship God... this is not a time for me to be worried about getting anything out of this. This was a time of giving God glory no matter what the circumstances were in my life, and what I thought I needed to get out of this experience. I had to worship Him because He is God, and that is all there is to it. When this snapped into my head I had a sense come over me like a warm blanket that He was in the room with me right at that moment. I almost felt like I could see Him. My faith for that instance seemed to be more real than ever. Then we took communion, and I've never taken a communion like it before. It seemed very literal and real. When they elders who were handing out the bread and wine said “this is Christ body broken for you” and “this is Christ blood poured out for you”, I've never felt a closer connection with communion. It basically ruined me... I lost control of myself emotionally for a little while and it took a lot of work to get my usual tough guy persona back. But through the experience and afterwards I was so amazed at how real my faith became when I stopped thinking of myself and what I needed, and I was able to praise God simply because He is God and He deserves our praise.

So the short of it, take your eyes off yourself and your own need for one minute and see how real God can become. Stop thinking of yourself for just a little while. God could show up and do something amazing, or He might choose not to sometimes. Either way, He is worthy to be praised, despite how we feel.

My Utmost - Oct 29, 2009

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Substitution

2 Corinthians 5:21
“He hath made Him to be sin for us... that we might be made the righteousness of God...”

Key Passages

• The New Testament view is that He bore our sin not by sympathy, but by identification. He was made to be sin.

• Our sins are removed because of the death of Jesus, and the explanation of His death is His obedience to His Father, not His sympathy with us.

• What is taught in the New Testament is that “He died for all” (not – He died my death), and that by identification with His death I can be freed from sin, and have imparted to me His very righteousness.

My Own Thoughts

Sometimes I find that I ignore the Father and the Spirit because we are focused on the life of Jesus. I feel like they get left behind because we focus on Jesus. While obviously its not wrong to focus on Jesus, we gotta realize that He is part of the triune God. The Father loved us so much, that He sent His son... (John 3:16-17), Christ died for us out of obedience to His Father... (Philippians 2:6-8). When we believe in the sacrifice of Christ and repent and turn from our ways and follow the way that Christ laid out for us to live, we receive the gift of the Holy Spirit (Acts 1:4-8) which empowers us to live the way that Christ prescribed for us to live. This is the Kingdom Life. The life that God wants for all His children to live. The life that brings His Kingdom to where we are now. This is not some promise delayed for when we die, but it is the life we are able to live now. All this brought about by the Father's love, Christ's obedience, and the Holy Spirit's work in us...

My Utmost - Oct 21, 2009

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Direction By Impulse

Jude 20
“Building up yourselves on your most holy faith.”

Key Passages

• There was nothing either of the nature of impulse or of cold-bloodedness about our Lord, but only a calm strength that never got into panic.

• Impulse is a trait in natural life, but our Lord always ignores it, because it hinders the development of the life of a disciple.

• Impulse is alright in a child, but it is disastrous in a man or woman; an impulsive man is always a petted man.

• Impulse has to be trained into intuition by discipline.

• … it does require the supernatural grace of God to live twenty-four hours in every day as a saint, to go through the drudgery as a disciple, to live an ordinary, unobserved, ignored existence as a disciple of Jesus.

• It is inbred in us that we have to do exceptional things for God; but we have not. We have to be exceptional in the ordinary things, to be holy in mean streets, among mean people, and this is not learned in five minutes.

My Own Thoughts

I am an impulsive guy. I live my life by feeling. I know this because I recently took a personality test that told me as much. I get an impulse I move on it... although sometimes its a blurry line whether that impulse should have been entertained or moved upon. I've been really wrestling with this idea of “living in the drudgery”. I feel that inbred desire or impulse to do something or to be a part of something exceptional for God. I don't think its a bad thing, other than I keep sitting on my hands and waiting for that exceptional thing to come along. I think to myself, when this thing happens, when things get rolling in this direction, then I can really serve God. Meanwhile I am not serving Him where He has me. What if the grand exceptional thing I am looking for never comes along? Will I never have served God? How will I look back on my life when I am 80 years old and I realize that I have wasted my whole life waiting for some grand calling that never came along, and all He really wanted from me was to live the life He described to live all the while....

Everyone should read this passage. We have this crazy idea in our culture that amazing things are going to happen to us in life. That we are all going to be celebrities and we're all going to be famous and doing amazing things, at least in the world's eyes. Well, that most likely just isn't going to happen to us (didn't I hear this speech in the movie “Fight Club”?)... It's so true though, Tyler Durton had it right. We all think we're going to make it, and we keep waiting for that and looking for it, and even trying things that would make us appear crazy in an attempt to make it happen. Forget it! Live your life now, where you are at, where God has placed you. Live the life he described for us to live where He has put you. I am screaming this at myself right now.

There's lots more to say on this subject, but I'd love to hear from anyone out there reading. If there is anyone...

My Utmost - Oct 19, 2009

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The Unheeded Secret

John 18:36
“My kingdom is not of this world.”

Key Passages

• The great enemy to the Lord Jesus Christ in the present day is the conception of practical work that has not come from the New Testament, but from the systems of the world in which endless energy and activities are insisted upon, but no private life with God.

• Jesus said, “The Kingdom of God cometh not with observation, for lo the Kingdom of God is within you,” a hidden, obscure thing.

• The central thing about the Kingdom of Jesus Christ is a personal relationship to Himself, not public usefulness to men.

• You have no idea where God is going to engineer your circumstances, no knowledge of what strain is going to be put on you either at home or abroad, and if you waste your time in overactive energies instead of getting into soak on the great fundamental truths of God's Redemption, you will snap when the strain comes; but if this time of soaking before God is being spent in getting rooted and grounded in God on the unpractical line, you will remain true to Him whatever happens.

My Own Thoughts

Here is something I need... I need to soak in the great fundamental truths of God's redemption. I need to stop reading books about the Bible and hearing what others have to say about the Bible, and I need to actually read the Bible.

My Utmost - Oct 16, 2009

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The Key To The Master's Orders

Matthew 9:38
“Pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest, that He will send forth labourers into His harvest.”

Key Passages

• The key to the missionary problem is not the key of common sense, nor the medical key, nor the key of civilization or education or even evangelization. The key is prayer.

• Naturally prayer is not practical, it is absurd; we have to realize that prayer is stupid from the ordinary common-sense point of view.

• We are taken up with active work while people all around are ripe to harvest, and we do not reap one of them, but waste our Lord's time in over-energized activities.

• Our Lord calls to no special work: He calls to Himself. “Pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest,” and He will engineer circumstances and thrust you out.

My Own Thoughts

Dear Father, I'd only pray tonight that you'd call on my heart and bring me into a right relationship with you. Take away all my thoughts of some grandiose vision that I could be part of and give me the vision of simply living my life for you wherever I am at, and whenever I am there. I don't believe the vision to be bad or wrong, but help me not to place all my hope on some future maybe while I let the current opportunities to share you slip through my fingers. Help me to live the missionary life for you now Lord.

My Utmost - Oct 15, 2009

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The Key To The Missionary Message

1 John 2:2
“And He is the propitiation for our sins: and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world.”

Key Passages

• “The Lamb of God which taketh away the since of the world!” - that is limitless.

• The missionary message is the limitless significance of Jesus Christ as the propitiation for our sins, and a missionary is one who is soaked in that revelation.

• The missionary message is not patriotic, it is irrespective of nations and of individuals, it is for the whole world.

• When the Holy Ghost comes in He does not consider my predilections, He brings me into union with the Lord Jesus.

• A missionary is one who is wedded to the charter of his Lord and Master, he has not to proclaim his own point of view, but to proclaim the Lamb of God.

My Own Thoughts

I want to be soaked in the revelation that is Jesus as the payment for my sins. I want to know my sins. I want to know just exactly what it is that I am saved from, and I want it before my eyes at all times. Honestly I struggle sometimes to see my sinfulness. There are other times that it is at the forefront begging my attention, but sometimes it slips from my conscience and I forget my great need for Savior. I want to be a missionary soaked in the revelation of Jesus Christ giving His life as the great payment for my sins, and I want that message to seep from every pore in my body. I am tired of myself really. I can't do anything right. Even when I am doing things right I quickly realize and forget my need and get prideful. When will I ever not need God? There is no time when that statement will be true. I will always have great need.

My Utmost - Oct 14, 2009

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The Key To The Missionary

Matthew 28:18-19
“All power is given unto Me in heaven and in earth. Go ye therefore, and teach all nations.”

Key Passages

• He does not say the heathen will be lost if we do not go; He simply says - “Go ye therefore and teach all nations.”

• If I want to know the universal sovereignty of Christ, I must know him for myself, and how to get alone with Him; I must take time to worship the Being Whose Name I bear.

• “Come unto Me” - that is the place to meet Jesus. Are you weary and heavy laden? How many missionaries are! We banish those words of the universal Sovereign of the world to the threshold of an after-meeting; they are the words of Jesus to His disciples.

• “Go ye therefore...” Go simply means live. Acts 1:8 is the description how to go. Jesus did not say – Go into Jerusalem and Judea and Samaria, but, “Ye shall be witnesses unto Me” in all these places. He undertakes to establish the goings.

• “If ye abide in Me, and My words abide in you...” - that is the way to keep going in our personal lives. Where we are placed is a matter of indifference; God engineers the goings.

• “None of these things move me, neither count I my life dear unto myself...” That is how we keep going till we're gone.

My Own Thoughts

As usual, Oswald just has a way of putting these things into words. I might as well have copied the whole chapter today. “Go simply means live”... what a truth to live by. Wherever we are at, at any given moment is where we are a missionary for God. That is where we are to reflect Him. “Come unto Me”... this is said for us now. We are promised rest now, not just in the future. The rest of God is here for us now, if we will come to Him. Just like any good relationship, it is based upon spending time together. You have to soak in the presence and the very essence of what God is like. How do we know what God is like? We look at Jesus... Jesus says “If ye abide in Me, and My words abide in you”... we must soak in His word and abide in it. Live in it. Take as much in as we can. This is a terrible weakness for me. I tend to go to other books first. I can read books about the Bible all day. I can read commentaries and devotionals, and theology or whatever else about the Bible, whenever. But I struggle immensely to simply come to the very Word of God and abide in it. I am a child of our culture for sure. I want the instant gratification of having someone do the hard work for me instead of digging and and finding the truth myself.

Dear Father, I want to abide in you. I want your word to saturate me. Give me a thirst for your presence and your word Lord.

My Utmost - Oct 13, 2009

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Individual Discouragement And Personal Enlargement

Exodus 2:11
“Moses went out unto his brethren, and looked on their burdens.”

Key Passages

• In the beginning Moses realized that he was the man to deliver the people, but he had to be trained and disciplined by God first. He was right in the individual aspect, but he was not the man for the work until he had learned communion with God.

• We may have the vision of God and a very clear understanding of what God wants, and we start to do the thing, then comes something equivalent to the forty years in the wilderness, as if God had ignored the whole thing, and when we are roughly discouraged God comes back and revives the call, and we get the quiver in and say - “Oh, who am I?”

• We have to learn that our individual effort for God is an impertinence; our individuality is to be rendered incandescent by a personal relationship to God.

• If you are going through a time of discouragement, there is a big personal enlargement ahead.

My Own Thoughts

Dear Father, you know me better than I know myself, and definitely better than I give you credit for. You know what makes me tick. You know what brings me up, and what takes me down. You know the vision I have had because you have given it to me. You also knew I would try to make it happen myself, and ever since I started trying I've been nothing but discouraged. And so I give myself to you Lord, I render my will to be yours and I wait as the silence is tearing me apart and making me into what you want me to be.

My Utmost - Oct 12, 2009

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Getting Into God's Stride

Genesis 5:24
“Enoch walked with God.”

Key Passages

• The test of a man's religious life and character is not what he does in the exceptional moments of life, but what he does in the ordinary times, when there is nothing tremendous or exciting on.

• The worth of a man is revealed in his attitude to ordinary things when he is not before the footlights.

• It is difficult to get into stride with God, because when we start walking with Him we find He has outstripped us before we have taken three steps.

• It was said of Jesus, “He shall not fail nor be discouraged”, because He never worked from His own individual standpoint but always from the standpoint of His Father, and we have to learn to do the same.

• God's Spirit alters the atmosphere of our way of looking at things, and things begin to be possible which never were possible before.

• Getting into stride with God means nothing less than union with Himself.

• It takes a long time to get there, but keep at it. Don't give in because the pain is bad just now, get on with it, and before long you will find you have a new vision and a new purpose.

My Own Thoughts

Dear Father, I want to be on stride with you. You've outstripped me by more than 3 steps thats for sure. I want that new vision and new purpose Lord. Make me into the person you want me to be whether it be in the ordinary times or the exceptional times.

My Utmost - Oct 7, 2009

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Reconciliation

2 Corinthians 5:21
“For He hath made Him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him.”

Key Passages

• Sin is a fundamental relationship; it is not wrong doing, it is wrong being, deliberate and emphatic independence of God.

• Other religions deal with sins; the Bible alone deals with sin.

• The first thing Jesus Christ faced in men was the heredity of sin, and it is because we have ignored this in our presentation of the Gospel that the message of the Gospel has lost its sting and its blasting power.

• The revelation of the Bible is not that Jesus Christ took upon Himself our fleshly sins, but that He took upon Himself the heredity of sin which no man can touch.

• … Our Lord bore the sin of the world by identification, not by sympathy.

• He deliberately took upon His own shoulders, and bore in His own Person, the whole massed sin of the human race...

• A distinction must always be made between the revelation of Redemption and the conscious experience of salvation in a man's life.

My Own Thoughts

This is hard to comprehend, truthfully. The very fact that Christ took on sin, in total, and bore it in His own body. All of the darkness and the complete saturation of every single act of ill will was placed upon His shoulders. From the seemingly most insignificant and sometimes nurtured thought of harm to another person that we sometimes play off as harmless because its just in our heads... to the complete destruction and genocide of a people group. From a quick second glance at an attractive young female to child molestation and sexual slavery. Every form of minor act of sin such as a white lie right down to the darkest and most complete forms of human depravity and brokenness. Christ took the full impact of that within Himself and bore it so that the human race could be made right with God. I find it hard to comprehend. It's not just that He died for us, He did it while feeling the full impact of the judgement of God on sin, and He walked into it knowingly. He knew what was going to happen, and He did it anyway. Simply because He loved us. Could I bare the darkness that Hitler created? That's just one man who was made very public. What about all the complete atrocities that happen all the time in the world that go unnoticed simply because no one is there to hear the voices of the victims. It is amazing to me that God would have anything to do with us.

The real trick for me is to realize that I am no better than Hitler. If a thought is as bad as the deed, then I am right up there with the worst of the worst. I don't think God gets into sin counting though. It's the complete condition that He came to fix, not the individual acts.

Now, the only thing I or anyone else has to do, is to believe that. Difficult to comprehend as it may be that someone could do that.... I believe it. I have to believe it because its the only hope I see for a world that suffers from a debilitating condition of brokenness.

My Utmost - Oct 6, 2009

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The Bent Of Regeneration

Galations 1:15-16
“When it pleased God... to reveal His Son in me.”

Key Passages

• If Jesus is to regenerate me, what is the problem He is up against?

• I have a heredity I had no say in; I am not holy, nor likely to be; and if all Jesus Christ can do is to tell me I must be holy, His teaching plants despair.

• But if Jesus Christ is a Regenerator, One Who can put into me His own heredity of holiness, then I begin to see what He is driving at when He says that I have to be holy.

• The New Testament teaching about regeneration is that when a man is struck by a sense of need, God will put the Holy Spirit into his spirit, and his personal spirit will be energized by the Spirit of the Son of God, “until Christ be formed in you.”

• When I reach the frontier of need and know my limitations, Jesus says - “Blessed are you.”

My Own Thoughts

That first question is the key for me right now. I am trying to figure out what it is in me that is holding Jesus back from being able to completely regenerate me. More and more I find it to be a sense of selfishness that has sprung up in me. I have grown accustomed to getting things my way when I want them, and if I don't get what I want I complain about it until I do. I am good at that. I have a sense of entitlement that I am having trouble shaking. A sense of entitlement to myself, my time, my own desires. I want to do what I want to do. What I am being shown increasingly by the Holy Spirit is that I am not my own, but I belong to Him for His purposes. I need to get out of the way and let go of all I am holding onto. Much easier said than done.

Dear Heavenly Father, I praise you for your gentle Spirit pointing out where you need to me to let go. I praise you for the fact that you created me and know me better than I can even know myself. I pray that your will would be done in my life Lord, as you want it done. Help me to let go of myself and to let go of this sense of entitlement. Forgive me for my selfishness Lord. I confess it to you now.

My Utmost - Oct 5, 2009

I missed a few days I know... it was busy weekend alright. Lay off...

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The Bias Of Degeneration

Romans 5:12
“Wherefore as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned.”

Key Passages

• The disposition of sin is not immorality and wrong-doing, but the disposition of self-realization – I am my own god.

• When our Lord faced men with all the forces of evil in them, and men who were clean living and moral and upright, He did not pay any attention to the moral degradation of the one or to the moral attainment of the other; He looked at something we do not see, viz., the disposition.

• The condemnation is not that I am born with a heredity of sin, but if when I realize Jesus Christ came to deliver me from it, I refuse to let Him do so, from that moment I begin to get the seal of damnation.

My Own Thoughts

When I read this passage I think of the woman at the well and the pharisees. The woman when confronted with all she had done wrong was open to being confronted with her wrong and she loved Jesus for showing it to her. She accepted his light being shined into her darkness. The pharisees however, when confronted with their brokenness and darkness did not accept Jesus' light being shined into it. They refused it because they didn't think they needed that. They were their own light. They were their own gods. They needed no God, even one they claimed to follow.

So the next question is which group do I belong to. Am I of the family of the woman at the well, or do I belong with the pharisees?

God I pray you'd give me the heart of the woman at the well, who ached for you to come and shine your light into her darkness. She longed for the revelation of your light in her life. She needed it and clung to it when it came. I want her heart Lord. I want to be broken so that I can be used by you Lord.

My Utmost - Oct 2, 2009

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The Sphere Of Humiliation

Mark 9:22
“If Thou canst do anything, have compassion on us, and help us.”

Key Passages

• After every time of exultation we are brought down with a sudden rush into things as they are where it is neither beautiful nor poetic nor thrilling.

• The height of the mountain top is measured by the drab drudgery of the valley; but it is in the valley that we have to live for the glory of God.

• We see His glory on the mount, but we live for His glory there.

• When you were on the mount you could believe anything, but what about that time when you were up against facts in the valley?

My Own Thoughts

I love these readings because they seem to catch me right where I am at. No phrase could sum up my life and this reading better than that third key passage. “We see His glory on the mount, but we live His glory there (in the valley).” Those mountain top moments are great because they captivate us to who God really is and to His amazing power. If all we ever received were the mountain top moments how could we ever be brought to a choice about trusting God or not. He wants us to trust Him and be drawn to Him at all times, not just when its made easy for us. I am right in that valley right now. It seems I am shown more and more each day just how selfishness and self-seeking I am lately. I am really struggling with this sin. It is the one sin that permeates my entire being and leads to all other sins.

Dear Lord and Heavenly Father, you are amazing and I thank you for giving me mountain top moments where I am quite nearly forced to believe in you. I thank you also for the dark moments in the drab valley where I must believe you to survive. I thank for those moments because they make you more real than even the mountain top moments. Forgive me for my selfishness Lord. I have sought only myself and my own comfort. Open my eyes to the needs of those around me. Help me to live in your Kingdom God.

Poetry... It Could Suck, But What Do I Care...

Rummaging around on my computer and straightening up file folders and what not, I ran across these old bits of poetry that I wrote long, long ago. They could really suck, but oh well. Just thought I would share them for the fun of it. Enjoy...

This Love
--------------------
Decisions are made each new day
some weigh heavier than others
but none sit so heavy
as the decisions we make on who to love
to genuinely love someone
despite their flaws
leaves us more vulnerable and dangerous
than any other time in our lives
love is a dangerous business
on either side of the spectrum
leave yourself open to attack
or crush someone with a word
but I wouldn't have it any other way
because love is more than dangerous
its alive and vibrant and active
and it can save the very soul of a man

much like this love has done for me
exactly as this love has done in me

to be accepted completely
despite the faults I contain
and my problematic temperament
is all that I can ask of no one
but I didn't have to ask of you
there was no working towards your acceptance
no attempts to get in your good graces
you look at me as lost and scattered
looking for the shepherd,
trying to be my own
trying to get back to no-mans land
trying to get back home

much like this love can do for me
exactly as this love has done in me


Time Spent
--------------------
time spent is time fast
and with you it moves quicker
enough can not grant

Marriage
--------------------
sometimes life gets the best of us
and other times we get the best of each other
sometimes we can't get enough
and other times we take too much


Stronghold
--------------------
You are a light on a hill unblemished
before a valley of darkness spreading
never yielding in beauty untarnished
or strength unmatched until time unending
you are my song and thy glory I praise
wild hearted savior, which can't be tamed
brilliant and terrible, shines thy face
both piercing the heart, and raising the shamed
mighty rock on which I will place my feet
the arms that hold me fast despite my fears
the mercy of which my sins match will meet
with thy wounded hand, wipe away my tears
freedom and life as meant to have been told
this is my hearts cry, you are my stronghold

My Utmost - Oct 1, 2009

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The Sphere Of Exultation

Mark 9:2
“Jesus leadeth them up into a high mountain apart by themselves.”

Key Passages

• We have all had times on the mount, when we have seen things from God's standpoint and have wanted to stay there; but God will never allow us to stay there.

• The test of our spiritual life is the power to descend; if we have power to rise only, something is wrong.

• It is a great thing to be on the mount with God, but a man only gets there in order that afterwards he may get down among the devil-possessed and lift them up.

• We are not built for the mountains and the dawns and aesthetic affinities, those are for moments of inspiration, that is all.

• We are built for the valley...

• Spiritual selfishness always wants repeated moments on the mount.

• The mount is not meant to teach us anything, it is meant to make us something.

• The moments on the mountain tops are rare moments, and they are meant for something in God's purpose.

My Own Thoughts

I guess I should have just copied the whole reading for today into my key passages section. This reading was great I thought, and really seemed to hit me hard. For quite a while it has seemed as though those mountain top moments were really the only thing keeping me going. I'd get one and be able to survive my daily life for a while, and right when it begins to feel like I am not going to make it God lifts me up and gives me one more of those moments. Those glimpses into who He is and what He is doing.

I've had a really hard time admittedly living in the “demon-possessed” valley for quite some time now. I don't feel like I am lifting anyone up. I think I am spiritually selfish. I've been looking to see what I can get from following God. Not what I can give to others to show them how much God loves them. I think a lot of us do this. We get so wrapped up in finding our own peace, safety, salvation, etc,... that we forget to look after others who need God in their lives. Jesus didn't come here preaching a gospel of self help, and he didn't come here preaching sermons on how to feel good about yourself. He came here and taught on what it means to live in the Kingdom Of God. Living in the Kingdom Of God couldn't be more opposite from living in the kingdom of Rick. Living in the Kingdom Of God involves righting the wrongs that we see day in and day out in the lives of those we come in contact with, and even in the lives of those we don't necessarily coming in contact with. It's not about trying to find peace & comfort, or health & wealth in our own lives. It's about trying to bring those things to those around us, and trusting that someday we may find that God has given us that in return. To live in the Kingdom Of God is to bring it to those in the demon-possessed valley.

Dear Father in Heaven, I praise you Father for being a God who cares about the least of these, and wants us all to live in your Kingdom. I pray that your Kingdom would come down, and that you would use me as a vessel and messenger of that Kingdom. Give me what I need to fulfill this purpose Lord, and only you know fully what it is that I need so I leave that in your hands. Forgive me for living for myself and showing no concern for those I come in contact with. Lead me out of the temptation to follow my own desires and my own heart. Give me the ability to follow your heart for others. This is your world and your kingdom Lord, and all the glory and renown belong to you Lord.