Inspired Word March 8, 2006

INSPIRED WORD

MARCH 08, 2006

SHARING / PRAYER

It is incomprehensible! Saint Paul, in his letters to the Ephesians, prayed for us that Christ might dwell in our hearts through faith. And that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend, with all the saints, the length, the width, the depth and the height of God's love, which surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with the fullness of God. That is my prayer tonight, for myself and for all of us, that we might know the touch of God in the depths of our being, to know a little bit of that length, width, and breath of His love for us; not just when we are feeling good because we are following God's Will and all things are wonderful, but maybe even when we are at our worst and perhaps when the worst is happening. Remember God's love for us and that He hasn't forgotten us, that He is still in control, that He has a plan and nothing can come against that plan. He loves us, He sent His Son to die for us. I can't comprehend that, but I continue to pray for just a little bit of understanding. There have been times when I have been blessed with the touch of God's love and it is overwhelming. So tonight, may our prayer be, 'God, touch us a little bit that we may know and feel a bit of Your love, so that when our trials come, we may remember that Your love never fails, no matter what we do. Thank You and praise You, Lord! We give You the glory and the honor that is due to You. Thank You, Lord!!'

IMAGE

I had a vision which wouldn't leave me. It is of a moth. There is a story of a man who was watching the moth trying to come out of its chrysalis or cocoon. The man was watching the moth which was going through a very violent struggle for hours. He couldn't stand to see the it struggle, so he decided he was going to help that moth. He picked apart that chrysalis and got the moth out. But something was wrong. The moth's wings were all crinkled; it couldn't fly; it couldn't be the creature God meant it to be. You see, the hours long violent struggle and flailing around was necessary to pump fluid into the wings, so that the moth could unfurl its wings and fly away and be the creature God meant it to be. The thought came to me that in our struggles God is watching over us, but unlike the man that pulled apart that chrysalis, God knows exactly what we need and what we need to learn in order to grow into what He meant us to be for Him.

EXHORTATION

......it should have taken a few months, as it really wasn't that far in walking or moving that many people, but it took them forty years to get where they needed to go. I had a teacher once who shared the insight of why God left them in the desert so long. What was the point? The point was this: His mission wasn't to get the Israelites out of Egypt, it was to get Egypt out of the Israelites. That is the part that took forty years. If they had gone into the Promised Land without having gone through that purging process and really becoming the people of God, they would just have recreated Egypt – the temptations would be the same, there was multi-gods, immorality, there were many different cultures within the people. God wanted His people to have the Promised Land, so He took them on the journey in which it was required to get Egypt out of them and Him into them. Lets ask Him to get the Egypt out of us. Let us surrender to Him whatever our idol is, whatever you put in your heart above Him. It is so easy to do and it is so hard to let God be number one in our lives. He has given us the grace and the promise that we can do it; He calls us to be part of His Holiness and that is the joy; that is the excitement of the journey.

PRAYER

.......this day, whom you will serve. But for me and my house, we will serve the Lord. Lord, we gather here as Your people in this place to choose to serve You, to choose to put our trust and our confidence in You. O Lord, we don't want to choose fear; we don't want to choose depression or discouragement; we don't want to put all the wrong thoughts in our minds about Your love. We don't want to serve error, Lord, we want to serve You! Our hearts want to serve You. Lord, we yield to You now all of those things which we carry with us in the desert place; all of those things that need a touch of Your love all of those things which need Your truth; our weaknesses that need Your strength our discouragements which need Your encouragement. Jesus, You are here among us and You touch us. You want us to reach out to others as well, in Your Name and in Your power and in Your love. So now in the midst of this place, in our anointing of the Lord, lets take some time for prayer. Tonight lets do it in a gentle way of maybe groups of three or so. Lets take about five minutes to pray for each other in our groups, for our individual needs.

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