We see much and are entering into so much because of the prayers of many. This is why we’ve set up the Champion’s. It is a group that starts to focus on an assignment, and together we move in unity and harmony.
Right now we’re in God’s moment of “turn”.
Inside of us is a treasure. We might not know how valuable the treasure is that we carry. It was given to us in Christ before our birth, which was before the foundation world. It has been given to us-communicated to by the word of God coming alive in us—things that we felt and desired and responded…and turned to.
All of that is getting buried is our “purchasing the field” and it’s about to be unveiled to the earth.
Many of us are going to become the happiest, friendliest, fun-loving, dancing, and singing people; whether we’re outwardly demonstrating it or not.
We’re going to walk in a liberty that is going to release others, who wish they could be free, without accusing anyone of not being free. You never get someone free when you tell them they’re not free. They only get free when they just get jealous of what you’ve got. And they say, “ I want that; I want in on that”. This is what’s happening. I was sharing two of the truths that the Lord has so impacted me, in all of us as a body, over the last few years.
One was the whole idea of starting, not from where you are but where you can be.
In prayer, our challenge is that we cannot start from “here”. Most of us start from the “earth”, when we should start from “heaven”.
Most of us spend much of our time in prayer trying to get to someplace. But Jesus said, “Let’s start there, and consequently, we go backwards in our thinking.
We come up with laws, rules and regulations. We try to keep them. We then come under more condemnation because once we try to keep one law, we have to try to keep all of them.
And we are just is a mess… locked up in the concrete physical world, when God has opened to us a place to rule and reign with Christ in heaven.
God’s trying to tell us something.
We engage ourselves into the place where God has given us boldness to enter which is the holiest of holy.
In reading Hebrews 10, let’s take a moment to step in here. Let’s practice so we are comfortable in practicing this:
Let’s practice skills on how to enter in—as far into the kingdom, into the presence of God as we like. No one can do it for us.
We make choices constantly. How far do we want to go into the Holy of holies?
Please imagine that you are a teen and I give you a brand-new car. I hand you the keys. You’re going to start with “I don’t need to know anything, I just want to try it”.
And if we try it, that way, we will go into places that we might be stuck in. But, if we’re older than a teenager we might think, “Can I afford the insurance? How do I keep it from getting scratched? Do I know how to drive it?
We think too many thoughts…We need to just let go of all that and… just step into this new vehicle.
The vehicle is the wonderful Holy Spirit. He’s been given the assignment to cause the things that Jesus promised, the words that Jesus spoke, and His accomplishments to be ours—to be experienced and for us to be able to move into them.
If you are wanting to start in prayer from where we should start, from where we are, we can do so by covenant…
Sometimes the presence of God simply picks us up. We may go to pray and we are surprised that God is already there waiting for us.
But a lot of times, it is not like that. In these times, we may go to pray and it doesn’t seem like God is in anything. The only things we sense are our problems, the devil, and memories, and struggles and troubles. So, we can’t go by feelings. Covenant is the place we can begin always and validate ourselves.
Here’s how it works: Hebrews 10
Verse 19 “therefore brethren having boldness to enter the holiest by the blood of Jesus by a new and living way which he consecrated for us through the veil that is his flesh and having a high priest over the house of God let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering for you promised is faithful”
Practice this with me, now:
Wherever you are right now, stand up. (Changing our position sometimes changes our position from listening to doing.)
Each statement in this scripture is a door. Any word, phrase, or imagery that the Bible presents is a door we can step into and experience.
The more we practice it, the more we will begin to experience every word.
We will feel the substance in the spirit of words—whether its songs being sung or your neighbor talking across the street. We will recognize things that are unseen, rather than just getting the what-is-in-front-of-us.
Let’s practice this prayer together:
Jesus, my Lord and Savior, I come, having boldness to enter the holiest, by the blood of Jesus.
This is the only way I can come, or any of us can come, with assurance, by the blood of Jesus.
So right now, say, Father, I’m coming into your presence to the holiest holies, with boldness, confidence, and freedom because of the blood of Jesus.
The blood of Jesus makes me accepted and I am welcomed. I come through the veil of Your flesh, the door of Jesus Christ—Your death, burial and resurrection, Your ascension and intercession.
You died for my sins and You were buried according to Scripture.
You were raised for my justification. I am justified in You and You ascended into heaven and You sent gifts to men… the precious Holy Spirit. And now You intercede for me and I come to this act, this perpetual work, and I step inside of the Holy of Holies, where God, my Father, sits on the throne of grace. Lord, where You are my high priest. And I stand here and behold you.
As we do this, imagine yourself here. This is why Jesus came to save us. It was so we could come here and be with Him. And as we look at Father, we behold what the throne of grace really means.
Practice this: Come up with 10 adjectives to describe God, our Father, Jesus our Lord, and Holy Spirit, our comforter.
Use the description of love and joy and peace.
Example: Father, You are beautiful, You are strong, You’re majestic in Your movement, You are kind in the way You respond, You are fun to be with, You are gentle and generous. You are majestic, saving, ferocious in Your love for us, You are beautiful.
Raise up praise. In your words… how would you describe God? How would you tell Him that He is beautiful?
You can use any of the words that you would describe anything on earth that is beautiful to you.
We draw near with a true heart.
Example: You are faster than the fastest car, more solid than the most assured place of rest and more powerful than a nuclear bomb. You are glorious in your behavior, Your love is ferocious and You pursue all man for freedom!
Once we’ve entered into God’s presence through Christ—through the blood, into Christ, then we can really be very honest. We can say, “This is what’s going on in my heart, this is what’s happening inside of me. These are my anxious thoughts. These are my emotion. This is my anger, my confusion, this is my offense, this is my betrayal, this a my gratitude, these are my true
feelings toward You this moment. Let’s draw near to God with a true heart.
Tell Him something honest about yourself. You will not surprise Him.
Don’t be afraid to tell Him something honest about yourself, something about how you’re really doing. And let it be honest.
We get really quiet here but no one’s listening to you. Be loud enough in speech so you can hear yourself say it. Commit yourself with your mouth. With your voice commit yourself to Him.
The Lord hears our hearts. “We’re drawing near to you Daddy with a pure heart. This means we aren’t going to mix it up or try to fake You out.
We will open up our sepulture. If it’s full of dead bones, then we would rather give You dead bones than a bunch of lies. So here’s who we are… Tired, angry, frustrated, jealous, envious, confused, and we are hurt. We have things we don’t know how to release or let go of. We don’t know how to make sense of senseless acts.
This is who we are, Dad.
Our journeys have left us wounded, some of us wondering, some of this frustrated. We just draw near to you in a true heart, in assurance of faith. The faith we have is in what you did, Jesus, not in what we did.
We are confident that we are not going to be sent out of this holy place because we told You something horrific about ourselves. Rather, we are accepted in the Beloved and the truth of who we are is received inside of the Banner of Christ.
Praise You, praise You. This is a beautiful place.
Let’s live here every day. We are not able to function in the earth if we don’t come here every day.
Thank you, Lord
Now, the Bible says something starts to happen and it happens every time we come to this place.
The blood of Jesus now starts to sprinkle afresh the very conscious things we brought forward and it starts to dismantle the feelings, the locked up emotions, the shutdown places, the reproach, the shame, the anger, and angst. Whatever it is that we are bringing forward, the blood of Jesus starts to dismantle it. It dissolves it and causes it to lose its ability to stay connected to us.
I just open my arms and lean into Your river of forgiveness, this redemptive reality and truth, until, I know that I am free from the blood of every man.
So Lord, I thank you right now according to Scripture that the blood of Jesus now sprinkles our conscience. We receive our conscience being sprinkled.
This is what Paul said. And he had led people to death in his zeal, yet he said that I am free from the blood of every man because he had been cleansed thoroughly. He knew that he was forgiven.
Then, it says that something else happens. The water of the word starts to wash our bodies. This is where the Scripture starts coming back to life. We come out of the current newspaper report about how we’re doing, to the God decree of what He spoke over us in Christ.
And it starts to take us out of our place of limitation into the unlimitedness of Himself.
Lord, I ask you Holy Spirit, to cause the word of God, to become alive in each of us right here and now. Holy Spirit, come alive and speak, in this place—the holy of holies.
Jesus our High Priest, sitting at the right-hand of the Father, we approach You in truth, confident that we’re here in Christ, faith keeps us in our place. Blood sprinkling and water washing us. We can now bring to You, the confession of our hope because You are faithful, Who has promised.
Hope is how we live, If we lose our hope, we lose everything—we lose our place. Hope is a promise, a word. It’s all the things we underline in the Bible that we recorded.
Holy Spirit, Come, You are the One Who was sent by Jesus, and now here on earth administrate our worship. We ask You right now to bring to our remembrance every beautiful wonderful thing that has ever been said and given to us in Jesus. Come and talk and speak and reveal and guide and remind, and draw us into awareness of eternity and promise now.
And as we hear, we will speak it back to You. And everything that comes to my mind I say out loud to You, Jesus: “I hear You I say, You are able”.
God is faithful. He can do what He said. So tell Him what He said. Now is when He likes to hear it… In the face of adversity and impossibility of circumstance.
You’re faithful God, my Father.
Upcoming Events
Wednesday, August 20, 6PM: Discovery Group – I will be sharing on “Hearing the Voice of God” How to develop a hearing ear and seeing eye.
Wednesday, 7PM: Glory Service – I will be sharing “Entering into Revelation and then Being Changed into What You See” intimacy is the art of seeing into. We will take the revelation prayers of Paul and see into…
Sunday, August 24, 9AM: Marilyn Noorda will be sharing “Youth Renewed” The exchange of strength in waiting upon the Lord. A new season is here.
Sunday, 10:20AM: Nations Prayer – Psalm 2 in action. … 8 Ask of Me, and I will give You The nations for Your inheritance.
Sunday, 11AM: I will be sharing “Practicing the Presence of God-Today” Leading to behold Him in all you do as He holds you in all you do. The journey into intimacy-today.
