Hi guys, it has been quite a while since I have added a blog post. As a matter of fact, the end of next month will be a whole year! So I have a lot to catch you up on.  Because of that and because of the work the Father has been doing in me, this will be a 4-part blog.  So consider this part 1 of 4.

You know I do a lot of healing and deliverance ministry with people, and it has really seemed this year there has been more need than ever!  

The Lord is making His Bride ready for His return.  He is coming for a spotless bride, so I have heard reports from all around and seen evidence in all the folks I have worked with that Holy Spirit has been bringing many deeply buried issues to the surface in the lives of His people.  It is time for overdue housekeeping in our souls, and Holy Spirit is really good at bringing it to our attention.

My own family have experienced healing and restoration in this year too. This year started off with an unexpected blow and recovery has taken time, patience and grace toward ourselves.  

I am a daughter of God and a friend of Jesus, yet the amazing strength and faithfulness of His Shalom (Peace) has been beyond anything I could have imagined.  The King’s peace has reigned in our lives as we have progressed and evolved in this year.  

2023 seems to be the appointed time for Holy Spirit to reveal festering wounds and lies we have believed, especially about Him.  He is tearing down strongholds we have lived under because we pushed down the pain.  

He is shining light on things hidden in darkness and then, if we are willing, helping us to heal and become strong.

If you have never been healthy, you don’t really miss your cast aside strength.If you have never been free, you don’t notice the weight of the shackles. But when you are suddenly set free there is less baggage taking up rooms in your heart.  Now it’s time for reorganization.  Time for understanding.  And definitely time to fill the voids with more of Jesus!

Your new freedom may make you a little uncertain, but let me tell you, you’re just getting used to the new normal, which is different for sure, but lighter and easier than the old.   

In this blog I hope to give you some keys that have helped me, so that they may help you breakthrough to JOY!

Often when I speak to groups or write blogs, I tend to be a bit teacher-y. I just want to tell you this will be kind of different.  

I’m gonna tell you a lot of little stories of when God stepped into my life at different times, knowing all the details that I didn’t even realize; that is, until it all came together this year.

He has used every part of my life, my thoughts, my fears…everything – to show me how KNOWN I am by Him.  AND to teach me and coax me along with Him.

Then I’m going to TRY to bring it all together for you and, hopefully, help you see that this is going on in your life too. OK?

But First A Bit of Background

About 12 years ago, after an especially rough year, I spent a few life-changing days with a couple of wonderful counselors; Jerry & Denise Basel. The duo helped me into a tremendous amount of healing and breakthrough!

They helped me understand some very important things that allowed me to forgive with greater understanding.

They taught me that we are spiritual beings and so, without meaning to, we apply many things we learn in life to God. Good and bad.  

For instance, if I had a good experience with my earthly Dad, I might be really comfortable with Father God. I would have a good expectation of how He treats me, etc.   But if I didn’t, I might have some very negative expectations of what He thinks about me, how he sees me, His opinion of me – whether or not He is safe.

The same is true in my experiences with siblings or friends – I tend to relate those relationships to my relationship with Jesus.

Finally because, as we know, Holy Spirit is the Comforter, we tend to relate our experiences of our Mom’s with Holy Spirit.  These things made sense to me.

So, like I hope many of you have done I chose to forgive my Mom.  Mostly for her need to control me.  (I had a really great Mom.  But because of her own wounds and the fear they caused, she felt safer if she was in control and “protecting” those she loved.)

In the next moment after I forgave Mom, I had what I now understand as an OPEN VISION.  In other words, I suddenly saw a spiritual story played out right in front of my open eyes while I sat in the room with these two wonderful ministers.  But they were not seeing the same thing I was.

In the vision I saw the faces of what seemed to be every person I had ever known up to that point.  Friends I had met recently, relatives, and even childhood neighbors I did not remember before that moment.  There was a red bloodline connecting all of them.

I was filled with a clear understanding that Jesus knew all of them, fully understood each one’s back story and loved them completely. Amazing.

(Now don’t get all crazy about the word “vision”, this is a very normal experience in the Bible, (yes in the New Testament too).  Check out the book of Acts – Ananias, Saul/Paul and Peter too.)

That experience confirmed to me that, just as I had not wanted my Mom to control me, I had also unconsciously feared that Holy Spirit wanted to control me; so I had blocked Him out.  The moment I forgave Mom, Holy Spirit came alive to me in a new way.  

Now I know that Holy Spirit will never control me – but I really wish He would!

Break for Background Again – Katy

My daughter Katy was born with special needs.  Well, we didn’t really know that at first.  Everything was normal at birth and she was easily hitting her milestones up to 15 months.

Then, over a weekend, after she had just said her first full sentence, she suddenly lost her ability to speak and her ability to use her hands for any purposeful tasks. For a time she developed a far away gaze, seemingly living in another world, apart from us much of the time.

After that weekend, Katy could no longer speak, could longer use her hands for purposeful things.

So she could no longer feed herself, could not dress herself, could not transition from sitting to standing or standing to sitting. She could walk, but not with great stability. 

Later, at the age she was when I was having this healing experience, she needed to wear her riding helmet as she walked around the house because we had tile floors and if she fell suddenly she fell like a tree, with no hands protecting her.

Well, if you are two Type-A people with lots going on, you adapt to life’s challenges. You learn to get around the difficulties so that your family can still have a life. We continued to travel, eat out and have a lot of social life with Katy at the center of our plans.

One of the ways we made those things more do-able was in how I walked with Katy. I wish I had a pic to show you our method.  But it was like this, I would hold her right hand in my right hand and I would put my left arm behind her and tucked my left hand under her left armpit.  That way she was safe no matter which way she might start to fall.  We could get going pretty fast.  We could have been pretty competitive 3-legged racers!

So that was background, but back to spiritual growth: Some months after that breakthrough weekend under Jerry & Denise’s prayerful guidance, I was with some mature friends who were praying and I asked a question and I don’t recall exactly what the answer was, but my friend simply said, ”We’re just trying to seek His Face.”  

I took her very literally!  When I literally tried to seek His face I realized I could only see the Father in my mind’s eye from His shoulders down.  I realized something must be blocking me.

I called on Jerry & Denise again to ask them what to do about it.  

They said, “Let’s ask the Father if there is a lie you are believing about Him.”  

So I did.  

The moment I asked I began to see a picture in my mind’s eye.  It was so very clear.  I saw a brushed and primped little dog with bows on its ears, sitting in a lovely dog bed by a perfect fireplace in a perfect home.

Then suddenly the scene changed and I saw Katy and me walking side by side down our wide hallway in the way I just described to you. My right hand holding her right hand; my left hand supporting her from behind.  She was safe, and I heard a voice say the word, “Cherished.”  

Suddenly I understood what the Lord was showing me.  You see, my earthly Dad was a very good provider.  He worked a lot and we had everything we needed. But when he came home, I often felt like the good little dog with all its needs taken care of.  When the owner returned, it got a pat on the head and that was about it.  

But the Lord was contrasting that lie with the truth.  I am not just a little dog to be patted on the head.  I am cherished by my Heavenly Father, just as Katy is cherished by me.

The little well cared for dog was the LIE I was believing about how my Father saw me.

As if I was well cared for and well provided for, but only someone to get a pat on the head when I had been a good girl.  

Katy, on the other hand was my CHERISHED daughter! She couldn’t really do anything FOR me, but I cherished her and cared for her and took care of all her needs out of love.  THIS was the TRUTH I suddenly understood!

The Father Cherishes me like I cherish my daughter? Wow!  I “knew that” in my mind, but I didn’t KNOW it in my spirit, soul and body as I do now until that moment.

And suddenly there was no distance between the Father and Me.

This is what it means when the Lord says, “Then you will know the truth and the Truth shall set you free.” John 8:32

I was set free by this truth to receive love from my Father.

By the way, not long after that “cherished” vision, Katy and I were laying on my bed laughing together, Katy began smiling up at the ceiling. I looked up to see what she was smiling at and I suddenly could see the Father (like in an outlined form) smiling down on us over the side of his throne! So pleased!  Such amazing fruit of getting rid of that lie!

Another nugget I gleaned from this experience was this. I cherish Katy because she is my daughter.  She is part of me and I delight in her.  I love her even though she lost all of the abilities that made it possible for her to be independent of me.

So this revelation was bigger than, “Wow! He loves me as much as I love her!”

You see, Katy had NO WAY to earn my love.  In many ways she remained like a baby, completely dependent on us for everything.  She needed help to eat, to be dressed, to get to the bathroom, to stand up or sit down, to go to bed.  

She could do nothing to impress me (though she often managed to anyway) but, you know what I mean. She was super smart, but she wasn’t winning awards at school or for her athletics or music or…anything.  I love her because she is mine and I cherish her.  

The Father was showing me that, in my relationship with Him, I am JUST LIKE THAT!  I am not winning his love by my perfection.

He loves me because I am part of Him.  I am IN Christ Jesus.  I am one with Him and He is one with the Father. We exist in love for one another.  The Father is not ashamed for us to be called His children because Jesus has made us perfect in His sight.  We are his cherished children in whom he delights.

When we believe the truth about how the Father see us and cares for us, we are set free.

Recently I was in a very mixed group of people in a 3 week class. Lots of them do not know the Lord at all.  I loved it!  I didn’t realize how much I had missed them. They are so hungry for the love of the Father!

Thinking about them I realized it has been a long time since I shared with anyone the basics of what the gospel actually is to me.

I would want be able to share it with them in the simplest way while still being complete.  At first it felt a little overwhelming. Over the years I have come to know many aspects of the heart of God. But I know my best professors in school were the ones who could take their years worth of learning and condense it down so that anyone, with a heart to understand, could grasp the message.  Jesus was that kind of teacher.

After some days thinking about this, the following is, I hope, an inspired explanation of the Gospel of Christ as I know it today.  I bless you to find freedom and joy in the heart of the Father as we enter into a brand new year.

The Good News

The Father took each of us from His own heart and gave us life by His breath. In this act, He imparted His eternal nature to our spirits and our spirits will exist forever because He does.

In the garden, man and woman lived in oneness with God, learning His nature and His ways. The evidence of oneness was before them in God Himself, the three in one, they saw perfect oneness at all times. And the God of love gave the people He made the most loving and valuable gift, freedom to choose.

But the enemy came to steal away this oneness, to kill the growth of our knowing God and used our own gift, choice, against us to destroy the peace that was among us.

The first man and woman were persuaded that God was holding out on them and that in disobeying God, they would receive something that they actually already had; they would be “like God”. Though they had been warned by God, they succumbed to the temptation and chose spiritual death.

Now spiritual life and death is comparable to light and darkness. No one can give you some darkness, it simply exists when there is no light. Likewise, no one can cause an eternal thing to stop existing, but spiritual death exists when there is no spiritual life. Separation from God is the absence of life and light. Separation from God is spiritual death.

But God always planned to make a way for us to be restored to His heart. If we flip to the last pages of the Bible, Revelation 21:3-4, and see God’s dream revealed and fulfilled. It is this:

“Now the dwelling of God is with men, and he will live with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God. He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away”.

In Romans 8:22-23, we see that He put this same desire within us and even in the rest of creation:

22 We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time. 23 Not only so, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption to sonship, the redemption of our bodies.

So how could that come about after we chose death? Our perfectly just Father has to punish sin, so how could he rescue us without killing us too?

As one, the Godhead planned to send the Father’s perfect Son to become one of us. They actually planned for this before the earth was made, before we blew it. He came to be just like us; He chose to be limited in all the ways we are limited, having the same gift of choice we have, and to demonstrate a perfect life; but also to suffer death for us so that the justice of God would be fulfilled in Him, instead of in us.

Just like we do, Jesus suffered betrayal, humiliation, ridicule, contempt, rejection, hatred, but then He was so badly beaten and whipped that His face was unrecognizable as human. After that, His head was impaled by a crown of terrible thorns and then He was nailed to a wooden cross by having his hands and feet nailed through to the wood. All of this followed the torturous anticipation of knowing in detail what He would suffer for us.

Why would an innocent person agree to this? The Roman governor declared Him innocent 3 times. Why suffer and not try to prove your innocence? Why accept even the accusation, much less the violence? Answer: Love.

But He wasn’t done yet. Many martyrs have died for many causes over all the centuries. But not one of them, however worthy, gained eternal life for their followers, or for those who were grateful. Jesus didn’t stop at dying for us. Jesus completed our restoration to the Father by overcoming death and the grave forever in His resurrection from the dead. He gave us a brand new life in Him.

By his love, Jesus reconciled every person and the whole of creation back to the Father. Now, it is our free choice whether or not we accept this gift and receive our salvation.

When we choose salvation, we get the biggest gift of all, the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. The person of God comes to reside within us to strengthen us, to convict us of sin, to give us understanding and guide us and comfort us forever. He will never leave us.

His Presence makes us brand new creations, we are completely unlike our old selves because of His Presence. In choosing life in Jesus, we must also choose to let our old self die. With His help, over time, we can put to death the deeds of our sinful nature and really live!  Our old way of living begins to peel away like the layers of an onion.  We have never before known freedom, but as the layers fall away we begin to know true joy and abundant life. This is how we become Sons of God.

This is a re-post of a blog I wrote a couple years ago.  As we enter into Rosh Hashanah and the Jewish Fall Feasts, it seems particularly appropriate. I hope you find yourself, as the Beloved, in this story.

For her, this chance was her last gasp, her last fragment of hope to be healed and restored from the wasting sickness that had aged her, made her pale, given her dark circles under her eyes, stolen her strength, stolen her energy, stolen her hope. But would she dare?

The oppression her culture imposed upon her because of her condition made everything harder. She had tried to find help, wasted all her resources on “cures” that didn’t. Everywhere she went she had to call out, “I am unclean!  Step aside or be defiled by my touch.” She wasn’t even supposed to be in public except for an emergency situation. As she gave her warning, people turned around, wide-eyed and then condemnation filled their faces, as if it were her fault. The most religious wouldn’t even look at her. Well this WAS an emergency!  It was her last gasp for life before she gave up, shriveled up and gave in to death.

Then she saw him, the Rabbi, Yeshua. Well, at least she saw and heard the cluster of activity and people surrounding him, moving slowly along with him. From  houses, from market booths, from begging mats, even from the aristocracy, people called out to Him, “Yeshua!”

“Son of David!”

“Heal me!”

“Touch me!”

She could see people straining to reach Him, straining to touch Him, just a touch, just a look, just a word! They were starving for Him and all He had for them. He was surrounded.

Yet with a kind smile in His eyes, he kept moving, talking, healing, bestowing love on people as He went along. His disciples tried to create some room for Him to move, giving him some distance from the pressing crowd. To do what she must, would cost her the last shred of dignity she still possessed.

As a good Hebrew man, Yeshua wore his tallit, his prayer shawl, with the fringes on the corners. Culturally it is a garment made for intimacy with God. As a man prays, he entwines his fingers in the fringes of the shawl, as he does his wife’s own hand; the reminder of the Word of God and how close, how much a part of his heart it is to be. In the culture of the day, only a man’s wife or children could touch this intimate place on his shawl. For a strange woman to touch it would be treated as adultery.

She could see the colors of His tallit from a distance, and she knew this place of intimacy with the one who sent Him was the key to her healing. Her heart was bursting with this sudden chance. “If I can just touch the fringe of his tallit I will be healed.”

In a burst of adrenaline she rushed the crowd on one side of Him, using the brief shutter of repulsion and the opening made as she shouted out, “Unclean!” one last time, and lunged to reach her arm and then her fingers through as she grasped the intimate fringe of His tallit.

Immediately and finally she felt energy and strength rush through her body.  Color rose in her cheeks as spontaneous recognition of hope fulfilled flooded her heart.  Color began to drain away again as she realized she might be healed but now in serious trouble; so she began to dart away to hide.

“Who touched me?” she heard the Rabbi ask? His disciples were confused. “What can you mean?  Everyone is touching you Yeshua.” “No. Somebody touched me and power has flowed out of me.” When the woman realized that she could not stay hidden, she began to tremble and fell to her knees in front of him. The whole crowd heard her explain why she had touched him and that she had been immediately healed.⁴⁸ “Daughter,” he said to her, “your faith has made you well. Go in peace. (Luke 8:47-48 NLT)

“What?” Her eyes popped open. Did he just say that? her mind raced as she realized no one was going to stone her to death. Look, His eyes are full of love and peace and He’s looking at me! He called me daughter! As His daughter I am permitted this intimacy. As one who is intimate with him I have broken no law, I cannot be punished, no law will judge me, I am free! I am clean! I am healed! I am restored! I am His!

Amen!  This is what we have been granted in the new covenant. As partakers of the Body and Blood of the King, we are permitted every intimacy with Him. Our fingers are entwined in His prayer shawl, entwined in His own fingers. When we take His body into ours we become one flesh with Him. From this intimate place we are permitted to know the thoughts of our King and He shares them with us. We are permitted to know His heart’s intention that, when spoken, transforms.

In the physical, it is a common thing for people who have received an organ from another person to have memories from that person’s life. When we partake of our Father’s blood in the blood of Jesus, I believe we are also given access to His memories, His thoughts toward us, the plans He made for us from before the foundation of the world.

As I sit with Him in the intimacy of communion, fully receiving from Him, I am permitted to know the works He has prepared in advance for me to do. I am given the blueprints, the strategies. I am permitted to receive all of Him into all of me.  I am daughter, I am friend, I am bride. I am His.

Based on Luke 8:43-48

I heard a whispered, “Elohim.” I knew that Holy Spirit had said it. 

Suddenly I felt the Presence of the Holy Trinity!  The room grew heavy and crowded.

Elohim; Divine family, perfect love, friendship

Elohim; Divine trust, unity, cooperation, even

humility. Elohim

Ancient of Days,

Holy oneness, rivers of joy; Elohim

Grace upon grace; Elohim

My master, my savior, my husband, 

my friend; Elohim.

Creator of Heaven and Earth; Elohim

God of oneness, intimate friendship; Elohim

Most powerful union; Elohim

Jesus is our perfect husband.  He loves us more than himself, he chooses us before His own comfort.  On the cross, He chose us over His own life.

In Genesis, Adam is the first husband ever.  Adam had heard the word of God, the warning about the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil (Genesis 2:17).  Yet, when Eve, who had not heard the word directly from the Lord, offered him the fruit he took it, because it was appealing to the flesh. 

Similarly, Abraham, the husband of Sarah had heard the word of the Lord saying that Abraham would have a son by his wife Sarah.  Yet, when Sarah impatiently offered him a young woman, Hagar, who appealed to his flesh, he too received the elicit fruit from his wife and satisfied his own flesh. 

In both cases, the wife offers something fleshly to her husband. In both cases, the husband does not say, “That’s not what God said.”  Neither husband corrected his wife, nor did either one deny himself.  Instead, both husbands received the fruit of the wrong tree with big consequences for themselves, their wives and their generations.  

As an aside, perhaps a big role of wives as helpmate is to demonstrate denying ourselves to our husbands in order to help them to do the same?

So I have expressed this idea about Adam & Abraham being examples of husbands who did not deny their own flesh and maintain the word of the Lord, but submitted to their flesh instead.  

Sometime later, (Exodus 4:24-26) Moses, the friend of God, had disobeyed the Lord and not circumcised his son as the Lord had commanded. The Lord was actually going to kill Moses!  So Zipporah, his wife, grabbed a knife and did the deed to save her husband’s life.  Then she said, “You are a husband of blood to me now.” There are many questions about her statement, but it is important to understand that circumcision was a blood covenant with God. It represented obedience to the word of the Lord and the, literal, denial of the flesh. Apparently, the covenant and Moses and his generations being under it, was important to God!

Jesus is our perfect husband.  He too was tempted by the flesh.  After fasting for 40 days, the first temptation the enemy brought to him was against His flesh, “If you are the son of God, why don’t you make these rocks into bread.”  But Jesus did not.  Jesus denied the desire of His flesh for food and spoke the true word of God instead.

Whereas these other husbands, rather than deny themselves, took the fleshly thing that they wanted and brought consequences upon themselves and their wives; Jesus denied himself and spoke the word of God instead.  He brought a covenant of blessing upon us instead.

Adam and Abraham were husbands under the covenant of the flesh.  The broken hymen making the two one flesh and creating a lifelong blood covenant of marriage.  But Jesus is a husband of the New Covenant.  The new and eternal covenant.  He sacrificed His life’s blood for us.  He sacrificed His flesh.  He sacrificed to remain holy, so that we too could live holy lives.

I believe this is the role of fasting in the Kingdom of God; to accustom us to denying our flesh in favor of following the Word of God.  We are to get accustomed to choosing life in the spirit over life in the flesh.  As Kingdom people, this helps us make all of our decisions with clarity that can be muddled through feeding our flesh in abundance.

In this season, my family and I take communion together on most days. The intimacy of communion is much like intimacy in marriage. In the physical intimacy of marriage, we offer our beloved our body. It can be a vulnerable moment. Jesus said, “This is my body, given for you.” I hear Jesus’ vulnerability and courage in His words.

He offered His blood for us freely.  He poured it out, not trickled it out. “This is the new covenant in my blood, which is poured out for you.”  In His words I hear His confidence and excitement about the New Covenant He is about to create.  His anticipation that we will be free of the old covenant of burden and empowered by the new covenant of His love.

To paraphrase Paul in Romans 7, our old husband, with his demanding to-do list, was about to die.  Jesus knew we would be free from the law. Under the new covenant (or marriage to Jesus) we have “died to the power of the law, when you died with Christ.  And now you are united with the One who was raised from the dead.” (Romans 7:4)

Next time you take communion, know that your spiritual husband, Jesus, sacrificed His all for you. He chose you over His own life so that you can be in eternal covenant with Him.

He is our perfect husband and has set us free.  “And because you belong to Him, the power of the life-giving Spirit has freed you from the power of sin that leads to death.” (Romans 8:2) Our perfect husband chose to provide the blood of the covenant, so we can have the consequence of blessings.  Choose Him in return.  Live in your blessings.  Know your husband and all His glories fully.  It will mean a lifetime of exploration and wonder as you behold your beloved.

It’s never too early to wish you a wonderful resurrection day!

This week was spring break and my daughter was home from school. She loves the show, It’s Supernatural with Sid Roth.  I watched an episode with her and the guest on the show, Chad Gonzalez, caught my attention.

Chad talked about a former witch doctor he met in Africa who had been very powerful in the demonic world.  The man was now a follower of the Lord Jesus.  But in curiosity, Chad asked him about how he had operated in his old life.  The man said something that really caught my attention.  He said, “Christians are lazy!” He said that in his old life, he would get up before the sun, go outside and sit alone.  He would think about the curses he was going to do that day.  He would meditate on them in his imagination until he was certain that when he spoke the curse, it would happen just as he imagined it.  Whoa!  That was so convicting to me about my prayer life and the prayer life of most believers.

In charismatic circles we have all heard that the devil doesn’t create anything.  He only takes the things of God and copies them.  For instance, psychic versus prophetic.  In each case, the person is receiving messages from the spiritual world, but in each case the person is tuned to a completely opposite station.  One to the kingdom of darkness and the other to the Kingdom of Heaven.   We also know there are demonic tongues that copy the gift of speaking in tongues.  Again, each person is speaking a language from the kingdom they serve.

You can list all of the gifts of the Holy Spirit and they have been copied in some form by darkness.  That does not mean that the gifts of the Holy Spirit are evil.  Of course not! They were ours first! It simply shows that the enemy is a copycat.  He knows the spiritual laws that God created and he uses these principles to accomplish his evil intention through humans who have the authority on earth that he lacks.

Last week in my time with the Lord, He said, “Whatever you wish for, whatever you do, bring it before me, let me hold it in my hand and I will bring it to life.”  Wow!  It amazed me then and it amazes me now.  My creator, my Father, the one who gave me life and sustains my life desires to bring  life to the dreams that He has put in my heart. His big Papa heart desires it for you too.

If a witch doctor who serves demons can spend hours dreaming of evil to do with his demons, how much more should we be willing to spend time throughout our day with our Papa.  Those demons hated that man and always intended his destruction. Our Father loves us and, according to his own word, has good plans for us.  Plans to prosper us and not to harm us.  Plans to give us a hope and a future. Jeremiah 29:11

If a person who serves evil can see demonic power manifested through their hands, how much more should we expect to see the power of God manifested through us if we give ourselves to His principles.

How beautiful to change my conversations with the Lord about my dreams into times of daydreaming with him about what it WILL look like when it is accomplished in Him.

When I was thinking about this principle of imagining with expectation, this verse came to mind. “Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it and it will be yours.” Mark 11:24  Jesus has already revealed this principle to us, we have been slow to believe Him.

We are the royal priesthood of the Kingdom of Heaven.  We are permitted to bless and not to curse. When people in your life are struggling, rather than deliver a laundry list of requests to the Lord for Him to do, what if we meditated on what it would be like when they are…healed, restored, empowered, set-free…whatever it is you have been asking for them.  Then go to them and pray for them with full expectation that when you do, your prayer shall be fulfilled.  I have a feeling this looks much more like the hours Jesus spent alone with the Father than what my prayer life has looked like until now.

I hope to hear glory stories from you of Jesus showing off through you because you spent time imagining with Him!

As I reflect on 2021, I feel expanded; not only in my waistline…I’ll soon return to strengthening and minimizing my physical self, but also in my internal house.  2021 was chock full of opportunities to trust Jesus in greater depths and to be expanded in our faith, in our understanding and in hope.

This year my friend Marti, who is about 10 years older than me, (don’t tell her I told you), has been talking about her new perspective on her future self.  She used to avoid thinking about aging and didn’t want to consider how she might be in the future. But then her daughter gave her a paradigm shift, and now, every day, Marti is advancing the possibilities for her future self.  What’s going on in her internal person is evident all over her external person.  It’s beautiful!

This year, I have felt that the Lord has been doing some remodeling of my internal house.  He has taken some old visions, old dreams and given me understanding.  As usual, His understanding means that my mind and heart have got to grow larger to take it all in.  As usual, my existing “knowledge” (what I understand with my mind and natural learning) only begins to encompass the larger and greater territory of wisdom and understanding that He makes available.

Have you ever had those moments when you are learning something new and you suddenly realize that the scope of knowledge on the subject is WAY bigger than you ever considered!?  Well that is life IN Jesus all the time if you are pressing in for more. Holy Spirit is so generous that the house will never be done expanding.  For everyone who has asked Jesus for more understanding, more wisdom–there are no tiny houses.  I wonder if that’s what He meant by, “In my Father’s house are many mansions”?

This year, the Lord took me back to passions I had in business school and youthful longings full of hope for social justice and expanded my former house with creative strategies that harmoniously blend the two.  He reminded me of what my spirit has always known, that this model of believers in business demonstrating social justice should be the norm, not the exception.

This year I have felt the Lord pushing me back in to the business world.  I’m excited about that.  But IN Jesus, there is no distinction between ministers who work on the church campus and ministers who run a business out in the world. Did you notice that Jesus took almost all of his first disciples from the business world, not the Temple?  Do you remember that Jesus was first an entrepreneur?

I have a heart and a hunger to address some social needs through a Kingdom oriented business.  I believe that is the future of the church.  Not just gathering together in churches for a weekly meeting, but Kingdom business people having an affect on many lives through transactions and interactions all week long.

Those interactions can open the door to natural connections becoming deeper in the intimacy of meals together, discussions and meetings in homes.  How is this better than what we have been doing?  It is a more natural social connection, it was modeled for us as a successful model in the first century church and it includes everyone!  Expansion is not just dependent on the pastor, but happens naturally in everyone’s daily lives.

Last night, I had a group of friends over. One friend, a business woman, was telling the story of how she never intended to run a business, she wanted to “run a household, which is a business,” she said.

“Yes!” my spirit shouted.  I have always seen it that way too.

Back in the day, I read a lot of historical fiction set in medieval Britain.  I remember a character who was a Duchess or some such. At any rate, she was the mistress of the manor.  Her husband had several fortresses spread across his lands.  In wartime, his armies and the many servants, farmers, butchers, blacksmiths etc who lived on his lands would also move into the fortress.  It was the responsibility of his wife to manage the household so that all of those people could be fed through the kitchens of the fortress.

All of the food supplies, medicinal herbs, bandages, wool fiber to make clothing, wine, etc had to be anticipated, and bought or produced for a good price.  In addition to this, she would make money selling extra produce, grains, or animals for meat, hides for leather, specialty products made from things grown on the land, wood for fires, services her workers could perform.  It was so apparent to me how running a household like that was really a business.  How well she stewarded that household spoke volumes to the political guests, tenant/farmers, suppliers and customers about her husband and his wisdom and authority!  Does this sound like the Proverbs 31 woman to anyone?

In case you didn’t read Proverbs 31 that way, she was a devout and diversified entrepreneur. In addition to her various business successes, she ran a household and made her man, who was a wise but seemingly unemployed politician, look good.

So this morning I was talking to my daughter about the future.  I was talking to her about our current market, long term trends and how to read them, what to expect from historic cycles so that she can begin living toward her future dreams.  I want her to be able to see clearly how to apply the business strategies and innovations the Lord has given her, in the future.  She can start developing plans for the future expansion of the Kingdom through her businesses on earth.  Looking at the past, we can develop an understanding of the future and dream with God. (This may seems strange to those of you who know my daughter, but that is a whole other conversation about planning for the future!)

I believe the path of growth in the Church of the future is the same structure that enabled the first century church to expand so dynamically; 1) Small home groups gathering in intimacy with one another and with Holy Spirit, 2) supported and expanded by believers in the marketplace demonstrating the ethics, favor, blessing and provision of the Kingdom to people who were not seeking Him in the usual places.

So whether you are managing a business or managing a household, I hope your understanding of your personal role in the Kingdom and the exciting possibilities for it just got bigger.  I hope that off in the distance, you just saw with awe and wonder how much bigger His plans for you are than you ever dreamed! I pray that in 2022 your internal house will undergo a major remodel as you press in and ask for more wisdom and revelation.  I pray that 2022 be the year expansion for you and for all those you love. Let His Kingdom come and His will be done in and through your life this year. Bless you!