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Write the Vision

Posted on by Melissa Lynne

I have given you this gift and it is your way of connecting with me and the world. Don’t worry about the critics and those that don’t understand you. Write what is on your heart. It is beautiful to Me. Don’t try to impress with your writing. You will move mountains if you let me take control of it. You will speak and preach but it will be based on your writing and something I give you. Come to me often and let’s get this started and flowing again. I never wanted you to give up writing. Stop being afraid of people knowing you and your heart. Your heart is beautiful to me. Stop bringing books into the prayer room. Just bring yourself, My Word, paper, pen and prayer shawl. Start writing and I will give you and show you My heart and your ministry.

______

I was just in Sam’s Club earlier this week and a man that I used to go to church with came up to me and said, “so I heard you were preaching now. Have you quit your job and started your church yet?!?” I said, “I am not trying to start a church. I am only trying to be obedient to the Lord and what He has called me to do.” He responded, “Oh we know what you are doing!” I smiled and gave him a hug. Said goodbye and Merry Christmas and left.

What?!?! Yes the Lord knows my heart, but sometimes I wish people did. I can’t be responsible for what people think or say but I can be responsible for my own stuff. There is a reason why the Bible says to write the vision and make it plain. So here is my vision that evolves daily but most of what you read here is the same you would have read 5 years ago:

I have never said to anyone ever that I wanted to start a church. I do believe in being faithful to the church God has place you in and I believe in supporting the vision of leadership and helping to build that Body of Christ there. Pastors are that leadership. If you aren’t supporting the Pastor(s) of the church you are set in you are in rebellion.

I have said to every pastor that I have had over the last 8 years that I felt called to preach. Some have given me opportunity and some have not but they all have known it. That is okay because it is God’s timing. He can open doors if He is ready. He can close doors as well. I want to preach because one day I was called! I was called in the middle of a Bible study with a group of ladies. It was later confirmed for me by the Lord during a joint Wednesday night Service that our church held at the Cramerton Presbyterian Church. My pastor at the time was teaching and discussing his own mother and her call to preach. I felt something I have never felt before and I can’t even explain it…it was a solid knowing and it was mixed with a while lot of holy fear.

When God puts a call on your life – you know it. I want to preach because of that call and because sometimes the Word burns in my bones and I feel like I might just explode from the inside. Maybe God will have me preach in a jail or on the streets or in the nursing homes. It is a knowing no matter how much or who comes against it…you still know. I felt the same way when I was called to Africa for a season. It hasn’t happened yet but I know someday it will because God spoke it into my spirit and He is not a man that He should lie. I don’t know when or how or all of the whys…I just know I am called to preach.

Preaching however doesn’t necessarily equate to being a pastor although I guess all pastors are called to preach. (Aren’t we all called to do that?) I am not preaching so that one day I can quit my job and make a “profession” of preaching… although many days I would love to retire and just be about other things. I think that and then He uses me right here in my own little world. I only want to serve the Lord. I want to do it His way…not my way, or my friend’s way…Just His. I found during my time of leading Bible studies that I was drawn to the ones that no one else seemed to want around or in their “groups” and they were drawn to me. The peculiar ones. The peculiar ones are very faithful. I believe that on Sundays we hear what the Lord has said to the pastors and I want to have a Bible study again like I once did on Monday or Tuesday because it is then that I want to hear what God has said to the rest of the Body— since He is speaking to all of His sheep. What has He said to you this week?

Just because I am to preach doesn’t mean that I don’t still believe I have a call to prayer ministry. It goes together and I believe in prayer more today than I ever have. There is actually still nothing I want more than to be a part of a community 24/7 prayer room. There are some of those out there but not in my community. Our communities need to be saturated in prayer. I believe all other ministry begins with prayer and ends with lack of it. I feel like God is going to use me in many areas but the Holy Ghost has drawn me to toward three specifics – prayer, healing, knowing the Word. I believe that preaching and teaching are part of discipleship and we are called to make disciples. I am a disciple of Christ and I am being “made” into a disciple by some very anointed Pastors and teachers and I pray one day I will look and sound just like them, not because of them, but because they look and sound and love like Jesus Christ. I can identify with Maria Woodworth-Etter and with Anna of the Bible. There you have it – straight from my pen. My “stuff.” Now you know.

Write the vision and make it plain : )

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Letting Go

Posted on by Melissa Lynne

Always toward the end of a year I evaluate. What have I learned this year? How have I changed, if at all?

This year I have come to a realization that as hard as I’ve tried to hold on I have lost several relationships and a couple of dreams that were very precious to me. Friends that were once close and likeminded are now acquaintances at best. Oh, I loved them so dearly and felt so invested in their lives. It is sad to know I have to just let go. This year I’ve also had to release a dream and a part of my business that I thought I never would have to see go until I decided it was time to. In this life we all need the graceful gift of good-bye.

Letting go is hard for me and for most of us, whether it’s letting go of a loved one, a dream, an expected outcome, business, etc. Life in this world seems to take people or things from us that we want to keep. I have asked God to help me to learn how to let go of them in my heart, so I won’t continue to feel such a hurt from the loss.

How do you let go of things or people you don’t actually want to give up? For me, I’ve struggled a lot with this. Although, I am introvert by nature, I highly value and am committed to the people in my life, even the ones who are on the fringe are important to me. I didn’t know it, but in my heart I was afraid of losing people and parts of my life. I needed to learn how to face the fear of loss and let go of people or anything else that I was holding onto out of fear.

What God has helped me this year to learn is to pray about it all. Pray about the relationships I lost. Pray about the things I lost. I would say to the Father out loud over each of those, “I let go of …” even before I actually did. I also waited on Him to reveal anything or anyone I was not conscious of that I was holding onto out of fear. As He revealed these people or things, I tried to respond. Sometimes in many tears but also in the most honest and sincere way I knew. Then I would say again to Him, “I let go of …”

As I did this I began to notice a difference in my peace of mind. The fear and feelings of being upset started dissipating. My vision concerning my own life and life around me broadened. The tunnel vision I was plagued with was gone.  I discovered what I thought was hurting and diminishing me was not that at all. That was a delusion. Do I absolutely need this person or thing to validate me, make me secure, happy, etc.? If the answer was yes then I believed a lie and that lie was causing me to fear. Sure, people or things can make us happy and give us a certain level of validation, security or whatever your need may be, but they can’t be the source of it. The Lord Himself is the source. Everything and everyone is a precious resource granted to us. Everything, even relationships, on this earth are the things seen as in 2 Corinthians 4:18: While we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen: for the things which are seen are temporal; but the things which are not seen are eternal.

I began to see the privilege God has granted me. I was graced to journey with some awesome people and do some awesome things for a season, but now that part of my life is over and my journey continues. God has given me(us) a future and hope. We are being transformed and the world around us is changing. Just because something or someone was right for me in the past doesn’t mean that is still so.

I also discovered thankfulness plays a role in letting go. One night in the midst of one of my pity parties the Lord showed me what was a sign that said, “Thank You.” I closed my eyes and saw it again. I believe part of letting go is to be thankful for the people and things that made us happy and helped us to learn, grow and become more of our true self.  It’s the acceptance of everything and everyone we have been given, everything and everyone we once had in our lives, but also being thankful for the possibilities and hope and people that lie ahead.

The missionary and martyr, Jim Elliot, summed it up like this, “He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose.”

Corrie Ten Boom’s wisdom is also helpful. “I have held many things in my hand and I have lost them all, but whatever I have placed in God’s hand, that, I still possess.”

This year as I head into 2015 I head in with one of my greatest loss challenges right before me. It will be a time of prayer and fasting for me because surely if God has allowed such He has something much greater in store. I pray I learn to count all loss as dung as in Philippians 3:8: Yea doubtless, and I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord: for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and do count them but dung, that I may win Christ,

Posted in Hiding His Word

Meditations on Mark

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“And his ears were opened, and the impediment of his tongue was removed, and he began speaking plainly. And He gave them orders not to tell anyone; but the more He ordered them, the more widely they continued to proclaim it.” – Mark 7:35-36

It’s a mystery to me that sometimes Jesus told those whom he healed to go and tell others, and sometimes he told them to keep silent. The reasons for this are not always obvious from scripture, and I’ve read several commentaries that try to give various explanations. But all attempts at explanation aside, there’s one thing that I cannot get past- that disobedience to Christ, no matter how well-intentioned, is still disobedience.

I don’t want to read too much into this passage here. The man who was deaf and dumb was indeed healed by Christ, but the fact remains that Jesus kept ordering him not to tell anyone what he had done, but he just kept doing it.

Hendriksen takes a pretty strong view of the man when he says, “…it takes more than admiration and enthusiasm to be a true follower of Christ. Many Christ-admirers are lost. The true mark of discipleship is revealed in John 15:14, ‘You are my friends if you do what I bid you.’ The people were doing just the opposite.”

This takes me to a place of self-examination. Am I a Christ-follower or simply a Christ-admirer?

__________

“But it is not this way among you, but whoever wishes to become great among you shall be your servant; and whoever wishes to be first among you shall be slave of all. For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many.” – Matthew 10:43-45

This seems to defy human thinking. Just take a look at children, what do they do? They fight for the front seat in the car, they want the first piece and biggest piece of cake, they want to be the leader of the pack, etc. Our natural tendencies are not to sit in the back seat, but to drive the car.

Probably the most famous missionary quotes of the twentieth-century was made by Jim Elliot when he said “He is no fool who gives up what he cannot keep to gain that which he cannot lose.” Men and women who spend their lives in the pursuits of power and fame lose everything in the end. Those who seek first the kingdom of God and walk as Christ walked, serving others, gain everything in the end.

Lord, I pray that you help me to keep this in the forefront of my very human mind.

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Fruit

Posted on by Melissa Lynne

“And let our’s also learn to maintain good works for necessary uses, that they be not unfruitful.” ~ Titus 3:14

As it regards good works, do you ever wonder what God thinks is unfruitful? Even if just unfruitful in your life? Some good works present themselves and it is easy to know what you should do. Other times choosing what to say “yes” to and what to say “no” to or walk away from is hard. Something I consider insignificant could be most important to Him!!

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Perfect Paths

Posted on by Melissa Lynne

The path the Lord puts you on is a perfect path!

“And thine ears shall hear a word behind thee, saying, This is the way, walk ye in it, when ye turn to the right hand, and when ye turn to the left.” ~ Isaiah 30:21

“Thou wilt shew me the path of life: in thy presence is fulness of joy; at thy right hand there are pleasures for evermore.” ~ Psalm 16:11

“In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths.” ~ Proverbs 3:6

“Thus saith the Lord, Stand ye in the ways, and see, and ask for the old paths, where is the good way, and walk therein, and ye shall find rest for your souls. But they said, We will not walk therein.” ~ Jeremiah 6:16

The path the Lord puts you on is a perfect path. It is perfect even though I surely don’t always remember that and some days I have to remind myself over and over. It is perfect though the scenery and experiences aren’t at all like I had once envisioned in my carnal mind. It is perfect though sometimes it feels like I am walking the path backwards instead of moving forward. And I wonder were these backward steps necessary because I got off His path somewhere or I did something wrong…or is this backward motion God’s forward after all?

I have asked for the “old paths, where is the good way” so I ask the Lord today to empower me that I would “walk therein” for “His Name’s sake!” Amen!

“He restoreth my soul: he leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his name’s sake.” ~ Psalm 23:3

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Stuck Between Two Messages

Posted on by Melissa Lynne

I find myself stuck somewhere between two messages I have heard this week – laying a dream on the altar and not giving up on a dream. I guess in God both can work together for His good purposes.

The problem with laying a dream on the altar is that you have to actually take the steps to kill it -yourself. The problem with the death of a dream is that it was only tangible to you and God and so for the most part no one else gets your grief and so they tend to try to redirect it toward something perhaps totally unrelated. 

——

Last night I was out having a quiet dinner with my son and we ran into my group of friends going to Africa on a mission trip this winter. They had all been getting their yellow fever shots. Ouch! They said it hurt. Don’t know about that but it sure pinched like crazy to have to deal with my own feelings in the middle of Cracker Barrel. I admit it hurts not being a part of the mission and group. It hurts to be on the outside when I get together with these friends and this mission is now the topic of conversation. It hurts and yet I am still interested and have a heart of love and I still am supportive and want to always offer life giving words regarding this mission and my friends willingness to go and share the Gospel.

So I deal privately with my heart and I sit here and the tears roll. I have happiness for them and the changes that will come in their lives. I have happiness for those they will meet along the way. They have lots of projects with orphans and widows and pastors and ladies that have come off the streets of Tanzania. I so wanted to be a part of the ministry to the ladies and widows there.

So I do what I know I am allowed – pray and sow and lay my dreams and plans on the altar.

Interesting how ours seem so “perfect” but God alone has perfect plans.

——-

And then there is the other message of don’t give up….

Posted in Hiding His Word

Chosen

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God has been continuing to speak to me today about those that are chosen, the elect, those He has gathered.  There were other things as well but these are the passages that struck my heart as I was reading.

Numbers 8:6 – Take the Levites from among the children of Israel, and cleanse them.

Numbers 8:10-11 – And thou shalt bring the Levites before the Lord: and the children of Israel shall put their hands upon the Levites: and Aaron shall offer an offering of the children of Israel, that they may execute the service of the Lord.  

Numbers 8:16 – For they are wholly given unto me from among the children of Israel; instead of such as open every womb, even instead of the firstborn of all the children of Israel, have I taken them unto me.  (these were the chosen, the firstfruits of the people set apart for God)

Numbers 9:8 – And Moses said unto them, Stand still, and I will hear what the Lord will command concerning you. (example of the prophetic ministry of Moses)

Mark 13:20b but for the elect’s sake, whom He hath chosen, He hath shortened the days.

Psalm 50:5 – Gather my saints together unto me; those that have made the covenant with me by sacrifice.

Proverbs 10:29a; 30a – The way of the Lord is strength to the upright. The righteous shall never be removed.

Elect – to pick out, choose. To select by vote for an office. To determine in favor of. Selected. Chosen by God.

Chosen – elect; selected; preferred, pick.

Gather – to bring together into one group, collection, or place. To bring together or assemble; collect gradually. To pick or harvest . Pick up piece by piece.

—

Proverbs 50:23 – Whoso offereth praise glorifieth me; and to him that ordereth his conversation aright will I shew the salvation of the Lord.

Off topic but I didn’t want to leave this out. The Word is so rich with instruction for our lives. Those that offer these praises and glorify Him, choosing to order their steps and conversations so as to be shown the salvation of the Lord will surely be set apart ones, so guess not really off topic after all.

—

Help me today Jesus to be content with where you have me in this life. Help me to always strive for Your best for me but to cease striving in my own strength to be liked or accepted or included. Help me to always be aware that Your presence accompanies me, Holy Spirit, even in those most lonely moments of this life when I can’t sense it. Help me to trust totally in Your Word regarding that. Love to you, my friend and counselor. I pray this in the precious and glorious Name of Jesus. Amen!

 

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No One Ever Cared For Me Like Jesus

Posted on by Melissa Lynne

A hymn on my heart this afternoon.

NO ONE EVER CARED FOR ME LIKE JESUS

by C. F. Weigle (1932)

I would love to tell you what I think of Jesus,
Since I found in Him a friend so strong and true;
I would tell you how He changed my life completely,
He did something that no other friend could do.

No one ever cared for me like Jesus,
There’s no other friend so kind as He;
No one else could take the sin and darkness from me,
O how much He cared for me.

All my life was full of sin when Jesus found me,
All my heart was full of misery and woe;
Jesus placed His strong and loving arms about me,
And He led me in the way I ought to go.

No one ever cared for me like Jesus,
There’s no other friend so kind as He;
No one else could take the sin and darkness from me,
O how much He cared for me.

Ev’ry day He comes to me with new assurance,
More and more I understand His words of love;
But I’ll never know just why He came to save me,
Till some day I see His blessed face above.

No one ever cared for me like Jesus,
There’s no other friend so kind as He;
No one else could take the sin and darkness from me,
O how much He cared for me.

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Death to your will, your desires, your dreams, etc…

Posted on by Melissa Lynne

The book Live Before You Die by Evangelist Daniel Kolenda was not only one of the best books I have read on the subject of seeking God’s will for our lives but it was one of the top five books I have ever read. Here is a Bible study I received today based on his teaching from his book. It touched my heart as it addresses so well a present struggle. 

This book is well worth the investment but you are welcome to borrow mine….if you promise to highlight things that speak to you and write in the margins your own thoughts as I have had several others do…and then return it to me.

_______

Part 5 – Death to Your Vision

Secret #2 – The Surrendered Will This Bible study has been taken from chapter 7 of LIVE BEFORE YOU DIE

When we talk about being crucified with Christ and dying to self, what do we mean? It means we die to our desires, our ego, and our will. Sometimes this even means dying to our own vision. But you may say, “I’m sure my vision is God-given. It is His will.” Yet there is an inherent danger. It is possible for the calling, promises, and vision God has given us to become our main ambition, making them opponents of God, for He is not willing to share our hearts with anything—not even with good things.

Isaac was the fulfillment of the promise God gave Abraham. Yet God was not willing to share Abraham’s heart, not even with Isaac. So God asked Abraham to lay Isaac on the altar and offer him as a sacrifice, knowing this would be the ultimate test of Abraham’s love. Author A. W. Tozer expounds on this brilliantly in his classic bookThe Pursuit of God.

God let the suffering old man go through with it up to the point where He knew there would be no retreat, and then forbade him to lay a hand upon the boy. To the wondering patriarch He now says in effect, “It’s all right, Abraham. I never intended that you should actually slay the lad. I only wanted to remove him from the temple of your heart that I might reign unchallenged there. I wanted to correct the perversion that existed in your love. Now you may have the boy, sound and well. Take him and go back to your tent. Now I know that thou fearest God, seeing that thou hast not withheld thy son, thine only son, from me.”

What does it mean to surrender our will to God? The word surrender is a radical word!Many of us are willing to surrender until it begins to hurt, but true surrender is painful. Some people are willing to surrender as long as it is logical, but true surrender is not subject to our rationale. Others can surrender what is bad and harmful, but God is not satisfied. To God surrender is not complete until it is all encompassing, exhaustive, total. It is not simply saying, “Your will be done,” but it includes, “Not my will.” This death to self is not some form of divine sadism. God always has life in mind. Just as a gardener prunes off the old branches so new ones can grow, God desires to remove that which hinders life and growth. This place of death is also the place of birth, and it is how God’s purposes are born in the earth!

John Wimber is best known as the founder of the Vineyard church movement, which is well known for its wonderful music that touched the world and, in many ways, revolutionized worship in the modern church. But many people don’t realize that John Wimber had been very successful as a secular musician. Two of his hit singles reached the US top ten before he met the Lord and abandoned fame and fortune to follow Jesus. His wife, Carol, told the following story:

John and I had been Christians only a few months. We were broke and Christmas was coming. John had laid down his musical career because Jesus asked him to. After refusing a lucrative offer to arrange a Christmas album, he quietly put down the phone. As I watched, John went to the cupboards, closets and the piano bench. He gathered a lifetime of work and talent and placed it in big cardboard boxes and we drove to the Yorba Linda dump. As he pushed the last box out of the station wagon and it sunk into the garbage, John 12:24 came to my mind: “Except a grain of wheat fall into the earth and dies, it remains alone, but if it dies, it bears much fruit.” In my heart I know that was when worship was born in the Vineyard.

What if God asked you to give up the thing you enjoy the most? What if He asked you to lay down your gift or talent, the thing that defines you—the thing in which you find self-worth? Could you lay your promise on the altar as Abraham did Isaac, or push your treasures into the Dumpster as John Wimber did? Have you checked to see who is sitting on the throne of your heart? Is it you? Is it your vision? Is it your dream? Or is it Jesus?

My friend, God has a wonderful plan for your life, and He wants to use you in extraordinary ways for His glory. But resurrection only follows death—death to self, death to your will, death to your desires, and death to your dreams. It is in these painful moments of surrender that God’s kingdom is established in us, when we pray with Jesus, “Not my will, but Yours be done.” This beautiful brokenness allows us to become an extension of God’s dominion, and our lives become “cracks in the wall” through which His kingdom can come and His will can be done in earth and on earth!

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“give up all…”

Posted on by Melissa Lynne

Lord, I give up all my own plans and purposes

I give up all my own desires and hopes and

I accept Thy will for my life.

I give myself, my life, my all utterly to Thee to be Thine forever.

Fill me and seal me with Thy Holy Spirit.

Use me as Thou wilt, send me where Thou wilt

And work out Thy whole will in my life at any cost 

  now and forever.

~ Betty Scott Stam

This is a prayer I have prayed so many times over these last years. Today in my journey I have come face to face in a very small way, to this “give up all…” that Betty Scott Stam speaks of.

What do you do when you want to do things for Jesus and go places for God? You ask Him to use you, to send you, etc and then His Will so far is to have you wait or to go nowhere and do what seems to be nothing except to live your same old, every day, ordinary life? I know, I know there is someone out there thinking my life isn’t ordinary. Believe me, it is!!! Over the last two days I have watched a sick grandson while trying to also work at a job where I am doing the same thing I was doing 21 years ago – when I would drag my own sick children through the same exact type of day I just had. Most days at the end of my day I feel like in a practical sense I have accomplished mostly nothing for the Kingdom. Maybe it seems to be nothing because my eyes can’t see or because it is not what I had in mind. Maybe these plans and dreams I have are my own and not God’s. How do you know? Some days I think maybe the Holy Spirit is weeding desires out of my heart and life. Maybe it is just not His timing. I mean the desire of my heart just presented itself almost perfectly today – the place, the mission, the leadership, the monetary costs – but the timing was so wrong that it was like a glaring red warning flag! Once again saying NO! NO! NO!

So what do you do? All I can figure is you either turn totally back or you go on that wrong path or you stand and wait…and turning back is not an option. So I wait on my Father to work it all out. I wait because I trust His dreams. I am well aware that my plans have led me to a pigpen or two. I wait because I love Jesus so much and I told Him I would yield to His will regardless, at any cost. “Nevertheless” was the word of the covenant I made. Even though it hurts like crazy to take my hands off of my dreams and leave them on the altar…what else can I do at this point in this journey. So many times we think that when Jesus says “follow me” and we say “Yes!” we will go on a journey where we are running after Him in a very real way like the disciples or we will be sent somewhere – to a people group like a missionary, with God opening doors in miraculous ways. My journey has not been quite like that and sometimes I wonder if there is any way God can use a woman like me.

I wait and while I do I daily pray the scripture John 15:5 – “I am the vine, ye are the branches: He that abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit: for without me ye can do nothing.”  I cry Lord, if today without you I can do nothing…then today Lord I ask that You please teach me to abide in You so that I can at least do something. Something for You!

And I wait… and then unexpectedly today I came face to face with what it means “give up all…” as in the poem. It means to wait if that is what He requires of me. Face to face He has allowed me to see so clearly that this “waiting” and this “nothing” I have felt almost offended by is actually leading to WORSHIP! It is perhaps the “something” I prayed for. Maybe worship in it’s truest sense means to give up all…all of your own will and dreams and desires and purposes and hopes. Give up all, not just until the right time, but give it all up for eternity if required! Give it all up with joy that I may win Christ.

“Yea doubtless, and I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord: for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and do count them but dung, that I may win Christ.” ~ Philippians 3:8

Learning step by step (and even in the waiting) to abide!