Are there any places roped off from the Lord?

     May He open any door?

     This span of time is one of decision.  What is withheld from Him?  I have heard some pretty big fish claim the right to rule some ares while thinking they are letting the Lord have other areas.

     The bottom line is, less of me and more of Him.  Letting go. 

     Transparency in prayer results in a clean conscience and allows the Holy Spirit to move into the deepest places.

     Soldier of The Cross,  He is The King.  The Word.  The Bright and Morning Star.  He wants to prepare you for eternity.  He is  not a lifestyle or a standard.  He is a Person who gave Himself for you.

     Now you must give all you have in order to know Him and let Him prepare you for eternity.

     Can He be trusted?  Will He come in with automatic weapons and unload?

     The One who holds the stars in place cherishes you and wants to make you free.

     Let Him.

     What is your all?

     You don't know that.  Only He does.  It is about how much you ask to be His when you pray.  Then, you can do more than all you can do. When we get to heaven, we will discover what was our all.

     Recently a new convert said to me "I wish I knew how I am doing. . ."    We are never the issue.  He is always the focus.

     So, Soldier of The Cross,  no taking of inventory.  Only He is able to know how you are being stretched.  The miracle of His life through us is that He can do the most amazing things in the unseen when we agree with Him.  The Holy Spirit is more than able to reveal anything that needs to be confessed.

     Tell Him He can do anything.  Ask him to give you exercises in faith.  Declare your intention to submit to anything and everything that He wants to do in your heart.

     Do it alone and aloud.

     You are a Soldier of The Cross. 

     That means that you have crossed The Line and have made the decision to eagerly and obediently pick up the Cross, which is the place of the death of the flesh, and follow hard after Him.

     And, it means you will do this daily.

     You may not live as do some believers do, who act as though they have no Sovereign God.
  
     Impatience must go.
     Any impurity of the mouth must go.  Christians must have clean language and that without game-playing.
     Needing human approval must be replace by His approval.
     Idleness must go.
     Smart, get-back comments must go.
     Self-defense must go.
     Constantly trying to guarantee the future must go.

     Relationships are marked by sacrificial and wise love.
     God's Word is always in the mouth, and not as a preachy missile.
     There is a tender and constant attention to the Body of Christ.
     Money comes from and goes to the Lord.
     Paryer is the common denominator of all activity and decisions.

     Daily we must affirmatively take up The Cross and it must happen in prayer.  
    Aloud.
 

     So, Soldier of The Cross, you must decide what your life is about.

     Is it about the unresolved, or is it about the Truth of God's Word? 

     Are you going to bend under the problems by sight, or are you going to agree with God?  Although the enemy would love to delude you, this is not a complicated matter.

     You must agree with God.

     Declare your decision to Him.
     Do it alone and aloud.   
     Look up and move on!

     I have been hearing a troubling theme as of late:

     An ostinato has crept into the church today concerning life's priorities - that a Christian should put God first, family second and ministry third.

     Not only is there is no such teaching in God's Word, but is the opposite of how we are intended to live.    We were not designed to worship at three altars, or even two.    We are to love the Lord with all that we are and have.

     If we are fully His, nothing can be deliberately separated out.  If I am putting the Lord first, I will want to learn to be sensitive to the Holy Spirit in everything from floor-sweeping and diaper changing,  to leading the lost to Christ.

     There is no formula.  Such a list produces passivity and allows excuses for avoiding living by faith.

     Soldier of The Cross, every minute is about Him.  It isn't about you or me or our families or our ministry.  Those expressions are gloriously released when we are willing to be alive unto Him and take up The Cross and follow hard after Him.

     How can it be that someone could  be a Living Sacrifice, let the Lord have full play in the heart, pray according to God's Word,  yet  be a jerk at home and a dud in ministry?  It isn't possible. 

     He has called us to Himself.  He wants to express Himself through us in word, thought and deed - all the time.

     He wants the ground under our feet to be a place where He is revealed and glorified.

     Only to be what He wants me to be, every moment of every day;
     Yielded completely to Jesus alone, every step of this pilgrim way: 
     Just to be clay in the Potter's hands, ready to do what His Word commands; 
     Only to be what He wants me to be, every moment of every day.
                                           (Norman J. Clayton)
 

     Lord, as I come before you tonight I thank you for separating the days.  I want to learn to live in today, with thanksgiving for yesterday and faith for tomorrow.
     Lord Jesus, I need to be able to see beyond the matters of sight so that I can be free to minister your Life no matter what.   It is my longing to be a no-matter-what-who-or-where Soldier of The Cross.
     So Lord, please do whatever is needed in the deepest places of me in order to bring this about.  Teach me to honor your Word with regard to the passing of Time.
    Anything, Lord.

     Marriage was never intended to be a state of human bliss.

     For the period of Time, marriage is a picture of Christ and the Church.  It is an opportunity for the taking up of The Cross. 

     Today's modern Christianity proposes some kind of formulaic allowance for domestic fulfillment.  God's Word does not indicate any such thing.

     The Soldier of The Cross is to lay down his or her life for the other and is to be a Living Sacrifice.  There is not one verse in the Bible indicating that marriage is about personal fulfillment or human happiness.  That is a modern philosophical slant concerning the matter on which God has made Himself abundantly clear.

     Marriage is an opportunity to die to self.

     I see no wiggle room in God's Word.

     Over the years, many have said to me "I just don't love him any more. . ."  I say, according to God's Word, you lower your horns, you serve the Lord, and you behave as God's Word indicates - you lay down your life for the other.  

          There are situations that are not as they appear.  We are not free to judge.  Each is in his or her own situation.  Inasmuch as we are His and find ourselves under The Blood, we submit to Him and we refuse the screaming demands of the flesh.

     Give it to Him and do it aloud.  Over and over and over.  Hold His Word in your hand.  Lift it up as high as you can and declare that you agree with Him. Tell Him that you want Him glorified more than you want your feelings to be assuaged.

     God's Word is More Real Than the Way That You Feel.
     There is nothing else.
     Make your decision and make it aloud before Him. 

     This is you.

     You have been called and chosen. Yes, you have free will and have the freedom to refuse Grace.  The problem is,  those who turn a deaf ear to the call of God have what I call the "Jonah Syndrome."

     They are miserable and find themselves discontent in storm after storm.  They want to examine circumstances themselves, refusing glad obedience.  When they finally move, it is with grumbling and resentment because they did not get their way.

     Seeking respite and shade, they find the rays of Time beating down on them and they have no recourse because they have already rejected and disapproved of the Plan of God.

     Soldier of The Cross, listen to the call.  Agree with God.  He chose you for Himself and that is no small thing. 

     Abundant Life?  Not in the search or the program or the mission.  He calls us to Himself and then teaches us to follow Him into places that forbid entry.

     His hand is on your heart and you know it well.
     There is nothing else.
     When you have learned to follow, you have learned to lead.

     It is easy to want to feel strong.

     We talk about and sing about His strength, but when it comes down to it, so much of the time, we are wanting our own strength.

     You were not created to do it on your own.    You were created to be dependent on Him and to need Him. 

     Remember, His Strength is made evident in our weakness (II Corinthians 12:9)

     I am not implying that we are jellyfish and have no spine.  It is about learning to follow.  Learning to lean.  Learning to let go of the things that make us wish they could be redone.  Learning to obey.

     Your job is to know the Lord.

     Look up and move on!

     The Soldier of The Cross is available without reservation or condition.

     What if there is rejection?
     What if there other Christians do not agree?
     What is there is no money ahead of time?
     What if there is false accusation?
     What if I appear to be a failure?
     What if I am not supported by backers?

     Soldier of The Cross, whose are you? 

     Margaret Clarkson, who was born in 1915, was a teacher in a gold-mining camp in northern Ontario, Canada. It was a lonely life for this woman.  God's call was on her life. She wanted to be a missionary,  but was ill. One day she was reading again the verse John 20:21, "Peace be unto you: as my Father hath sent me, even so send I you." While meditating on this verse she wrote the words to a hymn that has become a favorite during missionary conferences, "So Send I You."

      This is my favorite hymn:

       So send I you to labor unrewarded,
       To serve unpaid, unloved, unsought, unknown,
       To bear rebuke, to suffer scorn and scoffing-
       So send I you to toil for me alone.

       So send I you to bind the bruised and broken,
       O'er wand'ring souls to work, to weep, to wake,
       To bear the burdens of a world aweary-
       So send I you to suffer for My sake.

       So send I you to loneliness and longing,
       With heart ahung'ring for the loved and known,
       Forsaking home and kindred, friend and dear one-
       So send I you to know My love alone.

       So send I you to leave your life's ambition,
       To die to dear desire, self-will resign,
       To labor long, and love where men revile you-
       So send I you to love your life in Mine.

       So send I you to hearts made hard by hatred,
       To eyes made blind because they will not see,
       To spend, tho' it be blood, to spend and spare not-
       So send I you to taste of Calvary.