9 Ways to Restore Broken Relationships
The fruit of the Spirit is a byproduct of having the Holy Spirit dwell inside us. These are nine of the qualities that are evident and increasing in our lives as we nurture the Spirit’s presence and influence within us.
Having said that, we can further excel in these areas when we focus on them intentionally. In addition to being the natural result of spending time in the Spirit, when we seek to increase these qualities by living in the Spirit, this is one of the ways we are transformed into the image of Yeshua.
(more…)A Snapshot of Five Servants
Although he already had my full attention, I could hear in my spirit Yeshua call to me by name. My name, Christi, means “like Christ, the anointed one” in Greek. I’ve come to realize that when Yeshua says my name, he’s getting ready to tell me something transformative, to continue transforming me into his image, more like him.
That morning it was servanthood. He has called me his servant, and this is one more tool he wanted me to have. He showed me five servants and asked me what they had in common. Then he asked what each one was known for. The whole lesson took 30 minutes to write, but will serve me for a lifetime in my transformation into his image.
(more…)The Surprising Results of Submission
Submission. It’s not a very popular word in our society. Normally we think of someone giving up their will in deference to one with more power. More recently it seems it’s come to mean someone giving in against their will. Webster’s defines it as “humbly obedient, ceasing to offer resistance, to defer to another’s wishes.” Even those definitions don’t sound as bad as the word itself – “submission.” At least that’s how I felt. Then I began to learn a simple saying, but a difficult lesson: “The way we submit to our leaders on earth is the way we submit to God.” (Rabbi Kirt Schneider) Hmm, how am I at submission? (more…)
If MY People
“If my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and will heal their land.” 2 Chronicles 7:14
I found this verse repeating in my head, so I posted it in a place where I’d see it every day, a place where I typically pray for my friends and family as I’m starting my day. I continued my routine of praying for various people, and the verse stayed on my wall for probably three weeks.
I came to understand the power of this statement: (more…)
Availability vs. Ability
Have you ever felt God asking you to do something for which you know you’re not talented or maybe not qualified? No doubt Esther felt this way when Mordecai instructed her to speak to the king about saving her kinsman. Esther’s obvious gift was in her beauty, her speaking of political matters with the king was never a thought. In fact she hadn’t even had an audience with him in a month, and then only at his request. A person could be sentenced to death for approaching the king without his summons.
Esther’s asking the king to save the Jewish people must have seemed ludicrous. There must have been a mistake in translating Mordecai’s message or in Mordecai’s understanding of God’s will. (more…)
Humility: God’s Plan for Reconciliation
As I was pondering Yeshua’s path to death and all that came before that, one word rang in my mind loud and clear: humility. Yet the word, as we know it, hardly does justice to what Yeshua displayed.
“But [He] made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death— even death on a cross!” Philippians 2:7-8
This is God Himself in the flesh, being crucified as a criminal by those He created, in order to pay their penalty for them. That’s humility–and more, a concept for which we have no frame of reference.
What was He hoping to achieve? The answer was another astonishing realization: (more…)
Messianic Sabbath 