Can You See It 08: Can You Hear Him!

The principle we are looking at in this series of posts is the principle of perception. If you do not perceive something you cannot exalt it, and what you fail to exalt will never be close to you. Nowhere is this principle more important than when it comes to the voice of the Holy Spirit.

What I am about to say next is not to condemn, but it is the truth and if you do not receive this truth and act accordingly, you will never be able to flow in a supernatural life. Here is the statement: the Holy Spirit is really good at speaking, so if there is a communication problem between you and the Holy Spirit, it’s on your end. It is because you failed to perceive, failed to exalt and therefore there is a disconnect with the Holy Spirit. That’s not on Him, that’s on you. You owe it to yourself and your future and your destiny to learn how to perceive the voice of the Holy Spirit. The voice of the Holy Spirit is the most life-changing force there is.

There have been several times in my life the Holy Spirit has warned me of impending danger. There have been times where my life has been saved by listening to the voice of the Holy Spirit. This is not a trivial matter – this can literally be life and death. I believe in nearly all divorces are caused by one or both spouses not listening to the voice of the Holy Spirit. I believe the voice of the Holy Spirit can open doors to levels of abundance and life you have never seen before. I believe the voice of the Holy Spirit will connect you to people that will change your life.

The number one key to perceive the Holy Spirit is to be still. The Word of God says “be still and know I am God”. We need to take the time daily to be still before God. The more you do that, the more you will learn to perceive the voice of the Holy Spirit in times where there are many loud voices.

Next post, I will talk more about the still small voice. Stay tuned!

Can You See 07: Leave the Fools Behind

There is so much in the Word about making sure you are not around the company of fools. Proverbs 14.7 says “Leave the presence of a foolish man which you perceive not in him lips of knowledge”. If you are around someone and you suddenly see they have no knowledge, leave. This is not good advice, this is an eternal Biblical principle that if you do not follow, you will always end up in a bad place.

One of the hallmarks of our society, and sadly it is reflected in the church, is people are moving their lips when they have no knowledge. It is a form of arrogance. For example, people who have never planted a church will tell me pages of information on how to plant a church. I know Bible College students or recent graduates who think they have a divine right to tell pastors how to pastor, or become the pastors of pastors. It’s foolishness!

Another thing that is foolish is to assume when you join a ministry you are a peer with everyone in that ministry. Now I know we are all humans, and all equally loved by God – and I know that good ideas can come from anywhere in a company or church, but if I employ a pastor, I am the employer and they are the employee.

We had a very sad story of foolish, where we appointed a couple to pastor a church who turned out to be fools. I planted the church, I travelled six hour round trips over and over, I made disciples in the church, I gathered people, I started a small group. And then I appointed this couple as pastors. But the second they became pastors (or maybe earlier) they presumed they were equal to or greater than me at church planting, even though I planted my first church 26 years ago, and they have never been in ministry before.

The first sign of foolishness was a confidence in their flesh and a lack of humility. During a meal with them, just before they took on the church, they said “You know this church will grow bigger than Dagenham in about a year”, I said “you seem very confident”, and they said “of course it will, we are better than you, we are kinder than you”. I didn’t say anything, as I know there is an exuberance and immaturity when people first start something, but it turned out to be much more than that, it turned out to be foolishness.

If I had known it was foolishness I would not have appointed them as pastors (Proverbs 24.7 says wisdom is too high for a fool, and a fool should not open his mouth in the gate. The gate is a reference to speaking with authority as an elder or leader in a city. Fools should never be made leaders or given influence over others!). But at the time I didn’t, I thought it was just immaturity, and of course new leaders are immature, so I let it pass, after a few months dealing with reality, that tends to mature people quickly.

Now, as they started ministering, as I do with all our pastors, I will tell them how to do certain things, and it turned out they were not listening, but doing things “their” way. You do not get to do things your way if you are working for another! Not in business or ministry. Now I am seeing a lack of teachability, a lack of openness to wisdom and experience, I am starting to realize I am dealing with fools. Proverbs 23.9 says that “do not even speak in the ears of a fool, as fools despise words with wisdom in”. That certainly was playing out before me.

Then, this couple stopped going to our pastors’ meetings, they missed our conferences, always with excuses that seemed legitimate, but they were only ever too busy to listen and learn, they were never too busy to minister and do. That again is foolish, so now they are all talk and no listening to others. Ecclesiastes 5.3 says a fool’s voice is known by many words, Ecclesiastes 5.1 says that a fool does not consider he is doing evil. I had a conference with pastors who between them (including me) had over one hundred years of pastoring experience, all of it fruitful. They did not go.

So, now it was evident. In addition, some people in the church had been the subject of temper tantrums from this couple. The one thing they presumed they had was that they were more loving and kind than anyone, and it turned out that was not true. I had made a mistake, and according to Proverbs 26.8, if you give honour to a fool, you are putting a stone in a sling. By appointing them as pastors, I was now responsible for them, and they were a stone in a sling and could be aimed at anyone. They falsely accused someone in the church of something they did not do. They did not know that I knew the person for many years, and did not realize I knew they were lying to me.

So, now I have to confront them. It’s not good to confront fools. It’s not easy. A stone is heavy, the sand is weighty, but the wrath of a fool is heavier than them both! (Proverbs 27.3). When you correct a fool, you will always face a temper tantrum. They never respond well to correction or leadership. Proverbs says that you are better off meeting a bear robbed of her cubs than deal with the foolishness of a fool (Proverbs 17.2). It also says that you will not have peace if you deal with a fool (Proverbs 29.9).

It went exactly how you might think it went, badly. I calmly and kindly explained that they need to be in our pastor’s meetings, they needed to listen to me preach at least once a week, and they needed to come to our conferences, at least two a year. If they were not prepared to do this, we would not be giving them a place to preach and minister. Now, you may think this should have been said beforehand to them, and the boundaries made very clear. I absolutely agree. But up until this moment, I had never known any of our pastors not fight down the world to be in our conferences. All our pastors listened to me every chance they had. They loved being in Tree of Life, and they loved my voice and they loved the wisdom and grace God had given me. We never saw a need to codify what people were doing anyway! This was before I had to deal with a pastor who asked if they could use the Tree of Life name but just do what they wanted. This was before I had to deal with worship leaders who wanted to come and lead worship and get paid, but leave after the worship, and not go to any meetings, or listen to God’s Word, or doing anything with the church unless they had a platform or ever be told what songs to sing or what to do in the services. This was really my first encounter with foolishness.

Another truth about fools, and really, this is the lesson I learned through this situation was this: “It is senseless to pay to educate a fool, since he has no heart for learning” (Proverbs 17.16). For me, and for every other pastor I had appointed since then, the only problem was not knowing enough. So the more we learned, the more the Word was put in front of us, the more good, experienced pastors were put in front of us, the better we did. Now we had a couple who refused to get in front of wisdom and when they were forced, didn’t learn anything or care for it.

Now after this situation, this is still my number one way of recognizing a fool: they do not learn. They just are not growing. They miss church on Sunday, and you ask “did you listen to the recording in the week”, and they do not just shake their head, they look at you as if you are insane by suggesting they need to hear a sermon. I had one person tell me “I am the smartest person in Tree of LIfe, everyone else is stupid, why would I ever listen to any of the pastors in this church”. Later in that conversation he raised his fists at me, so I am not sure that man was that smart.

Teachability is an essential start to wisdom. If you cannot see that, if you see someone pontificating about things they clearly have never experienced, they are a fool. When someone who was given a church of 100 and they took it to 50 tries to explain church growth to me, that’s a fool. When someone “doesn’t do conferences”, “doesn’t do listening online”, “doesn’t do small groups”, then you are dealing with a fool. When someone is never too busy to preach or lead worship, but is too busy to listen and be part of the congregation, you are dealing with a fool. When someone is not involved in some level of self-development you are dealing with a fool.

And the couple lost their temper, I got some very nasty voicemails, and was told they will run the church their way, the way they wanted and there was nothing I could do about it. I was attacked verbally, my wife was insulted (fools always seem to come at family) and they started gossiping about me. They even mocked a death in my family, saying it was really not a big deal. Fools always want others in their foolishness, they want others to share their offense, they want their offense to turn into a mob of offended people leaving the church, rather than ever deal with the offense.

Now when that happens the temptation is to come down to the level of the fool and argue with them, but the Word is clear – Answer not a fool in foolishness, or else you will become like him (Proverbs 26.4). I just plainly explained the Scriptures and why it was impossible for them to continue as pastors, I even created an off-ramp for them, and an opportunity to come back. I did everything I could to treat them with honour and dignity. They told me they would stay at the church a few more weeks and resign when they wanted, not in my time.

Proverbs tells us that “the legs of the lame are not equal, nor is a parable in the mouth of fools” (Proverbs 26.7). Fools think they are giving divine wisdom in parables and principles, but it’s just more and more foolishness. They thought their resigning and working out a month’s notice was honourable, but it wasn’t, it was just more sharing of foolishness. I had to go up there myself, and take back that church.

Now the story ended well, we now have a pastor there who is very teachable, we now have a thriving and growing church. The couple tried to persuade a few people to leave our church by lying and meddling with people (Proverbs 10.18 says that he who hides hatred with lying lips is a fool. Proverbs 20.3 says that it is an honour to cease from strife, but every fool will be meddling. There’s another way to perceive a fool, they get involved in situations they have no business being in. Pastors – that deacon in charge of one department who is sticking his oar into other departments, that man is a fool) but thankfully the majority of our church are rather wise and didn’t listen. Before they left the church, I gave them a large sum of money to bless them. They used that money to travel around the country telling people how evil I am. That’s foolish.

But now we are separated from the fool and we are doing well. Imagine if I had kept them in place, imagine if I was scared to confront a fool because I was scared of their temper, or their lies, or their influence. Imagine I decided to ignore the Bible and just for the sake of a peace that was no peace stay the companion of fools. I think that the whole Tree of Life would be infected by now, and it would be dying.

I do not beat myself up for not seeing it earlier. I am still growing and learning myself. Also, the Bible tells us not to harvest things too early, and sometimes things have to harvest before you can definitely tell what kind of crop they are. But if there is foolishness around you, if you do not deal with it, there will always be trouble. The Bible tells us that the father of a fool has no joy (Proverbs 17.21). Now, if your son is a fool, that does bring sadness, but also this is referring to people you raise up in ministry. If they are foolish, you are going to be constantly putting out fires.

Do not try and live a life apart from Biblical principles. Just because we are in a culture in the 21st century that celebrates fools, that honours them, does not mean we have to. We do not celebrate people losing their temper and giving them what for. That’s not godly. We do not celebrate people who get offended at church and stop going. They are not heroes, they are fools. We do not honour people who only want the platform of the church as misunderstood, they are fools.

Selah.

Can You See 06: Be Serious!

In our last two posts, we are looking at how to recognize a fool. As the companion of fools will be destroyed (Proverbs 13.20) it is urgent that you learn to recognize fools so you do not become their companion and then become as foolish as them. One of the ways in which you can recognize a fool is that they take serious things and treat them lightly.

Proverbs 14.9 says the fools make a mock of sin – and that is one of the key signs of foolishness, they mock sin. This means that they are not sorry for their sin, they are not ashamed of sin, but rather they boast in their sin.

I hope that the message of grace that has been reaching across the church over the last few decades has got into your heart and you know God loves you and that the cross of Jesus has dealt with sin once and for all. SIn has been dealt with by Jesus – the punishment that brought us peace was laid on Him! He was made sin so we could be made righteous. And that’s not just true, it is precious truth, it is life-changing truth.

However, some Christians have now taken grace as an excuse to be casual about sin, to talk arrogantly about their sins, to mock sin. Listen carefully – sin will never hold you back, but your arrogant mocking attitude to sin will.

The Word of God tells us to assemble together. Not assembling together, missing church for no good reason is a sin. When someone says I am going to go for walks along the beach on Sunday morning and invites others to join them, they are mocking sin. You should instantly know that person is a fool, and be very careful about being their companion, because according to God’s holy Word, you will be destroyed.

If you are not going to church, you are a fool. That’s so foolish! If you regularly hang around with Christians who do not go to church, you are going to be destroyed. That’s not me saying that, it’s the wisest man who ever lived – Solomon. When I invite a guest speaker, one of the things I ensure is they are in church when they are not on the road. I don’t want to let you have a fool ministering to you.

When someone is proud of their rebellion, they are a fool. When someone is arrogant rather than humble about not tithing, they are a fool. When someone is nasty and insulting, and thinks that’s a good thing, they are a fool. Being rude is one thing, being glad about it – that’s foolish.

When someone is rude to you, insults you and your family, spreads lies about you and then wants to come back into your life as if nothing has happened, and shows no remorse or regret for their sin, that person is – according to the Bible – a fool. You do not have an obligation to reconcile with them while they are still in their foolishness. Yes, forgive, love, bless, but you do not have to be their companion, you do not owe a fool your company.

All of this ties in with what this “Can You See” series is about – what you perceive matters so much. If you fail to perceive a financial deliverer with an anointing to set you free, you are going to miss out on financial freedom. If you fail to perceive a God-given mentor, you are going to miss out on short-cuts to success. This one just works in reverse – if you fail to spot a fool, then you will end up a companion of fools because they are so “nice”, so “funny”, because your flesh likes being around people who slander and who have no standards and mock sin – and then you will be destroyed.

The word destroyed (in Proverbs 13.20) is ra-a. It means you will end up destroyed by the evil things you end up doing, and end up utterly useless. It’s a very strong word used for people that are harmful to society, and unwanted. I don’t believe anyone plans to be in that place, but if you fail to find out what is a fool and study these things out, and if you stay in the company of fools, this is what will happen.

When Ruth’s mother, Naomi, moved to Moab to “get food” and left the house of God and the people of God, and her husband died and her two son in laws died, she uses this word to describe herself. Destroyed!

Now Ruth is a powerful story of redemption, but if Naomi realized that living with pagans that hated God was being the companion of fools, the redemption of Ruth would never need to have happened.

If you have been the companion of fools and are feeling destroyed right now, if you missed the slander, missed the casualness to sin, missed the lightness in which they treated the things of God, and are heading for destruction, there is grace, redemption and freedom! But don’t suffer needlessly, decide to walk with the wise and be wise.

Can You See 05: A Fool’s Utterance

In our last post, we talked about it being important you are able to recognize a fool. The Bible has a lot to say about a fool – the word is in the Bible over 300 times – so it’s an important Biblical issue for all of us.

Now, one of the ways to perceive a fool is by what they say – the fool’s utterance – and one of the key ways to spot a fool by what they say, and one of the key things that a fool does is slander people with their words. Proverbs 10.18 says that “He that utters a slander is a fool”.

We have a kingdom obligation to avoid slander – both spreading it and receiving it. Leviticus 19.16 is very explicit: Do not go about spreading slander among your people. Yet, even in the light of this, some people – even those who name the name of Christ – will speak idle things about others, they will exaggerate things, paint pictures to make them the victim, say malicious, spiteful things, and talk gossip about others. Those people are fools.

Now, the word devil, a title for satan, in Greek is the word diabolos, which literally translates as slanderer. When someone is slandering someone else, it is literally devillish behaviour. If you are a gossip, if you are telling tales about others, you are working for satan. No wonder Proverbs said that slandering is what a fool does. Working for satan is foolish!

Now we have an obligation to perceive slanderers as foolish, not just to avoid slandering others with our own mouths, but we also have a responsibility to avoid slander with our ears.

It’s difficult because gossip tastes good to our flesh. In fact, Proverbs 18.8 tells us that the words of a gossip are like choice morsels, they go down to a man’s inmost parts. Part of our flesh is that when we hear something about someone that exposes how bad they are or paints them in a bad light – we love it. We see it as choice morsels and we gobble up the gossip! But understand it might look like good food, but it is actually poisoned – and if you eat them – you will absolutely poison yourself.

What should we do? Keep reading Proverbs! A gossip betrays confidence, so avoid a man who talks too much! (Proverbs 20.19). You avoid people who slander others! It’s not enough that you do not slander, you need to actively recognize that the slanderer is a fool, and avoid them.

Some of you have failed to perceive fools, you have honoured them, eaten their slander like a tasty morsel, and in doing so, have listened to the words of satan himself and extending satan’s kingdom – and by honouring the slanderer you have now got yourself in a position where they are drawing close to you. And they are poisoning you and your walk with God.

I have seen the symptoms of the poison from people listening to slander. Their spiritual immune system gets weak – so they get discouraged and they get offended much quicker than usual, they get so tired they cannot serve or even attend church regularly. They stop praying and stop studying the Word. Their only time spent with other people is spent slandering or listening to slander.

There are people reading this that need to repent. You need to ask the Lord to forgive you for listening to slander and eating it up like choice morsels. You need to close your ears to slander and learn to perceive the fools that slander and keep your distance.

It will make you healthier, your family healthier and your church healthier. Selah!

Can You See 04: Fool’s Gold

Far from suggesting that everyone you meet is wise, kind and honourable, the Bible is very clear that some people are foolish. In fact, the truth is there are fools everywhere. There are fools right now working in the workplace – some of them are teachers, doctors and lawyers. There are even fools who are pastors and evangelists. There are most definitely fools who are politicians. There are a lot of places where you will run into a fool.

Why is this important? Because today, we are still talking about perception, honour and proximity, but today I want to help you work this in reverse. If you can perceive someone is being foolish, then you can not honour their “wisdom” and “advice”, and hopefully the fool will then leave you alone. At the least, you will not join the fool in his folly.

I have seen many Christians shipwreck their lives because they did not perceive someone to be a fool, and they sadly listened to them, gave credit to their advice and end up in a total mess. Not all that glitters is gold, and not all that is dressed up in Christian robes is Christian.

The primary thing that determines a fool is they despise wisdom and instruction (Proverbs 1.7). If someone wants to instruct you, first find outdo they hate wisdom and instruction. When someone tells me that they would never listen to a sermon except on Sundays, that they only go to church to be seen, and they would never listen to any pastor tell them what to do, I know instantly – that person is a fool. When someone tells me they don’t do small groups, they don’t do conferences – fool. When someone has no one who they look to for advice and correction – fool.

That’s the hallmark of a fool. The Hebrew word for despise is “buz”, and it means to treat as unimportant or as small. That sums up far too many people’s attitude to wisdom and instruction. When someone is on time every day of the week for work and strolls into church with their drive thru coffee cup in their hand, they despise wisdom – they are a fool. When people would rather watch the football than the church midweek live stream – fool. When people put everything else before wisdom and instruction, when someone spends 40k on a new car, but will not spend £40 on Christian books they are a fool. They despise wisdom and instruction.

What happens if you are about to do something and your pastor says it is a bad idea? Or a wise Christian friend. Of course, if someone does not have a pastor or a wise Christian friend we already know they are a fool, and it is pride that leads to that foolishness.

If you don’t recognize a fool, if you don’t perceive them, they might walk into your life and cause untold mess! Watch carefully if you see someone who cannot take godly advice, they are a fool.

We will discuss this more next post, as we give more Biblical signs of a fool, and how to handle them, and handle them well.

Can You See 03: Do Not Miss Your Harvest!

You should as a Christian, blessed and highly favoured, be having harvests every single day of your life. But again, due to a lack of insight and eyesight most Christians miss their harvests.

  • Anyone who is a blessing to you – they are a harvest. Whether they are teaching you, blessing you, inspiring you, challenging you, edifying you, encouraging you, comforting you – that is a harvest.
  • A lot of the ideas we have are harvests caused by the seeds we have sown in others. Especially ideas that help people.
  • Any increase that comes your way, financial or otherwise is a harvest.

The problem is that a harvest must be harvested, but if you do not perceive your harvest, you will not honour your harvest, and then you will not receive your harvest. This is basic Biblical principles and you have to grasp and appreciate this.

One of my sons told me this week that he appreciates God for me being his father because I am easy to honour. I understand not every father is easy to honour, but actually – the way I am now he is an adult is the harvest to the way he is sowing seeds. The way he is now is a result of the seeds I have sown in his life. It all comes back to sowing and reaping. Remember, when Jesus told everyone the parable of the sower He said that if you do not understand this parable, you will fail to understand everything in the kingdom. If you fail to understand sowing and reaping, you fail to understand the entire kingdom of God. The principle that holds above all is sowing and reaping. To act like sowing and reaping is not sow, according to Galatians, is to actually mock God!

I believe harvests are coming our way daily and we do not see them. It is our responsibility to develop the ability to perceive our harvests. We had a lady leave our church (this is years and years ago) and before she left she wrote me a hand-written letter explaining the reason she had left was that during her time at Tree of Life Church she had received nothing from God during the worship or the teaching, and certainly she had received zero return on her giving.

Now, let me tell you as clearly as I can – I do not trust anyone who can write down that they have received nothing from God in a whole year. That’s not a failure of God, that’s a failure of their perception. It turned out in her time with us, she had gone from unemployed to employed, her children had got into the school of her choice, she had developed some great friends. I don’t know about you – but all those things are a harvest to me. This ladies’ failure to see harvest opened the door to bitterness.

Pastoring Tree of Life is a harvest, and that might be obvious to see. But being an accountant is a harvest, being a taxi driver is a harvest. Having a job is a harvest! When I got my first post-Bible College job, working in a fast food restaurant for minimum wage, it was a harvest – I sowed precious seed in an offering for that job! It was a harvest. Every day I would walk to God and thank God I had a job. It wasn’t the full corn in the ear, but it was a harvest. It put food on the table, it gave me people to share my faith with, and there was a glory about it all because I recognized it.

If you didn’t wake up today in a hospital with tubes running in and out of your body, you have a harvest and you should praise God. Many people went to work today and didn’t make it home. A friend of mine got on an aeroplane to fly to Africa and when the plane landed, he was in Heaven. Every plane that I get on alive and get off alive is a harvest. Get up early and watch the sunrise – it is a harvest. Thousands of people will never have another sunrise unless the Rapture.

Did you eat today? I believe nearly everyone reading this has the resources to go and eat right now until they make themselves sick. That’s a harvest. I have been in places in the world where people are literally dying due to there being no food. Feed yourself did you? Many people have to be fed by others? Have a car? There’s a harvest.

Ever heard a song and it just spoke to you? Harvest. Just look up for a second. That’s a ceiling above your head. The rain is not dripping on you, the snow is not in your house. Thank God for your harvests.

Most of us do not thank God for these things because we do not perceive them as harvests. The greatest harvest in your life is that you are a son of God because God sowed His one and only Son into your life.

So as you sit in your air conditioned car, and drive to work, listening to your favourite preachers (hopefully I am in there somewhere!), thank God for all of those things, they are part of the harvest.

The more you train yourself to see harvests, the more harvests come your way. There are many people who give very small amounts to Tree of Life Church, some people give £1 a month for example. When that £1 comes into the church bank account, sometimes I dance with joy – that’s a harvest. In the last six weeks, we have been given nearly £70k above our normal income – why? Because I learned how to recognize a harvest! If you can celebrate a slice of bread, you are about to have barns overflowing.

Now listen carefully, I have been doing this a long time and I have learned some things. Firstly, the main harvests in your life are people. People turn up and show you favour, they give you a piece of wisdom (or even correction) – that’s a harvest. That’s God responding to your seeds. Right now I am in France because I have been invited to preach there – that is a harvest for all the speakers I invite to preach in the Tree. Selah! The most common harvest in your life is people – when someone connects to you, that is a harvest. When someone tells someone else how wonderful you are – that’s a harvest.

If you do not know that harvests come in human form, you could easily miss your harvest. Jesus entered the world and came to the Jewish people as the Jewish Messiah as predicted over 300 times in the Jewish Bible. One of the saddest verses in the Bible says “His own received him not” (John 1.11). They failed to perceive their harvest had come. The harvest of all their rituals, passovers, celebrations, temple worship, all of it – was in the midst of them, and they failed to perceive Him – so they failed to honour Him, so they failed to get close to Him.

Harvest is coming to you every single day, so start to look for harvests and immediately respond with gratitude, even if it seems tiny. You must never get so busy you do not have time to thank God for what is already in your life. It’s not that God is not giving to you – it is that you are not perceiving and recognizing your harvests and therefore not honouring them, and that is breaking seedtime and harvest and mocking God.

Make a decision today, never again to say “God never blesses me” and start to count your blessings one by one. An unperceived harvest is a dishonoured harvest, and that is going to keep future harvests away from you.

Can You See 02: What Does A Seed Look Like

One of the principles that no one can escape from is that whatever a man sows he will reap that (Galatians 6.7). One of the reasons many Christians do not have mega, wonderful, glorious harvests in their life – harvests of joy, prosperity, abundance, peace and life – is that they do not recognize their seed, and rather than sow it, they eat it.

If you can give it to someone else and make their life better it is a seed. A thought can be a seed. Loving someone and taking the time for them to encourage them – that’s a seed. Being kind and patient with someone is a seed. Forgiving someone who messes up is a seed, and one day you will need a harvest of grace from others. Money is a seed, I’m sure you all realize that. Praying for people is a bunch of seeds.

So when you have a need, you sow a seed. You do not have what you need, but I guarantee you have a seed. But you have to recognize the seed. You have to realize that you cannot win battles with Saul’s armour, you have to find your stone and sow that as a seed. There is always a seed that enables you to win a battle, your job is to recognize it. Remember from last post, the principle of perception, exaltation and proximity. What you fail to perceive in your life, you will never honour. What you fail to honour, you will never have close in your life.

The key to your future is already in your hands, you just have to perceive it.

I want my harvests everywhere, so I am sowing seeds everywhere. I have to recognize seeds. Recently, I had to recognize my car was a seed. Before that I had to recognize my time was a seed, as I started getting up earlier every day and pray in tongues. All of this is sowing seed.

Going to church is a seed. Every Sunday you miss church, you have failed to bring yourself to a place of increase.

You can produce the life of your dreams with what is in your hands, if you perceive what is seed and learn how to sow it. A boy stopped seeing five loaves and two fish as his lunch, and saw it as a seed, and changed the lives of thousands. You do not have nothing, you have seeds. You might only have two mites, but start to see it as a seed. You have so many seeds, but you are not taking the time with the Lord to perceive them.

If you hold on to what you have, then that is all you will ever have. If you sow it, you will have 30, 60 and 100 times more. This is the base line here – can you recognize a seed. Because sowing ZERO produces a harvest of ZERO. I would hate to be near the end of my life and wonder about what harvests I could have had. I want to have a harvest of something, so I ned to sow something.

Now, if you are not a tither, you will always struggle to discern seed, because you simply do not have an attitude of giving even 10%. 10% is so little, when you consider God gave you 100% of your salary, and eyesight, and ears that hear, and the ability to do your job, and a brain that works, and favour to get that job even though your brain isn’t big enough to do it. You have zero that is not a gift from God!

Sowing seed is the only proof that you are not a hoarder! You are never the master of anything you cannot give away. So, today, ask the Lord – show me what I have that is seed, and then sow it where God says, how God says, the way God says, and sow it in faith and hope, expecting a great harvest. Sow it with joy.

All seed produces according to its kind. You know oranges produce oranges and apples produce apples. Every seed has one job – produce more of what it is.

Now you might be reading this and you are a sower – well, here is a truth for you – sow MORE, reap MORE. That’s what the Bible says:

Remember this — a farmer who plants only a few seeds will get a small crop. But the one who plants generously will get a generous crop. (2 Cor. 9.6, NLT)

One of the most powerful things you can do with seed is sow into your dreams. If you help other people’s dreams come true, God will help your dreams come true. That’s the harvest. When I started on TV, I gave big gifts to TV ministries I respect. I still partner with them today. When I started planting churches, I gave to church planting movements. When I started travelling, I gave to travelling ministers. I am now giving to crusade evangelists to gear up for the next phase of my ministry.

If you truly have no money, you can still sow seed. When I had zero money when I finished Bible College, I went to work for Jerry Savelle Ministries for free. Look at the favour I have had with Jerry Savelle and his ministry since then! That’s sowing and reaping!

God is speaking to some of you right now about sowing seed. Why? Not because God is looking to reduce you, but because He is looking for your harvest to come your way. Selah!

Can You See 01: The Grace on Others

One of our problems as Christians is that we can often fail to see things that are right in front of us. One of the most important principles I teach on I call the “PRINCIPLE OF PERCEPTION, EXALTATION and PROXIMITY”. It says this: what you fail to perceive in your life you will never be able to honour; what you fail to honour in your life you will never be close to you. It’s a divine principle that is hard-wired into the universe, and if you fail to understand this principle you will miss out on many things in your life.

Now, I want to spend the next few weeks looking at things that we often miss when they are right under our noses. I remember having to ask a friend to buy some food for me in a shop as I had forgot my wallet, but my bank card was in my shirt pocket all along. But I failed to perceive it, so I did not honour it, so it did not do me any good at all!

Now, today, I want you to think about this – the people that God has brought into your life have special grace on their life. They are remarkable people. God uses the people He brings into your life to bring gifts to you. It’s like the magi with Jesus – the people around you are great people with great gifts to help you do your mission. But if you do not see the grace on their lives, you will not exalt these people or their gifts, and therefore you will not have those gifts near you, you will not benefit from them.

I believe this makes perfect sense to you! Now the question you should be and hopefully are asking right now is “Pastor, how can you help me see the grace on the people God has brought into my life, so I can honour those people, honour the grace and benefit from their gifts”. That’s the right question, and the right answer is look at these people with a heart of love.

Last weekend, I was at a worship training day, with all the worship leaders and teams from three of our churches. Some people joked about when I would pick up a guitar, or play the drums or sing. It’s funny, but the truth is if you saw me do that you would miss the grace on my life. You would think why on earth is this person at the front of the church. It’s not the grace on my life. You might dismiss me, or laugh at me, but if you loved me, you would maybe listen to me and find out I express ideas through words not music, and I have a very different grace on my life. If eventually you heard me preach, you would be blessed, challenged, encouraged and inspired.

Don’t put a motivator in the place of an educator, don’t put an admin person in a place where they need flair, don’t put an efficient person in a place they need enthusiasm, don’t put an enthusiastic person in a place they need to be efficient. Love people to have their own grace and own gifts. Feed the gifts of the people near you, build on their gifts and do not become preoccupied with where they lack grace that you miss the remarkable grace on their lives.

You have people around you who can motivate you, encourage you, inspire you, challenge you – but you have no one around you who can do it all. Find out who offers what, and celebrate them.

I guarantee the grace you are missing in your life right now – God has given it to someone else and brought them into your life. Find out who, respect and honour their gift and watch them move towards you and benefit from that gift. You have areas in your life you are lacking grace and God will bring the right people to you. But they will not be like you because they have a different grace from you, so you have to learn to perceive them and celebrate them and not dismiss them as they are strange in your eyes and perspective. There is someone right now whose grace on their life is leading them to you, they are watching you struggle and loving you, and all you have to do is recognize it.

But often people miss out on the variants of grace in the body of Christ because we see someone with different grace from us, a different ability, different skills, different passions and we dismiss them for not having the grace – or even goals – we have.

I know husbands who are bitter at their wife for not being like them, rather than celebrating the grace on her life. And vice versa. That will cost you dearly. I know pastors who have only ever appointed elders that are like them, and they are paying dearly for it. And so on. This is the true acceptance of diversity – accepting the different graces on all our lives, so we all benefit!

Selah.

Feasting at the Tree of Life 07 Why You Avoid the Tree of Life

Why, when listening to God, and coming to Him and fellowshipping with Him and eating at the tree of life produces so much good fruit and healthy relationships and propels you into miracles and destiny, would anyone stay at the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil? What makes people prefer the Knowledge of Good and Evil to Life?

  1. Pride. To follow God we have to humble ourselves. We have to stop relying on our strength, our intelligence, our wisdom, our experiences, our knowledge. We may have to admit that we are wrong to follow God. It’s not easy to make a complete 180 and turn from something you have done. Pride is the normative stumbling block for people missing God’s plan for their life.
  2. Immaturity. Part of what is often called teenage rebellion is generally a childish desire to do things your own way, and not be part of something larger than yourself. People do this in the kingdom of God too, they just desire to make their own way in the world, do their own thing, and not have to consult anyone.
  3. Laziness. Seeking the Lord takes your whole heart, it takes faith, it takes time, it takes energy, it takes passion. It does not just happen. Doing things your way is easy, doing things the way they have always been done is easy.
  4. Cowardice. It takes bravery to stand up for Jesus, to go against the crowd, to do what God has called you to do even though others think of you as insane, or are seemingly being more fruitful without God. Not many have this bravery. Many are subject to peer pressure to the point that they never even say anything different from their peers, let alone do anything.

Feasting at the Tree of Life 06 Going Deeper!

As we become more effective disciples of Jesus Christ, as we go deeper with the Lord and in following Him, the more our choices will be choosing between the good of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, and the Tree of Life, truly doing what is God’s will for your life. There are a lot of good things that you could be doing that have nothing to do with God’s will for your life, therefore have nothing to do with life.

Many times people have suggested to me the church does certain things – maybe start an orphanage, maybe a food bank, maybe a school. But unless the Lord leads, it will not be life, it will just be good, and that’s the wrong tree!

If you want to know the will of God for your life and live from the Tree of Life, you have to spend time with Jesus. Many times Jesus will say something to you that goes beyond what a carnal person thinks is good and evil.

Jesus actually said that if you come to him and do not hate your own father and mother, and wife and children, and brothers and sisters, in fact if you do not hate your own life, you cannot be His disciple (it’s in Luke 14.26). We all know God is love, Jesus is love, the Spirit is love, and God loves us. There is no higher love than Jesus. But Jesus does not say love everyone the same. He says compared to Him and your love for Him, you should hate your father. The Ten Commandments tell us to honour your father. This is a hard saying unless you are a disciple of Jesus. But there are times where if following Jesus means you do something that your parents think is hate, you do it.

When I refused to go to medical school and went to Bible School, my parents certainly felt like I had made a wrong decision. When I entered the ministry, they made that very clear to me.

But what about hating your wife? If your wife is telling you not to go to church, is criticising Jesus, your church, your pastor, to you and you stand up for Jesus and are a disciple of Jesus, she may feel like you are hating her. But you have to be a disciple for Christ. It may look like your marriage has a lot more strife, and someone carnal might criticise you for your marriage, and you could have a more “successful” marriage. But Jesus said that’s the wrong tree.

Most Christians never think about these things, because they live a life so far below the level of discipleship of Jesus and so far from the tree of life. That’s why they don’t dominate life and circumstances and are otherwise dominated by them!

What about hate your children? Are you not supposed to care for your children, nurture your children? I am not writing this to excuse carnal hate or people who ignore their spouses or children, I am writing this to let you know sometimes you will have to do something for Jesus that seems uncaring.

Finally – hate your own life! Most people never reach that point where they act in a way that looks like they hate their own life. But if you want to stay impressing the world, if you want to stay making your flesh happy, if you want to be liked, if you want to be logical – you will tie yourself to the tree of knowledge of good and evil, and lose contact with God! Think about loving your son. No one loved their son more than God. God loved Jesus – but then sent him to be murdered in the most horrific way. That doesn’t look like love – but it was love. It’s not love in a logical standard, in a carnal standard, but to the spiritual it makes perfect sense.

We have to draw near to the Lord and let Him draw near to us. If God had not “hated” his Son, you would be going to hell. If God had not let His Son perish, you would be perishing right now. If we are to become true disciples of Jesus Christ, we need to leave traditions behind and walk in true life, no matter what anyone else thinks.