Sunday, July 5, 2015

How to Build a Rhema Box & Separating Peas from Gravel

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How To Build A Rhema Box & Separating Peas From Gravel, July 2, 2015

 

I wanted to share with you a couple of different methods of discerning and getting a word from the Lord, for direction, inspiration and understanding. There are many good Christian books out there, people who have led very holy lives, have great understanding and have written books.

 

Of course, we need great discernment when picking out a book, and no author is perfect or without some error in their theology, or without offense to someone. We can't please everyone. We're not called to please everyone, only God.

 

There are seasons in our lives. A season where perhaps we've been overcome by failure after failure to attain ur dreams, and we are lying on the floor half dead. During those times, we need something different than in the times when we are being propelled into success by the Lord, or we've been traveling a rewarding road for many years, but Jesus wants to do something different in this season.
 

Different authors tend to address their favorite issues, and there will be times when we are drawn to someone like Laurie Beth Jones, who wrote Jesus, CEO. She's a business woman, very established in the world of motivational speaking and helping large corporations sort out their problems, in a biblical way. She, for instance, is a person who is constantly looking for ways to get your mind on how Jesus handled the difficult situations. Then she takes that wisdom, from His example, and applies it to the business world.

Rick Joyner has visions of the church that are very revealing about leadership and obstacles you will encounter in any church. When I feel victimized by a church group, his books bring me comfort and hope.He also confronts sins in the Body that most pass over as acceptable. Many times Holy Spirit has used HIs books to give me a Rhema, a correction on my behavior or a comfort when I've been persecuted.

Then, at the opposite end of the spectrum,is Richard Wormbrandt, the founder of Voice of the Martyrs, who confronts materialism in the West-head on. He once came and preached about compromise with the world and worldly values, at a church I was attending in Phoenix, 30 years ago. Looking directly at me he said, "Everybody has a price. What's your price?" I nearly fell out of my seat! The Lord was calling my husband and I to join Youth With a Mission, but in order to do it we would have had to grossly offend his father, who had just bought us a brand new station wagon to haul our three kids around in. I was foolish and insecure and still very attached to the world. I missed our Lord's calling on my life. But, through a dream, He promised He would call again.

Reading Richard is a whole different world than reading Laurie Beth or Rick Joyner. Different people have different callings, and they touch us in a very special place where we need ministry. Only the Lord knows which medicine to apply at what time. My point is, it is good to have a selection of authors who have really gotten down to brass tacks and touched you at different times.

These books are highly useful for an anointed word of God - a Rhema. In other words, Holy Spirit will use them to instruct you if you let Him choose the page to open to. Of course, as in all things, use the binding prayer first for prayer time and as special prayer over the book, "In the Name of Jesus, I bind every lying and beguiling spirit  off this book."

Since I tend to depression and self-pity, especially after long trials, I need someone to grab me by the collar and say, "Look here! God is with you. Get up and try again!" Joyce Myers has helped me with that. Graham Cooke has helped me. Now, I am asking you right now, you may have a bone to pick with those authors, but I am asking you to put that aside and understand: God uses people like that to motivate people like me, when I'm Oh - So-Tired and down on myself and the world.

That doesn't mean you swallow their teachings hook, line and sinker. No, you need to be very careful, use discretion and if you pick up compromise on what Jesus taught, certainly don't absorb it. But, for Pete's sake, don't throw the baby out with the bath water. Such wholesale rejection is the mark of an ignorant, bigoted person, one who is long on opinions coming from his upbringing and short on intimate fellowship with God, and the wisdom and understanding that that brings. We should all be quick to listen and slow to condemn. And, just because you don't like a person's personality, doesn't mean he's not anointed by God.

 

The Lord uses the willing, not the perfect. If He used the perfect, we'd all be wandering around without any teachers or inspiration. These teachers are under construction, just like us, and they may have opinions or attitudes that put you off. What Holy Spirit needs from you is the maturity to be able to hear His Voice through Balaam's donkey...if that's the voice He's put before you!
 

Listening to a teacher or preacher is just like reading between the lines of your Bible to get an anointed word from God or a Rhema. You have to cultivate an 'ear' for Holy Spirit, not only in the Scriptures when He is trying to speak to you through them, but also through teachers you might feel prejudiced against. Driving down the street you don't look at every bumper sticker, and there are some pretty yucky ones out there. But when you see one that speaks to your situation directly, you get the feeling Jesus put it right there in front of you and a light goes on inside and you are inspired...that's a Rhema.

It's the same with these preachers. They may not be living the way you would choose to live, they may have made huge mistakes in teachings before, they may have been divorced and remarried, but you're not listening to the preacher, you're listening for Holy Spirit through the preacher.

For this you need to have good discernment. That is - knowing the basic faith so you won't be led astray by their errors, and a sensitivity to Holy Spirit, Who will be grieved when someone teaches error. Holy Spirit has been leading you for years and many right beliefs have been established in your soul. Now we are looking for every day encouragement, understanding and motivation and this is where these authors come in handy.

Someone once said it's like eating peas with gravel. You have to sort the food from the rocks and that's precisely why this intimacy with the Lord is so important. He may lead you to a teacher you wouldn't have listened to in a million years...and you may sit there awestruck listening to exactly what you needed to hear, kicking yourself for being an opinionated bigot in the past.

That doesn't mean everything this preacher says is right doctrine. It just means Holy Spirit is using them, RIGHT NOW, to adjust things in your mind, to help you move forward in your life. It takes GREAT discernment to be able to listen to different Christian preachers and get something out of what they say. To get what Holy Spirit wants you to hear. It also takes courage and fidelity to Holy Spirit. If He puts a plate of spinach in front of you, you can't turn your nose up. You need to eat the spinach because He put it in front of you.

Recently, I heard an interview with a famous preacher whose teachings helped us get out of the darkest time in our lives. But he was obviously tending towards the one world church movement. I was saddened by this, but it didn't negate what Holy Spirit taught me through this man. The knee jerk reaction is to vigorously put the man down. Speaking against the doctrine is important, but speaking against the man and interpreting the motives is not our job - only God knows the heart of a man and why he says something.

He may have exemplary motives but be totally deceived.  That can happen to ANY of us, guys. That’s happened to me –many times. And it can still happen. That’s why YOUR discernment is so important, and that’s why I keep trying to teach you to listen for the Lord’s voice and to be able to discern yourself. So that even if I make a mistake, you’re not going to follow what I have to say.

It’s not for us to judge that person. The Lord didn't allow the harvesters to pull the tares up lest the wheat harvest be destroyed. Hundreds of people in this man's congregation were drug addicts, alcoholics, homosexuals at one time, and were reformed. They refused to go to any church, until they heard him. There, they felt accepted and loved there in spite of their sins and eventually gave their lives to Christ. Now, what’s going to happen to them with this new bent in his teaching, I don’t know, but if they truly have a relationship with the Lord, which he encourages, then they will probably recoil at this new teaching...I don’t know. So, if you met one of these people and denounced the preacher that had brought them to the Lord, how do you suppose you would affect them? If they were new Christians, two or three year old Christians, they might be turned off to Jesus right then and there and never come back, being convinced that all Christians are hypocrites.

We can't afford to be controlled by denominational or non-denominational thinking. We can't afford to belong to a church with its particular doctrine, in the sense of “We’ll believe everything they have to say”.We must be 100% totally devoted to the Lord and go where He leads us. Every church I have been in fell short of the Early church of the apostles, but the Lord brought me there to learn and be a part of that Body for a while. Then He moved me on. This must be very important to the Lord, because this is not what I was going to teach on tonight. But, I just feel a very strong leading to teach this tonight.

What I wanted to say is that it is good, well rounded, well-grounded to have a handful of authors that inspire you. It is good to allow Holy Spirit to open the book to what He wants you to read.


Now, I want to introduce you to the Rhema file. Once you get these readings, it is very good for your soul to see them over and over again. So, I will write them down on a 3 ½” by 5” file card and put them on themirror, the fridge, near my desk, etc. Reading these Rhemas over and over again plants them solidly in my heart. After I've absorbed them for a while, I put them in a file card box, which now becomes a resource for me.
 

When you're sitting in front of the Lord after worship or on a hard day, and you just can't hear a thing, go to your Rhema file and allow Holy Spirit to guide your fingers to a card. You will be amazed, if not knocked off your feet, when you see how very present God is to you in your situation and how appropriate the card is that Holy Spirit picked.

I wanted to clarify, that I don't use the Bible Promise Book all the time, only when I'm having issues discerning or when I want to make sure what I've been given is not from my flesh, my own mind or the enemy. It is a sacred trust to speak in the Name of the Lord. But, most of the time, on day to day issues, I just act from my conscience and do what I know is right. When I feel God prompting me in one direction or another, I follow that.

 

It is only in times of dryness or confusion that I use my Rhema file or Bible promises, book of Psalms or other inspirational reading. When you've been in prayer and worship and you need to hear from God, that's the perfect time to choose a book for a Rhema. The word you get will point you in the right direction and break the ice. Very often, after I've received a Rhema, I have a breakthrough with the Lord and a stalemate is broken.

Another time when a Rhema is very important is for confirmation. We all need a second and third witness before we act on a certain direction. If you go to a book and find the chapter and verse you want, just because it addresses your issue, you're not letting God lead you. It would be far better if you opened randomly after you prayed so the Lord could point you in the right direction. Your problem may have a root that you don't recognize, allowing Holy Spirit to pick the reading will allow you to get to the meat of the matter immediately, rather than beating around the bush, or maybe never getting to the heart of the matter.
 

I have found that people who really don't want to give up their own will, reject this method of discernment and prefer their own intellect to guide them. And people who are given over to dying to self, hunger after this method of discernment and are very suspicious of their own will and intellect. Unless you become as a little child....

So really, what I am asking you to do here, if you want to have continual guidance directly from God, is pick a handful of books you've been led to for inspiration, keep them in your prayer place or even in the bathroom, and when you are praying you will find that Holy Spirit will draw your attention to one of these books. Pick it up, pray over it - binding a lying spirit - and open. Then sit and read and consider. God has just spoken to you in this book. Now, write down what He has said on a file card. Keep it visible for a few days and then put it in your Rhema file. In no time you will have at least 100 cards in that box, which gives Holy Spirit a wonderful selection of readings to choose from.

Sometimes He leads me to pick a card and it absolutely contradicts what the devils have been whispering in my ear: condemnation, self - hatred, lies. And all of a sudden, a cloud lifts off of me and I am restored to my former joy. In the beginning, you may want to spend an hour making your own Rhema cards from Scripture and your favorite books. That's wonderful, in that case you can use your card file immediately. I like to pick three cards at one sitting. That helps me navigate to the very location of the problem, but each with a differing viewpoint. You have to be flexible and creative in interpreting these Rhemas because this is the Lord's mind we are dealing with, His mind is so much higher than our minds.

Recently, when I asked about whether or not the Lord was speaking to me, I got scriptures under the heading of, Humility, Laziness, and Brotherly Love. What does that have to do with the price of tea in China??? I asked myself ...

Then, because I've been doing this for so long, the pieces came together. Humility refers to me being corrected for my pride...which is a major open door for a familiar spirit, as I have taught in other videos.When I am operating in pride, the Lord allows me to fall in discernment. Ok, red flag...the Lord is warning me that my pride is rising up again.

Laziness is about working hard, working on teachings, being faithful to teach the things the Lord is given me to my audience.

Brotherly Love nails it. That’s because I have a history with these three, I’ve seen this before and seen how the Lord uses it to correct me and my faults. This is about loving and deferring to my husband. Yes, I see it, I've been impatient and proud with him. I haven't honored him as I should, I am under correction. Chances are good, whatever I've heard is not from God.

Then, I pick a card from my Rhema Files: Jesus speaking, "I have no other recourse than to correct you this way when you fall into pride." Wow...that’s what I suspected the problem was – and now indeed it is confirmed.

So, how do I apply these three readings? I'm under correction right now, I need a major attitude adjustment only God can make, but I will certainly repent and keep trying. In the meantime, even though Jesus isn't giving me a word, I need to work hard at feeding His flock with teachings.

So you see, you don't always get a nice, clean, direct answer like “Am I really hearing from You, Lord and you get“ Holy Spirit - that nails it! God is speaking to you. ” Rather, you get what you need, an attitude adjustment. And a warning to be very careful, because you've opened a door.

Well family, I've shared with you how to get your own word from God, how to expand on that for a well rounded word, using different words, how to write it down and save and especially now, how to build a whole box of Rhemas to

draw from when you need a word or an ice breaker in prayer and how to avoid becoming a bigot, a hypocrite and stumbling block that pulls the wheat up with the tares.
 

I pray now that these tools will become a source of growth for you.

Lord, Your words in any form are absolutely precious and vital to our lives. Please, help us to discern, meditate and obey them. Dwell with us Abba Father, Jesus, Holy Spirit- for without You we have nothing of any value in our lives, and we are blind men and women stumbling along the treacherous paths of life. But,with You and Your words, our path becomes brighter and brighter everyday. Amen. 

Source: Heart Dwellers