Author: handmaidathisfeet

I AM NOT ASHAMED

handmaidathisfeet2 Comments

Luke 19:1-10 tells the story of a tax collector named Zacchaeus who when he heard that Jesus was coming to his town “sought” to see Him. But because the crowd was so large, and he was so short, in order to make sure he saw Jesus, Zacchaeus climbed up into a sycamore tree to get a better view.

Even though Zacchaeus had already been labeled a “sinner”, Zacchaeus did not allow his sinful state to cause him to hide away in the midst of the crowd. Zacchaeus did not allow his deficiencies to prevent him from seeking Jesus out to make sure the he caught a glimpse of the Messiah.

For that reason, because of that EXTRA EFFORT, not only did Zacchaeus see Jesus that day, Jesus SAW Zacchaeus. That day Jesus dined in the house of the “sinner”, Zacchaeus and said to him:

“Today salvation has come to this house, because he also is a son of Abraham; for the Son of Man has come to seek and to save that which was lost. (Luke 19:9, 10 NKJV)

How many times have we knowingly transgressed against God and felt so ashamed of ourselves that we even found it difficult to come before Him in prayer to ask for forgiveness.

How many times has our prayer been along the lines of “Lord, I know I’m not supposed to do these things, yet I don’t know why I keep doing them” or “Lord, I know that you are disappointed in me because I claim to be your child, yet, keep sinning against you.”

Brethren, the purpose of this message is not to advocate that one not feel badly when they sin, on the contrary we should feel bad. We should feel terrible. Sin should grieve our hearts to the point that we are destabilized.

“And I said: O my God, I am too ashamed and humiliated to lift up my face to You, my God; for our iniquities have risen higher than our heads, and our guilt has grown up to the heavens.” (Ezra 9:6 NKJV)

The purpose of this message is to encourage you that when we do sin, we should not feel too ashamed to come back and ask for God’s forgiveness. The purpose of this message is to stress that when we sin, it becomes incumbent on us to SEEK JESUS OUT! Climb that sycamore tree, and wave our hands frantically to get His attention. The contrition that a repentant heart produces should cause us not to run from Jesus, but to run towards Him.

The Lord knows when we sin. It in not our acknowledgement of our sins that brings the sin to His attention. But it is our acknowledgement and remorse of our sins, that brings to our attention our dire need for Christ.

Satan, the accuser, will come with every weapon in his arsenal and every trick in his book and lie to us that we are not worthy of forgiveness. Satan will lie to us that we can never be delivered from sinful ways. It is his tactic to keep us enslaved in sin! That is why it is important for the believer to understand that no matter how badly we’ve messed up, Jesus will receive us if we present ourselves to Him in our imperfection, and desire to come back to Him. He is the only one that can free us from the bondage of sin, so Brethren, what ever shame we feel should not drive us from Jesus, it should drive us to Jesus!

The bible tells us in Hebrews 4:14-16:

“Seeing then that we have a great High Priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. For we do not have a High Priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but was in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need.

May the Spirit of God bring us into the full knowledge to the redemptive power of the Blood of Jesus Christ, and how we can continue to abide in it. Amen.

Share your thoughts that you might encourage your brethren.

In Christ,
The handmaid at His feet.

THE TIME OF YOUR DELIVERANCE

handmaidathisfeet1 Comment

Exodus 2:23-25 reads “Now it happened in the process of time that the king of Egypt died. Then the children of Israel groaned because of the bondage, and they cried out; and their cry came up to God because of the bondage. So God heard their groaning, and God remembered His covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob. And God looked upon the children of Israel, and God acknowledged them.”

When I read this passage the first time, I wondered why it read “God remembered His covenant…”

My first thought was was that the word “remembered” seemed a bit odd to be used in conjunction with God as it somehow implied that He had forgotten.

But since we’re talking about God here, then we know that cannot be true. God forgets nothing.

Then in that same Exodus. Chapter 3 verse 7 “And the Lord said: “I have surely seen the oppression of My people who are in Egypt, and have heard their cry because of their taskmasters, for I know their sorrows.”

Again, knowing God to be all knowing, we know that it wasn’t at that moment when He was talking to Moses that He saw the affliction of the Israelites for the first time.

So I wondered, why all these references that gave the appearance of ‘recent discoveries’.

Well, the answer to that question was in the very next verse.

“So I have come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians, and to bring them up from that land to a good and large land, to a land flowing with milk and honey.” (Exodus 3:8)

The Lord did not suddenly remember Israel. The Lord did not suddenly hear their cry after all these years. The act of calling to remembrance was not for the Lords benefit. It was for ours. The Israelites, and we who are reading/hearing the scripture today. This call to remembrance simply denoted that it was now time for the deliverance to begin.

In that verse 8, the Lord said “ So I have come down to deliver them…”

Up until that point, the Israelites had to endure the suffering that they were enduring. They had to pass through that time of trial & tribulation. The time for deliverance had not come yet. But when it was time, The Lord “came down”, through Moses, to deliver them out of their bondage.

Brethren, our God is a God of timing. He does His work according to His perfect time table. This story of the deliverance of Israel out of Egypt, and the other stories of deliverance in the bible serve to do one thing for we believers. They serve to remind us that God hears the cry of His people. But He will move ONLY at the apportioned time.

Ecclesiastes 3:11 says “He has made everything beautiful in its time”.

We are required to seek God in prayer. We are required to call on Him in times of trials and hardship. But we also have to learn the ways of this God through the scriptures that he has provided for our benefit to know that He moves according to His perfect plan for us. We just have to remain strong in Him. Trust and believe in His promises and believe that He will move on our behalf at the appropriate time.

Keep in mind, when the Lord did lead the Israelites out of captivity; inasmuch as that served as their deliverance out of Egypt, the end of their captivity, it was just the beginning of their journey to the promised land. A journey that took 40 years! A journey that was filled with just as many trials and tribulations. But even along the way, through the miracles that the Lord performed through Moses on their behalf, He continued to assure the people that He was still with them.

So, when we get delivered out of a particular situation, that doesn’t mean that we have necessarily arrived at our promised land. It simply marks another phase of our journey in life, en-route to eternal salvation.

There will be trials, brethren. At every phase of the journey. But, there will always be deliverance! Because it is the God who delivers us out of the captivity that protects us along our journey. He will cause plagues will befall those that oppress us and seek to hold us captive! Red Seas will be parted when we are cornered! Manna will fall from heaven and quail will be provided to feed us when we are hungry! Water will come forth from the rock to revive us when we are thirsty!

The Lord will continue to deliver those who remain faithful to Him at every turn in their journeys. We just have to remain faithful. We must continue to trust. God will deliver us. We have to remain obedient to the teachings of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Because there is a price to pay for disobedience and rebellion. Just as was in the case of the same Israelites, because after a 40 year through the wilderness, despite all the ways that God proved to them that He was with them, most of them did not make it into the promised land. Because they were not obedient. Because they did not trust in Him. Because they did not wait for their deliverance.

Wait patiently and faithfully for your deliverance. For when it is time, the Lord will surely bring it about.

Share your thoughts that you might encourage your brethren.

In Christ,
The handmaid at His feet.

THE JUDAS SYNDROME

handmaidathisfeet1 Comment

                                                        THE JUDAS SYNDROME

We know the story of Judas Iscariot, one of the 12 disciples of Jesus; and the person who, in an inconceivable act of betrayal, handed Jesus over to the Chief Priests, who ultimately had him crucified.

Now, just for clarification, the Chief Priests did not come to Judas seeking his help in capturing Jesus, Judas went to them to barter a trade for Jesus. He did it for money. As John 12:3-6 explains:

Then took Mary a pound of ointment of spikenard, very costly, and anointed the feet of Jesus, and wiped his feet with her hair: and the house was filled with the odour of the ointment. Then saith one of his disciples, Judas Iscariot, Simon’s son, which should betray him, Why was not this ointment sold for three hundred pence, and given to the poor? This he said, not that he cared for the poor; but because he was a thief, and had the bag, and bare what was put therein. (John 12:3-6 KJV)

So his motivation was not only his gluttony for personal financial gain, but he simply had a very corrupt heart.

The passage that I want to focus on today is (Mark 14:17-20 KJV)
Which reads:
And in the evening he cometh with the twelve. And as they sat and did eat, Jesus said, Verily I say unto you, One of you which eateth with me shall betray me. And they began to be sorrowful, and to say unto him one by one, Is it I? and another said, Is it I? And he answered and said unto them, It is one of the twelve, that dippeth with me in the dish.”

When I gave the title of this piece as The Judas Complex, and gave the intro, if the first person that came to any of our minds was anyone other than ourselves, then we already started off on the wrong foot.

When Jesus sat at the Passover table with the disciples and revealed to them that one of them- for it was only his disciples that were dining with him- I found it incredibly enlightening that none of them asked “who is it?” Or “is it…” Then insert one of the other disciples’ name. Instead, each one of them asked “Is it I”?

Before calling out another who appeared to fit the bill, they considered themselves. In the event that they fit the bill.
It’s always easy to point out the faults in others. But very rarely do we lift up that same magnifying glass of judgement & use it to examine ourselves.

Judas did not suddenly wake up one day & in a moment of weakness, suddenly decide to betray Jesus, Judas was a wicked man at heart.

For starters, he was a thief. He was in charge of the “mission purse” of the disciples, and on a regular basis, he helped himself to the money.
When Mary anointed Jesus with the oil, it was Judas who had the loudest protest, under the pretense that the money could be given to the poor. He had absolutely no interest in the poor. He just wanted the money put into the purse so he could steal it.
And it was this same wickedness, that drove Judas to seek out those who were plotting to kill the same person that he professed to love, to be devoted to, because even though his mouth spoke of love & devotion, his heart was selfish, gluttonous & wicked.

Psalms 139:23-24 says
Search me, O God, and know my heart: try me, and know my thoughts: And see if there be any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.

The disciples asked “Is it I”?
Brethren, let us ask The Lord to search our hearts. Any one of us could be a Judas in some way. Just because we are in the company of Christ doesn’t mean that Christ is in us. I say that because many of us run to Christ for what we can get from Him; the healing, blessing, favor, protection, deliverance from our problems etc

But how many of us are here for Christ simply for change that he can work in us? Simply to be more like Him? Simply for the gift of salvation that He brought us?

Remember, Judas was one of the 12 disciples. He, too, was always in the presence of Christ. But he did not allow the presence of Christ change him.

He was not alone. Many people flocked to Jesus because He healed the sick, raised the dead, drove out demons. But how many of those people received Him in their hearts as Messiah? And allowed why He was really there to change them?

The answer is very few.
The story of the two thieves that were crucified with Jesus present this clear contrast of people who are in the presence of Jesus.

Then one of the criminals who were hanged blasphemed Him, saying, “If You are the Christ, save Yourself and us.” But the other, answering, rebuked him, saying, “Do you not even fear God, seeing you are under the same condemnation? And we indeed justly, for we receive the due reward of our deeds; but this Man has done nothing wrong.” Then he said to Jesus, “Lord, remember me when You come into Your kingdom.” And Jesus said to him, “Assuredly, I say to you, today you will be with Me in Paradise.” (Luke 23:39-43 NKJV)

One only believed in Him for the miracles that he could benefit from. The other believed in Him for the miracle of salvation. Which is the reason that Jesus came. And that is why that thief was saved.

What is that thing in our hearts that keeps us from being changed that we can’t seem to shake?
For Judas, it was his greed & love for money.
What is it for us?
Is it hatred, envy, anger, self-righteousness, a gossiping tongue, being overly ambitious, being overly competitive…
What is it?
We have to ask The Lord to reveal it to us, & more important, be ready to face what He reveals.
Because, guess what, it is this same area of weakness that Satan too will try to use against us and if we don’t identify it & commit it to God, we too could fall victim, as it states in (Luke 22:3, 4, 6 KJV):

Then entered Satan into Judas surnamed Iscariot, being of the number of the twelve. And he went his way, and communed with the chief priests and captains, how he might betray him unto them. And he promised, and sought opportunity to betray him unto them in the absence of the multitude.

Yes, Judas was remorseful at having betrayed the innocent Jesus. But by then, it was too late. The truth is that he’d had ample time and opportunity, while he was in the company of Jesus to repent of his heart’s ways. The teachings of Christ revealed them to him, but because he was so consumed & blinded by his own desires, he didn’t change when it mattered.
The Judas syndrome is something that can affect all of us, so let us be weary. Let us be mindful. Let us remain humble. Most importantly, let us allow Christ to work a change in us and remove anything that Satan too can use to rob us of that gift of eternal salvation.

Share your thoughts that you might encourage your brethren.

In Christ.
The handmaid at His feet.