Spiritual development is at all times is relational, positional, material, and exponential.
It is good for us to recognize that the Lord usually has several objectives in mind in our life circumstances. We tend to focus on the one that is causing the most anguish or difficulty. We want freedom or release from something. The Lord has that in mind also, but mostly as a consequence. We see it as a major objective; he sees it as a byproduct. He has other things that he also wants to achieve. There are times when our circumstances can be prolonged because we are not seeing or are not complying with the other objectives that the Lord has in mind.
Remember, all spiritual development is primarily relational. Firstly, the father wants us to know him as he is in his own glory; So a revelation is available about an aspect of his nature that he wants us to see and worship. Secondly, his intention is that we become partakers of that particular divine nature, so that we are filled and energized by it. Thirdly, we are to put on Christ and be made in God’s image within the context of what we are learning in our situation. To put on Christ means we appropriate, the aspect of his divine nature he is revealing. As we experience it we abide in it. An encounter always creates ongoing experience.
Freedom is a consequence, not an objective.
When the father gave me a revelation of his loving kindness towards me, my heart expanded with rejoicing. I received it and believed it! I understood who He is in terms of kindness! Then He began to be that for me, day after day. I began to see that whatever God is, He is relentlessly. He never changes. His love never ceases. His mercy is never ending. He is extravagant, overwhelming in His goodness. His love covers a multitude of sins. His grace is enough and much more than enough!
His kindness encircled my life. Every single day He would do something or say something that would be hugely generous and kind. There is no season with the nature of God. It is ongoing and relentless. I was overwhelmed pretty quickly. He poured out His kindness like a baptismal encounter, full immersion. I soaked in it. I was filled up, immersed, overwhelmed. The blessing of God kills the darkness in each of us. I experienced my judgmental spirit, my sarcasm, cynicism and unkindness disappear from me.
My heart became enlarged by His kindness. I wept for joy. I could feel His heart, really feel His nature of loving kindness towards His beloved. I could feel his heart changing my perspective, moving into my eyes, so that I began to see people differently. I was seeing them through the lens of His loving kindness. When my mouth opened, different words came out-words of affirmation, release, empowerment, affection. I could see people’s sadness, self-loathing and fear. I began to learn how to speak into peoples lives and turn all the negatives into positive aspects of God’s nature that He desired to impart to them.
I could see the negativity that covered people like a veil. I began to learn the art of reframing: empowering people to see the provision that was present with every problem. As the lord turned what he was doing in my life into a place of ministry to others, more changes became apparent in my experiences. I became a partaker with Him, conscious of His presence and deliberately acting in partnership with Him. Then, he withdrew from the majesty of my experiences and I stayed the same! I no longer had the same physical intensity, but the results were the same. He had made me like him, and now I was learning to abide. He lives in me, and I do those things unconsciously. He gives me occasional upgrades and sometimes rises up and inhabits me-I think just for the sheer pleasure that he has in involvement with his sons!
When we become established in the truth, we then have that life abiding in ourselves.
The abundant life is more love, joy and peace that we can now walk in.
The relational element in our development produces a place in us where we are positioned before the Lord in a very specific manner. All growth is positional, and therefore, must include the confidence required to occupy a particular place with strength and passion.
This place is called intentionality. The father is very focused and deliberate in all that he does. He has an incredible resolve which, when coupled with his astonishing patience, makes him remarkable in his passionate pursuit of his people.
Life in the Spirit is not about measure. That comes from an inferior way of thinking. Abundance is the norm for people living a life of faith. It is important that we commit our intentionality to a higher way of seeing, thinking and believing. It is called being renewed in the spirit of our mind-Ephesians 4: 23. When our heart is free to live from the place of intentionality with God, the alignment it creates in our spirit causes faith to rise. Confidence towards God is the goal of all the Holy Spirits interactions with us.
When we move with the father in his intention, we cannot be disappointed. In intentionality, God welcomes us to flow with him in divine purpose. When we confess his intention back to him, we welcome God to be at work in us! We learn how to call out to God to simply be what he has promised. Intentionality empowers us to combine faith and patience so that we inherit all that the father loves to promise us ((Hebrews 612).
Intentionality must be embraced fully because a double minded person cannot inherit (James 5: 1-8). It is the father’s plan that his intention and the confidence it produces in us should be the foundation on which we stand before him.
We are not yet the finished article. We are a work in progress. We must, therefore, be fully persuaded about the father’s intention towards us and his ability to see it through.
2 Timothy 1: 12- For I know whom I have believed and I am convinced that he is able to guard what I have entrusted to him until that day.
The enemy would love us to live in the present/past That occurs when we allow past situations to dominate our thinking, perceiving and living in the present. Old wounds, hurts, betrayals and disappointments are still given power by us to affect us in the here and now. The cross is an end to the old nature. The old nature is dead in Christ, and we must learn to walk in newness of life (Roman 6: 4).
If the enemy cannot overcome us through our past, he wants us to have little or no confidence about the future. Often, he wants us to be overwhelmed by all the things which are not and by the changes that still need to be made. He is a liar and a thief who must destroy everything the father is doing.
Salvation is the necessary process of celebration. Therefore, with joy shall we draw water from the wells of salvation (Isaiah 12:3). He has turned our mourning about ourselves into joy. We live present/future with the Lord. That is, we celebrate who we are now, and we look forward to who we will become in the Lord Jesus. In the present, we do not only look at what still needs to be done in us, we look at the next aspect of our increase in the divine nature. Salvation is the celebration of process! We must enjoy where we are now and rejoice in what the Lord has become for us. Then we can turn our attention joyfully to the next area of our renewal and upgrade. Development should be delightful. God loves transformation and wants us to enjoy the process of change and becoming more.
We see this in communion (1 Corinthians 11: 26-30). Communion is built on proclamation, not introspection. It is an act of rejoicing in all that Jesus has done for us by his death and sacrifice. We proclaim what that means to us in the present, and we declare what it’ll mean in terms of our future development. We have been changed to date, and we continue to be changed by his faithful application of freedom in Christ.
Galatians 5: 1-it is for freedom that Christ has set us free.
When the scripture (1 Corinthians 11: 28) encourages us to examine ourselves, it uses the word dokimazo, which means to look at with a view to approval. We examine ourselves so we can be encouraged by what the Lord has done in our life, and we proclaim him by celebrating that!
We live a life of celebration in Jesus, for both the present and the future. I love what God has done in me, and I joyfully look forward to what he wants to do next. 2 Timothy 1: 12-for I know whom I have believed and I am fully persuaded that he is able to keep/guard what I have entrusted to him, against that day.
Confidence before God is a marvelous way to live and undergo continuing transformation. When we look forward, we relax in the intentionality of God to make us like Christ in all things. We enjoy the process of learning to become fully formed in Christ (Galatians 4: 19). It’ll take years and years of joyful discovery, surrender and release.
The process must be enjoyable, delightful, and lead us into constant gratitude. Rejoicing is positional. It postures us in joyful celebration before the throne of grace. That position must result in our understanding and experience of favor. Intentionality provokes favor. Salvation must involve celebration.
God’s intentionality is fixed to his own excellence. It is partnered with fullness and abundance. This is our inheritance in Christ. We inherit God. We are heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ. The Holy Spirit is given as a down payment on our total inheritance. Here’s a down payment! Says the Lord, and there is more to come. God inherits us in Christ! Salvation is about enjoying what we have now and looking forward to more coming.
Favor involves our discovering that the father has an intentional bias towards us because of Jesus. In his personal identity statement (Isaiah 61: 1-7), Jesus proclaimed that he had favor. His favor is to train and equip us to live from a place of confidence, expectancy in the goodness of God. The Holy Spirit will empower us to become positioned so we stand in that favor, no matter what circumstances are present.
The way the Holy Spirit does that is to teach us about divine displacement. The keyword in the Isaiah 61: 1-7 passage is the word instead. It means in place of or an alternative to. He gives us beauty instead of ashes. When we feel burned out, and our life is turned to dust and ashes, he turns it around and grows something beautiful instead.
When we are surrounded by sorrow, and our hearts weep with the hardness and bitterness of life, he pours out the oil of joy. When our hearts are heavy, and we feel the crushing weight of depression, lethargy, passivity and indifference-he comes to us with his own innate happiness and empowers us to put on a garment of praise; literally, a covering of joy and rejoicing. He restores us to gratitude and worship as a way of life.
Instead means that the father intends for something else to occur in place of the negative. It means that he has created an alternative occurrence for us she stepped into, instead.
What shall we say instead, to those things? Romans 8: 31-39 is about learning an alternative mindset and heart disposition. Instead of being overwhelmed by things against us, we become astonished at who he is for us! We are in the business of learning an overcoming lifestyle. Therefore, we are not consumed by the negative; We are overjoyed at the opposite. Whatever the enemy has planned, God has provided an alternative instead. He is our heritage to move in the opposite spirit to what is coming against us. Favor is God’s intentional bias towards us.
Isaiah 54: 17-no weapon that is formed against us will prosper. And every tongue that accuses us in judgment will be condemned. This is the heritage of the servants of the Lord.
A heritage is a value that is passed down to all succeeding generations. Favor always comes in the context of vengeance (Isaiah 61:2). God has made provision for us against the enemy. Vengeance is the anointing to extract favor when we are under attack. It comes from an ancient promise that God gave Israel in the exodus from Egypt. Exodus 23: 27-I will make all your enemies turn their backs on you. Everything about the Christ life is concerned with turning the tables on the enemy. When he attacks, something else is supposed to happen instead. Therefore, at the moment of attack, we can focus on what God is giving us permission to overcome.
Think the opposite. Move towards it. Reposition yourself for a blessing. The ultimate revenge on the enemy is that everything he tries against us only makes us bigger, better and stronger. Permission is granted for us to prosper when under attack.
Our development is exponential.
As God develops us in him, we come into a realm of experiencing the tangible blessings of God in the material sense. As Israel was being delivered from bondage they received these tangibles, material prophecies about inheriting great and splendid cities that they did not build, houses full of good things which they did not fill, hewn cisterns which they did not dig, vineyards and olive trees which they did not plant so they could eat and be satisfied (Deuteronomy 6: 10-12). That we may prosper and be in health even as our soul prospers (3 John 1: 2).
All throughout scripture we see that God is concerned to meet not only the immediate, basic needs of his people, but also to establish them in their inheritance. We see Jesus in the gospels continuously looking after people’s material needs-whether feeding thousands of people (Mark 6), helping Peter pay the taxes (Matthew 17: 24-27), or blessing businesspeople (Luke 5: 1-11) who eventually become disciples.
Into this earthly domain and material world the Kingdom comes with power (Mark 9: 1). All authority is given to Jesus in heaven and earth-(Matthew 28: 18). Greater things will his people do (John 14: 12) because Jesus will intercede for us before the father (Hebrews 7: 25). He gives us authority to tread on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy, and nothing will injure you (Luke 10: 19-20).
Mark 16: 15-and he said to them, go into all the world and preach the gospel to all creation. He who believes and has been baptized shall be saved; but he who disbelieved shall be condemned. These signs will accompany those who have believed: in my name they shall cast out demons, they’ll speak with new tongues; They’ll pick up serpents, and if they drink any deadly poison, it will not hurt them; They will lay hands on the sick, and they will recover.
Finally, all that the father bestows upon us has the capacity for exponential growth. As we give out, it’ll be given back to us, press down, shaken together, and running over(Luke 6: 38; Mark 4: 24 25). There is a standard principle connected with giving that works across the whole life. Life in the Spirit is concerned with abundance (Ephesians 3: 20) and God’s people learning to abound in everything (2 Corinthians 8: 7). Living an exponential lifestyle is a hallmark of our place and capacity in Jesus (2 Corinthians 9: 6-15). Only God has abundance; the enemy has a budget. In a time of recession, it is hell that is running out of cash. God does not change, and heaven is always full. Life in Christ cannot cease to be abundant simply because the world is having a hard time. On earth as it is in heaven, it’s not only the Lord’s prayer, but also our testimony.