I'm not one to shout warfare all the time, but these last few weeks have been the most interesting I've experienced in a while. I've been having dreams at a rate more frequently than normal for me. Usually, I'm a vision person. I'll see or experience things as I am awake. Lately it's been more dreams, more quiet revelation in the word and more shaking. The Lord is really shaking me up these last few days, to a point that has made me very uncomfortable with where I am in life. There is a shaking going on, and things are falling away.
In this dream, I was in a large church. It was worn down but beautiful. It reminded me of an old high school auditorium. I was lining up chairs in the front row on the left side facing the stage. The chairs were spread apart and out of order. One by one, I lined them up and connected them together. There was one chair that was set to the side. It was in the isle and had not been used in a very long time. One of the legs was bent, but only to the point of visual damage. The structural component remained intact. It was sturdy, just looked a little off. I slid it in place and began to walk away. As I was walking toward the isle, someone came up to me and asked me to remove that chair, to get it out of there. I replied that it was fine and that it would hold up just as well as the others, they persisted that this chair just didn't look right there. That the visual bend in the leg was reason for it to be removed, no matter how strong it was.
As I turned toward the isle, there were mice gathered there. I scooped them up in my hands. They were cute and harmless. They looked like sweet little fuzzballs. I walked out back and decided to let them go free in the back of the church. As they spread out and ran in different directions, I went back in to gather the other few left. As I grabbed these other few mice in my hands, leading them out of the church, I felt that something was off. I opened the back door to let these soft, little fuzzballs out to roam free and as I did, I was met with fear. My vision went straight to this spot of grass that was lit up behind the church. The once sweet little mouse that I had let out moments before, had grown to be a rat the size of a toddler. It was no longer cute, it hissed at me, showed its teeth and continued to do damage chewing at the wood of a pavilion out back. I turned to go back inside and shut the back door. I was able to keep my visual through a small window, and as these innocent looking mice, got out of the darkness and into the light, they changed into these huge evil creatures bent on destruction.
I sat with this dream for about a day, I haven't had much time to focus and write lately. I took it to the Lord and I prayed about what I saw. What the Lord put on my heart regarding the chair, is the way people judge those in the churches. We feel that to be in church you have to look a certain way, act a certain way and perform a certain way, or live your life a certain way before you can fit in and be deemed as useful. The Lord sees your capability, not your exterior. It truly doesn't matter what you look like, act like, or sound like when you come to the Lord. You are just as useful as anyone else in that building. Often times more so, because you have a group you can minister to, that no one else would ever go near.
We need to accept the broken to minister to the broken. We need to accept the hurting to be able to minister to the hurting. You need to accept those that don't appear to be perfect, to draw in those that need to be in that very building. Our job is to lead people to Jesus, to show them who the Holy Spirit is and to let the Lord work on conviction and change as He sees fit. It's not out job to change others, it's our job to let the Lord do His job effectively.
The mice I believe represent sin in the church. We tend not to preach against every sin. Some are even tolerable in the church. They aren't hurting anyone, they aren't murder, greed, idolatry, they aren't taking the Lord's name in vain, lying, stealing, or cheating. They're simply jealousy, covetousness, strife, anger, bitterness unforgiveness, etc. They don't appear to be hurting anyone. Yet when all sin is met with the light of the Lord, you can see how evil it is. You can see that to the Lord, being jealous of the person at work that got promoted over you, is just as bad as murdering them to take that promotion for yourself. You can see that not forgiving your parents for the way they treated you is just as bad as not honoring them at all. You can see how avoiding the absolute truth to be kind is the same as telling an outright lie. We can see that these little sins can be just as problematic as the big ones. To the Lord, it's all the same.
Just because something appears one way, doesn't mean that it actually is the way it appears. We tend to look at things as we would want them to be and not as they are. We want these things to be harmless but they aren't.
It's time to focus on the right path, the one made clear. It's time to remain in the light, to cast out everything that lurks in the shadows. To eradicate the evil from our lives. It's time to step up our calling as Christians. To deliver our churches from the evil that lurks in the shadows. To welcome the unwelcoming, to call out the sins that remain hidden, to be the church that we proclaim. To bring freedom to the nations.
Luke 6:37 - Judge not, and ye shall not be judged: condemn not, and ye shall not be condemned: forgive, and ye shall be forgiven:
John 7:24 - Judge not according to the appearance, but judge righteous judgment.
Mark 11:25 - And when ye stand praying, forgive, if ye have ought against any: that your Father also which is in heaven may forgive you your trespasses.
Ephesians 4:32 - And be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ's sake hath forgiven you.
Matthew 6:15 - But if ye forgive not men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.
1 John 1:9 - If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
Matthew 7:5 - Thou hypocrite, first cast out the beam out of thine own eye; and then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brother's eye.
James 4:17 - Therefore to him that knoweth to do good, and doeth it not, to him it is sin.
Romans 6:23 - For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Galatians 5:16 - This I say then, Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfil the lust of the flesh.
1 John 3:4 - Whosoever committeth sin transgresseth also the law: for sin is the transgression of the law.
1 John 5:17 - All unrighteousness is sin: and there is a sin not unto death.
James 2:10 - For whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all.
Colossians 3:13 - Forbearing one another, and forgiving one another, if any man have a quarrel against any: even as Christ forgave you, so also do ye.
Pretty awesome!
ReplyDelete