Blog In Audio:
Greetings,
Well, I was not successful on my hunt last week. I will have another opportunity in December. The good news is it means more days in the woods. I hope that December will give good rewards in the natural and in the spirit. Change for blessings is no doubt getting closer. Today my wife and I are with our grandkids in California. I will be working on helping them remodel their new house this week and then I will be off to Georgia to teach in the G42 Leadership school.
I believe we are living in a day of knowing that God is great, God is good, and His mercy endures forever. This is a day to know God’s sacrificial agape love. Are we dependent upon God’s sovereignty or are we dependent upon His passion and compassion as a Father to His children?
I believe that we are in the midst of a grassroots revolution. There is a war on authority and eternity within the hearts of men and women is crying out for a restoration of fathers in the church and in the world. True fathers bring a testimony of life-giving identity, testimony, and purpose in the earth. This is the testimony of true authority. Authority is not control, but the ability to give life to others because of a measure of influence given to them by God. True authority gives life, it never takes. This is the true attribute of God as our Father. The world is filled with fatherless societies and the authority of fathers has been replaced with the control and the manipulation of people and leaders who grasp for power but understand little about the life-giving nature of true authority. The nature of authority is the true nature of God as a Father. He cares for us, He is there for us, and He fights for us. He gives us life, He gives us breath, and He gives us all things. He makes us come alive, He empowers us to become expressions of life to others in our world, and He calls us to partner with Him in all things to bring the influence of life to every aspect of our world. This is the testimony of God as a Father. As a Father He activates, facilitates, and releases us to become overcoming sons and daughters of His life-giving inheritance.
I believe that the one thing that qualifies God as God is the fact that He is the Father of all flesh. He is the creator of the universes, but He is the Father of all people. He is the one and only true Father of every tribe, tongue, people, and nation. He is the source of identity, testimony, and purpose for each and everyone. We were created in His likeness and His image; and in Christ we are born in Him for the destiny of His name! He is not God because He is powerful; He is God because He is the source of all life. He can be sovereign, but I believe His goodness overrides His sovereignty. I believe that religion demands the sovereignty of God, but relationship depends upon the goodness of God. He is good, because of who He is, and He is our Father. Because He is a good, He can turn even what the enemy intends for evil for our good. I believe this is the true source of belief and life for everyone. This is what sets the testimony of Christ in us apart from every religion in the world. God is the source and we are the fruit of Him in being His children of light and life.
1 John 3:18 My little children, let us not love in word or in tongue, but in deed and in truth. 19 And by this we know that we are of the truth, and shall assure our hearts before Him. 20 For if our heart condemns us, God is greater than our heart, and knows all things. 21 Beloved, if our heart does not condemn us, we have confidence toward God. 22 And whatever we ask we receive from Him, because we keep His commandments and do those things that are pleasing in His sight. 23 And this is His commandment: that we should believe on the name of His Son Jesus Christ and love one another, as He gave us commandment.
God wants us to live our lives according to His love, not according our own independence and a prideful knowledge of good and evil. What we know doesn’t qualify us to be children of God. The qualifier is who we know. Knowing God as our Father and one another as members of His family is what empowers us to sacrificially live for Him and one another. It is a knowledge of love and not a mere knowledge of right and wrong. It is a justice of life and not a justice of human opinion and man-made laws or man inspired lawlessness. God can know all things, but He chooses not to for the sake of love. He knows all things according to His care for us, not merely according to information as to our lives, our thoughts, our actions, or our accomplishments.
God is everywhere present according to His love. He chooses not to go some places for the sake of love. He told Moses that He would send His angel into the Promised Land to drive out the enemies, but Moses recognized that if God did not go with them the Promised Land was not a place of destiny. God then said He would go with Moses and Israel and leave the enemies to teach them to war and to empower them to love Him. God would partner with them in every aspect of this task. That story reveals a place where God would not be and a place where He would be. His everywhere presence is dependent upon His endearing love in our lives. He chooses to take us to the places where He freely lives and gives all life. He also chooses to go where He would not go for the sake of love.
Blessings,
Ted J. Hanson
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Yes and Amen.