Blog In Audio:
Greetings,
I hope you are well and growing in your connection with God in the midst of all that is going on in the world. Yesterday I was blessed to speak at our home church of ALife. I presented some things that I hear and see God doing in the season before us.
We are in the process of being manifest as the people of God in a fuller measure. It is the challenges of life that manifest the supernatural reality of being sons and daughters of God. The true test of grace is found I the process of tribulation, cheerful endurance, character change, and hope. That hope is the testimony of the work of grace proven in our lives. The revelation we receive becomes the substance we become by the work of God’s amazing grace. A new gift of trust is being given to us that is unlike anything we have known before. We can expect to be tested in our trust. God desires for us know a work of trust that comes by the grace of God. That trust is not a trust in the works of the flesh, but in the goodness of God. To know the trust that God desires for us to have is to know Christ as the Rock of hope in our lives. He is the Rock that is solid and true. He wants our character to match the character of His truth as a Rock of our salvation. I believe a prophetic charge for 2021 is for us to know the call of the Spirit to God for us to find the Rock of Christ to cause us be people who are immovable in the testimony of God’s love.
Psalms 61:2 From the end of the earth I will cry to You, when my heart is overwhelmed; Lead me to the rock that is higher than I.
A house is only as secure in its standing as it is in its connection to a foundation. Christ is the foundation of our lives and He is the life-giving Rock that empowers us to become a house that reveals the substance of who Christ is to the world around us. As we enter this new year we must embrace an authentic connection in hearing and responding to all that God says to us. Foundations guarantee the future of the house. Every house that is built faces the elements of testing and the opposition of many seasons of life. In Christ the foundation of our lives is established in the Rock of Christ. The objective is to be connected to the Rock, not to see how great our house can become, but our connection to Christ causes our house to reveal a testimony of who Christ is to our world. When we are connected to the Rock of Christ, even if the house were to fall down, we will be ok. Our connection to the Rock is a connection to LIFE in every moment and season of our lives. We are a house of God’s presence in all seasons of our lives.
Luke 6:47 “Whoever comes to Me, and hears My sayings and does them, I will show you whom he is like: 48 He is like a man building a house, who dug deep and laid the foundation on the rock. And when the flood arose, the stream beat vehemently against that house, and could not shake it, for it was founded on the rock. 49 But he who heard and did nothing is like a man who built a house on the earth without a foundation, against which the stream beat vehemently; and immediately it fell. And the ruin of that house was great.”
Foundations guarantee a future. When Christ is the foundation of our lives, the trials in our lives cannot prevail over the faithfulness of God in the foundation of our lives. The man who dug down to the rock, was the one who responded to the words of God in his life. In this story of two houses, both houses were built in the same geographical location. Both may have been the same design of house and even the same size of house. Perhaps they both were drawn with the same architectural floor plan. Both houses are likened unto people who God was speaking to and who were hearing what He had to say. The difference is that one responded by acting upon the words he heard while the other did not. Jesus says that the one who heard and responded to what he heard was like one who digs down to the rock and establishes a foundation for his house. The one who merely heard is like someone who built his house without any foundation at all. If we just hear God’s words of love for us without responding with love for Him, we will fall short in becoming who we are meant to be. Our love for Him is seen in our responding relationship with Him. The response of acting upon what God is saying is a testimony to the process of setting a foundation for the house. Both houses in this story were faced with the violent storms of life, but only the house with the foundation set upon the rock was able to stand.
Deuteronomy 32:1 “Give ear, O heavens, and I will speak; and hear, O earth, the words of my mouth. 2 Let my teaching drop as the rain, My speech distill as the dew, as raindrops on the tender herb, and as showers on the grass. 3 For I proclaim the name of the LORD: Ascribe greatness to our God. 4 He is the Rock, His work is perfect; for all His ways are justice, a God of truth and without injustice; righteous and upright is He.
This new year is going to be a year of knowing the Rock of Christ in our lives. In knowing Him we will become like Him in the place of our standing. As a Rock He is One to be trusted and He will prove to be trustworthy in our lives. We will stand as a place where God shines to our world.
Blessings,
Ted J. Hanson
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The Rock of My Salvation
If the foundation of Jesus in not established in me could it be like the foolish virgin who did not fill her lamp with oil!
Definition of The Cornerstone: “The cornerstone (or foundation stone or setting stone) is the first stone set in the construction of a masonry foundation, important since all other stones will be set in reference to this stone, thus determining the position of the entire structure.
Beginning in Genesis (29), the Stone is mentioned as Israel–But his bow remained firm, And his arms were agile, From the hands of the Mighty One of Jacob (From there is the Shepherd, the Stone of Israel.) The beautiful idea that God as our Shepherd is the Stone of Israel is synthesized throughout scripture. The concept of the cornerstone is illustrated by the fact that the people of Israel find their foundation built upon a promise; the first covenant with God through Abraham. Abraham, the Father of Nations, is the cornerstone of Israel where we Gentiles have been built into the foundations of the Kingdom of God in an eternal dwelling place with our Good Shepherd, Jesus Christ.
I go to the Mountain of the Lord and hide myself with Him in the cleft of the Rock You will have songs as in the night when you keep the festival, And gladness of heart as when one marches to the sound of the flute, To go to the mountain of the LORD, to the Rock of Israel (Isaiah.) The Mountain of the Lord is where He gives me access into the Holy of Holy’s where I abide in presence of God. Jesus is seated in Zion, the city of our God and I am seated in Him. And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus, (Ephesians.) The Rock is in me and I in the Rock. My life is redeemed because of what He did for us, grace becomes the mortar of a new construction beginning with the cornerstone. The position of my life is built on the sure foundation of Jesus Christ. The winds and storms come railing against such a structure. The structure is solid and shall not fall because all things work together for the good of those who are in Christ Jesus.
When I think on how my life has transformed because of the Spirit of the Living God and my relationship with Jesus my first love, I thank God for His Word that goes deep into my bones and builds more of the Rock into my life–the sure foundation, the precious cornerstone holds me on solid ground. My Rock gives water like in the wilderness, living water that never runs dry. My Rock shelters me from the cares of the world and hides me in the cleft as I look full into the face of Jesus. Do not tremble and do not be afraid; Have I not long since announced it to you and declared it? And you are My witnesses Is there any God besides Me, Or is there any other Rock? I know of none (Isaiah 44.)