Ted J. Hanson's Weekly Blog – ted4you.com

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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

Donations can be made at the link on the home site of:

www.ted4leaders.com

www.ted4you.com or

www.houseofbreadministry.org.

Checks can be made payable to House of Bread Ministry and sent to:

House of Bread Ministry, 3210 Meridian St., Bellingham, WA 98225

Blog In Audio:

Greetings,

Today I am blogging from the woods. I have been hunting for the past few days and living among the trees. No success yet on the elk harvest, but the weather is nice and the stillness with God is refreshing to my soul. I hope you had a great weekend and were able to connect to God and others. Thanks to the cell phone, I was even able to tune into our home service via the internet.

The greatest testimony of God’s power is the testimony of His love for us all. He remembers us according to His mercy, not according to our transgressions. Even in our error, when we turn to Him, He takes action on our part according to His love. Does God know all things? He knows all things according to His love and He also gives us the ability to be creative as sons and daughters of God to know what God would know if He were to choose to know it. God listens to the voice of man when man chooses what He would choose but didn’t. This was the case in the day when Joshua had been fighting all day in battle but ran out of time to defeat his enemy. Joshua was likely tired and bearing the marks of battle in his body by the end of the day. He may have had a finger missing. He may have had a few gashes in his flesh and wounds in his body from the combat of battle. He had been in the battle with a sword. A heavy sword! He had been likely fighting for 12 to 16 hours and he cried out to God for more time! We can do this! We can overcome! Give me another day to risk my life. Give me another opportunity to lose another finger. Give me the opportunity to suffer longer. We can do this! Give me another day. That day God heeded the voice of a man. He turned the sun back and gave Joshua another day.

Joshua 10:14 And there has been no day like that, before it or after it, that the LORD heeded the voice of a man; for the LORD fought for Israel.

I believe that God knew the heart of Joshua, but I also believe He chose not to know every decision he would make. He set His ability to know aside for the opportunity of sharing the nature of character and surprise. Joshua came up with the request for more time and God listened to Joshua’s request.

Genesis 4:1-5 Now Adam knew Eve his wife, and she conceived and bore Cain, and said, “I have acquired a man from the Lord.” Then she bore again, this time his brother Abel. Now Abel was a keeper of sheep, but Cain was a tiller of the ground. And in the process of time it came to pass that Cain brought an offering of the fruit of the ground to the Lord. Abel also brought of the firstborn of his flock and of their fat. And the Lord respected Abel and his offering, but He did not respect Cain and his offering. And Cain was very angry, and his countenance fell.

The offerings of Cain were not the honor due to God. Cain’s offerings lacked the spirit of honor that was found in the offerings of Abel. Cain didn’t have an offering problem; he had an honor problem. His obvious discouragement when God did not respect His offering reveals that he was giving to get something from Him. He was slow to give because he loved his offering more than he did God. It is the spirit of an offering that makes it what it is. Abel gave offerings of the first; when he had his first lamb in his flock, he gave it to God. His offering was also the best; when he had many sheep, he picked the best one and gave it to God. God does not need the first or the best. Abel’s offering to God was not something given to God for God’s sake. It was something given to God for man’s sake. Abel, a human being, needed to recognize whom God was. He recognized that God was the first and God was the best. There was no commandment. There was only a revelation of honor. He recognized that God was the first and God was the best. It was therefore easy to give God the first and the best because he understood in His heart who God was. Because He saw who God really was, it was easy for Him to give offerings that were expressions of who God was. God honored Abel because Abel’s offerings were ones of honor to God. God was in awe of what Able did. He respected His offering. The Hebrew word for “respect” in this Scripture is h8159. שָׁעָה šâ‘â; a primitive root; to gaze at or about (properly, for help); by implication, to inspect, consider, compassionate, be nonplussed (as looking around in amazement) or bewildered. God was speechless with Abel’s offering! He was surprised! He recognized who Abel was. He saw Abel as a child of God. The heart of the Father was for the son, because the heart of the son was clearly for the Father. There was no control. There was simply a recognizing of who God was by Abel. The son realized: ‘The Father makes me free!” “The Father sets me at liberty!” “He is first and He is the best!” The actions of Abel’s life were simply confessions of who God was to him. The things that Abel did were confessions of who God was in his life. It was easy for God to look at Abel and make confessions of whom he was. God’s respect was that of a father for a son who had come to a revelation of honor in his heart towards his father.

Abel surprised God with his offering. The tabernacle of David was David’s idea because Israel had lost the presence of God in the tent of Moses. God liked it and made David’s tent the tent of His presence. I believe that the element of surprise is an attribute of God. God is a Father and He delights when His children think as He would think without Him thinking it. The Scripture says that Jesus did what He saw His Father doing. This is more than merely doing what God says to do. It is living in the character, nature, way, power, and authority of being a son.

God knows all things according to His love. When it comes to love, there are things He chooses not to know for the sake of love. God wants us to desire to be people of love more than being people of knowledge.

Blessings,

Ted J. Hanson

Donations can be made at the link on the home site of:

www.ted4leaders.com

www.ted4you.com or

www.houseofbreadministry.org.

Checks can be made payable to House of Bread Ministry and sent to:

House of Bread Ministry, 3210 Meridian St., Bellingham, WA 98225

Blog In Audio:

Greetings,

I hope you had a great week and weekend. My week has been good but filled with challenges as well. It was a week to know that God is always good and that we can depend upon Him in all things. We had church in our home yesterday, since the last Sunday of the month at Alife is church deployed. It was a good day.

We don’t depend upon God because of His power. We depend upon God because of His love. God is not merely the all-powerful God; He is our heavenly Father. He gives us life, breath and all things. He is love and as His sons and daughters we are being transformed by the Spirit of God to be people of God. We are being transformed to be people of love. Love is the motivator of free will. Sons and daughters of God are motivated by love, not controlled by mere human conscience or law. God wants us to be the people of God. Being the people of God is the fruit of being a people of God’s presence, praise, and purpose in all things. This is the testimony of God’s manifest presence in the earth.

I believe that God is sovereign in His abilities, but His abilities are subject to the substance of His being. His substance is love. We often define sovereignty as the ability to be all powerful, to know all things, and to be everywhere present at all times. God can intervene in any situation and take control by His power, but there is something more powerful than control. It is the freewill power of love. God doesn’t just want to love us, He wants us to become love for the sake of others. He is quick to draw near to us when we draw near to Him, but He wants us to know the free will power of drawing near to Him. He is the Father at the edge of the road looking for the moment we turn in His direction so He can run to us reaching out to give us all that He has. He wants us to know the power of His love more than the power of His control.

God can know all things, but I believe that love motivates God to choose not to know all things. He has chosen to not remember our sins and our lawless deeds.

Jeremiah 31:34 No more shall every man teach his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, “Know the LORD,’ for they all shall know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them, says the LORD. For I will forgive their iniquity, and their sin I will remember no more.”

When we receive God’s mercy, our sins and lawless deeds He doesn’t know. His forgiveness of the past erases His knowledge of our failures. The Scripture says that Abraham never wavered in his faith. We can measure Abraham by his testimony as Abram, but God sees Abram through the testimony of Abraham.

Romans 4:20 He (Abraham) did not waver at the promise of God through unbelief, but was strengthened in faith, giving glory to God…

God remembers people according to His mercy, not according to their transgressions. He remembers those who come to Him with humble hearts. He is willing to take action for those He loves, but it is for the sake of love that He takes action. He does not exercise His abilities for the sake of legalism. He exercises His abilities for the sake of relationship. He will change His mind, because He can never change His character. When we give Him reason to show mercy, He is quick to respond in His mercy, even to the changing of His mind. People with a religious mindset are not willing to change their minds; therefore, they are willing to change their character to enforce what they have legally pledged.

Psalms 9:12  When He avenges blood, He remembers them; He does not forget the cry of the humble.

Psalms 25:7  Do not remember the sins of my youth, nor my transgressions; according to Your mercy remember me, for Your goodness’ sake, O LORD.

Psalms 79:8 Oh, do not remember former iniquities against us! Let Your tender mercies come speedily to meet us, for we have been brought very low.

Isaiah 43:25 “I, even I, am He who blots out your transgressions for My own sake; and I will not remember your sins.

God who could remember chooses not to remember for the sake of His love for men. As the people of God we must see God as the one who loves and shows mercy. He is slow to anger and quick to forgive. He is patient and long-suffering in who He is. Let us see Him for who He is. Let us be people who demonstrate who God is to a world that does not see Him rightly.

Blessings,

Ted J. Hanson

Donations can be made at the link on the home site of:

www.ted4leaders.com

www.ted4you.com or

www.houseofbreadministry.org.

Checks can be made payable to House of Bread Ministry and sent to:

House of Bread Ministry, 3210 Meridian St., Bellingham, WA 98225

Blog In Audio:

Greetings,

It’s been another week and it appears that fall has arrived in the Northwest. The beginning of rainy days is welcomed considering all the fires that have been on the West coast. With changes of seasons comes changes in our world. The same is true in the spirit. The change of season brings another measure in the change that comes by heaven’s grace.

God wants us to become expressions of His community influencing the communities of the earth. This is the testimony of the city of God and the life-giving river whose streams make it glad. Being a city of God is the fruit of being the people of God. Being the people of God is the fruit of being a people of God’s presence, praise, and purpose in all things. We are called to be a part in the manifest presence of God in the earth. This is the source of our true identity. Our identity is seen as a measure of God’s life in human form. The praise of our lives is the excellence of who we are as an expression of God in life. Our part contributes to the full part of being a family of inheritance for our Father’s name. The purpose of our lives is seen in the demonstration of the power of the life of Christ made known through us that brings life to our world.

Revelation 3:11 Behold, I am coming quickly! Hold fast what you have, that no one may take your crown. 12 He who overcomes, I will make him a pillar in the temple of My God, and he shall go out no more. I will write on him the name of My God and the name of the city of My God, the New Jerusalem, which comes down out of heaven from My God. And I will write on him My new name. 13 “He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.” ’

What is it that empowers us to live as a pillar in the temple of God? What is it that empowers us to live for the Father and for the city of God in all things? Does God control these things or is there something of a freewill offering on our part. Many people believe that God is God because of His sovereignty. I believe that He is sovereign, but I also believe that He has chosen not to exercise His sovereignty in order to reveal a greater power of life in who He is. His sovereignty serves who He is, He does not serve His sovereignty. I believe that He is love, not merely someone who loves. I believe that He is good, and He loves people (Jn. 3:16). I believe that He can be all-powerful, but I believe that He gave us a free will and that free will demonstrates His love for us. He is not looking for slaves or puppets. He doesn’t merely want people to serve Him. He wants people to know that He loves them. Our own traditions can make God’s word of no effect in our lives (Mt. 15:6). It is only when people know that God loves them that they in turn live to love Him and to love others.

Romans 5:8 But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

Romans 8:38, 39 For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

1 John 4:9, 10 In this the love of God was manifested toward us, that God has sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through Him. In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins.

God wants us to know first and foremost that He loves people. He loves us! If we don’t see Him through the eyes of love we will present Him as something less than love to us and others in our world.  When we see God through the eyes of love we become the people of God with a lifestyle of love. Love is more powerful than control. It is more powerful than restraint in any measure. Love is the testimony that triumphs over all offence. It is love that holds us to truth, not truth that holds us to love. As the people of God, we are becoming a people of love that freely give our wills to God and for God in all things because He as love has chosen to make our free wills stronger than His sovereignty. The community of God is a city that freely gives their lives in love to God and to one another in all things. This makes intimacy stronger than knowledge. It makes forgiveness stronger than being right. It makes humility, confession, and a willingness to change more powerful than the judgments of pride, fairness, unfairness, and any stronghold of self. It is not God’s sovereignty of power that makes us the people of God. It is His testimony of love.

Blessings,

Ted J. Hanson

Donations can be made at the link on the home site of:

www.ted4leaders.com

www.ted4you.com or

www.houseofbreadministry.org.

Checks can be made payable to House of Bread Ministry and sent to:

House of Bread Ministry, 3210 Meridian St., Bellingham, WA 98225

Blog In Audio:

Greetings,

We had a great week last week in hosting a World Race gathering at Alife. We had many young people present who are hungry for all that God desires to do in their lives. They are ready for the stirring of God’s vision and dream for their lives as the venture to see God’s presence, praise, and purpose revealed through their lives to their world. It is a journey of faith!

What parts of our lives have we believed to be in faith, only to find that in times of testing they prove to be false? We have all had things in our lives that we thought were important only to find that the loss of them revealed they weren’t as important as we thought they were. We have even held on to things that we thought were of God, but then they proved to be ideas of our own desires. God wants us to be dependent upon Him and no other thing, because only He can give us true life. God says that to be a true Jew is to be someone who has a circumcised heart. A circumcised heart is a heart that is dependent upon God’s Spirit in all things. A heart of flesh is dependent upon oneself, but a heart that is dependent upon God is a heart that puts no confidence in the flesh.

Romans 2:28 For he is not a Jew who is one outwardly, nor is circumcision that which is outward in the flesh; 29 but he is a Jew who is one inwardly; and circumcision is that of the heart, in the Spirit, not in the letter; whose praise is not from men but from God.

Circumcision is a removal of flesh in connection to the procreative ability of our lives. It is a testimony to the source of our future and the inheritance of our future in the destiny of our path in life. When we are challenged to choose between the strength of self or the strength of God in our lives, the loss of our self-will makes room for the gain of God’s will in our lives. This is a key to discovering the source of brotherly love in our connections to one another as the community of God and as a testimony of being the people of God in this world. When we lose the love of ourselves we gain the love of God. Only the love of God in our lives can give us a love for ourselves that goes beyond the limited boundaries of a love of ourselves. It is God’s love in our lives that gives us the ability to persevere in all things and to overcome in every test of our lives. To be the people of God we must each discover who we truly are. Who we are is part of the community of Christ and who we are gives the life of God to others. This is not merely giving the life of ourselves to others, but the life of God through us to others. This is a season where God is empowering us by the grace of Holy Spirit as the Spirit of Knowing to give the life of God through us for the sake of the life of God for us all. This is the testimony of being the community of God.

I believe that the letter to the church of Philadelphia is a testament to the principles, patterns, and values found in this present grace. Another aspect of this letter is seen in the removal of false things, things that pretend to be something of God but prove to be false testimonies that bring false accusations towards the people of God. God wants to remove the false things in our lives by giving us the authentic true things of our lives that worship Him.

Revelation 3:8 “I know your works. See, I have set before you an open door, and no one can shut it; for you have a little strength, have kept My word, and have not denied My name. 9 Indeed I will make those of the synagogue of Satan, who say they are Jews and are not, but lie—indeed I will make them come and worship before your feet, and to know that I have loved you. 10 Because you have kept My command to persevere, I also will keep you from the hour of trial which shall come upon the whole world, to test those who dwell on the earth.”

Perhaps there are things in each of us that need to be transformed to worship God. They may be things that pretend to be a part of us, but do not produce the testimony of God’s life. They are things that can build a city unto ourselves, but they cannot fulfill the true calling of our lives in Christ. They cannot build a temple or a city that is the habitation of God’s presence, praise, and purpose. Just as there were false Jews who opposed the building of the temple and the city in the days of Ezra and Nehemiah, there are things in our hearts that prevent us from being the habitation of God. God wants us to be members of a community that is the habitation of God’s presence, praise, and purpose. When we embrace these things in our hearts we find an overcoming grace to live for a new vision of peace. A peace that only comes by increasingly becoming the people of God. It is a peace that comes when heaven progressively fills our lives together as the people of God. This is the place where we find true brotherly love. The strength is not found in the flesh. It is found through a circumcision of our hearts. A circumcised heart is dependent upon all that God is writing by His Spirit within each of us for the greater testimony of us all together for the glory of God.

Revelation 3:11 Behold, I am coming quickly! Hold fast what you have, that no one may take your crown. 12 He who overcomes, I will make him a pillar in the temple of My God, and he shall go out no more. I will write on him the name of My God and the name of the city of My God, the New Jerusalem, which comes down out of heaven from My God. And I will write on him My new name. 13 “He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.” ’

Blessings,

Ted J. Hanson

Donations can be made at the link on the home site of:

www.ted4leaders.com

www.ted4you.com or

www.houseofbreadministry.org.

Checks can be made payable to House of Bread Ministry and sent to:

House of Bread Ministry, 3210 Meridian St., Bellingham, WA 98225

Blog In Audio:

Greetings,

I hope you had a great weekend. We were blessed at Alife with another corporate gathering. God and His people are very good! I was blessed last week to also have a visit from some young folks involved with World Race and the G42 Leadership Training school. We experienced the presence of Holy Spirit together and lives were touched.

We are living is a time of the grace of the Spirit of Knowing. Holy Spirit is working in the church and in the earth to bring forth a testimony of us as the people of God. It is about becoming expressions of the love of God in flesh. This is not love as defined by our personal woundings; but love according to God’s character of sacrificial giving. We are to be the community of God in the midst of the nations of the world. We can expect to face the resistance of spiritual forces of darkness as the light of Christ manifests in this grace in the earth. We must keep our focus on what God is doing and not be distracted by the counterfeits of the enemy.

This is a grassroots revolution to heal the bitter roots of our hearts that spawn the beliefs of legalism and/or lawlessness. These two attributes cry out with a voice of justice, but true justice comes from God. It is a justice of love and life-giving change. God is working by the Spirit of Knowing to bring about true brotherly love. In a time of brotherly love, the enemy seeks to deceive, conflict, and devour in the apparel of prejudicial division. It is a time of holiness and we can expect to face onslaughts of wickedness. God’s grace is inspiring a hunger for God and His presence, so we can expect the resistance of a spirit that inspires men and women to reject God and His word. God is opening legitimate doors of love and life-giving liberty; we can expect illegitimate doors of selfish agendas and carnal ways to oppose that life. It is a season to discover God resting in our lives. The counterfeit is a rejection of God and an unrest of mankind. This is a time for truth and to become truth. Therefore, there is a distraction of deceptions and lies where truth is depicted as a lie and lies are presented as the truth. It is a time to be authentic and not hypocritically false. As the community of the people of God we will see true vulnerability and change. The enemy opposes such a time with coverups to the truth and stubbornness of pride towards change. This is a season of the fruit of life and the opposing force of death comes in the disguise of flattering speech and deceptive words and ways. This is time of free willed sacrificial love, but the enemy opposes with things that tread upon and trample human hearts. They are thus bound from a willingness to make sacrifices for others in a free will offering of love, but seek the sacrifice of others for their own personal agendas based upon the bitter wounds of their own hearts and minds.

The bottom line is, we must look for life in this day of life. We will find what we are looking for and looking at. We will become expressions of what we are looking for and looking at. If bitterness is the root of the focus of our hearts, our eyes will look with a paradigm of a vindication of the flesh. We cannot heal the wounds of the past by seeking to erase the past. We can only allow the wounds of the past to become testimonies of love for the sake of others in our world of today. Jesus didn’t allow the marks of His crucifixion to be bitter wounds for carnal judgment. He allowed them to be testimonies for the sake of giving life and love to others, even to those who seemingly forsook Him in the day of His wounding.

John 20:19 Then, the same day at evening, being the first day of the week, when the doors were shut where the disciples were assembled, for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood in the midst, and said to them, “Peace be with you.” 20 When He had said this, He showed them His hands and His side. Then the disciples were glad when they saw the Lord. 21 So Jesus said to them again, “Peace to you! As the Father has sent Me, I also send you.” 22 And when He had said this, He breathed on them, and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit. 23 If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.”

When we embrace the resurrection life of Christ, we embrace the eternal love of Christ. God is invading the earth with heaven’s grace and this is a time of the Spirit of Knowing, a part of the perfecting process of Holy Spirit in our lives. We must look for, expect to see, and believe to be transformed by God’s grace to see intimacy, unity through diversity, the value of individuals for the greater purpose of us all, brotherly love, holiness, a hunger for God’s presence and word, legitimate doors of authority giving life to our world, mercy triumphing over every judgment and grace creating a new reality, grace to bring life to death and truth that comes by God’s transformation to crumble every lie, God resting in our lives, believing God’s truth and becoming testimonies of His truth, vulnerability and change, fruit producing life, and an empowerment to live our lives with free willed sacrificial love for God and one another. These things are happening right now in our word if we have an ear to hear the sound of faith and an expectancy to see pieces of these in our world. Clear vision is the big picture according to the eternal plan of our loving Father. Clear vision only comes through the added little pieces that we look to see. Look for the pieces of God’s grace working in our midst!

Blessings,

Ted J. Hanson

Donations can be made at the link on the home site of:

www.ted4leaders.com

www.ted4you.com or

www.houseofbreadministry.org.

Checks can be made payable to House of Bread Ministry and sent to:

House of Bread Ministry, 3210 Meridian St., Bellingham, WA 98225

Blog In Audio:

Greetings;

Yesterday we had our first return to church as ALife community after several months of meeting in homes. It was great to see people I haven’t seen face-to-face in a while. It was wonderful to have real live worship and people in the room. Pastors Jonathan and Danie did a great job delivering the word and we had some wonderful ministry time at the close of the service.

I have been addressing the need to keep our focus on what God is doing in the season and not to be distracted by the crisis management process of the world. This is the way of the world, but it not meant to be the way of the church. We are not called to respond to the enemy, we are called to force the enemy to respond to us. God’s grace gives us the power to reign in life.

As I stated last week, God is bringing about unity and we must not be distracted by division. God is calling us to a be who we are for a greater corporate testimony as the body of Christ. It is not about what we get in life, but the life that comes into the world because of us. Brotherly love is an empowerment of God’s grace and it is not merely a discipline of the flesh. It is a testimony of God’s Spirit of Knowing working in our midst.

We can expect to see Jesus standing in the midst of the church in the testimony of the Spirit of Knowing, a testimony of intimacy and love. In this present season He is standing in our midst as the One who is holy and true. Holiness is not some religious performance or religious character. It is an attribute of purity, morality, and a full connection to life. The word implies being sacred, but we most often equate being sacred to being religious. I believe that God’s true religion is an attribute of giving life at all times to those who need life. It isn’t an attribute of getting, but one of giving. God is holy because He doesn’t need anything, but is the One who gives life, breath, and all things. This is His ability because this is His substance. Because God is holy, He can make life-giving decisions even for those who are not holy. He is pure and nothing can cause Him to not be pure. God wants us to be pure and for nothing to cause us not to be pure. I believe this is to be authentic. The fruit of holiness is good conduct and virtuous works. It is void of envy, self-seeking, and any manner of hypocrisy. I believe godly wisdom is a testimony of holiness and worldly wisdom is based upon an unholy attitude, motive, and action spawned from a bitter heart.

James 3:13 Who is wise and understanding among you? Let him show by good conduct that his works are done in the meekness of wisdom. 14 But if you have bitter envy and self-seeking in your hearts, do not boast and lie against the truth. 15 This wisdom does not descend from above, but is earthly, sensual, demonic. 16 For where envy and self-seeking exist, confusion and every evil thing are there. 17 But the wisdom that is from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, willing to yield, full of mercy and good fruits, without partiality and without hypocrisy. 18 Now the fruit of righteousness is sown in peace by those who make peace.

King David experienced the holiness of God and the holiness of God was able to transform the character of David. In the flesh David was not holy, but his willing pursuit of God in His holiness changed the character, nature, way, power, and authority of David’s life.

Revelation 3:7 “And to the angel of the church in Philadelphia write, “These things says He who is holy, He who is true, ‘He who has the key of David, He who opens and no one shuts, and shuts and no one opens”…

As we see information explode in the environments of the world, we must look for intimacy with Christ and one another as the people of God. It is only by embracing being a giver of life that we can become holy and true. We must pursue an intimate connection with the One who gives life so we can also give life to others. When the environments of the world seem to explode with wickedness, it is time for us to look for and embrace being holy. This is not embracing some religious piety. It is being authentic to being connected to God who is life and being a giver of life at all times. I like to think of being holy as like being wholly who we are meant to be. It is a place of security in who we are in Christ to be the life of Christ in all things. Being holy and true will open the legitimate doors of our lives and close the illegitimate ones.

Blessings,

Ted J. Hanson

Donations can be made at the link on the home site of:

www.ted4leaders.com

www.ted4you.com or

www.houseofbreadministry.org.

Checks can be made payable to House of Bread Ministry and sent to:

House of Bread Ministry, 3210 Meridian St., Bellingham, WA 98225

Blog In Audio:

Greetings,

It’s amazing how quickly the summer months go by where I live. I don’t know if the same is with you, but in the Northwest of Washington it seems that August is one of the shortest months of the year. It seems that season change is in the air. Perhaps there is a spiritual change in the air as well. Change is always in the path to tomorrow.

It is important that we focus on what God is doing in the earth. We must not be distracted by what the world is doing, we must see what God is doing. If we fix our eyes upon what the world is doing, we will become like the world. If we fix our eyes on what God is doing we will be life-givers to our world. God gives life, breath, and all things. He is a giver and there is never a time where God cannot be a giver of life. As sons and daughters of God we are to be the same. What is it that has our attention?

Matthew 6:22 “The lamp of the body is the eye. If therefore your eye is good, your whole body will be full of light. 23 But if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If therefore the light that is in you is darkness, how great is that darkness!

It is easy to be distracted by things of darkness and to think they are light. Things of the world will inspire us to worry, but things of God will inspire us to see His kingdom rising and it will empower us to know God in an intimate way. True righteousness is a relationship with God that empowers us to be a testimony of the truth of life in this world.

Matthew 6:31 “Therefore do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ 32 For after all these things the Gentiles seek. For your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. 33 But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you. 34 Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about its own things. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble.

If we are worried about tomorrow we are focusing on the things that the world sees. Nothing can separate us from the love of God and God in His love is working things out for us in every situation. In a time of the Spirit of Knowing we must keep our eyes on intimacy with God and one another. We must not be distracted by knowledge that makes us word sensitive. We interpret the words of others through the dictionaries of our own hearts and minds. If we can be offended, we will be offended. Only love can make us unshakeable in times of offenses. The enemy uses the weapon of a knowledge of good and evil to distract us from exercising the use of love for others that overcomes the judgments of the flesh.

God wants us to find unity through diversity, but only God at the center of each of our lives can give us the true unity of life. The enemy uses the weapons of self-will, self-focus, and all manner of selfishness to create division. We must look to God to unite us in our diversity. Are we looking to find unity through a focus on God or are we looking to empower division by a focus on ourselves? God’s love for each and every one is strong enough to transform the hearts and minds of all people.

God wants us to be individual people that create a greater corporate influence in our world. The internal kingdom of God empowers us to live for the wellbeing of others. The enemy seeks to promote a corporate control disguised as benefits for individual people in order to destroy the uniqueness of our lives together. The power of the Spirit of Knowing is that of a freewill offering. It is not a matter of taking what others have for ourselves. It is a matter of freely choosing to live for others. It is a matter of freely living to be a community of life. To be a community of life, each member must live to give life to others. The enemy is a thief and he seeks to empower the nature of a thief within our hearts. A thief is a taker. A taker is inspired by envy, jealousy, insecurity, and a bitter root in their heart that causes strife in some way.

The Spirit of Knowing is a testimony of brotherly love. The enemy seeks to stir up prejudicial division between brothers. The sixth letter to the churches of Revelation was to the church of Philadelphia. The name Philadelphia means “brotherly love”. This is the fruit that God is going to bring to manifest in our day. We must not be distracted by the weeds in the garden. We must not be distracted by the counterfeits to the truth of God’s grace working in our world.

Blessings,

Ted J. Hanson

Donations can be made at the link on the home site of:

www.ted4leaders.com

www.ted4you.com or

www.houseofbreadministry.org.

Checks can be made payable to House of Bread Ministry and sent to:

House of Bread Ministry, 3210 Meridian St., Bellingham, WA 98225

Blog In Audio:

Greetings,

I hope you are all well and that your week and weekend were filled with God’s presence and life. I was blessed to be at Everyone’s Church in Mt. Vernon, Washington yesterday. It was good to see some faces I have missed, though it is nicer to view them without masks. We had a good encounter with Holy Spirit and God’s word.

We are in a season of the influence of the grace of the Spirit of knowing. This is not a grace for knowledge as in information. It is a knowledge of intimacy. It is knowing of God and a knowing of one another. It is knowing of the heart.  It is a grace for unity through diversity. Though we are diverse in our individuality, together we become a community of diversity for a greater testimony of the likeness and the image of our heavenly Father made known in the earth. We can expect that weapons will be formed against this, but the Spirit of Christ in the body of Christ is greater than any spirit in the world. God is going to bring about the attributes of the grace of the Spirit of Knowing. Those attributes are ones of brotherly love, as the sent Spirit to the church of Philadelphia is a testimony of brotherly love. Jesus is in our midst to reveal true holiness. He is in our midst to cause what is true to be made known. He is in our midst to demonstrate the judgments of God’s mercy on our behalf because of a willingness to embrace the corrections and the directions of God in our midst. Our hearts are being opened to hunger for and seek out God in our lives in a seven day per week, twenty-four hour per day reality. Like King David, we are going to discover God in every moment of time, not merely the events of time. God is opening legitimate doors and closing illegitimate ones. We are being tested in our strength to keep God’s word and in our willingness to confess His name. Lies  and liars are being exposed and God is going to confirm those He loves. Perseverance is a testimony of our day! This is perseverance in our love for God and for one another in a day of testing. The overcoming grace of the Spirit of Knowing, the sixth attribute of the sevenfold Holy Spirit, is empowering us to be a place where God rests in the earth. Resting in God and God resting in us is a hallmark of this present grace from heaven. God is going to change our thinking through a transformation of the beliefs of our hearts. We will live for God and for the community of God; a community that lives with and for a vision of peace that is only found in Christ. A testimony of being new is going to fill our hearts and minds in a knowing of God though our lives that empowers a freewill to live for the wellbeing of others.

The community of God is dependent upon being the temple of God’s Holy Spirit. The temple is not dependent upon the community. The community is dependent upon the temple. The temple of the Holy Spirit will activate, facilitate, and release the community of Christ. Build a temple and you will build the city. Build the city and you may never build the temple. If we try to create some expression of Christ community without the manifest presence of Christ, we will only form a human copy of what we perceive to be Christ-like. Only by a manifestation of Christ in us, the Holy Spirit who comes in the name of Jesus, can we become the true community of Christ. The place of life forevermore, eternal life, is the place where heaven touches the earth. This is the place where the anointing oil on the top of the head of Jesus the eternal High Priest who stands forever as the head of the body of Christ in heaven runs down upon the body of Christ and spills over unto the earth.  Christ is the manifest presence of Holy Spirit in and upon the body of Christ. It is not merely the human spirit that is in all people, it is the manifest presence of the Holy Spirit that God desires to be in and upon all people. The door is open in heaven, but human hearts upon the earth must open to Him to become the place of His habitation upon the earth. This is the testimony of being the temple of God.

Psalms 133:1-3 Behold, how good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity! It is like the precious oil upon the head, running down on the beard, the beard of Aaron, running down on the edge of his garments. It is like the dew of Hermon, descending upon the mountains of Zion; for there the Lord commanded the blessing — Life forevermore.

In the Old Testament King Cyrus made a decree to build the temple of God and that decree was in reality a decree to build the city of God (Ezra 1:2; Dan. 9:25). The city of God had to be built because the temple was built (including the law and proper offerings). The word sent to build the city was the physical manifestation of the temple. The temple was the word gone forth. Build a temple and there will be a city. It is just like our Christian walk. If the Spirit who comes in the name of Jesus is in our hearts, if there is a temple, then the work of the city (Christian community life) can be completed. Once the Spirit of Jesus is in our hearts, we are new creations, but it is yet to be further manifested in our lives. God spoke the word to call us, but it didn’t become ‘the word sent forth’ until we received the Spirit that comes in the name of Jesus into our hearts. We had to become a house for His Spirit to dwell in and we had to receive His Spirit to dwell in us to write His law upon our hearts and minds. That law is not the Torah law of the Old Covenant, but the testimony of the Father’s love. We had to become proper ‘burnt offerings’ through the one offering Jesus Christ (Rom. 12:1 – members of the body of Christ). Christian community doesn’t make us the testimony of Christ. Doing good and nice things doesn’t make us the community of Christ. Surly Christ in us will empower us to be good and to do good things, but the glory of good is not our goal. It is the glory of God! Christ in us empowers us to become the testimony of a Christ-like community.

Blessings,

Ted J. Hanson

Donations can be made at the link on the home site of:

www.ted4leaders.com

www.ted4you.com or

www.houseofbreadministry.org.

Checks can be made payable to House of Bread Ministry and sent to:

House of Bread Ministry, 3210 Meridian St., Bellingham, WA 98225

Blog In Audio:

Greetings,

We had a great weekend here in Bellingham. Pastors Jonathan and Danie did a great job yesterday with an online message for our Church Deployed. I am looking forward to our prayer meeting tonight. If you didn’t get a chance to view the prophetic word I released on www.ted4leaders.com last Wednesday, please give it a listen or a look. We can trust God! He is doing good things on our behalf.

When King Asa of Judah acted foolishly by trusting the power of human kingdoms above his trust for God, the prophet Hanani reminded him that God is only one to trust. It is God who looks for opportunities to show Himself strong on behalf of all who trust Him. This is not a time to be shaken by kingdoms we cannot trust. This is a time to be steadfast and strong in the One we can trust. God wants to reveal who He is in our lives

2 Chronicles 16:9 …the eyes of the Lord run to and fro throughout the whole earth, to show Himself strong on behalf of those whose heart is loyal to Him.

We are in a season of being dependent upon God. There is a faith towards God that grants us wisdom that is based upon a willingness to receive whatever He gives. There is also a faith towards God that grants us wisdom that is based upon an awe of who God is. It is an awe that enables us to do whatever God says for us to do. There is also a faith towards God that is fully dependent upon God above all things. It is a faith that gives us true wisdom because we recognize that apart from God we know nothing. In knowing nothing we are dependent upon the One who knows all things. This is the path of life. A path of trusting God in all things is a path unto increasing life. God takes note of those who trust Him. When we embrace God’s ways, God makes it possible for us to walk in His paths.

Proverbs 5:21 For the ways of a man are before the eyes of the LORD, and He watches all his paths.

God doesn’t watch us so that He can judge those who are bad. God watches us because He wants to reward us for being like Him in our character, nature, way, power, and authority. He is ready to give us His counsel. He is willing to support us with His strength. He is pleased to call us His children, therefore, we are pleased to act His children. When we commit the deeds of our lives to being deeds that glorify God, God is faithful to give us the fruit of our deeds in abundant measures. The deeds that glorify God are deeds that are done for the well-being of others.

Jeremiah 32:19 You are great in counsel and mighty in deed, whose eyes are open to all the ways of the sons of men, giving to everyone according to his ways and according to the fruit of his deeds…

God wants to expand the territory of our lives. He wants to empower us to become His life-giving community. He wants to bless us with provision that increases because of His presence in all that we are and have in Him. Our protection is God in our midst. Instead of walls of defense and isolation, God in our lives is an expanding boundary of fire. God’s fire is a testimony of His life-giving ways.

Zechariah 2:5 For I,’ says the LORD, “will be a wall of fire all around her, and I will be the glory in her midst.’ ”

We are in a season of increasing as the people of God in the earth. As the people of God, we are a growing expression of being His life-giving community in the midst of communities of men.

1 Peter 3: 8 Finally, all of you be of one mind, having compassion for one another; love as brothers, be tenderhearted, be courteous; 9 not returning evil for evil or reviling for reviling, but on the contrary blessing, knowing that you were called to this, that you may inherit a blessing. 10 For “He who would love life and see good days, let him refrain his tongue from evil, and his lips from speaking deceit. 11 Let him turn away from evil and do good; let him seek peace and pursue it. 12 For the eyes of the Lord are on the righteous, and His ears are open to their prayers; but the face of the Lord is against those who do evil.”

God is attentive to all who desire a relationship with Him. The evidence of our relationship with God is seen in our relationships with one another. We need never be afraid of the Lord being against us, because we willingly embrace Him and His ways by our compassion and care for one another. When we live to embrace one another, be compassionate to one another, and love one another as a family loves the members of the family, God takes note and is eager to answer the prayers of our hearts. He desires a face-to-face relationship with all who embrace His ways in life. This is the season of being the people of God that bring the life of God to our world.

Blessings,

Ted J. Hanson

Donations can be made at the link on the home site of:

www.ted4leaders.com

www.ted4you.com or

www.houseofbreadministry.org.

Checks can be made payable to House of Bread Ministry and sent to:

House of Bread Ministry, 3210 Meridian St., Bellingham, WA 98225