The Sword of Goliath

On January 27, 2023 By happyreignIn HeatherLeave a comment

This word is about a week late to posting.

Last week, closer to the turn of the new year, I felt like not only had things we had been dealing with over recent months shift and release but almost as if the chapter of the last decade of our life had also turned.

In the bible there is a story from the life of David where, his earlier major victory of rising up to face a giant and defeating him occurred. From there he went on to do other things, minister to the king, made new alliances and gained new best friends. He walked in a new level of exposure and authority for this season. He even married into the kings family. But eventually hardship overcame his new circumstances and he could no longer remain where he was at anymore. David could not control this, despite his calling and anointing.

The very person he had gained favor with by defeating Goliath had grown the desire to eliminate David. David remained the same but the season and circumstances around him changed. This was the Lord’s doing and was a necessary part in David’s growing process. The coming hardships are what forged David’s character to lead in Christ, through Christ, and with him,

Despite his previously achieved positions of influence and authority, David needs to leave this place. David leaves empty handed with nothing and no one into his next season. To the naked eye, one could not see his calling and the fact that he had previously already been anointed King. He visibly carried nothing with him into his next season, but what he DID carry was the only thing that mattered, his history in God, his calling and his anointing for it.

I’m almost to the point in the story I’ve been getting to. David arrived at the temple of the Lord at the time while fleeing (the first place he ran to was God’s dwelling, the place of God’s presence) and while there, God had two things for him. The bread of God’s presence, Christ crucified’s living word to nourish, sustain, and feed David. And secondly, what I’ve been aiming at, it that it seems to me a season where God himself is handing his people back, and placing in their hands again, the sword of authority they gained a decade ago when they slew the giant, that big thing from your past that you gained victory in that’s been wrapped in your mantle and hidden away for some time. You may have wondered even it even really happened or if it even mattered since it feels like it was sitting in an unvisable room in your life. It feels like God is saying, I need you empty handed and with me for this next season. Here, I’ve created circumstance where you are only getting sustenance from my words to you, and in this place I’m bringing out your distant past great victory with me and I’m calling that history and authority to the forefront again to pick up, carry, and walk with into your next season.

David asked the priest do you have any weapons–what can carry in my hands to be useful with now? The priest said I only have one weapon here to give to you, your own sword back, the sword you slew Goliath with. Let me hand your beginning, the thing that started it all, your history of victory in God, back to you, it is the mantle you will walk in again. David–alone, disposed of, and running away from the city toward the wilderness again (his old stomping grounds)–was handed back directly from God’s presence what had always been stored and kept there safely all along.

Invitation to Prayer – Death by a Fence

On August 14, 2022August 14, 2022 By happyreignIn Heather2 Comments

Hey Everyone! It’s been a million years since writing. I had a dream last night that I want to share for the purpose of praying together for the body of Christ.

I was looking down a dirt farm road and there were two large barns off to the left of this road right in front of me. Between these barns was a tall wire fence. This fence was stronger than the strength of a full size dam but it was still just a wire fence. I watched a heard of wild horses running full speed over these hills towards this fence from the left. There was no reduction in speed before they hit. The first died instantly, then the herd kept coming. They did not stop, the horses that hit first piled up dead at the front. The force with which these horses hit literally shook the earth I was standing on. It was a shocking and painful thing to watch.

As I awoke I understood that this fence was picture of running into offense in the heart of many powerful believers resulting in a lot of spiritual death. I do not know if this is offense at God or offense at men. I do not know whether this is happening now, has happened already or will happen. The force of offense resulting in spiritual death was shaking the earth.

Some sobering questions that arose within me from this picture are:
Am I operating out of offense toward another or others? Am I offended at God about something? Am I prepared if God moves in a way entirely against my expectation or understanding right now?

As I shared this dream out-loud, another verse grew in clarity for me. “The love of many will grow cold.” This came to mind not as a pessimistic outlook, but a sobering thermometer gauge of healthiness. This verse doesn’t say suddenly turn cold in an instant, it says “will grow cold.” When things grow in a field, it is a slow occurrence, little by little, over time, beyond the ability of a passing observant eye to even notice the growth. Loving the lord God with all your heart, mind, body, soul; receiving and experiencing the Love he first has for us is our walk of faith. This exchange of love is what everything else lives as an expression of; this is the healthy root of a thing. If we hate our brothers, we will be made into liars.

Thank you for prayers for the body of Christ that her heart would be protected against a great offense affecting many.

Is my love for man/God growing in this season? or growing cold? Return to my first L O V E

What is happening right now?

On November 2, 2020November 3, 2020 By happyreignIn Heather, Reflections & Musings4 Comments

Let me give you a zoomed out perspective that may offer you someone hope during this time.

I went into the spring of this year knowing God was setting each builder in place, in their callings, in order to fully mobilize the body of Christ this year.
Then COVID-19 happened. The arrangement of destiny placement happened anyway despite of this, and sometimes in part, aided by it.
The wave of restriction that hit our nation in March brought a blanket over every activity not worth fighting to resurrect again. Many things still lay dormant that no one will ever exert the effort and energy to resurrect. Only activities that are pertinent to life and families has endured. Everything that was an old ritual still in motion has fallen away.
You, right now you are placed. Some part of how you have been created is being set in place, is growing beneath the surface, is in the formative stages. You are walking out your destiny today, you are on the path of your destiny today.
If it doesn’t feel great, don’t worry about it. Sometimes we think when we lay ahold of our dreams or purpose everything will be clouds and pillows. Not always so; sometimes exactly the opposite. But there will be growth and growth can be uncomfortable and painful but it will always be worth its reward.
Nothing may comfortable. This is 100% okay. God has every minute (mynoot) detail of society poised and positioned for his glory. Every little hinge and door and window and hallway of culture is intentional. Sickness and disease arn’t intentional, but your lack of ability to trust what you used to is.
God is at peace. He is comfortable with your discomfort and certain in your uncertainty. He’s not doing things happenstancely in your life. When we feel completely dependent on him, it’s because it is real. We ARE completely dependent upon him.
When you are positioned in circumstances that you feel you cannot change, he always retains the ability to change them. This ultimately comes down to his Lordship over your life and how you feel about that. This doesn’t mean joy isn’t set before you or that it is not worth the outcome. On the contrary, its just what your destiny ordered.
You’ve been prepared for this. All that history, all that experience, all that wisdom you’ve been carrying around with you? It is for now.
Your presence in your country matters. That’s why you are there! Everyday you chose to show up, not let go of kindness, hope for peace, dare to laugh, and love anyway, these all matter…a lot.

I never have answers, only inklings. The course of a world is being altered at this time before our very eyes. We no longer can see our future anymore clearly through the lens of where we’ve come from.

Everything is about relationship. The fastest advancing front of the kingdom in this hour is family, even helped in-part by COVID circumstances. Everything God does is unshakable and preservable. You are a living collection of a lifetime of experiences of love that came in so many forms and fashions. You have experienced kindness and have the ability to continue to give it without condition.

Despite any trouble around you, he is oh so kind, oh so near, oh so excited about you just as you are. He never postpones delighting in you. I hope you feel connection with him despite any lack of understanding or confusion about what’s going on around you. He is not cold or harsh, he is not hurting you, or abrasive.

Nothing that happens for the remainder of this year has not been foreseen by him. Nothing that happens in the next two months will catch God off-guard or cause him to come off kilter. He is firmly placed, unmovable, unshakeable. Not only is he not undeterred, he is expectant and confident. He has seen the end from the very beginning. He is so good at conducting the orchestra of time and humanity.

You are hedged in by blessing right now and beloved of the Lord. Trust is the road that will bring you to the resting place of peace.

Blessings!

What Has Happened the Last Four Years in the Body of Christ in the U.S.??

On March 7, 2018March 7, 2018 By happyreignIn Heather, Reflections & Musings4 Comments

Okay, this piece may not resonate with everyone but it hopeful resonates with someone. So you’re a person who loves God with all your heart. If that has been the overwhelming cry of your heart for the past few decades some of us have been taken on a wild ride. Let me review in a tiny synopsis a general progression one could observe in the body of Christ before I make my point. Early 1500’s reformation of the concept of earned placement in heaven through the church – Martin Luther. 1700’s evangelism had the wind of heaven behind it on a number of people abroad and in America – Johnathan Edwards, George Whitfield, John Wesley, etc. Mid-nineteen hundreds we have healing and miraculous through Billy Graham, Smith Wigglesworth, A.A. Allen, Oral Roberts, etc. 1980’s Kansas City Prophets with a new normal being establish in hearing from God. 1990’s we have Toronto Outpouring that really redirected the lives of Apostles like Randy Clark, Heidi Baker, Bill Johnson, etc. In late 2000’s we have Lakeland and IHOP in glory and presence and miracles and grace with Todd Bentley and Mike Bickle and others. Then in the early 2010’s it was the seven mountains, going out, taking position, reigning and influencing.

We’re now in the late 2010’s. WHAT NOW?!? What is God doing?!? How are we growing?? What are we learning??

I know for the last four years in particular there are SO MANY people surrounding me that were the crazy-on-fire-for God type a decade ago that now look drastically different. But I don’t want there to be misunderstanding and so I write. Let me start off by saying I don’t see the devil. What I mean by this is that God is not in some cataclysmic warfare against an almost equal opponent in the sky. God has no enemy that provides any sort of threat and is writing a love story and an expression of himself that we get to be gloriously wrapped up in. Moving on.

I don’t see the drying up (on a corporate level) of the last jumping-around-in-the-river-season as human failure, performance blunder, and now the body of Christ is supposed to get back on the work-up-the-glory-treadmill to try and conjure up some past experience so that we can roll around and go back to where we were. I think that those crazy corporate times ended large-scale because they were meant to. There was purpose accomplished in them and now we are moving on with new experience and fuller understanding. There was no mistake, no failure, or “drying up.” When I say moving on, I’m not saying abandoning anything or that anything was wrong. On the contrary, we’re learning, we are moving on to the greater.

Let me summarize some things for you. The last for years has brought so much tumult to so many people riding the top of the waves of the last season and has left some people not recognizing the glory saturating their lives now but I see and want to share. I know a number of people who have been shaken to the core. Literally the thing that is most important to them was destroyed, has ended, was taken away, or has changed to the point where even we ourselves at our core are hardly recognizable to ourselves. I too am included in this group.

Unfortunately, (but it was not unfortunate because there was purpose in the experience), I spent so much time thinking I was broken. After way too many attempts to fix myself with old tools without success the unknown and unrecognizability continued. I met with a group of people I know intimately this past weekend and asked so many inquisitive questions. I almost universally have found people in the same position as I: the way we used to operate in certain gifts operate that way no longer, the certain relationships I grew up in operate that way no longer, health or body do not operate how they used to any longer, that person I loved is alive no longer, how I viewed reality before didn’t cut it and I had to change, the entire life I’ve known up until this point looks so different.

So if you in the body of Christ are out there wondering why this growing hurts so much, or why those relationships ended, or why you were allowed to be disappointed or fail there, or why you feel like you aren’t really experiencing Christianity as you once knew it, IT’S BECAUSE CHRISTIANITY IS CHANGING. Let me clarify; CHRIST ISNT CHANGING, WE ARE. Especially in the lives who literally would abandon everything for God’s will in any moment of their lives.

I used to say that the latest thing God was doing was family— strong, firm, and free— which is partially true, and a glorious expression of God himself, but incomplete as far as an explanation of what I see going on around me. So many people are in marriages, raising babies, working hard for them, but there were always those that are not, and how does that fit I used to ask.

Yes we are in a season where we are operating with the creator inside us all and living our dreams but there is more. Things that the body of Christ are learning in any season have already been true in every season, we’re just learning through experience now more fully.

So many people I know and love are going through their days entirely unobservable as “Christians” to their own eyes, hearts, or to others in outward culture or ritual. BUT. But I am wholly excited for God in the NOW. Productivity has stopped on so many other levels so that that which has always been important to God is what remains. There really is no separation of heaven from earth. They are one and the same place. God is not in some ethereal distance place, or movement, or teaching, HE IS YOU. God is not in some sign or doctrine or CHURCH. GOD IS YOU. There is taking place a complete melding of holy and secular. YOUR WHOLE LIFE IS HOLY.

God wants each of us to see that the only thing that matters to him is our connection with him, not our PERFORMANCE FOR HIM. He really doesn’t need us in the way we think he does. Us being ourselves is the most powerful and clearest expression of himself. Even though you don’t see all those Christian practices, even if you don’t feel all those holy spirit power feelings, even though you don’t influence people the way you used to, even though you don’t have those relationships you used to, YOU ARE NO LESS POWERFUL. YOU ARE NO LESS HOLY. Your communion with God is no less complete.

God gave us rivers and signs and glory and then transitioned out corporately on a wide scale because he wants us to look in another direction with him. Quit looking for him in the past signs, experiences, and external stuff. One of the leaders I’ve worked with that I respect the most listened to people when they came up to him about healings and deliverances that happened in his meetings but never gave them a further mention or time or attention. He remained entirely unimpressed with SIGNS because everything is about Christ, the person they’re pointing to here, now, inside of us.

So many have moved away from religious people, structures, places, or experiences because it was exposed that their foundation was something other than love and we can’t tolerate that anymore.

Family is included in this concept because LOVE is the only binding force between any family unit. It is the purpose of shared life. There’s no ulterior motives and so family as a structure remains and thrives, even through the messes that happen within them.

God is in the moment, this moment, the conversation, this conversation, in the now, and here. So much of the glory of Christian culture is fading away. Christ is in no way fading away, the culture we’ve created around him that does fade is NOT HIM. Language, doctrines, titles, hierarchies, separation, exclusion, condescension, none of them have been missed by me now that they’re gone. DO YOU REALIZE SOME CHRISTAINS NOW LOOK LIKE SECULAR PEOPLE BECAUSE EVERYTHING THAT WAS RELIGIOUSLY DEAD IS NOW GONE FROM THEIR LIVES?

What if ONLY LOVE REMAINS?? What if all those glory experiences, all those hours in prayer, all those encounters of love, all those hard times, our identity being shaken to the core, all those structures, all that revelation, were meant to build this one thing in us; our ability and capacity to love one another. To love our families. To Love ourselves. And everything else was a circumstancial tool to that end of being unconditional love. And not in the fluffy performance sense but the gritty steadfast kind that people are changed by, including ourselves.

I believe God is reducing the glory of everything that is not love. If something, anything in life, religious or not, is rooted in anything other than love it has lost its taste in our lives. And ANYTHING, whether religious or not, that is ROOTED AND GROUNDED in LOVE is breathes fresh air into our spirits in this season.

Love isn’t some vague idea, it is practical connection between ANY two human beings or any human being and God. This is the boiled down essence of everything that is the person of God and his kingdom. Everything God does is in the purpose of building or preserving that. If anything remains in our life for any reason–religious or not (especially religious ideas and concepts fostering any amount of rejection)-that actually threatens connection, it is moving counter to the kingdom of God and the living expression of love itself; heaven on earth.

This is just a view from my slice of the pie. Hope this encourages someone. Peace.