Created from the dust //

There is a lot of dust in the air after the election. No surprise, but what to do from here? The only way this much dust settles is with rain. 
Church that hears, hear. Church that is asked for help, I praise God for you because you won't turn that person away with a well wish. Church that sees, I thank God for you because you won't turn away and forget what you've seen. Church whose mind is on heavenly things, now is the time to bring heaven to earth -- it's always the time.

Snapshots of our country may look different to different hearts. You may see a community in mourning. Perhaps you see a people emboldened to speak as crudely as they desire because it's been modeled for them by the incoming senior leader of our nation. You could see chaos and hate and fear. Maybe you see a bunch of people overreacting and being pouty, entitled, and childish in their passionate outbursts. You might see your enemy and walk around watching your back in ways you never felt you had to before. The differences in sight yield differences in response. Protests, beatings, tears, caution, rolling eyes, praying Jesus comes back. Church, we have to say what WE see -- what the Father sees, what we see by His Son's Spirit in us -- and we have to respond the way He is responding.

He sees dust. He sees humanity that's separated from Him and the death and the pain and the terror and the destruction they live in because of it. He so desperately wants to embrace and cover and shield and fill and forgive and bless... He wants to resurrect every last soul -- the crying ones and the scoffing ones and the ones looking the other way. What looks like the Devil's time, God just sees as His time to shine. Church, He is here, right now, more than He even was in the flesh because now His Spirit is in ANYONE who believes that His death and resurrection counted for them 100% and is theirs for free. He is all over the place. We have eyes that see beyond what the world sees all around. We have ears to hear what our Daddy God is singing over this heart-broken and twisted world. We ARE His Body, all over the earth, and He has taught us how to do what He would do -- to love. See, step out, reach over, listen, respond with truth in love, worship in spirit and truth, overcome evil with good, put a hand on the sick and see them recover, raise the dead, speak life, call forth destiny.

All these dear, dear people with different eyes to see are created to be children of light and we are in their lives to help them know that. They have spirits behind them that are ugly but they don't need to be feared because all of them have been put under our feet, we have authority over all of them (not the people, the spirits influencing them). That doesn't mean acting as exorcists all over our friends and family and coworkers and social media connections, and if you've done that in faith God bless you, we are all learning, but we go on the offensive against the devil and we go after the very people he is wreaking havoc in and through. They don't know what they are doing, Church. They are literally yelling out in the streets for love, and we are the first-responders of heaven. I believe there are seeds of Good News already planted in all these hearts, just waiting to be watered and helped along. God is gracious to us, His Church. It's come to the point that the lost are literally seeking and ready to find, they are crying out and expecting a response, they are desperate for hope. We have it. We were made for this purpose: to administer Christ's reconciliation to all. The ones cursing their brothers and the ones seeking refuge and justice.

I don't believe this is the time that the true Church in America will go underground. I believe this is going to call them out of their places of preparation and hiding and into the destiny on their lives: to live as servant-Kings and Queens. This is the time of the Esther's who speak UP for life when it's the most risky to their own lives. (That does not mean just being pro-life and defending your position against the candidate that was pro-choice and calling that fighting for life. It means seeing the girl who wants to have an abortion and loving her to life, being willing to be spent on her behalf even if the only thanks you get is literally spit in your face.) This is the time of the Daniel's who do the right thing in secret and get exposed and targeted for it and become an undeniable testimony of the favor of God on His kids when they are submissively attacked and not only survive but come back with only blessing for those who tried to harm them. This is the time of the David's coming out of a season of being hunted to have their calling destroyed and stepping into that calling with a band of the world's outcasts who have become the mightiest of lovers and warriors and go on to serve and lead many, and see victory after victory over anything that comes against. (That isn't people of a sinful lifestyle "coming against" you in your holy lifestyle, but the devil and his armies coming against you the anointed child of God and your brothers and sisters in the Church who are walking in their high calling and tirelessly driving them out of long-held territory.) This is the time of the early Church filled with the Spirit and compelled out into the streets and to all the world with the power of God for emancipation from sin to all those that believe, those willing to suffer for this Good News knowing that no one can believe unless they hear and it's worth the cost of our own life to spread the news as far as possible. Remember that every single one of these was under the leadership of corrupt governments and honored those ruling, while being governed by God's authority. I truly believe that THIS is the time of a great revival.

God saw dust and He made something beautiful and deeply beloved out of it: man. We're made in His image. We too are hard-wired to see the dust and not just know the full potential for holiness in it, but to draw it out. 

Let it rain, Spirit pour out on all flesh, settle the dust that's filling the air with your overwhelming embrace, but let that water flow out of our bellies as you said it should. Out of us, Church, will flow rivers of LIVING water. And anyone who drinks this water [receives forgiveness freely offered and life fully given] will never thirst [from a place of death be so parched for just a drop of life] again. (Acts 2:17, John 7:38, John 4:14)

Please see my previous post for more on this time.