Sitting by a river watching it flow by hearing the water in the arpeggios of the piano music.

First I see petals from the blossoms as they drop off giving way to the fruit which is growing out of the bud.

Then the fruit as it floats by beckoning me to pull it out of the flow and eat of it’s cool refreshing sweetness.

Then the leaves begin to fall and flow by getting caught in the rocks and spinning in the whirlpools.

Slowly the water slows and begins to solidify into the glorious designs of ice, even the cascades turn slowly into frozen pictures of their previous flow.

As the warm breath of spring blows on the ice sculptures they begin to release the torrent trapped inside.

As life comes into bloom once again I see the pollen filtering down into the pools and backwashes coloring them golden.

And so the cycle begins again……

Perfect harmony and balance between life and death, beginning and ending but showing forth that death is not the end, just the beginning of a whole new reality.

But a reality that we can enter into now, Jesus’ death and resurrection opened the way for us to walk, as He did, in continual fellowship with Him in our heavenly worship walk.

unquiet or uneasy, perpetually agitated or in motion, unceasingly active, averse to quiet or inaction.

It has been what seems a perpetual state for me for years. Striving to maintain some arbitrary level of activity that is “necessary” to accomplish my goals or fulfill obligations.

In business, having deadlines, milestones, and project plans are the common way of life. The tyranny of endless todos, coupled with the need to accomplish something, anything, leads to discontentment and frustration which can crush the spirit.

So many times in our life in the institutional church we became over committed to “the ministry” and it was to the detriment of our family life and the witness to our children. It was fueled by that sense of urgency to “accomplish something great for the kingdom”

Solomon said it best, “vanity of vanities” pouring out one’s life in pursuit of some goal but never arriving and never reaching that moment of true rest. Sure you collapse at the end of the day or when the project is declared complete. But the next objective is always laid out in our restless minds to consume us again.

The Kingdom of God is not about striving to earn our way into God’s good graces. It is about coming to the realization that Jesus accomplished our redemption and our job simply is to rest in His glorious grace.

So peace and rest be with you and lay aside the restlessness of our own making..

Who is our worship for?

Is it to make us feel good or get a Holy Ghost goosebump? No, a thousand times no, it’s primarily for Papa, to be a pleasing aroma to Him, a fragrant offering of love directed back to him from the overflow of his love for us. It is so easy to feel like we have to perform or follow a certain mode as prescribed by our community. We are programmed into styles and forms of worship by those in our family of faith. Whether it is quietly contemplative or boisterously exuberant, we try to fit in and go with the flow.

It is also very easy to join in the group think and judge those around us as to the quality and even depth of their worship. Being a musician can really make it easy to fall into critical thoughts about the “quality” of whatever is happening musically. Much like becoming offended by someone else’s exuberance or extravagant actions in worship because they make you feel uncomfortable. I believe these are traps to divert our attention away from the papa and derail our blessings.

Our sole focus must be Papa and seeking His good pleasure, He alone is our audience!

Tongues awaken our inner man to the realities of heaven. As the spirit of God speaks through us our spirit comes alive and begins to realize our position in Christ in the heavens. It’s not so much that we “ascend” but that we fully appreciate that we are standing with Him in His presence. Indeed heaven is the place which is where our spirit lives 24/7. We are able to step directly into deep worship at the drop of a hat, there’s no need tow “work it up” that’s thinking with our mind.

Tongues unhinge our mind from the physical world because they disconnect our senses from it. That is one of the reasons they are such a hurdle for many Christians when growing in their faith walk. In fact it’s probably why they are such a stumbling block for whole denominations in the body. So many of the other gifts of the spirit have been co-opted by the new age such with its counterfeit manifestations that the gifts of the spirit have been shelved as being from the devil. Spoiler alert, satan can’t create only mimic and or twist. All good gifts come from the father of lights, you know Papa? THE CREATOR.

So step into the gifts, exercise them on purpose, diligently and regularly.

The passion of our heart; the destination of our desire, the goal of our longings, the focus of our love. How deeply are you enraptured by the love of Yahweh?

The energy of our being; our inner driving force, the lilt in our step, the fire in our belly. How stoked are you about your walk with Jesus?

Every thought; the source of our dreams, the focus of our eyes, the meditation of our heart. How intentionally do you dwell on thoughts of Holy Spirit?

All our strength; the wind in our sails, the oil in our lamp, the endurance in our bones. How much do you hold back from giving your all?

“Jesus answered him, “The most important of all the commandments is this: ‘The Lord Yahweh, our God, is one!’ You are to love the Lord Yahweh, your God, with every passion of your heart, with all the energy of your being, with every thought that is within you, and with all your strength. This is the great and supreme commandment. And the second is this: ‘You must love your neighbor in the same way you love yourself.’ You will never find a greater commandment than these.””
‭‭Mark‬ ‭12:29-31‬ ‭TPT‬‬
https://www.bible.com/1849/mrk.12.29-31.tpt

How are we walking these commandments out? Its not a long involved list but it takes everything in us to accomplish. In fact without the indwelling Holy Spirit it would be impossible. Lean on Him and listen to His voice we can do this!

Loving your neighbor as you love yourself; This one will be in another post….

Like a lost wandering child you lead me by your hand through the dry wasteland. Showing me the hidden springs of life and bounty in what appears to be desolation. Your presence with me is life and comfort, your voice is the song of heaven, your words like dew on the leaves in the morning sun. Be still my heart, be silent mind storms of fear and worry. Yeshua is here at hand leading the way into peace and joy regardless what I see with my natural eyes I know my way is smooth and safe.

Listen to the sounds of heaven, frequencies of life and love, healing and restoration. Rest in the presence, do not be swayed by the physical realm and what’s happening there, hold fast to my promises and to what you see in the heavens. That’s what is true and real.

My heart is overwhelmed by the beauty of Your countenance.  That is a fancy way to say I’m totally undone by Papa’s glorious presence.  All those Christian-eeze terms make things sound flowery and all, but when it comes down to it plain language is best.  Just remember when you first fell in love, how you couldn’t spend enough time together how you longed for their company, the sound of their voice, the look in their eye, the tenderness of their touch.  Simply sitting together, even without a word exchanged is completely enjoyable.   Be captivated by His extravagant love….

Why do we think a little time, here or there, spent reading our Bible or praying over our meals constitutes intimacy? The picture of intimate relationship pictured in Song of Solomon is so intense and even a bit racy at time. But it pictures our relationship with Papa inside the marriage covenant.

“Then may your awakening breath blow upon my life until I am fully yours. Breathe upon me with your Spirit wind. Stir up the sweet spice of your life within me. Spare nothing as you make me your fruitful garden. Hold nothing back until I release your fragrance. Come walk with me as you walked with Adam in your paradise garden. Come taste the fruits of your life in me. I have come to you, my darling bride, for you are my paradise garden! Come walk with me until I am fully yours. Come taste the fruits of your life in me.”
‭‭Song of Songs‬ ‭4:16‬ ‭TPT‬‬
https://www.bible.com/1849/sng.4.16.tpt

We ARE the apple of His eye, the Bride to His Bridegroom.  Song of Songs has so many passages that show our enraptured passion for Him in the words of the Shulamite.  But what is truly outrageous are the passages from the Bridegroom expressing His undying desire for the Bride, in other words, us!  He wants to be intimate with us even more than we want to be with Him.  I know, that doesn’t really surprise me, if I look at my life, I know how luke-warm I’ve been over the years.   Keeping our passion alive is impossible under our own power but when the Holy Spirit awakens desire for Him it is impossible to resist His wooing…

We went to a lovely Christmas Eve candlelight service with family this year. It was the first time in years we had been in an institutional church. The preachers did a tag team message on, “Why?” and it got me thinking of how my understanding of the Gospel has changed.

Traditional evangelical teaching says Papa had to send Jesus down here to die for us on the cross. The standard message is, Papa was locked into sacrificing His only beloved Son to assuage His wrath. However, what if the whole sacrificial system was really instituted by man as our way to appease our perception of God? Did Papa really setup the whole sacrificial system? It just sort of appears in the Genesis story as a thing we humans do, not necessarily as a thing God commanded initially.

It is a universal concept that we must appease God, but does He really want worship through sacrifice or is it worship through fellowship that pleases Him most? Would it not be that He prefers fellowship, by virtue of the revelation of His all consuming love through Jesus? In the Garden, “before the fall”, Papa walked with Adam in the cool of the day. What better image of perfect fellowship could there be?

It makes much more sense to me that God sent Jesus to obliterate our misunderstanding of worship. To show us exactly what Papa is really like through Jesus’ life here. To let us let us know how much he wants fellowship with us. Jesus submitted to our twisted sacrificial system to break through our traditions and prove that God’s way of Love and Grace are indeed higher than our systems of religion.