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Hope Alive

No one is exempted from crisis. In every stage of our life, we face some kind of crisis. Do I eat the one marshmallow now or wait so I can have two instead? The yellow shirt or the red one? A course in natural science or economics? Operation or chemotherapy.  Should I avail of the vaccine or should I wait for herd immunity? Oftentimes what we learn and who we become have been dramatically shaped and influenced by the crisis we go through. How we respond to them is crucial in navigating and thriving in life.

The COVID-19 pandemic has become more than just a global health issue. It brought about a very extensive dilemma that’s disrupting and shaking institutions, economies, and governments to the core. Most individuals now have faced or are facing prolonged isolation and disconnection due to quarantine rules and travel bans.  The uncertainty brought by this crisis marked an increase in suicide rate as more people are prone to suffer mental health issues as anxiety and fear permeate their everyday existence.

Where threat, fear and tragedy become the norm of life, hopelessness thrives.

Our sense of harmony and peace is always connected to our ability to be in control. We always feel safe inside our own bubble.  When we lose control over our situation and the solution is nowhere to be found, we feel helpless. When we feel helpless, hopelessness follows.

Hopelessness kills. It dulls our creativity, dampens our passion, stifle our faith and sabotages our freedom.

Ultimately, we feel imprisoned and become a victim of our circumstance. It’s a hard place to be in unless our heart attitude and perspective change. Hopelessness, like a dark cloud, engulfs us and causes our perspective to skew towards what could go wrong, instead of to hope – to have a positive expectation that something will turn out right. 

Hope is more than a wish

Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but desire fulfilled is a tree of life.

Proverbs 13:12

Commonly, our understanding of hope is synonymous to wish. It is to wish for, to expect a fulfillment of a desire. Its strength is in the person’s intensity of desiring. However, biblical hope is different. It is the confident expectation of what God has promised therefore its strength is in His faithfulness.

Hope makes us alive. While hopelessness kills our reason for living, hope empowers us to live it out. Our faith soars where our hope flourishes. So, whatever happens we have to cultivate hope. The starting point is, hope in the LORD!

Why are you in despair, O my soul?
And why are you disturbed within me?
Hope in God, for I shall again praise Him,
The help of my countenance and my God.

Psalm 43:5

Nowadays, people tend to desire, desire, desire, get, get, get. Social media, sadly, has become the platform for this unending ‘wishing’ frenzy as insecurity, jealousy and pride escalate.  FOMO, the fear-of-missing-out pushes people to the place of utter discouragement and disillusionment. When our hope is anchored in what we desire, what we are planning to do, what we wish to happen, we are bound to experience sickness of the heart. It is the kind of hope with an empty assurance, an expectation void of faith.

True hope on the other hand is one that’s anchored on God – in His nature. Our God is faithful and true to His promises. We hope not in the things that we see or what we are able to control but on things that are eternal, on God Himself.

From a sick heart to tree of life

“Delight yourself in the Lord; and He will give you the desires of your heart.”

Psalm 37:4

From this verse we understand that having our desires fulfilled is a matter of delighting in God first – making Him our greatest desire and devotion. And our desires that are rooted in God, once fulfilled, become a life-giving tree (Proverbs 13:12) for others. Our stories, testimonies and history with God are the fruits of the tree from which others can feed on and find their healing from their struggles of helplessness and hopelessness. Once I heard from a person I respect, “The person with the greatest hope is the person with the most influence.” At the end of the day, we influence others to the measure of our hope.

Christ is our Hope

Finally, hope is not just a mere optimistic expectation. Hope is a person- Jesus Christ.  Paul exhorts us that there is a mystery hidden for ages but now is revealed: Christ in you, the hope of glory (Colossians 1:27). With this truth we are assured that our present-future is glorious despite the challenges and uncertainties ahead. Our hope is anchored in the Eternal Christ.  With this reality, we can be instruments of glory in the midst of this darkness and our God-stories become life-giving fruits for others who are hungry and desperate to taste and see God’s goodness. Our lives filled with hope can become a beacon pointing others to the Eternal Hope, Jesus.

Now may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that you will abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.

Romans 15:13

The Power of Imagination

Why do we look forward to summer?  Because we can imagine frolicking at the beach, practicing for baseball or soccer, picnicking in the park, biking through lush greenery, and eating ice cream.  I bet these thoughts quicken your heart with excitement and anticipation.

That is the power of an imagination.  It gets us where you want to be.  To imagine is to think without limits.  Imagination fuels our dreams.  When we stop dreaming we stop progressing beyond where we are. That is why God is always inviting us to imagine and dream big.

Ephesians 3:20 says, “Now to Him who is able to do far more abundantly beyond all that we ask or think, according to the power that works within us.”  This verse is so pregnant with promise. We see here that for God there is no limit to what He can do and is willing to do through us and to us.  As for Him everything starts with His ability – God is able and His ability is limitless. However, the only measure of what we exactly received or experience is according to the working of His power within us. When we limit the power working within us, we limit what’s available for us. 

How big is your heart for Him? That is the measure of the working of His power within us. That is the reason why unbelief within one’s heart is so potent – it clouds the faith needed to unlock the power of His Word that is released in agreement with His heart.

Many times it is what we know in the past that hinders us from knowing what we should know and agreeing with what God wants to do at present and in the future. Yet for transformation to happen consistently, we have to learn how to build wisely on what we have known with the new revelations of God.

The secret of receiving from God is to have a heart that allows Him to freely move.  A heart that can receive freely is a heart that makes room for His Presence.  When we make room for Him within, He comes in greater measures. As we learn this process, our senses develop and mature. We begin to have our spiritual eyes and ears opened to be able to see and hear more and thereby receive more from what is available to us in heaven’s resources.

The more we get this rhythm of receiving more of His Presence and releasing it to address the needs of the world around us, the more our minds become aligned to the Mind of Christ. In the process, our physiological brain functions according to its intended design and purpose before the Fall- to be used for His glory. That is why renewed thinking brought about by progressive revelations and experiences of those revelations lead to our eventual transformation from within to without. We learn to move from the ordinary into the extraordinary, from the natural to the supernatural, and from the impossible to the possible in Christ.

The Bigger Picture

An encounter with God like this is surely extraordinary. Imagine pouring out your heart to God, and you suddenly hear an audible voice call out to you. I’m sure just the sound of it would jolt enough electricity through our veins and make your hair stand on end! 

So envision how Job must have felt when God not only showed Himself, but also started to give an astonishing description of His works, as though His presence wasn’t overwhelming enough. God kept elucidating the extent of His power to Job until finally Job said: 

“I had only heard about You before, but now I have seen You with my own eyes. I take back everything I said, and I sit in the dust and ashes to show my repentance.” (Job 42:5-6).

He could no longer take it. Job was so utterly besieged by the presence of God that his once vociferous claims of innocence now seemed like pitiful whimpers against the immense wisdom of God. 

He saw his life in the light of God’s infinite plan, and there his eyes were opened. 

In his previous life of bounty, Job savored the physical blessings that came from the hand of God. But it was at this lowest point of his life that he received something better – he caught a glimpse of the kind, wise, and irreproachable God first hand. As if scales had been taken from his eyes, Job realized he was not merely a recipient of God’s goodness. He was, in fact, the very object God had chosen to display His sovereignty! This newfound consciousness was more than enough to erase all his queries; this realization silenced all his apprehensions. 

Like what He did to Job, God sometimes brings us into situations that we do not understand. Many times these problems are so overwhelming that they cloud our vision. Everything we do is seen in the light of these trials, and because we hurt, everything that happens to us seems like salt rubbed in our wounds. 

Job’s story clearly tells us that God’s ways are higher than our own. In His preeminence, the answer that He provides us does not always come in the form of a solution or an end to our problems. Sometimes, God answers by showing us the bigger picture and giving us an avenue through which our faith can grow. 

[Excerpt from The Mark book]

Face to Face

We are created for face-to-face encounters with God. Imagine the first time Adam opened his eyes at the very instance God breathed on his nostrils the breath of Life. In a moment, He saw the face of God shining in glory right in front of him! We could just imagine as he was gazing upon His face, all that God is- His love, power, goodness, majesty, perfection, and glory inundated him and every fiber of his being pulsated with divine life. Literally, Adam was saturated with God. He was soaked in glory!

This is a beautiful picture of what face-to-face with God looks like. This encounter was not just for Adam exclusively but it is for the rest of mankind as well. In God’s sovereign plan, He designed us His Masterpiece to live in His Presence, in the place of intimacy. This is our highest purpose for creation- to host and be filled with the very Presence of God and live in perfect union with the Godhead.  And from that place we shine with His glory in all that we are and all that we do.

God placed the first man and woman in the Garden He called Eden. Eden means pleasure and delight. Come to think of this, He created a perfect world, and as if it was not enough, He planted a Garden- the Garden of His delight and pleasure. That became the special home for His beloved masterpiece-the first man and woman. In that place He gave them the mandate to manage the whole creation by expanding the borders of Eden to the rest of His created world. 

God, Who is love in highest perfection, sovereignly chose us to be at the very center of His delight and pleasure. We are God’s bull’s eye of His eternal affection.  Mankind is created and wired for intimacy with the Maker.

Day after day, God would walk with Adam and Eve in the Garden in the cool of the day.  As days unfold Adam and Eve discover the different facets of God’s character and beauty.  The more they see Him and hear Him the more they wanted to know Him and the more they discovered who they are in Him.  Gazing upon His face is like looking at the mirror they see their true identity in Him; for so they were primarily created – in His image and likeness.

Seeing from Heaven

What you behold you become.



Sight is of the eyes but vision is of the heart. Our perception influences both our sight and our vision. We view things not as they are but as we are inwardly. The Scripture is clear about this “as the man thinks of himself, so is he” (Proverbs 23:7).

The truth we adhere to as reality and the way we view our circumstances greatly affects the way we make choices and live our lives. Wrong thinking leads to wrong perceiving which in turn leads to wrong living. We react, respond and make choices based on how our hearts and minds are shaped by our past experiences, social environments, core values, beliefs and how we see ourselves (self-image). And the kind of life we live in eventually is the summation of all the decisions (right or wrong) we so far made.



However, there is a superior way of seeing things; it is seeing everything from heaven. The view of the kingdom of God is totally contrary to how most of us view reality. The life of Jesus demonstrated this truth. He lived in a different realm as He walked this physical world as the Son of God and the Son of Man. Although He was very much on the earth bodily, He was not of the earth in soul and spirit. He confronted all His circumstances with Kingdom eyes. He perceived everything with a 20/20 vision through the Kingdom lenses. He saw all the needs, the circumstances, and the problems that surrounded Him from the world He lived in – heaven. Consistently He released the reality of heaven at all times demonstrating its supremacy and addressing everything with its resources. The reality He lived in by heart and by spirit was the reality He constantly displayed.



Jesus knew exactly where to get the answers whenever He is confronted by situations be it sickness, sin, wickedness, unbelief, lack, poverty, injustice, persecution or rejection. In the face of all these, even death itself, His heart was set like a flint towards the heavens. He was never overwhelmed by anything except the love of His Father for Him and the purposes of the kingdom of God. He pulled the resources of heaven to address the needs on earth.



In Colossians 3:1-4, Paul issued this invitation from heaven for all believers to fix their eyes on the things above and not on the things below. Part of our call to demonstrate and expand the kingdom of God as sons and daughters of God here on earth is to access heaven’s reality by faith with our Kingdom eyes. This happens when we set our minds and our hearts toward heaven where Jesus Christ is enthroned and at the right hand of the Father.



In that heavenly realm our life is hidden in Him. This is an awesome truth! The best of who we are is found IN HIM! In the heavens this is the reality about us. This becomes a present-day experience to us when we abide in His Word by faith. We must come in full agreement with it and make it our reality. What the Truth says we are and where we are, that’s who we are and where we are. This world has yet to see the unveiling of YOU IN HIM! Keep looking towards heaven because what you see you will seize. What you behold you become.



The reality we live inwardly (heart and mind) will eventually be the reality we are able to manifest and illustrate. The measure of the atmosphere of heaven we cultivate within is the measure we can release without.

We have to have kingdom eyes to be fully kingdomized!

 

You in Christ

Embracing our true identity guarantees living in a new reality. Paul wrote several times in his epistles to the churches about the life that we, the believers, ought to live before God and before the world – we are ‘in Him’ and ‘Christ is in us’. For God, there is no other way He will ever treat us and relate to us but in and through Christ alone.  

Here are some of the reasons: God has accomplished His Eternal Purpose in Christ (Ephesians 3:11), in Him He chose us before the foundation of time (Ephesians 1:4) and our lives are hidden in Him (Colossians 3:3) and that in Christ we have been blessed with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places (Ephesians 1:3).

Jesus talked of this reality to His disciples before His arrest and crucifixion. He told them to “Abide in Me and I in you” (John 15:4). There is no other way to live our Kingdom life but to always abide in Him. We can never experience the fullness of the Kingdom of God apart from remaining in Christ – in spirit, in consciousness, in desire, in heart and in an organic, living and intimate way. As for the Father, what is true with His Beloved Son is true of us because we are in Christ. It is therefore illegal for us to ever think of any thoughts or imagine ourselves contrary to God’s intent and love towards Jesus Christ. 



In John 17, Jesus closed with this statement packed with great revelation, “I have declared to them Your Name and will declare it, that the love with which You have loved Me may be in them, and I in them.”  Jesus declared the Name of God to them- ‘Abba’ Father. And He promised to continually declare (reveal) it to them. God is so much a Father to us as He is to Jesus. And because of this, the perfect love of the Father towards His Beloved Son is toward all of us His children – in the same depth, measure and intent. Pause for a while and meditate on that one. Our finite mind could only infer the surface of this revelation of the Father’s great love to us. 

And because of this love, Christ resides in our innermost being by the Holy Spirit. No wonder Paul prayed, “that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the width and length and depth and height- to know the love of Christ which passes knowledge; that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.” (Ephesians 3:17-19). The Father’s Love is the master key to experiencing the fullness of His Glory.



Navigating a Difficult Season

The eagle is the king of the air. It is known for its ability to soar above the storm. With sharp vision it can spot its prey from miles away. Covered with majestic feathers and armed with powerful talons, they are designed to perform extraordinary feats.

Several times in the scripture the eagle is mentioned as a metaphor to describe God’s nature and intentions. Speaking to the nation of Israel, God said, “You yourselves have seen what I did to Egypt, and how I carried you on eagles’ wings and brought you to myself.” Exodus 19:4. Likewise, as believers, we are likened to eagles. We can read in Isaiah 40:31, “but those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint.”

We all go through seasons in life like eagles. Every season has its promises, challenges, and blessings. Molting season for eagles is that time when they shed their feathers, their vision blurs and their beak and talons break off.  It is one of the most painful times in an eagle’s life. It is a death process. However, it may seem an end but it is actually a renewal process so they can lead a longer life.

I went through a molting season in my life. It was a difficult time that affected all aspects of my life including my ministry.  It was a life-defining transition point for me. It is my desire to share to you some of the nuggets of wisdom that sustained me through my ‘dark night of the soul’.

What do we do when we are in the middle of molting? I find great inspiration from David’s experience.  David’s molting season came abruptly. One day he was in the courts of the king the next day he was a fugitive and an outcast because King Saul, driven by jealousy, wants him dead. David escaped to the wilderness of Judah and found refuge in the Cave of Adullam. That was his molting spot. During the hardest of times, when everything is being stripped away, the core of David’s heart was revealed.  Like a flint, He postured his inner being towards pursuing God no matter what his external circumstances may have been.  And this is what sustained him in his molting- he learned to navigate the hardest season internally. We see a glimpse of this in Psalm 63 that he wrote during the chase with King Saul.

  1. Divine Desperation

O God, You are my God; I shall seek You earnestly; My soul thirsts for You, my flesh yearns for You, in a dry and weary land where there is no water. (v1)

We can just imagine David exhausted from running, thirsty, emotionally drained and alone inside a cold cave. Yet despite the hostile environment, he cried out to God in desperation, not for food, safety or a softer bed, but for the ultimate desire of his heart-His Presence. Desperation is a raw expression of a deep longing for God from a place of humility, hunger and total dependence. With his heart, David used his external circumstance to push him deeper into God’s presence.  Divine desperation aligns our internal reality with the eternal reality of heaven.  When this happens we are transformed to bring transformation to the world around us.

  1. Remember your history with God

Thus I have seen You in the sanctuary, to see Your power and glory. (v2).

David’s desire is to pursue God no matter what. Growing up he’s had moments with God that marked him for the rest of his life. In the most difficult time, David remembered his history with God of how, in the secret place, alone in the wilderness, he played his harp for the One, standing in His sanctuary and beholding His power and glory. When we don’t know what God is doing in the now, our history with God becomes a clear compass to where He is leading us next.

  1. Lift Him Up

Because Your lovingkindness is better than life, my lips will praise You. So I will bless You as long as I live; I will lift up my hands in Your name. My soul is satisfied as with marrow and fatness, and my mouth offers praises with joyful lips. (v3-5)

We praise God all the time, especially during hard times. Praise and worship help us focus on who God is and who we are to Him amidst our circumstances and failures. When we declare His character in the midst of our difficulties, we are aligning our whole being to His heart and affection toward us. As we keep our heart in the right position we find ourselves empowered by His grace and encouraged by His goodness. We begin to see from His perspective not ours. This will keep our heart in the right place through the uncertainty and pain of molting.

  1. Rest in God

When I remember You on my bed, I meditate on You in the night watches, for You have been my help, and in the shadow of Your wings I sing for joy. (v6-7)

In rest, silence and solitude we become more aware of His Presence. Rest positions us to hear and receive from Him. This is so important because oftentimes when we go through difficult seasons we react in a number of ways: escape, isolate, fight or blame others. To meditate on Him is to be immersed in Who He is and understand that He is with us and for us.  Rest is making room for God to work a work that He only could do in us and through us.

  1. Hold On

My soul clings to You; Your right hand takes hold of me. (v8)

During the difficult times much of the work of God happen deep in us. During those times, His promises and His Presence will be our sustenance when we don’t have the capacity to see what’s ahead and the confidence to continue. His Word will be the bedrock on which we anchor our hope in the midst of the storm. What a revelation David had about this, that when he clings to God with all that he is, he sees himself embraced with His mighty hands. No wonder he ends his song declaring, “But the king will rejoice in God.” (v11) Who was the king he was referring to? Certainly, it wasn’t Saul. Nothing has changed, he sees himself the anointed king although there was no throne at all inside that dark, cold cave. He was king by heart. God said it and he hold on to Him and His promises. Nothing and nobody could change that.

When I went through my molting season, I was desperate and broken. I was doing ministry for 16 years.  I’ve seen many amazing things that God did through me in the past. Yet during that period I felt I was fading, passionless, helpless, exhausted from years of striving.  But all that shifted in one moment of encounter with God, in May 26, 2006. I was attending a conference with my wife Ahlmira. It was the first time we heard Leif Hetland who later on became our spiritual father. Through the revelations from his messages on the Baptism of Love, The Three Chairs and the Molting Eagle, our eyes were opened. We experienced a powerful impartation that moved us out of the molting season renewed, revived and transformed.  He prayed over us and we received a life-changing baptism of love that continuous to come to us in waves. It’s been 14yrs from that moment and we are still overwhelmed by all that happened in us and through us since that molting season that prepared us for a life-altering powerful encounter with the Father. Indeed, the deep work God is doing in us during the molting process prepares us for the greater work He’s about to do in the next season.

Sons and Daughters of the King

Our identity as sons and daughters of the King through Christ affords us full access to everything that is in the Kingdom of God. Jesus said, ” Do not be afraid My little children for it is the Father’s pleasure to give you the Kingdom.”(Luke 12:32) Not just a part of it but all of it. All that is in heaven is wrapped up in our inheritance. 

Our inheritance is what we administer to this world to transform it. In love, we serve the world and release heaven’s reality to earth. Paul wrote in Galatians and said, “And because you are sons, God has sent forth His Son into your hearts, crying out, “Abba, Father!” Therefore you are no longer a slave but a son, and if a son, then an heir of God through Christ” (Galatians 4:6-7). From our innermost being comes out the cry of the Spirit of the Son of God. It is the cry for union, for intimacy, for revelation of His glory in and through us! 

As we allow the Spirit to lead us deeper into God we experience the eternal union of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit in perfect love. Jesus prayed for this reality saying, “that they all may be one, as You, Father, are in Me, and I in You; that they also may be one in Usthat the world may believe that You sent Me.” (John 17:21) Our being one with Him awakens the world into faith – that the Father sent Jesus. 

There is another cry resounding throughout the ages. Paul wrote in Romans that “For the eagerly awaiting creation waits for the revealing of the sons and daughters of God…the whole creation groans and labors with birth pangs together until now.” (Read Romans 8:19-22). As we embrace our true identity as sons and daughters of God and live in and from Christ, the creation finds freedom from the bondage of sin and corruption. The groaning is for our revealing — to finally live in the newness of life, the new reality in Christ. The Father has set us up to transform a world prepared and longing to see the glory of Christ in us!

May our lives reflect and demonstrate the new living reality we have in Christ. Paul writes, “If anyone is in Christ he is a new creation, old things have passed away behold new things have come.” (2 Corinthians 5:17) May everything we do show the world that indeed Christ is in us and that we are in Christ. 

Understanding the Riches of His Grace

But God, being rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in our transgressions, he made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), and raised us up with Him, and seated us with Him in the heavenly places, in Christ Jesus, in order that in the ages to come He might show the surpassing riches of His grace in kindness toward us  in Christ Jesus. For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not as a result of works, that no one should boast. For we are His workmanship created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them. 

 

Ephesians 2:4-10 NASB

Grace is God’s gift to mankind. It is never earned by works but it is received by faith. God’s grace has multiple facets like a beautiful diamond. While we were yet sinners God demonstrated His grace. This is His unmerited favor that Christ died for us. We don’t deserve it but God gave His Son to die for our sins and bring us back into a living relationship with Him by the blood of Jesus. In Christ, He also raised us up and seated us with Him in the heavenly places. His grace did not just save us. His grace brought us back to glory!

It is by His grace through faith that we receive and inherit glorious state and identity in Christ. Without grace, we are hopeless creatures separated from God and headed for eternal judgment. His grace gave us a new life, a new identity, and a new reality! We now live from the reality of heaven as we face the challenges of life here on earth. We are no longer slaves to the forces of this world.  Victory is assured for His grace is enough.

We are His workmanship of grace and we have a glorious destiny that lies ahead of us we are now fashioned unto good works prepared by our Good Father. Oh, the depths of His wisdom and His love towards us!

Amazing grace! How sweet the sound
That saved a wretch like me!
I once was lost, but now am found;
Was blind, but now I see.

 

Amazing Grace by John Newton

God’s Favor Upon Us

Let the favor of the LORD our God be upon us; and confirm for us (or give permanence to) the work of our hands; yes, confirm the work of our hands. – Psalm 90:17

The favor of God upon us turns our ordinary works into extraordinary exploits. Any prosaic task has the potential to become a transformative and divinely inspired endeavor with God’s favor. The mundane can become a platform for the miraculous.

With God’s favor, a typical work becomes a catalyst for His mighty works. We see this in David who signed up to bring lunch to his brothers and ended up killing the giant who has been holding up God’s army. The poor widow who is down to her last cup of flour chose to bake bread for the prophet first, and the jar of flour was not used up and the jug of oil did not run dry until it rained. The paltry meal, just five loaves and two fish, from the little boy’s hands fed a multitude and the remaining food filled up 12 baskets. These are stories that inspire us and invite us to live the life that He intended for us.

When we have the favor of God upon us, we are positioned to partner with the Holy Spirit in bringing heaven to earth. We are favored and blessed so that the world around us will be transformed by His influence in and through us.

When the favor of God is upon us, the outcome of our works is tilted towards permanence. The temporal becomes empowered by His eternal grace. What our hands touch, our works under God’s blessings, no matter how small it may seem, has the influence and imprints of heaven.