City of Refuge Fellowship

Day 10 Giving God Possession of Our Future

II Timothy 1:12 “For this reason I also suffer these things; nevertheless I am not ashamed, for I know whom I have believed and am persuaded that He is able to keep what I have committed to Him until that Day.”

We have lived much of our lives unsure of our future. We have often allowed the unknown to keep us from being obedient in this moment. We have trusted God to save our souls but often mistrust Him with tomorrow.

Today we fast and pray for the faith to put all of our future in God’s hands. We declare today that He and He alone will open doors that men cannot shut and He will shut doors that men cannot open. We are confident that our lives are in God’s hands and our life is in the Spirit that dwells within us. We believe that nothing can cut short our days or derail our destiny. As God has spoken so it shall be.

We have given God full possession of our hearts and our minds. We trust Him with our eternity. We believe today that He is faithful, He is loving, He is merciful and He is kind. We believe that God will fulfill His eternal purpose for our lives through the power of the Holy Spirit who dwells in us and to whom we give the freedom to have His way in our lives.

During this 10 days we have fasted and prayed to give God full possession of our hearts, our minds, our past and our future. Tomorrow, on Pentecost Sunday, we will meet together and end our fast by giving God full possession of our present, of this very moment in which we are living. We often spend so much of today trying to undue yesterday and to prepare for tomorrow that we completely miss the moment. We are going to concentrate on now, what God is saying, what God is doing, how God is pouring Himself out and what God is requiring from His people. I pray that our fast has made us empty of ourselves so that we are prepared to be more filled with the Holy Spirit than ever before.

Day 9 Giving God Possession of Our Judgment and Pride

James 2:13 “For judgment is without mercy to the one who has shown no mercy. Mercy triumphs over judgment.”

I Peter 5:5 “God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble.”

Our minds have justified our own sin by focusing on that of others. The flesh’s way of building itself is to condemn another. We know that “there is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.” We must understand that being judgmental is always an act of pride; judgment and pride are tied to each other, the only way to walk in mercy is to walk in humility.

We fast and pray today to be a people of mercy and humility. We long to fulfill the longing of God, that His people would “act justly, love mercy and walk humbly with their God.” We give God all of our judgment and ask Him to break our Pharisee ways. We give God all of our pride and ask that He give us humble hearts before He has to crush our prideful ones. We declare today that “mercy triumphs over judgment” and we will walk in mercy. We declare victory in our hearts, our minds, our homes and our communities–the victory of mercy, of healing, of freedom, of love and of redemption.

Day 8 Giving God Possession of Our Guilt and Shame (Past)

John 8:36 “Therefore if the Son makes you free, you shall be free indeed.”

Guilt and shame are the tools of the enemy. If we are ashamed we will hide from God. Adam and Eve hid from God after they sinned because they were afraid and they covered their nakedness because they were ashamed. Guilt and shame come from sin and only from sin. When Jesus forgives us of our sin He also removes guilt and shame. We are not left with scars and reminders of our past failures, He washes us white as snow so that we are eternally reminded of His glory and His mercy

Today we fast and pray for the removal of ALL guilt and shame. We put our past in God’s possession believing that He has forgiven us, redeemed us and removed our stains. We declare today that we are in Christ and we are new creations, “old things have passed away; behold all things have become new.” We will no longer receive guilt or shame and we will no longer operate in them either, casting them upon others. We proclaim that we are reconciled to God and are now the ministers of reconciliation. “He who the Son sets free is free indeed.”

As a pastor I get invited into some of the most personal and intimate times in people’s lives. Pastors officiate weddings, dedicate children, bless new seasons and opportunities, give eulogies and help with funeral plans and lend an ear, a shoulder, a laugh, a tear or whatever might be called for in any given moment. Over the last few weeks I have been very aware of the situations that I have been invited to participate in. In my heightened awareness I pray that I have been more useful and thoughtful than ever before but I also believe that I have learned some things that I want to share today.

During these past weeks I have married a young couple, full of love and hope for the future. I have been called into hospice’s to pray with the dying and their families, filled with faith but also battling against fear. I had a dear friend stop at my home to share with me that he had just been laid off an hour earlier, even before he went home to tell his family and I have gotten news of two different people battling cancer whose tumors have shrunk in the last few weeks. In all of these situations, both those that we would consider good and would consider bad I have prayed for the right words, the right actions, the right prayers and the right thoughts. In each of these situations I have prayed specifically for the Holy Spirit to allow me to be obedient and to be able to be used to share the truth.

One of these situations has really stood out in my mind and I want to share what I believe God has taught me through it. A friend of mine asked me if I would join him and his family at the hospital as the doctor came to share the status of treatment for a family member. I went not sure of what I could give but praying for one thing in particular, comfort. The doctor came into the room and began to share the prognosis of the moment and the future. She shared that the patient was suffering from the shutdown of multiple organs. As she talked I listened closely but I also tried to watch carefully. She was not harsh but she also made sure to be very honest and to share in both medical and laymen’s terms what was happening now and what was about to happen. She shared how one organ was limiting the other and how the treatment of one would shut down another. Ultimately the prognosis was that there was nothing more they could do. The conclusion that the doctor shared was “we must just put her in the hands of God.” The most difficult part of this prognosis was that the patient does not feel as if she is dying. She knows she is sick, quite sick, she knows she is limited in strength and needs help with even the most simple daily task, but dying, no that never entered her mind, or the minds of most of the family members. As you can imagine when the doctor was finished there was sadness, there was shock and there was even some fear. There was something else that was present that I was not expecting, comfort. You see where there is truth there is also comfort.

We have wrongly defined comfort. We want comfort to be something that makes us feel better, something that takes away our difficulty, that takes away our pain. The word comfort is actually defined by Webster’s Online Dictionary as “to give strength and hope to.” We have made being comforted anything but being strengthened. Most of us live our lives looking for someone, anyone to tell us something that will make us feel better, but feeling better masks and covers the issue; being strengthened, being comforted means being given the ability to face, endure and even overcome the fear and doubt of any given situation. My friend’s family is sad, there is some fear and some numbness of shock but they have also been given a gift of truth that provides comfort. How are they comforted? They know the time is short and so they can now redeem it. Already, in less than a week the entire family gathered for a short trip that they had wanted to take but just kept putting off, because there was no urgency. You see, in this case, comfort isn’t news that the family member wasn’t really sick, it was the truth of the seriousness of her condition so that they can all do the things that are important. Comfort for this family now has the opportunity to be reconciliation and joyful relationships. Comfort for them, is being sure that all fences are mended and wrongs forgiven; it is the joy of knowing that each one will get to enjoy each other and take very seriously the time they have; it is being able to share everything on their hearts and hold nothing back until a better time.

In John 14 Jesus called the coming Holy Spirit “the Comforter”. Jesus said that the “Comforter” would lead the disciples into all truth and would bring to their remembrance everything that He had ever said. We have decided that being comfortable is being made to feel how we want to feel. We wear comfortable clothes, sit on comfortable furniture and even create comfortable relationships. In each of these things we define comfortable as something that does not hurt, challenge, stretch or strengthen us. Because of this we often reject the leading and the speaking of the Holy Spirit in our lives. He does not make us comfortable by our definition, He comforts us by the true definition of the word, He makes us stronger and gives us hope. Comfort is not the removal of difficulty it is the strength to endure it. It is not the neglect of hard words so that we are not offended it is the willingness to share the truth so that we will learn to obey it. It is not bowing to our emotional immaturity so that we won’t get upset, it is trusting us with the truth so that we have the opportunity to mature and grow.  Comfort isn’t God holding everything still so that we can walk a smooth and easy path, it is God shaking everything that can shake so that we will learn what is truly worth holding onto and what is of no real value.

Another friend called me on Monday to tell me that his mother had just passed away, I had visited her in hospice care last week. As I listened to his voice I silently asked God to give me words of comfort. Suddenly I realized, he didn’t call so that I would somehow make him feel better, he called so I could share in his loss and so that I could offer comfort. I shared with him how his mother had asked me to please pray that God would take her home, that she shared that she was ready to meet Him and that she was not afraid. I told him how much she loved him and how much she had looked forward to being free of pain and disease. When I hung up the phone I wiped my tears and I knew that I didn’t say anything that had caused him not to miss his mother, I didn’t say anything that would somehow stop the grieving process or restore what we consider normalcy to his life. I also knew that my friend was at peace, I knew that he had no doubts of his mother’s eternity or the mercy, love and timing of God. I knew that my friend had been comforted and that his mother had entered into her rest.

We must let go of this fleshly thought of being made comfortable. We are not a people that can willingly sit still and be without challenge, without strengthening and without the truth. Jesus said that He is the truth and that the truth sets us free. Freedom is always costly! It demands the overthrow of bondage, the removal of the former ruler and the implementation of a brand new order. The Holy Spirit was not sent to make us feel better about our current situations, He was sent to lead us into the fullness of Jesus, into holiness, obedience, redemption and perfection. I pray today that we would all run from the bondage of being comfortable and willingly be led into the strength, hope and divine care of the Comforter

Day 7 Giving God Possession of Our Fear and Anxiety

II Timothy 1:7 “For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind.”

Philippians 4:5b-6a “The Lord is near. Be anxious for nothing.”

Our culture has become paralyzed by fear and anxiety. Our enemy has used these two tools to create isolation and despair. God has never intended His people to be afraid. He is our protector and our defense. He has never wanted us to be anxious. He is our provider, our peace and our joy.

Today we fast and pray for the power to take off all fear and anxiety and give them to God. We have the privilege to cast all of our cares upon Him and today we actively enjoy that privilege as sons and daughters of God. We declare that we will keep our minds stayed on God and He will fulfill His promise to give us perfect peace. We declare that we will obey God’s Word, His voice and His Holy Spirit and give fear and anxiety no place in our lives. We will trust God because He has never failed or disappointed us and we will choose to deny thoughts of worry and embrace thoughts of peace

Day 6 Giving God Possession of Our Minds

II Corinthians 10:4-5 “For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal but mighty in God for pulling down strongholds, casting down arguments and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ, and being ready to punish all disobedience when your obedience is fulfilled.”

I believe that all of our battles take place in our minds. It is where the enemy attacks us, where lies enter, where temptation tries to take root and where selfishness becomes justified and logical.

Today we fast and pray to give God full possession of our minds. We freely acknowledge that His ways and thoughts are higher than ours, so we release ourselves from the bondage of making God, His character and His will fit into our limited understanding. We bind the goodness of God and His unchanging love to our minds so that we can not be easily deceived or led astray. We agree with I Corinthians 2:16 and declare “we have the mind of Christ.” We open our minds to the Holy Spirit and close them to our flesh and the world around us. We pray today for the power to take every thought captive and declare that we are transformed by the renewing of our minds.

Day 5 Giving God Possession of Our Community

Acts 1:8 “But you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be witnesses to Me in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”

We have been filled with the Holy Spirit that we would be witnesses to Jesus in our communities. Our emotions tell us to be concerned about how our community may affect us, but the Holy Spirit is within us that we would affect our community.

Today we fast and pray to be “salt and light” in our churches, neighborhoods, workplaces and community at large. We repent if our selfish concerns have taken the form of a covering for the light within us. We declare today that we will walk worthy of our calling and make faithful use of the “lamp stand” within us. We give possession of our communities to Jesus, we seek His, “that none would perish”’ and devote ourselves to freedom, healing, redemption and love in every place that God has set our feet.

Day 4 Giving God Possession of Our Families

We did not choose our families, they were chosen for us and we for them by God. Matthew 12:49-50 says “And He stretched out His hand toward His disciples and said, Here are My mother and My brothers! For whoever does the will of My Father in heaven is My brother and sister and mother.” Jesus’ lesson was not disrespect to His family but rather devotion to His calling and to His Father.

Today we fast and pray to entrust our families to God’s care, ownership and possession. We pray for their salvation, their healing, deliverance and blessing. At the same time we release ourselves from people-pleasing, from a yoke of burdensome worry and fear, and from being distracted by the opinions and beliefs of others. We declare that our hearts belong to God and so our steps are ordered by His hands. We will trust His leadership, His guidance, His love and His Spirit. We declare that “we will walk in paths of righteousness for His name’s sake.”

Day 3 Giving God Possession of Our Possessions

Matthew 19:22 “But when the young man heard that saying, he went away sorrowful, for he had great possessions.”

Our fleshly (sinful) hearts seek temporary pleasures. Many of us have been led into and deceived by emotional investments into the things of this world. A rich young man wanted eternal life and he went to Jesus to attain it. Jesus told him to sell all his possessions and follow Him. The young man went away sad because he loved his possessions. We are called to appreciate and care for our possessions but not to love them or cling to them. We must recognize that everything we have has been given by God and so we must be obedient to Him and love Him even with our possessions.

Today we fast and pray for the faith to trust God as our provider, for generous spirits and obedient giving. Our attachment to our possessions shows us the condition of our hearts. Jesus said in Matthew 6:21 “For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” Today we declare that our hearts are possessed by God and so we give Jesus ownership of our possessions: of our jobs, our homes, our money and all that we spend it on. We declare that we will “lay up for ourselves treasure in heaven.”