Category: Food For Growth

¹ Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. ² And after fasting forty days and forty nights, he was hungry. ³ And the tempter came and said to Him, “If you are the Son of God, command these stones to become loaves of bread.” ⁴ But He answered, “It is written, “‘Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.’”

⁵ Then the devil took him to the holy city and set him on the pinnacle of the temple ⁶ and said to Him, “If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down, for it is written, “‘He will command his angels concerning you,’ and “‘On their hands they will bear you up, lest you strike your foot against a stone.’” ⁷ Jesus said to him, “Again it is written, ‘You shall not put the Lord your God to the test.’”

⁸ Again, the devil took Him to a very high mountain and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory. ⁹ And he said to Him, “All these I will give you, if you will fall down and worship me.” ¹⁰ Then Jesus said to him, “Be gone, Satan! For it is written, “‘You shall worship the Lord your God and Him only shall you serve.’” ¹¹ Then the devil left Him, and behold, angels came and were ministering to Him. ~ Matthew 4:1-11

Notice when the Devil showed up? It wasn’t when Jesus was full. It wasn’t when He was strong. The Devil showed up when Jesus was weak. When He was hungry. We have this idea that The Devil won’t or shouldn’t attack us at our weakest moment, but that’s precisely when the best time to attack is.

When you watch a lion stalk its prey, it doesn’t go after the strongest gazelle; instead, it goes after the weaker gazelle. It attacks the prey that it feels it would be able to destroy and devour the easiest. And that’s exactly what the devil does with us. He waits for us to be weak. He waits for us to be hurting. He waits for us to be hungry. Because then he has a better chance of overcoming us. And the worst part is that a lot of the times we allow him to without a fight.

With every attack, Jesus defended Himself with scripture. How many of us can say that? We quote one scripture and then give up. Jesus is God, and it took Him three scriptures and a rebuke for The Devil to flee Him.

See we read the verse “resist the Devil and he shall flee you,” but we forget that we have to resist him more than one time. Depending on how strong your Spirit Man is and how weak your flesh is, will determine how long it takes for The Devil to flee.

For instance, if you don’t seek God daily, spending time in both worship, prayer, and reading the bible, you will be easily overtaken. Why? Because you haven’t fed your Spirit Man, so he is weak. You have to take time with God to strengthen your Spirit Man, or your flesh will always allow you to be overtaken.

See Jesus was hungry, but only in the physical sense. Jesus’ Spirit Man was well fed. Was strong. Was alert. Jesus knew that He had to strengthen His Spirit Man so that He could take on and overcome every sin known to man. We may not have to face every sin known to man, but we do have to face sins that continuously overcome us. And the only way to defend ourselves is by reading scripture, spending time in worship, prayer, and fasting.

Peace. Love. Go Forth and Feed Your Spirit.

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“⁹ And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, ‘¹⁰ Speak to the people of Israel and say to them, When you come into the land that I give you and reap its harvest, you shall bring the sheaf of the firstfruits of your harvest to the priest, ¹¹ and he shall wave the sheaf before the Lord, so that you may be accepted. On the day after the Sabbath the priest shall wave it. ¹² And on the day when you wave the sheaf, you shall offer a male lamb a year old without blemish as a burnt offering to the Lord. ¹³ And the grain offering with it shall be two tenths of an ephah of fine flour mixed with oil, a food offering to the Lord with a pleasing aroma, and the drink offering with it shall be of wine, a fourth of a hin. ¹⁴ And you shall eat neither bread nor grain parched or fresh until this same day, until you have brought the offering of your God: it is a statute forever throughout your generations in all your dwellings.’” ~ Leviticus 23:9-14

How many of us have successful businesses? How many of us never worry about their income? I’m gonna go with less than half think like this. How many of us give the first fruits to God? Here’s what I mean. The very first paycheck you earn from that business or the very first amount you earn from the first product you sold. How many can say they give that to God? Probably even less. Why is that important?

Because by bringing the firsts, you are bringing your entire business before God so that He can bless it. So that it can be prosperous. So that it can reap more than you ever thought. Now I know that it sounds crazy to give the first to God. It sounds absolutely crazy, but it’s absolutely necessary. How can we expect God to bless our business, when we can’t even bring it to Him so that He may bless it.

When you sow into God, God blesses what you have sowed, so that you can reap. Ecclesiastes 11:1 tells us to “Cast your bread upon the waters, for you will find it after many days.” Sow into God, and God will bless what you have sown, and you will reap exponentially.

And the firsts are different than the tithe. Why? Because the tithe is a tenth of what you have earned. But the first is the entire first you have made. If it’s a restaurant, the first you make from selling to your first customer, that’s the first. The first you get from the first car you wash. That’s the first. It’s gonna take a lot of faith. It’s gonna take a lot of trust. And it’s gonna take overcoming Mammon. But God promises that when we give to Him, He will give to us. We expect God to bless us first, then we will bring an offering. But that’s not how it works. You have to set the offering down before God can burn it up and accept it. You have to first provide the sacrifice so that God can provide the fire. You have to first open up yourself so that God can fill you up. We have to meet God’s standards before He can bless us. God doesn’t lower His standards. Neither does He go back on His Word, but He watches over it to make sure it has done what He has spoken. Take a step out in faith and see what happens.

Peace. Love. Go Forth and Bring Your Firsts.

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“²¹ But the Lord was with Joseph and showed him steadfast love and gave him favor in the sight of the keeper of the prison. ²² And the keeper of the prison put Joseph in charge of all the prisoners who were in the prison. Whatever was done there, he was the one who did it. ²³ The keeper of the prison paid no attention to anything that was in Joseph’s charge, because the Lord was with him. And whatever he did, the Lord made it succeed.” ~ Genesis 39:21-23

Even when we’re in prison, God is with us. Even when we’re at the lowest of lowest, and we allow God to be with us, He will be there. In fact, He’ll do more than just be there; He’ll show you your destiny, your plan, your call if you let Him.

See everywhere Joseph went, he was in charge. In Potiphar’s house, in the prison, Joseph was in charge. His destiny, or call, was to be in charge of all of Egypt second only to Pharaoh. Even though he was in charge in the prison he still had the prison keeper before him, even though he was in charge at Potiphar’s house, he still had Potiphar before him. Everything Joseph did, or went through, mirrored his future.

Even when we’re at our lowest, God still shows us our highest, but it’s up to us to look for it. Sometimes it’ll take a little time to find the best in the worst situations, so I beseech you, search hard and don’t lose hope.

Peace. Love. Go Forth and Search.

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“³⁵ All his sons and all his daughters rose up to comfort him, but he refused to be comforted and said, ‘No, I shall go down to Sheol to my son, mourning.’ Thus his father wept for him.” ~ Genesis 37:35

We’re like Jacob. See, we only look at the evidence that the devil has brought before us and refuse to allow God to comfort us. We refuse to look at anything except the bloody coat the devil holds in front of us. We want to feel the pain, we don’t want relief. We constantly say that we don’t like the pain, we complain about the pain, but we refuse to do anything to fix the pain. We refuse to look at God and allow him to comfort us. Instead we demand to go to Sheol in mourning. Sometimes all we have to do is look away from the bloody coat so that we can get free of the mourning. So that we can move on, but we refuse.

Maybe part of us just doesn’t feel right moving on. Maybe part of us just feels like it’s the right thing to hold on to pain. Maybe part of us feels attached and connected to pain because it’s been there for so long. There’s a time for mourning, but at some point in time we have to look up and be comforted by God. Even though it’s hard, it’s the only thing we can do so that we can move forward. Because if we stand still while time moves, we’ll soon die. The only one that can set us free, is ourselves. We were given the key to let ourselves out of the cell of pain that we are in, we just have to know where to find the key we hid so long ago.

Peace. Love. Go Forth and Look.

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^“1When the Philistines captured the ark of God, they brought it from Ebenezer to Ashdod. ²Then the Philistines took the ark of God and brought it into the house of Dagon and set it up beside Dagon. ³And when the people of Ashdod rose early the next day, behold, Dagon had fallen face downward on the ground before the ark of the Lord. So they took Dagon and put him back in his place. ⁴But when they rose early on the next morning, behold, Dagon had fallen face downward on the ground before the ark of the Lord, and the head of Dagon and both his hands were lying cut off on the threshold. Only the trunk of Dagon was left to him. ⁵This is why the priests of Dagon and all who enter the house of Dagon do not tread on the threshold of Dagon in Ashdod to this day.

⁶The hand of the Lord was heavy against the people of Ashdod, and he terrified and afflicted them with tumors, both Ashdod and its territory. ⁷And when the men of Ashdod saw how things were, they said, ‘The ark of the God of Israel must not remain with us, for his hand is hard against us and against Dagon our god.’ ⁸So they sent and gathered together all the lords of the Philistines and said, ‘What shall we do with the ark of the God of Israel?’ They answered, ‘Let the ark of the God of Israel be brought around to Gath.’ So they brought the ark of the God of Israel there.” ~ 1 Samuel 5:1-8

Notice how they saw that the God of Israel is greater than their god, they saw that the God of Israel is a greater God, yet the one thing they didn’t do is repent and beg forgiveness and try to serve the God of the Israelites. Isn’t that how we are in today’s world? We see that God is God. We see that there is none greater than Him. We know the truth, but instead of turning from our sinful ways and serving Him, we send Him away. We try to get rid of Him as soon as possible.

We refuse to give up the gods that we have grown accustomed to, even though we know they will lead us to death. We hold fast to these inferior false gods, even though we know that they cannot give us life. We cling to this feel-good, live how you want, everything you do is justified ideology, even though we cannot defend it. Even though we know our argument makes no sense. Even though we know our foundation has crack after crack, we still cling to it because we want to live the way that we want to live.

We refuse to learn/accept the truth by refusing to have a conversation about it, because we know that what we believe and the way we want to live is not okay. It isn’t right. And when we feel under attack, we throw up verses like ‘only God can judge me’ or ‘ye who is without sin.’ But what we fail to realize is that by doing this we are not only killing ourselves, but anyone who listens or looks up to us. We forget that on Judgment Day there are no more chances for forgiveness. On Judgment Day there is no redemption. On Judgment Day, that’s it. However, you chose to live your life will be set in stone. No matter if you believe or not, it doesn’t matter, because just as Dagon fell before God Almighty and was judged, so will all of us.

I urge each and every one of us to go out and seek the truth. Not the “truth” that tickles our ears. Not the “truth” that allows us to sin. Not the “truth” that feeds our flesh and crushes our spirit. But the actual full, Jesus stamp of approval TRUTH. This can only be achieved by conversation. This can only be achieved by submission. This can only be achieved by having a relationship with The Holy Spirit. Because without the absolute truth, you are now teaching others (even if you don’t realize it) and condoning others’ sins. By doing this, you have now just added their sin onto you. The Scripture says that “if I say to a wicked man you shall surely die and you don’t warn him or speak out to change his ways, then that wicked man will die for his sin and I will hold you accountable for his blood.” We can’t hide the truth in order to spare feelings to someone who doesn’t want to live the life of a Christ Follower. We cannot hide the truth from ourselves because we don’t want to live the life of a Christ Follower.

Sin tastes good in the beginning, but its end is a burning pain like no other. Eternity is forever, once you enter it, there is no going back. Once you take your last breath, there is no do-over. Don’t wait for God to judge you, let man judge you while you still have time to change, for iron sharpens iron.

Peace. Love. Go Forth and Talk.

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²¹ The governor again said to them, “Which of the two do you want me to release for you?” And they said, “Barabbas.” ²² Pilate said to them, “Then what shall I do with Jesus who is called Christ?” They all said, “Let him be crucified!” ~ Matthew 27:21-22

2000 years ago, Jesus took the place of Barabbas, a notorious murderer, but who did Barabbas really represent? Jesus an innocent man, pure of heart and blessed by God, took the place of a rebellious murderer, us. Barabbas represents us. We were the rebellious murderer Jesus took the place for. We were the ones released from our prison of sin, forgiven of our debt, and set free in eternity.

Just like us, Barabbas didn’t deserve to be set free. Just like us Barabbas deserved his punishment, but thank God that Jesus has taken our place. Thank you, Jesus, for taking my yoke upon your shoulders. Thank you, Jesus, for taking my place on the cross. Thank you, Jesus, for shedding Your Holy and Precious blood so that we may be cleansed of all unrighteousness. We overlook Jesus taking the place of Barabbas because we don’t realize that Barabbas stood 2000 years representing us. We don’t realize the pain and suffering He went through for us. We don’t realize how much we don’t deserve to be free. We don’t realize the weight that was lifted off of us and put on Him.

Today as you remember the price that Jesus paid for us all, give Him the recognition He deserves. When you teach your children why we celebrate this day, don’t change the story. Don’t sugar coat it. As children, my sister and I were shown the Passion of The Christ, and every year we watch it as a family on this day to remember just what Jesus did for all of us. It wasn’t a few scratches and scrapes that He received. He was beaten until He was unrecognizable. He had to carry His cross to Golgotha (Calvary). He was spit upon and cursed. He was stripped naked. He was mocked and abused. A crown of thorns was pushed down onto His head. He was nailed to a tree. And He died. There is no easy way of saying this, and any less devolves just what He went through. Today I urge you all to take the time to truly remember what Jesus did for us and give Him the praise and the glory that He truly deserves.

Peace. Love. Go Forth and Remember.

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