Stevemidkiff's Blog

O Lord,

mercifully receive our prayers

our heart is bursting for so much

we call on You,

grant that we may know

allow us too understand

show what things we should express

pour into us Your grace and power

You are faithful to accomplish all Your purposes;

through Jesus Christ our Lord,

who lives and reigns with You

and by Your Holy Spirit,

Who lives in us

now and for ever deepen our relationship of love

I was glad when they said to me,

Let‘s go to the house of the Lord.”

In Him we live and move and exist. Acts 17:28

Our frail bodies, needs God our Preserver.

“Let others boast how strong they be,

Nor death nor danger fear;

But we’ll confess, O Lord, to thee,

What feeble things we are.

Fresh as the grass our bodies stand,

And flourish bright and gay;

A blasting wind sweeps o’er the land,

And fades the grass away.

Our life contains a thousand springs,

And dies if one be gone;

Strange, that a harp of thousand strings

Should keep in tune so long!

But ’tis our God supports our frame,

The God that built us first:

Salvation to th’ Almighty name

That rear’d us from the dust.

[He spoke, and straight our hearts and brains

In all their motions rose;

“Let blood,” said he, “flow round the veins,”

And round the veins it flows.

While we have breath, or use our tongues,

Our Maker we’ll adore;

His Spirit moves our heaving lungs,

Or they would breathe no more”

Isaac Watts

Robinson Crusoe found a footprint on his island: yet how little that footprint told him!

Was it the footprint of who?

Was it the footprint of a friend or of a foe;

Was it the footprint of a man or of a woman?

He could not tell. I want more than a footprint.

The lover is not satisfied with the footprint of his lady: he wants her!

I am not satisfied with the footprint of God: I want Him!

“Is there, in all literature,
a more sweet,
a more winsome,
a more pathetic figure than little Naomi,
the daughter of Israel Ben Oliel?

She is, of course, the heroine of
Sir Hall Caine’s Scapegoat.

She is blind and deaf and dumb.

She is lonely too, terribly lonely.

Her father was lonely enough,
for he was a stranger in a strange land—
a Jew in Morocco—

and he felt that every man’s hand was against him.

To make matters worse, his young wife died
when little Naomi was born,

and then his loneliness was more acute than ever.

And, after awhile, he discovered that Naomi was lonely too.

She could not tell him so.

But often, in the night, Israel would awake to find
a little white-robed figure standing beside his bed.

Day and night were both alike to her;
the darkness was as the light.

She could as easily find her way about the great silent house at midnight as at noonday.

And so she came to his side and just stood there!

What she wanted, ’Sir Hall Caine says,

Israel’ could never know,

for her deafness denied him the power to ask,

and her dumbness deprived her of the power to answer.

Was she sick or in pain?

Or, in her sleep, had she seen a face
from the invisible world,

Had she heard a voice that summoned her away?

Or had her mother’s arms seemed to be about her
once again only to be torn from her afresh?’

No; it was none of these things!

It was just that she was lonely and wanted him—

wanted to feel that he was very near to her

and that she was very near to him.

I have sometimes felt that Hall Caine’s picture

of Naomi seeking her father’s presence in the night

is the most vivid illustration in our literature of

man’s blind search after God.

Man cannot live without air—and food—and sleep—
and God.

No tribe has ever been discovered that has not
made some gesture in the darkness

as little Naomi made.

In his Autobiography, Mark Rutherford insists

that all the religions of the heathen world

are eloquent and pathetic evidences

of man’s insatiable hunger for God.

Religions and philosophies, he says,

were not created by idle people

who sat down and said:

Let us build up a system of beliefs upon the universe!

What shall we say about immortality?

What shall we say about sin?’

Unless there had been antecedent necessity,’ he argues,

there could have been no religion.’

He goes on to show that the faiths that men invented

left their hearts eased, yet still aching.

Then Jesus came.

He satisfied man’s inner hunger.

For ‘Christ,’ Mark Rutherford concludes, ‘

is essentially the relationship of the lonely!’

The satisfaction of the lonely!

The consolation of the lonely!

We seem to be back in Israel’s silent room once more.

Little Naomi could only still the inner cry

of her solitary soul by entering her father’s room

in the darkness and feeling the warmth of his presence.

Man could only satisfy the deepest instincts

of his complex being by groping blindly after God.

In the history of the world there have been three heroic moments,

of which this gesture of little Naomi reminds me.

There was the venture of Philosophy.

It was a brave enterprise.

Nobody can read the history of philosophy

without being moved to the highest admiration.

Good and great men—

the purest minds of all time—

set themselves to think out the secrets of the universe—

to think out God.

And we all know the result.

Read any mythology—

Grecian, Roman, Egyptian; what you will;—

and see how these old thinkers conceived of gods

and goddesses galore.

They crowded the heavens with their divinities.

And what did it all amount to?

One can see at a glance that they had but magnified themselves.

They had done what the barbarians did at Brocken.

At Brocken, in Prussian-Saxony,

the highest summit of the Harz Mountains,

a weird and awe-inspiring phenomenon is to be witnessed each day at sunset.

If a man stands on the summit when the sun is sinking over the plains below,

a huge and ghostly shadow of himself is flung

athwart the banks of cloud in the eastern sky.

It is called the Specter of Brocken;

and, years ago, simple barbarians climbed to that summit

in order that they might behold and adore the gigantic figure in the heavens.

But one day there came disillusionment.

They discovered that,

in worshipping the huge and ghostly form
upon the clouds,

they were merely reverencing

the many times magnified shadow of themselves!

That is exactly what the philosophers had done.

The gods and goddesses

who sipped nectar around the celestial tables of the philosophers’ fancies were but magnified mortals.

How, without some external illumination
of the philosophers’ minds,
could their conception of God be anything else?

There was the venture of Science!

Learned men, skilled to interpret

the riddles of the universe,

searched the stars and the strata

in quest of eternal truth.

And they returned from that noble quest

to assure us that, everywhere,

they had discovered the footprints of God!

It sounded well; but what did it amount to?

The footprints of God!

It certainly proves that there is a God:

but I want more than that.

Robinson Crusoe found a footprint on his island:

yet how little that footprint told him!

we want more than a footprint.

We want HIM!

We are not satisfied with the footprint of God:

We want him!

And science, is failing to reveal Him,

Failing to meet our soul’s deep need.

And there was the venture of Judaism. The Jew became possessed of oracles in which the Son of God— the express image of the Most High—was actually described. All the details of his coming were set down in black and white. It seemed like a scheme of revelation so explicit that it could not possibly fail.

And yet, when he came to whom

all those inspired oracles pointed,

the people did not recognize Him!

He came unto his own, and his own received Him not.

So all three of these stately ventures collapsed
or met with but a partial and a transitory success.

Yet, in reality, they were
too good to fail,
too brave to perish.

And, in the end, they were saved from such disaster

The climax of Philosophy was reached on Mars’ Hill.

Paul stood in Athens,

amid the schools of the philosophers.

‘He told them the story of Jesus,

Wrote on their hearts every word,

Told them the story so precious,

Sweetest that ever was heard;

Told how the angels in chorus

sang as they welcomed his birth

Glory to God in highest

Peace and good tidings on earth!”’

That was the climax of Philosophy;

its long, long quest had ended at the feet of Jesus!

The climax of Science was reached when the Magi—

the sages of the East—

knelt at the manger,

offering, in deepest love and adoration,

their gold and their frankincense and their myrrh

to the Babe of Bethlehem!

And the climax of Judaism?

The climax of Jewish history was reached

when three typical Jews—

Peter and James and John—

ascended the slopes of a Syrian mountain

and saw the Son of Man transfigured.

There appeared with him Moses,

the representative of the Law,

and Elijah, the representative of the Prophets.

But the Law and the Prophets—

Moses and Elijah—vanished.

Theirs was not the ultimate unfolding
of the divine heart.

And the three Jews saw, we are told,
no man, save Jesus only!

Judaism, like Philosophy and Science,
had reached its climax

by looking full into the face of Jesus.

The summit of all revelation is to be found there!

It is thus that human hearts,
blindly feeling after the Father,
joyously find him.

Naomi had never heard the word ‘Father’:

she had no conception of such a relation-ship;

yet she knew what she wanted;

and she found the dictates of her heart.

Later on, as readers of Hall Caine’s great story

know, Naomi, seeing her father’s face,

and hearing his voice,

rejoiced every day

in the dear delight of his fond companionship.

And they who, in some dark, dumb sense,

have once entered the Father’s presence,

invariably undergo a similar experience

of progressive illumination and deepening love.”

Dr. F.W. Boreham

Sow righteousness for yourselves and reap faithful love

break up our unplowed ground in our hearts.

It is time to seek the LORD until he comes and sends righteousness

on us like the rain.

—Hosea 10:12

We should not be psychological captives of lies

The manipulative news- pessimistic headlines are downers

All journalistic spin polarizers should be ignored.

We are easily controlled by the false assumption that everything is out of control.

We can play into a defeatist attitude.

Prayer puts us automatically into the throne room of the King of all Kings.

He never sleeps and He’s not hard of hearing.

Satan’s and his earthly forces are actually losing.

Satan is not “alive and well on Planet Earth.”

He is alive, but he is not well.

To argue otherwise is to argue for the historical impotence and cultural irrelevance of Christ’s work on Calvary.

God answers prayer and He is moving His Kingdom rapidly forward where every knee bows and every mouth confesses that Jesus Christ is Lord.

We can bow now and confess Jesus as our Lord and King.

Then we will stand in Him and pray confidently about everything.

If we ever tried to make ends meet by stealing?
Well, don’t do that anymore!

Get a job & do an honest days work.

That’s how we can help others who can’t work.

Be sensitive in communicating.

Don’t be crass, foul or dirty in speech.

Use constructive words, terms that heal & help other.

Carefully make each word a rich gift

Don’t grieve God, He has tender feelings toward us.

Don’t break his heart.

His Spirit is in us, moving & breathing inside us.

He is very intimate with us.

He’s making us better through our circumstances.

Even when our situation is very challenging He’s building our faith.

Don’t react like a grouch.

Don’t stress out & become cutting

Refuse to be backbiting & stop all ugly, nasty talk.

Be gentle with each person.

Be sensitive.

Forgive one another as quickly and thoroughly

Just as God in Christ forgave us.

Ephesians 4:28-32 paraphrased

Whose in danger of slipping and falling? 

Will really, any of us are. No one is stable.

If we thinks we can stay upright in our stand

If we feel sure that our mind is steadfast and we’re firm in our position

Watch out be cautious that we don’t fall into sin

For no temptation and no trial where we’re enticed to sin

no matter how it comes or where it leads has overtaken and got a grip on us

that is unusual to all of us.

We’re vulnerable but we can resist, we can adjust and we can adapt

We can bear up. We don’t have to fall

God is faithful to His Word and God is supernaturally compassionate to us

He can be trusted. We can depend on Him to deliver us

God will not allow us to be tempted and tried beyond our ability and strength

God will allocate to us the power to resist and the grace to endure,

God always provides the way out. There’s always a means of escape

God gives us the capabilities and strength and powerful to endure it patiently.

1 Corinthians 10:12-13 paraphrased

Why do we fall? We fall, because we want to.

But doesn’t it say in Rom 1 that God gave them up,

and then a second time God gave them up

and then finally God gave them over?

Yes, actually

God put them in slippery places:

God throws them down into destruction.

Psa. 73:18

So is it God’s fault when we slip and fall? 

No, what happens is God’s reaching out in multiple ways to hold us up

and we slap his hand away.

There’s a 14 step process to falling explained in Rom. 1

SELF EXALTING BELIEFS V.21-24

1. DENY GODS AUTHORITY V.21 (INDIFFERENCE)

Because that, when they knew God, they glorified him not as God,

Because when they recognized Him as God they refused to honor Him

2. DENOUNCE GOD’S AMIABILITY (INGRATITUDE)

neither were thankful

They refused to be grateful.

Every breath we breath we should thank God for it.

Every pump of our heart we should appreciate

We’re obligated to respect and thank God for every moment of our existence

3. DESTROY YOUR ACCURACY (IGNORANCE)  

but became vain in their imaginations

When we refuse to be gratified for all we’ve been given we slip into resentment

Before we know it we’re blaming God for everything we don’t like

We become bitter, antagonistic and indignant toward God

4. DISCONNECT YOUR AFFECTIONS (INSENSITIVITY)

and their foolish heart was darkened.

We become futile and refuse to allow God in our thinking [with vain

Our imagination get warped

Our reasoning is now empty.

Our speculations become ridiculous and senselessly fogged up into a shady existence

Romans 1:21 paraphrased

5. DISTORT YOUR ABILITY V.22 (INADEQUACY)      

Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools

We present ourselves as intelligent

We Claim we’re wise, but we’re fools and block headed nitwits

Romans 1:22 paraphrased

6. DISTRACT YOUR ADORATION V.23 (IDOLATRY)

We pretend to know it all, but were illiterate regarding life.

We’ve traded God’s beautiful creativity for cheap replacements

We’ve rejected the fact that God holds the whole world in his hands

We think animals are more important then God

We think birds are more important then God

We think insects and creeping things are more important then God

Romans 1:23 paraphrased

7. DEMORALIZE YOUR APPETITE V.24 (IMMORALITY)

God then gives us to hearts full of desire for sexual impurity,

We dishonor our design as we’re abandoned sins degrading power

Romans 1:24

So God says,

“If that’s what you want, that’s what you get.” If you want to live smeared with filth,

If you want to be yucky inside and out.

That’s the trade off rejecting the true God for a fake god,

That’s the consequences of adoring a false god in place of the God our designer

If we refuse to bless God

The God refuses to bless us.

SELF DEGRADING BEHAVIOR V.25-27

8. DUPLICATE HIS AUTHENTICITY V.25 (IMPERSONATION)

We exchange the truth of God for a lie of man

We worship creatures rather rather than our Creator

We become slaves to fakes and pretensions

Romans 1:25 paraphrased

9. DEVIANT ALTERNATIVES V.26-27 (INDECENCY)

For this cause God gave them up unto vile affections & in natural stuff:

which is the consequences

This devolves into God abandoning us twisted affections and degrading passions.

Now we’re trading God’s natural function for unnatural, abnormal ones

We become deviant and aberrant  

natural relations are all cross wired. It results in a shock initially.

The we are on fire and consumed with disgusting lust for committing shameful acts

Our bodies and personalities become warped. That’s the inevitable consequences

We’re astray in behavior that’s abhorrent and repulsive

Romans 1:26-27 paraphrased

SELF DESTRUCTIVE BONDAGE V.28-32

10. DISREGARD GOD’S AGENDA V.28 (INSOLENCE)

We push God away more and more. God has now become redefined into what He isn’t.

11. DISCARD YOUR APTITUDE (INSATIABLE)    

God gave them over to a reprobate mind

We’re depraved.

We’re degenerate

We’re debauched.

12. DEPRAVE YOUR ACTIONS (INCORRIGIBLE)

to do those things which are not convenient

Now we have a pattern of loathsome activities

We do disgusting things

We do distasteful things

We do detestable things

13. DEGENERATE YOUR ATTRACTIVENESS  (INFECTION) V.29-31

Being filled with all

THIS AFFECTS OUR CHARACTER

Here we have a list of flaws which result from alienation away from God         

1.Unrighteousness is injustice. This is being bias, unfair and prejudicial.

2. wickedness is being evil in our actions. It’s being nefarious and corrupt

3. covetousness is greed with this incessant desire for more.

This is discontent

This is dissatisfaction

This is always being disgruntled, dissatisfied and displeased

4. maliciousness the desire to harm others; being venomous with hate

Being spiteful, nasty and mean

5. full of envy wanting what others have had holding a grudge against them

6. proud being haughty, arrogant, disdainful, gloating egotistically

THIS AFFECTS OUR CONDUCT 

7. fornication sexual immorality, adultery, and other forms of illicit sex, infidelity

8. murder destroying others character, ruining others livelihood

9. malignity being cruel, spiteful and poisonous, being hostile and vicious

THIS AFFECTS OUR CONVERSATION

10. debate given to wrangling, quarreling, contentiousness. A controversial contrarian

11. deceit full of trickery, treachery, intrigue, deceptive, dishonest

12. whisperers, gossips, busy bodies full of bad reports & dirt on others

13. Backbiters slanderers, those who bad-mouth others, defamers who vilify

14. Despiteful full of ill-will, spite, hostility, acridly bitter, vindictive, venomous & vicious

15. Boasters braggarts, self-paraders, blow heart braggarts and self promoters

THIS AFFECTS OUR CONCEPTS          

16. haters of God hostile opposition against God. They despise and loathe God

17. inventors of evil things devisers of hurtful destructive new forms of perversions

18. without understanding lacking discernment and without any self awareness

THIS AFFECTS OUR COMPANIONSHIPS

19. disobedient to parents rebellious to all authority and blames parents for everything & They avoid their parents and ditch them

20. covenant breakers untrustworthy, promises breaker, incapable of agreements Contractually unstable & never sacrificial but just self centered

21. without natural affection not able to have a relationship inventing ways to wreck lives

22. implacable unforgiving, irreconcilable, inflexible, unbending, unappeasable

23. unmerciful violent, despiteful, insulting, unloving, cruel, vindictive, without pity

14. DECRY GOD’S ABSOLUTE AUTHORITY (IMPERTINENCE) V.32

THE CONSEQUENCES   

They know they’re dead to God.

They don’t care

They’re spitting in God’s face.

THE COLLABORATION  

Everything is upside down.

They celebrate and reward those who pervert and twist God’s design and purposes

THE CONSENT       

but have pleasure in them that do them.

They approve, applaud and appreciate total disgusting dysfunction

What can we do in our energy? Do we ever need additional ability?

Who do we look to in our weakness? Do we look to Jesus?

We need more then energy. We need wisdom. We need direction.

We need freedom.

In our past we were under a dictator.

But now, If we’ve bowed to Jesus as our Lord and Savior,

we have a new Lord.

Now, we have a new direction to go. We can’t live any old way we want.

We need to live in our new freedom.

What we did in the past that we thought was freedom we now find

destroying our freedom.

If we choose to sin we decline off into bondage.

We need too, if we stumble back, yield back to our Lord for His freedom.

The way back is through admitting where we got off track.

We offer ourselves to the Lord and His freedom and His endless enabling.

In the past life we let sin tell us what to do.

But now we’re listening to a new master, one whose words set us free

to live openly in His freedom! …

If we continually surrender ourselves to someone else to do their will,

we become the slaves of those we follow and submit to.

That someone might be ourselves and our natural inclination.

That leads to death. Things inside us die and guilt and self defeating

thoughts start draining our spiritual interests making us frazzled.

But yielding to Jesus and what He’s done and is doing in us leads

to righteousness.

In Him we see our right standing.

We need to learn the deep lesson about who we yield ourselves too.

We have to learn the one we give in to is who we’re In bondage too.

Either we give in to our sin nature or we yield to our new life in Christ

Romans 6:12-16 and 1 John 1:9 paraphrased

In all our lives we come up against situations that we cannot overcome

in our own strength, or with our own wisdom.

We need a strength and a wisdom that comes from Above, that comes

from Beyond, that comes from Another outside of us and yet this

one rises up within us because He lives in us.

“Do you not know that to whom we present ourselves slaves to obey,

we are that one’s slaves whom we obey,

whether of sin leading to death,

or of obedience leading to righteousness?”

Rom. 6:16 (NKJV)

If we know Christ then we have experienced this over and over.

We know our inability to save ourselves, and so we surrendered to

Christ and trust Jesus to do in us and through us what we could not

do on our own.

That surrender is called various things, it is “taking up the Cross”.

We have to die to saving ourselves.

We can’t save ourself; and since we can’t it can be a harsh and

unfortunately a lengthy lesson.

It is only as we trust in the Life of our Lord Jesus to do what we can’t

achieve in our own strength.

This is what it means to “embrace Jesus” in our salvation.

And we see that when the death to Self is thorough and complete –

that is, when we stop trying to save ourselves and instead we cast

ourselves upon the grace of God,

Then God activates the reality that He’s already raised us from the dead.

That which was impossible before

We now see this is already accomplished by God.

We receive His grace in gratitude and praise.

We learn through the Cross Jesus has done everything.

What Christ accomplished on the Cross is sufficient no matter what our

situation or challenges with sin has been or is now.

The Cross is the power of God for salvation,

The Cross is also the power of God for our relationships,

The Cross is also the power of God for our spiritual growth and

development,

In Christ we find our life’s purpose, our encouragement and strength,

and our victory over everything which hinders and distracts and comes

against us.

We can’t save ourself. Jesus is our Savior.

Without Jesus we can’t do anything.

Through Christ we love God,

Through Christ we love others,

Through Christ we forgive those who wrong us,

Through Christ we cast out devils,

Through Christ we’re bold witnesses of Christ,

Through Christ we fulfill His design and destiny for us.

Just as we once relied upon Christ to save us from the penalty of sin,

Now we learn to daily rely on Christ to live through us to overcome sins

deception.

We rely on Christ for everything.

“As we have received Christ Jesus as our Lord…” He is our door.

So we walk in Him.” He is our Path.

We admit we can’t save ourselves.

We surrender ourself over to God in every area of our life.

We Walk in Him for His Purpose, His Power, His Lordship.

He’s Embraced us at the Cross!

It’s not religious cures of fasting, binding and loosing, exorcism,

and positive admissions.

It’s not psychological remedies: of visualization, counseling, psychotherapy,

self-help courses, motivational speakers, natural remedies, and

prescription drugs.

Its not wearing a rubber band around our wrist and snapping it whenever

our thoughts are ugly to interrupt bad thought patterns back into reality.

Multiple failures teach us one thing: we need Jesus.

We are powerless.

Come to Christ.

We Surrender it all to Him.

We Admit that apart from Him it can’t be done.

We’re dead. We can’t do it. Christ is our life.

“What is impossible with men is possible with God”

Lk. 18:27

Why do we have to spend so much time learning what is impossible

for us to do!

Why wander in the wilderness for 40 years.

Giving up is a mysterious process.

What is impossible with us, is possible in and through Jesus!

Since we’re in Christ old things are past and we’re a new creation in Jesus.

If we admit the fact that we have sinned

If we come clean confessing our sins, (which we have to do always)

Jesus is faithful and true to His own nature and promises and

He completely forgives our sins.

He dismisses where we’ve ignored His instructions in His Word.

Jesus continuously cleanses us from everything that’s out of conformity

to His will

He washes away everything that violated His design and purposes.

He corrects our thoughts, and our dumb actions.

1 Cor. 5:17 and 1 John 1:9 paraphrased

Embracing these truths.

We hold these facts deeply in our heart.

We do it through Meditation.

Like a dog adoring a bone and chewing it all day we have to combat the lies

of wrong thoughts and habits.

Even if we review these truths 100s of times a day.

We trust Christ by His Spirit to do what we cannot do.

In Christ:

we’re crucified, dead, buried, resurrected, ascended and seated with Him

In a place of abiding embrace.

We’re His Branches in the vine of Jesus abundant life.

It’s “Not us, but Christ”

Gal. 2:20

Everyday we need renewal, because we leak, we fade, and we get depleted.

We can’t run on yesterday’s fuel, our body won’t function on yesterday’s meal,

Our pain can’t be relieved on yesterday’s medication.

We can’t run today’s life on yesterday’s newness.

We need renewal, we need new lift under our wings of faith constantly.

There are new challenges, new battles and new needs of strength.

Jesus said

“Do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself.

Sufficient for the day is its own trouble.”

Matthew 6:34

The mercies of the Lord “are new every morning.”

Each day has its own trouble. But every day has God’s renewing mercies.

God renews them. God renews us everyday. Don’t listen to the evil one who pummels us about the past.

“We have this treasure in jars of clay” we’re fragile and the surpassing renewing power belongs to God

2 Cor 4:7

Give the leaks to Him.

We come to You, Lord,

We lift our empty cup to Your overflowing fountain of Grace strengthening and sufficiency.

You are more than enough for all our needs now