​I was listening to Judges 1-6 for the umpteenth time in the car, when I noticed something that seems to get overlooked all the times I’ve heard Chapter 4 taught in person, on-line or read it in print myself. Perhaps, because she sat in a particular spot and people went to her for wisdom, it’s stuck in our minds that Barak went to her on his own schedule. No. Judge Prophetess Deborah sent for Barak.

Judges 4 KJV
4 And Deborah, a prophetess, the wife of Lapidoth, she judged Israel at that time.
5 And she dwelt under the palm tree of Deborah between Ramah and Bethel in mount Ephraim: and the children of Israel came up to her for judgment.
6 And she sent and called Barak the son of Abinoam out of Kedeshnaphtali, and said unto him, Hath not the Lord God of Israel commanded,...”

Judge Deborah reminds Barak of what God told him to do. Barak didn't iniate the meeting with her.

Now, we generally want to wait for the person to know for themselves what we already know,  which is valid because a person has to go in their own awareness of God’s call and strength in them rather than in somebody  else’s strength that WILL wane when things get hard. Yet, apparently, Judge Prophetess Deborah was obedient to God’s instruction to send for Barak to tell him what she knew God had already told him, instead of waiting for him to get started or to approach her. We find out he was fearful, but that doesn’t negate that within the fear may have been a valid uncertainty of how to carry out the command and not knowing when to start the operation, rather than assuming he was just totally disobeying God out of plain old fear.  Judge Prophetess Deborah’s summoning him was the answer to all his internal questions (just like the ones we have about assignments). The summons let him know he heard God right, it was the right time to begin operations, and she gave him the steps to take.

God understands whether we’re not moving because we refuse to or because we are waiting for more directions from Him. God also knows whether He’s going to give us directions directly or will send someone to give us those directions.

Our prayer should be to follow what we hear from God and that whoever God has called to summon us in order to give us directions will do so, and for us to go when He sends us to give someone else directions they are waiting for or struggling with, in Jesus’ Name.

Amen?
Amen.
 
Note: She called for him. He received it, not questioning whether she was good enough to be used by God to tell or talk to him about that particular subject, like some still question certain ones of God’s chosen, even knowing how long or how much or how they've been used by God before. Some in their flesh either don’t want to believe what they’ve seen or heard of God doing through certain of His chosen ones or because they want to impart doubt or they think it's their job to keep certain chosen ones from getting as confident in God using them as they are with being used by God or to think their faith in God works, too. 


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​​(Details  of the situations DMd  only to followers  10.11.2023) 
(Pics are screenshots of audio text messages I send to myself while listening to the Bible as I drive. Imperfect transcription but decent.)
Some Christians despise drug addicts, alcoholics, unwed parents, kids born out of wedlock, laid-off workers, and the slow-moving disabled UNTIL it happens to them or their family member or friends.  Suddenly, they see the light of the love of Jesus, and decide to love instead of bash.  Most don't need the experience to understand the lesson of love and understanding what they understand about Christ. Others do.

Do you really believe what you say you believe? Think before you speak.
God can make your situation so unique that people will question their beliefs and realize they weren't necessarily based in God in the first place OR were but the person may not have the definite stance they thought they had (see IG post for exact wording).
 
Take this couple, for instance, both attending the same church in the 90s. One was told by God that the other would leave but was not supposed to. The One didn’t totally understand what was coming but knew the Other One was not supposed to leave. Incidences in the church happened, the pastor was dismissed in a situation involving criminal illegalities in the handling of paperwork. The Other One left with the pastor and joined him at a newly formed, but short-lived church. The One stayed where they had been because the Lord had already given instructions about that situation. Some at the church didn’t trust One. Some told One they needed to be with their spouse BUT they didn’t want and actually advised One to not go to the newly formed church. What? Yes. Basically, “I’m suspicious of you being here so I think you need to go with your spouse, but not over there because they’re the enemy.” Where One stayed was the right place to be. 

So what did that so-called advisor actually believe? Did she actually believe spouses are supposed to always be at the same church together or not? It seemed like “Don’t go over there. Stay here. But, I’m not going to do anything to get The One over here with you and really don’t want The One over here and don’t want One over there.
YET, that situation made some re-think their beliefs that one is always to follow the other and realize one can obey God while the other doesn’t EVEN when both agree to do the same thing.
People want to fix things that don’t look like what they believe or what they’ve been taught that is not exactly spelled out in the Bible. Some situations are not supposed to be fixed because God knows what God is doing with groups, families, couples, and individuals.  No matter who we are attached to and why, we are still individuals with individual destinies in Christ, that may not be the same, but will not hinder the other. 

We EACH have a path to walk in Christ and God's instructions to obey for God’s particular purposes. God knows each person’s down-sitting and uprising and thoughts from afar and has a plan, a race, a life with and/or without someone else. Your needs to be met to satisfy God are not always tied to whoever you are tied to. They have their own needs that will be worked out in and through Christ in different situations than the other person.

We all say that God wants all the Glory, yet we’re always trying to run other people’s lives.  God does things in ways that humans can't touch and can't take credit for it. God does things in ways that makes people shut up about your situation that they see is working for your good even though it doesn’t fit
t-h-e-i-r theology.

I remember of a man who came off the street and desperately wanted to be saved. He was told, ridiculously, that he couldn’t be saved unless he went back to his first wife. He had a long-time girlfriend who visited with him and his ex-wife had a man. The leader insisted. The man was desperate.  After a few weeks, he actually brought his ex-wife to church to personally tell the pastor she didn’t want him back and wouldn’t take him back.  The leader finally ‘gave him permission’ to get saved. It was weird.  The man left and didn’t return.  (Sarcasm) So now leaders can decide you can't be saved or they can give you a pass for God (so you still look like you were wrong but have been forgiven, and the leader doesn’t look like their demand was bad in the first place).
​
***Something that goes along with that is that where God is trying to get us, together and separately (because we each have our own race and one’s race is not just running behind the other), we have our own tests and storms to be made and tried through because we're individuals and we need different situations to get in or out of us what needs to gotten in or out of us.
 
By the way, similar situations happened to this couple three times over the years. They were blessed In all three situations because of obedience.  

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 loving the wife like Christ loved the church and gave himself for it.
Love means (scriptures): 
Gave himself (scriptures) is more than just working alot and paying bills. 
Some men think "gave himself for it" to mean working and paying the bills.
What about this, though:
Do you listen to her every time she wants to talk?
Do you go everywhere with her that she wants you to go?
Are you even available to go anywhere with her?
Are you available to be asked or informed of where she wants to go and what she wants to accomplish?
Do you answer her calls...as quickly as you answer other calls or at all?
Do you answer her texts...as quickly as you answer other's texts or at all?
Do you read her emails...as quickly as you read emails from others or at all?
Do you respond to her calls, voicemails, texts, emails, ...
But you call yourself loving her like Christ loved the church.
 
Sure, now! You’re old and friends/colleagues aren’t available, able or are bogged down with old folk issues.
 
But what about then, aaannnddd now and always meaning since you married her?
 
Huh?
 

Broken means prepared to do God's will and being the YOU God called YOU to be. Broken from doing what everyone else always wants us to do. Broken from not doing what everyone else wants us to not do. Broken from working their system for they glory. Broken from blending in. Broken from being quiet in the land/in someone else's 'field'/per someone else's instructions, when we should be doing what God called us to do.

Humble means doing God's will and being the YOU God called YOU to be.
​
People can lead and guide you and give advice to trim you up. YOU know the difference between training/trimming vs interference. WE know the difference between someone helping us go further vs someone who uses "help" to try to stop, suppress, or even move us past what God intended which will absolutely lead to failure because that's not the mark God intended for us to reach. 
How do we know? We feel it. Why do we feel it? God tells us. It's God's assignment so God tells us when directions are right or wrong. 
​
How many have been forced into or out of things by controlling people? How many have been manipulated into or out of their God-assignment for the sake of the manipulators ego to stop or ego use them? Even in secular society, kids have been controlled into practicing hours-a-day for the piano or gymnastics or choir to suit an adult and hate it when they get old enough to understand they were forced BUT are STUCK in it because they don't/weren't allowed to know how to do anything else.  This happens in the world of religion also. How many priests didn't have a choice because every family had to have a son who would rise to the priesthood? Yes, successful but trapped. Doing it but with inward hatred. 
The LESSON is to know for yourself.  WE are the stewards of the talent, call or gift God gave us. We are resonsible for saying yes to the right leader/helper/coach and no the the wrong leader/helper/coach.  Even when we have the right leader/helper/coach, we still have to utilize our yes and no when particular assignments or instructions match or don't match our spirit. Our final answer, daily, is to God. Leaders/helpers/coaches don't know it all. Only God knows ALL He has for us to do with what He's given us.  Yes, listen to others, run by God and don't be afraid to give it a yes or no. 



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In this process of determining what I want (based on a sermon I heard a few weeks ago),  one thing that popped into my mind last week, after seeing like-manner posts,  is that I'm not concerned about God preparing a table before me IN THE PRESENCE OF MY ENEMIES. If God wants to, GOOD. Otherwise, I don't care if my enemies see my blessings/wins or not. That's not my focus. That focus might actually lead me to do the wrong things in an effort to make something happen.




​

Barak had no shame in asking a woman, Deborah, to help him fight.

He had no resistance against God leading him to ask a woman for help.  He rode beside her, unlike some who may get directions and ideas from women, then put the women in the background or completely hidden, then walk out the directions and ideas as if they were his own.

He didn't seem to despise or reject or degrade in any way - spiritually, emotionally, intellectually - a woman/women. Men who do such seem to puzzle women and other men who can't see how those type men can incubate in a woman and are probably raised by a woman, but disdain and degrade women and suggests that in doing so, they are obeying God. 

Audio texts pictured. (I listen to the Bible when I'm driving and audio text myself my thoughts about what I hear.) 
My thoughts when listening to this chapter were that Barak wanted Judge Deborah to go with him because of her wisdom and perhaps her Ministry of Presence. To impart wisdom, one has to speak. How many take a woman with them, probably their wife (Judge D was not his wife. She had a husband.), but expect her to not say a word - just sit and look pretty and look like the man is doing a good job of being a husband. Come on! 

There are many Baraks who find themselves buddying up with their wife, especially later in life, when everyone else - all their guy friends - are stationed at home taking care of health issues with self or the spouse, raising grandkids, or have just run out of all the energy they had in the past that they expended hanging out with male friends (who also had families at home waiting). They eventually find their 'home' again. Don't we all?  

Ladies,

No. I won't help you mistreat her. I'm sure, that if she's like the rest of us, she has other people in her life working hard - and out loud - to let her know they think she's a worthless nobody to them. 

Leave her alone.


Psalm 35:20 KJV
Psalm 35:20 EXB

When Jesus gave up the ghost on the cross, Joseph asked for His body in order to bury it. Some thought Jesus' burial was the end of Him.

In Matthew 25, when the master gave talents to his servants to multiply, one servant buried his talent. 

Women, how many of you have buried your talent, either out of unbelief thinking if it's hidden, it will go away or out of fear like the servant who buried his talent or probably because you spend too much time helping others. 

A pastor once reminded me to not neglect my calling by spending too much time helping others work on their calling.  (I wasn't neglecting mine, nor was I the source of help to someone else that he surmised I was, but I totally understood his point and appreciated his concern.)

There is a gift of helps, but when it is not our specific gift, women still tend to put everyone else first and end up burying that which God specifically called us to do.  Then we don't have time left to learn the functions of the auxilary/ministry we have been assigned to lead or study  for the lessons or songs we've been asked to teach or sing.

Let's not bury our talents in our earthly body by doing someone else's work because we don't think they can do it or because we have spoiled them by helping them so much. Let's do our's first - I know that will be hard sometimes because we want to help and tend to try to get others' things out of the way so we can settle in and do our's...which rarely works - THEN we can enter into the joy of the Lord, not just when we meet judgment after death but also on earth when we stop grieving God's Holy Spirit (Ephesians 4:30).

Amen?
Amen. 

     





(Recorded and aired as a Thought-Provoking Moment on former WYZE1480AM April 2006)

Romans 5:19  "For as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous." 

Adam's disobedience in the Garden of Eden caused all mankind to be born into sin. Jesus' death and resurrection allowed all mankind - upon belief, repentance, and confession - to be reconciled back to God and save by grace. 

So now apply think of that in an earthly familial way. One earthly man's sin can possibly cause his whole family/household to sin. The man who gives in to alcohol, drugs, staying out late, anger, or adultery can open his children to anger, hurt and evil spirits that cause them to act out in the school, home, or community, which leads to punishment (more anger) for  bad conduct, suffering grades or a criminal activity which could cripple them for a good part of their life (Ephesians 6:4). Don't let your children get too hungry physically or emotionally for parental care (https://www.biblicalcounselingcoalition.org/2012/05/07/25-ways-to-provoke-our-children-to-anger/).  The wife may become too depressed to  properly care for the family. may not be able to deal with the lashing out of the angry children in the home, school and community, or may be tempted to lie or steal to keep the home  and to family's needs met because of the lack of attention to the family by the man.

The same man accepting Christ as his Savior can save his household both spiritually and naturally. His family may follow his example and also give themselves to Christ. Certianly there will be more peace and loving  connectivity in the family and the household, and even if the family is split in different households. And as a righteous man, he will care for his family which will save them from some emotional, financial, intellectual and spiritual hardships. Although we all are responsible for our own decisions and life-affirming or life-destroying actions (James 1:14-15), let's all accept and keep Christ as our Savior so we will be good examples of love rather than stumbling blocks.



(Note: Man in the OT refers to mankind in reference to human instead of animal.  Romans 5 specifically speaks of Adam - the man - the male.)

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​Mark 12:1-12

Have you as a Christian, among non-Christians and fellow Christians, been treated like one of the servants in this scripture?

You were sent to gather what Jesus had for you or to [harvest - do what He called you to do] for Him,
but you were beat up, left empty, stoned, wounded in the head, shamefully handled, killed and cast away?

These actions may be expected from unbelievers, even though some of them don't mistreat you at all. These actions happen among believers, which should not be so.

Just know and remember that you were sent by the Master - Jesus - the Cornerstone, who also suffered  those things at the hands of the unbelievers and those who claimed to be/presented themselves as the righteous.

They won't win.
Jesus won.
You will win.
You've already won.
We have already won.

I Peter 2:5, 9 (2:1-25)


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Don't be that smart.
Don't be that confident.
Don't be that Holy.
Don't be that Anointed.
Don't be that "tall" in spirit.
Don't be that happy.
Don't be that successful.

Why?

Their reactions say because it scares them. They can't handle it. It challenges their call to be all that to the level they know God called them...and they don't want to OR they seem to be living all that themselves and see you as someone who may match or surpass them (which is not possible in God's Kingdom because we all have a particular place to operate in) and they don't want you to do that.

People, that scenario (reality) is why we need to be dedicated to God, not to people.

Mark 12:30 And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength: this is the first commandment.

Be ALL YOU THAT GOD HAS CALLED YOU TO BE FOR, IN, BY, AND THROUGH HIM. Don't slap God in the face by diminishing who He Made you to be just because others (friends, family, co-workers, church people, Christians, non-Christians, neighbors, community) aren't ready!
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