Tag: discipline

Mountains on the Move

Imagine the great results of being disciplined and savor them.

Meditation Thought: Then Jesus, calling out with a loud voice, said, “Father, into your hands I commit my spirit!”  (Luke 23:46)

“Think about what happened after the excruciating pain of the moment Jesus said the above words. He trusted, even in the face of seeming disaster, His total being unto Me. And I did not fail Him. I made His name above all names; I gave Him power above all powers, I arranged for Him to live forever – even in the flesh, through believers.

I do not call upon you to go through the same trials as did Jesus – but I do call upon you to trust Me as He did, obey Me as He did – and to believe that the results of your doing so will unleash miracles as I did through His trust, His obedience, and His belief in miracles.

Dare to try to think, to pray, to act, as if Jesus is using your mind, your heart, and your body to live again. Discipline yourself – use your imagination to be the power of discipline. You can picture your optimum results based on the thoughts, words and deeds which you know are Jesus-prompted within your mind, your spirit and your body.

When you desire to do something other than the thing you know is right – pause – they pray, imagine the great results of being disciplined and savor them.

Your seeds will become trees, your mountains will be moved – and as your faith is expressed, it will inspire others to seek Me, to seek My will and to seek My way.”

Keeper of the Kingdom

The kingdom is administered differently than the world is administered.

Meditation Thought: “Then the king will say to those at his right hand, ‘Come O blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world, for I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, I was naked and you clothed me, I was sick and you visited me, I was in prison and you came to me… Truly I say to you, as you did it to the one of the least of these my brethren, you did it to me.'” (Matthew 25: 34-36, 40)

Your Father desires that you, as His child, inherit His kingdom. But you must be responsible before He can entrust it to you, knowing that you will be competent to deal with the inheritance, using it as He he has used it, or more properly as has administered it.

The kingdom is administered differently than the world is administered.

The ‘keeper of the kingdom’ must be, as is the Father, loving, gracious, forgiving, righteous, helpful, compassionate, zealous, energetic, orderly, competent, kind, perceptive, wise, knowledgeable, powerful.

How can you be such a ‘keeper’ – particularly as you have the ways of the world beckoning you to follow them? – the ways of selfishness, greed, self-seeking, slothfulness, deceit, slander, ruthlessness?

Only by disciplining yourself to know the Word (which is the law of the kingdom)) and to emulate your Father from whom you inherit, doing His works as He instructs you and reveals His ways to you, can you be entrusted to be a ‘keeper of the kingdom”: an heir.

The Son has clearly demonstrated the type of heir that is pleasing to the Father, the methods to be used in being a keeper of the kingdom while at the same time being in the flesh. While in the flesh, you are to be a keeper of the kingdom precisely as you will be behaving when you leave the flesh.

The physical manifestation is the training which you will need, and the development of your skills needed to administer the kingdom in the realm other than physical. You are to become skillful at using many talents in such a way as to multiply them, bringing joy not only to your “master” who entrusted them to you, but to those whom He benefits with them including yourself.

A Future of Good Return

…the present determines the character of the future.

Meditation Thought: “…if the householder had known in which part of the night the thief was coming, he would have watched and not let his house be broken into. Therefore you also must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect.” (Matthew 24:43,44)

You must anticipate the future, realizing that the present determines the character of the future. This will give you strength to conduct yourself as you ought, even when the required behavior is not to your liking at the moment. Not all moments will be “sacrificial” moments – in fact, as you come to rejoice in the perceiving and doing of the will of the Father, more and more activities will be joyful, and fewer and fewer perceived as sacrificial. It is this change in perception that is the moving of the kingdom upon the earth. It comes only by discipline and sacrifice of selfish desires – but the rewards of the discipline and sacrifice are as bountiful as the promised “hundred fold” harvest. It is this knowledge which gives you courage to labor for the moment, particularly when the labor is not to your liking.

The times of reaping the harvest – the unfathomable joy of actually having the promised return, will be carried in your memory as your tools to make the labor easier during the “tilling” times.

The more you experience in planting, tilling and harvesting – whatever area (field) it is in, the greater your wisdom and knowledge is to prompt a bountiful harvest.

This is consistent with the rewards of using whatever “talents” are provided int the most productive ways possible, and also the more provided, the more required. Each portion is either multiplied or not, and the more portions the more dramatic the contrast of results. The “Son of man coming at an hour you do not expect” compares to the owner of the fields checking out the status of your care of them. You cannot “set up” a good appearance for the “inspection” because you have no notice of the inspection time. Therefore, care must be constant and inspection will always reveal good care of the field because good care never ceases, when the laborer is as concerned about the harvest as the owner.

IT is the laborer who realizes that the owner will share the harvest with him who is able to be motivated to do a good job. If he is lazy he eventually cheats himself. It is those who will remove concentration from self alone who will know this, and thus use the present to provide a future of good return for themselves.

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