Day 8, Paragraph 8 of Weekday Blog #1

*Starting our morning and day off great with the 10-minute Weekday Blog*

Our first DAILY blog, every Weekday in JUNE!

Thank you for joining us for this
ground-breaking JOURNEY...
through the 1st CHAPTER of Keith's book,
“Keep the FAITH…Keep Your VISION”!

If you will read this book in its entirety, then you will be equipped
to begin walking with the confidence and authority that Jesus Christ
came and died to provide for us, in order that we may work *with*
Him, be *fulfilled* in our work, lead a *successful life*, and...
      

Day EIGHT,
Paragraph EIGHT:

    
This last point is missed by most people, because they base their emphasis in life on their physical bodies, whether on supplying its wants and cravings, or on dressing it, or on projecting some sort of image with it. Please do not misunderstand me on this: the maintenance of our bodies is indeed important for the fulfillment of God's plan for our lives, and He will provide all that is required, and more, to those who will trust in Him. Even so, He never intends for our bodies to be our primary focus. In fact, this is where most folks find themselves being drawn further away from Him.

Question to ponder:

When we take our primary focus away from our physical wants and desires and put the emphasis on our spirit, what happens?  _________________________________________

Keith's "Comments from the Author":

"

"

"God, knowing so well our backwards way of thinking, calls us to repentance through the prophet Isaiah, 'Seek ye the LORD while He may be found, call ye upon Him while He is near: Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts: and let him return unto the LORD, and He will have mercy upon him; and to our God, for He will abundantly pardon. For My Thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My Ways, saith the LORD.' (Isaiah 55:6-8)"

_____________________________

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Your friends & servants in Christ,

Take me back to the top of this post.

Take me to the top of yesterday's post *DAY 7*, June 9th.

Take me to the first post of this week *DAY 6* posted June 8th.

Take me to the beginning *DAY 1* posted June 1st.

To Show GOD BIG in a World that Sees Him small… 
sums up the reason Keith stepped out in faith to focus on reaching the lost and strengthening believers everywhere, through Toward The Mark, Inc.  Keith and Brenda's prayer is that you will be encouraged and edified by the Secrets from God's Word that Keith recounts in our written and recorded products.  The complete collection of original podcasts, music, blogs, books, CDs, and other resources of Toward The Mark, Inc. are made possible by the prayer and financial contributions of the TTM Support Family.  We'd like to welcome you onboard TODAY!

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GOD HAS A DREAM That We CELEBRATE Each Other's Unique Differences

Having this long weekend to celebrate Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Day with our families this mid-January Monday, we could think of no better time than now to shine God's liberating Light of Truth on an area that satan has gone all-but unchallenged on. Due to a lack of knowledge of God's Word by most people, the devil has been successful at deceiving countless millions of men and women away from the joy of discovering and walking in the purpose for which God created each of us. God's Word teaches us that, "My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge: because thou hast rejected knowledge, I will also reject thee, that thou shalt be no priest to Me: seeing thou hast forgotten the law of thy God, I will also forget thy children." (Hosea 4:6)

"As also in all his epistles, speaking in them of these things; in which are some things hard to be understood, which they that are unlearned and unstable wrest, as they do also the other scriptures, unto their own destruction."  (2 Peter 3:16)

A dear friend once said something in a message that taught everyone listening a valuable principle. He said, "If you don't know the purpose of a thing, all you can do is abuse (ABnormally-USE) it."  That same law applies especially where human beings are concerned.  If we do not know the purpose for people and why God has created so many different skin colors, ethnic groups, etc., all we can do is abuse one another.  Until we have pursued, with all diligence, God's written Word, to the point that we can hear His spoken Word -The Person of The Holy Spirit showing us personally- on why God does all that He does the way He does, my advice is do not say a word.  The purpose for a thing can only be found in the mind of the maker of that thing.  Where we individual human beings (being the "thing" referred to) are concerned, the purpose for each one of us, as individuals, can only be found in the mind of God, our Creator and our Maker.  So, "But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you. "  (Matthew 6:33)

Remember this, something I have learned, "People tend to criticize the harshest the things and the people they understand the least."  Why does this happen?  In short, it is a symptom of being afraid of what is unknown.  However, this kind of fear is far worse that your run-of-the-mill fear of the dark.  The fear that I speak of here are wicked spirits that are deployed for the purpose of working to lure us into the trap of casting false judgment against others - a sin that carries with it a deadly price.  Why do they work so intently at this?  Our enemies (satan and his minions) know, far better than most Christians do, that a family must first be unified before they can function effectively.  So, you see, if the enemies can tempt us into condemning ourselves by casting false judgment, they know they can knock out two birds with one stone (so to speak).  By their deceiving us into using our own tongues to condemn ourselves, one "bird" they can knock out is our approval of and favor for one another.  By our allowing ourselves to be used by the enemy, the second "bird" they can knock out at the same time is the unity within God's Family.

Jesus warns us of the price of falling into that trap.  He said, "Judge not, and ye shall not be judged: condemn not, and ye shall not be condemned: forgive, and ye shall be forgiven: Give, and it shall be given unto you; good measure, pressed down, and shaken together, and running over, shall men give into your bosom. For with the same measure that ye mete withal it shall be measured to you again."  (Luke 6:37-38)  Stop for just a moment and listen to what Jesus is gifting us with here.  Jesus, knowing how satan will use our own lack of understanding of the way God does things concerning the beauty that is His diverse Creation, is revealing to us how beloved everyone is to God and to the fulfillment of His Dream.  Simply put, when we condemn others, we are insulting God, His beloved Children, and the dream He carries in His Heart.  Here again, we find that our lack of understanding God and the reason and the way He does what He does provides satan and his minions with what they need to lure us into condemning ourselves with our own tongues.

If we are going to accurately represent God, we must know Him and His Dream, and work WITH Him to see His Dream fulfilled.  In order to do this, we MUST know that God is the Consummate Family Man!  God was Father way before there were dads on earth.  Everything God does is because of, and for, His children - *all* of His children!  Period.  Let's talk about the Bible for a minute.  Among so many other brilliant things God gave us, the Holy Scriptures are given to us for the purpose of leading us into the unfathomably loving and waiting arms of God.  My wife, Brenda, likes when I put it this way, "From the beginning of the second chapter of Genesis, all the way through to the very last period at the end of Revelation, in short, the Bible is God devising means to get us back around His 'supper table' (you understand that term best if you're from the south)."

You see, everything God has created began with the very first number that He formulated and mathematically arranged, then set into place as the base code of the very first molecule, or the "foundation molecule" for all of creation.  For each molecule to follow, God made changes to one or more digits of the strand(s) of mathematical code, formulating a series of numbers within each strand, for the ultimate purpose of designing everything He ever wants to, never creating any two objects alike.  So, why would God go to such unfathomable lengths to ensure that every single thing He creates is so different?  Because the brilliance in all of His entire Creation is in the fact that He was, and is, able to create everything, not just different but, entirely different because of the way each and every one of His molecules is coded mathematically.  This is what God meant when He said, "Let us make man in Our Image, after Our Likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth."  (Genesis 1:26)

What did God mean when He said "Let us make man in our likeness and in our image"?  In part, He was saying that He wanted to create each of us as individuals as well as members of various ethnic groups, with endless potential.  For example, Paul writes, "I  can do all things through Christ who strengthens me."  (Philippians 4:13)  To help explain the multiple facets of God, of Whose Image we are created, I would like to share a small part of a brother's account where he prayed one night, before he died, and asked Jesus if he could meet Him in person.  (Please note, I cannot confirm or deny the authenticity of this account.)  Something that this brother said happened toward the end of his encounter, I believe, will provide a good visual for the point that I am making concerning the endless potential of God.  Not long after the brother had made his request, he said that he was taken up into Heaven in the night.  He said that he was greeted at the gate by Father Abraham.  He said that Father Abraham, from the start, called him by his first name and led him through various parts of Heaven showing him things that he explained as being so beautiful that he could not explain their beauty in words.  After Father Abraham had taken the fellow to meet Jesus, Who he said was mighty beyond all comprehension, he said that Father Abraham wanted to take him to see one more thing.  He went on to describe a place Father Abraham then took him to where he saw and heard enormous sounds of lightning and thunder, more massive sounds than he could ever explain.  He said that he asked Father Abraham where they were at that time.  Father Abraham replied, "This is God's Throne."  The fellow said that he was frozen in awe!  He then said that, as he was taking it all in, he saw countless angels circling over God's throne nonstop.  The fellow said he then turned to Father Abraham and asked, "Father Abraham, what would cause all of those angels to continually fly around God's Throne without ever stopping to rest?"  Father Abraham replied, "Each time the angels fly a circle around God's throne, they see a facet of God that they had not seen before, and it compels them around again to see yet another facet of God that they had never seen."

Our difference is proof positive that we are created in God's Image.  The interesting thing here is, if we were to take two people of the same race and disassemble their physical bodies down to their base foundation molecule, we would find that the differences between the two same-race individuals is just as great as the difference between two individuals of two different races and/or skin colors.  Though, outwardly, we may *appear* to be the same, we most certainly are not the same.  Why?  Because we are created in God's Image, which is multi-faceted.

One evening, as I was enjoying time in fellowship with the Person of The Holy Spirit, He showed me, from a distance, the most beautiful painting or portrait that I had ever seen of Jesus Christ.  As I looked at the painting, I noticed that the distance was shrinking between the place where I sat and the painting.  The closer to me the portrait became, the clearer I could see the portrait, and I began to see that it was not painted with natural human hands.  All of a sudden, the Person of The Holy Spirit imparted to me that this most glorious portrait was not a portrait at all.  It was a tapestry made of countless threads or fibers, all of them woven together to become more beautiful than anything we have ever seen on earth!  Each of the countless threads represented an ethnic group and skin color.  That tapestry was like nothing I had ever seen; it was literally breathtaking!

As my eyes were taking in that "not-of-this-world" beauty, knowledge was imparted to me by The Person of The Holy Spirit.  Every single thread in the completely glorious tapestry represented the gloriously beautiful differences God created in each and every one of us, His Children.  It was then that I realized what it was that I was looking at.  What I was seeing was nothing short of stunning... it was God's Family Portrait!

SOMETHING TO THINK ABOUT:

"If each and every one of us does not play such a crucial role in the fulfillment of God's Dream, then why is satan spending so much of his time and effort trying to keep us divided?"

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God bless you,

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take advantage of these  Scripture-based resources from Toward The Mark as well:

~ "Keith Shealy's Toward The Mark" on Facebook

~ Keith and Brenda Shealy's "Between The Lines" Podcast on Libsyn

~ "Sharing with you the Secrets God Whispers to us" on our website 

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