ted4leaders

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Greetings,

Today I am gleaning from a subject that I blogged on in 2017, because the subject matter is very relevant for today. I felt impressed to revisit this regarding us being able to take in our hand what God has called us to take hold of in this present hour. God wants to bring a change in us, not merely a change of what we do. It is the change in us that will bring the change to our world. God is an I AM not an I DO. We must become a testimony of “i am” in Christ. As leaders, knowing who we are is more important than knowing what to do. We are not called to merely lead people in doing things for God. We are called to lead people in becoming who they are meant to be in Christ. The confession of our hearts cannot be one of the acts of our life, but that of the character of our lives. The character of who we are will not only define what we do, but also the reason for which we do all things. Knowing what to do is not enough. We must first know who we are. When we know who we are, we can easily discover the why of all the things we do in life. Knowing why we do what we do is more powerful than merely knowing what to do. Knowing why we do what we do will empower us to do anything and everything necessary in our path of destiny. Knowing why we do what we do will also inspire us to be creative in the changing seasons of our lives. To take hold of the new thing of God does not mean we forsake who we are or who we have been. It means we embrace a more mature reality of who we are for the sake of relevance today. Merely knowing what to do can leave us easily swayed from destiny when the style, method, and way of doing things changes in the seasons of God’s unfolding grace. Our focus and our passion can be easily extinguished when what we do is more powerful than why we do it.

I have been addressing the life of Moses in his path to carry the rod of deliverance for the Israelites. Moses was destined to be a deliver to his people, Israel. As a prince in Egypt, Moses knew what to do when he saw the oppression of the Israelites. He sought to deliver his people when he murdered the Egyptian. In his heart he knew what to do, but he had to become who he was meant to be before he could be entrusted with the task. He had to know that God’s purpose cannot be fulfilled without God’s presence in his life. His forty years in the wilderness was about becoming who he needed to be to deliver God’s people. It was not about knowing what to do. He needed an encounter with God, more than he needed instructions from God. He had to lose his old life and find it new! Every season of our lives is dependent upon us finding God’s presence in our lives. Every new thing requires a new discovery of God In the center of our being. It is God’s presence, testimony, and purpose in our lives that defines the reality of every season.

Who we are precedes the ‘what to do’s’ in our lives. Leaders are God’s gift to lead others into becoming who they are meant to be in Christ, not merely what to do in life. Who we are today is part of a continual process of change. The secret to being who we are today is finding the Lord in a fresh way in our lives today.

2 Corinthians 3:16 Nevertheless when one turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away. 17 Now the Lord is the Spirit; and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. 18 But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord.

The liberty of life is not found in what we do. It is found in what and who we become because of Christ in us. It is in our being that we are empowered in the doings. To lay hold of the new things of God we must first become a new expression of God in who we are. How many times do congregation members measure their leaders based on whether they think they know what they are doing or not? How many times do we all measure others based upon whether we think another knows what they are doing or not? Leadership is more about becoming than it is doing. Membership is more about embracing becoming what we are being led to become than what we are being led to do.

Food For Thought,

Ted J. Hanson

Donations can be made at the link on the home site of:

www.ted4leaders.com

www.ted4you.com or

www.houseofbreadministry.org.

Checks can be made payable to House of Bread Ministry and sent to:

House of Bread Ministry, 3210 Meridian St., Bellingham, WA 98225

Blog In Audio:

Greetings,

Last week, I presented that it was the rod in the hand of Moses that carried the authority and the anointing to part the Red Sea before the Israelites at their passage from the season of their past to the season of their present in their path of destiny. The rod in the hand of Moses was not the rod that he held in his hand when he was an Egyptian prince. It was not the rod that he held in his hand when he was a shepherd of sheep in the wilderness. It was a rod of deliverance! Where did it come from? How did Moses get this rod?

To receive the rod of deliverance, Moses had to have an experience with God in his day in the wilderness. Without an experience with God in his wilderness, his path as a deliverer would have led him to the rod of an Egyptian prince – a rod of a past season in his life. We must know that in this season of 2020/2021, God has been working things for our good. God is calling us into a fresh season as His people in the earth. We cannot return to the season of our past. If we return to church, or church leadership, as it has been we will be bound to a season of the past. If we embrace what is being given to us in the present circumstances of today, we will be bound to the condition of our present world. We must receive a rod of God’s kingdom come and His will being done now to move forward into what God has for us today.

Exodus 4:1 Then Moses answered and said, “But suppose they will not believe me or listen to my voice; suppose they say, ‘The LORD has not appeared to you.'” 2 So the LORD said to him, “What is that in your hand?” He said, “A rod.” 3 And He said, “Cast it on the ground.” So, he cast it on the ground, and it became a serpent; and Moses fled from it. 4 Then the LORD said to Moses, “Reach out your hand and take it by the tail” (and he reached out his hand and caught it, and it became a rod in his hand),

The rod that Moses was familiar with, the rod that Moses had depended upon in the past season of His life, had to become something new in the season of his present. God doesn’t want us to be someone that we are not, but he does want us to be willing to let go of what we held on to yesterday to pick up what He has for us today. Moses had to be willing to let go of the thing that was comfortable for him. The thing that worked for him was what was to be destiny in his hand, but he had to be willing to let it go. Holding on to the rod of a shepherd in the wilderness, would bind him to a season of his wilderness. The rod he carried was the thing he had leaned upon. He had learned to depend upon it to live in his present world. He had to let go of it, however. He couldn’t hold on to it. He had to cast it into the hands of God and let God bring life to it. The mundane had to take on the life of God. I believe that this is prophetically true for us in this present season in our world as the people of God. We must be willing to let go of some things we have been doing in order to pick up what God wants us to do now!

Whatever it is that God has called us to do is in our hands right now. No matter what stage it might be in, or what form it might take, in our hands is the destiny that God has called us to. Sometimes we fail to see it because we are holding on to it so tight, and we fail to give it to God to let it serve Him in the way that is relevant for today. We fail to give it to God and let God change it to what is necessary for today. When Moses threw his rod upon the ground it became a serpent. It appeared to be something that was a little scary. He would have perhaps rejected it in the past, but he had to be willing to pick it up in his present. He had to be willing to pick up what he threw down, even though its appearance was totally different than what he threw upon the ground. The secret was not merely in his ability to throw his rod upon the ground, but in his personal encounter with the presence of God in the burning bush.

What is in your hand? What are you responsible for? What is God calling you to be responsible for? How can you serve God with who you are and what you have today? How can you put what you have been depending upon into the hands of God and trust it to be God when it becomes something you don’t think you have seen before?

We must take what we have held on to in our past and put it in God’s hand and let Him bring life to it. What worked for us yesterday is found in the rod as it was yesterday, but what works today is found in what God makes the rod to be today. What is it that works for us today that is filled with the life that God is putting into it? Moses didn’t get a new rod. He got a transformed rod. What he held in his hand didn’t change who he was, it merely drew out another measure of who he really was for his path of destiny in life. God isn’t asking us to be someone we are not, but if we aren’t willing to grab hold of what God is putting life in today, we will be dwarfed to become who we always have been in our path of destiny.

God, help us to find You in the burning bush of our present reality. Give us faith to lay down what we think is our strength so we can find what You are putting Your blessing and life in today for the sake of those we influence in our world. The secret to our today is the rod in our hands today, but the secret to finding that rod is finding a fresh consuming presence of you in our lives. Only Your presence in our lives can empower the passion of our hearts for all that You desire today. Don’t let what You have done in our lives before be a greater flame than who You are today! Don’t let our preconceived ideas for tomorrow be a greater desire than the desire we have for You that inspires whatever You desire in our lives today. Renew us for such a day as this!

Food For Thought,

Ted J. Hanson

Donations can be made at the link on the home site of:

www.ted4leaders.com

www.ted4you.com or

www.houseofbreadministry.org.

Checks can be made payable to House of Bread Ministry and sent to:

House of Bread Ministry, 3210 Meridian St., Bellingham, WA 98225

Blog In Audio:

Greetings,

As I wrote last week, we must all embrace the reality of what God puts in our hands for each season of our lives. When we embrace who we are today, we can expect the supernatural testimonies of who God is in our lives for today. There is a Scripture concerning Moses and the children of Israel that is often misquoted. In this past season of COVID with its restraints and imposed adjustments to our lives, I have seen this text posted to proclaim what God is going to do in our day.

Exodus 14:13 And Moses said to the people, “Do not be afraid. Stand still, and see the salvation of the LORD, which He will accomplish for you today. For the Egyptians whom you see today, you shall see again no more forever. 14 The LORD will fight for you, and you shall hold your peace.”

These words of Scripture can only be understood if we look at the further text of Scripture where they were given. There is a time where God says to stand still, but that was not the case at the banks of the Red Sea. God had put something in Moses’ hand that would enable him to move forward even in a day of natural challenges that seemingly offered no way forward. We can easily misquote Scripture when we look at it according to mere chapters and verses. The chapters and verses of our Bible were not added until the 13^th and 14^th century after Christ came. It is handy to have the chapters and verses to be able to locate things in our Bibles, but they also very often distract us from the full story of their context. The Bible is filled with statements of truth as well as simply truly stated statements. When these two things are considered together in the context of their story, they present a greater testimony of truth. In this story of Moses and Israel at the banks of the Red Sea, God did not say to stand still. These were the words of Moses. The following verses reveal the reality of the truth.

Exodus 13:15 And the LORD said to Moses, “Why do you cry to Me? Tell the children of Israel to go forward. 16 But lift up your rod, and stretch out your hand over the sea and divide it. And the children of Israel shall go on dry ground through the midst of the sea.

God didn’t say to stand still. He expected Moses and the Israelites to move forward. God didn’t show up merely because of the cry of the people at their point of facing the Red Sea. He had already shown up in the rod that was in the hand of Moses. God was demonstrating that the rod in the hand of Moses was the source of the miracle for the day. God believed in Moses and what God had commissioned to be in the hand of Moses was the authority for the now circumstance of Moses’ life. What was that rod? Where did that rod come from? How did Moses receive that rod? The story of the rod in the hand of Moses can be found in the testimony of Moses finding God in his everyday world of the wilderness. Moses had to spend forty years in the wilderness of Midian to be prepared for the days of leading Israel in the path to the Promised Land.

Exodus 3:1 Now Moses was tending the flock of Jethro his father-in-law, the priest of Midian. And he led the flock to the back of the desert, and came to Horeb, the mountain of God.

Since we have read our Bibles, we know that miraculous things happened on Mount Horeb. But in the days of Moses in the wilderness, it was a dry, and sometimes difficult, place of taking care of Jethro’s sheep. It was in that place that Moses had to discover the fresh presence of God in his life. Finding God’s consuming presence in that place held the key to the authority in Moses’ rod of tomorrow.

Exodus 3:2 And the Angel of the LORD appeared to him in a flame of fire from the midst of a bush. So, he looked, and behold, the bush was burning with fire, but the bush was not consumed. 3 Then Moses said, “I will now turn aside and see this great sight, why the bush does not burn.” 4 So when the LORD saw that he turned aside to look, God called to him from the midst of the bush and said, “Moses, Moses!” And he said, “Here I am.”

God’s presence in the bush inspired Moses to turn from what he had been doing to discover what God would have him be and do. He had to know that who he was would determine what he must do in his present world and that was not determined by his present circumstances. It was determined by the consuming presence of God in his life. When he turned to look, he heard God call.

Exodus 3:5 Then He said, “Do not draw near this place. Take your sandals off your feet, for the place where you stand is holy ground.” 6 Moreover He said, “I am the God of your father—the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.” And Moses hid his face, for he was afraid to look upon God. 7 And the LORD said: “I have surely seen the oppression of My people who are in Egypt, and have heard their cry because of their taskmasters, for I know their sorrows. 8 So I have come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians, and to bring them up from that land to a good and large land, to a land flowing with milk and honey, to the place of the Canaanites and the Hittites and the Amorites and the Perizzites and the Hivites and the Jebusites. 9 Now therefore, behold, the cry of the children of Israel has come to Me, and I have also seen the oppression with which the Egyptians oppress them. 10 Come now, therefore, and I will send you to Pharaoh that you may bring My people, the children of Israel, out of Egypt.” 11 But Moses said to God, “Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh, and that I should bring the children of Israel out of Egypt?” 12 So He said, “I will certainly be with you. And this shall be a sign to you that I have sent you: When you have brought the people out of Egypt, you shall serve God on this mountain.” 13 Then Moses said to God, “Indeed, when I come to the children of Israel and say to them, ‘The God of your fathers has sent me to you,’ and they say to me, ‘What is His name?’ what shall I say to them?” 14 And God said to Moses, “I AM WHO I AM.” And He said, “Thus you shall say to the children of Israel, I AM has sent me to you.'”

Spectacular things were destined to happen at Horeb. Water from the rock, law given, golden calf (judgment), covenant made. The yet to be supernatural mountain was the common everyday backyard of Moses. It was his everyday situation. Like Moses, the mountain of God in our lives is found in our everyday situation, not somewhere else. It was the same old place that Moses had been walking around for 40 years. God had been doing a work in the heart of Moses. The Egyptian Moses had to die before the Hebrew Moses could be revealed. He, like each of us, had to die to his own personal agenda. He couldn’t be Pharaoh’s son. He had to be God’s son. Moses had to find out who he really was. 

The place that God has provided for you is not very far off.  Who are you? Who am I? God knows who He is. We are a son or a daughter of God. We are who we are, and great things are destined to happen in the coming days of our lives, but we must discover the presence of God now that is like the consuming fire of the bush. A consuming fire is a fire that gets our full attention. God must have our full attention today for us to move forward into our tomorrow. Things that have we have lost or things that we want to see happen cannot be what consumes our attention. God must consume our attention. Without God coming in a fresh presence in our lives today, we will be tempted to either stay in the circumstance of our present or to return to some no longer relevant season of our past. Where is the burning bush of God’s presence in our lives right now? Moses had to experience the consuming presence of God to discover the rod he would hold in his tomorrow.

Food For Thought,

Ted J. Hanson

Donations can be made at the link on the home site of:

www.ted4leaders.com

www.ted4you.com or

www.houseofbreadministry.org.

Checks can be made payable to House of Bread Ministry and sent to:

House of Bread Ministry, 3210 Meridian St., Bellingham, WA 98225

Blog In Audio:

Greetings,

Today’s blog is on a subject that is going to take me a few blogs to address. I was given this word while ministering in Wichita, Kansas last week. I was not able to record the message, but I feel it is in imperative that I write what God gave me for us to grasp hold of all that God is doing today and for us not to be bound in some season of our past.

We have come through a very interesting season. The year of 2020 and now into 2021 has proven to challenge us all with need to embrace the moment and not to hold on to what was yesterday. I believe that even what the enemy has intended for evil, God is turning for our good. We must look to God and trust God in every season of our lives. God has not called us to be someone we are not, but He has called us to be who we are today, but who we are today does not usually mean holding on to who we were or what we were doing yesterday. The essence of who we are has been seen in every season of our lives, but in every season of our lives we have had to embrace new things and new ways of doing things to be relevant to our today situation. King David was anointed with a kingly anointing as a boy, but he had to embrace being a shepherd, a delivery man of a few cheeses, a giant slayer, a servant in the courts of Saul, one who fled from Saul with honor, a leader who transformed lives, and ultimately the King of Israel. In that process, David always had the anointing of a king, but his rolls in life required him to be flexible in his function in life. In all that he did, he functioned as a king in forms that didn’t look like a king. It was not a matter of attaining to a position. It was a matter of always functioning in his world of today for the sake of the world he found himself in.

In every season of our lives, we must find our proper role for that season. Last week God took me in my mind through the many seasons of my life. I realized that in many ways I have lived several different lives. In all the seasons of my life I have found that there is good and there is bad, but God reveals His wonder and life in every season. Though who I am has not changed in them, I have had to be relevant to each, and every, season of my life to be effective in who I am in that season. I believe that every season of our lives leads to a greater glory for God’s name, but we must find ourselves in our present season and not stuck in some season of our past.

Moses was a man of some significant seasons in life. When he was born there was a great opposition to his birth. His mother had to hide him in a basket in the river Nile to save his life. He was discovered and raised by the daughter of a Pharoah in Egypt. The circumstance of his life had been greatly altered, but the purpose of his life had not. He was raised living the life of an Egyptian prince in his world. Moses had the heart of a deliverer and something inside of him desired to see the justice of God prevail for his flesh and blood people, the people of Israel. When he was a grown man, he observed the burdens of slavery and oppression that were upon his own people. One day he saw an Egyptian beating one of the Hebrew slaves and Moses killed the Egyptian. He was not welcomed by his fellow Hebrews for such a task, for they saw him as an Egyptian prince. He had the heart of a deliverer, but he needed to discover a season of becoming a true Hebrew. I believe he needed to become a Hebrew, a sojourner who knows God as Father and himself as a son. He needed to know that God was more important than merely the power to be a deliverer for God’s people. Moses found himself in a circumstance of having to flee into the desert of Midian. The name Midian implies judgment, but I believe that the forty years of Moses being in the desert helped Him find the true judgment of God’s love. Moses was forty when he fled Egypt and he was eighty years old when God called him back to Egypt to be a deliver for God’s people. Moses found himself living a seemingly different life, but the destiny and purpose of Moses remained true to who God had made and called Him to be.

It was given to Moses to be raised as an Egyptian prince, along with all the seasons that required. I am sure there were many facets to the upbringing and aspects of Moses’ life as a prince. Like me, he could probably find several lifetimes of experiences, testimonies, and memories in that forty-year chapter of his journey. The wilderness years of Moses were not less significant, they were significant for the increasing journey of destiny in his life. Moses could no longer carry the staff of an Egyptian leader, he had to learn to carry the rod of a shepherd of sheep. That rod was not a rod of great vision, it was a rod of great humility. It was a rod of great service. The sheep that he cared for were the sheep of his wife’s father and not a flock of his own. Those who have personal responsibility today are the fields where God harvests the tools of tomorrow’s authority.

As I write this blog, I know that we have all had to learn to carry the staff for every season of our lives. The staff that we carried yesterday will not work for the season of today. We must discover the rod of today and we must fully embrace it in our hands to be relevant for what God is doing today. I believe that 2020-2021 is a significant season for us as leaders in God’s church. It may seem like a season of judgment, but I believe it is a season to know the judgment of God’s love in a greater way. The season has changed, and we must find the rod of today. We cannot hold on to the rod of yesterday and expect to be relevant to the task that is at hand. God was preparing Moses for a greater rod than the rod that he carried in the wilderness, but the rod that he carried in the wilderness was essential for him to find himself in the place for receiving a greater rod for the deliverance of God’s people. I will write more on this but consider that the rod in your hand is not the rod that you carried yesterday. It is the rod of today. If we hold on to the rod that we held on to yesterday, we will bind those we are called to influence in this world to a season of the past. God is the God of NOW. He is, He was, and He will be, but He must be found today! The rod in our hands must be the rod of today and not something that we held on to yesterday. Even if we had to struggle to learn how to carry it in the past, the rod of yesterday is merely a place of comfort in our presence. We cannot be bound to what has become comfortable in our hands. We must be liberated by a fresh experience with God in every season of our lives that enables us to lay hold of the rod that is relevant for the season of our day. God wants us to embrace the challenge for our season of today!

Food For Thought,

Ted J. Hanson

Donations can be made at the link on the home site of:

www.ted4leaders.com

www.ted4you.com or

www.houseofbreadministry.org.

Checks can be made payable to House of Bread Ministry and sent to:

House of Bread Ministry, 3210 Meridian St., Bellingham, WA 98225

Blog In Audio:

Greetings,

As leaders we are called to lead people in knowing God and in becoming true testimonies as sons and daughters of God in all things. We cannot teach people to know God, but we can lead them in their process of connection with Him and in their process of responding to Him in all things. I believe that the voice of God is a very personal thing. It is the internal voice of Holy Spirit speaking to each one’s heart. The Holy Spirit is the voice, but we are responsible to discern His voice above the voice of self and other voices that seek to influence us in our world. The Scripture is a wonderful gift. It is a witness to the internal voice of the Holy Spirit in our hearts. It is not our teacher, but it is a true witness to the character, nature, way, power, and authority of our Teacher. As leaders we must lead others in reading the Scriptures well in conjunction with connecting intimately to the Holy Spirit in their hearts. When reading the Scriptures, we must look at Scripture in the context of all of truth. Truth is the person God, but Scripture is an informational truth of the Truth of God expressed. The New Testament Scriptures are filled with quotations of Old Testament Scriptures. The Old Testament is a shadow of truths found in the New Testament and the context of their quotations set a foundation for understanding their context for application in our own lives. Those Scripture quotes are usually written in oblique text in our Bible. When reading our Scriptures, we must pay attention to the oblique text! Without paying attention to the oblique text, we have no reference for what Holy Spirit is trying to reveal to us. Several examples of this are found in Romans chapter 10.

Romans 10:5 For Moses writes about the righteousness which is of the law, “The man who does those things shall live by them.” 6 But the righteousness of faith speaks in this way, “Do not say in your heart, ‘Who will ascend into heaven?'” (that is, to bring Christ down from above) 7 or, “‘Who will descend into the abyss?'” (that is, to bring Christ up from the dead). 8 But what does it say? “The word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart” (that is, the word of faith which we preach): 9 that if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved.

These verses are often used to inspire someone to confess Jesus as their Lord and Savior. Although there is a certain measure of truth in that application of this Scripture, these verses are talking about something much more. In order to understand these verses written by Paul, we must also read the verses written by Moses. Paul was quoting the words of Moses that pertained to the ability of God’s people to walk and live in the Promised Land given to them by God. These verses are not about a confession that grants us entrance to heaven when we die. They are verses that pertain to a heavenly testimony within our lives in this world.

Deuteronomy 30:11 “For this commandment which I command you today is not too mysterious for you, nor is it far off. 12 It is not in heaven, that you should say, ‘Who will ascend into heaven for us and bring it to us, that we may hear it and do it?’ 13 Nor is it beyond the sea, that you should say, ‘Who will go over the sea for us and bring it to us, that we may hear it and do it?’ 14 But the word is very near you, in your mouth and in your heart, that you may do it.

God’s promise was that He would be with His people on a daily basis and that He would make it possible to walk in the life He had promised. This pertains to confessing from our hearts that God is our God. It pertains to conclusive evidence that reveals an outward testimony that we are God’s people. It also pertains to a daily reality of living together with God in all things. It is not some testimony that is yet to come from heaven. It is not the result of a further sacrifice of the flesh. It is the testimony of Christ within the believer. The testimony of Christ in us in our daily lives is a witness to those around us in our world, even as Christ in the former converted gentiles of Rome were a witness to the Jews of their day.

Romans 10:14 How then shall they call on Him in whom they have not believed? And how shall they believe in Him of whom they have not heard? And how shall they hear without a preacher? 15 And how shall they preach unless they are sent? As it is written: “How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the gospel of peace, who bring glad tidings of good things!”

Isaiah 52:7 How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him who brings good news, who proclaims peace,

Who brings glad tidings of good things, who proclaims salvation, who says to Zion, “Your God reigns!”

The feet of the believers in Paul’s day were the voice that announced the salvation of God to the Jews and the Gentiles of their day. The feet of the believers were not just the word that they preached, but the testimony of the word that they were becoming because of Christ in them. This is the true message of Christ to our world as well.

Romans 10:16 But they have not all obeyed the gospel. For Isaiah says, “LORD, who has believed our report?”

Isaiah 53:1 Who has believed our report? And to whom has the arm of the LORD been revealed?

The good news of Jesus was good news for the completion of the Old Covenant, and that good news was Christ in the church because of the sacrifice of Jesus for us all. That news had been prophesied by the prophet Isaiah concerning the one who would be the atonement for us all.

Romans 10:17 So then faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God. 18 But I say, have they not heard? Yes indeed: “Their sound has gone out to all the earth, and their words to the ends of the world.”

Psalms 19:4 Their line (sound) has gone out through all the earth, and their words to the end of the world. In them He has set a tabernacle for the sun, 5 which is like a bridegroom coming out of his chamber, and rejoices like a strong man to run its race. 6 Its rising is from one end of heaven, and its circuit to the other end; and there is nothing hidden from its heat.

The context of Psalms 19 is that creation was the word of God to people in the Old Covenant, but they would not hear. The context of Romans chapter 10 is that our lives are a testimony to those of the Old Covenant by our changed lives in Christ. The internal voice of God changes us that our lives might be a testimony to those around us and inspire them to receive Christ.

As you can see, it is important that we pay attention to the quoted words of Scripture to understand the context of God’s word to our hearts today. As leaders we must inspire those we lead to read God’s word well.

Food For Thought,

Ted J. Hanson

Donations can be made at the link on the home site of:

www.ted4leaders.com

www.ted4you.com or

www.houseofbreadministry.org.

Checks can be made payable to House of Bread Ministry and sent to:

House of Bread Ministry, 3210 Meridian St., Bellingham, WA 98225

Blog In Audio:

Greetings,

As leaders we must set an example to those we lead through a life that exhibits faith towards God in all things. This is not just at times when everything appears to be going well. It is especially true when we are enduring challenges and even when we are suffering in life. The peaceable fruit of righteousness comes to those who endure difficulty as an opportunity for manifesting as a son or daughter of God. Chastening is not about right and wrong, it is about staying in the path of life even in the midst of difficulty. This is the chastening that was endured by Jesus to be a manifested son of God in His full state of being a son of man. That chastening was not a matter of correcting Jesus, it was a matter of empowering Him to be revealed for who He really was. He set an example for us to follow as sons and daughters of God in Christ. We must never allow the testing times of our lives to manifest bitterness as was in the life of Esau who exchanged his birthright for food that merely fed his flesh. He failed to see the greatness of the purpose of his life, so he selfishly traded it away for his personal desires. We could do the same if we forget that the reason we go through the testing times of life is to bring greater life to our world and to bring those in our world to greater life. For this reason, the writer of Hebrews instructs us to have strong hands, strong knees, and to make straight paths for our feet.

Hebrews 12:11 Now no chastening seems to be joyful for the present, but painful; nevertheless, afterward it yields the peaceable fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it. 12 Therefore strengthen the hands which hang down, and the feeble knees, 13 and make straight paths for your feet, so that what is lame may not be dislocated, but rather be healed.

How do we keep strong hands, strong knees, and straight paths before our feet? We can find these answers when we consider God in the entirety of His word. There are some key words written in the book of Job in regard to the character of the righteous man Job.

Job 4:3 Surely you have instructed many, and you have strengthened weak hands. 4 Your words have upheld him who was stumbling, and you have strengthened the feeble knees…

If the instructions of a righteous man can strengthen weak hands, the instructions of God’s Spirit can do even more. Our hands are a testimony to what we give to our world. The blessings of being life-givers comes from our ability to bless our world with life. When we trust the instruction of the Holy Spirit in our lives and when we respond to His instructions we will be givers of life to all that we touch. If a righteous man can strengthen the knees of others by his words, how much more can God’s word strengthen our knees? When we stand on God’s word we can overcome all things that seek to cause us to bow our knees to things that are less than truth. I believe God’s instructions are the testimony of His Spirit and God’s words are a testimony of His truth. When the Word and the Spirit come together in our lives we can surely be who we are meant to be for the sake of our sphere of influence in this world.

What about finding the straight path for our feet? I believe the key to our straight path is the manifest presence of God in our lives. It is not about knowing what to do. It is about knowing God in all things. His presence will give us the path of life in all things.

Psalms 16:11 You will show me the path of life; in Your presence is fullness of joy; at Your right hand are pleasures forevermore.

Isaiah 42:16 I will bring the blind by a way they did not know; I will lead them in paths they have not known. I will make darkness light before them, and crooked places straight. These things I will do for them, and not forsake them.

As leaders we must face everything in life for the sake of others. This is not just a testimony of leaders; it is a testimony for us all. Leaders lead to inspire this truth in others. If we follow the instructions of God’s Spirit in every situation of our lives we will be givers of life to our world. If we stand fast on all that God’s has said and is saying in His word we will not bow our knees to compromise to the ways of the world. We will be overcoming sons and daughters of God in all circumstances. If we hold fast God’s manifest presence in our lives we will find the path of life and light before us in every step of our journey in life. These things are attributes of sons and daughters of God in Christ.

Food For Thought,

Ted J. Hanson

Donations can be made at the link on the home site of:

www.ted4leaders.com

www.ted4you.com or

www.houseofbreadministry.org.

Checks can be made payable to House of Bread Ministry and sent to:

House of Bread Ministry, 3210 Meridian St., Bellingham, WA 98225

Blog In Audio:

Greetings;

What is our goal as leaders? I believe that our goal in everything is to lead others into encounters with God as their Father, Jesus the Son, and Holy Spirit as the One who reveals the mystery of the fellowship in all things. I don’t believe that God our Father sent Jesus to merely show us what to believe. I believe He came to demonstrate to us a life of a Son of man in relationship with God the Father in a testimony of love, life, intimacy, and power. He didn’t just model this truth; He made a way for us to daily experience this reality in our lives. I don’t believe that Christianity is what God had in mind for us. I believe it is Christ in humanity, the true reconciliation of the human race to God as their Father. As leader, we seek to lead others into this truth in growing moments to the fullness of their lives.

We don’t lead because we are trying to create something that is different than what we don’t believe worked before. We lead to point to the One who empowers faith in the human heart. That faith is a supernatural response to the internal voice of God’s Spirit in our hearts. We are not “anti” anything in life. We commit the focus of our lives on Christ. We know that Christ in us is the hope of glory and Christ in each one we lead is their hope of glory in all things. I believe that glory is the life of God in and through them in this life and into the eternal realities of heaven beyond this life. In this life we see increasing measures of heaven invading our world. We see the eternal life of God filling the circumstances of our lives until in the ultimate destiny death is swallowed up by life. This is our great hope in Christ.

If we live to fix the things of the past our focus is on the past. If we live to embrace God in the present, our focus is on greater things. Our focus is on heavenly things in this life and into eternity. This was the cry of the heart of the apostle Paul for those in the world of his day.

Philippians 3:7 But what things were gain to me, these I have counted loss for Christ. 8 Yet indeed I also count all things loss for the excellence of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them as rubbish, that I may gain Christ 9 and be found in Him, not having my own righteousness, which is from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which is from God by faith; 10 that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death, 11 if, by any means, I may attain to the resurrection from the dead. 12 Not that I have already attained, or am already perfected; but I press on, that I may lay hold of that for which Christ Jesus has also laid hold of me. 13 Brethren, I do not count myself to have apprehended; but one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead, 14 I press toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. 15 Therefore let us, as many as are mature, have this mind; and if in anything you think otherwise, God will reveal even this to you. 16 Nevertheless, to the degree that we have already attained, let us walk by the same rule, let us be of the same mind.

Paul wasn’t talking about him being at risk in not going to heaven when he died. He was talking about attaining to the resurrection life of Christ in increasing measures in this life. If we live to change the world, our focus is on the world. We can even find ourselves bound to some bitter root of the past with this mentality. We don’t live to change the world; we live to embrace the life of heaven in our world. Receiving heavenly things will change our world, but our focus must be upon receiving heavenly things. There is always more to know in God and more to know of God. We must reach forward to know Him in all things. Our upward call in Christ is to know Him and to lead others into knowing Him too. Our focus is Christ Jesus in all things! In the world, people are led by strong opinions of the soul and natural desires of the flesh. In Christ we are led by His strong Spirit and the supernatural desires of our Father’s will.

Food For Thought,

Ted J. Hanson

Donations can be made at the link on the home site of:

www.ted4leaders.com

www.ted4you.com or

www.houseofbreadministry.org.

Checks can be made payable to House of Bread Ministry and sent to:

House of Bread Ministry, 3210 Meridian St., Bellingham, WA 98225

Blog In Audio:

Greetings,

As leaders we must set an example in hearing God and in responding to what He says. This is not a straight path with logical steps based upon mathematical principals and rules. It is a dance of relationship with the One who loves us. It is the testimony of a trust relationship of sons and daughters of God with God their Father in all things. It is a matter of walking in the will of God in all things and our relationship with God is more important than the tasks we perform in life.

We hear God very well. The problem is, we don’t really understand Him much when He speaks. It is one thing to hear what God says and another to understand Him. Revelation, interpretation, and application of what God is saying are all three different things. As leaders, we must set an example in faith and patience in our journey of hearing and responding to God in our lives. It is ok to say we don’t understand much. It is better to understand little than it is to think we understand but really misunderstand much.

This is the week we celebrate the fact that Jesus gave His life for us and that He rose from the dead for us all. In the history of this event there were a lot of preconceived ideas on the part of people involved. Peter had the revelation that Jesus was the Christ, a revelation given to Him by the Spirit of God. He no doubt had preconceived ideas as to what that meant. His idea of the Messiah and the kingdom of God didn’t include Jesus dying on the cross. He likely knew the words of the prophet Daniel in regard to God establishing the kingdom of God with Jesus as Lord and Christ. For this reason Peter rebuked Jesus for talking of his death. For this reason He rose with a  sword to cut off the ear of Malchus in the garden. His preconceived ideas likely led to his own denial of Jesus at His arrest. The good news was; Jesus’ love for Peter was stronger that Peter’s preconceived ideas.

What about the crowd who shouted Hosanna to the King at the entrance of Jesus to Jerusalem? They were no doubt believing for a revolution in Israel. They were believing for God to deliver them from their state of oppression to Rome. They had preconceived ideas as to what their King would do. When Jesus was arrested and brought before Pilot, He gave no words in His defense. He was like a Lamb being led to the slaughter. Perhaps this is what invoked the crowd to shout, crucify Him! When offered the freedom of Jesus or Barabbas, the crowd shouted, give us Barabbas! They were willing to exchange the life of the supposed king for that of a thief and murderer. Barabbas, a name meaning son of shame, confusion, gave them more hope than the Savior of the world. All of this was because of preconceived ideas as to what God would and must do. Barabbas was a criminal, but he was also a zealot. He was a man who challenged the oppressive government of Rome and the crowd saw him as a more promising hope than Jesus. A week earlier they gave homage and honor to Jesus as the king of revolution in their shouts of praise as He rode into Jerusalem upon the back of a donkey. The crowds saw Him as the hope and the promise of freedom, but upon His arrest a week later He stood as a Lamb to the slaughter and the crowd could no longer see how He could possibly free them from their oppression. Although Barabbas was a criminal and a man of carnal character, they considered him a better option than the silent man of peace.

It was the preconceived ideas of Abram and Sarai that caused them to produce the child Ishmael, a testimony of the flesh. Again, God’s love for Abram and Sarai proved to be greater than their failures. They eventually became Abraham and Sarah and were given the seed of promise in the child Isaac. Their error of Ishmael did come with challenges and consequences to their future, but God’s faithfulness for Isaac also brought God’s blessings.

As leaders we must set an example in trusting God and moving at the pace of our understanding of God in each step of our journey. We can trust God’s love in all things, but we must also be aware of our preconceived ideas in all things. A revelation from God today can lead to an interpretation of that revelation tomorrow. An interpretation of what God has said can also lead to the application of that truth in our footsteps in our unfolding future. We must be willing to lay down our preconceived ideas in all things for the will of God in all things.

Food For Thought,

Ted J. Hanson

Donations can be made at the link on the home site of:

www.ted4leaders.com

www.ted4you.com or

www.houseofbreadministry.org.

Checks can be made payable to House of Bread Ministry and sent to:

House of Bread Ministry, 3210 Meridian St., Bellingham, WA 98225