Greetings;
As the people of God we must embrace and seek to live in a justice system of life. When grace becomes the administration of our hearts and minds our lives become testimonies of truth. When we live as truth, the truth of who we are crumbles every lie within our sphere of influence. It is only by the power of God’s grace that we can begin to manifest and grow in the testimony of who God intends for each of us to be. Who we are is more important than what we do. When we know who we are, we will do the right things. When we seek to do right things without knowing who we are in Christ, we end up doing right things for the wrong reasons and in the wrong ways. Jesus didn’t just give us the forgiveness of sins through His act of mercy on the cross, He gives us the power of His transforming grace from His presence upon the throne!
Ephesians 1:7-10 In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of His grace which He lavished on us. In all wisdom and insight He made known to us the mystery of His will, according to His kind intention which He purposed in Him with a view to an administration suitable to the fullness of the times, that is, the summing up of all things in Christ, things in the heavens and things on the earth.
As sons and daughters of God we are living with an administration of God’s grace. God’s grace empowers and governs our hearts and minds to become who we are meant to be in Christ. As leaders in the body of Christ we must set an example as those who live in such an administration. It is an administration of life!
Isaiah 32:1 Behold, a king will reign righteously and princes will rule justly.2 Each will be like a refuge from the wind and a shelter from the storm, like streams of water in a dry country, like the shade of a huge rock in a parched land. (NAS)
I have addressed the matters of being a shelter from the storm and a refuge from the wind. What does it meant to be like streams of water in a dry country? Without Christ within our hearts there is no true life. The hope of the fullness of life is only found with Christ in our hearts. The life line is the life blood of God’s presence at one with our own spirits. The life within our hearts is the testimony of the life that flows from our hearts. People in the world are never satisfied, they are thirsty, and they need life. They seek life in all the wrong places and things. They are left dry and dead, and a place of demonic influences – the dry place. They need life! As sons and daughters of God we are to be as an oasis in the dry places of the world. When we find our life in Christ, we become life to the world. It doesn’t make us better than those in the world, it simply empowers us to reveal the way of life to the world.
Psalms 1:3 He will be like a tree firmly planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in its season and its leaf does not wither; and in whatever he does, he prospers.
Isaiah 44:3-4 ‘For I will pour out water on the thirsty land and streams on the dry ground; I will pour out My Spirit on your offspring and My blessing on your descendants; and they will spring up among the grass like poplars by streams of water.’
We are in the world for the sake of the world. We have a mandate to give life to the world in which we live. The rivers in the garden of Eden were created to flow from the garden to give life to the world. Water speaks of life, future, inheritance, and posterity. In the midst of King Solomon’s search for wisdom, he discovered that life is a precious gift not to be wasted in the wrong place. We must not let our springs be poured out in the street to no avail (Pr. 5:16). Jesus said life would come from within us. As princes and princesses, sons and daughters of God, we must always seek to give life to others. We were born for greatness that goes beyond our own personal need and satisfaction. We were born to give life to the world.
John 7:37 Now on the last day, the great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried out, saying, “ If anyone is thirsty, let him come to Me and drink. 38 He who believes in Me, as the Scripture said, ‘From his innermost being will flow rivers of living water.’”
People in the world are never satisfied, they are thirsty – they need life. They seek life in all the wrong places and things. They are left dry and dead and end up living as a place of demonic influences. Their lives become a testimony of dry places. People of God live from a place of being satisfied in God, thus they seek to give life to others. They are a watered garden, a place of God’s presence and habitation. We must activate, facilitate, and release the community of God to be a source of life to the world. Living for the well-being of others is the testimony of those who live their lives administrated by the justice system of God’s kingdom of love.
1 Corinthians 10:23-24 All things are lawful for me, but not all things are helpful; all things are lawful for me, but not all things edify. Let no one seek his own, but each one the other’s well-being.
Food For Thought,
Ted J. Hanson
