LAM Newsletter, May 2003

Why this ministry continues?

First of all, the website has been changed to: www.mindsync.com/~lam. It now has a little "~" in it. The email to contact me is truthfrees@mindsync.com. I am going to change service soon, so keep watch out for the new addresses.

But this ministry continues as long as people need to find help in learning why they aren’t living in the promises written in the Bible. The same two areas apply to every person I have ministered to. These were the same two areas that I had to see first before really living the Christian life. The Christian life is a journey. Becoming a Christian is just the beginning to the fullness. It’s the journey we are on toward the promise of eternal salvation. When a person is saved, they are saved by grace through faith. Faith is the substance of things HOPED for the evidence of things not yet seen. Then truthfully, we are not exactly saved yet, we are "hoping" in faith for that salvation. Now don’t get all confused thinking you aren’t saved or that you will lose your salvation, but there is a responsibility for us to work out our salvation with fear and trembling – as the bible says. So we daily live by faith not yet seeing the promises. But as you walk out the faith, you will begin to attain, and the final promise is that of eternal life!

With all that said, there are two areas we as believers need to recognize in our own lives. The first one is the Father’s Love. Many people can believe God loves others, but somehow has a hard time believing He loves them. It’s probably because we know ourselves too well and wonder how anyone can love us in the condition we are in. But that’s the interesting thing. God’s love is unconditional. When we love others, we love with condition. We have to get a revelation on this before any fulfillment can take place in our lives. We need to truly build intimate relationships with our Father God, Jesus the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Ask God to help you do that, and He will.

In this area of love, I also find that many say, "I love God with all my heart." But then when I ask, "Have you received His love into your heart for you?" Many hem and haw and end up saying "Not exactly." Many individuals have only experienced a father’s love from our biological father on earth. We have to completely erase that, if that love was less than perfect, and find out how God loves us. It is quite different. This is the biggest issue that has to be resolved first before you can truly see the blessings of God in your life. We first have to believe and receive His love.

If you have any fear, it means God’s love isn’t present in your life. Perfect love casts out fear, so if we are in fear, we are not made perfect in love. This doesn’t mean we’ll become perfect, it does mean that we can receive the perfect love of God. The Bible says we love Him BECAUSE He first loved us. We cannot love others without fear if God’s love is not in us first. This is so very important to grasp. When we love others in fear we cannot be truthful with them, we fear they will respond incorrectly so we keep silent. This is not love. When we truly love each other, we are free to be ourselves and share our heart without fear of retaliation or hurt. I think we have a long way to go in this area. And by the way, those who think they have reached this level with the Lord, best think again. God’s love is so great we can never possibly attain all His love in this life time, even if we pursued it 24/7. So if you have stopped seeking His love, then you have cut yourself short, because there is so much more! I have been on this love quest for 6 years now and almost daily ask God for Him to reveal more of His love to me. Help me to love myself more, and help me to love others more. There is always "more" that can be had in the area of love. I heard someone say, "We stop seeking what we think we have." The Bible tells us that His ways are higher than our ways. Even though we "think" we have obtained, we still can obtain more in this area. I believe daily receiving the Love of God is living the Christian life. Love is the power that overcomes the devil!

The second area is forgiveness. Almost 90% of everyone I talk to has unforgiveness toward God. What I mean is that we accuse God for not doing this or that in our lives. We blame Him for our lives. We are mad at Him. We even think that He doesn’t hear our prayers, or truly doesn’t love us. But the truth is, the reason we are in this condition is that we are reaping what we have sewn and now blaming God for our condition. We have to receive forgiveness from Him if we are doing this. Our unforgiveness in Him will block anything else you try to do. After all, He’s the blessing giver. Can you receive from someone you are mad at or frustrated with or disappointed in? No. Go to God now if this is your condition. It only takes a prayer to become restored in relationship with Him again.

Then the other area of forgiveness is toward ourselves. I want to say this first. Before you can forgive yourself or even others, you have to first receive God’s perfect love. These two areas work hand and hand. By receiving God’s love for you first, now you have the love to give because love is forgiveness. Walking in love is walking in forgiveness every single day of your life.

When I minister along these lines, what tremendous results. Many people get "unstuck" in their Christian walk because the truth made them free!

Ask yourself these questions: 1) Am I having a hard time receiving the love of God personally in my life right now? 2) Am I disappointed in my life and unknowingly have been blaming God? 3) Do I harbor any unforgiveness toward myself or others? If you answered yes to any one of these, you have just given God what He needs to help you get "unstuck" or find what you are looking for in Him. Until we acknowledge some things, God cannot work because He wants you to know what He is doing so you can cooperate with Him. How many find that when you ask people to do something, they want to know why. If you don’t tell them, it’s like pulling teeth to get them to move. But if you tell them why, they feel a part of the process and it’s not too difficult to get them to do it. God is no different. He wants you to understand what He is doing so it doesn’t alarm or scare you when He begins to change you.

If you would like personal ministry in this area, you can email me at truthfrees@mindsync.com.

Practical Application

RIDING MY MOTORCYCLE

I’ve been riding my motorcycle for about 7 years now. I am a fair weather rider. That means I only ride when it’s sunny, warm, and no clouds in the sky! So that leaves only a few days a year to ride. It’s been about 6 months since the last time I took it out, but decided to get it out of moth balls and take it for a spin. I wanted to be sure the seat I just bought was comfortable because I was leaving for a weekend trip on it.

I started feeling a little light headed, a little anxious, a little apprehensive just thinking about getting on it. Then I said, "I will not fear riding my motorcycle." So I got on it, and had total peace. I was relaxed, and truly enjoyed the ride. I stopped at the gas station to get gas. As I bent over to get my money out of the saddlebags I got a little dizzy. (Just talking about it right now is causing me to feel dizzy!) As I sat there, I said, "I don’t think I can ride my bike on this run feeling like this."

Once I realized this, even though the "symptoms" were real. I said. "No, I am going on my motorcycle, I don’t care how I feel." So I began packing my motorcycle.

When I got on my bike, all these symptoms were gone. I confronted the fear, which then left those feelings powerless, and eventually went away!

Even though six years ago I was set free from the "spirit of fear" I still get opportunity to walk through things. I am still tempted to fear, but choose not to. I believe this will be a life long adventure, because fear comes to all from time to time. We have the power in the Holy Spirit to face it, confront it, walk through it and cast it out.

For those of you who never want to fear again. Get a grip! It’s not a sin when we are tempted to fear, it’s sin when we submit to it and react.

Let’s Make a Deal

I believe this revelation is going to change my finances forever. However, this revelation came before I realized there was blessings attached to it. Let me explain. Up until this month, for all of my life, I have made deals with people by getting the "best" and "lowest" prices. I would go away from a garage sale and be so excited I got something for practically nothing. I wasn’t one to talk people down, I would pay the price on the item, but knew I got a great deal! I would pride myself in finding amazing things. I have a friend who is a great garage seller. Every time I go over to their house, I’m shown another great item for a ridiculous price they paid. They are good at bartering.

Well, just a few days ago (during the writing of this newsletter) I got something dropped into my spirit that was like a ton of bricks. I have been involved in so many activities and events and I would ask for volunteers and donations from people in the area. I would work hard at paying little or getting things done for free. Believe me, that is hard work to do, too. But the events would go off without a hitch. However, the fruit of that labor wasn’t what I expected. I never really thought about that much, not until this very minute.

I had been living in cheap spirit mentality. Many months ago I wrote an article on the "cheap spirit." I talked about how some of us go straight to the sell racks before looking anywhere else. Always in the clearance shelves and would buy things, just because it was on sale. I have since been broken from that bondage and shop freely. However, God is now dealing in another area of the "cheap spirit’s" attributes. And that is in giving. Oh, I give a lot of my time, and money, and effort in all that I do, but this is something I never thought of. Let me share a story or two that will help explain what I’m getting at.

I had some work done on my motorcycle seat a few weeks back. I brought it home and put it on my bike, but it wasn’t quite right. So I took it back for more adjustments. This meant cutting all the leather off and remolding the seat. I finally got it back, and the charge was $250.00. He then went on to say he’d cut the cost in half for me, to $125. He had already indicated to me when I brought it back it would be around $100.00. Well, as I stood there looking at the bill, I said, "But you put a lot of time and effort in this, more materials and even got it done when I needed it." So I told him I would pay him $150. He was a bit surprised and said, "Wow, if you want to." Then as I wrote the check I wrote $175.00. Believe me, this wasn’t me! This was the Holy Spirit! Who knows what I’m sowing into someone’s life by this kind of giving. He was blown away, and very grateful. As I left, I said to myself, "what is work for but to bless others."

Then as I was driving home, I began thinking of all the garage sales I had gone to. What if I saw something I wanted for $5.00, but offered $6? What’s a buck? I don’t know about you, but that would totally blow me away if I were on the receiving end. I would wonder why this person would do such a thing. I would even ask, if I had the nerve. What would you say? Personally, I don’t know yet, cause I haven’t really ventured out it this yet for any responses.

I noticed one thing. When I gave the extra money to the guy who did the work on my seat, I had more peace than I ever had when doing a transaction. Have you ever left a store feeling like you spent too much or you spent too little, or you just didn’t have peace over what you just did? I have. But God told me, "Linda, you can never out give me."

God owns all. We’re His kids. But this is the problem. Until our heart is right about giving (not hoarding), God can’t give anymore. When I realized that I am to be a blessing to others in everything I do, a door was opened in my life that has already begun impacting Tom and I greatly financially. I didn’t even realize the blessing of doing this, not until I began reaping the benefits.

God saw my heart. I believe He can now trust me with a little more every day. I see this so clear as the nose on my face.

As I was sharing this with Tom, I told him that 6 months ago if God blessed me with more, I would have become a spinster. But because of this breakthrough in my heart about "aggressive giving", I understand why the things I did wasn’t as successful as they could have been. I understand now why it was so "hard" to get people to want to donate. I was doing everything with a cheap spirit – a spinster spirit. Yucko pooey!

I’m feeling so much lighter and freer. I’m free to give!

Tom’s Tidbits:

"CHEAP spirit goes along with CHEAP strife."

I was sharing my revelation with Tom on Aggressive Giving (the article above) and he said this to me, "Cheap spirit goes along with cheap strife." I asked him to explain the cheap strife, I already knew about the cheap spirit. He said, cheap strife is when you are in turmoil and conflict about money.

Seminar and Activity Update

June 20-22—Retreat in Mt. Aukum. This is the quarterly retreat for women only. If you are interested in attending please call me at (530) 620-2712 and press 1 to leave a message.

Freedom Fest Concert—August 23rd in Fiddletown CA, in Fiddletown Park. Noon – 6 p.m. For more information, see the website at www.mindsync.com/~lam, or call (530) 620-2712.