God is For You

Liberty and Law

"For the Law, since it has only a shadow of the good things to come and not the very form of things, can never, by the same sacrifices which they offer continually year by year, make perfect those who draw near." HEB 1:1

The Law was at best a dim representation of the grace of Jesus.  The Law was pointing to a future event, while the Gospel is good news.  News is reporting that which has already taken place.  Recognize the time you are living in.  The Gospel is not merely encouraging a holy lifestyle to become worthy of something to come, but a lifestyle of freedom in response to the holiness already imparted by the grace of Jesus Christ. 

The establishment of law isn't the mark of a civil society, for it's our lack of civility that prompts their establishment in the first place.  As the hearts of people begin to reflect their authentic identity, (made in the image and likeness of God reflecting His love and goodness), one would think that we would reward ourselves by eliminating laws one by one in due time.  Instead, we continue to make new ones.  

Ignorance would say that which is legal is also righteous, just as it would say that we are righteous because we don't break laws.  That is what defines a legalist. It is one who defines righteousness by law.  But Jesus dares us to live in perfect liberty by making us righteous apart from law.  It is how we respond to freedom that reveals the heart of a people.  What reward is there for walking a path that you are chained to?  The fact that we need laws defining our behavior is proof enough that we don't truly know who we are.  But we're waking up...

Questions and Answers

Who is the Holy Spirit? What is His role in the Trinity? Are there other spirits? How can we distinguish between the unholy and the Holy?

 The Holy Spirit is the kindest most gentle expression of God’s heart that I’ve ever met. He guides into all truth (Truth is Jesus) so He always leads me to Jesus, all of Jesus. Hebrews 5:14 talks about solid food is for those who have their senses exercised (trained) to discern good and evil. So it’s possible to sense the presence of God and the presence of something other. It does take training. This is important because most people have the ability to discern evil but the challenge is to discern good. It doesn’t just come by having the letter of the Word as your sole litmus test for what’s of God or not. (Dangerous thoughts ahead…) The Pharisees knew the Word better than you and I and couldn’t recognize the literal manifest presence of God standing right in front of them. Matter of fact, they claimed devotion to God but the presence of Jesus stirred contempt and hatred, so clearly their senses weren’t exercised simply by devotion to the letter. Abraham got a legit word from God to sacrifice his son. God doesn’t condone human sacrifice. God’s word to Abraham at the bottom of the mountain was different than what He told Abraham at the top of the mountain. But the word of the Lord stands forever, right? Hosea got a legit word to marry a prostitute. How many Pastors today would agree with Hosea if he came and said God told him to do that? Jesus emphatically tells a crowd to eat His flesh and drink His blood, so strongly that they all get offended and leave. God doesn’t condone cannibalism. Bottom line to all of this, unless the Holy Spirit reveals Jesus to us, we will kill ourselves and each other with the letter all day long. (Read internet message boards on Christian bloggers. Brutal, loveless, people more concerned with being right than revealing Truth.)

Questions and Answers

What is being drunk in the Holy Spirit and where is the basis in Scripture?

 This gets muddy when we put these two concepts together because it implies that one isn’t complete without the other. First, what is being drunk? It’s being given over to alcohol to the point where one loses control of his/her faculties or behavior. What is being in the Holy Spirit? It’s righteousness, peace, and joy. (Romans 14:17) I’ve never liked the term drunk in the Spirit, but I’m not offended by it because I understand that the joy and bliss of the presence of God transcends the limits of linguistic description. (I’m getting happy just writing this. Associative meditation perhaps, but He’s just soooooooo good!!) The difference between chemical intoxication and Spiritual ecstasy is different internally but sometimes generates similar physical responses. Hence the Acts 2 scene where onlookers made the assumption by the behavior of the church that they were drunk. Eph 5:18 says don’t be drunk with wine but be filled with the Spirit. The implication there is that one experience is the counterfeit of another. When you get the revelation that you are the righteousness of God in Christ, that the Prince of Peace has made you His temple, and that fullness of joy is found in His presence, the result of these concepts can fry the formerly limited ability you had previously assumed was possible when it comes to tasting His goodness. I dare anyone to spend five minutes meditating on John 14:20 and not be effected Spirit, soul, and body.

Looking Up

I don't know how else to say it, but to see, really see Jesus, sometimes it doesn't come from hearing a great sermon or reading an amazing book. Sometimes it comes through falling so hard into the dirt road of failure that the gravel marks are permanently imprinted on the palms of your soul. The hand that reaches down to bring you to your feet again, that's the hand of God. That's the encounter with Love that changes everything.

Freedom

"With Grace comes the revelation that your sin or behavior does not have the power to manipulate God or dictate to Him whether He can love you or not. The love of a father would seem to make him vulnerable to pain, so mankind wants to retain the power, through sin, to be able to hurt God if God disappoints or offends us. 

You may think that you have the ability to threaten God with the pain of loss, but I would ask to what extent could your child cause you the greatest pain? The most pain one person could inflict upon another would be injury to the point of death. And that's exactly what God's children did to Him.

Yet in both His death and resurrection He embraces you in reconciliation, grace, forgiveness, and love.  He embraces you in your ignorance declaring, "Father, forgive them for they don't know what they do."  He embraces you in His defeat of death, by unveiling love, not revenge upon humanity.  It is the resurrection that validates your innocence and is that premeditated decision to love you that nullifies your ability to control God with any past, present, or future behavior. While you were still lost in the blind confusion of sin's identity, He died for and as you.  This union with literal righteousness Himself completely liberates you from sin by removing any power that sin had in controlling and manipulating your life. Authentic Love produces authentic freedom, and you are authentically loved by God, right where you are today." )    
  

Waking Up

The origin of our reconciliation is in the perfection of our inception.  God exists beyond space-time, encompassing the end and beginning together, so He knew you before He formed you and in your origin is the artistic expression of a master designer.  God created you as a way to express Himself.  You are the mansion He has chosen for Himself to dwell in, and His heart is to receive you unto Himself.  Our creation has never stopped.

Though the work is finished the manifestation of that work is revealed as we awaken to our authentic identity.  Throughout our awakening there is revelation and rest.  Revelation comes from knowing the Answer and rest is when you realize that the Answer knows you.  Even more so, that the Answer has united Himself with you, and even in your blindness He empowers you with identity.  Your identity is not dependent upon your ability to fully understand who you are.  You are fully capable of adopting a false identity, acting out the role of a fictitious character, and presenting it to the world around you as if that is who you really are.  But it's what God knew before He formed you that is the true you, and He is thoroughly committed to you being fully revealed and known by yourself even as you are fully known by Him.

Forgetting to Remember

Experience is the most vilified necessity of your life. Religion promotes works (activity) while demoting experience (the result of activity). At its base level, a moment of servant hood provides God opportunity to form within us what can never be learned by mere meditation and contemplation. So religion creates confusion, working against itself to create a system that creates structure by confined activity. God is constantly working, loving, creating, in the most intimate and beautifully hidden ways to place memorable moments in our lives that anchor us into His heart. In the Old Testament man is admonished to pass down in declaration what God has done before so that the now generation lives with the awareness of what He is doing now and will do tomorrow. In the New Testament Jesus maintains this priority by commanding the disciples to remember again and again. Even communion is given for the purpose of remembering what He has done. We are told to remember because He knows that it within your capacity to forget. I'm convinced that the ability to forget is not a glitch in put design, but a gift that we abuse when the mind is not renewed. In 2 Peter 1:9 we are told that the only reason we lack in the area of virtues is that we tend to forget how pure we really are.

Freedom to Choose

Jesus gave mankind the freedom to hate, the challenge to love, and enough verses in the Bible to support both vengeance and grace.  What you do when you are free to choose anything says so much about the God in your heart and your eyes.  A prison cell has never produced a pure heart.

Dad's Radio Broadcast

I'm continuing to broadcast for my Dad's radio show that he had for more than 30 years.  I don't personally receive payment from the ministry, but rather, the program helps to take care of Mom Vanderbush and also generously supports quite a few trusted missionaries, ministries, and Bible sending organizations worldwide.  It's a small way that I can honor Dad's life, legacy, and desire to continue to share the love of Jesus Christ beyond his own lifetime.  The website to hear the podcast is vanderbushministries.com.

The End From the Beginning

You are designed with a blueprint that originated in the mind of God. You are a product of Gods imagination. When He created the cosmos, He spoke it into existence. When He created you, He expressed to Himself a declared intention. "Let Us make man in Our image, after our likeness. And let him have dominion..." You were created to be and to have. You exist by identity, but you have by authority. Adam and you have the same assignment, to rule and to reign. You reign according to your identity but you rule by authority. Lest we for a moment get serious about this, the very essence and presence of the Lord is marked by joy. Its the fullness that envelopes Him and the pervasive nature that surrounds Him. So it was within the context of joy that the One Who is Love prophesied you into being. You were chosen to be in Christ from before the foundation of the world. He is your home and you are His. He is the destination of this journey of revelation. (John 14:20) And that's the point of all human existence. That the romance of God would be fully manifest to us as it is to Him.

Moments That Matter

I know it probably seems like I'm on a social networking binge but that's about all there is to do here. We have spent a few days now sitting in the silence and solitude of the Midwestern winter and, yes, I am sure that I'm not quite ready to become a monk just yet. Dad's passing itself was glorious in every sense of the word. The eerie stillness that follows is what's difficult. I went out to the trailer to gather some things for Mom and saw dad's chair with his bible and reading glasses sitting by it. I'm not sure how long I stood there just watching the chair through the steam of my breath but eventually reality snapped into place and I realized I couldn't feel my toes. Things like that have happened a few times. Where the spine of a book, the sound of a train, creak of a step, the smell of a suit will just arrest my attention in a most uncomfortable way. Memories are ghosts of the moments that mattered. And right now they're all awake and wanting attention. So there's that.

A General Goes Home

My Dad passed away tonight. He is at peace, and so am I.

Taking Dad Home

This is a mobile blog that I created some time ago documenting taking my Dad to a nursing home in Brookings, SD. I know, it sounds less than enjoyable. Give it a try. You might find it interesting. http://will30.zapd.com/taking-dad-home

Michael Reed

I lost a friend today. (Written on June 25, 2012)

I met Michael and Meri Reed and their incredible family at a youth camp in the Texas hill country in a place known as Echo Valley. It was the early 90s and I remember Michael smiling and laughing. He spoke of his love for God and His people. He never stopped smiling.

When I graduated Bible College we moved into Michael and Meri's guest house back in Austin. I was nowhere close to prepared to become a father but was about four months away from it ready or not. Michael and I sat for hours as I watched his adoration of his family and listened to him speak of his love for God and His people. He never stopped smiling.

Many years later we moved yet again into the guesthouse. Different location but the same Michael Reed. I wandered many nights across the driveway into a living room filled with people loving God, celebrating His goodness, and learning as Michael spoke profoundly about his love for God and His people. He never stopped smiling.

A few years later we moved into the house yet again. This time it was the main house as they were in transition to California and we were...just in transition. Night after night Michael and I would sit on the porch, watching the deer. We spoke of the usual, of his love for God and His people. He never stopped smiling.

I began to wonder if Michael ever stopped smiling. I passed him I'm traffic once, looked over, and there he was, all by himself and smiling. I told him about it and he laughed. His joy had become an involuntary expression of an inner delight in God and His people.

A couple of years later we moved yet again into the main house. There are a very small handful of people to whom I have been completely transparent in my life, and Michael was one of them. On one exceptionally difficult day I caved and poured my heart out to him. He could have taken the occasion for well deserved harsh correction, and I was braced for it. Instead he went a very different and unexpected route. He told me who I was. Who he saw. Who he knew me to be. He reminded me of things I should have never forgotten, and though I gave him plenty of reason to look disappointed, he never stopped smiling. He held onto my wife and I, spoke love over us and our children and prayed as a father would. The love in his eyes and voice refocused my heart and left me solidly shaken by grace.

May the cloud of witnesses understand who they are receiving, and may those left here comprehend who we have lost. Michael Reed, I love and honor you, my friend, brother, teacher, father, and.....from the core of my heart there is a chasm of sadness that is swallowing up the words... In moments like this, only weeping will do.

Hi God.

Me - Hi God.

Him - Hi Bill. What's new?

Me - All things, so I hear.

Him - Good answer. What do you want to ask me this morning?

Me - I just want to grow, Spiritually.

Him - Hmm. Well that's a problem. You can't grow because I can't grow and the full measure of Me resides with and within you. All you can "grow" in is the revelation of what you already have and who you already are, in Me.

Me - Explain please?

Him - When did your son become your son?

Me - At the "beginning"?

Him - Right. And as he has grown, is he any more your son now than he was then? But the revelation of what it means to be called your son grows as the relationship deepens through experience. He could experience your love before he could explain or understand it. So I'm bringing you experiences you don't yet understand but can fully enjoy.

Me - Ok. I'm just going to sit here and be loved.

Him - That's called rest, and it's My gift to you. Now when you live, move, and have your being, be who you are, which is who I am. Be Love.

(Inspired by 1 John 4:17)

Blessing

Faith, hope, joy, peace, provision, communion, wisdom, revelation, grace, mercy, and the eternal Love of God be ever increasing upon you. All of you.

Art

The Strongest Link

A year ago today my wife and I stood in the courtyard of Notre Dame in Paris, France to renew our covenant vows. The amazing thing about covenant in the Kingdom is that the strength of it is reliant upon its strongest partner. God has established a covenant with us that He refuses to allow to be broken. That's why it's called everlasting. The Bible is not a prenuptial agreement where the odds aren't in your favor. It's a certificate of covenant marriage where the stronger party seals the agreement with enough blood to cover both parties. What if everyone viewed their own marriage, not as strong as it's weakest link, but rather as strong as the sacrifice of its most relentless lover? All it takes to save a marriage and strengthen a covenant is a revelation of Love's Grace. It is the power by which covenant becomes unbreakable. On this day we reminded each other that we did and do, both then and now, say yes to the covenant that we entered into more then half a lifetime ago. Traci, thank you for your relentless everlasting love. I love you, my bride.

Blessed Poverty

Matthew 5:1-3 "1 And seeing the multitudes, he went up into a mountain: and when he was set, his disciples came unto him:2 And he opened his mouth, and taught them, saying,3 Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven."

The state of being impoverished has less to do with what one actually has and more to do with what one thinks he needs. This is why those who have little in the way of possessions yet are happy and fulfilled are actually richer than some with multiple millions who "just need a little bit more". It's the hunger for more that reveals the attitude of poverty, and rarely is it considered a virtue. That is, until it comes to the things of the Spirit.

It is vital that we live with a hunger for God. A constant awareness that we haven't seen it all. An appetite to see what He has hidden for us, not from us. That no matter how much we learn, that we always remain a student of the Spirit, living with the awareness that there is more. Never become so much of an expert that you stop pursuing that which you haven't experienced. To those who will pursue what they have not yet tasted of His presence, the Kingdom belongs.

(See and study Jeremiah 5:1. That the hunger of one man seeking after the Spirit of God releases grace over a city. Also, John is "in the Spirit" in Rev 1:10, yet in Rev 4:1-2 he answers a call to step deeper "in the Spirit". Jesus releases the presence of the Holy Spirit in John 20 when He breathes upon the disciples. But in Acts 1 He invites those disciples to go to the upper room and wait for the baptism of the power of the Holy Spirit. 500 see Him and hear the invitation, but only 120 respond. The presence of the Holy Spirit is constant, but the power of the Holy Spirit is unique and belongs to the hungry.

To grow your appetite for God, rein in Your scattered attention and set your affection on things above. When you turn your heart of affection upon Him and His presence, your hunger increases and you position yourself for the more that your heart longs for.)