The Lord began speaking to me about how to better anticipate Him--how to foresee His next move. And there can be several steps to this. Now God can't just be formatted, but formats can help us understand how He works.
Step 1) The first step in anticipating God's next move in your life is understanding hope. We need to look forward to restored joy, restored love, restored peace...we need to look forward to restoration of fullness of life. We need to know that He will uphold us and push us higher and higher.
"Restore to me the joy of Your salvation, And uphold me by Your generous Spirit."
Psalm 51:11-12
Step 2) Once we have hope, then we can call on Him in confidence. (1 John 5:14) Then we can be bold and know that He will reveal to us something according to His will. We call on Him, and we have the awareness of our future 'saved'. (Romans 10:13) Once we have hope for the future, we can attain to the promises found in Jeremiah 33:3. And we can have boldness and confidence in this.
"Call to me and I will answer you and tell you great and unsearchable things you do not know."
Step 3) So we call out to God, and God tells us something. He tells us something about His future work that would otherwise be knowable. He tells us something that testifies to Jesus, something that is in line with the spirit of prophecy (Revelations 19:10). He gives us a word, or a vision, or a parable that points to and reveals His movement in the future.
For example, the Lord may reveal that tomorrow is going to be a day when a sibling of yours is really going to feel His love. This kind of prophetic knowledge can also come as a warning to pray against---He may say that tomorrow is going to be a day where the enemy is going to try to attack you financially. Whether God gives an encouraging word or a warning, the response needs to be in praying according to His will. We can 'pray into' that coming sense of love and call it forth, or we can 'pray against' that financial warfare. Remember that all God's promises are "yes" and "amen" in Jesus Christ (2 Corinthians 1:20).
Step 4) Step 3 is repeated as the Lord trains our ears to hear (Mark 4:9). We become accustomed to His voice, and build trust in the revealing of His plans. Once God has sanctified our ears, then He can sanctify our minds. He can make us attuned to Him. This is when He gives us the mind of Christ.
"But he who is spiritual appraises all things, yet he himself is appraised by no one. 16For WHO HAS KNOWN THE MIND OF THE LORD, THAT HE WILL INSTRUCT HIM? But we have the mind of Christ." 1 Corinthians 2:15-16
If we have the mind of Christ, the Lord speaks to us in a way that transcends a word, a vision, or a parable. The spirit of prophecy manifests in a new way that brings fullness and truth to our awareness of the future. And our own logical or mechanistic thinking on tomorrow, or the next day, or the next, is replaced by a knowing that comes from oneness with the Lord.
For example, I may be thinking about Vanessa's (previous) back problems, and in thinking with the Lord, I feel Him reassure me that everything is going to be alright. And then the next day, Vanessa tells me that her back was healed by the Lord that morning. Or, I'll be thinking of a certain Christian friend who we don't see often, and then go on to hear that they're coming to our house next month. God inspires our thoughts to the extent that they become prophetic. And if our thoughts are prophetic, then we don't necessarily need a clear word. We develop a type of godly premonition. What would Jesus think? As it relates to us, we begin to think along with Him, too.
Step 5) If we have the mind of Christ, praise God! That's when we can act on it. We can pray into it, act into it, and walk in it. God's reality can continuously be coming into union with our own. We can do only what we see, or envision, the father doing. (John 5:19) This is where God wants to take us, if we ourselves will respond by wanting to get there. If we are controlled by the spirit of prophecy to this extent, then we will be made into a testimony to Jesus. And that's what it's all about!
Step 1) The first step in anticipating God's next move in your life is understanding hope. We need to look forward to restored joy, restored love, restored peace...we need to look forward to restoration of fullness of life. We need to know that He will uphold us and push us higher and higher.
Psalm 51:11-12
Step 2) Once we have hope, then we can call on Him in confidence. (1 John 5:14) Then we can be bold and know that He will reveal to us something according to His will. We call on Him, and we have the awareness of our future 'saved'. (Romans 10:13) Once we have hope for the future, we can attain to the promises found in Jeremiah 33:3. And we can have boldness and confidence in this.
"Call to me and I will answer you and tell you great and unsearchable things you do not know."
Step 3) So we call out to God, and God tells us something. He tells us something about His future work that would otherwise be knowable. He tells us something that testifies to Jesus, something that is in line with the spirit of prophecy (Revelations 19:10). He gives us a word, or a vision, or a parable that points to and reveals His movement in the future.
For example, the Lord may reveal that tomorrow is going to be a day when a sibling of yours is really going to feel His love. This kind of prophetic knowledge can also come as a warning to pray against---He may say that tomorrow is going to be a day where the enemy is going to try to attack you financially. Whether God gives an encouraging word or a warning, the response needs to be in praying according to His will. We can 'pray into' that coming sense of love and call it forth, or we can 'pray against' that financial warfare. Remember that all God's promises are "yes" and "amen" in Jesus Christ (2 Corinthians 1:20).
Step 4) Step 3 is repeated as the Lord trains our ears to hear (Mark 4:9). We become accustomed to His voice, and build trust in the revealing of His plans. Once God has sanctified our ears, then He can sanctify our minds. He can make us attuned to Him. This is when He gives us the mind of Christ.
"But he who is spiritual appraises all things, yet he himself is appraised by no one. 16For WHO HAS KNOWN THE MIND OF THE LORD, THAT HE WILL INSTRUCT HIM? But we have the mind of Christ." 1 Corinthians 2:15-16
If we have the mind of Christ, the Lord speaks to us in a way that transcends a word, a vision, or a parable. The spirit of prophecy manifests in a new way that brings fullness and truth to our awareness of the future. And our own logical or mechanistic thinking on tomorrow, or the next day, or the next, is replaced by a knowing that comes from oneness with the Lord.
For example, I may be thinking about Vanessa's (previous) back problems, and in thinking with the Lord, I feel Him reassure me that everything is going to be alright. And then the next day, Vanessa tells me that her back was healed by the Lord that morning. Or, I'll be thinking of a certain Christian friend who we don't see often, and then go on to hear that they're coming to our house next month. God inspires our thoughts to the extent that they become prophetic. And if our thoughts are prophetic, then we don't necessarily need a clear word. We develop a type of godly premonition. What would Jesus think? As it relates to us, we begin to think along with Him, too.
Step 5) If we have the mind of Christ, praise God! That's when we can act on it. We can pray into it, act into it, and walk in it. God's reality can continuously be coming into union with our own. We can do only what we see, or envision, the father doing. (John 5:19) This is where God wants to take us, if we ourselves will respond by wanting to get there. If we are controlled by the spirit of prophecy to this extent, then we will be made into a testimony to Jesus. And that's what it's all about!
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