Ed Christian's World

The Joy of Willing…

Believers have a strange idea that if you will something, then it can’t be the Spirit. And yet God’s word is filled with the opposite. You can’t read the Bible without reading the word ‘Choose!’

You can’t get saved without the word ‘choose.’ It says ‘Love God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength.’ That takes your will. And that’s the Spirit. Some believers think that following God means just going along with the flow.

Yes and no. There are different flows – the flow of the Spirit and the flow of the world. In order to serve God you have to choose the flow of the Spirit and you have to choose against the flow of the world. And that requires choice, determination, and decision.

So many believers spend their whole lives trying to find the will of God. You want the will of God in your life? Stop asking everyone about it. Choose it. Obey it. Agree on it. Decide it. Will it. And the will of God will be done in your life, on earth, as it is in heaven.

“Now fear the Lord and serve him with all faithfulness. Throw away the gods your ancestors worshiped beyond the Euphrates River and in Egypt, and serve the Lord. But if serving the Lord seems undesirable to you, then choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your ancestors served beyond the Euphrates, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you are living. But as for me and my household, we will serve the Lord.” Joshua 24:14-15

After reading your Bible today, choose one verse to obey and do what you know the will of the Lord is.

Walk daily with God at your side!

Love always,

Ed

The Upward Call…

Believers and airplanes… what do they have in common? Airplanes are unique among all transportation. You can stop a horse, you can stop a car, and all of them will simply stop and stay there.

But if you try to stop a plane in mid-air, the plane will descend and crash. Further a horse can back up, a car can back up, but a plane can’t. So for a plane, there’s no backing up, and there’s no standing still. So it is for a believer. Other people can back up, but you can’t.

Your walk in God has no provision for backing up. That’s why, when you start going backwards you’re so miserable. Maybe your walk isn’t going anywhere and hasn’t been going anywhere for a while.

Don’t let it crash. Turn on your spiritual engines and start moving forward. For Paul wrote, ‘But this I do, forgetting what lies behind, and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.

You, my friend, are like an airplane. Press on, press on, press on, and you’ll find yourself flying in the heavenliest.

Brothers and sisters, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus. Philippians 3:13-15

Think of a way to move a step forward in the Lord today – and go forward (especially in an area where you may have been slipping backward)

Walk daily with God at your side!

Love always,

Ed

The Season Of Blossoms…

In Exodus 12, the Lord tells Israel that the present month was now to become the first of Months for them, the beginning of their year. The month was called Nisan. It literally means, “The Beginning”.

But it wasn’t just “The Beginning.” It was the New Beginning that ended the old year and begins the new. It was Nisan also that ended the winter and began the spring. And so it was Nisan that Jesus chose as the month and season in which He would die for the sins of the world and rise from death for its redemption.

The Hebrew word for winter is Sethav. It means the season of darkness and hiding. Nisan brought that to an end. What is the Resurrection? It’s your Nisan, the Nisan appointed to end your winter, your season of hiding, your season of darkness.

It’s your new beginning, your season of springtime. And what’s God saying to you in all this? He’s saying: “Arise my love and come away, for behold the winter is past… the rains are over and gone…. the flowers have appeared in our land … and the time for singing has come.”

My beloved spoke and said to me, “Arise, my darling, my beautiful one, come with me. See! The winter is past;
the rains are over and gone. Flowers appear on the earth; the season of singing has come, the cooing of doves is heard in our land. Song of Solomon 2:10-12

Today ask the Lord to bring you to a new Nissan in you walk with Him – new experiences and growth in His presence.

Walk daily with God at your side!

Love.always,

Ed

The Tzemach…

Tzemach is a most important word because it’s given in the Hebrew Scriptures as the name of Jesus. In Zechariah 6:12 it says, “Behold the man whose name is Tzemach, for He will branch out from where He is and He will build the temple of the Lord.”

The word Tzemach means the shoot branch, to spring forth again. Jesus rose up from the depths of the earth from the dead to life, the Shooting Forth – the Tzemach.

When this prophecy was translated by the rabbis into Greek, they chose a Greek word to represent Tzemach. The word was Anatolay. It means the rising of the light, the sunrise.

In fact it’s used in the New Testament and is translated as the Day Spring, The Morningstar, The Rising Sun. Are you in the depths? It’s okay. The power of the Tzemach is to rise up from the depths.

So live in the Tzemach, for He has risen, He has blossomed, He has dawned, He has broken the new day. And you too will rise and shine, for your light has come. And the glory of the Lord has risen upon you in the Tzemach – your rising.

“I, Jesus, have sent my angel to give you this testimony for the churches. I am the Root and the Offspring of David, and the bright Morning Star.” Revelation 22:16

What area of your life needs the power of the Tzemach, the springing forth? Lift it up to the Lrod and rise in His power.

Walk daily with God at your side!

Love always,

Ed

Jesus’s Sabbath…

Jesus died on Friday just before sunset. Why? Because Friday night was the beginning of the Shabbat, the Sabbath, the Day of Rest. And what was Jesus doing on the cross? He was working.

But when the Sabbath came, all work had to cease. So even in His death, Jesus honored the Word of God. He rested in the tomb. So He had to die when He did, because the Shabbat was coming. He had to finish His work.

It’s not so much that He died because the Shabbat was coming – but rather it was that the Shabbat came because He died. Jesus’s peace is more powerful than time and space and never dependent on circumstance.

Stop waiting for the Sabbath. Stop waiting for the circumstance to change. It doesn’t matter what day it is, it doesn’t matter how many problems you have, or what condition your life is in enter Jesus’s peace now, and the Shabbat will come.

Come sun or storm, hell or high water, it doesn’t matter. Bring it to Calvary and dwell in Jesus’s rest, and He will cause the Sabbath to come. For the Son of Man is Lord of Shabbat.

Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Matthew 11:28

Enter His peace today, living as if the circumstances surrounding you have already changed – it doesn’t matter what you see or feel, remind yourself you have the victory through His finished work.

Walk daily with God at your side!

Love always,

Ed

The Well, The Doors and The Gate…

What I’m about to reveal to you has no precedent in human history. The Temple of Jerusalem had three main barriers in its pathway signifying the separation between God and man.

Around the year 30 A.D., Jesus of Nazareth died and reconciled man to God. When that happened, the first and innermost barrier, the Veil was supernaturally torn in two.

The second barrier, the Golden Doors of the Temple started opening by themselves in 30 A.D. And the last barrier, the historian Josephus recorded that before the Temple was destroyed, the Great Bronze Doors of the Nicanor Gate, which took 20 men to open and close, all of a sudden opened by itself and scared everybody.

Even the Rabbis and Josephus unwittingly bear witness to the powerful truth: God is awesome and Jesus is the Way, the Truth, and the Life.

So live no longer in fear or doubt or division. Walk in the powerful power, through the gates and through the veils – because He’s real. He really does have the power to open any barrier, and He has opened up to you the gates of righteousness and the path of life and glory.

Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me” John 14:6

Jesus’s power is to break through barriers. Take a barrier in your life, and with the power of God, break through.

Walk daily with God at your side!

Love always,

Ed

The Nature of Sin – Poem Of God…

In Ephesians it says in the original Greek, “For we are His poema.” From “poema” we get our English word “poem.”

If you’re born again your life is now a work of God – a poem of heaven. One of the things that defines a poem is flow. If your life is to be a poem of God, it’s got to flow. It’s got to have a harmony, a rhyme and a reason — a flow.

The nature of the Spirit is to make your life flow. The nature of sin is to take away the flow of your life. The more sin in your life, the less your life will be the poem it’s supposed to be. It’s easy to lose the flow through sin.

If you want your life to be beautiful, then you have to get the flow back into it. And if you want the flow back, then you have to get back into the flow of the Spirit. Repent of sin or else it just won’t flow.

But God, being rich in mercy, because of his great love with which he loved us—we who were dead because of our offences—made us alive together with Christ—it is by grace that you are saved.
Ephesians 2:4-5

When you commit your life to living and walking by the Spirit, your life will be as beautiful as a poem from heaven.

So I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. Galatians 5:16

Seek to flow today in God’s flowing. Let the Spirit lead everything you do and go with the flow.

The Light of God surrounds you.
The Love of God enfolds you.
The power of God protects you.
The Presence of God watches over you.
The Mind of God guides you.
The Life of God flows through you.
The Laws of God direct you.
The Peace of God abides within you.
The Joy of God uplifts you.
The Strength of God renews you.
The Beauty of God inspires you.
Wherever you are, God is!
And all is well.

Walk daily with God at your side!

Love always,

Ed

Lord Of Eden…

In Genesis 3, the curse is pronounced over man. And it says this, “By the sweat of your brow you shall eat bread until you return to the earth…”

Two thousand years ago Jesus ate a Passover meal with His disciples. He had come to take away the curse and bring blessing; for the curse – linked sweat with death.

But it says something else. “You shall eat bread until you return to the earth.” So before the Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus fulfilled this Scripture. As He neared the hour of His death, He celebrated Passover, the Feast of Bread.

So when He lifted up the sacred bread of Passover, He was lifting up the bread of Adam, the curse. When we eat of that bread in the Lord’s Supper, it’s a sign that your life is no longer under the curse.

Your life shall no more be called “cursed,” but “blessed.” So don’t live any longer as if you were cursed and under a curse, complaining, afraid, in bondage. But be free and live as if your life were blessed and you were under a blessing. Because that’s what you are.

Mark 14:12- 26: On the first day of the Festival of Unleavened Bread, when it was customary to sacrifice the Passover lamb, Jesus’ disciples asked him, “Where do you want us to go and make preparations for you to eat the Passover?”

So he sent two of his disciples, telling them, “Go into the city, and a man carrying a jar of water will meet you. Follow him. Say to the owner of the house he enters, ‘The Teacher asks: Where is my guest room, where I may eat the Passover with my disciples?’ He will show you a large room upstairs, furnished and ready. Make preparations for us there.”

The disciples left, went into the city and found things just as Jesus had told them. So they prepared the Passover.

When evening came, Jesus arrived with the Twelve. While they were reclining at the table eating, he said, “Truly I tell you, one of you will betray me—one who is eating with me.”

They were saddened, and one by one they said to him, “Surely you don’t mean me?”

“It is one of the Twelve,” he replied, “one who dips bread into the bowl with me. The Son of Man will go just as it is written about him. But woe to that man who betrays the Son of Man! It would be better for him if he had not been born.”

While they were eating, Jesus took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and gave it to his disciples, saying, “Take it; this is my body.” Then he took a cup, and when he had given thanks, he gave it to them, and they all drank from it. “This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many,” he said to them. “Truly I tell you, I will not drink again from the fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it new in the kingdom of God.” When they had sung a hymn, they went out to the Mount of Olives.

Lift up one area in your life that you’re struggling with and haven’t being able to change. Thank the Lord for the victory He’ll help you conquer in your life and start living as a newly anointed of the Lord.

Walk daily with God at your side!

Love always,

Ed

The Cosmic Lamb Bone…

We continue the Passover Mysteries with the mystery of the Zeroah. On virtually every Passover Seder Plate there is something called the Zeroah. Yet it just sits there on the plate and is never touched and rarely mentioned.

What is it? The Zeroah is the roasted shank bone of a Lamb. The Zeroah is the full and awesome power of God. And in Isaiah 53, the mystery is revealed. For it is written, “To whom has the Zeroah of the Lord been revealed?”

Your translation will read arm, but the Hebrew is Zeroah, the same word as the Lamb’s bone. The Zeroah is Jesus, who is wounded for our sins, scourged and crushed for our punishment, and who goes to His death as a lamb.

By the Zeroah, we are saved. This is the true full power of the Almighty, the loving, gentle, merciful, giving, and beautiful One who bore all things to save us.

This is the Zeroah, the arm that saved your life. Trust in it, rest in it, reach for it, rejoice in it, and live by it, and nothing will be impossible for you.

“I am the good shepherd; I know my sheep and my sheep know me— just as the Father knows me and I know the Father—and I lay down my life for the sheep. I have other sheep that are not of this sheep pen. I must bring them also. They too will listen to my voice, and there shall be one flock and one shepherd. The reason my Father loves me is that I lay down my life—only to take it up again. No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have authority to lay it down and authority to take it up again. This command I received from my Father.” John 10;14-18

Today take some time to thank the Lord for all of the many blessings He has given you. Commit this day to rejoice in the Zeroah of your life.

Walk daily with God at your side!

Love always,

Ed

The Palm Sunday Connection…

What was the first Jewish holy day? Chanukah? Yom Kippur? Passover? The Sabbath? No… The first Jewish holy day was Palm Sunday, the most ancient, Jewish holy day given through Moses.

In Exodus 12:3 – “Tell the whole congregation of Israel that on the tenth day of the month, the month of Nisan, each one is to take a lamb.” Four days later came the eve of Passover.

Now if we count back four days from the Passover when Jesus was taken to His death, it comes to the day when he entered the city of Jerusalem – what we know as Palm Sunday. Jesus began the work of redemption on the first and most ancient Hebrew holy day.

So when the Jewish people fulfill this ordinance – and receive the Lamb of God, the purposes of God will be fulfilled. The greatest thing we have ever done in our lives is to receive the Lamb.

But it’s not just a one-time thing. Receive Him even more, even deeper, into your heart, into your mind – into every part of your life. For the more you receive the Lamb, the more the purposes of God will be fulfilled in your life.

Rejoice greatly, Daughter Zion Shout, Daughter Jerusalem!
See, your king comes to you, righteous and victorious, lowly and riding on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey. Zechariah 9:9

Think about that sin or problem you need to deal with today. Pray and ask God to help you to destroy it before it destroys your life.

Walk daily with God at your side!

Love always,

Ed