A TOUCH OF PRESENCE - PART ONE

As we approach our annual Presence Conference in April, we would love to inspire you to remain firmly planted in Christ, secure in your identity in Him and certain in the knowledge that Jesus is the same yesterday, right now and in your future.

Psalm Thirty Four

Psalm 34:1

I will bless the Lord at all times;

His praise shall continually be in my mouth.     

"I will bless the Lord at all times' Our commitment to Christ includes the pledge to bless Him when it seems God is ignoring our circumstances. 

David has fled Saul's court fearing he will be murdered by the demonized king. He hopes vainly for shelter with the Philistine king and is rejected again. It seems no one wants him. It seems no one will be his refuge, his friend. He has no family, no friends, no followers at this stage, no reason at all to bless God, especially when he is feeling so rejected. His pledge to bless and praise the Lord covers the good and the bad times. There will never be a day when praise for Christ cannot be found in the Psalmists mouth. All times includes our past, our present and out future;

Spurgeon; He who praises God for mercies shall never want a mercy for which to praise. To bless the Lord is never unseasonable. “His praise shall continually be in my mouth,” not in my heart merely, but in my mouth too.

‘At all Times’

Heb 13:8 Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever. 

This Scripture brings Jesus into three time zones;

 Yesterday

 Today

 The Future 

Bring Christ into your past. Rewrite your history. See Jesus engaged in your history. What you thought was unjust, impossible, a failure, wounding will appear different with Jesus in the furnace. Bring Christ into your present. Ask Him to be Lord. Ask what you should do. Yield everything to Him. Trust Him. Bring Christ into your future. What is it He has impressed on your heart to pursue. It will generally be different to what you have set your heart on. Yield your future into the hands of the Father.

When Jesus was with us on Earth, He did three things for the people He touched;

• He recovered them from their past. He forgave the woman caught in adultery. Her past had caught up with her. She had been found out. Vicious men brought her to Christ expecting judgment, but all she received was mercy and the judgement they had hoped for her, fell on themselves. Jesus healed people of the diseases, even if their past had been sickness, some 38 years, others, 12 years, some since a child they had been suffering fits that throw them into the fire. Whatever you have lost in the last year or years, Christ will recover in 2015. Whatever health, people, friends, houses, businesses, finances have been lost in last year, will be recovered in this year.

• He reset their present. He told Zaccheus ‘Today, I’m coming to your house’. Once He arrived, Bacchus repented of all his misdeeds and Jesus declared, ‘Today, salvation has come to this man’. Jesus pushed the reset button. For some He closed their entire life down and pressed the reboot button after downloading an entirely new operating system.

• He reprogrammed their future. Peter only ever thought he was going to be a fisherman. Jesus told him he would be a fisherman, but a fisher of men. He told him he would be a builder, and upon himself and other apostles the church Jesus was building would be built

Jesus Christ the same yesterday, today and forever!

If He was good in the Gospels, then He is good now. If He was powerful to heal, to set free from demons, to raise the dead, then He is the same now and will be always in the future.

If He was accepting and kind, gracious and wise in the Gospels, then He is that now and will always be.

If He was loving, patient, sacrificial and eager to help, then He is that now and will be for you for the rest of your life.

He hasn't changed.

Your circumstances may have, but not Jesus. He is still the same Jesus He was in Matthew, Mark, Luke and john.

Jesus is not about to force Himself into anyone’s life. 

He enters where is invited.

We need to bring Christ into our past, our present and our future, so that He occupies the core of our history, the centre of our present and the Lordship of our future.

Rather than focussing on the problems of our past let’s focus on the promises of God.

Painful memories can easily overwhelm our feelings about other people and God Himself. However, when we focus on the Word of God rather than the memories of our mind we will find healing and victory.

 
For more information on Presence click here. We would love to see you there!

See you in church!