For the kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking, but of righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Spirit. —Romans 14:17

Joy is not a happiness that comes from outside things—like a pay raise, a new job, vindication, a letter with good news, or receiving a coveted invitation. It is the Spirit’s own witness, indeed the person of the Holy Spirit Himself, coming right inside of you that brings joy. This is why it is called immediate and direct. Joy comes from within. With syllogistic reasoning the Holy Spirit applies the word; we use our minds to apply what we have heard and are thus able safely to conclude that we are going to heaven. But our minds applied the word and then it touched the heart. But this rest of soul—the result of the immediate and direct witness of the Spirit—comes without any reasoning, applying, thinking, deducting, or reflecting. It is the Spirit overruling our minds and going directly to the heart—straight from heaven to the soul. It is an act of God, sovereignly bestowed, and there is not one thing you can do to make it happen. And yet Jesus tells us it is what the Father delights to do for those who ask Him.

One further fruit of this is how the Bible comes alive—you know more than ever that the Bible is the very Word of God. I do not believe one needs the baptism of the Spirit to believe that the Bible is the Word of God, but I am certainly saying that it enables you to believe it more than ever! All of it! You know you have not been deceived. You see clearly and without doubt that Christianity is true, the Christian faith is real, and Jesus is real. His resurrection is real.

Joy is knowing you’ve got it right, not because of how much you have read or how much teaching you have received, but by the presence of the Holy Spirit in power. Nothing at all compares with this.

Excerpted from Pure Joy (Charisma House, 2006).

I bear on my body the marks [stigma] of Jesus. —Galatians 6:17

Most of us do not want the feeling of being irrelevant. We want to feel that what we have to say relates to the present scene, that we are equipped for what is needed today—in short, that we have today’s anointing. The most horrible feeling in the world must be that one is yesterday’s man or woman, once used but not relevant now.

The task of every generation is to discover in which direction our sovereign Redeemer is moving, then to move in that direction. I can think of nothing worse than for God to be at work and for me not to see it, for His anointing to be on someone’s ministry and for me not to recognize it.

The trouble is that we all have an inclination to believe “the old [wine] is better” (Luke 5:39). For example, we like what is familiar, the old hymns or songs we became accustomed to, the old style of preaching we grew up with. In a word: where there is no stigma (offense)—no mark of the Lord.

The first church I pastored was in Palmer, Tennessee. Although I came from the hills of Kentucky, where the preaching style was often loud and emotional, I did not develop a preaching style that was popular then. It didn’t matter whether there was any content in your sermon; a certain style largely determined whether you were acceptable. They called it the “holy tone.”

When I took the pastorate, that is the style the people were used to—and wanted. They honestly equated the style with the anointing. It was the “old wine” to which they were accustomed. For all I knew, perhaps in a previous era, truly anointed men developed that manner of preaching. But by the time I was around it was only a form of godliness with no power. And no stigma.

Many of us are very happy if God is so kind as to “do it again” as He has done it before. In this we are happy. For this we are quite ready. Why? Because there is little stigma here.

We want to avoid any stigma when it is outside our comfort zone. “What will they think? What will they say?” But today’s anointing is totally missed by looking over our shoulders, probably more than by any other factor.

Excerpted from The Anointing: Yesterday, Today, Tomorrow (Charisma House, 2003).

The Lord said to Samuel, “How long will you mourn for Saul, since I
have rejected him as king over Israel? Fill your horn with oil and be
on your way; I am sending you to Jesse of Bethlehem. I have chosen one
of his sons to be king.” —1 Samuel 16:1

Although I’ve read 1 Samuel 16:1 many times, one day it was as
though a laser beam flashing from three different directions
illuminated the verse with a clarity that shook me rigid. In one verse
I saw three types of ministry: yesterday’s man or woman, represented by
King Saul; today’s man or woman, represented by Samuel, to whom God was
speaking; and tomorrow’s man or woman, represented by David, whom
Samuel was led to anoint.

King Saul, yesterday’s man, lost God’s approval but still wore the
crown. Tomorrow’s man, David, got the anointing but without the crown.
Today’s man had to break with yesterday’s man and cast his lot with
tomorrow’s man.

In recent years I have found myself using the expression
“yesterday’s man.” It refers to a person who ceases to be relevant. He
or she may continue to minister and say things. But such a person has
somehow “lost” it—he is out of touch.

He is saying the same old thing he has uttered in years gone by when
it probably had impact, if not power. But it has ceased to carry weight
today. Such a person often struggles to prove himself, trying to show
his relevance, but the power has gone. In other words, such a person is
a has-been in God’s sight, thriving on his natural skills, grace-gifts,
strong personality, or influential platform, and may lead many people.
But God has secretly passed the greater anointing to his or her
replacement—tomorrow’s man or woman.

Excerpted from The Anointing: Yesterday, Today, Tomorrow (Charisma House, 2003).

Who through faith conquered kingdoms, administered justice … quenched the fury of the flames … whose weakness was turned to strength. … Women received back their dead, raised to life again. —Hebrews 11:33-35

Hebrews 11 gives us three unique possibilities of what true faith looks like:

1. True faith is always original. It sets its own pace and loves to treat existing molds with contempt. It mocks precedents and transcends our own projections. The same God who loves each person as though there were no one else to love also challenges each person as if there were no on else who could succeed. True faith challenges us to be unique and to set our own pace.

2. True faith is unlimited in its potential. Faith refuses to accept the “inevitable”; it marches to a different beat of the drum than what the masses hear. To grasp the nature of true faith is to understand its opposition to nature and the way we naturally think. In the natural, we say, “It cannot be done.” But faith says, “It can.” Faith builds its domain with the stone that the “builders rejected” (Matt. 21:42). Faith is not threatened by the solitude of seeing what others are blind to.

3. True faith is unrewarded obedience. Faith is obedient to the God who gave it. This obedience is not contingent upon results or calculated success. It is not at work because it “works”; it is at work because its motivation is pleasing God. Faith is not motivated to do what it does because it anticipates a certain payment in this life in return; it just does it.

What emerges as a common thread in the events described in Hebrews 11:33-35 is that they were unprecedented. When Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego were bound and cast into the fiery furnace, there was no precedent that they would be seen walking loose with the Fourth Man. But their faith “quenched the violence of fire” (v. 34, KJV). This is the essence of true faith.

Excerpted from Believing God (MorningStar Publications & Ministries, 1997).

For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may receive what is due him for the things done while in the body, whether good or bad. —2 Corinthians 5:10

Have you ever wondered what it will be like at the judgment seat of Christ? I don’t know where it will be—whether at a place on the earth, in the sky, or in a newly created part of God’s universe. But you and I will be there. It is hard to imagine having confidence, or boldness, on that day even though John said that this is possible if “love is made complete among us” (1 John 4:17).

It seems to me that our hearts will be pounding out of our chests. Surely it will be the most sobering, terrifying moment we have ever experienced.

You and I will be judged at the judgment seat of Christ in part by whether or not we accepted our anointing and whether we lived within the limitations of that anointing. The reason is this: we will not be rewarded because of a gift God gave us.

Whether or not we receive a reward will be determined by our accepting our anointing (which requires obedience) and living within its limitations (which means not disobeying), whatever the profile that follows.

We will also be blessed here below on the basis of how we lived within the grace given to us. We may or may not be pleased with the profile that comes with that anointing. But the greatest thing that can happen to you or me at the judgment seat of Christ is to hear Jesus say, “Well done.”

To the degree that we accept and live within our anointing we can sense God saying even now, “Well done.” It brings a wonderful feeling that comes from knowing you are pleasing God. Not man. God. And it is within the grasp of every single one of us.

Excerpted from The Anointing: Yesterday, Today, Tomorrow (Charisma House, 2003).

He said to me, “Son of man, stand up on your feet and I will speak to you.” As he spoke, the Spirit came into me and raised me to my feet, and I heard him speaking to me. —Ezekiel 2:1-2

I think there is a sense in which we can define spirituality as the ability to close the time gap between the moment the Lord appears and our awareness that it is the Lord. Let me put it this way: Perhaps God spoke to you at a particular time or was present on a particular occasion. At the time, it didn’t seem as if it was God who was doing the speaking or God who was present at all. What He was doing or what He said you underestimated, if not rejected. Only years later did it become clear to you that you had failed to recognize His presence.

Some of us may take less time to recognize God’s presence—weeks or days; others may have it down to only minutes or seconds! So, when our initial feeling is to reject something, we find ourselves thinking instead, This may be the Lord.

Perhaps you can think of an experience when something came up that first you thought God simply wasn’t in. Then later, like Jacob, you had to say, “The Lord was in this place. I didn’t know it. I wasn’t aware of it.” (See Genesis 28:16.) Let’s not think ourselves so spiritual that we are sure we couldn’t possibly miss the Lord’s presence. Our very biases may keep us from seeing the Lord when He appears.

Does God tell us what He’s going to do? The answer would have to be—sometimes He does, sometimes He doesn’t. But when the Lord does appear, we ought to be able to recognize Him. I would hate to think of the Lord appearing and my not knowing Him. I would love to think that the Holy Spirit within me would recognize the Holy Spirit within someone else; then, if I am where God is at work, I could overrule my biases, my prejudices, and my instincts and see that this is God.

Excerpted from When God Shows Up (Renew Books, 1998).

Therefore I was angry with this generation, and said, “They always go astray in their heart; and they did not know My ways.” —Hebrews 3:10, NAS

You get to know a person’s ways by spending time with them. My wife, Louise, and I have been married for over forty-five years. I know her ways, and she knows mine. When we are asked a question or receive an invitation, we almost always know what the other will say. God wants us to know Him like that.

Flowing in the Spirit means to honor God’s “no” as well as His “yes.” Paul and his companions were “kept by the Holy Spirit” (“forbidden,” KJV) from preaching the word in the province of Asia (Acts 16:6). Really? Are we to believe that the Holy Spirit—not the devil—would actually stop people from preaching the gospel? It seems to me that this would take both supernatural discernment and considerable courage to act on a word from the Spirit like that. This seems to fly in the face of our mandate to preach the gospel to every person (Mark 16:15). How did they know? I only know they listened to the Spirit and obeyed. It must have taken as much courage to obey not to preach as it did to preach.

To flow in the Spirit is to have intimacy with Him and to feel what He wants. It is to learn God’s ways, His style, His manner of doing things, His way with people, His gentleness, His indignation, His impulses. In other words, do what pleases the Spirit and what He prompts you to do. God wants us to know His ways; it is as though God admits to having a certain kind of personality. God wants intimacy with us, and there is no greater joy than to keep in step with the Spirit.

Excerpted from Believing God (MorningStar Publications & Ministries, 1997).

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. —1 Corinthians 13:4-5

A fresh definition of love can be quite difficult to come by. A two-word definition is “selfless concern,” and if I had to narrow it to one word, it would be “unselfishness” or “brokenness.” That is what Paul meant by “the most excellent way.”

First, Paul describes love as grace renewed. In 2 Corinthians 3:18 he says, “And we … being transformed into his likeness with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.” Believers often find themselves going from glory to glory in church or in their quiet time. Often the transition is accompanied by suffering, but every experience of being changed carries with it a fresh baptism of love, of unselfishness. It is like the calm after the storm. It is this calm that is described in 1 Corinthians 13:4-5. This is a description of grace renewed. It is not only a renewal of faith and trust, but it is a peace that is devoid of bitterness.

Second, Paul describes love as guilt removed, and that in two ways: first, we don’t feel guilty, and second, we don’t make others feel guilty. When grace is renewed, and we are changed from glory to glory, the guilt is removed, and we feel so good. Guilt is the most crippling thing in the world. But when the guilty feeling is gone, the need to make others feel guilty is not there. It is when we feel totally forgiven, totally absolved, that we will find it easy to forgive others.

Third, it is also a description of the Golden Rule: “In everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets” (Matt. 7:12). In other words, treat people the way you would like them to treat you. How do you feel when people make you feel guilty? How do you feel when people blame you? It makes you feel like dirt; you feel awful. God keeps no record of wrongs.

Perhaps your marriage is in trouble. If that is the case, start living like this. Don’t wait for your wife or husband to do it—you do it. It will heal your marriage. “Do to others what you would have them do to you.”

Excerpted from Just Love (Christian Focus Publications Ltd., 1997).

Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. —Hebrews 11:1, KJV

Faith is believing God. The heroes of Hebrews 11 are people who believed God. They are the writer’s examples to show that faith itself is not a New Testament innovation. Faith goes way back in time, claims the writer of Hebrews. There is nothing new about it at all. God hides His face in order that we might believe. He withholds the evidence of things visible that we might be persuaded by His Word alone!

Faith, then, is the long parenthesis between the undeniable appearances of God’s glory. When God appears, faith is no longer necessary. There are actually times when faith is eclipsed by such a sense of the majesty and glory of God that one is temporarily without the need of faith. These are times of mountaintop experiences, such as when our Lord was transfigured before His disciples (Matt. 17:1-9).

But one is not permitted to live indefinitely on the mountaintops. Like the disciples who “came down from the mountain” (v. 9, KJV), so must we. It is in the valley that we live by the faithfulness of God, who periodically reveals Himself so we will not be swallowed up in despair.

These Hebrew Christians were witnessing a long interval. They were discouraged. They had known better days—perhaps some mountaintop experiences. They were perplexed and could not understand the utter absence of the sense of God’s presence. The writer comes along and shows them that this is nothing to despise. It is an opportunity to believe.

Although faith is not a New Testament innovation, it is a New Testament norm. The Christian life is a venture of believing God. Seeing is not believing. Believing is not seeing. Faith is an inner persuasion in those who live by the integrity and faithfulness of One whose manifested glory is worth waiting for.

In the meantime, faith accomplishes extraordinary things.

Excerpted from Believing God (MorningStar Publications & Ministries, 1997).

They lay their crowns before the throne and say: “You are worthy, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power.” —Revelation 4:10-11

God wants us to know that He takes notice of everything we do. We are made in such manner as to want recognition and approval. Dale Carnegie, author of the classic best seller How to Win Friends and Influence People, states that the strongest urge in the world that people are born with is the desire to feel important. God made us that way. For those who say, “I don’t need a reward to do what God tells me to do,” I just hope they are not being a bit smug and self-righteous. It is as if they are saying, “I love God so much I would work for Him without any glory whatsoever.” Good. And that is the way we are to be here below. The problem with the Pharisees was that all they did was to be seen by people (Matt. 23:5), but Jesus put forward the proposition that we should abandon the honor that comes from one another and seek to obtain the honor that comes from God (John 5:44). That is a motivation for how we can be honored—by God Himself, but in His way and in His time. And most certainly at the judgment seat of Christ.

Some will no doubt say, “I don’t care whether I receive a reward at the judgment; I will be happy enough just to make it to heaven.” I do understand that, but that is certainly not the way you will feel when you actually have to stand before Jesus the Righteous Judge. You will wish beyond the ability to imagine with all your heart that you might receive His “Well done.” It would be the most awful feeling to be passed by when others were being so blessed.

Not only that, if I understand the meaning of Jesus having many crowns (Rev. 19:12)—plus the theology of some of our greatest hymns—where do you think those crowns come from?

The crowns on Jesus’ head are our crowns. They are the crowns given as a reward at the judgment seat of Christ.

We will never—ever—be able to thank God enough for saving us and giving us a home in heaven. But one thing that will be given to us—that will help us show our gratitude—is that we get to take off our crowns and give them to Jesus.

Excerpted from Pure Joy (Charisma House, 2006).