“And who would mend worn-out clothing with new fabric? When the new cloth shrinks, it will rip, making the tear worse than before.  And who would pour fresh, new wine into an old wineskin? Eventually the wine will ferment and make the wineskin burst, losing everything—the wine will be spilled and the wineskin ruined. Instead, new wine is always poured into new wineskins.” Mark 2:21-22

Rip! Thats the sound that comes from placing new wine in old wineskins. We ask God for more of Him, more of His Spirit, more of His presence, but we fail to understand that the old mindset can’t handle what the Spirit of God is doing.

We keep looking for the old, the old time revival, the old rugged cross, the way it used to be. Those things had value for what they accomplished in their day, but our focus can’t be there anymore. Luke 5:39, Jesus said, “No one who drinks the old wine seems to want the new wine. ‘The old is just fine!’, they say.”

I cannot tell you how many churches have remained in a state of limbo because they refuse to change out the old with the new. It’s sad to see people my age and older who are content with what was. They refuse to get out of the comfort of their pews in search of new music, new worship, new wine.

Yesterday morning I awoke to a snapshot of a state map with all the highways and cities and the Lord spoke this to me: “You become so consumed with the journey that you forget your destination.” Don’t get so hung up on the journey to heaven that you forget what the journey should be about. Keep your focus on Jesus, the author and finisher of our race.

We’ve been blood bought, yet we live our lives as if we owe no one. Busy doing our own thing, going after our own goals and dreams. We buy because we want not because we need. We don’t seek the Lord because we don’t really want to do what He asks of us. We are the rich young ruler who turns away sadly because the Lord has asked too much of Him and revealed where his love really was.

Have mercy on me oh God! My life is not about me! My old life has been ripped from me. Thankfully! If it hadn’t been, I wouldn’t be where I am today. Was it painful? Every tear, every rip! If I’m not willing to let God rip the old from me, I will never have room to contain the new that He wants to put in me. My agenda doesn’t matter. I must surrender and not look back.

I’ve surrendered my marriage for a new and better one. I’ve surrendered my children so that God could do the same in them as He has in me. I’ve surrendered my old church, my old friends, my old job, my old home because I realized that unless I leave the old, I won’t be ready for the new.

“Never going back! Never going back! Never going back to the way it was!” Let me be empty and poured out, made new, when the ripping is over, may I stand in Your presence ready to be filled with the new wine of your Spirit and the new plans You daily map out for me.

Until Next Time,

Sandy G

For just one day of intimacy with you is like a thousand days of joy rolled into one! I’d rather stand at the threshold in front of the Gate Beautiful, ready to go in and worship my God, than to live my life without you in the most beautiful palace of the wicked. Psalm 84:10 TPT

Just one day. One day in the presence of the Lord is indescribable to those who’ve never experienced intimacy with Him. But David penned it so well, “like a thousand days of joy rolled into one!” It’s better than the feelings I had on my wedding day. Better than the intimacy we shared on our first night together. More thrilling than the sound of our baby’s heartbeat or the first glimpse of her as she made her way into the world.

I’d rather sit on His lap and be wrapped in His arms than to be introduced to kings and queens on this earth. I’d rather feel His sweet breath on my neck than the warm embrace of my lover in our marriage bed. I’d rather hear His voice than the voice of accolades or praises from something I said or did to someone.

I’m ready to go into His presence and lay at His feet. Ready to give my offering, as pitiful as it may be, I know how lovely it is to Him. He takes my little and makes it much. He takes my tears and kisses them away. No one can do that like Jesus. No one!

What will you do with your day? Will you place your hand in His and allow Him to lead you down a strange path, an unfamiliar street? Will you choose His way or yours? Better is one day in His presence than a thousand days of doing my own thing, living my way. As He places His hands on your shoulders, will you allow Him to lead? Will you trust Him with your one day?

My heart belongs to You oh Lord. Nothing can take Your place or satisfy me as You do. I submit and surrender my plans for Yours. Lead me and guide me for I place my trust in You. It’s in Jesus’ name, Amen.

Until Tomorrow,

Sandy G

Do you think you can explain the mystery of God? Do you think you can diagram God Almighty? God is far higher than you can imagine, far deeper than you can comprehend. Stretching farther than earth’s horizons, far wider than the endless ocean. If he happens along, throws you in jail then hauls you into court, can you do anything about it? He sees through vain pertensions, spots evil a long way off–no one pulls the wool over his eyes! Hollow men, hollow women, will wise up about the same time mules learn to talk. Job 11-7-12

I don’t use the Message bible often, but this made me laugh. It reminds me of the old sitcom, Mels Diner and the tall waitress with the southern drawl who was constantly saying, “When donkey’s fly!”

We think we’re so smart, we have it all figured out just as God takes a hard right. Hey wait a minute God! Are you sure we should go this way? I like the scenery over there better than the scenery here. Can’t we spend a little more time just resting here by the brook?

I feel God stretching me today. He’s stretching my faith, my ability to hear and obey. There are days I feel like Gumby and my arms simply won’t stretch any further, but once again, He proves me wrong and stretches me some more.

Father, I will not doubt your ability to take dead things and bring them to life. I will not doubt that the seeds I planted are merely dormant for a season, but in due time you will breathe on it and cause those seeds to live.

Thank You for stretching me beyond my limitations. Each moment spent in Your presence brings me fullness of joy and at Your right hand, pleaures forever more. It’s in Your great name and for Your glory, Amen

Until Tomorrow,

Sandy G

For just as the heavens are higher than the earth, so my ways are higher than your ways and my thoughts higher than your thoughts. Isaiah 55:9 NLT

Sometimes I’ll be dreaming up ways that God could answer a prayer or concern I have. I feel His eyes on me, smiling. “I’m doing it again, aren’t I? I’m trying to figure everything out. Seems I’d learn by now. There is absolutely no way I will ever figure out how You’re going to do it, but I trust that You will and I’m going to rest now!”

There are times I’ll just be talking with the Lord about some concerns I have, before I know it, He answers me in such a unique and special way that I just know it’s Him. I hadn’t told anyone else, so I know it could be no one else.

I talked a little bit about expectations and trusting the Lord, but let me tell you that until you step out on that limb and know that God is able to keep the limb up even when the rest of the tree falls, you’ll never know true trust. If you’re willing to believe, all things are possible to those who believe.

Either trust God or not but don’t hang on that fence any longer. Either believe His Word to be true or not but don’t hang out in the middle to just watch. I believe that my steps are ordered by the Lord! That means that regardless of what happens, whether or not it makes sense, it’s all a part of a plan that is larger then I am. I mean seriously, people! Look what He has to work with!

Don’t blame God when you’re the one who took the easy or logical way. I believe we are standing under a sky black with the promise of rain. We can run to shelter or get drenched, our choice.

Sometimes doing the safe thing isn’t always the right thing. Remember that David chose to run toward the giant when he could have run away. Don’t run from your destiny, run toward it & just trust God.

Until Tomorrow,

Sandy G

And behold, an angel of the Lord suddenly appeared and a light shone in the cell; and he struck Peter’s side and woke him up, saying, “Get up quickly.” And his chains fell off his hands. Acts 12:7

Let me give you a little back story on this. The early church was being harassed for speaking such heresy against religious doctrine. King Herod killed James and saw it pleased the Jews, so he arrested Peter to do the same, but thought he’d wait till after the Passover feast to present him to the Jews.

He posted 4 squads of soldiers to keep him, but God had other plans. It says that because of the constant prayers that came up before Him, he sent an angel to deliver him. Now I don’t know about you, but that would have freaked me out. Peter thought it was a vision. He was chained between two guards who were sleeping. He got up, got dressed, tied on his sandals, put his robe on and walked out. He passed the two guard posts and when they came to the gate that lead into the city, it opened on it’s own. The angel took him down one street and disappeared.

He finally realized what happened so he went to the house of Mary (Marks mom) and knocked on the gate. A girl named Rhoda came, saw it was Peter, ran back in and told everyone Peter was there and no one believed her. He continued knocking until someone came to the door and let him in.

This story always cracked me up! Picture this in your mind if you will; You’re at a prayer meeting praying that God delivers Peter from prison and spares his life. Hours pass, the man you’re praying for shows up and no one believes it. Seriously? Why bother praying if you’re not going to believe what you’re praying for will come to pass?

Yet even today, this is how we pray. Our prayers are real, our cries are heard, but our expectation isn’t there. Can I say it like this? We pray and cry for God to deliver us and when He comes through with a different method than we’re expecting, we don’t accept it or believe that it’s God. We command, “Well, I bind that in the name of Jesus!” when it’s Jesus who’s trying to do the very thing you asked for. Just because we don’t recognize how it could happen that way, we dismiss it as not God.

What we need to be doing is what He said to do from the beginning, trust. Trust in the Lord with ALL your heart, lean not on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge Him and He will direct your steps. Proverbs 3:5-6

He’s the master planner. He knows the end from the beginning. His time is a bubble not a line. He’s the beginning and the end. He sees all and knows all. Nothing surprises Him and nothing takes Him off guard. He doesn’t wring His hands when things look bad cause my friend, if you trust Him in His plan, He will work all things out for your good and His glory.

It’s time to raise the bar, to have greater expectations and to trust that what happens will end up far better than you could ask, think or even imagine. It’s according to the power that works in me and that power never ever stops working!

Until Tomorrow,

Sandy G

Before David was king of Israel, he had a band of merry men who fought together.  Periodically they would go out and fight against the enemies of God, but on one particular day, in one particular battle, they returned to find their town burned to the ground and all of their families kidnapped.

Loss. 1 Samuel 30:4 says they wept until they could weep no more.

Brokenness. In verse 8 during his extreme grief, David sought the Lord and asks if they should pursue their enemy. God responds, “Yes, go after them. You will surely recover everything that was taken from you!”

Recovery. Found in verses 18-20 you will see Gods recovery system. “David got back everything the Amalekites had taken, and he rescued his two wives. Nothing was missing; small or great, son or daughter, nor anything else that had been taken. David brought everything back. He also recovered all the flocks and herds, and his men drove them ahead of the other livestock.”

Don’t curse your season of loss and brokenness. Seek the Lord with all your heart as Jesus told us to do. Everything will be added that’s needed and more. God doesn’t just restore what you lost, He restores it in better condition with benefits.

If you lost your job unfairly, God has a better job for you where your potential and creative ideas will benefit you more than before. Whatever it is, God always knows where it is and how to get it, you only have to sit in His presence and ask Him. He may not show you right then, but He will show you. In His perfect timing, you will pursue and recover all.

Stop looking at what you’ve lost and encourage yourself in the Lord by thinking on all He’s done for you in the past. If disease is present in your body, focus on the stripes Jesus took on His back for your healing. Take communion and remember that His body was broken for you so yours wouldn’t have to be. Disease cannot live where the Spirit God dwells.

I remember a story where scientists placed a deadly virus on a man of Gods hand and watched it die under a microscope. He believed that the power in him was greater than the power in that virus. Paul believed the same thing when he shook off the viper that bit his hand. All things are possible to those who believe.

Remember, the very area the enemy is fighting you in is the very area God wants to bless you in. Body, soul, mind, spirit, faith, finances, family and future. God didn’t love David more then He loves you. Don’t allow this time of loss and brokenness to dictate  where you will end up. The battle isn’t yours, it’s Gods! His ways are not your ways, they’re backward. Who else would design a seed to fall into the ground and die before it could yield fruit?

Father, I give you my losses, my tears, my pain and sorrow. What the dvil has stolen from me, you will return it 100 fold, now in this lifetime according to Your Word. Just as you have in the past, You will take all that the devil intended to use against me and it will be for Your glory. I trust in You! Not everyone will understand me, but Father, You do and that is all that matters to me.

I trust you with my husband, may children, my body, my finances. I trust you! With my job, I trust you! With my gift, I trust you. I rejoice in my victory because as David recovered all, so will I.

Therefore I say to you, whatever things you ask when you pray, believe that you receive them, and you will have them. Mark 11:24

If what we speak today shows up tomorrow, what would we be speaking? I know a whole lot of people who would be praying for crop failure! I was talking to a friend the other day about this very thing. 

Did you know that God is a speaking Spirit? Everything that came out of His mouth came to pass. The Bible even says that nothing He speaks will come back to Him without first accomplishing what He’s sent it to do. We were made in His image and likeness, created to be gods in the earth. Our problem is, we’ve been deceived into believing otherwise.

It’s truly about what we believe, you know that, right? Even salvation is based on believing.  In Romans 10:9, Paul explained that if you confess with your mouth(speaking) the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. Those two ingredients are key to receiving anything from God.

Guess what? If you don’t read what God says about you, you’ll never believe the truth of who you are. If you don’t believe it, you’ll never say it and if you never say it, you’ll never receive it. 

I speak salvation to my community, that revival would break out in the schools and work places. I speak hunger & thirsting for righteousness into the young people in our nation. I call forth signs, wonders and miracles to manifest through the simple and hidden ones who have cultivated relationship with God! That they would follow us believers in the grocery store, the work place, the schools.

I speak healing would manifest, lame walk, deaf ears open, the mute would speak, limbs grow, blind eyes open, the paralyzed rise and walk! Not in our churches, but in the fields as we work, the office during meetings, while we get our groceries.

I speak success in our neighborhood businesses. I call out, windows of Heaven-be open over us today! Uncontainable, chase me down and run me over kind of blessings. Father, I will not doubt in my heart for I believe that whatsoever I say in faith will come to pass, in Jesus Name! And those who agree say, AMEN! Now speak it! Don’t just read it, speak it out daily!

Until Tomorrow,

Sandy G

“So will you also pass through a time of intense sorrow when I am taken from you, but you will see me again! And then your hearts will burst with joy, with no one being able to take it from you! For here is eternal truth: When that time comes you won’t need to ask me for anything, but instead you will go directly to the Father and ask him for anything you desire and he will give it to you, because of your relationship with me. Until now you’ve not been bold enough to ask the Father for a single thing in my name, but now you can ask, and keep on asking him! And you can be sure that you’ll receive what you ask for, and your joy will have no limits!” John 16:22-24 TPT

I’m pretty sure that Jesus’ followers thought He had lost His ever-loving mind when He tried to explain what was just ahead for them. Things didn’t turn out as they had anticipated. They thought Jesus was going to ride into Jerusalem on a white horse and take the kingdom back. But Jesus knew the plan of God was to take away the sin of the world so that man could once again walk and talk with God as before.

To restore man to his rightful place of authority, to have unhindered relationship with the Creator. To be who we were created to be. Direct access to the throne room at anytime. No go-between. No high priest offering blood sacrifice every year. Unspeakable joy that nobody could take away.

“First a seed must fall into the ground and die before it can yield fruit.” Jesus was the seed who died, but rose again and is bearing much fruit. His fruit is still bearing fruit. You and I are a part of that great tree of life that keeps generating more fruit. 

What joy to know that because of my relationship with Jesus, I can ask my Father for anything and He will do it. New knees? No problem! Expansive bank account to fund the vision? No problem! Everything I ask for is available, all I have to do is ask and keep on asking. I’ll receive and my joy will know no limits. Now that’s a whole lot of joy!

It’s all about relationship! My children have relationship with me and they know that if they need something, they only have to ask. If I have it, I’ll gladly share what I have. I have relationship with God because I believe that Jesus was the only sacrifice needed to redeem me and put me in right standing with my Father.

We talk all the time cause that’s just the kind of daughter I am. He gets me! He made me so I’m pretty sure that was a part of the plan. I know that I can ask for things I need and things I want and Father will gladly share with me. I constantly lavish my love on Him, not for what He can do for me, but because of what He’s done for me. 

I truly hope you too have experienced this limitless joy that constantly bubbles up from inside of me. Even when things look bad, I know that good things are close behind. It’s His way to always bring dead things to life and causing them to feed many.

Until Tomorrow,

Sandy G

Arise, shine, for your light has come, and the glory of the Lord has risen upon you. For behold, darkness shall cover the earth, and thick darkness the peoples; but the Lord will arise upon you, and his glory will be seen upon you. And nations shall come to your light,
and kings to the brightness of your rising. Isaiah 60:1-3 ESV

If you stand on a brightly lit stage, you can’t see what’s in the dark of the auditorium. It doesn’t mean that no one is there, they still hear you and see you, but you’re not distracted by them because you’re in the light.

I believe in this day of darkness we’re in, we must be aware that people everywhere are watching us, not because we’re all that! No it’s because He is all that! Jesus, the light of the world lives in us and those who are sitting in the darkness are looking toward the light.

This morning as I sit in the light of His presence, I hear Him whisper, “So many are looking for a stage to demonstrate their brightness, but when all eyes are on them, they forget that I am the light in them. It becomes about them and not me. But as I told them, if I be lifted up, I will draw all men to me.

“Sandy, there is a great harvest of souls that will be harvested by unknown workers who live surrendered to My Light. I’ve placed them in random places everywhere. They’ve become so accustomed to hearing my voice and obeying in hard seasons that they will follow me anywhere I lead them.

“These are the ones I trust with this last great revival. These are the ones I will transfer great wealth to fund my mission. These are the ones who will stand before kings and queens. They have surrendered to the light and shine bright in my glory.”

Set your thoughts on Jesus today, stay surrendered to the light of the world so that the things of earth grow dim in the light of His glory and grace.

Until Tomorrow,

Sandy G

Don’t tolerate people who try to run your life, ordering you to bow and scrape, insisting that you join their obsession with angels and that you seek out visions. They’re a lot of hot air, that’s all they are. They’re completely out of touch with the source of life, Christ, who puts us together in one piece, whose very breath and blood flow through us. He is the Head and we are the body. We can grow up healthy in God only as he nourishes us. Colossians 2:18-19 Message

I love the last part of this. To me, it shows that what we need to grow up healthy in God is to allow Him to feed and nourish us. How do we get that nourishment? By spending time with Him, reading His Word and asking for insight and revelation. When it comes from Him it brings nourishment. When you’re force fed the law, the do’s and don’ts, it stunts your growth and causes you to be malnourished.

This was why Jesus had such a hard time with the Pharisees. They were so focused on rules and magnifying peoples inability to keep them, that they had forgotten the goodness of God and His many blessings. They were so focused on the law of God that they missed the Grace of God.

When people become focused on the wrong things, they tend to bring with them guilt and condemnation. But when they focus on the finished work of Jesus and knowing that what He did is enough, they are whole, fully nourished and healthy, living in the new not the old.

I would encourage you today as Paul did so long ago, don’t focus on the gifts, focus on the giver of gifts. When He wants to show you more, He will. When He thinks you can handle more, you’ll get it. For now though, just lavish your love on Jesus and let His health become yours.

Until Tomorrow,

Sandy G