Don't let your heart harden, keep it in rich soil and bear much fruit!

Sunday 4th August 2013

Life beyond Reason - the empowered life

Don't let your heart harden

In the morning service yesterday Chad had a word "It is a time for releasing old wine skins!" In the word it states:

Mark 2:21-22 "No one sews a patch of unshrunk cloth on an old garment. If he does, the new piece will pull away from the old, making the tear worse. And noone pours new wine into old wineskins. If he does, the wine will burst the skins, and both the wine and the wineskins will be ruined. No, he pours new wine into new wineskins."

When we reflect and unpack these verses, we learn that a wineskin was a goat skin sewn together at the edges to make a watertight bag. As new wine ages it expands and stretches the wineskin. Therefore, if you put new wine into an already stretched wineskin, it will stretch it more and both the wine and the wineskin are lost and ruined! (NIV Life Application Study Bible, 1991)

So how does this apply to our lives? Jesus used this analogy to explain how the pharisees had become old and rigid like old wineskins - they could not accept faith in Jesus that was not contained by man made rules. Likewise, our hearts are like wineskins and can become rigid & tough and hardened like old wineskins and when this is the case, this may prevent you from accepting the new life that Christ Offers. So keep your heart pliable and open to accepting the life changing truths of Christ! (NIV Life Application Study Bible, 1991)

At the evening service, Illana brought a word "Don't harden your hearts! She had a picture of a juicy steak on a braai and when it was cut to eat it was as tough as ever!" She went onto to say that we need to marinade our hearts with the holy spirit and keep them tender to avoid our hearts becoming hardened by circumstances!

So I believe God is really talking to us and we need to walk together in this exciting time of TRANSFORMATION! We need to keep our hearts tender, remain soaked in the holy spirit to release the old wines skins and fully embrace the new ones!

God needs you and your unique colour, don't disqualify yourself from what God has prepared for you!

One of the big obstacles that often prevents us from releasing old wine skins is that we disqualify ourselves! Gerhard shared a beautiful image that he had of a big canvas that God is painting and He is saying its time for TRANSFORMATION! But in order for the canvas to be painted in His Will, God requires certain colours to mix together to get the perfect colour He needs for the canvas! He continued to say that each one of us are a shade of colour that God needs to use and He needs to mix us together to get the perfect tint! Some of us are holding back and not letting God put our colour onto His paint palette and he needs you! Some of us are disqualifying our selves from what God has called us to do!

I had shared a word about this in the morning and Pete shared the same message in the evening! Previously I had disqualified myself to be used by God, I suffered from much anxiety and self doubt about my ability and thought that I had nothing new to bring or contribute to this world! I now know that was all a lie and actually an insult to God who made me perfectly for what He has called me to do!

We are made in Christs image and made perfect according to the will and purpose He created us for! Don't disqualify yourselves - Jesus came as the ultimate sacrifice so that we can live as kings in the fullness of the life God intended for us! Don't let your circumstances and past harden your heart and make you disqualify yourself! Boldly walk in the free grace Gods has showered upon us and open your heart to let the Holy Spirit in and release those old wineskins and walk in the fullness of Gods Grace and Love! 

In order to release old wineskins and walk in the fullness of the life we are created for we need to have tender hearts rooted in rich soil to produce a bumper crop!

In line with that, Brian shared an excellent message on the parable of the sower! I believe this is totally linked to the above message from God! In order for us to walk in to the abundance and fruits that God is preparing for us, we need to have our hearts and roots growing into the deep rich soil which produces a bumper crop! In line with Brians word, some of you may remember this from the family camp...Charles opened the Saturday in prayer and this was part of his prayer:
"25% of the seed fell on good ground - The people who are here on the camp this weekend are key in the next season of DLC - We will grow 30%, 60%….100%…..abundance coming! God is deputizing & commissioning us to operate in the gifts!"
That was 5 months ago and look at what has happened in the last 5 months! Get ready people - there are great things in store for us!
In line with that - it is so awesome that just today at church Reagan has stepped out and started a Healing Room "operating in the gifts"!

Brians message...
God is a farmer and He is immensely concerned about productivity, with increase and yield! 
There is so much happening in our church currently - Lesotho, Zim, Frasers etc and God is wanting to increases this. We need to have prepared, tender hearts!

Brian continued to explain the 4 types of soil (4 categories of people) as follows:

1. The Scoffers - people who have an agenda and feel threatened by what Jesus had to say so they pick holes in what He says and does. They are hostile and like old tough wine skins!
2. The Opportunists - These guys look like they following Jesus but they have ulterior motives! They look the part but in the tough, testing times they fall away! 
3. The Earnest - these people resonate with Jesus to a certain level but they lack clarity of WHO Jesus is. And therefore they do not produce fruit!
4. The Emphatic believers - these guys believe Jesus is Christ, the Messiah! They have their roots planted in deep rich soil and produce abundant fruit! They are mature in Christ and have a high yield, increase and productivity!

Where am I?

Brian expanded on the 3rd type of soil and listed 7 characteristics of people in "Soil 3"

The Earnest are people who hear the word but their behaviour does not always reflect it! They are lacking in revelation and their plants won't die but they also will not produce any fruit!

7 Characteristics of The Earnest / 7 enemies of the empowered live!

1. The believer is choking!
• They are sharing ground with free radicals and they are being robbed from full maturity!
• They are deceitful and desire things of the world and let the worries of the world affect them!
2. They are lacking full revelation - they have imperfect revelation
• They are almost right about Jesus, they see but they don't see, they are all seeing but not perceiving!
3. They are ineffective on the Great Commision
• They have their minds wrapped up in the worries of the world and they desire worldly things!
4. They are indistinguishable from the world
• They blend into the world!
• John Piper "Don't waste your life, you are created for more!
5. They are double minded and unstable in all they do
• They doubt, they are tossed about.. 


• James 1:6 "For the one who wavers (hesitates, doubts) is like the billowing surge out at sea that is blown hither and thither and tossed by the wind."
6. They have an unhealthy balance of REASON and FAITH
• Reason can be deceitful, there are some parts that are not helpful!
• Reason fails us when a) it blinds the truth, b) a worldly understanding is not the prophetic, kingdom reality and c) it tells is the facts not the truth! Reason can cripple us!
7. Incapable of living large before God
• They have lost proportion and are not living life large and are not open and living in the adventures of life!

What soil is your seed in?

The 3rd soil is a great struggle for Christians!

God wants to rebuild your house! He is knocking out walls etc and changing the structure - He is TRANSFORMING your country cottage to a palace fit for a king!

(Brian Rea, Message at DLC 5th August 2013)

LIVE BIG!