From Arks to Spaceships

This post was inspired by a prophetic word the Lord gave me for my family.  It’s the first article that I received from the Lord and wrote down in one sitting.  It was like my hand couldn’t write fast enough to keep up with what I was receiving in my spirit.  After looking it over, I felt this word could help others, so I decided to share it. Here it goes.

Two themes have been running through my mind recently: healthy families and generational patterns.  Why are healthy relationships so difficult to cultivate these days?  Why does the cycle of unhealthy families and relationships seem to pass down from one generation to the next? I have a few thoughts on the matter.

People can only operate out of the grid they have and nothing else.  Meaning, you cannot produce function out of dysfunction.  If there’s an unhealthy cycle already in place, God has to intervene and interject His cycle of blessing.  Our generation is facing issues and challenges that the previous generation didn’t have to face.  As a result, solutions that worked for them may not necessarily work for us.  I believe what God wants to do, is to create a whole new paradigm for us.  Using unhealthy grids and paradigms is like trying to travel in an ark during an era of spaceships –It just won’t fly.

So what is the challenge when we’re talking about grids and paradigms?  The challenge is that when God attempts to introduce a new paradigm to us we either cannot comprehend it or we’re totally resistant to it.

Here’s an example in scripture where Jesus tried to share a new paradigm.  Remember when Jesus told Nicodemus about being born again?  Nicodemus basically responded with, “I don’t get it.”-John 3:9 Jesus said, “If I have told you earthly things and you do not believe, how will you believe if I tell you heavenly things?” -John 3:12 Jesus was saying to Nicodemus, “I just gave you a basic paradigm. What if I gave you a grid out of a whole new realm? You should already get this!”

Another paradigm that people didn’t understand was Jesus being the bread of heaven.  In John 6:41-52, Jesus teaches His disciples about His flesh being bread.  And if that wasn’t offensive enough in John 6:53-59, He goes on to say that the disciples have to eat His flesh and drink His blood.  Because of our understanding of communion, we have a grid to put this verse in but the disciples had no such grid.  What was their response to this new, foreign paradigm? John 6:60 says, “When they heard this, said, This is a hard saying; who can understand it?”  The disciples were still operating out of archaic grids.  They couldn’t grasp the new paradigm that Jesus was trying to give to them.

What about instances when we’re completely resistant to a new idea from God? Great question.  In Matthew 9:14-17, Jesus is questioned by John’s disciples about fasting.  Their subtle complaint sounded like this “Your disciples aren’t fasting like we are.  Why aren’t they using our old strategy?” Jesus’ response was perfect, “You have to put new wine into new wineskins.”-Matthew 9:14  You cannot expect to get new results by relying on old paradigms.  Wineskins connote the structure that holds that which is truly valuable.  God wants to gives us healthy families and relationships but not all have the structure to contain it.  The new thing God is doing can be likened to sophisticated machinery much like a spaceship.  You can’t use the same tools you used to build an ark to engineer a spaceship.  This  could explain some of the challenges in developing kingdom families and relationships. In the story of the new wineskins, Jesus explained that people are typically resistant when God begins to move in a new way. He said, “But no one who drinks the old wine seems to want the new wine. The old is just fine, they say.” -Luke 5:39 The old grid becomes a hindrance to the new.

So that’s just it.  Could a lot of the challenges we’re seeing in relationships and families be due to our resistance to new paradigms?  Maybe.  But how can you tell?  Well, if you feel like you’re throwing your head against a brick wall and it’s not moving; that could be an indicator that it’s time for a new paradigm.  Let’s take some inventory of our lives and relationships to figure out what’s not working and why.  I really feel the Holy Spirit is ready to open up minds to see which paradigms need to be ditched and which grids need to be embraced.

Don’t delay, upgrade to one of God’s spaceships today!

© Solape Osoba 2012

Let Our Children See Your Glory

Let us, your servants, see you work again; let our children see your glory. And may the Lord our God show us his approval and make our efforts successful. Yes, make our efforts successful! – Psalm 90:16-17 NLT

When I read this verse, I was hit with such a deep cry and with a spirit of intercession.  I recognized that this verse is talking about walking with God in such a way that we build momentum for the next generation.  The first verse says, “Let us, your servants, see you work again; let our children see your glory.”  My heart reads this as: let our children constantly experience You and have an intimate knowledge of Your manifest presence.

I can’t think of a greater honor than to be called to live for another generation. I want to be a believer who not only believes God for great things now. But one who also believes that my children will see greater things.  And so even now, I pray for this ongoing revival to increase and I imagine a generation born into a thriving supernatural culture.  A culture where it’s normal to see angels. It’s easy to see the sick healed. It’s delightful to watch food multiply. And raising the dead is just what we do on Mondays.

The second verse says, “And may the Lord our God show us his approval and make our efforts successful. Yes, make our efforts successful!”  What efforts are we asking Him to make successful? Our efforts to follow Him, to serve Him and to sustain His outpouring. We want to do everything we know how, to be faithful in stewarding a move of God. More importantly, we want God to bless our efforts so that our children would experience more of His world.

Isn’t this what David did? Of course it is! In Acts 13:36, the scripture says that David served his own generation by doing the will of God.  David created momentum for his sons and his descendants by carrying out everything God desired. Wow! David clearly portrayed what it looks like to live for a time you may never see. He laid up plans for Solomon to build the house of the Lord.  David not only wrote up intricate plans for the building of the temple but he also set aside gold, silver and other precious materials.  In today’s currency, this would be commensurate to $32 billion. He also gave $800 million of his own personal treasury toward the temple. Why would David do all of this knowing Solomon would be the one to see the fruit? He tells us why, “I had it in my heart to build a house of rest for the ark of the covenant of the LORD.” (1 Chronicles 28:2) David had a heart after God and he also had a heart that believed in the next generation.

Let’s take a look at Abraham. He’s known as the father of faith. Abraham depicts what it looks like to be a father of promise. God told Abraham “I will make nations of you and kings shall come from you” (Genesis 17:6).  The Lord also promised that Abraham would have descendants as numerous as the stars and the sand on the seashore. Well Abraham died at the age of 175 and he had two sons, Isaac and Ishmael; neither of whom were nations and neither of whom were kings.  So did God keep His word? Yes, but not in Abraham’s lifetime.  And that didn’t make the promise any less true.  Abraham lived beyond his time, and since he believed God’s promise, he taught Isaac to keep the covenant with God.

Why should you care about living for another generation? Because it’s a basic need in every believer. Don’t believe me? Even the secular world has discovered this truth and states, “there’s an intrinsic human need to be involved in something greater that one’s self.” You see, when you became a believer you were formed and fashioned in the image of Christ.  You share His likeness.  He was your prototype.  Well what was Jesus like? His description of Himself says, “The Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many.”  Matthew 20:28 In simple terms, we won’t be happy until we find something to give our lives for. He has placed eternity in our hearts. A knowing that there’s more to this divine plan than what I see today. And because of that, I’m willing to live my life in such a way that they (our children) are better off.

This revelation is for singles, couples, parents, grandparents and everyone else. We are all called to live beyond our lifetime by stewarding what He’s given us today. We live in hopes that our children would see His glory!

© Solape Osoba 2012