Philip K Stone

the next step…

Been asking this question so often of late, how do You know were to put your next step when You can’t see were Your Going?

God has been showing me a little glimpse of How we must position ourselves before Him, in Prayer, in Worship, in Life, heres a few scripture I come accross in this journey….

Ps 95:6 Come let us bow down in worship, let us kneel before the Lord our Maker.
Rom 14:11 “Every knee will bow before me; every tongue will confess to God.”
Acts 21:5 and there on the beach we knelt to pray.
Ps 123:1 I lift up my eyes to you, to you whose throne is in heaven.
John 11:41 Jesus looked upward and said, “Father, I thank you for having heard me.”
John 17:1 After Jesus had spoken these words, he looked up to heaven and said, “Father…”
Ps 134:2 Lift up your hands in the sanctuary and praise the Lord.
Ps 63:4 I will praise you as long as I live, and in your name I will lift up my hands.
1 Tim 2:1,8 I urge, then, first of all, that requests, prayers, intercession and thanksgiving be made for everyone… I want men everywhere to lift up holy hands in prayer…

I’m Starting to see that Life has three key areas:

Righteousness, Humility & Posture

time to see how I can improve all three… what about You?

Brokeness…are you Ready?

Yesterday morning I woke with the word Brokeness in my spirit and mind, as the day went on and I processed it a little, I finally caught what God was trying to say to me, and I possibly prayed the most dangerous Prayer I’ve ever prayed last night during our time of worship in Church.

“By reason of breakings they purify themselves” Job 41:25

The modern day sacrifices that God accepts from His People are broken and contrite hearts!

• It was the breaking down of Jacob’s natural strength at Peniel that got him where God could clothe him with spiritual power.
• It was breaking the surface of the rock at Horeb, by the stroke of Moses’ rod that let out the cool waters to thirsty people.
• It was when the 300 elect soldiers under Gideon broke their pitchers, a type of breaking themselves, that the hidden lights shone forth to the consternation of their adversaries.
• It was when the poor widow broke the seal of the little pot of oil, and poured it forth, that God multiplied it to pay her debts and supply means of support.
• It was when Esther risked her life and broke through the rigid etiquette of a heathen court, that she obtained favor to rescue her people from death.
• It was when Jesus took the five loaves and broke them, that the bread was multiplied in the very act of breaking, sufficient to feed five thousand.
• It was when Mary broke her beautiful alabaster box, rendering it henceforth useless, that the pent-up perfume filled the house.
• It was when Jesus allowed His precious body to be broken to pieces by thorns and nails and spear, that His inner life was poured out, like a crystal ocean, for thirsty sinners to drink and live.

The Truth of this all is that if you want to be a vessel that God uses, You need to let him take control, as Phil said yesterday, not to take sides with us, but to Take Control!

That means our ways need to be broken up, so that we can be moulded to follow in Gods ways. God needs to break wealth, self-will, ambitions, beautiful ideals, worldly reputation, affections, health, the list goes on.

The Fact of the matter is something inside us needs to die, be broken or cast out of our lives to make beautiful Godly things happen, We need create a capacity or space inside us that we Guard and only let God Fill.

Today lets take up the challenge and ask God what we need to do so that He can use us as He wishes. Andrea Wigglesworth talked yesterday morning about how we need to Jump off the plane if we’re going in the worng direction, Alan rightly mentioned last night that it was God who packed the parachute, Now is the time to Jump, scary thing is I can’t see the landing place and I don’t know how hard the landing will be, and who knows the consequences, but if its a God thing – The He will Honour You!

Last night I Prayed Dangerous, knowing that Gods Refining Fire will have to Purify me, and that I Could be in for a battering, But as Long as I have the Armour of God on, at least that will Keep satan away so its only God who is working at me and in me!

A Word for me…and U?

I got into bed last night, my head has been spinning at 100mph for a number of days now, lots of stuff going on, ideas running through my head, but I got a Vision/Dream/Something last night and heres a go at trying to explain it, I know i can apply it to my life, but its one of those ones that can bring a challenge to other believers as well.

‘I saw someone holding a glass of water, pretty full glass it was to, but as I got closer I realised the glass had small deposits of mud or dirt at the bottom, but i could only see it as I got closer. The glass I knew to represent believers and the dirt was sin. The Glass Started to move and the dirt started to make the clear water very cloudy. All of a sudden the Glass of water looked just like muddy water. Then I heard the challenge, “Sometimes Sin is left at the bottom of your heart, sins that you think have been dealt with, Its time to shake your glass, time for You to see the sin within and deal with it forever, Stop fooling around thinking your pure and clean, I want you to get rid of all the dirt in your life, every last bit of it!”

That has brought a challenge to me, today I’m gonna look deep inside, one of my favourite verses in in the Bible is ‘Who shall asend the Hill of the Lord? – He who has Clean Hands and a Pure heart!’ God Wants us to be Clean – Top to Bottom, inside and out, Receive this challenge from God Today!

Society… Online?

Its amazing to see what the internet has done to people in the 25 years its been about, although its probably the last 5 years that have seen its biggest ever growth rate in terms of usage and availability.

To think that you can Bank Online, Buy Electrical Appliances Online, Order Your groceries online and even your Dominos Pizza to mention a couple. Apparently 1 in 10 people in America now work from home – mostly over the internet! To think that over 2 Billion People are daily surfing the web worldwide its just crazy what has happened in the last 25 years.

The scary thing is that young people now tend to favour talking on chatrooms, via blogging, skype and online gaming rather than face to face conversation.

Can I suggest to make the most of talking to people when you see them, because I really think that not engaging in conversation face to face is damaging so many people, creating high depression rates and much loneliness.

Choose today to use the net as a tool and not to let it use You!

Let God do His Job!

I am starting to get concerned about the number of Christians who go through rough patches and the thing that scares them most about coming back to church or back to God is fellow believers. And I guess the second biggest obstacle is forgiving themselves.

Read this short passage in Romans 2v1-4 (NASB)

‘Therefore you have no excuse, everyone of you who passes judgment, for in that which you judge another, you condemn yourself; for you who judge practice the same things. And we know that the judgment of God rightly falls upon those who practice such things. But do you suppose this, O man, when you pass judgment on those who practice such things and do the same yourself, that you will escape the judgment of God? Or do you think lightly of the riches of His kindness and tolerance and patience, not knowing that the kindness of God leads you to repentance? ‘

Lets beat this judgement thing out of ourselves, GOD IS JUDGE! The thing that makes me sit up in this passage is the hint that if you “do the same yourself”. None of us are perfect, infact we are a billion miles from it, but when we have a close and intimate relationship with God, He sees us through our imperfections, he sees us as pure vessels, We see different the biggest reason I think is because we Judge Ourselves!

Stop Judging Self and Others and start letting God do all that, worry more about relationship and intimacy with God! Worry about Reading His word, offering Him Your Heartfelt worship and Worry about how real and productive your prayer life is!

Bless ya!