Choose you this day, Blessing or Curse.

Friends I have been silent for a long time and all I can say is that God has had me in a wilderness place so He could teach me something about Himself. It is 3:30 a.m. and though I got to bed 1-1/2 hours later than usual I am wide awake and there is a phrase going through my head that won’t go away and I know the voice of my Lord and it is clear that now the silence is broken and I may now begin to relate what He has given me.

The phrase is this “ A life lived in total harmony with God and His word is a life that is blessed beyond description, but a life lived apart from total harmony is a life that is exposed to every kind of curse and disharmony and the choice is ours”.
It is going to take some time to expound this to my readers because I have to use words and words have limitations whereas God communicates on a much higher plane and can convey a lifetime of information in mere moments if He wishes. The apostle Paul had a few brief encounters with the Divine and spent his entire life trying to describe what He experienced.
May God help me for I do not have much life remaining and I have so much to share but we humans are so very dull of hearing in addition to being stiff-necked and hard of heart.
Even Jesus spent 3 years speaking and teaching in person and still His closest friends and followers didn’t understand until He was gone to heaven and sent the Holy Spirit and they received a heavenly download. More importantly is the fact that the only ones who received this understanding were the ones who obeyed His command to wait until they received power from on high, the promise of the Father. This power was in the form of God’s Holy Spirit but more than that was the opening of their mind and heart to understand what Jesus had been talking about all along.
Imagine spending 10 days just waiting in prayer and fasting, not even sure of what to expect, That's dilegence and God promises that He is a rewarder of those that diligently seek Him. Hebrews 11:6
I’m sure that if you, my readers are Christian and have spent time with the Lord that at some point or perhaps on many occasions you have suddenly received understanding in some area of your life or clarity concerning some scripture that was confusing to you and you could say that suddenly a light has come on in your head.
Well, like a jury sequestered in an important criminal case I have been sequestered by the Lord and what He has taught me has quite literally changed my life. I have been His disciple for nearly 34 years and by comparison with the last couple of months they seem like wasted years. It is my heart-felt prayer that God will enable me to convey what has been given me and that my final years may yield fruit that will make up for the lost years. Isaiah speaks of the restoration where the lost years are made up and it is my cry unto the eternal Father that I may deliver His message in a way that those who have ears to hear might hear and those with eyes to see might see and receive of Him a desire to follow.

First let me say that you’ve got to really want it. You’ve got to be so sick of life as it is and hungry for God and with your heart aching for the pain and suffering around you that little else matters or perhaps I should say “nothing else matters”. Jesus said, “straight is the gate and narrow is the way that leads to life and few there be that find it” and I am beginning to understand what He meant in way that I never have before.
Those who have been reading my blog or have known me for any period of time know that I am serious about my relationship with God but what I have begun to experience is on a completely different level and yet on the outside nothing may appear different to the casual observer. Let me put your mind at ease that there is nothing weird about the kind of life of which I speak. Jesus said, “I have come that you might have life and that more abundantly”. I thought I knew what that meant and I have even written about it and I was right, however I had only merely tasted a little bit of it by comparison.

All my Christian life I have read and heard teachings about the Israelites and their failure to enter the Promised Land and their rebellion and the 40 years of wandering in the wilderness as a result. Hebrews chapters 3&4 speaks of this and also speaks of a day of rest promised to the people of God that some would enter into because of the failure of the Hebrew people. For the first time I am beginning to understand and perhaps to experience that promise.
Finding that Pearl of Great Price and actually obtaining it are two very different propositions. Many think that adding Jesus to their life is it but they completely miss the mark because they must actually make Jesus their only life and that is much different. Some are going to be offended with me but I don’t care anymore, if what I have to say offends anyone then they are not honest with themselves and will not likely find what I am trying to give them anyway and what I have found is too precious to keep to myself.
Hebrews Chapter 4 verse 6 speaks of the Rest of God that “since therefore it remains that SOME must enter it and those to whom it was first preached did not enter because if disobedience vs7 again He designates a certain day, saying in David, “today after such a long time as it has been said, “Today, if you will hear His voice, do not harden your hearts, vs 9 There remains therefore a rest for the people of God”.

Mark my words friends, this very moment you have a choice, reading this blog you can harden your heart and say who is this fool and who does he think he is and you can ignore what I have to say or you can open your heart like a good Berean “Now the Bereans were of more noble character than the Thessalonians, for they received the message with great eagerness and examined the Scriptures every day to see if what Paul said was true Acts 17:11
The choice is yours. When I write I may make references to scripture without quoting the scripture in full or giving you the exact location of that scripture and that is for several reasons. First is to save time, I am slow on the keyboard and second I expect my readers to have their bibles close by and you will gain much by spending time in the scriptures but I also expect that those who are seeking are not afraid to do a little digging. Often Jesus spoke of scripture without giving it’s location simply by saying “it is written” or “Isaiah said or David said”
I am going to bring this to a temporary end by suggesting that everyone get your Bible out and read the 28th chapter of Deuteronomy. This is God’s ideal, This is what the people of God could have had and I am speaking of the first 14 verses. This is abundant life, this is life blessed beyond imagination, this is the life I am speaking about being available yet today to those who will choose to enter the Rest of God. Unfortunately, verses 15-68 sounds much more like the life most people including most Christians that I know of today are experiencing. I hope that I have written enough to whet your appetite to come back and read what I have to share in the days to follow. You may be asking “ why don’t you just spite it out John”?
I told you at the beginning that this would be a process and I must repeat myself that I can only relate to you what God gives me. I write under inspiration of the Holy Spirit and nothing I have to say apart from Him has any value at all, so you are going to have to been patient but diligent. But I can promise you that if you will seek Him as you read what He gives me to write your life will change remarkably and that is a Promise. If you think these kinds of statements are arrogant then you don’t know me and you may not know much about the Lord I serve. He used a bunch of uneducated fishermen to turn the world upside down and according to 1 Corinthians 27-29 He’s going to do it again.
God bless you all and may He give you a hungry heart.
john Martin