Luke 15: 11-32 (Aramaic Bible in Plain English) And Yeshua said to them again, One man had two sons. And his younger son said to him, My father, give me the portion that befalls me from your estate. Then he divided to them his wealth. And after a few days his younger son gathered everything that was coming to him and he went to a distant country, and there he squandered his wealth while living wastefully. And when he had spent everything that he had, there was a great famine in that country and he began to be wanting. And he joined himself to one of the citizens of that country, and he sent him to a field to herd pigs. And he longed to fill his belly from the carob pods that the pigs were eating, and no man was giving anything to him. And when he came to himself, he said, Now, how many hired servants are in my father’s house who have plenteous bread for themselves, and here I am dying with hunger! I shall arise and go to my father and say to him, My father, I have sinned toward Heaven, and before you. Now I am not worthy to be called your son. Make me as one of your hired servants. And rising, he came to his father, and while he was still distant, his father saw him and he was moved with compassion for him and he ran and fell on his neck and he kissed him. And his son said to him, My father, I have sinned toward Heaven and before you, and I am not worthy that I should be called your son. But his father said to his servants, Bring the best robe and clothe him and put a ring on his hand and put shoes on him. Bring and kill the fattened ox; let us eat and celebrate.Because this, my son, was dead, and he is alive; he was lost, and now he is found. And they began to celebrate. But his older son was in the field and as he came, he approached the house and he heard the sound of many people singing. He called one of the boys and he asked him, What is this? And he said to him, Your brother has come, and your father has killed the fattened ox, because he has received him well. And he was angry and he did not want to enter and his father went out pleading with him. But he said to his father, Behold, I have served you for many years of servitude, and I have never transgressed your command, and you never gave a goat to me that I may celebrate with my friends. But when this your son, who had wasted your money with whores, has come back, you killed for him the fattened ox. His father said to him, My son, you are always with me and everything that I have is yours. But it is right for us to celebrate and to rejoice. For this your brother was dead, and he is alive. He was lost, and he is found.

There are 3 main people in this parable: 1. The Father 2. the son who took his inheritance and left and 3. the son who stayed behind.

Many times when we meditate on this scripture, we look at the son who was given his inheritance and foolishly took it and squandered it and was left with nothing. We make references to men and women who have openly sinned and their sins are worn like scarlet robes. But I would like us to pause and reflect for a little while on what Jesus is actually saying. We have all sinned and come short of God’s glory. So the prodigal son is all of us. We have taken God’s talents and gifting and many times wasted it on foolish things of this world. One of the most precious things God has given us is TIME. Often we squander time on things that do not matter in the end. We have taken our talents and have used it many times to glorify ourselves and others and not to glorify God Himself. We waste it. So we have all sinned.

But we look at the other brother who stayed with the father, yet his heart was not with his father. Here, we have a sinner who does not see his sin. Covered in robes of self-righteousness, this is the kind of sinner who does not see himself as a sinner and most times seeks to condemn the grace and mercy of the father himself. The self-righteous cannot understand the need for forgiveness. So if we look closely, we see instead of a prodigal son and a righteous son, we see two lost people. One who comes to his senses because he was lost in the world and the other lost in comfort of his own home and life and has not come to his senses.

But more importantly, this parable is about the Father’s love. Oh how wonderful is His love! This is a parable of the compassion and grace, the mercy and the love that flows from a Father’s heart. It is a pattern of a pastor over the people, a shepherd over his flock. How we have lost the father’s heart in churches today! We have lost the message of the Father’s love. We preach love but we do not live it. If we live it, we will embrace the lost, the dying, we will embrace those who lives are downtrodden, who make mistakes, who fall and who sometimes lose their way altogether. Indeed, the church of our age have lost the father’s heart and have instead embraced a form of self-righteousness. Instead of shepherding and loving people, there is condemnation and pride- a seeking after self and self promotion rather than on servanthood and true ministry.

Let us reflect on this parable, not as a teaching only for those in the world who are lost, but for those in the church who have lost their way. We have all lost our way. Anything that we do that is not pleasing to God is itself a sin. We are all sinners. But what separates us from sin is the Love of God and His mercy. Let us extend His grace to those around us, His mercy, His compassion. Let us truly lift up the name of Christ by allowing ourselves the freedom to love the unloved and the unlovable. Let us come out of the comfort of our own lives to seek after true ministry – one that only seeks to glorify God and lift Him up.

Amen

Ephesians 6:10-13 (NKJV) Finally, my brethren, be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might. Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places.  Therefore take up the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand.

When we look around us we must remember that even though we see things naturally with our eyes or perceive things with our natural ability to reason and think, there are workings that go far beyond that which we see and comprehend. The apostle Paul is giving us a glimpse into the warfare that we as believers need to engage in our daily life.

We are in the middle of an election and there are some who wonder why is it so nasty. Well… no battle is easy or nice. And when a changing of the guards takes place, the battle gets worse. We wonder why the conservatives have lost the elections in the last 8 years. Led by people whose belly is their gods, there is not much to fight for. They talk a good game but their hearts are far from doing good for the people. It is all about ideas- pushing an agenda that defies and have replaced common sense.

America boasts of liberty. Yet she has given up her liberty, that she once fought for, to be enslaved under those whose desire is not liberty but oppression. The ruling class and those who control the money have usurped power. Is there any reason to believe that freedom exists? I would dare say, American freedom today is controlled by this same ruling class so much so that “freedom”  is not  freedom at all. It is only “freedom” if it is sanctioned by the ruling class.We the masses complain “we have no bread” and the ruling class callously say “eat cake”. How sad that we continue to condone such hypocrisy and blatant tyranny.

Their tactics have no changed. When we desire to rise up and ask for change, they apply the smokescreens. And usually the smoke works to keep the worker bees in line. Distract from the issues at hand and focus on foolish things that have nothing to do with your future. But as a people we have to look past the voices of the many and look deep within. Is this what we want for our future? Can we survive under the oppression much longer? If the meat of the oppression seems too good to give up for the manna of the greater good of our future, then we will stay under oppression.

We have been lied to, deceived, and manipulated for decades. Too many men, women and children have died under the oppression of America and her ruling class. Is it any wonder that judgment is about to come to this country? We have blood on our hands. We elect people whose lust for power have murdered millions. We elect those who willingly sacrifice our children on the altars of convenience. We elect those whose words sound great but whose heart and desire is really to oppress. And they have mastered the tactics of smokescreens.

I would admonish those who know Christ to wake up. America is bound for judgment and there will be wailing. Rise up warriors of God and seek His face for mercy. We have defiled every principle of God and there is one voice  speaking of judgment. The other just keeps attacking the truth.God is using Mr. Trump to sound a clarion, a call to repentance. If we, as believers,  whose duty is to watch,  fail to hear the call today, we will certainly face judgment and it will be swift.

I would love if God extended mercy to us and I pray for it. But as I listen, I hear one thing and that is the dismissal of the trumpet that calls for repentance. When the prophets spoke on behalf of God to Israel, they were usually ostracized, beaten and left for dead. The tactics of the enemy has not changed. This is not an election, folks. This is the last call for repentance from God who desires mercy but whose duty must be judgment for non-repentance.

Stand fast and be prepared. We have only a few more days. If we do not hear His Voice- we only expose ourselves to be judged.

2 Corinthians 10:3-6 (NKJV) For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war according to the flesh.  For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal but mighty in God for pulling down strongholds,  casting down arguments and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ and being ready to punish all disobedience when your obedience is fulfilled.

This scripture is  a powerful weapon of warfare for every one who calls on the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. I use it daily in my walk with Christ, remembering that my victory starts with me willing to bring every thought that enters my mind to the obedience of Christ.

But I wanted to focus on the word “strongholds”. Derived from the Greek word “ochuróma” it means “a fortress, strong defense, stronghold”. Wow! A strong defence, a fortress… and we need to pull those down.

The first thing that comes to mind when I meditate on this scripture is that this fortress is not a physical wall. It is a mindset. A thing that we have allowed to be built up within us that needs to come down. But to bring down these fortresses or walls, we need to war in the Spirit, to bring our thoughts into obedience to Christ.

When I think of thoughts, they appear to be like birds, flying things that first need to be captured. To capture anything, there needs to be a trap laid and watchful vigilance. To capture thoughts, we need to have presence of mind and not be drunk. If we drop our guard, our spiritual defense, we allow the enemy to enter our minds with thoughts that fly in with seeds to impregnate our minds with deception and lead to the building up of fortresses and defenses to the carnal nature.As a believer, coming in from the kingdom of darkness, the enemy has already laid groundwork in our minds that need to be purged. There must first be a cleansing within. We need to first pull down the fleshly walls, the strongholds, the mindsets of the old nature that refuse the entry of the Spirit nature. This must happen in order for the Holy Spirit to have dominion in our lives.

To many times, we see Christians struggling under the burdens of the carnal nature. Even if we long to have a Spiritual Life, we find ourselves easily buffeted on every side by an enemy who is relentless. Strongholds are established in our lives by the things we experience, see, hear and live through daily in our lives. We need to look deep in our lives and ask the Lord to reveal to us the reason for our reactions and actions to certain events and encounters in our lives. What is the reason that I am who I am? The question and answers may surprise even the best of us.

“Stranglehold” is a term that means “an illegal hold in wrestling by which your opponent is choked, a force or influence that stops something from growing or developing” Merriam- Webster Dictionary. The enemy infiltrates our minds, takes territory, establishes strongholds and then makes sure that he chokes out all things that might oppose him as he applies the stranglehold on our lives. As we allow him to do this, mostly because he deludes us so that we feel helpless and captured, as if we have no way out but to submit to him, we become infertile ground for the Spirit of God to manifest the fruit of the Spirit.

We have allowed ourselves to be victimized too long. We live our lives as if we have no way out. We have to realize one thing, Jesus Christ came to set the captives free. We who were captives to the carnal nature, now have the power to take captive the thoughts and mindsets that once overpowered us.

Luke 4: 16-19 (NKJV) So He came to Nazareth, where He had been brought up. And as His custom was, He went into the synagogue on the Sabbath day, and stood up to read.  And He was handed the book of the prophet Isaiah. And when He had opened the book, He found the place where it was written: “The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me, because He has anointed Me to preach the gospel to the poor; He has sent Me to heal the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed;  to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord.

I pray that we will indeed welcome the Christ the Deliverer into our lives even as we accept Him as Savior. For Him to be our Lord, the strongholds and strangleholds MUST be broken and laid bare so that it can never be rebuilt. Amen