9 Jul 2017 – WE REAP WHAT WE SOW
Why do so many things go wrong at thresholds? Partly because we ignore the basic spiritual laws.
Number 1: We reap what we sow.
In other words, if we plant good things in our lives eventually we will find good things springing up and blessing us. If we plant bad things, we will find bad things sprouting and messing us.
Conversely, if we keep having the same sort of bad thing happen over and over – and over and over – then we can be sure we planted bad things in our lives. These include evil judgments, unforgiveness, refusal to repent and so on.
Simple? Should be. But sometimes the root causes of this are hidden from us. Which is why we need other believers to pray for us and help us uproot those things which defile ourselves and others. (Hebrews 12:15)
And for those who believe it’s impossible to reap what you’ve sown because the cross of Jesus did away with all this, I suggest you read Galatians 6:7.
Without some training in the absolute basics of prayer ministry, it’s difficult trying to rewire your mind to get ready to deal with threshold issues.
10 Jul 2017 – WE REAP IN THE SAME KIND AS WE SOW
Why do so many things go wrong at thresholds?
Partly because we ignore the basic spiritual laws.
Number 2: We reap in the same kind as we sow.
You don’t plant an orange tree and expect strawberries.
In the natural world, if we make a judgment that our dad is harsh and cruel, we will eventually reap that condemnation in our own lives in one of two ways – either we will become like our dad (despite swearing repeatedly we’d never be like him!) or we will continually draw into our lives significant people who are like him.
In the spiritual world, the same thing happens. We make judgments about spirits. Now it’s one thing to be discerning, another thing entirely to condemn – to curse and swear and revile and abuse spirits as we take authority over them. And when this kind of tactic works on demonic footsoldiers, we tend to think it will work on principalities, powers and world-rulers.
At the threshold, we’re dealing with angelic generals, not privates. And the rules of engagement are given in 2 Peter 2:9-11 and Jude 1:9-11.
But really what it comes down to is that same old law of sowing and reaping. We’re going to get back what we give out.
When it comes to the threshold, sometimes our worst enemy is not Python, Rachab or Leviathan. It’s ourselves. They don’t have to exert much effort at all because they can just sit back and allow God’s law of sowing and reaping to come into effect.
11 Jul 2017 – SOW THE WIND, REAP THE WHIRLWIND
Why do so many things go wrong at thresholds? Partly because we ignore the basic spiritual laws.
Number 3: Sow the wind, reap the whirlwind.
The universe was created with a built-in multiplication factor. If we could only plant seeds that could replace themselves, then sooner or later we’d run out of food as we ate through the same number of grains as the original store.
John Sandford says that this was to upbuild the world in love. The multiplication factor was designed so that blessings would quickly overflow.
However this “law of increase” is impartial and impersonal and does not make any distinction between blessing and curse. But this “law of increase” also needs time. The longer sin and iniquity is present, the worse it gets. The harder it is to eradicate, the more consequences there are going to be.
The moral of the story for thresholds: (1) identify your whirlwinds (2) get help to deal with them (3) thereafter keep “short accounts” with God
Q&A
Question: please give an example of a whirlwind? I don’t fully understand yet.
Anne: Suppose you steal a small amount of money – the reaping will be that you keep getting being the victim of theft. As the “whirlwind” increases, the amounts stolen from you keep increasing dramatically.
Question: Does this include what our ancestors did?
Anne: Yes
Question: How will you cut the generational curse because you also reap the whirlwind of your ancestors?
Anne: By faith, you go before the Father and repent of what your ancestors have done and also repent that you have let the situation go on so long without doing anything about it yourself. This means that you speak out aloud words that explicitly state what your ancestors have done and say that you turn away from that. Then you ask Jesus through the power of His cross and His blood to give life to your words so that they do accomplish real repentance. You might like to ask the Father for His grace to place the cross of Jesus between you and your ancestral bloodline, so that the whirlwind stops in your generation. I hope this makes sense.
8 Jan 2019 – HARDENING OUR HEARTS
Some of the trickiest passages in Scripture to come to terms with concern the hardening of Pharaoh’s heart. The first time that it becomes clear God has hardened Pharaoh’s heart is on the seventh occasion when it happens. Before that, Pharaoh did it or the text simply says that his heart was hardened.
After a while our choices are taken from us. We reap what we have sowed. If we harden our hearts, then the automatic operation of the law of sowing and reaping will mean that our hearts are hardened, even when we don’t deliberately make it so – until such time as God takes us in hand.
Of course, in the sowing-and-reaping stakes, there was a lot of generational curses to reap. Eighty years prior to the appearance of Moses and Aaron before Pharaoh (don’t you love this medieval illustration with the “horned” headgear to distinguish Moses?), the previous Pharaoh had given orders for thousands of boys to be thrown into the heart of the waters of the Nile.
Think about what happens when this Pharaoh sends his armies into the heart of some different waters.
22 Jan 2018 – LONG DELAYS
Just as there’s a law of gravity in the physical universe, so there are laws in the spiritual realms. The most obvious is: “we reap what we sow”. It’s a law meant for blessing – but it’s also an impartial law.
Jacob used the skin of a goat wrapped around his neck and arms to deceive his father Isaac and get the firstborn blessing.
Much later in life, the blood of a goat was used to deceive him – when it was splattered across a coat-of-many-colours to give the impression his favourite son Joseph had died.
Just as there were intervening decades in Jacob’s life between the “sowing” and the “reaping”, so it is true for us. We often don’t recognise that we are reaping in the same kind as we have sown because such a long time has passed.
28 Nov 2016 – IMPORTANCE OF ASKING WHEN
The “laws” of the spiritual universe are both like and unlike those of the physical universe. There’s a law of “sowing and reaping” – which is like the agricultural principles every farmer uses constantly. Plant seed in the ground, it ripens and matures and eventually a head of grain appears. (Jesus used this law in His miracle of the multiplication of the loaves and fishes. He only did what He saw His Father doing.)
A similar law is that mentioned by Hosea: “sow the wind, reap the whirlwind.” If we plant blessings in life, we reap blessing – multiplied many times over. If we sow bitterness, division and dishonour, we reap curses – the thorn- and-thistle barrier of the spiritual world that keeps us from our calling and destiny.
Too many people, when faced with the relentless obstacles, ask the wrong questions. Instead of “why?”, it is “when?” If God’s answer is ten years ago, then you know you probably were involved. But if it was two centuries ago, you know it’s a generational matter and has only been growing stronger for being ignored.
12 Mar 2020 – SOLUTION: FRUIT OF THE SPIRIT
Way back in Eden, the fruit of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil was weaponised.
It was used by the serpent to claim our inheritance.
Now the principle of ‘sowing and reaping’ is an immutable law. In physics it’s like the famous dictum: ‘To every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.’
It shouldn’t be a surprise to us then that, when the Holy Spirit turns the tables on the serpent, that we are able to reclaim our inheritance through weaponised fruit.
But we’re not used to thinking of the Fruit of the Spirit as weapons. Instead, we’ve got used to thinking that, for warfare, an increase in faith and authority is the answer to almost everything.
But neither faith nor authority overcomes Python, the spirit of constriction. We do not have the authority to tell it that it doesn’t have the right to test us. Because it does. Yet Love, the first of the fruit of the Spirit, overcomes it.
And neither faith nor authority overcomes Ziz, the spirit of forgetting. Joy, the second of the fruit of the Spirit, does.
And neither faith nor authority overcomes Leviathan, the spirit of retaliation. Shalom, the third of the fruit of the Spirit, does.
Because in the garden of Eden, mankind was taken out by fruit, it is by the fruit of the Spirit that the enemy will be taken out.
