Speaker 1: 0:05

Welcome, friends, to Preach it Girl podcast, where we aren't just sitting around waiting for Jesus to return and Skinny Pop to make us skinny. I mean, those things are bound to happen. But while we wait, join me, auntie Lala, for a jaunt through the scriptures so lively you'll think they were written just yesterday, not thousands of years ago. Now put on your listening ears for a somewhat sassy retelling of stories from the Bible Y'all. I really hope this will be an episode that is encouraging to everyone who hears it, and if it is, please share it with somebody. It is a call to beware the strategy of the enemy to turn your hearts into a glacier of ice. Let's not confuse setting our faces like flints with having a cold heart. God said if we have not loved, all the ministry, all the service to God, every gift in use without love is nothing. I'm not talking about just loving your neighbor, I'm talking about loving your enemy. And Auntie Lala is not just talking to you, she is talking to herself.

Speaker 1: 1:18

It is easy to see in today's times, with ugliness flashing across screens in such great numbers, it's like a sea of hatred. Can you imagine, though, back in the day, what the Nile must have looked like when it turned to blood what was once a life source for the Egyptians, with one powerful command, boiled with the stench of death by the power of God. And yet we are called to love the very ones who spew insults, hurl threats and accusations, those who hate us. So why did God turn the Nile to blood? Basically, he took the life source that they depended on for all their needs and showed them how worthless it was, how much they depended on something that was not God and how quickly it could be taken away. So we've got to lay our lives on Jesus, and the good news is God said, the gates of hell will never prevail over the body of Christ, no matter how angry, how fraught with hatred it becomes, no matter how many times they kill us. We are but seeds planted in the soil of Christ that will bear much fruit. God's already won the battle, he already secured the ultimate victory, and God told us, if the world hated him, the world would hate us. So how do we love those who hate us?

Speaker 1: 2:59

It helped me to remember that the apostle Paul, who was once Saul, lived to torment, haul, to jail and murder the early Christian believer. With ravenous delight he plotted to decimate the church. And yet God had a plan, a purpose for Saul's life, a purpose for Stephen's death that Paul gleefully celebrated. That kind of paints every insult differently, because that very person who is insulting you, spewing hatred towards you, could be a Saul who will turn into Paul if you love them enough to pray for them. Are you willing to pray for your enemies Y'all? It ain't easy, because it's not like we just got a bubbling up love coming up out of us, right. But you know what? Neither did the fella that God asked to go and meet Saul and to pray for him. He was like, oh God, didn't you hear, didn't you hear about him, what he's been doing to the church? God said, yeah, and I've got something planned, something good. Trusting God had a redemptive plan. He obeyed the Lord, he went for the one who hated him and God changed everything.

Speaker 1: 4:18

This man wrote most of the New Testament With prayer and intercession. On our knees before God. We must pray for the lost. Oh, just when you think about it, it's kind of like oh, am I going to be joyful about this? Am I going to be obedient? Come on, think of what this world would be like if we were praying for our enemies, like fervently persevering in prayer for those who hate us, I mean. The other thing we must do is remind ourselves our enemy is not flesh and blood, despite how many people openly behave like our enemies. Our fight is in the heavenly realm. And how do we fight it? With heavenly power, in the spirit, walking in the spirit, harnessing the spiritual gifts given to us for this moment, for this life, for the battle, in bold words of faith. We aren't to shrink back from proclaiming the gospel openly. We overcome the enemy by the blood of Christ and the word of our testimony.

Speaker 1: 5:29

I think sometimes we make it a little complicated. I think sometimes we make it a little complicated. I know I do thinking I've got to share from Moses to Jesus, when really all we have to do is reach out in love to those people within our sphere of influence and share what Jesus has done for us. Pray for the opportunity to share your faith. I heard this guy in an interview share that he had shared his faith every day for years, every day. I might share my faith once a quarter, okay, the podcast, but in a fervent attempt to share, praying daily.

Speaker 1: 6:07

Give me opportunity, lord, to share my testimony. Give me opportunity to give what's been given to me. If we desire God's kingdom to come, more than we love our comfort and ego, we would be one powerful church. If not, if we don't do it, we're no better than non-believers. We're actually worse, because of course, they live for themselves. Who else are they going to live for? But we know what God's done for us. He lifted us up out of the pit, cleaned us up and gave us new life, not so we can sip sodas with Jesus in our cozy lives, but that we would share what we've been given with others.

Speaker 1: 6:50

Pray for opportunities to share what you've been given. Pray for those people who what you've been given. Pray for those people who consider you an enemy. They're attacking you, they're persecuting you, they're hurling insults and accusations at you, they're calling you bad. Right. I already said this, but I am talking to myself as much as I'm talking to you. We have to love the lost, gosh. We have to love the lost, and that just doesn't come natural. The angry hater of the church Dang it. We aren't going to share with those. We can't stand. We have to share Christ's love by having love in our heart, and the only way to get that is from Jesus.

Speaker 1: 7:30

So I'm wondering if keeping Christ's love alive and well in our hearts isn't what that oil in the parable of the virgins that have to keep their oil lit for Christ coming back, because God said in the end times, as evil increases, hearts will wax cold and many will fall away. Well, without that love in our heart, that's what happens. That love in our heart, that's what happens when we hate others back or despise them or think less of them. Just don't let that be you that falls away. Don't let our hearts wax cold. And it isn't overnight y'all, it's like a steady decay, a steady drift to the land you don't want to be in, to the land of cold hearts that have fallen away.

Speaker 1: 8:18

So may we who are called by his name fall on our knees and repent of hardheartedness, of judgmentalness, superiority, complex, our comfortable complacency. If we get on our knees and lay that at Jesus's feet, ask him to remind you of the pit that you were in. Remind us where we once sloshed around before he saved us, before he rescued us. Help us to see people as you see them lost lambs thrashing around hopeless, hurt and angry. Help us to reach out with your nail-scarred hands, even if they slap it away over and over again. We cannot take back the territory the enemy has stolen until we take back the territory of our own hearts. They must be softened in tears of repentance, softened by the blood of God's extravagant mercy and grace for us, and then turned in love to others.

Speaker 1: 9:21

In our world today, when we are all just a little heavy, aghast, at the celebration of death, god, I pray that you would show up when we hit our knees, repent of our cold hearts, requesting that you renew them, make them soft with your mercy and grace, and help us to love our enemies because of your great love for us. Help us to give away what you've so freely given us. Okay, I love y'all and I can't wait to get together next time. On Preachy Girl.