As I sat listening to the doctor telling us that my husband Bill has to go on medication for diabetes, I felt sick, heart sick that is. I thought to myself, “It’s not fair, it’s just not fair!” We’ve tried so hard to eat right in the last few years. To eat fresh fruits and vegetables, whole grains, more chicken and fish and less red meats, to detoxify our bodies.
Since we’ve been called to a higher walk with the Lord in the last two years, our lives have been one big roller coaster ride. It took us years to get to a point financially that we felt comfortable. What I mean by that is, we could go grocery shopping and just buy what we wanted. We could go to the “up market” stores and buy organic produce and such. Then it seemed like our world started tumbling around our feet.
First of all, our business that we worked so hard to build started getting quite lean. Then my husband got Endocarditis and almost died in February 2006. After getting him back to the land of the living and feeling good, the business really started going “belly up”, as I call it. Bill “wrestled” with the Lord about that until around March 2007 when he finally told the Lord “Not my will, but Your will be done!” He still didn’t want to give up but kept trying to put forth the effort to keep the business alive and going.
In August of 2007 he was on his way home from a mens prayer group when he was startled by a voice in the truck with him that said, “NOW WILL YOU TAKE MY YOKE UPON YOU AND LEARN OF ME?” His immediate response was, “YES, LORD!” From that moment on our lives would never be the same.
In September, just one month later, we finally laid the business to rest and stopped fighting to do it “our way” and took hold of the Lord’s yoke.
Needless to say without the income coming in that we were used to, all the bills were past due. Bill would go out looking for work and putting in applications and resumes online. But to no avail. He got maybe two interviews but nothing else. We decided to apply for food stamps so we could at least eat. We lost our house in foreclosure and had to move in with our son for over a year, all the while continuing to look for work. Our son even tried starting the business back up under a different name and a few orders trickled in enough to take care of some things. Then in December 2008, Michael had to close that business down due to the expenses being greater than the income. Bill didn’t want to but he opted to take early retirement since he was turning 62 in March of 2009, and started getting a small retirement check in May. At that time we still received over $300.00 a month in food stamps so eating properly was still not much of a problem. Then later that summer, we had to be reevaluated and our food stamps were all but taken away. They dropped down to $68.00 a month.
All the while this is going on, the Lord was training us and teaching us through our Bible reading and certain other books He would lead us to, not for doctrine, but for instructional purposes. Unfortunately, our bodies became full of toxins again through the foods we had to eat. We began to be sluggish and less energetic, bloated, put on weight and all the things we don’t want to do.
Here’s where the whole thought of this is going. We also become toxic in spirit and soul by consuming all the wrong things. When this happens there is no spiritual maturity. Think of it this way….a baby growing in the womb can be fully formed as in having all the necessary parts, but then needs to mature in order to survive outside the womb. If born too soon, the child would most likely die. It’s the same with Christians, my friend. Paul puts it this way in Ephesians 4:13 “until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ,”
Oh, we think we’re okay by going to church, or only listening to what’s called “Christian music” and nothing secular. We read our Bibles so that’s getting the “pure word”….right? Not necessarily! Just reading the word doesn’t mean you understand the fullness of it. We also allow toxins entrance into our spirits by the programs we watch on television or movies and even the books we read. Talking with others and listening to gossip is another way. There is so much “garbage” out there in the form of evil that we as believers should stay away from.
We think we are walking in the fullness of God because we’ve been baptized in water or the Holy Spirit. Why do we think that? Well, the word says so…..where? Where does God say that we are in the fullness of Christ by being dunked in water or having some man or woman laying their hands on us speaking some kind of “mumbo jumbo” unintelligible words? Yes, I’m talking about speaking in tongues.
Beloved, the only way to be IN the fullness of God is to be IN Christ. Once you are IN Christ (through His death burial and resurrection by faith) you have to be “detoxed” or cleansed spiritually, mentally and physically. The way this is done is by forsaking the world and all the evil in the world, or worldly ways. Our thoughts as well as our actions can be evil. I know we’ve been told that the thought is not the sin, but when we act upon that thought it then becomes sin. That’s correct, but……if the thought is not there or allowed to take hold, then the chance to sin isn’t there. That’s why Paul tells us to “cast down every imagination and take into captivity every evil thought to the obedience of Christ” Paul also tells us that we are to have the mind of Christ.
It’s like drinking a glass of water. When you hold that glass of water up you believe it to be pure and clean, since you can’t see anything floating or swimming in it, it must be pure. So you drink it with confidence that it’s healthy for you. Now, if you took that same water and examined it under a microscope what do you think you’d find? I shudder to think what is in it! Okay, my point is……we are washed, sanctified made clean by the washing of the water by the word but, and I make that a big BUT……..is it pure? Or has it been defiled in some way, or diluted? Have YOU examined it under the microscope to see if it’s pure? The microscope in this case would be the Spirit of God. If the word you’re getting is defiled or diluted in any way you will not be able to grow spiritually as God intended you to do. Nor will you be able to “RIGHTLY DIVIDE THE WORD OF TRUTH” What do I mean by rightly divide? Take a look at 2 Timothy 2:15 where Paul tells Timothy to STUDY TO SHOW HIMSELF …what?....APPROVED OF GOD!! He told him this so that Timothy wouldn’t wind up with a reprobate mind, worthless, and not understanding the truth thereby walking out in the world doing the things of the world. Becoming mixed and mingled just as Israel was.
I wrote an article titled, “Do You Have a Reprobate Mind?” which explains not having a pure mind towards the Lord. When someone has a reprobate (worthless, not understanding) mind, they haven’t approved (or see fit to retain) the things of God and His will, His way or His word. Therefore, God disapproves them, and allows them to be full of and function according to the toxins of the evil world. Read Romans chapter 1.
Reprobate
REPROBATE, a. [L. reprobatus, reprobo, to disallow; re and probo, to prove.]
1. Not enduring proof or trial; not of standard purity or fineness; disallowed; rejected.
Reprobate silver shall men call them, because the Lord hath rejected them. Jer 6.
2. Abandoned in sin; lost to virtue or grace.
They profess that they know God, but in works deny him, being abominable and disobedient, and to every good work reprobate. Titus 1.
3. Abandoned to error, or in apostasy. 2 Tim 3:8
REP'ROBATE, n. A person abandoned to sin; one lost to virtue and religion.
I acknowledge myself a reprobate, a villain, a traitor to the king.
REP'ROBATE, v.t.
1. To disapprove with detestation or marks of extreme dislike; to disallow; to reject. It expresses more than disapprove or disallow. We disapprove of slight faults and improprieties; we reprobate what is mean or criminal.
2. In a milder sense, to disallow.
Such an answer as this, is reprobated and disallowed of in law.
3. To abandon to wickedness and eternal destruction.
4. To abandon to his sentence, without hope of pardon. Drive him out to reprobated exile.
About Glenda Maynard:
Affectionately known as "William's wife" ,mother to three, and a Grandmother; Glenda is a Bible teacher, who passionately encourages people with the Good News of Jesus Christ. She lives in Tennessee with her family and enjoys writing articles that she hopes will bring forth life, truth and hope to others.
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