Worship

“Tend” by Emmy Rose and Bethel Music

Scripture

“And you, Solomon my son, know the God of your father and serve him with a whole heart and with a willing mind, for the Lord searches all hearts and understands every plan and thought. If you seek him, he will be found by you, but if you forsake him, he will cast you off forever.”-1 Chronicles 28:9, ESV

“So that he may establish your hearts blameless in holiness before our God and Father, at the coming of our Lord Jesus with all his saints.” -1 Thessalonians 3:13, ESV

“Therefore, preparing your minds for action, and being sober-minded, set your hope fully on the grace that will be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ. As obedient children, do not be conformed to the passions of your former ignorance, but as he who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct, since it is written, ‘You shall be holy, for I am holy.'” -1 Peter 1:13-16, ESV

A Call to Action

At the beginning of 2023, the Spirit placed these words on my heart:

Prepare your heart and mind for action.

I was so intrigued by the charge, and yet I didn’t know how to do this, quite practically speaking. “Lord, what does this even mean when You say this?” I have pondered this charge for days, quite honestly

As the world is rapidly changing, Christendom as we know it is in a profound pivot, and believers are being pummeled by the enemy. There’s an acceleration of events taking place on the biblical calendar, and the Bride is awakening. It’s time to make preparations for His coming. It’s the sort of moment the disciples had in the upper room with Jesus before and after His death. They were preparing for a moment with their Savior that was unexpected. So it is with us, in this historical moment. We must get to the upper room and make preparations as we ready our hearts and minds for a time and a season we have not ever walked through.

“This moment requires those of us in positions of authority (and even most of us who are not) to embrace an adventure-or-die mindset, and find the courage and develop the capacity for a new day. We are heading into unchartered territory and are given the charge to lead a mission where the future is nothing like the past.” -Tod Bolsinger, “Canoeing the Mountains”

Scripture’s Pattern for Heart Preparation

What is being required of those of us daring to go there with Jesus is a heart and mind prepared for action. That means the clutter and cobwebs are cleared out! The idols of the heart and the things that hold our minds captive are submitted to the loving counsel and housekeeping of the Holy Spirit. The gardens of our lives need to be intimately tended by the One who prunes the vines. As I dive into these two segments, let’s get ready. Time is ticking, and we have a race to finish!

Make this your prayer right now:

“Prove me, O Lord , and try me; test my heart and my mind.” -Psalm 26:2, ESV

Circumcise Your Heart

“And the LORD your God will circumcise your heart and the heart of your offspring, so that you will love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul, that you may live.” -Deuteronomy 30:6, ESV

In Hebrew, the word for circumcise is muwl, also meaning to cleanse, to circumcise, let oneself be circumcised, cut, and be cut off. It’s a removal of all the complications, idols, distractions, and clutter so that we can be the ones who belong fully to the Lord. It’s a cutting process that we give permission to the Lord to undergo. He does it with a physician’s precision and shepherd’s care because He knows what is giving us heart disease and an irregular heartbeat. He wants us to be whole and healed and have our heart beat in rhythm with His own for more than just temporary affairs. It’s a matter of belonging and being so intimately known by Him for the sake of simple devotion and a life of great flourishing.

“I knew Jesus, and He was very precious to my soul; but I found something in me that would not keep sweet and patient and kind. I did what I could to keep it down, but it was there. I besought Jesus to do something for me, and when I gave Him my will, He came to my heart, and took out all that would not be sweet, all that would not be kind, all that would not be patient, and then He shut the door.” -George Fox

Pray this prayer with me to clean up our hearts:

“I renounce and repent for having a heart that has grown fat with spiritual plaque. I repent for hard heartedness and for allowing my heart to grow dull, my ears to become hard of hearing and my eyes to become dim and blind. For myself and my family line, I repent for and renounce hardening our hearts to the voice of God. I repent for and renounce saying any words to suggest or declare that God doesn’t hear, see or care about our situation.” -Paul L. Cox, Brian P. Cox, and Barbara Kain Parker, “Generational Prayers”

Lord, I ask You now to ignite my heart with a fresh passion and desire for intimacy with You. Would You come and cut off anything that has held me back in obedience and consecration? Tend to my heart afresh today. I give you permission to circumcise my heart with Your precision and kindness.

Renew Your Mind

“Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.” -Romans 12:2 (ESV)

“For who has understood the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him? But we have the mind of Christ.” -1 Corinthians 2:16 (ESV)

In Greek, the word for mind means: the mind, comprising alike the faculties of perceiving and understanding and those of feeling, judging, determining the intellectual faculty, the understanding reason in the narrower sense, as the capacity for spiritual truth, the higher powers of the soul, the faculty of perceiving divine things, of recognizing goodness and of hating evil.

Having the mind of Christ means that we as believers have the ability to share the plans, purposes, and perspectives of Christ. We see things from His vantage point and have His insight and discernment on all matters. Because He is not shaken, neither are we. We are seated with Him in heavenly places so our ears are tuned to the things He shares with us from the throne room of Heaven. That truth, spoken into our innermost being, should shift the counsel of our hearts and the decisions of our will. It’s from this place with Jesus that we ask the Lord to renew our minds so that we think and move and have our being from this place of truth, informed by intimacy with Christ. It’s a necessary process of preparation in order to finish this race. Many will fall away in the last days. Let that not be us, Lord Jesus, because we are operating fully with the mind of Christ!

A Prayer of Preparation

Pray this prayer with me to prepare our minds for action:

Lord, we repent for allowing our minds to become sidetracked, distracted, and informed by the world. Forgive us for not desiring Your Word or Your counsel and for doing things our way, with human reasoning. We repent for having minds that are tantalized by the world and not the Word of God. We repent for our intellectualism, humanism, and ungodly logic and reasoning. Renew and refresh our minds today so your plan, purpose, and perspective becomes ours. Align our thoughts with Your thoughts and ready us for action, so that we would hear the word of the Lord and move on it. Deliver us from double-mindedness, second-guessing, doubt, fear and an unsettled mind when it comes to Your Word, Your voice, and Your invitation to follow You.

Beloved of the Lord, it’s time we head to the upper room for a while and spend time seeking His heart for the days ahead. Make preparations. He is coming for a Bride who is wide-awake, yet many of us are exhausted over worldly matters and distractions. This hour is calling for intentionality of intimacy so that we can move in lockstep with the Spirit into the greatest harvest field awaiting you and me.

 “And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.” -Philippians 4:7

• Tickets for our next Dallas luncheon on February 22 are available!
• My book, “Arise My Darling” has just been published in Spanish! Grab a copy for your friends, neighbors, or to pass kindness on to a stranger.