Dictations From The Spirit

If you are running away from God,
Where exactly are you running to?
If you’re turning your back on Him,
What in this life is better to choose?

Is this life you are trying to lead,
Is all the striving worth the cost?
Are you finding true satisfaction?
Or are you feeling even more lost?

Or is it the thought of God as judge
Slamming down His gavel on you?
Have you not heard of His mercy,
Or the grace He daily gives to you?

Are you willing to learn the truth?
Uncover the countless evil deceits?
To receive His complete forgiveness
All that you’re required is to believe.

Should you opt to keep running away
He’ll not lose track of your location.
He’ll be there when you stop running.
His desire to save is an open invitation.

Preciously loved creation of His.
His loving grace knows no bounds.
You cannot get so completely lost
That you can’t by Him be found.

When you get to that point in life,
When your running has ceased.
Don’t be so afraid or ashamed
To knock on His door of belief.

His arms will be stretched wide.
Just like they were on the cross.
The Good Shepherd never quits
When He’s seeking out the lost.

They can come from hell below
Or descend from heaven above.
They can be drowned by noise
Overwhelming and far too much.

They can wander like sagebrush
Randomly shifting with the winds.
We can follow them to the heights.
They can ignite the path to our sins.

Thoughts are all these and more.
Their origins too often a mystery.
They can be cast into the future
Or imprisoned by painful history.

Suffering creates a ball of fire.
Fueling thoughts to fight or flee.
Will they retreat and submit to
The unknown of faith and belief?

Can we manage these thoughts?
Give them a place to take root.
One place where they can settle -
A land of rest known as the truth.

Such a place can only be found
In a God whom we can know.
His Word says His thoughts to us
Are of peace, a future and a hope.

Lord help us to direct our thoughts
To come into alignment with Thee.
May they be purified by the Spirit
To view the world only as You see.

Oh, that our thoughts will one day
Be at peace and set upon You.
No more lost and wandering about
As they find a home in Your truth.

Don’t look for perfection in others.
You’re looking in the wrong place.
You won’t need much time to find
Their flaws with no eyes of grace.

For if it’s perfection you’re seeking,
You need not go one step farther.
Than to look to the rugged cross.
To the holy Son of God the Father.

He was the only true Lamb of God.
His precious blood had to be shed.
Oh, the power in remission of sins
That also raised Him from the dead.

Yet His disciples had forsaken Him.
Forgetting His promise to them.
Even though He would see the grave,
He would rise and see them again.

His resurrection became the proof
That Jesus is the God of the living.
Restoration to our original design
Made possible through forgiving.

Sin no longer has its dominion
To those who choose to believe.
He sets us on a new life’s path
Paved with hope and eyes to see.

A world that is deeply deceived.
Seeking love in the wrong places.
Every imperfection we each have.
No longer seen through His graces

Let us rejoice in this gift of salvation,
And to live in gratitude and praise.
Shaped into the image of the One
Who made death’s stone roll away.

Has the pain become too much?
Or have your doubts taken hold?
Has your hope set with the sun?
Are your sins devouring your soul?

There’s a different path to choose
That leads you to a better place.
It starts at the cross of Calvary
Covered by waterfalls of grace.

Have you stumbled once more?
Guilt and shame are piled high.
Condemnation is your burden.
For the believer that’s just a lie.

Don’t let the enemy’s falsehoods
That deny the Savior’s embrace.
Let the truth of His love be felt.
Under God’s waterfalls of grace.

Yet the accusations keep coming,
And it’s hard to deny their truth.
The desperation of your situation
Is something God already knew.

So don’t give up or walk away.
His love doesn’t drift into space.
Stretch out your arms and receive
New life in His waterfalls of grace.

Some two thousand years ago one night,
Hope came in the form of a newborn child.
Wrapped in swaddling clothes in a manger.
That innocence never once to be defiled.

For thirty-three years He walked the Earth.
A life led as His Father’s faithful witness.
He provided hope in the form of miracles.
With the greatest being God’s forgiveness.

For what greater hope could we ever ask,
Than to be restored to our original design?
Living at peace with our beloved Creator.
A life of shaming sins forever left behind.

What is hope if it doesn’t offer assurance?
It is something more than wishful thinking.
It becomes all the more powerful and real,
When those who believe in Him are giving.

This giving that we offer He first gave us -
His undeserved grace and sacrificial love.
If we extend this to who He puts in our lives,
We are the testimony of hope from above.

We carry this hope to who don’t believe.
Who’ve been too deceived to know it’s real.
But when they hear of Christ’s empty tomb,
Hope is something even death can’t steal.

Ultimately, the root of hope is God’s love.
It is this love that will conquer every fear.
We will find hope is not an empty promise.
But the certain truth that our God is near.

Every member of His creation has hope
If they choose to have faith in the unseen.
May we become that tangible evidence,
And a reason that hope is to be believed.

Beyond the bluest sky.
Farther than we can see.
Eyes of hope gaze down
Despite our unbelief.

Heaven opens in grace.
Angelic beings descend.
To watch over and care.
To protect and defend.

Your sovereign goodness
Fertilizes the possible.
Unfailing love pries open
Doors to the plausible.

Why such acts of mercy
And undeserved grace?
Your well of faithfulness is
A fount in the driest days.

Even as the clouds form -
Casting shadows of lies.
Rays of truth find a way
From beyond the skies.

Your eyes stay upon us.
Revealing peace and love.
The Light of the world
Shines down from above.

Draw us into Your heart
And forgive us our sins.
Mount us on Your wings
As our new life begins.

May Your Word be a Light
And a lamp unto our feet.
Cleanse us from blindness
And give us Your eyes to see.

May others see You in us.
And be drawn to the skies.
May they find beyond them
The true source of Light

Aren’t we all a little weird?
Sanity sways with the breeze.
As we fence with our fears
And pursue an elusive peace.

We chase after a happiness
That vanishes when caught.
Yet we ignore the offer of joy
Provided by an eternal God.

How can we trust the invisible?
But can we really not see Him?
Evidence that things are made
Reveals the Author of creation.

We’re fatigued with our efforts
To catch feathers in the breeze.
Unsatisfaction burdens us down
And humbles us to our knees.

We learn He already knows us.
Our weirdness is no surprise.
He sows seeds of faithful love.
Uprooting falsehoods and lies.

Whatever He provides will last
And satisfies down to the soul.
Forgiveness applies His balm.
That makes the empty whole.

This world is ever-changing.
We always want a little more.
Imagine such a contentment
That satisfies us to our core?

It’s okay to be a little strange.
Normality is to have weakness.
It is there we find His strength
That we may walk in meekness.

But do we want to be different?
Or are we too afraid to change?
God can’t help us with our plight
Unless we believe in His name.

When I breathe my last breath,
Come before You face-to-face.
It can’t be by the way I lived -
But by Your life that You gave.

I doubt I will be able to stand.
To my knees will I descend.
You’ll have to pick me up
As You have again and again.

What could I possibly say?
For one who’s in my position.
Standing before the One who
Loved me without condition.

I’m silenced by the wonder
And the majesty of this place.
Songs from saints and angels
Sung as one in glorious praise.

What will You say to me?
My great Deliverer from hell.
If it should be “Well done.”
It must be for someone else.

For my efforts to follow You
Have too often fallen short.
Then there are my thoughts.
Convicting me in any court.

"My Son, look at My hands
And the scars upon My feet.
It was never all Your efforts
That brings you before Me.

Remember Ephesians 2:8 -
That I saved you by grace.
It was My efforts at Calvary
That has you in this place.

Because you made the choice
To believe I was the only way.
Enter into My rest and peace.
The eternal fruit of your faith."

I stand and gaze at the fading sun
As it falls upon the glistening seas.
The chilling winds tug on the cord
Of the final curtain on my memories.

Moments of simpler days and times
Ebb and flow with the aging winds.
Some filled with unburdened joy,
While others cling as shaming sins.

At times I grieve this darkening path.
Consuming both fun and sorrows.
I’m steered to look a different way.
Trading yesterdays for the ‘morrows.

Life wasn’t meant to be traveled
Looking through a rear-view mirror.
For the past diminishing over time,
Will someday completely disappear.

Whether the memories remain alive
Or disappear with the setting sun,
Faith in the grace and love of God
Cleanses and resurrects each one.

God takes every moment of the past
Sowing it into His holy imagination.
Remembered or not – none is wasted
As a fully forgiven new formation.

Regardless of the grief we may feel
Over memories lost to a setting sun,
Praise God for His promised future
Of eternal hope with His risen Son.

Until you stop listening to the lies
From those that don’t know you,
You will be lost and downtrodden.
In agreement with what isn’t true.

For through the sins cast upon you,
Or the ones committed on your own.
The enemy has deceived you to think
You’re not worthy of a loving home.

He roars in your ear you’re worthless,
But what’s the true measure of value?
It’s not an evil condemning opinion.
It is the price one will pay for you.

A form of your personal expression
Could be a creation of a piece of art.
Shouldn’t you have some love for it?
As it displays a part of who you are.

This is so with God as your Creator -
Making you in His beautiful likeness.
He is good, kind, holy, and loving.
His destiny for you being righteous.

He never changes; He never lies.
He looks upon you as His creation.
He sees you in His original design.
His plan is your eternal repatriation.

He showed your true value to Him
When He sent His son to the cross.
Can you think of a greater price to pay
To prove you are worth the cost?

The choice is yours, oh beloved one
As to the life you choose to lead.
Remain worthless and condemned?
Or accept your true value via belief?