Creative Friday: One Day – Beautiful Moments in Ordinary Places – Pass the Salsa Please!

Do you believe that God reveals Himself in ordinary moments? I hope that you not only believe it but also experience it. You know those times – when it seems that the spiritual atmosphere shifts, feeling almost electric. You can sense it. You can feel it.

God’s manifest presence brings with it a sense of awe and wonder. He loves showing up, showing Himself in the moments, and charging the atmosphere with heaven on earth.

I can feel far from God at times but that’s an illusion brought on by fear, anxiety, or worry. He always right here, in me. Christ is in me at all times and is my reality. So I practice His presence in my life, wherever I am. I always look to engage with Holy Spirit on this journey wherever I find myself, at any moment.

While sitting in a Mexican restaurant with a friend, celebrating my birthday, He moved in with His manifest presence right in the midst of our conversation, reminding us that He loved to be with us.

Shawn and I talked about the day-to-day and what was going on in our lives. Inevitably, the conversation centers on Jesus, in some way. He’s our life, so that’s the way it should be as we talk. He’s right there. He blends in nicely. You know…one minute we’re talking about prayer and worship and there He is, right in the middle as I say, “Pass the salsa.” Our God is incredibly wonderful.

The more we talk about Jesus, the more we sense that a shift in the atmosphere comes, a tangible shift that is real, right in our midst, right in the restaurant. 

Shawn began to tell me about watching a session of IHOP (International House of Prayer) when there came a moment, an ordinary moment when the worship leader was so engaged and overcome by the Lord that she was crying. It was a holy moment where people bowed down in His presence just gazing on the beauty of Jesus. That sense of holiness came right into Shawn’s home in Texas. Our spirits transcend time and place and His presence moves right through the TV to right where we are. How awesome is that right? I know that many have experienced that. It shows me how sensitive God is to us, right where we are, even in a Mexican restaurant one particular day, one ordinary moment.

As she told the story, we then began to talk about the beauty of God right over the chips and salsa. Engaging conversation about the One we love. To gaze upon His beauty and to reflect His glory is what makes our hearts beat.

Shawn mentioned that it is a challenge to find beauty in life, with some places being harder to see His beauty than in other places. I wholeheartedly agree. While in Kenya, God told me to speak on beauty while ministering in the slum area of Eldoret. Beauty and the slums – quite a paradox. Hardly seems to go together. But, that day, His beautiful presence flowed out amidst poverty conditions. He makes all things beautiful and changes atmospheres in ordinary moments with ordinary people just as He did that day and just as He did while sitting in a Mexican restaurant eating tacos, chips and salsa.

Here’s some of Shawn’s words from an email. I think you will get the picture quite easily.

“…Some places and people groups just exude beauty and loveliness and it practically hits you in the face and surrounds you, engulfs you…others you have to search underneath, dig for the beauty…ask the Lord to show you where it is…. sometimes gritting your teeth…. but then you see it and sometimes this hidden beauty is more wondrous than the kind that smacks you in the face!

Oh, sometimes we are just covered in muck, and dirt…but we need the Father, Jesus and Holy Spirit eyes to see them/us washed and clean and the hidden treasure, just be one dot of light or the tiniest spark…..” in the midst of the moment.

Jesus is beautiful. When He is exalted through our lives, our conversation, our worship…the Father looks at us with loving affirmation speaking out, “This is my Son in whom I am well pleased.” God manifests His presence anywhere, at any time where the Son is glorified through our conversation or any number of outlets.

I picture Father God saying, “I love to see My Son honored and magnified. It brings such joy to my heart. Just keep talking.”

Then, Jesus smiles and flows into the midst of it all as Holy Spirit reveals the Son’s presence. All while eating chips and salsa, or watching holy moments on TV or anywhere for that matter…just an extraordinary God showing up in ordinary moments.

Each Friday I want to do something a bit different so I call one Friday a month “One Day” to see how God invades ordinary moments. Another Friday, I want to feature creativity in another aspect as I did in this blog about prophetic artist, Shari Breault. Each Friday, something different led by the Spirit. Enjoy!

In Christ,
Debra

I would love to speak at your conference, gathering, church or home group. Contact me here, on Facebook or on Twitter. Enjoy reading about Rivers of Eden and the Timeline of our Life!

Beauty – Inside Out…A Prophetic Insight For All of Us

Beauty in its outward form is always accepted, while beauty in its inward form is mostly rejected.

One is enhanced by the eternal. Do you know which one? Can you see?

Beauty flows out from an inner womb of transformation to BE….just to BE.

Yet, worldly heads turn with eyes open wide at what can easily be seen, their vision grafted into perverted perceptions and worldly distortions. They see but don’t see. They chase an illusion to try to obtain what is unobtainable. Ah, to be beautiful! To be seen! To be known is their cry.

I have another way for you today. Turn your focus in another direction with eyes of perception to see what can only be seen in Holy Spirit.

Holy…..Spirit. Not the spirit of the world. The Spirit of the Beautiful One – Jesus Christ.

Holy Spirit orchestrates beauty as an inner reality in Christ. Inner lives adorned and transformed from the inside out. Gaze upon the One who is beauty – Jesus Christ.

Though outwardly rejected in His time, He inwardly reflected heaven’s glory for those who would truly see. A life ravished by the violent apprehension of the cross, beauty marred and distorted yet necessary to bring us into glory…into beauty as sons and daughters. Do you see?

Beauty in our identity in Christ, destined to also go through the sufferings of the world – its rejection, its provocation, its disdain, its contempt toward us. In ascribing its own definition of beauty, it fails to see what is right before their eyes. How often the world hurls insults at our lives in Christ.

But then our revelation of resurrection. There’s always a resurrection for those who desire to see and to be.

The inner revelation of our eternal beauty is worked out in the midst of darkness and oppression. We rise up right in the midst of this darkness as a Bride, clothed in glory with heaven’s beauty.

Now. Not someday. Now.

Getting past our own limitations and our own imaginations, we begin to truly see ourselves from within……in Christ. And in this, the world soon loses its hold on our identity. We see. We know.

Comprehend the beauty that lives within us. Understand the flow, form and function in our lives. Creative expression in Christ.

Look at the darkness. Look at it closely. It cannot comprehend this beauty, yet it is fearful of its reality. The darkness consistently tries to keep us in the shadows…away from the light that reveals who is inside, who we are…….in Christ.

So come out from the shadow today all you beautiful sons and daughters of the Most High God. Gaze upon His beauty. Reflect His glory. Now.

 

In Christ,
Debra
About Me
Rivers of Eden Ministry

Beauty – The Master Craftsman At Work

The work of the master craftsman (Jesus) flowed through the artisans to build the tabernacle. The glory of the tabernacle revealed the beauty and majesty of God. My passion direction right now is the restoration of not only creativity to the church but also beauty.

Moses told the Israelites, “See, God has selected Bezalel son of Uri, son of Hur, of the tribe of Judah. 31 He’s filled him with the Spirit of God, with skill, ability, and know–how for making all sorts of things, 32 to design and work in gold, silver, and bronze; 33 to carve stones and set them; to carve wood, working in every kind of skilled craft. 34 And he’s also made him a teacher, he and Oholiab son of Ahisamach, of the tribe of Dan. 35 He’s gifted them with the know–how needed for carving, designing, weaving, and embroidering in blue, purple, and scarlet fabrics, and in fine linen. They can make anything and design anything. (Exodus 35:30-35 Message)

These artisans were chosen by God, filled with the Spirit, and followed the blueprints of the Lord given to Moses to build a habitation for His glory. Through the excellence of their anointing, they created something beautiful under heaven’s directive.

All of this is now fully realized in the very person of Christ. He tabernacles among us full of grace and truth and beauty. His life was a beautiful expression of the Father’s glory. And now, after His resurrection and ascension….He lives in us by His Spirit. What is that saying? Quite simply. Our lives are the creative expression of Christ Jesus in the earth, fashioned after the blueprint of heaven, guided by Holy Spirit to show forth His glory in the earth through our lives. The Master Craftsman forms and fashions us according to the blueprint of heaven.

And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth. (John 1:14 NKJVS)

As He dwells among us, He tabernacles with us, in union with us, in our salvation. We are carriers of His glory full of grace, divine creative expression and beauty in a life sold out for Jesus Christ. We are walking habitations of His glory, a living tabernacle displaying the beauty of the Lord through our lives. We are creative. We also hunger deep inside for beauty in our lives.

Each of us, uniquely expressing a life of beauty through a life lived in the Spirit of God. This creative beauty flows through our hands, our mouth, our minds, our hearts to raise up a habitation of His glory so the world will stop and see the glory of the Lord manifested in the earth……..through us. Beauty? It’s essential.

In Christ,
Debra
About Me
Rivers of Eden Ministry