Wisdom-Spiritual Riches I

Wisdom  for the day

As a young mum of 5, I had a deep hunger to know the best way to mould and care for my babies.

Materialistically, I had grown up with little and still had about that, but I started to explore God’s wisdom to find the answers and guidance I sought. I studied what I found in the Bible but also relied a lot on the wonderful connection I felt between me and God and His love for me.

The following passages became mantra-like for me. To know that I’d been granted access to the same forces that framed the universe gave me incredible inspiration.

Pr3:19-20

“BY wisdom the Lord laid the Earth’s foundations, and by understanding He set the heavens in place.

By knowledge the mountains were formed and the clouds let drop their dew.”

Pr 24:3-4

“By wisdom a house is built & by understanding it is established

                By knowledge its rooms are filled with rare and beautiful treasures.”

I concluded from these verses that God had given me the exact same abilities to raise my family (build my house) as he used to create perfection in the universe. And in James we read that we can simply ask God if we find ourselves in need of wisdom and he’ll freely give it to us (Jam 1:5)

Obviously wisdom is more than a lofty ideal. It has potent practical application.

Wisdom at the beginning of all things

Just as Pr 3 states, wisdom was from the beginning. The book of Proverbs espouses the countless benefits of walking in wisdom’s counsel. Silver, gold, honour, long life, health, safety, practical knowledge and rewarding relationships are ALL listed as blessings offered through Wisdom. Who of us doesn’t want these things and yet how often we ignore what’s available to us in the form of Wisdom, in order to acquire them? Or try to find other places that share some of these truths without encountering God because Ego doesn’t want to face Judgment. But Truth is God. Eternal. Unchanging.

Of course, it isn’t about knowing the theory of wisdom, it is about reshaping one’s beliefs to harmonise with this Logic of God. And when a person starts out on that path, that’s when he finds just how much he has been alienating himself from the Truths of God’s wisdom, understanding and knowledge. Prov 2 and Prov 8 are particularly good for a description of and the benefits surrounding Wisdom. And also the level of dedication it takes to attain her company and blessing. Nothing short of your complete commitment will yield these returns. Total alignment-and once aligned...the rest follows.

No Punishment Today

Proverbs 1:7 opens with the concept that the “fear of the Lord is the beginning of Wisdom” but ‘fear’ here is referred to “a reverential respect” for God and his ways...not a terror of being punished by him. God isn’t punishing anyone at this point and if anyone tells you differently, you can say that Jesus bore the punishment of ALL of, not only your past , present and future “sin”, but everyone’s past, present and future shortcomings! Anyone willing to accept this can be free of judgment, come boldly to God’s throne of Grace and experience God’s peace.

And then, on the other hand, if you encounter someone who tells you there’s no need to receive forgiveness then evaluate the fruit of their self worth.

Perhaps some can find a way to get free of judgment another way, but I’ve not really encountered it. Somewhere along the line, I find people come to a place where they can’t forgive themselves and so suffer self inflicted guilt. This is the guilt that destroys us.  Telling oneself it’s ok is not the same as freedom-trust me!

The antidote to a poor self worth is being LOVED as you are. God does this but if he hadn’t provided a gateway for man to approach him, we would still be running and hiding like Adam, when God wanted to come and commune with us. Because we feel GUILTY!

 We can’t even reason WHY we feel bad, or why we feel the need to justify. The mind and heart become an endless labyrinth-an abyss of rationalisms. Personally, I gave up trying to understand and just accepted that I can enjoy freedom from judgment without having to analyse it, by surrendering to Wisdom.

To accept this “wisdom of God” opened my heart and keeps it open to receive whatever other insights I need to live well.

To Live As I Was Designed

So I believe I was created and fashioned to live as a mini version of God, co-creating together with God using the laws he established through wisdom , understanding and knowledge ( AKA law of Attraction/ Love). In French, “knowledge” is translated “la science”. I love this as it signifies the affinity rather than enmity of God and Science. Religion and Science have had issues, but the truth about God is SCIENCE. Science just takes a little while to catch up and make instruments that measure what was previously “invisible”.

I want the wealth God intended for me...all of it! And every kind of it promised to those who walk with Wisdom.

Living True
Since I started song-writing years ago, I have found that my songs, much like my drawings and my writing have carried a strong creative element. That is, I see them become real in my life.
Some would call them prophetic but because I understand how we can intentionally design our lives, I see them very much as tools for creating-more like ‘self fulfilling prophecies’. That’s not their only purpose but it sure is a potent one.

It could be this way for me because my talents have always been about tapping into the inner font and been an overflow expression of my heart. Not contrived for any reason or motive other than to say what’s in my heart.  And  the most impacting work is work that comes from the heart. But when is aligned to God...now, that’s when you get something incredible!


My Singing & Song-writing
How I Love You Lord
The very condensed version of how I began singing and song-writing follows:
When I was 5 and watching two sisters up the front of my kindergarten class singing together, I heard a Voice. It was the same Voice that I’d known for years and one with whom I shared regular dialogue.  Even as a 5yr old, I’d already begun to receive wisdom and insight that was so incredible. God was very real to me. And very close.


This Voice spoke and said “You’re going to be a famous singer”. I simply thought, “Ok!” I had no reason to doubt and immediately began to sing and performed later that year for the first time. After that, crowds of people would gather around me at school, so I could sing for them and I was brought before the entire school assembly to sing, unaccompanied, to them.


I even learnt to read through my singing by asking my sister to write out words to songs and as I learnt the songs, I could read and learn the words.


So, obviously, I had a love for music.


Life got even messier and the opportunity to sing, being always portable, was ever present, but access to instruments was not a priority. For 6 months only, when I was 11, I had access to a piano and began teaching myself. I didn’t gain access again until 12 years later, when I bought myself one.


It came into my life at the same time that I re-committed MY life to God, and to His truth,  in a life changing way. I still couldn’t play but suddenly I heard songs in my head and I could sit at my piano and play them in different keys until I settled on one. Song-writing and piano playing were a gift that flowed straight from the heart of my connection with God. Turned on like a tap. And they were all love songs between me and God.
That’s how it started and it seemed that God redeemed the time, bringing me and my abilities up to where they would have been , had I had access to a piano all along. Only now, it was so much more amazing.


Living True


All that simply to introduce this song I wrote called “How I Love You Lord”. I wrote it mid 1995 but it has been reignited in me and is fanning the flame of the Fires of God within me, reminding me of my purpose and my path and strengthening me in that way.


And as I sing it over and over, rededicating my  heart, I feel such a radiance glowing within and such a firmness beneath my feet that I feel sorry so many people have never known this type of experience with God. And due to previous bad experience are closed off to having it.


I pray this song ministers the beauty of the truth in being enveloped in love with God and draws you deeper into the Secret Place where He awaits you.


Song Lyrics- How I Love you Lord
HOW, HOW I LOVE YOU LORD
WITH ALL MY HEART
WITH ALL OF MY MIND, SOUL, AND STRENGTH
AND I WILL SERVE YOU MY DAYS
AND IN ALL MY WAYS
ACKNOWLEDGING MY  PATH  BEFORE  YOU

AND I WILL GIVE MY ALL FOR YOU
ALL THAT I AM 
AND ALL THAT I DO
HOLDING NOTHING BACK
SURRENDERING IT ALL FREELY UNTO YOU
TO FULFILL YOUR CALL

AS I LIVE MY LIFE IN YOU
GIVE ALL FOR YOUR TRUTH
THAT OTHERS MAY KNOW YOU
AND YOU WILL GLORIFY YOUR NAME

IN THIS FLESH AGAIN
THAT OTHERS MAY KNOW YOU
AND I LAY DOWN MY LIFE IN YOU
NO OTHER IS AS TRUE
JESUS, I LOVE YOU
SO NOW, GLORIFY YOUR NAME 
IN THIS FLESH AGAIN
THAT OTHERS MAY KNOW YOU

writtten and performed by Lisa Shah C 1995

On Being In Love

God is Love. Whoever lives in love lives in God and God in him.-I Jn 4: 16b

When a person  is in love, they are engaging with God on a different level.

Love has to be both one of the singularly most misunderstood states on the planet , yet the most universally and profoundly grasped concept of humankind.

This Love is agape (Gk- a-ga-pay)

Relationships are the ultimate place to give and receive love. But broken people cannot give or receive love easily. When God\'s love is shed abroad in the human heart, bringing healing,love can flourish freely and fearlessly."
Agape is the daddy of all loves and at different times is given expression in all the other delightful forms we have come to think of as 'love' (and many we have not!).  But the premium, set apart quality of Agape is that it "seeks nothing in return". This kind of love , in whichever form it is expressed longs only to be expressed. It lives only to be surrendered and even so, loses nothing of itself in the doing so. It preserves all parties intact whilst simultaneously having the ability to make whole those that are broken. Where it is received, rocks sing-believe it!

This kind of Love is too good to be true!

But it is true!

The Love of God is the creative force of the universe. It sustains all things and is the energy that IS all things, including the space between all things.

The wisest thing I ever did was believe that God was in love with me. It turned my world upside down and inside out and connected me with a Presence that I could literally feel delighting in my company.

"Listen, o daughter, consider and give ear.

Forget your people and your father's house.

The king is enthralled with your beauty

Honour him, for he is your Lord" Ps 45:10-11

The king is enthralled by my beauty...wow!

The first verses that came alive to me from my Bible, were all like this, telling me of how intoxicatingly in love with me God is. Not with a love like anything I'd known (Ez 16:1-14). Not to use me or abuse me or exploit me or jealously possess me but to adore me, uplift me, adorn me, honour me. As I gazed upon His beauty, drawn in by his love, he showed me a truer reflection of myself and I fell in love again( 2 Cor 3:18. I love the "love version of Lisa". I choose to live there! That's what I call "Agapeism" now. It takes a bit of practise, but the more I see how God loves me and believe it, the more  those same beautiful qualities flow from deep within me, where God and I play together in the garden (SS 4:15-5:1).

About 25 years ago, as I rode a train through Sydney's inner west, I was quietly conversing with God. At one point I asked for reassurance saying "If I could just know that you love me..." ( As in feel it as real) At that moment, I looked up and out the window. We were passing flat concrete blank walls of old terraces backing up to the railway line. Blank , that is, but for the graffiti. And there before me, sliding by on a wall, these words:

"I Love you, Lisa"

I was flooded with the experience of KNOWING God's love for me again, just as I was the first time I read Ps 45:10-11 and felt the inner witness of it being spoken right then to me. I can choose to relive the reality of this love in my emotions as often as I please.  And I do. And so, more 'love notes' come in a variety of expressions. God loves me! I'm a being in the state of love and a love-being, a god-being and have my being in God. And I'm enveloped in love, one with God in this love state of being.

I believe God has given me the gift of being able to help others experience this truth in a deep, life changing, soul healing and undeniable way and I intend to do just that. So, to "whosoever will" out there who wants to know God's love for them this way...hang around. I guarantee, if this is your desire and if you hunger for it, you will be filled.

Lisa IN Oz

I'm A Believer

I'm sitting on my deck. 


The deck that looks out across the road to the beautiful beach of Burleigh.
I spent a year cultivating the right "vibe" -or faith, if you like- to move into this dream of wanting to be living beachside.


My decision to be consistent to walk the beach every day  (from mid Feb 2010)was part of making "real" that element of my desired life.


So many other wonderful benefits, pleasures, artworks, blogs, vlogs, radio shows and insights came as a result of the year that followed. You can find many on this site as well. They document the journey under the main title of DIY Designer Living.


Another Year...


So, I moved into my place but then felt somewhat lost.
The work contracts ( singing/playing) I had started to ebb and things became very tight.This happened at a time when my youngest two ( and last remaining at home of 5)children moved out. I had looked forward to the extra $$ to save for a trip overseas and to spend on all sorts of things I'd never had.


Because money dried up, I was forced again to think about to generate more and nothing that I used to do or had previously done was getting any results. I was losing interest in trying and even doing it, if it came. Some thing needed to shift.


However, even if work had continued, I would still have felt plagued by the same inner question that had walked with me ALL my days. And it wasn't so much "Why am I here?" as much as it was "What does it actually look like when I'm fulfilling this 'why?' "

I knew it was spiritual. I knew it was mentoring, musical, artistic and I knew I could help people locate, live and flourish authentically.Since I really didn't know how to walk this out given my life as it had become, I was equally more perplexed than ever.

Two Degrees Off Truth

You see, the only place I'd ever felt was "right" was when I was worshipping God and sharing how his Wisdom was changing my life. When I left church, ten years ago, I was at a loss as to where/how to sue these gifts that were so obviously for "The Body Of Christ"

Aaah...(shaking my head) it suddenly seems so obvious.

I had not seen this quite this way before.

This is why I couldn't get this stuff to function to any great degree anywhere else. I tried the Corporate World. I tried New Age Circles. I tried Network Marketing and Social Media. I tried study and teaching...nothing "took" and certainly nothing took my heart. They were all  "two degrees off My truth" 

Three times in just the last few days, I have been referred to as "a gift" to the Body. The minister on Sunday, pointed me out, spoke of my "ministry" and said "Lisa is a gift" given to help lead people into the Presence of God.

That same day, another lay minister wrote of me saying:

         "When Lisa is singing praise & worship she effortlessly carries you along into the tangible     prescence of God. It is not something learned or even practised but a true gift given to the body of Christ." 

And what it has just prompted in me is a reminding that I have repeatedly said over this past week, that "the gift has always made a way". But the gift is not just what I do ...it is WHO I AM.

The reason I have never felt like a proper fit in any of the many other places it seems I would be a great fit, is because I am a gift to the Body of Christ. I am a ministry gift.

:-)

And why does this help me so much right now? (As revelation always does-helps now!) It makes it easy for me to see and understand "WHO" I need to focus on. In business terms, you could say my "target market". I know who it is I am talking to/for /with.

I was trying to overhaul my website but couldn't even get started. Now, it will be much easier.

 It's so funny how we can "know" something but then we can "see and know" it more and it brings faith and empowerment, insight and instruction. I knew I felt called back to ministry and in a much more significant way but thinking of myself as "a gift to the Body" really sheds a light on this in a more profound way.                        Another point that had been percolating around inside me was the understanding of commitment and that it cannot help but promote exclusivity.                       The Whole idea of "niche marketing" is based upon this premise. You become the expert of your chosen field. I could never decided how to select and define that for myself. But I always knew...it's worship. And it's obvious that worship doesn't really relate to anyone but those that know and love God as father.  It just wouldn't mean anything to anyone else.  And did you know that Gods seeks  worshippers who worship Him in spirit and in truth? Jn 4:23 God SEEKS them!

"Do not take the children's bread and give it to the dogs". The term "dog" simply refers to those outside the covenant and was quoted by Jesus in reference to the distinction between Jews and Gentiles. After Jesus' death and resurrection the covenant would be open to all but in this passage, the Gentile Jesus was addressing answered , "Yes Lord, but even the dog gets the crumbs that fall from the Master's table." That man received his desire. Jesus ministered to any and ALL that came to him but He was sent to the children of Isreal-those under the Law first.       

It's easy enough for anyone to become a "child" now and participate in the covenant God has made with Jesus, sealed in his own  blood.

In understanding myself as "a gift to the Body", I know exactly who I'm speaking to and what my words should do-and my being is flooded with that wonderful sense of his Blessed Assurance once more.

:-)

Emergence of Love's Full Bloom

The Proof is in the Pudding
This week I have had the enormous pleasure of grasping truths that I have long sought to master.

Many years ago, when I was 16 ( 3 decades!), I had to walk home to my mother's house in the dark. I was always terribly afraid, when I was young, of being abducted, raped...hurt etc. There were reasons why I had this fear, but I wanted to be free of it.

I didn't have to walk a long way, but it was late, and over a creek bridge, and past parkland. I wanted to run all the way, but as I went, I remembered a song I'd learnt as a 10 yr old. It went like this:
"If you know the Lord,
you need nobody else,
to see you through the darkest night.
You can walk alone.
You only need the Lord.
he'll keep you on the Road marked Right
Take time to pray, every day,
and when you're heading home, He'll show you the way.
if you know the Lord,
you need nobody else
to see the light, his wonderful light."

I guess you could say this became the theme of my life.

I always loved God. ALways talked to him, and heard him speak to me, from when I was really young. As I sang this song, I MADE myself walk. "If I believe really believe this. " i told myself, "then I don't have to run".

I still felt scared, but I SOOO wanted to believe.

LESSON LEARNT

The reason I bring this up here, is because I spent all those years, a little at a time, a layer at a time, working that faith through my entire psyche. My whole life has been about proving to myself that I really believe what I believe. I tested myself, over and over, pushed myself to prove to myself that I trusted the goodness of God. That I would give ALL believing, rather than accept fear and doubt.

I want to learn. I want to grow. I want to expand and be more than I am NOW...always.
I'm addicted to stretching and challenging myself to believe MORE, BIGGER, FURTHER.
I know it's all about LOVE. About Agape. "There is no fear in love, for perfect Love drives out fear".

I remember a moment, when I said "God, I just wanna be in love!" I wanted to feel alive and happy and exhilerated and passionate. Now, if you know me, you'd know that's how I live, but I needed a new level. I always need a new level. Always so hungry.
Not for anyone, or anything...from within, for God. For LOVE.
"Whoever lives in love, lives in God and God in him"
Being ONE with Source has been my conscious lifelong endeavour. God/Love is always the answer to every question for me.
I am a worshipper.
I am not 'religious', or 'pious' as most would think it, but I am devoted to being in total harmony with Source/the Universe/God, and I have known the sweetest place in his heart, in that state. I have felt so known and adored by God. Even so, it has taken me all this time, to come to a place, where I feel like I am working together with God, without resistence. I am empty of it. I see it now, and let it go.

It was a process of layers, recognising fear, and yeilding, and I didn't do as well as I wanted, coz I still felt the fear. Then , I discovered that I could cease resisting fear, and that has been the freedom I sought.

Understanding how resistence has played a part in perpetuating the things I so feared, or worried about,and then, learning to really 'read' the signs that revealed resistence for what it was, these have been golden lanterns on my path.

This whole exercise has been about being fully love.

For so long I have looked for this moment. For so long, I have wanted to BE where I am NOW.
And I'm not suggesting that my growth in any way is done, but this state of "righteousness", this state of KNowing I am ONE with God, and that all He is, is me, and all I am is him...this fullness that I now LIVE in (most of the time), it is my DREAM COME TRUE.

Everything that it makes available is well and good, and empowers me to minister these Truths much more effectively, but nothing compares, for me, to where I find myself with God and the worshipper's heart that I've known has exploded in a whole new way.
I'm in love...again...and even more deeply.