Tag Archives: faith

Agent of Change or Compliance

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I’ve already confessed to being an analytical thinker. It’s who I am and I blame God for it 😉 He’s also responsible for the huge gift of sarcasm that has landed with me.

What He hasn’t given me enough of is the gift of hospitality. Perhaps it is because I’m too busy assessing my surroundings or off in a “what if” scenario to give adequate attention to comforting people to make them feel welcome and invited. But just because I have been seemingly overlooked by God with that gift doesn’t mean that I don’t appreciate it when I see it in others.

When a gifted person is put in the right situations to express their giftedness, it is a beautiful thing. (Except of course when it comes to being a prophet. That’s only beautiful to God as evidenced by how often the prophets were persecuted throughout history.)

I have a bit of a dilemma that I’m willing to share with you. Know that it requires me to be vulnerable so give me a break going into this dialog. As a prophet, God usually sends me to a church as an agent of change. That agenda can be awkward for everyone. God will not allow me to be a member of a church where false doctrine is being knowingly taught. But I so miss Christian community and family. As you might imagine, I spend a lot of time alone until God sends me for a specific purpose.

There is a ladies’ Bible study starting this week that I would like to attend with God’s permission. It is at a church that seems to not treat women as less-than beings. I want to attend as a woman, not as a prophet, but God has cautioned that it may place me in a conflict-of-interest position. Can I blend in when God wants me set apart? It’s easy to follow God’s instructions when He sends me, but very difficult when He later holds me back from the people that I have formed a connection with. I’m not sure that I know how to do this.

The dilemma is do I attempt to do this thing or should I just stay in my own lane. I can certainly study the Bible with God alone at home. Should I risk my heart in community or just be content where things are? Do I risk possible punishment from God for wanting to be silent when I should speak? Is it silly for me to be so apprehensive about being truly welcomed. Perhaps it will take God telling me that I must go before I can step confidently in that direction. He has no problem with that technique at most other times. Could He want me to be reluctant? Am I being too analytical when I should just accept hospitality?

Perhaps I should just keep talking to God about this until there is peace. Why isn’t there peace?

Visions To His Prophet

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There have been many times in my years as a prophet when God has given me visions. I even once had a vision of the Rapture and Jesus ascending on the clouds. While that may or may not actually happen in my lifetime, it doesn’t change God’s choice to use me as His prophet.

The apostle Paul believed that the return of Christ was imminent. That belief did not cause Paul to be a false apostle even though it did not take place in his lifetime. God often works with His apostles and prophets vastly different than He does with other Christian leaders. There are times when He wants us to have an urgency to deliver the message. At times, He wants us to inspect our standing with Him and how it affects the current generation. While visions can be very clearly seen, their meaning is often meant to spur the apostle or prophet forward more than to predict the future.

The book of Revelation was a vision delivered through John. He saw things that would actually come to pass but not in his lifetime. Some of those things were happenings in the spiritual realm rather than the physical realm. That those things didn’t happen in his lifetime, did not disqualify the message as being from God. Isaiah’s prophecies about the coming Christ were hundreds of years before Jesus appeared in flesh. It did not invalidate Isaiah’s standing as a prophet that Christ did not appear in his lifetime.

God often talks to me about President Trump, not because I will effect the outcomes of what Trump will do or ever even speak to the man. God wants me to be aware of what He is doing through the president of our country. Many of the prophets of old did deliver messages to the kings of Israel. And God has had me deliver a few messages to President Trump in the form of letters, emails, and workbooks that I created. Whether or not Trump ever actually saw those things doesn’t have anything to do with what God was doing through me. He told me to do something specific and I did it. That’s where my responsibility ends until God tells me to pursue it further or to do something additional. (I have received a few short typed letters with Trump’s signature, but that doesn’t mean anything necessarily.) One email from me with a message from God warned Trump of a betrayal that was coming … and it did happen.

When God asks you to do something, it’s often more about you learning to obey God, to be right where He wants you, or to demonstrate an ability that He has given you. God saw everything about your life before He even created you to live it. He knows the beginning from the end.

A prophet never really knows at the time if God is giving future insight or checking the heart of His prophet. God has told me that Trump will not serve for his entire second term and it haunts me because I have grown to highly respect and even love the man. That may not be a future prediction. It may be about causing my heart to stay involved in what Trump is accomplishing. That’s what I hope it is. Either way God chooses what He tells His prophet and how He tells the prophet to deliver the message. Whether it is a warning that comes to pass or not isn’t what is important to God. We can assess in hindsight some of the behind the scenes things that could have been going on. Read about Jonah. Jonah delivered a message that was meant to change hearts, not to predict the future.

Women Or Not?

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How can you know your church’s doctrine about women in ministry? Most denominations have a position either for or against women in leadership. There are a few questions that you can ask to determine where your church or denomination stands on the subject.

Does my church allow for a women’s ministry leader?

Does my church allow for women ministers to teach adult men?

Does my church ever have a woman teaching from the pulpit if men are present? (Not the same thing as a woman giving announcements or reading a Scripture. However, some denominations refuse for a woman to do those things or to lead prayer if a man is present in the audience.)

Does my church expect that men are superior and head the household rather than Jesus as the head of the household?

Does my church allow for women pastors and elders?

You might be surprised at how many churches locally do not allow for women to be equal to men in ministry. God sees everything. He will withhold His supernatural anointing on men in those churches and pour them out the women who honor Him. It’s no wonder that those pastors don’t hear God and why God has to send a woman prophet to point out their false teaching. I’m just saying that those men need to get their head out of their own butt long enough to realize that God is not playing games with this. Seek God and know His will.

I will put a link below as an example of how to google search certain denominations and their doctrinal stance. Check and see if your church sees you as a less-than because you are a woman. Who would want to be part of that? Why would you give money in the offering to a church that teaches falsely?

(I typed into Google search “Does Calvary Chapel allow women pastors?” and the AI response was: “No, the official position of the Calvary Chapel Association and CGN is that they do not permit women in the senior leadership offices of pastor or elder, as they interpret scripture to reserve these roles for qualified men. While women can hold other leadership positions, evangelize, and disciple others, they are not allowed to serve as the public, doctrine-setting, governing authority over a mixed-gender congregation.”) The link is on my Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/tammie.edwards.100

“It’s A Bug, Not A Monster”

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I have always had an irrational fear of bugs. I hate those ugly things and don’t want them anywhere near me. The fear is completely foolish. I could destroy them easily and have many times. But, let’s face it nobody wants to see a big roach when they get up in the night to go to the bathroom. Who could sleep after that?

Well, several weeks ago, I caught a glimpse of something moving in my peripheral vision when I was up in the night. So, I slept on the couch with the lights on. I admit it. I’m a wimp with these sort of things. I can be a mighty warrior in the spiritual realm and still have irrational fear in the physical realm.

Last night I saw a tiny bug moving on the floor when I was in the bathroom. It was a baby roach and he/she had a few siblings. I was thoroughly disgusted not so much by the tiny bugs but by the idea that there was a bigger bug lurking somewhere that had spawned the smaller ones. I flushed the little ones smooshed in toilet paper, but it couldn’t end there. Now I was on high alert for momma bug. She was going to meet her maker if I had my way.

When I laid back in bed, completely stressed, I heard the Lord say “It’s a bug, not a monster”. He continued to reason with me that it doesn’t have teeth. It can’t harm me. It is more afraid of me than I am of it. Seriously, just turning a light on causes it to look for a means of escape. That one stupid bug has managed to torment me without me ever even seeing it. I’ve been unreasonably aware. Despite God’s reasoning, I don’t think anything has changed. Every light in the place will go on for my nighttime bathroom visit. There’s going to be all out warfare if it makes itself known.

Of course, God couldn’t waste an uncomfortable scenario to teach me something greater. How often do we have irrational fears over the trials in our lives? I’m a very analytical person. That can be a good thing, but it can also be a fear-inducing bad thing. Analytical people typically jump to the worst case scenario first. As in the example above, my analytical thinker was jumping to the idea that the bug in question would crawl on me while I was sleeping. I wasn’t worried about it biting me or attacking me. I was afraid of it being near me. It sounds silly, but we all do a similar thing when we worry about things unreasonably. And yes, I do realize that a cancer diagnosis is a bigger thing than a bug being near you, but jumping to worst case scenarios can overemphasize fear and distort what’s true.

Last month, I was sick for nearly a week. I was having fever, nausea, and burning pain in the esophagus. It caused me to have no appetite, which was a good thing since I had no food in the house and no strength to go to the grocery store. My usual go-to people were all out of town on vacations and travel. I had hours of laying around questioning why God had allowed me to be sick. I continually asked God if I had done something wrong and He answered that I had done His will exactly. Listen, I hate being sick every bit as much as I hate bugs. Eventually, I drove myself to urgent care to get checked out and the doctor said that it was likely acid reflux. He gave me a prescription for Prilosec and one for nausea. Yuck! Did I mention that I hate being sick. But, and here’s the big but, I made it through. Was it uncomfortable? Yes. It was not how I wanted to spend my time. But I did make it through to the other side of that thing.

As I was on the mend, God finally gave me a different word about why I was sick. He said that it was a reset. Reset? It wasn’t punishment. It was a reset? I can analyze what that means (and I guess I’m supposed to since God won’t elaborate). So, one of the things that I’ve read about fasting from foods for health reasons is that fasting causes your body to eliminate certain toxins and can help prevent certain cancers, etc. Truly, if I hadn’t been sick, fasting for four days would have seemed unreasonable. And it still does. You see, my thought is that I have this God who could have prevented me from being sick then and in the future without me doing a thing. He’s all powerful. He’s the healer. He could have given my physical body a reset without putting me through the trial. But He didn’t. And He didn’t rid my home of that stupid bug that has stalked me in the dark either.

I know that there is a bigger picture that God is doing that He just won’t trust me with the details at the moment. I don’t like it, but I don’t have to. What am I going to do with God? I can’t spank Him when He doesn’t do things my way. He always has the final say and the final authority.

“It’s only a bug, not a monster.” That’s a saying that I need to remember for the next trial that is sure to come.

Pearls or Pigs?

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What is being communicated to us in this passage of Scripture?

“Do not give dogs what is sacred; do not throw your pearls to pigs. If you do, they may trample them under their feet, and turn and tear you to pieces.” (Matthew 7:6 NIV)

If you read the passage in context, it takes on a slightly different tone than when it stands alone. Can you always judge what are the pearls and what are the pigs? God can adequately judge heart motives, but can we?

Is anything sacred to the wrong people? I don’t feel like I can even enter a church service with any level of privacy these days. There are phone cameras everywhere as if God had ordained some to be videographers of tender moments of intimacy. In my opinion, it desecrates the sacred spaces and makes a spectacle of worship. But does God see something different when He looks at the individual heart motives of those same people? Maybe they just don’t understand boundaries, or maybe the culture has skewed their idea of privacy.

The passage mentions dogs. I love dogs in the right setting. But are you going to put your precious newborn baby alone in the same room with an animal that is known to bite when they are anxious? Probably not. That leads me to another boundary that people constantly cross with their dogs. Please, people don’t bring your dogs into a restaurant. Last night, my daughter and I went to eat at a local dining establishment. At the table right beside us was a family with a dog. The pet was positioned under the table and on a leash but he had its eyes on us during the entire meal. That’s not comfortable. But if you have no sense of compassion for other diners, then who cares?

In a society that seemingly has few boundaries, we can be positioned right next to someone who has severe hygiene issues, or who talks loudly on their phone in a public setting, or even one who is as high as a kite on street drugs or alcohol. At the laundromat yesterday, a mother ignored that her 4-year-old daughter was screeching every few seconds for the entire time. How is that being a good citizen to the other people who need to also use those facilities. It drained me of energy. I don’t even need to get started about people who play loud obnoxious music as if the whole world were their audience. I get it. You like crappy music but please go listen to it somewhere that I’m not.

Another thought. Is it right for a woman to wear revealing clothes around your teenage son or your husband? Yuck, I saw a woman walk into McDonalds wearing what could have passed for lingerie and there was absolutely nothing left to the imagination. She walked right in as though it was perfectly normal. I could see her bare breasts through the thin netted swimsuit coverup. What the heck?

Do you think that God has an opinion on any of those scenarios that I just described? Is He judging the heart motives to see if those are acts of selfishness or does He see a different picture that goes deeper? Does God see the heart of the ignorant false teacher? Does He excuse their stupidity because He can see beyond their current circumstances? Does He love them beyond their own vision of themselves and their surroundings? Or does He want them to change? What are the pearls and what are the pigs?

Listen, there are pastors that are going to tell you that God loves everyone exactly the same, or that God doesn’t have favorites (which is completely contradictory to what the Bible communicates, but oh well). The truth is that God wants us all to change. He wants us all to be mindful of His will. He wants us all to grow in maturity of character, even those of us who know we are His favorites.

“But, Let the one who boasts boast in the Lord. For it is not the one who commends himself who is approved, but the one whom the Lord commends.” (2 Corinthians 10:17-18 NIV)

Their Three Gods Aren’t Saying Much

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This morning, I was reading from the book of the prophet Isaiah. As I regularly read through the messages from the various prophets, I have to wonder if the local pastors ever actually read the words from the prophets. Are they ignorant to the warnings from God?

There are over 100 churches in this city. The Lord says that not one of them teaches correctly about who God is. How can not even one pastor know the truth about God? Some of them say that they hear God but then preach that there are three Gods (a trinity of Gods). How foolish is that?

For about 8,030 days (22 years), I have been hearing God’s voice all day, every day. Yet, the pastors, who admit that they only hear God once in a while or a few times in their lifetimes, refuse the words that God delivers through me. They have convinced themselves that God is not one God but instead three-1/3 Gods that make up a godhead. Why don’t they have eyes to see just how stupid that doctrine is?

Why do they call God a liar? God said (as recorded in Isaiah 43:10 NIV) “ ‘You are my witnesses,’ declares the LORD, ‘and my servant whom I have chosen, so that you may know and believe me and understand that I am he. Before me no god was formed, nor will there be one after me.'”

No God before or after seems pretty clear. So why do they insist that Jesus is a separate God sitting next to the primary God? In my opinion, it’s because they’re idiots. But at the very least, it has to be that they don’t know God. If they knew God, then they would know that He is the only God. Certainly, God could choose to open their eyes and reveal Himself to them. What is He waiting for? Is He waiting for them to humble themselves and admit that they have not sought Him to know His identity.

Jesus said this: (red letter words) “You study the Scriptures diligently because you think that in them you have eternal life. These are the very Scriptures that testify about me, yet you refuse to come to me to have life.” (John 5:39-40 NIV)

I’m eagerly awaiting for one of the local pastors to truly come to know God. In that intimacy with God, I hope they will learn true doctrine. I want a church family but I refuse to be part of a church that teaches falsely. God wouldn’t allow it! He wants more for me than that. I don’t know why He doesn’t seem to care about the congregants of all the local churches enough to forbid them from participating in false religion. That’s His business, not mine.

Go-Bag?

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Hurricanes, floods, tornadoes, fires, plagues and wars can leave us in helpless situations. How do we prepare for the unexpected?

We can’t entirely trust the news, weather forecasts, or vaccines to get us where we need to be. God is the only one who has sovereign knowledge of what’s happening, when and where. No weather radio is going to give us the guidance that God can.

There have been times in my life, when God had me prepare in unusual ways for unexpected events. Mostly it was hindsight that illuminated how His direction provided security or escape. One scenario comes to mind because it was so obvious when the situation played out. It’s been more than a decade ago since this story took place but it was clearly divine provision that has become a memorial stone for me. One day, God told me to make an extra set of all my keys: car, home, and office and to put the keys in my car. It was a simple enough direction from God, and of course I did it. The very same week, because of an unexpected once-in-a-lifetime occurrence, I was thankful that God had given me that exact instruction. God foreknew what would take place and that His provision would be an obvious sign to me that He was leading me. God knew in advance that I would be falsely accused and that the person holding my keys would refuse to return them on my release. I had a spare door key to my car in my wallet and a full set of new keys to everything else hidden inside my car. God’s advance instructions provided an escape from the enemy’s plans against me and proof that He was on my side.

God provided much more for me during that very difficult time in my life and I know I could never thank Him enough for His watchful care. But I know too that my obedience played an important part in my safety. I would be lost without hearing God’s voice. Are you hours or days away from your biggest trial? Are you constantly listening to and obeying God’s instructions? Will you be ready for what’s ahead?

What should you place in that “Go” Bag?

What Is Your Reputation With God?

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“To the angel of the church in Sardis write: These are the words of him who holds the seven spirits of God and the seven stars. I know your deeds; you have a reputation of being alive, but you are dead.” (Revelation 3:1 NIV)

Notice those words “you have a reputation of being alive, but you are dead”? How haunting that must have been to have heard that God saw that church’s reputation as the opposite of what mankind saw it. It was a dead church to God!

The next verse says “Wake up! Strengthen what remains and is about to die, for I have found your deeds unfinished in the sight of my God.” The warning words continue with a need to repent or there will be great consequences.

The Pharisees had seats of honor and great reputations at the exact same time that they crucified Jesus. Can a reputation among men ever be more important to God than teaching true doctrine? Can group consensus ever take the place of seeking God and knowing His heart?

Yesterday, I listened to a sermon online by a local pastor who is determined that group consensus of like-minded people is more important than hearing God speak on a subject. The pastor seems sure that God wants to be left out as long as the pastor can find a number of people who agree with him on his false trinity doctrine. Listen, the Muslims can find plenty of people to agree with their false religion. So can the Buddhists. And likewise, the Mormons and Catholics have large congregations and leaders who believe false doctrine to be true. And so it is with the false doctrines in the Christian church. Anyone can interpret the Scriptures as they see fit and find a following, hence the various denominations in the Christian churches.

If you believe that God speaks, why is He not your top priority for knowing true doctrine? I really want to know.

Faithfulness OR Deliverance

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Three years ago, I completed the magazine edition “Discipleship & Deliverance” (cover photo attached). At the time, God was waking me up in the early morning hours every day to focus on the work. While I love to be completely immersed in God’s efforts to help this generation, He was pushing me very hard to get it exactly right and on a quick timeline. My thought at the time was that there was someone who needed a “NOW” word from God on the subject. Only 10 copies were printed, though, and I never received any feedback from those who received the copies. I did, however, post pages online regularly but would have no way of knowing for sure who or how many saw the pages through social media sites.

Now, please understand, deliverance is a topic that requires great confidentiality. The devil would love to destroy the credibility of anyone who undergoes the process of turning from the kingdom of darkness to the kingdom of light. Deliverance is about restoring a broken covenant relationship.

This morning, God and I talked while I ate breakfast in my van down by the river, again. He had me take notes on my phone so that I would remember specifics about the conversation. Here is what I recorded:

(For context: I asked the Lord what was His favorite thing about me. He answered that my “faithfulness” was beautiful. There was a quick discussion about how faith and faithfulness were not the same thing. While I have great faith, it was loyalty that He was addressing.)

Faithfulness means that you don’t need to second guess everything because you have an immediate attitude of obedience. But that doubtless loyalty only comes when you are sure that you are hearing God’s voice. Once you know God’s voice (from the voice of the enemy), it is much easier to move forward without doubt. This is why learning to discern God’s voice with precision is so important and why relationship is not the same as religion. It’s why false teachers need to learn to recognize the voice of God clearly so that they can change their teaching to true doctrine.

God doesn’t have a problem with as many questions as necessary for you to have confidence in following His direction. He constantly knows your heart so you might as well reveal your doubts when you have them. But that conversation does not let you off the hook for obedience. You cannot be loyal without obedience.

Bogus Thoughts?

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“’For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,’ declares the LORD.” (Isaiah 55:8 NIV)

Throughout the more than 20 years of hearing God’s voice in prayer, the Lord has told me many things that I would rather have not heard. I guess that I could have pretended that I didn’t hear Him, but that would have likely resulted in actually not hearing His voice going forward.

One specific thing that I have heard the Lord tell me was to distance myself from a family member who is always surrounded in drama and betrayal. The term “no good deed goes unpunished” is exactly right when it comes to that family member. She just can’t help herself. One of my siblings insists that God would never tell me to distance myself from her. As if he, who has only heard God say a few words in his lifetime, would know what God would want for me personally. So let’s hypothesize for a moment what would happen if I chose to ignore God and instead listen to my brother’s instruction. Aside from making my brother a mini-god, I would lose connection to the one true God. I would stop hearing God’s voice because I would have chosen to disobey God and honor my brother above God.

Does God have a purpose for telling me to distance myself from a family member? I could quote Jesus in Luke 14:26 (“If anyone comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters—yes, even their own life—such a person cannot be my disciple.”) which seemingly contradicts a commandment in Exodus 20:12 (“Honor your father and your mother, so that you may live long in the land the LORD your God is giving you.”) Do I leave the situation up to a Biblical interpretation, a family consensus, or do I give God the absolute authority and obey Him? Listen, I would absolutely be lost without hearing God’s voice. I would be truly the loneliest person on the planet if God ever stopped talking to me. I would be devastated. Not only that, God would likely need to dethrone my brother in a way that would burden my heart.

My daily routine is constantly seeking God. I ask Him for direction all day long every day. It’s one of the reasons that loud music in restaurants is so offensive to me. It is difficult to hear His spirit voice when there are distracting sounds trying to drown out His guidance.

Do I just ignore my brother’s opinion? No, I don’t. I take everything to God and ask Him why my brother is so determined to tell me to disobey God. God’s response is usually something like “Leave him to me. I’m doing something in his life.” I’m not angry with my brother but I can’t help remembering the Scripture where the serpent in the Garden said “Surely God didn’t say” as the devil walked Adam and Eve out of God’s specific will for them.

So why bring all this up now? While I was eating a breakfast sandwich in my van down by the river this morning, God told me that it similarly portrays a pastor’s desire to seek the counsel of men rather than to trust God’s authority on the matter of the trinity doctrine. The pastor has searched the Scriptures, sought peers, and struggled with his own identity but has refused to listen to and obey God. Why? Has he convinced himself that being right with man is more important than being right with God?

Yes, I have provided Scriptures for the pastor to study but always with the instruction to seek God. I have repeatedly stated what I have heard God say but have always reminded that obedience to God is not by proxy. “Don’t believe me. Ask God yourself!” Here’s the thing, I don’t want to be responsible for those who would twist the words that I bring from God. I don’t want to be responsible for being a mini-god for anyone. My responsibility is solely to do exactly what God tells me to do. I’m not responsible for how it is received. Will I lose friends? Sure. Will I find it difficult to be part of a church family when false doctrines are being taught? Sure. But will I ever lose my connection to God? Never!