Honesty, Looking At Yourself in God's Mirror

April 18, 2015

The Lord bless you with an open heart for tonight's message.

Every night I am so amazed that He has something really relevant to share with us. (if you hear little footsteps in the background, that's Gracie, my kitty coming to snuggle...)

The Lord began very quickly tonight to speak to me.

He said:

"Tonight I want to talk to you about honesty. Honesty with yourself and others. You all have areas that need to be looked at just a little closer. If I did not love you, I would not bring this up at all, but because time is very short and there are still areas where you have not confessed sin to Me, I am asking you, precious Bride, look again.

"For the sake of survival in the past you have hidden certain things from yourself because it was too painful to look at. But you needn't hide anything from Me. I already know about your sins, dearest. I want to work with you and lift the burden of guilt deep down inside where you have hidden things too painful and disturbing to bring up.

"There is nothing that can keep Me from loving you, absolutely nothing. But our relationship must be built on honesty. I cannot perfect that which you refuse to see. In order to bring you to perfection, you must be willing to admit the truth about yourself. You are beautiful beyond imagining and there is nothing that will change My mind about that. But these deep dark secrets and unconfessed sins let off a scent of guilt and shame.

"This, too, is responsible for you distancing yourself from Me. You know there are things too dark to confront but that in My presence all things are seen. May I say I have seen all these things even before they happened? No one wants to see themselves as evil and so they hide their evil thoughts and deeds even from themselves and make excuses to cover them up, or invent stories."

Wow! Am I guilty of that!

"My Love, come to Me and ask to be relieved of these sins. Ask Me to bring them to the surface where My grace can cauterize your flesh and you will never more be burdened by them.

"For instance, so many make the excuse that they don't have time to pray the way they should. Let's examine that. Do you have time to shop, prepare dinner, watch a show on TV, talk to a friend for 45 minutes, go to a salon to have your hair done, take a trip with friends, sit on the porch and enjoy the fresh evening air?

"Let's analyze that. You have made time to nourish your body and provide for your body's needs. You have made time to relax and be entertained, to give your emotions a break. You have made time for a friend to confide in you or to share in your victories and failures. You have made time to be stylish and look good in the eyes of man, and you have made time to get away from everyday life with friends.

"What is the truth of this, what is the conclusion to be drawn from this example? Simply that I am not as important as any of these things. That is the honest truth I am looking for. You make time for the things that are most important for you in your life. You make time to work and make money, to shop and spend money, to entertain yourself, even to go to church. These things are important to you. But a friendship and a relationship with Me?"

At this point, I really wanted to say something and I asked the Lord and He told me to go ahead.

Well, I just want to say that I had a to-do list every day, and it was long. If I didn't accomplish everything on the list or most things, I would end the day in disappointment. I was very unhappy and frustrated until one day the Lord spoke to my heart, "You have a spirit of Ambition." This spirit would suggest expectations and I would write them down to be done in a day. But I was over reaching my energy level and my time, so I would have to push to accomplish everything. Not only that, but I had to push away anyone or any thing that would take time away from my list. And there was always something I just couldn't get done.

Everything on that list was either in the world or from the world. Sure, there were things that couldn't wait but rather than spending time in the kitchen baking, I could just buy something that would make do. But no, it had to be really good if not the best, so I had to make it. There are easy ways to do things and there are superior, harder ways to do things that cause you to become more involved, using more of your time. I would always pick the more demanding ways. Perhaps the root sin of this was Pride, it just had to be the best.

And I never had enough time for God. I never had hours when I wasn't exhausted or in a hurry to get out and get everything done. Early I was busy getting ready to go, late I was in the dregs of my energy. I knew He was calling me to more prayer, but I was so tied to my worldly pleasures and agendas, I didn't have time. I mean really substantial time with Him.

One day the Lord told me what my problem was: "Clare, you don't have time for Me."

I was floored by that remark...don't have time...for God? Huh? Why is that - isn't He the most important One in my life?

The answer was easy, "No." He was not the most important thing, a million other details pertaining to the world were more important...exercise, finding the right clothing to wear, working with my hair, looking for makeup and trying new techniques, baking the most intense dark chocolate cake with homemade frosting, cleaning the car, keeping it shiny and bright. Repotting my plants and looking up details about how to increase their yield, studying health issues and what certain vitamins can do. I could go on and on and on and on with this list. All of those things were more important to me than Jesus. And that was the Honest truth. I loved the Lord, I gave Him my life. I thought I was living for Him, but looking back, I was living for myself.

Yes, I had prayer time, but nothing like what He wanted from me. Yet I was hungry for the gifts and the ministries others had. I would feel Jealousy over the success of others and ask myself, why can't I be successful like that?

I would even tell the Lord, "If You throw me into ministry, Lord, I know all those other things will fade away." But He wouldn't do that. What He wanted from me was to see me abandon the familiar things of the world, the things I thought were essential, and really were nothing more than vanities, before I was put in ministry. He wanted to see that He meant everything to me, and nothing in my life was more important to me than Him.

I began to realize that my jealousy was based on laziness. I was not putting out the effort to succeed, because my life was too taken up by trivia, all those things that are going to burn in the fire. I remember once hearing something that stuck in my mind like velcro. "If you are jealous of someone it is because you see something they have, that you know you could be doing, but you're not applying yourself to the level necessary to attain it." That statement haunted me. And the reason I wasn't attaining? The time in my life was being used up by foolish things.

Then one day I got confronted with the Rapture. And I was told, you are one of the foolish virgins. How did I know that? There was a deep down gnawing in my gut, that I was wasting precious time on foolish things. But I would throw up an excuse, that has to be done! that's important! I've got to have that, and so on and so on, but that gnawing refused to go away and when the Lord burst my little bubble telling me that I didn't have time for Him...and I saw the reality of the Rapture, well that was my wake up call. I just knew that if I continued on this way, I would run out of oil, if I was not already out. That's when I changed, lowered my expectations and standards on worldly things so that God could dominate my life.

The Lord continued, "And that's where I would like you My Brides to pick up. I want you to be unyieldingly honest with yourselves about how you are spending your time. Re-assess the must haves in your lives. Lower your expectations so that trivia and vanity does not rob you of Me. It is so slippery, one step in the wrong direction and all the wrong things hop onboard."

I had a thought at that point, and I said:

I remember Lord, when I was dressing for church, years ago, I just had to have a coordinated outfit, the right dress, the right accessories, the right purse, the right shoes, the right hose the right makeup. One thing steps out of line and everything else follows it. Whereas if I weren't so conscious of my outer appearance, I could make do with the same simple clothes every week. Then my inner man would be truly ready to worship and oblivious to the fashion show. For you men it would be the right tie, with the right shirt, the right jacket and slacks, and the right shoes, with a shiny new clean car to make a shiny impression for all the guys coming to church with their families. Boy, were we into it.

"The saddest part of this My Bride is that you don't see your involvements are choking out the fruit you could have borne. Truly in this country the briars have overgrown the churches to the point where there is no room for Me to move. And much of the time, the issue anchoring My movements, is social acceptability. Dressing right, looking right, acting right, at all the wrong times. I have no room to breathe.

"This is why I am calling for honesty. A new level of honesty. When this country is at war there will be honesty because all the frills will be impossible to have, then we can get back down to content, personal holiness and what really matters. But now My church is bound by social standards and acceptability in the sight of man.

"My Brides, My beautiful Brides. I beg of you, check your motives. There is only one motive you should have: love of Me and love of neighbor. Any other motive is impure, and purity is what is necessary to see and hear Me clearly.

"'Did I say that because I wanted to be clever and impress them? Did I dress this way to upstage so and so? Am I exercising so I can turn the men's heads at church? And catch a husband?'

"May I say that if you seek to attract a husband by carnal standards, you will have a carnal man and a carnal marriage?

"'Did I call so and so to plant an ugly thought about someone I don't like? Did I sign up to serve in the church to improve my influence and status? Did I offer to help because I want people to think I am good? Did I buy that new car because I wanted to turn heads in the parking lot?'

"Check your motives, both men and women. Check to see if the reason you are doing something is strictly because you love Me and for no other reason. If it is to be seen by others and thought well of, I guarantee you, oil is leaking from your lamp and it is in danger of going out.

"I am going to convict you of your motives this coming week. I am going to expose attitudes and habits that have hindered you and prevented you from becoming who you truly are in Me. Some things may come as a shock to you, when you see why you really do what you do. But this is for your own good. This is to remove more spots from your wedding gown. This is to bring you to repentance. And if any think more highly of themselves than they do of others, well, you will discover just how lowly you are. This is a good thing. For truly I lift up the humble but decrease the stature of the proud.

 

"Please My Bride, men and women, be honest with yourselves and do not try to make excuses or sidestep the truth about why you are doing things. At every turn, repent and ask for My help to let go of these worldly attitudes and posturing. I am purifying you like fire-tried gold. Cooperate with Me, for I love you and have only your best and eternal interests at heart.

"I bless you now with the courage to cooperate with Me as I prepare you for our wedding day."

I wanted to let you know that I do have some teachings on the subject the Lord brought up tonight. It's called Wounding Waters, the Worldly Church. And you know, in church you are supposed to receive the fresh, living waters. But so often because of social position and other things, the waters are wounding and hurtful. So, I have an entire playlist called Wounding Waters, the Worldly Church. I'm going to try to put the link at the end of this video. I rearranged the videos in that playlist so that the topic that He brought up tonight would be first to be addressed.

Please forgive the bad audio and sometimes bad visual for these - they were my first videos that I did, pretty much my first ones. I was grappling with a lot of techniques, trying to figure out what worked. But the teaching is still there. I just feel that it's really important and really relevant to the message that He gave us tonight.

Thank you for being on our channel and for watching our videos and commenting. I couldn't dream of a sweeter and more open and loving audience than you guys. I really, really am humbled by the beauty of the souls that the Lord has sent to our channel.

The Lord bless you with the courage to look at yourself in God's mirror, and not to freak out! Have a blessed night.