Knitting Hearts Ministry on Saturday, November 9, 2019
with Sue Sanders
Friends gathered today at Betheseda for an anointed time of worship and sharing. Greeters made everyone feel welcomed. The beautifully decorated tables and delicious breakfast demonstrated the commitment and loving care of the hospitality team. Joyce Sanders welcomed everyone and opened in prayer.
Dalana Barnett and Bert Cousar blew the shofars, a call to victory. Carolyn Williams mentioned a number of mission ministries that we support each month through the offering. Taylor Smith shared a declaration from Isaiah 42. The Hadassa Flag Team danced to “Break Every Chain” by Tosha Cobbs. The song focused on the power in the name of Jesus to break every chain. The imagery in the song was powerful causing us to hear the chains falling and to visualize the army rising up.
“First Glimpse,” a local worship group, led the audience in praise and worship. They sang of our need for rescue and shelter. We declared that when He called our names, we ran out of that grave, out of darkness, and into His glorious day. We sang too of struggles and trials, being low in the valley and down in deep despair. But we are victorious and can sing glory, hallelujah. The overcomer theme continued as we sang of His free grace that washes over us, releasing us from our chains, cancelling our debts, and setting us free. “Reckless Love” highlighted the overwhelming, never-ending, reckless love of God that chases us down.
Sue Sanders shared a message that God birthed into her this year, “One-Year Adventures with the God of my Story.” Sue’s word for this year was PEACE, and God instructed her through Luke 1: 79 that He would lead her into a straight line into the way of peace. In February God highlighted Jeremiah 33: 3: “Call to Me and I will answer you and show you great and mighty things, fenced in and hidden, which you do not know (do not distinguish and recognize, have knowledge of and understand).” This verse offered an invitation to new and exciting adventures with God as she sought Him for what was hidden for her each day.
Wasteland was one of the first words that the Lord highlighted. It did not seem like a treasure because a wasteland is empty and void. God said that she had an area of wasteland in her spirit that needed to be filled. She remembered a song from years ago that talked about a river of life flowing out of us. That became her heart’s cry. The children of Israel spent forty years in a great and terrible wilderness and wasteland, “a land that no man passes through and where no man dwells.” However, God brought them into a plentiful land with abundant fruits and good things. “He made Israel ride on the high places of the earth, and he ate the increase of the field; and He made him suck honey out of the rock and oil out of the flinty rock.” The Lord was declaring that He would cause Sue’s wasteland to flourish, to blossom so that His Spirit could flow freely.
The next part of Sue’s talk focused on various walls and hedges that the Lord raises up for our protection. She shared a story of a missionary couple to the New Hebrides Islands. The first night they were there the natives surrounded them with their spears drawn ready to kill them, but miraculously they never attacked. Slowly, the couple learned the language and led natives to the Lord. When the chief got saved, they asked him about the first night they were there. They found out that the natives had not attacked that night because there had been a massive army of warriors with their swords drawn around the missionaries’ home, God’s mighty army of angel warriors.
II Kings 6 describes how God provided an army of angels leading horses and chariots of fire to protect the prophet Elisha and his servant from the King of Syria, Ben-hadad, and his army. Elisha’s servant was horrified when he saw the Syrian army, but God opened the servant’s eyes so that he could see the angelic army surrounding them.
Another wall or fence is a protective fence, a barrier. Satan was aware that God had a spiritual hedge of His favor around Job, all his household, and his possessions. Job couldn’t see the hedge, but Satan could.
God opened Sue’s eyes to the bronze wall. God literally made Jeremiah a bronze wall. The people of Judah tried to stop him from uttering his gloomy prophecies. However, they found out that they could not destroy Jeremiah but could only break themselves by smashing against him. Yahweh saved Jeremiah and delivered him from his foes. The evil doers even lowered Jeremiah down into an empty cistern with quagmire at the bottom. They left him there to perish, but the king sent men to deliver him. God made him a bronze wall.
Another hedge, a hedge of protection around those we love, is illustrated by the story of Hosea and Gomer in the Old Testament. Hosea’s wife, Gomer, was an adulteress. When she wandered away from her husband, God put up a hedge of thornbushes to keep her from being unfaithful. The entire story is an allegory of how Israel was unfaithful to God. We can pray for God to put a hedge of protection around those we love to keep them safe and to keep them from evil. God expects us to build up the wall through our prayers.—Ezekiel 22: 30: “And I sought a man among them who should build up the wall and stand in the gap before Me for the land, that I should not destroy it, but I found none.”
The praise and worship team sang two more songs. The first declared that the Lord of Hosts is with us in the fire, the shelter, and the storm. He will lead us through the fiercest battle. The second one, “This Is How I Fight My Battles,” reinforced the truth that the Lord fights our battles, and He surrounds us.
The Lord spoke to Sue through the prickly pear fruit. The prickly pear cactus has been used for centuries both as a food source and a natural fence that keeps in livestock and marks the boundaries of family lands.
In the fall of 1961, Cuba had its troops plant Opuntia cactus along the 17 mile fence surrounding the Guantanamo Bay Naval Base to stop Cubans from escaping to take refuge in the United States. They called it the Cactus Curtain. The Lord builds a cactus curtain or wall around us.
Sue got an added bonus while studying about the prickly pear. The coat of arms of Mexico depicts a Mexican golden eagle, perched upon an Opuntia cactus , holding a rattlesnake. According to the official history of Mexico, the coat of arms is inspired by an Aztec legend regarding the founding of Tenochtilan. The Aztecs, then a nomadic tribe, were wandering throughout Mexico in search of a divine sign to indicate the precise spot upon which they were to build their capital. Their god had commanded them to find an eagle devouring a snake, perched atop a cactus that grew on a rock submerged in a lake. After 200 years of wandering, they found the promised sign on a small island in the swampy Lake Texcoco. There they founded their new capital.
This image is fascinating. Eagles are bold, courageous, and powerful. They do not fear man, beasts, or snakes. They have literally been seen engaging with poisonous snakes and tearing off their heads with their beaks. The eagle does not fight the snake on the ground. It picks it up into the sky and changes the battleground, and then it releases the snake into the sky. The snake has no stamina, no power and no balance in the air. It is useless, weak and vulnerable unlike on the ground where it is powerful, wise, and deadly. Take your fight into the spiritual realm by praying, and when you are in the spiritual realm, God takes over your battles. Don’t fight the enemy in his comfort zone; change the battle grounds like the eagle, and let God take charge through your earnest prayer.
Don’t give Satan a stronghold.
Diane and Bobby Raymond left their home for church in their pickup truck. Suddenly, they saw a snake coming from under their hood, wrapping itself around the passenger mirror, and bamming its head against the window. Diane was driving, and she kept jerking the truck until the snake was shaken off into the bushes on the side of the highway.
We have to shake off Satan and not allow him to get grip and build strongholds in our lives. Don’t give Satan a stronghold. Shake him off. The fiery darts of the enemy are quenched and can’t penetrate the shield of faith. However, they can bombard us causing trembling, shaking, and noise as he fires them at us.
Build up the wall. Put up a No Trespassing Sign on your cactus curtain wall. If there are already trespassers there, toss them out and show them the sign.
The last thought was the aroma of the knowledge of Him. One morning the Lord highlighted diffuser as one of her symbols. After analyzing how the diffuser works, Sue realized the Lord was asking her to think about the aroma that she was diffusing into the atmosphere. When we walk into a room, we are carrying something with us that is either compelling, neutral, or repelling. Sue recalled a time when vultures surrounded their car while they were on the way to VBS and vomited the foul contents of their putrid stomachs all over their car. Our words and attitudes, like the vultures’ vomit, can poison the atmosphere.
II Corinthians 2: 14-15 says that God uses us to spread the aroma of the knowledge of Him everywhere.
Carrying the fragrance of Christ into the atmosphere is part of the sacred charisma. The Lord wants us to spread His pleasing aroma. The Lord instructed Sue: “Lean into Me, come closer, get more intimate. This is where you will get my fragrance.” Spending time with Jesus will help us spread a pleasing fragrance to those around us—the fragrance of Christ.
After sharing a few of the treasures that the Lord had fenced in just for her, she left us with a challenge.
CHALLENGE: WHAT GREAT AND MIGHTY THINGS DOES THE LORD HAVE FENCED IN AND HIDDEN FOR YOU?
THE LORD SAYS: CHALLENGE ME TODAY. PUT ME TO THE TEST AND SEE WHAT I CAN DO IN YOU, FOR YOU, AND THROUGH YOU TODAY.
Hearts United Women's Ministry 