This is a picture of just how simple it is to fill our lives with either the good or the bad stuff. All we have to do is choose the GOOD TREASURE to put in our hearts. After we’ve done this only the good treasure can flow out of our lives. Amazingly simple isn’t it?

A good man out of the good treasure of his heart bears what is good, and an evil man out of the evil treasure of his heart bears what is evil. For of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaks.

Luke 6:45

We all have a choice. When we walk in the wisdom of God we will make the right choices and it will overflow into our account. We are literally storing up the good treasure of His glory and truth in our hearts. God wants us to be so overflowing with the good treasure of heaven inside of us that it flows like a river to all that surrounds us.

If you need joy then take some time to sow the seeds of joy in your life. Find some scriptures on joy, making it your meditation. If you want to see more miracles flowing through your live spend time in His Presence and give your thoughts over to the testimonies of what God is currently doing as well as the miracles of Jesus. What you sow into your heart is what you will get. It is really that simple.

Breaking Through Enemy Lines

I remember hearing some say a long time ago that if you can focus in just one area to get a breakthrough it will cause breakthrough to happen in so many other areas of your life. Just as an general of an army strategizes to break through one area of the enemy’s front to overtake them, so when we find that one point of breakthrough in the enemy line we can come from behind and annihilate the enemy.

Give some attention to your thought patterns and measure them with God’s standard. Make an intentional effort to pull down the bad habits and strongholds of the mind replacing them with strongholds of the Holy Spirit.

The New Wine of His Presence

God wants us to be filled with the new wine of His Holy Spirit. For this to happen our thinking has to change, we need a new wineskin. Why do we need new wine? What are the things closely associated with New Wine? Why do we need to experience the reality of His New Wine in our lives?

The eternal God is your refuge, and underneath you are the everlasting arms; He will drive out the enemy before you, and will say, Destroy them. Israel dwells in safety; the fountain of Jacob will be secluded in a land of grain and new wine; its heavens will rain down dew.

Deuteronomy 33:27-28

What we find is that when the blessing of God is upon his people there is:
1. Fresh Bread/Grain
2. New Wine
3. The Heaven Release Rain

So the Lord answered and said to His people, Here! I am sending you grain, new wine, and oil, and you will be satisfied, and I will never again make you a disgrace among the nations.

Joel 2:19

God wants to bless us to be a blessing. Our actions and obedience opens the windows of heaven where the blessing of God is poured out in abundance upon our lives. God responds to our actions releasing His blessing. It is not just a random act that where God decides that it is just a nice day to do it. Typically not. God does things in response to our prayers, actions and obedience to His will.

Do not be wise in your own eyes; fear the Lord and depart from evil. It will be health to your body, and strength to your bones. Honor the Lord with your substance, and with the first fruits of all your increase; so your barns will be filled with plenty, and your presses will burst out with new wine.

Proverbs 3:7-10

The Lord gives us instructions saying, “Get my wisdom, fear the Lord, depart from evil.”

Here are the benefits:
1. Health
2. Strength
3. Increase
4. Plenty
5. New Wine

The new wine fails, the vine languishes, all the merry-hearted sigh. The joy of tambourines ceases, the noise of those who rejoice ends, the joy of the harp ceases. They shall not drink wine with song.

Isaiah 24:7-9

When people are disobedient to the Lord this is what happens. You see in this passage that the joy is gone, the song is gone and the new wine is gone! You will always see new wine, the waters of His Presence and the fresh grain or bread of heaven as a sign of the blessing of God.

And Jesus said to them, “Can the friends of the bridegroom mourn as long as the bridegroom is with them? But the days will come when the bridegroom will be taken away from them, and then they will fast. No one puts a piece of unshrunk cloth on an old garment; for the patch pulls away from the garment, and the tear is made worse. Nor do they put new wine into old wineskins, or else the wineskins break, the wine is spilled, and the wineskins are ruined. But they put new wine into new wineskins, and both are preserved.

Matthew 9:15-17

Here Jesus tells us that there is no purpose for the disciples to fast UNTIL He Himself (the Bridegroom) is taken away. It is then the disciples did mourn the loss of the reality of relationship and intimacy they had with Jesus. Then they fasted waiting 120 days until the Day of Pentecost. The pressed in waiting for the Holy Spirit to be poured out, to have that intimacy with God restored. Jesus told them to wait until this happened then they could be His witnesses.

Whenever we are faced to the lack of intimacy with God, the feeling of disconnect that is a good time to fast to see that restored, because God has purposed our lives to be filled with His Presence and Holy Spirit. That is where intimacy with God thrives. The Holy Spirit is Christ in us, the hope of glory. We need that desperation for His Presence in our lives enough to be willing to sacrifice to have it.

I humbled my soul with fasting;
and my prayer returns to my own heart.

Psalm 35:13

Fasting can serve as a way to express your desperation, opening doors for your intimacy with God to come alive, to be made real and tangible. That should be our primary reason for fasting, not works or from a place of doing a good thing.

To sum things up, the mind needs transformed (new wineskin) and the heart needs desperation to see the need to press in for that reality of God’s Presence (new wine) in your life. Through this life of obedience and desperation God will open up the heavens and pour out blessings that cannot be contained.

Sow the good treasure in your heart, get that new wineskin from heaven. Press in for that intimate life with God and expect to receive the fresh bread of heaven, the new wine of His Presence and the rain of His Holy Spirit poured out in your life like never before!