His Hand Moves the Brush

My days are consumed with learning to be a wife again. I am reminded that this is one of God's highest callings. Making two people into one flesh is always going to require more "flesh-death," more compromise, more laying down of one's own needs and wants and embracing another's. But within that process lies God's greatest victories!

This morning I received a prophetic word from Pastor Matutis in Berlin, Germany. Through him the Lord spoke, "Learn to filter out the negative. Recognize My way of handling your challenges. My wonders are hidden within your problem. My victories are hidden within your fights. My Word has the answer to all your questions. I am rounding things off and harmonizing them. Do not force anything. Do not let it stress you out. My hand moves the brush, putting the right color combination in your life. I am placing you in front of situations and challenges and helping you with the outcome."

I felt this word was speaking about the timing of my marriage. John and I are not having fights or facing great challenges in our home life. We are, like all newlyweds, learning how to please one another and set aside our own wants. But the greater message of this word from the Lord was, in my estimation, His instruction for how we are all to navigate through the treacherous days ahead of us. Watching the news on TV can be entirely negative and fill us with fear. The verses of Habakkuk 3 are being fulfilled before our very eyes: "He stood and shook the earth, He looked and nations trembled. The ancient mountains crumbled and the age-old hills collapsed (Japan). His ways are eternal! I saw the tents of Cush (Libya/Ethiopia) in distress, the dwellings of Midian (Yemen, Arab peoples) in anguish. In wrath You strode through the earth and in anger you threshed the nations."

Yes, the earth is shaking, the sea roaring and the nations trembling! But then Habakkuk 3:13 gives us the great, good news: "You came out to deliver your people, to save your Anointed One. You crushed the leader of the land of wickedness, you stripped him from head to foot!"

The world stage is being set for the Anti-Messiah to step up with a "solution for world peace" and the desperate nations will follow him and worship him. But we know who wins in the end! And so we filter out the negative that we hear and see - we do not stress out - we allow the Creator to move His brush in our lives, putting the right color combinations together! How blessed I am that He put John and Kelly together - (we call ourselves "Jelly!") We will continue to die to ourselves, learning to serve one another, and together to serve our King, the Anointed One, whose Kingdom has no end!

The Bride Price

I promised you more stories and parables from our wedding, so here is another.

My 87-year-old father was to accompany me up the steps and present me to John, my Bridegroom, so that John could hand him a velvet bag filled with five pieces of silver, in payment of the mohar or bride price. As we rehearsed this the day before the wedding, my dad's knees became very wobbly going up those steps, and I knew he was leaning heavily on my arm, trying to steady himself so he would not fall. That evening he wrote me a note and had my sister deliver it over to me. In his note he expressed his worry about falling on the steps, and asked if I would be willing to have him walk me just to the foot of the steps so John could come down and give him the bride price there.

Little did we know the picture we were now painting, as the Bridegroom descended down to pay the price for His Bride, in order to then bring her back up to live with Him! One person wrote to me, "I was so moved watching the Bridegroom, as my Messiah, coming down those steps, as if descending down to earth, to pay the price for His Bride! Then He brought you back up the steps and into the bridal chamber to dwell with Him!"

Again, it was something unplanned. It was changed at the last moment. And yet God, in His infinite wisdom, used it to share this beautiful illustration of His love and grace toward the Bride, the Wife of the Lamb! He had to come down among us to die - so that we might one day ascend up to Jerusalem to live with Him!

1 Peter 1:18-19: "For you know that it was not with perishable things such as silver or gold that you were redeemed from the empty way of life handed down to you from your forefathers, but with the precious blood of Christ, a lamb without blemish or defect."

Preparing the Bride

Shabbat Shalom dear friends!

It is my first blog since before our wedding! I would struggle to find words to share with you the power and joy of our Kingdom wedding ceremony, but fortunately quite a few people wrote to tell me the Kingdom pictures and parables they experienced while witnessing our wedding. Little by little I want to share these revelations with you.

This week's Torah portion is centered around the mishkan, or tabernacle in the wilderness. Carl & Julie Parker's Torah commentary this week states, "If we are looking for freedom in Yahweh we need to let go of our own ways and trust in His faithfulness. In so doing, we will see Him in far deeper depths of revelation and experience the building of a tabernacle/mishkan that cannot be destroyed. May we thus enter in to such an experience of His Presence. May our pattern and building be exactly as the Children of Israel built it so long ago. May it be after the pattern of the heavenly Tabernacle that Yeshua serves in today, the bridal chamber of the bride who is getting herself ready for the return of her Bridegroom (Ezekiel 43:10-12; Hebrews 8:1-13).

Reading this certainly brought back the memory of the seven circles I took around John while he was under the chuppa. This tradition is from the ancient Jewish wedding, and it is symbolic of the bride hemming her new husband in with prayer and protection. But those witnessing our wedding saw something even more incredible as I circled John. After I had made six rotations, John thought it was seven, so he reached out for me with his outstretched arm, but I quietly shook my head and kept walking. I knew I had one more rotation yet to make. Although we did not plan this, the Father used it to illustrate some profound revelation, which we received from friends Angie and Philip. Angie wrote, "As you were circling the Groom and you came around the 6th time, John held out his hand for you to join him, BUT you had to complete one more circle before entering in...I was suddenly filled with the intense awareness of how "patient" our God is in waiting for His Bride to enter the wedding chamber with Him. And, how much He longs for us to be with HIM as He says in Matt. 23:37...how he longs to gather us, but we are not willing...and so Yeshua must "wait" until the circling/time is complete and we (the Bride) can enter in, under the Chupah! The time is coming and He is preparing His Bride...Oh how I felt HIS desire and longing for us and HIS sadness when we "are not willing". This brought tears to my eyes, as you continued your journey and the Ruach filled my spirit with HIS longing! It was intense!"

And my precious friend Philip from Kenya, who was with me at the Jerusalem House of Prayer wrote this: "One thing that stood out and painted a picture for me was during the seven circles, you kind of got playful dancing away from John in a manner that seemed to say 'You want me? come get me!' When you didn't go in, but had to make another circle around, he slammed his thigh, playfully expressing a longing and a desire for you in a manner that portrayed he just could not wait any longer! And as much as we all are eagerly waiting for Messiah's return, I can imagine how much he slams His fist on His thigh, waiting for the Father to say, 'Go get your bride, Son!' I know He is longing for me even more than I am longing for him.'"

How thrilling that in our own wedding the people saw this picture of the Heavenly Tabernacle, and the Messiah's yearning desire to bring us into the bridal chamber with Him!

Sabbath Blessings,

Kelly