It’s human nature. Everyday people try to shrink God down to size—make Elohim experience their human experience. Yes God did, through Christ, victoriously walk though our mortal existence. And in so doing, He empowered us to do what many in previous generations only dreamt of doing—live outside the box. It is His nature to constantly remind us that our thoughts and His thoughts are vastly different. Visualize it. Isaiah wrote, “As far as the East is from the West…. And as far as Heaven is from Earth.” Think a thought, then, multiply it one hundred times! Ephesians 3:20 declares that the Lord is able to do immeasurably more than we can ask or think! So whatever level you’ve been thinking on, it’s probably too low. If you truly believe in the awesomeness of God, then you must believe that not only can He do awesome things in your life, but He wants to as well! Let’s take the lid off the box, a Blessing Blocker you probably didn’t even know you’d put God into.

I’ve been there. I thought I was doing everything God wanted me to do. Somewhere along the way though, I’d placed barriers on myself and God. Isaiah 1:19 says, “If you are willing and obedient, you will eat the good things of the land,” verse 20 contrasts, “But if you resist and rebel, you will be devoured by the sword.” In these situations, I was actually unknowingly resisting and rebelling. I thought I was being willing and obedient. What I had done was allowed my experiences and distorted thoughts to trap me and limit God. These verses in Isaiah seem easy enough to understand (and verse 19 is definitely easy to quote!), but applying them could pose a challenge.

Case in point: Think about a difficult situation you are facing or have faced. As far as you know, you’ve been faithful to God in everything. Now at some point, was there an action the Holy Spirit prompted you to take that defied your natural mind? Why would Elisha tell Naaman to dip in the Jordan River seven times and be clean? What was Jesus thinking when He spat on the ground and made a spit and dirt patty to heal a blind man? And what was up with Peter and John when they, while broke and in the middle of controversy, had the audacity to tell the lame beggar at the gate called Beautiful to get up in the name of Jesus?! They were all out of the box!

The bottom line is this people—The Blessing can’t flow inside the box. I don’t care how long you’ve been saved. You must guard your thinking on this. Constantly renew your mind, hear sound teaching and, by all means, protect your spirit. Don’t listen to any and everything people say, or what’s flowing though the media. Check your caller ID—don’t just pick up the phone! It could be the box calling!

If I seem extra passionate on this point, it’s because I’ve recently been on a personal journey out of the box. It was an epiphany. My thinking on an area was so tightly in the box, that at one point I literally had a person sitting in my home telling me what to do, and I missed it! It took me two years to realize that God was using that person to speak to me.  The box also blocks God’s Blessing in our lives by stealing our time. Two years? Yes, two years. Thank God that this mistake was neither grave nor at the point of no return. My husband and I saw God using it to show us that when we say absolute things like always and never, we limit Him. Whoa! The only thing we should be absolute about is His Word. We’d been obedient, but we weren’t willing. And actually, we weren’t trusting. We weren’t willing to hear and obey God no matter what. So we put Him in a box and struggled until we corrected the mistake. How’d we correct it? We took the barriers off our thinking. We began to trust God in that area and let Him do His part.

Please understand that even though our paths may cross, and our testimonies may be similar, God will not require the exact things from us (outside the basics, of course). Even in the Bible you will not find identical stories of people’s experiences with God. Decisions must not be based on what someone else did or said. It’s not always safe to repeat a previous action either. Remember our examples in the Word. God’s people were always asking for His direction and permission to do things, even if they’d done those same things and succeeded or failed before.

Go ahead and bottle-feed your baby if God gives you peace about that. I did, and my children live in divine health. Go on the missions trip that none of your friends signed up for; you may meet your spouse. Witness to the person that everyone else has given up on. You might help save their life. Don’t abandon your dream, but stop trying to tell God how to use you and how to bless you—you can’t manipulate him. You must be willing and obedient. Solomon wrote in Ecclesiastes 12:13, “Fear God, and keep his commandments: for this is the whole duty of man.” Don’t allow the box to block you from The Blessing. You must learn to seek Godly advice, hear God, and obey Him. Liberate yourself. Whatever He tells you to do, do it. Put this Blessing Blocker where it belongs—in the box!

Throughout the Bible human beings were always fascinated with the experience of seeing God. This may have been one of the reasons for manmade gods. I suppose that the people who made these idols wanted to be able to see and touch the beings they worshiped. When all along, God Almighty had given man a picture of Himself—man was the image of God. All that needed to be done to see God was to see a human being. In Genesis 1:26 God said, “Let us make man in our image, in our likeness, and let them rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the livestock, over all the earth, and over all the creatures that move along the ground.” Despite this fact being rehearsed through generations, Jesus disciples still wanted to see the Lord.

Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me. If ye had known me, ye should have known my Father also: and from henceforth ye know him, and have seen him. Philip saith unto him, Lord, show us the Father, and it sufficeth us. Jesus saith unto him, Have I been so long time with you, and yet hast thou not known me, Philip? he that hath seen me hath seen the Father; and how sayest thou then, Show us the Father? Believest thou not that I am in the Father, and the Father in me? the words that I speak unto you I speak not of myself: but the Father that dwelleth in me, he doeth the works. Believe me that I am in the Father, and the Father in me: or else believe me for the very works’ sake.

—John 14:6-11

OK, so how can you not love this passage of Scripture! Focus on the way Jesus spoke. The surety of His words is so powerful. He had no doubt about who He was or what He was saying. We are supposed to behave the same way. The first blessing God ever gave us was to create us in His image! Why? So we could do the same works and greater! I am excited as I write this—it’s a true revelation. Jesus told the disciples that by seeing Him they had seen the Father. And as a part of the Acts generation, not only are we made in the image of God, we also have the Christ in us! Are you feeling me?! This is why I can say that everyday I see the Lord. Jesus lives in me and my physical body is in the likeness of the Father.

This is another reason why we cannot focus on what we see on the outside of people. No matter what they may be doing with their bodies, they were not originally created for or by evil. Psalm 100:3 tells us, “Know ye that the LORD he is God: it is he that hath made us, and not we ourselves; we are his people, and the sheep of his pasture.” And in Psalm 139:13-16 David continues, “For thou hast possessed my reins: thou hast covered me in my mother’s womb. I will praise thee; for I am fearfully and wonderfully made: marvellous are thy works; and that my soul knoweth right well. My substance was not hid from thee, when I was made in secret, and curiously wrought in the lowest parts of the earth. Thine eyes did see my substance, yet being unperfect; and in thy book all my members were written, which in continuance were fashioned, when as yet there was none of them.”

People were created by God. So whenever we look at someone, we should be looking through the eyes of God. By giving you and me His image, He was able to give us His power. The Blessing can flow through us because we’ve been made the righteousness of God in Christ. We were made a little lower than Elohim! You have to get this. Let’s close with Hebrews.

“You made him a little lower than the angels; you crowned him with glory and honor and put everything under his feet.” In putting everything under him, God left nothing that is not subject to him. Yet at present we do not see everything subject to him. But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels, now crowned with glory and honor because he suffered death, so that by the grace of God he might taste death for everyone. In bringing many sons to glory, it was fitting that God, for whom and through whom everything exists, should make the author of their salvation perfect through suffering. Both the one who makes men holy and those who are made holy are of the same family. So Jesus is not ashamed to call them brothers.

—Hebrews 2:7-11 NIV

You look just like your Father. You have His eyes and you possess His power. You’ve been blessed in His image. Don’t go around wishing you could see God or touch Him. As you read His word and pray, you will see more of Him in you and all around you. You will be just as confident as Jesus was when He told the disciples that they had seen the Father by seeing Him. When you witness and work for the Lord you will be able to tell others, “When you look at me, you are looking at the Lord.”

Be blessed friends, and have the perfect day everyday!

Psalm 138:8

—Shontta