Foundations: Shaking

This message got started as an e-mail to a relative out of state and became a word on shaking, pruning and hope. So it sounds like this blog will be in three parts.

Acts 16:25-26 [in prison]"About midnightPaul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the other prisoners were listening to them. Suddenly there was such a violent earthquake that the foundations of the prison were shaken. At once all the prison doors flew open, and everybody's chains came loose." Not only is this word literal, it has a deeply spiritual meaning for us in the 21st. century. Those things we build that are of our own doing and not God's will be shaken, we can count on it. Sometimes what we go through in this shaking, feels like an earthquake; other times it feels like the grape vine that gets pruned at the end of the season, that it might bear great fruit the next year. We had a grape vine one year and my Dad pruned it that winter. By the time he was done, it looked like it would never recover. The next year, the vine that had not been well taken care of, had leaves that were larger, fruit that was larger and sweeter. Pruning was a good thing! But surely not in us Lord! Yes, that too is good. When everything around you seems like a pile of rubble because of the shaking, remember; faith and hope will bring us to a new level. This is a great work of God and the natural mind can't understand or receive it.

Let your spirit receive this; everyone's chains were loosed. The cutting and shaking may seem unending, but let faith arise in your heart, the open doors are coming, the multiplied fruit is coming.