Dear friends, as the title suggests, this is an overview of the book of Romans. I encourage you to read through the book of Romans over the course of the next few weeks and allow God to enrich your lives through His Word as you embark on this journey with us. I promise you, there is so much insight available in Romans if we will commit ourselves to digging up the nuggets of His Word. When done with a hungry heart, we will discover the treasures found in Romans. Much love, Ricci
The minute you start a Bible study the enemy is going to stop you in your tracks because he does not want you to learn what God has for you. You will become so busy in ministry and in your life that you will not be able to dig in, because it is one thing for us to read the Word of God and it is an entirely different thing for us to study the Word of God. This is why the enemy resists us the way he does. He steals our time and strips us of what God has for us.
As I poured over the book of Romans and read and re-read to summarize chapters and titles, I felt it was extremely beneficial and I discovered many treasures I hadn’t seen before. No matter how mature we are in the faith, we will discover new insight each time we study His Word! It’s life and breath to us. As I read, I asked the Lord, Lord what makes this time different? What is unique in this exercise? And today the Lord showed me some things that I would like to share with you.
We’ve learned that the book of Romans is the message of Salvation. The theme—in a nutshell—is the righteous shall live by faith. However, this is about our salvation. This is much more than the moment we are converted; it is about our path of salvation and ultimately, our entrance into union.
In Romans chapters 1 and 8, we learned that God put within each of us that tiny seed that would begin to draw us to Him—it works within us throughout our lives until that moment where we will finally bow the knee and be restored in relationship with our God. He put that seed inside everyone and it is understanding this to the fullest that allows the heart and passion of the book of Romans to really penetrate our hearts. This is where we learn how to live the life of a believer, where we learn the importance of our treatment of one another, where we learn the importance of submitting to God, where we learn and begin to understand what it means to truly walk in obedience to God.
Throughout our time together [in prayer], the Lord is revealing things about the future. He’s shown us what He has planned for the future of our Nation as well as the move of God that is coming. If I sound like a broken record to you, then good! Play it again and again and again. There is a move of God that is coming and if we want to be a part of it, we need to be ready. We need to be ready to be a vessel of Christ’s. I see what’s coming, there is a new anointing, a new level of intimacy, a fire that will be released into those who’ve prepared and I want so desperately for you to be part of this powerful move of God. I love you all dearly, deeply, and with more love than you can imagine, which is why I carry this burden for you before the Lord. I want you ready...
This is a move of God that will transform the lives of the Church. It will transform the Church to be the Body of Christ that she was called to be and if we are going to be an active participant of this move of God—not just a spectator—then we must be ready to step into that position.
So, what does the enemy do to try and prevent us from stepping into these places in God? Well, he distracts us from our prayers, interferes with our time in the Word, stirs up our wounds, provokes us to anger, causes us to accuse one another, compels us to pass judgment on our brother, and on and on. How should we respond? Determine in our hearts to press into God and when it comes to our relationship with others, go low! We need to humble ourselves, ask God to help us allow these things to do His work and healing within us—strengthening us and getting those things out of us that are not of Him. And the fastest way to the path of healing is to walk a life of obedience.
Sometimes those wounds are so deep and so grounded in who we are, it is like God has to completely re-shape us and the enemy can get us so wrapped up in it that we lose sight of the end-goal. This is not minimizing anyone’s pain, please understand that I do know there are those of you who have suffered greatly at the hand of others and my heart weeps for you. God will meet you if you take that step of faith to Him and lay down those experiences at His feet. He longs to heal your heart, to touch you so deeply that you are fully healed and transformed. You may have to do this again and again until each experience, each wound is healed, but I promise you, He will not give up until your healing is complete.
Why do I share this? Because it happened to me. I experienced a season where I hurt so badly I thought, How am I going to get out of this? How am I ever going to fulfill the call that You have on my life when I hurt this badly, Lord? There have also been times of distractions, seasons where there were so many things going on in my life externally, it kept me distracted from what God was wanting from me. There’s also the day-to-day responsibilities of running a ministry that can keep me busy. Sometimes I would think, How in the world can I ever step into the call when all of this life is keeping my time tied up? I laid that at His feet and eventually I began to realize, and especially over the course of the last few years, He began to teach me, show me, and help me to find my peace in Him in the midst of the most extreme circumstances. He is always trying to help me find my focus in Him and pull me up and out of what I am going through while maintaining my rest in Him.
It is not just about us finding our rest—that is only one part of it. Over the course of our study in Romans, God began to show me what He has in the days ahead and it began to transform me from the inside out. As I saw this and as He gave me the Word of the Lord for 2017 to “Know No Bounds”—from this point on He began to do a work in me where I would stop looking at these boundaries that I placed around myself, God, my family and around ministry and I would look at Him. And what do I mean by that? It is not a simple exercise, really it’s not. It is a place where we must force the boundaries down and give it all to God. Where we must determine in our hearts and our minds to let God use us however He needs to.
To be continued next week…
Blessings & Love,
Ricci
