Fixate PHX

by Fixate Phoenix

Christianity Spirituality Religion

Tent to Temple Pt 3; From Mud to Miracle

John 9:1-11 4 main points and takeaways from this passage 1. God didn’t just pull me out of the dirt. He used the dirt to make me see. (John 9:6) 2. Before I ever tried to find Jesus. He found me first (John 9:1) 3. Sight comes after the surrender (John 9:6-7) 4. When God changes how you see, it changes how you live (John 9:8-9)

Tent to Temple Pt 2; Money on my Mind

LUKE 21:1-4 Luke 12:15-21 LUKE 16:10-13 COLOSSIANS 3:23-24 4 thoughts on a poverty mindset rooted in need 1- We judge what others have because if we don't have it we think others don't deserve it. 2- We have a rational reason to not be generous and that rational reasoning takes the place of a faith we declare we profess. 3- WE LOOK UPON THOSE WHO WE THINK OUR “RICH”, AND THINK THEY SHOULD BE FORCED TO GIVE MORE TO MAKE UP FOR WHAT I CANNOT. NOT REALIZING THAT WITHHOLDING FROM GOD IS JUST ANOTHER LAYER OF GREED WE TRY TO TELL OURSELVES IT ISN'T… NEED CAN PRODUCE GREED JUST AS MUCH AS GREED PRODUCES MORE GREED. 4- We only view the world through our need… and WE SEEK to position ourselves relationally and personally to try to in our own strength to produce more to comfort our situation, USING AND LEVERAGING OTHERS FOR GAIN.. When we are generous we are saying you meet my needs, you have all the power, you are my identity, and you have the greatest influence in my life. 4 thoughts on a prosperity mindset rooted in greed 1- Is accumulating money for my glory or is it rhythmically and routine partnered in generosity for his glory? You can't say he gets the glory if the only thing you use your finances on is to produce your own.. 2- Do I have contentment and gratitude for what I have currently? Or does a feeling of lack, rooted in comparison and coveting, fuel my lifestyle to always have more? 3- As my life is elevated, is my generosity elevated? YOU CAN GIVE AND STILL BE GREEDY.. Bare minimum effort and activity gets bare minimum fruit, just as no effort or activity gets no fruit.. 4- Greed is foundationally about power and control. We inadvertently become our own God not realizing we have gained the whole word and lost our souls… we are not in control.. And we do not have ultimate power.. Generosity is about submitting your thirst for power and your need to control to God in trust that he will bring the fulfillment I truly seek. 4 THOUGHTS ON BIG-PICTURE STEWARDSHIP 1- I HAVE RIGID ROUTINE IN MY TIME, ATTENTION, AND RESOURCE THAT CIRCUMSTANCES DONT DICTATE DEVIATIONS FROM. 2- I OWN THE LITTLE OF THINGS RELATED TO MY TIME, ATTENTION, AND RESOURCE BECAUSE I KNOW IT MAKES A BIG DIFFERENCE. 3-THE STEWARDSHIP OF MY TIME, ATTENTION, RESOURCE IS ALL UNTO GREATER SENSITIVITY AND DEEPER DISCERNMENT. 4- ONCE I START IN THE STEWARDSHIP JOURNEY THERE IS STRONG RESISTANCE AT FIRST.. THAT SLOWLY GIVES WAY TO A REALIZATION THAT I CANNOT STOP…. AS I FEEL FUELD DAILY BY MY LIFE IN GOD AND TANGIBLE SENSE A COMMUNIONING WITH HIM.

Tent to Temple Pt 1: Let's Settle This

Matthew 25:14-29 – How to live in the multiplied and not buried talents. 1- Tithing is a floor not a ceiling. Test Him and see. 2- Spiritual maturity is when my life has rhythmic, routine, regular, boring, secret, and consistent generosity. We live in a day and age of knowing the words to say to pass the Christian eye test… but it is the rhythmic activity of the heart showing lordship… that God is able to see how we are using the talents He has given us. 3- Money is not bad, but our views of it, worship of it, fixation of it and withholding of it; is. You're either a hand that’s releasing it or a hand burying it, and you're not robbing God, you're robbing God of an opportunity to show you He's more in control than you could ever realize. 4- Giving under the pretense of getting only produces death, and giving that seeks to dictate to its passion points only robs faith of the reward of its secret work. Trust, believe, and let it go.

Renewal School Pt 5; The Remnant of Discernment and Sensitivity

Luke 2:25–40 How a Remnant of People Walk in a Sensitive and Discerning way 1 – We live righteous and holy in order to see what others can’t, and say what others won’t. Simeon and Anna were on a different wavelength not because they were born Levites or trained to be Pharisees and Sadducees, but rather because they took seriously the call to devote their lives to God. Full ownership given to the Spirit in your life gets full access to the Spirit and the life it brings. Every part of you must serve, and be submitted and surrendered, to every part of Him. 2 – Righteousness and holiness must start in your life with what is unholy and unhealthy being brought to the light of His Spirit in repentance and in a posture to be transformed. It is an ownership over your patterns, disciplines, habits, and desirous appetites that becomes the seedbed for a life in the Spirit to take root and thrive. You will never step into discerning and sensing the Spirit for others if you cannot and will not discern and follow the Spirit for yourself first. Before Anna and Simeon discerned baby Jesus in front of them by the Spirit of God, they had decades of faithfulness to discerning and sensing that Spirit in the devotion of how they lived—in righteousness, in prayer, in worship, and in the frequency of life in the temple of God. We start small in order to live big. 3 – The challenge and new course direction of Fixate on its third-year anniversary is to become a house of Annas and Simeons—devoted to righteousness and holiness in such a way that we would discern the Spirit of God before the concept was even realized, carry a message from God when their status in life said they couldn’t, see the image of God in the midst of those who—even when trained to see—were blind to find it, and live a life of remembrance because they did something before anyone else ever did. Righteousness, holiness, sensitivity, discernment; this is who we are becoming.

Renewal School Pt 4; Holy Patterns

Daniel 1:3–9 Daniel 6:10–13, 16-23 How to Become a Person Defined By Holy Habits Holy habits are God-focused patterns that sow seed in the soil of daily life that yield fruit of a relationship of intimacy and proximity in the life of tomorrow. Holy habits are not activities; they are disciplines that submit and surrender unholy appetites and unhealthy desires, that then allow God to resurrect you in spiritual health and wholeness. In the beginning it is more training your appetites to say no and drawing the lines of what you don’t do, before those appetites rewire you into living in a way you were never meant to live. Have you come to be defined as one who constantly serves God? What got Daniel in trouble was that he constantly served God. But in even greater detail, the king over all the land doesn’t even know the God Daniel serves by name, only that his life is lived in such a way that he constantly serves Him. Renewing your life, focus, and functionality is what determines if the title rests on you of a constant servant of God. If you will take seriously the call of constant service, the blessing is discovering and sensing a God with you, around you, and inside of you, in every season and aspect of your life. Even the smallest patterns of renewal in this day and age can be the very resistance needed for a shift in the climate of the world around you. Daniel started with prayer three times a day in quiet resistance to the modern order and by the end had a king passing a decree in which everyone was mandated to worship the God Daniel served. The king’s first decree went from worship me to worship Him. And this is the first step—turning the attention from worship of self, to worship of Him. His first decree missed the mark and the second decree corrected it. The king wanted to worship something; he just needed someone to show him, through how he lived, who was worthy to be worshiped.

Renewal School Pt 3: Contending Prayer

Formulaic Process of Renewal – Holy Discontentment + Preparation (in secret) + Contending (in prayer) + Holy patterns + Remnant = A Region Renewed in the Spirit of God 2 Kings 18:1–6 2 Kings 20:1–10 What Defines a Life of Contending Prayer Hezekiah’s first response when he is faced with discouraging news. “Remember now, O Lord, I beseech You, how I have walked before You in truth and with a whole heart and have done what is good in Your sight.” (20:3) Meaning, to develop a life of response from Heaven, I must produce these characteristics as a descriptor of who I am: someone who is walking with God in truthfulness, giving Him the whole of my heart, and knowing from this place I will produce good in His sight. How deep does prayer really go for you? Contending prayer is a prayer that fights, wrestles, and grapples for the revelation of God in the areas I’m seeking Him. God’s response to Hezekiah’s prayer? “I have heard your prayer, I have seen your tears; behold, I will heal you.” (20:5) God hearing prayers and seeing tears are two different things. Communication with no emotion is not healthy communication. Prayer with the depths of our souls comes out in the weeping bitterly and the praying pointedly, that then turns the Father heart towards His children. We contend in righteous awareness, vulnerability, and transparency, and the Spirit will respond. Be real, be raw, or don’t be anything. Contending prayer doesn’t just believe for messages. It demands signs and miracles. “Now Hezekiah said to Isaiah, ‘What will be the sign that the Lord will heal me?’” (20:8) Abnormality is embraced and even expected when we enter into a deeper understanding of what contending prayer is supposed to produce. Hezekiah shifted the shadows of the sun to confirm a word from a prophet. What ways do you need to shift your mindset to start to expect that God wants to reveal signs of His goodness, grace, and miraculous power in your everyday walk with Him?

Renewal School Pt. 2: Preparation in Secret

Process of renewal –– holy discontentment + preparation (in secret) + contending (in prayer) + holy patterns + remnant == a region renewed in the spirit of God 1 Sam 17:20-23 /// 31-40 How to Prepare in Secret in Order to Walk in the Promises of God in Your Life. 1 - You must take out the lions and bears with God in your private life before you can take down the giants with God in your public one. Before you're ever going to win visible battles, you must take ownership of the invisible ones. So often we know the giants we are up against in the obvious ways, but we disregard the lions and bears feeding on the areas of our souls in the non-obvious ways. You must understand that it is the battles we learn to fight when no one is watching that allow us to emerge victorious in faith when people are watching. 2 - We prepare in secret so when the time comes we aren’t tempted to be someone else other than who God called us uniquely to be. Before David was knocking down a giant he was deciding if he believed in the skill of the sling shot over the strength of the king's sword and armor. Oftentimes the reason we're not taking down giants is because we are using everyone else’s strategy to win, uncomfortable and not confident in the gifts our Father has given us. Preparation is about understanding who God has uniquely called me to be, and being willing to look foolish if it means I walk out in the faith I have God is with me. If you lose yourself, you lose it all. 3 - You can hide in the baggage, or head to the battle. Proper preparation is when you handle the baggage before it affects the battle. So often we bring baggage to the battles, not realizing that the gift of fighting the lions and bears when no one is watching is having the skills needed to defeat the giants when everyone is. Preparation is the healthy ownership of my healing journey and gift development that can only be done in the deep cultivation of a life in God. You have to own what's around you in order to win at what's ahead of you

Renewal School Pt 1: Holy Discontentment

2 Kings 22:1-2; 11-20 Process of Renewal: Holy discontentment + preparation + contending + holy patterns + remnant = a region renewed in the Spirit of God. How to Walk in a Holy Discontentment: 1 - The action of hearing the words of God must produce a heart of changing my behavior to reflect the revelation I receive from His Word. All it takes for idols and high places to remain in a heart indifferent to the effects of duplicity. What you behold you become, and if you're not happy with what you're becoming, be mindful of things you might be worshipping that you're not aware you may be kneeling before. Better is one day with Him than a thousand elsewhere is a real time litmus test. 2 - Holy discontentment often starts when my heart is tender to the spirit of God and I become humbled by and to the truth of His Word. We worship in Spirit and in truth; not one at the expense of the other. Holiness is the pursuit of the Spirit and presence of God while also developing a depth of wisdom and awareness with the truth of God's Word. When His Spirit and Word confront the high places and altars of a life contrary to Lordship, we must respond in full surrender and full submission. 3 - Holy discontentment is when His Spirit fills me and constantly highlights areas of idol worship and high places that we may never know actually exist. A true encounter with Jesus leads to a lifestyle of constant awareness of anything not of Him, and a discontentment of anything that I would view above my relationship and intimacy with His Spirit and truth. Removing idols is just His Spirit removing any obstacle or barrier of a life intimate and proximity to Him... righteousness and holiness are not the end goal.... awareness of an intimate God all around you, at all times... is.

Roots and Fruits

Jude 1:20-25 Cross References for further study: On divisions & building yourselves up: Romans 16:17-20 Hebrews 10:24-25 2 Peter 1:3-11 Ephesians 2:20 On having mercy on others: 2 Cor 5:11; 20 - Zechariah 3 On Him who is able: Daniel 3 (16-18 specifically) Isaiah 43:2 Philippians 2:13 Hebrews 10:14

Treasures Hidden in Darkness

John 14:27 Isaiah 42:16 Matthew 16:19 Matthew 5:17 Hebrews 12:24 Isaiah 45 :2-3 Lord, I Wanna See I Wanna Be Unshakeable I Wanna Receive the Treasures Hidden in Darkness

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