2014: REFORMATION OF OUR REPUTATION LEADS TO REFORMATION OF THE NATIONS

They Will Know HIS Love When They Know OUR Love

by, Elizabeth Enlow

My husband Johnny and I have a tradition of setting time aside every year to seek God’s heart concerning the upcoming new year. This year I sensed God’s invitation for His sons and daughters to participate in His plans of reformation in 2014 by caring more about our reputation or image in the world than ever before. I felt He said that as we gain a reputation more for our love than for what we stand against, then the knowledge of God and His correct reputation will also increase in the earth.

Just in case you may think it’s inappropriate for a Christian to care about what others think of us, remember that Luke 2:52 says “Jesus increased in wisdom, and stature, and in favor with God and man.” I believe our Father has given us the same privilege and responsibility. You may also remember that Philippians 2:7 tells us that Jesus “made Himself of no reputation.” If you read this verse in context, it explains how Jesus gave up His more true identity as God in order to be known as a servant among us. I believe God is inviting us to change our reputation, or what we are known for in the eyes of the world, for the purpose of increasing in favor.

The Love We Discovered in 2013 Will Launch Us Forward In 2014

Johnny’s word for 2014 is The Year of the Catapult. God began to speak to me about our love for the world being the catapult that will launch us into the reformation of cities and nations. I believe He has taken our generation through many intentional steps over the last several decades to teach us, as His sons and daughters, how He truly does love us and desires an intimate and authentic relationship with us and not religion or works. The best evidence of that can easily be seen in the progression of our worship. Clearly we are learning to pour our hearts out to a God we feel can handle our honesty and wants our genuine affection and freedom in His presence. Our Father has individually and corporately been intentionally convincing our hearts of the very thing that we must learn to give away to the world - unconditional, extravagant love that secures us even when the enemy would try to use circumstances to convince us that we are not loved or valued. Until we began to believe it for ourselves, we certainly wouldn’t have been capable of giving it away.

2013 was filled with the usual ups and downs, but it was a year that our hearts began to pass the test of knowing, no matter what circumstances looked like, we were still loved by God and He could still be trusted. Johnny described it like the intense pressure and tension that happens when a catapult is pulled back. It was in that place of tension and extreme pressure that our hearts became more convinced than ever of the goodness of the Lord and therefore convinced of His love towards us. The next step will be seen in our ability to give to the world that same love we have received. It is that very love that

will propel us forward into places of influence, bringing with us the solutions God is excited to provide through us in all areas of culture.

2014: The War Is Raging

No matter where you live, what race or religion or economic situation you are in, you were born into a war zone. This war, along with every lesser battle, have and will always be over the same issue- the truth of who God is and what He’s really like- His correct reputation. Habakkuk 2:14 assures us that this war will be won, “For the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord.” That word, “knowledge” can be translated as understanding or perception and “glory” can be translated as reputation. It all ends with the earth having seen the correct perspective of who God His- His correct reputation as the good, perfect, and amazing Father that He is! The war is over the knowledge of God.

All of us, from those who claim there is no God to the most spiritually mature, have struggled with knowing if God loves us, sees us, and if we are truly valuable to Him. Ever since that fateful bite was taken from the forbidden fruit Adam and Eve ate of from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, all of humanity has been attempting to perceive or judge if God is good or not, if He can be trusted or not, and if His intentions towards us are good. Whether we are aware of it or not, we individually and collectively live according to the perspective we have formed about God. He has a definite reputation in our eyes. His reputation among us is seen in the choices we make and in the ways humanity has established the structures of culture.

This war over the knowledge of God, or His correct reputation, plays out in the collective hearts of cities, nations, and their cultures in much the same way it plays out in our own individual hearts. We filter our understanding of God through our circumstances and the consequences of our reactions to them. We and others make decisions that cause painful results that leave us feeling unloved, unseen, and not valued. Most every aspect of culture and our lives reflects the pain cycle most are stuck in. We make decisions based on the fear of causing or receiving more pain, resulting in the creation of systems, structures, and values that we hope and believe will protect us from more pain. Those societal structures then cause us to reap the painful consequences that produce more circumstances in life that tempt us to make more decisions based in fear of pain. For example, our economic system is built on the reality of that fear of pain. We work, plan, and hoard more than we actually need while much of the world barely survives, all because we want to prevent ourselves and our families from the pain of lack or discomfort.

Culture itself, whether speaking of government or economic structures, education systems, or art/entertainment, is a collective response to our fear of pain and our wrong perceptions of God. Bottom line, we don’t believe that He will care for us or that His ways are best for us, so we have constructed a society that reflects our best ways of caring for ourselves, which causes us more pain and therefore perpetuates more lies about Him.

As another example, our education systems, for the most part, reflect a collective perception of the way we think God instructs us. We have wrongly perceived, and therefore wrongly set up education that reflects our belief, that what God wants us to learn is more important than we are. At our core, we think what we know or can do is what gives us our value. We live as if we believe that we are valuable to God after we learn the things He wants to teach us. So, we pass this belief along by establishing education systems that leave our children believing the same thing. They are shuffled along year after year, expected to learn valuable information that will make them have value to the world. The truth is, we are of great worth to God and when He instructs us it always leaves us feeling our worth. His better way of educating causes us to know we are more important than what we are learning and that because we are valuable, He desires that we learn what He is teaching us. When culture is done God’s better way, love permeates the experience and love is the result, not fear.

Finding the Correct Battle Front

Knowing what the war is over is not enough. We must also be fully conscious of what the war is not over in order to show up at the right battle front and fight a good fight. The battle is not about defining sin or who can do the best job communicating to the world what they are doing wrong. The battle is not over homosexuality, or prayer in schools, or who we elect to govern. I believe Christians have fallen into great deception and distraction when we run to false battle front lines that the enemy tempts us with. False battle fronts are usually those issues that present us to the world as ones who care more about what we are trying to teach them than we do about them.

Generally speaking, our current reputation is as those who are compelled to keep telling them what we are against and what they are doing wrong. The horrific thing about this is that because of that reputation, many now believe that God also is that way. Do we not realize that the only reason God even cares about sin and behavior is because He cares about us? Every other thought or emotion God has towards us pales in comparison to His love for us. Is that the God we have shown them? If they are ever going to know the real Him, we must see and then show them the real Him.

The real Him is the One Jesus showed us- forgiving, loving, healing, redeeming, accepting and never condemning. God impressed my heart with the reality of this in a new way. We must believe that the reason God sent Jesus was so that we could know Him and know His love for us. That was the reason for Jesus’ death and resurrection- that we would know Him and His love for us. That was His message and must be our message to the world as well. He dealt with our sin through Jesus so that we could know Him, therefore we must become known for “He loves you!” and not “Deal with your sin!” We have shown the world the God we have perceived, but the good news is, we are beginning to see Him more clearly.

There Is One Enemy

If we are to participate with God in reforming nations by filling the earth with the knowledge of how good He is and how much better His ways are than ours, then we simply must remember that there is one enemy. Satan, the father of lies, is the one who uses us and our culture like pawns to spread His lies about who God is or isn’t. He has done a good job of drawing us into an “us versus them” mentality. He tricks us into attacking the very ones we have been given the privilege to love in His name. When we are not vigilant, we become resentful of the very ones we are called to reach with the truth of how good He is. Why would someone who doesn’t feel loved by us want to know our God?

I recently sensed God saying, “If my sons and daughters learn to be as protective over My reputation as a loving and good God as they have been over their right to live in a country that has Godly government, then they will see great advancement of My kingdom on earth in 2014 and the earth itself will celebrate.” Many have lived from a place of disappointment in all the perceived ways our government has let us down, which has been a distraction from the real enemy.

In 2 Corinthians 10:5 Paul tells us that “The weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but are mighty in God for pulling down strongholds, casting down arguments and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God...” This war is not against people, but against the lies, arguments, and mentalities about God that are false. Our weapons are not of this earth nor are they the usual tactics of debating, degrading, and destroying others. Perhaps we believe just as many lies about God as the world does. If we focused on the basics of the core truths we have learned and presented them more effectively and clearly to those we say we want to see free, we would see great progress in the knowledge of God in the earth. We are all wired the same by God- when we feel loved by Him, we draw near to Him. When we draw near to Him, He affirms our value to Him and leads us to freedom from those things that keep us distant from Him.

How Do We Individually Win This War?

We win with love. We win when we stop wasting our energy on false battle fronts, on the wrong enemy, and on a false responsibility for holding up a standard of behavior for the world. We win when we know how loved we are and then give it away extravagantly.

There will be no greater personal accomplishment you can achieve this year than to grow in the knowledge of God. None of us can give away what we do not have. As we grow in the understanding of all the ways He is good, we will begin to give to the world the God they have longed to know. When we are known for our love, they will want to know the real Him. When we are known for love that is expressed through practical solutions in culture, they will begin to see His better ways of doing everything. And His better ways always communicate to our hearts that we are loved, valued, and seen.

So how do we each grow in the knowledge of God? First, know that no one can do it for you. It requires hunger for Him that you can simply ask for if you don’t have. You don’t have to talk a hungry person into being disciplined enough to take the time and eat. Second, purpose to stay filled with His love. There are many ways you can do this: sit quietly with Him and let Him pour His love into you when you feel yourself running on empty. Study and write out the many scriptures that tell us about His love for us or write out a truth statement about how much He loves you and read it out loud to yourself a few times a day.

If we are going to shift our reputation as Christians, we must stay filled with His love. When we feel as loved as we are, then we will give it away freely and be able to see love as the only option in every situation and with every person. Give yourself permission to simply love. Take off the yoke of the enemy that says we must be able to “seal the deal” of salvation with someone in order for it “to count” or be worth our time. Be convinced that absolutely every time you choose love, you are advancing the knowledge of God in the earth. Yes, there will be times that we will help “connect the dots” for someone, but we must throw off the weight of trying to save the world when God has already done that. Through our love they will discover that reality. What a place of freedom we can live in!

Again, we win by deferring to love every time. I’m not saying we should always roll over and play dead. I’m talking about love as it is defined in 1 Corinthians 13, which would be a great text to begin the year meditating on.

Favor Is Coming!

Many have grown weary in recent years because we have begun to awaken to desires to bring change, yet we haven’t found enough personal breakthroughs. So why hasn’t God given us more favor in the world? I believe, that out of His love for us, our Father has been preparing us to handle favor. For at least two reasons we have not been ready: It would have consumed us and we would have confused it with His love. When favor comes to immature people they tend to self destruct. A good Father wants His children to always know and feel His love, even when circumstances aren’t easy and tempt you to believe you’ve been abandoned. Love is unconditional, but favor is for the purpose of fulfilling destiny and advancing the kingdom. We must know in our core that we are always loved, wether we can see it or feel it. We must also know that the favor He gives us is not His love, rather it is His strategy for advancing the truth of who He is in the earth. Favor gives us permission to show them the Father and give them the love He has given us.

Favor is coming and your Father is making sure you are ready. Be so convinced of His love and goodness, that when favor comes, you know what it is for. May this be the year that our reputation of love is known in every home, office, shopping mall, Facebook post, etc. Wherever our voice is heard, let it resound with love.

About Elizabeth Enlow: An encourager at heart, she and her husband Johnny are passionate social reformers focused on the reformation of the 7 primary areas of culture: Media, Arts and Entertainment, Government, Family, Religion, Economy, and Education. Her passion is to help individuals understand and fulfill the simplicity of the call on our lives- to know the real God, to make the real God known, and to learn to love and be loved. As an international speaker, co-author of Rainbow God: The Seven Colors of Love, and spiritual mentor, she loves the opportunity to provoke hearts and minds to consider what God as love looks like coming through us and our unique places of passion and influence.