Posted on by thornstocrowns

Who knocks at your door: Draw your attention

In a modern world of doorbells, buzzers, intercoms, and text messages I would like to point out the good old-fashioned hand knocking. Knocking on doors has been used to draw our attention since time. The expected knock of family or friends coming to visit, the unexpected knock of strangers, the knock of urgency/warning, and many other code knocks you can remember. A common question we typically ask ourselves after a knock is who is at the door? If you have lived quite a bit like I have, based on the knock, you may know who is at your door. This is all physical, our ears hear and know and we proceed with action. Can I shift your attention for the sake of this blog? Keep the idea of knocking and knowing who is at the door in the physical. The Bible in many examples has used knocking to illustrate this call of our attention to God. In the book of Revelations, God says in chapter 3:20, “Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with that person, and they with me.” How does the knock from God sound? Of course, it is not one we can recognize with our ears, but surely our hearts know when God stands at the door and knocks.

When the heart knows who knocks at the door

Aside from keeping us alive, the heart is the internal ear of one’s soul. There are several things that we can know based on our hearts. We know when we are in love, afraid, excited, nervous, heartbroken, calm, and at peace when we pay attention to our hearts. How then can the heart communicate to us and draw our attention to hear and know who is at the door? If the heart is the internal ear of the soul, it will know what the knock from the Lord sounds like. He is the Creator of it all after all! Think of it this way, when an app is down or does not function as it should, it will only respond to the app developers coding correction because they created it. This is the same way our hearts respond to God’s knocking. It is almost like a natural incline of our hearts to know who exactly is at the door. We can ignore the knocking for a while until we can not anymore. God gently knocks, he doesn’t force his way into your life or like a robber breaks through your doors and steals from you. He stands there and your heart hears him knocking, the question is, do you respond?

Who is the knock for?

The knock is for all of us! The word in Revelations 3:20 was addressed to a people who knew God and probably heard him knock several times. They knew what his knock sounded like, but eventually had their attention drawn to other things. They no longer wanted to allow God into their lives as they were filled with their own means of sustenance. We are no different from these people, we have been hard of hearing because of our very own means to sustain ourselves. We may not see the need to respond to God’s knocking when we are preoccupied with our lives. Yet, he still stands at the door and knocks to draw our attention to him and do life with him.

Opening the door and inviting him

Opening the door for the Lord to come in is pleasant, and the heart tells you immediately. The times I have tried to keep the door shut after hearing God knocking were probably the most difficult in my life. I thought I could get by just fine on my own until I couldn’t anymore. Overwhelmed by the hurt and pain I concealed, my heart drew my attention to the door, and opening it was the best thing I could ever have done for myself. It was a different experience and from then on I decided to keep the door open and always invite God in. Opening the door and inviting him in means you want to have an intimate relationship with him. He no longer is just a God you read about in the books, but you know him and desire to have him in your life. You fellowship with him and him with you (Rev 3:20). What a beautiful opportunity we have to open our hearts to the Lord. If you have been hearing this knock for a while now, please don’t ignore it anymore. Allow him in! Your heart knows who is knocking at your door. It is time for you to take your rightful place. It is time to trade thorns for crowns!

Much Love,

Xholiwe

Posted on by thornstocrowns

Intentional encounters: Make the time

In the 24 hours we have in the day, we can do as much as we possibly can. Before bed, we may think where did the time go? Time does have a way of slipping by us so easily and we oftentimes tend to lack the intentionality of our time. Typically, what usually suffers is our intentional time spent meeting with God. We have limited our encounter with God to only our Sabbath days when there are so many more opportunities for us to meet with him in our daily 24 hours. I am guilty of this sometimes, I get caught up in my own timetable, and making time to meet with the Lord becomes difficult. In these situations, being intentional about connecting with the Lord helps take away the focus from our own timetable to then connect with God. Making the time, and preparing to have an encounter with God does change the day-to-day. If you are struggling with intentionally encountering the Lord, please keep reading.

INTENTIONAL about your time with the Lord

By definition, to be intentional is doing something on purpose. When we think of ‘purpose’ of this blog post we must think of preparation to successfully meet with the Lord. I was speaking with a dear friend of mine and she was sharing her amazing encounters with the Lord. She told me how before these many encounters with the Lord through confirming scriptures, dreams, and visions, she took time to prepare herself. She did a Daniel’s fast for 21 days and was intentional about how she spent her time. In her preparation, she ensured that her food planning was well-curated and this helped her avoid the temptation of meat and animal products. Every day during the 21 days she spent an hour in prayer. She went even further to put away all distractions, things such as social media accounts, TV shows, etc. All this was intentional and well thought through, I can’t go into detail about her beautiful encounters with the Lord in these 21 days, but rest assured it was great! While you may not be thinking about a 21-day Daniel fast as a means to encounter the Lord, you can still be intentional in your daily encounter with the Lord. Understand that God wants to be connected with you, he wants to spend time with you. How then can you be intentional about your time spent with him?

  • Start your day with devotion and prayer.
  • Listen to praise and worship music.
  • Study your Bible and seek understanding.
  • Listen to a podcast/sermon on a specific topic you want to gain more understanding from.
  • Write your prayers and thoughts by journaling.
  • Create times when you fast and pray.
  • Create absolute quiet time where you can just focus on your time with the Lord with no distractions (especially your smartphone). Allow yourself to quiet the noise of each busy day.

These are a few things that I do that help me intentionally make time to spend with the Lord. You may look at the list and think these feel like chores, and honestly when I have fed my flesh more than my spirit, they have felt like chores to me too. Almost like a to-do list that I am supposed to check off and feel great about my accomplishments at the end of my day. But these intentional things listed above are far from feeling like chores when continuously done with the purpose in mind that we get to encounter God. The idea of intimately connecting with our creator holds greater significance when we make the time to do these things. We intentionally prepare ourselves for an encounter knowing that he too wants to commune with us. In our intentionality, we find the very thing that we so desperately need. 

Come near to God and he will come near to you. Wash your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. James 4:8

Seek the Lord and His strength;
Seek His face continually [longing to be in His presence].

1 Chronicles 16:11 AMP

The scriptures invite us to draw near to God and to continually Seek his face. May your intentions to seek God and draw closer to him be pure and true. It will surprise you what God can do with your intentional ways to encounter him daily. Encountering God does do so much for one’s journey, I can testify to how being intentional has helped my closeness to God. In your intentions to encounter the Lord, your faith is built, you are strengthened, you establish discipline and most importantly deepen your relationship with God. Intentionally making time for the Lord means that you recognize his significance in your life! If it has been a while since encountered the Lord and want to re-establish your connection start with making time for him in your day. He is waiting for you and eager to draw nearer to you as well.

It is time for you to take your rightful place. It is time to trade thorns for crowns!

Much love,

Xholiwe

Posted on by thornstocrowns

Cultivating your relationship with God: Being rooted in it

The idea of cultivating a relationship with God to many may feel like a daunting task and for some nearly impossible. I personally was quite intimidated by the idea of cultivating a relationship with God because I wanted to believe that I did not have what the others had. I would think to myself, I do not pray as eloquent as this person, or give my time as the other person, how then would God want a relationship with me? I single-handedly talked myself out of cultivating a relationship with God. If this is you I hope after this read, you feel encouraged to cultivate a relationship with God. It is not as intimidating as you think! If anything, it is quite easy because you have a God ready to build a relationship with you!

A relationship with a God you can’t see

Many may argue and say how do you build a relationship with a God you can’t see? And in all realness, it is a good question. My answer would be through having knowledge of him. You are unable to cultivate a relationship with God if you have no personal knowledge of him. Fortunately, God made knowing him quite simple, you can get to know him through the bible (his word). If you are like me and grew up in a Christian home, I grew up being taught of him, but I personally did not know him for myself. It was what was taught to me that helped me believe in his existence, but seeking him is what helped me know him. The amazing thing about God is that he is not hiding himself from you, he is in plain sight wanting to be known by you. Our part then is to seek knowledge of him.

Think about how we get to cultivate relationships on earth for a second, we first get to know the person who a minute ago may have been a stranger to us. We ask questions such as; how are you like? what do you enjoy? what matters to you? and the list goes on. These are the exact questions you can ask God if you want to cultivate a relationship with him. It will require you to seek these answers in his word (the bible) to know him better (read Jeremiah 33:3). While with earthly relationships it may feel easier because you can see and touch the person that does not mean you can not have a similar experience in your relationship with God. The key is to know him and cultivate this relationship with him. Doing so is not as complicated as it seems to be or even as intimidating. You can have a relationship with a God you do not see by seeking to know him better. (read Jeremiah 29:13).

communication with God

Any long-lasting and fruitful relationship requires communication. With our earthly relationships, we communicate quite regularly with people we know. The constant communication builds even deeper and more meaningful relationships. Our approach to making communication essential in our earthly relationships would also apply to our relationship with God. Cultivating a relationship with God requires you to communicate with him regularly. We do this by praying to him, we have the privilege of communing with God daily through prayer. Our constant prayer to God starts to grow our relationship with him because, with each prayer, you invite God to be a part of your life and relate with you. Similar to how you call a friend when you receive good news or even bad news, is the same way God would like to hear from you. His desire is to be known by you and commune with you. (read 1 Chronicles 16:11). It will surprise you how much your relationship with God will grow because of your constant prayers to him.

Becoming rooted

From my experience with earthly relationships, I can tell you that my strong and meaningful relationship had to be rooted so they could stand through it all. If you want your relationship with God to become meaningful, it has to be rooted. It is the type of relationship you want to stand and stay anchored in. Becoming rooted comes from your constant desire to know God, to be known by him, and to commune with him through prayer. Becoming rooted in other words is a commitment to your relationship with God. You stay in it until the very end.

17 [I always pray] that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may grant you a spirit of wisdom and of revelation [that gives you a deep and personal and intimate insight] into the true knowledge of Him [for we know the Father through the Son]. 18 And [I pray] that the eyes of your heart [the very center and core of your being] may be enlightened [flooded with light by the Holy Spirit], so that you will know and cherish the [a]hope [the divine guarantee, the confident expectation] to which He has called you, the riches of His glorious inheritance in the [b]saints (God’s people), 19 and [so that you will begin to know] what the immeasurable and unlimited and surpassing greatness of His [active, spiritual] power is in us who believe. These are in accordance with the working of His mighty strength

Ephesians 1:17-19 AMP

Again, God wants to be known by you and I hope that you want to know him too. Cultivate a relationship with him, he has been waiting for you to come around. Tend to this relationship like you would to the dearest relationships you have on this earth and watch it grow. Share with God in your good, and in your bad and see how making him part of your life transforms you. It is possible to have a meaningful relationship with God. You have to cultivate! It is time to take your rightful place, it is time to trade thorns for crowns.

Much love,

Xholiwe