Discernment is something that I've been asked to teach on recently and have been asked to teach on it by a couple of different people. We are living in such a cloudy time in the world that we have to be able to see through the smoke. We have to rise as believers and walk in our authority in Christ and be able to appropriately sift through what's going on in our society today. We must be able to remain upright and strong when there's chaos all around us, and the only way that we're going to be a will to do that is to know what God is saying about each it's every situation going on in the world today.
One way to walk in discernment is to get quiet with God. There are so many opportunities for us to remain distracted, especially his parents. However, even if you're not a parent, Satan will always try to make a way for you to be distracted from spending time with God; be it in prayer, in worship, and true submission to him, and how you treat other people. To walk in discernment, we must begin to silence the things going on in the world.
Now, I am not talking about turning a blind eye to what's going on in the world; however, I am talking about not letting it become an influence in your life that is stronger than the voice of the Lord. We need to turn down social media, we need to turn up the word of God. We need to be rising early to pray when Holy Spirit leads us, and if you don't feel like he's leading you, then ask him to wake you up and let you know when it's time to pray. Robin and I and Chris and Zuly Garcia recently dated teaching on rising early to pray in the importance of it during this time.
I know that there are people that are called to different times to pray, but there does seem to be special power right now that is upon us when we rise early to pray, and I fully believe that it has to do with not being obstructed. What I mean by that is that nothing is getting in the way of your prayer when the only person up is you and Jesus (maybe a dog that keeps throwing you sideways looks because you’re being too loud in prayer and preventing them from sleeping).
Operating in discernment means that you can differentiate between the voice of God from your flesh, and the voice of the enemy from God's voice. We must always keep in mind that God is not the author of confusion or delusion, He is not the author of hate or racism or discouragement or shame. We must know that God is a God of hope, He is a God of strength, and power, and sound judgment. The other thing that we have to work on in our lives of who want to operate in discernment, is having a sound mind the word of God says that we have been given; peace, love, and a sound mind.
The world today seems to be lacking in the area of walking in sound judgment because they don't have Jesus. However, as Christians, we must begin to walk with a sound mind at all times, because otherwise what separates us from the world? We must begin to look to God for answers instead of the prophetic voices that stand upon lofty platforms. There are times that it's great to listen to a prophet, God sends prophets, but we must learn to hear the voice of God for our self, because if we don't, how are we supposed to know that the prophetic voice is true? We are living in a time where we need to be able to discern, because the enemy if roaming around, seeking whom He may devour.
Satan has people on assignment to Christian organizations to go in and destroy them from the inside out. He, in other words, is looking to see whom he may quickly and readily destroy completely. Therefore, we must always be on guard, because we don't have time to respond to Satan if we're not on guard. That being said, discernment is not something that we do in the flesh. It is a gift of the spirit listed in first Corinthians with the other gifts of the spirit. You may be wondering how do I know if I making a judgment or a prime discerning something, or by making an assumption.
I will just tell you right now, that if you are describing someone in their walk with Christ or not with Christ, and it is done out of any ill intention, then you're not operating in the spirit, but you're operating in the flesh. However, if you are discerning, you will be coming from a place of wanting to know the truth about the situation and the person. You will be coming from a place of wanting to know what the truth is about it, to protect people, and to know how to best love that person in the situation they're going through.
There different boundaries that we have to draw with every person, and as business owners, there are different decisions that we have to make to protect our company. There are ways that we need to lead people as leaders and we can best know what way to lead each person based on discernment. Therefore, you can see why it's so important to be operating in this on a day-to-day basis, no matter what your status of employment is on, or who you are interacting with; it's coming from a place of needing to know what the Lord is saying about each situation because we want to be like Jesus. Jesus knew at all times what the truth was behind situations, and he acted accordingly.
We don't want to move anywhere unless Jesus is moving with us, therefore, we must know what's going on in each situation according to him to be able to know what move he's going to make. We must always have our eyes set on Jesus, and not this world. That means, that we can't get into gossip in regards to what we're discerning about someone. That would be an ill intention.
Just because God is telling you something about someone's personality, or you’re perceiving something that no one has told you, does not give you the right to misuse his name and talk to other people about other people in a negative way. It does not give you an excuse to go up to someone and talk to them about someone with the knowledge you have but hide it as if you're asking for prayer for that person. These are just a couple of ways that Satan uses members of the body of Christ to devour one another, and we want nothing to do with that.
There are a lot of people that are making judgments right now about what's going on politically and they're putting their judgments out on Facebook and all social media sites including their opinions, that is not discernment. There is no discernment where there is truth spoken without love. I do want to say that it is important that we learn to discern what is good and what is excellent. That is one of the definitions of discernment, to be a will to know what is good and what is excellent because as members of the body of Christ, we must operate always in excellence.
There are times we must know what is the work of the flesh and what is the work of the spirit because good works will not get us to Heaven. Therefore, we must be able to understand how to walk in the things of the spirit but to know that something is of the spirit, we must operate discernment.
Okay, so how do I operate discernment you might be asking at this point. The very first thing that you can do to increase your discernment is to pray for it. God is a good father, and he will not withhold anything good from you, including discernment. I do want to take a moment here to make note that each person can operate in the gifts of the spirit as the Holy Spirit chooses. That means that just because you may operate in one gift stronger than another doesn't mean you will never operate in that gift. So, if you have never felt like you operated in discernment before, which I'm sure you have and just not been able to recognize it, that doesn't mean that you won't build operated at now and going forward. We need discernment and it's a gift to us so, we must know that we cannot rely on any part of ourselves to walk in discernment, because the Lord is the one who gives the gifts of the Holy Spirit.
We must honor the Holy Spirit by recognizing that we are not the ones operating in discernment without him that we cannot do it without him. We must always remember to rely solely on the Holy Spirit and not ourselves. The second thing that we must do to walk in discernment, is to spend time in the word of God. This is the best way to hear the voice of God and be able to decipher and sift through what is not of God, but you cannot do that without knowing the truth you cannot know what is a lie without knowing the truth, and the truth is the word of God. So if you want to operate in a higher level of discernment, make sure that you're in the word of God and that His words are on your lips and in your heart and mind morning noon and night.
Another way to walk in discernment is to make sure that you are taking yourself out of situations that would cloud your spiritual vision or your vision of discernment. Make sure that if someone is talking negatively about a situation, or if the news is going on and on about a situation from a worldly perspective, that you remove yourself from that situation. I know this may be hard where you live in a home where someone is always saying or playing something negative, but you can do your best ask Holy Spirit to guard you and protect your heart and remove yourself as able and begin to draw boundaries with people that you live with so that you can correctly do this. It's also important for you to have a mentor. I believe that this person is not someone that's going to control you or tell you you're always right or wrong, but it someone that you can trust to bounce things off of, that is well-versed in the word of God, and that operates in discernment and their own life.
The way that you can tell if someone is operating is in discernment is to assess their fruit. Are they having good fruit, are they operating in the gifts of the spirit and seeing success are they seeing healing, are they seeing people's lives change for the better, are they seeing blind eyes open, demonically oppressed people set free, are they loving? If someone is not walking in love been they are not walking in discernment. You have to have the discernment to fully love someone.
As you know, I teach and mentor in classes here at Fireside Grace Ministries, so if you want someone just to talk about what you're hearing, please feel free to reach out and set up mentoring sessions with me. I talk to the females, and Robyn talks to the males. We have to be as wise as serpents and as gentle as doves and that's why discernment goes with love because we have to be gentle in how we handle the people that we're discerning.
One thing that I know for sure, is that discernment is required it is a must to make good decisions. This is why you see good fruit when someone has discernment because they have discerned rightly a situation and have made good decisions.
Now, I'll be the first to tell you, that I was not always making good decisions. I went through about a 5 to 7 year period where I was just struggling to know how to make a decision and I had no idea what formula, if you will, to use to make good decisions. However, with the help of mentors and the Holy Spirit, I was able to bounce ideas that I was having off of my mentors and see if they would tell me that yes this does sound like God no, it is not.
Now, you have to be extremely careful with who you trust to do this with and make sure Holy Spirit again has told you and you have discerned, that the who you're asking to do this for you is in righteous person, with no Jezebelic tendencies. The reason being, this can easily become a manipulated situation where the person speaking into your life is operating in control, and that will not help you discern anything, but it actually can hold you back from your calling.
I trust if you're reading this, and you are going to seek out a mentor, that the Holy Spirit will lead you, and they are the right mentor to seek out for you. We are praying and believing in faith with you for this. If you want to know more about discernment, e-mail me at firesidegrace@yahoo.com, reach out on our Facebook page, and let us know we would love to talk to you more about discernment.
As of right now, the times are very difficult and we have to discern to be a proper voice regarding what's going on. We have to know how to lead people during these times, and we even have to get to the point where we lead people in such a way that they are hearing God amid crisis. We should lead people in such a manner that they don't have to have everything silent to hear the voice of God, but to be able to do that, we have to take time in the quiet time to build that bond if you will, of hearing God's voice, and build that relationship so that we know what it is God would say amid a situation where we can't take time to get away from the noise. I love you, I bless you, and I believe in you. I believe in the gift of Holy Spirit in you and that He's a good father, and that He's going to give you discernment today and in the days ahead. Be blessed in Jesus’ name, amen.