Daily Huddle - Sat May 18, 2019 Highly Valuable

Love you all, praying for you. 

Today is full of God’s grace for you, His promise, His goodness.  It’s only found in Him, and in doing what He tells you to do.  Praying that you will be found in Him today – that you will find Him!  And that He will lead you – every hour – even in the little.   God was showing me recently.  Proverbs 16:13 – “Kings take pleasure in honest lips; they value a man who speaks the truth.”  It’s easy to flatter and... it’s easy to say nothing.  But speaking truth when it is needed, when it may not be popular, takes courage and skill.  The first reaction may not be the final valuation.  You have to know what to say, you have to know when to say it, and you have to know how to say it. 
 
What to say.  Many people can’t speak truth even though they have the courage to, because they don’t seek it or walk in it themselves.  So when they speak, it’s not really truth – just partial truth or lacking truth – both are deception.  Honesty that is valued is the honesty based on wisdom.  And the only wisdom that is true wisdom is the wisdom that comes from God – by the Holy Spirit.  “I’m just being honest” – “I just tell it like it is.”  No, you’re rude, and you’re just sharing your opinion, your judgment of others.  You just tell it like “you think it is,” but you’re in error…   No-one needs friends like this, and please don’t do this to others.  Better to listen, and not talk.  But for leaders or even friends to be blessed by your honesty – it needs to be based upon wisdom.  That’s why PRISM every day is so vital!  Don’t miss.  That I: Insight from the Word – through Proverbs - will establish you in wisdom.  This will be of infinite value in your life, and others.
  
When to say it.  This takes great discernment.  You need to ask the Holy Spirit.  Just because something pops into your mind, or is a strong reaction inside you – doesn’t mean it’s from God – or it’s for you to say right now.   A friend once said.  Sometimes God gives you something to say, but more often, God gives you something to pray.  Make sure your default is "pray before you say."  One of the greatest impacts of correction in my life was from a young couple, friends of ours, who approached me on something that was a miss in my life.  They had first prayed about it together, they didn’t just bring it up the moment they thought it.  Their humble approach invited me to seek God and make the corrections He had for me.  Timing is everything.  Be sure the Holy Spirit is leading you – on when to say, not just what to say. 
 
How to say it.  This too requires great discernment, as well as courage - the clear and specific leading of the Holy Spirit.  Check your motive first.  Have you taken care of the log in your own eye, before addressing the speck in theirs?  But equally important, just because you’re not perfect, doesn’t mean God does not want to use you to say something.  Are you sharing this for their benefit?  Or just to get something off of your chest? Is this love? Or subtle retribution?   God gives instruction for these situations – whether addressing peers or superiors.  Ephesians 4:15 – “Instead (of being deceived by every opinion or doctrine- even your own), speaking the truth in love, we will grow to become in every respect, the mature body of Him who is the head, Christ.”  Our responsibility is to speak truth out of the motivation of love.  And here is how God instructs us to do this.
 
Proverbs 25:11 – A word fitly spoken is like apples of gold in pictures of silver.  This “word” (dabar, daw-bawr)  - means a “matter spoken of,” not just a side-comment - it’s weightier than that.  “Fitly” spoken means – in the appropriate season -  in the proper and best timing to be received and effective.  The word “apples” – tappuach <tap-poo'-akh> interestingly - also indicates the apple “from its fragrance” – not just the apple itself – but the aroma that accompanies it.  (Like the smell of bushels of apples in a barn on a fall day).  “Pictures” (maskiyth – mas-keeth) are carved images – which figuratively mean - “imagination, the image of what could be...”  So the message delivered includes not only truth, but timing, presentation, and the senses - imagery as well as the fact itself. 
 
I love the next verse,  Proverbs 25:12 – As an erring of gold, and an ornament of fine gold, is a wise reprover upon an obedient ear.   Ok, the receiver must be humble, to hear intelligently – predisposed to obey – but that’s not on you if you are the reprover that God wants to use.  A wise reprover is one – skillful at bringing needed correction in a kind and convincing manner.   Only the Holy Spirit can help you do this.  This begs a few questions.  Are you a wise reprover?  (Do you have wisdom? Do you wait on God’s timing? Do you pray before you say? Do you obey with courage when He says now is when to speak? and Do you ask the Holy Spirit to deliver the message through you with love and fragrance?  And as always – put the shoe on the other foot - when a wise reprover addresses you and something in your life – are you defensive? Or has God finally matured your default to be humility – pre-disposed to obey? 
 
Praying for you all – that you will not miss even one day of PRISM.  The best way I know to grow in wisdom – so you have something to say when it’s needed!  Your Daily Call gives you daily practice of the Holy Spirit’s timing and delivery!  You have to do PRISM every day!  The Word of God is the only source of wisdom.  Give the Holy Spirit something to work with!  Do PiVAT every day before dinner– wisdom that is not put into practice never becomes understanding for you - only hearsay.  Would you rather hear something from somebody that has “heard this advice somewhere before,” or from an obeyer - who is walking in the fruit of it every day!  And finally.  Your Daily Call is “Apples of Gold in Pictures of Silver”-practice – for both of you!  This is how you yourself receive counsel from trusted and honest lips – a Daily Call Partner who is an obeyer, who knows and loves you.  This is how you get daily practice in speaking the truth in love for them.  And even greater than that - when you pray for each other at the end of each Daily Call – the Holy Spirit speaks His Counsel directly through you!
 
Praying that you will have the courage and skill to share what God wants you to share in any situation that God may lead.  First practice in your Daily Call, so God can then use you in other situations.  Praying that your love for God would overflow into love for others.  That your Daily Call would build in you the joyful obedience that results in wisdom and blessing, the discernment of when, what and how to say, and the courage to speak blessing to others – as you walk in his infinite blessings for you. 
 
Love you all,
dad