May the blessings of our God be upon you today as you open your heart to the One that is able to conform you into His own image and cause you to walk even as He walked. The Lord has told us that if we say we are in Him then we should walk even as He walked. (1 John 2:6) Last week we looked briefly at the verse in John’s gospel where Jesus tells us that we are able to go forth and do greater works than He did even as Elisha did greater works than Elijah. What an awesome God to know and hold onto who is such a loving Father that has purposed to make us like Himself.


The Lord has given me some new insights on this verse that I quoted above where we are told that we have the mind of Christ. I have been praying earnestly that I might be able to put down on paper some of what I am hearing and seeing in the Spirit. Praise God that we do have His mind and if we are to walk even as He walked we must embrace this truth; but, our problem is that, along with having His mind, we also have our own mind and many times the mind of the world and the devil. Discernment must come forth to help us distinguish between these minds and then to come forth in the power of His mind. Only God can do this in and for us. Lord, we are asking you to be our ever present help in doing in and through us your good pleasure as You bring forth your mind in us.

While we were still in Israel I prepared two pallets of soap to be shipped to us and they arrived last week. They came by ship to New York and then on to Dallas by truck. Because of 9/11 the security of our borders is a major issue these days and the U.S. Customs have tightened up their regulations on incoming freight, especially from the Mideast. My pallets of soap and personal items were held up in New York because of Thanksgiving and then the bad weather last week but, praise God, they finally arrived in Dallas on Thursday of last week and I drove there to pick up our freight on Friday.

I had sent two checks to New York to cover the freight to Dallas and the customs clearance. I assumed that the freight had cleared customs in New York but I was in for a little surprise when the woman at the freight office told me that I had to go to customs and get my paper work stamped by them before they could give me my freight. In telling me this news she told me that most likely they would not clear my freight until Monday and if customs decided to come and inspect my freight it could be even later.

As I drove the twenty something miles to the customs office I discovered that, in fact, I was waging a war in my mind. Yes, I had the mind of Christ but, with His mind, I had to deal with my fleshly mind along with the mind of the world and the devil was shooting a few darts of his own at me. I truly needed help from heaven as this wrestling match heated up as each mile went by. Praise God that He is not far away and has promised to never leave us nor forsake us. The Holy Spirit quickened the following verse to me which greatly encouraged me:


I have discovered that the Lord generally speaks to us from scripture and then a word out of His mouth in the same way that He did to Jesus when He was tempted by the devil in the wilderness. Jesus responded to the words of the devil by telling him that it is written and then finally telling him that he lived by every Word that proceeded out of the mouth of God. I found myself singing a little chorus that we learned many years ago and it had been a long time since I had sung it. "The Lord did not bring us out this far to take us back again. He brought out this far to take us into the promise land and though there be giants in the land we will not fear for the Lord has brought us out to take us in." Glory!

I had some giants in my mind that had to be dealt with. I thanked the Lord for encouraging me and He reminded me that He had crowned us with favor so that we might walk as He did. Praise and thanksgiving are tremendous weapons to slay all the giants and by the time I arrived at the customs office I was expecting the Lord to go before me and make a way where there seemed to be no way. He is so good and as expected the Lord led me to a U.S. Customs agent that was a believer and in less than 10 minutes I was on my way back to the freight terminal to pick up my soap and other items. Glory! They were amazed at the freight office and the woman told me it was a miracle of which I told her I agreed.

I will finish shipping out all of the orders for soap that we have received this morning and we will be ready to fill your order if you have not ordered some of this miracle soap yet. We visited with an old friend last week that had been troubled with a severe case of Psoriasis and his wife went on and on over how wonderful our soap had worked to completely clear up his skin and scalp. God is good and we are thanking Him for allowing us to bring you this pure olive oil soap from the hills of Samaria. Click here to order the soap from our website: http://www.samaritanfoundation.org/product.htm We truly appreciate your support in this little project.

May He continue to bless your going out and coming in this week, Homer Owen

www.samaritanfoundation.org
homer@samaritanfoundation.org