Recent Blog Entries

  • 8 hours ago
    Posted by Dion Todd
    Yahweh opened the mouth of the donkey, and she said to Balaam, "What have I done to you, that you have struck me these three times?" Balaam said to the donkey, "Because you have mocked me, I wish there were a sword in my hand, for now I would have killed you." The donkey said to Balaam, "Am I not yo...
  • Thu at 3:01 AM
    Posted by Dion Todd
    Yahweh said to Joshua, "Get up! Why have you fallen on your face like that?" Joshua 7:10 WEB.Joshua lay prostrate before the ark of the Lord all that evening. Yesterday, he had been a mighty warrior. Now Israel had lost the battle at Ai, all because one of the men with him had become greedy and brok...
  • Wed at 3:01 AM
    Posted by Dion Todd
    Now the king of Syria had commanded the captains of his chariots, saying, "Don't fight with small nor great, except only with the king of Israel." When the captains of the chariots saw Jehoshaphat, they said, "It is the king of Israel!" Therefore they turned around to fight against him. But Jehoshap...
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  • March 25, 2022 - led by Lynn Brown
    This is a group for RHM sponsored events like corporate fasts. Everyone is welcome to join and participate in things currently going on in the ministry. We love you and thank you for being a part of Refreshing Hope!
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The Humbling Reality of Grace

  • As received from the Holy Spirit...2 Corinthians 1:2 Grace be to you and peace from God our Father, and from the Lord Jesus Christ. 3 Blessed be God, even the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies, and the God of all comfort; 4 Who comforts us in all our tribulation, that we may be able to comfort them who are in any trouble, by the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted of God. 5 For as the sufferings of Christ abound in us, so our consolation also abounds by Christ. 6 And whether we being afflicted, it is for your consolation and salvation, which is effectual in the enduring of the same sufferings which we also suffer: or whether we are comforted, it is for your consolation and salvation. 7 And our hope of you is steadfast, knowing, that as you are partakers of the sufferings, so shall you be also of the consolation. 8 For we would not, brethren, have you ignorant of our trouble which came to us in Asia, that we were pressed out of measure, above strength, so that we despaired even of life: 9 But we had the sentence of death in ourselves, that we should not trust in ourselves, but in God who raises the dead.

    It is only as you are stripped by God personally and as you are completely exposed in His Presence and brought to the very end of yourself that you understand the amazing power and the humbling gift that grace actually is. We so have absolutely NOTHING to boast within ourselves except to boast in the Lord and all that He has wrought and accomplished in us.

    Isaiah 26:12 LORD, You will ordain peace for us: for You also have wrought all our works in us.

    Self-righteousness is an ugly monster that puts its victim in a deceptive state of self-importance. It causes a person to elevate themselves above others through vain conceit. It causes a person to be puffed up through self-deception and makes them think that they have attained a state of spiritual superiority through self-effort. This state of hypocrisy causes a person to be easily critical and judgmental of others who doesn't seem to match their own state or standard of self-righteousness or self-importance.

    It matches the prideful attitude of the prideful Pharisee in Luke 18.

    10 Two men went up into the temple to pray; the one a Pharisee, and the other a tax collector. 11 The Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself, God, I thank you, that I am not as other men are, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this tax collector.

    12 I fast twice in the week, I give tithes of all that I possess. 13 And the tax collector, standing afar off, would not lift up so much as his eyes unto heaven, but smote upon his breast, saying, God be merciful to me a sinner. 14 I tell you, this man went down to his house justified rather than the other: for everyone that exalts himself shall be abased; and he that humbles himself shall be exalted.

    I thank God for purifying our hearts in the furnace of affliction. I thank the Lord for stripping us on this journey of death to self in the pathway of the cross so that we may learn to only boast in the Lord our God and that we learn to love and treat others with the same GRACE and COMFORT with which He continually treats us.

    It's only when the light of God's truth penetrates a person's own sinful heart that he realize and understand that without the grace of God He is nothing but a sinner as the rest of humanity.

    God did not call us to be the judge. He called us to LOVE AS HE LOVES. The self-righteous religious spirit loves to be critical and judgmental and loves to seek fault in others as with the Pharisee in Luke 18.

    LOVE UNDERSTANDS THE WEAKNESS OF THE ONES HE DIED FOR AND GIVES THEM THE GRACE THROUGH HIS POWER TO CHANGE

    The moment that you point your finger to judge or to condemn or to criticize you expose your ugly self-righteousness and sense of superiority because you seem to forget where you were when God intervened to save you.

    Isaiah 58:9 If you take away from the midst of you the yoke, the pointing of the finger, and speaking wickedness.

    1 Corinthians 4:5 Therefore judge nothing before the time, until the Lord comes, who both will bring to light the hidden things of darkness, and will make manifest the counsels of the hearts: and then shall every man have praise of God.


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4 comments
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Pastor Marty Pena
Pastor Marty Pena Yes, I was led to write this new blog yesterday. So, it is a confirmation to Pastor Todd's message this week. Love you, lady! To God be all the Glory!! <3!!! Shalom!
February 9, 2017
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Sylvia Todd
Sylvia Todd Love you too, sister <3! (((HUGS)))
February 9, 2017
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Pastor Marty Pena
Pastor Marty Pena Nope! Love you more!!!!
February 9, 2017
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Sylvia Todd
Sylvia Todd

Beautiful word, Marty, and will go well, I think, with Dion's message for this week :). Thank you for sharing it <3!

February 9, 2017