Your Destiny Awaits You - by Jack Frost
A Book Report by Margot Cioccio - November 1, 2017
International Healing Rooms School of Transformation - Year 2
Summary
- Briefly write what the whole book is about and why the author has written it. (Imagine the author will read this and would say, “Yes, this is the main point(s) of my book.) The main thrust of this book is to help people realize that they are responding like orphans rather than sons and daughters of the High King of Heaven. The author shares many poignant stories of his own journey from orphan to beloved son along with wonderful answers and steps how we can also make that transition in our own lives. I think the following passage is the biggest take home message of the entire book. “We don't become like Jesus by focusing our lives on Jesus; we become like Jesus by focusing our lives on what Jesus focused His life on. And Jesus focused His life on being a son and revealing the Father and His love so that a world of spiritual orphans could become sons and daughters. Jesus wasn’t sinless because He was God; it wasn’t his divinity that made Him the man He was. Jesus was the man He was because of the Father He had. The person each of us become will be determined by who we focus our life on.” pg 73
- Briefly outline 4 major points of the book as the author presents them including page numbers.
- Understanding our place as Sons: “Our quest is not to regain our sonship with the Father: we cannot regain something we never had. Rather, our quest is to enter into the embrace of the unconditional love of Father God and receive a heart of sonship that will displace our orphan heart.” pg 37
- Fatherlessness is a curse on the land: “Until and unless Elijah comes, the land remains under a curse. And what is that curse? A feeling of fatherlessness. More than at any other time in human history, fatherlessness is the curse of our generation. Today more children than ever before are growing up in fatherless households, and many more are growing up without a father emotionally, even though their biological father is physically present in the home.” pg 45
- Only Sons and Daughters receive an inheritance: The Kingdom of Heaven is a kingdom of humility, innocence , and love; and only the child like - those who are willing to humble themselves to become sons and daughters - will enter it. The depth of humility we embrace determines the depth of Kingdom life we will experience. pg 132
- The Importance of Honor: “Honor involves a decision that is made to put love into action, to give a person a position of high value and worth. Even when we have been disappointed, hurt, or wounded by a person, honor chooses to make a decision not to respond in kind. No matter what is felt coming from another person, honor choses to not expose but speak words that give grace to the hearer. Honor views each person as a precious gift of God’s creation and grants them a position that is worthy of great respect. Honor chooses not to respond with an unwholesome word or tone. pg 159
- Thoughtfully explain one main strength (or point of agreement) with the author. It is easy to think that this orphan behavior in peoples is simply a spirit that needs to be cast out. I love how the author makes sure that the reader understands that the orphan heart must be displace by the love of Father. “When wanting to cast out an orphan heart, remember that you can displace it only by introducing it to a loving Father. Even then, an orphan heart must choose to embrace the spirit of sonship by willing becoming interdependent in relationships and embracing God’s community of love. This is not a once-and-for-all choice. You must choose sonship over and over because orphan thinking doesn’t surrender easily, and it often comes back and tries to assert its influence once again. The orphan spirit tries constantly to weaken our families, relationships, and the nations by deceiving us into becoming subject to our own mission rather than living life to experience God’s love and to give it away.” pg 70 I also thought it was very insightful on the authors part to distinguish the need to deal with our thought fortresses. On may cast out various spirits but as long as mental structures are still in place giving them legal right they are able to come and go in a persons life as they please. “Fortresses or strongholds in themselves are not demonic; this Script refers to a fortress of thought that includes lies against what God has revealed about Himself. It is a habit structure of thinking that exalts itself above the knowledge of God’s love. The fortress of thought gives the enemy ground to traffic in your life. If you cast out the demonic influence but let the fortress of thought remain, then the demonic influence has a legal right to return and reoccupy the fortress.” pg 189-90
4. Write down some of your favorite sentences in the book.
“Fear disables us. We can know all about the things of God and yet our fear of trusting and of intimacy can hold us back from receiving the benefits of what Jesus died for - to bring restoration and healing in our families and our relationships. So many of Christians do all the right Christian “stuff,” yet fear continues to hold us back from casting ourselves fully into our loving Father’s embrace.” pg 22-23
“Instead of drawing our energy and our source of life and peace from the love of God, we try to find them in these counterfeit affections of performance, the passions of the flesh, power and control issues, possessions, position, people, or places. Somehow we think that unless we have these sources of comfort in our lives, we simply cant’t go on.” pg 23
“ Living life as if we have a home means living to experience God’s love on a continuing and ongoing basis and making that love known to others. As Christians, we are sons and daughters of God, yet so many of us live as if we don’t have a home. We live, think and act like fatherless orphans because we have never truly embraced Gather God’s love on a personal level.” pg 24
“Home is where you constantly hear the voice of God speaking His affirmation over you, HIs love over you, and His forgiveness, compassion , and grace over you. “ pg. 25
“Being saved does not automatically mean feeling secure, loved, and accepted as a son or daughter of God; they are two different things.” pg 38
“We can give to others only what has been given to us.” pg 40
“I classify counterfeit affections under the “seven P’s passion, possession, position, performance, people, place and power.” pg 43
One study has revealed that, for most Christians, 80 percent of our thinking is negative and in agreement with the enemy, the accuser of the brethren, who tells us we have no value or are unloveable, and who feeds our orphan heart ungodly beliefs about God’s loving nature so that we live as if we don’t have a home even though we are children of the King. pg 46
Fathers’s mission is for you to experience His expressed love and to give it away to the next person you meet. pg. 57
Matthew 22:37-40 is Jesus way of saying, “When you seek to know God’s love and to make it known, you are released from every other obligation in the word of God.” pg 59
Those with orphan thinking are easily deceived, as I was for many years, into placing the Great Commission ahead of the Great Commandment. They become more committed to justice, dusty or ministry that to intimacy. Intimacy must precede fruitfulness. pg 60
Any time you put the Great commission (your ministry) before the Great Commandment ( your relationship), you step outside being subject to Fathers’s mission, and death starts working its way into your relationships. pg 61
The quickest way to shut down intimacy and trust is by sowing seeds of doubt into the relationship. pg 64
Orphan thinking begins - you start doubting Father’s love, kindness, and generosity towards you. From there, its is only a short step to doubting the love of others around you, including family. “ pg 65
“I will not leave you as orphans: I will come to you” John 14:18 We have a home anytime we want it, whenever we are ready to give up the life of orphan thinking and return to the warm embrace of our Father’s love. pg 68
Our tendency is to live by the love of law instead of by the law of love. pg 71
If satan cannot stop us from doing good things, he will keep us so busy doing good things for others that we neglect our own children who end up feeling like they don’t have a place in our heart, and they too become spiritual orphans. pg 71
Follow Jesus’ example and focus your life upon being a son finding life and peace. Be a gift of love to the next person you meet. pg 74
If we have not embraced healthy accountability relationships. the anointing can quickly empower us and take us places where our character may not be able to keep our boat afloat. pg 103
Jesus was in training for His Father’s mission - the mission of announcing and ushering in the Kingdom of Heaven and introducing people to the Father’s love. pg 109
Remember that an orphan heart cannot be cast out; it must be displace. It is a heart that does not feel like it has a home in a father or mother’s embrace. pg 131
First John 4:18-19 infers that you cannot cast out these fears but you displace them by introducing the orphan to Perfect Love. Then the orphan just make a choice; he either risks opening up his heart and submits to love, or he continues to put up walls of self-protection and rejects love once more. “ There is no fear in love; but perfect love casts out fear, because fear involves punishment, and the one who fears is not perfected in love. We love, because He first loved us” 1 john 4:18-19 pg 131
James Jordan, addressed the subject of the spirit of sonship and asked us the question, When did you cease being your father and mother’s son. He went on to add, when your rejected your mother and father, you rejected the spirit of sonship and God will only deal with you only as a son.”pg 143
We don't want to become stalled by the three basic fears: the fear of trusting, the fear of rejection and abandonment, and he fear of opening our heart to love. pg 164
You do not leave when the chips are down, or you will repeat the pattern in the next place you go. You leave only when you are sent out blessed. pg 177
No sonship, no inheritance! No sonship, no influence! pg 179
5. In what way did this book impact your life as one who transforms cities? How will you be different? It has encouraged to step into my true place as a daughter of the King from that place I may find that God will at some point use me to be a mother to others and help them to get free from the bondages of orphan thinking. “Malachi 4:5-6 prophesies that in the endtimes a fathering spirit will be released on earth; but before there can be fathers, there must be sons. and before there can be mothers, there must be daughters. pg 164
6. What challenges(s) have you been given by the Lord to implement some of the strategies in this book? I think that walking in biblical rest is something that I can model for others and especially encourage the many people who come to my massage practice with pain from the effects of stress and unrest in their lives. “Biblical rest found in sonship is not a place without activity or fruitfulness. Rest is a posture of the heart of sonship that feels so sheltered in Father’s love that it does not allow itself to be pulled into a place where we strive to feel valued, affirmed, or secure. Abiding in rest is the place where all people will be drawn to us because everyone is searching for rest. pg 199
7. My Concluding Thoughts
I found the difference in focus between the Great Commission and the Great Commandment eye opening. I can say from 30 some years of ministry that too often it is the Great Commission that is the big focus. It is no wonder it is so hard to get people to be involved in evangelism. We as church leaders have too often put the cart before the horse. We expect people to evangelize the lost before they have encountered the great love of God for them self. “The Great Commandment to love God and love others is a call to intimacy; the Great Commission to go and make disciples is a call to fruitfulness. Intimacy must precede fruitfulness. The Great Commandment must precede the Great Commission and is an inseparable part of it. When intimacy does not preceded fruitfulness, we easily become subject to our own mission and become focused upon religious duty, hyper-religious activity, and aggressive striving that leaves and angry edge in our life and relationships.” pg 60
My Bonus Thought :
I really like these statements about immaturity on page 104 so I put together a sheet that can be printed and posted. I read these and can easily think of times when I have behaved in these ways. “How do you begin movement toward a homecoming in Father’s embrace? by focusing your life on being a son or daughter.” pg 81
The information in chapter 6 about Orphan or Son that is found also in the appendix in a more concise version was also very powerful. What I liked about this book is that it was so practical. It did not present a problem without a clear path to solve it. This is a book that had many take homes for me personally and one that I will recommend to people that need to come out of the slavery of having orphan spirit.
Immaturity is…..
…a slave to circumstances and emotions. Our circumstances determine whether we have a “good hair day” or a “bad hair day. “
…a slave to self. seeking to meet personal needs at others’ expense.
…seeks the place of comfort, ease, least resistance, and whatever makes us feel valued and affirmed.
…obeys out of a fear of loss or punishment, not because we do not want to grieve the one we love.
…values people for what they can do for us, not for relationship. Thus, we unconsciously use and manipulate people to meet our needs.
…demands its own way or nothing. “If you do not play my way, I am going to take my ball and go home.”
…subject to its own mission. Our thoughts continually gravitate towards me, myself and I.
…“obtain-oriented”: How does this benefit me. Our choices are influenced by what we can gain.
…self-centered, self-consuming and self-referential. “Let’s talk about your for a while…have you read my book yet?”
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