November 25, 2023 I was woken again this morning and roused out of sleep. The clock again said 4:22 a.m. The dog had to go out so I laid on the couch to wait for her. Suddenly a huge, strong, oppresive demon came at me trying to overcome me. I cast it off, but it came at me again. I felt its hatred. I knew it wanted to destroy me. I wasn't afraid. I was annoyed. "In the name of Lord Jesus get out! Do not act, speak, or transfer! You must come to attention and face the judgement of Almighty God! You will go where Jesus tells you to go when he tells you to go! You are rendered helpless! In the name of Lord Jesus, go!!" It left then and I went back to sleep until my usual alarm at 5:30. "Good morning Lord. How are you feeling this morning?" "All is well." "I believe you, but I don't understand how it is well when he is with a woman who can't stand to hear your name or even the word church." "Remember Saul who became Paul." "Oh yes! Will you show me the life you are trying to give him?" "Come with me." I walked with him and he let me see the little family that will be his. I saw that he is protective over them. I saw gardening tools in his hands. "I must not be seeing this correctly. I can't picture him being a gardener." "You are not seeing. I will give him a career that will nurture his soul. He will have a child. He will love his child and honor his child's mother." November 19, 2023 "I am Lord over all the Earth. What I say goes. I have given you authority. Now go. Go in authority , and shine my light for I made you a Light Bearer. Study. My Word will teach you. Now go. Shine my light, and I will go before you making the way straight for you. You will not dash your foot against a stone. You will see clearly the way to go. Walk in it. My Word will light your path. And I am with you even to the end of the age." "You are my God in whom I place my trust. I love you." I feel something flooding through my being. So powerful and yet so gentle. So comforting. It is Holy Spirit moving in me. November 18, 2023 The Lord took us to a little church down the road from us. He has me there for a specific purpose. I don't know yet what he is doing. I only know I am to be there. For many years my only territory in spiritual battle has been over my family. He has not allowed me to expand. He shows me now he extends my territory over this little church. This morning, as I got ready to enter the battle field over my family praying scripture, the Lord said in his quiet gentle voice, "Pray for your church." I brought my family before the Lord to pray for them then asked for instructions about how to pray for my church. "Take no position there. Only pray. Search scriptures about my church, and pray." This is the first scripture that came up in my search, so I started there: 15He said to them, “But who do you say that I am?” 16Simon Peter replied, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.” 17And Jesus answered him, “Blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jonah! For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father who is in heaven. 18And I tell you, you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. 19I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.” Matthew 16:15-19 Suddenly the Lord dropped this blast of understanding in my spirit: The church built on the knowledge that Jesus is the Son of God is where Heaven and Earth are connected. What we bind or loose on Earth is done in Heaven also. The church must be careful to serve and obey God alone. It is we who allow or refuse what happens. We have been apathetic and allowed much evil to thrive. It is our responsibility to bind evil and expand righteousness! Oh Lord bring us into alignment with you! Open our understanding about this power you have put in us. Let us be powerful about these keys. Let us push back the gates of hell! It is our responsibility! Forgive us, and fill us anew! November 17, 2023 Father loves his children and longs for us. I realized this morning I may not have the life I wanted for my old age. Father reminded me if I lose my life I will find it. November 14, 2023 "At church I need to do as YOU ask me to do."      I need to stop feeling shy and worrying about what they think. I must remember I am there for one purpose, the purifying of the bride. I am not there to be loved by people. I don't know what God will do with me there. I just need to follow him.      In this world I feel worthless, but I am not worthless! In Christ I am a warrior, a vessel of honor. I better act like it! November 13, 2023 "You must enter the spirit realm to take your position." "Father, is my territory still only over my family?" "It now includes the church where I have sent you. Remember the gathering? Remember how holy angels gathered and encamped around the church? Remember the waiting? Jesus was your Commander. The army waited for his command." "Lord why do I feel exhilliarated? I remember the war we went through. People get hurt in war. Do you feel exhilliarated Lord? Am I wrong in this?" "It is a spiritual energy that you feel. There will be victory!" November 12, 2023 "The war has begun. Take your battle stations! Wait for your commander."

Don't leave Me on my own dear Lord Dont leave me on my own when trials and temptations come to drown me in despair When fiery darts and shootting arrows try their best to destroy me from within, When the waters of sorrow threaten to drown me underneath There Your strong arms of love undergird me to my great relief You never leave us Lord, nor forake us When to the world our world seems destroyed Yet Your loving hand and great power guides us, propel us, sailing safely to the shore We are safe at home with You Lord, During the day or during the night And as a sure foundation We are planted firmly, soaring, and victoriously through the fight.   "We are troubled on every side, yet not distressed We are perplexed but not in despair, Persecuted by not forsaken, Cast down abut not destroyed" (2 Corinthians 4:8-9)

But He knoweth the way that I take:  when He hath tried me, I shall come forth as gold. (Job 23:10) While contemplating everything I have seen; one thing becomes very clear to me.  And it's not anything that we have not heard or been reading about through different prophetic voices and things. I find that it is very crucial to understand what the Lord is saying to me at this time because of the deep deception that is all around.  God wants me to see through smoking guns and baits and switches.  After all, Christ is the head of the church and I am His body.  I need God's eyes to see behind the smoke and mirrors. I need God's perspective. A couple of weeks ago, God directed me to watch the Lord of the Rings Trilogy.  I have to admit, I did not do it right when He asked me to.  But I did start watching it and finished it.  Then He directed me to watch it again.  I did not understand what He was trying to show me.  I rememeber years ago when these movies came out.  I remember sitting in the movie theater watching these movies and equating them with spiritual warfare.  Of course at the time, I was in the middle of my own spiritual warfare and could not see the forest for the trees.  And it would have helped to remember just what did He say.  What understanding did He try to convey to me?   But over time, His message became clear like an alarm ringing in my ear.  The Lord of the Rings, even though a secular movie, depicts a battle for earth against a monstrous evil and a quest that includes unlikely people to win the battle.  In one scene, Frodo says to Gandalf, " I wish the ring had never come to me".  And Gandalf replies, "So do all who live to see such times.  But it is not for them to decide.  All we have to do is to decide what to do with the time that is given to us."  As a Christian, I did not realize I had entered a war.  At one time in my life, I was headed into the military.  I loved the military.  And then, circumstances changed and I wasn't.  But I remember one time while praying and God impressing upon me, that "well you wanted to be in the army, well you've got your wish, you're in mine".  Maybe He didn't say it like that but I got the point. There many scenes in those movies of heroism, of despair, and of weariness.  There were scenes when it seemed like the enemy was winning but he really wasn't.  There was betrayal and friendship and loyalty.  There were times in those movies that showed what was in the heart of the men.  The loyalty of friendship that went the distance. The misunderstandings and cowardice even in ranks of leadership.  Louder still was the cry there can be no friendly fire because we are all on the same team.  And beyond our human endurance there is one who stands in us and stands with us, our Saviour.  Even though not said specifically in the movies, to me it was evident that there was a power there.  They could not proceed or even succeed without. I would have never dreamed that some truths in God's word would come full circle.  You see, each of us in our own spiritual battles we sometimes don't understand that they are training for us for greater battles.  This is something I did not understand until now.  I have  come to realize that in the story of David and Goliath. Before David was King, He was a shepherd boy.  His job in tending the sheep prepared Him for the greatest battle of his young life.  We get trained by God for far greater battles but sometimes these truths do not hit us until God opens our eyes and shows us.  He tells us, "see, remember when you were going through that hard time, that trial that you didn't believe you would get out of".  And we look back and we receive our 'metals" so to speak that are invisible.  God sees the battles and the metals we accumulate.  Sometimes I don't want to fight, sometimes I get weary.  Sometimes I feign ignorance.  War what war? But God brings along other solidiers to help us while we sit on the side of the road.  They carry us and carry our backpacks to give us rest so we can continue to fight. We get rest and then we enter the fight again. I've  come through so many battles.  Those little skirmishes that I did not see as training ground. Sometimes it was my  point of view versus someone else's.  Sometimes its my health and finances, or even relationships, or something the insidious like evil itself.   I stand in defiance and say this is the hill I am prepared to die upon. And then God says, no Luella, that isn't that hill.  God brings them back to my memory.  He starts to give me understanding.  We are battle tested for such a time as this. But we don't ever go into battle alone.  God provides us with weapons which we test each day and we get used to wearing them.  Not like when Saul wanted to give David his armour when confronting Goliath,  David said to Saul, .."I cannot go in these, I have not proven them..." (1 Samuel 17:39)  

  Do I get it yet?    There are times when I feel like I am on top of the world or that I've climbed that big mountain and I think surely I've done something.  But it's then, I slip and fall not seeing or understanding my true spiritual condition.  I trip and fall backdown the mountain.  So now, I must humble myself before the Lord.    I realize that I must also humble myself when I am on that mountain top too.  Last week, or a few weeks ago I was inspired to draw what I saw God doing in me.  I drew myself on top this mountain shouting and waving my hands in some sort of victory.  Mind you, it kind of felt good being up there cause it was a hard climb and I made it.  Which of course of not true, I didn't make it up there on my own.  The truth is God was behind me allowing me to use His forward momentum to get me to the top.  And He was also in front of me encouraging me to keep walking.  Up on that mountain, I kicked off everything I needed for the journey thinking they are too heavy.  I kicked off perseverance, and joy, and praise, and prayer thinking they are heavy.  But I'm not getting up that mountain without them.  And then I kicked off humility because I tend to believe my own hard work and effort got me there in the first place.  Rolling back down that mountain was real quick.  It didn't take much effort to fall.  But in my weakness, I was able to see my need and cry out to God.  I realized it was Him all along that got me up that mountain in the first place.  I'm humbled that I fell and it was a major fall, but now I know it was never meant for me to think I had it all covered.  To believe the lie that I could do it all on my own.

God said to me today Satan will always lie about who you are. Identity.  It seems like an ugly word these days.  But it’s not. When you don’t know who you are or whose you belong to, you can be prey for the thief, the murder, and the destroyer. All the times when I would ask God, who am I Lord?  I don’t know who I am?  Who do I belong to?  And sometimes God has to show us who we are and who we belong to. I look back over the years and I can remember those times when other people have gotten those verses, (Isaiah 43:1-2), that promise from God.  Because its not just a verse from a promise box, it’s the word of God to us at the moment when God knows we will need it. Years ago, we had a fire in our home.  I had just come here to live.  In fact, it was in the month of my birthday on November 1st.  And three months after that we had a fire which almost burned down the house.   My friend Judy received that promise from Isaiah 43:2 about going through the fire.  And I hated that scripture even before we had the fire.   At the time, I had been reading Keith Green’s book, No Compromise.  And the spirit of fear was licking its chops as I was its meal.  And my first reaction to my friend getting that scripture was ‘that can’t be good’.  The reference to Keith Green’s book was when I started asking God or more specifically, I kept telling God that He doesn’t protect his children too well.  And I am sure he was not happy about that but He was like “well let’s wait and see.” So, when the smoke alarm went off in our house, we were waxing the floors.  And me and my friend said, “why is that stupid thing going off?”  She had forgotten that she put a pot of water on the stove and put the wax can in the pot to heat up and soften the wax.  When we went into the kitchen to see what was going on, the fire had already burned the pot and was licking the ceiling.  That is when according to her, she pulled the pot off the stove to try to stop the pot from burning. The handle of the pot was so hot she dropped the pot.  She jumped back just inches from where the fire instead of burning her up, went up the side of the hutch.  At the point, that is when the house started to burn.  And that is when I was thinking, “I wonder if that is what that scripture meant?” The point is God was not asking me to concentrate on the waves and the fires but on the promise that I belonged to Him.  I couldn’t deal with how deep the waters might go or how hot the fire might get then.  But because He needed me to remember   who my real Father is.  My heavenly Father will always tell me the truth.  To me, my identity is tied to my trust in God.  If I know who I am, if I know that God is my father, that I am in covenant with Him, then it doesn’t matter how high the waves are or how hot the fire gets. Because God controls how high the waves are and how hot the fire gets.  I could say today, better late than never in coming to this realization, but then I have to remember it's a moment by moment and day by day walk. It's in the drawing that I drew of myself at the bottom of the sea, with all the soot that floats to the bottom.  It’s supposed to be the darkest place where the sun light cannot penetrate.  “If I take the wings of the morning, And dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea…”  

written before the clock struck 12am for the next day this is for 9/11 victims and Heroes "Sleep on you sweet soldiers Heroes, life Savers You who risked it all that day trying to save those in the fall We keep your helmet and your shield We fight another day Rest easy you whose lives were crushed in sudden agony So now we have the memory of those sweet smiles now immortalized on top of mantle’s memories of  yester years sleep on you rescuers whose hands dug deep in soot and debris looking for lives to save that day breathing in polluted air whose lungs inhaled the poisonous gas from fumes of imploded buildings which once stood tall and majestic there was no glory here in tall tales of stories shared by deceit and lies the truth exposed By God's own grace His justice shall reign once more."

  I drew a picture the other day in my notebook.  I had started a picture journal to try to capture images that teach me something about God, about who He is, what He means to me, and any truths that He reveals. I got the idea from a devotional I read every day.  It seemed like a good idea at the time.  I try to draw something every day.  Now, mind you, I am not an artist so these pictures would win no contest.  But the other day I drew a picture in my notebook, that depicted varying degrees of dark clouds with some grey mixed in. And on the bottom of the page, I drew a house.  I drew the dark clouds so they almost engulfed the house.  I used up all of the room on that paper to show the intensity of the black clouds. I drew the clouds in a circular pattern. Where there were gaps of spaces in the clouds, I added yellow.   The scriptures that came to mind were from Psalms 139:11-12 "If I say surely the darkness shall cover me and the night shall be the only light about me. Even the darkness hides nothing from You, but the night shines as the day; the darkness and the light are both alike to you”.  And in Daniel 2:22 the word of God says “He reveals the deep and secret things.  He knows what is in the darkness and the light dwells with Him”.  Light dwells with God no matter how dark the darkness is to us.  He sees right through it.  Maybe the house at the bottom of the page is me.  And maybe the darkness sometimes tries to penetrate to overwhelm, but God’s light penetrates.  The picture of the dark clouds is not the focal point but the fact that there is God’s light showing up even when the darkness is extreme. Even in a dark room, our eyes are trying to focus to see.   When it’s so dark, even in a cave, our eyes try to adjust to the darkness and sometimes we get disoriented. We panic because we can’t see.   We don’t know which way to go.  We lose our sense of direction.  But if we can see just a small shaft of light, our eyes begin to adjust.  The light is God.  When God shows up, He brings the light because He is the light.