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Shooting Blanks


In all my life, the only person I can use as a good example is me. Because I know myself best and better than anyone else, so I’m using my own experience here.

Now, don’t draw any conclusions yet on the title, it will make sense soon. As i write this I’m also planning on doing a video on it as well, because I believe the impact of it can touch any area of our lives.

We are all, and I mean all, on a level in our lives. Over the course of our lives we travel between different phases and stages, if you will of either advancement or regression. If I will be honest with myself then I can correctly place myself at my current level and how I stack up compared to, let’s say, a year ago. Now, if I follow the precepts of the Word and chase the presence of God then I will always be disciplining my life and and advancing the Kingdom and by virtue of chasing God, I will be getting closer to “The Light” so to speak and further from the pull of the enemy.

Spiritual warfare is just that, simply put- Follow God and the consequence is leaving the devil and his plans behind. Here’s the rub though! At every new level in life, the Lord, being a good Father, will send people along to help you on your journey and lead you into paths of righteousness for His name’s sake! That’s huge in itself, that we get to be a part of His Name; The Name above all names! That is how we are counted when we say yes to Jesus and receive His love for our lives.

Back to the point though, when those people come along to help you, there is always the chance to become dependent on their voice instead of God’s! For instance, when we are born and as we grow up into children, we are dependent on our physical fathers voice to guide us and we essentially become like him, or in the case of an absent father, we become the collective sum of those around us that fill the gaps that our earthly father didn’t fill. Just a quick note, no matter if you had a great father, terrible father or no father, Father God wants to fill that space and can do it quite adequately.

So when we are entering a new level in life, it’s as if we are starting over to some extent and follow the voice of the one who God sends to help guide us. For me, it was Bill Johnson, Senior Leader at Bethel Church in Redding, CA. In October of 2012 I heard him for the first time on YouTube and my world was rocked. I have been chasing hard after him and those like him ever since. I won’t ever stop that because there is honor in pursuing God through people. However, people can never take the place of God’s voice in your life, because He has a unique expression He wants to emit through you that only can come from His lips to your ear and out of your mouth. You and Father God have a unique signature of expression when you become His vessel on the earth.

When I started following Mr. Johnson then Randy Clark, the late John Wimbur, Todd White and many others who were passionate about the supernatural activities of God, I began to act like them. Paul, the apostle, said in one of his epistles, “imitate me as I imitate Jesus!” and that is a pretty big statement. He was saying “do what I do” because I’ve been with Jesus and I know what He does. There is an important lesson though and one Paul also talked about, that there is no replacing your own time with God. Yeah, follow me while you start out and I’ll help you see how to be successful on this journey, but as we go, develop your walk with Jesus, because it’s there that you will find true fulfillment and learn to walk in your stride with Him. You can’t ride on someone else’s coattails for very long.

So when I started on this new level, before my level increased to the point of my own “Divine signature” I followed those who were where I want to go. Perfectly healthy and natural! I talked like them, walked like them and used their statements. I would listen to messages, read books and then preach like it was mine. And in the beginning, God honored that with signs and wonders following and some really good results. I was following success and success followed me because it was true and right in my life. However, after some time of being shown the way, we must take the reigns on our own and pursue the one those we admire are pursuing, because it’s only in that place that we find Zoe Life.

If I continued doing the same old thing and copied others then there is a point in time that my words have no power and I become an echo instead of a voice. Now to the title! Let’s say I have an enemy, and I do! And he comes to me a lot to try and hurt me and those around me… and he does! One day, I get a gun from someone who I trust and the next time he comes around I flash the gun at him and immediately he runs away. Why? Because he’s scared of the sight of the gun! He continues to come back and get closer even though I’m showing him I still have the gun until he gets close enough that I shoot in the air to scare him away and true to form he runs away.

I scared him off, but only for a little while because he’s not dead and in the back of his head he’s still wondering if I will really shoot him. This happens a few more times and every time he runs but comes back quicker each time and closer to me, until he gets too close and I point the gun at him and fire! Bammm!!! When the smoke clears though, he’s still standing there, checking himself for a wound, finding none and then looks up at me and we realize that I was just brandishing a gun and shooting blanks the whole time! At this moment, its too late to head the gun store to get real bullets.

So my point is… if I’m going to get to the next level that God has for me and He does, because His level are never ending and always get better, I will have to get my own ammunition from His word, so that when the enemy comes, I’m not just fooling around with fake bullets and loud noise, counting on that tot scare him away, but I’m armed with the deadly force of the time I’ve spent in the Word and in Prayer, getting my ammo for the battle. Then when I point and shoot I’m not relying on what I heard someone else say, even though it helped get me further, but I’m relying on the fact that I went to the gun store and found the suitable weapon that the master gunsmith always had prepared for me and had prepared especially for me.

This time when he comes and I take aim, fire and the smoke clears, he will find holes and wounds that he has to retreat to tend to. I have become a deadly weapon for the Kingdom of God, because I’ve been with The King! At this time I can say “follow me as I follow Him!”


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​© 2017 by Barry Tubbs Ministries

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