And what I say to you, I say to all: Watch!” Mark 13:37.
Watch therefore, and pray always that you may be counted worthy to escape all these things that will come to pass, and to stand before the Son of Man.” Luke 21:36.
Today you LORD (יהוה) God says:
What I say to you, I say to all, “Watch!”
I direct you to watch, be alert, be awake, to guard, to be on the look-out, many times in My Word. If you are wise you will look into this further. So here we go on a hunt for the treasures I reveal to you in My Word. Pay attention to My Words for they are your very life and well-being for now and eternity. If you heed them and do them you will make your way successful.
What are you to watch? Primarily three categories, yourself, the devil, and Me. And all three have to do with your heart. So of primary importance is to watch your heart, and by your heart I am referring to your inner self, your thoughts primarily, and your mindset, desires, and determinations. “Above all guard your heart, for out of it are the outgoings of life.” Proverbs 4:23. In the Hebrew language in which it was first written, that line actually says to watch your heart and confine it (mishmar: place of confinement, jail, prison, guard, watch, observance) for out of it flows your life and its comings and goings and its final earthly termination. In other words, as My apostle John put it, “Watch yourselves that you do not lose what you have accomplished but that you may receive your full reward.” 2 John 1:8.
Watch yourself as a watchman does a city or a shepherd watches his flock. Watch for danger signals, warning signs, and inroads of the enemy, even if camouflaged. Watch for little foxes and darkness. “Watch out that the light in you is not darkness.” Luke 11:35. Many have missed when the darkness starts settling in and have gone down under its weight so that they do not finish to the end in the first love in which they started out. For if the light in you becomes darkness, how deep that darkness will be. “The lamp of the body is the eye. Therefore, when your eye is good, your whole body also is full of light. But when your eye is bad, your body also is full of darkness.” Luke 11:34. And I mean the eye of your heart, that is, of your mindset in your inner self.
If you let regret, fear, shame, weakness, missed opportunities, and a feeling of unrighteousness settle in, you will go down into darkness and hope will vanish and when hope goes down faith goes down as well, because faith is the substance of things hoped for. “Watch, stand fast, be brave, be strong. Let all you do be done in love.” 1 Corinthians 16:13-14.
My servant Paul warned you of this. He alerted you to the tactics of the realm of darkness many times and told you to be on guard. “But you, brethren, are not in darkness, so that this Day should overtake you as a thief. You are all sons of light and sons of the day. We are not of the night nor of darkness. Therefore let us not sleep, as others do, but let us watch and be self-controlled. For those who sleep, sleep at night, and those who get drunk are drunk at night. But let us who are of the day be sober, putting on the breastplate of faith and love, and as a helmet the hope of salvation. For God did not appoint us to wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us, that whether we wake or sleep, we should live together with Him.” 1 Thessalonians 5:4-10.
“Watch and pray, lest you enter into temptation,” warned Jesus, “for the spirit indeed is willing but the flesh is weak.” Mark 14:38. “Blessed are those servants whom the master, when he comes, will find watching. Assuredly, I say to you that he will gird himself and have them sit down to eat and will come and serve them. And if he should come in the second watch, or come in the third watch, and find them so, blessed are those servants. But know this, that if the master of the house had known what hour the thief would come, he would have watched and not allowed his house to be broken into. Therefore you also be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect.” Luke 12:37-40.
Vigilance. Diligence. Both will keep you in My Word. “And we desire that each one of you show the same diligence to the full assurance of hope until the end, that you do not become sluggish, but imitate those who through faith and patience inherit the promises.” Hebrews 6:11-12. Paul gave you the terminology for “watch clothing” as the “full armor of God.” And it all has to do with not letting down your guard when the devil comes to put toxic, lustful, anxious, or fearful thoughts or words of others or media, or just thoughts or advice appealing to your senses, pride, and self-ambition (as he did to Eve and Adam), in your mind or in your path. Watch and pray that you not fall into temptation, because the devil’s bait and his thorns will be there. But My Word is a light to your path and a lamp to your feet so you can avoid these things. “Let your eyes look straight ahead, and your eyelids look right before you. Ponder the path of your feet and let all your ways be established. Do not turn to the right or the left. Remove your foot from evil.” Proverbs 4:25-27.
When Israel turned their hearts from Me to worship other gods, the walls of Jerusalem were besieged they the enemy and burned to the ground. The watchtowers were gone. But when My people returned to Me and My Word one of the first things that they did was to rebuild the walls and the watchtowers. Nehemiah led this miraculous work and he directed the people, because they were many enemies in the area trying to keep the walls from going up so they could continue to control the people with their godless thoughts as one with them, to watch for the enemy as they built so that the enemy could not stop their glorious work. And this is how he did it: “Those who built on the wall, and those who carried burdens, loaded themselves so that with one hand they worked at construction, and with the other held a weapon. Every one of the builders had his sword girded at his side as he built.” Nehemiah 4:17-18. And you should always have the Sword of the Spirit, which is My Word, ready at your side as you build your life each day. And they kept watch to sound the alarm if the enemy approached. And so should you in your inner man. Watch your thoughts, when darkness begins to set in or hatred, fear, offense, or lust, sound the trumpet to alert all your members and Me for the battle to begin immediately. Listen to Nehemiah, “And the one who sounded the trumpet was beside me. Then I said to the nobles, the rulers, and the rest of the people, ‘The work is great and extensive, and we are separated far from one another on the wall. Wherever you hear the sound of the trumpet, rally to us there. Our God will fight for us.’” Nehemiah 4:18-20. Take every thought captive in obedience to Christ and be ready to punish all disobedience by full denial of entrance.
Solomon did not keep watch on his heart. I gave him great wisdom that all came to hear, and you still benefit from his proverbs and wisdom, but he did not guard his heart, he thought he was well established in all wisdom and understanding. But the temptation of lust and sensual pleasure deprived him of his destiny and destroyed all that he had built over his glorious life before his heart turned away from Me. His heart turned to foreign woman of other gods and he sought to please and entice them as he grew older by setting up altars to and burning incense with them to their “gods.” And yet in his first love he had asked Me to give him a hearing heart, a heart that heard My voice above others. His heart turned away from Me and he refused to hear My voice warning him to stop his folly. 1 Kings 11:4-9. A wise man builds a house, but the foolish man tears it down with his own hands. He opened the way to idol worship in Israel, which Samuel and David had stopped, and it destroyed the nation until both Israel and Judah were carried off by pagan nations who knew Me not. They lost all the glory Solomon had built up from the foundations laid by David, his father. But David was a man after My own heart.
Samson, like Solomon, went after women who were not following Me but other gods. His heart was not turned to Me though I had destined him to judge My people and free them from Philistine oppression. Free them from the enemy of their souls. But he turned his heart to the enemy, enticed by sensual lust in immoral union with the enemy, and he revealed all that was in his heart to a prostitute. Judges 16:17-18. And it was then the Spirit left him and his strength was gone. He became as ordinary unbelievers.
Love and value people but only give your heart to Me. You can trust Me with your heart. Let Me be able to trust you with Mine. I could not trust Adam. I could not trust Samson. But there have been so many I can trust. Watch your heart so you are one I can entrust Myself to. I share My secrets and My strength with those whose hearts are turned entirely to .Me.
Jesus warned you, “But watch yourselves lest your hearts be weighed down with dissipation and drunkenness and cares of this life, and that day come upon you suddenly like a trap.” Luke 21:34. In the busy days and nights, pleasures, and disappointments of this world it is easy to slip away and the thorns choke My Word unless you keep watch and pull them out immediately. I told Adam, “guard and cultivate the garden.” Watch over the garden of your heart. What are you growing there today? Keep watch. If the birds of the air plant there, pull it up before it becomes a bitter root that poisons your life and the lives of others.
“Behold, I am coming as a thief. Blessed is he who watches, and keeps his garments, lest he walk naked and they see his shame.” Revelation 16:15. Wash your robes and make them white in the Blood of the Lamb and do not soil them in the lusts and worries of this world. Also, don’t take off the “armor of God,” and be caught off guard by the enemy so that you soil your garments with the dirt of his lies, keep your minds above where you are seated with Christ at My right hand. And think of what Nehemiah told those working on building the walls against the attack of the enemy: ‘“Let each man and his servant stay at night in Jerusalem, that they may be our guard by night and a working party by day.’ So neither I, my brethren, my servants, nor the men of the guard who followed me took off our clothes, except that everyone took them off for washing.” Nehemiah 4:22-23. They were ready for any hour so they would not be caught off guard.
Watch, treasure, and guard My Word in your heart so you may not sin against Me. “How can a young man cleanse his way? By guarding it according to Your word. With my whole heart I have sought You. Oh, let me not wander from Your commandments! Your word I have hidden in my heart, that I might not sin against You.” Psalm 119:9-11. Jesus told you, “If anyone loves Me, he will keep (guard) My word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him. Whoever does not love Me does not keep My words. And the word that you hear is not Mine but the Father’s who sent Me.” John 14:23-24.
Finally, watch but don’t take the care of it all on yourself. I am there to help you watch and to overcome. Could you not even watch one hour with Me? We will watch together.
Above all, keep your eyes fixed on Jesus, the author and finisher of your faith. “Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.” Hebrews 12:1-2.
And My servant Paul tells you how to watch yourself and the tactics of the devil and Me: “Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, rejoice. Let your reasonableness be known to everyone. The Lord is at hand; do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. What you have learned and received and heard and seen in me—practice these things, and the God of peace will be with you.” Philippians 4:4-9.
I love you. Let’s watch your life together and keep it in line with My Word and in step with Me. I make a way where there is no way. I see paths in the sea. But I say to you what I say to all, “Watch!” Selah.
No soldier gets entangled in civilian pursuits, since his aim is to please the one who enlisted him. An athlete is not crowned unless he competes according to the rules. It is the hard-working farmer who ought to have the first share of the crops. Think over what I say, for the Lord will give you understanding in everything. 2 Timothy 2:4-7