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Your Assignment for Each Section!

Over-all Assignment: A Need to Work Together  

The concepts on this site are biblically sound and are effective. Where things can break down is in communication between you and I. 

My goal is to communicate these principles as effectively as I can in order to help you delight to direct your heart toward God and experience His presence more fully. I want to help you be a "doer of the word of God" (James 1:22).    

It is my strong desire to help you individually as much as possible. I will respond to each e-mail as much as I am able. 

One assignment for you is that I need you to write me and let me know where your heart is responding and where it isn't. Is there something you need to be stated more clearly? Are you struggling to apply these principles and need to know how to apply these things in your situation? We need to communicate. Doing that has potential to help both you and I. We need to work together at this. Help me to communicate more effectively.  

I can only do so much. You have to do your part. It will be helpful for you to have some goals about each section that will help you to know what you should be trying to accomplish. 

"Assignments" that are Goals to Rest Into

Start by thinking about these assignments as goals to rest into, not things that you have to achieve. You have to do them, but if the pressure is too great you will also have to work with even more fears and insecurity than would otherwise need to be addressed. Your fears have to be calmed about repentance and drawing near to God, not increased.

By resting I mean you will need to get your heart to submit into it believing that it is true that it is right and good and safe for you to repent and turn to God. If your heart believes it you will be able to rest into being able to do it, without it being something you have to achieve and deserve. Remember that we are changing from "works" to grace. 

The pressure isn't on you to put your faith in the greatness of your what you achieve. If there is any pressure it is that you need to get your heart to believe the grace of God. That is something you are going to have to work with your heart about. 

Don't think that because you have to rest into these "goals" you can relax and not try. Speaking about faith and entering the throne room to draw near to God, the Bible says to, "...let us be diligent to enter that rest..." (Heb. 4:11; see also 3:19 and 4:16). 

"Accomplish" these goals but by applying your effort to resting into believing. When your heart believes you will be able to act on that belief. This entire web site is about how to do that.  

Assignment for Understanding Yourself

My goal for this section is to help prepare you for repentance with delight and drinking from God. Think of it as a good place to start, but not as the whole thing. 

Your assignment for "Understanding Yourself" is to come to the place of recognizing the evidence in everyday life that you are thirsty for God 24 hours-a-day. It never stops. Learn to see that all your behavior and longings are evidence of how much you long for the presence of God. Let your heart be convinced that this is true even when it seems on the surface that you want everything else except God, and may even be trying to avoid Him.  

Mostly this section has to do with things you need to understand with your mind. But that isn't the extent of it! You also need to hear it with your heart so that your heart is better prepared and gets softer toward the idea of actually turning to God and drinking from Him - anywhere and all the time. 

Your assignment is to let your heart be convinced that even when your desires seem bent in directions totally opposite to God, you are acting out of an unmet desire for His presence. Think of any sinful behavior as a twisted kind of evidence of how deeply desperate you are for the closeness of God. 

A second assignment for "Understanding Yourself" is that you need to be able to see earthly ways of quenching your thirst as being a system of drinking that is by "works." What I mean is that we are trying to "work" at something until we believe we deserve being able to drink from it - humanly speaking. Understanding that will help you turn to God because you will be able to boil everything down to changing from works to grace for quenching your thirst. When you boil it down to works and grace you will better understand what it means to rest in God. It will also make your repentance more focused. (In case you are wondering - drive and desire are still important. The heart-training will help you change your basic motive for living from subtle ways of trying to exalt yourself until you can drink - to exalting God and continually drinking by His grace. This topic is addressed off and on throughout the series.)

Do you have addictive tendencies? "Understanding Yourself" should help you to recognize how your addictive tendencies can help you in your pursuit toward God. The "Come and Drink" book will help with this even more.

Note that the goal here is not for your heart to be fully "prepared." I am only trying to help you get the process off to a good start. The more that can happen the better. If you read through it and you don't feel all that "prepared" just keep going to the next section. By being more prepared, I mean that you need to be more aware of the times when you are drinking from earthly sources. I also mean that you need to recognize more and more that you are constantly drinking from something. We never stop. 

Remember that God designed your thirst for Him. He also gave you a choice about how to try and quench that thirst. Let it burn into your heart that your desire for God never stops. It just gets mixed up sometimes.  

Assignment for "Why Repent"

The purpose of this section is similar to the previous except that here I am trying to remove some of the barriers that tend to make us hold back. 

My observations are that most of the reason why Christians think about repentance is to avoid condemnation from God. If you are a Christian you don't have to worry about condemnation. Don't repent because of that!

The negative reason why you should repent is to avoid the correction from God that is both loving and tough. God corrects His children because He loves us, not because He feels condemning toward us. The problem is that correction from God can be painful. Repent now and don't wait until you force God to have to correct you.    

My goal for this section is to get you to think about repenting because of the grace of God to draw near to you. That is the positive reason why you should repent.  

Your assignment for this section is to expand your thinking about why you should repent. Consider this topic from our perspective and God's. 

We have to repent because of God's grace because repentance is about turning to God just as much as it is about turning from our earthly ways. If your motive for turning to God is because of fear you will always hold back. Grace needs to be your motive because the need here is that you turn and run toward God. If grace isn't your motive for repentance I don't think you will be able to do that from the heart.    

Don't get hung up on the page that is about end times. Skip that page, if you don't agree with my views and you feel strongly about it. I believe those things but I don't believe it is right for me to be dogmatic about them. They are helpful in the context of why repent and that is why I include them here.  

Even after this section you may still not yet feel like you can commit yourself whole heartedly to repentance. That is not a problem! Your assignment for this section is to let your motivation to repent be increased. Like "Understanding Yourself," the goal here is to help get things rolling. 

Assignment for "What to Repent from"

Mostly this section is for you mind. Your assignment is to understand how you can think about the potentially hundreds of idolatrous substitutions we make for God in a more organized and manageable fashion. It is helpful to do that in order to better understand how to make your repentance practical. 

The most necessary part of this assignment is that you understand how to boil everything down to the essence of what to repent from.  

Assignment for "How to Repent"

Your assignment for this section is that you understand what the Bible says about how to repent and change. The goal here is that you come to the place of saying, "Because this is what the Bible says about how to repent and change, I have to trust that it will work for me."

The top two thirds of the buttons are mostly instruction for your mind. The "Repent Better" pages are mostly for your heart. Considering all the time you could spend in this section, the majority of your time should be spent in those pages that are more for your heart.

After understanding how to repent, the how to "Repent Better" pages are some of the most important pages on this site. They are important because they explain what you need to do in order to make your repentance effective. Without the information on these pages it is possible that you could do some of the heart-training and feel like it didn't work. Don't make that mistake.     

Understand "How to Repent" well enough that when you see the principles applied in Heart-training, you are already convinced that it will work for you. Just don't let yourself get stuck here. You have to keep going. Consider the possibility that anytime you get stuck it is evidence of your need to address your fears with truth and move on.   

Assignment for the "Heart-training!" Section

Get to know the tools that are available here. Read through the Heart-training index and the Heart-training w/diagrams page. Be sure to note that the Heart-training index points you to heart-training that addresses many very specific areas that are common areas of struggle.

One of the top 5 most important pages on this site is the one called, "Heart-training Promise!" Be sure to understand what that is because it will help you to believe that Heart-training will work for you.

Your assignment is to use the tools here and to use them with a determination to turn your heart so as to increase your freedom to trust God's grace and drink from God. 

The "spiritual act of turning" is your assignment. Learn what it is, at least on a mental level. Then determine to use every heart-training statement to help you to do the "spiritual act of turning." 

Your assignment is also to use the tools enough so that you are able to take your heart-training into everyday life. The Heart-training tools can help you turn from difficult areas of sin. But taking your heart-training into everyday life will help you to be better at drinking from God all through the day.  

A page is given so that you can write your own heart-training statements. Let me warn you about this page that so far, I have only seen this page help people in specific areas. It has not helped them to do the over-all kind of repentance that is necessary for actually drinking from God (works to grace). 

Write your own heart-training statements as a supplement to the tools included in this section. Don't ignore the tools given here. Writing your own heart-training statements has potential to help you greatly. But think of that as only part of the process.  

Many more hours and thought has gone into the Heart-training than what is obvious. Each section has a purpose and should not be ignored.

The Heart-training with diagrams is better for the general works to grace kind of turning because it helps you to cover many areas more quickly. The Heart-training you find in the "Index" is aimed to help you turn from works to grace and some pages are quite effective at it. But in general, think about the longer Heart-training pages as being for issues that are often hidden and more specific in nature. The "Heart-training Level II" material is more for turning to God than it is turning from earthly things. The diagram and the index versions will help you to be able to do the Level II stuff. 

Think of the Heart-training Level II material as being most effective after the "Come and drink" and the "What About Shame" sections.

Have fun directing your heart toward God!

Assignment for "Come and Drink" 

We receive the promise of the Holy Spirit by faith in the grace of God to draw near to us freely (Gal. 3:14; Isa. 55:1,2; Rom. 4:16). But in order to have faith like that you need to have a foundational understanding of the scriptures that gives you strong reason to believe. The better that foundation, the easier it becomes to receive. 

Your assignment for this section is to understand why you can confidently believe that when you draw near to God, He will draw near to you. 

Your goal should be to study this section in order to know the scriptures well enough that you can rest into confidently believing that you do have access to draw near to God, in all His glory. You can receive His presence because of His strong and radiant presence upon you when you are near. You may already know that with your mind, but let the material in this section be instruction for your heart.     

Use this section to develop a scriptural basis for strongly believing that you can drink from God by His abundant grace. Use the principles you learned about how to repent in order to encourage your own heart to receive and believe what you are reading.   

Reassure your heart with the truth about God and your access until you are able to act on what you are believing. The Acrobat Reader file in the Heart-training about our access and God's grace will help. 

Assignment for "What About Shame?"

Your assignment for this section is to understand why and how you can be free of shame about drawing near to God. 

You need to understand what God did for you on the inside when you became a Christian. You also need to understand what God does so that you don't have to feel shame because of your humanity. God washes your body as you draw near to Him! You need to understand it. Then you need to make the effort to get your heart to believe it. Heart-training will help with this to.

Note that this section is more than just a theological statement. It is based on much study of the scriptures and years of trial and error. You get to learn from my mistakes!    

Over 300 pages of the 550 pages in the books are available by purchase only.   I have made it worth it to those who make the purchase -- many of the most helpful materials are not on the web site.  Click here to go to the page about the ebooks.

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I am praying for the Lord's abundant blessing on your efforts to direct your heart toward Him.

Barry.

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(C) Barry Hall 1999

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Other scriptures are from the New International Version or Amplified Bible as noted.