Wednesday, February 9, 2011

To Get Your Roar Back (Amazon book review by Isaiah 61 Ministries

Posted by Hazel Holland

"If you are a Seventh-day Adventist, you must read this book. If you are a Spirit-filled Adventist you will be equipped to break through the mysterious `glass ceiling' that veils the intensity of His authority and Presence in your circles. If as a member of the Body you care about your SDA sisters and brothers you need to know how you can help them and intercede for their release. In some of this book you will find a reflection of yourself. Old covenant attitudes are subtle and well embedded in much of the Body. In any case the extent to which our brothers and sisters are captive affects the freedom of us all. I'm talking about Hazel Holland's book, "The Naked Truth...".

In C. S. Lewis's "The Last Battle" there is a donkey who wears a lion's skin - a good metaphor of attempting to be a lion through law. When Jesus transforms us from being slaves to workers, He invests us with the nobility and authority of the lion we know as Aslan.

Adventist leaders do not lack for want of trying. The younger and more passionate are constantly on the look-out for a new speaker, a new strategy, a new adaptation of some current artifice for `spiritual purposes'; a new building to paint in some far off land. But sadly the painting of this building somewhere in Oceania releases no more of the life of God than could be released by any good-living atheist.

The reason, unpalatable as it is to many, the truth that Adventists live in is a lie. The origins and accumulation of that lie are authentically researched and scripturally supported in Hazel Holland's new book, THE NAKED TRUTH. Written in love with and un-remitting honesty, this is a book that gives short thrift to lies and brings hope to anyone who desires to move beyond the kingdoms of men to the Kingdom of God.

It is a book that any genuine believer in Christ must take seriously, since it deals with the extent to which any group that remains in the old covenant, hag-ridden by the law of sin and death can genuinely represent the Kingdom of God's Son. Sincerity has never been a substitute for obedience.

"If my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and will heal their land" 2 Chron 7.14 NIV.

Repentance and turning to Jesus is all that the Father requires of anyone. But to remain affixed to our own ideas, with our back to His Revelation is both obstinate and wicked. I hope that your reading of this book will open doors for some to minister to their brothers and for others to become the kind of lion they really are in Christ. I mean possessors of the kind of roar that shakes not only earth but the heavens.

`Why do you call me, `Lord, Lord,' and do not do what I say? I will show you what he is like who comes to me and hears my words and puts them into practice. He is like a man building a house, who dug down deep and laid the foundation on rock. When a flood came, the torrent struck that house but could not shake it, because it was well built. But the one who hears my words and does not put them into practice is like a man who built a house on the ground without a foundation. The moment the torrent struck that house, it collapsed and its destruction was complete' Luke 6.46-49 NIV."