Patience

                                  

                                    That ye might walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing, being fruitful

                                    in every good work, and increasing in the knowledge of God;

                                    Strengthened with all might, according to his glorious power,

                                    unto all patience and longsuffering with joyfulness; Giving thanks

                                    unto the Father, which hath made us meet to be partakers of the

                                    inheritance of the saints in light:    (Col 1:10-12)

                                   

                                   

It has been said that the thing we should never pray for it “Patience”, but the Bible commends patience as needed and central to our Christian life. If heaven was to respond to your asking and God was to say, “have patience” in response to a request, our thoughts would be of “amiable waiting”. We might recoil from this answer, but try to comfort ourselves in the knowledge that God has spoken personally and spoken favorably in the scriptures of patience. At this we normally would drop the matter before God, believeing that the passage of time is all that is now required. This is not the patience the scriptures speaks of.

The word “patience” is a Greek compound word, literally “under-abiding”. “Under” implies this word should bring to mind a positional relationship, but modern English teaches us this time based. There is a word which is time based and matches our definition “amiable waiting”, but that is the word “longsuffering”; or being “long-spirited”. There are a few cases in which the translators cross these two words, but careful study will reveal them. While patience is never stripped from the idea of “endurance”, it refers to the position from which we endure, and leaves the consideration of the time we endure to the word “longsuffering”.

                                    And we desire that every one of you do shew the same diligence to

                                    the full assurance of hope unto the end: That ye be not slothful,

                                    but followers of them who through faith and patience inherit

                                    the promises.    (Heb 6:11-12) 

                                    I know thy works, and charity, and service, and faith, and thy

                                    patience, and thy works; and the last to be more than the first.

                                                                                                (Rev 2:19)

                                    For ye have need of patience, that, after ye have done the will of

                                    God, ye might receive the promise.    (Heb 10:36)

Patience being positional has other implications; it is now no longer passive waiting, but active. Now to receive that which is promised we must remain patient, meaning in a position under God. We must endure, not just over the passage of time, but from the position God has placed us in and desires for us to remain. Bible speaks of us “under-abiding” God and “under-abiding” difficult circumstances; both are being patient. God is over all, and so we are never cut off from our abiding in Him. This is our position of intercession; under-abiding God and making prayers in a the circumstance. We find ourselves as a soilider who is given a position to defend, given a fixed place to abide and endure whatever may come.

                                    By whom also we have access by faith into this grace wherein

                                    we stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God. And not only so,

                                    but we glory in tribulations also: knowing that tribulation worketh

                                    patience; And patience, experience; and experience, hope...
                                                                                                                               (Rom 5:2-4)

                                    Wherefore take unto you the whole armour of God, that ye may

                                    be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand.

                                    Stand therefore… (Eph 6:13-14) 

This “grace wherein we stand” is positional, and the first thing that any tribulation “worketh” (literally gr."energizes") is patience.We know this experientially, as the first thing we checked when the circumstance arose was if we have moved from our previous position in God. We have also spoken of it other ways, saying that troubling times tempt us to move away from God or saying we must take our "stand". We must remain standing in this grace, we must “patient” it; “abiding” in Him and “under-abide” our circumstance. From this position we can pray, from this position we view both the grace of God and the difficulty before us; in “intercession” between the two.

                                    For ye have need of patience, that, after ye have done the will

                                    of God, ye might receive the promise. For yet a little while, and

                                    he that shall come will come, and will not tarry. Now the just

                                    shall live by faith: but if any man draw back, my soul shall have

                                    no pleasure in him. But we are not of them who draw back unto

                                    perdition; but of them that believe to the saving of the soul.

                                                                                    (Heb 10:36-39)

                                    If ye continue in the faith grounded and settled, and be not moved

                                    away from the hope of the gospel, which ye have heard, and which

                                    was preached to every creature…    (Col 1:23 )

Patience is not optional, nor is it something avoided by simply refusing to ask for it. It is from this position of “under-abiding” from which our prayers flow as intercession. We have not turned away from God to seek our own solution, but we abide in Him and under the circumstance at the same time. Patience is not something to obtain, as an object or spiritual substance we can receive, but is the full condition of a healthy spiritual life lived before God. 

                                    If ye abide in me, and my words abide in you, ye shall

                                    ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you. Herein

                                    is my Father glorified, that ye bear much fruit; so shall

                                    ye be my disciples.   (John 15:7-8)

 

About What is Coming

April 12, 2012

I have been asked by a few to comment on the word that Glynda Lomax released on 4/5/2012 called “Prepare for War”; this will be my only response to those requests. The word is true, but not as you might think it to be. A few years ago what I was hearing from the Lord personally was no longer lining up to what many main line charismatic oracles were declaring. I set forth on a hunt which led me to Glynda’s YouTube channel and the Wings of Prophecy. I find that what the Lord has spoken to me in prayer has consistently been in agreement with what the Lord has given to Glynda to release.

It is the question that is always asked of prophetic people, “What do you think is going to happen?” When speaking of what is coming as simply “judgment” many want more details. “Judgment” is a catch all term which does nothing except explain the judiciousness of God’s decision. It is a term which is general enough to excite the excitable, and offend away those looking for more specific information. In short, because we have not apprehended the ways of God for our self, every words seems to come out without enough information. It is one of the ways of God to conceal a matter, and give only enough information to draw us into a proper response. That response is to come to Him.

Be Careful How You Hear

Many people seeking a word from others about coming judgments are doing so because it is expedient and useful for them to prepare specifically for an event. It makes the practical preparations less costly and more effective.  The reason why more specific words have not been released is because God does not want you to have them. Does that should harsh? It is however true. Go to God for yourself and seek Him personally as to what you should do, and stop expecting other people to be god to you.

The specifics of “What should I do?” are designed to come in the prayer closet, in relationship with God. If you “have not” more detailed information, it is most likely because you have “asked not”.  If you have asked and received not, check you motives. Is this to secure your kingdom or the Kingdom of God. Are you trying to save the life of the king of your kingdom? Or working for the Glory of The King?

Words specific enough to be actionable for practical preparation are rare through a prophetic person. Even the person speaking of judgments to come still must go personally before God and ask of Him, “What shall I do?” God’s goal all along has been to draw you into a personal relationship with Him, without Him you are lost for an eternity. The short term is only a little matter.  Many are waiting for such words now, but God has left us in waiting so that we might trust Him. Not to trust in our own resourcefulness above Him. He has left us waiting to seek His face, repent of our sins, receive of His Spirit and ready our hearts so that they do not faint. The temporal and practical considerations are secondary!

It is not as simple as “God told me judgment is coming, so I will prepare”. Have you considered that God might not want you to survive? If you have not asked that simple question of God, it is a practical place to begin.  The relationship begins with death; with Him as our example and then us in obedience. Death puts everything in the proper perspective. This leaves us in a place of prayer and seeking His face; a place we should have been all along. As I said before: He is able to keep many without any preparation, and call home many who have prepared much.

About What is Coming

God gave me a word in 1998 on the 4^th of July. I was living with my Dad shortly after finishing college, and was attending a Fireworks show. As the show was going off the Lord began to speak to me that there was coming a judgment that was not yet, but would most certainly be. He would give America time to repent, but in the end they would not, and the judgment would come. Over the next weeks I sought the Lord as to the normal questions at receiving such a word: “who, what, when, where and how?” All of those questions He was silent about, yet there other things which are important to be known.

The type of judgment is important to understand, because there are judgments, and there are judgments. 9-11 was a judgment, but it also was a warning. Is there a person on earth who has not seen the images of the collapse of the World Trade Center? It was a warning that went to the ends of the earth, and to every household in America. Yet, have we repented? We sang “God Bless America”, but have we changed?

What is this type of judgment that is coming? At the time the Lord first spoke to me He made clear that it was after the pattern of Israel’s carrying away into captivity. The judgment of America will follow the Biblical patter of the removal of a nation because its sins. The approach to it follows the Biblical prescription of those days. May prophets spoke during those days, and all of it applies directly for us NOW and should be considered as the pattern for what is coming. He will not spare us nationally, and so the end is not repentance: it is destruction. The time for repentance passed with the warnings, and will not return. It is before us, coming and even here.

There is one change to this Biblical pattern of judgment from the Old Testament writings, Israel had a Biblical and prophetic end in the scriptures: America does not. Israel both ceased from being a nation and regained being a nation. Israel’s captivity was 70 years as an example, but ours is forever. I have heard of many words which speak of this happening suddenly. If it is fast or a long slow slide, the end is certain.

To claim America has a “special” place in scripture is to stretch Biblical interpretation past what it was ever intended. In the end such claims are no more than a sales pitch of hopefulness! Some might say we are the figure Babylon: this is a fair judgment, but consider the end of Babylon. In Daniels time Babylon fell in one night and in Revelation it is declared to end in “one hour”. Babylon speaks to a system that stretches the whole of the earth, and while not us in particular America is at its center.

Speaking of the End

In the July 4^th word the Lord admonished me that many things were ahead of me before that time, but be aware of these things in their season. Many things have happened in those 14 years personally and nationally. Personally, I received Bible training, married, worked in church based ministry and had children. I have followed the Lord on many adventures, all of which have helped me to grow closer to Him. Nationally we experienced 9-11, the war on terror, the invasion of Afghanistan and then Iraq and countless smaller military engagements. At every turn I wondered if it was the time, and it has not been. Life continued on, and I personally continued to follow the Lord. I honestly hoped these days would never come, but they are here and running quickly toward us.

In the early spring of last year came the word that it was now time the Lord has spoken to me. It was time to prepare, but I had been prepared already. The primary preparation is faith and relationship with Him, all other things are secondary considerations. We are dealing with God, who made all that He will judge and it is in His hands to do with as He chooses. The last preparation to put into place was natural, earthly and physical. God has been preparing His own to follow Him for a long time. As I have said before, He is able to keep you without any preparation, and call you home even if you have made every peroration. You are in His hands.

Specifics of the End

The Lord at that time spoke to me of Lamentations Chapter 4 (Read it!) as being descriptive of the final end of America.  The situation described by Jeremiah as an eye witness shows what removal of a nation looks like when carried out. These verse are also highly descriptive matches with the words given by many of God’s prophetic voices about what is coming. Many have seen masses of wandering and starving people dying as they went. Much of what people have seen is the end of the judgments; very few have a sure word about the beginning. Have we not considered the most basic precepts of the prophetic, that God “declares the end from the beginning (Isa 46:10)?” Why then do we seek to know the beginning and middle, when we shall see clearly the end? The rest, if God be willing, we will only witness with our eyes (PS91).

God is not speaking much of the specifics of the beginning. The only people this will not take by complete surprise are these following the Lord presently. Many things have been said, but only through the eyes of History will it be judged as true/false and specific/vague. The central message of all the words the Lord has given to His servants is to prepare: spiritual preparation being always at the forefront of EVERY admonition! The question is actually this: “Are you ready to meet your maker?” Live the rest of your time ready! Prepare naturally as the Lord wills, allows and provides.

Hard Things

Many are said to be sensationalists or only trying to get up a following by words of warning and visions of destruction, but time will tell. Knowing personally many of the people speaking these things, and having done so myself, would it shock you if I was to say we don’t really want to hear of it all either? We are not joking. We are not taking anything we are saying lightly. Most people getting such words have been in intercession and prayer for the very people we are saying destruction is coming to! What do you think our hearts to be at this moment, after giving such a report? The most important place of all to be is in the prayer closet, hearing for yourself the answer to the prayer, “What shall I do?”

To hold this knowledge in any amount of real faith is hard to bear. Some think that anyone would speak of these things lightly. Lightness is nice mental exercise, as theological discussion of judgment; but hold the word of the Lord regarding these things is a horror and terror.

Do you believe in the judgment of God? As only a mental exercise or do the words of the words drive you to your knees in prayer for the unsaved? In prayer for your family, for your community, for your church and Christian brother and sisters.  If that has not been the effect of such a word on you, don’t have a real word. The real word of this judgment is a horror, and not a delight. Examine your motives in wanting to hear of such things, and the outcomes if you do. They are hard to bear when you know that the speaker is powerful enough to perform all that which He has spoken.

Brian D. McClafferty

The Screen of the Imagination

There is more in our souls that speak than just the stream of our thoughts and emotions. Our thinking also manifests as images, as all of our memories are recalled as pictures. These images appear on what I call the screen of the imagination. This is the same location in the soul that visions appear and word of knowledge pictures are displayed.


Before the digital age of photography I had a darkroom that I developed many rolls of slides in. If you would look at each slide individually, the colors were vibrant and rich. If you looked at two slides at the same time, the images became mixed and confused. If you held multiple slides together you would see only blackness.  This is the effect that unforgiveness has on the screen of our imagination.


This screen of the imagination can be defiled. When unforgiven or unhealed images from the past flash across the screen of our imagination it is damaged. The images are burned upon them like the old PC monitors who have displayed the same image for too long. The pains, sins and wrongs that have gone unforgiven are etched upon the screen. We allow them to remain, because we will not let them go.


The screen can be cleansed as we forgive others, and as God works healing within our heart. Sometimes we will be forced to deal with these images one circumstance at a time, other times the Lord will heal it on mass. Sometimes the images will be healed all at once. Eventually we will learn to forgive, and walk in forgiveness. Our hearing and seeing depends upon it.


There are other images that flash across our soul on a daily basis. As we take captive every thought to the obedience of Christ, this is an area that we need to pay some attention to. These impacts advertising, the magazines in the checkout line and  television also impact on this area and will need to cleansed away daily.

This place can be rendered nearly entirely useless by the modern epidemic of pornography. This area is deeper in our soul than our conscious thoughts, and this is the reason for the powerful hold this addiction has on our society. Our thoughts are words, but it has been well said in our time that a picture is worth a thousand of them. It has been an intentional plan of the enemy of our soul to corrupt this area.

Are you Ready to Follow God's Voice?

                                    I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that

                                    ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy acceptable unto God, 
                                   which is your reasonable service. And be not conformed to this world:
                                   but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may
                                   prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.

                                                                                                (Rom 12:1-2) 

                                    But ye believe not, because ye are not of my sheep, as I said unto you.

                                    My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me:

                                    And I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish,

                                    neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand.

                                                                                               (John 10:26-28)


The voice of God comes to the sheep of God, and to no other. The topic of hearing the voice of God is much more than only a process to be learned, or formula to be developed. It is a life of turning away from the pattern of this world. At the heart of the all learning on this topic is the discipline of being and staying one of God’s sheep. We can hear and follow other voices: for there are many voices in the world. There is only one true voice of the God of the Bible.

There is something which comes before any hearing of Gods voice, it is the laying down of our lives before the living God. Until our life is surrendered to God generally, His voice speaking to us is particularly will be of no value. If in your heart you are still seeking your way, your plans and following your will there is no room for His; therefore God is silent.

Who is actively running your life Right now? Are you choosing your own way? Do you believe that any path through life is acceptable to God, as long as it is accompanied by Christian ethics, morals and regular church attendance? If God was to make instant changes in your life what would you be most afraid of losing? Or most anxious to be rid of?

It is assumed that surrender is no longer a valid when a person makes a confession of faith. Even after having followed the Lord to the cross, a person can at any time take the reins of their life back from God. To assume that a confession of faith at one point in time is sufficient to be counted as submission for a lifetime is unrealistic. This is not a discussion of the doctrine of salvation, but it an exploration of hearing the voice of God and the surrender that must accompany it. We must become and remain a sheep. Without the literal, actual and current surrender of your life to God: you will proceed no farther in hearing the voice of God, there is no need.

God alone is the determiner of the quality of this kind surrender. He knows us better than we know ourselves, and is fully able to be God to us. Our first learning of God is that He loved us so much that He came to us, suffered and died the most shameful of deaths on our behalf. After such a lavish display of love, should there be any doubt of His goodness toward us? If we are convinced of His love, and His fatherly care to us, we should feel at liberty to surrender all to Him without reservation. If we are not hearing God’s voice and God’s leading in our lives it might good indicator of the quality of offering we have placed before Him, that it might not be lamb at all, but possibly goat.

Have we been paying games with God? Surrendering only that which we find convenient and easy, and dismissing the rest as being “under the blood”? Are you really ready to hear a word from God, a word which will shakesthe very foundations of your life? Or have we places a blemished offering before God? Are we ready to die personally, actually and painfully to being the God of our own life?

I am persuaded of better things of any who would seek any writing on hearing the voice God. The nature of the topic alone is enough to indicate that a person is seeking a deeper and more complete relationship. Nevertheless, examine yourself and see if you be in the faith: for making a deepening commitment to Him is required to grow into hearing His voice. If this is not at the core of your seeking after God, there is no need for Him to speak. If this is not the very attitude of our hearts, there is no need for us to hear.

Playing with Idols

                                    Son of man, these men have set up their idols in their heart,

                                    and put the stumblingblock of their iniquity before their face:

                                    should I be enquired of at all by them? Therefore speak unto

                                    them, and say unto them, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Every man

                                    of the house of Israel that setteth up his idols in his heart, and

                                    putteth the stumblingblock of his iniquity before his face, and

                                    cometh to the prophet; I the LORD will answer him that cometh

                                    according to the multitude of his idols;

                                                                                                (Eze 14:3-4)

God made it very clear to Ezekiel the costs of not fully surrendering to the will of God before seeking to apprehend the voice of God. Leaning our lives toward anything else but God for support is the definition of New Testament idolatry. Idols own us when we need them more than God: our relationships, our career, our health, or our beauty, our retirement accounts, our credit reports. Anything that we can claim as "ours" independent of God, is not ours, but we belong to it. If our surrender before God has been honest and pure, God will deal with the idols one by one. If we presumptuously approach God, without consideration the state of our hearts, He will answer us according to our lusts. We will get what we wanted, but we will not like what we have gotten.

The person walking this path will eventually find that God has lead them into nothing but troubles. These troubles themselves are not the problem, but getting the idols out of their hands is. Many will turn back at this point because they do not knowing the ways of God. They did not know that He must accomplish a work in them, before promises can be fulfilled to them. Until that process is complete, we are unable to walk in the things which God would speak into our life, and unable to enter our promised land.

God has a way of shaming our idols before our own eyes. If our trust had been in our ability to earn income, we might suffer job loss. If our trust has been in our career path, He might place a supervisor over that suffocates our hopes. He will place immovable objects before us, like mountains and leave us with no resource of our own able to remove it. Eventually we become tired of our idols, and we judge them as unable to save. Everything we once trusted in, all of what we counted as "our best" and "our strongest" has now been shown useless. The only answer allowed to remain is God, but to grab hold of Him we must first let go of our idols.


Our Attention

                                    Wherefore (as the Holy Ghost saith, To day if ye will hear his voice,

                                    Harden not your hearts, as in the provocation, in the day of temptation

                                    in the wilderness: When your fathers tempted me, proved me, and saw

                                    my works forty years. Wherefore I was grieved with that generation,

                                    and said, They do alway err in their heart; and they have not known

                                    my ways...)

                                                                                                             (Heb 3:7-10)

An overemphasis on righteousness and willful ignorance of sanctification and holiness is trouble. It is leaving many without the basic tools needed for Biblical Christian living. Had we been attentive to the scriptures, we would have seen our oversights. We have a false confidence in righteousness. We have substituted its definition over the words holiness and sanctification, so that we have erased them from our usage. Fortunately God has written a book without any omission and it is highly recommended reading for anyone considering living as a Christian! Any deficiencies can be reestablished in the life of anyone literate. If we bold enough to take the scriptures seriously and to take God at His word. We need our Bibles!

The Living God has gotten our attention off of our idols and onto Him. We have surrendered to Him. Becoming sheep we are made dependent upon the Great Sheppard, whom we are grasping toward. We now desire to know the living God, and to hear His voice directing the particulars of our life. We should start by returning to what He generally said. The best examples of God are on display for us in the scriptures: what He might say and how He might act is in the pages of the Bible. I have heard the Lord many times using the some question from the Bible with me personally. He has asked me the same challenging questions, when I came with a heart worth of the Biblical Pharisees.

Foundational to hearing God is the nature of God. He does not change, and so neither does His voice. He has spoken in the scriptures, and at hearing His voice there upon the pages of the Bible, we can recognize it when it comes. This is new to us because previously looked into the scriptures to find if our will was consistent with His. Now we are considering this consistency in regard to the voice of God.  The voice of God will have the same spiritual sound; meaning to the untrained ear it might at first be indistinguishable from the scriptures. Isn't this how it should be?

Finding ourselves lead into desert places by God has an effect on our approach to the scriptures: we become amazingly attentive. The warnings in the book of Hebrews become real to us, and we will find them highly useful in understanding our own journey into our promised land. The historical narrative of Israel in the desert now becomes alive to us, with spiritually practical object lessons made personal. The truthful observation has been made that after God took the children of Israel out of Egypt, but it still took forty years to get Egypt out of them; though we hope will it be so long a journey for us.

God’s Dealings vs. Personal Reformation
                                 
                                    For whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth, and scourgeth every son

                                    whom he receiveth. If ye endure chastening, God dealeth with you

                                    as with sons; for what son is he whom the father chasteneth not?

                                    But if ye be without chastisement, whereof all are partakers, then

                                    are ye bastards, and not sons… 
                                    …Now no chastening for the present seemeth to be joyous, but

                                    grievous: nevertheless afterward it yieldeth the peaceable fruit of

                                    righteousness unto them which are exercised thereby.

                                                                                                            (Heb 12:6-8,11)

It will be clear to you after this wilderness is passed that God has done a work in you, distinct from the circumstances around you. Looking back many are horrified by the reflections of their own pasts, but now speak favorably of such dealings they once begged to an end.  This is God’s work in us, a work which we cannot do for ourselves. We previously may have tried to do this work ourselves, but that is only personal reformation. Personal reformation has its season, but there is a work which only God can do.

God is recovering His rightful position in our life as God.. We are once again becoming sheep and He our Great Sheppard. The promise of yielding the “peaceable fruit of righteousness” is only to those who “are exercised thereby”. Take account if your willingness to follow the voice which you are about to hear. An entire generation of Israel perished in the wilderness when they followed God half heartedly. You will inherit a land flowing with milk and honey, but not without laying down all first. Half hearted following yields half hearted results, which is only enough to lead you into the desert, but not enough to lead you out. God will cleanse you, but in a place without resources save for Him.

The holiness and sanctification, which we had only heard about are become a reality in us. I had eluded our grasp when we tried to obtain it through personal reformation; but now we count it a cherished gift from God. If God had allowed us to apprehend it by our own efforts, pride would become the new idol of our promised land. The existence of pride requires this working to not be our choice, but a work which God chose to do in us.

A new humility becomes resident in our hearts, which was not present before the pressures were applied. Life springs up from once dead places in our souls. The scriptures come alive not just to us, but in us; taking their rightful place in our life. Reading the Bible becomes an adventure, a constant companion and living guidebook, rather than the object religious duty. In short, the life spoken of in the scripture is at work within us.

The process of rooting out idols began with the offering of our lives before God. He has been waiting for us to come. It ends when God says it ends, because these times (by the mercy of God) are seasonal, not continual. When it ends we might not judge ourselves fully clean before God, but the wisdom of God for our sake is at work here. We can see in ourselves that farther work needs to be done, but some things are left for the sake of humility. Even as Paul sought the Lord three times to have His buffeting removed, only to have the reply be “No”. Fear not, He will fully cleanse us; but this process is in His hands, not ours.

Goodness of God


                                    For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy 
                                    to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us.
                                                                                                             (Rom 8:18)

The severity of God cannot be compared with His goodness! The promises draw us to the living God for fulfillment, but it is His goodness that led us. The rebuke of Israel in the wilderness was because of their faithlessness that God was going to make good on His promise. The same hope we have from God in our lives and we do well not to lose sight of it. No dealing for the present seems joyous, but afterward, afterward is the blessing. The goodness and the promises are sure, thought the path might be as straight as we first believed.

The promises God made to you personally are true, for God is not a man that He should lie. At times we might be tempted to believe God has led us into a wilderness to kill us, and in a manner of speaking He has. We died in the wilderness, yet a new life sprang up within us. Both literally and figuratively, the promises God made are larger than the death we died.

God’s promises are eternal, larger than life or death. This is far beyond our understanding of simple honesty. If something God speaks is not true at the time, His power will create it into being. Obtaining such promises is not easy, as we witnesses in our wilderness walk, but if it were easy it would have no value. God who has promised us will bring it to pass.

                                    But without faith it is impossible to please him: for he that cometh

                                    to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them

                                    that diligently seek him…

                                    … Through faith also Sara herself received strength to conceive

                                    seed, and was delivered of a child when she was past age, because

                                    she judged him faithful who had promised.

                                                                                                (Heb 11:6,11)


It is impossible to fully articulate these things for everyone. They are individualistic, personal and must pass directly from God to you. They are to be cherished, recorded in notebooks, and shared with spiritual friends as testimonies. The Lord will do the most personal and touching things as a display of His care for you is. The harshness and severity of God in the wilderness sometimes shakes our faith that He cares for us, but God takes opportunities to show us just how well He knows us. This is just one such story:

I was on my way to work one morning and was going to stop for the coffee I skipped because my stomach had been upset. As I positioned myself to turn off, the Lord spoke to me saying, “No!” When I asked Him why, His immediate response was, “I have commanded my servant to give it to you.” I proceeded to work and  found that a coworker had purchased a coffee at the same location for a friend who was out of the office that day, so she offered it to me. I thanked her with a warm smile, but upon opening it found it to be prepared with cream and sugar. In my heart I mused that I normally took my coffee black with sugar, the Lord replied, “It’s for your stomach!”

Nearly twenty years after that morning it still provokes me to tears at how God loves us, knows us personally, understands even our aches and pains. Surely the hairs of our head are numbered, for He has counted them while looking upon us while He was thinking of us!

He knows you, not just as a memory exercise, but with personal attention and thoughtfulness toward you; this is known as love. He formed you and has a path for you, a course and race for you to run in life which He has marked out. This course requires His personal leading; hearing His voice, apprehending His will and allowing Him to be God to you. He will speak to you directly, make promises to you personally, and keep them.

The ethics and morals of the Christian faith are not enough to follow God, and while they are not to be discounted or discarded they are yet insufficient. The scriptures themselves point to a life in God beyond their pages: a real life, in a real relationship with the Living God. The most basic message of the Gospel is that He is alive and risen, so we can no longer think of Him as dead and gone. He has spoken in the scriptures and continues to speak to any who would dare follow Him on an adventure by submitting their lives to him, and following after His leading. God bless you in it!

To Will and To Do

                                    For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to
                                    do of his good pleasure.   (Phil 2:13)

                                   
A new work is always exciting, filled with expectation and the fruit of the Spirit springing from within. Beginnings are easy, but as we continue forward, resistance, pressure and confrontations take their toll. One day we awake and to find it hard to continue, the joy is gone, but the work remains. We press on for we know we must, but going forward wishing that the joy and fruit we began with were still present.

What changed? When we begin to use absolute terms like “duty”, “calling” and “faithfulness” to describe the way forward, a change has occurred away the grace of God we professed at the beginning. The fruit of the Spirit we once enjoyed, now no longer accompanies us as it once did. Faith is not the issue, if it was we would not choose words like duty and faithfulness as a way forward. 

                                    If ye be willing and obedient, ye shall eat the good of the
                                    land: But if ye refuse and rebel, ye shall be devoured with
                                    the sword: for the mouth of the LORD hath spoken it.
                                                                                                (Isa 1:19-20)

We missed God's warning to be both “willing and obedient” and the promise to us that God works in us both “to will and to do” His good pleasure. Are these one and the same, if God speaks of them separately? We believed because we were still obedient that we are still willing. Our willingness left, but our obedience remained, so to accomplish the task we begin to burn flesh instead of the grace of God. For this reason the “works of the flesh” are with us in our duties as the “the fruit of the Spirit” has disappeared. As our frustration has grown, mumurrings and disputings have broken out within us, and are about to spread to others around us, for we can no longer restrain them. What began as a work to shine the light of God into the world, has now become pit of darkness we have fallen into. How do we recover our willingness?


                                    Then saith he unto them, My soul is exceeding sorrowful,
                                    even unto death: tarry ye here, and watch with me.   (Mat 26:38)


Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane is an example for us, but strictly speaking, Jesus’ requests were not the reason for His prayer. The object was not that "this cup be taken” from Him, but rather to align His will with the Fathers. “If it be possible that this cup pass from me” might be the actual words of our prayer in our circumstance, but the answer is about the agreement of our wills. Jesus had been heading to the cross for some time, He knew the will of the Father and the plan of salvation through His suffering, but this knowledge did not exempt Him from the crisis of human will. Such times of prayer are not about the requests we make, but about the submission and surrender we experience to the will of God.

                                    Saying, Father, if thou be willing, remove this cup from me:
                                    nevertheless not my will, but thine, be done.   (Luke 22:42)

We might add will-power to the list of needs, but the will-power we are asking for is not the forcefulness of God’s will which carries us through to the end, but we means to wrestle our own will into submission; for only then can we obtain any power to do the will of God. The end of this wrestling will bring us to rest when it is fully accomplished it, but we must pass the night in the Garden of Gethsemane as did our Lord. If we find the grace of God to work within us “to will”, we shall again find the grace of God working in us “to do” which has eluded us.

                                    For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to
                                    do of his good pleasure.   (Phil 2:13)