The Manifestation of Jesus

                               I will not leave you comfortless: I will come to you.

                        Yet a little while, and the world seeth me no more; but ye see me:
                         because I live, ye shall live also.

                         At that day ye shall know that I am in my Father, and ye in me, and I in you.
                        He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me:
                        and he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father, and I will love him,
                        and will manifest myself to him.                       

                        Judas saith unto him, not Iscariot, Lord, how is it that thou wilt manifest
                        thyself unto us, and not unto the world? 

                        Jesus answered and said unto him, If a man love me, he will keep my words:
                        and my Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode
                        with him.
                                                                                                                        (John 14:18-21)


Good Intentions 

Jesus is alive! Not just as a character in a book or a theological idea, but someone we need to know personally. In an attempt to make Christianity less mystical to a skeptical, practical and scientific world, we have watered down the gospel. We have been pretended that the scriptures about the manifestation of Jesus to be only symbolic, not literal and actual. If we desire to hear the voice of God, our faith on this point needs to be made crystal clear. The world will not like it, the atheists will say we are crazy (for that matter the Church might not be thrilled either), but the world has got to hear it strait; Jesus is alive today, and we have met Him!  

We have held to tightly to the reformation-ideology that education alone would bring a better picture of our Savior. That by studying His teachings we could gain a better picture of the Him. We have substituted knowing about Him for actually knowing Him personally.  

To this presentation of the Christian faith the world has asked the most obvious of all questions; “How do these manifestations differ from the manifestation of Buddha, or Mohamed, or other religious leaders?” If this has been our only approach, it does not differ in the slightest! If we have not progressed past teaching Christianity as only a systematic theology, as ethics, as morality or as a world view, we have missed God. We have presented the Living God as out of the picture. Why are we coy about telling the world He is alive?!  

Could it be that Jesus meant what He said and more literally then we have dared portray? What injustice have we done to the gospel by this portrayal of Jesus? Could He actually be living and active, the personal leader of His Church? Could He be listening to our prayers personally? Could He be so alive to us that our prayers stop sounding as speeches made to a deity far removed, and more like a dialogue? A dialog with a friend whom we know well?  

Christianity made devoid of the living God is non-distinct when compared to the pantheon of the religions in the world. Elements of its ethics and morals have been duplicated other places. Have you wondered why the world easily places Christianity on equal footing with other religions? In our practice of the faith we have not distinguished ourselves from the rest. The resurrection has been dismissed as fantasy, and Jesus as only historical figure. Worst of all, because we have not been bold in declaring “He is Alive”, we have allowed it to be done. We have proclaimed the cornerstone of our faith as resurrection of Jesus Christ, but in practice we act as if He were still dead. We have been called liars, fools and hypocrites, and I humbly submit to you that our behavior has been correctly discerned. 

Excuses, Excuses, Excuses 

We have said the right words when speaking of salvation, saying that a “personal relationship with Jesus Christ” is the only way to God. However, when a new believer enters our Churches to learn about the Christian life to find change our mind about Jesus. We begin to make excuses for the “personal relationship” with Jesus Christ Himself we preached to them for salvation, but quickly replacing it instead with religious exercises.  

We contradict ourselves by presenting a relationship with God as devotion toward God. A couple of times a week (at best) we attend a Christian meeting in which our religious professionals present a teaching on the scripture. Churches are a learning program. We learn to sing in the general direction of God, learn to give to support God’s work and learn we must attend “God’s House” regularly. We have yet to meet the owner of the house, and assume the works we have been paying for are keeping Him occupied. We are confident will someday meet Him, because we have heard an awful lot about Him.                                    

Through experience our convert learns that his brothers and sisters do not have what was sold to him either: an actual personal relationship with Jesus Christ. Through they are devoted and attentive to the Bible, the Church and doing everything asked of them, even the best of them do not have Him really. If we were the door-to-door salesperson of any other product than religion, we would be jailed for fraud. We have not delivered what we have been selling! How do we believe we will get away with it when we come to judgment day? He will turn away many, saying, “I never knew you” (Matt 7:23)? 

                                    Ever learning, and never able to come to the Knowledge (recognition,

                                    or full discernment) of the truth.

                                                                                    (2Ti 3:7)

                                       A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put

                                    within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your

                                    flesh, and I will give you an heart of flesh. And I will put my

                                    spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes, and

                                    ye shall keep my judgments, and do them.

                                                                                                (Eze 36:26-27) 

To take the term “relationship” to mean only the exercise of our devotions toward God is shameful. It shuts us off from the life of God, and leaves us only with religious notions of morals, ethics, and dogmas that we find impossible to actually live. What is missing is the Living God who gave them and promised that He would empower us to do them. The same can be said of living the Christian life as it is of salvation: not only does it require a “personal relationship with God”; it is the reality of that relationship.  

Christocentrism

The principles of the Protestant Reformation moved us away from Catholic practice. Chief amongst these ideas was the “The Priesthood of all Believers”. This is the belief that no other mediator is needed between God and man, aside from Jesus Christ. Historically it smashed the need for a special priesthood and clergy, and put mankind back in direct contact with God. However, this idea demands that each have a personal relationship with the Living God. We hold this doctrine as an article of faith in our churches today. The idea is fine as presented, but in our practice of it as individuals has been lost.  

We have a religious expert at the front of our churches claiming only through education can apprehend God. This was not the experience of the first century Church, they had no Bible! The disciples spoke of what Jesus taught them and told the stories of who He was and what He had done. This Gospel is known as the Karigma Gospel, the message that preceded the recorded scriptures. It was their personal account of the Jesus Christ.  

The theology was the preaching of Jesus from the Old Testament, combined with their eye witness account of His life, death and resurrection. They presented Jesus as not just the head of the Church, but of their lives. They preached these messages with the expectation of His personal care and Lordship over them. Combined this expectation with the preaching of Jesus from the New Testament and we will have the conditions set for renewal of the Church. Recovering the sharpness of the Karigma Gospel in our day, aided by richness of the doctrines birthed in the Reformation will change the Church once again. The recovering of the manifestation of Jesus is key to this, but it makes and learning how to follow Him an absolute necessity.  

                                    And they shall teach no more every man his neighbour, and

                                    every man his brother, saying, Know the LORD: for they shall

                                    all know me, from the least of them unto the greatest of them,

                                    saith the LORD: for I will forgive their iniquity, and I will

                                    remember their sin no more.    (Jer 31:34) 

How have we done this? We have read it pages and studies its doctrines, this is not wrong. We have derived morals and ethics from its pages, this is not wrong either. We failed to apprehend the Living God to whom the Bible points; this is absolutely wrong. We have made the same error as the experts in Jerusalem and gotten the same result. They did not know Him when He appeared, and we do not know Him as we should. He will “exhibit” Himself; He will “disclose” himself. This is the claim the scripture and the teaching of Jesus Christ Himself.  

                                    You search the scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life:

                                    and they are they which testify of me. And ye will not come to me,

                                    that ye might have life. (John 5:39-40) 

We have taken the pats of head from our clergy, as we asked as to why we do not have the same Christian experience as the first century Christians. Why our lives seem dwarfed by the magnitude and impact of the saints in the book of Acts. We have listened intently as they excuse the portions of scripture that point to a greater personal experience of God. We have had our hunger and thrust for God dismissed as being in error, that the Bible does not support such “experiential” Christianity. The final result was we tried to live the scriptures without the life of God which was given in Jesus Christ. The Bible only points to this life, but the life is in Him. 

The manifestation of Jesus is not a projection of our thoughts about who He is. It is not a recollection of all that we know about Him, nor a reconstruction of a lifetime of sermons. It is His actual personhood present in our lives. He is the very heart, center and focus of Christianity and the Bible. Our calling is to follow Him; personally and really.  

The Bible is intended to get us familiar with Jesus Christ. The Old Testament prefigured Him. In the Gospels we see the man. In the letters to the churches we see Him as God.  The most vivid of portrayal of Him comes at the end of the Bible, in the book of Revelation. This book which John the Apostle penned begins with these words, “The Revelation of Jesus Christ”. It contains the most accurate pictures of Jesus as He is today. The highest revelation of Him ends the Bible, but our relationship is just beginning. All our learning is in preparation to follow Him.


Into the Market Place


The manifestation of Jesus is worthy to be portrayed in the marketplace of religious ideas with boldness. There is no danger in not placing it above other religious principles. If we properly present Jesus not only raised from the dead, but alive today: God Himself will show Himself. I have no fear in setting the manifestation of Jesus Christ next to the best philosophies of the heathen. They will be thrown down as the fish god dagon was (1Sam Ch. 5). However I tremble at any attempt to set Christian ethics, morals or philosophy up against such a formidable foes. We have tried these approaches and failed. It is Jesus Christ Himself that triumphs over them. He shall put them to open shame. 

Let us be frank about this point; there are more attractive and easily lived religions than Christianity for those only looking to be moral. Christianity rises to impossible heights ethically. Its standards were never meant to be obtained without the direct intervention of God in the life of the person. We have flaunted the high expectations of God to distinguish ourselves from other religions, but failed to obtain them ourselves. We have been trying to obtain them, but without Him.  

                                    Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself,

                                    except it abide in the vine; no more can ye, except ye abide in me.

                                    I am the vine, ye are the branches: He that abideth in me, and I in

                                    him, the same bringeth forth much fruit: for without me ye can do

                                    nothing.    (John 15:4-5) 

We have attempted to confront an unregenerate world to a standard they could never obtain. Worse than that, we attempted to apply “righteousness” as a means to justify our failure. We have earned ourselves the title as hypocrites. We have lost hold upon the Head of the Church, Jesus Christ Himself, who was the only one to live these standards faultlessly. Without His personal intervention and a real relationship with Him we will keep failing.

                                   

Is He Alive or Isn’t He? 

Let me ask a simple question: What is the Gospel? Jesus came to earth, born of a virgin, He lived, ministered, was crucified, died and one the third day raised to life again. The ending of the gospel narrative leaves us with Jesus Christ alive and well.  

If anyone comes and say an honest prayer before God asking for Him to reveal Himself to them, it will not be long until He does. Our job in the gospel is simply to proclaim the truth, but the truth that He is alive! It is the first truth of the Gospel, and we dare ignore it in our practice. If you call upon Him desiring to know Him, He will exhibit and disclose Himself to us.

                                    Behold, I stand at the door, and knock: if any man hear my voice,

                                    and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him,

                                    and he with me. To him that overcometh will I grant to sit with me

                                    in my throne, even as I also overcame, and am set down with my

                                    Father in his throne. (Rev 3:20-21) 

All of the learning about Him has not been wasted or useless, but compared to the manifestation of Jesus Christ Himself, these have been only misty shadows. The Old Testament pointed forward toward His appearing, the Gospels point directly to Him and after all this we should be able recognize Him today. When we come into contact with Him, though we might not see Him physically, we should be able to identify Him when He speaks.  

Have you seen this same Jesus of the Bible alive and well in your devotions, prayer or life? Jesus is in the business of disclosing himself to whoever will ask after Him. I cannot present to you evidences of His continued existence, for this must remain a matter of faith. The Christian testimony of over two-thousand years has not changed, He is alive!


Dialogue  

                                    And there was a certain disciple at Damascus, named Ananias;

                                    and to him said the Lord in a vision, “Ananias.” 

                                    And he said, “Behold, I am here, Lord.” 

                                    And the Lord said unto him, “Arise, and go into the street which

                                    is called Straight, and enquire in the house of Judas for one called

                                   Saul, of Tarsus: for, behold, he prayeth, And hath seen in a vision a

                                   man named Ananias coming in, and putting his hand on him, that

                                   he might receive his sight.” 

                                    Then Ananias answered, “Lord, I have heard by many of this man,

                                    how much evil he hath done to thy saints at Jerusalem: And here

                                    he hath authority from the chief priests to bind all that call on thy

                                    name." 

                                    But the Lord said unto him, “Go thy way: for he is a chosen vessel

                                    unto me, to bear my name before the Gentiles, and kings, and the

                                    children of Israel: For I will shew him how great things he must

                                    suffer for my name's sake.” 

                                    And Ananias went his way…   (Act 9:10-17)

Who was this Ananias? The answer is no one. Ananias of Damascus is never mentioned again in the scripture outside of these events. The Bible calls him only a disciple: not a prophet, not an apostle, just a disciple. This man is having a dialog with Jesus Christ. Not only did he recognize His Lord, but he received instructions specific enough to rivals modern road map. Ananias even talks with Jesus about his concerns about Saul. The Lord answered is firmly, but without rebuke, and a touch a comfort by telling him his plans for Saul’s life. I submit to you that Ananias was no more than a first century Christian, someone who actually knew the manifestation of Jesus and could recognize Him personally.


                         For the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any twoedged
                        sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints
                        and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart. 

                        Neither is there any creature that is not manifest in his sight: but all things are
                        naked and opened unto the eyes of him with whom we have to do.  

                        Seeing then that we have a great high priest, that is passed into the heavens,
                        Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our profession.  

                        For we have not an high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our
                        infirmities; but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin. 

                        Let us therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace,
                        that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of
                       need.                                                                (Hebrews 4:12-16)


The Word of God here is not speaking of the scripture, but the manifestation of Jesus Himself as we stand before Him in prayer. This Word of God is the title of Jesus, the text itself explains this! The writer calls Him “living and active”, “quick and powerful”, “zaō and energēs”, “living and strong.” He is sharp like a sword, His words and questions piercing right to core of matter. It is He who sees all, all of creation manifested in His sight, all creation laid bare and open before His eyes. It is Him who is touched with our infirmities, yet the writer say, “let us therefore come boldly”. This is the manifestation of Jesus Christ, at His throne of grace, and you will find Him personally on it. 

The questions He asks you are piercing like a sharp sword. These questions of God are not because of ignorance. These questions are more of a questioning of us. These are revelations themselves. Have we not heard them before in the scriptures? Can you hear Him in the garden calling to Adam, “Adam where art thou?” (Gen 3:9)? God already knew!  

Can you hear Him asking for the coin used to pay taxes to Cesar? “Whose image and superscription is this?” (Matt 22:20). This is an inquiry based on knowledge, not on ignorance: asked for the sake of the responders, not the responses.  

                                    And when they were come to Capernaum, they that received

                                    tribute money came to Peter, and said, Doth not your master

                                    pay tribute? He saith, Yes. And when he was come into the

                                    house, Jesus prevented him, saying,  

                                    “What thinkest thou, Simon? of whom do the kings of the

                                    earth take custom or tribute? of their own children, or of strangers?” 

                                    Peter saith unto him, Of strangers. Jesus saith unto him, Then

                                    are the children free.   ( Matt 17:24-26) 

There are dialogs in scripture, and do not be surprised if when you encounter Jesus when He acts just like this. These have been written for us, so we can recognize Him and how He speaks. When you come with questions and hear, “I will also ask of you one question, and answer me, and I will tell you…” (Mark11:29). This is the same Jesus portrayed in the scriptures!  

He knows you personally, and might ask you to “call your husband” when you have had five (John4:18), or tell a fisherman which side of the boat to fish (John 21:6). He may ask you “Do you love me?” (John 21:15). Have you encountered this Jesus in prayer? Have you come before the His throne of Grace? This same Jesus of the Bible is alive and waiting for you! He is ready to disclose and exhibit Himself to you, if you are ready to follow Him. He is Alive!

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!