Multiple things:
Those with no voice to defend themselves have been grievously treated. The unborn, specifically. Justice has fled from our shores, from amongst all the people. God, then, will stand and judge on their behalf, as He has ever said He would do...as He has ever done.
...
Self-preservation is anti-Christ (...alternately, total reliance upon God for all direction is "more better."). The current trend toward thoughts along the line of, "It's fine to help people, but don't let them take advantage of you," is anti-Christ: He didn't trouble Himself over people's motives or dependency, when teaching, healing, and sacrificing Himself to provide salvation. Rather, He knew the wickedness of people's hearts, and loved us regardless. He saw our sinful, self-seeking natures, and our complete feebleness and incapacity and He--God Incarnate!--walked among us as a servant, regardless of our depravity, abject neediness, and absolute unworthiness. He relied upon God, the Father, completely for direction in where to go, who to help, and in what manner to sacrifice Himself (and when and where, and oh, but did our blessed hope then arise in glory!).
And for those who refuse to be served by Him...?...who believe they don't "need help"...?...believing they are "self-sufficient" and able to take care of and provide for themselves...?
Consider this:
...when Peter tried to refuse to allow Christ to wash His feet, He said those who refused His service--to be washed by Him--had no part, with Him or in Him. No one is capable of "taking care of and providing for themselves," in other words: salvation is our highest and greatest need, and if we can't do that, then what can we do, truly?--all else is vanity, even as only perpetuating life in this realm.
Sunday, March 22, 2015
Thursday, March 19, 2015
Tempted Even in Silence: The Case Against Self-Justification
Two things, recently.
First off: In trials requiring subjugation of self (unto what equates to complete silence) there comes a necessary point of abject surrender upon God, as awareness of complete incapacity to continue in silence unfolds. That sort of conscious, total dependence upon God is simultaneously absolutely freeing, completely humiliating (I had no idea how wonderful it is to remain humiliated, before God!), and inexplicably surreal for being so absolutely foreign.
Problems may arise, however, along that last point, as "self" (i.e., the flesh) attempts to reassert its own series of rationale regarding circumstance, as it's wont to do, so to "institute order and make sense of the situation."
Along those lines, there is something in our natures which constantly seeks for self-justification, apparently.
This, in blatant opposition to the will of God.
So, when He calls for silence, unless flesh has been completely crucified with Christ (oh, some blessed day!)...in the midst of even a divinely ordered and largely restful silence, flesh will still restlessly stir and mutter grievance and stubbornly seek to put names on the stages of procession: Flesh seeks to place its own mark on the "operation," in other words. Even upon the very Word of God, ultimately (ergo, we have false teachers, false doctrine, etc.--although demonic interference is definitely part to play, in instance...the flesh doesn't require encouragement unto such wrongdoing).
First off: In trials requiring subjugation of self (unto what equates to complete silence) there comes a necessary point of abject surrender upon God, as awareness of complete incapacity to continue in silence unfolds. That sort of conscious, total dependence upon God is simultaneously absolutely freeing, completely humiliating (I had no idea how wonderful it is to remain humiliated, before God!), and inexplicably surreal for being so absolutely foreign.
Problems may arise, however, along that last point, as "self" (i.e., the flesh) attempts to reassert its own series of rationale regarding circumstance, as it's wont to do, so to "institute order and make sense of the situation."
Along those lines, there is something in our natures which constantly seeks for self-justification, apparently.
This, in blatant opposition to the will of God.
So, when He calls for silence, unless flesh has been completely crucified with Christ (oh, some blessed day!)...in the midst of even a divinely ordered and largely restful silence, flesh will still restlessly stir and mutter grievance and stubbornly seek to put names on the stages of procession: Flesh seeks to place its own mark on the "operation," in other words. Even upon the very Word of God, ultimately (ergo, we have false teachers, false doctrine, etc.--although demonic interference is definitely part to play, in instance...the flesh doesn't require encouragement unto such wrongdoing).
Monday, March 16, 2015
Discernment, Thus Far Discerned
What does it mean to be called, but not chosen? What are the characteristics?
Is salvation conditionally secure or eternally secure? Or is that a false dichotomy?
The Lord never contradicts Himself, is all. He cannot deny His own nature, so is wholly consistent.
His ways aren't self-contradictory. Ever. Any seeming contradiction can only result from a lack of understanding: His ways are higher than ours, His thoughts higher than ours, and we can't possibly entirely understand them--to claim otherwise is to assert an equality with God, as sufficiently equipped to comprehend His infinitely transcendent manner: an impossibility, so effectively defaming Him by refuting His word: He is the one who has said His ways our higher than ours, His thoughts higher than ours. Infinite ways--by definition--can only (ultimately) be unfathomable, to a finite mind.
Yet, He has provided us with vast amounts of insight into who He is and how He is, through His inspired Word. And even more directly, in and through Christ. Still...assuming we're in a position to be able to sufficiently comprehend Him, as to pronounce absolute intellectual understanding of any of His more mysterious ways...seems as though it must entail assumptive references unto self-sufficiency, just per claim to have strictly intellectually discerned the mysteries of God.
Is salvation conditionally secure or eternally secure? Or is that a false dichotomy?
The Lord never contradicts Himself, is all. He cannot deny His own nature, so is wholly consistent.
His ways aren't self-contradictory. Ever. Any seeming contradiction can only result from a lack of understanding: His ways are higher than ours, His thoughts higher than ours, and we can't possibly entirely understand them--to claim otherwise is to assert an equality with God, as sufficiently equipped to comprehend His infinitely transcendent manner: an impossibility, so effectively defaming Him by refuting His word: He is the one who has said His ways our higher than ours, His thoughts higher than ours. Infinite ways--by definition--can only (ultimately) be unfathomable, to a finite mind.
Yet, He has provided us with vast amounts of insight into who He is and how He is, through His inspired Word. And even more directly, in and through Christ. Still...assuming we're in a position to be able to sufficiently comprehend Him, as to pronounce absolute intellectual understanding of any of His more mysterious ways...seems as though it must entail assumptive references unto self-sufficiency, just per claim to have strictly intellectually discerned the mysteries of God.
Saturday, March 14, 2015
Self-Referential Faith
Starting this over.
There is absolute necessity of fearing God: reverential fear is inspired by viable realization of who and how He is, unavoidably.
Absent fear of God, there's no viable knowledge of Him as He truly is, whatsoever: to know Him to any true degree is to experience and encourage justifiable fear of Him. So, without reverential fear of God, come by valid glimpses into who He is, as He is--THE I AM--there can be no possibility of proper worship. Furthermore, without fear of God, as knowing truth of Him, there can also be no valid possibility of consistently discerning His providential will--no ability to unerringly fulfill it (only possible in the Holy Spirit, regardless).
Fear is a right response to the God which, according to His divine will and holy justice, instantaneously killed Nadab and Abihu for bringing strange fire, as implicitly irreverent, thus improper, worship. Fear is a proper response to the God which promises to completely destroy a people who take pleasure in seeing His judgment meted out upon others (Ezekiel 25 (initially mistakenly submitted as 23)). And where disobedience and lack of proper reverence for this God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob persist: where active (even unconscious) rebellion continues against this Holy God, even Christ, of the Holy Spirit...eternal damnation results under the weight of His justice, per His righteous wrath.
So, a God which does not inspire fear is not the God of the Bible. A God which doesn't inspire fear is not capable of inspiring due diligence necessary to serve Him faithfully. He, similarly, is not a God who would save people from His own wrath, sending His son--Himself, becoming incarnate, to teach, direct, and enable to right reverence. A God who doesn't inspire fear is not one who would maintain a testimony to Himself, true through the ages, even as a fearful sign through times of His judgment and enacted wrath.
God must be feared, in order to be known, is all: fearing Him is irrevocably, unavoidably characteristic of any viable knowledge of who He is.
There is absolute necessity of fearing God: reverential fear is inspired by viable realization of who and how He is, unavoidably.
Absent fear of God, there's no viable knowledge of Him as He truly is, whatsoever: to know Him to any true degree is to experience and encourage justifiable fear of Him. So, without reverential fear of God, come by valid glimpses into who He is, as He is--THE I AM--there can be no possibility of proper worship. Furthermore, without fear of God, as knowing truth of Him, there can also be no valid possibility of consistently discerning His providential will--no ability to unerringly fulfill it (only possible in the Holy Spirit, regardless).
Fear is a right response to the God which, according to His divine will and holy justice, instantaneously killed Nadab and Abihu for bringing strange fire, as implicitly irreverent, thus improper, worship. Fear is a proper response to the God which promises to completely destroy a people who take pleasure in seeing His judgment meted out upon others (Ezekiel 25 (initially mistakenly submitted as 23)). And where disobedience and lack of proper reverence for this God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob persist: where active (even unconscious) rebellion continues against this Holy God, even Christ, of the Holy Spirit...eternal damnation results under the weight of His justice, per His righteous wrath.
So, a God which does not inspire fear is not the God of the Bible. A God which doesn't inspire fear is not capable of inspiring due diligence necessary to serve Him faithfully. He, similarly, is not a God who would save people from His own wrath, sending His son--Himself, becoming incarnate, to teach, direct, and enable to right reverence. A God who doesn't inspire fear is not one who would maintain a testimony to Himself, true through the ages, even as a fearful sign through times of His judgment and enacted wrath.
God must be feared, in order to be known, is all: fearing Him is irrevocably, unavoidably characteristic of any viable knowledge of who He is.
Wednesday, March 11, 2015
Christ, Alone: No Other Light, No Other Foundation.
Light shines all the more starkly in darkness.
The darker it is, the brighter light will seem.
Christ is the light in our world. He is the only light. So, the darker the world becomes--the more steeped in sin and wretchedness, glutting on the horrid aftershocks of its own malfeasance, ever unto deeper reaches of depravity...
...the more starkly pure and brilliantly bright does Christ's love shine, the lone beacon in our midst which puts to shame the absolute shamelessness of such treachery as otherwise seeks to consider itself good, having obliterated most all dissent.
Thus, we have all the more necessity to refrain from compromise.
If we look away from His light, adapting to any evil which calls itself good, yet we still claim to be in Christ...we walk into the darkness ourselves, friends. And who was it who penned that phrase?--"when you stare into the abyss, the abyss peers back into you..." They were so right.
There are reasons we aren't to traffic with darkness. We are to be innocent of evil--we are not to be or become familiar with it: We don't need to know how it operates. We don't need to know all of its faces. We don't need to try to anticipate its next move.
Those are the war-tactics of man, not of God.
Seriously.
I got mired in that for a while--thinking it necessary to study up on the enemy, so as to "know His ways," so to be able to "protect myself and deliver those around me."
It does not work that way. Seriously. That's a sidetrack. It's a distraction. We can do nothing, apart from Christ's empowerment.
That sort of distraction unto self-sufficiency is a tactic of the enemy, which is utterly pernicious, as it has the superficial appearance of well-doing. ...the Lord allowed me to go down that track, for a bit. He allowed me to garner insight into the ways and means of the enemy. He even allowed me to begin to take a perverse pleasure in thinking myself wise to the ways of our foes, to such extent I began to consider myself on "a stronger foundation," because I understood the enemy, thus had ideas of "what to expect."
Thankfully, though, the Lord disabused me of those delusions.
Going so far into an attempt to get into the mind of the enemy...does just that: it deludes you, putting the mind of the enemy into your mind, Holmes.
And you may begin to think like he thinks.
Or, have you not heard of that tactic, as a strategy?: "Know your enemy, so well as to become your enemy--have the mind of your enemy, so you can act like he acts, think like he thinks, as to be able to outmaneuver him."
Which...that is the end-output of that trail, if you follow it to its natural conclusion. Seriously. In attempting to understand the ways of the enemy, you will reach a point where you attempt to get inside their mind, so to understand the reasoning behind certain things--under the guise of being able to anticipate and deflect.
Whose mind do you want to be in, though? Seriously.
Satan's? Or Christ's?
One way the Lord really began to break me of that habit (and, yes, I'm aware I've still got a link to one of Derek Prince's books on here--I have respect for the way he treats demonology, though: the focal point is Christ, moreso than any other demonologist or "deliverance minister" I've yet wandered across...just: Christ is the only answer) was to make it clear that reading about demons and fellowshipping with the Holy Spirit were ultimately mutually exclusive activities. Even when doing so under the banner of an attempt to arm myself to help those whom I encounter, still...it distracted from Christ. And the further from fellowship I began to drift, the more difficulty with thoughts I began to experience.
Mental attacks, in other words.
When I'm not fellowshipping with the Holy Ghost, with Christ...there is an onslaught. A straight-up, full-scale war zone is unleashed within the realm of my mind, when I'm not sheltered in His presence, abiding in His love.
We're talking horrible, horrible thoughts. Ones which would result in hospitalization, at the very least.
But not while I abide in His presence, consciously fellowshipping with Him. While I abide in Christ, all is well--for once in ever.
It's like...sitting next to someone you love, on a couch. There's conversation, but there's also a constant comfort and reassurance in the nearness of their abiding presence, consciously, palpably experienced. Like...the last night I had with my mother, two nights before she killed herself...we talked, and for a brief while shared the normal intimacy of a mother and daughter--I lay with my head upon her lap, as we conversed, and she ran her fingers through my hair, while she reassured and comforted me. That sort of comfort.
That sort of closeness. That sort of intimacy of love. Only more. So much more.
It's His gift. Part of it. To His glory.
Just...I've noticed certain things will make me less cognizant of His presence, to an extent that...if I were to go on, and on, I would eventually lose sensibility of Him, altogether. I would become insensitive to His presence, moreover.
His presence never departs, is the thing of greatest note: He is everywhere, in all. All things subsist in Him.
So, He goes nowhere--whether we're experiencing His presence, or not, He's there. Only, our attention wanders, and we may do things which bar our awareness against sensitivity to His presence. Effectively, we shut Him out. In favor of paying attention to other things--even as many distractions are actively hostile to the Lord, making for complete restriction from awareness of His presence.
That's not...explained very well. Just...cultivating the fellowship of the Lord entails establishing an increased sensitivity to Him, to His presence. It's not that He's not present. He is. Always. Everywhere. He's omnipresent.
He is wholly immanent.
Think of it still in terms of sitting on the couch with a beloved family member. All is particularly and keenly comforting and enlivening when you sit engaged in loving conversation. The comfort of their presence may be just as keenly felt, if you both sit in periodic silence, reading and occasionally sharing thoughts. If one of you is reading and the other watching television, without any conversation, the comfort will still be somewhat sustained...but not nearly as keenly as if you were sharing in like-minded pursuits and engaging in dialogue. If one of you is playing a video game while the other talks on a phone...you might still benefit from one another's presence, but it won't be vital. Past a certain point, one of the two of you may as well be in a different room or not even in the same house, then. And that's the sort of distance that's generally engendered against God, spiritually, according to the way we often live.
We become so focused on absolutely anything and everything else, we're no longer even aware of His presence.
Also, just as horrid, a tangent process: I used to experience His presence during worship in churches--years prior to salvation--and took that as the sign that I was alright with God. Despite that sin didn't phase me, and despite that I didn't abide in His presence, whatsoever......because I didn't abide in Him. Completely overlooked all that portion of Scripture, in other words, for a long while.
There seem to be four broad classes, in that regard: knowledgeable of and abiding in His presence to some meaningful, conscious, increasing degree (indwelled by the Holy Spirit, regenerate/saved); periodically experiencing His presence during guided, collective worship, but not commonly experiencing nor aware of necessity of abiding in His presence (largely unregenerate/unsaved); completely hostile to God, thus wholly insensitive to His presence (openly opposed to the one true and living God); and encounters with His revealed presence are physically painful, even unto torment (demonic influences are prevalent).
Those are the only ones I have direct experience with, at least.
Just: He's everywhere. Yet, for some reason, although the New Testament is rife with mentions of fellowship with the Spirit and communion with Jesus and abiding in Christ--even the abject necessity of being led by the Holy Spirit, as a signifying factor in the life of one who is the Lord's elect...despite all that, for some reason, people don't really talk about the necessity of abiding in His presence.
It's all wrapped up in where our priorities are, though, is the thing. If we're focused on three-million things which have to be done by Friday, every Monday morning and all week, are we even attempting to cultivate and maintain interaction with Christ?
Seriously?
If it weren't something which is of utmost necessity, in present days and coming times, there wouldn't be a need to discuss these such things. But a time is coming, and is now, when we had an absolute necessity--a requirement--of having oil in our lamps, or otherwise we'll be left out in the dark.
Point being, if you're not fellowshipping with Christ, you are fellowshipping with something which has occluded your view of Him. Whether that be self (i.e., the flesh), the world (i.e., all the many shiny, pretty, necessary, or distracting things around you), or demonic influences (e.g., mental detours which begin with random thoughts like, "...are you really going to let them do that to you, and just get away with it???," or "...looks like you completely botched things up again, didn't you?," or "...can you believe he got that promotion? You totally deserved it. Who does he think he is, anyway," etc., ad nauseam)...and that something is likely entirely sinful, whatever it is.
The whole "if your light be darkness, how deep is that darkness?" Yeah.
Because there certainly is a way that seems right to a man, which leads unto death.
And...that would be: anything and everything which isn't Christ.
Which would seem to leave a lot of room for error, wouldn't it?
Even as it's simple. Entirely simple. Christ. Him. Only Him.
Just Him. Our Blessed Savior and Almighty Lord. He is the author and the perfecter....the finisher of our faith. And He is the one who works, in us, through the Holy Spirit.
So we must look unto Him, and Him alone, ultimately. Even as we may congregate, and had ought do so with our brethren in the Lord--ultimately, we're each accountable to Christ, and He is the one to disciple every one of us. We who are His all are to be taught of the Lord, directly, in these last days of salvation through Christ: even as this may mean revelation garnered over course of discipling in a doctrinally sound church. We will look to one another for edification in Christ, for correction and encouragement in Christ...but looking always ultimately to Christ, is the key.
So, we can't compromise. We can't.
He is all, and He must be all in all, to us, in order for us to overcome until the end. Everything in the Bible, and everything from fellowship with brethren, and everything from communion with Christ, Himself, has proclaimed and reinforced that base, foremost requirement of our faith walk with the Lord, throughout this temporal realm.
For each of us, there are different spheres of operation in which He has placed us, yet still to operate according to that same standard. The Lord will guide each of us, individually, in what we need to do in our specific environment, but that base necessity will not waver.
He must be central and paramount priority in all things. He must be.
And He must forever remain in that position, in order to constitute our foundation.
It won't matter, then, whether there's a storm coming or not: It wouldn't even matter if the entire world were on fire: Christ would be and would remain your all, in all, and you would and will overcome, by abiding in Him...in His love, in His peace, and in His will.
There's no other way.
You can study every technique in every manual in every discipline from every age, yet the only solution and survival strategy which will amount to anything worthwhile, as eternal, is to abide in Christ. Which entails coming to know Him. Having fellowship with Him.
Just have conversation with Him, even.
Which is largely how things started, for me: Regardless of how entirely offensive I know that idea would be to most devout theologians, it's no less valid a course than any other, given it was part of His course for drawing me to salvation.
I was in process of undertaking a series of solitary, multi-hundred-mile road trips, and I just started talking to Him while I was driving, as though He were seated next to me. The first time He responded was sufficiently unexpected (and thus wholly unsettling) to have me running for a Bible and multi-hour Google research, in order to verify and test the spirit which had made itself known per even such a still-small voice. But that went on for months: constantly testing. For hours. And still, even now, it's necessary to remain in the Word and to pray, so to retain and further hone spiritual discernment.
We have to test all the spirits, to see if they are from God.
Which, the latter portion of that verse is what really decided things, as far as going about testing every spirit with utmost stringency--never relaxing a defensive stance. For some reason, many years ago I'd gotten the strange idea that you weren't supposed to also verify the Holy Spirit. I'd taken a notion that, somehow, He was exempt from the admonition given in that verse and others like it.
Only, the latter part of the verse directly eradicates that concern: as testing is conducted in order to qualify a spirit's origin, admonition to test all spirits implies that some of the spirits which will be tested may indeed actually be from God. It is a very serious business, though, and not to be lightly spoken of--taking what may be the work of the Holy Spirit for granted as a lesser spirit would be entirely inadvisable, and who truly knows all the works, ways, means, and intentions of God, but He, Himself? So, don't do so lightly. And don't assume, as far as observation goes--let be what isn't directly concerning self and one's personal walk with God, unless the Lord directs intervention. But, only if He directs.
As to the method of testing: I don't know about you, but my only tangible, authoritative resource for comparison, unto determining a spirit's caliber and consistency, is the Bible. So, cultivating fellowship with the Holy Spirit necessarily entailed a lot of delving into Scripture--even just to ascertain and continually verify the identity of He with Whom fellowship occurred and continued. Still, I got sidetracked by periodic revelations--got wrapped up in the momentum, rather than the revealer--yet Christ was ultimately the focus of all pursuit.
He's the only Way, after all. So, He has to be the sole focus of pursuits. Otherwise, what other way is being traveled?
He does reveal Himself to people, though. People who seek Him.
Even as, all along the course, there've been so many matters which have continually developed into distractions. A near-constant stream of distractions. Whereas, everything which distracts from Him alters fellowship, by detracting from the consistency of interaction. Like as, once I stop praying--once I stop talking to Him, or cease from continually acknowledging His presence for the comfort which it is...once I stop remaining consciously aware of Him--I get so wrapped up in other things, I've effectively moved away from sensitivity to His presence, mentally.
So, being holy is just as much about being able to maintain unbroken, ever-deepening fellowship with Christ as it is about being obedient to a beloved Master. For, just as loving God is being obedient to Him and entails obedience to His commands, such obedience simultaneously engenders an experience of His love and abiding presence which is so wholly fulfilling as to be completely inexplicable--there is nothing greater and more wonderful than to know and be known by Him. So comes desire for greater degree of restraint from distraction, per applied self-discipline unto abiding more continually in His presence, as to know Him more clearly. And simultaneous comes all the more opportunity for fruits of the Spirit to be borne, having sprouted while abiding in the Vine. And also, then, the more detestable and utterly untenable acts of sin become, per increasing contrast to the untarnished glory of His person.
It takes time. I know it takes time. But the process can start whenever the desire to progress exceeds the desire to refrain from motion: we ofter prefer the "known" to the "unknown." And apathy is a common ailment.
The light will shine, though. Where Christ comes in to dwell, abiding, He birthes His light. And, in the world, His light so shines as never before, when darker comes the day. Just as when the world seeks to destroy us, when circumstances seek to oppress and completely overwhelm...His light, within, becomes all the more precious and vital. His fellowship then becomes all the more appreciated, beloved, and trusted...and utterly relied upon as absolute necessity.
So, is your lamp full of light? And has it ample oil?
Or are you expecting not to need reserves of oil, set aside to your own solitary, individual use, as to make it through a dark night? Are you expecting always to be able to make it through, upon revelations of the Lord received in group worship? Are you expecting it will be sufficient, just to seek Him in the company of others? ...that's not abiding. ...that doesn't constitute a sufficient store of oil to make it through a long night.
And the oil of this world won't sustain you.
Seek the Lord while He may be found.
We all must.
And must continue to do so, forever.
And we must also exhort ourselves and one another, ever more, to continue to seek Him.
Even as we also do all the Lord wills and allows, to share His message with those who don't yet know Him.
Of which there are so many..
And there are so many who believe themselves saved by grace who don't know Christ. There are so many who call Him by name, yet who don't talk with Him and walk with Him, in private. Even as there are some whom He yet operates through, who otherwise esteem themselves: their heart doesn't long for Him--they have no longing to hear His precious voice, to feel His soothing presence, to know His infinite heart. Not of their own. And what is proclaimed before men is nothing, compared to what lives in the heart of man--of which God knows all.
We can't afford to look to ourselves for answers, is all. We can't afford to attempt to outwit the enemy. We can't afford to spend time trying to understand a system which is corrupt from beginning to end.
Not when knowing Christ, walking ever more closely with Him--abiding in His presence ever more completely, unto total surrender of (as death to) self...is the only answer to any and all which ails.
The Lord bless you and keep you.
The darker it is, the brighter light will seem.
Christ is the light in our world. He is the only light. So, the darker the world becomes--the more steeped in sin and wretchedness, glutting on the horrid aftershocks of its own malfeasance, ever unto deeper reaches of depravity...
...the more starkly pure and brilliantly bright does Christ's love shine, the lone beacon in our midst which puts to shame the absolute shamelessness of such treachery as otherwise seeks to consider itself good, having obliterated most all dissent.
Thus, we have all the more necessity to refrain from compromise.
If we look away from His light, adapting to any evil which calls itself good, yet we still claim to be in Christ...we walk into the darkness ourselves, friends. And who was it who penned that phrase?--"when you stare into the abyss, the abyss peers back into you..." They were so right.
There are reasons we aren't to traffic with darkness. We are to be innocent of evil--we are not to be or become familiar with it: We don't need to know how it operates. We don't need to know all of its faces. We don't need to try to anticipate its next move.
Those are the war-tactics of man, not of God.
Seriously.
I got mired in that for a while--thinking it necessary to study up on the enemy, so as to "know His ways," so to be able to "protect myself and deliver those around me."
It does not work that way. Seriously. That's a sidetrack. It's a distraction. We can do nothing, apart from Christ's empowerment.
That sort of distraction unto self-sufficiency is a tactic of the enemy, which is utterly pernicious, as it has the superficial appearance of well-doing. ...the Lord allowed me to go down that track, for a bit. He allowed me to garner insight into the ways and means of the enemy. He even allowed me to begin to take a perverse pleasure in thinking myself wise to the ways of our foes, to such extent I began to consider myself on "a stronger foundation," because I understood the enemy, thus had ideas of "what to expect."
Thankfully, though, the Lord disabused me of those delusions.
Going so far into an attempt to get into the mind of the enemy...does just that: it deludes you, putting the mind of the enemy into your mind, Holmes.
And you may begin to think like he thinks.
Or, have you not heard of that tactic, as a strategy?: "Know your enemy, so well as to become your enemy--have the mind of your enemy, so you can act like he acts, think like he thinks, as to be able to outmaneuver him."
Which...that is the end-output of that trail, if you follow it to its natural conclusion. Seriously. In attempting to understand the ways of the enemy, you will reach a point where you attempt to get inside their mind, so to understand the reasoning behind certain things--under the guise of being able to anticipate and deflect.
Whose mind do you want to be in, though? Seriously.
Satan's? Or Christ's?
One way the Lord really began to break me of that habit (and, yes, I'm aware I've still got a link to one of Derek Prince's books on here--I have respect for the way he treats demonology, though: the focal point is Christ, moreso than any other demonologist or "deliverance minister" I've yet wandered across...just: Christ is the only answer) was to make it clear that reading about demons and fellowshipping with the Holy Spirit were ultimately mutually exclusive activities. Even when doing so under the banner of an attempt to arm myself to help those whom I encounter, still...it distracted from Christ. And the further from fellowship I began to drift, the more difficulty with thoughts I began to experience.
Mental attacks, in other words.
When I'm not fellowshipping with the Holy Ghost, with Christ...there is an onslaught. A straight-up, full-scale war zone is unleashed within the realm of my mind, when I'm not sheltered in His presence, abiding in His love.
We're talking horrible, horrible thoughts. Ones which would result in hospitalization, at the very least.
But not while I abide in His presence, consciously fellowshipping with Him. While I abide in Christ, all is well--for once in ever.
It's like...sitting next to someone you love, on a couch. There's conversation, but there's also a constant comfort and reassurance in the nearness of their abiding presence, consciously, palpably experienced. Like...the last night I had with my mother, two nights before she killed herself...we talked, and for a brief while shared the normal intimacy of a mother and daughter--I lay with my head upon her lap, as we conversed, and she ran her fingers through my hair, while she reassured and comforted me. That sort of comfort.
That sort of closeness. That sort of intimacy of love. Only more. So much more.
It's His gift. Part of it. To His glory.
Just...I've noticed certain things will make me less cognizant of His presence, to an extent that...if I were to go on, and on, I would eventually lose sensibility of Him, altogether. I would become insensitive to His presence, moreover.
His presence never departs, is the thing of greatest note: He is everywhere, in all. All things subsist in Him.
So, He goes nowhere--whether we're experiencing His presence, or not, He's there. Only, our attention wanders, and we may do things which bar our awareness against sensitivity to His presence. Effectively, we shut Him out. In favor of paying attention to other things--even as many distractions are actively hostile to the Lord, making for complete restriction from awareness of His presence.
That's not...explained very well. Just...cultivating the fellowship of the Lord entails establishing an increased sensitivity to Him, to His presence. It's not that He's not present. He is. Always. Everywhere. He's omnipresent.
He is wholly immanent.
Think of it still in terms of sitting on the couch with a beloved family member. All is particularly and keenly comforting and enlivening when you sit engaged in loving conversation. The comfort of their presence may be just as keenly felt, if you both sit in periodic silence, reading and occasionally sharing thoughts. If one of you is reading and the other watching television, without any conversation, the comfort will still be somewhat sustained...but not nearly as keenly as if you were sharing in like-minded pursuits and engaging in dialogue. If one of you is playing a video game while the other talks on a phone...you might still benefit from one another's presence, but it won't be vital. Past a certain point, one of the two of you may as well be in a different room or not even in the same house, then. And that's the sort of distance that's generally engendered against God, spiritually, according to the way we often live.
We become so focused on absolutely anything and everything else, we're no longer even aware of His presence.
Also, just as horrid, a tangent process: I used to experience His presence during worship in churches--years prior to salvation--and took that as the sign that I was alright with God. Despite that sin didn't phase me, and despite that I didn't abide in His presence, whatsoever......because I didn't abide in Him. Completely overlooked all that portion of Scripture, in other words, for a long while.
There seem to be four broad classes, in that regard: knowledgeable of and abiding in His presence to some meaningful, conscious, increasing degree (indwelled by the Holy Spirit, regenerate/saved); periodically experiencing His presence during guided, collective worship, but not commonly experiencing nor aware of necessity of abiding in His presence (largely unregenerate/unsaved); completely hostile to God, thus wholly insensitive to His presence (openly opposed to the one true and living God); and encounters with His revealed presence are physically painful, even unto torment (demonic influences are prevalent).
Those are the only ones I have direct experience with, at least.
Just: He's everywhere. Yet, for some reason, although the New Testament is rife with mentions of fellowship with the Spirit and communion with Jesus and abiding in Christ--even the abject necessity of being led by the Holy Spirit, as a signifying factor in the life of one who is the Lord's elect...despite all that, for some reason, people don't really talk about the necessity of abiding in His presence.
It's all wrapped up in where our priorities are, though, is the thing. If we're focused on three-million things which have to be done by Friday, every Monday morning and all week, are we even attempting to cultivate and maintain interaction with Christ?
Seriously?
If it weren't something which is of utmost necessity, in present days and coming times, there wouldn't be a need to discuss these such things. But a time is coming, and is now, when we had an absolute necessity--a requirement--of having oil in our lamps, or otherwise we'll be left out in the dark.
Point being, if you're not fellowshipping with Christ, you are fellowshipping with something which has occluded your view of Him. Whether that be self (i.e., the flesh), the world (i.e., all the many shiny, pretty, necessary, or distracting things around you), or demonic influences (e.g., mental detours which begin with random thoughts like, "...are you really going to let them do that to you, and just get away with it???," or "...looks like you completely botched things up again, didn't you?," or "...can you believe he got that promotion? You totally deserved it. Who does he think he is, anyway," etc., ad nauseam)...and that something is likely entirely sinful, whatever it is.
The whole "if your light be darkness, how deep is that darkness?" Yeah.
Because there certainly is a way that seems right to a man, which leads unto death.
And...that would be: anything and everything which isn't Christ.
Which would seem to leave a lot of room for error, wouldn't it?
Even as it's simple. Entirely simple. Christ. Him. Only Him.
Just Him. Our Blessed Savior and Almighty Lord. He is the author and the perfecter....the finisher of our faith. And He is the one who works, in us, through the Holy Spirit.
So we must look unto Him, and Him alone, ultimately. Even as we may congregate, and had ought do so with our brethren in the Lord--ultimately, we're each accountable to Christ, and He is the one to disciple every one of us. We who are His all are to be taught of the Lord, directly, in these last days of salvation through Christ: even as this may mean revelation garnered over course of discipling in a doctrinally sound church. We will look to one another for edification in Christ, for correction and encouragement in Christ...but looking always ultimately to Christ, is the key.
So, we can't compromise. We can't.
He is all, and He must be all in all, to us, in order for us to overcome until the end. Everything in the Bible, and everything from fellowship with brethren, and everything from communion with Christ, Himself, has proclaimed and reinforced that base, foremost requirement of our faith walk with the Lord, throughout this temporal realm.
For each of us, there are different spheres of operation in which He has placed us, yet still to operate according to that same standard. The Lord will guide each of us, individually, in what we need to do in our specific environment, but that base necessity will not waver.
He must be central and paramount priority in all things. He must be.
And He must forever remain in that position, in order to constitute our foundation.
It won't matter, then, whether there's a storm coming or not: It wouldn't even matter if the entire world were on fire: Christ would be and would remain your all, in all, and you would and will overcome, by abiding in Him...in His love, in His peace, and in His will.
There's no other way.
You can study every technique in every manual in every discipline from every age, yet the only solution and survival strategy which will amount to anything worthwhile, as eternal, is to abide in Christ. Which entails coming to know Him. Having fellowship with Him.
Just have conversation with Him, even.
Which is largely how things started, for me: Regardless of how entirely offensive I know that idea would be to most devout theologians, it's no less valid a course than any other, given it was part of His course for drawing me to salvation.
I was in process of undertaking a series of solitary, multi-hundred-mile road trips, and I just started talking to Him while I was driving, as though He were seated next to me. The first time He responded was sufficiently unexpected (and thus wholly unsettling) to have me running for a Bible and multi-hour Google research, in order to verify and test the spirit which had made itself known per even such a still-small voice. But that went on for months: constantly testing. For hours. And still, even now, it's necessary to remain in the Word and to pray, so to retain and further hone spiritual discernment.
We have to test all the spirits, to see if they are from God.
Which, the latter portion of that verse is what really decided things, as far as going about testing every spirit with utmost stringency--never relaxing a defensive stance. For some reason, many years ago I'd gotten the strange idea that you weren't supposed to also verify the Holy Spirit. I'd taken a notion that, somehow, He was exempt from the admonition given in that verse and others like it.
Only, the latter part of the verse directly eradicates that concern: as testing is conducted in order to qualify a spirit's origin, admonition to test all spirits implies that some of the spirits which will be tested may indeed actually be from God. It is a very serious business, though, and not to be lightly spoken of--taking what may be the work of the Holy Spirit for granted as a lesser spirit would be entirely inadvisable, and who truly knows all the works, ways, means, and intentions of God, but He, Himself? So, don't do so lightly. And don't assume, as far as observation goes--let be what isn't directly concerning self and one's personal walk with God, unless the Lord directs intervention. But, only if He directs.
As to the method of testing: I don't know about you, but my only tangible, authoritative resource for comparison, unto determining a spirit's caliber and consistency, is the Bible. So, cultivating fellowship with the Holy Spirit necessarily entailed a lot of delving into Scripture--even just to ascertain and continually verify the identity of He with Whom fellowship occurred and continued. Still, I got sidetracked by periodic revelations--got wrapped up in the momentum, rather than the revealer--yet Christ was ultimately the focus of all pursuit.
He's the only Way, after all. So, He has to be the sole focus of pursuits. Otherwise, what other way is being traveled?
He does reveal Himself to people, though. People who seek Him.
Even as, all along the course, there've been so many matters which have continually developed into distractions. A near-constant stream of distractions. Whereas, everything which distracts from Him alters fellowship, by detracting from the consistency of interaction. Like as, once I stop praying--once I stop talking to Him, or cease from continually acknowledging His presence for the comfort which it is...once I stop remaining consciously aware of Him--I get so wrapped up in other things, I've effectively moved away from sensitivity to His presence, mentally.
So, being holy is just as much about being able to maintain unbroken, ever-deepening fellowship with Christ as it is about being obedient to a beloved Master. For, just as loving God is being obedient to Him and entails obedience to His commands, such obedience simultaneously engenders an experience of His love and abiding presence which is so wholly fulfilling as to be completely inexplicable--there is nothing greater and more wonderful than to know and be known by Him. So comes desire for greater degree of restraint from distraction, per applied self-discipline unto abiding more continually in His presence, as to know Him more clearly. And simultaneous comes all the more opportunity for fruits of the Spirit to be borne, having sprouted while abiding in the Vine. And also, then, the more detestable and utterly untenable acts of sin become, per increasing contrast to the untarnished glory of His person.
It takes time. I know it takes time. But the process can start whenever the desire to progress exceeds the desire to refrain from motion: we ofter prefer the "known" to the "unknown." And apathy is a common ailment.
The light will shine, though. Where Christ comes in to dwell, abiding, He birthes His light. And, in the world, His light so shines as never before, when darker comes the day. Just as when the world seeks to destroy us, when circumstances seek to oppress and completely overwhelm...His light, within, becomes all the more precious and vital. His fellowship then becomes all the more appreciated, beloved, and trusted...and utterly relied upon as absolute necessity.
So, is your lamp full of light? And has it ample oil?
Or are you expecting not to need reserves of oil, set aside to your own solitary, individual use, as to make it through a dark night? Are you expecting always to be able to make it through, upon revelations of the Lord received in group worship? Are you expecting it will be sufficient, just to seek Him in the company of others? ...that's not abiding. ...that doesn't constitute a sufficient store of oil to make it through a long night.
And the oil of this world won't sustain you.
Seek the Lord while He may be found.
We all must.
And must continue to do so, forever.
And we must also exhort ourselves and one another, ever more, to continue to seek Him.
Even as we also do all the Lord wills and allows, to share His message with those who don't yet know Him.
Of which there are so many..
And there are so many who believe themselves saved by grace who don't know Christ. There are so many who call Him by name, yet who don't talk with Him and walk with Him, in private. Even as there are some whom He yet operates through, who otherwise esteem themselves: their heart doesn't long for Him--they have no longing to hear His precious voice, to feel His soothing presence, to know His infinite heart. Not of their own. And what is proclaimed before men is nothing, compared to what lives in the heart of man--of which God knows all.
We can't afford to look to ourselves for answers, is all. We can't afford to attempt to outwit the enemy. We can't afford to spend time trying to understand a system which is corrupt from beginning to end.
Not when knowing Christ, walking ever more closely with Him--abiding in His presence ever more completely, unto total surrender of (as death to) self...is the only answer to any and all which ails.
The Lord bless you and keep you.
Tuesday, March 10, 2015
George D. Watson's "How to Die to Self"
How to Die to Self
“I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me.”
If we allow our faith to be molded by the words of Scripture, and by the illumination of the Holy Spirit, instead of a narrow human theology, we will be clearly convinced that there is need for a real death to self. There are many manifestations of the self life which are not clearly sinful, but neither are they truly Christlike. When the Spirit is given room to illuminate the heart, this middle zone of self activity will be seen as something which must be passed beyond or crucified in order to reach deep abiding union with God, where there is none of self and all of Christ Jesus. Those who deny that such a state of grace is possible are often the very ones who demonstrate in many ways their need of being dead to self. I am writing this not for those who have any theory to maintain, but for the humble and simple-hearted saints who really hunger to sink out of self into God.
First I will caution against a few false notions as to how to die to self.
One false notion is the conceiving of a wrong hatred of ourselves. The more we are divinely illuminated, the more minutely and astonishingly do we realize the great blindness, foolishness, and meanness of our past lives. Unless we are kept very mellow and subdued, this sight of our meanness may tempt us to form a bitter, revengeful feeling toward ourselves. Under such an impression, we may feel like punishing ourselves in some way, or by making unscriptural and rash vows. This is the source of cruel and deceptive penances.
A similar false notion is the choosing of some line of mortification for ourselves, selecting some particular cross. This will defeat the very end we want to attain, which is the loss of our will in all things. The very act of choosing a cross for ourselves keeps alive our own preferences and furnishes a secret nourishment to self-will—a little place for self to live under the very pretext of dying to self.
Likewise, another erroneous view is that we can sink to a deeper death by overwork, throwing ourselves into a task beyond our ability. But even if the extra work be of the most religious kind, still it supplies a field for self-activity. It is in this respect that Paul speaks of persons under a false zeal, going to every extreme of self-imposed poverty, and even burning at the stake, yet all under the principle of self-action, rather than the complete relinquishment of self which is caused by being entirely possessed by divine love.
In the opposite direction we find another false notion which says that we are to calmly leave ourselves to the mere law of development. If we can only be kept from well-defined sins, we are not to tax ourselves with anything deeply spiritual, but leave ourselves to grow without a diligent attention to growth. I am afraid this is the danger that the majority drift into. And those with such views are the least likely to seek the sure way.
But now let us face the real question—how to die to self, and let Christ be all and all in us. In the first place, do we really believe such a state is attainable? Have we looked at the blessed Christ until we have obtained a clear conception of what it is to lose ourselves in union with Him? Have our spiritual eyes surveyed this blessed possibility, until its attainability in this life has become a settled conviction with us? Then have we calmly, deeply, irreversibly settled it that there shall be none of self and all of Christ? Are we prepared to make that the motto of our lives? Do we think it, dream it, pray it, breathe it, drink of it, bathe ourselves in it, until it becomes a subtle, steady, all-prevailing passion in our minds—none of self and all of Jesus?
As we tread this golden shore, let us go slow and walk softly on these shining sands; let us not launch out in those fathomless waters without duly counting the cost and without ample ballast in our ships. If we have determined to make this celestial excursion entirely out of self into the depths of the divine nature, let us remember that the first step toward this perfect death is to have a pure divine motive, and that motive must be nothing less than the ever-blessed triune God Himself. That is, it must be the seeking of God as our all and in all, our last end, our exceeding great reward, so that it will be for His glory, His beauty, and His praise, through us and by us, and that we have no desire to exist except as a channel for His outflow, a chosen vessel for the embodiment of His life, and the outbeaming of His glorious attributes through us. The deepest death to self lies in the motives and intentions, hence this all-consuming motive to want to be nothing but a capacity for Christ to live in, lies at the foundation of the death of self, and the highest life of Christ. With this pure motive fixed in the heart, we are to habitually and willingly accept of every occasion for humiliation and self-abasement, which God’s providence brings to us. While on the one hand we are neither to make or seek a cross, on the other hand we are to sweetly and willingly accept of every blow, or mortification, or inconvenience, or painful annoyance, which comes to us in the order of God’s providential will. Humiliation is the very quintessence of the Christ-life, and we must appreciate every opportunity of sinking into humility. Hence, when reproaches, unkind treatment, poverty, loneliness, persecution, mental distresses, seeming failure in our work, disappointments, deep perplexities, or any disagreeable thing comes to us, if we are in a state of divine recollection, we will calmly face these things as appropriate occasions for losing our own will and letting the omnipotence of God take charge of them. In these humiliations we can thus be more delicately and firmly knit to the will of God.
Another effectual method of dying to self is to be exceedingly careful not to receive human honors or praise into our hearts. If we are worthy of having enemies, who will seek opportunities of humiliating us, we will also have some friends who will love and honor us. As a rule, the more bitter our enemies become, the stronger our friends will love us, and there will be times when we will be honored in spite of ourselves. But if we open our hearts to receive this honor and in our thoughts feed upon it as a social honey, or if we allow human praise to inflate our thoughts, it will instantly breed a human self-esteem, and this becomes a hotbed of the self-life. It requires great humiliation and divine reconciliation for evangelists, preachers, teachers, singers, and writers, not to lose the Christ-life at this point.
Another step in the death of self is to seek in everything to be childlike, unsophisticated and unembellished. We should strive to be simple of manner, word, dress, taste, and experience. Self naturally feeds on complexity and things grand and large and loud, but Christ is the very embodiment of divine and eternal simplicity. The deeper we sink into the Christ-life, the more we become disappointing to the people; our talents or learning will not show off to such fine advantage. We talk less, we live more quietly and privately, our labors are less ostentatious. We do more hard fighting with fewer dress-parades. We bring things to pass through prayers and faith in God more than by outward showy methods. We love to live like God, a profound hidden life, in which people think we don’t amount to very much. This is one of the tests of sinking out of self.
Another step in the death of self is the living more keenly by pure faith, a faith that depends less on spiritual phenomena, but which clearly apprehends that the three persons of the Godhead possess and pervade us. Realizing that every atom of our lives is in the grasp of His will, and that by a perpetual act of entire abandonment we are by the simple act of believing most blessedly united in the deep of our being to the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
Whenever we enter a new and higher region in the Christ-life, there will be some distinguished marks of grace, some memorable and blessed manifestations of the Holy Spirit, working within us. This may come in the shape of conscious fullness, or a flow of sweetness, or spoken words, or bright mental illuminations, or prophetic premonitions, or abounding joy; some gracious phenomena, which will serve as a memorial, or a spiritual landmark. But to linger too much on these things, or to rest on them, will furnish a refined nourishment of the self-life. Hence the deepest conformity to Jesus will lead us to be weaned from ecstasies and bright inward lights. These are very essential in their place, but to be constantly drinking the Christ-life by an act of pure faith is the path to the deepest death of self.
Another aspect of dying to self is to thoughtfully avoid making our religious life an unnecessary burden, or cross, or tax, to our families and loved ones. Sometimes those who want to be real Christ-like, for lack of wisdom, adopt some mode of life, or devotion, or theory of sanctity, which is a source of positive peevishness and disagreeableness to those with whom they live. This is exactly opposite to Christ, and feeds self instead of killing it. We should seek to be yielding and pliant, obliging and accommodating. In all non-essentials, where a well-defined principle of right is not involved, we must surrender our little choices and tastes and ease, for the well-pleasing and gratification of others. “Be kindly affectioned one to another with brotherly love; in honour preferring one another.” To be rigid and stubborn on non-essentials is simply self-righteousness, a stronghold of self.
Lastly, in everything we are to seek our nothingness and the allness of God. This is to become a daily habit of our motives and intentions, to distrust ourselves, to ignore our own wisdom, but to look to Christ for the most minute guidance that we may be one in all things.
Some may misunderstand this direction, thinking it leads beyond a Bible experience. Yes, it is possible to be led astray by other spirits, and Satan has traps to entice the souls that hunger for God. But if our eyes are upon Jesus, and our ears are open to the sound counsel of the Holy Spirit, He will not let us be satisfied with anything other than Himself.
...Prayer meeting online.
Every Tuesday night.
Times Square Church
www.tscnyc.org
7:00pm EST.
If the Lord is willing that you be able to attend, please do so: The world as a whole needs to humble themselves in prayer before the Lord, right now.
Are there any other online prayer meetings?
Friday, March 6, 2015
Time For That Which Matters Most
Responded to a single-question survey about church, a brief while ago.
The fellow conducting the survey wanted to know what the most frustrating aspect of church is, open-ended response...the following is not my precise response but an elaboration upon it:
Four months ago, by the grace of the Lord, it was possible to spend the entire day seeking Christ: Small group at 9am, church service (same church) 11am, an hour drive to a service which lasted from 2-4pm, then any church possible for a 6pm service (alternately, reading the Bible and praying when service couldn't be found, or sitting in at a choir practice while reading and praying). No persistent human fellowship, mind you: conversations all seemed to tend away from Christ, thus were restrained. But much fellowship with the Lord, along the course of driving between, and before and after.
The time was absolutely glorious. Absolutely wonderful. Praising Him, traveling; praising Him, arriving; praising Him, departing. And hearing sound bits of exposition of Scripture, all the day.
Spending all day with Him, then.
And I still...thought much was lacking--craving human fellowship, as well. I got it in my head, according to things said here and there, periodically, that it wasn't sufficient to have a Bible and the Spirit of the Lord (a dire course, requiring much, much prayer and study): I believed I needed more.
When everything went completely wonky, mid-November, a door immediately was shown open to attend a new church: farther away, but assuredly peopled with true believers who would be willing to speak of the Lord. It was so.
Service begins with an hour of prayer, interspersed with worship, something around an hour of preaching/teaching, then a couple hours of fellowship. And travel time allows for a few hours alone with the Lord--praising and praying.
But it's not enough, still.
The last couple times attended led to attendance of an evening service (mostly elsewhere, just as available).
And that's still not enough. Never enough praise, worship, and edification of and in Christ.
The Lord has sincerely blessed me, in so many ways. ...so many ways.
And it is my sincere pleasure to seek Him wholeheartedly, given all the time He has shown open to doing so, now.
And it's still not enough.
(Moments/hours taken to reflection here, online, are yet significantly given to continuing to seek Him, in line with Ephesians 4:15.)
Granted, He has made it very clear to me, many times (and perhaps more yet to come) that I'm not the one who is even maintaining my zeal and devotion and application to such seeking: He ordained it, He manifested circumstances so to support it, He instilled the desire within me, and He drew me to Himself so as to even begin and continue the process. My attention span is akin to that of a gnat (only, gnats are more persistent), except that He is keeping me attuned to Him. He has given me the desire for it to be so, and He is actively fulfilling that desire in and through me. Otherwise, it wouldn't persist.
The few times, thus far, I've started to get the idea I'm doing so well, in maintaining such ardent pursuit of the Lord and continuing to learn new things and "find new things to learn" (as though I were the one directing all efforts, in other words)...I've immediately begun to fall prey to distraction, and have at those times begun to completely forget the need to pray constantly. (In becoming focused on self, becoming erroneously conscious of "self-sufficiency," I draw away from Christ...)
Every time I've started to take for granted that I'm the "head honcho" in charge of maintaining motivation and attention...I've drifted into error.
And He has allowed me to do so. For reasons beyond my knowing, certainly... ...but also to let me see that it's not even in my own power to be able to seek Him, properly, without faltering and completely becoming lost.
Same goes, in regard to the manner of things I've periodically begun to study, in regard to doctrines, theology, and the church: many things have proven to be distractions, becoming fascinations in themselves, gradually stealing focus from off the Lord, Himself, and putting attention and desire upon factional ideologies or tenets being considered. This, even regarding straight-up Bible study, when it's become more about attaining a goal than about knowing the Lord.
Point being, whenever the focus of my attention drifts from Him, everything falls completely apart. Completely apart. To extents which I still can't entirely admit to, here...I'm still too humbled and abashed, coming to terms with such abject reliance upon Him, in recognition of some minute portion of the enormity which is entailed, per an extrapolation of many tangential considerations.
...the foolish things to confound the wise, indeed.
So, no matter the prospect, there can be nothing beyond right here and now, in the Lord. I can't want for anything more. Having His ear, residing in His glorious presence, being guided by Him into learning...what more could a person desire? There is nothing else, even to want, aside of greater knowledge of Him...and increasing fellowship with Him. There's nothing else worth having.
Maybe that's the thing we've all compromised and thus lost track of. Just to always be in this moment, with Him--ever unto the next...is fulfillment. Never being concerned about what's to come. Only being grateful for what is, whatsoever is, just knowing...that He has ordained for the situation to persist or exist. Otherwise it wouldn't.
So, always giving thanks. No matter what's going on. Because life in Him is more important than anything else going on around you.
Then, no more "What if...?" dioramas played out, even briefly, in thought. I renounce those, utterly: He has made it very clear that it's a complete waste of time and energy and it grieves the Holy Spirit (courting the darkness of anxiety does such a thing, implicitly), thus distancing from Him.
In all circumstances: If things had been different, then they would have been different, and I would have been in whatever other situation He had chosen to manifest and allow, rather than the present one. If things change in such a way to require different approaches to living, then it's by His will and He will remain the number one priority: regardless what that entails, He will guide me in and through, as according to His will.
Just...there is always a choice between the Lord...and anything else which could occlude vision and pursuit of Him. And He will always prevail: He must: by His grace to do so, alone. It's not within my power to always make the proper choice, to always choose Him, except that He keeps my eyes on Him. I pray that He continues to do so, thus I trust Him to do so. He will keep me--same as for anyone who is His. He will keep me near Himself, and draw me ever nearer, because it's the utmost desire of my heart. And that desire surely originates with Him, so I trust Him to fulfill what He has inspired. He can and will do the same for any who would seek Him--desiring His fellowship, above all things.
There are just so many things which can draw attention from Him, is all: television, news, idle camaraderie, reading, games, shopping, work, family, chores...the list is endless. Whatever's done, though, He ought to be central: There just doesn't seem to be middle ground, in Christ's Greatest Commandment: Love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, mind, soul, and strength.
So, are we seeking to fulfill that Commandment, whatsoever? Collectively? Individually?
I'm praying that we are.
I'm praying to continue to strive to do so: it will be by His power, alone, that any of us do seek and seek unto finding Him, sufficient as to even begin to love Him as is His due. This, as having ever begun to seek Him with our whole heart.
He, alone, can make that a reality. And He, alone, can cause it to continue...to persist unto that day of completion, at His return.
So, as the survey went, my greatest frustration with church is that we don't have church. There's not something to go to, every day, as a church function: teaching, preaching, intercessory prayer, worship, or fellowship-in-Christ (not coffee-time, support groups, concerts, or game nights: entertainment is largely not Christ-centric, as it usually distracts from Him and puts attention on the group/individuals/activity). And the days when there are Christ-focused activities, everything's limited to less than a full day's endeavor.
Except for rare occasions.
Further, think of it this way: There are 168 hours in one week. If we spent two hours in church on Sunday, then only spent an hour devoted to God every additional day of the week, we would have devoted less than 5% of our time to the Lord, in that week (math is not my forte: I forgot to move the decimal, earlier). Eight hours. Eight hours, in one week, is less than five percent of our week.
How does that constitute devotion?
And, no, I didn't take the necessity of sleep into account: folks give up sleep for all manner of reasons--some more vital than others (babies...college finals...movies...drinking)...why not for God?
Is He or isn't He the Creator? Is He or isn't He the central point of your existence?
Because, if He's not...that ought to be a red flag, in terms of salvation: Christ said those who love Him obey His commands, and even leaving off the majority of them (i.e., seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness, be anxious for nothing, etc.)...The Greatest Commandment is to love God with all your heart, mind, soul, and strength: eight hours a week doesn't much priority indicate. If He's not a priority, then, do we love Him? In practice, as well as in theory...?
I'm just concerned for us, as a people, is all. Those of us who are Christians, whether in truth or in name only.
Perhaps there are many who are...Paul's so-called "carnal Christians" who are yet so steeped in the world, there's not realization of need to seek Christ..? ..but I do wonder about that. The Lord performs a work of sanctification in us, after salvation--after conversion--unto the day of completion. Transforming us into the image of Christ.
If there's no proof of that transformation progressing, is salvation in truth or name, only?
I don't know.
I pray about it, but it's not my business to know, ultimately.
All I do know is what admonitions to strive for progress are in the Bible. We are to press on toward the goal of salvation, as though we were running a race. We are to strive for the faith. Not rest on our laurels and wait for a jet plane to cart us out of here.
We are to be busy, at work, in Christ. We are to bear fruit.
And the fruit of the Spirit certainly comes to mind, there. I know of no way to come by the fruit of the Spirit except to grow in Christ, to abide more fully in Him, to be further and more wholly sanctified unto Him--dying evermore fully to self and dying (one day completely!) to sin.
It's a process, though. An ongoing harvest of fruit.
Read of the vine. Of Christ, the true vine. And we who abide in Him are the branches. The Father cuts off those branches which don't bear fruit, y'all. Even as He prunes those who do, so they'll increase in yield.
Meaning... ...it sounds as though He said it's possible to at one point abide in Christ, then to be cut off and still thrown in the fire. Because there was no fruit...no abiding, ultimately.
Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. The fruits of the Spirit. Are you growing in them? Have you noticeably borne increased yield, in any of these?
Or are you pretty much at the same place you were, when you first came to know Christ? We must continually examine ourselves, to make sure we're in the faith.
Really, the only way for us to bear fruit is that Christ does so, through us...but we must abide in Him, which requires fellowship, in order to bear.
That sort of fellowship isn't something that happens or is maintained like some friendships may be, where you can go for years without talking and pick right up on the same page. No, not at all.
Go for a few hours without talking to Him, without consciously abiding in His presence, and it'll be all that much more off-putting and awkward to reach a necessary point of self-subjugation again, so as to again realize and revel in His immanence. The more time spent in the flesh, the more time it takes to press through the miasma of barriers erected against such fellowship in the Spirit (pride, self-sufficiency, anxiety, fear, uncertainty, worry, doubt, distraction, etc.)--the more barriers, the more focus self has attained, the more time it requires to set them all aside, as to ardently seek Him and find Him, once having surmounted all mental distractions. Or, that's been my experience. Even as the words aren't perfect.
Just, if we are to bear fruit...yet don't abide in Him?...how can we claim to be His, in truth?
Such a lack of abiding, which seems evidenced in our lack of time congregating as a church which seeks Him, central of all activity...collectively...is very much cause of frustration and indictment for prayer.
Was the Lord's Day ever actually a full-day given to seeking Him, or has it always been so stringently limited, as to time allotted?
The fellow conducting the survey wanted to know what the most frustrating aspect of church is, open-ended response...the following is not my precise response but an elaboration upon it:
Four months ago, by the grace of the Lord, it was possible to spend the entire day seeking Christ: Small group at 9am, church service (same church) 11am, an hour drive to a service which lasted from 2-4pm, then any church possible for a 6pm service (alternately, reading the Bible and praying when service couldn't be found, or sitting in at a choir practice while reading and praying). No persistent human fellowship, mind you: conversations all seemed to tend away from Christ, thus were restrained. But much fellowship with the Lord, along the course of driving between, and before and after.
The time was absolutely glorious. Absolutely wonderful. Praising Him, traveling; praising Him, arriving; praising Him, departing. And hearing sound bits of exposition of Scripture, all the day.
Spending all day with Him, then.
And I still...thought much was lacking--craving human fellowship, as well. I got it in my head, according to things said here and there, periodically, that it wasn't sufficient to have a Bible and the Spirit of the Lord (a dire course, requiring much, much prayer and study): I believed I needed more.
When everything went completely wonky, mid-November, a door immediately was shown open to attend a new church: farther away, but assuredly peopled with true believers who would be willing to speak of the Lord. It was so.
Service begins with an hour of prayer, interspersed with worship, something around an hour of preaching/teaching, then a couple hours of fellowship. And travel time allows for a few hours alone with the Lord--praising and praying.
But it's not enough, still.
The last couple times attended led to attendance of an evening service (mostly elsewhere, just as available).
And that's still not enough. Never enough praise, worship, and edification of and in Christ.
The Lord has sincerely blessed me, in so many ways. ...so many ways.
And it is my sincere pleasure to seek Him wholeheartedly, given all the time He has shown open to doing so, now.
And it's still not enough.
(Moments/hours taken to reflection here, online, are yet significantly given to continuing to seek Him, in line with Ephesians 4:15.)
Granted, He has made it very clear to me, many times (and perhaps more yet to come) that I'm not the one who is even maintaining my zeal and devotion and application to such seeking: He ordained it, He manifested circumstances so to support it, He instilled the desire within me, and He drew me to Himself so as to even begin and continue the process. My attention span is akin to that of a gnat (only, gnats are more persistent), except that He is keeping me attuned to Him. He has given me the desire for it to be so, and He is actively fulfilling that desire in and through me. Otherwise, it wouldn't persist.
The few times, thus far, I've started to get the idea I'm doing so well, in maintaining such ardent pursuit of the Lord and continuing to learn new things and "find new things to learn" (as though I were the one directing all efforts, in other words)...I've immediately begun to fall prey to distraction, and have at those times begun to completely forget the need to pray constantly. (In becoming focused on self, becoming erroneously conscious of "self-sufficiency," I draw away from Christ...)
Every time I've started to take for granted that I'm the "head honcho" in charge of maintaining motivation and attention...I've drifted into error.
And He has allowed me to do so. For reasons beyond my knowing, certainly... ...but also to let me see that it's not even in my own power to be able to seek Him, properly, without faltering and completely becoming lost.
Same goes, in regard to the manner of things I've periodically begun to study, in regard to doctrines, theology, and the church: many things have proven to be distractions, becoming fascinations in themselves, gradually stealing focus from off the Lord, Himself, and putting attention and desire upon factional ideologies or tenets being considered. This, even regarding straight-up Bible study, when it's become more about attaining a goal than about knowing the Lord.
Point being, whenever the focus of my attention drifts from Him, everything falls completely apart. Completely apart. To extents which I still can't entirely admit to, here...I'm still too humbled and abashed, coming to terms with such abject reliance upon Him, in recognition of some minute portion of the enormity which is entailed, per an extrapolation of many tangential considerations.
...the foolish things to confound the wise, indeed.
So, no matter the prospect, there can be nothing beyond right here and now, in the Lord. I can't want for anything more. Having His ear, residing in His glorious presence, being guided by Him into learning...what more could a person desire? There is nothing else, even to want, aside of greater knowledge of Him...and increasing fellowship with Him. There's nothing else worth having.
Maybe that's the thing we've all compromised and thus lost track of. Just to always be in this moment, with Him--ever unto the next...is fulfillment. Never being concerned about what's to come. Only being grateful for what is, whatsoever is, just knowing...that He has ordained for the situation to persist or exist. Otherwise it wouldn't.
So, always giving thanks. No matter what's going on. Because life in Him is more important than anything else going on around you.
Then, no more "What if...?" dioramas played out, even briefly, in thought. I renounce those, utterly: He has made it very clear that it's a complete waste of time and energy and it grieves the Holy Spirit (courting the darkness of anxiety does such a thing, implicitly), thus distancing from Him.
In all circumstances: If things had been different, then they would have been different, and I would have been in whatever other situation He had chosen to manifest and allow, rather than the present one. If things change in such a way to require different approaches to living, then it's by His will and He will remain the number one priority: regardless what that entails, He will guide me in and through, as according to His will.
Just...there is always a choice between the Lord...and anything else which could occlude vision and pursuit of Him. And He will always prevail: He must: by His grace to do so, alone. It's not within my power to always make the proper choice, to always choose Him, except that He keeps my eyes on Him. I pray that He continues to do so, thus I trust Him to do so. He will keep me--same as for anyone who is His. He will keep me near Himself, and draw me ever nearer, because it's the utmost desire of my heart. And that desire surely originates with Him, so I trust Him to fulfill what He has inspired. He can and will do the same for any who would seek Him--desiring His fellowship, above all things.
There are just so many things which can draw attention from Him, is all: television, news, idle camaraderie, reading, games, shopping, work, family, chores...the list is endless. Whatever's done, though, He ought to be central: There just doesn't seem to be middle ground, in Christ's Greatest Commandment: Love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, mind, soul, and strength.
So, are we seeking to fulfill that Commandment, whatsoever? Collectively? Individually?
I'm praying that we are.
I'm praying to continue to strive to do so: it will be by His power, alone, that any of us do seek and seek unto finding Him, sufficient as to even begin to love Him as is His due. This, as having ever begun to seek Him with our whole heart.
He, alone, can make that a reality. And He, alone, can cause it to continue...to persist unto that day of completion, at His return.
So, as the survey went, my greatest frustration with church is that we don't have church. There's not something to go to, every day, as a church function: teaching, preaching, intercessory prayer, worship, or fellowship-in-Christ (not coffee-time, support groups, concerts, or game nights: entertainment is largely not Christ-centric, as it usually distracts from Him and puts attention on the group/individuals/activity). And the days when there are Christ-focused activities, everything's limited to less than a full day's endeavor.
Except for rare occasions.
Further, think of it this way: There are 168 hours in one week. If we spent two hours in church on Sunday, then only spent an hour devoted to God every additional day of the week, we would have devoted less than 5% of our time to the Lord, in that week (math is not my forte: I forgot to move the decimal, earlier). Eight hours. Eight hours, in one week, is less than five percent of our week.
How does that constitute devotion?
And, no, I didn't take the necessity of sleep into account: folks give up sleep for all manner of reasons--some more vital than others (babies...college finals...movies...drinking)...why not for God?
Is He or isn't He the Creator? Is He or isn't He the central point of your existence?
Because, if He's not...that ought to be a red flag, in terms of salvation: Christ said those who love Him obey His commands, and even leaving off the majority of them (i.e., seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness, be anxious for nothing, etc.)...The Greatest Commandment is to love God with all your heart, mind, soul, and strength: eight hours a week doesn't much priority indicate. If He's not a priority, then, do we love Him? In practice, as well as in theory...?
I'm just concerned for us, as a people, is all. Those of us who are Christians, whether in truth or in name only.
Perhaps there are many who are...Paul's so-called "carnal Christians" who are yet so steeped in the world, there's not realization of need to seek Christ..? ..but I do wonder about that. The Lord performs a work of sanctification in us, after salvation--after conversion--unto the day of completion. Transforming us into the image of Christ.
If there's no proof of that transformation progressing, is salvation in truth or name, only?
I don't know.
I pray about it, but it's not my business to know, ultimately.
All I do know is what admonitions to strive for progress are in the Bible. We are to press on toward the goal of salvation, as though we were running a race. We are to strive for the faith. Not rest on our laurels and wait for a jet plane to cart us out of here.
We are to be busy, at work, in Christ. We are to bear fruit.
And the fruit of the Spirit certainly comes to mind, there. I know of no way to come by the fruit of the Spirit except to grow in Christ, to abide more fully in Him, to be further and more wholly sanctified unto Him--dying evermore fully to self and dying (one day completely!) to sin.
It's a process, though. An ongoing harvest of fruit.
Read of the vine. Of Christ, the true vine. And we who abide in Him are the branches. The Father cuts off those branches which don't bear fruit, y'all. Even as He prunes those who do, so they'll increase in yield.
Meaning... ...it sounds as though He said it's possible to at one point abide in Christ, then to be cut off and still thrown in the fire. Because there was no fruit...no abiding, ultimately.
Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. The fruits of the Spirit. Are you growing in them? Have you noticeably borne increased yield, in any of these?
Or are you pretty much at the same place you were, when you first came to know Christ? We must continually examine ourselves, to make sure we're in the faith.
Really, the only way for us to bear fruit is that Christ does so, through us...but we must abide in Him, which requires fellowship, in order to bear.
That sort of fellowship isn't something that happens or is maintained like some friendships may be, where you can go for years without talking and pick right up on the same page. No, not at all.
Go for a few hours without talking to Him, without consciously abiding in His presence, and it'll be all that much more off-putting and awkward to reach a necessary point of self-subjugation again, so as to again realize and revel in His immanence. The more time spent in the flesh, the more time it takes to press through the miasma of barriers erected against such fellowship in the Spirit (pride, self-sufficiency, anxiety, fear, uncertainty, worry, doubt, distraction, etc.)--the more barriers, the more focus self has attained, the more time it requires to set them all aside, as to ardently seek Him and find Him, once having surmounted all mental distractions. Or, that's been my experience. Even as the words aren't perfect.
Just, if we are to bear fruit...yet don't abide in Him?...how can we claim to be His, in truth?
Such a lack of abiding, which seems evidenced in our lack of time congregating as a church which seeks Him, central of all activity...collectively...is very much cause of frustration and indictment for prayer.
Was the Lord's Day ever actually a full-day given to seeking Him, or has it always been so stringently limited, as to time allotted?
Tuesday, March 3, 2015
The Blessed Pursuit
Three focal points have continually caught attention, these past few days, over course of encountering various materials:
1) Seeking God does not constitute a diversion from everything else in life: everything else in life is supposed to exist as means by which to seek and glorify God. Glorifying God, in everything, in other words...is all there had ought be, if we recognize anything of His majesty. Strive for that.
2) The Great Commission is for real: preparation consists of having entered a personal relationship (i.e., not merely religion) with Christ--thus honestly knowing Him:present-tense-effective fellowship with God, baptism in the Holy Spirit, and immersion in the Word of God (taking up the full armor).
3) The sort of discipling we're called to conduct, as part of the Great Commission, entails necessity that we actively practice the teachings we're relaying: in order to know them sufficiently as to teach others how to do the things we have been taught, we must necessarily be practicing those things, ourselves (otherwise, enter the Pharisee). It all begins with, revolves around, and resolves in our relationship with Christ, ultimately: seeing Him, as He is, further removes the veils from our own hearts and minds, renewing and transforming us further into His image: discipleship is effectively constituted by progressive evangelization (as heard by one preacher, called "Gospelizing"--same difference, either way, entailing continued revelation of further breadth of the unfathomable Gospel of Christ).
Seeing Christ as He is opens our eyes to who we are, to who we had ought to be, and to the preciousness of all those around us: every new revelation, realization, encounter with who and how Jesus Christ is has the power to alter our view of everything.
Like as: "We shall know the truth, and the truth will set us free"-sort of effect. Taking into account that He is Truth.
Knowing Him sets us free:
Free from sin, from self, from the world: Free from self-regard, self-centeredness, self-esteem, self-sufficiency, self-confidence: Free from self-concern, then come to peace by way of increasingly abject worship of God. Such self-denial, as freedom, yields to increasing death to self--upon a cross as with Christ, ever taking up that cross daily--then all the more does Christ become visible and evident in the yielded, emptied (peaceful) vessel which remains.
Every bit more we see Him, can we further surrender ourselves upon an altar as a living sacrifice: gladly denying self, so as to serve God more fully. Until all that remains (some blessed day!) is Christ.
Humiliation: mortification of self, so that Christ alone will live in and through us.
Possessed by the Holy Spirit, completely.
Pride doesn't want to die, but it must. In all its forms. Pride in intelligence, pride in ability to provide for self, pride in ability to serve--whatever form it's taken, it must go. It must be crucified upon that cross daily carried, in pursuit of Christ.
I'm still struggling to understand what humility even means, however. There seems so much less a means of defining it, except to experience it...and then wonder at the limits, less and less boldly.
Hearing how God humbled Himself in becoming Emmanuel, though: that's mind-boggling. One account, yesterday, going over Christ's simultaneous humanity and divinity, touched on some aspects of how vast a humility did He condescend to, in coming to walk among us.
God of everything. Beyond--exceedingly, incomprehensibly beyond--our ability to conceive of His true majesty, power, and glory... ...made Himself to be seed of a human, going through the entire process of gestation, unto birth and infancy... ...He placed Himself in a position of inconceivable incapacity, in terms of who He is. He emptied Himself, to become a human. Even going through the process of being raised, as subject to the authority of "parents," and subjecting Himself to all the normal physical laws of humanity. He was even tempted, as we are: never sinned, but He was tempted. Struggling with temptation, perhaps, but never sinning.
He didn't operate on His own distinct authority, in being a man: He was wholly, admittedly, forever subject to and dependent upon Father God. His human will was forever kept subject to the will of God the Father. And, yet being also wholly divine, He never sinned by asserting anything other than abject, persistent humility, in terms of His human nature: any boldness evidenced would only have been in keeping with the will of the Father, as explicitly directed and given to express.
As we had ought be.
And of His power and gifts? He was explicitly dependent upon the Holy Spirit, which rested upon Him--given without measure by the Father. Yet, He didn't boast of it. He didn't go around performing miracles for the sake of showing people He could. Even folks who said they would believe in Him, if He would perform something miraculous...He didn't do. In accord with the Father's will.
People who "could have been saved" if He had exerted effort to convince them, even? He didn't entertain them. And He didn't make excuses for not having done so, either: the choice was the same as it always had been: either believe on the evidence you've already received and submit to the will of God, or don't believe and stand condemned by your own actions.
He was wholly dependent on the Father and the Holy Spirit, though. More gloriously dependent than any of us may ever be able to conceive of comprehending.
Another teacher recently spoke of it in these terms:
Christ remained fully aware that His life had been given by Father God, and so trusted Him explicitly to provide for all its necessities and to keep it according to His will. Unto the end. Without question or qualm, always giving thanks.
I wonder, sometimes, what it must have been like for Him, in youth: His mind perhaps a blank slate, as all ours are, as a babe..as a youth. Only, His nature didn't tend to rebellion against God, as ours does. His conscience was pure and remained pure: He listened to it, without fault. He was wholly devoted to Father God, in humility. He wanted to obey the Father.
Didn't question. Didn't plan. Only rejoiced in pleasing God, in seeking Him. So, it wasn't necessarily a matter of "planning" for anything, it was just a matter of doing whatever was given next.
That's all laid out, in the Gospels: The way He talks about Father God, the way Christ's described by others, and even the teaching He gave--He taught us what we needed to know, discipling us along the course He had been directed, having known.
Being God, incarnate, yet subjecting Himself even to "relative" ignorance: relying upon Father God, entirely, as for wisdom, insight, knowledge, understanding (thus, possessing all).
And we're called to be His siblings, you know.
We're to be like Him.
He prepared the way for us. He lived in all those ways, even dying as He died (suffering the very wrath of God Almighty which was due each and every one of us who are sinners, so that those who come to Him could be saved), then resurrected and ascended to reign...He did all those things so we can live as He lived.
As He lives in us, moreover--the means by which we're able to live as He lived, in subjection to the will of the Father, in fellowship with the Holy Spirit. And ever greater the surrender of ourselves, our base fleshly natures, then the more the Lord may be known to us...the more we may conform to His image.
Seeking Him is all, in that process. But there's really nothing else: everything else is a fleeting, temporal illusion.
So, seek Him now--while He may be found.
I get frustrated, still, sometimes. Not knowing even how to seek Him seems the most vexing thing: do I spend the next eight hours reading the Bible, do I spend the next six watching sermons by people in whom I see Him (thus, sort of by-proxy listening to Him, as through them--discerning for missteps, all the while), had I ought to go and just be silent in His presence for some span, or converse with Him? Or music, or worship? Poetry or verse?
How can I seek Him, more?
Longing for Him always seems the first step. Yearning for Him beyond absolutely everything else. Requiring a deeper knowledge and fellowship with Him, as a vital necessity. Requiring Him as a vital necessity: desperately craving more: to know Him more, to understand Him better (inconceivable as the mere idea is).
Always, always more of Him, though: knowing Him is the most vital, wholesome, cleansing, edifying, fulfilling, secure pleasure, peace, joy, love, and fulfillment I've ever known: never having even realized the capacity for feeling so was possible, prior to the actual experience.
Otherwise, I'd not have wasted so much time, elsewhere, prior. This, especially now knowing how horrid prior acts, thoughts, and all else...really were. Not that I'm flawless--never sinning--now (still being sanctified), but, oh, how I long for that day! In the meantime, I'm doing everything I know, everything I can, to refrain from acting according to the flesh, though: seeking to be holy, as He is holy: having hope in Him, I'm seeking to be pure, as He is pure.
The only way I've found to do that is to abide in Him, is all: ever seeking to press further into His presence, into knowledge of Him and His ways. Praying, always, that He'll continue to remove the veils from my heart, my eyes, my mind, that I'll be brought to repentance through greater revelation of who He is.
Just so many things constantly seek to distract and detract from single-minded pursuit of Christ.
Just so many things constantly seek to distract and detract from single-minded pursuit of Christ.
I renounce all else, for the sake of having Him. He has kept me, He will keep me. Come what may, I'm His, and He is all which is mine. For better or worse of it, as the world might view things, yet there's no other course worth pursuing.
And knowing Him, serving Him, is worth any which might come.
However He wills.
Strange days, being so blessed as to pursue Him ardently, awaiting...
Whatever He wills.
So, learning to wait.
Learning who He is.
Getting to know Him better.
And sharing of the overflow.
While watching faith flourish in the garden of trust.
He is so good.
Sunday, March 1, 2015
From glory to glory, the transformation.
Listening to Zac Poonen, again. In addition to the other churches, for the day.
Listening to the message Daily Transformation to Christlikeness, unto further revelation of the process of transformation. It's all strictly, explicitly clear in Scripture, just...for some reason, there'd still been relative obliviousness, in regard to how it goes: same as always--hearing the same things over and over again, knowing they're connected according to thematic similarity, yet having received no vision of the apparent interconnectedness which would reveal the active process. Wondering, then, longing to understand.
While striving, striving, striving onward. Always further. Seeking His face, His kingdom. For righteousness. Unto righteousness. In faith, as to please the Father. Unto faith, as to please the Father. Loving, as being loved. Coming to new depths of awareness of that love received--love overwhelming all, to an extent of continually redefining everything. A new love wrought, within, thereby. That deeper love: His shed further abroad within, ever more broadly encompassing.
Unto increased realization and acceptance of complete incapacity: wielding further humiliation, per further-realized depths of abject insufficiency and depravity. Realizing, ever more broadly, the absolute inability to accomplish anything outside of Him, except that it would be wrought of fallibility, thus inherently fallible, thus ever short of being done to His glory: yet, longing to glorify Him in all things.
Yearning to please Him, thus longing for increased obedience, so as to glorify Him of all, in all: yet possible only as He is the one accomplishing work: He must ever be the driving force and enacting power--even through yielded, broken vessels--in order for any wrought to be to His glory.
Seeing so much fallibility in self, aside and implicit even such desires, ever entails inability to route it. Self-sufficiency is a known impossibility, then. Yet knowing all things are possible for and through Him, so carrying all inability and falling at His feet. Finding rest, there. So, staying there. With all the mess, all the pain, all the inability, all the lack of awareness of even what ought be done. Just desperately laying there, praying not to move--even knowing, trembling in fear, that it's not within the power of self to refrain from slipping, sliding away into continued outposts of distraction unto depravity. Knowing everything within self is yet inclined to slip and slide away, ever more and continually.
Knowing that it's impossible to even remain collapsed upon Him, when according to personal ability.
Except that He keeps and redirects attention, Himself. Then knowing, further, that He's aware of our inherent fallibility of character.
Knowing that He is wholly aware of that as an inherent trait, and that He loves no less for so knowing. That He wills He had ought be the keeper and the refuge. He acknowledges that, He wholly acknowledges it, in love: He is the keeper, as well as the fortress and the savior.
According to His divine will.
He who shaped us in the womb loves us, and held our hands (even unacknowledged) through childhood and into adulthood. And it will be He who yet keeps us, all our days. As He ordained it to be, as He wills it to be, and as He has given us, in love.
He refines, as through the fire, that we may be more aware of His presence. That we may be more reliant upon Him, so as to experience the joy of knowing Him more truly--even while we're yet somewhat adrift in the temporal. Our greatest joy is found in coming to experience His presence more clearly. And He wills that we would have that joy, per His pleasure.
To know Him. Just to know Him is such wonder. There's nothing like a moment spent in His presence, aware. There's nothing like the glory of His joy, shining upon one so blessed as to fall at His feet in abject worship...seeing self as inconstant and wholly fallible.
There is nothing else. Nothing else.
All things on earth become strangely dim. In contrast to His glory. All else falls away.
Seeing Him, gaining a revelation of Him as He truly is...we are thus transformed, to be like Him.
The Holy Spirit reveals Him to us, who seek. We must seek, though. Knowing there's truly nothing else.
Nothing. Nothing.
All else is vanity--completely futile, meaningless, empty. Except that He inhabit and enliven, all is death.
He brings life, He brings joy, He brings encouragement, He brings light to the truth of who He is.
Transforming us, moment by moment, glory to glory...as each veil further is stripped away.
Even as once the veil was torn, that now any may seek to see His glory.
Yet only those who seek with a pure heart will see Him.
And the only way to gain such a heart is to have Him remove the veils which encapsulate and hide the tarnish that yet divides. Only as He sheds light on those areas which haven't been surrendered to Him can we know their persistence. Only as we look at Him, look to Him--per what glorious reflection may be found in His recorded Word, as enlivened by the (leading and ultimately) indwelling Holy Spirit...may those veils be pulled aside from our own natures, revealing our wickedness and depravity, in such light of His glory.
Seeing Him as He truly is, we do then see ourselves as we are, then further yielding to Him so to be wrought anew. Seeing His glory, we are thus known evident as fallen, then to surrender and be transformed: from glory to glory, into His image.
What a glorious hope! What a wonderful path!
He is truly marvelous. Full of wonders.
And of all, He is able to relay in the most simple terms the most complex of all considerations in such a way that meaning is limitlessly unveiled per ardent searching. Evermore complex are the realizations of Him possible, per continued perusal and pondering.
And there's more to it than than, even, but this is enough to relay the outermost frequencies of that which is realized as possible. You can't know it, unless He reveals it, is the thing. Even as there are some things which are so deep that even an eternity will never make them absolutely plain. That's such a hope, though: no matter how far gone, there's always more joy and hope to be realized.
As we see Him, so will we be. Seek, then, to see Him as He truly is.
Listening to the message Daily Transformation to Christlikeness, unto further revelation of the process of transformation. It's all strictly, explicitly clear in Scripture, just...for some reason, there'd still been relative obliviousness, in regard to how it goes: same as always--hearing the same things over and over again, knowing they're connected according to thematic similarity, yet having received no vision of the apparent interconnectedness which would reveal the active process. Wondering, then, longing to understand.
While striving, striving, striving onward. Always further. Seeking His face, His kingdom. For righteousness. Unto righteousness. In faith, as to please the Father. Unto faith, as to please the Father. Loving, as being loved. Coming to new depths of awareness of that love received--love overwhelming all, to an extent of continually redefining everything. A new love wrought, within, thereby. That deeper love: His shed further abroad within, ever more broadly encompassing.
Unto increased realization and acceptance of complete incapacity: wielding further humiliation, per further-realized depths of abject insufficiency and depravity. Realizing, ever more broadly, the absolute inability to accomplish anything outside of Him, except that it would be wrought of fallibility, thus inherently fallible, thus ever short of being done to His glory: yet, longing to glorify Him in all things.
Yearning to please Him, thus longing for increased obedience, so as to glorify Him of all, in all: yet possible only as He is the one accomplishing work: He must ever be the driving force and enacting power--even through yielded, broken vessels--in order for any wrought to be to His glory.
Seeing so much fallibility in self, aside and implicit even such desires, ever entails inability to route it. Self-sufficiency is a known impossibility, then. Yet knowing all things are possible for and through Him, so carrying all inability and falling at His feet. Finding rest, there. So, staying there. With all the mess, all the pain, all the inability, all the lack of awareness of even what ought be done. Just desperately laying there, praying not to move--even knowing, trembling in fear, that it's not within the power of self to refrain from slipping, sliding away into continued outposts of distraction unto depravity. Knowing everything within self is yet inclined to slip and slide away, ever more and continually.
Knowing that it's impossible to even remain collapsed upon Him, when according to personal ability.
Except that He keeps and redirects attention, Himself. Then knowing, further, that He's aware of our inherent fallibility of character.
Knowing that He is wholly aware of that as an inherent trait, and that He loves no less for so knowing. That He wills He had ought be the keeper and the refuge. He acknowledges that, He wholly acknowledges it, in love: He is the keeper, as well as the fortress and the savior.
According to His divine will.
He who shaped us in the womb loves us, and held our hands (even unacknowledged) through childhood and into adulthood. And it will be He who yet keeps us, all our days. As He ordained it to be, as He wills it to be, and as He has given us, in love.
He refines, as through the fire, that we may be more aware of His presence. That we may be more reliant upon Him, so as to experience the joy of knowing Him more truly--even while we're yet somewhat adrift in the temporal. Our greatest joy is found in coming to experience His presence more clearly. And He wills that we would have that joy, per His pleasure.
To know Him. Just to know Him is such wonder. There's nothing like a moment spent in His presence, aware. There's nothing like the glory of His joy, shining upon one so blessed as to fall at His feet in abject worship...seeing self as inconstant and wholly fallible.
There is nothing else. Nothing else.
All things on earth become strangely dim. In contrast to His glory. All else falls away.
Seeing Him, gaining a revelation of Him as He truly is...we are thus transformed, to be like Him.
The Holy Spirit reveals Him to us, who seek. We must seek, though. Knowing there's truly nothing else.
Nothing. Nothing.
All else is vanity--completely futile, meaningless, empty. Except that He inhabit and enliven, all is death.
He brings life, He brings joy, He brings encouragement, He brings light to the truth of who He is.
Transforming us, moment by moment, glory to glory...as each veil further is stripped away.
Even as once the veil was torn, that now any may seek to see His glory.
Yet only those who seek with a pure heart will see Him.
And the only way to gain such a heart is to have Him remove the veils which encapsulate and hide the tarnish that yet divides. Only as He sheds light on those areas which haven't been surrendered to Him can we know their persistence. Only as we look at Him, look to Him--per what glorious reflection may be found in His recorded Word, as enlivened by the (leading and ultimately) indwelling Holy Spirit...may those veils be pulled aside from our own natures, revealing our wickedness and depravity, in such light of His glory.
Seeing Him as He truly is, we do then see ourselves as we are, then further yielding to Him so to be wrought anew. Seeing His glory, we are thus known evident as fallen, then to surrender and be transformed: from glory to glory, into His image.
What a glorious hope! What a wonderful path!
He is truly marvelous. Full of wonders.
And of all, He is able to relay in the most simple terms the most complex of all considerations in such a way that meaning is limitlessly unveiled per ardent searching. Evermore complex are the realizations of Him possible, per continued perusal and pondering.
And there's more to it than than, even, but this is enough to relay the outermost frequencies of that which is realized as possible. You can't know it, unless He reveals it, is the thing. Even as there are some things which are so deep that even an eternity will never make them absolutely plain. That's such a hope, though: no matter how far gone, there's always more joy and hope to be realized.
As we see Him, so will we be. Seek, then, to see Him as He truly is.
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