Why should it be so difficult to just accept the fact that God is in control and nothing matters, beyond trusting Him? Jesus was pretty clear about things while He walked with us. The Father knows our needs. Every single one. Every need.
And He was pretty clear about the fact that our Father does far more than the minimum in fulfilling our needs. Even while He uses the minimal disciplinary action necessary to correct, like He continually made clear throughout all His deliberations over what to do about Israel.
Again and again, He saw that His people had earned His wrath. They'd turned completely against Him. Not just away, but against (which, in essence, turning away is turning against). They were mocking Him to His face. And it hurts when people you love do that. Hurts sorely. Especially to just bear it in loving silence, grieved, while Your face is slammed in the dirt and ground in. They were despising Him, as such, to His face. Mocking Him within their hearts, in their private assemblies (where priests were convening and worshipping other gods, even, so mocking Him), in public worship, and in all spheres of community and private life. How much would that hurt?
Seriously.
They needed to be corrected. All the good they received (and same for everyone, but for Israel God had shown them and clearly revealed the truth to them of who He and and of the fact that all good comes from Him and that ultimately He is sovereign of everything--all strength and might and power to acquire personal provision is ultimately from Him, too, as He is the Creator of everyone)...came from Him. And there'd been turning to error despite having clear guidance on the truth. Despising the truth. To their own destruction. Turning from good is turning toward evil. Turning away from God is likewise an inverse unto all thus-oppositional fronts (which, given He's infinite and holy in all His perfections...). There aren't really human words or concepts to adequately relay how actually wretched it is to turn away from Him. Because there aren't words or means of adequately grasping His actual goodness. We just see evidences. And have His word, as clarification. Not one apart from the other--jointly held, as existent truth. Not plural.
His revelation in our own terms, as words, though. That's a whole other mind-blowing contemplation. He is beyond comprehension, beyond the ability to conceptualize in a way which does justice to the truth. And yet He's so deeply concerned and intimately involved with us, all of us--we, His creation--that He took measures to reveal Himself on our level, in words...in a variety of types of constructs of words--narratives, histories, poetry, lamentations, monologues, proverbs, philosophical treatise, letters to His beloved ones, instructions and admonitions, prophetic revelations, testimonies, and...well, all the many types of literature there are, I think, given some bits of at least marginal representation over course of His self-revelation. With every genre from comedy to horror, tragedy to romance, and even a philosophical treatise with a scientific bend, in terms of progression. A level I evidential document--report filed by an expert with lived experience regarding trials conducted over a life-time and observations likewise compiled, longitudinally. No controls. No randomized trials. But observation. And personal experiments.
Anyway, point just being, God was thorough in representing Himself on a level we could approach. In word. In concepts which are accessible. Giving insight into His thoughts and emotions, even, so that we can see He's not unconcerned and apathetic. Not unreasonable or aloof. But faithful, unwavering, good, loving, just, long-suffering. And He's due our worship by matter of the fact that we are His creatures. Pretty simple.
He isn't forcing us at this point. But we'll enter His presence without the shield of our preferred delusions at some point and the fact of either our love or our hatred will be evidenced, even as we'll no longer be able to deny the truth of His sovereignty. Whether we like it or not, we will acknowledge and submit to His sovereignty. We will bow to Him.
He's been really clear about that, too. Making His people's denial of Him that much more heart-breaking. Because He is so clear and has made Himself so apparent to them...again and again. But there was and is such refusal to heed Him, to love Him. That's what He wants, above all.
That we love Him. As we are loved.
Love manifests all sorts of good, though, when it's true and not contrived or self-indulgent and self-serving. Love thinks no ill, it is patient and kind, doesn't self-exalt but seeks to serve. Love gives when there's nothing left, persevering no matter the cost. Suffering all things for the sake of another, forgiving anything. Covering a multitude of sins, He said. Love trusts, protects, hopes, and waits. Love never fails.
But we all chose instead to exalt ourselves and do what we think is best rather than remaining totally dependent upon Him. We all do. At the expense of life, itself. At the expense of love. To the death of our own spirits, cut off from life itself--cut off from God.
But again and again, He spoke about the wrath due His people. That they had accrued judgment unto their own destruction in full. They had worked such wickedness that the penalty deserved was total devastation. But for two things, though.
One, He remembered His promise never to totally destroy them.
Two, He loves them still and would not utterly destroy them but longed to restore them to Himself. Like a wife who had turned astray and become adulterous, He described His people. Yet also saying He'd bring her back and restore her joy in Himself as at their initial union. That she would dance with delight to be His beloved, being taken to be alone with Him in the desert or wilderness.
He mitigates discipline to what is necessary to effect what's most needful to return us to Himself. Otherwise all of creation would have been destroyed from the outset of sin, even.
But He lavishes love and provision. Even to restore the adulterous wife into His love and to a place of joy, of dancing as though a maiden He described.
He is so good. And yet we think, or at least I'm continually tempted to think...that I "need" to plan for things. Plan how to get out of debt. Plan how to get my life in order. Plan how to seek Him. Plan how to serve Him.
As though I was able to save myself, to begin with. Paul chided the Galatians pretty sorely on that point. Not without love, mind you--I've heard so many people interpret that book as though He was cursing them up one side and down another and treating them with malice. Whatever hardness there is or was, it's only as much as is warranted by God's knowledge of what's necessary to be heard. Even as the Pharisees were called vipers, outright. And whitewashed sepulchres.
Not soft speech. But not from a heart of vindictive malice, either--not taking pleasure in speaking harshly to someone for the sake of self-exaltation per debasing another.
Just, if He calls us, He's going to sanctify us. Or there's no hope otherwise. We didn't start the work, we certainly can't finish it. We can't change our own hearts.
He showed me very clearly week before last that it's utterly beyond my power to change my heart, to forsake sinful tendencies. He has to deliver me from this body of death. He has to conform my heart to His will. He has to bring me to repentance, through such gracious kindness as allowing me to see the wickedness in my own heart and leading me to a recognition of it and unto open confession/discussion with Him and pleading His forgiveness, asking His help and deliverance. Nothing doubting. But hoping, leaving the whole deal in His hands.
So, why, though...if I see so clearly that I can't manage to "fix" or "help" or rightly divide the nature of my own heart...why, if that most fundamental matter is beyond me...why would I then think that somehow it's within my power and domain to plan for and accomplish daily "necessities" and "life goals" and even nutrition, in my own strength and per my own thusly-indicated-wholly-limited-perception? I can't change the most fundamental part of myself, which is me, but I'm somehow capable of planning for tomorrow and for business interactions and for food things that came from countries that I may never even see this side of eternity?
Now, that is delusional thinking.
Can't stop myself from losing my patience with a barista who has a difficult time understanding me when I say "soy latte," but I've got a 401k on track to recover in 30 years (having a difficult time imagining what that latter would be like...but I have heard tell). Can't keep myself from becoming bored when there's a lull between customers at work, but I have the next four years of grad-school mapped out in order to get the Ph.d. that's going to put me on the map for missions. Or, like...regularly tempted to want the life of other people who look more successful than me, but I'm on track with this year's M'Cheyne Bible plan and I'm planning for more involvement in my church's ministry teams (way, way closer to personal life)...or planning for more church attendance...or planning to (fill in blank).
There's the dual disconnect, is all. We can't earn righteous standing with God by trying to conform externally. If we do somehow manage to achieve some type of external conformity to what our understanding of godliness is...that isn't to say He may not honor that by also conforming our hearts to His own. But it's not a certainty. Because the external seeking is after conformity to an ideal and not after God Himself, most generally. He's pretty gracious, though. So...He may redirect (He did for me, in so many ways...and still does).
But it's not about the external efforts, still. It's a matter of heart. We can't earn righteousness. We can't acquire it through works.
And the secondary disconnect is in terms of thinking we somehow know the future when, actually, we have no idea what's going on right now. If most of us had a clearer conception of what the deal with international economics is, right now, except that there were faith in God...there'd probably be so much freaking out. We're all suspended in this totally illusory web of machinations. Nothing holds us aloft but grace. Even as per the greed-fueled inclinations that interweave all of society as to sustain a common delusion giving credence to the lies that make international economics and capitalism viable.
The closer to the end we get, the more apparent is His truth. But the less visible to those who deny Him pre-eminence in their lives, though His due.
Just to say, if we are making plans...He's indulging that tendency in us to still attempt to operate according to our own understanding, according to worldly precepts, according to the ideologies which fueled Satan's fall. There's no "submitting to God" and "having a backup plan." Either there's submission or there's not.
And I fall away so often to start wanting companionship (especially), counsel, godly instruction, "life goals," or whatever of all the like. So I see that it's a thing, because He keeps delivering me out of it. And I don't deserve to be delivered. And He's not obligated to, except that He promises to always be with me, to never forsake me. And that He loves me so much He gave Himself for me, to free me from these things.
He knows our state. He knows we're all prone to fall away. We all have fallen away from Him, drawn by our own desires. But He's been tempted, too. Never sinned. But He was tempted in all manners such as we are. So He isn't unsympathetic.
He will help. Otherwise there'd be no hope.
We just have to ask Him to let us see what is in us that's not of Him, what displeases Him. And honestly want to know (which He'll work out, too).
And He was pretty clear about the fact that our Father does far more than the minimum in fulfilling our needs. Even while He uses the minimal disciplinary action necessary to correct, like He continually made clear throughout all His deliberations over what to do about Israel.
Again and again, He saw that His people had earned His wrath. They'd turned completely against Him. Not just away, but against (which, in essence, turning away is turning against). They were mocking Him to His face. And it hurts when people you love do that. Hurts sorely. Especially to just bear it in loving silence, grieved, while Your face is slammed in the dirt and ground in. They were despising Him, as such, to His face. Mocking Him within their hearts, in their private assemblies (where priests were convening and worshipping other gods, even, so mocking Him), in public worship, and in all spheres of community and private life. How much would that hurt?
Seriously.
They needed to be corrected. All the good they received (and same for everyone, but for Israel God had shown them and clearly revealed the truth to them of who He and and of the fact that all good comes from Him and that ultimately He is sovereign of everything--all strength and might and power to acquire personal provision is ultimately from Him, too, as He is the Creator of everyone)...came from Him. And there'd been turning to error despite having clear guidance on the truth. Despising the truth. To their own destruction. Turning from good is turning toward evil. Turning away from God is likewise an inverse unto all thus-oppositional fronts (which, given He's infinite and holy in all His perfections...). There aren't really human words or concepts to adequately relay how actually wretched it is to turn away from Him. Because there aren't words or means of adequately grasping His actual goodness. We just see evidences. And have His word, as clarification. Not one apart from the other--jointly held, as existent truth. Not plural.
His revelation in our own terms, as words, though. That's a whole other mind-blowing contemplation. He is beyond comprehension, beyond the ability to conceptualize in a way which does justice to the truth. And yet He's so deeply concerned and intimately involved with us, all of us--we, His creation--that He took measures to reveal Himself on our level, in words...in a variety of types of constructs of words--narratives, histories, poetry, lamentations, monologues, proverbs, philosophical treatise, letters to His beloved ones, instructions and admonitions, prophetic revelations, testimonies, and...well, all the many types of literature there are, I think, given some bits of at least marginal representation over course of His self-revelation. With every genre from comedy to horror, tragedy to romance, and even a philosophical treatise with a scientific bend, in terms of progression. A level I evidential document--report filed by an expert with lived experience regarding trials conducted over a life-time and observations likewise compiled, longitudinally. No controls. No randomized trials. But observation. And personal experiments.
Anyway, point just being, God was thorough in representing Himself on a level we could approach. In word. In concepts which are accessible. Giving insight into His thoughts and emotions, even, so that we can see He's not unconcerned and apathetic. Not unreasonable or aloof. But faithful, unwavering, good, loving, just, long-suffering. And He's due our worship by matter of the fact that we are His creatures. Pretty simple.
He isn't forcing us at this point. But we'll enter His presence without the shield of our preferred delusions at some point and the fact of either our love or our hatred will be evidenced, even as we'll no longer be able to deny the truth of His sovereignty. Whether we like it or not, we will acknowledge and submit to His sovereignty. We will bow to Him.
He's been really clear about that, too. Making His people's denial of Him that much more heart-breaking. Because He is so clear and has made Himself so apparent to them...again and again. But there was and is such refusal to heed Him, to love Him. That's what He wants, above all.
That we love Him. As we are loved.
Love manifests all sorts of good, though, when it's true and not contrived or self-indulgent and self-serving. Love thinks no ill, it is patient and kind, doesn't self-exalt but seeks to serve. Love gives when there's nothing left, persevering no matter the cost. Suffering all things for the sake of another, forgiving anything. Covering a multitude of sins, He said. Love trusts, protects, hopes, and waits. Love never fails.
But we all chose instead to exalt ourselves and do what we think is best rather than remaining totally dependent upon Him. We all do. At the expense of life, itself. At the expense of love. To the death of our own spirits, cut off from life itself--cut off from God.
But again and again, He spoke about the wrath due His people. That they had accrued judgment unto their own destruction in full. They had worked such wickedness that the penalty deserved was total devastation. But for two things, though.
One, He remembered His promise never to totally destroy them.
Two, He loves them still and would not utterly destroy them but longed to restore them to Himself. Like a wife who had turned astray and become adulterous, He described His people. Yet also saying He'd bring her back and restore her joy in Himself as at their initial union. That she would dance with delight to be His beloved, being taken to be alone with Him in the desert or wilderness.
He mitigates discipline to what is necessary to effect what's most needful to return us to Himself. Otherwise all of creation would have been destroyed from the outset of sin, even.
But He lavishes love and provision. Even to restore the adulterous wife into His love and to a place of joy, of dancing as though a maiden He described.
He is so good. And yet we think, or at least I'm continually tempted to think...that I "need" to plan for things. Plan how to get out of debt. Plan how to get my life in order. Plan how to seek Him. Plan how to serve Him.
As though I was able to save myself, to begin with. Paul chided the Galatians pretty sorely on that point. Not without love, mind you--I've heard so many people interpret that book as though He was cursing them up one side and down another and treating them with malice. Whatever hardness there is or was, it's only as much as is warranted by God's knowledge of what's necessary to be heard. Even as the Pharisees were called vipers, outright. And whitewashed sepulchres.
Not soft speech. But not from a heart of vindictive malice, either--not taking pleasure in speaking harshly to someone for the sake of self-exaltation per debasing another.
Just, if He calls us, He's going to sanctify us. Or there's no hope otherwise. We didn't start the work, we certainly can't finish it. We can't change our own hearts.
He showed me very clearly week before last that it's utterly beyond my power to change my heart, to forsake sinful tendencies. He has to deliver me from this body of death. He has to conform my heart to His will. He has to bring me to repentance, through such gracious kindness as allowing me to see the wickedness in my own heart and leading me to a recognition of it and unto open confession/discussion with Him and pleading His forgiveness, asking His help and deliverance. Nothing doubting. But hoping, leaving the whole deal in His hands.
So, why, though...if I see so clearly that I can't manage to "fix" or "help" or rightly divide the nature of my own heart...why, if that most fundamental matter is beyond me...why would I then think that somehow it's within my power and domain to plan for and accomplish daily "necessities" and "life goals" and even nutrition, in my own strength and per my own thusly-indicated-wholly-limited-perception? I can't change the most fundamental part of myself, which is me, but I'm somehow capable of planning for tomorrow and for business interactions and for food things that came from countries that I may never even see this side of eternity?
Now, that is delusional thinking.
Can't stop myself from losing my patience with a barista who has a difficult time understanding me when I say "soy latte," but I've got a 401k on track to recover in 30 years (having a difficult time imagining what that latter would be like...but I have heard tell). Can't keep myself from becoming bored when there's a lull between customers at work, but I have the next four years of grad-school mapped out in order to get the Ph.d. that's going to put me on the map for missions. Or, like...regularly tempted to want the life of other people who look more successful than me, but I'm on track with this year's M'Cheyne Bible plan and I'm planning for more involvement in my church's ministry teams (way, way closer to personal life)...or planning for more church attendance...or planning to (fill in blank).
There's the dual disconnect, is all. We can't earn righteous standing with God by trying to conform externally. If we do somehow manage to achieve some type of external conformity to what our understanding of godliness is...that isn't to say He may not honor that by also conforming our hearts to His own. But it's not a certainty. Because the external seeking is after conformity to an ideal and not after God Himself, most generally. He's pretty gracious, though. So...He may redirect (He did for me, in so many ways...and still does).
But it's not about the external efforts, still. It's a matter of heart. We can't earn righteousness. We can't acquire it through works.
And the secondary disconnect is in terms of thinking we somehow know the future when, actually, we have no idea what's going on right now. If most of us had a clearer conception of what the deal with international economics is, right now, except that there were faith in God...there'd probably be so much freaking out. We're all suspended in this totally illusory web of machinations. Nothing holds us aloft but grace. Even as per the greed-fueled inclinations that interweave all of society as to sustain a common delusion giving credence to the lies that make international economics and capitalism viable.
The closer to the end we get, the more apparent is His truth. But the less visible to those who deny Him pre-eminence in their lives, though His due.
Just to say, if we are making plans...He's indulging that tendency in us to still attempt to operate according to our own understanding, according to worldly precepts, according to the ideologies which fueled Satan's fall. There's no "submitting to God" and "having a backup plan." Either there's submission or there's not.
And I fall away so often to start wanting companionship (especially), counsel, godly instruction, "life goals," or whatever of all the like. So I see that it's a thing, because He keeps delivering me out of it. And I don't deserve to be delivered. And He's not obligated to, except that He promises to always be with me, to never forsake me. And that He loves me so much He gave Himself for me, to free me from these things.
He knows our state. He knows we're all prone to fall away. We all have fallen away from Him, drawn by our own desires. But He's been tempted, too. Never sinned. But He was tempted in all manners such as we are. So He isn't unsympathetic.
He will help. Otherwise there'd be no hope.
We just have to ask Him to let us see what is in us that's not of Him, what displeases Him. And honestly want to know (which He'll work out, too).
And then openly consider whatever He reveals, with Him. And follow His leading.
But it's His work. His Spirit doing the work.
But it's His work. His Spirit doing the work.
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