All the Earth Shall Be Filled – Part 2

(Habakkuk 2:14, John 17:1)

How can we speak, how can we preach, except we be sent?  We must experience His very intimate presence and hear Him send us.  We often hear of Isaiah’s call when his eyes were opened to see the Lord high and lifted up.  He saw the glory of God and he was “undone”.  What is that?  What does it mean?  One cannot explain it but all your pride, all your self-sufficiency, all the good you thought you were is blown away.  And you blurt it out.  You confess you are not clean.  And immediately that uncleanness is burned up.  The Lord opens His heart to Isaiah, and He will do the same with you.  He looks for one He can send on behalf of Himself.  Too often, we run on what we think He wants.  It takes a personal, direct confrontation with the holy One of Israel, Elohim, your heavenly Father.

Either you are His child, or you are not. (Rom. 8:9)  By His Spirit in us we know our heavenly Father.  Continue reading in Romans, chapter 8.  The Lord’s central thoughts toward us are written there.  We understand we have access to the throne of grace.  Like little children, we learn to come to Him to have our sins forgiven, and we find He sends us out in that grace to bless someone.  First be a blessing to your family.  Jesus was such from the age of 12 until 30.  We are in such a hurry to do “public” ministry.  If we understand the target we can become and the true spiritual maturity required for public ministry, we would not be in a hurry.  Yet the Lord knows how to prod us out onto the stage so to speak.  If you have never heard this, hear it now.  David was tending Jesse’s sheep until the day he was called and anointed.  Then he went through a ton of training before he came into all that his anointing by Samuel indicated and began.

Moses tended sheep on the backside of the desert for 40 years before he was a shepherd to an entire nation for 40 years of wilderness wandering.  I have experienced the training of waiting and faithfully doing what the Lord puts in my hands to do.  Take care of your family, please.  The time will come when He will lead you out, even thrust you out.  He, the Spirit, will lead you through the doors to places where you will be fruitful.  To what purpose has God called you?  Is it clear?  If not keep seeking Him.  Seek His face continually.  He will speak.  He did not call you to remain empty without direction.  Quietness is not silence.  Stillness is a peacefulness with your mind free from clutter and distraction.

As I thought about all I am writing, I caution us not to be afraid to step out.  I recall knowing a stirring in my spirit as I stood in a very large meeting at a Bible school.  I had something to speak out and was not ready to let it out.  Then a loud voice from a woman who I would later receive from, called out, “Quench not the Spirit.”  Oh, woe was me.  Then another voice, “Some of you young men are afraid of your own shadow.  Jesus will take you by the hand and. . . .”  I don’t recall the finish.  It is enough that He takes us by the hand.  Do you know such fellowship with Him?  He is seeking you out and calling you to Himself, so you can find your rest in Him.

As we walk with Him, we grow in grace and the knowledge of Him.  Paul prayed that for us all.  He was praying for those he knew of firsthand but those prayers never stop.  Jesus prayed we would be one as He and His Father, our Father, are one.  He taught His disciples that they would know the Father directly.  It is always so with Jesus.  He is forever the mediator of the new covenant.  He is never out of the picture.  As we come to, and know the Father directly, we find a maturity that enables us to know and carry the love that the Father has for men.  I have written before, we become a gift that the Father gives and sows into the earth.  Unless a grain of wheat falls into the ground and dies it abides alone.  And if it is sown it will bear fruit.  It will yield a harvest.  Death works in us that life might work in others.  This is the way of our Father’s kingdom.  Get to know your Father.

At that table of the fulfillment of Passover, the Lamb of God prayed, that God would glorify His Son that the Son might also glorify Him (John 17:1).  Jesus knew He was going to the cross.  In that act of ultimate humility, God glorified Himself and displayed His love to mankind.  In that same way, a people will lay down their lives so that our Father would be glorified.  It has happened through so many who have gone before us.  It is happening in ever increasing measure today, and it will increase until He sees His bride is ready and He comes for her.  Others will see the display and experience the glory of the Lord.  So will the knowledge of the glory of the Lord cover the earth.  It will not be with a trickle.  It will be with a deep, flood, like the waters cover the sea.  That is very deep, my friend.  Wherever you are today, ask for the Living God to pour over, in, and through you!  He is waiting for you.

All the Earth Shall Be Filled – Part 1

(Habakkuk 2:14)

Many of us have some background in a denominational church which colors our understanding of the Lord and His kingdom.  Often, we think we must shed everything we heard when in those places.  While the traditions of our earthly teachers may hinder the Holy Spirit’s work in us, we may be losing truths of value.  I was recently irritated by someone referring to themselves as being in the office of the prophet.  I do not see such an identification voiced by the apostles, except in humility.  But I must confess, my attitude is tainted with self-ambition.  Out I say to that, and it is done.  On the other hand, among the reformers of the 1500’s, it was understood that every believer is a prophet, priest, and king.  If Christ is in you, the potential for any operation of His Spirit is living in you.  Most notably, the testimony of Jesus is the Spirit of prophecy.  Does it look, sound, feel, and taste like Jesus?  That is the mark of true prophecy.  I thank God for those who have spoken His life into my own.

All things are possible to Him who believes.  This leads us to many questions.  If we believe for something that in a broad sense is His will, it does not mean it will come to pass through us personally.  He is sovereign.  It is He who initiates in a very personal, intimate way.  Do we know Him?  Are we growing in that knowledge, that relationship?  It is certainly no mistake that His church is identified as His bride.  In earthly marriage, as human beings, we all know what destroys a marriage.  Unfaithfulness brings deep wounds.  Trust is broken.  Our lives here in this age, in the world, present opportunities to know the truth, to know Jesus as friend, even as lover.  The true knowledge of Him happens through real life.  Do you bring your heartaches to the Lord Jesus?  Are you trying to be tough?  Trying to be a “good Christian”?  We are learning to yield to His life.

No one is righteous!  No, not one!  We look to pastors, preachers, teachers, and sadly some of those only want to draw us to themselves.  Of these the prophet spoke that the Lord’s face is set against them.  He does not like them.  We must be careful how we judge.  Is it the pastor that is the real problem, or is it your own desire to be connected with the “right” ministry so that you can ride on that one’s coattails?  Some lessons come hard.  But do not misunderstand.  We do want to be connected to ministries that minister His life.  As time goes on, I so enjoy meeting “strangers” who I find to be believers, and those who are disciples.  And I meet some who love truth but do yet have a revelation of the One who is truth Himself.  The Lord must go deep and tear down all self-righteousness.

I knew a woman who was married.  She made the mistake of marrying to fulfill a desire to have a family.  She deceived herself and did not really want that particular man as a husband but he seemed “safe”.  No man is “safe”.  During the marriage, she had a friend who she treated as a boyfriend.  She confided more deeply with him than her husband.  And she wanted intimacy with him.  He wisely withdrew.  Her husband was lonely.  Something was missing.  Eventually she ended that marriage with that man that she never really wanted.  At times she had wanted him but they were never fully in sync.  You have to want to want your husband, and husbands need to want to want their wives.  Love includes desire.

Desire is a necessary part of love.  What does this have to do with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord?  Everything.  Are you knowing His passion for you and returning it?  Is that passion growing?  If it diminishes are you asking why, and seeking for more?  Earthly marriage is ultimately only a picture, a life lesson.  I am not saying it does not matter.  If we are following the Lord Jesus, our marriages, on our part, will be the best they can be.  We will want everything we do to reflect His glory.  We cannot remake our husband, or our wife, into the “perfect” other half.  This life is about learning, about receiving, eternal life, the knowledge of Christ.  Jesus taught us that in the kingdom of heaven, when this earthly life ends, our earthly relationships will pass away.  Oh, we will still recognize family that received the life that Christ is but our desires here, while valid for now, will have passed away.  And we will be so enraptured with the glory of the Lord, of Elohim, of our heavenly Bridegroom, that we will not remember the former things.

When Jesus met with His closest followers, those 12 men, and shared that last meal this side of the heavenly table, He prayed that they would behold His glory.  That beholding accelerated at Pentecost.  But there at that table, that meal, Jesus said, “I have earnestly desired to share this meal with you.”  The word He used could be translated “lusted”.  That word may trouble us.  It is too strong, even wrong.  No.  We must have our earthly passions redirected by the Holy Spirit.  The more we invite and allow Him to fill us, that fruit of self-control will grow.  As we soak in His passionate love for us, we will return the passion.  Then we walk worthy of His calling and our ways are pleasing to Him.