God finds us like the wild donkey, our nostrils wide and our eyes blazing and our ears laid back, hating the touch of leather, hating the touch and smell of people. The Holy Spirit comes, takes over, and starts, as we say on the farm, breaking the colt. After that the whole nature of the animal changes. He perks his ears up and whinnies when he sees you coming. His eyes are calm now. Lay your hand on his neck and he will lean over and nuzzle you. The Spirit of God wants to do that for you. He wants to domesticate you, humble you and make you meek. The Christian who has been transformed by the power of the Holy Spirit into a docile, obedient, meek, trustful person has more treasure than all the wealth of the world (A.W.Tozer)
Brother Tozer uses an analogy that most of the world would hate. I can hear the protests now (mainly because my own flesh raged against the process) “what do you mean, breaking the colt.” The truth is we are much worse that any horse or mule. We rage against the light because it brings us to heel if we indeed surrender to it. The horse is broken, yet we, unlike the horse, must first surrender to the process. And if we just had to do it once that might be ok. Yet just like everything else in the Scriptures that brings life it must be abided in. We must abide in His word daily. We must abide in the Holy Spirit daily. We must take up our cross daily. We must be filled over and over again. And so, just like that, we must surrender over and over again.
Brokenness is a process of surrenders. Stronghold by stronghold, high ground by high ground, well defended positions must fall. Jericho walls must come tumbling down and it wont be by might and it wont be by power, it will be by the Holy Spirit. We cannot cause the walls within us to fall, only Jesus by the power of the Holy Spirit can do that. We cannot form the cross that we take up daily, only Jesus by the power of the Spirit can do that. Just like it is not possible to strangle yourself, we could never create crosses strong enough to break us. The flesh would not allow it That is uniquely the work of the Spirit and every step of the way must be surrendered to it. We are called into the river, not up to our ankles nor our knees nor even our waists, we must be fully immersed in the river of life. We must surrender to the current. We cannot be standing on our own two feet.
You may believe that you are walking in the depths with Jesus. Yet ask yourself this saint. Are you still standing on your own two feet? Do you think you are doing good because the water comes up to your neck? In the final analysis you will be no better off than the fella that is only ankle deep. The real changes come when you are swept away by the river, everything else is religion and vanity and ashes in the wind. We have to come to the point where we are simply not in control, we are not in charge. The River, Jesus, the Holy Spirit is. He can only take you to where He wants you to go when you are fully surrendered. And now, just like the broken horse, we fall deeply in love with our Master and long to see His coming. We nestle into His loving arms and when the storms rage all around us, we see Him and we know we are safe. Will you surrender to the river today?
Jesus Christ spoke rugged truth. He was never ambiguous, and He says it is better to be maimed than damned-better to live your life lame in the people’s sight and lovely in God’s than to be lovely in humans eyes and lame in God’s. We may look all right in the sight of other people, but we are remarkably twisted and wrong in the sight of God. (Oswald Chambers)
It is amazing how many folks only care about what other people think about them. Victory to them is looking good to other people. Its a shallow human problem and also the problem with “religious.”folk in general. To really know God is to really only care what God thinks about us. The deeper the relationship we have with Him, the less we care about what other people think. Offense is not easily taken and is quickly forgiven. We only care about not offending Him. If we let Him down we are deeply wounded. Its a mark of the depth of love we have with Him. And so the superficial and shallow, run all the way from not knowing God at all, to immature babes in Christ. If you find yourself after 10 or 20 or 30 years of professed Christianity to only really care what people think, you must examine yourself to see if you are even in the faith.
In the end, the man or the woman of God, who is deeply in love with Jesus and who can cry out Abba Father, strives to please the Master. If they are fools in the eyes of the world then they do not care. If they are rejected by the religious then they do not care. The Pharisee only talks about love and forgiveness but he or she actually knows nothing of it. I have personally offended men who preach love and forgiveness yet who do not have the capacity to forgive me. It is two dimensional theology as opposed to a living vibrant relationship which actually does the things that Jesus commands. And along the way we often forget this simplest of all truths, Jesus sees. He sees our heart and the condition of it and in the end that is all that counts. Everything else is vanity and ashes in the wind. When we stand before Him we shall have no standing among men. It will just be us and what we did with the word of God and the direction of His Spirit.
Eph 5:22 Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands, as unto the Lord.
This might be one of the most controversial scriptures in the NT in our day. We are at least three generations into feminism and that very feminism has permeated its way through all of society. This is usually where we flip over to “yes but the men.” Lets not do that today, it has been preached ad nauseam. So Godly wife, do you submit and honor and reverence your husband? Could they put that on your gravestone? How are are to submit to the Lord? In everything, as they old song goes “I surrender all.” Now I hear the multiple arguments rising “but my husband doesnt …….” fill in the blank. If your husband does not love you as he aught (oftentimes subjective, not talking about abuse here) does that mean you can abdicate your role as a wife? If we flip the argument around and the wife is not Godly in the husbands opinion, does that mean a husband has no responsibility to love his wife even as Christ loves the Church?
Eph 5 goes on to state categorically, and all the many abusive husbands and wives in the past cannot change this truth, that within a genuine Christian marriage the husband is the head. This is what the world calls Patriarchy. This is what the world has rejected and has assaulted from every conceivable angle. This is the plan of God, and man, or woman cannot change it. Now that this has been stated, how do husbands or wives walk out their walk within less than perfect marriages? ( which I am assuming is most) What is always the final say, to either the man or the woman? The Word of God. That is our high measuring bar. How do we live up to that? Looking unto Jesus the author and the finisher of our faith. What is His will for us? What does the Holy Spirit prompt us to do and say, and by the same token what not to do and what not to say? Shall He not lead and guide us in all things even though they be less than perfect?
Now this is not an academic issue for me. I was saved 10 years after I was married and my wife is not saved. So, for over 30 years I have lived with a woman who certainly does not go for “thus sayeth the Lord.” Can I now abdicate my role as a husband and father because my wife is not saved? The standard remains the exact same for me. I have been called to love my wife as the Lord loves the Church and I have also been called to be the head of the house, I have not abdicated either role nor would I. Now, as an unsaved wife she could have chosen not to stay with me.
1Co 7:15 But if the unbelieving depart, let him depart. A brother or a sister is not under bondage in such cases: but God hath called us to peace.
We have been called to peace. I have peace in my house but if my wife had been a constant undermining influence, if she rejected my position within the household, is she tore me down at every turn and hated my Christianity and began to ruin our children (a house divided) then she would not have been a wife who was choosing to stay.
1Co 7:13 And the woman which has an husband that does not believe, and if he be pleased to dwell with her, let her not leave him.
Brothers and sisters we are called to peace. My situation is actually less complicated than many I have encountered where the spouse confesses to be a Christian but is clearly not. Now that is complicated and God bless every saint who finds themselves in that situation. Yet here is the standard. We are called to peace. Does your house have peace? Or is it in constant turmoil and Christ is being perpetually undermined day after day? We have not been called to this. I am not saying we cannot be specifically called to this, God knows. He does the calling and sometimes spouses are called to stay in situations where all others would say get out. Only God can make this call. I grew up in a household just like this and in the end my earthly father was saved. God must be our guide and the Word must be a lamp unto our feet. Let peace reign in your house.
By whom also we have access by faith into this grace wherein we stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God. And not only so, but we glory in tribulations also: knowing that tribulation works patience; And patience, experience; and experience, hope: And hope makes us not ashamed; because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us.(Rom 5:2-5)
The opening verse to this chapter reads “Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.” We have peace through our Lord Jesus Christ. And through Him we can rejoice in hope and the glory of God. Yet we are told that we do not just glory in God, we glory in our tribulations. Imagine that, glorying in our trials and our tribulations, in our sufferings. You will not hear that preached in Charismatic circles. Like Job’s friends they would accuse a suffering saint of sin, or lack of faith. They have tried to turn faith into a weapon that destroys and nullifies suffering and trials and tribulations. Yet faith is what gives us access to grace. By trusting in God we glory in His unmerited favor. By trusting in His Son, the Lord Jesus and His work on Calvary we enter into the glory.
In order to flesh out this blessed hope, we have to learn from suffering and tribulations. We learn patience and trust which leads to hope. Therefore tribulations is the birthplace of hope. By patiently enduring our cross, we begin to see how much the flesh dominates us. As we stand there in the fire, the flesh begins to burn away. And yes, if one were to peer into your trials and tribulations they would see the Son of man standing there with you. And this hope that is forged in the fires of trial and tribulation causes us to be strong in the Lord and the power of His might. We are not ashamed of the Gospel of Jesus Christ for we know it is the power of God unto salvation.
Those who patiently endure and overcome shall stand in that day, unashamed of our Lord, for He has walked with us, every step of the way, through the high mountain passes and in the depths of the valleys. The love of God is shed abroad in our hearts for our Lord for He has been our companion through it all. He has stuck closer than a brother. He has been so faithful to us and therefore we could never deny Him. This is our strength. This is our glory, the glory of the God that dwells within us by the power of the Holy Spirit. Our closest companion, the lover of our souls and the one who has never left us not forsaken us. This knowledge, lived out in our lives, is the hope and the glory.
The sands of time are running low
Yet the river still continues to flow
It flows for you and it flows for me
And it still flows from Calvary
His Blood cries out and still it saves
It pulls men out from stormy waves
His Blood shall never ever fail
In the shadow of the Almighty we shall prevail
Who shall stand in the final hour
Who is held by His great power
Who shall rise above the flood
Those who are covered by His precious Blood
His Blood is still a mystery
It echos down through history
Those who are dying they fail to see
That victory was nailed to a Bloody tree
And from that tree it flows still yet
For you and for me and for our debt
We surely owed what we could not pay
Yet our sins were surely washed away
Washed and delivered I know not why
Yet the Son of God He came to die
And on that cross He took our place
Our sins were forgiven, were surely erased
And now I stand high above the flood
Washed and redeemed and covered by His Blood
Who shall take me out of His hand
There is none there is none for In Him I stand.
Thank you Jesus, for you died for me
Thank you Jesus for you set me free
Thank God in heaven that He sent His only Son
Thank you Father in heaven for victory won.
Luk 6:32 For if you love them which love you, what credit is that to you? For sinners also love those that love them.
It is said about free speech that it only really counts when you tolerate speech that is extremely offensive to you. That is actual free speech. If you only tolerated speech that you like, then you are actually devoid of toleration and you are a totalitarian. You are headed down the road of dictatorship, the same road that Mussolini went down, the same road that Hitler and Stalin went down, the same road that every tyrant went down and all of them ended in pure hatred and destruction of whole groups of people. When I first came to America, it was liberals who defended neo-nazi groups and the argument went something like this “I hate what they are saying, but I will die defending their rights to say it.” It was liberals who had the saying “live and let live,” meaning let everyone do their own thing, lets not compel anyone to be something they are not. You do not have to major in political science to know just how much that has turned around in 30 years, the former guardians of free speech have now traded places with those who would have suppressed it. So, only tolerating speech you like is no toleration at all but rather it is the opposite, it is fascism.
For if you love them which love you, what credit is that to you? For sinners also love those that love them(Luk 6:32) Jesus is saying, in effect, “so you love those who love you, big deal, everybody does that.” True love, Jesus love, is measured by how much we love those who do not love us. How do we react to those who do not like us? To those who hate us? To those who reject us. To those who cheat us and harm us? Are we just like the world or do we have something supernatural inside of us, Jesus, that has changed our very disposition? Too often brothers and sisters we are just like the world, it should not be so. The world only tolerates those who agree with them, they do not have love they have hate. How about us? Do we love even when we are not tolerated? Do we render evil for evil? Imagine if God the Father had rendered evil for evil? We would all be dead and rotting in an eternity separated from our Creator.
If we can recognize the truth of what free speech means, then surely we must recognize the truth of what true love is? It blossoms not on decadent beds of roses that we ourselves made, no, it blossoms in the fire and the dungeon and the heat of hatred. True love finds its expression when it is reviled. True love finds its expression in the arms of forgiveness. It is cradled in a cot of mercy. When it is attacked it has the opportunity to render its attacker of their true power, the power they have over you. True love stands alone atop the highest mountain for all to see. It is unsullied by the rage of human emotions and is grounded in the will of man surrendered to the heart of God by the power of the Holy Spirit. As the days darken, true love, the love of God, will be assaulted on every side and if we respond correctly then God shall be filled glorified around the world “for the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of God as the waters cover the sea.” Let us glorify God in this manner.
Mat 5:28 But I say unto you, That whoever looks on a woman to lust after her has committed adultery with her already in his heart.
God does not give a person a new body when he or she is saved, the body is the same, but a new disposition is given. God alters the mainspring-He puts love in place of lust. (Oswald Chambers)
He alters the mainspring. The mainspring in a clock regulates the workings of it. It’s the central force that propels all of the gears and wheels within the mechanism. God alters the force that drives us. Lust is a powerful force. Rage and anger is a powerful force. Greed and desire is a powerful force. They all rage against the spirit and demand to be heard, demand to be obeyed. It must be satiated. It knows it’s time is short and its moment will pass quickly. Love is sacrificial and is patient and kind and it waits. Lust is self serving and demanding and simply takes what it wants. It is blind to the consequences of its actions. Rage is the same. Adultery and murder, they both take what they want in the heat of the moment and so many times there is a lifetime of reckoning. Esau with his appetites sells his birthright and Jacob waits patiently for seven years for Rachel.
Love is always the antidote. The sermon on the mount is a breakdown of love and how is actually operates. For God so loved the world……..Jesus being the expression of that love. He loved us when He created us and He created us in His image. We are designed to love as He loves. It break the bonds of murder and lust. It does not rage that it is compelled to carry a load a mile, it carries it two miles. It does not rage that it is assaulted rather it loves the one who assaulted it. “So that the world will know that You sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.” What manner of love is this? God sent His only Son to show us what love looks like. He walked out the sermon on the mount and completed it on Calvary as He cried out “forgive them Father.” Only through Jesus can we know this love. Only through the Holy Spirit can we love as He has loved.
This is our calling brothers and sisters. The Holy Spirit is the mainspring of our lives. It is by His power and His force alone that we can sail upon the ocean of this life. We can have sails but without the wind of the Spirit where are we going? We would founder and die in the doldrums where there is no wind. In order to wind up the mainspring there has to be a key, Jesus is the key to everything and the Holy Spirit is the power. The word of God alone will not give us the power to walk as we have been taught to walk by Jesus, the word must be combined with the Spirit. Look at the word “word.” Now add an S to it. It becomes “sword.” The S is the Spirit and when we combine it with the Word then we have the power of the s-word which pierces even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.
1Pe 4:12 Beloved, think it not strange concerning the fiery trial which is to try you, as though some strange thing happened unto you:
Fiery trials, suffering and tribulations. In certain circles of Christianity you wont even hear it spoken of. Its almost as taboo as death. Yet in the very next breath Peter tells us to rejoice. Why should we rejoice? We are to rejoice because we are partakers in Christ’s sufferings. We actually enter into something very mystical, very holy, the sufferings of our Lord. When the glory of Christ is revealed we shall be glad indeed that we entered into His sufferings. And in verse 14 we are told that when we are reproached for the sake of Christ that the, “Spirit of glory and of God rests upon us.” In 2 Cor we see another Apostle use almost the exact same language “Most gladly therefore will I rather glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me.” We can be sure that His grace is sufficient for us and when we are in great need of grace, in the midst of sufferings, then the spirit of glory and of God shall rest upon us.
This word “rest,” is the Greek word, “episkēnoō.” It means to “tent,” or to “encamp,” or to “tabernacle.” God Himself will come to you in your distress. He will encamp around you. He will tabernacle with you. His glory, His manifest glory will fall upon you like the morning dew upon the mountains. His sun shall rise above you and His power rain down upon you and envelope you. This is a faithful God whose grace will be more than enough for you to rise up in your spirit above the flesh that is momentary and passing away. Yet your spirit, in the very heart of His, shall remain forever and great will be your joy in that day that you indeed were counted worthy to enter into the sufferings of Jesus. Wherefore let them that suffer according to the will of God commit the keeping of their souls to him in well doing, as unto a faithful Creator. (1Pe 4:19)
Your spirit is the most excellent part of who you are and the Lord has called for us to commit the keeping of it into His hands. The phrase “commit the keeping of,” means a deliberate act, like kneeling down or giving over to. We have to do it by an act of our wills, we must give our situations and our sufferings over to Him and not try to keep our souls by our own strength in the midst of it, we shall not succeed. Only in His hands are we safe, only as His power rests upon us can we rejoice in the midst of it all. And only then shall we be glad in that day. Will you carry your soul today to God and commit it to Him in the days of your sore trial? You must do it saints or the trial may just carry you away. Let us do our part, the commiting, and let the Lord do His part, the carrying. He will carry you by His grace and His power shall rest upon you.
The desire of my soul is for your name
And with my soul I have desired you in the night
With my whole heart I have longed for you
For the one who restored my very sight
Just one single touch and I fall down
One word from your precious lips sustains me
I am whole and complete when you are near
Your perfect love in me casts out every fear.
For when I stand in the shadow of my King
My heart bursts into flames and begins to sing
Of your glory and your majesty that makes me whole
I remember the very moment that you took my soul.
Oh take me now and forever Lord I pray
Every day with you is a brand new day
I will sing of the mercies of the Lord forevermore
No eye has seen nor ear heard what thou has in store
Cast me upon the ocean of thy great love
Where I am consumed by the one from up above
Adrift forever on thy eternal endless sea
I who once was captive now sings, for I am free
I shall sing of all thy glories until time comes to an end
And then I'll sing again the eternal song that thou has penned
The song of love that forever changed my heart
That carries me to that place where we shall never part.
You are our majesty, this and so much more
You are our bright and morning star, to us an open door
An open door to glory that leads us to your throne
So as we walk this lonely road we are never quite alone
You are our refuge from the storm,
A shade from the searing heat
And if the world had spiritual eyes
They would see us at your feet
For we have been forgiven much
So we love you all the more
You to us who are our King
Forever an open door
Let us step into Your glory
For you are high and lifted up
And in this place of glory
No man can interrupt.
No matter the darkness the light prevails
Just as we saw in the thorns and the nails
Victory in Jesus as the darkness drew near
Victory over hell and death and fear
The world may languish and be spiraling down
Yet victory belongs to the one with the crown
Glory and majesty with the dawns early light
Filled with His strength and ready to fight
The proud shall fall never more to rise
His glory shall be revealed in magnificent skies
The sun shall flee and the moon disgraced
The stars in the heavens are violently displaced
The King of kings, the Lord of all ages
Steps down once more as the devil rages
The victory is complete, the darkness no more
The ravenous lion has given his last roar
Mat 6:34 Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about its own things. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble.
Due to my still healing hip, my wife helped me this weekend with painting the deck. It occurred to me in the process that there are two broad categories of people. There are those who only believe that there is a job to be finished. And there are those who believe there is a job to be done. It may seem that these two statements represent the same thing, but they do not. Oswald Chambers writes “The test that Jesus gives us is not the truth of our manner, but the temper of our mind. Many of us are wonderfully truthful in manner yet our temper of mind is rotten in God’s sight.The thing Jesus alters is the temper of the mind.” Lets say you sin against someone and you know that you must ask forgiveness from that person. You believe you have to finish the job. The purpose is to do what you know you have to do, And you do it. Yet, your heart in the matter was not changed, you merely did what you knew you had to do. It is very likely that you will sin again against this person and others. This is the flesh. It is not altogether different from Catholic confession.
The Lord did not come to teach us how to live with good manners, He came to change our very hearts and minds. By the power of the Holy Spirit, and only by the power of the Holy Spirit, can we live out the changed life. The changed life is not doing things right, doing things right is the consequence of a changed life. We live our lives not in order to achieve something, to get the job finished, no, we live our lives as unto the Lord, daily. The job to be done is to follow the Lord. We are the project. There is no finish line so to speak, there is only being rightly shaped. Now does that mean we cannot have an eternal perspective, not at all, we must have an eternal perspective, but eternity must be lived out daily in our lives and this should be our perspective. Doing the job for the jobs sake is very different from doing the job just to get it finished. It’s a subtle twist that can change the very nature of how we live. Living in the moment is living in eternity. The job is still going to get finished yet getting to heaven is the furthest thing from the saints mind because getting to heaven is not and end in and of itself, its just the outcome of the work of the Lord and those who take up their crosses daily and follow Him.
1Sa 27:1 And David said in his heart, I shall now perish one day by the hand of Saul: there is nothing better for me than that I should speedily escape into the land of the Philistines; and Saul shall despair of me, to seek me any more in any coast of Israel: so shall I escape out of his hand.
Let’s be very honest here, David is just wrong. We have the advantage of time on our side to look back and know that he is wrong. He would not perish by the hand of Saul. David said in his heart or to his heart that he was going to die. How many of us have come to the wrong conclusions based on how we feel? Our emotions begin to drive us, like a mighty wind drives a sailing ship in a storm onto the rocks. Fear is the low depression that builds in the atmosphere. Low depressions in the natural lead to storms and high winds. When we speak to ourselves and not to God we convince ourselves of a bad outcome, or perhaps even a good outcome, but rash actions based on unhinged emotions leads to storms and failures.
David knew that he was anointed. David knew that God had delivered him time and time again. David let exhaustion and depression and fear lead him. He came to the wrong conclusions. In John chapter 6 the disciples went down to the sea. Jesus was nowhere to be found. Yet these fishermen knew that the light was fading fast and decided to head of into the open sea where they would find themselves in the darkness, and now, of course, a storm blows up. When we head into anything without Jesus, when we are led by our state, whether physical or emotional, we are heading towards a storm. Much better to wait where we are, on the Lord and pray. David would have better off to stay where he was. This anointed man of God was not going to die, that was a lie he told to himself undoubtedly embellished by the enemy of his soul.
Where are you right now saint? Are you ready to rush of into something? Is that something motivated by God? Have you heard from the Lord? Are you keeping in step with the Spirit, meaning, is He walking with you in this? The disciples should never have left the shore, David should not have tried to escape. David would find himself in Ziklag. This town will not be remembered well by David. This is the place where he lost everything and he cried “until there were no tears left to cry.” Yes, the Lord came to him in the storm so to speak, yes he took back all that was stolen by the power of the Spirit of God. How much better to have never found himself in that position in the first place? Wait upon the Lord brothers and sisters, lest you find yourself in urgent need of rescue. Move when you are told to move. Silence the voice of fear that urges you to act right now. Just because others have went a certain way, does not mean that you should follow. Follow the Lord and His word rather, and the still small voice. Following your heart is the way of the world.
I will shake the heavens and the earth shall move out of its place
For fear shall fall upon the world as they begin to see my face
Wail O inhabitants of the earth for the day is soon at hand
You will see my unfolding judgment and know that it was planned.
The sanctified ones who greatly rejoiced in my exaltation
Shall march across the earth, there will be trembling in every nation
Behold the day of the Lord comes, the end of all the ages
And sin shall be no more as it collects its final wages.
And when its said and done joy shall come in the morning
Peace and love and joy shall replace tears and fears and mourning
Prepare your hearts O saints for the day of the Lord is at hand
And only the righteous, covered by His Blood, shall stand
A banner is set on high for all the world to see
It flutters in the wind above the ones that He set free
An army of Gods righteous saints, there they stand as one
And at the head of this mighty army rides the only begotten Son.
Joh 12:32 If I be lifted up from the earth, I will draw all men unto me.
Jesus came to earth to fulfill the will of His Father in heaven. His Father asked Him to be a Living Sacrifice. He was sent down like bread from heaven to bring life to the world. To be the Light that shines into the darkness of a world already condemned. All men could see the light and all men knew what that Light meant. It was brighter than any lighthouse standing high upon a hill. And it shone out to mankind who was caught up in a storm of gross darkness. The Life came down from heaven so that it would be as a light shining in the darkness of death. Love sent the light to those who had no light. While they were yet in their sins. The great love of the Father for a world caught up in darkness. While they were yet in their sins life came to the dead. To the crushed and the broken-hearted the light shone for them and drew them and they were healed.
To the captives the light shone into the very depths of the deepest dungeons and they came forth delivered and free. Who will come to the light? The proud? The haughty? The self made man? The strong? No, they shall run from the light. You cannot run from what you cannot see. The world saw that light and the life that came down from heaven. Most ran from it, most still run from it. The few are drawn to it. Let it never be said that God did not desire to draw all men to Himself, He did. There is nothing beyond Jesus. What more could God give? He gave His all in the greatest sacrifice ever made. There is no sacrifice beyond this. All men are drawn by the light, but you have to come to the light and believe, in order to be saved. Jesus is the light, and in Him alone is life, and in Him there is no darkness.
The phrase “If I be lifted up,” signifies what kind of death the Lord would have. Yet the Greek word for the phrase also means “to be exalted,” If the Lord Jesus Christ is exalted above all things then the power of Calvary and His resurrection flows into the life of those who exalt Him. There is power in the exaltation of Jesus. There is light in the exaltation of Jesus. There is life in the exaltation of Jesus. There is healing in His exaltation. There is love and mercy to be found as we exalt the name of Jesus. There is forgiveness in the exaltation of Jesus. There is salvation in the exaltation of Jesus! Let us exalt that name today, Jesus, which is above every name. That at the exaltation of that name every knee shall bow and every tongue confess that Jesus is Lord to the glory of God the Father. For there is no other name under heaven given among men whereby we must be saved, neither is there salvation in any other. Jesus is the first and the last and He is the light which, when He was lifted up, drew all men unto Him. What will you do with the drawing?
Thank you for inexhaustible fountains That flow down from the highest mountains Higher still and then again We find the source of the falling rain
Living waters whose source is the King By their refreshing we hear angels sing Sing to the Lord for He has done excellent things Cry out ye saints for He is greatly to be praised
Deep in unfathomable mines there is treasure And at His right hand forevermore there is pleasure Refreshed by the waters that flow down on me They carry me onward towards an eternal sea
We shall draw water from the wells of salvation Upon the Rock we shall stand, our eternal foundation We shall raise our sails high and be carried along By the breath of the Spirit and a heavenly song.
Those who hear His still small voice Lie down in the night in peace and rejoice Even in the midst of the midnight hour There is glory in His praises and with them brings power
He leads us beside the eternal still waters into lush green pastures He has surely brought us Goodness and mercy follow all the days of our lives To a banqueting table we can barely describe.
His table to us is His manifest presence By the Spirit of God we speak with great eloquence Words that flow from the Kingdom within From the beauty of Holiness that lies therein
Evergreen trees give their fruit in all seasons There are a million ways to praise Him and a million reasons To rise up and with the morning sun and cry holy To walk in humility, to be contrite and lowly
He has planted us beside His holy river He has established us in His heart forever And forever and a day and forever it shall be be For into our very hearts He has placed eternity.
1Sa 20:31 For as long as the son of Jesse lives on the earth, you shall not be established, nor your kingdom. Wherefore now send and fetch him unto me, for he shall surely die.
We see here a complicated truth. What Saul says to Jonathan is actually true. Unless David dies, the kingdom of men, the kingdom of Saul, the future kingdom of Jonathan can never be truly established. There is enmity between what man wants and what God wants. They are diametrically opposed to one another. Jonathan sought to persuade his father on behalf of his beloved friend and it results in Saul now trying to kill his own son with a spear. The same spear, the same javelin, the same anger, the same rage that was all directed towards David, in a mere moment, was directed towards his own son. In the end it was never about David or Jonathan or even a kingdom, it was all about Saul. He cared more deeply about what people thought about him than he did about any other thing. Its the kingdom of self and many many men have destroyed everything around them in their worship of their own self destructive flesh.
Why is the cross so important? Why does it lie at the center of our faith? The reason? It is the one and only weapon that can take the flesh down. Jesus conquered the flesh on a cross. Jesus told His disciples that in order to follow Him, in order to be worthy of being His disciple, they must take up their cross daily. The battle against the flesh rages on. Its only means of death is a cross. Not a spear, not a javelin and not the weapons of this world. Our fight is against the flesh that raged within Saul. And on every occasion there is a lurking enemy ready to back up your flesh with very deliberate persuasive arguments as to why your flesh is correct. The sermon on the mount is the sword of God relentlessly and without mercy exposing and dispatching the real enemy. It slashes away at self preservation. It runs though self determination. It cuts asunder self promotion. It turns on its head self-ishness. All of this is useless to the man or woman who has not been born again. The dead man must be put in his grave and up from it must rise the man who is born again. Only he can walk the walk of the sermon on the mount.
Jesus says to Pilate “My kingdom is not of this world.” The kingdom of God is not established by men but rather it is established in the hearts of His saints. The Kingdom of God exists collectively and individually within us. There are forces that forever are trying to invade the Kingdom. They know what Saul knew. While there is a single “David,” that exists on the earth then the kingdom of men, the kingdom of darkness can never be established. And the tactic of the enemy has not, nor will it, change. It must eliminate the saints. It will not even be good enough to neutralize them from society and chase them into the wilderness. It will come looking for us in the wilderness. And it will look, for a time, times and a half a time to completely eradicate us. And it was given unto him to make war with the saints, and to overcome them: and power was given him over all kindreds, and tongues, and nations (Rev 13:7 ) Yet, we know, that the forces of darkness will fail. And just like Saul, the forces of darkness know it too. For the victory was already won on a day, 2000 years ago when Jesus announced “It is finished.”
And it came to pass on the morrow, that the evil spirit from God came upon Saul, and he prophesied in the midst of the house: and David played with his hand, as at other times: and there was a javelin in Saul’s hand. And Saul cast the javelin; for he said, I will smite David even to the wall with it. (1Sa 18:10-11)
Jealousy and envy lie at the heart of many a murder or a murderous spirit. Once it is given in to then they are given over to a spirit far worse. Murder rises from the darkness of our hearts and meets a spirit willing and able to take us down roads we would normally never go down. It becomes cold and calculating quite apart from the heat of passion. Saul knows fine well he is going to murder David and he sets about lulling him into a fall sense of security by “prophesying,” out of his distress. He is speaking, not on behalf of God but rather he is speaking from a place of jealous rage. It is so well controlled and so religious in nature that David takes up his lyre and begins to worship God having no idea what lurks in the heart of his his king. Then Saul, with all of his might mind you, with everything that is in him, unleashes the javelin in an attempt to not just injure him, but to run him through and pin David to the wall.
This spirit has manifested itself down through the ages. Jealousy and insecurity has been its primary motivator. How the Pharisees must have bristled by the multitude that followed after Jesus and would make Him their king. Murder rises in their hearts while all the time portraying themselves as men of God. And in every century since Jesus arose, religious men, men, jealous of those who actually know Jesus, who actually have a relationship with God, who actually enter into worship with Him, plot their downfall. Hangings, stonings, dismemberment, torture and vicious treatment all in the name of God, all flowing from the distress in their hearts when they encounter a man or a woman who actually know God. Even today we see the same spirit at work. The once born man becomes the all out enemy of the twice born man and often times all done under the same roof and under the name of God.
David’s attitude towards his primary enemy is outstanding. Jesus’ love for His enemies is the reason we now live. He forgave the ones who cruelly and with malice aforethought designed His downfall. Stephen cries out the same message while he is in the midst of being stoned to death. It breaks the chains of hell. One of the audience that very day at the stoning of Stephen would go on and write two thirds of the New Testament. And all down through the following 2000 years, men and women of God would face the same enemies with the same spirit and they would follow the dictates of the most High God. They would speak the truth in love. They would never relent, never capitulate yet never render hatred for hatred. They would stand strong in the worship of God and that worship would be first measured by their lives. Let us stand strong brothers and sisters in a day and age where tolerance is worshiped as a virtue but never actually lived out. Our enemies design is to pin us to the wall and do it all in the name of something that sounds very religious, tolerance. We know better, therefore we are to be as wise as serpents and as harmless as doves.
Fire from heaven rain down upon me now
Open the eyes of our hearts that might see and bow
Go forth before me Lord with your fire and you're rain
Burning all the dross and breaking every chain.
By your presence let all the mountains tremble
And rain down glory from above, from your eternal temple
Let the skies break forth that they may split asunder
When the lightening flashes and the earth shakes with thunder
The clouds are His chariots and He walks upon the wind
He broke the chains of hell and death and delivers those who sinned
His glory endures forever and He fractures the sky above
As the whole earth is filled with His eternal love.
He is our shelter from the storm, our precious strong high tower
He has filled us with His love and His everlasting power
Though worlds may fall to pieces and begin to crumble
We follow Him who walked before, and never did He stumble.
Take hold of His precious truth in a world that's full of lies
Raise your hands and lift them up, lift them up unto the skies
Look up and testify that our Redeemer lives
And that His mercy is still flowing and He surely still forgives
A Call To The Remnant 