The word of the Lord was sent me yesterday, near the end of a day and a half of devotion to worship:

“You will be tested severely (to the extent of your faith).  And you will be laid low.  But I will come to lift you up.”

Nothing awakes awareness like such a statement from the Lord who does not lie.  And it should be known to all, that I post this as a marker to His testimony within His servant.  He is Lord of all!  And all His children are equal in His sight.  It is He who makes a man righteous.  And it is He who makes the beasts of the field.  All things belong to the Lord God Most High.

But I take no fear in this.  The test will be severe, yes.  But it will be to the extent of my faith.  I also see that I am not told I will be tempted to the point of falling.  I am told it will be a test to see the extent of my faith.  And I take heart, great heart, in hearing that He will appear to lift me up at the end.

I say in response, and ask no intervention of prayer (for what the Lord has spoken will surely come to pass), “You are God.  All Your Holy ways are Righteous.  And Your Love is unfailing.  I am Your servant.  May it be done to me as You have said.  And may You receive the Glory You deserve for the power of Your Holy hand!”

Amen, Amen, and Amen!

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Thursday, October 06, 2011

“You are to be tested severely; to the extent of your faith.  And you will be laid low.  But I will come to you to lift you up.”

This was said to me at the end of a day and a half of worship and dedication to the Lord.  In Okemos, Mi (10-2-2011), on a 34 hour restart.  I had to spend that time parked behind a store.  I had run out of hours to drive.

Since that day I have watched.  I considered that this testing would be in the form of doubt.  Then It occurred to me that it might be a sickness foisted upon me by the one who accuses, as it was with job.  Then I considered that my wicked past would be made public and that all who know me and those I love would turn away from me and I would become homeless and destitute.  Indeed, all these things might come upon me.

But I woke this morning and smelled something within me that I now realize I perceived last night as I drove:  Doubt draws near like a fog in the evening.  Before the darkness sets in, a man’s vision is obscured.  He finds himself groping for familiar objects as he makes his way back home.  But a simple word of praise and a remembrance of His Love restores the Light which drove away the fog.

I found myself speaking a string of beautiful words and praise to the Lord last night.  Almost without ceasing for over 2 hours I praised the Lord.  I recounted His Glory in me.  The signs, with which, His Spirit has transformed me from dust to a shining light.  Not one word was at fault as I recounted the Lord’s beauty and gentleness, which He has extended to me.  I marveled that my tongue could speak such a long string of beauty without sin.  I had appealed to Him to bless me with beautiful thoughts.  Such a flurry of beauty my tongue expressed!  This was a sign to me of the faith He has bestowed upon me.  It is a powerful sign.  Though my simple mind will forget the words, He will hold them in the palm of His hand.  For they now belong to Him.  They will be given back to me when I appear before Him!  Though they are His words, He gave them to me.  Only by His Grace, do I own them.

This morning, after such a display of faith and blessing last night, I woke and felt a question pop into my head.  I wondered if it were a lie.  Perhaps I had simply mouthed those words as a parrot might repeat what is played in his ears often.  Perhaps the boredom of driving and isolation caused me to believe without any basis for that belief.  But I remembered that prophecy to me; that I would be tested to the full extent of my faith.  And it came anew, that what the Lord speaks is true and faultless.  Doubt enters in and I must watch it closely.

I do not fear this test from the Lord.  Why should I fear what comes from my Lord?  I would know the fullness of my faith.  And the Lord would know the extent of my faith.  It is a test.  In this test, there is no pass or fail.  I would push it as hard and long as I can.  And it is important to struggle hard to maintain what He has taught me.  Is not the nature of a test?  I will see the end of my faith; that which He has given.  He has provided this faith by many signs to me.  As it is so with me, so it is with all His people.

He has rescued me from the very pit of hell.  I don’t say that lightly or as some might quote a saying they have only heard.  I was there at death’s door.  My sins were worse than most who do not believe God.  I became like the most hideous of them, and worse.  What made me worse is that I knew the Lord was pure and Holy.  I knew that He demanded that His people become holy, even as He is holy.  Yet I fell into horrible lies, immorality, drunkenness, rage, slander, and every possible sin.  My fall was set ablaze by my pride and folly.  He has told me that He watched it all.  This had become my horrible shame.

These things were true.  They have become something I have done.  They are a sign to me, it is the Lord who allows life.  It is the Lord alone who lifts up and lowers man.  He alone is the source of life.  I say, what is it to me if the entire world knows what I have done?  What is it to me if I end up homeless and shamed?  Before Jesus, I deserved the death reserved for those who hate Him.  How should I deny the suffering imposed by being a man in this Place of Testing?  The Lord has forgiven those things I did, and He has set me on my feet.  He has given me a new heart.  I will not be ashamed before Him.  All men would disown me if they knew the extent of my sins.  In fact, they would kill and dismember me before they burned my bones to powder.  Then they would gladly add them to a rocket headed into space and discharge my very memory from among them.  Man is vile and mean.  Man is as wicked as the lord of flies they happily offer service.  Suffering is their god and they expend their power on whomever they choose.  I expect such things from them.  How should I know about that?  I am one of them.  And I was the worst of them.

He came to pick me back up, however.  He set me on my feet and caused me to walk in that path called The Way.  And years later, I walk now as never before.  I find strength to resist every temptation that held me near the sulfur-ridden gates of Hell.  All this strength is directly from the Lord Himself.  Thus He owns my love.

Man does not have the strength to resist.  Nor does he have the strength or faith to walk before the Lord upright.  All good things come from the Lord.  Having come to know this, He has allowed me to walk with a power I have never had.  I not only trust Him.  But, I have entered into many amazing understandings as I presented myself before Him.  The kindness and mercy of God is unspeakable.

He has granted that I perceive Him as more real than the people, objects and animals which are in this world.  We will see how far this faith, He has provided, will take me.  I will know, and so will He, how true my faith really is.  He has carried me and placed me where I am today.  It is right for Him to test me in this fashion.  In Him, I find no fear.  In me is every present possibility to destroy what God has made.  If there is fear within me, this is the source.

Remember these things Paul.  You are entering in and you know it.  When you perceive that all your experience with Him might have been a product of your mind, remember those beautiful words you spoke so fluidly for over 2 hours.  What man can do such a thing?  God alone redeems.  He will not leave His people in the dust.  By that statement, hope arises.

Remember Peter.  You know who he is, and you presently watch the Glory of God unfold.  Remember the praying woman.  The vision of her praying, and the subsequent confirmation of that vision, will give you strength.  Remember the love you have felt from He who is Love eternally.  Remember the gasping tears you have cried; both at your sins, and at the touch of His Hand of Love.  Remember the wisdom He has given you as you rendered a conclusion to another’s dilemma.  Remember how He has guarded your way through dangerous paths.  Remember how He has lifted you up from a life of complete waste and sin.  Look at the love you hold in your heart for the people around you.  Look at the joy you now own.  Consider the testimony one holds regarding you.  That one was there and saw you nearly die.  Remember the night when you almost died, two nights, even three.  He sent someone to wake you from your intent to sleep.  Remember, “Cain is Able.”  Remember your liberty.  Remember that liberty which He allows you to render; either to keep or to sacrifice to His Glory.    Remember Elk Mountain.  Remember the deadly place you crossed by the peace He gave you.  You drove through the snow, wind, and ice as if on a holiday drive in the middle of spring.  150 miles of terror turned to a wondrous peace!  Remember!  Read this letter you have made for yourself and consider, are these the words of a man who does not know God?

I will remember!  We will see how far this faith of mine, which He has given me, will last.  There is a place of being laid low.  But, it is in the Hand of God, to have taught me as I enter this place of testing.  His work will become apparent.  Even now, I see the fruit of His Love in these words.  Even now, I take great heart of His faithfulness!  He is Good!  And His beauty lasts forever!

Consider this letter to yourself and remember, it was He who provided all these things.  I know He is true.  What He says will surely come to pass.  Regardless the walls and weapons a man amasses, the Lord’s truth will penetrate.  If He has said I will be laid low, it will happen.  But I will not desire that such a lying low should happen within three days!  Does my faith really have only that tiny a mass?  I say NO!  Surely, I will be tested!  God will apply His wisdom to me.  We will both know the extent of His lovely touch upon me.

You are not your own.  You are purchased with a price, which can only be paid from the Holy God of Israel, even Jesus.  Father, I set my heart to serve You.  I know You have been gentle and kind to me.  You have given me gifts that I had only heard of in the past.  Now I own them; wisdom and love are mine.  I praise You for all Your beauty.  Even that Beauty I have never seen.  Now I see you with adoration as a blind man praises his love by the sound of her voice.  I will see Your Holy face by the promise of Your Son’s Sacrifice.  You are my God!  You teach Your people to say, “May Your Will be done.”

I will say this, to myself and to all men:  Wait for the Lord!  Have hope, for He offers it without cost.  He has paid the price for you.  Wait for Him.  Call on His name and be silent.  Wait and you will see His hope blossom within your soul.  Wait for Him.  I will wait for the Lord my God!  He will set me in a place of glory.  He has said that He has glorified His Son.  And, His Son has spoken that it is His desire that those who the Father gives Him will see and share in His Glory!  Hope all things, this is love; Love from God.  Wait for Love’s sake.  Trust Him, for He alone is worthy of all trust! 

I consider His wrath to His people.  It is not like that of a man.  A slight displeasure from my God and my soul withers like a fragile flower in the heat of a summer day.  I know His Love is Life!  His touch is more pleasant than anything this earth can offer!  His touch is more than all things of this earth combined; those things which this world can offer.  I have His promise of Love and hope!  I will take great joy in His presence!  He has promised.  I believe!

He alone redeems a man.  His hand lifts up those He has intended to love.  I did not warrant His love.  He extended His hand of friendship to a man of Great sin!  I obey because He has touched me with that Love which was before all this came to be.  I obey because He teaches me to love Him!  He is my Love!  I cannot muster the will or strength, or words to express this love He is teaching me to own.  He is God!  There is no one like Him!

I have spoken to men regarding the Love of God.  I testify as one who has tasted this Love.  I testify that, if you will submit yourself to Him, you will come to Love Him more than you now love your sins.  I testify as one who knows!  I will not turn away from the One who is Love!  I believe!  I believe and I will receive His Glorious Salvation. 

Why would the wicked die without You?  They hold so tightly to the things that will not last.  Their senses are the extent of their god.  Yet You are immeasurably more!  Glory to Your Holy Name!  Glory!  Glory!  Glory!

h how lovely is the Lord my God!  How lacking is my tongue to express!  The words are not owned  by man to speak of the truth of God’s beauty.  How lacking is my tongue to express.  The Spirit of God within me is able.  Therefore, I will praise Him by His Holy Spirit!  Glory to You, Most High God!  For Your love is given to your enemies; they come to worship You because You touch them with Your Holy Love!  May You receive the Love of Your people forever.  For You alone are worthy.  Your Holy Love covers Your people as a fine raiment of Joy!

A man may say to himself, “I will serve the Lord.”  How will you serve the Lord?  What will you offer?  What thoughts will you receive from your own hand?  How will you dress yourself in love?  What kind of love might that become?  Love that comes from a man and becomes his expression of what he thinks is God’s love is, a selfish love.  Selfish love is no love at all.  And you cannot muster a love like God’s.  Why would you settle for that which is in your hand to do?  Why would you open your hands and render a worship to that which you can generate?  You will die.  And this false god you create, with the imagination of your own mind and the frailty of your body, will die with you.  And God will remain!  You will have missed the Glory of God by an eternity!  Why would a man say to himself, “I will serve the Lord.”? 

I testify that I have no right to proclaim any sin or offence against me.  Before the Lord, I have rendered you all free.  How should I hold any offence, which might have done to me?  I have been more wicked than any of you!  I owe you all.  You owe me nothing.  By the power of my God, the Lord Jesus, I have blessed those who might have offended.  I have proclaimed that no one will suffer loss because of me!  You are free from accusation regarding me.  I will carry no accusation or complaint to the Lord on your behalf.  Before the Throne of the Most High God I have rendered you free of these things.  You will receive no condemnation for any offence against me.  I say this that you might be free, even as He has set me free!  Seek Him with a clean conscience, regarding me.  For you owe me nothing.  Who is this fool that he should presume to be paid back anything from the hand of man?  I have sinned before the Lord and against you all, and so many times it is not possible to count them.  Were my sins divided among men, each city, town, and every village on earth, would request a payment.  It is I, who owe every man what I cannot repay.  How can any man repay such a toll when it is laid against him?  He has seen this plight.  His wisdom will render what is due on my account.  It is from the riches of my God, which will repay.  He has already done it in the testimony I hold of His Lovely Son Jesus!  Attach yourself to His sacrifice and reap more riches than you might have rendered if you took everything I have ever owned; even the drops of blood from my body.  In Him I repay, for He is all I own.  I am not a man of riches as the world counts them.  The riches I own in my Lord are Great!  I beg you to come with me to His Holy Throne, so that you might be paid from the riches I have.  My Father will repay what I owe. 

Some of you might say, “I will be free from accusation and condemnation because of what Paul owes me.  I ask you, however, have I really owed you enough to pass through the fire of His Holy Judgment?  I suspect not.  While you receive from my Father that which I owe you, you owe more than you can repay yourself.  There is a payment demanded, for we have spent ourselves on behalf of ourselves.  Selfishness is not the nature of the God who made this place.  Look how He gives to all.  Even those who hate Him, He allows to breathe, eat, and move freely about.  No man can own enough to pay the bill for what he has done out of the selfishness of his greed.  Look how the wickedness of the heart of man plays tricks on those who do not trust in the righteousness of God.

This work that I work with these words is a good work.  It is a good work because He, who alone is Good, is at the very center of my words.  What should I speak that is right?  What can I call mine that has not come from His Holy Hand?  He alone is God.  Only He can be Righteous, for all life comes from Him.  Everything that is righteous comes from the Hand of the Lord.  This test, then, is providing the food you now eat.  You have been invited “Come sit at a banquet of my flesh, mind, heart, and soul.”  All that is placed here before you is from the Lord of Life.  Eat your fill, and seek His mercy that you might eat even more.  Join me, by His Sacrifice, that we might join hands with Great Joy come that day.  His salvation is marvelous!  This joy does not wait for heaven.  Walking with Him now is to enter into the kingdom of God on this earth.  And, what is done by the Lord God in the heart of a man will not fail to see the light of Day.

I listen now to the Psalms.  How absolutely Glorious is God’s Promised Hope!  How beautiful to inhabit His Grace!  He whose word is True is to be respected.  Both the respect of fear of judgment and the respect of His Promise are due Him.  This test I encounter, is to do with the extent of my faith, and He has shown me from where it will end.  Yet, as I listen and believe, I wonder how I could doubt.  He is King, and what He has spoken will come to be.  He alone gives this Hope of His Promise!  And, if His hand is removed, even by a little, a man will stumble as if he were a blind and deaf man who walks in a silent, still, and rot strewn forest. 

We eat because He provides.  We drink water, clean water and good for our lives, because He provides.  We breathe so that we can speak His praises because He has provided such things for our good.  He alone gives reason to the mind so that we can consider His words and we respond as He demands.  A soul becomes lifted from death and destruction by the power of His Glory in the Holy Spirit Jesus has sent to those who love Him.  He alone is God, and He shall receive the praise of His people forever!

The Lord Jesus has spoken a beautiful joy:  “My Father will honor the one who honors me.”  This test of my faith is an honorable examination of my love for Him.  May God receive the fruit of His work within His servant.  I am come to love Him with the fullness of my ability.  Oh!  Let me learn to love Him with the Love He extends to me!

The wicked man perceives the Lord as his wicked mind allows perception.  The guilt of his own sins blots out the clear vision, which remains just beyond his eyelids.  If there is one man who hates God and abhors the faith, of those who God calls to Glory, who reads this chronicle, I tell you that what we say regarding God is true!  Your wicked unbelief will testify against you on the day He calls you to account. 

For now, you deny that God even exists.  You say these things because you have remained locked in the wickedness of your heart.  Sin covers your eyes, and you cannot see.  Yet, will you even hear these words?  Will you listen to the lie you were born with?  Will you become a man, and not a beast, and realize that you are not your own.  Men walk about proclaiming great boasts.  They busy themselves with the work of their hands.  They purposely ignore the Word of God.  How many Bibles litter the houses of the wicked?  How many pages of those Great Books are ever disturbed from their dusty existence?  Yet the day of accounting is approaching as fast as your death.  Once that day reached, there is no point of return.  Regret will counsel you for eternity.  Hopelessness becomes your counselor.  Your sloth and ignorant pride will be the lawyers who will try to defend you before the Most High God; He who never sleeps.  Will He even allow your tongue to move in the sticky dryness of your fear?  What breath will you use to provoke your vocal chords to make an intelligent noise?  You say that you are enough to save yourself.  So then, provide that breath yourself!  Draw a lung full from air which you created by your own hand.  How incredibly foolish we are who decide we are on our own.  For we walk on a ground we did not make.  We drink and wash with water, which did not result from the will of man.  We eat plants and animals we did not imagine into existence.  How foolish.  How foolish can we possibly get?  Isn’t this why the Psalmist said, “The fool says in his heart, ‘There is no God’”.  And there are more foolish men.  There are those who will ignore the Bible’s claims.  They will adapt weird alien creatures to take His place.  They will create a pond of mud, from which we all arrived in this glorious day of man’s lofty thoughts.  Those people refer to that pond as a theory.  Yet, they hold to it as if it is absolute and true.  And they promote this complete garbage to the children with a smile on their faces.  There is a day coming when none of them will ever smile again.

Do not let your silly pride puff up against me.  It is not my words, which accuse you of being a fool, or being foolish.  It is the Lord God, who has made you and proclaimed your stubbornness foolish.  Present your complaint to Him.  Why would you add to your misery by condemning me?  Perhaps He will look at the earnest ignorance of your mind and grant you understanding.

Now is the day to turn from your sins!  You wasted yesterday because you preferred your pride instead of humility.  You had a thought and you decided to give it honor.  But you refused to give honor to He whose thoughts cause planets to become out of nothing.  What will become of the wicked who give more honor to the walking dead; those whose death will end in trouble, than that of He who lived forever before this creation began?

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Friday, October 7, 2011

On Thursday I wrote as I could understand.  Not long after, however, I received the understanding needed to make sense of His words to me.

What I wrote Thursday was more farewell letter than an accurate depiction of His intent.  Perhaps it was more like my last opportunity to address the men of this world.  What did I know of what was true in the words spoken to me?  As it is with all God’s words, they come to us dressed in understanding.  We perceive them at first and take them in as we are able.  But, it is the gift of God to cause a man to understand His Glorious ways.

I will strive to unravel this word to me in a manner of the language of man.  I ask your patience and understanding, for I might miss the mark a bit.  The intent, however, is to help us all.  He has helped me and I perceive this help to be of value to all men.

1. 1.      It is God’s will that no man die the second death.  To those who appeal to His mercy through the sacrifice of Jesus, mercy is given to live.  No man can divide the Gospel in himself to the very place where life is offered.  Even a man, himself, cannot say where Life within him began.  We can measure our experiences and say that it seems to have happened on this day or that.  But we will surely stand amiss if we speak with certantity that God granted life to us at a specific time.  He moves within us long before we perceive His presence, let alone His acceptance.  The point is, the Gospel of Christ is from God, and only God knows when it is given to a man to Live.  We perceive this gift as if in a mirror, as we look behind today to what was and has become.
2. 2.      It is God who saves a man.  It is not in the hand of man to save himself.  And this is ordained by God to alleviate His people from pride (the greatest of man’s sins.  And the most hideous mark of the flesh).
3. 3.      God begins the work of salvation in a man.  He, alone, knows when and to what effect.  He knows our ability to receive.  He knows our ability to rebel.  He, alone, is able to render His Holy Ways to a man’s heart according to a wisdom born accomplishment.
4. 4.      As each new place of obedience is attained, we are prepared for another.  No man will attain to the full measure of the Lord Jesus.  But we are driven by God to move from where we are to where He wants us to be, toward the mark of His Son’s obedience.  This driving is such a beautiful experience.  We balk against Him, like little children who don’t want to stop playing.  We look at His face and see the understanding and love He has.  And His appearance softens our rebellion.  For we understand in a flash that He is providing us with what is good.  Our understanding of His intent becomes the driving force of our heart to obey.
5. 5.      He speaks to His people in various ways.  His wisdom is richer than every possible mixture of colors, and His people are as various as His wisdom.  Who am I to tell another that God will do such and such, because He did it to me?  I am not you.  You are not me.  And neither of us is God.  One thing, however, is sure.  It is God, who initiates our growth in His Glorious Righteousness.  Not one man can point to anything of his own and speak of it truly as the righteousness of God.  All belongs to God, or it does not have a belonging. 
6. 6.      So I speak of this from my understanding.  That does not mean I have no basis for this understanding.  What is related here is true, just as what another will relate regarding his testimony of God’s working within him can be true.
7. 7.      He has provoked and provided the man I am today.  I know where He has found me groveling in my own vomit and blood.  I know where He has raised me up to belong today.  I do not know where He will lead tomorrow.  But this divulging is born of words spoken to me.  So it is to that I turn my attention now.
8. 8.      “You are to be tested severely, to the extent of your faith.”  I rest now in understanding.  It is not saying that I will be tempted.  I will not fall from this place of Grace He has lifted me.  He is testing what He has accomplished, as a man might test a rope before a climb.
9. 9.      “Severely” indicates the intensity of this test.  It is not to be taken as a foreboding omen of sickness, pain, fear, or hopelessness.  He is promising me that this test will provide a seriously positive outcome.  There is no pass or fail.  It is the purpose of this test to accomplish, or render, a decision regarding what comes next.  And I now rest peacefully in His Glorious hand.  For He has caused me to understand His intent.
10. 10.   “. . . to the extent of your faith”, does not indicate that I will become faithless at some point, as I had first perceived.  He will know what faith is within me.  As a loving Father, He will prove His work to us both.
11. 11.   “You will be laid low” coherently follows.  The test has a purpose and an end.  If I will know the extent of my faith, it must follow that the end is shown.  How much rope do I have in my hand?  It must be measured, to know the answer to that question.  I will measure the rope from one end to another.  Only then will I truly know how much I have.  This also gives me peace in trusting His word to me.  I find great pleasure to submit myself to His unending wisdom and knowledge.
12. 12.   “But I will come to you and lift you up.”  How misunderstood those words were.  The misunderstanding was born from a lack of knowledge on my part of the words which came before it.  I perceived that I would fall sharply and with a great thud.  That, only after the carnage, would the Lord come to lift up what remained.  How foolish of me to think that my Lord of Love would treat His people like this.  He has my apology.  And I offer it to anyone who has read Thursday’s entry.
13. 13.   This lifting up is not unlike what He has done all along.  It is a correcting of my ways.  In the past, He has directed me by a constant voice of teaching.  It is this consistency of teaching that is to be lifted from me.  And He will know if His teaching has provoked the proper understanding.  Rightly so, I have leaned on this voice heavily, as I learned to obey His Holy desires.  It is a refinement of understanding.  For instance, If I listen to religion in Christianity, I learn to recite the Lord’s Prayer.  If I have no understanding of the prayer, I might use it every time I come before my Father.  But I have learned, over time, to apply that concept to other words.  And there is a language of prayer that is not born in the mind of the unsaved man.  We learn to talk to our God with truth.  The more we apply what we learn of Him, the more fluid our prayers become.  The more truth our prayers can inhabit as we learn of the nature of our Father.
14. 14.   In the sum of it all, He is the Great Teacher of all He accepts as sons.  He is teaching me how to stand on my own a bit, much like a child who graduates from kindergarten to first grade.   There will be misunderstanding on the part of the child.  Haven’t they just learned to get comfortable where they were?  But now it’s time to move from there to here.  Only a wise teacher will remember that rebellion will be stemmed by a loving and correcting heart.  His wisdom knows what to do.  And our first sign of His wisdom within us is that we quickly submit when we understand His intent.

I am His!  By His promise, He is mine!  He is allowed to do as He pleases.  And He teaches His people to say, “Yes, my Lord.”  May Your will be done forever, my God, and my King!

Amen.

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October 11, 2011

Through proof of His love, I drove the last couple hours last night.  I began to feel that I was sitting right next to Jesus, as we talked of things.  Proof was given to me that He was able to lead me to my destination on time, and I drove in peace and joy.

I arrived at the spot and with great confidence I went to Him in prayer.  I approached the Throne of God with a steady confidence that He would hear my prayer.  The things of His Kingdom were addressed and when the time was right, the needs of the people I know were introduced.  As I got some distance into this part of the prayer, I felt the confidence recede quickly.  I dismissed it as my wicked heart lying to me.  But it persisted.  Then it became obvious that I was no longer a welcome guest at His Throne.  So I stood up perplexed. 

Had I said something offensive?  My mind rolled fast over what had been said.  I found no accusation of conscience.  Then, after some wrestling with myself, I went back to prayer without that lovely confidence.  I had remembered the testing which was spoken to me.  I determined to push as far as my tiny faith would allow.  In the end, I could not say what the outcome had become.  I went to bed unsure.  But I was encouraged by His promises of love to any who are called by His Holy Name. 

Sleep came and rested on me with steadiness.  And the night has passed with no concern to my safety within Him.  The incident, however, has given a small jolt.  As I sat pondering this in my chair, a realization washed over me.  “At least I have a God to worship, whether or not He blesses me with His presence.”  My position before His is not that of one who is completely lost and without hope.  I can worship Him with the truth He places in my heart, even if I can only worship Him as if at a distance.  I come away from this odd encounter holding something precious: I consider myself greatly blessed to know His Love is Holy and true.  Though His ears turn away from my lips, He is still Holy, Good, Loving, Merciful, Full of Grace, Tender, my Rock, my protection, and my Peace.  As the psalmist has written, “Though He slay me, yet shall I live.”

I will still search my words before Him, lest there is something which has placed me at fault.  There is a trace of understanding forming within me.  I may have found the culprit.  He will make it clear to me as the morning moves forward.  I will learn of His ways, for the language of Heaven is a Holy language.  And all who learn to speak it will come under a certain stress of demand.  It is not a language of foreign words which come out of my mouth.  It is not a language which has no understanding within my mind.  It is a language which understands certain laws of honor before the Throne of God Most High.  It is more like the language a man might employ as he has his one shot to kneel before a mighty King and present his case with careful words.  With his head at stake, that man’s words are not rendered without considerable thought.  Wisdom, it is a Holy wisdom.  It is a wisdom which we reach for to give The Father of all Life the honor and respect He deserves.  I will come to understand, for He will teach me.

He has shown me what was wrong.  And if I speak of this to others, I wonder if they would understand.  While I was busy in my prayer to my Father, I kept referring to myself as His servant.  A very simple understanding was given me in regard to that:  What servant would speak to his father as he speaks to a king?  He accepts us through Jesus as sons.  He is my Father.  I am His son.  It might seem subtle to those who read this.  But it is so very important to BELIEVE.  It is not an honor for the Father to listen to His children address Him as a task master.  Something to consider for all men, yes.  How much more important to those who are called His children.

A ponderous thought resides on my heart.  If I am a son of the King of All Glory, what does that mean to me?  I mean to say, if I am not just a servant to be ordered around and forced to pray for others and such, what does that mean?  My Father is the God of all Life!  Who, then, are His sons?  I will, obviously, give that considerable thought.              

Wow!  All the privileges associated with a son of the Most High God are mine.  All the responsibilities associated with a son of the Most High God are mine.  He has often told me, “You do not yet know who you are.”  Though I perceive this teaching, it takes my entire mind to task to search it out.  “When I was a child, I talked like a child, I reasoned like a child.  But when I became a man, I put childish ways behind me.  Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face.  Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.”   (1 Cor. 13: 11, 12)

He is making it plain to me that I am His son.  Though it is impossible to ignore the source of that rich and great title, Jesus, it is important to grasp the fullness of understanding that God allows His people.  How many have never even come to consider their standing before the Father?  I refuse to become one of them.  He offers so very much more to any who will submit themselves to understand. 

Come!  The Father is waiting for you to ask.  Come!  The door remains open to all who would enter.  None of us need remain sons of darkness in this world.  Jesus has opened a door that we might become sons of the Most High God!  And I testify that this is a truth which is extended to all who would risk all to believe.  Come!  Yet, I cannot say that without reminding us all: There is a place where that door closes.  I will not pursue that thought further in this article.  There is a place for such a conversation.  I’m not up to it right now.  And, if you will please excuse me, I must go love my Father.

By His Grace.

 

By His Grace.