Tag Archives: Grace

Peaceless Peace

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prayer..

prayer.. (Photo credit: aronki)

The morning before dawn greeted me with a nightmare.  My belly complained to me with heart burn.  And the prospect of prayer before dawn beckoned to me.  For these reasons I left the restless place of sleep and came to seek the Lord’s face.

Knives were used against me in a dream.  It was ordered from a man that I should die.  And that man’s people hunted me down.  To my shame I tried to hide, but I was found.  I asked why.  But none of them answered with respect.  Violence covered them with dedicated violence.  And they cut at me.  In the end hatred consumed them and the final thrust of a knife was more than I was willing or able to dream.  So I woke.  The heartburn caused me no peace in my body.  And now my soul was troubled at the dream.  So I rose and came to seek the Lord’s face.

But in prayer there was no peace to be found.  No understanding came to me.  I confessed what sins I could grasp.  And my mind searched quickly through the day before to see if the Lord would shine a light on any of them as the reason for this “empty” place of prayer.  Nothing was found to separate me from His presence.  And I considered the meaning of this violent morning of peaceless turmoil.

I asked to be dressed by His Grace so that I could serve both He and man.  And I received what is true.  All good things come from God.  We are utterly empty of any means to provide what God alone holds in His Holy hand.  All things good remain in His hand.  What shall we give to purchase God’s blessings?  He will give what He will give.  And if He retains a certain peace, which we have come to expect, what shall we do to gain that which belongs to the Living God?  Who are we to demand?  It is God’s Holy Right to do as He pleases.  And with this peace has come.

It is not the peace I was looking for.  I came to seek those things He has given in the past.  But I found a place different; a peace has come which is fragile and somewhat unsure.  I had sought something deeper and more filling.  But two things came to me that I have known.  It is by faith alone that we will be saved.  Each day has its own trouble.  And I have remembered freshly that it is God who retains the right to teach as He sees fit.

May His will be done forever.  He is the Holy God of Israel.  We serve as we are given.  And all that is given comes dressed with His perfect wisdom and understanding.  Even in an unsettled emptiness I will serve Him and I will not complain.  Who am I to order the Lord to feed my perception and expectation of His perfect ways?

By His Grace.

“Suitable” for Who?

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The Garden of Earthly Delights [detail]. Neder...

The Garden of Earthly Delights [detail]. Nederlands: De Tuin der Lusten [detail]. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I had thought for many years that the creation of Eve was only that God had compassion on Adam.  I thought God considered loneliness in His man.  And that Eve was simply created to fill that void.  But after reading it again (with the new eyes the Lord Jesus has given me to see with), I see something new; something true and continuous from the truth I have come to realize over the years.

The word “suitable” is what turned my understanding.  I had thought that loneliness and companionship were the target of that creation.  Now I see that the word “suitable” stands out as the key to understanding the meaning of Eve’s creation from Adam.

Suitable for who?  Is the proper question to ask.  Suitable for Adam?  From Adam’s perspective?  Absolutely not.  Wasn’t God with him?  Wasn’t it Jesus who walked in the garden to fellowship with Adam?  How much more peace can a man get than to know the Lord of creation in person?  I have never seen Him.  Yet, by the faith He has given me, I see enough of Him to enter even into death with an enormous peace and contentment.  No.  It was not for Adam’s lack that Eve was created.  Suitable has to do with what is purposed by God Himself.

What was suitable for God was to create a place of testing for a people He would later gather into an eternal kingdom.  This was His purpose all along.  And we know that Jesus was crucified from the foundation of the world.

I have often told people who asked, that the two trees were placed in the Garden to create a people to redeem.  The trees were the engine which would Glorify the Son of God.  And then, at the first bite we can hear the engine start up.  Did Adam know this?  How could he?  All Adam knew was that his kind creator had made someone just like him; someone who he would be so attracted to that he would obey any desire she had.

She was weaker, for she was not built from the ground up.  She was built from a small piece of the man.  She was not first.  She was last.  She was the one who was tempted.  And she succumbed because God had planned, all along, that She would bring Adam into sin.

I read that Adam was told not to eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.  And I perceive that obedience was primary within the man.  Where obedience is full, there is no temptation.  So God created a creature which would reach deep inside the man’s heart and pluck out his obedience to the Lord.

All the Glory goes to Jesus.  And that, for the Glory of the Father in heaven.  For He has created this place to produce a crop of holy people who have passed the same test His Son underwent.  Don’t we read that those who overcome will be given the same glory as that of Jesus, short of ownership of all power, authority, strength, and such.  We are designed by God to endure by the power of the Lord Jesus so that God will gather for Himself a people who will never fail to obey Him, regardless the temptation.

All the more then, we struggle to reach out to the God who made us.  The God who tests our hearts, rebukes us as we wander, softens that hardness of heart which the serpent has, and leads us in His eternal ways.  The proving of the man of God is NOW.  Please don’t believe those who say that we can do as we please now.   They say that God will transform us when we see Him face to face.  Please don’t believe that lie.  Submit now and you will enter into the very place God has in mind for you.

By His Grace.

The Living Language of God

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Diagram of basic procedure to determine whethe...

Diagram of basic procedure to determine whether two sounds are allophones (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

My God, I thank You.  You have given us words to communicate with our brothers.  And among men we speak and are understood.  But there is a language You have used for eternity.  And it is these words You purpose to teach us to use.  When You speak, You do not use sounds.  You speak in living words.  All Your words are true, thus alive.  And I thank You that this can be understood by a people who are used to only speaking sounds.  These sounds are heard, remembered for a time, then fade away.  But Your words last forever.

There are times, my God, when I think of what You are giving Your servant and marvel.  There are times when this seems but a dream. For we are taught to doubt from the moment we are born.  Yet You continually prove Your love to my soul.  This is true of all who know You.  And we rise in one accord to give You praise for Your loving hand among us.  We say, “There is a faith which becomes a ‘knowing’.  There is a God, invisible to man, who makes Himself known.  He is the Living God.  He speaks to us with Living Words.  And we will believe because You have touched us.  We believe because You have Spoken to us by granting us Life.  Those who went out from among us did not belong to us.  For if they had belonged to us they would have remained.  For to know Your touch and instruction is to gain life itself!  And no living creature desires to die.  Rather we move nearer that we might learn to truly live.”

There are words a man might speak which require no sounds from his lips.  These “words” are deeds of love to one another; a service rendered back to He who gives freely.  They speak louder than a man can scream.  And they last through time eternal.  This is the language of my God.  It is Your purpose to create a people for Yourself who understand these things.  And You willingly teach all who will submit to You about these things.

Holy are Your ways!  Marvelously Holy, pure, powerful, and complete are Your ways!  Glory adorns You forever.  And what astounds me is this:  Though nothing impure will ever enter Your Holy presence, You dress Your servants with Your own Righteous Light.  You have provided a manner, way, power, and path, by which we have hope to enter Your Holy presence.  Your Holy Son is this means.  And it is Your own Hand which has done this.

Praise to the Father through the Son!  For He has created a people for Himself from that which was not, and now is.  Glory is the Father in Heaven!  Eternal Glory!  Great is He who purposed to collect a people for His Son from this “Place of testing”.  Glory, Glory, and Glory to He who IS!  Amen.

By Your Grace.

Under the Eternal Oak

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Remrkable oak at Saeul, lieudit Hëlzent, Luxem...

Remrkable oak at Saeul, lieudit Hëlzent, Luxembourg. This oak is around 280 years old. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Still I sit, head bowed in utter dismay.

Breaths come because they have to come.

In my lap are things sincere; righteous acts done in earnest.

Someone has opened my eyes and true light enters them.

Now they stare in disbelief at what I thought was good.

“I did these things?”  I whisper with dry lips.

“All of this, which lay in my lap, is a putrid mass!”

God has spoken, and my heart heard the message.

But understanding only came when I sat here to pray.

Offering was made and my eyes were opened.

The things brought for His pleasure are but a steaming pile of dung.

He alone is Righteous!

He alone is Pure!

He will grant me what is good.

Then, at some place distant, I will sit again under that eternal Oak.

And I will praise Him with Pure things.

For He will dress my ways with Glory along this way to the Eternal Oak.

By His Grace!  Again, by His Grace!  All good things are solely by His Grace.

Responsible

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Father Ford in the fire truck

Father Ford in the fire truck (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

A dead body cannot be responsible.  Neither can a fool be responsible.  It is even hard for a righteous man to be responsible.  Why?  In answer, let me take responsible apart:  Response Able.

God has given gifts to men for the sake of His Holy name.  He has given forgiveness for sins.   What is our response?   Do we dress ourselves with ability to respond?  Or do we take His Glorious gift for granted.  He has spoken in the gathering of wickedness.  He has danced a Holy dance in a body for all to see.  He endured this place of testing without sin.  And God has granted Him, (Jesus) Glory, Joy, Eternal Life as the Ruler of all.

I look at the ability of Jesus to respond to His Father as He walked in this utter black world of decayed souls.  And I am amazed that He performed perfectly!  He did not cave to the words and actions of man.  He desired only to be available to the will of His Father.  And He shunned all proposals to capitulate with the enemies of His Father.  He made Himself able to respond to the will of God.  He is perfectly Responsible to God, the Father of all Life and Righteousness.

With that in mind, I ask again, are we individually able to respond to the Grace given us?  Are we responsible Christians?  I write this with a severe anger at the sinful nature within me.  I remember what was spoken, and will not be taken out of the way, “Hate what is evil and cling to what is good.”  This is what is asked of us.  And it is not an unjust request.  For He gives us the power to over come.  What will be our response?  Are we able to be willing to work?

We retain men who have learned to put out fires.  If they are not responsible, what is the possibility that they can carry out the charge that has been laid upon them?  God has retained us through the sacrifice of His Holy Son.  Are we responsible?

In Hopes of Helping

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A cardboard box that appears to look shocked a...

A cardboard box that appears to look shocked and unhappy (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I will relate what the Lord has done for me.  I hope this is helpful to others.

He came back to get me when He had let me chase after sin for a season.  During the last three years, or so, He has spoken plainly to me regarding what I must do every moment of every day.  Now, if that were the sum of my testimony about what He has done for me it would not be fair to others.  One more thing He has done that needs mentioning:

I had no teacher during those three years.  It was the voice of Jesus alone which guided me toward what was pleasing to His Father.  And as I understood I noticed Him ceasing to speak of certain issues.  And when a new issue came up about my behavior He would instruct me in that also.

Now I have reached a point of understanding that seems to please the Father enough to suffice.  There are many more things to build on, to say the least, but they will become a testimony of what is “more”.  I am not saying I have arrived at a holy life.  I am saying that it was the leading (the direct leading) of Jesus that has brought me to this place.

I mention these things because many of my brothers and sisters struggle against many sins and difficult times.  I want to encourage you to seek His face with all patience and humility.  I know you already do that.  But I urge it all the more.  He has taught me to listen to “what is.”  I mean that He taught me to look for Him in the present, for the present is what eternity is.  He has allowed the memory of what I have done to remain as He has uncovered the reasons for it and shown me the proper way to live my life.  I hear His voice less clearly now.  But there is absolutely no loss.  For He has taught me how to live what His voice was urging me to attain.

Was there a formula I used to get here?  The answer is a yes and no.  These things you have known from the beginning:  Read your Bible, pray, then do what the Bible and answer to prayer says you should do.  If there is a formula that is it.  Seek the will of the Holy Father in Heaven and do not lean on your own understanding.  Don’t rely on man’s version of Christianity (psychology and the watered down gospel of the day).  But seek the pure will of the Lord.  He will show you what is necessary.  And if you do not have a worthy teacher in Christ, Christ Jesus Himself will show you.

He once showed me a vision to give to another:  I saw a box with eyes and arms with its hands folded in prayer.  He commanded me to fold my hands like that and speak.  What my lips spoke I relayed to the man, “Though they are led in darkness, yet will I lead them out.”  So I can say with great confidence, take great heart in the Lord you serve in faith.  He is willing to lead you to the Father.  He is willing to give you the prosperity of eternity.  And He is quite able to accomplish what He has promised He will do.  Only be patient and humble while you wait for Him to arrive in that certain moment of eternity which is called “today”.

By His Grace.