Next Few Weeks

Because of a special set-apart season for me in the Lord, the postings for the next few weeks will simply be quotes from a variety of men and women of God who have discipled me through their books over the years.

I'll begin this series of quotes this week with the words of Roland Allen, an Anglican missionary in China from 1895 till 1903. His experience in the missions world resulted in books that present the work of missions through a different lens than that through which we, as modern western missionaries, are used to looking. I highly recommend two books by him: "Missionary Methods: St.Paul's or Ours?" and "The Spontaneous Expansion of the Church."

In his chapter entitled "Fear for the Doctrine" in "The Spontaneous Expansion of the Church", Allen says the following:

"What Christ asks of His disciples is not so much exposition of doctrine about Him as witness to His power...It does not require long training for a man to say: 'Whereas I was blind now I see.'...There is a difference between the revelation of a Person and the teaching of a system of doctrine and practice...the Person is greater than the doctrine and far excels it."

Jesus, You are altogether lovely and our hearts exclaim that You far excel any doctrine about You! Holy Spirit, show us the transcendent beauty of Jesus...thank You!

The Remembrancer (Part 2)

Last week we looked at the role of the Holy Spirit as "Remembrancer" - the One who is assigned to remind Jesus' followers of all that He has spoken. The Spirit has no memory problems! Besides that, He knows the Father and the Son perfectly, and He knows each child of God perfectly. He knows exactly what I need to hear when I need to hear it! In contrast, I forget easily and quickly when the pressures of life bear down on me. It's good news that the burden of remembering is on His shoulders and not mine.

While the weight of the responsibility for remembering the words of Jesus at the precise moment of need is on the Spirit of God, I have a small but necessary role to play in order to continually have ears to hear when the Remembrancer is wanting to remind me of something. I see the believer's role as two-fold:
1. Saturate my heart and mind with the Word of God in prayer and fasting.
2. Fellowship continually with the Holy Spirit.

I'm going to assume that the reader knows the Word of God and continues prayerfully and regularly in the Word. (If not, that needs to be established so that the Spirit has material from which to draw to remind you of in the moment of need.)

For those who are faithfully in the Word and prayer, my encouragement to you is to practice fellowshipping with the Spirit continually. One of the best ways to do this is to pray a lot in the Spirit (in tongues) if you have that gift. This is a dynamic way to be in ongoing communion with Him even while engaged in other activities. Also, talk directly with Him and ask for His help; ask Jesus regularly to fill you afresh with His Spirit.

To fellowship with the Holy Spirit means we talk often to Him as we give our heart to Him. It means we hear back from Him in a two-way dialogue. The Holy Spirit honors our part in the relationship by not forcing us to dialogue with Him, if we do not want it. He is in us a bright light that drives darkness out and overpowers the darkness of confusion, accusation and rejection (Jn. 1:5); a consuming fire that devours everything that gets in the way, like bitterness and addictions: a flowing river that connects our heart with the spontaneous movement of God’s heart (Jn. 7:37-39).

David calmed and quieted his soul. (Psa. 131:2) We need to "dial down" and listen. The fallen human soul is naturally over-active. An over-active soul keeps us out of sync with the subtle movements of the Spirit. We quiet our soul to connect with the Spirit’s whisper in our heart. It takes a while to get in sync with this (it may take weeks or months of practice).

Below are some simple suggestions for fellowshipping with the third Person of the Trinity:

As you linger in His presence, speak affectionately (intermittently saying to God, “I love You”) speak slowly, softly (not shouting at the indwelling Spirit), briefly (short phrases not paragraphs, even reducing phrases to one word) and minimally (listen twice as much as talking) with many pauses, praying with our spirit (1 Cor. 14:2) along with gentle sighing (Rom. 8:26). “Less is more” in terms of amount and volume of speaking. Take time to record thoughts and prayers so as to capture the truths He gives you.

There are phrases all through the Bible that we can use for quiet repetition so that the soul quiets down to hear the whispers of the Spirit; the following are a few from Psalm 119:
1. “Open my eyes” (vs. 18)
2. “My soul breaks with longing for Your judgments” (vs. 20)
3. “Have mercy” (vs. 58)
4. “Give me understanding (or revelation)” (vs. 73)
5. “My soul faints for you” (vs. 81)
6. “Revive me” (vs. 88, 107)
7. “I am Yours; save me” (vs. 94)

Thank You, Holy Spirit, that You are the Light and Fire and River of God; You are constantly vigilant to remind us of Jesus and His Word. Thank You that we can know You and dialogue with You and experience the grace and power that comes through communing with You and becoming increasingly acquainted with Your subtle nudges and whispers. Thank You for Your passion for the Father and for the Son - would You make Them known to us as we fellowship with You, in Jesus' name. Amen.

The Remembrancer (Part 1)

John 14:25,26 "These things I have spoken to you while I am still with you. But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you."

I am increasingly grateful for the Spirit of Jesus! He is wonderful and He is perfect in fulfilling His role as God, the third Person. It's obvious by all that Jesus says about Him (especially in the Gospel of John) that He loves the Holy Spirit.

One role of the Spirit is that of Remembrancer. "Remembrancer" is an old word referring to a person who helps another person remember what is needful. Jesus said of His Spirit that He would remind us of His life-giving words in the moment of need. What a wonderful Gift! It's not up to me to try to figure out which word of Jesus applies to my current situation; He is the One who knows best how to minister the Word of God to my life. And from personal experience I can testify to how delightful and surprising His quickening of the Word is to given situations.

For example, a simple but profound experience that marked me as a young missionary was when one of my major supporters died suddenly. This person was giving me 1/5 of my needed monthly financial support. When I received the news, I was tempted to panic; then the Father's Spirit whispered to my spirit, "Nita, I am your Source; I didn't die!" That simple word (based on Matt. 6:33 and many other truths in the Word) immediately brought me peace. The Spirit reminded me that God is my Source and Provider; the means of provision come and go, but the Provider is eternal and He is my Father.

As I journey with the Lord and as I help others in their journey with Him, I'm struck by how much we weak and fallen humans desperately need constant reminding of truth in Christ Jesus. As western Christians we have no shortage of Bible information, but I believe we lack a personal and ongoing experience of the Spirit of Jesus who is not only able to keep reminding us of what we have learned, but delights to function as Remembrancer of Jesus' words and life.

We humans forget easily and quickly. (Notice how much this is underscored in the account of Israel's history in Psalm 106; in contrast, God is good at remembering.) It is a living and current fellowship with the Holy Spirit that holds us steady in the Truth in our moment of need. The more we commune with Him, the more alert we are to His slight whispers and nudges throughout the day. These reminders from Him come in a variety of ways; sometimes they come directly from Him to our inner life, other times through outer influences. He is wanting to constantly remind us of truths that we know and that will empower and liberate us in the moment of need.

Next week I'll follow up on this with some simple and practical steps by which I believe we can cooperate with the Spirit of God as He fulfills His role as Remembrancer.

Jesus, thank You for the "Promise of the Father" about Whom you spoke before You ascended to God. What a blessed Gift - Your very own Spirit! Thank You that you have left us without Someone to remind us of Your truth, Someone Who not only has perfect memory of Your words but Who also knows me perfectly and knows what I need to remember in any given moment and situation. Thank You, thank You!

Trust

Today I took my filthy car through an automatic car wash. There were at least two times during the process that large lit-up signs gave these instructions:"no braking; and hands off the steering wheel." On top of that, the man who was at the start of the wash yelled the same instructions loudly to me through my closed window.

As I approached the end of the wash when the dryer was running and there was no opening out into daylight, a different lit-up sign said something like, "Relax; the door will open automatically..." Sure enough, it opened just in time!

Obviously, all those signs and instructions indicate that the creators of the system count on fallen humans' bent towards grabbing for control when disorientation comes into our lives.

It was an experience in trust, because in the middle of the wash, I could hardly see anything. The mixture of heavy dirt and soapy water covering all my windows made visibility almost nil. If I had not trusted what the machine and the people running it said, I would have grabbed the wheel and hit the brakes.

What was it that made me trust myself into the hands of this machine and obey its instructions to let go of control of the car in order for it to be cleaned? A few things come to mind:

1. Promise: the company that created the machine promises that it will do the job well and without injury to the user.
2. Laws: there are laws that enforce the fulfillment of the claims made in such promises.
3. Experience/proven-ness: both my own experiences and others' experiences of such machines gave me confidence that it would all come out just fine. Countless people over recent decades have used these machines with success.

There are very real reasons I can trust in the Lord and not depend on my own understanding (grabbing the steering wheel and hitting the brakes when doubt and fear strike my heart). Those reasons are the following:

As a wholehearted follower of His, I have His Word and promises of His perfect leadership and control over all of my life; He has promised to fulfill His purposes for me and tells me that all of His intentions are for my well being.

Backing up those promises is all of the force of God and His Kingdom. The One making the promises is Love, He is Faithful and True, and He is powerful to fulfill what He has spoken. His nature, character and works back up all that He says.

And all of my experiences of His work in my life along with countless testimonies of His people through all ages of human history tell me that His words have been tested over and over and over and they have been proven true. Not once has He ever failed to fulfill His promises to any human.

The apostle Paul says by the Spirit that we see as though we're looking into a very dim mirror in this age, but someday we will see Him face to face, the One who has proven Himself true in every circumstance of every person's life. Trusting the Lord is not "blind faith" but it's walking according to His promises which are fully backed up by His nature and actions as tested and proven true by countless saints (including me) throughout history.

Our emotions will vacillate and there will be times when for a moment we'll reach out to grab control of the steering wheel, but by His grace, we quickly let loose again as we remember Who He is that has promised to bring us into fullness. As one worship song goes, "All men's empty promises lie broken at Your feet, but You have never broken one!"

Praise Your name, dear Lord Jesus!

Mary and Martha (Part 2)

Last week I wrote some thoughts on what I believe Mary and Martha represent related to contending for faithfulness to Jesus as First Love in the midst of internal and external pressures to prioritize that which screams the loudest for our attention in everyday living.

This week I'll share some steps for cooperating with the Spirit of Jesus to fight for a life of spiritual intimacy and of living from the inside out rather than being driven from the outer life. I'll put these steps into two categories - first, the changing of mindsets and second, practical steps:

1. Change of thinking

a. Be convinced that the attitude and action of Mary to pause everything in order to hear Jesus' words is His priority for all of His own. Talk to the Lord about this; ask the Holy Spirit for living understanding of His heart in this. Read the writings of the great saints throughout the generations; those most fruitful were those who prioritized prayer and devotion to Jesus no matter how busy their lives are/were. (Men like Oswald Chambers and Watchman Nee warned believers that our bentness as fallen humans is to prioritize ministry to people at the expense of ministering to God.)

b. Prepare your heart and mind for the fact that while this sounds wonderful in theory, you will have to fight for this reality every day and that it will cost you to actually live this way, just as it cost Mary. You are swimming upstream to do this, even in the Church. Having said that, I'll add that there is much grace for this once the heart and mind is set in this direction.

c. Ask the Holy Spirit to help you. Only He (God, the Third Person) can truly love God in and through you; and only He knows you perfectly and can lead you in this journey. Ask Him for ongoing revelation of the Father's heart of affection for you and the Bridegroom's heart of desire for you even in the midst of what you define as weakness and failure on your part; without this understanding, it is very hard work to find time to be with Him (or when being with Him, to have an open spirit), because of fear of how He will receive you when you approach Him.

2. Establishing a habit

a. Set a time in your schedule to regularly sit at His feet to listen to Him in and through His Word. Without actually putting something on the calendar for meeting with Him, we can't know Him and experience Him as He wants us to. This will look differently for each person, but just as in a healthy marriage, the spouses find time to be alone together, so we need this with Jesus. It is this faithful regular seeking to know what He is really like that will sensitize you to feel His gentle and subtle nudges during the busy times of your day.

b. Find devotional helps to use in your time with Him. There is plenty available, especially now that there's easy access to the internet. Make sure it's grounded in the Word and in the Spirit. Since much of our struggle in seeking God is based on wrong ideas of how He views us, I would suggest that you read and meditate, with the help of the Holy Spirit, on portions like Hosea, Jeremiah 2, Song of Songs. The International House of Prayer has much material available on these themes: www.ihop.org.

c. Ask someone to be your helper if you need this in order to establish the habit. Being in solid Christian relationships is imperative for ongoing growth in knowing Jesus, no matter how long we have walked with Him. As you get established in your personal walk with Him, He will lead you to partner with others to develop a shared walk with Him.

Many of you already have a vital walk of intimacy with Jesus; in that case, I simply encourage you to continue on and look for ways to grow and to help others develop in their personal life and experience with the living God. May the Lord empower your heart through the revelation of His desire for you!

Mary and Martha (Part 1)

There's confusion at times around the persons of Mary and Martha among us believers. I find that when this topic comes up, there's often guilt related to this story (Luke 10:38-41), reflected in the defensiveness that arises about these two sisters.

I don't pretend to have a final word on the subject, but I hope what I share may help give at least a piece of understanding as to why the Holy Spirit made a point of including these young women in the Word of God. I don't believe His intention was to pit the two against each other and thereby cause us to do the same.

There's A LOT that could be said about them. My point in this 2-part writing is to say that I believe that Mary and Martha each represents a mindset or attitude related to priorities. I'm not convinced that any one person is a "Mary" nor that any one person is a "Martha". I don't think we're intended to apply these labels artificially.

We tend to think that the very active person who has a calling to work with his/her hands is not expected to spend time at the feet of Jesus because of the demands on him/her and because they just aren't the contemplative type. On the other hand, we look at a more contemplative type person as someone who finds it easy to sit and listen to Jesus and who doesn't do anything else.

I see Mary as representing what I'll call the "spirit of first Love". In other words, she exemplifies the one who has settled in his heart that he will do whatever it takes for Jesus to remain true to Jesus as First Love in a world that is constantly pulling and pushing the believer into so much human-initiated activity that he has little time to sit at Jesus' feet to listen to Him.

I see Martha as representing the believer who has given up the fight and reconciled himself to being a slave of the expectations of himself and of others.

I had a simple experience a number of years ago that the Holy Spirit used to open my understanding to what it means to have a "Mary" heart. One Saturday morning I was going through my normal routine of having a simple breakfast after having had time in the Lord and His Word. As I finished eating, I got up as normal to wash the dishes, and suddenly I had a sense of the Lord drawing very near to me in a manifest way. My first thought was that I would wash the dishes and then take some moments to be with Him. At that moment the Spirit of God whispered to me that this was a Mary/Martha moment. The "Martha" response to His nearness is to finish the task at hand first THEN stop to be with Jesus. The "Mary" response is to push the "pause" button, leave the task undone and be with Jesus.

By God's grace, I chose the "one necessary thing" that morning; of course, the dishes got washed a little later. The secondary things that have to get done will get done when we make being at His feet priority.

All of God's own are called to be "Marys" in heart and mind, though the expression of this will differ with each one according to each calling and personality; it's a heart posture of fighting for being at Jesus' feet as top priority, being His friend above all else. Notice that I speak of "fighting" for this; in other words, it's the attitude and action of contending for the "first Love" lifestyle even though we will never feel like we've "arrived." I believe Martha represents the one who has decided to quit fighting for this place at His feet and has settled for a lesser place of not experiencing His nearness and is content to serve Him at a distance and leave intimacy with Jesus to those who we think are more "naturally wired" for that.

Put into different language, I see Mary and Martha as pictures of walking in the spirit and walking in the flesh. Sarah and Hagar (as taught about in Galatians 4:21-31) are pictures of the same.

God has fashioned you uniquely for Himself; whatever your uniqueness looks like, you can have a Mary heart, one that desires and fights to be in the "first Love" relationship with Him. Even when you feel you don't attain this (and how do we ever know we've attained??), your desire and struggle to live in this reality counts to Him, and His heart is moved by you. The more living understanding you have of His heart being touched and moved by your fight to keep Him in first place, the more empowered your heart will be to walk in the "Mary" reality.

Next week I'll share some thoughts about how we can cooperate with the Holy Spirit to fight the good fight of remaining in the Vine, true to Jesus as our First Love.

Lord Jesus, thank You for Your life and death and resurrection and ascension and for the Gift of Your very own Spirit by which we are empowered to be men and women with hearts and minds like Mary of Bethany. Come and increase desire for You so that we can leave undone that which must be left undone in order to give You wholehearted devotion. Thank You for Your zeal concerning this, which is our greatest hope for being true to You!

Excited about God

A.W. Pink says in his book,"Our Accountability to God", that "The theology of the last century has failed lamentably at two essential points, namely, its teaching concerning God and its teaching concerning fallen man. As one writer expressed it, 'On the one hand, they have not ascended high enough...on the other hand, they do not descend low enough.' God is infinitely greater and His dominion far more absolute and extensive than most theologians admit, and man has sunk much lower and is far more depraved than they will allow."

I am very grateful for the journey the Holy Spirit has led me in over my life up until now; but I am just as grateful that He's not nearly finished with me yet! Years ago I read a quote from Catherine Marshall in which she said that excitement and enthusiasm for God grows as one truly matures in God's love and life.

Often we think that excitement about God is for the "immature" and those in the early stages of life in God, and that it's to be expected that our emotions about God get tempered as we grow in Him. I wonder if that idea might partly be rooted in the weak theology referred to by A.W. Pink in the quote above.

If excitement about God is only for us when we've first been delivered from the kingdom of darkness into His kingdom of light, then I suspect we don't have clear ongoing understanding and revelation of Who God is and who we are apart from Him.

Although the excitement isn't always in the surface emotions, I am much more excited about God now than I was in the early years of my life in Him. Even a short few minutes of meditating by His Spirit on His infinite beauty and power and sovereign leadership of humanity coupled with pondering how deeply lost I am at every point without Him awakens deep emotion within me. I pray I will never become sophisticated about God.

A.W. Tozer says in "Whatever Happened to Worship?", "I have had people tell me very dogmatically that they will never allow 'feeling' to have any part in their spiritual life and experience. I reply, 'Too bad for you!' I say that because I have voiced a very real definition of what I believe true worship to be: worship is to feel in the heart!" He goes on to say that there is something wrong with our worship if we don't experience emotions over God.

Holy Spirit, You Who love the Father and the Son with fiery passion, keep us in a place of childlikeness; open the eyes of our heart to see the true and living God and to see our true condition without Him. May we never speak of Jesus with a cold, hard heart, by Your grace. Thank You for Your faithful work in us to help us love Him with Your love.