Written Word

Following after Humility

"Humble" is a thorny concept. If you are verifiably humble, you don't blow a trumpet advertising your humility and lowliness; that would immediately give everyone the opposite impression. "Humble" is humble; it does not consist of what it can do; quite the opposite, to be humble is to be keenly conscious of what you cannot do and what you cannot be.

We have all heard varying versions of the man who declared that he was the humblest man on earth. That immediately put the lie to his statement; humble simply is and never promotes its avowed humility. Now let me make my own boast – no, scratch that – my own great desire: I want to be so sincerely humble that men and women will not see me so much as they will see the Spirit of God working through me.

Now I am about to be so frank with you that it hurts: I have to admit to having an enormous ego that I have to fight constantly with all the weapons at my disposal. I have tried the pragmatic approach, which is 1) to remind myself I haven't accomplished any great work in a long life in which others would have done great things, and 2) I am certifiably a true "nobody."

I know all of that and it does help to curb the burgeoning growth of pride that would of course eventually make me fit for nothing.. As stated, it helps, but ego and pride are noxious weeds that refuse to die and threaten to destroy the whole garden, never mind how many arguments you marshal against them. Sure, you and I both know factually there is no reason for pride in any human, that whatever talent/ability we have was certainly not created by our own sagacity or power. We are fully aware that we didn't come into being by our own will. Before we existed we were nonentities (nonbeings) and consequently we who were not had no will, no power, we had nothing. We were nothing, nobody; and only a God can bring something out of nothing. So our very existence and whatever talent we have are ascribable only to God.

This pragmatic or reasoning mind-set is a tremendous weapon for mortifying" (killing) the unreasonable pride that is a part of the carnal nature of every person., but still we have the old longing to "be somebody," even if it is only a sham. We feel this mortal need to be praised and looked up to although the recognition is baseless and we know in ourselves, and of ourselves, we are mere persons of straw. We haven't a leg to stand on, not even a material crutch to prop up our senseless vanity. We should forget our pride and revel in the fact that we know God and He is our all in all.

To recap, this is what we must do about the pride that wants to consume us.

1. We need to acknowledge the pride within us.
2. Take the pragmatic approach to the problem as stated earlier in this post.
   1. This will not forever eliminate our carnal desire for self-glory, so we should
3. Continually pray and fast and deliberately humble ourselves before God.

We could take a lesson from Hezekiah king of Judah:

"In those days Hezekiah was sick to the death, and prayed unto the LORD: and he spake unto him, and he gave him a sign. (25) But Hezekiah rendered not again according to the benefit done unto him; for his heart was lifted up: therefore there was wrath upon him, and upon Judah and Jerusalem. (26) Notwithstanding Hezekiah humbled himself for the pride of his heart, both he and the inhabitants of Jerusalem, so that the wrath of the LORD came not upon them in the days of Hezekiah." (2Ch 32:24-26)

The whole account may be seen in 2 Kings 20.1-19. I haven't the space to recount the whole story here. Suffice it to say that Hezekiah let pride get the better of him and God reproved him for it and, as punishment, told Hezekiah through the Prophet Isaiah that all the wealth and glory that Hezekiah had boasted about would all be taken away from the kingdom and carried to Babylon. But, as we can see, Hezekiah humbled himself before God and God extended mercy to him.

When God sees our deliberate self-loathing and the determination to be humble in the full meaning of the word, He will help us for however long we need help. If need be, He will be there for us the rest of our lives.

"In a dream, in a vision of the night, when deep sleep falls upon men, while they slumber on their beds, (16) then he opens the ears of men, and terrifies them with warnings, (17) that he may turn man aside from his deed, and cut off pride from man; (18) he keeps back his soul from the Pit, his life from perishing by the sword." (Job 33:15-18 RSV)

"The LORD is nigh unto them that are of a broken heart; and saveth such as be of a contrite spirit." (Psa 34:18)

Are You Bound by Your Five Senses? Revised

In this post we are revisiting a post made earlier this year, Are You Bound by Your Five Senses? (2/4/09) because you (whoever "you" may be) did not read it and because once again it seems very timely. There is such a tendency among the children of God to expect all believers to act the same way and say the same things We have to be, in other words,all made of the same cookie cutter.

Whenever an individual deviates from the "norm" he or she is considered different (in those instances where love is trying to come to the front) or "not saved" (in those extreme instances where love is shoved into a corner and told to shut up).

We are NOT all alike nor did God intend for us to be. But let's get on with this edited post of Are You Bound by Your Five Senses? Continue below:

 

Apart from our five senses (sight, touch, taste, smell, hearing) we humans have no way of knowing anything other than we exist. We would know nothing at all if it were not for our indispensable faculties of perception. Obviously we would not be aware of anything or anybody outside of our wretched selves. We would become mad creatures shut inside ourselves with only our deranged thoughts for company.

Below is the little speech I would make to God if I did not know better – but I DO know better. I have been raised in the Christian faith since I was a baby. Thank God I have had the blessing of growing up in a godly environment and learning from scripturally grounded parents. So I know better. But I am only human and at times my thinking becomes a little blurred. Here is what I would say – if I didn't know better:

"Ah, but Lord, you made me as I am, requiring physical confirmation of the universe that is all around me and extending out to the farthest cosmic object an infinity away. You made the universe; you made me and you are asking me to trust you when I can neither see nor hear nor feel you. You are asking me, Lord – me, the one you created subject to my five senses for confirmation of all I know and experience – you are asking, nay, you are demanding that I trust you whom I have never seen nor heard nor felt nor touched nor smelled nor tasted. How can I trust you when you have made me so ill-equipped as I am for trust outside of my senses?

"I do not have the faculty even for dreaming the occasional significant dream or seeing the infrequent momentous vision that you grant to some of your servants. Again, Lord, how can I possibly extend myself to trust you when you have made me so lacking while you are undeniably great and mighty – and so imperceptible by the five senses you gave me and by which I live?"

But whenever my thoughts tend to wander in that direction, I remember what Jesus told Thomas the doubting disciple. Thomas had said he would never believe Jesus was resurrected until he felt the print of the nails in Jesus' hand and thrust his hand into the gaping spear hole in Jesus' side. Several days later, after Jesus had shown Thomas by physical proofs that it was indeed Jesus and He was at that moment alive, Thomas was awed and speechless. The now penitent believer could only exxclaim, "My Lord and my God!"

Jesus gently chided Thomas:

"Jesus saith unto him, Thomas, because thou hast seen me, thou hast believed: blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed." (Joh 20:29)

God is asking, nay, demanding that we who are so captive to our senses should believe in Him and trust Him to the utmost. The following statement may sound a trifle weird, but think on it awhile: "Trust is what trust is all about." It means we are required to rely solely on a God we cannot sense physically but who made the universe and all things in it. That is unadulterated Trust.

The world cannot accept that kind of "blind faith." The world is very materialistic; it requires sight, touch, taste, smell, hearing and if it is asked to trust based on anything other than the five senses, the world resorts to mockery and ridicule. A well-known and intellectual humorist recently said on TV (paraphrased):

"These religious nuts expect me to believe that a man who was crucified is coming back to earth to save His people when He couldn't even save Himself!" This was attended by the usual laughter – by some in the audience who were professed Christians.

I have to confess: My parents brainwashed me at an early age and I haven't been able to snap back to normal all my life. I had my bouts with the credulity of "faith" in my teen years; but I could not shake this voice inside me that prodded me, "God is not going to give you the proof you want until you first trust Him."

That seems a trifle backward, that I have to trust Someone whom I can't experience the perceptible way. But that is the way it is; it's the way God arbitrarily lays out for us. When we believe in Christ, He then gives us the "proof" of His existence within our spirit, and we know positively there is a God, not just "out there" somewhere, but living and moving within us.

Someone has said there is no such thing as "blind faith." In answer to that, all I can say is this: I cannot always literally see where God is taking me; that means I can't see the way, therefore I am walking blind. But then – considering it from another perspective, I am not really tap-tapping my way through the dark that envelops me because God sees the way for me. So perhaps I am not walking blind. What better way to see can there be than through the eyes of God?

For a moment let's dispense with the white cane for the blind and the seeing-eye dog and the special high-tech devices that depend on man's ingenuity. Let's throw away all other aids than God and stretch our hands out to Him and confidently allow Him to lead us where He wants us to go. Yes, there may be a yawning chasm lying ahead of us, on either side of us and behind us. In other words, we are stuck on a pinpoint of space, with a limbo of nothingness all around us. But remember: We are walking by faith, not by sight. We don't really see the potential disasters waiting to engulf us. Therefore, if God gives us a gentle tug to move ahead or to turn right or left, we are sure that, as we take each step in the dark, God will put solid ground under each footstep taken in faith.

And we have this testimony: we have come through the dark this far by faith. God has brought me personally through the waters and the floods, through the fire and great sorrows. Even now in my years of so-called retirement, the challenges are still confronting me, but they can never defeat me – I have the evidence there is a God because I first believed in this imperceptible God and He then gave me the evidence that no one can refute. I repeat: His Spirit lives and moves within me. While this is no evidence to an unbelieving world, it is the greatest of evidence to me.

I need no archeological find to convince me of the existence of my God and Savior Jesus Christ, no documentary proof is called for to bolster my belief. My subjective evidence is the proof, also the fact that this God I cannot see nor hear nor touch nor taste nor smell, has brought me through eighty-nine years of ups and downs, highs and lows and through serious setbacks brought on by my own sins and carnality. If God did indeed not exist, I would have to thank Someone or Something for an extended life touched by a grace that I in no wise deserve.

The Totality of Surrender

What Jesus wants and what I want are one and the same. He wants the Christ in me to grow and permeate the very pores of my body. He wants me to be enfolded and saturated by the sweet Spirit of God until this Christ, this sweet Spirit of God, becomes the very core of my existence. With that I am in total agreement. It is not nearly enough for me to have a mere intellectual knowledge of Christ: I yearn to know Him intimately and as the close Friend without whom I could not live naturally or spiritually.

I have strongly asserted at times that Christ is the core of my existence, and He is. But I want this vital fact to become a greater and greater reality in my life. It should be so overpowering that, if I should be cut off from Him or – God forbid! – if I should leave Him, I would either 1) be compelled to leave the sin that in a sense drove Him from me and to return to my Source of life, or 2) actually die.

At this point in life I do not want to live without my Lord and Master. I have to say with Peter, "Lord, to whom shall [I] go? thou hast the words of eternal life."

'Speak, Lord, If Only in Rebuke'

In the still of the night when the luxury of sleep evades me, God will at times deal with me either in censure or in sweet communion or in both. And even when He censures me, there is still a sweet feeling afterward that He would think enough of me to correct me and set me back on the right track. It is remarkable that in His corrective rod I feel the love that drove Him to the cross. It is reasonable to assume that if He wanted to slay me outright, He could do it without the rod, but He wants always to save me and you and He will use the rod or do whatever it takes to keep us on the right path and to perfect His will in us.

David the palmist cried out to God, "O LORD, rebuke me not in thine anger, neither chasten me in thy hot displeasure." Psa 6:1. This is supposed to have occurred after David had committed adultery with Bathsheba and had compounded the heinous sin by having her husband Uriah slain to cover his sin.

It was a terrible thing that David did and he could find no way to undo it. Encountering the judgments of God against him and knowing the judgments were justified, he did not ask the Lord to still the corrective rod altogether: he submitted to the rod and pled with God not to wield it in anger and judgment. No person can withstand divine judgment for his sins, but when he is corrected in love, even though it is "tough love," he will develop and grow by submitting to it.

Touching Others with the Finger of God

It is not enough that God should deign to speak to me; it is not enough that he should correct me; it is not enough that I should learn more about Him – I have a driving need to channel the grace God has directed my way, to you and you and you, anyone who will read what "thus saith the Lord." Having been touched by the finger of divinity, I cannot let that mighty finger rest only on me. I have written sometime, somewhere, the following:

"God reaches out His mighty hand and touches me, commissioning me and enabling me to do His will. The hand of God is large but not threatening, powerful yet kind and not terrifying; it is a symbol of God's love. It is so thrilling that it makes me bold enough to ask Him, "Lord, let me take your hand of blessing and touch others as you have touched me!" That is a daring request made in the fervor of the moment.

He answers in a voice that sounds like gentle rolling thunder on a day bright with sunlight, 'Do so, my son!'

So I take this mighty, glorious hand that has just blessed me, in both of my altogether unworthy hands. His hand is still turned palm downward with the fingers clenched except for the forefinger pointing slightly down in a gracious gesture as in the Creation of Adam by Michelangelo. I then place the divine finger of blessing on this person and on that person for whom I have a burden to pray. As I place the divine finger of blessing on each person, I too am blessed – again. And I am so very grateful that God graciously allows me to direct His blessings in that way."

What Does God Want from Us?

"The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit: a broken and a contrite heart, O God, thou wilt not despise." Psa 51:17. To come to God for salvation, we have to come broken and contrite. He cannot use us in that terribly broken state, so He heals us – gives us salvation – in that way mending our brokenness. But it is always imperative that, even while we know He has forgiven us and made us whole, we maintain the attitude of contrition. God can then use us to the full extent of His perfect will and awesome power.

Micah made a reasonable offer to the Israelites of old: "He hath shewed thee, O man, what is good; and what doth the LORD require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God?" Mic 6:8.

Isn't it time that we balance the scales somewhat and give to God all we have? In the person of Jesus Christ God gave up all He had for the sake of mankind. Our all may be ragged and tattered, but we can only give our all. That is the full extent of what God requires of us, no more, no less.

Remember that God does not expect overnight perfection in His people; He realizes they are made of faulty clay. What He does demand, however, is an acknowledgment of sin and a submission to the inevitable divine correction that comes with our sins and lapses in love. Divine correction replaces judgment. No one can survive the horrible consequences of the raw, unmitigated judgment of God.

The Rod of Correction versus the Wrath of Judgment

If you are being chastised for your faults, you can stop the chastisement by correcting whatever it is you are doing wrong. And in the midst of your hurting you should thank God that 1) He cares enough for you to correct you and 2) He is reproving you in love and not chastening you in His "hot displeasure." That would be the wrath of judgment, a never ceasing, irreversible state of damnation. But that is not what God wants for you. In fact, God loathes inflicting judgment on any of His creatures. He earnestly yearns to hold us in His arms and comfort and soothe us, but too often we turn away from this loving God. Too often we insist on bulling our way onto the path of our choosing, a path leading eventually to perdition. And we break the heart of God – but only for the present. You surely didn't think that you could cause God grief and sorrow forever, did you?

One day the never-ending grace of God will cease flowing for you. The judgment and wrath of God will be unleashed on you in eternal excruciating torrents. You will have insisted on clinging to your sins and they will be your everlasting destruction. God hates the sin which you so fervently clutch to your chest and that hatred will consume you. No longer will He be for you a God of love and tender mercy; He will be your implacable foe. Since you would not be separated from your sin, it will take you straight to the lake of fire.

God will then be at peace throughout the never ending ages with his faithful saints who suffered so much and followed Him to the end. I am truly sorry for you who didn't know enough to come in out of the torrential rain of divine wrath. I will not be sorry then because in that day and in that place called heaven there will be no distress or regret of any kind. God hasten the day!

We All Need the ‘Marks of Christ’

"5 Let a righteous man strike me--it is a kindness; let him rebuke me--it is oil on my head. My head will not refuse it. Yet my prayer is ever against the deeds of evildoers…" (NIV)

Within the body of Christ there are many anointed ministers of the Word of God. That is, those who receive direction from God to proclaim His Word to others saved and unsaved. They can be preachers, teachers, writers, or even those who, occasionally or as a career move, engage in one-on-one personal ministry. Whether these people articulate it this way or not, they want to "smite" you with the Truth or Word of God. They want very much to imprint on your being the marks of Christ, inflicted not by their own will or at their own hands, but the hand of God working through them. That is an achievable goal only because of the marks (wounds) that Christ suffered in purchasing redemption for all mankind.

The marks meted out to Jesus literally tore into His flesh and His emotional being. The marks disfigured Him so much that He was not recognizable.

"As many were astonished at him-- his appearance was so marred, beyond human semblance, and his form beyond that of the sons of men—" (Isa 52:14 RSV)

The wounds or marks that Christ will mete out to your carnal nature will tear into the old self – the sinful nature that is your basic self – and it will hurt you and transform you until the old sinful nature is no longer recognizable as you.

The wounds that Jesus suffered were inflicted by hateful hands, but the marks that He will leave on you will be motivated by a loving heart. They may hurt and damage the fleshly self (your sinful nature), but they will yield "the peaceable fruit of righteousness."

"Now no chastening for the present seemeth to be joyous, but grievous: nevertheless afterward it yieldeth the peaceable fruit of righteousness unto them which are exercised thereby." (Heb 12:11)

Now the wounds of which I speak are in goodly measure meted out to the followers of Christ by their fellow worshipers, the dedicated servants of God. These dedicated men and women are motivated by the love of Christ within them. They are instructed by their Lord to do all they can to kill the carnal self within you (and which also is in the beings of us all). They want the carnal man to be so disfigured and torn that he will no longer be recognizable, and will eventually literally die.

You realize of course that the same "fellow worshipers" have to endure their own chastisement as they are not perfect. They get their chastisement in the same way you get yours: it is meted out by the loving hands of their own brothers and sisters. Sometimes it will come at their own hands when God inspires them to cry out against a particular fault of which they themselves are guilty. Don't assume that when they are castigating you, they are not guilty of the same fault. It is evident they have to be very careful that in their zeal to remove the mote from your eye they are not neglecting the beam that is impeding their own vision.

There is a fine line here between hypocrisy and hewing to the line without regard to cost. The wielder of the chastising rod has to constantly be aware of, and willing to acknowledge, his or her own shortcomings. The chastening they lay on their fellow servants they must apply to themselves at the same time and they must be humble enough to accept chastening when the Spirit of God moves on their fellow workers to administer it to them. The latter could come in direct fashion, person to person or it could come in a casual conversation without the temporary wielder of the rod being aware of it. It could come from another minister. However the chastening comes, the erstwhile wielder of the rod should be willing to take his or her own necessary correction.

There are no shortcuts to perfection. There is no easy path to apprehending that for which we were apprehended of Christ. The local churches are in need of correction and doubtless so are those who administer the correction. And, with love as our hallmark, we all shall attain to the perfect likeness of Christ.

The Concept of Salvation Is an Impossibilty

When you look with an indiscriminate eye at the whole story of salvation, it seems to be a greatly improbable and totally impossible scenario. No one could dare to imagine that the Sovereign of the universe, the Creator of everything visible and invisible, would deliberately topple Himself from His unique, exalted position in the heavens and, with the same deliberate intent, come crashing down to an earth reeling in its sins. And, as if that were not humiliation enough, He then allowed Himself to be crushed under the cruel boot of the creature He had made and which creature was now reveling in its own filth.

The concept is utterly ridiculous – when you fail to factor in the love and grace of God. But love and grace wholly transform  the concept. The concept then becomes totally awesome and breathtaking in its unparalleled beauty. And why should it not? We were the unloved and unlovable creatures who were singing and reveling in our sins, frolicking our way to eternal damnation when the love of God stopped us in our reckless tracks and plucked  us out of the sinful madness that had seized upon us.

Who could not love a Savior like that? Who could be so unfeeling as to spurn a love that gave its all for a filthy unkempt beggar in return for the beggar’s rags and tatters? Thank God He helped us to see the picture of salvation and love and grace as it really is. So we eagerly fall prostrate before Him and commit ourselves wholly to Him. He is God of the universe and He is God in our hearts, which beat solely for Him and only at His bidding.