The results of hearing God

 

A few weeks ago a woman came a bit late to our church and took a seat on the end of the row in front of us. The congregation was singing, but she was sobbing uncontrollably. To my eye, she appeared devastated by loss and overwhelmed by sorrow. The Lord prompted me to step forward and go to her. As I put my arm around her, she leaned into me and continued to sob. She only said one thing: “He is so beautiful.”

I had no idea who or what she was talking about. A lost child? A broken relationship? Bad news of some sort? As the song neared the end, she settled and nodded when I asked if she was okay. I returned to my seat. After the service, we invited her to sit with us at brunch (a weekly event at our church) and she told us that her tears came when she realized the beauty of Jesus and was overwhelmed with joy.

This reason never entered my mind, yet now I understand the transparency of her response. As today’s reading says, to some the revealing of the Lord comes as a mighty and overwhelming power, yet to others He comes as the tender and gentle presence of love. Either way, He always makes His presence manifest and real to those who experience it. Jesus described it and the certainty of this wonderful gift, even though many would be too self-conscious to allow this revelation to affect them so deeply in a public place full of strangers. But as He said…

In that day you will know that I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in you. (John 14:20)

I was deeply impressed by this woman and her response to meeting Jesus. It was not the first time. She told us of her faith and how God revealed Himself and His will to her. Today’s devotional says we may have believed certain things before because God says it in the Scriptures, but when He gives it to us with the testimony of an inward consciousness, it becomes ours — totally unassailable by any form of questioning or doubt.

Our son told us that God was revealing much to him about the source and extent of evil in this world. He added, “I couldn’t see it before, but now I do and sometimes I wish I could un-see it.” In other words, when what God says is heard, it sticks. Not that we don’t have lapses. Our spiritual enemies (principalities and powers in heavenly places) make many efforts to rip truth from our minds and plunge us into darkness, yet that light from the Lord cannot be extinguished.

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made. In him was life, and the life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it. (John 1:1–5)

In the OT stories, the Israelis believed the Lord was in their midst during their wanderings and in their years of bondage, even when no sign of His presence was seen among them. After they settled and Solomon built the temple, Solomon prayed: “But will God indeed dwell with man on the earth? Behold, heaven and the highest heaven cannot contain you, how much less this house that I have built!” (2 Chronicles 6:18)

I can relate to Solomon’s prayer: How can God be in my life? Yet “As soon as Solomon finished his prayer, fire came down from heaven and consumed the burnt offering and the sacrifices, and the glory of the Lord filled the temple.” (2 Chronicles 7:1) At once, without the need of any command from Solomon, the people bowed themselves with their faces to the ground and worshiped and praised the Lord. In the midst of whatever happened, they knew He never abandoned them.

PRAY: Lord, Solomon’s prayers and requests affirmed faith and You answer me just as You answered Solomon, “I have heard your prayer and have chosen this place for myself as a house of sacrifice.” (2 Chronicles 7:12) The sacrifice part is as real as the understanding that You are with me, even when all seems dark. If I did not know your presence, I would fight or flee the discomfort and pain sacrifices bring. However, hearing You makes a difference. Your voice helps me accept that Your plan involves death to self and giving up my desires. Your voice also reveals Your plans. Not only that, when I hear You, I know You are standing very close to me!

Christ makes the difference…

Today’s reading says we need to know who we really are in order to know how we ought to live. In Christ, we are God’s children, His heirs, and His friends. But there are more ID markers.

He also calls us His sheep. I’ve had sheep. They are easily frightened, follow each other and need a shepherd to keep them in green pastures! Yes, I often behave as a sheep, but am glad that He enables me to hear His voice and follow Him, my Good Shepherd.

Jesus also says of me that I will be hated by all for His name’s sake and must endure to the end.(Matthew 10:22) This means behaving with endurance, not giving up when life includes persecution.
Lest I complain or fear that possibility, Jesus suggests in a parable that He is to be “allowed to do what I choose with what belongs to me.” (Matthew 20:15) I am His child and His friend, but I am also His possession. I belong to Him. Not only that, when I feel weak, useless, unable to do as He desires, He says:

“My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. (2 Corinthians 12:9)

Being His child, heir, and friend sounds like good news, yet Jesus is not ‘my buddy’ for He is my Lord and Teacher, and also His disciple who must live obediently to what He teaches me:

So Jesus said to those who had believed him, “If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, (John 8:31)

What does that look like? Abiding in Him shows up in the way I live and treat others...

By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.” (John 13:35)
As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Abide in my love. If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love…. You are my friends if you do what I command you. No longer do I call you servants, for the servant does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all that I have heard from my Father I have made known to you. (John 15:9-10; 14-15)

These things are possible because Jesus lives in me. “In that day you will know that I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in you.” (John 14:20) He changes my life because of the Holy Spirit who enables me to witness to the love and power of God…

But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.” (Acts 1:8)

And He enables the way I ought to live. While knowing who I really am is helpful, it is His life in me that enables the actions that I ought to have…

I myself am satisfied about you, my brothers, that you yourselves are full of goodness, filled with all knowledge and able to instruct one another. (Romans 15:14)

None of the “ought to” behaviors are up to me alone, but are the wonder of Christ using me to do His will, like a hand in a glove.

PRAY: Jesus, while the Bible does not use this metaphor, You are the hand in this glove and living as You desire me to live is all about You and Your amazing grace and power. I am so thankful that striving for excellence comes to even lazy and helpless people like me. You make the difference.

God is always with me…

The past two weeks have been filled with the certainty of God’s presence along with many emotional experiences. I’m learning to abide in the former rather than let the emotions take me away from the reality of Jesus being with me. He is my source and my song, my stability in both storms and smooth sailing.

Today’s reading is filled with Scripture that describes the blessing of this life of union with Him. While I know the Lord is everywhere, the sense of His presence is precious in the ups and downs, particularly when both are extreme. In the OT, Solomon wrote as he dedicated the temple:

But will God indeed dwell with man on the earth? Behold, heaven and the highest heaven cannot contain you, how much less this house that I have built! (2 Chronicles 6:18)

People have called church buildings the house of the Lord, as if this was the only place to be with God. That sense is heightened when dozens of people who have it are together, but it need not go away when I walk out the door and into the rest of the world. As Solomon’s prayer continued and the Lord answered, it reminds me of what the NT says:

Do you not know that you are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in you? If anyone destroys God’s temple, God will destroy him. For God’s temple is holy, and you are that temple. (1 Corinthians 3:16-17)

What Solomon constructed was noted for its grandeur, yet now the people of God are described as being the dwelling place of God. The words He spoke to this ancient king are repeated to me and when I read them, I feel as Solomon must have felt. God said to this man:

I have heard your prayer and have chosen this place for myself as a house of sacrifice. When I shut up the heavens so that there is no rain, or command the locust to devour the land, or send pestilence among my people, if my people who are called by my name humble themselves, and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and heal their land. Now my eyes will be open and my ears attentive to the prayer that is made in this place. For now I have chosen and consecrated this house that my name may be there forever. My eyes and my heart will be there for all time. (2 Chronicles 7:12–16)

These days have been days of prayer, not merely for the normal needs of life, but for dramatic changes of weather, for behavior changes in people, for extraordinary love shown to openly sinful people, for God to fill me so I could be like Jesus for those who need Him. And God says this to me:

In that day you will know that I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in you. (John 14:20)

If you abide in me, and my words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. (John 15:7)

By this we know that we abide in him and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit. (1 John 4:13)

So we have come to know and to believe the love that God has for us. God is love, and whoever abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him. (1 John 4:16)

He reminds me often that He is with me and that I will know it. What a blessing.

PRAY: Today is a day of rest, ordained by You that I might let You help my soul catch up with my body, settle the emotions, restore alignment with You, remembering that I am a temple for the Holy Spirit  and a place where You live forever. May it be special, not for my sake, but that You will be worshiped and glorified.