The Holy One calls to me this morning. His words to me speak of a grief to His heart and it registers as a grief to mine. "Why is it not enough for you to be counted among my Beloved?"
His question pierces the atmosphere that has been heavily saturated with complaints about the degree of hardships many of us, His people, are facing today.
While the Word of God is a Book of promises and I believe every one of them is mine, the one thing missing is the "when" of the fulfillment of these wondrous promises. The promises are given by an eternal God and I must accept that God's timetable in all matters may be different than mine.
The Old Testament is a history and outline of how God deals with humanity. It is revealed through the historical account of the one nation called Israel. God has provided the modern world along with all the generations before us, the knowledge of Himself through the ancient and historical account of the Jewish journey as a nation.
From the promise given to Abraham for his descendants up to the fulfillment of the promised Messiah in the first coming of Jesus the Christ which begins the New Testament, God provided us with clues as to His being.
The Old testament set the stage for what the New Testament provided at the arrival of Jesus: God revealed Himself completely in human form. The New Testament in the person of Jesus is the complete revelation of His being.
The Old Testament speaks volumes about what our Sovereign God expects and how He kept the nation of Israel within the boundaries of those expectations throughout their history. We can point to all their failures only to find that failures are also part of what God expects.
The Law and the Prophets were a honing tool useful not just to the ancients but to us "moderns" in the Church today. The nation struggled with life on earth just as we do. They struggled with flesh temptations in rebellion and disobedience just as we do. They struggled with God's Sovereignty just as we do.
Yet we, who are living in this dispensation of Grace called the "Church Era", have a profound advantage in life and the struggles we find and face on earth today. The struggles may be the same but we are blessed to have the indwelling Holy Spirit of Christ to rely upon as we decide the best way to handle those struggles.
In the Old Testament, the Holy Spirit was active but external to the people. Since Pentecost and when Jesus breathed His Holy Spirit into His followers, we have Him as our internal Counselor and blessed Companion.
The Holy Spirit is the Spirit of Truth. When He speaks to me I listen. When He warns me I take heed. And when He voices His grief I come to ask His forgiveness and seek to change what is causing Him the pain.
In very short order I follow His lead back to the Word and His Will. The Holy One knows my meandering spirit and this is how He leads me to find the nuggets of truth He has for me today.
I have a chain reference Bible and that is such an important resource for the way I go and grow along our journey. I may start at one point and thought then that leads me to another thought and scripture which leads to another but then I will eventually find the word He has written just for me today.
Through a series of very interesting scriptures I finally arrive at Numbers 11:1-3, "Now the people complained abut their hardship in the hearing of the Lord and when He heard them His anger was aroused. Then fire from the Lord burned among them and consumed some of the outskirts of the camp. When the people cried out to Moses, he prayed to the Lord and the fire died down. So that place was called Taberah because fire from the Lord had burned among them."
Part of why I appreciate the Old Testament so much is due to the way God dealt very directly with His people. I tend to be a cause and effect person so I appreciate a direct and immediate response if I walk out of bounds. But the Lord is grooming me in a love relationship and that learning curve is different than for one just being taught His rules.
When I read the word "anger" in the Old Testament, the Holy One interprets through His filter to my heart the word "grief". I see how in my life I am similarly guilty of complaining about the hardships and that is a grief to my Lord.
Then He takes me to the New Testament for His directive and to understand what He expects of me today.
James 1:2, "Consider it pure joy my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance, perseverance must finish it's work so that you may be complete not lacking anything"
And again in Hebrews 124-7 it speaks of running the race with perseverance, "In your struggle against sin you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding your blood and you have forgotten the word of encouragement that addresses you as sons, "My son, do not make light of the Lord's discipline, and do not lose heart when He rebukes you, because the Lord disciplines those He loves and He punishes every one He accepts as a son. Endure hardship as discipline. God is treating you as sons."
I am very clear about what has caused Him the grief: my personal lapse into complaining and how that interrupts the strength I might otherwise find to persevere. I get the image of a runner focusing on the muscle pain in his leg rather than on the finish line or a body builder half way through a lift focusing on how heavy the weight is rather than the goal of lifting it above his head.
There are so many priceless points to ponder in each lesson the Holy One teaches. His lessons are personal and endless as He grooms His beloved for our eternal destiny, of which this earth life is the preliminary phase.
For me today, I see by His word that "perseverance" must finish IT'S work. The time between my prayer and its answer is the perseverance zone. If I spend the time in that zone grumbling and complaining the finished work of perseverance might not be attained in the present hardship.
My performance mentality reels at the thought of missing what the Lord is trying to teach and that may be classified as "striving" to some. But for me the thought of grieving my Lord over something I can ask Him to help me change, is heart breaking and I need to fix it.
I repent and ask Him to forgive my complaining and give me His help as I persevere through the hard times waiting for His much sought after answers to come. I can feel His warm love and forgiveness and I must declare to my Lord, it is enough to be counted among His beloved.
The Spirit is calling. Can you hear Him?
His question pierces the atmosphere that has been heavily saturated with complaints about the degree of hardships many of us, His people, are facing today.
While the Word of God is a Book of promises and I believe every one of them is mine, the one thing missing is the "when" of the fulfillment of these wondrous promises. The promises are given by an eternal God and I must accept that God's timetable in all matters may be different than mine.
The Old Testament is a history and outline of how God deals with humanity. It is revealed through the historical account of the one nation called Israel. God has provided the modern world along with all the generations before us, the knowledge of Himself through the ancient and historical account of the Jewish journey as a nation.
From the promise given to Abraham for his descendants up to the fulfillment of the promised Messiah in the first coming of Jesus the Christ which begins the New Testament, God provided us with clues as to His being.
The Old testament set the stage for what the New Testament provided at the arrival of Jesus: God revealed Himself completely in human form. The New Testament in the person of Jesus is the complete revelation of His being.
The Old Testament speaks volumes about what our Sovereign God expects and how He kept the nation of Israel within the boundaries of those expectations throughout their history. We can point to all their failures only to find that failures are also part of what God expects.
The Law and the Prophets were a honing tool useful not just to the ancients but to us "moderns" in the Church today. The nation struggled with life on earth just as we do. They struggled with flesh temptations in rebellion and disobedience just as we do. They struggled with God's Sovereignty just as we do.
Yet we, who are living in this dispensation of Grace called the "Church Era", have a profound advantage in life and the struggles we find and face on earth today. The struggles may be the same but we are blessed to have the indwelling Holy Spirit of Christ to rely upon as we decide the best way to handle those struggles.
In the Old Testament, the Holy Spirit was active but external to the people. Since Pentecost and when Jesus breathed His Holy Spirit into His followers, we have Him as our internal Counselor and blessed Companion.
The Holy Spirit is the Spirit of Truth. When He speaks to me I listen. When He warns me I take heed. And when He voices His grief I come to ask His forgiveness and seek to change what is causing Him the pain.
In very short order I follow His lead back to the Word and His Will. The Holy One knows my meandering spirit and this is how He leads me to find the nuggets of truth He has for me today.
I have a chain reference Bible and that is such an important resource for the way I go and grow along our journey. I may start at one point and thought then that leads me to another thought and scripture which leads to another but then I will eventually find the word He has written just for me today.
Through a series of very interesting scriptures I finally arrive at Numbers 11:1-3, "Now the people complained abut their hardship in the hearing of the Lord and when He heard them His anger was aroused. Then fire from the Lord burned among them and consumed some of the outskirts of the camp. When the people cried out to Moses, he prayed to the Lord and the fire died down. So that place was called Taberah because fire from the Lord had burned among them."
Part of why I appreciate the Old Testament so much is due to the way God dealt very directly with His people. I tend to be a cause and effect person so I appreciate a direct and immediate response if I walk out of bounds. But the Lord is grooming me in a love relationship and that learning curve is different than for one just being taught His rules.
When I read the word "anger" in the Old Testament, the Holy One interprets through His filter to my heart the word "grief". I see how in my life I am similarly guilty of complaining about the hardships and that is a grief to my Lord.
Then He takes me to the New Testament for His directive and to understand what He expects of me today.
James 1:2, "Consider it pure joy my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance, perseverance must finish it's work so that you may be complete not lacking anything"
And again in Hebrews 124-7 it speaks of running the race with perseverance, "In your struggle against sin you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding your blood and you have forgotten the word of encouragement that addresses you as sons, "My son, do not make light of the Lord's discipline, and do not lose heart when He rebukes you, because the Lord disciplines those He loves and He punishes every one He accepts as a son. Endure hardship as discipline. God is treating you as sons."
I am very clear about what has caused Him the grief: my personal lapse into complaining and how that interrupts the strength I might otherwise find to persevere. I get the image of a runner focusing on the muscle pain in his leg rather than on the finish line or a body builder half way through a lift focusing on how heavy the weight is rather than the goal of lifting it above his head.
There are so many priceless points to ponder in each lesson the Holy One teaches. His lessons are personal and endless as He grooms His beloved for our eternal destiny, of which this earth life is the preliminary phase.
For me today, I see by His word that "perseverance" must finish IT'S work. The time between my prayer and its answer is the perseverance zone. If I spend the time in that zone grumbling and complaining the finished work of perseverance might not be attained in the present hardship.
My performance mentality reels at the thought of missing what the Lord is trying to teach and that may be classified as "striving" to some. But for me the thought of grieving my Lord over something I can ask Him to help me change, is heart breaking and I need to fix it.
I repent and ask Him to forgive my complaining and give me His help as I persevere through the hard times waiting for His much sought after answers to come. I can feel His warm love and forgiveness and I must declare to my Lord, it is enough to be counted among His beloved.
The Spirit is calling. Can you hear Him?
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