Pray for our Land of Exile

The Holy One calls to me this morning.  America, the land that I love has become like a foreign land to me as corrupt leaders have taken up and seemed to have stolen the highest offices in government.  Not unknown to Adonai and never outside His Sovereign "permissive will", they have brought chaos and changes to our land alien to our guiding principles and values. Thereby symbolically fulfilling the description of us living life in a land of exile on our earthly journey, far from the good (but not perfect) land we have experienced in the recent past. His words to me this morning, challenge me to seek His purpose in what He has allowed:

"I have given you a taste of ungodly government.  Understand My purpose and pray for your land of exile".

For the Christian whose heart is fixed on Eternity, this land (whether good or bad) is not our home.  No matter where we pitch our "tent" here on earth, we are just passing through. When things are difficult it just serves to remind us of the bottom-line truth: we are created for and promised a homeland beond our wildest imagination. 

Back in Jeremiah's day, when the Lord spoke through His Prophets, He gave a message to the Children of Israel on this very subject.  Jeremiah sent a letter from the Lord to the "exiles" who were living in Babylon. 

The Lord calls me to read it again and apply its directive to life today.

Jeremiah 29: 4-7:  "This is what the Lord Almighty, the God of Israel says to all of those I carried into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon: Build houses and settle down.  Plant gardens and eat what they produce.  Marry and have sons and daughters.  Find wives for your sons and give your daughters in marriage, so they too may have sons and daughters.  Increase in numbers there and do not decrease.  Also, seek the peace and prosperity of the city (land) to which I have carried you into exile.  Pray to the Lord for it because if it prospers so will you."

Tucked into this message is a picture of God's world view and His purpose in the world:  His people, carried by Him into a land not their own with a commission and a command to live and prosper there.  A quick read of the text brings a revelation of God's Will for us in this temporal life experience.

God moves His people into foreign places (whether neighborhood, communities or really foreign lands) to represent Him to the world around us.  We lose His perspective when we wall ourselves off and isolate to live out all our "doomsday-prepper" scenarios.  We may not be as "radicalized" as some but the walls between us are as fixed as the barbed wire around the compound.

What gets defeated in the practice of judgement and isolation is the Heavenly war for souls; those precious to the One who gave all men the breath of life, and the One who died that all may live in the Eternal Presence of Holiness.

There is great news for us as believers within the "Great News" for the world at large.  The "Great News" for the world is that God so loved the world that He gave His only Son, JESUS, THAT WHOEVER BELIEVES IN HIM (as the Son of God, what He did for us through His death and what He made available for us through His resurrection) WILL NOT PERISH but WILL HAVE ETERNAL LIFE.

Within that great news of eternal life is the promise of His presence in the temporal world as well.  God can and will make a distinction in the lives of His people. (Malachi 3:18) But may we never lose sight of His reason:  That the world will see Him in us, and desire to join the family and community of believers in the one true God and His Son Jesus.

This is not about a bank account or all the "fixins" of a gilded life.  The Gospel must be as true here as it is in 3rd world countries, just relative to our surroundings. 

I pray for peace so that in each trial that WILL come, others might come to know His peace through my life and example. I pray for prosperity so that as I am taken care of by my Lord, others will come to know the security of His provisions through my life and example.

There is always an opportunity to pray for our land of exile.  Opportunities abound in the land of exile to represent Christ to the world around us.  The question to each one of us who "know" the Lord is: "Will we take them?"

The Holy Spirit is calling.  Can you hear Him?

Hide and Go Seek With Jesus

Life is never dull when your Best Friend is the Creator of the Universe. I am one who thrives on word pictures and my Lord has always revealed things He wants me to think about through mental pictures that I can convert to principles of His wisdom and will.  

Living in a forest has enabled me to visualize the original Garden of Eden and the place where Adonai walked among His Creation.  On my personal journey with Jesus, I am always learning delightful new things about His will and His ways. Sometimes there is even a game involved and it's very much like the childhood game of 'Hide and Go Seek' in the forest.

The will of Adonai can be very mysterious and not easy to find without a deep search. One day I was pondering how His wisdom is like finding a treasure hidden in a vast forest.  Life has been for me like treasure hunt of discovery, unearthing all that our Creator has buried for us to find on our earthbound journey.  A visual appeared in my mind.  I "saw" Jesus and me, together enjoying sweet fellowship when suddenly He disappeared.  This was my clue that it's "Game-On" and time for me to begin the search to find Him and the treasure He wants to share with me. 

Some parts of the forest are deep and dark.  Not scary but hard to see through. The search gets intense.  When I feel I am lost among the trees, I cry out to Him, "Lord, where are you?" My Beloved will call to me to follow the sound of His voice. As I near the place where He is hiding, I hear the familiar laugh and I know I'm close. Then I "see" it, the golden nugget of truth He wants to share with me. The smile on His face and in His eyes assures me He is pleased with my perseverance.

As I am enjoying the pleasure of His company, thinking about how He leads me to all the great hidden treasures of wisdom He has buried for me to search for and with Him to find, I am suddenly sad at how many of His disciples will not or do not play the game with Him.  So many do not understand that when Jesus hides, He wants us to seek for and find Him and the treasure He is holding for us that remains hidden. 

The visual itself has become a lesson for me in sensing His heart of sadness if or when I walk away having lost interest in the pursuit of holiness for the prize He has waiting, just as a child playing hide and seek with friends gets left all alone when the seekers leave the game.  I know full well, I don't ever want to leave Him alone when intimate fellowship is what we both desire. 

The Holy Spirit is calling.  Can you hear Him?

 

 

The Power of Pentecost

The Holy One calls to me this morning.  So much is happening in the world, it seems like the end is near.  Ancient prophecy is unfolding before our very eyes in real time on the 6:00 news.

The times can be very dark and scary.....or.....the times can be very exciting.  I have heard it said that the same wave that would drown a swimmer, provides a surfer with the ride of his life.

The Holy One presses in on my perspective and takes me to His Word in Acts 2.  By this time the historic record was set, Jesus had come, died, resurrected and ascended.  His visible Presence was no longer with the Disciples.  Gone was His voice, His laughter, His touch, even His stern rebuke which set boundaries to their over zealous flesh and calmed a raging storm.

They had a life experience to draw from, having watched God interact with His creation.  But now they were just ordinary men with an awesome memory and a story to tell.

Jesus lived His earthly life as a man; flesh, blood, emotions and He knew the weaknesses within.  He knew that, in their flesh, not one of them could complete the eternal life or death assignment He had left them with.  All that He came to accomplish associated with the message of our salvation, His sacrifice and the restored relationship between the Creator and the created, would require a strength and power beyond their humanity to convey.

The Holy One whispers to my heart, "Those days for the Disciples are not unlike your days today.  Apart from Me you can do nothing."

The Spirit takes me back to read one of the last commands from Jesus before He ascended into Heaven.  Acts 1:4, "On one occasion while He was eating with them He gave this command, "Do not leave Jerusalem but wait for the gift My Father promised, which you have heard Me speak about.  For John baptized with water but in a few days, you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit".

And in Acts 1:8, when discussing the restoration of Israel, Jesus said, "It is not for you to know the times or dates the Father has set by His own authority.  But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you and you will be My witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria and to the ends of the earth".  Those were His parting words to them and then He was taken up and a cloud hid Him from their sight.

With that very limited description of what was to come, the Disciples went to Jerusalem and waited.  I wonder if some might have been tempted to rush out and share the super-natural event they had just witnessed, by-pass Jerusalem, and go in their own powerful self-sufficiency?

Thankfully they did not.  Thankfully they obeyed the Lord and left us with a completed story of the indwelling Presence of Holiness and passed on a legacy of the power and authority available to all of us who call Jesus our Lord.

I cannot begin to imagine the anticipation of that event we now know as Pentecost.  But I know that I need to experience my own "Pentecost" today.

"The fields are white unto harvest and the laborers are few."  And again, "How can they call on the one they have not believed in?  And how can they believe in the one whom they have not heard?  And how can they hear without someone preaching to them and how can they preach unless they are sent?

Jesus is the One sending.  But.........the task for any believer who calls Him Lord is too much to take on unless Jesus provides us with His authority to operate and His love to share.

We are fortunate to have the written record of the life and times of the Disciples at our fingertips.  We can go to the Bible and read the historical account of what happened on the day of Pentecost but the Disciples had not yet experienced the great event when Jesus told them to go to Jerusalem and wait.

I can't begin to imagine the anticipation over what was about to happen.  What they had already seen was so off-the-chart supernatural and miraculous.  The deaf hear, the blind see, the dead are raised.  They had been able to see, feel, and touch the Savior who was crucified then resurrected.  They ate, drank and shared more of life with the One who died and then came back to them.

And then, wonder of wonders, they watched Him ascend up, off planet earth and into the Heavens. Pentecost came just like the Lord told them.  A day when they received the special "Baptism" different than the water baptism that identified them with Jesus' death, burial and resurrection.  The baptism with the Holy Spirit was the necessary component and power to LIVE the resurrected life and enable them to be His witnesses to the ends of the earth.

The Holy One speaks, "and it's no different today".

I am thankful to know that I need more in order to answer the call of the Lord on my life.  The much more that I need is the very thing Jesus promised to provide more of:  His Holy Spirit.  Odd as it sounds to me, there is great relief in realizing that in and of myself, I can do nothing. 

The power and Presence of the Holy Spirit has been given to every Believer who calls Jesus their Savior.  Yet it is up to each one of us to yield to His Presence and operate in His power. 

The day of Pentecost is a symbol of the Divine Habitation of Holiness in humanity and our intense anticipation  should be in the awe and wonder of what He's going to do next.

Acts 2:17 and Joel 2:

"In the last days, God says, I will pour out my Spirit on all people.  Your sons and daughters will prophesy, your young men will see visions and your old men will dream dreams.  Even on my servants, both men and women I will pour out My Spirit in those days and they will prophesy.  I will show wonders in the heaven above and signs on the earth below, blood and fire and billows of smoke.  The sun will be turned to darkness and the moon to blood before the great and glorious day of the Lord and everyone who calls on the Name of the Lord will be saved."

I don't know about you, but the excitement and anticipation of that is almost killing me.  Come, Holy Spirit and fall afresh on me.

The Holy Spirit is calling.  Can you hear Him?