Ask if you have not received. There is nothing more difficult than asking. We will have yearnings and desires for certain things, and even suffer as a result of their going unfulfilled, but not until we are at the limit of desperation will we ask. It is the sense of not being spiritually real that causes us to ask. Have you ever asked out of the depths of your total insufficiency and poverty?

“If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God . . . ” (James 1:5), but be sure that you do lack wisdom before you ask. You cannot bring yourself to the point of spiritual reality anytime you choose. The best thing to do, once you realize you are not spiritually real, is to ask God for the Holy Spirit, basing your request on the promise of Jesus Christ (see Luke 11:13). The Holy Spirit is the one who makes everything that Jesus did for you real in your life.“Everyone who asks receives . . . .”

This does not mean that you will not get if you do not ask, but it means that until you come to the point of asking, you will not receive from God (seeMatthew 5:45). To be able to receive means that you have to come into the relationship of a child of God, and then you comprehend and appreciate mentally, morally, and with spiritual understanding, that these things come from God.“If any of you lacks wisdom . . . .”

If you realize that you are lacking, it is because you have come in contact with spiritual reality— do not put the blinders of reason on again. The word ask actually means “beg.” Some people are poor enough to be interested in their poverty, and some of us are poor enough spiritually to show our interest. Yet we will never receive if we ask with a certain result in mind, because we are asking out of our lust, not out of our poverty. A pauper does not ask out of any reason other than the completely hopeless and painful condition of his poverty. He is not ashamed to beg— blessed are the paupers in spirit (see Matthew 5:3).

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June 9, 2014

Journal Entry for Today-JDV

Lord, this has been the lesson over the past several weeks, look to You for everything.  However, when Chambers says that only when we ask out of our poverty, are we asking out of our need. When we are not in need we are asking out of our lust? Is that accurate?  I thought we were learning to trust You at every level, for everything.  I thought You were teaching us to understand  that we are to be connected to You for everything.

And God says…”When Oswald says “out of your poverty” he is saying out of your desperation. You can be desperate about the everyday things of life as well…knowing that when you allow Me to live through you at every level, you can live connected, and at peace regardless of your lack or abundance.   Acknowledge me in all your ways, in all your actions, hopes, thoughts and dreams and I will make your paths straight. You can be desperate in your love and yearning for Me…and when you are desperate, by circumstance or through the pattern and development of your faith, you put your trust in Me. That is how to live. Delight yourself in Me and I will give you the desires of your heart.”