January 7, 2010

Intimate With Jesus

Jesus said to him, ’Have I been with you so long, and yet you have not known Me, Philip?’ —John 14:9

Music and video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HCLr_pvuwH4

These words were not spoken as a rebuke, nor even with surprise; Jesus was encouraging Philip to draw closer. Yet the last person we get intimate with is Jesus. Before Pentecost the disciples knew Jesus as the One who gave them power to conquer demons and to bring about a revival (see Luke 10:18-20). It was a wonderful intimacy, but there was a much closer intimacy to come: “. . . I have called you friends . . .” (John 15:15). True friendship is rare on earth. It means identifying with someone in thought, heart, and spirit. The whole experience of life is designed to enable us to enter into this closest relationship with Jesus Christ. We receive His blessings and know His Word, but do we really know Him?

Jesus said, “It is to your advantage that I go away . . .” (John 16:7). He left that relationship to lead them even closer. It is a joy to Jesus when a disciple takes time to walk more intimately with Him. The bearing of fruit is always shown in Scripture to be the visible result of an intimate relationship with Jesus Christ (see John 15:1-4).

Once we get intimate with Jesus we are never lonely and we never lack for understanding or compassion. We can continually pour out our hearts to Him without being perceived as overly emotional or pitiful. The Christian who is truly intimate with Jesus will never draw attention to himself but will only show the evidence of a life where Jesus is completely in control. This is the outcome of allowing Jesus to satisfy every area of life to its depth. The picture resulting from such a life is that of the strong, calm balance that our Lord gives to those who are intimate with Him.

January 6, 2010

Worship

Music and Words: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CoxopsRSfdU&feature=fvw

He moved from there to the mountain east of Bethel, and he pitched his tent with Bethel on the west and Ai on the east; there he built an altar to the Lord and called on the name of the Lord —Genesis 12:8

Worship is giving God the best that He has given you. Be careful what you do with the best you have. Whenever you get a blessing from God, give it back to Him as a love-gift. Take time to meditate before God and offer the blessing back to Him in a deliberate act of worship. If you hoard it for yourself, it will turn into spiritual dry rot, as the manna did when it was hoarded (see Exodus 16:20 ). God will never allow you to keep a spiritual blessing completely for yourself. It must be given back to Him so that He can make it a blessing to others.

Music and video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NPWq8eM4lu8&NR=1

Bethel is the symbol of fellowship with God; Ai is the symbol of the world. Abram “pitched his tent” between the two. The lasting value of our public service for God is measured by the depth of the intimacy of our private times of fellowship and oneness with Him. Rushing in and out of worship is wrong every time— there is always plenty of time to worship God. Days set apart for quiet can be a trap, detracting from the need to have daily quiet time with God. That is why we must “pitch our tents” where we will always have quiet times with Him, however noisy our times with the world may be. There are not three levels of spiritual life— worship, waiting, and work. Yet some of us seem to jump like spiritual frogs from worship to waiting, and from waiting to work. God’s idea is that the three should go together as one. They were always together in the life of our Lord and in perfect harmony. It is a discipline that must be developed; it will not happen overnight.

January 5, 2010

The Life of Power to Follow

 

Jesus answered him, ’Where I am going you cannot follow Me now, but you shall follow Me afterward’ —John 13:36

“And when He had spoken this, He said to him, ’Follow Me’ ” (John 21:19). Three years earlier Jesus had said, “Follow Me” (Matthew 4:19), and Peter followed with no hesitation. The irresistible attraction of Jesus was upon him and he did not need the Holy Spirit to help him do it. Later he came to the place where he denied Jesus, and his heart broke. Then he received the Holy Spirit and Jesus said again, “Follow Me” (John 21:19). Now no one is in front of Peter except the Lord Jesus Christ. The first “Follow Me” was nothing mysterious; it was an external following. Jesus is now asking for an internal sacrifice and yielding (see John 21:18 ).

Between these two times Peter denied Jesus with oaths and curses (see Matthew 26:69-75). But then he came completely to the end of himself and all of his self-sufficiency. There was no part of himself he would ever rely on again. In his state of destitution, he was finally ready to receive all that the risen Lord had for him. “. . . He breathed on them, and said to them, ’Receive the Holy Spirit’ ” (John 20:22 ). No matter what changes God has performed in you, never rely on them. Build only on a Person, the Lord Jesus Christ, and on the Spirit He gives.

All our promises and resolutions end in denial because we have no power to accomplish them. When we come to the end of ourselves, not just mentally but completely, we are able to “receive the Holy Spirit.” “Receive the Holy Spirit “— the idea is that of invasion. There is now only One who directs the course of your life, the Lord Jesus Christ.

January 4, 2010

Why Can I Not Follow You Now?

Music and video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FWI-iZsIKIk&feature=related

Peter said to Him, ’Lord, why can I not follow You now?’ —John 13:37

 Proverbs 3:5-6

January 3, 2010

Clouds and Darkness

Clouds and darkness surround Him . . . —Psalm 97:2

Music and Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WsoiI8XhpmY&feature=related

A person who has not been born again by the Spirit of God will tell you that the teachings of Jesus are simple. But when he is baptized by the Holy Spirit, he finds that “clouds and darkness surround Him . . . .” When we come into close contact with the teachings of Jesus Christ we have our first realization of this. The only possible way to have full understanding of the teachings of Jesus is through the light of the Spirit of God shining inside us. If we have never had the experience of taking our casual, religious shoes off our casual, religious feet— getting rid of all the excessive informality with which we approach God— it is questionable whether we have ever stood in His presence. The people who are flippant and disrespectful in their approach to God are those who have never been introduced to Jesus Christ.

I am not certain that God desires formality ad much as He responds to our honest and open cxommunication that is led by His Spirit. And His Spirit leads us into a relationship that is at once respectful, and overwhelming, if not formal. In our contemporary American culture we have learned that we can be respectful, and totally connected with God without formality. When we cry out Abba, Father, we cry out in an informal way as demonstrated by our Savior. Formality is not called for, but intimate connection is…JDV

Only after the amazing delight and liberty of realizing what Jesus Christ does, comes the impenetrable “darkness” of realizing who He is.

Jesus said, “The words that I speak to you are spirit, and they are life” (John 6:63). Once, the Bible was just so many words to us — “clouds and darkness”— then, suddenly, the words become spirit and life because Jesus re-speaks them to us when our circumstances make the words new. That is the way God speaks to us; not by visions and dreams, but by words. When a man gets to God, it is by the most simple way— words.

And as the Bible teaches us,(Matthew 19:14) our relationship to Him should  be like that of a child, and we need not truly understand everything; the Spirit of God within us when connected to the Holy Spirit of God, and the word of God, provides peace and reassurance and the knowledge we need exactly when we need it…JDV

January 2, 2010

Will You Go Out Without Knowing?

He went out, not knowing where he was going —Hebrews 11:8

Music and Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_bmbZS3BnaA&feature=player_embedded

Have you ever “gone out” in this way? If so, there is no logical answer possible when anyone asks you what you are doing. One of the most difficult questions to answer in Christian work is, “What do you expect to do?” You don’t know what you are going to do. The only thing you know is that God knows what He is doing. Continually examine your attitude toward God to see if you are willing to “go out” in every area of your life, trusting in God entirely. It is this attitude that keeps you in constant wonder, because you don’t know what God is going to do next. Each morning as you wake, there is a new opportunity to “go out,” building your confidence in God. “. . . do not worry about your life . . . nor about the body . . .” (Luke 12:22). In other words, don’t worry about the things that concerned you before you did “go out.”

Have you been asking God what He is going to do? He will never tell you. God does not tell you what He is going to do— He reveals to you who He is. Do you believe in a miracle-working God, and will you “go out” in complete surrender to Him until you are not surprised one iota by anything He does?

Believe God is always the God you know Him to be when you are nearest to Him. Then think how unnecessary and disrespectful worry is! Let the attitude of your life be a continual willingness to “go out” in dependence upon God, and your life will have a sacred and inexpressible charm about it that is very satisfying to Jesus. You must learn to “go out” through your convictions, creeds, or experiences until you come to the point in your faith where there is nothing between yourself and God.

January 1, 2010

Let Us Keep to the Point

 

“. . . my earnest expectation and hope that in nothing I shall be ashamed, but with all boldness, as always, so now also Christ will be magnified in my body, whether by life or by death” —Philippians 1:20

My Utmost for His Highest. “. . . my earnest expectation and hope that in nothing I shall be ashamed . . . .” We will all feel very much ashamed if we do not yield to Jesus the areas of our lives He has asked us to yield to Him. It’s as if Paul were saying, “My determined purpose is to be my utmost for His highest— my best for His glory.” To reach that level of determination is a matter of the will, not of debate or of reasoning. It is absolute and irrevocable surrender of the will at that point.

And like the gift of conviction, make no mistake this level of determination is also a gift of God provided us by the Holy Spirit of God. JDV

An undue amount of thought and consideration for ourselves is what keeps us from making that decision, although we cover it up with the pretense that it is others we are considering. When we think seriously about what it will cost others if we obey the call of Jesus, we tell God He doesn’t know what our obedience will mean. Keep to the point— He does know.

And when we are connected we know as well, this obedience will mean peace and harmony within. We cannot avoid the call of the Spirit and have true peace ahdn happiness. JDV

 Shut out every other thought and keep yourself before God in this one thing only— my utmost for His highest. I am determined to be absolutely and entirely for Him and Him alone.

Our determination means nothing. It is false hope, just like a New Year’s resolution we know we will break in days, weeks or months. Real determination comes from the Spirit of God as we surrender and  stay connected to Him. JDV

My Unstoppable Determination for His Holiness.

Our determination is only unstoppable when it is the Spirit of God and the person of Jesus living inside of us that offers up the determination. JDV

“Whether it means life or death-it makes no difference!” (see Philippians 1:21). Paul was determined that nothing would stop him from doing exactly what God wanted. But before we choose to follow God’s will, a crisis must develop in our lives. This happens because we tend to be unresponsive to God’s gentler nudges.

We can hear the more gentle “nudges” when we are connected to God. And if we can hear and respond to these gentle “nudges” then we may  avoid the impending crisis that will surely arrive when we are unresponsive to God’s earlier nudges. JDV

He brings us to the place where He asks us to be our utmost for Him and we begin to debate. He then providentially produces a crisis where we have to decide— for or against. That moment becomes a great crossroads in our lives. If a crisis has come to you on any front, surrender your will to Jesus absolutely and irrevocably.

As DJR has said, “We come to Him out of need and stay connected out of love”…JDV

December 31, 2009

Yesterday

Here I am a sinner
Broken and in need of You
Take my life and wash my fears away
For You are the Great I AM
Rest assured, I feel Your hand
Holding me until the darkness clears
A Father to the fatherless
Redeemer of my soul
My Life is Yours forever
I want the world to know

Your mercy saved me
Mercy made me whole
Your mercy found me
Called me as Your own

Here I stand a child of Yours
Broken and in need of You
Break these chains and wash my guilt away Healer of my brokenness
My weary soul will find its rest
You are my strength, the lifter of my head
You’re greater than my yesterdays
You hold me close today
You’re the Lord of my tomorrows
My heart will always say
You’re greater than my yesterdays
You hold me close today
You’re the Lord of my tomorrows
My heart will always say

You called me as Your own
You called me as Your own
Thank You for Your mercy
Thank You for Your mercy

You called me as Your own
Your own

You shall not go out with haste, . . . for the Lord will go before you, and the God of Israel will be your rear guard —Isaiah 52:12

Security from Yesterday. “. . . God requires an account of what is past” ( Ecclesiastes 3:15  ). At the end of the year we turn with eagerness to all that God has for the future, and yet anxiety is apt to arise when we remember our yesterdays. Our present enjoyment of God’s grace tends to be lessened by the memory of yesterday’s sins and blunders. But God is the God of our yesterdays, and He allows the memory of them to turn the past into a ministry of spiritual growth for our future. God reminds us of the past to protect us from a very shallow security in the present.

Security for Tomorrow. “. . . the Lord will go before you . . . .” This is a gracious revelation— that God will send His forces out where we have failed to do so. He will keep watch so that we will not be tripped up again by the same failures, as would undoubtedly happen if He were not our “rear guard.” And God’s hand reaches back to the past, settling all the claims against our conscience.

Security for Today. “You shall not go out with haste . . . .” As we go forth into the coming year, let it not be in the haste of impetuous, forgetful delight, nor with the quickness of impulsive thoughtlessness. But let us go out with the patient power of knowing that the God of Israel will go before us. Our yesterdays hold broken and irreversible things for us. It is true that we have lost opportunities that will never return, but God can transform this destructive anxiety into a constructive thoughtfulness for the future. Let the past rest, but let it rest in the sweet embrace of Christ.

Leave the broken, irreversible past in His hands, and step out into the invincible future with Him.

Help provide facility for the gift of conviction that can lead to direction from the Holy Spirit

December 30, 2009

“And Every Virtue We Possess”

. . . All my springs are in you —Psalm 87:7

Our Lord never “patches up” our natural virtues, that is, our natural traits, qualities, or characteristics. He completely remakes a person on the inside— “. . . put on the new man . . .” ( Ephesians 4:24 ). In other words, see that your natural human life is putting on all that is in keeping with the new life. The life God places within us develops its own new virtues, not the virtues of the seed of Adam, but of Jesus Christ. Once God has begun the process of sanctification in your life, watch and see how God causes your confidence in your own natural virtues and power to wither away. He will continue until you learn to draw your life from the reservoir of the resurrection life of Jesus. Thank God if you are going through this drying-up experience!

I have misenterpreted this “drying-up experience” of my life on a number of occasions. Whenever I find my own best efforts begin to fail, I wonder if God has deserted me. A former and historically positive virtue, characteristic, or skill that  worked for me in my past suddenly does not work anymore. I wonder if God has abandoned me, but no, He has only abandoned MY virtue, MY talent, MY characteristic. He cannot support me or any of the ‘old me”. He can only give life and growth to the Jesus inside of me. His Spirit connected to the Holy Spirit within me through the cross of Jesus. JDV

The sign that God is at work in us is that He is destroying our confidence in the natural virtues, because they are not promises of what we are going to be, but only a wasted reminder of what God created man to be. We want to cling to our natural virtues, while all the time God is trying to get us in contact with the life of Jesus Christ— a life that can never be described in terms of natural virtues. It is the saddest thing to see people who are trying to serve God depending on that which the grace of God never gave them. They are depending solely on what they have by virtue of heredity. God does not take our natural virtues and transform them, because our natural virtues could never even come close to what Jesus Christ wants. No natural love, no natural patience, no natural purity can ever come up to His demands. But as we bring every part of our natural bodily life into harmony with the new life God has placed within us, He will exhibit in us the virtues that were characteristic of the Lord Jesus.

And every virtue we possess is His alone.

December 29, 2009

Deserter or Disciple?

From that time many of His disciples went back and walked with Him no more —John 6:66

When God, by His Spirit through His Word, gives you a clear vision of His will, you must “walk in the light” of that vision ( 1 John 1:7 ). Even though your mind and soul may be thrilled by it, if you don’t “walk in the light” of it you will sink to a level of bondage never envisioned by our Lord. Mentally disobeying the “heavenly vision” ( Acts 26:19 ) will make you a slave to ideas and views that are completely foreign to Jesus Christ. Don’t look at someone else and say, “Well, if he can have those views and prosper, why can’t I?” You have to “walk in the light” of the vision that has been given to you. Don’t compare yourself with others or judge them— that is between God and them. When you find that one of your favorite and strongly held views clashes with the “heavenly vision,” do not begin to debate it. If you do, a sense of property and personal right will emerge in you— things on which Jesus placed no value. He was against these things as being the root of everything foreign to Himself— “. . . for one’s life does not consist in the abundance of the things he possesses” ( Luke 12:15  ). If we don’t see and understand this, it is because we are ignoring the underlying principles of our Lord’s teaching.

If and when we are connected to the Spirit of God, we are not only attuned to the leading of the Spirit of God we are closely aligned with Jesus. Connected, we “know” what God wants from us as we gladly and eagerly move off in that direction. In fact, we are even strong enough “in the Lord” to wait for Him to reveal His plan for and to us, a step at time. JDV

When we are not connected…….

Our tendency is to lie back and bask in the memory of the wonderful experience we had when God revealed His will to us. But if a New Testament standard is revealed to us by the light of God, and we don’t try to measure up, or even feel inclined to do so, then we begin to backslide.

And it seems we will always “backslide” if we rely on our own strength, because when we are “connected” to God we realize we do not have the capacity to “measure up”. We can only measure up when we let Jesus live through us.  JDV

When we are not connected directly to the Spirit of God in an area of our lives……

It means your (our) conscience does not respond to the truth. You (we) can never be the same after the unveiling of a truth. That moment marks you (us) as one who either continues on with even more devotion as a disciple of Jesus Christ, or as one who turns to go back as a deserter.

We have all been both; discipile and deserter, and often we wonder if we can ever make the courageous decision when it truly counts. Yes we can, when we understand that the Spirit of God that lives in us can and will make the right choice on our behalf (just as Jesus did on the cross) when we simply give up (surrender) ourselves and allow the Spirit of God to provide all we need.  We may feel uncomfortable,  and the experience may seem strange, but when we are truly connected, we simply know we are right where Jesus wants us to be…..As the song says…JDV

And this may not be the road I would choose for me
but it still feels right somehow