In today's lesson we learn why this may be. Then we are encouraged to press into the promises of God.)
There are various steps that we can take to open up our spiritual perception.
We want our spirits to develop to the point where we can discern what is taking place spiritually.
When you come into an awareness of the spiritual realm, and you begin to feel and sense things, it is discouraging if you do not understand what is happening, or the source of it, or how to cope with it.
I know that we feel the burden of this.
You may feel that you are walking with the Lord, but that you walk too blindly through the things that you experience, and you need to know more about them.
It is one thing to walk by faith and not by sight, but it is another thing to be a Christian without the proper perception to know what the will of the Lord is.
We want to know the mind of God in any circumstance or situation.
We want to be able to discern the origin or source of anything that is said or done; Is it of God? Is it of the devil? Or is it just the human spirit that is involved?
It is a tragedy today that many ministers who have come into a walk in the Holy Spirit do not really know how to discern the enemy or his attacks against them or against the Church.
They do not recognize specific movings of God that could bring great blessing or great deliverance to their people.
The apostle Paul wrote to one of the early churches in the first century, mentioning certain important keys for the development of their spiritual perception and revelation.
Notice how God blessed the church at Thessalonica.
We are bound to give thanks to God always for you, brethren, even as it is meet, for that your faith growth exceedingly, and the love of each one of you all toward one another aboundeth.
The whole church, every individual in it, was abounding in love toward everyone else. Notice these two phrases: "faith growing exceedingly" and "your love aboundeth."
These two factors are very important. So that we ourselves glory in you in the churches of God for your patience and faith in all your persecutions and in the afflictions which ye endure.
II Thessalonians 1:3-4
That church did not have it easy. They suffered persecutions and afflictions.
If the Lord was not giving them a bad time, then the devil and the world were. Do you agree that God does not give us an easy time?
He does not allow us to have an easy time, because even in a born~again believer the human nature is very susceptible to passivity, and this passivity will control his spirit.
The less one has to do the less he will do.
People who live in a land of freeways and fast traffic automatically learn to drive fast. That is why many people who are not used to driving in these areas often get involved in car accidents; they are not conditioned to react quickly enough.
They are not trained to be alert. In every sense, some pressure is good for you.
God sees to it that you receive enough pressure to keep you from becoming passive and indifferent, to keep you from vegetating.
There will always be afflictions and persecutions to test you.
The persecutions and afflictions in the Thessalonian church resulted in their faith growing exceedingly and the love of each one of them abounding.
Whenever people have trials, that is the time they do not neglect their prayers.
If a church is only concerned about being more faithful to read the Word and to pray, they should pray for the Lord to give them some afflictions and persecutions.
First they need a real meeting with God; then the Lord will begin to apply the pressure to them, because that is what will keep them on their toes.
I have wondered many times whether the Lord was working for us or against us, just as Joshua did when he saw the man with the drawn sword and said, "Art Thou for us, or for our enemies?"
"Nay, but as Captain of the host of Israel am I now come"
Joshua 5:13-14
Then Joshua led the Israelites forth into the conquest of Canaan.
Sometimes the Lord comes in the same way today, and the poor pastor looks up and asks, "Lord , are You with us or are You with our enemies?
Are you trying to chop this church up into little pieces, or are You really trying to build a church without spot or wrinkle?"
What is happening? God is allowing persecution and afflictions to come.
They are allowed by God, of course, but it is Satan and the world who persecute the believer.
The afflictions, however, are those things that are ordained of God to teach you. We read in James 5:13: "Is any among you afflicted? Let him pray."
It is something God uses to drive you deeper into Himself.
So on one side the Lord afflicts you, and that keeps you right on your toes pressing in for the glory of God.
Is this what is happening to you?
The book of Acts records that Barnabas went up and talked to the Gentile Christians who were converted at Antioch and exhorted them that through much tribulation they must enter into the Kingdom of God ( Acts 14:22 ) .
He did not paint a false picture for them. He told them plainly, "You are going to be persecuted, and through much tribulation you will enter the Kingdom of God."
The Lord can stir a man's soul; until he cannot contain the hunger he has for God. Sometimes it can be almost a torment to you, and your hunger and thirst after God will drive you to possess what God has for you.
And just when you think you are going to lay hold of it, God will put something in the way so that you have to battle and struggle for it.
The purpose of all of this is to strengthen you and increase your perception, to bring the anointing of the Lord upon you in a special way.
In verse 5 of our text Paul tells us about their persecutions and afflictions:
Which is a manifest token of the righteous judgment of God; to the end that ye may be counted worthy of the kingdom of God, for which ye also suffer.
Take notice of this: It is the righteous judgement of God to allow you to be persecuted and afflicted so that you will be worthy of the Kingdom of God.
Let me illustrate it for you in this way. The recruiting sergeant sits at his desk while half a dozen boys are deciding whether or not they want to join the Marines.
While they are discussing the benefits and just what is involved, the sergeant is patient with them. He shows them the forms and answers their questions; that is his job.
Finally the boys decide to join, and they sign up. Then he shouts, "Alright, stand on your feet, you bums! Attention!!!"
He may coax you politely at first, but after you sign on the dotted line the situation is a little different.
Everything changes after you become a Christian. Wen you become a Christian, you realize that you are not worthy of anything.
But then God says, "I am going to make you worthy of the Kingdom of god."
At first the Lord says, "Not of works, lest any man should boast"; but afterward you become His workmanship, created in Him unto good works, which He has before ordained for us to walk in ( Ephesians 2:9-10 ) .
When you become a Christian you say, "I bring nothing in my hand; I simply cling to Your cross Lord."
But after you have become a Christian, God has a plan, a pattern, and a discipline for your life. Then you have to endure hardness as a good soldier of Jesus Christ.
That may sound a little deceitful, and just as tricky as the action of the Marine sergeant. But it really is not,for when you finally stand in the Kingdom of God as kings and priests of God upon the earth, you will be worthy of it.
He will have worked into you His righteousness and His worthiness.
He scourges every son whom He receives ( Hebrews 12:6 ) . The minute He receives a son He starts laying the whip on him.
He chastens us that we may be partakers of His holiness. That is what God has in mind for you.
He does not say that He is going to do an easy work in your life. He is bringing many sons to glory.
He made even the Captain of our salvation perfect through the things that He suffered.
Though He was a Son, yet ( He ) learned obedience by the things which He suffered. Hebrews 5:8.
This is how we are going to be accounted worthy of the Kingdom of God. And all of it is by the grace of God.
He puts you in a corner so that you have to reach into Him and get a little more blessing, a little more grace. This is the way God works.
Everything that you are going through is actually the training in preparation for the age to come. I know that I have not preached on heaven or our future life very much.
For the past twenty-plus years of my ministry I have been engrossed with the present, with the development of the Christian and his walk in the difficult here-and-now.
But I think it is also important to preach about the sweet by-and-by because in the final analysis we cannot live for this age.
We live in this age in preparation for the age to come.
The book of Ephesians emphasizes that God is doing all these things now, that in the ages to come He might gather into one all things in Christ Jesus ( Ephesians 1:10 ) .
God has something in mind that He is preparing us for, and that makes it very difficult for us now.
If you look around, you see that the wicked have their portion in this life. The Psalmist said, "But as for us, we are only satisfied when we awaken in His likeness" ( Psalm 17:15 ) .
Something in us causes us to look to the future.
God has created within us so great a hunger and yearning after Him that it torments us. Nothing in this life could ever satisfy us except what is to be found in God.
I will continue to emphasize our walk with the Lord now; however, I am persuaded that for most of us, our eternal hope is the thing that must be emphasized.
Frankly, the rewards fr serving God right now are just not worth the price, without a revelation of God's great eternal plan for us.
You may think that it is worthwhile just to serve the Lord right now. What makes you think so? What are you getting out of it?
Although you know that it is worthwhile, it does not seem to be worth the price in the process that you are being put through now.
It could be compared to refining a whole mountain in order to get one little nugget of gold. The process does not warrant the results that you see now.
You understand its value only when you realize that God is doing something that will have value through eternal ages.
Minister after minister has given his life and died without having much money, without having any place of importance.
A man with the same intellect, the same drive and diligence, putting his heart into any other field, would have great rewards in this present life.
But the man who has given himself in dedication to the Lord may have very little. Does this mean that it is not worthwhile?
No it is infinitely worthwhile. And so, lest you be discouraged, let me also speak to you about the great day that God has for us when we will share the blessings and the rewards.
He is making us worthy of the Kingdom of God, and that is a difficult process.
No testing for the present seems to be joyous but grievous; yet afterwards it yields the peaceable fruit of righteousness. ( Hebrews 12:11 ) .
2 Thessalonians 1:6-12King James Version (KJV)
6 Seeing it is a righteous thing with God to recompense tribulation to them that trouble you;7 And to you who are troubled rest with us, when the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from heaven with his mighty angels,
8 In flaming fire taking vengeance on them that know not God, and that obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ:
9 Who shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord, and from the glory of his power;
10 When he shall come to be glorified in his saints, and to be admired in all them that believe (because our testimony among you was believed) in that day.
11 Wherefore also we pray always for you, that our God would count you worthy of this calling, and fulfil all the good pleasure of his goodness, and the work of faith with power:
12 That the name of our Lord Jesus Christ may be glorified in you, and ye in him, according to the grace of our God and the Lord Jesus Christ.
It requires some concentration to understand this passage. Paul is saying, "Those who harass and persecute and afflict you are making you worthy of the Kingdom of God that is to come.
But rest in peace, because when the Lord has accomplished His purpose in you, He is going to come and bring vengeance upon those who have afflicted and harassed you."
It may seem peculiar, but this is the economy of God; there is no wasted motion.
There is an example of this in the book of Habakkuk.
The children of Israel became very wicked. They knew the Lord and worshiped Him, but they were worshiping their idols also. Their hearts were mixed.
So God sent the wicked Assyrians to punish the children of Israel because they were backsliding and were not serving Him as they should.
The prophet Habakkuk must have wondered, "Why should God use such a wicked nation to punish us when we are much better than they? We are more spiritual than they are any day of the week."
In the same way God may allow the unrighteous man to come against you and give you a bad time. You may think, "Why should God use sinners to punish me? I have only transgressed a little bit. I am more righteous than they are ( by the grace of God ) ."
But soon you will find yourself repenting of prayerlessness and a few other things, and you will be getting yourself right with the Lord.
The Lord punished the Assyrians for what they did to Israel. When God wanted to punish the children of Israel, He used the Assyrians as a tool.
When they harassed the children of Israel, they were accomplishing God's purposes. But because it was in the heart of the Assyrians to touch the people of god and because they dared to do so, God destroyed them.
It was as if God said, "I was looking for a good chance to get at you fellows because you have been so wicked."
That filled up the whole cup of His wrath. God is an economist. He does not waste a move.
When people harass you and persecute you, they are only making you worthy of the Kingdom of God.
They are causing you to be ready to walk in a ministry. They are causing you to be ready to serve the Lord.
When God has accomplished His purpose in your life, He will deal with them for being so audacious as to harass His people.
This is the providence of God; it is the way He works. I think it is rather clever.
At times you may want to throw up your hands and say, "Look at all those people who are harassing me! I am the mental, moral, physical, and spiritual superior in every way, so what right have they to persecute me?"
But in the process, the Lord is teaching you a little humility. Later He will deal with the other situation.
God is working in your life, preparing you for things to come.
What can you do to be a little sharper in your spiritual perception? How can you be more aware of what God is saying and doing?
How can you be more led by the Spirit of he Lord?
In these lessons I want to show you how to come into greater spiritual perception.
I think it is important to understand the need for divine awareness as opposed to receiving personal ministry. Very often the two are in conflict.
If you are aware of the presence of the Lord, that is good.
If you are only looking for someone to minister to you and bless you and meet your need, then you are leaning on personal ministry.
Many of those who have taken the lion's share of personal ministry and revelation in this move of God have been lost to it. It has been that way from the beginning.
Over the years I have noticed that the people who are growing the most are those who are not necessarily getting the most personal ministry and revelation.
These are the ones who are flourishing because they are awakened. There is a divine awareness in them.
Personal ministry and revelation are wonderful, but there are those who receive a great deal of it, and yet they have no awareness of the Lord.
If I were to develop one or the other, I would choose divine awareness over personal ministry.
And I would choose to have a congregation that is aware of the Lord's presence and awakened to it.
People need to become sensitive to the presence of the Lord.
In the first place, without any awareness of the Lord, no one can minister. When personal ministry is given, it is accomplished through divine awareness.
The one who is ministering is tuned in to the Lord. He is focused on the Lord and drawing what God as for that individual.
He is in tune with his needs through the wisdom of the Holy Spirit, and this is how he is able to minister to him.
But the person who is being ministered to may just stand and hear it, having no awareness of the Lord's presence at all.
David said, "I have set the Lord always before me. He is at my right hand. I shall not be moved" ( Psalm 16:8 ) .
He practiced the presence of the Lord; he concentrated on an awareness of the Lord continually.
The Lord is always with us, but are you aware of it? When you begin to develop an awareness of the Lord and you are awakened to His presence, then your spiritual perception will increase.
If someone in the room is speaking and you know it, you can tune your ear to it. Even if that person is speaking softly, you will hear it.
And if he cannot be heard at all, you can still try to read his lips. There is always some way it will get through to you if you are aware that someone is trying to communicate with you.
But some people could be sitting in the midst of a spiritual hurricane and they would not even know that anything was going on because there is no awareness in them.
Spiritual perception is an outgrowth of spiritual awareness. You see, you hear, and you know because you are continually aware; you practice the awareness of the Lord's presence.
This is a very valuable secret and you should lay hold of it.
I do like the reverence in some of the denominational churches. The people come into the church and reverently kneel and wait upon the Lord.
If they just had the faith to believe that God would speak to them, it would be wonderful.
If people would begin to cultivate their awareness of the Lord when they are gathered together, in a short time there would be something tremendous taking place in their services.
Another thing is necessary for the growth of your spiritual perception is that you have the proper evaluation of things that are happening to you.
Let me illustrate. Young children sometimes amaze and amuse us with their choice of playthings.
They may put aside an expensive toy and play for hours with the box it came in. That box is worthless, but they do not realize it. They are intrigued with it.
The difference in evaluation and viewpoint between a child and an adult is obvious. Things that would impress an adult make no impression on a little child.
Some little girls are intrigued by a common little chicken. If you would take them to the zoo to see a hugh elephant, they might ignore the elephant and watch a little chicken eating corn by the elephant's foot.
If you showed them a tall giraffe with his long neck, they might pay no attention to him, but instead watch a little bird flying around. Their viewpoint is completely different from that of an adult.
Can you see that this illustrates what happens to many Christians?
They are interested in the "little birds" than in the big things that God is doing. Their evaluation is
not quite right.
The difference between a mature Christian and a babe is that the babe has never learned what is most important and what is least important. It is a matter of evaluation.
Do you want to have spiritual perception? Do you want to prevail?
You can either remain a child and go through your Christian life talking about inconsequential matters, being concerned with unimportant goals, intrigued with things that do not make a bit of difference- or you can concentrate on what is truly important.
If Satan can succeed in distracting you with some unimportant detail that causes you to become very emotional and upset, then he has defeated you. You will struggle for hours with that problem.
Blessed is the man who has the proper evaluation, who will look over the whole situation and weigh it carefully.
You are beginning to grow up when you can give up the good and cleave to the better.
As you grow further in God, you will say, "This is better than anything I have seen, but this is not the best that God holds before me."
Then you must let go of the thing that was better and cleave to the best. The maturity of the Christian life is evolved around this.
Your spiritual revelation and your spiritual development and growth all depend upon the fact that you grow up in your evaluation of things. You must learn how to judge a situation accurately.
It is easy to judge another person when you focus on the things that are wrong in his life. I have learned to look at people pretty much the way the Lord looks at me.
Every time the Lord gives me a Word, I feel like Gideon, when he was looking around to see if the Lord was talking to someone else.
When the Lord called to him, he was hiding in the cave of the Midianites, threshing out a few grains of wheat.
When the Lord said, "Hail, thou mighty man of valor," Gideon said," He cannot mean me. I am nothing. I am the littlest of my father's family, and my father's family is the least of my father's tribe, and our tribe does not amount to anything." ( Judges 6:12-15 ) .
But God looked at Gideon, not as he was at the moment, but as what He intended to make of him and what He intended to do in his life.
This is very important.
When I see a brother who seems to be in trouble, who does not seem to be measuring up to the standard that he should be as a Christian, then I remember what he was when I first saw him.
I remember how he has changed from season to season, and I weigh that very carefully.
I remember what the Lord has said over him, what the Lord was going to make of him. The goal that God has in mind for him seems to overbalance the problems that he has at the present.
God, who has begun a good work in him, is able to perform it unto the day of the Lord.
Knowing this, the brother the brother does not ignore the present need, but he looks at it with a mature viewpoint.
The immature Christian can only see the little birds hopping around. The mature Christian sees the vast panorama of things that are unfolding in the will of the Lord in which the little birds are just another expression of His love.
When you see people whining and fussing about this, that, and the other thing, what should you do? Should you get disgusted with them?
No, they are going through something. They are screaming and squealing like a pig caught in a fence. Among the most irritating noises in the world is the cry of a hungry baby at three o'clock in the morning and the frantic squeal of a pig that is caught in a fence.
Either one will keep you awake. They will disturb you until you do something about their problems. People are like that too.
We have the babies with us. What do we do- discard them? Shoot them to keep them quiet? No, just recognize that they are in the process of growth.
Do not judge with the unrighteous judgment. You must think as the Lord does. You must see what God has done and what He wants to do in your brothers and sisters; and if their failures in the present are annoying to you, then pray for them and try to find an answer.
God will make a way for them. Regardless of how things are at the present, you can be sure they will change in the future.
The changes are going to be for the good as we trust God and love Him, but for those who have no sense of evaluation, no sense of dedication or devotion, the changes will be a cause of frustration.
In a walk with God, the initiative of faith is very important to spiritual growth. God has been dealing with me about this and I have come to the conclusion that I am going to be yelling my prayers from now on.
I may have to find a soundproof room. It is not that I think God is deaf, but I want to put more emphasis upon my prayers. I think that some of our prayers should be expressed with more feeling. Do not think that this is sacrilegious. A certain initiative of faith is necessary.
The psalmist cried, "Where are our signs? There is no prophet to tell us how long" ( Psalm 74:9 ) .
Why did men of God get so excited about these things? Why did they agonize and pray about these things?
Elijah bent down to the ground with his head between his knees ( which is no little feat in itself ) and prayed earnestly that the Lord would break the drought that had been upon the land for three and one-half years.
He had prayed earnestly that it might not rain, and this time he began to pray that it would rain.
Elijah said to his servant, "Go and look. Stand over there on the cliff and look out over the sea to see if there are any clouds."
But there were no clouds. So Elijah put his head between his knees and prayed earnestly again.
Seven times he sent that boy to look; the seventh time he prayed, in effect, "All right now, God; You had better get with it. You have ignored me long enough. You must do this thing. You promised that as I stood before Your face, there would be no rain or dew in the land but by my word."
( Elijah had declared this to King Ahab at the beginning of the drought. )
The next time the boy came back, he said, "say, there is a cloud the size of a man's hand up there." Elijah said, "Good, we finally moved something."
He told the boy, "You had better run to the palace, for there is going to be a 'gully-washer' here you will not make it if you do not hurry."
Elijah threw off all of his excess clothing and out ran the king's horses and chariot to the palace ( I Kings 18:41-46 ) .
Pretty good for an old man, wasn't it? The Spirit of the Lord was upon him. The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much. James 5:16.
People sometimes accept their situation with a passivity that amounts to unbelief. If you believe that God has a certain deliverance , a certain ministry, or a certain walk for you, and He has not brought it forth in your life, then it could be due to the timing of God in His sovereign plan.
But there are many examples in the Scriptures where blessings were overdue, and then the people began to get a little disturbed about it.
They reminded the Lord, "You had better find out what is going on up there. Someone must have goofed. Some of those angels must have their wires crossed because this blessing should be coming through."
Daniel 9 tells us that Daniel was praying over a prophecy that had been written by Jeremiah when Daniel was just a boy.
At that particular time, Daniel figured out that according to the chronology, the fulfillment of the prophecy was two years overdue.
So he fasted and prayed for twenty-one days, while the devil tried to hinder him.
We do not completely understand this, but God can make promises and give leadings, and even though Satan cannot prevent the will of God, under certain circumstances ( according to the Scriptures ) he is able to hinder the fulfillment of the promises.
In Romans 1:13 Paul wrote, "I purposed once and again to come to Rome, but Satan hindered me."
You are defeated if you sit there passively and say, "Well, the Lord made a promise and in His own sweet time He will bring it to pass."
If you take that attitude, you will be growing whiskers before it comes to pass. You must do as Daniel did.
He was thumping on heaven's door saying, "How about this prophecy? It is overdue. Come on, I want to see some action!"
Because of his insistence, the Lord unfolded to him the seventy weeks of Daniel, but first he had to get a little stirred up. And sometimes we do too.
Jesus said, "The Kingdom of heaven suffereth violence, and the violent take it by force" ( Matthew 11:12 ) .
He was not talking about the violence of the world; they have never possessed the Kingdom of heaven.
But we can reach in and forcibly take it. God loves for His people to be reverent and humble before Him, but He wants them to be desperate enough to be insistent and persistent.
Imagine the angel of the Lord standing before Jacob and saying "Jacob, let's lay it all on the line. How about it-the best two falls out of three?"
They wrestled all night.
Finally, as the day was breaking, the angel said, "Let me go for the day breaketh." But Jacob said, "No, I will not let you go until you bless me."
The angel said to him, "All right, you deserve a blessing. What is your name?"
Jacob," meaning supplanter or crook. "I am going to change that. You will be called Israel, which means prince of God, because you have prevailed with God and with man" ( Genesis 32:24-29 ) .
Where are the people with enough fire in their souls that they will refuse to take the prophecies of God passively, a people who will fast and pray and storm heaven?
You have had many promises and blessings, but perhaps you are not claiming what God has provided for you.
When God says, "I have loosed finances for you, " and He moves on the hearts of the people so that money is loosed for the projects that He has set before them to do, then you are not to worry over your bills even though you have not yet received your portion.
Instead, you had better start praying about it because God said it is yours. I think we need to be a little more excited about the promises that God has given to us as a people.
In my opinion, if God has given us a Word, then He should either fulfill it or else step off the throne. You may think that this attitude is sacrilegious, but it is not.
If He is going to be my Lord, then He is going to be my Lord! He is going to measure up in every way.
I am going to be submissive and dedicated. I know that I am unworthy. I know that I am weak. I know that I am human.
But on the basis of His grace, He has promised certain things, and I think that it is time for us to claim those promises. This takes an initiative of faith.
Jacob had it and Abraham had it. All the way through the Bible, men had it.
David inquired after the Lord; he sought His face earnestly.
These men ave had their faults They had their problems, and God knew it. He knew their human weaknesses and He dealt with them.
But He also saw their hunger. He saw that they would not be still until He met them.
In the New Testament times there were probably many blind beggars sitting by the wayside, rattling their tin cups.
They probably wore signs that said, "I am blind." They were having a difficult time in life because they could not see.
One day two of these blind men heard a commotion of the crowd nearby.
When they heard that Jesus of Nazareth was passing by, they started hollering and yelling until the whole crowd was so disturbed that they tried to stop them.
"Be quiet. You are disturbing the Master. We cannot hear what He is saying!"
The blind men cried out, "Jesus, Thou Son of David, have mercy on us!"
This was not a humble entreaty; it sounded like a bellow of a wounded bull. They were yelling for attention, for God to come on the scene.
Jesus said, "What do you want?" "Lord, our sight!" they answered.
He healed them and they threw away the tin cups, ripped off the "I am blind" signs, and followed the Lord.
When people get desperate enough to believe God, they begin to move in and claim His promises. Do you want to be a passive Christian?
Do you want to be one who stands in the midst of a generation in which God is moving by His Spirit and see the little showers, but not be a part of it?
There is something in the violence of men's souls that God honors. I do not know if it could be said of all the disciples, but we know that Peter did not draw back very often.
His aim was not very good, but his heart was in was in his defense of the Lord. He was a bold man.
When the soldiers came for the Lord, he took his sword, ready to cleave a man right down the middle. Fortunately, his aim was not very good, so he chopped off an ear and the Lord put it back on.
But you do have to give him credit; even with all those soldiers coming, he was not timid.
Of course he was not able to withstand the kind of spiritual battle he later had to encounter; and before the night was over, he had denied his Lord. Then he went out and wept bitterly.
But on that wonderful morning when they were fishing and the Lord came to meet them, Peter said, "It's the Lord, " and he went right over the side of the boat and swam to the shore as fast as he could go. When he got there, he was right at the feet of the Master ( John 21:7 ) .
There are some people who never cause any problems. they do not even have the audacity to sin. It takes a certain amount of courage to be a good sinner, but it takes a certain amount of courage to be a good Christian too.
And so, many remain very passive individuals, neither fish or fowl; and all you need to do is give them a little shot in the arm once in a while and they do fine.
But there are others who say, "I am going to reach in and get the blessings." They go after it with all of their heart.
Sometimes God finds an individual who has been in the depth of sin and brings him in. After that person becomes a Christian, he may serve God with more of a whole heart than someone who has been restrained from the days of his youth.
Sometimes parents restrain their children so much that they are rather docile and submissive to authority over them, but they have lost their own spirit. They have no drive, no hunger.
We must raise our children to be good- but good for something! We must raise ourselves to the position in God in which we have the initiative of faith to insist that we are going to have the blessing that the Lord has set before us in this generation.
What do we want from God? What do you want to do?
Do you want to hear sermons every once in a while about what God is doing today, and what He is going to do, and just hold it up before you like some kind of ethereal blessing that some day, in some generation, may come to pass?
Or would you really like to see things change? Would you like to take steps into God? It involves much prayer and fasting and wrestling before God.
It is our attitude toward God that is important. I am going to need a soundproof room in which to do my praying from now on, because I do not like restrictions that are on my spirit. I do not like them!
I want to move into God! I do not like the limitations that I see upon my ministry. I want to flow in Gd in a far more effective way. I hope you feel the same way.
A man who is really contented with God and wants no part of the world is the one who will continually pray prayers of discontent to God. Think about that.
A man who is not contented with God is constantly praying, "Help me, Lord, because the world is pulling me. The flesh is pulling me, and I have all these problems. Lord, help me with them."
He is not content with God; therefore he is constantly reaching out for the world to be his source of contentment. But a man who is content to walk with God finds that his prayers are always an expression of discontent.
He is discontented with the amount that he has possessed of the Lord, with the way he has appropriated the promises, with the frailty and weakness of his own approach to God.
He wants more, in such an insistent way that it becomes a frustrating discontent and a drive in his heart until he possesses it.
He says, "Is there a wall before me? God , take it down or I will kick it down. One way or the other, I want to see some action!"
This is what God wants.
This is how He is blessed. To put it in far more beautiful language, it is like the great love story between Christ and His Church, in which the Church says, "Draw me, and we will run after thee" ( Song of Solomon 1:4 ) .
We need the same audacity that Peter had. I imagine that he did more things wrong than any of the other disciples. He chopped off a man's ear to protect the Lord.
then he denied Him three times in one night. He was the one to whom Jesus said, "Get thee behind Me, Satan"; but to him He also said, "Blessed art thou, Simon Barjona."
He was impulsive in what he said; I think he had such a hunger and such a desire to move out in God that he was always pushing in.
One dark night, the Lord withdrew to the mountain to pray. Many mighty miracles had been performed that day.
The disciples took the boat across the Sea of Galilee, and a sudden squall came up that almost sank the boat.
In the midst of the darkness, with the waves beating against the boat, Jesus came to them, walking on the water.
When the disciples saw Him, they were fearful. But when He revealed Himself to them, Peter was the one who said, "Lord, bid me to come walking to You on the water. Lord, bid me to come- come on, Lord, bid me to come!"
There was such an eagerness in him that when the Lord said "Come," he scrambled over the side of that boat and started walking.
Before long he realized what he had gotten himself into, and when he saw the boisterous waves he started to sink.
Do not criticize him because he sank. Commend him for the audaciousness of his faith.
As far as we know, he is the only man besides the Master who ever walked on water.
I love to see an audacious man who will say, "Lord, help me. Come on, help me!"
This is worth striving for...
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