Wednesday, April 23, 2008

Overwhelmed, Addicted, Messed Up...

[Sometimes seeking the Lord can be a delightful experience, yet sometimes it can be a 'painful' one. Delightful when his tangible presence can be felt and enjoyed. Painful when you are pressing in despite not understanding, not knowing, but pressing in cos you just want to pursue Him and know Him more. .. But you know what, if you seek Him, He will surely come...]

"Let us know,
Let us pursue the knowledge of the LORD.
His going forth is established as the morning;
He will come to us like the rain,
Like the latter and former rain to the earth."
~ Hosea 6:3


The More I Seek You

The more I seek You
The more I find You
The more I find You
The more I love You

I want to sit at Your feet
Drink from the cup in Your hand
Lay back against You and breathe
Feel Your heart beat

This love is so deep
It’s more than I can stand
I melt at Your peace
It’s overwhelming

Hear the song by Kari Jobe here http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendID=60769488

Thursday, April 03, 2008

Men who saw God

[In the house of prayer, we pray quite a bit using Eph 1:17-19 - that we will have the wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of God... When God answers this prayer, His ways have often been that of self-revelation (of ourselves) => end of self (a response to the holiness of God) => entrusted with deep things of God. May we keep our eyes on the Author and Perfector of our faith, for truly His ways are better!]


[The following is extracted from the book “Spiritual Maturity” by J. Oswald Sanders]


Job – God calls him a perfect and upright man, one that feared God and shunned evil. When confronted with the vision of God, the perfect man is reduced to abject self-abhorrence. “I have heard of thee by the hearing of the ear; but now mine eye has seen thee: Wherefore I abhor myself, and repent in dust and ashes.” Job 33:9; Job 1:8; Job 42:5-6 Collapse of Job’s self-righteousness was quickly followed by the bestowal of double what he had lost, and the turning of his captivity through his intercessions for his friends.

Isaiah – one that presented lofty prophecy, calling down woes on his contemporaries. After the radiant vision of God, he called woe upon himself…Lips which had mediated the divine message were foul and unclean in the light of the holiness of God. Not only were Isaiah’s unclean lips purged and his iniquity removed, but he received an enlarged commission. Isa 3:9, 11: 5:8, 11, 20; 6:1-5

Daniel - One of the most blameless of saints when confronted with the divine glory is prostrated at the corruption, not of his vices but of his virtues! “for my comeliness (beauty) was turned into corruption”. Dan 10:7-9 To Daniel, the sense of corruption gave place to joy in the privilege of being the vehicle of Divine revelation.

Men who saw God - Joshua the High Priest, Job, Jacob, Elijah, Isaiah, Ezekiel, Daniel, Peter, Paul, John... A consistent pattern appears throughout these visions. First the vision, then self-abhorrence, self-abasement, the averted face, the sense of uncleanness, blindness, prostration, comeliness turned into corruption, self-banishment, falling as dead. Do we still desire to pray for a vision of God?

But there is still another side to the picture. God takes no pleasure in seeing His children lie in the dust. If He abases and humbles them, it is only that He may exalt them in due season. Humiliation is not an end in itself - it merely prepares the way for blessing.

The open lesson of these visions surely is that God cannot entrust a man with any deep blessing, any important spiritual ministry, until there has come a complete collapse of self.

True, the vision of God inevitably leads to self-revelation, but always with a beneficent end in view. God does not aim merely to humiliate us. There is no need to fear being brought to an end of ourselves for “the end of self is the beginning of God.” Indeed we may welcome the vision of God if our deepest desire is to advance in holiness and to be of the greatest use to Him.


Prov 29:18 - "Where there is no vision (revelation from God, of God), the people perish (die spiritually prematurely): but he that keepeth the law, happy is he."



 
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