A Voice Crying in the
Desert.........Mary Newsom.
I spoke in last quarter’s editorial of coming out of the desert but
that seems to mean that I write down some of what I have heard the Lord say.
I fear that much will not be heard because it is a hard message and we
are so attracted to twenty first century living.
However the bubble is about to burst and I would question how equipped we
are to live in a time of tribulation and ask how we can serve our Lord and love
the world?
Those who believe that they will be “raptured” and not have to go
through tribulation will not be prepared but I believe that the Church must be
made ready for a time of suffering intended to bring people to their knees.
We have seen floods and we are now seeing large scale job losses and foot
and mouth disease which will cost the livelihood of farmers and many others in
the rural and leisure economy.
Stock Market crashes were prophesied a couple of years back and the level
of the FTSE has now returned to that same point.
There has been so much prayer for revival in recent years and that is
after all what we all want, but did you think it would come without pain?
We have not shown ourselves very good at proclaiming the gospel and
non-Christians do not seem able to hear!
We don’t seem to have anything to give to a society which has such a
material outlook on life. New Age philosophy is exciting many as it offers them
relief from stress and cures to twenty first century ills!
If the Church is to reveal the answer there is a cost, a price to pay!
I
quote from Romans 8:18-21: “I
consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with
the glory about to be revealed to us. For
the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the children of God;
for the creation was subjected to futility, not of its own will but by the will
of the one who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be set free
from its bondage to decay and will obtain the freedom of the glory of the
children of God.”
The
Lord is asking us, in fact pleading with us to consider our relationship with
Him. That relationship can
only grow if we spend time with Him, it has to be a relationship in which love
encompasses everything. Easter
has been a time to remind us of that, but we must live in the love of Good
Friday always. Jesus promised
to send the Holy Spirit after the Resurrection but have we received Him?
Friends
I know that you have heard the scriptures but it may be that you have heard
without understanding just like those living in New Testament times ( Matt.13:14-15). I beg you to study and contemplate the whole of Romans
8. For we are the “children
of God” spoken of in verse 19.
God has laid this verse on me to pray into for the last couple of years.
Like most of you I’ve had no problem with praying to my heavenly Father
and yet if you had asked me who I was in my relationship with God I would have
looked first at, “part of the Church, - the body, - the bride of Christ”.
That would make me first an obedient servant and loving spouse but I had
lost sight of the fact that I was primarily a “child of God”.
Often it is our enthusiasm to serve or even to sit quietly at the feet of
Jesus and know him as “lover” that causes us to be blinded to how Jesus
intended His church to work!
We cry out, “Why is the Church so powerless?
Why are there not miraculous healings in our churches when we hear of mass healings in other parts of the world?”
It is not enough to say we do not have enough faith, it is to do with
being the “children of God”, and that is where the faith must be
directed.(Gal.2:26-27)
It
is through the action of the Holy Spirit that we are the children of God
that the whole of creation is waiting for.
So our whole lives are to be modelled not only on Him but by Him.
Look
at Romans 8 verses 5-9, although we profess to be Christians, sadly we do not
allow God this control of our minds and bodies.
Paul
then tells us that we have an obligation because the Spirit of God lives in us,
we are dead to sin if we have the Spirit of sonship and we must, as co-heirs
with Christ, share both His suffering and His glory. But what is this glory that will be revealed in us?
Verse 30 says: “And
those whom he predestined he also called; and those whom he called he also
justified; and those whom he justified he also glorified.” Clearly
it is what God wants, look again at the quote of verses 18-21.
We
need to know the Love of God and build a relationship with Him before we are
ready to surrender to His Will and His plan for His Holy Church.
He will never force us - there has to be a sharing in a relationship of
LOVE - and in the meantime we run the Church our way!
Far too many think they “know” how to run “their church”.
So
if we are
God's children we have a part to play, there is a mystery here as only through
His grace can creation be set free, but we are invited to become the vessels
through which this grace can flow.
I find confirmation in Christ's own words,
"Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called
sons of God", for it is in this way that we might truly be ambassadors for Christ,
permitted to be involved in the reconciliation.(2 Cor. 5:17-21)
So are we willing to allow God to
have His way, by preparing the way, for Him to walk, into all areas of our lives
into all parts of the church and repent of all that is not holy, all that is not
true? To call first the
churches and then the world to repentance.
But the starting point is with each of us and our relationship with God, to become like Jesus, and to allow God to act in and through us so that it is clear to the world that we are His sons and daughters. When shall we be able to say “I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but it is Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.”(Gal.2:19-20)