Permitting vs. Preventing

Hebrews 12:26, 27, “And His voice shook the earth then, but now He has promised, saying, ‘Yet once more I will shake not only the earth, but also the heaven.’ And this expression, ‘Yet once more,’ denotes the removing of those things which can be shaken, as of created things, in order that those things which cannot be shaken may remain.”

I am fascinated by and enjoying the amazing move toward 3-D movies. My first real experience with this technology was at the World’s Fair in Seoul, Korea. I remember the little old women in traditional dress waving their hands in front of themselves to push away the images that appeared to be coming toward their faces. As an aside, I did make a mistake on that trip, in that there were few Westerners visiting and somehow the word spread among the crowd that I was Dustin Hoffman, the American actor. Out of politeness, I started signing autographs for the spectators who had waited for me to emerge from an exhibit. It was people-pleasing gone mad, and it spiraled out of control when hundreds began to wait, and in the end I was exited out the back door of the fair! By the way, I am happy just being me. Well, back to the theater, we are given glasses that allow us to see what the producer wants us to see, which are things that do not really exist. In a like manner we are given “theological glasses” so that we see what the giver wants us to see. Often it simply is not there. From our youth denominations have given us glasses to see what they desired to be seen. Something that must be twisted and distorted to be seen is rarely something that is true. Man is intent on knowing and systematizing God, which brings comfort to those that lack faith. Honestly, the mind of the created will never fully understand the mind of the Creator; it is not possible. The end result is the categorizing of believers. Are you Calvinist, Armenian, pre-tribulation, covenant, free will, sovereignty, full gospel, Spirit-filled, or more? When we hear a speaker, the glasses go on and we try to pigeonhole him. Often this is merely done to discount what is being said. Many actually are comforted by the thought that denominational leaders have already addressed all the pertinent issues, and therefore, they do not need to. Of course, in all of this is the pride of man that makes him unteachable because of blindness and deafness. Why say all this? Simply because I do not believe that the people of God are so stupid, unenlightened, ignorant, or “sheepish” (in the negative sense of the term) that the panic button has to be hit when they are hearing something outside the denomination’s theological box. Denominational leaders generally hate and oppose the teaching of the equality of believers. After all, they have sat through countless meaningless meetings and kissed up to hordes of self-important men to get to the place of wearing a robe or in other ways being “recognized.” If all men and women were equal in Christ, they would have to admit to a wasted life. In fact, I have noticed that the equality of believers in revelation, relationship, and understanding of Christ creates a jealousy in those that have jumped through the hoops to gain some church-styled superiority. Amen. I do believe that I do not know a thing more than any other believer, that I do not have a special dispensation, that I do not have a special handle on the truth, and that others’ insights into Jesus are as important as mine, period. This is the foundation for looking at permission and preventing. I am not speaking in Calvinistic, Armenian, free-will, foreknowledge, or any other terms. I am just posing a question to a fellow believer, to a brother or sister in Christ. Ready? Does God permit what He could prevent? To bring this question quickly into black and white, I will add suicide to my question. Does God permit some to commit suicide and prevent others? If the answer is no, then we should stop praising God for situations in which a believer was delivered. I have heard hundreds of such testimonies. “My son was to take the bus, we got him there late, the bus ended up going off a cliff, and everyone died. Praise God that my son was not on the bus.” “There was a huge traffic accident, and if my daughter had been there one second earlier, she would not be here, praise God.” “My husband, praise God, at the last minute was sent to a different unit; his former unit was attacked, and no one survived.” “My wife overdosed, and her aunt that she had not seen for years was in town, came to the house, called the police, and today my wife is alive, praise God.” Now, if God did not prevent these things, we must just say that it was fate, and fate must be praised. On the other hand, if we are to thank God for preventing a death, we must admit that He has permitted others to die. For some reason that thought is quite objectionable to believers. It seems to lead to questions, justifications, and accusations, such as, “What kind of a God permits wars, death, and accidents?” This begs for an answer to the obvious question, “Well, what do you believe in?  Buddha, Krishna, spirits, the government? How can you keep believing when those ‘gods’ permit wars, death, and accidents?” Wars, deaths, and accidents are all absolutes; however, preventing and permitting is not to be equated with causing. The worship of false gods does cause those things, sin in human beings does cause those things, but the Creator does not cause them. If I let the dominoes fall in the direction of saying that God does not permit and prevent, the end is chaos, and there is really no need to have a God but just press on in chaos and fate. Therefore, I must say that I believe that God will both permit and prevent. This is not a stretch on two counts. First, I believe what the Scripture teaches, “Flesh and blood does not enter the Kingdom of God.” This establishes an absolute: man must die. This then leads to another Biblical truth: the days of man are numbered. If God numbers our days, then can a drunken driver shorten them? Can a war shorten them? Can cancer shorten them? Can suicide shorten them? I do not believe it is accurate to say that a murderer took a life, but that he was the “means” by which the life was taken; he was not permitted to take the life until the fullness of time, for flesh and blood cannot enter the Kingdom of God. I do not believe that cancer took the life of someone’s mate. I believe that flesh and blood does not enter the Kingdom of God, and cancer was the means by which God permitted the loved one to exit. To recap, God has numbered our days, we must exit, there must be a means of our exiting, and God permits or prevents that “means” according to His will and the number of our days that are set. Therefore, if the means of exiting is suicide, murder, war, disease, or old age (which is technically a disease), what is the difference? Here is how I see it. God permits the perfect means that will accomplish the most in His will. Take for example murder, which did not happen without permission, His permitting. However, the means will accomplish much. For those that have a heart for the Lord, hearing the news will break them. My children attended Columbine High School, famous for the mass murders. Hundreds of students turned their hearts toward Christ. Those who were killed only exited by permission. Those that did the killing by permission had their hearts revealed also; they were murderers. The glory of God is in choice. He permits choice, but choice is within His parameters. This means that man chooses, but God, in a sense, restrains the choice until the perfect time, when the choice will either reveal the soft hearts of people or their hard hearts. They will receive a blessing or a curse. Their judgment will be “good and faithful servant” or “depart from Me.” Pharaoh’s heart was hardened by the good that God did to him. Is that not amazing to see? Some have pitted themselves against God, and anything that happens that does not prove their assessment of Him must be twisted and distorted in their minds to continue to support their position. At that point God is condemned by them if He helps and condemned if He does not. Even the blessings of God prove to them that God is to be rejected. One day I will die. I do not know the means, but I believe that those means will be perfect, and some will recognize Jesus and others will have the cup of judgment filled as they refuse to see Jesus. God is really incredible! Now, if God has permitted something that is unpleasant into our life, it was done out of love. He only permits in the believer’s life the things that will build the believer. I know so many people that would never have come to Christ if they had not been abused. Does this mean that God condones abuse? Never! It means that He allows wicked men to choose, wicked men choose to do something wicked to victims, and those wicked men will be judged. However, it also means that God permitted the wicked to act in a believer’s life only because it would ultimately drive him to Jesus. Had it not driven him toward Christ, He would have prevented it. This takes revelation, but it will set the believer free and keep him from living in regret concerning an event in time; the enemy only knows the past and therefore comes to whisper, “If that had not happened to you, if God had prevented it, you would be fulfilled and happy.” It is a lie. The facts are that if the event had not happened, the believer might never have come to know Christ. No doubt the wicked meant it to destroy the person, but God meant it to build him, and He has the last word. Now, having established the above—that we must exit, there must be a means to our exit, and God will maximize the means of our exit—I will revisit my question. Is there a difference between exiting through old age or suicide? No! Many of us have had to experience a suicide in our families. Mine is no different. I know the questions that are left unanswered (something to be discussed at a later time). God permits. I have more stories from those that wanted to commit suicide and it did not work out than I do notes from families who had to deal with a suicide. God has both permitted and prevented. In our minds, the consequences of the “means” of exiting are much different. I must agree. Suicide is the most hurtful thing anyone can do to those he loves. It is much easier to blame a war or a drunk driver for a death than to blame the person that did it to himself. However, I believe God did permit. Many “victims” of suicide have gone as far as they are going to go in this life concerning the revelation of Christ. God permits their exit in order to avoid many negatives that might come their way in the future. This is hard to grasp, since we only see someone exiting as missing out on blessings. This is deception, because we all know the daily struggles of life with a small “l” as we discover life with a capital “L.” I believe that the God of LOVE permits a teenager to die in an accident because the   he needed was attained, and to remain on the earth would actually send him in reverse. I believe the same of the person that commits suicide. I began all of this by saying that you have Christ, Christ is teaching you, and we are equal. This is my assessment, my gospel, and I have shared it with you. Amen.

 

Nobody Has It all!

Ephesians 4:11, “And He gave some as apostles, and some as prophets, and some as evangelists, and some as pastors and teachers.”

In our uniqueness we express the things of God differently. I am once again reminded about a man in Africa who prayed that the Father would give him all the revelation of Christ that is possible for man. He next had a vision of a room so large that none of the walls could be seen, but gold chests were all around, and on each chest was the name of a different believer. God spoke to him, “It would take every believer to begin to express who I am. Each is given his own revelation. There is a chest with your name on it. You will have what I give, but all of Christ cannot be expressed in one man.” Amen, I believe that man. I have seen Christ, learned of Him, and had revelations of Him from different people ranging from what the world and religion would call the upper and lower castes. I understand that I am simply a thread in this Christian life, that my message is simple, and that what I say is not intended to be the last word for the Christian life. Yet sometimes I am taken aback by the complaints. I remember getting a traditional East Indian treatment that consisted of beautiful feeling and smelling botanical oils. The interesting thing about those doing the massage was that though their hands were constantly in oil and touching soft skin, their palms were covered with huge hard calluses. As in everything in life, we can learn something about Life, and I could see that even in ministry in the Holy Spirit and touching the souls of believers where they hurt, there must be a little protection. If I reacted every time someone criticized me or sent an angry e-mail, I would never get around to ministering. I must glance at the complaint and gaze at the Christ that is in the person. More than once I have heard this testimony from a believer that invited me to his church: “The pastor said that he wants me to remain involved, but I am not to advance the ‘Christ in you, the hope of glory’ teaching that Abiding Life Ministries brought.” This baffles me, for even if I were to look at the very worst in teaching that I have ever brought, there is no doctrine that would deter someone from a focus on Jesus, and all great teaching has the goal of Christ. However, I realize that the teaching of Christ in you does equalize all believers, and those in the Christian religion have worked very hard to be exclusive. I thought I would have my throat cut in Asia when before a large crowd I said, “If the men in robes and collars have not admitted to you any of their weaknesses, you should stop attending their church.” For, in fact, it had become “their” church, the self-serving domain of the higher-ups. We must look at teaching and judge its goal. Is the goal the revelation of Christ in you? If not, then what is the goal? God was so depressed with man, so to speak, that He sent His Son. If the goal is man, then you will get depressed. I am a great supporter of the Christian religion and the legalism to which it gives birth. Why? Because we need it! We must pass through it to discover that the man that is now in Christ is just as weak as he was before Christ. Once this is accomplished, we will look to the Christ that is in us for everything that is needed. Well, no matter what treasure chest is yours to open, you will know that it is the golden one when “your message,” or rather, as Paul called it, “my gospel,” is pointing others to Christ.

Knowing Your Call!

Colossians 1:25, “Of this church I was made a minister according to the stewardship from God bestowed on me for your benefit, so that I might fully carry out the preaching of the word of God.”

The Apostle was very clear on what the call of God was for him. Yet many believers are unsure as to what they are to be doing. The confusion over their “call” is compounded by the onslaught of writings that purport to help believers discover their call. Just as an employer does not hire people when he has no idea what job he has for them, I would assume that God is not hiding from His children the call He has on their lives. I have discovered through my interaction with believers that before they can understand a “call,” they must have a clear understanding of the purpose of the Christian life. If I were to take one digit out of someone’s phone number and place it at the end of the number, the whole thing would be so out of order that I could never use the number to call the person. In God’s order we must first know the purpose of our lives. His goal is the revelation of Christ in us, and once our goal in life also becomes the revelation of Christ within, we will see that these two purposes meet perfectly in our unique sets of circumstances. From working in the yard to working in the corporate world, our life’s goal and His goal remain consistent, the revelation of Christ. We have all had friends for whom nothing seemed to work out; they always have a broken car and are in financial straits, and, though amply qualified, they never get the good job. In the past I was vexed over that, but no longer! Once I could see the purpose of life, I could see that God had permitted them to be placed in situations that would best aid their advance into the great revelation of Christ. Therefore, we first define the goal of life, which will be expressed uniquely through every individual. I believe that this is what many people define as a “call.” On the Vine we are branches witnessing to other branches about the very same Life that flows in all of us. I have said several times, “There are no great speakers; there are only great audiences able to respond to the message.” Perhaps God has not spoken ahead of time into the hearts of the other branches; in that case, a speaker’s attempts to witness to a message that is not in the listeners will not bear fruit. I was visiting a church in Asia where many of the men had taken mistresses. The pastor had chosen the topic on which I was to speak: prayer. It is a beautiful topic, but it was not where the Vine was speaking to the other branches. If I had the “call” of God to teach prayer, this was not the time, and we must be sensitive to our call. It is very simple for a believer to determine what his call is. It is that which, when witnessed to by the leading of the Vine, creates a divine explosion in others. The secret is that since the life flows through the Vine, when there is an explosion in the receiver branches, there is an equal explosion in the witness branch! I am always telling people things that they already know, for God has placed it in them. Yet when I see a spark in the eyes concerning the indwelling Christ, the love of God, the sufficiency of Jesus, and the hope that we have in Him, I never know who gets more excited! For the explosion, by way of the Vine, is taking place in me, also. In short, the “call” is the work of God witnessed to and exciting a believer as he shares it every bit as much as the receiver. “Calls” are different. Paul makes this point to the Corinthians. We are all different members of one body, one Vine. In our “calls” we do not compete with the other branches but complete the work God has for all of us to do.

If Only I Knew Then What I Know Now!

Romans 7:18-20, “For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh, for the wishing is present in me, but the doing of the good is not. For the good that I wish, I do not do, but I practice the very evil that I do not wish. But if I am doing the very thing I do not wish, I am no longer the one doing it, but sin which dwells in me.”

Revelation does not come through effort; it will come through life and can take years to arrive. Revelation can never be forced; it is an outgrowth of our lives in a fallen body and in a fallen world. Revelation comes in the fullness of time; therefore, time is essential, and the longer one lives, the more revelation he will receive. Many exit at an early age, having been given the revelation that is needed for a move from this reality to THE reality. Life with a small “l” is constantly teaching us of Life with a capital “L.” That is why revelation waits in the future for life to prepare us for what Life would teach us. In the fullness of time, we will receive what we would not have received at an earlier time. There is no need to be frustrated and make silly comments like, “I wish I would have known that sooner.” At a sooner time we could not have received it and would not have “known” it. This planet and our lives are not made up of random experiences. This world is the womb in which the things of God are made known to us, and just as a baby is methodically formed in the womb of the mother, the child of God is methodically formed in the womb of the world. God is the God of order, not of chaos; therefore, everything comes in order. To say, “If only I had known this sooner” is assuming that “knowing” is what has made the change in us. Rather, it was revelation. Knowledge can come at any time, and yet revelation must come at the fullness of time as our “time” on earth prepares the way. “If only I could go back and make different decisions!” Well, if we could go back, we would be the same persons that we were back then, and we would make the same decisions. However, such a statement does reveal that we have grown, and the new persons that we are today would never have made such decisions. We have mentioned before that there are journey people and destination people. As believers we need to accept that we are all on a journey and enjoy the journey. In the fullness of time, God is teaching us. We cannot hurry up that process (Bible schools and seminaries are the proof of that). If the process cannot be hurried, then we must accept the way of things on the earth and rest in Him. The Holy Spirit will bring the revelation, His teaching that moves from head to heart, in the fullness of time.

Revelations!

II Corinthians 4:7, “But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, so that the surpassing greatness of the power will be of God and not from ourselves.”

Often I used to pray, “Lord, I want all of the revelation of You that is possible for a human being to have in this life.” Over, and over, and over again I prayed it. Then one day He spoke: “The revelation of My Son is like a roomful of treasure chests. There is one chest for every one of My children, but no child will receive them all. There is one for you, and that one you can have.” I more fully understood the body of Christ and His love for each and every one of us. Just as the body needs countless cells to express a human being, it takes countless believers to begin to express all that Jesus is. He is way too big for one person, and any one person that believes he possesses it all is deluded. Paul himself said that we are like members of the body; he refused to see himself as the whole body. I am afraid that many believers have succumbed to the Christian caste system, wherein a particular believer or a certain expression of the body becomes the norm or standard for everyone else. In my early days of being a believer I remember attempting to copy another person’s expression of Christ. It was error then and it is error now. I have often said that if I could change anything in my Christian life as it developed, it would be one thing: I would have taken all of the “great” people of God and kept them on the fringe of my life where they belong, leaving Jesus in the center. No one person has it all, and we each have what He has determined is best for us and has given to us.

Prayer!

II Samuel 7:18-22, Then David the king went in and sat before the LORD, and he said, “Who am I, O Lord GOD, and what is my house, that You have brought me this far? And yet this was insignificant in Your eyes, O Lord GOD, for You have spoken also of the house of Your servant concerning the distant future. And this is the custom of man, O Lord GOD. Again what more can David say to You? For You know Your servant, O Lord GOD! For the sake of Your word, and according to Your own heart, You have done all this greatness to let Your servant know. For this reason You are great, O Lord GOD; for there is none like You, and there is no God besides You, according to all that we have heard with our ears.”

Prayer is a wonderful thing, for in it we can express the greatness of our God (the only God) and our gratitude toward Him. Prayer is a relationship builder . . . that is, from our perspective; God has had a relationship with us before the foundations of the world. I have often pondered prayer and have a few observations. Again, everything I say is not absolute, but I trust that I am pointing to the One who is absolute, the sum total of resolution and truth, fixed eternally in the universe. To begin with, I do not think that the purpose of prayer is to direct God. We have a God, and that statement says it all, for the very confession of that designation proclaims that He does not need directing. Only those with a small god need to direct him; our God knows all and is directed by no one, but we are to listen to His direction. So many who entitle themselves “Prayer Warriors” believe that they will change the course of God by countless repetitions. Jesus spoke to this very attitude: “And when you are praying, do not use meaningless repetition, as the Gentiles do, for they suppose that they will be heard for their many words. So do not be like them; for your Father knows what you need before you ask Him” (Matthew 6:7). I have never understood the emphasis on going to a city to walk around it and pray. In a city near where I live there is even a huge building around which fly the flags of differing countries, positioned in the direction the country lies from there; the goal is to stand at the flagpole representing the country for which one has a burden and pray. I cannot get anyone to explain to me why we would have to go to a country or point toward it to pray. Can we not enter our closet and pray? Amen, if believers want to travel and see a place, they should go without spiritualizing it. God does not really care if they go to Israel for curiosity or enjoyment. I believe there are several purposeful bases for prayer. First, it is the recognition of the constant unbroken relationship that we as believers have with the Father that is not dependent on time, place, or our present condition. “For in Him we live and move and exist”

(Acts 17:28a); it is so good to recognize that and not have to create it. Second, the intent of prayer is not to change the mind of God but to come to peace with the will of God. This is of utmost importance in this present day. We must remember that God is permitting what He could prevent for the revelation of hearts. We will not change an evil person’s choice. God permits man to have choice for the revelation of hearts. In the final judgment, a heart will be judged as it was revealed to be in this life. In prayer, we find peace with what God does, allows, prevents, and denies. Finally, prayer permits us to participate in the work of God. For example, I am awakened in the middle of the night and told to pray for someone. It is not as though if I turn over and go back to sleep, God will not act; it is merely a matter of my missing the blessing of participating in what God is going to do. Later, when I hear that the person was under attack, in a near accident, or had family struggles, I rejoice in the awareness that God came at the exact moment to deliver, and I am blessed that He allowed me to participate in what He was doing. In fact, any time we experience answered prayer we can boast in the Lord that He enlightened us to pray for what He was going to do; He allowed us to take part in His kingdom doings. In short, prayer is very easy and enjoyable. In the recognition of His presence within and without, we rest, participate, and enjoy our life in Him; we want nothing but His will, which is the overriding affirmation of our prayer life. Have we not all had our fill of our own will, since we have never enjoyed it?

The Most Negative Man to Ever Live? Jesus!

John 2:24, 25,

“But Jesus, on His part, was not entrusting Himself to them, for He knew all men, and because He did not need anyone to testify concerning man, for He Himself knew what was in man.”

Jesus was never a humanist who believed that man, given enough “education,” would act in the proper manner. Therefore, He was not about broadcasting the suitable information on which man could act. The history of the human race has proven this one thing: man is inhumane, period. Paul echoed the same truth, For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh (Romans 7:18a). This brings us to the point that Jesus did not come to improve man through a system of religion; He came to remove the inner life of Adam (Romans 5) and replace it with His life (Colossians 3:4). He was not all gushy over mankind but rather was negative about man in his present condition. It was not until Pentecost that He would become positive about the second Adam, the new creation, the child of God, for man without Christ is nothing about whom to be optimistic. “The first Adam was of the earth and the second from Heaven, and so we have the earthly and also the heavenly,” says Paul, who had the revelation of what we truly are (I Corinthians 15:40-49). I can be positive about the believer and aloof from the delusions of the unbeliever. Even the great humanitarians display their foolishness with discussions concerning the goodness of man apart from Christ; their words fall flat and lose their appeal in the light of a look at history.

Strange Flesh

Jude, 5-7 “Now I desire to remind you, though you know all things once for all, that the Lord, after saving a people out of the land of Egypt, subsequently destroyed those who did not believe. And angels who did not keep their own domain, but abandoned their proper abode, He has kept in eternal bonds under darkness for the judgment of the great day, just as Sodom and Gomorrah and the cities around them, since they in the same way as these indulged in gross immorality and went after strange flesh, are exhibited as an example in undergoing the punishment of eternal fire.”

Given the state of our present world, it is important to keep such passages in mind. Incredibly, quoting from Romans or Jude is increasingly considered to be a hate crime in the “aware” Western countries. Along that line, there is a converted Muslim that became a pastor in Australia and spoke one evening on understanding Islam. Two Muslims in the audience reported to authorities that they felt threatened, and the police arrested the pastor. The pastor refused to say that he had done anything wrong, since he was only quoting from the Koran! The world is upside down. However, the passage from Jude reminds me of something else. All flesh is created, and each is called to its own. God has set boundaries beyond which no one is to pass without judgment that is both swift as it destroys today and slow in its effects for eternity. God will bind Himself by His own judgments and will not go after strange flesh, either. This is why God became a man and the God/man will one day have a man/child-of-God bride. Believers compose the bride of Christ, and we are not something strange. Looking ahead, it will be so much fun to discover what we really are and how He has made us like Himself. It takes revelation to glimpse it in this body, but one day we will see it clearly. I John 3:2 & 3, “Beloved, now we are children of God, and it has not appeared as yet what we will be. We know that when He appears, we will be like Him, because we will see Him just as He is. And everyone who has this hope fixed on Him purifies himself, just as He is pure.”

The Dealer

“For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but wanting to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires.” 2 Timothy 4:3

As a youth working in the inner city of Chicago, I was always mystified by the drug dealer. He would stand next to an expensive convertible, have on a fur coat and big hat, flash gold teeth, and usually be accompanied by more than one woman dressed to fit the motif. He exuded all the deeds of the flesh. There was always a demeaning air about him as he dealt with those lining up to make their purchases. He had something that they wanted (or had to have, in some cases), and that gave him the upper hand; he could be as rude as he wanted to be. It was vexing to watch the twisted, worn, and toothless come to make their purchases. Even then I knew that a lesser gave way to a greater, and the reason he so despised those pathetic creatures was because he needed them to maintain his lifestyle. Something in him knew that he was lesser and they the greater, and this he disliked. I am seeing something similar that is disturbing today. The “spiritual” dealer is nearly a mirror of the drug dealer. I have heard the sermon on “seed money” so many times from the “spiritual” dealer as he admonishes believers to give and it will come back to them. The “spiritual” dealer may own three twenty-million-dollar homes, a jet, designer clothes, a multitude of luxury cars, and jewelry. This is all justified, because Jesus deserves the best. But Jesus is not living in the houses. Jesus had a robe with no pockets for collecting things; His Kingdom was not of this earth. Yet believers line up to give to such foolishness, even though the “spiritual” dealer talks about his followers with disdain, due to the clear separation between “us and them.” I watched a hidden camera catching the  “spiritual” dealers sweep up the donations, put them in trash bags, laugh, and gad about town on a shopping spree. I have to say that these things are good, because God has permitted them for the revelation of many hearts. In the context of His will, He gives the desire of the heart; and if it is health, wealth, security, and fame, it may be given. However, if the heart’s desire is to know Him in this short life, that also will be given. We are not to peddle or promote ourselves, but Christ. The best way to stay away from a drug dealer is never to let what he has stir something in our flesh. The best way to avoid the “spiritual” dealer is never to let his appearance stir some flesh in us. Finally, we can ask for the grace of God to accomplish, in this life, our never being sidetracked by giving attention to something that surrounds Him, but is not Him.

Captive to Something How?

“Therefore it says, When He ascended on High, He led captive a host of captives, and He gave gifts to men” (Ephesians 4:8).

So many of us, at some time in our Christian lives, believe ourselves to be enslaved to something. It is either a returning habit or a new one, but the slavery seems very real. We have said it before but God cannot, as a shepherd, lead someone that is sitting. We must move to be led, and that means that we must move into a truth to discover the reality of the truth. He has taken captive everything that could have held the believer captive. We are free! Growth for Christians does not comprise a series of efforts to make us free but a series of revelations that make known our freedom. We look at our Red Sea and wonder how WE will part it to obey and go forward. In reality, we step into it and discover that HE is the one that parts it, but only so far as needed for us to place one foot at a time in it. That is the life of faith. It is a lie that we are enslaved or captive to anything but Christ. However, the voice of sin, Satan, the world, and flesh are so loud that sometimes we sit in the chair and bemoan a condition that we do not even have. The glory of God is in choice, and there are none freer to make a choice than the believer. I have counseled people in a variety of situations, among which are several prisons, orphanages, alcohol and drug treatment centers, and with couples in troubled marriages. I have given them information and witnessed some miracles, but it was not the information that ever set the people free; it was their choice to act on the information and to walk in the freedom Christ had already given them. The one dispensing information can never take the credit for a changed life; it was simply that the believer chose to walk in a freedom that was given by Him. I am happy that being obsessed with Betty long before she knew it, that upon her discovery of my love, she chose me. I chose her first, but she responded by choosing me. I am happy that she was not forced to marry me but responded to my choice with her choice. God has chosen you, He chose to set you free, and now you will thrill Him by choosing to walk in it. It is a hard pill to swallow, but if you can choose not to go shopping naked, you can certainly as a believer choose not to walk in what you believe to be a behavior to which you are held captive. Admit where you are so you can leave where you are. Admit that you are choosing to stay in your state and let God work with your honesty.

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