"For
the Kingdom of God is not just fancy talk; it is living by God's
power." I Corinthians 4:20....."Abide in Me and I will remain in
you......You cannot be fruitful apart from Me." John 15: 4......"When
the Spirit of God moves through the Word preached in power, the
objectives of God are accomplished.....the work of redemption is done.
How can we attain to this? The old fashioned way is prayer, faith and
surrender; and I know none other. Pray, and as you pray, surrender, and
as you surrender, believe." A.W. Tozer
I've been thinking on
the words of I Corinthians 4, John 15, and Tozer. We are called into a
life of power. Resurrection power. Yet so few of us ever seem to
really enter into that life. We do an excellent job of talking about
that life, even inviting others into it, but I think on something spoken
by T. Austin-Sparks over 50 years ago, and that is that we have no
right to invite others into the rest of God when so much of our own
lives are lived in unrest. We cannot invite others into a life lived
out in His power when we ourselves are not living such a life. Power,
not of the sort that brings attention to us, but glory to Him, is to be
the natural consequence of a life lived out while living fully in Him. I
believe most professing believers would like to live such a life, so
why don't we? I think, no, I know, that the answer lies in the three
elements Tozer shares in what it is to live in the power of His
resurrection. Prayer, faith, and surrender.
I think most of us
never go beyond the surface in our prayer lives. We're mainly concerned
with getting God's help on all of our problems here in the earthly
realm. Get us out of this problem or trouble. Improve our
circumstances, change difficult people, get rid of the "bad stuff" of
life and replace it with what we consider the "good stuff." God is our
helper and we spend a great deal of time trying to get Him to see and do
things our way. We live mainly in our own strength, but seek His when
we think ours might not be enough. News flash: The Father has little
interest in such a prayer life.
The ultimate purpose of prayer
from His viewpoint is that it brings us ever deeper into the knowledge
of who He is, and also who we are. It's prayer and life that is lived
out as we abide in, live in Him. We may start as mere buds on the vine,
but we gradually grow more and more into His likeness until our lives
really become fruitful. Our agenda ends and His purposes begin to be
lived out through us. It's not that we no longer bring desires and
needs before Him, but that as we do, it's with a surrendered heart and
spirit. It's always with a heart attitude of "not my will, but Yours O
Lord." The natural outcome of this is an ever growing trust and faith
in Him. We believe. Not because conditions are favorable or that He's
doing what we ask, but because we KNOW that He is God, and He is a good
God, whether our lives are currently "good" or not. The fruit of this
is a life of peace, joy, hope, strength.....power. It's His Life.
Resurrection life. Is it our life?
Singer and speaker Sheila
Walsh, sharing of how she had voluntarily checked into a psych ward to
deal with deep depression in her life, wrote in her journal on the first
night there, "I never knew You lived so close to the floor." She
didn't expound on all she meant by that, but what it said to me is that
this is where we will always find Him. We need not seek to work up to
Him because He has already come down to us. He meets us on the floor,
in our brokenness, weakness, helplessness, and then raises us up with
Him. Such is the pathway of prayer, faith, and surrender. I want to
walk such a path. How about you?
Blessings,
Pastor O
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