Hello world!
After starting several books and getting 20-30 pages in before starting another one, I finally decided to start a blog. Maybe it will all be a book someday, but until then, I will write my thoughts, ideas, and revelations here.
Tonight at church, we watched a teaching about prayer and meditation. He talked about going into the deep places of revelation in the Lord. He mentioned that many of us don’t even know how to swim, yet we still long for the deep places. Something in us wants to go deeper, but we don’t know how. We think we know how we think we know how to do things, but many of us who think we know how to do things to shoot us into the depths of God don’t do them. We know we should get into the word, we know we should worship God, we know we should pray, but knowing what to do and actually doing them daily is a whole different ballgame. I’ve heard people talk about that for years: knowing about God and knowing God aren’t the same thing. My first reaction to that statement has always been, “Duh!” But then, when God quickens your heart to see the difference. Well, you get it. The ones who have been around a while might say they finally got to the “I know that I know that I know” part of that revelation.
But let me ask you, do you know? Do you really know Him? The teacher, if I remember correctly, was Kirk Bennett. It was an old video recording. Misty Edwards played piano and sang, and I didn’t even recognize her. As he was teaching, he mentioned that there weren’t just two groups of people present when we read about the 10 virgins who fell asleep. Many of you know this story well. 5 had oil, 5 didn’t, and all 10 fell asleep. There weren’t just maidens present; there was the Bridegroom, whom we know to be Jesus; there were the virgins, and there were the friends of the Bridegroom. The friends of the Bridegroom were awake. Bennett encouraged listeners to not just shoot for getting their midnight oil but to shoot for being a friend of the Bridegroom and to stay awake!
At this point in the teaching, it was like a lightbulb went off for me. It wasn’t even the main part of the teaching, but this is what stuck out to me the most. I’d never put all the stories together. I’ve read those scriptures countless times and didn’t ever get that. Right now, there are voices calling out to wake up! “Wake up from your slumber, you sleeping church, wake up!”
I’ll be honest; I would hear people say things like that in the past, and offense would rise in my heart. I didn’t want to talk bad about the bride of Christ. To me, saying she was asleep was somewhat prideful and seemed to only come from lippy people who thought they had all the answers. Yes, I will be real here. I’m not even kidding. But then I started to get it. I started to get an idea of the fiery, passionate love that Jesus has for His bride, and I started to see that it wasn’t pride that was driving the call to go forth. I admit that I don’t always agree with the way some of these calls go forth. It’s easy to start in the spirit and mix your flesh in. Still, I would rather the call go out from a place that burns with passion, from a person coming out of an encounter, than from a sleeping person who just wants everyone to be happy, playing their cards to the best of their ability.
Do we really know what it’s like to be a friend of God? I don’t think most of us really know what that means. I used to think I knew, but I used to think I knew a lot of things until I realized with more and more revelation that I didn’t know all that much. With every new revelation, I ask the Lord, “What does that look like?” Most of the time, the answer is that we haven’t seen it before. Or we’ve seen bits and pieces of it. But God’s desire is to take all of those bits and pieces and put them together into something only He can build by His strength. The second I think my strength can come in and help God build His kingdom is when I notice things start shaking around me. The shaking is necessary. True lovers of God welcome the shaking with glad hearts because they know the result is gold. The things left are holy, unshakable, unmovable, unbreakable, upright, and good. The things left from the shaking are eternal. All the other things just fall away and will be burned up in the fire.
So here I am, pondering a while on being a friend of the Bridegroom. I used to just want oil. I’d chase the presence of God with all my heart. I’d long to stay in that place where it’s all sunshine, butterflies, and rainbows. I had to have all of my doctrines in check, all my theology properly placed in its neat little box, complete with an alphabetical filing system. And over the last several years, the Lord has taken my system and has decided to play what feels like a 52-card pickup with all of my cards. It’s like you stay a Christian for 10 years or more and feel like you know how to play your cards. You know how to play a hand. Some can even stack the deck to feel okay, but then the Father comes, and He is ready to play a new game. He wipes the floor out from beneath you. He does what it takes to get you to lean on Him again with all you are and have. Then, He shows you that a deck has many more cards than 52. He has an unlimited supply of cards. He can’t be contained in my file folder system. He can’t be fully understood.
Don’t you think the angels and elders would’ve been tired of throwing their crowns down and crying out holy by now if he could be known fully? No, they’re falling down in worship and adoration at the new revelation of God that comes from knowing Him. They encounter Him and just can’t help themselves. And here we think (I think) I can play my cards right… and the answer isn’t more than “No, my dear, go pick up these cards, then let me know how it goes. I’ll be right here. Trust me, this will be fun.” And it is. And it’s worth it.
Here, all this time, I thought that the cry coming out of the friends of the Bridegroom was driven by pride. Pride had disguised itself and had tricked me into thinking that’s where it stood when really it was in my own mind thinking I could play cards with my doctrine. The Lord would have none of it. He didn’t want my pretty box, he didn’t want my royal flush, he wanted my heart. He wanted my hunger. He wanted my zeal. He wanted me with oil. He wanted me to stay awake! And He will do whatever it takes to get and keep me there. And I’m REALLY okay with that!
The other night, I had a dream. In this dream, an older Christian man was planning his own funeral. He was already dead, and yet he was trying to make sure everything went just the way he wanted it to. One lady was hired to play the piano. He wanted a particular song played. The woman who sat down at the piano, whom I knew couldn’t play well anyway, sat down and began to play the music. She became so overcome with emotion that she couldn’t continue playing and instead began weeping uncontrollably. The older Christian man started to get angry. He wanted her fired and removed from her position. He wanted to take her out. He wanted to gain his honor and orchestrate everything as he wanted it done. I was watching all of this unfold, and my heart just broke. The woman pouring her heart out was sincere. I was so excited for her to be experiencing what she was experiencing at that moment because it wasn’t just grief coming out of her song; she was clearly encountering the Lord.
A few weeks ago, I met with an old friend and felt led to share this dream with her. As soon as the Lord started to speak to her about the meaning of the dream, the tangible presence of the Lord fell in that room, and I could feel every cell in my body. His presence came so strongly, with just the two of us sitting there, that we couldn’t hardly sit up. We started weeping. Then the word of the Lord came forth. He said to us then, “How could my people be so vain as to plan their own funeral? I am coming, and I will break pride in this region.”
He is coming. And He will break pride, the pride that causes us to think we can play our own card game. He will break the pride that causes us to believe that we know the answers already, the pride that causes us to manipulate others into doing OUR will. That pride that disguises itself as all of those other things. He will break the pride that seeps into churches and rip the leadership apart. That pride that sneaks into marriages and tears families apart. That pride that causes strife. That pride that allows bitterness to simmer in our lives is justified by all of our excuses. He will break that pride. He will have His bride. Surely, He will finish the work He has started, and that work He will complete.
We might not have an idea of what it will look like. But we will remember what He has done. We will meditate on His word. We will cry out day and night. We will seek His face. We will position watchmen on the walls. We will go right when He says go right, and we will go left when He says go left. We will listen. We will hear. We will see. We will submit to Him in our weakness. We will give Him our yes. We will die and not plan our own funerals. We will die. And we will live.
The truth is this: God has the whole deck of cards available. Bits of revelation, pieces explaining who He is and what He’s done. He’s got them all. We need them all to know Him. We tend to grab the cards we like and use those to make our own God. Many people start building on the rock as their foundation, but they soon get to a point where they don’t like what the rock offers. So they take their hammer to the rock and chip off the pieces they like. Before you know it, a seed comes into its foundation and turns into a root of bitterness. Then, that root of bitterness starts breaking up more pieces of that rock. Then, the winds hit the rock. The waves hit the rock. Before you know it, you’ve only got a handful of cards, and your foundation has turned to sand, little pieces of rock. The house that is built on sand as a foundation doesn’t last. So, friends, count it as joy when God plays 52-card pickup with your theology. He wants you to know Him. Fall on the rock before the rock falls on you; by all means necessary, STAY AWAKE!
