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TALKING
ABOUT PROPHETS
3
TALKING ABOUT PROPHETS
ChapterTHE
LOVE OF GOD AND THE
PROPHET
It’s a well known fact that the
prophet looks most of the time through glasses
or spectacles that are either black or white. Something is right or
something
is wrong. There is nothing in between. Mercy is a gift which develops
slowly
in a prophet’s character and it grows by suffering. When the prophet
finds
out that he/she is not infallible and that they have weaknesses as
well,
they get more grace for the other person when they fall.
In the letter to the Corinthians we find a whole chapter about love. Not human love, but the God kind of love. Though I have the gift of prophecy and understand all mysteries and all knowledge; and though I have all faith, so that I can remove mountains and have not charity (love), I AM NOTHING. (1 Cor 13:2) Wow, what a statement! „I am nothing". I studied this portion of scripture thoroughly with the help of my Strong’s concordance and this is what it actually says: Even if I have the gift and ability to know God’s thoughts and to pass them on to people and I can understand and see what can only be seen through godly revelation and I possess all knowledge about spiritual things and in my relation to you I am: Impatient, unfriendly,
suspicious, quickly offended,
proud and haughty, think that I am better than you are and do not want to protect you. And I am not prepared to share and am jealous, envious and competitive and feel threatened by you. And I am independent and use the gifts God gave me to sell myself (Ezek.16). And I am not polite and don’t know how to behave myself and sometimes I am quite unpleasant to be with and I treat some people better than others because of their social status etc. And I am selfish or embittered and I am quick to judge others and I constantly am defending myself, am hardheaded, slow to learn, quickly irritated, full of resentment and have a temper. And I am legalistic, boastful, dishonest and a hypocrite and I look for recognition. And I have no joy, talk too much, don’t have faith in others and compromise myself, then….I AM NOTHING! When you read through this list, as I did and you are honest with yourself then you might just find that one or more of the above fit you, but that is no reason to get despondent and give up. We looked at God’s faithfulness and we know that we cannot change our own hearts. Lack of love has to do with the condition of our hearts. God must do a work in our hearts and He waits until we come to Him and ask Him to change us. Moab was proud and did not want to change. Moab has been at ease from his youth, and he hath settled on his lees and hath not been emptied from vessel to vessel, neither hath he gone into captivity; therefore his taste remained in him, and his scent is not changed. (Jer 48:11) His scent is not changed, says the Bible. He hath settled on his lees. In the book of Zephaniah we read that the day of the Lord is coming, a day wherein God will examine His church and judge her: Hold thy peace at the Presence of the Lord God: for the day of the Lord is at hand: for the Lord hath prepared a sacrifice, he hath bid His guests (Zeph 1:7) And it shall come to pass at that time, that I (the Lord) will search Jerusalem with candles, and punish the men that are settled on their lees: that say in their heart, The Lord will not do good, neither will He do evil. (Zeph 1:12) The good news is that there is now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit (allow Him to change their hearts) (Rom 8:1). God holds us only responsible for that which we know. Every time we allow God to do a work in our hearts we find that we get a greater anointing on our life and we move with greater authority. Paul knew this too and he wrote to the Corinthians: But with me it is a very small thing that I should be judged of you, or of man’s judgment: yea, I judge not mine own self. For I know nothing by myself; (my heart does not condemn me) yet am I not hereby justified: but he that judgeth me is the Lord. Therefore judge nothing before the time, until the Lord come, Who both will bring to light the hidden things of darkness, and will make manifest the counsels of the hearts; and then shall every man have praise of God. (1 Cor 4:3-5). We also read in the Bible that God chooses the weak things in this world and base things, things which are despised.............… that no flesh should glory in His Presence (1 Cor 1:27-29) So for us it is important to know how God goes to work when He changes our heart, so that we can cooperate with Him. Are you also like me? Not so much now anymore, but when I was a young Christian, God would want to do something in my life and I would cry, fuss, sometimes scream and rebel against what He was doing. And then when I understood what was going on at last, I would be so sorry. I would cry, Lord I love you and now I did it again, please forgive me?! Ofcourse the Lord forgave me, time and time again. But sometimes it took so long before I found out what he was wanting to do and I felt I was wasting time and it was all my own fault. I can remember sitting in church one day, for the umpteenth time I had failed to cooperate with God and I sat there asking His forgiveness for my rebellion against Him. Suddenly the speaker stopped in the midst of her message. She was a prophetess. She pointed her finger at me and asked me to come forward as God had a word for me. I stood there in front and the Lord spoke, I am not worried about your rebellion, I see your heart! And when I am finished with you, you will be a joy to Me! Needless to say that I have kept this word in my heart and I cherish it. Great is Your faithfulness, oh Lord! Paul wrote to the Corinthians: For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty to the pulling down of strongholds; casting down imaginations and every high thing that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ; (2 Cor 10:4,5) This scripture tells us that our minds can rebel against God and that there are strongholds which need to be broken down, because they hinder us from really getting to know God. Those strongholds come from our past life. Things which happened to us, which caused us to build up walls inside of us and gave us certain thought patterns. We built up those walls to protect ourselves. And woe to the person who comes too close and bumps into those walls. This is how you can imagine it to be. Your soul is like a cup. The painful lessons and experiences in our life fill this cup as it were, with hot boiling tea. When someone bumps into you, guess what happens. That person gets the hot tea spilled all over him or her and that hurts, it burns! So we must allow the Lord to empty the cup and fill it with His love. It took a long time for me to understand the scripture where it said: all things are new, old things are passed away (2 Cor 5: 17). I found that not to be true in my own life. What does it mean to be saved, I wondered. Then one day I understood. While in the world I was a slave to sin. I had lost the best thing God had given me, my free will, the ability to make the right choice. And then when I became God’s child, when I was born again, he gave me back that ability to make a choice, my free will and now I have to pick up my cross daily and follow Him. Daily , when confronted with situations, I have to make a choice, react like I always did, or do what the word says and when I make the right choice the old behaviour and thought patterns are erased and everything becomes new. My mind is renewed day by day in that way. Praise the Lord! And then I will be able to walk in God’s love, because He pours His love in my heart by His Holy Spirit. And hope maketh not ashamed; because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us. (Rom 5:5) Jesus said in John 14:21,23 that He would clearly manifest Himself and he and Father God would come and make their abode in us and the condition was that we would keep His commandments. His commandments are: We must love the Lord our God with all our hearts and our neighbour as ourselves (Matt 22:37-40) The most important thing in our life is to get to know the Lord. We have been created to have an intimate relationship with Him. In Matt 7:22 we read that people will say, Lord did we not do wonderful things in your Name? And He will say, I never knew you, you were never willing to pay the price to have an intimate relationship with Me, depart from Me. God wants that relationship with me, not with me the prophet, but with me, the person with all faults and shortcomings. God longs to pull us under His wings, so that we will be safe for that which is to come. We cannot come there by ourselves, God will have to draw us and in the process purify us, for He is Holy! If we would dare to just walk into His Presence (if we could) we would be incinerated because our God is a devouring fire, the Bible says in Heb 12:18-29. Let us therefore stretch out our arms to Him and ask Him to come and bring us into His Presence and fill us with His love. He says if we search for Him with all our hearts, He will be found. |
