The Cost Of Christ

Serving the Beloved will cost you. 

It will cost you things that you never expected. It will cost you in ways that you never anticipated. Our Lord lays out his requirements for discipleship very plainly at Luke Chapter 14, concluding His teachings with, “…those of you who do not give up everything you have cannot be my disciples.” 

I remember the first time I read those words, I thought to myself, “Surely not?” It seemed so extreme. Way too extreme to be said by the Jesus I grew up hearing about. But until we realize how extreme our brokenness is, until we realize just how extreme the gulf is between us and the fullness of God’s holiness, we will never understand why Jesus said this. We will never understand what Jesus meant when He said, “Whoever does not carry his own cross and come after Me cannot be My disciple.”

Sometimes, all there is to do, is just hang on your cross and die. Gasp after excruciating gasp, die to sentiment, to nostalgia, to what may have been. Die to being seen by men, being honored by men, and being acknowledged by men. Die to all your good plans in Jesus’ name. Die to measurable results. Die to being understood. And die to validation. 

To die like Jesus. Because Jesus paid it all to save us— it cost Him everything. 

(Luke 6:39,40) Now He also spoke a parable to them: “A person who is blind cannot guide another who is blind, can he? Will they not both fall into a pit? A disciple is not above the teacher, and everyone fully trained will be like his teacher.”

(1 Cor 6:19,20) Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; For you have been bought for a price: therefore glorify God in your body.

(Rom 8:5) Those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh; but those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit. 

(Col 3:1-3) Therefore, since you have been raised with Christ, strive for the things above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things. For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God.

Heart Of Stone

“[He turns] the hard rock into springs of water.” (Ps 114:7)

Only God could turn a rock into a source of life. I think of a time when I once had a heart of stone. A heart that had been hardened through life’s circumstances. A heart hardened by my own wrong choices, blindness, and ignorance. Because a heart full of anger, pride, and rebellion is indeed a heart made of stone. 

But God’s word says that He will gather a people unto Himself for whom He will remove their heart of stone and give them a heart of flesh. And He will make them a cleansed people, full of His Spirit, and full of desire to know and obey Him. A people who from within will flow rivers of living water. Living water from what was once a hard rock. 

Because only God can turn a rock into a source of life. 

(John 7:37,38) On the last and greatest day of the feast, Jesus stood up and called out in a loud voice, “If anyone is thirsty, let him come to Me and drink. Whoever believes in Me, as the Scripture has said: ‘Streams of living water will flow from within him.’ ”

(Ezekiel 36:25,26) I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you will be clean; I will cleanse you from all your impurities and from all your idols. I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh.

(1 Cor 10:1-4) I do not want you to be unaware, brothers, that our forefathers were all under the cloud, and that they all passed through the sea. And all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea, and all ate the same spiritual food, and drank the same spiritual drink; for they drank from the spiritual rock that accompanied them, and that rock was Christ.

Crisis Revelation

“Crises always reveal a person’s true character.”— Oswald Chambers

A verse that the Sprit has been keeping in the forefront of my mind is, “Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.” For some reason, the true meaning of “meek” in this verse seems to have been lost and replaced with an understanding of meekness as someone who is demure, diffident, or spineless. Whereas the true meaning of Jesus’ Greek here (praeis), means “strength under control.”

The meekness that Jesus speaks of, is the ability to have unreserved restraint in the face of unrestrained provocation. It is the ability to be prudent in the face of gross injustice, and the ability to remain patient in the face of extreme frustration. It is the ability to have mastery over one’s reactions— confidence without cockiness, and assurance without arrogance. It is to be a stoic, fortified wall of bronze in a land full of shadows and strongholds that relentlessly hammer at the gates of righteousness and truth.

Jesus was all of these things during the time of His early ministry. Crisis after crisis, He stood in the midst of ignorance, confusion, and rebellion as a beacon of truth, holiness, and hope. He never wavered, He never relented, and a bruised reed He did not break, nor a smoldering wick did He snuff out. And when His body and dignity were crushed at the end of His life in this place, the wine that poured forth was not bitter, angry, and full of spiteful self-preservation, but sweet, selfless, and meek. 

Because Jesus understood that “it is mastery in circumstances that is needed, not mastery over them.”—Oswald Chambers. 

(Jer 1:17,18) Get yourself ready. Stand up and tell them everything that I command you. Do not be intimidated by them, or I will terrify you before them. Today I have made you a fortified city, an iron pillar and a bronze wall to stand against the whole land—against the kings of Judah, its officials, its priests and the people of the land.

(Matt 12:18-21) Here is My Servant, whom I have chosen, My beloved, in whom My soul delights. I will put My Spirit on Him, and He will proclaim justice to the nations. He will not quarrel nor will he cry out; nor will anyone hear His voice in the streets. A bruised reed He will not break, and a smoldering wick He will not extinguish, till He leads justice to victory. And in his name shall the Gentiles trust.

(Matt 27:29-31) And they twisted together a crown of thorns and set it on His head. They put a staff in His right hand and knelt down before Him to mock Him, saying, “Hail, King of the Jews!” Then they spit on Him and took the staff and struck Him on the head repeatedly. After they had mocked Him, they removed the robe and put His own clothes back on Him. Then they led Him away to crucify Him.

(Luke 23:34) Then Jesus said, “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.” And they divided up His garments by casting lots.

I Need You

I need You in my life

I need You today 

In this hour

Moment by moment

I need You in my life

I think I’m okay,

And I go on thinking that, 

Until I realize I’m not

I’m not okay

Because I’ve been doing things on my own

In my own strength

According to my own reason

It seeps in every time,

The illusion of “I’m okay”

Like a fog that creeps in 

And gently, quietly, covers the landscape

Until it is so thick

You can’t see the landscape anymore 

You can only see the thick fog of “I’m okay”

It covers everything—

The path, the horizon 

Everything except for the summit 

And when we see it,

When we see the tremendous height of the summit,

We remember our great need

We remember how truly small we are

We remember that we were not made to climb this mountain alone

In the suffocating fog of “I’m okay.”

But with You, in the clear light of “I need…”

I need You today 

In this hour

Moment by moment

I need You in my life

(Ps 43:3) O send out Your light and Your truth, let them lead me; Let them bring me to Your holy hill And to Your dwelling places.

(John 15:5) I am the vine and you are the branches. The one who remains in Me, and I in him, will bear much fruit. For apart from Me you can do nothing.

(Is 41:10) Do not fear, for I am with you; do not be afraid, for I am your God. I will strengthen you; I will surely help you; I will uphold you with My right hand of righteousness.

Surrounded By Strongholds

Surrounded by strongholds— a word I’ve been given to share:

There are many strong towers in the land. Each stronghold produces gateposts driven deep into the ground. Each gatepost is an expression of the strong tower. Each gatepost is a fruit of the tower’s aberrant nature. The stronghold itself, being a manifestation of deviation from absolute truth.  It produces gatepost after gatepost, until the fencing of lies goes ‘round, and we find ourselves penned in.

Many of my brothers and sisters in the Lord fight against gateposts. Victory over a gatepost is pointless as long as the stronghold still stands. A gatepost destroyed by a soldier of truth is simply a gatepost replaced by the stronghold of lies, because the root of that gatepost is grounded in it. Which means, the gateposts will continue to surround us as fast as we take them out, until we unite ourselves against the strong tower. 

I fought against such gateposts this week in prayer— the gateposts of sexual confusion and  immorality that surround us and seem to have penned us in. I began to pray against this “stronghold,” and the Holy Spirit communicated, “That is not the stronghold, that is just one it’s many expressions.” So I asked Him, “What is the stronghold? What is the root of all this spiritual destruction in our midst? What is the identity of this invisible enemy?” And immediately the answer came into my mind, “The worship of self-expression.” Then the Spirit began to minister to me about gateposts and towers. 

What the church must have for us to unite and fight together as one, is discernment. A divided company does not fight against a common enemy, a divided company fights against gateposts. More than anything, the enemy does not want the Lord’s company to have discernment. For if the Lord’s people have discernment, they will be able to unite against a clearly-named stronghold, because once the stronghold is identified and saints gather against it, we are “divinely powerful for the destruction of fortresses… tearing down arguments/ assertions/ presumptions that raise themselves up or set themselves up against the knowledge of God..” (2 Cor 10:4,5)

Knowledge of God is knowledge of absolute truth. Knowledge of God is utter and complete discernment against every lie of the enemy, no matter how subtle or slightly deviated from God’s standard it may be. Our job as saints is to know God through Jesus Christ. And through that knowledge, we fight against the enemies of the Lord, until the only one that remains, is death. 

And one of those revealed enemies, one of those strongholds is, “The worship of self-expression.” May we unite as one against it, and the Lord bring it down. 

(1 Cor 15:24-26) Then the end will come, when He hands over the kingdom to God the Father after He has destroyed all dominion, authority, and power. For He must reign until He has put all His enemies under His feet. The last enemy to be destroyed is death.

(Eph 6:11,12) Put on the full armor of God, so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.

(2 Cor 10:3,4) For though we live in the flesh, we do not wage war according to the flesh. The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds.

The Saint Who Longs To Be

Hammered by life

I pray for those who are being

Hammered by the enemy

Do I feel like praying?

No. 

I don’t. 

And I’m not sure why. 

Even though I know the power of prayer

Even though I know it is incumbent upon me

To “do the faithful things”

And not “the selfish easy things”

I still find that much of the time 

I must make myself “do the right thing”

The choice of rightness is forced 

It takes a muscle that is present behind my own will 

A muscle from somewhere or something else 

To push past the place where “self” stubbornly clings 

Like a petulant child who plops down on the path

And refuses to go any further until he or she gets what they want

There is no reasoning with this child 

There is only pushing-past

Moving on

Moving ahead

Because the pace of the path cannot be determined by the “selfish child” in me

It must be determined by the “mature saint” who longs to be

(Phil 3:13,4) Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize of God’s heavenly calling in Christ Jesus.

(Eph 6:18) Pray in the Spirit at all times, with every kind of prayer and petition. To this end, stay alert with all perseverance in your prayers for all the saints.

(Gal 6:2,3) Bear one another's burdens and thus you will fulfill the law of Christ. If anyone thinks they are something when they are not, they deceive themselves.

A Love Not Fragile

Fill me with incorruptible love.”

A few days ago, I thought I had offended a brother in Christ. I panicked as I began to imagine all sorts of ways the enemy could wedge his way in through misunderstanding and offense. I dropped to my knees and went to the Lord in prayer, asking Him to protect our genuine affection, to preserve our deep connection. As I prayed, the Holy Spirit gently communicated, “Do you really think my love that fragile?”

When I heard those words in my spirit, I sat back, my face still wet with tears and me full of the realization that yes, deep down inside it seemed I did think His love was that fragile. In that moment the Spirit began to minister to me about the true nature of God’s love— a love that is as strong as death. A love that is as unyielding as the grave. A love that burns like a blazing fire that many waters cannot quench, nor rivers wash away. 

This is the kind of love that disciples of Christ are called to have toward each other. A love not easily offended, nor one that keeps a record of wrongs. A love that bears all things and hopes all things, a love that always protects, always trusts, and always perseveres. A love that can be tested by the wrecking-ball of the enemy and not be found fickle, fragile, and wanting, because its incorruptible foundation is in Jesus Christ the Lord. 

Last night I had a dream. In the dream I was on my knees weeping, as I confessed both my need and desire to be filled with incorruptible love. O Lord, fill us with Your incorruptible love. 

(Rom 5:5) Now hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who was given to us.

(1 Pet 1:22,23) Since you have purified your souls in obeying the truth through the Spirit in sincere love of the brethren, love one another fervently with a pure heart, having been born again, not of corruptible seed but incorruptible, through the word of God which lives and abides forever..

(1 Cor 15:52,53) For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed. For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality.