HGM TEACHING FOR 22 MAR 16

Home Group Meeting Teaching notes for 22 March 16 without margin notes.  Audio for 22 March posted soon.

WILDERNESS TRUTHS FOR MODERN TIMES-31

TEXT:  "And it came to pass, when Moses came down from mount Sinai with the two tables of testimony in Moses' hand, when he came down from the mount, that Moses wist not that the skin of his face shone while he talked with him."      (Exodus 34:14)

 

  I.  IMPARTATION

      A. If God stops us in our tracks, apart from correction, it may be for a time of impartation.  The impartation in this verse is the glory of God.

      B.  Impartation is the reason for God's drawing us unto Himself.  He desires us to wait in His presence for the purpose of impairing His glory and power.  He must accomplish this impartation in order to express Himself to others through the one receiving the impartation.  A minister who waits in His presence before the service, carries God's glory and power with him into the service.  During the service, that impartation is manifested.

      C.  In Exodus 33:18-23. Moses expressed his desire to see the glory of God.   He said,  "And he said, I beseech thee, shew me thy glory."  (Exodus 33:18)

If this becomes the  prayer of our heart, we may have to be brought to a standstill in order to have our prayer answered.  Be still and know Him!!

      D.  God responses to Moses' prayer;  "And he said, I will make all my goodness pass before thee, and I will proclaim the name of the LORD before thee; and will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will shew mercy on whom I will shew mercy."  (Exodus 33:19)   It took more than Moses' natural vision to see the qualities of God.  It is one thing to see the manifestations of God's mercy, love, grace, etc. and quite another thing to see the qualities themselves.  Remember, we are moving toward Jesus (being conformed into His image) and not the provisions and wonderful works of Jesus.

     E.  If our prayer is to see the invisible, then we must expect God to bring us to a halt and bring us apart from some natural and spiritual involvements.  Moses was separated from all natural involvements.   He did not eat, drink, or sleep.  God actually waited six days for Moses' body system to be cleaned out so that Moses would not have to excuse himself for nature's call.

     F.  That which is impossible for man to see, will be brought by God to man's spiritual vision.  The unseen beauty of the Lord will be seen with the eyes of man's spirit.  We have eyes in your spirit.  When our body falls to the ground dead, our spirit will not be blind.  We will then see more than we ever saw with our physical eyes. 

    G.  Moses actually saw God's form.  "And he said, I will make all my goodness pass before thee, and I will proclaim the name of the LORD before thee."   God promised Moses.  In the fulfillment Moses saw goodness in form, and heard its identification.  Moses was not able to explain what he saw.  It is beyond language, Paul testified of this; "How that he was caught up into paradise, and heard unspeakable words, which it is not lawful for a man to utter."  (II Corinthians 12:4)

     H.  It is so far above the natural that there is nothing in the natural realm to which it can be related.  And it happens in the wilderness!!  It does not happen in green pastures.  It does not happen every day.  Most of the time God works with us on lower levels.  In fact, Scriptures is in the lower form, even in the natural and physical form.  That way, we all have opportunity to see His goodness.

     I.  Things of God must be reduced for us children.  Otherwise we would never grow into wise adults.  So God must say, " I am your Banner; I am your shield; I am the Lord Who supplies all your needs."  Almost everything from God moves in this level so that we ALL can grasp His truth.

     J.  Hidden in the lower level language is the spiritual sublime.  God will bring is through and beyond the lower level into the unknowable.  He will transcend all that is high and noble in our culture and language, and bring the unknowable to the heart of man.  He will instill within man such mysteries of the Kingdom of God that man is at a loss to explain them.  But that which man cannot speak will be communicated as light flowing from that life.

    K.  That which God has shared of Himself will be manifested in that human life and seen and felt by others.  The Love of God, His mercy, the grace of God, His faithfulness, cannot be translated into terms.  But God's qualities can be translated into a life.  That which is not understood and not able to be known by the human mind is expressed by a life.  Jesus, the character, in the Greek, meaning "impression," of God, becomes the greatest example of this.

    L.  Language and man's mind will limit communication of God's glory.  The inner spiritual being of man breaks through this limitation.  But even with this breakthrough, the glory of God is still limited to man.  The reason for the limitation is that man, in all of his spiritual qualities, is finite and God is infinite.  Man does not have the capacity to contain the capacity of God. 

II.  PARTING THOUGHTS

      A.  God will give in relationship to our ability to hold His things.  Strong meat will kill an infant, just as revelation was Adam's downfall.  He was not able to handle all that the tree of knowledge of good and evil brought to him.   Even Jesus said;  "I have yet many things to say unto you, but ye cannot bear them now."      (John 16:12)

They were not able to walk under such a load; they could not carry nor sustain such sublimeness.  Moses in his limitations, would not be given such a fullness of God as to render him inoperative.  Little by little God brings the infants into the strength to sustain heavier revelation.

     B.  Revelation is progressive.  This progressiveness can be seen and traced in the Bible from Genesis through Revelation.  The revelation of God to man is like an ascending stairway, one step up, next step up, the next step up, and on it goes, one  a step at a time.  This method is not suitable to man.  This is why God said to Moses in so many words, "you will see only so much at this time, and no more."  "Now I know in part" as Paul said in Corinthians; "For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known."  (Corinthians 13:12) We are to be content to have something which is a mystery, without pressing to know which God has no intention of revealing at this time.

    C.  As it is to our advantage to know certain things, it is to our advantage not to know certain things.  The unknown things will be revealed to us when we are in the proper place in God, and with the suitable strength to receive and properly carry them.

TWO REALMS

The eternal attitude of God toward humanity is that of a seeking God. We may think we are seeking Him, but rather, He is seeking us. As we expose our hearts to Him, He responds. At times, we may even feel as though He is invading us; that He has taken the initiative and is pushing in from every angle to find, or discover us. We become acquainted with one another; but as for the real inner person, we know very little. In fact, we know little about ourselves. The Lord desires to fully possess us, to shape and mold us into the image of His Son. As we advance in God, the Holy Spirit will keep projecting before us unexplored territory in our lives that we have yet to move into, and over which He seeks domain. We say, He reigns and rules in our heart and this may be true. But have we given the Lord absolute and perfect control and possession of all the realms within us that are yet to be possessed? We are but little cells within this mystical Body of believers that has been developing and projecting itself down through two thousand years of history. In His time, He will lift this Body out of time and present it to the Ancient of Days. This is the great desire of His heart. Therefore, He desires that He will have something worthy to present to His Father. There is no experience into which the Lord leads us, no matter how profound or revolutionizing that experience may be, that will of itself mature us. Many are deceived because they think, I have received, now I have. Never allow yourself to come under the power of an experience and then build your life around it. This is not a question concerning the fact of our salvation, but of how we allow God to move and work within and through us while we are within this present condition of time and sense. Whatever there is of spiritual value within us - that which we will carry into the next age - must be acquired in the here and now. Therefore, we must ask ourselves has the Lord been able to accomplish within us all that He seeks to accomplish? After we have been released from this present realm of temporal life, we cannot come back to choose or decide. We should not be disturbed if the Lord is not using us as a missionary, or in some ministry. Unless He has given this, He is not expecting it from us. He had one Paul, and one Wesley. He has one of you, and you are the only specific edition of who you are. Since this is true, He is desirous to bring forth all that the potential within us will allow. Thus our “works” are the technique, or the method which He will use to accomplish this miracle of changing us into the image of His Son and equipping us for a higher purpose. If He has called you to be a preacher, then preach; if He has called you to be a plumber, then be a good plumber. Whatever we are called to do, we are to do it to the “Glory of God,” and sing while doing it. Why do we sing? Because we are to say, I Thank you Father, this is what You asked of me, and I am doing it for Your glory with all the strength I have. We often become entangled in the mechanism and forget the objective. We must be careful to not lose sight of our objective. We are to keep it always before us, our life surrendered and our whole being moving back again to the heart of God. We are being disciplined, educated, trained, and conformed to His image, by the thousand and one things that the Lord throws into our pattern of daily life experience. We may say, this is sacred and that is secular. To one fully committed to the Lord, everything should be holy and sacred; there is nothing secular about it. That is common talk among people who do not know the things of God. Therefore, they have categories into which they place certain experiences of life. We never should do this. If I am called to be a good plumber, this is a sacred calling. What makes it sacred? Plumbing? No, the will of God. None of us have arrived; we are in the process of becoming and we will be in that process until the Lord takes us home. When we were saved, the Lord dealt with our sin nature. He can do that in very short order, but it takes a life time to deal with our character. After we have gone through several dealings, we may feel we have arrived. Then the Lord will say to us, I have been dealing with your sins. I dealt with all that externally, now I want to come within, and get a hold of you. Truth has a two-fold way of disturbing and moving. If allowed truth will slay us, yet it is the truth that resurrects us. There are two opposing forces, and we swing back and forth between them. The Lord talks about death, but He also speaks of life. He not only talks about crucifying, but about resurrection and life also. We are to keep them together, not separated. In Luke we read, “He entered a certain village: and a certain woman named Martha welcomed Him into her house. And she had a sister called Mary, who also sat at Jesus’ feet, and heard His word. But Martha was distracted with much serving, and she approached Him and said, Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to serve alone? Therefore tell her to help me. "And Jesus answered and said to her, Martha, Martha, you are worried and troubled about many things. But one thing is needed, and Mary has chosen that good part, which will not be taken away from her.” (Luke 10:38-42) We should never separate Martha and Mary. They are sisters in the same family, having different vocations. Martha has a valid place within us. She represents our activities, our ministries, all the things we do. But Mary has a place also. She represents our spiritual aspirations, our moving toward God. But all we receive at the feet of Jesus must descend and find its place in the daily activities of our lives, where it is to become a practical reality. Otherwise, we will become unbalanced. Thus, we are not to remain detached in even the most magnificent revelation of life and truth. Whenever “Martha” gets up within us and busily hurries around, we know that we will not receive a revelation from the Lord in all that activity. We must let “Mary” arise within us and sit at the feet of Jesus. Each has their proper place and time in which to function.

 

  Up - Mary - Revelation.

  Down - Martha - Demonstration

 

Both are essential parts of our spiritual development and growth and must be maintained in the right balance. “And seeing the multitudes, He went up into a mountain: and when He was set, his disciples came to Him: And He opened His mouth, and taught them, saying, Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” (Matthew 5:1-3) and “When He had come down from the mountain, great multitudes followed Him. And, behold, a leper came and worshiped him, saying, Lord, if You are willing, you can make me clean. Then Jesus put out His hand and touched him, saying, I am willing; be cleansed. Immediately his leprosy was cleansed.” (Matthew 8:1-3) Jesus went up into the mount and sat. His disciples came to Him and He taught them, but He did not stay there. Afterwards, He went down into the valley among the multitudes, where He was met by a leper seeking help. Here in the valley of life, the revelations of the mountain top became a practical reality. The Lord may wait for years for us to come into this balance between our devotion and our works. Only then will we come into the balance of “being” and “doing” that He desires for us. Written by John Wright Follette

WHY NOT ME LORD

Salvation does not exempt us from the everyday problems of life nor does it prepare us for ministry and service unto the LORD. I remember when the LORD was drawing me in greater ways I would pray why not me Lord. Well this went on for some time and I think it was after I got back from spending 55 days (roughing it) at a Joint Task Force Headquarters (as the Deputy Surgeon) in Haiti with the US Army in Port-a-Prince the LORD spoke to me, "you are not ready yet." I was shocked! What I am saved come on LORD get your magic wand out and make me ready, well my friend God does not operate like that. The LORD expects us to ready ourselves in obedience (our choice) as he works in our lives. Those who are fully committed to the LORD often find themselves entangled in on-going difficulties. Finally a release comes, only to find that another pressure has taken the place of the one that was resolved. Job had it right when he said, "Yet man is born to trouble, as the sparks fly upward.” (Job 5:7) "Sparks fly upward" all the days of our lives, up to where the LORD resides. And why? Because we are on the grinding wheel of the LORD to grind and hone off the rough edges of our character and nature. Funny how the Scripture uses the wheel symbolically to represent our lives. We all (as Christians) are on the potter's wheel and as the wheel goes around the LORD crushes, molds, and breaks us as He makes us into a vessel of honor or dishonor. Paul tells us in Romans, "Hath not the potter power over the clay, of the same lump to make one vessel unto honour, and another unto dishonour?" (Romans 9:21) We as the clay have no say in God's finished product, the LORD and He alone fashions us as He sees fit for the Masters use. The harder the master squeezes the more He works it the life of the finished product and of course that which comes with the squeezing is the difficulties the clay experiences, but there is a reason for these difficulties. Therefore we should view them as servants placed in our circumstances to accomplish a higher purpose. Only as we refuse to allow these seemingly unending pressures and difficulties to hinder us and instead rise above or overcome them will we be able to successfully become the vessel The LORD has created us for. One thing for sure the longer we stay on the wheel (our choice) the more the LORD can work on us. But how can we refuse to allow these unending pressures and difficulties to hinder us? This is accomplished as we respond appropriately to the circumstances, testings, and disciplines of obedience that we face, and recognize them as the means to prepare us. Therefore it is important that we respond in heart obedience looking to the LORD for a way through these difficult times. As we respond correctly we must remember a few things, one is clay never talks back to the potter. All clay gets to do is go around and around on the wheel of life as the potter fashioned it. In life there are few things we are really in control of. The only thing we are in control of is our attitude and how we act in troubles and difficulties will determine how long we get worked over by the LORD. Victor Frankl (a holocaust survivor) said, "Everything can be taken from us but one thing the last of the human freedoms to choose ones attitude in any given circumstance." I can think of no person in the Bible other than Joseph who experienced Frankl's words in depth. Did you know Joseph's life can be explained in five "P" words? The first word is "Plenty." Joseph was raised in a world of plenty, loved and favored by his father. He had a coat of many colors his father gave him. God even spoke to him in dreams what a wonderful life, but at the tender age of 17 Joseph's brothers threw him into the second word, the "Pit." God loved Joseph so much and the word He spoke to him in his dreams He put Joseph in a pit for safe keeping. But the LORD did not leave Joesph there oh no because the LORD loved Joseph He had his brothers sell him into slavery. I think Joseph learned something while he was in the pit because, "And the LORD was with Joseph, and he was a prosperous man; and he was in the house of his master the Egyptian. (Genesis 39:2) Now you have to get this image in your mind to really appreciate the LORD's way of seeing things. Here is a young boy standing naked on a slave block waiting to be sold and the LORD said of him, "he was a prosperous man." God does not see things the way we see things. We would think Joseph is poor and naked, but the LORD sees him rich and prosperous. The next "P" word is "Potiphar" the Captain of the guard and to whose home Joseph was sold. But while he was a slave in Potiphar's house the LORD was with him. Did you know it does not matter where you are or what you are doing if the LORD is with you? Moses tells us, "And his master saw that the LORD was with him, and that the LORD made all that he did to prosper in his hand. 4 And Joseph found grace in his sight, and he served him: and he made him overseer over his house, and all that he had he put into his hand." (Genesis 39:3-4) Joseph learned something. He learned the only thing we are really in control of us our attitude and because of that God was with him, gave him favor in his master's sight, and blessed all that Joseph touched. One would think all is well with Joseph and the world, but because of the LORD's word to Joseph and the eternal plan the LORD had for him Joseph was take to the next "P" word the "Prison." Through no fault of his own (all God's will and plan for his life) and because of the favor of the LORD on his life, his good looks, and a lie from his master's wife he was cast into prison. But Joseph knew something. He learned the lessons of the pit and the house of Potiphar (all progressive lessons) and now he could keep his attitude in check. We read, "And Joseph's master took him, and put him into the prison, a place where the king's prisoners were bound: and he was therein the prison. 21 But the LORD was with Joseph, and shewed him mercy, and gave him favour in the sight of the keeper of the prison. 22 And the keeper of the prison committed to Joseph's hand all the prisoners that were in the prison; and whatsoever they did there, he was the doer of it. 23 The keeper of the prison looked not to any thing that was under his hand; because the LORD was with him, and that which he did, the LORD made it to prosper." (Genesis 39:20-23) Again the LORD was with Joesph not because he was Joseph, but because he learned the lessons the LORD wanted him to learn. And again God blessed him in the prison. When we are in the right place (spiritually) with the LORD it is easy for Him to bless us. Lastly the LORD did not leave Joseph in prison he elevated him to the last "P" word the "Palace." "And Pharaoh said unto Joseph, I am Pharaoh, and without thee shall no man lift up his hand or foot in all the land of Egypt. 45And Pharaoh called Joseph's name Zaphnathpaaneah; and he gave him to wife Asenath the daughter of Potipherah priest of On. And Joseph went out over all the land of Egypt." (Genesis 41:44-45) Joseph was raised up to be number two in all of the world (at that time), not because he was Joseph, but because he learned how to keep his mouth shut, endure, and follow the LORD in obedience. At the ripe age of 30 (13 years later) Joseph was made (by the LORD's hand) "Zaphnathpaaneah" or God our savior. Many Christians ask "why not me LORD? Why can I not get involved in ministry? Well have you learned how to keep your mouth shut, endure, and follow the LORD in obedience? This is the price we pay to be used of the LORD not abilities, gifts, or talents. This process will be effective only when we accept the fact that these pressures have been placed in our daily life experience to press us into the image of our Lord Jesus Christ. The Lord may permit us to remain without satisfaction for a time, while our problems linger without an apparent solution. If we were quickly or easily released from these and given an uncluttered pathway we would relax and feel that we had arrived. There would be little inner change or spiritual progress as we would be resting in the blessings and provision that we received. Now here is the lesson for us. In the Psalm we read of Joseph, "He sent a man before them, even Joseph, who was sold for a servant: 18 Whose feet they hurt with fetters: he was laid in iron: 19 Until the time that his word came: the word of the LORD tried him. 20 The king sent and loosed him; even the ruler of the people, and let him go free." (Psalm 105:17-20) Did you get that, "Until the time that his word came: the word of the LORD tried him." What time and what word came forth? The time is the manifestation of what the LORD has spoken to us. What has God spoken to you? But notice until the manifestation of the LORD's word in our lives the approving and qualifying of our obedience will be tried time and time again. In Joseph's life at age 17 the LORD spoke, his father and brothers would bow down (all the LORD's plan for their livers) before him. And for 13 years, "the word of the LORD tried him" not till age 30 did the LORD's word manifest in his life to fulfill the plan and purpose. The LORD takes time to do things, no instant Godly leaders and His ways can hurt, but as we rightly respond to the process of being tested and corrected we grow spiritually and enter into our spiritual identity as a mature son. I am chastened when I do something wrong. Our being scourged has nothing to do with any wrong doing. Rather it has to do with the reduction of our independence and is an indication that we are doing everything right. Scourging reaches into the very depth of our being and crucifies our self-life (our right to our own ways) and removes our propensity towards our self-sufficiency. Even a spirited horse has to be broken before it can be ridden. This is done not because the horse has done something wrong, but so it can become productive. Likewise, scourging has to do with our becoming a yielded vessel in the hand of the Lord. John W. Follette once said, "there are few who minister out of a broken spirit. This is because there are few who are willing to go through the process of being reduced, through scourging." We may feel that we do not deserve the problems that we find in our pathway and this may be true, but they are there because the LORD is seeking to make us far more capable and useful to Him in the outworking of His purposes and it all start by our attitude. Written by David Stahl