December 3rd, 2005: MANIFESTING CHRIST, THEY THAT WAIT UPON THE LORD.

PART #15

THE STAFF AND SWORD MINISTRY

December 3, 2005

MAY[FESTING THEY THAT WAI'C UPON THE LORD

by Nancy-TONI Youngbrandt Waiting upon the Lord — something we should do at all times and yet the thing that seems hardest to do when we need to the most.

For some months now I have discerned that many intercessors are seeking God for answers to their prayers and have found themselves discouraged by a seeming lack of response on God's part. Has God forgotten me? Why does He feel so far away right now?

When will His answers come?

These are all normal reactions our soul has when it is waiting upon the Lord Jesus and our Heavenly Father. But alas, it is only the reaction of our soul who is being made silent and the awareness of its helplessness to work what we want it to that is speaking while, in truth, as we wait upon the Lord, He is working in our spirit to renew our strength and to lead us into what He has for us. After all, in Isaiah 40:31 it says,

"But they that wait upon the Lord shall ren ew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run and not he weary; they shall walk and not faint. "

THE VALLEY OF THE SHADOW OF DEATH There is no question that in every believer's walk in Christ that there are times when God and His Presence seem close and times when He seems so far away.

When He is near, it is like the sun shining on you filling you with a warm glow that comes from being in His Presence and knowing His Love in your heart and spirit.

When the sun seems to disappear, suddenly all feels cold and bleak, and darkness is all

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THE VALLEY OF THE SHADOW OF DEATH continued around. Nighttime has fallen and suddenly you feel all alone.

HOWEVER, in truth, the sun is actually shining all of the time — it just doesn't shine

where we are at all of the time and we must wait until it does once again. Likewise, God is always there and is always listening, we just have to wait until He makes His Presence known and answers our prayers as He sees is best for us. We can no more make God respond to us anymore than we can make the physical sun to rise, rather we must learn to wait and trust in God that He will lead us and shine His Light upon us when it is in His time and Perfect Will to do so.

Why does He do it this way? To keep us reliant on I Iirn and not on ourselves. Our selfnature is all too eager and at the ready to lead us and if God shined His Light on our path so we could see what He was doing all of the time, our self-life would and does quickly seek to take control and works to "help" God make His path happen. So God withdraws His Light and Presence from our soul's selfish reach and causes us to seek Him anew. God does not want us to get too full of ourselves and so He leads us through a sort of "valley of the shadow of death" — a death to self— before bringing us into the Light once again. But when He does, we tend to emerge much more grateful and assured of His Love for us than ever before.

To me, the mental picture of a "valley of the shadow of death" seems to describe best how it feels to be waiting on God to the soul. It's like I am walking in a valley with darkness all around and yet there's the hint of light ahead, I just don't know how long it will take to get to that light. I only know that I have to keep going or in this case, keep prayerfully waiting until the Light shines fully on me once again. When that happens my path will be clear once again.

I think of it as a form of death — a shadow of the death to self that Christ endured. Here in the darkness I know that the fears, doubts, and desires of self emerge which must all die out. I must come to know within my heart that I and my self-nature cannot make God do

anything. I cannot make the sun to rise. I cannot do anything of my self to make God respond to my pleadings and prayers except to wait in silence for Him to act.

SILENCE BEFORE GOD I have often likened our soulish side or self-nature as being like a spoiled child since it reacts so much like one — and like most children it doesn't like to be told to be quiet.

However, for us to hear from God and to receive from God, we must quiet our soul and wait in "holy silence" before Him. This holds true whether we are seeking an answer to prayer about moving/relocating, a healing, seeking direction for a new job or even manifesting Christ.

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SILENCE BEFORE GOD continued No matter what it is we desire or seek, it all comes down to waiting for the power from the Spirit of God to move and fill us, thereby making that answer to prayer a reality.

In his book, A LIFE OF POWER , by Andrew Murray (published by Whitaker House, 30 Hunt Valley Circle, New Kensington, PA 15068), he shares about this very thing — the need for the power to be of the Spirit of God and for our need to wait for the fuller manifestation of the power of the Spirit of God within us. He describes it this way: Then comes the waiting. Wait on the Lord. Wait for the Spirit. Quiet your soul and give the Holy Spirit time to give the assurance that God will grant Him to work

mightily.

As you wait before God in holy silence, confess that you have nothing - no wisdom to pray correctly, no strength to work correctly. Waiting is the expression of need, of emptiness. All through the Christian life these go together - the sense of poverty and weakness and the joy of His riches and strength.

If is in waiting before God that the soul sinks down into its own nothingness and is lifted up into the divine assurance that God has accepted its sacrifice and will fulfill its desires.

After we have waited upon God, we can go forward in our daily walk believing that He will fulfill His promise and His child's expectation.

Another way of looking at these inner workings is to see that we must come to the end of ourselves so that we can see and recognize that God is indeed working on our behalf.

The question could then be raised as to what is meant by the term "holy silence"? Well, while I don't know exactly what that meant to Andrew Murray, the Holy Spirit brought to my attention something that Michael Molinos wrote about silence. He had the insight to breakdown silence into three kinds. He wrote in his book, THE SPIRITUAL GUIDE (published by The Seed Sowers Christian Book Publishing House, PO Box 285, Sargent, GA 30275), the

following: "There are three kinds of silence: a silence of words, a silence of desires, and a silence of thoughts.

The first is perfect. The second is even more perfect and the third is most perfect.

In the first, the silence of words, there is virtue that is acquired. In the second, the silence of desires, quietness is obtained; and in the third, the silence of thoughts ... this is the goal: the internal recollection of all of your senses. To lay hold of the silence of thought is to arrive and abide at the center of your being, where Christ dwells.

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SILENCE BEFORE GOD QUOTE BY MICHAEL MGLINOS continued By not speaking, desiring, nor reasoning, we reach the central place if the inward walk - that place where God speaks to our inward man. It is there that God communicates Himself to our spirit; and there, in the inmost depths of our being, He teaches us Himself. He guides us to this place where He alone speaks His most secret and hidden heart. You must enter into this through all silence if you would hear the Divine Voice within you.

It will be best for you if each of these silences are done as an act of surrender out of love to God. For me, it is not merely an act of shutting up and being quiet but a time of letting go and resting before God as I wait for His answer to my prayer. I surrender to Him my words —the words I would use to even form my prayer to where I just give Him the whole situation or request and trust that by the Spirit He knows what I would mean to say.

The same would go for my desires — I would surrender to God and Jesus my desires by surrendering all of my heart to Him and all that is therein. I would see myself giving Jesus my heart and I see Jesus taking it and then I would rest in Him and in the assurance that He knows what is best for me and will bring to pass that which He desires for me.

Lastly comes the silence of thoughts — those nagging doubts or worries that my soul is reluctant to Set go of Those thoughts of unworthiness and self-pity. All that would come up to in my mind to pull me away from Jesus — all of these things need to be silenced. When this happens, Ijust pray to put those thoughts under the Blood of Jesus and to gently tell my mind to be quiet. I then pray to let go of all those thoughts to simply focus on Jesus and to rest in His Presence. When all has been given up to Jesus, then it is time to just sit in quiet surrender, just waiting upon God — no matter what we do or do not experience ... just wait.

WAITING - NO MATTER WHAT I say this ... waiting — no matter what ... because (as I said earlier) there are times when God's Presence can feel or seem near even when He isn't speaking, and there are times when we are waiting and He can seem so far away or like He's not there at all. Both experiences are a normal part ofour journey in Christ. As a matter of fact, Michael Molinos wrote in his book back in the 1600's likening that latter experiences to being "dry spells."

In that same book, THE SPIRITUAL GUIDE , he wrote about this dry feeling this way: In all your journey as a believer, you will have two categories of spiritual experiences. One is tender, delightful, and loving. The other can be quite obscure,

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WAITING — NO MATTER WHAT QUOTE BY MICHAEL MOLINOS continued dry, dark and desolate. God gives us the first one to gain us; He gives us the second to purify us.

First He deals with you as if you were only a child. Then He begins to deal with us as though you were a strong man. In the first there is a great deal of your Christian experience tied to that which you can sense outwardly. (You are attracted by these nice pleasant and outward experiences; in fact you can even become addicted to them.) But the other category of Christian experience calls for a believer to no longer mind the outward senses. Rather he must know warfare against his own passions, and attain to a will that is in complete agreement and concert with the Lord ... This is the proper occupation of us all.

Dry spells are the instrument of God, for your good. Yes, it is true in such times, your five senses have been deprived and all outward progress of outward piety ends. Know this: In such times you are either going to leave off prayer, and perhaps even a large part of your Christian walk, or you wilt be driven to a comfort which has nothing to do with the outward senses.

There is always a veil that comes to us in relationship to times of dryness; it is a time when we do not know what He is doing. If we always knew what His working was (as He works on our outward man and works in our inward man) we would become very presumptuous. We would imagine we were doing quite well if we always knew what He was doing, would we not? We might even reckon that we had drawn near to God. Such a conclusion would be our undoing.

Why would this our undoing? Because we would be taking credit for something that God decides and initiates. In truth, we cannot draw near to God out of our own power and workings. It is God who determines how close we get to Him and how close He gets to us.

God and His Spirit are ever careful to be sure to encourage in us that which is of Him and the Spirit and not that which is of self and carnality.

Again, waiting on God has to do with getting outside of ourselves so that we can receive that which is of God, His Son and His Spirit. It is as Isaiah wrote in Isaiah 30:18y "And therefore will the Lord wait, that he ma he gracious unto• you, and y y therefore will he he exalted that he ma have merc upon ou; , fot the Lord is a God of judgment: blessed are all they that wait for him. "

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December 4, 2005

THE BENEFITS OF WAITING As hard as waiting on the Lord may feel to the soul, the benefits always make it worth the wait. When Jesus finally speaks or the Spirit of God finally reaches down and fills me with a peace and faith that God has heard my request and answered my prayer — my heart rejoices and praises God with renewed joy and strength. Scripture likewise is full of examples of what comes to those who wait on Him. For example, in Psalm 27:14 David wrote: Wait on the Lord: be good courage, and he shall strengthen thine heart : wait, I say, on the Lord."

of

And then in Psalm 37:3-5,7,34 he tells us to

"Trust in the Lord, and do good; so shalt thou dwell in the land, and verily thou shalt be fed. Delight thyself also in the Lord; and he shall give thee the desires on thine heart. Commit thy way unto the Lord; trust also in him; and he shall bring it to pass. ... Rest in the Lord, and wait atientl for him: fret not thyself because of him who prospereth in his way, because of the man who bringeth wicked devices to pass. ... Wait on the Lord, and keep his wa y , and he shall exalt thee to inherit the

Another uplifting and encouraging Scripture is found in Isaiah 40:28-31 -"Has thou not known? hast thou not heard, that the everlasting God, the Lord, the Creator of the ends of the earth, fainteth not, neither is weary? there is no searching of his understanding.

He giveth power to the faint; and to them that have no might he increaseth strength. Even the youths shall faint and be weary, and the young men shall utterly fall: But they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings of eagles; they shall run and not be weary: and they shall walk and not faint."

A few other Scriptures I found of interest were the following: Habakkuk 2:3 "For the vision is yet for an appointed time, but at the end it shall

speak, and not lie: though it tarr_tia_ wait for it; because it will surely come, it will not tarry."

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THE BENEFITS OF WAITING continued 2 Thessalonians 3:3-5 "But the Lord is faithful,

who shall stablish you, and keep

you from evil. And we have confidence in the Lord touching you, that ye both do

and will do the things which we command you. And the Lord direct your hearts unto the love of God, and into the patient waiting or Christ. " Luke 12:35-38 "Let

your loins be girded about, and your lights burning; Andy ourselves like unto men that wait or their Lord when he will return from the

wedding; that when he cometh and knocketh, they may open unto him immediately. Blessed are those servants, whom the lord when he cometh shall . find watching ... and if he shall come in the second watch, or come in the third

watch, and find them so, blessed are those servants. " Here we see examples of waiting for the fulfillment of a vision to those waiting for the return of Christ. No matter what it is, if it is to be of God we must wait on God to bring it to pass. In doing so it is helpful to take time to simply cease from our labors and workings to rest in the Lord.

THE OLD TEMPTATION Lastly, I would encourage you to resist the old temptation to give into partaking of the knowledge of good and evil in your time of waiting. It is all too easy to begin judging yourself or others as to why God has not answered a certain prayer request as we would like.

It is also tempting to think that if we "do" something to show our deep need for His answer, that God will then choose to answer us more quickly. The problem with this is that we are entering into the "works of the law" territory if we think that we can do something to make ourselves more worthy of receiving an answer to prayer than we would be without the works. However, the truth is that none of us are worthy on our own merits but rather it is through Christ Jesus that we are counted as worthy. Jesus makes us worthy of God's Love and worthy of receiving God's promises and provision for us. However, it will be on His terms and at a time of His choosing so it comes down to waiting upon Him for the answer.

I found a beautiful illustration of this when reading William Bramwell's testimony shared in the book, DEEPER EXPERIENCES OF FAMOUS CHRISTIANS, by James Gilchrist Lawson (Whitaker House, 30 Hunt Valley Circle, New Kensington, PA 1506). Here William Bramwell wrote of his prayer request the following:

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THE OLD TEMPTATION continued WILLIAM BRAMWELL'S TESTIMONY: 1 was for some time deeply convinced of my need of purity and sought carefully with tears, entreaties, and sacrifice, thinking nothing was too much to give up, nothing was too much to do or suffer, if I might attain this `pearl of great price" (Matt. 13;46). Yet I did not find it, nor did I know the reason why, until the Lord showed me I had erred in the way of seeking it. I did not seek it by faith alone, but as it were, by the works of the law.

Being now convinced of my error, I sought the blessing by faith alone. Still it tarried a little, but I waited for it in the way of faith. In the house of a friend at Liverpool, where I have gone to settle some temporal affairs before traveling, while I was sitting on a chair, my mind was engaged in various meditations concerning my present affairs and future prospects. My heart now and then lifted up to God, but not particularly about this blessing. Heaven came down to earth; it came to my soul. The Lord, for whom I have waited, came suddenly to the temple of my heart, and I had an immediate evidence that this was the blessing I had for some time been seeking. My soul was then all wonder, love, and praise.

IF YOU FIND YOURSELF DISTRACTED To conclude this article, I would like to leave you with two final Scriptures for you to meditate on should you find your soul is distracted and does not easily calm down and become silent before God. This is the time when it is good to direct your soul and to get your eyes off of yourself and onto Jesus. So, to direct your soul, simply pray Psalm 62:5-8.

"My soul, wait thou only upon God; for my expectation is from him, He only is my rock and my salvation; he is my defence; I shall not he moved. In God is my salvation and my glory: the rock of my strength, and my refuge is in God. Trust in him at all times; ye people, pour out your heart before him: God is a refuge for us."

The other appropriate Scripture is Psalm 25: 4-5 --

"Show me thy ways, 0 Lord: teach me thy paths. Lead me in thy truth, and teach

me: for thou art the God of my salvation; on thee do I wait all the day."

May the Lord God of Heaven shine His Love and Grace upon you always!!