What is this strange … yet familiar attraction
this awareness of Your person that draws me beyond myself
It’s not a desire for pleasure or any type of reward
it’s a hand upon my spirit that pulls me toward
a consciousness of our union
without distraction.
What will You say …
Where will You take me …
You are utterly unpredictable yet completely dependable
and I revel in this uncertain security.
Uncertain, because You continually surprise me.
Secure, because I’m at home in Your embrace.
The more intimate our acquaintance
the greater the intrigue
of Your boundless person and infinite mind.
Here I belong; here I will abide.
I found the secret of satisfaction
yet there remains this mysterious magnetism
to explore Your height and depth,
to open my spirit eyes as wide as You.
And as I experience a vision of Your greatness,
I expand beyond the narrow confines
of earthly logic and my natural mind
to perceive what cannot be understood
and know for certain what cannot be explained.
(by Andre Rabe)
What I want to declare to you is not a truth that, in the first place, you can comprehend or apprehend ... but a truth that apprehends you, comprehends you. This declaration is about creating an opportunity for the truth to get a grip on you. This declaration is at best the opening of a window which reveals a landscape, a sight far greater than can be comprehended at once. When God reveals Himself the inevitable response is awe ... adoration. If you think that you can take a hold of and possess what you see, then you haven’t seen God - you’ve seen something far inferior.
If, in all we say, we simply inform one another, help one another to better order our concepts of God, then we have failed in our communication. The power of our testimony lies not in what we know, but in who knows us. “...now that you know God—or rather are known by God” (Gal 4:9). To know God is of immeasurable value, but there is something even more valuable, even more astounding: we are known by Him! I believe that this gospel is much more than an orderly human doctrine of God; this gospel is the power of God unto salvation. This gospel originates in the heart of God and both its declaration and the faith it stirs are gifts of God - not inventions of man.
It’s so easy to settle for words that tickle our ears; words that confirm our beliefs or add useful information to our understanding of God. But this Gospel is much more likely to confront our conceptions of Him; to shake the foundations of our arguments and to take us beyond the comfort of the familiar - to reveal that which no eye has seen, no ear has heard nor has entered the mind of man. It is only once the false fortresses of our own concepts are destroyed, only once every high thought is brought down, that we can begin to sense the real meaning of this gospel; that we can begin to hear the deep calling unto deep - the echo of our hearts responding to His call.
He desires to reveal Himself, but before His Word can be the comforting voice of our Father, it needs to be the fearful sound of weapons of warfare. For just as Paul zealously persecuted Christians in the belief that he was serving God, so we can hold onto doctrines, arguments and principles in the belief that they serve God, not realising that these are the very thoughts that oppose His purpose in our lives.
He will not allow His words to be used to strengthen our deceptions - He will not speak comfort to our illusions. Many other words can be used to do this - our own interpretations of the Scriptures can be used to build our fortresses of comfort - our intellectual security - by which we convince ourselves that we have Him figured out; that we are in control; that we know just the principle to apply to get God to do what we need Him to do. He has no part in that. When He speaks, He shatters our illusions; He tears down every argument; He destroys every fortress. I’m so grateful He does, for it is far better to know that you are ignorant and consequently seek His enlightenment, than to live in the illusion that you are illuminated.
Let Me now teach you
how best to approach My Word:
My Word is more than a comment on your thoughts,
more than a reference to support your view,
more than words to fill your mind,
or quotes to support your philosophy.
To grasp My thoughts, forsake your own!
To have the mind of Christ, you have to lose you own!
My Word is not a tame, fluffy pet you can control,
it’s a dangerous creature - devouring lesser words,
destroying every argument, taking captive every thought.
(by Andre Rabe)
Coming to the end of our own wisdom also marks the beginning of a new wisdom - a wisdom which does not have its origin in this world. God takes no delight in simply showing us the foolishness of our own wisdom, but brings us to this recognition for the greater purpose of making us receptive to His wisdom. This wisdom does not co-exist with any other wisdom - all else is reduced to foolishness in its presence.
In Ephesians 3, Paul seems to be grappling for words to try and give a sense of the awesomeness of this love: “...exceedingly ... abundantly ... above all that we can ask ... or imagine”. In verse 16 he starts by praying that we would be strengthened by His spirit in our inner man ... that we might be able to comprehend ... that which surpasses knowledge. This is a different kind of comprehension - an awareness that surpasses knowledge.
What makes Paul’s writings so influential, so fascinating is not because he gives the impression that he has a broad and firm hold on the truth, but rather, the obvious fact that someone much greater than Paul had got a hold of him. In fact, in his letter to the Philippians he writes that his life’s ambition is to try and get a hold of that which got a hold of him. “I press on, that I may lay hold of that for which Christ Jesus has also laid hold of me.” Phil 3:12
“You’ll remember, friends, that when I first came to you to let you in on God’s master stroke, I didn’t try to impress you with polished speeches and the latest philosophy. I deliberately kept it plain and simple: first Jesus and who he is; then Jesus and what he did—Jesus crucified.
I was unsure of how to go about this, and felt totally inadequate—I was scared to death, if you want the truth of it—and so nothing I said could have impressed you or anyone else. But the Message came through anyway. God’s Spirit and God’s power did it, which made it clear that your life of faith is a response to God’s power, not to some fancy mental or emotional footwork by me or anyone else.
We, of course, have plenty of wisdom to pass on to you once you get your feet on firm spiritual ground, but it’s not popular wisdom, the fashionable wisdom of high-priced experts that will be out-of-date in a year or so. God’s wisdom is something mysterious that goes deep into the interior of his purposes. You don’t find it lying around on the surface. It’s not the latest message, but more like the oldest—what God determined as the way to bring out his best in us, long before we ever arrived on the scene.” 1 Cor 2:1-7
Revelation
But how do we receive this wisdom? This wisdom is not the product of our intellectual searching. In fact there is nothing we can do to attain it - it is completely hopeless! But precisely because we can do nothing to earn it, we are free to receive it as a gift - a gift which means that the initiative resides not with us but with the giver. He reveals Himself even to those who do not seek Him, proving that this message is not the product of enquiring minds or wishful thinking, but a truth that stands on its own whether we believe it or not, whether we seek it or not.
What no eye has seen, no ear has heard and has not entered the mind of man ... God revealed through His Spirit. God devised a way for us to see, what no eye has seen, to hear what no ear has heard, and to understand what no mind can conceive.
There have been events that I can’t describe in any lesser terms than Divine encounters, in which God simply showed me something about Himself that forever changed who I was - or thought I was. It’s as if He by-passed all of my intellect, all of my emotion and all of my imagination and displayed an image of Himself to my spirit. Like the shutter of a camera that opens and shuts in a millisecond yet is able to capture a scene of majestic and ancient beauty, so eternity exposed ‘itself’ to the temporal, the infinite to the finite.
These ‘impressions’, for lack of an adequate word, could take days, months or even years before they connect with my natural mind in order for me to articulate them accurately. It is as if my natural faculties have to race to keep up with an injection of perception that happened in a part so deep within me, that it is not immediately available to my mind. I have to draw it out as Proverbs say: “Counsel in the heart of man is like deep water; But a man of understanding will draw it out.” Once they do catch up … oh, what joy, what emotion, what understanding it brings. His counsel often starts at a level much deeper than our natural intellect. That’s why our love affair starts with “love the Lord with all your heart” and then moves on to “with all your mind”. There is a progression present here.
He does this (by-passing our faculties) purposely to avoid areas that can skew the vision He wants us to have. All of us are at different places in our thoughts and emotions, and we therefore interpret whatever we encounter differently. Our Father does not want to be misunderstood! And so He engineered a way of communication that could not be interfered with by our natural faculties.
Bottled at Source
I recently read the label on a bottle of spring water: “Bottled at Source” was printed boldly and proudly on it. The rest of the message emphasised how this water contained no additives or contaminants, but only the natural goodness found at the source, the unpolluted origin. The message was clear: the further from the source, the greater the potential for contamination; the closer to the source, the purer.
This is the same idea Paul had about the message he preached. “Now I want you to know, brothers, that the gospel preached by me is not based on a human point of view. For I did not receive it from a human source and I was not taught it, but it came by a revelation of Jesus Christ.” Galatians 1:11,12
The first chapter of this letter and much of the second is focused on this concept that no human taught him this message, neither was it the product of his own scholastic efforts. Rather, this message was initiated and communicated by God directly - he received it from the source … unpolluted, original, authoritative, pure. This gospel is not subject to human interpretation, translation or misrepresentation.
He goes through great lengths to explain that he had no prolonged contact with any of the recognised leaders - in summary: “But from those recognised as important (what they really were makes no difference to me; God does not show favoritism )—those recognised as important added nothing to me.” (Gal 2:6)
Paul obviously understood the importance of direct, unrestricted contact with the Light of life as opposed to a second-hand religious system that attempts to communicate truth through a man-made hierarchy. Now he undoubtedly thought it important to communicate this message, but the whole purpose of his communication was to introduce the listeners to the Source of these truths and not to set himself up as the source of their spiritual understanding. His attitude is portrayed so clearly in this portion of one of his letters: “We’re not in charge of how you live out the faith, looking over your shoulders, suspiciously critical. We’re partners, working alongside you, joyfully expectant. I know that you stand by your own faith, not by ours.” 2 Cor 1:24 MSG
This seems to me a very different approach to that taken by many religious institutions. Many of these institutions regard themselves, consciously or unconsciously, as the guardians of truth - desiring to control and mediate between their followers and God. In the process these religious systems have become contaminants of the original message, no longer containing the pure message as derived from the source, but mixed with the additives of human tradition and popular interpretation.
No father desires a relationship with his children to be interfered with by a third party broker - speaking to his children via an interpreter. The Father, your Creator, desires a direct, open relationship with you personally. He is confident in the ability He gave you to hear Him and to respond to Him. “The hearing ear and the seeing eye, The LORD has made them both.” Pr. 20:12
Jesus, seeing the emptiness of religious festivals and rituals offered a much better alternative. “On the last and most important day of the festival, Jesus stood up and cried out, “If anyone is thirsty, he should come to Me and drink! The one who believes in Me, as the Scripture has said, will have streams of living water flow from deep within him.” (John 7:37-38). Jesus has more to offer than religious festivals and rituals; more than external sources of religious experiences. Once you partake of what He has to offer it becomes a source of overflowing life within you.
His way of thinking
Isaiah:55:7,8
Let the wicked one abandon his way,
and the sinful one his thoughts; ….
“For My thoughts are not your thoughts,
and your ways are not My ways.”
Notice that having thoughts that are not His thoughts, is described as wicked and sinful - a way of thinking that should be abandoned. God never stated that such a condition is simply human, and therefore we should just accept it. No! He challenges us to forsake such low level thinking. He plainly says that if you don’t think like Him, you need to change your thinking!
He desires for you to know His thoughts and His ways. Not only does He desire for you to know His thoughts, but He also wants to teach you how to think as He does. Let’s look again at that scripture:
Isaiah:55:7-11
Let the wicked one abandon his way,
and the sinful one his thoughts;
let him return to the LORD,
so He may have compassion on him,
and to our God, for He will freely forgive.
“For My thoughts are not your thoughts,
and your ways are not My ways.”
declares the Lord.
“For as heaven is higher than earth,
so My ways are higher than your ways,
and My thoughts than your thoughts.
For just as rain and snow fall from heaven,
and do not return there
without saturating the earth,
and making it germinate and sprout,
and providing seed to sow
and food to eat,
so My word that comes from My mouth
will not return to Me empty,
but it will accomplish what I please,
and will prosper in what I send it to do.”
Just like the rain and snow bridge the gap between Heaven and Earth, so His Word bridges the gap between His understanding and ours. He wants to saturate our minds with His thinking; He designed our imagination as fertile soil in which His ideas would germinate and sprout. The fruit of thinking His thoughts, is living His life.
Our Creator desires to be known; our Father wants to be understood, but His desire extends even further. He longs for meaningful companionship with a being that can think on His level; a being that is able to communicate boldly and comfortably in His presence. Such a being exists … it’s the one He created in His own image and likeness … it is you.
Discovering His thoughts has always been a pleasant discovery. He surprises me time and again with His goodness. My best imaginations are always overshadowed by much better realities, when I see things from His perspective. He is better, bigger, wiser, more thorough, more involved, more loving than what we could ever have hoped for. He is exceedingly abundantly above all we could ask or imagine. He invites you right now to come and partake, to boldly come and commune with Him. There are no reasons to hesitate … just let Him surprise you with His goodness.