Written
three years ago on March 14, 2012-
I
thought of Jesus standing still and calling to me. I thought of myself going to
Him, and Jesus asking me, "What do you want?"
And
I knew there was only one answer I would ever give to that question. I knew I would
throw myself down at His feet, hold on for dear life, and pour out my desire
without reserve. I would say:
"Entreat
me not to leave You, or to turn back from following after You; for wherever You
go, I will go; and wherever You lodge, I will lodge. Your people shall be my
people, and Your God, my God. Where You die, I will die, and there I will be
buried. The Lord do so to me, and more also, if anything but death parts You
and me." (Ruth 1:16-17)
Written
on year ago on January 15, 2014-
I
watched The Passion of the Christ, because I wanted to hear the Aramaic. When I
came to Jesus that night, I was astonished and overwhelmed to realize that I
was with Jesus- not an actor, but Jesus Himself.
I
fell down before Him in a heap as if my bones had turned to water. He knelt down and drew me into His arms, but I
couldn’t look Him in the face; I couldn't lift my head.
And
this request was rising up in me, it was pouring out of me as if it were the thing that my heart had always been
saying and would always say, like a song which it was weaving-
let
me be with You always, never let me leave You, let me be with You always,
serving You and loving You. I am Your handmaiden. Don’t ever let me depart from
You again. I want nothing in heaven or on earth but You. Never send me away
from You again- let me be like a part of the very structure of Your house, which
cannot be moved out of it, for eternity. I want only You, Adonai. My Lord, let
me live in Your house forever and ever and never to go away from You and let me
serve You, and let me be always near You
Then
I listened, in this way that was close to fear and hardly breathing, because He
held my entire fate and my whole heart in His hands, to hear what He would say,
my eyes on the floor, because I couldn't lift them to Him.
And
He said- I have answered your prayer. I
have already given it to you, you have it now.
Written
last month, February 2, 2015-
Went
to Jesus the day before yesterday, feeling windswept and storm tossed. I
stretched out my two hands to His and He took them firmly in His and drew me to
Him and I was standing before Him in the inner room.
Are the waves rising? Jesus asked me, with
tender love.
“Yes!”
I cried in relief at His knowing exactly what it was and how to describe it. I leaned
against Him and put my head against His heart and was steadied and comforted.
Then
I knew the perfect thing to say to Jesus. I smiled up at Him. “Let’s fall
asleep in the boat!"
And
His laughter! I love to do that to Him.
February
5, 2015-
Was
praying for Jesus to give me, His servant, discernment so that I would
understand His decrees and His words, because I desperately need discernment
and I need it increasingly- to understand His decrees so I can obey Him and to
understand His words, so I can understand His heart.
My
need was so great that it was as though in my spirit, I was standing before
Jesus and asked this of Him, putting all my focus on Him, holding
out my open, empty hands and opening my heart and insisting that Jesus give me
discernment and understanding- me, His servant, that I might know His will and
His heart and that I might bring only honor to His name.
Jenny, Jenny, Jesus was saying in a
rush of loving response to my urgent prayer, and I kept insisting, with my open
hands and my open heart, hiding nothing, and Jesus said to me, My decree is love.
And
I was sitting at the desk, in wonder, thinking, Jesus gave that commandment
to His disciples the night before He died, and He is still saying that to
His disciples today. His commandment is that we love one another- as Jesus said:
"I have loved you even as the Father has loved me. Live within my love. When you obey me you are living in my love, just as I obey my Father and live in his love. I have told you this so that you will be filled with my joy. Yes, your cup of joy will overflow! I demand that you love each other as much as I love you. And here is how to measure it- the greatest love is shown when a person lays down his life for his friends; and you are my friends if you obey me."
-John 15:9-14, Living Bible
"I have loved you even as the Father has loved me. Live within my love. When you obey me you are living in my love, just as I obey my Father and live in his love. I have told you this so that you will be filled with my joy. Yes, your cup of joy will overflow! I demand that you love each other as much as I love you. And here is how to measure it- the greatest love is shown when a person lays down his life for his friends; and you are my friends if you obey me."
-John 15:9-14, Living Bible
And
so this we pray-
That our love might
abound yet more and more
and extend to its
fullest development in knowledge and all keen insight-
That our love may
display itself in greater depth of acquaintance
and more comprehensive
discernment-
So that we may surely
learn to sense what is vital,
and approve and prize
what is excellent and of real value-
recognizing the highest
and the best
and distinguishing the moral differences,
and that we might be
untainted and pure and unerring and blameless-
so that with hearts
sincere and certain and unsullied,
we way approach the day
of Christ,
not stumbling nor
causing others to stumble.
May we abound in and be
filled with the fruits of righteousness-
of right standing with
God and right doing,
which come through Jesus
Christ, the Anointed One-
to the honor and praise
of God-
that His glory may be
both manifested and recognized.
Amen.
*
In
the night, thinking of how He is described in Mark, standing before the
Pharisees with the man with the withered hand:
Again Jesus went into a synagogue, and a man
was there who had one withered hand [as the result of accident or disease].
And
[the Pharisees] kept watching Jesus [closely] to see whether He would cure him
on the Sabbath, so that they might get a charge to bring against Him [formally].
And
He said to the man who had the withered hand, Get up [and stand here] in the
midst.
And
He said to them, Is it lawful and right on the Sabbath to do good or to do
evil, to save life or to take it? But they kept silence.
And
He glanced around at them with vexation and anger, grieved at the hardening of
their hearts, and said to the man, Hold out your hand. He held it out, and his hand
was [completely] restored.
Then
the Pharisees went out and immediately held a consultation with the Herodians
against Him, how they might [devise some means to] put Him to death.”
Mark
3:1-6, AMP
As
I pondered this scene, the fact that Jesus has been there, in that time and
place, was becoming more and more impressed on me- that Jesus, breathing the
air and taking up space- God incarnate, a flesh and blood Person, standing in a
synagogue that probably no longer exists, but which must have seemed sturdy
and solid then, before flesh and blood people who had been living right then,
looking at Him face to face, full of intense feelings and thoughts. And the man
beside Him, with the withered hand, was a real person with history of his own.
And
how beautiful and powerful was Jesus, how strong His emotion, how courageous,
standing before them beside the man, and Abba’s love and His perfect obedience
compelling Jesus to manifest Abba’s heart in the face of human convention,
religious tradition and threat of death, knowing they had set a trap for Him
and healing the man anyway, having called him right up into the midst.
It was coming over me that I knew this courageous young Messiah, with the heart of
over flowing love and unshakeable authority. My life was bound up with Him- Jesus lives in me and I in Him and I know Him.
And
the fact that in my spirit, I was face to face with Him was pouring over me and
through me and I was in fact in His presence and I was seeing Jesus but I was
not face to face because I was sinking to my knees and then to my face and I
felt the stone floor cool against my forehead and it was vivid and immediate,
the wonder and the joy of being in His presence, the feeling leaping up in me, and
I thought to myself in delight, ‘This is the joy!”
The
joy was so great it was almost as though it had substance, like something I
could drink or pour out, or pass on, welling continuously up through me simply
because I was so close to Jesus. I was not even looking at Him- I couldn’t lift
my head because of the weight of reverent awe, but I was being filled with and
held in bliss just to be on the floor in His presence.
And
I was thinking in this wondering haze of joy, thinking of everyone born of His
life and saying and praying- “If only they knew they are every day, each
moment, living in His presence and that Jesus Himself is with them and in them!
Jesus Himself! If only they knew that right now, Jesus is as close to them as
their own heartbeat, sustaining them and loving them!”
This
wonder and the desire that the joy should spread out and go forth and
illuminate other hearts was pouring out of me in an almost wordless longing,
and the longing itself was full of joy, because it seemed to me almost
inevitable that everyone should know the presence of Jesus in their lives, with
them, close to them, loving them. It seemed to me, in the moment, almost
impossible that they should not, because after all, He was! He was there! He is
there with you. You live with Him.
Jesus
had knelt down and pulled me up into His arms, but I was having trouble even
breathing and the wonder that I felt was so great that it was as if my hands
were trembling.
Each
time I dared to look up at Him, the tender and personal love in His
face and the familiarity of His features and expression and feeling, would come
cascading over me in a wave, taking away my breath.
Time
and again, the knowledge that I was with Jesus- Jesus that I loved so
much, that I admired with such awe, that I longed for so deeply- would wash
over me and this knowledge pulled my love for Him up and out of the very depths
of my being in a mostly wordless outpouring of adoration, love and worship.
I
kept trying to speak, but most of the words got caught in my throat and I kept
holding my trembling, open hands up, as though if I dared even to touch His
shoulder, it would burn my fingers by the pure and holy Light that He is, even
though He was holding me in His arms and speaking to Me.
He
was saying my name and He was saying,
you know Me, and causing me to remember the history and profound trust of knowing Him.
When
I truly grasped this and remembered it again- the weight of that history, indescribable and far beyond anything I had ever dared hope for, and the weight of His
presence as I knelt before Him right then- the understanding of this caused every wall and limitation in my heart to fall open, washed away.
My
heart, my spirit fell down and fell away at every edge, like an infinity
pool, the water appearing to run endlessly over the edges and yet never running
out, and the water that was flooding through and endlessly over flowing, so that
it was pouring out and yet always full, was the indescribable and living
love of God.
*
Yes,
furthermore, I count everything as loss compared to the possession of the
priceless privilege (the overwhelming preciousness, the surpassing worth, and
supreme advantage) of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord and of progressively
becoming more deeply and intimately acquainted with Him [of perceiving and
recognizing and understanding Him more fully and clearly]. For His sake I have
lost everything and consider it all to be mere rubbish (refuse, dregs), in
order that I may win (gain) Christ (the Anointed One),
And
that I may [actually] be found and known as in Him, not having any
[self-achieved] righteousness that can be called my own, based on my obedience
to the Law’s demands (ritualistic uprightness and supposed right standing with
God thus acquired), but possessing that [genuine righteousness] which comes
through faith in Christ (the Anointed One), the [truly] right standing with
God, which comes from God by [saving] faith.
[For
my determined purpose is] that I may know Him [that I may progressively become
more deeply and intimately acquainted with Him, perceiving and recognizing and
understanding the wonders of His Person more strongly and more clearly], and
that I may in that same way come to know the power outflowing from His
resurrection [which it exerts over believers], and that I may so share His
sufferings as to be continually transformed [in spirit into His likeness even]
to His death, [in the hope]
That
if possible I may attain to the [spiritual and moral] resurrection [that lifts
me] out from among the dead [even while in the body].
Not
that I have now attained [this ideal], or have already been made perfect, but I
press on to lay hold of (grasp) and make my own, that for which Christ Jesus
(the Messiah) has laid hold of me and made me His own.
I
do not consider, brethren, that I have captured and made it my own [yet]; but
one thing I do [it is my one aspiration]: forgetting what lies behind and straining
forward to what lies ahead,
I
press on toward the goal to win the [supreme and heavenly] prize to which God
in Christ Jesus is calling us upward.
Ephesians
3:8-14, AMP
