Expel Guilt by Irreverence

This is one of six responses that we have built into our life systems to deal with our guilt.

Basically nothing in life is essentially sacred.

In fact, many who use this escape mechanism suggest that guilt is a conditioned response orchestrated principally by religion. They argue that religion is a hangover from pre-modern times and nothing falls into an actual category of right and wrong. Guilt should be erased from our society’s lexicon and jeered out of existence.

Television today indicates that we have licensed the wholesale ridicule of things once held sacred.  Are we beginning to erase?

Ravi Zacharias mentioned that he knew of a Jewish journalist who made the comment that Christians would be the Jews of the 21st Century.  Because there is little doubt that no other major religious voice in this world cries out for people to deal with sin, to repent, and to come to God for forgiveness than the Christian voice.  Hate and anger vented against the Christian gains momentum with a society that wants to live life without restraint - just look at our school system response to the Bible.

To expel moral law may seem very cavalier and liberating, but understand that irreverence is just another word for self-worship and the destruction of all that stands in its way.

The killing of Abel by Cain was such an effort. Abel symbolized acceptance before God; Cain, rejection. Cain’s final solution was to silence the voice of the one whose life reflected sanctity.

Joseph represented the special favour of God. His brother’s final solution was to do away with him.

John the Baptist presented to Herod a judgement that was inevitable. Herod’s final solution was to decapitate him.

Elijah warned Jezebel of history’s warning when decency is mocked. Jezebel’s final solution was to pursue him until he wanted to die.

Jesus represented the voice of God to a corrupt priesthood and to power-mongering political authorites. Their final solution was to send Him to the cross.

To silence the voice that reminds us of our guilt is always the “final solution.”

Dis-ease

The split gives us a unique definition; dis-ease is the suffering of one who is no longer at ease in the flesh because of the torment of the soul.

Such was the disease of Lady MacBeth from Shakespeare.
Macbeth was spurred on by his wife to murder King Duncan and seize the throne.  After the murder, she took the blood and smeared it on the sleeping guards to implicate them in the murder.  But the plot focuses on Lady Macbeth, walking in her sleep, night after night. Staring at her hands she pleads,
“Out, damned spot! Out, I say! One; two…Here’s the smell of the blood still. All the perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this little hand. Oh, oh, oh!” Observing her pitiful plight, the doctor says, “This disease is beyond my practice.”

Adam and Eve experienced the question in the cool of the evening, "Where are you?" Neither Adam nor Eve could break free from the ensuing anguish of a choice made in wilful violation of God’s command.

When David's adultery with Bathsheba and the murder of her husband was brought to light, David likened it to the agony of a person with broken bones.

Pontius Pilate, with Jesus, trying to wash his hands of the guilt that he feared from having sent Jesus to the cross.

What can we do when we experience this kind of dis-ease and what will be our response?

 

The Cry of a Guilty Conscience

The Sunflower’s central concern is revealed to

the reader when the author recounts a particular

incident that occurs while he is on a work detail at a local hospital. He is summoned to the bedside of a dying Nazi who wants to make a confession for his participation in a crime in which two hundred Jewish men, women and children were herded into a house which was then set on fire: ‘amidst screams from within the house and fire leaping from one floor to another, rifles were readied to shoot down anyone who tried to escape’ (p.40). The soldier then recounts: ‘Behind the windows of the second floor, I saw a man with a small child in his arms. His clothes were alight. By his side stood a woman, doubtless the mother of the child. With his free hand the  man covered the child’s eyes … then he jumped into the street. Seconds later the mother followed’ (p.42). The soldier shoots them. Later, in combat with the Russians and ordered by his superiors to fire, the solder finds himself unable to move: ‘In that moment I saw the burning family … they came to meet me. No, I can not shoot at them a second time’ (p.51). In his moment of hesitation, a shell explodes by the soldier’s side and the injuries he sustains will ultimately lead to his own death.

Images of the family continue to haunt him. In the soldier’s words: ‘I have longed to talk about it to a

Jew and beg forgiveness from him’ (p.54). Simon Wiesenthal listens to the confession, at times even

offering acts of kindness. But he leaves the room without any reply to the soldier. Simon Wiesenthal then begins to question himself, and his fellow prisoners, as to whether or not it was right to refuse a dying man forgiveness. 

The Sunflower chronicles their conversations. Then we discover that the author is not only telling a

story of a tragic time in the history of Jews or his own life. He is also creating a context for the reader

so that the reader may respond to a question that is both personal and political. He says: ‘You who have just read this sad and tragic episode in my life, can mentally change places with me and ask yourself the crucial question, ‘What would I have done?’’ The question invites the reader to consider his/her own ethical and moral traditions. These traditions of thought which influence our actions in response to crime, justice, compassion, and individual and collective responsibility, are then made visible.

The issues raised in this consideration are, at the same time, historical (the Holocaust) and contemporary (e.g. Bosnia, Rwanda).

Check the entire article at:

http://www.narrativetherapycentre.com/Documents/Simon_Wiesenthal_Review_R_Pluznick.pdf

God's approach to suffering

I am intrigued by the credulity of those who seem to think that proving the accidental arrival of life in this universe will spell victory for the skeptic. That is why God’s first approach to Job was to remind him that there was a power infinitely greater than his listening to Him - He was not just speaking into a void.

In His second approach we find that God has left Job to ponder about Him being both the Creator and Designer, and God now approaches Job as Revealer and Comforter. There is a place for knowing, healing, and reading, but there has to come a moment of personal surrender as God has graciously invited us to come to Him on a personal level.Remember Peter – quite of few quotes from others as to who Jesus was – but “who do you say I am?”Until pain is seen in a personal context and its solution is personally felt, every other solution, however good, will seem academic.

Suffering needs to be dealt with personally but also with a real understanding that there is life beyond the grave.  From Creator and Designer, to Revealer and Comforter and now God's third approach is as Mediator and Saviour. Our thirst for a mediator is a very genuine cry that has been expressed in virtually every theistic religion.  For most, the God who is out there is treated as still being out there. For others, the quest to bring God near without humanizing Him has been a particular struggle.  In the Christian faith, the fact that God comes close while remaining transcendent is very unique.  Suffering is not always because of one’s personal sin, but suffering will have to be dealt with personally.  Jesus Himself bore our pain and was made complete through suffering.

What should keep us going, more than anything else is our confidence in the character of God and that brings us to God's fourth approach to us.  From Creator and Designer to Revealer and Comforter to Mediator and Saviour and finally Strengthener and Restorer. 

Since Jesus has suffered Himself, Jesus is now able to intercede on our behalf.  Job provided a mirror image of that as he had to intercede for his three friends in order for them to obtain forgiveness from God.

Truths from Job
1.We must understand that suffering, death, disease, pain, and bereavement are all part of life, whether we be righteous or unrighteous.
2.We see that the role of a friend is very pivotal in seeing people through their times of anguish.
3.We know that most answers of this nature require a process. The questions must become more selfless before the answer becomes more personal.
4.We have learned that those who know God personally and understand the cross are better able to find help in the dark nights than those who merely tackle their problems philosophically

“When you are looking for wisdom, always look for one who has suffered much but whose faith has remained unshaken.”

Check out life story of an amazing individual - you may believe the ending.

http://www.bdcconline.net/en/stories/w/wang-mingdao.php

Do we question the coexistence of a good God with a world of evil?

If there is a story, Job would love to tell it. He lost his health, wealth and finally, his family.

Grieving on his ash pile, covered head to toe with boils, his wife said to him, “Are you still holding on to your integrity? Curse God and die!”


Job’s wife was reacting the way every human being is tempted to react when everything we have believed in seems to make absolutely no sense in the face of what appears to be the opposite

Job reacted with an assumption that just as God is the source of comfort, so also was He the source of pain and therefore, he just had to resign himself to it.

Job had three friends come to visit him – to help him understand where God was in all this devastation.
Eiphaz: The oldest and the kindest of the three,  and he built his entire summation on a (one) dream, the foundation of his belief system was on this one dream – as real as it might have seemed to him – to share this as foundational truth to a very hurting friend was not helping the anguish that Job was experiencing.
Bildad: His thoughts seem true -- but did they answer the question of why pain occurs in our lives or are they thoughts passed from one generation to the next on acceptance and triumph in the situation?
Zophar: Youngest and rudest of the three - called Job an idiot and a windbag, adding that that God’s ways are not Job’s ways, however, that is no different than saying the devil’s ways were not Job’s ways either – not really an answer.
Job wanted to know the what and why of the difference between God’s thinking and his, not just the fact of it.


Then God shows up.  He had, in effect, listened in silence, waiting for this conversation to unfold and giving the best of minds an opportunity to try to untangle the mystery.  God’s response shocks Job – He begins to question Job. God reminded him, as a first step, that there were a thousand and one things he did not fully understand but had just taken for granted.  God proceeded to ask Job 64 questions.

This story cautions us to retain the wonder and to remember our finitude.  God basically says, “Do not assume that you only accept that which you comprehensively understand.”  God challenged Job to admit his limitation and to allow God to be God. God insists that those limitations do and must exist.

A man who was sitting under a tree that was laden with nuts. He looked up into the tree and mockingly said to God, “Somehow I do not think You are very smart. You have made a huge tree to hold small nuts and a small plant to hold big watermelons. Big tree, small nuts; small plant, big watermelons. Your sense of proportion does not seem to have much meaning.” Just then a small nut fell from the tree and hit him on his head, He paused and muttered, “Thank God that was not a watermelon.”

What God wanted him to realize was that this same God who brought such pattern and beauty into a world He had fashioned out of nothing could also bring a pattern and beauty out of Job’s brokeness.

The Cry for a Reason for Suffering

David Hume, a Scottish skeptic from the 18th century had this very interesting quote -

"Were a stranger to drop on a sudden into this world, I would show him, as a specimen of its ills, a hospital full of diseases, a prison crowded with malefactors and debtors, a field of battle strewed with carcasses, a fleet foundering in the ocean, a nation languishing under tyranny, famine, or pestilence. To turn the gay side of life to him, and give him a notion of its pleasures; whither should I conduct him? to a ball, to an opera, to court? He might justly think, that I was only showing him a diversity of distress and sorrow”


Which of us has not looked at a deformed child, swallowed hard with pity, and pondered the purpose behind it?

Which of us has seen a mother who has lost her child and not wondered why?

Habakkuk – “why do you make me look at injustice? Why do you tolerate wrong?”
Jeremiah – “I would speak with you about your justice: Why does the way of the wicked prosper?”

  I have never been in a conversation with a skeptic who failed to raise this as the principal reason for their skepticism. However, there is a blatant oversight and that is that the skeptics who have raised the question must also give an answer to the same question. How do they explain the problem of pain? Not only must they give an answer, but they must ultimately justify the very question itself – all that, while  leaving God out of the picture Here the voices get silent and their own answers border on the irrational

G.K. Chesterton:

“When belief in God becomes difficult, the tendency is to turn away from Him; but in heaven’s name to what?” The Christian does not deny that a meaningful answer must be found, but has the one who denies God found a better answer to the problem of evil? With a touch of humour, and in recognition that many answers come close but not close enough. Chesterton went on to say, “My problem with life is not that it is rational, nor that it is irrational…but that it is almost rational.” Just when we are able to form a cohesive framework, someone or something pokes a hole in it, and we take a step back.”

Ravi Zacharias:

Some time ago I was speaking at a university in England, when a rather exasperated person in the audience made his attack upon God.

“There cannot possibly be a God,” he said, “with all the evil and suffering that exists in the world!”

I asked, “When you say there is such a thing as evil, are you not assuming that there is such a thing as good?”

“Of course,” he retorted.

“But when you assume there is such a thing as good, are you not also assuming that there is such a thing as a moral law on the basis of which to distinguish between good and evil?”

“I suppose so,” came the hesitant and much softer reply.

“If, then, there is a moral law,” I said, “you must also posit a moral law giver. But that is who you are trying to disprove and not prove. If there is no transcendent moral law giver, there is no absolute moral law. If there is no moral law, there really is no good. If there is no good there is no evil. I am not sure what your question is!”

There was silence and then he said, “What, then, am I asking you?” 

 
Father Copleston vs Bertrand Russell:
The Famous 1948 Radio Debate on the Existence of God:

  Copleston asked Russell if he believed in good and bad. Russell admitted that he did, and Copleston responded by asking him how he differentiated between the two. Russell said that he differentiated between good and bad in the same way that he distinguished between colours “But you distinguish between colours by seeing, don’t you? How then, do you judge between good and bad?” “On the basis of feeling, what else?”

(full debate -http://www.bringyou.to/apologetics/p20.htm)

  In short, the problem of evil is not solved by doing away with the existence of God in the face of evil; the problem of evil and suffering must be resolved while keeping God in the picture.

I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For

U2, a well known group of musicians lead by Bono, who himself has reinvented himself as an activist, has a song entitled, I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For.

The lyrics take you through all that life has to offer and even refers to the gospel but ends with a “been there, done that” refrain



In my effort over the past number of blogs is this whole issue about “trying to feel God,”  there are possibly two conclusions that I would like to present, with some help.

1st conclusion - one way or the other, as we live we will be broken; we will have to be broken. We will be broken by a lie or by the truth.

Even Jesus embodied and very dramatically showed this certainty in one very significant choice. When He came face to face with the cross, He knew what lay before Him, and He knew that any path He chose was going to deeply wound Him. An anguished cry came from within Him indicating how He felt at that moment.
He asked His disciples to stay close to Him. He needed their nearness.  Why?  He certainly was not afraid of the physical pain. He could face that. It was the knowledge and the feeling of being abandoned by even God the Father while at the same time being in the centre of God’s will.  In an effort to forestall the rupture with His Father, Jesus could have walked away from that sacrifice, but in so doing He would have actually ended up being alienated from His Father’s will and heart. By choosing to die and endure that momentary separation He was drawn completely into the bosom of the Father. Putting it differently, He had a choice – to resist the cross and leave the world a broken place, or else to be broken Himself so that the world might be drawn near and live. In that death and separation from the consolation of His Father, He was able to bring us who were far off into the embrace of God.  That cross on which our Lord was broken, where He took our sin and suffering, where He took our alienation, where He was abandoned by all, that cross is at the heart of the gospel.
If it is properly understood and surrendered to, the cross cannot just merit a “been there, done that, didn’t work” kind of feeling.

As a person employed in engaging the Christian community to support charitable activity around the world, I can truly say that an appeal during the Easter season that mentions the cross at all, receives little response from this same community.  They don't mind the resurrection, but the cross is so offensive, even to the Christian community.  We need to grasp this message before we lose its power in our lives to live our lives for Christ - passionately.

2nd conclusion -even the skeptics, somewhere deep in their own hearts, that even when they are witness to the most evil expressions of life, God must be somewhere within reach.

I worked Dennis Ngien at Tyndale Seminary and enjoyed him first as a preacher and then as an author. Christianity Today published one of his articles, The God Who Suffers - http://www.ctlibrary.com/print.html?id=1027

Here is a short paragraph to end my thoughts -

Elie Wiesel, Jewish survivor of the Holocaust, never shrinks from saying that the opposite of love is not hatred but indifference. If God were indifferent, he could not love. This is made plain in Wiesel's story about the hanging of two Jewish men and a youth in a Nazi concentration camp. All the prisoners, Wiesel included, were paraded before the gallows to witness this horrifying spectacle. "The men died quickly, but the death throes of the youth lasted for half an hour. 'Where is God? Where is he?' someone asked behind me. As the youth still hung in torment in the noose after a long time, I heard the man call again, 'Where is God?' And I heard a voice in myself answer: 'Where is he? He is here. He is hanging there on the gallows.' " Any other answer would be blasphemy, says Jurgen Moltmann.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vxhyVVkHaBY

Summarizing our journey of talking to our feelings

•  We must hear the voice of God speaking to us through His Word
•  We pause to speak to ourselves about what we know to be true
•  We speak the language of obedience to our emotions
•  We build friendships that endure and strengthen us when we are weak
•  We draw from the strength of the church to sustain us
•  We enjoy the sound and the inspiration of music that God has given to His people

"Listen" to the words of this song --

Be still, my soul: the Lord is on thy side.

Bear patiently the cross of grief or pain.

Leave to thy God to order and provide;

In every change, He faithful will remain.

Be still, my soul: thy best, thy heavenly Friend

Through thorny ways leads to a joyful end.

Be still, my soul: thy God doth undertake

To guide the future, as He has the past.

Thy hope, thy confidence let nothing shake;

All now mysterious shall be bright at last.

Be still, my soul: the waves and winds still know

His voice Who ruled them while He dwelt below.

Be still, my soul: when dearest friends depart,

And all is darkened in the vale of tears,

Then shalt thou better know His love, His heart,

Who comes to soothe thy sorrow and thy fears.

Be still, my soul: thy Jesus can repay

From His own fullness all He takes away.

Be still, my soul: the hour is hastening on

When we shall be forever with the Lord.

When disappointment, grief and fear are gone,

Sorrow forgot, love’s purest joys restored.

Be still, my soul: when change and tears are past

All safe and blessed we shall meet at last.

Be still, my soul: begin the song of praise

On earth, believing, to Thy Lord on high;

Acknowledge Him in all thy words and ways,

So shall He view thee with a well pleased eye.

Be still, my soul: the Sun of life divine

Through passing clouds shall but more brightly shine.

http://www.cyberhymnal.org/mid/f/i/n/finlandia.mid

Fifth source of communication: The Language of the Church

There is no doubt that the place of the church is in caring for its people and in undergirding those in need.



There are two languages that I really like.

1.The church is a place for inner healing and restoration



 When a person stumbles or is taken in sin it is the privileged call of the church of Christ to reach out and to help restore.

When one struggles with feelings that God is so far away, the arms of those who are part of the church will be the only arms God has to draw such people near.

When someone feels abandoned, the hearts of the people of God may be the only hearts God can tap to feel with this person

Nothing brings back feelings of being cared for as much as being in a community that feels

Nothing will speak to our society as much as a community that reaches out with the love of Christ

2.The church is a place where the role of music provides powerful and yet vulnerability in controlling feelings

Music plays a greater role in consolation and inspiration than it does in vibration and ecstasy.  Over time, the heart gives way to certain cries: the cry for peace and tranquility, the search for solace and help, the cry that does not just carry hope for the future but reflects the past – music has the capacity to strike at the core of our beings in a way that God has designed our beings to respond.  Music will bring either harmony or discord and more often, reveals the harmony or discord in a life.

How else can you explain driving down the 401 towards London, Integrity music in the CD player and then in a sudden moment - tears, big alligator tears for about 30 minutes as I absorbed the love of God in the car - haven't had that happen in a while - haven't been loved like that in a while.

Fourth source of communication: The Language of Friends

This communication type comes as part of God's gift of grace because I have seen it manifested even when the recipient is undeserving.

I enjoy more than anything the opportunity of serving and then find that those I serve with end up as my friends - no greater feeling in the world.

Paul shared these exact thoughts to the church in Philippi

“It is right for me to feel this way about all of you, since I have you in my heart; for whether I am in chains or defending and confirming the gospel, all of you share in God’s grace with me. God can testify how I long for all of you with the affection of Christ Jesus”

David would show the other side of times when our friends have hurt us so much that the pain, sometimes, never goes away.  Remember when Absalom betrayed his father, Ahithophel, a one-time confidant of David’s stayed with Absalom, rejecting David.  Chech out David's feelings –

“If an enemy were insulting me, I could endure it; if a foe were raising himself against me, I could hide from him. But it is you, a man like myself, my companion, my close friend, with whom I once enjoyed sweet fellowship as we walked with the throng at the house of God”

A	Always Funny
B	Beautiful Personality
C	Common Interests
D	Delightfully Entertaining
E	Exciting Person
F	Fashionable
G	Good Taste
H	Happy Times Together
I	Intelligent Person
J	Jolly Laughter
K	Kind
L	Listens Well
M	Makes Jokes
N	Never Mean or Cruel
O	Original
P	People Person
Q	Quality Time
R	Real Person
S	Secret Keeper
T	Terrific Sense of Humor
U	Understanding
V	Very Special
W	Works Hard
X	Xciting Person
Y	You Are The Best
Z	Zero flaws

Third source of communication: Language of Obedience

This is the language that builds and strengthens faith.

Faith results in works, however, works can also result in faith.

One of the fundamental differences between the Greek way of thinking and the Hebrew way of thinking was that for the Greeks truth came by reason, and for the Hebrews truth came by obedience. 

A classic demonstration of this principle was seen in the encounter between God and Moses. When Moses demanded proof that God had indeed called him, God said, “I will be with you. And this will be the sign to you that it is I who have sent you: When you have brought the people out of Egypt, you will worship God on this mountain” (Ex.3:12)

The proof of God’s call was after the obedience, not before.

The second source of communication: The Language of Self

Just as God’s Word speaks to us, there must also be the word that we speak to ourselves.

Listen to what Oswald Chambers shares in My Utmost for His Highest --

"There are certain things we must not pray about – moods for instance. Moods never go by praying, moods go by kicking. A mood nearly always has its seat in the physical condition, not in the moral. It is a continual effort not to listen to the moods which arise from a physical condition, never to submit to them for a second. We have to take ourselves by the scruff of the neck and shake ourselves, and we will find that we can do what we said we could not. The curse with most of us is that we won’t. The Christian life is one if incarnate spiritual pluck.  Unless we train our emotions they will lead us around by the nose, and we will be captives to every passing impulse or reaction. But once faith is trained to control the emotions and knows how to lean resolutely against weaknesses of character, another entry-way of doubt is sealed shut forever. Much of our distress as Christians comes not because of sin, but because we are ignorant of the laws of our own nature.”

Martin Lloyd-Jones says something along the same lines --

“The main art in the matter of spiritual living is to know how to handle yourself. You have to take yourself in hand. You have to address yourself, preach to yourself, question yourself. The essence of this matter is to understand that this self of ours, this other man within us, has got to be handled. Do not listen to him; turn on him; speak to him; condemn him; upbraid him; exhort him; encourage him; remind him of what you know instead of placidly listening to him and allowing him to drag you down and depress you.”

 Well, I guess the question is -- can we find someone in the Bible who shared some similar thoughts?

I guess Paul and David might be two characters that would help us understand this truth.

Paul -- "For my part, I run with a clear goal before me; I am like a boxer who does not beat the air; I bruise my own body and make it know its master" - 1Corinthians 9:26, 27

David -- "Why are you downcast, O my soul?  Be at rest once more, O my soul, for the LORD has been good to you" - Psalm 116:7

In another place Paul wants to see us speak to one another with psalms, hymns and spiritual songs as an encouragement and influence to others - surely the same must apply to ourselves - making melody in our hearts to the Lord is an encouraging word to ourselves!

First source of communication: Language of God

One of the first expressions of communication from God is that He describes Himself as a God who feels - Genesis begins with an expression of grieving and a heart filled with pain by chapter 6. For those acquainted with God having such intense emotion, we are sometimes tempted to humanize God at such times.  We need to be very, very cautious that we do not take the terms in their human limitations and with connotations of finitude, but we will be equally in error to deem these words as purely metaphorical with no real emotion behind them.  At the end of the day, I believe we are intended to grieve over evil and to rejoice over good.

John also started off with a description of God's word and being as identical - the incarnate Son of God felt, wept, laughed and hoped. In the beginning was a thinking, feeling God.

But this is where our difficulty begins. As godlike in their origin as feelings are, we must also learn to put them in perspective and protect ourselves from the glorification of feelings as the final affirmation of truth.

God feels with perfect knowledge, and His feeling is in conformity with what is true. He does not act because He feels as much as He acts because He knows.

Nothing is so important to the nature of a word as the truth, and truth is the property of propositions not feelings. Feelings are never described as true or false. Feelings may be legitimate or illegitimate, understandable or incomprehensible; but they are not true or false.

This is where we often get bogged down, longing for feelings when indeed those very feelings could be the most seductive force to take us away from the truth.

The apostle Peter learned this lesson the hard way when he revelled in the glorious feeling of witnessing the transfiguration - how inexpressible must have been the awe when they saw and experienced…
the whitest white the eye could ever contain -
the purest bliss the mind could ever imagine -
the greatest theophany one could ever describe -
the most esteemed human personages the Jewish person could ever have wanted to see – Moses and Elijah -
the grandest ecstasy of spirit the heart could ever yearn for -
the noblest sound the ears could ever desire when the voice came from heaven, “This is my Son. Listen to Him.”

Yet it was in the context of this experience that Peter said what he did about the superiority of the Word --

“For we did not follow cleverly devised stories when we told you about the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ in power, but we were eyewitnesses of his majesty. He received honour and glory from God the Father when the voice came to him from the Majestic Glory, saying, “This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased.” We ourselves heard this voice that came from heaven when we were with him on the sacred mountain. We also have the prophetic message as something completely reliable, and you will do well to pay attention to it, as to a light shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts. Above all, you must understand that no prophecy of Scripture came about by the prophet’s own interpretation of things. For prophecy never had its origin in the human will, but prophets, though human, spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.”

Peter saw the experience and the feeling as secondary to the certainty of God’s Word.

Knowing then that His Word is constant and eternal and personally applied, let us discipline our wills and minds to hear from Him each day --

•“Early will I seek thee” (Ps 63:1)
•“Search me, O God, and know . . . my thoughts” (Ps 139:23)
•“Speak Lord, for your servant is listening” (1Sam 3:9)
•What do you want me to do? (Acts 9:6)

Paul  says something about this as well -- “That I might know him, and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings, being made conformable unto his death” (Phil 3:10).Obviously it was not feeling that drove Paul but the knowledge of Christ.

Even Samuel -- his message was one that broke his heart because he had a message of judgement to give his predecessor and mentor, Eli.  I know that God had given me a word for someone and I did not give it because I knew this couple would be extremely angry.  God had to use someone else in the church, that person knew to speak the truth, the couple were angry for months, but at the end, they thanked him for there was no way they could have dealt with the tragedy if it were not for his word he gave earlier.  I learn a valuable lesson on how my feeling has nothing to do with what God wants for or from me.

"Listen" to these words penned by William Runyan --

1. Lord, I have shut the door,
Speak now the word
Which in the din and throng
Could not be heard;
Hushed now my inner heart,
Whisper Thy will,
While I have come apart,
While all is still.

2. Lord, I have shut the door,
Here do I bow;
Speak, for my soul attend
Turns to Thee now.
Rebuke Thou what is vain,
Counsel my soul,
Thy holy will reveal,
My will control.

3. In this blest quietness Clamouring cease;
Here in Thy presence dwells
Infinite peace;
Yonder, the strife and cry,
Yonder, the sin:
Lord, I have shut the door,
Thou art within.

4. Lord, I have shut the door,
Strengthen my heart;
Yonder awaits the task--
I share apart.
Only through grace bestowed
May I be true;
Here, while alone with Thee,
My strength renew.

An Upward Look

•  Isn't it amazing to realize that of all the descriptions God could have given of Himself when referring to His own eternal nature, He chose the metaphor of language.

When John begins his Gospel with the words, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God,” he without a doubt echoed the very first words of Genesis, “In the beginning God.”

And at the very doorstep - we also read, “And God said.”

Clarke's Commentary offers these insights --
 

The original word אלהים Elohim, God, is certainly the plural form of אל El, or אלה Eloah, and has long been supposed, by the most eminently learned and pious men, to imply a plurality of Persons in the Divine nature. As this plurality appears in so many parts of the sacred writings to be confined to three Persons, hence the doctrine of the Trinity, which has formed a part of the creed of all those who have been deemed sound in the faith, from the earliest ages of Christianity. Nor are the Christians singular in receiving this doctrine, and in deriving it from the first words of Divine revelation. 

An eminent Jewish rabbi, Simeon ben Joachi, in his comment on the sixth section of Leviticus, has these remarkable words: "Come and see the mystery of the word Elohim; there are three degrees, and each degree by itself alone, and yet notwithstanding they are all one, and joined together in one, and are not divided from each other." See Ainsworth. 

He must be strangely prejudiced indeed who cannot see that the doctrine of a Trinity, and of a Trinity in unity, is expressed in the above words. The verb ברא bara, he created, being joined in the singular number with this plural noun, has been considered as pointing out, and not obscurely, the unity of the Divine Persons in this work of creation. In the ever-blessed Trinity, from the infinite and indivisible unity of the persons, there can be but one will, one purpose, and one infinite and uncontrollable energy.

We have seen that the word אלהים Elohim is plural; we have traced our term God to its source, and have seen its signification; and also a general definition of the thing or being included under this term, has been tremblingly attempted. We should now trace the original to its root, but this root does not appear in the Hebrew Bible. Were the Hebrew a complete language, a pious reason might be given for this omission, viz., "As God is without beginning and without cause, as his being is infinite and underived, the Hebrew language consults strict propriety in giving no root whence his name can be deduced." 

Mr. Parkhurst, to whose pious and learned labors in Hebrew literature most Biblical students are indebted, thinks he has found the root in אלה alah, he swore, bound himself by oath; and hence he calls the ever-blessed Trinity אלהים Elohim, as being bound by a conditional oath to redeem man, etc., etc. Most pious minds will revolt from such a definition, and will be glad with me to find both the noun and the root preserved in Arabic. Allah is the common name for God in the Arabic tongue, and often the emphatic is used. Now both these words are derived from the root alaha, he worshipped, adored, was struck with astonishment, fear, or terror; and hence, he adored with sacred horror and veneration, cum sacro horrore ac veneratione coluit, adoravit - Wilmet. 

Hence ilahon, fear, veneration, and also the object of religious fear, the Deity, the supreme God, the tremendous Being. This is not a new idea; God was considered in the same light among the ancient Hebrews; and hence Jacob swears by the fear of his father Isaac, Genesis 31:53. 

To complete the definition, Golius renders alaha, juvit, liberavit, et tutatus fuit, "he succoured, liberated, kept in safety, or defended." Thus from the ideal meaning of this most expressive root, we acquire the most correct notion of the Divine nature; for we learn that God is the sole object of adoration; that the perfections of his nature are such as must astonish all those who piously contemplate them, and fill with horror all who would dare to give his glory to another, or break his commandments; that consequently he should be worshipped with reverence and religious fear; and that every sincere worshipper may expect from him help in all his weaknesses, trials, difficulties, temptations, etc.,; freedom from the power, guilt, nature, and consequences of sin; and to be supported, defended, and saved to the uttermost, and to the end.

Here then is one proof, among multitudes which shall be adduced in the course of this work, of the importance, utility, and necessity of tracing up these sacred words to their sources; and a proof also, that subjects which are supposed to be out of the reach of the common people may, with a little difficulty, be brought on a level with the most ordinary capacity.