Spring
1995
Entering the Depths
Wade E Taylor
Many of us have formed an opinion of what a particular person
was like. Then when we met them, they were totally different
than we had thought. This was due to a "perceived"
knowledge from which we formed an opinion without having "experientially"
known them.
We cannot explain the fact that God had no beginning, or
how He will deal with those who never heard the Gospel. We
are not called to understand these things. Rather, we are
called to worship and faith.
If we understood God, He would be no bigger than our understanding.
That indeed would be a very small God.
"For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither
are your ways my ways, saith the LORD. For as
the heavens are higher than the earth, so are
my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts
than your thoughts" Isa 55:8-9.
Rather than information about God, it is the foundational
doctrines along with an active faith and trust, which has
been built upon a personal relationship with our Creator,
that establishes us upon a rock-solid foundation. As our spiritual
life is built upon this foundation and the Lord begins to
take us beyond these doctrinal basics, there is a "deep"
within the heart of God that reaches out toward the spiritual
capacity which He has created within us.
Even though we may not sense that this "deep" is
within us, it is there. When it is stirred by the Lord, there
is the ever present danger that we will seek some other means
to satisfy it. We often become so taken up with information
about the Lord that we do not come to the Lord Himself and
allow Him to bring us into the experience of personally knowing
Him. We stop short of experiential knowledge.
"When they therefore were come together, they
asked of him, saying, Lord, wilt thou at this
time restore again the kingdom to Israel?" Acts 1:6.
The disciples were seeking the external, rather than a change
within their lives. Many today are doing the same, seeking
an adjustment in their social arrangements, rather than facing
their real need which is within and from which, those things
that are external will find their adjustment or correction.
The Apostle Paul saw beyond the limitations of his natural
life and reached for the higher eternal things. Although he
had "counted" all things but loss, the time came
when he said, "I have suffered the loss of all things."
He could accept this because all that he desired had been
lifted from the natural to the spiritual and here, he found
the satisfaction that he had so intensely sought.
John W Follette, who never married, had a unique relationship
to the Lord. While in His home one time, I noticed that he
had placed three settings on the table. When I questioned
it, he said "I always set a place for the Lord, then
I invite Him to sit at the table with me while I partake of
my meal." He was able in a practical, yet profound way
to fellowship with the Lord, even during the necessary occupations
of life. He also had found the satisfaction and fulfillment
he was created for.
The disciples had asked Jesus about the Kingdom being restored
to Israel. He answered, "It is not for you to know the
times and seasons, BUT ..." He directed their attention
to a present work that would inwardly change them in preparation
for the coming of the Kingdom.
As Jesus came up out of the waters of baptism, the heavens
opened and His Father said, "This is My beloved Son in
whom I am well pleased." Immediately, "Jesus was
led by the Spirit into the wilderness being forty days tempted
of the Devil" After this, the Word tells us that "Jesus
returned in the power of the Spirit" Luke 4:1-2a,14.
Notice that He had gone into the wilderness in the FULLNESS
of the Spirit, but returned in the POWER of the Spirit.
Power is the result of a right response to our being tested
and proven. To be tested and come through victoriously will
produce this empowering, which is broad in its scope and creates
within us the ability to go deeper in the Lord.
As we obey the Lord, the result of our obedience produces
within us grace in the form of enabling strength, which makes
it yet easier to obey. If we disobey, it becomes easier for
us to disobey, as a "hardness" sets in within us
and we fail to hear His voice.
Our obeying the Lord and receiving His blessing does not
mean that we will never have a problem again. After experiencing
a time of remarkable blessings and provisions, things may
get worse. The Lord will test us to see if we are capable
of rightly handling what we have already received, and if
He might trust us with more.
We may then experience a further ongoing time of being tested
and proven, to bring us into the depths of our knowing Him
as He desires, and of His knowing the limits to which He can
trust us.
As we come to better understand His desire for this close
relationship, we will be able to fully trust Him, even when
we may not understand.