Luke 24 32 And they said to one another, Were not our hearts greatly moved and burning within us while He was talking with us on the road and as He opened and explained to us the Scriptures?
These two disciples had been walking along sad and broken hearted. Their hopes were dashed, life hadn’t worked out as they had expected or hoped. With their faith crushed to pieces, they talked in the past tense trying to figure out where it all went wrong.
They did not recognise Jesus! The very one they had hoped in! The one they had followed for so long. He was walking and talking with them but they were ignorant of His presence. Their gaze so inward and their sight so blinded by self pity, disappointment and defeat that they did not recognise their risen, victorious Lord and Saviour was with them.
But Jesus, after a straight but gentle rebuke, corrects their understanding and lays firmly the foundations of the gospel message. Slowly they came to realise how their expectations had been wrong! Their focus and understanding had been on the wrong thing, it had been fleshly, without Spiritual understanding. Slowly, by knowledge of The Word, their faith began to stir again… Of course Jesus had to die! It was prophesied, it was necessary, it was God’s plan for Salvation all along! They gradually became certain and assured of the scriptures, they started to believe again, truly Jesus was risen, they didn’t know where He was but it didn’t matter any more! They were reassured in the scriptures, took God at His word and trusted in Him! Their hearts burned with excitement, expectancy, hope, joy and rejoicing in all that God was doing.
When their hearts burned in the Spiritual, Jesus revealed himself in the physical! Only after their hearts burned with faith did He open their eyes to see He had been there all along!
May our faith be so stirred and may our hearts burn with such joy, expectancy and trust! Hallelujah! HE IS RISEN! PRAISE THE LORD!!
2 Corinthians 7 9 Now I rejoice, not because you were made sorry, but because you were sorrowful unto repentance: for ye were made grieved after a godly manner, that you might receive damage by us in nothing. 10 For godly sorrow produces repentance that leads and contributes to salvation and deliverance from evil,: but worldly/fleshly sorrow is deadly resulting only in death. 11 For look back now and observe that ye sorrowed after a godly sort, and observe what this same godly sorrow has done for you and has produced in you…
Why would we give thanks for such an experience of the burden of sin? How can we find comfort in sorrow for sin? It may seem strange to rejoice in such regret and shame.
But look what such sorrow produces, repentance that leads to restored fellowship and rejoicing! The greater the sorrow, the greater the repentance, the greater the rejoicing!! Hallelujah! “But he who is forgiven little loves little.” Luke 7:47
Romans 2 4 Or are you so blind as to despise and underestimate the wealth of His kindness and forbearance and long-suffering patience? Are you unmindful or actually ignorant of the fact that God’s kindness is intended to lead you to repent?
Consider this thoroughly… It is God’s loving kindness that leads us to repentance. It is His mercy that allows us to feel such guilt and grief. In order to repent we must first acknowledge and confess our shame, weakness and sin. Coming to such an understanding of our flesh in the eyes of our perfect, loving Saviour is a painful and shameful realisation.
Why? Why does God lead us to such regret, shame and anguish? Why does His goodness lead us to experience such sorrow, grief and conviction? How on earth does the acknowledgement of such wretchedness demonstrate the Almighty Love of God?
Hebrews 12 6 For the Lord corrects and disciplines everyone whom He loves, and He punishes, even scourges, every son whom He accepts and welcomes to His heart and cherishes. 7 You must submit to and endure [correction] for discipline; God is dealing with you as with sons. For what son is there whom his father does not [thus] train and correct and discipline? 8 Now if you are exempt from correction and left without discipline in which all [of God’s children] share, then you are illegitimate offspring and not true sons [at all]. … 11 For the present time no discipline/punishment brings joy, but seems grievous and painful; but afterwards it yields the peaceable fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it [a harvest of fruit which consists in righteousness-in conformity to God’s will in purpose, thought, and action, resulting in right living and right standing with God].
God deals with us as His children!!! The heart of The Father thoroughly delights in His sons and daughters! The Born Again believer is a child of God and heir with Christ! He has placed His glory on us! He LOVES US with an everlasting love! He disciplines us for our good; to restore us to Him and to glorify His name in and through His people!
Jacob spoke truly when he said “I am not worthy of the least of all the mercy and loving-kindness and all the faithfulness which You have shown to Your servant” Genesis 32:10. We are not worthy of the least of all His mercies!! We are worthy of God’s wrath and hell! But God, who is rich in mercy and great love takes time to teach us, correct us and has promised to forgive our sins when we sincerely confess our lack and disobedience to Him.
Our Heavenly Father longs for us to come to Him in repentance so that He can restore us into glorious communion and fellowship in His secret place of intimacy!
Psalm 23 4 Yes, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear or dread no evil, for You are with me; Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me.
For the heart/soul that longs to abide in “the secret place of The Most High” there is such great comfort in the chastisement and conviction of The Lord! How precious are His proddings, pressings and painful lessons! How precious is the privilege and opportunity to have our flesh/sin exposed and then to come in confession and repentance!
To be lovingly, though sternly corrected by The Shepherd, to be taught and rebuked in love by Almighty God! It is so incredible that God would be so patient and tender with these failing, lusting hearts! But HALLELUJAH!!! WHAT A SAVIOUR!!
Psalm 119 65 You have dealt well with Your servant, O Lord, according to Your promise. … 67 Before I was afflicted I went astray, but now Your word do I keep [hearing, receiving, loving, and obeying it]. … 71 It is good for me that I have been afflicted, that I might learn Your statutes. … 75 I know, O Lord, that Your judgments are right and righteous, and that in faithfulness You have afflicted me.
Psalm 51 7 Purify me with hyssop, and I shall be clean [ceremonially]; wash me, and I shall [in reality] be whiter than snow. 8 Make me to hear joy and gladness and be satisfied; let the bones which You have broken rejoice. … 12 Restore to me the joy of Your salvation and uphold me with a willing spirit. 13 Then will I teach transgressors Your ways, and sinners shall be converted and return to You. … 15 O Lord, open my lips, and my mouth shall show forth Your praise.|
REPENTANCE ALWAYS LEADS TO REJOICING!! We are not to live in a constant state of sorrow, we are not to remain in a state of affliction and grief. To stay there is to continue in sin!
When The Lord does lead us to repentance, when Godly sorrow does overwhelm us, when the burden and guilt of lack and sin weighs us down… Then let us come in obedience, humbled but boldly to His feet and confess and repent! And immediately we do we can rise up REJOICING! For He forgives!!! He restores, cleanses and forgets!! Hallelujah!! Praise The Lord!! Oh, what great love and comfort there is in The Lord’s chastening!
Oh, praise God for His tender mercies and loving kindnesses that lead us to sorrowful repentance. Oh God, THANK YOU for the dealing of your Holy Spirit! Oh Lord give us more of your Godly sorrow for sin that we might praise you all the more for your love, mercy, patience, forgiveness, long suffering and compassion.
2 Peter 1 2 Grace and peace be multiplied to you in the [true, intimate] knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord. 3 For His divine power has bestowed on us absolutely everything related to life and godliness, through true and personal knowledge of Him who called us by and to His own glory and excellence. 4 For by these He has bestowed on us His precious and magnificent promises [of inexpressible value], so that through these you may be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the moral decay and corruption that is in the world through lust.
THERE IS NO LACK IN GOD! There is NOTHING lacking in the Life and Spirit of Jesus Christ in a believer! If we find that we are lacking, dry or without His Joy then very simply but very sincerely we need to acknowledge that we’ve been in unbelief! We need to repent, confess and turn again to the promises and testimonies of The Word of God and take by faith the victory and provision given us in the resurrection life of Jesus Christ! Hallelujah!! Praise His precious name!! Sing again His songs of victory and declare HIS Salvation!
HE HAS ALREADY GIVEN!! He is not holding back until we are ready! He has ALREADY bestowed on us EVERYTHING that pertains to HIS LIFE and GODLINESS! We already have access to all that we need! Jesus has given us HIS LIFE, HIS VICTORY, HIS ACCESS to The Father, HIS POWER, HIS TESTIMONY!! It is for us to simply have the faith to believe!! Do we live by faith? Do we truly believe that Jesus Christ is all that He says He is… IN US!!
WE HAVE NO EXCUSE! The ONLY reason we lack is through our failure to believe! We doubt His provision, we doubt His promises, we forget all that He has done and all that is ours in Him! Have we forgotten to grow in a “true and personal knowledge of Him who called us by and to His own glory and excellence”? We have forgotten to praise and magnify The Lord!
John 16 33 I have told you these things, so that in Me you may have perfect peace and confidence. In the world you will have tribulation and trials and distress and frustration; but be of good cheer [take courage; be confident, certain, undaunted]! For I have overcome the world. [I have deprived it of power to harm you and have conquered it for you.]
Romans 8 37 Yet amid all these things we are more than conquerors and gain a surpassing victory through Him Who loved us.
1 Corinthians 15 57 But thanks be to God, Who gives us the victory [making us conquerors] through our Lord Jesus Christ.
2 Corinthians 2 14 Now thanks be to God, Who always causes us to triumph in Christ, and by us makes manifest the fragrance of his knowledge in every place.
1 John 5 4 For whatever is born of God is victorious over the world; and this is the victory that conquers the world, even our faith.
• Oh brothers and sisters in Christ, may we be stirred up in our faith! May we arise and leave the place of despondency and self. May we exalt The Lord Jesus and not magnify our problems! Let us rise up in faith believing that Jesus has won every victory, that He has already gone before us, that He is casting out the enemy… Let us be found ever rejoicing and giving thanks in all things, knowing that we are more than conquerors because the battle is already won! Let us fix our eyes on The Giver, not the gifts. Let is offer our sacrifice of praise, for when we offer to Jesus the little praise we have, we will always leave full of Him!!
Exodus 32 10 Now therefore let Me alone, that My wrath may burn hot against them and that I may destroy them; but I will make of you a great nation. 11 But Moses besought the Lord his God… … 14 Then the Lord turned from the evil which He had thought to do to His people.
What if Moses hadn’t interceded? What if Moses had simply accepted God’s word and Israel’s fate? God was not joking or merely suggesting in order to test Moses, the Israelite people were as good as destroyed!
Psalm 106 23 Therefore He said He would destroy them. [And He would have done so] had not Moses, His chosen one, stepped into the breach before Him to turn away His threatening wrath.
Moses, who placed himself between The Lord and the people, successfully interceded on behalf of God’s Glory and the people of Israel. Man moved God! But note that Moses’ primary focus in prayer was for the Glory of God, not the excusing of man! Exodus 32:11-13.
Moses, who is introduced to us as a man of feeble faith, not knowing God and questioning His ability, had power with God to cause Him to repent! He had no provision that we don’t have today, in fact he had less! He didn’t have the power and revelation of The Holy Spirit. He was simply a man who had come to know God so intimately through submission and obedience, that his heart longed for and reflected The Lord’s heart. He desired, more than anything else, to see God truly known and glorified on the earth!
Matthew 9 37 Then He (Jesus) said to His disciples, The harvest is indeed plentiful, but the labourers are few. 38 So pray therefore to the Lord of the harvest to force out and send labourers into His harvest.
It takes faith to believe that you can move the heart of God. Faith doesn’t pray in uncertainty but with assurance and confident rejoicing and rest. Oh let us pray with faith! Let us pray for The Lord to restore His Glory in His name. Let us pray for the chaff to be removed. Let us pray for The Lord’s testimony to be great amongst His people, and in us! Let us pray for there to be a shout of praise in the camp, a song of joy in the hearts of the redeemed and HIS rest/victory in our daily lives! Let us pray expectantly for the lost and for the labourers who share the Good News. Let us pray that more labourers be sent out into HIS harvest. For the field is HIS and it is HIS plentiful harvest! So many lives depend on our intercession. Consider the consequence if we do not!
May we yield to the life of Christ within us and allow His desires to be ours. We have the power available to us, in Jesus, to move the heart of God for those who are destined for destruction! May our hearts be stirred and our faith fortified to beseech God for His glory and that He might, by our intercession, receive the reward of His suffering.
Luke 16 10 Who is faithful in a very little is faithful also in much…
The very little things. They’re so little. Things that seem unimportant, things that are so menial, boring and basic. They are little things. So little we often miss them, we forget them or we hide them away. We may find them tiring or inconvenient. However, it is these little things that make up the mighty work and testimony of God in a believer.
James 4 14 … What is the nature of your life? You are [really] but a wisp of vapor (a puff of smoke, a mist) that is visible for a little while and then disappears [into thin air].
Let us be found faithful with the little lives that we have. May we never lose the joy of simply having the opportunity to faithfully serve The Lord. No matter the outcome, it is a joy and precious privilege that He would entrust us with His mina, His life, His word and His Spirit! Continue in well doing. Hide yourself in the secret place of His presence. Stay faithful in the little for little is much when God is in it.
Oswald Chambers: My personal life may be crowded with small petty incidents, altogether unnoticeable and mean, but if I obey Jesus Christ in the haphazard circumstances, they become pinholes through which I see the face of God, and when I stand face to face with God I shall discover that through my obedience thousands were blessed.
The world observes God in the greater works but it is in the little things that we can know Him.
Learning With Lovell 