2002-01-01
Good Morning Faithful Ones,
This morning, the Lord leads me to begin a conversation that will probably last for several days on Him as Adonai, the “Lord.” The word, Adonai, is first used in GN 15: 2, where Abraham, who has no children at the time, asks God what good it would do him to have a great reward that God has just promised him. Since we talked about that very recently, I won’t take time to repeat what was said here. However, I am led to discuss the issue of making God, through Christ, the Lord of our lives. Paul spoke about this at length in his ministry. One such passage was in 2 COR 12: 7-10, which is most revealing. “But to keep me from being puffed up with pride because of the many wonderful things I saw, I was given a painful physical ailment which acts as Satan’s messenger to beat me and keep me from being proud. Three times I prayed to the Lord about this and asked him to take it away. But His answer was, ‘My grace is all you need, for My power is strongest when you are weak.’ I am most happy, then, to be proud of my weaknesses, in order to feel the protection of Christ’s power over me. I am content with weakness, insults, hardships, persecutions, and difficulties for Christ’s sake. For when I am weak, then I am strong.” It is interesting to note that Les Feldick feels that Paul had typical Middle Eastern eye disease that looked ugly at times [referring to (7)].
If my experience is any teacher, then often God brings us to some kind of brokenness before we are willing to open our hearts completely to Him. I believe this is what Paul refers to here. Considering the kind of egotistical, out-going personality Saul of Tarsus must have been, we can get a good view of the enormous and righteously applied power our Lord, Adonai, really has in Saul’s conversion to the apostle Paul. To bring Saul of Tarsus to the conclusion, “For when I’m weak, then I am strong,” is nothing short of a miracle. The extent of that conversion and thus, a hint of Adonai’s power, is seen in PHIL 1: 20-21. “My deep desire and hope is that I shall never fail in my duty, but that at all times, and especially right now, I shall be full of courage, so that with my whole being I shall bring honor to Christ, whether I live or die. For what is life? To me, it is Christ. Death, then, will bring more.” These are the words of a man whose mind has been supernaturally transformed by its renewal. Once Paul’s mind was renewed by God, He spent three years in the wilderness alone with Christ, so that the Latter prepared him for the hugely important ministry to which Paul was called. I suspect it was during that time that what had been put into Paul’s mind sunk deeply and irretrievably into his heart.
We might ask how Christ viewed the difference between a person who acknowledges the leadership and power of Adonai in his life and one who doesn’t. This is revealed in MT 7: 21-23, “Not everyone who calls Me ‘Lord, Lord’ will enter the Kingdom of heaven, but only those who do what My Father in heaven wants them to do. When the Judgment Day comes, many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord! In Your name we spoke God’s message, by Your name we drove out many demons and performed many miracles! Then I will say to them, ‘I never knew you. Get away from Me, you wicked people!’ “ Christ’s view is further elucidated in LK 6: 46-49, the Two House Builders. “Why do you call Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ and yet do not do what I tell you? Anyone who comes to Me and listens to My words and obeys them-I will show you what he is like. He is like a man who in building his house, dug deep and laid the foundation on rock. The river flooded over and hit that house but could not shake it, because it was well built. But anyone who hears My worlds and does not obey them is like a man who built his house without laying a foundation; when the flood hit that house it fell at once-and what a terrible crash that was!’ “
A person without faith would look at these two citations and conclude that this man, Christ, must have been a flaming egotist that He thought He had a right to cast some people who call him ‘Lord’ away with such disgust. But those of us who have the kind of faith that is a “circumcision of the heart” [RO 2: 29] will see it differently. It is not good enough to vocally claim that Christ is the Lord of our lives or to acknowledge the ultimate power and sovereignty of Adonai in our lives. Adonai, Who is omniscient, knows when those convictions arise from our hearts and when they don’t. Because He is in Christ, and Christ is in Him [JN 14: 9, 11], Christ really is able to differentiate between who is a hypocrite and who isn’t. That is what He was doing in the LK and MT verses above.
Yesterday, we I spoke of El Shaddai, the “All-Sufficient One,” it became apparent to me that we would never know Him as this without accepting His position as Adonai, the “Lord.” We would never know the blessings of His ways in our lives, if we didn’t learn to seek those ways out first. I can’t imagine my life without Him now; that’s what fuels me to want to spend my life spreading His word to others. Christ made it plain in MT 6: 24, “No one can be a slave of two masters; he will hate one and love the other; he will be loyal to one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money.” While He was speaking in the context of placing money before the Lord in our lives, this message certainly applies to anything we are foolish enough to consider of greater or even equal importance to God in them. People with real faith know that God, through Christ, really is their lives.
PRAYER: O Lord, by every name You are called in the Scriptures, You are showing us the real power for good that we have when we are faithful to You. Your perspective on our suffering, which Paul and Christ Himself show us, gives us a purpose we never had before. You are our Adonai, the Lord of our lives, the God Who wants to provide for us, protect us, and offer us eternal salvation through the death of Christ on the cross. You command us to make You our one and only Master. When we trust You and obey, You bless us abundantly. For what more could we ask? When we have the kind of faith to seek You out and follow Your ways, You put our feet on a sure foundation, Your Rock. When the adversary tries to challenge us with temptation, lose of faith, or illness, You stand in the gap for us and equip us to be victorious over these attempts to do evil. When we carry out the tasks You have for us, You bring us closer to the perfection we need to be glorified, that is to share in Your glory. For that and so much more, we humbly offer You our adoration, worship, loyalty, trust, obedience, praise, and thanks. In Christ’s name, amen.
Tomorrow, the Lord leads me to continue discussing His position in our lives as Adonai, the “Lord.” It is my fondest hope that each of you will know the love and protection of our Abba is a part of your lives, just as I do. Where would we be without Him? He surrounds us with His love, guidance, a hunger for His holy word, and a growing recognition of our need to communicate with Him often in prayer. When we are troubled, His greatest delight is to see us seek Him out for help; this is help He freely offers us through His most excellent grace. These are the acts of a Father Who loves each of His children deeply. We are indeed a blessed people for having answered His call to come to faith. Peter and I also send you our love too.
Grace Be With You Always,
Lynn