April 21 Lesson

April 21st.
NOW DON'T HURT THE LORD!

"Have I been so long time with you, and yet hast thou not known Me, Philip?" John 14:9
Our Lord must be repeatedly astounded at us - astounded at how un-simple we are. It is opinions of our own which make us stupid, when we are simple we are never stupid, we discern all the time. Philip expected the revelation of a tremendous mystery, but not in the One Whom he knew. The mystery of God is not in what is going to be, it is now; we look for it presently, in some cataclysmic event. We have no reluctance in obeying Jesus, but it is probable that we are hurting Him by the questions we ask. "Lord, show us the Father." His answer comes straight back - "There He is, always here or nowhere." We look for God to manifest Himself to His children: God only manifests Himself in His children. Other people see the manifestation, the child of God does not. We want to be conscious of God; we cannot be conscious of our consciousness and remain sane. If we are asking God to give us experiences, or if conscious experience is in the road, we hurt the Lord. The very questions we ask hurt Jesus because they are not the questions of a child.
"Let not your heart be troubled" - then am I hurting Jesus by allowing my heart to be troubled? If I believe the character of Jesus, am I living up to my belief? Am I allowing anything to perturb my heart, any morbid questions to come in? I have to get to the implicit relationship that takes everything as it comes from Him. God never guides presently, but always now. Realize that the Lord is here now, and the emancipation is immediate.
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To go along with this Utmost is something that I'm learning to do everyday... Seek the relationship with God and the encounters with Him surely follow. As I seek the close knit relationship with my most loving God... I have the most amazing encounters when He touches my heart. It is as if I'm rocket propelled into His Glory and I'm just floating in His river of Glory that leads straight to the throne of God. I love to be there and to just be filled. We as broken human vessels LEAK... so I have to go there often to be filled. It is a daily choice for me to chose to disregard the whispers of the devil and to take EVERY thought captive and analyze it to determine where the thought came from. Then to choose to make an agreement or not. Most likely if I have the choice to make an agreement.... or if I have to think about it.... the thought didn't come from God, because if it did I wouldn't have to make the choice... it would be automatic... a task that is very hard, but very rewarding because as I keep my thoughts on Jesus... The Holy Spirit has the reigns and I don't have to worry that I'm taking the lead away from Him. The first clue that I get when I start to take away the lead from the Holy Spirit is when I feel a load on my shoulders that is heavy. That is a sign that I'm taking my life and living out of my own strength and bearing the worries and thoughts of the future on my own. Then I get a check from the Holy Spirit that jolts me back to reality and I surrender the control back to Him. We has humans have a very hard will to break (speaking for only myself) and I have been in control for the last 28 years.... but since January of this year I have come to that realization and God is drawing me back to the basics of His Word and the great work of the Holy Spirit here on Earth (as a person in our Tuesday Night Group put it "Earth Guy"( Holy Spirit) (love that)).