My Utmost For His Highest Mar 27
Come up here, and I will show you things which must take place… Revelation 4:1
A higher state of mind and spiritual vision can only be achieved through the higher practice of personal character.
If you live up to the highest and best that you know in the outer level of your life, God will continually say to you, “Friend, come up even higher.” There is also a continuing rule in temptation which calls you to go higher; but when you do, you only encounter other temptations and character traits.
Both God and Satan use the strategy of elevation, but Satan uses it in temptation, and the effect is quite different.
For example, when the devil elevates you to a certain place, he causes you to fasten your idea of what holiness is far beyond what flesh and blood could ever bear or achieve. Your life becomes a spiritual acrobatic performance high atop a steeple. You cling to it, trying to maintain your balance and daring not to move. (Anyone relate?)
But when God elevates you by His grace into heavenly places, you find a vast plateau where you can move about with ease. (What a joy to be so thus surrounded with such freedom?)
I suggest you invest a few minutes today sometime to reflect and compare your spiritual acuity, depth, and satisfaction this Holy Week with your Holy Week memories of last year, to see how God now has called you to a higher level, enjoying a broad spacious plateau in which to operate. We are all continually being encouraged to elevate His perspective through us beyond our comfort zone, and incidentally, never allow God to show you a truth which you do not instantly begin to live up to, applying it to your life. Always work through it, staying in its light.
I’m recalling Carl’s 4 D’s this past Sunday; our destination, its distance, our decision, and of course, all without a doubt, OUR (it’s gotta be our, His & I, otherwise I’ll surely fail!) all-out DETERMINATION, in order to vibrantly declare, IT IS FINISHED after which we’ll hear, “well done thou good and faithful servant.” Perhaps use a Post-It Note to remember your 4-D’s?
Your growth in grace is not measured by the fact that you haven’t yet turned back, but that you have an insight and understanding into where you are today spiritually! We’re not merely performing or increasing our workout repetitions in the gym here! Have you heard God say, “Come up higher,” not audibly on the outer level, but to the innermost part of your character? “Shall I hide from Abraham what I am doing…?” (Genesis 18:17). Understand here, God has to hide from us what He does, until, due to the growth of our personal character, we get to the level where He is then able to reveal it. Oh, the wonder of it all! Praise His Holy Name!
| POWERFUL WISDOM FROM OSWALD CHAMBERS: You must comprehend the remarkable fact about fearing God is that when you fear God you fear nothing else; WHEREAS, if you do not fear God you fear everything else! “Blessed is every one that feareth the Lord. |
Sustaining Encouragement for Further Reflection: Colossians 2:6-23 NIV
[6]So then, just as you received Christ Jesus as Lord, continue to live your lives in Him,
[7] rooted and built up in Him, strengthened in the faith as you were taught, and overflowing with thankfulness.
[8] See to it that no one takes you captive through hollow and deceptive philosophy, which depends on human tradition and the elemental spiritual forces of this world rather than on Christ.
[9] For in Christ all the fullness of the Deity lives in bodily form,
[10] and in Christ you have been brought to fullness. He is the head over every power and authority.
[11] In him you were also circumcised with a circumcision not performed by human hands. Your whole self ruled by the flesh was put off when you were circumcised by Christ,
[12] having been buried with him in baptism, in which you were also raised with him through your faith in the working of God, who raised him from the dead.
[13] When you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made you alive with Christ. He forgave us all our sins,
[14] having canceled the charge of our legal indebtedness, which stood against us and condemned us; He has taken it away, nailing it to the cross.
[15] And having disarmed the powers and authorities, He made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross.
[16] Therefore do not let anyone judge you by what you eat or drink, or with regard to a religious festival, a New Moon celebration or a Sabbath day.
[17] These are a shadow of the things that were to come; the reality, however, is found in Christ.
[18] Do not let anyone who delights in false humility and the worship of angels disqualify you. Such a person also goes into great detail about what they have seen; they are puffed up with idle notions by their unspiritual mind.
[19] They have lost connection with the head, from whom the whole body, supported and held together by its ligaments and sinews, grows as God causes it to grow.
[20] Since you died with Christ to the elemental spiritual forces of this world, why, as though you still belonged to the world, do you submit to its rules:
[21] “Do not handle! Do not taste! Do not touch!”?
[22] These rules, which have to do with things that are all destined to perish with use, are based on merely human commands and teachings.
[23] Such regulations indeed have an appearance of wisdom, with their self-imposed worship, their false humility and their harsh treatment of the body, but they lack any value in restraining sensual indulgence.
NEXT UP: You’re on your own to personally reflect on your spiritual journey to date, as encouraged in this and prior posts. Happy Easter my friend!