Wading through life

Sow for yourselves righteousness;
Reap in mercy;
Break up your fallow ground,
For it is time to seek the LORD,
Till He comes and rains righteousness on you.
You have plowed wickedness;
You have reaped iniquity.
You have eaten the fruit of lies,
Because you trusted in your own way,
In the multitude of your mighty men.

— Hosea 10:12-13

Let’s clear the air about something: sowing and reaping is a major principle of God’s Word and one we must still recognize and live by. Just as Hosea warned Israel in the passage above, if we sow wickedness with our thoughts and actions, we’re going to reap iniquity—or the willful injustice of oppressors, as the Amplified Bible puts it. We won’t just reap an icky feeling of having lived wrongly; we’ll actually attract injustice and oppression from others.

Conversely, if we sow righteousness—or uprightness and right standing with God, as the Amplified translates—we’ll reap mercy and loving-kindness. When we break up our fallow ground, we are able to receive the soaking rain of God’s blessings. God can rain down righteousness all He wants, but if our hearts are hard, His rain will splash off us like flash floods upon Utah slickrock and not bring lasting change.

In this season where the love and affections of the Father are being reintroduced to the Church in new and powerful ways, it’s easy to lean too heavily upon God’s mercy and forget that our wrong actions still carry heavy consequences.

Paul warned the Galatians (6:7-8):

“Do not be deceived, God is not mocked; for whatever a man sows, that he will also reap. For he who sows to his flesh will of the flesh reap corruption, but he who sows to the Spirit will of the Spirit reap everlasting life.”

It’s a stern warning: Do not be deceived! Paul would only say that if there were legitimate reason to be concerned about deception. How are we living our lives? Do our actions reflect that we take this spiritual truth seriously? It’s a question I need to ask myself more often. For if I truly lived like this was absolute reality, I’d certainly live differently. And when we don’t live this way, we’re falling into the very deception that Paul warns against. And we’re (yikes!) mocking God—the pure opposite of living in the fear of the Lord. That is not where we want to be.

The Amplified paints a more complete picture of what this ugly, dismissive attitude look like to God:

Do not be deceived and deluded and misled; God will not allow Himself to be sneered at (scorned, disdained, or mocked by mere pretensions or professions, or by His precepts being set aside.)

We probably tell ourselves, “Lord, I would never scorn, disdain or mock you!” just as Peter told Jesus he would never betray Him. Yet, days, if not hours later, when we live as though we won’t reap what we sow, we’re doing it. God sees it as mockery.

When were stingy with our tithes and offerings and wonder why the budget never works out, we’re mocking God. When we consider God’s commandments to be trivial and wonder why things just don’t seem to be going our way, we’re mocking God. When we’re rare with complements and words of encouragement and wonder why people seldom notice or praise us, we’re mocking God. When we’re tight with tips at the restaurant or salon and wonder why people aren’t more generous with us, we’re mocking God. I could go on forever.

What it comes down to is this: Yes, God loves us all more than we can imagine. Yes, God is quick to show mercy and extend forgiveness. Yes, God works together all things for our good. But, yes, you will still reap what you sow. If you want the blessings of God to flow through your life like a mighty river, you have to commit to sowing into that stream of blessing with your thoughts, meditations, words and actions. God will not be mocked.

I’ve recently heard separate commentaries on two Biblical stories that have the common element of ships enduring violent storms: Rick Joyner referenced the story of Jonah in a recent word and Paul’s adventurous trip to Rome at the end of Acts was taught on by Lance Wallnau. In both teachings, the United States, battered by extreme circumstances, is prophetically represented by the ship and the church, full of truth and destiny, is represented by God’s messenger aboard.

Running from God into a Storm

In the story of Jonah, we see God’s chosen messenger board a ship in rebellion to God’s commission to cry out against Nineveh and its unrighteousness. As storms arise and the sailors fear for their lives, Jonah is managing to remain asleep. It’s the heathen sailors who must shake Jonah awake and demand he pray to his god, who happens to be the One True God. They had tried praying to their gods, but to no avail.

Jonah was aware of the solution to their predicament all along. But he was so apathetic about his life and so rebellious in his ways that it took the sailors drawing straws and demanding an answer from him before he would cough it up. Sheer terror came upon them when they realized that all they were enduring was because Jonah was rebelling.

Yet, even at that revelation, the sailors “rowed even harder to get the ship to the land”. But it was in vain. The way out of the problem was beyond human apprehension. So they reluctantly cast God’s rebellious servant overboard and pleaded for mercy!

Running with God Through a Storm

In Luke’s account of Paul’s voyage to Rome as a prisoner, we see someone completely willing. In Acts 23:11, the Lord appeared before Paul and told him that He would be preaching the Gospel in Rome. From that point on, we see no signs of doubt within Paul that this promise will surely come to pass—even being absent the details. He simply walked out his faith with boldness and confidence.

This confidence in his God-appointed destiny is what carried him through the storms and shipwreck. When all hope seemed lost among the sailors—they hadn’t eaten in nearly two weeks—the prisoner Paul gathered them together and charged them to remain courageous, for an angel had visited him and promised he would testify before Caesar. And all the sailors would arrive safely in Rome with him, to boot!

A shipwreck on Malta and a healing revival later, God’s promise came to pass and Paul had passed through the storm that was meant to keep the truth of the Gospel from reaching Rome.

One Destiny; Two Paths

I wonder if we’re not nearing the times when America, as a vessel carrying a sleepy, backslidden church, is about to be brought to the point of shipwreck. I wonder if the world will shake us from our slumber and demand we call upon God for salvation and deliverance. I wonder if we’ll repent from our rebellion or apathetically allow ourselves to be cast overboard, good as dead.

How much better would it be for the American church to willingly embrace her destiny to be a faithful witness of the Kingdom of God to the world? We could stand unshakably upon our promises, triumphantly weather any storm, and deliver His Word to the ends for the earth. And we’d save the crew and an island while we were at it!

As is often (if not always) the case with God, things can get done the easy way or the hard way—the choice is ours. Things started out easy in the Garden of Eden. God planted; Adam and Even tended and harvested. As Adam and Eve filled the earth and subdued it under the leadership of God, His Kingdom would incrementally expand to fill all of earth. Then came the Fall and suddenly things got hard. Childbirth got painful, relationships developed strife and crops became crowded by thorns and thistles. The Kingdom of God would have to be established amidst a ruling enemy and the Curse.

In God’s wisdom, he works all things together for our good, but there’s often an easier way. In Jonah’s case, the good that came from him setting sail on the high seas in rebellion is that the sailors encountered the Living God and vowed to serve Him. Praise the Lord! Situation redeemed. But God’s best was for Jonah to obey and deliver the word to Nineveh in reverence and with gladness. God could save the sailors another way.

The point being, the American church can be Paul or Jonah—a rebellious prophet or a willing apostle. We can run from our destiny, slumber through crisis and begrudgingly fulfill our purpose through a near-death experience and bizarre, supernatural intervention. Or we can embrace our destiny, see our country through our storms with prophetic revelation and insight, heal the nations of the earth, and walk in divine favor, power and blessing.

Either way, the job will get done. Que sera sera. But one is pleasing to God, though, and is loaded with reward and blessing—in this life and in the next. The other isn’t pleasing and leaves the rebellious servant bitter, angry and resentful.

We’re going through a storm regardless. Which would we rather be?

But it was the Lord’s good plan to crush him
and cause him grief.
Yet when his life is made an offering for sin,
he will have many descendants.
He will enjoy a long life,
and the Lord’s good plan will prosper in his hands.
When he sees all that is accomplished by his anguish,
he will be satisfied.
And because of his experience,
my righteous servant will make it possible
for many to be counted righteous,
for he will bear all their sins.
I will give him the honors of a victorious soldier,
because he exposed himself to death.
He was counted among the rebels.
He bore the sins of many and interceded for rebels.

— Isaiah 53:10-12

I sometimes forget that this thing is a done deal. Complete. Over. Not a matter of outcome, but only a matter of time. Christ has seen all that has been accomplished by His anguish and He is satisfied. It isn’t lacking in any way. Not a thread of regret over missed opportunities exists in Jesus’ mind, for “It is finished.”

And because of that, in the words of Pastor Garner, “We fight from victory, not for victory.” Sure, there’s an enormous amount of work to be done and there are still many battles to fight. But this story’s final chapter has already been written and shipped to the publisher. No edits, appendices or epilogues are being accepted.

147 years ago to this day, the Battle of Gettysburg broke out in Gettysburg, Penn. Many historians consider it the turning point of the Civil War. Leading up to July, the South was on a roll and marching north, hoping to take the war into enemy territory. When the Union and Confederate forces collided in Gettysburg July 1-3, 1863, the Union would turn the tide of the war and send the Rebels back to Virginia no longer feeling invincible under General Lee.

A similar battle was won for us on Calvary some 2,000 years ago with an even more decisive victory. Our enemy was not just pushed back feeling vulnerable and unsure of victory, but Jesus “disarmed principalities and powers, [and] made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them in it” (Col. 2:15). He then rose again and “ascended on high, leading a host of captives in [His] train and receiving gifts among men, even among the rebellious, that the LORD God may dwell there” (Psalm 68:18).

Probably the most effective strategy the enemy engages against me is to take my eyes off these truths laid out above: that because of the work of Jesus, everything has changed. We’ve won. And Satan’s head has been crushed.

An Age for the Ages

The age in which we’re living is the one foreseen by the prophets of old and is even a wonder to the angels themselves. This isn’t just “church”. This isn’t some religion.  This isn’t a feel-good, bedtime story. This is the very mystery of God that was sealed up for ages and has been released in our time to be made known to not just man, but to even rulers and authorities in heavenly places (Eph. 3:7-10).

Peter tells us (1 Peter 1:10-12):

Concerning this salvation, the prophets who prophesied about the grace that was to be yours searched and inquired carefully, inquiring what person or time the Spirit of Christ in them was indicating when he predicted the sufferings of Christ and the subsequent glories. It was revealed to them that they were serving not themselves but you, in the things that have now been announced to you through those who preached the good news to you by the Holy Spirit sent from heaven, things into which angels long to look.

Isaiah, one of the most gifted prophets ever, with the most revelatory insight into the Messiah, gazed upon those wonders for YOU and I. And those heroes of the Hall of Faith, who “were stoned… sawn in two… killed with the sword… of whom the world was not worthy” (Heb. 11:37-38)? Though they are “commended through their faith, did not receive what was promised, since God had provided something better for us, that apart from us they should not be made perfect” (Heb. 11:39-40).

WE ARE PART OF SOMETHING HUGE… THE GREATEST STORY OF ALL TIME! There are literally millions of saints, Jews and Gentiles alike, who are tuning in to our very lives on a day-to-day basis to see this thing brought to a close. Able. Enoch. Noah. Abraham. Isaac. Jacob. Joseph. Moses. Joshua. Samuel. David. Daniel. Isaiah. Jeremiah. Esther. John. Paul. Peter. All of them. The inheritance for which they all labored was purchased by Jesus and is being secured by us. We’re part of it. We have roles to play. Their faith is in a sense incomplete until it bears the fruit of the Bride of Christ.

That’s why the author of Hebrews follows up chapter 11 by saying: “Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith.” They’re banking on us to seal the victory and bring home the trophy. It’s a relay race and we’ve been handed the baton with the lead for the final leg of the race. We can’t get tripped up!

All of the created order—heaven and earth, angels and demons, animals and plants, ocean and desert—it all has a reverence and awe for mankind. While we rightly have our own reverence and awe for creation and its power, wonder and beauty, it’s actually designed to be the other way around. Creation is eagerly longing and groaning for us to fully realize who we are and secure our inheritance—creation itself! For when we do fill the earth and subdue it as God intended from the beginning, creation “will be set free form its bondage to corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God” (Romans 8:21).

What does that even mean? Mankind is wasteful, greedy and destructive, right? What freedom can we actually offer creation? And what glory do we have that this world desires?

Those questions aren’t going to be addressed in this post, but they’re important to consider. For millennium, people have pondered the question, “What is the meaning of life?” And this is part of the answer. We were ultimately made to glorify God. And we glorify God as we fulfill the original intent for our existence, seen in God’s first directive to Adam and Eve: “Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and over every living creature that moves on the ground” Gen. 1:28). Our purpose is to co-labor with Christ as God’s adopted sons and daughters, ruling the Earth as God rules creation.

His kingdom come, His will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.