Renewed Hope

Friday Musings  February 15, 2013

My heart is stirred as I sit here at my computer this afternoon.  These past few weeks as I become well aware of the changes that are taking place all around me, knowing most of them are completely out of my control, I keep being brought back to the Rest that is mine in Christ Jesus.   That Rest that the Israelites and all of us who operate in our own self power and knowledge cannot enter into. Scripture calls it The Land of Rest in places.  That is the "land of our inheritance." But it isn't a place or a thing. Rather it is Himself that we are drawn into by the Holy Spirit as we lay down our own desire to fulfil even God's will!

One of the phrases that was in the post I just sent out that really got me stirred was this:


Our spirit man can adjust to the Spirit realm as we consciously release our previous naturalized view of spiritual things. Entering the narrow gate into the wide world of kingdom living is not possible with intellectual thinking from our old world souls trained in doubt and unbelief of spiritual things. God abiding in His people by Christ Jesus in His yielded and willing people will renew and retrain our souls to follow the Spirit. (McGatlin)

And Couchey said:

He spoke, “Son, when you focus upon the evil works of the enemy and what he is doing you become vulnerable to the dark fog of fear and anger. If you allow the fear and anger to find a place in you, you will be compromised and your rest in Me will turn to warring. You cannot remain on this mountaintop while in that state of unrest.Moses allowed man’s fear and wrath to overtake him and its offense kept him from entering the Promised Land. Man’s wrath CANNOT accomplish My purposes. Do not be offended by the world and its wickedness, for if you do so you leave MY mountaintop. Keep trusting in Me and do not allow the offense of wickedness to take you captive.


I was in conversation with someone today and while I heard her heart cry to hear more of the Word, to learn more and more and more,  my heart was aching.  I remembered so well my days of "acquiring knowledge", accumulating it and filling up back pack after backpack which in the long run became a weight that I carried around.  Then learning what to use in what situation became a serious responsibility far beyond my fragile human being to carry. 

I love God's word and have to admit that I really would like to know much more of it as I get revelation of Jesus Christ. But in this hour, it is as if He is calling, "Come to Me, Rest in Me and I will quicken to you everything you have need of to your understanding."

I am so thankful for some of the great bible scholars and teachers we have today that preach the Word with an understanding of words that make so much more meaning to the scriptures than I have ever received from preaching in past years. It is as if the doors of revelation are opening so wide in this hour. BUT....if I hear these men with the desire for knowledge of the Lord and about the Lord instead of knowing Him, walking with Him, all that knowledge becomes a weight and burden that keeps me from the intimacy that He is calling His church/bride to in this hour.

My flesh man, my adamic desire to be in charge, to do it the "right way and avoid the wrong way" is very strong and I hear it in my own words and thinking and in the mouths and writings of others so frequently that I am so in need of His Spirit to speak loud to me above those passions and desires, that I might lay down that control over my life and yield to His Spirit's uprising.

Do I understand this?  No. I don't understand why when I responded to that inner direction to pray for my trainer Wednesday that He didn't manifest His healing power when there are so many so hungry to see His provision and all that is embodied in the name of Jesus!  Why didn't the grace that does not need the receiver's faith flow to my trainer?  I know God spoke and I know He is at work. Will I trust that even when I can't see any manifestation of His word in that woman's life?

I don't have all understanding but I know this.  My life is in Christ.  What He does or doesn't choose to do when I call upon His name and put my faith and trust in Him is beyond my control and I can rest in His arms even when I don't understand.  I can't see what HE did or He is doing. But I trust His Word, for JESUS is The Word and my life is IN him.

I found myself waking in the night a couple nights ago thanking Him for his healing power and healing in my husband's body and mine and several others.  That is something new for me to know His uprising in me in that way and the peace and joy that HE is when He is at work in and through me and I cooperate through praise and thanksgiving is beyond understanding even as the Word says.

Yet as I read articles like I posted today, there is a fleshly desire to "run to and fro."  Maybe I need more impartation from those who are gifted in the Spirit.  Maybe I need to do this or that, more bible study as my friend said, more church attendance, more freedom from past hurts and pains, before He can do in me what He has promised. Yet we know faith is NOW...in the present and unto each of us is given the measure of His faith that is needed to trust in Him in the now!!  To accomplish the issues of today, the household duties, the yard work, the calls to family, and all those "little things" that our daily lives involve which we are called to do out of His Rest, operating with our words out of His Peace, our being Oned with Him....whole and holy....in Him moving forth in all we do out of that wholeness which describes Peace...there is no deviation or division in Peace. It is whole, holy, one.  Oh to walk in this with my husband, my children, the people at work, at the grocery store...to Know Him not only in Me but as He is in the world around me, as He is working in other lives.....and I will know it only by "faith."

Father call us, draw us to yourselves that we might know you more, be more conformed to the image of Christ that you have predestined for us to be filled up with and relate to this sick and dying world with.  Father, shape and mold us as fits your holy purpose and plan for the days which lie ahead.  Father,  may we be found "enduring in You" to the end, lest we fall away and separate from The Vine and be cast into the fire and burned.  Lift us up Father even where we don't know that we are cast down tempted to put our roots into the ground/earth rather than live among the branches of the vine, drawing and drinking from HIm.  Thank you for the pruning you do that more and more of you might be released in and through our daily lives. May the words of our mouth and the meditation of our hearts be found to be Oned in You...and therefore acceptable to you and "righteous."

Meri Ford

renewedhope@peoplepc.com