If I said I was surprised at your news, David, I would not
be telling the truth. Job 22:29 declares -"When men are
cast down, then thou shalt say, There is lifting up..."
"There is lifting up." Oh! Thank God! For in the
times of trial and calamity, when men are cast down in their
spirits, when they are cast down in their affairs, when they
are sinking, desponding, and ready to despair; then the Word
of the Lord will come saying - "There is lifting up."
God will surely save the humble in heart and circumstances.
The funny thing about it is that we are often unaware of the
operation that suffering works "in" us. I have no
doubt whatsoever that healing is beginning.
Isa. 48:10 Behold, I have refined thee, but not with silver;
I have chosen thee in the furnace of affliction." Unbelievably
strange work this. Surely he would choose us when we're at
our "Sunday-go-to-meeting" best. Maybe he would
chose us in a time of high holiness and soteriological joy?
No! It is here in this sooty old furnace of human suffering
that He ordains and empowers us to serve Him.
I
love what Spurgeon wrote about Isa. 48:10. “It is no
mean thing to be chosen of God,” he wrote. “God’s
choice makes chosen men choice men....We are chosen, not in
the palace, but in the furnace. In the furnace, beauty is
marred, fashion is destroyed, strength is melted, glory is
consumed; yet here eternal love reveals its secrets, and declares
its choice.”
An
acquaintance of mine in North Carolina used to say, "God
doesn't trust everyone with suffering for not every saved
one can cope with its demands. He has to know the bent of
the heart before he can trust it with this most challenging
itinerary towards perfect obedience."
Worldly
saints and the ungodly do not like these "furnace elected"
saints. After all, they're not smooth in their speech and
the smell of the burning is still on them and they are regarded
in 1 Cor.4:13 “as the scum of the world, the dregs of
all things.”
So
with that in mind, knowing that sophistry was not the source
of Salvation, St. Paul cried out, "Who shall separate
us from the love of Christ? shall tribulation, or distress,
or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?....
Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through
him that loved us. For I am persuaded, that neither death,
nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor
things present, nor things to come, Nor height, nor depth,
nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from
the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord."
(Romans 8:35-39) Not one of these! Not one.
God
uses affliction to select us...but he also uses it to sustain
us, "Blessed be God, even the Father of our Lord Jesus
Christ, the Father of mercies, and the God of all comfort;
Who comforteth us in all our tribulation, that we may be able
to comfort them which are in any trouble, by the comfort wherewith
we ourselves are comforted of God." (2 Corinthians 1:3-4).
YOU
WILL BE BACK MINISTERING AGAIN DAVID BUT YOU MUST ALLOW YOURSELF
TO BE LED.
"Follow
Me," says our Saviour. He won't drive us like horses
are driven! "Follow Me"...He'll not run ahead and
leave you panting behind. The word "weary" means
"faint," "worn out," "1. Tired: fatigued.
2. Exhausted of tolerance or patience." It can also be
associated with sickness: "...the common accompaniment
of 'sickness"' is "weariness of mind...which not
infrequently hinders physical recovery..."
"He
that believes shall not make haste!" Oh we need to learn
NOT to run out and DO FOR GOD. We need to be healed. we need
to learn to labour and to wait. We have to become conscious
of the difference between a gentle Saviour's call and a camouflaged
Satanic guiltridden compulsion.
I
think I have learned, Beloved Ones, that Satan works to kill
us by making us feel that we are not doing enough for God.
He's have you and me running like a white mouse in a wheel!
Satan doesn't have a due season....Jesus does!
Wait
On the Lord for the Due Season
The
King James Version of Galatians 6:9 says, And let us not be
weary in well doing: for in due season we shall reap, if we
faint not.
The
Lord promises to bring the harvest, the answers we are waiting
for, in due season. Because we don't know exactly when due
season will be, many believers grow weary during the wait!
They think, "Did I miss my appointment?" The Bible
promises that God will never be late, but it doesn't tell
us that He usually is early either!
Many
times He is the God of the midnight hour. He is stretching
our faith and teaching us to believe Him for greater things.
Believing brings us right into the middle of God's rest. And
during the wait our strength is renewed if we wait in faith
instead of fear and frustration.
The
type of believing that brings us rest when we are waiting
for the Lord is this: "God, I believe You are smarter
than I am and that You have a better plan than I do! I believe
Your timing and Your ways are better than mine because Your
thoughts are above my thoughts " (Isaiah 55:9.)
We
must realize that God's timing is more accurate than ours
will ever be. This will free us to abandon ourselves to God
and say, "Lord, I would like to see the circumstances
happening this way, but that doesn't seem to be happening.
I'm not going to live my life in frustration from struggling
to try to do something about something I can't do anything
about or trying to make something happen that I'm obviously
not making happen.
"I
surrender. I give my idea, my timing, my wants and desires
to You. Do what You want to do, the way You want, when You
want. And I'm going to rest!"
"Fainthearted"
means "small-souled." Because the soul is often
defined as the mind, will and emotions, someone who is fainthearted
can't mentally handle very much of a problem or challenge
coming against them without caving in, wanting to quit and
giving up. It isn't very long before they become discouraged,
depressed and negative.
When
we wait on the Lord and He renews our strength, we become
the kind of people the devil can't wear out. We can outlast
the devil's attacks, standing against them until we receive
the manifestation of our victory in due season.
I
believe in the "Due season", Beloved. I'm convinced
of it's reality. I've had a few "Due seasons" and
so have you both! The nature of the ministry you have exercised
together tells me that. I reach across the Atlantic Ocean
by faith and I spiritually embrace you both. "Where two
or three are gathered...
From
ev'ry stormy wind that blows,
From ev'ry swelling tide of woes,
There is a calm, a sure retreat,
'Tis found beneath the mercy-seat.
There
is a place where Jesus sheds
The oil of gladness on our heads,
A place than all besides more sweet;
It is the blood-stained mercy-seat
There is a scene where spirits blend,
Where friend holds fellowship with friend;
Tho' sundered far, by faith they meet
Around one common mercy seat.
Here let us, together and totally
Leave all to God,
Forsaken
one, and stay thy tears;
For
the Highest knows thy pain,
Sees
thy sufferings and thy fears
Thou
shalt not wait His help in vain,
Leave
all to God.
Be still and trust!
For
His strokes are strokes of love,
Thou
must for thy profit bear;
He
thy filial fear would move,
Trust
thy Father's loving care,
Be
still and trust!
Know, God is near!
Though
thou think Him far away,
Though
His mercy long have slept,
He
will come and not delay,
When
His child enough hath wept,
For
God is near!
O teach Him not
When
and how to hear thy prayers;
Never
doth our God forget,
He
the cross who longest bears
Finds
his sorrows' bounds are set,
Then
teach Him not.
If thou love Him,
Walking
truly in His ways,
Then
no trouble, cross or death,
E'er
shall silence faith and praise;
All
things serve thee here beneath,
If
thou love God!
I'm expecting good to come to both of you! Aren't you?
The Lord bless you and keep you:
The Lord make his face to shine upon
you, and be gracious to you:
The Lord lift up his countenance upon
you, and give you peace.
Numbers 6:24-25
Forever!
+Aaron
He
maketh me to lie down
Thy
God hath ordained thy strength
