Letters for Edification III

April '12

I like that in the email you just sent, the content was more about your heart and honesty than about the thing, because in God the thing is not the thing. All we go through and all we do is the father putting a thing before us to show us ourselves: where we stand, what we desire, what we judge, what our faith weathers and where it withers. This is about about fathering. Many teachers you have but few fathers, so where do we get our identity?

Rev 2:17 He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. To him who overcomes, I will give some of the hidden manna. I will also give him a white stone with a new name written on it, known only to him who receives it.

We are a generation of bastards, raised by mothers who've done their best, but were not designed by God to form men. Christianity today is about mothering - birthing babes in the faith that are left to die because nobody is willing to raise them the way a father is supposed to give his life for his children. It's not to blame anyone - this is everyone's fault and everyone's problem.

But not really.

satan has been successful, but the seeds of his own destruction are in his very machinations. God's won. His children have it at their disposal to become again what it is they're meant to be through the search for fathering.
Mothering happens.
In the beginning, you are born and can't do much yourself. Mom tells you it's okay and gives you milk (the word) that satisfies you and is easy to digest. As you toddle, you are taught little life lessons. As a teenager, you make stupid mistakes and suffer for them when you assert your know-it-allness and your independence, but you're free to make those choices. At some point, your body must move from milk to meat. Meat is tougher because you have to work for what you get. Even if it's set before you, you've got to cut at it and chew it up and the body takes a long time in its digestion. The word becomes a harder and more concrete truth, something more real and satisfying. If you still desire milk, you might resent the toughness of the word. But God has said you are strong, and if mom's been reflecting Dad as you've been raised up, you'll know that truth and it'll be part of you, so you can stand in the face of conviction when YOUR strength and YOUR pride of life are called into question. God's said you're righteous: what have you to be proud of? The point is that at some point my parents stop smothering me with care and affection and the onus is placed on me to seek them out. To PURSUE the heart of my father, my dad, my spiritual father, my elder, the one who HAS WHAT I NEED, and the one who loves GOD enough to be straight with me. To tell me the word with the spirit on it so I might go free from what has been entrenched in emotion and mindgames and social obligation to what is Liberty and Life; that which propels me into a walk that is upright and the world judges as freakish and outside the norm. We are peculiar people for a reason! But mainstream christianity is mixed and muddled and soft and outspoken and either full of hippie-love for everyone or judgement on all people and there is no balance and no real life.
There are few fathers in the homes, and there are no fathers in the churches. Every struggle I have has to do with my idea of being a man. Taking care of my finances, considering the girl or not considering her, eating well or taking care of my body, saving for a house, getting a real career so I can support a family, considering myself [anything] rather than a child of God. These things are all ideas I've picked up somewhere, heard with my ears, that have found a place in me to take root. And I let them and held them. I didn't know it at the time, but these roots have gotten deep, and now when I am confronted with these mindsets (all works, mind you - the things that God doesn't accept? the ones that don't get you into heaven? because righteousness doesn't come from the law but by faith?) I falter, because my foundation is being torn up by their uprooting. I have let these things become my peace: I will be happy and a real winner in God when I am good with my hands and can make a matching set of furniture. This sets my satisfaction and identity in my deeds and in the future when really God is with me here (loves me as I stand or sit or fall or shake) and now (because he dwells outside of time:backward and forward, yes, but we can't yet conceive of this so being Present is all there is).
Fathers are meant to teach us these things, and as we grow in prowess, trust, faith, the gifts, the word, the truth, the child-like faithfulness required to perceive God, then we can begin to pursue Fathers. It is the glory of God to hide a thing, but the honour of kings to search it out.
The most spiritual man I know is facing God. He has no pride, is ugly as sin  and will give me every moment of the day that doesn't impede with his caring for his family. He is ALWAYS communing with God, so he is ALWAYS facing forward, and I must ALWAYS go to HIM to get whatever he's chewing on. He's growing, but I won't get any of that if I don't go to him. Whoever is with him benefits from his gleaning, but they must glean from his reaping! They must humble themselves and recognize what they already know: that this man has something I do not yet have and I want it so much! He is my father. Any man older than me, any spiritually guided man to whom I must humble myself and call Lord (all authority is of God, and if my faith is in God then HOW could a man wrong me?), any man who doesn't look like I think a holy man should is a challenge to my faith (the unwritten law that says a holy man has good stature and nice words and tithes consistently and doesn't swear), and God speaks through asses...Do we listen? (Donkeys btw represent humility. Go figure.) To be fathered by the Father is they cry of our hearts, and we have been told we were abandoned, which is why Jesus, a man, loving us so much, speaks so greatly. Real love is strong - affectionate, but more than that: True. It lasts and once we have heard the Truth we are without excuse. Grace is to change, and the word is written on our hearts. How are we not free?
Freedom is a lot closer than we think. It lies in understanding sovereignty, knowing where to find what you need, humbling yourself in order to get it, and letting go of whatever you have held in order to receive it.
This is what your story's about. It's about the Real. About the State of things. About socialism that says I'll work and your lazy ass will benefit, because a mother will dote on a child she thinks deserves the world. It's about the strength of the arms of a dad when our mess-ups consume us and he still says 'well done, son'. It's about my not being approved by my works because I'm loved in spite of my failings and to spite my successes. If I sat here and watched tv for the rest of my life I'm still loved. It doesn't matter what I do - God's love for me is all-consuming. It literally is me. My breath is his realization. I am in His image. Masculinity? A man is one who seeks hard after fathering. It has nothing to do with how much he can lift, who he can provide for, what he looks like, how he sounds: All these things come from his faith (either in the father (where all are perfected), or in those things being the mark of a man). I am that I am. I am no less a man because I fell for video games for years and thought satisfaction would come by that. I am no less a man because I lied to my dad at age three. I am no less a man because I proposed to a girl because I thought it was what I should do. Being a man in God isn't an issue. Taking on who he is is what it's all about. But I'm free, so if I never do take on who he is, it doesn't matter. I'm still loved and still can't win satisfaction by my deeds.
So be what you are, Elijah, Hans, free from the bondages you held to. Be liberated in heart, by spirit, unto the Father, the one who loves you beyond reason and beyond comprehending. You are a gift and gifted, not to glory in, but to give glory to the one who is the beginning and end. This is what you're story's about: about finding an identity, not in choices or action, but in who the father is - even the physical one, despite his shortcomings, because all are flesh and have the flesh to contend with (EVEN THOUGH WE DON'T CONTEND WITH FLESH AND BLOOD), yet it's a veil we've been given to believe has been undone. The veil of the flesh is the hardest to get through because it's the man before me I can decide is low and dirty, the one I can say in my heart does not come in the name of the lord, and so I remain hard-hearted and the same. But we grow from glory to glory, line upon line, precept upon precept, and God's faith does not waver.


_____

April '12


I am elated to get this. I saw that it was a chunk mail and not just a line or title and went 'holy crap', because that sort of staying power in writing means there's something legit inside.
Congrats on the baptism. It's incomparable to be submerged into a new way of life. It's not just about the washing: your old man is left there, in the water, and a new one rises up. You no longer need relate to things in the old way, how you always have, but you are free. Free to breathe. Free to receive grace to walk a new way. Grace is to change. I like you man, and whether I judged, judge, or will judge you, matters nothing to Your walk. Our walks are individual. It's me and God: when I feel judged, that's NOTHING to do with the other person - the judgement's already inside me. God doesn't demand you do anything, so neither can I hold you to some 'do this/don't do that" standard. God's about freedom and walking free. Obligation isn't freedom, performance isn't freedom, lies aren't freedom, murder isn't freedom, lust isn't freedom. Only grace is freedom. We MUST get our eyes off the earth to perceive that Grace covers our actions and inactions, but that our walk isn't even about our actions. Actions stem from the heart: if you do things to be a good person or to get man's approval (I do this constantly), your actions show you where your faith lies because if your actions aren't good enough your satisfaction and peace is stolen. If you do things because it's in your heart to do them (you'll know when you do something because you 'should' (obligation) and when it's simply in you to do), then you are free, because the lord impressed something on you and you were propelled into motion. I love you man, and my heart is very much for you. I am excited for this new walk and eyesight, this energy you've entered into. Another name for the holy spirit is 'energeo' (sp?) which translates to energy. Light is energy.
On Easter we saw a guy in Sydney lugging a cross on a wheel up the city street. It had something something 'Christ' written on it and I sort of laughed. What is this man's faith that he would go out with this giant attention-getter to... what? Save people? How's he gonna do that? We saw him about 20 minutes later further up the street. He was yelling at a guy 'You are a coward! You are a coward! You are a coward!" as the guy walked away from him. And then they had some more words, I suppose. We kept walking. It was remarkable. God's people are different because they are in him, moving to a sound the rest of the world doesn't care to hear. This man was told that he had to be a martyr for people, had to reach out to grab them from the grips of hell before Jesus returns on the clouds, and this is how he figured he could do it. But the great commission doesn't say 'go and witness', it says 'as you go, bear witness' which means 'you're going: bear witness to the light inside of you and others will see it.' If grace says all you are is safe, and sovereignty says that nobody (God included) can demand anything of you, how could Jesus say 'Go!' and make people go? People go by faith, and I can EASILY say that my coming to Australia was a move in Faith. And in my going I have born witness to the changes God has wrought in me:  the longevity of my faith, the staying power of my salvation, the way my peace remains in the face of adversity because GOD IS BACKING ME UP AND I KNOW IT. Minister to God WITHIN you, and you will see his works occur without you. You cannot save a damn person, but you can bear witness, learn to recognize the spirit moving in your heart, and a word of deliverance might come forth. If you shout down someone with 'you need Jesus!' or 'You're a coward!' that's okay, it's just not really in line with the word.
Let your mindsets concerning Who God is and How He operates come down, because He was never who I was raised to think He is. He doesn't look that way, he doesn't show up like that, he isn't far-off and his nearness doesn't feel the way it used to or 'should'.
Most people live with earthly wisdom, and give lip-service to God, because they haven't been schooled in the True God (the one with real and powerful Grace, the one who saves, the one who backs us up, and the one who visits us every freaking day but we don't see), because we have many teachers but few Fathers. We are a religion of bastards, brought into the fold by men who wish to see God's kingdom increase by numbers, and then left to fend for ourselves the minute we are born. So we raise ourselves with the words everyone else uses, taking on the judgements and values of everyone around us because if everyone's doing it it should be right. It's safe to say a buzz phrase in the christian world is that 'there's something wrong with Christianity today', so pastors dress young to reach kids, and try new music to get the congregation out of their comfort zones, and buy more lights to attract more people and it all becomes the next big attempt at reaching a God who hasn't changed since the beginning. Psychology isn't the answer, self-help isn't what it's cracked up to be, and marrying a good, christian woman won't save you the way you think it will.
To walk in Christ is to be radical, but not like you think. It's a departure from what you have been living into something that is alien. It effing hurts because it's separation from the identity you have spent 25 years forming. But everything is given back to you. You only Ever have anything to gain because God is working ceaselessly on your behalf. We have turned from our first love, but when you desire to recognize the Lord, do something more than go to church and put your hands up. Seek out those who have him. Spiritual elders who are at peace and those who have the spirit. You know them. They're REAL MEN because they have something, a sound, maybe, that other people don't. Seek the spirit AND truth, because to have one but not the other is a travesty and misses the mark. But nothing is in vain.
I have great hope (expectation) for you, because if you stay the course God will not disappoint you. It's NEVER a pass/fail thing, and God won't EVER reject you, because you are NEVER beyond his reach. You are loved, brother, even when you don't feel it. We simply learn to recognize love as He is, and then we will be like Him. The feeling does go away, because feelings are soulish (earthly) - it's what you do when they fade that shows you where you stand and what you're heart's become, where you can still increase, where you might grow, and if you can testify in Truth in the dry times, you will be the spirit-man you desire to be. If it's just when you're high that you can say 'I love life!', then you don't really love life.
Rockin'.