Acknowledge Yahweh (10/10/11)

Shalom,

Please begin by reading Hosea 6:1-3.

John Wesley wrote the following to his sister Hetty: "I am glad to hear you prosper in your soul; rest in nothing you have attained; but press on till you are filled with the fullness of God."

Hosea spoke the same kind of words to Israel. "Let us press on to acknowledge Yahweh." Press on means to follow, to run after, to be zealous in chasing. The Father, Son, and Holy Spirit should be the heart, the very core of our faith and worship. The rituals and religious activities we involve ourselves in aren't supposed to be the main point. In fact they're positively dangerous unless they bring us to a closer relationship with our Lord and Master. When we make our religion more important than the one who's supposed to be the focus of our devotion, we need a wake up call just like Israel did.

Some Christians are hurting themselves because they're not pressing on to know their Lord more intimately. Without this focused effort on our part we can't be instruments of righteousness in the hands of our Creator. Some have a distorted understanding of what exactly intimacy with our God actually is. Some are only flirting with their Father. They talk about how much they love him, what they're doing for him, but they never go all the way. They play games with Yahweh instead of getting serious about their relationship with him. Intimacy requires a full surrender to the one you're being intimate with. If you're holding anything back, you're not truly being intimate.

Some even go so far as to have a live-in trial with God. Just like too many humans think they have to test out their future marriage partner before making a full commitment to them, some have the mistaken belief that they can do the same kind of silly test with the Lord of Glory. So they get partially involved with Yahweh, even sharing a bit of intimacy. But in the back of their minds is a veiled threat, "If you hurt me (or any of your church people do), I'm out of here." If anything connected with God and his Church breaks their heart by not meeting their every whim or expectation, they're ready to walk away. Yahweh doesn't do prenuptial agreements, he's in the business of receiving us into his family as a gift. We're not equal partners with him.

Hosea's inspired words tell us Yahweh is concerned with our knowledge of him. We should easily recognize his voice, knowing it well because we've spent a lot of time with him. And because we've spent a lot of time with him we can also understand what our Lord's saying to us. Hosea is warning the Israelites to stop trying to use Yahweh for their own benefit and to apply themselves to truly knowing him. We should certainly heed this warning ourselves in this time of enhanced self-gratification.

The secret to solving the problems of life is to know the Creator and his ways. As Paul was nearing the end of his life, he wrote these ambitious words: "I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death" (Phil 3:10). Do you have this kind of desire to know your Lord and Savior? It's the only way to avoid the kind of pain and injuries Hosea mentions. His admonition to Israel was "Come, let us return to Yahweh. He has torn us to pieces but he will heal us; he has injured us but he will bind up our wounds." Sometimes our loving Father has to allow our sin to be painful to get our attention. Sometimes he sends chastising because we certainly deserve it.

Paul stressed that we're running a race. The goal of runners is to win. The goal of the Christian should be to work at completing our knowledge of Jesus and the perfection of our salvation. Christians shouldn't be discouraged by past failures, and also not overly proud of past achievements either. We must look forward and press on to the prize of eternal life in Christ. No past failure can stop us if we repent and return to our Lord. No ego trip will help us draw closer to him. Find the balance point that helps you draw closer than you ever have to your loving Master.

The ultimate goal of any believer should be to know the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit better. When we know him, truly know him like we're encouraged to in Jer 9:23-24, then we're enabled to live a new life by the "power of the resurrection." That we know him means that we progressively become more deeply and intimately acquainted with our Lord, clearly recognizing who he is and what he's done for us.

One of our major problems today is that we're practicing bad discipleship. We're not training new Christians into the basics of faith. We're spending too much time training them to fit into our church. We're not providing them the means to live a victorious Christian life. We're indoctrinating them into our particular brand of doctrinal belief. Consequently, they stumble and inevitably backslide. If they aren't instructed well, they'll probably just end up as nominal church members.

If our instruction of new converts is defective, they'll only press on as far as their first emotions of conversion take them. As soon as they reach the end of their emotional strength, they'll come to a stop. What's bad about this is that at this point many will begin to decline and backslide. If our instruction of new converts is that weak, what does that say about our "more mature" members? Are they solidly grounded in the teachings of their heavenly Master, or the less than perfect example we set for them?

What we need to be teaching people is that faith isn't dependent on impulses or excitement or emotion, but that the important thing is going steadily onward to the goal of intimately knowing Jesus. Every new convert needs to know that moving forward in their personal faith journey is vital to their spiritual health. We must all press on and advance to maintain good spiritual health, that's what our Designer declares. Remember Hosea spoke of our Lord healing his people and binding up their wounds. Our Father will help us deal with the hurts and wounds we've received in the world and the Church.

We can't be like Israel, thinking that we're privileged in some special way because we're "God's People." They took things for granted because of this attitude. They didn't work at their relationship with their Father. Jer 8:11 says, "The priests and kings dress the wound of my people as though it were not serious. Peace, peace, they say, when there is no peace." The picture is that their spiritual and political leaders were taking someone with a broken leg or a cut in need of stitches and only putting a band-aid on it. We must allow Yahweh to deal with the root causes of our wounds so they can be completely healed.

Israel had turned to idols, committing spiritual adultery. Yahweh will only accept an exclusive relationship with any one of us. There are no love triangles allowed. We can't split our time with him and our family, or him and our job, or him and anything else. What do we have that's more important to us than our relationship with our heavenly Father? If that relationship is right, everything else will fall into place. He wants us to take good care of our families. He wants us to be good workers. He wants us to be good citizens. He'll make sure that we're taking good care of everything if we obey him (Matt 6:33).

Yahweh knows that life on this earth is tough. He doesn't need to watch the evening news to parade a river of sorrows before him night after night. He's fully aware of our conflict. Yes, the conflict is very real and often very bitter. Many people use the escape of drugs or alcohol to attempt to numb the pain. Others use the mind-numbing capacity of TV, movies, and the Internet. Some use the pursuit of sex, money or power to avoid the pain.

Many ask, "Who wants to live forever?" They say only a fool would want the pain and suffering to continue forever. For many people the possibility of living forever is anything but good news. Instead, it's a frightening consideration, something to be feared rather than welcomed. No wonder many people will have nothing to do with the Church if we can't explain the truth to them to help them overcome their fear.

But the Word of the Lord God Almighty says: LET US PRESS ON. It gets much better is we listen and obey our Creator's plan. The resurrection of Jesus means that death isn't an end, but a beginning. It means that through the obedience of the Suffering Servant we can have eternal life. And eternal life means much more than just living forever. It also offers us the opportunity of victorious living right here and right now. It says to us that pain and suffering are only temporary.

This is what people are looking for, the power to overcome the trials and pain and suffering of this life. Through the power of the resurrection we're offered a new kind of life, a new quality of life. We secure this life by knowing the love of the Father, Son, and Spirit found in the resurrection. We can know Jesus personally in the forgiveness of our sins and the abiding presence of the Holy Spirit after we've received him as Savior.

Do you appreciate all that Yahweh has done for you? Do you cherish his presence in your life? We must press on to know him better and better. Any lack is due to our personal failure to draw as close as we can to him. We must strive to learn all we can, obediently following our Lord wherever he leads us. Yahweh wants us to know Jesus intimately and to receive his power to live a better quality of life. He wants us to let the Holy Spirit guide us. He's there to help us if we'll trust him to lift us above the nasty and less-than-likeable circumstances of life.

Henry Ward Beecher said: "The difference between perseverance and obstinacy is, that one often comes from a strong will and the other from a strong won't." Which category can you place yourself in concerning your knowledge of your Father in heaven? Are you willfully persevering or obstinately being willful?

Yahweh's call to us is dependent on our response. If we want the power and ability he freely offers to his children, we must attempt to know him better and better. Here and now he wants all Christians to press in and press on. For the new convert, he calls the mature Christians to encourage and teach them so they won't fall away after the surge of energy that accompanies salvation fades. For the one who's been a Christian for some time, do the new things the Spirit leads you to. They're necessary for our faith to stay fresh and vital and lively.

Our Lord will surely respond favorably to our loyal efforts at getting to know him. The rains Hosea mentioned in verse 3 were vital to Israel's agricultural prosperity, and the regularity of the rains was taken as a sign of Yahweh's favor on them. We need some spiritual rain to soften the gorund so the Gospel seed will more readily take in the hearts of the lost.

Press on and show some zeal for the things of our Lord. Can you imagine how pleased our Father will be if we zealously chase after him? Wouldn't you like to be well-received in heaven because you worked at getting to know your Lord better and better? I know I want to be revived and restored and living in his presence.

Blessings & Peace, Mike