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“Live in me. Make your home in me just as I do in you. In the same way that a branch can't bear grapes by itself but only by being joined to the vine, you can't bear fruit unless you are joined with me. "I am the Vine, you are the branches. When you're joined with me and I with you, the relation intimate and organic, the harvest is sure to be abundant. Separated, you can't produce a thing. Anyone who separates from me is deadwood, gathered up and thrown on the bonfire. But if you make yourselves at home with me and my words are at home in you, you can be sure that whatever you ask will be listened to and acted upon. This is how my Father shows who he is—when you produce grapes, when you mature as my disciples.”
I will most likely touch upon additional thoughts that I started here yesterday with, “Closed and Open Doors,” as this continues to be an area that Father is wanting to open up to me in ever clearer ways.
Once again I quote from my friend Bill Landon’s book, “Life After Death.”
“As I stated in the introduction, the Bible is the one objective source of confirmation that I accept on matters of truth about life, God and spirituality. This position can only be applied successfully if the Scriptures are used correctly.”
Before I go any further here I want to emphasize a needed and necessary point.
Because of sin and the death affects that came into an entire race of people, which which was totally unnatural became the norm for us. Because of what Adam and Eve did in imbibing from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, it has become the fixed inclination (fulcrum) of our hearts to trust in ourselves, to lean unto our own understanding and in all our ways acknowledge we are the ones (gods) in control of life.
Sadly this inclination was not aborted in those who were re-birthed, if it was then why was Jesus forcefully stressing the following, “If you continue to abide within this relationship I have called you into, you will know the Truth and the truth will make-set you free.”
Our loving and compassionate heavenly Father is dealing in direct proportion, going to the depth of the habitual sin habit pattern inclination of us turning to ourselves verses being freed to turn to Him as our only Life.
The truth will set us free, but it is my experience that before the fruit of this becomes evident within our lives, the truth will make us very miserable!
A perfect word for that might be, “disillusioned!”
"Please remember that we human beings have the ability to choose to use any tool correctly or incorrectly. Contrary to what many believe, correct use of the Bible is not a massive intellectual exercise. Further, receiving instruction from the Bible does not require special instruction from a seminary or the blessing of any organization of men. We only need an understanding of a few relatively simple rules to be able to work with the Father in using His marvelous book. If we choose to ignore or violate these rules we will have to deal with the consequences of that decision and the Bible will be a snare to us instead of a guide.
The Bible is a wonderful writing but is, unfortunately, also an extremely dangerous one. For reasons completely known only to the Father, He had this book constructed in such a way as to make it completely usable only when we study it in surrender to His teaching through the Holy Spirit’s revelation. I understand at least one reason for doing this. This is a safeguard to prevent us from unraveling the mysteries of the spiritual out of our own intellectual efforts alone.
This prohibition is not a mean-spirited act on the Lord’s par. We are kept from successfully discovering spiritual truth on our own because the whole purpose of life in this world is to develop a personal living relationship with God. As such, it would be counterproductive and even harmful for the Father to allow the truth of reality to be accessible without some collaboration with Him. In God’s plan, our growth in intellectual understanding is only a secondary attribute in the larger area of developing our living relationship with the Father.”
Rich
I will most likely touch upon additional thoughts that I started here yesterday with, “Closed and Open Doors,” as this continues to be an area that Father is wanting to open up to me in ever clearer ways.
Once again I quote from my friend Bill Landon’s book, “Life After Death.”
“As I stated in the introduction, the Bible is the one objective source of confirmation that I accept on matters of truth about life, God and spirituality. This position can only be applied successfully if the Scriptures are used correctly.”
Before I go any further here I want to emphasize a needed and necessary point.
Because of sin and the death affects that came into an entire race of people, which which was totally unnatural became the norm for us. Because of what Adam and Eve did in imbibing from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, it has become the fixed inclination (fulcrum) of our hearts to trust in ourselves, to lean unto our own understanding and in all our ways acknowledge we are the ones (gods) in control of life.
Sadly this inclination was not aborted in those who were re-birthed, if it was then why was Jesus forcefully stressing the following, “If you continue to abide within this relationship I have called you into, you will know the Truth and the truth will make-set you free.”
Our loving and compassionate heavenly Father is dealing in direct proportion, going to the depth of the habitual sin habit pattern inclination of us turning to ourselves verses being freed to turn to Him as our only Life.
The truth will set us free, but it is my experience that before the fruit of this becomes evident within our lives, the truth will make us very miserable!
A perfect word for that might be, “disillusioned!”
"Please remember that we human beings have the ability to choose to use any tool correctly or incorrectly. Contrary to what many believe, correct use of the Bible is not a massive intellectual exercise. Further, receiving instruction from the Bible does not require special instruction from a seminary or the blessing of any organization of men. We only need an understanding of a few relatively simple rules to be able to work with the Father in using His marvelous book. If we choose to ignore or violate these rules we will have to deal with the consequences of that decision and the Bible will be a snare to us instead of a guide.
The Bible is a wonderful writing but is, unfortunately, also an extremely dangerous one. For reasons completely known only to the Father, He had this book constructed in such a way as to make it completely usable only when we study it in surrender to His teaching through the Holy Spirit’s revelation. I understand at least one reason for doing this. This is a safeguard to prevent us from unraveling the mysteries of the spiritual out of our own intellectual efforts alone.
This prohibition is not a mean-spirited act on the Lord’s par. We are kept from successfully discovering spiritual truth on our own because the whole purpose of life in this world is to develop a personal living relationship with God. As such, it would be counterproductive and even harmful for the Father to allow the truth of reality to be accessible without some collaboration with Him. In God’s plan, our growth in intellectual understanding is only a secondary attribute in the larger area of developing our living relationship with the Father.”
Rich
4 comments:
Rich, it took me over 2 decades before I finally learned this truth:
"In God’s plan, our growth in intellectual understanding is only a secondary attribute in the larger area of developing our living relationship with the Father.”
Better late than never, right?! :-)
Tracy
Tracy,
What a delight and pleasure to hear from you again.
Yes better late than never, but then it takes what it takes to bring us to respond to His out stretched heart and embarce.
The glorious One in us as us is wanting to so saturate us in the true knowledge of His love, that as Father continues to prove his love for us in his correction, inner adjustments, we will progressively move from being his child into a fully mature son-daughter!
Tracy,
Here is another quote from Bill that ties in with it taking two decades to learn what and Whom you are learning now.
“I will go as far as to say that the belief in our capacity for self-sufficiency is the foundation for all the failure and evil in the world. The basis of this assertion is the reality that the belief in self-sufficiency is closely wed to the desire for a life lived in independence from God.
This is the great failure of Satan and the cause of the fall of humanity: “You will not surely die,” the serpent said to the woman. “For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.” (Genesis 3:4-5) If we did not desire independence from God, we would have been content to let the knowledge of good and evil remain with the Father. It is for this reason that it is vitally important that we understand and learn from the various dispensations presented in the Bible.”
Also I want to say once again for any reading this that the greatest trick the prince of darkness has done is to transform himself into an angel of light, in fact he still remains the impetus to sin in our members.
This too is all part of His glorious and master plan, that without having the freedom to choose Him over self, is it really Freedom??
Great quote from Bill, thanks!
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