Programme: Believers’ Convention Prayer Meeting (Week 3_Day 4)
Date: Saturday, 27th July 2024
Transcript Summary
1. God has been speaking in very unique ways about building and has now moved to other aspects, all of which still relate to building. These other aspects are foods that are still relevant to our building. In the midst of all of that, it is still one thing that is taking different shades in bringing forth God's mind to us as a people.
2. In this light, we see how much God loves His people, and how much He is jealous over His people, using the Shepherd to typify the connection between the Shepherd and the sheep. This connection is invariably tied to food — provisions that beget a unique connection that is rooted in His voice because the voice of a stranger they will not follow (John 10:5). Feeding is instrumental to the sheep growing into a capacity to identify and relate very closely (have a connection) with the Shepherd.
3. There is usually a limitation for a sheep who has an opportunity to find pasture and find that connection. It is the heritage of the sheep to know the voice of the Shepherd. All through the scriptures, we see there is always a desire for God to connect with His people. In so many ways and places, God was always trying to connect. The Jewish nation were people that God favored, loved and blessed, but they did not understand the uniqueness of that love and did not use that uniqueness to transit into God's provisions (Rom 3:2).
4. Deuteronomy 4:7-8 God had committed the oracles of God to them. The oracles of God were largely the privilege to have access to God's statutes, voice, nature and thoughts. But at some point, they decided that God should speak to Moses alone because of the terror of God's face. Beyond that point, they also wanted their own king who would lead them to become like the nations of the earth. So, they liked their uniqueness, but they were not ready to submit to the uniqueness that God has given them and the main instrument for shepherding them, which is the statutes and judgments of God over them as a nation.
5. Psalms 147:19-20 Specifically, Israel had access to the word of God. When Apostle Paul was saying that the oracles of God were committed to them, it was not that they were very committed to it in the very sense in which God expected it. But God had committed it to them by reason of provision, predestination, access and the way God had to deal with them. This is because He wanted them to be a prototype of a people that understand and relate to God as sheep to Shepherd, and in some form, typify what is to come in Christ Jesus. However, they did not really understand it.
6. God did not just give them rules to live by, He wanted them to connect with Him and with His word. God held the children of Israel in very close esteem and the purpose of it was that God wanted to nurture them into that place where they could fully realise all of God's promises for them. One of the very strong instruments for that was going to be His voice.
7. Romans 9:3-4 Here, Paul was trying to list out all the things that they had access to but had somehow not come into. We can have our own interpretation of who God is to us but we might never really be able to come into what God truly has in mind. So God had plans for them; He wanted to put His covenant in their hearts. He wanted to call them “My people” and He would be their God. He wanted to make them understand covenants and relate with Him in very specific ways. God wanted to make them appreciate that His laws were meant for their heart which was going to be the template for a covenant with them.
8. The instructions that God gave to the Israelites was defining a life in them. God can be giving us specific instructions which we are obeying and a time will come when the true sense of all of these instructions will begin to come together through God's word. If we find that God is instructing us against our will, it might look like He does not like anything good but this is because there is a frame in us that is contrary to God. As we grow and acquire God's sense, we will begin to acquire His sight and see what He truly wants us to see. If that sense is not there, it becomes burdensome to follow the instructions.
9. The essence of learning to be cultured and trained by the Shepherd's voice culminates in acquiring the sense and wisdom of the Shepherd. The wisdom of the Shepherd, which is also resident in the meal that He is giving, is His ways that are being given to the sheep. God has so much in store for us and that is why He wants to lead us. He wants to lead us away from ourselves so that we can be His people. The Jews did not get it right, if not, it would have been easier to transition into what God had in store for them in Christ Jesus.
10. There is a connection between the sheep and the Shepherd, and His voice; and if the leading of the Spirit does not bring us to the point where we have that connection, then we will not be able to see our exceedingly great and precious promises. We are called to partake of divine nature and that promise is not just things, it is firstly the Person. Christ, the Father and God are promises which God wants to give to us. So no matter what we have now or what God has given as an understanding to us, there is still more that God wants to give.
11. “For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, saith the Lord; I will put my laws into their mind, and write them in their hearts: and I will be to them a God, and they shall be to me a people…” (Hebrews 8:10) The covenant is to put the law in their minds and write in their hearts, to be their God and they, His people. So what God could not achieve in that generation, He wants to achieve in ours. By the privilege of Christ Jesus, it is not just limited to Israel in the flesh anymore because as many that put on Christ are Abraham’s seed. It is a privilege that God has covenanted with us in Christ Jesus. But as beautiful as this opportunity is, a people can still waste it.
12. The oracles of God are a spelling out of the ways of God that comes via the speakings of God and via the ability to relate to God's ways from His word and judgments; and via the ways He has dealt with us, chiefly through the provision of His word. The oracles are meant to be a pathway for that sheep-shepherd connection. The Shepherd does not just want to have a sense of ownership of sheep but it is through a walk that our heart is made a template for the writing of God's laws. The writing of God's laws is the movement towards the promise.
13. The greatest heritage that the Shepherd gives is the knowledge (Heb 8:11-13). The voice of the Shepherd is knowledge. Knowledge can be a heritage. In Christ Jesus, God has done so much to make us connect with Him. God wants us to know and relate with Him from the least to the greatest. Covenant is the writing of His laws in our hearts. What makes the covenant alive in us is when it is written in our minds and our hearts.
14. God was using the way they were responding and dealing with the physical land to culture them to understand that there is a way He deals with His people (Heb. 4:9). Anyone who truly walks with God and truly feeds from the pasture should connect to the higher provision or higher calling. The reason God leads one and speaks to one is to connect to the higher calling.
15. We ought to put some weights on seasons, opportunities, and provisions; the Jews had a provision but they wasted it, and till today they are still looking for it. God wanted to connect the Jewish nation to His Person, not just a physical land. They were not just to keep instructions, but to live the life and hold the Head. We must know how to move from what God instructs to the point where He can culture our hearts to hold Him. Instructions point to the Person. The more God instructs you, the more you ought to acquire the sense of that instruction.
16. “Because strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it.” (Matt 7:14). This is not separated from the dealing with the Shepherd. Jesus used a gate as a way to communicate access or opportunity. The straight and narrow way looks constricting but that is the provision and access route to the promise. We should come to a place where though we do not have many options, the only option we have is enough for us. Dealings makes one compatible with God's ways. It makes the things of God sit. When one goes through that process, one would know something has been worked inside one—a nature that is compatible with God’s ways.
17. The leading of the Spirit is to train our souls so that He can truly be the shepherd of our souls, and we would be in subjection to Him (Heb. 12:9). Being in subjection is being able to take the conditioning of our hearts, will, and mind so that it is easy to see through and our eyes can see what God is seeing as the end goal. If our eyes are not seeing it, it would be more difficult to see it as a promise. Every dealing of God is pointing us towards realizing that promise.
18. Rest is rooted in the ability to trust in God and have absolute conviction and peace in our hearts that as for God, His ways are perfect. It is when our souls get to a point where we are no longer wrestling with God or His ways. There is an ultimate rest for there remaineth a rest for God’s people but there is also a culturing of rest so that we can truly realize the promise. The culturing of rest will make one be at peace with God.
19. Rest is not being inactive. Rest means that you are deferring to God and you have learnt to take God’s understanding as a connection to God. That trust has become a strength in you to be able to relate and journey with God. You are using it as a basis to journey. Otherwise, rest can become a waiting on, standing on and hanging on but one is not making progress or responding to the order of the promise; this is because rest becomes relevant when we are stepping into the full provision of the promise. “I will be to them a God and they shall be to me sons and daughters…” —these are true promises and not just ideas God put on His words.
20. Many times, the difference between one season and another season is the state of heart. A season can be so robust but one is so absent in that season because his heart is not able to connect to it. God can be so unique in the way He is dealing with us that sometimes what we think will take so many years to happen will not. But because He has brought a season upon us and He finds a right heart posture, it takes a different turn; our natural minds will not even be able to qualify the process because grace becomes available to make it happen.
21. “Butter and honey shall he eat, that he may know to refuse the evil, and choose the good.” (Isaiah 7:15). These are provisions of God that define how God led Jacob. It was also said of Jesus also. These two things (butter and honey) come through our journey and it is in the journey that we acquire these things. The Israelites found that the land was blessed with milk and honey but it was after so many years that it was discovered.
22. The ‘people of God’ is not just a title; it is a training, a culturing, a nature. Knowing how to refuse the evil and choose the good is a hallmark of the people of God. It is not just to bear the mark or name; it is a strength and nature formation that will reject evil and hold good. Jesus Christ hated iniquity and loved righteousness (Heb. 1:9). As we are being fed and knowing God, and come to a place where we are truly the people of God, we will truly be like our Lord who loves righteousness and hates iniquity.
Blessings!