A WORD IN SEASON TO THE WEARY
🌷🌷🌷 August 13🌷🌷🌷
“…stand perfect and complete in all the will of God” (Col. 4:12).
At Jericho, Elisha is asked, “Knowest thou that the LORD will take away thy master from thy head today?” (2 Kings 2:5). The sons of the prophets there too wanted to bring doubts into the heart of Elisha. The enemy uses the words of all kinds of people to make us doubt God’s Word. Through listening to Sarah’s suggestion, Abraham doubted God’s promise, and then see how long he had to wait for the fulfilment of that promise. Today we find many servants of God have lost their faith because they believed in the words of their wives, relations or friends. They do not openly deny the Word of God, but in the secret of their hearts there is unbelief. Their wives make up all kinds of stories with tears in their eyes to get what they want. See how these young men tried to hinder Elisha at every step. So also the devil will try to prevent us from obeying the Lord whole-heartedly. We must be strong and pray with determination, “Lord, I have decided to follow Thee all the way. Please save me from being deceived in any way by relations, or friends or others”.
The next test came to Elisha at the river Jordan which speaks of death (2 Kings 2:6). He had to learn to die completely to himself. We too have to go on learning that lesson and pray again and again, “Lord, not my will, but Thine.” When we want our own way we say, “Lord hear my prayer and let me do my will”. Only after much conflict and defeat do we learn to yield to Him saying, “From now on Lord, I want only Thy will.” When we are willing to die to our thoughts, ideas, plans and desires, God can reveal His own plans and desires and make us His co-workers in the building of His House.
We need to be sure that our steps and our ways are ordered by the Lord, and also to learn how to ” walk in the Spirit”, be “led of the Spirit” and “live in the Spirit” (see Gal.5:16,18,25). When we walk, we go step by step, we do not jump. To walk in the Spirit means just that: taking one step after another as the Lord leads. If we want to walk in the Spirit, we must allow the power of the cross to bring all our thoughts, ideas and desires into death. We must die to ourselves as Paul also testifies in 1 Cor. 15:31, “I die daily”.
In 2 Kings 2:10 we read that if Elisha wanted to receive the double portion of Elijah’s spirit, he had to see Elijah at the time of his departure. So also we must keep our eyes upon the Lord Jesus Christ if we want the Holy Spirit to control and guide our lives, and we must not let anything else distract our attention. The world offers us many attractions, and because of these we turn from God and miss our way. We must learn how to look to the Lord Jesus Christ for everything. He is the author and finisher of our faith. As we look unto Him constantly for everything we can receive the double portion of His Holy Spirit and then our ministry will become effective and fruitful.
