A Fire That Cannot Be Quenched June 2007
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Gilead is translated, "rocky or strong"--it could be aligned with fortress, like the old stronghold of Masada in Israel.
We have all seen the horrific footage of bombings, murders, other disasters, or the too-real madness of money-loving movie makers--scenes of slaughter, carnage, pools of blood with footprints leading away: the images of murder, of mayhem, of destruction.
I have spent a near-sleepless night praying for faces, some known, some unknown, with God telling me to be a watchman, that the thunder of hoofbeats approaches. He is telling me that He is the Avenger, that He will judge His people, that He will repay the shedding of innocent blood.
God is about to visit the Church again, but not as we have seen in our lifetime in this nation. This will be an unwanted visitation.
Our God is a Raging Flame, an Unquenchable Fire.
I have just returned from preaching in another place--I have not seen God move as He did there in many years. It so reminded me of the early days of the Charismatic Movement. I was heartsick for what used to be, longing for what will be, and scared of God for what is.
Before I stood in the pulpit, I had an overwhelming experience, one I have had before, but stronger. I was so afraid I would drop dead in the pulpit--this was a tangible, ominous Glory that weighed me down, that pressed upon me. I have had this experience before in the early days of ministry, and for a time in the late 80's and early 90's, but nothing as distinct and palpable. What I felt could be touched.
God was there.
Two distinct streams of thought came to me, one, the word "pandering" and the other, a passage of Scripture.
"Pandering" is defined aa pimping, procuring sexual favors for somebody. More broadly it means catering to the lower tastes and desires of others or exploiting their weaknesses. Another twist on this word states that pandering is indulging weaknesses: indulging somebody's weaknesses or questionable wishes and tastes.
A good sentence for this last shade is, "The parents were tired of pandering to their children's demands, rebellion, and poor choices."
I pondered this word, remembering my own days of vice and seduction, the "game" of the culture of sexual sin--the awfulness of the destruction that masquerades as momentary "love". Such indulgence scars the soul, and trashes the participants, both vampire and victim. It is the dance of death.
Sin is ironically amazing in that it is a young man's fancy and an old man's regret. What we do because we want to when we don't care, we will one day mourn intensely when we do. There is no winner's circle in darkness.
We play and then we pay. For Christians, what we sow in sin, we often reap in temptation.
While I mused, I thought of how weak, how soft and self-indulgent I had been in general. Our culture has a ravenous devotion to the God of self and image. Americans seem to have a venereal addiction to frivolity and the mirage of self-fufillment, becoming fretful and irate when the bow breaks.
I perused the imprint of such upon the Church, the revision of sin into a personal prerogative, the creation of a Jesus Who has few rights. So many have no foundation in basic Bible teaching, but have been moved by winds of doctrine. In much of what is taught the pulpit emanates a venial pestilence which degrades Jesus into the One Who is obligated to be Who we want Him to be and deludes listener to a false peace, or hollow, ambivalent frustration.
Some go from one church "fling" to another looking for the magic preacher with all the answers. Some preachers oblige the idolatry. Others seem bent on oxen serfdom to a spiritual feudal lord. Sort of like the philosophy of darkness in the night clubs of the 70's--if what's standing at the bar doesn't look good, just drink until it does. It seems far too easy to flirt with hell in the pursuit of heaven. I really see little in Scripture about me being having my best life on this side of Glory, just revealing the unseen Kingdom in my heart to those, who en masse don't want it.
So many who are "Spirit-filled" really want nothing to do with the Holy Spirit and His works. The big "move of God" now is for mainline denominations to have open-worship, casual dress, and persuasive preaching--the appearance of being Spirit-filled--but want none of and have none of the Gifts Of the Spirit in operation. I can't say I really blame folk as crazy as some of the Charismatic Churches have acted--at least they know what they're getting up front. I don't mean to be a provocateur, but this sort of knock-off marketeering is "at risk" polity, as the anti-Christ spirit is working big against the Anointing...
...I wondered how much of our churching and preaching is pandering in the eyes of God.
At the same time, I was thinking these things, I'm feeling the weight of God's Presence, afraid I was going to die.
Then I began to think about the bloody footprints I had seen all over the Body of Christ, the tracking of innocent blood. I know that I have walked in some of that blood, and shed some. I grieved for the religious virtue of the self-righteous destruction of others. It has been developed into a diabolical art form which rivals the Borgias in creative cruelty.
God take all the dead men's bones out of my white-washed sepulchre!
Sometimes you know Truth, about life in general, spiritual things, and yourself you'd rather live and die without knowing. The veiled pretense of murder, the bloodlust of the human sushi-bar: this is the carnivorous elistism that seems to have hardened and harnessed the hearts of many Christians.
I once watched what I perceived to be a grotesque parody, a special program of the cattle industry in equatorial South America. The gauchos were driving a herd across a lazy, peaceful looking river--they stopped at the banks knowing there were pirannah fish lurking under the deceptive calm. They selected a cow that didn't look like much compared to the others--then they drove it across the river unattended and stood back to watch the show. In a matter of five minutes, the thrashing animal was reduced to bones by the feeding frenzy until the fish were satisfied--the gauchos then drove the fatter, sleeker animals across the river in safety.
The weak was sacrificed for the strong--only problem is the "safe" cattle were later butchered.
Christians, the Sword we use on others is two-edged and cuts both ways. Self-serving and religio-poitical hatchet jobs produce self-inlficted wounds; the stones we throw become boomerangs: in the glass houses ALL we Christians live in, such ways are not much more than suicide by proxy.
Whenever the ends justify the means, whatever we preserve by sacrificing others always winds up in the slaughterhouse of the vanities.
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