Isaiah 17:13 reads: “The nations shall rush like the rushing of many waters: but God shall rebuke them, and they shall flee far off, and shall be chased as the chaff of the mountains before the wind, and like a rolling thing before the whirlwind.” Here the nations are said to be making the noise of the sea, but God will rebuke them. We might ask ourselves some questions: what does it sound like in my church? Do we need more reverence, more quiet? Do we come here to hear the sound of our own voice or to hear God’s voice?
When God was about to speak the Ten Commandments, the people were instructed to prepare themselves to listen to His voice. When we pray, we really can’t tell Him anything. He knows all about us, even our thoughts. We can’t tell God anything He doesn’t already know, but He does want to hear us. He wants us to speak to Him, and He desires to hear us truly confess our sins. He wants us to pray for our leaders; He wants us to ask for angels to protect our children; and Jesus said specifically that we are to ask for the Holy Spirit. So, God does want to hear us; He says, “Call upon Me.” Yet there is a time to be quiet, to be still, to listen to His voice.
Today He speaks through men, and He would speak through them more if congregations would pray more for those who are speaking to them, instead of talking to their neighbour about whatever – or being distracted by others, or even by one’s own thoughts.
When Jesus was here, He was the living Word walking among men. And He wants to walk again in this world in us – in you and me. But before He walks in us, we need to come to quiet and rest in our souls so that we can listen to His quietest whispers. We won’t be able to hear Him if we are living in the citadel of self. Like Mary, we need to sit at the feet of Jesus and first learn from Him. We are told to “study to be quiet.” It isn’t natural for us, but it is possible to learn.
The book of Ephesians contains a very interesting pattern, or progression, which is seen in the Christian’s life: sit, walk, stand. Ephesians 1:20 says Christ is sitting at the right hand of God in heavenly places; and chapter 2:5 and 6 say we who were dead in sins God has raised up and made “to sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus.” We are “in the Beloved” by God’s act, and we need to recognize that, because what we are talking about here is what God has done for us! He has put us in Jesus Christ, and the next thing He wants to do is put Jesus Christ in us. If we are going to walk the walk with Christ in us, we first need to sit with or IN Him.
The second concept in the book of Ephesians is that we are to walk in Him. Or better said, our walk is to have Him in us. Ephesians 5:2 tells us this will make us a sweet-smelling savor, because we are to walk in love. But what is love? It is the character of God, and His law is the transcript of His love.
When you look at the Ten Commandments from the very beginning – and that is verse two of Exodus 20, not verse three where people usually start – you will notice an interesting thought: “I am the Lord thy God which brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage.” The first thing God said on Mount Sinai was: “I am your Saviour, I am your Redeemer,” therefore you shall have no other gods before Me! And God is love. This love is not what the world calls love. We are talking about a principle here. Love always tries to benefit the one whom it loves. No matter what the person does, we still want the best for him or her. Regardless of the other person’s dark deeds, fits, and foibles, true love will always seek to bless. But to do that we have to go on a walk. We need to walk out of the shadows of the valley of self and climb Mount Benevolence and stand in the full light of the Sun of Righteousness. There, like Peter, James, and John, we will see Jesus transfigured before us. We need to rise above our selfish, self-interested, self-centered lives and stand on the mountain with Jesus – above all that is below, all that is earthly.
On the top of that mountain, you cannot go any further unless you go down. And that is why the apostle Paul says that there we are to stand! God has called us and placed us in Jesus Christ. If we accept that act, He has something for us to do; but it is not for us, IN OURSELVES, to walk but to allow Him to walk in us. As we are in Christ in heavenly places, He must be in us here on earth. What is needed is not to will to serve God but to yield our will to His will in willing service, all the way to the top. And when we get to the top, the apostle Paul tells us in Ephesians 6:13-14 that we are to put on the whole armor of God and then to stand – stand!
Why are we to allow Jesus to walk in us? Because the day of test is coming very soon, and in that day we want to be able to stand. But to stand then we must walk NOW – up the mountain – and stand with Jesus on the top and rise above earthly things. We can only do that if we have first found true peace in our souls by sitting at the feet of Jesus.
That is the story of Mary. When we come to church, we are not to come to talk or even whisper to each other; we come prepared to listen to God speak. When we are tuned to hear Him, He will speak, and our souls will rejoice.
In Luke 10:38-39 we see Jesus in His favorite place in Bethany. There is something special about Lazarus’ two sisters. Martha was concerned about herself: “Lord, don’t You see that Mary is leaving all this entertaining to me, and it’s because of You that we are having to do all this.” So, what is it with Martha? She was doing it herself! “Lord, don’t you see what I’m doing?” She had not sat down at the feet of Jesus. She went on the walk that she thought God wanted her to go on, but she hadn’t yet sat at Jesus’ feet. It was she who was doing everything, NOT Christ in her doing it. “And Jesus answered and said unto her, Martha, Martha, thou art careful and troubled about many things: But one thing is needful: and Mary hath chosen that good part, which shall not be taken away from her.” Luke 10:41-42
If you go to a Bible dictionary or concordance and look for the word “problem,” you won’t find it. And if you take a computer and search all the definitions of all the words in the Bible, you will not find the word “problem.” It’s not there, because God has no problems. He has only solutions. And He wants each of us to be one of His solutions. How does He do that? By writing His law in our hearts – as we take that walk to the top of the mountain.
There is a Chinese proverb that says, “The man who comes home from a journey is not the same as the one who left on the journey.” So, God wanting to take you on a journey will enable you to stand on the top of the mountain in the full light of the sun – where there are no shadows.
When God first made the tablets of the Ten Commandments, He Himself provided the stones and did the writing. When Moses came down from the mountain and saw all the people making all kinds of noise, he threw down those first tablets and destroyed them. A little later, God instructed Moses to make a second set of tablets and bring them up to the mountain so God could write His law again, but this time on tablets that were provided by Moses.
We could say that the first tablets are a symbol of Adam. God made him perfect and wrote the law in his heart. But when man sinned, he became selfish. Now God needs to write His law again into the hearts of children born in the likeness of sinful Adam. He wants to write it in your heart; but He can do that only if you give Him your heart, your desires. Will you say, “Yes!” to God? Will you listen to Him? Will you come into His presence to hear His voice? This is not your voice, nor your neighbour’s, but His voice alone that we hear, so when we go out of the church, we will know what to say for Him. We will know how to walk the talk.
So what must we do? We must be like Mary. We need first to sit at Jesus’ feet and listen to Him carefully and quietly so we will be able to follow His instructions and He can walk in us.
In John 12:32, He says, “And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto Me.” We must lift up Jesus, not ourselves; we need to tell what He has done and what He is doing. His true followers will serve Him alone. In verse 26, He makes it clear that “if any man serve Me, let him follow Me; and where I am, there shall also My servant be: if any man serve Me, him will My Father honour.”
It doesn’t say, “Where I am, Jesus will be.” It says that where He is, His servants will be. Are we His servants? What does a faithful servant do? He listens for and to the voice of his Master! The servant desires to please Him and do His will.
In the Bible there are sixty-six books. Six is the number of man. Furthermore, the name of the last book is “The Revelation of Jesus Christ.” Putting those two concepts together, the remnant people, the last people, will be a revelation of Jesus Christ. Is that your goal and desire? How are we to accomplish that? We must sit at His feet like Mary and listen to His instructions. Then we must get up by faith, follow those instructions, and live them out in our lives as we go to the top of the mountain.
When we become His servants, He will take us to the top of the mountain to stand for Him in the full light of the sun so that we may give Him all glory and honour and power and wisdom and praise. Then we will be the greatest blessing to our families, to our children, to our unbelieving spouses, to our believing spouses, to our churches, to our communities, and to the world.
God only gives us one second at a time. The past is gone forever, and the future becomes the present. We can do nothing about the past except learn from it, and the future is not yet ours. So, it is now – in the present – that we are to listen to Him and glorify Him by following His instructions. Those who do that will be a revelation of Jesus Christ, their Redeemer, the One who brought them out, who delivered them, so He can live and walk in them and reveal Himself to the world. Will you let Him be in you and accomplish that through you? God bless you with that experience.
Larry Watts
USA