New Wineskins don't Feel Right at First
There are many reasons why change
will always be uncomfortable to human beings. Still, we are called to shift with
the Lord each and every time He calls for it. One opposition to change comes in
the form of age, or aging. Experience tells us that we must know what we are
doing and the fact that we have made it thus far is evidence of that fact.
Therefore, why change now? Another potential enemy to change is a perceived
threat to security. We can KNOW that a change is to be made, but still decide
against because what comes with it is a decreased sense of security- whether
emotional, social, financial, or physical.
This requires us to concede that fear may choke our motivation and
especially our Spiritual anointing for change. And along with fear comes control:
changing at the behest of the Lord absolutely requires that we release control
of our life to Him in that area.
Therefore, what would become new
in our life from God can very often bring more of a sense of discomfort than
that of blessing, especially at first. But we must move with the Lord anyhow.
Otherwise, we can never expect to please Him and fulfill the call on our lives.
And this means without change, we will never reach His destiny for us.
To the mind, will and emotions,
it is neither preferable nor sensible to change what is comfortable,
established and has proven trustworthy in the past. In the soul realm, the
apprehensions and anxieties that arise as we ponder the shift into newness can
contradict, confuse and even choke out what God is calling for. As a result,
many allow the logic of self to remain prevalent over the guidance of God. But
this is the act of a heart that prefers the flesh to the Spirit; this is the
evidence of a life committed to self.
At times, one can say to self: after
I get more comfortable with this, I'll move toward it,” or I have to wait until
I can get my head around this, or: let me first just get adjusted to it. But when it comes to change God is calling
for; as it pertains to the new season of God for your life that has been
postponed for too long already- your feelings, thoughts and desires must be
subjected to the One who is calling you onward with Him. If you wait until
things feel right, make sense to you, or you want them in a human way, nothing
God has for you will ever take place. This is because we must move with the
Lord when He calls, not when it works for us (Jn.6:44; 65).
The Root Issue of Refusing to Change is
Unbelief
Having described many objections
to Godly change, such as experience, security, fear and control, these are
carnal symptoms of a spiritual illness, or fruits of a root issue: unbelief.
Christ
was faithful as a Son over His house-whose house we are, if we hold fast our
confidence and the boast of our hope firm until the end. Therefore, just as the
Holy Spirit says, "Today if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as
when they provoked me, as in the day of trial in the wilderness, where your
fathers tried me by testing me, and saw my works for forty years. Therefore I
was angry with this generation, and said, they always go astray in their heart,
and they did not know my ways, as I swore in my wrath, they shall not enter my
rest." Take care, brethren, that there
not be in any one of you an evil, unbelieving heart that falls away from the
living God. But encourage one another day after day, as long as it is still
called ‘Today, so that none of you will be hardened by the deceitfulness of
sin. For we have become partakers of Christ, if we hold fast the beginning of
our assurance firm until the end, while it is said, "Today if you hear his
voice, do not harden your hearts, as when they provoked me." For who provoked Him when they had heard?
Indeed, did not all those who came out of Egypt led by Moses? And with whom was
He angry for forty years? Was it not with those who sinned, whose bodies fell
in the wilderness? And to whom did He swear that they would not enter His rest,
but to those who were disobedient? So we see that they were not able to enter
because of unbelief. (Heb.3:5-19)
As We Trust & Move with God, New Ways
Bring New Days
It's clear what God is saying; it's
the time for each to be led by God through the faith that comes by hearing Him
(Ro.10:17; 8:13-14). God is calling each to trust and movement. And that trust
is not in the God of the past, but instead of the One who made it clear: I AM. The
One who said "behold, I make all things new" calls us to this
trusting move with Him:
"But
I press on so that I may lay hold of that for which also I was laid hold of by
Christ Jesus. Brethren, I do not regard myself as having laid hold of it yet;
but one thing I do; forgetting what lies behind and reaching forward to what
lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God
in Christ Jesus. Let us therefore, as many as are perfect, have this attitude; and
if in anything you have a different attitude, God will reveal that also to you." (Php.3:12-15)
The faith of God creates and
releases Christ's own energy for moving with Him into all He has for us in the
Kingdom (Ro.4:17-18). The soul realm will come into order as it is subjected to
God through trust and obedience. In that way we can each become one (whole)
within ourselves as well as one with and in Him. Then the stage is set for
becoming sanctified completely, just as He calls for:
The God
of peace Himself sanctify you entirely; and may your spirit and soul and body
be preserved complete, without blame at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Faithful is He who calls you, and He also will bring it to pass. (1Thessalonians 5:23-24)
It is only through God's
continuously new ways that we will be brought into the promised new days. Trust
Him; obey Him.
Win!
Bill Click
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