There are not many of us who are that moldable and pliable in the hands of the Lord, because we get too attached. One of the things the Lord is saying to us today, is, “Get detached from your attachments.”
We must remember we are stewards of what God has provided us, not owners. The ministry I am involved in is not my ministry; it is God’s ministry. If He ever decides He is finished with it, it will be finished. I don’t look for that to happen, nor do I plan for it, but I know I must always be prepared to go on with God if it did happen.
We must not get too attached to people or things. We must always be free to move with the Spirit. There is a season in our lives, and when that season is over, we must let it go. Too often we try to hang on to the past, when God is saying, “It’s time to move on to something new.”
If God is done with something in your life, let it go. Look to the new thing and allow it to “come to pass.” Don’t live in the past when God has a new season for you. Let go of what lies behind and press on to what lies ahead. (Philippians 3:13,14.) If God is no longer in something, you will no longer be happy in it. Reach out toward that new horizon God has for you. That’s what Abraham did — and God blessed him for it.
“THIS IS THAT!”
Now [in Haran] the Lord said to Abram, Go for yourself [for your own advantage] away from your country, from your relatives and your father’s house, to the land that I will show you.
And I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you [with abundant increase of favors] and make your name famous and distinguished, and you will be a blessing [dispensing good to others].
And I will bless those who bless you [who confer prosperity or happiness upon you] and curse him who curses or uses insolent language toward you; in you will all the families and kindred of the earth be blessed [and by you they will bless themselves].
So Abram departed, as the Lord had directed him.…
GENESIS 12:1-4
God spoke to Abraham and told him to leave his country, his home, and his relatives and go to a place He would show him. That is what God did to me when He told me to leave that church in St. Louis. The difference is, Abraham obeyed immediately, while I delayed.
God said to me, “Go, and I will show you,” and I said, “No, You show me, and I will go.” We had an argument for a while because I did not want to leave the job I had at the time. I thought, “There can never be anything better than this — this is it.” But God was saying to me, “No, this is that.”
At one time in my life, that job was “it.” But now the Lord was telling me it had “come to pass,” and it was time for me to move on to something else.
I look back on the people with whom I had such close fellowship in those days and remember all the things we used to do together. They are still there doing those things, but I am no longer a part of them. They still love me, and I still love them, but our relationship is different. Does that mean it was wrong for me to have spent that time there? No, it just means God was finished with that season in my life.
We must remember there are different seasons in our lives and let God do what He wants to do in each of those seasons. We must stop trying to find some “it” that is never, going to change. Everything is changing all the time, and so must we.
It is much easier to cast our care when we know that “this too shall pass.” Even the good things in life we enjoy so1 much will not always stay as they are at the moment. I am not being negative or fatalistic. I am just trying to establish the-fact that we need to be careful not to become too attached to anybody or anything in this life more than we are to God and His will and plan for us.
ALLOW GOD TO CHANGE YOU
And while He was in Bethany, [a guest] in the house of Simon the leper, as He was reclining [at table], a woman came with an alabaster jar of ointment (perfume) of pure nard, very costly and precious; and she broke the jar and poured [the perfume] over His head.
MARK 14:3
So often we are afraid of brokenness. But if our outer man has things broken off, the powerful things inside us can pour forth. The perfume of the Holy Spirit is within us, but the alabaster box, which is the flesh, has to be broken for that sweet fragrance to be released.
To fully release the power of the Holy Spirit within us, we must allow God to deal with us and do with us as He wills. We must learn to lean on Him and trust in Him completely, knowing that everything in life changes.
In ancient times, whenever a Roman general returned victoriously from war, he would be driven through the streets of Rome which were lined with cheering crowds loudly proclaiming, “Hail the conquering hero!” In the chariot alongside the hero there was always stationed a slave who held over the general’s head a gold crown encrusted with precious jewels. But as they rode along, it was the slave’s job to constantly whisper in the hero’s ear, “Look behind you,” or “Remember that you are mortal.”2 This was done to keep him from becoming too proud by reminding him, “This too shall pass.”
That is what God does to us. He gives us His Holy Spirit to fill us and empower us and use us as a blessing to others. But He also sends His Spirit to remind us that “this too shall pass.”
If you and I are ever going to have stability in our lives, we must quit looking for one thing that will be “it.” We must recall that life is a continual process in which everything is constantly changing — including us. We must put our hope not on the things of this world, but on the Lord, because He is the only thing in this world Who does not change. He is the same yesterday, today, and forever. (Hebrews 13:8.)
KEEPING IN BALANCE
…I have learned how to be content (satisfied to the point where I am not disturbed or disquieted) in whatever state I am.
I know how to be abased and live humbly in straitened circumstances, and I know also how to enjoy plenty and live in abundance. I have learned in any and all circumstances the secret of facing every situation, whether well-fed or going hungry, having a sufficiency and enough to spare or going without and being in want.
I have strength for all things in Christ Who empowers me [I am ready for anything and equal to anything through Him Who infuses inner strength into me; I am self-sufficient in Christ’s sufficiency].
PHILIPPIANS 4:11-13
Stability is maturity. To grow up in God is to come to the place that we can be content no matter what our situation or circumstances may be, because we are rooted and grounded, not in things, but in the Lord.
Paul was emotionally and spiritually mature because he knew whatever state he may be in at the moment, it too would pass. In verse 12 he said he had learned the secret of facing every situation of life, whether good or bad.
One day as I was reading that verse, the Lord spoke to me and said, “That’s how I keep balance in My people.” He showed me if we never had to wait for anything, if everything always went just as we wanted it to, when we wanted it to, we would soon become soft and spoiled. We would assume anybody who was not being blessed as much as we were was doing something wrong. We would try to give that individual “victory lessons.”
We must be on our guard against spiritual pride. We must not think more highly of ourselves than we should. (Romans 12:3.) We must remember that all blessings come from God and not from our efforts or our holiness. We must never get to thinking we have arrived. We must remember that pride goes before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall. (Proverbs 16:18.)
God wants His people to keep in balance. He wants to bless us and be good to us. He wants to use us as vessels through which His Holy Spirit can work. But in order to do that, He must teach us how to handle new realms of blessings without developing a wrong attitude.
That’s why we may enjoy wonderful blessings for a time, and then suddenly experience a series of setbacks. God allows that to happen to us occasionally so we will learn to keep things in perspective. He knows if we have too many blessings, we get spoiled and prideful. He also knows if we have too many bad times, we become discouraged a
nd despondent. That’s why it is so important to remember that whatever comes our way, “This too shall pass.” That’s why we must learn to cast it all upon the Lord, knowing that nothing — good or bad — lasts forever.
JUST PASSING THROUGH!
Yes, though I walk through the [deep, sunless] valley of the shadow of death, I will fear or dread; no evil, for You are with me; Your rod [to protect] and Your staff [to guide], they comfort me.
PSALM 23:4
The psalmist David said he walked through the valley of the shadow of death. That’s what we must do. In all the situations and circumstances of this life we must remember we are just passing through. Whatever may be happening to us at the moment, in time it too shall pass.
We must be aware of how fast things can change. Even though at times they may seem agonizingly slow, later when we look bade at that period, we can see it was not really as long as it seemed.
When the devil tries to whisper to us, “Things will never change, everything will be this way forever; you are trapped!” we should say to him, “Wrong! Things may be this way right now, but whether they change or not makes no difference to me — I’m just passing through!”
In Isaiah 43:2 the Lord has promised us, When you pass through the waters, I will be with you, and through the rivers, they will not overwhelm you. When you walk through the fire, you will not be burned or scorched, nor will the flame kindle upon you.
Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, the three Hebrew children, were cast into the fiery furnace by King Nebuchadnezzar. But because they trusted themselves to the Lord, they didn’t stay there to be consumed by the flames. They came through them to victory. (Daniel 3.) Daniel was thrown into the lions’ den, but he came through that experience unharmed. (Daniel 6.)
In Psalm 91:15 we have seen that the Lord promises the same kind of protection and deliverance to all those who put their faith and trust in Him.
WE ARE BEING CHANGED
And all of us, as with unveiled face, [because we] continued to behold [in the Word of God] as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are constantly being transfigured into His very own image in ever increasing splendor and from one degree of glory to another; [for this comes] from the Lord [Who is] the Spirit.
2 CORINTHIANS 3:18
One of the things the devil wants us to believe is that we will never change. But that is not what the Bible tells us. The King James Version of this verse says that as we behold the glory of God we …are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord.
The Greek word translated transfigured or changed in this verse is metamorphoo, meaning “to transform.”3 It is from this Greek word we get our English word metamorphosis, which means a complete change from one thing to something totally different, as when a caterpillar enters a cocoon as a worm and later emerges as a butterfly.4
That is the kind of process you and I are going through spiritually, as we change from the old man to the new man. When the devil tries to tell us we are the same old worm we used to be, we should say to him, “No, I’m not. I’m in the process of change. I won’t be a worm forever, you just wait and see. One day I’ll be something totally different from what I am right now. I’ll be a beautiful butterfly!”
Before the caterpillar enters the cocoon, to get from one place to another he has to crawl slowly and laboriously along on the ground or on a blade or twig. But then he spins a cocoon and crawls into it for a while. When he emerges from that cocoon he has been totally changed. He has become a butterfly, one of the freest of God’s creatures. He can soar through the air on beautiful wings. But to emerge from that cocoon is a struggle, one that is necessary for the butterfly’s full transformation and development.
I once read about a man who saw a butterfly struggling to emerge from a cocoon. Moved by misplaced compassion, the man decided to help the poor creature, so he broke open the cocoon and pulled the developing butterfly out. In just a matter of minutes the weakened creature curled up and died.
If we didn’t struggle through some things, we would never develop the strength and stamina we need to survive in this world.
I used to complain to God, asking Him why He didn’t help me with my ministry. I didn’t realize that I was struggling to emerge from my own cocoon. God could have helped me, but if He had done that my ministry would have weakened and died.
God often works through struggle. But He also sometimes works through what I call “suddenlies.”
THE “SUDDENLIES”
Behold, I send My messenger, and he shall prepare the way before Me. And the Lord [the Messiah], Whom you seek will suddenly come to His temple; the Messenger or Angel of the covenant Whom you desire, behold, He shall come, says the Lord of hosts.
MALACHI 3:1
We all like “suddenlies,” and as we draw closer to the end times, the Bible promises us a “season of suddenlies.”
For example, in 1 Corinthians 15:51, 52 Paul exhorts us: Take notice! I tell you a mystery (a secret truth, an event decreed by the hidden purpose or counsel of God). We shall not all fall asleep [in death], but we shall all be changed (transformed) in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the [sound of the] last trumpet call. For a trumpet will sound, and the dead [in Christ] will be raised imperishable (free and immune from decay), and we shall be changed (transformed).
When Jesus comes back to this earth to take us to Himself, we will be changed or transformed “in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye” — in other words, suddenly.
You and I do not have to be discouraged in our walk with God, because no matter what remains to be done in the transformation of our old man into our new man, it will be accomplished suddenly — at the appearing of Jesus in the heavenlies. We are not going to stay the way we are forever. If the devil tries to tell us we are, he is lying. God is even now in the process of changing us from glory to glory, and whatever remains to be changed in us He will one day do suddenly.
In Acts 2:1, 2 we read: And when the day of Pentecost had fully come, they were all assembled together in one place, when suddenly there came a sound from heaven like the rushing of a violent tempest blast, and it filled the whole house in which they were sitting.
This passage goes on to describe how all the disciples were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues. They had been waiting in that upper room for days. Finally, when the time was right, God fulfilled His promise to pour out His Spirit upon them.
God works just as suddenly among us today. In my meetings people are suddenly filled with the Holy Spirit, just as these people were on the Day of Pentecost.
A young woman who was filled with the Spirit in one of my services later wrote me about the experience and the impact it had on her life. She wrote that she had been to many meetings and had stood in many prayer lines before coming to a certain conference I was holding.
“There must have been some kind of curse on me,” she explained. “I felt that you were going to call on me and minister to me, and, sure enough, you did. I had been in meetings like yours for years, and I couldn’t tell you what the difference was. All I know is, I went home a totally different person.”
She went on to write that after that experience her marriage was different, her relationship with her children was different, the way she kept house was different. Even the way she cared for her body was different. She was no longer lazy, but got up every morning and went out to walk for exercise something she had never done.
What had happened to her? God had suddenly showed up in her life. Now He was at work day by day, changing her from glory to glory.
That’s the way God works — sometimes supernaturally and sometimes ordinarily, sometimes suddenly and sometimes over a period of time. That’s why we need to get up every day with the hopeful attitude, “Maybe when I go to bed tonight, my circumstances will be totally different because You, Lord, have moved suddenly in my life.”
In Acts 9 we read about the conversion of Paul on the road to D
amascus: Now as he traveled on, he came near to Damascus, and suddenly a light from heaven flashed around him (v. 3). The account tells how Jesus appeared to Paul and changed him from a persecutor of the Church to a brand-new convert who would later become the leading apostle to the Gentiles.
Sometimes when we pray for others who are not believers or are not living their faith, we get discouraged because we see no evident change in their attitude or behavior. We must remember that if God could suddenly confront and change Paul, He can confront and change anybody. After all, didn’t He confront and change us?
We must never get tired of praying for our loved ones, because sometimes God works suddenly, and sometimes He works over a period of time. But He does work in response to prayer and praise, as we see in Acts 16:26 which describes what happened while Paul and Silas were singing praises to the Lord in the Philippian jail: Suddenly there was a great earthquake, so that the very foundations of the prison were shaken; and at once all the doors were opened and everyone’s shackles were unfastened.
As soon as the jailer heard the noise and saw what had happened, he drew his sword to kill himself, because he thought the prisoners had all surely escaped. But Paul called out to him, “Don’t harm yourself, we’re all still here!” When the jailer brought Paul and Silas out of the prison cell, his first question to them was, …Men, what is it necessary for me to do that I may be saved? (v. 30).
What a change. The same man who had them beaten, chained, and thrown into the innermost dungeon was now asking them for salvation. Once he became a believer, the jailer took them into his own home, bathed their wounds, and served them something to eat. He was so excited he …leaped much for joy and exulted with all his family that he believed in God [accepting and joyously welcoming what He had made known through Christ] (v. 34).