No hoops to jump through first.
God was that guy right? He said there’s a Reformation coming?
Absolutely. He heard that direct from me. Years ago. He’s carried it, waited for it all those years. He’s not the only one. There’s been a lot of pain among those who listen. Pain as they wait for this change which seems to have given up ever coming.
Ok. He said the change that’s coming, ‘the Reformation’, will be that people hear direct from you. That we won’t have to hear the most significant things you say through someone else? Was he right?
Of course. It may cause anxiety for some, but the fact remains that the Old and New Testaments both point to these facts. Both of them full of it. I WILL have a friendship with no intermediaries. That’s what this is all about.
Can I hear you say that anyone who reads this should search the scripture to see if the Bible really says this. To see if it really says that you want to talk direct to each us without having to go through someone else?
Yes I said it the other night, and I’m saying it to you again right now. If anyone doubts the fact that t I want to talk direct to them, without having to go through any middle man, they should search their scriptures. If it really matters to them, they should search the scriptures hard. They WILL find the answer. ‘Seek me and you will find me’. ‘Seek and keep on seeking, knock (demand) and keep on knocking’.
That’s what I want. Look it up. You won’t find just one reference to it, you’ll find that’s what the entire Bible is about. The whole Bible is about a one on one, you and me, back and forth relationship. Back and forth!! Not all one way. The whole Bible is about that, and the lengths I went to, to make it possible.
It is NOT common to find people enjoying a relationship like that, not a back and forth conversation. Some do, but many don’t. Would you like to argue that??
Not me God. No argument from me! But equally, I’d rather not be writing this down. Some will think I’m making this up. They’ll ask who do I think I am. There are so many who think you are deliriously happy with the way the average modern Christian experiences you. God you know that writing out words that suggest you disagree with that perspective will only annoy them.
Bible knowledge is not your main strength Mark, but if it was you’d be able to rattle off hundreds of verses that clearly point out that I want you to hear from me direct. That I don’t want you to hear me through a hierarchy of others.
Of course it’s healthy to check what you hear with others. But the fact remains that I want you to hear first and foremost from me. Direct. Not through others. By all means check it with others. But first and foremost I want what you hear from me, to come direct from me.
God you’re reminding me of that verse in Isaiah aren’t you.
Yes. I often do, because it’s so pivotal.
Surely you don’t want me to list it again in this conversation God? It will look like I don’t know many scriptures. After all I only just put it in Monday’s conversation. God?
Put it in this one too.
You will see your teacher with your own eyes. Your own ears will hear him. Right behind you a voice will say, “This is the way you should go,” whether to the right or to the left. ISAIAH 30:19-21 NLT
Reading that scripture and others that make all this clear, helps you stay focused on what a relationship with me is all about. A conversation. Which is, as you are discovering, so very simple.
I want to teach you direct. That’s what this is all about. Just that – I want to teach you direct.
Yes you can check it with others. You know that’s scriptural. But the fact remains that I want you, every single human alive, to learn to hear me direct. All day long.
I want you to get your key teaching direct from me. ‘I did not hear it from any man, nor was I taught it, rather I received it by revelation from Jesus Christ’. Look it up. I want everyone to experience that, the revelation straight from me.
It will mean that leaders can help others learn to hear me direct, and not have to spend their entire lives hearing on others’ behalf. I don’t want to talk to you, so that you can pass it on to others. I want to talk to them direct. Less of you, more of me. It’s always been the way, and always will. The chief priests and the teachers of the law didn’t understand that. Most of them, although confronted with the living, dying and risen again God, still determined to go their own way, to pray AT me, worship AT me and constantly allow themselves to be told by those ‘even higher’ that they need to jump through hoops.
Why oh why do they want to do that? I already jumped through all the hoops on their behalf. Tell them not to argue the details of the cross and its meaning. Tell them simply to consider once again, its beauty. A wooden cross, an instrument of torturous death; and yet a thing of beauty, possibly the most beautiful thing in history. ‘Greater love has no man than this, that he lay down his life for a friend.’
I did the first part. Your part is to be my friends. And what have I told you is the way to make friends?
Conversation; conversation leads, according to you, to friendship.
And once a friendship is struck, if those friends continue with the conversation. What happens then?
Something much deeper. Love. Trust. Respect. That’s what you keep telling me.
Can you see what will happen as a result of all this?
Yes. I’ll be getting teaching that changes me completely. As I hear direct from you, all the time, I’ll be getting my mind filled with your ideas and thoughts and specific instructions, reasoning, thinking. The more of your thoughts that fill my mind, the less of his thoughts will be in there.
Mark do you understand it’s not some nirvanic state that so many people expect? It’s simply the result of being constantly in conversation with me. Tell me, when you are in love, what happens to the way you think.
It becomes filled with what the person you love thinks and says, and even does. The world begins to be about them.
Exactly. And when you fall in love with me through conversing with me, you’ll find that very quickly my thoughts consume you. The more you listen to me the more you’ll know what I think. About everything. From the right-now stuff, to the overriding truths.
“So here’s what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life—your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life—and place it before God as an offering. Embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can do for him. Don’t become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God. You’ll be changed from the inside out. Readily recognize what he wants from you, and quickly respond to it. ROM 12:1-2 MSG
‘Be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is.’ ROM 12:1 NIV
I can’t wait God. I think I’m finally starting to get the hang of how to relax in this conversation aren’t I?
Mark the conversation will change you from within. Will change anyone who does it. Little by little till the day you die. Turn all your need for company and reassurance and enjoyment to me. Just to conversing with me. The conversation with me is not a salve for wounds, that’s not the key idea at all. Rather it’s the state that you were designed for. The ache for satisfaction inside every man is designed to press him toward contact, conversation with me. You can feel it now. That’s what you were designed for. Contact. With me.
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