Some of you may remember the Scripture in Song movement of the 60’s and 70’s. For a while we only ever sang the Word, and now I find that whole scriptures come into my spirit when I need them, carried on the wings of melodies that have become part of the soundtrack of my life. I could take up the rest of today’s devotional just listing the songs I know whose substance is the quoted Word of God 😊!
I like the way the NLT puts Hebrews 4:12&13: “For the word of God is alive and powerful. It is sharper than the sharpest two-edged sword, cutting between soul and spirit, between joint and marrow. It exposes our innermost thoughts and desires. Nothing in all creation is hidden from God. Everything is naked and exposed before his eyes, and he is the one to whom we are accountable.”
This scripture really hit home this week as Best Beloved and I listened to Hebrews. I have quoted it more times than I care to remember but today I am struck by a vivid picture of the relentlessness of this sword, pressing down into me, uncovering what makes me ‘tick,’ taking me apart for his purposes. I confess, it is humbling to be reminded that despite my so-called maturity as a believer, the Holy Spirit finds it necessary to expose to me ‘the secret thoughts and intents of my heart’ on a regular basis. And, it ALWAYS hurts that camouflaged pride that lurks in the darker recesses of my being.
There is nothing I desire more than for the essential me to reflect the essential Christ in me. This challenge has been out there for all disciples ever since Jesus first said, “Come - follow me!” to a rag-tag bunch of obviously fallible human beings. They bickered, they argued, they wore their envy of each other like grubby garments wherever they followed him. Even in the Garden of Gethsemane their human nature asserted itself, over and over again.
As Paul put it in Romans 7:18: “I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my flesh [my human nature, my worldliness—my sinful capacity]. For the willingness [to do good] is present in me, but the doing of good is not.”(AMP)
BUT – and how I thank God for this BUT! – if this were the end of the story, I would be a sad and sorry disciple. There is a way to live that demonstrates, daily, who is seated on the throne of my life – it’s that non-stop conversation with the Holy Spirit that should be the very air I breathe. I am not a humanist, wistfully believing in the essential goodness of mankind. While it is true I do not live in the condemnation of the past but in the freedom of knowing that I am a beloved child of God, growing ‘from glory to glory’ means I am continually aware of my dependance on him to be someone whose living and speaking shows whose I am.
If I am humble enough to invite the Holy Spirit to keep plunging the Fiery Sword of the Word into the deepest thoughts and intents of my heart, to keep taking me apart, then, and only then, as I allow HIM to put me back together again, will the full magnificence of ‘Christ in me, the hope of glory’ reveal itself!
