Advancing in the Wilderness

I did not think when I became a Christian that there would be wilderness seasons in my life or even believe how long some would be.  Does victory mean that we never go through the wilderness or as David put it pass through the valley of the shadow of death?  I believe that Father in His infinite goodness knows how to powerfully use wilderness seasons in our lives to transform us and bring us into a greater measure of intimacy and power.

The Holy Spirit spoke to my heart, that when Jesus was in the wilderness the predominant voice He heard was the one of the enemy.  Jesus was led into the wilderness by the Holy Spirit, yet God's voice seems silent during this season.  How did He know what Scriptures to speak when the enemy brings Him the three temptations.  I would like to submit to you that He had studied and memorized the Scripture as a boy and that even while in the wilderness He meditated on the Word.  I believe it was the Holy Spirit who prompted the specific Scriptures He used.  It is actually the voice of the enemy, his challenge to Jesus being the Son of God and the temptations which is at the forefront in the wilderness.  I believe the voice of the enemy, his lies and temptations, which is dominant in the wilderness seasons.  Often we need to draw on previous revelations to be able to speak to the enemy's challenges to our identity, God's Fatherhood, and our calling.

In Hosea 2:14, God speaking to Israel says, "Therefore, behold, I will allure her, and bring her into the wilderness, and speak comfortably unto her."  The wilderness is a season of discomfort, being stripped of our comforts, a time where God feels silent, and also a time of amazing intimacy with God.  In our discomfort, affliction by the enemy, and God's silence comes God in His comfort drawing us to Himself.  Yet unlike the taunting, torment, and tempting voice of the enemy which often seeks to drive us.  The voice of God is one of allure and comfort but often seems difficult to find in the wilderness.

Jesus is led into the wilderness by the Holy Spirit and is led out in the power of the Holy Spirit.  So Father actually uses wilderness seasons to promote us in the Spirit as sons just as He did Jesus (see Luke 4:14).  It also even says that the news about Jesus spread throughout the surrounding district, this after He was isolated in the wilderness and put in a showdown with the enemy.  Father sure has a different way of promoting people.   I once heard Kris Vallotton say, "private victories lead to public anointing."

Advancing even in the wilderness,
Bret

Freedom from the Spirit of Poverty

We normally connect poverty with a lack of money or financial resources, yet I believe the affects of poverty go much deeper.  After the Fall in the Garden of Eden the flow of resources from heaven to earth that had continually brought provision was interrupted.  For the first time in Adam and Eve's lives they experienced lack.  This was not our loving Father's design for there to be any lack, heaven was meant to resource the earth and provision was important in the Creation Covenant.  Provision came through the Father caring for His children by them being in right relationship with Him. Adam and Eve  eating of the tree of knowledge of good and evil and choosing sin meant they became orphans.  Orphans do not have a source of provision, they must provide for themselves.

In Isaiah 61 which describes the anointing that is on the Messiah (and then on us), the first thing the anointing deals with is poverty.  The Webster definition of poverty is:  1) the state of one who lacks a usual or socially acceptable amount of money or material possessions, 2)  Scarcity or dearth, 3)  debility due to malnutrition or lack of fertility.  Amazing that poverty is connected even to the lack of fertility, which is directly opposes the Genesis 1:28 mandate which says "...be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth...".  Yet often times the religious world holds up poverty as divine, even having some servants take an "oath of poverty".  

Ever since I was a child I felt our poverty, through lack of resources, hopelessness, lack of dreams, lack of a father and earthly provider and envy of those who had more.  Yet when I would visit my dad's side of the family who had more resources than my immediate family, there was freedom, a joy, and a sense of investing in others.  My father had even judged his own family because they had resources and often sought to divest himself of the material possessions that came to him through the family.  Yet is our destiny to be poor and in lack or did Jesus die to destroy poverty so we may come into a place of prosperity.  Biblical prosperity is not primarily about how much resources you have but I believe about our right relationship with a Generous Father.  One definition of Biblical Prosperity, "Having all you need for all that God has called you to."  In 1 Peter 2:9 we are called a "royal priesthood" and in Romans 5:17 (Amplified version) we are called to "reign in life as kings through the one Man Jesus Christ".  Now I don't know a lot of royalty personally but I have not heard of many kings and royalty who are poor.  I believe that the greatest place of poverty has been first in our relationship with God, second in our identity, and third in the resources we are entrusted to manage.  

How many children dream of being poor?  No one really wants to be poor because it is not part of our destiny as a son or daughter of God with an extravagant Father.  Yet to use our resources to greedily get whatever we want while ignoring our Father's heart is just as against our destiny, since we are to be a blessing to the whole earth (Genesis 12).  Radical generosity is the to be like our Father.

Rich in Christ,
Bret