I just recently completed the “Get Real” bible study with some of the women of Harvest Bible Chapel Peoria, and I am so thankful for the willingness and humility of the ladies who taught and how God used them to speak (some hard) truth to us. But times of refreshment and learning are usually followed by times of sifting and trying. And though I feel like I could have written multiple blogs after each session, I have found that my priorities have desperately needed shifting to do what best worships God instead of my self throughout the day. So, I had to forgo blogging until this morning. [Ok, I have to just stop and say that I really wish I could expound on everything that’s led to this post, but I am just going to have to ask you to go and listen and read for yourself. Go taste and see that the Lord is good and that His Word proves true.]
Now that I'm a few weeks out from having been poured into immensely, I am finding myself being tested on wether or not I can/will accurately handle the truth to which my eyes have been opened. I’m sure most of you who read this will identify with me that when God lays parts of you open, you become very sensitive to that sin and shortcoming not only in your own life but also other’s as well. So you are then given the chance to walk in humility and be a vessel of the grace that is being poured out to you, IF you are willing. And then there are times where we’ve been illuminated to something that resonates so deeply and moves us so powerfully that we are quick to share it and let it go instead of letting that Word take root as we meditate on it and really let God work it into our bones so we can live it out. It’s like we hear it, think it sounds great and clever, and regurgitate it back out and then it’s gone. We haven’t let it take root for the Spirit to nourish and water and prune that truth for it to bear fruit in our lives.
But what is really striking a chord with me, and has since I surrendered my life to the Lord, is that spiritual maturity and wisdom aren’t just reserved for the older. No one is just rewarded those things because they have more years in their life than another. And the older that one gets, the easier it is to cast judgement on someone younger than yourself just because you believe they haven’t had the years in their life yet to know things or gain wisdom. And let me just say that I will always go to bat for the young. Shame on me for showing disrespect to a brother or sister in Christ because they are younger, and I assumed that they didn’t have the capacity to see the wood for the trees. If their heart is the Lord’s, He can teach and move and show them what He pleases! Historically God used the young. He shames the old with the young. He calls for the young to come to Him and for the old to be as the young in their faith and trust in Him!!! 1 Timothy 4.12 says to not let anyone despise or think less of you because of your youth. And even in the face of that condescension to still be an example in your speech, conduct, love, faith, and purity. 1 Corinthians 3.18-19 warns that no one deceive themselves supposing that they are wise in their age. They should become a fool by discarding worldly discernment and recognizing their self as being dull, stupid, and foolish, without true learning and scholarship. Walk in humility! Then comes wisdom. Worldly knowhow is foolishness, absurdity, and stupidity with God, and He WILL lay hold of the ‘wise’ in their own craftiness.
Proverbs 1.7 also says that reverential and worshipful fear of the Lord is the beginning, the starting point, the essence of wisdom. BUT fools despise skillful and godly wisdom, instruction, and discipline. (Especially when it comes from a younger believer.) Brother and sister, let the latter not be you!!! My heart cry, my plead, my challenge is this: that we let Ephesians 4 be true of us; that we are walking in a manner worthy of the calling to which we’ve been called, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit and the bond of peace.
That is my heart this morning. I pray it’s to God’s glory.
