Contemplations

(Romans 7:18 For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good thing: for to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not.

Deuteronomy 26:11 And thou shalt rejoice in every good thing which the LORD thy God hath given unto thee, and unto thine house, thou, and the Levite, and the stranger that is among you. 

Philemon 6 That the communication of thy faith may become effectual by the acknowledging of every good thing which is in you in Christ Jesus.

Psalms 84:11 For the Lord God is a sun and shield: the Lord will give grace and glory: no good thing will he withhold from them that walk uprightly.  

Psalms 103:5 Who SATISFIETH thy mouth with good things; so that thy youth is renewed like the eagle’s. 

Psalms 107:9 For he SATISFIETH the longing soul, and filleth the hungry soul with goodness. 

Psalms 145:16 Thou openest thine hand, and SATISFIEST the desire of every living thing.)

All that I have ever needed, need now, or will ever need to be totally satisfied is God—not God “out there” or “up there” in a physical location, but rather “the Father within that doeth the works” (John 14:10 Believest thou not that I am in the Father, and the Father in me? the words that I speak unto you I speak not of myself: but the Father that dwelleth in me, he doeth the works.), the God who is always with me (Matthew 28:20) and who will never leave me (Hebrews 13:5), even when I make my bed in hell (Psalms 139:8). I need only the God who formed me in my mother’s womb (Jeremiah 1:5), who is continually knocking at the door of my heart (Revelation 3:20) and, indeed, who is living His life through me (Galatians 2:20 I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me.)

This “Father” (or God) appears as whatever I need whenever I need it. He appears as fish and bread when I am hungry, as wine at my wedding feast, as sight when I am blind, as healing when I am sick. He appears as matter, but He is not matter. When I recognize, accept and receive whatever I need as God appearing in whatever is necessary for my need (and desires) to be satisfied, I experience the righteousness, peace and joy which characterize the kingdom of heaven (Romans 14:17).

But the moment I believe that that which is appearing (or the one through whom it is appearing) is what is satisfying my need, I am no longer satisfied. I am like the five thousand who continued to seek the man Jesus to provide them with the loaves and the fishes rather than the God who appeared as loaves and fishes through the man Jesus to satisfy their need for food. Had they recognized the “blesser” rather than the blessing, they would have continued to experience the blessing. It is not because God is an egotistical man requiring adulation and praise for what He does. God is not a man (Numbers 23:19) at all. He is the “I AM” within each of us which is always providing, but which must be recognized to be experienced.

The most common mistake we make as we attempt to get our needs and desires satisfied by God is misinterpreting those needs and desires. We believe that our sense of hunger represents the need for food; but, in reality, our desire is not for food, but for the feeling of satisfaction that we get when we eat food. We wouldn’t care if we had no food as long as we felt satisfied by the lack of hunger. When the disciples forgot to bring bread on one of their outings, Jesus told them that He had food they didn’t even know about (John 4:32). He wasn’t talking about physical food, but rather about that which satisfied the feeling of both physical and spiritual hunger. He was talking about “the bread which comes down from heaven,” the bread that causes one to “live for ever.” (John 6:31-33, 50-51, 58).

We think that we know what we need to satisfy our needs, and that is what we pray for. We pray for a husband or wife because we feel lonely. As the divorce rate demonstrates, having a spouse is not what brings satisfaction. It doesn’t remove our feelings of loneliness. We have to know, as Jesus did, that we can never be alone because our Father is always with us:

(John 16:32 Behold, the hour cometh, yea, is now come, that ye shall be scattered, every man to his own, and shall leave me alone: and yet I am not alone, because the Father is with me.)

Although God’s provision for fellowship oftentimes comes through another person, we must remember that our fellowship is with God, not with the person. People come and go, but God always remains—in whatever form He chooses to appear. This is vividly demonstrated in the account of the disciples on the road to Emmaus as they were grieving over their loss of the man Jesus (God appearing as man) after His crucifixion.

Mark 16:12 After that he appeared in another form unto two of them, as they walked, and went into the country.

The resurrected Christ (the Father within each of us) knows what they have need of (Matthew 6:8 Be not ye therefore like unto them: for your Father knoweth what things ye have need of, before ye ask him.) and even comments on their sadness (Luke 24:13). As they give Him an account of the crucifixion, of the empty tomb, and of the women’s reporting that angels had told them that Jesus was alive, Christ reprimands them for being “slow of heart to believe” and begins expounding the Scriptures (v 27) until their sadness lifts as their hearts “burn” within them (v 32). They are now ready to follow this new Messiah, insisting that he come inside and remain with them for a meal. It is then that He opens their eyes so that they can see that He is the same Christ who appeared as Jesus—whereupon “he vanished out of their sight” (vv 29-31) so that they could not attach themselves to this form.

It is the same with us. We are not to look to a form (to a particular person through whom God is appearing) for an answer to our prayers, for at any moment that person can also vanish from our sight. But we can rest assured that God is still there to satisfy our every need in whatever way He chooses; we mustn’t attempt to dictate what way or through whom that may be.

Now let’s look at what we call disease—or a lack of harmony in the physical body (or the form in which I am currently appearing). I think I need healing when in fact what I need is the absence of the discomfort (dis-ease) that I am feeling in my body or, more importantly, the absence of the fear associated with the illness. Many times there is no discomfort at all, but just fear coming from a doctor’s report (the wisdom of man which is foolishness to God (1Corinthians 3:19)), and we all know that what we greatly fear is what comes upon us (Job 3:25).

All fear comes from the belief in two powers, the belief that God (who is good and only good) is not omnipotent (all powerful) but that there is a power of evil which is opposed to God and which has the power to harm us. It comes from the belief that we don’t have the dominion over all creation which God gave us in the beginning (Genesis 1:26) and that Jesus didn’t really mean what He said:

Luke 10:19 Behold, I give unto you power to tread on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy: and nothing shall by any means hurt you.

The “enemy” here is all our false beliefs about God and His relation to us. We don’t really believe what we read in the story of the prodigal son and his elder brother. We don’t believe that no matter how far we have strayed from the truth of our being, all we need do is “come to ourselves” and return to the Father within where we are again glorified with the glory we had with Him before the world was (John 17:5) (before we began accepting these false beliefs about our separation from Him and about how we must do or not do something to again regain His favor)—we don’t believe that simply by returning to the Father within, all that He has is once again ours (Luke 15:31 Son, thou art ever with me, and all that I have is thine.) because His love for us is unconditional.

Yes, it is that love, and only that love, from which nothing can ever separate us (Romans 8:39), that perfect love—which will cast out the fear (1John 4:18). When we recognize and accept that love, we will find rest for our souls (Matthew 11:29) and experience “the peace of God, which passes all understanding” (Philippians 4:7). For we know that the love of God “which passes knowledge” (Ephesians 3:19) is the perfect love that never fails (1Corinthians 13:8) to bring satisfaction, no matter what our need or desire.

Again I must emphasize that this satisfaction comes only from God Himself, the Father who has taken up His abode in each of us (John 14:23):

Isaiah 45:22 Look unto me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth: for I am God, and there is none else.

When we look to anything or anyone else for the satisfaction we are seeking, we are sure to be disappointed. But when we look to God alone, He is sure to appear as whatever we need exactly when we need it.