Calling Captive and Wandering Sons to Return

I have awaken this early Sunday morning at roughly 1:45am. Not able to return to sleep, I get up to spend time with the Lord. As I sit under the lamp at the end of the couch, my still-foggy mind is suddenly invaded with the faces of brothers in the Lord whom I have walked with over the years.

Many of these men I have served with closely. Many of these men I have not seen in a very long time. Some of these men I see from time to time, but I'm aware their relationship with the Lord is tepid. Regardless who they are, nor the length of days since we've spoken , every last one of these men are greatly treasured by me...largely because they are ALL vastly treasured by the Lord. These men are HIS SONS! They are an awesome treasure indeed! I have seen these men in the days of their valor; I have watched them serve others with heroic devotion; and I've witnessed them strive to do their utmost to please the Lord of all Glory.

And yet, in this early hour as I see them looking back at me (almost like a vision) as their faces pass before my eyes, I see a hollowness looking back from theirs. There is a look of bewilderment that clouds the faces that once shined with devotion. The faces of this magnificent company of brothers can only be described as having the look of prisoners of war staring shoulder-to-shoulder past the barbed wire feebly hoping to be delivered one day.

They are soldiers still but have been stripped of their weapons. They were seized in the very midst of battle and have now been dominated by their foe! They did not die in battle. They still awake every morning and dress for the day. They fall in to their ranks to show themselves present and accounted for. But they have no mission. These men I see do not awaken to a purpose larger than themselves but rather awaken with the anticipation just to survive their way through another day.

Not all are POWs. Some are MIAs. These men are the wanderers. They've not been sidelined by the enemy. Instead, these men "benched" themselves by disappearing. These brothers somehow lost their vision--blurred by battle--and were separated from their comrades. These guys know they're lost but don't know where they want to go nor realize how imperiled they really are!

I must be sincere. I am disturbed by the condition of all of these treasured men. Most of these brothers maintain a brave front that they are doing well though they struggle every day with the confines of their captivity or lostness of their confusion. Here is the scary part: these brothers are just glad they themselves are "holding up" and gage their own well-being by comparing themselves with the other POWs and MIAs around them! Why not? After all, they are so far removed from the troops on the front lines they've seemingly forgotten the adrenaline rush of engaging the enemy! More sadly, some brothers can no longer put on the brave front. They are succumbing to defeat and risk suffering a worse fate.

Let me step aside briefly from the military metaphor to speak plainly. I see Christian men all the time whom I personally know whom I can look into their eyes and discern their spirit because the fire in their eyes has largely gone out. For some, it is to a lesser degree than others but is not just a few but MOST! At other times, I need only listen to them speak. Jesus rightly said "from the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks." I simply listen to these men and they are unconsciously downloading their present heart-condition to me. Some of you men have even left your wives believing they were the problem when the problem was your heart! And you still have THAT with you! I can't over-emphasize how greatly distressed I am about the condition of God's men today.

And let me hasten to include Pastors in this concern. They are the men given the assignment of maintaining the condition of God's people and in many cases, I believe these men have either gone blind or gone AWOL. However, I am NOT laying blame on a single person. We must all work out our own salvation with fear and trembling.

That being said, here is the message I believe the Lord has put on my heart for these precious comrades (and it is not an easy one):

You are waiting for the day when your brothers-in-arms come marching across the field to tear open the gates for you or find you in a ravine somewhere. That day may come, but you will probably never see it till the war has come to an end. Putting all your hopes on that eventual day is taking the risk you will survive to ever see it. (Let me say plainly, here, I've already seen men I was certain would be survivors only to witness them fall by the wayside. So if you think you can tough out dilemma...think again.) OK, so here's the tough part, brother...and this is coming from an ex-POW...you must plot your own escape! You'd thought about a quick escape frequently when you first realized your were snagged. But others in your circumstances gave you false comfort by saying there was no way to escape. You just needed to ride it out till the war was over. I can assure you, the Lord takes no delight in you "riding it out."

So how do you shake yourself from your circumstances and catch a fresh vision of becoming once again who God designed you to be? How do you escape insipid existence when others around you say its pointless? Well, its NOT pointless. You were destined to stand shoulder to shoulder with the rest of God's mighty men. But escaping from your entrapment will take focus and determination. For one thing, you will have to turn a deaf ear to discouragement. In fact, you'll have to turn a deaf ear to a lot of things. There is more, but the REAL question now is "Are you even willing to be fully engaged as a son of God, again? Are you ready to seize a larger purpose, again?" The question must be asked because, truth be told, you just might prefer being where you are rather than being fully engaged.

If you are willing to plot your own escape, email me so I can notify you of my next posting about this. I want to help men who are ready for change and I just don't know of a more efficient way of reaching so many diverse brothers better than this without hitting men with emails they don't really want.

If you don't have my email address, leave a comment on the post. (Just make sure when you sign in, you check off that I can respond to you by email.)

Some email addresses of men I know are obsolete. So feel free to forward this to other brothers because we all kind of travel in the same circles.

Next time: RECONNAISSANCE Later: THE GREAT ESCAPE

The Glory of the Lord Fills the Earth

We're all familiar with Habakkuk 2:14 "The glory of the Lord will fill the earth as the water covers the sea." Only that's not exactly what it says. Here's how it reads, literally:

For the earth will be filled with the KNOWLEDGE of the glory of the LORD as the waters cover the sea.

That SUBSTANTIALLY changes how we should comprehend what this verse is saying. We've always simply assumed that God would pour out His glory in a mighty end-time move. And in context this verse is, indeed, exclusive to the end-times. Verse 3 of that chapter sets the context for that:

For the revelation awaits an appointed time; it speaks of the end and it will not prove false. Though it linger, wait for it: it will certainly come and will not delay.

However, Hab 2:14 is not speaking of an end-time outpouring, but rather an end-time revelation! We should come to realize its not God's glory that would fill the earth in the last days...it is an international KNOWING (literally: to know, to perceive, to be skillful in) His glory.

We can be encouraged that our yearning to intimately know the Lord and His glory is not "our idea." Rather, it is a fulfillment of an ancient prophecy and evidence we are living in "the end." It is a revelation from God reserved for the end-times according to Habakkuk. This is the Lord's doing, not ours!

Returning to Our Journal

It has been quite some time since I logged a Firelight post. It was originally intended as an opportunity to log what God was saying during our prayer gatherings and for others to likewise express their thoughts through any comments. Since none ever took the opportunity to log their own thoughts or comments, I saw no reason to maintain it.

However, in recent months, the LORD has been drawing a number of us i

nto a fresh and rich depth of relationship with Him. So as to chronicle the baby steps we are taking into this seeming new frontier of relationship with Jesus, I am resurrecting this blog. I hope it serves as a point of reference for each of us as we engage in our exploration of intimacy with Jesus!

First let me establish that a few short weeks back, we began meeting each Thursday night for what we call "Fascinate." Inspired by having read "Gazing Into Glory" by Bruce Allen, we have chosen to encourage each other to learn to become more attuned to the reality of the spirit life than we have been up to this point in our lives.

So to digress a bit, I will post a bit about our Fascinate gathering of June 9. During our worship, Tonya Rainey watched Jesus go to each person in the room and recorded what He said concerning each one present:

Russell:

with great love in His voice, and smiling, the Lord looked at

Russ then looked at me and said, "I am his sufficiency." there was great weight to the word "am"

Jordan:

as He walked in front of Jordan, He began giggling. He seemed to enjoy Jordan. Then He sai

d, "We're walking together." There was a certainty in His voice.

Eileen:

with great affection, He placed His hand on her cheek, then looked at me and said, "She's precious to Me."

Pastor Don:

when He walked over to Pastor, He patted his shoulder a couple of times and said, with a smile, "That's My boy!" Then He

looked at me and said, "he's walking in a new light."

Will:

He walked over to Will and placed His hand on Will's chest. He looked at Will for a while, then he said to me, "I have much more in

store for him."

Jon:

When He got to Jon, He lifted Jon's chin so that Jon was looking strai

ght up at the Lord, and said to Jon, "Keep your eyes on Me. Don't look

to the left or the right." Then He looked at me and said, "I love this boy!" (there was great weight to th

e way He said that He loves Jon.)

David:

The Lord embraced him

in a hug. It was a chest to chest kind of hug and it lasted a while. As they embraced, I could see tha

t there was an exchange happening between the Lord & David....spirit to spirit....deep

to deep. I knew that whatever He was transferring from His Spirit to David's that great encouragement would be a result.

Jack:

He stood in front of Jack for a while, enjoying his worship. Then said, "he'll see things h

e never imagined he'd see."

Bev:

He waited a while before speaking about Bev. It seemed He had many things on His mind. Then He said, "she yearns....and she will be filled."

Now we come to this week's Firelight. We blended our weekly Fascinate gathering with our once-a-month Firelight meeting. The truly astounding aspect of the night was that we CLEARLY were enjoying a spirit of revelation from the very outset. A comment would lead to a realization which would, in turn, lead to an "aha moment." Then an observation would be made and someone would relate it to something said earlier. A scripture would come to mind followed by a thought, that related to a comment and it would connect to an earlier revelation.

This continued unbroken for three solid hours! It was almost as though we couldn't turn around without bumping into a "eureka" thought. We tried to start our worship time but it was almost as though we couldn't stop the stream of thought, scripture, postulations and what-about's. At some point Mike finally, almost unable to contain himself, remarked, "Man, Jack! I don't know what's going on here tonight, but you'll say something and it reminds me of a verse that I'll wonder where to find it and when I open my bible, THERE IT IS!" Then he added, "I can't tell you how many times that's happened tonight just the short while we've been in this room."

It was finally 9:30 when we BEGAN worship. But we were already saturated! Wanting to be mindful of the time, we wrapped up worship at 10 but then interpersonal ministry got started in obedience to the Holy Spirit's direction. We finally ended at 11:00. It was a truly remarkable evening.

In conclusion, I could sum up the theme of the night as revelation on God's BOUNDLESS expanse of all He wants to do in our lives. "New wineskins" was an underlying topic as was "repent" AKA "burn the house down!" The operative word for the night was "enlargement." Lord, give us a greater capacity for Your Presence!