THE PRIVILEGE OF PAIN - AUDIO
It has been for a week now that Father has been speaking to me about the privilege of pain. But in truth, He has preparing me all
my life for the privilege of pain. You may think that these two words seem as two great
opposites and should not be paired together, but it is essential to our understanding to what He has called us
to. Paul said the following in the book of Hebrews...
Hebrews 5: 10 - 14
10 Called of God an high priest after the order of Melchisedec.
11 Of whom we have many things to say, and hard to be uttered, seeing ye are dull of hearing.
12 For when for the time ye ought to be teachers, ye have need that one teach you again which be the first principles of the oracles of God; and are become such as have need of milk, and not of strong meat.
13 For every one that useth milk is unskilful in the word of righteousness: for he is a babe.
14 But strong meat belongeth to them that are of full age, even those who by reason of use have their senses exercised to discern both good and evil.
Not everyone will be able to hear this word. He enlarges our heart through trials and
persecutions in order to receive understanding and revelations that we otherwise would
not have been able to receive. Having said that, let those who have ears to hear, hear what the Spirit of the Most High is saying to you, as well as to me.
My
attention has been directed towards intercession. This is no
new subject to me as I have served the Lord for many years in
intercession. The purpose of intercession is identification. The book of Hebrews is often said to be read
with the book of Leviticus. The book of
Leviticus by the mere name tells us that it is Levitical, which is to say
priestly. If you have not listened or
read my devotional, "Blood On Your Hands" as yet, I highly recommend it. It goes into a bit more detail as to how He
makes us into priests, which is to say, after the Order of
Melchizedek. So let us read in Hebrews
about our great High Priest.
Hebrews 5: 1 - 10
1For
every high priest taken from among men is ordained for men in things pertaining
to God, that he may offer both gifts and sacrifices for sins:
2 Who
can have compassion on the ignorant, and on them that are out of the way; for
that he himself also is compassed with infirmity.
3 And
by reason hereof he ought, as for the people, so also for himself, to offer for
sins.
4 And
no man taketh this honour unto himself, but he that is called of God, as was
Aaron.
5 So
also Christ glorified not himself to be made an high priest; but he that said
unto him, Thou art my Son, to day have I begotten thee.
6 As
he saith also in another place, Thou art a priest for ever after the order of
Melchisedec.
7 Who
in the days of his flesh, when he had offered up prayers and supplications with
strong crying and tears unto him that was able to save him from death, and was
heard in that he feared;
8 Though
he were a Son, yet learned he obedience by the things which he suffered;
9 And
being made perfect, he became the author of eternal salvation unto all them
that obey him;
10 Called of God an high priest after the order of Melchizedek.
A. W. Tozer wrote a very famous sermon called, "The Saint Must Walk Alone". I have quoted him often in my writings. To some of us this truth is painfully true. When we are willing to lay it all down, willing to allow Him to strip us of everything that stands between us, He brings us to a very lonely place. Loneliness cuts deep and I mention this in my book, The Enochian Bride, just how lonely it can get. This loneliness settles deep into your bones, greets you in the morning and lays with you late at night in your bed, whilst everybody is peacefully asleep. He brings us to this place so that we in fact like Paul, start to live our lives before the Audience of One. We live for only Him. Our meat is to do His will and this walk is a very lonely walk. This loneliness is also keeping us weak, a needed provision on this journey. You never grow used to it, but you come to accept it as part of the journey. This is not because of the absence of people in your life, but it can include it though. This loneliness is a gift from Him. It binds you to Him in a way that nobody else is bound to Him. Because in essence, when two people go through the same experience, there is a mutual cross that binds them. And such is the case of loneliness...it is His. It comes from His own life that was stripped here on earth, when He just like you had to go early in the morning to the Father to receive grace for the day. Where He had to embrace the weakness of man in order to receive the grace of the Most High. When we embrace this loneliness, we embrace Him. We share in His suffering. Without embracing our weaknesses, we cannot receive His grace for strength.
The same is true when we go through pain. There is pain that comes from wrong choices and disobedience, where the enemy finds opportunity to cause us great harm. But then there is pain that comes from His nail pierced hands. This pain comes through many ways, whether a loveless marriage or abusive relationships. It can even come throught sickness. Often through these relationships words cut as swords and leaves you breathless and torn inside out. Where you are taught by Him to turn your back and receive the lashes from your loved ones or friends. Those who are supposed to love you, rejects you, persecutes you and redicules you. You partake in your loneliness the pain of rejection and persecution, and in that sharing, you share in His suffering. This never becomes easy. It causes you to throw yourself into His loving arms and like Yashua you cry, "Oh Abba, let this cup pass by me!"
This lies at the heart of intercession...identification. As I experience this in my own life on a daily basis, the Spirit started to speak to me about the privilege of pain. Actually, it started with the realization of the privilege of prayer. Father told me a while back that the new season I am in will require longsuffering, endurance and patience. Those are some choice words that gives one pause to ask…”Just exactly what is waiting for me?” We often get very happy when we hear the words "new season" from the Lord, but every new season means a greater battle and learning curve before you reap the reward of this new season. We need to remember that. Whilst recently being baptized in this pain of rejection and being cut to shreds with words like swords, the Comforter reminded me of those three words. I prayed, "Lord, help me to embrace the pain. Instead of trying to cry in sadness and give in to a broken heart, let me hold the pain in my heart and really feel it. Instead of resisting it, I want to embrace it." For some this may seem like madness, but I have learned through the years that He works in ways that we truly do not understand at first, but He will eventually reveal His purpose in it. We have to trust Him with our pain. Yashua spoke to His disciples of His crucifixion and their hearts were broken by what He would have to endure, especially knowing from personal experience what crucifixions entailed. We read the following in Matthew.
Matthew
16: 21 - 25
21 From
that time forth began Jesus to shew unto his disciples, how that he must go unto
Jerusalem, and suffer many things of the elders and chief priests and scribes,
and be killed, and be raised again the third day.
22 Then
Peter took him, and began to rebuke him, saying, Be it far from thee, Lord:
this shall not be unto thee.
23 But
he turned, and said unto Peter, Get thee behind me, Satan: thou art an offence
unto me: for thou savourest not the things that be of God, but those that be of
men.
24 Then
said Jesus unto his disciples, If any man will come after me, let him deny
himself, and take up his cross, and follow me.
25 For
whosoever will save his life shall lose it: and whosoever will lose his life
for my sake shall find it.
The Lord gave Peter a stern rebuke, showing him that the spirit that speaking through him was not of the Most High, but rather against Him. Suffice it to say that we should not be so quick to tell someone that the Most High will not allow them to go through certain suffering. Sometimes pain and suffering comes directly from Him because of a divine purpose. We have to be able to discern when this is the case and then ask Him in faith for the grace to endure. Once I understood that I was to embrace the pain and that there would be more to come, my attitude towards it changed drastically, which allowed the Most High to reveal more to me. He enlarged my heart to understand. Coming back to the subject of identification which lies at the heart of intercession, He said something profound, as I never looked upon it from this perspective. He said to me that all of my life, all my experiences and everything He taught me, has led me to intercession. Something as simple as prayer is the endgame? Could it be that every heartache, everything He has ever brought you through was for this one purpose? At first that just seems too simple, almost a let down. However, this places a whole new weight on intercession. If everything I have ever gone through is for this purpose, it stands to reason that I should give it its proper place in my life. Of course our immediate reaction to such a statement is to fall on our knees and start praying. However, He told me a while ago that I was not to lean on any understanding of what He has taught me before for this new season. Maybe you will recall in one of my previous devotions how I spoke of Psalm 133 that speaks of the oil that pours from Aaron’s beard onto his clothes, which is representative of our High Priest and how His anointing flows down to His Body, which we are. At that point I wrote in my Bible, “He my head, and I His knees”. When I read those words, the Spirit asked me, “Will you be my knees?” Ever since then, this has been His work in me. Another thought that came to me is that some of the great men and woman of the Most High have started with a wide audience and teaching opportunities, even being shepherds of a church, who at the end was brought to a place of seclusion, a place of intercession. Where He takes them away from everything they have done for Him and He calls them to come aside and intercede. For us crusades and having many souls saved and great miracles is the pinnacle of ministry, but not so with Yashua. His ways are not our ways. I am sure that these great men and woman always prayed, but this is a new season He brings them into, which often left those who were fed by them for years astounded as they could not understand why. Needless to say that when we have gone through much and have been taught by the Lord in His wisdom and ways, it makes for informed, compassionate and heartfelt intercession. I have started to read one of the books of my favorite author, P T Forsyth. He confirmed what Father came to show me. One of his quotes caught my eye, from his book called, "The Soul of Prayer". He has a very difficult writing style, but it is always very profound. You might want to read or listen to this twice. But here is the quote from this book.
"Prayer is often represented as the great means of the Christian life. But it is no mere means, it is the great end of that life. True prayer is the supreme function of the personality. The praying personality has an eternal value for God as an end in itself. This is the divine fulness of life's time and course, the one achievement that survives with more power in death than in life. The intercession of Christ in heaven is the continuinity and consummation of His supreme work on earth."
Did you catch that? Intercession is the continuity and consummation of Yashua's supreme work on earth. In other words, when all has been said and done, it continues in intercession. This is also true for us but we do not realize that. I did not realize that until He came to show me and my heart just became so overwhelmed with gratitude for the privilege of prayer. But what kind of intercession is this? Paul’s beautiful words ring true in
my heart which forms as the backbone for the title of this devotional.
Philippians 3: 10
10 That I may know him, and the power of his resurrection, and
the fellowship of his sufferings, being made conformable unto his death;
We can all appreciate the suffering our Beloved Savior and what He went through. It served not only as our salvation by taking the wrath of the Most High due for us upon Himself, but also the fact that through His suffering He identifies with our pain and suffering as well as trials. It is so easy to sound factual, but the reality is that some of us go through so much pain and heartache on this journey. It is not a one time only embrace, it is an embracing every time. I had to do it this morning again. But something happened that I believe He wants you to know. Yesterday I was speaking to some ladies on this forum that I am a part of. We were talking about ID numbers and then one of the ladies said, He knows us by name, not by number. This morning I listened to a song where one of the lyrics is, He calls you by name. And then it hit me...last night, I heard an audible of Him calling my name. And this is what I believe He wants to say to you. I KNOW YOUR NAME. I know everything you are going through and I watch over you every second of the day and night. You are Mine. Not for one second do I look away, but I see everthing you are wiling to endure for My sake. I see how you struggle and how heavy the weight of the cross you bear can be, but I want you to know, I KNOW YOUR NAME. This brought tears to my eyes this morning, that when Yashua speaks to the Father about me, He does not have to go through a long list and read up about me just to catch up, but He knows exactly who I am. He knows YOUR name. You belong to Him. You live your life before the audience of One that sees everything, and He KNOWS your name. You are not alone.
Coming back to Paul, why did Paul have such a
desire to identify with His suffering and to be made conformable unto his
death? Yes, by it we are purified and
may obtain unto the resurrection as Paul explains further in this chapter. However, Father
came to show me something beautiful with regard to this identification with His
suffering. Paul in himself and the life
that he lived is an extension of Christ after the resurrection. This is why his words of “I no longer live, but Christ lives in me, yet the life I live, I live by the faith of the Son of God”
(Galatians 2:20) is so profound. It
expresses the life we as followers of Yashua are to live as an extension of His
life after being resurrected into newness of life, now. Paul is saying He wants to IDENTIFY with
Yashua’s suffering and be made conformable to His death. This identifying is not just to be able to verbalize one's understanding of something, but it speaks of an intimacy through experience that your whole being is a part of.
As a royal priesthood, we are His Body and He
is our Head. As our Head, and the High
Priest of our confession, He ever lives to intercede for us and identifies with
all our trials, persecution and pain. How does He identify? Through an intimate real felt experience of His whole being with our trials and pain in the life He lived here on earth. It was not enough for Him to know as being Omniscient, but through experience He became our High Priest that identifies with our pain and suffering. He
gave up His body for us to be the sacrifice as the offering that ever
intercedes for us on the mercy seat before the Father.
In the same way, we ourselves are called to be a royal priesthood and a living sacrifice as His Body. As the Head, so the Body. Just like He who identifies with our pain, as His body,
we are to identify with His pain and suffering as the Head in a real felt way with our whole being. It cannot be superficial, but deep and to the bone like the very stripes on His back. He said that the servant is not greater than his master and so we are
not greater than Him that we should not suffer.
This call to be a living sacrifice unto Him, our High Priest, is a call
to lay our bodies down to be offered by Him as He wills. This includes loneliness and pain. Whether physical or emotional. This is the cup of suffering He had to drink
in Gethsemané, and so to us, His Body, He also presents the cup of suffering. Like Him, we cry, “Father, if at all possible,
let this cup pass by me. Nevertheless,
not my will be done, but Your will be done”.
To us He gives His cup of suffering to be partakers of His suffering,
that we may also be partakers of His glory.
At the same time, our Father
prepares us for this suffering in the same way that all of Yashua’s life was in
preparatioin of the crucifixion He would experience on the cross. He prepares us for each new season.
5 Wherefore
when he cometh into the world, he saith, Sacrifice and offering thou wouldest
not, but a body hast thou prepared me:
6 In
burnt offerings and sacrifices for sin thou hast had no pleasure.
7 Then
said I, Lo, I come (in the volume of the book it is written of me,) to do thy
will, O God.
This body that was prepared for Him,
is not only His earthly body which He dwelt in, but the very Body He now dwells
in. This is why we are a living
sacrifice. Some may taste actual death,
but others only that of pain and sorrow.
But the reality is that whatever He may have chosen for us, it is so
that like Paul, we may desire to know His suffering and be made conformable to
His death. Our identification as
intercessors is not only that we may be able to identify with those we pray for, because we have experienced it ourselves, but that we may identify with His
pain, His heartache, suffering, anger and disappointment, and if need
be, His death as well. As intercessors our identification is two-fold. We identify with man and with God. When we say, "Lord, I give
my body as a living sacrifice to Thee" , we by extension say, “Nevertheless, not
my will, but Your will be done.” I have
to ask, “Who is sufficient for this?”
Truth be known, no one is unless you have allowed Him to work this death
in you. To us He is calling not only to
experience pain and suffering, but also to embrace and accept the suffering He divinely gives to us. This would mean that we cease our moaning and complaining and stop resisting the work of the Spirit in this regard. There comes a time in your life where the gift of pain and suffering is from His very nail pierced hands, so that you may identify with His pain in a very real felt way. This is the privilege of
pain.
I could never truly understand why
the martyrs of old considered it a privilege to die for Christ. Maybe you think me strange for saying this. Sometimes we can so easily ascribe to something,
claiming that we will gladly die for Him, but not truly understand why it is a
privilege. The martyrs of old did not
just count it a privilege, they longed for it with their whole being.
Think on that for a while. They truly longed
for it.
Why?
It is only of late that I have come to realize that the privilege lies
in the fact that when we come into a trust relationship with Him, He shares His
heart with us. I have said before, He does not share His heart just for the sake of it. He shares His heart with those He can trust, and trust is earned. He shares His pain, His
suffering, His joy and His love. This is
a real felt experience that increases as our heart is enlarged to receive
it. And of course, this enlargement comes with a huge
price. However, what a privilege to be
able to be trusted with His heart. Those who are willing to embrace and accept
His pain and suffering, will also share in His glory, which He has reserved for
them. There is only one man who knew in
part what the cross of Christ felt like. This
was the man called Simon. He was called to help carry the cross for Yashua on the way to Golgotha. As followers
of Christ we get to carry our own cross, but as intercessors by identification,
we get to carry His cross. There are many Christians out there who carry their cross, but few who carry His. What a privilege, words fail me. This is why the martyrs of old wanted to die for Him, and the greatest privilege for them was to be crucified like their Savior.
He is greater than our suffering. He wants us to be able to trust Him when it comes to physical and emotional pain. To know that He has a far greater purpose with it, in the same way that the disciples had no idea just how far reaching the crucifixion would be at the time Yashua first spoke to them about it. He gave His body, His soul and His Spirit. He trusted the Father with all three, and so He is asking us..."Will you trust Me?" Will you embrace what I have given you even though you do not understand. Will you praise and worship Me in spite of it, because you truly trust Me?
Sometimes we suffer needlessly
because of a wrong perspective of why we go through what we are going
through. Like Paul we kick against the goads, when in fact we need to embrace the pain in longsuffering,
endurance and patience for the journey set before us.
Hebrews 3: 1
Wherefore, holy brethren, partakers of the heavenly calling, consider the Apostle and High Priest of our profession, Christ Jesus;
What is our heavenly calling? A new and living way has been made for us to enter into the veil and from there have our being. This is where He calls us to in hiddenness. That is why it is called a new and living way. A new way of living. The place of intercession is beyond the veil from where we are to now live. In Him and in His suffering we identify as His Body with both the body, that is to say the Church, and we identify with the head, our High Priest. With Him we too ever live to intercede on behalf of the saints. This is the heavenly calling that He has prepared you for in everything you have gone through in your life as His priest.
Intercession is not prayer, but
prayer is an extension of intercession. Why? Because intercession is life and life is intercession. Prayer is but an extension of intercession, but our whole life, just like His, is intercession by means of identification. This is the
privilege of pain. The question then to
all of this is, “What is your disposition towards your pain?” “What is your
disposition towards your loneliness or your trials?” Is it just so that you could just get through
it and hope that it will pass? Have you placed a limit to your
pain? Or are you counting it a
privilege? Chuck Pierce made the following quote.
“We think of a martyr as one who dies for his faith; however, it is really one whose life is so totally committed to his faith. His death does not make him a martyr; it only confirms that he was truly a martyr” - Chuck Pierce
A few years ago I asked Him to pour out His love in me, but I was not asking just for a normal infilling. I was asking for the type of love that transcends human capability. I believed He placed that desire in me and has prepared me ever since. At that point He said to me that I do not know what I am asking of Him. This was a strange thing to say. To which He replied, “No one has greater love than He who lays down His life for his friends”. He was saying, "It will cost you your life."
Love is not a feeling, as much as it is an act. The love He has for us that we want so desperately, is a love that will require of us to express it by laying our lives down. Only His love in us, not our own, will create in us a longing to die for Him and for those He loves. That is the outflow of His love. For God so loved the world, that He gave His only Begotten Son...It is a love that will cause us to bear all things, believe all things, hope all things and lastly, endure all things. Love is sacrifice. God is love. I want to end this devotional with a word He gave me last year, but will be understood better from the context of this devotional. I pray you know that there is no partiality with Him, and that to you too He promises this love.
NOTHING BUT LOVE…
My child, you are in a new season.
This season will require of you to trust me inextricably without
boundaries. More than ever to be as a
child. To not doubt, but always believe. Do no concern yourself with this world, but
as I have said…
Look unto Me.
Stay focused, stay committed to the way I have chosen for you. You may not understand the way I have chosen
for you. You may not understand and this
is good. For I do not desire for you to
understand, but to trust.
Trust and Obey.
I have said that I would guide you with Mine eye upon you. Not with My mouth, not with reasoning, but
with My eye. Though you may not
understand, you may know this.
I love you.
I know you love Me. Never doubt
these two facts. For love is the fulfillment
of the law. Draw near to Me, stay near
to Me. Not by doing, but by a
disposition of love. For love conquers
all. Love endures all, hopes all and
believes all. So come, and do not
fear. I am always with you.
There will be times when you will feel you will no longer be able to
endure, but as I said,
Love endures all things.
Nothing more is required but love.
Not your love, but Mine. I will
pour out My love into your heart at the right time. Will it be as you expect? No.
For you cannot put Me in a box.
Faith has no limits, neither does love.
So come. Come in the insurance
that I will never leave you and remain in the posture of hope, faith and love,
of which the greatest is love. Hope does
not disappoint, faith has no boundaries, and love endures forever.
I am your reward.
Not a crown, not souls, nor anything else. I AM.
Have I not said that I am able to do super abundantly above all that you
could ask or think? Know then that I am
your all in all. That I fill all and so
I will fill you. This is your reward…I
AM your reward.
I love you My child, I love you.
Helen Rosevear said the following:
The question is not what is the price we must pay?
The question is not whether it is worth it?
The question is, "Is He worth it?"
This is the privilege of pain, that we may share in His suffering and so also in His glory.
