Day 2

I love what Bob Sorge says about fasting on p. 43 of our “Secrets of the Secret Place” book—

Oh, what an awesome little gift this fasting thing is! It’s probably one of the most under-rated, under-employed, misunderstood gifts of grace. There is no spiritual merit in fasting; it doesn’t earn extra points with God. But it does tenderize your spirit, sensitize your hearing, and accelerate the pace of divine flow in and through your life. For those committed to exploring spiritual violence, fasting is a true friend.

Today was better, bloggerbuddies! I’m a little less antsy and more focused, although a lot hungrier. It’s probably a bonus that I feel weak, because I’m not tempted to do anything that takes any energy, and that’s a GOOD thing!

One of the things I’m doing today is to begin rereading “After God’s Own Heart” by Mike Bickle, a book about David that Annette gave me a couple of years ago. Bickle has a huge ministry (1,000 fulltime people!) as the leader of the International House of Prayer in Kansas City. If you were at the IWI, you remember Bob Sorge talking about what God is doing there, the 24/7 worship, the bridegroom paradigm, and the habitation they are seeking. (I’ll loan my CD, if anyone wants to hear it.) Here are some of the thoughts from the book (which I’ll also loan) that I’ve meditated on today:

Today, as in David’s day, He seeks lovesick worshipers who understand how he feels. To worship in spirit is to worship deeply from a heart of total abandonment. Compare that to the limited way most people worship, staying within the strictures of external forms and religious rituals. True worship is not often seen on the earth. To worship, serve, and love the real way—God’s way—demands something more than what we usually see on Sunday mornings or Wednesday evenings. To worship in truth means more than just singing the right songs or striking the right worship poses: it means understanding the truth about God’s heart and personality. Worship is not a 20-minute period during a church service but a lifestyle of relating to God in a particular way. But if you look at the body of Christ today, you see that religion has burdened us with lies about God’s heart; it has hindered us from giving God the “love responses” we naturally desire to give him. The turbulent rivers of affection in God’s personality flow strong, and yet we respond with the drip-drip of ritual or passionless worship. When Jesus said in John 4:23 that God was seeking for worshipers, He was referring to the tremendous, fierce, fiery desire in His Father’s heart. That love seeks out lovers to requite His passion, to understand His love, and to worship Him drenched in the desire He has for us. That’s what it means to be a true worshiper. David was such a man. And we must be men and women like him.

The Holy Spirit is raising up shepherds to teach God’s people to live after his own heart. They will feed others from the reality they encounter through their own unyielding personal pursuit of God. They will only be able to shepherd others because they have given themselves wholly to the great Shepherd. Some of these shepherds will lead through preaching and some through writing, singing, or other skills and talents. Some will do it through one-on-one discipleship and spending time nurturing younger believers’ faith in a spiritual relationship. Some will do it in the context of their business or workplace. Perhaps you are called to be a shepherd, to aggressively pursue the knowledge of his personality in your own life so you can feed others with the truths you discover. I encourage you to pray specifically about this. What has God called YOU to do, bloggerbuddies? You can guess mine!

There’s one other thing I think I’m supposed to share with you, but I really don’t want to, so I waited until the end, and to be very honest, I’m hoping few people will wade through the rest of my post to get to this part. But at least I’m obeying, even if it IS reluctantly.

It’s pretty bizarre, but this morning I woke up with a lot of aches and pains in very odd places, and I haven’t done any exercise to make me sore, so I really think I’m carrying someone else’s pain. Yeah, I know that sounds crazy, and I’ve never actually heard or read of anyone else doing that (except Jesus on the cross, of course), but I’ve got a pretty long history of it, so it doesn’t freak me out. The first time was many years ago when a college friend of ours and his son were duck-hunting. Their boat capsized, and the dad drowned, but the son survived by hanging onto a tree that was in the water. By the time he was rescued, hypothermia had set in, and the doctors thought they’d have to amputate his legs. Well, as soon as I heard about it and began praying, I started having pain in my legs. I suppose that could have been just the power of suggestion, but in my spirit I KNEW I was carrying some of that kid’s pain. I don’t know if it lessened his pain or if it just served as a reminder to pray for him. Anyway, he’s walking around today on both legs, and MAYBE I played a very small part in that—or maybe not, who knows.

I have other more recent experiences I could share, but telling this stuff is really uncomfortable, so I’ll just tell one more from the past. I used to do pro-life talks in high school classes, and I always felt almost unbearable headache pain and nausea when I did. Driving home afterwards was torture, and it would take a day or two to get over it. Possibly it was just a satanic attack, but I always felt like somehow I was feeling some of the pain of the babies being aborted. OK, now you know I’m crazy.

Being Baptist, sometimes I’m embarrassed by the strange things God does in my life, but I’m learning by experience the truth that “God will offend the mind to get to the heart.” He has never been willing to stay in the boxes I put him in! Like Erik at the worship institute said, “God hides himself in a mysterious shroud so that we will diligently seek him.” Sometimes I find him in unusual places.

But the Bible is full of strange things, too. Wasn’t the scripture Darrell used Sunday about the seraphim with six wings strange? I rest my case.