February 29, 2008

February 29, 2008

I want to follow this thread of restoration again today. There is a second dimension of restoration. We are all comfortable with restoration from disobedience. That’s something we can fit easily into our understanding of an all loving, all merciful God. We blew it-He fixed it! That is simply grasped. But what about the loss you have suffered because you completely obeyed what God required of you? Really, how do you reconcile obedience with loss?

We don’t associate obedience as requiring restoration, that entire thought process is disjointed. It’s is easier to justify and accept your restoration when the loss has been a result of disobedience. You can wrap your mind around the “why”. Cause & effect works perfectly for us. And, when your obedience to God becomes the culprit that takes everything away, we have learned to acknowledge that as sacrifice! But maybe that’s not what it is at all. The overwhelming majority of scriptural references related to sacrifice have to do with worship, not restoration. I am writing to someone today who obeyed God and it has cost you everything.

When God spoke to Abraham initially, he could not have known that incredible price that obedience would require of him. Hebrews 11:8 reveals this to us, “By faith Abraham, when he was called to go out into a place which he should after receive for an inheritance, obeyed; and he went out, not knowing whither he went.” All true obedience is blind because it involves a “yes” to a single frame of reference in our lives that is connected to an eternal purpose that we cannot see. When we answer the Call of God we do so in blind faith. Maybe that is why we call it faith!

Let’s talk about obedience to God for a moment. Your obedience to God, and your affirmative answer to His call, will involve three distinct life patterns you must embrace. They are found in Mark 8:34:35, “…whosoever will (1) come after me, let him (2) deny himself, and (3) take up his cross, and follow me…”

THERE IS NO PARTIAL ACCEPTANCE OF OBEDIENCE FOR THOSE WHO TRULY DESIRE INTIMACY WITH GOD! Jesus heralded this in Luke 14:33, “So likewise, whosoever he be of you that forsaketh not all that he hath, he cannot be my disciple.” JESUS HIMSELF FULFILLED WHAT HE WAS ASKING BY THE GIVING OF HIS ALL ON THE CROSS! Mark 15:34 shows Jesus’ struggle, “And at the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying, Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani? which is, being interpreted, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?”

OBEDIENCE DEMANDS WE BECOME VESSELS TO BE FILLED AND EMPTIED BY GOD! PICKED UP AND PUT DOWN! USED IN GOD’S HANDS TO POUR OUT HIS DESIRE ON OTHERS!

We can see a picture of this in 2 Corinthians 4:7, “…we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellency of the power may be of God, and not of us. We are troubled on every side, yet not distressed; we are perplexed, but not in despair; Persecuted, but not forsaken; cast down, but not destroyed; Always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our body…”

OBEDIENCE THAT IS NOT TIED TO GIVING OF WHAT YOU HAVE IS IMPERFECT! PARTAIL OBEDIENCE IS FULL DISOBEDIENCE! Matthew 19:16-22 displays this in the manner Jesus answered the Rich Young Ruler, “…If thou wilt be perfect, go and sell that thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven: and come and follow me. But when the young man heard that saying, he went away sorrowful: for he had great possessions.

Now, let’s get back to how we approach the subject of restoration when your only reference you can connect it to is obedience.

The Bible describes a great woman of Shunem. This woman had a desire to bless the Man of God without expectation of return or reward. 2 Kings 4:8-11 records this account, “And it fell on a day, that Elisha passed to Shunem, where was a great woman; and she constrained him to eat bread. And so it was, that as oft as he passed by, he turned in thither to eat bread.”

HER DESIRE WAS TO SUSTAIN THE MAN OF GOD WITH STRENGTH SO SHE MADE THE INVITATION AND STARTED THE GIVING PROCESS HERSELF! SHE WAS NOT FORCED BY FEAR, SHE WAS MOVED BY OBEDIENCE!HER SECOND GIFT WAS OUT OF WHAT SHE DID NOT HAVE - IT INVOLVED OTHERS - FELLOWSHIP

This great woman of Shunem didn’t stop there, she pressed even further, “And she said unto her husband, Behold now, I perceive that this is an holy man of God, which passeth by us continually. Let us make a little chamber, I pray thee, on the wall; and let us set for him there a bed, and a table, and a stool, and a candlestick: and it shall be, when he cometh to us, that he shall turn in thither.”

HER OFFERING INCREASED AS SHE DESIRED TO MAKE THE MAN OF GOD MORE COMFORTABLE! SHE EVEN WENT TO A DECORATIVE TOUCH BEYOND THE NECESSARY! SHE WANTED TO BE CLOSE TO THE SOURCE OF DIRECTION!

Her reward came in the form of a son. God blessed her womb at the command of the Prophet and she received what she could not produce on her own. But even though her heart was right and she had received a son from God, trouble found her in 2 Kings 4:19-20, “And he said unto his father, My head, my head. And he said to a lad, Carry him to his mother. And when he had taken him, and brought him to his mother, he sat on her knees till noon, and then died.”

SHE HAD DONE NOTHING BUT OBEYED THE DIRECTION OF GOD IN HER LIFE. SHE DIDN’T DESERVE THIS! WHAT DO YOU DO WHEN YOUR ONLY FAILURE IS THAT YOU HAVE OBEYED EVERYTHING GOD PUT IN YOUR HEART TO DO?Watch closely what she does in 2 Kings 4:21, “…she went up, and laid him on the bed of the man of God, and shut the door upon him…” What she thought was just a room for the Prophet now became a resurrection chamber for her son. She laid the harvest she received in the seed she had sown and went to find the Prophet. You know the story; God restored her son to her. All that you have lost through obedience will be returned to you! Listen to the words of Jesus in Matthew 19:29, “And every one that hath forsaken houses, or brethren, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or lands, for my name’s sake, shall receive an hundredfold, and shall inherit everlasting life.”YOUR OBEDIENCE WILL BECOME THE SEED THAT YOUR RESTORATION GROWS OUT OF. GOD HAS PROMISED THAT SEED TIME AND HARVEST WILL NOT FAIL AS LONG AS THE EARTYH EXISTS. THERE IS A PROGRESSIVE GROWTH OF OBEDIENCE IN YOUR LIFE THAT WILL NOT ONLY SUSTAIN YOU, IT WILL RESTORE YOU IF YOU SUFFER LOSS BECAUSE OF IT!

Watch how this restoration continues to follow the Shunemite woman in 2 Kings 8:1-6, “Then spake Elisha unto the woman, whose son he had restored to life, saying, Arise, and go thou and thine household, and sojourn wheresoever thou canst sojourn: for the LORD hath called for a famine; and it shall also come upon the land seven years.” It sounds like she has been asked to leave everything and start over in a strange place. It appears for her to continue to walk in obedience she will have to forsake everything, even the Prophets quarters!

Read on with me, “And the woman arose, and did after the saying of the man of God: and she went with her household, and sojourned in the land of the Philistines seven years. And it came to pass at the seven years’ end, that the woman returned out of the land of the Philistines: and she went forth to cry unto the king for her house and for her land.”

THERE IS A CRY FOR JUSTICE THAT IS UNDENIABLE WHEN YOU HAVE OBEYED WHAT GOD HAS INSTRUCTED YOU TO DO! GOD WILL RESTORE! HE WILL NOT SUFFER HIS FAITHFULNESS TO FAIL! WATCH HOW GOD BRINGS IT ALL BACK AROUND FOR THE GREAT SHUNEMITE WOMAN, “And the king talked with Gehazi the servant of the man of God, saying, Tell me, I pray thee, all the great things that Elisha hath done. And it came to pass, as he was telling the king how he had restored a dead body to life, that, behold, the woman, whose son he had restored to life, cried to the king for her house and for her land. And Gehazi said, My lord, O king, this is the woman, and this is her son, whom Elisha restored to life. And when the king asked the woman, she told him. So the king appointed unto her a certain officer, saying, Restore all that was hers, and all the fruits of the field since the day that she left the land, even until now.”

The word restore in this passage is the Hebrew Word “Shuwb” which means to put it back. It is a verb or action word. YOU NEED TO CRY BEFORE YOUR KING FOR THE RESTORATION OF ALL THAT YOU HAVE LOST IN YOUR PATH OF OBEDIENCE. GOD IS ACTIVELY MOVING TO BRING BACK EVERYTHING YOUR OBEDIENCE COST YOU!

Read your promises from Deuteronomy 6:1-11 aloud, “Now these are the commandments, the statutes, and the judgments, which the LORD your God commanded to teach you, that ye might do them in the land whither ye go to possess it: That thou mightest fear the LORD thy God, to keep all his statutes and his commandments, which I command thee, thou, and thy son, and thy son’s son, all the days of thy life; and that thy days may be prolonged. Hear therefore, O Israel, and observe to do it; that it may be well with thee, and that ye may increase mightily, as the LORD God of thy fathers hath promised thee, in the land that floweth with milk and honey. Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God is one LORD: And thou shalt love the LORD thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might. And these words, which I command thee this day, shall be in thine heart: And thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children, and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou risest up. And thou shalt bind them for a sign upon thine hand, and they shall be as frontlets between thine eyes. And thou shalt write them upon the posts of thy house, and on thy gates. And it shall be, when the LORD thy God shall have brought thee into the land which he sware unto thy fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give thee great and goodly cities, which thou buildedst not, And houses full of all good things, which thou filledst not, and wells digged, which thou diggedst not, vineyards and olive trees, which thou plantedst not; when thou shalt have eaten and be full…”

WHEN OBEDEINCE COST YOU EVERYTHING GOD WILL NOT BE MOCKED! HE WILL RESTORE ALL THAT YOU HAVE LOST AND WHAT SHOULD HAVE BEEN PRODUCED DURING THE SEASON OF YOUR LOSS!