His Word

"We only know Him to the extent we are seeking."

WE ACCEPT TOO MUCH without the confirmation of the Holy Spirit, making sense of things stated in the Word of God using our minds. We reason them out when so often in our heart, if we’d listen to Him, we’d know to search deeper. We should never accept anything blindly.

The story of the Gadarene demoniac is an example I frequently use. I’ve heard many versions of this story filled with half-truths, but in listening to the Spirit, there is so much we are meant to glean that has been lost in minutia. It isn’t about the Gadarene area, although that is where the story happened, nor about the hog farmers, what nationality they were. It is about the healing of a man’s mind and the size of the problem that was overcome by the compassion of the Messiah.

The story of Jairus’ daughter and the woman with the issue of blood are two others frequently used but misunderstood. Jairus’ daughter was raised from the dead. The woman with the issue of blood was saved from death. The Gadarene demoniac, told in the same chapter of Mark, was healed from the suicidal death the demons wanted to force him into. In one chapter are three resurrections.

They are also representative of Jesus’ death. You have healing of the mind, of the heart, and of shedding of the blood, just as in His death. They depict the family. There’s a man, a woman, and a child in each miracle. My point is, one brief glimpse doesn’t reveal the fullness of the truth in God’s Word. We can never exhaust His revelation to us, but if we don’t take the time to meditate in the Word and seek the voice of the Spirit, then we will miss out on what He delights in giving.

When Jesus spoke in parables, He stated plainly that it was so that some would hear and understand, and others would not. Why is this? We’ve read His remarks and decided He was being harsh. No, He wanted people to seek Him. These were the words of the psalmist, words they should have known. “When thou saidst, Seek ye my face; my heart said unto thee, Thy face, LORD, will I seek (Psalm 27:8).” It is the hungry soul, the one who thirsts for God, who will find themselves satisfied. It is the one who sits in His presence and desires more of Him who will be enriched.

We will only know Him to the extent we are seeking. If a newly married husband and wife come home after their wedding festivities and proceed to avoid each other, their relationship will suffer. God is on the throne of heaven, yes, but He is in your heart. So speak to Him. Take all your needs and desires to Him in prayer, and I mean everything. If you are having trouble finding time to study the Word and worship, ask Him to help you. If you are unsure how to cover some of your financial debts, ask Him to help you know where to cut costs and where to exercise your faith. Because God is not against you having things you enjoy.

Then take that relationship, the one that forms from your seeking Him, and apply it to what you hear of His Word. For it is HIS WORD. Every chapter and verse were spoken by Him through someone who was listening. That’s the fantastic miracle of HIS WORD, that so many from different generations, different cultures, from the oldest books of the Bible to those who translated it from Hebrew into Latin and from Latin into English and those who have dedicated themselves to making modern translations, all of them did it with the Spirit’s guidance. For when it comes to the Word of God, the Spirit of God is never absent from it.

All three stories from Mark 5 are of people who faced public ridicule. We can only see this when we put them as they stand, side-by-side. The Gadarene demoniac was widely known for his behavior, and after he was sitting in his right mind, the townspeople were more uncomfortable seeing him normal than when he was cutting himself and crying out amongst the tombs. They even begged Jesus to go. Jairus was a synagogue leader who, despite the controversy among those in the Jewish religious priesthood, sought out Jesus. Despite those mourning his daughter’s death and mocking the words of Jesus, he continued to believe Jesus would raise her from death. The woman with the issue of blood shouldn’t even have been in public. She was considered unclean and at great risk for speaking up.

We can also look at these three stories and see God’s perspective instead of ours. We look at a demoniac, but God heard a man begging for deliverance, a man who refused to die despite 2,000-plus demons possessing him. We look at a father with a dead daughter, whereas she wasn’t dead at all but sleeping. Jesus knew there was a supernatural which the people could not see and did not much believe in. We see a woman who went to many doctors and wasn’t better but worse; we see her fighting the crowd to reach Jesus’ garment. Jesus felt the power of God leave Him and knew, though many had been bumping up against him, that someone was healed.

Who told Him that but the Spirit of God, whose voice He knew? It is God’s perspective I most want to see, not my own. What looks like gobbledygook to me is clearly spelled out to Him. In the Holy Spirit, we have all the knowledge of God and man in infinite detail. He’s seen it all, heard it all, and remembers it all. He knows what every man and woman has said on this earth and also, what every demonic power has said on this earth and under this earth. Nothing is outside of His purview. He doesn’t see the future. He is the future. He doesn’t explain the Word. He IS the Word.

“Wait, I thought Jesus was the Word.” He is. But what does John 1:1 say? Here’s another often misinterpreted verse. “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” In this verse, we see the Word WITH God and the Word which WAS God. Two separate entities of the Word. The word “with” means “next to.” The word “was” is a being verb. Who is the I AM, the fullness of being itself? God – Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. We separate Jesus from the Spirit when the word “Christ” means “the Anointed One,” and the anointing on the Anointed One is the Spirit of God. They cannot and could not EVER be separated. Jesus told plainly that He spoke the words of the Father and did the works of the Father. They cannot be separated either. And the Spirit of God is the Breath of the Father, so again, no separation is possible. Jesus is the Word of God in John 1:14, the Spirit of God is the Word of God in the sword of the Spirit in Ephesians 6:17. Jesus is the perfect representation of the Father in Colossians 1:15.

“Is Christ divided?” (1 Corinthians 1:13)

Only through the Holy Spirit can we fully grasp the understanding of God’s truths. Read the Word of God in this light. Throw out all you’ve heard, right or wrong, and let Him speak to you. He will confirm what you know and correct what you’ve believed. This renews the mind, changes our way of thinking, and causes us to mature, and in our maturity, we will go far deeper into the things of God than we ever could as infants. Paul asked the church to mature, to move from milk to meat, and this was his heart on it. For God is not a feeling or an emotion or a wave of presence solely in the church sanctuary, but He is personal and to you personally, He has revealed Himself.

Background Image by Ilho Byun from Pixabay


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Suzanne D. Williams, Author
www.suzannedwilliams.com
www.feelgoodromance.com