Two things that touched me in the midst of my exams

I've been out of action for a while now, sorry about that, but here I am to share something I have enjoyed in the midst of my exams. 
Two things touched me the past 2 weeks:

1) The shepherding of the saints; I have been studying at the home meetings, it is so sweet to be with the saints even when I have to study while they are busy in the  meeting, and also studying at the sisters house when my flat gets a bit to quiet for me, there is something nourishing when I am with the saints. It helps me allot to just hang out where the saints are.

2) How very close and enjoyable the Lord is during the exams, the truth is that in busy and stressful times the Lord didn't go anywhere, He is still with me in my spirit, I just have to contact Him. The aim is not to get out of the situation but to bring the Lord into the situation. During the past 2 weeks I have realised that I can take everything to the Lord in prayer, and when I say everything I mean everything;, I can tell the Lord when I am stressed, I can ask the Lord if what I am planning for the day is according to His will, I can even ask Him to help me focus while studying, and those times when I just can't remember a answer in the exam, even though I memorised it, I can ask the Lord to help me remember my work and to be my peace. Praise the Lord we can bring everything to Him, if we really bring everything to the Lord in prayer we can learn to experience Him in every aspect of our lives! 

Your word is sweet unto my taste

I love the Word of God! How wonderful that we have the Word of the living God! The Bible isn't just some stories of history, dead letters on a page that we can read for inspiration. No! the Bible is the very breath of God! 2 Timothy 3:16 tells us that all scripture is God-breathed, how amazing is this! 
In my experience I have noticed how easy it is to come to the Bible in a religious way, reading it out of duty rather that coming to the Word to touch Christ. In John 5:39,40 the Lord said "You search the scriptures, because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is these that testify concerning Me. Yet you are not willing to come to Me that you may have life." We can come to the Word in a dead way, we can read the Bible and completely miss the Lord, this is terrible, and is not a good experience, instead we should come to touch the life in the Word, to touch something of Christ. I have experienced how easy it is to go back to my default setting of searching the scriptures without touching the Lord, out of myself I keep trying to read the Bible in a different way and by doing this I fail time and time again, but praise the Lord His life is in me! Out of myself it is difficult but by allowing Him to work in me and to bring me to His living and wonderful Word I can touch my Lord! He brings me to His Word every day and He nourishes me with all the riches it contains. I have realised how wonderful His Word is, every page is filled with nothing but Christ. 
A practical way to touch the Lord in the Word is pray-reading, you may wonder what this is; it is exactly what it sounds like; praying what you read, we can pray the Words of God back to Him, this is very sweet and enjoyable. There is a good booklet on pray reading that helps explain it, if you would like to read it just follow this link 

Why are you here?

Recently I went through a dry patch, or rather a huge desert according to my experience. I didn't understand what was going on, why was it so difficult to touch the Lord in this time. In this dryness it was so easy for me to pull back and not share my enjoyment of the Lord, even if it was just a little, also to pull back from the saints and fellowshipping with them.This resulted in a vicious circle, I'm in a dry place, don't want to share, no new water can then flow into me because I'm not allowing the water to flow out. And soon enough there I was dry and feeling sorry for myself. We are channels, if we want new living water to flow into us we need to flow out to other people. How convenient to try and blame this dryness on others but the truth is 1) No one wants to spend time with someone that is sulky and refuses to share what they are going through, have you ever tried to convince someone to open up to you when you know they need to talk about what's going on, and they just refuse to, this is really hard and after a while it's a unpleasant situation for others too, and 2) why are you really here?
Last night I finally opened up to a dear sister about what I was experiencing and she asked me a valuable yet simple question; why are you here? This question though so small exposed my motive. Why was I in the church life? Was I here to make friends? To social? OR was I here for Christ and nothing else. The thing is, if we are here for a reason other than Christ we will most probably leave because of that reason, for example; if I am in the church life because of a sister being nice to me and including me in everything, if my motive for being in the church is that sister, I will probably leave because of an offence with that sister.
Our motive should be Christ and nothing else, for this to happen we need a vision, we need to pray and ask the Lord to give us a vision for His body, for Zion. When our vision is right our motive too will be right. Praise the Lord He is faithful and true!

He has the water that we need!

I Just got back home after the prayer meeting and some much needed fellowship. A prayer meeting is so sweet, whenever I feel dry and discouraged it always helps to pray with the saints. I receive some much needed watering at every prayer meeting I go to. And tonight this watering was topped of with some sweet fellowship. My spirit is revived after this wonderful time with the Lord and saints. 
This reminds me of the water that the Lord spoke of in John 4, He has the water that can take away all our thirst. In our daily life we continuously need to drink water to survive, I can't drink all my water for the next month today, I need to drink water every day to stay healthy and alive. In the same way we need to drink the water that the Lord has every day to have a healthy spirit. Luckily this water is freely available, we can drink this water by calling on the Name of the Lord, pray reading a verse, praying, or fellowshipping with the saints. After tonight I feel refreshed, my spirit had a good drink of the water of life. How wonderful that we don't need things of the world to quench our thirst we just need Christ. Praise the Lord He is the source of the water of life and that He freely gives to all who come to Him. 
There is a wonderful hymn on this chapter in John that can be found at http://www.hymnal.net/hymn.php/ns/347 , which is definitely worth a read.

His fresh speaking...

I enjoyed something we touched in the sisters bible study today on campus.
John 3:34 " For He whom God has sent speaks the words of God, for He gives the Spirit not by measure."
How wonderful that we can receive the Spirit in abundance! and John 6:63b speaks some more on the 'words' mentioned in John 3:34. John 6:63b "the words which I have spoken to you are spirit and are life." The words mentioned here is the rhema word, this is the instant speaking of God. The Spirit is embodied in His words. When we receive His words by exercising our spirit, we get the Spirit, and we get Him as the the Spirit without measure! I also enjoyed to see that in John 3:34 it is because of the bountiful Spirit that Christ spoke the words of God, and the wonderful thing is we have the Spirit in us without meaure. When we touch the Spirit we touch the instant word of God. In Mark 13:11 we see that the Spirit can speak for us, and when the Spirit is speaking for us we speak the words of God! Mark 13:11b "do not be anxious beforehand about what you should speak, but whatever is given to you in that hour, speak that; for it is not you who are speaking, but the Holy Spirit." Praise the Lord we have the speaking Spirit in our spirit! Lord praise You for the speaking of the Spirit, let us keep turning towards You moment-by-moment and receive Your fresh speaking. 

Celebration Meeting in Pretoria

This is a short post just to share about our celebration meeting. The celebration meeting was today, students from Pretoria, Johannesburg and Roodepoort came together to share their portion of Christ. 
This is a very sweet time where we speak our enjoyment of the past 6 months to build each other up and nourish one another with Christ. 


1 Corinthians 14:3 "But he who prophesies speaks building up and encouragement and consolation to men."
1 Corinthians 14:31 "For you can all prophesy one by one that all may learn and all may be encouraged."
I enjoy these two verses very much, we all can speak in the meetings, it is good for us to stand up and speak something, even if it is a short word, because the speaking is for the building up of the body. Lord open our mouths to speak.


After today's meeting I am truly encouraged by all the students and how much they love the Lord, O Lord Jesus we love You! I was so exited to see how many students had a portion of Christ to share! Praise the Lord He is moving on the campuses in South Africa! 
Two students also got baptised today after the meeting, praise the Lord! I pray that there will be many more. 
Lord move in South Africa! Gain more ground in this country for the building of Your body. 

Zion

My enjoyment of the week's morning revival;


Psalm 84:5 "Blessed is the man whose strength is in You, 
In whose heart are the highways to Zion" 
Psalm 86:2 "Jehovah loves the gates of Zion
More than all the dwellings of Jacob."


Psalm 132:13 - 14 " For Jehovah has chosen Zion
He has desired it for His habitation.
This is My resting place forever;
Here will I dwell, for I have desired it."


Psalms often mention Zion, at some point we are going to wonder what this place is and why is it so significant. In the Old Testament we see Jerusalem the holy city, and in this city there is a high peak, this peak is called Zion, the temple was built on Zion. Jerusalem typifies the church, Zion typifies the overcomers in the church. It wonderful to see that this is what God desires, He desires His overcomers, the overcomers are His habitation where He can rest. I really enjoyed to see how important overcomers are to God, He desires the overcomers! This is what He longs for! 
When we pray to have a heart that is burdened for what God is burdened for this is the burden that we will get, we will be burdened for Zion because this is what God desires. The overcomers are for the building of the Body of Christ, the Body is part of their being. They long for the Body so that Christ can have His Bride. O Lord! bless us with a heart for Your Body, a heart for Zion!
I enjoyed to see how we can reach the high peak of Zion, we can reach this peak by praying. Prayer is so significant in God's economy, we can go before God in everything in every moment, in this way God is so available to us, to pray is to breath God in, when we pray we are receiving more of God! Praise the Lord! We can gain God by praying! We get our life from God we get everything from Him by praying, O Lord! Make us a praying people! Lord let Your people pray! Lord open our eyes so we can see how important Zion is, how wonderful and beautiful Zion is, grant us a heart that is burdened for Zion.

The dew from the womb of the dawn for Christ's satisfaction.

Psalm 110:3 " Your people will offer themselves willingly

In the day of Your warfare,

In the splendor of their consecration.

Your young men will be to You

Like the dew from the womb of the dawn."

Psalm 110:7 " He will drink from the brook by the way;

Therefore He will lift up His head."

I enjoyed this point the past week in the morning revival:

In order to cooperate with Christ's heavenly ministry in the day of His warfare, we need to rise up early in the morning to contact the Lord so that we may enter into the womb of the dawn to be conceived as the dew for Christ's watering.

Our time with the Lord in the morning isn't mainly for our satisfaction; it is for His satisfaction. When we rise early in the morning to spend time with the Lord we enter into the womb of the dawn. Here in the dawn something fresh of Christ is conceived in our being, making us the dew to water Christ for His satisfaction. Our personal time with the Lord is to make Him happy, to refresh Him by being the dew of the womb of the dawn for His satisfaction. Dawn refers to the first appearance of daylight in the morning. For us to be the dew of the womb of the dawn for the Lord's satisfaction we should be available to Him early in the morning.

Rising early in the morning is important because this is the best time to meet with the Lord. Brother Nee wrote in 'Early Rising'; "A sister once put it well when she said, 'How much a person loves the Lord can be judged primarily by the way he chooses between his bed and the Lord. Do you love your bed or the Lord more? If you love your bed more, you sleep a little longer. If you love the Lord more, you rise up earlier.'" 

There is a number of examples of people in the Bible that rose early in the morning; Abraham - Gen. 19:27;21:14; 22:3, Jacob - Gen. 28:18, David - 1 Sam 17:20, Mary - Luke 24:22; Mark 16:9; John 20:1, The Apostles - Acts 5:21 etc. Rising early has a great impact on our spiritual life, those that have learned to rise early know the significance of it. When we rise early in the morning we may ask; what should we do in this time? We fellowship with God, we praise Him, we read the Bible, and we pray. Not necessarily in that order or any specific order for that matter. 

Early in the morning is when we should be gathering the manna (Exo.16:14-21). Manna, signifying Christ, must be gathered before the sun rises, else it will melt. We need to gather the manna early in the morning before our day begins, when we do this we will be nourished and will have a good start to the day. Whether or not a person has gathered manna early in the morning can be seen in his walk during the day. It is so important to our spiritual life. 

When we want to practise rising early there is a few things to which we should pay attention; when you want to rise early, you must have the habit of going to bed early; do not set a too high standard, start at a moderate time for example 6:00 or when the sun is just about to rise, if the standard is too high you could get discouraged, take physical and environmental limitations into account, set a time, and then keep it; You will face difficulty in the beginning, it is always hard to form a new habit, but gradually your mind and body will begin to adjust. It is always important to take this matter to the Lord in prayer, He is so available to us, if we struggle with early rising we can tell Him; "Lord I struggle with early rising, but I know this is when I should gather the manna, Lord work in me concerning this matter." As a brother once said "be yourself until the Lord changes you."

So back to the beginning, this habit of rising early in the morning is to spend time with the Lord  mainly for His satisfaction. When He is satisfied we are satisfied. Those who offer themselves in the splendor of consecration are the dew of the morning to water Christ, and the overcomers are the brook in Psalm 110 to quench His thirst. When Christ is taking the lead in the warfare as seen in this Psalm, He will need water to drink, and this water is the overcomers. Praise the Lord! This is wonderful! Let us meet Him early in the morning for His satisfaction and enjoyment. In the morning revival it says; "He is our living water, and we are His drink. He is our refreshment, and we are His refreshment." 

Christ as food to be our supply

Bread is food, we eat food, when we eat food our body breaks it down, through metabolic processes, into smaller components that can be absorbed and be assimilated into our body. Eating is enjoyable, tasting our food is a good experience. But why do we eat? We eat because the food supplies us so we can live, if we don't eat we won't be able to live, we will die. 

In John 6:35a it says; "Jesus said to them, I am the bread of life;", and in John 6:57 He said "As the Father has sent Me and I live because of the Father, so he who eats Me, he also shall live because of Me." this shows us that Jesus is available for us to eat of Him, the Lord Jesus is telling us that we can eat of Him. To eat Him is to take Him in so He can become a part of us, it is by this process of taking Him in that we live by Him, and He lives in us. By doing this we receive His life, by taking Him into our being we will live because of Him. This is wonderful! Praise the Lord that we can eat and enjoy Him! When we eat Christ we enjoy Him as our life supply and He lives in us. Rom 8:10a says "But if Christ is in you," Christ can dwell in us, He dwells in us as the Spirit, the footnote on this verse is so sweet "In this verse the Spirit is not mentioned, for here the emphasis is that Christ today is the Spirit and that the Spirit of Christ is the very Christ in us. According to the fact, it is Christ; according to the experience, it is the Spirit...As the Redeemer, He has the title Christ; as the Indweller, He has the title the Spirit. There are not two who dwell in us but one Dweller in two aspects." When we eat Christ and He enters into us He dwells in us! Praise the Lord!

So how do we eat Christ? We can call upon the name of the Lord Rom 10:12b "for the same Lord is Lord of all and rich to all who call upon Him;". Calling on the name of the Lord is so precious, when we call upon His name we can touch Him and experience His riches. How precious it is to call Him. Jeremiah called on the name of the Lord, he also explains to us that to call on the name of the Lord is to cry to Him and to experience spiritual breathing. Lam. 3:55-56 "I called upon Your name, O Jehovah, from the lowest pit. You have heard my voice; do not hide Your ear at my breathing, at my cry."  In Isaiah 12:2-6 Isaiah also tells us that our calling upon the Lord is our crying to Him. There is many examples in the old testament of people calling upon His name. In the new testament, in Acts 2:21 Stephen called on the name of the Lord while he was being stoned. In Acts 9:14 it indicates that the people who called on the name of the Lord were the Christians. 1 Cor 1:2b " with all those who call upon the name of our Lord Jesus Christ in every place, who is theirs and ours." 2 Tim 2:22 " Flee youthful lusts, and pursue righteousness, faith, love, peace with those who call on the Lord out of a pure heart." It is normal and healthy for Christians to call on the name of the Lord. Out of experience I can say that the Lord truly is rich to all who call upon Him. 

Another way for us to eat Christ is by pray-reading the word. The word can be so rich to us when we muse over it, we need to spend time in the word, John 1:1 tells us that the Word is God, when we spend time in the word we touch the Living God! How wonderful! 1 Tim 4:6 tells us we can be nourished by the words of the faith. This shows us that God's word is food to nourish us.  The function of the word is to impart God into us as life, when we read the Bible we should take something of God's essence into us just as we take in our food. When we pray-read we are taking in God's word by prayer. Eph 6:17-18 tells us to receive the sword of the Spirit, which Spirit is the word of God, by means of all prayer and petition. We are to take the word of God (which is Christ - John 1:1, 14) by means of all prayer and petition. This is pray reading. Pray-reading the word is to pray the word that we read.

Both calling on the name of the Lord and pray-reading is for us to take Christ in and to enjoy Him as our supply. We should practice to call and to pray-read corporately (2Tim 2:22). The nourishment obtained from the Lord by calling on Him and pray-reading is for the whole Body not just for one member. You will profit by calling and pray-reading alone, but you will see and experience the difference when you come together with other members of the Body. 

O Lord! Praise You we can eat and enjoy You. You are the true food that we need, we want to be nourished by You continually. Lord Jesus! You truly are rich to all who call upon Your name, Lord we love Your name and Your word!

Light!

John 1:4-5: "In Him was life, and the life was the light of men.

And the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not                        overcome it."

John 8:12: "Again therefore Jesus spoke to them, saying, I am the light of the world; he who follows me shall by no means walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life."

1 John 1:5: "And this is the message which we have heard from Him and announce to you, that God is light and in Him is no darkness at all."

Praise the Lord for this word! He is the light, He Himself is the very light that shines in our being. 

Footnote 4 on 1 John 1:5 opens this wonderful word up: "As light is the nature of God in His expression, so darkness is the nature of Satan in his evil works (1 John 3:8). Thank God that He has delivered us out of the satanic darkness into the divine light (Acts 26:18; 1 Pet 2:9). The divine light is the divine life in the Son operating in us. This light shines in the darkness within us, and the darkness cannot overcome it. When we follow this light, we shall by no means walk in darkness, which according to the context is the darkness of sin."Today this really touched me, to know that the Christ who is in me (Rom 8:10) is the light that shines in the darkness. By nature we were dead in sin, but Christ came as the life giving Spirit to fill us with Himself, to shine Himself into us. Our sinful nature cannot survive in the divine light of our Lord.

1 John 1:7 tells us that we can walk in the light, and 1 John 1:5 tells us that God is light, how wonderful! We can walk in God! We can dwell in God, we can dwell in Light! The Lord is in us as light that shines in us, light that removes the darkness from within our being, and He is the light in which we can walk, light in which we can live.

Lord Jesus! Praise You, You are the light, praise You we can walk in You as the light. We desperately need to experience You in this way, as the indwelling light in our being that we can dwell in. Praise You, You are a mysterious and wonderful God!

To Dwell in Christ

This being my first post ever, I think I'll start it off on a good note by sharing my enjoyment from the morning revival. 

John 15:4 "Abide in Me and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it abides in the vine, so neither can you unless you abide in Me." 

I always assumed that to abide has the same meaning as to remain, but this week I learned that the Greek word translated 'abide' doesn't only mean to remain but also to dwell.  When we dwell in a home, we live in that home, we have our life in that home and experience that home. According to this we can say to abide in Christ is to dwell in Christ. To dwell in Christ is to take Him as our everything, to have our life and living in Him, to experience Him in the fullest way. How wonderful this is! We can dwell in Christ and He can dwell in us [John15:4]. A mingling of man and God. How marvellous that the Triune God dwells in man to be man's supply, and man can dwell in God to experience Him to the fullest extend. A paragraph out of the morning revival explains this in a sweet way "The first issue of our abiding in Christ is that Christ and God abide in us to dispense Their riches to us, supplying and transfusing their riches into us. If we abide in Christ, He also will abide in us, enabling us to enjoy all the riches of His life." I like this word "transfuse". Transfuse means to pour out of one vessel into another, to cause to be instilled or imparted, to diffuse through, permeate. When Christ and God dwells in us we are being filled, saturated, permeated, with Their riches! This is wonderful! 

Lord Jesus! Saturate and Permeate us with nothing else but You.