December 19, 2009 What God is telling me

"What I tell you in the darkness, speak ye in the light" (Matt. 10:27).

Last Sunday my pastor challenged us to be in the Word. Not just to read it but to watch for and listen to what God was telling us individually.

I have been experiencing a bout of depression - whether from hormonal deprivation on my anti-cancer drug or spiritual warfare - it was an unfamiliar and difficult time. I opened the word Tuesday Morning, asking God to restore my joy. An online devotional I'd read that morning suggested John 15 as a passage to pray over. As I began to read and pray for understanding, each word sank in with fresh meaning. I read slowly, pausing for God's clarification this time:

"I am the true vine, My Father is the vinedresser. Every branch in Me that does not bear fruit, He takes away; and every branch that bears fruit, He prunes it so that it may bear more fruit. You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you. 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."

It soaked in, filling me with a fresh understanding. Abiding in Him, the living Word. And the Word in me. I realized that the joy I sought, required my participation, my ingestion of His Word. I grabbed a 3X5 card and began to write out this passage to memorize. I read on:
"I am the vine, you are the branches; He who abides in me and I in Him, he bears much fruit, for apart from Me you can do nothing. If anyone does not abide in Me, he is thrown away as a branch and dries up; and they gather them, and cast them into the fire and they are burned. If you abide in Me and my words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you."

I felt my excitement growing. This is what my pastor was talking about. I was hearing God speak to me. I was "getting it". My prayer for restored joy was being answered here:

"My Father is glorified by this, that you bear much fruit and so prove to be My disciples. Just as the Father has loved Me, I have also loved you; abide in My love. If you keep my commandments, you will abide in My love; just as I have kept My Father's commandments and abide in His love. These things I have spoken to you so that My joy may be in you, and that your joy may be made full."

My jaw dropped open at these last words. I had prayed for joy. I hadn't searched my concordance for passages on joy and yet here it was, telling me just what would resore my joy.

A friend recently shared that each Christmas she asks Jesus what he wants from her for His birthday. I liked that and prayed that He would tell me what I could give Him. This is my answer: He wants my time with Him - abiding in Him through the prayerful study of His Word and letting Him abide in me as I memorize this and other passages that He gives me.

The very next day, as I was rushing in the morning, deprived of my bible time. I found myself reciting these words "I am the true vine, my Father..." I smiled to myself, knowing the He, indeed, was abiding in me.