Chapter Two (read it here)
The Blessedness of Posessing Nothing
Quote:
God let the suffering old man go through with it up to the point where He knew there would be no retreat, and then forbade him to lay a hand upon the boy. To the wondering patriarch He now says in effect, `It's all right, Abraham. I never intended that you should actually slay the lad. I only wanted to remove him from the temple of your heart that I might reign unchallenged there. I wanted to correct the perversion that existed in your love. Now you may have the boy, sound and well. Take him and go back to your tent. Now I know that thou fearest God, seeing that thou hast not withheld thy son, thine only son, from me.'
The old man of God lifted his head to respond to the Voice, and stood there on the mount strong and pure and grand, a man marked out by the Lord for special treatment, a friend and favorite of the Most High. Now he was a man wholly surrendered, a man utterly obedient, a man who possessed nothing. He had concentrated his all in the person of his dear son, and God had taken it from him. God could have begun out on the margin of Abraham's life and worked inward to the center; He chose rather to cut quickly to the heart and have it over in one sharp act of separation. In dealing thus He practiced an economy of means and time. It hurt cruelly, but it was effective.
(My emphasis above)
"Things" can sneak into our lives. Sometimes without our even becoming aware of them, aware of where they sit within our heart. An awakening like Abraham's is hard to contemplate, yet if we are honest to the Spirit, is not that how we all want to live? Totally and utterly, whole-heartedly surrendered, obedient -- and in essence possessing nothing. We can be surrounded by good things and enjoy them, yet if we can keep them at "arms' length" knowing they do not come to us through our own "goodness" or own power, then we are being wise.
I think this is a study of "every day" or needs to be. I need to be aware of the "things" in my life and where they fit into my heart and life. Are they "larger than life" and I shudder to think of their loss? Is this the way it ought to be? As Abraham, do I put my son or my husband into this place of my heart, instead of keeping it sacred and allow God to have the most utmost "high place" within my heart?
Quote:
We are often hindered from giving up our treasures to the Lord out of fear for their safety; this is especially true when those treasures are loved relatives and friends. But we need have no such fears. Our Lord came not to destroy but to save. Everything is safe which we commit to Him, and nothing is really safe which is not so committed.
And the paradox is if I hold so fast to those I love, both people and material objects, I will lose them. God is a jealous God, eager for the communion between my inner being and Himself, wanting nothing between Him & me. So, by surrendering my loved "things" unto Him, they are safer with Him than they ever were within my grasp.
Quote:
If we would indeed know God in growing intimacy we must go this way of renunciation. And if we are set upon the pursuit of God He will sooner or later bring us to this test. Abraham's testing was, at the time, not known to him as such, yet if he had taken some course other than the one he did, the whole history of the Old Testament would have been different. God would have found His man, no doubt, but the loss to Abraham would have been tragic beyond the telling. So we will be brought one by one to the testing place, and we may never know when we are there. At that testing place there will be no dozen possible choices for us; just one and an alternative, but our whole future will be conditioned by the choice we make.
(Empahsis mine above, both bold and italicized.)
This is why this is an "every day" kind of "ritual"-- searching my heart, giving Him all that is held there, surrendering and willing to be obedient in all things. We may never know when the testing is coming, nor even when it has come & gone, but our lives will show its taking place, I think... if not to the world, definitely to Him who made it. As Scrip-ture states that we ought to be ready to give an answer at any moment, so we need to be willing & ready to give it all up at one word from Him who loves us so much.
May we all come to the point where we can pray Tozer's prayer ourselves:
Quote:
Father, I want to know Thee, but my coward heart fears to give up its toys. I cannot part with them without inward bleeding, and I do not try to hide from Thee the terror of the parting. I come trembling, but I do come. Please root from my heart all Those things which I have cherished so long and which have become a very part of my living self, so that Thou mayest enter and dwell there without a rival. Then shalt Thou make the place of Thy feet glorious. Then shall my heart have no need of the sun to shine in it, for Thyself wilt be the light of it, and there shall be no night there. In Jesus' name, Amen.
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