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This is a continuation of what I posted here from my friend Art.
What a wonder our Papa is as he lovingly walks us through His maze of Grace!
Rich
My Personal Testimony Concerning His Shining Light of Life
Just such an exposure to the light came to me by my stress induced heart attack that occurred November 6th 1994. Since that heart attack, I’ve come to see my “self,” that is my real condition, in His light and as He had long seen and known me. The veil has been rolled back to allow me to now see how I, as an independent self-abled self, who had been attempting to live my secular and even my Christian life by my self-will and self-strength; apart from trusting Christ as my all. I saw that my self-life was one of always trying to control everyone and everything around me. I saw that it was rooted in my insecurity – because I had not yet come to trust God for my daily life. Living by self-effort, I was making the Christ who lives in me essentially of no beneficial effect in my life – and so the load was heavy. I never found rest when I attempted to fix and control things on my own. Even when it seemed all was under control, I was still not at rest for fear that something might be about to go out of my control.
The day after I left the hospital, after the heart attack, I sat with my Bible open, seeking Him to show me why such a thing had happened to me. I then felt I was under His loving divine illuminating radium as He spoke to me saying, “I’ve dealt with you and your relationship to the world, but now I’m dealing with your very “self.” I did not at that time understand His words but I melted with tears flowing, as I innately knew that He was not condemning me, but rather I sensed His unconditional love, and that he was bringing me onward to know Him in a deeper way. This realization came to me by His exposing me and diminishing my independent “self,” my self-godhood, which long had been in the way of my finding rest in Him.
I had always lived by my own self-strength and control. To understand the basis of the independent self in a Christian, we must know the true condition of all men before and after they come to Christ. 1.) We’ve all been raised under a merit system of sorts, “Little Johnnie or Susie, you do this, and you’ll get this”. We’ve been trained to “perform” or else. 2.) We’re all born into this world incomplete until our spiritual rebirthing, when Christ completes our creation (Col. 2:10). Once and for all, the Fathers love and grace births Christ into us when we are born of Christ’s Spirit (Jn 3:6, Rom 8:8-10). Yet, glorious as that spiritual rebirth and reconciliation was for me in 1968, my “soul-self” was still at that time totally in control and untouched…awaiting His later work of renewal, a “saving of my soul’s way of living” (Rom 5:10).
Thankfully, God is faithful to His task of renewing our sick souls. It may come 10, 20 or 30 years after our initial salvation, nevertheless, He is working to set the stage for the renewing our soul, bringing us into the glorious liberty of the sons of God. God is at work in those darkest hours of our lives, into which the light of His life can shine with its divine, curative, radium (His light).
Philippians 2:13 For it is God which worketh in you…. 2 Peter 1:19 … ye do well that ye take heed, as unto a light that shineth in a dark place, until the day dawn, and the day star arise in your hearts.
What a wonder our Papa is as he lovingly walks us through His maze of Grace!
Rich
My Personal Testimony Concerning His Shining Light of Life
Just such an exposure to the light came to me by my stress induced heart attack that occurred November 6th 1994. Since that heart attack, I’ve come to see my “self,” that is my real condition, in His light and as He had long seen and known me. The veil has been rolled back to allow me to now see how I, as an independent self-abled self, who had been attempting to live my secular and even my Christian life by my self-will and self-strength; apart from trusting Christ as my all. I saw that my self-life was one of always trying to control everyone and everything around me. I saw that it was rooted in my insecurity – because I had not yet come to trust God for my daily life. Living by self-effort, I was making the Christ who lives in me essentially of no beneficial effect in my life – and so the load was heavy. I never found rest when I attempted to fix and control things on my own. Even when it seemed all was under control, I was still not at rest for fear that something might be about to go out of my control.
The day after I left the hospital, after the heart attack, I sat with my Bible open, seeking Him to show me why such a thing had happened to me. I then felt I was under His loving divine illuminating radium as He spoke to me saying, “I’ve dealt with you and your relationship to the world, but now I’m dealing with your very “self.” I did not at that time understand His words but I melted with tears flowing, as I innately knew that He was not condemning me, but rather I sensed His unconditional love, and that he was bringing me onward to know Him in a deeper way. This realization came to me by His exposing me and diminishing my independent “self,” my self-godhood, which long had been in the way of my finding rest in Him.
I had always lived by my own self-strength and control. To understand the basis of the independent self in a Christian, we must know the true condition of all men before and after they come to Christ. 1.) We’ve all been raised under a merit system of sorts, “Little Johnnie or Susie, you do this, and you’ll get this”. We’ve been trained to “perform” or else. 2.) We’re all born into this world incomplete until our spiritual rebirthing, when Christ completes our creation (Col. 2:10). Once and for all, the Fathers love and grace births Christ into us when we are born of Christ’s Spirit (Jn 3:6, Rom 8:8-10). Yet, glorious as that spiritual rebirth and reconciliation was for me in 1968, my “soul-self” was still at that time totally in control and untouched…awaiting His later work of renewal, a “saving of my soul’s way of living” (Rom 5:10).
Thankfully, God is faithful to His task of renewing our sick souls. It may come 10, 20 or 30 years after our initial salvation, nevertheless, He is working to set the stage for the renewing our soul, bringing us into the glorious liberty of the sons of God. God is at work in those darkest hours of our lives, into which the light of His life can shine with its divine, curative, radium (His light).
Philippians 2:13 For it is God which worketh in you…. 2 Peter 1:19 … ye do well that ye take heed, as unto a light that shineth in a dark place, until the day dawn, and the day star arise in your hearts.
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BEAUTIFUL
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