What do you call faith?

Something a fellow forum member posted in a thread I asked to revisit regarding the things I blogged yesterday. I was in great crisis yesterday as I faced the question under a naked and glaring bulb: how do I receive You, Lord Jesus? Then I saw what my forum-friend wrote, and I heard the sermon by Driscoll, and I began looking in the right direction.

I spent a lot of time recently looking at the claims of one website which denounced Eldredge, Miller, Bell, McLaren, and many others. While some of the claims against some authors, notably Tony Campolo, had some merit, many other claims were based on a very spurious point. It went something like this: Eldredge and others teach you to get alone and listen for God's speaking. Since the bible says we are to pray verbally, any advice to listen to God is New Age, and an open door to the enemy. Pretty ridiculous reasoning.

I wondered as I went to bed last night--are things, even down to the closest relationships in my life a lie, or are You the liar? It felt like this matter HAD to be decided as an either/or. This is the thrust of those who would erect a cross here. All or nothing. To say anything else is to be a heretic and in danger of hell-fire. And by the way, decide NOW! And behind it all, it seems that I'm actually facing that old Groucho Marx question: Who ya gonna believe, me or your lyin' eyes?" Only now, You're asking the question. Do I reject everything that has come to mean "relational interaction" between Thee and me as a thing evil? Do I return to a faith-on-paper life and cast in the fires of judgment all that You seem to say that is of a personal and guiding and loving nature--even those things I find confirmed in Your Word? I ask, because to throw away every text that has been black-listed by those You've placed in leadership over me throws this away, too.

Last night, in bed before I slept, I came through the crisis of whether my debate was all within my own heart; whether it ended there. Was I just a reactionary, mildly delusional woman who just needed and got a good dose of reality? Many would say yes. But even last night, I committed my will to the reality of Your presence in my life...Your real, Holy Spirit presence. And before I slept, I remembered two things You'd told me recently:
1) All has not yet been revealed...
2)The altar is accepted...
If an offering I am to make--and this You've shown me in that domain of Your Spirit where we commune--then there must be an altar. I am exploring every grain of wood upon it, O Ezekiel.

Now this morning, I go into Your word and find You confirm my faith pledge of my will to Thee. I read in Mark 6 and 8 the stories of the feeding of the 5000 and the 4000. After the feeding of the 5000, You went walking on the water before Your disciples, and they thought You a ghost and were terrified, and this after they'd almost let You walk right past them. Why? Their hearts were too hard to remember the miracle of the loaves.


Mar 6:46
And when he had sent them away, he departed into a mountain to pray.
Mar 6:47
And when even was come, the ship was in the midst of the sea, and he alone on the land.
Mar 6:48
And he saw them toiling in rowing; for the wind was contrary unto them: and about the fourth watch of the night he cometh unto them, walking upon the sea, and would have passed by them.
Mar 6:49
But when they saw him walking upon the sea, they supposed it had been a spirit, and cried out:
Mar 6:50
For they all saw him, and were troubled. And immediately he talked with them, and saith unto them, Be of good cheer: it is I; be not afraid.
Mar 6:51
And he went up unto them into the ship; and the wind ceased: and they were sore amazed in themselves beyond measure, and wondered.
Mar 6:52
For they considered not [the miracle] of the loaves: for their heart was hardened.

So later when You fed the 4000, and then You proceeded to be straight away asked yet again for a sign by the Pharisees, You sighed Your deepest of sighs over their demand, because You were "seeing" more than just what was before Your eyes...You were seeing the end of the age. And when You therefore told Your disciples to beware the leaven of the Pharisees and of Herod, here again they had the chance to get the point, but they didn't. They took Your words to be about whether they remembered bread for this boat trip that followed this feeding. They made the here and now simply that, and made Your instruction about their immediate existence and took it in the vein of condemnation. And You said:


Mar 8:17
And when Jesus knew [it], he saith unto them, Why reason ye, because ye have no bread? perceive ye not yet, neither understand? have ye your heart yet hardened?
Mar 8:18
Having eyes, see ye not? and having ears, hear ye not? and do ye not remember?
Mar 8:19
When I brake the five loaves among five thousand, how many baskets full of fragments took ye up? They say unto him, Twelve.
Mar 8:20
And when the seven among four thousand, how many baskets full of fragments took ye up? And they said, Seven.
Mar 8:21
And he said unto them, How is it that ye do not understand?

You taught them to look to the larger meaning of the events of the story of life that played before them and involved them, but was nevertheless a story bigger than they were. Consider things like the number of loaves, You said. And this is the same sort of thing You say to me.

Then You proceeded to heal a man in two stages, one who had obviously been able to see at one time for he know even in that half-way point inhis healing what a tree and what a man should look like. Did they understand why such a healing should "go there" in this Gospel telling?
And then, even Peter had to hear this from Jesus after Jesus had looked at all of them:
Get thee behind me, Satan: for thou savourest not the things that be of God, but the things that be of men. (8:33) Who hears that today? Even Peter?

So here was the question for me, as well. Would I walk with the Word in my hand, but continue to look at the events of life by limited vision? Or would I allow You to interpret them for me, in Your beautiful way? O God, may I never reason within myself condemnation over my lack of "real" bread when You are trying to give me hidden manna! I see now the machinations of Satan in these things that have tried my faith. It is like a bill before congress. To reject the bill is a wise thing, as much in the bill may indeed deny Your virgin birth, heaven, hell, etc. But, pork has been added to this bill...pork that should not be thrown away, the pork mentioned in the initial quote: the idea that if a person will actually listen to You, that person is embracing things New Age and evil. So what am I to do? Line item veto. But what do I say to those leaders who refuse to use such a tool? For their sake, I finish out that chapter from Mark:

Mar 8:34
And when he had called the people [unto him] with his disciples also, he said unto them, Whosoever will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me.
Mar 8:35
For whosoever will save his life shall lose it; but whosoever shall lose his life for my sake and the gospel's, the same shall save it.
Mar 8:36
For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?
Mar 8:37
Or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?
Mar 8:38
Whosoever therefore shall be ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation; of him also shall the Son of man be ashamed, when he cometh in the glory of his Father with the holy angels.

Will I be ashamed of Thee? No, I embrace Your testimony of Yourself to me.
I remember the words of Joshua...all the words of Joshua, not just the last part, easily thrown up in sanctimonious cross-stitching on people's comfy living room walls, but the whole passage. And I pray to humbly walk with Thee in all of it:

Jos 24:15
And if it seem evil unto you to serve the LORD, choose you this day whom ye will serve; whether the gods which your fathers served that [were] on the other side of the flood, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land ye dwell: but as for me and my house, we will serve the LORD.
Amen.