Friday, September 9, 2011

On The Mountaintop

In Genesis 22, God brought Abraham to a place of testing and He told Abraham to take Isaac, his only son, and to bring him up to the mountain as a sacrifice. God was bringing him to a place of obedience. And Abraham, the father of faith passed the test with flying colors, as we used to say, because we all know that when Abraham arrived, the sacrifice he was supposed to make had been provided for him. The ram in the bush. Nevertheless he still had to do what God told him to do. He had to believe God in spite of what things looked like, in spite of what they felt like, and just had to trust God for the result. And God came through!


Sometimes we may feel as though we are in a place of testing. We are going through things and they don’t feel good. People are doing things that challenge our Christianity. They’re saying things that we never thought they would say (or not saying them). People are hurting us. Our faith is being stretched. We find ourselves wondering about the promises of God. Asking, when Lord, why Lord, even WHY ME LORD? And we arrive at the place where we are either going to believe God or turn away but I hear the Spirit of the Lord asking, but where will we go? And we don’t have an answer. We are being tested. We are being tried. We are being stretched.


And we find ourselves in this bad place and we just can’t seem to get out of it. We don’t have the strength. We don’t have the energy. And we don’t even have the desire. And that’s the real thing. It’s almost as if we “enjoy” being where we are, being miserable, because the alternative or the place of obedience that God wants to bring us to, does not look too good to us either (or so we think). Because we first have to do something, to sacrifice something before we get there. And we simply don’t want to. But God yet wants to bring us there, to that place of obedience.


God is calling us to go up. To come out of the place that we are in and into that place of obedience where He has made provision. Where He has everything that we need to be better. That place on the mountaintop.


But in order to get there we are going to have to go with our sacrifice. Just like Abraham did. We’re going to have to sacrifice what we feel like doing and do what God wants us to do. We’re going to have to sacrifice our feelings about someone or something and walk in faith, not leaning on our own understanding. We’re going to have to go to Bible Study more than once a month; we’re going to have to go to church on a regular basis. (Yeah, it is about going to church. There is something to be said about being in the house of the Lord). We’re going to have to speak to people we don’t like. We’re going to have to apologize. To humble ourselves. To shut our mouths. We’re going to have to pick up our Bible and actually read it during the week and not just on Sunday, and not just when the preacher tells us to turn to this book of the Bible. And how about this one… we’re going to have to “ONLY BELIEVE.” And God will meet us on the mountaintop (just as He met Abraham) once we make up our mind to go.


The Scripture says the joy of the Lord is your strength. It says, in the presence of the Lord there is fullness of joy. If we are not in God’s presence, we are not going to have any joy. And if we don’t have any joy we won’t have any strength and we will stay in that bad place. But God! God wants us to press our way into His presence. To come up. To come to Him. We’ve got to go where He is. Go where is telling us to go. To the mountaintop. To that high place. To that place of obedience. To the place that He has made provision.


God is always telling us to come up. He is always telling us to look up. The Scripture says, “Look to the hills from whence cometh your help.” The hills are a high place. God told Moses to come up to receive the Ten Commandments. Moses needed to know what to do concerning the people of God and God made provision. God gave him instructions. God told John in the Book of Revelation to come up and He would show him of things to come (for He knows the thoughts He has for you. A future and a hope).


Come up. Go up. To the mountaintop. Where Abraham found provision. Where you will find provision for whatever it is you need. On the mountain of God. Where you will be refreshed, renewed, strengthened, encouraged, and given your promise. Whatever it may be.


Abraham had no clue what would happen when he got to the mountaintop, but he needed to be there. And when he got there God made provision. And then God spoke, “This is what the Lord says: Because you have obeyed me and have not withheld even your son, your only son, I swear by my own name that I will certainly bless you. I will multiply your descendants beyond number, like the stars in the sky and the sand on the seashore. Your descendants will conquer the cities of their enemies. And through your descendants all the nations of the earth will be blessed—all because you have obeyed me.” (Genesis 22:16-18)


Come up to the mountaintop. To that place of obedience. Get your provision and receive your promise. Thus saith the Lord.


God is real.


A servant of the Lord,

Sis. E