Let us have a word of prayer before I start.
Father, You know my heart, and You know that I would much rather live this out than try to preach about it. But, Lord, here we are before You, that You might reveal Your heart to us; and that You would be blessed by the things we share and the things we hear this morning, and that You would be exalted. We commit our hearts to You, in Jesus’ name. Amen.
I entitled this message, borrowing a line from a hymn in our songbook, “Heaven Came Down and Glory Filled My Soul.”
As an introduction, I just want to say that we are all very familiar with a number of ministries concerning how our Lord Jesus ascended into the heavens. The letter to the Hebrews talks about His wonderful ministry there in the heavens on our behalf, as an intercessor on our behalf, and all that He has done—shedding His blood all the way through the curtain, all the way to the very throne of God on our behalf.
We have also heard a lot of ministry on the book of Revelation, and of the Lord Jesus in His magnificence, in His new appearance, seated at the right hand of the Father. It was read this morning a little about the glory, honor, power, and strength that are in our Lord in the heavens.
Then we have also had ministry on the letter to the Ephesians and how it talks about how the Lord has ushered us into the heavens with Him. We are seated there in Christ Jesus in the heavens.
But there is also something else that the Lord has done on our behalf. I would like to read a couple of verses in John 14. Of course, this is the Lord speaking to His disciples around the table on that last night.
I am going to start with John 14:16-17:
I will pray the Father,
and He will give you another Counselor, to be with you forever,
even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive,
because it neither sees Him nor knows Him.
You know Him, for He dwells with you and will be in you.
So there we have the Spirit of the Father, who has been given to us—the Spirit of truth. He dwells with you and will be in you.
Then, just below that, John 14:18 and 20:
I will not leave you desolate; I will come to you.
In that day you will know that I am in the Father,
and you in Me, and I in you.
There we have the Lord Jesus, as the Son, saying that He is in us.
Then we turn over to John 14:23:
Jesus answered him, If a man loves Me, he will keep My word;
and My Father will love him,
and We will come to him and make Our home with him.
There, all three of the Godhead are promised to make Their home with us, or in us.
One other verse I want to read is in Ephesians, which I mentioned earlier. Of course, that is the letter that lifts us up into the heavens with the Lord, and yet Paul says, in Ephesians 3:14, “I bow my knees before the Father,” meaning that he is praying this for the saints.
Then, in Ephesians 3:17:
That Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith.
So there, even in the letter to the Ephesians that lifts us up into the heavens, it says that Christ dwells in our hearts.
We have this situation: the Lord is in the heavens, and we are in the heavens; but the Lord is also in us and dwells in us.
There are a number of attributes that the Lord has revealed to us in this age about who He is and what His nature is like. One of them is that God is immutable, meaning that God does not change. He does not and He cannot change.
God is God wherever He is. He does not change.
In the heavenlies, God has manifested Himself to us. We have glimpses of it in the different books of the Bible and the letters of the New Testament. Again, as I said before: His strength, His honor, His majesty, His magnificence—it is all there, revealed to us in all the glory and honor that are with the Lord.
The point is that those same attributes, those same strengths, honor, power, and glory are in us today—in you and me today. There is no difference. God cannot change. What He is in the heavens, He is in us right now, today.
That is what I want to emphasize this morning: whatever is true in the heavenlies is true in our lives.
There is something about God’s desire for us. A little pamphlet was written in 1954 by, I think, Robert Munger. It was distributed by InterVarsity Press, and then, of course, redistributed during the Jesus Revolution to all of us Jesus freaks. It was very illustrative—an illustration of something that is very true. It was called My Heart—Christ’s Home.
He uses the illustration of a man who comes to know the Lord and invites the Lord into his life. The Lord, in His great mercy and grace, comes into his life and is there with him. Then the man begins to open up the different rooms of his home to the Lord.
First, he opens up his study, or his library, and the Lord very graciously deals with some of the things that are perhaps a bit amiss in his life. He puts the Word of God as the first and foremost thing in his life.
Then he goes on to the dining room, and the Lord deals with some of his appetites and bodily desires, showing that the Lord is his manna and his food. He goes on to the other rooms of the house—his workroom.
Then finally, of course, there is that hall closet that most of us have in our homes, where things get stuffed. He has that hall closet, and it is locked. Nobody can get in there.
The Lord notices a smell—an odor coming from that room. It is not a good smell. The man had never really noticed it before, but the Lord noticed it. Then the man notices it.
Lastly, he opens up the hall closet and deals with the last vestiges of things that he tried to hide from the Lord, and it gets dealt with.
At the conclusion of this little pamphlet, the man realizes that it has all been taken care of. The Lord has gone through all the rooms and touched and dealt with things in his life. He feels pretty good about it.
But then he realizes, “Hey, wait a minute. He is still sort of like just an invited guest. He is a dweller in this house of mine—my house.”
He remembers, “Wait a minute. I do not know how to keep this thing running the way the Lord has set it up.” So he deeds the house over to the Lord and says, “It is Your house now. You get to run it the way that You desire to run it.”
So it is my heart, but it is Christ’s home.
It is true for us also that there comes a time in our lives when we need to say, “It is no longer my life to live and the things that I have desired or want to do.” The Lord really desires, as He dwells in our hearts and lives, “I want this to be My house. This is where I want to dwell”—where the Father, the Spirit, and the Son desire to dwell.
Madame Guyon said something that really spoke to my heart about this matter:
Do you not know that He wants you to seek Him no longer within you, but within Himself?
So the deed to the house, the deed to our heart, has been signed over. It is no longer that I am looking for the Lord who dwells within me, but it is in the Lord Himself that I come to, that I touch, and that I enjoy.
Of course, Hebrews 3:6 says:
But Christ was faithful over God’s house as a Son,
and we are His house, if we hold fast our confidence
and pride in our hope.
We are His house. What is true of the church, the body of Christ—the corporate expression of Christ—is true of us as individuals also. We are His house.
There we see the real desire of the Lord for us: that He would own us, that we would be His house, and that He would have His way with us.
I want to touch on just a few things in my own life. When I came into a fuller realization of this reality—that the Lord is there with me, and I can come and commune with Him at any time, any place, and in any situation—I saw that He is always available to me and to you. He desires to have communion with us.
The first realization I really came to was that the Lord is actually present in me, in all His glory, all His splendor, all His power, and all His might. He has made Himself available to me and to you.
A second thing that I came into a realization of is expressed in another quote from Madame Guyon. She puts it so succinctly, and she repeats this over and over again in her books. Fénelon does the same thing, repeating the same idea:
Everything that happens has all come to you by His will and by His permission.
You must utterly believe that everything that has happened to you is from God and is exactly what you need.
There is the realization that there is nothing outside of the Lord’s control that happens in my life. No matter how small it is, the Lord has allowed it to happen in my life.
Therefore, everything can become a lesson to us about who the Lord is and what He is trying to do with us. We do not ever have to think that something has happened to us by chance, or that something bad has happened to us. There is nothing bad that happens to us. It is all ordered by the Lord and given to us.
Then the Lord began to teach me about myself. I use the phrase “the finger of God.” Actually, it is the Spirit convicting me of different things in my life—small things, large things. He has been there to put His finger on things.
He has allowed things to rise up from my self-life—my self-love, my self-preservation, whatever it might be of self. He is so gracious to bring it about and to show me, and to show you also, what He wants to deal with at a particular time.
It is marvelous. The God of the universe would have that much time and that much concern for us as individuals—that He would put His finger on something so very small or so very large in our individual lives. But that is the truth. That is who our Lord is.
Something very small and trivial happened that I will share. Recently, I have been studying and reading the minor prophets. I go through them, and certain phrases and things I write out. I am like Kenny: I write out the Scriptures. I have thrown away a number of reams of paper, but I find that it speaks to my heart clearly when I write things out—when I write the Scriptures out.
I was reading in the book of Jonah and had just finished the fourth chapter. We all know what Jonah 4 is about. He is there watching over Nineveh and seeing what is going to happen. The hot sun is burning him, and he builds his shelter, but it is not sufficient. So the Lord raises up this tree to shade him during the day.
Then, as you know, the next morning the shade tree withers away. There is Jonah, grumbling and complaining about the plight in which he finds himself under the burning sun. He is bitter in his soul about it.
As I was writing out this verse, my pen dried up. You know, one of those little irritants in life. We all know what those little irritants are: red lights, having to go to the gas station and fill up your car, all these little niggly things that you have to do.
My pen ran out of ink. Of course, I got that little grumble, that little, “Oh, man,” you know.
I thought to myself, “The Lord has just showed me something. He has taught me something. You are Jonah.” Jonah was bitter about this plant that the Lord had given him. I had this little bitterness about this dried-up pen.
The Lord showed me His heart toward human lives, human hearts, and revealing Himself even to the Gentiles in that day. And here is little me, complaining about a little niggly thing.
I think we can all identify with something like that—the little things that bother us in life and that we think we have a little complaint about. Well, next time, think about it. What is the Lord teaching you through something as simple as that, something as little as that?
A couple of days later, the Lord began to put His finger on some larger issues that He began to reveal in my life.
I say this to my shame: I have been a Christian for a little over fifty years, and the Lord is revealing some things that have always been there, things that are an offense to Him and that He wants to deal with.
Yet they have always been there, and His love has always been there for me. It boggles the mind to think that the Lord has always known that. That whole closet has always been stinking, always smelling, but He has been gracious enough to still live in the house.
So He put His finger on my life again. This time, He revealed to me that I was being sarcastic. I was using sarcasm at various times against various people.
Of course, the person who uses sarcasm thinks of himself as just being witty. You are quick-minded. You have a certain degree of intelligence about things, so you can immediately say something or do something in a situation.
But then the Lord revealed to my heart, “No, sarcasm is not just being witty or being quick of mind. In reality, sarcasm is hurtful. It is biting. It is demeaning other people at your own expense.”
So the Lord showed me that and put His finger on it. He said, “Do not do that. You cannot do that.”
What was also so beautiful about that was that, normally in the world, you would say, “Okay, let us look at the psychology. Let us look at what causes me to be this, and let us deal with the root cause,” or whatever.
The Lord did not want to deal with me about the root cause. He just said, “Come to the cross. It is dealt with.”
What a marvelous thing—that something which has been there for fifty years, the Lord just graciously put His finger on and dealt with. I do not have to dig into it or into the past to find out why it is there or whatever. It is dealt with.
You know what that means: the assurance of the Lord in your heart that, yes, the Lord has done something. I know something has been done.
Then, a little later in my own experience, I realized that it is not only the things that He does not want me to do—my self-life, my self-love, my self-preservation, or whatever is left in us of self—but there are things He wants us to do also. Not just things He wants us not to do, but things He wants us to do.
When He put His finger on that, my immediate reaction was, “Oh no, He is going to ask me to do something grand, something great, something that is going to be horrendously costly to my self-life. Oh, Lord, You know how I try to avoid those kinds of things.”
But the Lord was very gracious. That day, I was reading Fénelon, and he said:
Great acts are rare. Great acts of virtue are rare.
But to do small things that are right continually, without being noticed, is much more important.
The small acts attack your pride, your laziness, and your self-centeredness.
What a relief that was to my heart, and perhaps to your hearts also. He was not asking me to do some great and grandiose thing that seemed impossible. He was saying, “Do the little things.”
Whatever the little things are—washing the dishes, going to work and earning a living, whatever it might be—just do the little things and do them right. Do them as unto the Lord. They will minister to you and to the Lord Himself.
I am so grateful. I could go on. I have a list of the various things that the Lord has spoken to my heart. It is just so wonderful, is it not, that the Lord would care that much about us?
It boggles my mind that the Lord is that precious to us.
Believe it or not, I am coming to the conclusion of my message. I just want to wrap it up with a few thoughts.
First of all, just a reminder that you and I are the Lord’s house, and that He lives inside of you. Just like I said at the very beginning, in all His magnificence, in all His majesty, in all His strength and power, that is the same God who lives inside you and me right now.
He is so precious and so thoughtful, so long-suffering, that He would graciously put His finger on things. Just be aware. Try to be aware during the day, as you are going along in the day’s activities: “Lord, what are You trying to teach me right now? Is this a lesson, or is this not?”
The second thing is that we need not dredge up the self. Do not try to bring up things that you think are important to the Lord. Do not put yourself in the place of the Holy Spirit and of the Lord and say, “Oh, Lord, You need to deal with this in me.”
That is just another form of self-love and pride—that you think you know better than the Lord.
The Lord is so real and so precious that He will bring up what He wants at the right time—not your timing, His timing. When He brings it up and puts His finger on it, then you know something has been dealt with. Something has been touched in your life.
So do not try to dredge up yourself, and do not try to hurry the Lord along. He does not need to be hurried along by us.
It might take fifty years for Him to touch certain things in your life, but that is the right time. That is when it is ready to be dealt with. It is not to be dealt with by our flesh.
The concern might be that, with such a focus on the Lord living inside of you, and all this attention to what is inside our hearts, you might become self-centered or too introspective. You might think that you do not have the big picture.
You do not have to worry about that. We do not have to worry about that. The Lord does not let us get self-centered and introspective, because He is there. It is His house, and He will not let us become self-centered about things. He will put His finger on it.
Another thing He spoke to my heart is this: the Lord is my Lord. The Lord is your Lord. He owns my life, and He owns your life, whether you know it or not. That is what He has done.
It is the exhortation of Scripture, what Scripture says in the first and great commandment:
Love the Lord with all your soul,
with all your heart,
and with all your strength.
Every part of you, every bit of you—your heart, your soul, your strength—you are giving Him your self-life. “Lord, You deal with it as You wish, when You wish. I do not want it any other way.”
It may really hurt at times. It may seem harmful and difficult, but, Lord, I would have it no other way. I know that you say the same thing in your own hearts: “I would have it no other way than to have the Lord present and putting His finger on the things that He desires.”
May the Lord do and direct as He sees fit, and not as we see fit.
One other thing that I want to mention: I mentioned it on Friday night in passing. Again, it is a quote from Fénelon that really spoke to my heart. It is kind of hurtful in a way, kind of contrary to what you might think is the truth.
But Fénelon said, “God leaves weakness in all of us.”
He gave this illustration of what he meant by that. Of course, he was writing in the eighteenth century, so this is the language of his reference:
In a field, a workman may leave a pillar of earth to measure the amount of material removed.
Then Fénelon explains what he means by that illustration:
God leaves similar pillars within those that He is perfecting.
The Lord leaves a weakness in us all. The first thing that came to my mind was, of course, the Apostle Paul and the thorn in his flesh. Three times he petitioned the Lord to remove it from him because it weakened him.
Probably it weakened him physically, it weakened him in what he thought was spiritual, and it weakened him as a man. He thought that thing would be taken away, that thorn would be taken out.
You know what it is to be working in the yard and get a thorn in your finger or hand. It is a painful reminder. You touch it and it is always there. Fortunately, we remove the physical thorns, but Paul could not remove that thorn.
Of course, we know what the Lord was teaching him: “In your weakness, I am strong,” or, “My strength is made perfect in weakness.”
For all of us, there will be something that the Lord is going to leave in our lives from the self-life. It will be a different thing for all of us. No two are going to be the same.
But we will see it. We will sense that there is something there that is contrary to the heart of God, contrary to His will, and we will seek for the finger of God to touch it.
He will show us and convict us, that we might repent, come to the cross, and know His power. But He is going to leave it there in you.
You will come back, and you will go back three times, asking for the removal of this weakness found in the self-life: “Lord, surely it must weaken Your testimony, because this is my self-life. This is contrary to Your life.”
But the Lord says, “I leave it there. This is a reminder of your weakness within yourself. But learn the lesson: that is where you have to rely on the Lord and His strength for your life.”
I hope and trust that this is just a reminder to all of us of what the Lord has done for us—who He is in His fullness. He is not just the God of the heavens, but He is the God of our lives also.
At a moment’s notice, we can come unto Him in whatever situation we find ourselves, whatever circumstances, however dire they might be. The Lord is there, makes Himself available to us, and speaks to our hearts.
How precious is the Lord. How wonderful is our salvation. How full is our salvation. It is beyond any of our understanding or comprehension—who the Lord is and what He has done for us. It is just so, so marvelous.
Let us end with a word of prayer.
Lord, thank You for who You are. Thank You for living, for dwelling, for owning our lives. Thank You for possessing our hearts and our souls.
Thank You for Your tender touch, the quietness of Your voice, and the finger that You put on different things in our lives.
Even, Lord, in the days when You seem to be absent and there is a shallowness in our hearts, when it seems like You are far away, yet that is when You are closest to us. Even in that, You are teaching us such a vital lesson of who You are.
Lord, we tell You that we would have life no other way than for You to be present in our lives. It is just so marvelous.
We thank You for who You are, in Jesus’ name. Amen.