Stirred

Stirred

“And Moses called Bezalel and Oholiab and every craftsman in whose mind the LORD had put skill, every one whose heart stirred him up to come to do the work.”
Exodus 36:2

The work of God through His people is only accomplished in hearts that are stirred up and open to the promptings of His Spirit. It requires diligence to serve the Lord daily. Belief alone, without an actual serving of Him, is deception. (James 1:22-26)

Religion is often a great façade. It soothes the heart and often provides a buffer from the whispers of God and a bearing of the cross of doing His Will. An unstirred heart, content to live isolated from the outreach of God into the world around us, is the tragedy of life. While such may avoid the trials and tribulations accompanying the doing of God’s Will, it also remains unchanged, undeveloped, and oblivious to the depths of God’s love.

An unstirred heart knows little of its own condition. Its faith is untested and assumes itself to be true; it has not touched the reality of its own poverty. Such a faith is based upon the words of the covenant of grace rather than the life of the covenant of grace. Grace is held as a sentiment of God rather than the actual power of God.

The stirrings of God and our response to them take us from being spectators of the economy of God into the wonder of participation. It is in the “yoke of Christ” that we learn of Him. Jesus was always pressing the disciples into involvement in the Will of the Father.

Feeding the multitude:
“But Jesus said unto them, They need not depart; give ye them to eat.” Matthew 14:16

The nearer our heart is to Him the more we recognize the stirrings of the Spirit. Sensitivity to Him is a virtue that can only be learned by obedience.

“But he that doeth truth cometh to the light,
that his deeds may be made manifest,
that they are wrought in God.”
John 3:21

The Word is clear: only those who “do the truth” will know whether their “deeds” are the work of God. It is in our doing that we discover the confidence to grow into the truth of His Will. Many are content with an intellectual knowledge of the truth but have not touched the “hidden manna” that comes as they do the truth. (Revelation 2:17)

The Hidden Manna

“But He said to them, I have food to eat which you do not know. Then the disciples said to one another, No one brought Him food to eat? Jesus said to them, My food is that I should do the will of Him who sent Me, and that I may finish His work.”
John 4:32-34

Early in their walk with Jesus, the disciples were presented with this powerful truth: the “meat” or substance of His nourishment was in doing the Will of the Father. How presumptive it is to think that we are excused from such a truth. Jesus plainly declared that the secret of the power and unction of His Life was through the medium of obedience.

“Jesus said to them, My food is that I should do the will of Him who sent Me, and that I may finish His work.”
John 4:34

The Parable of the Vine in John 15 reveals the secret of abiding in His love:

“if you may keep My commands, you will remain in My love, according as I have kept the commands of My Father, and remain in His love”
John 15:10

Jesus kept the commands of His Father through obedience. “If you keep my commandments you will abide in MY Love”. The reason many fall from a life of obedience is that His Love ceases to beat within their hearts. If we keep His commandments His love abides in us, and our hearts are stirred into the involvement of His Will in the earth.

The crisis of our day is that multitudes claim God has not moved them to extraordinary things. Rather than questioning such a life, they are complacent and content. When we live a life that has no stirrings of His Love, His mercy, and His Will, we must know that we are lacking His Love within. Love is the voice of God within the human heart and no heart can remain unmoved where He abides. Love is the basis of true obedience.

“He that loveth not knoweth not God;
for God is love”
John 4:8

Brian Troxel