ASPECTS

Then the cloud covered the Tent of Meeting, and the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle. Moses could not enter the Tent of Meeting because the cloud had settled upon it, and the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle. Exodus 40:34-35

The Christian must, at some point in his or her life, face the important distinction between knowing God and apprehending Him--the difference between visiting God and actually living with Him.

Every born again believer knows God, but only some have truly apprehended Him. Only some have taken hold of the reality of holy God dwelling in them, coursing through their veins, filling their lungs with His Spirit

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for thou art an holy people unto the Lord thy God, and the Lord hath chosen thee to be a peculiar people unto himself, above all the nations that are upon the earth 1 Deut. 14:2 KJV[1]

Imagine a nation--a people singled out by God--living in abject servitude, day after day, year after year, for 430[2] years. Imagine these people--numbering something more than a million[3] souls--living all this time, enduring their plight under a steady stream of different Pharaohs, never having any contact with their God--never even having a prophet or priest to speak in His name.

(In our convenient arrogance we cluck our tongues at their wilderness demonstration of fragile faith, but really, after the silence they endured for more than four centuries, we should respect them for keeping any faith at all.)

But then, finally, at the time appropriate for His eternal plan, God did indeed hear their cries and put into motion events which would result in the people of Israel being released from their Egyptian bondage.

On their circuitous journey from Egypt to Canaan, Jehovah God gave detailed instructions[4] to Moses for the construction of a place--a tabernacle,[5] or 'Tent of Meeting'--where He could descend to meet with His people.

What a marvelous opportunity this was for the people! After four centuries of silence, they would now have the eternal God actually in their midst.

Access to His presence, however, was severely restricted. Only Aaron, the high priest, and Moses could enter into the most holy place where the glory of the Lord appeared. Only the high priest could represent the sins of the people to the Lord; only the high priest could receive the yearly atonement.

For the common person, this was as good as it got. Even so, this was an improvement over the old; at least one could stand outside worshipping in confidence, knowing that holy God was actually nearby--no longer silent, His cloud or fire visible to everyone.

Because of the blood of Christ, the modern believer need not settle for only 'nearby.' Christians have no need for a representative, such as a priest, to speak for them and offer up confession for sins. Christians need not carry around with them, or travel to a tabernacle--a place of meeting--for God is always with them, wherever they are.

When communing with His people, God requires a place. In the time of the ancient Hebrews it was a tent--later a stone building in Jerusalem; today it is the body of each believer.

The tragedy is that so few of His people have actually apprehended that presence. Oh yes, when one accepts Christ as Lord, the holy presence comes in to take up residence. But that indwelling is not the same as the believer fully taking hold of that presence--fully realizing and enjoying continuous, steady communion with Father, Son and Spirit.

"This intercourse between God and the soul is known to us in conscious personal awareness. It is personal: that is, it does not come through the body of believers, as such, but is known to the individual, and to the body through the individuals which compose it. "And it is conscious: that is, it does not stay below the threshold of consciousness and work there unknown to the soul, but comes within the field of awareness where the man can 'know' it as he knows any other fact of experience." A.W. Tozer[7]

For two decades my wife and I kept Southern California at arm's length. For twenty years we lived, worked and played in the beautiful Mediterranean climate of San Diego, making friends, making enemies, and making a living until we finally left there to return to our native Iowa.

All that time--from March, 1971 to late December, 1990--we kept our distance from the culture and people of the area.

We mostly, and especially near the end, had a siege mentality. We considered our modest home to be our refuge, our safe haven, into which we barricaded ourselves from everything surrounding us. A woman lived next to us for years; we never knew her name. People on all sides moved in and moved out without our caring or even noticing. We kept our doors locked and our windows closed to their noise.

There were few trees in our neighborhood, yet we could not tell you what kind they were. There were some birds, but we didn't know their names. When relatives would visit and ask, "What is this bush?" or "What flower is this?" we couldn't say.

To be sure, this was not twenty years of misery. We had times of profound joy, and established relationships with people that continue to this day. But we never considered ourselves a part of the community--we never considered it to be home.

Even on our own property we had no regard for the outside; in our minds that area, being so close to the rest of the neighborhood, was up for grabs. While we kept the inside of our home nice--even adding on to the house--the outside was left a virtual wasteland. The condition of our lawn became a point of good-natured derision among our friends; one old acquaintance, trying to locate our house without recalling the street address, nevertheless located us simply by the deplorable state of our front lawn.

After living in the same house for seventeen years, when the time finally came to pack up and leave, we departed without regret or the smallest measure of sentimentality over the house, the neighborhood, or the community.

When we took up residence in our present home, we felt, almost immediately, that we were, indeed, home. In only a matter of months we knew our eleven-and-a-half acres more intimately than we ever had our one-third acre in San Diego.

In Southern California, as soon as we would step outside the house, we felt ourselves in alien territory. But here the house and out-of-doors are fused into one: our home. Here the windows are flung wide, the doors unlocked, the sounds and smells of the outside permeate, traveling throughout all the rooms.

Now we know almost all the trees and bushes by name. We understand their ways, their seasons; we know when the leaves will fall, and when they will return. We know when the bushes will flower, and when they will dry in the autumn wind. Their upkeep is our happy responsibility.

The lawn is kept mowed and trimmed. Annuals and perennials bloom from early spring through to the first frost, and are often cut and brought into the house to brighten the rooms. Fruit trees are managed, to supply apples, pears and cherries for the table; vegetables are raised and eaten fresh, as well as canned for winter consumption.

When a bird sings outside our window we now know its name, and whether it is male or female. We know when it will leave, in the late autumn, and when to expect it back in the spring. We know where it has built its nest--and quite often how many eggs have been deposited there.

We know when to look for the arrival of the wood ducks, and when to expect the year's new fawns. We are learning their behavior and sounds, their ways.

Put simply, we have invested ourselves in this place--in ways never imagined or pursued in California. We have committed ourselves to having a relationship with this place we now call home--to truly know it.

"Now this is eternal life: that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent." John 17:3

It is our responsibility--each of us as an individual, not as a collective group--to have a relationship with God. No one else can do it for us, and the Father never forces Himself on anyone. It is up to us.

What began many centuries ago as a simple tent, then was transformed into an elaborate stone temple, now exists privately and intimately in each us. God has chosen to 'tabernacle' with us individually--to meet with us one on one.

"The moment the Spirit has quickened us to life in regeneration our whole being senses its kinship to God and leaps up in joyous recognition. That is the heavenly birth without which we cannot see the Kingdom of God. It is, however, not an end, but an inception, for now begins the glorious pursuit, the heart's happy exploration of the infinite riches of the Godhead." Tozer

The pursuit of God never ends; since it is impossible to ever know Him completely (in this life), the pursuit continues. It does, however, mellow with time. At first we pursue Him as a child: sporadically, emotionally, in fits and starts and pouting disappointment when things don't go our way.

Later, as the pursuit mellows with our gathering maturity, it gradually evolves into a comfortable cohabitation: two friends living together. At least that's how it should be.

But many of us keep God at arm's length. We know He's out there; we see signs of His presence. But we prefer Him to stay in His place, while we stay in ours. Just a little bit of Him is all we really want.

"May not the inadequacy of much of our spiritual experience be traced back to our habit of skipping through the corridors of the Kingdom like children through the market place, chattering about everything, but pausing to learn the true value of nothing?" Tozer[8]

The Kingdom is filled with people bobbing and weaving through their spiritual walk--like a boxer trying to dodge incoming blows. God is patient, but He nags, and we resist His subtle advances as if they would do us harm.

For many of us our intention should be this: to stop thinking as a renter, and begin conducting ourselves as a homeowner.

As I mentally compare what we were in California to what we are now, two truths reveal themselves: First, we missed out on a lot by not having more of a connection with the society around us and, second, it was our own doing.

We could have invested ourselves more in that community, and we would have been the better for it, but we chose not to. Here, in our present home, we have assimilated more into everything around us--and we are the better for it.

Just so with the Lord God. He is with us, in us, all around us--there for the having. He contains the wealth and riches of eternal knowledge and grace, and offers it to us in eager, outstretched hands. Yet we take Him into out hearts thinking that's the end of it--that that's as good as it gets, all the while missing out on His limitless bounty.

Haven't we all marveled at the stories of contemporary saints of the faith who seemed to exist on an entirely different plane from the common believer ...

• Jim Elliot
  
• Charles Spurgeon
  
• Dwight Moody
  
• Aiden Tozer
  
• Dietrich Bonhoeffer

What made them extraordinary? Why did they stand out so in the kingdom?

Here were men cut from the same cloth as any of us, flesh and blood sinners, imperfect members of the body of Christ. Here were men who were not without their critics. So what set them apart? What was it about their lives that made them shining examples for all of us?

I believe one answer to be that each of these men would say, along with the apostle Paul in his letter to the believers at Philippi,

Whatever was to my profit I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. What is more, I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them rubbish, that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ--the righteousness that comes from God and is by faith. I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, and so, somehow, to attain to the resurrection from the dead. Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already been made perfect, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me. Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus. Philip. 3:7-14

"I want to know Christ ... becoming like him ..."

One thing that made these men (along with many others) remarkable was their commitment to knowing the person of Christ, with their purpose being to emulate Him. They were determined to "remove themselves from the realm of the common"--to fully invest themselves in the person of Christ, and the cause of His kingdom.

When I left the shores of the United States aboard the U.S.S. Chicago, headed for Vietnam in the year 1970, I was a fresh-faced lad of a grand total of eighteen years. Barely old enough to tie my own shoelaces, here I was headed off across the waves to visit foreign lands and participate in a most bizarre war understood by no one.

Over a six-month period our ports of call included Hawaii, The Philippines, Japan and Hong Kong. One of my lingering and more uncomfortable memories from that time is how I, as one of the younger members of the group, would spend my liberty, in contrast to the older members of the group.

As I now recall, it seemed that at almost every port-of-call I would fritter away this valuable time in pursuits both silly and frivolous while the more mature members of the group would be off taking advantage of this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to see the sights. While I was down on the Hong Kong docks buying plastic trinkets, they would be off on a train trip to the Red China border; while I slept away the evening in my rack, they'd be visiting a museum or a theatre. How I wish now that I had been older--or at least a little less stupid.

Scripture gives us very good word pictures of the Spiritually immature contrasted with the mature. In Ephesians, Paul describes the immature as those who are constantly changing direction, easily tossed about by crafty liars with false doctrines.

It was he who gave some to be apostles, some to be prophets, some to be evangelists, and some to be pastors and teachers, to prepare God's people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ. Then we will no longer be infants, tossed back and forth by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of men in their deceitful scheming. Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will in all things grow up into him who is the Head, that is, Christ. From him the whole body, joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work. Ephes. 4:11-16

But when we invest ourselves in the way of the Lord, when we "grow up into Him", we are on our way to preparing ourselves--as well as others--for His important work.

Jesus, in one of His parables, described how the good news of the gospel would not take root in the lives of those who were childish, those without any real depth to their lives.

"A farmer went out to sow his seed. As he was scattering the seed, some fell along the path, and the birds came and ate it up. Some fell on rocky places, where it did not have much soil. It sprang up quickly, because the soil was shallow. But when the sun came up, the plants were scorched, and they withered because they had no root. Other seed fell among thorns, which grew up and choked the plants. Still other seed fell on good soil, where it produced a crop--a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown. He who has ears, let him hear." Matthew 13:3-9

Because even His disciples were not mature enough to understand the parable, Jesus explained it to them.

"Listen then to what the parable of the sower means: When anyone hears the message about the kingdom and does not understand it, the evil one comes and snatches away what was sown in his heart. This is the seed sown along the path. The one who received the seed that fell on rocky places is the man who hears the word and at once receives it with joy. But since he has no root, he lasts only a short time. When trouble or persecution comes because of the word, he quickly falls away. The one who received the seed that fell among the thorns is the man who hears the word, but the worries of this life and the deceitfulness of wealth choke it, making it unfruitful. But the one who received the seed that fell on good soil is the man who hears the word and understands it. He produces a crop, yielding a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown." Matthew 13:18-23

Finally, the writer to the Hebrews comes right out and compares them to babies incapable of digesting anything but warm pabulum.

We have much to say about this, but it is hard to explain because you are slow to learn. In fact, though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you the elementary truths of God's word all over again. You need milk, not solid food! Anyone who lives on milk, being still an infant, is not acquainted with the teaching about righteousness. But solid food is for the mature, who by constant use have trained themselves to distinguish good from evil. Hebrews 5:11-14

The Christian does not leave childishness by declaring he'd rather be an adult; neither does he attain maturity by setting out to leave behind his childish ways. The sincere believer becomes mature as a by-product of living with Christ. The goal is not to become mature; the goal is to become like Christ.

Only when we stop keeping Him at arm's length will we begin to truly understand His ways, and begin to work those ways into our life. Only when we dare to step above the common-place--when we let Him draw us up toward His higher plane--will we truly know Him.

"If we truly want to follow God we must seek to be other-worldly. As we begin to focus upon God the things of the spirit will take shape before our inner eyes. Obedience to the word of Christ will bring an inward revelation of the Godhead (John 14:21-23). It will give acute perception enabling us to see God even as is promised to the pure in heart. A new God-consciousness will seize upon us and we shall begin to taste and hear and inwardly feel the God who is our life and our all. There will be seen the constant shining of the light that lighteth every man that cometh into the world. (John 1:9) More and more, as our faculties grow sharper and more sure, God will become to us the great All, and His Presence the glory and wonder of our lives.O God, quicken to life every power within me, that I may lay hold on eternal things. Open my eyes that I may see; give me acute spiritual perception; enable me to taste Thee and know that Thou art good. Make heaven more real to me than any earthly thing has ever been. Amen." Tozer