I’m struggling. Where do I find the words for this, when it drives me so very hard and I cannot be silent? The urgency itself is beyond words.
Does it strike you as odd that something granting us such limitless inner peace is the same thing that drives us so very hard? The very nature of what we have found includes a demand that we share it. That’s because the sweetness of the divine gift is a shocking departure from everything around us. Why, oh why was this not already ours? Why did we come to it only after so much painful struggle?
And I’m still struggling to find words for it.
Here’s my vision: There is a world of people who already belong to Christ and they have almost nothing He promised. It’s not a question of assigning blame for that situation, but of assessing how we might break them free of all the bondage. It’s painful to watch them chase the wind because it’s a sorrow I know too well.
Lord, isn’t there something I can do to resolve this jarring disconnection between the vast riches of what You have given us versus the shocking poverty of their souls? And of course, the answer is: Only if they come to realize they don’t have anything. If they sense no need, you cannot offer something they might take. It’s Revelation 3:17 — “You do not know that you are wretched, miserable, poor, blind, and naked.”
So there’s really nothing I can do except live by His revelation and hope that someone will notice, that somewhere, somehow, their sense of need will awaken.
Of course, this is why tribulation has come. The wrath of God takes away what little His people believe they have in order to awaken them to the situation as He sees it. Our mission is to be ready to help them struggle through to answers when everything they thought they knew turns out false.
By the same token, I’ll offer my prophetic warning that chaos and bloodshed is coming, but only God can make that real to you. Logic won’t get you there; it has to touch something in your convictions. So I can’t predict what kind of privations you will experience, only that tribulation doesn’t work if any of us are substantially exempt from suffering. It’s not that our faith keeps away suffering, but it’s the matter of how faith carries us through the suffering that falls on everyone.
Thus, the only preparations you can make will be those related to your personal divine mission and calling. Your mission determines your personal priorities, the things you really must have to push through. Pray for the sensitivity and wisdom to hear the voice of God in your own soul about such things.
