“God does nothing, but through prayer” John Wesley
Western mentality wants end results. The problem is that the end result that we’re looking for aren’t the end result that God’s looking for. (Isaiah 55:9) We want a “good meeting,” God wants to shed His light on darkened hearts and awaken them to His fullness. We want people healed, God wants to capture the attention of his Bride in such a way that she move with Him, run with Him, when He breathes out she breathes in, He wants to reveal Himself to everyone through signs and wonders…but the signs and wonders aren’t the reason. He isn’t interested in a power display…if God gave us a full on power display it would kill us. (Exodus 33:20) The reason for the signs is revelation of Him. The reason for wonders isn’t a feel good experience. The reason for signs and wonders is to deepen our hearts into chasing after the revelation of God. Western mentality says that Kingdom ministry is doing the work of Christ, and what that means usually is: visual healings, hands raised, altar calls, and people saying “I feel better.” God’s mindset of “Kingdom Ministry” is a people so enthralled and consumed and led by His Spirit they personify humility, they crave righteousness at any cost, they are willing to labor in prayer until they see God move in power and they say, “I have been crucified with Christ, it is no longer I who live but Christ who lives in me.” (Galatians 2:20) We often make Christianity something that will fit into our plans…something manageable, the salt on the top of our lives; God’s mentality is death: death to ourselves so that Jesus Christ can reign in our lives, our motivations, our ambitions, our hopes, our fears…virtually everything that drives us as human beings, God wants to reign as Lord over each part. (John 12:20-36; Matthew 10:37-39; Mark 8:34-35; Galatians 6:13-15) Why? John 17. He wants us to be one with Him.
A life buried in prayer is a life buried in the heart of Jesus: the Great Intercessor. It’s us being partnered with His heart. It’s us being yoked with Him. The western world wants to partner with Jesus in visual power displays…but not in the intimate place. They want the mountain of transfiguration but not Gethsemane. Jesus wants both for us, but the Mount of Transfiguration will not come without Gethsemane first. Reigning with Him in power will not come before the fellowship of His sufferings. The world’s heart beats for itself; the heart of the Christian is forever drawn to God and after Him. The heart crazy in love with God is addicted to His heart. It has tasted, seen and knows He is good, His mercy is strong and His love edures forever. As God calls us, He calls us deeper into the mystery of His fullness by inviting us into voluntary weakness. (Matt 5)
So, this confronts the melancholy humanist’s statement, “[You are] so Heavenly minded your no earthly good.” If the glory of the Christian life will not come without longing, then the biggest waste would be the one who believes that they will by some miraculous feat have the fullness of God without the intimate place of His suffering. (Philippians 3:10) That somehow program, creating another ministry, or even mulling in their own gifting will somehow be the fertile ground for God to break through. As Billy Humphrey director of the International House of Prayer in Atlanta once said, “Jesus is not going to return in vacuum, He’s coming back in response to prayer.” Jesus is not operating on the tick of a stopwatch to usher His return, He is living as a Bridegroom madly in love with His Bride and He is coming back in response to her heart’s desire for Him. As the Bride of Christ cries out against the atrocities of this world, she is partnering with His heart. His heart’s desire is for her to be one with Him and as she cries out against injustice, she is crying out in unity with Him: the Righteous Judge. The truth herein lies that in reality you are no earthly good if you are not Heavenly minded (as Correy Russel has said). If you expect for your programs, religious offerings or gifting to be the thing that will transform the world with “power,” you will be gravely mistaken when the lights are turned off, you aren’t standing in front of man for acclaim, but rather you are stripped raw before the Creator God. Our accomplishments don’t impress the One who spun the universe(s), they will not sway His judgments and they will not affect His level of love for us; the one that Jesus wants to reign with Him is the one who will utterly waste themselves on Him. The one who will give utterly all they are for all the fullness of who God is…that is what tugs at the heartstrings of God.