December 04, 2007
Refuge
Although it happens occasionally, we don’t often see deer in town. Last week when I was returning home from the fitness center a six point buck crossed the four lane highway in front of me. It was just before dawn, so this normally busy stretch roadway had very little traffic at the time. Once safely across the road, the buck took cover in a forest of evergreen trees leaning against a fence at the farm supply Christmas tree lot. Maybe man can’t always see the forest for the trees, but his poor fellow saw trees and thought it was a forest. I can relate to the buck. I’m guilty of trying to take refuge in the church and amongst other believers…I need to remember that my refuge is in Christ.
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Gail;
-----Maybe a concept of refuge in the Lord’s body is slipping a bit from your awareness since you have been worshipping in a BYOW church. Indeed our refuge is in Christ. But without the fellowship of His others, the refuge is restricted to thoughts and feelings. Admitting that these are all our consciousness is made of, why is it that just knowing Christ as our refuge and experiencing the feeling of reality about it is less than what He wants to make available? Why can we not satisfactorily take refuge in Him alone, drawing up our own water of comfort and encouragement from our own meditations in solitude?
-----Man is a physical being made to interact with a physical world. His mental constructs need validation and correction by that interaction. It is like driving to Pittsburgh. You can imagine Highway 50 through Gunnison to Highway 287, then the intersection of I-70 in Denver, on to passing through Kansas City and coming to the confusion of the twists and turns in St. Louis, until finding I-87 to Pittsburgh. If you have been that way, you may even remember sights, thoughts, and feelings you experienced along the way. But none of this is actually valid to the soul until one physically steps into the car and begins the real experience of the journey, seeing the sights imagined, and many more unimagined. And as one goes that way, he begins to notice that what he physically observes corrects the inaccuracies of what he thought he would see. Maybe even his course may change as what he sees corrects faulty memories or misperceptions of the map. One can also imagine the forgiveness we have in Christ and experience it much fuller within than one can imagine a trip to Pittsburgh. But one also increases that experience when forgiven by another, and will wonder at the total increase of the full experience when forgiven on That Day.
-----For man is also a spiritual being made to interact with a spiritual world from which he has been cut off. God has given back to us some connection to that world through His Spirit within us and our obedience to His Word. As we obey His principles all the way through our feelings and thoughts to our actions in the physical world, His Spirit develops our understanding by our experiences. And we all have different experiences leading to different understandings. These given to each other become some of the comforts and encouragements of the refuge, helping to validate those comforts and encouragements welling up from our inner solitude with the Lord. In this way His refuge for us is expanded beyond the size of our selves.
-----But the dimension of His refuge among His people is not the lone factor of its strength. It must also effect the actual joy, peace, and righteousness in the Spirit that is His kingdom. And there are two areas of responsibility, besides the Lord’s, for that effectiveness: yours, and other’s. No refuge among His people can avail any comfort or encouragement for you until you practice at least some obedience to the Word. For the Scriptures give much instruction about the position of the self amongst others: receiving, giving, acknowledging, tolerating, forbearing, and forgiving, for example. We are not only directed to serve the needs of those around us, we are also directed to get along with them, agree with them, and allow them to be who they are in their failures as well as successes. For they are His creation. And the more we live up to our own responsibility in the congregation, humbling ourselves to allowing the Bible to step forward with its own message, the more effectiveness we can find in the refuge there.
-----The other responsibility is the same responsibility coming to you from those around you. The more that those with whom you gather obey the Word, the easier it is to find in their refuge the spring water of comfort and encouragement. But the refuge shrinks significantly among a people, who to feel valid, must change the understanding of others into that of their own. The service they offer you carries little moisture since it is offered in their taste without regard to yours. This does not absolve you of your responsibility to offer to them your service in their taste. Thus, through meeting your own responsibility, you are sucked dry. The stress of being continually compelled to understand according to someone else’s experience takes much warmth out of the comfort. And the strain of continually being compelled to express according to someone else’s emotion takes much strength out of the encouragement.
-----I know this is the atmosphere in which you have been trying to seek refuge. I tried to find some there as well. To be genuine to the Word and remain in that kind of environment requires fine strength in the Lord, as this environment demands more comfort and strength from you than it is willing to give back to you. And I know you, that you do comfort and encourage well, because you do walk a straight course from your careful observation of the Word. So, maybe you do not feel much comfort and encouragement there, dear sister, but those around you with honest hearts open to the Word do feel it coming from you. I often wish I were there to help. But my fair ladies were not spiritually made to weather the dust and cactus of a body led by men seeking the validation of their own religious ideas from the coerced participation of those around them. My ladies need a genuine spring the Lord brings to flow from everyone’s contribution of responsibility well met, not a mirage to where you must Bring Your Own Water in the canteen of your own heart.
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