MATTHEW 5:6
"When a woman bakes a cake, at some point, she has to close the oven door so the cake will actually bake."
Before we can fight the darkness, plant these churches or free the oppressed, we need to shut the door.
Why is shutting the door so important:
1. It guards your heart against hypocrisy: There's a temptation to pray extra-spiritual prayers, but it's ok to pray short prayers, or to even use white out on some prayers. The devil doesn't want you to pray, and even if you do pray, he wants you to pray in a way that isn't really heartfelt. Jesus said, when you pray be careful that you don't babble.
When you go into the secret place, rote memorization becomes real. The secret place is where you get rid of the hypocrisy of having to please people.
Secrecy is the antidote for the hypocrisy gene that we have.
2. Shutting the door saves my mind from complexity: In a world when there's so much going on around you, Jesus said, shut the door! You've turned off the cell phone, you're not looking at your emails, it's just you and fazher.
Shutting the door is like your Sabbath, it's where you find your rest.
"Jesus is a better Savior than you are a sinner." So, when you say, "I'm not faithful" that's exactly why you need him.
If you don't shut the door, you're gonna work so hard and you're never gonna find your rest.
3. Your heart needs you to shut the door because that's what leads you to your Father:
There's a way in which God manifests himself in the secret place in a way that he doesn't manifest in another place.
Mike's example of Isaiah sneaking a cell phone away to say hi and get his buddy to talk to Mike.
"I love this kid so much, he has this curly hair and this little lisp...sometimes when he's asleep, I just touch his hair or speak into his ear 'Isaiah, your Father loves you."
What if your Father in heaven feels this way about you? I like my son's hair, Jesus, apparently has numbered your hairs..."number one, number two..."
Behold the manner of love the Fathe has bestowed on us, that we should be called sons of God.
Hebrews 4:16, Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace.
I don't know how Jesus did this, but after sweating blood, going to the cross and praying "Father forgive him" he made the throne of justice a throne of grace. Now when you approach , you don't approach on your own righteousness, you approach because of that one who died.
Shut the door, not because you're worthy, but because he is. Not because you're a better sinner, but b/c he's a better savior.
Shutting the door is not a command, it's an invitation.
No comments:
Post a Comment