Then Elisha prayed and said, “O Lord, please open his eyes that he may see.” So the Lord opened the eyes of the young man, and he saw, and behold, the mountain was full of horses and chariots of fire all around Elisha. 2 Kings 6:17
Do you know, God has to reveal certain things individually to His kids in order that they be able to do everything - anything - that He has called them to do ?
I wrote down a nice list for this year, inquiring from The LORD what He would like to grow in my life. He cares about all areas of our life, and in His gardening these all bring glory to Him . The list simply touched areas I could and would like to see expand or grow in, and I asked Him to highlight something specific from it.
On one line of the list, I left a blank space for Him to fill in. He did fill it in. And, it is also His highlight pick -
I D E N T I T Y
The WORD says that when I accepted Jesus, I became a NEW creation.
New .. It has an overarching meaning and an individual one.
In the overarching meaning, each person making the decision to accept Jesus enters capacity for being completely transformed into the Image of Christ. While alive and breathing, it is the entering of an invitation process for being purified through and through.
God at creation poured out His best for making His family, making male and female in His perfect image. And, through His Son, God returned us to this perfection. The individual meaning of this reality is one is so increasingly deeply and divinely supernatural.
Over the weekend, a teacher I listen to said something from the Word that is very central to the individual meaning of this reality.
We are already seated with Christ in Heavenly places.
Through Jesus Christ, GOD has already seen the fulfillment of each one of His kids' perfection. In the finished work of the cross, this reality of perfection is the dimension everyone is partying, dancing, singing in Heaven in.
David explains his own glimpse when he said,
In the scroll of the book it is written of me
I delight to do your will, O my God;
Your law is within my heart . (see Psa 40)
Who knows, but David, how God revealed this to him? Doesn't much sound like a future tense deal, however. At David's time in history, animal sacrifice was yet the means for atoning for the sins of the nation and would be for the generations ahead of him until Christ was born. We do know from the Word that David does not wait until then to start getting crazy about what God showed him.
Essentially, God revealed promise that David, the frail mortal he knew himself to be, would yet remain in God's presence beyond the grave and forever.
In sacrifice and offering you have not delighted,
but you have given me an open ear.
Burnt offering and sin offering
you have not required.
Then I said, “Behold, I have come;
in the scroll of the book it is written of me:
I delight to do your will, O my God;
your law is within my heart. (Psa 40: 6-8)
The sacrifice of animals would not produce in this promise. A Messiah somewhere out in the future was the only hope of escaping separation from God in mortal death. Continually in the Psalms, David wrestles with God about the doomed meeting which he mainly considered so because he understood it as a separation from the God he loved. As the conversation unfolds, God reveals to David who he is in His eyes. David's actions continually show his transformation in this revelation.
King David, the same shepherd called upon to remain near and soothe the unrest of the king before him plagued by God's rejection for disobeying and performing a priest's duty in 1 Samuel.
This David --
And David danced before the Lord with all his might. And David was wearing a linen ephod. So David and all the house of Israel brought up the ark of the Lord with shouting and with the sound of the horn. 2 Sam 6:14-15
And he said to them, “Have you never read what David did, when he was in need and was hungry, he and those who were with him: how he entered the house of God, in the time of Abiathar the high priest, and ate the bread of the Presence, which it is not lawful for any but the priests to eat, and also gave it to those who were with him?” Mark 2:25-26
David was just out of control, if you ask me.
God, making sure that the Pharisees would recall the account in Mark chapter 2, loved it.
David's experience of knowing God was so intimately connected to discovering who God believed he was. A king, and ultimately as David learned, a dwelling place of The LORD Most High.
Generations later, Jesus' greatest conflict amidst His own people was over who He said He was. He entered testing after The Father announced who He was. And, Jesus was ultimately crucified for steadfastness in this identity.
Say ye of him, whom the Father hath sanctified, and sent into the world, Thou blasphemest; because I said, I am the Son of God? John 10:36
Think about everything that Jesus carried on His shoulders during His lifetime . He did it by order, as revealed in the Gospel of Luke. Early in Luke, in chapter three Jesus is baptized and announced by The Father -
And the Holy Ghost descended in a bodily shape like a dove upon him, and a voice came from heaven, which said, Thou art My beloved Son; in thee I am well pleased. Luke 3:22
There are so many times in the Gospels where Jesus explains Himself next to what His father is doing, saying . It was His given identity by God. In Matthew chapter 16, the matter of Jesus' identity gives shape to the meaning of being a New creation in Christ.
Simply, identity is something revealed by God.
And Jesus answered him, “Blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jonah! For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father who is in heaven. Matt 16:17
Can you picture someone showing you a photo of your future husband or wife? or son or daughter? when you were toddler age? It would have no meaning for you at that time in your life. In ideal circumstance, not because you hadn't yet started to experience love and family in mom and dad as a team, or in being a son or daughter. But, because at toddler age there is just too much to learn about who you are before understanding what it may mean to give of this in loving commitment to others.
We know from the Word that Jesus was prepared for about 30 years .. that he would be ready to believe what God said about Him unto death at the cross and resurrection to the right hand of The Father.
...
Jesus sent His Word seed to me when I was a toddler.
At one of the most difficult times in my life, He pushed the tender plant back into the light that I have a look at it, that I remember where and who I was in Him. I could say that I wished I had lots of people around me at that time who could understand, who could give life in some way, who I knew prayed for me. Instead, I can say that His hand held me and that if I could trade in an easier path in turn for what I learned about God, I would not trade it.
In love, and a billion times more in the One who loves us, we also begin to understand ourselves.
Only a few years before that season, I'd returned to a religious community that I had familiarity with from childhood. I was in transition after finishing a degree and looking for people in the same phase of life as I was. The organization seemed like it would be a safe place for me, a place to connect and to contemplate on what may be ahead while 'staying out of trouble'. The place did have just that, normal people living their lives and gathering as community and just being decent people.
I accepted leadership in the organization and was satisfied with the fact that for once in my life I could say I had 'people' instead of no people. A Grandparent planted my good seed early in life. What followed that blessed childhood season was lots of family division, some of which is relayed in my testimony post here April of last year, and much of which is not relayed. And so, often in life up to then I felt like I was the foreign traveler. Now, I had 'people'. Finally.
If there's one thing about being a traveler, it's that there's no room for wondering Who has brought you through. Through strangeness and storm, I've come to learn the rhythm of One who has been steady. The rhythm is a Who. Don't know where this is headed, don't know what the point was up till now. But, I'm here because of Him. And, 'people' or no people, this rhythm is my comfort zone. In this 'people' season, I began to lean in. If the rhythm I knew was not going to be in this 'people' place, I was going to go find it . If it's in a storm, if it's in a strange land, that's where I'm going. If it's in this 'people' season .. great!
Leaning in can look different ways for different people. In that season of my life, I'd only just begun to lean in the way Jesus likes to meet us . The organization had more of an early influence on my life than I'd realized even though I'd not been participant for years up till that season. While being the safe place where people act more Christian than Christians, they claim Jesus and preach from another book. While away at school however, I found the first answer to a desperate prayer in the Word of God. This was the God I understood myself to be leaning into one day, seated by myself.
I wanted God to show me His face.
The rest of this post gets pretty supernatural. God is supernatural; this is a real Christian post.
God says to believe as a little child. In my life at that time, believing meant taking in simply what was going to set me free from one of the safest-looking places I'd found in life.
Seated alone, I closed my eyes and I began to picture what I could imagine Jesus look like first from the feet. I look this very slowly, finally making it to the eyes and leaving room for Jesus to take over. I didn't try to imagine my own version for this part. I wanted Him to show me.
You will recover, because I did. More than this, it was the beginning of being set free from full deception. But, what I saw was black eyes. The whole thing black. I quickly opened my eyes. God was preparing to reveal to me a swift escape from this organization without needing to deal with any form of 'if, and, or but' from me. It was only the beginning of His divine repair for paradigms that reached back into childhood.
Perhaps, needing now to be said, the organization is a well known one that is completely satanic in ways that people who choose to participate in certain ways become aware of at some point way in. By the Grace of GOD, He showed me escape before all that.
Jesus is God, the Word, and this was how He chose to show me what direction to go in.
Following, things began to move very fast.
Satan does not like to be discovered.
Don't ask me where any Christians were in this season of my life. I don't know. I don't have an answer. I do know that I had to begin to walk through some things, and Jesus walked me through them.
A few years later, I was in as best of a normal place I knew how to be in then. And, this is when The LORD began to push His baby seed forward, to remind me where He first met me in my life. It was in this season that I began to feel a heaviness so great, that I began to speak with God about. It was a heaviness that felt like someone who may be preparing to see their child move hundreds of miles away to leave home for the first time and go to school . I began to tell God that whatever it was, I could 'handle it'.
I began to assure God... ' I can handle it.. '
During this season, I had a dream that a child showed up at my door trying to pull my attention toward a body of water with alligators and relay something about mess in their diaper. And, upon other things, I was moved to go into intercession for my whole family, many of who I had not seen in years. I began to repent for all of us, for every way we'd failed to generally be a family with love and forgiveness. No matter what happened, I will always have that God allowed me to give it my absolute all for a situation I would have no understanding of until after.
Just a few short months after this time, I received news that my father had passed away. I had not seen either of my parents since I had been a child. I received the news and had no one to talk to about it.
So, I went to work that day.
Who knows what I was really thinking? But, on the surface, nothing had changed. And, there was the reality that life around me was not going to slow down one bit for me to have a moment. During the day, I decided to run an errand for lunch. While driving my vehicle there, something behind my reasonable mind took over and I began to break down crying. Maybe I was avoiding going to this place because there was no one to pull me up, no one around who even knew who I was.
But, my human decided to be human that day. I could not stop it.
I went home from work early for the day and went to contact the only person I knew who may be able to help me reach my mother. It was a person in that organization that Jesus had allowed me to cleanly escape from. Up until that moment, I had no info except that my father had passed. I'd planned on getting a phone number and briefly disconnecting from the call.
Instead, it was as though satan inhabited that person to relay to me what had happened .. closing with the statement that my father had 'gone on to his eternal purpose'.
Weeping only a short time earlier was in the reality before me God would spend years helping me to process. I would not see my father again - ever. In case I had been waiting on God for helping me to see it His way, as God does little by little, for what 'ever' meant, satan wanted to be sure I begin to think about it any other possible way but. And, this in the simple reality that losing a parent begins a transformation on identity.
The loss is not a natural reality only. Things begin to move around in the spirit. Things that parents have not dealt with in the bloodline, unfinished business in their own lives .. all begin to meet at your door. Before I knew, I assured God that I could 'handle it' . I had no idea what was ahead of me.
In case you reading have not yet gathered, this is a testimony post .
I made the call that day in the only safe place I knew, in my vehicle while parked on a random neighborhood street I would not remember the location of once driving away from it. Once reaching home again, I escaped any possible situation to my own room and closed the door. I was enraged at the hatred that met in that person who'd known what I thought 'eternal purpose' might mean for my father who was lost.
It was a first in actually beginning to process the passing of my father, and it was a moment met with satan's ocean deep hatred for me.
It was a moment of choosing.
Encountering force of hatred so fierce, which I don't think has happened to a lot of people, one is met with decision. To this day, I understand what occurred over that phone call was not human. The person had no reason to even relay the news to me as if I had called about it. I had simply inquired about my mother. I cannot explain why I stayed connected to the call.
I did understand once alone in my room that I had just been attacked, and that I was at war. In that initial thinking at least, I was right. Time was not going to slow down for me. The only way to remain was to make a decision. I did not know how to fight by matching such hatred .
That day, I became a part of the family business.
If my father was lost, and satan wanted to be sure that I knew it, I decided I would arrive to the battle. What I spoke out of my mouth in those moments God has been answering and honoring in ways I will hereto relay.
"A thousand souls" .. then I thought once more,
"ten thousand souls for the Kingdom" ...
I understand now these numbers are quite meager for what God has in mind . But, God answers.
Recall now, this is a testimony about I D E N T I T Y.
Psalm 91 speaks God's promise
He shall call upon me, and I will answer him:
I will be with him in trouble;
I will rescue him, and honour him.
In tender moments of loss like the one I describe, something new has to take shape. The enemy of my soul wanted to ensure what took shape was deformed, marred, powerless.
But, everything I have to remember about those moments continues to take shape in what God thinks about me.
I'm not trained in any way but what God has taught me. I don't know if I will personally ever reach 10,000 souls for Jesus. Yet, God works things out.
These scriptures come to mind.
And when he was alone, they that were about him with the twelve asked of him the parable. And he said unto them, Unto you it is given to know the mystery of the kingdom of God: but unto them that are without, all these things are done in parables: That seeing they may see, and not perceive; and hearing they may hear, and not understand; lest at any time they should be converted, and their sins should be forgiven them. Mark 4:10-12
And the Lord said to Moses, “When you go back to Egypt, see that you do before Pharaoh all the miracles that I have put in your power. But I will harden his heart, so that he will not let the people go. Exo 4:21
These scriptures shock me in their meaning.
God fully relays in them that the heart belongs to Him. Even a repentant heart is unattained save by His power.
The only honor I asked for the life of my father was souls satan would loose to the Kingdom.
And, God said 'Ok'.
If ever someone is here in this small space of mine and God is pulling on their heart strings, it is God. That's what I know about it. If leaders who are fathers of nations stopping by to glean anything I am blessed to share, I see God's divine honour ...
Anyone who may be reached in some way because of something I am blessed to share here is counted in that 10,000 as asked for that very dark day in my life.
Rest assure, it's God's legacy .. that I get to share in having nothing else but Him. In this, there is nothing but gains.
“Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever believes in me will also do the works that I do; and greater works than these will he do, because I am going to the Father. Whatever you ask in my name, this I will do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son. If you ask me anything in my name, I will do it.
(John 14)
Because I have an idea of my readership here, this is not a normal thing to share. But, I'm going to share it anyway. It's my testimony.
This month marks a certain year since the passing of my late father. If you have never been able to articulate it before now, I will assist by saying that living in the finished work of the cross means seeing where God finished. It is a vision possible for every person who has received Jesus, and satan strives against this through inflicting of trauma.
Trauma is simply that. A roadblock on a path you're destined on through the finished work of the cross. Where the Word states that Jesus is coming back for a spotless Bride is the manifestation of the finished work. Perfection is possible, meaning in the Hebrew, whole, nothing lacking.
There may be a large group who feel that this life is not about seeing 'perfection', just about trying to get there. They need a Psalm 40 revelation. Many of the things God has called His people to do require that we be whole, solid, supernaturally equipped which requires supernatural stewardship. And, brokeness is not too big for God. He made all New at the cross.
In what I've experienced God doing, opposing satan's strategy at any angle, has everything to do with identity.
This year on the marked timeline of the things I relayed here, The LORD gave me vision for a part of my identity that is only received as revelation. Any revelation a person will ever receive in kind will be immediate addition to what they understand about God. Because of all I had to weigh concerning my late father, it became necessary for me to wonder how God rejoices as a part of being who He is as God when others have been lost.
In intercession, through the finished work of the cross, we travel dimensions through time and space revealing the work that Jesus finished. It is like a huge treasure chest waiting to be opened by the Body of Christ at large. On many occasions since the passing of my late father, The LORD has shown me what was taking place in the spirit that today I have a testimony of being present in what was unfolding during that season before his passing though I had not seen or spoken to my father since childhood.
God secured me in these things that I be ready for what He revealed to me this year, a closing that I tried to cry about. I forced out tears just to be able to feel like a human being . But, I was stuck with Manasseh .
The LORD showed me in a dream, extending from a message I recently listened to mentioning about the faith of Moses' sister watching him afloat in the basket. In the dream, I was seated by still water on a dock when noticing movement in the water which I immediately knew were crocs. I warned then to my late father in the dream seated somewhere next to me, pulling on him to get up as I also moved swiftly with instinct away. In running, I turned to view the scene as though he were close behind, but he was swimming in full stride toward a swarm of crocodiles in the water.
In the dream, a sudden closure of peace came to me, seeing that a moment of decision had been obtained and fulfilled. He had fully made his choice . I called to him while viewing him being consumed as a child understandingly saying good bye to her father when he has to leave the house even though she'd rather him stay. And, The LORD allowed me to see the last thing I ever said to my father, though not in the flesh.
In the dream I spoke aloud as though knowing he could hear me, I love you.
I awoke from this dream as though with an understanding that this closing statement was indeed a closing one. And I had understanding of how Abba saw it. He gave the choice for each one of us to make. In love He allows each one of us to make it, and He is love while doing so. I tried for days for some kind of unfinish to steer itself around.
More forcing out tears for how I should be able to feel ... Manasseh.
God unfolds to me the identity of being whole in such a reality, by showing me where He is. It is not naturally understood, and no person I know today would teach me this.
Surely, this perfection in Christ is for every person alive, in their lifetime.
The flesh does not understand.
But, now that I have seen that Jesus me ...
Gabrielle (Gabby) Thomas
