Therefore return to your God! Hold fast to love and mercy, to righteousness and justice, and wait [expectantly] for your God continually!
Hosea 12:6, AMP

Let’s picture this turning from the Lord in our minds…

The Lord, bright and holy, His face shining as the sun at noonday, is before us. His loving, passionate, yearning gaze captures our hearts and attention. He desires us more than anything and wants to consume our hearts with His never-ending love. Truth Himself is the object of our gaze.

Jesus Christ, the hope of glory, may You save us all!

I believe that there is infinite freedom in facing the truth. The saying goes that the truth hurts. It is a time when we acknowledge and consent that this is the way things really are. We might not like to see it or admit it but we must agree.

Joy becomes more pervasive of our lives when the facts are laid bare. No cover-up, no hiding. They are in plain sight. We begin to accept things. Maybe change will result. The important thing is that we see things the way they really are.

“Our fallen thinking processes automatically justify our actions and rationalize our thoughts. Without the Holy Spirit, we are nearly defenseless against our own innate tendencies toward self-deception.

“Therefore, if we would be holy, we must first renounce falsehood. In the light of God’s grace, having been justified by faith and washed by the sacrificial blood of Jesus, we need not pretend to be righteous. We need only to become truthful.

“No condemnation awaits our honesty of heart—no punishment. We have only to repent and confess our sins to have them forgiven and cleansed; if we will love the truth we shall be delivered from sin and self-deception. Indeed, we need to know two things and two things only: the heart of God in Christ and our own hearts in Christ’s light.”
Francis Frangipane, Holiness, Truth and the Presence of God

In the same way God’s Truth (His Word) shines the light in our hearts as to expose the darkness that lies within us. It does us no good to deny, cover-up, or make excuses for those things. That prevents the Light from penetrating our beings and doing the work it was sent to do. What we must do is simply confess, ask for forgiveness, and then receive God’s healing touch.

Too often, I fear, we get caught up in should’s and shouldn’ts. ”Well, I shouldn’t be like this, so it cannot be true.” “I ought to be a better person. There must be something wrong with me.” If you’re a Christian, you most likely know what I’m talking about. We need to shine with God’s light to the world. Sometimes, though, we generate all of the doing part on our own for the sake of appearances. For instance, we are told that we are to be hospitable to others, so then we feel it’s something we should be, regardless as to whether or not that is really in our hearts. Instead of possessing a submitted life lived for the Lord, obligation and legalism settle in. The heart of the matter gets dissipated. (Please see my last blog for more on this matter!)

When we just admit to God our weaknesses, faults, sins, etc. and ask for forgiveness, the whole healing process goes so much faster!!! We consent that we are weak and need God’s help and grace to have a heart for what He wants us to be and do. It is in totally relying on the Lord that we are able to be who He so desires us to be.

Any relationship is radically strengthened when you are able to be lovingly truthful with others. Fears. Doubts. Worries. Mistakes. Brute honesty and forgiveness are the way to go.

As we open up our hearts to others, may we always know that our hearts are laid open to and totally bare to the Lord God every single moment of the day and of our life. Whether or not you believe in Him, this is the truth. All that He asks is that we come to Him and give it up. He will replace our darkness with the radically awesome light of His love. Tell Him you are weak. Tell Him you need help to be the way He wants you to be. Then lean on His grace. Look full into His Truth. His Spirit will take God’s Word through the very fibers of your being and make you to be more like Christ.

Face the truth. Face reality. Face God’s Truth. It is reality.

When we look in a mirror, a phenomenon occurs. An image is reflected back as it is. In order to use the mirror light must be present. In the dark a mirror is totally useless. However, with even the faintest glimmer of light images begin to form and make sense to our minds. So it is with us. In order to perceive the Truth of God’s Word we must have the Light of the Lord dwelling in us to illuminate our hearts to the great and majestic personality of God.

When we look into God’s Word, it’s like looking at mirror. The Truth found in the Scriptures gets reflected right back to us and illuminates our hearts even more. God’s glory, God’s light, and God’s truth are all so interrelated and connected. I love the verse in Habbakkuk that says, And His brightness was like the sunlight; rays streamed from His hand, and there [in the sunlike splendor] was the hiding place of His power. That’s why the more we gaze God’s glory in the Word, we are changed because His glory reflects right back at us!

Isn’t it stunning to think about how we only have a dim and blurred perception of reality? It is going to be breathtaking when we see things the way they really are. To see things as God sees them. No hindrances. No lies. Nothing obscuring our view. We will see the full Truth!

We are also encouraged to not forget upon reflecting. In James 1:22-25 (AMP) we are told:

But be doers of the Word [obey the message], and not merely listeners to it, betraying yourselves [into deception by reasoning contrary to the Truth]. For if anyone only listens to the Word without obeying it and being a doer of it, he is like a man who looks carefully at his [own] natural face in a mirror; For he thoughtfully observes himself, and then goes off and promptly forgets what he was like. But he who looks carefully into the faultless law, the [law] of liberty, and is faithful to it and perseveres in looking into it, being not a heedless listener who forgets but an active doer [who obeys], he shall be blessed in his doing (his life of obedience).

And just like Joshua who kept God’s commands hidden in his heart that he might obey them, so we need to do our part in partnership with God. We must act in accordance with God’s ways. We read, reflect, pray, and then in partnership with the Holy Spirit are enabled to walk along the narrow path and bear the everlasting fruit.

It can’t be reiterated enough that it all begins in our thought-life. If we have correct thoughts, outlooks, attitudes, and mindsets, then we are empowered to talk and act in true accordance with God’s heart. This is why we must take the time to meditate and reflect on God’s Word, so that it becomes ingrained in us. It’s similar to how we get fuel for our body. We put food in our mouths, chew, and swallow. Then it goes through the digestive system where it is broken down into its parts. The nutrients are then sent to their rightful places in the body. Like so, when we read the Word, ponder it, chew on it, break it down, inspect it, the Holy Spirit sends it throughout our being to do His work. From there our everyday lives become more and more lined up with what God wants for each of us, individually and corporately.

So take the Word. Embrace the Word. Read it. Hear it. Think about it. Receive and welcome it into your heart. Let it change your souls. Let God in and allow Him to clear out the junk. Then the fruit on the outside will become real, true, and pure.

Dig in.