Roy Hession

THANKSGIVING

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RECEIVING THE SPIRIT TO MINISTER

Screen Shot 2016-08-23 at 3.50.46 PM“…when the Holy Spirit comes on you, you will be able to be my witnesses…” (Acts 1:8 MSG).

FATHER, I gratefully thank You for inviting me to be the cup You use to pour out Your goodness on mankind. You require and then enable me to keep my cup clean so You can choose me to be Your minister.

You require it and make me able to die to self—to be constantly dying, always carrying in my body the death of JESUS, so that the life of JESUS may also be manifested in my body (2 Cor 4:10) (ref#97, p25).

“It will mean no plans, no time, no money, no pleasure of our own. It will mean a constant yielding to those around us…” Roy Hession (ref#97, p25).

You make me able to put out of my life every known sin (ref#30, p116). The SPIRIT makes me willing to show You my dirty cup—makes me willing to give it to You to clean—and it will be cleaned with Your Son’s precious Blood that continually flows for sin (ref#97, p30).

You make me able to be broken of my will.   The SPIRIT brings me to the foot of the Cross to show me what real brokenness is. I see His wounded hands and feet and His face crowned with thorns… (ref#97, p48).

Through Your direction of the SPIRIT, He is able to make me into a suitable tool for Your use. And going yet further, the SPIRIT points my desires toward a further spiritual anointing—the “definite endowment of power from the Holy Spirit” R. A. Torrey (ref#30, p115-116).

All praise to You, FATHER, for You make me able to be in relationship with You. I thank You for the SPIRIT Who leads me to every step of cleanliness and on to the ability to minister with You in Your behalf.

CONFESSION

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GOING TO THE CROSS

Screen Shot 2016-03-15 at 4.51.02 PM…FATHER, what would happen if I willed myself to look into the face of JESUS on the cross? Could the SPIRIT reveal something in my heart that I’m unaware of and have been avoiding?

Can I let CHRIST’s self-forgetful love—His longsuffering and forbearance flow into my self-remembering heart? I see His wounded hands and feet—His face crowned with thorns (ref#97, p48)—“the bruised body, the dying cries” The Valley of Vision (ref#76, p41). I remember how He lived—what He did—what He didn’t do. This cross scene is not something in the past; the Cross still stands! His precious blood still flows for my sin (ref#97, p29)! Do I comprehend the magnitude of that?

“…let us go…in all our rags and poverty and defilement of our natural condition. Let us clasp that cross and look into His eyes. Let us bathe in that fountain filled with blood.  Then we will have our first love restored to us.  Once again we will experience the simplicity of our faith and the tenderness of our hearts” Charles Spurgeon (ref#34, March 30th PM).

CONFESSION

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WHEN THE LORD WILL NOT HEAR

Screen Shot 2016-01-26 at 2.11.22 PM“For any one…who separates himself from me, taking his idols into his heart…I will set my face against that man; I will make him a sign and a byword…and you shall know that I am the Lord” (Ezek 14:7-8 ESV).

“…I will act in wrath. My eye will not spare, nor will I have pity. And though they cry in my ears with a loud voice, I will not hear them’” (Ezek 8:18 ESV).

FATHER, these hard words You have recorded are a sobering punctuation of how important it is to daily evaluate myself. My ruin will be estrangement from You by deciding to move my dependence from You to someone else (ref#18, [Ezek 14:1-11]). (An idol is some creature, mainly myself, who I allow to set up rule in my heart that replaces You).

“…the only life that pleases God…is His life—never our life, no matter how hard we try. But inasmuch as our self-centered life is the exact opposite of His, we can never be filled with His life unless we are prepared for God to bring our life constantly to death” (ref#97, p25).

The sin of living by my born-with nature is loathsome to GOD. I am in the way of GOD’s wrath when I attempt to “satisfy a vain curiosity, to stop the mouth of a clamorous conscience, or to get or save a reputation among men, but without any desire to be acquainted with God or any design to be ruled by him” (ref#18, [Ezek 14:1-11]).

“…human nature was created by God, not by the devil; it is impaired, and enfeebled, but it is not sinful. The first creation retains the remnants of God’s handiwork; re-creation is the building of a spiritual habitation, ‘an habitation of God,’ and all our effort is to be spent in disciplining the natural life in obedience to the new creation wrought in us through the Spirit….Any attempt to build on the natural virtues will ultimately outrange the grace of God…” (ref#157, June 5th).