Faith: Rak Chazak! – The Quickening – by Brian Pease

Inspired and adapted from “The Christian in Complete Armor by William Gurnall”, 1658.

Ephesians 6:10 “Finally, my brethren, be strong in the Lord, and in the power of his might.” (2 Chron. 32:7) Be strong and courageous, be not afraid or dismayed. (Isaiah 35:4) Say to them that are of a fearful heart, Be strong, fear not: behold, your God will come with vengeance, even God with a recompense; he will come and save you.”

So, the question to us is how are we to be strong as a body of believers? We must unite all the power of our souls together, as the disciples and believers did into one accord as is found in Acts chapter 1. We unite in fellowship to give strength and encouragement to each other, that we may be fervent and unrelenting in prayer and be filled with the Holy Spirit: which is the power we must receive to effectively witness for Jesus.

A Christian in fervent prayer is a Christian in close fellowship with God. It is a humble boldness of faith: humble knowing we can only come close to God with a broken and contrite heart and through the shed blood of our Lord Jesus Christ and yet bold in God’s word to take hold of the Lord as Jacob, and will not let go until without a blessing. We desperately need these blessings of God to have victory over our flesh in a fallen sin-cursed world as we make our march toward Heaven: a march in which we must often fight for each and every step of the way.

In this strength we are to proclaim and prosecute an irreconcilable war against our own sins; those sins which lay nearest our heart must now be trampled down under foot. Think of what great courage and strength this war will require?

Abraham was tested and tried to purpose in the tearing of his heart when he was called to take his son, his only son whom he loved, and offer him up, with his own hands. Yet think of that trial compared to mortifying our own sins. Soul, take your lust, your greatest lust, which is the child of your dearest love, your Isaac, the son which has caused most joy and laughter; from which you have pleasure or profit: lay hands on it, offer it up, pour out the blood of it before God, run the sacrificing knife of mortification into the very heart of it and this do freely, joyfully even, for it is no pleasing sacrifice that is offered reluctantly, and do all this now before you have one more embrace from it. Truly this is a hard task, flesh and blood is weak to follow through and our lusts will not lie so patiently on the altar as Isaac or as a lamb that is brought to slaughter, which is dumb; but will roar and shriek, yes, even shake and rend the carnal heart with conflict, wrestling, and convulsions of Satan’s excuses of worldly reason to extenuate and minimize the sin, especially by comparison or because of its secrecy. Now what resolve and strength is required in our prayers and supplications, in our whole-hearted desires of God; that we may be given the strength to bring swift execution of our sins?

We are also not to be conformed to this world. We are to be separate. 1st Corinthians 2:5 says, “That your faith should not stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God.” To be separate requires courage to despise the shame which the Christian must expect to meet with. Worldly ridicule and shame is that which a proud nature most avoids. Those in their pride will not confess Christ openly, and many loose heaven because they are ashamed to be a fool for Christ, to bear a cross of mocking ridicule that a cursed world will lay upon them.

Again, as some will mock, others will persecute to death, merely for this non-conformity of the Christian to this fallen world’s understanding. We are to live a life committed to our Lord: that all our enemies can say against us is that we are consistent in God’s word and will not live as the world does. There is so great an opposition that we must be grounded, steadfast in our faith, which is held by the power of God. We must persevere in our march toward heaven, even in the midst of scandals that are cast upon the church by apostates and false preachers who have allowed those weak in faith to compromise God’s truth and backslide. We have need of Holy Spirit-filled resolve, so we can bear up under these failures, to surround our hearts with God’s peace, and be undaunted in serving our Lord.

We require boldness of faith in the times when we struggle to hear God, when he seems to withdraw and allow trials to discipline us. Isaiah 50:10 “Who is among you that feareth the LORD, that obeyeth the voice of his servant, that walketh in darkness, and hath no light? Let him trust in the name of the LORD, and stay upon his God.”

As in the 23rd Psalm we walk through the valley of the shadow of death. We walk in a shadow, darkness because something has gotten between us and the SON. Does God still shine and reign? Really? Are you fully persuaded of that truth! When we seem to be in the shadow, something has gotten between us and our Lord.

Here, I would add to Isaiah, 1st John 1:9 and say: we are to confess our sins, though seem to walk in the darkness of this world, we trust in the name of the Lord, we stay upon our God: who is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. This takes a great faith especially when we feel we are rebuked of God, when it seems our prayers don’t go any further than the ceiling.

In Matthew 15:22-28, we find a very telling example of faith: “And, behold, a woman of Canaan came out of the same coasts, and cried unto him, saying, Have mercy on me, O Lord, thou Son of David; my daughter is grievously vexed with a devil. But he answered her not a word. And his disciples came and besought him, saying, Send her away; for she crieth after us. But he answered and said, I am not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel. Then came she and worshipped him, saying, Lord, help me. But he answered and said, It is not meet to take the children’s bread, and to cast it to dogs. And she said, Truth, Lord: yet the dogs eat of the crumbs which fall from their masters’ table. Then Jesus answered and said unto her, O woman, great is thy faith: be it unto thee even as thou wilt. And her daughter was made whole from that very hour.” (*emphasis added)

Jesus, our loving, compassionate Savior, called the woman of Canaan a dog (a culturally common nickname then for the unbelieving Gentile) and yet she was not deterred! She agreed with the Lord, which is the meaning of confession, that she did not deserve the Lord’s saving power: a power that we don’t deserve either. We must cleanse and prepare ourselves as a vessel unto honor as in 2nd Timothy Chapter 2. We are to be ready to be filled of the Holy Spirit in the face of all the evil actions of this rebellious world. Do you believe God is in control? Do you believe that Satan can only run to the end of his chain that is held by God? Do you know that all things work unto good for believers? Doesn’t this mean that God, in his wisdom allows things that in our understanding may seem tragic perhaps even feel as an evil attack; and yet will ultimately bring good?

Consider this: how does a loving parent teach a child to walk? They call the child to walk toward them. The child pulls up; is unsteady, afraid, tries to walk, stretches out its arms and cries to be picked up for the discomfort in their legs. So, what does this loving parent do while holding out their arms, smiling and calling their child: they back up! How horrible and cruel, from the child’s point of view. But isn’t this the way we see some things that God allows in our lives? The parent backs up so that the child may put forth all its strength and learn to walk. Our Heavenly Father trains us in our spiritual growth which is our sanctification: the often painful and uncomfortable lessons that we learn to love Jesus more than anything else.

We are in a battle. How disgusting it is that everywhere you look there are utterly shameless sinners, who are determined to be wicked. They have scared off weak and compromising Christian’s into a retreat from battle and leave Hell to keep the field as we have seen on many fronts in our own nation. At every victory they behave even more openly profane against our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. How disheartening it is to see saints retreat from their God and frightened from the battle; when they should have wrapped themselves in the Lord’s word and died upon that place, rather than betray the glorious name of Jesus.

Is this disgusting? Yes! Is this disappointing? Absolutely! Are we to be discouraged? Never!!! God himself has appointed His own Son, the Captain of our Salvation, who never turned His head from danger and death: not when attacked by the ignorance and betrayal of men, not when surrounded by the malice of Hell, nor when Heaven laid upon Him the terrible price of God’s righteous judgment for our sins; but He triumphed over it all.

He shall lead us on with courage and bring us off with honor. He lived and died for us, He will live and die with us in this our march toward heaven.

We are encouraged by our fellow soldiers, some who are enduring great struggles of affliction in this moment. For though our battle may be long, and we don’t think we can endure; we are quickened and revived by faith. In faith we know that the instant we are with the Lord: all our tears are dried, all our wounds are healed, and the pain of the battle is no more; for we are enveloped in the joy of that present victory.

God grant us the fullness of the Holy Spirit to live our lives this side of eternity as if we are already in that present victory in Jesus! Rak Chazak!