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Text Sermons : ~Other Speakers S-Z : George Warnock : His Dealings

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God deals with His own in a very individual and specific way; and therefore we are not to criticize anyone who is doing God’s will in the realm of his personal walk with the Lord. But we can be assured of this, if we really mean to go on with the Lord, all of us are going to experience some very drastic changes in our lives as He leads us from one degree of glory to another. God is far more concerned about His people coming to know Him than He is in our doing many good works. And the reason should be self-evident: for if we do not truly know Him, we can never perform His works. But if we are truly willing to be changed, and become what He wants us to become, we cannot fail to do what He would have us do.

The cocoon, therefore, (whatever it may be in your life and mine) is not to be considered as some strange thing that has happened, to hinder us in our quest for true fulfillment. Rather it is a sure token that we are walking in His ways, seeing Him, and seeing ourselves for what we really are: helpless, needy, confined, limited, and ineffective in all our ways. We look for a new life, a life beyond the veil of our own flesh, a life in the heavenly realm where we are in vital union with Christ, and reigning in life by Christ Jesus. As a boy I was greatly fascinated with the process of metamorphosis long before I knew there was such a word. Every spring I would look for a furry worm, put him in a ventilated jar along with some green leaves, and watch the process. What a thrill to watch him two or three weeks later coming forth as a beautiful butterfly... a one-time crawling worm, and now flying in the atmosphere above! Little did I know then that in the days to come I myself would find myself in a cocoon designed by my Creator--a cocoon of His own dealings. There is a labor to enter into His rest. There is a struggle. But it is the struggle of life, a struggle that God ordained. You cannot snip the cocoon with a pair of scissors when you see the butterfly struggling to emerge. No matter how careful you are he will not be able to fly... because it takes the struggle within the insect to pump the life into his wings that will enable him to fly. Let us not seek to remove the impediments from our lives or from the lives of God’s people that God deliberately put there for our transformation.

Something else we must consider. What causes the releasing of the hormones in the worm to set in motion the process of metamorphosis? The scientist we mentioned discovered that it was caused by the warmth of the spring season! The timing of God is so important. God has "seasons" for whatever He would do; and when the season arrives He prepares His people for what He has in mind. So we must not compare ourselves with other men, nor yet with men of other generations, and feel that we have all that God has in mind if we measure up to them. When we speak of a life in God and a revelation of His glory that was not given to previous generations, it is not that we are better, or have more favor with God, or more knowledge of the scriptures. They served God according to the provision of grace that He supplied for their generation. But now in view of the tremendous onslaught of evil and corruption about us, God knows we need more of His grace and more of His glory… and He is causing us to know it, that we might seek after Him and find it.

So in this hour the rays of the Sun of Righteousness are beaming forth upon His people who have grown weary of the worm-life, and long to explore their inheritance in heavenly places. Oftentimes men of this world are "wiser than the children of light." We have witnessed in our generation a new thing in the earth. Men have been able to escape the power of earth--gravity and orbit about a new center, and even walk on the moon, completely free from the pull of the earth. Yet the children of light find it difficult to believe that God has sufficient power and wisdom to thrust us forth from realms of flesh-bondage into realms of spiritual liberation, where we too may find a new center and source of life in God alone. But there is a people in the earth who believe that God is willing to do this very thing... and to these God would speak words of great encouragement.

"Fear not, thou worm Jacob,

And ye men of Israel;

I will help thee, saith the LORD,

And thy redeemer, the Holy One of Israel.

Behold, I will make thee

A new sharp threshing instrument having teeth:

Thou shalt thresh the mountains,

And beat them small,

And shalt make the hill as chaff.

Thou shalt fan them,

And the wind shall carry them away,

And the whirlwind shall scatter them:

And thou shalt rejoice in the LORD,

And shalt glory in the Holy One of Israel" (Isa. 41:14-16).

Just a worm! Just an insect! But it becomes a threshing machine, a new one... "having teeth"! In vain are we going to put any "teeth" into our efforts to reach the nations and gather in the harvest, until we partake of the changing, transfiguring, transforming work of the Spirit of God in our lives. Think of it! God is going to use a worm to thresh the mountains, and crush the powers of evil into dust. The kingdoms of this world are to become "the kingdoms of our Lord, and of His Christ." And God says "all nations shall come and worship before Him" when His judgments are made manifest in the earth! (See Rev. 15:4.)





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