Higher Purpose Strengthens Faith

If things are going well in your walk with God, you will always have something new to talk about. There will always be a revelation, an answered prayer, a miraculous healing, or some other new blessing to discuss. If this isn’t happening to you, you should be encouraged, because it means you’re doing things wrong, and if you’re doing things wrong, then you can start doing things right, and that means you can enter into a new level of blessings.

My marriage continues to exceed expectations. I didn’t think I’d marry at all, and then once I started looking around, I thought I’d have to get by with a wife who was, in some way, a compromise. I thought I was going to have to settle for someone who had significant doctrinal differences with me, or who was less excited about God than I was, who didn’t pray in tongues, who didn’t want to spend a lot of time praying with me, who never got any revelation of her own…I figured I couldn’t have everything.

Rhodah and I are in very close agreement, so we don’t have stress about who believes what. She gets lots of revelation. She loves prayer. I don’t think I could have done better. God really outdid himself, finding me this lady.

The other day, I got some revelation, and when we had our daily video chat, I planned to bring it up, but before I could, she brought up her own revelation, which was nearly the same thing.

A lot of Christians have spouses they have to drag around, like backpacks full of lead bars. They can’t get them to pray. They can’t get them to read the Bible. They can’t get them to give up secular entertainment. It’s amazing to me that I don’t have these problems.

I don’t know if I can reconstruct what Rhodah told me, but I can explain the basic idea that occurred to us both.

Psalm 37 says, “Delight thyself also in the Lord: and he shall give thee the desires of thine heart.” I guess this is a good place to start. God doesn’t want us to have miserable lives of unrewarding suffering. Christians are supposed to have happy, fulfilled lives.

We also know that there is a symmetry between our treatment of God and the way he treats us. For example, he cursed the world with weeds when Adam sinned. Why? Adam’s sin assured that the human race, which started out pure, would turn out like a garden the brought forth lots of troublesome weeds. God wanted Adam and Eve to see what it felt like.

If God wants to give us the desires of our hearts, what does he want us to give him? The desires of his heart.

A week or two back, I saw a video about the Lord’s Prayer. Messianic Rabbi Zev Porat was speaking. He pointed something out: he said Jesus used “we” and “us” when he prayed. He wasn’t just praying for himself; he prayed for all of God’s children.

Not long after that, I saw a video in which Ecclesiastes 10:8 was discussed: “He that diggeth a pit shall fall into it; and whoso breaketh an hedge, a serpent shall bite him.” The speaker was Bill Wiese, the man who wrote 23 Minutes in Hell. He said it was about breaking the hedge of protection God puts around us. You can open yourself up to problems by doing things like occult practices, getting tattoos, looking at pornography, and so on. When you do these things, you open the wall of protection so spirits that hate you can come after you.

Somewhere down the line, I started thinking about Cain and Abel. After the father of all vegetarians murdered his brother, God asked him where Abel was, and he said, “Am I my brother’s keeper?”

Christians misunderstand this verse, thinking it means we have to break our necks doing all sorts of wonderful things for random people. That’s not quite right.

I looked up the Hebrew word translated “keeper.” It’s Strong’s H8104, “shamar.” It looked a lot like “shomer,” which means “to guard.” I have looked “shomer” up, and it derives from “shamar.” Cain was asking if he was his brother’s guard.

These ideas came together in my head and heart, and I saw something. One reason God does not answer our prayers or give us authority is that we focus too much on ourselves.

Who are my brothers? Everyone on Earth? No. The Bible clearly says, “As many as are led by the Spirit, they are the sons of God.” Jesus refused to talk to his biological mother while he was busy talking to people who had accepted him, saying, “Behold my mother and my brethren.”

Should you be good to people, generally, whether they are Christians or not? Yes, but unbelievers aren’t your brothers or sisters, and you don’t owe them as much. The Bible tells us we are the body of Christ, so we are connected to each other in ways we can never be connected to unbelievers.

Jesus asked God to look after “us,” not just himself, to show that we are supposed to be one.

I wish I could recall what Rhodah said. It was about our duty to be watchmen. Same thing.

The Bible uses “hedge” and “wall” somewhat interchangeably. Hedges and walls are barriers. They can keep the disobedient out, as the wall around the Garden of Eden does. They can keep the disobedient in; God has said he surrounds the rebellious with hedges to prevent them from succeeding. They can protect whoever or whatever is inside them. Isaiah 62 says this:

I have set watchmen upon thy walls, O Jerusalem, which shall never hold their peace day nor night: ye that make mention of the Lord, keep not silence, And give him no rest, till he establish, and till he make Jerusalem a praise in the earth.

Informed Christians know we are supposed to be the world’s caretakers, but when we say that, what do we mean? Do we use the word “world” to mean the planet or the people who live on it? It’s supposed to refer to the people. The world is a mess because we use Christianity to look after ourselves but not others. It’s not God’s job to look after the world; to take care of his children. It’s ours.

We are supposed to be defenders and protectors who intercede, mainly for the body of Christ, and, to a lesser extent, for everyone. We are supposed to stand guard, like the cherub who guards the gate of Eden and the tree of life with a flaming sword.

This is more helpful than it may seem.

One of the big problems we have is that Satan has us convinced God doesn’t want to do anything for us. We don’t expect our prayers to be answered, even though the Bible clearly says they will be. Would you feel that way if you thought your prayers helped God look after someone he loves?

God loves people, so when he looks down at the earth, he sees things he wants to change. It’s like sitting on your porch and watching your baby son crawl toward a busy road. God doesn’t resent it when we ask for help. He is eager to jump in. He is waiting for us to give him the desires of his heart.

Now, when I pray, I try to include the body of Christ. When I ask for revelation or deliverance or protection or some other aid, I ask on behalf of God’s other children, not just myself and my wife. Then I ask God if he wants to grant the prayer. If I feel he does, I ask in Jesus’ name, and I say, “Receive the desires of your heart.” While I’m doing this, over and over, I don’t feel I’m annoying God. I feel I’m holding the channel open for him so he can do what he wants to do. It’s a new mindset. I feel I should ask him for more things, not fewer. It allows faith to flow.

I also ask him to motivate others to pray for the same things and to glorify himself in what he does.

Things have really changed since we got this revelation. I feel much better about prayer. I feel I’m doing what God has been trying to get me to do, so I feel he is on board. It’s much better from the standpoint of faith.

Our revelation also ties into the apocalypse. I believe the tribulation will take place because of the rapture. The watchmen who pray and keep Satan from destroying the world will be gone, so the hedge will be broken. It all makes sense.

I hope this testimony helps other people. It is certainly helping me.