The Disconnect
Illustrating a Truth of Invisible Kingdoms at War
By now practically everyone in the world knows how wonderful a cell phone can be when it is charged up and how useless it is when the battery goes dead. We're just the same! The Lord says that we only "work" rightly when we are well-connected to Him and fully charged with His Spirit. He calls it "abiding" in Him. Strangely (or perversely), the devil seems to know this better than many Christians. His favorite tactic is to get us disconnected from our life Source--and then keep us from noticing we're no longer abiding.
How do you know if you are well-connected? That's easy: The Peace of Christ. We receive the Lord's own peace whenever we are trusting Him sufficiently with our life and our loved ones and are willing to do the next right thing He shows us.[i] Otherwise, there will be little or no peace. The peace is His elegant way of letting us know if we are abiding in Him in any given moment. Have you ever pushed the charging tether into your phone only to discover (hours later!) that it only looked connected, but wasn't inserted deep enough to draw the necessary current? Is it possible that many of us only look tethered to the Lord, but are actually living without His peace flooding us?
So, here's the drill. Get into the River of Peace by trusting the Lord with everything. Start flowing in His Spirit and watch to see how stuff that "happens" will almost always work to disconnect you from His peace. We all get negative emotional reactions at times that rob the peace away. The trick is not stopping stuff from happening (good luck with that), or stopping your insides from going off, but learning to get a quick recovery of the peace. Otherwise, the same event that could have taken you up into faith and grace will take you down into your old ways of thinking and behaving. It's your call...
"I call Heaven and earth to record today against you. I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing. Therefore, choose life, so that both you and your seed may live, so that you may love Jehovah your God, and that you may obey His voice, and that you may cling to Him. For He is your life and the length of your days." Deuteronomy 30:19-20a MKJV
"Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in me." John 15:4
Prayer
Dear Jesus, It's true! I get so easily disconnected from You and Your peace and I don't even realize it until hours or days later. Please help me become instantly aware of any loss of peace and recognize it as a call to return to trusting You with all that is going on. I'm probably going to stumble at this until I get the hang of it, so help me get really, really good at trusting You to keep loving me even when I'm not trusting You. In fact, let's begin now. With Your help, I choose to surrender myself entirely into Your Loving Hands and Your Spirit's gentle leading. I cast all my cares on You, including all of my loved ones. Now, meet me and lead me, teaching me how to live each day in the River of Peace by abiding continually in You.
Endnotes
[i] Colossians 3:15: And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body. And be thankful.
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