Rest Versus Passivity
by Daniel Yordy

A Video Recording of this Message (Rest)

A Video Recording of this Message (Weakness)

Passivity - Bad.

Rest - Good.

"They that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength." The Hebrew word that Isaiah used here for 'wait' is not a passive, maybe someday, kind of waiting. It is not putting off until tomorrow what God has already said belongs to right now. Rather, it is the same meaning as to braid a rope. "They that are entwined together with the Lord shall renew their strength."

That 'entwining' is filled with great workings and passion, yet it is complete rest.

Jesus said, "He that thirsts, let him come to Me and drink."

Paul in several places used the word 'groan' instead of thirst. He said that we groan and long specifically for the physical body to be swallowed up in the life of God, that the defeat of death in our physical bodies is the focus of the Christian's travail.

We are well into the transition between the age of human folly and the age of the liberty of the sons of God. There are three foundational truths we must keep solidly in our minds and hearts as we walk through this time of great contradiction.

1. We see glory as has never been seen before. Nothing in the experience of man upon this earth can compare to what we will see and be a part of. We cannot even look back to Jesus as He Himself walked this earth, for we know Him that way no longer. He is in us to do a new thing. Every word God has spoken through His covenant with us we will know in full reality, we will see it fully in our experience.

2. We have not been this way before. We live in both heaven and earth, but, although we know much about living in the earth, we know very little about living in the heavenlies at the same time. Each of us is entwining ourselves and being entwined into that full revelation of Jesus Christ as He intends through us. Although there are similarities, yet each one of us must find that particular revelation of Jesus that we are.

3. This is all God's doing. It is God who determined right from the start that I would be just like Jesus, conformed to the image of His Son. I can accomplish nothing of myself. All of my groaning and all of my thirst is a pointless waste of time - except God.

And so we find ourselves between passivity and rest. They look very similar but they are very very different. The one will cause us to be left behind, the other places us directly in the grip of a passionate and wild Being who gets His way and who always accomplishes His purposes.

Paul said, speaking of our pursuit of the resurrection of our bodies, "That I might apprehend that for which I have been apprehended."

I love the Greek word that has been translated 'apprehend.' It is better translated 'seized.' "That I might seize that for which I have been seized." The word 'seized' means "caught in a powerful and certain grip." I have been seized by the intention of God. I am utterly in the grip of His will. Then, out of the certainty of the grip of God upon me in all of my ways, I myself seize hold of every expression of His life in me.

This is rest; this is the entwining of God.

But passivity is different, though it can appear similar. Passivity says, "Well, since its all up to God and not up to me, I will simply live life as it comes and God can do whatever He wants to do whenever He gets around to it."

We certainly live life as it comes, simply and with all joy, giving thanks in all things. That is an essential part of our rest. But the problem with that attitude all by itself is that it has eliminated my direct involvement with a passionate and determined God.

We live in the Matrix. We have lived in a false understanding of reality. Our earthly focus has kept us from walking in all the reality of the heavenlies in which we presently live. The shattering of our 'seeing' with earthly eyes requires both faith and violence. Rest is not passive. We are coming out of unreality. That is not a passive process.

At the same time, I read those who have decided that since they have discovered the reality of Christ in them, there is no more spiritual warfare. The devil is just an extension of God performing His will in the world and we don't worry about him anymore. I read of those who go for months without a sense of God's presence and power and that is just part of accepting Christ living as us.

Bunk!

First, I cannot comprehend anyone who accepts living without the immediate sense of God's presence, His power, and His peace.

(And please understand my purpose for sharing my own personal experience. Sharing 'theology', only, has less value than sharing the Word made flesh. It is the sharing of our own personal experience of the Lord Jesus Christ that is of the most value to one another.)

Spiritual warfare is now, for me, on a whole different level than it once was. I used to fight the shadow of darkness attempting to stand between me and the knowledge of His glory by pleading the blood of Jesus. That level of warfare was for a season. Now I fight that shadow by placing myself utterly in Jesus and seeing Jesus in every part of me - and by deliberately moving over to seeing all things through God's eyes.

The difference in my own experience is this. I have never accepted 'brass heavens,' and I have never understood anyone who willingly did. Sometimes, I would battle for some days, crying out to God for mercy, pleading the blood, before the darkness fled and His overwhelming peace flowed in. Now, I stand firmly against the darkness, drawing my mind out of seeing the lie of the darkness and placing my mind fully upon this confession of faith: "Christ is all there is in me." Often, when the assault is most severe, the darkness will persevere for an hour or two before its hold breaks and it flees.

But I am no longer in any way asking for 'mercy' from a position of fault. Rather, I stand in the certainty that all of my weakness, He already carries within Himself, and He lives utterly in every part of me in the present moment.

God placed Satan in this world for His own purposes, yes. But God's purposes for placing Satan here is to teach us to fight. God's intention, the sons He has determined to form, can only come about through a very good fight. That's just the way it is.

I have no doubt that spiritual warfare is a far bigger deal now than it has ever been. And not only for our own liberty, though our own liberty is absolutely essential for all creation. But we also stand in intercession for others now, agreeing with what the Lord Jesus is already doing and by that agreement, we release Him to do what He is already doing.

But!

I find it so easy to depart from rest and to get into the thought that I must 'press through.' Let me share with you the progression that my mental state then takes. It always begins with an earnest desire to connect fully with the great thing God is doing in the earth right now. I cry out to Him, "Oh God, oh God. Do it in me." Then I become anxious about missing God or having missed God, somehow. (This is where earnestly seeking God falls away.) Then I begin seeing that maybe I missed it here or there in the past. Then I begin feeling a need to repent, both for past mistakes and for present indifference. Then I find myself no longer seeing myself in Christ and Christ in me. I am now a lost sinner in need of God's mercy.

Then I wake up! I wake up because I know that I know that I know, from long years of wandering around in that wilderness, that there is NO LIFE TO BE FOUND THERE.

And I must bring myself back into the utter REST that we must walk in, that every part of me, especially my mistakes, Jesus carries utterly inside of Himself. And right now, He is living in every part of the human me.

And in that certainty, I find gladness, joy unspeakable, and the sweet love relationship with my Savior that alone will carry us through.

I am seized by the will of God - as you have been. I am caught in the determined intention of a God who has been plotting these next few years of human experience long before time began. All of His focus has always been upon this present time in human history. Here is where He shows His stuff! Now is when He proves His will!

God will have His way.

And He will have His way entirely inside of and dependent upon human faith.

God is a risk-taker. He has determined to triumph in my weakness and in yours.

And here is the secret. Here is the door. Here is the way in which you will experience the very birthing of God Himself in you.

"I am Your servant, let it be to me according to Your word."

Could it be that Mary, a little, simple-hearted, teenage girl, is the one who shows us the way into all the revelation of God?

Every word that God has ever directed towards the hearing of man upon this earth, let it be fulfilled in me, according to my appointed portion in the New Covenant.

A woman giving birth has no real control over the pangs that have gripped her body. The life inside must come forth. But a woman who is prepared will cooperate with that pain, rather than fight against it. If a woman is encouraged to press before it is time it will wear her out without results. (I allude to that which I have myself known.) And this is that fruitless 'pressing through' that I spoke of that takes us from rest and places us outside of the present knowledge of Christ.

When our first son was born, we were in a hospital surrounded by passive women who had not prepared themselves for their moment of birthing. When the pangs of labor hit them, one by one, they screamed in terror and demanded drugs, NOW! Their children were born into this world stoned out of their minds. I was so proud of my precious wife (I better say no more).

But when the water breaks, and the time is come, then the woman who is prepared gives herself to those pains and she presses with the pressing already taking place within her.

This is the rest of God. This is the birthing we are now in. The pangs of labor have seized us. Let us embrace those pangs in all of their workings, resting utterly in the reality of the life of God that is being birthed from out of our being.

This is the work of God: believe in Jesus.

Weakness Versus Pretending

"Therefore I will boast in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me."
"When I am weak, then I am strong."
"His strength is made perfect in my weakness."
Paul - who claimed that his take on the gospel was the only one that was correct.

"What must I DO in order to be saved."
The man who did not continue with Jesus.

In the sermon on the mount, Jesus said that we must do what He says in His teachings. James said that we must be doers of the word and not hearers only, deceiving our own selves.

I hope you realize that the New Testament is rather confusing. Christians have a habit of picking one or two verses on a topic and ignoring all the rest. They rely on their pastor or their denomination to tell them which verses to consider and which to ignore.

Most of the time they consider the least important and ignore the most.

For most Christians, none of this is an issue, because their goal is to go to heaven when they die and since that takes no faith at all - everyone dies - they don't give it a thought.

But hidden throughout the New Testament is a promise, a view, a vision of those who overcome, who triumph over sin and death, who see Christ revealed in them. God is determined to win in this age, and therefore He opens that hope up to those whom He has chosen.

Through the strength of my adult years, from age 20 to age 41, I lived under a word of "doing" and "obedience." Alongside that word was a revelation of 'Christ in you,' with a vision of overcoming all things, but through the last several years before I left that fellowship, 'doing what He says' had triumphed over 'Christ revealed in us.'

Why did I leave that fellowship? Two specific reasons.

1. I hate wearing masks; I'm no good at it.
2. I had no hope. I was no good at 'doing what He says' and if that's what it took, then no way could I ever 'make it.'

Mask Wearing
Christianity is all about wearing masks. There are no more experienced pretenders on this planet than Christians. We exhort one another all the time to do what God says in His word. This week, my boss exhorted us to step aside in our classrooms, and let Christ teach through us. Don't rely on your own gifts and abilities, but rely on His.

Now this sounds really really good. The problem is, it's really really not.

This exhortation comes out of a very definite belief. "I am bad; Christ is good. If I am seen, that's bad; if I step aside and let Christ be seen, that is good."

We are taught and we believe that Christ is something we are not and that we ourselves are human, fleshy, and bad. We imagine that if Christ is seen, we are not, and if we are seen, Christ is not.

The more we are involved with other believers, the more pressure is on us to 'act' a certain way. And act we do.

Here was my problem. I was never ever able to "die" so that Christ was seen and not me. Never. The problem was that I was still around. Always.

But those who are really good at pretending, at convincing themselves and others that it is not 'them,' but Christ, we call elders and pastors. And the strongest humans of all we call 'apostles.' An apostle then becomes the one who is most convinced that he can never be wrong, and is most capable of convincing others that he is never wrong.

As I said, I'm just no good at all that.

Over the last few months, for the first time in my life, I have begun to come out of pretending. In my classroom, for the first time in my life, I am learning to just be me without one ounce of condemnation or pretending. When I am frustrated with a student, I holler at them. I will be the first to admit that I'm no good at any 'political' approach. When I am wrong, I apologize without pretense. When I see an opportunity to say something hilarious, I do so. This last week, one student had another student pulled back onto his desk and was choking him. The student who was being choked was making all kinds of gasping noises. These are two unending jokesters. Meanwhile, I was trying to teach something. Without pausing I said, "________, if you are going to die, do it quietly." The whole class roared in laughter. My own son wanted to high five me.

I was just being myself.

Christ is in ME. Christ is in me!

Sin? If there is sin, I didn't do it. The one who did it is dead, crucified on the cross of Christ long ago.

My weakness? Jesus carries me in Himself. All of me. And He has never once offered to put me back upon myself.

Doing the Word
The New Testament presents to us an expectation of performance. Young adults are filled with the belief that they can do what God says. They give years of effort to it.

But the greatest focus of effort with the 'doing' word is directed towards teenagers. We tell them to 'act their age.' (In other words, we adults have an expectation, and you need to 'act' or pretend in order to present an outward appearance of our expectation.) There is a strong belief in most adults who work with teenagers that teenagers are completely fleshy. That they are a disaster waiting to happen. That without great manipulation and control constantly placed upon them they will go in the wrong direction. They are often treated with open disrespect.

The church in general loses 70 percent of its teenagers. The fellowship I was a part of was better than that, we lost more than 90 percent. (That is a third reason that we pulled out. My children were getting older and I did not want them driven away from God.) With that data, we increase the pressure of expectation and the loss rate rises. Teenagers standing at the back of the chapel, not entering into worship are to be targeted. They must know that they are losers, unless they come up and pretend once again.

(Our whole approach to education is based on fiction and fakery - but that is a different topic.)

Oh, how we learn to pretend. Pretending is what the Christian life is all about.

But I do not do all things to the glory of God. I'm no good at that. I have caved in too many times.

At the time of my greatest failure, in the middle of icy winter, I packed all of our belongings in my van and parked it. I put my family in our little car and we left everything behind. We drove for five thousand miles, having no real idea where we were going or why. We just knew we could not stay. And although those were the bleakest weeks of my life, I've been a complete failure many more times than that.

And I had failed. I had arrived at the pinnacle of all my hopes and dreams. I was now sitting in the circle of elders in the greatest thing God was doing in the earth, at the height of the power and glory of His kingdom. And I sat there, with the dawning realization that the only way that I could ever move like them was to pretend as I had never pretended before. And the dawning realization that every single person in that circle was doing nothing more than pretending. When I saw the raving madness in the eyes of the brother who was trying to convince me why he was an elder and another was not, I knew that we had to go.

I hear the exact same arguments and I watch the exact same pretending in the school in which I teach. It is not as all-consuming, no, only because here we move in a limited relationship with each other.

So why, then, does God fill His word with the expectation of performance? "All that God says we will do?"

I believe there are two reasons. First, God is giving us a prophecy of who we really are, conformed to the image of His Son, right now before Him. Second, so that we will utterly and absolutely fail.

Failure is the only way you will ever know Jesus. (This is what Romans 7 is all about.)

At a certain point in one's life, the realization comes slowly, bit by bit, that if I must be a "doer of the word and not a hearer only" in order to please God, then I am without hope.

How many times through the years did I cry, "God, can you not save me from the wretchedness of my inability?" With brokenness and tears. With an open, desperate heart. Over many years in a life of radical commitment to the kingdom of God, pouring out my strength in service to others. And God never once answered me. Not once.

Dear believer. If I could but convince you. Failure is your only option.

Only when you are weak can you ever be strong.

When I read messages from those who teach the 'obedience' gospel, when I read them at their strongest protestation of God's requirements and the damnation that belongs to those who don't measure up, I have only one question to ask them. "When are you going to admit to yourself that you yourself are barred out by the very words that you proclaim?"

"You are fake, sir!"

xxxxx

I deny that I have a self separate from Jesus.

When I am myself, Christ IS revealed in me.

I know that this sounds desperately heretical. Blasphemous, even. That's why they crucified Jesus.

I am just like Him; He reveals Himself in me. I don't have to 'get out of the way.' That idea is ridiculous anyway. There is no such thing.

Christ is in me. I am weak - and Christ is in me.