This week we will cover Parts One through Nine of the points listed  below  as we consider how to consistently “maintain a joyful Christian walk”, an investigation sparked by Andrew Murray’s jewel of a book “The Ministry of Intercessory Prayer.” Let us commit this study to God and ask for His wisdom. Let us ask with faith, knowing He will give it, for we know He is good and only good and that He delights in giving good things to His children (James 1:5-8, Luke 11:11-13). I pray that pondering Andrew Murray’s teaching convicts, comforts, and spurs you on to greater commitment to our loving Father, as it did me. May your deepening commitment enable you to feel His loving embrace ever more clearly in your daily walk. Here are the headings of this two-part series.

1. Practicing His presence.
2. “As you do not know the path of the wind. . . “(Ecclesiastes 11:5)
3. The message of the hummingbird.
4. Drawing nearer to God includes pulling away from the world and self.
5. Steps to wholeness of healing, which is this joy of depending only on Him.
6. STEP ONE
7. “But I am already living a holy life”, my flesh says.
8. More pruning produces more fruit.
9. Too straight and too hard?
10. Are You my vital necessity, Lord?
11. Am I (still not yet) a slave to righteousness which leads to holiness?
12. STEP TWO
13. STEP THREE
14. ONE LAST “STEP”
15. I know You will guide me, Lord.

[1]       Practicing His presence.   “Father, I love this new habit You led me to, this just sitting with You a while before starting morning devotions. Thank You for guiding me.” I sipped the chamomile fast, so it would help with breathing, and gently moved the rocker, peering into soft morning light, grateful three-story units to the east blocked the direct morning sun. The window framed soft green, intertwined crape myrtle branches in shadow, like a private, secluded forest.

[2]       “As you do not know the path of the wind. . . “(Ecclesiastes 11:5)  The morning Texas wind shoved larger branches to the right, pinning them there, while slender stems at the ends traced quavering circles in the air. As abruptly as it had begun, the wind stopped. Branches snapped back and stood straight, stretching leafy arms toward their Creator.

“Yes, Lord, I remember when I learned that verse, “As you do not know the path of the wind or how the body is formed in the wind, so you cannot understand the work of God, the Maker of all things.” (Ecclesiastes 11:5, NIV). It was more than thirty years ago, when Sharon was in elementary school and I was a new believer. I was walking from the bus stop to the office on a cold, gusty February morning, holding an index card as I walked, memorizing the Word. I remember the wind blasted my coat open at that very moment, reminding me that You were with me. That one touch of Your love warmed me the whole day. Hmm.  So sweet, so sweet. . . Thank You, dear Father. Memories of Your Word speaking to me are truly are “sweeter than honey”, as You say in Psalm 119.

Lord, I could not then and I cannot now know which way the wind will turn, and I do not understand Your work or Your ways, but I do love Psalm 25, how the whole psalm is a plea for You to teach the psalmist Your ways and show him how to live. I especially like that short verse, verse 25, “Show me Your ways, Lord; teach me Your paths.” (AMPC).  I am glad it is taking so long to memorize. That’s making me think deeply about each phrase.

[3] The message of the hummingbird.  “Oooh!” I breathed as I saw a hummingbird hover beside the fuschia flowers of the crape myrtle ten yards from my second-floor window.

“I have never seen one this high up. Thank You Lord!” Before the hummingbird darted away, another treasured memory drifted into thought.

“I remember how, when depression was at its worst, You gave the person praying with me visions of hummingbirds and a rhema word that I must feed on the nectar of Your Word as a hummingbird feeds on flower nectar. That so much confirmed how You had led me to meditate constantly, day and night, on Your Word. And that constant meditation healed the depression and fear and has kept me free.

“Yes,” I thought, “that is part of drawing closer, when God lets events force us to return our mind to Him as often as hummingbirds return for nectar. That pulling away from anything else but dependence on Him must be an essential part of drawing nearer.”

[4] Drawing nearer to God includes pulling away from the world and self.  I have been pondering a chapter in Andrew Murray’s sterling book “The Ministry of Intercessory Prayer.”  He says “Your inability to maintain a joyful Christian walk in God’s way is a sign of disease.” (p. 84). That sentence grabbed my attention. By grace alone, I maintain joy and victory more consistently now than before, but not always.

I have learned to fight my way back to emotional balance and joy, rather than just avoiding depression.  But Andrew Murray’s book explains my “remaining disease of self” is the cause of emotional imbalance and negative emotions that still happen sometimes. Andrew Murray talks about this disease of the self that is so hard to be free from. The chapter “Will You Be Made Whole?” outlines God’s way for healing us of self so we can walk as He intends, with consistent joy and “heavenly power beyond anything we could dare to imagine or hope for.” (p. 81).

Murray notes that a doctor heals by making the patient independent of the doctor. Our Great Physician’s aim is to heal by bringing “. . . us into such dependence upon himself that we will not be able to live a moment without Him.” (p. 82). We live frail Christian lives because we do not appropriate Divine truth for our own selves.

“As long as we expect Christ to continually do something for us in single acts of grace, trusting Him from time to time to give us only that which will last a little while, we cannot be restored to perfect health. But when we grasp the fact that we need Him moment by moment in our lives in utter dependence upon His strength and provision, then the life of Christ becomes the health of our soul.” (p. 82)

[5]       Steps to wholeness of healing, which is this joy of depending only on Him. Murray outlines three steps to being made whole: telling God we want to be made whole, looking to Him as our only help, and responding in faith.

[6]       STEP ONE: To achieve this condition where “the life of Christ becomes the health of our soul”, Murray explains, Christ first asks us, as He did the man at Bethesda (John 5:2-9), “Do you want to get well?” And we must tell Him we want to be made well.  Some will not admit we are sick and others will not believe Christ can make us fully whole.

“At the root of it all [this not admitting our sickness and our unbelief] is the fear of self-denial and the sacrifice that will be required. People are not willing to entirely give up self-will, self-confidence, and self-pleasing (emphasis added). The walk in Christ that makes us like Christ is too straight and too hard (emphasis added). They do not want to be made whole. . . . If you are willing to be made whole, you must confess clearly, “Lord, at any price, I will!” (p. 84)

[7]       But I am already living a holy life”, my flesh says. Each round of trials-wobbling-rebalancing these many months has shaken off more self-confidence, more of the flesh, and more of the world. My walk has become more narrow regarding what I do, read and listen to. I also am better now at forgiving and forgetting because they now feel like the poison they are (whereas for years before they stayed buried, unaware, deep in my heart). This narrowing of our daily life is part of the pruning Jesus describes in John 15:2. “He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit he prunes so that it will be even more fruitful. (NIV)” Andrew Murray explains that of all fruit-bearing vines, the grapevine most needs pruning. Pruning cuts away not only dead branches but good, fruit-bearing branches because those branches use sap, and more sap must be channeled into producing fruit, rather than merely sustaining branches.

[8]       More pruning produces more fruit. And now? Now I think God is calling me to sacrifice some good things in favor of better things, lovingly pruning good wood so that more of my life’s energy will, like sap, will go into producing fruit for the kingdom. I believe that includes more prayer and Bible study and more time invested in others rather than self-indulgences, self-pleasures or self-will.

[9]       Too straight and too hard? I am thinking deeply about Andrew Murray’s observation that entirely giving up  our “walk after the course of this world” can seem “too straight and too hard  because it includes giving up “self-will, self-confidence, and self-pleasing.” Suppose, for example, we forego R-rated movies because God shows us those are no longer acceptable. Suppose our path then narrows to only movies with no violence or obscenities. Would our path to greater closeness seem “too straight and too hard” if it means many evenings of foregoing all “entertainment” so as to make more time for Bible study and prayer or acts of service or a higher quality of family evenings?

More than four years ago, when God first showed me it was necessary to keep my mind on the Word all day, I recall thinking “I can’t live like Joyce Meyer and other Bible teachers say they do. I can’t think about the Word ALL day.” At that point, I do not think I wanted to either, although I thought I loved God with all my heart back then. Perhaps I did to the fullest extent I could, BUT He was not yet my “vital necessity,” not until desperation forced me to meditate constantly, just like I had heard.

Is God showing me that He is still not truly my vital necessity, that I still depend on and/or love my own self and worldly things more than Him? Part Two explores this question.