Day 3

Become Totally

Absorbed In Gospel Truth

Roger and Eileen Himes

www.ThePracticalGospel.com

We hear so many different things today, it’s like ‘The Second Tower of Babel.’ Occasionally I’ll take a whole day and just listen to different preachers that have notoriety and are in the public spotlight. I want to hear what they are saying. What they say is so diverse, I get fatigued just LISTENING to it all, let alone trying to apply it all.

Doing this takes me back, down memory lane, to where I was almost 20 years ago — trying to apply all the things I heard preached. I was dedicated! I spent close to an hour every morning just reviewing concepts, and praying for power to integrate them into my day. This is trying to live Christianity totally ‘basackwards.’

I was trying so hard, because my Christian life wasn’t going well. I wasn’t in deep sin, so It wasn’t totally bad, but I wasn’t ‘trucking for Jesus.’ I was not on the fast track. I felt like I belonged in a slower group -- like I was treading water — taking one step forward and two steps back. I wasn’t disillusioned, because I was making a little progress, but I sure was frustrated at the little progress I made.

My eternal life was secure, but earthly life was very insecure. I wasn’t on higher ground, spiritually. It was like I was stuck in religious mud. I was working the principles, but where was God most of the time? The harder I tried, and the harder I prayed for his help, the more it seemed like he was off on vacation.

My professional life was so-so. My marriage and family was getting better, albeit not on top, after Eileen and I had had a two-year separation 10 years before. We had closed down the church I had been a pastor (in addition to law), and I was really seeking God. I had a lot more questions than I had answers.

I came out of a self-motivation background. Becoming Christian, I applied the world’s ways to God’s Kingdom, as many preachers try to do too. I’d even written a book on how to live a daily prosperous life: Searching For Reality. It was all about SELF — what to do to make life work. I wrote it mixing worldly philosophy with evangelism, and it was a good book. It was endorsed by Dr. Norman Vincent Peale and others. But it wasn’t gospel truth, and it was not working for me NOW.

Instruction requires effort to change. The Christian life becomes a JOB to do, not a JOY to live. You go to work at your job most days, and other days you learn to work at being a good Christian. God’s gospel process is totally different. Paul shows it best in Galatians 2;20: “I no longer live, but Christ lives through me.” This is not just theology, but practical gospel reality when you enter into God’s process.

I was out hiking in the mountains, as I often did, when I heard something in my spirit: “If your Christian life only got better 1% a week, in a year you would be over 50% better off.” I knew God was infusing his thoughts into mine. This didn’t happen often then. But it happened enough so I knew it was God. I asked how I could do this. He said, “You can’t, but I can do it in you, IF you will let me.”

I wish I could say this experience led to a change that day, but God doesn’t work that fast in me. I did slowly begin moving into what I now call ‘the process of God — the gospel of his Kingdom.’ Then, it took me over a year to really grasp it. I worked hard at it, but it was all so new. Now he’s shown me his process, and I’m able to bring others into it much faster. This is what A 40 Day Gospel Fast is all about.

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GOSPEL TRUTH #5

The process of the gospel can cause you to be living the Christian life at least 50% better within a year! You don’t even have to WORK the process — but just enter into it. Remember Jesus says HIS way is easy (Matt 11:28). The truth is if you try to WORK the process, it doesn’t work, because it is the process of GOD. Just let it enter into you.

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Paul says God is able to do much more than we ask or think. In ourselves, ‘one can chase 1,000, but two can put 10,000 to flight.’ If God is involved, there is no limit to this. There is a synergism in God’s dimension we cannot understand — but we can experience it!

The gospel was written in ‘the halls of heaven,’ but it was made for earth. “Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” We won’t need the gospel in heaven because we will have God. We also have God on earth, but you must admit the dynamics here are a little different. Here, God needs a way to express himself. The gospel is his means of allowing us to experience him fully. The gospel is his strategy — his process of living divine life on earth. It begins in HIM.

The world system begins in US, and it is built on this law: ‘do good and get rewarded or promoted — do bad and get spanked or fired.’ If we apply this to Christianity, we get stuck in religious mud. This is the world’s version of ‘sowing and reaping.’ It doesn’t work in the gospel. The process of the gospel is built on a very different foundation.

The gospel is entering into the flow of what God is doing. Jesus says, “I only do what I see my Father doing.” I see this as being like the flow of a river. The river does all the work. You just have to get IN it. You just rest on your raft and let the current propel you along — maybe guiding it a little bit. But you do have to enter into the river’s flow. You can’t benefit from the power of the river by sitting on the bank observing how powerful the river is.

Jesus says, “Come unto me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will giver you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am meek and lowly in heart, and you shall find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light” (Matt 11:28-30).

Instruction produces labor which causes fatigue. The gospel is lived in rest.

I’m NOT saying there isn’t any work for us to do. I even believe we will have work in God’s eternal heaven. I do not believe heaven is an idle place where we sit on clouds and strum our harps (and for my sake, I hope heaven has guitars). Jesus says ‘take my yoke upon you.’ If you are yoked to Jesus, there is work. But if you are yoked to God, who do you think does the brunt of the work?

Man began life in rest. Look at Genesis 2. it says God rested, after he created man. Do you think man was working while God rested? No way! Man was resting with him. Our western mindset says we must work before we rest. God says we must rest before we work. We’ll see this in greater depth later.

Hebrews 4 is about entering into God’s rest. Resting is spoken of in terms of faith (Heb 4:2), which is contrasted with unbelief. As we started seeing on Day 1, belief is our WORK: repent and believe the gospel. Correct gospel belief produces good behavior — it’s the flow of the river.

When God talks about rest, he doesn’t mean take a nap!

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GOSPEL TRUTH #6

Rest is how we enter into the process of God’s gospel. Psalms says, “The people saw the acts of God, but Moses knew the WAYS of God.” In the gospel we enter into God’s WAYS — or better said, he enters into us, and our ways. We become beneficiaries of the gospel of the New Covenant, not parties to it. If we repent and believe God’s gospel truth, we enter into the flow of God’s river — and become rivers of living water (John 7:38).

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God is no respecter of persons, but he does respect human faith. Without faith it is impossible to please God (Heb 11:6). This faith must be in God, and in nothing else (Heb 6:1). “The just shall live by faith.”

Faith is often an abstract thing to us. We know we need faith, but the word ‘faith’ doesn’t always communicate to our hearts to produce God’s results in us and through us. What does this mean practically and personally? Paul says it in different ways:

We must be ‘separated’ unto the gospel (Rom 1:1).

We must ‘continue’ in the faith of the gospel (Col 1:23).

We must allow this new dispensation to fulfill God’s word (Col 1:25).

We must allow the gospel to establish us (Rom 16:25).

We must allow God’s gospel revelation into us (Rom 1:16-17).

The idea is to ‘set apart’ to the gospel, and to be consumed by it. This is the meaning of the word ‘sanctified.’ If we are sanctified in something, set apart in it and consumed by it, then it permeates every cell of our being. It becomes us, and we become it. We cannot be separate from it anymore than we can be separated from our heart. It becomes life to us — the constant, abundant inflowing life of Christ, that Jesus best describes in terms of the Vine and the branch (John 15:1-5). God will take ANY measure necessary to get us into his gospel process.

God doesn’t care how we reach this point

— only that we do reach it.

We can reach it by means of good, or bad

— by means of blessing or suffering.

God will do everything necessary to bring us to this point,

and yet, even with this, 93% are reported to miss it.

Talk about a remnant. Talk about a narrow way.

Have you reached this point, or are you like I used to be?

This is what A 40 Day Gospel Fast is designed to do.

In the process of the gospel, God enters our space. The dues we pay for this is absolute trust in him, and belief in his gospel! We often strive to get God to enter our space. We plead and pray, and we bargain and make vows. We work harder, attend church more, and give more money. We go on hunger strikes (we call it fasting).

Repenting and believing the gospel is the ONLY way it happens!

This is the way our lives get better at least 1% a week— 50% a year. Don’t forget the synergism. God’s rate of return can be much greater. I’m not much on 1-2-3 types of things, but I know a lot of people are. Here’s three simple steps to begin the journey, if you relate to them:

(1) ACKNOWLEDGE. We must see things from God’s perspective. The gospel is the vehicle of the New Covenant to accomplish his will on earth. The gospel is the only language God speaks, this side of the cross. The gospel is his process for fulfilling his good pleasure in us.

(2) ACT. We must take action, and separate ourselves unto the gospel, and enter into God’s process. This is to “Repent, and believe the gospel.” By faith in God we take action on what we believe. Jesus asks, “Why do you call me ‘Lord,’ and do not do what I say?” The two commands of Jesus interrelate with each other, and empower each other: (a) “Repent and believe the gospel,” and (b) love others as I have loved you.” You will see this on Day 5.

3) ASK. We must ask God to speak, and impart the revelation of the gospel to us. “The gospel is the power of God… unto everyone who believes… for therein is the righteousness of God revealed” (Rom 1:16-17). Jesus had to open their minds to understand the scripture. Three times Paul says, “Today if you WILL hear his voice…” (Heb 3:7, 15, 4:7).

The BIGGEST part of asking is taking time to listen!

In this 40 day fast, you will indeed learn to listen to God’s voice declaring gospel truth to you, and you will learn to distinguish the difference between this, and the theology and wisdom of man. This is what becoming totally absorbed in gospel truth will do for you.