The LORD JESUS came to pursue a
people, a People for HIMSELF+.
HE+ pursues us from the streets to
the dung heaps, from serving mammona to serving, serving, serving without
choosing the better part, from the fisheries to the porkers --- HE+ pursues us.
Purposeful and persistent, The LORD JESUS didn't come here to lose what HE+ came for.
Like Asahel ( 2 Samuel 2), The
LORD was purposeful in His+ pursuit, not veering to the left hand nor to the
right once HE+ locks onto a person’s heart, in His+ eyesight.
HE+ pursues the heart of men like
Paul. Paul --- previously called Saul --- was passionately intent on destroying
GOD'S people. Paul mistakenly thought they were GOD'S enemies.
However, in His+
Pursuit of Paul, The LORD soon showed Paul that he, Saul, was that enemy of GOD
that he, Saul, was pursuing!
Our LORD was and IS
capable of apprehending any person --- all the persons --- HE+ wants. HE+ knows
exactly how to commandeer their attention.
HE+ came to build a PEOPLE, not a
system.
High church or low, formal or
casual groups, Torah-keeping or SPIRIT-led, all systems are self-propagating.
Insatiable, they draw away the People of GOD from The LORD.
Siphoning away
the very ones whom HE+ seeks out of every kindred, tongue, family, and nation,
they consume them upon their own system.
These ones whom HE+ pursues, the
religious systems confuse, putting the SYSTEM ahead of The LORD... although
affirming all the while that serving the SYSTEM is "serving GOD."
Thus the Pursued ones gradually falter and fail, growing deader and drier towards The LORD, becoming
a people of a religious system.
However, Our LORD is a jealous
GOD, zealous to complete the work HE+ was sent to do.
Thus, HE+ allows these religious
systems of every stripe and color to exist for His+ purposes.
HE+ uses them to
sift His+ Pursued People, sifting, sifting, sifting them to find out who will
remain true to HIM+ and who will not. HE+ discovers whose priority is found in
HIM+... and whose is not.
The LORD JESUS does not need a
religious system; a religious system put HIM+ to death. They all do. In one way
or another, they adroitly mingle error with Truth and find some way to deny
CHRIST before men.
HE+ came to Pursue a People who
will separate themselves unto HIM+, not veering to the left hand nor to the
right, a people who will hold lightly to the religious systems and tightly unto
HIMSELF+.
If the system veers from The LORD,
then His+ Pursued People veer FROM
the SYSTEM; they cannot be moved.
His+ Pursued People follow JESUS,
their first love, their top priority, their TOP MAN+.
Let us pray:
O LORD JESUS, I have
been so foolish. I have allowed systems of religion to have a hold of my heart. I
have followed the associations of man more than my fellowship with THEE+.
Instead of focusing on
THEE+, I have been utterly distracted with the workings of the religious
systems.
I have allowed the
religious systems to tell me what THOU+ hast said, instead of listening to Thy+
Words myself. I know, O my SAVIOR, that
Thy+ HOLY SPIRIT is capable of teaching me and leading me in the way which I
should go.
Help me to pursue
THEE+ like THOU+ hast pursued me... purposeful and persistent, in SPIRIT and in
TRUTH.
For THOU+ only art
HOLY; THOU+ only art the LORD. THOU+ only, O CHRIST, with the HOLY SPIRIT, art
most High in the Glory of THE FATHER.
Amen
