Butterflies, Dreams/Prophesies and Deuteronomy 13

Shabbat Shalom (peaceful sabbath) to all of you out there!

I am emerging from a spiritual cave, if you will, and greeting the sun on my face (despite a current thunderstorm outside) with a renewed peace.  These last few years, nearly ever free moment of my time has been spent with my nose in scripture, seeking understanding and discernment in accordance with the Word of God... eager in my expectation that He would grant me wisdom because I have asked believing fully He will deliver.

But my timing is certainly not God's timing!  However, I am learning that His timing is far more gracious than even my imagination could fathom.

Patience and diligence are becoming all-too-familiar words of "reassurance"... sometimes met with annoyance and other times met with humility.  But the journey is one leaving me deeper and deeper in love with the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob... the one and only everlasting God who is steadfast in His love, slow to anger, merciful and just in all His judgments.  And to Him belongs all glory, forever and ever.  Amen.

So why the cave?  Perhaps cocoon is a better description.  I am undergoing a transformation, if you will, as I let the Word refine, rebuke, reshape all that I once believed was Truth.  My old self has experienced a death as God revealed to me where I had elevated my own definition of Truth above His universal one for all peoples for all time.  I thought my understanding of Love was truth but He is showing me how HE defines love... and it is drastically different than what my own understanding had perceived.  To my horror, it left me empty before the question "do I LOVE God?"

No matter how well-intentioned I thought my heart was, I have been deeply humbled by a veil being lifted by the grace of God allowing my eyes to see the god I placed before Him... my own understanding.

"Trust in the Lord your God with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding."  (Proverbs 3:5)

As I have been transforming, my natural desire has been to share all revealed knowledge with anyone and everyone... whether they asked or not!  "Look!  Look!  Look!  Behold the manna of life!  It will humble you to the point of dying to one's self but see the life it gives!!  Repent!  Repent!  For we risk worshipping in vain!!"

Hmmmm, can you imagine how well THAT message feels to loved ones who never asked for it?  Before I realized it, I was becoming a sledge-hammer whacking anyone near me with a sword of truth I thought would shed light and bring life.  After all, isn't that what anyone wants for those they love?  Well, cue in dose of humble pie number one of... well... countless to come.  Sigh.

I was yielding a sword that left me standing in the blood of a spiritual massacre, trusting that God would breathe life back into His people!  But I ran into battle without waiting for Him alone to say "go... I will be your front guard and your rear guard."

I withdrew as I observed loved ones pulling away rather than drawing near.  How is THAT glorifying to God?  His word should burn like a burning bush and cause others to draw near, just as Moses did... not flee in the opposite direction!  But by the same token, His truth truly IS a double-edged sword cutting through flesh and marrow and revealing the true intentions of the heart.  If that revelation stings (which it ALWAYS does), not everyone will eagerly declare, "Oh please, sign me up for some spiritual torment!"

But...

God is looking for the humble and contrite and let me testify, nothing in my life has humbled me as the chastisement of His word and revelation of His truth.  It is fearfully beautiful, humbling and glorifying, terrifying and glorious all at once.  It is the deepest hurt and death I have experienced and the greatest joy and life I have encountered.  I don't know how He manages to encompass all of these extremes in one but it sheds light to His truth that He is indeed "the alpha and the omega, the beginning and the end."

So I have been cocooned in hopes of emerging a new creation... His new creation... in submission to His everlasting and unchanging word... declaring His word, not by whacking people over the head or yielding His sword carelessly around those who never asked, but by living my life as a living testimony to it.  And should my life burn with His light, then He will stir something in others that will cause them to draw near.  Only then, when a heart wants to know and consequently inquires will I be able to answer to the best of my ability... knowing it will never be by my words that one will see and know but by His grace alone that a seed will germinate and bear fruit for His glory... by His calling alone... just as Jesus alone lifted the veil from his apostles in Luke 24 allowing them to "see" Him in all the scriptures (Torah - books of Moses, Neviim - prophets, and Ketuvim - writings (psalms, proverbs, ecclesiastes and song of solomon).

Having said this, I emerge with the hope to share my journey with a humble heart... praying that no one feels the need to withdraw, run away, or take offence, but rather to simply know it as my testimony for others to do with it as God alone inspires them to do.  I am now ready to share because I no longer feel the need to "prove" or "defend" what I understand as if one little person could make a difference in the big picture, but rather to simply testify to what has always been and will always be, truth.

All of this to say my next few posts will likely be dedicated to sharing this journey.  I have taken Deuteronomy 6 very seriously (the Greatest Commandment) and am devoting my motherhood to teaching my children the word of God.  I will indeed talk about it when I am sitting in my house, when I am walking by the Way, when I lie down and when I rise.  I will keep them as frontlets between my eyes and bind them as a spiritual sign on my hand.  And I will indeed, teach them diligently to my children, too.  That the world may know that the Lord our God is ONE.  Not one God for Israel and one God for Gentiles... nope.  One God.  One righteous rule.  One Shepherd.  One bride.  One faith... united through the blood of a Passover Lamb.  Just as Egyptians left with the multitude of Israelites after the 1st Passover and God addressed this WHOLE mixed multitude as "Israel"... so does He look upon Gentiles grafted in to Israel through the blood of the Passover Lamb whose name is Immanuel.  God has indeed fulfilled the promise spoken through Abraham that "God Himself will provide the lamb."  And just as the Gentile, Ruth, declared "Your God will be my God" so do we who have faith through the blood of Yeshua declare this same redemptive work through the outstretched arm of God.

I have known my whole life that I was living in a precious time.  Prophecy is unfolding before our eyes and I feel privileged to live in such a time as these.  I have had dreams and visions for as long as I can remember.  At age five I shared this with my parents concerning God's will for His creation... "God intended His church to be a place of healing, not of judgement."  Even back then, my heart knew this was not concerning a physical building but rather His dwelling among the people... His ecclesia.

It has been pressing on my heart to share some of these dreams knowing full well there could be nothing to them.  But also knowing that God uses dreams and visions to reveal His will.  However, these visions and dreams MUST align with His word or it fails the Deuteronomy 13 test which states that should a dreamer of dreams or prophet come and these visions come to pass BUT this dreamer of dreams or prophet teaches God's people to move AWAY from His Torah (instructions), then these are FALSE PROPHETS sent by God to test our faithfulness to Him.

So I share some of these dreams praying that someone out there, anointed by God, may shed light on their meaning, should there be any.  Again, perhaps they mean nothing but perhaps they mean something.   I put it out there trusting God will reveal which it is.

With much love in my heart, I leave you with this blessing which reaches deeper than my own prayers for you ever could:

The Lord spoke to Moses, saying, "Speak to Aaron and his sons, saying, Thus you shall bless the people of Israel: you shall say to them, 'The Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make His face to shine upon you and be gracious to you; the Lord lift up His countenance upon you and give you peace.'  So shall they put my name upon the people of Israel, and I will bless them."  (Numbers 6:22-27)