The One - Talented People in this World Today

Tip! An effective prayer life can have a huge impact on not only our own individual life, but on the lives of those around us. Through prayer we can have an impact on our local community, our country and the world.

"He also that had received the one talent came… " Matthew 25:24

The five talented people are the geniuses of this world, successful in everything they touch. The two-talented people, on the one hand, are not exposed to the temptations of genius, but are not quite at the minimum. But why did the man with the one talent make such bad use of his gift?

Surely, this is a true story of life! One-talented people can do so little, that they do nothing. They are crushed and weakened by a sense of their own insignificance and inferiority. Many start life with high and pure aims, but at the moment they find their opportunities so skimpy, their control so limited, their power so scanty, that after a few struggles they give up in complete despair.

But the world will never be saved and helped unless the one-talented people, who are the great majority, can be aroused to a sense of their responsibility. Five men can put the whole energy of their manhood behind their single talents, even as the one man with five talents has only the driving power of one.

It is probably a greater thing in God's sight to use one talent faithfully than many. No one notices the person with their humble one talent. There is no outburst of praise or cheering. It is a greater test of the quality of the soul to go on doing one small thing well, than to be able to turn with brilliant versatility from one talent to another. The boredom of life presses hard on those who have only one string to their bow, one tune to play, one act to perform in the great factory where labor is carefully subdivided.

But the one thing that our Lord demands of each of us is to be faithful--faithful in a very little. He is watching each of us with great eagerness as we live our daily life, because He knows, as we cannot realize, how much our position in the other world depends on our faithfulness in this. It is for our sake that He is so anxious that we should make good use of our one talent.

Tip! The Master will not expect more from anyone than a person is capable of doing for Him. Jesus wants us to understand that each person will be rewarded according to their faithfulness in doing their given task.

Have you only one talent? Are you doing anything with it? Remember it is the ounce-weight that may turn the scales where hundred-weights are balanced; it is the tiny tug boat that can move the great liner. Make sure you are faithful in your very little, and you will receive the "Well done" from our Lord.

PRAYER:

O Lord, at the end of every day, may we stand before You to hear Your verdict, and when all the toil and labor of our life is ended, may we hear You say: "Well done, good and faithful servant! Thou hast been faithful in a few things, enter thou into the joy of thy Lord" In Jesus' Name. AMEN.

How can Faith Develop if He is Going to Humor Us Along all the Time?

Tip! Talking to God – This is the one on one type prayer – where we converse with God to develop our relationship with him. We may ask him to help us in areas that we need spiritual, physical or emotional support.

Sometimes I have a test of faith as I mature in God. He doesn't ask me to understand Him; but He understands me perfectly. I don't always understand Him; but I love Him anyway. Sometimes He is very difficult to understand, and I say, "Lord don't look at my tears. Please, look at me, in here, where I'm saying, Yes, Lord. Yes, Lord."

The Holy Spirit never leaves my spirit, but I may not feel His Presence. The Lord has a right to leave me without a touch of His Presence for weeks or months at a time. I have my contact - prayer and His Holy Bible, the word of God, without my need for emotional reaction. If He wants to leave for China (figuratively) for three months, it's all right if I don't get blessed in three months, or even sing a little song while at home walking around.—I pay a price for every last thing I get from God.

I pay a price for it, and I want to. He is not going to baby me — we have to learn that, and that isn't pleasant.—But God is doing something inside of me like a tornado. Then out of that I come out with: "The Lord is wonderful!—He IS wonderful!"

The further we go on in God, the less He is going to honor that field of the emotions. We have to learn to walk with the Lord without His conscious Presence, which is very terrifying. Less and less are we dependent on our old devotional patterns that served for our living.

Tip! “Supplication” is the very soul of prayer in the way of pleading for some one thing, very much needed, and the need intensely felt.

How can faith develop if He is going to humor us along all the time?

In those difficult places we will never be able to synchronize the state in which we are moving with our fluctuating emotions. They will not always flow together. We are trying to let our emotions run parallel with our experience in God.

Don’t Try to Split-up the Lord from the Word – the Holy Bible!

Tip! What really determines’ the effectiveness of our labor for Christ is the measure of our faith and the fervency of our prayers. If our faith is poor and our praying is indifferent; how can we expect to achieve much for Him?

Finally, after three years, they could accept Him as their Messiah, but that is as far as their acceptance went! When Jesus came down from Caesarea Philippi, He turned to His disciples, when alone with them, and asked, "Who do men say that I am?" Now if He had been revealed in a long white robe with a halo in the back of Him, do you think He would have asked that? NO. Then He asked, "Who say ye that I am?" He pins them down; He doesn't want a general opinion from them. Peter answered: "Thou art the Christ." (Christ means the Messiah). But he says something more, "The Son of the living God."—"And Jesus answered and said unto him, Blessed art thou, Simon Barjona for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but My Father, Who is in heaven." (Matthew 16:17) This was a revelation by God the Father. Truth comes by a revelation of the Spirit, not by reasoning, logic, scientific deduction, philosophy or any other scheme,

"No man knoweth the Son, but the Father." (Matthew 11:27). Then it takes the Father, through the Holy Spirit, to reveal Him to us, but the Father is really the only One Who knows Him.

Jesus Christ and the Word of Life run parallel. If we are studying the Word of God as Truth, we will have to have the parallel revelation of the Lord Jesus running with it. Jesus doesn't stand over there, static, as we study something in the Word here. We have to have an inner, personal fellowship with the Lord running parallel with the Word, or there is no life or Spirit in the Word at all. We may have wonderful insight as to the letter of the Word, but there is no corresponding insight into the Lord. We do not have an inner consciousness of entity; no awakening.

Anyone who is finding Truth in these deeper, fuller revelations of life in the Word of God, who is still entertaining the same vision and conception of Jesus he had fifteen years ago, is not very far along in spiritual growth. Why? The revelation of Christ, the personality of Christ, must unfold, and unfold, and unfold until we begin to find the treasures of this revelation —TRUTH HIDDEN IN THE CHRIST. It is hidden. Where will we get this Truth? It comes only by a parallel revelation.

Tip! He didn't say we would see the manifestation of our prayers immediately. We need to give God time to work things out, continue in our faith, and not doubt, 'For a man who wavers is like a wave of the sea, driven with the wind and tossed.

I never can read that Word of God, and get anything unless there is a continual, parallel revelation all the time in my spirit. I am discerning something new in Him. I see Him in some new slant of light. Why? As I read the Word, I see Him! He's the WORD! Keep that idea parallel. Don't try to split-up the Lord from the Word - the Holy Bible!

Keep your parallel: The opening of the Word of God under the power of the Spirit, and the opening as to this wonderful Christ—God—the Eternal Son. God came to us in flesh, going home, but coming again in the power of the Spirit. Keep that, all the while, in parallel with the Word. It is a double revelation, and it is sweet, and we should have it!

Never Approach the Lord as You Would Approach any other Literature.

Tip! The Master will not expect more from anyone than a person is capable of doing for Him. Jesus wants us to understand that each person will be rewarded according to their faithfulness in doing their given task.

The Holy Spirit is needed for the Word's revelation.

Truth cometh by revelation, and that by the Spirit of God; not by our mental processes, but by the Holy Spirit, Who reveals the things of God to us. (1 Cor. 2:10)

Teachers are those who have gotten into the Word, move in the Spirit, and have revelation, light, and Truth from God by the Holy Ghost. I have the Bible, and I have the Holy Spirit, but they run parallel in their responses. Just as soon as I move in the Word of God, I have to move into a broader and more glorious revelation of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Jesus said, "I am the Truth." This means that all Truth is personified in Him; all Truth becomes articulate; all Truth becomes fully expressive in this dynamic, marvelous, living Christ, and the nearer we get to Him, the more we love Him. Oh, those profound unfolding by the Spirit, Who takes us into the Person of Christ, in Whom are hidden the treasures!

If the Holy Spirit has been gracious enough to take us into the darkness, and has said: "Look, you have made a discovery," we come out enriched, because we have found some little, simple treasure in the personality setup of Christ.

There is much that we can have which is quite visible and tangible; what we call the articulate aspect of Him. But there is so much of Him which is evasive. It is abstract, but it is in this Christ, and that is. where I get blessed. When Jesus was here, He said, "I am the Truth." He means by that: all Truth is summed up in this revelation. "He that hath seen Me, hath seen the Father."

You see, He is talking about a manifestation of the nature and character of God.

The people who gathered about Him, and heard Him speak, saw His manifestation in miracle power. They were recipients of His grace, and even of His healing, but how many of you think they had any inner revelation as to His identity? No, they didn't—even His disciples did not.

Tip! Talking to God – This is the one on one type prayer – where we converse with God to develop our relationship with him. We may ask him to help us in areas that we need spiritual, physical or emotional support.

It took Him three Years of intensive work for the disciples to even recognize that He was the Messiah, let alone the Son of God! That never entered their brains when they first started out with Him, It was a long time before they even found Out He was the Son of God, They all supposed Him to be the son of Joseph. Later on they perceived by His learned exposition, and, finally, through His works, miracle working, and all the rest, that this Man did not teach or speak like any of the rest of them. Well, of course not!

Be Willing for the Crucifixion - Because it is the Author of LIFE - Part I

Tip! The Holy Bible says in (John 5:13) this statement about prayer: “And this is the confidence that we have in Him, that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us. And if we know that He hears us, whatsoever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that we desired of Him.

Every person will find their discipline, and every person will find their cross. All Christians are not disciples. When He first introduces the cross, it is to Christians. Jesus Christ never places a cross on anybody. It is in our exercising the Power of will to choose. He doesn't lay a cross on us "so we can love Him!" No, we voluntarily take it. He never forces it; it will be the instrument on which we will be slain. Our cross will be the most liberating thing in our life. As with Christ's cross, it liberates and sets free everything in salvation, and the things of God.

If we want to sidestep the cross and miss its ministries, we won't go to hell, but, if we sidestep this cross, we will sidestep one of the greatest agencies in the economy of God to bring us into God. He says, "Come, take up this cross as a voluntary act." The cross is the instrument of death, but it brings a fuller revelation to our hearts and lives than that of any other agency in His economy.

If we would know fellowship in the future, we must know it now. We must know the cross in its two fold teaching; not only sins forgiven, but, on-the other side, joy: agony—but joy. Embrace it; hang on to it; cruel and bitter though it is; for joy and a sensing of God, as never before, will follow.

Be willing for the crucifixion, because it is the author of LIFE.

Tip! Jesus promised to pass on the power from heaven to accomplish greater works for Him in this world. That promise is His Holy Spirit. Jesus intended for His chosen apostles to go and bring in a lot of fruit, the same goes for us.

The more spiritually-minded we are in heart and life, the more we can understand the revelation of God, and the more we understand the cross.

"Though He were a Son," He learned obedience continually. (Heb. 2:10; 5:8) That was like a cross. Learning obedience is a cross which we will have too, if we want to follow Him. "If any man wants to follow Me (to My destiny), let him take up his own cross and follow Me." But this is not the cross which He lays on us; it is something that we may voluntarily resist or accept. It is a cross distinct from trials and testings that He brings upon us. It does amount to great suffering, but it is a suffering in which we have the power to resist if we don't want to take it.

Sometimes, for example, great teaching, a great revelation, amounts to a cross. We know if we take that cross up, if we embrace that Truth, if we dare to subject ourselves under the impact and power of that Truth, it is going to be a terrific cross that will kill us. It will crucify us. Well, it is supposed to! Take up YOUR cross.

Be Willing for the Crucifixion - Because it is the Author of LIFE - Part II

Tip! THE possibilities of prayer are gauged by faith in God's ability to do. Faith is the one prime condition by which God works.

Your cross and my cross will vary according to the disposition, and the calling of our lives, so we don't have the same in that sense, but everyone will have one.

Why? Because in God's economy and purpose for us, He knows the pattern, the situation, the episode that will perfectly crucify our old flesh. So He says: "Will you voluntarily take it? You pick it up. You know what My cross did for Me. It was the place of My execution; it was the place where I died; now, you take yours. It will be the place of the execution of the creature that you are; it will slay you. I don't lay it upon you; I want you to voluntarily take it up, for then your identification with Me will be what I want—a voluntary love and surrender."

So, He will bring a cross to you; it may take different shapes and forms, but it is always a cross. I can't interpret your cross; nobody but you can. So when God brings it, don't be amazed, upset, and confused.

He says, "Take it up." For if you take up your cross; this decision, this consideration, this surrender; if you take that up into your life pattern and walk, you will have a crown over there. Because the sequel, the answer, to a cross is a crown; and there is no crown without a cross, because every cross, if borne, will take a crown.

"Hold that fast which thou hast..." What do we have? We have the Truth, which becomes a cross, which will slay every one of us. Hold fast to the Truth as to a treasure, lest something come along, and snatch it away. Hold fast the Word of Truth which is a cross; it will eventually spell a crown. Snatch your crown! For the crown is the answer to the Truth. Hold to your Truth; hold to your cross; lest in not holding it, the crown is affected.

What is the symbol of suffering? It is the cross.

Christ had His cross every day, and Calvary was the climax. "He was made perfect through suffering." Ready for supreme sacrifice, suffering had done the silent, sacred ministry. ". . . Who for the joy that was set before Him, endured the cross..." (Heb. 12:2). "... Our light affliction which is but for a moment, worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory." (2 Cor. 4:17) He has gone, but He left His cross. Every man has his own cross to bear, but the sequel is life and secret joy— the crown.

Your cross is your crown in disguise.

Prayer:

Please Father, May we interpret the cross, the crown, the Truth as You see it in us. In Jesus' name; Amen.

He is a Seeking God - Seeking Us With a Broken Heart

Tip! One warning you should bear in mind in the matter of prayer is the negligence of this great resource. We often neglect prayer until we get into some major trouble; and then suffocating with fear, we rush into some shallow appeal to God only to realize that our prayers are not accepted which is due to the fact that we do not even believe that those very prayers would be accepted in the first place.

He is a seeking God - seeking us with a broken heart; not getting the response that He ought to have in the creature. We say our hearts get so hungry, but God's heart is so hungry. When did you give Him anything to satisfy Him? When did you feed Him?

The first picture of His broken heart is found in Genesis 3:8-10, and the last one in Revelation 3:20. In Revelation He says, (to an individual; not to a collective group): "Behold, I stand at the door and knock; if any man hear My voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with Me.—I won't force you; I won't open the door."

God is coming to that door saying, "Adam, where art thou?" He is saying the same thing, because the same Adam is still dwelling in there; and, in that original thought of God for man, there is still a throbbing Heart longing that we would open to Him, "You were made for Me, and I for you. My heart is aching and longing for you." There will be a restoration of what was lost way back in the Garden; Jesus will restore it in any individual who wants that experience back again.

I asked the Lord about "sup with Him, and he with Me." He said, "I let them always offer to Me first, because I am a Guest, and I will sup with them using whatever they have to offer Me." We bring our resources; we lay it all before Him; we have sweet fellowship with Him, but our resources are soon exhausted. "I let them have the first privilege," our Lord says, "Then I supply Eternal Bread, Eternal Life; all that has eternal value."

What a time we have bringing our little crooked loaf of bread, scorched, and all out of shape. We nearly die trying to get it consecrated to the Lord, but He says, "I take it, dear, and I have a Loaf too; partake of it forever!"

A Relationship Prayer:

We are all so self-centered about our comings and our goings, our little lives, our little doings, and our fussing around. Dear Lord, help us to get away from that. Let our inner beings pour out to You in a holy, loving consecration, a surrender, and a yielding of all that we have. Let it flow back again to Your loving heart. Teach us how to enter into communion with You; deliver us from prayer patterns, and help us to be normal, natural, and real with You so that You will be able to receive from us that which would satisfy and please Your heart.

The Decisions and Choices We Make Today Will Last Forever!

Tip! In (Phil. 4:6) we have these words about prayer: “Be careful for nothing, but in everything, by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known unto God.

We are standing here, and we are the sum total of all the choices and decisions we have made in our lives. They have all registered, and this, is the composition of our character. We live in our own wills.

We forget, when speaking about heaven, that so many of the things which are for us in the ages yet to come, after this life has been lived, and we as a conscious entity,—a spirit released from the body, and moving in the new resurrection body—in a new spiritual realm, most of the things that we have on that other shore—over there in the ages—are DETERMINED HERE.

Now don't think that we can just live a Christian life as happy as bumble bees, and, when we go to heaven, everything is going to be so wonderful, l am sorry to disillusion some people. It isn't going to be that way! Right here and now, we are making the derisions; the choices; the surrenders; the outpourings of life. We are doing that HERE, and THAT WILL DETERMINE what we will have over there. That is not built up all of a sudden over there; not at all. We determine all that right here and now. The decisions we make today will last forever!

Life is too short for us to demonstrate that which we would choose. Even with a good choice, life is too short for it. But I tell you one thing, life is long enough so that when Truth is presented, and there is an occasion for us to make a decision; or surrender; or die a death; or accept a Truth—right here is where we do it, but the fruit—the real fruitage—of it, won't always be seen here. We aren't here long enough; the real fruit will be projected in the things yet to come.

Remember when Jesus was talking about the talents? He said the same thing to all three men; (two were faithful and one wasn't) He said, "Thou hast been faithful over a few things... I will now give you a gold house to live in, a pair of wings to fly with, and also an harp!" No, all of those things hadn't anything to do with what He was talking about. He said, "Thou hast been faithful over a few things." What was the reward? A gold crown? A harp? No, the reward was the lifting up of a quality of faithfulness, which the two men earned here, and projecting it upon a new plane over there—multiplied!

Tip! So it is the same elsewhere in the Holy Bible (James 1:5) we have “asking” put into view as a prayer: “If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all men liberally, and upbraiding [scolding somebody] not, and it shall be given him.

The reward was not the material things which most hymn writers put in song books. The reward for those men was the faithfulness which they had acquired HERE, multiplied and projected on a new level; on a new plane. Jesus Said "Thou hast been faithful over a few things—you will also now be faithful over many things."

People think that, when we die, God is going to give us all presents; that He is going around with a big clothes basket full of crowns and saying, "Here's a crown... and I won't give you any, you missed chapel twice...?" He doesn't do any such fantastic things like that in the world. CROWNS ARE NOT WON! We EARN THEM—they are not souvenirs. Crowns are symbolic of certain authority and power which we merit and earn while we are here. It is here that we make our decisions, and certain surrenders. We have to die to a lot of things that nearly kill us—they SHOULD kill Us! The trouble is we don't die. We say, "It nearly killed me." It is supposed to kill us... so we will learn.

General Guidelines Part 1

Tip! One warning you should bear in mind in the matter of prayer is the negligence of this great resource. We often neglect prayer until we get into some major trouble; and then suffocating with fear, we rush into some shallow appeal to God only to realize that our prayers are not accepted which is due to the fact that we do not even believe that those very prayers would be accepted in the first place.

• If we know HIM, we know enough!

• Christ's character is built in us; not given to us. Righteousness is imputed.

• Never take the initiative in moving into or do anything unless you have the Word of God to control you.—As soon as the Spirit takes hold of that Word, He makes it a throbbing reality.

• The motto of Jesus' life: "I have come to do Thy will, O God."

• Some leave the great essentials, and involve themselves with doctrinal issues.

• Don't crowd God into two thousand years.

• We were not made for the here and now; we were made for the heart of God.

• The spiritual, mental and physical should all have their source in the Christ.

• It is not a reformation, but a total deliverance when He comes.

• When we move in the will of God, it answers about a thousand prayers.

• There is such a difference between being religious and being spiritual.

• Always watch out that you have not too many possessions. If you are not careful, those possessions will possess you!

• Don't develop a devil consciousness; develop a God consciousness.

• Too many are conscious of their limitations. Count HIM in! Remember what He did with five loaves and two fishes.

• We should give to God our very best—and all that we have - NOT what we don't have.

• We can be just as holy, just as devoted to Jesus as we want to be; and we can walk just as near to Him as we want to.

Tip! In (Phil. 4:6) we have these words about prayer: “Be careful for nothing, but in everything, by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known unto God.

• We can let the hour of our visitation slip right away from us. Awareness—we have to be aware.

• The highest vocation of any spiritual expression is worship and adoration; not service.

• The whole issue between broken humanity and God is a question of life and death; not heaven and hell.

• Lord, keep me alive until I die.

• Humility is something which is birthed within, and when we think we have it; we haven't!

• In the realm of the Spirit, there is no distinction between secular and holy. Everything in God's sight, in this new life, is holy.

Tip! •Approach God in prayer and ask for a fit body. • Get clear and visualize your fit body and believe.

• We learn the laws of living in the realm of spiritual reality by living.

• "I don't want your gifts, your services, what you are doing; I want your HEART." Says God our Father.

• He has so many who serve Him, but so few who love Him!

• Everybody wants the fruit; nobody wants the death that causes the fruit.

• When He gives a word, it is creative, and has a measure of faith every time.

• Miracles are for beginners, but, for disciples, He expounds all things.

• Miracles appeal to the cosmic curiosity of the flesh. Don't commercialize them. Have spiritual adjustment in God. "Rejoice not in miracles, but that your name is written in the Book of Life in heaven."

• Many have the Christ, but they have not discovered the hidden treasures in Him. (Colossians 2:3)

• Never "Why" God: Only Worship Him!

• Truth is never ours until it is personalized in our lives.

General Guidelines Part 2

Tip! •Approach God in prayer and ask for a fit body. • Get clear and visualize your fit body and believe.

• It is good to have a disappointment once in a while. It will throw us to God like nothing else will.

• He is always and forever the same, but He is seeking to change us.

• You and I are basically made for His pleasure.

• Don't read traditionally, or automatically, because you think you have to read God's Word the Holy Bible! Read until He blesses you!

• Just to please the heart of God one day at a time is wonderful. Don't let your life pattern project so far ahead that it swallows up the importance of the moment.

• I like what I call an overall pattern and perspective in my thinking.

• My work is only a means unto the end; it is not the end.

• The instrument is always of greater value than what the instrument can do.

• No experience, in itself, ever matures us.

• The more we see and know Him: The more we love Him.

• Anybody can stand a blessing, but few people can take a defeat, a disappointment.

• Here (on earth) is the place of decision. Then (in heaven) is the place of expression.

I am saved;

I am being saved;

I am yet to be saved.

• Jesus: "I made the testing; also a way of escape."

• Everybody has enough entertainment —we need instruction now!

• God has all eternal ages to work out the problems that we can't work out here.

• Every heart has its own discipline, its own cross, and its own dealings with God.

• "Be still and know that I am God." —Don't clatter so much!

• My motto: Keep in the middle of the road of God's will.

• We learn to pray by praying.

• In a holy life, there are no accidents.

• The martyrs in the arena in Rome had an inner life element: They had agape love. Some can't face a lion, because they cannot face themselves for five minutes!

• The devil will tempt us with the identical setup God uses to test us. Temptation is always unto defeat and death. Testing is always unto strength and life.

• A walk in the Spirit is not a gift; it is an achievement.