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Delighting Ourselves in the Lord
17 August 2022
Welcome to The Guide to Holiness! This newsletter contains a testimony to entire sanctification and some minor commentary and links to helpful material. The name comes from a publication that Phoebe Palmer and her husband distributed in the 19th century. I hope these testimonies will serve as a guide on your way to perfection.

I know that last week I said I’d share another testimony this week, but will you forgive me for a change of plans and let me share one more thing on my heart? It’s about holiness. Holiness the right way.

In about two weeks it will have been 23 years since my first day of school at Asbury Theological Seminary. I was 22 at the time which means more time has passed in my life since that day than there was before that day. On that first morning, I got dressed and went to the cafeteria. I’ve never been what you call brave when it comes to first time interactions. I don’t walk up to people I don’t know regularly. But, on this morning I thought, “this is Asbury and I’m in seminary. Try something new.” I got my tray and walked into the dining area. I saw some people I had already met, but a man older than me caught my eye. I didn’t know him. So I walked over to his table, introduced myself, and asked if I could join him.

The details get fuzzy for me after that, but I recall that he wasn’t a brand new M.Div. student like I was. He’d been a pastor for some time. Like, since I was a baby. I asked him why he decided to come back and do whatever it was he was there to do. He said, “Because after twenty-plus years in ministry I fell in love with Jesus.”

I have a mental dictionary and under the entry for “incredulous” is the image of my face when he said that. How on earth could a person be in ministry for twenty-plus years and not be in love with Jesus?

Twenty-three years later, nineteen of which I’ve spent in full-time ministry, I now know how naive I was in that moment. A person can love a lot of things and do a lot of good things in life and ministry while first love’s lamp is not burning. Believe me. I’ve done it. A good sermon while total focus is on how well I was doing it? Guilty. Thinking my experience and wisdom are why a person was able to turn away from destructive patterns and toward God? Yes. Caring more about getting a church to a stable place and not risking a thing in order to have more of Jesus? Forgive me, but yes.

It’s easier than you might think to give Jesus just a sliver of that pie called “heart’s desire.”

Recently, I’ve been listening over and over to this message I saw on YouTube. The speaker is Steffany Gretzinger who you would probably recognize from the song “Reckless Love” or “King of My Heart” from Bethel Music. She gave one of the most beautiful messages I’ve ever heard. It was a rally cry to turn our attention to Jesus. I’ve transcribed this part because I want you to read it:

The beautiful thing about God, one of the endlessly beautiful things about Jesus is that, as my dear friend Elizabeth said, "Jesus is more humble than we are." He'll come to meet with people in spite of us. We can often think that when he comes into a room while we're doing whatever it is we're doing, that it was because we're here. That's when first love's lamp has gone out--the minute we think we had anything to do with this. When the hungry come they will be fed because he's good, and to the pure all things are pure. It's why the presence of God moves in rooms where even people who have no character are leading worship. That's not a judgment it's just true. *Because God won't withhold from someone who comes in with a pure heart to see God. They will see God.* The Beatitudes are mind-boggling! He's so kind, but he wants to do it with us, and he wants to do it through us. He's looking for a bride that won't look away, that won't be moved by the crowd.

She’s not wrong. God will not withhold from someone who comes with a pure intention to see him and nothing else. As Samuel Whitefield has written, “discipleship begins with beholding.” Behold!

 

Friends, get a look at Jesus and don’t look away. Behold.

Let’s keep praying this until it is true in our hearts: “Lord, I delight in you. You are the desire of my heart.”


Jesus is the treasure,
-Matthew



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