Waking the Dead: Walking With God
Chapter 6
The Four Streams: Walking With God
Key Verses:
Narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it. – Jesus (Matt. 7:14)
You have made known to me the path of life. -- King David (Ps. 16:11)
Pages 91-92 recount a portion from the Fellowship of the Ring by JRR Tolkien about “Strider” guiding the Hobbits safely for a couple of days, but the Enemy eventually finding them.
GUIDED
Pages 93-94 continue with Eldredge recounting a day in which his morning devotions led him to “hear” from God that he must be ready to forgive. This was followed by a call from some partners to a venture who wanted out, and blamed Eldredge and those on his side for the problems. While all types of emotions tried to take charge – Betrayal, Anger, Hurt, Resentment, Indignation, False Guilt, Pride, God’s urging to “simply forgive them” continued. In the end he did. He said that when the day was over he felt that he had been “guided,” “rescued” by some “wise Ranger like Aragorn.” Eldredge says his journals are full of such things—God has guided him through all sorts of beautiful surprises and adventures as well as difficulties.
Then he makes the following statements:
…But I don’t think He speaks to me any more than others; I think I’ve just learned to expect it, need it, keep an eye out for it. It’s a whole different perspective on how we approach our day. Either we wake to tackle our “to do” list, get things done, guided by our morals and whatever clarity we may at the e moment have (both rather lacking to the need, I might add). Or we wake in the midst of a dangerous Story, as God’s intimate ally, following Him into the unknown.
If you’re not pursuing a dangerous quest with your life, well, then, you don’t need a Guide. If you haven’t found yourself in the midst of a ferocious war, then you won’t need a seasoned Captain. If you’ve settled in your mind to live as though this is a fairly neutral world an you are simply trying to live your life as best you can, then you can probably get by with the Christianity of tips and techniques. Maybe. I’ll give you about a fifty-fifty chance. But if you intend to live in the Story that God is telling, and if you want the life He offers, then you are going to need more than a handful of principles, however noble they may be. There are too many twists and turns in the road ahead, too many ambushes waiting only God knows where, too much at stake. You cannot possibly prepare yourself for every situation. Narrow is the way, said Jesus. How shall we be sure to find it? We need God intimately and we need him desperately. (Page 95)
??? How do you respond to Eldredge’s contentions that we wake either to tackle our to do list or wake in the midst of a dangerous story as God’s intimate ally; and that if we aren’t pursuing a dangerous quest in our lives, then we don’t need a Guide?
WHAT IS DISCIPLESHIP
Eldredge recounts a program for “discipleship” at a large church in the in the Midwest: “Their plan for discipleship involves, first, becoming a member of this particular church. Then they encourage you to take a course on doctrine. Be “faithful” in attending the Sunday morning service and a small group fellowship. Complete a special course on Christian growth. Live a life that demonstrates clear evidence of spiritual growth. Complete a class on evangelism. Consistently look for opportunities to evangelize. Complete a course on finances, one on marriage, and another on parenting (providing that you are married or a parent). Complete a leadership training course, a hermeneutics course, a course on spiritual gifts, and another on biblical counseling. Participate in missions. Carry a significant local church ministry “load.”
You’re probably surprised that I would question this sort of program; most churches are trying to get their folks to complete something like this, one way or another. No doubt a great deal of helpful information is passed on. My goodness, you could earn an MBA with less effort. But let me ask you: A program like this—does it teach a person how to apply the principles, or how to walk with God? They are not the same thing. Change the content and any cult could do this. I mean, Ghandi was a remarkable man; so was Lao-tzu, Confucius, or Thomas Jefforson. They all had principles for a better life. But only Christianity can teach you to walk with God.
We forfeit that birthright when we take folks through a discipleship program whereby they master any number of Christian precepts and miss the most important thing of all, the very thing for with we were created: intimacy with God. There are, after all, those troubling words Jesus spoke to those who were doing all the “right” things: “Then I will tell them plainly, ‘I never knew you’” (Matt. 7:23) Knowing God. That’s the point. (Pages. 95-96)
??? What is the difference between discipleship as “information gathering” and discipleship as transformation?
You might recall the old proverb: “Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day; teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime.” The same holds true here. Teach a man a rule and you help him solve a problem; teach a man to walk with God and you help him solve the rest of his life. Truth be told, you couldn’t master enough principles to see you safely through this Story. There are too many surprises, ambiguities, exceptions to the rule….. Only by walking with God can we hope to find the path that leads to life. That is what it means to be a disciple. After all, aren’t we “followers of Christ”? Then, by all means, let’s actually follow Him. Not ideas about Him. Not just his principles. Him. (Page 97)
??? What does it look like in your life when you are actually following Jesus?
BY WISDOM
A personal walk with God comes to us through wisdom and revelation.. You will soon discover that we need both. Eldredge then goes on to recount the rashness of “King Tirian of Narnia” in C.S. Lewis’ book The Last Battle. Because of his rashness much harm was done. Eldredge makes this analysis:
King Tirian of Narnia has a good heart. But he also has an unwise heart—an untrained heart. I’d say that’s true for most of us. Our heart has been made good by the work of Christ, but we haven’t learned how to live from it. Young and naïve it remains. It’s as though we’ve been handed a golden harp or a shining sword. Even the most gifted musician still has to take lessons; even the bravest of warriors must be trained. We are unfamiliar, unpracticed with the ways of the heart. This is actually a very dangerous part of the journey. Launching out with an untrained heart can bring much heart and ruin, and afterward we will be shamed back into the gospel of Sin Management, having concluded that our heart is bad. It isn’t bad; it’s just young and unwise. The poet George Herbert warned,
Go not abroad at every quest or call of an untrained hope or passion
When the apostles needed the help of some good men to shepherd the exploding new church, they chose men “full of the Spirit and wisdom.” (Acts 6:3) The two go together; we need both. We need to walk by the inspiration of the Sprit , and we need wisdom as well. Wisdom and revelation. Early on in our journey, I think we should lean more into wisdom. It takes time to learn to walk with God in a deeply intimate way, and many challenges face us before we are accustomed to the way of the heart. We must practice our chords; we must do our drills. (Page 98)
??? What do you think of Eldredge’s contention that our hearts are not bad, they are just untrained, and so shame makes us assume our hearts are bad?
Eldredge moves to an illustration about a friend of his who wanted to teach English as a second language as mission work in Asia. She went with an untrained heart. The result was the shame and guilt, added to by the shame/guilt theology of the missionary organization she was part of home added up to “failure” on the field. Eldredge concludes, “She went; she got hammered; she came home defeated. Her friends wonder if she’ll ever try it again.” (Page 99)
??? Have you ever gone through such a situation? What was the result?
The disaster could have been avoided. Wisdom was crying out: do not rush the field (Luke 14:31); train yourself to discern good and evil (Heb. 5:14); live as though your life is at stake and the enemy is waiting to outwit you (Matt 10:16). God has given us all sorts of counsel and direction in his written Word; thank God, we have it written down in black and white. We would do well to be familiar with it, study it with all the intensity of the men who studied the maps of the Normandy coastline before they hit the beaches on D-Day. The more that wisdom enters our hearts, the more we will be able to trust our hearts in difficult situations. Notice that wisdom is not cramming our heads with principles. It is developing a discerning heart. What made Solomon such a sharp guy was his wise and discerning heart (1 Kings 3:9). (Pages 99-100)
??? What would be the difference in your approach to Bible reading and study, if you saw it as “maps of the Normandy coastline” for those who would be hitting the beaches on D-Day?
We don’t seek wisdom because it’s a good idea; we seek wisdom because we’re dead if we don’t. We seek wisdom because the trail is narrow and hard to find. It is a cruel thing to tell someone to follow her dreams without warning her what hell will come against her. High school and college commencement speeches are full of such naivete. Reach for the star, follow your dreams; find yourself. It’s not that the advice is bad; it is, however, woefully inadequate. That’s like a thirteen-year-old falling in love. Her motives may be lovely, but she is in for a painful fall. Will she ever love again with such abandon? (Page 100).
??? In what ways are we “dead” if we don’t seek wisdom? How do you think “naivete” works against the American church, as she seeks to fulfill the will of Jesus?
AND REVELATION
Wisdom is crucial. But wisdom is not enough. Many well-meaning evangelicals rely on it exclusively. That is why their lives remain where they are—rather short of all Christ promised. Okay—way short. Wisdom is essential. . . and insufficient.
Eldredge next recounts how Saul’s conversion came about through a miraculous encounter with Jesus—“the blinding light, the voice from heaven, the total realignment of his worldview.” Then Eldredge points out that the believers in Damascus didn’t know this. They only knew Paul had threatened to arrest every Christian he could find and hopefully see them executed. Against this backdrop, God speaks to Ananias and tells him to go to the house were Saul is staying, lay hands on him and pray for him. Ananias “suggests this is not a good idea: ‘Lord… I have heard many reports about this man and all the harm he has done to your saints in Jerusalem. And he has come here with authority form the chief priests to arrest all who call on your name.’ (Acts 9:13-14) It’s okay, god says, he’s my man now. Against wisdom Ananias goes, and the greatest of all the apostles is launched. (Pages 100-101)
??? Has wisdom – even biblical wisdom – on its own ever left you short of knowing what to do? Of knowing God’s will?
The Bible is full of such counterintuitive direction from God. Would you counsel a father to sacrifice his only child, the only hope for the promised nation? Certainly it wasn’t wisdom that compelled a fugitive to walk back to the country where he was wanted for murder, a land where all his kin were held as slaves, march into Pharaoh’s palace and demand their release. Was it reasonable to take a fortified city by marching around it blowing trumpets? What’s the sense of slashing the ranks of your army from 32,000 to 300, just before battle? It was dangerous advice, indeed, to send the young maiden before her king unbidden, and even worse to send a boy against a trained mercenary. And frankly, it looked like perfect madness for Jesus to give himself up to the authorities and let himself get killed.
Somewhere in our hearts we’d all love to have a role like that, be used by God so dramatically. To find it, wisdom is just not enough—may even hold us back from doing the will of God. The particular foolishness of the church in the past century was Reason above all else. The result has been a faith stripped of the supernatural, the Christianity of tips and techniques. The commonsense life, which, as Oswald Chambers warned, can be the enemy of the supernatural life. Many of the ministries and churches I’ve known made their decisions by principles and expedience. We have our morals and we have our precepts, but where is the living God?……Putting all our confidence in human reason was naïve, and it left us in a very dangerous position. The only way out of this mess is to turn to our Guide, our Captain, to learn to walk with God. (Pages 101-102)
??? Why do you suppose that God so frequently calls on us to go beyond wisdom, to doing things that make absolutely no sense from a human standpoint?
REVELATION: LISTENING FOR HIS VOICE
We begin by assuming that God is still speaking. An old hymn celebrating the wonderful Scriptures has a line that goes something like this: “What more can he say, than to you he has said?” The implication being that God has said all he has to say to us in the Bible. Period. Is sounds orthodox. Except that’s not what the Bible says: “I have much more to say to you, more than you can now bear. But when he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all truth.” (John 16:12-13) There’s more that Jesus wants to say to you, much more, and now that His Spirit resides in your heart the conversation can continue. Many good people never hear God speak to them personally for the simple fact that they’ve never been told that he does. But he does—generously, intimately. “He who belongs to God hears what God says” (John 8:47).
The man who enters by the gate is the shepherd of his sheep. The watchman opens the gate for him, and the sheep listen to his voice. He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. When he has brought out all his own, he goes on ahead of them, and his sheep follow him they know his voice. . . I am the Good Shepherd.” (John 10:2-4, 11)
You don’t just leave sheep to find their way in the world. They are famous for getting lost, attacked by wild animals, falling into some pit, and that is why they must stay close to the shepherd, follow his voice. And no shepherd could be called good unless he personally guided his flock through danger. But that is precisely what he promises to do. He wants to speak to you; he wants to lead you to good
pasture. Now, it doesn’t happen in an instant. Walking with God is a way of life. It’s something to be learned; our ability to hear God’s voice and discern his word grows over time. As Brother Lawrence had it, we “practice the presence of God.” (Pages 102-103)
??? Does God speak to you? If so how, when? What has He said? How have you learned to discern His voice?
Next Eldredge gives an example of how God spoke to him and his wife about a family vacation—and not to do the same thing a second year in a row. It seemed a small thing, but God provided their way out of what could have been a potentially difficult or even deadly situation. The Eldredge recounts how God led him into “the Four Streams”:
I was sitting upstairs one Saturday morning, having some time with God, when he spoke to me two words: Jack Hayford. I paused, waiting to hear what the Lord wanted to say. That was it. Jack Havford. I said, “Yes, Lord...anything else?” Silence. I sort of shrugged it off as my weirdness. A random thought. About an hour later the phone rang. My friend Joni was calling from the lobby of a conference here in town.
“John, I know this is late notice and it’s Saturday and all…but I think you’re supposed to be at this conference … so I bought you a ticket.”
I was silent. Truth is, I was bugged. This was my day off.
“Jack Hayford is speaking next,” she added
“I’ll be right there.”
It was a powerful and balanced talk Jack gave that day, on how we bring the life of Christ to people. As almost a side comment, he said, “All the streams are come together now in the church—Healing, Counseling, Deliverance, and Discipleship.” My heart leapt. Yes. That’s it! That’s what we need in order to see people come alive—to set them free. (Pages 103-104)
??? How do you see God speaking in this situation or do you? Was it just a series of coincidences?
PAY ATTENTION TO YOUR HEART
Second, we pay attention to our hearts.
When we set out to hear God’s voice, we do not listen as though it will come from somewhere above us or in the room around us. It comes to us from within, in the heart, the dwelling place of God. Now, most of us haven’t been trained in this, and it’s going to take a little practice “tuning in” to all that’s going on in there. And there’s a lot going on in there, by the way. Many things are trying to play upon the beautiful instrument of the heart. Advertisers are constantly trying to play upon the beautiful instrument of the heart. So is your boss. The devil is a master at manipulating the heart. So are many people—though they would never admit that is what they are doing. How will you know what is compelling you? “Who can map out the various forces at play in one soul?” asked Augustine, a man who was the first to write out the story of listening to his heart. “Man is a great depth, O Lord … but the hairs of his heard are easier by far to count than…the movements of his heart.”
This can be distressing at times. All sorts of awful things can seem to issue from your heart—anger, lust, fear, petty jealousies. If you think it’s you, a reflection of what’s really going on in your heart, it will disable you. It could stop your journey dead in its tracks. What you’ve encountered is either the voice of your flesh or an attempt of the Enemy to distress you by throwing all sorts of thoughts your way and blaming your for it. If it seems that some foul thing is at work there, say to yourself, “Well, then—this is not my heart. My heart is good. I reject this. Remember Paul in Romans 7? This is not me. This is not me. And carry on in your journey. Over time you’ll grow familiar with the movements of your heart, and who is trying to influence you there. (Pages 105-106)
??? Do you pay attention to your heart? Is there a struggle going on in your heart right now? To whose voice are you listening?
STAY CLOSE TO HIS FRIENDS
Third, we get alongside those who walk with God
…Put simply, that is what the church is supposed to be about. Would that it were. I hope you will find a few folks who walk with God to also walk with you through the seasons of your life. But honesty—and Scripture—forces me to admit they are a rare breed. Few there are who find it. All the more reason for you to make the number less scarce by becoming someone who walks with God and teaches others how.
Look to those who have walked with God down through the centuries. Certainly, that is why the Bible is given to us. If God had intended it to be a textbook of doctrine, well, then, he would have written it like one. Oh, yes, we learn many crucial things about doctrine and Christian character in the Scripture, along with a great deal of wisdom. But if you’ll flip from cover to cover, you’ll notice that it’s overwhelmingly a book of stories—tales of men and women who walked with God. Approach Scriptures not so much as a manual of Christian principles, but as the testimony of God friends and what it means to walk with him through a thousand different episodes.
And there are those who have walked with God since the canon of Scripture closed. Here is an Athanasius, a Bonaventure, a Julian of Norwich, a Brother Lawrence, and A.W. Tozer—here is how they walked with God. (Pages 107-108)
??? Are you walking with a small group of folks who walk with God in your life right now? If so, what difference does that make? How do you look at the Bible—textbook, example book….what?
OTHERWISE….
“Most of us are afraid of our guidance, our intuition, our ‘hunches,’” warns Agnes Sanford. “We try to close our minds to them, thereby increasing our restlessness and losing the benefit of the heavenly warning that would tell us when and how to pray.” Eldredge closes the chapter with an example of a pilot friend of his following one such hunch. It most assuredly saved his life! The account is on page 108-109
??? How will you be more intentional about listening to God’s voice in your life in the coming week?