Christian Living

The Blessed Interaction

by Terry Barlow
11/03/14
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   The Hebrew word for peace, shalom (a deep down sense of peace and well-being) was actually translated in the Septuagint by the Greek word “soteria” or salvation. So as I lay in bed last night I was experiencing that shalom, I was feeling my salvation, actually mining the peace at the heart of it as though it were a precious metal.

   I did no work to earn that salvation, and yet that salvation is FOR works and is producing work that I was predestined to perform along paths that were prepared for me to walk, in a life that was pre-arranged for me to live. (The Christian life and culture as it was meant to be lived culminates in the ultimate prearranged marriage, where our Father has decided wisely for us.)

  When I entered into this salvation through the open door that is the Messiah, I was reconciled to God the Father. While we were still sinners Messiah died for us or one might say, he still died for us. That is,  I was suddenly put on speaking terms with my heavenly Father. Not only was I put on speaking terms but I was given something to say to my Father in heaven and the capacity to hear from Him. It is possible to be on speaking terms with someone and have nothing to say, which may characterize more relationships than we care to admit. Not only then are we who are reconciled to our Father in heaven on speaking terms with Him ( and each other), but we have something worthwhile to say and something worth hearing that we want to hear, even if it hurts sometimes.   Not only do we have something worthwhile to say and hear, but we are actually saying it and hearing it!

  Now being reconciled and interacting this way, the Lord of Hosts is with us, meaning also that the Lord of Hosts is FOR us. And not only is Yahweh our Lord with us and for us, as if that wasn’t much more than enough already, but His Hosts are with us and for us too. His Hosts are His angel armies of which He is commander-in-chief. These angelic Hosts can be deployed on our behalf at any time their Heavenly Commander chooses. And, as a reminder, they outnumber 2 to 1 the rebellious angels that followed Lucifer in his revolt before creation. (Revelations 12) Also by way of reminder, it only took one angel of those Hosts to bind Satan for a thousand years.(Revelations 20) They are always up to something good, so there is at least twice as much good being enacted by them as there is evil by their adversaries.

   The opposite of being driven is being drawn, Our Heavenly Father is ever drawing us through His Holy Spirit toward Himself. If we recognize and respond to the sometimes subtle drawings, we won’t have to be driven by harsher circumstances. But one way or the other we,  as His redeemed and reconciled ones,  will be moving in His direction into increasing interaction with Him. And that, of course, is a great blessing!