Wendy's Blog

By faith alone...

Excerpt from "When God is Silent" from His Imprint, My Expression by Kay Arthur

Madame Guyon, a French woman who lived during the reign of Louis XIV, knew a great deal about the silence of God. For seven years she was bereft of religious joy, peace or emotions of any kind - a time of "privation or desolation."

During all that period, she had to walk by faith alone. She continued her devotions and her works of charity but without the pleasure and satisfaction she had previously felt....For seven years she kept looking for feelings and emotions before she learned to live above feelings and by simple faith in God. Then she found the life of faith is much lighter, holier, and happier than the life governed by feelings and emotions.

Almost seven years after she lost her joy and emotion, she began to correspond with Father la Combe, whom she had been the means for leading into the light of salvation through faith some years previously. He was now the instrument of leading her out into the clear light and sunshine of Christian experience. He showed her that God had not forsaken her as she was so often tempted to believe but that he was crucifying the self-life in her.

"I had a deep peace which seemed to pervade the whole soul, and resulted from the fact that all my desires were fulfilled in God. I feared nothing; that is, considered in its ultimate results and relations, because my strong faith placed God at the head of all perplexities and events. I desired nothing but what I now had, because I had full beliefs that, in my present state of mind, the results of each moment constituted the fulfillment of the Devine purposes. As a sanctified heart is always in harmony with the Devine providences, i had no will bu the Devine will, of which such providence are the true and appropriate expression."

What Madame Guyon learned, in essence, was that God was her all in all. He was all that mattered - not her emotions, not her desires, not her pleasures...Only God. It was when she understand this that she began to walk in the totality of meekness.

Meekness is not weakness...It is strength. HIS strength Meekness is accepting everything as coming from God without murmuring, disputing, or retaliating...Even His silence.

Madame Guyon consecrated herself wholly to God; He could do with her as He pleased. She would no longer look to external experiences or internal joys. Instead she would find rest in His sovereigns dealings, whatever they were.

Feel it or not, see it or not, hear it or not, she knew that "He Himself has said, 'I will never desert you, nor will I ever forsake you,' so that we confidently say, 'The LORD is my helper, I will not be afraid. What shall man do to me?'" (Hebrews 13:5-6)

posted by 板板子 @ 11:10 AM