Day 13

And the LORD spoke to Branch, and said: “Branch, thou has done well to visit with me all the days of the week. Take your rest and enjoy the weekend. For there is no need to labor in meeting with Me beyond the measure of your desire to be in My presence. If the burden of it is too heavy, take Saturday and Sunday off. You earned it.” I Hesitations 6:66
Funny huh? I decided to write that mocking my own thoughts of sleeping in on a Saturday. I knew that the LORD and I had been spending some quality time together over the past several days – but even knowing that I was about to go into the “weekend,” I was eager to once again be in the presence of the LORD! As I begin my study of the passages for today, I encounter these leading verses, and bask in the reinforcement of remaining connected to God:
John 15:2-4 “Every branch in Me that does not produce fruit He removes, and He prunes every branch that produces fruit so that it will produce more fruit. You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you. Remain in Me, and I in you. Just as a branch is unable to produce fruit by itself unless it remains on the vine, so neither can you unless you remain in Me.”
In the immortal words of Danielle Bregoli – “How bout dat?!” OK, I’m ready to move on 😉
When we consider how infrequently anyone in the Bible is referred to as “a friend of God,” it is easy to escape into a feeling of unworthiness and accept the possibility that we may never commune fully with God as others have in the Bible. Moses was a friend of God. Abraham was a friend of God. In Exodus 33:11, we bear witness to the level of intimacy shared between God and Moses:
“The LORD spoke with Moses face to face, just as a man speaks with his friend….” (33:11a)
We know that becoming one of the prophets and founding fathers of our faith might put us into that status. And we know that God’s nature to be in that relationship with man extended all the way back to the beginning when God walked and talked with Adam in the garden. But it just isn’t so applicable to us today. Not in 2017. Not really. Unless that is exactly what God intended. Unless that is exactly what God intended from the beginning. When Christ was preparing to depart for the final chapter of His dwelling here among us on Earth, He gathered His disciples to the upper room and shared a meal with them. It was here that Christ re-affirmed the relationship that we saw demonstrated between God and Moses back in Exodus 33:11. He uses a perfect analogy of the relationship between vine and branches to compare to the need for remaining connected to Him as the source. John 15:7 “If you remain in Me, and My words remain in you, ask whatever you want and it will be done for you.” But then Christ brings home the relationship demonstrated in God’s communion with Moses and exalts us to the SAME LEVEL!
“You are My friends if you do what I command you. I do not call you slaves anymore, because a slave doesn’t know what his master is doing. I have called you friends, because I have made known to you everything I have heard from My Father.” (John 15:14-15)
Jesus’ statement to His disciples “no longer do I call you servants… but I call you friends” means that the intimacy of relationship that Moses experienced with God (while somewhat unique), is our privilege as well!
As I consider the weekend, and relaxation. I know that my time with the LORD is not taking a 48-hour break. I will continue in the “habit” of inwardly gazing Godward (A.W. Tozer, the Pursuit of God) and honor gratefully, my obligation to have regular times of communion with God. I have guests visiting with me this weekend, and I have an obligation to meet with my friends. The obligation I have to meet with God is a duty I anticipate with joy, just like I anticipate an evening with an old friend.