Expectations

‘I praise you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and learned, and revealed them to little children’. Matthew 11:25

What does a person who has come to Christ expect? What should he expect? And what does the Bible tell him He will expect? I believe that his own expectations will be blown out of the water when he realises that the message he received at the very beginning is only a welcome into the kingdom. If someone had told him the truth and given him both barrels of the gospel, so to speak, he would’ve had to deliberate closely what he was getting himself into. He is told that Jesus died for him, that his sins are forgiven, and that he has become a new creation. But the new creation he has become is like a baby that has just emerged from the womb. He is not fully grown and is still far from it. His maturity will be decided when Jesus returns. In the meantime, many changes need to occur. It is the same as when the body grows; Bones must be extended and strengthened in order for the new shape to occur. However, there must not only be a change in the body but also in the mind and most of all in the spirit. He must learn to love in a way he’s never loved before. He must learn to love as Jesus loved. When a man first comes to the cross, he must realise who he is and what he has become. But when he receives the life-changing, amazing grace of God, he must hold his hands up and declare his wretchedness and say to the one who created him, ‘Place your hands up on me and reshape me, because I am not as I should be.

Every day we must come to God having been changed from the day before, but how many of us remain unchanged? Jesus loves me as I am, is often the mantra of the slippery grace mob. This is just declaring that my change comes from Jesus' part and that we have nothing to do with it. The time is coming, and it is now that the new revelation of the words of Jesus will come. We will read the scriptures in a new way with a new understanding.

Jesus said of John the Baptist; Matthew 11:11, I tell you the truth, among those born of women there is not written anyone greater than John the Baptist.

This is the word from the one who was before Abraham. How can John the Baptist be greater than Abraham, Noah, Moses, David, or Elijah?

The truth is, no one can be greater than the one they prophecy about. Our expectations must not be to seek greatness in status, or in accomplishments, but to be humble in serving Jesus and magnifying His name in all the earth.

The hand of God moves in incomprehensible ways. It is the power and wisdom of God to do and to will as He sees fit. Who can argue against His wisdom? God is a God of change — He moved the  earth and wrote the history of it to bring about the fulfillment of His purposes upon it. The God who establishes all things changes us, but how much of us must we expect to be changed?

When we come to Jesus, we should not expect to stay as we are. To remain just as I am is not what is required of me. What is required of me is to know Jesus and to love him. But what does it mean to know Him and to love him?

Jesus said in Matthew 11:25 I praise you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and learned, and revealed them to little children.

As long as we continue to debate the complex, we are unable to see the simple. We mix knowledge with understanding. But not all is as it seems in the kingdom. Some things remain a mystery until the Father reveals the hidden to us.

Loving Jesus does not mean that we must know all things and be clever in our debate. It means to take His yoke and to do what He asks of us and to go where he tells us. In other words, it is to obey His commands; it is also to lay our lives down for others and to pay the cost that is required.

To say to the Lord ‘I come to you just as I am’ is a cop out. When we come to the Lord and proclaim what we are, it means simply that I am a human upon the Earth — I have things to deal with and I need you to be part of all of those things. We can choose to carry the burdens of the world, even though Jesus has released us from them, but that is not what Jesus wants — He wants us to be yoked to Him because his burden his light. We can choose to climb the mountain of faith with as little baggage as possible, or we can choose to climb with a cartload. In the former, my expectation is that I will make it to the top — in the latter, my expectation may be that I won’t. Our walk with Jesus is as one who comes as they are, not as what they were. Walking with Jesus up the mountain changes us.

Times of tribulation and great trials are coming to the Earth and especially to the house of God. If I am yoked to Christ, then I know that he and I will go together, and I will not be phased because He has overcome the world. My expectation is that I can make it through the valley of shadows. My expectation is that I can make it to the Mount to be with him. My expectation is that I walk with Christ and, in the closeness of that intimate relationship, he will choose to reveal himself to me that I may know him. Jesus says that he chooses those to whom he reveals himself.

In the Christian world, it is a shame that there are still many who carry the burdens of the world and who are getting weary in life. But this need not be the case. Jesus says, ‘Come to me all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Matthew 11: If we are not doing this, then we are not listening to what Jesus said. Jesus says, ‘Come to me’. When Jesus called Peter to step out upon the water, he said ‘Come to me’. God will not leave us destitute or let us down when we respond to his command. We must relinquish our control and look him in the eyes. When a tightrope walker steps out onto the line, he doesn’t look at the line; he looks ahead of him and feels the line with his feet. If he looks down, he will become disorientated, but if he looks up, he will maintain his balance. In our walk with Jesus, we must still feel the Earth beneath our feet, but our eyes must look up to where He is because where He is our destination, and in order to get to where we are going, we cannot remain as we are.