The High Calling

Let not the height of the Vision dismay you, or discourage you as you walk towards it. Remember this.., that the high calling is not too high for you, or God would not have called you to it. And take courage in the fact that the HIGH calling is really an UPWARD call, as the Greek word means, and as it is translated in some versions. It is an UPWARD call! This gives us hope and courage. If it were simply "high," I could very well look up and say, "It is just too high for me." I might gaze at the heights of the call, and flounder in discouragement. But it is an UPWARD call! God is saying to you and to me, "I am calling you UPWARD... I want you to go on... I want you to come higher... I do not want you to stay where you are, frustrated and perplexed and bewildered. The reason you abide in those realms is because you do not see the Vision. And if you see it you think I have set before you a goal that you know you can never reach. You do not understand that I only ask you to take one step at a time, and I only ask you to climb the steps with Me, as you take My yoke upon you, and learn from Me... for I am meek and lowly in heart, and ye shall find rest unto your souls."

And so we take but one step at a time, and God is pleased. But we must not lag behind or yield to the enticements that come our way from time to time to take a shortcut. For there are many that appear to be good. You can get gifts of the Spirit freely. You might even develop for yourself a ministry, that may satisfy your heart for a season, and from which you might find a certain fulfillment. And certainly you need His gifts! But pray God that He will cause you to sit and learn from ministries that will lead you to His feet... ministries that will encourage you to take His yoke, and follow His ways. Gifts and ministries must not be considered to be in any sense ultimate... they are but means to the end... and the end pursuit of gift and ministry is to come to know Him, to be joined in like spirit unto others in the Family of God who are seeking to come to the "fullness" of Him... so that together you might be able to comprehend, to apprehend, to receive fully... the living Christ, in the full expression of His Being.

And let us not be dismayed when in spite of all our noble efforts to climb higher we feel... we just know... that we are getting lower and lower. For as we travel this way we are going to discover, as men and women of all ages have discovered... that...

The way UP is DOWN...The way OVER is UNDER...The way to SUCCESS is through FAILURE...The way to true PROSPERITY is through spiritual BANKRUPTCY...The way to the true RICHES, is through POVERTY...The way to VICTORY, is through DEFEAT...The way to LIFE, is through DEATH.

And therefore, for the people of the UPWARD WAY God has set before us a very clear pattern and example:

"Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus: who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God (Or, 'He did not consider that equality with God was something He should grasp after'): but made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men: and being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. Wherefore God also hath highly exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name" (Phil. 2:5-9).

For the Son of God, the Captain of our Salvation, the Author and the Finisher of our faith... for Him the UPWARD CALL was one that brought Him lower, and lower, and lower... even unto the death of the Cross.
And so it must be with you and me. God deliver us from all that striving we see today to excel... striving for highness, for exaltation, for greatness, for bigness... even among many who profess to know the "end-time" message, and who profess to be heirs of the "Kingdom." Let us make no mistake about it... the pathway of SONSHIP leads to none of these. It takes one lower, and lower, and still lower... in order that in the Spirit of Christ we might rise higher... and higher, and still higher...