“You are My servant, I have chosen you and have not cast you away: Fear not, I am with you.” Isaiah 41:9,10
Throughout Scripture in God’s dealings with men, in particular with those who belong to Him by surrender and faith, He often addresses the need of morale, that attitude of heart and mind which is committed to believing God, being led and kept by Him, and blessed in that calling to which one has been entrusted. The reason for this has to do with faith, that very essential attitude by which the believer receives all from Christ.
From the very moment that a lost sinner is being drawn to Christ to be saved, he is called upon to receive the revelation of God to his heart. He may not recognize it as the Lord working in him, but all the same, for the Lord’s work to have its intended result, the individual must receive it. At the moment of the new birth, the Apostle John tells us that, “…as many as received Him, to them He gave the right (or power) to become children of God.” (1:12) No one can come to God, to Christ, and be saved from sin, Satan, and this world system without accepting the convicting work of the Spirit of God, receiving grace to repent from sin, turning towards God, but by faith also receiving the very gift of God in Christ, forgiveness of sins and the new life in Christ. The true believer in Christ is a receiver of Christ. From the very moment when the Spirit of God comes into the heart, Christ is the present, perfect Giver of every good gift, especially the giving of His perfect life to dwell in the heart. From the day of the new birth, the believer is, as the Psalmist framed it, one with mouth wide open, to receive all from Christ one’s very life. Every attempt to trust in something or someone other than Christ for all that Christ alone can give, will always result in failure. Not only is Christ the Fountain of Living Waters, but the eternal Spring, ever springing up in the heart of the new creation in Christ, the New Man. Christ has forever become that well, and stream of living water, to reveal Himself as “floods of living water” in and through the life by the Spirit. The believer is called to fulness of Life, and power, by the Spirit of Christ. One with Christ, he cannot die. He is God’s and Christ is his for every need and purpose.
What then of the importance of morale, that attitude of mind and heart that is so very important if one would live the victorious life? Faith is the key to receiving from Christ all that is needed to know the will of God, and to accomplish it. Faith is also the target of the enemy to restrict the reception of the power of the Spirit. If the enemy can through circumstances, or people not walking with Christ, or simply spiritual opposition to mind and heart, turn faith to fear, then the flow of the life by the Spirit will be limited. It is for this reason, in this spiritual warfare, that God is consistently reminding the believer to not fear, but to believe. Whether it be in the context of a storm of unwanted circumstances where hope would wear thin, the call of God to the believer is to refuse, and resist all fear, at the same time turning to God, to Christ, by the Spirit, and by prayer and faith, to receive God’s answer, His provision, His direction, and this in faith. The believer is called upon in the face of such opposition, coming from without, and from within, to look upwards to the Father on His throne, and Christ at His right hand to whom the believer belongs, trusting Him for all, and this completely. He makes his petition to God, thus, opening his mouth wide so that God will fill it. God’s provision in Christ is constant and complete.
Dear Father, Strengthen us to receive. In Jesus’ name, Amen.