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The Choice of YES and AMEN
Episode #703
05/24/2020
With Martha Kilpatrick and hosted by John Enslow
Special Guest: Joan Wentzel
This the continuation of a series of podcasts started in Episode #693
So you’ve made your choice and said YES to God, but your life still looks the same as always. What happened? Well, you said YES but did you also say AMEN?
Martha:
So, Joan, share with your notes. She, she got really brilliant about it.
Joan:
Well, I have been so impacted by Julia’s simple statement that I, it has just opened my life to me. And I felt like the Lord posed to, the question to me, the life has, God has given me, that He has given me, do I say ‘yes’ or ‘no’ to Him? Because it really comes down, it is boiled down to the ‘yes’ and ‘no.’ It’s not… We want to make it specific and say, “Well, I don’t like this or that,” but it’s really comes down Him and me. Do I say ‘yes’ to You?
And I saw that the ‘yes’ is a very open ‘yes’; it’s clear, it’s seen, it can be seen in anybody’s life when they make it. And I also saw that the ‘no’, which is a refusal, we don’t like that word but it’s truly a refusal of Him, the life He’s given in all of its facets, every, from the start to the finish.
It’s a refusal but it’s often hidden because we hide it from ourselves. We like to think I’ve made a ‘yes’ but in reality, we’ve said ‘no’. And I feel like I’ve asked the Lord to expose every place of I have a no in me because, you know, I’ll hide it from myself. I’m great at that, you know. I’m one of the queens of denial on such things. But it’s just, I just saw, it’s just such a, a simple thing. It’s like in Deuteronomy where He says, “Choose life that you may live.” The choice was not complicated. It was simple. Not easy.
And I’ve also seen… Martha and I talked about choice and that the Lord showed me something about choice, in that there must be a commitment to the choice. You, you can’t just choose. Oh, I did that for a lot of years and that was part of my hiding in the ‘no’. “Well, I’ve made the choice but nothing’s happening.” Well, I didn’t really make the choice, because I saw that even in the kingdom we receive the kingdom by faith but at the same time the Lord says, “Seek first the kingdom and His righteousness.”
So there is a choosing and then our part is the seeking. And what does that mean? Well, that means how, how does that play out in my life? What is the reality of that? And I saw that the present is not static, that now is ever moving. We are in an ever-moving moment of choice. And so my seeking is my commitment to the choice. And I, and I puzzled over “Seek His righteousness,” and this may be totally off, but I was given, His righteousness was imputed to me, but the actual process of the choice, I seek His righteousness and my ‘yes’; my ‘no’ to myself and my ‘yes’ to Him produces an ever-increasing reality of righteousness.
John:
So I was, I was speaking to a friend of mine this week about choice and the ‘yes’ and everything like that. And we had an interesting discussion about ‘want.’ And basically, I said to him, “Hey, you know, you can, you can ‘want’
something all day long and still not achieve anything.” And I think that that’s a trap that people get in, and I’m actually writing a post about it. People get in that trap that, “Well, I want to do this. I want to do this.” Well, you can’t just want it. That’s a, that’s passive. You know, you, you… It’s… The, the ‘want’ is the, the, the step prior to the choice.
And so, I’m looking forward to writing this one and getting this out and, and I’m gonna include some of the stuff that you’ve said because it just works absolutely perfectly. And, and I’m, I’m looking forward to, you know, because I, I think that that’s a, that’s a satanic pitfall that we all fall into, because I feel like I’ve effected change by wanting but until I make the choice I haven’t.
Joan:
Well, and I see that as what you’re talking about is acting on the choice. We can want something but if we don’t act on that and that’s what you’re talking about. And the acting on my choice is the seeking. I say, “I want You, Lord.” Well, do I seek You? Or do I just go on my merry way expecting You to, to do it all. And “I’m okay, God. You’re not doing Your part.” No! I have refused to do my part, which is, you know, seeking which He even puts the desire into seek. He, He even moves the choice if I’ll have a, I’ll say, ever moving ‘yes’, an ever expanding ‘yes’.
Martha:
The ‘want’ that I’ve heard so many people say, “Well, I want to follow Him. I want to love Him.” And I say, “Well, you never will because it’s not a want. Of course, you want. Of course, you desire! But do you choose? Do you say ‘yes’? Do you say, ‘I am Yours, Lord’?” But that ‘want’ is saying, “God’s just isn’t moving. I want it but He isn’t doing His part.” Oh, He has done His part on the cross and He does His part every day by the Holy Spirit.
So the word ‘want’ is, is a ‘no’, really. “It’s, it’s God’s problem and He’s not moving!” And you can buy the lie if you want to.
Joan:
There it is, Martha. You said it! There’s the hidden ‘no’.
John:
It’s His life that we rely upon but my choice is involved in it. Otherwise I’m just a robot. And He wants, He gave me free will to, to live out my life and, but I have to, I have to make the direction and the choice for Him to engage His life in my life. I have to make the choice. That’s, that’s the, that’s the weird thing about the exchanged life because you would think, “Oh well, you know, boom, here comes Jesus’ life out of me.” No, you, you have to choose it. It’s a, it’s a choice.
Martha:
And the choice is me or Him.
John:
Exactly. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Martha:
And in Him I have all, everything for me. It’s foolish.
John:
Right.
Martha:
Because if you say ‘yes’ then God’s on the job and He will bring you to the end and it will be finished – your life, your destiny. He will finish it. You don’t have to do that complicated thing. He will do it for you but He requires of you and me a choice. And the choice as Joan is telling us is on-going.
John:
It is.
Martha:
Always it’s a challenge.
John:
Um hmm.
Joan:
And this is the part of union. We… The Lord didn’t say… He says, “You belong to me” but we belong to Him in union. He wants our participation. He does not absorb us, consume us. He’s looking for an active participation of our ‘yes’ to His life as our life. But that requires us as well as Him.
So to say, “I want” really is to say, “You do all the work. I may want this but I’m not doing anything about it because I’m not in union. I just dump it all on You. I have no place of responsibility in this relationship.” Which every relationship requires a place of responsibility and commitment or there is no relationship.
Martha:
One thing I’ve discovered in studying the scriptures, looking at all different aspects of the Bride, and I realize that what God wants for His Son is a partner, not a slave. He wants a partner. And one of the phrases He gave me was, “A partner who would sing His glories forever;” a partner who understands Him and knows Him.
That, the danger in this generation is that in the name of Jesus, we deny Jesus a place in the church. You can see it, if you watch for it. You can see it in a lot of the speakers and a lot of things that are written. That the Bride is to be absolutely in partnership with the Lord; His goals are her goals, His desires are her desires. And the church is going to be made up, the church is those who do the will of God. Jesus said, “Who is My father, mother, sister? Who’s My family? Those who do the will of God.”
So that’s… Occasionally I’ll, I’ll come across someone or some situation where that’s so obvious that Jesus has been removed. And there may be zeal, there may be, there may even be miracles. There’s a lot now of, of the false that is going on, false miracles and without Jesus being either the source or the object or the center. That’s my cry.
John:
This all reminds me of 2 Corinthians 1:20 in the Amplified. It’s, it’s_____?
“For as many as are the promises of God, they all find their Yes [answer] in Him [Christ]. For this reason we also utter the Amen (so be it) to God through Him [in His Person and by His agency] to the glory of God.” And that’s, there’s your ‘yes’. There’s your, there’s your ‘yes’ and amen. It, it is through His life but we’re not free of the responsibility to join in that. I mean what bride, you know, isn’t in union, isn’t connected, isn’t making that choice, isn’t wanting to be? That’s, that’s, that’s slavery, that’s bondage, that’s not true union and true beloved bridal union.
Martha:
Well said, well said.
I love that scripture. Thank you for remembering it. I didn’t and I like, I love that it says, “Amen.” We have to say, ‘amen’ to the ‘yes.’ And that, that’s deeper than just saying ‘yes’. It’s saying, “So be it.” That’s what ‘amen’ means. So be it, so be all of it! That’s what Mary said when the angel gave her the news of her destiny. “Let it be unto me according to Thy word.” She said not just a ‘yes’ but let it all be. “All that You planned let it be, let it become.”
John:
I love this. I just looked at it in the Passion (2 Corinthians 1:20 TPT).
“For all of God’s promises find their ‘yes’ of fulfillment in him. And as His ‘yes’ and our ‘amen’ ascend to God, we bring Him glory!”
I love that! His ‘yes’ and my ‘amen’. That’s amazing.
The Choice of YES and AMEN – Episode #703 – Shulamite Podcast
So you’ve made your choice and said YES to God, but your life still looks the same as always. What happened? Well, you said YES but did you also say AMEN? A real choice involves commitment to what you chose, and a true YES is followed by AMEN!
We put our sail up, unfurl & set it. In union we embrace the wind, move with the wind. He’s charted the course, our sail is up…”these see the works of the Lord, and His wonders of the deep.”
This podcast is full of succinct banners flying in the wind! Thank you all!