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Training And Living
Episode #311
With Martha Kilpatrick and hosted by John Enslow
Special guest: Julie
(M) Well, we’re here with John and Julie, and it looks like we’re still on the Green Berets, “Surviving The Cut”. Julie sent me an e-mail with a scripture from 1Timothy. And it had a phrase in it so near to what we’ve been dealing with, the refusal to be trained, and so I sent it over to John and I said, we need to do a podcast on this. So we’ve been, on this beautiful fall day in the mountains, with the leaves falling, it’s just gorgeous, we had to come in and, and talk in the microphone. So, (John laughs) that’s honest. So, Julie, what’s your scripture?
(Julie) Ok, this is from 1Timothy, chapter one in the Amplified version, starting about verse three. Paul tells Timothy, “As I urged you when I was on my way to Macedonia, stay on where you are at Ephesus in order that you may warn and admonish and charge certain individuals not to teach any different doctrine, nor to give importance to or occupy themselves with”, and then he lists some things, “legends, myths, genealogies.” But here’s, here’s what the effect would be, “which foster and promote useless speculations and questionings rather than,” two things: one, “acceptance in faith of God’s administration”, and number two, “the divine training that is in faith in that leaning of the entire human personality on God in absolute trust and confidence.” So, Paul highlights the two things that are important to him and central to his discipleship. And it means so much to me because I see that these are the two things you’ve emphasized to me in your discipleship. One is “the acceptance in faith of God’s administration”, the headship of God over everything, Him being in absolute control. He calls the shots for everything in my life; it’s basic obedience to God. And along with that the “divine training that is in faith.” But I loved how the Amplified put it; it’s a training that causes the leaning of the entire human personality on God.
(M) Well, I’m thinking about what you and I have been through in the last two days, Julie, where you have something that you are called by the Lord to deal with in a person. And so I could come back and tell you a few things that I learned the hard way and the long way, very difficult. I could give it to you without having to go through what I went through. I could know the heart of it, and the heart of Christ, because I did it the wrong way for so many years. And I won’t go into what it is or what it meant, but the training is from, the discipling is from one who’s been, gosh, as you said, I think you said seasoned warrior, who can impart it to you so you can get it in not half of the time it took me, but a tenth of the time. I can tell you right off the bat, ok, this is not Christ’s attitude, this is what His attitude is; and then spare you a whole lot of repentance (Martha laughs), and devastation, which I have done to learn it the hard way. So, the training is from one older; that was the Green Beret training. It was from those men who were older who had been through the path, had made all the mistakes, who knew what the pitfalls were, and knew how to succeed, and the right way to go and the right way to think. So, as you read that I was thinking about, you know, what we’ve been through practically in the last couple days of training. And you are utterly amazing in how you will, are willing to be trained. You will hear and obey anything that bears witness with your spirit, and it’s just amazing. You are so focused on being trained, and it’s one reason you’ve grown fast and bring such riches into this group, of the Spirit.
(J) Funny enough that God always exercises our choices and our decisions out in practical, external, earthly exercises, so to speak. Like the guys that were surviving the cut, internally they had to do a work, but then it was tested externally, with external things. And I see how God does that with us, that basically, you know, and this is no, it’s just neat to see it right now. It’s not any big revelation. The cool thing about it is that you can see it played out before you. It’s like He extracts out of your heart the choice and displays it before you, so that you can see your choice. And I’m in awe of Him because of the fact that He is able to say, “Here’s something deep and secret, let Me bring it out so you can see it and have it revealed in front of you. Is this really the choice that you want to make?” So it’s almost like He checks it back with us, “Ok, here it is played out before you, is that really what you want?” And then you have to make an affirmation of the choice that you made so that there will be something that He can put back in your heart, and then it’ll come out again. But it’s like He does a work of seeding and then re-seeding and then re-seeding by harvest, and how He harvests it is in these individual actions and trainings that He displays before you your choice. Does that make sense?
(Julie) It goes… That’s illustrated in different words in this passage where Paul’s talking about to Timothy, because he’s setting up this big contrast. He’s telling Timothy warn and admonish people not to teach what’s gonna end up in useless speculations and questionings, and then he comes back and he says, he calls it vain arguments and discussions and purposeless talk. And he’s contrasting that against what he’s telling Timothy is His way, which is acceptance and faith of God’s administration and divine training. Those are, like you said, if I heard you, those are practical, workable, testable kinds of things. I mean to accept God’s administration in your life, that is a tough work and a tough training at times, because the fact is it does draw out of us what we don’t like about His administration. It requires constant bowing and being pushed beyond limitations that I’ve set. Just like in that training, He, God, He’s amazing. You say Martha, that He searches out every ‘no’. He will put me on an obstacle course that will flush out every ‘no’ in me to Him, every resistance, every fear, everywhere my faith, because He keeps calling it my faith, acceptance in faith of God’s administration, the divine training that’s in faith. But that faith is a leaning on Him. So, I was thinking about earlier how it’s opposite. In the Green Beret training they took them through an obstacle course to try to prove to them what they could be that they didn’t know they could be. But our training is different. Our training is to push me into situations where I realize Who Christ is in me, so that it’s ok, because at the same time I’m gonna realize what I’m not. Even like the situation you mentioned, I completely failed in love, but it’s an opportunity to realize that, and then come into Who He is as love that I’m not. So, to me that’s… And we were seeing in terms of the refusal to train, then the refusal to train is a refusal of His administration or a refusal to be pushed to lean. And boy, I sure wanted to ‘not lean’ a lot of times. And so that’s where we… So, I see what you’re saying, John, and it is in this passage, it’s the difference between something that’s just a bunch of talk verses something that has meat to it, has legitimacy, has…
(M) It’s the difference between talk and experience, questionings and living. What God shows us He wants us to live out. And I used to hear this, it’s not original with me but, God gives you a revelation, and immediately that is tested. It’s tested by life in the practical. And I love Him, because He is so practical. We don’t think of God as practical. He, Jesus lived as a practical, hardworking laborer. And God is so aware that we have to live the practical life. It’s the practical that tests us. It’s the practical that tests me. I don’t know about anybody else. But the tremendous physical and practical work that has to be done to sustain a life for a family is enormous. And it’s in that place that is our training spiritually. We don’t, and most people don’t… What you said is so valid, John, because there’s so many… I keep thinking about Paul warning about those who are lazy. And he had this mandate if they don’t work they don’t eat. And so we have so much of that in Christianity now that doesn’t, that is ethereal, or it’s theoretical, or it’s spiritual or it’s ideas, rather than getting into the trenches of life.
(J) I love the word flushing out because He extracts it to flush it out, to bring it before you. And I’m writing something right now about His incredible patience and His incredible respect of us as a person and our will as a person. And so, even though you may be words only, it’s His respect of us to extract that out of our heart and reveal it to us as only words and no substance, so that we can make either the choice that that’s where we want to remain, that we don’t want to go any further than words. And He will allow that in His respect of us and our free will, He’ll say, “Ok, if you only want words, that’s fine.” He’ll set up circumstances that makes it awful, but, but He will allow that. And if that’s as far as we want to go, He’ll allow that. I know Martha always says He’ll let you, you know, walk your path straight to hell if that’s what you really, really, want. But His flushing out the choices and displaying it before us, to deposit it back into us, that is the training, that was the pushing of those men, push, push, push, for them, extracting out of their bodies and out of their will, their fears and their raw determination, and everything. They extracted that out, and then displayed it before them so that they could make the cut and go the course, or not. And that’s what God does with us.
(M) It’s so practical. I’ll tell on me. During the, oh, two or three months really, when I was writing three booklets, was gone some, and I don’t remember all that was going on, but I was terribly busy. And I had areas of my house that were just trashed. And I could not conquer it and get to it. And I kept praying and kept praying, and the Lord said, “What I want you to learn is to live in a situation that doesn’t suit you, and continue to walk in the Spirit.” Oh that was a tough lesson. That was so hard to obey. I wanted it clean and orderly more than I wanted to walk in the Spirit. That’s what He provoked out of me that you’re talking about, John. I felt like that order around me would enhance my ability to write. He said, no, not this time. I want you to be content in this situation. I want you to learn to be content in whatsoever state you’re in, to be abased or to abound. And Paul’s secret was Christ’s strength. So I accepted it. At some point, in the space, I think I was having houseguests, I do not know how this house got in order. I absolutely don’t. I did it. But it was, Christ did it. And He did it with such ease that I don’t even, it just happened. And it was in order and it was beautiful and it was together. And when He was ready to live that practicality in me… See, it’s not just for me to work, it’s for me to discover Him in whatever work is ahead of me. And I discovered that He wanted me to learn to be content no matter what, and to walk in the Spirit is my highest priority in life. If that meant there were several rooms that weren’t together, then so be it. My loyalty to the Spirit was tested by the practical. And then, because He knew it was time, and He just came in and did it Himself. I can say that He cleaned my house. And it’s not outlandish. It is typical. He has to live my life. For me to live is Christ. And to live in the practical, I’m at the stage of my walk where if He doesn’t do it, I can’t. I’m at the stage where there’s not… I don’t have a plan B. It’s either Christ or nothing. And so, that’s just, that’s how practical it is.
(J) But the practicality of that was to reveal out of your heart the choices that you had made.
(M) Oh, oh yes, oh yes, oh yes, my house was to be in order.
(J) But isn’t it His kindness to say, let Me show you what’s here, so that you have an ability to deal with it?
(M) So, that really illustrates what you’re trying to say.
(J) Yeah, it does, yeah.
(M) It really illustrates what you’re saying.
(J) Well, yeah, that displays it, that in the kindness; what a kindness of God.
(M) Oh yes, I didn’t know that I was that, you know, I’m not perfect at all, and I didn’t know that I had that kind of standard that I felt ‘had to be’.
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