Not long after I started up deerlife, I wrote (boldface added today):
I have been praying for some time God would bring together in a more cohesive way those of us who have a heart for revival and have received a calling to pray for revival. I believe we are spread too thinly on the wall (think Nehemiah).
Nehemiah 4:19 And I said to the nobles and to the officials and to the rest of the people, “The work is great and widely spread, and we are separated on the wall, far from one another. 20 In the place where you hear the sound of the trumpet, rally to us there. Our God will fight for us.”
I’m not quite sure how this might look in reality, but I have been feeling for some time that we need to be strategic as we rebuild the wall. By strategic I don’t mean resorting to worldly means but seeking God’s ways and God’s wisdom. The three fold cord is not quickly broken. I confess I have often been tempted to feel like Elijah, that there are no others out there (as I know others have had similar temptations), even though I know there are others. Let us remember that God always has a faithful remnant He is calling and wanting to use. Through deerlife, I pray God might raise up a fellowship of believers here who can support, uphold and encourage one another, so we can be mobilized and sent back into our home churches and communities on mission for Him. I am praying that those of us who have had a taste of revival in our own lives would be able to take that into our churches. I know there are some of us who are specifically called to this blogging community, but all of us are called to build on the home front as well.
I am also praying God would begin to raise up people in the local church to disciple and equip the saints both now and as revival does come, for there will be an influx of hungry souls needing meat. We should all be praying about our responsibility and role in that.
I love the Church and want to see her glorify God as she is intended and that starts with each one of us! I am a strong advocate of every member ministry. As Christians, we are all ministers, we are all uniquely called and equipped by God to be serving Him, His people and our neighbor in love with the gifts and resources He provides for His glory. I am praying God would be gracious to us and allow us to encourage one another to live our lives to His glory in the places He has put us here on this earth.In the Church today the work is great and the work is widely spread. It is also crucial for us to come together because the world is united in opposition against Christ and against those who are seeking to do His will and seeking the welfare of His Church. We are separated on the wall, far from one another in many ways. I am praying God might be gracious to us here and work through Deerlife to equip, encourage and edify His people as we seek to walk in the works God has ordained for us and build up His Body for His glory.
For more information, please read my posts Welcome to deerlife and Why deerlife? (we are separated on the wall, far from one another). (Some of the thoughts I’ve shared here have been adapted from those posts.)
I would also invite you to visit my other websites, naphtali_deer (Reformed Bible teaching with an eye to experiential Christianity) and tent_of_meeting (prayer for revival).
By the grace of God may we battle with His strength where He leads us and may our God fight for us! May Jesus Christ and Him crucified be preached and Jesus Christ have the preeminence in His Church once more!
And just over three years ago, on May 14, 2010, in my post, a challenge to you (God has some secret ones in all places), I wrote … (boldface added today):
As I said when I started up deerlife, my intent here is to encourage us to encourage one another as we blog/comment here, but also to go out into our local communities and churches and work there. I truly value the friendships and fellowship I have found here. I have been truly blessed. More than I could have imagined. I am not ready to discard what we have here, nor do I believe God intends for us to discard it at this time. I also believe there are others God wants to draw into this cluster here along with us.
From the time I started up [my other blog] tent of meeting [in March 2009], I’ve had in the back of my mind to challenge those of you out there to begin praying that God might bring you to like-minded men and women in your own churches and cities and begin to meet with them on a regular basis to pray for revival for we know that God does have some secret ones in all places, who tremble at His Word. (I’ve already been doing this for myself to some extent.) I’ve held off on publicly announcing that since I didn’t want to go ahead of God, but I believe I He’s leading me to give you that challenge today. I do know He is calling me to more concerted prayer for myself in that regard.
I have no authority over any of you, but I will humbly ask you to consider praying about this, to pray that God would lead you to others in your own area who are zealous for God’s Name and are longing for revival in the Church and seeking to pray for revival… I am bringing this request to this cluster of friends here, and I am asking as God leads you, that you would begin praying this not only for yourself but also for the rest of us here.
I have a dream of many sweet knots of religious friends, clusters of friends flourishing all over the globe as they gather together in concerted prayer to seek God’s face for revival! No Doubt God has some secret ones in all places, who tremble at His Word. The thought of this thrills me! I hope it does you also.
The thought of this still thrills me today! Little by little, God has been leading me (in spite of my fears, my pride, and my stubbornness!) into fellowship with a few of those secret ones locally here in the Madison area. I’m not going to sugar-coat this at all: this has NOT been an easy process or a painless journey by any means, but it’s been a wholly profitable one. And I confess I’ve struggled many a time as I’ve looked around at the “waves” rather than fixing my eyes on Jesus and staying my mind upon Jehovah and entrusting myself wholly to Him –– but God has continued to show Himself ever faithful and ever true, and shown His mysterious and inscrutable ways to be always loving, always wise, always good, and always beneficial to my soul…
17 Thus says the LORD,
your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel:
“I am the LORD your God,
who teaches you to profit,
who leads you in the way you should go.
18 Oh that you had paid attention to my commandments!
Then your peace would have been like a river,
and your righteousness like the waves of the sea;
19 your offspring would have been like the sand,
and your descendants like its grains;
their name would never be cut off
or destroyed from before me.”
Romans 8
28 And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good,
for those who are called according to his purpose.
I’ve shared a some of my journey in the local church through my blogging (see my posts tagged local church ). I’ve not been blogging as much here at deerlife (or, for that matter, on my other sites) because my mind, my heart, my energy, and my emotions have been increasingly devoted to the local church, but I still have a great affection for all the saints in all places (including those of you I’ve met via Xanga), as well as a desire for God’s Gospel to run speedily to all the nations –- and so it is with very many mixed emotions that I write today… I’m feeling somewhat like Paul and the Ephesian elders on the seashore (Acts 20):
As I’ve been blogging at deerlife significantly less often than when I started up, in light of the upcoming changes at Xanga and the possibility that Xanga may even end up shutting down (if you’ve not heard, Xanga is hoping to convert to a paid blogging platform – please see here and here) –– I’m planning to shut down deerlife eventually (whether or not Xanga continues). I believe deerlife may possibly be grandfathered in for a period of time if Xanga gets the funding it needs since I did purchase a Life membership just over three years ago. Regardless, I’m hoping to consolidate the posts I’ve written here into my other two sites. I’m not quite sure how I’m going to do that, but I’ll update you here in another post with the details. I’m suspecting I may end up tagging them with “deerlife import,” “deerlife post,” or something like that.
In my very first post here on deerlife (March 15, 2010), I wrote:
I feel I already have a lot I’m already juggling (as do many of you), but if we might come together here once in a while to support each other, I pray it might be a blessing to all so we might build up the local body of Christ in our own communities.
I have been blessed immensely through blogging here, and I thank you for reading, and I thank you for your encouragements and your prayers. However, with my focus increasingly drawn to engagement in the local church, I’m definitely juggling even more –– but as God allows, I still wish to encourage and support you, particularly to spur you on to minister in your local church and to pray for revival. However, that won’t be happening here via deerlife, but, Lord willing, I hope to continue to do so through my other websites:
(Reformed Bible teaching with an eye to experiential Christianity)
http://tent_of_meeting.xanga.com
(Prayer for revival)
If you are NOT currently part of a local church, whether or not Xanga shuts down, I urge each and every one of you to go and find a local church steeped in Reformed Bible teaching. (Truly, I do love all the saints, but, well, I say unapologetically that I’m one of the saints cut out of the Reformed cloth. )
Yes, we can certainly join with other believers via cyberspace, and I have found some blessing in that for sure, but there’s a limit to that.
And yes, there will be struggles and difficulties as you seek to find a local church. People are fallible and they will disappoint you (yourself and myself included!).
All that said, I beg of you: please pray to the Lord to lead you in this, and then to submit to HIS leading and entrust yourself to HIM as you put yourself under the regular systematic teaching of the Word of God, the leadership and discipline of church elders, and the accountability of other believers –– otherwise you are going to be tossed to and fro and you will be deceived (see Eph. 4:1-16). The Church is the pillar and ground of the truth, and as much as I do appreciate the internet and the many resources and relationships that have benefited my soul, there’s really a free-for-all out there as far as doctrine goes, and that’s a real and grave danger. The devil appears as an angel of light –– prowling on website after website, seeking whom he will devour!
And yes, it’s true that each one of us has been redeemed by the blood of Jesus and has been called out of the world as individuals –– however, we are also part of the ekklesia… (From Strong’s Concordance: 1577 ekklesia ek-klay-see’-ah from a compound of 1537 and a derivative of 2564; a calling out, i.e. (concretely) a popular meeting, especially a religious congregation (Jewish synagogue, or Christian community of members on earth or saints in heaven or both):–assembly, church.) In other words, Jesus died to purchase a people for Himself, a community, i.e. – His bride, His Body. If you are not involved in the local Body of Christ, you are quenching and grieving the Holy Spirit of God.
Whether Xanga will continue is yet to be seen. At this point, with 19 days left until the deadline of July 15, they raised just over $ 31,000 of their goal of $ 60,000, Xanga 2.0 is looking less and less likely… (link)).
If you’d like to, if you’ve never done so, you can check out my other Xanga sites (above) and/or keep in touch with me via WordPress at the site below. If Xanga does get the funding to carry on, it sounds like there’ll be a transition period around July 15, so I’ll be giving updates on my WordPress blog. And if Xanga does shut down, I’m expecting to import my naphtali_deer Xanga site to my WordPress blog, and start up another WP site for my tent_of_meeting Xanga site.
1 For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven:
2 a time to be born, and a time to die;
a time to plant, and a time to pluck up what is planted;
3 a time to kill, and a time to heal;
a time to break down, and a time to build up;
4 a time to weep, and a time to laugh;
a time to mourn, and a time to dance;
5 a time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together;
a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing;
6 a time to seek, and a time to lose;
a time to keep, and a time to cast away;
7 a time to tear, and a time to sew;
a time to keep silence, and a time to speak;
8 a time to love, and a time to hate;
a time for war, and a time for peace.
I’ve been reading in Daniel, and in times of uncertainty, change, and transition, what a refreshment it is to read there of our Surety, of the God who changes not, of the Stone cut with no human hand –– the Lord Jesus Christ –– and of His Dominion which is an everlasting dominion and His Kingdom which will never be destroyed! (See Daniel 2, as well as the rest of the book.) May our God grant us grace upon grace to know and to savor Him as exceedingly precious!
25 Of old you laid the foundation of the earth,
and the heavens are the work of your hands.
26 They will perish, but you will remain;
they will all wear out like a garment.
You will change them like a robe, and they will pass away,
27 but you are the same, and your years have no end.
28 The children of your servants shall dwell secure;
their offspring shall be established before you.
Revelation 5:8
Worthy is the Lamb who was slain,
to receive power and wealth and wisdom and might and honor and glory and blessing!
Isaiah 28:16
… “Behold, I am the one who has laid as a foundation in Zion,
a stone, a tested stone,
a precious cornerstone, of a sure foundation:
‘Whoever believes will not be in haste.’
Scripture quotations are taken from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version. Copyright ©2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
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