He Has You

Years ago, I read an amazing book written by Oswald Chambers called Studies on the Sermon on the Mount. It is based on some of his sermons given in 1911 and was published in 1915. To this day, it remains one of the most revelatory books I’ve ever read.

This book explores the depths and the revelations found in the Sermon on the Mount by Jesus, found in Matthew chapters 5 to 7. If you would dare to truly receive all that Jesus said in that sermon, then, as Oswald said, they will be like spiritual torpedoes to you.

Oswald started his book saying that to understand the words from Christ means we must first know Christ, and it is only by the Holy Spirit that we can do so. And once we know Him, His words will be like spiritual torpedoes that blow up our natural theological mindsets.

Oswald Chambers wrote: “The statements of Jesus seem so wonderfully simple, but in reality they are like spiritual torpedoes, they explode and burst in the unconscious mind, and they come up to our conscious mind and we say, ‘What a startling statement that is!’”

One such statement from this sermon stands above them all, where Jesus said, “Therefore you shall be perfect, just as your Father in heaven is perfect” (Matthew 5:48 NKJV). Was He kidding? Are we actually supposed to do what Jesus says we are to do?

When we read such a statement as this in Matthew 5:48, we immediately protest, saying certainly God doesn’t expect me to live a perfect life. Surely Jesus does not really mean these things! This is impossible, so why would Jesus even say it?

Jesus meant exactly what He said. If that doesn’t wreck you, then you have yet to receive His word into your heart. “For the word of God is living and powerful…” (Hebrews 4:12 NKJV).

When Jesus says something, He means what He says. Later Oswald wrote, “Everything He teaches is impossible unless He can put into me His Spirit and re-make me from the inside.” That’s the point: He did send us the Holy Spirit to help us. You can’t, but He can.

You don’t have what it takes to be holy, but the Holy Spirit in you does. God promised us, “I will put my Spirit inside you and cause you to live by my laws, respect my rulings and obey them” (Ezekiel 36:27 CJB).

Spiritual torpedoes will blow up our natural understanding so that we can see the divine revelations hidden deeply in the Word of God. So long as you use only your natural mind to understand the truth of God, you will never find the deeper meanings.

Revelatory truths cannot be mined with the tools of intellectualism but only by the Spirit of God. Jesus promised that “…when He, the Spirit of truth, has come, He will guide you into all truth…” (John 16:13 NKJV).

Child of God, stop settling for the meager, diluted, worldly, half-baked Christian life that falls pitifully short of the high calling Jesus has for you. He died to save you from your sin, then sent the Holy Spirit to give you power over sin. Live as high as He can help you.

A few weeks ago, the Lord gave me these words below in italics. I’ve added a few Scriptures as reference.

People think Jesus lowered the bar of our righteousness when He died for our sins, when the age of grace began, and He covered us with His own righteousness. But the opposite is true.

Jesus raised the bar of righteousness. He said, “You’ll have to do better than the Pharisees.” Jesus said, “I can guarantee that unless you live a life that has God’s approval and do it more faithfully than the experts in Moses’ Teachings and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 5:20 NOG).

He said to be perfect, like your God is perfect. Jesus said, “You must be perfect—just as your Father in heaven is perfect” (Matthew 5:48 GNT).

He said it’s not only what you do; it’s what you think about. “…God, through Christ Yeshua, will judge people’s secret thoughts…” (Romans 2:16 NOG).

It’s not about how men measure you, but how He measures you. Every word you speak. Jesus said, “I promise you on the day of judgment, everyone will have to account for every careless word they have spoken” (Matthew 12:36 CEV).

Even things you don’t do will go against you if you should have done them. “…knowing what is right to do and then not doing it is sin” (James 4:17 TLB).

Stop living a life using grace as an excuse to do whatever you want, as if it doesn’t matter, because it does matter. Because Jesus told us He will come back and measure everything we did, every word we spoke, every thought we entertained. “…Christ will judge each of us for the good or the bad that we do while living in these bodies” (2 Corinthians 5:10 CEV).

Be careful. It’s one thing to have a bad thought and then to rebuke it in the name of Jesus. And it’s another thing to entertain that thought and let it remain in your heart. “…we take every thought captive and make it obey Christ” (2 Corinthians 10:5 GNT).

That was the end of the words I heard.

Sometimes the Lord convicts me so deeply that it hurts. I’ll be thinking about how far I have come, and He will show me how far I have yet to go. I’ll be reading a verse I’ve read a hundred times before, and the Holy Spirit will illuminate a deeper truth, and then it comes- spiritual torpedoes that wreck the comfortable and safe natural intellectual understanding that I had before. Spiritual wisdom runs circles around natural thinking.

You can’t understand spiritual truth without spiritual understanding. “…ask that you may be filled with the knowledge of His will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding” (Colossians 1:9 NKJV).

Child of God, ask the Lord to show you just how wrong you are with your shallow understanding of the Words of Christ and the spiritual torpedoes He needs to send your way through the revelations that only the Holy Spirit can give you.

You have to be willing to be wrong so that you can be made right. Jesus said, “And when He [the Holy Spirit] has come, He will convict the world of sin…” (John 16:8 NKJV).

Oswald Chambers said, “God not only expects me to do His will, but He is in me to do it.” The secret to being in God’s will is having God in you. The Lord promised, “I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will keep My judgments and do them” (Ezekiel 36:27 NKJV).

Blessings to you always,

Paul Balius