So we’ve heard from Jay about his testimony of Relationships from God.  He’s given witness to the vulnerability and sensitivity to the Spirit that needs to happen to live in these relationships.  As our communication continues, it amazes me to see how God lays out more and more about, in particular, how He does relationship.  What transpires between Jay and me is much bigger than just Jay and me.  It’s a picture of the Lord wooing His Bride.

One of the things I’m particularly interested in while going thru the book is what and how the Lord lays out as being necessary to do these spiritual relationships.  That requires a sensitivity to what’s between the lines of what’s being said and done.  Jay already had much of what he wrote to me written.  He “recycled” his writings to various people throughout the years, as they applied to the current circumstances.  Some of you might recognize them as something he sent to you.  Jay had a sensitivity to what has been written (in the Bible and what he had already heard/written from the Lord) and where to apply it.  It was his gift. 

In this next email exchange, he includes a piece about drinking from the Cup, and preconceptions.  Today we’ll only go thru the drinking from the Cup portion, and save the preconceptions for next time.  As I stand back and look at this from a distance, it’s more and more apparent that the Lord is not in any hurry, and neither am I.  What’s more important is “getting it”.  I want to allow plenty of time for absorption and clarification, if needed.

As in the book, what Jay writes in in normal print, I’m in italics, and this red is my present day musing.  We’re starting on page 38 of the book, Not Left Behind: Going Back for the Offended.

Lisa

Dear Jay,

I have to say that I’m quite touched by your vulnerability and your willingness to speak your truth.  What you have to say is quite beautiful.  It saddens me to know that you must concern yourself with questions of legality and rejection.

Dear Lisa,

Thank you so much for your very thoughtful consideration and response. I felt I needed to write again right after sending the last, just to say that I had written that chapter to “Christians”. For that reason, I wrote it in their language. The reason that “the church” is as divided as it is, is because most Christians understand Jesus Christ to be some kind of religious add-on. This is the reason for all of the legalism and all the rejection. It might be better called “Church Going”, rather than Christianity.

Yet I know that there is such truth in that – and it sounds like you have experienced it (rejection) in a big way.  That you’re willing – no DETERMINED – to keep and show your heart in your writing is evidence to me of the depth of understanding you have about what I believe we’re REALLY here for:  to learn how to be an expression of love for everyone and everything. (I know that this is oversimplifying

Actually, what you have just written is very close to the bottom line: 1 John 4:8 says: “Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love.”

Elsewhere it is written: “Dear friends, now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known. But we know that when he appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is.” 1 John 3:2 If you combine both thoughts, then we will be love for we shall see love as it is.

– but that is how I strive to live my life – cutting down to the bare bones.)

As we have already discussed, it comes more by seeing, than by striving.

Love this!  :-)

Dear Jay,

I was thrilled to hear you talk of speaking “what the Father is saying, but in different words, and without conscious effort”.  I believe this happens frequently, which makes sense if you are attuned to a living, breathing presence and not just some words in a book (albeit a very GOOD book).  I applaud you for allowing yourself to be led and recognizing it for what it is:  gifts from God.

Your relationships from God sound precious and alive in love. How could anyone doubt them? If only our hearts could ALWAYS be so open!

Dear Lisa,

In following Jesus, we eventually come to a cup.  It’s not a nice cup, not a cup that anyone would volunteer to drink. In a sense, it is a cup full of hazardous waste. It is a cup full of garbage, full of abomination,[1]a cup of wrath,[2]a cup of heart break.

Jesus came to a place in His ministry when he had to drink this cup,[3]but He was not the only one who would drink from it, there would be others.[4]

And what shall we say? It was on the matter of this cup, that we first see a difference in wills between Jesus and His father. For the first time from eternity past, there is a difference between them. It was the Father’s will that Jesus should drink of this cup. It was the son’s will that it might pass from Him. In the Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus was locked into a conflict of wills, a conflict, which would not pass, until His Father’s will prevailed. The conflict was so great, that Jesus asked his closest friends to come and pray with him, but they fell asleep in the midst of it, and didn’t wake up until it was over.

In a sense, this matter had already been settled from before the foundation of the world, but none of us should be too quick to think that we can drink from this cup. When the moment of truth finally comes, we too may sweat blood over the matter. We may not be called to drink the cup for everyone, but we may be called to drink the cup for those we love, if we are going to love them to the end.

There were those in Babylon that The Father loved. He wanted them out of there. But the only way to get them out was to dispose of the cup from which they had been drinking. It was a cup in the hands of a MYSTERY.[5]Once again, Jesus asked, “My Father, if it is not possible for this cup to be taken away unless I drink it, may your will be done.”[6]Jesus knew that this cup had to be disposed of. He wanted another way to get rid of it, but there was none. Perhaps someone else to stand in the gap, but there was none.[7]

In order to make it possible for us, the ones who were captive in Babylon, to be intimate with Him, He had to drink the cup of our abomination, and, with it, the desolation. In order to love me, he had to take the worst of me into Himself.

Would that were the end of it. In loving one another, there is a cup that we also must drink. Otherwise, we will break faith with one another.[8]

Are we prepared to do whatever is necessary to get the objects of God’s affection out of Babylon, and Babylon out of the objects of God’s affection?

“Is it nothing to you, all ye that pass by? Behold, and see if there be any sorrow like unto my sorrow, which is done unto me, wherewith the Lord hath afflicted me in the day of his fierce anger.”[9]Lamentations 1:12 (NIV)

This is pretty heavy!  Brought on by a comment, “If only our hearts could ALWAYS be so open!” But it sets the tone that this is not frivolous stuff.  Jay dedicated his life to God and to the relationships He gave him, and he drank from a lot of cups.  The question comes to, are we prepared to go “all the way” with one another?

Dear Jay,
I’m grateful that you are so willing to share these words of love with me and (hopefully) many others.

Dear Lisa,
I don’t want to give you the impression that my life is full of rejection and its attendant pain. Actually, having discovered what is possible in relationships, gender neutral, I have been very blessed with many very precious relationships, relationships experienced in shadow form in what I call “old creation families”, but much deeper than that in “new creation” or “spiritual family.” This is to say, brothers, sisters, mothers, fathers, sons and daughters. In all these relationships it is possible to be much more intimate in the Spirit, than it is in the flesh.

I wanted to end on this note, because it gives a snapshot of something Jay saw in the Spirit that is such a meaningful insight of many things in the Bible.  Jay saw that God did not do anything in the Spiritual realm that looks different from how He created things. 

For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse., Romans 1:20 NIV

We have a “flannel board” of how he put us in relationship as created people – we were born into a family.  We grow up in the context of this family and learn how to “be” in the world in the natural.  As Spiritual beings, when we’re born again, He puts us into Spiritual families that don’t look different from how He created us… we have mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters, kids, etc.  And we grow up and learn how to live in His Kingdom – a supernatural realm – in this same context.  There’s so much to be said about the importance of this.  There is nothing like having those that we can “bang around” with while learning the ropes of the supernatural realm – knowing that what God has put together will never go away.  Just as with created family, you have a safety zone. And the ability to become very close. 

It’s important to note that we’re talking about New Creation.  In order for these relationships to work, we start with being covered with the blood of Jesus.  We start with believing His word and promises.  With knowing we’re forgiven and that He has taken away the garbage.  We have to let go of our fallen understanding of family relationships to be able to see and access a much higher understanding of what God intends for us and who He is for us… the very BEST that a Father is, a Mother is, etc. The intimacy that Jay speaks of is ours in the Spirit, with those whom He gives us in particular in the Spirit. We may or may not have this kind of spiritual intimacy with our created flesh and blood, although it’s possible they could be both.  There needs to be a word of warning, though, that flesh wars against spirit and spirit against flesh.  You can expect to see this play out in these created (flesh and blood)/spiritual relationships as well as internally.

For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh: and these are contrary the one to the other: so that ye cannot do the things that ye would., Galations 5:17 KJV

[1]Revelation 17:4, 18:6, Ezekiel 23:31,32,33, Habbakuk 2:15, 16 [2]Revelation 14:10, 16:19, Psalms 75:8, Jeremiah 25:15,17,28, Jeremiah 49:12, Jeremiah 51, Lamentations 4:21,  Zechariah 12:2 [3]Matthew 20:22, Matthew 26:39,42, Mark 10:38, Mark 14:36, Luke 22:42, John 18:11 [4]Matthew 20:23, Mark 10:39 [5]Revelation 17:4 [6]Matthew 26:42 [7]Ezekiel 22:30 [8]Malachi 2:10-16 [9]Lamentations 1:12.