There seems still to be some confusion as to what the violence of spirit is all about, even in those who are so violent in their own spirit. At times it seems to be a cry of frustration coming out of our heart because of promises yet unfulfilled, promises that said, “this is the time” and yet we do not yet see their fulfillment before our eyes.
WHAT IS VIOLENCE?
One of the greatest evidences of the violence that has come is that little by little an unwavering determination comes into the people. This determination can be violent without a sound. It can be violent without a blow. It can be violent without the deep upheavals and volcanic expressions that come from our emotional nature. It seems to distill itself into an unswerving, silent tide. Like a tidal wave it rises up to sweep over the land.
It is the unifying of our spirits before God, until spirit, soul and body rises up to walk in His perfect will. And everything within spirit, soul, and body determines that we will walk before Him; we will claim His promises; we will possess everything that He has set before us.
THIS VIOLENCE ILLUSTRATED
Remember how Joshua expressed this violence. Joshua does not express himself with anything that seems to be an emotional upheaval. He is not blood thirsty. Yet, when the issue is there, he can bring Achan to task and kill him because he stands in the way of the conquest of the land. Joshua 7. He is violent because he is unswerving in the objectives that God set before him, and the promises to Abraham and the law of the Lord that was given to Moses before him fills his heart and he “meditates upon them day and night.” Joshua 1:8–9. He becomes violent because of the unifying of everything within him. He is in no way scattered. There is nothing within him that seems to drift off by distraction. His violence is expressed by the fact that he refused to be distracted by any of the momentary things. When it seems like there is defeat he does not look at the enemy or look at himself. But he humbles himself and he cries to the Lord. When everything seems to go wrong, there is only one thing that his heart responds to: we have had a word from the Lord. If even nature itself wars against him, he commands that the sun stand still until the purposes of God are accomplished for that day and that hour. Joshua 10:12–13. He refuses to see a single span of time of his life wasted in something that is a frustrated misapplication or misappropriation, or distraction or discouragement from what God had said was to be done that day. What his hands are to do by the will of God, that he is set to do. This is violence.
CONTENDING WITH GOD?
What is violence? Violence is the thing that seems to strive on because there was a word from God even when the actions and the response of God to us directly seem to be adverse and contrary to the word that He has given. How many a time a man would know that the blessing that he sought was of God and the cry of his heart was that he could not survive without it. And yet God seemed to be his opponent! When God seems to be the enemy, this is violence, that a man wrestles with God until the true purposes and intent of God come forth in the earth. The violence of a believer is an expression, “God, I will not accept what seems to be Your action. I will not accept what seems to be Your negligence or unconcern for me. I will believe what You have said over me. What You have said in Your Word is the only valid thing. And I will violently contend with Thee until these things happen.”
In the King James version the translation of Isaiah 49:25 (which seems to be inadequate) reads “I will contend with those who contend with Me, and I will save thy sons.” Jacob did find that this was closer to the violence principle than we might realize. Jacob wrestled with the Lord Himself, the angel of Jehovah. And he obtained that which he sought after. In everything he said, “I will not let Thee go except You bless me.” Genesis 32:26. Oh, how God gives a word, makes known His will! He said from the foundation of the world Esau have I hated, Jacob have I loved. Malachi 1:2–3. Romans 9:13. And yet he wrestles until He has broken the thigh of Jacob. Genesis 32:25. He wrestles with Him; he contends with Him and He seems to be his enemy. Yet in His heart, expressed from the foundation of the world was that He loved him. The violence in the heart of Jacob was the thing that He loved. Violently, he was ready to fight God until God did to him what he knew God wanted to do to him. That God provide for him what God had said He had provided, even though he had to walk through a barren wilderness where the provision of God was not coming forth. Blessed is the man that reaches up and says, “This supply from the hand of God that I claim, that would seem to be wrested from Him only by violence, was in His heart to give me all the time.” Intercession, when violent, only claims from God what God has promised, and what His heart decrees shall be ours. God has destined His fullness to rest upon those who violently claim it.
THE VIOLENCE WITHIN
Here is another point on this violence. The violent are those who recognize that all the forces of Satan have come against them. And they know that the forces that fight them come from without, from principalities and powers, from Nephilim spirits. But they also reckon that their enemy is also found within them. And so, the Kingdom of heaven suffereth violence, and the violent take it by force.“ Matthew 11:12. For that violent man not only opposes principalities and powers, but violently he also fights the foes within. He fights the things within his own nature that stand diametrically opposed to all that God has said. He fights himself until he stands before God as the prepared channel ready for God to use. God may use the weak to confound the mighty, but you’ll find that that weak man who confounds the mighty has stood and said, “I come in the name of the Lord,” and he has refused to accept his weakness and refused to accept his limitation. He has refused to accept his inadequacy. He has said, “God has spoken to me and I violently resist everything that I am that stands in the way of doing His perfect will and possessing His promises completely.”
Stevens, John Robert: This Week, Volume IX (1978). North Hollywood, CA. : Living Word Publications, 1988, S. 222