If we could project ourselves five or six months into the future, and then look back to this present time, we would probably come to one basic, inevitable conclusion—the same conclusion we would reach if we now looked back five or six months. Each one of us would have to say, “God, help me. I do not love enough.” We must reach unto God for more love. Six months from now, you will say, “I wish I had known more. I wish I had understood more. I do not know enough.” We are not referring to our adequacy on a human level, however; we are referring to what we must appropriate from the Lord.
A few months from now, you will look back on these days and say, “I just did not care enough. That was wrong. Down deep inside of me, I did not care enough.” Does anything more need to be said? You do not love enough. You do not know enough. You do not care enough.
I feel this in my own heart too. Every time I pass through a testing, I must say, “God, You have revealed to me that I did not love You quite enough. Even with the revelation You gave, I did not know quite enough. I did not care enough.” Probably it could all be summarized in another statement: I did not believe enough. I heard the Word, and I declared it to be the Word of God; but in the test, I did not apply that Word to the situation. I did not believe enough. I did not appropriate enough of God.
There is still too much of the Laodicean passivity within us. We may think that we have it made, but God is saying, “You do not know that you are wretched, miserable, poor, blind, and naked. You had better buy some eye salve so that you can see, and white raiment that you may be clothed. Wake up, buddy. You do not realize yet how little you really have” (Revelation 3:17–18). When it comes to evaluating what we have from God, we measure it from zero up to where we are and exclaim, “Look at how wonderful it is!” We should pray to God that we could see ourselves as He sees us. This means looking back to see what we could have had from God; in fact, we can still have it. We can appropriate it and walk in it. There is no reason why we should be limited—except in ourselves.
This brings up another truth: We do not hunger enough. We read of David crying out to God, “My tears have been my meat day and night” (Psalm 42:3). How that man hungered after God! How he went after Him, “like a hart panting after the water brooks” (Psalm 42:1). The country of Israel did not have many springs, and it was difficult to get water. Those who happened to be near a well were fortunate. Many people had to walk one or two miles to a well for a jug of water. Maybe we have something to learn about thirst. We had better read the Beatitudes again. Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness. Matthew 5:6a. If you are hungry, you do not get rid of your hunger pangs until you have something to eat. If you are thirsty, it gnaws at you until you get something to drink. That hunger and thirst drives you. It is not merely a momentary emotion! Do not call that short-lived feeling hunger, and do not call it thirst. There must be a deep yearning after God that does not subside!
I do not know whether we have enough faith yet. We have a vision of bringing this world under the authority of Christ, but it will not happen automatically. We will not bring forth the Kingdom until we seek it first. How many other things in our lives squeeze in and become first? We had better read Matthew 6:33 again. God wants us to seek His Kingdom first! first! first! This Scripture is the answer to all of our other shortcomings.
Shiloh is the place where the hungry come to meet God. Sometimes they want to run from Shiloh because they do not want to meet too much of Him. But we cannot meet only part of God. He comes in all of His fullness, that we might be filled with all the fullness of God (Ephesians 3:19). That is a painful process, but it is what we live for; actually, it is what we are dying for. We are experiencing the work of the cross for this.
One of our biggest problems is that we get our focus on someone else (and do not tell me that you don’t). As you go through an experience, you realize, “God help me, I was moved; I was disturbed by what someone else thought or did.” Perhaps a telephone call was all it took to move you. It should not make one bit of difference what anyone else does. I wish we could reach the place where we could say, like David, “I have set the Lord always before me. I shall not be moved” (Psalm 16:8). That is what really counts.
As you intercede before the throne of God, one thing you should do is to maintain your focus on the Lord, so that you are not moved by anyone. We are ready for a breakthrough, and it will be more than a religious exercise. It will be a matter of every thirsty heart reaching into God.
It is difficult to describe the intensity we feel in our spirits as we cry, “O God, we want to walk with You!” How many years we have been striving for this! Could it be that we do not strive enough? How many years do we have? Let us yearn for what God has promised us! I know we are striving. We are giving more and more of our being unto everything we do, including the intercession; but perhaps we do not give ourselves enough yet. Let us look at David: he could crush a troop and leap a wall, with nothing in his heart but cold-blooded extermination of his enemy (Psalm 18:29; Psalm 118:10–12).
Maybe we do not hate the nephilim spirits enough. While we were being so careful in our intercession to avoid saying anything that might offend someone, others were destroyed in their walk with God. Look back along the trail and see how many did not make it because the satanic nephilim spirits kept devastating, and demonic principalities and powers kept hitting. Maybe we do not really hate what God hates. Notice the fury and vindictiveness expressed by the psalmist in Psalm 137:9: “How blessed will be the one who seizes Babylon’s children and dashes them against the rocks.”
We keep praying that God will help us out of our limitations. We are not referring to the limitations upon what we can do, miracles we can work, ways we can preach and prophesy. But how we long to come to the place where, as children of God, we can think like God. That is the limitation we want to break, so that we can think as He thinks, hate as He hates, and hate what He hates; so that we can love as He loves, and love what He loves. If we do not know anything, we have only to look up and say, “God, I lack wisdom.” James 1:5 tells us, “If any man lacks wisdom, let him ask of God who gives to all men liberally.” It is not God’s responsibility if we have not moved into wisdom. That wisdom can be appropriated. Let us strive a little more. Let us intercede a little more.
Do we worship the Lord enough? Maybe we do not wait upon Him enough. Perhaps we are still children. Sonship must be something you earnestly desire. Stop and think of the difference between being contented children and earnestly wanting to be sons.
Paul wrote in I Corinthians 13:11–13: When I was a child, I used to speak as a child, think as a child, reason as a child; when I became a man, I did away with childish things. For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face; now I know in part, but then I shall know fully just as I also have been fully known. But now abide faith, hope, love, these three; but the greatest of these is love.
Now notice Paul’s description of love, verses 4–8a: Love is patient, love is kind, and is not jealous; love does not brag and is not arrogant, does not act unbecomingly; it does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered, does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never fails.
We do not love enough. I hope you feel something in your heart crying out, “God, open the door for me to love more. Let me take one step into it today.” We should not be like arrogant brats who think they know everything and have everything. Let us humble ourselves. The more mature we become, the more we recognize how much we need. The Lord can help us to repent of the deep reservations that limit our dedication. We all have them, and most of us know what they are. As we approach the Lord to worship Him, let us shake off the restraints and reservations that are on our spirits.
While you feel that every part of this Word is true, are you also facing the realization that you do not have it in your heart to love God with real depth? Remember that all you can do is believe that if you love as much as you are capable of, God will give you more love. You will appropriate from Him what you do not seem to have. What you do not have the ability to do, God will help you to do. You must believe this! God gives to the man who lacks. If you lack wisdom, ask Him; He will give it to you, and upbraid you not (James 1:5). He knows your limitations. He will not be harsh with you simply because you do not have what you need or cannot manufacture it. He will help you. Reach up! Ask Him!
It does not matter what your needs are. The deciding factor is this: How far do you think you can go? How far will you believe you can go? Life is like a big canvas, and you are the one who paints the horizon. You are the one who determines how far you will see and how much will be in the picture. Reach into God for more!
We know that we have not yet attained the full measure of God’s provision, and we understand what Paul was saying in Philippians 3:12: “I have not yet attained; I am not already made perfect, but I press on! With everything in me, I press toward the mark!” We could paraphrase this, “I live on tiptoe.” Our hearts are reaching up. God has made Himself available to us, and we are determined to partake of Him. Oh, we hunger after Thee, Lord! We thirst after Thee!
As you open your heart to this Word, the Lord is stretching you so that your capacity will become greater. As you move deeper into God, you will think a little taller, reach a little higher. This Word is not the end of your seeking, but a beginning. Today you will have more of God. Tomorrow you will not look back on your experience with God today and say, “I have arrived.” Tomorrow you will reach in a little more—not turning to the right hand or to the left-until you have what God wants you to have, and that is to become His worshiper. The term “worshiper” will never be restrictively defined. Every six months it means something more. Today it means more than it did yesterday. We open our hearts to worship God.