The Day of New Beginnings

Let Us Run After Him

 

Have you ever wondered why the words that God speaks to us seem to have a token fulfillment, then disappear? Whether it be words of personal prophecy, or promises quickened to us by the Holy Spirit from the Scriptures, fulfillment seems to linger outside our reach. At times we could think God has forgotten what He spoke to us. But here’s the thing. What God speaks to us on one level is always fulfilled on a higher one. We never see fulfillment on the level we’re on when God speaks. 
 
In the Old Testament God instituted the sacrifices to atone for sin. Yet it was a couple thousand years later before the fulfillment of those rituals was realized in Jesus’ sacrifice. And when fulfillment came, it was on a completely different level than what they were instituted on. Many prophecies came in the Old Testament about the Messiah who would come and deliver Israel. But when Jesus, the Messiah appeared, He came healing the sick and casting out demons. The Jews looked for a Messiah on one level, but He was manifested on another. There are also many prophecies concerning natural Israel that will never be fulfilled because their fulfillment lies in another realm with spiritual Israel. And so it is with us. 
 
2nd Pet.4: 
2* Grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord;
 3* seeing that His divine power has granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness, through the true knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory and excellence.
 4* For by these He has granted to us His precious and magnificent promises, so that by them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world by lust. 
 
God uses the word He speaks to us as the means to draw us higher unto Himself. This is how we grow spiritually. He has granted us precious and magnificent promises that by them we might become partakers of the divine nature. How does it work? He speaks to us on one level and we look for fulfillment. Sometimes we see a token fulfillment, sometimes not. But then He begins to deal with us, putting us through the work of the cross. All the while the cross is operating in us, we are striving to walk in what He has spoken. It is always a wrestle with God. The work of the cross is never an instantaneous thing. Even when our minds say, “Yes, Lord,” there is usually resistance in us, many times on a subconscious level, saying,  “No.” Change takes place only as He prevails in us. By the time we see fulfillment, we are in a different realm, and something of His nature has been created in us. 
 
It is a living Word (the precious and magnificent promises) that draws us after Him (Song of Sol. 1:4). Although it is cloaked in much symbolism, the Song of Solomon illustrates this process by which we become partakers of the divine nature. Throughout the book the bride is seeking Him whom her soul loves. 
 
Song of Sol. 3:
1 ¶ "On my bed night after night I sought him Whom my soul loves; I sought him but did not find him.
 2 'I must arise now and go about the city; In the streets and in the squares I must seek him whom my soul loves.' I sought him but did not find him.
 3 "The watchmen who make the rounds in the city found me, And I said, 'Have you seen him whom my soul loves?'
 4 "Scarcely had I left them When I found him whom my soul loves; I held on to him and would not let him go, Until I had brought him to my mother's house, And into the room of her who conceived me."
 
The bride found Him whom her soul loved. But later on, He disappears again! She is continually being drawn into a closer, more intimate relationship with the bridegroom. 
 
Song of Sol. 5:
2 ¶ "I was asleep, but my heart was awake. A voice! My beloved was knocking: 'Open to me, my sister, my darling, My dove, my perfect one! For my head is drenched with dew, My locks with the damp of the night.'
 3 "I have taken off my dress, How can I put it on again? I have washed my feet, How can I dirty them again?
 4 "My beloved extended his hand through the opening, And my feelings were aroused for him.
 5 "I arose to open to my beloved; And my hands dripped with myrrh, And my fingers with liquid myrrh, On the handles of the bolt.
6 "I opened to my beloved, But my beloved had turned away and had gone! My heart went out to him as he spoke. I searched for him, but I did not find him; I called him, but he did not answer me.
7 "The watchmen who make the rounds in the city found me, They struck me and wounded me; The guardsmen of the walls took away my shawl from me.
 
It is the running after Him that turns the cross loose in our lives. It is designed to bring us closer to Him, which means ascending higher to be with Him where He is. Jesus Christ is the precious and magnificent promises that create the divine nature in us. As we run after Him, His Word is fulfilled in our lives. We obtain Him, for Christ is the fulfillment of every promise spoken to us. It may not look or feel like what we thought fulfillment was going to be when He first spoke the word to us, but on the higher realm of fulfillment, it will be Christ revealed to us.