" For I will show him how great things he must suffer for my name's sake."

 To be hidden so completely in Jesus, so dead to the world and to self, to receive no honor of men, and to be found rejoicing to suffer shame for HIS NAME.  To be so dead to this life, that to be considered as "the filth of the world, the offscouring of all things", would offend not at all.  To be defamed, yet bless.....to count the loss of all things but dung, "that I might win Christ".  To see one's self as the "least of all saints", the "chiefest of sinners". How could any person of flesh and blood desire such a thing?  How can the natural mind even understand and grasp such a concept?  From the foundation of the world, from the loins of fathers, from the wombs of mothers, He knows, He brings forth to manifest the life of Jesus.

"Behold, I have given you a new heart, my heart....a seed within you, being watered and fed by My Word. You are exchanging your life for mine, can you not know it? It is My Life in you that you seek, to Live in Me, to move with me, to walk in the Sabbath perpetually, to rest from your own works of righteousness, for those things men are determined to do are not of the Heart of our Father. Can you not see it? You are flesh and blood, prone to error and sin, and would join yourself to Hagar had I not checked you. Have I not shown you? Have you not seen my obedience to our Father, joined with Him in One, having become flesh and blood to dwell among men.....bound heart to heart with the hosts of heaven, to do only what our Father worked, to speak only those words I heard Him speak. This is your walk. As you abide in Me, you will walk as I walked....heart to heart, bound to an Heavenly Jerusalem, born of the freewoman, a child of promise."

A crazy man in the eyes of some, still I saw Jesus, in the spirit, hugging me.  As I stood there, His arms holding me, I slowly disappeared into Him.

"Now your life is hidden.  Our Father looks in your direction and sees only Me.  It is I who will speak, it is I who will work those things given.  It is My Life in you that pleases our Father."

" But when it pleased God, who separated me from my mother's womb, and called me by his grace,
 To reveal his Son in me."Not only the call for apostles.....it is the call for all of us.  And "In Christ" we will recognize those who are truly apostles, prophets, pastors, evangelists and teachers.....and again, I have heard in the spirit.....these will not "announce" themselves, rather, God will announce them, and His people will know.

Who is there among us willing to suffer?  Of the flesh.....NOT ME!  Who would dare say......I will die for you, Jesus?  Except Christ be formed in us, each of us would fail miserably.  My own desire would be to forever remain in the shadows......just a doorkeeper.

tears from the wilderness

bob