The School of Life teaches us profound truths from circumstances and incidents, if we have “ears to hear” what the Spirit is teaching us through them. When we are tuned in to Heaven, we see God’s perspective on every day incidents: A man settled down, with great anticipation, to watch his favourite football team playing on the television. Twenty minutes in to the match there was a power cut. Nothing electrical in his home functioned. He looked around the room at all the technology he possessed and reflected on the fact that it was all useless without power, just a load of junk!
The Lord impressed on him that our lives can be like that – powerless, unless we are one with Him. Everything I do and say is powerless, “wood, hay and stubble”, unless I am one with the Father. Jesus performed many miracles and yet declared that of Himself, He could do nothing. He operated through the power of Another in Him, His Father. Jesus was so completely one with His Father, He only ever spoke the words He gave Him, He only ever did the things that pleased Him. He was a living demonstration of a surrendered life. He always chose His Father’s will above His own, thus God could trust Him with His divine power and authority. Every miracle that Jesus performed was through the power of His Father. He had no personal agendas of His own, He came to do His Father’s will. Jesus is called the “Amen” because everything His Father allowed or desired, Jesus said “Amen” to. He was one with His Father in everything. The words Jesus spoke were spirit and life and embodied creative power. When God speaks, creation takes place. His word will not return to Him void:
Isaiah 55:11 “So shall my word be that goes forth out of my mouth: it shall not return to me void, but it shall accomplish that which I please, and it shall prosper in the thing whereto I sent it.”
In John 17 Jesus prayed for the disciples and for all future Believers in Him, that we would be one with our Heavenly Father, as He is. Verse 21:”That they all may be one, as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be one in us, that the world may believe that you have sent me.”
Practically, what does it mean to be one with the Father then? We all have situations that maybe we dislike in one form or another. If I entertain discontent, anxiety, fear, judgement of others, then I am not seeing God in my circumstances and I am not one with my Heavenly Father. Ultimately, He is in control of everything and I must learn to trust Him with situations I do not like or understand. Of course, we will all have wrong feelings at times because we are human, but we can repent of them quickly before the Lord, as we learn to trust Him, instead of giving them house room in my heart, which only results in a heart that is out of order, and there is a power cut. My heart must be Christ ruled, if I usurp His reign there, my heart becomes divided and a kingdom divided against itself cannot stand nor operate in God’s power and authority. The power is switched off through my negative believing.
God has put within us the incorruptible seed of His Son, the life of Another. This life is the power through which I can do all things, just as Jesus did. He declared that of Himself He could do nothing, but He was coupled up to His Father who did all the mighty works through Him. His Father was the source of all power, He always gave God the glory and never claimed it for Himself. Jesus is the only One who is one with the Father in everything. Oneness is God’s purpose for everyone of us. When I am one with my Father, I do not entertain fear because I operate in His perfect love, where fear cannot live. 1 John 4:16-18 “God is love: he that dwells in love dwells in God, and God in him. Herein is our love made perfect…..as he is, so are we in this world. There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear, because fear has torment. He that fears is not made perfect in love.”
When I am one with My Father, surrendered to His will, I can learn to allow this oneness to become my lifestyle. Here I will operate in His perfect love and fear has no place in my life. My relationships will improve as my relationship with my Father deepens and becomes more intimate. Unity with my fellow men will be a consequence of oneness with my Father. Love covers and does not seek her own, but the welfare of others.
When Jesus’ prayer for us (John 17:21-23) is fulfilled in our lives: that we all may be one with the Father, and one another, then the world will notice the difference in our lifestyle as we walk in the power and authority of God. We try every way but the Way, the pattern Jesus laid down in that prayer. God has locked up redemption in His Son, who is the Way, Truth and Life. Our lives are an open book, living epistles to be known and read of all men. May the pages of our book reveal the life of His Son to a needy world, as our daily prayer to our Father is: Keep me true to You, Lord. Amen. One with the Father in all I think, do and say!
