Come Up Higher

Today, as we continue to be impacted by current culture, we can find ourselves screeching at the digital door where our hearts crave to know where to turn our attention and who to believe. This is not a new phenomenon in human history. There are countless challenges facing us, such as, what to buy for food, where funds are to be spent this month, or how to match and measure our competing obligations.

In our faith walk, it becomes increasingly important to gain a deeper perspective on just where and what to take action on. This is why in my life and those I journey with we discuss these matters because as we forge higher with God, the air gets thinner. Like a mountaineer, each of our life journeys have both peaks and valleys. We will not be able to tolerate or maintain a stand on those new pecks unless we have been built out spiritual strength during our times in the valley.

This is not a new paradigm, as we see in Numbers, chapter 1, where Moses was told to take a censes of the tribes of Israel. Many theologians have hashed out this story before but perhaps this interpretation will be new for a few of you.

The census was down to the very names of the people who were to lead their particular tribe. God knew their names, and went as far as to add to their name, ‘the son of ……’ in His discourse with Moses as its’ recorded for us in the bible. What strikes me is how God mentions each by name.  Such an intimate invitation by the God of the Universe to those He was calling forward.  

The text sets an order how the census was to be taken (minus the Levities) and where each tribes was to set up camp in relation to the Tabernacle of Testimony. Such specifics. But why?

I believe it’s because God had listened to all the Hebrew’s groaning, complaining and prayers and knew that in order to become a people prepared for the mountain top experience of entering the promised land, they would need to learn the value of honoring their own request of going the way of Yahweh and how He decided to answer their prayers.

They had wanted belong, be free, be provided for, safe, at peace but they hadn’t anticipated how that was going to come to pass in the middle of a wilderness. The storehouses of God are rich with ways to teach us and in this case, the Hebrews of the importance of how and where to take their position both in the land they were passing through and the community God had surrounded them with. The central point of alignment for each tribe related to the Tabernacle of Testimony which was set in their midst.

Today, that symbolic Tabernacle of Testimony still exists, but it’s made without walls. Centered in the heart of every believer is a position ready to be occupied in response to the prayer, “Lord, I surrender, use me in Your awesome plan.” His answer then and now is the same, come learn to synchronize with Him.

Our names have been called out today and we once again we’re given a choice to be led by His plan, or stopping short, allowing our soul to take the lead once again. It’s easy to do, because as the days get harder, we easily can become weary in well doing.

Leaving behind the thrill of seeing water flow from a rock to quench a certain thirst, it’s time to set focus on the higher place of His calling – it’s a gutty trail we are to blaze, because He’s called us by name.  

Moving up this mountain requires a slow and steady pace, being selective and intentional about what we allow in to incarnate in truth, after all we are staking camp by our Heavenly Father’s house, that Tabernacle of Testimony.

The air is thinner as we ascend so we must become strategic in connecting to the resources that are already at hand. Look around, become a recipient of the abundance of assets God has given through those He things and people He has surrounded you with.

We are all fatally flawed and will fall short but get up again and see how God honors a heart’s cry who seeks His perfection through alignment step-by-step up into a high place. The best is the rest you will have as you set sights on the landscape and terrain of His creation.

 God’s elegance will give you strength to push past the frustration and step up into the joys in the sacred realities of this new path, one less traveled but fulfilled in tempo with God’s harmony of riches and glory. In our transformation, we hear more clearly His ‘pitch’ and follow His sound. Listen with your spirit and unlock the perfect position in possession of the explicit nature of God.