The Shulamite and the Foxes

God’s Thoughts to me

Catch all the foxes, those little foxes, before they ruin the vineyard of love, for the grapevines are blossoming! (Song of Songs 2:15, NLT).

Fox Hunting

Through the years I have been walking with God, I have often been harassed by the little foxes from the Song of Songs. They have been so persistent with their gnawing and pestering of my thoughts.

I realised the time was ripe for me to chase and catch these little rascals. Little did I realise how cunning these creatures could be! I started to plan my battle strategies on how to fight and conquer these hard-to-destroy-grapevine-loving cute little pests by doing some research.

My expert advisors, the Bible scholars, seemed to agree on one thing, at least. These, not so little foxes, represent all the false preachers, prophets and teachers of a different gospel.

Our Lord Jesus warned us, ” On judgement day many will say to me,’ Lord! Lord! We prophesied in your name and performed many miracles in your name.’ But I will reply,’I never knew you. Get away from me, you who break God’s laws.” (Matthew 7:22-23, NLT).

My advisors nearly convinced me through the letter Paul wrote to Timothy, ” Now the Holy Spirit tells us clearly that in the last times some will turn away from the true faith; they will follow deceptive spirits and teachings that come from demons. These people are hypocrites and liars, and their consciences are dead.” (1 Timothy 4:1-2, NLT).

But I knew, although these gentlemen were spot-on with their analysis, this battle, for me, had to be fought on a much deeper level; on the only battleground my enemies were able to destroy; my heart and soul.

So, I fired my clever, highly esteemed advisors and asked our Lord Jesus to be the Commander-in-Chief of my whole life; a position He gladly wanted to fill since forever, and to show me the best plan of action against these potential soul destroyers.

At the time King Solomon wrote this beautiful song, vineyards had protective walls built around them against all the unwelcome visitors. The foxes would dig holes in the vineyard, spoiling the roots of the vines, gnawing and breaking the tender, little branches and leaves.

These gluttonous, little creatures were not interested in the flowers, they wanted the juicy grapes, especially when they were young and tender. Then my ever-so-romantic mind’s eye caught sight of the Shulamite and her King! To be specific, the love relationship between the two.

It is a relationship of love; not a doctrine, teaching, a charismatic speaker nor all the things we associate with the modus operandi of the modern church scene. The foxes are those great and little enemies and adverse circumstances that threaten to gnaw and destroy their blooming, tender love!

I knew it was time for me to take stock to discover how many of these little foxes I allowed to freely roam and destroy the vineyard of my heart. I knew I had no means to fight against these formidable foes.

But I remembered that only our Pappa God is mighty to save, I recalled His words, “Listen all you people … ‘Do not be afraid! Don’t be discouraged by this mighty army, for the battle is not yours, but God’s.” (2 Chronicles 20:15, NLT).

My heart jumped with joy when I realised our Lord Jesus was my Knight in shining armour and together we made a mean team, just like Lancelot and Lady Guinevere. He was more than able and prepared to destroy this foe that was preventing my heart from producing the delicious fruit of love and trust, He so greatly desired.

Together we first had to identify and destroy this big army of little foxes’ commander-in-chief, Brigadier-General Work-To-Earn-God’s-Love. What a despicable liar this one was! We overcame this fellow easily, once I allowed our Lord Jesus to counteract his lies with truth.

Once he was slain, his whole army of well-trained soldiers started to crumble. Lieutenant Good Works and Sergeant Shame put up a good fight, but quickly raised the white flag when they saw my Commander-in-Chief! Their whole platoon of privates soon followed suit; private Guilt, private Condemnation, private Rejection, Anger, etc., etc.

Of their once mighty army, only a few mercenaries remained, but I knew that as long as I didn’t willingly hire their services, they would leave me well alone. They know the battle belongs to the Lord and that makes them tremble with fear.

Our King of kings destroyed all their shelters of wood, hay and stubble. Now, if I just spy one of them on the horizon, I run to my Strong Tower and Place of Refuge, into our Lord’s loving embrace.

We daily encounter many of these nasty little foxes and foes who want to lock us in shackles of despair. We have to fight many battles and it can be downright horrible, but as we allow the sweet Holy Spirit to teach us how to abide in our Lord Jesus, we only need to submit to our Pappa and resist the evil ones!

As we live in His Love, moment-by-moment, we can confidently say with Paul, “Neither death nor life, neither angels or demons, neither our fears for today nor our worries about tomorrow-not even the powers of hell can separate us from God’s love.” (Romans 8:35).

Living life is a fine balancing act in a world lost in chaos and darkness, filled with many foxy foes. Let us therefore fix our eyes on our only Commander-in-Chief, our dearest Lord Jesus.

Hugs and sweet blessings

Mia

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This is an edited repost from the archives.

Jesus, the Iconoclast

God’s Thoughts to Me

Jesus entered the Temple and began to drive out all the people buying and selling animals for sacrifice. He knocked over the tables of the money changers and the chairs of those selling doves.
(Matthew 21:12, NLT).

Dear children, keep away from anything that might take God’s place in your hearts. (1 John 5:21, NLT).

For, as I have often told before and say again even with tears, many live as enemies of the cross of Christ. (Philippians 3:18, NIV).

And the beast was captured, and with him the false prophet who did mighty miracles, on behalf of the beast – miracles that deceived all who had accepted the mark of the beast and who worshipped his statue. (Revelation 19:20, NLT).

Deceiving Idols

My husband is clever…a living, walking, talking Encyclopedia of Trivia, he modestly claims. Oh, he does not suffer foolishness gladly!! Whenever Fibrofog pitches its tent around my mind, he suffers BIG time!

Then, one day I discovered a word…a BIG word! With glee, the somewhat malicious kind, I rejoiced with a wordless scream,”Bingo!”. Of course I did not know the meaning of the word, but neither did he.

According to WordWeb the meaning of “iconoclast” is:

1. Someone who attacks cherished ideas of traditions or institutions.
2. A destroyer of images used in religious worship.

I want to tread softly, delicately in my exposition, taking off my shoes, for this is “holy” ground. I can almost see the stones flying and feel the tar and feathers! And, I don’t suffer suffering gladly!

Then, I remember my Beloved, our Lord Jesus, the greatest iconoclast of all times. He was ruthless and showed no mercy when He condemned and criticized the Scribes, the Pharisees and the religious elite. Matthew 23 paints a vivid picture of our Lord’s attitude towards the religion of the Jews, and by implication, all religion through the ages.

And!!!! He was despised by His people and far too many people through the ages as well. He was ostracized, a man of sorrows, familiar with suffering and crushed for our sins. (Isaiah 53:3-5).

Religion produces enemies of the cross; for instead of denying our efforts to save ourselves and allowing our Lord Jesus to do His job, religion teaches us to cling to our rules, traditions, programs, laws, do’s and don’ts, for the whole focus of religion is on our feeble performance which at best is usually just less than pathetic and of no use.

I definitely am not a Communist, but Carl Marx did have his bright moments when he observed with unusual wisdom that religion is the opiate of the people.

Our Lord Jesus identified Satan as the father of religion, and those who misused the common people for gain through their religious practices and rules, the “children of the devil”. (John 8:44)

He labelled their religiosity as evil and as hatred of the truth He came to bring; binding the poor, the over-burdened common folk, the laity like us who are easily duped by the charisma and rhetoric
of anyone who claims to speak on our Pappa’s behalf! Spiritual discernment has become extinct!

Please allow me to be a teeny bit iconoclastic. An idolatry I have found amongst our God’s children
is bibliolatry…. esteeming the letter of the Word above the Living Word, our Lord Jesus. A dear friend of mine has accused me of calling our Pappa a liar, when I told her that the Bible is not a book of rules, but a story of redemption…pointing to Jesus, our Redeemer, not the letter of the law. I lost a dear friend in the process and it hurt…very,very much.

Currently there are about 41 000 different Christian denominations worldwide, all claiming their fame from the Bible. Common sense, which is not so common nowadays, should tell us that everything is not so kosher as far as to who has the hold on the truth!

Looking at origin of the word “Bible” we see that it is derived from the Greek ” biblion”, meaning “book”, or more accurately, “papyrus scroll”. In some aspects the Bible is just like any other book with pages and printed letters. What makes it completely different and unique is that its Author is our Heavenly Father…His letter of love! What makes it completely unique and different from any other book ever written is that it is the only book where you need to know the Author personally to understand His words and heart towards you, always wooing you back into His Loving Embrace!

The Christians after Pentecost were mostly illiterate and socially unimportant. An estimated 80% could neither read nor write and came from a slave background. They had no Bibles, but they had the Divine Teacher living within them through His Holy Spirit. They lived in Him and that was all they needed.

The human race is not irreligious; just the opposite! They are extremely religious as we see through the ages. Looking at the religious Crusades, I can only say AMEN to the words of Blaise Pascal, “Men never do evil so cheerfully as when they do it from a religious conviction.” We are all created with the need to worship. Whom or what we worship is the daily choice we have to make.

This, in my mind at least, is a humungous, monstrous problem, for many of our Pappa’s children have been deceived by the Great Deceiver…that beast who forages through the world, trying to lure us away from our Beloved Lord Jesus! And his bait….the sometimes undetectable lie of religion.

The mark of the beast has been associated with many things, but I ask you to consider the possibility that accepting religion might just be the mark etched on our foreheads, on our minds, into our thoughts! The mark on the hand might also just be our efforts trying to replace our Pappa’s saving grace with the work of our hands.

I consider this a very serious matter and carry a heavy burden in my heart today, robbing me of all my peace. Thank you for indulging me and, Pappa, for returning my peace.

Much love and blessings to you

Mia

Linking-up with Mindy at New Equus.