I already shared how God expressed His displeasure to me for participating in the afternoon session after He had told me He lifted His anointing from the meeting. A portion of my devotion time in the wee hours of the morning dealt with that. And then I had some wonderful intimacy time with Him as I listened to worship music and prayed.
After a while God told me to sit up and write. He began to give me a rather difficult teaching on obedience. This teaching was a bit different from the others because it was more scripture intensive than most, more teaching and less acting out. The first point was that God expected all believers to obey Him. The scriptures He gave me for that included Deut 30:15-20 on the blessings of obedience and punishment for disobedience. Then He gave me a subset of the scriptures where Jesus made it clear that He expects us to obey Him: John 14:14, John 14:21, John 14:23-24, John 15:10, John 15:14-15. Then God told me that Jesus talked about obedience so much because it was important to Him.
I was beginning to get the impression that this sermon was explicitly for me, rather than something to preach. After all, I had accidentally been disobedient at the previous day's meeting when I agreed to the request to give the closing prayer after God told me He was upset about the meeting. So I took this teaching seriously and personally. I did not expect to end up preaching it to anyone. I thought it was just for me.
The second point was that the greater anointing God gives us, the more He holds us accountable to obey Him. (This sermon was stepping on my toes, but I tried to keep an open and receptive heart to God as He corrected me.) The second point gave three examples of people God elevated in leadership and then held more accountable. There were a lot of scriptures to go with this, but I won't "bore" you with a complete sermon outline.
However, let me summarize the three examples God gave me. Moses was disobedient when he struck the rock for water instead of waving his staff over it. He did that because he lost his temper as the children of Israel grumbled and complained. But because of that disobedience, he was not allowed to enter the promised land. Then there was King Saul, who God rejected as being King because of two specific acts of disobedience recorded in 1 Sam 15. Finally there was the prophet from 1 Kings 13 who was tricked into disobedience by listening to the lies of another prophet -- God held him accountable for disobeying and as a result allowed him to be killed by a lion on his way home. God spent a lot of time developing this point, that the higher level of power/anointing/authority we move in, the more God holds us accountable to obey Him.
The third point was that when God gives us an impossible command to obey, He empowers us to do it. God reminded me of how Jesus sent the disciples out to heal the sick and cast out demons in luke 10, and then He empowered them to do it. Then God reminded me of how He provided a publisher for me when He commanded me to write a book on hearing His voice. (that was a miracle story in itself... God asked me to write a book teaching how to hear His voice. I did not start on it because I had no idea how to get it published. So God told me that He would bring a publisher to me. Shortly after that, Dave Welday of Strang publications telephoned me and asked me to write a book for them on hearing God's voice. Then God reminded me of Heidi Baker's story, which is full of her standing in faith in seemingly impossible situations and then seeing God come through for her with miracles. God made it really clear that He would never ask us to do something and then not empower us to do it. He is faithful if we will only trust in Him and obey Him no matter what the circumstances may look like.
The fourth point was that God wants to empower us, but He needs us to make a commitment to completely and unconditionally obey Him, no matter what He asks. Then God told me that at this point I must explain what a covenant was and how serious of a commitment that was with God. Then I was to lead the people into a covenant of obedience with God.
About then I realized that this was not just a sermon for my benefit, God wanted me to preach it. "Gee Lord, that seems like a really strong sermon. Wouldn't you rather have me do something a bit more encouraging?" God made it clear to me that this is what He wanted preached that day.
It took so long to get this sermon from God that I found I was running late. Michelle would be here any minute to help me wrap my saree. So I jumped out of bed and sprayed my rear end with mosquito repellent so that I could go into the bathroom. (The toilet was a festering breeding ground of mosquitoes and that bathroom was the most unpleasant place I had to go the entire trip. I could not stand to be in that room, and made my trips there as short and infrequent as possible.) I got the blouse and slip that go under the saree on just as Michelle knocked on the door.
Michelle finished wrapping the saree but the guys (Sharath and her father) did not come to pick us up for quite some time. We telephoned his room to see what the delay was. Apparently Pastor Joshua had to run a quick errand that turned out to be not so quick. There was a good half hour delay before we left. Then we rushed to a nearby "western" restaurant, e.g., one that has sanitary enough cooking conditions to make it safe for a westerner to eat there. It was closed. We spent about 20 minutes driving from place to place, looking for a restaurant were I could eat but they were all closed that morning for some reason. So Pastor Joshua took us back to his house for breakfast.
His place was stirring with activity. He had about 30 relatives there -- they did not fit in the small house and were mostly sitting in the yard in folding chairs that had apparently been rented. Some people had been hired to cook some sort of large lunch for the relatives. They were obviously preparing for some type of family party that afternoon, and I could see why Pastor Joshua wanted to find a restaurant rather than having to feed us at his home. But once we arrived, someone began preparing breakfast for us.
They don't have microwaves or fast food in India, so it takes a while to prepare a meal there. Sharath and I waited in the living room while the meal was being prepared. Pastor Joshua's oldest daughter had recently had a baby, a little girl, who was about 3 weeks old. In India, the pregnant woman goes to her parent's home for the last few months or so of pregnancy and the first few months after having the baby. The grandmother takes care of the baby and of the new mother. In the bigger cities, they get sort of flexible about how long the new mother stays in her parent's home. Apparently this was the baby's last day there and mom and baby would go home that afternoon to her husband, who missed her very much.
It was a special day for another reason as well. They had decided to have the baby naming ceremony that day, while I was in Vizag. It is apparently an honor to the family for someone "important" to officiate the naming ceremony. Since I was a missionary from a western country, I was "important" in their eyes. The parents had already selected the name for this darling little baby girl -- Blessie. But they wanted me to give the name at the ceremony.
They were originally going to do the ceremony at the church as part of the service. But since I was already at the house for breakfast, they decided to do the ceremony on the front porch instead. I don't fully understand these ceremonies, so I simply do what they tell me to do at them -- no more and no less. They had fixed some sort of hanging hammock made out of nice material to the porch ceiling (their porch was a covered porch). They called it a swing and part of the ceremony was to put the baby in the swing. Originally they were going to have me do that, so they were explaining it to me. Then they decided to have the paternal grandparents do that part instead. I was really happy with that decision since I'd never seen the ceremony and did not understand how the baby went into the swing.
They gathered on the porch for the ceremony, and her mother handed the baby to me. They had me hold her, pray over her, speak a blessing over her and then pronounce her name -- which apparently had been kept a secret from the relatives until they heard it pronounced at the naming ceremony. Little Blessie was so good during that ceremony. She seemed totally comfortable with me holding her and she just smiled. Some of the relatives wanted to take some pictures of me holding Blessie just before I gave her to the grandparents to put in the swing. I swear the little girl understood they were taking her picture and she put her hand up and waved at the camera just as the picture was being taken. It was so cute.
Then I handed her to the grandparents, who lovingly laid her in the swing and relatives gathered around to put presents on her.. including some little tiny baby rings and necklaces, all made out of real gold. Then the relatives all filed up to greet her and look at her and take her picture and love on her as she lay in the little swing. It was a very nice ceremony. When it was over, there was more picture taking and I was again asked to hold little Blessie and pose for pictures with the parents and with various relatives.
Children are very important in India, and many relatives had come from eight and ten-hour train rides away to be present for this naming ceremony. I really love that about the Indian culture, how people love and value their families and treat each other well. They consider each child to be a precious gift and value each one dearly. I wish that my own culture could learn that from the Indians, because they come much closer to Bible values on family than my own culture does.
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