Faith is an action! If you and I want to continually hear from the Lord, we will have to do something about what we have heard in the Spirit. Still, when we hear the Lord speak to us through dreams and visions, we must learn to cooperate with the Holy Spirit to learn from them and see them come to pass. This is what I experienced last night as he prayed about digging the wells of our ancestors again.
Hebrews 11:6
6 But without faith it is impossible to please him; for he who comes to God must believe that he exists, and that he is a rewarder of those who diligently seek him.
As I began to pray very slowly and purposefully in the Spirit. I began to see myself digging a well that had been plugged.
Genesis 26:15, 18
15 For all the wells that his father’s servants had dug in the days of Abraham his father, the Philistines had stopped up and filled with earth.
18 And Isaac dug again the wells of water which they had dug in the days of Abraham his father; because the Philistines had stopped them after the death of Abraham; and he called his names according to the names by which his father had called them.
I tell you this: I never imagined what I was about to discover when I began in the Spirit to go back to digging the wells of our ancestors. When the Lord gives us a task, we seldom realize how difficult, daunting, and disappointing it will be. Every journey the Lord sends us on will be a journey of self-discovery with an emphasis on discovering the “me” in all of us and I say not in a good way. For example, when the Lord told Abraham to go to the land He had prepared for him, Abraham found many disappointing things about himself and those traveling with him. Didn’t he fail her wife and lie about her relationship with her? Wasn’t he instructed to leave his family and go to the land that the Lord pointed out to him? Instead, he took his nephew Lot with him and it turned out that there were many struggles and problems as a result of not fully obeying the Lord. Again, when the Lord shows us something or assigns us to do something, we usually see the beautiful end of that assignment, but rarely do we understand everything that will happen in the process. Didn’t he just tell Moses: “He leads the children of Israel to the Promised Land”? Moses had no idea of the rebellion, complaints and criticism that he would experience on this trip. He never imagined that he would lose his temper and hit the rock that represented the Lord Jesus Christ and be barred from entering the Promised Land.
Still, hearing the Lord say, “If you go back to digging the spiritual wells of your ancestors, you will release their power, anointing, and reforms on earth.” We immediately got fired up and threw ourselves into the task. In fact, that is what we should be doing and are doing. However, if we stopped to think about what these wells have been filled with, we would probably start this task with a little more caution and care.
Let me ask you this: “If you were the devil and wanted the great power of past generations to stop and never flow again, what would you use to bury that passion, vision, anointing and gifts?” Well, whatever you called it, that’s what you and I will find as we seek to re-dig the spiritual wells of our ancestors. Yes, and darling, we will find much more than we ever dreamed would be there. So put on your coveralls, your work gloves, grab your shovels and pickaxes, and arm yourself with a massive amount of air freshener because we’re going to need it all.
Imagine with me now that we are so excited to open the spiritual wells of those the Lord used to bring reformation to the world. We know that, at the bottom of the well, we are stepping into the life-giving truth that will bring worldwide revival! How excited we are and look how fervently we want to throw ourselves into the task with all our energy. However, when we enter the pit with our shovels and picks, we are horrified at what we have walked into. This well that has the potential to change the world is filled to the brim with a black stench-laden concoction that has all the deeds of the flesh laced with the pride of life. As we sink our blade into ourselves, we find that the entire mass moves and adheres not only to the blade but to every part of our body. What seemed like a simple and practical approach to digging back the wells of our ancestors has instantly become an impossible task. We know that the water at the bottom of this well is so valuable that it is worth any price to obtain it. On the other hand, we also know that it will be impossible to remove the garbage from this well with the tools we have. Oh dear, do not be discouraged, for it is always the way of the Lord to reveal that the ways of the Spirit are impossible to understand with the natural man.
Have you ever read or heard these words:
Matthew 12:26
26 And if Satan casts out Satan, he is divided against himself; How then shall his kingdom stand?
Do you see what I’m trying to say? The pit is filled with every work of the flesh and is held together with the very root of all “pride” sin. Therefore, the first task is not to re-dig the well, but rather to have fleshly thoughts, ideas, and ways purged from our own lives. I have found that usually the first thing that comes up when the Lord shows us something is an emotion that is almost always based on pride. We see ourselves as someone great and someone others will look up to because of what we have accomplished. We imagine how great this work will be and how much we will be able to do “for the Lord”. It seems so spiritual, but at the bottom of it all is the evil of “pride”. I know this is hard for us to swallow. It hurts our pride, doesn’t it?
Take heart, my friend, the Lord has always taken what the enemy has done for evil and turned it for good. That is his path and his pattern. Every work we start for the Lord will uncover the hidden pride that is hidden in our hearts and must be dealt with first. The truth that, “We cannot cast out pride because of the pride that is living in us,” must come home as an unalterable law first and foremost.
Zechariah 4:6-7
6 Then he answered and spoke to me, saying: This is the word of the Lord to Zerubbabel, saying: Not by army, nor by force, but by my spirit, says the Lord of hosts.
7 Who are you, O great mountain? Before Zerubbabel you will become a plain: and he will take the cornerstone out of it with acclamations, crying: Grace, grace to her.
You see, the very fact that we get discouraged, disillusioned and defeated is evidence that the carnal man and his companion, “pride”, are living very strongly in our hearts. It is further proof that we are focusing on our abilities, skills and gifts instead of the power of the Holy Spirit. We need to see discouragement and disappointment differently. We need to thank the Lord for revealing these emotions and mental attitudes for the wicked pride that they are! Instead, we often feed them self-pity and false insight that leads to a kind of paralysis.
When a man is bitten by a poisonous snake, his nerves and tissues are deeply affected. Still, when “pride” is in our lives, we are on a constant roller coaster of false strength and power, and deadly discouragement and depression. We have been bitten by the deadly viper Satan with the poison of his pride. In fact, pain is an indication that something is wrong and needs to be addressed. The pain of discouragement and depression are signs of a hidden pride that is doing his deadly work. We should rejoice when the Lord reveals them in our lives.