House Church Talk - Visualizing Christ

[jim pierceall]

> Not so with "the poor of this world" who are desperate for Him. They
> exercise their imaginations. They actually imagine themselves talking to
> a real person when they pray. They imagine God, as a real Person, talking
> to them when they read the Bible or sit in the quiet of His presence.
>-------------

Please include and think of me, when you say "the poor"...    I would rather
be seen that way, than pompous, rich, and have need of nothing...   neither
claiming to have Him all figured out.. O;>)

Now if in person to person, I suspect this next might be read as gentle and
kind, rather than corrective, which typical e-mail, is often misleading...

But that word "imagine/visualize" is such a loaded word.. ha!  Imagine is
akin to
"speculation" and speculation akin the "gambling"...

<<They imagine God, as a real Person>>

No!  For the believer, we KNOW we are speaking to a real person - a very
special real person
at that... When we first came to God, we knew that He is.. and thus our
first steps commensurate w/ this very "knowing"..  And then this knowing
would
grow and broaden.. He would become increased w/ each passing dimension of
His essence..  Daddy, Provider, Lord, Healer, Teacher, Baptizer...  Moving
into Brother - defining and refining while knowing what a Friend we have...
and all of these identities, would flow forth from His Eternal Nature...  Of
course this identity of Him, will be seen greatest w/ His nature becoming
expressed to us, and hopefully through us, as we take on the very nature of
He that captivates us...  Gal 5:22-23
But the fruit (singular) of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience,
kindness, goodness, faithfulness,  gentleness, self-control;

... and while different wording than Exodus 34 - essentially the same...
Might we come to Him, and then go forth while being "aglow"....

I suspected your first post would bring a "knee jerk" word of caution...
and I didn't think that totally wrong....  Yet ironically I found myself
humming/singing that recognizable song:

        Fix our eyes upon Jesus...
        Look Him full in the face...
        and the things of this world,
        shall grow strangely dim...
        As we feast on His Glory and Grace...

I trust the writer of that lyric was not advocating some "new age" approach
in knowing/growing in Christ...  Neither did I think you had either
Phillip...

Might this speak to us all, as words of direction:

Eph 3:16-19
16 That he would grant <us>, according to the riches of his glory, to be
strengthened with might by his Spirit in the inner man;

17 That Christ may dwell in <our> hearts by faith; that <we>, being rooted
and grounded in love,

18 May be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and
length, and depth, and height;

19 And to know the love of Christ, *which passeth knowledge*, that <we>
might be filled with all the fullness of God.
KJV


JimP - kentucky