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The Lord God has given Me the tongue of disciples,
That I may know how to sustain the weary one with a word.
He awakens Me morning by morning,
He awakens My ear to listen as a disciple.
The Lord God has opened My ear;
And I was not disobedient
Nor did I turn back.
Isaiah 50:4-5
This Messianic passage, which the Lord pointed out to me several days ago, has sparked an epiphany.
This is the Christian life.
Yes, I know -- I've described several things that way before. There are indeed a number of wonderful pictures of the Christian life in scripture, in nature, in daily experiences, in relationships...
Yet this literally is the Christian life, because Jesus is telling us here what His earthly relationship with the Father looked like. In telling us what His own spiritual life looked like, He is revealing the life He calls us to live, in and through Him.
The part of the above passage that I find particularly "epiphanic" (nobody really uses that word, but it fits) are these lines from verse 4
He awakens Me morning by morning,
He awakens My ear to listen as a disciple.
There are two aspects that strike me. First, echoing what Hudson Taylor said, Jesus is the initiator of our communion. HE awakens me. HE leans in to greet me. If I can't always perceive this nudge, I can ask Him to begin heightening my awareness; or, I can simply accept His nudge as fact, and respond as though I did perceive it.
The second aspect is at least as astonishing. He Himself trains me, if I am willing. One-on-one discipleship training can't begin in earnest until He truly has my attention. Heaven knows what course of preparation He may take me through to get me to the point where He truly has my attention.
Seeing that Jesus' walk with the Father, and ours with Jesus, is a response changes everything.
Picture it as a waltz. In a waltz, the leader leads and the follower follows. The follower actually follows by gracefully stepping back, out of the way of the leader's carefully placed strides. It's only when the two partners move together as a seamless unit, in confident synchronization, that the dance becomes beautiful.
He initiates. Will we respond?