OTD's BSSM Weekly | Thanksgiving, Meditation, and the Love of a Good Father
My week four round-up from the Bethel School of Supernatural Ministry
I will start this week’s roundup on a note of thanksgiving. I have just completed the first month of my study at the Bethel School of Supernatural Ministry Online. It has been incredible and definitely what I needed for this time. This week was especially interesting as God’s word dug into the crevices of my heart to root out a couple of hindrances to receiving God’s love and trusting Him. On the streets of Nigerian Social Media, we’d call it a week of gbas gbos! (onomatopoeia for blows during a fight) In the midst of opening up my heart to this transformation journey, I also enjoyed God’s love in material blessing. Just as I sent in an assignment where I repented and poured out my heart about still being on the journey of surrendering my source of provision to God, I received a most unexpected cash gift! It was like God saying, you can trust me.
Finally, on the thanksgiving list, I have the funds to pay for the first instalment of my fees! This is a most interesting phase and I look forward to sharing more on it when it is time. Haha. Sounds so coded. But all in good time I have learned.
On to week four lessons! One of the biggest things I am learning is to never take what I’ve known, heard of, or been in contact with before for granted. There is always something new to see and learn.
This week was filled with new discoveries in old places both in the Scriptures and about myself. I also have questions about Paul’s letter to the Corinthians, especially chapters 5 and 7 of the first letter. I’m looking forward to more unravelling in the coming months and years. That said, here are the highlights I am sharing this week. Let me know what you think.
Lectio Divina
This was a very interesting one. On Wednesday, I listened to a teaching by Tim Mackie on Solitude and Community and he taught about the Lectio Divina. It’s a 5 step meditation process that includes:
Reading the text aloud and slowly
Meditating deeply on the words and meaning of the text
Pray the text aloud as led and listen for God’s side of the conversation
Contemplate what it means and how it affects your behaviour and actions
Act on it.
I recalled this on Thursday and Psalm 23 came to mind. I’ve been reciting this at intervals for some weeks now. I decided to practice with it throughout the day. Then, our Thursday session (night for me because of the time difference) begins and our facilitator says he is going to do an activation called Lectio Divina. My eyes popped! Now, I was just waiting for him to say Psalm 23. He did. I was stunned. I have continued with this in the past few days and intend to carry it on. You should try it too.
You can listen to the teaching by Tim Mackie here.
Water into wine at Cana
Why was Jesus’s first miracle and sign to show His glory the turning of water into wine for people who were most likely already high on wine? I saw this in a new way during one of the teaching sessions this week. It got me excited because what Jesus did for us is so beautiful! The story is in John chapter 2.
The stone water jars that Jesus asked the servants to fill were used for ritual purification by the Jews. With the turning of the water in the jars into wine, Jesus was showing us how His assignment was to change our path of purification from the washing of the external body (the law) to getting intoxicated by the spirit (indwelling presence of God).
He was effectively showing us what He came to do on earth. Our worship is no longer about keeping the laws and being pious to stay clean, we are simply drinking of the spirit, freely given after Jesus converted the law into His life-giving Spirit. This gives me a new view of the moment He said He did not come to abolish the law but to fulfil it. He erased the need for external purification, not by destroying the stone pots or throwing out the water, but by turning the dictates of the law into something that goes into us and controls us from the inside out as we drink freely of this Spirit! The law is now written on our hearts and stirs us from within. Amazing!
Loved ones and Lovers
John, the disciple that Jesus loved!
That claim. The awareness. The acceptance of that love. John and David always fascinate me in how they revelled in the love of God.
This week, one of my facilitators highlighted this difference between John and Peter. Then, I realized that John never did claim to love Jesus through the book of John. He just kept saying 'the disciple Jesus loved.’ His focus was not on the love He had for Jesus, it was centred on the love Jesus had for Him. Through the book, you’d see Him always in such close proximity with Jesus. He embraced His access to Jesus physically and spiritually. Do you remember when a voice spoke from heaven and the people around had different interpretations? John heard, clearly. (John 12:28-30)
His entire being was about him being loved by Jesus, not him loving Jesus. This is unlike Peter, who, at every chance, was vocal about how much He loved Jesus and would never leave Him. At the last supper, when Peter wanted to know who would betray Jesus, he asked John to ask Jesus. It was either he was slightly afraid of the answer or John gave no one any space when he was so closely cuddled on Jesus’s chest!
When the test came with Jesus’s arrest, they all ran. John and Peter as well. However, both of them still followed Jesus. John first into the courtyard, and Peter following. (So many side notes here, but another day)
Peter ends up denying Jesus and we later see John at the foot of the cross with His mother and the other women. The musing here is this; it is our acceptance and dwelling in the love of Jesus that carries us through the tests, including our ability to love Him.
There is no denying Peter’s heart for Jesus. He does get restored after the denial and becomes a great leader. To be honest, I can relate more with Peter than with John. I think many of us will. We want Jesus and the world to know that we love and obey Him. John wanted anybody who cared to know that Jesus loved him the most. I think he even cared more that Jesus loved him than anybody knowing it. He just enjoyed the love. It’s a radical shift and will influence every area of our lives once we embrace this mindset. Connecting it to the first paragraph about the turning of water to wine, accepting the love of Jesus is like drinking the wine we have been freely given. That love then controls all that we do, including how we love Jesus back.
I am Oluwadamilola, the girl that Jesus loves.
Experiencing the Father’s Embrace
I read this book last year. Or better put, I read the first few chapters and scanned through the rest last year because I needed to write a report on it. Now, I do need to write a report on it but my commitment to this process made me pick it up and read it properly. I wasn’t sure of what to expect but I just prayed that my heart would be receptive. Boy o’ boy! I am gobsmacked. Even if I read those chapters in detail last year, it wouldn’t have made such an impact. I wouldn’t have been able to relate. Those first four chapters that I read deeply were what I needed last year. As I read the following chapters this past week, I felt God’s love and correction so deeply. It gave answers to questions and struggles that events in this year have raised. Issues like vindication, comparison, criticism, trust, and much more were exposed for what they are. All my excuses and attempts to make them sound ‘not so bad’ were called out. As they say on the streets of social media, ‘wig snatched’!
In all of it, I feel a deep sense and awareness of God’s love. As I read and shouted and laughed and flipped and repented, I kept saying over and over that God loves me. He led me through seasons of being open to His love first and then, allowed me to be in situations that exposed these things I’d never known were a problem. Now, He is leading me on the path of correction in His love. It’s like what Paul said in Ephesians 5:25-27.
Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless.
He is cleansing me, as He is you. I also realized again, the importance of knowing God as a Father before addressing the hindrances and flaws we have. We begin to enjoy His purification process and embrace His corrections without feeling slighted or feeling rejected. We begin to ‘value relationships over being right.’
I recommend this book. Highly! You can shop for it here - Experiencing the Father’s Embrace by Jack Frost.
Our journey with God is fascinating and always ongoing. There is always more to unravel, more to discover, more to enjoy.
As we go through this week’s phase of the journey, I am praying that you enjoy God’s rest in the midst of the crazy things happening around you. I pray that your eyes stay fastened to His as you walk on the waves of challenges and general life demands this week. I pray for a heart that is tender and always eager to receive the love of a good Father.
Love and love,
OTDamilola,
For King and Kingdom.