This is the Truth Network. Wouldn't you love to open a door and be able to see God, to be able to see exactly what's going on in any given situation?
Well, in today's episode, you no doubt we'll see, it's a real door opener.
So this morning I felt God calling me back to Ephesians chapter 4. And this idea of unity and the idea of oneness And my need to do that in love and how I can get to there is obviously very critical to what God has here for us to walk worthy of our calling. And I definitely want to do that, and I'm sure you do. And so let's look at those seven verses again as I read them here. It says, I therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you to walk worthy of the calling with which you are called, with all lowliness and gentleness, with long-suffering, bearing with one another in love.
Endeavoring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. There is one body and one spirit, just as you were called in one hope of your calling. One Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is above all and through all and in you all. And so you see there are actually Seven ones that they talk about, where they're talking about one faith, one baptism, and that kind of thing. But then, actually, if you add the one another in the beginning, and this, I believe, the second verse.
There are eight, and eight being the miracle number that you do things in seven days in a cycle, and then you on the eighth. Day, see what God's going to add to that. It's amazing that you they cleansed the temple on the eighth day, Jesus was baptized on the eighth day. And so that number eight is pretty significant and shows something of how all these things are going to come together for us.
So I really felt the Holy Spirit just pinning me down on this idea of Oneness and unity, which interestingly, the words are spelled almost identically, with the difference just being the first letter, which by the way, I showed you both those words in the show notes. Beautifully illustrated into what the letters each mean, and I'll let you look at that. And the thing that really struck me that actually I felt the Holy Spirit waking me up with is why in the world does the word one or a hod in Hebrew end with that letter that means a door? It's a dolled, and it means also a humble servant. And it has that idea always been.
that a humble servant goes through a door. And so I was wondering about the door that has to do with the idea of oneness. And fascinatingly, when I looked up the word unity, it ends exactly the same way because the words are spelled almost identical. And so I started to begin to think. About that humble servant.
And of course, there was nobody more humble than Jesus. And when you think about it, him on the cross and and the idea of being needy Of being afflicted. That's the idea of that letter to Allah, which is fascinating that this affliction would be a door for us. But when you think about it, you know, it may be that you're like me, that some of the closest times you ever were with God is when you were greatly afflicted. You know, they say it's the worst of times, the best of times, or it might be the other way around, the best of times, the worst of times.
But I remember when I was crushed by the Jeep, or even recently when I was in this accident, that you feel God so near when you are afflicted. And it made me begin to think about poor Jesus. Nobody was afflicted more than him on the cross. I mean, they literally gambled for his clothes. They beat him as much as they could beat him without killing him, totally disfigured him, spit on him.
But you know, nobody Uh you know, was standing up for him. His friends ran away. You know, the women were there and which was beautiful, no doubt. But when you think about it, he was just highly afflicted and and it un it was unthinkable all that they did to him. And he could not have been more of a Dalad, more of a door.
And as it was, that happened to be the door that brought about the unity to all of us, right? And again, he died. You can't get more afflicted than that, I don't suppose. And so, when you think about the idea of our own unity in whatever relationship you're talking about, in whatever church setting you're talking about, or ministry setting, or your marriage, you know, friendships, the idea is that often we find ourselves afflicted in that friendship. We often find ourselves.
Maybe And at that point, interestingly, it gives us the opportunity to rely on God rather than ourselves, right? As we fall back on the idea of obviously. I have got to take the lowest position at the table, whatever that may look like in that particular situation, and I've got to be needy. And what do I need? I need Jesus, is what I absolutely need.
And so it's amazing that. You know, only at the point that you see your need. Does the door open? If not worse. Like that.
I would see so much of God's glory if I only knew how badly I needed him at any given moment, like Isaiah when he saw God. He realized he was a man of unclean lips.
Well, honestly, we need every single breath that we need. We need to be held down on the earth by gravity. There's so many needs that we have, it's almost unthinkable. Yet we don't see ourselves anywhere close to as needy as we really are. And that idea of unity.
of seeing God's glory The door that's at the end of both word unity and oneness. can only be opened When we get a good look, and our neediness forgot. And as we turn towards him in our nativeness, That door? opens to oneness with Him, with Jesus, with our friends, with our wife, with our church. Oh, it's a real door opener.
