'The Stone which the Builders Refused:' Part Two: the stone of stumbling the path of the Holy Grail...

Continued /

     Why did we first, refuse Jesus? Why was the first stone sent to us, rejected? Because ‘self’ in us always rejects the Truth; innately and unconsciously suppressing the truth, lest the knowledge of the true GOD should spring up and sting it, forcing in us a change of allegiance, and an altering of our ways. Self’s dreaded altar! The cross! Dreaded, because ‘self’ evades its own exposure at every juncture, at every point in its ceaseless defense of its own wicked life: our utter corruption, thereby, manifested! Our original sin self, in us, is set to evade and to fight and even to kill any attempt to expose corruption and sinfulness in it. Truly, we “oppose our own selves.” (2 Tim. 2: 25) We seek our own destruction!!  For we are fighting against Jesus as we fight against “the sting ;”( 1 Cor. 15: 56) and in refusing the offence we are refusing him: fighting against that very thing which will help bring us freedom!

     We do this all unknowingly, of course. Because we don’t comprehend the stone which was sent to us first. The capstone that lies underneath everything and which is the true foundation. The heavenly ground above upon which all must be built for our house to stand and not fall. The spiritual stone/offence that ‘self’ in me is opposed to the truth.  Being as it is on the same side as the serpent, having been made one with the serpent through deception, through my first sin, my original sin; and that, therefore, I really am, absolutely corrupt.

     And because I don’t have the capstone in me, first, from the beginning: that ‘self’ in me is always opposed to God, I naturally don’t realize that of myself I will naturally reject the truth: Jesus; naturally refusing the saving truth that self rejects God, which is the first stone and the last stone that makes complete:  ...that naturally I hate the light that stings me; and that I run from all that would force in me a change of allegiance.

     And this is the truth that saves! And the only truth which could save us! This is the one pearl of great price, which once you have found, you sell all that you have, and buy it. (Lest you were left behind; cast off, thrown out of the wedding, for being inappropriately dressed, and thrown out of the kingdom where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth.)

     This is the stone he lays in Zion, for a foundation; the chief stone which offends, the most costly of all pearls. And truly, it is the gift of God. “Disallowed indeed of men, but chosen of God: elect and precious.”  This is the door to heaven this is the stone of stumbling, and the rock of offence: JESUS. Whose inner working in us is like a hidden gin, and a snare: a shepherd’s crook. That we might stumble and fall, and be broken, and be snared, and be taken. That he might expose to us, in us, the deceitfulness of our own hearts, creating in us the need of him: that we no longer turn to ‘him’ from out of a fascinated intellectuality, but truly turn to him, from out of a true and pure perception of our deceitful hearts. From out of an over flowing grateful love, that he should come to us to save us from ourselves!! It is from our selves that we need to be saved. (For ‘self’ in us is absolutely corrupt; manifested by our natural refusal to believe that it is. And this is the precious stone he lays in Zion; and our rock of offence.)

     Only once I am broken, am I snared, and taken of my beloved: wooed, and then raptured by the ecstasy of his own love in me tearing me down to make me free; and turning my humiliation and suffering in it to joy all unspeakable. Only then shall I not be confounded, nor found to be rejecting him. Only then shall I not be brought to confusion or to defeat in not comprehending the good purpose of the Thief; his glorious intent having been made evident to me in me. And so I shall recognize him and know him; in recognizing and knowing that he is the precious taker of ‘my’ life; my own wonderful thief: the LORD, my beloved; ‘thieving’ from me to bless me.  For the very stone sent to make me fall is the blessing to make me rise. Truly, the stone I reject is the gift of God; and the one pearl of great price.

     When I finally come to comprehend this, which is only after I have fallen upon the stone, and been broken, I am no longer confounded. I am no longer found floundering in darkness and defeat; for I perceive the truth that Jesus, the stone, he is both the problem and the solution, at the same time.  He is the first stone and the last. For only within a problem is the possibility of a solution.  So he shows up my iniquity inside of me first that I might be delivered of it at last. Maintaining the beginning firm unto the end that at the end I might be saved.

     For it is only as we see our corruption that we can be delivered from it; if we didn’t see it we couldn’t be saved from it; and it would remain hidden in us and we would not be saved.  So ‘the Stone’ which offends, which we continually reject: “the sting of death” we don’t want to feel, it is really a good thing; a most precious stone! A marvel! And a wonder! A living stone: a life-giving problem! Despised and rejected by us; but chosen of God, and therefore precious; most precious. And it is all the LORD’s doing: it is marvelous in our eyes. For only by means of the problem, the offence, the stone, can we be taught of him “in the inward parts ;”  that in “the hidden part” (Ps. 51: 6)  we can be changed. And changed, there, freed! Only there, truly saved! For only in the inward part is the place where salvation is real. Knowledge in my head doesn’t save me.

     What if I shut my eyes to the truth; how could I see? If I shut my eyes to the offending thing, how could I know that that is darkness within in me? So if I am not brought to see my darkness, how can I possibly be saved from it? Why it would just lie buried in me! And I would think, “I see.” (John 9:41)  But darkness remaining dark in me, I actually wouldn’t, truly. And the stone will come and take me unawares. It will come and fall on me, and grind me to powder.

     But in coming to Jesus in the spiritual house, the inner sting of truth which once we so vehemently refused, is accepted; and once accepted, the possibility of its being found precious. And the stone which we at first refused becomes to us a delight! Made the glory of God, inside us:  as he turns “the sting” of the problem – the grit in the oyster – into shining pearl, within us. And the offence of the truth is become unto us the most wonderful gift. The chief cornerstone, the chiefest thing to us. ‘The head of the corner,’ first our crown of thorns, becoming our crowning glory: as we come to rejoice in the exposure of the stinging offence within us. Perceiving great value in it no longer perplexed by our problem. Rejoicing in his wisdom in turning the world to us upside down; and us back to front, and inside out!

     Not that which seems good to us has God chosen to use to transform our life, but those things which are an affront to us; things we naturally don’t like God has chosen. Things despised by us, he has made precious to him. He chose to use the things which seem to take away from us, to take away those things which we think we have of him: those things which have given us the illusion of the knowledge of him; but, being not, him, himself, they are deceitful things. All those pieces of knowledge, all those figurines of mine are beautiful, but they can’t breathe!! So in his love he comes as a thief to me, and he takes them all away! Stealing them from me, to give me that which does breathe: JESUS, himself, life! And the painful offence, in his stealing and taking away from me, he has turned to glorious joy in his own life in me! “The LORD, our righteousness!” The LORD, himself!!

     Truly, the stone most despised and rejected of men, generation after generation will be found to be the most precious stone in the whole temple of God; whose temple we are; because the foolishness of God, which confounds the wise, is wiser than men; and the weakness of God, which is the glory of God, is stronger than men. And in his wisdom it will be those things that the world has belittled and refused which shall be found precious at the end; as he restores all things, and unravels the truth: “even the mystery which hath been hid from ages and from generations, but now is made manifest to his saints.”

     And the mystery of God shall be finished. And he shall appear to our joy, and to their shame that reject the sting of death.      For the sting of death is sin: our refusal of any piercing light, exposing us to our own selves, is sin.  And it is sin, because it is a going away from the light…a running away from him, not a coming to him...it is a rejecting of JESUS.

     And so the last stone was delivered to the builders first; though it was put in place last, and at the end of the age. For in the heavenly house, the last stone is the first stone. The stone that bruises our head the foundation to bruise our heel that we might truly walk in the LORD; (only the lame walk ;) and this is the foundation stone upon whom the LORD builds. So, both come at the same time; that we might be built a complete house, a heavenly house, from the top down, right from the beginning. Complete, right from day one, even as babies are. Complete from the day they are born. Behold, I will do a new thing.

     My beloved, he is both Alpha, and Omega: the Beginning, and the End.  He is both the hard Question, and the joyful Answer. The stinging Offence, and the glorious Remedy; for when we comprehend the offence we stand in the truth: and there, and only there the possibility of being saved. Fused. Married. Complete.

                                       *

‘I thank thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that thou hast hid these thingsfrom the wise and prudent, and hast revealed themunto babes: even so, Father; for so it seemed good in thy sight.'