MTP October 15, 2024 | 13 Tishri 5785

STEEP

From steeping in this week’s podcast, there are two sentences that have become anchors for me, tangible takeaways I use to tend my tether to Elohim.

The first is, “Take the fruit or marry the root.” This sentence, for me, is basically the entire concept of this podcast brought into one simplified sentence that I use as a filter to stack my actions and intentions up against daily. Basically asking myself in the moment, “Am I taking what fruit I can get for myself here, or am I married/connected/grafted to the Root, the Source, so that fruit can be produced through me?” This has brought a consciousness to my everyday choices that has been very good and very growing for me.

The previous two podcasts have had me asking Elohim to shine the Light of Jesus and reveal to me all the places I have been self sourcing, or “building golden calves.” So no surprise that this week He so sweetly offered such a simple sentence to help sort my sourcing.

The testimony I’d like to share that has come from applying this anchor is, not surprisingly, that I have been held in His harbor. Held in the safety of the place He’s provided. Held in the grace of a sustainable transition. It has grown my love for, and trust in, Elohim’s plan, pace, and portion.

In the past, when I’ve recognized an invitation to new lands or new plans, I’ve either run out in my own execution of the plan or ran away from it altogether. Obviously neither led to me dwelling in what He had planned. But now that it feels like falling in love instead of fulfilling a plan, everything about it has been testimony. No stark and sudden change has been demanded of me to be worthy of His fruit or helping hand. He has gently revealed my plans, and lovingly invited me to His, in the grace of daily bread.

The sustainable transition of it all has absolutely wooed me. With every step I am overwhelmed by the goodness of His plan, and His safety and provision for me in it. It “renews my strength like the eagle’s” and quickly spurs my trepid steps to trusted soaring. How great is our God! The God of a sustainable transition from simple seed, to abundant harvest! The God who loves the journey, because that’s where the relationship is!

The second tangible takeaway this week’s steep is growing in me is that “atrophy is inevitable if effort is not applied.” The heart of this one is just the reminder that a marriage takes effort. Being “married to the root” is not a passive happening but an intentional act.

In the podcast, Ma shares about the Hebrew word laqach. She was brought to this word when she was steeping in the word Elohim had for her for 5785, “seized by affection.” (Ha, I’m just now realizing that that’s exactly what I was trying to express in my testimony shared in the previous portion! Wooed by His goodness in the sustainable transition, seized by affection, continuously strengthened by the joy of who He is to me!)

When I heard the word laqach, I immediately recognized it from a previous podcast and felt to look into how it was shared there as well. Here is an excerpt from the Morning Tea Podcast of January 11, 2022 when Pa shared on the word laqach.

““A word was secretly brought to me, my ears caught a whisper of it.”  Job 4:12

‘A word was secretly brought to me, my ears caught a whisper of it.’ I love it. I felt like Pappa said we need to hear ‘caught’, my ears ‘caught’ a whisper. The word for caught is laqach (H3947), it’s a verb made from lamed, qof, and chet. It also means, this is not the covenant but the word also means, ‘to make a choice of marriage.’ Dang. So to catch a whisper with your ears means, it isn’t just like, I’m passive and I get hit with something, but to catch. Like if somebody throws a ball at you, you have a choice of whether you’re going to grasp your fingers around that ball and catch it. So there’s a choice. So my ears chose to receive a whisper. That choice was a choice of marriage. When our ears are open we can hear the still small Voice and it calls us to say yes to Jesus, it calls us to become the Bride. It calls us to become One with the Spirit.”

Not passive.. it’s an action.. an effort applied.. it wasn’t long ago that this phrase would’ve roused a whirlwind of reaction for me. For most of my life I felt like I was putting the most extreme effort I could muster into everything I did. But that very rarely bore the fruit I had hoped for or expected. Or when it did, more was expected of me. There was never a fulfillment of the expectations. It all felt so unsustainable. Eventually, I began removing myself from everything that felt unsustainable. And it wasn’t long before anything that required any effort at all felt unsustainable.

Often times when we talk about the ways we tend to our personal intimate relationships with Elohim we use words like, “daily” and “consistent,” and for good reason. It is important that we are consistent with tending to this relationship, daily. But my hang up was thinking that consistent effort applied required consistent tasks accomplished.

When I’d set the goal to “journal every day” or “consistently do a wait first thing every morning,” every time I didn’t follow through I was increasingly disappointed in myself and drifting further and further away from trying again tomorrow.

Because not meeting these goals was drawing me deeper into self hatred instead of drawing me deeper into His heart, I decided to stop setting goals altogether and just “let our relationship unfold naturally.” Which sounded good at the time but then I realized, it wasn’t. It wasn’t unfolding naturally because, as we said before, relationships require effort.

Back to the drawing board. So I asked Elohim about how to make this impossible possible and He offered me a new perspective. Instead of the goal being to daily apply effort to a specific task, the goal is now to daily apply effort to our relationship. That I can do! And the more I do, the more I fall in love, and the more I fall in love, the more effort I want to put into our relationship. It’s a really sweet cycle.

Living in this space of being pierced by who He is and what He’s doing keeps my thoughts on Him and His goodness. And this keeps my ears open to catch the whisper, to recognize the invitations to brew rendezvous or to trade my plans for His. It keeps me ready and willing to apply the effort with Him in this sustainable transition to becoming one with the Spirit.

INVITATIONS

1. Let Elohim shine the light on any places you are taking the fruit you can get for yourself. Look for the fear that causes this (of lack, failure, loss) that keeps you from the fruit that comes from being wed to the Root, the Source.

   Am I taking what fruit I can get for myself here, or am I married/connected/grafted to the Root, the Source, so that fruit can be produced through me?”

2. Journal about any rendezvous you’ve had with Elohim. How have things been/felt different since becoming intentional about special appointments with Elohim?