“How are you Walking”
By
Bishop M.L. Maughmer, Jr.
Isaiah 40:31 “But they that wait upon the LORD shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint”
OPENING:- When we look at this scripture we often read over it so fast as we often do with most scriptures that we miss out on somethings. If we look at this scripture and dissect it we will see 3 different levels or aspects if you will. Remember the number 3 is very significant in scripture, it represents fullness. Past, Present , Future – Spirit, Soul, Body – Outer Court, Inner Court, Holy of Holies, - Death, Burial, Resurrection – Father, Son, Holy Ghost – 3 people died on Calvary One died in sin, one died to sin and One Died for sin. So when we look at this scripture and dissect it properly we will understand the fullness of it.
Ω - But they that wait upon the LORD shall renew their strength – This is a promise – if you wait upon the Lord – to wait is to expect patiently, to serve thoroughly, to be in anticipation for shall renew – to restore or replenish, to revive their strength – the quality of being strong, courage, power, vigor. ***After the promise comes the manifestation of the promise.***
Ω1 - they shall mount up with wings as eagles; this is to soar. Everyone likes to soar because sore means I am above my troubles. Amazingly Eagles soar faster and fly higher than any other bird. They average speeds of 120 miles per hour (that’s a very significant number in scripture) in level flight, and have been clocked in excess of 150 miles per hour. When searching for prey, the eagle can soar to a height of one-half mile. From that vantage point, and using its exceptional eyesight (it can spot a rabbit from a distance of almost two miles!), the eagle can survey an area of some four and one-half square miles. Upon spotting its intended prey, the eagle will turn sharply, fold its wings into a tight, aerodynamic formation, and dive at speeds of up to 200 miles per hour! The eagle has 7000 feathers and its wings are so powerful that when a storm is approaching the eagle doesn’t fly away from the storm but flies directly into the storm. It flies through the storm until it reaches the mountain peak and then it takes its powerful talons and grips the mountain and stays there until the storm has passed. When we hear that part of the scripture we often get excited because if we wait upon the Lord we will soar and that is true but that is just part of it. That is emotional excitement – let me explain – there is nothing wrong with emotional excitement it’s o.k.; however, you can be emotional without being spiritual and that is where the problem is.
Ω 2- they shall run, and not be weary; people praise runners because runners so and ability to endure. When the runner carrying the torch into the Olympic Stadium runs into the stadium people stand and cheer as they run up the stairs. At the finish line of a marathon or race people cheer as runners come across the finish line. Sometimes it doesn’t even matter what position you come in just as long as you cross the finish line they are praised as runners – and everyone likes praise. Praise is emotionally stimulating – WATCH THIS – every preacher likes to hear after they have preached someone say that was good. It’s emotionally stimulating, it excites gladness and lets them know that the studying and time they put into this that God gets the glory; however, they are glad that you received something out of it..
Ω3 - and they shall walk, and not faint – Walkers aren’t praised like runners are praised, it’s not as exciting as soaring. However; walking is very important in your relationship with God.
Soaring & running are comparative to Sunday morning experience. People come to church on Sunday morning and are moved and motivated by the worship style, music, praise and so forth, but walking is relationship. How do you walk all the rest of the week? In your presence I can show you excitement. I can become emotionally stimulated - I can move to the beat of the music and get caught up in the emotionalism of the service, but my walk tells about my relationship with God.
You can’t tell if I am walking or not just by what you see on Sunday morning. WATCH THIS:- In the natural you may not see me walk , but when I go to the doctor for my check-up they are able to do a test on my heart and they are able to tell rather or not if I have been walking or not – Walking benefits your heart.
Health Benefits of Walking
Studies have shown that those who walk throughout their lifetime experience a few benefits others miss out on. Walkers are better able to control their cholesterol, blood pressure, and blood sugar levels. They are at less risk of becoming diabetic, and may be at lower risk for heart disease. The reduced risk of developing life-threatening disease alone explains how routine walking can predict a longer life span. Walking, Energy Levels, and Metabolism. Walkers have enhanced cardiovascular endurance, which makes it easier for them to move around in daily life as well. Everything from picking up babies to bending over to pick up something dropped in the floor becomes much easier and safer when walking is a part of the daily routine.
It’s the same way in the Spiritual we all have a appointment with our Physician and He is going to check our hearts to see if we have been walking with Him or not. When you walk with Him you can endure hardness as a good solider, when you walk with Him things are easier to handle. When you walk with Him you become like Him.
SPIRITUALLY WALKING WITH GOD:- There are several people described as “walking with God” in the Bible, beginning with Enoch in Genesis 5:24. Noah is also described as "a righteous man, blameless among the people of his time, and he walked faithfully with God Genesis 6:9. Micah 6:8 gives us a glimpse into God's desire for us: "He has shown you, O mortal, what is good. And what does the LORD require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God." Walking with God is not an activity reserved for a select few. God desires all of His children to walk with Him. My mind goes back to a song we used to sing years ago – “Walk with me Lord while I am on this tedious journey I want Jesus to walk with me”.
WATCH THIS:- What happens when we walk with someone? You are in close proximity. You talk, laugh, listen, and share your hearts desires, emotions, feelings, hopes, dreams, aspirations, likes and dislikes. Your attention is focused on this person to the exclusion of almost everything else. You notice the beauty around you or an occasional distraction, but only to point it out to your companion. You share it together. You are in harmony, and you both enjoy the peaceful camaraderie. Does anybody like to walk with their significant other?
Walking with God is like that. When we enter into an intimate heart relationship with God through faith in His Son Hebrews 10:22, He becomes our heart's greatest desire. Knowing Him, hearing His voice, sharing our hearts with Him, and seeking to please Him become our all-consuming focus. He becomes everything to us. Meeting with Him is not an activity reserved for Sunday morning for a couple of hours. We live to fellowship with Him. The desire of every Christian should be to live in a state of unbroken worship and celebrate a relationship like no other. This is only possible when we walk with God.
I WANT YOU TO UNDERSTAND 4 THINGS ABOUT YOUR WALK WITH GOD!
► 1. YOUR WALK WITH GOD IS IMPORTANT – as a matter of fact your life depends on it. Just like your life depends on walking in the natural. They tell those of us that sit in front of a computer 8 hours a day that every 50 minutes you should get up and walk for at least 5 minutes because it helps to circulate the blood and avoid the formation of blood clots. WATCH THIS:- Life is in the blood and a blood clot means the (life) blood isn’t flowing properly and if not treated the blood clot can travel to the heart and cause death. Your walk with God is important because the devil wants to kill your life, he wants to clot the life and literally stop your heart. YES your life depends upon your walk with God.
► 2. THE DEVIL HATES WHEN YOU WALK WITH GOD. He doesn’t mind you coming to church on Sunday, he doesn’t mind you singing and shouting, but he hates when you walk with God. Because when you walk with Him your relationship grows, you become more spiritual, you become more powerful. When you are stuck on soaring or running the emotional experience of church you don’t mind if you miss a service or not, after a while it gets easier and easier to miss church. But when I walk with Him I don’t want to miss out on my relationship.
You want to make the devil mad just do like the song writer said “Just a closer walk with thee grant it Jesus is my plea daily walking close to thee let it be dear Lord let it be”.
► 3. ANYTHING THAT AFFECTS YOUR WALK IS IMPORTANT. I had plantar fasciitis and it affected the way I walked. I would get up at night to go to the bathroom and I literally had to hop on one foot because if affected the way that I walked. The pain was so excruciating that I went to the doctor and I said I can’t walk the pain is to great. I ended up getting a shot in my heel of my foot because it affected the way that I walked.
When something affects the way that you walk you have to take care of it right away because if you don’t it can have everlasting damaging effects on the rest of your body.
STORY:- There is a man named Peter Jenkins and in 1973 he started walking across America with his dog. He walked some 5000 miles from New York to Oregon and it took him nearly 6 years. During the 6 year journey he was mugged and robbed 3 different times, he was stabbed 1 time, he was hit by a car, and his dog was killed by another car. After he finished his journey he was interview and asked the question was there ever a time when you wanted to just quit walking. He said yes. The interviewer asked him was it the mugging that made you want to quit or the stabbing, or the getting hit by a car or the death of your dog. He said no neither of those things made me want to quit. The interview said then what was it that made you want to quit walking and he said when I got sand in my shoes.
When you get sand in your shoes it affects the way that you walk. It irritates you and makes the journey uncomfortable. It doesn’t take a lot of sand but just a little bit of sand in your shoes will cause a blister on your foot to appear. A little sand in your shoes has the potential to cause life changing scenarios in your life. I like to walk on the beach with my wife it’s nice, romantic, sensual, relaxing and something we both love to do together, but when you get sand in your shoes it’s time to stop walking and take care of the sand.
Where are you going Bishop?
If you are trying to walk with God understand that the devil is mad and he is going to try to do whatever he can to affect your walk with God because he knows if he can affect your walk he will ultimately destroy your relationship.
UNDERSTANDING:- It’s not going to be the big things that he uses to affect your walk. Just like Peter Jenkins said it wasn’t the muggings or the stabbing but the sand in his shoes. The Bible says in Songs of Solomon 2:15 “….the little foxes, that spoil the vines…..”“
The devil wants to destroy your walk and he will use sand to destroy your relationship. He is to wise to come at you with the BIG STUFF because he knows you are expecting that so he is not coming with Drugs, Alcohol, Pornography, Adultery, or Fornication those are the big foxes.
However, he will come at you with grains of sand to irritate you like discouragement – Lord I have been asking you for this and I haven’t received it yet – so now you become discouraged.
You thought you were going to be the one that got to be the Pastor’s Aid president position and they chose someone else so now depression is a grain of sand in your shoes I’m not going back to that church because they just don’t appreciate me.
You thought tithes was under the Law and the sand of misunderstanding is affecting your walk.
The doctor said I see something in your x-ray so the grain of fear grips you and affects your walk.
Your company says we have overtime every Sunday for the next year the sand of greed now affects your walk because you take all the overtime you can get.
The pastor didn’t speak to you this Sunday because they were counseling someone the sand of pride begins to affect your walk. You say I can’t believe they didn’t speak to me today!.
Other grains of sand get into your shoes and begins to affect your walk like laziness, lack of time for self, worrying about things you have no control over, lustful thoughts, gossiping, excessive television watching, I’m too tired to go to church today, Sunday school is too early in the morning, Sunday school is for kids.
You might think it’s a small thing, but WATCH THIS:- sand can strip the paint off a car. It may seem like a small thing right now but it is slowly eating away at your relationship because it is affecting the way that you walk.
I said my wife and I like to walk on the beach. When you leave the beach area they have showers or at least a place where you can rinse your feet off with water. The problem is when you try to rinse your feet off you rinse on off set it down and begin to rinse the other one off, the one you just rinsed is covered in sand again. It nearly impossible to get the sand off your feet.
You have been trying to rinse off the sand of jealousy and it’s still there.
You have been trying to rinse off the sand of pride and it’s still there.
You have been trying to rinse off the sands of lust and they are still there.
You have been trying to rinse off the sands of habits and they are still there.
You have been trying to rinse the sand off of your feet only to have it still there.
► 4 The 4th thing about your walk with God is God never designed for you to wash your own feet. You have to allow Christ to wash you clean.
1 Peter 5:7 “Casting all your care upon him; for he careth for you”.
Matthew 11:28 says “Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest”.
John 13:5 – 9 “After that he poureth water into a bason, and began to wash the disciples' feet, and to wipe them with the towel wherewith he was girded. Then cometh he to Simon Peter: and Peter saith unto him, Lord, dost thou wash my feet? Jesus answered and said unto him, What I do thou knowest not now; but thou shalt know hereafter. Peter saith unto him, Thou shalt never wash my feet. Jesus answered him, If I wash thee not, thou hast no part with me. Simon Peter saith unto him, Lord, not my feet only, but also my hands and my head”.
I don’t know what you may be going through right now but I know without a shadow of a doubt that some have sand in their shoes.
This sand is causing you pain and discouragement. It is affecting the way that you are walking. You are at the point that you are about to give up because of the sand in your shoes.
But I dare you to be like Peter and say not just my feet, but also my hand and my head.
I dare you to be like David and say like he said in Psalm 51:2 & 7 “Wash me throughly from mine iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin. Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean: wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow”.
How are you walking?
After you have been cleansed and the sand is out of your shoes you must then go and help others get the sand out of their shoes so that they may be able to walk properly.
Bishop M.L. Maughmer, Jr.
