LAND OF THE LIVING
by Pamela Carter
I was alone on Valentine’s Day, February 14, 2008, and was feeling a bit sad because my husband was out-of-town and it was the 21st anniversary of the day he asked me to marry him. I was alone, so decided to spend time with my “other” Husband and Bridegroom, Yeshua (Messiah Jesus). I felt led to call a widow friend of mine, as I knew she would be alone as well. We often pray together and have had so many delightful experiences with the Lord. I was excited in my spirit to see what our Bridegroom was going to pour out upon us on the day of love, in our culture – Valentine’s Day.
As we began to ascend into our place in the heavenlies in Christ Jesus, I knew He was taking us into a new place, a place where we had never been before. All of a sudden I began to see a giant heart. It looked very much like a big valentine. As I traveled into this giant heart, I knew we were going into the very center of the heart of God. I began to taste the sweetness of the Lord, the “gooeyness” of the love of God. It was like biting into a dark, velvet Godiva chocolate that just melts in your mouth. I love chocolate and for about two years had been praying, “Lord, your love is better than wine (or chocolate)” from Song of Solomon 4:10.
I knew there was a greater love I could experience, had been contending for and asking God for. It was to have a fresh revelation of “the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living.” I had prayed, “Lord, astound, confound, and amaze me this year with Your goodness! Lord, I need to know that You are good and that Your love truly does endure forever.” I had been through some very dark trials and testing the past few years with my family, my ministry and interior life with Him. I knew the love I once had for Him needed to be rekindled and refired. I knew this was not something I could do but rather had to come by revelation and an experiential knowledge of the love of God through the agency of precious Holy Spirit!
I also knew this was His way of letting me go into the very center of His heart to “taste and see that He is good.” He is all sweetness, love and kindness, and every good and perfect gift comes down from the Father of Lights in whom there is no variance or shadow of turning. He is all gooey, mushy love, love, love for His betrothed, His beloved bride. He said, “You are My Sweetheart!” We were overjoyed and overwhelmed that the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords had called us His “sweetheart” on Valentine’s Day!
All of a sudden, my friend saw a picture of a honeycomb. We remembered when Jonathan and David were fighting the enemies of Israel, they dipped their swords into a honeycomb and “their eyes were brightened or enlightened.” So now, we had greater understanding that when we taste the sweetness of the Lord, our strength for the battle is renewed and our eyes are able to be opened to a deeper revelation and understanding of the realms of His love and goodness. So many believers talk about the “glory realm” as though it is some mystical place unattainable to lowly believers. What did God tell Moses? “I Myself will make all my goodness pass before you” (Exodus 33:19). This is His glory: His nature, character, goodness, and His unconditional love!
Now that Yeshua, Jesus, has torn the veils of our hearts, we are free to come boldly before the throne of grace and find help in our time of need, completely, and we are invited through His blood into the Holy of Holies.
As we prayed, the Scripture of Samson’s riddle at his wedding came to our minds: “Out of the eater came something to eat, and out of the strong came something sweet.” The answer to this riddle was, “What is sweeter than honey? And what is stronger than a lion?” (Judges 14:14–18)
The Lord spoke to me, “To the enemy you shall be strong as a lion, but when you are persecuted, lied about, or hurt or betrayed, you must, under pressure, endure hardship as good soldiers. Only my goodness, sweetness and love must come to the surface when you are squeezed!”
I began to see the areas in my soul where the little honeycombs weren’t filled with the sweetness of the Lord; they were filled with bitterness, anger, resentment and unforgiveness toward some who had hurt me very deeply. We both began to repent as the Lord gave us grace to give all to Him and to receive His cleansing of every hidden pocket of sin, so we could be filled completely with his goodness, glory and love. I wanted every area filled with the sweetness of the honey of the Lord’s goodness and glory. (Since my name Pamela means “all honey, and sweet spirit,” I figured I had better make sure I lived up to my namesake!)
Jesus went about doing “good” and healing all who were oppressed of the devil. His words, “If you do not forgive everyone from your heart, you cannot enter the kingdom of God,” gripped me!
I thought I had forgiven everyone in my life that had hurt me, but this was all those little hidden areas, or pockets of pain, hurt, disappointment and anger that had been hidden even from me. Through eating His “honey,” my eyes were opened and I was strengthened in grace to receive a deeper level of His glory, goodness and forgiveness.
In Hebrew, the word taste is from the word, ta’am, “to taste or perceive.” We then asked Jesus to fill up all those “combs” in the honeycomb in our hearts with His honey, goodness and glory, so only sweetness and love would be poured out from our lives. We wanted our hearts to truly and fully be “all sweetness and honey” to Him. Psalm 34:8 reads, “O taste and see that the Lord is good.”
It is the daily “tasting” and then the “seeing” Him as He really is that transforms us into His image and likeness inside and out! Proverbs 24:13 says, “My son, eat thou honey, because it is good; and the honeycomb, which is sweet to thy taste.” His word is honey and He is our goodness. Song of Solomon 2:3 says, “And His fruit was sweet to my taste,” and Psalm 119:103 reads, “Sweet are thy words unto my taste.”
As I repented, and was filled anew, I looked and there was another gate or door opened to us. I heard the Holy Spirit say, “Welcome to the Land of the Living!” We walked through the gates into this new land, the land of Promise, the Promised Land where the Kingdom of God is all light, love, glory and goodness. Revelation 21:23–27 speaks of His holy city where no sin can enter there. I believe the Lord is calling us as His Bride, His body, higher into this Holy City to walk in purity of heart, mind and spirit.
The land of the living is a spiritual place in a land flowing with milk and honey. It is a land of abundant living, where there is no need of the sun or moon, where only the Lamb of God and God Himself light the highways and only those who have been washed in the Word and in His blood can enter, live, move and have their being. We are to be strong as a lion but sweeter than honey to the unsaved as well as our brethren, and live in the goodness of the Lord forever! I believe, now more than ever, it is the time we must live in this new place in Him!
Revelation 22:14 reads, “Blessed are they that do His commandments, that they may have right to the tree of life, and may enter in through the gates into the city.”
Suggested Resource: Ultimate Passion
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Pamela's heart is to communicate the Ravished Heart of Jesus for His Bride and to divinely imprint upon the spirit of man the very heart and image of the Father through arts and media.
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