The Dry Places

by Pam Clark

I was talking with one of my fellow minister friends tonight and we were discussing the dry climate in which we live, spiritually. We were talking about how God can move and position people by the circumstances they go through as they yeild to Him and His Plan. Often we do not know the Plan, although prophetic people may have a little more insight, but we do know (or should know) Him and His ways.

There can be a lot of talk about God in the land but how few really know Him and His Presence. When you are in His Presence you are changed, refreshed, revived and cleansed. You are more determined to do things right, not to just brag on things that happened. Most of my holy times are still at home, yet I have known days where it used to be at the church house. I also found there were seasons for this, and while we do what we can to maintain these seasons, most will document that "moves of God" come through prayer. Some say it starts with one or two, others say, a group determines it.

But is everyone praying for the same thing or the right things? This is where I am having a problem. I see prayer for things that don't bring out the holiness in me, or in others necessarily, and that is what I want! There are rallies, and then there are experiences. I am aware of God's Presence daily in my life, but I have had visitations and seasons where it has been very profound. Not all of these were precipitated by active praying. Some of these were the sovereign move of God in my life and for it I am very grateful, but nothing I did or could do can make those experiences happen, nor could anyone "prophesy" it. But they were experiences that changed my life and marked me permanently.

After being marked this way and then the usual consequential time of sorting through what just blew me away, which sometimes has taken years to assimilate and process, I know that I am never going to be the same, yet it also seems I am asked in a silent way after a season, "Do you want this?" And I know He is saying, "Do you want Me?"

Now many people write about this, some quite eloquently, but it is in these dry times that I think the most critical decisions are made. Sometimes I get angry and say, "God, where are You???!!!!" but I know He is really right there. I know from experience. It's like the poster of the storm clouds you've probably all seen that says, "I believe in the sun even when it is not shining." We must believe in God the same way.

Because of how I was raised, as well as how I have been taught, there are certain standards in my life, but it seems that fewer and fewer really share these standards. But one thing I have learned is that when I get critical, often it is God showing me it's time for me to make a difference. Because people feel called to make a difference in different ways, many see it as conflict rather than unity. That's too bad.

This is usually church traditions and religious ways that say everyone must do it in a certain manner. There is much of that that leads to conflict as many, INCLUDING PROPHETS, vie for having "the way" it should be done. It amazes me how much shame is put on people in the name of having the word of the Lord. When it is curses and heavy doom and gloom, I tremble for what might be a multiplied backlash upon that person, for if their words inflict pain and paralyzing fear and they did it wrong, it will still come back to them multiplied.

A curse causeless will not light, but if someone is deceived by it, and they are Christ's, it will be sent back to the sender. And if someone is not walking in righteousness but in arrogance, and the Bible says the heart is deceitful above all things, then woe to the offender for what will come back in retribution - a law as sure as gravity. And face it, we all offend! Do we know how to repent?

Repenting is changing the actions and the way one walks in their course of life, but repenting is also a spiritual posture. True repentance confesses that righteousness is the way to live. It's not just not committing the sin anymore, it's proclaiming the right way in that area and living the change. You can tell after a while who walks and who talks. There is a witness in the Spirit and the life.

But the tricky part can be that God's ways are higher and some things that we think we know, we don't. A policeman may not be candy coated sugary nice when he tells you to obey the law, but he does keep order and he does it for your good. But we seem to be a society that looks for ways to reject order.

Now there is legalistic order that binds and limits people from expressing who they are and can be, and there is an unrighteous authority that imposes an oppressive order for its end purposes of greed, but how few really seem to have a good discernment on that? We cry out to each other about the "religious spirits" but so few seem to press through with overcoming. They mostly just complain and point it out but they have no plan or overcoming life. Usually they complain and ask you to join their sorrows!

A plan that does not require that you live righteously is probably a man's plan and not the plan of God. I don't know about you, but I am looking for my places of oasis. Sometimes I have been thrown in the lake, sometimes I have fallen in, but other times, I am walking through the dry land. It is in these dry places where, as I mentioned earlier, that you make crucial decisions as to how you are going to live.

In my own life, I find places of stress that really test my everyday Christian lifestyle. Since I know when I am led by God in certain directions, if He is not speaking, I usually am not moving! Sometimes I think about doing it differently and may even start to act, but usually get checked in my spirit. So when that happens, I know that there are reasons why things are going on that I just do not understand, and, I do not have to understand it! I can have all the opinions in the world, but they don't change anything. This does not work if I am not living consecrated.

My ministry has grown and changed in such a way that I am not moving out without a partner. I have been single for 25 years and have done ministry and taken a lot of hits, and made a lot of progress, but I have made the serious and crucial decision not to move out in public ministry without my mate. Since I am still single, it's a waiting game. I will minister in the familiar places where I know and am known, but until I am married, you will probably not see me on the road. I appreciate your prayers for that.

I have had friends in the past that I partnered with, some good, and some not so good, and that was fine, but realize why so many successful ministries are family organizations and that is because there is a commitment that goes beyond friendship with family. I have been trusting God for many years and have made strides but realize that to truly make an impact, I need a ministry partner. Jesus sent them out two by two as a command. I have friends and covering, a good church home and accountability but until I get married, I am not moving out beyond a certain point BECAUSE I know what it will take to accomplish those things I see ordained in the Spirit.

Trusting God on this is a major thing. With lying signs and wonders, one really must be discerning and walk in faith. As I heard one say, we all have taken a bite out of the rotten apple. The Church must cover each other. Until it comes into a place where trust is not bred to gain personal advantage, but instead brings its collective wisdom for the good of all, the Church is going to continue to experience dry seasons.

Dry seasons can be good. Dry seasons will let you know who really has living water and who does not! Dry seasons will let you know your limitations. I can feel so dry sometimes and then be amazed at how much I find I have to give. In those times, God is showing me that my capacity has expanded. Dry seasons will also make me preserve the water that I have within. I will be careful with it and not just splash it around wastefully. When you need your strength to fight the stronger enemies, you preserve it for the confrontations that surely come.

New levels, new devils, as they say. When you are being promoted, you will be tested and you really will want to pull on all the wisdom you have gained. So often you find people who have the pat answers. I think that is the most exasperating! For all the married folks who say to me, "You should be happy single, just enjoy it, Jesus is enough," I think, "Should I wish you widowhood and aloneness? You will be fine, too! You are wishing it for me! Will that wish come back to you multiplied?" God Himself said that it is not good for man to be alone; and that two are better than one!

So often we don't really hear what the other person is saying. Another friend of mine just recently said to me, "I think we should pray for all the prisoners as if they were us." Well, there is some merit to that but this person was suggesting I pray for a certain person who was incarcerated for a terrible crime involving children and it was "the ministry" to support this person and want them out. I asked, "Do you want this sex offender, (who was complaining that he had taken a Bible course, but now he was getting out and no one wanted him their neighborhood because it had to be reported he was there), and I asked, do you want this person living near your high school aged daughter?" The reply was, "Well he won't be living near my daughter."

I replied that statistics show that rehabilitation for these type of offenders is very low and while I read his letter that he wrote wanting your sympathy and see a change of mind, I don't see a change of heart. There is a difference!!! If he lives near someone else's daughter, that is ok? But not yours? You say you want to be his friend, and this is your "ministry" and should be mine, but someone else carries the load? Where is the real wisdom? I don't see it.

Now don't get me wrong. There is a man in this city named Roger that I call my friend and who has ministered at our meetings who was a murderer, homosexual, drug dealer and pimp and he is living for Jesus today and has the most beautiful countenance of anyone I have ever seen. This man talks Jesus morning, noon and night and he also talks repentance from that lifestyle. He preaches it and obviously lives it. There is a difference. Many who know wrong from right can know it in their mind and confess that, but when it's in your heart, everything shows it. When I see Roger's life, I fear God.

Today everyone wants a rally and wants to call it God, but they are after the "experiences" rather than the changes. I want the changes. And usually you will get some experiences to go with your changes, but experiences alone are not enough for me.

Another thing dry places does is let you know that you are called to ministry. You can see so much not right around you and you can see the ways and how it should be changed and you go looking for someone, anyone, to help make a difference. Well guess what, what if it is you that should make the difference? It probably is! How many does God have to go around? Not near enough!!! We presume upon so few so often. We use them and abuse them. I have been guilty myself.

Often dry places are where people get their ministry callings but if they do not consecrate it and themselves, the ministry can become corrupted and void and flat. People don't realize how willing God is to help you get it going, but you do have to come under discipline because the plan is not yours, but God's! It's hard and sometimes we feel insulted or hurt when it doesn't go the way we want it to or think it should. But there is good news in that you can be sure of the Scripture. It is a tried and tested and sure Cornerstone for building.

Yes, God will weed out, root out, tear down and destroy, but He will also build and plant, of that you can be sure!!! These cursing ministries with no plans for building and calling themselves "God's Word" are probably not God's Word at all. God was pleased with what He made, and He called it good. (He is not in distress.)

He called Adam and Eve (Mankind) "Very Good" and in Isaiah 45:18-19, He says: "For thus saith the Lord that created the heavens; God Himself that formed the earth and made it; He hath established it, He created it not in vain, He formed it to be inhabited: I am the Lord; and there is none else. I have not spoken in secret, in a dark place of the earth: I said not unto the seed of Jacob, Seek ye me in vain: I the Lord speak righteousness, I declare things that are right."

If you know and believe in the power of God, you know that God is ruler over all. And if you don't know, He still is -- and one day you will believe! Believe in the goodness of God. Believe in His Plan. Act on it! It works. We'll find it when we seek for it with all of our hearts.