The Knowledge of God - Part 3

Moses prayed, “Show me now Your way that I may know You.” I am amazed at the working of God, the world over. What I observe each year in many countries is this: God is at work breaking down denominational differences, prejudices, and ecclesiastical bigotry, where one group says, “We are His people.” The Lord is bringing His people together into the unity of the Spirit of God, irrespective of any denominational identity. In heaven, there are no denominational differentiations. If we truly know God, we will know that He has only one family. When people say to me, “Beuttler, you’re Assemblies of God. What are you doing in that place?” My response is, “I am having a good time with the rest of the Lord’s children.” The Lord’s Prayer begins with “Our Father, which are in heaven.” Notice that there are three things here: 1. The family. 2. The Father. 3. His residence. “Our,” this is the family. “Father,” obviously, He is the Father of this family. “Which are in heaven,” this is His residence. The Lord’s Prayer begins with the family – “Our.” And this pronoun includes all true believers in Jesus Christ, irrespective of the particular group that they are associated with. There is only one family, and we are brought together and united, both with other members of God’s family, and rightly related to our Heavenly Father, the God and Father of us all. This is part of “Show me now Your way that I may know You.” People think so differently. Different nationalities think differently. The Orientals think all together different from the way that you and I think or reason, as Westerners. This is one reason why the United States is poor in its relation with other countries, as they do not understand this. So it is with God and us. Man, in his natural state, does his thinking by the ways and thinking of the flesh, that is to say, our carnal nature, independent of God. But God thinks differently. I often run into this, where people think I ought to do this, or that, go here, there, or nowhere. God has other ideas. Some years ago I was in Marseilles, France on the way to Algiers. This was during their revolution. The French folk took me to the airport, and they said, “Brother Beuttler, do not go to Algiers.” I said, “I know God has asked me to go there.” “Now that cannot be right. It is not logical.” “Well, why not?” I knew what they meant. Everyone that could was trying to get out of Algiers to get away from the Arabs. They were killing people. They said, “Do not go. Everyone is coming out that can. Nobody goes there.” I said, “God wants me in Algiers.” I do not know French, but I studied French in Germany and could get a few ideas what they were saying - more than they would have liked. I heard the chairman of the Assemblies of God say, “That man is a fool.” Finally, I walked toward a pillar there and said to them, “Will you please leave me alone for awhile?” I put my head up against the pillar and said, “Father, tell me one thing. Am I going to Algeria or not?” And the Lord, in accordance with His thinking gave me an altogether different answer from what they thought. I was quickened with a Scripture. It is Ecclesiastes 11:4. “He that observes the wind shall not sow; and he that regards the clouds shall not reap.” I am trying to show you how God works, and how differently are the ways of the Lord. But God’s thoughts are higher than our thoughts. So at once the Lord answered and gave me this Scripture. I understood at once that the Lord said to me in effect, “Beuttler, if you are going to look at circumstances and events, you are not going to do anything. You will never get anywhere.” I understood, and came back to the group and said, “I am going to Algiers.” They still thought I was wrong, but I went. Sure bombs went off and there was a fire fight while we were holding a meeting down below street level in downtown Algiers. They had some 43 casualties while we were studying the things of God. They were killing each other upstairs. By the time we came out, there was a lot of rubble. I went back to Algiers a second and a third time in different years. I was the last foreigner that was teaching the Word of God there. Shortly after I left the third time, they were wiped out. I am still here. One year, Mrs. Beuttler came along. The French sent us into Algiers. My younger daughter Norma was along. There were risks, but we were in the will of God. “Show me now thy way that I may know thee.” One afternoon we had a service downtown, and we were on our way walking home and up went a building. This girl of mine said tearfully, “I’m going home.” We just cannot always follow the thinking of man. We have to check with the Lord. This prayer was uttered by a man who enjoyed intimate communion with God, who speaks with this man as a friend speaks to a friend. In Psalms 25:14, “The secret of the Lord is with them that fear him; and he will show them his covenant.” There are conditions here. There is a difference between being a child of God and being a friend of God. It is possible to be saved without necessarily being a friend of the Lord according to His definition or idea of friendship. I will give you a verse. Jesus said somewhere in John. I cannot always give you an exact reference because I speak rather extemporaneously. Jesus said to His disciples: “You are my friends, if you do whatsoever I command you.” In other words, true friendship with the Lord, as with the Father, involves the recognition of His sovereignty over our lives, and our subjection to His sovereignty in obedience to do His will whatever the cost. Could you follow this? It is one thing to recognize His sovereignty. It is another thing to subject ourselves to that sovereignty. I have seen signs or mottos in homes: “Jesus is the guest of this home.” When you are in somebody else’s home, you do not find fault with the home. The first thing I see when I come to your house is whether one of your pictures in the living room is hanging crooked. Long ago as a draftsman, I used to make drawings for the US patent office, so I have an eye for that. The first thing I see is: if that thing is an eighth of an inch out of line, I spot it instinctively. Well, I cannot help but see. “Jesus is the guest of this home.” I do not say anything, but in my heart I know that is the trouble with many a home. I have heard people say, “Jesus is the guest of my heart.” Jesus does not want the guest room; He wants the throne room. Very often, He gets the guest room all right, but self sits on the throne and does as it wills. If we are going to move into the true knowledge of God, into true friendship with God, one of the things that will be imperative is that we abdicate the throne of our lives, and turn the government of our lives over to Jesus Christ, as Lord. The term LORD is not merely a title. It has a very far-reaching connotation. Jesus said, “You call me Lord, Lord, but you do not the things that I say.” Many Christians say, “Oh Lord, and do as they please, but the two are incongruous. As soon as we use the term Lord, we testify either truly or on pretense that we recognize Him as the sovereign of our lives, and subject ourselves to His government to do His will. I was speaking in Philadelphia recently. One of the deacons said to me, Brother Beuttler, somebody asked me a question.” “Well, what’s the question,” I answered. “A lady wants to know why you do not stay home with your wife…” BUT, I am not on my own. When you are the servant of the Lord, you cannot do as you please. I am going to take you to John 21. It is not on my menu here, but it belongs. Those of you that say in your heart, “I would love to know the Lord, and have the experiences that Brother Beuttler has had.” So you say, “How I would like to enter into that realm.” Yes, but the higher the tower, the deeper and broader must be the foundation. Do you realize that for a good foundation in breadth and depth, there has to be corresponding excavation? When you are asking for the tower of the knowledge of God, do not think that God is starting by building the bell tower, and ringing the bells, the first night you are starting out. This knowledge of God, of which I speak, is not found in the bargain basement. Without excavating there is no foundation, except for a little shack, but not the high tower of the knowledge of God. A large crowd followed Jesus on one occasion in Luke 14. He stopped and addressed this large group and let them see the price tag that termed a true disciple; “He that forsakes not father or mother, or wife or children, brothers, sisters, houses, lands for My sake cannot be My disciple.” He did not mean we should hate because the Word says, “Love your father, love your mother, and you will live long.” We can extend the time of our life by honoring our parents. What Jesus is talking about is that anything beside Him must be secondary to Him. In other words, true discipleship involves the acceptance of the Lord as having total priority over our lives so that neither father, nor mother, wife, children, houses, lands, jobs, what have you, are permitted to invalidate His claim upon our lives. In John again, Jesus is talking to Peter. Here, I am giving you a truth that I did not see for many, many years. I am 69 years old next month. I was saved when I was 25 thereabouts, and all these years until about 20 years ago, I had never seen this until the Lord began to deal with me during the night hours. I would be up with Him during the hours of 2:30-3:30, or 4:30, and He would deal with me and open the Scriptures to me. One night, He was leading me into new dimensions of the knowledge of God, and drew my attention to John 21:18. Have you ever read in Ezekiel when he was asked to eat the roll, on which was written the Word of God within and without. This roll was the word of God, which was his message. The angel said, “It shall be sweet to your mouth, but bitter to your stomach.” As we begin to see this truth, it is sweet, but in its application, it is awfully bitter and that makes us bittersweet. God’s mature Christian is bittersweet. It is not all-sweet or all bitter, but God brings into our lives, shall I say, a balanced diet of both bitter and sweet. We need this. “Verily, verily, I say to you, When you were young, you girded yourself, and walked whither you would: but when you shall be old, you shall stretch forth your hands, and another shall gird you and carry you whither you would not.” John 21:18 Jesus is speaking of Peter’s youth, but has in mind his spiritual counterpart. “Peter, when you were young, you did as you pleased, but when you are old, mature, things are going to change.” As we talk about the knowledge of God, we are moving in the direction of maturity in God. I remember our little girl, Norma, standing in the kitchen with a little dress in her hand. Just a little thing, you know. She handed the dress to Mother and said, “Mother, put my dress on me.” So Mrs. Beuttler took the dress and the little girl stood there with her hands up, and the dress came down over her hands, you know with the sleeves - well you know how you put a dress on. Wife would make a little bow, a kiss on the top of her head and she was all fixed up. The Lord burned this into my heart one night, “When you shall be old, you shall stretch forth your hands.” This is hard to see for those who are steeped in psychology, because psychology is often the very reverse from the thinking of God. The Lord is saying here, “Peter, in truth, as you mature, you will grow from independence to dependence, instead of from dependence to independence.” A child is dependent, “Mommy, put my dress on me” But when they get older, they refuse help, “I can do it myself.” This is the natural way, but in the spiritual, it is reversed. The more we grow up into the knowledge of God, the more helpless we are: “Blessed are the poor,” the more helpless, the more dependent upon Him we become. Can we let the Lord re-clothe us in the process? Can we let Him take away our independent, self-assertive, all-knowing attitude and spirit, and give us another dress, and clothe us with dependence, with humility, with contriteness? “Another shall gird you. You shall stretch forth your hands.” We have it in the song, “I need Thee, Oh I need Thee.” This is not just for the sinner, but it is also for the saint. The saintlier you get, the needier you become, and the more dependent upon Him. We are just as needy, even when we do not know it. But as we get to know it, “I need Thee, Oh I need Thee.” Are we willing in the process of the knowledge of God, not only to be excavated from things He doesn’t like, but also re-clothed with dependence upon Him? We had Hattie Hammond up at school one year, and she told us something I have never forgotten. I have told it the world over. She shared with us an experience she had. She said the Lord gave her a dream. In the dream, she was to be the concert pianist before a great, large audience. In the dream she saw this great audience, this beautiful hall, lovely piano. The Lord bid her to sit down and play for this audience, and handed her a sheet of music. She put it on the piano, and when she looked at it, she was flabbergasted. She said, “Lord I cannot play this. It is much too difficult for me. The Lord then said to her, “Hattie, if you will depend on Me, I will help you, and you will be able to play it.” “Oh Lord, You better help,” she said. She started, the audience clapped, some stood. When she was finished there was a tremendous applause with, “Encore, Encore!” She was elated. The Lord handed her a second piece. She said, “Oh Lord, this is worse than the other. I will never be able to play this one.” The Lord said, “If you will depend on Me, I will help you. You can play it.” She answered, “Oh Lord, You better.” And she played. She finished with great applause and “Encore, Encore.” She was elated. Then, the Lord handed her a third piece of music, a very simple piece. She said, “Oh Lord, this one is different. This one I can handle, as it is within my capability.” She didn’t need Him, you know, not for this one. So, she played it, and made a mistake, and another, and another, and another. Some people got up, but they didn’t clap. They walked out. One after another walked out, and when she got done, there were only a fraction of the people left, nobody clapped, nobody stood in applause, nobody cried, “Encore.” They quietly went out, and she burst into tears and wept bitterly. The Lord said to her, “Hattie, you do not only need Me for the difficult task; you need me just as much for the easy task, for without Me you can do nothing.” She woke up, and knew what the Lord tried to get across to her - dependence. People do not know the Lord ’s Prayer. (In a sing-song ironic voice, he recited the Lord’s prayer): “Our Father, which art in heaven, hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done.” Amen. “Thy kingdom come.” Well what does it mean? Jesus said, “The kingdom of God is within you.” People do not know what they are saying when they pray the Lord ’s Prayer. They are not praying it; rather, they are saying it. We can say the Lord’s Prayer, without praying it. Most people only say it; they never pray it. “Thy kingdom come!” What does it mean? They answer, “I don’t know.” It means, “Lord, have me to recognize You (Heavenly Father) as the sovereign of my life.” Your kingdom come in my life. Establish Your government in me. Bring me into subjection to Your will, to the laws that govern Your kingdom. “Thy kingdom come.” Help me to be aware of Your sovereignty. Establish Your rule over my life in my heart. Help me to submit to Your will in obedience, and abide by the laws that govern Your kingdom. If you are after this knowledge of God, are you ready to abdicate your own kingship and sovereignty over your own life? Are you ready to resign from your self-life and give to the Lord the throne of your heart? Dependence – “And another shall gird you, and carry you whither you would not.” He will take you in ways, and lead you along a path that you would not choose. He will permit circumstances to come into your life that you would never select as a Christmas present. He will deal with you in ways that you would never chose by yourself. Mostly, I travel alone, and I sat in a restaurant in Melbourne, Australia, my favorite restaurant. It is just an average restaurant, very good meals, very ordinarily priced. I like it there for various reasons. They have a waterfall, and tropical fish at every table. I was there one afternoon and had lunch. I always select a remote corner, as I am a loner by nature. So I was there in my corner, and I was missing my family. I remember I had some noodle soup. In came a man, wife, two little girls who were just about the age of mine. As I was eating and watching them, I thought, “How wonderful to sit down with your wife and two girls and eat together. Here I am at the other side of the world by myself,” and tears started to trickle down into my soup. “And carry you whither you would not.” Do you think I choose to be there? I arrived in Iceland one year for meetings, and no one met me. If any of you have been there, you know what a God-forsaken island it is: no trees, no flowers, a miserable place. I was at the airport all by myself, which is way out from the city. I was tired, as it was a very long flight. I had no address. I went to an airline’s girl to tell her about my predicament. She said, “You cannot get out of this airport unless somebody gets you. There’s no taxis, no buses, nothing. If no one picks you up, you are stuck.” After an hour or two, I saw her again, “Anyway to get out of this place.” “No way, sir. Sorry, you are here. Not much pity. I found a US sailor and talked to him. That was the worse thing I did on this island. He felt worse than I did. He wanted to go home, and he was no help. I went back to the airline’s girl and said, “Sorry, but is there no way yet?” She said, “Did not I tell you that you are stuck, if nobody gets you?” “Yes,” I answered. So I walked away. She came back and said, “Sir, in a half an hour, I am off duty. I will take you to a town where you can get a bus.” The Lord bless her good. She took me, I do not know where, through volcanic craters (it is a volcanic island). How the girl had the courage to take a total stranger on a trip like that, I will never know. I wonder if the Lord intervened, as she got me there. I said, “Lady, I have no money as I cannot get to the exchange.” She said, “I will buy you a ticket.” I got to the hotel, the Burke Hotel, the only decent hotel. I did not know what else to do. The girl behind the desk said, “You’re American?” I said, “Yes.” I could feel the hostility in her tone. They do not like Americans there. “Sorry, no vacancy.” I thought she was lying. I explained my predicament and she said, “We have no room. You are American, aren’t you?” I said, “Yes.” “We have no room, sorry.” Do you know what I did? I spent the night in the park with the prostitutes and the drunkards. It never really gets dark. It was the time of the midnight sun, and the sun barely touches below the horizon when it comes up, so it was really light. You could read the newspaper at midnight, but even so. I moved from one bench to the other. you have a room? I can get you a room.” I didn’t want that kind of room. The next day, I was hungry. I looked for a restaurant. “Americans not wanted” was the sign in the window. Another, “Americans not served.” I went to a barbershop. I like to look decent. “No Americans.” I got nothing to eat, and I couldn’t get a haircut. I went back to the hotel. “Are you still here?” “Yes, Lady, nobody has come for me.” I explained the situation. “Would you please, could you just take me one night?” “All right. If you promise to get out tomorrow morning, we will give you one night’s room, but that’s all. Is that understood?” I answered, “That is understood.” I stood at that airport and watched a Pan American DC 7 take off for New York. I watched the people sitting by the windows, and the plane started to move, and tears trickled down my cheeks. I was the sole person standing at that airport. I looked at that plane and said to myself, “Lucky people. Tomorrow morning, they will be in New York, and I have to stay behind on this forsaken island.” When I come home and people say, “Brother Beuttler, did you have a good time? What are you going to say? They do not know what it means, “When you shall be mature,” as you develop in the things of the knowledge of God, there comes a time, and here is the whole thing in a nutshell, if you can grasp it. There will come a time, or should, in our Christian development, when we are heading toward a point where the initiative for our lives gets transferred from us to Him. “When you shall be old, you will stretch forth your hands, helpless, needy, dependent, and another shall gird you, and carry you whither you would not. This spoke he signifying by what death he should glorify God.” John 21:18-19 In this pursuit of the true knowledge of God, there is ahead of us, awaiting a death, a self-crucifixion, a crucifixion of all of our own ambitions, plans, wishes, and pursuits; where the motivations of our lives are brought into the channel of the will and purpose of God, which involves the crucifixion of the self-assertive and self-seeking self-life, death to the world, to the flesh, and to the devil. Do we still want the knowledge of God? Not what I wish to be, nor where I will to go, for who am I that I should choose my way. Moses said, “Show me now Your way that I may know You.” It has to be God’s way, and it is the only way to the true knowledge of God. I was on my way to Australia by way of South Africa. I had an invitation to minister in the Congo to the ministers deep in the interior. I had never been there and was glad for the opportunity. I had everything set, everything ready, when a few weeks before leaving, I became aware of the song of the Spirit singing, “Not what I wish to be, nor where I will to go, for who am I that I should choose my way.” The Spirit was singing. I am teaching you something here, if you are alert: the ways of the Spirit in dealing with us, in meeting us. You can pick up a lot of things as I tell you these things. It kept singing, and finally I said, “It seems like the Spirit is trying to say something.” It kept on singing, “Not what I wish to be.” I opened my heart and said, “Father, are You trying to tell me something? Is something wrong?” When I did that, at once in my mind stood the word, Congo. Well, I said, “Dear Lord, what is wrong with the Congo?” I got nothing, but this thing kept singing. I became more and more aware there was something wrong with my visit to the Congo. I said, “Father, I am on my way to South Africa. I can stop in the Congo without any additional airfare and have the seminar. What could be wrong with it?” I got no explanation, but I got the instinctive something that I knew there was something wrong with my going to the Congo. The Lord gave me no explanation. He just let me know there was something wrong with it. I said, “All right I will cancel.” So I canceled. Later, I got a letter back of very great regret. I had no reason except I felt I was making a mistake. That sounded silly, but this thing was not logical. Our logic may not be in harmony with divine logic. I find that in school, the students have an awful time in the things of the Spirit. It’s the same with psychology. They should be grounded in God first, then study the other. Well, that’s something else. I cut Congo out. Now it meant I had a whole week free. You cannot fill up a week like that. So I thought, “All right, I will turn it into a vacation.” I was at Kano. That’s a city at the south of the Sahara Dessert in Nigeria. I stopped there instead of going on to the Congo. I thought, “I will get a hotel and wait a week and then go on to South Africa.” I was sitting at the airport. It was furiously hot. As I was sitting there sipping away, a plane came in, a DC 6. That’s nothing new, but I watched the passengers get off: women and children only. I thought, “That’s funny, not one single man.” Five minutes later another DC 6 comes in with women and children only. I thought, “That’s a funny passenger group.” Five minutes later, here comes another DC 6, women and children only. They carried bundles. I remember a little girl dragged a doll along. I said, “Something is up somewhere.” I went down to the information desk and asked the lady. She said, “Haven’t you heard?” I said, “No, heard what?” “There’s a revolution in the Congo.” And where in the Congo?” I asked. The revolution broke out precisely in the same city where I was to have a seminar with the national pastors who would have been brought together into that very city where the revolution broke out, and I would have been caught in the middle of the thing. I would have been right in the middle, BUT, “Not what I wish to be, for who am I that I should choose my way.” If I had not responded to the leading of the way of the Lord, there is a great question of whether I would be here today or not. I would have been caught in the middle of the thing. And from the natural standpoint there was no reason to suspect anything. There are two sides to this coin. There is a death, and there is a life. Those of you who are praying now with Moses, “Show me now Your way, that I may know You.” This will lead to a path where, somewhere at a juncture, we will be brought into dependence, helplessness, reliance upon Him instead of self-reliance. There we can sing, “I need You, Oh I need You.” A place where we need to surrender the initiative of our lives and turn it over to the Lord, and let Him carry us in whatsoever manner or experience or situation that He will bring our way for the true accomplishment of the true knowledge of God in our lives. As we pray, “Show me now Your way, that I may know You,” may the Lord grant that somehow in our hearts there will come an echo from the throne of heaven saying, “My presence shall go with you, and I will give you rest.”

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The Knowledge of God - Part 3

Walter Beuttler

Walter Beuttler (1904 - 1974)

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