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Christ The Bridegroom
Episode #212
With Martha Kilpatrick and hosted by John Enslow
(M) But when it went to the husband as a source of comfort, love, understanding, listening, all those things, then it blew it up for me into that I am the woman at the well; And we all are; all of us are. She is the New Testament Gomer, and that’s why Jesus revealed His identity to her, and this is the one the Father seeks to worship Him, and to receive Jesus as Husband.
(J) I mean she gave… He gave her the, the New Testament worship. I mean He, He… Everything pivoted on what He said to her.
(M) And the most amazing thing is that the spring of water would be within her. Not outside, not up in heaven, not a relationship, but in the true union of Husband and wife, the true internal oneness where the source would be Him within. And the spring, as we saw when I was so sick, the spring was bubbling in spite of me. I had nothing to do with the bubbling of the spring. It was flowing because He places Himself within us as the Church, and as His Bride, and as the Believer. And I think in terms of childlikeness, that’s the level ground for male and female. Because a child, boy or girl, male or female, is a receiver entirely, owning nothing, having no rights. And that’s why it says, “there’s neither Greek nor Jew, nor male nor female.” In the Church those distinctions are obliterated because we are all children; that helps me understand. If a man is willing to come down to that level of weakness and receptivity, to live by being sustained outside of yourself, if a man can come there, he has come to being a child. If a woman will stop looking to a man, and come down to need, her need is for God, that no man can possibly meet, then we are all, we are all on the same ground as children. So we, I think C.S. Lewis is the one that said we are so feminine in comparison to God that we are all as female. We are so receptor’s that we are all female. But I like… I think I can see it easier as being a child who must receive all and owns nothing. So when we are all children together, as very much we are in this Body, then we are all on equal ground of need. But our need is not just for a Father; it’s for a Husband.
(J) Hmm, hmm.
(M) And really I think it’s pretty accepted fact that Mary the Mother of Jesus was pretty much as child when the Holy Spirit came to her, fourteen probably. So Christ comes in to the child, and the child enters the Kingdom, and the Kingdom is… The King is a Husband, and God is the great Father. So it’s, it’s… the issue of Husband that Fabiola brought to us is exploding for me. And it’s like the Holy Spirit comes to bring everything we need in relationship, that we cannot find in any other relationship remotely. It’s like I told my ‘divorcee’, (Martha laughs) you can make your children your husband. If your husband fails to be your husband, then you can… Oh it’s a danger these days in divided homes, to make the son the husband and split his soul right in two. And so, that’s my revelation of the morning.
(J) The amazing thing to me with that is that the Husband, the heavenly Husband, will use the earthly Body. You can’t be dogmatic about that; He will use the earthly Body. And I watched it during your sickness. Your need was met in a lot of different places, and the amazing thing was, is He was using the Body to bring the comfort, but the comfort wasn’t ‘in them’. We were just doing what He was giving us to do to supply for you.
(M) Oh, that’s wonderful, John, because you know, it was like you very removed. In my heart, though I was terribly touched and terribly grateful and amazed, it was like you all were not there. Because I was so desperate for Him that I knew, because He was giving me what couldn’t be logically explained. For instance, He sent me to the beach four times; and to the northeast ocean one time. And who would have thought that was a ‘need’. I never, I never even thought I was capable of traveling to that degree. And so, you’re right. I hadn’t even seen how much I removed you all, because… And you were wonderfully loving and there and comforting, but you all didn’t hover over me. You didn’t come all the time; you came as you were led. And so He was really Head of the Church during my illness so that, so much so that I wasn’t focused on needing you all at all. I wasn’t there, I wasn’t dependent, I wasn’t entrusting myself to you to solve it. To me it was much bigger than anybody could solve.
(J) He wasn’t just Head; He was the Hand.
(M) Ahhhh.
(J) He literally was touching you and your situation through this Body, and, and ah, does that make sense?
(M) Oh, absolutely. It makes me fall in love with Him right now, swoon.
(J) Well, it was like, you know, the thumb and the forefinger and the pinkie, we were all moving, and I believe that for the most part we were all doing it unto Him. I was standing in the promise that He had given me for you. And I was listening. It wasn’t like I was detached from you, I was very aware of you. But I wasn’t aware, I wasn’t involved in your exact circumstance in this point; that I was in a place of faith for your circumstance, so I couldn’t look directly and be involved with your exact situation. Does that make sense?
(M) Ohhhh. Oh yes it does.
(J) Ok, so I wasn’t involved with the illness. I was involved with what He was doing toward your illness at any given moment, but I was in a different place in my heart in faith that your illness was just momentary.
(M) So your faith detached you from meeting my need; whoa.
(J) Yeah, and my faith also put me in Him. I stayed abiding in Him in the faith. I was abiding in Him, and so then I could freely come and not be all… I mean because I can go there, I can go and be ‘wigged out’ at any given point. But I wasn’t ‘wigged out’, you know, I was worried. Jennifer in the office could see. You know, it was on my face, there wasn’t a… I wasn’t detached like la-la-la-la. I mean you were, you were right in front of me, and He was right in front of me all the time. And ah, the… It was a battle of faith. The entire illness was a battle of faith. Because I’d look at the circumstance and the situation and the pain or whatever particular thing was going on, I would be like ‘ouooh’! And I’d get away from it and I’d have to get into that abiding place because if I dwelt with the reality, and the visible reality of what was going on, it would have taken me down. And I can’t tell you that I didn’t go to bed just zonked because I had to do a fight to believe. But I abided and… but go back to what you just said; the faith was what kept me…
(M) From trying to be more than you could be to enable me. Enabling is trying to be the Husband to somebody that only Christ can be. My failing in most of my life has been enabling, trying to be a sufficiency to someone, and it’s impossible.
(J) It was so big that it was ah; it was possible. There was nothing I could do. How could I work out something that was completely out of my realm?
(M) Yeah, and in this there was no… There was only building my health, but there was no medication, there was no relief.
(J) And we did everything that could bring any kind of relief; we did it.
(M) Yeah.
(J) But ah, hmm.
(M) Yeah, and ah, but it puts that… That puts this issue of Husband… See, I understand idolatry; I really understand idolatry, but this was about Husband, and that puts it into a much more intimate, personal place. And I went back to a favorite scripture with new eyes this morning. Hmmm, I think its Isaiah 30.
(J) I love the fact that I wasn’t a source; I was a conduit.
(M) Yes, and that made me see Him. I wept in gratitude to Him and said, I have lived in a spa, I have been in a… I have been in a Kingdom during this time. Ok, this is Isaiah 30, verse 15. I remembered this. “For thus says the Lord God, the Holy One of Israel; in returning, or repentance and rest, you shall be saved; in quietness and trust shall be your strength.” And then he goes on to say, “But you were unwilling.” And the unwillingness goes on, ‘I went flying to the world, to the horses’. Verse 18, “Therefore the Lord waits to be gracious to you.” And in the Amplified this is so rich. “Therefore He exalts Himself to show mercy to you. For the Lord is a God of justice. Blessed are those who wait for Him.” “For people shall dwell in Zion, you shall weep no more.” “And though the Lord gives you the bread of adversity and the water of affliction, yet your Teacher will not hide Himself any more, your eyes shall see your Teacher, and hear a word behind you, saying, this is the way.” “Then you will defile your carved idols overlaid with silver, and your gold plaited metal images; images of the Lord Messiah, Who is Husband. You will scatter them as unclean things. You will say to them, be gone.” And I think that’s why my friend and I laughed so this morning, because we were saying ‘be gone’. You give me a lot of sustenance, but you are not Him. And if you gave me any sustenance, it was from Him.
(J) Hmhmm.
(M) If you gave me encouragement or a scripture or correction, it was Him.
(J) Hmhmm.
(M) Then, after you wait for Him, He longs, in the Amplified, He longs to be gracious. And He will… And what it means is He will come after our strength and our dependencies. And then He will give rain for the seed, livestock, ox and donkeys; every lofty mountain there will be brook’s running with water. And the water is flowing from within, from the Husband. So that was, you know, “in repentance and rest will be your strength.” So, anyway, I’m rejoicing this morning that I see the Husband, sort of in a different way, in a bigger, certainly a bigger way.
