"Yet I will distress Ariel, and there shall be heaviness and sorrow; and it shall be unto me as Ariel [once more]." Isaiah 29:2
Before Jerusalem can be the "Lion of God" once more, it must go through heaviness and sorrow. There is no escaping this fact: there are no crops unless the seed dies, no remission of sins without the shedding of blood, no change without pain, no glory without desolation. If we would be everything God wants us to be, it will mean the death of everything that is not of Him. That process will mean pain and sorrow and heaviness, but its fruits are joy and peace and all the evidences of God's Spirit.
At salvation, the old man died and is no more; the inner man is now Christ (Galatians 2:20). The battle line is drawn between the life of God within you and your dead body without (Romans 8:1-11). All the old habits and thought processes formed by those habits will have to go, and that means death and pain. To be formed into the image of Christ means a shattering of the old image of man.
We do not take seriously our prayers to be "like Christ." To be "like Christ" means to pray the prayer that Paul prayed (Philippians 3:10). Are we ready for that kind of likeness? Are we ready for the total wounding to annihilation of our pride? A total collapse of our self-reliance? A total loss of our control over our circumstances? Are you ready for desolation? Are you really ready for glory? It will mean walking through the valley of the shadow of death first.
"What Pains You bring me through,
I am in Fellowship with Christ.
Through the Fires I come forth
Purer than Gold..."
-Jon Vowell
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