There is an irony that with all the advances in technology and conquest of outer space, there is yet still an emptiness in many people’s life. Though the inner space is so much closer to our own selves, many experience turmoil within it and cannot calm it. Why is this so?
Recently, sis Kok Meng Chow, one of the respected elders at Kajang Assembly of God shared an in-depth and comprehensive message about the cultivation of the inner space. This inner space that we are speaking about refers to the inner life of humanity where our heart, spirit, and soul are.
Because the outer physical world of our senses is so much more concrete and tangible, we tend to focus a lot of our advancement into it. Oftentimes, however, we end up neglecting the nurturing of what truly matters; our spirit and souls.
Sis Meng Chow shared that work is good, for we need to take care of our own lives. For many of us, there is also a family that we need to take care of. Still, amidst all the busyness, we need to ask ourselves, is our work producing fruits that would matter for eternity?
This is a question that each of us must ask ourselves individually. It is extremely important that we tend to our spirit, and this space can only be filled by God. Many such questions that we ask can only be answered by having a relationship with God and through the time we spent seeking Him in our time alone with Him.
If we want to live a victorious and a fruitful Christian life, we need to build a strong inner life, allowing God to fill the inner space. The Bible speaks in the Parable of the Sower of the good soil and of the bad soil. The seed being sowed is the word of God and the soil represents our heart conditions. How can we cultivate good soil within our hearts? There are several ways. The first is through building a strong prayer life.
Building a Strong Prayer Life
Why is prayer important? It is because prayer is our life line to God. The Bible says in Jeremiah 33:3 that we need to only call on God and He will show us great and mighty things. That line is always open, 24/7, but it requires us to dial in.
Nevertheless, though we know that prayer is an extremely important part of our Christian life, many of us struggle to keep a consistent prayer life. Even the disciples succumb to the weakness of their flesh in the Garden of Gethsemane (Matthew 26:41). We all recognize the reality that though our spirits are willing, our flesh is weak. So how do we overcome this problem?
We need to feed our spirits with the things of God. The parts that we feed will grow and become stronger. If we feed our spirits, our spirits will grow. If we feed our flesh with the things of the world more, our fleshly desires will grow.
Sis Meng Chow shared that while initially our spirits may constantly battle with our flesh, we must not lose heart or give up. We must keep pressing in. Over time and with diligent effort and the help of the Holy Spirit, our spirit will grow strong. Our spirit man will eventually rise up to tell the flesh who is boss.
How do we pray and what is prayer about? First, we must be intentional and make effort to build our prayer life. As we go deeper, we can pray in the Spirit. Prayer is also not just about meeting our own needs. Rather, prayer is about God and His will being done.
This is how Jesus taught His disciples to pray (Luke 11:2). Jesus pointed them to God the Father in Heaven and His Kingdom. To pray the Kingdom prayers as taught by our Lord Jesus, we must firstly know our Father in Heaven. We can come to God the Father only through our Lord Jesus Christ.
Another way we can pray is through the Closet Prayer. Sis Meng Chow shared that public prayers build the breath in our prayer life. It is the closet prayers however that will build strength and depth in our prayer life (Matthew 6:6).
Closet Prayer involves Time Alone With God and can be found in the secret place. The secret place is right here, within our heart, where our spirit communes with the Spirit of God. This is where we can meet with God and spend intimate times of quietness and unrushed prayer. We don’t need to go far away to some mountains to find God. He is right here where we are. All we need to do is to be still, and enter into fellowship, friendship and deep intimate relationship with God.
To be still means to be in the state of being where:
- We are at rest in His Presence: we stop fighting and struggling but let God be God
- We are anchored in God and understand the secret of being in His Presence
- We meet with God and loving Him whole heartedly; where God can love us unreservedly
- God communes with our spirit: inspiring, correcting, teaching, soothing and loving us
It is during times of stillness that we cultivate seeing eyes, hearing ears and perceiving hearts. In His Presence, something deep has transacted, something has changed from within. In that stillness, God wants us to know Him as our Father. Jesus revealed to the disciples the Father’s heart of God; our daddy God who is a good and generous God, who will loves and lavish His children with good things.
For those who are fathers and mothers, they will understand what it is to love their children. They want to give their children good gifts. Our God is a God of “How much more” (Matthew 7:11). It is only when we know God as our Abba Father, as the God of the how much more will we respond to His love as His children.
Once we know Him, we will be praying Kingdom prayers that will ignite Kingdom action for Kingdom advancement: “Our Father in heaven, Hallowed be your name. Your Kingdom come. Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. “ (Matthew 6:9-13; Luke 11:2-4). To know Him, is to love Him; to love Him is to obey Him.
Saturating Our Lives with the Word of God
Besides a strong life of prayer, we also need to saturate our lives with the Word of God. Scripture tells us in John 1:1-3 that Jesus is the Word of God and Colossians 1:16 says that all things were created through Jesus and for Him.
Sis Meng Chow communicated that something happens in our inner lives when we read the word of God for it is alive and powerful. The word of God is sharper than any two-edged sword; it pierces the spirit and soul and discerns the thoughts and motives of men.
In this manner, the word of God is like water washing us clean and renewing our minds. The Word of God is like refining fire burning up the dross and purifying our hearts. The Word of God brings life to our body, soul and spirit, transforming us into the likeness of Christ.
The Bible also counsels us that we will do well to guard our hearts by letting the Word dwell in us richly (Col 3:16). This is so that when we are squeezed by adversity of life, what comes out of our mouth will be the Word of God. We need to declare and decree God’s word.
When we decree the word of God, we will possess what we say. There is power when the word of God comes out of our mouth. So when we release the Word of God from our mouth, we are become God’s mouthpiece and we are releasing His will be done on earth as it is in heaven. This will change the atmosphere around us. We declare and decree His Presence, His Prosperity, His Blessing and His Healing.
Sis Meng Chow conveyed that we must learn to search the Scriptures and declare and decree God’s Word, bringing His will on earth – bringing light where there is darkness, bringing hope where there is despair, bringing life and healing to those who are sick, breaking strongholds where there are bondages.
Cultivating a Life of Praise and Worship
A third way we can cultivate our inner life is by cultivating a life of praise and worship. The atmosphere of praise and worship attracts the presence of God. When we cultivate a lifestyle of praise and worship, we will move into the glory realms where anything becomes possible.
What is the significance of our praises to God? God inhabits the praises of His people. Sis Meng Chow imparted that praise delight our God and the greatest instrument of praise that God has given us is our voice. We must learn to lift them up to God.
God breathes in our praises and He breathes out His Glory, which is His manifested presence. Sis Meng Chow shared that there are times when circumstances overwhelms us and we don’t sense the God’s presence. One way to get back right into His presence is to start to praise with thanksgiving.
Along with our praises comes our worship. Worship is our heart response to our revelation of God. It is a heart of adoration. As we press in, the Holy Spirit will reveal to us the majesty of our Father God and the beauty of Jesus. If there is a depth in the revelation we have received of God, there will be a corresponding depth in our worship, and the more we worship, the more revelation of God we will receive.
True worship begins with Jesus. Jesus is the way, the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Jesus (John 14:6). Without Christ, no one can truly worship God but all believers in Jesus can truly worship God. True worship must come from our spirit because God is Spirit. Right in the secret place of our hearts, the presence of God can be found. When we worship God, we look into His face and we are being transformed from glory to glory.
We become like the One we worship. We will slowly change and will take on His character, we talk like Him, and we walk like Him. We become more and more like Jesus and we become pleasing to our God. When our worship touches the heart of God, His Glory comes. Glory is the realm of heaven where His Presence is manifested. In His Glory, we can sense the majestic presence of God. In that realm, nothing is impossible.
Lives Lived Inside Out
Sis Meng Chow shared that as Christians, we are called to live our lives inside out, just like David who slew Goliath. There was a time when he was a solitary shepherd boy, tending his sheep all alone in the field. He fought the bears and lions where no one could see him. But this was also where David practiced his sling shots and where God trained him to fight.
When it was time, God rewarded David with victory when he killed Goliath in public, where everyone could see. This was because he had learnt to fight the lions and the bears in private, where no one except God could see.
She conveyed that we are all at different stages of our Christian life. We are all on our journey of life and the road ahead may have challenges. But there is also one certainty; our Lord Jesus did not intent that we just survive the journey. Jesus wants our lives to be fruitful.
God wants us to live an overcoming and victorious life. As we cultivate and nurture our inner life, our life will bear fruit. And this will only come to be when we take the cultivation of our inner lives intentionally and soberly.
NOTE: Much of this article was strongly guided by the notes provided through the kindness and generosity of the speaker and a desire to bless others through the message.
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Jason Law
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