Yesterday afternoon I had the opportunity to sit down and record the new song, The Narrow Road. In all honesty when this song was given to both myself and Netty, I struggled and had little desire to do anymore with it. Not the song itself but any music for that matter. The thought of doing anything met with a lot of resistance and I couldn't understand why I was feeling this way. IN fact the last two songs were very difficult to record. I didn't have a peace about putting them up.
When I talked to Abba about it, what He revealed wasn't easy for me to accept at first. It was very painful because of some doors I had opened up that He did not intend for me to open. The fault does not lie with those who were used to bring me to this compromise and the direction Spiritsong was forging headlong into, but my own blinded disobedience. When I look back at how Abba blocked and strongly hindered me from the new direction I thought He was allowing me to go into with the music, I was too filled with pride to see it. This was my KICKING hard against the goads.
A goad is a stick with a pointed piece of iron fastened to the end of it. This instrument is used to prod the oxen on when they are plowing. When a stubborn ox attempted to kick back against the goads (pricks), he would actually wound himself. The proverb was often used to teach the lesson that it is foolish to rebel against a powerful authority. Any attempt to do so would result in much greater difficulties..... And hurt it did!
Because of my stubborn disobedience, Abba Father prodded me to take down the two songs I recently recorded called, Against a Thorn and Invisible People. The way I went about doing these songs were not HIS Way. And being they are HIS songs, whether I receive the words and music or the music to songs given to another, if they have the taint of mans hand and the flesh upon them it deeply grieved His Spirit in me. When He revealed that it really HURT, but I KNEW it to be true! Some may not understand this kind of spiritual discipline, but when you desire to yield fully to His Spirit and no longer live in such a way that coddles and makes excuses for your own fleshly desires than you welcome His discipline.
Psalm 94:11-13 11The LORD knoweth the thoughts of man, that they are vanity. 12Blessed is the man whom thou chastenest, O LORD, and teachest him out of thy law; 13That thou mayest give him rest from the days of adversity, until the pit be digged for the wicked.
Proverbs 15:9-10 9 The way of the wicked is an abomination to the LORD, But He loves Him who follows righteousness. 10 Harsh discipline is for him who forsakes the way, And he who hates correction will die.
Hebrews 12:5-9 5And ye have forgotten the exhortation which speaketh unto you as unto children, My son, despise not thou the chastening of the Lord, nor faint when thou art rebuked of him: 6For whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth. 7If ye endure chastening, God dealeth with you as with sons; for what son is he whom the father chasteneth not? 8But if ye be without chastisement, whereof all are partakers, then are ye bastards, and not sons. 9Furthermore we have had fathers of our flesh which corrected us, and we gave them reverence: shall we not much rather be in subjection unto the Father of spirits, and live?
I asked Mike and Netty to pray with me about the Lords heavy dealings with the music of Spiritsong and how I have so grieved Him. The tears and inner grief came pouring out in repentance. At first I wanted to lay it all down, but that was only self pities attempt to sabotage what Abba was trying to teach me about the true call to His music that has come out of my worship, prayer and fellowship time with Him throughout my walk. A call To not separate the gift He gave which included the guitar and His songs to be used in perfect harmony and/or to take what He gives in Spirit to be a work of the flesh for my own selfish gain.
Prior to my calling for prayer, I did receive the melody to the Narrow Road song, but the spiritual flow was NOT THERE, especially what "I" was attempting to do with the chorus. I had to stop because I KNEW if I proceeded to go through with this song without His anointing and KNOWING that I have had with MOST of the songs He has given, it would have to be given up and sacrificed like the two previous songs I recorded. The next morning after praying with Mike and Netty I went in the back room to pray. I felt the Spirit move me to get my guitar to worship Abba. I sang to Him about two songs and then out of nowhere I began singing the chorus to the Narrow Road. I thought to myself, "wow Lord, You are giving me this melody that brought such joy and excitement to my Spirit."
When I played the verses and chorus together, I noticed it had the feel of another song that was quite different from the verses I had gotten the melody to. "LORD, what do I do with this?" ..."Play it together and you will find that though they be vocally challenging, the two will compliment each other."...... I found the chorus to be a DEEP cry of ones heart while journeying on the long hard narrow road. Especially when you meet up with the constant battle of your flesh and those outside demonic forces that work at trying to get you off that road to the road of compromise or broad road leading to destruction. I was so excited with this break through that I couldn't wait to give Mike and Netty a call.
As I was attempting to work on a blog the phone rings. When I answered I hear Mike on the other end with his greeting, LOL! He had gotten a word for me that he read later on in the day after we all prayed together. He knew immediately after reading this word it was for me. But before He could get it out I told him what happened. What a time of rejoicing and praise to our Abba! \0/ This is what Mike shared. I was going to put up a post about my call to obscurity that would include this word he shared, but it just wasn't coming together. Spirit had this post in mind in it's place all along.
<3 I LOVE YOU, ABBA! <3
The following quote was taken out of “Renewed Day by Day” by A.W. Tozer
What we do for God must be done in the power of the Holy Spirit, and we know and accept the fact that we may have little praise from men. But what we do accomplish for Him as a true spiritual work done with eternity in view, will have His praise written across it! Most of us have never heard, or do not remember, the name of the humble sixteen year old girl, whose singing ministry brought such spiritual results in the Welsh revivals with Evan Roberts. This quiet, humble girl would sing the gospel songs and much has been said about her spiritual gift, the Spirit-given ability to glorify Jesus Christ as Savior when she sang.
Not too much has ever been said about her voice, but the record is clear that she was a gifted soul–that the Holy Spirit seemed to be singing and moving through her yielded expression. Evan Roberts would then rise to preach and there was little left for him to do. He said that he would quote from the scriptures and add an exhortation and the people were ready to come to Christ. She had melted them with the warmth and the power of the Spirit! Oh, what we would be tempted to do with her ministry today! We would put her on a coast-to-coast network tour, show off her talent–and spoil her!
Thank God that they knew better than to start writing her life story. She was a beautiful example of the humble use of our spiritual gifts for the glory of Jesus Christ–a simple Welsh girl willingly controlled by the power of the Holy Spirit!
I believe this pretty much speaks for itself. You see ABBA is a JEALOUS Father over His children. I have known this calling for some years now that has come under a lot of attack as our adversary attempts with every effort to exploit this gift and make what Spirit has given, the Way He has given it to be tarnished, tainted and to remove the purity of Spirit in the songs He gives that reflects my spiritual journey in Him. I pray it will NEVER be "I, me or my" when it comes to His music and my own walk with Him, but CHRIST ALONE! Abba got me up at 3am to type all this. I have some places I have to go to around noon with my daughter and hope to download "The Narrow Road" (I recorded yesterday) sometime this afternoon.
I just want to briefly share how the recording came together. I practiced playing the song a few times before recording it. It is VERY rare that I can record a song all the way through without making mistakes and starting all over again. Well, this song happened to be one of those rare songs that I did only ONE recording all the way through. : ) \0/ I am very thankful for Abba's grace, help and anointing with this song. Usually recording the first track of the song all the way through becomes the greatest challenge and the vocal harmonies, dubs and echoes are the easiest part of recording for me. Well with this song it was reversed. LOL! It took me quite some time to layer the additional vocal tracks and yet WHAT JOY it was putting it all together HIS WAY!
........STAY TUNED IN to Spirit and check back later to hear the new song which is a new chapter of my walk in earnest through faith, and by His grace setting my heart, mind, eyes and ears on Jesus the author and finisher of His faith in me by staying on the Narrow Road.
<3
Linda @->--