Breaking Default

Behold I am doing a new thing.

The last couple of weeks have been a battle. It has seemed that no matter how long I spent in the word and in prayer (at least trying to pray!) I was coming against a very real heaviness. Most days I succeeded in breaking through into a place of peace and rest in Him, only to wake up the following morning to find that someone sneaky had pressed the reset button in the night and again… there it was, that extreme heaviness, the one I had prayed away the day before, back with even more intensity.

When I asked the Lord what on earth was going on He said "keep pressing in because I AM BREAKING DEFAULT." I had an idea of what the Lord was saying, but as ever I find when I begin to dig, He reveals so much more. The original Latin meaning of default is: to fail, to disappoint, to deceive. In modern language it has come to mean….

• something that is usual or standard 

• a selection made usually automatically or without active consideration due to lack of a viable alternative

• a selection automatically used by a program in the absence of a choice made by the user

• Failure to act: inaction or neglect

• Failure to pay or to fulfill or satisfy an engagement or a claim

• Failure to fulfill an obligation especially to repay a loan or appear in a law court

These definitions are so telling and revealing! 

At first they seem disparate, but when the Lord speaks, He chooses His words carefully. 

3 things stood out to me:

• Something usual or standard (normal!)

• Something AUTOMATICALLY selected in the absence of choice or without consideration

• Failure

I know that when I am going through a tough time, I don't automatically slide into a posture of trust and faith, (I have to actively consider and CHOOSE trust and faith!) I slide automatically into default mode and that place always (to me anyway) reminds me of how and why I failed.

For each of us our default will look different but we all have one. The default position is the place we are in when we are not walking in faith, when we are not following the impulses of the Holy Spirit. It is the place of reason. It is our own uncrucified voice, and the voice of the accuser. It is all of the reasons why we can't and shouldn't. It is the voice of fear and anxiety, of doubt and of unbelief.

My default definitely looks like doubt and unbelief... Did God really say!? It looks like intimidation and independence and isolation (I wonder why that one has been coming up!?) When I look a little deeper I see that fear is also there... fear of not being enough, which leads to striving on the one hand (I WILL be enough) and apathy on the other (what's the point, I will never be enough). It's a place where I feel voiceless and purposeless. 

Why does default look like failure.. Because inherent in the word default and the way we use it is the notion of going back to something, but God is all about the new..

See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland. Isaiah 43:19

God is ALWAYS doing a new thing. Living by faith is ALL about the new! We don't believe God by faith for what we already have, or what we had yesterday or what is normal or usual or standard or possible. We believe Him for NEW! For over and above / for impossible.. Otherwise it's not faith! And this is the only way to live as a Christian:

Now the just shall live by faith: but if any man draw back, my soul shall have no pleasure in him. Hebrews 10:38

I began to ask the Lord how He was going to break default and it was about a week later, after trudging through the desert of my own default settings day after day, that I was reading through the first few chapters of Joshua and this verse leapt out:

As Commander of the army of the LORD I have now come. Joshua 5:14

I immediately felt the weight and significance of this and I knew it was my answer from the Lord.

In these scriptures in Joshua, the Israelites have just crossed over the Jordan into the promised land (Joshua 3:14-17). The reproach of Egypt has been rolled away (Joshua 5:9) and there has been a fresh circumcision (Joshua 5:2-8). Passover has been celebrated for the first time since leaving Egypt (Joshua 5:10). (Incidentally, Passover, in the Jewish calendar, has just been celebrated, from 8-16 April). The people of God stand on the edge of the land of Canaan but have yet to go in and occupy. It is here, near Jericho, that Joshua looked up to see the Commander of the Lord of Hosts standing before him. He fell face down in reverence, and the commander of the Lord's army said: "Take off your shoes because the place where you are standing is holy ground". (Joshua 5:15)

Beloved, I believe this is exactly where we are at. We are standing on holy ground poised on the cusp of something very new…

Everything in this passage of scripture tells us that before we can go in to occupy the promised land there has to be a fresh consecration and circumcision of our hearts. We can't go in without the fear of the Lord. We can't go in without a positioning of our hearts upon the altar. We can't go in without holiness. We can't go in, in our own strength with our own strategy.  We can't go in dragging default with us.

There are a people who have been laid down before the Lord in the last season, who have invited Him to search their hearts, who have said ‘create in me a clean heart oh Lord'. A people who are yearning for breakthrough, to see promises fulfilled; to see the Kingdom of God come. To see the constraints of religion broken and the glory of the Lord made manifest. There are a people who, in this lockdown season have heard the emptiness in their souls and have felt their lack and who have found themselves going back to default (again) and asking the Lord ‘Did you really say? 

I want to tell  you that YES! God did really say!!

The Commander of the Army of the Lord has now come. He has come in response to a people who have separated themselves from Egypt, who have allowed the discomfort of the awareness of their default sins to drive them to a deeper place of repentance. He stands before us to wage war on our behalf. He has come as The Lord Almighty, Jehovah Sabaoth to break our defaults… our Jerichos, those seemingly insurmountable foes, our signature fears, doubts and unbeliefs that stand between us and the new; between us and the promises the Lord has given us. 

And the enemy of our souls has also been standing before us. Over the past few weeks in particular, he has loomed large and he has cast a long shadow. He stands as the counterfeit of the Lord of Hosts, as the accuser, as the one who would keep us bound in slavery and wandering in the wilderness; locked and trapped in our default settings: In doubt, fear and unbelief. He stands before us as a legalist, reminding us why we have failed to fulfil our obligations….why we have defaulted on our payments in the courts of heaven; why we will always be the way we are and why we can never change and move into our promised land. Default has been screaming and demanding our attention. It is rooted in the plane of earthly wisdom and horizontal listening. It is a looking in on ourselves and a partnering with condemnation.

Even for me to release this word there has been such a battle… I can't tell you the weight of the lies and chatter and witchcraft that have come against me over the last couple of weeks, the accusations of the enemy, the myriad reasons (reasonable reasons!!) why I can't and shouldn't and won't!! because this (writing) for me represents a stepping away from default into the new and the opposition has been fierce!!

And I KNOW I am not alone in this..

Default is at war with new. This is transition season! We are poised to go in; there is a battle over the release of the new, and there is a battle for your eyes and your ears and your mouth and your heart.

Who will you look at? Who will you listen to? Who will you believe? Whose words will you speak?

Will you trust in the accusations of the enemy, look to reason, to your track record, to your regrets, mistakes and failures and retreat into the prison of default or will you look up as Joshua did into the eyes of Jesus… the Commander of the Lord's armies.

As the Lord breaks default in our hearts, He is also breaking default in the church. What is standard in the world is not what is standard in the Word. What was usual or standard in the last era will not be usual or standard in the new era we are moving into. There is a breaking and a dismantling of the way the church has been. 

A friend of mine had a dream a few years ago where the Lord showed her that the walls of the church were coming down; everything that is not of Him and rooted in Him is going. Everything that is not of faith is going. Things are going to look very different. The normative position of much of the church for a long time has resembled more and more the shape and flavour of the world rather than the shape and flavour of heaven. The old structures and ways of going about things will not be able to contain the new that He is doing and bringing upon the earth; we will simply be unable to go back to them. It will literally feel like a dog returning to vomit…

As a dog returns to its vomit, so fools repeat their folly. Proverbs 26:11

This new era will need (NEED) His people to walk by faith and not by sight. It will not be optional any longer...

For we walk by faith, not by sight. 2 Corinthians 5:7

This is also a battle over identity…

The Lord is shaking the world out of the church and bringing her into her God ordained identity. 

There is a wrestling going on in the spirit between the default and the new, between who we think we are and who God says we are. Between the orphan and the son. Between fear and faith. Between what was and what is becoming.

We can’t take default with us into the new because default is not of faith… it is of the carnal mind, it is enmity against God, it is not subject to the law of God, nor indeed can be (Romans 8:7).

As we look up at Him, into His eyes (be intentional to look Him in the eyes!!) we will see ourselves (the authentic us, the son, the daughter, the child of the promise) reflected back. 

I watched the first episode of The Chosen over the weekend and was moved to tears by Jesus words to Mary. In this adaptation Mary was not using her real name.. she was using the name Lilith (which characterised the false her / the broken her / the prostitute).

But Jesus pursues her and finds her and He looks her in the eye and says:

"Mary.... Mary of Magdala, and He goes on to quote Isaiah 43:1:

But now, thus says the LORD, who created you, O Jacob, And He who formed you, O Israel: “Fear not, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by your name; You are Mine.

Beloved the Lord is calling us by name. Each one of us. He is calling us into our identity, into the authentically us. He is calling us away from the failure of our defaults and into the new. In this season of ‘enforced sabbath’ He is calling us back to Him, into rest. This new season will not be characterised by performance or striving. It will be characterised by a people who have  positioned themselves before the face of Jesus, who have looked into His eyes and seen their deep, true and authentic selves reflected back. It is a purposeful looking at Him. It is a choosing HIM and a choice to keep choosing Him and it is a conscious choice to not partner with the voice of the accuser, for You won’t find the new in the old... you won’t find the living amongst the dead!!!

Why do you seek the living among the dead? Luke 24:5

It is His strategy not ours.

The battle is the Lords and He has the battle plan. He is the master strategist. We receive His strategy when we wait upon Him in rest and stillness. Psalm 46 is one of the very few Psalms that mentions the Lord of Hosts:

He says, “Be still, and know that I am God; I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth.” The Lord Almighty is with us; the God of Jacob is our fortress. Psalm 46:10-11

BE STILL AND KNOW THAT I AM GOD.

This is where we are, in a be still moment. It is a holy time; a time to take off our shoes and to circumcise our hearts afresh. It is a time to look up into the eyes of Jesus and to keep looking. To wait before Him for His strategy. This is crossover. He is breaking default and He is doing a new thing.

Consecrate yourselves, for tomorrow the LORD will do amazing things among you. Joshua 3:5