9. Being a Caller

© Daniel Yordy – 2020

What does it mean to be one who calls God into His creation. What does it mean to be a caller?

In most of the Christian communities in which I lived, the bell was a caller. We heard the bell two or three times a day and we knew that, from wherever we were working, that bell was calling us to come into the Tabernacle in order to break bread and dine together in joyous fellowship. Graham River, the Ridge at Bowens Mill, and Blueberry, all three had a large bell in a belfry on top of or in front of the Tabernacle, and the ringing of the bell was always a warm and inviting moment in our day.

You know, I’ve never thought about it before, but I loved the calling of the bell. It meant that the hard task of the moment could be laid to rest and we could gather for an hour of our hearts being filled with food and gladness (Acts 14:17).

Think of that, for almost fourteen years of my life, I heard the bell once, twice, or even three times a day (at Graham River) calling me into the feast.

Before continuing, however, I want to bring a balance to something that appeared strongly in the last letter, “The Jesus Secret,” and that is the almost-picture of God as some sort of wimp under the control of humans who force Him to do what they want.

It is not my intention to present such a picture of God. Rather, I want to show an angle of God that few see, and that is the extent to which humans acting unjustly against each other affects God inside His Heart, as well as the extent of “room” God gives to Christians to command authority in heaven and earth. The rule of death flowing out from Adam continues to flow out into heaven-earth from the Christian mis-use of the things of God. 

Now, I am using the word “caller” for a definite reason, more than one, actually. I am defining the word “caller” by everything God means by the very Biblical word, “prophet.” But I am using the word “caller” instead of “prophet” because I wish to know what God means without any shadow of all the religious images that must attend our use of the word “prophet.”

Another reason is that many of the driving ideas which I am wanting to know by writing this series come to me out from the reading of a particular book. I did not name the book when I used it before, but in the interests of “giving an account,” I must name it now.

The book I read for the second time, just after I wrote the second chapter, “What God Wants,” is a series of three books called Shadowfell, that is, Shadowfell, Raven’s Flight, and The Caller, by Juliet Marillier of Western Australia. Now, in full disclosure, Juliet Marillier describes herself as a practicing “Druid” and writes out from the folklore of Ireland.

Because many things that I am including in this series are coming out of the wondrous things God was showing me as I read the Shadowfell trilogy, and because I intend to use quotes from it, I must give some account on why I would be using such a fantasy story that is well inside the bracket called “new age.”

First, I am not interested in anything “new age.” I want only one thing, and that is what God actually says in His word concerning me. I will not teach anything as “truth” that is not the Bible from beginning to end.

BUT – we have a problem. So much of our knowledge of Bible things comes out from the savage gospel of the serpent. And so much of God’s truth has been known by us only inside the rigid hierarchy of the law of sin and death.

Let me give an example. I just had reason to use an illustration drawn from Pilgrim’s Progress by John Bunyan. English speaking Christians from 1650 to 1950 have read Pilgrim’s Progress second only to the Bible. It is a most influential book on how you and I think, whether we know that or not.

John Bunyan was not a Puritan, and he suffered much for his faith in Jesus at the hands of the Puritans. He is a dear brother in the Lord. Nonetheless, as I glanced again at his account of the path Christian must take, and remembering Christian’s entire path from my two readings of it years ago, I am mortified at the darkness of John Bunyan’s understanding.

To Bunyan, the task of finding and staying on the path that would one day lead to life, after Christian was dead, was entirely and only the doing of Christian. Bunyan had zero knowledge of an active Savior who comes to us and embraces us in Himself. He had zero knowledge of a God who lives now inside of us and reveals Himself through us, nor anything of the realms of Spirit.

Yet the path of the Christian, as told by John Bunyan, RULES how you and I see the Christian life far more than we have ever realized, and that description BENDS the words God speaks in directions God never intended.

Here is something Jesus said, “For the children of this world are in their generation wiser than the children of light” (Luke 16:8 – KJV).

I find that there are a handful of writers who have a greater understanding of the realms of spirit, of the heavens all around us in which we dwell, than do Christians, who have relegated all those things to a place far away and a time far in the future.

Christians should know all the reality of the heavens in which we live, but they do NOT. Instead, they call normal heavenly realities, the things of the Spirit of God, to be “new age.” Of truth, believing that today is the day that we live inside of Jesus and Jesus inside of us, John 14:20, is thrown out by many as unbridled “new age” heresy.

There are many “new age” and fantasy stories that are dark, that feel unclean, and that drop rapidly into wickedness. But neither Tolkien’s stories nor Juliet Marillier’s are like that. Instead they ring true to God’s reality, and as I read them, I see Bible truths, as God speaks them, in ways I had not seen otherwise. As I read them, my spirit sings in joy, to my astonishment.

I love good stories; God always speaks to me through them.

And I am actually going to draw a fair bit from the story of Neryn in Shadowfell to lay out our approach to being true prophets of God. You can judge for yourself the Biblical-ness of what I am presenting. I will not give you the actual story, but just enough of an outline for you to know the context of some of the things I will share.

Neryn lives in a land occupied by two very different types of beings. On the one hand are humans, Neryn’s people, and on the other hand are what the author calls “the good folk.” These “good folk” are semi-spirit beings and semi-physical beings. They can be seen by humans, but they can and usually do hide themselves and are not noticed at all. They also possess some “magical” properties.

The human part of the land is ruled by an evil king and queen who send violence and death into everyone’s lives. The balance between the two realms of beings has been shattered and both sides live in fear, for the king can hurt the good folk as well.

Neryn is a fifteen-year-old girl who has a gift that few have. She is a caller, that is, she can see and visit with the good folk; they can’t hide from her. More than that, she has the gift to call all the good folk into her service and if she calls, they must respond, even the greatest of them.

Neryn, then, is on a great journey to learn her gift and how to use it. She is aghast at the thought of disrespecting any of the good folk in any way or of using them to bring hurt to humans, even those who are used by the king to hurt and kill indiscriminately. Thus her desire through her journey is to learn the depths of being a caller so that she can use her gift truly in the moment of victory and not mis-use it in any way.

The good folk, however, cannot trust Neryn, for she is a human. First, she must prove that seven virtues are part of her character. By the time she learns of these seven virtues, she has already proven each of them. This is so important, she did not “try to do,” rather, these were already what she was, and in the difficult moments, she responded from her heart to the needs of the good folk, thus proving, step by step, all seven virtues.

On her journey, Neryn must find the four Guardians of the realm, four great ones of the good folk, in order to learn the words of calling and how to use them from each of the four. From the Guardian of the West, she learns the words that are as water. From the Guardian of the North she learns the words that are as earth and rock. From the Guardian of the East she learns the words that are as air. And from the Guardian of the South she learns the words that are as fire.

Then, as the time for the “showdown” with the  king approaches, another caller appears, this one under the king’s control. This is a young man who is willing to use his gift for the king’s purposes, even though those purposes are destructive to both humans and good folk alike. He is willing because he wants to appear as “somebody” in the eyes of those in power.

That is the context; I will add a few more things as we go forward ourselves in this wondrous task of prophesying God into the knowledge of His creation. AND – I reference all the things in the story towards knowing God and knowing Jesus Sent as Word into us. Angels are involved very much in our final victory over evil in this world. Only those who are true callers, however, having known all the proving of Christ through them, have any business connecting with angels, and that only inside the perimeters God clearly sets out.

The primary quality that Neryn possesses, that which makes her a caller that all trust fully, from the least to the greatest among the good folk, and among all humans who know her, even among many who have done wrongful things contrary to their humanity, is that she does not live for herself. She knows that she has no power in herself, but that her gift serves those of both realms, that she is only a channel, that of herself she can do nothing.

This “not” quality is then matched fully by the positive of her honor and respect shown to all, regardless. Thus this central virtue of RESPECT for all others rules the story. And in fact, the final showdown is shorter than one might expect in a great fantasy epic. The reason it is short is that Neryn has already proven respect every step along the way. This is the central truth of the entire story, and it is amazing to me that Juliet Marillier perceives so clearly this central quality of God revealing Himself through Jesus.

Then, it is this great respect that Neryn holds for all, that drives her to learn the innumerable nuances of WORD in all of its forms, so that she might know those whom she is calling.

I have the next fifteen chapters penciled in, and I do like the layout. As part of explaining what it means to be a caller, I want to lay out those chapters and what they will contain.

The next chapter is “Heaven-Earth,” in which I hope to set forth an extended definition of this realm in which we live, a realm that contains two sides and two types of sentient created beings. That will be followed by a chapter on the ways Christians act to keep God out of His creation, as well as an introduction to the false calling of God by Christians into their worlds. This will be followed by a chapter outlining what are the seven virtues that Jesus proves inside of us that are essential to the task of prophesying Christ into the knowledge of all.

To explain these two chapters, “Keeping God Out” and “The Seven Virtues,” I want to point you to Chapter 18 of The River of Life, “To Overcome.” That chapter is one of those life-changing experiences that happen now and then through my writing. In that chapter I placed the seven overcomings of Revelation 2 & 3 together with the seven seals of Revelation 6 & 8, that keep what is written on the scroll, Christ in our hearts, from being seen and known by all.

The complete agreement between the two lists was astonishing.

So – I am calling the qualities of Christ in us as shown by the seven overcomings by the term, “The Seven Virtues.” And then, I see that the removal of the seals speaks of two things at the same time. As we saw in The River of Life, each of those seals is a powerful demon spirit casting its “spell” upon Christians on this earth. In this series, however, we are going to approach each of those “seals” as two things together. On the one hand they are the means by which Christians keep God out, and on the other hand they are a false calling of “God” in, that is, the essence of what the Bible calls, “false prophets.”

Then, I have seven chapters, one for each of the seven virtues as it dispels the false. And I carefully chose the word “dispel,” because we do NOT “attack” the false. The false vanishes as a vapor because we do not regard it. And this is exactly what happened in the story, the false caller failed because Neryn simply did not regard his false call. Hers was the true call, and her true call caused the false to be as if it did not exist.

And the low-born of the world and those being despised God has chosen, and that which is not, so that He might bring to nothing that which is existing, so that no flesh might boast in the presence of God (1 Corinthians 1:28-29).  

Here are those seven chapters, then. (Since I have not yet written them, I hold the possibility that I might change the exact word chosen for each part.) – “Humility Dispels Arrogance” – “Respect Dispels Contempt” – “Honor Dispels Dishonor” – “Love Dispels Death” – “Faith Dispels Refusal” – “Honesty Dispels Dishonesty” – and “Thankfulness Dispels Accusation.”

The next chapter is “The Word of Our Hearts.” This is another look at 2 Corinthians 3:3, the Lord Jesus written as Spirit ink all through the pathways of our hearts – the very writing upon the scroll as it is opened so that all can see the love and goodness of God through us. The purpose of this chapter is to place the meaning and wonder of the four chapters following in which we will explore the knowing of every nuance and shade of meaning that is the Word God speaks.

The next four chapters, then, are “Word as Earth” – “Word as Air” – “Word as Fire” – and “Word as Water.” Here are four lines from the New Testament that assert this approach to Word.

And the Word became flesh [earth] and dwelt among us. – The Words that I speak into you are Spirit [pneuma – air – breath] and they are life. – The Word is living and energeoing [fire]. – The washing of the water of the Word.

Then comes the chapter titled “Expectation.” In this chapter we will set out the expectation of God that is the essential quality of a caller, that is, of a New Testament prophet. From there, who knows where the Wind will take us. The thing is, knowing Word as we will discover in the chapters ahead is to me the most exciting thing in all the range of excitement ahead of us forever.

I think you can see that I am fully justified in using this story by Juliet Marillier as a fresh and meaningful way for us to set out our understanding of God revealed through the Words of the Bible written all through our hearts.

For the remainder of this letter, however, let’s set aside that fantasy story and set out what it means to be a true prophet of the fullness of Christ.

And He Himself gave some apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, some shepherds and teachers towards the preparation of the saints for the work of service, into the building up, the construction of the body of Christ, until we all come down to …the completion of Christ (Ephesians 4:11-13).

This ministry of “prophet” penciled out here by Paul is NOT the subject of this text.

Let me explain. Paul is referencing here those in-part ministries whose function we understand by our study of the Tabernacle of Moses. Specifically, the evangelists are those who stand just inside the Gate, calling many into knowing Jesus as Savior. The prophets, then, are those who stand just inside the Door, calling many into knowing the realms of the Spirit and knowing Jesus as truth. The apostles, however, are those who are as the coals of the Altar of Incense, being found on both sides of the veil, calling God’s people into where they already live, full union with Christ. We place this in-part role of the apostle as a function that is not yet living turned around, seated upon and as God’s Mercy Seat, and going forth with Father as the Ark of the Covenant.

This ministry we possess now, of calling God into His creation, is not an in-part ministry on the way into knowing what is already true. It is, instead, a ministry coming out from all fullness, that is, the second witness of Christ.

Here, then, is the New Testament reference to this true and complete prophet ministry.

And I will give to My two witnesses and they will prophesy one thousand two hundred and sixty days, clothed all around with sackcloth. These are the two olive trees, and the two lampstands, standing in the face and presence of the Lord of the earth. And if anyone should desire to do injustice against them, fire goes forth out from their mouth and eats up their enemies. And if anyone should desire to do injustice against them, it is inevitable for them to be consumed. These are possessing the authority to the heavens, that no rain should fall in the days of their prophecy. And they have authority over the waters, to turn them into blood, and to strike the earth with every wound or blow as often as they might desire (Revelation 11:3-6).

Here is the point. In the last chapter, I set forth the challenge of – What kind of a God will you call into the knowledge of humans?

Look at these words. – Fire goes forth out from their mouth and eats up their enemies. Do you see how essential it is that we be 100% pure as is defined at the end of the last chapter?

Consider the man who saw this vision – John, the brother of James, sons of Zebedee, who, as teenagers, were known as the “sons of thunder.”

But they [a village of Samaritans] did not receive Him… And when His disciples James and John saw this, they said, “Lord, do You want us to command fire to come down from heaven and consume them, just as Elijah did?” But He turned and rebuked them, and said, “You do not know what manner of spirit you are of. For the Son of Man did not come to destroy men’s lives but to save them” (Luke 9:53-56).

Jesus is making it very clear that the description He will give to this same John many years later in vision form is NOT speaking of the destruction of people, but of their salvation.

The voice of one crying in the wilderness: “Prepare the way of the Lord; make straight in the desert a highway for our God. Every valley shall be exalted and every mountain and hill brought low; the crooked places shall be made straight and the rough places smooth; the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together; for the mouth of the Lord has spoken” (Isaiah 40:3-5).

As we fulfill our calling as the second witness of Christ, we will be calling this God down this completed path into the knowledge of all.

In order to be that true prophet of God, we must know the Lord Jesus proven faithful and true inside of us as each one of the seven virtues or overcomings. We must know Word as the Personal essence of Father. We must know Word as the personal essence of our brothers and sisters in heart and soul as Jesus Sent already into them.

And we must know, all through the core of our beings, that we have this treasure in earthen vessels that the excellency of the power might be of God and not of us.