“There is nothing we could do of greater importance than to have fortified in our individual lives an unshakable conviction that Jesus is the Christ, the living Son of the living God.” Gordon B. Hinckley
“Endurance is not just the ability to bear a hard thing, but to turn it into glory.” William Barclay
Here is a song I think is appropriate for the times in which we find ourselves living:
Unshakable
WORDS & MUSIC
Dennis Jernigan
February 12, 2016
Verse
Once more the time has come
For lies to be undone
Real hope stands on Solid Ground
All other hopes come crashing down!
Kingdoms built on strength of man
Such kingdoms cannot stand
Built on sand not Solid Ground
Such kingdoms all come crashing down!
Everything that can be will be shaken!
Everything that can be is coming down!
Everything that can be will be shaken!
Except the Kingdom built on Solid Ground!
Chorus
Unshakable! This Kingdom!
Unshakable! This King!
Unshakable! This Kingdom!
Unshakable! The redeemed!
Unshakable! Kingdom come!
Unshakable! Will be done!
Unshakable! Kingdom come in me!
Verse
This present darkness may
Bring fear to cloud the way
Calling evil what is good
Making idols where a cross once stood!
Hearts of stone that will not turn
Melt away like grass when burned
Make sure of your heart's desire!
Our God is the All-Consuming Fire!
Everything that can be will be shaken!
Everything that can be is coming down!
Everything that can be will be shaken!
Except the Kingdom built on Solid Ground!
Chorus
Unshakable! This Kingdom!
Unshakable! This King!
Unshakable! This Kingdom!
Unshakable! The redeemed!
Unshakable! Kingdom come!
Unshakable! Will be done!
Unshakable! Kingdom come in me!
Bridge
One day every knee will bow!
One day every tongue will shout!
Jesus Christ! Jesus Christ is King!
This very day my knee I bow!
This very day my tongue will shout!
Kingdom come! Kingdom come in me!
Come in me!
Chorus
Unshakable! This Kingdom!
Unshakable! This King!
Unshakable! This Kingdom!
Unshakable! The redeemed!
Unshakable! Kingdom come!
Unshakable! Will be done!
Unshakable! Kingdom come in me!
This song had been brewing in my heart since hearing my spiritual mentor, Jack Taylor, speak on the kingdom of God, specifically from Hebrews 12. God truly is in control regardless of the cultural state of our world…regardless of who is the leader of the political world…regardless of any circumstance I may encounter. What helped bring the song to fruition was coupling what Jack’s words had stirred in my heart with a very real circumstance facing one of my sons.
That very week, he had found out his company was downsizing drastically…and he was part of those being cut…being shaken. This song came out with several components. Boasting in God. Warning the church to be ready for the shaking that is certainly coming. Proclaiming Jesus Christ as King over all. Encouragement to the body that our King and His kingdom cannot be shaken. That is wonderful news!
See to it that you do not refuse Him who is speaking. For if those did not escape when they refused him who warned them on earth, much less will we escape who turn away from Him who warns from heaven. And His voice shook the earth then, but now He has promised, saying, “YET ONCE MORE I WILL SHAKE NOT ONLY THE EARTH, BUT ALSO THE HEAVEN.” This expression, “Yet once more,” denotes the removing of those things which can be shaken, as of created things, so that those things which cannot be shaken may remain. Therefore, since we receive a kingdom which cannot be shaken, let us show gratitude, by which we may offer to God an acceptable service with reverence and awe; for our God is a consuming fire. Hebrews 12:25-29 NASB
Reality is that life is a marathon and marathons require endurance. Reality is that life is full of moments of great shaking - tremors of pain and suffering and lack and betrayals and temptations and all manner of things the enemy will try to use to cause us to lose heart and give up the running of the race. Reality is life is full of troubles and disappointments and sorrows…but reality is also that we have been given grace to run the entire race and finish well…with joy in our hearts.
One night several years ago, Melinda and I were sitting in our chairs (Yes, we have grandpa and grandma chairs) watching a favorite TV show when the entire atmosphere began to vibrate without warning. My first thought was that a military helicopter was flying - hovering - much too close to our rooftop. Expecting the aircraft to move on, it only felt as if it was getting closer and closer. Soon, the entire room began to vibrate. The entire house began to shudder violently. Walls and floors began to creak and moan. Melinda and I were looking at one another, frozen in fear as we shook in our chairs. It felt as if the house was swaying slightly back and forth and felt as if waves of power were surging through both house and the air we were gasping for.
After about 40 seconds, the shaking, trembling, shuddering, thunderous sounding ‘whatever the heck that was’ stopped as suddenly as it had begun. Melinda and I sat there looking at one another with bewilderment. We were in shock. As we sat there gripping the arms of our chairs, we spoke in unison, “Earthquake!” The local news noted us the quake had registered 4.8 on the Richter Scale! As soon as we felt safe to do so, we went around the house looking for signs of damage.
Pictures were crooked. Some had fallen from the walls. A crack developed in the ceiling of our bedroom along the wall - a gap where the wall and ceiling met. The floor tiles in our bedroom had cracked and some had even warped upward, looking like cracks of ice forced upward from an ice floe in an once-packed river. As we ventured outside to survey the damage to our home, we noticed that the faces of many of the bricks on the two brick chimneys had shattered and fallen like some weird snow all over the back deck and yard. For 40 seconds, we experienced a physical picture of what a spiritual earthquake looks like!
The shaking trials of my life may be different than yours, but reality is that we all must go through them. Even our earthly house received minor damage, it held firm because its foundation was on solid ground. Whatever could be shaken had been shaken, but what could not be shaken was left standing.
God allows and sometimes causes the shaking times in our lives in order to help us see our need for placing our faith - building our spiritual houses - on the Solid Rock of Jesus Christ. This is why a kingdom point of view is vital to living an abundant life even while enduring the violent shaking times of upheaval life brings our way. The kingdom of God is unshakable…and we are to seek that kingdom first and foremost if we are to walk in our true identities in Christ. And just how do we seek first the kingdom of God? We seek first the King!
My life was shaken by the temptation of same sex attraction. On November 7, 1981, Jesus stopped that shaking when He rescued me from the lies concerning my identity while simultaneously planting my feet on Solid Ground
My life was shaken by persecution and times when people have tried to silence me. My life has been shaken by hurt and vile words of insult and offensive threats. What was left after these times of shaking were the ability to identify more with Christ…the ability to bless those who curse me…the grace to forgive those who would do me harm…the ability to love those who hate me. The kingdom point of view, in a sense, is that I am commanded to love even if I don’t agree with those who would silence me.
My life has been shaken by grief and loss, but what was left after the loss of my grandmother and the loss of my dad was the eternal truth that I will see them again someday soon.
My life has been shaken by the ravages of Parkinson’s…by the loss of a major portion of my ability to sing…by the loss of physical strength in my right hand to the point my three right-most fingers seldom work anymore (you should see the remaining thumb and forefinger of my right hand as they try to compensate for the loss of their companions when I am playing the piano, LOL!)…by the constant ‘what-if’s having such an illness brings to one’s mind.
What cannot be shaken is the fact that I can still worship God with my voice. It may be a whisper of its former self, but it is even more passionate and precious than before.
What cannot be shaken is the fact that I still have the use of 2 fingers on my right hand and the reality that, should I lose all physical ability someday, I will still be able to praise God with my entire being.
What cannot be shaken when fear and thoughts of ‘what-if’ arise is the fact that God is my consent Companion and that He loves me with all He is.
Let’s review the last portion of that passage from Hebrews I quoted earlier. Hebrews 12:28 NASB, says, “Therefore, since we receive a kingdom which cannot be shaken, let us show gratitude, by which we may offer to God an acceptable service with reverence and awe…” May I suggest that we walk in gratitude for what we DO have and not focus on what we don’t have. The latter always leads to despair and constant sorrow.
Hebrews 12:29 NASB, gives us all we need to know about how to deal with the shaking times of life. It simply says, “…for our God is a consuming fire.” I believe that fire is the power of His love to burn through the things of this earth in whatever way He chooses. After all He is God and He can do and use whatever He likes to get our attention. The jealousy He has for us - to know us intimately - burns with the fire of passion He has for each of us. Let us proclaim the fact that our God is unshakable and that we are anchored to the Solid Rock of Jesus Christ during shaking times…
His love, like a fire, burned away the shackles of my sin. His love, like a fire, burned through the times or persecution, betrayal, and wounding leaving me wonderfully able to forgive and bless even those who hate me, leaving my conscience clear and my mind willfully dependent upon Him and His love. His love, like a fire, burned away my grief over the diagnosis of Parkinson’s and the subsequent loss of my voice and the loss of the use of three fingers, and left me at a place of recognizing my need to rest from my labors and to cherish the things most dear to me and my life: my wife, my children, my grandchildren, my family, and my friends.
Who I am is an unshakable child of Almighty God whose only goal in life, at this point, is to leave as large a legacy - roadmap - of how to live an abundant life as possible for generations to come. I am more determined than ever to use whatever comes into my life for the King and for the Kingdom of God. Let the physical pain come. Let the loss of memory come. Let the loss of stamina come. I will use them all for the King and kingdom because who I am…is unshakable…
Dennis Jernigan
To hear The Dennis Jernigan Podcast version of this teaching and to hear the song, Unshakable, go to http://podcast.dennisjernigan.com/e/unshakable-1606236531/
Photo courtesy of https://cdn.pixabay.com/photo/2016/09/12/21/57/earthquake-1665878_1280.jpg