Downshifiting

There isn't really a "shortcut," but I can tell you how you can certainly accelerate the learning process: every moment you invest in spending time with Me, be it through prayer, or reading or memorizing or giving out My Word, every minute you invest in learning more about wielding the weapons of the Spirit World, those are steps that take you further and closer to the goal of being ready for what's to come.

It's a choice you have to make nearly constantly: "What am I going to invest my time in?" Something that's merely connected to this temporal realm and isn't going to last or contribute in some way to the advancement of My eternal Kingdom, or the apparently less fun option of spending time and dealing with what for you at this point in time is still invisible?

Vision is a luxury you've gotten used to and wouldn't want to do without; you're kind of spoiled by the ease with which information hits your brain through the simple process of seeing things, so, having to glean information from invisible sources is so much more tedious for you. That's why you would like Me to give you the gift of visions, so that it all would become easier, and you could finally rely on that good old process of handling information that's coming in through what you see, even if it's with your spiritual eyes...

It's a sacrifice you're having to make, to slow down a bit. The pictures and the information that comes with them move along so much faster in the movies or on computer screens, or even in the real world, than what you can derive from the slow flux of input you get from reading or hearing from Me, or closing your eyes in prayer... It seems to be downshifting to a lower gear, when your natural inclinations tell you to upshift... step on the gas... do more in order to get there faster.

But that's where faith comes in. Faith to do the opposite of what your flesh tells you to do, namely nothing. Nothing in the flesh, that is, in order to behold the apparent (to the flesh) nothingness of My invisible Realm, that seems anything but conducive to great accomplishments in the physical, which is what the flesh really yearns for. But in the end, it's precisely that "nothingness" that will really get you places, whereas all the efforts of the flesh without availing itself of the power of the Spirit will turn out to have been decoys, detours, distractions, and a waste of time, good merely as another lesson in the long line of ways how not to do it.

So, if you want to get there faster and quicker, I'm afraid you're going to have to go slower, and do the exact opposite of what your flesh tells and urges you to do. The first and fastest and best thing to do if you're really going to get somewhere in the Spirit is to stop all the feverish activity in the flesh and find out by waiting for Me and My input where it is that I really want you to go, and if necessary, let Me take you there; find out what I really want you to do, and if necessary, allow Me to do it through you and for you. "Stand back and see Me fight," instead of rushing off into the battle half-baked yourself.

"We don't have time for all that" is what they often say. "We don't have time for what brother so-and-so has to say. After all, he doesn't show forth the signs that would make him worthy of devoting our time and attention to him: those great, and big and flashy signs that catch our attention, of big and showy accomplishments..."

Just as it's mice's appetite that lures them into the trap and to their doom, so it is the appetites of the flesh that often lead you into the traps of the distraction, the wrong way, the opposite direction of where I want you to go.

You have to realize what it actually means to be a follower, a disciple of Mine, to be taking up your cross daily and deny yourself and lose your life in order to truly gain and find it. It means going in the opposite direction of where the world is going and the flesh would lead you. Instead of letting them drag you along with their current, you go the opposite way. It's humanly impossible, to do so, I know, and it couldn't and shouldn't be expected of anyone in the natural. But that's basically what faith is.

It disregards all the philosophies of man and their counsel on how to make headway, it discards all that the world advertizes as wisdom and their secrets to "success" and chooses to go the opposite way, one that apparently leads nowhere, down to the most undesirable place of the defeat and death of that wich the System is trying to build up: the ego, the self, one's own position and advantage...

"How can I look good in the eyes of those that I'm trying to please?" "How can I become someone to be remembered?" When in reality, those who are truly remembered have always been those who forgot about themselves and melded with their cause: the people they would give their lives for, seeking above all their good and welfare, and not their own.

Faith defies the wisdom of the flesh. It has the courage to say "No" to it. "No, thank you! That's very kind of you to offer me that advice on how to get ahead and really make myself stick out above the rest of the crowd, or on how to enhance my image, but I think I'll have to pass. Because there's this urge in me, this voice that says, 'there is a way that seems right to a man, but the end thereof is destruction...' I'm afraid I can't follow your path..." And then turns around and goes the opposite way. Just like that song, "turn around, walk away and start again." Start again, doing it the right way this time, starting to go the proper direction, starting to avail yourself of the heavenly sources and powers to sustain you, instead of your own natural resources, which are going to come to an end as all the worldly riches the Devil has to offer in his realm: time and money and fame... all these things will fade away into nothingness. They'll disappear. And only what was done truly for love will still stand when all those bigmouths will finally have been shut up.

So, you want to make headway for Me and make progress in My school of thought, in the School of heavenly wisdom? Stop being dragged about by the old school of the System and the flesh, and whatever they tell you to do in order to make progress. Stop all that and come to Me! Turn around and start walking a new way, in a new direction. Don't be afraid of going the opposite direction of the one everybody else is heading. You may look terribly alone, going that way, and at first you may wonder, "Am I going to be the only one?" But somebody's got to make the first move and have the courage to lead folks in the path that is truly Mine, and they'll follow suit, eventually...

Folks are still very much prone to follow the leadings of those who are geared to the flesh and motivated by the flesh and carnal urges. That's where you've got to make a difference and have the courage and guts to withstand the general trend, and simply go the opposite way.

It may look like a humbler, less promising way, a darker, less shiny, less glorious way, and folks may be shaking their heads at you and wonder, "Why's he taking that shabby road?" But in the end you and they will see which of the two paths really will have led to what I'd call true success. True success is the road that will lead you to Me, and you have seen which is the path I have taken. It wasn't a glorious road, and one that not many initially would have had the courage to follow. It was a road that took My followers far away from their homes and all they were familiar with, and that was something they only hesitantly set out to do, and only because one man, Paul - a former enemy - led the way. He had the courage to do it in spite of all they would say, and eventually, they followed his sample...

He had the courage to go the opposite way! Away from all that was familiar and trusted... Away and off into the horizon... into the new, the unknown... with Me.