“Behold, I am going to send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and terrible day of the Lord. He will restore (turn) the hearts of the fathers to their children and the hearts of the children to their fathers, so that I will not come and smite the land with a curse (destruction).” Malachi 4:5-6

“No man has ever seen God at any time; the only unique Son, or the only begotten God, Who is in the bosom [in the intimate presence] of the Father, He has declared Him [He has revealed Him and brought Him out where He can be seen; He has interpreted Him and He has made Him known].” John 1:18 AMP

Elijah represents a fathering anointing, which was manifested in his own personal life. The spirit of Elijah was later embodied in John the Baptist, the forerunner for the ultimate restoration – Abba embodied in Jesus. The glory of the story is that “he who is joined to the Lord becomes one spirit with Him.” 1 Corinthians 6:17

Jesus said, “I will not leave you as orphans… if anyone loves me he will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him.” John 14: 18,23. We are invited into the very bosom of the Father – the intimate presence – a mystical union of ever deepening proportions. The unfolding revelation of the Father to my heart is like being introduced to Him for the first time, over and over again. The anticipation of something new and wonderful is unending. This is the opportunity before us and the path we must persist on.

“Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.” Hebrews 12:1-2

“It is for discipline that you have to endure. God is treating you as sons. For what son is there whom his father does not discipline?  If you are left without discipline, in which all have participated, then you are illegitimate children and not sons.” Hebrews 12:7-8

Discipline is to train yourself in a certain way. It also defines the ability to keep working at something that is difficult. Healing requires a consistent and ongoing process. It’s work; it’s training. All the “weights” within your control are your responsibility to remove. Absence of discipline reflects an absence of relationship. When I refuse to be exhorted or admonished by those whom God sends across my path, I am isolating a part of my heart, thus choosing to remain fatherless in that area.

“Besides this, we have had earthly fathers who disciplined us and we respected them. Shall we not much more be subject to the Father of spirits and live?” Hebrews 12:9. One author has paraphrased the last part of the verse to say, “Be subject to Father’s mission and live. Be in submission to, get underneath, and be dependent upon Father’s mission, and life will begin to flow in our emotions and relationships.”  *

The other option is to be subject to my own mission, which is the path of self protection and independence – never allowing my heart to risk being hurt again and thus remaining closed to love. The Great Commandment to which we must devote our allegiance is to “love God with our whole heart, soul, mind, and strength.” This requires trust. This requires faith. In every age of human history, the spirit of sonship and the orphan spirit have been in conflict. The one is an invitation and a promise, for which Christ came to fulfill. The other results in no sense of belonging or destiny, ever seeking for a place to call home for the heart.

Come out from under the curse. Let’s follow Jesus by focusing our lives on what He focused His life on – being a Son and revealing the Father. This is the prayer He’s praying for us: “The glory which You have given Me I have given to them, that they may be one, just as We are one; I in them and You in Me, that they may be perfected in unity, so that the world may know that You sent Me, and loved them, even as You have loved Me.

* Jack Frost, Spiritual Slavery to Spiritual Sonship.