Radically Happy

[Lightly edited from my inner healing session with RF for House of Hope]

To all who mourn in Israel, he will give a crown of beauty for ashes, a joyous blessing instead of mourning, festive praise instead of despair. In their righteousness, they will be like great oaks that the LORD has planted for his own glory.
Isaiah 61:3

Belonging

Young Ernie, along with the rescued Intimacy and her resurrected children Hope and Joy, are in a cocoon. And I see Jesus placing his hand on that, then walking over to UG (who has been contemplating the vine that was planted on the ruins of the hut where he had kept Intimacy safe from Old Earnest). The vine is starting to grow into an oak.

And Jesus says: Rise, your sins have been forgiven. UG leaps and clasps Jesus, like the prodigal son. And just like with the prodigal son, Jesus takes a ring and places it on UG’s finger.

Jesus says: You once were called Outcast. But your new name is Belonging.

Your new name is Belonging.

Jesus

The oak is dropping acorns. Jesus is telling belonging to take one of those acorns and plant it in the cocoon
Belonging is still sort of large and intimidating, but growing younger and more beautiful as he spends time around Jesus. He takes the acorn and plants it in the cocoon. It ignites.

Rebirth

There’s a burning sensation – I guess there’s a technical word for this – the thing that happens in a chrysalis where the body digests itself and is remade.

And I feel reborn. I come out of the furnace, glowing like burnished bronze, molten almost. Belonging takes me to the oak tree where I can rest in its shade and cool down.
Jesus brings me a cloak to wear because all my clothing and everything has been burned off.

So the cloak is a mantle. And Belonging feels like an Ultra-Guardian, who shepherds people into a centered set — rather than a bounded set where Guardians exist to keep people away.
But Belonging is big and strong and secure enough that he can safely bring intruders in.

I feel like somehow near the oak, it’s like Psalm 1: the oak planted by streams.

There’s now a stream flowing, it looks like it’s flowing out of the oak. Maybe there’s an artesian well underground, but it looks like there’s a stream – fairly deep – growing out of the oak.

And so I take off my cloak and dip into the stream. It steams and cools me down and I return to something more like a normal human temperature. I guess there are now also normal human clothes that I can wear: The hat of salvation, the shirt of righteousness, the girdle of truth, and the boots of peace. And they look like ordinary cloth, but they feel a bit like Mithril – from the Lord of the Rings – as light as cloth, but more sturdy than steel.

It’s clothing that looks ordinary but functions like armor. But when I take up the mantle, I have to divest myself of the armor.

@1:06:00 – RF

Wow. Why is that?

@1:06:09 – Ernest Prabhakar

Because my greatest weapon is my vulnerability.

Because my greatest weapon is my vulnerability.

Allegiance

Func the dog comes wandering up to snif the new clothes, but is scared of Belonging. But then Belonging gives him an acorn, and the dog eats it and then he’s fine.

Then the partially redeemed Guardians – who liked Jesus but didn’t entirely trust Him – come and kneel, before me and Belonging and Jesus.

And I feel like Belonging leads them in a new oath of allegiance to Jesus. Yes, they still have their old jobs to watch out for threats internal or external; but not to steal, kill, and destroy. Ah, that’s the word: they’re not guards, they’re guides. They’re looking out for those:

• who don’t know where they are
• who don’t know where they’re going
• who don’t know what they want
• because they don’t know who they are

If they’re acting violent or angry, it’s because they have forgotten who they are. They don’t need a soldier to stop them. They need a guide to lead them, back to themselves, back to Jesus, back to this sacred spring that they left so long ago.

They don’t need a soldier to stop them. They need a guide to lead them back to themselves…

And this is a place where all are welcome. The worst they can do is kill me because I’m vulnerable. Because the spring is the baptism of death. And the worst they can do is get me back there faster.

And so yes, I put on clothes and armor and walk among the world, but I’m secretly looking for the person who has to attack me so that I can lead them back to the grove and shed the armor and let them kill me. So they can see what belonging saw, which is the death of Hope and Joy brought back to life.

This means I have to enter in, have to incarnate into their pain, their brokenness, their fear, and feel the part of them that has not seen Jesus. And take on that and mirror their anxiety and pain – as we do as humans, with those we love and care about, or those we fear.

And it’s precisely when I take that on — when my armor is scarred and battered and even bloody — that I have to return and plunge into the water and be reborn. So I can take up the mantle to speak forgiveness and healing and wholeness.

I can’t do it on a mountaintop in the distance. I can only do it the way Christ did, by walking among people and bearing their grief and bringing it to the incarnation and pain and crucifixion and resurrection.

For intimacy is at the very heart of the Trinity, though we can’t see it because of the glorious light.

For intimacy is at the very heart of the Trinity, though we can’t see it because of the glorious light.

But that is what it means to be God. It’s to be Christ. Jesus was not some afterthought that was tacked on to divinity. He is the fundamental nature of divinity that was a secret for the history of the world until the cross.

And that is the life that I am called to lead and to lead others into.

The Mantle

I don’t know the name of the mantle.

Maybe the name of the mantle is “Identity.” To give identity to others I have to let go of mine and enter into theirs. Or not hold on to mine and trust Christ within me. Maybe using the white stone with the name on it that no one knows. That is the thing that I hold on to, the name Christ has given me, and that is how I can give love and identity to others.

And those who come with the most anger and pain and hatred are precisely the ones who need this place the most, that I am most excited to see.

Those are the Sauls of Tarsus that he has been luring here – using me as bait, if necessary – so they can see Jesus and find themselves.

@1:15:17 – RF

So, I encourage you, if you’re up to it, if you’re willing, to look into Jesus’s eyes.

@1:15:26 – Ernest Prabhakar

Mmm. I feel full of fire; feels like I’m starting to glow again.

@1:15:51 – RF

What are you feeling from him?

@1:15:53 – Ernest Prabhakar

I feel Him. His life just flooding into me.

@1:15:58 – RF

Wow.

@1:16:05 – Ernest Prabhakar

Wow, this is what it means to be a son. This is true fatherhood, pouring life into the son.

This is true fatherhood, pouring life into the son.

I just feel more of His life, and just the glow and the heat and the light just keep increasing.
If I had any armor, it’s all burned off again; it’s just the mantle.
I wonder if I’m starting to melt. I almost feel like there’s little pools of golden fire or liquid metal – I’m not sure what – gathering around my feet. But it doesn’t burn the grass; ah, because it’s fed by the springs of living water.

@1:18:55 – RF

While you’re there, was Jesus looking into his eyes, would you like to ask him to help you relate to your wife?

@1:19:39 – Ernest Prabhakar

He says: The key is to not hold on to my identity, but be vulnerable. Use it to speak identity into her, and see her as I see you now.

@1:20:40 – Ernest Prabhakar

A friend of mine sent me this video about what they call the Ministry of Presence.
That’s more powerful than the Ministry of Words.

To just be and to see and to put my faith in the love of Christ spilling out through my eyes rather than anything I can say or do.

Put my faith in the love of Christ spilling out through my eyes rather than anything I can say or do.

@1:21:12 – RF

That’s encouraging.

Func (The Function Part)

@1:21:26 – Ernest Prabhakar

I see Func – who was pretending to be human, to be me, but is happier as a wordless dog – I recognize that Func is actually a herding dog. He can work with the guides like a sheep dog or whatever to help people get here.

But he cannot heal anyone. He can’t solve any problems. He can just nudge people in the right direction to see Jesus.

@1:22:29 – RF

How does Func feel?

@1:22:30 – Ernest Prabhakar

He’s happy, really happy. Yeah, he’s running around. He will not eat acorns by himself. But if someone gives him an acorn, he will eat it.

@1:22:45 – RF

Wow.

@1:22:46 – Ernest Prabhakar

And, you know dogs. If someone’s feeding them and they’re part of their family and they get to run around, you know, that’s heaven.

@1:22:54 – RF

That’s heaven. Hey.

@1:23:13 – Ernest Prabhakar

I guess he is impatient to, like, go exploring and re-engage with the world.

@1:23:33 – Ernest Prabhakar

But he’s like a sheep dog or a husky. He was born for work.So he loves play, but he feels most alive when he’s working, which is fine. That’s Func. That’s his job. But it’s okay for him to just sit and eat acorns.

RF

So Func, I want you to know that you get to have your own relationship with Jesus.

Ernest Prabhakar

I see Jesus taking an acorn and holding it. Func is very cautiously sniffing and looking up – a little intimidated by Jesus – but he wants the acorn so he gets closer. Jesus lays the acorn between his feet and Func comes and sees the scars. He starts to lick the feet of Jesus, because that is what dogs do for wounds. Then he rolls over and presents his belly to Jesus in surrender and submission and for a belly rub.

@1:25:08 – Ernest Prabhakar

And his legs start kicking, like dogs do, when Jesus scratches that spot. Jesus just sits on the ground, then the dog jumps into His lap and licks Jesus’s face.

He just cuddles with Jesus.

With Jesus.

The End