There is something significant about the posture of being on my face before the Lord.
Photo by Grace Cockrell
"On my face there is nothing I can’t face
In Your presence, in Your presence”
This is the phrase and melody that the Lord literally sang over me during a worship service over three years ago. After many hours of deep corporate worship, I found myself on the floor with my face to the ground. Within moments, the music pouring from the platform faded to nothing and I heard the Lord so clearly sing over me, "On your face there's nothing you can't face." This pierced my spirit. I stayed there on the floor weeping in his presence. The reality of dwelling in His presence in a place of devotion makes every exterior form and style irrelevant. Every battle is won in the secret place and this truth will never change.
Then Abram fell on his face, and God spoke to him.
-Genesis 17:3
The first thing that being on your face creates is communion. Being in this posture positions you to hear from the Lord. Do not wait until he speaks—have an expectation before he chooses to speak. The truth is that He speaks every day. Do we listen?
God said, "As for me, behold, my covenant is with you and you shall be a father of many nations.”
-Genesis 17:4
The second thing that being on your face creates is covenant. When God speaks, He always brings life. Just like Abram in that moment, we are also brought into a covenant with the Lord.
What is a covenant? It is a contract or an agreement with the Lord to love and serve Him fully. There are five covenants listed in the Bible: Noahic, Abrahamic, Mosaic, Davidic, and New Covenants. The chart below is provided by webtruth.org, which has amazing theological teachings:
We operate under this new covenant thanks to Jesus Christ. When we accept Christ, He lives in us and we in Him (John 15:4). We have an exchange and then enter into an intimate covenant relationship. Are you operating in this covenant? Are you treating your life as though you are in a contract that cannot be broken? The truth is that His love constantly pursues us, and our love is to be a reflection of that. His love is true; are we reflecting this truth in our lives?
No longer will you be called Abram; your name will be Abraham.
-Genesis17:5
The last thing that being on your face creates is change. Just like he changed Abram’s name to Abraham, He is changing our identity too. There is no way to come into a covenant relationship with the Lord while remaining the same as you were. Constant change is the beauty of the Christian life we live.
And standing behind him at his feet, weeping she began to wet his feet with her tears, and kept wiping them with her hair, and kissing his feet and anointing them with her perfume.
-Luke 7:38
There are two people who were mentioned in the Bible that kissed Jesus. Those people are Mary and Judas. In the culture of first-century Israel, a kiss was not always a deep expression of love; rather, a kiss on the cheek was a common greeting, or a sign of deep respect or honor. What is ironic is that Judas used such an intimate expression of love and respect to betray Jesus. It was very hypocritical because his actions said, “I respect and honor you,” while he was betraying Jesus to be murdered.
Wounds from a friend can be trusted, but an enemy multiplies kisses.
-Proverbs 27:6
Evil often wears a mask to conceal the true purpose. When Mary washes Jesus’ feet and kisses him, she is doing this as an act of worship. Notice how she is positioned—on the ground with her face downward.
A kiss is only a kiss unless you are positioned correctly. We all kiss Jesus, but are we like Mary or are we like Judas? It matters not about our words or even our actions sometimes. Are we authentically expressing love from our hearts? It starts in a place of devotion on our faces.
On my face there is truly nothing I cannot face.
Do you desire a place or a posture?
Correct posture should produce presence. His presence produces fulfillment 100 percent of the time.
The original word for prostrate, as it is used throughout scripture (and specifically within the narrative in Genesis) is proskuneo. The original definition of this word in the Greek is “to kiss, in token of reverence.” Knowing this, it puts a new spin on everything I know regarding this concept of “On My Face.”
Kissing was a common sign of greetings during the Bible days. In many cultures around the world, greeting people with kisses is still a common thing. The most famous of all Bible kisses is the one Judas gave to Jesus. It was given in the Garden of Gethsemane, the place where Jesus and the disciples went after they finished celebrating their last Passover together.
Now the one who was betraying Him (Judas Iscariot) gave them a sign, saying, 'Whomever I shall kiss, He is the One. Arrest Him!'
-Matthew 26:48, Mark 14:43 - 46, Luke 22:47 - 48
What role do kisses play in the Bible? In the Old Testament, the English word kiss comes from the Hebrew nashaq (Strong's Concordance #H5401). In the New Testament, it is usually derived from the Greek philema (Strong's #G5370). The first reference to kisses in the Bible may have come when God gave consciousness to the first human being. When Adam was created it states, “Then the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life . . .” (Genesis 2:7). The first literal use of the word kisses is in Genesis 27:26 when Isaac requested that Esau, who was actually Jacob in disguise, kiss him before he gave the birthright blessing.
Jewish tradition believes, based on Deuteronomy 34:5, that the death of Moses was accomplished through a kiss given by God. It also states that when a person died they were given last kisses before their eyes were closed and the body prepared for burial. The religious tradition of the Jews additionally infers, based upon a unique rabbinical interpretation of Psalm 62:12, that there were 903 ways of dying. The best and gentlest of these, compared to drawing a hair out of milk, was called ‘death by a kiss.’ Esau greeted his brother with this show of love (Genesis 33:4). Joseph welcomed his brothers, who had sold him as a slave because they envied him, with this sign of forgiveness (Genesis 45:14-15).
Kisses of respect were not unusual during the time of Christ. In the first century, it was customary for a student to greet a teacher in such a manner. Ironically, Judas made a token of affection to Jesus after the last miracle before his death when he had to heal an ear (Luke 22:49 - 51). Kisses in the Bible have the power to cheer, the power to hurt, and the power to strengthen or to murder. They can sometimes signify death or symbolize life.
Kisses are powerful. There are two accounts of Jesus being kissed: one was Judas, as discussed earlier, and the other was Mary.
One of the Pharisees asked him to eat with him, and he went into the Pharisee’s house and reclined at a table. And behold, a woman of the city, who was a sinner, when she learned that he was reclining at table in the Pharisee’s house, bought an alabaster flask of ointment, and standing behind him at his feet, weeping, she began to wet his feet with her tears and wiped them with the hair of her head and kissed his feet and anointed them with the ointment.
-Luke 7:36
The huge thing that I noticed is that she positioned herself to be at Jesus’ feet. Then, she kissed his feet. Her weeping tells us that she was emotional. The bottom line is that being on our face before the Lord truly creates emotional, passionate, and intentional encounters with Jesus!!
We are all kissing Jesus in some way. Are you like Judas and betraying Him? Or are you like Mary and lingering from a humble place at His feet giving your all in a passionate pursuit? Position your heart to hear what He is saying. Posture is everything.
Listen to the song behind the message:
References:
biblestudy.org Brown-Driver-Briggs Hebrew Definitions Holy Bible Strong’s Concordance Thayer’s Greek Definitions
Much love in Christ,
Carson
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