What Are Parables
GOD SPEAKS THROUGH ALLEGORICAL PARABLES
What are parables? Parables are a short allegorical story, message, prose, narrative, or thought that illustrates, teaches or conveys a life lesson.
The message uses symbolism to speak two languages. The first language is the story itself and the second language is the hidden meaning of the story. The hidden meaning is the message as interpreted through spiritual analogies and comparisons of symbols within the story.
I began to understand allegories and parables when the Lord started speaking to me through dreams and visions. It took an entire season to discover He wanted them to be interpreted spiritually, not literally. (That is not always the case.) When I discovered this, I realized I was hearing Him, but wasn’t UNDERSTANDING what He was saying!
I said, “Lord, I can hear You just fine, why don’t You just talk to me and tell me what You mean?” What He spoke was plain as day: “Sweet One, I am not teaching you YOUR language, I am teaching you MINE.” Immediately I saw two separate picture-visions. Each picture contained two pillars in His temple. The first picture had “substance” to it and was on earth. The other picture was an identical pillar, but it was somewhat ethereal. It was the same copy, only in heaven. Then He said, “I teach you one, so that you might know the other.” He shows us the physical allegory in our physical lives so we may understand the “Words” He speaks into our spiritual lives.
I soon discovered parables and allegories were a delight! They put a bounce in my step and a smile in my heart. He amazes me the way He speaks His Words in exact details, large and small, placing them in orderly fashion in my life. Ask Him to open your ears to hear Him this way. You will receive such joy.
THREE EXAMPLES OF ALLEGORICAL STORIES
GOD AND MY BOX OF CRAYONS
{Allegory}
One day I received a big box of crayons on my computer screen. It was marked:
To My Beloved Child,
With love, from Heaven.
As I clicked on the lid to see so many crayons sent from heaven I was overwhelmed with the depth, nuances and flavors of expression. There were so many colors, each unique but all effecting one another. Many colors were different than what I was used to, and some were the same. I first noticed they were organized to reflect similar shades together. But another section was organized in opposite contrasts. Some colors were blah but when put next to another, it made the combination show a reflection I hadn’t seen before. The colors came in swirls and lines and dots and shapes. The vastness of how each part interrelated was so amazing.
My eye stopped on one color I didnt like at all and that was okra. Yuck, that had to go. I clicked on okra and pushed delete. When the okra disappeared, it took all of the okra out of the box. I had not realized that okra had been blended in among the colors and shapes. In that instant the colors all changed, the shapes became smaller by one color; the box adjusted and reduced in size. That was better but with okra now gone, the color closest to it suddenly looked like okra. I clicked on it and it was gone. My colors all changed and my box shrunk. I thought I remembered what okra looked like and decided anything that was similar to that color needed to be culled out of my box. One by one I started clicking delete and my box changed and reduced.
Finally I had worked through all the colors to my liking. The shapes, lines, dot and swirls were either missing or something very different than what was given, but they appealed to me and I was satisfied. The colors in my box were rather primary and simple but I remembered that okra and decided this was fine for me.
Years passed and I no longer remembered okra or the time that I had worked through my box. I started to notice other people had boxes that were much bigger than my own and they were passionately using their boxes of many colors and their boxes were expanding with even greater colors and reflections. Why was my box so small? Try as I could, I was not able to change its size and so I sent a letter to heaven asking for a bigger box.
Heaven responded very sadly that each color in the box sent to me had represented a shade of its Creator. It contained His heart, His thoughts, His feelings, His depth and the very essence of Who He was.
Heaven told me I had deleted weakness, and judgment, sickness, and vessels of dishonor. I had deleted accountability for seeds I had sowed and warnings of being friends with the world. I had deleted that the Creator hides Himself and reveals Himself to those who listen and seek Him. I had deleted that He speaks in mysteries and parables for a purpose and that to know Him clearly was costly. I had deleted that the Creator uses evil as instruments of judgment and discipline with all things working together for good; that nothing escapes His Sovereign eye as He watches over me. I had deleted that when I judge others, I am judged by the same measure. I had deleted what happens when I dont forgive or when I dont ask for forgiveness. I had deleted that I would be treated exactly as I had treated others. I had deleted that sin produces death of everything abundant and good. He told me that His thoughts were not my thoughts and His ways were not my own. And when I was done, my box of Who He was to me, had set the boundaries of my mind about the scripture, my faith, and how He could reach me and affect my life.
After I saw the fruit of my errors, I told Him I was very sorry for not accepting Him as He really was and asked Him for another box. In His infinite mercy, He forgave me and then surprised me. He said that the box of colors was in His Word and I could pick it up anytime I pleased and use the colors He had provided. He told me this time not to throw away any color, but respect each Word as a portion of Who He is, for He does not change; He is the same yesterday, today and forever.
Mark 4:24-25 NKJV
Then He said to them, “Take heed what you hear. With the same measure you use, it will be measured to you; and to you who hear, more will be given. For whoever has, to him more will be given; but whoever does not have, even what he has will be taken away from him.”
James 1:17 NKJV
Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and comes down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow of turning.
Heb 13:8 NKJV
Jesus Christ is the same yesterday , today, and forever.
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THE PARABLE OF THE PACIFIC SALMON
When the Lord first called me in 1984 I had many awesome supernatural experiences. They were enough to catapult me into a new life and direction and launch my faith to a new level. I did not know at the time that I would need this. Because for the next several years I had terrible, terrible resistance in the way of demonic dreams, visions, nightmares, voices at night. I battled night and day to overcome these things, because I was so inflamed in deep longings for the intimacy I had in the Lord when He first called me. He comforted me and told me He was putting me through basic training of how to overcome as His warrior. And I learned so much in those years in the school of overcoming.
The parable He gave me was the story of the Pacific Salmon that live in the Pacific Northwest. When they are mature, they travel up from the ocean into the rivers and stream beds from whence they were born. They travel uphill against the current, the rocks, the white water and all the entanglements. Eventually the strongest make their way to the very place where the were hatched. It is there that they lay their own eggs. As they are finally still you can see their bodies with gashes and wounds from such a hazardous journey upstream. It is then you truly understand their innate passion. In spite of their wounds, they relentlessly continue to climb upstream until they have fulfilled their destiny. Once they have laid their eggs, they die. Their children swim downstream to the ocean to repeat the process.
It is the triumphant story of God’s overcomers as they decrease and God increases, as they die to self so that God can live through them.
Rev 12:10-11 NKJV
Then I heard a loud voice saying in heaven,” Now salvation, and strength, and the kingdom of our God, and the power of His Christ have come, for the accuser of our brethren, who accused them before our God day and night, has been cast down. And they overcame him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony, and they did not love their lives to the death.
I learned through the process that God alone allows what touches our lives, for good. And He really is our trainer in every sense of the Word. I learned a rock hard faith through those years, and now when I get a demonic experience at night it is not for overcoming because I keep my weapons honed, but rather for my training and discipline for opening wrong doors.
Each and every time the enemy swarms, it is for our promotion. God will take us higher with greater authority, more revelation and better perspectives than ever. He brings EVERYTHING together in our lives for good because He is our GOOD FATHER.
Rom 8:35-39 NKJV
Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? 36 As it is written: “For Your sake we are killed all day long; We are accounted as sheep for the slaughter.” Yet in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us. 38 For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, 39 nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Rom 5:3-5 NKJV
And not only that, but we also glory in tribulations, knowing that tribulation produces perseverance; 4 and perseverance, character; and character, hope. 5 Now hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who was given to us.
Rom 8:28-30 NKJV
And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose. 29 For whom He foreknew, He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brethren. 30 Moreover whom He predestined, these He also called; whom He called, these He also justified; and whom He justified, these He also glorified.
A PARABLE OF THE WATCHMEN
Tonight I was watching a documentary about how they made the Planet Earth series, only 5 world wide impacting one hour programs in 5 years. I was thinking about the spectacular shots of creation they have in their series and the hours and hours and HOURS they spend trying to capture the right shot.
In this one scene, the poor photographer sat in his hidden hut for 8 hours a day for 5 weeks to finally get the shot of the blue bird of paradise doing his dance.
It made me realize that a watchman is full time and we spend all our hearts and time listening, and those hours are finally rewarded for the impacting messages we share that make a difference in the world.
Jer 31:3-6 NKJV
The LORD has appeared of old to me, saying: “Yes, I have loved you with an everlasting love; Therefore with lovingkindness I have drawn you. Again I will build you, and you shall be rebuilt, O virgin of Israel! You shall again be adorned with your tambourines, and shall go forth in the dances of those who rejoice. You shall yet plant vines on the mountains of Samaria; The planters shall plant and eat them as ordinary food. For there shall be a day when the watchmen will cry on Mount Ephraim, ‘Arise, and let us go up to Zion, To the LORD our God.'”
