Friday, May 27, 2011
Thursday, May 26, 2011
Entering The Kingdom by Kiston Couchey
Entering The Kingdom
by Kriston Couchey
SEEING THE KINGDOM
Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. While being born of the Spirit gives the ability to see the kingdom; seeing the kingdom and entering it are not the same. We can stand at the border of a city and observe its activities and how people travel to and from that city and still not enter that city. Seeing it does not mean we partake of its lifestyle or becoming a citizen of that city. As it regards the kingdom of God, Jesus spoke clearly about the manner in which the kingdom of God is entered. From what He showed us there are conditions or prerequisites to entering the kingdom.
LOSING YOUR OWN LIFE Then said Jesus to his disciples, If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me. For whoever will save his life shall lose it: and whoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it. The Gospel of the kingdom is like a seed. A seed may be planted in the ground, but the growth and the bearing of fruit of that seed is dependent upon right soil conditions. Jesus made it clear in the Parable of the Sower that there were conditions of the heart that either hindered or helped the seed grow to become a mature plant that bears fruit. There is one paramount heart condition: Truly, truly, I say to you, Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it stays alone: but if it die, it brings forth much fruit. There came a time after years of Spirit filled "ministry" when I personally lost my life and abandoned all and stood before Him empty without the baggage of ministry, church, doctrines, anointing, gifts, and call. It became a time of just beholding Him. I began to experience a kingdom reality that transcended my understanding and spiritual gifts. In that place of losing my own life, I found it in Him.
LIKE A CHILD Truly I say to you, Whoever shall not receive the kingdom of God as a little child shall in no wise enter therein "Humble teachableness" is the word that comes to me when I think of a child. Humble teachableness means flexible and changeable to align our beliefs, our being, and our actions according to WHATEVER our Father would desire of us. The kingdom is not complicated, and it only takes the faith of child to receive and enter the kingdom. A child believes what His Father says, and does what he sees his Father do. It is such as these that enter the kingdom. This is rest; to simply believe, accept, love, and trust Father fully in every circumstance, like a child.
DOING HIS WILL Not everyone who says to me, 'Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. Those who have entered the kingdom do His will. The kingdom of God is manifest as the will of God is done FIRST within us, and then through us. Entering the kingdom is realized as we become the very dwelling place of God on the earth, and express that oneness in obedience to His will. From this dwelling of union with Him; His will is done, His kingdom comes upon the earth as it is heaven. For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God. The kingdom of God is what Jesus demonstrated as a Son in perfect oneness with Father God's will. All those who are led by His Spirit do His will, and are sons in the kingdom of their Father.
ENTERING THE KINGDOM
The greatest hindrance to the gospel of the kingdom for Jesus was not from sinners. They welcomed Him as He brought them healing and wholeness. In Jesus' day the established "system" of religion resisted and killed Jesus. ...for you shut up the kingdom of heaven against men: for you neither go in yourselves, neither suffer you them that are entering to go in. The gospel of the kingdom is still resisted by the same religious mindset that is unwilling to lose its life and holds selfishly to its ministry, it's traditional church structure, it's position of influence, it's monetary gain; and will not enter the kingdom. We each must lose our own life as it regards the religious mindset that opposes the kingdom. We must also not let "well meaning" men and women bound to religious mindsets hinder us from entering the kingdom.
I believe there are some reading this who are truly seeking to find Life in Christ that has eluded them in their experience with church life. You have been born again, you have been filled with the Spirit, but you are unsatisfied and see the emptiness of man's religion. Your ONLY hope is to lose your life and abandon everything you have known or think you know and come before Him like a little child. No complex doctrine. No gift or ministry credentials. Nothing to prove. Just come face to face with Him with NOTHING but a simple faith as a child who loves their Dad. And where He leads you, GO!
In His Love
Kriston Couchey
http://my.opera.com/Boanerges/blog/
by Kriston Couchey
SEEING THE KINGDOM
Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. While being born of the Spirit gives the ability to see the kingdom; seeing the kingdom and entering it are not the same. We can stand at the border of a city and observe its activities and how people travel to and from that city and still not enter that city. Seeing it does not mean we partake of its lifestyle or becoming a citizen of that city. As it regards the kingdom of God, Jesus spoke clearly about the manner in which the kingdom of God is entered. From what He showed us there are conditions or prerequisites to entering the kingdom.
LOSING YOUR OWN LIFE Then said Jesus to his disciples, If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me. For whoever will save his life shall lose it: and whoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it. The Gospel of the kingdom is like a seed. A seed may be planted in the ground, but the growth and the bearing of fruit of that seed is dependent upon right soil conditions. Jesus made it clear in the Parable of the Sower that there were conditions of the heart that either hindered or helped the seed grow to become a mature plant that bears fruit. There is one paramount heart condition: Truly, truly, I say to you, Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it stays alone: but if it die, it brings forth much fruit. There came a time after years of Spirit filled "ministry" when I personally lost my life and abandoned all and stood before Him empty without the baggage of ministry, church, doctrines, anointing, gifts, and call. It became a time of just beholding Him. I began to experience a kingdom reality that transcended my understanding and spiritual gifts. In that place of losing my own life, I found it in Him.
LIKE A CHILD Truly I say to you, Whoever shall not receive the kingdom of God as a little child shall in no wise enter therein "Humble teachableness" is the word that comes to me when I think of a child. Humble teachableness means flexible and changeable to align our beliefs, our being, and our actions according to WHATEVER our Father would desire of us. The kingdom is not complicated, and it only takes the faith of child to receive and enter the kingdom. A child believes what His Father says, and does what he sees his Father do. It is such as these that enter the kingdom. This is rest; to simply believe, accept, love, and trust Father fully in every circumstance, like a child.
DOING HIS WILL Not everyone who says to me, 'Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. Those who have entered the kingdom do His will. The kingdom of God is manifest as the will of God is done FIRST within us, and then through us. Entering the kingdom is realized as we become the very dwelling place of God on the earth, and express that oneness in obedience to His will. From this dwelling of union with Him; His will is done, His kingdom comes upon the earth as it is heaven. For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God. The kingdom of God is what Jesus demonstrated as a Son in perfect oneness with Father God's will. All those who are led by His Spirit do His will, and are sons in the kingdom of their Father.
ENTERING THE KINGDOM
The greatest hindrance to the gospel of the kingdom for Jesus was not from sinners. They welcomed Him as He brought them healing and wholeness. In Jesus' day the established "system" of religion resisted and killed Jesus. ...for you shut up the kingdom of heaven against men: for you neither go in yourselves, neither suffer you them that are entering to go in. The gospel of the kingdom is still resisted by the same religious mindset that is unwilling to lose its life and holds selfishly to its ministry, it's traditional church structure, it's position of influence, it's monetary gain; and will not enter the kingdom. We each must lose our own life as it regards the religious mindset that opposes the kingdom. We must also not let "well meaning" men and women bound to religious mindsets hinder us from entering the kingdom.
I believe there are some reading this who are truly seeking to find Life in Christ that has eluded them in their experience with church life. You have been born again, you have been filled with the Spirit, but you are unsatisfied and see the emptiness of man's religion. Your ONLY hope is to lose your life and abandon everything you have known or think you know and come before Him like a little child. No complex doctrine. No gift or ministry credentials. Nothing to prove. Just come face to face with Him with NOTHING but a simple faith as a child who loves their Dad. And where He leads you, GO!
In His Love
Kriston Couchey
http://my.opera.com/Boanerges/blog/
Monday, May 23, 2011
Word Of The Lord For The United States Of America
Word Of The Lord
For The United States Of America
Today's prophets are speaking out as they did in the days of Amos. We are not in the days of King Uzziah but the days of President Obama, President of the United States of America. We need to hear the Word of the Lord from the genuine mouthpieces that are declaring the truth. Now is the time for the leadership in the United States of America to turn to God with their whole heart. God is speaking and saying, if you who lead the nation of America will call a solemn fast and begin to pray for your nation to repent on a national scale America will be spared.
If on the other hand you continue to rend Israel and come against God's chosen people as you divide Israel so shall your own Nation be divided. You cannot have it both ways. You will either bow down and serve Me and love the apple of My eye or you will be utterly thrown down and in the end destroyed. I am indeed speaking through My servants the prophets and declaring a Word in season.
Those of you that are weary, come to Me in repentance and I will hold you, and I will forgive your sins. They are many and have come up before Me. I am calling you to repentance and calling you to be an example to the Nations of the earth. You have many that are praying and calling on Me for change. Faith filled lips have been praying and interceding but there needs to be prayer on a national scale to spare your nation. Darkness is on the face of the land. Sin is rampant in the church and in the world. The government is seeking to deceive many and these truths will be revealed as My people pray and seek My face. I will speak and those that will hear Me, will hear Me and see change in their lives.
Families need Me, your whole nation will be spared as you call on My name in a large scale. As Sodom and Gomorrah was destroyed, so I will destroy nations of the earth that will destroy My people Israel. Take heed, and do not destroy her by trying to divide her but read the Word of the Lord. Read My Word and know that it is truth and honor the boundaries set in it. Then as you serve Me you will prosper, says the Lord. but if you bow to other Gods you will be destroyed. Forsake other Gods, break up your follow ground and I will honor you, says the Lord.
May 18, 2011
May 18, 2011
Patricia Hamel
For The United States Of America
Today's prophets are speaking out as they did in the days of Amos. We are not in the days of King Uzziah but the days of President Obama, President of the United States of America. We need to hear the Word of the Lord from the genuine mouthpieces that are declaring the truth. Now is the time for the leadership in the United States of America to turn to God with their whole heart. God is speaking and saying, if you who lead the nation of America will call a solemn fast and begin to pray for your nation to repent on a national scale America will be spared.
If on the other hand you continue to rend Israel and come against God's chosen people as you divide Israel so shall your own Nation be divided. You cannot have it both ways. You will either bow down and serve Me and love the apple of My eye or you will be utterly thrown down and in the end destroyed. I am indeed speaking through My servants the prophets and declaring a Word in season.
Those of you that are weary, come to Me in repentance and I will hold you, and I will forgive your sins. They are many and have come up before Me. I am calling you to repentance and calling you to be an example to the Nations of the earth. You have many that are praying and calling on Me for change. Faith filled lips have been praying and interceding but there needs to be prayer on a national scale to spare your nation. Darkness is on the face of the land. Sin is rampant in the church and in the world. The government is seeking to deceive many and these truths will be revealed as My people pray and seek My face. I will speak and those that will hear Me, will hear Me and see change in their lives.
Families need Me, your whole nation will be spared as you call on My name in a large scale. As Sodom and Gomorrah was destroyed, so I will destroy nations of the earth that will destroy My people Israel. Take heed, and do not destroy her by trying to divide her but read the Word of the Lord. Read My Word and know that it is truth and honor the boundaries set in it. Then as you serve Me you will prosper, says the Lord. but if you bow to other Gods you will be destroyed. Forsake other Gods, break up your follow ground and I will honor you, says the Lord.
May 18, 2011
May 18, 2011
Patricia Hamel
Pray For Joplin, Missouri
CALLED FOR SUCH A TIME AS THIS
Pray For Joplin, Missouri
Our hearts go out to the people of Joplin, Missouri. Let us keep them in our prayers during the difficult days ahead.
Last night as I heard of the tornado in Joplin, Missouri and prayed for the people, it also came to me about President Obama's meeting with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel and his pressure on him to put back the lines to 1967. Two days earlier on the 18th the Lord gave me a word for the USA and a lot of it was about dividing Israel. God is making this clear through many. On May 20, 2011 Billye Brim put out a prayer alert to this effect and I am sure others have put out warnings as well.
There was the voice of a woman saying," Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, Heavenly Father" that could be heard above those hiding in a store freezer during this tornado. She knew who to call on in the time of storm, calling on the name of Jesus. This speaks volumes of where our hearts need to be not just during crisis, but daily.
Do you ask the Father to order your steps each day? This is something we all need to do. We need to walk out our salvation with fear and trembling. This woman did not know she would be called on last night to be a witness in the storm and devastation but clearly she was ready.
We need to pray Psalm 91 for protection and get it into our spirits. He is our front end and rear guard. We need to trust in Father and put our lives in His hands. We have assurance of life for the moment we are in and not more. Let us walk a repent walk and be ready at all times to meet our maker.
Let us continue to pray and intercede for the Lord to have mercy.
For whoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be saved. Romans 10:13
http://patriciahamel.com
Pray For Joplin, Missouri
Our hearts go out to the people of Joplin, Missouri. Let us keep them in our prayers during the difficult days ahead.
Last night as I heard of the tornado in Joplin, Missouri and prayed for the people, it also came to me about President Obama's meeting with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel and his pressure on him to put back the lines to 1967. Two days earlier on the 18th the Lord gave me a word for the USA and a lot of it was about dividing Israel. God is making this clear through many. On May 20, 2011 Billye Brim put out a prayer alert to this effect and I am sure others have put out warnings as well.
There was the voice of a woman saying," Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, Heavenly Father" that could be heard above those hiding in a store freezer during this tornado. She knew who to call on in the time of storm, calling on the name of Jesus. This speaks volumes of where our hearts need to be not just during crisis, but daily.
Do you ask the Father to order your steps each day? This is something we all need to do. We need to walk out our salvation with fear and trembling. This woman did not know she would be called on last night to be a witness in the storm and devastation but clearly she was ready.
We need to pray Psalm 91 for protection and get it into our spirits. He is our front end and rear guard. We need to trust in Father and put our lives in His hands. We have assurance of life for the moment we are in and not more. Let us walk a repent walk and be ready at all times to meet our maker.
Let us continue to pray and intercede for the Lord to have mercy.
For whoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be saved. Romans 10:13
http://patriciahamel.com
Thursday, May 12, 2011
The Kingdom Of God Is Within You NOW!
CALLED FOR SUCH A TIME AS THIS
The Kingdom Of God Is Within You NOW!
Neither shall they say, See here! or, see there! for, behold, the kingdom of God is within you. Luke 17:21
And the glory of the LORD shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together: for the mouth of the LORD has spoken it. Isaiah 40:5
God's glory is going to be revealed in you and in me. His glory is going to be revealed as daily we are transformed into the image of Christ. He is changing us little by little and each day we are becoming more recognizable as the bride of Christ. Have we arrived, no, but we are being transformed by the renewing of our mind. We are being made new and becoming more like Jesus. His Spirit is moving in our hearts, stirring, transforming and changing all that is not of Him as we allow Him the pre-eminence in our lives.
Let Him change you! Let Him stir your heart! Let Him challenge you to come higher! Enter into His courts with thanksgiving and praise. Enter in. The Kingdom of God is within you. Indeed the Kingdom of God is within each one of His precious jewels and this truth is being revealed to His church. Walls are tumbling down. Hearts are being changed as we are being shaken out of complacency and realizing that there is a model for the new testament church and it is Christ in us the hope of glory. The new testament church and today's church are far apart and transformation is taking place. This shaking will forever change how we view the church. It will come at great price as the religious spirit is attempting to resist what the Lord is doing but it will be brought down.
Sadly love one for another is not readily visible in the body today. We may feel that we have arrived, but we have not come to that place of being willing to die for one another. We have not come to the place where we are willing to come out of our comfort zone and serve one another. We are still sadly far from being like Jesus but the bride will be changed into His image.
There is a remnant that have been refined in the refiners fire. Father has been cutting away all the garbage and removing self from lives. Sometimes the pruning does not seem pleasant but it is so necessary that we abide in the vine and allow Jesus to flow through us (the branches).
The axe is being applied to the root and we are going to be like Jesus and His glory is going to be revealed in us. The Kingdom of God is within you. The Kingdom of God indeed lies within each one of us. Do you see the Kingdom of God? Do you see it by His Spirit? Do you see what the Father is doing? Do you hear the wind of the Spirit blowing where He wants to blow. God will not be stopped. The storms of life are on all sides. The wind is blowing and picking up in its velocity and glory to God, Christ is going to be revealed in all His glory.
You are His bride. You are His precious jewel. Allow Him to flow and let the wind blow on you. You will be changed and transformed into the image of Christ.
Hear the wind blow My people. Hear the wind of My Spirit blow throughout the land. I am taking My church to a new level. I am taking her and moving within her and little by little she is coming to life. Pray in the Spirit. Walk in the Spirit. Press into Me and hear the wind blow. You will catch the wind for it will not stop blowing nor will it be contained. I cannot be contained or put into a box. Hear the wind of My spirit blow in your life today. Do not resist Me. Do not attempt to contain me! I am not in the four walls of the church but I am within your hearts. Allow Me the pre-eminence in your life. You are the temple of My Spirit. The Kingdom of God is within you. Transformation is coming. You will one day be the beautiful bride I have called you to be. I see you as perfect and you are being elevated to that place. Stand aside Me and walk in purity and holiness. Be transformed into My image by the grace of God.
Praise Me and magnify My holy name. Walk in love one toward another, seek the Kingdom of God first and My righteousness and all things will be added to you. Love those that are without, love those that are within and redeem the time for it is short in the earth.Bring glory to My name and be reminded that the Kingdom of God is within you NOW. Move with Kingdom principles NOW. Move by My Spirit NOW. Love NOW. Repent Now. Have joy NOW for the Kingdom of God is within you NOW.
The Kingdom Of God Is Within You NOW!
Neither shall they say, See here! or, see there! for, behold, the kingdom of God is within you. Luke 17:21
And the glory of the LORD shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together: for the mouth of the LORD has spoken it. Isaiah 40:5
God's glory is going to be revealed in you and in me. His glory is going to be revealed as daily we are transformed into the image of Christ. He is changing us little by little and each day we are becoming more recognizable as the bride of Christ. Have we arrived, no, but we are being transformed by the renewing of our mind. We are being made new and becoming more like Jesus. His Spirit is moving in our hearts, stirring, transforming and changing all that is not of Him as we allow Him the pre-eminence in our lives.
Let Him change you! Let Him stir your heart! Let Him challenge you to come higher! Enter into His courts with thanksgiving and praise. Enter in. The Kingdom of God is within you. Indeed the Kingdom of God is within each one of His precious jewels and this truth is being revealed to His church. Walls are tumbling down. Hearts are being changed as we are being shaken out of complacency and realizing that there is a model for the new testament church and it is Christ in us the hope of glory. The new testament church and today's church are far apart and transformation is taking place. This shaking will forever change how we view the church. It will come at great price as the religious spirit is attempting to resist what the Lord is doing but it will be brought down.
Sadly love one for another is not readily visible in the body today. We may feel that we have arrived, but we have not come to that place of being willing to die for one another. We have not come to the place where we are willing to come out of our comfort zone and serve one another. We are still sadly far from being like Jesus but the bride will be changed into His image.
There is a remnant that have been refined in the refiners fire. Father has been cutting away all the garbage and removing self from lives. Sometimes the pruning does not seem pleasant but it is so necessary that we abide in the vine and allow Jesus to flow through us (the branches).
The axe is being applied to the root and we are going to be like Jesus and His glory is going to be revealed in us. The Kingdom of God is within you. The Kingdom of God indeed lies within each one of us. Do you see the Kingdom of God? Do you see it by His Spirit? Do you see what the Father is doing? Do you hear the wind of the Spirit blowing where He wants to blow. God will not be stopped. The storms of life are on all sides. The wind is blowing and picking up in its velocity and glory to God, Christ is going to be revealed in all His glory.
You are His bride. You are His precious jewel. Allow Him to flow and let the wind blow on you. You will be changed and transformed into the image of Christ.
Hear the wind blow My people. Hear the wind of My Spirit blow throughout the land. I am taking My church to a new level. I am taking her and moving within her and little by little she is coming to life. Pray in the Spirit. Walk in the Spirit. Press into Me and hear the wind blow. You will catch the wind for it will not stop blowing nor will it be contained. I cannot be contained or put into a box. Hear the wind of My spirit blow in your life today. Do not resist Me. Do not attempt to contain me! I am not in the four walls of the church but I am within your hearts. Allow Me the pre-eminence in your life. You are the temple of My Spirit. The Kingdom of God is within you. Transformation is coming. You will one day be the beautiful bride I have called you to be. I see you as perfect and you are being elevated to that place. Stand aside Me and walk in purity and holiness. Be transformed into My image by the grace of God.
Praise Me and magnify My holy name. Walk in love one toward another, seek the Kingdom of God first and My righteousness and all things will be added to you. Love those that are without, love those that are within and redeem the time for it is short in the earth.Bring glory to My name and be reminded that the Kingdom of God is within you NOW. Move with Kingdom principles NOW. Move by My Spirit NOW. Love NOW. Repent Now. Have joy NOW for the Kingdom of God is within you NOW.
Monday, May 9, 2011
Heavenly Citizenship!
CALLED FOR SUCH A TIME AS THIS
HEAVENLY CITIZENSHIP!
Tomorrow the census is due in the nation of Canada. The government requires the Canadian people to fill one in so that they have a record of things pertaining to the people. In scripture we read about Joseph and Mary also having to go to another town to fill out their census. In those days Caesar Augustus issued a decree that a census should be taken of the entire Roman world. Luke 2:2 Everyone went to his own town to register. (Luke 2:3) Joseph and Mary had to travel to Bethlehem because of their lineage and it was a distance away. Today one does not need to leave their town and I only need to walk a few blocks away or fill it out online. Life is simpler or so I realized after reading this today.
Mary was carrying the son of God in her womb on this difficult journey. As I go to deliver my census today I too am carrying someone holy within me. That same anointed one, JESUS that was in Mary's womb is in my heart today. His spirit lives within me. Today hopefully I too will share my new birth with someone in the world and be used to touch their heart by faith.
We are in this world but not of it. Our true citizenship is in heaven and we are seated in heavenly places in Christ. All looks different when we see life from this vantage point and life becomes so much clearer. We are ambassadors representing the Kingdom of God and are His workmanship, here only temporarily until God calls us to our true home where we will rule and reign with Him forever.
Man's census asks if you have garden vegetables for sale and this is on the short version of it. Some people receive the longer one. God's would be looking to see if you are bearing fruit that will remain. Today let us remember our true citizenship. We are blood bought children of God and joint heirs of salvation. Citizens of this world temporarily but of heaven for eternity.
It is time to walk in your God given authority and carry out the Kingdom assignments as the Lord gives them to you. Fulfill your kingdom assignments with joy and let Him carry your burdens today. His yolk is easy and His burden is light.
Rejoice that your name is written in the Lamb's book of life.
For our conversation is in heaven; from whence also we look for the Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ: Phil. 3:20
HEAVENLY CITIZENSHIP!
Tomorrow the census is due in the nation of Canada. The government requires the Canadian people to fill one in so that they have a record of things pertaining to the people. In scripture we read about Joseph and Mary also having to go to another town to fill out their census. In those days Caesar Augustus issued a decree that a census should be taken of the entire Roman world. Luke 2:2 Everyone went to his own town to register. (Luke 2:3) Joseph and Mary had to travel to Bethlehem because of their lineage and it was a distance away. Today one does not need to leave their town and I only need to walk a few blocks away or fill it out online. Life is simpler or so I realized after reading this today.
Mary was carrying the son of God in her womb on this difficult journey. As I go to deliver my census today I too am carrying someone holy within me. That same anointed one, JESUS that was in Mary's womb is in my heart today. His spirit lives within me. Today hopefully I too will share my new birth with someone in the world and be used to touch their heart by faith.
We are in this world but not of it. Our true citizenship is in heaven and we are seated in heavenly places in Christ. All looks different when we see life from this vantage point and life becomes so much clearer. We are ambassadors representing the Kingdom of God and are His workmanship, here only temporarily until God calls us to our true home where we will rule and reign with Him forever.
Man's census asks if you have garden vegetables for sale and this is on the short version of it. Some people receive the longer one. God's would be looking to see if you are bearing fruit that will remain. Today let us remember our true citizenship. We are blood bought children of God and joint heirs of salvation. Citizens of this world temporarily but of heaven for eternity.
It is time to walk in your God given authority and carry out the Kingdom assignments as the Lord gives them to you. Fulfill your kingdom assignments with joy and let Him carry your burdens today. His yolk is easy and His burden is light.
Rejoice that your name is written in the Lamb's book of life.
For our conversation is in heaven; from whence also we look for the Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ: Phil. 3:20
Thursday, May 5, 2011
The Lamb in the Midst of the Throne by T. Austin-Sparks
The Lamb in the Midst of the Throne
by T. Austin-Sparks
Chapter 7 - The Subjective Work of the Cross
Reading: Revelation 5:1-14; 7:9-17.
The Negative Aspect
We are concerned with the matter of spiritual life, spiritual growth, spiritual progress. We are deeply distressed because of the smallness, the limitation, the weakness of so many children of God after so long a time. We are troubled because converts do not move on and believers do not grow, and so few come to the place where they are able to take responsibility and you have no need to be keeping a "weather eye" on them all the time. Why do we have to write off so much of our life, as being very full and yet so empty? The Lord has shown us why and the solution to the problem is found in the Cross.
If spiritual growth is arrested or retarded, you can usually trace in the case concerned some strength of natural life. It does not always appear as strength, mark you. Its appearance is sometimes as of weakness. It is not always the aggressive one who is marked by strength. Sometimes our strength is in our passivity, in our unwillingness to take risks. We call that, of course, being very humble, being meek, docile. Oh, but sometimes that is the thing the Lord has to hammer at. That is the passive side. On the other side, there is the more active and aggressive kind. But usually you can find somewhere a strength of some sort which is the strength of nature, which is not yielding or letting go to the Lord. The Lord has to deal with us according to what we are. In those people who are all too ready to be aggressive and take responsibility and do things, the Lord has to deal with them along one line, in taking away all that in which their soul glories. On the other side, He has to challenge to do, challenge to accept responsibility. He deals with us according to how He finds us. But the key to the matter is whether we, in what we are by nature whatever that may be, will really yield to the Cross; for the Cross is many-sided, and as many-sided as there are temperaments amongst men.
The Cross is applied according to every man's make-up. What would be the Cross to me would never be the Cross to you, and the Cross may mean something different for every one of us. But it is universal. That is the point — central and universal. It touches us all perhaps in a different way, and it raises questions and issues for each one of us peculiarly. That is our challenge of the Cross, and then it is a matter whether we, in what we are, will come and allow the Cross to deal with us. It is no use our saying, "What shall this man do?" The Lord will at once answer, "What is that to thee? Follow thou Me". There is a personal, individual, shall I say, private application of the Cross to every one of us, and our spiritual growth depends entirely upon the Cross doing its work in us, and our response to it personally.
There are a good many other matters which we could not cover if we tried to. For instance, we do not know God's purpose for each life. God's purpose touches each one in a different way. There is that sovereign choice of God which has a place for each one of us, a peculiar work for each of us to do. While it is related, a part of the whole, nevertheless it is a facet of that great jewel, the City of God, and God has to have us dealt with and responsive to Him in a particular way, in which someone else has no place, and we, in the Cross, have particular dealings with the Lord because of something which is peculiar to us in the Divine purpose.
So, you see, it is very necessary that we should recognize that this cannot be taken as a kind of a general thing. It has to become peculiar to each one of us. Oh, beloved, do believe that this is not just teaching, or doctrine. It is of very great importance. But I would beg you not to accept it merely because I am saying it and emphasizing it, nor even because I tell you that so far as some of us are concerned, it is a proved thing. I would ask you for one thing only, namely, not to close your heart to it, not to say, That is a teaching! but just to ask the Lord, "Is this right?", taking an attitude simply and honestly before the Lord, even should you feel it is not true, and so leaving room for the possibility that the prejudice may, after all, spring from yourself, from something in your constitution or in your upbringing. Will you go to the Lord with this and say, "Lord I do not see, it is difficult for me to believe it; but, if it is true, then, Lord, I am open to the truth, and I want You to take me definitely in hand on the ground of the truth". There is not one of us, I am sure, who wants to stand in the presence of the Lord later on, and for the Lord to say, "My child, I would have led you into something very much fuller if only you had given Me the chance". Will you take a very honest and open-hearted attitude toward the Lord in the matter?
That is the negative side. Of course, the things included in that are legion. But it does mean this on all matters, that you and I have no prejudices, no pre-conceptions, that we have not reached a position on any point where we have come to finality. It means that we may yet have to change our entire position on some matters. Things about which we are most certainty convinced may have to go yet. We must recognize God's sovereign dealings with us. There are some of us who at one time in our lives believed with all our being that a certain thing was God's will, and God's directive will at that, and we have come at length by the deepest experience, and experience which has issued in the greatest values, to have to say, "That was only God's permissive will, and God never meant it as anything like His end." It was only a step towards something else, and the thing involved was to us tremendous. We would have staked our lives upon it. But we have had to change our entire attitude to that, and put it in a secondary place in the will of God, and see that God was dealing with us where He found us, and leading us step by step, and each step called for adjustment and a change. Oh, the purpose of God was the same all the way through, but His methods with us had to vary, and He has very graciously, in His sovereignty, used these imperfect stages and steps to teach us much. I think we should say today that our position now is so much the stronger because it represents such a change. Oh, beloved, we have to keep that Cross where it preserves an open way which makes it yet possible for new things to happen, without our so clinging to our position that God cannot do revolutionary things in us still. The Cross is fundamental to all that God wants to do, and when the Lord is going to do a new thing, the Cross is going to deal with some fresh obstruction. Well now, that is on the negative side.
The positive side of this arises when you see the object of the Cross in God's mind. Why the Cross, you ask. Well, negatively the Cross is to get this incapacitated man out of the way; for, while he is so injured and incapacitated, he is yet a very active and very energetic and very positive factor. If only he were so crippled that he could do nothing, it would be an easy matter. But it is not so. He is the most active, energetic cripple, bothering everything and everybody. But he has to be got out of the way for God's positive object.
(b) The Positive Aspect
What is God's positive side of the Cross? It is that the Cross shall make room for a man who is capable, who has all the capacities, capabilities and faculties for Divine things: and it is just at that point that the whole meaning and value of the Holy Spirit comes in. It is not possible for us to know the Holy Spirit until the Cross has become a reality. You never, in type or in antitype, reach the anointing until you have come to the slaying. Thus Paul says this strong word to the Galatians: Christ was made a curse for us. "Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us: for it is written, Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree: that upon the Gentiles might come the blessing of Abraham in Christ Jesus; that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith" (Gal. 3:13-14). Made a curse for us that we might receive the promise of the Spirit. That is borne out in the New Testament in every instance of receiving the Spirit.
The Cross and the Spirit
Take one instance, Acts 19:1-5. Paul, having passed through certain regions, came to Ephesus, and found there certain disciples and said unto them, "Did ye receive the Holy Spirit when ye believed?" evidently perplexed because of an anomaly, because of something which was abnormal or sub-normal, something freakish. Here were people who were calling themselves Christians and disciples of the Lord Jesus, and he did not discern there the marks of their having received the Spirit. This, thought he, is strange, this is extraordinary, because if they are Christians in the real, genuine, true sense, they cannot be without the Holy Spirit, they must have received the Holy Spirit. But here is a little group of people gathering together as Christians, and yet the tokens of their having received the Spirit are not there: and perplexed, he said, "Did ye receive the Holy Spirit when ye believed?" You know their reply, "We did not so much as hear whether the Holy Spirit was given." Then in what Paul next says he goes right to the heart of things. "Into what then were ye baptized?" What has that to do with it? They might have answered: what is the relationship between receiving the Spirit and being baptized? If baptism is a testimony to our death and burial and resurrection in Christ, then that is the foundation of receiving the Spirit and Paul had put his finger upon the whole situation. In reply to his question, they had said they had been baptized into John's baptism. Ah! so that is it. Well, he explained to them the difference between John's baptism and being baptized into Christ and then they were baptized into the Name of the Lord Jesus, and when Paul had laid his hands upon them they received the Holy Spirit. The two things go together always — the Cross and the Spirit.
The Cross in its negative side is to get rid of that old cursed creation which can never receive the Spirit. Remember that! Anything which lies under a curse can never receive the Spirit of God, and you have to get it out of the way. What will you do with a cursed thing? You will put it to death and bury it. That which has no curse then comes into view and the Spirit comes upon that.
The Nature of the New Creation — The Joining of the Holy Spirit with the New-born Spirit of Man
The positive side of the Cross is the coming in of the Holy Spirit to what is born again, the newborn spirit of a believer, and the joining of the Spirit of God with the spirit of man sets forth a new type of being such as never has been in the creation before. Oh, yes, in the Old Testament there were comings upon and workings within by the Holy Spirit, but the joining of the Spirit of God with the spirit of man had never taken place before. That is what Adam missed and the race in Adam lost and could never recover because of the curse. There is a new creation in Christ Jesus and the new creation is the joining of the Holy Spirit with the born anew spirit of man.
Now you have the Holy Spirit in and upon the spirit of man as the Spirit of life, and that Spirit of life means that in the inward man we are alive unto God. We know what it means to be alive unto things, to be alive unto God. It is something very active: alive in consciousness, alive in every way unto God. It is something quite new, is this aliveness unto God. Oh, it is a blessed thing! I know this is very elementary; but it is a very blessed thing to be alive unto God, to know that you are alive unto God. You see, this is altogether different from a traditional relationship with God, a doctrinal relationship with God, the relationship of a system to God. This is our personal, inward, blessed possession, to be alive unto God. Well, I think it is unnecessary for me to labour that. I hope you know really what it is to be alive unto God within, through the Spirit of life.
The Holy Spirit Brings New Faculties
But that life, that Spirit of life, means that there has been brought by the Holy Spirit into our spirit a new spiritual capacity, new spiritual faculties; that whereas in our natural state we could not, because we were incapacitated, now we can know the things of the Spirit of God. We can receive the things of the Spirit of God: we can move, intelligently and understandingly, in a realm which was closed; and the difference is very great indeed. But it is a very — I was going to say — subtle difference. Let me illustrate. There was a time when we did great things with our Bibles. We read Romans, and no one in all the world could have known Romans 6, so far as the chapter and wording was concerned, better than we did. And we read Ephesians and knew it; and we could preach on Romans 6 and on Ephesians, and give the most splendid interpretation and the most wonderful Bible analysis on the blackboard. We could say that the Church is not an organization but an organism. We could use all that phraseology. Yet with regard to Romans 6, when we were baptized we had truly testified to the fact that we were being buried with Christ, and the day came, beloved, when in very truth we met our Passover, our feast of unleavened bread, our smiting by the Cross of this natural life. We came, under the hand of God, to a very real experience and crisis of the Cross, and went through this, not just as sinners, but as Christians and preachers, ministers and workers, organizers. Something happened, a desperate and terrible thing happened. It was death indeed. But that was followed by a new knowing of the Lord, a new working of the Spirit, a release of the Spirit, a coming out into a life under the anointing, under an open heaven, and not only we, but everybody else, recognized that Romans 6 was something other than just teaching when we now spoke of it. What that "other" was it would be difficult to define. Ephesians too was different. Again, what the difference was, it would be very difficult to say. It was certainly not in the language, certainly not in the letter, certainly not in the doctrine; but there was meaning, there was power, something had happened. Before we could still preach Romans 6 and contradict it, and in the same way we could preach Ephesians and speak of the heavenly Church being an organism, and yet be in an earthly thing, limited and bound. Something happened, and not only were we in resurrection, but grave-clothes went.
I have only said that to reach this point. There is a difference. You may have difficulty in defining it, but it is the difference between death and life; it is the difference between our coming and taking up the Word of God with our natural powers of penetration and interpretation and analysis and presentation, and that revelation of the Holy Ghost in our hearts which lifts us into a new position and gives us an open heaven. It is a tremendous difference, and the Cross is the basis of that. The Holy Spirit brings new faculties, new capacities. They are different, altogether different. Before we were working in the things of God with our heads, now we are in them with our spirits. New faculties and a new power, spiritual power by the Holy Spirit. This is the positive side of the Cross.
So we have to challenge ourselves over this with regard to where we are. If this is not true, if this is only true in a very small degree, if ours is not this inward path which is growing brighter and brighter unto the noonday, why is it? Well, the responsibility cannot be placed at the Lord's door. There is some reason for it and God's answer to every such inquiry is the Cross. That Cross is intended to clear the ground for all that God has to give us, and into which He would lead us. If we are not coming into it, what is the reason? We can only say that somewhere the Cross is not being suffered to do its work. There is a need somewhere for the Cross to do something more.
Now, when I have said all this about the subjective application of the Cross, the Cross as a power, the Cross as an instrument, the Cross as a working thing in our experience, I must remind you that this has nothing to do with our acceptance, with our standing, with our position. That is assured to faith when we receive Christ. This is simply the outworking of God's purpose in us. But it is an important side. You cannot divorce these two. The divorcing of these two has resulted in a most deplorable state in Christendom and the end of the story is going to be terribly tragic. For many, the history of Israel is going to be repeated. They are going to die in the wilderness; that is, they are never going to reach the land of fullness, because Jordan has not been crossed. That does not mean that they are lost eternally; but they have missed all that God intended; they have come short of the fullness of Christ. There is a great deal of work that is going to be burnt up when it is tried by fire, a great deal of Christian profession is going to resolve itself into nothing. It is only what is really of the Spirit of the Lord, produced in us and produced through us, that is going to stand and go through; and that is determined by how much scope the Holy Spirit has; and the scope is determined by how thoroughly the work of the Cross is done in clearing the ground.
The Lord give us grace to receive His word and to be before Him very much that He will have His fullest way in us.
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by T. Austin-Sparks
Chapter 7 - The Subjective Work of the Cross
Reading: Revelation 5:1-14; 7:9-17.
The Negative Aspect
We are concerned with the matter of spiritual life, spiritual growth, spiritual progress. We are deeply distressed because of the smallness, the limitation, the weakness of so many children of God after so long a time. We are troubled because converts do not move on and believers do not grow, and so few come to the place where they are able to take responsibility and you have no need to be keeping a "weather eye" on them all the time. Why do we have to write off so much of our life, as being very full and yet so empty? The Lord has shown us why and the solution to the problem is found in the Cross.
If spiritual growth is arrested or retarded, you can usually trace in the case concerned some strength of natural life. It does not always appear as strength, mark you. Its appearance is sometimes as of weakness. It is not always the aggressive one who is marked by strength. Sometimes our strength is in our passivity, in our unwillingness to take risks. We call that, of course, being very humble, being meek, docile. Oh, but sometimes that is the thing the Lord has to hammer at. That is the passive side. On the other side, there is the more active and aggressive kind. But usually you can find somewhere a strength of some sort which is the strength of nature, which is not yielding or letting go to the Lord. The Lord has to deal with us according to what we are. In those people who are all too ready to be aggressive and take responsibility and do things, the Lord has to deal with them along one line, in taking away all that in which their soul glories. On the other side, He has to challenge to do, challenge to accept responsibility. He deals with us according to how He finds us. But the key to the matter is whether we, in what we are by nature whatever that may be, will really yield to the Cross; for the Cross is many-sided, and as many-sided as there are temperaments amongst men.
The Cross is applied according to every man's make-up. What would be the Cross to me would never be the Cross to you, and the Cross may mean something different for every one of us. But it is universal. That is the point — central and universal. It touches us all perhaps in a different way, and it raises questions and issues for each one of us peculiarly. That is our challenge of the Cross, and then it is a matter whether we, in what we are, will come and allow the Cross to deal with us. It is no use our saying, "What shall this man do?" The Lord will at once answer, "What is that to thee? Follow thou Me". There is a personal, individual, shall I say, private application of the Cross to every one of us, and our spiritual growth depends entirely upon the Cross doing its work in us, and our response to it personally.
There are a good many other matters which we could not cover if we tried to. For instance, we do not know God's purpose for each life. God's purpose touches each one in a different way. There is that sovereign choice of God which has a place for each one of us, a peculiar work for each of us to do. While it is related, a part of the whole, nevertheless it is a facet of that great jewel, the City of God, and God has to have us dealt with and responsive to Him in a particular way, in which someone else has no place, and we, in the Cross, have particular dealings with the Lord because of something which is peculiar to us in the Divine purpose.
So, you see, it is very necessary that we should recognize that this cannot be taken as a kind of a general thing. It has to become peculiar to each one of us. Oh, beloved, do believe that this is not just teaching, or doctrine. It is of very great importance. But I would beg you not to accept it merely because I am saying it and emphasizing it, nor even because I tell you that so far as some of us are concerned, it is a proved thing. I would ask you for one thing only, namely, not to close your heart to it, not to say, That is a teaching! but just to ask the Lord, "Is this right?", taking an attitude simply and honestly before the Lord, even should you feel it is not true, and so leaving room for the possibility that the prejudice may, after all, spring from yourself, from something in your constitution or in your upbringing. Will you go to the Lord with this and say, "Lord I do not see, it is difficult for me to believe it; but, if it is true, then, Lord, I am open to the truth, and I want You to take me definitely in hand on the ground of the truth". There is not one of us, I am sure, who wants to stand in the presence of the Lord later on, and for the Lord to say, "My child, I would have led you into something very much fuller if only you had given Me the chance". Will you take a very honest and open-hearted attitude toward the Lord in the matter?
That is the negative side. Of course, the things included in that are legion. But it does mean this on all matters, that you and I have no prejudices, no pre-conceptions, that we have not reached a position on any point where we have come to finality. It means that we may yet have to change our entire position on some matters. Things about which we are most certainty convinced may have to go yet. We must recognize God's sovereign dealings with us. There are some of us who at one time in our lives believed with all our being that a certain thing was God's will, and God's directive will at that, and we have come at length by the deepest experience, and experience which has issued in the greatest values, to have to say, "That was only God's permissive will, and God never meant it as anything like His end." It was only a step towards something else, and the thing involved was to us tremendous. We would have staked our lives upon it. But we have had to change our entire attitude to that, and put it in a secondary place in the will of God, and see that God was dealing with us where He found us, and leading us step by step, and each step called for adjustment and a change. Oh, the purpose of God was the same all the way through, but His methods with us had to vary, and He has very graciously, in His sovereignty, used these imperfect stages and steps to teach us much. I think we should say today that our position now is so much the stronger because it represents such a change. Oh, beloved, we have to keep that Cross where it preserves an open way which makes it yet possible for new things to happen, without our so clinging to our position that God cannot do revolutionary things in us still. The Cross is fundamental to all that God wants to do, and when the Lord is going to do a new thing, the Cross is going to deal with some fresh obstruction. Well now, that is on the negative side.
The positive side of this arises when you see the object of the Cross in God's mind. Why the Cross, you ask. Well, negatively the Cross is to get this incapacitated man out of the way; for, while he is so injured and incapacitated, he is yet a very active and very energetic and very positive factor. If only he were so crippled that he could do nothing, it would be an easy matter. But it is not so. He is the most active, energetic cripple, bothering everything and everybody. But he has to be got out of the way for God's positive object.
(b) The Positive Aspect
What is God's positive side of the Cross? It is that the Cross shall make room for a man who is capable, who has all the capacities, capabilities and faculties for Divine things: and it is just at that point that the whole meaning and value of the Holy Spirit comes in. It is not possible for us to know the Holy Spirit until the Cross has become a reality. You never, in type or in antitype, reach the anointing until you have come to the slaying. Thus Paul says this strong word to the Galatians: Christ was made a curse for us. "Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us: for it is written, Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree: that upon the Gentiles might come the blessing of Abraham in Christ Jesus; that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith" (Gal. 3:13-14). Made a curse for us that we might receive the promise of the Spirit. That is borne out in the New Testament in every instance of receiving the Spirit.
The Cross and the Spirit
Take one instance, Acts 19:1-5. Paul, having passed through certain regions, came to Ephesus, and found there certain disciples and said unto them, "Did ye receive the Holy Spirit when ye believed?" evidently perplexed because of an anomaly, because of something which was abnormal or sub-normal, something freakish. Here were people who were calling themselves Christians and disciples of the Lord Jesus, and he did not discern there the marks of their having received the Spirit. This, thought he, is strange, this is extraordinary, because if they are Christians in the real, genuine, true sense, they cannot be without the Holy Spirit, they must have received the Holy Spirit. But here is a little group of people gathering together as Christians, and yet the tokens of their having received the Spirit are not there: and perplexed, he said, "Did ye receive the Holy Spirit when ye believed?" You know their reply, "We did not so much as hear whether the Holy Spirit was given." Then in what Paul next says he goes right to the heart of things. "Into what then were ye baptized?" What has that to do with it? They might have answered: what is the relationship between receiving the Spirit and being baptized? If baptism is a testimony to our death and burial and resurrection in Christ, then that is the foundation of receiving the Spirit and Paul had put his finger upon the whole situation. In reply to his question, they had said they had been baptized into John's baptism. Ah! so that is it. Well, he explained to them the difference between John's baptism and being baptized into Christ and then they were baptized into the Name of the Lord Jesus, and when Paul had laid his hands upon them they received the Holy Spirit. The two things go together always — the Cross and the Spirit.
The Cross in its negative side is to get rid of that old cursed creation which can never receive the Spirit. Remember that! Anything which lies under a curse can never receive the Spirit of God, and you have to get it out of the way. What will you do with a cursed thing? You will put it to death and bury it. That which has no curse then comes into view and the Spirit comes upon that.
The Nature of the New Creation — The Joining of the Holy Spirit with the New-born Spirit of Man
The positive side of the Cross is the coming in of the Holy Spirit to what is born again, the newborn spirit of a believer, and the joining of the Spirit of God with the spirit of man sets forth a new type of being such as never has been in the creation before. Oh, yes, in the Old Testament there were comings upon and workings within by the Holy Spirit, but the joining of the Spirit of God with the spirit of man had never taken place before. That is what Adam missed and the race in Adam lost and could never recover because of the curse. There is a new creation in Christ Jesus and the new creation is the joining of the Holy Spirit with the born anew spirit of man.
Now you have the Holy Spirit in and upon the spirit of man as the Spirit of life, and that Spirit of life means that in the inward man we are alive unto God. We know what it means to be alive unto things, to be alive unto God. It is something very active: alive in consciousness, alive in every way unto God. It is something quite new, is this aliveness unto God. Oh, it is a blessed thing! I know this is very elementary; but it is a very blessed thing to be alive unto God, to know that you are alive unto God. You see, this is altogether different from a traditional relationship with God, a doctrinal relationship with God, the relationship of a system to God. This is our personal, inward, blessed possession, to be alive unto God. Well, I think it is unnecessary for me to labour that. I hope you know really what it is to be alive unto God within, through the Spirit of life.
The Holy Spirit Brings New Faculties
But that life, that Spirit of life, means that there has been brought by the Holy Spirit into our spirit a new spiritual capacity, new spiritual faculties; that whereas in our natural state we could not, because we were incapacitated, now we can know the things of the Spirit of God. We can receive the things of the Spirit of God: we can move, intelligently and understandingly, in a realm which was closed; and the difference is very great indeed. But it is a very — I was going to say — subtle difference. Let me illustrate. There was a time when we did great things with our Bibles. We read Romans, and no one in all the world could have known Romans 6, so far as the chapter and wording was concerned, better than we did. And we read Ephesians and knew it; and we could preach on Romans 6 and on Ephesians, and give the most splendid interpretation and the most wonderful Bible analysis on the blackboard. We could say that the Church is not an organization but an organism. We could use all that phraseology. Yet with regard to Romans 6, when we were baptized we had truly testified to the fact that we were being buried with Christ, and the day came, beloved, when in very truth we met our Passover, our feast of unleavened bread, our smiting by the Cross of this natural life. We came, under the hand of God, to a very real experience and crisis of the Cross, and went through this, not just as sinners, but as Christians and preachers, ministers and workers, organizers. Something happened, a desperate and terrible thing happened. It was death indeed. But that was followed by a new knowing of the Lord, a new working of the Spirit, a release of the Spirit, a coming out into a life under the anointing, under an open heaven, and not only we, but everybody else, recognized that Romans 6 was something other than just teaching when we now spoke of it. What that "other" was it would be difficult to define. Ephesians too was different. Again, what the difference was, it would be very difficult to say. It was certainly not in the language, certainly not in the letter, certainly not in the doctrine; but there was meaning, there was power, something had happened. Before we could still preach Romans 6 and contradict it, and in the same way we could preach Ephesians and speak of the heavenly Church being an organism, and yet be in an earthly thing, limited and bound. Something happened, and not only were we in resurrection, but grave-clothes went.
I have only said that to reach this point. There is a difference. You may have difficulty in defining it, but it is the difference between death and life; it is the difference between our coming and taking up the Word of God with our natural powers of penetration and interpretation and analysis and presentation, and that revelation of the Holy Ghost in our hearts which lifts us into a new position and gives us an open heaven. It is a tremendous difference, and the Cross is the basis of that. The Holy Spirit brings new faculties, new capacities. They are different, altogether different. Before we were working in the things of God with our heads, now we are in them with our spirits. New faculties and a new power, spiritual power by the Holy Spirit. This is the positive side of the Cross.
So we have to challenge ourselves over this with regard to where we are. If this is not true, if this is only true in a very small degree, if ours is not this inward path which is growing brighter and brighter unto the noonday, why is it? Well, the responsibility cannot be placed at the Lord's door. There is some reason for it and God's answer to every such inquiry is the Cross. That Cross is intended to clear the ground for all that God has to give us, and into which He would lead us. If we are not coming into it, what is the reason? We can only say that somewhere the Cross is not being suffered to do its work. There is a need somewhere for the Cross to do something more.
Now, when I have said all this about the subjective application of the Cross, the Cross as a power, the Cross as an instrument, the Cross as a working thing in our experience, I must remind you that this has nothing to do with our acceptance, with our standing, with our position. That is assured to faith when we receive Christ. This is simply the outworking of God's purpose in us. But it is an important side. You cannot divorce these two. The divorcing of these two has resulted in a most deplorable state in Christendom and the end of the story is going to be terribly tragic. For many, the history of Israel is going to be repeated. They are going to die in the wilderness; that is, they are never going to reach the land of fullness, because Jordan has not been crossed. That does not mean that they are lost eternally; but they have missed all that God intended; they have come short of the fullness of Christ. There is a great deal of work that is going to be burnt up when it is tried by fire, a great deal of Christian profession is going to resolve itself into nothing. It is only what is really of the Spirit of the Lord, produced in us and produced through us, that is going to stand and go through; and that is determined by how much scope the Holy Spirit has; and the scope is determined by how thoroughly the work of the Cross is done in clearing the ground.
The Lord give us grace to receive His word and to be before Him very much that He will have His fullest way in us.
[ Previous Chapter ] [ Contents ]
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Therefore, we ask if you choose to share them with others, please respect his wishes and offer them freely -
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