Category Archives: Body of Christ

Body of Christ, who I am in Christ

The Representation of God’s Nature

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“And He is the radiance of His glory and the exact REPRESENTATION OF HIS NATURE, and upholds all things by the word of His power. When He had made purification of sins, He sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high, having become as much better than the angels, as He has inherited a more excellent name than they” ~ Hebrews 1:3-4.

CrossDaily05Jesus is our example of One representing the very nature of the Father, and He calls to us, “Come. Follow Me.” When we choose to follow, we become His living stones. Just as Jesus is the Living Corner Stone, we are being chiseled into the very image of God in Christ Jesus. Peter expresses our call as image bearers in 1 Peter 2, telling us that we, as living stones, are…

“a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for God’s own possession, so that you may proclaim the excellencies of Him who has called you out of darkness into His marvelous light; for you once were not a people, but now you are the people of God; you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy. Beloved, I urge you as aliens and strangers to abstain from fleshly lusts which wage war against the soul. Keep your behavior excellent among the Gentiles, so that in the thing in which they slander you as evildoers, they may because of your good deeds, as they observe them, glorify God in the day of visitation” ~ vs. 9-12.

As royal priests, we are representatives of God and His interests in the world. The more we know Him, the better our understanding and comprehension of His nature will be. In knowing His nature, the better we will know His ways. And the better we know His ways, the more clearly stated will be our representation of Him, His glory, and His interests.

This is what I believe was the problem for the people of God in Moses’ day: they refused the invitation to experience God for themselves, preferring instead for Moses to relate with Him on their behalf (Exodus 19:16-20:26). Failing to choose to know Him for themselves, they did not have relational experience of His presence to help them stand firm in His ways, and they wound up falling away from the Living God. God calls us to individual relationship with Him still today. And still today, the choice is our own to make, whether or not we will walk with Him.

Paul tells us that once we choose relationship with God through Christ, we become His representatives in the world with a charge to be His light where we are. As God’s representatives, we are continually stripping off the old, unregenerate self in order to put on the new, spiritual self, “which is ever in the process of being renewed and remolded into fuller and more perfect knowledge upon knowledge after the image and likeness of Him Who created it.” And as Paul continues in Colossians 3, He implores us:

“Clothe yourselves therefore, as God’s own chosen ones – His own picked representatives, who are purified and holy and well-beloved by God Himself, by putting on behavior marked by tenderhearted pity and mercy, kind feeling, a lowly opinion of yourselves, gentle ways, and patience, which is tireless and long-suffering, and has the power to endure whatever comes, with good temper. Be gentle and forbearing with one another and, if one has a difference, a grievance or complaint against another, readily pardoning each other; even as the Lord has freely forgiven you, so must you also forgive. And above all these put on love and enfold yourselves with this bond of perfectness which binds everything together completely in ideal harmony. And let the peace – soul harmony which comes from Christ rule and act as umpire continually in your hearts, deciding and settling with finality all questions that arise in your minds, in that peaceful state to which as members of Christ’s one body you were also called to live. And be thankful, giving praise to God always. Let the word spoken by Christ have its home in your hearts and minds, and let it dwell in you in all its richness, as you teach and admonish and train one another in all insight and intelligence and wisdom in spiritual things, and as you sing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, making melody to God with His grace in your hearts. And whatever you do – no matter what it is in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus and in dependence upon His Person, giving praise to God the Father through Him” ~ vs. 12-17, AMP.

This is our calling and equipping, beloved, as true representatives in Christ, fulfilling the purpose and bringing to completion the interests of Father in the earth. But this is only a beginning of our knowledge. For more clear understanding, each individual of us must seek to know Him for ourselves; and one main place He is found is in the pages of His Word. Learn it so as to have it dwelling within so that you may live it.

Father, as Jesus represented Your very nature, so are we to follow His example. You not only call us to be Your representatives in this life, but You equip us for it, filling us to the full with all that You are: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control, and more. We are fully supplied to shine Your nature to the world so that they may know You and so they may know Your ways. Grant us to walk by the Spirit so that we will not carry out the deeds of the flesh. In Jesus, glorify Yourself in our very nature. Amen.

My Desire Playlist (8 songs) ~ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=113H_ySsBYg&index=3&list=PLfiEjLIYhJ9AfidNKH4ify2vg0Z5t-SSj

All scripture is in New American Standard Bible (NASB) unless otherwise stated.

Body of Christ, who I am in Christ

The Radiance of God’s Glory

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“And He (Jesus) is THE RADIANCE OF HIS (FATHER’S) GLORY and the exact representation of His (Father’s) nature, and upholds all things by the word of His (Father’s) power. When He (Jesus) had made purification of sins, He (Jesus) sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high (The Father), having become as much better than the angels, as He (Jesus) has inherited a more excellent name than they” ~ Hebrews 1:3-4.

This week on Living Worshipers Rally Point, we are praying this passage for the Body of Christ. It seemed good, as I considered the example we have in Jesus, to write accompanying devotionals to go along with each day’s focus. Yesterday, as I did not get back to this as planned, we looked at the radiance of the Father’s glory that is exemplified for us in Christ.

WALK-WITH-GODJesus radiated the glory of God for us, so that we could see what that looks like. Thinking of that, I recall Moses in contrast. The people were afraid of Moses because of the light in his face that shined forth the glory of God found in the intimate relationship with Him that Moses possessed; so for the sake of the people, Moses covered his face. Jesus, on the other hand, let it all hang out—or shine forth, if you will. And He calls us to follow His example by doing the same.

“You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden; nor does anyone light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on the lampstand, and it gives light to all who are in the house. Let your light shine before men in such a way that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father who is in heaven” ~ Matthew 5:14-16.

Like a lamp, we are placed where we are in this life for the purpose of lighting up the area. The closer we walk with God, the brighter our light. We must not be ashamed to let the light out. Nor are we to cover it up so-as to make others more comfortable. That defeats the purpose of light.

“Let no one deceive you with empty words, for because of these things the wrath of God comes upon the sons of disobedience. Therefore do not be partakers with them; for you were formerly darkness, but now you are Light in the Lord; walk as children of Light (for the fruit of the Light consists in all goodness and righteousness and truth), trying to learn what is pleasing to the Lord” ~ Ephesians 5:6-10.

We are to be in direct contrast to the dark things of this world. Our light is made known by a life of goodness, Parhelia Diamondsrighteousness, and truth. There is no truth in shrinking back so the darkness can have its way. Light dispels darkness. The very purpose of light – of glory, is to shine forth into the night.

I have night lights scattered throughout my house. When I wake too early and walk out of our room, made extra dark for sleeping, I am immediately greeted by lots of light throughout each room and across every walkway, making it easy to traverse the night. That is the job we have as His light. Dispel the dark so others may see to find The Way.

“We who first hoped in Christ [who first put our confidence in Him have been destined and appointed to] live for the praise of His glory!” ~ Ephesians 1:12, AMP.

Father, we are here to radiate Your glory: not hiding it from onlookers, but living as pleases You in all things so that others may see and know You. As we lift the Body of Christ to You today, O God, I pray that each individual one of us will follow Christ’s example and be the radiance of Your glory in the place You have placed us, no matter how dark and difficult. May we be found faithfully fulfilling our call in Your name and to Your glory. In Jesus, amen.

For further thought, read “Be Parhelia”. Then press into your day and SHINE! ~ https://darlenesponderings.com/2012/07/13/be-parhelia/

Body of Christ, Church, Kingdom Living, who I am in Christ

Be Strong and COURAGEOUS! ~ Part 2

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“Then He (the Lord) commissioned Joshua the son of Nun, and said, ‘Be strong and courageous, for you shall bring the sons of Israel into the land which I swore to them, and I will be with you’” ~ Deuteronomy 31:23, (authors note).

We are called and equipped, Beloved, to be strong and courageous in life, being as God is, living as Jesus lived – in the world but not of it, so others may come to know Him for themselves and find His promises for life. Jesus said…

“If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself (his fleshly lusts, worldly desires, and ungodly demands), and take up his cross daily and follow Me. For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life (by denying self and the desire to be in control above even God) for My sake, he is the one who will save it” ~ Luke 9:23-24 (Authors note).

When we choose to live as God desires, walk in obedience to Father as Jesus did, and live as His Eternal Kingdom CrossDaily05People in the midst of a world that denies Him, it will be difficult for us to do. Just as Jesus sweat blood before taking up His cross, there are times when we will feel we are doing the same (Hebrews 12:4). Here is the upside, Beloved one. Following the will of God even when we have to bear the cross of going against cultural norms and beliefs, sometimes even standing as if alone in order to obey Father and do His bidding, that cross bearing produces eternal fruit with great reward.

Every time we do right before God, though it puts us in difficult situations where we are, we add gold, silver and precious stones to our immortal structure that will not burn away as we enter His presence on the day of Bema seat (the judgment of the works of those who are God’s through Christ) (1 Corinthians 3:10-15). Accomplishing this in a society that promotes self (self-centeredness, self-reliance, self-fulfillment) will require faith in God, hope for eternity, and love, “and the greatest of these is love” ~ 1 Corinthians 13.

We are called as God’s people to love: loving Him first and foremost, above all else and with all that we are. We are called to love Him and others as He loves us, and to love our neighbor as we love ourselves. The question is, “How does He love us?” I believe the answer to that is best revealed through 1 John 3-4, especially chapter 4, verses 7-8:

sm34“Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God; and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. The one who does not love does not know God, FOR GOD IS LOVE.”

God is love, and that is the goal for our love-walk, to learn of Him so that we may be love as He is love. Everything God does is dictated by love – EVERYTHING – even what is known as His wrath. His wrath is not self-centered, it is us centered. When He came against the evil a person did in scripture, it was because He, knowing the heart and outcome of man’s choices, the path they would choose, protected those who had a heart to follow Him by removing from their midst the tempter – those dead-set against God’s will and way. God is love and everything He does and allows stems out of that sincere care for us, His created beings, as He works with us to build a Kingdom of people who have a heart for Him as He does for us.

Beloved, just as there is a Bema Seat to judge the works of our lives here on earth, how we loved and lived in His name, there is also a White Throne judgment. Those who refuse His gift in Christ will stand before that White throne and be cast out of His presence with no hope remaining for their eternal, immortal being. Love will compel us to live in a way that shows that we care about that fact.

Hear me, Beloved of God. Put your eternal-minded ears on. God will one day remove all evil from its ability to influence and lead His creation away from His purity—His essence. But here is the thing: as we stand before whichever judgment seat we are headed for, not only will there be full revelation of who we are within our being and what we have done in this life, but in that instant each will fully see and know Him as He is. All His glory, all His purity, ALL HIS LOVE will be evident to us all. Those who stand before Bema will enter in to enjoy His essence for all eternity. Those who refused His gift of grace through Jesus and stand before the White throne will be cast into outer darkness to never experience the light of His essence or touch the hem of the knowledge of His love for them again.

The burning of hell is not just flames and heat for all eternity. I believe with all my heart that the greater burning will be desire to stand before Him and to simply be able to touch the hem of His essence one more time.

FEEL THAT, BELOVED BROTHER AND SISTER! With every fiber of compassion you have in you, let that soak in to motivate your life. It is vital for us to understand that those who fail to choose to follow Him now will enter into eternal separation from Him knowing full well all they are missing out on. Loving compassion should move us to be as He is for the sake of bearing a testimony of love to a lost and dying world in need of the knowledge of their Savior, God and King.

It is vital that we overcome our fear in this life: fear of persecution, fear of standing out, fear of rejection, fear of being different. If we, out of love, do not overcome our “self” so as to take up our cross of self-denial in order to love others at any cost, we put those given to our charge, as being in our sphere of influence; we put them into jeopardy of eternal longing for God, all for lack of a witness to draw them into His eternal arms.

Our love-walk, not as the world loves, but to learn to be love as He is love and allow those around us to experience Him through us, is vital! “The greatest of these is LOVE” will impact those around us, bringing them to knowledge of Him and to a relationship with Him that will protect them from missing His presence with a longing that burns unfulfilled forevermore.

~*~

“If I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but do not have love, I have become a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy, and know all mysteries and all knowledge; and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. And if I give all my possessions to feed the poor, and if I surrender my body to be burned, but do not have love, it profits me nothing. Love is patient, love is kind and is not jealous; love does not brag and is not arrogant, does not act unbecomingly; it does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered, does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. LOVE NEVER FAILS….” ~ 1 Corinthians 13.

Body of Christ, Church, Kingdom Living, who I am in Christ

Be Strong and COURAGEOUS! ~ Part 1

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“The Lord is the one who goes ahead of you; He will be with you. He will not fail you or forsake you. Do not fear or be dismayed” ~ Deuteronomy 31:8

For over a week now, every time I read a passage like the one above, God highlights it and grabs my heart, drawing my attention to it. Today, when I found myself again caught by this version of the same theme, I bowed before Father and prayed, “Lord, You keep grabbing me with this word to not fear or be dismayed, but to be strong and courageous, but I do not understand why. Is something coming? Please prepare me to stand.”

Then, as I read further, Father brought clarity of understanding to me. In Deuteronomy 31, God has Moses preparing the people to enter in to possess the land of promise. But God has warned Moses that, once the children of Israel have done so, they will become complacent in their relationship with God because of their prosperity and ease, and they will turn again to serve other gods, coming under the disciplining hand of Father’s anger over their spiritual harlotry. As He is speaking with Moses, He says these words:

“…for I know their intent which they are developing today…” ~ Deuteronomy 31:21.

King-Daddy-God knows the intent of the heart of mankind even before that man realizes the path he is heading for in his ungodly thoughts. It is like being on a diet instead of a live-it plan. A live-it plan comes to one with a heart for true change, to be transformed to no longer walk in or desire the old, but to make the very person they are into the new they are possessing, making the new way to be how they live from now to eternity. We go on a diet so we can lose weight, and often without our even realizing it, our intent is to return to our old ways of eating and our sedentary lifestyle once we get what we want.

Too often we treat our relationship with God that way. “I will stay the course of righteousness until I get my desire, or until it gets too hard to follow,” failing to realize that the word “until” in our vocabulary sets our hearts with intent to return to our own way. That is what God saw in the children of His heart’s desire. So He warned Moses in order for him to prepare Joshua and those who lead with him to lead the people with determined purpose that would require of them much strength of character and courage to stand firm and stay the course despite the leanings of those they lead.

So what does that have to do with us today, Beloved?

We are in the midst of a nation of people who are walking their own way, and that diet is alive even in the body of Jesus-Bride006the followers of Christ. Our call as the people of God is to live-IT, and to do so with the intent of bringing others back to live-IT with us, in sincerity of heart toward God and with committed purpose.

“Then He (the Lord) commissioned Joshua the son of Nun, and said, ‘Be strong and courageous, for you shall bring the sons of Israel into the land which I swore to them, and I will be with you’” ~ Deuteronomy 31:23, (authors note).

Just as God personally charged Joshua with individual responsibility to lead the people in the ways of God, trusting His Presence with him, thus He is commissioning me today to be careful how I live so that I am strong and courageous to show the way of true and eternal life to those around me. And just as God later has Moses call together the others charged with leading alongside Joshua, in order to extend the commissioning to them, thus God has me writing to you today.

If this teaching resonates with your spiritual heart toward God, be careful to know, Beloved, that you too are given charge this day to live-IT, despite the cost to you personally, with strength and courage so that Father may use you to lead many to follow Him into eternity.

I am a member of SparkPeople.com, and leader of a couple of teams. One of those is one for which I just accepted the position of co-leadership during the absence of the main leader who is in a difficult season of life. Unlike my other team, which is a Christian team, this team has people from all walks of life in it. Because of a bad experience of the past, when I was just being who I am in Christ and hit a wall of persecution and rejection where I was told to “stop mentioning God or leave,” this morning I found myself praying how I should “speak” when responding to those I do not know, but can tell they probably do not know my God. My concern was to not be so strongly me, a seeker of Jesus through prayer for all people, in love with the Triune and with those I minister to and walk alongside, that I inadvertently push them away. God convicted me in that moment to have the courage to be who I am in Him, and leave their response to Him. It is, after all, Him they are truly rejecting.

This is the call of this day. We are in a day when we hesitate to show our Christian colors for fear of rejection and persecution. But we cannot be one thing in the midst of the people of God, act like the people of the world when in their midst or cow down for fear of them knowing who we are in Him – thus leaving them to conclude that we are just as they are, and fulfill this call to lead others to possess the land of promise.

Our day is strategic in a world of chaos. We do not have time for a diet lifestyle. God is not calling us to necessarily break any laws against proselytizing, but He is calling us to be His people, living His will and way where we are, without fear of the rejection and persecution that will come from those who reject Him.

Those who see in us something they desire to have will ask us where we got it and how they too may possess it. We do not have to be pushy in our desire for others to follow Christ. We can love all people as they are with hope of being a light that draws them to find Him without forcing our way on them. It will take strength of character to shine for Him, and courage of heart to do so in the society in which we live today.

On this subject, there is one other thing God is speaking to me that is vital as we seek to live-IT for His glory and the good of those we hope to help to find righteous paths and peaceful pastures. But this part is long, and thought two will also take some words to express it fully, so we will continue tomorrow.

Body of Christ, who I am in Christ

The Goal is God

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John 16:12-15 ~ “I have many more things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. But when He, the Spirit of truth, comes, He will guide you into all the truth; for He will not speak on His own initiative, but whatever He hears, He will speak; and He will disclose to you what is to come. He will glorify Me, for He will take of Mine and will disclose it to you. All things that the Father has are Mine; therefore I said that He takes of Mine and will disclose it to you.”

This quote from Sarah Young’s Jesus Calling in the January 19 devotional captured my thoughts, and I am still meditating on it today. Speaking as in the voice of Jesus, Sarah encourages:

“I am the goal of all your searching. When you seek Me, you find Me and are satisfied. When lesser goals capture your attention, I fade into the background of your life. I am still there, watching and waiting, but you function as if you were alone. Actually, My Light shines on every situation you will ever face. Live radiantly by expanding your focus to include Me in all Your moments. Let nothing dampen your search for Me.”

God has truly been impressing upon my heart the absolute necessity in this time of life that I understand and comprehend that I am one with the Father in the power of His Spirit through the gift of Christ. We are one with Him and with each other just as Jesus was one with Him when He walked the earth. Heaven is not my / our future. It is our now reality because God is heaven and He places heaven within us. We are here and now one with Him in His Kingdom reality. But our life situations and circumstances in the flesh overpower our comprehension of this and keep us from experiencing this unity and the Kingdom life we have right now.

This thought came to me with the impression, as example, of applying it to my journey to a healthier lifestyle. I have a goal of eating healthier, developing a healthy lifestyle of exercise, hopefully losing weight, and definitely feeling better. God spoke to me through this thought process He has me in and through Sarah’s devotional thought to say, “Darlene, don’t separate searching for the greater depths of understanding Me from your common place journey to health. Seek Me, to know and understand Me more, to experience Me in great depth of realization even in that mundane, fleshly need, and You will find Me. Make growing in unity with Me and knowing Me the main goal even there, and You will not only find Me, but you will find Me faithful in equipping and helping you to success in the journey to health.”

No matter the situation we face, instead of focusing on it, I sense strongly that having unity with the Father and living Kingdom purpose now requires us to face every situation with realization that the main goal is God: to find Him there, to learn of Him, and to come into unity with Him in that situation.

“Live radiantly by expanding your focus to include Me in all Your moments. Let nothing dampen your search for Me.”

Here am I, Father. I long to know You better and live Your will and way more fully through the situations and circumstances of life. Whatever challenge comes my way, help me to look for You and what You would have me learn of Your ways through the experience. You waste nothing. Help me to reap the full benefit so whatever struggle there is produces the lasting, Kingdom fruit of becoming vitally united with You. In Jesus, amen.

Body of Christ, who I am in Christ

In Christ, Empowered to Be Real

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I have struggled to press forward in this teaching, at first struggling with desire to take a particular path with it and being held captive by God to wait until He could make me aware of the first step we must take to come into the reality of who we are because of Christ. Today, as I long to write what is in my heart, I seek the Lord for a jumping point from scripture. That search leads me to Paul’s letter to Timothy.

“I am calling up memories of your sincere and unqualified faith (the leaning of your entire personality on God in Christ in absolute trust and confidence in His power, wisdom, and goodness)…” ~ 2 Timothy 1:5, AMP. (Other verses in scripture use the words “leaning of the entire human personality…” Read them here.)

God has truly been revealing to me lately that before we can come into all that we are in Christ, we must first realize that we are safe to be real in God’s presence. We can fully trust Him: PERIOD, THE END.

Lean on02We have talked about this before, but God has truly been drumming it into me of late. Adam and Eve, when they fell from obedience to God, sought to cover not just the nakedness of their physical body, but the nakedness of their entire human personality: they were afraid to let God see what they had become as people, so they tried to hide and cover up. And we are still trying to hide from God even today, afraid to be real with Him.

I look at the patriarchs of old and one thing that stands out to me is those who are most well know are the most real with God: Moses, David, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Peter, Paul. These stood before God, flaws and all, and the scriptures listed / linked above in our text tell us how they were able to do that. They leaned their entire human personality on Him in ABSOLUTE trust and confidence in HIS POWER, WISDOM, AND GOODNESS.

Jesus tells us that without Him we are weak and ill equipped to do anything (John 15). Paul tells us that it is through our weakness that God’s power can show off, making itself known to and through us (2 Corinthians 12:7-10). But if we cannot be real with God, having full faith in Him to use His power on our behalf, granting us wisdom, and doing good toward us, how can we experience the fullness of who we are in Christ?

I sit before you today in a very hard place in life. My precious daddy, whom I have always loved, trusted, and looked to as a strong tower in life, has lost his ability to see things as they truly are. He believes things of his family members that are false and that greatly hinder our ability to minister to him because his beliefs hinder his ability to trust us to do good to him. I love my daddy and I want him to be proud of who I am, but right now he cannot see the truth of who I am in Christ, and his accusations deal a crushing blow to my aching heart. Though I am real with my daddy, trying to do good to him and for him, it is not received because he has no power to receive it, no wisdom to discern the truth of it, and he believes I have no goodness to give him or toward him.

As a result of his inability to trust me, I find myself cowering, unable to trust him. It is a frustrating, vicious cycle that highlights the weakness in me. God has shown me that my struggle when it comes to dealing with daddy in his current state of mind is because I am failing to fully trust
my God. And now that I am working to trust Him more, He is helping me to see that the reason daddy’s beliefs and accusations and actions hurt so bad is because of pride in me. I can’t believe that anyone can see me the way he does, especially not my daddy, and though I know his beliefs are not the true me, pride that wants him to see the truth leads to hurt that hinders relationship. Thus God is using the situation to teach me about the real me and help me to trust Him more so I can be and do better as I again let go of my pride and surrender my reputation to Him who gives me favor with man.

Today, as I find myself again grieving over my dad who is very ill and needs our help but won’t allow us to help him, God is reminding me that He is faithful and trustworthy. He sees me as I am and He still loves me. I can be real with my Father-God, my Eternal-Daddy, and He will be faithful to comfort me, empower me, granting me wisdom in this hour, and He will do good to and for me and my daddy.

Because of God’s love and faithfulness, I awoke this morning with the Spirit singing to me. “Your Love Never Fails” running through my mind, He speaks to my heart, encouraging me that I can lean my entire human personality, all that I am—good, bad, or indifferent—on Him in Whom I can trust, for He is the same through the ages—disease of the mind does not change Him. He loves me as I am, though He loves me enough to help me be better, training me as a child to bear His image. But even when I fall and fail, His love never changes.

~*~

Listen to these words of comfort and assurance and be encouraged with me, beloved. We can be real with our trustworthy, loving Daddy-YAH:

Your Love Never Fails by Chris Quilala and Jesus Culture

Nothing can separate / Even if I ran away / Your love never fails

I know I still make mistakes / But You have new mercies for me everyday / Your love never fails

You stay the same through the ages / Your love never changes / There may be pain in the night / But joy comes in the morning / And when the oceans rage / I don’t have to be afraid / Because I know that You love me / Your love never fails

The wind is strong and the water’s deep / But I’m not alone here in these open seas / Your love never fails / The chasm is far too wide / I never thought I’d reach the other side / Your love never fails

You stay the same through the ages / Your love never changes / There may be pain in the night / But joy comes in the morning / And when the oceans rage / I don’t have to be afraid / Because I know that You love me / Your love never fails

You make all things work together for my good / You make all things work together for my good / You make all things work together for my good / You make all things work together for my good / You make all things work together for my good / You make all things work together for my good

You stay the same through the ages / Your love never changes / There may be pain in the night / But joy comes in the morning / And when the oceans rage / I don’t have to be afraid / Because I know that You love me / Your love never fails / Because I know that You love me / Your love never fails

Body of Christ, Stand Firm, who I am in Christ

The Prophetic Warning

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I sat down to get into God’s word and opened my Bible to Judges because I committed myself to reading through it while we are studying Gideon with Priscilla Shirer. My mind did not go to anything else for my time this morning, so I started reading. Then I clearly discerned, “You did not ask Me where I want you to read this morning?”

“Okay, Lord. I will finish this chapter and then ask,” I foolishly reply. A couple of verses later, I knew that was silly and it was not working for me, so I stopped: “Okay, Lord. Where do You want me to read this morning?”

“Hezekiah.”

*!&^%, = confusion. “Lord, there isn’t a book of Hezekiah, is there (looking to make sure)? Am I supposed to do a word study on him? Where do You want me to read?”

“Hosea.”

So I go to Hosea, and there is Hezekiah as confirmation. Hosea prophesied for God during the days of numerous kings, one of which was Hezekiah. Here I find God speaking to me for our nation who is walking in the ways of Israel, just as they did in the days of Hosea.

The things God speaks to Hosea for those of his day are being spoken to the people of our land in our day. Here is what I see:

Our land, as in the land of Israel in Hosea’s day, is guilty of “flagrant harlotry,” forsaking Jehovah-God as LORD. Even in the church, many of us hold to a form of godliness, but deny its Power (2 Timothy 3:5). In all of history, Jehovah has not sat still for such behavior. He will not tarry long when we fall to following after other things as if they are our God and the one who blesses our lives.

Our nation, whether or not we want to hear and believe it, is under the disciplining hand of Jehovah-God. People don’t often like to hear that, but God disciplines those He loves, especially those who are sons. That is scriptural (Hebrews 12). All that we are going through, and that which is yet to come our way, is being allowed by God for the purpose of getting our attention and allowing us opportunity to see that all those other gods and / or the people or resource we look to as in the place of a god have failed. We have walked out from under the protective cover of God as a nation.

There are two ways I know of in which we come out from under the protective cover and provision of God: one is to walk out from under through sin and refusing His will in our lives. The second way we find ourselves outside the protective cover of God is for Him to lift His hand away from us for some eternal purpose of His own. With these, even though we walk out of the hedge of His protection by our choice, there is most often still a grace cover that limits the consequence of our coming out from under our Protection. As example, we see this in the book of Job and in God’s work of deliverance for Israel, taking them from Egypt to the land of promise, and in the cycle of Israel found all throughout the book of Judges. But with sin issues, where we deny Jehovah as the one and only true God, the hedge is removed more and more until we repent, as God releases us, giving us over to our own way. Right now God’s hedge is greatly removed from our land, and, as in the land of Egypt in Moses day, God is removing the hedge in areas where we rely on false gods, revealing their inadequacy and His supremacy.

Through the book of Hosea today, here is what God is revealing to me:

God is “removing the bow” – the power – of our nation. He is sowing weakness in us until we realize Who our true Power is and return to Him. We are not strong in ourselves as a nation. We are strong because of Jehovah-God’s grace to us. Until we realize and return to Him who is our strength, our bow – our economic and military power in the earth will be weak.

God has also removed His hand of provision from us as a nation. Crops will continue to fail us as a nation. Our clothing needs will go unmet more and more. I have found myself lately, as I shop for new clothing, making sure I buy things I will enjoy wearing for a while, things I sense will last me.

As our power fails, we will not find pity from God or others. God is the one who has given us favor in the earth, but we continue to show signs of thinking we earned the favor and position we have in the world. Others have looked up to us because God has given us favor as a people who believe in Jehovah-God through a faith that walks that belief out and reveals itself through integrity as His people. We have walked out from under God’s favor and He has lifted His hand of grace, therefore we will find no pity nor aid from those who would normally have compassion toward us because of God’s favor.

We, who have been known as a godly, Christian nation, now are being called, “not My people”, not because that is what God wants, but because we have walked away from serving Him alone as God. We as a nation are not walking as His image bearers, fully trusting in and committed to Him. As a nation, we are taking away the right of the people of God to serve Him, express Him, and be what we are called to be, and this is being done for the sake of those who serve other gods, or profess no god at all. And God’s people are too often cowering under the pressure of laws and regulations that deny Him as God and require us to be silent in our beliefs and faith. A government entity who professes many gods or no god, leads a nation to the same.

As in generations past, God has kept a remnant for Himself and that remnant in our nation is growing and making itself known, taking its stand on godliness that obeys Jehovah’s will and pleasure above that of man. God’s hand of provision and grace remains with the remnant. But as a nation, we have left our first love, giving ground to false gods who are rising up to greatness in the land through the numbers who are following them. We have removed Jehovah from government and schools, and are being pushed to remove Him from society as a whole. Thus, Jehovah-God is removing His hand of grace and favor from us as a nation.

This fact is seen on the news every day. There are signs in the news that consistently reveal that we have surrendered to being a nation of many gods. Jehovah will not give His glory to another. Thus His hand of discipline is upon our land and God says to us, “You are not My people and I am not your God.” We are no longer a godly, Christian nation. The covenant with and alliance of Jehovah in our nation is broken as we see other gods given power in our land, and see our land weakened, God, letting the seeds of weakness have full sway in the land, His hand of power and grace removed from us.

Even so, people-of-God, Jehovah leaves to us hope in Him. He tells us, who are of the remnant to remind one another that we ARE His people and we are pitied—given grace with mercy—and to do so with hope filled assurance that God will succeed in turning our nation back to Himself. No matter how hopeless it looks to us, hope in God to do the impossible sustains us, so we must earnestly, expectantly hope in God and work toward seeing hope fulfilled. Like for Israel in the day of Hosea, as God lifted His hand from the nation, He did so for the good of the nation, to lead them back to reliance on Him alone, and He let Hosea know early in his ministry that they would turn back to Him to be called “His pitied / graced people” anew.

The difficulty that is upon us is there to reveal to all the land that our false gods over us are impotent. God will use the remnant to reveal His power, glory, and sufficiency. God’s hand of protection will be powerfully and recognizably over those of the remnant; His grace sufficient will be recognized as our obvious supply; and His peace that passes understanding will cause us to stand out as we remember our God and put our trust in Him alone.

As I read on in Hosea, these things stand out to me:

God will hedge the way of the harlot with thorns so she cannot go on the paths she desires, but will be herded into the paths of His design. This stubborn stance we see going on in congress that has our government shutdown is a hedge of thorns. Pray the thorns of God will stand firm so as to be used of God to take us as a nation where we need to be, to that place where He is found waiting for our return to Him as God-alone.

If you, like I, have loved ones who are chasing after the false gods of the day: happiness, wealth, mother earth, or more, take courage. Those who are running after their false gods will find no satisfaction. Their dissatisfaction will turn them back to the Faithful One anew.

One thing I note is that our nakedness as a nation will be revealed. All those things we do in secret and try to hide will come out in the open and our lewdness will be found out from the top down. No one will be able to rescue those ensnared in God’s hand of discipline, and that which is our “gaiety” will be removed. There will be no happiness in our ungodly pursuits; only discontent, discord, and dissatisfaction until only deprivation, destitution and deficiency remain to those who refuse Him His rightful place in our life and land.

Even the righteous who truly seek after Father-Jehovah are being led of God to tell their darkest secrets and how God led them to repentance and victory over sin. It is not easy to do, but as we get real with God, with ourselves, and with others, God is revealed, and those in need of Him, see Him as He is and realize their only true Help is in Jehovah-Yeshua.

This post though separate from the focus on who we are in Christ fits with it as it introduces our next stop on the road of discovering what those belonging to God as His possession look like. We are “real”. See you in the next post of Darlene’s Ponderings.

Body of Christ, who I am in Christ

In Christ I am NOT…

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There we have it, an awesome, though incomplete list of who we are in Christ: each being a sheep in His pasture, lifted to positions of the children of God, royalty in the Kingdom of God, ambassadors for Christ and priests unto God who are in the world for a time on assignment while being of the Kingdom of God. There is much more to discover about who we are, but this is a good beginning. I hope you will be alert and grow strong in all that God has caused us to be through Christ.

Beloved, as we close our study this week, fast and furious as it is, I sense strongly that we must not close out this thought process without covering what Christ has delivered us from being. There is nothing the enemy of God loves more, once he has lost the battle for our eternal being, than to keep us thinking we are still the same person we were before Christ set us free indeed. So let us take that ammunition out of his hand by beginning to discover what God delivered us from being.

First we have already established that, in Christ, you are NOT DUST. You are of His SEED: Holy SEED.

Satan loves to point out all our struggles and flaws and make us feel like dirt that is unworthy of God’s Kingdom. Before Christ, that was true. After Christ we became His plantings, the seed of righteousness is in us and is growing stronger day by day as we learn Whose we are, and who He makes us to be, that we may withstand the schemes of the enemy while Father is maturing us as His righteous shoots.

Second, we are NOT THE OLD MAN.

“Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come” ~ 2 Corinthians 5:17.

“…But now you also, put them all aside: anger, wrath, malice, slander, and abusive speech from your mouth. Do not lie to one another, since you laid aside the old self with its evil practices, and have put on the new self who is being renewed to a true knowledge according to the image of the One who created him” ~ Colossians 3:1-10.

We are no longer the old. The evil heart is removed from us in Christ and we are made a new creation with a new, clean, circumcised heart. We have a new mind, the mind of Christ (1 Corinthians 2:16). Therefore our challenge now is to learn to think, act and function out of that new creation.

Part of that is realizing that we can take every thought captive and make it obey Christ (2 Corinthians 10:1-6). Another part is not letting the world, our flesh, and the devil tell us that our heart is evil. We must believe that our heart is made new in Christ, that it is circumcised and set free from the flesh and its ways, and, committing ourselves wholly to God, being quick to wait upon Him, we let Him lead us to unity as people after His Own Heart.

Third, we are not unqualified and insufficient.

“Not that we are fit (qualified and sufficient in ability) of ourselves to form personal judgments or to claim or count anything as coming from us, but our power and ability and sufficiency are from God. [It is He] Who has qualified us [making us to be fit and worthy and sufficient] as ministers and dispensers of a new covenant [of salvation through Christ], not [ministers] of the letter (of legally written code) but of the Spirit; for the code [of the Law] kills, but the [Holy] Spirit makes alive” ~ 2 Corinthians 3:5-6, AMP (see also 1 Corinthians 1:4-8).

When we feel insignificant, inadequate, incapable, ill-equipped, powerless, we are looking at our old self instead of seeking after and trusting in the promised supply from Father in the power and equipping of the Holy Spirit that makes us new. Satan loves to keep us functioning in the flesh instead of in our Spirit-filled supply. When he can do that, he can make us impotent as Kingdom people.

Fourth we are NOT whores, harlots, and dogs.

We no longer chase after other gods, or make ourselves into one. We have one God, that is Jehovah. We have one Father, that is Abba-Jehovah. We have one King and Lord, that is Jesus. And we do so in the power of the one true Spirit of God. As sheep who are the children of God, bride to the King, we give ourselves wholly to our One God and King. As the son and daughter bow down as slaves set free from sin, we freely, out of love, give ourselves to Him as Bond-slaves, wholly committed through love and choice to these: the Three in One – Father, Son and Holy Ghost.

We are not lost, but have been found (Matthew 18:11-14; Luke 19:9-10).

We are not rejected, but chosen and approved (1 Peter 2:9; John 15:16; 1 Corinthians 11:19; 2 Corinthians 5:21, 10:18).

We are not left behind, for no one and no-thing can take us out of the Father’s hands or separate us from His love (John 10:18, 29; Romans 8:31-38).

Rejoice beloved, for you are NOT, but YOU ARE!

Now may the God of peace [Who is the Author and the Giver of peace], Who brought again from among the dead our Lord Jesus, that great Shepherd of the sheep, by the blood [that sealed, ratified] the everlasting agreement (covenant, testament), strengthen (complete, perfect) and make you what you ought to be and equip you with everything good that you may carry out His will; [while He Himself] works in you and accomplishes that which is pleasing in His sight, through Jesus Christ (the Messiah); to Whom be the glory forever and ever (to the ages of the ages). Amen (so be it) ~ Hebrews 13:20-21, AMP.

Body of Christ, who I am in Christ

In Christ I am Citizen of the Kingdom

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Beloved, we have looked at some truths regarding who we are created to be in Christ that are awesome to me, but let me tell you again today, this is not working in me some ungodly pride that leads to haughtiness. As alert as I am becoming to myself as a daughter of God and queen of His Kingdom under the Lordship of the King of kings, I am still acutely alert to my need of Him as a sheep of His fold and as part of the Bride, being weaker than the Groom (1 Peter 3:7). I can do nothing apart from Him.

What this information is working in me is a deep sense of understanding of my need to take ownership—take full possession of my position through Christ and to take seriously the responsibility those positions of power and authority bring to me. Some we will not fully perceive and possess until we stand side by side with Him. But other things are made clear in scripture that instructs our heart as to our here and now authority in Christ and Kingdom responsibility in this life.

walking-with-godBefore we press on today to whom we are in Christ, we need to realize where we are. Jesus prayed that we who are His would be in the world but not of it (John 17:11-15). Beloved, truly what we are to be, though we are not physically in His Kingdom at this time, is very mindful that we are of His Kingdom. Thus it is important for us to realize what that looks like and practice that life where we are.

One thing we look at is Scripture that says things like “The Kingdom of God is righteous, peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost.” Those of the Kingdom are authorized with power over the demonic; they are given discernment of Kingdom mysteries; and those of the Kingdom scatter its seed in places where they take root and grow to bear much fruit (Romans 14:17; Matthew 12:28; Mark 4:11, 26-29).

The Word of God has much to say about what the Kingdom looks like on those who are in the world, but of the Kingdom. It is vital, as we continue this journey to discover who we are in Christ, that we realize where we are: though in the world, we are of the Kingdom, and we are charged with duties in the world that focus on fulfilling Kingdom purpose in the name of our God and King. With that understanding, we are now ready to continue to discern who we are:

“So we are Christ’s ambassadors, God making His appeal as it were through us. We [as Christ’s personal representatives] beg you for His sake to lay hold of the divine favor [now offered you] and be reconciled to God” ~ 2 Corinthians 5:20, AMP.

We are Christ’s ambassadors, on assignment in this world, keeping in heart the good of the Kingdom of Godseedling and working on its behalf. There are many things we are charged with as Ambassadors of the King: not the least of which is to do all He equips us to do in the ministry of reconciliation. We are called and equipped to share all that God has done to bring reconciliation to His created beings. We are called and equipped to lead others to saving knowledge of the Christ. But it goes farther than that. We are His ambassadors, called and equipped to make disciples of mankind. We do not just plant the seed then leave it without food and water and care that makes it grow deep roots and strong branches. But we do raise up those who receive the seed so they grow strong and produce a harvest. We are Kingdom builders, charged with responsibility to aid in the building and establishing of God’s Kingdom from our in-the-world-position as Ambassadors of the Kingdom. And I am discovering that a vital part of that work is to help others who are of the Kingdom realize who they are as His representatives in the world.

Another very important thing that we need to realize about who we are in Christ is this:

“But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for God’s own possession, so that you may proclaim the excellencies of Him who has called you out of darkness into His marvelous light; for you once were not a people, but now you are the people of GOD; you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy” ~ 1 Peter 2:9-10.

EchadWe are of the Royal Priesthood. Beloved, in Christ we are birthed not only into the lineage of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, but we are of the tribe of Levi, bearing within ourselves the Levitical priesthood. Revelation words who we are this way:

“He has made us to be a kingdom, priests to His God and Father—to Him be the glory and the dominion forever and ever. Amen. …You have made them to be a kingdom and priests to our God; and they will reign upon the earth” ~ Revelation 1:6; 5:10.

We are called to be priests unto God, beloved, ministering before Him with songs of praise and psalms of adoration, glorifying Him in the earth not only through our words, but through our deeds and lifestyles.

Yes, our God has graciously lifted us dust particles up from the place of separation from Him, and He has highly exalted us in the Kingdom of our God and King, not for anything we have done, but because of the Christ in whom we trust. Being priests unto God is a total other study, but this is an excellent beginning. As sheep in His fold, children sealed by His Spirit, raised to royalty in Christ, we serve as part of His Kingdom being Ambassadors of Christ and Royal Priests unto God. Now to proclaim the excellencies of Him who has called us out of darkness into His marvelous light.

See you tomorrow, beloved, as the next thing we need to realize is who we are not.

Body of Christ, who I am in Christ

In Christ I am Crowned with Royalty

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Jesus-Bride006Yesterday we discovered that through Christ we are lifted from the position of dust, to that of sons and daughters. We saw that we are exalted through Christ from created beings made a little lower than the angels, fallen to the position of a dust particle, and raised to be co-equals as the children of God with the sons of God in the angelic forces. All of God’s children glorify Him, live for His purposes, and stand with Him in battle. This is who we are.

One thing I have noticed in the earthly realm, which mimics the heavenly, in the royal family, there are children of the kings of nations, princes and princesses, but not all are eligible for positions on the throne of the kingdom. This fact is the distinction we will see today that exalts our positions and establishes the next step in understanding who we are in Christ that makes a distinction between us and the angels, who also are sons of God.

“Let us rejoice and be glad and give the glory to Him, for the marriage of the Lamb has come and His bride has made herself ready” ~ Revelation 19:7.

Scripture uses so many terms to describe our unity through Christ with the Father and with the Son. Two terms that describe our unity with Christ are us being “the body of Christ” and our being pictured as “the bride of the Lamb.” Scripture teaches of this union in Genesis 2:23-24, as Adam says…

“‘This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.’ For this reason a man shall leave his father and his mother, and be joined to his wife; and they shall become one flesh.”

As the Bride of Christ we are united with Him as one flesh. We complete one another. We can do nothing apart from Him. And He chooses to use us as a suitable helper in his ministry of reconciliation and the work of His Kingdom. He is King of kings. As His bride, what does that make us?

The Kingdom of God is shown throughout scripture to be established as a hierarchy. Jesus, as reward for His sacrifice for the Kingdom of God in fulfilling the purpose of God for the redemption of God’s creation, was raised up with God and seated with Him as the crowned King of the kingdom. Thus we, as the people of God’s fold, lifted through Christ to the position of the children of God, chosen by God to be the Bride of Christ, are once more lifted up to a position of royalty in the hierarchy of the Kingdom of God.

As I think on that, it brings new meaning to me as to the title of Christ who is King of kings. As one who is ever mindful that I am the creation of God, a sheep in His fold, it is difficult to realize my royal blood in Christ and say that we are kings and queens under King Jesus, but that is the picture we are given. And it lifts us a little bit higher in the hierarchy of the Kingdom, a little higher than the angels.

Jehovah is God the Father. There are none higher than He. Jesus is God-Son the King. He submits to none but the Father. Holy Spirit is the power of God that binds all together and empowers the completion of all things. He submits to Father and Son. And by the power and seal of the Spirit, we are sons and daughters of God the Father, united as one with the Son and King, Bride of the King of kings and seated with Him in the heavenly realm. We submit to Father, Son and Holy Spirit. The seal of God is placed upon us and within us, and we are given authority through our position to fulfill Kingdom responsibilities.

Now let me tell you, that does not raise up ungodly pride in me, but godly fear and reverence for the God of all creation who set these things in motion: raising mere dust to a position of royalty in the Kingdom of God! That realization makes me acutely aware of my responsibility to God, which we will address as we continue to look at who we are in Christ tomorrow.

Body of Christ, who I am in Christ

In Christ I am a Child of God

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Read James 4:5-10

“…God sets Himself against the proud and haughty, but gives grace [continually] to the lowly (those who are humble enough to receive it)” ~ James 4:6b

Yesterday may not have appealed to our desire for great things, discovering that we are sheep in the pasture of God. But, beloved, until we are humble and lowly enough to receive the grace of God’s keeping over us, we will not have the humility to be fully and powerfully the rest of who we are in Christ. Humility to trust in, rely on, be confident in God who lifts us to the positions we will cover over these next days is vital for our ability to fully be all He calls and created us to be. Understanding that without humility to realize that our provision in all things is from God and to humbly realize that without Him, we can do nothing is the most vital and blessed position He gives us that we must realize and submit to walking out. Beloved, there is nothing impossible for the sheep of God’s pasture for all the resources of heaven are available to us who are humble enough to receive it.

“Humble yourselves [feeling very insignificant] in the presence of the Lord, and HE WILL EXALT YOU [He will lift you up and make your lives significant]” ~ James 4:10, AMP.

So today we press forward from sheep who are kept and fully provided for and needful of His protection to the next description of who we are through Christ on my list to share with you. Oh, Father. How to share what is in my heart without this becoming the book it could be? Here am I. I surrender my mind, heart and hands to You who make me able.

“…In love He predestined us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the kind intention of His will…” ~ Ephesians 1:3-14.

Beloved, from the beginning of time, it was God’s desire and design to bring those reborn through Christ into the family of God as His children. Now, I am not a scholar in the educational sense of the word, but as a student of God’s word, I cannot recall a time in the Old Testament when the people of God were called His children. I even did a quick search of the phrases “sons of God” and “children of God” in the old testament through Bible Gateway, and none were found except when speaking of the angels of God who were called His sons. So, beloved, here is what God has been showing me.

Adam and Eve were created by God as His created beings, the people of God’s image. They were set in a garden, given charge over it, and given opportunity to choose whether they wanted God as Lord, or not. It is said in Scripture that they were created “a little lower than the angels (or heavenly beings)” (Psalm 8:5; Hebrews 2:7,9).  They were God’s created beings, having His authority for a purpose, but unlike the angels, they are not called His sons and daughters or children. They have lesser status in their relationship with God than the angels at this point in history.

Next we see Adam and Eve fall from grace by choosing pride to rule themselves as Satan chose rather than choosing God, and what does God say to these creatures who were a little lower than the angels? “For you are dust, and to dust you shall return” (Genesis 2:19b). Thus mankind fell from being a little lower than the angels to return to being dust.

Then comes Jesus, who pays the full price demanded for sin on behalf of all of mankind. But it is not automatically given to us. We still must choose God as the one and only true God and Sovereign for us. We make that choice by choosing Jesus as Savior, our Kinsman Redeemer, who purchased us for Himself. Once we make that choice, God’s word says we are reborn. We are no longer dust, but the blessed SEED of God rebirths us to adoption as the sons and daughters—the children of God. No longer are we dust: no longer are we a little lower than angels, but we are equal recipients of those having claim as the children of God, heirs with Christ. The image of God is restored to us and we begin the journey of looking more and more like our Father as we grow in the knowledge of Him and receive more fully within us the truth of who we are through Christ.

“Therefore be imitators of God [copy Him and follow His example], as well-beloved children [imitate their father]” ~ Ephesians 5:1, AMP.

Ah, but that is not all. Come join us tomorrow, beloved and blessed child of the Living and Loving God, who are exalted to high positions in Christ.

Body of Christ, who I am in Christ

In Christ I am a Sheep of His Fold

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Seeking the Lord for direction, He instructed my heart that His people need to know and realize not only Whose they are, but who they are because of the work of Christ in us. So beginning today, we start a journey of discovery in this area in which God has been so greatly deepening my understanding of these things. Today we begin with our most humble position, which we must realize and submit to in order to fully grasp and press forward to the exalted positions found in Christ.

Read John 10

good_shepherd1“…27 My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me; 28 and I give eternal life to them, and they will never perish; and no one will snatch them out of My hand. 29 My Father, who has given them to Me, is greater than all; and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand. 30 I and the Father are one. …”

Being sheep in the pasture of God does not sound very appealing, but it is a most blessed position in the Kingdom of God. Being followers who humble ourselves under the mighty hand of God to follow the Good Shepherd (Jesus Christ) in learning humility before God and complete reliance upon Him is the beginning position that prepares us for positions we would deem of greater worth. To skip learning first and foremost to be sheep who willing follow and trust the Shepherd is to invite opportunity for the wolf of the demonic to tempt us away through haughtiness that thinks more highly of self than we ought. So the first position we must learn to possess with glory in God who cares for our every need and positions us to be protected from falsehood and temptation is vital to our pressing forward to possess the higher ground He has for those who fully trust Him.

Through following the good shepherd we learn that He uses His staff to guide us and His rod to protect us because He loves us and desires the best for us. We learn to trust Him in these things, and the closer we follow to Him and the more attuned we get to Him, the more readily we recognize and surrender to His most gentle call.

For times when we become rebellious, putting ourselves, and even others in danger, the crook of His staff becomes an implement of rescue, to pull us back on track or lift us up out of pits we fall into. And His rod becomes an implement of discipline, used not to our harm, to destroy us, though it may feel that way, but putting us where we have opportunity to bond with Him and trust Him more.

He always leads us into good pastures where all our needs are met in Him, and where we may drink from the waters of His river in safety. As Psalm 23 tells us, even in the presence of our enemy, He feeds us from His table and empowers us for victory in the valley of the shadow of death, making us to pass through enemy territory with confident peace that the Good Shepherd is caring for us fully.

The good shepherd of a heard of sheep knows that a stubborn sheep that will not stay close to his shepherd puts himself and those who follow in danger of being snared by the wolves and other predators. To train that sheep to stay close and become one that leads others to do so as well, he will go so far as to use the rod to break the leg of the sheep. He then carries that sheep everywhere they go, keeping it close, loving on it as if a pet, tending its wound. By the time the sheep heals, it has bonded with the shepherd, trusting the shepherd fully, becoming teachable and easily led so as to keep it and those that would follow it safe.

Beloved, has God got you in a broken-leg place in life. He is not trying to be cruel. He cares for you and wants to keep you in safety. He is here to tend to your need and wants you to trust Him and rely on Him, being confident in Him that He will not fail you.good_shepherd2

Being a sheep in the flock of God is not a shameful position for us. It is a picture of His great care for us who are followers of Christ. Learn to follow closely to the Good Shepherd and Watcher of your soul so that you may be led by Him to realize and possess all that you are in Christ through faith that fully believes and trusts His leading. (See John 3:18; Romans 10:9; 1 Timothy 4:10; Hebrews 3:12-19; 10:39-11:1, 6, AMP.)

Pray today for your faith in the Good Shepherd to grow strong, so that you fully trust His lead in your life and in the lives of those you love. Pray to remain close to Him. And pray for those you see with “broken legs” spiritually, that their faith in the Good Shepherd grow strong and that they will develop a teachable spirit, becoming pliable to all the good He has for them.

Psalm 23 ~ The Good Shepherd: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yLI8Sv8_HlA

Holiness, Practicing His Presence, who I am in Christ

The Burning Bush

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burning_bush3“Now Moses was pasturing the flock of Jethro his father-in-law, the priest of Midian; and he led the flock to the west side of the wilderness and came to Horeb, the mountain of God. The angel of the Lord appeared to him in a blazing fire from the midst of a bush; and he looked, and behold, the bush was burning with fire, yet the bush was not consumed. So Moses said, ‘I must turn aside now and see this marvelous sight, why the bush is not burned up.’ When the Lord saw that he turned aside to look, God called to him from the midst of the bush and said, ‘Moses, Moses!’ And he said, ‘Here I am.’ Then He said, ‘Do not come near here; remove your sandals from your feet, for the place on which you are standing is holy ground.’ He said also, ‘I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.’ Then Moses hid his face, for he was afraid to look at God” ~ Exodus 3:1-6.

What was it that drew Moses attention and desire to ‘check it out’? It was the Light of God’s presence, burning in ways he realized was something unusual, special, real, producing a light that caught Moses eye and beckoned him over. Like others in scripture, when he realized He was in the very presence of Jehovah-God, he was quickly impressed that his feet were on Holy Ground. And what did God say? “Take off your shoes.”

What was it that caused Adam and Eve to want to cover up their nakedness? I believe it was not their naked bodies that beckoned the cover-up. It was their sin that distorted the image of God they were created to bear. They sinned against God and immediately wanted to hide themselves from Him so He did not see them as they now were. Their covering they made was inadequate, so God made coverings for them that included the shedding of blood to cover their sin.

When Jesus came, He paid the full price of sin and provided His own robe as a new covering for all who believe and receive the gift of His sacrifice for their sin. In so doing, not only does He clothe us with eternal robes, but He cleanses us from the inside out, leaving with us His Holy Presence who indwells us and restores the image of God in us who have new life through rebirth in Christ.

So now, we who are called the temple of God, house His presence and we are called and equipped to be Hisburning_bush light shining in the dark places of this world. Now we become the “burning bush” and the ground under us is holy, for He is holy. He wholly dwells within those who believe and receive Him. The question is, are we – His people, His temples, His lights, His burning bush for our day, living as people of Holy Ground? Or are we hiding behind coverings of our own making that try to hide from God the sin our Savior and Lord died to cover?

God told Moses, “Remove your shoes.” We are to be real with God, standing in His presence as His image bearers made whole and holy in Christ. We must be real with Him so that He can fully and completely cover our nakedness and restore the image of God in us. And we must be real with Him so He can set up His presence within us to set afire our lives as His burning bush that is useful for drawing others into His holy presence.

Remove your sandals from your feet, Beloved of God, for the place on which you are standing is holy ground.

Body of Christ, who I am in Christ

Child, BE Who You Truly Are

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I am reminded in my Heart Quest study today of what God began showing me more clearly at Quest. We are a new creation and must learn to work and function out of the new that is in the world, but not of it—aware of the world and its ways, but not touched by it so as to be knocked back into the old. The lesson instructed us to write out what God said to us in our study today. Here is what I discern:

“Darlene, Remember that you are a new creation and walk in it. Learn to function in the new that is Me, where belief and trust come easy because we are one and you KNOW Me. Take hold of the eternal to which you are called and possess it as belonging to you even now, because it does.

“You have known for some time that Kingdom living can and should be your here and now experience out of which you flow. Major in this way of life I am showing you and go deeper still in your understanding and experience of its truth so you may become in this life more and more who you truly are in Me, the person you will be eternally. Some will enter the eternal Kingdom in shock because they will not even recognize, much less know, themselves. Don’t be one of them. Draw near to Me and I will draw near to you, beloved, and I will teach you the depths of who you are in Me. Be all that I show you in ever increasing surrender and I will use you to reveal the truth of My Kingdom in the earth.”

Body of Christ, Chronic illness

The Importance of Circumcision

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As I meditate on the last two memory verses in the pre-retreat study for the Women’s retreat I leave on tomorrow, trying to digest them more fully, the nurse in me begins to consider the “foreskin” and the reasons for it being so important that we circumcise ourselves to the Lord by deliberately removing the foreskin of the heart;  and why it is vital that He be the lead surgeon in that circumcision for us and our descendants. Here is what I find:

  1. The foreskin is folds of flesh whose sole purpose is to hide the true organ: it is a façade.
  2. These folds of flesh are difficult to keep clean, thus making them excellent breeding ground for filth, bacteria, and disease.
  3. This fold of flesh can refuse to retract, keeping the true organ hidden, hindering proper function, which can cause pain and further disease. Or…
  4. This fold of flesh can either get stuck in a retracted position or left improperly circumcised leaving a ring of flesh around the organ, thus restricting and cutting off proper blood flow, causing the true organ to swell, develop gangrene, and if not properly treated, bringing death to the true organ.
  5. Once gangrenous death sets in, if the organ is not cut away completely from the rest of the body, it causes sepsis to seep out to the body.
  6. Sepsis untreated brings death to the entire organism: of which the church is a living organism.

Therefore, beloved, make sure that you “…Break up your fallow ground, and do not sow among thorns. Circumcise yourselves to the Lord and remove the foreskins of your heart…” by cooperating fully as God the Father and our Great Physician works to “circumcise your heart and the heart of your descendants, to love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul, in order that you may live” ~ Jeremiah 4:3b-4a, Deuteronomy 30:6.

Body of Christ, who I am in Christ

Religion: or Jesus?

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For even as the body is one and yet has many members, and all the members of the body, though they are many, are one body, so also is Christ. For by one Spirit we were all baptized into one body, whether Jews or Greeks, whether slaves or free, and we were all made to drink of one Spirit ~ 1 Corinthians 12:12-13.

I arise early this morning with a flow of Spirit speaking what I believe to be truth to my heart over an issue that more and more becomes important to me, because it is used by enemy forces to tear asunder and dismember the body of Christ. We are called to be one, yet we are separated by religious doors. It breaks my pea picking heart, as my momma might say.

I have many friends and family members of many differing religious persuasions, and the one thing I find that draws us and closes the gap of our respective belief systems is unity of faith in Christ and common grounds of truth. Oh, I want so for this to flow to you as beautifully as it has to me. Lord, here am I, a conduit looking to You to flow through me.

I am thinking on this subject this early morn because of questions to a friend and Sister in Christ in a group we attend together where she is being asked to share about her religion of choice. Always unnerves me when the body starts talking religion. You see, as I look at this subject of religion or Jesus, what I see is that when we come together through the veil of Christ, we find bonds that bind us as one through the truth we unite under in faith of mutual belief. But religion exists because of differing opinions of truth. There is only one real truth: God’s truth; so how can this be? Where there are differing opinions of truth, at least one in a group of two is living behind a veil of falsehood.

God is truth, and in Him we find fullness of truth that unites. But Satan, the father of lies, throws little twists into our understanding of God’s truth, just enough to work separation and dismemberment in the body. A house divided will soon fall, right? Satan cannot destroy Truth, but he can throw a few wrenches in through weak flesh that is open to the allure of the lie and destroy the fullness of the effectiveness of the body to work together as one. So what is the answer?

This friend I mentioned earlier, I love her so much and I see and experience Jesus in her. It is where our bond comes from. But she was raised in and still resides in a religious faction that is very controversial in our day and is seen by the rest of Christendom as a cult. Now, from what I have been taught of that belief system, when held against the strictest defining parameters that separate the true church from the cultic practices, I cannot argue with that evaluation regarding her religion. But I can argue with any who would try to tell me that she does not know Jesus, the Savior, and God the Father, as I do.

Some others I love warn me, “Darlene, they are being taught how to talk Jesus so as to be more palatable to us Christians.” I have no doubt that can happen in any church, but the Spirit of God and the connection He brings to the equation cannot be mimicked or taught by human reason. I have experienced the sincerity of her faith. We are Sisters in Christ, I have no doubt, but we are divided by religious falsehood in some areas: whether hers or mine, God knows.

Now here is what God showed me that I found to be so beautiful as I awoke with this heartache over religion and its dismemberment of Christ’s body. I believe it is the solution to the division if we can grasp it to walk it out in the earth.

When Jesus gave His life, a propitiation for all sin, the instant He breathed His last breath of His earthly life, God, the Father, reached down to the temple of Israel and rent asunder for all time the veil that divided Him from those who seek His face. In the place of that veil stepped Jesus at the ordination and beckoning of God the Father.

Jesus is the Way, the Truth, and the Life; He is the only Door by which we may be saved and have access to the Father; and all who desire to enter in to the holy of holies must first pass through Him by faith in the sacrifice of blood He paid. None who go through Him are turned away. All who go through Him have personal access to God, as Jesus is our advocate; and in Him we are raised up as part of the Royal Priesthood.  No man or human institution has right to restore the veil God removed in Christ. Any who would hold another back telling them they are not pure enough to enter the holy place of God’s presence are standing in falsehood and resurrecting the old veil, lacking understanding of the fullness of Christ to the equation of salvation and sanctification. How can I say that? (1 Peter 2:9; Hebrews)

There, in the holy of holies we find the purest of love, truth, righteousness, holiness, justice—a justice wrought through grace found in Christ, peace, unity, and wholeness. As I thought on this fact, I saw myself step through the Veil, Jesus, into God’s presence with my Sister in Christ, and I physically felt all the fetters of this life fall away: sin, falsehood, division, enmity, fear, distrust, and separation fell to the wayside and the only thing that mattered in that place was the common ground of the fullness of God’s truth coupled with faith to believe. We were one in Christ. All religion swept away. We both felt this burden removed and turned with amazement to the Door we just passed through in believing faith together.

I long for a place like that. The only way I see of finding it in our earthly existence is to lay down all of our preconceived ideas of truth and walk through the veil. Only as we begin to see churches rise up with only one name over their doorway will we find it. Only as we step through the door of Jesus together and enter into the presence of God with open hearts to full truth will we find healing to bind up the brokenness in the Body of Christ in our day.

My heart breaks as I see lines drawn that seem to say, “Follow me in my religious beliefs and understanding if you want unity with me, even though our separation works disunity in Jesus’ body.” And a flipside to this that furthers the gap between us is the watch groups who are so bent on pointing out the falsehood they see in others, when all that is needed is to present truth and let God draw the hearer through the veil. What separation we breed when we raise the hair on the neck of those who feel they have to fight for their religious right. Truth unites. Speak truth and watch God bring down the veils of separation among us.

I have had the privilege through ministries God has placed me in to walk in the doors of many differing churches of most every differing religious faction. What I have found is this: though I may not agree with all I hear, when I walk in to hear from God, I will receive something, some truth I can cling to that inspires my day and helps me on my way. There I find common ground with believers in that place. When I enter those doors with Jesus-love in heart, I always find, without exception, a brother or sister connection with others who have believing faith on common grounds of truth too.

Religion: or Jesus? Won’t you come through the veil with me where we find wholeness of truth and faith to believe? Let us cast off our preconceived ideas of the things that separate us and bring them to the holy of holies where truth is found. If God is God…and He is…if He desires truth…and He does…don’t you think He will teach our hearts unity of faith to believe and be one in Christ’s beautiful body?

Father, teach us truth that we may be whole and accomplish Your purpose in the earth. In Jesus, the veil, the only true door, we pray. Amen.

Body of Christ, Choice, Christmas, Holidays

Christmas, or Not? The Controversy and Our Choice

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nativity 02
Merry Christmas

This morning, as I awoke, my thoughts ran quickly to the controversial issue I have been mulling, and yes, fuming over for weeks now concerning Christmas as a Christian holiday and it being “stolen from us in our day and culture”. I am hearing that there are even people gearing up to fight to get it back. And until I started my research, I was leaning toward getting aboard the boat with them. But after just barely starting my research, God began to minister to my heart and lead me to adjust my understanding and perceptions. I am now leaning toward a thought that has hit my head several times of late; that thought being that we need to celebrate Christ in peace with those who celebrate their “holidays” or set another time as a time for our celebration of Christ. Why do I say that?

The very beginning of my research reveals what I have heard for years; that Christmas as a celebration started out of other traditions of the day. Quoting one article on History of Christmas website:

“Believe it or not, many of the traditions that we observe during the Christmas holiday season began way before the birth of Christ. Exchanging gifts, decorating trees, and the burning of the Yule log were all winter traditions that began before Christ was born, but were eventually incorporated into the holiday that became known as Christmas, and became part of Christmas history.” 1

According to this same article, “One theory about the evolution of the winter celebrations to the celebration of the birth of Jesus is that the Roman emperor Constantine, who converted to Christianity, wanted to incorporate the pagan winter rituals together with the celebration of Jesus’ birth. In this way, Constantine hoped to help both pagans and Christians celebrate together. Many believe that this is the reason for celebrating the birth of Christ on December 25th. It is widely believed today that Jesus was not actually born on, or even close to, December 25th. Eventually, the Roman church became more successful in making the December celebration about the birth of Christ, replacing any celebrations that were in honor of pagan gods.” 1

Some interesting facts:

†   The original date of the celebration in Eastern Christianity was January 6, in connection with Epiphany, and that is still the date of the celebration for the Armenian Apostolic Church and in Armenia, where it is a public holiday. 2

†   The first Nativity was created by St. Francis of Assisi in 1224 and was a living nativity, set up in an effort to explain the birth of Jesus. The Nativity is exclusive to the Christian faith and the celebration of Christ at Christmas in many parts of the world. 3

†   Decorated trees were used in celebrations long before Christ, as well as being seen as home décor for luck and other such beliefs. It is believed that Boniface, a Monk who came to Germany in the 7th/8th century, first introduced the use of the fir as a Christmas tree, its triangular shape being used to signify the Trinity. 4

†   The 12 Days of Christmas is believed to come from the Zagmuth in Mesopotamia, a festival in support of their chief god, Marduk, who was believed to battle the “monsters of chaos” at the beginning of winter. 1

†   The Council of Tours in 567 established the period of Advent as a time of fasting before Christmas. They also proclaimed the twelve days from Christmas to Epiphany a sacred, festive season. 5

I could go on, but you can read the articles linked below for more information. The fact is that the celebration of Christmas, meaning “Christ’s mass”, is highly linked with celebrations of other non-Christian cultures through adoption of timing, traditions, and symbols. Do we have a right to celebrate it with freedom and respectful consideration by those who choose not to? Yes. Is this season solely ours? No. There are too many other cultures with similar celebrations, some linked with other gods, who have had this same season for eons, long before our choosing it for our purpose of honoring and remembering the Christ.

So what’s the solution?

†   “Whether, then, you eat or drink or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God” ~ 1 Corinthians 10:31.

†   Remember that “we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were making an appeal through us; we beg you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God” ~ 2 Corinthians 5:20.

†   And, lest we forget, “Therefore if there is any encouragement in Christ, if there is any consolation of love, if there is any fellowship of the Spirit, if any affection and compassion, make my joy complete by being of the same mind, maintaining the same love, united in spirit, INTENT ON ONE PURPOSE. Do nothing from selfishness or empty conceit, but with humility of mind regard one another as more important than yourselves; do not merely look out for your own personal interests, but also for the interests of others. Have this attitude in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus, who, although He existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men. Being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross” ~ Philippians 2:1-8.

Our main purpose for still being here, the reason we continue to watch for Christ’s return, is because He still has a work for us to do in the earth. We are here to represent His interests, and His interests are for us to be an expression of His image in the earth, reaching out to those He died for with arms and attitudes of love. And we are to do so in likeness to Christ, who gave up His high position and all the rights that afforded Him to come here and suffer the loss of all He had for a time so that He might provide a way of saving grace for us. Thus, we are to lay down our lives, if need be, in order to win some. (Read 1 Corinthians 9:19-24)

The celebration of Christ is a heart issue. We cannot force it on others. They cannot truly take it from us. My decision today as I think on these things is this: When I say “Merry Christmas” and someone else responds with Happy Holidays, I will smile and thank them while lifting a prayer for their ultimate blessing. If someone complains about my nativity being visible to all in my front yard, I will do my best to respond to them with grace while standing my ground in celebrating my King. Hopefully as I do so, with respectful consideration for him while still standing firm for my Christ, that person will come to some understanding of my love of my God and will return the respect of my right of choice as I respect their God-given right to choose against Him. Remember, rejection of Christianity and its practices and peoples is not ultimately rejection of the person serving Christ, it is rejection of Christ Himself, and He will deal with that (Luke 10:16; Titus 1:16). Ours is to love Him and love others as He does: unconditionally and incorruptibly.

Are some things worth fighting for? Yes. Are we, as Christians to do so? We are called to “fight the good fight of faith”, so I would say we are to pick our battles well, make sure our heart and attitude in the fight line up with God’s will and way, then stand firm on Him.

We are called to be wise as serpents and innocent as doves in this world. To me, that means to understand the ways of evil and know what God has supplied us in the set-up of world government that can be used to fight the good fight within the legal bounds of His Law and the laws of man, but we must do so always with our role of ambassador in heart, being innocent of unrighteous motive and clear of attitudes that misrepresent Him, standing with His Law when man’s law is in contention with Him.

Christmas is the focus of the Christian in celebrating this Holiday season. But other belief systems coincide with our Christmas. Let them have theirs while we keep ours with respect and peace one to another, or change the date for ours and separate from the rest. It is our choice, people of Jehovah in Jesus, the Christ. What will we do?

References:

History Of Christmas on History of Christmas website: http://www.historyofchristmas.net/page1.html

Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christmas; See also History of old Christmas day: http://www.thehistoryofchristmas.com/ch/old_christmas_day.htm

Nativity History: http://www.thehistoryofchristmas.com/ch/nativity.htm

Symbols of Christmas on The Holiday Spot.Com: http://www.theholidayspot.com/christmas/christmas_symbols.htm

History of Advent: http://www.thehistoryofchristmas.com/trivia/advent.htm

Sites of interest:

History of Holidays: http://www.historyofholidays.com/

The History of Christmas: http://www.thehistoryofchristmas.com/

The Holiday Spot: http://www.theholidayspot.com/

Body of Christ, Choice

A Call to The Elect

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“For the Lord spoke thus to me with His strong hand upon me, and warned and instructed me not to walk in the way of this people, saying, ‘Do not call conspiracy [or hard, or holy] all that this people will call conspiracy [or hard, or holy]; neither be in fear of what they fear, nor make others afraid and in dread. The Lord of hosts—regard Him as holy and honor His holy name by regarding Him as your only hope of safety, and let Him be your fear and let Him be your dread lest you offend Him by your fear of man and distrust of Him. And He shall be a sanctuary, a sacred and indestructible asylum to those who reverently fear and trust in Him; but He shall be a Stone of stumbling and a Rock of offense to both the houses of Israel, a trap and a snare to the inhabitants of Jerusalem” (Isaiah 8:11-14, AMP; brackets removed for easier reading).

We are in precarious days as a nation and indeed, the whole world, facing many and diverse challenges. As I watched things unfold over these weeks of the election season, the Sandy storm thundering its bolt upon our land, God has spoken many things to my heart.

He often speaks warning to me of things to come, and through these weeks of waiting and watching for Him, He again warns of difficult days ahead. The true election of our day was and is “God” or “not God.” Not only was that our true choice where our vote for a President was concerned, but it is our true choice with every decision and every potential path throughout every day of our lives. As for the Presidential election, the days ahead will reveal our vote.

One thing God is making clear to me as I consider all He is revealing is that I am not here to cause further dread, calling things a conspiracy, giving way to paranoia. I am not to give focus to the hard things ahead, or call things ‘holy’ that this world calls ‘holy.’ Instead my cry is to the possessed of God, those truly belonging to and surrendered to Him. My cry is a call to look up; look up to the Lord, your shelter and strong stay; and look down, look down to your feet and check your stance. Where are you standing on this issue of God and His ways. “…Therefore, brethren, be all the more diligent to make certain about His calling and choosing you…” (2 Peter 1:1-10).

Our stance on the issue of God and His way is vital to our nation and to each individual professing faith or no faith in Jehovah—Yeshua. “The Lord of hosts—regard Him as holy and honor His holy name by regarding Him as your only hope of safety, and let Him be your fear and let Him be your dread lest you offend Him by your fear of man and distrust of Him.” I believe we are a nation heading into the winds of adversity right now, but God is our help and hope. “…And He shall be a sanctuary, a sacred and indestructible asylum to those who reverently fear and trust in Him….”

“…but He shall be a Stone of stumbling and a Rock of offense to both the houses of Israel, a trap and a snare to the inhabitants of Jerusalem.” At the time of the writing of Isaiah 8, Israel and Judah were failing to honor and follow God. They were coming under the disciplining hand of God and Assyria was raining down on them. God allows such adversity in the lives of those who are His chosen, who refuse to heed His instruction that is given for our good, His glory, and the fulfilling of His purposes.

The days ahead will call each individual to make our choice. Will we look to and stand in the shade of the Mountain of God? Or will we look to and follow the dictates of the winds of adversity coming down off the hills of false hope?

“He who dwells in the secret place of the Most High shall remain stable and fixed under the shadow of the Almighty [Whose power no foe can withstand]. I will say of the Lord, He is my Refuge and my Fortress, my God; on Him I lean and rely, and in Him I [confidently] trust! For [then] He will deliver you from the snare of the fowler and from the deadly pestilence. [Then] He will cover you with His pinions, and under His wings shall you trust and find refuge; His truth and His faithfulness are a shield and a buckler” (Psalm 91:1-4, AMP).

~*~

If you would like to join a prayer force as we watch to see the Lord’s opinion of the recent election, join us on Facebook at Living Worshipers (http://www.facebook.com/LivingWorshipersPage?ref=hl).

 

Body of Christ, Worship

Worship: Positions From the Heart – Prostration

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“So I fell down and lay prostrate before the Lord forty days and nights because the Lord had said He would destroy you” (Deuteronomy 9:25).

Prostration: laid out, face down, in complete and utter surrender, laying one’s life down to be had by the One before whom we fall down.

Pastor Marshall at my church tells of when he finally surrendered to God, receiving Christ as Savior. He tells of going for months and months, unable to get through a service at church upright. He was so overcome by gratitude to God for saving him that he prostrated himself, feeling his absolute destitution without God and totally surrendering himself to Him.

Prostration is the greatest form of worship I can imagine. It again begins in the heart, for true prostration before our Holy God must be wholehearted and sincere. It pours forth from a heart that knows our lives belong to Him and He will do with us what He will. Our surrender and cooperation, in complete agreement with Him, is necessary to the heart that prostrates itself, laying life and limb before His throne. If ever we need to prostrate ourselves in complete surrender to God, laying our lives out before Him, it is now.

Our nation and indeed the world is in dire need of God’s work in our midst. God can do more in and through one person that is totally and completely surrendered to Him, than a thousand can do without Him. We want to impact our world for the glory of God and see Him victorious in our situations and circumstances? Fall down before Him in complete and utter surrender, realizing, “I cannot, but You can. I cannot unless You do.” Surrender all to Him and see Him high and lifted up in you.

Take Me In – Kutless: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7vG9Cx767mc

Body of Christ, Worship

Worship: Positions From the Heart – Throughout our day

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“You shall teach them diligently to your sons and shall talk of them when you sit in your house and when you walk by the way and when you lie down and when you rise up” (Deuteronomy 6:7).

Part of worshiping God is telling others, especially our children, of His precepts and of our experiences with Him. God is alive, but people who do not know Him are too often blinded to His existence. It is important that we remember to praise Him and tell of Him throughout our day to day lives. This passage in chapter 6 of Deuteronomy speaks of four strategic worship stances: sitting, walking, laying down, and rising up.

Sitting to me pictures relationship. We often sit when we visit with someone. Giving them our focus and taking every opportunity to speak trust in God into their situations is a vitally needed form of praise and worship.

Walking depicts comradery, walking together through life. We all know in this life we do not always see eye to eye. But we can learn to walk together even in our differences and to share God’s presence and how He reveals Himself to us as we walk together for His glory and to His purpose.

Laying down: I see rest. We best worship and honor God when we enter His rest. Too often, in our moments of rest, this life, its struggles, things of the past and worries of the future hinder our laying down times. Such hinders our testimony of God, keeping others blinded to His reality, when they see us as stressed and uptight as they are. It is the greatest form of worship when we can go through this life that can often be difficult, facing those challenges from a stance that is rested in Him.

Rising up: when life does knock us down, what greater worship can there be than to get back up again and carry on with faith in God.

Worship is not a here a little, there a little, word of mouth and sing along action. It is the day in and day out living with earnest expectation and hope that is rested on the reality of our loving, life-giving God.

Here With Me: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=74CNUExD4I8&list=PLFF54F40EEBC31260&index=1&feature=plpp_video

Body of Christ, Worship

Worship: Positions From the Heart – Bow the Knee

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“Come, let us bow down in worship, let us kneel before the Lord our Maker; for he is our God and we are the people of his pasture, the flock under his care” (Psalm 95:6-7).

It is interesting to watch military personal when in the presence of the commander and chief. You can tell by the way they salute where their heart lies toward the man in the office. Some are very respectful and sincere in their salute. Others salute the office position because it is expected, but there is no real respect for the man in it. And then there are times when the man in the office is such a disappointment that the soldier at arms will refuse to salute.

Like with these soldiers, it is the same with those who profess to worship God. Yesterday we discussed the heart of worship. God looks to the heart and it is the sincere of heart toward Him that He best responds to. Today we look at the first of several positions of worship that scripture speaks of and the heart behind each, beginning with the bow.

Bowing before a sovereign is a show of respect to that position of authority. It is like the salute, honoring the office of one in authority, and the heart behind it makes all the difference. As I consider the positions of worship, I see in each a heart issue that must be in play for God to recognize it as sincere worship in spirit and in truth.

Taking first the bow, we bow to the authority of God over us. It is a position of surrender. And that position must begin in the heart of the man. To bow without consciousness of the surrender to God’s authority is position without true thought and intent.

Today, in the wake of the storms of life that come at us, in the challenges we face through the day, our call is to bow the knee by first bowing the heart in surrender to God. In closing, let us realize anew what the “heart” is. Heart in scripture speaks of the core of ones being. It is body, soul, and spirit. To bow physically to God in our body is easy in itself, but what of the rest of our core being?

Bowing the spirit, the eternal part of us that lives on into eternity, requires unity with the Spirit of God that quickens us—breathing new life into our being that will remain with God forever. Our spirit man bows to the work of His Spirit in us.

Bowing the soul: the mind or thoughts, the will and the emotions, this is the biggie to our surrendered posture. As the thought of a man goes, so goes his body or his being. We bow to the sovereignty of God in our minds when we take every thought captive to obey Him in Christ. When we bring our thoughts in line with His, our wills will quickly fall in line with His, and our emotions will follow our will.

Bowing before Sovereign God is a heart issue that must be whole and complete to be real and true of spirit.

We Bow Down

Body of Christ, Worship

Worship: From Hearts After His Own Heart

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“… The Lord has sought out for Himself a man after His own heart …” (1 Samuel 13:14).

In these days, as we watch the destruction that is coming out of the storm to the northwest of where I now sit, my heart is filled with the understanding that we need to be aware of the greatness of God who can and will see us through. My heart has been troubled for some time, called by God to pray for some “devastating storm” that will hit our land. Even as I watch the destruction that seems to be what God has my heart crying out to Him for His grace to protect, I sense, “this is not yet it.” I can’t even fathom what God is warning of in this season of prayer, but one thing I know:

“I have heard your prayer and have chosen this place for Myself as a house of sacrifice. If I shut up the heavens so that there is no rain, or if I command the locust to devour the land, or if I send pestilence among My people, and My people who are called by My name humble themselves and pray and seek My face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, will forgive their sin and will heal their land. Now My eyes will be open and My ears attentive to the prayer offered in this place. For now I have chosen and consecrated this house that My name may be there forever, and My eyes and My heart will be there perpetually” (2 Chronicles 7:12-16).

God is with and for His people, and, in Christ, we are His chosen and beloved temple, chosen as His house of sacrifice as we follow the example of Christ. He heeds and responds affirmatively to the heart that is sincere before Him, the heart of the people of His temple. And one assurance we have that continually comes to my heart in these days is that “Yet You are holy, O You who are enthroned upon the praises of Israel.”

When God’s people put their hearts to praise the Lord, wholeheartedly trusting in His sovereignty, there is no evil that can prevail against His will. He is God above all, and a heart after His own heart, that trusts in, relies on, has faith in and is confident in Him will see His sovereignty in their life storms.

Therefore “I will bless the LORD at all times; His praise shall continually be in my mouth” (Psalm 34:1).

For a season we begin a look at the heart of true, Spirit-filled and Spirit-led worship. As we worship God with a heart that truly believes in His Worth-ship, we will see Him high and lifted up and working in whatever storm may come our way.

“An hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for such people the Father seeks to be His worshipers. God is spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth” (John 4:23-24). Worship in Spirit and truth comes to those who are wholehearted toward God, sold out to trust in Him, no matter the difficulties life in a fallen world brings. The sacrifice of praise is the call of God in this hour of storms.

~*~

“We are the true circumcision, who worship in the Spirit of God and glory in Christ Jesus and put no confidence in the flesh” (Philippians 3:3).

 Join us as we pray, praise and worship together on Living Worshipers’ Page: http://www.facebook.com/LivingWorshipersPage#!/LivingWorshipersPage

Body of Christ, God's Faithfulness, who I am in Christ

The Dream – Part 3

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God Intends Good 

Though this dream I shared with you is obviously meant for the body of Christ, as God instructs my heart for the writing of this short series, I can see clearly my own life in its meaning. During the time of many things coming at me and my family in the past few years, I have walked the premise of this dream out with realization that God is doing a work in me and in mine. What the enemy intends for harm, God uses for good (Genesis 50:15-21; Romans 8:28). In my many and growing number of years in this life, one thing I have learned is that any evil allowed to reach me is intended by God to do a work in me that purifies and helps me to grow in Him, so I face such struggles with earnest expectation and hope of seeing God do just that. And I know that He is after a root of rejection that has been with me from my earliest days. A root that has grown so deep for so long sometimes has to be burned and blasted out: thus the fires of testing and trial.

Besides doing a work in me, it also gives me opportunity to bear testimony of His work in my life as doors open for me to share the comfort He gives me with others who struggle. So as I relayed to you these things I perceived from God as the many faces and forms of the enemy, I was made acutely aware that though this dream is for the Body – the Bride of Christ, it is also very much for me as an individual part of that Body, thus, the testimonial of my struggle flowed to the pages. Just as this message is for me, so it is for you in your struggle.

I know that I am not alone in this struggle with the enemy suitor who seeks to destroy our ability to bear righteousness into the earth. Everywhere I turn I meet people of God who have their own story of heartache and challenge to tell: devastating, stagnating, unbelievable things coming at the body of Christ. Beloved, if that is you, please know, what the enemy means for harm, God uses for good.

I also want you to realize something I am increasingly aware of in my own struggle. Our flesh is one of the faces and forms of the enemy. Our own bodies, when under great stress, give way to the stress. Though we fight to do right in our situations, the effects of extreme stressors mess up our hormones and body chemistry in ways that turn our own bodies, minds, and emotions against us, making the body we live in an enemy to overcome. This is the battle I am in, and it is the battle I believe is portrayed by Paul in Romans 7.

It is important for us to realize this truth about the physical body and its limitations for several reasons: one being to protect us from falling to guilt and shame in our struggle. Like Paul, we need to realize the righteousness of Christ that covers us and makes us whole even when our own flesh betrays us.

Try as I may to carry on as the daughter of my daddy, doing right by him, many days my flesh gives way to the stress and breaks down in the effort. I’ll tell you, there are days when I need someone to come alongside me and be the hand of God, grabbing mine and helping me do the good I desire when my own flesh is shut down, destroying my ability. This is especially true when my grief over daddy gives way to social anxiety. We need to not only be alert to our own struggle, but as people of God watching others who are in such a battle, we need to be there for those we can help. This is the time when those of the Body who are weak need the strong to cover them like a hand going to stop the bleeding wound: not just with prayer, but with encouragement, and even walking alongside them in their struggle.

One thing I have learned in my Christian lay counseling studies is that those who are ensnared by paranoia and anxiety issues that are empowered by out of control body chemistry need people who will walk with them faithfully, not turning from them in their time of need. It is difficult to deal with the negativity of those who struggle. It is frustrating to see them begin to make progress, only to fall back again and again in their battle. But let me tell you something, we are the hands and the feet, the arms and the legs, the mouth and the ears, the heart and the mind representing God in the earth. We are the Bride, yes; but we also are the body of the Groom and we need one another.

How are the legs of Christ lopped off? Through the frustration of us, His body, working with individual members of His body who are in the fight of their lives. Through our indifference to those who are in difficulties we want to run from. Through our own protectiveness that pulls away from them instead of sticking it out with them. I’m not just speaking to you, the reader, here; this is truth I need to realize as well. There are times in our lives when we need the physical hand of the Groom, the Body of Christ in the earth, to reach our own and help us heal so we as the body of Christ can move unhindered by disabling forces of life in the world.

Today’s blog is my hand reaching out to those who struggle as I am struggling, sharing some of the things God is teaching me through my experience, hoping that it will be the bandage and balm you need as well. Because of His grace toward me and His work in helping me through this season of life, I have learned many things that are vital to our ability to be the Bride and the Body, bearing righteous fruit in a difficult day and age. Following are some of those things. I have learned…

†   The greater depths of God’s love for me personally and how understanding and trusting that love frees from fear: He loves me with a love that will not be moved.

God, for years, has used my husband’s love for me to teach me of His love. I have heard my husband profess his love for me verbally and seen him show it in ways that amaze me, over and over again, expressing his love in ways that have me convinced of its veracity. When we first married, I feared the loss of his love, wondering of its trustworthiness because of childhood experiences and that of a previous marriage in which “love” proved unfaithful and fleeting. But he has so poured his love into me that I no longer doubt it or fear the loss of it.

Like most children, I learned of love through childhood experiences, and though I have always believed that God loves me, fear of somehow losing that love has been there to hinder. During this season of struggle, God has done the same thing for me that my husband did. He has assured me over and over of His love for me being faithful and trustworthy. I no longer fear that God will turn from me in my struggle. I know He will stick with me until I come out strong, shining like gold, having legs to birth righteousness in the earth as He intends.

†   I can trust God when I can trust no other: That is ingrained into me as never before. He loves me, knows my heart, and will never leave or forsake me. I am His servant. He has chosen and not rejected me (Isaiah 41:8-16). Though my daddy may reject me, disbelieve me, turn with anger and suspicion from me, God knows my heart and He chooses me. He has repeated that Isaiah 41 phrase to me so many times since my struggle with Complicated Grief Disorder began that I believe it with all my being and trust Him in it. My trust in God’s presence, understanding, faithfulness, love and care in choosing me and not rejecting me is beyond measure. I stand in awe of God.

†   God understands better than I where I am right now, mentally, physically, emotionally, and spiritually. He is the one who led me to the study of counseling that revealed the Complicated Grief Disorder that I am in, which is akin to and treated the same as Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. He diagnosed it, and He will lead me to healing when He is finished using the grief to work change and maturity in me. In the meantime, His grace covers my “I can’t” with His righteousness while I seek to grasp the Groom’s hand and walk in His “I can.”

†   God’s opinion is true and righteous judgment: As long as I know God’s opinion of me and my situations, the opinion of man has no bearing on me. I do not have to worry about what man thinks of me as long as I walk forward in the Lord’s pleasure. He sings over me when no other will. I was amazed a few weeks back when the pastor called for the weary to come to the altar. As I knelt there alone at the altar, I feel the hand of a woman I do not know on my shoulder. She did not know my pain, but as she prayed, her prayer turned to singing over me, and I knew though she did not know what to pray, God was responding to the need. He is Lord of my life and my relationships, and He alone gives favor with man. Please God and He will take care of the rest.

Though I struggle to minister to daddy right now, I am not without a ministry to my Lord. He keeps me active in His work in other areas while He is building me up to be what He needs me to be as my daddy’s daughter. I know He will be victorious in the situation and I rest with hope in Him to see my legs restored in this struggle.

†   Footstool praying: there is value of what I call “footstool prayers.” Though, in my pain, I may not have words to express the need for which I pray, God does. In the power of His Spirit I have learned that God loves to respond affirmatively to the prayer that is lifted to His throne without words, but with sincere desire for Him to have His will and way in the need. My concern being laid at His feet, beside the footstool of Christ, I can then turn my attention to go on my way without that burden weighing me down. I am freed by faith to know that I can leave that need, whatever it is, with Him and He will deal with it. I may not think of it again until I realize His answer. Some days thought of the need may come with many words of prayer pouring forth in the power of His Spirit. But when it overwhelms me, I know He hears my heart’s groaning, though my mind can form no thought for words, as I lay it beside His footstool for His disposal.

†   I can! When God wants me to, I can press forward to minister to daddy and deal with him, because God through His Spirit supplies power to perform. When that power moves, I go in obedience with it. If that power from Him is not there, I wait for it, trusting Him to meet the need where I can’t. I have grown to trust His covering and His faithfulness to Himself (2 Timothy 2:1-13). Though I may not always be able, He always can, and He will accomplish the purpose of His will.

†   Jesus is our example: The ways He revealed through example are mine to portray as need arises. In the dream, the example of Christ was to have faith to believe God and see Him faithfully supply. I am learning to choose to believe even when my body fails me and fights me.

Did you know that sometimes Jesus walked away from a situation knowing it was not yet His time? I am growing in faith to know that sometimes God moves us to step back and let Him deal with a person or situation that is beyond us to cope with. He does not want us beat down by the assault of those given over to their own flesh.

Earlier I said that we, the body, need to be God’s hand to grab hold a struggling body part and help them heal. But God knows when that part is not open to being helped. So there are times in life when God tells us to step back and get out of the way so that He can deal with it.

Did you know that my daddy, who cannot read, quoted scripture to me verbatim the other day? Years ago when my daddy’s struggle began, I got up in the night, grieved over him, and God led me to pray through whole chapters of scripture for him. During that prayer session, God spoke very clearly to my heart that I would see my daddy sitting fully clothed and in His right mind, sharing His word with those who will listen. Also years ago, God led me to give my daddy the entire Bible on tape. He, for many years now, has listened to it faithfully. Thus, I saw that promise fulfilled as we talked together my last visit and I came to discover that my daddy has the gospel figured out and secured in his own heart—he is fully clothed and in his right mind spiritually. And he spouted several verses as he shared his faith. I am praising God for His hand that can, even when I am without legs to press forward.

~*~

Bride of Christ, nothing shall be impossible with God. Keep seeking the hand of the Groom and give your life to the birthing of His seed. Trust in Him no matter the appearance of the circumstances of life; listen for His voice crying “only believe”, knowing that it is unity with Him that grants us strong legs and a birth canal. Then rise up and go forth to prosper His kingdom, even in the midst of enemy incursion. Hold close the child of righteousness birthed through you by His grace, and trust His protection over you and it. He alone can produce the seed within you, and He alone can protect and empower its growth and maturity to His intent and purpose. Let no enemy-suitor draw you away from holding tight to His hand. Only BELIEVE!

Body of Christ, Practicing His Presence, who I am in Christ

The Dream – Part 1

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The Battle Revealed

 

Father, the dream, it is pregnant within me, filled with meaning and power. Here am I, O God. Help me to write it. I can do nothing on my own, but only as You give utterance can I.

~*~

Last night I had a dream that I believe is vital for our day. In my dream there were three main characters: the Groom, the Bride, and the enemy suitor that took many forms and had many faces, all coming at the Bride and Groom at one time.

~*~

Now you have the characters, here is the setting:

The Groom has a Bride that He is absolutely mad about. He loves her more than life itself and she is His by promise and by right. All that He does, He does for her, giving even life and breath to show His love and care for her.

The Bride loves the Groom like no other and desires Him above all. Her heart soars at the site of Him, and her greatest delight is His pleasure.

But there is a rival to the Groom who is constantly trying to separate them from one another and woo the Bride away. This enemy suitor puts on appearances of having love and care for the Bride like that of the Groom’s, but his motives are sinister. Though she is not swayed, this rival suitor is relentless in his pursuit.  

~*~

Now you have the setting, here is the dream.

The suitor is constantly pulling at the Bride. She frantically reaches for the Groom who is chasing hard after her as His rival works to separate Him from her presence, but every time they get near to a firm grip on one another, she is swooshed away by the suitor in some new form or many. The Groom runs hard after her, never doubting her faithfulness to Him as He sees in her eyes her desire, and knows her heart for Him.

As the Groom chases His Bride, the enemy suitor takes His legs from Him. Each time he does, the Groom yells, “I believe!” to His Father, and His legs grow back fully restored. He starts His pursuit of the Bride again with ever increasing fervor. Over and over, the enemy suitor takes the Grooms legs, the Groom cries out His faith to the Father who responds to His faith, restoring His legs with power to perform, and the chase goes on.

Determined to win the battle, the suitor turns and takes the legs up to half of the pelvis of the Bride. The Bride, impregnated begins to show signs of her pregnancy as the fetus grows strong within her. The suitor tells her the child is his, to be raised up for his intent and purpose. Missing half of her body, the Bride puts the whole of her life energy into the focus of growing the child within her to be birthed healthy and strong. She has lost sight of her Groom in her pain and stopped reaching for Him, putting all her energy into growing a healthy child within, trusting that something will happen to free her from the pain as she gives her life for the child.

Meanwhile the Groom is calling to her, reaching and fighting to get to her side only to be hindered and fought at every turn by the enemy suitor’s many forms and faces. Calling out to her, as she focuses to grow the child, she hears with recognition the voice of her Beloved, shouting, “Only believe!” Her focus on delivering a healthy child, filled with hope, increases.

Finally the Groom breaks through to the Bride grabbing hold of her hand and assuring her, “The child is ours! We will raise it to our intent and purpose.” Her legs grow back, full and strong, and the suitor with its many faces and forms steps back for a bit as the child is born. I awake to the scenes of the Bride holding the child close and protected; and the Groom standing guard and fighting off the enemy that is now intent on steeling the child.

As I wake, I come quickly to discern the meaning of the dream. The Groom and the Bride are, of course, Jesus and His Bride, the Church. The enemy suitor is Satan and all he uses to lure the Bride away from the Groom, with all their many forms and faces. They try to stop Jesus from complete, intimate, and faithful union with His Bride, but Jesus looks always to the Father who protects His ability to pursue her and get to her. The Bride is impregnated by the Groom with the seed of Righteousness that will work His intent and purpose in the earth. But we have the enemy suitor that is doing all he can to hinder our union with the Groom and get hold on the fruit of our lives, souring it for his intent and purpose, to hinder the birthing of Righteousness in the earth and the bearing of the good fruits of the Kingdom and Crown.

So what are these hindrances used of Satan to cut the legs to half the pelvis off of the Bride? Next post we will look at some I believe are the biggest influences that make the birthing of Righteousness a challenge to be overcome by faith to “Only Believe.”

Body of Christ, who I am in Christ

Rejoicing Comes in the Fellowship of His Sufferings: Part 14

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The Joy of One Flesh Living

A review of 1 John 4:12-16 brings us to the final aspect of our ministry to God in Christ as we work to fulfill what is lacking of Christ’s afflictions: given here in the Amplified version, verse 12-13 adjusted for easier reading.

“No man has at any time yet seen God. But if we love one another, God abides, lives and remains in us and His love, that love which is essentially His (and can only come from Him in His power) is brought to completion—to its full maturity, running its full course and is being perfected in us! By this we come to know, perceive, recognize, and understand that we abide so as to live and remain in Him and He in us: because He has given / imparted to us of His Holy Spirit” [vs. 12-13 (love-defining thought added by author)].

In Christ, as we come to know, recognize, believe and rely upon the love God has for us, we enter into a life experience of one flesh living—being fully one with God and He with us. His body, His bride, His child: every way in which the scripture speaks of “this being bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh,” He uses to describe the life of one who is one with Him in Christ.

This fact is awe inspiring to me. I can see this principle of God in His word more clearly than ever before. There is a part of me that knows I am already there in His power and provision. But I desire more than ever to get to that place in my every day experience in ways I have yet to know.

How do we do that? I do not have it all figured out yet, but here are some clues we can grasp hold of as we look at the remainder of this passage in chapter 4 and on through chapter 5 of this book. Continuing with verses 14-16 of chapter 4, we find our first answers to our “How” question.

“And besides we ourselves have seen and have deliberately and steadfastly contemplated and bear witness that the Father has sent the Son as the Savior of the world. Anyone who confesses (acknowledges, owns) that Jesus is the Son of God, God abides (lives, makes His home) in him and he [abides, lives, makes his home] in God. And we know (understand, recognize, are conscious of, by observation and by experience) and believe (adhere to and put faith in and rely on) the love God cherishes for us. God is love, and he who dwells and continues in love dwells and continues in God, and God dwells and continues in him.”

Know Jesus: The first step to one flesh living with God is to know Jesus, His Son, acknowledging with full belief of understanding Who He is in all His fullness. Through faith in Jesus as the Christ, God incarnate, the propitiation for all sin and victor over the death that separates from God, we enter into the body of Christ, which brings us to this one flesh relationship with God.

Know and trust the Love God has for us: We become ingrained perpetually into one flesh with Him as we come to greater realization and more full assurance of knowledge to understand, recognize, being conscious of by observation and experience, and to believe so as to adhere to, put faith in, and rely on the love God cherishes for us.

Realizing that God IS LOVE, in all its fullness, and all He does flows forth from His heart of love to us, equips us to trust His hand in our lives and come more fully into agreement with His will and way. It helps us to have His thoughts and walk in His ways when we trust His love for us.

Trusting His love removes fear of any hardship that may come to us because we live in a fallen world. Believing His love, we are equipped to know that we are part of His flesh, protected and encompassed by Him, only being touched by pain as will make us stronger and provide us opportunity as His witnesses to a lost world still ensnared by death’s grip. We are His hands and feet, reaching out with His love so that others may enter in with us to live and abide with Him.

Pressing on through Chapter 5 we find:

Love as He loves (vs. 1-3): Unity with the Father produces love in us, equipping us to love those in our sphere of influence. The better we become at our roll of being a conduit for His love, the more we will experience this one flesh dimension in our relationship with Him. His love flow includes empowering our sincere love for Him that will produce in us…

Obedience to His commands(vs. 1-3): Whether His commands are from His written and Holy Word, or whether they are the day to day directives He gives us personally in the power of His Spirit, love for God produces a unity that makes His desire our own. And more than that, it makes Him our greatest desire. Thus we willing choose His will even when it is hard, because we desire to walk in one flesh with Him who is our true desire. And that flows not only out of our love for Him, but from…

Faith in Him (vs. 4-6): True belief in God’s testimony to us produces a faith that will follow Him in obedience. We become one with Him in thought, desire, and understanding, and we walk as one with Him. I believe this is the walk that led to Enoch being no more, “for God took Him” (Genesis 5:21-24).

What a testimony to have: that we walked with God as Enoch did, being known as the friend of God like Abraham, thus being a person after His own heart as David was, doing only what we see Him doing, as Jesus did. We have the capability of having this testimony as we grow strong in one flesh living in God through Christ. This is the faith we are called to. And this faith…

Believes the testimony of God in the power of the Spirit (vs. 7-12): It is God who sent the Spirit as His testimony that Jesus is the Christ and that His Kingdom has come to us who will enter into it by faith. It is God who sends the Spirit to reach out to us and woo us to Himself still today. To refuse to believe the testimony of God concerning the Christ and all He is and does in us by God’s provision of grace, a testimony sent to us in the power of His Spirit, is to call God a liar, and that is the unforgivable sin (see vs. 16).

There is an encounter Jesus had with the Pharisees where they accused Him of casting out demons in the power of Satan (Matthew 12:22-31). In so doing, they blasphemed against the work of the Spirit in the earth and through Jesus Christ. So, was the real issue that they did not believe Jesus, though He was casting out demons in the power of God? No, that would be speaking against the Son of Man and was the symptom of the true underlying issue. Jesus says speaking against Him can be forgiven. What was the issue?

The work of God through Jesus in the power of the Spirit was done for the purpose of making the Christ known in the earth, proving His coming, and calling people to enter into the Kingdom of God with Him. The work of the Spirit is the testimony of God regarding Himself and the Christ. The Spirit does the work of God in the earth, proving He is.

I believe the point Jesus is making is that, to refuse this work of the Spirit being the testimony of God, sent to equip us to live this one flesh Kingdom life, that is the unforgivable sin. Refusing the Christ when the Spirit is doing all He can to make Him known to us is the only unredeemable sin—refusing to believe the Spirit’s testimony concerning God and Jesus, proving they are and that Jesus is the way, is the only true suicide. All else is covered by the blood of Jesus and can be forgiven man.

For us who believe the testimony of God and enter into one flesh relationship with Him, never to be killed by sin again, we find…

Our Confidence (vs. 13-21): In the power of the Holy Spirit at work in us, Jesus is our confidence for all eternity. Because of the Spirit in us, we experience God in new and real ways that help us to know that we know that He is and that He is the redeemer of all mankind who will put their faith in Him through Christ.

Because of relationship with God through Jesus Christ, in the power of the Spirit, we have confidence that we have the mind of Christ, and being covered in His blood, we can freely approach the throne of God and make our request of Him. We receive our request from God because we have His heart desires within us when we are actively living in one flesh with Him through the Spirit at work in us.

We have the mind of Christ, being equipped to have the thoughts of God. Being a people birthed through Christ to be people after God’s own heart, God’s heart beats within us, thus equipping us to have His desires. And the Spirit flows through us, the blood of Christ coursing through us in the power of the Spirit in which the true life flows, making us one with Him. Therefore, we have the full resource of God at our disposal as we walk with Him in obedience.

By this power in us we KNOW with confidence that He is, and that we have eternal life. With this confidence we know that we are in Him as He is in us. And our lives can flow with confidence from Him as we grow in one flesh living with Him.

John ends his discourse with this warning, which is worthy of repeat: “Little children, guard yourselves from idols.”

Idols rise up in our lives when we follow the voices of the false prophets. These lead us away from God and when we walk out of the protective cover of God, our one flesh life with Him is hindered and harmed.

The joy of the Lord is our strength because we are in Him and He is in us. By this truth, not only do we have joy in Him, but He rejoices over us, calling us “friend,” and He fully equips us for a life of abundance that honors Him. Our protection, power and provision for a life of victory supplied in Christ is found through one flesh living in God.

“By this we come to know, perceive, recognize, and understand that we abide so as to live and remain in Him and He in us: because He has given / imparted to us of His Holy Spirit. …Little children, guard yourselves from idols.”

Don’t follow the false. Follow the truth as testified to us by God and we will remain in Him.

Body of Christ, Overcomers, who I am in Christ

Rejoicing Comes in the Fellowship of His Sufferings: Part 13

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Rejoicing in Sure Revelation Knowledge of the Truth

“Beloved, do not believe (put faith in) every spirit, but prove (test) the spirits to discover whether they proceed from God; for many false prophets have gone forth into the world…” (1 John 4).

As we begin this focal thought on our work of completing what remains to be done in fulfilling the sufferings of Christ in our age, we must consider revelation knowledge of the truth of God. Here John, in the leading of the Spirit, warns us to beware the false prophets, instructing us to “prove or test the spirits to discover whether they proceed from God.” Why would he instruct us to “test the spirits”?

Think about what a prophet is. A prophet, no matter the religious philosophy they come from, is believed to be one endowed with some special power or insight from some higher power that enables them to have revelation knowledge from that god. The god the person represents, even those of no god at all, receive their knowledge from a spirit, whether God’s Spirit, a demonic spirit, or the spirit of flesh. We must realize whether the prophet we follow is truly and rightly representing our God in the power of His Spirit.

This chapter of scripture gives us clues regarding what to look for that will tell us for sure whether the spirit behind the prophet is our God’s Spirit. Where does his or her revelation knowledge come from and how do we test the spirits to know?

“By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God; and every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God; this is the spirit of the antichrist, of which you have heard that it is coming, and now it is already in the world” (vs. 2-3).

One of the best ways to know whether the spirit behind the prophet is from God is to discover what they have to say about the Christ. Now this statement of discovering whether the spirit confesses that “Jesus Christ has come in the flesh” is deeper than it sounds. It is not just that the prophet believes Jesus was, but that he truly knows and confesses who He was: the Son of God, Immanuel, somehow very God with us, the promised Christ, the seed of Abraham, the true and rightful King of kings and Lord of lords.

All that scripture says will be in the Christ is found in Jesus. Any prophetic spirit that denies any aspect of Christ’s person is a false spirit of antichrist. What brings me to this conclusion? For one thing, James, based on experiences seen with Jesus as expressed in Matthew 8:28-34, speaking of faith in Christ that is active, said, “You believe that God is one. You do well; the demons also believe, and shudder” (James 2:19).

Another found in Luke 4:41 says, “Demons also were coming out of many, shouting, ‘You are the Son of God!’ But rebuking them, He would not allow them to speak, because they knew Him to be the Christ.” Demons know who Christ is and will say who He is, but they will not confess Him as Lord. They will not bow the knee in surrender to Him.

Jesus says, “Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father who is in heaven will enter. Many will say to Me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name, and in Your name cast out demons, and in Your name perform many miracles?’ And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness.’”

The Spirit that truly professes who Jesus is will lead us to live a life that reveals Him to be our one and only Lord of lords and King of kings. It will empower us to wholeheartedly bow the knee in habitual and willing practice of obedience. The person following the true Spirit of Christ will not only know the triune God, but will be known by Him because they are in vital relationship in every way. Though they slip and fall, the relationship being of vital importance to them will lead them quickly to repentance.

“They (those under the influence of the false spirits) are from the world; therefore they speak as from the world, and the world listens to them. We are from God; he who knows God listens to us; he who is not from God does not listen to us. By this we know the spirit of truth and the spirit of error” (vs. 5-6).

Another key to testing the spirits is unity of spirit. When I meet a brother or sister in Christ, my Spirit in me jumps for joy in agreement with the Spirit of God in them. When that connection is absent, chances are great that there is a spirit of error or of antichrist in play.

I.e.: many under the influence of a false spirit are grumbling under their breath right now with the very talk of there being spirits at work in the world today. They do not believe in such, though the scriptures clearly reveal their existence and ability to affect our thoughts and our lives. A false spirit can have greatest sway in the life of one who refuses to acknowledge their existence. Beware, beloved. The word of God is either all truth, or it is not true at all. We can’t have it both ways. What kind of god would be worthy of our following if he could not even protect the veracity of His professed word? If God cannot profess truth to us I in all it fullness for us to follow, and protect that word of truth, we cannot trust His word and, therefore, are fools for believing.

“Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God; and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. The one who does not love does not know God, for God is love” (vs. 7-8).

It is impossible for a person to truly love as God loves without the Spirit of God in them. We can tell by the love walk of the man whether the Spirit of God is in them. The absence of this love signals that a spirit of error is in play.

Many false prophets speak words of love while leading the flock astray from righteousness. True love always works to do what is best for those they love. We can know we are following a spirit of error when it leads us to err against God.

“By this the love of God was manifested in us, that God has sent His only begotten Son into the world so that we might live through Him. In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins” (vs. 9-10).

We cannot confess the fullness of the love of God that was expressed through the Christ without the Spirit of God in us. Such love is beyond our ability to fully understand, much less work out of, apart from the work of God’s Spirit bringing revelation knowledge and understanding of that love and its ways to us.

There is a story of a man who, out boating with his family, winds up jumping into the brink to try to save his Christian son and one of his son’s friends who did not know Christ, when they fell overboard. Realizing he could only save one, he swam past his son to reach his friend who would spend eternity separated from God if he died that day. Making such a choice requires revelation knowledge that understands the love for us that it took for God to allow His son to die as propitiation for our sins. Thankfully that young man came to know Christ and is a testimony of love beyond understanding today.

“Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has seen God at any time; if we love one another, God abides in us, and His love is perfected in us. By this we know that we abide in Him and He in us, because He has given us of His Spirit. We have seen and testify that the Father has sent the Son to be the Savior of the world. …We love, because He first loved us. If someone says, ‘I love God,’ and hates his brother, he is a liar; for the one who does not love his brother whom he has seen, cannot love God whom he has not seen. And this commandment we have from Him, that the one who loves God should love his brother also” (vs. 11-14, 19-21).

A person who has a spirit of antichrist in play cannot rightly portray or express the love of God. Those who profess Christianity under the guise of a false spirit can and will lead those around them to false understanding that can cause them to miss the Christ and chance eternity separated from God if they are not reached by the love of God miraculously or through a true believer. Without understanding of God’s love for us and the work of the Spirit to help us love as He loves us, we cannot make His love known in truth. And if we cannot love others on His behalf as He loves them, how can we truly be in love with God? Love cares about the things that are important to the beloved.

“Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God abides in him, and he in God. We have come to know and have believed the love which God has for us. God is love, and the one who abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him. By this, love is perfected with us, so that we may have confidence in the Day of Judgment; because as He is, so also are we in this world. There is no fear in love; but perfect love casts out fear, because fear involves punishment, and the one who fears is not perfected in love” (vs. 15-18).

Being in sincere relationship with God, having His Spirit to lead and empower us, we are made one with Him, having Spirit lead revelation to understand how great the love of God is toward those who believe and receive His Son with understanding of who He is and what He accomplished on our behalf. Through Christ we are made one with God, never to be separated from that love relationship again. Once we fully understand the depth of God’s love for us, having assurance of His desire and care for us, we enter into understanding of His pure love that protects us from fear tactics.

One major weapon in Satan’s arsenal is fear. If he can cause us fear that doubts God’s care for us, leading us to question the assurance of our eternal relationship with Him, Satan can defeat us and rob our strength. Full understanding of God’s love for us assures our heart of His care and provision for our here and now and for our eternity. Fear no longer can grip so as to defeat the heart of the one who has revelation knowledge of the great love of God. Understanding that love increases faith that God is for us and not against us; that He is in control of all that concerns us, working for our good, to give us a hope and a future. Thus we realize fully…

“You are from God, little children, and have overcome them; because greater is He who is in you than he who is in the world” (vs. 4).

Growing in our relationship with God through the power of His Spirit equips us to have revelation knowledge of the truth of who Christ is and His work on our behalf even now. It equips us to know and rightly express the love of God in the earth, having assurance of His faithfulness toward us that protects from fear tactics. And it grants us eyes to see and recognize the spirit of error and the spirit of antichrist in our midst, enabling us to give warning to those who may be fooled by the imitation, including warning the elect—the righteous lot of God who are failing in any given moment to be watchful in the power of the Spirit of God within them.

Brother and Sister in Christ, I warn you, we are heavily into the days of the spirit of antichrist, as many, even big names in the Christian realm, profess as true beliefs that make the work of Christ small and insignificant. Beware the spirit of error in our day.

 ~*~

 My grandson had to have an emergency appendectomy last night. I will be helping with him as needed, but if all goes well, I hope to have the last excerpt of this study posted for you tomorrow. If not, it will be next week. BLESSings, and thanks for reading my blogs. I pray that this study will be used of God to help us grow strong in our work of completing all Jesus left us to do on His behalf.

Body of Christ, Holiness, The Righteous Lot, who I am in Christ

Rejoicing Comes in the Fellowship of His Sufferings: Part 12

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The Delightful Proof of His Nature Practiced

Read 1 John 3:

“…Little children, let us not love [merely] in theory or in speech but in deed and in truth (in practice and in sincerity)…” (1 John 3:4-24, Amplified version quoted herein).

The number one clue of our belonging to the Kingdom of God is seen in our practices stemming from His nature at work within us. It is a practice without hypocrisy. This practice of righteousness does not merely say what we believe then habitually walk off to do the opposite. It proves what we believe in our practices even behind closed doors with no one watching but God alone, because we love Him and what we believe is who we are in Him.

God delights in the righteous acts of His people, in a righteousness that is not just external for show and tell, but that begins in the sincerity of heart that is surrendered to Him for His use. True righteousness stems from the heart of who we are. The remainder of this chapter reveals ways in which we see this action in the lives of the people of God’s pasture. Those who delight in righteousness as God does, bringing delight to His heart in the sincere practice of it from a nature made one with Him will:

Practice the Keeping of His Law / Commands / Will:

“Everyone who commits (practices) sin is guilty of lawlessness; for [that is what] sin is, lawlessness (the breaking, violating of God’s law by transgression or neglect—being unrestrained and unregulated by His commands and His will)…” (vs. 4-10).

I have a wall hanging that quotes G. K. Chesterton as saying, “The only faith that wears well is that which is woven of conviction.” Keeping the laws and commandments of God, practicing them in sincerity and truth from the heart of our being, requires conviction in the veracity, integrity and credibility of God. If we do not trust Him to lead us in righteous paths for our good and His glory, we will say one thing and do another as if to placate Him and look good to others while going our own way. Completing the sufferings of Christ means to continue in His likeness of trusting fully the veracity, integrity and credibility of God, walking with God in His ways, even unto death, with hearts that are pure toward Him.

“…Boys (lads), let no one deceive and lead you astray. He who practices righteousness [who is upright, conforming to the divine will in purpose, thought, and action, living a consistently conscientious life] is righteous, even as He is righteous. [But] he who commits sin [who practices evildoing] is of the devil [takes his character from the evil one], for the devil has sinned (violated the divine law) from the beginning. The reason the Son of God was made manifest (visible) was to undo (destroy, loosen, and dissolve) the works the devil [has done]” (vs. 7-8).

The practice of righteousness through the keeping of the laws, commands and will of God comes natural and is of vital importance to the one who truly belongs to Him, having His Spirit residing within by the gift of grace through Christ. If this is absent from our lives, we have need to question whether we truly know Him, for “No one born (begotten) of God [deliberately, knowingly, and habitually] practices sin, for God’s nature abides in him [His principle of life, the divine sperm, remains permanently within him]; and he cannot practice sinning because he is born (begotten) of God” (vs. 9). The same is true when it comes to…

The Practice of Love Toward the Brotherhood / Sisterhood

“By this it is made clear who take their nature from God and are His children and who take their nature from the devil and are his children: no one who does not practice righteousness [who does not conform to God’s will in purpose, thought, and action] is of God; neither is anyone who does not love his brother (his fellow believer in Christ)” (vs. 10).

God is love. Him truly residing within us in the power of His Spirit will produce love in us as well, not only for those we call “brother and sister in Christ,” but for all mankind. We do not love the ways of the evil one that resides in those who do not know Him, but we do love the person with a holy love from God that desires them to enter into this union we possess. Thus we do good to all, especially to the brotherhood, and we do good to those who do us evil with hope that through acts of lovingkindness we may indeed win some (Romans 12).

“For this is the message (the announcement) which you have heard from the first, that we should love one another, [And] not be like Cain who [took his nature and got his motivation] from the evil one and slew his brother. And why did he slay him? Because his deeds (activities, works) were wicked and malicious and his brother’s were righteous (virtuous)” (vs. 11-12).

The world, on the other hand, will hate us because they do not have within them the love that can come only from God, living and active within.

Now realize that there are several kinds of love in this life: brotherly love, sensual love, self-love—these three being dictated by the object of ones affections and the fickle emotions within us. The love God speaks of in this passage we consider is the unconditional Agapé-love that is not destroyed by sin done against it. This love is not subject to its surrounding or physical emotions, but comes from within, from who we are in Christ by the power God supplies. It presses forward to do that which is best for the one loved even when the one we love sins against us. It is a love that can only be achieved when surrendered to the Father’s love flowing through us to those around us. Though this Agapé-love may be hindered for a time by our flesh warring against the Spirit within us, this love will eventually win out as the nature of God within us takes hold and has control, proving us to be one with God and working in His nature.

“Anyone who hates (abominates, detests) his brother [in Christ] is [at heart] a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life abiding (persevering) within him. By this we come to know (progressively to recognize, to perceive, to understand) the [essential] love: that He laid down His [own] life for us; and we ought to lay [our] lives down for [those who are our] brothers [in Him]. But if anyone has this world’s goods (resources for sustaining life) and sees his brother and fellow believer in need, yet closes his heart of compassion against him, how can the love of God live and remain in him? Little children, let us not love [merely] in theory or in speech but in deed and in truth (in practice and in sincerity)” (vs. 15-18).

Thus, as we live the life as He lives, having a nature like His, we…

Practice Confidence Before God

“By this we shall come to know (perceive, recognize, and understand) that we are of the Truth, and can reassure (quiet, conciliate, and pacify) our hearts in His presence, Whenever our hearts in [tormenting] self-accusation make us feel guilty and condemn us. [For we are in God’s hands.] For He is above and greater than our consciences (our hearts), and He knows (perceives and understands) everything [nothing is hidden from Him]” (vs. 19-20).

Even when we are caught in any sin, we stand with confidence before a holy God in the grace gift He supplies through Christ, knowing that nothing can separate us from His love for us. God convicts of sin and brings us to repentance as He disciplines us as sons and daughter through Christ (Hebrews 12). Desiring to remain in His love, we come quickly to repentance and work to cooperate with His Spirit’s work of transformation within us. Equipped by Him to stand in confidence and without condemnation before our holy God as we desire, we work to…

Practice What is Pleasing to Him

“And, beloved, if our consciences (our hearts) do not accuse us [if they do not make us feel guilty and condemn us], we have confidence (complete assurance and boldness) before God, And we receive from Him whatever we ask, because we [watchfully] obey His orders [observe His suggestions and injunctions, follow His plan for us] and [habitually] practice what is pleasing to Him” (vs. 21-22).

Confidence in our eternal destination though Christ is ours to possess. And the possessing of it through the practice of His nature proves our relationship with Him, completing the work of Christ, who made a distinction between the hypocrisy of those snared to evil, refusing the work of God within. And He proved the nature of God within Himself by His habitual practice of righteousness and God-pleasing from a pure heart. We join in fulfilling His sufferings by proving the nature of God that frees from sin and His work in the world of men that is available through the sacrifice of Christ, as we live, breathe and move in the power of His Holy Spirit residing within us, thus destroying the work of the evil one with Him.

“And this is His order (His command, His injunction): that we should believe in (put our faith and trust in and adhere to and rely on) the name of His Son Jesus Christ (the Messiah), and that we should love one another, just as He has commanded us. All who keep His commandments [who obey His orders and follow His plan, live and continue to live, to stay and] abide in Him, and He in them. [They let Christ be a home to them and they are the home of Christ.] And by this we know and understand and have the proof that He [really] lives and makes His home in us: by the [Holy] Spirit Whom He has given us” (vs. 23-24). This being true, we…

Practice Walking in the Spirit of God

“…But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not carry out the desire of the flesh…” (Galatians 5).

Giving the Spirit full sway in our lives, trusting God to make His presence and leading surely known to us, surrendering to His lead so as to not quench the work of the Spirit within, this is the nature of Christ in us. He always lived to please the Father.

We carry on to completion His suffering against the flesh, the world and the demonic as, in the power of the Spirit, we stand against evil by walking “in the Light as He Himself is in the Light.” Thus “we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus His Son cleanses us from all sin” and we prove ourselves to be in Him and He in us (1 John 1:7, NASB).

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Rejoicing Comes in the Fellowship of His Sufferings: Part 11

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The Delight of His Kingdom

“See how great a love the Father has bestowed on us, that we would be called children of God; and such we are. For this reason the world does not know us, because it did not know Him. Beloved, now we are children of God, and it has not appeared as yet what we will be. We know that when He appears, we will be like Him, because we will see Him just as He is. And everyone who has this hope fixed on Him purifies himself, just as He is pure.” (1 John 3:1-3).

Children of God: Princes and Princesses of the Kingdom. We are part of the royal court. God rejoices over each one of us, and the more we come to look like His Firstborn Son, the more joy we bring to Him.

The only real goal we need to have for life more abundant and full is to grow strong in our likeness to Christ, purifying ourselves as God is pure; wholly belonging to the Father, being passionate about Him and all He that is passionate over. If we do this one thing, our weight will line out as we surrender our health practices to Him. We will overcome health issues, if not finding our healing this side of glory, then finding our strength in the wait for the healing. As we learn to deal with the situations and circumstances of life as He would, we will have peace in knowing that we followed Him and we can trust Him to deal with the situation in due season.

Like Jesus, we are to strive to live lives as children of His kingdom in our here and now experience. Jesus spent a lot of time teaching about the Kingdom and what it looks like. That is a clue to us that we should know how the Kingdom of God functions and looks so we can be an expression of His Kingdom as His ambassadors to the world, completing His work of making the Kingdom of God known in the earth.

In doing so, we also must realize that though we are of His Kingdom already, secure in our citizenship, we are not in the Kingdom yet. Thus the reason Jesus prayed that though we are in the world, we would not be of the world (John 17:13-19). Our lives are to continue His work of expressing the Kingdom lifestyle into our surroundings.

We have covered the Kingdom life before in other studies, and I don’t want to belay our time here spending too much time on that again, but just by way of review for those who have read my materials for long and intro to the new reader, let’s touch on a few of the aspects of the Kingdom life that should be in us. The Kingdom is:

†   Love – God is love and those who are truly His will love as He loves for His love abides in them and will flow through them, even to the unlovable (1 John 2-5; Matthew 5:43-48).

†   One – Those who truly belong to God are one with the Son, who makes us one with the Father and with one another. There is unity in the Kingdom and we are to work together toward unity in the earth (John 17; Matthew 12:25-28).

†   Righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Ghost – By the power of the Spirit at work in us, we strive to be righteous as He is righteous; we enter into His peace provided for us even in the difficult seasons of life in a fallen world; and we have joy in Him because He empowers us to know our God and trust His hand (John 12-16; Romans 14:17).

†   Kingdom Revelation – The Kingdom is no longer mysterious to the true believer, for it is given for us to know, understand and proclaim His Kingdom on earth; it is ever growing within us; it is a treasure worth discovering and possessing for oneself; it is a resource to us, equipping us to separate the good worth keeping from that which is to be cast away (Matthew 13).

We could go on, but suffice to say that ours is to possess and release the Kingdom of God on the earth in ways that encourage all who will to enter in with us. We are in the world, though not of the world: we are of the Kingdom while yet we await our entrance for all eternity.

While in the world, we are warned, “For this reason the world does not know us, because it did not know Him” (1 John 3:1). We are in the world, but because we do not behave as those of the world, they often find us strange and disagreeable to their way. They cannot know, recognize or understand us because they do now know, recognize or understand Him (Amplified). John 15:18-21 warns:

“If the world hates you, you know that it has hated Me before it hated you. If you were of the world, the world would love its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, because of this the world hates you. Remember the word that I said to you, ‘A slave is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted Me, they will also persecute you; if they kept My word, they will keep yours also. But all these things they will do to you for My name’s sake, because they do not know the One who sent Me.”

It is not us they truly persecute; but it is our ways that are not their own. And when they come against us because our ways are not like theirs, it is not truly us they come against, but Christ in us. They do not know, recognize as legitimate or acknowledge the righteousness of our ways because they do not know, recognize or acknowledge Him. Those who stand in opposition to God and His ways, naturally find themselves standing in opposition to all who represent Him and His ways.

Kingdom life is upside down to that of the ways of the world. We love those who hate us, choosing to do good toward them where we can. We find peace in the midst of turmoil; joy in the Lord within the pages of life’s sorrows; and when we are weak, that is when we are truly strong. We do not walk the paths of life as the world does, but while on paths with them we walk the straight and narrow way of the Father. And we seldom fret as the world does, coming quickly to remember and realize our limitless supply is made sure through His grace toward us who believe. This is our call, to finish the work of Christ in our day, making His Kingdom known to all who will hear.

“Jesus was going throughout all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom, and healing every kind of disease and every kind of sickness among the people” (Matthew 4:23).

“And He sent them out to proclaim the kingdom of God and to perform healing” (Luke 9:2).

Body of Christ, who I am in Christ

Rejoicing Comes in the Fellowship of His Sufferings: Part 10

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Rejoicing in Assurance of Our Anointing

“As for you, keep in your hearts what you have heard from the beginning. If what you heard from the first dwells and remains in you, then you will dwell in the Son and in the Father always. And this is what He Himself has promised us—the life, the eternal life. I write this to you with reference to those who would deceive you, seducing and leading you astray. BUT AS FOR YOU, THE ANOINTING—THE SACRED APPOINTMENT, THE UNCTION—WHICH YOU RECEIVED FROM HIM ABIDES PERMANENTLY IN YOU; so then you have no need that anyone should instruct you. But just as His anointing teaches you concerning everything and is true and is no falsehood, so you must abide in, live in, never depart from Him; being rooted in Him, knit to Him, just as His anointing has taught you to do. …” (1 John 2:24-27, Amplified with brackets removed).

Our anointing: yum! Taste and see that the Lord is good.

From the beginning of our relationship with God through Christ, we receive His Spirit as a gift within us, anointing us and making us whole. We may not always realize this wholeness as it sometimes takes time for experience to catch up with the reality of the Kingdom life we now have in Him. But we are even now fully complete in Christ and made adequate by Him through the power of His Spirit at work in us.

Jesus was fully God, but in His decision to come in the form of the Son—however that was accomplished, scripture teaches He left His rights as God behind to live fully in human form. He was fully God and fully Man, but while on the earth He lived as a Man. That means He grew from infancy to adulthood and knows the weakness of flesh fully because of it, yet without sin. Why is that?

I believe that it is because, as we see throughout scripture to that point, like with the kings and prophets of Old, Jesus was The Anointed One. Though He refused the crown at that moment, He was and still is King. The King was anointed by God with the power of His Spirit to perform. Also Jesus was and is the High Priest. That position is an anointed position. So though He was in flesh by choice and living in that weakness, He was fully anointed by the Father with the Spirit to help and empower Him.

Thus we see that Jesus grew in wisdom and stature and in favor with God and man (Luke 2). Amazing the spiritual leaders of the day with His wisdom at such an early age, He worked and lived even at age 12 in the power of His anointing. He saw where God was working and joined Him in that place of opportunity as the Spirit anointed His flesh eyes to see in the power of the Spirit and accomplish the work. And He had power to perform because He was fully surrendered to the Father and able to walk in the anointing of His Spirit. And as I reread this paragraph, I am reminded that He often protected His anointing and empowerment of Spirit by refusing to take opportunities presented Him that would lead Him away from the God-head’s designed will for His earthly path.

This, too, is our call and responsibility as we complete the sufferings of Christ. We too must work out of the anointing we have through His Spirit at work in us to overcome the flesh, fulfilling our calling and equipping in the earth. To understand this anointing, let’s take a look at the Spirit of God and His work in and through us. As always, this is a good starting place to grow from.

1. The Spirit of God seals us:

“In Him, you also, after listening to the message of truth, the gospel of your salvation—having also believed, you were sealed in Him with the Holy Spirit of promise, who is given as a pledge of our inheritance, with a view to the redemption of God’s own possession, to the praise of His glory” (Ephesians 1:13-14).

We are sealed into Christ and into relationship with God by the power of His Spirit; a seal that cannot be broken by any man (Romans 8). God gives us His Spirit at the moment of our rebirth into Christ, when we say “I do” to Him as Savior, King and Lord. We become one with Him for all eternity in the power of the Spirit, our promise of eternal hope in Christ. We are sealed and sanctified by the Spirit, never to separate from Him again.

2. The Spirit of God transforms us, bearing the good fruit of the true Vine in us:

“But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as from the Lord, the Spirit” (2 Corinthians 3:18).

The Spirit of God works in us to transform us back into the likeness of God, working maturity in us from one degree of glory to the next. If this is not our experience, something is wrong with our relationship. Either our commitment to Him is not sincere and we are still lost in sin, or we are rebelliously or ignorantly clinging to a sin.

Scripture teaches that those who are truly His will be known by the fruit born out of their lives. Jesus used fruit bearing trees to make this point, saying, “You will know them (those who are God’s as opposed to those who belong to the evil one) by their fruits” (Matthew 7:15-23). And what is the fruit that proves us to be His?

“The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law” (Galatians 5:22-23).

The proof of relationship is seen as we begin to take on the characteristics of God in Christlikeness, by the power of His Spirit at work in transforming us to His image. I believe this is a partial list here in Galatians. We see indications of other flavors of fruit in other passages, such as Colossians 3, Romans 12, and 2 Peter 1. But note that though there are many shapes and flavors, if you will, it is all one fruit, the fruit of the Spirit at work and bearing forth in and through us. If this fruit is not in us, we have need for concern.

“Therefore I urge you, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect” (Romans12:1-2).

3. The Spirit of God gifts us:

“Now concerning spiritual gifts, brethren, I do not want you to be unaware. You know that when you were pagans, you were led astray to the mute idols, however you were led. Therefore I make known to you that no one speaking by the Spirit of God says, ‘Jesus is accursed’; and no one can say, ‘Jesus is Lord,’ except by the Holy Spirit.”

Note in starting his discourse on the spiritual gifts, Paul begins by saying that except by the power of the Spirit in us we cannot truly call Him “Lord”. It is the Spirit that leads and equips us to bow to Him in sincerity, and in bowing to Him, we are entrusted as His servants with spiritual gifts that He can use through us in blessing others and fulfilling His work in the earth in our day.

“Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit. And there are varieties of ministries, and the same Lord. There are varieties of effects, but the same God who works all things in all persons. BUT TO EACH ONE IS GIVEN THE MANIFESTATION OF THE SPIRIT for the common good. For to one is given the word of wisdom through the Spirit, and to another the word of knowledge according to the same Spirit; to another faith by the same Spirit, and to another gifts of healing by the one Spirit, and to another the effecting of miracles, and to another prophecy, and to another the distinguishing of spirits, to another various kinds of tongues, and to another the interpretation of tongues. But one and the same Spirit works all these things, distributing to each one individually just as He wills” (1 Corinthians 12:1-11).

Now there are several lists of gifts that the Spirit gives, and these are believed to be categories of gifts that may have other giftings that stem off of them as part of that category for fulfilling that area. Most studies I have done on the gifts teach that we have a main gifting as seen in verse 28 of this chapter, Romans 12:6-8, and Ephesians 4:11-13. These are areas of gifting that each is said to have one of, and out of this gifting, all other gifts given function. One whose functional gift is that of the prophet may have an underlying helping gift, but as he helps, he will prophesy about how to overcome the issue that requires his help. A helper may prophesy, but it will be with hope of helping the person come up higher in life.

All are gifted and we need to know what our gifts are so we can better function and cooperate with the Spirit as we do our part in the church and in ministry to those in our sphere of influence.

4. The Spirit teaches us:

“But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all that I said to you” (John 14:26).

Yes, we can and should learn from one another, but we cannot learn in truth unless the Spirit teaches us. And if we have the Spirit, we have the teacher and are able to learn without the aid of others. You can study the word and learn just as I do. Don’t let the devil tell you otherwise.

“As for you, the anointing which you received from Him abides in you, and you have no need for anyone to teach you; but as His anointing teaches you about all things, and is true and is not a lie, and just as it has taught you, you abide in Him” (1 John 2:27).

5. The Spirit directs us:

“But when He, the Spirit of truth, comes, He will guide you into all the truth; for He will not speak on His own initiative, but whatever He hears, He will speak; and He will disclose to you what is to come” (John 16:13. See also John 14:15-17; Galatians 5).

Jesus gives us His Spirit to take His place as guide. In John 14:18 He tells us that in this way He will not leave us as orphans. The Spirit is here to parent us, leading us not only into all the truth of God, but in His ways and into His individual will for us personally.

6. The Spirit empowers us:

“… you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be My witnesses both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and even to the remotest part of the earth” (Acts 1:8).

I shared on my Spark People blog that I am in a season of transition. When I am in such a time as this, I often find myself struggling, unable to get things done well, having little energy, struggling to walk right paths. Why? Because I am hanging on to things and activities that God wants me to give up so I can take hold of some new things. In those times, I struggle in my own strength to keep up. God is not obligated to empower that which is not of Him. So I am reevaluating my proverbial plate and making adjustments so I can flow in His power. We need His power, and we need to realize when we are walking in little power because we are hanging on to things not ours to have.

“For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth derives its name, that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with power through His Spirit in the inner man, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; and that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled up to all the fullness of God” (Ephesians 3:14-19).

7. The Spirit perfects us:

“…Are you so foolish? Having begun by the Spirit, are you now being perfected by the flesh? …” (Galatians 3).

It is the work of the Spirit in us that brings us to perfection, reestablishing us to portray the image of God. Mankind was originally created in His image. That image was distorted for all born to flesh because of the sin of Adam and Eve. Jesus came to reveal the true image to us. And by His Spirit at work in us, that image is restored as it was originally intended to be when God created man. We are perfected in Christ by the power of the Spirit at work in us.

But the Spirit, like God, will not force us to His will.

“Do not quench the Spirit; do not despise prophetic utterances. But examine everything carefully; hold fast to that which is good; abstain from every form of evil” (1 Thessalonians 5:19-22).

We can quench the work of the Spirit in us through disobedience to His gentle nudges. Now the seal is unbroken, we are still His in Christ’s perfect sacrifice, but our relationship with God and our power to perform will be hindered as long as we refuse to obey and cooperate with the work of the Spirit in us.

For those truly saved, there will be fruit bearing. If there is no fruit, there is no Spirit in the life of that person. The amount of fruit born to the true believer filled with His Spirit will be hindered by refusal to cooperate with the perfecting work of His Spirit. That is why we can move with strength from Him in one area where we are surrendered to Him, while struggling and floundering in another area of life where we are rebellious. Do not quench the Spirit.

8. The Spirit is our assurance:

“The one who keeps His commandments abides in Him, and He in him. We know by this that He abides in us, by the Spirit whom He has given us” (1 John 2:24).

We can know that we are in Him and Him in us by His Spirit at work in us. The Spirit is our assurance. Knowing His presence in us is vital to our stability and faith.

“And now, little children, abide—live and remain permanently in Him, so that when He is made visible, we may have and enjoy perfect confidence, boldness, assurance in Him and not be ashamed and shrink from Him at His coming. If you know, perceive and are sure that Christ is absolutely righteous—conforming to the Father’s will in purpose, thought, and action, you may also know and be sure that everyone who does righteously and is therefore in like manner conformed to the divine will is born and begotten of God” (1 John 2:24-29, Amplified with brackets removed).

Little children that we are, we must walk by the Spirit, for in so doing, we will not carry out the deeds of the flesh. This is our charge in completing the afflictions of Christ. We must overcome the flesh in the power of the Spirit.

“Now those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. If we live by the Spirit, let us also walk by the Spirit. Let us not become boastful, challenging one another, envying one another” (Galatians 5:24-26).

This life is available to all who will believe, receive, cleave, and proceed in the power and work of the Spirit of God in us. In this way we each can learn, we each can grow strong, we each can be the best “me” God designed and desired, we each may fulfill our purpose. Thus there is no need for jealousy or boasting. Just be as God’s Spirit leads. We all are one in Him, equal of importance in our unequaled roles.

Body of Christ, who I am in Christ

Rejoicing Comes in the Fellowship of His Sufferings: Part 9

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Dealing with Antichrist, Rejoicing in Relationship with The Father

“Children, it is the last hour; and just as you heard that antichrist is coming, even now many antichrists have appeared; from this we know that it is the last hour…” (1 John 2:18-23).

The spirit of antichrist: it is very prevalent in our day. Many cannot see that Jesus is the Christ because He did not come and do as they expected in His first appearance as Savior. Though He fulfills every prophesy spoken concerning the Christ’s appearing, they cannot recognize Him. The spirit of antichrist has blinded their spiritual eyes and hinders their perceptions so they cannot understand to see the truth. Others are snared by belief that the Holy Bible is antiquated and Jesus is the parable. Others approach Him with their own expectations, and, finding things with the Christ not as they think it should be, they quickly turn away. Still others walk into the church and profess Him with their words, desiring some miracle or expecting some magical experience of Him, and finding that lacking, they deny His reality and turn aside to other things. And others come into our midst looking for the Christ in the people, where they should be able to see Him, yes, but not understanding that we are continually being perfected, disillusioned by what they see as hypocrisy or having their feelings hurt, they walk away never having truly believed. Then there are some who come in as a thief in the night, pretending to know Him, and with words that sound right, leading even the elect astray, they form the cults of our day.

We see Jesus dealing with the spirit of antichrist often in His ministry. The Pharisees and Sadducees of the day, misunderstanding the way the Christ would first appear and why, jealous of His renown often came against Him, fooled by the spirit of antichrist working through them. Many who followed Jesus were looking for their own desire of what they would find in the Christ. Jesus revealed this truth in John 4:48, “So Jesus said to him, ‘Unless you people see signs and wonders, you simply will not believe’.” And I see in the parable of the seeds sown on many soils a picture of the various ways in which the spirit of antichrist can pull the heart of man from knowledge of the Christ as disillusionment and discouragement pull us from the truth (Matthew 13:18-23). Then we have the words of John, telling of Jesus dealing with this blindness in those of His day:

“There was the true Light which, coming into the world, enlightens every man. He was in the world, and the world was made through Him, and the world did not know Him. He came to His own, and those who were His own did not receive Him. But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, even to those who believe in His name, who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God” (John 1:9-13).

Still today people cannot accept that we are born anew through Christ, who covers our sins—past, present and future—as we go through the process of growing up as the children of God, made new day by day through the perfecting work of the Spirit of God within us. They cannot understand that it is a work of God. We cannot be good enough apart from His Spirit at work in us. And we can only have His Spirit as we recognize the Christ for who He truly is and put our faith in Him. The spirit of antichrist hinders this faith.

Part of our role as we complete the sufferings of Christ is to recognize the spirit of antichrist at work in our day and to stand against it; not only living in stark contrast to it, but taking every opportunity to correct the understanding of those deceived by it. Anything that leads a people to look for and follow after the christ of their expectation and miss the true Christ is ensnared by the spirit of antichrist. Many rise up among us, believing they know what Christ should look like and how He should be in our lives, and having just enough truth to be believable, they break off from the true church and true faith to lead many astray to a false-christ.

I see this passage in 1 John as proof text of once saved, always saved. Those who truly believe will remain, that is what it says. Why? Because God, through His Spirit, is able to make them stand.

“…They went out from us, but they were not really of us; for if they had been of us, they would have remained with us; but they went out, so that it would be shown that they all are not of us…” (vs. 19).

Those who do not truly believe may walk with us for a time and may even appear to be true believers, but eventually the deceptiveness of their understanding will be revealed as they walk away due to one of the previously stated reasons above or some other not covered here. Many of these become the voice of the spirit of antichrist in our midst as they begin to put down those of true faith and the truth professed. These who fall away as our focal passage implies often become a false teacher that, if we are not alert and watchful, can lead even the mature in Christ away from the paths of truth and righteousness.

Scripture warns that even the elect (Matthew 24:24), those who have sincere faith in Christ and a true, growing and strong relationship with Him, even they may be fooled for a time by the lie that has just enough truth in it to be believable. They are still true believers in Christ, but they get on a wrong path because they are not alert and growing in their own understanding in the area of falsehood they have fallen too.

“But you have an anointing from the Holy One, and you all know. I have not written to you because you do not know the truth, but because you do know it, and because no lie is of the truth” (vs. 20-21).

From my own experience, I believe that the elect who are fooled for a time but who are sincerely seeking God in Christ will eventually recognize the truth and turn back to right paths. Verse 20 of our focal passage confirms this as it says that we know all truth because of the anointing that is in us, The Spirit of God within us who teaches us all things. But it can be devastating to the lives of those who see the example of the elect who may fall away from truth for a time, as those who follow us, not truly knowing Christ, become snared by the fake because of following the true believer during their time of false understanding. So we, the elect, must be alert and constantly growing in the truth of Christ.

Verse 21 instructs us in how to recognize the false teaching of antichrist:

First, any little falsehood found in a teaching should give us pause. If we are drawn to a new teaching and there is something in it that we recognize as a lie, that is a clue that we need to dig deeper into the so called “new truth” and make sure it is not an old lie behind a façade-christ.

Then the Amplified version of verse 21 speaks to me of another thing we can realize as warning that we need to look closer at a “new truth” before we go running after it. “I write to you not because you are ignorant and do not perceive and know the Truth, but because you do perceive and know it, and [know positively] that nothing false (no deception, no lie) is of the Truth.” As I read this version of this verse I see not only assurance of truth, but I sense the peace of mind and heart that assurance brings to us. When peace is disturbed by a new teaching, it is a signal to look more closely and discern from whom the teaching comes: The Spirit of Christ or the spirit of antichrist.

Another warning of a need to check our facts is what is being said about Christ and the Father (vs. 22-23): “Who is the liar but the one who denies that Jesus is the Christ? This is the antichrist, the one who denies the Father and the Son. Whoever denies the Son does not have the Father; the one who confesses the Son has the Father also.”

I.e.: any teaching that denies Christ being God with us, Immanuel, God incarnate in the body of One call the Son of God, the propitiation or full price for our sin, is antichrist. And this passage warns that we cannot have the Father without first having the Son in truth. They are a package deal.

The spirit of antichrist is not to be trifled with. It is prevalent in our day and it is the major force of our day that blinds the eyes and deceives the hearts of many. We must seek constantly to know the truth for ourselves, so that we can be used of God in our day to dispel the false.

Before I close, I want to stress verse 23, Amplified: “No one who [habitually] denies (disowns) the Son even has the Father. Whoever confesses (acknowledges and has) the Son has the Father also.”

Note the words, “habitually denies and disowns the Son”. I don’t know about you, but I have experienced times when the devil—the author and perfecter of the spirit of antichrist, has raised a doubt in me about the truth of Christ and even made me wonder about the truth of God. It is what he does. But God always leads me back to truth as I know it from His Spirit’s teaching me, not only from reading it in scripture, but from experiencing it in life.

The word “habitually” is vital for the Christian to remember. We will, because of where we are in our flesh and in the world, fall from time to time to sin. But we do not lose our salvation because of a temporary fall that is not based in habit (Romans 2:1; 1 John 3:6, 9, Amp., scroll down). Habitual sin is seen in those who refuse change, refusing to become like Him; it is the sin that, when recognized, sees us shake our fist in the face of God and, denying the right of Christ to rule that area of our lives, we choose to hold to that habit of sin. If we make a habit of denying that Jesus is the Christ, feigning faith through half-hearted or total lack of obedience to turn away from sin, that falls under the category of habitual sin that proves we do not belong to Him.

An occasional struggle in our faith that is defeated by truth is a temptation to sin. Satan may try to convince those who have such struggle with temptation that they are not of true faith, but Romans 8:1 tells us that God does not condemn us in our struggle against the flesh, the world, the devil, and the spirit of antichrist. Tell that demonic accuser to go away and keep standing on the truth. He will eventually give up.

Now we all have habits that seem constantly to pull us back into struggle with our sin nature in this life. This is what Paul was speaking of in Romans 7:14-8:1. These are habits that we may have struggled with all our lives, hate having in our lives, work to overcome, but often get snared by it despite our stance against it. Such lifelong habits are often hard to break and too easily fallen back into. Realize that when we hate a sin that too easily snares us though we actively struggle against it, Jesus has us covered in our struggle. Every repentance of such sin and new attempt to have victory over it is aided by His Spirit until we find victory in His strength. It is the sins that we do habitually, giving ourselves to it in rebellion against God that is antichrist and can be proof of false faith that is no salvation at all.

So we have to not only watch what is going on around us and realize when a spirit of antichrist is pulling us and others away from true faith; but we also have to watch for that spirit at play in our lives, chaining us to habitual sin. The wisdom of the flesh, the wisdom of the world, and the wisdom of demons are all antichrist in nature. This is our battlefield as we seek to walk with Him, and not against Him. As we choose to follow Christ, daily taking up our cross of self-denial: seeking, finding and standing firm on His truth, we complete the suffering-affliction of Christ in standing against the spirit of antichrist wherever it is found. So walk by faith, rejoicing that by having the Christ, you get the Father also, and take every opportunity to give an account of the hope that is in you.

“Who is there to harm you if you prove zealous for what is good? But even if you should suffer for the sake of righteousness, you are blessed. And do not fear their intimidation, and do not be troubled, but sanctify Christ as Lord in your hearts, always being ready to make a defense to everyone who asks you to give an account for the hope that is in you, yet with gentleness and reverence; and keep a good conscience so that in the thing in which you are slandered, those who revile your good behavior in Christ will be put to shame” (1 Peter 3:13-16).