About Covenants

I must first apologize for the length of time since I last published. We have had a testing of our faith in the health of my husband but, as with all testing, we have a stronger footing and a deeper respect and relationship with our Father and the Lord of Life. The Lord reminded us of the night 62 years ago when we knelt together and totally surrendered our lives into His Hand to do as He would with us. He assured us He has never let us go! It has been an adventure and one we will never regret.

I asked the children I teach in Children's Church the simple question, "What is a covenant?" They thought about it for a bit of time and one said, "Is it like a contract?" We began to compare a covenant with a contract and came up with some interesting similarities and differences. I thought it might be of interest for you to consider these also.

Both are signed with a signature.
Both have provisions that must be fulfilled.
Both have a time period.

The differences are significant. While both have consequences if broken, the covenant consequence is death.
Covenant goes on to another generation and the length of that time is determined by the Instigator of the covenant. (In the history of man's covenant it was usually to the third generation. In God's covenant with Israel, it was to the thousandth generation. We are still covered!)
Blood is involved in the cutting of the covenant. Animals were used to demonstrate the serious oath of covenant. The two cutting the covenant stood in the midst of the pieces of the slain animal to take their oath, ending with the phrase, 'so be it unto me, as these, if I break this covenant.' The signatures of that covenant was in their own blood, written by their own hand.

The most significant difference is in their origin. God created covenant to be a protection of the creation as well as a protection for Himself. His purpose in making a creation was to make man in His image. All creation was made after God purposed to so make man. Every thing came into being for the sake of man to give him a place to live and be protected during the time alotted him to make his choice and to become in the image of God. God does not have to live in the rest of eternity with rebellious and sinful man. God does not send man into eternal punishment, man makes his own choice. God provides the way and lovingly provides everything to allow man to be shaped into His image. We are the work of His Hand. But we are constantly allowed to withdraw and go our own way. God does not force us in our choice. The Way is set before us and we choose to follow or go our own way.

Man's answer to the covenant is a contract. It allows us to negotiate rules and price. It gives us what we want at the price we are willing to pay. There is little or no protection if we fail and very little help in the process. It can be broken with no obvious penalty other than losing the object of the contract's purpose. This has seemed to be such a good substitute that most of mankind today has little or no understanding of covenant.

In the learning and keeping of God's covenants with man, there is the opportunity of learning God's ways. The deepest relationship with God comes from the knowledge of His ways and the deep appreciation of those ways gives a depth to the worship response to Him. We flounder in guilt and self condemnation, discouragement and constant appraisal when we do not have this relationship with Him.

Learning to Heed

When Jesus was in the wilderness tempted by Satan, He used only the Word of God as His protection and answer to Satan. The answer He gave to the temptation of the body's craving was from Deuteronomy 8. The words of Moses to Israel of admonition before he was to depart from them are very important for us today. Moses had cried out to God to teach him His ways. While Israel saw God's acts, Moses had God's ways revealed to him. (Psalm 103:7) We need to understand God's ways in this day of increased deception. Satan uses God's Word to deceive, politicians quote it to impress, people use it to strengthen an opinion and some to justify their ways. But Jesus taught us to let His Word abide in us and for us to find our abiding place in Him.

We see a revelation of God's ways in Deuteronomy 8:2-5(NLT) 2 Remember how the Lord your God led you through the wilderness for these forty years, humbling you and testing you to prove your character, and to find out whether or not you would obey his commands. 3 Yes, he humbled you by letting you go hungry and then feeding you with manna, a food previously unknown to you and your ancestors. He did it to teach you that people do not live by bread alone; rather, we live by every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord. 4 For all these forty years your clothes didn’t wear out, and your feet didn’t blister or swell. 5 Think about it: Just as a parent disciplines a child, the Lord your God disciplines you for your own good.
In the Amplified Bible, it says He "humbled you to know what was in your mind and heart". In a testing we find out what our reactions are and so realize what is still within us that we need to overcome. In the Revelation, we find that we overcome by the Blood of the Lamb and the word of our testimony. The act of repentance and the process of identifying with God's Word is the way we overcome our adamic nature.

We live by EVERY word that comes from the mouth of the Lord. I appreciate translations that try to stay as accurately as possible to the language in which the Word came to men of old. I know this becomes something people become obsessed with and usually I don't even think of it when I am feeding on the Word for I know the Spirit will reveal. But when I am doing this blog, I try to be very careful how I use the Word and so often use several translations to compare a verse and rely on the Holy Spirit to direct me. To me it is vital that we listen carefully to what God is saying to us. Everything pertaining to our lives is included in His Word. Past, present and future are covered.

God did not leave us with just a recorded Word, but sent us a living manifestation in Jesus. For God is making us in His image. Not the image of God we form in our imagination or from doctrine or man's opinion of Who He is. God wanted us to know to What we are being conformed. He sent to us Jesus, the exact representation of the Father, to walk out the Law so we can understand the heart of God in giving us the Law. He fulfilled the Law so we are not left to our own ability to keep the Law. In Him, we keep the Law. In Him, we are the righteousness of God. In Him we are able to be pleasing to God. In Him, we are enabled and we do the works He did.

God gave to us the ministry of the Holy Spirit to live in us. His grace enables us to understand, feed on and become His Word. When we are commanded to love, the Spirit works love within us until we come to that perfect representation of His love and we love as we are loved. When we see the covenant expectation that we forgive even our enemies, the Spirit works forgiveness in us until we can forgive as we are forgiven, completely without reservation. This carefulness is "taking heed" and it is our own responsibility and a covenant response.

Learning Response

One thing I have learned very well and that is that every action has consequence. Covenant requires action. There must be response to a covenant expectation. God created covenant for the very purpose that mankind would be partners with Him in the creating of man in God's image. So every covenant requires response or action on both sides. This creates a flow or a circle. God gives us His expectation or commandment and we respond with an action that God can respond with His action, that we can respond with our action, and so on and on until we reach God's goal.

The Spirit spoke something to me that was startling to me. Every person does God's will one way or another! The Sanhedrin of Jesus' day fulfilled God's will by crucifying Jesus. That action came out of their Adamic nature that they had not allowed to be subdued by the Law. They had carried out the letter of the Law, but they had not responded to God to be led by the Law to understand Him. Instead, they used the Law. Religious action does not change the human nature. So the very ones who stood in the office of teaching the Law did not know God. There is an action of refusal to respond to God's expectation. Keeping the control in yourself to make judgments, to have your own way, and react out of your human nature are actions that will result in judgment for this keeps one in darkness. Paul addressed this in his letter to the Galatians. Galatians 6:7-8 NLT 7 Don’t be misled—you cannot mock the justice of God. You will always harvest what you plant. 8 Those who live only to satisfy their own sinful nature will harvest decay and death from that sinful nature. But those who live to please the Spirit will harvest everlasting life from the Spirit.

To "work out your salvation with fear and trembling", you pay attention to your actions and reactions. Do they come from your adamic nature or are they the response trained by the Spirit as you feed on God's Word? The difference in your own nature and the nature of Jesus that is produced in you by the Holy Spirit is outlined by Paul. Galatians 5:19-26 NLT 19 When you follow the desires of your sinful nature, the results are very clear: sexual immorality, impurity, lustful pleasures, 20 idolatry, sorcery, hostility, quarreling, jealousy, outbursts of anger, selfish ambition, dissension, division, 21 envy, drunkenness, wild parties, and other sins like these. Let me tell you again, as I have before, that anyone living that sort of life will not inherit the Kingdom of God. 22 But the Holy Spirit produces this kind of fruit in our lives: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness, and self-control. There is no law against these things! 24 Those who belong to Christ Jesus have nailed the passions and desires of their sinful nature to his cross and crucified them there. 25 Since we are living by the Spirit, let us follow the Spirit’s leading in every part of our lives. 26 Let us not become conceited, or provoke one another, or be jealous of one another.

Actions for either nature will have consequence. You are either building or tearing down. Speaking is an action. Even feeling or thinking is an action. Paul exhorts us to meditate on God's Word. Jesus spoke to us of eating or feeding on it. The Psalmist said, "Let the words of my mouth and the meditations of my heart be acceptable in Thy sight, O God, my strength and my Redeemer." We are warned to "guard your heart, for out of it are the issues of life." Listen carefully to your own words and measure your actions. For we are becoming slowly and step by step into the being that will live in eternity -- somewhere.

Learning to Knock--Trust

Luke 11:9-13(NLT) 9 “And so I tell you, keep on asking, and you will receive what you ask for. Keep on seeking, and you will find. Keep on knocking, and the door will be opened to you. 10 For everyone who asks, receives. Everyone who seeks, finds. And to everyone who knocks, the door will be opened. 11 “You fathers—if your children ask for a fish, do you give them a snake instead? 12 Or if they ask for an egg, do you give them a scorpion? Of course not! 13 So if you sinful people know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him.”

I have come to find the difference between "seeking" and "knocking". I began to seek the meaning of Paul's admonition in Philippians 2:12-13 (NASB) 12So then, my beloved, just as you have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your salvation with fear and trembling; 13for it is God who is at work in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure. I asked the question many ask, "What is the 'work' when our salvation is a free gift?" It goes back to the word "salvation". We throw the word around loosly. We speak of salvation of souls as being an initial experience of a sinner coming to believe and accept Jesus Christ as his Savior. At that moment his spirit is born into the Family of God and he becomes a blood-washed new creature in a new nation that is not geographical or of this realm. There remains the "saving of his soul" that is an on-going experience and will involve many ministries and your own personal work with the Holy Spirit leading the way and revealing the Word. The soul, like our spirit, is everlasting. We are a spirit, we have a soul, and we live in a body. The body and soul are very close. So close, that when the spirit and soul leave the body, the body dies, while parts of that body may be used in a person with a soul and still live and be effective.

Our soul is our personality, our drive and motivation. How we think and react to circumstances is in our soul. I believe our energy is tied to our soul also. While our bodies can be trained to more energy, our soul can cause lethargy through despondency. A happy outlook is better than medicine in many cases. We have to "work" at the saving of the soul. Let the Word of God abide in you. Meditate on it and eat it. Let it be the mirror into which you look. Then apply it to your reactions, motivations and relationships.

Knocking is the way we have a door opened. We do not change in our human nature's reactions to people and circumstances without knocking. It is putting into our own being a "natural" response that is Christ-like. It is walking in His Rest, His Peace, His Forgiveness and Mercy. I capitalize these because we have a human response that is often mistaken for these. This is why we go through tests. The human response fails in the testing, so we go back to knocking at the door.

The greatest tool in the task of knocking is trust. Proverbs 3:5-6(NLT) 5 Trust in the Lord with all your heart; do not depend on your own understanding. 6 Seek his will in all you do, and he will show you which path to take. I have witnessed people seeking to be filled with the Holy Spirit and realize that the most needed asset in this asking, seeking, and knocking is trust. The deeper we go in God and the more we receive, the greater the need to trust. The more we see in our self of our own nature, the greater the need to trust in the One Who is at work in us. Knock, and keep on knocking, until the door is opened and you witness the completed work that God has in His mind.

When God created the vegetation on this earth, He commanded the ground to bring it forth. He had in mind what He wanted in all its detail, but He commanded the ground to produce it. He has brought your spirit to Life and now He commands you to do the works prepared before all creation for you to do. It is not enough for you to know, or even to understand, you must become. He came to BE the Way for you to become as He IS. So, keep on knocking!

Learning to Seek--Curiosity

We are awesomely made by the hand of God. Our bodies are awesome in the ability to grow and renew. Our souls are awesome in the ability to change--better or worse! But our spirit is a true gift from God and can retain His touch and grow to be like Him! Curiosity is a part of our being. It is expressed in spirit, soul and body! Without curiosity we would never ask, seek or knock! It is the means of progress in this realm. "Necessity is the mother of invention!" but "Curosity leads to wonder!" are two sayings that remind us that change is possible. We are made to make choices and change.

Have you ever just wondered about God? Nature is a great inspiration to the wonder of curiosity. Viewing the heavens, the ocean, the mountains and the woods is an opportunity to wonder at the Creator's attention to detail. I have been privileged to be familiar with many places and have found how little I know of any of them. Some were visited, and even lived in, many years ago and so would be vastly different now. Not in their geographical appearance but in what man has done to them. But these are only places. What of His Word? You say but that never changes! Not in some respects, but God in His progressive leading of us in our understanding, reveals more to us constantly. Without the curiosity of "What does God have for me today?", we become lethargic toward God in our everyday life.

We become so experienced in the way we live and work and play, we do not seek God in the "little" things of our life to be identified with God in them. "We are in control of this situation" has become a way of life to us! Little children learn very quickly the impatience of help with the cry, "I can do it!" But they are also quick to say, "Help me!" We need to keep this child-like attitude. Yes, God wants us to step out and learn to be responsible, mature and capable in Him. But He also wants us to remember where our help is.

This awesome, majestic, omnipotent and omniscient God is our covenant Friend saying today to you, "I Am your shield and exceeding great reward!"

Living With an Inheritance

As a young person, I used to wonder how it would be to "be rich" and know you have an inheritance. I think it was about the time that Queen Elizabeth became a princess and her father crowned king of England and magazines and newspapers were full of their new lifestyle. My father showed me a scripture that changed my concept of being rich. Ephesians 1:13-14(NASB) 13In 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, 14who 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.

Listen to Jesus' word as related by Luke. Luke 11:9-13(NLT) 9 “And so I tell you, keep on asking, and you will receive what you ask for. Keep on seeking, and you will find. Keep on knocking, and the door will be opened to you. 10 For everyone who asks, receives. Everyone who seeks, finds. And to everyone who knocks, the door will be opened. 11 “You fathers—if your children ask for a fish, do you give them a snake instead? 12 Or if they ask for an egg, do you give them a scorpion? Of course not! 13 So if you sinful people know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him.”

In learning to seek, we also have to learn to live with the wealth that is ours in Him. In seeking, and in the confidence of finding, we not only have to refuse to become contented with what we have received and keep on seeking, we have to learn to appreciate what we have. There is a big difference in thinking we have "received it all" and so rest contented, and being appreciative of all we have received, while seeking more of God. I am so thankful that God has given us a part of our inheritance now. The Holy Spirit is true riches! We are rich while becoming richer! Not only is He our Teacher, He fills us with the awareness of who we are in Christ Jesus. Our inheritance is not just for the rest of our lives on earth, but for all eternity. We are the evidence of God's desire to make man "in Our image."

We must learn to live with such an inheritance. Live as His children, not paupers, but rich in His wealth. Be filled with all He longs to give you. Show who is your Father and your place in His Family by being radiant with His love, His mercy, and His forgiveness. All the wealth of His storehouse is yours. All Jesus paid for is laid up in that storehouse. The ministry of the Holy Spirit is to take what Jesus has won for you and manifest it into you and through you.

Walk in His peace and in His joy. Jesus spoke it into this realm while here and it is yours for the finding.

Learning to Seek -- believing

Hosea 6:3(NLT) Oh, that we might know the Lord! Let us press on to know him. He will respond to us as surely as the arrival of dawn or the coming of rains in early spring.”

This was one of the earliest verses I learned as a child (of course in KJV)and has been one my husband and I have used many times in preaching, teaching and counseling. There is encouragement, instruction and hope in that verse that we need to remember daily. Hundreds of years after Hosea spoke these words, the writer to the Hebrews said to persevere. Hebrews 10:35-38(NLT) 35 So do not throw away this confident trust in the Lord. Remember the great reward it brings you! 36 Patient endurance is what you need now, so that you will continue to do God’s will. Then you will receive all that he has promised. 37 “For in just a little while, the Coming One will come and not delay. 38 And my righteous one will live by faith. But I will take no pleasure in anyone who turns away.”

It is vital that we do two things in seeking: keep on seeking and believe you are receiving. No matter how much we learn, know and receive, we never come to the end, or the total, of what God has for us. We have no idea of the vast change God has in mind for us. So keep on seeking. But do not become discouraged. Keep your confidence that He Who has begun a good work in you will complete it!

The more I seek, the more I know I have to learn. The closer you get to Him in your relationship, the easier it is to be humble. Isaiah saw the Lord, high and lifted up, and he fell to the ground and said, "Woe is me!" He will come to you, bless and refresh you, but it is not a prideful thing. His coming in revelation and manifestation only makes you want more! Seeking is a lifetime occupation.

Learning to Seek by Hearing

Mark 4:24-25(NIV) 24"Consider carefully what you hear," he continued. "With the measure you use, it will be measured to you—and even more. 25Whoever has will be given more; whoever does not have, even what he has will be taken from him." What you hear is going to depend on two things, the speaker and the listener. Jesus was speaking what He had heard from the Father but He was speaking to a mixed crowd. Some were listening to the Word of God and some were listening to hear a man. Some of these had different motives for listening. They might have wanted to be entertained and some might have wanted to judge him for their own purposes.

How often Jesus said, "Take heed..." I have fed on the parables of Jesus often. In them is buried so much truth to guide us. In the eleventh verse of this chapter, Jesus said to the Twelve, "The secret of the kingdom of God has been given to you." This statement alone must have boggled their minds. It still makes those who hear wonder. It is God's intent that you know Him. Most are willing to know about Him but Jesus said to KNOW Him is eternal life (John 17:3). Paul prayed often that the hearer would be filled with the knowledge of His will through all spiritual wisdom and understanding. This knowledge is hidden only to those who do not respond to Him.

Humility is an essential response. The humility of a child asking questions because they want to know and are seeking answers. The child understands they do not know. The disciples knew they did not know. They came to Jesus to seek understanding. This humble state is the foundation of our relationship to Truth. (Adam and Eve were forsaking that foundation when they started listening to Lucifer. He was offering them a different approach to knowledge they could control.) Jesus said they had the secret of the kingdom of God. The Word of God is given to us to reveal, to change, and mature us. Only by the Holy Spirit, our Teacher and Guide, does Truth become this to us.

Be a little child, ask the Holy Spirit to show you, reveal to you, and to guide you.

Learning to seek

I often say the phrase "learning to seek", for it reminds me that this realm and its circumstances automatically distract us to seek "things" on this level. Only the Holy Spirit leads us to seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness and reveals how to do this.

My own experience in this has been (and still is!) a gradual unveiling of the Word of God and a learning to identify with Jesus through His Word. The Holy Spirit is a great teacher. He reveals a lesson and then demands action to express faith in what is learned. The "action" is usually a response to a circumstance that comes to test what we think we "learned". I have found that identification with Jesus is far more difficult than learning a "factual knowledge", even if it is something in the Word revealed by the Holy Spirit. We rejoice in a passage that comes alive to us. We have a tendency to think we have "learned" when we can meditate on and even pass it on with a degree of anointing. We have not learned it until, in our identification with Jesus, it becomes a part of our being.

Jesus came into our realm as the Son of Man, One with the Father and filled with the Holy Spirit. He kept that oneness with the Father by the Holy Spirit and His identification with the Father. In His humble obedience to the Holy Spirit's work in Him, He did only what He saw the Father doing and said only what He heard the Father saying.

We have the same Holy Spirit in us, revealing Jesus to us through the Word and through our identification with Him. We are born anew in our spirit when we identify with Jesus' death on the cross as our own punishment for our sin. We identify with Jesus in all the ways that the Spirit reveals Truth to us. But it isn't until we begin to act like Jesus that we begin to seek to know Him on a higher level than just being redeemed. We begin to see the purpose God has for us. We begin to do His works. But most important, we begin to change into His image. It is no longer that we "know" but now we "become". Old reactions fall away and we react to the circumstances around us with His peace, His compassion, His mercy and the Spirit's perception of the "truth" found in people and circumstances. This perception is the grace of the Holy Spirit we call the discerning of spirit. Jesus walked in this. He knew what was in the heart of a person and what was motivating them. He had laid aside His Omniscience to rely on the Holy Spirit to reveal to Him. He did this so that in every way we can follow Him! Don't deny the right to the Holy Spirit to lead you to follow Jesus and manifest into you what belongs to Jesus, our Savior.

A Closed Door

I have been meditating on the word "enter" (Matthew 7:13) we were considering last time. It includes not only the command to do so, but shows our responsibility of taking an action. God reaches out to us, providing through His Love an access to Him. But we have to take the next step and, unless we do, for us in that passisve state, there might as well be no provision at all. God is so awesome in His Being. His love and mercy, holiness and power, wisdom and knowledge are so complete we cannot perceive in our limited capacity such Light that in Him is no darkness at all. He fills all space and is ever present, all knowing, and from Him we cannot hide. Yet we live our lives as though we, and our circumstances, actions and dreams, are everything. Most people in your own city don't even know you and couldn't care less about your circumstances. In five years you won't even have full memory recall of your circumstances and actions. But we still ignore God's extended invitation to "enter" His realm.

Jesus outlines the path of our responsibility in taking a step toward God. It is a progressive path, leading onward and upward, toward His complete provision for us. Matthew 7:7-12(NLT) 7 “Keep on asking, and you will receive what you ask for. Keep on seeking, and you will find. Keep on knocking, and the door will be opened to you. 8 For everyone who asks, receives. Everyone who seeks, finds. And to everyone who knocks, the door will be opened. 9 “You parents—if your children ask for a loaf of bread, do you give them a stone instead? 10 Or if they ask for a fish, do you give them a snake? Of course not! 11 So if you sinful people know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give good gifts to those who ask him. 12 “Do to others whatever you would like them to do to you. This is the essence of all that is taught in the law and the prophets.

This passages reveals the progressive growth in our approach to God and in God's response to us at each level. We don't start out "knocking" because we do not know how to do so. "Asking" is on our human level of achieving. Many do not go beyond that stage. Only the Spirit of God can teach us how to seek. Many of our opinions and "hang-ups" have to be dealt with and overcome before we can learn to seek. How much more so with learning to "knock". Many never even realize there is a door on which to knock, but being earnest to seek God's ways and being obedient to walk in the way revealed, will lead you to the door and it will be opened.

Taking Heed

My apologies for the long delay in the blogs. Will be keeping these up now and hope you are able to follow with me.

There has been a thought that has been with me for several weeks and I know it is something that needs to be considered here. Jesus often said, "Take heed," and it must not be ignored for it is a covenant response. We live in a realm that is a constant distraction from the pursuit of righteousness. God gives us the commands, or His covenant expectations, that will produce His goal to make you in His image.
I Peter 1:16(NIV)for it is written: "Be holy, because I am holy."
Matthew 5:48(NASB)"Therefore you are to be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect."
To the human nature, this would seem to be impossible and I have often heard the excuse that only when we are in heaven can we be perfect. It is common to hear "only God is perfect", and it is comfortable to say "we are only human!" But all through the Scriptures in both the Old and New Testament, the word "perfect" is applied to man in both description and command to become.
In Ephesians 4 the provision Jesus made for His Church is defined and the result of the five-fold ministry is described. One facet is "a perfect man".
Ephesians 4:13(KJV) Till we all come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ: Most translations substitute "mature" for "perfect", but the meaning is the same. Our spiritual maturity is to become just like Jesus Who was perfect in all His ways, manifesting the Father and doing His Will.
All action has consequence. Paul says it so well in His letter to the Galatians. Galatians 6:7-8(NLT) 7 Don’t be misled—you cannot mock the justice of God. You will always harvest what you plant. 8 Those who live only to satisfy their own sinful nature will harvest decay and death from that sinful nature. But those who live to please the Spirit will harvest everlasting life from the Spirit. I am most familiar with the King James' "Be not deceived!" Human deception is a part of all of us. We have to resist it and overcome it with the Word of God. Only in God is Truth and in every way deception "dogs our path". In the smallest action there is choice, and, either our nature or God's is going to be expressed. If you "sow" to the human nature, you reap darkness and death. We either give to God a covenant response or we ignore Him.
Matthew 7:13(NIV) "Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it."
The key word in this passage is "enter". This is not speaking of sinners choosing but those who desire to "enter". We who call ourselves "Christian", are the ones to whom Jesus is speaking! We seek to "enter" the Kingdom of God. There are two gates. One is of our own devising and placates the human nature, (broad), and the other, (narrow), is God's way that means death to our nature and a life pursuing His righteousness by His Spirit living in us and controlling our actions. Every day, in every way, we are making this choice. EVERY action has consequence!!

Following Jesus

I love it when my spirit is "quickened" by an anointed Word. I feel the "tandom yoking" with another member of the Body of Christ and the feeling of pulling forward that oxen must feel when they are yoked with "equal strength" and can do what could not be done alone. We have that "yoking" with the Holy Spirit binding us together in Christ and our motto is indeed, "I can do all things through Christ Jesus Who strengthens me!" Yesterday, our Pastor brought a sermon from Acts 15 on His intentional church. (Our blogs are connected so you can track this down!) I felt like a person who has been on welfare all their lives and suddenly told he did not have to pay back anything but was free to become whatever he wanted to be! I am not going to "preach" his sermon but I am going to give you one of the questions he gave us. Why did Jesus not address the most difficult problem the early Church had to face when Gentiles were faced with Judaizers insisting on circumcision? I pondered this the rest of the day and was thinking on it when I awakened in the night and again this morning when a "light" went on in my spirit!

Jesus had a "mission" from the Father to accomplish on earth. He had to fulfill the first covenant with Israel before another covenant could be cut. He walked out the first completely according to the heart of the Father, not according to man's idea of the Law. The disciples, following Jesus, saw Him fulfilling the Law and the covenant, teaching the Father's heart in each aspect of that covenant, bringing it to a higher level of motivation rather than just the action. He only introduced the New Covenant at the Passover table just before His crucifixion. They could not be under the New Covenant until He had cut the covenant in His Blood.

After His resurrection, in His appearances and teaching them, He still did not bring them into the understanding of the expectations of the New Covenant. They would learn from the Holy Spirit, Who was to be their Teacher and Guide in laying a foundation for His Church. Just as Moses would teach Israel the expectation of their covenant, so the Holy Spirit would teach these Apostles, as He wrote it on their hearts. As the Church would be led in the future, so would it begin. Until they were filled with the Holy Spirit and became acquainted with His method of teaching, they could not understand the New Covenant or the new "nation" that would be birthed by that covenant. A new people, a new choosing, a holy nation was about to be revealed by a new "baptism". Paul became the product of that New Covenant when God separated him by sending him to the "wilderness" to be taught by the Holy Spirit.

The only way the Church today is going to be the power of God in this last day is by the Holy Spirit being our Guide and Teacher. The Holy Spirit will unite us to the Head of the Church, Jesus Christ, in a relationship not known when under the "headquarters" of man. Jesus gave us, the church, what we needed when He gave us the gift ministries. The Spirit separates those people to Jesus Christ. They are shaped into the ministries to His church so the body of Christ might be brought into the same maturity, filled with the same measure of the Holy Spirit, doing the same works that Jesus revealed in His walk among us. We need to be His church, shaped by His hand, led by His Spirit and His provision to us of ministers in tune with His purpose. "Yoked" together by His Spirit and purpose, we can be what He wants us to be!

The Right to Repair

Revelation 3:14-22(NIV) 14"To the angel of the church in Laodicea write:
These are the words of the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the ruler of God's creation. 15I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot. I wish you were either one or the other! 16So, because you are lukewarm—neither hot nor cold—I am about to spit you out of my mouth. 17You say, 'I am rich; I have acquired wealth and do not need a thing.' But you do not realize that you are wretched, pitiful, poor, blind and naked. 18I counsel you to buy from me gold refined in the fire, so you can become rich; and white clothes to wear, so you can cover your shameful nakedness; and salve to put on your eyes, so you can see. 19Those whom I love I rebuke and discipline. So be earnest, and repent. 20Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with him, and he with me. 21To him who overcomes, I will give the right to sit with me on my throne, just as I overcame and sat down with my Father on his throne. 22He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches."

This letter to the Laodiceon Church presents Jesus, the Lord of Creation, the Head of the Church and King triumphant over all God's creation. He Who came to take our place of shame, now offers the right to share His place on the throne. He revealed the Way to the throne and told us to follow Him. To follow anyone, we have to keep them in our focus. The Apostle Paul showed us that, while not knowing Jesus in the flesh to follow Him, it is possible to follow Jesus and do His work by keeping our spiritual eye on Him. But first we must be able to "see" Him. In verse 17, we know that Jesus saw this church as blind, yet in verse 18 He offers the salve to put on their eyes to see. He saw this church as naked. We humans seek to be clothed with this world's ideas and do not know it is the Emporer's robe. A church may have the building and the signs proclaiming to all that they are a church and not know they have nothing to offer. The church can only give what they have. Peter said to the blind man at the temple gate, "Such as I have, I give to you..." Jesus offers the white raiment to clothe ourselves with. Revelation 19:7-8(NIV) 7Let us rejoice and be glad and give him glory! For the wedding of the Lamb has come, and his bride has made herself ready. 8Fine linen, bright and clean, was given her to wear." (Fine linen stands for the righteous acts of the saints.)
To every condition that would cause them to be rejected, Jesus offers something for them to do to correct and reverse. There are two key words in this offer Jesus holds out to this church. Be "earnest" and "repent". The wide road that is easy and leads to destruction lacks these two signs. The way back to God requires these two things. Earnestly seeking Him means a whole-hearted seeking. "Repent" is more than being fearful of punishment or sorry while being scolded. There must be a turning away from a familiar way and a turning toward a new way that is earnestly sought.

Two covenant actions are revealed. Jesus states that He will rebuke and discipline because He loves. The response that is required is earnest corrective action that reveals true repentance. Overcome the human tendency that created the condition that God must reject. The human tendency was to be rich in this realm's wealth. Now seek the gold that has been refined by fire and can only be purchased from the hand of Jesus. Do you remember the revelation of Jesus with feet like burnished bronze? That only comes from walking through fire and He did it for us. He walked out the Law and the rejection of men that He might please the Father in all things. This earned Him the sonship He can extend to us, if we walk in His Way. (Philippians 2:5-13) He is a son in two ways: begotten of God into this realm, and faithful and obedient in all ways to the Father while walking out our salvation. Gold represents the Diety. You must purchase this gold with your human nature in an exchange. Your nature for His! Your desires for His. Your motivations for His. Your pleasure for His. It will cost you everything. But this is your only opportunity to purchase!

He knocks at the door He created for you. That door opens the way for you into His eternal joy. Only you can respond to His knocking. You hold in your self the key to overcome or remain in your passivity and human understanding and need.

Responding to God's Amen

Revelation 3:14-16 (NLT) 14 “Write this letter to the angel of the church in Laodicea. This is the message from the one who is the Amen—the faithful and true witness, the beginning of God’s new creation: 15 “I know all the things you do, that you are neither hot nor cold. I wish that you were one or the other! 16 But since you are like lukewarm water, neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of my mouth! 17 You say, ‘I am rich. I have everything I want. I don’t need a thing!’ And you don’t realize that you are wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked.
The identity revealed to the Church in Laodicea is a very powerful revelation with great meaning for our day. The "So be it" of God is a powerful statement. How I yearn to be the Amen of Jesus! Should the Church respond to the Nature and Being of Jesus and become the Amen of our Lord and Savior, we would make a powerful statement to our generation! There will be a remnant that makes that statement. It is our choice to be a part of that remnant!
To understand this identity of Jesus, we must turn to the revelation of Jesus that the Apostle Paul received of Him. Colossians 1:15-20 (NLT) 15 Christ is the visible image of the invisible God. He existed before anything was created and is supreme over all creation, 16 for through him God created everything in the heavenly realms and on earth. He made the things we can see and the things we can’t see—such as thrones, kingdoms, rulers, and authorities in the unseen world. Everything was created through him and for him. 17 He existed before anything else, and he holds all creation together. 18 Christ is also the head of the church, which is his body. He is the beginning, supreme over all who rise from the dead. So he is first in everything. 19 For God in all his fullness was pleased to live in Christ, 20 and through him God reconciled everything to himself. He made peace with everything in heaven and on earth by means of Christ’s blood on the cross. And again in Hebrews we see the purpose of God in sending His Son to this realm, for only through the revealing power of Jesus walking among us do we see what we are to become. Hebrews 1:2-3 (NIV)2but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed heir of all things, and through whom he made the universe. 3The Son is the radiance of God's glory and the exact representation of his being, sustaining all things by his powerful word. After he had provided purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty in heaven.
This is the revelation given to the Church that has not given to God the response to the glorious covenant cut to give us the right to bear His image. Instead, the church in Laodicea has become what they desired to be: rich, successful in the eye of the age in which they live, powerful in their own control and passive toward God. This church ignores the desire of God, spurns His purpose for them, and continues in their own program as though God had never made such a sacrifice of love for them to become sons like the Son He sent to them.
There is a phrase in this that causes me to marvel. "I will spit them out of my mouth..." I know it is an expression of distaste and rejection, but it also expresses a condition of intimacy, of delightful anticipation on the part of God in His regard to His Church. In His watching over us, does He have this anticipation of sharing with us His joy in His eternal purpose? Does He taste the sweet honey of our response of worship and obedience and trust and our own anticipation of His joy? Does He find what pleases Him or is the taste He gets the bitter and putrid stench of our adamic nature of self-pity, criticism, and pride in what is decaying and putrid in His sight? Yes, there are deeds and works, but they are not the flow of His hand using the hand of the church. The deeds are not "cold" in that they are good works that man can produce. But they are not "hot" in that they are what the Father is doing! This church was not following in Jesus' footsteps. They were walking on their own road and not the Way Jesus revealed.
There is a human condition that does not see "past their own nose" to desire to see by the Spirit a realm in which God is. The new birth opens the door to dwell in that realm of spirit. So many Christians receive the new birth but never grow in their new inheritance. They do not develop the ears to hear or the eyes to see. They seek to please "man" but not God. They do not become a "sweet savor" to the Father. They do not "check" to see if they are pleasing to Him.
Yes, I agree with the many that say we live in the days of the church in Laodicea!

The Name of Covenant

As I have said in earlier discussions of covenant, the exchange of names is a very important part of the proof of the existence of a covenant. Taking the name, or a part of a name, of the instigator of the covenant, gives credence to the fact they are "in covenant", as well as the identity of the covenant-protector. The disciples were first called "Christians" at Antioch. (Acts 11:26) In the covenants God has made with this realm there is progression allowed by the open-ended condition of covenant to include future generations. In the covenants God uses with this realm, there is progression from the natural realm to the spiritual and on into eternity. This is what we see in the letter to the church in Philadelphia. The Name given in the New Covenant Jesus gave to us will be changed in the next, eternal, covenant. We saw the importance of the Names of God in the Old Covenant. In the New Covenant, Jesus is the Name by which we are redeemed and come into full salvation.

Our covenant response to God in this New Covenant is to follow Jesus completely to become an overcomer. What do we overcome? Jesus has overcome the world (this realm of darkness)and death, the grave and the devil. Our Adamic nature and our link to this realm are our responsibility to overcome. That will involve our unbelief, our passivity to following in His footsteps, and our ignorance of spiritual matters. The last, our ignorance, is most dangerous, for it is most susceptible to Satan's temptation. We learn from our Teacher, Counselor, and Guide, the Holy Spirit. He opens the Word of God to us and will woo us into hunger and thirst for God, to know His Ways and obey His Word. To lean on the Holy Spirit is the only safe way to attain knowledge of the spirit realm. Overcoming our natural responses to any circumstance, our human motivation and our human understanding by trust and obedience to God's Word, is not an easy response. A religious ritual that does not interfere with our lives is much easier and opens the wide road that most travel.

Giving the response to the Covenant under which you live, opens the door to the next Covenant God makes with mankind. We now live under the banner of the Name, Jesus. A faithful response to Him now will open the door to receiving His new Name and a new name for us. We will go into His eternal purpose as a covenanted people.

Rewarding Response

There is something about the letter to the Church in Philadelphia that has always made me feel like a child sitting on a father's lap and listening to him tell of the wonderful things planned for the days ahead. It is a safe, comfortable and yet exciting feeling of anticipation. God has "a joy" planned for us that He anticipates opening to us, His children. There are thousands of His children who are looking to Him with joyful, loving hearts that say a heart-felt "Yes!" to His Word and expectation of obedient worship. It is the response of Job who said, "though He slay me, yet will I trust Him!" Their focus is not on their own comfort or desires but on His desire. To please Him, to serve Him and to respond to His plan and purpose is their greatest desire. To spend time with Him in precious communion of thought and worship is the best part of any day. To these, He has a special message of purpose.

Revelation 3:11-13(NASB) 11'I am coming quickly; hold fast what you have, so that no one will take your crown. 12'He who overcomes, I will make him a pillar in the temple of My God, and he will not go out from it anymore; and I will write on him the name of My God, and the name of the city of My God, the new Jerusalem, which comes down out of heaven from My God, and My new name. 13'He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.'

The ear to hear is the ear tuned to the Spirit of God, given to us to guide us, counsel us, and comfort us. He opens to us the realm of spirit where God is enthroned. His temple is that awesome place where worship is continually heard and Light dwells and music is visible. To most people this is a place they anticipate to see when they die because they "dwell" in this realm. When Jesus said, "if you abide in Me, and My Words abide in you," and this word "abide" means "dwell", He was not talking of heaven or life after death. I do not read this passage and say, "when I die", but I reach for this now. I want to dwell in His temple now, with praise and worship in my heart and on my lips, with His Light radiating in my spirit. I want to be a pillar in His temple now. (A pillar is a stable, permanent part of His temple!) I don't want to ever leave it no matter what circumstance may be in this realm! I can only do that if I overcome the control this realm has on me. I can only do that if I enter into His Rest! I can only do that if my control is given over to His hand and I refuse the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil so I can eat of the tree of Life! I have to be an overcomer! I have to "dwell" in Him, not be an occasional visitor. My emotions can't be tapped by circumstances to go back into worry, frustration, discouragement and anger. You don't live with one foot in depression and one foot in joy. You can't live in two places at once. You only visit one or the other. When Jesus prayed that we would not be removed from this realm, He asked that we not be "of" this realm. I must confess, I feel like an "alien" most of the time. I can't feel a part of the "tube" or of most "casual" conversations. If you want to discuss His Word or His goodness, I can talk all day with you, but I can't think of much to say otherwise. I praise God I am beginning to make that switch to abiding in Him, but I haven't made it all the way, so I need the prayers of all of you. I pray for you that your heart will yearn more for Him than anything in this earthly realm. To hear His Voice, to understand His language, to dwell in His temple! The blessing of God go with you and fill your day!

Living in Awareness

Revelation 3:7-13 (NLT) 7 “Write this letter to the angel of the church in Philadelphia. This is the message from the one who is holy and true, the one who has the key of David. What he opens, no one can close; and what he closes, no one can open: 8 “I know all the things you do, and I have opened a door for you that no one can close. You have little strength, yet you obeyed my word and did not deny me. 9 Look, I will force those who belong to Satan’s synagogue—those liars who say they are Jews but are not—to come and bow down at your feet. They will acknowledge that you are the ones I love. 10 “Because you have obeyed my command to persevere, I will protect you from the great time of testing that will come upon the whole world to test those who belong to this world. 11 I am coming soon. Hold on to what you have, so that no one will take away your crown. 12 All who are victorious will become pillars in the Temple of my God, and they will never have to leave it. And I will write on them the name of my God, and they will be citizens in the city of my God—the new Jerusalem that comes down from heaven from my God. And I will also write on them my new name. 13 “Anyone with ears to hear must listen to the Spirit and understand what he is saying to the churches.

Jesus prefaces this letter with His identity of the victory of completion. He holds the key of David because He fulfilled the Davidic covenant. He opens doors to His realm because He triumphed over every closed door in this realm. He can close every door in this realm that man has opened because He remained faithful to His Father's will in all things and did not go through any door Lucifer or man opened to Him. We, His Church, inherit His victory. He opens a door to us that no man can close. He knows the limit of our strength and He values our faithfulness to His Name and His word. A part of that faithfulness is to walk in His steps and avoid the religious bypaths that man makes. Lucifer, in his desire to detour the worship of God to himself, creates religion to pacify and deceive all who are not willing to pay the price for Truth. So many walk that broad path. These are the ones who criticize and ostracize those who humbly walk in Jesus' footsteps. Man's education and achievements mean more than following the Spirit's leading and teaching. Pride of titles that man can give ignores the calling and placing of the Head of the Church. Jesus shows in this letter what He thinks of this. His love for His own will lift them in Him so His love for them will be recognized by all. His protection over them, the promise of all covenant, will cover them.

Our response to His love, to follow Him no matter how hard the path grows, is rewarded with His promise of immunity to the hour of testing that will come to this earth. This testing is greater than the assault that comes to the believer from Satan when he is given the same right over the church that he was given over Job. Much is stripped from us in this short period but nothing is stripped away that God does not restore in a double portion. Our patience through the stripping must be shown by our continual focus on the love and mercy of our Lord. We do not let circumstances dictate our place in Him or His love for us. Do not let any one's trial be your "evidence" for criticism or judgment. When Satan's hatred is vented on God's people, it is not because they have sinned, so let us not become Job's comforters. Stay close to the Lord and let His Spirit lead you. This is a difficult time but it is covenanted by His Word!

Response and Reward

In the letter to the church in Sardis, Jesus presented Himself as the victorious Lord of the church. The reward to the overcoming church in Sardis was the eternal position in His hand and the garment prepared for eternity. There is much said in the Revelation concerning garments and how a person appears clothed. Rev 19:7-8(NASB)7"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." 8It was given to her to clothe herself in fine linen, bright and clean; for the fine linen is the righteous acts of the saints. 9Then he said to me, "Write, 'Blessed are those who are invited to the marriage supper of the Lamb '" And he said to me, "These are true words of God." Ephesians 2:10(NASB) For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them.
I see in this that God provides and we accept and move in His provision with faith in Him as our covenant response to Him and His provision. Our focus has to remain on Him, even when we are doing the work that is His will for us. If our focus waivers, we do not complete the work He gave us to do because if we waiver, the work becomes ours and not His.

The reward for the overcoming of this human hindrance of losing our focus is to be given the privilege of doing His works with faithful connection with Him and He will be faithful to us that we do not lose that connection. II Timothy 1:12(ESV) which is why I suffer as I do. But I am not ashamed, for I know whom I have believed, and I am convinced that he is able to guard until that Day what has been entrusted to me. In most translations that verse reads, "what I have entrusted..." But this translation points out that the works and the completion of the works is entrusted to us. I appreciate that He is able to guard not only the works but my fulfilling the same! I need that. I falter in my focus and need the Holy Spirit to bring me back to awareness too many times not to recognize my need for complete reliance on God.

The church in Sardis

Revelation 3:1-6(NASB) 1"To the angel of the church in Sardis write: He who has the seven Spirits of God and the seven stars, says this: 'I know your deeds, that you have a name that you are alive, but you are dead. 2'Wake up, and strengthen the things that remain, which were about to die; for I have not found your deeds completed in the sight of My God. 3'So remember what you have received and heard; and keep it, and repent Therefore if you do not wake up, I will come like a thief, and you will not know at what hour I will come to you. 4'But you have a few people in Sardis who have not soiled their garments; and they will walk with Me in white, for they are worthy. 5'He who overcomes will thus be clothed in white garments; and I will not erase his name from the book of life, and I will confess his name before My Father and before His angels. 6'He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.'

This revelation of the identity of Jesus is the same as to John when He came walking among the seven lampstands. It is the revelation of the resurrected, ascended, Victorious Jesus, Head of the Church and King of the whole realm. He speaks to the church that is regarding themselves as "being alive", but is regarded as dead by the One Who is alive! Jesus said, "I know your deeds; you have a reputation of being alive...." We need to go to school on these letters to the churches. A reputation of being alive is not good enough. Man is not the judge of a church, God is. What He considers dead is the dangerous truth.

The first and foremost action they were to take was to "wake up!" If they did not wake up, Jesus would come as a thief and they would not be aware of the time. In the parable of the five wise and five foolish virgins, Jesus said that all of them were asleep. This is a very dangerous element of our human nature. The world around us is so very "real" and we so labor to keep up with "our lives" that we become oblivious of the constant, omnipresent activity of the Spirit realm and His will that is to be carried out on earth as it is in heaven. Jesus walked with this awareness constantly as He ministered here. He did only those things He saw the Father doing and spoke only what He heard the Father speaking. It is the mixture of motivation that causes the separation from God. We have too many things "pressing in on us" to give the time to prayer that keeps that union a life-giving flow into our lives.

I have often voiced the warning of the contamination that opinions have on our spiritual state. We get an opinion of what is God and what is not and that can be the most dangerous opinion of all. The Pharisees are an example to us of what that strong opinion, stubbornly held, can cause us to do. Certainly, if we rely on our own human knowledge and judgment, we will have soiled garments. No matter what generation or culture a person has ever lived in or now lives in, the ever present circumstances of that culture will help shape your reaction to and your response to God. The people we see in the Bible are a parable to us of human reaction and response. Notice my use of those two words. A reaction can sponser unbelief and withdrawal but a response is given regardless of any circumstance and is evidence of deep faith in the Being of God. Church attendance, reading the Bible and praying can be learned reactions and not a response. We have to give ourselves a reality check and see what is in our spirit. Some circumstances are present in my life right now that are causing me to give myself that reality check. Am I reacting to what is happening or am I moving in the flow of the Father's will as Jesus did on earth. How can I follow Him if I do not know the path my feet are on? Do you see how easily our garments can be stained with this life? One circumstance, wrongly viewed and reacted to, can change the course of our life! That is why life is so full of regrets. Yes, the steps of a righteous man are ordered of the Lord, but are we always responding to His order? That does not mean we cannot get back on course, but it does mean we have to wake up, repent and follow through until we get in the flow of God's will. Jesus said to Sardis, "I have not found your deeds complete in the sight of My God." We can make a good start but have we followed through with the revelation of His Word that we have received? What you purpose to do while listening to your pastor or when reading your Bible, do you continue in the moment of stress or weariness? We know His Presence is always with us but how is your awareness of His Presence?

This message to Sardis is all about His Resurrected, victorious Life and how that is reflected by His church. Are we following in His Resurrected Life, clothed in the white garments of His victory, or are we revealing our weary reaction to this age we live in? What is more important to you? His Word revealing His plan and purpose or the circumstances of the life you are living? By importance I mean the measuring stick of your joy and sustaining element of your "self". What drives you? What gives you joy? What motivates you and gives you purpose? Is it your job? Is it your relationships? Is it your house or your car or your possessions? What do you plan for and dream? What fills your imagination? Are you alive to this realm but asleep to God's realm? There is still a little time, let us "wake up" to His desire!

Response and Consequence

In reading the letters of Jesus to the seven churches given to John, there is so much we can learn concerning the Ways of God. The identity He shows to each church has much to do with the way that church is responding to the Head of the church, Jesus. The reward to that church is in direct relationship to their overcoming those things that hinder them. The enemy seeks to disrupt and destroy the connection with the Head. This causes confusion and human reaction to the disruptive influence.

We have seen in the church in Thyatira that the disruptive influence was the Jezabel spirit that sought to manipulate the authority of the church. Those who accepted her ways or "committed adultery" with her misleading guidance into sexual and religious practices against the Truth, were committed to God's judgment. Any time authority is taken out of the hand of God and put into the natural reasoning of man, there is a removal of God's favor and Light. The enemy saw it work in the Garden of Eden and it has been an effective tool in his arsenal ever since.

To those who continue in their faith, love and perseverance in walking in the truth of following Jesus, overcoming the influence of the ways of the world around them, doing the will of their Savior and Lord, there is the reward of increased authority in the age to come. Revelation 2:26-27 (NASB) 26'He who overcomes, and he who keeps My deeds until the end, TO HIM I WILL GIVE AUTHORITY OVER THE NATIONS; 27AND HE SHALL RULE THEM WITH A ROD OF IRON, AS THE VESSELS OF THE POTTER ARE BROKEN TO PIECES, as I also have received authority from My Father;
Note that the authority is as Jesus received from the Father. His identity of One with feet of burnished bronze, who walked out in victory the will of the Father, is connected with the overcoming, obedient and faithful ones who follow Him. He will also give to them the morning star.

Living a Covenant Response

To the Church in Thyatira, Jesus revealed Himself in relation to their response to Him. He revealed His zeal and His faithfulness that this church was echoing. Revelation 2:18-19 (NASB)18"And to the angel of the church in Thyatira write: The Son of God, who has eyes like a flame of fire, and His feet are like burnished bronze, says this: 19'I know your deeds, and your love and faith and service and perseverance, and that your deeds of late are greater than at first.
It is important that we walk in the ways of God. Keeping our focus on Jesus, we are able to grow from glory to glory and keep pressing onward to the goal He has set for us. But again, we see Satan's effort to thwart and destroy by infiltrating and working within. We saw those who followed Balaam's teaching in the Church in Pergmum and now we see those who identify with Jezebel working in Thyatira as the church tolerates her presence.

I want to just point out the subtle difference in Satan's efforts to deceive and destroy these churches. Both churches were tolerating these influences, which though very subtle, were being effective. The "Balaam" sin was to get people to give way to temptation that appealed to their appetites and so get God to destroy them. The teaching of the Nicolaitans was that God would embrace and excuse whatever seemed to be "good" from other religions even if it was not in His Word. These appealed to the church in Pergamum enough to tolerate them.

The Jezebel spirit was so strong in the church in Thyatira that Jesus called the woman Jezebel. This spirit is manipulative while expressing the arrogance of the attraction and temptation of sex and using it to pervert authority. Combined with the fleshly appetite for forbidden foods and a stubborn refusal to repent, this became a deadly force that Jesus was going to punish those who agreed with her and followed her by yielding to her ways.

The attack of Satan on these two churches reveals a truth we need to see and understand for we face it today. Satan always attacks what God is doing. One of the most precious gifts God has given to mankind is to allow us to be a part of His creative work to "make man in Our image." The Psalmist said we are "wonderfully and fearfully made" for our bodies are created for covenant making and producing children. We are allowed to enjoy family life and watch the generations on earth reproduced over and over again with unique facets that delight and satisfy the soul. Satan hates this part of God's plan and has, from the beginning, sought to destroy mankind with that which God meant to be a great blessing. Every kind of beastial and perverted way of destroying the beauty of sexual relationship is inspired by Satan in the unredeemed. As we approach the fulfillment of God's purpose of The Church made ready as a Bride for her Beloved, Satan's anger and defilement are approaching the insane. Every kind of defilement is available to every age and in every environment. As God's chosen people, cleansed by His Blood, enriched by His Grace, led by His Spirit, we must not tolerate any form of the temptation Satan forces into our space. We must not let our human nature tolerate and condone the evil practices that Satan inspires.

Thyatira

Revelation 2:18-29(ESV) 18"And to the angel of the church in Thyatira write: 'The words of the Son of God, who has eyes like a flame of fire, and whose feet are like burnished bronze. 19 "'I know your works, your love and faith and service and patient endurance, and that your latter works exceed the first. 20But I have this against you, that you tolerate that woman Jezebel, who calls herself a prophetess and is teaching and seducing my servants to practice sexual immorality and to eat food sacrificed to idols. 21I gave her time to repent, but she refuses to repent of her sexual immorality. 22Behold, I will throw her onto a sickbed, and those who commit adultery with her I will throw into great tribulation, unless they repent of her works, 23and I will strike her children dead. And all the churches will know that I am he who searches mind and heart, and I will give to each of you according to your works. 24But to the rest of you in Thyatira, who do not hold this teaching, who have not learned what some call the deep things of Satan, to you I say, I do not lay on you any other burden. 25Only hold fast what you have until I come. 26 The one who conquers and who keeps my works until the end, to him I will give authority over the nations, 27and he will rule them with a rod of iron, as when earthen pots are broken in pieces, even as I myself have received authority from my Father. 28And I will give him the morning star. 29 He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.'

Let us first look at the identity of Jesus to this church. His eyes are as a flame of fire and his feet as polished bronze. The eyes are often called the window to the spirit within. His eyes reveal the fire of the Spirit of God. The feet are the vehicle of our being and reveal the path we walk. Jesus walked out the Law and the path human beings walk to reach God's purpose of being in His image, mature sons of God. He was faithful in all His ways to God's purpose and desire. He was faithful to the very nature of God as well as His will. He carried out God's plan with a complete faithfulness in His attitude and response. He became a Son of God in two ways. He is the only begotten Son, God in the likeness of man. As a man, He walked in faithfulness and submission to the Father in all things and in His obedience, even to the death of the punishment of sinful man, was proven to be the Son of God by His resurrection. He is not ashamed to look at His followers and call them His brothers.

In these letters to the churches, Jesus reveals His identity in covenant in a deeper way than in the first covenant. In the Old Testament, we see the revelation of God was in His Names of covenant. The worship of God was identified by the sacrifice and the Temple. It was "exterior" worship. Jesus came and walked among us and led us into a relationship with His Father. He opened the way for us to become a part of His Royal family, His "House". He paid the price for us to become as He IS. We are enabled to worship Him with an invasive worship, a life changing identification with Him that produces change into His likeness. I feel so sorry for all these people that have to keep changing God's Word to fit their own image of their "self". They have to keep a neutral God that is "she" and "mother" and keep every thing on this temporal plane. Jesus plainly said that in the spirit realm there is neither male nor female. God is a Spirit and our identification with Him is in the spirit. The covenant promise I embrace is that I shall be like Him and receive a body like unto His glorious body, an eternal dwelling.

Identity

One of the rich advantage of being a covenant friend is the identity of covenant. The exchange of names, the scars of cutting a covenant, the exchange of items that are strongly linked to the owner are all means of identifying a person "in covenant". A person's enemy knows immediately that he is taking on not only that person, but also the covenant friend, should he attack. Satan knows and can identify one walking in covenant with God. He knows the power and authority of a covenant.

To the Church in Pergamum, Jesus' identity is linked to the double-edged sword. All through this message there are references to teaching and eating. We know both of these are descriptions of our relation to The Word of God. Satan uses these same methods to link people to his "doctrines". I have been impressed many times as I read these messages to the churches, how very closely Satan stays to the methods of true worship of God to get people to worship him. Deception is very hard to identify by sight and hearing. To the observer there seems to be little difference. Only when you know and have paid the price for Truth do you hear the lack of Life in the words used. The religious rulers did not hear Truth even when they heard it from the mouth of Jesus. The discerning of Truth is not a human capability, but is a part of the grace of the Holy Spirit. We do not come to the Father except the Spirit draws us! This church in Pergamum had a mixture of those walking in Truth and those who clung to the Lie. Jesus told the church to repent!

The power of repentance is beyond human observance. We are told to humble ourselves and repent for sins we do not even commit so God can heal our land! We are identified by the covenant we are under. God has always seen that people are a part of the nation to which they belong, the church to which they belong, the family to which they belong and holds them responsible for that to which they are identified! It was not enough that some were holding fast to the faith in the midst of Satan's persecution if they could not expose the darkness within their own group! If they could not use the "sword of His mouth" and cut out the false, Jesus would come and do it (verse 16).

To those who would overcome, the fruit, or blessing, of covenant would be theirs. The blessing is linked to the identity of Jesus to that church. This message is concerning the Word of God. It is powerful to the bringing down of strongholds and is the bread of Life to those who eat it. Being faithful to the Truth, the very nature of God revealed in Jesus, is to overcome our human nature and let the Holy Spirit reveal in us and through us God's nature. This is walking in Light in the midst of darkness. This is abiding in Him even when we are walking in the "city" where Satan dwells! Being faithful to what we have in Him opens the door to receive more from Him. Responding to the Spirit's leading as we eat His Word, is the key to receiving the hidden manna kept from the casual and reserved for those who knock.

The exchange of names in covenant is complete when God gives to us the new name by which He knows us. It will only be complete as we give to Him the covenant response of being faithful to His Name!

Passive Attitudes

When the Israelites faced the battle God had been preparing them to fight, the enemy sought a prophet to be on his side to help fight God' people. This should tell us something of the enemy's fear of God's people! When Jesus said that just before His return, the Church would be asleep, He certainly saw our condition. The only way we can become "aware" of what is happening is to trim our lamps! Then we will be aware of our need for more oil! Only the Holy Spirit will lead us through these days of preparation to meet our Bridegroom!

The enemy has been infiltrating the church all over the world by influencing people's opinions so they will preach their opinion as did Balaam. Whoever thought homeosexuality would not only be practiced by "Christians" but would be defended from the pulpit? And even have them in the pulpit to lead people seeking to be Christians? I have no doubt the great deception that Jesus warned us is upon us. That deception has lulled the Christian world away from seeking God and have settled with the comfort of religion, the broad way that leads to destruction. Religion can have any range of "the lie" and still find those who will embrace it. Satan is the author of "the lie" and he uses it as his weapon to bring people over to his side. He declared he would make himself as God and exalt himself above the stars, the declaration of God of His purpose written in the stars. Isaiah 14:13-14 (NASB)13"But you said in your heart, 'I will ascend to heaven;I will raise my throne above the stars of God, and I will sit on the mount of assembly in the recesses of the north. 14'I will ascend above the heights of the clouds; I will make myself like the Most High.' The key phrase of deception is "I will make myself". Paul warned Timothy of this when he charged him to hold to the Truth and to sound doctrine. II Timothy 4:12-17(NLT)12 Yes, and everyone who wants to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will suffer persecution. 13 But evil people and impostors will flourish. They will deceive others and will themselves be deceived. 14 But you must remain faithful to the things you have been taught. You know they are true, for you know you can trust those who taught you. 15 You have been taught the holy Scriptures from childhood, and they have given you the wisdom to receive the salvation that comes by trusting in Christ Jesus. 16 All Scripture is inspired by God and is useful to teach us what is true and to make us realize what is wrong in our lives. It corrects us when we are wrong and teaches us to do what is right. 17 God uses it to prepare and equip his people to do every good work. Satan's attack against God's Word has always been to lead people away from those who hold to the Truth and lull them into passivity concerning the Word. Those who would read and "study" God's Word and then teach that God is not against homeosexuality and murder, do not know God. They have never crossed over into Life but continue in the way of the arch-deceiver, the author of the lie. Jesus' covenant word to us is that He will come and fight them with the sword of His mouth.

Living In Truth

Revelation 2:12-17(NLT) 12 “Write this letter to the angel of the church in Pergamum. This is the message from the one with the sharp two-edged sword: 13 “I know that you live in the city where Satan has his throne, yet you have remained loyal to me. You refused to deny me even when Antipas, my faithful witness, was martyred among you there in Satan’s city. 14 “But I have a few complaints against you. You tolerate some among you whose teaching is like that of Balaam, who showed Balak how to trip up the people of Israel. He taught them to sin by eating food offered to idols and by committing sexual sin. 15 In a similar way, you have some Nicolaitans among you who follow the same teaching. 16 Repent of your sin, or I will come to you suddenly and fight against them with the sword of my mouth. 17 “Anyone with ears to hear must listen to the Spirit and understand what he is saying to the churches. To everyone who is victorious I will give some of the manna that has been hidden away in heaven. And I will give to each one a white stone, and on the stone will be engraved a new name that no one understands except the one who receives it.
It became important to me this morning to explain that I am not trying to "explain" these messages to the churches. My goal in these times with you is to show you the covenant relationship that is expressed, not only in these letters by Jesus to the churches, but in all of His Word. The letter to the Church in Pergamum is rich in covenant reference but also contains much that must be revealed by the Spirit.

The identity of Jesus is One with the two-edged sword. Hebrews 4:12(NIV) 12For the word of God is living and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart. 13Nothing in all creation is hidden from God's sight. Everything is uncovered and laid bare before the eyes of him to whom we must give account. The entire Word of God is revealing Jesus. He told this to Israel's rulers. John 5:39-40(NLT)39 “You search the Scriptures because you think they give you eternal life. But the Scriptures point to me! 40 Yet you refuse to come to me to receive this life.

There are two strong facets of a covenant that this church held strongly. The Name of Jesus and the faith of covenant. Abraham believed that Eternal Jehovah could and would cut covenant with a mortal man and it was accounted to him as righteousness. This church in Pergamum also held true to His Name and did not deny their faith in Him. They had ample opportunity to do so because of the strong persecution directed against them. Antipas, evidently one who had taught and led this people, was martyred brutally before them, yet they held strong.

They lived in the midst of darkness. Their light was established in the heart of darkness. This city was called by Jesus the dwelling of Satan, yet here was one of the seven lampstands! But the human weakness that could destroy them faster than Satan's persecution was exposed to them by Jesus so they could overcome it. They were suffering from human tolerance. They were allowing those who were following the teaching of Balaam and the Nicolaitans to co-exist as part of the church. God was prepared to make war on these elements with His sword. This church had to overcome their tolerance to those who embraced this sin and face them with the Truth, or the Lord would come to the church and do it His way!

You have a treasure when you have a leader who is courageous to hold to the Truth of God's Word and line up with that and not with compromise. Courage to face persecution is praiseworthy, but the courage to stand only on God's Word is life eternal. Compromise with Satan's attitude toward sex and the feeding on the "food" of the idols of this age, will destroy your relationship to God. What the world seeks and plays with are not to be a part of our attitude and desires, nor are we to excuse those who do as a tolerated part of God's purpose. This has nothing to do with our love for sinners and desire to see them brought to God. We can go into the dens of iniquity and hold forth the light. This church was living in the city where Satan dwelt and was a light. Jesus went among sinners to reach them and did not judge where they were but led them away from it. This is not the same as being tolerant and co-existing with that which God hates. When we abide in Jesus, we have found our dwelling place and in Him, there is no darkness at all.

Rich Toward God

Revelation 2:8-11(NASB) 8"And to the angel of the church in Smyrna write: The first and the last, who was dead, and has come to life, says this: 9'I know your tribulation and your poverty (but you are rich), and the blasphemy by those who say they are Jews and are not, but are a synagogue of Satan. 10'Do not fear what you are about to suffer. Behold, the devil is about to cast some of you into prison, so that you will be tested, and you will have tribulation for ten days Be faithful until death, and I will give you the crown of life. 11'He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches He who overcomes will not be hurt by the second death.'

Notice the connection the identity Jesus has with the overcoming victory of the church He addresses. When we follow Jesus, our victory echoes His! There are seven separate revelations of Jesus to the seven churches. Each of these churches reveals an expectation of God for His Church. These churches reveal the pitfall human nature creates in our effort to respond. It is so easy for us to wander off the path, lose our focus and lose the way completely. Religion is waiting to swallow the church that loses her focus on Jesus.

The church in Smyrna represented in this message is a wonderful example of victorious living. They already had proven they could keep their focus through hard times. So many times, when faced with the hardship of affliction and poverty, we, as humans, turn to human resources as the answer. To keep our focus on Him and our spirit tuned to worship Him as we follow Him makes us rich toward God with the true riches. This connection gives us the understanding to discern the true from the false. Keeping our eye on the Plumbline God has "dropped" into our realm, Jesus, allows us to discern the false.

This message gives us an insight into God's viewpoint of religious acceptance of His provision to us. In Genesis 15:1, God gave Abraham His covenant purpose toward him and his descendants. These have become ours in Jesus. It doesn't matter if we build a synagogue or a church, if we do not give a true covenant response, we are giving a false or religious one. This church in Smyrna had refused to follow that way. They were holding true to focusing on Jesus.

The only human response that Jesus warns them about is fear. Anxiety of what men can do in their hatred of Light, fear of our reaction to suffering and persecution, can distort our focus. In this message, Jesus assures them it is for but a limited period and being faithful to the end will have a rich, eternal reward.

The identity Jesus reveals to this church is His travail and victory as a man when He stood in for us and took our place. His promise to the overcomer is that the overcomer will share in His Victory and not face the eternal separation from God. The overcomer will have and wear the royal Crown of Life for all eternity.

Repentance

Let us look at the remedy Jesus gave to the Church in Ephesus and the consequences if they do not give that response. Revelation 2:4-5(NASB) 4'But I have this against you, that you have left your first love. 5'Therefore remember from where you have fallen, and repent and do the deeds you did at first; or else I am coming to you and will remove your lampstand out of its place--unless you repent.

One translation says, "remember the height from which you have fallen.." In covenant view, it is not about the person, the intention or lack thereof, but about the covenant. What were the covenant expectations that you committed yourself? God's covenant expectation is that we become as He is. Following in Jesus' footsteps will bring us into the fulfillment of that expectation for Jesus is the exact representation of the Father. But if we do lose sight of Who He is, how can we be like Him? God is love. The love He has poured out on us is not reasonable in our human sight. But the Holy Spirit reveals His love to us and our love response to Him is not reasonable to other humans. To let His love abide in us until we love as He loves is something the world cannot fathom. But when we get our eyes on our "working for God", rather than on His love, we lose that love connection. Rescuing the lost, feeding the poor, covering the wounds the enemy inflicts on the unsuspecting, pouring ourselves out as Jesus poured Himself out for us as an expression of the Love He has shown us causes the change in us that God expects to happen. We don't orchestrate the change, God does. We only respond to Who we see He is and He does the rest. But if our response is outside the covenant and is what we feel we "need" to do because we see someone else doing it or someone expects it of us or we are driven to do something religious to justify ourselves, we are not giving God that connection He must have to accomplish what He desires to do.

What must God do as His covenant response when we do not give to Him a covenant response? He must come and take our lampstand out of the place He has put it. We may continue doing what we have always done and feel we are really working for God, and never know our lampstand no longer stands where He put it and is really no longer a lampstand at all. But what happens if we repent and come back to responding to His great Love?

Because we respond to God's Word with our own understanding, we miss or distort what He says. Let the Word of God interpret the Word of God. Read carefully, seeking the Holy Spirit to reveal to you, the passages in John 5:19-30 and John 6:44-58. God so loved the world, not just those whom He had chosen to be a separate nation, but all who would respond to His call, that He sent to us Jesus, God in the flesh of man. Jesus revealed God to man. Jesus came showing that same love that is without measure. He came in our poverty so we could come into His riches. All He is is now available to us! Come and feast at His table! Jesus IS the tree of Life!

Keeping a Focus

In the first letter to the church at Ephesus, the revealing of what the Lord had against the church is the first step of opportunity for the church to get back on track. Their experience with foundation-laying apostolic ministry had given this church an understanding of faithfulness and a perception of the "imitation" that God despises. They were still moving in the direction the apostles had pointed them. They needed only to sincerely repent of losing sight of Who God is and that they were to BE as He is. We can so easily get our eyes on our actions and forget God is looking for the change in our basic being to be like Him!

So let us exam what they were "doing" right. First, they were faithful to persevere and endure hardships. This, I can imagine, would be greater than any hardships we face for they were constantly seeing friends and fellow believers and beloved leaders being martyred.
Second, they did not tolerate wicked men. Toleration of sin is a condition. It requires man's opinion of what is acceptable to God rather than relying on God's Word about what is not acceptable to Him. This church at Ephesus was grounded by an apostolic ministry to know and understand God's Word and Nature.
Third, they hated the practices of the Nicolaitans which God pronounced He also hated. Look back in Acts 6 when the Apostles chose seven men to serve tables and whom we have called deacons. Acts 6:5(NLT) Everyone liked this idea, and they chose the following: Stephen (a man full of faith and the Holy Spirit), Philip, Prochorus, Nicanor, Timon, Parmenas, and Nicolas of Antioch (an earlier convert to the Jewish faith). Nicolas, once a worshipper of false gods in Antioch, converted to Judaism and now a resident in Jerusalem, converted to join the new church under the apostles' teaching. When the Christians were scattered from Jerusalem, they went separate ways to many countries, carrying and spreading the Good News. They began discipling converts. Those who followed Nicolas were evidently getting a mixture of "the best" of ideas Nicolas had embraced at one time and had not abandoned when he converted each time. Their adherence to Nicolas' teaching to follow "justified" practices became separate from the teaching of the apostles. These practices the church at Ephesus hated.

Revelation 2:7 (NASB)'He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches To him who overcomes, I will grant to eat of the tree of life which is in the Paradise of God.' If you know the Voice of the Spirit and are of the heart to follow, you will understand that The Spirit of God is drawing you to hear the message Jesus is giving to each church and know it is for you to heed. To heed is to hear and act upon what you hear.

So, what did we hear? The Church at Ephesus would be considered today an exceptional church. Understanding what an apostle is and able to follow the apostolic teaching to persevere and endure would seem to be totally victorious. To turn away from man's opinions that would justify the satisfing of the fleshly desires would make a church look truly righteous. But it is exactly this human viewpoint that Jesus is NOT justifying. He is revealing to this church how God views it. That is a blessing I seek. I want to be forewarned of the way I am NOT pleasing God before I stand before Him in judgment!

To do the works God gives us to do is praiseworthy. But we must not lose our connection with the covenant purpose of God. All He has ever done and will yet do is to bring the human person into His image! This is not to be accomplished in heaven after you die. You are given a body to live in the realm that is the preparation ground for eternity. Here on this earth you are given an opportunity to give covenant response to God so He can accomplish His purpose in you. You are given covenant "expectations" from God and as you give response and steadfastly look to Him to reveal Himself to you, you are changed. Deep in your being, your spirit begins to take on the likeness of God. The Word, the sword of the Spirit, begins to separate the soul, with its human responses, from your spirit which is feeding on God's Word of Life. If His Word is your connection to His Life, you will begin to overcome your soul's response to this realm and other people.

The Identification in Covenant

We have seven letters to the seven angels that, to me, are some of the most vital passages in the Bible! These seven angels (stars) are held in the right hand of our ascended Lord! These letters reveal the carefulness with which God follows covenant in His relationship with us. All the elements of covenant are in each letter. I had read The Revelation hundreds of times before God showed me covenant language. Then I began to realize why the blessing is on the reading and hearing of this revelation but we are not told to understand. We have to expose our selves to this revelation and He will take care of the revealing it to us. I have heard many people say they do not read this book because it is too hard to understand. As humans with Adamic nature, we are the product of eating from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. We want the control of gaining knowledge and deception is the result. No one knows they are deceived, for deception is so subtle. Crying out to our Lord to deliver us from the way of this realm so we can walk in His ways is the first step. The Holy Spirit will teach you the submission to His Lordship. The humble cry of the little child opens the way to the Tree of Life. We all stumble and falter on this way. God knows our dust and our weakness, but He has given us the Holy Spirit to be our Guide.

The first element of covenant I saw in these letters was the identification of covenant. Jesus first reveals His own identity. Then He reveals the identity of the church. First, He acclaims the way they probably see themselves and which He not only recognizes, but acknowledges. Haven't you heard prayers that start out listing all the ways in which the person has served the Lord and given up certain things for Him? In this first letter to Ephesus, He beats them to it and gives them "credit" for their labors. Revelation 2:1-7(NASB) 1"To the angel of the church in Ephesus write: The One who holds the seven stars in His right hand, the One who walks among the seven golden lampstands, says this: 2'I know your deeds and your toil and perseverance, and that you cannot tolerate evil men, and you put to the test those who call themselves apostles, and they are not, and you found them to be false; 3and you have perseverance and have endured for My name's sake, and have not grown weary. 4'But I have this against you, that you have left your first love. 5'Therefore remember from where you have fallen, and repent and do the deeds you did at first; or else I am coming to you and will remove your lampstand out of its place--unless you repent. 6'Yet this you do have, that you hate the deeds of the Nicolaitans, which I also hate. 7'He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches To him who overcomes, I will grant to eat of the tree of life which is in the Paradise of God.'

How does our Lord identify Himself? He is the One Who holds you in His hand and walks among us! The key to the identity of our Lord is the need of that particular church! He reveals Himself as the One to meet the need! That is true all through the Scriptures. God reveals His Name to a person who has recognized a need. Each time God reveals Himself in a Name, it is to a person He wants to use to proclaim Him to meet that need. It took 40 years of wilderness living for Moses to be prepared to meet the I AM. Then he was prepared to lead God's people 40 years through their wilderness! The Church at Ephesus had been birthed in the miraculous revelation of the Love of God. They embraced the wondrous truth of God coming in the likeness of man to redeem them! They followed the teachings they received and labored well. They had been ministered to by Paul, John, Timothy and many of the apostles. They knew the reward of apostolic ministry and knew when that reward was lacking from those who tried to assume the title and position without the choosing and anointing by God. They had much for which to be praised.

But they had lost the connection with the identity of the One they served! God came to this realm because He LOVED. The One Who holds us and walks among us does so because He is LOVE. When we lose that connection, we lose the capacity to love. The purpose of all God does is to make us in His image. The very essence of God is love. When God created man, He gave everything He wants us to be as a human echo. Only in our response to Jesus, our covenant with God, are we able to be more than an echo. By steadfastly beholding Him, we are changed from glory to glory, or bit by bit! If we get our eyes on WHAT we are doing FOR Him, we lose sight of Him and Who He is. God is love. To walk in His love, we must keep Him in our focus.

The Mystery of the Lampstand

Revelation 1:20(NASB) "As for the mystery of the seven stars which you saw in My right hand, and the seven golden lampstands: the seven stars are the angels of the seven churches, and the seven lampstands are the seven churches.

Only as we understand the "deepening" of the progressive revelation to mankind of The Way to the completion of God's purpose to "make man in Our image," do we begin to comprehend the hidden truths in His Word. I was a Christian for many years before I began to see the hidden truths. Let me say this and pray you understand. These are not man's opinions of God's Word, neither do they depend on our experience or knowledge. They are not discerned from study but by the unveiling work of the Holy Spirit. Understanding may come when you are not even reading His Word. But this understanding does depend on a yielded walk, led by the Holy Spirit, following Jesus. God uses anointed people to help you to come to that place of yielding, circumstances and experiences help you come to that place of yielding, but man and experience are not what you follow. To know the Way and The Truth and The Life, you must follow Jesus. Jesus told us in John 14-17 the key to following Him is to be guided by the Holy Spirit.

There are so many things I do not know. It is not that I have not read many books and commentaries concerning these things, but I know in my spirit, I have not heard from the Holy Spirit the meaning hidden in some Scriptures. I do not know why these seven churches were chosen to reveal the truth of human response to God's covenanted Word. I only know of the church at Ephesus through the letter Paul wrote to them. Even if we knew them through historic means, we would not know them as Jesus was revealing them to John. I am sure John was acquainted with these churches but not as Jesus was revealing them to him. When I read these chapters, I echo the cry of David, "Search me, O God, and see if there be some destructive way in me!" We can get locked in to a mental acceptance of God's Word and follow blindly a way that is not The Way. Only as we pay the price for Truth, (and the cost is our total surrender!) do we find The Way. Our response to God is not limited to our church experience. We walk The Way 24/7 or we are not in The Way! Because we have a ritual and a knowledge of the Scriptures does not mean we know The Truth. Only the Holy Spirit can reveal Jesus to us for that is His ministry and the reason He comes to dwell in us. If we do not know His Voice, and do not know to follow very carefully the way He reveals to us, we cannot know the intimacy of knowing Jesus.

This verse shows us how God views the church. Our individual connection with a church makes us a lampstand. We understand "lampstand" from our study of the Old Testament tabernacle or temple that had a "room" without windows, lit by a lampstand with oil and a wick burning continually. What a message to us! Oh, that our church could be a "room" without windows! We built a church once without windows! We wanted no outside distraction to our worship! But the church is not the building. We are the church. We come together to bring our worship and join our worship with others who are bringing their worship. If we could live in this realm and not be of this realm, we could be a "room" without windows and the only Light would be the flame of the oil of the Holy Spirit! How else are we going to be the light of the world? How can we be the Light set in the earth to separate the light from the darkness? God depends on our covenant response to His Light to be witness to that Light. How can we be a witness unless that Light is the witness? How can we be witnesses to His Resurrection unless His Life is alive in us?

A lampstand has a tremendous responsibility. It is given the privilege of holding and revealing light.