Did the big guy know who he was? (A true Father’s Day gift)
I have been thinking about Jesus as the pattern son or the template we are supposed to emulate. It was around February 2013 that I feel God really started to work in me the concept of identity. One of my favorite quotes has become:
“What I think/say about God does not define me, what God thinks/says about me defines me”
This past week I started to notice Jesus and how he dealt with identity. He moved not on what people said about him or wanted of him. I have listed a few verses that show how Jesus moved. There is a common thread in the verses, and that is in Jesus’s relationship with his Father. His relationship is that of a son. He knows his identity. He moves in that relationship. He is secure in his identity and his relation as a son.
John 5:18-20
18 Therefore the Jews sought the more to kill him, because he not only had broken the sabbath, but said also that God was his Father, making himself equal with God.
19 Then answered Jesus and said to them, Truly, truly, I say to you, The Son can do nothing of himself, but what he sees the Father do: for what things soever he does, these also does the Son likewise.
20 For the Father loves the Son, and shows him all things that himself does: and he will show him greater works than these, that you may marvel. …
John 5:30
By myself I can do nothing; I judge only as I hear, and my judgment is just, for I seek not to please myself but him who sent me.
John 6:38
For I have come down from heaven not to do my will but to do the will of him who sent me.
John 8:28
So Jesus said, “When you have lifted up the Son of Man, then you will know that I am he and that I do nothing on my own but speak just what the Father has taught me.
John 12:49
For I did not speak on my own, but the Father who sent me commanded me to say all that I have spoken.
Now with that being said, we are sons and daughters of God. We are not adopted sons and daughters or black sheep im the family. Before the creation of the world it says he knew us.
John 1:1
In the beginning the Word already existed. The Word was with God, and the Word was God.
Jeremiah 1:5
Before I formed you in the belly I knew you; and before you came forth out of the womb I sanctified you, and I ordained you a prophet to the nations.
He knew me before created the world. He created all of mankind to be his sons and daughters. Many of us have garbage and or baggage to get rid of in regards to identity. The only source for our true blueprint has to be what God says about us. He declares us whole and pure before him. With Adams fall we automatically came with a sin nature. Andrew Farley asks the question “How many sins does it require for us to fall short? ” the answer is not one it is actually zero. This all due to Adam. Jesus died on the cross and we were co-crucified with him. We were co-resurrected and forgiven one time for all sin. This act redeemed our innocence. It restored our original design. A re-genesis for all mankind if they choose to walk in sonship. That sonship is our identity. We have that same relationship a shared identity. Our true identity is found in Him.
2 Timothy 1:1 and 1:9
The amazing news of announcing this life which is unveiled in Christ Jesus is what my ministry is all about! The promise is a person! I, Paul, am a man on a mission; God’s delightful desire sponsors me!
He rescued the integrity of our original design and revealed that we have always been his own from the beginning, even before time was. This has nothing to do with anything we did to qualify or disqualify ourselves. We are not talking religious good works or karma here. Jesus unveils grace to be the eternal intent of God! Grace celebrates our pre-creation innocence and now declares our redeemed union with God in Christ Jesus.
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Addendum:
This is in reality a true Father’s Day gift. To know your daddy and to know his heart towards you is priceless. You have a father and in him you are defined perfectly. To be able to walk in the understanding of sonship means more than anything. My identity needs to be founded in him and him alone.
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Where are you looking for your identity?
My origin is pre-earth/pre-birth!
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Slow Train Coming
There is a stirring over me this song. There is a conference coming up next weekend and during the announcements at New Day Lloyd Rindels started talking a bout the Mirror with the Word conference featuring Francois du Toit (the author of the The Mirror Translation Bible). Lloyd said his prayer time had been hijacked the day before. During his time with God he said he felt God said “that Zimmerman kid got it right.” For those of you who dont know it, Bob Dylan’s last name pre fame was Zimmerman. The song Slow Train Coming was coming to Lloyd. God was showing him that Francois du Toit was one of those cars on the train a coming. He is literally unknown but the message he is carrying is so important. Grace is nothing new. But its relevance is so important.
I’m going to leave it at that for now.
If you want to register for the conference click here
“Slow Train”
Sometimes I feel so low-down and disgusted
Can’t help but wonder what’s happening to my companions
Are they lost or are they found, have they counted the cost it’ll take to bring down
All their earthly principles they’re gonna have to abandon ?
There’s slow, slow train coming up around the bend.
I had a woman down in Alabama
She was a backwoods girl, but she sure was realistic
She said, Boy, without a doubt, have to quit your mess and straighten out
You could die down here, be just another accident statistic
There’s slow, slow train coming up around the bend.
All that foreign oil controlling American soil
Look around you, it’s just bound to make you embarrassed
Sheiks walking around like kings, wearing fancy jewels and nose rings
Deciding America’s future from Amsterdam and to Paris
And there’s slow, slow train coming up around the bend.
Man’s ego is inflated, his laws are outdated, they don’t apply no more
You can’t rely no more to be standing around waiting
In the home of the brave, Jefferson turning over in his grave
Fools glorifying themselves, trying to manipulate Satan
And there’s slow, slow train coming up around the bend.
Big-time negotiators, false healers and woman haters
Masters of the bluff and masters of the proposition
But the enemy I see wears a cloak of decencyAll non-believers and men stealers talking in the name of religion
And there’s slow, there’s slow train coming up around the bend.
People starving and thirsting, grain elevators are bursting
Oh, you know it costs more to store the food than it do to give it
They say loose your inhibitions, follow your own ambitions
They talk about a life of brotherly love, show me someone who knows how to live it
There’s slow, slow train coming up around the bend.
Well, my baby went to Illinois with some bad-talking boy she could destroy
A real suicide case, but there was nothing I could do to stop it
I don’t care about economy, I don’t care about astronomy
But it’s sure do bother me to see my loved ones turning into puppets
There’s slow, slow train coming up around the bend.
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It’s all past tense baby!
God relates to you through your identity not through your behavior. He defines your identity not you.
He says you are made in his likeness. You were created in his image. His image of you is spotless. He sees eternity in him in your identity now. He likes you now. He liked you before he created the world. He is not wanting you to be something or do something to gain his acceptance or love. If we could do something to please him on our own merit he would not have had to send Jesus to the cross. It is a free gift given to us at the time of the cross, that’s right he did it prior to our being conceived. He forgave us and extended the gift of forgiveness and grace freely to all at the time of the cross. It is simply a matter if accepting the gift and walking into the place of sonship he has supplied.
We were created to not only be partakers of his divine nature (in fullness) in heaven but also to partake here on earth. He says who I am not me or my actions. My significance is or should not be defined by anything but the word of God.
2 Corinthians 5:16-19 TMT
16 This is radical! No label that could possibly previously define someone carries any further significance! Even our pet doctrines of Christ are redefined. Whatever we knew about him historically or sentimentallity is challenged by this conclusion.
17 In the light of your co-inclusion in his death and resurrection, whoever you thought you were before, in Christ you are a brand new person! The old ways of seeing yourself and everyone else are over. Acquaint yourself with the new!
18 To now see everything as new is to simply see what God has always known in Christ; we are not debating man’s experience, opinion, or his contribution; this is 100% God’s belief and his doing. In Jesus Christ, God exchanged equivalent value to redeem us to himself. The act of reconciliation is the mandate of our ministry.
19 our ministry declares that Jesus did not act independent of God. Christ is proof that God reconciled the total kosmos to himself. Diety and humanity embraced in Christ; the fallen state of mankind was deleted; their trespasses would no longer count against them! God has placed this message within us. He now announces his friendship with every individual from within us!
Romans 5:17-18 TMT
If death saw the gap in one sin, and grabbed the opportunity to dominate kind because I’m a one man, how much more me we now she’s the advantage to reign in righteousness in this life through that one act of Christ, who declared us innocent by His grace. Grace is out of all proportion in the superiority to the transgression.
18 The conclusion is clear: it took just one offense to condemn mankind; one act of righteousness declares the same mankind innocent.
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“You don’t have to claim another promise when you discover that the promise already claimed you! 2 Cor 1:20 For all the promises of God in him are yea, and in him Amen, unto the glory of God by us.”
Francois du Toit
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Incarnation by Kristian Holms:
Had to share!
When the Word becomes flesh in Jesus a radical statement is made by God! God’s original thought, His logic that has been preserved from the beginning manifests on earth! What is amazing about this is that the real God is revealed as well as the true man. Jesus as fully God becomes fully man and does not reduce His expression of himself as God. In fact, the fullness of the Godhead is in him bodily. What does this mean for man? It means that we also accurately and completely express God by our design. It means that we also house the fullness of the Godhead within us. When God’s logic becomes flesh we see what He really thinks about ‘flesh’ and that we do not have to continue to war with our ‘flesh’ against sin because He dominates sin in the flesh.The amazing thing about Jesus is that he simultaneously reveals God and man in the incarnation. This means that there is no separation between us and God. Also it wasn’t a temporary arrangement for him to be a man for 33 terrible years until he goes back to heaven free at last. He was raised as a man to show that we could never ever be separated. He is forever united with us! This is why Paul can make such a radical statement in 2 Cor 5:14 when he says, “If One has died for all, then all have died.” We see that Jesus wasn’t alone in His life or on the cross. 2 Cor 5:19 says that “God was in Christ, reconciling the world to Himself.” So man and God were united in Christ’s life and cross. Jesus says in John 14:20, “On that day, you will know that I am in my Father, you are in Me and I am in you.” He comes and reveals a union that cannot be broken. There is one mediator between man and God, the man, Christ Jesus. As long as He is a man, mankind is completely united and reconciled to Himself.Why was sin destroyed? Because it wasn’t in our true design. Why are we in perfect union with the Godhead? Because we were designed for that. Why does Jesus look like us? Because He made us in HIS image and likeness. Why did love win over rule-keeping? Because love designed us to live in His heart and He put His heart in us. The incarnation is a radical statement from God that WE BELONG!
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“To know as you have always been known.” By Andre Rabe
This speaks to so many of the ideas and topics that I have been contemplating. I highly recommend following both Andre Rabe and Francois du Toit.
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My 2:00 am wake up
So I woke up around 2am, I
got up went to the kitchen and had a, drink. I came back to bed. I often put worship music or play the Bible audio (streaming) while I sleep. As I was crawling back into bed I picked up my phone to change the track. I noticed a blinking blue light reminding me I missed something and my phone wants to remind me to look. I looked at the status bar and opened Facebook. I saw a post by Francois du Toit and read it. My spirit was provoked by it. About seven hours I was with a small group discussing the resurrection in light of Romans, Ephesians, and 2 Corinthians. God you can wake me up like this as much as you want.
Francois quote is below.
“A meaningful relationship with the Creator and our fellow humans of tangible content and feedback was substituted for an airy-fairy philosophy of religious ritual, sentiment and dreams. Trapped in a spiritual vacuum of ignorance, we’ve latched on to worn-out and fading traditions of the past and vague future hopes.”
Francois du Toit
Once the veil of religion (law) is lifted and the epiphany of the realization what happened at the cross truly or even partially gets through a mans mind and springs forth into his spirit the freedom it brings is wow
Ephesians 2:13 TMT “But now wow! Everything has changed; vhou have discovered yourselves to be located in Christ. What once seemed so distant is now so near; his blood reveals your redeemed innocence and authentic genesis. ”
The WOW factor, the cross a the impact of mans co-death and co-resurrection. We are one with Christ at that time, pre-coneption.
Francois will be coming to Kansas City the end of May beginning of June, I look forward to it expectantly.
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Sonship Dude!
I was reading in Romans 8:19-24 still contemplating sonship (following yesterday’s blog) it states;
Our lives now represent the one event every creature anticipates withheld breath, standing on tip-toe as it were the unveiling of the sons of God. Can you hear the drum roll?
Every creature suffered abuse through Adam’s fall; they were discarded like a squeezed out orange. Creation did not volunteer to fall prey to the effect of the fall. Yet within this stark setting hope prevails.
All creation knows the glorious liberty of the SONS of God sets the stage for their own release from decay.
We sense the universal agony and pain recorded in history until this very moment.
We ourselves feel the grief echo of their groaning within us while we are ready too EMBRACE the ORIGINAL BLUEPRINT also of our physical stature to the full consequence of SONSHIP. What we ALREADY NOW PARTICIPATE in as first fruits of the spirit will bloom into a full gathering of the harvest.
For what we already experience of salvation confirms our hope and continues to fuel our expectation for what we still cannot see. In the final visible completeness of the harvest, hope has fulfilled its function.
Through the cross we co-died and became co-heirs with Christ. This act brought mankind into sonship. Sonship! Do you get the ramifications? We have a new lease, Adam’s fall has been wiped clean.
You hear stories of prisoners who have been behind bars for decades and have been released and still act like prisoners.
James Whitmore in The Shawshank Redemption
Jame Whitmore’s character in the Shawshank Redemption had been in prison since his late teens and was released an old man. He was free but he didn’t know how to cope with his freedom. He still acted like he was in chains asking permission to use the bathroom among others. He didn’t understand traffic or how to cross the street. He knew about street and cars. He had knowledge of what they were but it was merely cognition not understanding of the practical. We are like that, I’ve often used the terminology “we are sons and daughters of God” but I never walked in it or even remotely understood what it means.
I am a joint heir with Christ! What he gets, I get. He has access to daddy, I have access to daddy.
I’m a parent of four kids; Savannah, Shakanah, Benaiah, and Moriah in that order. I cannot honestly say I have a favorite. In fact I have told them when we are alone (one on one) that they (which ever one is with me) that they are my favorite. Each one can come and ask me a question at any time and I will see what can be done to answer there question or make a request possible. No good father/mother will give their child a spider if they ask for a _______________. I am God’s son his child. I am not a servant or a guest. I am his favorite.
Jesus’s act of sacrifice on the cross redeemed our innocence, it brought us back to that pre-fall relationship that Adam and God had in Eden.
God has invited each of us to walk in that sonship. A good parent loves unconditionally and God is definitely a good parent. Remember the prodigal sons brother who at the end of the story is jealous of his brother and when confronted by his father about his issues the father says;
Luke 15:31-32
“My son,’ the father said, ‘you are always with me, and everything I have is yours. But we had to celebrate and be glad, because this brother of yours was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found.”
Your original identity is that of a fully functional son/daughter of God!
Grasp your original blueprint Dude!
Give the word your undivided attention; do not underestimate yourself. Make the calculation. There can only be one conclusion: your authentic origin is mirrored in the word. You are God’s poem; let his voice make poetry of your life.
James1:22 The Mirror Translation
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THOUGHTS ON HELL by Francois du Toit
THOUGHTS ON HELL
by Francois du Toit
It is so sad that for many years the church had to reduce its message to a heaven or hell theme in order to persuade people into a decision for Christ.
The Gospel persuades man what God believes and what God achieved on humanity’s behalf in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. If the Gospel has the power to get people to fall head over heels in love with God and to love their neighbor as much as they love themselves, then this Gospel demands our total attention and emphasis. This automatically frees anyone anyway from the dread of hell or any sense of pending punishment. There is no law against the free expression of the fruit of the spirit. No one can exaggerate love, peace, joy, endurance, kindness, goodness, faith, gentleness, self control. Legalism can neither match nor contradict this. There is no law against love! Galatians 2:22,23. The urgency to tell everyone the good news of their redeemed innocence because of the success of the cross and God’s act of kindness in Christ to rescue mankind from an inferior expression of life into the most attractive life possible can never be matched by a fear motive! Paul gives such context to the motivation of ministry when he declares that “the love of Christ constrains us, because we are convinced that one has died for all, therefore all have died!”
Our message is powerful enough to stop people in their tracks with the best news ever! Sin in its every disguise doesn’t have what it takes to even remotely match the attraction and total contentment and appeal of the Christ life!
The truth of our original identity revealed and redeemed in Christ, sets us totally free from every distortion in our minds about the life of our design. We declare the intimate resolve of God and his attraction to engage with the individual in the most personal tangible way possible. The biggest waste is to miss out on one day of fellowship with your Creator.
I amount often overwhelmed with the thought of the ultimate extent of the great work of redemption and act of reconciliation that God undertook to rescue the human race. Underestimating this great salvation has always been the biggest sin of the church. The greatest safeguard we can ever give someone against a wasted life is in our message that reveals truth in such a way that every possible excuse we could have to experience distance from God or to continue in any form of sin, guilt, fear or an inferior lifestyle is done away with. In its stead there remains only the wide open arms of Father God longing to embrace the individual and the world into unrestricted friendship. There is enough content in the positive revelation of Christ in you to rid you of a sin consciousness and its dreadful consequence. Our message is not to persuade people that there is no hell, but rather to convince them that Christ suffered the horror of it to liberate us from its dread both in this life and the next. To influence people into making a decision for Christ based on hell is to distract from the truth. The focus and central theme of the Gospel is the revelation of the mystery of man’s inclusion in the death Jesus died and our co-resurrection and joint-position in the father’s right hand. The liberating truth of the forgiveness of sins and an understanding of their innocence that leads to a tangible intimacy with the living God and spontaneous love for people. God pleads through us to bring people to realize their full inclusion in the Gospel. Let his love in you reveal him to your neighbors and the nations. His love is unthreatened and needs no defense! Col.4:4 This is my prayer request, that I may be able to present this message in the most effective way possible. 4:5 Do not spoil your chance to touch others with the word through a lack of wisdom. Redeem the time by making the most of every opportunity. (Time only finds its relevance in redemption-realities) 4:6 Season your conversation with the revelation of grace. This remains the most attractive and appropriate option to respond in every situation.
The object of New Testament ministry is not in the first place to get people to go to heaven one day! It is the unveiling of the most attractive life possible, the life of our design redeemed again. Now to be enjoyed in an immediate, intimate, daily, constant, conscious feedback encounter with the Living God in Spirit and in truth and undiluted friendship with our fellow man!
He overlooked the times of ignorance and now urges all men everywhere to discover his eternal thoughts about mankind, revealed in Christ, when we were judged in righteousness in one man’s death, and raised in his resurrection as the trophy of justice redeemed! Acts 17:30,31. Having made purification for sins he sat down! His throne authority is established upon our redeemed innocence.
The more we declare the integrity of God’s persuasion concerning us demonstrated in his son’s obedience in our favor, the less we have to prompt people to believe, their believing will be most spontaneous! Even our faith is from him! Eph 2:8 Your salvation was a grace thing from start to finish, you had no hand in it; because it is all God’s gift to you, because he believes in you. (Mirror Bible) Eph 2:8 For by grace you have been saved through faith; and this is not your own doing, it is the gift of God– (RSV)
Paul preached in such a way that many believed! Acts 14:1 Yet he never asked for a show of hands to indicate their ‘decision’ to believe! The more we make an issue of “Now do you believe this? Because if you don’t you’re going to hell!” the more we disguise the very message we’ve just proclaimed!
God’s work of redemption is valid with immediate effect. “The hour all creation was waiting for has come. The son of man is glorified! The single grain of wheat did not abide alone; it fell into the earth and died and bore much fruit!” John 12:23,24. Mankind died in his death and was made alive together with him and raised together with him and is now seated together with him in heavenly places. Every human life is fully and equally represented and justified in one man’s act of righteousness. 2 Cor 5:14,16; Acts 10:28. “Jesus reveals that man pre-existed in God; he defines us. He justified us and also glorified us. He redeemed our innocence and restored the glory we lost in Adam. (Rom 3:23,24; prohoritso, pre defined, like when an architect draws up a detailed plan; kaleo, to surname, identify by name) What further ground can there possibly be to condemn man? In his death he faced our judgment; in his resurrection he declares our innocence; the implications cannot be undone! He now occupies the highest seat of authority as the executive of our redemption in the throne room of God. (See verse 1, also Rom 4:25) Rom 8:30,34 Mirror Translation Jesus is what God believes. If every human life is equally included in God’s economy of grace then man deserves to hear this Gospel more than what any man deserves to be judged.
Our influence in society, regardless of our profession, is determined by our faith and not our job-description; our faith is sourced in Christ, in his perfect work of reconciling a hostile world to himself. While we proclaim the sinful state of humanity we are not proclaiming the gospel, and life changing faith cannot come to the people! This conviction is critical, if we are serious about impacting our world with the proclamation of the Gospel.
So sad that we allow the deception of a Christless “universalism” to hijack words like ‘inclusion’ and ‘universal,’ These words powerfully and significantly describe the masterful genius of God when Jesus died humanity’s death! This is the mystery that none of the rulers of this world understood, otherwise they would never have crucified the Lord of glory!
The point is that the gospel is good news for all people because the gospel reveals how fully included they are in Christ by God’s doing; truth is already true before anyone believes it; a diamond doesn’t become a diamond when you discover it, obviously God hid the diamonds and treasures in the earth for man and not from man! That is why we preach with passion, urgency and persuasion in order to awaken every mans mind and instruct every man and present every man perfect in Christ Col 1:28, because the mystery that was hidden for ages and generations is now revealed.
We have underestimated the Gospel of Jesus Christ for centuries, because we have adopted an interpretation that robbed us of the true impact of salvation in its relation to life in the here & now on planet earth. We have felt more comfortable with a faith that refers us to a place in heaven one day rather than to see faith as the now & relevant substance of things we always longed for & the evidence of unseen realities around us & within our grasp; the life of our design is redeemed!
Jesus didn’t die 99% or for 99% He died humanity’s death one hundred percent! If Paul had to compromise the last part of verse 14 of 2 Cor 5 , to read: “one died for all therefore only those who follow the prescriptions to qualify, have also died,” then he would have had to change the first half of the verse as well! Only the love of Christ can make a calculation of such enormous proportion! The same all who died in his death were raised together with him! According to the only scripture in the entire OT that refers to the 3rd day resurrection, we are included! “After 2 days God will revive us, on the 3rd day he will raise us up!!” Hos 6:2 When Paul ponders this scripture (he also quotes it in 1 Cor 15:4) he makes one of his most radical discoveries in his gospel; he writes “While we were dead in our sins (before we knew or believed the gospel) God made us alive together with Christ, and raised us (mankind) together with Christ and seated us together with Christ in heavenly places! That is the point of the gospel; what happened to Christ happened to us before anyone but God believed it! We’re not window-shopping here we are gazing into the mirror! For so many years we’ve read 2 Cor 5 verse 17 out of its context! Verse 14 and 16 gives context to verse 17 Therefore the IF cannot be a condition it must be a conclusion otherwise verse 14 also becomes ‘iffy’!!
The gates of hades will not prevail against the testimony of truth; the weapons of our already won warfare tears down every argument and resistance to the knowledge of God; love wins, I can see even the ‘other brother’ awakening to the festive sound!
I suppose I would still have questions if I think about all the contradictions and issues that theology presents us with; but for years now I have determined to go with what I know by revelation concerning his perfect work of redeeming his image in us: to live daily in the full benefit of that and to unveil him in every person I have the privilege to meet; that keeps one pretty busy enjoying him and sharing him! I am addicted to the Philemon 1:6 kind of koinonia! The koinonia (communication) of our faith is ignited by the acknowledging of every good thing that is in us in Christ!
Exploring the extent of his love initiative and where it leads us truly exceeds any limitation or dimension! And we are all in it together! Wow what eternal bliss and glory we participate in! The hubble telescope surely increases our horizon daily, only to realize again and again that we are dealing with measureless dimensions in outer space that reflect in us! That we may be filled with all the fulness of God is a thought that breaks all boundaries, we are fearfully and wonderfully made and equally fearfully and wonderfully redeemed! The whole earth is full of his glory, “and as truly as I live”, says the Lord, “all the earth shall be filled with the knowledge of my glory, even as the waters cover the sea!” Jesus said: if you believe that I am what the scriptures are all about, then you will discover that you are what I am all about and rivers of living waters will gush out of your innermost being!
The good news unveils the love of God spectacularly! The dimensions of his love exceed any concept we could possibly have of height, length, breadth or depth! The gospel can be underestimated, but never exaggerated! The half could not be told of Solomon’s wisdom and wealth and in Luke 11 Jesus says, “A greater than Solomon is here”! Rev 5:13 And I heard every creature in heaven and on earth and under the earth and in the sea, and all therein, saying, “To him who sits upon the throne and to the Lamb be blessing and honor and glory and might forever and ever!”
While we argue that all would be OK regardless, we still miss the point! The urgency to communicate this gospel is not compromised thru speculations about the future, but constrained by the revelation of how God’s faith included hostile indifferent mankind in the sacrificial death of Christ, and his triumphant resurrection, when he represented the entire human race; multitudes are living in torment right now because they have never heard the truth of their redemption; what a waste to postpone redemption to life hereafter if it can happen now! How all will eventually discover what they have missed and how they will be ‘judged’ is none of our business anyway; it is our business to live the living epistle to be known and read by all men! And to give everyone within earshot on this planet the opportunity to hear truth that ignites life-changing faith!
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The Locator (Sons and Daughters)
So have you ever had one of those days? Well all six of us are on antibiotics. It has been one of those stay in bed days. I flipped on the television and there was a show on called The Locator. The pretense of the show is for family members to be reunited after years of absence do to splits at birth, family splits, foster kids, etc. I watched two different segments, one was about reuniting a brother who was seperated by a marriage split when he was two (currently he is 40) the other was reuniting a mother and daughter. Where am I going with this?
Well I found this interesting as turned off the television and opened up the word. I opened up to where I had left off.
Romans 8:15-19 (TMT)
Slavery is such a poor substitute for sonship! They are opposites; the one leads forcefully through fear while sonshipI resppnds fondly to Abba Father.
His spirit resonates within our spirit to confirm the fact that we originate in God.
Because we are his offspring, we qualify to be heirs; God himself is our portion, we co-inherit with Christ. Since we were represented and included in his suffering we equally participate in th glory of his resurrection.
He has taken the sting out of our suffering; what seemed burdensome in this life becomes insignificant in comparison to the glory he reveals in us.
Our lives now represent the one event every creature anticipates withheld breath, standing tiptoe as it were to witness the unveiling of the sons of God. Can you hear the drum roll?
The Locator was all about reuniting lost relationships. All of mankind has lost relationship with God because of Adams sin. We need that reuniting that relationship with our original father. From the moment God created man he was, is, and always will be our original father. Just like any family there are different levels of function or disfunction. Some people walk in that sonship amazingly while others are black sheep, prodigal sons, foster kids, etc. Our father is like that parent on the television show who is continually trying to reunite his family. We were his sons and daughters from the beginning, his death and resurrection brought that ability to walk in sonship full circle. No one who calls themselves a Christian can deny Jesus is the son of God. Jesus is in me and I am in him. 2 Corinthians 3:18 says that we look into a mirror and see Jesus, he uses that same reflection and sees us. If a mirror sees in the present tense the fact that what Jesus sees is him in us and we see him in us. The image seen both ways is sinless, blameless, perfect at that current moment. Jesus calls us co-heirs, sons and daughters. We are Gods sons and daghters. Sure some of us feel like orphans, foster kids, or black sheep but just like the prodigal son we have a father waiting arms open wanting us to run to him. Don’t worry about showering or cleaning yourself up. If yiu think I have to make myself presentable before going to him, get over it. Man will never on their own be able to make themselves good enough, that’s what grace is all about.
Malachi 4:6 New Living Translation
His preaching will turn the hearts of fathers to their children, and the hearts of children to their fathers. Otherwise I will come and strike the land with a curse.”
Kilen's Spot 