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KINGDOM
BIBLE STUDIES
"Teaching the things concerning the kingdom of
God..."
FROM THE CANDLESTICK TO THE
THRONE
Part 20
IN
THE SPIRIT ON THE LORD’S DAY
(continued)
“I was in the spirit on the
Lord’s day, and heard behind me a great voice, as of a trumpet, saying,
What thou seest, write in a book, and send it unto the seven churches which are
in Asia” (Rev. 1:10-11).
I’ve heard a lot of different definitions of what the Lord’s day is, and all the explanations I’ve heard lead me to
believe that not very many people have been caught up in the Spirit.
I have been caught up in the Spirit, and the things I saw and heard were
the same realities I read in the book of Revelation!
With the brush of the Holy Spirit and the paint of the word of God I hope
to create a picture on the canvas of your understanding.
The real world, the eternal world, the world that will never pass away,
God’s world, the kingdom that flesh and blood cannot inherit, can only be
seen, touched, and experienced by the
spirit man that you are. It is in the spirit that we connect with this invisible, divine, heavenly,
eternal world!
“I John, was in the isle that
is called Patmos…I was in the spirit
on the Lord’s day” (Rev. 1:9-10). Praise
God for that “in the isle,” — “in the spirit”!
Physically, John was in Patmos; spiritually, he was caught up into the
heavens of God’s Spirit! The
“was” is from a Greek word which means “became” or “came to be.”
“I John, became in Spirit on
the Lord’s day.” What do you
suppose John was in before he was in the Spirit? Someone says, “Well, he must have been in the flesh!”
No — I do not believe that John was in the flesh.
Paul clearly tells us, “But ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit,
if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you” (Rom. 8:9).
The way this reads in the Greek is that as long as the Spirit of God is constantly dwelling, abiding, motivating, and controlling us, we are
not in the flesh.
I don’t believe the beloved John was in the flesh!
He was, however, in his soul.
The soul is the mind, will, emotion, and desire of man. John was in his own mind, his own will, his own emotion, and
his own desires. There is nothing
wrong with that! These were not
ungodly or corrupt, but neither were they the Spirit of God or John’s own
spirit. We need to think spiritual sense about these things! The “flesh” is the realm of sin
in my members. It is a lower
realm than the soul. I am acting in
my soul when I drive my car, chat with my neighbor, play with my grandchildren,
or go to a concert. I am in no way
acting fleshly — that is, out of a
sinful nature. Now, if while
driving my car I deliberately run someone down, or, if while chatting with my
neighbor I lie to him or insult him, then
I am in the flesh! But when I am doing very natural things I am not sinning.
I am merely moving in my soul life.
There is something wrong with
walking after the flesh, for “the works of the flesh are manifest, which are these: adultery,
fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness, idolatry, witchcraft, hatred,
variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies, envyings, murders,
drunkenness, revelings, and such like…” (Gal. 5:19-21).
To become “in the Spirit” is to ascend into a higher realm! It is to consciously rise from your soul into His Spirit,
from your own mind into His mind, from your own thoughts into His thoughts, from
your own will into His will, from your own emotions and desires into those of
the Lord Himself. There is nothing
wrong with playing with the grandchildren, going out to eat, attending a
concert, feeling weary, or thinking about the work you must do tomorrow.
Jesus hungered and thirsted, grew weary, worked in a carpenter shop, rode
a donkey, and attended some very lavish banquets!
When Jesus needed a piece of wood for a table He was building, He
didn’t pray, shake, speak in tongues, fall on the floor, and seek a vision for
instructions about selecting the right board.
That’s why He had a soul — for the plane of natural, everyday living.
I have met people who thought they had to “hear from God” before they
could go to the store!
God gave us
a mind fully capable of making such decisions and carrying out our normal
physical, business, and social activities.
He gave us emotions capable of enjoying love, beauty, music, travel,
recreation, and many other things. But
that is not the dimension of the spirit!
It is possible, yea, desirable, to walk in both realms at the same time!
It is by the soul that I drive my car, but I may also drive it in the spirit. Now if
you find that difficult to believe, you should see the spirit some people drive their cars in! I have often done my business, social activities, and
physical labors while at the same time being overwhelmed by the presence and
power of God! I have walked into a
store while caught up in a heavenly realm, and was still able to buy a loaf of
bread and walk out again. No one
knew I was in the Spirit except me! I
have received revelations while
brushing my teeth, but I didn’t require a revelation to
brush my teeth. You see the
difference!
In the spirit there is a sensitivity to God, the sensation of life and
light, the consciousness of His presence, the revelation of His voice and His
will, and the reality of a higher state of
being. Bennie Skinner told of a
man who went into an office and the gentleman there had a plaque on his desk
that said, KEEP LOOKING DOWN. The
man said, “Sir, don’t you have that saying backward — aren’t we supposed
to KEEP LOOKING UP?”
The gentleman replied, “It depends on your perspective, on where you
are. If you are living above the
things of this world, if you are seated in the heavenlies, then you can keep
looking down. But if you are
burdened down, overwhelmed by earthly things, and walking in the lowlands of the
flesh, then you must keep looking up!”
John came to be “in the Spirit.” It is a blessed thing to be in the
Spirit! God is making a spiritual
man today! When God formed Adam of
the dust of the ground, he became a living soul.
Adam was sinless when he came from the hand of his Creator, and he lived
and walked in the dimension of his soul. It
is natural to live in the soul realm! It
is not sinful or wicked — just natural. You
don’t have to do a thing to get into the soul realm.
We were all born into this world in that realm!
But Adam did have to do something to fall down into the flesh realm — he ate of the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of
good and evil. He disobeyed the
word of the Lord to him! He partook
of the fruit of a lower realm. He sinned!
That is just the difference between “flesh” and “soul.”
You have to sink to a lower level to be in the flesh.
In the flesh is a dark realm, a rebellious realm, a sinful realm, a
wicked realm of selfhood, corruption, and unrighteousness.
The soul can be beautiful! What
can be more beautiful than the innocence of a child, though they know nothing of
the spirit? It is the soul that
enjoys traveling to far-away places with strange-sounding names, quaint
cultures, and exotic vistas. It is
the soul that is moved by the strains of beautiful music, that stands transfixed
before a colorful sunset or the majesty of mountain peaks. The soul may be lifted up to touch and partake of the high
realms of the Spirit of God! In
such a moment the sweet singer of Israel exulted, “Bless the Lord, O my soul!” And in the
Magnificat the virgin of Galilee cried out, “My soul doth magnify the Lord!”
The soul can also sink into the domain of the flesh and revel in base
things, for “the soul that sinneth,
it shall die.” But the soul
itself, of itself and by itself, is neither evil nor spiritual. It is just the soul. The
soul is incomplete and seeks union. It
finds union with either the flesh or the spirit! When it walks after the flesh, it dies. When it walks after the spirit, it lives!
“The first man Adam was made a living
soul; the last Adam was made a quickening
spirit” (I Cor. 15:45). It is
in conscious union with Christ that we become “in the Spirit.”
This was John’s “rapture”! In
this rapture John became a spirit-man.
He became one who heard;
one who turned; one who saw;
one who became as dead; one who was quickened
by the right hand of the One in the midst of the candlesticks.
His own consciousness, life, identity and reality were swallowed up in
the vision of Another! And the whole subsequent vision of the book of Revelation is
in that holy Light!
“I was in the Spirit on the
Lord’s day…” The whole
church world today is waiting for the day of the Lord.
And many in this word of the Kingdom are also waiting for the day of the
Lord. But John wasn’t waiting for
the day of the Lord! He
“became,” or “came to be,” as the Greek expresses it, in
the day of the Lord! It seems to me
that if John “became” in the day of the Lord two thousand years ago, you and
I can “come to be” in the day of the Lord right now!
It was on or in the Lord’s day that John was in the Spirit.
In the New Testament days the Roman emperor was deified and claimed to be
God. The day that a man became the
Roman emperor was called “The Emperor’s Day.”
And all the time that the emperors reigned over the Roman empire the
people of the empire were required to observe that day as “Emperor’s Day”
That was the day when the emperor was crowned.
On that day the Romans acknowledged that “Caesar is Lord! Caesar is God!” But
then the Christians came along and they refused to acknowledge the emperor as
Lord, or as God. They said,
“Jesus Christ is Lord! Jesus
Christ is God! He has risen from
the dead, He has ascended up far above all heavens, He has been given the name
that is above every name, all power has been given unto Him in heaven and in
earth, He has been exalted to sit on His Father’s throne, He has been crowned
as King of kings, and Lord of lords — King of the universe.
Jesus Christ is King! Jesus
Christ is Lord! This is the
LORD’S DAY!” To know Christ in
living reality and walk with Christ in the Spirit was to be in the Lord’s Day!
Here is how John came to be in the day of the Lord.
He says, “I became, or came to be, in
the Spirit.” It was “in the
Spirit” that he was in the Lord’s day!
It is not by arriving at a date on the calendar, but by living and
walking in the Spirit that we enter into and experience the day of the Lord!
Many people are looking into the outer world to see the coming of the day
of the Lord. They watch world
events, calculate times and seasons which they imagine point to the signs of the
approach of the day of the Lord, and study the prophecies of the Bible for an
understanding of the ages so that they can recognize the day of the Lord.
But it was only in the Spirit
that John perceived that he was in the Lord’s day.
The day of the Lord is a realm above in the Spirit, and when we come to
be in the Spirit we find ourselves in the day of the Lord!
Jesus lived in the Spirit.
He always lived in the Spirit.
He walked in the Spirit.
He talked in the Spirit.
He ate, drank, slept, worked, and ministered in the Spirit.
Thus we plainly observe that all true spirituality is lived out in practicality.
We’re talking about a very practical daily walk!
Ah, my beloved, do not childishly wait for goosebumps to tell you that
you are in the Spirit! We can
be in the Spirit without any goosebumps, feelings, or emotions of any kind.
We can be in the Spirit while in the fire that has been heated seven
times hotter. The three Hebrew
children found themselves in the Spirit in the fiery furnace!
Daniel knew what it was to be in the Spirit in the lion’s den!
Noah experienced being in the Spirit on an ark in the dark, swirling
waters of the deluge! Jesus was in
the Spirit hanging upon a cross on Golgotha’s hill!
John was in the Spirit on the rocky desolation of an isle called Patmos!
Do you see it, my brother, my sister?
Being in the Spirit has absolutely nothing to do with chills and thrills
or electric currents running through our body.
Singing, dancing, and shouting are no evidences of being in the Spirit!
Loud and emotional preaching does not mean the preacher is in the Spirit.
Being in the Spirit is not a feeling, not an emotion.
It can be an emotion, but it
may not always be a favorable emotion! I
thank God for wonderful feelings and blessed experiences of all kinds.
I will not turn any of them down! But
that is not what it means to be in the Spirit!
If all hell breaks loose and my whole world crashes down around me, I am
still in the Spirit as I walk in the stability and victory of the Christ within.
John came to be in Spirit in the day of the Lord.
He didn’t come to be in flesh, moaning and groaning, demanding to know
why God allowed this to happen to him. He
knew he was a spirit-created man, he knew he was a son of God, he knew that he
was destined of God. His exile to
Patmos was not punishment for disobedience, it wasn’t due to a lack of faith,
it wasn’t because he had failed God, and it wasn’t that God had failed him.
Oh, no! John was right in
the center of God’s will on that horrible island, and there he gave himself to
be in Spirit. I’m sure he didn’t feel
very spiritual! He was hot and
sweaty, he had no shave cream, no shower, no soap, no deodorant or toothbrush,
no laundromat, and he was lonely and destitute.
If he identifies with his flesh, he’s a dead man!
But he came to be in Spirit. With
this scene filling our hearts perhaps we can approach with uplifted heads the
heavenly wonders John saw that day on Patmos as he beheld things which carnal
men can never understand. In the
Spirit he was carried beyond the flesh, beyond the world of Patmos with its heat
and flies and insects and scorpions and hopeless despair.
In Spirit we see the invisible, hear the inaudible, and understand the
incomprehensible! What man knoweth
the things of God save the Spirit of God that is in him? In the Spirit we know the things of God, we see as God sees,
understand as God understands, think as God thinks, speak as God speaks, act as
God acts, and live as God lives. Oh,
the wonder of it!
I now exhort all who read these truths to earnestly seek to live and move and have
your being IN THE SPIRIT. These
are things beyond the scope of the natural mind and beyond the power of the
natural man. But there in the Spirit you are a new creation, no longer of
the earth earthy, but one Spirit with the Lord from heaven.
There in the Spirit you stand no longer in the dark world of natural men
who live and walk after the flesh; you stand no longer in the insipid realm of
vain traditions, carnal programs, and wanton harlotry of the apostate church
systems; but you stand in the
light, wisdom, power, and glory of the DAY OF THE LORD!
The day of the Lord is not a date on the calendar.
It doesn’t begin one day and end another. It’s not a twenty-four hour day, a seven-year day, neither
is it a thousand-year day. The day
of the Lord IS. “God IS LIGHT,
and in Him there is no darkness.” That
is the day of the Lord! It is the
illumination of the light of God. The
day of the Lord is a condition that takes place within a people. It is the light, the understanding that begins to dawn in our
consciousness that elevates our awareness of God and the dimension of Spirit.
It is the understanding of the Almighty!
It is the revelation of God’s glory, majesty, will and purpose.
In Genesis God called the light “day” and Jesus said, “I am the
light of the world: he that followeth me shall not walk in darkness, but shall
have the light of life” (Jn. 8:12). Then
He said, “Ye are the light of the world!” (at. 5:14). And the apostle Paul by revelation added, “But ye,
brethren, are not in darkness, that
that day should overtake you as a thief. Ye
are all the children (offspring) of light,
and the children (offspring) of the day:
we are not of the night, nor of darkness” (I Thes. 5:4-5).
What is happening is that understanding is coming to us. Understanding is light!
Paul prayed for the Ephesian saints that “the eyes of your
understanding being enlightened, ye may know what is the hope of His
calling, and what the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints”
(Eph. 1:18). God’s called and
chosen elect in this hour is getting understanding!
We’re understanding God! We’re
understanding His Spirit, His ways, His will, His truth, His plan, His purpose,
His heart — so the day of the Lord is dawning in us!
The Day Star is arising in our hearts and the shadows and darkness are
fleeing away in the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of
Jesus Christ. Never have we
understood as we understand today! How
we rejoice in this day, that our eyes can see the things they see, our ears hear
the things they hear, and our hearts understand the things they understand!
The veil has been torn from our minds and from our hearts, and with
clarity we see God’s great plan and purpose in the earth, in the elect, and in
the universe! We see both sides of
the veil — the great cloud of witnesses all around us there in the realm of
the spirit, and the visible company of overcomers walking here in this world in
flesh bodies. And God is moving in
both realms, preparing for the manifestation of all
His sons! The true nature of all things is becoming crystal clear! For us,
the day of the Lord has dawned! And
it has dawned because we have “come to be in Spirit!”
Just as day and night co-exist on earth side by side, so the day of the
Lord and the gross darkness that covers the people co-exist side by side.
Just as Americans walk in the brightness of the noon-day sun at the same
time that Chinamen slumber in mid-night darkness, so there are both children of
the day and children of the night
in the world today. Some men walk
in darkness while other men walk in light!
They may dwell in the same house, work at the same job, or sit next to
each other in a meeting. Some men abide in darkness while other men abide in light.
The day of the Lord neither begins nor ends.
It simply IS. God has never
known anything but the day that HE IS! It
begins for us at that blessed moment
when, quickened by the Spirit of God, it consciously dawns
upon us, just as the natural day begins when we arise and greet the dawn.
The fact is, it has been day somewhere on earth all the while the veil of
darkness hung over us as a shroud. Day
has nothing to do with time. It has
nothing to do with dates. It has
nothing to do with the calendar. It
has nothing to do with the ages. It
only has to do with your relationship to it!
If someone asks when the day of
the Lord begins, I cannot answer. If
you can fly at the right speed in an airplane you can stay in the day all the
time. The sun will never set!
Traveling home from Europe Lorain and I were in the day for twenty hours.
The day of the Lord IS. Yet
almost all Christians in the church systems today are talking about when the day of the Lord is going to come.
It will come when they arise from their carnal-minded delusions and begin
to walk fast enough in the Spirit to STEP INTO IT!
That is how John got there, and that is the only way any man will get
there!
I do not believe that the day of the Lord is Saturday, or Sunday, or any
other day of the week. Sunday is
nowhere called “the Lord’s day” in the scriptures — it is always called
“the first day of the week.” Yet,
in nearly every book I have read on the book of Revelation, the author has said
that John was “in the Spirit on Sunday!”
The Lord’s day is not a time period at all!
The Lord’s day is a state of
being. As we become “light
beings,” illuminated by the light of God’s glory from within, we truly become the light of the world — the day of the Lord!
That is what the “unveiling” of Jesus Christ is all about!
It is taking off the veil from the glory of the Christ raised up in the
lives of His many brethren. That is
in process right now! We are now being changed from glory to glory by the Spirit of the Lord!
Christ is being formed in us! The
kingdom of God is being established in that earth which we
are! This, my beloved, is the
Lord’s day!
Oh, we are seeing with such clarity today!
The day of the Lord is a state of being that God’s elect is entering
into right now! Have you wondered
why you are able to see the deep
mysteries of the kingdom of God, while those about you are void of
understanding? Have you questioned
why the wonderful truths of reconciliation, sonship, and the kingdom of God burn
brightly within your heart, while they are meaningless to other believers? Have you pondered why the great plan and purpose of God in
this hour is so clear and obvious to you, whereas others reject it with
hostility? I will tell you why!
The day of the Lord has dawned in your land! The
Sun of Righteousness has arisen and when you awaken in the Lord’s day you can
see all things as they really are. You
are able to see backward and forward, for the Lord’s day is an eternal day,
having neither beginning nor ending, and in this day all things are revealed!
For some strange reason it is difficult for men to believe that the day
of the Lord is nothing more nor less than the glory
of the Lord Jesus Christ. They
would rather have a date on the calendar, a time period with a beginning and
end, than to have the glory of God
within themselves!
As we step into the Spirit in the day of the Lord something happens.
Great and marvelous changes occur. There
is divine activity that is taking place within us and out from us.
Something is happening to us,
something wonderful is happening in
us, and marvelous things beyond our understanding are happening out of us!
As we ascend in the Spirit all creation is being affected!
The events in the outer world are not things that are “just
happening.” Heaven casts its shadow upon the earth, and the great
spiritual things that are taking place within the heavenlies of God’s sons are
producing an effect in the earthlies. My
brother and sister, there is a strange and wonderful thing happening today, and
John saw it in Spirit while on Patmos. “And
another angel came and stood at the altar, having a golden censer; and there was
given unto him much incense, that he should offer it with the prayers of all
saints upon the golden altar which was before the throne.
And the smoke of the incense, which came with the prayers of the saints,
ascended up before God out of the angel's hand.
And the angel took the censer, and filled it with fire
of the altar, and cast it into the earth:
and there were voices, and thunderings, and lightnings,
and an earthquake” (Rev. 8:3-5).
This is a
scene in the heavenly temple of God which we are!
As the sweet odor of our prayers and praise and worship ascends before
God from the golden altar within us — there is produced an effect!
The prayers of the saints! The
prayers, praise, and worship of God’s elect in the heavenly realms of God’s
Spirit are not a useless exercise, they are part of God’s cosmic purpose.
Ah, we have missed the importance of our ministry unto God in the Spirit!
We have thought prayer was for “getting things” from God, blessings
and benefits for us and for our loved ones.
That is part of it. But the
spiritual priesthood ministry of God’s elect in the heavenly temple of God
which sheds itself in prayer, praise, and worship, is an important function in
the redemptive and reconstructive and restorational purposes of God!
There is a relationship between the decrees of God, the prayers of the
saints, and the deliverance of creation. As
our prayers and praise and worship ascend in the Spirit, the very coals from the altar that released the fragrance of the holy
incense of our spiritual ministry is CAST INTO THE EARTH!
The spiritual and divine fire of God which takes a cold, hard substance
(incense) and transforms it into a spiritual fragrance that wafts its way to the
throne and brings pleasure to the very nostrils of God, is cast into the earth
realm and mighty powers are released in the earthlies!
There are voices as the word of the Lord is released, and thunderings
as the power of God is manifested, and lightnings
as the illumination of God flashes within the consciousness of men, and a great earthquake
as the carnality of man, and the kingdoms of man, are shaken to their
foundations. Oh, yes! The
earth realm of our own life, and that of the world about us, is powerfully
transformed by the activity of the Spirit that comes out of the heavens of our
spiritual ministry in the heavenly temple of God!
As God moves us to minister unto Him in the Spirit He is urging us to do
what is necessary to enable things to happen in the way they are supposed to
happen in the earth realm. As we
pray, the fire from the censer of our lives is cast into the earth!
That fire produces the day of the Lord!
As we learn the holy purpose of our ministry in the high realm of the
Spirit in these significant days, there comes that deep inner consciousness that
somehow we are participating in a tableau and drama of history!
We are bringing the day of the Lord upon the earth!
No man can get into the Spirit in the Lord’s day and all things remain
the same. In the glory of God the
face of Jesus Christ is revealed! He
becomes revealed more and more. This
is where and how John saw the revelation of Jesus Christ — in the Spirit on the Lord’s day!
May God grant understanding to all who read these lines to see the great
truth that the day of the Lord will increase and increase in intensity and scope
until all darkness everywhere is illuminated and all shadows pass away.
The day of the Lord shall come upon all
men! In the day of the Lord the
haughtiness of man is cast down, and the Lord alone is exalted. The day is surely coming when the nations shall walk in the
light of this day and the kings of the earth shall bring their glory and honor
into it. The tabernacle of God
shall be with men, and He shall dwell with them, and they shall be His people,
and God Himself shall be with them and be their God.
This is true of God’s elect today!
But it shall be true for all men and all nations, and God shall wipe away
the tears from all eyes, and in all God’s vast universe there shall be no more
sorrow, neither pain, nor crying, and
there shall be no more death; for all the things of man’s day shall pass away
and all things shall be made new!
And there shall be no night there. These
words are true and faithful (Rev. 21:3-5).
The firstborn sons of God are
the day of the Lord, for upon them is risen the glory
of the Lord, and they are the light of
the world. Christ’s presence
is beginning to fill the whole earth and the glory of the Lord is risen upon a
people. This is not a fancy or a
fallacy, this is the sovereign work of God in the lives of those who have been
called to this Day. This is the
very truth, the very understanding as the Spirit has made it known unto His
chosen people, that we might know the counsel of God for this very Day.
Though multitudes continue to walk in darkness, the darkness of the world
of the carnal mind and of the carnal religious systems of men, you
shall walk in the Light! Many
stubbornly cling to those things which are passing, to the former orders and
moves of God that have ended, the relics of a former season of glory, but those
whose hearts have responded to the call to sonship are taking hold of those
things that are new. The former
heavens are being rolled up like a scroll and set aside.
There is a new order, a new heaven and a new earth for you today, saints
of God! The sun has risen higher in
the heavens and this Day is brighter than it has ever been!
Ascending in the Spirit we have stepped into the day of the Lord!
We must go forth and lead the way for all who will follow.
The day of the Lord begins with those who are enlightened,
cleansed from all error, bondage, and carnality, and clothed upon with the glory
of Christ’s presence, mind, and nature. The
day of the Lord begins with those who have eyes to see the true purposes of God
for this hour, and commit themselves to walk therein.
There is glory and power and rejoicing and praise ahead for those who
walk in the light of this day of the Lord!
This is the day of deliverance, not bondage.
The bands are broken. Christ
is conqueror! He reigns!
We are not expecting the antichrist nor the great tribulation, for we
have met the Christ, we have heard His heart, we have beheld His glory, and have
been made one with His purposes. His
hosts are invincible, and we are those hosts.
Our coronation draws nigh. We
are the city foursquare, the heavenly Jerusalem, and mount Zion where Jesus the
King is ruling and reigning. The
kingdom of God is within us! His
glory overshadows us! His light
emanates from us! Those who are
born of this word of the kingdom are now standing on kingdom ground.
“I was in the Spirit on the Lord’s day, and heard behind me a great voice, as of a trumpet…and I turned to see the voice that spake with me” (Rev. 1:10,12).
No sooner was John in the Spirit in the Lord’s day, than he heard a
voice behind him. It was the sound
of the voice that gripped his attention. John
responded to the voice and turned, was
changed, to see the voice.
The voice comes to turn us around, to change us!
It will change our thoughts, our perceptions, our understanding, our
purpose, our form, our substance, our very state of being.
Hearing the voice did not cause him to get in the Spirit, but being in
the Spirit John was able to hear the voice!
Those around him who were not in the Spirit in the Lord’s day heard
nothing.
This great voice, this majestic voice, this voice of power and authority
was as the voice of a trumpet. Let
us understand what a trumpet is. By
the Spirit we understand why John reacted so swiftly to the voice as a trumpet,
for the trumpet speaks of a prophetic tone
in which the Lord appears in the midst of His people. John hears that prophetic tone in the Spirit!
Many of us have heard that prophetic tone!
There is a time in prayer, in meditation, in waiting upon the Lord, in
the moving of the Spirit, in the sovereign operations of God in our lives, when
we become aware of the prophetic spirit, and in that prophetic spirit the Lord
Himself is descending into our experience and speaking, unveiling something of
Himself. It is beyond the letter of
the word! It is beyond a mere
blessing! It is the Lord Himself,
and we hear a word in the Spirit that can only be heard in the Spirit, and
behold a glory that can only be seen in the Spirit.
John understood something that few today understand — when you hear the
trump the Lord is descending out of
heaven! (I Thes. 4:16). Let us,
then, who are coming to maturity in our understanding, stand together with John
on that blessed day, and looking through the eyes of inspiration know once and
for all that the Lord descending from heaven in
the sound of a trumpet is not a future eschatological event, but a present
reality to all the blessed elect of God who come to be “in the Spirit on the
Lord’s day!”
John turned to see the voice that spake with him!
He turned to perceive the
voice, to discern the voice, to understand
the voice, to gain the knowledge of
what the Lord was saying and doing in the voice.
When we hear the voice of God it’s never where we expect it to be —
it requires a turning to see the
voice! When we think we know what
God is doing, and we have His ways and His will and His word all figured out, He
speaks in a new way never heard before and we must turn from the norm of our
spiritual experience to hear and see Him. The
presence of the Lord is so fresh, so new, so transcendent,
that it always demands a turning!
The voice John heard was the voice of the resurrected, ascended,
glorified Jesus Christ! Once he
heard the voice everything changed and wonders began to unfold. Before he heard the voice John was describing his own
situation on Patmos. As soon as he
heard the voice the visions of
glory began! The voice commanded
him to write the things he saw in a book and send it to the seven churches. There is not a man on earth who is qualified to speak God’s
word until he has heard the voice of the Son of God! And no word uttered by man will ever be effectual in the
lives of the hearers until that word is energized to go forth as a Living Word.
There is a tremendous value in words even in the natural realm.
All words are either creative or destructive.
All that happens every day in the world is accomplished by the power
invested in words. All the business
and transactions of men and nations are carried on by the power of words.
All the political and economic ideologies that have shaped movements and
determined the course of history and the destiny of billions of people and races
and empires have first issued as words which form their consciousness within the
minds and wills of men, who then actively create out of them the external form
and substance of them. The whole
Communist empire, for instance, with all its institutions, tyranny and powers,
was inspired and produced out of the energy of words
spoken and penned by a man by the name of Karl Marx.
Words printed or written on paper are powerful enough to imprison or put
to death a man, or to release him. Words
on paper are powerful enough to join a man and a woman in marriage, or to
separate them by divorce. Mere
words on paper are sufficient to make one exceedingly wealthy or to make one
penniless, to start a war or to bring peace, to establish a kingdom or to
dissolve an empire. Everything
works and moves by and through the power of words!
All words spoken form some level of consciousness within man which in
turn forms the world you live in. But
none of these words produces life
unless it is enriched by the spirit of
life from God! Many words
gender death.
The mystery of God is not far off in heaven somewhere. GOD IS THE WORD AND THE WORD IS GOD! Furthermore, THE WORD IS THE SPIRIT AND THE SPIRIT IS THE
WORD! “The words
that I speak unto you, they are spirit,
and they are life” (Jn. 6:63).
Words are the most powerful things in creation!
All things, visible and invisible, were created by God’s word.
“And God said, Let there
be…” (Gen. 1:3). “In the
beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
All things were made by Him; and without Him was not anything made that
was made” (Jn. 1:1,3). We are born again
by the word of God! “Being born
again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the word of God, which liveth
and abideth for ever” (I Pet. 1:23). The
Living Word is the LIVING CHRIST!
Christ is the perfect speech of God.
When the invisible and unknowable God desired to reveal Himself and
communicate Himself to mankind, He placed the substance of Himself in His Word,
and made that Word flesh, and caused that Word made flesh to dwell among men and
speak as God to men. Christ the
Word contains the pure essence and power of Life!
The words of Christ will form the consciousness and sense of HIS BEING
WITHIN, and of His world, so that you may live in it forever.
The presence of Christ places us in a position to hear the voice of God!
This is the voice we want to hear, not just any voice, but the voice of
the Living Spirit. I have witnessed
many men speak and preach
the words of scripture with great persuasion and nothing happened.
There is no “magic” or “mystical” power in the words of the
scriptures! The only power they
have is that they testify of CHRIST THE LIVING WORD!
They point to HIM WHO IS THE LIFE! When
men come to HIM they live! One can
preach great sermons and die.
But when one hears the dynamic living voice of the Son of God
transformation takes place! The
same Living Word that by its almighty power brought creation into existence was
made flesh and dwelt among us. The
Word was not made a book. The Word
was not made a teaching or a doctrine. The
Word was made flesh, divine substance in human form, the Son of God! That is the
Word that John heard! And that is
the same Word we hear today in the Spirit!
That Word is the voice, the living voice of the Christ within every son
of God. The same Word that came
into this world and conquered sin and death in the person of Jesus Christ is
being raised up in you and me in these days!
Here, Christ’s voice, as
John heard it, is compared to a trumpet.
Later John said, “After this I looked, and, behold, a door was opened
in heaven: and the first voice which I heard was as it were a trumpet talking with me; which said, come up hither, and I will show you things which must be
hereafter” (Rev. 4:1). Notice
this trumpet-voice told him to come up higher, so he could see the things God
wanted to show him. God’s
trumpet-message is always to come up higher!
It is sent because that is the great need of the saints and of all
mankind, to come up into the higher realms of the Spirit, for we cannot see the
glorious spiritual truths, nor behold the wondrous heavenly things, from the
lowlands of our carnal mind and childish religion.
Normally we “hear” a voice, but John said of the trumpet-voice that
penetrated his spiritual consciousness, “And I turned to see
the voice that spake with me, and being turned, I saw seven golden candlesticks; and in the midst of the seven
candlesticks one like unto the Son of
man” (Rev. 1:12-13). The One who
spoke with a “voice” as of a “trumpet” was in
the trumpet-voice, and it was in the
message of the voice that this glorious One was revealed.
I do not hesitate to tell you that this was the revelation of Jesus
Christ as He appeared to John IN THE TRUMP OF GOD!
“God is gone up with a shout, the Lord with the sound
of a trumpet” (Ps. 47:5). When
a rising time is due for God’s people, it may be said that God is “gone up,”
as taken from the lesson that He moved in a pillar of cloud and fire to lead His
ancient people, Israel. “With the
sound of a trumpet” signifies that His voice is being heard.
God’s voice and His trumpet are one and the same! It
is the sounding forth of His word! Many
messengers (His many-membered body) add volume to the sound of that trumpet.
Another passage speaks of “His voice as the sound of many
waters” (Rev. 1:15). John
also tells us that waters means multitudes of people! (Rev. 17:15). So God’s trumpet-voice is sounding through many people,
“many waters.” “And a voice
came out of the throne, saying, Praise our God, all ye servants, and ye that
fear Him, both small and great. And
I heard as it were the voice of a
multitude, and as the voice of many
waters, and as the voice of mighty thunderings, saying, Alleluia, for the
Lord God omnipotent reigneth” (Rev. 19:5-6).
John heard coming from the throne (divine authority) a message which he
said was a voice of a “multitude,” of “many waters,” and of “mighty
thunderings.” It was one
trumpet-message with many voices adding volume to it!
It was one message, but being
trumpeted by many voices, so that it became as the voice of a “great
thunder.” This shows the
beautiful unity between Christ the Head and His many-membered body!
The trumpet bespeaks of a clear word of God from the Spirit-appointed and
Spirit-anointed messengers, His ministers.
Trumpets are words, clear words, living words! The trumpet of God is His voice, His voice from heaven, His
voice in the saints; even the voice of the Holy Spirit through the consecrated
messengers of God. The trumpet is
the revelation of the Lord speaking through His people in an oracle of the
Spirit. The sound of the trumpet is
simply the PROCLAMATION OF A MESSAGE!
With a simple knowledge like this we should have no trouble at all in
understanding that our blessed Lord Jesus Christ, the Logos of God, is Himself
the trumpet, the message, the revelation! In
type, Jesus is the trumpet of God, delivering a clear sound, a living word,
introducing us to the reality of the perfection and incorruptible life of which
He is the beginning. Praise God, it
is the Lord Himself who comes in the trumpet-message, and at the sound of His
voice we are caught up with Him to
share the glory of His sphere of life. The
Lord Himself descends out from the highest realms our heavens (spirit) into the
lower realms of our earth. We are
the creatures God is creating to express His nature, power, and glory unto
creation. His purpose for coming
out of the realm of spirit into our earth is to catch our whole being up into
the realm of spirit, to swallow up all death into HIS LIFE!
And He accomplishes this by coming to us in
a trumpet message! It is the word that changes us!
Too numerous to mention have been the things God has taught us as we have
walked in the light of His ever-increasing truth.
Our minds have often been staggered by the wonderful things we have seen
and heard and our ambitions have been raised as we have gazed into the promised
land of the Spirit and have seen the innumerable and wonderful glories that lie
before us in the fullness of our sonship. We
are undoubtedly standing at the threshold of a new dimension in God, a higher
realm in the Spirit, and a new level of experience.
Like John, we have heard a voice as a trumpet!
When we come to a time like this, many will refuse to go on.
There is some strange thing inherent in all men that makes them reluctant
to leave the security of their fixed abode to press forward into the challenge
of the new. They feel that they have journeyed far enough and that the
effort to press into the new and more wonderful realm is too great a risk.
We tend to become rigid, settled, self-confident and crystallized, fixed
in our gaze and in our pose. In order for us not to miss the next phase of the unfolding
revelation of Jesus Christ, God has to sound a shrill trumpet into our hearts
that we might be alerted. God is
saying and doing a NEW THING! It is
time to go forward! It is the hour
to arise to the battle and possess our land, our full inheritance in God.
It is time to leave the first principles of the doctrine of Christ and GO
ON TO PERFECTION! It is time to put on the mind of Christ and be transformed by
the renewing of our mind! It is
time to live and not die! “Come
up hither!”
The trumpet-message is alerting our minds to the fact that the sons of
God who are being prepared to restore creation are not just ordinary Christians
with ordinary experiences. We have
tasted the earnest of our inheritance, and it is now time to arise and enter an
entirely new realm of experience in God. I
speak of the realm which is in truth the realm of the fullness of God, the realm
of incorruptible life and glory, the realm of the kingdom with authority and
power. Furthermore I am convinced
that those who have ears to hear the sound of the trumpet in this hour, and the
willingness to “come up hither" as the Spirit commands, will attain to
the glory of that new realm while the rest of the church world goes on as usual
in the old realm and on the old planes. Jesus is the revelation of this realm of which I speak
because He came forth as the Pattern Son and He speaks a clear sounding word.
He is the pattern of this heavenly sonship and He is the Alpha and the
Omega of it! He is the beginning of
the new creation of God, but you and I are following the forerunner, and just as
He trumpeted a clear sounding word, you and I are going to trumpet a clear
sounding word to the elect in this generation.
Let us take heed to how we hear, and how we speak and what we speak!
The order of man is passing. How?
BY THE SOUNDING OF THE TRUMPET! By
the very word of our mouth, because of HIM who speaks out of us!
We might compromise the message and bear a message of appeasement to the
old order of the religious systems, but what would that accomplish?
If a trumpeter blows an uncertain sound, how will you know to prepare?
If the trumpeter has no message, how is he going to speak?
“Blow ye the trumpet in Zion, and sound an alarm in my holy mountain:
let all the inhabitants of the land tremble: for the day of the Lord cometh, for
it is nigh at hand” (Joel 2:1). God
has commanded us to blow a trumpet in Zion and sound an alarm in His holy
mountain! Our job is to sound an
alarm in Zion, to awaken His elect, and let them know that THE DAY OF THE LORD
IS HERE!
God has a trumpet-message that is sounding forth because it is time for
His people to move into new territory. May
God grant us wisdom and understanding that we may apprehend the mystery of these
things. The trumpet-voice John
heard that day on Patmos later becomes
the seven trumpets sounding through
the Revelation! The seven trumpets
are like the seven eyes, seven horns, seven stars, and seven spirits — they
are the seven-fold fullness of God’s trumpet-message, the declaration,
proclamation of the process of His victory wrought out experientially within
each of us! Seven angels sound the
seven trumpets. Who are they? THEY ARE THE LORD! Know
this, and you will possess a great key to the book of Revelation.
It is the Revelation of Jesus Christ!
So when someone shows up under a symbol, doing something that originates
with God, who do you suppose it is? Why,
bless your heart, IT IS THE LORD! He
said in chapter one, “Behold, I come quickly.”
And throughout the book He comes, and He comes, and He comes, and He
continues to come! He comes as a
trumpet-voice. He comes as a Lion.
He comes as a Lamb. He comes
as seven spirits. He comes as seven
angels. He comes as a mighty angel.
He comes as the Son of man. He
comes as horses galloping out of a seven-sealed book.
He comes as a star coming down out of heaven.
We could go on and on. But
when an action originates out of God and out of heaven, under whatever symbol is
used — IT IS THE LORD! It is the
Lord coming to purge us, refine us, thresh us, perfect us, transform us, change
us, mature us, and conform us to the image of the Son!
As the trumpets sound within the lives of God’s people we begin to
experience the fullness of all that God is!
There has never been an expression of God at this level in the earth at
any time except in the person of our Lord Jesus Christ, for He is the firstborn
among many brethren. But now there
is a people that has been sealed unto the day of redemption, and when God begins
to loose the seals, sound the trumpets, and pour out the vials, it will bring
forth a many-membered expression of God at the same level of God’s fullness.
This is the revelation of Jesus Christ!
“And the angel which I saw…sware by Him that liveth for ever and
ever…that…in the days of the voice
of the seventh angel, when he shall
begin to sound, the mystery of God should
be finished” (Rev. 10:5-7). The
words, “In the days of the voice of
the seventh angel,” and the words, “begins to sound,” speak volumes to me
because the complete sounding of that trumpet involves a process in time and
shows us that our change which comes with the sounding of the seventh, or last,
trumpet is not to find its total consummation in one specific moment.
There is the obvious implication of a prolonged sounding extending
through various periods and dealings. Yet
at the initial sounding, the “mystery” of God’s purpose for His elect
shall no longer be hidden. Ah —
methinks I have heard this trumpet, for the mystery of God has been revealed in
the midst of the saints in these days! When
the seventh trumpet sounds a wonderful thing takes place — the manchild
is birthed, caught up to the throne of God, and rules the nations with a rod of
iron!
In the days when the voice of the seventh angel with his trumpet-message
begins to sound, the mystery of God shall be finished.
The mystery of God is God manifest
in the flesh! “Great is the mystery
of godliness: God was manifest in the flesh” (I Tim. 3:16).
This is also the mystery of Christ, that God was in Christ, and now God
in Christ is in us! Paul elaborates
upon this mystery in these words: “How that by revelation He made known unto
me the mystery; which in other ages
was not made known unto the sons of men, as it is now revealed unto His holy
apostles and prophets by the Spirit; that the Gentiles should be fellow heirs and of the same
body, and partakers of His promise in Christ by the gospel” (Eph. 3:2-6).
When you follow the word “mystery” through the writings of the
apostles it is clear that the mystery is the body
of Christ. In Ephesians 5:31-32
it is the mystery of the union of
Christ the Head with Christ the body in all the fullness that that means. It is time, my beloved, for the mystery of God to be
finished! Finished means completed or consummated. In the days of the voice of the seventh angel THE BODY OF
CHRIST SHALL BE FINISHED! Not just
quantitatively, but qualitatively. That
trumpet signifies that the Lord’s elect, the sons of God or the body of
Christ, have all been transformed into His image and likeness and grown up into
the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ! Christ the Head and Christ the body shall be joined in the
blessed union of fullness.
The mystery of God manifest in
the flesh will be finished!
The seventh trumpet signifies that the hour has arrived for the sons of
God or the body of Christ to come forth in birth, into full and complete
manifestation! This corporate
Christ, Head and body, this manchild company, shall rule all nations with a rod
of iron. Caught up to God and His
throne — into His authority! In
the days of the voice of the seventh trumpet-message the mystery shall be
finished, the body completed, the long and tedious work of preparation of
God’s sons shall at last be consummated.
The trumpet has begun to sound! There
is an acceleration of God’s revelatory word, an intensified trumpet-message, a
clear sound of the revelation of Jesus Christ!
Listen, my friend, for the sounding of the trumpet-voice within your
spirit!
If you can hear this trumpet sounding above the hue and cry of rapture,
antichrist, mark of the beast, great tribulation, denominationalism,
sectarianism, mansions over the hilltop, cabins in the corner of gloryland, pie
in the sky, religious programs, rituals, ceremonies, endless meetings,
coverings, bishops, cunningly devised fables, money raising schemes, false
prophets, false healers, lying signs and wonders, carnal health and wealth
prosperity doctrines; if you can mount up with wings as eagles and soar high
above all this carnal, confused, frustrated clamor of noisy gongs and clanging
cymbals, and hear the distinct, plain, unmistakable sound of this last trump,
then it can be said to you: Blessed art thou, overcomer, manchild, hundred-fold,
firstfruits; for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father
which is in heaven!
The seventh trumpet is the final redemptive message and when it is
finished sounding God will have made a man in His image! What tremendous truths are being blown on this redemptive
trumpet! Let not any man rob you of
the greatest sound that man has ever been privileged to hear!
A sound with such a high and holy pitch, with tones so deep and profound,
that only the Spirit can reveal its message to those who hunger and thirst after
righteousness. Do not miss what the Spirit is saying; gird up the loins of
your mind with the truth that will fully redeem you, spirit, soul, and body!
“I was in the Spirit on the Lord’s day, and heard behind me a great
voice, as of a trumpet. And I
turned to see the voice that spake with me.
And being turned, I saw seven golden candlesticks; and in the midst of
the seven candlesticks one like unto the
Son of man, clothed with a garment down to the foot, and girt about the paps
with a golden girdle. His head and
His hairs were white like wool, as white as snow; and His eyes were as a flame
of fire; and His feet like unto fine brass, as if they burned in a furnace; and His
voice as the sound of many waters. And
He had in His right hand seven stars: and out of His mouth went a sharp two
edged
sword: and His countenance was as the sun shineth in his strength” (Rev.
1:10-16).
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