Note: J. Preston Eby, in order to continue to devote his full energy to writing no longer works in the office and does not receive this email. He does, however, respond to any urgent correspondence via snailmail. |
|
To be added to the mailing list to receive the current issue of Kingdom Bible Studies each month: |
"Teaching the things concerning the kingdom of
God..."
Part 88
BREAKING
THE SEALS
(continued)
“And when He had opened
the third seal, I heard the third living creature say, Come! And I beheld, and lo a black horse;
and He that sat on him had a pair of balances in His hand. And I heard a voice in the midst of the four
living creatures say, a measure of wheat for a penny, and three
measures of barley for a penny; and see thou hurt not the oil and the
wine” (Rev. 6:5-6).
These words —
barley, wheat, oil, and wine are code words. They refer to the produce of the land of
Canaan, but more specifically to the three feasts of Israel. The seasonal observance of the feasts is a
perfect allegorical type of God’s redemptive processes within us! What most people miss about all this is that
the feasts of Israel are not just an Old Testament observance — they are a New
Testament experience! And these three feasts serve as the
background for the work of Christ as the Rider upon the black horse! Most commentators have missed this beautiful
truth altogether. Notice the spiritual
sequence: after the initial revelation of Christ riding into our earth upon the
white horse, beginning His conquest of our land (life) for God by quickening
and awakening us to Truth, the red horse gallops in bringing awareness of our
duality, the duality of flesh and spirit; and in the struggle that ensues
between these two identities peace is taken from our earth. Following this it is time for the springing
forth of the Christ-life within so that Christ may begin to be raised up in our
experience as life, power, and victory.
This is accomplished through the spiritual celebration of the three
feasts of Passover, Pentecost, and Tabernacles!
In our last study we considered the sheaf of the firstfruits of the barley
harvest that was waved before the Lord during the feast of
Passover. We know that our Lord died on
the Passover, for “Christ our passover is sacrificed for us” (I Cor.
5:7). He died on the afternoon of the
Passover as the sacrificed Lamb of God.
He remained dead and buried in the grave until the day after the Sabbath
when the sheaf of the firstfruits of the barley harvest was waved before the
Lord. Precisely at that time Jesus arose
from the dead as the firstfruits of the new creation! He ascended to the Father that same day (Jn.
20:17) to be, as it were, waved before the Father as the first sample of full redemption —
and the waving of the sheaf was fulfilled!
What then, does barley represent?
THE RESURRECTED CHRIST! And so it
is written, “But now hath Christ been raised from the dead, the firstfruits
of them that slept” (I Cor. 15:20). Yet,
it is not merely Christ raised out of the tomb two thousand years ago — it is
Christ resurrected and raised up in
us, the body of Christ! The
barley represents the beginning of the resurrected Christ rising up
within each of us to gain the victory over the flesh and show forth the beauty
and glory and power of His life within.
Now we come to the second feast, the feast of
Pentecost. Pentecost is also a feast of firstfruits,
even the firstfruits of the wheat
harvest which ripened after the barley harvest was complete. The firstfruits of the wheat harvest were
treated differently from the barley firstfruits. Instead of waving a sheaf of firstfruits, or
the first ripened grain, the wheat was ground into fine flour and baked into
two loaves along with leaven. Then, just
as with the barley sheaf, the two loaves of bread of the firstfruits of the
wheat harvest were taken to the priest and waved before the Lord. There was leaven in these loaves, which beautifully pictures the second firstfruit. Jesus, the first firstfruit of the barley
sheaf, was unleavened. Leaven is a type of carnality and sin. Our Lord Jesus was sinless, pure, undefiled,
and altogether holy! And so is the
resurrected Christ raised up out of our spirit!
Christ in our spirit, and as our spirit, is sinless, pure, undefiled,
and altogether holy! That is the new
creation within us. Yet as we follow on
to know the Lord we find that there is still a mixture — flesh and spirit, our
will and God’s will, our way and God’s ways, and even in our expressing of
Christ and ministering of Christ, there is so often a mixture of the self of
the flesh life and the pure spirituality of the Christ within!
The two loaves of the firstfruits of the wheat harvest
also represent the greater measure of the Spirit raised up in our lives through
the baptism in the Holy Spirit. The day
of Pentecost represents the time when the Holy Spirit was poured out and raised
up within the body of Christ in great power and glory. “And when the day of Pentecost was fully
come, they were all with one accord in one place. And suddenly there came a sound from heaven
as of a rushing mighty wind, and it filled all the house where they were
sitting. And there appeared unto them
cloven tongues like as of fire, and it sat upon each of them. And they were all filled with the Holy
Ghost, and began to speak with other tongues as the Spirit gave them
utterance” (Acts 2:1-4).
That is the power of a REAL PENTECOST! It is important that the feast of Pentecost
occurred at a separate point in time from the Passover and was different and
distinct from the previous feast. For
the second time all males were to appear before the Lord in the place of His
choosing (Deut. 16:16). Whereas Passover
was held at the time of the barley harvest, Pentecost was held at the time of
the wheat harvest (Ex. 34:22). Therefore,
we see that the feasts were associated with a progression in harvest, and speak of the ongoing process of
the development and maturing of His
life within His people. There
is a continuous process of sowing and reaping throughout our walk with the
Lord! We do not receive the life of our
Lord in full measure, or full blossom, or full fruitage at the time when Christ
first begins to arise in our life at the spiritual feast of Passover, but we
continually “put on the Lord Jesus Christ.”
We are being progressively changed into His image from glory to glory
until we finally arrive at the measure of the stature of the fullness of
Christ!
It will be obvious to every spiritual mind that the feast
of Pentecost is not the fullness of the Spirit anymore than is the
spiritual feast of Passover. The feast
of Pentecost was called “the feast of the harvest, the firstfruits of thy labours” (Deut. 16:9-12; Ex. 23:16; 34:22).
Pentecost was the “firstfruits” of the wheat harvest, and under New
Testament economy it is called spiritually “the firstfruits of the Spirit” (Rom. 8:23), the firstfruits of our
inheritance. Christ’s coming in the
feast of Pentecost saw Him descend on a little flock as the Comforter, which
coming Paul tells us was but “an earnest” (or sample) of the Spirit (II Cor.
1:22; 5:5). “Earnest” means merely a pledge or first
installment. The balance must
follow! Just as when you buy a house or
a car and put down “earnest money,” the fullness is guaranteed by that first
installment or down payment! The Baptism
in the Holy Spirit is the guarantee of our full inheritance in
God! “After that ye believed, ye were sealed
with that Holy Spirit of promise, which is the earnest (down payment) of our inheritance…” (Eph.
1:13-14). “Who hath also sealed us, and
given us the earnest (down payment)
of the Spirit in our hearts” (II Cor. 1:22).
Jesus came to earth as a manifest Son of God and the
scripture says that God did not give Him the Spirit by measure. In other words, manifest sonship means to
have the absolute FULLNESS OF THE SPIRIT OF GOD! No son of God will be manifested to creation
in either the feast of Passover or the feast of Pentecost, for both of these
feasts bring forth within us the life of the Spirit “by measure.” There are two measures here, the measure of
barley and the measure of wheat. Jesus
said, “I am that bread of life. This is
the bread that cometh down from heaven,
that a man may eat thereof, and not die” (Jn. 6:48-50). The living bread of God is measured out
to man — there are three measures of barley, one measure of wheat, and
then there is an unlimited supply of oil and
wine! It is in the three feasts
of Passover, Pentecost, and Tabernacles that we experience the life of God from
measure to measure, from strength to strength, and from glory to glory. Is that not precisely what the Holy Spirit is
telling us as the black horse gallops through our land and the Rider has a pair
of scales in His hand, and the cry is, “A measure of wheat for a penny, and three measures of barley for a
penny!” You see, it is all by measure! Yet, when we come to the oil and the wine
the word measure is not used!
The oil and the wine, as we shall presently see, are associated with the
feast of Tabernacles, which is the feast at the end of the year, at the time of
the ingathering of all the crops, when the vats are full and the barns
are overflowing! This is the fullness of
the Spirit, the Spirit without measure —
the manifestation of the sons of God!
“And I heard a voice in the midst of the four living
creatures say, A measure of wheat for a penny, and three measures of barley for
a penny; and see thou hurt not the oil and the wine” (Rev. 6:6).
These two principles — the wheat and the barley — are the
very principles revealed under the third seal as the black horse strides across
the scene. No sooner does the black
horse gallop into our land revealing the carnality in our lives, than the Rider
of the horse follows this action with the provision of barley and wheat! There is a divine progression here. As we forsake the darkness and futility of
the carnal mind (Egypt), there lies immediately before us the incredible
fruitfulness and plenitude of the land of Canaan — the realm of the
SPIRIT! As we enter into this land of
His fullness and glory and unlimited power an injunction is laid upon us — “and
see thou hurt not the oil and the wine.”
We are the people of His land, apprehended to be the priests of His
temple. The oil and the wine are the
fullness of God to which the barley and the wheat merely point. The sons of God who hitherto have feasted
upon the barley and the wheat, are now becoming custodians of His priceless oil
of sonship anointing and His precious wine of incorruptible life!
And yet — we do not enter into the fullness of the oil
and wine in the feast of Tabernacles as quickly and easily as we received the
blessings of the barley and the wheat!
The truth of this is illustrated by the fact that the voice commands,
“and hurt not the oil and the wine.”
Do not open it, do not disturb it, do not use it! It means that the oil and the wine are there
— but the time has not arrived for them to be opened, rejoiced in, and
appropriated! You see, by beloved, there
is only a small space of time between Passover and Pentecost, just fifty
days, to be exact. They are close
together because they are both feasts of the firstfruits. But there is a long space between
Pentecost and Tabernacles — the space of five months! We cannot move swiftly from Pentecost to
Tabernacles, for there are many experiences in between. Throughout the church age Passover and
Pentecost have been experienced in the lives of the Lord’s people, and
generally it has taken but a short time in our experience to enter into both
experiences. But during the whole church
age the people of God have not partaken of the feast of Tabernacles! “See thou hurt not the oil and the wine”
signifies that once we have experienced Passover and Pentecost, we are still
not yet prepared to lay hold upon the
last, the highest, the greatest, the fullest feast of all — THE FULLNESS OF GOD
IN SONSHIP! Throughout the entire church
age it has been prepared for us, yet God reserved it for another day, and we
could not enter in until the time appointed of the Father.
The feast of Tabernacles is the feast of FULLNESS! The natural feast in Israel was the
culmination of all, coming at the close of the agricultural season, when all
the products of the year, from field and oliveyard and vineyard, had been
gathered. It was also called the feast
of the Ingathering, the last harvest festival of rejoicing in the bounty of
God! The “present truth” is that
spiritually God has brought us to this time!
We have been moving through the feasts, and through the multiplied
dealings of our Father between the feasts, and God has now brought a
people to the threshold of the feast of Tabernacles. For a number of years now the Holy Spirit has
been witnessing through His apostles and prophets that we have finally arrived
spiritually at the seventh month, and we will now celebrate the final feast,
the feast of Tabernacles. The Amplified
Bible refers to this festival as “a holy feast.” And that “holy feast” of fullness has not yet
been completely fulfilled, because for two thousand years the saints of God
were restrained by the injunction, “and see thou hurt not the oil and the
wine!”
The feasts are no longer kept in the natural, but are
observed by the Spirit. Christ fulfilled
every one of the feasts within Himself.
In Him dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily! He has already experienced and appropriated
every blessing, benefit, and provision that God has ordained for mankind to
come into. He has conquered all sin,
sorrow, limitation, and death, and has ascended to the throne of the Father
where He has been given all power in heaven and in earth! We have experienced victory over sin, we have
risen above the storms and troubles of this life, we have been healed, spoken
in tongues, prophesied, heard the voice of God, done signs, wonders, and
miracles, and rejoiced in the wonderful gifts of God. All of these things pertain to Passover and
Pentecost. The only feast not yet
completely fulfilled is Tabernacles!
This feast will be fulfilled when we have entered the power and glory of
the kingdom of God in fully redeemed bodies.
Then the feast of Tabernacles shall be fulfilled in the absolute sense
as all power in heaven and in earth is given into our hands, for the Spirit
without measure shall be poured upon us from on high.
The fullness of the
Spirit imparted to the elect is the fulfillment of the feast of
Tabernacles. Receiving the fullness of
the Spirit also involves our bodily transformation, for the Holy Spirit,
through the apostle Paul, has clearly spoken, saying, “For we know that the
whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain (to be delivered from the
bondage of corruption) together until now.
And not only they, but ourselves also, which have the firstfruits of
the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption
(placement as sons), to wit, the redemption
of our body” (Rom. 8:22-23).
Again, “After that ye believed, ye were sealed with that Holy Spirit of
promise, which is the earnest (down payment) of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased
possession” (Eph. 1:13-14). The
“purchased possession” is the whole man — spirit, soul, and body! The scriptures show that the earnest of the
Spirit has been given to us to lead us to His highest and utmost. By His Spirit we shall make it all the way
into full redemption of the
purchased possession!
Let men now cast aside their pride of attainment. Passover is not the fullness. Pentecost is not the fullness. Pentecostal people love to call themselves
“Full Gospel.” There are people right
here in El Paso who say, “We’re a FULL GOSPEL church!” No they’re not! I am asked the question sometimes, “What is
the difference between what the Pentecostals and Charismatics preach and what
you teach?” Indeed, there are vast and
varied differences! But fundamental to
them all is the fact that they preach two
feasts, whereas we proclaim three. They preach two feasts and call them “Full
Gospel.” The truth is, they are but
two-thirds of the Gospel at best!
Passover is not the fullness! It
is but the beginning — the appetizer before the meal. It is the soup, the porridge made of barley! Pentecost is not the fullness — it is the hot
wheat-bread with butter placed on the table before the main
course!
There is yet another
feast, the feast of Tabernacles, the feast of the FULL HARVEST AT THE END OF
THE YEAR — the balance of the meal together with the oil and the wine! Tabernacles is the feast of ALL THE FULLNESS
OF GOD at the end of the year, the final experience into which the Lord’s elect
are graced to enter, at the conclusion of the age, all the power and glory and
wisdom and majesty of God to be manifested in the sons of God. This feast will bring the fullness of our
redemption in the whole man, and release to creation, with salvation and
blessing to all the nations. The glory
of the Lord will cover the earth as the waters cover the sea! There will be a MIGHTY OUTPOURING, A
TORRENTIAL DOWNPOUR OF OMNIPOTENCE!
Praise God for the earnest — but let us follow on to receive
the FULLNESS! Some profess to already be
walking in the glory of Tabernacles, but I must sadly confess that I have not
yet seen THE MANIFESTATION OF FULLNESS
FROM ANY QUARTER!
Our heavenly Father has been gracious and faithful to
give us our bread from day to day, from dealing to dealing, from realm to
realm. He has called us to His feasts
and has abundantly fed us in each. We
were called to the feast of Passover and began to eat of Christ as barley, in
the first rising up of His resurrection life within. Then He called us to the spiritual feast of
Pentecost in the baptism in the Holy Spirit.
How wonderfully He fed us there!
We feasted at His table upon the living bread of His Word and His Spirit
and partook of His power and glory in divers gifts of the Holy Ghost. But there is a third dimension in God where
we move beyond new birth and gifts into the very throne of God. The sons of God are now called to the third
spiritual feast, the feast of fullness!
Blessed are they who are called to this great feast, that which
supersedes Pentecost, that which is the BALANCE OF THE MEAL of which Passover
and Pentecost were merely first courses!
And the balance must therefore come, the remainder of the meal, which
will give strength to the laborers to go forth and accomplish great and mighty
things for the Master.
I believe I speak the truth when I say that many of us
have reached the point of no return — there is nothing to go back to, not in
the flesh, not in the world, not in the church systems; there is nothing out
from which we have been drawn by the Spirit of God to which we would return; it
is all so empty, so meaningless, lifeless, worthless; not worthless to those
who still need those things, but worthless to us in our quest for the High
Calling of God in Christ Jesus. Now we
must FOLLOW ON TO KNOW THE LORD IN HIS FULLNESS! It is vain to come out, unless we
are committed to enter in. It
is not enough to come out of the flesh, out of the world, out of religious
Babylon, unless we are prepared to cross our “Jordan” and possess the land of
Canaan. We are committed to a course
which cannot be altered, for it is fixed in its destination — His throne! “To him that overcometh will I grant to sit
with me in my throne, even as I also overcame, and am set down with my Father
in His throne” (Rev. 3:21).
We
do not desire the throne for what we can get out of it, for our own fame,
interests, or fortune, but for the infinite potential it holds for blessing and
restoring creation. Today the world is
full of broken hearts, the hospitals are crowded, the cemeteries are being filled,
sin, sorrow, warfare, poverty, and injustice abound, even nature itself is
groaning. You go down to the seaside and
you can hear the sob of the waves, you go to the mountains and you can hear the
low sigh of the wind in the tree tops, you walk through the forest and you can
hear the anguished shrieks of the animal kingdom. Creation is groaning, waiting for the
manifestation of the sons of God!
Some in this hour have
watered down the revelation of manifest sonship, making it something less than
what God intends. They have abandoned
the hope that the sons of God will go forth in a ministry of signs, wonders,
and miracles, touching men’s lives with the power and demonstration of the Holy
Ghost. They seem to think that we are
just going to stand in our little sonship gatherings and “speak the word” and
creation will be set free. But God has
never done it that way! The firstborn
Son of God, a manifest Son of God if there ever has been one,
didn’t do it that way! And that first
manifest Son by His indwelling in His body throughout the age has not
done it that way! These folks scoff at
the idea that the sons of God will actually minister in the fullness of the
power of the Spirit, and literally empty the hospitals, call men out of the
funeral homes and cemeteries, deliver the creation from the bondage of
corruption, reveal the secrets of men’s hearts, break the power of sin and
rebellion, convert the ignorant, the deceived, the hateful, the terrorists, the
drug lords, and all wickedness of men, turn nations upside down, and transform
the whole world, establishing the kingdom of God in every heart, in every
people, and in every nation. Let me ask
you — if the manifest sons of God don’t empty the hospitals, doctor’s offices,
mortuaries, and all the hell-holes of this world, WHO IS GOING TO DO IT? CREATION WILL NEVER BE SET FREE FROM THE
BONDAGE OF CORRUPTION UNTIL SOMEONE DOES
IT! Let’s get real!
There is a mystery
about the feast of Tabernacles. It is
the only one of the three feasts of Israel that as yet has not had an
earth-shaking fulfillment. The
fundamentalists know Christ in the feast of Passover. The Pentecostals and Charismatics know Christ in the feast of Pentecost. We ourselves have joyfully witnessed some of God’s great deliverances,
signs, wonders, and mighty acts in these realms! But who is there among us that has
demonstrated a glory or power beyond
Pentecost? Just having “deeper
revelation” and “feeling something wonderful in the spirit” in a meeting does
not mean you are walking in Tabernacles!
Therefore, the feast of Tabernacles has not been celebrated in a
spiritual dimension by the Lord’s people the world over as has been the case
with the other two festivals, those of Passover and Pentecost. Truly we can say — Passover has
come, Pentecost has come, and Tabernacles must come, for each
is a part of God’s great plan for His people!
We have had the feasts of Passover and Pentecost and both
of these feasts have been fulfilled IN THE NEW TESTAMENT AGE OF THE CHURCH,
which is His body, and right here upon earth.
For some strange reason men seek to postpone the last feast to some
future age, or give it to the Jews, or relegate it to some beautiful “Isle of
Somewhere,” and consequently the real spiritual meaning and import of the feast
of Tabernacles is completely obscured and lost. The grand truth is that like the others, the
feast of Tabernacles will be fulfilled in the body of Christ RIGHT
HERE UPON EARTH! It will be fulfilled
individually, it will be fulfilled dispensationally, and it will be fulfilled
in us as the Corporate Christ.
The grand truth of this has been wonderfully quickened by
the Spirit of God to multiplied thousands of saints around the world in these
days at the transition of the ages. All
over the world at this particular moment in history, the Spirit of God is
speaking to the elect about an imminent manifestation of Christ. The trumpet has sounded — the appointed time
has come! Believers in every nation
under heaven have heard the voice of the prophets, foretelling of this most
awesome intervention of God’s power that is about to sweep the earth.
The prophetic word of
the Lord gives promise of a time to come when the Lord will move mightily by
His Spirit. At that time the Lord will
restore that which was lost all through the ages past and the long night of
man’s selfhood and rebellion. There is
an event soon to take place that shall overshadow and eclipse all former,
lesser, manifestations of God’s glory and power in the earth. The glories of this great event will
inspire, initiate, and bring to fulfillment the times of the restitution of
all things. The grandeur, the
splendor, the glory, and the great power of God to be manifest at the time of
this great event is impossible to comprehend presently, for we are still living
and moving, for the most part, under the economy of the “firstfruits” of God’s
Spirit. Therefore we press forward to
partake of that greater and more
glorious feast — with the oil and the wine!
What sets the feast of Tabernacles apart from all others
is the abundance enjoyed during the feast.
It’s the fall harvest. At the
celebration of Tabernacles, not only had the barley and wheat been harvested,
but also all other grains, the fruit trees, the olives, the grapes, all that
could possibly serve as food or drink. The harvest was complete. On the spiritual plane this points to the
fact that God has been using His people everywhere to whatever degree He has prepared
the vessel for that revelation of the Christ.
There has come a beautiful unfolding of His purpose, the outflow of His
life, and the manifestation of Himself throughout this church age, right up to
the present time. But there shall yet
come the ultimate, the total, and complete revelation of Jesus Christ — not a
narrow, limited thing, not to get a number of people saved and filled with the
Spirit, and healed and blessed and used — but the kingdom of God coming with
power and great glory! As an expression and a manifestation of God in His total
capacity with no limitations, with all the power, with all the glory, all the
might, all the majesty, all the authority, so that nations shall be swept into
the kingdom of God, creation delivered, and the last enemy, even death,
destroyed from off the face of the earth for evermore. What bright and glorious prospects loom
before the vision of all who press on to the feast of Tabernacles!
Since
the church’s birth almost every generation has experienced something of an
outpouring of the Holy Spirit. Most of
these moves would have to be characterized as something less than
worldwide. They swept communities,
cities, states, provinces, even nations at times, but few, if any, were
global. But now, beyond the strength and
influence of the feasts of Passover and Pentecost, there has been released from
heaven in the last several years an intense sense of expectancy. It is the expectancy that ALL HEAVEN is
about to break loose in the midst of the Lord’s elect on a worldwide
basis! Do you identify with that
expectancy?
God is raising up
voices in every hamlet and metropolis to say, “The earth is about to see the
glory of God in a most remarkable way!”
I am convinced that a host of heavenly messengers has recently been
released to every corner of the earth bearing the message: “And the glory of
the Lord shall be revealed, and all mankind together shall see it, for
the mouth of the Lord has spoken it!” (Isa. 40:4, NIV). What I am proclaiming,
announcing, and declaring is that there is a third experience in
God! The Rider on the black horse has
revealed that this feast of the oil and the wine would come to pass long
after the feasts of the barley and the wheat had been experienced by God’s
people. But now the hour has come to
“hurt” or “open” and “distribute” the oil and the wine — without measure! There is
an appearing and manifestation of the Lord that is going to come to pass in the
body of Christ today, right here upon this earth, and the implications of this
feast go far beyond anything you or I could possibly imagine!
Oh, what a grand and
glorious realm lies before us in the feast of Ingathering! As George Warnock has pointed out, it is the
day of the full fruit of the Spirit! The
day of Perfection! The time of full and
complete redemption, spirit, soul, and body!
The full and complete experiencing of HIMSELF! The fullness of Strength and Power and Glory! The Feast of feasts! The strange part of the whole thing is this,
that the whole purpose and plan of God for this new day of the kingdom of God
is completely obscured and lost amidst the shout and euphoria over the
“firstfruits” of the Spirit which we received at Pentecost. Those who glory in the “firstfruits of the Spirit”
do not even know what this day is about!
They can see the healings, deliverances, miracles, prophecies, gifts…and
so forth; and they understand not that it is God in His great mercy inviting
His people to enter on in to their
full inheritance. They do not
realize that all this is but the foretaste, the appetizer, and the earnest of
their heritage, and that God bids us arise and come away with Him to the great
Feast that lies before!
God is speaking to His people today and saying to us as
He said to Israel at mount Sinai, “You have kept the feast of Pentecost long
enough…you have enjoyed this realm to the fullest. It is time to move! Pack up your tents and begin to move!” The church world today has no vision for
what is about to happen. All it can
think about is getting raptured away into the clouds. Our prime concern is to prepare the ground
for the truth concerning the feast of Tabernacles, which surpasses the glory of
Pentecost, as the noon-day sun surpasses the brightness of early dawn. Oh, how I yearn and travail for the manifestation
of this new thing in God! Yes, there are
many who claim to have already apprehended this high place in God, and I do not
doubt their revelation; perhaps in some measure they have received the
experience; but I do not hesitate to tell you that nowhere in all the earth, or in the lives of any of
my precious brethren, have I seen the manifestation
of Tabernacles!
When the saints catch only a glimmer of the glory of the
feast of Tabernacles which even now looms before us, they cannot possibly cling
to the stagnant remains of yesterday’s visitations. If Passover was wonderful — and it certainly
was — how much more wonderful has been Pentecost! And if Pentecost is glorious, how much more
shall we expect Tabernacles to exceed it in glory! And even now as the first faint rays of this
glorious feast appear on the horizon, we have every reason to rejoice — knowing
that the days of deliverance and restoration are here!
Although God has His “time” for everything, the marvelous
reality is that in this hour the journey from the feast of Pentecost to the
feast of Tabernacles is not primarily a matter of chronology of time or
distance, but a chronology of experience! One does not get from the feast of Pentecost
to the feast of Tabernacles by a date on the calendar or by a trip through
space — we get there by an experience in
God. It is not now a sequence of times
or locations, but a sequence of growth, experience, life, and
reality! God’s called and chosen
elect is beginning to move into a new dimension in God, the veil is being drawn
back, the seal is being loosed, and we are seeing that there is another whole
realm of reality that we never knew about in the church systems. There is a whole other feast, food that we
knew not of, an entirely other dimension of being in God, another vast
realm of glory that brings us into the very fullness of God!
Passover and Pentecost have not delivered creation from
the bondage of corruption. Our
“revelation” of sonship, the most holy place, and the feast of Tabernacles has
not delivered the creation either!
Therefore creation still waits and groans and travails for the manifestation of the sons of God! We must have more than revelation, we must
have more even than experience — there must the MANIFESTATION! The book in the right hand of Him who sits
upon the throne is a wonderful book, glorious things are written therein, but
they mean nothing to us or to creation until the seals are broken and there is an UNVEILING, a MANIFESTATION. Only the fully manifest sonship ministry can
save this old world, demolish the systems of men, transform the hearts of
humanity, establish the rule of the Spirit, and break off from all men and
nations the bondages of sin, sorrow, sickness, fear, deception, limitation,
torment, hatred, tyranny, and death!
Ah, my brother, my sister, we have only seen the edges of God’s ways,
the borders of His mind, and the fringes of His power, until the fullness of
His great redemption is raised up within us!
To be continued… J. PRESTON EBY
Links to other ministry websites
Not finding what you need? SEARCH HERE
Search this site or the web powered by FreeFind |