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 email. He does, however, respond to any urgent correspondence via snailmail.

Donations

HOME       WEBSITE LINKS

To be added to the mailing list to receive the current issue of Kingdom Bible Studies each month:

 PLEASE CLICK HERE

 KINGDOM BIBLE STUDIES

"Teaching the things concerning the Kingdom of God..."

 

The Kingdom of God

Book Four

By J. Preston Eby


Table of Contents

Chapter                   Title                                  Page

42.                    The Increase of the Kingdom                                    3

43.                    The Increase of the Kingdom (cont.)                        14

44.                    The Increase of the Kingdom (cont.)                        29

45.                    The Increase of the Kingdom (cont.)                        43

46.                    The Increase of the Kingdom (cont.)                        57

47.                    The Increase of the Kingdom (cont.)                        70

48.                    The Increase of the Kingdom (cont.)                        84

49.                    The Increase of the Kingdom (cont.)                        96

50.                    The Increase of the Kingdom (cont.)                        106

51.                    The Increase of the Kingdom (cont.)                        120

52.                    The Increase of the Kingdom (cont.)                        133

53.                    The Increase of the Kingdom (cont.)                        143

54.                    The Increase of the Kingdom (cont.)                        158

55.                    The Increase of the Kingdom (cont.)                        170

56.                    The Increase of the Kingdom (cont.)                        184

57.                    The Increase of the Kingdom (cont.)                        198

58.                    The Increase of the Kingdom (cont.)                        211

59.                    Qualifying for Kingdom Dominion                           224

60.                    Qualifying for Kingdom Dominion (cont.)               238

 


Chapter 42

THE INCREASE OF THE KINGDOM

A Pentecostal, Charismatic or Fundamentalist Christian who has been fed the “dispensationalist” scheme  of things has only a future concept of the Kingdom of God.  On the other hand, there are those who preach a “right now” word about the Kingdom, the present reality of the Kingdom, but conclude that the present expression and manifestation of the Kingdom is all there is.  They have no concept of any progressive or future dimensions of the Kingdom.  I do not hesitate to tell you, my beloved, if what I have seen of the Kingdom up till now is all there is, then the Kingdom will never be victorious, triumphing in all realms!  If the present activity and power of the Kingdom is all there is, I believe I have reason to fear that it will never break in pieces, subdue and consume all other kingdoms as the prophets have prophesied, and all nations will never come to worship before the Lord, God’s will will never be fully done on earth as it is in heaven, and God will never be all in all!

Those who read these lines are, for the most part, God’s very elect, a people beloved of the Father, a people chosen and predestinated to sonship, the most enlightened and obedient people out of all the children of God on the face of the earth.  But if what you and I currently have in God is all there is, then the power and glory of the Kingdom is most limited, and the hope of creation is cut off.  There is a glory yet to be revealed in us!  There is a manifestation of the sons of God that all creation is still groaning and travailing to see.  There is an age, and there are ages yet to come of Kingdom increase, for it is in those glorious ages to come that God shall put on display before the whole creation, in and through the saints, what are the riches of His grace and kindness toward all men (Eph. 2:7), and of the increase of His government and peace there shall be no end (Isa. 9:7), and in the dispensation of the fullness of times He shall gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven, and which are on earth, even in Him (Eph. 1:10).

Unknown to mankind as a whole, yet clearly revealed in the prophecies of the scriptures, the plan of God for man’s salvation, transformation and eternal happiness has been progressing steadily onward in an orderly and systematic manner.  The experience of evil, man’s participation in the heartbreak of sin and the anguish of death, God’s dealings with Israel, the sending of the Son of God into the world as the Redeemer, the formation of the Church and the preparation of the sons of God have all been steps in God’s great plan.  They have all been paving the way for the glory that shall be revealed when God shall set His hand to save all the nations, restore all things, and fill the whole earth with His glory as the waters cover the sea.

We can only grasp God’s great plan of the ages when we understand that God has a goal and a timetable by which He works, and His dealings with men are different at various times and stages of history, according to the need, in order to advance His Kingdom program.  God has manifested His power and glory in different ways at different times and for different purposes.  As the great pendulum of the ages has relentlessly ticked away the centuries and millenniums one second at a time, God’s Kingdom has come, and continues to come from glory to glory, from realm to realm, from stage to stage, until it shall be all-triumphant and all-encompassing.  The great and glorious consummation of the Kingdom has not yet come, but it is coming, it is on the way, and it is right on schedule.  When God’s timetable reaches a certain point, His dealings with mankind will again undergo a dramatic change.  His power and glory will be manifested in an altogether different way from what it has been during the age now ending.  We are right now standing at the point of transition into the new age of God’s great Kingdom purposes!

Every time God brings a fresh revelation and new experience to His people many of them are prone to say, “This is IT!  This is the ultimate truth and the crowning glory of God!  This is what it is going to be!”  At the beginning of this past century when God brought the baptism in the Holy Spirit with speaking in tongues, many of those people believed that such was the last great move of God.  They had come out of Holiness and Evangelical Churches and the Lord led them into a blessed new experience.  Very quickly they settled down in it.  For fifty years they organized and systematized it and Pentecost became one of the more respected denominations among the church systems.

In 1948 God moved again with power and great glory.  It was called “Latter Rain.”  Rain, whether it be the former or the latter, or showers between, is the Lord coming to His people.  The Lord Himself came in the Rain!  When this outpouring began, again we found many people believing that was it, this was God’s greatest and final move, and thousands have settled for the blessings and manifestations which characterized that move of the Spirit as being permanent.  Already the clammy arms of the sectarian octopus have crushed its vitality and sucked the life-blood from it.

So God moves on!  God brought Luther out of the Roman Catholic denomination, but God did not desire to stop there.  The Holy Spirit drew the Wesleys out of the Church of England, but again He did not stop there.  Latter Rain was unquestionably a shower of great refreshing and quickening power, but God did not stop there, and He is not stopping with any of the present-day movings, manifestations or dealings of His Spirit.  His pathway is ever onward and upward, from glory to glory.  What anticipation this stirs in our hearts!  The fact is there will never be any stopping with God for He ever moves ahead, and “of the increase of His government and peace THERE SHALL BE NO END” (Isa. 9:7).

The present emphasis of the Holy Spirit is upon the imminent manifestation of the sons of God.  We are privileged to be living in blessed days of preparation for this grandest of all events, days fraught with holy and awesome responsibility for God’s elect.  But I would be remiss if I failed to acquaint the saints with the fact that even the placing of the sons of God is not the last revelation, nor the final act, in God’s great drama of the ages.  It is easy for the apprehended ones to settle down in the beautiful hope of sonship to God.  But God will move on, beloved,  making sonship, too, but a stepping-stone to realms higher and grander, for, as sonship is not the ultimate reality or position in the natural life, neither is it in the spiritual life.  We praise God for the call to sonship, and with bated breath await the glory of its unveiling, but the crowning glory of God remains to be demonstrated in the age of the ages yet to come.  Saints of all ages have stood in awe, wondering in great amazement as in spirit they caught faint glimpses of the divine mystery of God’s purpose of the ages, and deep within my ransomed being lies the sacred knowledge that even this marvelous reality of sonship, glorious and far-reaching as it is, is NOT THE ULTIMATE IN GOD!

God has put His hand to the task; He is ready to grasp the whole world and, through the ministry of the manifested sons of God, switch it onto another track, changing its course and destination.  I tell you, dear ones, we are not waiting nor preparing our hearts in this hour to behold the dawn of the Kingdom; as sons of God we are laborers together with God in inaugurating the next stage of the Kingdom.  We shall work and work, minister and minister, reign and reconcile and bless and deliver and transform all nations and all men and all realms and all worlds and all ages until we accomplish the end.  “Then cometh the end, when He shall have delivered up the kingdom to God, even the Father; when He shall have put down all rule and all authority and power.  For He must reign, until He hath put all enemies under His feet.  The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death” (I Cor. 15:24-26).  If it takes a week, a month, a year, a decade, a century, a millennium, a billion years or a trillion years, it matters not one whit the Kingdom of God shall increase and expand and triumph until that blessed day when from pole to pole and from sea to sea and throughout all the unbounded heavens everywhere God shall be ALL IN ALL.

Let the truth sink deeply into the heart of every saint of God who now reads these lines, the great and glorious truth that GOD HAS A PLAN.  God’s plan is His aionian plan, His wonderful PLAN OF THE AGES.  God is not an experimenter doing test procedures and making trial runs, driven to His wit’s end by clever and cunning enemies, just doing the best He can as occasion demands.  Let the notion forever perish from our minds that God is something like a chess player arduously straining for opportunities to out- maneuver an expert opponent (the devil).  Oh, no!  The great Architect of the ages drew out His plan before ever He commenced the vast work of creation and redemption, and those plans were complete, in both principals and details, long before He spoke the first angel or atom into existence.  The wonderful goal of creation, and the methods and means for attaining that goal, were settled before ever a star twinkled in the night sky or brook babbled over mountain rocks.  In this wise and magnificent plan the UNSEARCHABLE WISDOM of God is exhibited, His INEXHAUSTIBLE RESOURCES revealed, His INFALLIBLE JUDGMENT displayed, and His IRRESISTIBLE POWER manifested.  And now, in the midst of our present distresses and travail, our faith quietly rests in the blessed assurance that the end will justify God in all His ways.  The triumphant declaration of the prophet is, “As for God, His way is perfect,” and “He maketh my way perfect” (Ps. 18:30,32).

THE PROGRESSION OF THE KINGDOM

From the very heart of events from the morning of creation there can be observed a gradual development of everything that came from the hands of the omnipotent Creator.  From the lips of the almighty Elohim came that irresistible command of the word of God, “Let there be!”  And there was.  But it was not a single command, the heavens and the earth were not formed in an instant nor fashioned in one day, by one divine word.  Again and again there issued forth the majestic proclamation, “Let.”  Let there be light.”  “Let there be a firmament.”  Let the waters be gathered.”  Let there be lights in the firmament.”  Let the waters bring forth.”  Let the earth bring forth.”  Let us make man.”  Dispensations had come and gone with their Cain and Abel, Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Moses, David, and the prophets before our Lord Jesus explained to the inquiring Nicodemus, “Except a man be born again, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.”  And now through the dreary years of every century since Jesus proclaimed the Kingdom of God with power and birthed His anointed body in the earth, the blessed Holy Spirit has been planting within the believing hearts of men and women the seed and power of that ever-increasing Kingdom and, wonder of wonders, yet true to God’s progressive purpose of the ages, that incorruptible seed is ready to bring forth a company of sons of God in the fullness of the nature, power and glory of God’s firstborn Son and Christ.

It cannot be otherwise!  All things have a beginning, followed by various stages of development, formation, growth, and increase until ultimately comes the fullness and perfection.  Space travel did not begin by sending a man to the moon.  Men first jumped off cliffs, trying to fly with crude, homemade wings.  Then men flew in balloons.  The Wright brothers invented the first airplane, and other types of aircrafts followed until the Russians startled the world by sending their Sputnik into orbit around the earth, inaugurating the space age.  Today we are sending space probes throughout our solar system, and it is only a matter of time, if God permits, until Star Trek will move from science fiction to living reality.  Can we not clearly see by this how it is that each and every step was required in the grand and epochal work of creation and redemption.  For six thousand years the race has witnessed the natural evolution of civilization, human government, science, economics, medicine, and technology.  Nothing ever happens overnight!  But all things move inexorably forward.

How old is this earth of ours?  How long were each of the creative “days” in which the word of God brought forth the things now seen and enjoyed by mankind?  Nobody knows of a certainty, but the evidence is on the side of antiquity, a million years might be conservative.  It takes a vast stretch of time eons, indeed to produce coal and diamonds and a variety of other natural resources of earth.  It reminds me of a story I read once about a little boy with a small shovel.  He was trying to clear a pathway through deep, new-fallen snow in front of his house.  A man paused to observe the child’s enormous task. “Little boy,” he inquired, “how can someone as small as you expect to finish a task as big as this?”  The boy looked up and replied confidently, “Little by little, that’s how!”  And he continued shoveling. Progression is a divine principle rooted in the very way of our omniscient Creator!  He took seven days (epochs, periods) to create this world in all its beauty and splendor.  Notice how He began by creating first the grass, then the herbs, and then the trees, followed by the sea creatures, then the winged fowl, then cattle, then the great beasts, and finally the greatest miracle and crowning work of all man in the likeness and image of God! The implications of such a marvelous, precise and determinate process is staggering to the imagination, and it is small wonder that our elder brother, whose name is The Word of God, by whom and through whom all things were made, has instructed us with these words of wisdom and understanding, “So is the kingdom of God, as if a man should cast seed into the ground; and should sleep, and rise night and day, and the seed should spring and grow up, he knoweth not how.  For the earth bringeth forth fruit of herself; first the blade, then the ear, after that the full corn in the ear” (Mk. 4:26-28).

God is revealing His Kingdom plan to us piece by piece, revelation by revelation, and from each piece of the puzzle revealed to us, we know that the entire, completed picture will be beyond our wildest imaginations!  I do not profess today to have all the pieces of the puzzle nor to understand all the mysteries of the Kingdom of God.  But of one thing I am very confident I do possess the next piece of the puzzle!  And so do all the sons of God!  I can assure you today that the next thing on God’s agenda is the manifestation of the sons of God!  The ministry of God’s Son-company will bring to pass the subduing of the living nations of earth to the dominion and glory of the Kingdom until the heavenly words are fully fulfilled, “The kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our Lord, and of His Christ; and He shall reign to the ages of the ages!” (Rev. 11:15).

When our lovely Lord Jesus came into this sin-cursed world bringing the word and power of the Kingdom, He ushered in a new and glorious age.  But it should be clearly evident to all who have eyes to see and hearts to understand that the blessings of the new order did not, and have not, come to all men.  Even in Jesus’ day not all the blind received their sight, not all the lame were healed, not all lepers were cleansed, not all demons were cast out, and only a few dead were raised.  Multitudes of deformed, sick, diseased, tormented, sinful, lost, and dead men in Palestine remained untouched by the life of the new-born Kingdom of God.  Rome remained pagan and the unnumbered millions of humanity of all the nations throughout the ends of the earth had not even heard that God had sent  a Redeemer and a Christ!  The saving power of the Kingdom was not universally operative.  It was resident only in Jesus and His “little flock” of footstep followers.  The mighty signs of the Kingdom wrought by Jesus and His early disciples were but a token, an earnest,  a parable and prophecy, not the fullness nor the consummation.

It is very doubtful that any in those days had the remotest idea that it was the Father’s intention to take the next two thousand years to complete the great work of preparing the kings of the Kingdom. Jesus came to bring in the new age of the Church, the seedbed in which the Kingdom could grow and develop to its next stage.  When the conditions are fully ripe for this next stage of the Kingdom, this age will completely pass away.  How our glad hearts rejoice in the sacred knowledge that we are standing even now at the door of the next new age and the greater glory of the Kingdom that it brings!  Oh, the wonder of it! Sonship!  Sons of God and joint-heirs with Christ receiving power over the nations to rule them with a rod of iron!  Sonship is the hope of all creation and the joy of the Father’s heart.  The manifestation of the sons of God is now ready to bring to fruition the desire of all nations.  The hopes and dreams of all the years for peace and righteousness and blessing and life upon the teeming billions of the nations of this benighted planet are met in the unveiling of God’s sons, the increase of the Kingdom for the new age.

When all the ages have passed, and the sun has set on every progressive stage of the unfolding of God’s glorious Kingdom, there will be no more deaf or blind  or leprous or demon possessed or crime or violence or wars or sin anywhere.  Death shall be swallowed up in life!  Here we discover the mysterious law of the Kingdom.  Its blessings entered the old age of the law, introducing a new order of life for all who would believe.  This new order of the Spirit that Jesus brought is not the final age, nor even the age before the last age!  The blessing and glory of each new age is rooted  in the previous age and springs forth from it.  The new age of the Kingdom upon the nations is not by any stretch of the imagination the closing dispensation in God’s great plan of the ages.  Oh, no!  A new age is hidden in this present age, as the blade is hidden in the seed, and another even more glorious age is hidden in the new age now dawning, just as the stalk is hidden in the blade.  Another age will proceed from that age and on and on and on until the dispensation of the fullness of times (Eph. 1:10).  Thus did the Holy Spirit speak through the apostle Paul, “But God, who is rich in mercy, for His great love wherewith He loved us, even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ: and hath raised us up and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus: that in the ages to come He might show (demonstrate, put on display, reveal) the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness toward us through Christ Jesus...that in the dispensation of the fullness of times He might gather together in one all things into Christ, both which are in heaven, and which are on earth; even in Him” (Eph. 2:4-7; 1:10).  The issue is not in doubt.  The Kingdom of God moves onward from stage to stage, from age to age, to its inevitable triumph: THE RESTITUTION OF ALL THINGS.

Well did Paul Mueller write: “As the ages unfold in harmonious and ordered progression, all the attributes of God will likewise unfold to be revealed in a vast and increasing manifestation.  As we have already shown, grace is increasing as is righteousness, peace and joy.  When one age ends, the spiritual characteristics of that dying age do not end.  Rather, each divine aspect of the previous age is raised up to a higher spiritual level of fulfillment and is then carried over into the next age.  Thus, the grace of God will not end with this age, but will increase because the Lord has raised it up to a higher order.  All the other attributes of the divine nature that we have known in the past will not decrease but will be fulfilled in a greater measure, and manifest in increasing fullness to the saints of the new order.”  Amen and  amen!

It is impossible that our Father of grace, mercy, love and power should endure forever the moral entanglements and spiritual darkness of the world.  Creation would be a tragic failure if nothing better than our mixed circumstances of good and evil, of truth and error, or light and darkness were to continue forever.  The present condition of the world does not justify its existence or vindicate the creation of man. There is something better to eventuate!  The present is only tolerable as a stage in the vast process of God’s creative genius.  The forecast of scripture anticipates a time when evil will have run its course, and when all that remains obstinately and persistently evil shall meet with swift, severe, stern measures of judgment and doom.  Jesus came into the world to “seek and to save that which was lost,” to be the “Saviour of the world,” and to “give life to the world.”  He was born, He lived, He taught, He labored, He worked miracles, He gave Himself a sacrifice for sin, He died, He rose, He ascended up far above all heavens, He poured out His Spirit, He sent forth His apostles to establish His Church, to raise up His body in the earth.  And is that all?  If so, it is not enough!

The very purpose of the Christ’s coming demands something more.  We are not satisfied with such a climax.  So far as it goes, it is well, but it does not go far enough.  Sin, sickness and death still stalk the world.  If Jesus came to be the Saviour of the world, to give life to the world, but the world still lies in the power of the evil one, and is “not of the Father,” something is missing!  The nations are angry and there are wars and rumors  of wars.  Deceit, plunder, greed, lust, hatred, bigotry, tyranny, sorrow, pain, trouble and poverty plague all peoples and nations.  If what we have had for two thousand years is all there is, and the last thing we are to see on earth is a miserable handful of Christians getting ready to die or be evacuated away to some far-off heaven somewhere, then Jesus’ mission was a failure, and He might as well have remained in heaven so far as planet earth is concerned.  If the ages of the future are to go on in endless repetition of what has been; if the age-long battle between Christ and Belial, between righteousness and evil, between the Church and the world is to continue forever with only slight advantages to one side or the other, but without a definite outcome of victory for one of the sides; if there is to be no progress or decisive and triumphant conclusion  to the fact of Jesus Christ being the SAVIOUR OF THE WORLD, and the PRINCE OF THE KINGS OF THE EARTH, then there is an incompleteness about the entire message of the Kingdom of God which is not to be reconciled with the omniscience and omnipotence of our heavenly Father.  What is begun here on this planet is to be finished here!  If Christ came to save the world and rule all nations with a rod of iron, then His work is not finished until the world is saved, and the nations are subjected to His glorious rule!

There should be no need to remind any who read these lines that there is much more to come for this sin-weary world!  It is somewhat like touring a beautiful and spacious mansion.  Entry into the foyer is only the beginning.  It would be unfair and misleading to judge the whole house by what is first seen, or to conclude that nothing more remains to be seen.  Likewise, it is unfair to judge the whole Kingdom of God from the standpoint of this present Church age.  This age has been but the foyer, the introduction to the grand and glorious Kingdom of God!  The extent of the riches of God’s kindness and the excellence of His glory will only be revealed in the age and the ages to come as the Kingdom expands, unfolds, and intensifies from glory to glory.  This age is but a small segment of the rule of God for the ages!  This age is not the whole stage for that rule.  It is merely the scenes in the First Act.  In these few scenes a great drama is being played the outcome, however, is assured, for the Finger of God has been lifted up in the person of Jesus Christ.  These scenes will give way to greater scenes when “the righteous will shine like the sun in the Kingdom of their Father,” and all creation shouts for joy at the manifestation of God’s sons!

For those who lived during the Second World War and suffered the terrible consequences of that conflict, one of the most important days of this past century was D-Day.  That was the day when the Allied Forces landed on the beaches of Normandy and won the decisive battle against Hitler’s army.  True, it would still take another year for V-Day, or Victory Day, to occur, but it was D-Day that delivered the death blow to the Nazi enemy and guaranteed its ultimate defeat.  For all of us who live with sin, sorrow and death and who suffer the terrible consequences of their destructive power, the most important day in all human history took place some two thousand years ago just outside Jerusalem.  That was our spiritual D-Day!  For when Jesus walked out of the tomb alive He won within Himself and for every son of God and for all humanity the decisive battle over satan, sin, and death!  Ah, we still see the effects of these enemies in our violence-filled world, in our broken-down and abusive relationships, in our weaknesses and fears, in our disease-ridden and aging bodies, and self-centered attitudes.  But as surely as there has been a D-Day in the Kingdom of God, just that certain it is that there shall also be a V-Day!  That’s where the sons of God stand at this moment between D-Day and V-Day!  The battle is on, but the victory is sure, and the sons of God are pressing their way forward to overcome all things in this great Day of the Lord.  This glorious victory will herald the day of manifestation and usher in to the visible world the next stage of THE INCREASE OF THE KINGDOM!

Long centuries ago in far-away Babylon the aged prophet Daniel received this challenging and assuring word from the Lord: “And they that be wise shall shine as the brightness of the firmament; and they that turn many to righteousness as the stars for ever and ever” (Dan. 12:3).  Our blessed Lord Jesus Christ is the bright Morning Star (Rev. 22:16).  There are many other stars besides the Morning Star in God’s glorious celestial realm, His spiritual heavens.  Here the signification of stars is identified with the saints.  Each member of God’s elect is one star in God’s spiritual universe.  You are a star in God’s economy!  You are appointed to have an eonian fixed position in God’s heavenly Kingdom as a star, as a shining one, as a luminary.  There are different degrees of glory to the stars, “There is one glory of the sun, and another glory of the moon, and another glory of the stars: for one star differeth from another star in glory: so also is the resurrection of the dead” (I Cor. 15:41-42).  As one star outshines another in glory so is it in the incorruptible Kingdom realm of God.  Stars have different dimensions of glory.  The greatest of all stars signified to us is as the Sun Himself, Jesus Christ our Lord.  But there is a vast multitude of stars possessing differing degrees  of glory in the Kingdom of God but they are all called “wise” stars and they all “turn many to righteousness,” therefore they burn as bright lights in the Father’s Kingdom.  Stars are bright lights that give light where there is darkness.

I am sure most of my readers are familiar with the old song, “Will There Be Any Stars In My Crown?”  There is no scripture to indicate that the saints will wear “starry crowns,” but there is scripture which is greater by far!  It is the privilege of all who treasure the beautiful hope of sonship to dwell upon the bright hope of this marvelous promise, “And they that be wise shall shine as the brightness of the firmament; and they that turn many to righteousness as the stars for ever.”  God’s universe embraces all places.  This little world of ours, and each star and sun and  planet and moon are but tiny grains of sand on the seashore of infinity.  Each one is small indeed in relation to all the rest of the systems, and in relation to limitless space.  A conception of its magnitude can be gathered only from the stellar worlds themselves.  What are those stars, in the likeness of which the wise teachers of righteousness are to shine to the age and beyond?  How much brightness, and majesty, and length of days is involved in this analogy?

There are stars, as, for instance, Arcturus, which emits light equivalent to one hundred fifty-eight of our suns; Capella, one hundred eighty-five; and so on, until at last we reach the great star Rigel, in the constellation of Orion, which floods the celestial spaces with a brilliance fifteen thousand times that of the ponderous orb which lights and controls our solar system!  Why, then, does it not appear more luminous to us?  Ah, its distance is equivalent to thirty-three million diameters of the earth’s orbit; and the latter is one hundred eighty-six million miles!  Figures are weak to express such distances and sizes.  It will be sufficient to say that its glowing light must traverse space as only light travels one hundred eighty-six thousand miles a second for a period of more than ten years before it reaches this world of ours.  There are many other stars which are hundreds of light years from our solar system.  A few years pass away, and all things earthly gather the mold of age and the odor of decay as the desert winds blow the swirling sands over the  crumbling ruins of ancient empires.  But the stars shine on in their glory as in the beginning.  Centuries and cycles have gone by, kingdoms have arisen and slowly pass away.  Yet the stars’ brightness is not dimmed, nor their force abated.  The dew of youth still seems fresh upon them.  No faltering motion reveals the decrepitude of age.  These shine on in undiminished glory through all the ages of time, for they are the lights of the ages.

Thus shall those wise and blessed sons of God shine who turn the inhabitants of the world to righteousness.  Thus shall their ministry and their years roll on from age to age until that wonderful age of the ages, the dispensation of the fullness of times wherein everything in heaven and on earth and throughout all realms is gathered together into one in God’s Christ and God becomes All-in-all.  What glories lie beyond this, we cannot yet know, but methinks there will be more worlds, further universes, vast new creations from the hands of God and His sons who, in Christ, become the Word by which the creative power of God brings forth His pleasure and purpose forever.  God has always been a Creator, for He has always been all that He is.  God will always be a Creator, for should He stop creating, He would cease to be God!

Of this we may be sure: We who are redeemed have entered a progressive institution, a Kingdom in which stagnation will never enter.  We will ever go on “from glory to glory,” for “of the increase of His government...THERE SHALL BE NO END!”  We will never come to the place where we can sit down with folded hands and say, “This is the end.”  The end of one creation, of one order, of one plan of the ages, will only bring us to the next.  We who have been born into the heavenly realm, have entered a stage of action, we have become active agents in the greatest development program ever conceived.  A whole universe awaits our touch and guiding hand.  “What is man, that Thou art mindful of him?  Thou hast put all things in subjection under his feet.  For in that He put ALL in subjection under him, He left N-O-T-H-I-N-G that is not put under him.  But we see not yet all things put under him (man).  But we see Jesus crowned...” (Heb. 2:6-9).  Surely these words can mean nothing less than UNIVERSAL DOMINION!  Away out there in the blue is a Kingdom of life and light and love for every son of God to explore and develop and perfect.  And if ever, in all the countless ages to come, that Kingdom should become too small or overcrowded for its citizens, let us remember that we, being as He is, are therefore, one and all, the very same kind of Beings as He who simply spoke the word, and lo! the present worlds appeared.  Being like Him, we will also be creators, one and all, and not destroyers, as in our human state.  “WE SHALL BE LIKE HIM.”

God says that men enter His heavenly Kingdom by being born into it (Jn. 3:5).  Men do not die to go to heaven, they are born there.  And then after they are born into that state after they become heavenly beings they can lay up, by their obedience to the heavenly Father, heavenly riches which will not only be a place, but royal pomp and splendor and majesty and dominion beyond compare.  Sonship does not only entitle one to residence in God’s limitless and eternal domain, but to the ownership and rule of that domain. Ah, the sons of God are heirs of God and joint-heirs with Christ their Lord, who is the heir of all things!  Oh, that it were possible to lift men up above the shadows, and give them just a glimpse of something higher!  Mortal minds are so entirely inadequate; human eyes so dim; human ears so dull!

Heaven is not a mansion over the hilltop, nor the gratifying of the needs and desires of this vessel of clay.  It is not that which will bring creature comfort.  It is not a state of eternal creature enjoyment and rest.  The celestial realm is something infinitely higher.  It is eminence, power, majesty, glory.  It is becoming the same kind of a Being as the One who made the worlds (Jn. 10:34-36; I Jn. 3:2), and will bring, not inactive rest with fluttering wings and strumming harps, but activities and accomplishments far surpassing that of earth’s mundane limitations.  And it includes kingship and priesthood over God’s eternal and infinite domain.  It is dominion and power and influence far above that which carnal minds can contemplate or even imagine.  And then the place which we receive after entering this heavenly state is not heaven, but that which we receive as a consequence of our entrance into the celestial sphere.  The place is the reward which faithful heavenly beings will receive as their very own, a part of their inheritance, heavenly real estate!

The stars are distant lights.  They shine in other spheres.  There is no doubt that vast numbers of these stars are “suns” like unto our own, the centers of great solar systems, with heavenly bodies that revolve around them, perhaps populated by beings of which we know nothing at this present time.  Thus will it be in the Kingdom of the Son, in the spiritual heavens of God’s universal and eternal dominion.  Each son of God will be a star, a sun, shining forth in living and everlasting luster.  Each member of the elect will faithfully radiate his beams of life and light and love, shining in those spheres which the omniscient Father shall allot to them.  Thus each shall become the central star of a spiritual solar system composed of myriads of creatures in God’s glorious creation which revolve around them, unto whom they shine as the revelation of God’s nature, glory and power.  And thus shall the scripture be fulfilled, “Then shall the righteous SHINE FORTH AS THE SUN in the Kingdom of THEIR FATHER.  Who hath ears to hear, let him hear” (Mat. 13:43).  The Kingdom does not become the Kingdom of “the Father” until Christ, having put all enemies under His feet, including the last enemy death, delivers up the Kingdom to God, EVEN THE FATHER, and God becomes all in all (I Cor. 15:24-28).  What glorious and ineffable prospects lie before us!

LIKE A SEED

The Word of God contains mysteries which little by little are opened to us like the opening of a rose.   In His wonderful Kingdom parables Jesus revealed the great mystery of the progression of the Kingdom from stage to stage and realm to realm.  He said, “The kingdom of heaven is like unto a grain of mustard seed, which a man took, and sowed in his field: which indeed is the least of all seeds: but when it is grown, it is the greatest among herbs, and becometh a tree, so that the birds of the air come and lodge in the branches thereof”(Mat. 13:31-32).  Again, “Behold a sower went forth to sow; and when he sowed, some seeds (the word of the Kingdom) fell by the wayside, and the fowls came and devoured them.  Some fell upon stony places...some fell among thorns...but other fell into good ground, and brought forth fruit, some an hundredfold, some sixtyfold, some thirtyfold.  Who has ears to hear, let him hear” (Mat. 13:3-9).  And yet again, “The kingdom of heaven is likened unto a man which sowed good seed in his field: but while men slept, his enemy came and sowed tares among the wheat, and went his way...” (Mat. 13:24-25).

In this illuminating teaching Jesus reveals to His disciples the nature of the Kingdom of God.  He teaches them how to know the mysteries of the Kingdom.  What mystery is it?  Ah, before anything else, it is the truth that the Kingdom comes as a seed into the midst of men, seemingly the smallest, most insignificant, weakest and most defenseless thing there is.  It can be devoured by the fowls, it can choked by the thorns, it can be scorched by the sun, and sometimes it can hardly be distinguished from the tares.  That is the secret of the Kingdom!  But just as life lies hidden within a seed, and springs forth in power and unfolds in beauty and substance to become a mighty tree, so the Kingdom of God has entered this world in the person of Jesus Christ and now the world is full of the redemptive power of God.

What a wonderful thing is vegetation!  Look at this tiny acorn.  Little sign does it give of the vital energy locked up within it the costly diamond is more promising!  But plant that diamond, plant it carefully in the richest of soil, under the most favorable conditions.  Let your descendants ten thousand years hence visit the spot.  No dazzling tree is there, flashing with countless jeweled leaves.  Nothing is there but just what you planted an unchanged, cold, dead diamond, perhaps much depreciated in value.  But the acorn an autumn wind sweeps through the forest; that little brown, seemingly dead acorn falls to the ground.  The hoof of a browsing deer presses it beneath the sod.  There it lies in its grave  an unnoticed thing.  But the germ of a great life is in it.  The winter chill breaks away, amidst spring showers the sun warms the earth, the finger of its secret power touches its inner life, and, lo, the little brown nut is quickened, swells, bursts, roots, springs forth, grows, develops, and by the time your descendants visit the spot the whole earth is filled with mighty oaks!  As the acorn embodies the tree in embryo, but is not the oak tree in extenso, so is the Kingdom in this age within the hearts and lives of God’s elect.  But God’s elect shall, in due time, fill the earth with the power and glory of the Kingdom.

The mighty king Nebuchadnezzar beheld in a dream the same wonderful truth under another figure, and the aged prophet Daniel interpreted the king’s dream with these words, “Thou sawest till that a stone was cut out without hands, which smote the image upon his feet that were of iron and clay, and brake them to pieces.  Then was the iron, the clay, the brass, the silver, and the gold, broken to pieces together, and became like the chaff of the summer threshing floors; and the wind carried them away, that no place was found for them: and the stone that smote the image became a great mountain, and filled the whole earth” (Dan. 2:34-35).  The revelation in this instructive experience of Nebuchadnezzar is that the Kingdom of God comes into the earth, smites the kingdoms of man until they no longer exist as the kingdoms of man, and the Kingdom of God increases until its glory and dominion fill the whole earth.

God has a wonderful plan for the earth!  The firstborn Son of God came into the world, the cross of Christ was placed in this world, and Christ arose here, and poured out His Spirit here, and began to conquer the hearts of men here, and to build the new society of His Kingdom here.  It is this effective power of the increase of the Kingdom in the earth that Jesus unfolds in His parables of the mustard seed and the other seeds.  The seed is planted in the earth.  The seed is very small but the tree is very great, the birds lodge in its branches and people seek shelter under its leaves.  The Kingdom seeks the people and the ends of the earth and the heights of the heavens and the depths of the underworld.  The Kingdom of God, which began as a small seed in these vessels of earth, has the very life of God in it.  The Kingdom seed, which is Christ, is growing within us to become a great tree in the earth.  The growing, increasing, and expanding Kingdom of God in the earth is forcing man out of the picture.  And the mighty and all-glorious Kingdom of God shall continue to grow and expand in the earth, and in the whole universe, until there is nothing else, but only GOD.  He shall fill all things with the glory that He is, until He shall truly be all in all.

A dear brother with whom we correspond shared the following in one of his letters.  “I recently took a sack of acorns to my Sunday School class and passed them out.  I asked the class what they could see in them.  Then I compared the acorn to the word of the Kingdom.  Starting small it produces an oak tree, which then produces many trees,  which produce a forest.  When man rightly “divides” the Word, bringing his chain saws, then planers, table top saws, jig saws, etc., from one acorn comes a fine home, then a subdivision, then an entire city.  Inside the homes the acorn produces trim, shelves, closets, and beautiful furniture. All from one acorn, one seed and that seed is Christ!”

The notion that there is but one single age of the Kingdom, or the “Kingdom Age” as it is called, is foreign to scripture and contradictory to God’s great purpose.  God’s Kingdom plan is a “plan of the ages,” not one “Kingdom Age.”  The ages of the Kingdom of God stretch into infinity!  “Of the increase of His government and peace there shall be no end” (Isa. 9:7).  That doesn’t sound like one age or a mere thousand years to me!  Ah, the purpose of God is a purpose that encompasses the ages, and the Kingdom of God is a Kingdom that progresses and triumphs through the ages.  As Jesus taught, it is like a farmer planting his seed in the soil.  He makes the field ready and plants the seed in the ground.  The seed lies buried under the earth, lost from sight, of course.  If I had my way, I would expect a field full of corn tomorrow morning!  After all, I put a lot of time and energy and money to prepare this soil and plant this seed.  I did the right thing.  I sowed the seed.  An experienced farmer understands, however, that it is going to take time for the seed to sprout, to grow, to develop through all its stages, and ultimately bear fruit at harvest.  The consummation doesn’t come immediately nor instantly, but in season.  Seedtime and harvest!  That is God’s method of operation in everything He does.  It’s been this way since the beginning, when God took six “days” to fashion the heavens and the earth, and it will continue to be His way throughout all the limitless ages.  The Lord is ambitious.  He enjoys growth and expansion!  That is the way of His plan and purpose, always.  Do not despair, precious one, if the work of God in you seems very slow.  As long as there is some progress, however infinitesimal it may appear to the eye, GOD IS AT WORK!  He will never leave you nor forsake you, He will not abandon the work of His hands, nor will He turn from His purpose in you.  God will complete that good work He has begun in you!  Oh, yes, He will!  You see, this is the deep mystery of the Kingdom of God.  Jesus has taught us that it comes like silent leaven, grows like a grain of mustard seed, develops like corn, which is “first the blade, then the ear, after that the full corn in the ear.”  Of the increase of His government and peace within you and in all the earth beneath and the heavens above, there shall be NO END!  Eternal increase!  God has only gotten started!

I heard a brother relate the following experience.  He said, “It was 1977, and I really lost half my crop.  It was a bad, bad year.  It was so wet, I couldn’t get half of it harvested and it didn’t develop.  So, at the end of the year, in October, I would walk through the fields and try to pick up a bushel here and a piece there.  Then, I saw standing by itself a most extraordinary soybean plant.  I walked over and I was shocked by its size and its good looks.  I went and I carefully picked off the pods.  There were 202 pods and I opened them and I counted out 503 soybeans and I took them home.  I kept them in a pan all winter, and they dried out.  The next spring they just seemed special to me.  In 1978 I took those 503 soybeans and I planted them in a little plot behind my house.  When October came I harvested 32 pounds!  32 pounds!  I dried them out in the winter, and in 1979 I took those 32 pounds and planted them on one acre.  When October came, I harvested.  I had 2,419 pounds.  Well, next spring was 1980 and I took those 2,419 pounds and planted them on 68 acres, which was all the land I had available.  In October I harvested 2,100 bushels and cashed it out for $15,000 dollars!  Now, one bean stalk four years later, $15,000 dollars.  Not too bad, is it?”

What a beautiful modern day parable this is of the Kingdom of God!  The extraordinary seed this farmer discovered in his field in the midst of desolation and ruin represents the only good seed to ever spring forth in the presence of the sin, darkness and death of earth's benighted ages.  This good seed, this extraordinary seed, is our blessed Lord Jesus Christ, who is the Word of God.  It is a very good seed, for it is the germ of spiritual life.  It is the incorruptible seed.  When this seed was planted in the earth it began to grow vigorously and brought forth first the glory of the early Church.  Then, from move to move, from visitation to visitation, from revival to revival, from dealing to dealing this seed has grown and multiplied and reproduced in the earth and now it is time for the cash crop that will bring blessing to all the families of the earth the manifested sons of God.  The sons are the increase of the Kingdom of God within the Lord’s elect.  Within that first, extraordinary seed was a preview of the Kingdom when Christ with His entire body of sons will appear in the glory of  sonship.  And that, precious friend of mine, is how the Kingdom of God will also increase and expand from age to age throughout the ages of the ages with the unending increase of God!  Think about it!  Just as Jesus was the first seed for this age, bringing forth a harvest of many sons, so the sons are the first seed for the next age.  What an increase of the Kingdom they will bring! And the harvest out of the age now dawning will be the seedbed for the age that follows after that.  And of the increase of His Kingdom there shall be NO END!

Man’s God gets bigger each time a man grows.
His Lord becomes greater, the more a man knows.
One time, a lone mountain, His total domain.
He grew with His people, Their gain was His gain.
In Israel’s small country, they centered His grace
He stayed with His people, their place was His place.
He grew with their concepts, He grew with each thought.
Bigger and bigger grew all that He wrought.
From sacrificed creatures...to sacrificed wills.
From temple that held Him...to heavens to fill.
From war with the heathen...to love for all men.
He grew, and He grew, and He grew...again.
I know God is constant...His size cannot change.
And never, no mountain, could limit His range.
God’s quart in our pint?  Such greatness in man?
God shows us as much, each day, as He can.
A soul that is hard...sees not the Lord’s kindness.
A person that’s rude...sees not the Lord’s fineness.
As children we’re apt to misunderstand.
So oft’ misinterpret, the heav’nly command.
We limit God’s size...  ‘cause we are so stunted.
It’s not the Lord’s fault, that we are thus runted.
As we grow in grace...as we grow in love..
So groweth our God...we keep learning of!
    By Bob Robin
    (Used by permission)

 


Chapter 43

THE INCREASE OF THE KINGDOM

(continued)

As I begin this message on THE INCREASE OF THE KINGDOM I am moved to share these words from the pen of brother Paul Mueller.  He writes, “With each revelation and manifestation of Christ to His people, the Truth that He is increases, the Life that He is increases, and the Light of His glory increases, so that we know Him in greater fullness than we did previously.  When Christ appears to His elect, as He is doing now, He comes in His increased presence.  How wonderful to know the Christ of increasing truth, life, light and glory!  He was revealed and manifested as the Latter Rain in 1948-1953 (Hos. 6:3).   Since then, Christ has been revealed and manifested as the Living Word.  He appeared within us as the Living Word, not in a manifestation of outward glory as in previous visitations, but to impart His word of truth in a hidden manifestation of Himself.  And to know and experience Him in His greater glory as the King of kings and Lord of lords, as the One who increases in glory, is more spectacular than any previous manifestation of Christ.  His glory, as revealed in us now, will do more for the needy of the world and for the creation than anything of the past.  Also, the work of the Holy Spirit within us is to guide us into all truth, and show us things to come (Jn. 16:13).  And when He shows us things to come, we have no desire to continue in the old ways of the past.  Therefore, the glories of the past dim and fade from view when compared with the glory of His present revelation and manifestation.  The glory of Christ increases with each revelation of Himself (Isa. 9:7).   Thus, the revelation and manifestation of Christ as the King of kings and Lord of lords is a far greater glory”   — end quote.

The increase of God’s Kingdom extends to all realms everywhere, but the reality and power of the increase of God’s government is first experienced in our individual lives.   Each of us is a microcosm of the macrocosm.   You say, “How do I get to the place of maturity and fullness in the Kingdom?”  Well, as I heard brother Bennie Skinner say one time, you don’t get there by pulling an acorn out of your pocket now and then, and saying, “I’ve got an oak tree.   Everybody look at my oak tree!”  There are a lot of people that are presuming things, they are talking as though they have arrived, or they are settling for the measure they have and are calling it manifested sonship.  They are manifested sons, they say, and they have even now entered into the fullness of God, they have already put on incorruption and immortality — but they haven’t even planted the acorn yet!  They have heard the message of sonship and the kingdom, they have been quickened in the revelation of this word, they can spout out all the terminology and doctrine of it, and speak all the high-sounding phrases and clichés, but live a low-sounding life.  “Amen, brother Eby, that’s the truth if I ever heard it!” they shout, and then go on living their carnal lives.  They have their oak tree in an acorn — their sonship exists in the seed that has been placed in their hearts, but they have not planted the acorn.  The power and glory of the Kingdom are not growing, developing and increasing within them.  The word of the Lord to you today is: Plant the acorn!  Water the acorn, fertilize the acorn, cultivate the acorn, let it grow, let it mature, and your potential as a son of God will unfold.  The acorn will become a mighty oak tree spreading its branches through the heavens.  I say today to all who read these lines, Come on up to mount Zion, come on up to your place in the throne, come on up to your full potential in the Kingdom.  Expose your acorn to the conditions that will cause it to germinate, grow, develop and increase, and your branches will reach to heaven and your branches and leaves will overshadow and bless humanity.

The government of God is the Kingdom of God.  His Kingdom is His authority, His lordship, His rule.  The coming of the Lord Jesus Christ into our spirit is the seed or life-germ of His Kingdom.  That is the beginning of His Kingdom within.  We have already noted how Jesus described His Kingdom as a tiny grain of mustard seed, which is the smallest seed of them all, but it grows to be the biggest of plants.  It becomes a tree, big enough for the birds to come and nest in its branches.  The coming of the life of God into our spirit is the beginning of the Kingdom and it is the gift of God.   “Fear not, little flock; for it is the Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom” (Lk. 12:32).  That germ of life, which is the word of life, comes into our spirit and it immediately changes our spirit.  When there is no change in an individual’s spirit, in his spiritual consciousness, Christ has not come in.  That is the first beginning of His government and His peace.  By the operation of God we become a member of God’s New Creation Man.

The Kingdom is birthed into us in an infinitesimally small beginning.  But it comes with sufficient power to begin to change our lives!   The government of God begins in that undistinguished place where the spirit of Christ takes root in the inner life.  Little by little we begin to become aware of what God wants in our life, and the paths of obedience begin to be learned.  The desire is created within us, by the new genetic makeup of our new mind, to want to do His will.  We want to do what He wants us to do and to be what He wants us to be.  It is right there that the church systems begin to lay upon the Lord’s people their own man-made laws, creeds, commandments, rules, regulations, traditions, rituals, works, and a whole world of religious tomfoolery, and leads the child of God down the dead end street of man-made religion.  But if the child of God will turn a deaf ear to the seductive voice of the gaudy harlot of the church systems, and hear only the voice of Christ by the Spirit, the Christ in him will continue to give him more light and understanding, and the Kingdom of God will grow and increase within him.  As we walk in the light that the Spirit brings, the Kingdom of God increases and develops from stage to stage, from glory to glory within our lives.

Within the indwelling Spirit of God we possess that which has the power to open up, unfold and develop the government of God in our lives.  But we do not have the rule of God’s government within us just because we have Christ within us, or just because we speak in tongues, receive blessings, miracles, answers to prayer, or have some gifts of the Spirit.  All of those are mere blessings and gifts.  We do not have His governmental rule operating within us and through us until we have spiritually matured, becoming an overcomer by the conquering power of His life and nature!  There is not a man or woman on the face of the earth today who has received spiritual authority and power to rule for God apart from putting on the mind of Christ and being an overcomer.   Men have received great and wonderful gifts of the Spirit while still weak and immature (babes), but not KINGDOM AUTHORITY AND POWER.   There is a great difference!

We can never rule anything until first we overcome it within ourselves.  To “overcome” means to COME UP OVER THAT WHICH IS OVER US.  The term implies the existence of obstacles in the pathway of the righteousness, peace, joy, and power of the Kingdom of God.  When, within ourselves, we rise up above the circumstance, above the problem, so that it no longer harasses, troubles or controls us, we are then ready to begin to control it; to no longer be the victim of circumstances, but the master of them.  Ah, my beloved, come up over what the religious systems have fed you!  Come up over your own pride and inherent weaknesses!  Come up over your timidity, fears, and carnal mindedness!  Come up over the desire to build a reputation for your name!   Come up over the myriad pressures from within and without!  Come up over the old order of religious thinking, understanding, and works of the past!  Come up over the world of turmoil and confusion about you!  You are called to be an OVER-COMER.  Come over that wall!  Come over into the Kingdom of God and a realm of complete victory.  If we cannot come out victoriously over ourselves and over the little temptations and frustrations of our fleshly life, and if we cannot stay out of the harlot’s house (church systems) how can the Lord trust us to reign over that which is without?   What kind of warriors would we make?  How much could He depend upon us?  He will give us the place for which we are prepared and qualified; we must set our faces to be overcomers if we are to sit with Him upon His throne and reign with Him over all things.

As sons of the Most High, we have access to the same strength that enabled Jesus to live an overcoming life — and to conquer even death.  He has given to us that same authority and power that gave Him victory of sin, self, religion, death, hell and the grave.  Have you ever wondered what would happen if Jesus would come and trade places with you?   If suddenly He would come to dwell in your body?  I have often wondered what He would do if He had my circumstances, my weaknesses, my lusts, my fears, my pressures, my problems.  If the Master came to me and said, “Move over, I am coming to live in your house for a season,” I do not doubt that in a short period He would have all my problems straightened out and all my weaknesses and turmoil under control.  He would overcome all of the things that I struggle with.  But the wonderful truth is, dear one, HE HAS COME!  HE DOES LIVE IN MY BODY!  AND HE LIVES IN YOURS!  “I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me...” (Gal. 2:20).  “But ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you.   Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of His” (Rom. 8:9).  Ah, He is right here within each one of us and He is fully able to be the power of our life as we yield to Him.  This is the wonderful victory Christ is bringing to His elect in this hour as He comes within us as King of kings and Lord of lords!  He has come in lesser ways in the past, to do lesser things, but He is coming in great power and in great glory in this hour within those who are apprehended to the be kings in His Kingdom.

You see, until Christ in you becomes your very life you won’t know anything about the government of God except that it will some day rule over you.  You will have to be subject.  There are subjects in the Kingdom, and there are kings who rule over the subjects.   You will be under those who are over you in the Lord, you will have to learn to be submissive, you will be required to take a servant’s place, you will hardly be qualified to be called a “friend,” because a friend knows his master’s will (Jn. 15:15).  The servant never shares the inside information and intimate thoughts, plans, and purposes of his master, he just does what he’s told.  That is where the vast majority of Christians are today!  They are mere children in the family of God.  Even the preachers and great personalities and super-stars of the church orders today are only babes in the family of God.  They cannot lead you into the Kingdom of God.  They are busily engaged in playing their little religious church games, and in making great names for themselves, and making great claims for their ministries; but their spiritual minds are darkened, having no understanding of what God is really doing, no vision of the purposes, principles, potentials, powers and responsibilities of   sonship in the Kingdom of God.

Come hither into the son realm, into the throne zone, and learn the ways of God’s government!  All things are given by the Father into the hands of the Son.  “He that overcometh shall inherit all things; and I will be his God, and he shall be my son” (Rev. 21:7).  “To him that overcometh shall 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).  “And he that overcometh...to him will I give power over the nations: and he shall rule them with a rod of iron; as the vessels of a potter shall they be broken to shivers” (Rev. 2:26-27).

It is in the realm of sonship, this realm of maturity, this realm of overcoming, that the increase of God’s government is known.  As Christ’s life grows within us His government increases within.  We find that we are able to reign over all His enemies within ourselves.  We all have inherited characteristics, have learned ways, acquired traits, developed habits and personality quirks carried over from childhood, that are in opposition to the laws of the Kingdom of God.  His government must increase within us until all those things are so ruled over by the mind of Christ that no one would ever suspect that they ever existed in our life.  Many who know me would be surprised to hear that at one time in my life I suffered from an inferiority complex!  Some people have been stubborn all their life and rebellious.  They started in that rebellion in their teenage and never outgrew  it.  They’ve been stubborn, rebellious and bull-headed all their life.  They want to have their own way.  Some have fallen again and again to the lusts of their flesh, to greed, immorality, drunkenness, etc. But by the indwelling life of Christ you have been given power to lay down your life, and there is another government that is progressively being raised up within you, and as this government unfolds within you, you find that that stubborn will is broken, that rebellion is conquered in you, all your weaknesses are mastered within yourself.  The increase of His government within delivers us from all the enemies of His Kingdom.  Christ is King in us.  He rules!  He delivers!  He is mighty to save to the uttermost!

Some people are naturally shy.  You say, “Good morning,” to them and they blush.  You look into their eyes and they drop their head.  They are so bound up with timidity that they are limited in every way.  The increase of His government within will deliver you from that timidity!  Other people are loud-mouthed, overbearing,  and obnoxious.   Every time you get within sight of them you hear their mouths.  Yakity, yakity, yak...it goes all the time.  The truth is that they are covering up something deep within them that is very painful — often a deep-seated  insecurity.  That person is trying to compensate outwardly for a deep inner lack.  But when Christ the King unfolds within us sufficiently He “equalizes” us, bringing balance, harmony, sufficiency.    His Lordship brings stability and wholeness.  He fills up the valleys and brings down the high places, He makes the rough places smooth and the crooked places straight.  The government of God can take the vilest of men — whoremongers, murderers, thieves, blasphemers, liars, haters, violent men whose lives have been marred and ruined by sin and disobedience and dissipation — and transform them into gentle, gracious, lovely, honest, clean, caring, humble, beautiful saints of the Most High God.  THAT IS THE POWER OF HIS GOVERNMENT WITHIN!  It is the power of God’s divine life and nature wrought in the lives of men and women.

God purposes that His government rule not only in us, but through us.  The government of God through us can bring peace in our homes.   You can bring peace to your home if you want it.  You may have an unsaved husband, or an unsaved wife.  Or there may be all kinds of personality conflicts and clashing of wills in your marriage or between parents and children.  Just because a man and woman are married doesn’t mean they don’t have personality conflicts.  Just because they are saved, baptized in the Holy Spirit, speak in tongues and sing in the spirit doesn’t mean they don’t have personality conflicts.  They may love each other deeply and still have personality conflicts.  When the personality conflicts outweigh their love for one another the marriage ends in divorce.  But the increase of His government in  our lives will bring peace in the home!  We cry out for peace in the world, and dream of the day when the sons of God will bring it, but let us begin by bringing the wonderful peace of God’s glorious Kingdom into our homes!  The Kingdom of God will bring peace to your children.  It will bring stability and blessing at difficult times.   Someone may say, “But brother Eby, you don’t know what I have to put up with, you don’t know how impossible things are!”  Well, then, have we not found an enemy that God’s Kingdom cannot destroy?  Have we not discovered something that the life of sonship cannot overcome and conquer?

I say to you today by the authority of God — if God’s Kingdom is coming in you, if His government is increasing in you, then His government is absolutely capable of ruling in righteousness and peace and deliverance in your situation and circumstance.  I do not say it will all happen overnight or tomorrow.  But nothing is too hard for the government of the almighty Christ!  You do not have to settle for things as they are.  YOU can change them!  He that is in you is mighty, and He will make you an overcomer right where you are.  You must overcome within yourself before you can expect to see changes in those about you.  God will flood your heart with a  divine love that will go the second mile, that will swallow up all anger, resentment, hostility and reactions, that will give itself for the blessing of your mate, or your children, or your in-laws, or your neighbor, or your boss, no matter how difficult or ungodly they are.  God will give you a heart to serve them in love, to be gracious, kind, merciful, compassionate, and forgiving.  LOVE is the power of the Kingdom of God!  You have been apprehended as a King-Priest after the order of Melchizedek.   You have power to reconcile, to bless, to redeem, to change, to transform all things.  The overcomers are given power to rule.  Unless we can first rule in our own lives, emotions, desires, circumstances, finances, problems, and life situations — how can we rule nations and worlds and galaxies!

Do we have enough of the government of God in us to influence the things around us?   How much salt do we have in us?  We are the salt of the earth!  How much light shines forth out of us?  We are the light of the world!  Beloved, God wants His government to so increase in us that we change the complexion of all things about us.  God is raising up His elect in this hour to sit with Christ right now on His throne.  Oh, yes!  His divine authority is beginning to operate in and through our lives in that undistinguished place where we are.  Don’t tell me that you are reigning in some mystical way in a high place in the spirit over Russia and Europe and Asia and Africa and America, calling the shots of what is happening in the political, social, judicial, military and economic realms, if you aren’t ruling right where you are.  Peace and righteousness and blessing shall be established wherever we go!  It is our ministry to bring the Kingdom of God to bear on all situations great and small.  The Kingdom of God is not just in word, it is not something we talk about in church, or read about in papers, and it is not a doctrine — the Kingdom of God is that power which is working in us.  We are the salt of the earth and the light of the world.  We are given power to rule and reign over the earth (Rev. 5:10).

Of the increase of His government and peace, there shall be no end (Isa. 9:7).   Something has gotten hold of us to which there is no end.  It is not that the Kingdom doesn’t end, although that, too, is a great fact, but it is the increase of that government and peace that shall never end.  The Kingdom of God is an eternally increasing government and peace!  It eternally increases within us.  How far does it go?  It just keeps on going and expanding.  There is no end to the enlargement.  It never stops.   It consumes your whole being, reaches out to your wife, your husband, and your children.  It reaches out to your family.  It reaches out to your neighbors and your friends and your enemies.  It reaches out to your community and your city.  It reaches out to your county and to your state.  It reaches out to the United States of America.  It reaches out to the nations, to continents and hemispheres and empires.  It reaches out to all the ends of the earth.  It extends to every planet in every solar system and to all the billions of galaxies.  It is a universal Kingdom.  It increases with eternal increase until everywhere throughout all the unbounded heavens every knee bows and every tongue confesses that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father.  It increases until God is all in all.  God is raising up Princes in His ever-increasing government, to bind all kings with chains and all nobles with fetters of iron, to execute upon them the judgment written.  Know ye not that the saints shall judge the world?  Know ye not that the saints shall judge angels?  God’s government of sons is about ready to appear.

Just this week while writing this message a letter arrived in the mail from a dear brother in New Zealand, and his sharing stirs me deep to the depths of my spirit.  He writes, “About three months ago, when in prayer, I saw a little vision which is so encouraging.  Looking downwards, I saw the earth enshrouded with a plastic film-like substance, and just beneath that film was a motionless man fully dressed.  The man was being pushed from below or drawn from above, somehow.   The head and shoulders were protruding into the film which was stretched to the point of almost causing it to split.  On inquiring of our Father, “What is this, Lord?” understanding was given to me by Him replying, “The imminent birth of the sons of God.”  I understood that the earth was the womb and that the Corporate Man is in the birth canal ready to be born.   Oh!  What a Day lies immediately before us, my brother...”

To the saints is given the authority to baptize men with the Holy Ghost, but also to baptize them with fire, to cast them into the great lake of fire and brimstone which our God is and which in Him we are, to burn out of their minds, souls, and bodies the thoughts and ways and passions and wills that are contrary and hostile to the will of God.  The fire of God is His all-consuming and all-powerful LOVE.   Out of His love the sons of God shall send decrees and commands coming from the Most High God out of Zion.  The sons of God will send decrees to individuals, to rulers, to authorities, to governments, to nations — we will even send commands to the elements as our Lord did when He spoke to the winds and the waves, hushing the gale and calming the waters with His Word.

There is no doubt about it — Jesus brought the reality of the Kingdom of God into the earth and the Kingdom has been here ever since.  May I say again that this Kingdom is a progressive and growing thing.  “Of the increase of His government and peace there shall be no end.”  “No end” transcends even the ages, reaches beyond all time as we know it, and bespeaks of eternal increase.  That is one of the glories of the Kingdom!  It has always existed, for God in His omniscient purpose and omnipotent power and dominion has always existed.  Two thousand years ago Jesus brought the Kingdom into the earth, into the world of men in a unique way.   But the Kingdom already existed in God, and will always exist!  It will increase, grow, and expand from realm to realm throughout eternity.  The universe itself reflects this divine principle of unending expansion.   Exquisite measurements by the Hubble telescope have lent strong evidence to the idea that the observed expansion of the universe will continue forever.  Previously, scientists who believe the galaxies and the space between them were created in a cosmic explosion about 15 billion years ago had wondered whether the swelling of space would eventually stop and all matter would eventually reverse its direction and begin to move backward, converging in the same infinitesimal point where it all began.  The Hubble data suggest that the universe will keep expanding, rather than collapsing.  And all the while new stars and new worlds are being birthed!  Eternal increase!

There is nothing static or sterile about this Kingdom at all, but a constant, eternal growth!  This wonderful reality of the Kingdom is defined in the Lord’s Prayer where He taught us to pray, “Thy kingdom come.”  One of the greatest revelations of the Kingdom that one can receive is the wonderful truth of divine increase.   All that pertains to God and His Kingdom is increasing!  The Lord and all the blessings and benefits of His Kingdom are increasing daily.  Grace, mercy, goodness, wisdom, righteousness and power are increasing in the earth with each succeeding age.  “Grace and peace be multiplied unto you,” the inspired apostle Peter wrote.  To multiply is to increase!  God’s covenant with Abraham was, “Surely blessing I will bless thee, and multiplying I will multiply thee” (Heb. 6:14).  Abraham has been multiplied into millions of people as the stars of the heavens for number.  What increase!   God is increasing Himself in His sons, just as Abraham has increased through his offspring.  “And not holding the Head, from which all the body by joints and bands having nourishment ministered...INCREASETH WITH THE INCREASE OF GOD” (Col. 2:19).  This is an incredible and marvelous revelation and it unlocks for us the beauty and power of God’s great purpose of the ages.  If we observe history, we will discover that the unfolding of God’s grace and goodness and will has been intensified with each passing age, and will continue to expand and increase with each succeeding age until all is gathered up into God again, and He is all in all.

Someone has written, “If only the people of Israel would have had minds that were being renewed, as well as the spiritual degree of maturity that we have today, when they traveled for forty years through the waste-howling wilderness!  But their spirits and minds were dull, for God had not given them an understanding heart, eyes to see and ears to hear.  Also, we are a few thousand years and many fulfilled purposes of God beyond that day.  Furthermore, the revelation of Christ, which increases with each age of time, has been increasingly manifest from that day to this.  And we are the recipients of that greater manifestation and revelation of Christ!  What a process of spiritual increase from that day to this!  And what tremendous spiritual growth has taken place in our lives!  Only as we discern the limited spiritual growth in most Christians today can we properly appreciate the extent of our own growth in God.  Yet, we are not to compare ourselves with others, for Christ is our only true, spiritual standard and example.”

God in the beginning ordained in the earth the orderly progression of the seasons.  Most areas of the world experience what is spoken of as a rainy or wet season and a dry season.  In the land of Israel, between the early and latter rains, there was a period of great dryness and dearth.   The pools dried up and the brooks ceased to flow.  But there was a wise design in the dryness, even as there was a beneficent purpose in the rain.  It was the time when under intense heat of the sun the grain was able to develop in a particular stage.  We know from Church history that the Lord Jesus visits the earth with special outpourings of Himself from time to time, in order to accomplish the work of the Kingdom.   There are seasons of refreshing that come from the presence of the Lord!  The reformation, the great Methodist revivals, the move of God in Scotland, the Great Awakening in America, the revival in Wales, the Pentecostal outpouring, the Latter Rain visitation, and present movings of the Spirit in various regions of the earth — the Lord’s presence and power and glory comes among His people in a mighty way, but afterwards lifts for a season, so that other purposes can be accomplished.  Such flowings and ebbings of divine life are according to the law and design of God.

Some necessary changes are wrought in our lives through means of blessing and glory, and others take place when we go through dry seasons or through the fires of testing and refining.  So there are times of refreshing from the presence of the Lord, and there are times when it seems He has pulled the veil over His face, hiding His presence from us.  There are times when there is a forward thrust — new dimensions are opened up, great revelations stream forth, mighty power is displayed, there is blessing, quickening, growth all around, and spiritual advance is made.  Then the glory lifts, the blessings diminish, the siftings and shakings commence as we are brought before His judgment seat, and that which was received with great joy is put to the test.  It is during these times of “nothingness” that the elect, the remnant of the Lord is severely tried, that they may be proven and found faithful.  Will the vision  and deposit received during the rain now take deeper root to become a firm, stable and permanent inward nature, the planting of the Lord; or will the adverse circumstances and pressures from without cause the tender shoot to wither and die?

This crucial time between the “seasons of refreshing” will either make or break the follower of the Lord!  Each refreshing begins with the Spirit of God sovereignly moving over the heads of men.  God has never asked for either the approval or cooperation of any chief priest, scribe, rabbi, bishop, pope, preacher or organization when He is ready to visit His people in power.  Suddenly, without warning, He thrusts forth upon the scene the thundering voice of a John the Baptist or a Luther; brings to the stage of action a Knox, a Wesley, a Whitefield; or showers from some bright cloud, refreshing rain-drops of His life and graces and gifts, unfolding the beautiful blossoms and exquisite flowers of glowing faces, transformed lives, weeping, repenting sinners, spontaneous testimonies, healings and miracles and provisions, revelations and gifts of the Holy Ghost, mighty blessings and powerful baptisms of grace and glory.  The leaders, superintendents and bishops of the time-honored religious systems beat on their desks, rant and rave, denounce it as heresy, attribute it to the devil, label it as wild-fire, and declare that it will not last.  And, of course, it doesn’t last!  In due time the fiery cloud of glory passes and the invigorating showers evaporate.  But let me tell you something!  Though the visitation ends, there is an establishment of something permanent in the earth, the thing that God was bringing forth out of His presence.

Let me illustrate.  Martin Luther is gone, and much of the movement  he founded has since gone into apostasy, but the truth the Spirit of God spoke so eloquently and powerfully through his lips remains in the earth, yea, is established in the earth, and millions of Christians who have nothing whatever to do with the Lutheran denominations do believe, and know, and have experienced that men are justified by faith. When the baptism in the Holy Spirit with speaking in tongues was again poured out more than a century ago, all the main-line denominations of Christendom rejected it as wild-fire or satanic manifestations.  But it did not go away.  God by His sovereign power established that glorious experience in our generation, and now, behold, most of the denominations that mocked and ridiculed the “holy-rollers” are now themselves speaking in tongues!  Oh, it isn’t called “speaking in tongues” anymore, it is now called by the more refined title “glosalalia.”  And the time-honored denominations still spurn the name “Pentecostal,” so it is called the “Charismatic Renewal.”  Then when Christ came in 1948 as Latter Rain, all the Pentecostal denominations, without exception, rejected Him and there was a great exodus out of the denominations.  “Fanaticism!  Heresy!  Delusions!  Deception!” they cried.  And they would have nothing to do with the heavenly worship, prophecy with the laying on of hands, or the message of the Kingdom of God.  By 1953 the rain had ended.  The great glory cloud lifted.  The movement split and splintered and splintered again, and practically disappeared from off the earth.   But — today in a great many Pentecostal Churches you will hear them singing the worship choruses, and singing the harmonious song of the Lord in the Spirit, and prophesying with the laying on of hands!  They don’t even have a clue where these things originated, where they came from.  But they came from the Christ of the Latter Rain!  God brought forth a manifestation of His life by the outpouring of Christ and it raised all things in all realms.  And make no mistake about it — the unique things God was doing in that visitation were established in the earth!  They have infiltrated even the very movements that rejected them.  Those pressing on in God are not to remain there, but each truth and experience in God remains, like a grade or course in school, for others who are coming along progressively in God.  Ah, God does have a sense of humor, doesn’t He — He gets the last laugh!  But the great truth is: OUR GOD IS MARCHING ON!

My father in the flesh was a Pentecostal minister, and by God’s design, he was stuck in Pentecost.  The Lord moved my wife and me on into a deeper move of the Spirit, into a further word, and I remember I used to talk with my dad, and of course, I wanted him to see the glorious things we were seeing in the Spirit.  I wanted him to have an ear to hear, but he never could hear.  So usually our discussions would end up in an argument.  One day the Spirit of the Lord spoke to me, and the Lord said, “Leave him alone!  He is in the realm that I have appointed him to, and he will not be in another.”  And you know, that brought me a great peace, because now I was able to fellowship with him on the level that he could fellowship with me, without strain or condemnation, realizing that he was in the place that God ordained for him, and I was in the place that God had ordained for me.

My father died thirty-five years ago, and he passed away in the Pentecostal realm, just as the Lord had said.  Shortly after he passed away, the Lord gave me a dream.  In this dream I was in the living room of our home and all of my family was there, my father and mother, my brothers, my wife and my kids were all there sitting in chairs and sofas around the walls.  My dad was sitting on the end of a sofa and looked exactly the way he did just before he died.  Nobody was saying anything, we were just there.  Suddenly my dad looked up, gazed intently across the room into my eyes, and said, “P-r-e-a-c-h  t-h-e  MANCHILD!”  I then awoke out of that dream and immediately I knew two things by the Spirit.  I knew that now my dad knew something that he did not know before he died.   But I also knew that he represented a cry that comes from the very realm of death itself, the cry of the groaning creation, that is groaning for the manifestation of His life.  It is the cry of creation for the manifestation of the sons of God who shall deliver creation from the bondage of corruption!

You see, when I said that my dad was stuck in the Pentecostal realm, I didn’t mean that he was stuck there forever!  We are all on a journey into God which is pictured by the entrance of the priesthood into the tabernacle of Moses in the wilderness, first into the Outer Court where our sins are dealt with by the blood of the Lamb; then into the Holy place with its candlestick, table of showbread and altar of incense, where we experience the baptism in the Holy Spirit, begin to eat of the good word of God in the loaf of the body of Christ, and learn the powers of prayer and praise; and finally into the Most Holy Place of the fullness of God’s life, nature and glory.  But you see, dear one, the end of the matter is not the Outer Court, the Holy Place, or the Holiest of All.   That’s but a blueprint of our progression into God.  It should be obvious to all who have eyes to see that the vast majority of Fundamentalist and Evangelical Christians never get past the Outer Court.  Pentecostals and Charismatics dwell in the Holy Place.  Those called to sonship have entered on into the Most Holy Place where God’s glorious fullness may be known.  These same heavenly realities are figured in the three feasts of Israel — Passover, Pentecost, and Tabernacles.  But the end of the matter is not the three steps of the tabernacle or the three stages of spiritual life experienced in the spiritual feasts of the Lord.  Oh, no, that is merely a blueprint of the redemptive process of God!  In the end, when God becomes All-in-all, there will be NO COMPANIES.  There will not be Fundamentalists, Pentecostals, Latter Rain, the Bride of Christ, Servants of God, and Sons of God.  In the end there are not people living in the Outer Court and others living in the Holy Place, while others dwell in the Most Holy Place.  IN THE END THERE IS ONLY GOD ALL IN ALL, God everything to everyone!

You see, it’s just like a school.  The purpose of a school is not the school itself.  The purpose of a school is that people may progress through the grades and eventually get beyond the school.  Everybody that enters the school is supposed to graduate!  So the purpose is not to glory in the fact that I am in the first grade, or the eighth grade, or that I am a junior, sophomore, or senior.  That’s not the glory of it at all.  The glory of it is that each grade accomplishes its purpose, brings everyone to the final, same accomplishment.  The purpose of every step, level, and realm in God is that every man may, in God’s due time, pass through all the grades and graduate into the fullness of God.  We have been moving through the Feasts, and God has now brought a people to the Feast of Tabernacles.  He has brought us to the Third Day.  He has brought us to the Most Holy Place.  Each step is but a temporary arrangement, we have been passing through the grades, and all creation will pass through the grades.  And when every man who has ever lived, or ever shall live, has received his diploma and walked off the stage on his graduation day, God will be all in all.  Hallelujah!  A sign will then be posted on the door of the school, “Closed.”  If everybody graduates, you don’t need a school anymore.  Such is the increase of the Kingdom of God!

Spiritually, no one can hinder or stop the ongoing seasons of God as He brings forth His purposes in the earth.  Historically, the purposes of God have marched forward triumphantly from age to age, from dispensation to dispensation, from dealing to dealing, unfolding God’s Kingdom in the earth from realm to realm.  The New Testament record begins at the period just before and at the time of the coming of Jesus into the world.  Just like the seasons, “When the fullness of time was come, God sent forth His Son” (Gal. 4:4).   He came into the world to do away with the old dispensation and covenant of law, which had no power to bring life to dead souls and is symbolized by winter, and to usher in the new dispensation of grace, which is symbolized by spring.  The law of God has never been fulfilled except in Jesus Christ.  That which man could not do, Christ came and did as He walked upon earth and when He died upon Calvary.  The darkness and winter of condemnation and bondage which rested upon man, were done away by the Lord Jesus Christ, who satisfied every demand of the law.  The rain of the Holy Spirit which came with the doing away of the law softened the ground and prepared it for the bringing in of a better covenant.

As we think of the faint light that the people of God had under the old dispensation, we see that it truly was winter.  It was like the warmth of the sun in midwinter, when its rays can scarcely penetrate and disperse the frost in the air.  There was no more power in the law to give life to one soul, than there is power and warmth in the midwinter sun to bring out the flowers of spring and the fruits of summer.  In the individual this is a picture of the soul who is dead in trespasses and unbelief;  full of deadness and darkness, full of fruitlessness; whose life is bleak, cold, dead, like midwinter.  When the breaking up comes, and the rays of the sun begin to fall upon the winter of death and unbelief, the clouds of doubts and fears and ignorance begin to roll away, and the warmth of the Sun of righteousness brings life and warmth to the soul.  It is the rain that comes when the winter begins to break up that prepares the ground for the seed and fruitfulness.  It is the breaking up that comes in deed conviction and dealing, with godly sorrow and repentance, that prepares the heart of man for the seed of Christ and the fruit of the Kingdom.  The rain cannot bring fruit any more than can the snow and winter; but it prepares the ground for the germination of the seed, which has life in it, and has life more abundant.

Dispensationally, we are standing at the springtime of our development into the fullness of God’s Christ.  As the summer comes on the Sun  of righteousness arises within us and the flowers appear upon the vines of the heritage of the Lord, giving promise of a rich harvest of mature fruit upon every plant and vine that the Father has planted in His vineyard.  This is the beginning of the setting up of the Kingdom of God in that earth which we are.  Everything is either in blossom or in flower; upon the olive tree and upon the vine appear the bud, the blossom, the green fruit.  Though the fruit has not yet ripened, though the “many brethren” have not yet come fully into the likeness and image of the firstborn Son, nor into the fullness of His power and glory, yet the fragrance and beauty of the first days of spring cover the Lord’s vineyard; the sunshine of the Father’s approval is over the vineyard of His sons.  The warmth of His grace and the light of His revelation is wooing the buds to burst forth into flowers, the flowers to give place to the tiny fruit, and the immature fruit to go on to perfection.  And, blessed be God! none can hinder or stop the mighty working of God in this hour to bring forth His sons and the next stage in the manifestation of His Kingdom.

The wonderful truth is: NO ONE CAN HINDER OR STOP THE PROCESSES OF GOD!  God has a plan!  At the beginning of the Church age the world was visited by events so momentous in their power and glory that all things were changed from that time onward.  In the eternal realm before the ages were formed, and ages before man ever saw the light of earth’s day, the almighty Lord set in motion His omniscient and immutable purpose for the ages which were to follow.  As a year is filled with weeks and a week is filled with days and a day is filled with hours, so time is filled with ages and ages with dispensations.  Let all who read these lines thoroughly understand that our all-wise heavenly Father planned the events of each successive age from the very first age unto the ages of ages far beyond the comprehension of mortal man.  It is not by accident nor by natural evolution that the world has progressed from the darkness of paganism to the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.  It is by divine design!

The plan of the ages conceived in the heart of Him who purposed all things after the counsel of His own will is being worked out one step at a time in each succeeding age in like manner as you and I have often planned in advance the work for each successive day of a week.  Is it not true that many of the wives and business people now reading this paper have plans in mind for today and tomorrow and perhaps even weeks and months into the future?  I do!  Each week I can tell what I, Lord willing, will be doing on each day of the week.  There is mail to answer, days for study and writing, business with the printer or at the post office and numerous other things, and each week is mapped out in advance.  Whether consciously or unconsciously we all plan ahead, daily and hourly working toward some human goal.   There is nothing that opens the wellspring of love, of understanding and hope and faith, in the hearts of God’s people like THE KNOWLEDGE OF HIS PURPOSE.  What infinite illumination floods our souls, what joy and satisfaction and assurance fill our hearts when by the spirit of wisdom and revelation from God our great and wonderful Father is seen to be a God of purpose, knowing the end from the beginning, because He planned the end from the beginning!  He created all things by His omnipotent power that His glorious purpose might be fulfilled.  And the power that made all things is the same power that upholds all things, and fills all things, and controls all things and shall bring to a successful conclusion the divine purpose in all things.

The Kingdom of God came  first of all in the person of Jesus.  Then it came in 120 disciples of Jesus on the day of Pentecost.  Then it came upon the household of Cornelius the centurion, and upon the Gentiles.  But upon the rocky slopes of the isle called Patmos the beloved John saw beyond the redeemed of his day — he beheld with wonder “a great number that no man can number.”  John was a great mathematician, and he managed to count up to one-hundred and forty-four thousand footstep followers  of the Lamb standing upon mount Zion.  But that was only a representative number for the company of the manifested sons of God: as for the Church of God, gathered out of all the tribes and tongues and peoples and nations of earth, he gave up all idea of computation, and confessed that it is “a number that no man can number.”  When He heard them sing he said, “I heard a voice like the voice of many waters and like great thunder.”  There were so many of them that their song was like the Aegean sea lashed to fury by a tempest, nay, not one great sea in uproar, but ocean upon ocean, the Atlantic and the Pacific piled on each other, and the Indian ocean upon these, and other oceans upon these, layers of oceans, all thundering out their mightiest roar: and such will be the song of the redeemed when every creature which is in heaven, and on  earth, and under the earth, is heard saying, “Blessing, and honor, and glory, and power, be unto Him that sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb unto the age of the ages!” (Rev. 5:13).

There you have the glorious outcome of the increase of the Kingdom!  Behold, and see, ye who laughed at His Kingdom, see how the little Lamb has become hundreds of billions!  Now look ye, ye foes of Christ, who saw the handful of corn on the top of the mountains; see how the fruit thereof doth shake like Lebanon!  Who can reckon the drops of the dew or the sands of the seashore?  When they have counted these then shall they not have guessed at the multitude of the redeemed of earth, and of the underworld, and of the starry worlds above, that Christ shall bring to glory.  And all this harvest from one grain of wheat, which except it had fallen into the ground and died would have remained alone!  Oh, beloved, what a harvest from Mary’s little Lamb!  What fruit from that glorious Man of Nazareth!  Men esteemed Him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted; and they made nothing of Him, and yet there sprang from Him a great and glorious and universal Kingdom filled with multitudes which are as many as the stars of heaven!  This day shall declare it without fail.  Oh, the wonder of it!  Oh, the mystery of it!  The increase of the Kingdom of God!  What anticipation thrills our ransomed souls as we contemplate the potential of the wonderful age and the ages to come!  God acted yesterday.   He acts today.  He will act tomorrow.  We cannot mark the boundaries of His Kingdom any more than we can mark the boundaries of the universe.

In the late 1950’s a military idealist styled by the American press as  an “agrarian reformer”  sought to liberate the people of Cuba from the “repression” and “corruption” of President Fulgencio Batista.  Fidel Castro was hailed by the New York Times as a man of high ideals, with strong ideas of liberty, democracy and social justice.  Lorain and I were missionaries in Cuba during and after the Cuban revolution.  Castro was in power for only a few months when it became crystal clear to us, as it was not yet to the Cuban people, that the Castro government was an atheistic, Communist regime.  But apart from the negative character of his revolution, the methods he employed in his takeover of the Caribbean island do serve as a powerful illustration of the increase of the Kingdom of God.

When Fidel Castro arrived in Cuba from Mexico with a handful of men to spark the revolution, he was practically unknown.  He spent time gathering around him men who were fired with the same zeal as he to see their country under new government.  In those early days they were only a few men with Castro as their leader.  But after the creation of some “incidents” the Cuban people rapidly became aware of them and their professed objectives.  Little by little fathers and sons commenced to leave their homes, families, and jobs to join Castro’s forces in the mountains in order to “liberate” their country.  Soon support increased, the number of rebel soldiers, sympathizers and supporters began to swell, and the passions of the Cuban people were stirred.  Castro expertly organized his forces and ruled and controlled the mountain areas where his armies freely roamed.  His men were well trained and equipped and fought courageously.

The area of the country under Castro’s domination was declared to be the territory of “Free Cuba.”  It had its own government — Castro and his top aids.  But most of the Cuban territory and people was still under the control of the Batista dictatorship.  After several fierce battles the territory of “Free Cuba” was enlarged.  We fell into that territory during the latter part of 1958, and were cut off from the outside world, from mail service, and from the rest of the island.   Fighting and bombing became daily occurrences in our town.  Several times a day we would run for shelter when we heard the airplanes approaching town.  As Castro’s advance continued, suddenly President Batista, in the dark of night, fled the country.  The revolution was victorious!  But — though Batista had departed, and technically the revolution has triumphed, Castro was still not “in control” of the nation.  He and his troops began the long trek up the island to Havana.  As soon as he arrived in the capital he began consolidating his power, taking over every function of government  from the top to the bottom.  Many months passed before all things were firmly established under the revolutionary order.

There are many things to learn from parables, both old and new, for by them truth is taught with more force than any spoken word.  Almost two millenniums ago God manifested His first Son, the Lord Jesus Christ.  The seed of God’s Kingdom on earth was planted in that one man — who is the Head of all the sons of God prepared of God throughout the age.   He is the leader and initiator of the Kingdom.   Jesus was unknown among all the rulers and the kingdoms of earth.  He gathered around Himself a handful of men from the province of Galilee in the tiny land of Israel.  Into them He impregnated the revelation and life of the Kingdom.   They in turn, with the resurrected and ascended Jesus directing, marched through the nations proclaiming the Kingdom of God with power and announcing that finally this Kingdom would rule from pole to pole and from sea to sea.  Through the age men and women have defected from the kingdom of darkness, from the kingdoms of this world, to join themselves to the free “New World” of the Spirit, becoming citizens of God’s Kingdom.  For two thousand years Christ’s army has been forming, being meticulously trained and adequately equipped by the power of the Holy Ghost.  These sons of God have fought many battles, although these battles for the most part have been confined to the small and undistinguished territory of their own earth — soul and body.  Long has been the preparation and persistent the struggle.  And even now, at the end of the age, it still seems that the whole world lies in the lap of the evil one!  But soon — yes, very soon — there shall be a glorious and decisive victory!  Our lovely Lord Jesus Christ, together with all the glorified sons of God who through the furnace of affliction and the heat of battle have qualified to reign with Him, shall come forth into full manifestation.  The clay feet of the image of great Babylon shall be smitten by this heaven-sent army as by a stone cut out of the mountain without hands, and by them will be crushed the whole system of Babylon with its millenniums of confusion, deceit and darkness  Oh, my soul!  What a word!  But even as the sons of God make their appearance, marching forth conquering and to conquer, not by the sword of man, but by the sword of the Spirit which is the Word of God, all will not yet be as it should be, and for this reason they must reign on and on and on...until “ALL ENEMIES are put under His feet.”

We have all eternity to dwell with God and to work with people.  The challenges and tasks shall extend into all ages of time, calling for redemptive ministry to flow through us to the whole creation, just as the Lord Jesus’ ministry flows forth unto us today.  Through us God shall wipe away all the tears of earth’s teeming billions — of all who have ever lived and died upon this planet, and of all who shall yet live.   All shall be raised up and redeemed, all shall be saved, delivered, and transformed, and all shall live in righteousness, peace and joy in the presence of God.  There shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain.  In those blessed ages sin and death and hell shall be destroyed in every creature and in every world, throughout all God’s vast universe, and God shall be all in all. Praise His matchless name!  Such is the increase of the Kingdom of God!  If there is no more pain there can be no more hell, for the torment of hell is pain.   If there is no crying there can be no death, for death floods our faces with tears.  If there is no more sorrow there can be no sin, for sin begets heartbreak and sorrow.  Oh glorious victory!  Only the increase of God’s Kingdom can bring creation to that Day!

 


Chapter 44

THE INCREASE OF THE KINGDOM

(continued)

It is a conspicuous fact that the various errors and inconsistencies found in the King James Version of the New Testament serve to obscure any clear understanding of the teachings of the scriptures in regard to God’s wonderful plan of the ages.  One of the most inexcusable of these misleading translations is the unqualified use of the English word “world.”  The word “world” has a limited meaning in English, but is used by the translators as the one English rendering for at least three widely differing ideas in the Greek text.  This one word, world, is used to translate a Greek word which means a distinct period of time such as an age, epoch, or dispensation; it is also used to translate a Greek word denoting the visible things created the earth or the universe; and finally it is used to translate a Greek word denoting the inhabitants of the earth together with their culture, morality, customs, life style, organized society, government, etc.

One of the Greek words erroneously translated “world” is the word AION.  AION denotes a specific period of time an eon or an age.  The ages are often referred to in the scriptures, and the study of the exact conditions and purposes of each of them is not a fanciful pursuit, but is rather the only foundation for any true knowledge of the development of God’s plan and kingdom in the earth.  It is not possible to consider all of the ages in this writing, but only a few that might be confused one with another.

The age of law, which began with the giving of the law to Israel at mount Sinai, and ended with the death, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus and the outpouring of the Holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost, is mentioned by Zacharias in his prophecy at the birth of John the Baptist: “As He spake by the mouth of His holy prophets, which have been since the world (aion age) began” (Lk. 1:70).  The same period is referred to by Peter in Acts 3:21, “Whom the heaven must receive until the times of restitution of all things, which God hath spoken by the mouth of all His holy prophets since the world (aion age) began.”  These references, as one can clearly see, are not to the creation of the world, as the King James rendering would indicate, but to the beginning of that particular period in which the prophets spake, beginning primarily with Moses.  As a distinct period of time which was to end, the age of law is mentioned about forty times in the New Testament and is called the “world” in the King James Bible!  Here are a few examples. “And whosoever speaketh a word against the Son of man, it shall be forgiven him: but whosoever speaketh against the Holy Ghost, it shall not be forgiven him, neither in this world (aion age, the age of law), neither in the world (aion age, the church age) to come” (Mat. 12:32).  “The disciples came unto Him privately, saying, Tell us, when shall these things be? and what shall be the sign of Thy coming, and of the end of the world (aion age)?” (Mat.  24:3).  “And the Lord commended the unjust steward, because he had done wisely: for the children of this world (aion age) are in their generation wiser than the children of light” (Lk. 16:8).   

The present age of the calling out of the body of Christ, in which the grace of God has had its appearing unto salvation, began where the law ended, with the coming of Christ and the outpouring of the Holy Spirit upon all flesh.  This age, and the fact that it, too, will end, is referred to as “world” in a number of places.  A few of the passages follow:  “And, lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world (aion age)”  (Mat. 28:20).  “Which He wrought in Christ when He raised Him from the dead, and set Him at His own right hand in the heavenly places, far above all principality, and power, and might, and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this world (aion age), but also in that which is to come” (Eph. 1:20-21).  “Teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly, in this present world (aion age)” (Tit. 2:12).  By these and other passages it may be seen that the present age is a particular limited period of time in which special conditions are to prevail, and definite purposes to be realized.   

In explaining one of the Kingdom parables to His disciples, Jesus mentioned that “The harvest is the end of the world (aion age)” (Mat. 13:39).  Because of the King James’ misuse of the word “world” in this and other passages, people have latched on to this and fabricated all kinds of doctrines about the “end of the world.”  But the world is not about to end!  This age will end, of course, for every age has its ending, and then gives way to the dawn of another age so why then all the upset and fear?  Furthermore, if WE ARE NOT OF THIS AGE, and have by God’s grace tasted of the POWERS OF THE AGE TO COME, why do we get overly concerned about this age ending?  The desire of all the Lord’s people should be for that new age which lies before us, and however God chooses to bring this present evil age to an end, will but open the flood-gates of far greater glory to come!  We say that we are not of this world/age, yet we are constantly clinging to it and fearing the doom to come upon it.  Ah, how we need the Holy Spirit to guide us into ALL TRUTH, until we are ready to joyfully relinquish all of the old, to lay hold upon the new.

Judging from the mass of Christian writings and from utterances in sermons and teachings from many different doctrinal persuasions, this age is assumed by many to be the final age, ending with the coming of Christ, the final judgment, and the destruction of the world.  Others believe that there is yet one more age which they term the “Kingdom Age” or the “Millennium,” which will wind up God’s great program on earth.  These are the two errors abroad in the land today in respect to the Kingdom of God.  There is a tendency among God’s people to limit the Kingdom either to this age of the Church economy, or to the next age called the Millennium or the Kingdom Age.  The first group can see nothing in the Kingdom beyond our present experience except to die and go to heaven! To these the Kingdom is identical with our salvation experience and the multiplied gifts, blessings, provisions, and benefits of the Church age.  This concept views the Kingdom as a “little flock” right up to the end of time, in the world, coexisting as it were with the world, yet not of the world, but never triumphing over the world.  According to this view the Church and the world, or the Kingdom of God and the kingdom of the devil, both continue as they now are right up to the end of time when Jesus comes again and terminates the whole program, destroying the present heavens and earth, casting the wicked into everlasting hell fire, and shipping the saints off to glory.  In this view there is no ultimate triumph of the Kingdom of God over the kingdom of darkness on earth, no consummation of the Kingdom where all kindreds and tongues and peoples and nations serve Him, and God is all in all.  Instead  of consummation these dear people settle for termination.  God just “winds things up” and the whole program on earth comes to a jarring halt.  According to this scheme the prophecy of Daniel will never be fulfilled: “And in the days of these kings shall the God of heaven set up a kingdom, which shall never be destroyed: and the kingdom shall not be left to other people, but it shall BREAK IN PIECES AND CONSUME ALL THESE KINGDOMS, and it shall stand for ever” (Dan. 2:44).  Nor, if these brethren are right, can the prophecy of Revelation 11:15 come to pass: “The kingdoms of this world ARE BECOME THE KINGDOMS OF OUR LORD, AND OF HIS CHRIST; and He shall reign for ever and ever.”

The second error recognizes no present literal Kingdom of God on earth, pushing the Kingdom off into a future age, making its present reality utterly meaningless.  These people are always talking about the “coming Kingdom.”  Men with their human theology have imagined that the Kingdom of God has not yet come on earth and that it remains to be “established” during the “Millennium.”  People often declare in no uncertain terms that Jesus is returning to “set up” the Kingdom.  They proclaim that the Kingdom is an “age” of one thousand years duration.  I do not hesitate to tell you that every shred of evidence is to the contrary!  All such notions are utter rubbish and have no foundation in the spirit of Truth.  At this very moment, when Christians are busily looking for a one-world government under the antichrist, and the great tribulation followed by the return of Jesus and the establishment of the Kingdom, we who have followed on to know the Lord, and have sought first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness, have had our hearts ravished by this blessed reality: “Who hath delivered us from the power of darkness and hath TRANSLATED US INTO THE KINGDOM OF HIS DEAR SON” (Col. 1:13).  Let demons rage.  Let fools and unbelievers hang their heads in shame.  The Kingdom of God is a present reality to those who have been caught up into the high places of the Spirit!  It is not a matter of this or that, of here or there, of now or then, of this age or the next age.  The Kingdom is none of those things.  It is more than all.  It is this and that, here and there, now and then, this age and the next and much, much more!

The great truth I declare to you today is that Jesus Christ came two millenniums ago and brought the Kingdom and set up and established the Kingdom in the hearts and lives of the sons of the Kingdom.  “Now after that John was put in prison, Jesus came into Galilee, preaching the good news of the kingdom of God, and saying, The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand: repent ye, and believe the good news” (Mk. 1:14-15).  And again, “The law and the prophets were until John: since that time the kingdom of God is preached, and every man presseth into it” (Lk. 16:16).  God has a plan for His great and glorious Kingdom!  Indeed, God has a wonderful plan for this world!  It is a plan of which the architectural drawings were made in eternity.  It encompasses the minutest detail of all creation.  I assure you that when time has run its course, and the curtain is drawn upon the final scene, we shall discover that that plan has been worked out to its tiniest detail, just as God planned it in eternity.

Upon your table today there is or should be a book we call the Bible.  This book alone reveals God’s secret plan of the ages.  It unfolds with unerring accuracy the mysteries of ages in the dim and misty past, and points with unerring finger to the purpose of countless eons yet to come.  The Christian Church as we know it has been living in a fool’s paradise, propounding pet doctrines, ranting and raving about an endless eternity with golden streets and harps and white nightgowns for some and crackling, searing, tormenting flames for others, while almost completely overlooking God’s wonderful PLAN OF THE AGES.  Paul writes of this plan of the ages in Ephesians 3:8-11.  “Unto me, who am less than the least of all saints, is this grace given, that I should preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ; and make all to see what is the fellowship of the mystery, which from the beginning of the world hath been hid in God, who created all things by Jesus Christ: to the intent that now unto the principalities and powers in heavenly places might be known by the church the manifold wisdom of God, according to the eternal purpose which He purposed in Christ Jesus our Lord.”  The word translated “eternal” in the phrase “eternal purpose” is the Greek word AIONON which means “ages.”  Young’s Literal Translation reads, “And to cause all to see what is the fellowship of the secret that hath been hid FROM THE AGES in God, who the all things did create by Jesus Christ, that there might be made known now to the principalities and authorities in the heavenly places, through the assembly, the manifold wisdom of God, according to A PURPOSE OF THE AGES, which He made in Christ Jesus our Lord.”  The Emphatic Diaglott renders verse 11 thus, “According to A PLAN OF THE AGES, which He formed in the Anointed Jesus our Lord,” and Rotherham says, “According to A PLAN OF THE AGES which He made in the anointed Jesus our Lord.”

As men with the aid of God’s Word have gazed into the vista of the future, it seems to have missed their understanding that God says very little in His Word about eternity, while devoting many hundreds of passages to His will and works wrought through THE AGES.  “God, who at sundry times and in divers manners spake in time past unto the fathers by the prophets, hath in these last days spoken unto us by His Son, whom He hath appointed heir of all things, by whom also He made the worlds” (Heb. 1:1-2).  What tremendous statements we have here!  God has spoken to us through His Son literally, “spoke to us in Son,” or, God spoke to us in One who has the character that He is a SON, revealing the realm and relationship of sonship to God.  Every age has its beginning and its end, its first days and its last days.  So the writer to the Hebrews tells us that God has spoken unto us in the person of His Son in “these last days,” that is, in the closing days of the age of  law in which Jesus came into the world.  People talk about “the” last days, as though the end of our present dispensation were the only “last days”  or “end time” to ever exist!  

This Son is heir of all things and, blessed be God! we are joint heirs with Him.  “By whom also He made the worlds.”  Many people believe this refers to the creative act “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.”  It does not refer to that at all.  The word here for “worlds” is AIONAS.  It means ages “...by whom He framed the ages.”  This goes beyond His being the Creator of matter and its arrangement into multiplied billions of galaxies, stars, suns, planets and moons with their atmospheres and inhabitants.  This lends purpose to everything.  He is the heir who GIVES THE PROGRAM FOR THE FUTURE!  He planned and framed the ages, He ordained the end from the beginning; not only did He create everything, He did it for a purpose, and “known unto God are all His works from the beginning of the world” (Acts 15:18).  Notice the Amplified Bible says, “But in the last of these days He has spoken to us in the person of a Son, whom He appointed Heir and lawful Owner of all things, also by and through whom He created the worlds and the reaches of space and the AGES OF TIME that is, He made, produced, built, operated and arranged them in order!”  “Through  faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God” (Heb. 11:3), but it should read, “the ages were planned by the word of God.”  God made, planned, and determined the destiny of all the ages in and by Jesus Christ.

The age we are now living in is not the last age, nor is the age to come the final age in God’s vast Kingdom program.  The apostle Paul tells us that God “hath raised us up together, and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus: that in the AGES TO COME He might show (put on display, exhibit) the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness toward us through Christ Jesus” (Eph. 2:6-7).  According to these inspired words there are “ages” yet to come so there can be no less than two ages beyond our present age and there could be many, many more!  It is during these “ages to come” that God shall take the wonderful work He has so meticulously wrought in His elect throughout the past age and put it on display in and through them for the whole creation to behold and consider.  This will certainly not be to the condemnation of creation, the masses of unregenerated men that have lived and died upon this planet, but rather redounds unto their blessing, deliverance and transformation; for it is HIS KINDNESS TOWARD US IN JESUS CHRIST that is exhibited through the saints throughout the coming ages.  Grace and kindness on display!  Think of it!  That is no curse, no judgment it can only mean salvation!  The grace of God appears unto salvation.  This glorious display is for the instruction and enlightenment of all men.  What a marvelous prospect!

The Word of God is crystal clear that there is to be an increase of the Kingdom from age to age.  The very fact that there are yet “ages to come” shows that the Kingdom advances from one age to another.  Historically, every new age has superseded the previous ones, bringing greater light, a further revelation of God, and more advanced dealing with mankind.  Each new age inaugurates a higher dimension of God’s purposes in the earth.  Nothing is clearer in the scriptures than the fact that THIS IS NOT THE LAST AGE.  There is no “final windup” at the close of this present dispensation.  We can expect, therefore, fresh and greater manifestations and administrations of Kingdom dominion as we move from this age into the new one now beginning.  What anticipation this evokes in our hearts!

The apostle James made a statement to the council at Jerusalem in which he clearly defines the complete outline of God’s purpose for the so-called age of grace and the dispensation that is to follow.  “Simeon hath declared how God at the first did visit the Gentiles, to take out of them a people for His name.  And to this agree the words of the prophets; as it is written, AFTER THIS (after God has taken out of the nations a people for His name) I will return, and will build again the tabernacle of David (the fullness of God’s glory in a people), which is fallen down (following the great apostasy); and I will build again the ruins thereof, and I will set it up: that the RESIDUE OF MEN MIGHT SEEK AFTER THE LORD, and ALL THE GENTILES, upon whom my name is called, saith the Lord, who doeth all these things” (Acts 15:14-18).  Dispensationally, this is one of the most significant passages in the New Testament!  It gives God’s divine purpose for this age and the next age.  James says that the purpose of God during this age now ending has been to visit the Gentiles, or the nations, as it is in the Greek, to TAKE  O-U-T  O-F  T-H-E-M  A PEOPLE FOR HIS NAME.

 One thing that nearly all Christians have missed is the fact that it has never been God’s purpose to save the world during the Church age.  While the gospel was to be preached as a “witness” to all nations, there is no hint of it being accepted by all.  Jesus never led His disciples to expect any such result from their ministry!  Wherever the preached gospel is referred to in the New Testament, its limited acceptance is at the same time made clear.  “Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature.  He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be condemned (judged)” (Mk. 16:15-16).  The witness of Paul is equally clear.  He says, “I am not ashamed of the gospel: for it is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth” (Rom. 1:16).  “I am become all things to all men, that I may by all means save some” (I Cor. 9:22).  “For we are a sweet savor of Christ unto God, in them that are being saved, and in them that are perishing.”

All through the centuries the Church has been found holding to the false hope of converting the whole world during this age.  Frequently one hears preachers, especially missionaries and televangelists, speaking of “winning the world to Christ.”  In missionary conferences and evangelistic crusades people are admonished to go forth and “win the world.”  But as honest and sincere as these persons are, the fact remains that the efforts of those who walk in the spiritual feasts of Passover and Pentecost are doomed to failure.  The fact remains that nowhere did the Lord tell His disciples to save the world!  Rather, Jesus said, “I will build my church.”  And that is precisely what the Lord has been doing for the past two thousand years building His Church!  But never did He say that all would believe or that we should win the world to Him or sweep the nations into the Kingdom of God in the age now ending.  If He would have said it, it would have happened, for He is the omnipotent Lord with all power in heaven and in earth!  The fact that the world hasn’t been saved, and the nations have not been subjected to the rule of God, is the only proof needed that it has not been God’s plan to do so!  He who holds to the hope of converting the world by Pentecostal preaching, or by gifts of the Holy Spirit, or by well organized revival crusades, or by forty days of fasting and prayer, is running after a mere phantom.  It simply won’t happen!

 But God has been calling out a people for His name saving, delivering, teaching, purging, purifying, dealing, maturing and bringing them progressively unto the full stature of Jesus Christ.  It has taken the process of two millenniums to bring His people to birth that a manchild, the manifested sons of God, might be revealed.  Meanwhile, the Lord has not interfered with the downward course of the world!  He has allowed the selfishness of the human race to drag it down into ever lower depths of  sin and degradation.  Even when His professed people, misguided by their lack of understanding, and motivated by their unscriptural and unspiritual ambitions, have established church-state systems in His name, He has not interfered.  And when these have fallen, and when all the misguided efforts of those people who have tried to establish peace for the Prince of Peace by carnal warfare and bloodshed and tyranny in the Lord’s name, God has still not intervened.  His plans for the salvation of the world have been separate from all human efforts, and He wants the whole world, including worldly churches, to learn that apart from GOD’S CHRIST and GOD’S TIME they can accomplish nothing beyond the limited work prescribed for this dying age.  He wants them to learn that in order to achieve success they must work with Him, and in keeping with His plans, rather than expect Him to bless their plans and their efforts to establish His Kingdom.

I once wrote articles against communism.  That was because of their atheism and rejection of God and His word and His people.  But I think I realize now, more than I did then, that ALL NATIONS have been cut off from God by God’s own decree, since the time of Adam and Eve.  Jesus emphasized this when He said, “No man can come to me, except the Father...draw him” (Jn. 6:44). Many nations have never known much if anything about God.  In ancient Egypt they worshipped their fictitious gods, Isis and Osiris, about the time the ancient Chinese were worshipping their ancestors even before the appearance of Confucianism and Taoism.  The ancient Greeks and Romans  had their idol gods, such as Jupiter, Diana, Hermes and others, and the ignorant worship of these gods was the state religion in almost every land and among all peoples.  They had no salvation but neither were they “lost” God Himself had cut off the descendants of Adam.  They simply were not being judged at all by God nor are they even yet today!  God is not now dealing with nations, He is building His Church and bringing His sons to birth!

Since God is not now judging the nations, WHY SHOULD YOU OR I?  I know that I myself am being judged now!  The temple of God is being measured in the heavens, the elect of God is being judged by the measure of the stature of Jesus Christ as the sons of God stand in this hour before the judgment seat of Christ.  Some of us are called now and the work of the Spirit will be completed in us now.  The world as a whole has not been called YET!  Those now called to salvation to be a part of the body of the Christ are the “firstfruits” merely the first small “harvest” of spiritual life.  To all others, God said, in effect, “Go, since you have rejected me, my government, my salvation, my revelation and knowledge, GO form your own gods and your own religions and philosophies and your own cultures and moral codes and your own governments.”  And, for six long millenniums has the world so done!  Therefore I do not judge their governments, or their religions, or their cultures.  I do not go to try to “sweep nations into the Kingdom of God,” as some say.  BUT GOD DOES HAVE A PLAN FOR THE NATIONS and a glorious day of release and restoration into the Kingdom of God!  And those called and chosen as the elect of God, as the sons of the Father in this significant hour, are being given understanding of the sacred secret of God His plan of the ages!  Out from among the billions of earth God is choosing an ELECT COMPANY to bear His name His nature and His authority.  It is here, in the true Church, which is His body, that Jesus Christ FIRST ESTABLISHES HIS GOVERNMENT that He might rule and reign on the throne of men’s lives.  And now soon very soon these sons of God shall be revealed to all creation that the exceeding riches of the grace and kindness of God unto these sons might be exhibited for all to see and be blessed thereby!  But most Christians will not come to this!  They are too busy playing Church, rejoicing that they are not going to hell or that they are going to heaven when they die, and blundering around in the carnal programs, immaturity and shame of a wretched, fleshly, religious system which falsely calls itself “the church.”  But just as the dispensation of the law, at its conclusion, brought forth that which it typified and pointed to Jesus Christ the Son of God so this present Church age must, in these last days, at its conclusion, bring forth that for which it was intended and to which it pointed a many-membered body of Christ, perfected, matured, overcoming, and full grown into the exact likeness and glory of the firstborn son of God, its Head and Lord.

God never intended that Christ should rule over all the earth and all nations during this age.  His reign is confined completely to that company of footstep followers who have heard His voice and follow Him all the way unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of the Christ.  Baptized in His fullness these sons of God become the very embodiment of His government in the earth.  This may seem to be an extremely slow method and a very small Kingdom for such a great and exalted King, but we cannot over emphasize the importance of this lowly beginning for a government whose authority is destined to “subdue ALL THINGS.”  So let us see that not only is God establishing His government in the lives of His elect, but through His dealings with them He is actually FORMING THEM INTO A GOVERNMENT a ruling body of sons of God, kings and priests after the Order of Melchizedek!

 God is calling out a people to bear His name, to be His nature, authority and power in the earth!  But to bear His name WHERE?  WHEN?  HOW?  To bear His name only through their fleeting years in the flesh?  Not at all.  James says, “AFTER THIS (after the Lord has completed His work of calling out a people for His name) I will return and build again the tabernacle of David... THAT THE RESIDUE OF MEN MIGHT SEEK AFTER THE LORD, AND ALL THE NATIONS...saith the Lord.”  The “residue” of men denotes “all the rest,” that is, all who were not part of the “called out.”  I tell you, my beloved, God is now forming a government composed of faithful sons (the tabernacle of David) whom He shall use in the age now dawning and in the ages yet to come as kings and priests after the Order of Melchizedek to bring God’s Kingdom to pass in all the earth and in all realms.  Through this glorious anointed body of sons ALL THE REST OF MEN...ALL THE NATIONS...SHALL SEEK THE LORD.  What wonderful news that is!  While the church world is getting ready to “fly away” to some far-off heaven somewhere, the sons of God are even now being prepared and equipped to rule all nations with a rod of iron.  This is not the “coming” of the Kingdom it is the next step of “advancement” and “increase” of the Kingdom!  The Kingdom has already come.  It is being refined now in the hearts of all those blessed ones who have received the call to sonship.  This next step of the Kingdom will  come with great power and glory when the elect of God is fully matured, perfected, prepared and equipped.  God, through nearly two thousand years, has been slowly, methodically, meticulously, surely and wisely choosing this body of sons, preparing them through the furnace of affliction and the discipline of testings to sit together with Him on His throne, for those that suffer with Him shall also reign with Him!

The promise is sure!  “And he that OVERCOMETH, and keepeth my works unto the end (of the processing), to him will I give POWER OVER THE NATIONS: and he shall RULE THEM with a rod of iron; as the vessels of a potter shall they be broken to shivers” (Rev. 2:26-27).  “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).  “And now they sing a new song, saying, You are worthy to take the scroll and to break the seals that are on it, for You were slain and with Your blood you purchased men unto God from every tribe and language and people and nation.  And You have MADE THEM A KINGDOM AND PRIESTS to our God, and they shall REIGN OVER THE EARTH! (Rev. 5:9-10, Amplified).

This great truth cannot be any more forcefully presented than it is by the prophet Daniel when he writes, “These great beasts which are four, are four kingdoms (Babylon, Persia, Greece, Rome), which shall arise out of the earth.  But THE SAINTS OF THE MOST HIGH SHALL TAKE THE KINGDOM and POSSESS THE KINGDOM for ever, even for ever and ever.  I beheld and the same horn made war with the saints (throughout the Church age), and prevailed against them; until the Ancient of days came, and JUDGMENT WAS GIVEN TO THE SAINTS OF THE MOST HIGH; and the time came that THE SAINTS POSSESSED THE KINGDOM (world rule).  And he shall speak great words against the Most High, and shall wear out the saints of the Most High...BUT THE JUDGMENT (of the saints) SHALL SIT, AND THEY (the saints) SHALL TAKE AWAY HIS DOMINION TO CONSUME AND DESTROY IT UNTO THE END. AND THE KINGDOM AND DOMINION AND THE GREATNESS OF THE KINGDOM UNDER THE WHOLE HEAVEN, SHALL BE GIVEN TO THE PEOPLE (elect) OF THE SAINTS OF THE MOST HIGH, whose Kingdom is an everlasting Kingdom, and ALL DOMINIONS SHALL SERVE AND OBEY HIM” (Dan. 7:17-18, 21-22, 25-27).

The work of the sons of God only begins at the opening of the age that follows the Church age.  Even as I pen these words we are in the transition of the ages, the overlapping of the ages as the old age dies and the new age is inaugurated.  Already the sons of God are beginning to move in the authority of God within the high realms of the Spirit.  A word is proceeding forth from their lips by the inspiration of the Spirit that is shaping the nations for the greater glory soon to be manifested before the face of all peoples and every nation.  These sons are not filled with the darkness of man’s carnal mind, but are heralds of the GOOD NEWS of the Kingdom of God!  They cherish the precious truth of their Father’s plan of redemption and restoration for all!  They are the true sons of God, or sons of Life, Light and Love, who are by their proclamations dispelling the darkness of this long night of sin, sorrow and death.  They are the sons of Zion raised up in this hour to bring righteous judgment into the earth!  By the Spirit, they are lifting mankind from the depths of sin onto the new highway into the Kingdom of God.  They are lifting up their voices as trumpets in the Most Holy Place, in the high place of the Spirit, singing the praises and victories of their King and Lord of all.  By the spirit of their sonship they are crying aloud, saying to all who shall hear, “The Lord God omnipotent reigneth!

 As we ascend in the Spirit into the place of God’s throne, we thereby rise up above all the lower realms of evil and darkness, to dispel them by the power of His word.  This is the present ministry of the sons of God in the new order of the government of God on earth!  As we press forward into our new Kingdom ministry, the power of all evil and darkness shall eventually be removed, to trouble the world no more.  Preaching and ministering according to the old church order will avail nothing in this conquest of the nations.  The five-fold ministry was given for the edification of the saints during the Church age, but only the ministry of sonship is given to rule the nations and restore all things to God!  We are entering into a ministry in the Spirit that will manifest the power and glory of the Kingdom of God to all mankind.  We are called, not merely to preach the gospel, but to RULE AND REIGN with Christ!

Make no mistake about it; we have an awesome responsibility!  We are to RULE with a rod of iron, over all the enemies of Christ, including the nations and all darkness, error and evil.  There is a world of difference between edifying the saints and ruling the nations.  We are called of God to REIGN with grace and love and mercy and wisdom and power over the affairs of mankind in the earth by ministering the authority of God in the Spirit and by the Spirit.  We will never understand this deep mystery of reigning in the Kingdom until we know that the work of the Kingdom of God is spiritual work.  As Paul Mueller recently wrote, “It is work that is nothing like the carnal, religious, church works of the flesh, which have now become works of iniquity!”  As we minister from this high and holy place of God’s throne in the Spirit it shall come to pass that “All the ends of the world shall remember and turn unto the Lord: and ALL THE KINDREDS OF THE NATIONS shall worship before Thee” (Ps. 22:27).  That will be the blessed effect of our ministry from the throne!  By this spiritual ministry from the throne we shall see and know that “The Lord most high is terrible; He is a great King over all the earth.  He shall subdue the people under us, and THE NATIONS UNDER OUR FEET” (Ps. 47:2-3).

Scripture could be piled upon scripture, but it should be clear to every honest heart that God has a plan beyond this age, and beyond the Church, the called out a plan that includes ALL THE NATIONS OF EARTH!  The age now ending has been the age of the “called out,” the age for the formation of God’s elect into a Kingdom of Priests.  The next age is the age for that Kingdom of Priests to take authority over the nations and bring the Kingdom of God to pass in the earth among all living nations.  That is the difference between the two ages!  And it means a difference in ministry, for God is now raising up in His sons the new ministry for the new age!  In the ages beyond God shall deal with all the billions of men who have lived and died from father Adam all the way down to this and future times.  All these shall be restored to God and to life and brought into the courts of His Kingdom.  It is an extraordinary and awesome thing that the Lord by revelation of the Spirit gives His sons understanding that what He is doing on the earth today is merely a beginning.  Nothing is finished yet!  The dawning new age will accomplish a mighty work of God in the earth, far beyond that of the previous age, but the new age will not finish God’s purpose, either!  We are not even approaching the end of the world, or the consummation of the ages, or the great “wind up” of God’s program.  Nothing is so complete, so perfect, that it is to remain unchanged from what it was in its time.  What the sovereign Lord has given us is a root and not yet a tree.  The Kingdom seed still must grow, the branches spread out; the blossoms will come later.  In the end the fruit will come, for that is how the Kingdom develops, saith the Lord, “first the blade, then the ear, then the full corn in the ear.”  This wonderful work goes on from generation to generation, from dispensation to dispensation, from age to age, from realm to realm,  from world to world, from galaxy to galaxy, until all things everywhere find their life in God.

Within this divine and glorious principle lies the nature of the Kingdom of Christ and the purpose He represents.  God’s Christ, Head and body, is for the redemption of creation and how can that be completed in a day?  How can that be finished in one earthly generation?  How can that be accomplished in one age, or in two or three?  Creation took a long time seven incredibly long epochs called “days” in the book of Genesis.  In like manner redemption, restoration, and re-creation require time!  It is not for just a few people or for several thousand or several million; it is not for one race, or one nation, or just for the Church; it is for all mankind, for every kindred, tongue, people, and nation, and for the whole vast creation!  The Lord Jesus Christ is the beginning and the end regarding the Kingdom of God and must reign until all enemies are under His feet, all things are made new, and God is all-in-all (I Cor. 15:25-28).  All must be restored  to Him in the far-flung heavens above, in the earth, and under the earth.  No wonder there are yet AGES TO COME!

THE ORDER OF MELCHIZEDEK AND THE AGES TO COME

 God’s house of sons is a Kingdom of Priests after the Order of Melchizedek.  The Lord Jesus Christ is a King-Priest after the Order of Melchizedek, and we are the body of Christ.  Thus, Christ is the Head of the Melchizedek Order of King-Priests, and we are the body of that divine and heavenly Order.  Jesus has inherited that exalted position as King-Priest after the order of Melchizedek, and we are joint-heirs with Him.  “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).  That throne is the throne of the Melchizedek order of King-Priests after the power of an endless life!

I would now draw your attention to the duration of the Melchizedek Priesthood.  The Melchizedek Priesthood is after the power of an indissoluble or indestructible life, but does that mean that the ministry of the Melchizedek Order continues forever?  It is stated, “Thou art a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek” (Heb. 7:17).  The average person sees that word “forever”  and assumes that it means that the Order of Melchizedek is an eternal Order.  But this is not the case!  The Greek word from which “forever” is translated is AION from which, as we have already pointed out, we get our English word eon.  Whenever one speaks of “eons” he is not talking about eternity, for eons denote specific spans of time.

Any thinking person should clearly see that if you translate the word AION, which means an age, by the words eternal or forever, which have nothing to do with time, you immediately get the wrong idea.  While the King James Bible says, “Thou art a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek,” the Greek form is eis ton aiona which literally translated is “to the age.”  The Melchizedek Priesthood lasts for time.  In this tremendous passage we see the precise duration of this Priesthood TO THE AGE.  We have no conception yet of the great and vast ages that are still ahead of us! When the ages have all been completed, then a priesthood will not be needed, but as long as time lasts, the priesthood is a necessity, for it falls within the scope of God’s PLAN OF THE AGES!

A priesthood “to...THE AGE!”  The true understanding of the Word of God is freighted with far more glorious meaning and depth of purpose than the shallow traditions of church creeds. While the scriptures speak of an age, and the ages, and the ages of the ages, one age proceeding from, or out of, a previous age until all the ages have run their courses, it also points to that glorious climatic age of all ages.  We read the phrase, “Thy throne, O God, is for ever and ever” (Heb. 1:8).  We carelessly suppose that it refers to the eternity of God’s throne!  But this expression, “for ever and ever,” comes from the Greek which literally reads TO THE AGE OF THE AGES.  This is very familiar terminology in the Greek scriptures.

Few men have been caught away by the spirit of inspiration as was the wise king Solomon when he penned the beautiful Song of Solomon.  God dropped one thousand and five songs down into the heart of Solomon, but of these, only five comprising the Song of Solomon, have been preserved and have found a place in the canon of scripture.  Inspiration named it “The Song of Songs,” that is, the one song which was above and beyond all the songs that have ever come from human heart and human lips.  Just as the “Song of songs” was chief above them all, just as the “Holy of holies” was the Holiest place of all, just as the “King of kings” is the greatest King of all, so all through the scriptures, though obscured by many translators, we have this remarkable phrase TO THE AGE OF THE AGES.  It points to that age which shall be the most glorious of all, and which finds its type in the year of Jubilee.  This is the Holy Spirit’s way of expressing the superlative, and so far as God’s plan of the ages is concerned this AGE OF THE AGES is THE AGE PAR EXCELLENCE of them all!

A simple illustration of this is our expression, “a day of days,” meaning a day that comes out of previous days, but which crowns them, and embodies not only what they contained, but the full fruition of all that was elementary in them.  Eternity does not emerge full grown in man’s consciousness until this wonderful age, the “age of ages,” is ended.  This AGE OF THE AGES is that glorious climax to God’s purpose and process of the ages, wherein He states, “Behold, I make all things new” (Rev. 21:5).  And when He says, “A-L-L,” it is self-evident that there is nothing remaining in the whole vast universe which shall not be made new, else all is not all.  “For He must reign until He hath put ALL enemies under His feet.  The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death” (I Cor. 15:25-26).  When the last enemy is under His feet, destroyed, and there is no more death no more physical death, no more spiritual death, no more first death, no more second death in any creature anywhere in all God’s great universe, in any heaven or in any hell, then shall God be ALL IN ALL!  The Amplified gives, “...be everything to everyone.”  Time comes to an end when the ages end and eternity, with God all in all, becomes a conscious reality.  There is no more change, therefore there is no more time.

Our blessed Lord Jesus Christ is a great priest after the Order of Melchizedek, not forever, as we have erroneously been taught, and not for just this one age of the Church dispensation, either, but unto THE AGE, that wonderful climatic age of all the ages, the grand finale of God’s great plan of the ages!  It cannot be made plainer than it is in Young’s Literal  Translation where we read, “And those indeed are many who have become priests, because by death they are hindered from remaining; and He, because of His remaining TO THE AGE, hath the priesthood not transient, whence also He is able to save TO THE VERY END, those coming through Him unto God ever living to make intercession for them” (Heb. 7:23-25).

Great are the mediatorial and redemptive glories of God’s Priesthood!  What distinguishes this ministry above all others is the fact that it carries its wonderful mission to a successful, victorious conclusion.  The Melchizedek Priesthood is a priesthood TO A FINALITY.  The fact that there will come a day, O glorious day! when it will no longer be needed, is the highest praise that can be brought to the Melchizedek Priesthood.  It will, in due time, have accomplished its mission, and finished the task God intended it to do.  All other ministries retire because of their weakness and inability to bring aught to perfection.  That is why God shall bring His son Company into the fullness of incorruptible life the sons of God must be able to live for the ages in order to fulfill their role in this Priesthood of the Ages.  All creation is standing on tiptoe to see the wonderful sight of God’s sons coming into their own!  All creation is in travail and pain waiting for the manifestation of the sons of God!  All creation is groaning together for each of God’s elect to come to their adoption to wit, the redemption of the body!  And this is because the creation itself also shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty from sin, sorrow, limitation and death, which is the liberty of the sons of God!

 The priests of the old covenant all died, so that even the good and faithful priests were not able to stay on the scene to see that God’s purpose was fully fulfilled in His people Israel.  They could never bring anything to perfection because of death!  But the Royal Priesthood after the Order of Melchizedek retires with honors having accomplished its glorious mission!  Oh, how it drags the Christ’s highest honors in the dust to distort God’s Word so that His priesthood is eternal and His reign everlasting!  Christ does not reign forever, my friend, for “He must reign till He hath put all enemies under His feet.  The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death.  For He (the Father) hath put all things under His feet.  But when He saith that all things are put under Him, it is manifest that He is excepted, which did put all things under Him.  And when all things shall be subdued unto Him, then shall the Son also Himself be subject unto Him that put all things under Him, that GOD may be all in all” (I Cor. 15:25-28).  May God forgive the ignorant zeal which seeks to gild the glory of His crowns with the tarnished tinsel of man’s imagination!  What He starts He will finish, and what He commences He will consummate, praise His wonderful name!

One of the main arguments of the book of Hebrews is that the Aaronic priesthood  and sacrificial ritual “brought nothing to completion.”  It was a treadmill of repetitive service which could not make the participants perfect.  But Christ’s Melchizedek Priesthood does and will bring mankind into perfect harmony with God, however many ages it takes, for He continues to live and remains a priest unto “THE AGE.”  During the Church age the Lord Jesus has been the only priest of that High Order, a priest for us, His younger brethren, to bring us to the perfection of His incorruptible life. But now we, together with Him, shall make up that priesthood for the age and the ages to come.  Oh yes!  We shall REIGN WITH HIM.  “Thou hast made us unto our God kings and priests, and we shall reign over the earth” (Rev. 5:10).  In and through His body of sons He is well able to complete the work and bring the priestly service to a close!  If the Melchizedek Priesthood should continue forever, then His priesthood would be just as impotent as Aaron’s, never able to obtain its objective.  Hence Christ, and those who share His Priesthood, are priests after the order of  Melchizedek “eis ton aiona to the age.  WITH WHAT ANTICIPATION DO WE AWAIT THAT GLORIOUS AGE!  WITH WHAT JOY DO WE GIVE OURSELVES TO SERVE IN THIS MELCHIZEDEKIAN ORDER TO BRING THAT AGE TO PASS!  At last, at long last, praise God, the Royal Priesthood will be able to say with finality, IT IS FINISHED!  MISSION ACCOMPLISHED!

That God might advance His Kingdom from one stage to another He has by omniscient wisdom designed dispensations, epochs, and ages.  From time to time He brings about a change in dispensations, which means the bringing forth of new means, methods, and revelations, always richer and more glorious and powerful and earth-shattering than the previous ones.  There always lies between the closing of one age and the opening of another, a short period which partakes of the powers and methods of both ages, and is especially filled with dramatic manifestations of God’s activity.  We are now in the very throes of such a time, which lies between the age of the building in the earth of the many-membered Christ body and the age when the Kingdom shall subdue and break in pieces all the governments and nations of man.  The rule of the Kingdom of God over the nations is about to open in power and great glory!  This new age that is even now dawning will see the most extraordinary move of God, so vast in proportions, so dynamic in power, so revolutionary in its effects that it will transform all the present cultures and society of mankind, switch the currents of civilization, and alter the structure of the nations.  This earth will receive such dramatic shock, such a global earthquake, such a divine impact of wisdom and glory and power that the whole world will be changed, completely remodeled.

This revolution will come through the manifestation of the sons of God and will penetrate and judge the motives, character, intents, activities, and institutions of the whole world!  This marvelous work and ministry will be wrought by a company of King-Priests after the Order of Melchizedek.  This sonship ministry will be the most awesome and powerful ministry the Lord has ever unleashed on the earth.  Nothing will be able to stand before it!  It will consume and break in pieces the whole fabric of the nations.  The economic, cultural, educational, military, ecclesiastical and political structures that man has erected by the carnal mind and fleshly wisdom will disintegrate before the very eyes of all men.  These sons of the Most High are even now being prepared and empowered with the mightiest weapon in the universe the sword of the Spirit which is the living word of God!  All things and all creatures obey the command of the word of the Most High God!  At His word creation springs forth and darkness flees from before His face.   

“The Lord shall utter His voice (speak His word) before His army: for His camp is very great: for He that is strong executeth His word: for the day of the Lord is great and very terrible; and who can abide it?” (Joel 2:11).  This army of God is earth’s deliverers and the Lord’s restoration hosts; not a revival crusade, not a political action committee, not a movement or organization, not a regiment of soldiers, but a spiritual company of divine origin and formation invincible and all-conquering!  These are the marching men and women of God progressing through the ages, tramping the corridors of God’s purposes, binding time and eternity together, fulfilling their mission, bringing the Kingdom of God on earth as it is in heaven.  Wherever the desperate needs of men are, from India’s vast land, teeming with hundreds of millions, from Africa’s dark juju ceremonialism, from the igloos of Iceland to the farthest reaches of Tierra del Fuego, from Wall Street to the Great Wall of China, from the ivory-covered halls of learning in Paris, or Cambridge, to the dusty roads of the commonplace of all nations wherever man may be found the sons of God shall bring the blessings and benefits of the Kingdom of Heaven with power and great glory!

THE GREATEST SHOW ON EARTH

What a high and holy calling!  “But God, who is rich in mercy...hath quickened us together with Christ...that in the ages to come He might SHOW the exceeding riches of His grace...” (Eph. 2:4-7).  Those dear people who teach and preach that the day of grace will soon be ended know nothing at all of grace, nor do they understand that God Himself is grace.  He is the God of all grace.  You may as well say that God can die as to say that grace will end.  So vast, so marvelous are the wonders of His grace, it will require the ages to come to continue to unfold these wonders, and He has purposed that there shall be a people through whom He would give this demonstration.  “That in the ages to come He might show...”  “Show” is from a Greek word meaning “to exhibit, to put on display like a work of art, to demonstrate.”  The Amplified Bible reads, “He did this that He might CLEARLY DEMONSTRATE through the ages to come the immeasurable (limitless, surpassing) riches of His free grace...”  Kenneth Wuest translates, “In order that He might EXHIBIT...in the ages that pile themselves upon one another in continuous succession the surpassing wealth of His grace...”  What a word!  “Show...demonstrate...exhibit the riches of His grace” unto whom?  Not to those who already know it, for they are the demonstration!  For those who have experienced His grace to demonstrate that grace unto themselves would be useless nonsense.  Ah, but to demonstrate it to those who do not know it!  To the whole vast creation of men and realms and worlds and universes who dwell in darkness and the shadow of death.

Ah, God is preparing a divine show for all the earth, indeed for the entire universe.  The mighty Barnum, in describing his circus, said it was THE GREATEST SHOW ON EARTH.  True, Mr. Barnum was a great showman and, for its kind, he had a great show, but God is the Master Showman and He is preparing to give the world THE GREATEST SHOW IT HAS EVER SEEN.  It is a theatrical of MERCY and GRACE and LOVE in a world of wrath and despair and sin and death.  This will be God’s master stroke as the curtain rises on creation’s greatest drama God’s Great Show THE MANIFESTATION OF THE SONS OF GOD!  Praise His name, once the finishing touch is put on the last stone of His living temple of Kings and Priests, the firstfruits of His redemption, in ages yet to come He shall put His grace and kindness and wisdom and power inwrought in us ON DISPLAY so that the entire creation may walk across the stage of His cosmic theater and behold and see and finally come to understand and appreciate what God has provided for all men in Christ.

Our ears have heard the sound of the trumpet and we cannot, dare not, settle for anything less, we must follow on to know the Lord in all His glorious fullness, to put on the mind of Christ, to be transformed into His image, to drink deeply of His incorruptible life, so that we in turn may be His Givers unto all.  Let us not sell creation short in these days!  All creation is groaning and travailing together in pain to be delivered from the bondage of corruption.  Mankind is sick and tired of sin and fear and hatred and sorrow and pain and empty religious platitudes, rituals, ceremonies, doctrines and programs.  The whole race is gripped by the most intense desire to receive, there is everywhere an unprecedented hunger for deliverance, life and reality.  Let us not deny the Lord who purchased us to be a Kingdom of Priests by settling for something less, a comfortable position in the church realm, or a mansion over the hilltop.  While we seek no glory of our own, there is, nevertheless, great wealth and heavenly glory for all who fulfill the will of God.  You never lose with God!   

The compelling passion of my life is to be filled with all the fullness of God and come to the image of Jesus Christ.  The deep cry of my heart is for the satisfaction of knowing that my life counts for God.  As God knows my heart, it is not a selfish desire.  The reason I want to be like Jesus is because I love Him so, but also because it is the only way I can ever be used in the restoration of the fallen creation.  I see the needs of the world around me, and realize that I am practically powerless to do anything about it.  Oh yes, I can pray, and give a little, and believe God, and see occasional conversions, deliverances, and blessings.  But anyone who says they have reached the place where their ministry is meeting the needs of the world is either blind to the needs of humanity, a proud hypocrite, or a compulsive liar.  “Lord Jesus!  Breathe Thy Spirit into all who read these lines until we are like Thee in all of Thy ways that Thou mayest be glorified and all creation blessed.  Make us a center of omnipotent God!  May the great river of Thy love and grace and power flow, and flow, and flow until the outflow of Thyself from our center knows no circumference, enveloping all creation in Thy life and light and love.  Amen!”

God will make the reality ours.  And it shall bring the increase of His Kingdom into the next age and unto the ages to come.  Blessed be His name!

 


Chapter 45

THE INCREASE OF THE KINGDOM

(continued)

From the dawn of history right down to the present time men have dreamed of a golden age when peace and prosperity, health and happiness should be blessed realities among all peoples of every kindred and tongue and people and nation on earth.  Poets, philosophers and prophets have sung and spoken of harmony and brotherhood when all strife and discord should cease and the earth should be reborn.   Plato wrote of an ideal republic, and the Lord Chancellor of England in the reign of king Henry the Eighth described a glorious Utopia one day to be established among all nations throughout the world.  The ancient Hebrew prophets prophesied of a time when the nations would beat their swords into plowshares, men would live so long that one who died at an hundred years of age would be a mere child, and the whole earth would be full of the glory of the Lord.   Hundreds, perhaps thousands, of others, politicians, military generals, ministers, and visionaries of all kinds have predicted the arrival of the Golden Age, the Utopia to come.  Were all these men suffering from delusions or merely indulging in wishful thinking?  Shall these things be, or is it in vain that men look forward to the coming of a nobler, truer, happier, more blessed and righteous order in the world?  If such a vision is to be relegated to the realm of fiction and fantasy, or if such realities exist only in the realm of the spirit or in some bright glory-world above, then it is useless for us to pray, “Thy kingdom come.  Thy will be done, AS IN HEAVEN SO IN EARTH.”

Oftentimes when a motel or restaurant is poorly managed and thereby develops a bad reputation, its business falls off and the owner is forced to sell or vacate.  The first thing the new manager does is to put up a huge sign conspicuously located, reading, UNDER NEW MANAGEMENT.  This is what will happen to this planet soon!  Truly things are in a bad, distressful and deplorable condition.  The manager, old Adam with his carnal mind, human reasoning, and sinful nature, has been wicked and deceitful, selfish and immoral, causing strife, heartaches, wars, deaths, tragedies, pains, troubles and sorrows everywhere. Thank God his lease is about up!   The first man Adam’s days are numbered, and the second man, who is the last Adam, is about to take over this earth, and will become its new manager, if you please, as is indicated in the following verses: “I will declare the decree: the Lord hath said unto me, Thou art my Son; this day have I begotten thee.  Ask of me, and I shall give unto thee the nations for thine inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession.  Thou shalt break them with a rod of iron; thou shalt dash them in pieces like a potter’s vessel” (Ps. 2:7-9).  This is the destiny of all the sons of God!

God is not one bit interested in whisking us off this planet and hiding us from the devil in some far-off heaven somewhere.  But He is vitally concerned with making us overcomers, the sons of God in the midst of the land, to inherit all nations and rule them with a rod of iron.  “He that overcometh shall inherit all things; and I will be his God, and he shall be my son.”  It is not God’s purpose to burn up the earth and destroy the nations of men that He has created to inhabit the earth, exiling billions of men and women into eternal damnation in the abyss of hell.  Oh, no!  It is His purpose to heal the nations!  “And the leaves of the tree (of life) are for the healing of the nations” (Rev. 22:2).  “And the nations of them that are saved shall walk in the light of it (the City of God)” (Rev.   21:24).  God is going to destroy the sin and rebellion in the world, but He is going to bring healing to the nations.  The Sun of righteousness shall arise with healing in His wings for all men and for all the nations!

Only with great difficulty can we even imagine what the world will be like under the ministry and rule of the manifested sons of God.  It’s wonderful to look at what’s in that new world, but it’s almost as great to think of what’s not there.  Satan and all his cronies will be missing (Rev. 20:1-3).  The Kingdom of Heaven on earth will have no crack houses  or rehabilitation centers, no police stations or courthouses or prisons, no locks or alarms.  “They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain (kingdom): for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea” (Isa. 11:9).  In the new world there will be no guns, no missile factories, no abortion clinics, no sirens wailing, no ambulances, no hospitals, no cancer clinics, no morgues or funeral parlors.  “There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away” (Rev. 21:3-4).   The shroud of Turin is an ancient burial cloth that shows the wounds and facial features of a crucified man.  Certain analysts think it has undergone a kind of radiation.  Some Christians believe it is the shroud in which Jesus was buried, and that gets them excited.  But I’m not so excited about any shroud Jesus may have preserved.  I’m excited about the shroud Jesus destroys.  “On this mountain He shall destroy the shroud that enfolds all peoples, the sheet that covers all nations; He will swallow up death forever.  The sovereign Lord will wipe away the tears from off all faces” (Isa. 25:7-8).

At the present time men are, on account of sin, made to be afraid of one another.  This is really the meaning of all the policemen, the detectives, the FBI, the CIA, security guards and neighborhood watch programs.  All these exist in order to protect us from violence, injury and violation at the hands of our fellow-men.  This is the meaning, too, of all the carefully and strongly constructed locks, bars, and security systems in our houses and businesses, to protect us from thieves and rapists and murderers and others who would molest us.  This is the meaning of the millions of soldiers who are trained in the art of warfare, as well as the great navies patrolling the seas, the air force flying the skies and the satellites scanning the globe.  They exist for the purpose of affording protection from hostile invaders or terrorists bent on coming to take away our freedoms and power and position on the earth.  This is the meaning of the large burglar-proof safes made to be so specially strong and secure that men cannot steal away our treasures and wealth.

I am reminded of something I read some time ago.  Standing before a masterpiece in a national museum, a tourist says in a snide tone, “I don’t see anything in that!”  Then another tourist, looking at the same work of art, replies thoughtfully, “Don’t you wish you could?”  As we witness our nation and society deteriorating year after year, and as we read and see reports that confirm our worst fears, ordinary citizens tend to sigh in despair and say, “I see no reason for hope.”  And as they despair, we hear the still small voice of the Spirit asking, “Don’t you wish you could?”  Thank God for the hope of creation!  According to the apostle Paul’s teaching in the eighth chapter of Romans the hope of all creation is the manifestation of the sons of God.  Together we can praise God that this present evil order is shortly to come to an end.  The world, which for ages has been marred by sin and ruled in unrighteousness, is to experience the rule of heaven.  “Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.”  That is the prayer of sons!  That will make this earth of ours like heaven, because heaven’s conditions will prevail and God’s will shall be done here — everywhere and in all things.   Isn’t that simple, now?  Isn’t that much more reasonable than going into this theological blackout and thinking that this world is sort of a diving-board from which men jump into either eternal torment, or up into the clouds somewhere?  Doesn’t the gospel of the Kingdom of God fill your soul with the realism of God’s great plan and give you a redemptive vision?  Ah, it will give you an incentive to fulfill the will of God here and now upon the earth!

The first great work of the new age is the manifestation of the sons of God.  “And he that overcometh, and keepeth my works unto the end, to him will I give power over the nations: and he shall rule them with a rod of iron” (Rev. 2:26-27).  The spectacle will be absolutely unique and glorious, as the Saviour of the world, the King of kings and Lord of lords, comes to be revealed in the fullness of His love, righteousness, power and glory in the splendor of myriads of glorified sons of God!  The sons of God will hold in their unerring hands the reins of government over all the earth!  The mighty Christ within us knows all languages.  He certainly understands and knows all hearts with all their hopes, dreams, desires, and ambitions, whether good or bad.  He is the fountainhead of all wisdom and grace and power, and foreknows all things from the beginning.  Morning stars shall again sing together, and all the sons of God shall shout for joy, when Jesus comes to be revealed in His saints and to be admired in all them that believe in that day.

The disciples of our Lord Jesus Christ were greatly perplexed when Jesus died.  But then He arose the conquering Christ!  The fact of the Christ’s resurrection is historic.  The man who disputes it disputes the best established fact in history.  He was seen by those who despaired of His existence.  He ate with them.  He drank with them.   He walked with them in a bloodless body.   He talked to the despondent and broken-hearted apostles, the eleven, for nearly forty days.  It was impossible to be deceived.  He spoke, and was heard and seen on one occasion by five hundred, most of whom were living at the time that Paul made the declaration that they knew Christ and had seen Him after His resurrection.  He proved His resurrection by telling them that if they would go to Jerusalem and enter into an upper room, and wait for the promise of the Father, the Holy Spirit’s power would come.  The promised outpouring took place.  Christ went up and the Holy Ghost came down.  They saw Him go and they saw Him come.  It shook the place where they were sitting.  The divine earthquake shook Jerusalem.  It shook Israel.  It shook the Roman empire until it fell, to rise no more.  It shook the world.  The Spirit’s power came.  The Christ returned in mighty Spirit-power.  He ascended up far above all heavens that He might return as the Spirit to fill all things (Eph. 4:10).  He who is the Truth came again as the Spirit of Truth.  He came as an indwelling Life.  Men who were weak became strong.  Men who were wicked murderers and devils were transformed into men of virtue and power with God.  Men who were illogical became great and mighty reasoners.  Men who were feeble stood up, and in their spiritual majesty tower today above all the men of their time.  All history substantiates the claim.  Every philosopher and potentate of their time had to recognize them so that Peter, Paul, James, John, and many of their successors, became the mightiest Powers even in a heathen Empire.

The day had dawned, the shadows were fleeing away, darkness dispelled.  We would but deceive ourselves were we to conclude that the conflict of the ages between Christ and Satan, between truth and error, between light and darkness, between righteousness and unrighteousness, between life and death has ended.  The second thousand years are drawing to a close since Jesus came, died, conquered death, and poured out His life-giving Spirit and, blessed be His name, He pursues His mission still and reigns in majesty over His Kingdom by entering into these temples of clay, and filling our spirits, and souls, and bodies with His own eternal presence and power, making us one with Him, members of His very own body, of His flesh, of His bone, of His blood.  He has gathered millions into His gospel net of salvation that out from their midst He may birth a vast company of sons who have put on the mind of Christ, been conformed into His image, with the Law of His Life inscribed upon the tables of their hearts, that they may then be filled with the fullness of His Spirit.  And the hour is wonderfully nigh at hand when there shall be a further transformation, even the bodies of His elect sons shall be changed in likeness unto His body of glory as this corruptible puts on incorruption, and this mortal puts on immortality, so that we, who were destined from the beginning to be the revelation of HIMSELF to creation, may complete His mighty work for the redemption of humanity.

And now, a new Day has dawned!  Thank God, a few of His chosen ones have arisen to behold the dawn and to drink in the intoxicating freshness of the morn.  A new age has arrived.  “Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men (humanity, mankind), and He shall dwell with them, and they shall be His people, and God Himself shall be with them, and be their God.  And God shall wipe away all tears from their (mankind’s) eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away.  And He that sat upon the throne said, Behold, I MAKE ALL THINGS NEW” (Rev. 21:3-4).  Blessed promises of a mighty deliverance, which by the Spirit we even now begin to see fulfilled.  The time has come for the nations to hear the voice of the Son of God and live!  There shall be a glorious victory as the devil that has deceived all nations is bound with the great chain of the word of God through His sons.  The un-deceiving of the nations means a new mentality, new understanding, new thought processes, the unveiling of the truth about all things in the minds of the vast multitudes of earth.   The light of divine truth and reality will at last shine into the speculations of science, the theories of education, the practice of commerce, the world of politics, the dogmas of religion, and all things will be MADE NEW!  What anticipation this evokes in our hearts!  “And it shall come to pass, that...all nations...shall even go up from year to year to worship the King, the Lord of hosts, and to keep the feast of tabernacles” (Zech. 14:16).   This scripture reveals that it is by the ministry of those who have partaken of, and entered experientially into, the FEAST OF TABERNACLES, that the nations shall be brought into living relationship with the Lord!  Ah, those walking only in the feast of Passover (Fundamentalists and Evangelicals) or the feast of Pentecost (Pentecostals and Charismatics) can never get this job done!  Only those who press on into the fullness of God will have the power to rule the nations!  “And the nations...shall walk in the light of it: and the kings of the earth do bring their glory and honour into it...and there shall be no more curse” (Rev. 21:24; 22:3).

The ministry and rule of sonship is ready to be poured out upon the nations of this world.  What a perfect luxury of blessing shall come upon all mankind!  The ministry of Christ revealed in the four Gospels, shall be intensified by tens of thousands of manifest sons of God in the midst of the earth!  “The wilderness and the solitary place shall be glad for them; and the desert shall rejoice, and blossom as the rose...they shall see the glory of the Lord, and the excellency of our God.  Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf shall be unstopped.  Then shall the lame man leap as an hart, and the tongue of the dumb sing: for in the wilderness shall waters break out, and streams in the desert” (Isa. 35:1,2,5,6).  When the mighty work of salvation, restoration, and transformation is complete there will be none of those painful and debilitating diseases which now plague mankind.  There will be no cancers wasting away the frame, no multiple sclerosis, multiple dystrophy, or Parkinson's disease destroying the nervous system.  Because streams of healing and deliverance shall flow out to earth’s needy, helpless and hopeless, there shall be no need of medicine, and drug stores will disappear.  We shall need no doctors and the great clinics and hospitals of our cities and towns will have no patients who need treatment, surgeries, or nursing.  From every mental hospital the inmates will stream forth shouting for joy at finding that God’s Christ has touched their minds with His omnipotent hand of love and power.   From every prison in the world will leap forth prisoners of each sex and every age to testify to the saving, delivering, transforming work of God in their lives, breaking completely and forever the shackles of sin and satan, turning thieves, murderers and rapists into men of mildness, righteousness and compassion.  The power of sin and death being broken, the undertaker will look in vain for corpses and will find it the hardest thing in the world to keep his business open.

NOW HEAR THE WORD OF THE LORD!  When God’s spiritual work of mind, will, heart, nature and character is finished in each of His sons, the sign that the hour for the manifestation of the sons of God has arrived will be given throughout the whole earth.  On a day much like today, those who have been fully awakened within and transformed into His likeness in spirit and soul, will step into another dimension.  Suddenly, instantaneously and simultaneously every sickness and disease in each and every body of all the sons of God will be totally and permanently healed.   This will be the most astounding mass-miracle of the ages!  A shuddering will run through their bodies.  In an instant these sons will burst into the resplendence of the shimmering glory of God brighter than the noonday sun.  Incorruptible life will surge forth from within quickening their mortal bodies with vibrant, self-perpetuating life.  Their minds will at the same time be expanded with divine wisdom and understanding.  All things will become open and known.  The secrets of the universe will become as clear as the letters of the alphabet.  Creative power will flow from their mouths and their hands.  The secrets of men’s hearts will be revealed and they will know all that is within man; but they will not be permitted to speak these things, only mercy, grace and omnipotent love will flow forth to mankind!  But the very first sign that the hour of manifestation has arrived will be the sudden, instantaneous, and simultaneous healing of every sickness and disease in the body of every son!  You can watch for that sign that the day of full manifestation is here!  Some will not receive this word, but it does not matter.  The sign will be fulfilled, and glorious shall be the Day unto those who are appointed to it!

The lovely Christ who two millenniums ago spoke to the winds and waves and with a word hushed the sea’s mad raging, will through the authority of the many sons He has brought to glory control the climates of the world, giving freedom from howling tempests, raging hurricanes, devastating tornadoes, destructive floods, and desolating droughts.  By the increase of His Kingdom and peace ferocity in man and beast and nature will cease and “the sucking child will play on the hole of the asp, and the weaned child shall put his hand on the cockatrice den,” unharmed.  The natural mind can barely comprehend what the world will be like when there is no hatred, strife, bigotry, broken homes, domestic violence, child or spouse abuse, alcohol or drug abuse, no war nor crime, no soldiers nor policemen, no doctors nor hospitals, no beggars nor homeless people, nor hungry people, nor children with bloated stomachs, no suicides, no election frauds nor stealing and buying votes, no wicked scams, no pornography nor prostitution, no adultery nor fornication.  All people of all nations will speak of God’s Christ as THE LORD OUR RIGHTEOUSNESS, for everyone will be righteous!  The nations will be spiritually clean.  Righteousness will fill the Kingdom.  The knowledge of the glory of the Lord will cover the earth as the waters cover the sea.  The laws of God will be in the hearts of the people.  The Spirit will be poured out on all flesh, and the joy and peace which God intended for man to enjoy will be restored to him.  The Kingdom of God shall triumph over all and there shall be no more curse.

During the age now ending the dealing of God has been with His Church, and not with the nations.  The nations have been affected, of course, but only in an overflow of blessing from the work and righteousness of God in His people.  The Kingdom in its present state does not rule over the nations of the earth, but the nations, for the most part, have a rule over the Church.  The nations have persecuted the Church, and still do.  The nations have placed limitations upon the Church.  In most countries the church systems are even chartered by the government!  The apostle Paul admonished the saints to be obedient to kings and rulers, and to submit to every ordinance of man for conscience’ sake.  Christ now rules in the hearts and lives of His chosen ones in the midst of His enemies.  But the day is coming when He will rule through His Kingdom Sons over His enemies.  While world governments exist under the supervision of God for the good of mankind, those governments are not by any stretch of the imagination a reflection of the Kingdom of God!  The spiritual forces that influence them are often the malignant spirits from realms of darkness, and most of their activities are manifestations of the carnal mind, works of the flesh.   No government on earth today is truly Christian.  No, not one!  Human progress without God has always been progress in evil, not good.  His upward progress, progress in return to God, has not been discernible at all through the centuries.  God turned the world over to man to govern.  But man ruined the world through sin, wrecked his happiness, and sold his life for death.  There can be no such thing as upward progress apart from God!  With every invention of man evil only multiplies.  With all the medical knowledge and great hospitals man’s wisdom has built, there are more sick people today than ever.  In the past century of man’s “enlightened civilization” more people have died in treacherous, bloody wars than in all the wars from the beginning of time put together.  Man has tried to rule the earth, and failed.  He is failing now.   The vast experience of six thousand years is now nearly complete.  With pollution pouring into our atmosphere, soil, rivers, lakes, and oceans; with atomic bombs stockpiled by more and more nations, and terrorists stalking the earth with fanatical zeal, the case is most manifestly going against man.

At this crisis we now stand.  We are on the verge of momentous events.  We are at the close of a long series of experiments made by Adam the banished.  And we find the world more wicked and more lawless than at the first.   Peace does not reign among the nations.   Misrule has not departed.  Righteousness is not ruling the world, nor our own nation.  Holiness does not beautify the homes of men.  Man has found no cure for the deceitfulness and desperate wickedness of the human heart.  Sin and sorrow rage on, and he is powerless.  The curse still rests on the earth and poisons the air.  Man cannot check it.  The thorn and thistle, the prickly memorials of the first sin, still shoot up.  And the thorns and thistles in the garden of men’s lives are thicker and taller than ever.  Disease still scourges the body.  Man cannot drive it out.  Death still smites down its daily myriads.  Men cannot disarm or check it.  The grave still receives the loved, and preys upon the young and the beautiful.

These are the fruits of the first Adam’s doings, and this is the powerlessness of his children to remove so much as one in ten thousand evils!  It has been manifestly demonstrated that man can ruin, but not restore, the world.  His attempts at restoration have resulted only in greater evils.  Every invention of science has ultimately proven detrimental to the earth and to the lives of mankind.  His antibiotics produce super-viruses more deadly than before.  His automobiles and airplanes spew pollutants into the atmosphere.  His chemicals spread sickness, deformity and death throughout the planet.  His television and movies destroy the moral conscience of both children and adults.  His food additives and prescription drugs kill hundreds of thousands, yea, millions annually.  His guns and bombs and sophisticated implements of war have killed millions, and are still killing today in every corner of the globe.  But this progress in evil has a limit.  God has set bounds which He will not allow it to pass!  He will not allow this earth to become altogether a hell.  Even now He makes the wrath of man to praise Him, and the remainder thereof He restrains.  We are now nearing the boundaries of man’s evil.  The second man, the last Adam, has been formed in the earth as a many-membered body, and is now at hand and with Him the kingdom and the glory.  This Man is ready to assume the dominion that was given to man in that long ago beginning.   He will bring the cure.  He will knit the broken world.  He will subdue and subject it, beginning with the hearts of men.  He will break man’s rebellion with a word of power and life — a rod of iron.  He will redeem, reconcile, and restore mankind to the fellowship of God.  He will teach men the ways of righteousness and bind their hearts to the will of the Father.  He will rebuke disease and sorrow.  He will bind death.   He will rifle the grave.  He will deliver creation.  And on His righteous peaceful throne He will rule until God is all in all.

The sons of God are now waiting in the wings.  That is the essence of their action.  They patiently watch as the men of this dying age are moving helter-skelter.  These sons know in their enlightened minds that all the feverish activities of the world’s rulers is but the last frantic stages of a mad rush to save the world of mankind from destruction by the formation of a “new world order” already in view, a true City of Man, built by man’s ingenuity for man — this, finally, is the avowed goal they forecast for themselves, shimmering on the mountains of the future.  But God’s holy sons are waiting — growing in the knowledge, wisdom, nature, and power of their heavenly Father — but not for that City of Man that man is building, the modern-day Tower of Babel, for that city will not be built, at least not as men have configured it.   The Kingdom of God will come upon the nations after all the efforts of Transnationalists and Internationalists, of the Trilateralists and Illuminatists, of liberals and humanists, of globalists and ecumentalists have come to utter shipwreck upon the shoals of the treachery, deceit, greed, bigotry, wretchedness and wickedness of the human heart.

The day is coming, Oh glorious Day! when God’s nature and glory and power and rule will no longer be found only in God’s elect, no longer in a tiny minority of people in every city, state, province and nation, but in all people of all the nations.   There will not any more be one people redeemed, but all people redeemed; not one land glowing with the glory of God, but all lands radiating His life; not one nation owning Christ as King, but all nations become the Kingdom of God through the wonder-working achievements of the sons of God.  That great day is coming, the world will do the will of God, for Christ is not only the redeemer of His called and chosen people, but He is the SAVIOUR OF  T-H-E  W-O-R-L-D.  For Him the banners of all people shall wave in the breeze; to Him shall the kings and presidents and prime ministers and rulers bow themselves, and unto Him shall the gladdened hearts of the children of men uplift their songs of triumph.

He who came to redeem the world will not fail!  To deny that the world and the nations of earth will be gathered into the Kingdom of God is to wickedly deny Christ His victory.  The Kingdom of God is for the world, and the world is for the Kingdom of God.  Make no mistake about it:  Christ our Lord shall be King of all kings and Lord of all lords!  Onward, ever onward, rolls the glorious song of redemption, and to the sons of God who yearn to see the glory of the Lord cover the earth as the waters cover the sea, I say:  The world, and the whole of it, for God and His sons!  No less will satisfy the Father.  No less will satisfy His sons!

Someone has eloquently written: “What a scene of unimaginable grandeur that will be, when at last all nations are gathered to His feet!  That will include the people from all the European States, from Iceland in the far north to Greece in the south, and from Portugal in the west to Russia in the east.  There will the people from Algeria, Morocco, and the Atlas Mountains of the Sahara; from the great lakes of Central Africa, from the banks of the Niger, the Calabar, the Congo, and the Zambesi rivers; and from the upland of South Africa.  There will be gathered to Christ the people from Israel, Jordan, and Arabia; India will contribute her millions; and even from closed lands like Nepal, Sikkim, and Tibet, Christ will gather His inheritance.  From the Islands of Indonesia they will come — Java, Sumatra, Bali, Celebes, Lombok, Soembawa, Borneo,   and the rest — and they will be gathered to the feet of the Redeemer.  From the teeming millions of Central Asia, from China, Japan, Korea,  and Mongolia, there will be an immense home going to the Saviour.  From the myriad islands of the Pacific, the peoples  of Polynesia and Melanesia will be gathered to the Lord who redeemed them.    From Australia and New Zealand there will be multitudes who will join in the glad song of praise.   Every republic of Central and South America, and the West Indies — Cuba, Haiti, Jamaica, Puerto Rico, and the Lesser Antilles, they will come.  From the far-off forests and lakes of Canada and the plains of the United States and the mountains of Mexico there will be a similar homegoing.  This gathering to Christ will be overwhelmingly splendid!”   — Author unknown.

This is how the Christ will be revealed in His saints in this hour:  Christ is coming in power and in great glory!  He is coming to judge the earth with righteousness!  I am not talking about military power or political power.   I am not talking about power in the way men know power — NO!  The power of the Kingdom is spiritual power.  It is power greater than Pentecostal power, for Pentecostal power is but the earnest of the Spirit.  Christ is coming in the power of sonship, the power of the Man of Galilee multiplied and intensified in a many-membered body tens of thousands of times.  The mighty works of Jesus of Nazareth were but a sample, a swatch, a preview, a foretaste of the glory of God’s Christ, Head and body.  The Christ Himself prophesied of this greater glory of sonship to come when He said, “The works that I do shall ye do also, and greater works than these shall ye do...”  And again, “He that overcometh shall inherit all things; and I will be his God, and he shall be my son.  To him that overcometh will I give power over the nations: and he shall rule them with a rod of iron; as the vessels of a potter shall they be broken to shivers: even as I received of my Father” (Rev. 21:7; 2:26-27).  He says that He intends to come to this little planet (in His elect) and finally put down the rebellion that has broken out — He will break the nations with a rod of iron and smash them to shivers like the vessels of a potter.  Maybe you don’t like that.  Well, you take it up with Him.  He said it, and He is going to do it just that way.

Suppose Jesus came back to this earth tomorrow like He came two thousand years ago, the man of Galilee, the carpenter of Nazareth, the gentle Jesus.  Suppose He were here.  Suppose He went to the Communist Party Headquarters in Beijing, China and knocked on the door.   Whoever keeps the store over there would come and say, “Yes?”  He would say, “I’m Jesus.  I’m here to take over.”  Do you think they would say, “My, we have been expecting you!”  No, they’d put Him before a firing squad in the morning.  My friend, how do you think He could take over if He came to China today?  He would have to break them with a rod of iron!  Now suppose He goes to France, England, and Germany.  There are no strong men in these nations anymore, but some ambitious men rule those countries.  They don’t want Him.  Their constitutions make no provision for the transfer of power to God’s Christ.  Suppose He came to the United States of America.  He could never be King because we have no king, and He could not be President unless He ran in the primaries of the Democratic or Republican parties.   And if He wanted to put prayer and truth and righteousness in the schools, in the courts, and in the halls of government they would brand Him an unconstitutional right-wing fringe fanatic and He would never make it past the first primary in New Hampshire.

Suppose He went over to Rome.  I was there some years ago and walked the halls of the Vatican, stood under the dome of Saint Peter’s, and paused in the revered quietness of the Sistine Chapel.  Suppose our Lord would go and knock on the door of the Vatican.  The man with the long white garment would come to the door, and the Lord Jesus would say, “I’m here to take over.”  What do you think he would say?  I think he would say, “Now look, you’ve come a little too soon.   I’m preparing a mass, and my pope-mobile is being readied for a historic trip to Asia, and we have two thousand years of tradition and orthodoxy and organization to back up what we are doing.  I don’t need you.”  I don’t think he would want Him.  Now maybe you think the nations’ reactions would be different.  Perhaps you are saying, “Oh, they would take Him.”  Then why don’t they take Him?  They do not because they won’t have Him!  Suppose He went to the World Council of Churches today, and He said to Protestantism, “I’m here to take over.”  Would they receive Him?  They would not!  Suppose He went to Hollywood and New York and announced to the heads of the movie industry and the news media, “I’m here to take over.”  They would hate Him, they would reject Him, they would ridicule Him, they would mock Him, they would make jokes about Him on the Tonight Show and on the David Letterman Show, laugh Him to scorn, sue Him, call the SWAT team and have Him hauled away!

When Christ comes in His sons He is coming with power and great glory, with wonder-working power, paralyzing, mood-altering, will-subduing, rebellion-breaking, mind-changing, heart-transforming, mighty regenerating power!  Let me quote it again: “And he that overcometh...to him will I give POWER OVER THE NATIONS: and he shall rule them with a rod of iron; AS THE VESSELS OF A POTTER SHALL THEY BE BROKEN TO SHIVERS...”  When all the sons of God are manifest vengeance against evil and all the institutions of the carnal minds of men will be the first order of business.  Only the sons of God can rend the shroud of darkness and death that hangs over the whole earth.  These magnificent beings will possess the power of God to chase the darkness away.  After they have broken the power of sin and satan, the sons will begin a heavenly restoration.  As kings and priests of the incorruptible Order of Melchizedek they will with divine authority correct every physical and spiritual disorder.  This wonderful company will shimmer with celestial glory, and the life of light will emanate from them to illuminate and quicken all men.  These sons of God are the living government of God, the essence of His heart and throne.  They are the chosen and proven, the called and tested, the nobodies who walked closely with God and  are elevated to the heights of His Kingdom.  All the firstborn sons of God will step into magnificent permanence and find themselves clothed with the glory of universal power.

These sons will arise in the midst of the earth out of every hamlet and cove, from the deserts and rain forests, from the valleys and the mountains, from every town and city, from every province and state and every nation on earth and will be gathered together by the power of the Holy Ghost to form the governing council of the new world order of the Kingdom of God.  Jesus will stand in His rightful place at the helm of this invincible body.  Every son of God will be the brother of Jesus Christ, birthed in the image of their Father.  These are fantastic beings, focused, strong, powerful, mighty, formidable, overwhelming, supreme, conquering warriors who love creation and rule the created realms with all the power of God.   As an invading army of celestial kings they shall advance to subdue the earth.  In tumult and conflict, in reconciliation and restoration, their truth and light will cover the land.

No device of men — money, worldly wisdom, political clout, military genius — shall deter this unstoppable army of the body of Christ.  They will crush the ignorance of carnality, and abolish the power of darkness in the hearts of men.  The glorified sons of God will fear not to slay, for they are also the resurrection and the life.   Their actions are wisdom, their weapons are truth, and their motives are love.  They will dispense the knowledge of the holy as a clear stream, to bring forth judgment unto victory.  All the peoples of the nations will become their possession (Ps. 2:8).  Then shall the teeming millions of earth know peace in a new and unspeakable tranquility, for righteousness shall be established in every heart and in every institution.   All  creation shall rest as the nations beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks.  This is the plan of God for all the nations of this earth, and its implementation is the legacy, ministry, and destiny of Jesus the Christ.

THE WORK OF GOD IN THE NATIONS

The scriptures reveal many wonderful promises and much enlightening revelation concerning the rule of God over the nations.  THESE PROPHECIES HAVE NEVER YET BEEN FULFILLED.  By no stretch of the imagination can any development or condition during the Church age be construed as fulfilling these beautiful prophecies.  The glorious Kingdom of God will break in pieces and subdue all other kingdoms, kings, rulers, lordships, religions and gods and replace them with one glorious Kingdom of God in this earth.

Nothing is more evident in the Word of God than the fact that God has a great and wonderful plan which He is working out among the nations of earth.  Many saints recognize that God has a predestined purpose in the life of each of His people, an appointed end for Israel, an eternal purpose for the Church, and a foreordained plan for the overcoming sons of God.  But we fail in our understanding of God’s wonderful plan of the ages until we understand the great truth that the Lord has a determined plan and purpose for ALL THE NATIONS AND GOVERNMENTS OF MEN UPON THE EARTH.

From the very dawn of human history God has had the formation, development and destiny of NATIONS in mind and purpose.  God has always been actively dealing with nations.  I am indebted to Dr. Harry Rimmer for the following information.  The present nations of earth had their origins in the early days following the Great Flood.   In Genesis chapter ten is found a most remarkable and comprehensive list of the descendants of Noah who became the heads of the families and tribes which subsequently developed into nations.  Even higher critics have often admitted that the tenth chapter of Genesis is a remarkably accurate historical document.  There is no comparable catalog of ancient nations available from any other source.  It is unparalleled in its antiquity and comprehensiveness.   You would do well to read the entire chapter.   Here is the one link between the historic nations of antiquity and the prehistoric time of Noah and the antediluvians.  The grandsons and great-grandsons of Noah are listed, each of whom is identified with the city or country established by his descendants.  It has been possible in many cases to identify the names in Genesis ten with nations and peoples known to antiquity, especially as revealed by archaeology.

An interesting verse is found in Genesis 10:25.  “And unto Eber were born two sons: the name of one was Peleg; FOR IN HIS DAYS WAS THE EARTH DIVIDED; and his brother’s name was Joktan.”  Peleg — or rather, the event associated with his name — is of special interest at this point.  “In his days was the earth divided.”  Evidently this was a memorable event, and Eber named his son in  commemoration of it.  The name Peleg means “division.”  Almost nothing else is said about Peleg apart from mention of his family line and how long he lived.  The fact that the earth was divided in his days seems the only possible item of distinction that can knowingly be attributed to Peleg himself.  The important thing concerns the meaning of this indicated “division of the earth.”  It is obvious that this division was the division of the peoples that took place at the Tower of Babel, rather than some cataclysmic splitting of the continents.  We have such statements as this: “From these were the isles (coasts) of the Gentiles (nations) DIVIDED IN THEIR LANDS; everyone after his tongue, after their families, in their NATIONS,” and again, “These are the families of the sons of Noah, after their generations, in their NATIONS: and by these were THE NATIONS DIVIDED in the earth after the flood” (Gen. 10:5,32).

The descendants of Noah migrated over the whole face of the earth, forming tribe after tribe, city after city, and nation after nation.  Let all men know that it is the Almighty God who is the designer and architect of all the nations of the world!  The time periods and localities in which nations flourish have all been pre-arranged by the will of Him who “worketh all things after the counsel of His own will” (Eph. 1:11).  The truth of this cannot be made any plainer than it is by Moses in Deuteronomy 32:8: “When the Most High divided the nations their inheritance, when He separated the sons of Adam, HE SET the bounds of the people according to the number of the children of Israel.”  Paul refers to this verse in Acts 17:26-27: “And (God) hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on the face of the earth, and hath determined the times appointed, and the bounds of their habitation; that they should seek the Lord.”  This reveals that it was God who, from the beginning, set the national boundaries of ALL NATIONS.  These boundaries were established in relation to Israel and with a view to their being able to seek after the Lord.  While these things have not fully played themselves out, yet it is remarkable that the ancient land of Canaan was originally reserved by the wisdom and goodness of the Lord for the possession of His special people, Israel, and the display of the most stupendous signs and wonders.  The theater was small, but wonderfully suited for the convenient observation of the whole human race — at the junction of the two continents of Asia and Africa, and almost in sight of Europe.  From this spot as from a common center the reports of God’s wonderful works, of His mighty power and awesome glory, of the glad tidings of salvation through the ministry, death, and resurrection of His firstborn Son, of the wonder-filled outpouring of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost as the footstep followers of Jesus were set ablaze by the life and power of their glorified Lord, might be rapidly and easily wafted to every part of the globe.  Yes, God set the bounds of habitation for all nations and planted Israel at the crossroads, to the end that all nations might seek after the Lord!  What a plan!

Can we not see by this that out of Israel came Christ; out of Christ has come the Church, which is His bride (Eph. 5:23-32); and out of the Church is birthed the Manchild, the holy sons of God who are destined to rule all nations with a rod of iron (Rev. 12:5) and bring deliverance to the whole creation that it might be fulfilled which was promised to father Abraham: “And in thy seed shall ALL THE FAMILIES OF THE EARTH BE BLESSED” (Gen. 22:18).  ALL NATIONS —   shall be blessed!  From the very beginning God not only designed the nations of men that dwell upon the earth, He also planned and purposed to BLESS THEM — each and every one of them!  Not only Israel, not only the Church, but the nations themselves must come under the gracious hand of God in blessing and quickening.   Oh, the wonder of it!

One of the prophets of ancient Israel sang of this hope in the spirit of prophecy: “God be merciful unto us, and bless us; and cause His face to shine upon us; that Thy way may be known upon earth, Thy saving health among ALL NATIONS.  Let the people praise Thee, O God; let ALL the people praise Thee!   O let THE NATIONS be glad and sing for joy: for Thou shalt judge the people righteously, and govern the nations upon earth...yea, ALL KINGS shall fall down before Him: ALL NATIONS SHALL SERVE HIM” (Ps. 67:1-4; 72:11).   The day is surely coming when all nations shall be joined to the Lord and fulfill their obligations to Him as their Maker and Saviour.   “Arise, O God, judge the earth: for Thou shalt INHERIT ALL NATIONS.  ALL NATIONS whom Thou hast made shall come and worship before Thee, O Lord; and shall glorify Thy name.   For Thou art great and doest wondrous things” (Ps. 82:8; 86:9-10).

Many precious “fragments” reveal God’s ultimate purpose for mankind, when “ALL the ends of the world shall remember and turn unto the Lord, and ALL KINDREDS OF THE NATIONS shall worship before Thee, for the kingdom is the Lord’s, and HE is the governor among the nations” (Ps. 22:27-28).  In the beautiful second Psalm the Father says to His Son: “Ask of me, and I WILL GIVE THEE THE NATIONS for Thine inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for Thy possession” (Ps. 2:8).  Surely the will and plan of God is revealed in this most gracious request, and surely this was the purpose for which Jesus came and was sent.  “The Father sent the Son to be the Saviour of  THE WORLD” (I Jn. 4:14).  With this divine plan in view, well may the Lord’s people triumphantly sing, “O let THE NATIONS be glad and sing for joy, for Thou shalt judge the people righteously, and GOVERN THE NATIONS UPON EARTH...and ALL the ends of the earth shall fear Him” (Ps. 67:4-7).  “ALL NATIONS SHALL CALL HIM BLESSED...and blessed be His glorious name forever, and let THE WHOLE EARTH be filled with His glory.  Amen and Amen” (Ps. 72:17-19).

If you are truly destined to stand among the company of the sons of God you assuredly share the thrill of the heavenly vibration in these inspired words:  “But in the last days it shall come to pass, that the mountain (government) of the house of the Lord (the priesthood of God) shall be established in the tops of the mountains (strong kingdoms, super- powers), and it shall be exalted above the hills (smaller kingdoms, third-world nations); and people shall flow unto it.  And MANY NATIONS shall come, and say, Come, and let us go up to the mountain (government) of the Lord, and to the house (priesthood) of the God of Jacob; and He will teach us His ways, and we (the nations)  will walk in His paths: for the law (authority) of the Lord shall go forth of Zion (the sons of God), and the (living) word of God from Jerusalem (the bride of Christ).  And He shall JUDGE among the people, and rebuke STRONG NATIONS afar off; and they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks: nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war  anymore” (Mic. 4:1-3).  Blessed beyond my puny ability to articulate shall be that day when it shall come to pass that “He shall sprinkle (cleanse, sanctify) MANY NATIONS; the kings shall shut their mouths at Him: for that which had not been told them they shall see; and that which they had not heard they shall consider” (Isa. 52:15).

The same ecstatic exclamation of joy and gladness at the prospects of God’s salvation poured out upon the nations is commanded by the prophet in these words, “Sing and rejoice, O daughter of Zion: for, lo, I come, and I will dwell in the midst of thee, saith the Lord.  And MANY NATIONS SHALL BE JOINED TO THE LORD in that day, and shall be my people” (Zech. 2:10-11).

The national message of the Bible is one of the most neglected themes of the church systems.  It is possible erroneously to limit God and His program of redemption to a narrow personal and individualistic interpretation.  In the light of such a profound array of scriptures as those we have just considered (and there are many, many more!), I am at a complete loss to understand how anyone who knows God at all could fail to grasp the living hope that a radiant age of splendor, in which Christ and His glorious body shall rule and reign and subdue all enemies and all nations and all things unto God, is coming.  A careful study of the scriptures reveals an outline of the progressive expansion of God’s Priesthood Ministry in the earth.  Its headings are:

1.  In Genesis we have the Priesthood for the Individual.
2.  In Exodus and Job we have the Priesthood for the Household.
3.  In Exodus and Leviticus the Priesthood for the Nation.
4.  In Hebrews the Priesthood for the Church.
5.  In Revelation the Priesthood for the Nations.
6.  In Colossians 1, Romans 8, & Hebrews 2 we have the Priesthood for the Universe — all of creation.

The first four of the above orders are now fulfilled and we are standing at the very beginning of the fifth — a Priesthood for the nations!  Has this wonderful reconciliation of the nations been accomplished?  History shouts aloud that it has not — not yet!  God has called Israel, built His Church, and brought His sons to birth, but He has not yet saved all the nations.  The kingdoms of this world have not yet been broken to pieces and consumed into the Kingdom of God.  The Kingdom and the dominion and the greatness of the Kingdom under the whole heaven has not yet been given to the saints of the Most High.  All dominions do not yet serve and obey Him.  All nations have not been subdued unto Him nor do all nations come before Him to serve and worship Him.   China does not!  Tibet does not!  Iraq does not!   Iran does not!  Egypt does not!  The European nations as a whole do not!  In fact, only the Church worships and serves Him — not any nations!  But fear not, dear ones, for a people is prepared to take the Kingdom and possess the Kingdom and reign until the kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our God and of His Christ!

On the rocky slopes of the isle called Patmos the beloved John beheld in spirit the wonder-filled scene of God’s throne with its Kingly or Royal Priesthood.  He beheld, and lo, “the four beasts (kingship) and the four and twenty elders (priesthood) fell down before the Lamb, having everyone of them harps...and they sung a new song, saying, Thou art worthy to take the book , and to open the seals thereof: for Thou wast slain, and hast redeemed us to God by Thy blood out of every kindred, and tongue, and people, and nation; and hast made us unto our God KINGS AND PRIESTS: and we shall REIGN ON THE EARTH” (Rev. 5:8-10).

We have come to a period of the world, and to a condition, for which there are no precedents.  There are no instructions left for guidance in the details of the restoration of all things, beginning with the deliverance of the nations and their entrance into the Kingdom of God.  The Holy Spirit has given no exact direction concerning the manner in which the priesthood for the nations is to minister or its work to be effected.   We have, in the Word of God, abundant instructions for the “in part” realm of Church age ministry.  It is not difficult to learn how to function in the body of Christ as an apostle, prophet, evangelist, pastor, teacher, deacon, bishop, elder, or to move in the gifts of the Spirit.  But I defy any theologian to find anything that will give direct help, even in the words of Jesus Himself, concerning how to reign as King-Priests over the nations!  He left that for the Holy Spirit to teach to the elect company of overcomers who should be the heirs of the Kingdom of God.  We have come to that hour.  Ah, we can only learn these sacred and secret things by being TAUGHT OF HIM!  “I have yet many things to say unto you, but you cannot bear them now.  Howbeit when He, the Spirit of Truth is come, He will guide you into all truth...and He will SHOW YOU THINGS TO COME” (Jn. 16:12-13).

We think we have seen some wonderful moves of God, and we have, but we haven’t even scratched the surface, we haven’t seen anything yet that faintly resembles the glorious things God will do in the days that lie before us.  With all its multiplied missionary programs and evangelistic efforts the Church has not yet even started on world evangelism.  God is laying a groundwork and teaching. processing, qualifying, equipping, and empowering His people for the coming invasion of all the world.  He must do something unprecedented for us first, so that we will be ready.  We don’t have all that we need for this great work, but God is quickening us for it.  He is stripping away our dependence upon money, methods, and materials, drawing us to move out of that and into HIS REALM.  The realm of God is the realm of Spirit.  It is the realm of Being.    God is teaching us the ways of His Spirit.

The word came to Phillip the evangelist in Samaria to go down into the desert to meet the Ethiopian eunuch.  Phillip didn’t say, “Lord, I haven’t got a helicopter, how can I go down there?  Give me time to mail out a newsletter to my partners in faith and raise the money for the trip.  How am I going to find one man in all that vast desert, and anyway, Lord, I’ve got a big revival going here in Samaria.”  Phillip did not speak like that at all, but he obeyed the Lord and went immediately.  God TRANSPORTED HIM BY THE SPIRIT into the desert and pointed out the chariot and said, “Go and join yourself to that chariot.”  Phillip had to run and outrun the horses to get into the chariot.   And when God was through with him, the Spirit took him up and he was “found” at a place called Azotus.

Can we believe that when God wants any of His sons in any place, HE will put them there?   God, omnipotent in power, need pay no attention to iron or bamboo curtains.  He need not take into consideration national borders or immigration or passport offices.  He is in no way restricted by man-made laws and regulations.   We are talking about the miracle working power of God and a level of resurrection life to be manifested in the ministry of the sons of God after the Order of Melchizedek!  We have really known little of the Melchizedek Order, but God is teaching!  We have not experienced the fullness of this, but God is working!  We have yet to see a pure, unadulterated move of the Spirit with everyone in total subjection to the mind and will of God, but we are going to.  It is coming in this hour.  Some are already beginning to walk in these realms with baby steps.  Giant leaps lie before us!

We have not yet witnessed the magnitude of ministry that shall be revealed through the King-Priests of the Melchizedekian Order.  At times God has raised up mighty men and, as it were, pulled apart but a little the veil, giving a glimpse of the force of a ministry filled with the fullness of His power, the harbinger of greater things to come.  Such a man was Charles Finney, an attorney, who upon being apprehended of the Lord left his vocation, waited upon, and then followed the Lord.  When he entered into a town often all the taverns and houses of prostitution and other hell-holes would close, not because of some law, nor out of respect for religious gatherings, but because there was no longer any need for them, there weren’t any customers, the whole town had turned to God!  One man wrote of Finney, “No one has ever approached the gigantic stature of the mighty Charles Finney, who alone, without an evangelistic society, without a radio or television program, without a computer, without 10,000 partners  to appeal to or a business manager WON TWO AND A HALF MILLION SOULS TO CHRIST.  A hundred like Finney  WOULD WIN THE ENTIRE AMERICAN NATION.”  And do I have some good news for you!  God is going to turn 144,000 incorruptible sons of God, with a thousand times more power than Charles Finney, loose on this sin-cursed world!

 


Chapter 46

THE INCREASE OF THE KINGDOM

(continued)

The day when the kingdoms of this world indeed become the kingdoms of our Lord and of His Christ is the day when all nations are ruled by the authority of the many-membered Christ of God.  That time has already begun!  Everything that God did in the millenniums and centuries that preceded this Day was designed to bring us to this Day.  Everything Jesus Christ did on earth and has since done from the heavens was designed to bring us to this Day.   All that God has done in the lives of His elect up to this present moment was designed to bring us to this Day.  Oh, what glory!  What a Day this is!

Periods do not suddenly burst upon us.  They come by degrees, as the darkness of the night steals upon us at the close of the day, or the dawn of the morning chases the darkness away.  There are days and nights in the world’s history.  We are entering a wonderful day in the world’s history — when the saints of the Most High shall take the Kingdom and possess the Kingdom unto the age of the ages, and all dominions shall serve Him.  Prophecies which have been spoken by holy men of God since the world began are being fulfilled in these days.  Mysteries which have been sealed up in the Book of God for millenniums are now being opened.  Streams of events which had their source in the dim, remote past are now converging in a mighty river of divine destiny, which is rushing on with irresistible swiftness to the dispensation of the fullness of times.

The Kingdom now advances,
The great Messiah reigns,
And virgins join in dances
On Zion’s blissful plains.
How happy we, who live to see
The glorious Day increasing!
Give thanks, give thanks, give thanks,
Be thankful without ceasing.

Nothing in the world today is as when God made it.  Everything has been interfered with and changed in a greater or less degree by the power of sin and death.  God pronounced everything good when it came from His hands, as He made it.  Before things can be restored as they were at the beginning they must be shaken to pieces and changed.  “And he that overcometh, and keepeth my works unto the end, to him will I give power over the nations.   And he shall rule them with a rod of iron; as the vessels of a potter shall they be broken to shivers...” (Rev. 2:26-27).  “And He that sat upon the throne said, Behold, I make all things new...” (Rev. 21:5).  When the sons of God reign on this earth everything is to be good and pure and beautiful.  There is to be no sin and no sickness and no death.  Death is the last evil to be abolished.  Sickness and disease and sin and self and wickedness will be destroyed first.  Some do not believe that God will rule the nations or that creation will be restored to its pristine glory.   They entertain the notion that there is only the new creation and that the old will never be subjected to and swallowed up into the new.  Their idea is that the natural creation will simply pass from existence, it will be annihilated.  But that is not the testimony of scripture nor is it the heart of the Father!  The truth is that the old things pass away by being changed and made new.  That is why the scriptures tell us that Jesus came to be the Saviour of the world, to reconcile all things, to restore all things, and to make all things new!   There is a world of difference between making all new things, or making all things — NEW!  The sons of God are being prepared at this very hour in the bosom of the Father to deliver creation from the tyranny of sin and death — the bondage of corruption.

If I believed that this world was to continue to be misruled and misgoverned as it is, that the abominable press and vile politicians and greedy money-lords and devilish religions would continue forever to curse this earth, I should despair of the whole plan of redemption.  Redemption means a “buying back.”  Reconciliation means to “restore to a previous harmony.”  Restoration means a “return to a former condition or state.”  I proclaim to you today the great truth that Christ the Lord is the Redeemer, the Reconciler, the Restorer of —  THE WORLD!  He is all this because He is the world’s Creator and Owner.  God has never given it up.  Righteousness, purity, peace and power are in God.  The gospel which our Lord Jesus, the Christ, came and preached as Good News to planet earth is the gospel of the Kingdom of Heaven coming down to earth that the will of God might be done in earth as it is in heaven!  Any other gospel is a spurious gospel that denies the work of God in redemption, reconciliation, and restoration.

The apostle Peter, speaking of these things, wrote, “The heavens and the earth which are now, by the same word are kept in store, reserved unto fire against the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men” (II Pet. 3:7).  But Peter had prefaced these ominous words with the following illustration.  “By the word of God the heavens were of old, and the earth standing out of the water and in the water: whereby the world that then was, being overflowed with water, perished” (II Pet. 3:5-6).   The heavens and earth of old perished, but they were not obliterated out of existence!  When righteous Noah stepped out of the ark that bright morning he stepped onto the soil of the very same earth that existed before the flood, and at night he gazed into the star-spangled splendor of the same heavens above.  Yet — all was changed!  Was it not a new heaven and a new earth by being purged through the overflowing waters of the flood from the wickedness and corrupt order that previously pervaded it?  With what joy and satisfaction do we now entertain the precious promise, “For behold I create new heavens and a new earth, and the former shall not be remembered, nor come into mind” (Isa. 65:17).  Hallelujah!  What a wonderful thing that God will so thoroughly cleanse our own little world and the whole vast cosmos that even our minds will be purged from the remembrance of it!  God will make such a good job of His work, that the past will be completely obliterated and never thought of any more!  God shall not end this present evil world and call forth the new by destroying either His creatures or His creation.  Not one thing, not one precious person shall be lost!  He shall bring this world to an end and establish new heavens and a new earth wherein dwelleth righteousness by MAKING A-L-L  T-H-I-N-G-S    N-E-W — changed, purified, and transformed by the fire of His Word!

The coming “world” will be one that will see the fullness of God in operation through His sons, the demonstration of the mighty power of the Kingdom of God!   It is not a mansion over the hilltop, nor a cabin in the corner of glory-land, nor white night gowns, nor harps, nor palm branches, nor dangling feet in some celestial stream.  There is a job to be done!  A battle to be fought!  A victory to be won!   Enemies to be conquered!  “And there shall be no more death.”  This is not a hope for heaven, this is God’s will for humanity on the earth, and this is what our call to sonship is all about.  It would be a most beautiful thing if all the saints of God could have an open vision that would enable them to understand the glory of God’s purpose on earth, and His election in man.

We read in Hebrews 6:5 of those who during this age have “tasted the powers of the world to come.”  The Rotherham translation renders this, “the mighty works of a coming age.”  The Interlinear Greek New Testament says, “The works of power of the age to come.”  How reminiscent that is of our Lord’s beautiful promise, “The works that I do shall ye do also, and GREATER WORKS THAN THESE SHALL YE DO...”  But have the followers of Jesus during this past age really done any greater works than our Lord Jesus did?  The book of Acts certainly doesn’t record them!  Neither do the epistles.  Nor does Church history.  The apostles actually never did any works even as great as feeding five thousand people with five loaves and two fish, turning water into wine, or hushing the raging sea with a word.  And, my friend, after a century of the restoration to the Church of the baptism in the Holy Spirit; after fifty years of the restoration of all nine gifts of the Spirit and the five-fold ministry, and the prophetic flow — have you seen any greater works than raising the dead, cleansing lepers, and walking on water?   You know you haven’t!  But Peter prophesied of the MIGHTY WORKS OF A COMING AGE — GREATER WORKS THAN JESUS DID TWO MILLENNIUMS AGO!  And all the miraculous, the power and the glory, the visions and revelations we have experienced in all previous visitations of the Spirit of the Lord have been merely a small taste, a sampling, an appetizer of the glory and power of that coming age!  Why, beloved, we have only seen the firstfruits of what God will do through His enChristed body upon this earth!  The hospitals emptied, the dead raised incorruptible, natures changed, the crucial problems of poverty, crime, strife, violence, war, corruption, and natural disasters solved, the whole world-system transformed, the elemental forces of nature harnessed and controlled by the power of a spoken word — and GREATER WORKS THAN THESE SHALL YOU SEE as the glorious mind of Christ rules and reigns over the earth through the manifest sons of God!  The fullness of what we have just had a taste will be the normal works on behalf of humanity during that wonderful world to come.  The next dispensation is to be so different as to be the very reverse of the present one in almost every particular.  Rejoice, O ye saints of the Lord, for the end of the world is upon us!  “Behold, I make all things new!” saith the Lord.

THE PEOPLE OF THE NEW DAY

These are tremendous and exciting times in which our lot is cast; days full of momentous happenings, when an era is closing and a new chapter in our human history is opening; when, whether we like it or do not, the world we have known is vanishing; and another and very different one is taking shape before our eyes.  The Spirit of God these days is summoning the elect of the Lord, each in his own place, to play his part with faith and valor, that the purpose of God in this Day be not hindered; but that we may prove worthy of the daring trust God has put in us, and may so respond to it, that this great earth with its billions of people and more than two hundred nations may be gathered into His arms of love.  And to no one does this call come more plainly or more powerfully than to those called to be the sons of God!

While a few years one way or the other is a small matter in relation to the unnumbered ages in God’s vast universal plan, it seems clear now that we have entered upon a definite change in dispensations.  Therefore we can say by revelation of the Spirit that certain aspects of the old economy are now passing away and those of the new age are coming in.  Mighty changes are taking place in the earth, and man supposes that he is doing it!  But it is God all the time.  All is according to God’s plan and is the design of His hands as He moves by His Spirit among the inhabitants of the earth.

Recently I read one of Paul Mueller’s powerful exhortations wherein he wrote, “Father has a purpose for each age, a purpose that may not be revealed until the time for the administration of that purpose has arrived.  The mystery of Christ that was revealed to Paul was not made known in previous ages.  Not until the new day of grace dawned did the Lord reveal His plan for that age.  So it is with the new age of the dominion of the kingdom of God in the earth!  The new truths and the great mysteries for this age shall soon be revealed to those who have ceased walking in the ways of the dead past.  The firstfruits of the kingdom, who have been awakened by the appearing of Christ, the Day Star, in them, shall hear the fresh, new word of the kingdom.  The prophet Micah prophesied that the first dominion of the kingdom shall come to the remnant of Jerusalem (Mic. 4:8).  And indeed it is!   And, like Paul in His day, we shall hear a fresh, new word.  It will be a revelation of the mystery for this new age of the kingdom of God on earth, making clear Father’s plan for this age.

“New Truths, revealing Father’s new administrative order for the new age, are necessary for every age.  With the dawning of the new age of the kingdom of God, the Lord shall reveal new truths for the administration of His purposes for this age.  The new administrative order for the church was revealed to Paul.  That was new truth that Paul declared was ‘not made known to the sons of men’ in other ages.  The truth Paul received was indeed new truth.  Men of earth never before heard such truths as Paul received by revelation of the Spirit.  Paul wrote to the Romans, telling them that the mystery he received ‘was kept secret since the world began’ (Rom. 16:25).  So it is in this time of the dawning of the new day of the Lord!   There is a fresh, anointed word of truth for today that has also been kept secret since the world began.  Think of it!  We shall hear a fresh word from the Lord that no other person has ever heard before!  Like the revelation of the mystery given to Paul in his day, we also shall receive a fresh new word of kingdom authority and administrative purpose.  That new word shall shake Christendom and the world, and bring the blessings and benefits of the kingdom of God to many more people.  Doesn’t it excite you and encourage you in God to know that He has chosen you to receive the new truths of His kingdom, truths that mortal man never heard before?  Are you ready for this new kingdom word?  Have you repented of the past with all its dead forms and ceremonies?  Are you emptied of all the religious, church-age plans and works of man that are now obsolete so that you may receive Father’s new administrative order for this new age of the kingdom of God?

“When Jesus spoke to the people in parables, He said He did it ‘that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophet, saying, I will open my mouth in parables; I will utter things which have been kept secret from the foundation of the world’ (Mt. 13:35).  Did you know that the Lord keeps secrets from His people, secrets that are reserved for its time of fulfillment?  Well, He does!   And did you also know that God reveals His secrets to those chosen before hand, to those whose eyes and ears He has opened?  Indeed, He does!  The fact is, the truth I am writing at this very moment is fresh truth.  If you can receive this truth, then it is obvious that the Father has given you hearing ears and seeing eyes, to both hear and see the fresh, new, secret word of the kingdom, and enter into its fulfillment.  This word has been hidden and kept secret from former generations and those of previous ages.  That fresh, new word is specifically reserved for this ‘day’ of our transformation and the dominion of the kingdom of God in the earth.  It shall be revealed to those who love Him; to those who have hearing ears; to those who have entered into His rest, and have ceased the dead works of the past ages of man.  New kingdom truths and mysteries are being revealed and are now coming forth out of Zion.  That new word of the kingdom will reveal more clearly how we are to walk to be in full harmony with our Father and His kingdom purposes in this new day.  A new, fresh, anointed word of Christ, who is light and life, shall flow out of Zion to impart that life and light to all whose hearts have been prepared in advance”    — end quote.

The only people who have ever marched on with God in this world-plan have been those who have listened to His voice, heard what He said, obeyed His commands and believed and did all that this absolute surrender to His will involved.  Such people in ages past were the faith heroes referred to in the eleventh chapter of the epistle to the Hebrews.  It was greatly illuminating to me when I first saw that everyone of the individuals mentioned there stood at the junction, threshold or crisis of a dispensation.  You can verify that for yourself by turning to every stage of history associated with such people as Noah, Abraham, Jacob, Moses, Joshua, Gideon, Samuel, etc.   The names are not casually or indiscriminately selected by the inspired writer.  He sees that they were pioneers in faith, that they lived ahead of their times, that they perceived what God had arranged to do, and come what may they walked on in the promises and purposes of God and did exploits in His name.  Each in turned condemned the world of the previous age, and brought in a new day of God’s purposes through their faith and obedience.  And each brought in and established a new administrative order for the new day!   And now — the sons of God have come to such a time as this!

In the gross darkness of this present hour I do not believe the age is ending simply because I observe great changes in the outer world in technology, lifestyle, and in the order of the nations.  Oh, no!  It is true, we have in one remarkable century come all the way from the horse and buggy to the atomic, space and computer age.  We have passed through two world wars that have changed the social, economic and political structure of the world.  Nearly all of the kings and thrones of Europe and the whole world passed away during the twentieth century, being replaced by an entirely new governmental order in the earth.  The former ruling houses of Russia, Germany, Austria, Italy, France, China, Japan, India, Egypt, Portugal, Hungary, Turkey, Albania, Yugoslavia, Bulgaria, Rumania, Iran and a number of other nations are completely destroyed. Who could have foreseen such things?

Yet none of this convinces me that we have entered a New Day!  Nor does the fact that the calendar has turned over to the year two thousand convince me!  The revelation of the Spirit is not communicated by reading Newsweek magazine or by doing intellectual, carnal-minded studies of chronologies, times, and cycles.  If it can be “figured out” with the natural mind, it is not a revelation of the Holy Ghost!  It is the voice of the Father by the Spirit, the living word of God that convinces me we are standing in the threshold of a new age!  Believe me, the sun is now setting on the Church age with its administrative order of apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors and teachers.  The transcendent glory of that brighter and greater age ruled by King-Priests after the Order of Melchizedek is even now dawning upon us!  Some of God’s sons are already rising up into high realms of the Spirit, into the throne-zone of the heavenlies, and are speaking a governmental word to the nations by which they are being shaped for the hour that is at hand.  Marvelous things are happening among those who hear the Father’s voice and receive the revelation of His purposes for this time!  In 1984 by revelation of God I began a ministry to Russia in and by the Spirit and saw the collapse of Communism there just as the word of the Lord  showed me.  Everything that has happened there has been according to that word of the Lord and the proclaiming of it!  Later I declared in the presence of brethren that Mikhail Gorbachev was a dead man politically, and within three months he was removed from office and has never been able to regain power.  When the present distress in Russia has run its course there will be an unprecedented, sovereign move of God in that country that will bring multitudes into living relationship with God through the power of the Holy Spirit.  The sons of God are beginning to reign in the heavenlies, and earth is being impacted by their authority and dominion!

Ah, precious ones, we are receiving a fresh word from the throne!  We know that we are standing at the transition of ages, and that the manchild is being caught up unto God and His throne, not by claiming a scripture or by embracing a doctrine, but because the Holy Spirit has powerfully spoken and testified of it among vast numbers of the Lord’s elect in recent years.  It is a revelation “come down from heaven” and proclaimed in the “power of the Spirit.”  Those who cannot see the change in dispensations, and know nothing of the sons of God ruling in the heavens, have not heard from God.  The present work of the Spirit has to do with the Kingdom of God increasing into the new age, not established just in the lives of the elect body of Christ, but through them upon all the nations and peoples of the earth.  It is a new day and a new work!  It is a new kind of ministry!  And it will change again in the near future.  In the previous age the Lord’s dealings have been for the formation of His body, the sons of God.  In the dawning age the Lord’s dealings will be through the manifest sons of God, gathered out of the previous age, for the increase of His Kingdom and peace throughout the earth.  Of the increase of His Kingdom and of His peace there shall be no end!  From age to age the Kingdom shall increase, first in the Lord’s people, then in all the earth, and finally throughout all the endless vastnesses of infinity forever more!

Since the great Latter Rain outpouring of the Spirit in 1948 God has thundered by the mouth of His holy apostles and prophets throughout the whole world proclaiming that GOD’S NEW DAY IS HERE!  One of the many prophetic songs given by the Spirit in the years of that wonderful coming of Christ to His people eloquently expresses the word the Lord began to speak and has continued to speak through the years:

The time has come to take the Kingdom,
Rise up ye strong, ‘tis Christ’s command;
For every power and dominion
Is given now into your hands!
Ye that have ears to hear the trumpet,
Ye that have hearts to understand;
The time has come to take the Kingdom,
Rise up ye strong, possess the land!

Another is this:

In the year of Jubilee, in the year of Jubilee,
The prisons shall be opened, the captives all set free;
What a mighty restoration, what a mighty victory,
The sons of God appearing in the year of Jubilee!

These are not the words of man, they are the words of the Holy Spirit!  These words were written under the inspiration of the Spirit at the time of a sovereign, supernatural move of God and are inspired just as the scriptures of old were inspired when holy men of God spake as they were moved upon by the Holy Spirit.  Within them is contained the message the almighty Father is conveying to His very own sons for this significant hour.  When Elohim created the earth in the beginning, the inspired record states, “And God said.”  Ten times in the first chapter of Genesis our heavenly Father’s creative acts began with the speaking of a word.  “And God said...”  Each creative “day” began with that same statement.  The very first creative word spoken was the wonderful command, “Let there be light!”   Light then appeared out of incomprehensible darkness, flooding space and illuminating the earth.  Again and again we read, “And God said...”  Each “day” was brought forth by the creative word of the Lord.  By His creative word of power, our Father spoke every day, epoch, and age into existence.  One scripture tells us that it was by His word that God framed the ages (Heb. 1:2).  This is the wonderful pattern set forth in Genesis.  The Genesis “days” therefore become the example for all the age-days that follow.  And now, it is our Father’s word that has begun another new Day, even the day of the advancement of His Kingdom to deliver, redeem, and restore all nations under the government of God’s sons!  By that same spiritual process, in the power of His word, the Lord has proclaimed the end of the old age of Church order and the dawn of the new age of His manifest sons.  The change came by the Spirit, when Father released His creative word of Kingdom power and authority into the hearts of His elect.  We have heard that word!  We have received that message!  We have said “Amen” to the proclamation!  We have presented ourselves before the Father for His new work!  We have been given our orders!  That is why the excitement of the so-called “revival” realm holds nothing for us anymore.  Father reveals His words to those whose ears He has opened.  All those elect, who worship the Lord by ascending to His holy mountain, are hearing the mighty declarations of His creative word, announcing God’s great purpose in the transition of the ages, and the new order to be revealed through His kings and priests after the Order of Melchizedek.

From our vantage point in the Spirit we can see that we are living  in a wonderful era when the old age is swiftly grinding to a halt.  The next age of greater glory, light and life is appearing on the horizon.  As the sun of the new age arises, the trumpet sounds heralding the dawn of the new day.  That trumpet is the prophetic voice now sounding forth alerting the Lord’s elect to the hour that has arrived and the work now to be done.

At a specific moment appointed by God, John the Baptist emerged from the wilderness of Judea proclaiming, “The kingdom of God is at hand!”  In like manner, so are the Lord’s anointed messengers of this hour called to announce the next stage of the manifestation of God’s Kingdom in the earth.  The purpose for John’s ministry was to alert the people to the hour that was at hand, which was the fixed time, the predetermined hour, as ordained by the omniscient mind of God, when God would move to bring forth His Kingdom among men.  His mission was to announce the coming of Jesus and the Kingdom.  As soon as John appeared among the people sounding forth his message, Jesus laid aside all His other activities, left the carpenter shop in Nazareth, and came forward to make Himself known.

With the preaching of John, the time appointed for the appearance of the Kingdom was at hand.  It was the time for the King of the Kingdom to be revealed.  Thus the scriptures declare, “But when the fullness of time was come, God sent forth His Son” (Gal. 4:4).  The time allotted for the age of the law and the prophets ended the day the Father witnessed, “This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased, hear ye Him.”  The precise time had now arrived for the coming forth of a new day with a new administration of the Lord’s purpose.  No longer would the age of law with its ceremonies, commandments, and priesthood be the standard by which men would worship and serve God, and by which the administrative order would function.  A new day had come, and it was time to turn from the dead past to the new thing the Lord was doing.  And now, with the sounding of the prophetic trumpet in our generation, a new day is being announced, and all who are among the wise and chosen will heed the prophetic call of the Lord!

When Jesus came THE WHOLE PRIESTHOOD WAS WRONG!  When John the Baptist began his preaching, strange as it may seem,  he was the ONLY MAN IN ALL THE WORLD who had the right message!   Everyone was out of spiritual step but John, and when Jesus began also to preach, they were the only two who had the message of the hour.  Today we are standing at the transition of the ages and God is raising up men and women over the nation and around the world to proclaim the message for this Day.  But we must be able to forget the things of the past and look only to God’s purpose in this Day.  We cannot put new wine in old bottles, nor can we patch old garments with new cloth.  Just as Jesus and John announced the inception of the Kingdom two millenniums ago, so the apostles of the Kingdom in this day are announcing the arrival of the next stage in the increase of the Kingdom.

It is now time for the apostles of the Kingdom to be sent forth into all the earth!   These apostles of the Kingdom are the firstfruits company.  In these firstfruits the foundations of the Kingdom are being  laid.   It is to these — to the elect remnant of the Lord — that the first dominion or reign of the Kingdom of God comes.  Christ must first rule and reign in the lives of His elect before He can reign in the lives of anyone else.  And when Christ fully reigns in our lives, the scepter, or ruling authority of the Kingdom of God, is then bestowed upon us.  According to the measure that Christ reigns in our lives He has given us the authority to reign with Him from His spiritual throne in the heavenlies.  And according to the measure that His life, wisdom, grace, nature, power and purposes are established in our lives WE ARE GIVEN THE KEYS OF THE KINGDOM OF HEAVEN!   How wonderful and complete is the plan of our God!

Those people who have received a revelation of God’s purposes in sonship received it not from man, but by revelation of the Spirit of Truth.  It is God Himself who has delivered a vast company of saints from the bondage of Babylon’s harlot system into which the whole church world has been taken captive, bringing them out into the pure light of His truth — yea, the light which Jesus Himself is.  It is God Himself who has washed away the darkness and confusion of the false doctrines and silly delusions and static creeds and vain traditions of the church systems which for years held the Lord’s people in a spiritually starved and stunted condition and shut them up from the light of God’s eternal purpose.  It is God Himself who has opened the eyes and unstopped the ears of the called-out elect, teaching them more in weeks and months than they were able to learn in all the years they were held in bondage to church teaching and the doctrines of men.  It is God Himself who has opened within our hearts the heavenly vision of the Kingdom of God and given us the beautiful promise and hope of sonship, which is the high calling of God in Christ.  It is God Himself who has declared in the hearing of our ears and within our very hearts that we have entered into the transition of the ages, and the hour is wonderfully nigh at hand for the manifest sons of God to arise and bring the Kingdom to all the nations of earth.  It is God Himself who has set the agenda!

In these awesome days of Father’s dealings we have waited in His presence until all earthly voices were stilled, until the mundane sounds of earthly interests and pursuits were silent, until we could, in the wonder of His presence, hear Him whisper to our hearts the revelation of His will and the instructions of His purpose.  May God disturb His people from the paralyzing lethargy, laziness, slumber and death of the carnal mind!  Awake thou that sleepest, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give thee light!   The promises, challenges, and opportunities of God’s New Day are upon us, and only those who with abandon embrace the Day, forsaking the things of the past orders and all of Egypt’s bondage, shall attain to the glory, power and victory which is freely offered to those who follow the Lamb upon mount Zion.

God has called us to have a role in establishing the new order of the Kingdom of God over the nations.  God is offering to His called-out in this hour something He has never offered to any other generation before, He is giving us an open invitation to participate in the activity that will lead to the prize of all the ages.  It is greater than anything He has ever done from the time of Adam to the present, and it will never be done again!  It has never been done before, because it is God’s NEW THING.  He’s inviting a people to obey Him, to follow on to know Him, to be His sons and daughters indeed for the deliverance of all creation.  Beware lest old order brethren rob you and steal this hope from you.  It’s very important that we not let anyone rob us of this reward.   It’s our inheritance!  The inheritance is the absolute fullness of God to deliver creation!

God is preparing a people He will put His stamp of approval on and endorse with all His wisdom, power, and majesty.  The voice will come from heaven and say, “These are my beloved sons, in whom I am well pleased, hear ye them!”  You who have been thoroughly processed by the Father have His likeness, you bear His image, and He will put His full endorsement upon you to represent His Kingdom purpose in the earth.  We are called to live such a life and walk in such a dimension of righteousness, peace, joy, and power in the Kingdom of God that we can testify, “If you have seen me, you have seen the Father.”  It will take a life of total abandonment to walk with God as sons and express His nature in the earth before all men and nations.  It has been said that we beheld the Saviour and became the saved, we beheld the Redeemer and became the redeemed, we beheld the Healer and became the healed, we beheld the Baptizer and became the baptized, and now it is time to behold the Father and become the expression of the glory of Fatherhood in the earth!  We must not bear a message about the Father, we must be the message!

Beyond thy fondest expectation are the days that lie before,
No mortals have ever seen them, no days like these in store.
Like the days that are in heaven, they have come upon the earth;
Mankind has never seen them...’tis His Kingdom come to birth.
Like the sound of many waters, like the voice no man has heard,
So the former things are ending; it’s the Newness of His Word.
It’s the revelation of His glory spoken of so long ago,
Every knee to Him is bending, every heart in Him aglow.

And shall ye not know it?  Former things I take away;
Every bondage shall be broken, ‘tis God’s new Sabbath Day.
‘Tis the Feast of Tabernacles, it’s the year of Jubilee,
The sons of God appearing, all creation is set free.

Great is the Lord!  And greatly to be praised,
Beyond all expectation, the new creation raised;
The glory of New Jerusalem is descending from above,
It’s the fullness of the Father, it’s the fullness of His Love.
Expectation has been granted to all the nations of the earth,
It’s the glory of the Father, NEW CREATION BROUGHT TO BIRTH!

— Jack Hodgdon.

WHEN THY JUDGMENTS ARE IN THE EARTH

Through the cunning of the adversary, both the world and the popular church have been robbed of the blessed assurances of the time when God’s RIGHTEOUS JUDGMENTS break forth in the earth.  Most people know that the Bible tells of a “judgment day,” but the average person, believer or unbeliever, regards it only with a certain sense of fear and dread.  Because of this fear there is, to them, no more unwelcome tidings than that the Lord is coming to JUDGE THE EARTH.  Many tremble inwardly at the thought of God’s judgments, and in this mind put them far from them, preferring not even to hear the subject mentioned.  At various times in the past many people have become terror-stricken when some unusual event or terrible calamity has occurred, because they have supposed that the event signaled the finale for our planet with billions of people suddenly thrust into eternal damnation.  They have absolutely no idea of the wonderful blessings in store for a  sin-weary world under the glorious reign of the sons of God filled with all the nature, wisdom, grace, power, and glory of God!

The end of divine judgment — no matter its form, no matter its subject — is to bring the whole universe into harmony with His will.  With what optimism did the holy prophets and apostles regard the coming of the Lord in judgment!  Note the expectation in Isaiah’s spirit as he announces: “Yea, in the way of Thy judgments, O Lord, have we waited for Thee...with my soul have I desired Thee in the night; yea, with my spirit within me will I seek Thee early: for when Thy judgments are in the earth, the inhabitants of the world WILL LEARN RIGHTEOUSNESS” (Isa. 26:8-9).  Here Isaiah assures us that the day when God’s judgments are in the earth will be a most glorious and desirable day, a day in which the inhabitants of the world  W-I-L-L  LEARN RIGHTEOUSNESS!  How opposite to the idea entertained by many that when God’s judgments come into the earth the inhabitants of the world  will finally “get what they deserve” and be sent into oblivion or damnation.

If the desire of your heart is anything like the desire of my heart, this is a blessed thought and a wonderful assurance: The inhabitants of the world  W-I-L-L  LEARN RIGHTEOUSNESS!   How my ransomed soul yearns to behold the wonder of such a thing!  Every time I scan the headlines of the morning paper I am seized with an intense longing that the inhabitants of the world will learn righteousness.  Oft times as I watch the evening newscast my spirit is mightily moved within to intercede earnestly that the inhabitants of the world will learn righteousness.  As I drive across this great land of ours; as I walk the streets of our cities and towns, observing the condition of those about, my spirit groans with unutterable supplications that the inhabitants of the world will learn righteousness!   What a marvelous provision of our omniscient and loving Father that, to this very end, He has ordained judgment to come forth in the earth.  Bless His name!

While the Lord has permitted the devil, the great adversary, to rule in the hearts of “the children of disobedience” for a season, He has never ceased to plan and purpose for the ultimate release and blessing of mankind.  In fact, throughout all the thousands of years during which He has refrained from interfering on any large scale with the reign of sin, darkness, and death, God has been laying the groundwork for a glorious day of deliverance!  Our heavenly Father has had a strategy!  Up until this time His plan of redemption and restoration has progressed silently and unobserved by the world.  God has been quietly dealing with His apprehended ones, processing, purging, purifying, perfecting, teaching, training, equipping and preparing them for the day of battle and overthrow of Satan’s kingdom.  He has done this without any fanfare!  Just as Jesus, the firstborn Son of God, was prepared in His “Nazareth,” the “place of no good thing,” so today the Lord has a remnant, unseen, unobserved, and as yet unheralded, hidden away from all the activity of the world and of popular religion, in the secret place of the Most High in the Spirit, learning the ways of the Father, taught and instructed in the principles of His Kingdom, changed and transformed in mind, heart, desire and purpose, brought under the Lordship of their King and High Priest, in preparation for the day when the great Commander shouts, “Arise, shine; for thy light is come, and the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee!  And the nations shall come to thy light, and kings to the brightness of thy rising.   All they gather themselves together, they come to thee.  The abundance of the sea (multitudes) shall be converted unto thee, the forces of the nations shall come unto thee.  Therefore thy gates shall be open continually; they shall not be shut day nor night; that men may bring unto thee the forces of the nations, and that their kings may be brought.  They shall bow themselves down at the soles of thy feet; and they shall call thee, The City of the Lord, The Zion of the Holy One of Israel” (Isa. 60:1-14).

The ways of the Kingdom are not at all like the ways of the Church.  The ministry of sonship is not in any way like the Church age ministry of apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors and teachers.  Sonship is the new administration for the new age!  The order of the new age will be altogether different from the order of the passing age!  George Hawtin graphically articulated this wonderful truth when he wrote in his paper, The Page, “Some years ago it was revealed to me that the evangelization of the nations during the coming age would be accomplished in exactly the opposite way to the method used in this age.   In the church age the commission has been, ‘Go ye into all the world and preach the gospel.’  In the next age entire nations will come to Jerusalem and to Zion to seek and find the Lord.  What could be more certain than the words spoken by Micah the prophet when he said, ‘But in the last days it shall come to pass that the mountain of the house of the Lord shall be established in the top of the mountains (Zion) and it shall be exalted above the hills; and people shall flow into it and many nations shall come and say, Come, and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord (Zion), and to the house of the God of Jacob and He will teach us His ways and we will walk in His paths: for the law shall go forth of Zion and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem’ (Mic. 4:1-2).”

The terms Zion and Jerusalem as well as the mountain of the Lord and the house of the God of Jacob speak prophetically and spiritually of kingship and priesthood.  John the Revelator beheld the 144,000 sons of God standing on mount Zion having the Father’s name written in their foreheads.  Mount Zion, the highest hill in Jerusalem, spiritually represents the very highest pinnacle attainable in God’s Kingdom.  Such are the ruling class prefigured by king David of old who dwelt on the natural mount Zion  in the earthly Jerusalem.  From there he reigned.  This company, standing on mount Zion, following the Lamb of the throne, can represent nothing other than those who have followed Jesus all the way, who have put on the mind of Christ and the nature of the Father, and shall now reign with Him on His throne forevermore.  The house of the Lord, on the other hand, bespeaks of the temple on mount Moriah in Jerusalem with its order of sacrifices and priesthood.  The two together are God’s ROYAL PRIESTHOOD, or God’s KINGLY PRIESTHOOD, the kings and priests after the Order of Melchizedek.  Kingship and priesthood, embodied together in the ministry of sonship, constitute the new governmental order for the new age! 

During this church age, by the ministries of apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors and teachers the Lord has sought the people.  The Lord has sought the people in this way because the members of His body must be gathered out of the world.  But in the new age, when the Kingdom of God comes upon the nations, He will pour upon them the spirit of grace and supplication and the billions of earth will come, as nations, to seek the wisdom, goodness, life and glory of the Lord revealed in His sons.  What an indescribable wonder!  You see, when the Lord removes the veil, the covering that has been cast over the minds of all people, then all men will see in a clear light and will come to God’s holy nation to seek His face.  Centuries ago the prophet Isaiah wrote with great clarity of this same wonder, saying, “Behold, thou shalt call a nation that thou knowest not, and nations which knew not thee shall run unto thee because of the Lord thy God, and for the Holy One of Israel; for He hath glorified thee” (Isa. 55:5-6).  This is a glorious promise revealing that entire nations will run to seek the Lord, because He has glorified His sons upon mount Zion.

I have already quoted earlier the passage from Isaiah, chapter sixty, which clearly agrees and bears witness to this great truth.  Time and space forbid me to even try to quote all the passages that speak of the universal conversion of the seeking nations in the day when God’s sons are revealed.   Therefore I will quote only one more and pass on.  “Thus saith the Lord of hosts, It shall come to pass that there shall come people, and the inhabitants of many cities: and the inhabitants of one city shall go to another, saying, Let us go speedily to pray before the Lord and to seek the Lord of hosts: I will go also.  Yea, many people and strong nations (industrialized super-powers) shall come to seek the Lord of hosts in Jerusalem (God’s governmental people),   and to pray (seeking the blessings and benefits of His Kingdom) before the Lord” (Zech. 8:20-23).

What a marvel that will be when the “Great Commission” has fully come to an end!  No longer will the Lord say, “Go ye into all the world and preach the gospel.”  It is an historical fact that each of the first apostles to whom that word was spoken, left Judea and carried the word of Christ to different parts of the world.  According to histories I have read Peter went to Babylon, Thomas to India, James to Spain, Andrew to Scythia, John to Asia, Philip to France, Thaddeus and Bartholomew to Armenia and Persia, Matthew to Ethiopia and Parthia and Macedonia, James the less to Syria, Jude to Armenia, Syria, and northern Persia, Simon the Zealot to Armenia.  The dispensing of the Word in Asia Minor, Greece and Rome by Paul is a well-documented fact and there is some evidence that he went as far as Britain in his spreading of the gospel.  Thus, the Great Commission was completely fulfilled in the days of the early Church and continued to be carried out throughout the age now called by many the age of grace.

That was a wise and wonderful plan for this age when God was “calling out a people” from among the nations for His name.  Those who were sent were never able to reach all the people, and it was only “whosoever believeth” that responded to their word.  That is how Christ built His Church!  No one could improve on that method for doing the job the Lord required for that age.  But now in the new Day the residue of men, earth’s teeming masses, and all the nations of the world are being called upon to COME TO THE LORD.  Billions of the world’s darkened, dejected, weary, and oppressed souls shall come streaming into the Kingdom of God.  The sons of God are the Light that shall shine upon them (Isa. 60:1-22; Rev. 21:24) and the voice that shall bid them come.  We are also the “gates” through whom the multitudes of earth’s needy shall enter the New Jerusalem City of God (Rev. 21:25).  That glorious event shall so overshadow and eclipse all previous spiritual visitations, outpourings, and revivals, that none of our old church age terminology will be adequate to describe it.  God will indeed have to give us a new vocabulary!

In this new age of the Kingdom all our former ideas, opinions and methods of evangelism will have to be discarded.  The emphasis of the past age has been upon GO and DO.  Constantly we were going places and doing things for God!  But, thank God, the order is changing!  God is doing a new thing!  He is establishing a new order in the earth!  And we will have to change with God!  And we will change, because we will be changed!  All the old religious methods of the past age are passing away!  The time of raising money and sending missionaries and establishing churches is ending.   I do not say that it has ended; it is a good plan as long as God is calling out a people for His name.  But the new age demands an intensified program of God to harvest all the nations into the Kingdom of God!

Instead of sending messengers to go into all the world, the Lord will so pour out the spirit of grace and supplication upon all the nations of the world through the ministry of the manifest sons of God that it will cause billions of earth’s sick and sinning and dying people to flow like a mighty river into God’s Kingdom, to find rest for their weary souls.   We may think we have witnessed mighty manifestations of God’s power and glory in the past, but we haven’t seen anything yet!

I was greatly inspired by the following testimony of Paul Mueller which I share in closing these thoughts.  “I grew up on a farm;  before the Lord called me to serve Him, I was a farmer.  About fifty years ago, the Lord gave me a vision of a great harvest field.  In that vision, I saw a field of ripened grain being harvested by old, outmoded means.  The farmers were using a hand scythe, cutting the grain and then bundling it all by hand, as farmers once did before the invention of binders and combines.  But then, the Lord let me see that He had a large combine being prepared on the side of that field, waiting for the right time for it to be used.  I was encouraged when the Lord revealed to me that that massive combine represented the new thing He would do in the earth.  By the Spirit, I saw that the Lord was preparing a people who would represent Him and His kingdom purposes in the earth.  They would be used of the Lord to gather in the ripened harvest of the world’s billions.  In due time, the multitudes of the world will be as ripened grain to be gathered into the kingdom by His massive, spiritual ‘combine.’  They will all be fully prepared and ready to come to the Lord.  With heavenly eloquence and vision the prophets prophesied of this time.  We are now living in the hour when much of the prophetic word of the Lord shall come to pass.  And we are the people God has chosen to fulfill His purposes!”   — end quote.

Even with the light of divine revelation it is difficult to imagine the wonderful sight of whole nations coming to the Lord!  Think what it will be like!  One day a nation is communist, filled with people spouting by rote the godless line of  Lenin or Mao.  The lives of the people are tightly controlled by that totalitarian system, with all its restrictions and tyranny.  But then, the sons of God speak a word from the throne of the heavenlies releasing a mighty flood of the Spirit of the Lord over that nation, and the whole nation is set free by the power of God.  The glory of the Lord appears to millions of people, and the truth of Christ is unveiled to their minds and hearts.  All the people of that nation will turn to the Lord to love, worship, and serve Him.  They will seek God in the persons of His sons, and there will be a dispensation of life, light and love unto them.  In the sons of God they will see and learn and know the ways of the Lord, the will of the Lord, and all aspects of their national life will become transformed by the wisdom and nature of God.  With one mighty sweep of His Spirit, God has changed a communist nation into a nation that loves and serves the true and living God!  The Kingdom of God has then come to that people and nation.

What wonders shall be wrought when our Father has glorified His sons with the glory of Christ!  All the nations of the world shall remember and turn unto the Lord, bowing before the feet of this glorious Christ, confessing Him as their Saviour, Lord, Redeemer and King, to worship Him in spirit and in truth.  And since it is nations, and not individuals, that shall come to the Lord, it is obvious that they shall not come to a geographical location.  There will be no literal, physical throne nor any literal, earthly city.  The government of God is a glorified people reigning in and by the Spirit from heavenly places in Christ Jesus!  But they shall COME to the mountain of the Lord’s power, to the beautiful and spiritual temple of living stones, to a kingdom of priests and an holy nation, glorified in the midst of the earth.  It is an absurd impossibility to imagine whole nations coming to a literal mount Zion, or to great crusades in buildings or stadiums, which are all so limited.  Such carnal thinking is a remnant from the old age now passing, and has no place in the new order of the Kingdom of God upon the nations.  God will not repeat the limited methods of the past, for they can not prevail to do the work that must be done in this new Day.

The Lord is doing a new thing in the earth.  The manifestation of the sons of God is the next thing on the agenda in God’s Kingdom program.  This manifestation will bring multitudes, even many nations at a time, into the greater glory of the fullness of God dwelling among men.  What a marvelous plan, revealed and confirmed now by the Spirit of the Living God within our hearts!  We know God’s purpose because He has called us and chosen us to be a vital part of the redemption and restoration all things.  We wait in holy expectation!

 


Chapter 47

THE INCREASE OF THE KINGDOM

(continued)

Even though we have heard that we are living in such a day of miracles and sensational happenings that people are shock-proof, let me remind you that people are not shock-proof!  Soon a series of prophetic fulfillments of a sensational nature will be transpiring right here on this earth that will shock millions of people who thought themselves to be shock-proof heretofore!  Truly, we are living in a day of miracles.  Every time we look at a new born baby we are looking at a miracle, and every time we see a giant plane take off the ground into the air with hundreds of people on board, we are looking at a miracle.  I have seen paralyzed people jump out of wheelchairs, tumors and goiters  disappear before my eyes, and gasoline created in the tank of my automobile.  However, these will fade into insignificance, compared to the miracles that are just ahead.

The prophetic word of the Lord gives promise of a time when the Lord will move in a marvelous and unprecedented way by His Spirit.  At that time the Lord will restore all that was lost through the ages past and the long night of man’s selfhood, sin, sorrow and death.  There is an event soon to take place which shall overshadow and eclipse all former, partial, 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 event is impossible for us to comprehend presently, for we are still living and moving in the realm of the “firstfruits” of God’s Spirit.  The grand and glorious event to which we refer is the manifestation of the sons of God.

The supernal glories that lie like towering sierras before us are beyond compare.  The grandest event of all time is now at the doors!  For almost two thousand years the Lord has been gathering out of all nations and peoples an elect body, refining its members in the furnace of affliction, transforming them in mind and heart by the deep dealings of His Spirit, preparing them by experience and in wisdom and knowledge to possess the reins of the government of the world.  And while we rejoice and praise God for all the mighty visitations of the past, and those glorious movings of the Spirit we have experienced in our life-time, yet we know by the word of the Lord that the next great move of God will be greater than all — the manifestation of God through His many sons.  Nothing is more certain than that.  The Spirit witnesses all across the land and around the world that the long awaited unveiling of God’s sons is at hand.  The unveiling of the in-Christed is upon us!  The cry of the groaning creation and the prayer of the travailing saint are joined with the unutterable longings of the Holy Spirit, all crying in unison and harmony for the arising of God’s deliverers.  The desire of all nations is at hand.  The next stage of the Kingdom of God is ready to unfold!

Let the mountains reverberate with the sound of the message, let the hills shout aloud for joy, and all the trees of the forest clap their hands!  For we now stand on the threshold of a new dimension of the Kingdom of God, and we must be prepared to receive HIM in fullness.   As we earnestly look for His appearing, we are to receive ALL THAT HE IS, for when He appears in His glory in His manifest sons, all the traditions of yesterday will be swept away and the realms of limitation swallowed up in His surpassing glory.  I cannot overemphasize this great and important truth: When Christ appears in the fullness of Himself in His many brethren, we must be prepared to receive Him on a higher plane than we have known Him hitherto.  We cannot tell Him what portion of Him we will receive and what portion we will not receive.  WE WILL RECEIVE AND MANIFEST HIM IN FULLNESS, and without any reservations or preconceived ideas, or we will not receive Him at all.  Either we will walk in the power and glory of His sonship, or we will miss the glory.  Should we cling to the ministries and methods of the past, we will not be manifest sons.  Vast multitudes of Christians will not stand in this new glory because of their tradition — but their time of visitation will come later.  But for those who are willing to pay the price, to be thoroughly purged of all that is of the flesh, and disposed to turn loose of the past religious traditions, the old forms and ceremonies, the former means and methods, and the stagnant remains of yesterday’s visitations, there awaits great glory and heavenly wealth, and a world-shaking ministry beyond the comprehension of mortal mind.

Some of us have surely noticed that in every generation and age God is doing two different kinds of work — a general work and a specific work.  For instance, in Noah’s day there is no doubt that God was acting in diverse ways and on different levels, doing numerous general things in the earth.  He certainly was caring for His creation and we know that His Spirit was striving with all mankind (Gen. 6:3).  But God was also doing a very specific thing.  The Lord appeared to Noah and gave him His word for the new day He would bring to pass.  The Lord told Noah that because of man’s wickedness He was going to destroy all flesh by a flood, except his family, and that he should build an ark to save his family and two of every kind of creature on earth.  Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord!  He was a just man and perfect in his generation.  He walked faithfully with God and became related to God in that specific thing He was doing in the earth at that time.

To fulfill God’s purpose required that Noah build an ark on dry ground in a world where rain had never been seen.  Nobody really knew what a flood was, for God had not caused it to rain upon the earth.  The face of the earth was watered nightly by a mist that the Lord caused to cover the land.  No one had ever seen a rainbow, for there was never sufficient moisture in the air by day.  After receiving his instructions from the Lord, Noah labored faithfully to build the ark.  With every stroke of his hammer Noah was judging that generation.  I do not doubt that the scoffers mocked Noah and ridiculed him for building such a huge monstrosity which he maintained would one day float above the mountains and save his family from death.  With no rain in sight, the mockers had a hundred years to laugh at Noah, taunt him, shout obscenities at him, while calling him a stupid and crazy old man.  But when the flood came and the waters overflowed the earth, their mocking came to an abrupt end.  God’s word to Noah, and Noah’s involvement with that specific thing God was doing in that generation, judged the whole world and brought the dawn of a new age.  When the flood was over, Noah and his family stepped out of the ark to see a new earth that was cleansed of the evil of previous times.

Ah, time fails me to speak of Abraham, Joseph, Moses, Joshua, Samuel, David, Solomon, Jeremiah and a host of others who dared to become related to God in that specific work He was doing in their day.  It is easy to be related to God in the general things He is doing.  Today God is moving in the earth to touch and bless and use people on may different levels of His purposes.  Vast multitudes of believers throng to the activities of these general movings of God.  You will always find the crowd at the general move of God!   But we live in a unique period  of the history of the world, just as Noah and others did.   And in our generation, as in theirs, God has a SPECIFIC PURPOSE in mind, that one precise, unique, special and transcendental work which He is performing for the advancement of His Kingdom into the new age.  The masses of Christians flocking to the meetings, crusades, projects and activities of the church systems in this hour are related to God only in the general things He is accomplishing in the earth.

There is a people unto whom the Lord has appeared and to whom the Lord has given His word for the New Day.  For this reason we are a people to be conformed to a higher standard — a people made in His image and likeness, trained in His ways, instructed in His purposes, initiated into His sacred secrets, devoted to His will.  The apostle Paul also lived in a unique period.  He was called to bridge the gap between the old and the new.  Paul was called and ordained and equipped to establish a new order in the earth.  So is it in this Day!  The specific purpose of God in our generation is to bring the many-membered body of Christ to maturity, to birth the company of the manifest sons of God, to bridge the gap between the old Church age and the new age of the Kingdom of God upon the nations.  I speak as a prophetic voice in the earth in this generation.   The manifestation of glory and power and righteousness that will be manifested in this Day will eclipse all former moves.   Who can carry on with the programs of man anymore, who can wade in the shallows of former visitations once he has received the vision of what shall be realized as God’s people launch out into the deep.  The last or most recent “shower of blessing” came as the great outpouring of the Lord as Latter Rain during the years 1948-1953.  The effect and blessing of that outpouring is with us still and various smaller showers have fallen also.  But the celestial deluge is yet to come in GREAT POWER AND GLORY.  Glorious beyond words to describe was that wonderful outpouring of God’s Spirit at Pentecost, but no language of men below nor of mighty angels above can begin to describe the SURPASSING GLORY of the manifestation of God in this New Day.  The “waters to swim in” are coming, the outpouring of the fullness of the spirit and life of the almighty Christ of God, and compared to these waters the former outpourings are but trickling streams compared to the vast ocean currents beyond the power of man to either produce or control.

Here me now and believe me later — if you cannot believe me now — soon there will come the manifestation of the sons of God, for which all creation has groaned for long millenniums and ages.  Then the glory of the Lord shall be revealed from the living, completed temple of His body.  His glory shall flow out and fill the earth.  His power shall shake the nations and all nations shall come and worship before Him.  The harvest of this age shall be gathered.  Everything shall live whithersoever the River cometh.  The Spirit of God has witnessed to many thousands of saints around the world in this hour that a NEW DAY is upon the horizon.  The next great move of God is even now at hand.  There will not be another revival.  There will not be another visitation.  It is not the hour for the restoration of the New Testament Church.  All that has already been accomplished!  A new day dawns.  God is marching on.   He shall do an entirely new thing in the earth.  A new age lies directly before us.  The manifestation of God’s sons is at hand.  That has never happened before!  A new and unspeakably wonderful stage of the Kingdom of God is upon us!  In this New Day the ministry of the fullness of the Spirit of God shall be released through many sons in reconciliation, blessing, and transformation unto all the ends of the earth!  It shall bring a deliverance and change beyond any the world has ever witnessed.

There can be no hanging on to the things of the past.  There must be a clean break away from all of the old order, not only the orders of men, but the old order of God Himself.  We must forsake all that has waxed old and is ready to vanish away that we may attain to that specific thing God has called us to.  For my part, nothing short of attaining will satisfy!  We must attain without counting any cost.  It means the loss of friends and fellowship.  It means misunderstanding among our relations and often the closest members of our family.   Those who are led by the Spirit are the sons of God (Rom. 8:14).  All others will go the way of the flesh, receiving their instructions and guidance, not from the Spirit, but from carnal-minded preachers, childish, immature Christians, and apostate church systems.   Do you want to share in the Kingdom?  Then there are responsibilities for you which Martin Luther, John Wesley, Billy Graham, Oral Roberts, the Full Gospel Business Men’s Fellowship, and all the other orders of the past and present have not had.  Therefore, for you to live an earnest and dedicated Christian life as these have, is not enough.  Did not the generation of Jews, on whom the end came in the days of Christ Jesus — the generation that saw or might have seen the glory that came with the new activity of God in those days — have responsibilities their fathers did not have?  And were they not judged accordingly?

Unless we are enlightened by the Spirit and given eyes to see as God sees, and hearts to understand as God understands, our minds will be filled with the darkness and spiritual foolishness of these times.  The Christ within should always be our guide!  The Christ within will open our eyes and cause us to see new things in the Spirit and by the Spirit.  Then we will see this great Day and Father’s Kingdom purposes to which His chosen, faithful and mature sons are called.  Only when we are enlightened by the light of Christ are we able to look beyond the feverish religious activities of the carnal church world and the evil and darkness of these times, to see the hope and purpose and glory of a people prepared to rule and reign with Christ in His Kingdom — in this Day!

When this people arises in the earth the Kingdom of God shall prevail through an altogether new ministry for the new age.  Yet many of those who yearn for the manifestation of God’s sons are left feeling much like the expectant woman whose due date for delivery of her baby has come and gone.  All the signs are there that there is a baby — the tummy is swollen so tight it can’t be pinched, the baby is kicking, the water may even have broken and contractions begun — yet the birth has not followed.  At such a time the mother may wonder if things could go on like that indefinitely.  It seems almost unbearable, the waiting grows intolerable, the nights long and depressing.  Still, all signs give assurance that the hoped for event will take place.  And, praise God, it surely shall!  We are getting very near the end of our journey.  For some of us it has been long, hard, and treacherous; the road often rough and stony, feet becoming torn and wounded.  But the glad news is this, the morning is at hand, the day is dawning, the glory of the Lord is arising upon the elect, and the overcomers are ready to be clothed with His resurrection and immortality.  We have been set apart from birth.  We were always “different” from others.  We were in the world, at times we were part of the world, and for a season we enjoyed the pleasures of the world.  Yet  something within us pulled us away and led us to the spiritual...to the unseen...to the eternal.  HE was always with us.  Through all the steps of our growth and development in the spirit we always sensed...knew...that there was more.   We were never satisfied at any stage of the journey, with any church or move or ministry.  We were irresistibly impelled onward to things we did not yet see nor comprehend.

Carl Schwing wrote of the beauty of this great truth, “There is a field, a very lovely field, where the lilies grow.  They stand tall in the sunlight and dance freely in the wind;  white trumpet-shaped flowers with the fragrance of a rare perfume.  They neither labor nor toil...they are free from things like that.  They simply do what they were created to do; they grow and become beautiful and are admired by every passerby.   But sadly there comes a cold gray day when the flowers fade and all of their loveliness is gone.  Yet deep within the cold dark earth they rest, until summer’s sun.  I have often wondered if the lilies know that someday the sun will rise to set no more, and that they will bloom forever in the Father’s lovely field.  Ah, then shall they be free from change and decay.  They will be free to live on and on, and be a thousand times lovelier than they were before.  I must share a secret: I know that they know...for they moan for the hour of the Manifestation of the Sons of God.

“There is another field...the earth which we are.  And deep within that  cold harsh earth there is hidden an inner son.  Within this son dwells all the mysteries of the ages.  All the wisdom and knowledge of the Father dwells in him.  He is the ‘inner being’ out of which the River of Life shall flow.  He is the emancipator that the whole creation cries out for.  He is a son of God’s Christ.  And now he rests within the body of flesh...till the call of the Rising Son.  This, my beloved, is the unrest which you feel.  The earth which you are is being shaken by the knowledge of the inner truth.   This is the feeling we have of something breaking forth.  The stone of flesh is soon to be rolled away.  The light of God is swelling within you and His Kingdom is being prepared to come forth.  Even now the Rock is grinding to powder the kingdoms of the world.  Even now we can hear the songs of the Kingdom as we dwell in the presence of the Father.  Even now the Kingdom Light is shining forth from our eyes (understanding).  Even now upon the horizon we can see the coming of the Manifestation of the Sons of God...and they shall live on and on, and be a thousand times lovelier than they were before.  They will be the eternal glory of the Father, the pillars of His House, and the joy of all creation.  They, with their Elder Brother, form the Son of God by whom all things were created, redeemed and restored.  Who can be compared to these Holy Lilies of the Field?  Hallelujah!”

There is coming a new and fresh and full revelation of our Lord Jesus Christ.  The night is falling on the present order.  Already we are seeing evidence of the dawning of a new day breaking forth upon us  as thousands of the Lord’s elect are arising to behold the first rays of the dawn and to drink in the intoxicating freshness of the morn.  There is a mighty cry in our hearts for the Lord to move in an altogether new way in our lives and in the earth.  Many things are happening in the Pentecostal and Charismatic realms today, but I do not hesitate to tell you that all of those things are but stale “leftovers” from previous visitations.   We are due for a fresh move and a new work of God in the earth in this hour!  So the night is coming upon the religious realms, bringing an end to particular forms of the movings and operations of the Spirit of God.  Though all the manifestations of the past have been precious and needful, yet our God in this hour is moving on.   A new manifestation and revelation of the Christ is coming in the midst of us, and I hear and see the signs that He is beginning to come.  We are living in the early dawn of the fullness of the APPEARING OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST.  This appearing will be through the long-awaited manifestation of the sons of God.  It will not  just save and heal and bless people, it will deliver creation from the bondage of corruption.  It will bring full salvation, spirit, soul and body!  This truth is burning within my bones, pulsating within my bosom.  I am being quickened by these things.  My one desire is to be available to be a part of this appearing of the Lord that is preparing the sons of God for the wind-up of this age and the inauguration of a far greater age of glory.

We must be willing to move with God into the new, and that means to be completely released from, separated from, stripped from the old.  Oh!  How we try to bring the old along into the new, to adapt the old methods, the old order of the church systems to the new order of sonship and the Kingdom of God.  But God will not have that, my friend.  It is human nature to want to fit the passing into the mold of the new.  Have you ever noticed, for example, how it worked in the automotive industry.  How many of you remember what the first automobiles looked like?  If you do, then you remember they looked exactly like horse-drawn carriages without the horses!  When the designer sat down to draw up a concept for this new vehicle of transportation known as an automobile, he was so hitched to the past that he came forth, not  with a new vehicle at all, but merely with a reproduction of an old one.  The first automobiles were made to resemble horse-drawn  carriages — right down to the sockets for the whips!

Every time there is a change in the working of God we are thrown into a crisis situation.   There is something about us that is never quite prepared for change.  There is always that shock of seeing a cherished order vanish, while wondering what the next order will be.   But this is how it is.  The Lord reveals His glory and it accomplishes a purpose.  Then the end of that day comes.  The night steals in upon that era.  God is ready for a new order, a new day, another  greater phase of His workings.  Again, even as I pen these lines, there is a fresh revelation and working of God in the earth.   Again there is a “going forth” of Jesus Christ, released in a fuller form through a many-membered body of mature and transformed sons of God.

I must speak very frankly, my friends.  The next move of God, the manifestation of the sons of God, will not come through those who are waiting for a rapture to whisk them away to the skies.  It will come through  people who are crying out from the depths of their spirits, “Oh God, visit us afresh.  Do a new thing!   We need YOU!  Creation groans for a mighty deliverance!  Come, Lord Jesus, move through us on a higher order, a higher dimension of your power and glory.  Come to your temple in fullness.  Come in the manifestation of your sonship.  Come! that we might behold you as you are and be changed into your image, clothed with your life and immortality.  The whole earth is waiting with bated breath for the glory of the Lord to be revealed.  Come! and cause righteousness and praise and incorruption to spring forth before all nations!”

THE GLORY OF MANIFESTED SONSHIP

Old as it is, there is always something new, something prophetic, in the miracle of the coming of spring.  No man of us, unless he be utterly dead of soul, but feels a new thrill and throb of heart as he witnesses the wonder of the world renewed.  “Behold, I make all things new” is a text of which nature writes a new lesson every year, lest we forget.  Gently the earth, but yesterday so gray and winter-worn, is bathed in sunlight; silently a new life wells up from within, and the wonder is wrought.  The dead grasses are gone, they are reborn in living green; the stark trees adorned in elaborate foliage and ornate blossoms.  Since time began this demonstration has touched the heart of man with new hope that, if God so reclothes the grass which perishes, shall He not much more by a mightier ministry renew the men made in His image together with all creation?

The word of God clearly teaches that the manifestation of the sons of God at the close of this age brings FULL SALVATION — salvation for spirit, soul, and body.   The purpose of this manifestation is two-fold: first, to bring full redemption to God’s elect; second, to bring deliverance to all peoples, tongues, kindreds and nations, to those now living as well as to those vast multitudes who have lived and died throughout the ages, until sin, sickness, sorrow, darkness, pain and death shall exist no more anywhere in God’s unbounded universe, worlds without end.  Let us notice how the apostle Paul reveals this purpose of God in the following words: “For even the whole creation waits expectantly and longs earnestly for God’s sons to be made known — waits for the revealing, the disclosing of their sonship.  For the creation was subjected to frailty — to futility, condemned to frustration — not because of some intentional fault on its part, but by the will of Him who so subjected it.  Yet with the hope that creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and corruption and gain an entrance into the glorious freedom of God’s children.  We know that the whole creation has been moaning together in the pains of labor until now.  And not only the creation, but we ourselves too, who have and enjoy the firstfruits of the Holy Spirit — a foretaste of the blissful things to come — groan inwardly as we wait for the redemption of our bodies from sensuality and the grave, WHICH WILL REVEAL OUR ADOPTION, OUR MANIFESTATION AS GOD’S SONS” (Rom. 8:19-23, Amplified).

As our Lord did after His resurrection, so will the sons of God do.  We will be in glorified bodies and we will belong to the heavenly world, but we will appear and take part in earthly life and show forth the fullness of the power and glory of His resurrection right here on earth.  This is Christ coming to be revealed in the fullness of Himself among all peoples and over all nations.  Our Lord’s life on earth after His resurrection gives us an illustration of what resurrection life ultimately means.  He was in a place simply by willing to be there, regardless of space, time, or of material obstructions.   He had access to heaven and to earth.  This is the destiny of all the sons of God!  Since this is the truth concerning the resurrection of the firstborn son of God, it follows that this is the glory that shall be manifested  when all the sons of God are glorified.  Furthermore, the glory of the Lord to be manifested on this earth when all the sons of God are transformed and glorified shall be much more magnificent than it was when Jesus was glorified.  Jesus was glorified to ascend and pour out the firstfruits of the Spirit; the sons of God shall be glorified to express in the earth the fullness of the Spirit and to deliver all creation from the bondage of corruption.

Although the glory of the Lord revealed and manifested when Jesus was glorified was awesome, there is a glory coming that shall be greater by far!  For it shall not be just one son glorified, but many sons brought to glory.   The whole creation is standing on tiptoe to see the wonderful sight of God’s sons glorified and manifested!  Every created thing is waiting to be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the family of God.  Deliverance from corruption means the abolition of death — resurrection life for everyone and everything.  Oh, the mystery of it!  Oh, the wonder of it!   Imagine the glory to be revealed when all the sons of God are transformed and glorified!  And not to ascend to heaven in a cloud, but to minister deliverance, transformation and glory to the whole creation!  Truly this is the promised “coming” of our Lord Jesus Christ.  That great event will be the transformation and glorification of the entire body of Christ, resulting in creation’s deliverance from the bondage of decay and death, into the glorious liberty and victory of the very sons of God.  And what a triumphant victory that shall be!

Most Christians today are expecting the “end of the world.”  I cannot but feel astonished that any serious Bible student should have his mind fettered with the common and vulgar notion that the great Creator and our heavenly Father intends to destroy the earth and creation.  God so loved the world that He sent His Son to be the Saviour of the world.  The Christ came and consecrated even this earth by His presence, and by spilling upon it His life’s blood.   He drenched the very soil with His precious, divine blood! There is a special consecration upon the earth which makes it revolting to think of its being handed over to oblivion.  God created it to be inhabited and established it that it be not moved.  The footsteps of the Son of God upon its soil, the breathing of its atmosphere by His lungs, the wearing of its dust upon His person, the warming of its fluids in His arteries, and above all, the glorification of its atoms and particles by the resurrection of His earth-body, ought to be enough to satisfy us that neither the devil nor destruction will ever possess it.  It is the place where the Son of God took the earth into His very existence, where He was born and reared, and where He taught, and slept, and suffered, and died.  It is the territory on which Divine Love and Mercy have poured out the costliest sacrifice the universe has every known.  It is the chosen theater of the most momentous deeds that have ever attracted the adoring interest of angels.  It has furnished the body, the death-place, the grave, and the glorious resurrection and triumph of Jesus Christ.  And how is it to be delivered over to everlasting nothingness?  Perish what may, a world so consecrated can never be blotted out, or cease to be one of the most cherished orbs in God’s great creation!

God has purposed that the Christ shall be glorified in the whole creation, in the earth and throughout the unbounded heavens, to the whole extent of His grace.  He has already glorified Him in the realm above all heavens.   He will now glorify Him where He lived  in poverty, where He had nowhere to lay His head, and where He gave His life a ransom for all.  As He, in humility and obedience, went down below all that God created, He has been raised as man above all that is created.  ALL between those depths and those heights, ALL, I say, must own His authority, ALL must be gathered beneath Him as head over all things, ALL must be infused with His divine life, ALL must be delivered from the bondage of corruption.  That is the testimony of the written Word and it is the testimony of the Holy Spirit in the mouths of His holy apostles and prophets in this Day.  What unspeakable joy!  What immeasurable glory!

Many of the Lord’s people are caught up in prophecies of gloom and doom, predictions of the destruction that they believe will come upon the earth.  But these are messages that come out of the darkness of men’s carnal minds and soulish imaginations.  Such teachings pertain to the blindness of religion.  God’s plan is not to destroy the earth or the universe, but to redeem and restore it.  The whole purpose of the coming of Jesus Christ with the glorious gospel of the Kingdom of God is to bring forth a new earth filled with righteousness in the lives of all mankind, and not to destroy the earth or the world that He has graced with His divine presence and atoning blood.   God’s elect are destined to be the agents and ministers of that restoration!  If we know what time it is on God’s great prophetic clock, we will understand that it is time for one age to end and another more glorious age to begin right here on earth.  We will then stir ourselves from the blessings and orders of the dying age and arise to become related to God in His purposes for the new age.   We will put away all those prophecies of gloom and doom, of the destruction of the earth and multiplied billions of people with it.   We will then seek the Lord for His appearing in us, for we are the hope of the restoration of all things.  Certainly there will be judgments, but not unto destruction and everlasting doom, rather unto correction and salvation.  Yes, Great Babylon will fall, but will be replaced by the light and the rule and the glory of God’s New Jerusalem people and His sons who reign from mount Zion.  And what a Day of deliverance this shall bring when the sons of God begin to reign!

As Carl Schwing has written, “It has been appointed to the sons of God to establish the New Heaven and the New Earth in righteousness and peace.  The high places shall shout for joy and leap with gladness; the low places shall be filled with blessing, honor and glory unto the Lord.  And like a mighty river the Word of the Lord shall go forth, baptizing all things in the light and life of the Son of God.  All creation shall gather before the Father to proclaim His power and might.   Everything that has breath shall glorify the Lord.  Every knee shall bow and every tongue shall confess that God’s Christ is Lord and King over all...unto the eternal praise of the Father.  Knowing that such glory lies just ahead, should we not lose sight of all else?  Even now our inner son can ascend to the place of his former birth and eat of the feast that has been prepared.  Even now we can walk at the Father’s side amid the Paradise of our former dwelling.

 “Though all the powers of the world and of religion oppose the hand of the Lord, He shall, through the sons of His Christ, bring forth His good pleasure.  Not one portion of His plan will be altered, not one among His creation will be able to resist His authority.  Among the lightening and the thundering of the Father’s infinite glory, the sons shall send forth the proclamation of freedom, to establish the justice and  goodness of the Lord.  Life, and love, and grace, shall burn as a purifying flame throughout all creation, until God is all and in all.  The New Age dawns before us; bask freely in the rays of this earthly morning.  Let thy spirit soar upon the wings of the Spirit to the place known only to the sons of God.  Enter into the peace and stillness of the age; enter into the rest of the Greater Sabbath.  Where we are, there is light; for He who is our light hath enlightened us with Himself.  He is the True Light, born from the Divine Energy of the Supreme Being.  He is the Light that conquers all darkness; the Light that shall lead all creation into the City of Life.  He is the Eternal Light that rises as the Morning Star within our hearts.”

 “For He is our peace, who hath made both one, and hath broken down the middle wall of partition between us; for to make in Himself of twain ONE NEW MAN” (Eph. 2:14-15).  “Till we all come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a PERFECT MAN, unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ” (Eph. 4:13).  God is making a new man, a perfect man.  There is going to be a new man after a new order.  This new man is a new creation in the Christ.  That is God’s purpose for calling us, for birthing us, for filling us with His Spirit, for dealing and changing and transforming us from glory to glory into His own image and likeness.  And here is what this new many-membered man is for: A NEW MAN FOR A NEW AGE.  For two thousand years God has been fashioning and forming this new man in Christ.  This new man is the new Adam, the second man, the head and authority and ruler over God’s vast creation.

Through our many years in the pews of Babylon all we ever heard was “the end of the world, the end of the world, the end of the world is coming!”  So we grew up looking for the end of the world.  All the preachers ever thought about, it seems, was the “end of the world.”  Now I am going to tell you something folks — there isn’t going to be any end of the world!  Someone, to make it spiritual, says, “Well, my world has ended!”  That may well be, but the truth is the Bible does not speak of the end of the world.  If you will look up all those scriptures in the King James Bible where Jesus spoke of “the end of the world,” you will discover that in the original Jesus never said “the end of the world” at all; He just said “the end of the age.”  The Greek word is AION, meaning an eon or an age.  Ages end, but the world does not end.  Jesus Christ is THE SAVIOUR OF THE WORLD!  Look up the times where Jesus spoke of “those who would be accounted worthy to attain the next world,” etc.  Check it, and you will find that in the Greek text Jesus didn’t say anything about a world to come, but He said, “those that are accounted worthy to attain THAT AGE.”  And THAT AGE is going to be right here, beloved!

There isn’t going to be an end of the world.  You might as well stop packing your suitcase and testing your wings and praying God to kill you and take you to heaven.  We have far too many Christians in the world today with dying faith, but they don’t have any living faith.  They’re always wanting to die and go off to heaven to be with the Lord.  That is, until they get a dizzy spell or chest pains, then they rush down to the hospital and spend their very last dime to keep from flying away out there to be with the Lord!  It gets rather ridiculous.  They talk about going away to heaven to be with the Lord, they sing about going to heaven, they preach about going to heaven, they shout about going to heaven, they clap about going to heaven, then do positively everything they can to KEEP FROM GOING TO HEAVEN!  They go to every doctor, enter every hospital, swallow every pill, pass through every healing line, and call the saints far and near to fast and pray — so they won’t have to go off to be with the Lord!  Ah, something is wrong, very wrong, somewhere!

Should I die, certainly my desire is to be with the Lord.  But I am with the Lord even now!  My vision is not to die in order to go and be with the Lord, but to live and reveal the life and the power of God here upon this earth.  God is raising up a people in this hour with a vision for LIVING, not so they can stick around to see their great-grandchildren, or go on another cruise, or raise another garden — but because of an inner consciousness  of the mind of Christ that the Spirit of God doesn’t want us out there, He wants us right here bringing in this NEW AGE!  There will be no end of this world, only the end of an age.  The end of an age bespeaks of change, transition, progress, furtherance, upward movement, breakthrough, growth, advancement,  enlargement, increase, new order.  When God’s new man has come to perfection, to the full measure of the stature of Christ, then the age in which the carnal mind and wicked heart of man has ruled over the world will end, and the new age will be brought in, in which God’s many-membered man will be ruler over all this world that God has created for the sons of God right here.  Hallelu-yah!

God is making a covenant in this Day with His chosen elect, a covenant of miracles, a covenant of power, a covenant of glory, a covenant of life.  He is going to keep His word and we will see miracles, signs, and wonders on a higher plane and of a higher caliber than we have ever seen before.  It won’t elevate men in the flesh, making one man a superstar, another man “God’s man of faith and power for the hour,” or “God’s handmaid for the age.”  It will bring the sons of God into the ministry that will exalt Jesus Christ and bring His kingship and dominion into the earth in mighty power and glory.  This sonship ministry will begin in the Spirit and it will end in the Spirit.  It will not parade across a stage with theatrics and showmanship.  Flesh can have no part in this Day!

The manifestation of the sons of God will break suddenly and rapidly upon the scene.   It will begin to happen everywhere at the same time, spontaneously and supernaturally.  The glory of God will arise upon a people, an unknown people, an unheralded people, prepared in the isolation of solitude of the wilderness experience and in the crucible of the furnace of affliction.  There won’t be time for anybody to come along and educate people or explain what has happened, how it is happening, that this is a move of God that is originating with this one or that one, with this movement or that movement, or who is in charge.  The spontaneity and power of it will blow our minds away and defy everything we have ever learned or known about evangelism or ministry of any kind.  The Lord will suddenly cause the paralytics and quadriplegics to walk and leap as an hart, the tongue of the dumb will sing for joy, the blind will see out of darkness, the deaf will hear the words of the Lord, the embalmed dead will be raised out of their coffins at the mortuaries, the secrets of men’s hearts will be revealed and men will fall on their faces and admit of a truth that God is in us.  The wisdom of God will pour forth like mighty Niagaras of living water, the righteous will have divine information from God, the omniscience and omnipotence of God will be revealed through His people, revelation knowledge will abound in the lives of the elect, and this Word will be spoken to all men great and small, without respect of persons, from the beggar on the street to kings, presidents, prime ministers, tycoons, and men in all positions of authority will recognize that there is a God in heaven and that the sons of God have arisen in the earth!

The One who shall be glorified in this Day is the Lord Jesus Christ.  God is preparing a company of sons who will walk with God in the moccasin print of their leader.  The Native Americans were tremendous strategists.  Those were intelligent people, and we could use them in our intelligence apparatus today.   The leader would walk along and all of those who followed would walk in the leader’s moccasin print.  They did this to confuse the enemy.  The enemy would come along and see only one set of moccasin prints, and the enemy would say, “Well, an Indian passed this way today” — one Indian.  But the truth of the matter is that perhaps 120 Indians passed that way, armed with bows and arrows, but they didn’t know it.

That’s what our great Captain has in mind when He says in Luke 9:23, “If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow me.”  He is saying, “Whoever will be my successor, or participate in this sonship ministry, let him deny his own identity and presence in this world and follow in my footprints.”  We’re going to see it happen on this wise.  The devil and the wise men of the world will come along and say, “Well, look at this — what’s going on here?” because hospitals will be emptied, dens of iniquity will be cleaned out, great men and rulers will be astounded, all the people will be saved, healed, delivered, filled with the Spirit, and transformed in spirit, soul, and body.

You see, it’s not enough to say that thousands of people made a decision for Christ or were healed.  So what?  That’s not what the manifestation of the sons of God is about!   Creation is not groaning for more Christians, Church members, or people who have been blessed or received a miracle.  Creation is groaning for the manifestation of the sons of God because creation is to be DELIVERED FROM THE BONDAGE OF CORRUPTION.  That is deliverance from all sin, limitation, and death in spirit, soul, and body.  It means total transformation.  It bespeaks of a complete metamorphosis.  If thousands of people in any town or city are raised up out of hospitals, mortuaries, slum, dens of iniquity, and are healed, delivered, regenerated, changed, and transformed by the resurrection power of Jesus Christ, I want you to know that the houses of prostitution will be affected, the pornography shops will be affected, the crack houses will be affected, the medical industry will be affected, the funeral business will be affected, the work places will be affected, the homes will be affected, the schools will be affected, the  lawyers will be affected, the judicial system will be affected, the city government will be affected, everything and everyone will be impacted by the Kingdom of God.  God will move in such incredible and unprecedented power that the multitudes of men and women and entire nations will be swept into the Kingdom of God as it were in a Day!

It will not be said, “Billy Graham had a crusade here today,” or “Benny Hinn had a great meeting and hundreds of people were healed,” or “Pat Robertson shook this place with a word of knowledge,” or “Preston Eby passed this way today and gave a great teaching.”  Oh, no!  The people will declare, “It was Christ the Lord who did this — the Lord of glory passed this way and He has set us free!”  Only one set of footprints, but 144,000 sons of God in the fullness of God’s Christ!  That’s what the Lord has waited on all this time as He has prepared His sons in secret, He has had long patience for the precious fruit of the earth, until they receive the former and the latter rain, bringing forth a people conformed into the exact image of Jesus Christ, the Son of the living God.  These sons will give all the glory to Jesus just as Jesus gave all the glory to the Father.

A brother has said that the three things which most easily destroy the ministry of preachers are the gold, the girls, and the glory.  The final test is the hardest.  It is because we covet the glory that there is so much petty jealousy and strife among brethren.  We are so concerned that our church, our talent, our opinion, our counsel, our position, our gift or our ministry gets the recognition, the praise, and the glory.  We want to get the credit.  And the credit IS the glory!  Many religious people cannot receive the things I now say, but, because it is the truth it will strike a chord within the hearts of all of God’s elect.  To pray, “Thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory,” demands full humility, brokenness and obedience.  And right here is where the Kingdom laws come into operation.  When we abdicate the throne of our own lives, our own strength, our own ambitions, plans and ways, the Lord makes us kings and priests unto God.  When we confess that all the power is His, He makes us strong in the Lord and in the power of His might.  When we refuse to touch the glory, He glorifies us with the glory He had with the Father before the world was.  And this is an unfolding glory, an ever-intensifying glory that shall shine as the stars and the brightness of the firmament forever.

We are commissioned to preach the Kingdom, and commanded to do the works of the Kingdom; but we must always be careful to understand and acknowledge that the Kingdom is His, the power is His, and the glory is His.  If we get a touch of the Kingdom in revelation, in preaching it, or in demonstrating its power, and use that to elevate ourselves, to gather men to us, to manipulate and control people, to build a little kingdom around our talent and ministry, or to fleece God’s people of their money for our self-aggrandizement, then that is all there is.  Such can never be kings and priests that reign over the earth.   Such are not sonship material.  Those ministries will hang their heads in shame and slither away into the woodwork in the day when the sons of God arise in the earth.

Those who splash their pictures over every page of their magazines, know nothing of what it means to walk in Jesus’ footprints.  They will not be a part of the sonship ministry.  God has used great men, He has used superstars as they have been known, God has used men with great religious pedigrees, with magnetic personalities, charisma oozing from their pores, promotional abilities, talent and soulical powers, but the time has come when God looks back on the foolishness of these lesser orders, which have been blessed by His mercy and grace, and no longer winks at it.  He says, “Now the real thing is coming, I’m going to stand my sons up in the earth, I will pour out, not ‘of’ my Spirit, but I will pour out all the plenitude, all the fullness, all the majesty, and all the glory of the seven spirits of God upon all flesh, I will show the world my ways, my acts and my life, and the scripture will be fulfilled, ‘All the ends of the world shall remember and turn unto the Lord: and all the kindreds of the nations shall worship before Thee’ (Ps. 22:27).”  If what we have had up to this time is all there is in God, then the devil has already outsmarted God and won the day.  But there is a ministry coming, even now it dawns upon the horizon, the heart of God is being fashioned in a whole army of people who are after His own heart.  To these He is revealing the fullness of His power and His greatness and His total majesty and they are going to turn the world right side up, never to sink again into the abyss of selfhood, sin and death.

God has called us to have a role in establishing this new order of the Kingdom of God.   God is offering to His elect in this hour something He has never offered any generation before.  He is calling us to participate in the activity that will lead to the prize of all the ages.  It is greater than anything He has done from the time of Adam to the present; it will never be done again!   It has never been done before, because it is God’s new thing.  He is calling a people to obey Him, to follow on to know Him, to be His sons and daughters indeed for the deliverance of all creation.  Be aware lest old-order brethren rob you by stealing this hope from you.  It is very important that we not let anyone rob us of this treasure!   It’s our inheritance.  The inheritance is the absolute fullness of God to deliver creation.

God is preparing a people He will put His stamp of approval on and endorse with all His wisdom, power and majesty.  The voice will come from heaven and say, “These are my beloved sons in whom I am well pleased — hear ye them!”  You who have been thoroughly processed by the Father have His image, you bear His likeness, and He will put His full endorsement upon you to represent His Kingdom purposes in the earth.  We are called to live such a life and walk in such a dimension of the righteousness, peace, joy and power  of the Kingdom of Heaven that we can testify, “If you have seen me, you have seen the Father.”  It will take a life of total abandonment to walk with God as sons, expressing His nature before all men and nations.  It has been said that we beheld the Saviour and became the saved, we beheld the Redeemer and became the redeemed, we beheld the Healer and became the healed, we beheld the Baptizer and became the baptized.  But now it is time to behold the SON OF GOD and become the sons of God in the earth.  We must not bear a message about the Father, we must be the message.

Men and women are reading these lines at this very moment of whom the world is not worthy.  They are part of a company under the dealings of God’s great hand and the world has no clue of their true stature and destiny.  The day is wonderfully nigh at hand when these shall arise in such power and glory that all nations will come up the mountain of the Lord’s house to learn the Lord’s ways.  All nations will come and sit at the feet of the sons of God to learn the wisdom and knowledge of God.  Upon these sons shall rest the spirit of Yahwey — the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the Lord.  The world will sit at your feet because you have sat at the feet of Jesus.  This people is partaking of the mind of Christ, the heavenly calling, and these are the ones who receive sonship authority and have influence over nations to rule them with a rod of iron — the irresistible power and all-consuming passion of the love of God.  My greatest hope is to live to walk into this Day as it dawns brighter and brighter upon the world.  And if not, I will be back in the power of His resurrection!  The nations don’t yet know that a  kingdom of priests is being prepared for the great transition of the ages.  These are now being abased under the mighty hand of God in order that they might be exalted in due time.  In this new age of the Kingdom there will be no more superstars for God is raising up an obscure, motley crew in this Day to manifest sonship authority that will scare the devil out of the devil, raise the dead, release the prisoners, and do mighty signs and wonders that will stop every mouth and testify of the Father to all men.

The sons of God will not minister out of talent,  natural ability, personality, charisma, nor out of theological training or organizational skills, but in power and demonstration of the Holy Ghost.  I say to you by the word of the Lord — it’s coming, and it is going to be powerful!  There shall be a glorious showdown, this sonship ministry will show forth the glory of the living, exalted Christ in the face of every power on earth.  The sons of God will actually accomplish more for the Kingdom of God in one year than the church systems have been able to do in all these hundreds of years of history.   Hallelu-yah!

The religious crowd will never bring in the Kingdom of God with power.  Look at Jesus’ followers when He walked the pathways of earth.  Thousands thronged about Him to see the miracles and eat of the loaves and the fishes.  His followers were at one time five thousand, then later five hundred, there was the seventy, and then twelve, and finally we find Him with just three — Peter, James and John — the innermost circle.  Is that not how it was with David’s army?  There were 800,000 men that drew the sword, but only thirty mighty men   (II Sam. 23-24).  One out of every 26,666 was a mighty man of valor.  Think about it!  There was a small inner circle that was distinguished among them all.  Gideon’s army at the beginning was 32,000, then it was decreased to 10,000, and in the end there were only 300.  Out of all the ministry there is in the body of Christ today the hand of God is upon a small remnant that is aiming for excellence.  So whatever spiritual level you fit in you can just stay there, but if you have heard the trumpet, if you have received the call, if the urgency of the Spirit has been birthed within you then set your face as a flint, turn neither to the left nor to the right, and   go for the one-hundred percent — THE HIGH CALLING OF GOD IN CHRIST JESUS.

The best is yet to come!  We haven’t seen anything yet!  The glory of Christ is about to appear, the banner will wave, and the whole world will say, “This is our God; we have waited for Him, and He will save us: this is the Lord; we have waited for Him, we will be glad and rejoice in His salvation” (Isa. 25:9).  The ears of the people of all nations will tingle, it will be glorious for multitudes, and frightening for others, but there is coming a shaking, there is coming a quaking, as all creation comes face to face with God.  There is a people unknown by the church and unheralded by the world, who in the secret place of the Most High has discovered the rarest extract of God, these have drawn so close to the Father that they have sucked the very breath out of the mouth of God and live by every word that proceeds out of His mouth.  To these the true and un-cut word of the Lord is revealed, the incorruptible word of God is being inworked, and by the metamorphosis from corruptible to incorruptible a new ministry will shed forth in these significant days.

In the time of glory that lies before us the earth shall reel to and fro like a drunk man under the impact of the power of God in His sons.  The thing God will do will get the attention of whole cities, of whole states, of whole nations, and finally the entire world will see that God is in this people that has the ensign, that has the seal, that bears the banner of the presence, nature and power of the Lord of glory.  The Day is upon us.   The season of preparation is now drawing to a close,  for soon we will speak and the lame will leap as the hart, little paralyzed  children in children’s hospitals will be overwhelmed by the power of the Kingdom, their little bodies will be made straight, whole wards of precious little ones will leap and dance under the supernatural power of God, the dumb will sing for joy, blind eyes will open, deaf ears will unstop, drug addicts will cast their  needles and paraphernalia from them, men of pomp and power will be broken and melted in the presence of the Lord, worshippers of false religions will be quickened to the living reality of Jesus Christ the Saviour, wicked men shall be cleansed and transformed by the consuming fire of God and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed and all flesh shall see it together!

There is a sound in the heavens and there is a rustle in the mulberry trees.  This is the New Order!  This is the New Day!  I have lived my whole life for this Day.  Thank God, we have not wasted our inheritance; thank God we have not squandered the substance of our Father in riotous living with the wanton harlots of Mystery Babylon.  Thank God we are just now ready to cross over the threshold to see the glory of the Kingdom of God reserved for this Day.  The spirit of wisdom and power in God’s sons will bring a fatal blow against humanism and against religious, scientific, educational, medical and political professionalism.  It will be marvelous beyond description!  We will be able to accomplish more  in a day than we have been able to do in a lifetime of preaching the gospel.  The power of God will reach from one end of the earth to the other, from pole to pole, and from sea to sea.  The glory of God will reach every cavern, every foxhole, every hidden valley, every isolated hamlet, every remote jungle, every mountain height, every tribe, every tongue, every people and every nation.  God will reach them in spite of the vast populations and expanses of earth, despotic rulers, blinding religions, entrenched customs, and godless cultures.  THERE SHALL BE A MIGHTY AND UNIVERSAL INCREASE OF THE KINGDOM OF GOD!

 


Chapter 48

THE INCREASE OF THE KINGDOM

(continued)

The grandest event of all times is now at the doors!  For almost two millenniums the Lord has been gathering out of all nations and peoples an elect body, refining its members in the furnace of affliction, transforming them in mind and heart by the deep dealings of His Spirit, preparing them by experience and in wisdom and knowledge to possess the reins of the government of the world.  And while we rejoice and praise God for all the mighty visitations of the past, and those glorious movings of the Spirit we have experienced in our life-time, yet we know by the word of the Lord that the next great move of God will be greater than all — the manifestation of the sons of God.  Nothing is more certain than that!  You see, it’s not enough to say that thousands of people have made a decision for Christ or were healed and blessed in this way or that.  That’s not what the manifestation of the sons of God is about!  Creation is not groaning for more Christians, Church members, or people that have been blessed or received a miracle.  Creation is groaning for the manifestation of the sons of God because creation itself is to be DELIVERED FROM THE BONDAGE OF CORRUPTION (Rom. 8:19-23).  That means deliverance from all sin, limitation, and death in spirit, soul, and body.  It means total transformation.  It bespeaks of a complete metamorphosis.  The Spirit witnesses all across the land and around the world that the long-awaited unveiling of God’s son-company is at hand.  The unveiling of the in-Christed is upon us!  The cry of the groaning creation and the prayer of the travailing saint are joined with the unutterable longings of the Holy Spirit, all crying in unison and harmony for the arising of God’s deliverers.  The desire of all nations is at hand.  The next stage of the Kingdom of God is ready to unfold!

Things will be very different than I have thought, and I’m sure they will be a lot different than you have thought.  The Lord has spoken deeply within my spirit, “You’re going to have to see things my way.  I am going to do a new thing and it will be different than anything you have seen or heard.  Nothing will be carried over from the old, it will be an entirely new thing that I do in this Day.”   I do know this.  It will take far more to bring the Kingdom to its conclusion than it took to get it started!  If it required apostles and prophets, and divers gifts of the Holy Ghost, and healings and tongues and signs and wonders to launch the Kingdom of God in the world, it will take a ministry greater than apostles and prophets, greater than gifts of the Spirit, greater than the level of miracles performed in the early Church, to bring this Kingdom to the glory of its consummation.  It will require a pure, full, mature, powerful, glorious SONSHIP MINISTRY to finish the work!

The glory of the latter house shall be greater than the glory of the former, saith the Lord.  The apostles of the former house literally turned the world up-side down!  On the day of Pentecost the whole city of Jerusalem was stirred and shaken by the power of God and three thousand souls were saved in one day without a meeting, a building, an advertisement, a radio or television program, a choir or a crusade.  But when the sons of God are manifested, one son will do more in one day than all the apostles and prophets did in a decade.  God will do things through His sons that are unprecedented, different than anything He has done before.  That is how it has been in every new move of God!  What God did in Noah’s day was altogether different than what He had done in Abraham’s day.  The thing God did in Moses’ day was entirely different than His work in Noah’s day.  The events in the life of David in no way resembled those in the experience of Moses.  The day of Pentecost was unlike anything God had done in any of His previous visitations.  In like manner, the manifestation of the sons of God will eclipse all former moves of God and will bring a glory in the earth greater than you and I can ever dream of in our wildest imaginations!  The fame of this will go throughout all the world and eventually every knee will bow and every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father.

No saint has ever trod where we are treading.  Millions trod in their appointed paths, did their work, triumphed gloriously, and entered heaven.  But, although the same faith of the Son of God, His presence, love and power animates and sustains us, as it did them, our pathway into sonship is a very different one to their walk in the church order.  They never had the work to do that we have.  They never experienced the dealings of God in the way we do.  They never saw the goal of the fullness of Christ as we see it before us in this hour.   They never saw the vision we see, nor cherished the hope we have in the Father.  They fulfilled their appointed roles in the on-going purposes of God, and received their reward.   But the time of the unveiling of God’s sons had not arrived, and the glory of such a high calling was seen but dimly and afar off.

My father in the flesh was a Pentecostal minister, and by God’s design, he was stuck in Pentecost.  The Lord moved us on into another move of His Spirit, into a further word than we had in the Pentecostal realm, and I remember I used to talk with my dad, and of course, I wanted him to see.   I longed for him to have an ear to hear what the Spirit was saying, but he never could hear.  So usually our discussions would end up in an argument.  One day the Spirit of the Lord spoke to me, saying, “Leave him alone!  He is in the realm that I have appointed him to, and he will not be in another.”  And you know, that brought a great peace, because now I was able to fellowship with him on the level that he could fellowship with me, with no condemnation, realizing that he was in the place that God had ordained for him during his sojourn on earth, as I was in the place God ordained for me.

Thirty-five years ago my father died and he passed away in the Pentecostal realm, just as the Lord had said.  But shortly after he passed away, the Lord gave me a dream.  In this dream I was standing in the doorway  in the living room of our home, and all of my family, my father and mother, my brothers, my wife and my children, everybody was there.  They were sitting along the walls, on chairs and the sofa.  My dad was sitting at the end of the line, on the sofa.  He appeared exactly the way he looked just before he died.  No one was saying anything, we were just there.  Suddenly my dad looked up, gazed across the room straight into my eyes, and said, “P-r-e-a-c-h  t-h-e  MANCHILD!”  Immediately I awoke out of that dream and I knew two things by the Spirit.  I knew that now my dad knew something that he didn’t know before, but I also knew that he represented a cry that comes from the very realm of death itself, the cry of the groaning creation, groaning for the manifestation of HIS LIFE that sets creation free from the bondage of corruption.

Well did Paul Mueller write, “Many years ago the Lord got my attention through visions and other experiences with Him.  One vision, in particular, was an urgent call to ascend the high places in God.  In that vision, I saw a large mountain.  It was the mount of the Lord’s presence.  Many people were climbing that mountain, higher and upward toward the pinnacle of His presence.  But few were reaching the heights.  In that vision, the mount of His presence was like the literal mountains.  The higher one goes, the fewer trees there are.  And the higher we go in God, the fewer believers there are at that level.   As I watched the people climb that mountain, they appeared on the spiritual level where they were when they died.  Some of the people climbing that mountain of the Lord’s presence were loved ones and friends.  One among them was a man whom I considered a man of God, a man I had known quite well.  By the Spirit, I was taken up that mountain but close to the people who were on various levels ascending that mountain.  As I passed by some friends and loved ones, they all cried out to me, ‘Go higher!  Don’t stop now, but keep going higher and higher.’  That vision made a profound impact on my life.  I shall never forget it!  By His grace and His Spirit, I intend to keep climbing higher and higher in God!

“Those who have lived and died in Christ are now in a realm where they can see and understand more clearly.  The true reality is in the realm of Spirit, and they know it well now.  They know what it means to walk with God toward perfection, and they appreciate it more now than when they were in this earthly realm.  If the Lord would give us ears to hear the cries of those who have gone on before us, we would hear them crying unceasingly for us to ascend the very heights of the mount of the Lord.  I heard them briefly.   And the tone of their voices persuaded me to believe that our spiritual growth will also mean something significant and wonderful for them.  Their call to keep going higher was almost a cry of desperation, but was one of hope as well.  Without us they cannot be made perfect (Heb. 11:40).  Therefore, the remnant of this hour must ascend in the Spirit to the heights of the mount of the Lord, where we shall be changed.  And we shall also release many who died in Christ from their limited, static positions where they rest on the mount of the Lord.

“As we ascend the heights of the mount of the Lord, we will find that it is a lonely walk.  To take a step higher in God may mean forsaking old friends and loved ones.  When Moses made his seventh and last ascent up mount Sinai, the Lord said to him, ‘And be ready in the morning, and come up in the morning unto mount Sinai, and present thyself there to me IN THE TOP OF THE MOUNT.  And no man shall come up with thee...’ (Ex. 34:2-3).  Like Moses, some are invited of the Lord to ascend the mount of His presence and meet Him there.  Half way up the mount will not do!  Those who shall partake of His life and the fullness of His kingdom must go all the way up.  God said to Moses, ‘present thyself there to me IN THE TOP OF THE MOUNT.’  The top of the mount was Moses’ goal, and it is ours as well.  And it is impossible for us to take anyone else with us.  We must go alone!  Spiritual progress is not based on fellowship with people, but on fellowship with God!  A few others will also go alone to meet the Lord in the top of the mount, so that a remnant — all the remnant — shall ascend the mount to present themselves to Him in the top of the mount.  Not one member of that remnant company shall be missing, for the Lord will lead them all there by His Spirit”   — end quote.

AS A THIEF IN THE NIGHT

A miraculous event is soon to occur, the most startling and revolutionary in the history of the world.  This is nothing more nor less than the manifestation of the sons of God.  There will be a terrible and mighty manifestation of power and brilliant glory, as the sons of God arise and step upon the stage of world history.  It will come upon both the church and the world as a thief in the night.  Christians have been trained and taught that the world is getting worse and worse, and that finally the church will be evacuated off the planet, and the devil and the antichrist will take it over.   What a shock it will be when the sons of God suddenly appear on the scene bringing salvation and transformation to all the ends of the earth!

Recently, as I was meditating upon these things, I thought about the element of surprise that God has manifested in His activities throughout history.  Consider Adam in the garden without a companion, suddenly put to sleep, and then awakening to find this exquisite creature awaiting him.  How could Adam ever anticipate a thing like that?  Who could have anticipated the flood in Noah’s day, or the separating of the Red Sea, or the manna from heaven, or the water out of flinty rock?   Who could have anticipated the fall of the walls of Jericho, the overnight overthrow of ancient Babylon, or if you like, the resurrection of Jesus Christ, His ascension to heaven, and the manifest power of the Holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost?  As I look back at the history of God’s activity, I’m just excited and on tip-toe to see what He is going to do in this hour!

The thing God is doing, and shall do, is so stupendous, so altogether glorious and unprecedented, that I am reminded of the little story I read one time.  There was a little boy who came home from Sunday School.  His mom said, “What did you learn in Sunday School today?”  The little boy answered, “Oh, we learned about Moses.”  “Oh?  And what did you learn about Moses?”  He answered, “Mom, if I told you, you wouldn’t believe me.”  “Well, try me,” she responded.  So the little boy began.  “Well, Moses was in a terrible situation.  He had all of these soldiers coming at him on chariots and he was pinned at the Red Sea.  So he prayed to God, and suddenly, all these tractors came rolling along and workmen and steel crews appeared, and within half an hour, they built a bridge that spanned the Red Sea.  Then Moses and the Israelites walked across it safely, to the other side.”  His mother looked suspiciously at him and said, “Son, I don’t believe you learned that in Sunday School today.”  To which the little boy muttered, “Mom, if I told you the TRUTH, you really wouldn’t believe it!”

There is something very powerful and awesome going on in the world today!  God is at work doing something hidden and quiet — and it is so supernatural, it’s beyond human comprehension.  Yet what He is doing right now is going to affect the whole world in these days.  God is preparing a small but powerful company of kings and priests in the glory of His sonship.  And the Lord shall come forth within them to do exploits and to shake all nations.  He is going to bring in a new age with a small band of heavenly revolutionaries!  A whole new realm of ministry is about to come forth!  Oh yes, there is an act of God that transcends anything that has ever been known.  For many millenniums all creation has groaned and sighed under the thralldom of sin, sorrow and death, but our heavenly Father had a purpose wonderful and glorious beyond words to express when IN HOPE He subjected the creation to the desolation of the curse.  “For the creation was subjected to frailty — to futility, condemned to frustration — not because of some intentional fault on its part, but by the will of HIM who so subjected it.  Yet WITH THE HOPE that creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and corruption and gain an entrance into the glorious freedom of God’s children” (Rom. 8:20-21, Amplified).  Ever since that day and because of that hope which springs perennial within the bosom of every man and all things, “the whole creation waits expectantly and longs earnestly for God’s sons to be made known — waits for the revealing, the disclosing of their sonship” (Rom. 8:19, Amplified).  The blood, the sword, the fire, the cross, and the deep dealings of God have not been working in us through these many years in order to make us ready for a harp in heaven.  Oh no!  God is preparing us to set creation free!

Carl Schwing has asked the question, “How much longer must the sons be silent?   How much longer must they remain hidden?   How much longer until they are clothed upon with the garments of immortality?”  We don’t know the precise answer to that, but he continues, “It will be in the twinkling of an eye...as the sons are taken beyond the barriers of time and distance, and the lightning of His great glory penetrates the stronghold of their flesh, and the fire of God consumes the remaining marks of Adam’s curse...that the sons of God shall stand in the awesome majesty of their Father’s presence as He proclaims to a waiting creation: ‘These are my beloved sons, hear ye them.’  We shall stand with our Elder Brother upon the highest regions of Zion, and all mankind shall hasten to the mountain that glows with the Light of God’s fullness.”

THE SEVEN SPIRITS OF GOD

The manchild company, the sons of God, will be born, literally and dramatically birthed upon the stage of this world, in a blaze of earth-shaking supernatural power and glory.  They will be the total, corporate incarnation of God upon earth.  That will be the greatest of all “spectaculars” the world has ever witnessed.   The inhabitants of the world will at first be terrified, yes, even paralyzed!  Instantly they will know this is no natural phenomenon, no traditional religious activity, while deep within the voice shall witness: TRULY, THIS IS THE SON OF GOD!  The effulgence of His Person shall appear upon His chosen ones, the intensity of His brilliance, equating to that of seven suns, shining through the undulating “garment” composed of tens of thousands of glorified saints, a star-studded super-spectacular, seven times the power of Pentecost, the likes of which has never been witnessed by any man since the dawn of creation.

John on lonely Patmos beheld this greater glory and recorded, “And immediately I was in the spirit: and behold, a throne was set in heaven, and one sat upon the throne...in the midst of the throne...stood a Lamb as it had been slain, having seven horns and seven eyes, which are THE SEVEN SPIRITS OF GOD” (Rev. 4:3; 5:6).  “And out of the throne proceeded lightnings and thunderings and voices: and there were seven lamps of fire burning before the throne, which are THE SEVEN SPIRITS OF GOD” (Rev. 4:5).  John saw One sitting upon a throne, and He that sat was to look upon like a jasper and sardine stone: and there was a rainbow round about the throne in sight like unto an emerald.   A rainbow is one but it has seven colors, and the seven colors of that glorious rainbow represent the sevenfold intensified fullness of the Spirit of God, even as the seven lamps of fire, the seven horns, and the seven eyes are the Seven Spirits of God.  Some imagine that the One sitting upon the throne is God the Father or our Lord Jesus Christ, and it is both, yet more, for just previous to this celestial scene Jesus spoke to the overcoming members of His body, saying, “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).  There is only one throne and only One upon the throne — GOD IN HIS MANY-MEMBERED SON!

In the day when the fullness of these seven Spirits of God is realized in the body of Christ it shall also come to pass that “the light of the moon shall be as the light of the sun, and the light of the sun (the glory of Christ) SHALL BE SEVENFOLD, as the light of seven days, in the day that the Lord bindeth up the breach of His people, and healeth the stroke of their wound (removes the curse)” (Isa. 30:26).  Malachi prophesied of this day too, saying, “But unto you that fear my name shall the SUN OF RIGHTEOUSNESS ARISE with healing in His wings...and ye shall tread down (overcome) the wicked...in the day that I shall do this, saith the Lord of hosts” (Mal. 4:2-3).

God’s promise is the sending forth of the Sun of Righteousness, not in the single light of the man Christ Jesus, nor yet in the double portion of the Spirit, the former and latter rain in the first month, but AS THE LIGHT OF SEVEN DAYS CONCENTRATED IN ONE.  Many are the figures of this coming sevenfold glory of Christ upon His people.  When the Lord Jesus was on the mount of transfiguration His face shone as the sun.  Saul of Tarsus, on the road to Damascus, experienced something of that brightness, was blinded and fell from his horse, and was completely transformed.  In the book of Revelation we read of a symbolic angel (a company of saints with a message) which comes down from heaven and his countenance is as the sun shining in its brightness.  In chapter twelve of that book we read of a woman clothed with the sun, having the moon under her feet.   In chapter one John saw one like unto the Son of man, Christ glorified in that body of sons conformed to His image, and of Him he witnessed, “His eyes were as a flame of fire...and His countenance was AS THE SUN SHINING IN HIS STRENGTH” (Rev. 1:14-16).  Isaiah looked forward to this Day with intense anticipation and described the glory of its dawning in this way, “Then shall THY LIGHT BREAK FORTH AS THE MORNING, and thy health (full salvation) shall spring forth speedily: and thy righteousness shall go before thee; the glory of the Lord shall be thy reward” (Isa. 58:8).  Solomon wrote prophetically of this army of the Lord: “Who is she that looketh forth as the morning, fair as the moon, CLEAR AS THE SUN, and terrible as an army with banners” (S. of S. 6:10).

The body of Christ is now maturing and moving out of the darkness of tradition, bondage, carnality, and limitation into the bright light of the fullness of the glory of God.   The history of the church is a history of   darkness and sorrow and bitterness.  But, thank God, rays of promise are even now breaking forth from the heavens, and there is a company of apprehended ones that is rising up into the realms of the Spirit to drink in the intoxicating freshness of the morn!  To these God is witnessing that in this Day He shall bring forth a light that is sevenfold in its intensification, so that there will be nothing hidden from it, and all things will be illuminated and quickened by it.  This is the DAY OF THE LORD!  Nothing short of this will lift this sin-cursed world out of the dominion of darkness into the Kingdom of God’s dear Son.

The early church with all its glory and power did not bring to consummation the Kingdom of God.  Its glory was eclipsed, sinking into that which even secular history records as the Dark Ages.  The Reformation in the sixteenth century was unable to bring the Kingdom to its consummation.  All the mighty revivals of church history have failed to bring the nations under the sovereign rule of God and to deliver  the groaning creation.  The Pentecostal and Charismatic movements have been unable to subdue all things unto God.  All the methods and programs of religion, all the missionary and evangelistic crusades, all the deliverance ministries and healing campaigns, have in turn failed to deliver this old world from the tyranny of sin, sorrow and death.  The Bible Societies, the door-to-door witnessing campaigns, the train loads of gospel tracts, the prayer meetings, and all the other feverish activities and promotions by the world’s churches have not gotten the job done.

All of us are thankful to God for what we have known of His power, we rejoice with joy unspeakable for every evidence of His manifest glory today, and we honor everyone who is demonstrating any measure of the life of God and accomplishing anything to His glory; but to break the dominion of sin and satan and ignorance and death over the nations in this hour of overshrouding gloom and darkness will require a SEVENFOLD REVELATION OF THE LOVE AND POWER OF GOD!  Nothing God is doing in the lesser realms today can get the job done.  God intends to send forth this sevenfold brightness of His life, light, love, grace, glory, righteousness, peace, joy and power.  When this happens, and that glorious company of God’s sons is manifested, then shall come to pass the word spoken by our Lord, “The works that I do shall ye do also, and GREATER WORKS THAN THESE SHALL YE DO” (Jn. 14:12).  For this, my beloved, God is shaping the nations and preparing His elect in this great hour!

The prophet Daniel witnessed of this Day: “But the people that do know their God SHALL BE STRONG, and DO EXPLOITS” (Dan. 11:32).  God is raising up a people that will be “fair as the moon, clear as the sun, and terrible as an army with banners.”  Yes, a people who, in the darkness of this hour at the end of the age, shall “arise and shine” until the nations come to their light and kings to the brightness of their rising.  The DAY is at hand, my beloved, the greatest hour for the greatest body to march forth in the greatest glory to secure the greatest victory for the Kingdom of God in the history of God’s great purposes!  Be encouraged and strengthened in this wonderful hour!

When the sons of God are manifested more people will come to Christ and salvation than have from Pentecost until now.  As the new age dawns every village in every nation will have been visited by the manifestation of the glory of God through His sons.  Every living person will encounter the power of God!  The knowledge of the Lord will cover the earth as the waters cover the sea, and many whole cities and some entire nations will be converted to Him.  As strange and impossible as it may seem today, the state of Israel and the country of Russia will be among the first to be transformed by the power of God’s Christ!  That is the clear word God has spoken in my spirit.  The magnitude of this sonship ministry cannot be measured by anything that has been before.  Even nature itself will be infused with life and transformation as creation begins to be released from the bondage of corruption.  These results will be obtained without church meetings, revival crusades, healing campaigns, deliverance services, television programs, outreaches, missionary projects, literature distribution, or any of the methods, teachings, and programs of the church systems.  This ministry will not stand in the wisdom of men’s words, but in supernatural power and unparalleled demonstrations of the Holy Spirit.

The sons will move in the fullness of the “in part” anointings, gifts and powers of all who have gone before them.  The greater works promised by Jesus will be done by the sons of God.  The “works that He did” have in measure been done by believers during the church age, but the “greater works” have been reserved for the anointing of the Seven Spirits of God.  The sons will walk in unlimited power and authority.  Men will no longer look back wistfully at the early church and historic moves of God because of the exploits of those days, beseeching God to “do it again.”  All will recognize that He certainly has saved the best wine for last!  The most glorious times in the world’s history now lie just before us.  The magnitude of this unveiling of the glory of God’s Christ will astonish even the most optimistic believers.  Miracles which exceed even the greatest Biblical marvels will cause whole nations to bow before the authority of God’s  sons.   The visible glory of the Lord will appear upon multitudes of people, and power will flow out from them to convict, deliver, and transform all who come into their presence.  The cloud and pillar of fire that hovered over Israel in the wilderness will not even compare to the intense presence of the Lord in these days.  Never has the Lord Himself been as personal and intimate with His people as He will be at this time.  The whole world will stand on tiptoe continually, wondering each day what great new wonders they will behold.

Wondrous things await the people of God, things that it is not possible for a man to utter.  We do not know, we may not know all that awaits us.  But enough is known, enough is revealed, to wean us from the things of earth, from the priorities of religion, from the concerns of time, and fill our souls with rapture on account of the extraordinary vision.  For He hath “made known unto us the mystery of His will, according to His good pleasure which He hath purposed in Himself: that in the dispensation of the fullness of times He might gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven, and which are on earth; even in Him...that we should be to the praise of His glory...and...that in the ages to come He might show (display) the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness toward us through Jesus Christ” (Eph. 1:9-12; 2:7).  We are now come to the dispensation of the fullness of times.  This dispensation was yet future in Paul’s day, he pointed to it and to the comprehensive work of restoration God would do in it, but it is now upon us with its power and glory.  The world has never yet seen anything like that which shall take place when God’s sons are manifest in this dispensation of the fullness of times!  The transformation of the saints is the next event in the commencement of this Day.

THE SYMPHONY OF LIFE

A brother related the following experience.  “When I first went to Nashville, Tennessee, some friends, thinking they were doing me a favor, called me and said, ‘We have tickets for the Philadelphia Symphony Orchestra that’s coming to town, and we want to take you as our guest.’  Well, I love music, but I know nothing about it, and I can’t sing it — I always help congregational singing by keeping quiet.  Frankly, I can’t think of anything more boring than a whole evening of symphony!  But I had to go because they were so polite and I wanted to be polite, so I accepted graciously and went along.

“I had never been to a thing like that before, and I was impressed by what I saw.   We went in, took our seats, and in a few moments there began to drift out from the sides the musicians.  They were in shirt sleeves for the most part, and each man went up to his instrument and started tuning it.  The fellows with the fiddles too big to put under their chins sawed back and forth — oh, it sounded terrible.  The fellows with the little ones they put under their chins squeaked up and down with those.  The ones with the horns — oh my, nothing was in harmony.   It was a medley of discordant, confused noise.   Then after they got through with that kind of a disturbance, they all disappeared again, went out through the wings.

“Another five minutes went by when all of a sudden the lights in the auditorium went off, the lights on the platform came on, and the musicians walked out.  This time they had on their coats.  My, they looked so nice.  Each one came out and stood or sat at his instrument.  Then there was a hush in the auditorium, a spotlight was focused on the wings, and the conductor stepped out.  When he did there was thunderous applause for him.  He bowed.  Then he came up to the podium and picked up a thin little stick.   He turned around again to the audience and bowed, then turned his back to the audience, lifted that little stick — total silence came over that auditorium, you could have heard a pin drop — then he brought that little stick down.  And, my friend, there were goose pimples all over me.  I never heard such music in all of my life.  Oh, what harmony, what wonderful harmony there was!”

I tell you today God is preparing His sons for the greatest symphony the world has ever heard, a symphony of divine wisdom, omnipotent power, and unconditional, unbounded love.  The sons themselves will be the symphony!  All the chords of God’s nature, wisdom, and power will be struck in them.  At this present time, as God is fine-tuning our lives it seems as if every man is tooting his own horn, everyone is playing his own little fiddle; it sounds like everything is out of tune, a medley of discord.  But as God deals in our lives, teaching us His ways, writing His laws in our hearts, bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ, establishing His will and transforming our beings, He is creating within each of us a chord of the spirit of life in Christ Jesus.  Our minds and our souls are now being renewed, through repentance, by the Spirit of God.  Through the crucible of daily experience by the dealings of God we are learning to perceive and fully understand by the wisdom of the mind of Christ instead of thinking with old Adam’s carnal mind.  As God by His refining fire purges out of us the trusting in our own strength, our confidence in the flesh, the inbred mentality of Babylonish religion, and the spirit of the world, what a raucous screeching is emitted from our lives!

We all seem so different, and Father’s purposes in us appear disparate.  What a motley crew the sons of God appear to be today!  But you, precious friend of mine, are an instrument designed to be a channel of Life, Light, and Love.  And Jesus Christ is the Master Conductor,  and wants to play the strings of emotions and thoughts and desires and nature within you until you become a son indeed, the Song of the Lord in the midst of the earth.  Your life, when it is hid with Christ in God, becomes a beautiful thing; your thoughts and actions all in unison with God are running along the lines that lead to God, for they diverge not.  When the hour strikes for the unveiling of God’s sons, Jesus Christ the Lord is going to lift His scepter — oh, the harmony that will sound forth from all His many brethren!  Then the world shall see the fullness of Christ, which includes Christ, the Head, and Christ, the body, in all the life and glorious harmony of the Kingdom of God!

Every knee on this globe, and in the heavens above, and in the underworld, shall bow before the majesty of the presence of the Lord as they awaken to hear the pure melodies of the harmony of God in His sons.  Never again will they be satisfied with the discordant notes of this world’s pleasures and programs, nor the off-beat of the world’s religious systems.  As they hear the pure song that flows from the heart of God in His sons, all men shall hunger and thirst to be filled with the same, the harmonious chord of the righteousness, peace, and joy of the Kingdom of God.  We have not yet witnessed the glory of God’s manifestation in the way it is going to be expressed.  We have not seen the hand of God move in the way it is going to move.  The Lord spoke through prophecy years ago, at the time of a mighty move of His Spirit, and said that He was moving by His little finger, and I tell you when He moved that little finger there were tremendous things that happened, glorious things took place.   But now — just think of the glory that shall come when He moves by His hand and makes bare His holy arm!

THE GREATER WORKS

Amazed, the sons themselves will stand awed, as suddenly before them unfolds the true purpose of their lives on earth.  Quickened within them in all its power and potential will be the great and high secret of God.  They will become within themselves the magnificent expression of the greatest glory God has ever revealed.  Reproduced in them will be the sonship ministry of Jesus intensified into the light of seven days in one.  They will stand in the earth as the firstborn brothers of Jesus Christ, the sons of the Father in heaven.

When a man becomes a father, he is not diminished by his children, but enriched, increased, and expanded.  If his children grow up with nobility and accomplishment, he is proud and delighted.  His children make him greater than he ever was before.  Sonship is the Father’s delight, the culmination and climax of His ages-long plan and purpose.  God is electrified with anticipation to see His sons with skill and maturity visibly revealing the invisible things of His eternal power and Godhead to creation.  This is  the message of sonship revealed in the life of the firstborn Son of God, the Lord Jesus Christ.  Sonship is the singular objective of God, and the sole purpose of the formation of His body.  The sons of God are the principle players in the awesome plan of God for all the wonderful ages to come.

The sons of God are reality.  This company of divine-human beings is even now rapidly reaching completion.  These will become what Jesus is and have what He has as their very own reality.  God will be in them and through them in all His unutterable plenitude.  What He is they will be also.  They are the express image of their Father in Jesus Christ.  This is the revelation of God and the staggering message of the Bible!  The sons of God are destined to inherit all things on earth and throughout all the vastnesses of infinity, for they are heirs of God and joint-heirs with Jesus, who is the heir of all things (Heb. 1:1-2).  They are destined to be the blessers, deliverers, quickeners and transformers of all the created realms.  Thus creation groans with expectant birth pangs, longing for their arrival.

From the lowest darkness of demons and devils to the inhabitants of the farthest galaxy of light, the universe stretches in anticipation of the glorious unveiling of God’s sons.  They will be the full and complete expression of God in all the attributes of His deity.  Like a super-nova the sons will burst into everlasting splendor, streaming glory and power for all creation to behold.  These noble beings will conquer and restore all things to God on earth and throughout all worlds of the unbounded heavens.  As priestly shepherd-kings they will lead the creation, dispensing judgment unto righteousness.  As Saviours they will loose the bands of Adam’s curse from this world, and the darkness from all worlds in all realms.  The sinful will be redeemed and changed, the ignorant will be taught of God, those in the church systems will be delivered from their delusions and guided into the pure truth of God.  The angelic realms will behold the birth of God’s manchild and arrive to honor God’s sons.  All creation will marvel at the splendor of a race of beings who are the offspring of God matured up into the fullness of all He is.  The reins of creation will be surrendered to them, and all created beings everywhere will be committed to their loving and skillful care.  These divine sons of the omnipotent and loving heavenly Father are the only answer to creation’s lack and problems.  They have been ordained of God as the power that shall deliver creation  from the bondage of corruption.

These sons are the anointed sovereigns, the appointed rulers of all things.  Today they stand in the wings, at this very moment they fine-tune the instruments which they are, but suddenly shall they enter upon the stage of history, strike their majestic chord, and all flesh shall hear the word of the Lord and see the salvation of God.  Then a mighty power shall arise from the earth, as a stream of expanding light it will race through the galaxies, spreading out and penetrating all things with the life of God.  Every creature on earth and in distant worlds will see the wonder of God.  Every kingdom will be subdued, changed, instructed, and brought into harmony with the Father of lights.  Throughout the endless eons to come, the sons of God will govern the creation in righteousness, infusing all things with the dynamic of His life.

When the sons of God arise, cruel oppression shall be banished.  When the sons of God appear, savage war shall be driven from the face of the earth.  When the sons of God come, the power of sin shall be broken, every sickness and pain shall be healed.  When the sons of God march forth, the last enemy, even death, shall be destroyed.  When the sons of God are unveiled, Satan shall be bound to deceive the nations no more; darkness shall flee away, the sorrowing shall be comforted, the meek shall be exalted, the weak shall be made strong, the broken-hearted shall be healed, and the glory of God shall cover the earth.   These are God’s kings and God’s priests, a Kingdom of priests unto God and for creation.  Every son is royalty — a king — born out of the loins of the King of the universe.  As a king he rules in the sphere in which God places him, and as a priest he serves.  He is kingly in his sphere and it is the priestly spirit that makes the nobility of character in the king.  In Christ the sons stand above all authority and dominion and glory, holding the scepter of infinite love and power.

The ancients wrote on the pillars of Hercules, Ne Plus Ultra, meaning “No more beyond.”  For centuries those words chiseled on the mighty rock of Gibraltar reminded seafaring men that beyond those straits was nothing but a shoreless sea.  One day, however, a man named Columbus sailed through those straits and set his course westward.  In spite of storms, discouragements, and threatened mutiny, he sailed on and on and discovered a new world.   Later men climbed the rugged straits of Gibraltar and removed the word Ne, leaving the message Plus Ultra meaning “More beyond.”

Captain James Cook was a famous English explorer who lived more than two hundred years ago.  His adventurous life began when he joined the British navy at the age of 27.  He surveyed the St. Lawrence Channel and the coasts of Newfoundland and Labrador before he was given his own ship, the Endeavor, to command.  He sailed this ship all the way around the world, exploring the coasts of eastern Australia and New Zealand on the way.  After returning to England he set out again for the South Pacific  with two ships, the Resolution and the Adventure, and explored the icy Antarctic Ocean.  He explored the New Hebrides Islands and discovered the island of New Caledonia in the Pacific Ocean off Australia.  Early in his career Captain Cook made this amazing statement, which I am paraphrasing: “It is not my desire to merely go where other men have not gone; I WANT TO GO AS FAR AS IT IS POSSIBLE FOR MAN TO GO!”  And his wish was granted,  for when he was killed in 1779 by natives of the Hawaiian Islands, there were no more frontiers on this planet to explore, and no more coasts to be charted.

Ah, in the spiritual world just such a desire has arisen within a company, those destined to become the manifest sons of God, the desire to not merely press on in God into heights and depths not discovered by those great ones who have blessed this earth with God’s grace, glory, wisdom and power, but indeed to GO AS FAR AS IT IS POSSIBLE FOR A MAN TO GO IN GOD!  What a vision!   We are well acquainted with the “in part” realm, where God anoints men with the Holy Ghost and with power, and their gifts increase and their ministries expand and many are blessed.  But then they die, and while others might try to carry on their vision, it is never again the same as the movement crystallizes around the “part” the ministry possessed, and while men try to perpetuate it, it finally stagnates and dies.   For one thing, every generation needs a new vision and not a carry-over of the old, but in this transition of the ages God is birthing a SON COMPANY that desires not merely to rebuild and restore the work of God of yesteryear, be it New Testament Church Order, five-fold ministry, gifts of the Spirit, expressions of worship, or whatever; but we are possessed of a heart to become identified with Jesus Christ beyond the veil, in the Holiest of all, after the power of an endless life, to know God not just in a measure, but in His fullness, and receiving that ministry after the order   of Melchizedek which can proceed through the ages until a full victory is consummated and God is ALL IN ALL.

A dear brother, in opposition to this teaching of the ministry of manifested sonship, wrote, “We cannot have any selfish ambitions.  It may sound very good to have the desire to change the world, to walk up and down the earth doing miracles, releasing people from their misery.  This would make us look great in the eyes of people, yet that would be receiving glory for self.  This desire for glory has to die!”  My question would be just this: If doing miracles and releasing people from their misery is self-glory, then why did the firstborn Son of God do just that!  And why did the apostles go out and walk up and down the earth doing the very same thing!  Was Jesus grasping after glory for Himself?  Were the apostles in this thing for the glory they would receive from men?  I DON’T THINK SO!  Creation is groaning for deliverance and God is birthing in His sons the intense desire and holy passion to set creation free.

When those who treasure the beautiful hope of sonship speak the words the Spirit is speaking to His elect in this hour, people demand, “Who do you think you are?”   When we declare that we are called to be the sons of God, to grow up into the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, to partake of a ministry greater than that of the church age, to set creation free and reconcile all things, people ask, “Just who do you think you are?”  It really makes no difference who we think we are, but it makes a great deal of difference that we know and understand WHAT WE ARE APPREHENDED TO BE IN HIM.  Our ears have heard the sound of the trumpet and we cannot, dare not, settle for anything less, we must follow on to know Him in all of His glorious fullness.

Are you willing today, in the presence of God, to hear the word of God, “As the Father has sent me, so send I you.”  Someone says, “How can you declare such things?”  Because they did not originate with us, it is the Father who is saying them in us.  We are not commissioning ourselves.  We are not a group of people who of our own selves have a burden for the lost creation, we bear the burden of the Lord in our hearts.  And what His burden is, that is what matters.  If we were a people with our own burden for the lost, to try and help people, we would say, “We have tried everything else; we have had apostles, we have had prophets, we have had evangelists, pastors, and teachers; we have had gifts of healing, working of miracles, we have had money and missionary programs, we have had everything and it did not get the job done, so let us now try this sonship message.”

We are not such a people.  God has not put on us the problems of the world — God has called us unto HIMSELF — that we may live unto HIM, that we may be totally committed to HIM, that He may send us out to being salvation to humanity.  If this thing began with  OUR BURDEN, I would be suspicious of it.  If we were wondering whether the communists were going to take over the world, and what about the masses of Moslems and Hindus, and the millions of lost souls in Africa, and we must hurry and reach the whole world before they slip away into damnation and hell; if we were speaking in that sentimental, religious vein, I would be suspicious.  But our vision is not turned that way, we are not “need” conscious, nor “problem” oriented, nor “world” centered, nor “self” conscious — our eyes are turned toward the Father.  “Ye shall be unto me a kingdom of priests,” saith the Lord.   Jesus never went around looking for that which He could do, or needs He could meet, or problems He could solve.  Jesus went around looking to see what His Father was doing.   That’s all!

God wants sons today who are not caught up in world events and prophecies of gloom and doom, not worried about the desperate needs everywhere, but who are occupied with the Father’s words and the Father’s works.  God is raising up sons in these days who do not have to explain anything, defend anything, build anything, promote anything, protect anything.  God is merciful to us in saying to us, that the reason we can declare this, the reason this commission is coming, is because the burden is not of ourselves, but the Father is sending us.  He is saying to us, “I am setting you to be lights.  I am ordaining you to be Saviours.  I am forming you to be the habitation of God, I am anointing you to be kings to reign and priests to minister my salvation.  I am sending you forth to be bread to be broken and fed to the hungry multitudes.  I am pouring you out as a flowing, surging, bounteous river of life.”   Let us not sell creation short in these days.   Let us not deny the Lord who has purchased us to be His people with a purpose for the ages.  While we seek no glory of our own, there is, nevertheless, great wealth and heavenly glory for all who fulfill all the will of God.  You never lose with God!

The compelling passion of my life is to be filled with all the fullness of God and be conformed to the image of Jesus Christ.  This is what sonship is.  The deep cry of my heart is for the satisfaction of knowing that my life counts for God.  As God knows my heart, it is not a selfish desire.  The reason I want to be like Jesus is because I love Him so, but also because it is the only way I can ever be used in the restoration of fallen creation.  I see the needs of the world around me, and realize that I am practically powerless to do anything about them.   And should I initiate a program it would not even scratch the surface of the need.  Men hold great crusades today and when you listen to their glowing reports you would think the whole world is turning to God.  But should you walk the streets of the city they just left, you can barely find a trace of evidence that they were ever there.  Oh yes, we can pray,   believe God, and do our thing, and see some people saved, blessed, healed and delivered.  But anyone who says that they have reached the place where their ministry is meeting the needs of the world is either blind to the needs of men, a proud hypocrite, or a liar.   But God is not blind to the need of this day, nor is He impotent to move.  He has a plan, a wonderful plan!  And He is going to move in mighty power just as soon as the time is ripe for it.

 


Chapter 49

THE INCREASE OF THE KINGDOM

(continued)

The great characters of the past who have cut new channels, blazed new trails, opened new frontiers, opened up hidden secrets and led humanity onward to better days have been men of vision. Without a vision and the ability to soar on the wings of imagination there would be no progress of humanity.  Back  of every great development that thrusts man forward is the vision of someone who caught a glimpse of something higher and grander.  What is it that discovered new worlds, opened new territories, built the great cities, tunneled the mountains, plowed the mighty deep, brought forth astounding inventions, developed technology, and conquered the air and space, but the power of vision?  Society would be stagnant indeed without the vision of better and greater things to come!

The wise man said, “Where there is no vision the people perish.”  That is, where there are no new, fresh, vital thoughts there can be no progress into transcendental realms.  The Old Testament prophets were called seers.  They stood in the high places of the Spirit and looked down through the ages and caught visions of the coming purposes and glory of God’s unfolding plan hundreds of years ahead of the reality.  The scripture itself is a document of visions.  It starts with Abraham.  As someone has put it, “When God first called Abraham He inundated his soul  with a sea of promises.  He spoke to him from the starry heavens, from the soil of Canaan on which he walked, by the visit of angels, and by the Holy Ghost in his deep nature.  Abraham saw great fields of light, great possibilities of things for himself and his posterity.  His soul drank in these promises until his faith became wide and powerful, even before any of them were fulfilled.  God deals with souls in a similar way.  Yet when He calls anyone to a great degree of perfection or usefulness He begins by opening up to them the promises of His word and the possibilities which they may achieve even before there are any outward symptoms of their fulfillment.  That heart anchors itself in the promises of God until those promises become as real as God Himself.”

Joseph began as a mere wisp of a boy having visions of the distinguished life he was to lead.  No man, except our Lord Himself,  ever suffered such indignities against the hope of God he cherished in his soul as Joseph.  Yet through it all he remained steady, calm, and resolute because of the word that burned within him.  The secret of the great life of Moses, the deliverer of Israel, is that he lived “as seeing Him who is invisible.”  It was this that motivated him to forsake the throne of Egypt with its wealth, honor and glory and join an ignorant, despised, oppressed, destitute company of slaves.  A vision of the supernal spoiled him for the fleeting things of earth.  Later God called Moses up into the Holy Mount to commune with Him at the counsel-table of His divine government. While there God communicated to him a vision of the divine order of His redemptive purposes and gave him the plans for a model of it to be erected in the midst of His people on earth: its size and shape, where every curtain was to hang, its furnishings and order of ministry, its golden altar and the Holy of holies.  Moses had a mental-spiritual picture of all this before it became a reality.  He was commanded to build it according to the pattern that was shown him in the Holy Mount.  He brought the pattern down from the Mount as a vision in his spirit of the glorious plan and purpose of God!

Ah, God has a wonderful plan and purpose for the life of every son of God.  The Bible is full of this thought, that for each of us there is a course, a race, a work, a divine plan to be unfolded and fulfilled.  To this end we have been birthed on this planet and for this purpose there is ample provision of grace, revelation, and power.  Never forget, dear one, you were born to be victorious and to achieve something transcendental.  Just as the scientist and poet can look down on the lower animals and say, “Poor things, if only you understood the glory of this world of mind and intellect, of wisdom and knowledge, of harmony, beauty and purpose,” so the son filled with the inner spirit, with the mind of Christ and the nature of the heavenly Father, can look upon the poor worldlings, the rich and the famous, the great and the powerful, philosophers, scholars, politicians, and say, “Oh, poor things, if only you knew the purity, the peace, the joy, the interior brightness, the vastness, the sacred secret, the divine purpose, the sweetness and the divine personalities that I see and enjoy and respond to ah, if only you knew!”  And of course they shall, in God’s due time!

This is the spiritual vision where our spiritual nature, with its inner senses, unfolds to the heavenly world.  The Holy Spirit, quickening our spirit, opens our inner eyes and ears and reveals to us the vision of our high calling.  This is the meaning of Paul’s wonderful prayer where he prays that the saints might have “the spirit of wisdom and revelation,” through “the eyes of your understanding being enlightened; that ye might know what is the hope of His calling, and what the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints, and what is the exceeding greatness of His power to us-ward who believe...” (Eph. 1:17-19).  Another translation says, “the eyes of your heart being enlightened,” which is the very core of our being and the fountain of our thoughts and conception of divine realities. It is not through the intellect of the natural mind that God reveals Himself to us, but it is through our inner spirit, the seat of our spiritual consciousness.

Let us not rest contented with present attainments.  There is a higher, larger, deeper, fuller experience that awaits each one of us, where we can have all the mind that was in Christ Jesus, all the nature of our heavenly Father, and all the fullness of the power of the Holy Spirit.  This is the substance of the heavenly vision!  Many years ago the sainted A. B. Simpson wrote, “If you could see all the fullness of His grace and love, all the rich provision of His great redemption, and all the possibilities of His indwelling life; if you could but get a glimpse of what it means to be a son of God, a temple of the Holy Ghost...if you could but fully realize what it means to have the peace of God which passeth all understanding, to have your sun no more go down in sorrow, but have the Lord for your everlasting light, and the days of your mourning forever ended; if you could for one moment taste the exquisite delight of the life of Jesus in your mortal flesh, as an antidote for disease and death, and the very mind of Christ to quicken your weak and erring brain; in a word, if you could see, as Moses saw, the good land which the Lord hath given thee, you would quickly arise and, casting all else behind, you would go over this Jordan and let nothing hinder your entering into your full inheritance.”  What a word!

The Spirit is saying today that He is preparing a people, He is preparing a body, He is preparing sons who shall be conformed to the image of His Son, who shall be partakers of the divine nature, who shall have the mind of Christ, who shall be brought to glory and who then shall become the very image of the Father.  These shall become the very brightness of the Father’s glory and the express image of the Father’s person.  Even as the first Son, who went into the ground and died as a grain of wheat to produce other sons in His likeness, bearing His image He was the brightness of the Father’s glory and the express image of the Father’s person and God sent Him to be the Saviour of the world.  God is now preparing sons, God is now preparing a body for that first Son, we are the body of the first Son, the body of Christ.  We are the body of the Christ and in and through these sons, when all have grown up into His fullness, His salvation shall be manifested unto the ends of the earth.  The Lord is saying unto His people in this Day, “For this cause have I raised thee up and sent thee to be a light unto the nations, and thou shalt be my salvation unto the ends of the earth” (Isa. 49:6; Acts 13:47).

God is not talking to babies today.  God is not talking to spiritual children today.  Spiritual children get all sentimental and starry-eyed over the provision of the Father in prosperity, healing, miracles and blessings.  Little children cannot do much, but oh, how they love to receive things!  Gifts mean everything to them!  How excited a child gets over a shiny bike, a new doll, the latest toy, or a little spending money.  Children know their parents will supply all of their needs and often ask, even beg, for things they want.  There is nothing wrong with that, that is just how children are! And this, my friend, is a perfect picture of the spiritual level of most Pentecostal and Charismatic Christians today!  Spiritual children have a little knowledge that puffs them up.  Spiritual children fight among each other.  “I am of Paul, I am of Apollos, I am of Cephas.”  Spiritual children pride themselves who shall be the greatest.  Spiritual children want to know which side of the throne they will be sitting on, “What am I going to get out of all this.”  Spiritual children like to play adult, imagining that they possess much more than they actually have, and that they have attained a stature far beyond their experience.  Ah, now I’ve stopped “teaching” and started “meddling” in the attitudes of some in this Kingdom message!  But God is not sending children today, He is sending sons, whose only desire is that the Father may be glorified, that the pleasure of the Lord will prosper in His hand, that the will of the Father may be done.  What happens to us has no bearing on the situation.

Christ says, “As my Father has sent me in this total commitment to His will, so that I desire only to reveal the Father so I am sending you, in a total commitment to the Father’s plan and purpose, that the Father may be revealed in the multitude of sons.”  And let me assure you, precious friend of mine, if through one son in Eden’s fair Garden who disobeyed, the whole creation came into bondage and death because of disobedience; and if through one Son in the Garden of Gethsemane who obeyed, God was able to provide a salvation for all humanity because of obedience if God could bring such a revelation of Himself through one Son, a Son who was crucified and rejected, whom God raised again and set at His own right hand what will happen in these days, when through a multitude of sons who have been identified with Him, buried with Him in His death, raised again in the likeness of His resurrection, ascended with Him, seated with Him in the heavenly places, anointed with His Spirit, glorified with His glory, invested with His wisdom, nature, and power what is going to happen in all creation when many sons are revealed in the glory of God?

The future the Father has planned for His sons is away beyond our ability to comprehend or even imagine.  I am overwhelmed with awe when I think of what is ahead for us!  In Romans 8:18 the apostle says, “For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that shall be revealed in us.”  Phillip’s beautiful rendering of this reads, “In my opinion whatever we may have to go through now is less than nothing compared with the magnificent future God has planned for us.”  Oh, the glory of it!  Oh, the wonder of it!  Who can express it! On another occasion Paul said, “Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither hath entered the heart of man, the things that God hath prepared for them that love Him” (I Cor. 2:9).  I have heard preachers attempting to describe the future glory with the most eloquent language, but it didn’t come anywhere near the truth.  Even my feeble attempt in these pages will prove no more fruitful!  The human mind is incapable of conjuring up a picture of what the omniscient Father has prepared for His sons.  We can let our imagination run as wild as the wind and it will not come anywhere near comprehending the grandeur of what the Father has in mind!  Yet we cherish, as did Joseph, the vision Father has given us.

THE GROANING CREATION

The jubilation, gladness, and joy that will take place at the manifestation of the sons of God is beyond our wildest expectations.  The Christ body, the sons of God, will experience great transport at their change from mortal to immortal.  And the creation will also express the ecstasy that will be theirs’ when they are released from six millenniums of bondage and servitude to sin, sorrow, and death  The songs of victory and glad tidings will be greater far than on that first glad occasion when the morning stars sang together and all the sons of God shouted for joy (Job 38:7).  “For the creation was made subject to vanity, not willingly, but by reason of Him who hath subjected the same in hope.  Because the creation itself also shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God.  For we know that the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now” (Rom. 8:20-22).

 “The whole creation groaneth...”  The word “groaneth” signifies to sigh, to pray, to be moved with inward feeling.  Creation is depicted as a slave in bondage, groaning in its captivity, crying out to be free.  Today the world is full of broken hearts, men suffer lack, pain, and indignities, the hospitals are crowded, the cemeteries are being filled, and all nature is groaning under its bondage to corruption and death.  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.  Can we not hear the sigh and groan of nature in the hiss of the cat, in the yelp of the dog, in the lowing of the cattle, in the roar of the lion, in the tremor of the earthquake, in the howling of the storm, in the shriek of the captive, in the weeping at the graveside, and in the universal cries of disillusionment, sorrow, and pain? “The bondage of corruption.”  The word “bondage” means more than being bound, it means servitude, slavery; and “corruption” signifies ruin, decay, death, to perish.  The servitude to decay resulting in death conveys the meaning.  Creation is said to be longing for deliverance from this “servitude of decay resulting in death” with “earnest expectation.”  Those longings which are implanted by God in all of nature will surely be met by Him!  It is a fact in nature that God never puts an intuition within, without meeting it without.  Therefore while creation is in bondage, it is not in despair, for an earnest expectation throbs through it and makes it to be like one who is looking out with intense longing for someone who is expected.  The Greek word rendered “expectation” is made up from apo-kara-dokia.  Apo signifies from, or from afar.  Kara means the head, and dokia means to wait for, or to look with intense expectation.  This compound word at once suggests a striking figure, namely, one whose head is raised, and who is looking out on the distant horizon with intensity on the countenance, and longing in the eyes, as one expecting to receive something from another, or the arrival of a loved one from afar.

The whole creation is joining us in unutterable groans and birth pangs, earnestly looking forward to its release with ours, out into full and free eternal inheritance.  EVERY CREATED THING is waiting, looking anxiously and with a kind of universal travail waiting for what?  A greater manifestation of the gifts of the Spirit?  More missionaries?  More Bibles and gospel tracts?  Greater evangelistic crusades?  Another televangelist?  Or are they waiting for the combined efforts of all the churches to get together in an all-out assault against sin, sickness, and evil?  Are they travailing for another preacher, another movement, another revival, or a restored New Testament Church?  NO, NO, A THOUSAND TIMES NO!  Creation is not standing on the seashore of history gazing expectantly across the ocean of time, looking with anticipation for any of these things.  The whole creation, without exception, is waiting for the manifestation of the sons of God which is nothing less than our FULL SONSHIP, THE TRANSFORMATION OF OUR BODIES.  It is full and complete and eternal victory over sin, sorrow, limitation, sickness, and death.  It is the life and glory of the Father fully revealed upon earth in a people!  That, my beloved, is the hope of creation!

The story is told of a little boy who couldn’t play outside because it was raining.  His father, who was trying to take an afternoon nap on the sofa, became annoyed.  “Go to the other room, son; Daddy wants to sleep.  Find something in there to play with.”  “Like what?”  “Anything,” snapped the father.  “There isn’t anything,” replied the lad.  Grabbing the newspaper, the man tore out a page with a large map of the world printed on it.  He knew the boy knew nothing about geography.  With the scissors he cut it into hundreds of odd-shaped pieces like a puzzle.  “There, see if you can put it together, and don’t bother me till you’re done.”  The father settled down on the sofa thinking his problem was solved, but ten minutes later there was a tug on his shirt.  “You can’t be done yet!” But there on the floor was the neatly constructed world.  “How did you do it?” he asked.  “Easy,” said his son.  “A man’s picture was on the back, and when I got the man together right, the world was right.”  Ah, yes when God gets HIS MAN put together in the fullness of Christ all the problems of the world will simply fall into place!  Let us not expend our energies trying to get the world straightened out and ordered aright in this hour.  Rather, let us give ourselves to apprehending that for which Jesus Christ has apprehended us to grow up unto a PERFECT MAN, unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ.  Then the whole creation will fall into place!

If Alexander the Great could march his armies across the earth and conquer the whole civilized world before he was thirty-three years old; if Hitler could change the world for evil; if the communists could march forth to enslave one-third of the world’s population, weaving a hundred million into the vortex of communism each year it is not presumptuous to believe that the sons of God, armed with the immortal life and glory of Christ, can turn all nations to God, deliver the whole creation from the tyranny of sin and death, and bring the Kingdom of God to pass under the whole heaven, from pole to pole, and sea to sea, in power and great glory.  As Ray Prinzing has written, “What glory, what wonder awaits the revelation of that true character and quality which HE is producing in His new creation species.  Resurrection life shall burst forth, Babylon’s shame and corruption shall be ended.  Holiness is to be personified in a people.  Religious racketeers will come to naught.  Light will dissipate the darkness.  No more will there be wells without water, and falling stars that fade into the darkness.  HIS SONS will be a revelation of such character and quality as to satisfy all that men have waited for.”

THE MINISTRY OF THE SONS OF GOD

I have shared this before, but am deeply impressed to relate the following vision again, received by an old prophet of God (Bill Britton’s cousin) many years ago, one of the Lord’s pioneers of this gospel of the Kingdom of God.  He wrote of his experience: “In that vision which lasted all night, the most wonderful vision I ever had, in which I saw the sons of God in action all over the world, ministering to the multitudes in every tongue and nation, to all people, I saw both men and women ministering.  I saw them standing, suspended in mid-air, in the midst of a busy intersection of a large city, with all traffic stopped, and thousands of people seeing them with their eyes, and hearing them with their ears, regardless of distance, and without the aid of mechanical devices.  I saw them speaking to a people of one language, and in a moment’s time I saw them transported to another people of another language, speaking to them in their own language, having power over all mechanical devices and natural laws, so that they could cause every activity to cease, and every eye to be fixed upon them, until their message had been delivered.

 “I saw them walk upon the water; I saw the terror in the faces of the wicked, at the sound of their voices.  I saw the professing Christians fall upon their faces in true repentance, crying out for mercy, and I saw them being genuinely converted.  I saw the skeptics being convinced, and the blasphemy of the wicked, as they would rail and mock, only to be struck dumb or blind at just a word from the manifested sons and daughters of God.

 “The vision lasted all night, as in my spirit I was living in that future time, when God will be manifested in fullness in His sons and daughters, while my body was back there in bed alongside my wife.  Sometimes the scenes would make me weep and I would sob, my body shaking violently with pain and agony, whereas another scene would cause me to laugh with holy laughter, as I witnessed the genuine repentance of the shallow church members.  I’ll never forget the vision of the young girl (the daughters of God) who spoke with the voice of many waters.  Human language could never describe the quality of her voice.  All I can say is, it was so filled with love and compassion, it would break the hardest stone, and at her command, every infirmity, every sickness, every blindness, every lameness was healed; every one was made perfectly whole, even those who had been lunatic from birth.

 “Sister Britain got no sleep that night, and finally when the dawn was ready to break, she asked me why I didn’t get up and write the vision.  I did try, but could not hold my hands on the keyboard of the typewriter.  Some unseen force held them aloft over my head.  I walked the floor and wept, and begged the Lord to permit me to write some of the visions I had seen, to preserve them in black and white.  At last He did, and I wrote just a very few of the visions I had seen, for a large book could not contain them all.”

And now, many years afterward, the old prophet has passed from the scene.  But today, not only the small number who were touched by his word, but multiplied tens of thousands of saints in every nation under heaven have been quickened to these wonderful truths.  It has not been the work of any man or group of men, nor of any movement or organization, nor of any organized effort or theological promotion.  It has been the sovereign work of God by the Holy Spirit!  A vast army of saints is now in preparation for the greatest day in earth’s long history the manifestation of the sons of God!

Some time ago brother Paul Mueller admonished the saints, “This age has been the time when the Lord’s purpose was to bring people into His kingdom by ‘the foolishness of preaching’ (I Cor. 1:21).  We rejoiced to see many gather together to hear the anointed messages of preaching and to be saved by that means.  But God has a more perfect way!  The old order of meetings, of the manifestation of the gifts, and of the foolishness of preaching is ending.  We once preached, prophesied, and ministered in part.  That which is in part is being removed, and that which is perfect is coming!  The new, perfect order will function by perfect love.  It is now time for us to put away the childish, foolish things of the past (I Cor. 13:8-13).  The Lord is replacing the old order with a new order of greater Spirit Life and manifestation.  And we are highly privileged to be the firstfruits of that new order in God.

 “Imagine the wonders of the mighty moving of the Spirit as the new highway to God is revealed.  Instead of church meetings, the Spirit of the Lord will move on an entire body of people wherever they may be gathered, and the whole group will be converted without a preacher, a choir, or an altar call.  Instead of one man preaching to a group of people, the transformed saints will stand amidst many on the streets, on the highways or byways, or in a shopping mall.  When they see the glory of Christ on us, they will gladly accept the Lord and their lives will be immediately transformed.  Instead of one man preaching or ministering healing to a group of people, and seeing many turn to the Lord, the transformed body of Christ will  point the way to the new highway to God, and many more multitudes will be brought into the kingdom.  It may be difficult for us to envision entirely, but that new highway to God will be far more glorious than anything we have seen in the past!  The Lord will do more in one minute by His Spirit than a man has been able to do in his entire lifetime.  Yesterday the Lord worked and moved in the 30 and  60-fold degree, tomorrow He will move mightily in a l00-fold manifestation of His power and glory.  And all of this will be the result of our spiritual growth unto sonship.  Multitudes shall then find the peace and joy of Christ, and will embrace the fullness of His kingdom and dominion.”

Another brother has added his testimony of how the Spirit has opened to his understanding events that will herald the unveiling of God’s sons.  “Many believers today are ready in spirit, as they await this great wave with excitement and expectancy.  Some have already been given a glimpse of this great Light that will move upon the waters.  God’s remnant will involve individuals who are humble, word-filled, trustworthy, meek: those who have died to self and have kept their eyes on things above.  Many, like yourself, are they who are usually unnoticed or lost in a crowd.  Let us look at a few examples of this coming anointing.  We may hear of an elderly lady, one whom the world has never given so much as a second glance.  She is walking to a nearby store, but the Holy Spirit speaks and directs her to enter a theater en route.  She enters, as if invisible, and standing at the rear of the great audience the Holy Spirit begins to sing through this lady and instantly everyone becomes quiet; even the picture on the screen and the sound in the theater stop.  Every individual in that audience feels the notes rising in their soul and all that are in need are made free, and all those sick are made whole and well.  Much weeping and praising and giving glory to God is heard from that theater, but during this time the song ends and the little lady simply leaves unnoticed.  Indeed the audience is stunned, but ‘The voice of the Lord is upon the waters: the glory of God thundereth: the Lord is upon many waters.  The voice of the Lord is powerful, the voice of the Lord is full of majesty’ (Ps. 29:3-4).

 “We shall now witness another move, or event.  We see a large church in service and during the service the Holy Spirit directs a man to enter the church and he walks directly to the organ that rests at the side of the platform.  Having never played an instrument in his life, the Holy Spirit causes his fingers to play heavenly chords of music that immediately paralyze the entire congregation. Tears flow and hearts beat unto that higher sound, and again all are made whole, set free from earthly bondages.  The entire body is now giving glory to the Most High, and our little man simply turns and walks out of the service without notice, receiving no personal glory.  Whatever the situation, whatever the conditions, THERE WILL BE NO STRONGHOLDS THAT GOD’S LIGHT WILL NOT PENETRATE.  The land will shine here and there as God causes His vessels of light to move forth.  They shall run to and fro in the city; they shall run upon the wall, they shall climb upon the houses; they shall enter in at the windows like a thief.  The earth shall quake before them; the heavens shall tremble...and the Lord shall utter His voice before HIS ARMY: for His camp is very great: for He is strong that executeth His word: for the day of the Lord is great, and very terrible; and who can abide it?’ (Joel 2:9-11).

 “Truly we see that the Lord shall have an army of Light-bearers.  Words cannot describe the acts and supernatural wonders that God will yet perform.  It is your opportunity among that called remnant to stand among the number of this great army.  Your life may have had many trials, testings, and hardships, you may be old and sickly, but if you believe that God has prepared you with all these exercises in order that you may stand in this hour, then nothing is impossible unto you.  You have undergone a life training for such a time as this, so spend your time wisely now until that moment...”

A dear sister in the Lord, Rita Kahr, wrote a letter to a friend of ours a few years ago.  I quote a portion of her letter.  “About ten years ago I was in bed late at night reading a paper by Preston on the “Greater Works” ministry of the manifested sons of God that are to come forth.  My spirit was leaping then, but I was also overwhelmed by my lack lack of anything and of everything to help in any way in the ministry.  I felt absolutely drained, and so I cried out to the Lord then and there, ‘Father, I don’t think I can attain to this ministry.  It’s too precious and wonderful and I have nothing to offer.  I can’t prophesy, I can’t write like Preston Eby and others, I can’t teach and I can’t even sing to offer some praise.  About the only thing I can do is speak in tongues, and that only a little.  I feel I am failing in my very lack.’

 “I then fell asleep and had a dream.  I never dream, or at least very seldom do I remember them.  Here I was in this dream in front of a large group of people.  I opened my mouth to speak and out came words of great wisdom and profound teaching.  The people cried out, ‘It’s the Lord!  It’s the Lord!’ I then stretched forth my hand and people cried out, ‘I’m healed it’s the Lord!  It’s the Lord!’  I awoke and was confused because I was doing these ‘Greater Works’ and more, and then the Spirit spoke to me: ‘Rita, do you believe the message you just read in Preston’s paper?’  I answered, ‘Yes, but it seems so far beyond my reach.’  The Lord answered, ‘You couldn’t even believe it if the seed wasn’t in you with all the potential for its growth.  I’ll water and bring the sunshine and it shall prosper in my time.’  Oh, what joy and comfort that word brought me!  I ceased all my fears and that word has kept me to this day I still haven’t any ministry, most of God’s people don’t even recognize me as a brother (sister), my body confesses to a ‘Job experience,’ and I can say the time has been long and dry.  Nevertheless, the seed has grown greatly in these last years, but there is yet to be a demonstration of that which I believe I can hardly wait, though, for it shall surely come to pass.”

Earth has not yet witnessed the magnitude of ministry that shall be revealed through the manifest sons of God.  In this hour at the transition of the ages, God is preparing His perfected and matured body, anointed with the seven-fold intensified fullness of the Spirit of God, and this enChristed company shall appear on the cosmic stage of history with ten thousand times more power than any of the revival showers of the past centuries.  God has moved deeply upon my heart to proclaim to God’s elect that there is soon coming a great and glorious MANIFESTATION OF CHRIST before the face of all nations and the whole earth.  There will be a full and complete revelation of Jesus Christ in His many brethren and it shall usher in the next stage of the Kingdom of God on earth the dominion of the Kingdom over all the living nations on earth.  I know God is on the move, and my deepest desire is to be a part of this manifestation that will usher in a new day for this sin-cursed planet.  The Lord wants to reveal Himself in our midst in a new, dramatic, and powerful way, and through us to creation.

The church order and ministry of the past two thousand years has been good and appropriate for saving a remnant and bringing the elect into the beginnings of their life in Christ.  Let no man say that we are opposed to it!  I still rejoice when I see hundreds of people walking down the isles in a Billy Graham Crusade to give their hearts to the Lord.  And I still praise God when I see people testifying to the healing, miracle working power of God upon the stage of a Benny Hinn Crusade here or abroad.  But it is not sonship ministry!  Therefore, it can contribute but a little to the Kingdom of God in the earth.  To deliver the creation from the bondage of corruption GOD HAS A MORE PERFECT WAY!  He has given us a sneak preview of this way in the life and ministry of the firstborn Son, the Lord Jesus Christ.

The Pattern Son was never “meeting oriented.”  Meetings “happened” but they were not called, announced,  planned or organized.  Jesus never advertised that He would be speaking or ministering in the temple, or at any other place.  No date was set for a meeting to commence on a certain day at a particular hour.  There was no place and no time.  All was entirely spontaneous! Jesus ministered at all times and in all places.  He taught and healed in the streets.  He ministered in the homes.  He ministered in the places of business.  He taught by the sea.  He ministered in the fields.  He spoke to the multitudes in the mountains.  He proclaimed the word of the Kingdom in the courts of the temple.  He ministered to one person alone.  He ministered to ten people.  He ministered to crowds of many thousands.  It made no difference!  Buildings, dates, praise services, campaign managers, music directors, choirs, announcements, and offering plates were all completely irrelevant to His sonship ministry.  He ministered the same wherever He was, day or night.  There was no need to sing hymns and choruses to “create an atmosphere” to “bring God’s presence” or stir up His gift so it would work.  HE W-A-S GOD’S PRESENCE!  JESUS WAS HIMSELF THE VERY ATMOSPHERE OF GOD’S GLORY!  There was absolutely no “meeting” or “church” mentality in the life of the firstborn Son of God.  God was God in Jesus at all times, in all places, to all people, in a perfectly natural expression of omnipotence.  And, my beloved, JESUS IS THE PATTERN OF SONSHIP not Paul, or Peter, or the apostles, or the early Church, or the Church Fathers, or the revivals of past centuries.

When God roars out of His Zion Company in the fullness of His incorruptible life and divine glory and presence, the old drunk will rise up out of his drunken stupor and know that there is a God upon the throne.  All will know, kings and presidents and prime ministers and members of congress  and parliament, and rich men and mighty men everywhere will be made to know that there is ONE to whom they all owe their allegiance.  Do not doubt for one moment, precious friend of mine, that when God wants any of His sons in any place, He will put them there.  God need pay no attention to iron or bamboo curtains, vast oceans, boundaries between nations, immigration laws, passports or visas, airline schedules, or any form of transportation.  I am talking about the miracle-working power of God to be manifested when the sons of God arise as King-Priests after the Order of Melchizedek, in the power of an endless life.  Creation shall soon behold a pure, unadulterated move of the Holy Spirit through a people moving on the plane of incorruption, doing just what the Father wants them to do, without any limitations whatever.  The Spirit will be poured out upon ALL FLESH.  In the cities, on the plains, in the jungle paths, in the deserts, on the mountain heights, upon people of means and education and culture in the industrialized nations and upon the few savages remaining in earth’s remote corners, in all the dwelling places of men the Spirit shall flow.  In the time of which I speak there shall be a complete overthrow of every government, institution, religion and power on earth.  God will not leave one place on earth where the adversary can rally his forces.  If God did not cover the seas with His Spirit, and move upon all flesh upon the seas, the adversary would have a place to rally his forces.  If God did not pour His Spirit out and flood the deserts, the adversary would have a place for recruiting his followers.  But, thank God!  The glory of the Lord shall cover the earth as the waters cover the sea.  God will have this time, this day to do His mysterious work in all the earth and all the kindreds of the earth shall turn unto the Lord.  All nations and peoples will come and bow down before Him.  The Lord alone shall be King over all the earth in and through His body.  The saints of the Most High shall take the Kingdom (government) and possess the Kingdom and reign forever and ever.  Hallelu-yah!

 


Chapter 50

THE INCREASE OF THE KINGDOM

(continued)

Earth has not yet witnessed the magnitude of ministry that shall be revealed through the manifest sons of God.  In this hour at the transition of the ages God is preparing His perfected and matured body, anointed with the seven-fold intensified fullness of the Spirit of God, and this in-Christed company shall appear on the cosmic stage of history with ten thousand times more power than any of the revival showers of the past centuries.  God has moved deeply upon my heart to proclaim to God’s elect that there is soon coming a great and glorious manifestation of Christ before the face of all nations and the whole earth.  There will be a full and complete revelation of Jesus Christ in His many brethren, and it shall usher in the next stage of the Kingdom of God on earth the dominion of the Kingdom over all the living nations of earth.  I know God is on the move, and my deepest desire is to be a part of this manifestation that will usher in a new day for this sin-cursed planet.  The Lord wants to reveal Himself in our midst in a new, dramatic, and powerful way, and through us to creation.

In this message I want to deal with some issues that are vital to our understanding and appropriating the purposes of God for our lives in this important hour.

History is full of the vain-glorious attempts of well-meaning men to calculate, interpret, and figure out the date of the coming of Christ, the beginning of the great tribulation, the so-called rapture of the church, the manifestation of the sons of God, the beginning of the millennium, or some other great event, real or imagined, in relation to the coming of the Kingdom of God.  But all the prophecies and booklets are misleading when they suggest that this Day comes according to some calculation of time!.  Many misconceptions regarding the “last times” are in circulation and only by the spirit of wisdom and revelation from God do we know the things that pertain to our Day.  The HOLY SPIRIT BEARS WITNESS that the manifestation of the sons of God  is the next great event on God’s prophetic schedule but I know of no system of  chronology, no Biblical time-prophecy, no pattern of cycles, no numerical calculations, or prophecy that can accurately tell us the hour, day, year, or decade when this coming glory shall break forth!

The elect of the Lord has little interest in dates and years, or in the passing of time.  Our primary interest, yea, our all-consuming passion is to KNOW HIM in the fullness of Himself!  It is that we might experience Christ in the perfection of His nature, in the fullness of His spirit and power, in the accomplishment of His purposes, and in the revelation of His sonship glory, that the creation might behold HIM in the dawn of the New Day.  Then everything and everyone will be blessed and quickened because of what He has wrought in us, not merely because a date on the calendar has arrived.  Only by the power of Christ raised up in us, the Light that He is, can anything anywhere be transformed by our hand.  By His Light all darkness shall be dispelled.  The arising of His glory, the dawning of His Day is not a date to be calculated, but an attainment to be realized!  It is the power of the voice of God, and the wonder of the work of God in His elect that alerts us to the reality of this Day not dates, times, cycles, prophecies, numbers, or calculations of any kind.

Look into any period of history and you will find prophets of all types who claimed they knew when the next end-time event would occur.  Most have claimed to have discovered the hidden secret to the Bible’s time-prophecies or found hidden meanings in Biblical numbers, cycles, or chronologies.  Some time ago brother Ray Prinzing penned the following wise observation: “‘Searching what manner of time...’ seems to be the occupation of many.  We find there are those of a more negative nature that keep close watch of all the doom events every earthquake, flood, war, etc., has them asking the question, ‘Does this fulfill the prophecy, and indicate that the end of the age is here?’  And there are those who look for the more positive elements, and with every surge and quickening of the Spirit, they are convinced that it means that the end is nigh.

 “Some take their clue from Daniel, who said, ‘I Daniel understood by books the number of the years, whereof the word of the Lord came to Jeremiah the prophet, that He would accomplish seventy years in the desolations of Jerusalem’ (Dan. 9:2), and so they study ‘the books,’ every one they can find that is related to prophetic events, to see if they can understand the NUMBER OF THE YEARS.  Let it be clear, we have no condemnation for those who make these ‘searches,’ and if the Spirit quickens any fragment of truth to them, we are delighted to share it, and hold it before the Lord for His quickening, and following confirmations.  Some would try to search out the times with a solar calendar, others use the lunar calendar.  Some would go back to Israel’s times of old to see if they can glean understanding and relate it to these present times.  And all the while, we find our own challenge being to hold a balance between looking to the future for its glorious fulfillment of that TOTAL SALVATION,  and our living in the present times with a deep consciousness of just ABIDING IN HIM.”

Efforts to set dates for the so-called “end time” began early in the Church’s history, some as early as the first century after Christ.  Saint Augustine (A.D. 354-430) talked about the end of human history.  He tried to determine when human history would end.  He divided human history into six ages of 1,000 years each.  This was based on the six days of creation and Psalm 90:4, “For a thousand years in Thy sight are but as yesterday,” and II Peter 3:8, “One day is with the Lord as a thousand years.”  Therefore the “end” would come in the year 6,000!

Many supposed that the second coming of Christ would take place in the year 1000, a thousand years after the first coming of Christ and the establishment of His Kingdom in the earth.  As the year 1000 approached the message which was emphasized throughout Christendom was that the end of the world and the final judgment were eminent.  Because of this approaching event, all were advised to repent and prepare themselves for the end of time.  The end did not come!  Its failure to materialize was a great disappointment to the faithful, for it had been the expectation of generations of Christians. When the second coming did not happen the church system had to change its message.  The next date was set in the fourteenth century exactly one thousand years after the church became the official religion of the Roman empire.  It was taught that the rule of the church over the nations of Europe and the world was the reign of the saints with Christ over the nations, therefore the millennium would end at that time, Christ would return, the final judgment would be set, and the world would come to an end.  Of course, it didn’t happen then, either!

Martin Luther found that the birth of Christ was approximately 4,000 years after creation.  So the year 5525 had arrived (A.D. 1525), and Luther looked for the great “wind up” near the end of six one-thousand-year days, or the year A. D. 6000.  Then Luther found that Jesus had said the time would be shortened for the elect’s sake (Mat. 24:22).  The year 5525 was 475 years short of 6,000, and Luther concluded, because of the earth-shaking spiritual events that were taking place in his day, that the end of human history could come in the year 1525 or very soon after.  Then the great world Sabbath would begin and last forever!  (Luther did not believe in a literal 1,000 year reign of Christ).  In 1527 Luther and a friend published a book describing two events which they regarded as “signs” of the end.  Somebody had discovered the carcass of a monster with a donkey’s head and a human body on the bank of the Tiber River in Rome.  Luther, who believed the Pope was the Antichrist, called it the “Pope-ass.”  The other sure sign of the end was a calf born with a monk’s cowl over its head.  That meant that the end of Roman Catholicism and all false religion was at hand. That was not all.  There always were wars in Europe, but the war in A.D. 1525 was different.  Emperor Charles V and Pope Clement VII were fighting the war to end all wars.  Jesus had said, “Nation will go to war with nation, and kingdom with kingdom” (Mat. 24:7).  Kingdom with kingdom surely meant Emperor with Pope!  Even that was not all.  In 1524, the planets Jupiter and Saturn met in the sign of the fishes: The fish was a  significant Christian symbol.  Jesus had said there would be signs in the heavens and “the powers of the heavens will be shaken” (Mat. 24:29).  Jesus had said, “This good news of the kingdom must be preached in all the world, for a witness to all nations, and then shall the end come” (Mat. 24:14).  In Luther’s mind the gospel proclaimed by the Protestant Reformation was that preaching of the gospel in all the world.  Therefore, the end was at hand!

 In more recent times similar prophetic schemes have been promoted among the Lord’s people.  During the second quarter of the nineteenth century William Miller, who became the founder of the Millerite sect, traveled through New England, New York, New Jersey, and Canada, with the announcement that Christ would return in 1843.  He thought he saw, plainly, the time indicated, in the scriptures, when our Lord would return.  In 1818 Miller, during his systematic study of the Bible, began to focus on Daniel 8:13-14 wherein we read, “Then I heard one saint speaking, and another saint said unto that certain saint which spake, How long shall be the vision concerning the daily sacrifice, and the transgression of desolation, to give both the sanctuary and the host to be trodden under foot?  And he said unto me, Unto two thousand and three hundred days; then shall the sanctuary be cleansed.”  Miller concluded that “the cleansing” in this passage referred to the purification of the earth (God’s sanctuary) by fire.  He understood that in Biblical time-prophecies a day stands for a year, therefore there would be 2,300 years until the earth would be purged by God’s fire.  Using also Daniel’s prophecy of the 70 weeks, Miller determined that the 2,300 day-years began with the decree of Artaxerxes in 457 B.C. to rebuild Jerusalem.  This scheme is too detailed to go into here, but when one reads it, it is quite convincing to the intellectual mind.  Proceeding from the beginning date of 457 B.C. Miller counted the 2,300 years forward, arriving at the year 1843 as the end.  He restudied his conclusions for several years and in 1831, convinced of their certainty, began to teach and preach the second coming of Christ to take place in 1843.

Being a signally gifted and scholarly man, he led thousands to adopt his views.  The burden of his preaching was: Christ will soon be here; are you ready to meet Him?  There were many conversions born of fear in view of the imminent appearance of Christ the Judge.  The meetings of the people were often scenes of wild confusion; emotion was aroused, people fell down crying, men shouted and women fainted.  Despite all the opposition of the churches to this unbounded sensationalism, Miller continued his crusade with great persistence and assurance.  As the predicted day drew near many took their horses, with fodder for two or three days, and went out into the woods, expecting to be all the more likely to see all that was to be seen when once away from the crowded city. All over the States there were people who had made ascension-gowns in which to soar into the air in proper costume.  They waited, and they waited.  But when the year 1843 passed by without any unusual occurrence, Miller had to resort to the subterfuge that Christ had indeed come but remained in hiding temporarily because the people had not yet repented sufficiently; and when the year 1844 also passed by in the ordinary way, he finally had to admit that his calculations had been mistaken.

Pastor Russell, the spiritual father of Jehovah’s Witnesses and several other groups of Bible Students, reasoned that God’s plan of the ages would be worked out on earth through seven one-thousand year days.  He, like many today, believed that the seventh thousand-year epoch would be the epoch of Christ’s millennial reign, the great Sabbath Day of the restoration of the world and all mankind, an age of refreshment and rest from their own carnal works in which the whole creation labors and groans under the bondage of sin and death.  Russell presented a detailed study of Bible chronology by which he demonstrated that 6,000 years from the creation of Adam were complete in A.D. 1874.  The millennium, therefore, began in 1874 and at that time Christ returned in His spiritual presence to reign until all enemies are under His feet.

According to Russell’s reckoning the forepart of the millennial age would be the “Day of the Lord,” the “day of trouble,” the “Great Tribulation,” which would witness the breaking into pieces of the kingdoms of this world and the establishment of the Kingdom of God under the whole heavens.  This great work would take one generation of forty years those living when Christ’s invisible Presence began in 1874 would not pass away until the final end came.  Therefore Russell prophesied that the Times of the Gentiles would end in 1914 and from thence forward the saints would reign over the nations.  Russell further “proved” his calculations by another novel idea.  In Leviticus 26 Moses prophesied that Israel’s scattering among the nations would last seven times.  To Russell those “seven times” were prophetic times of a day for a year, and using the day for a year theory he reasoned seven times would be 2,520 day/years.  He said Israel ceased being a nation in 606 B.C. when the Babylonians destroyed their nation and carried them away into captivity.  By counting seven times, or 2,520 years, from 606 B.C. he arrived at the date A.D. 1914, thus verifying his 1874 plus 40 year generation date.  Russell died in 1916, admitting that things had not worked out as he anticipated and that was the end.

Russell’s successor, the eloquent Judge Rutherford, kept alive the expectation of the speedy transformation of the living saints.  He changed the time of Christ’s coming in His spiritual Presence from 1874 to 1914 and said the final resurrection would take place in 1925.  The burden of his message, which was spread nationally over billboards, shouted over the radio, and blazoned to the world in paid advertisements, was “Millions now living will never die!”  It was a rather daring assertion, seeing that it could be so easily proved or disproved.  A leading laundry, which had more humor than reverence, adopted the slogan as its own, making it read in this fashion: “We do the dyeing for the millions now living.”

Then there was the Great Pyramid delusion.  Back about the turn of the century a man by the name of Morton Edgar published a book titled PYRAMID PASSAGES.  The thrust of this book was that the Great Pyramid of Gizeh in Egypt was built by divine wisdom and under God’s direction, probably by Shem, the son of Noah, to be one of God’s witnesses to men, the object of its construction being to establish in stone a record and a prophecy of God’s great redemptive plan of the ages.  The scriptural basis for this was Isaiah 19:19-20, “In that day there shall be an altar to the Lord in the midst of the land of Egypt, and a pillar at the border thereof to the Lord.  And it shall be for a sign and for a witness unto the Lord of hosts in the land of Egypt.”  This “altar” and “pillar” was assumed to be the Great Pyramid often referred to as THE BIBLE IN STONE.

It was conjectured that every passage and chamber therein silently but eloquently symbolized in size, length, structure, etc., the whole wonderful plan of God from the heaven blest garden in Eden down to the times of the restitution of all things when every enemy should be destroyed and God would be All-in-all.  Those who studied the Pyramid from that standpoint were able to locate all the major events of history there Creation was there, Calvary was there, the Reformation was there, the return of Christ was there, and the Millennial  Age.  It was all laid out neatly and precisely in the measurements, passages, chambers, and symbolism of the Great Pyramid!  And, since the measurements from certain well-established points to another, for instance, from Calvary to the Reformation, were all quite precise, it followed that the measurements from the Reformation to the beginning of the Millennial Kingdom (and hence, the second coming of Christ) were conclusive. The testimony of the Great Pyramid showed irrefutably that Christ would return in 1914!

When Christ didn’t make the anticipated appearance in 1914, the theory was later revised by Dr. Adam Rutherford of England.  According to Rutherford’s careful calculations, the entrance into the King’s Chamber, typifying the beginning of the Millennial Age, would be reached on August 20, 1953.  With 95% of the chronology of the passage system of the Great Pyramid supposedly already verified by history, the attention of thousands was focused upon August 20, 1953.  Their expectancy was that the events of that day would demonstrate beyond question that their understanding of the purport of the Great Pyramid revelation was correct.  In the summer of 1953 thousands of followers began to anticipate the development of spectacular events to climax, perhaps, with the visible appearance of Jesus, on the Great Pyramid dating of August 20.  They hoped that what would occur would then firmly establish their belief in the reliability of the prophecy.  But the day came and with it the failure of the hoped-for developments.  Jesus didn’t show up!  The Millennium didn’t begin!  Armageddon didn’t break out!  NOTHING HAPPENED!

Again, the system was revised!  According to Rutherford the “mistake” that had been made in his reckonings was “discovered” and duly “corrected.”  A new date was set: 1978.  This date was bolstered by a study of the “seven times” of Israel’s judgment, Daniel’s 2,300 day/years, the 1,260 day/years of John’s vision in the book of Revelation all of which, according to Rutherford’s reckonings, ended in 1978-79.  You see, beloved, everyone was using the very same system of deciphering the time prophecies of Daniel and the Revelation but each used a different starting point!  Even if this application of these time prophecies is correct, the fact remains that unless one can be absolutely certain of the exact beginning point of any of them he will never wind up at the right ending point!  And that does make a difference, doesn’t it?  The “88 Reasons why Jesus Will Come In 1988” delusion used the very same type of chronological scheme altered to fit their own agenda, of course.  It caused hysteria and chaos all over the nation and around the world.  But Jesus didn’t return in 1988, either!

In July of 1978, I published an article in which I admonished the Lord’s precious people, “Others are proclaiming that the Millennium will begin in 1978-79 according to the revelation of the Great Pyramid in Egypt.  I must speak a word against that!  I have no fear in offering to buy all your Pyramidology books for 1 cent each in 1980.  I’ll even pay the postage!  Beloved brethren, I have no desire to be cynical about these things, but the Spirit of the Lord would have His chosen ones to get their eyes off of dates, pyramids, computers, newspaper headlines, world leaders, world events, conspiracies, supposed antichrists, beast governments, banking and economic systems, and all the rest of the ten-cent side shows which would capture the minds of those apprehended to be sons of the Most High.  How much more profitably will our time and meditations be spent in LOOKING UNTO HIM.  A correct understanding of all the above mentioned things (and most saints’ understanding of them is not correct!) can never add one inch to our spiritual stature nor bring us to perfection in Christ.  The finishing touches on God’s great Building, His House of Sons, are not yet complete.  ‘Let your loins be girded about, and your lights burning; and ye yourselves LIKE UNTO MEN THAT WAIT FOR THEIR LORD’ (Lk. 12:35-36).  Look unto HIM!  That is the only act you can perform in this hour that will in any way hasten the Day of manifestation”    end quote.

The error of these delusions is manifest in their repeated failure.  I am sure that most of my readers remember the great 1982 Planetary Alignment hype.  According to certain Fundamentalist and Charismatic preachers the “rapture” was going to take place on September 6, 1975.  The “logic” for this was that in 1982 all of the nine planets of our solar system would be perfectly aligned on the same side of the sun.  Two scientists, writing in Newsweek magazine, September 16, 1974, theorized about the catastrophic effect of this planetary alignment on the upper part of the atmosphere caused by the magnetic pull of this line-up of the planets on the sun, creating an increase in the magnetic activity on the sun with huge storms of sunspots and solar flares, some spreading over fifty million miles.  These would greatly disrupt weather patterns around the world by sharply altering wind directions.  This in turn would give our rotating planet a jolt large enough to trigger many major earthquakes in those areas of the world under severe geological strain.  It was expected that the earthquakes around 1982 could destroy large populations of the earth.  Some even theorized that the sun would “nova” in which case the earth would be completely burned to a cinder!

Therefore, reasoned certain preachers and teachers, since the earth would be purged by fire in 1982 (sounds like William Miller, doesn’t it!), the Great Tribulation must precede that event by seven years, necessitating a beginning in 1975.  Furthermore, since Jesus must come, according to their imaginings, before the Tribulation; and considering that He would come with the sound of a trumpet, and at the “last trump,” it was concluded that He would split the eastern sky on the date of the FEAST OF TRUMPETS in the year 1975 precisely on September 6!  I arrived in Big Spring, Texas on the afternoon of September 5, and found a large number of Charismatic brethren weeping, wailing, and repenting in preparation for the rapture the following day.  It fell my lot to declare to the brethren assembled in the meeting where I was speaking that night that nothing, absolutely nothing, would happen the next day!  Of course, Jesus didn’t come on September 6, 1975 and seven years afterward the long-awaited planetary alignment turned out to be a non-event!  The mischief done by these well-meaning men is all the greater when they coolly fix a fresh date when the march of time has utterly falsified their previous chronological predictions.  It is still a very adulterous generation that seeks after a sign.

Let me briefly insert a partial list of date setters. These speculators set themselves up above the knowledge of God, futilely attempting to date events about which they know nothing by the Spirit of wisdom and revelation from God, in fact, dates which the Holy Spirit Himself has chosen not to reveal!  It is amazing how many Christians, including many in this word of sonship and the kingdom, fall for this spectacle of scholastic manipulation!  Here are only some of those who throughout church history have set dates for the coming of Christ, the beginning of the Millennium, or the end of the world.  First the name, followed by the date they predicted.

Tichonius   381
Hippolytus and Lactanius   500
Joachim of Floris   1260
Michael Stiefel   1533
Isaac Newton   1715
William Whiston   1734
William Miller   1834
Joann Albrecht Bengel   1836
Joseph Wolff   1847
Philo Britannicus   1849
Irvingites of England 1864
Hans Wood   1880
Mother Shipton   1881
Joanna Southcott   1884
Charles T. Russell   1914
Edward D. Griffin   1921
Judge Rutherford   1925
Adam Rutherford   1953, 1978
William Branham   1977
Edgar Whisenat   1988

You may smile to yourself at the errors and mistakes of others, but I will incur the wrath of many well-meaning people when I declare that not a few of these chronological prognosticators are in the sonship and kingdom message, right in the midst of those sincere saints pressing on into the fullness of God.  One of the fads recently occupying the attention of some has to do with JUBILEE CYCLES.  One of the several theories is that there would be 40 Jubilees from A.D. 33 (Pentecost) that effectually bring us to the end of the church age.  The Jubilee came every fiftieth year in Israel and forty Jubilees would be reckoned as 40 times 49 years (the 50th being the Jubilee).  This would add up to 1960 years from Pentecost to the end of the church age.  By adding 33 to 1960 we are brought to the year 1993.  This theory was concocted before 1993, and some were expecting the manifestation of the sons of God, or at least some great move in that direction, at the time of the Feast of Tabernacles in that year.  Since there was no obvious outward change in the spiritual order on that date, it has now been determined that the church age, or Pentecostal age, is typified by king Saul of old.  Saul represents flesh, and the Feast of Pentecost had leaven which is construed to represent the fleshly ministry of the church systems the church under carnal man’s control.  Following the death of Saul, there was a seven year period before David was crowned king of Israel.  David represents the ministry of the manifested sons of God.  According to these calculations, at the end of the 40 Jubilees allotted to the church age, in a spiritual sense the carnal church systems die, or come to their end, in 1993.  But the seven year lull between the death of Saul and the reign of David brings us to the year 2000.  It is believed that David was crowned king in November.  The inference is that in November of the year 2000 some great change is to take place possibly the manifestation of the sons of God!  (This message is being written prior to November, 2000 in order to get it to the printer and ready to be mailed early in the year 2001).

 The question follows by what authority does one determine that there are 40 Jubilees from the day of Pentecost to the close of the age?   Where does the Bible reveal such a scheme?  And how does one then reach the conclusion that the years between Saul’s and David’s reigns are to be applied to the years here at the end of the age: 1993-2000?  The folly of such methods should be obvious!  By playing with numbers, chronologies, types, dates, etc., one can take nearly any year from the time of Christ until now and make it “seem” significant.  All kinds of seemingly unique and interesting things can be done with numbers, times, and types having nothing whatever to do with inspiration or revelation.

Look at the following predictions made by a brother.  “We may see other events occur even before the end of 1999.  December 29 seems to stand out as a potential date for something, since this is 2000 years from the slaughter of the children in Bethlehem.  It is also 1260 days from July 16, 1996, when we began our Red Dragon wars.  I had thought the 1260 days ended on January 1, 2000, but I made a mistake in calculation.  It actually ends on December 29, 1999.  This puts that date in a whole new perspective, since it is the 2000th anniversary of the slaughter of the children in Bethlehem.  Others also say that they have had some revelation about this date that it is a time of judgment.  By the time you receive this letter, we should know one way or another.”  Let the heart of every faithful son of God be assured of this that is not divine revelation, it is merely playing silly numbers games with the Word of God!  We are living in a day when men without any true revelation from God are pawning off ridiculous carnal-minded calculations and intellectual tomfoolery as “end-time truth.”

Those who promote these senseless “numbers games” usually use terminology like, “If our chronology is correct,” “whether this proves out or not remains to be seen,” “could this possibly indicate?” and numerous other carnal-minded, wishy-washy admissions that what they are writing is NOT A REVELATION FROM THE LORD but mere human speculations.  This is not the foundation on which TRUTH is built!  Notice the following expressions in the one short paragraph quoted above: “We may see...December 29 seems to stand out...I had thought...but I made a mistake...by the time you receive this...we should know one way or the other”!

One brother in the Kingdom message who has repeatedly, over many years, predicted dates for this and for that event, including the coming of the Lord, and has missed every time, wrote the following acknowledgment: “Now swiftly I shall set before you the proof that our Lord’s return is immediately at hand; yet I cannot say that I know (with absolute and positive knowledge).  It is but the human mind dealing with the Infinite; wherefore, unless the conceit be too great, we will recognize the possibility of error.  Unless the Lord Himself were to appear and speak to a person, stating clearly the year, month, and the day and hour that He would return, we are not justified to use the word ‘know’.  But when we have sufficiently studied His Word, and weighed the massive evidence which concurs that ‘these are the days’, then we can certainly say that we know (are aware) that the time IS NOW.  In fact, we can be far more specific by narrowing down the ‘now’ to the limited era of an odd few years; in fact the year and day might even be pinpointed!”  If you analyze what this brother is saying, he is contending that it is possible for the human mind to figure out and pinpoint with precision the timing of events that the Lord Himself has chosen not to reveal!  Obviously this man “knows” nothing because all his projections are based on calculations made by natural understanding the carnal mind!  The natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God, neither can he know them, for they are spiritually discerned.

Another sign of the carnality of such schemes is that they are constantly being “revised.”  When the prophesied dates come and go uneventfully, they then “discover” the error in their calculations and “correct” them.  Hogwash!  The Holy Spirit does not make mistakes.  The carnal mind makes mistakes.  I have made mistakes.  I even expressed once that I felt the sons might be manifested within a certain decade, but I am not revising that, for it was a mistake and I have learned my own lesson from it.  But some brethren never learn!  They continually spew out date after date, none of which amounts to a hill of beans, and mysteriously God’s precious little gullible people never seem to learn that they are being conned, for they get all excited over every new prediction. When God speaks, His word does not have to be corrected!  And when we speak by the Holy Ghost our words do not need to be corrected, either.  It’s just as simple as that!

All predictions based on types, times, cycles, and chronologies will fail.  You can put that down in your little black book.  It would seem that all the mistakes of the past would provide a warning, but the inquisitiveness of carnal minds never gives up.  INQUIRING CARNAL MINDS WANT TO KNOW!  And let me assure you God will not dignify any of the foolish dates and predictions of men by doing His strange and wonderful work at that particular time!  Here me now, and believe me later if you are assembled some year at the Feast of Tabernacles expecting the sons to be manifested at that time because man has determined from some study of types, cycles, times, or chronologies that this is the year it will happen, you can rest assured that nothing supernatural or divine will transpire and you will leave your gathering disappointed.  Oh, how gullible we still are!  Don’t get carried away, beloved, with teachers who tickle your ears with some strange “key,” some obscure “clue,” some magic “formula,” some alleged “cycle,” or some special “understanding” of times, etc.  The difference between spiritual truth and fiction is just this if it can be “figured out” with the natural mind it is fiction, not truth.  The deep things of God are revealed by the Spirit and discerned by the Spirit, not intellectually by pouring over charts, time prophecies, historical data, world events, cycles or chronologies.

Now another flaw of the scheme of “figuring out” prophetic dates through the study of those things just mentioned is that our present calendar is not dependable for such usage.  In fact, the calendars are so messed up that there is absolutely no way to accurately ascertain the correct date for anything not even the birth of our Lord Jesus Christ!  The proof of this is that the men who have done scholarly studies on the birth of Jesus all arrive at different conclusions!  In the spring of 1999 a brother sent me his article exposing the fallacy of date-setting based on man-made calendars.  I concurred then with what this brother wrote, and I still agree today.

Let me quote a portion of what this brother shared.  “Our God in His marvelous creation of the heavens and the earth provided mankind with the means to determine times and seasons and days and years.  ‘Then God said, Let there be lights in the expanse of the heavens to separate the day from the night, and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and  for days and years’ (Gen. 1:14).  This marvelous system of days and years has been beneficial to man down through the ages by the making of solar and lunar calendars.  The lunar calendar, based on the phases of the moon, goes back to the beginning of history.  Consisting of twelve lunar months, with periodic adjustments, it continues in use throughout many parts of the world.  The children of Israel were using the lunar calendar in Egypt, like their forefathers Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, but when the time for their exodus out of Egypt came and the night of the Passover took place, God gave Israel new meaning and new reckoning dates for their calendar.  The Lord said to Moses and Aaron in Egypt, ‘This month is to be for you the first month, the first month of the year’ (Ex. 12:1-2, NIV).  More instruction followed; on the tenth day of that month each household was to set aside a (Passover) lamb; it was to be kept until the fourteenth day of the month, when the whole assembly of the congregation of Israel was to kill the lamb, take the blood and strike it on the two side posts and also the upper door posts of the house.  Thus the house was prepared and spared from death.  According to the lunar calendar, that night would be a full moon.  One can only marvel at the planning of God, giving them moonlight for travel during the next several nights, enabling the exodus of probably two million people on foot, with all their cattle.

 “Many centuries later, during the time of Roman domination in the known world, history tells us that Julius Caesar in 46 B.C. issued a solar calendar that was based on a 365 day year.  The names of the months in the Julian calendar are still used in our present calendar.  As many centuries went by, the Julian calendar continued in use and it was not till 1582 that Pope Gregory XIII replaced it with a revised calendar of 365 days with a 366 day year (leap year) every four years, each year beginning January 1, and ending the following December 31.  The changes included the designating of many of the Roman Church’s religious observances and holidays which still affect our lives.  It is called the Gregorian calendar and is probably the most commonly used today for international datelines, international trade and record keeping.  It is the same calendar that hangs in your kitchen, marked with your schedules and appointments.

 “When this present year (1999) runs out these calendars will read year 2000 which is really a non-event, just another New Year’s day, but the news media is carrying stories of how millennium fever is showing up in many places.  One article stated that even in Christian circles individuals and house holds take this change very seriously.  Two men said they have been stockpiling goods for the past year: a gas-powered generator, a solar-powered lamp, six-gallon pails of grain, 55 gallon drums of water, canned goods and extra clothes.  Others told of digging their own back-yard wells.  In addition to the interviews a poll showed that among those who take the Bible literally, 40% believed that the new millennium is tied to Christ’s return.  Among those who are not Biblical literalists, only 18% said so.

 “This leaflet is written in April of 1999 with the intent of showing that the new millennium and the transition from one century to the next is a man-made situation and our God with His plans and purposes is not involved.  He will continue to flow out to this world with His grace just as He has done for almost two millenniums.  Our man-made calendars, useful as they are, have no connection to any Biblical prophecy or coming event.  On December 31 of 1999 the earth will continue to rotate and at midnight the Gregorian calendar will change to January 1, 2000.

 “One other matter of concern to many people is the man-made Y2K computer problem that could possibly cause some isolated disruptions in older computers.  Those problems, made by men, will be worked out by men.  The days and years of time will continue to roll by until the day comes, known only to God, when He will intervene in the affairs of men and assume His authority in this world.  God has His own calendar...when God intervenes, the times and seasons of HIS CALENDAR will bring great blessing to this world, changing every individual and all life upon this earth...we are encouraged by the Lord to pray for His Kingdom to come”    David R. Hettema.  And let me hastily add GOD’S CALENDAR is simply that which HE REVEALS TO HIS PEOPLE BY THE SPIRIT!  That is how we know the times and seasons, that is how we  gain enlightenment about what God is going to do God reveals His plans and purposes by revelation of the Holy Ghost!  If you don’t have a word from God, my friend, then stay out of the date-setting business.  The hour is too late, and God’s purposes too serious, to be playing games.  “He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith to the churches!”

THE GLOOM AND DOOM FOLLY

A “gloom and doom” interpretation of history and world events sees culture and history descending into a diabolical abyss in which all of society degenerates until the Antichrist takes over and the Lord has to come back to save what is left of the church.  The “gloom and doomers” keep track of every famine and earthquake, view the enemies of our nation, and even our own politicians, as involved in dark and sinister conspiracies for our destruction and the overthrow of God, watch every planetary lineup and extra-terrestrial activity, observe every new world leader to see if he might be the Antichrist, and expect communism, the new age movement, or a one-world government to take over any day.  Gloom and doom sees the coming of the Lord and the manifestation of His Kingdom in relation to a series of “end-time” cataclysmic events and over-whelming evil, rather than a progressive new stage of God’s intensified dealings with humanity.  The gloom and doomers think that when things get bad enough God will be forced to step in and do something!

No matter what you have been hearing about the dark and dreadful things to come upon the earth, let me tell you something about the doomsday prophecies that keep coming year after year and decade after decade.  Sherlock Holmes once solved a famous murder case by noticing what did not happen.  He observed that the victim’s dog did not bark on the night of the crime.  Therefore the dog and hence the victim must have known the assailant.  The rest was easy.  So it is in the events of the end time.  What hasn’t happened for instance, a great Doomsday Crash mindlessly foretold by the parrots of pessimism year after year has tremendous significance by its very absence!  Despite all the prophets of gloom and doom the communists have not taken over, America has not been invaded, California has not fallen into the ocean, the economy has not crashed, the government has not declared marshal law, the churches have not been closed, our money has not been confiscated, our old money was not called in when the new money was printed, Clinton was not our last president, the Antichrist (as people think of him) is nowhere to be seen, we have not been laser-tattooed with 666 on the forehead, Y2K went the way of all flesh and the folks who fled to remote areas with their generators, out-houses, guns, and stockpiles of food had plenty to eat for a while before creeping back into civilization and the sons of God continue to be processed and matured for the Day of Unveiling!  Only the word of the Lord has stood!  All the false prophets have been proven liars, and God alone is true!  In my files over the past twenty years or so, I have purposely saved booklets and papers in which people have set dates for devastating tidal waves, killer earthquakes, the collapse of the money system, the fall of America,  and a host of other ominous events, which I refer to from time to time.  With the passing of time, their falseness is evident not one single prophecy of gloom and doom has come to pass!  Ah, Sherlock Holmes, what is missing is significant!

All these doomsday apocalyptic pictures of the end of the age, the antichrist, the great tribulation, etc., are based upon carnal-minded interpretations of certain prophecies in the Bible, have nothing whatever to do with the unfolding of the Kingdom of God on earth, are completely irrelevant to God’s purposes for this hour, and simply do not enter into the equation at all.  They are founded upon a confusion of thought a failure to understand the scriptures by the Spirit.  The expositors take totally unrelated and disconnected passages from different parts of the Bible, and weave them together into an elaborate tapestry which is pure fiction.  The scriptures that are put together to prove the end-time events of the rapture, the antichrist, the great tribulation, the seven year covenant with the Jews, the rebuilt temple in Jerusalem, the revived Roman empire, one world government, and all the other imagined happenings at the end of the age when understood by the spirit of wisdom and revelation, these concepts make no more spiritual sense than the moronic letter I read one time that goes like this:

Dear So and So,

I set down pencil in hand to typewrite you a letter (excuse the pen).  I don’t
live where I lived before.  I moved to where I live now.  When you come to see me,
ask anyone where I live, because no one knows.  I’m so sorry we’re so far together,
I wish we were never apart.  We are having more weather this year than last year.   I
started to Fulton to see you last week and I saw a sign that said, “This takes you to
Fulton.”  So I got on the sign and set there for three hours and the crazy thing never
moved.  I mailed you an overcoat, but took off the buttons to make it lighter (those in
the pockets).  If you don’t get this letter let me know and I’ll mail it to you.  I would
have sent you the $600.00 I owe you, but I didn’t think of it until after I had sealed
this letter.  Enclosed you will find a picture, but for fear it would get lost, I took it out.

Yours very truly,
THE LITTLE MORON

That letter, my friend, makes absolutely as much common sense as most preachers’ prophetic teaching makes spiritual sense!  If you escape this confusion and refuse to be moved by the fleshly sensationalism of uninspired literalistic prophetic interpretations of men, then you have taken the first step into the revelation of the Kingdom of God!

Let me quote a passage which I am sure you have heard as descriptive of our times and the signs of the end of the age.  “Our earth is degenerate in these latter days; there are signs that the world is speedily coming to an end; bribery and corruption are common; children no longer obey their parents; every man wants to write a book, and the end of the world is evidently approaching.”  What a sad commentary of the times!  But what times?  These words are inscribed on a tablet in a museum in Constantinople, Turkey.  They were written 2,800 years before Christ and yet it sounds so modern!  Here’s another: “Our youths love luxury.  They have bad manners, contempt for authority they show disrespect for their elders, and love to chatter in place of exercise.  Children are now tyrants, not the servants of their households.  They no longer rise when their elders enter the room.  They contradict their parents, chatter before company, gobble up food, and tyrannize teachers.” This was written by the philosopher Socrates in 400 B.C.!

Today we pick up a newspaper and read of all these things happening, so we are assured that the prophecies of the Bible are being fulfilled, and we conclude that it must be about THE END based on external evidence.  “Darkness shall cover the earth, and gross darkness the people.”  “In the last days perilous times shall come...”  The doom-casters quote every verse that speaks of negative conditions in the outer world, yet they have not the foggiest notion of the awesome inward work of God in His sons to bring forth a NEW ORDER IN CHRIST.  They know what the world is doing, but have no idea of what GOD IS DOING!  They must look to the world around for the signs of the end of the age.  They must see and hear in the fleshly realm around them with their natural eyes and ears, and with the understanding of the carnal mind.  They can understand outer, natural, earthly, dark things, but cannot hear and see in the Spirit and by the Spirit.  They lack spiritual vision and understanding.  But God’s elect are not spiritually blind!  They are not dependent upon what the eye sees and the ear hears and the carnal mind comprehends.  The Lord would not have chosen us if we were stuck in that realm!  He has given us His faith, vision, and understanding.  Now we live by His faith, we hear truth by the voice of His Spirit, we see with spiritual eyes enlightened by Him, and we understand with the mind of Christ.

 There are many who feel that every earth-shaking event that shocks the public must be a sign of the “end-time,” and we must make certain that we are prepared for the “doom day” which is upon us.  Millions of Christians suffer from a malady called the “Doomsday Syndrome.”  They constantly fear what the future holds.  Hardly a day goes by that we don’t hear some doomsday disciple pronouncing imminent judgment and damnation.  Babylon’s preachers and teachers continually have a hey-day with sensational world events, trying to make them fit the fulfillment of specific Bible prophecies, speculating about their meaning, projecting, predicting, and even prophesying about their outcome, and never apologizing for all their past mistakes and erroneous conclusions.  Every year a new super-disaster hoax is promoted among gullible Christians.

To the above brother Paul Mueller adds this timely testimony: “Our Lord has said, ‘The light of the body is the eye: if therefore thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light.  But if thine eye be evil, thy whole body shall be full of darkness.  If therefore the light that is in thee be darkness, how great is that darkness’ (Mat. 6:22-23).  We are entering a new age of increased Light.  A new day has begun in the world!  It is a new day of the Light and glory of Christ in a greater measure.  This new kingdom Day is a Day when the darkness is being dispelled by the Light of Christ.  And all who are awake and aware are keeping their single, spiritual eye focused on Christ and the wonderful things He is now doing in all the world as  the King of kings and the Lord of lords.  No longer do we see only the negative things taking place in the world.  Now we see that Christ is reigning, and things are changing because of His increased dominion in our lives and in the world around us. Messages of doom, gloom and darkness cannot possibly bring anyone to sonship fulfilled.

 “In this new Day the Lord is changing our spiritual diets!  He is giving us the type of messages that are necessary to our spiritual growth, messages that will bring about our change.  The Lord’s chosen elect must have God’s pure word that gives them hope!  Yesterday’s messages of doom, gloom and darkness will only discourage and defeat us.  To read and assimilate the negative stories coming from the news media, or even from the writings of some current ‘come-outers,’ will keep us in defeat and cannot help but adversely affect both our minds and our bodies.

 “To read and speak of war, lawlessness, immorality, violence, tribulation, distress of nations, and all the other ills of the world, only fills us with darkness.  And darkness only begets more darkness within us!  We need a single eye in this great Day that sees only the Lord and His great glory.  We must feast on the royal food of the kingdom!  We must feed on food that begets Light within us.  We must feast on Christ to the full!  Let nothing turn your single eye away from Him.  There are those who would saturate your mind and wrap it in the darkness of man and his shadowy world.  But this will only impede your spiritual growth!  The wise will keep their minds centered on Christ and the positive, kingdom work He is now doing in this great Day.  This indeed is the way to sonship!  This is the path to the throne of God!  And this is the route that leads to the fullness of the Life of Christ and the glory of the kingdom of God!”

I was once among those who believed the negative predictions of man. But I must confess, something wonderful has happened to me!  I spent a lot of my early life and ministry with an “apocalyptic mentality.”  By apocalyptic I mean that mentality that is always looking for the end of the age with great cataclysmic upheavals and tremendous earth-shaking events kingdoms falling, nuclear bombs exploding, economies crashing, and all those violent, catastrophic happenings that are supposed to take place in the world.  I was looking for that.  In 1964 I believed the issue was God and Goldwater, and I just felt that if Goldwater didn’t win the election, brother, this country was down the tube, the antichrist would rise up in the earth, and we would be in great tribulation. We watched the stock market, because we knew if it crashed, the jig was really up!  We were concerned about the Russians, the Chinese, the Illuminati, and a thousand other things.

God delivered me from that apocalyptic mentality!  It takes the same power of God to deliver one from that spirit as it takes to deliver one from any other demon.  You see, every nation of earth has experienced economic collapse, including ours.  Every nation has had war and destruction.  All the saints of God from time immemorial have suffered persecution.  All that live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution” (II Tim. 3:12).  Two thousand years ago the apostle John wrote, “Even now there are many antichrists. All these things have been happening out there in that external world for ages, but let me tell you, it has nothing whatever to do with the Kingdom of God.  NOTHING!  None of those things will herald the Kingdom or bring the Kingdom.  Only the nature of the Father formed in His elect, only the full measure of the stature of Christ found in God’s New Creation Man, only the power of God upon His people, only the glory of God in His sons, will signal the hour of transition into the greater glory of His incorruptible and all-conquering Kingdom of God!

The mind of Christ is now being imparted to God’s elect in greater fullness.  By the spirit  of wisdom and revelation in the glorious mind of Christ we are beginning to see all things as they really are.  We are now seeing new things, a new heaven and a new earth.  This knowledge and vision come not by any outward observation, but by the mighty working of God in our lives.  This is a marvelous transition for me and for the body of Christ, as I trust it is the reality of all who read these lines, who are moving on in God.  The hope and promise and power and glory of the Kingdom of God burn more brightly in my spirit today than at any time in the past.  I rejoice that this is the DAY of manifestation when Christ and His body shall see the Kingdom triumph and reign over the nations. bringing Life, Light, Love and Peace to all mankind.  This is the Present Truth.  This is what the Spirit IS SAYING to the overcomers in this great hour!  Hallelujah!  Great and glorious things are at hand!

 


Chapter 51

THE INCREASE OF THE KINGDOM

(continued)

For those longing for the coming of the Kingdom of God upon the nations of earth, today’s march of history-making events has special interest.  Millenniums ago ancient prophets saw our times, prophesied the rise and fall of world empires, revealed the frantic efforts for global peace and a new world order in the last days, and finally outlined clearly and unmistakably the last great world empire of all.  The Spirit of God has revealed the course of human history today.  He shows the finale of the efforts made by mortal men to resolve their differences and live peaceably, every man beneath his own fig tree and by his own vineyard.

In the days of Daniel the prophet, Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, had a dream in the night.  He awoke disturbed, perplexed.  “Then the king commanded to call the magicians, and the astrologers, and the sorcerers, and the Chaldeans, for to show the king his dream.   So they came and stood before the king” (Dan. 2:2).  The king shared with them his problem.  He was certain the dream he had had was a significant one.  But now he could not remember any of it!  So he called upon the magicians, the astrologers, the sorcerers, and the Chaldeans to tell him the dream and to give him the interpretation of it.  It was common practice for these men to give the king fanciful, highly colored interpretations of his dreams.  They were usually twisted to please the king and build his ego.  But now there could be no guessing!  They were called upon to not only interpret the dream but to provide the dream!  They were left speechless.  They pled with the king to at least tell them the dream; then they would give the interpretation.  But try as he might, the king was unable to remember his dream.  In wrath the king ordered their execution.

Numbered among the wise men in Babylon was Daniel.  He, along with others, had been taken into captivity when Nebuchadnezzar invaded and destroyed Jerusalem.  The first he knew of the king’s disturbance and drastic action was when Arioch, the captain of the king’s guard, came to take him to the place of execution with the rest of the wise men.  The record states: “And Daniel answered with counsel and wisdom to Arioch the captain of the king’s guard, which was gone forth to slay the wise men of Babylon: he answered and said to Arioch the king’s captain, Why is the decree so hasty from the king?  Then Arioch made the thing known unto Daniel.  Then Daniel went in, and desired of the king that he would give him time, and that he would show the king the interpretation.  Then Daniel went to his house, and made the thing known to Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah, his companions: that they would desire mercies of the God of heaven concerning this secret; that Daniel and his fellows should not perish with the rest of the wise men of Babylon.  Then was the secret revealed unto Daniel in a night vision.  Then Daniel blessed the God of heaven” (Dan. 2:14-19).

You see, God has promised “Surely the Lord God will do nothing, but He revealeth His secret unto His servants the prophets” (Amos 3:7).  God will not leave His people in darkness about the future.  God is in control!  In the annals of human history the rise and fall of empires appear to be dependent on the will and power of man.  But by the word of God the curtain is drawn aside, and we behold, behind, above, and through all the play and counter play of human interests and power and passions, the workings of the great God, silently, patiently working out the counsels of His own will.

King Nebuchadnezzar’s question to Daniel was to the point: “Are you able to make known to me the dream which I have seen and the interpretation of it?”  Daniel answered the king, “The secret that the king has demanded neither the wise men, enchanters, magicians, nor astrologers can show the king; but there is a God in heaven who reveals secrets, and He has made known to king Nebuchadnezzar what it is that shall be in the latter days at the end of the days.  Your dream and the visions of your bed are these...” (Dan. 2:26-28, Amplified).  And then came the dream, one of the most dramatic revelations of all history, in which God outlined the rise and fall of global empires, moved beyond to our day with its struggles for peace and safety among the great powers, on to the setting up of earth’s last great world empire.  The dream accurately  portrayed the events now transpiring before our very eyes.  “God...has made known to king Nebuchadnezzar what it is that shall be in the latter days...”

THE GREAT IMAGE

 “Thou, O king, sawest, and behold a great image.  This great image, whose brightness was excellent, stood before thee; and the form thereof was terrible.  This image’s head was of fine gold, his breast and his arms of silver, his belly and his thighs of brass, his legs of iron, his feet part of iron and part of clay.  Thou sawest till a stone was cut out without hands, which smote the image upon his feet that were of iron and clay, and brake them to pieces.  Then was the iron, the clay, the brass, the silver, and the gold, broken to pieces together, and became like the chaff of the summer threshing floors; and the wind carried them away, that no place was found for them: and the stone that smote the image became a great mountain, and filled the whole earth.  This is the dream; and we will tell the interpretation thereof before the king” (Dan. 2:31-36).

Now it all came back to Nebuchadnezzar.  This, indeed, was the dream he had dreamed in the night!  And Daniel informed the king concerning the significance of the dream: “As for thee, O king, thy thoughts came into thy mind upon thy bed, what should come to pass hereafter: and He that revealeth secrets MAKETH KNOWN TO THEE WHAT SHALL COME TO PASS” (Dan. 2:29). This was a dream whose interpretation was to reveal the FUTURE.  Painted dramatically, unforgettably, unmistakably, was a precise outline of world history the rise and fall of world empires and the exact events which would lead to the establishment of the last great empire of all.

FIRST KINGDOM OF GOLD

With what interest and astonishment must the king have listened as Daniel began his interpretation of the dream and informed the king that his own kingdom was the golden head of that magnificent image.  Gold, the king of metals, represented the Babylonian empire.  Daniel informed the king that the God of heaven had given him his kingdom, and made him ruler over all.  The character of the Babylonian empire is indicated by the head of gold.  It was indeed the golden kingdom of a golden age!  A natural center of trade and commerce, Babylon was immensely wealthy.  Site of the ill-fated effort of Nimrod to erect the tower of Babel centuries before, it boasted one of the seven wonders of the world, the hanging gardens, which tradition says Nebuchadnezzar built to console his Median wife who missed the mountains of her homeland.  The city of Babylon itself was another and still mightier wonder which there is neither time nor space in this message to recount.  There, with the whole world prostrate at her feet, a queen in peerless grandeur, drawing from the pen of inspiration itself this glowing title, “The glory of kingdoms, the beauty of Chaldees’ excellency,” stood this magnificent city, fit capital of that great world kingdom which was represented by the golden head of this great historic image.

SECOND KINGDOM OF SILVER

 The Babylonian empire was not to stand forever.  It was to give way to another.  Interpreting the dream, Daniel added: “And after thee shall arise another kingdom inferior to thee” (Dan. 2:39).  The breast and arms of silver represented the Medo-Persian empire (538-331 B.C.).  Fulfilling a word of the Lord (see Isaiah 45:1), Cyrus damned up the river Euphrates flowing through Babylon, marched his armies beneath the two-leafed gates, and through this stratagem overthrew the kingdom of Babylon.  Across the banqueting hall of Belshazzar, the king of Babylon at that time, appeared the dreadful words: “Mene, mene, tekal, upharsin,” (“thou art weighed in the balances and found wanting”).  Before the night was over, blood flowed in the streets as Belshazzar and his thousand lords perished at the hands of the Medo-Persian armies.  Medo-Persia, inferior to Babylon in some ways, was nonetheless a great empire.  The king had two capitals, one at Persepolis and the other at Susa.  The one he occupied in summer, the other in winter.  Medo-Persia had the first organized mail system.  While it did not launch the Pony Express, it did have the Dromedary Express camels carrying messages throughout the empire.  Its great armies are said to have numbered in the millions.

THIRD KINGDOM OF BRASS

Great as was the Medo-Persian empire, it too, was to topple.  Daniel declared: “And after thee shall arise another kingdom inferior to thee, and another third kingdom of brass, which shall bear rule over all the earth” (Dan. 2:39).  Alexander the Great assumed the leadership of the Grecian armies at the age of 20, and marched with lightning rapidity to conquer the then-known world by the time he was 33.  From the beginning of his military career he was a marked man a man of destiny.  Ambassadors came to Alexander almost from all parts of the world: some to congratulate his victories, others to tender his crowns, others to make leagues and alliances with him.  However, Alexander could conquer cities but not his own spirit.  With contemptible arrogance, he claimed for himself divine honors.  He gave up conquered cities, freely and unprovoked, to the mercy of his bloodthirsty and licentious soldiers.  He often murdered his friends and favorites in his drunken frenzies. He encouraged such excessive drinking among his followers that on one occasion twenty of them died as the result of their carousal.  Finally, having sat through one long drinking spree, he was immediately invited to another, when, after drinking to each of the twenty guests present, he drank twice, history records, incredible as it may seem, the full Herculean cup containing six of our quarts. He was seized with a violent fever and died eleven days later while he yet stood only at the threshold of his life and career for he was only 33 years old!  His kingdom was divided among his four generals.

FOURTH KINGDOM OF IRON

 What kingdom succeeded Greece as the empire of the world?  Daniel said to Nebuchadnezzar: “And the fourth kingdom shall be strong as iron: fore as much as iron breaketh in pieces and subdueth all things: and as iron that breaketh all these, shall it break in pieces and bruise” (Dan. 2:40).  One kingdom did this and only one.  Rome.  Rome conquered Greece; it subdued all things; like iron, it broke in pieces and bruised.  Rome everywhere victorious!  Rome with its universal language, Latin; its universal highway system, of which the Appian Way is a surviving example; Rome with its invincible armies moving undefeated to the outposts of the globe.  In A.D. 312 Rome experienced a radical change.  In that year, Rome became so badly divided that Diocletian abdicated as emperor.  The two most likely successors were the general Constantine who was in the West, and the general Maxentius who was in Rome.  Constantine rounded up his loyal followers and marched into the capital to battle Maxentius for the throne.  When Constantine approached Rome he found that he was greatly outnumbered by Maxentius.  That night at a bridge Constantine had a dream.  He was shown a sign which was the combination of the Greek letters Chi and Rho.  These are the first two letters of the name “Christ” in Greek.  These letters had been used as a symbol or logo by the Christians in Greece.  In Constantine’s dream, the Latin words, “Hoc signo victoreris” appeared beneath the Greek logo.  These words mean, “By this sign conquer.”  At dawn, Constantine ordered the logo to be painted on every soldier’s shield, and the soldiers were encouraged, “By this sign, you will be victorious!”  Against overwhelming odds and against a very strong defense by Maxentius, the army of Constantine was victorious at one of the world’s greatest battles, the Battle of Melvian Bridge.  In gratitude, he caused Christianity to emerge as the state religion.  Constantine moved his imperial capital to Constantinople, thus dividing the kingdom into two parts, East and West.  Nebuchadnezzar’s dream of the image with the two legs of iron points to this period when ancient Rome was divided into two segments, with government at both.  Rome’s years of power were from 168 B.C. to A.D. 476.

A logical deduction would be that after Rome another world empire would emerge.  Not so!

TEN KINGDOMS EMERGE

It should be noted that at first the fourth kingdom is described with two legs which are unqualifiedly as strong as iron.  This was the symbol of its strength, by which it has been likened in history to a mighty colossus bestriding the nations, conquering everything, and giving laws to the world.  But this was not to continue.  Daniel went on to say: “And whereas thou sawest the feet and toes, part of potter’s clay, and part of iron, the kingdom SHALL BE DIVIDED; but there shall be in it of the strength of the iron, forasmuch as thou sawest the iron mixed with miry clay.  And as the toes of the feet were part of iron, and part of clay, so the kingdom SHALL BE PARTLY STRONG AND PARTLY BROKEN” (Dan. 2:41-42).  The decline and fall of the Roman empire was a gradual thing. Luxury, vice, an almost total moral breakdown, disintegration of the family it culminated in A.D. 476 when the barbarian hordes overthrew the Roman empire.

Ten kingdoms, represented by the ten toes of the image, emerged.  The ten peoples which were the instruments in fragmenting the empire were the Alamanni, Ostrogoths, Visigoths, Franks, Vandals, Suevi, Burgundians, Heruli, Anglo-Saxons, and Lombards.  The kingdom was indeed divided!  These barbarian peoples not only overran the Roman world, but planted themselves within the territory of the empire and thus became the empire!  The connection between these and the modern nations of Europe is clearly discernible in such names as England, Burgundy, Lombardy, France, etc.  These are the roots of the leading nations of Europe today!  The geography of Europe is determined by the ethnic identities of these ten peoples!  A study of the history of the last days of Rome shows that the empire did not really “fall.”  It has been suggested that its political and judicial system, religion, culture, and militarism continue to exist in Europe and many countries of the new world having European roots.  In reality, the ancient empire only fragmented.

REVIVAL OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE?

The earth was never again to see the cohesive strength of the Roman empire welded into the superstructure of one great World Empire.  For Daniel, in one of the most significant prophecies of all time, declared: “And whereas thou sawest iron mixed with miry clay, they (the ten toes) shall mingle themselves with the seed of men: but they shall not cleave one to another, even as iron is not mixed with miry clay” (Dan. 2:43).  It is important that we take more than a mere casual perusal of these words of the prophet, for in them is contained the KEY to, and UNDERSTANDING of, the world’s history from the time of ancient Rome all the way down to, and including, events that shall unfold in this our day.

Many are proclaiming a “revival” of the Roman empire here at the end of the age under the Antichrist.  Some speak of a “One World Beast Government” which they believe to be even now arising in the earth.  Preachers declare to us that the European Common Market will give birth to a political alliance in the United States of Europe that is to be the coming last great “revived” Roman empire through which the Antichrist, or the beast, shall rule the world and universally enforce the “mark of the beast.”  Nearly everyone is looking for a world government under the beast to arise out of a UNITED EUROPE.  And right here, before going any further, I want to speak a word against that.  I will say plainly that IT SHALL NOT COME TO PASS.  Now, I do not say there will not be a United States of Europe or some kind of political alliance in Europe.  There has been before.  If there is, it will not last, and should it come, it will not be a World Empire nor a World Government.  It will not be the beast government nor the government of Antichrist.  That is what I am saying.

One brother said in a meeting with us in 1971 that the “Beast Government” would arise in the earth and take over the United States within three or four years.  And for many years until his death he continued preaching and proclaiming that the beast government would rise up and take over the world within three or four years.  One wonders just when “three or four years” will end!

One of the problems today is that men read too much trash.  People read all kinds of politically oriented literature telling about the Illuminati, the Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion, conspiracy theories about the Rothschilds, Rockefellers and others who control great financial empires and international money systems, much of which is either spurious or misinterpreted or misapplied.  Many take this kind of information and try to harmonize it with what they imagine to be the prophecies of Daniel or the Revelation and come up with all kinds of speculations that they embrace as revelations about so-called “end time events.”  Many years ago the Spirit spoke to me that all those kinds of “revelations” are false because, in reality, they are NO REVELATION AT ALL!  At best, they are merely carnal unions of flesh and spirit, mixture of men’s ideas, theories, speculations, and lies with the word of God.  Most the sources for this information about the great banking conspiracy, the Illuminati, the Council on Foreign Relations, the Trilateral Commission, etc., are not Christian at all.  Granted, there are many Christians promoting these ideas, but they are not the originators of them.  When one accepts the political theories and speculations of unregenerated men and mixes them with the prophecies of the scriptures, calling  it a REVELATION, promoting it as the word of God, he has created an abomination before the Lord.  None of the true, proven prophetic voices that I know across the land are prophesying those kinds of things.  And those who are will live to see their prophecies come to naught!

Even apart from the teaching of the Holy Spirit, I have no faith at all in the conspiracy-mongers who harp on the above issues and the coming One World Government.  I have followed their writings for at least forty years, both political and economic forecasts, and have found them liars.  Their predictions have been proven false time and time again in fact, they have rarely been right! This one-world conspiracy of the Illuminati has supposedly been around for more than two hundred years.  In the meantime we have passed through a civil war, two world wars, the great depression, the rise and fall of communism, and they still have not taken over our government, formed a one-world government, or imposed the mark of the beast.  Either the conspirators are extremely stupid and inept or the whole supposed conspiracy is a lie.  The fact is the world is fractionalizing, not uniting.  The prophecies of the Bible are opposed to the concept of a coming world government. In Nebuchadnezzar’s dream of the course of history in the form of a great image there were only FIVE world governments Babylon, Medo-Persia, Greece, Rome, and the Kingdom of God.  That’s all!  There was NO other world empire between Rome and the Kingdom of God.  And the kingdoms of Rome that exist just prior to the triumph of the Kingdom of God are fractionalized ten toes of iron and clay mixed, that will not cleave together.  Many have historically tried to unite those ten toes into a powerful one-world government Charlemagne, Napoleon, Kaiser Bill Wilhelm, Hitler, the Communists.  And all have gone down in ignominious defeat before the infallible word of the omnipotent God!  So I put no confidence in the prognostications of the fundamentalist conspiracy-mongers.

The church today is full of energetic and sincere preachers and teachers who are just full of and bubbling over concerning things that are going to happen.  Eighty-five years ago men were telling how the Kaiser was the Antichrist and was going to upset the world.  Then when that failed to materialize, they frittered away much time and wasted much good paper and printer’s ink telling what the next war was going to be like, and how it was going to be fought.  There were to be death rays, and a hundred and one other horrible devices.  There were to be rays that would melt a gun in a soldier’s hand even as he held it.  But the next war came.  There were no death rays.  It was fought in much the same manner as the last one had been, except that there was very little or no poison gas used, and the equipment and methods were much more effective, particularly on the Allied side.  And yet, even after this next war had actually begun, certain religious periodicals published these blood-curdling articles telling of the awful inventions which were ready to be used against mankind.  The actual battles that were being fought at the time the articles were published made a lie of the articles.  And the unbelievable reality is that many of God’s people today  are so gullible and so susceptible to this kind of sensational trash, that they have no better sense than to glory in it, even though the statements are proven false by actual events then transpiring before their very eyes.

Then Mussolini arose, and he was to be the future superman who would revive the Roman empire and do this, that, and the other.  Then Hitler formed a deceitful alliance with Russia, and the false prophets loudly predicted that they would soon fight side by side.  But we now know the answers to all these predictions.  They were nothing more than the presumptuous guesses of idle shepherds who were destitute of truth.  Other men, now that the Kaiser, Mussolini, Hitler, and other hoped-for candidates for the office of Antichrist have passed out of the picture, pinned their hopes on Henry Kissinger, Jimmy Carter, Mikhail Gorbachev, Saddam Hussein, and others.  And all the books written about these are today worthless except as kindling to start a fire!

My prayer is that God will deliver His people, especially those who have heard the call to sonship and God’s great Kingdom purposes, from all this carnal and soulish sensationalism.  I fear that even many of the Lord’s precious saints who have a vision for higher and deeper things haven’t progressed far beyond Dr. Scofield’s footnotes when it comes to their understanding of events at this transition of the ages.  Many people today fear the term “New World Order” as it has been used by George Bush, Mikhail Gorbachev and others.  But those who are afraid of it have a misguided “One World Government” mentality.  Learn this, my friend, and you will know a great truth.  THERE WILL NEVER BE A MAN-MADE ONE WORLD GOVERNMENT!  When it comes to the so-called New World Order I must ask: Which one?  History records one in 1815, 1848, 1861, 1918, 1945, and 1990.  And they each collapsed into chaos and war!

The question follows: Will this latest effort at forming a New World Order be any more successful than those that preceded it?  According to the prophet Daniel not a chance!  And our recent experience in Iraq, Somalia, Bosnia, Kosovo and other places confirm the word of the Lord!  I’m glad David said, “In all their evil imaginations they are vain.”  That means their evil imaginations will not come to pass!  Whatever those who roar against God and His purposes devise, their imaginations are vain, vanity, emptiness, and they fall  on the ground before His face and in His presence.  Their imaginations cannot triumph over our God, His word, or His Christ.

Those who are looking for the Antichrist are always calling on us to imagine a world with no national boundaries...one global government...one international economy...one monetary system with one universal currency.  Imagine a world where conflicting religions are unified into one supreme ecumenical force, presided over by one self-exalted “god.”  Imagine a world leader so powerful that he personally directs the world’s economy and military might...a man so crafty that he enforces universal peace even in the troubled Middle East!  My friends, it won’t happen.  Do the world’s leaders want this?  Some do.  Is there a movement in that direction by the world’s governments?  I do not doubt it.  But just because men wish for it, hope for it, plan for it, and work toward it, doesn’t mean it will happen!  The word of almighty God is against it.  And even if God had not spoken against it, it is unlikely that it would happen due to the deceitfulness of the human heart and the treachery of human nature.

Let us look for a moment at the practical political ramifications of the idealistic concept of one world government.  President Clinton attempted to follow the idea which George Bush proclaimed, namely that a New World Order can be inaugurated under the UN which should use the NATO organization as its main police force.  China laughs at that.  The British government feels obligated to make polite noises, but doubts such  a system is practical.  Germany does not believe that America will be able to construct a single New World Order.  Germans know that a One World Government cannot be set up without China gaining numerical superiority, and Germans would not accept that.  Like Russians, they are still nationalistic, as are the French.  China and Russia and the Middle East all have their own aims which do not fit in with a One World Government, especially if Europe or America is in the driver’s seat.  The whole Moslem world, about a billion people and many nations, have no intention of being ruled by a One World Government.  Neither a unified Europe nor the current NATO system can now stop or change the course of events that those four influences will cause.  Every nation and block of nations has its own agenda!  We are no more on the verge of a One World Government today than we were in 1815, 1848, 1861, 1918, or 1945! 

Ah, beloved, every son of God must be able to distinguish between FACTS and TRUTH.  Truth is Reality, Life, Christ.  Truth is a Living Person!  In Truth there is a flow of Life.  If there is no quickening flow of Life, then you are not receiving Truth.  Jesus said, “I am the way, the truth, and the life” (Jn. 14:6).  Now Truth always brings Life because Christ is the Truth and Christ is also the Life.  Truth always brings Life, but there are things that are true that can sometimes bring death.  For example, were I to rob a bank this morning, and someone stood up in your fellowship next Sunday to tell how Preston Eby robbed a bank, would it bring you Life?  Would you say, “Hallelujah, praise the Lord for that word, we are blessed!”  Do you see what I am saying?  The word would be true but it would not minister Life.  Therefore, though it would be true it would not be the Truth, for the Truth and the Life are one, the Spirit and the Word are joined together as one Living Stream.  There are many things that are true, but they are not the Truth and if you live in them you will die.  Truth brings Life and because we are the children of Truth we desire Life. 

And now may I exhort you further to flee from those things that are true but are not Truth, as surely and swiftly as you would flee from your home if you discovered it to be a den of rattlesnakes.  We have a whole crop of doom-casters in the land today who spend their time in nothing else but informing the Lord’s people of all the negative situations which are going to overtake our nation and the world.  Many believers are continually being fed a diet of messages, articles, books, and tapes about world conditions, politics, intrigue, crisis, economic collapse, conspiracies, antichrist one-world government, mark of the beast, tribulation, so-called safe areas, planetary conjunctions, earthquakes, tidal waves, wickedness, and a whole catalog of other fearful and frightening events, some of which may happen, but most of which I tell you now are nothing more than carnal-minded sensationalism proclaimed by men masquerading as end-time teachers and prophets, bewitching the saints.

Let every child of God in whose bosom has been birthed the bright hope of sonship answer this one question:  Do any of the before mentioned things minister LIFE?  Does the study of them or the knowing of them cause you to be more filled with the Spirit?  Do they aid you in putting on the mind of Christ?  Do they work deliverance in your life?  Do they transform you into the image of God?  Do they imbue you with divine wisdom, spiritual understanding, righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost?  Do they add an inch or a cubit to your spiritual stature?  Are they Truth, Life-giving Truth, or are they merely things that are true, or may be true, or may not even be true!

My deepest prayer is that the reality and force of this may grip your believing heart!  I cannot over-emphasize the importance for every son of God that our thoughts be His thoughts and that our words be the Father’s words of Spirit and Life.  One of the unmistakable marks of a son is that he speaks as His Father speaks.  The mind that dwelt in that glorious firstborn Son of God was His Father’s mind.  Is that not why He could say, “For I have not spoken of myself; but the Father which sent me, He gave me a commandment, what I should say, and what I should speak.  And I know that His commandment is LIFE everlasting: whatsoever I speak therefore, even as the Father said unto me, so speak I” (Jn. 12:49-50).  How could He do otherwise when the Father’s mind possessed Him!  As we walk in blessed unity of mind and spirit with the Father, the words of our mouths automatically become a river of Life unto all who hear them.

We do not have our heads in the sand, pretending that the horizons are not dark, or that the world has no problems, or that sin and death do not stalk the lands.  But those who walk in the Father’s purpose for this Day are able to distinguish between the voice of man and the voice of God.  You will hear a multitude of voices from both the secular and the religious world in this hour, but the sons of God do not parrot the words of scientists, politicians, economists, ecologists, psychologists,  military leaders, or theologians.  Sons speak only the words of their heavenly Father!  We do not get our revelation of “end-time” events from Newsweek magazine, USA Today, or the Wall Street Journal.  The words spoken by the learned ones of this world hold nothing for me, for I know only and always as I am taught of my Father, and I must speak only the words I hear my Father speaking.

For years preachers warned us that the communists had a plan and time-table for world domination, and we were told that they were ahead of schedule.  What fear this struck into men’s hearts!  But it was not the word of the Lord, it was the word of the communists!  The preachers didn’t take time to hear from God, they just accepted the word of the communists.  So they jumped on the anti-Communist bandwagon and stomped around the country warning God’s people about what the communists were going to do.  But the word of the communists was merely a lying vanity within their own deceitful and wicked hearts.    Finally they came face to face with the power and purpose of the Most High God, and the Lamb overcame them!  And even if they could have been successful in dominating the world for a season, their plans would have been true, but not THE TRUTH. 

Preachers today are just full and running over with information about what Russia is going to do, or China, or the Illuminati, or the Antichrist, or the Common Market, or Saddam Hussein, or somebody else.  The question follows Has GOD revealed those things unto them by the Spirit, or has the knowledge of them been gained from the reports, books, and tapes of men?  You see, if I accept the word of the Illuminati as being true; if I then teach God’s people that this fulfills certain prophecies about an end-time One World Government; if I proceed to show how gun control, oil crisis, economic collapse, martial law, etc. are instruments in the implementation of this One World takeover, then I have accepted the DEVIL’S WORD as Truth and have transformed myself into a messenger of Satan, convincing men that the devil’s word can be counted on, he will surely do all that he says he will do!  I care not one whit about any conspiracy on earth or the aims, plans and goals of any group of men or nations.  Satan is a braggart and a liar.  He is defeated!  This is the LORD’S DAY, the day of victory and triumph, the Day of the unveiling of the Christ, when the kingdoms of this world shall become the kingdoms of our Lord and of His Christ!  The next thing on God’s prophetic schedule, my beloved, is the manifestation of the sons of God! 

In Noah’s day, in Abraham’s day, in Moses’ day, in Elijah’s day, in the days of all the prophets, and in the day when Christ Jesus trod the pathways of earth, it was the man of God who notified the world, by the spirit of revelation from God, of the impending events that would determine the future course of men, kingdoms, and the world.  The prophets didn’t get their information from the counsels of men, rather, the counsels of men received a word through the prophets from almighty God who rules in the heavens and in the earth.  In our day it is the world that is feeding the information to the preachers about what is supposed to happen!  If your revelation of events that are going to transpire in this hour at the transition of the ages is dependent upon what comes over the wire services, or what you read in someone's book, then you need a NEW REVELATION!  And if God has not spoken about the events unfolding before our eyes from day to day, then we need not worry about our ignorance of those things.  Our only concern is to hear the voice of our Father, and when He sends us light, that we receive it and walk in it.  The words of God are always Spirit and Life and by them we are quickened to those things which are above, where Christ sits at the right hand of God.  About many things happening in the world I confess that I know very little, but my heart sings a thousand hallelujahs, for I do know that this earth in God’s good grace is yet to see a whole race of sons of God begotten by the Holy Spirit in the extremity of the age, and the wonderful life of Jesus Christ shall flow out from the throne of God within their innermost beings as mighty surging torrents of Life-giving water in those blest days that lie just before us.  This word I have received of my Father!

THEY SHALL NOT CLEAVE  TO ONE ANOTHER

Let us now examine more closely the prophecy of Daniel 2:43.  There are two important statements in this prophecy concerning the final stage of the Roman empire, the ten toes.  Of them Daniel says, “And whereas thou sawest iron mixed with miry clay,

1.  They shall mingle themselves with the seed of men:

2.  But they shall NOT CLEAVE one to another, even as iron is not mixed with clay.”

Hear it!  “They shall NOT cleave one to another!”  This reference is to the ten divisions of the old Roman empire which remain with us unto this day in the nations of modern Europe.  But if these ten toes must yet be formed into the superstructure of a World Empire of Antichrist, where is the signification of that COMING WORLD GOVERNMENT?  Daniel revealed that there would be four great World Empires of man.  The fourth would be divided into ten parts, brought into a condition of fragmentation.  Then, in the days of those kings, in their weakness and fragmentation, the God of heaven would set up a Kingdom which shall never be destroyed.  If there is to be a World Government here at the end of the age, then God left something  out!  The Holy Spirit was wrong!  The word of God was missing something!  There was an oversight on His part!  Perhaps there really was to be a FIFTH WORLD GOVERNMENT in between the fourth World Empire and the Kingdom of God but in His haste to reveal to king Nebuchadnezzar the plan of the ages God momentarily overlooked that fifth kingdom!

Perhaps one of the most astonishing features of this prophecy is the declaration that the Roman kingdom would be the last not the last of four but the last of all, the end of man’s political domination of earth through World Empire.  How could Daniel have known that no other kingdom would ever rise to world dominion?  It would have been but the natural supposition that since the Babylonians would give way to the Medes and Persians, and they in turn would fall before the Greeks, who, in course of time would surrender their scepter to the Romans that, at length, when the Romans ceased to dominate the world, that surely another great warrior-conqueror would rise on the horizon who would gather in his hands the reins of power, and forge a new World Empire, perhaps stronger than any in previous history.  How has the continent of Europe, for nearly two millenniums, escaped unification?  Everything in Europe seems to call for it; great men and mighty armies have tried to accomplish it; yet history testifies to the futility of every effort.  Had Daniel written out of his own imagination, why should he have stopped at four in predicting coming empires in Europe and Asia?  Why not fourteen? or forty?  Because only God rules over the nations and controls human destiny!  Ah, God almighty has a controversy with the statesmen and leaders of this world who dream of a United Europe and a New World Order.  They should know that the future is not Europe nor a world based on it.  All attempts to reconstitute the Kingdom of Iron will not succeed.  Europe is no longer the Kingdom of Iron, it is now a mixture of iron and clay in divided form, a conglomeration of peoples culturally, ethnically, linguistically, and religiously different, and because of its inherent weaknesses can never again be the Kingdom of Iron.

Furthermore, if these ten toes were to be united into a fifth World Empire, they would have to be symbolically joined together in a sort of webfoot.  Men do not have web feet, and this image of Daniel being the image of a man, therefore signifies no joining of the toes.  If God had wished to give such a signification, He would necessarily have given Nebuchadnezzar a dream of an aquatic animal, such as a muskrat.  He did no such thing.  Furthermore, if there were to be this union of the Empire of the Toes, then Daniel, in his explanation of the vision, surely would have said something about it.  Instead, he stated the exact opposite: in speaking of those toes he said, “but they shall not cleave one to another, even as iron is not mixed with clay.”  If these toes still have to be joined to form a kingdom for the Antichrist to rule, then they must cleave one to another, and that would make Daniel a false prophet.  I leave my readers to judge who are false: Daniel, or those who contradict him and thus contradict the Word of God.

With Rome fell the last of the world’s universal empires.  Heretofore it was possible for one nation, rising superior to its neighbors in prowess, bravery, and the science of war, to consolidate them into one vast empire.  But when the Kingdom of Iron passed away, such possibilities forever passed away!  The iron was fragmented and then mixed with clay, and lost the power of cohesion.  No man or combination of men can again consolidate the fragments as a power over  the earth.  No other human empire was to succeed it, as had the three which went before it.  It was to continue, in this ten-fold division, until the Kingdom of the Stone smote it upon its feet, broke them in pieces, ground them to powder, and scattered them as the wind does the chaff of the summer threshing floor!

In the afterglow of a thousand battlefields, in the shattered dreams of would-be world conquerors, in the light of two world wars, the words stand invincibly true... “they shall mingle themselves with the seed of men: but they shall not cleave one to another, even as iron is not mixed with clay.”

CHARLEMAGNE TRIES IT

In A.D. 800 Charlemagne was crowned Holy Roman Emperor.  Voltaire, an able French writer and intellectual, observed wittily and sarcastically that while the coronation had plenty of pomp associated with it, as for the empire, it was “neither holy, nor Roman, nor an empire.”  Charlemagne grasped for world empire, came close, then found himself defeated by the words of the great God: “They shall mingle themselves with the seed of men: but they shall not cleave one to another, even as iron is not mixed with clay.”

LOUIS XIV TRIES IT

Louis the Fourteenth was a vain and pompous Frenchman.  He sent his armies into Holland and the Low Countries, to no avail.  At death, he too, had failed.  Before him, Charles the Fifth had marched his armies across much of Europe, then found himself unable to achieve world empire.  The words still stood: “They shall mingle themselves with the seed of men: but they shall not cleave one to another, even as iron is not mixed with clay.”

NAPOLEON TRIES IT

From the ashes of the French Revolution arose Napoleon Bonaparte.  “I will tear the heart out of glory,” he promised a friend. The supreme object of Napoleon’s life was to get the Roman empire together again, and he very nearly did it.  Christian people told Napoleon that he was the “beast” and he was flattered.   In Marengo, Ulm, and Austerlitz everywhere Napoleon’s armies were victorious.  Then came the invasion of Russia.  Due to a set of circumstances Napoleon made a fateful decision.  He would return to France.  The retreat that followed was the most disastrous of all history.  Literally hundreds of thousands of soldiers fell in the ice and snow as the coldest winter of Russian history struck.  Napoleon was captured, and escaped, and returning to France rallied his troops for one last great effort to unite the nations of earth under his control.  June 15, 1815, as the sun sank on the third day of the Battle of Waterloo, Napoleon’s career sank with it.  In captivity Napoleon wrote his memoirs.  And he gave what he felt was the reason for his failure: “God almighty has been too much for me!”

 “They shall mingle themselves with the seed of men: but they shall not cleave one to another, even as iron is not mixed with clay.”

KAISER WILHELM TRIES IT

For decades prior to the outbreak of World War I, the world had been at peace.  Men anticipated the Golden Age.  On the fateful night when the ultimatum delivered by the British empire to the Kaiser had been rejected, Sir Edward Grey stood with his military aide looking out over the London skyline.  It was late.  Lights in the buildings of the city were winking and going out.  Pondering the implications of the outbreak of the first World War, Grey turned to his aide and said, “The lamps are going out all over Europe.  We shall not see them lit again in our lifetime.”

Kaiser Wilhelm’s armies met Allied forces in No Man’s Land in France.  For a time it appeared victory would be his.  The horror of trench fighting had demoralized the Allied armies.  Then came the battle of the Marne.  From every standpoint, German armies should have been victorious.  But up and down Allied battle lines the slogan went, “They shall not pass.”  Victory went to the Allied armies!  Before the war was over 60,000,000 casualties had been sustained on the land, in the sea, and in the air.  Armistice day came.  Kaiser Wilhelm had failed as had all the others before him. He too, had come face to face with the words of our God: “They shall mingle themselves with the seed of men: but they shall not cleave one to another, even as iron is not mixed with clay.”

HITLER TRIES IT

In the 1930’s, fed by the injustice of the Versailles Treaty, the storm clouds of war began to gather.  September 5, 1939, Hitler’s panzer divisions swept through flimsy barriers that separated Poland and Germany.  World War II had begun.  Unstable and mercurial, Hitler deceived and misled the Germans, a people with a proud and ancient heritage.  He sought absolute power for himself.  He held out the promise of a thousand-year Reich.

Five weeks, and Poland was defeated.  The Low Countries were quickly conquered too, with Blitzkrieg, a new lightning war technique that utilized the mightiest mechanized army the world had ever seen.  Bypassing France’s “invincible” Maginot Line, Hitler plunged through France to Dunkirk.  Military experts gave England a few weeks at the most a few months before she too would be crushed beneath Hitler’s mighty military machine.  Nazi armies at that point seemed to be unstoppable.  But Dunkirk was a turning point.  For when the picture appeared hopeless and the logical course for Britain to follow was surrender, Winston Churchill, British prime minister, announced the course England would take: “We shall go on to the end, we shall fight in France, we shall fight in the seas and oceans, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender.”

Had Hitler at this point launched a massive invasion of England with paratroops and air cover supporting, there is little question the British Isles would have fallen.  Possibly, eventually, the whole world.  But curiously he did not.  He was sure England would sue for peace.  So he waited for an event that never came.  Then, too late, after England along with refugee troops from Europe had had opportunity to rally, Hitler launched the  Battle of Britain.  Hitler invaded Russia, making the same mistake of Napoleon before him.  Later came D-Day, June 6, 1944, and the invasion of continental Europe by the Allies.  Hitler is believed to have died a suicide in a Berlin Bunker.  Like military leaders before him who had dreamed of world conquest, Hitler was defeated.  But he was not defeated by military might this he had in super-abundance.  Rather, it was the fateful words of our never-failing God that doomed him to failure: “And whereas thou sawest iron mixed with miry clay, they shall mingle themselves with the seed of men: but they shall not cleave one to another, even as iron is not mixed with clay.”

Hallelujah!  The Lord God omnipotent reigneth!  Next month we will consider the Kingdom of Stone.

 


Chapter 52

THE INCREASE OF THE KINGDOM

(continued)

Millenniums ago ancient prophets beheld in spirit the scroll of history, prophesied the rise and fall of world empires, revealed the frantic efforts for world domination, and finally outlined clearly and unmistakably the last great world empire of all.  The Spirit of God has revealed the course of human history today.  He shows the ultimate outcome of the efforts by mortal men to resolve their differences and live peacefully, every man beneath his own fig tree and by his own vineyard.   

The unfailing promise of God is, “Surely the Lord God will do nothing, but He revealeth His secret unto His servants the prophets” (Amos 3:7).  God has not left His people in darkness about the future.  God is in control!  In the annals of human history the rise and fall of empires appear to be dependent upon the will and power of man.  But by the word of God the curtain is drawn aside, and we behold, behind, above, and through all the play and counter play of human interests and power and passions, the workings of the great God, silently, patiently working out His own purpose and will.

In the days of Daniel the prophet, Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, had a dream in the night.  He awoke disturbed and perplexed because he knew the dream was significant, but he could not remember any of it!  The king called the magicians, astrologers, and sorcerers, all the wise men of Babylon, but none was able to tell him his dream or give the interpretation.  When Daniel received news of this, he requested an audience with the king.  King Nebuchadnezzar’s question to Daniel was to the point: “Are you able to make known to me the dream which I have seen and the interpretation of it?”  Daniel answered the king, “The secret which the king has demanded neither the wise men, enchanters, magicians, nor astrologers can show the king; but there is a God in heaven who revealeth secrets, and He has made known to king Nebuchadnezzar what it is that shall be in the latter days at the end of days.  Your dream and the visions of your bed are these...” (Dan. 2:26-28, Amplified).

And then came the dream, one of the most dramatic revelations of all history, in which God outlined the rise and fall of global empires, moved beyond to our day and its efforts toward a New World Order, on to the setting up of earth’s last great world empire.  “God...has made known to king Nebuchadnezzar what it is that shall be in the latter days...thou, O king, sawest, and behold a great image.  This great image, whose brightness was excellent, stood before thee; and the form thereof was terrible.  This image’s head was of fine gold, his breast and his arms of silver, his belly and his thighs of brass, his legs of iron, his feet part of iron and part of clay.  Thou sawest till that a stone was cut out without hands, which smote the image upon his feet, that were of iron and clay, and brake them to pieces.  Then was the iron, the clay, the brass, the silver, and the gold, broken to pieces together, and became like the chaff of the summer threshing floors; and the wind carried them away, that no place was found for them: and the stone that smote the image became a great mountain, and filled the whole earth.  This is the dream; and we will tell the interpretation thereof to the king” (Dan. 2:28, 31-36).

With what interest and astonishment must the king have listened as Daniel began his interpretation of the dream and informed the king that his own kingdom was the golden head of that magnificent image.  Gold, the king of metals, represented the Babylonian empire.  Daniel informed the king that the God of heaven had given him his kingdom, and made him ruler over all.  But the empire of Babylon was not to last forever.  It was to give way to another.  The breasts and arms of silver represented the Medo-Persian empire which overthrew the kingdom of Babylon.  Great as was the Medo-Persian empire, it too, was to topple.  It was succeeded by the Grecian empire.  The fourth and final empire to arise and dominate the whole of the civilized world was Rome.  Of this fourth kingdom Daniel said, “And whereas thou sawest the feet and toes, part of potters clay, and part of iron, the kingdom SHALL BE DIVIDED; but there shall be in it of the strength of the iron, forasmuch as thou sawest the iron mixed with miry clay.  And as the toes of the feet were part of iron, and part of clay, so the kingdom SHALL BE PARTLY STRONG AND PARTLY BROKEN” (Dan. 2:41-42).

The brokenness spoke of division.  Ten kingdoms, represented by the ten toes, were to emerge.  The earth was never again to see the cohesive strength of the Roman empire welded into the superstructure of one great World Empire.  For Daniel, in one of the most significant prophecies of all time, declared, “And whereas thou sawest iron mixed with miry clay, they (the ten toes) shall mingle themselves with the seed of men: but they shall not cleave one to another, even as iron is not mixed with clay” (Dan. 2:43).  It is important that we drink very deeply of these words of the prophet, for in them is contained the KEY to, and the UNDERSTANDING of events that shall unfold in this our day!

Hear it!  “They shall NOT cleave one to another!”  This reference is to the toes of the image, the ten divisions of the old Roman empire which remain with us unto this day in the nations of modern Europe.  But if, as some say, these ten toes must yet be formed into the super-structure of a World Empire of Antichrist, where is the signification of that COMING WORLD GOVERNMENT?  Daniel revealed that there would be but FOUR great World Empires of man.  The fourth would exist first in two parts (the two legs), as East and West, and finally would be divided into ten parts, brought into a condition of fragmentation and weakness.  Then, in the days of those kings, at the time of the ten toes of iron mixed with clay, in their fragmentation and weakness, the God of heaven would set up a Kingdom which shall never be destroyed!  If there is to be a World Government of the ten toes here at the end of the age then God left something out!  God was wrong! There was an oversight on His part!  Perhaps there really was to be a FIFTH WORLD GOVERNMENT in between the fourth world empire and the Kingdom of God but in His haste to reveal to Nebuchadnezzar the plan of the ages God momentarily overlooked that fifth kingdom!

Time and again men have dreamed of rearing on these ten fragments of the fourth kingdom ONE mighty empire.  A single verse of scripture was stronger than all their hosts... “Partly strong, and partly broken,” was the prophetic description.  And this is exactly the history of these ten kingdoms!  “They shall NOT cleave together!” God announced.  And yet men have tried to mold them together.  And men of God, who ought to know better, predict that they shall unite and form a Fifth World Empire a World Government in our time!  “This shall not be,” says the word of God.  “This has not been,” replies the book of history.

But in the light of history’s dramatic chapters and the current move toward a united Europe a UNITED STATES OF EUROPE what of the future?  Will the elusive mirage of world peace based on the foundation of European solidarity, the result of wishful thinking, again cause men to forget the counsel of the word of God?  “They shall not cleave one to another!”  Ah, alliances may come, as they have for brief periods in the past, even some strong-man may arise, and it may appear that the iron and the miry clay of the feet and toes have finally fused to again dominate the world, but the word of God standeth sure: “They shall not cleave one to another!”  It may seem that old animosities have disappeared and that the “ten kings” have truly become one, but I must assure you that “the scripture cannot be broken” (Jn. 10:35).

What further proof of divine inspiration need anyone than these words of the Lord: “They shall mingle themselves with the seed of men: but they shall not cleave one to another.”  Everyone who knows the history of Europe knows that for generations and centuries the royal seed of these nations intermarried and mingled to foster unity, but the result was always the same they never could cleave together!  And neither can they now.  In the year 1957 the European Economic Community (Common Market) was created under the Treaty of Rome.  This is the latest, perhaps final, effort to unite the ten toes that cannot cleave together, and thus revive in some form, by a United States of Europe, the old Roman empire.  This, too, is ultimately doomed to failure no matter how promising it appears at the present time.  Even now all is not peace and harmony within the European Union.  A struggle for unity and direction has become increasingly tense.  Germany and France insist on a strong central government.   Luxembourg, Belgium, and The Netherlands, wedged between the two giants, are forced to join the two stronger powers.  Denmark has been a reluctant participant, fearing the Catholic Church.  England has been reticent from the beginning to surrender sovereignty to a strong central union.  Spain and Italy have at times sided with England.  Greece, Iceland, and Portugal are going along for the ride.  I do not say there will not be some kind of European unity.  There have been in the past for short periods of time, only to be violently broken apart by age-old resentments, mis-trust, and hostilities.   But I can prophesy this: Should such a union materialize for a season it will NOT be a world empire, neither will it last!

When the Soviet Union collapsed, some observers thought they heard its crumbling superstructure sputtering out promises of a new world order a grand new era of peace, cooperation and easing of international tensions.  The tearing down of the Berlin Wall, a precursor of the Soviet breakup, became a symbol of fresh winds of freedom and hope blowing over the European continent. Winds, it was proposed, that would blow goodwill and understanding around the world!  As we look honestly at today’s rapidly changing political world, I doubt that most people are being deceived into believing that some wonderful new era of man-made peace is developing.  It is other winds, renewed dark winds of long-standing hatred and religious and economic confrontation, that have all but devastated the idea of a new world order.  The end of the Cold War between the former Soviet Union and the West is leading to far-reaching consequences.  The shape of the world is changing.  New power blocs are emerging.  Frightening scenarios of economic upheaval, intensified regional armed conflict dividing the interests of the super-powers, more starving populations and ecological disaster loom on the horizon.  Once again the almighty Lord is setting the stage to show the immutability of His word “They shall mingle themselves with the seed of men: but they shall not cleave one to another, even as iron is not mixed with clay.”

THE COMING WORLD EMPIRE

The awe-inspiring vision of Nebuchadnezzar did not end with the vision of the feet and toes of iron and clay.  The greatest event of all was yet to come, for he saw a stone cut out of a mountain without hands which smote the image on its unsteady feet.  The blow fell upon the feet because they represent the ruling power at the time of the end when these events take place and the vision is fulfilled.  The moment that blow was struck by the stone from the mountain, the whole Babylonish system fell and crumbled to dust beneath its own weight.  It became like the dust of a summer threshing-floor and the wind blew it away.  Then the little stone cut from a mountain itself became a great mountain and filled the whole earth (Dan. 2:35, 44-45).  This, of course, is the beginning of the Kingdom of God over the nations which will eventually fill the whole earth!

 That Daniel should have thus so accurately and precisely foretold the past two thousand  five hundred years of world history is convincing proof that we have in his writings a divine revelation, and it demands that we expect the due fulfillment of the rest of his forecast.  We are bound to expect the sudden and dramatic overthrow of all the nations that have emerged out of the old Roman empire by a heaven-sent power, the “stone cut out without hands,” which smites the image, grinds it to powder, blots it out of existence, takes its place and then rapidly increases and fills the whole earth, not merely with the gospel of salvation, but with the GOVERNMENTAL RULE OF THE KINGDOM OF GOD OVER THE NATIONS.

Some have imagined that this was fulfilled in the days of Christ and the early church as the apostles and disciples went forth proclaiming the name of Jesus and the Kingdom of God, triumphing at last over the pagan religions and gods of the Roman world.  But it is clear that this stone cut out without hands has nothing to do with that.  In the first place, the stone falls on the feet of the image. Now you will observe that the stone did not fall on the head, nor on the breast, nor on the belly, nor on the legs, but on the feet of iron and clay it was upon the feet that the stone fell!  This helps wonderfully to identify the stage of world history when the stone is cut out of the mountain without hands and smites the image.  The ten toes, representing the ultimate fragmentation of the Roman empire, did not even exist in the days of Christ or the early church!  Christ came and the church grew from one hundred twenty souls into millions in the time of the undivided imperial strength (the iron kingdom), not after its decay and division (iron and clay mixed).  Christianity had already been established for centuries, as the religion of the Roman empire, before the state of things symbolized by the ten toes of iron and clay arose.  The “days of these kings” were not yet come.  The hordes of barbarians from the north and the east had not poured into the empire and broken it up.  You see, the church came before the legs were fully formed.  The church came and triumphed over the pagan religions and gods of the Roman empire.  The church began and triumphed, not in the days of the toes, but in the days of the loins of the image.  The church did not destroy human government, and then take its place.  The church has been growing alongside of human government for two thousand years.  No, the stone is not the advent of Jesus two thousand years ago, nor is it the church!

 In addition to this, the destruction of the image is attributed to the sudden fall of the stone, not to its gradual expansion into a great mountain that fills the whole earth.  Nothing whatever answering to the crushing, destructive fall of the stone came upon the Roman empire at that time.  The Roman empire barely knew that a man called Jesus had walked upon earth.  The growth and development of the stone into a mountain does not even begin till the image has been struck by the stone, broken to pieces, ground to powder, and blown away like the chaff of the summer threshing-floor!  The stone will fall on the feet of the image.  Earthly politics will then crumble forever into dust.  Empires, monarchies, republics, and democracies alike, the iron and the clay, will disappear from man’s experience upon this earth and the Lord shall be King over all the earth, and alone be exalted in that Day.  The gospel of salvation preached among all nations for the past two millenniums has never destroyed the civil powers of human government; to the contrary, the church systems have ridden upon the back of the civil powers as a gaudy harlot riding the beast (Rev. 17:3).  But what we have in Nebuchadnezzar’s wonderful dream of the stone smiting the image is that there comes a power that sets aside every human empire and government, and then is introduced the rule of the Kingdom of God over every dimension and institution of national life.  In fact, even the residual influence of human government in culture, politics, government, judicial systems, social orders, philosophy, education, science, art, religion and all other realms shall be smashed to smithereens, ground to powder that the wind (spirit) drives away the whole thing disappears to be remembered no more!

God’s own nation on earth must take up the scepter.  This Kingdom SHALL NEVER BE DESTROYED!  “Never” covers a long time.  This Kingdom of God “shall not be left to other people.” The four preceding kingdoms were left to others.  Babylon became a prey to Medo-Persia, which in turn was seized and held by Greece, which in turn was left to Rome to subject and dominate.  Rome has fallen into its fragments  which in due course shall be subjected to the rule of the saints of the Most High.  It is God’s Kingdom which must “break in pieces and CONSUME A-L-L these kingdoms, and it shall stand forever!” (Dan. 2:44).  Furthermore, this is no fiction or fairy tale: this is history in the making.  “The dream is certain and the interpretation thereof sure” (Dan. 2:45).

As the fourth kingdom, the Roman empire, was represented in a two-fold state, first strong and flourishing, “with legs of iron,” and then weakened and divided, “with feet and toes, part of iron and part of clay,” so this fifth kingdom, or Christ’s Kingdom on earth, is likewise described in two states.  But while Rome passes from strength to weakness, from iron to iron mixed with miry clay, the fifth kingdom begins small, merely a stone, and advances to become a great mountain.  First it is cut out of a mountain to become the kingdom of a stone.  The final phase is when itself becomes a mountain, larger and greater than the mountain it was cut from, “and filled the whole earth.”  There is ANOTHER KINGDOM coming!  It is the Kingdom of the Stone, and yet it is not another kingdom, but another stage of the same Kingdom of God.  It is the Kingdom of the LIVING STONE!  It is the Kingdom of God in His sons!  It is not made with hands it is not of man’s doing.  It is cut from the mountain of the house of the Lord (Micah 4:1).  It shall roll irresistibly forth from the mountain (kingdom) of the Lord’s house (the true church), smiting the feeble feet of the great image, leaving it in ruins, and as the chaff of the summer threshing-floor the wind (spirit) shall carry it away that it shall be no more.  Thus will the kingdoms of this world become the kingdoms of our Lord and of His Christ, and we shall reign unto the ages of the ages.  Hallelujah!

 The great majority of commentators have missed the truth here, assuming this stone to be Jesus Christ, when God says it is A KINGDOM.  The text does not state that God sets up the Christ, who shall never be destroyed, as beautiful as that fact is.  Furthermore, in verse 45 we find this stone “cut out of a mountain.”  Jesus was not cut out of a mountain.  But this fifth kingdom was cut out of a mountain.  And the next verse definitely states that this kingdom is set up by God “in the days of these kings,” that is, in the days of the kingdoms of the toes.  The ten toes did not even exist when Jesus came!  Rome was not even in its “feet” stage at that time.  And the stone smites the feet!

I do not deny that there is a Kingdom of God in the world today.  The Kingdom of God has been here among the Lord’s people ever since Jesus came and brought it.  If a man has been born again, he has been delivered out of the power of darkness, and translated or transferred into the Kingdom of God’s dear Son, submitting to the will of God in the Spirit as supreme.  And yet this Kingdom is as a mountain in the earth co-existing with the image of Nebuchadnezzar.  The Kingdom of God in the earth is one kingdom among all the kingdoms of men, one mountain among all the majestic peaks of human government.  But this present “mountain” form of the Kingdom is not the one that shall smite the image and break it to pieces and utterly destroy and replace it.  A stone must be cut out of this mountain without hands, by the sovereign move and work of God, and it is the stone that smites the image!  The stone destroys all human government!  Only then does the stone begin to grow and become a mountain so great and mighty and immense and boundless and all-consuming not a little mountain co-existing with the image, but a great mountain that fills the whole earth!  Ah, can you not see it, my beloved?  There are TWO MOUNTAINS AND A STONE.  The stone is cut out of the first mountain, and the stone becomes the second mountain.  The first mountain is a small mountain, the second mountain fills (dominates) the whole earth!  The first mountain exists “in the days of these kings.”  The second mountain only materializes after the image of human government has completely passed away!  The stone and the two mountains are different forms or stages of the Kingdom of God in the earth!

The apostle Peter, when writing to the church, says, “But ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, AN HOLY NATION, a peculiar people...”  (I Pet. 2:9).  He calls the church a nation.  He also calls the members of the church a race, for the word “generation” is from the Greek GENEA which means “race.”  The Amplified Bible renders this, “But ye are a chosen race.” Nations are generally built up after ethnic lines.  The church is both a race and a nation because it is composed of people who have been born of God!  God is thus the head of an entirely new ethnic entity which is heavenly in its origin!  Born again, born of the Spirit!  The off-spring of God!  And God has formed this new race of men under His government, making them a nation.  It is God’s nation.  He is the King over this people.  And in the scriptures mountains are used to denote kingdoms or nations.  So when we read in Daniel 2:45 of a stone CUT OUT OF A MOUNTAIN, it is a stone, a force, a power cut out of a kingdom out of a nation!  And that nation, or mountain, is GOD’S CHURCH!  The stone is, therefore, the many-membered Christ of God, the overcomers out of the church age who form His divine government for the nations  the sons of God!  The Hebrew word for “stone” is EBEN, taken from the root word BANAH, which means “to build”.  The Hebrew word for “son” is BEN, also derived from the root word BANAH.  Thus, in the Hebrew language the association between “stone” and “son” is clearly established.  The stone is the sons!

The stone is the corporate Christ, the body of sons.  It is the body of Christ, which we are, united with Christ the Head.  Our spiritual maturity and union with Christ make us the stone of Daniel’s prophecy.  And this anointed body of Christ is now ready to smite the image, man’s systems and governments, the remnants and residue of the fourth kingdom of Rome lingering in the modern institutions and nations of the industrialized West, breaking it into pieces.  This will begin to happen when the body of Christ steps forth into the full expression of Christ’s immortality and omnipotence at the manifestation of the sons of God.  This manifestation is not afar off, beloved, it is even at the door!  That mighty stone, which is this glorious Christ company, including the Head and the body, shall smite the image, representing man’s governments and systems, by the power of the fullness of the Spirit of Sonship.  It will be the mighty spiritual manifestation of the glory of God!  It will be the power of God of which Pentecost was but a foretaste, a sampling, the appetizer!  This will be the balance of the meal the fullness of the Feast of Tabernacles!  In due time, all those bits and pieces of man’s corrupt and fallen systems shall become like chaff to be carried away by the wind of the Spirit, leaving no place on earth for any of them.  And that stone shall become a great mountain or kingdom that shall fill the whole earth, not with laws, rules, force, or coercion, but with the eternal glory and transforming life of Christ.

Even now that stone is being fashioned and formed, chiseled and cut out of the mountain without hands, by the sovereign dealings and work of God in the elect members of His body.  We are truly members of our Father’s glorious Christ!  According to the prophecy of Daniel we are gods, sons, lords and kings in union with Jesus the Christ.  I find myself too limited to set forth this truth as I should do, but king Nebuchadnezzar’s heart was pierced by these sacred words when Daniel interpreted the king’s dream by the spirit of revelation from God.  Hear the words of the king in response to the mysteries opened up to him in that awesome hour: “Of a truth it is, that your God is a God of gods, and a Lord of kings, and a revealer of secrets, seeing thou couldest reveal this secret” (Dan. 2:47).  What a word!  Our God is a God of gods, and a Lord of kings.  Now it naturally follows that we are those “gods” of whom Yahwey is the chief God, and we are those “kings” of whom Yahweh is the Lord!

The elect of God are beyond doubt a very special people, members in particular of the body of Christ, called and chosen unto a divine and supernatural calling.  They are a people hand picked for sonship from the teeming multitudes of redeemed men and women.  They are few in number, for they are but a small stone cut out of a great mountain.  They are chosen by the sovereign purpose of God and refined in the furnace of affliction.  They have welcomed Father’s call and have stripped for the race.  They have girded up their loins with truth.  They have laid aside every weight and the sin which doth so easily beset the human frame.  They have pressed toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.  They are fashioned in the heights of the mountain of the Lord.  They are destined for full sonship in Him.  They have counted every dear and precious thing of earth but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus their Lord.  Christ has become all in all to them.  They have brought into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ, and He is high and lifted up within them.  They love Him first and foremost, and all other men they love-in Him.

We have thus become the mighty Stone of Christ that is ready to smite the image.  The hour is at hand when this mighty Stone of Christ will bring down all the carnal, worldly systems of man, replacing them with the righteous and just and beneficent Kingdom of God in all the earth.  Whenever we turn away from the religious doctrines, traditions, ceremonies and orders of the church systems of man to embrace completely the truth, life, maturity, mind, will, power, and authority of the Spirit of the Son in our hearts, we thus enforce the mighty, kingdom Stone of Christ.  Whenever we reject the will of man, the ways of the flesh, the systems of the world, and the religious principles derived from eating the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and seek to do only and always the will of the Father in the earth, we thus enforce the mighty Stone of Christ.  When we cease eating of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil after the rules, laws, and doctrines of the religious systems of man, and begin to eat of the tree of Life by the Spirit, we receive the greater wisdom of the mind of Christ and transformation into His image by the spirit of His Life working within.  We then become partakers of Him who shall feed the peoples of the nations, and impart to them the Life that He is.

This mighty and glorious Stone of Christ is taking form as it is chiseled out of the mountain without the aid of any of man’s works or religion’s methods.  It is cut out of the mountain without hands!  Oh, the wonder of it!  Thousands who now read these lines can testify to the fact that it is the Lord Himself who has revealed Himself and these truths to their hearts, and who has directed their steps, ordained their path, and brought forth His dealings in their lives to conform them to the image of God’s Son.  Only the work of the eternal Spirit within their hearts has purged, purified, refined, delivered, changed, enlightened, transformed and empowered them to do nothing but the absolute and perfect will of their Father.  Because we have come before Him declaring our solemn purpose and intention of submitting to every one of His dealings in our lives to make us His sons, we see that the Lord is taking away the former order of things and preparing our minds, hearts, and bodies for the fullness of His resurrection life, glory, wisdom and power.  We are being readied for the great fall down the side of the mountain which shall bring the more glorious order of the Kingdom of God upon the nations of the earth.  How marvelous is this day and Father’s sovereign, omnipotent purpose for it!

The same analogy of the stone cut out of the mountain is drawn in John’s vision of a woman bringing forth a manchild in chapter twelve of the Revelation.  The woman is the church.  The manchild, born out of the woman, is that company of God’s overcoming sons who are to “rule all nations with a rod of iron” (Rev. 12:5).  Thus, the woman of Revelation twelve, and the mountain from which the stone is cut, ARE ONE AND THE SAME God’s church!  The manchild out of the woman and the stone out of the mountain refer to the same company that is also the 144,000 overcoming sons of God who come with the Lamb upon mount Zion to reign!  Immediately following the marvelous description of the 144,000 sons of God in chapter fourteen of Revelation, John sees an angel flying through the mid-heaven crying, “Babylon is fallen, is fallen!”  The remainder of the chapter symbolically portrays the process of the destruction of this Babylonish system by the stone which was cut out of the mountain without hands!

Can we not see by this that the manchild out of the woman, the overcomers out of the seven churches, the 144,000 symbolically out of the tribes of Israel, and the stone cut out of the mountain all bespeak of the same company.  Of the manchild it is written, “And she brought forth a manchild, who was to rule all nations with a rod of iron” (Rev. 12:5).  Of the overcomers the record states, “And he that overcometh...to him will I give power over the nations: and he shall rule them with a rod of iron; as the vessels of a potter shall they be broken to shivers” (Rev. 2:26-27). In Revelation, chapter 14, the 144,000 come up on mount Zion, the symbol of kingship and dominion, where typically king David ruled gloriously over the kingdom of Israel.  Daniel says of the stone, “And in the days of these kings shall the God of heaven set up a kingdom, which shall never be destroyed: and the kingdom shall not be left to other people, but it shall break in pieces and consume all these kingdoms, and it shall stand forever.  Forasmuch as thou sawest that the stone was cut out of the mountain without hands, and that it brake in pieces the iron, the brass, the clay, the silver, and the gold; the great God hath made known to the king what shall come to pass hereafter; and the dream is certain, and the interpretation thereof sure” (Dan. 2:44-45).

So the stone rules and breaks in pieces all these kingdoms.  The overcomers rule and break the nations into shivers.  The 144,000 rule from the dominion of mount Zion.  The manchild rules all nations with a rod of iron.  And each of these “comes out” of something else — out of a larger group of God’s people!  They all fulfill the same function smashing the kingdoms of this world and bringing the Kingdom of God to pass over the nations of earth!  This, precious friend of mine, is GOD’S GOVERNMENT.  And this is the NEXT WORLD GOVERNMENT!  After Rome, the NEXT WORLD EMPIRE IS THE KINGDOM OF GOD!  Hallelu-yah!

Is there not joy in your heart to think that the One who came, and had nothing but a borrowed cradle, a cross built for a criminal, and another man’s tomb I say, is there not joy unspeakable and full of glory in your heart today that God is going to establish His Kingdom over ALL?  I freely confess it is a great joy to me, and I am blessed with the sacred knowledge that we are sharers of His glory, we are called to sit with Him on His throne and reign with Him in His Kingdom, and we are glad to the full because it is the Day of the exaltation of our Lord Jesus Christ as King over the nations and Lord over all.  At the present moment, when I think of God’s dealings with men, I learn this, that “grace reigns through righteousness unto eternal life”  (Rom. 8:21) it is divine grace upon a righteous basis that saves men today.  But in that glorious age now at hand “Behold, a king shall reign in righteousness, and princes shall rule in judgment” (Isa. 32:1) — there righteousness reigns and there comes forth a new heaven and a new earth wherein dwelleth righteousness.  Righteousness is perfectly at home, so to speak, there.  It is the Day when righteousness reigns upon the earth through the transforming authority and rule of the sons of God.  The unrighteousness of men, institutions, and nations shall be broken to shivers, ground to powder, and carried away like the chaff of the summer threshing-floor.

Press on, saints of God, for we are on the winning side!  We are on the way up, and the kingdoms of this world are on the way down!  All of the distress and perplexity among the nations today does not indicate the imminent rise of a world dictatorship under Antichrist.    Oh, no!  Rather, it heralds the hour for the final collapse and destruction of this present evil system of things and the victory of God’s glorious Kingdom.  The kingdoms of puny, unregenerated men are growing old and wearing out like a garment.  Democracy is not the greatest form of government ever devised, it is the weakest, the clay mingled with the iron.  It is the rule of the people with unregenerated hearts and uncircumcised minds.  Democracy cannot stand.  Communism cannot stand.  Dictatorships cannot stand.  Kingdoms of men cannot stand.  They are all time-worn and threadbare, faded and dilapidated ready to be discarded like a worn-out garment and replaced by a new order.

The carnal-minded rulers of this world plan for a One World Government, a New World Order of their own making.  But it matters not what the Fabian Socialists or any other group plans don’t you believe for one moment in any scheme that the carnal mind devises!  Just because men plan doesn’t mean they will succeed.  Man that is born of woman is born in sin and shapen in iniquity and because men have sinful natures and dwell in a world where sin with all its sordid evil and wicked deceptions and vain illusions, they craftily devise many inventions, plans and plots, and the vast majority of Christians believe these things.  Man boasts of what he is going to do and all the Christians say, “Amen!” fully expecting it to come to pass.  The confession of many of God’s people corresponds with what the devil is promoting.  Remember, beloved, millenniums ago men were promoting the same ideas.  “And they said, Go to, let us build us a city and a tower, whose top may reach unto heaven; and let us make us a name, lest we be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth” (Gen. 11:4).  But GOD had other plans!  “And the Lord came down to see the city and the tower, which the children of men builded.  And the Lord said, Behold, the people is one, and they have all one language; and this they begin to do: and now nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined to do.  Go to, let us go down, and there confound their language, that they may not understand one another’s speech.  So the Lord scattered them abroad...and they left off to build the city” (Gen. 11:5-8).

The effort to World Government today is just as contrary to the will and word of God as was Babel of old.  And the whole world, including the people of God, must yet again, one more time, come face to face with the word of the Lord: “They shall mingle themselves with the seed of men: but they shall not cleave one to another, even as iron is not mixed with clay.”

The present nations of the earth, and most of the Christians of the world today, will be surprised...shocked...when God steps in again and by His sovereign power derails the well-laid and proud and boastful schemes of the great men of the earth, bringing forth a company of unknown, unrecognized, and unheralded sons of God, the instrument in His hand to establish in the earth HIS OWN WORLD GOVERNMENT!   

God’s word is always true, but it is our meddling with it that makes it awkward and difficult to explain.  The simple truth is just this: “But the saints of the most High shall take the kingdom, and possess the kingdom for ever, even forever and ever...the Ancient of days came, and judgment was given to the SAINTS of the most High: and the time came that the saints possessed the kingdom...and the kingdom and dominion, and the greatness of the kingdom under the whole heaven shall be given to the people of the saints of the most High, whose kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and ALL DOMINIONS SHALL SERVE AND OBEY HIM” (Dan. 7:18, 22, 27).

These saints who take and possess the Kingdom, to whom is given judgment and dominion, are THE STONE OF CHRIST THE COMING WORLD GOVERNMENT!  You have God’s word for it!

 


Chapter 53

THE INCREASE OF THE KINGDOM

(continued)

You won’t find the English word “millennium” in your Bible.  Our English word “millennium” is derived from the Latin word mille, meaning “thousand.”  The Greek equivalent for millennium comes from chilias, meaning “a thousand,” and annus, meaning “year.”   

The only place in the entire Bible where the millennium is mentioned per se is in chapter twenty of the book of Revelation.  Still, this lone passage has built a doctrine and expectation as firm in most minds as that of eternal torment or the rapture!  We are inclined to lightly pass over the fact that the book of Revelation is written in symbolic language, using elaborate figures of speech to convey spiritual truths.  I think this should be obvious to every spiritual mind, but some of our brothers and sisters in Christ try to use the “literal method” of interpretation (the letter rather than the spirit) even within this book of symbols.  A statement like: “The Bible means just what it says and says just what it means!” sounds good, perhaps even spiritual, and often brings some hearty “amens,” but this cannot apply when the Holy Spirit speaks and conveys truth through symbols.  The very nature of a symbol is that it means something else.  Otherwise it would not be a symbol!

In the opening verse of the book of Revelation the beloved John is told that the message of the book would be signified to him.  This word means just what the syllables say: sign-i-fied, that is, communicated to him by means of signs and symbols, in parables, in the typology of numerology, figures of speech, and so forth.  These signs and symbols were not to be taken literally!  For instance, the “lamb” in the midst of the throne is not a four-legged lamb with wool.  The “beast out of the sea” is not some weird pre-historic reptile from Jurassic Park.  The “1260 days” are not twenty-four hour periods.  The “woman” clothed with the sun and in pain to be delivered is not an ordinary female having a baby.  Why should the Holy Spirit suddenly change His style once He nears the end of the book?  Why should it seem strange that the “thousand years” should have a spiritual meaning beyond a literal age lasting for exactly a thousand earth years?  Why should not the angel still be sign-i-fying when He shows John this millennial reign of Christ with His saints?

One brother has well written, “Principles of interpretation are very important.  This is the only passage in the entire Bible which speaks of a ‘thousand years’ period of Christ and His saints reigning.  A single passage such as this, sitting as it is in the midst of all the symbolism of the book of Revelation, should not be used to explain other passages of scripture in the Bible by taking it as having a natural fulfillment instead of being symbolical.  Rather, this passage of scripture should be interpreted in the light and understanding of all the other teachings of the Bible.  Many take this one passage of scripture and try to fit a hundred or more other passages into a supposed meaning of it, thereby distorting the meaning of the many other passages...in this, they do not properly handle nor rightly divide the word of God.”

The chief difficulty is in a literal or carnal or letter of the word understanding of the nature, place, and time of the thousand years.  Most teachers make it an earthly scene, with a physical Jesus reigning on a material throne in the old city of Jerusalem, for a thousand earth years.  I do not expect men to love me for pointing out that the understanding of many who call themselves sons of God has not progressed one whit beyond that of the Baptists, Pentecostals, and other Fundamentalists in these things!  The fact is, the Lord Jesus Christ did not preach even one sermon about the millennium publicly to the multitudes that followed Him, nor did He teach it privately to His disciples, either before or after His death and resurrection.  Think about it He was completely silent on this now popular doctrine!  The apostles, in their epistles, are likewise silent on the subject of a thousand year reign of Christ.  The Holy Spirit did show them “things to come,” but a thousand year kingdom was never proclaimed as one of those things.

 Now, don’t misunderstand me!  I do not say that the next age of the Kingdom of God will not last for one thousand years.  It may.  Or, it may not.  I will not debate the point with any man. What I am saying is just this: Of all the wealth of scripture truth nothing is more certain or clear than the great truth that the book of Revelation is a symbolic and spiritual book.  Can we not see by this that the spiritual meaning of “a thousand years” is something higher and grander by far than a mere time period or number of years?  There is no value whatever in the letter of the Word.  It is when a man begins to see the spirit of the Word that truth and reality are quickened as life within.  My spirit rejoices today in thankfulness to my Father in heaven for that divine, eternal, life-giving wisdom which is the secret of His own heart.

In Bible usage, one thousand is a round, indefinite number.  Psalm 50:10 states, “Every beast of the forest is mine, and the cattle on a thousand hills.”  Does that mean only a thousand?  Or are all the cattle and all the hills His?  In like manner, does the Kingdom of Christ last a thousand years, or does it stand forever?  Do the sons of God reign with Christ for a thousand years, or do they reign throughout all ages until God is all in all?  Is the Kingdom really an age of a thousand years?  “God keeps covenant and mercy unto a thousand generations,” says the prophet (Deut. 7:9).  Does His mercy stop there?  “He commanded His word to a thousand generations” (Ps. 105:8).  The thousand is not literal in any of these.  They speak figuratively of an abiding principle and the unchanging character of God throughout all generations and ages.

THE DAY OF THE LORD

In chapter twenty of the Revelation God has clearly revealed the scenario of the millennium by symbols an angel, a key, a bottomless pit, a great chain and a dragon.   Are any of these literal?  NO!  Not one.  Therefore, when we understand by the Spirit the great truth of the symbolic meaning of the thousand years, we find that it signifies something infinitely more meaningful and glorious than a mere period of time!  The thousand years signifies a complete and total reign with Christ IN THE FULLNESS OF THE DAY OF THE LORD.  The essence of the millennium is within us now because in measure the light, the illumination, and the glory of the Lord has risen within His elect and to that degree we are even now reigning with Christ.

We live in a day when almost everyone, saint and sinner, recognizes that this is a crazy, mixed-up world we live in.  But most preachers and multitudes of Christians are constantly talking about how bad it is and how dark it is getting.  Hogwash!  It might be getting dark in the world you live in, but in the Kingdom I’ve been translated into “...the path of the JUST is as a SHINING LIGHT, that shineth MORE and MORE unto the perfect Day” (Prov. 4:18).  Rotherham translates, “But the path of the righteous is as the light of dawn, going on and brightening, unto meridian day.”  The Revised Standard Version reads, “...which shines brighter and brighter unto full day.”  The Moffatt translation says, “... like a ray of dawn, shines on and on unto the full light of Day.”  Young’s Literal Translation renders, “...going on and brightening till the Day is established.”  The Amplified Bible is so clear and expressive, “But the path of the uncompromisingly just and righteous is like the light of dawn, that shines more and more brighter and clearer until it reaches its full strength and glory in the perfect (to-be-prepared) Day.”

Many think Christ will reign for a thousand years and He will, for one thousand years is as a day, and a day is as a thousand years, and that day is the Day of the Lord in your life.  I know no words, be they many or few, that could more adequately establish that the term “thousand years” is the New Testament code-word for THE DAY OF THE LORD.  The thousand years is the symbol of a time in the life of a son of God where he experiences the power and glory of ruling and reigning with Christ.  It is not a literal thousand years, it is the symbol of an attainment of reality and ministry whereby the authority and power of God’s Christ is revealed and expressed through us as the elect of God.  It is not a date on the calendar it is reality in the spirit.

We know that the Kingdom of God does not last for a thousand years.  The Kingdom came with Jesus and it shall stand and increase throughout all the ages of time and Christ is the King eternal.  Of the increase of His government and peace there shall be no end.  So there is a deep mystery here.  The mystery is in God’s word, and if we search out the scriptures with the spirit of wisdom and revelation we will be able to see the mystery.  The mystery is just this: “A day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day” (II Pet. 3:8).  This lofty thought should assure us beyond doubt that the “thousand years” ARE THE DAY OF THE LORD!  Understanding the Word spiritually I believe that this interpretation is the correct one.  The “one thousand year day” is the Day of the Lord in your life.  The Day of the Lord in your life is when, by the illumination and work of the Holy Spirit, Christ is fully revealed to you, in you, through you, and as you.  When Christ rules in you one hundred per cent, the brightness of the Day of the Lord has reached its zenith within your life.

The Biblical imagery for the Day of the Lord begins in the very first verses of the Bible, in the opening chapter of Genesis.  Right at the beginning of the creation account we are told that God created light and named if Day (Gen. 1:2-5).  May God give us eyes to see just what happened at that moment!  The Spirit of God was hovering, brooding, vibrating over the face of the deep, and God said, God spoke creatively by His Word, “Let there be light! This means that when God created light, it sprang from His Logos-Word, which is Christ the light of the world.  “God has spoken to us in the person of His Son...who being the brightness of His glory, the out-raying, effulgence, and emanation of the divine...” (Heb. 1:3).  What the sun’s rays are to the sun, Christ is to God.  From the start, therefore, we are taught to associate Day and Light with Christ and God.  And now we have been made the (light) body of Christ!

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.  I know what the church system has taught, but they taught a lie.  They teach that the Day of the Lord is the seven-year tribulation at the end of the age.  They have no scriptural foundation.  I am making known a DAY unto you, beloved, and the day I am proclaiming is the Day of the Lord, and it is upon us now.  We must not be established upon the traditions of the elders nor the doctrines of men.  We must allow the Holy Spirit to unfold Christ, that we may know Him when He appears, in whatever form or manner He appears, that we miss not the Day of visitation as did the Jews of old.  A great light shined in the darkness, the greatest light that has ever been upon this earth and yet, to this day, they are living and walking in darkness.  The very glory of the Father was revealed to them as the scripture said it would be.  All God ever could be or ever shall be was manifested in Jesus Christ, the firstborn son of God.  No greater light could have shone unto them than that light, because the Light of lights was there to see.  Most of them did not recognize Him, neither did they suspect that the Lord of glory was right there in the midst of them.  If they had entered into Him, He would not have declared that another day yet remained for the children of God.  Let us not fall short of what He is now speaking into our hearts!  God is in this Day raising up a people that is hearing His words of instruction and is beginning to walk in the light of the glory of God’s Christ.

I admonish all who read these lines be established in YOUR DAY.  It is a new day, the Day of the Lord!  It is not the great tribulation, nor is it the literal millennium.  It is the Day of the unveiling of the glory of Christ and this Day comes in like a thief.  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 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 day 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 Day of the Lord is the Light that Christ is.  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).  John, in the first chapter of his Gospel, gives additional revelation on this great truth, when he speaks of the Word being with the Father in the beginning, and how all things were made by Him, and without Him was not anything made that was made.  Then he goes on to make this significant statement, “In Him was life; and the LIFE WAS THE LIGHT OF MEN” (Jn. 1:4).  From this verse we see that life and light are essentially the same thing.  “The life was the light!”  So when the Christ came as a light into the cosmos, He was also the life that was injected into the creation, to give life to all mankind. John goes on to say, “That was the TRUE LIGHT, which lighteth every man that cometh into the world” (Jn. 1:9).  All other lights are artificial, imitation, be they sun, moon, stars, sages, teachers, or holy men.  Only the Word of God, the Logos, the Christ is the TRUE LIGHT, and He came a light into the cosmos.

When God separated the light from the darkness in that long ago beginning, He called the light DAY, and the darkness He called NIGHT.  We are also told that He made two great lights, one to rule the Day and the other to rule the Night.  Man with his limited carnal understanding and dead letter-of-the-word interpretations has restricted this to our solar day and lunar night, and the sun and moon in the sky.  But our almighty Father has something infinitely higher than this in mind!  These are mere shadows and types of reality.  There is a great spiritual meaning to all this.  There is a REALM OF LIGHT and a REALM OF DARKNESS in creation which have nothing to do with our solar day and lunar night.  They are realms in the spirit, and we can be inhabitants of either.  The realm of light is ruled over by the Son of God, the Sun of Righteousness, who is THE LIGHT in our spirit; and the realm of darkness is ruled over by satan, the prince of darkness enthroned in the ignorance of the carnal mind.  Paul, when writing to the saints at Thessalonica, stated, “Ye are all the children of the Light, and the children of the Day: we are not of the night, nor of darkness” (I Thes. 5:5).  There are many other passages where we read of the children of Light, the children of the Day; and the children of the night or of darkness.  So we can be either children of the Day, or children of the night.  We can either walk in Light, or walk in darkness; it all depends on whom we are following Adam or Christ.  Jesus spoke this beautiful truth: “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).

As we consider this world in which we live, we see that all the physical light we have springs from the sun in our sky.  Take away that orb and darkness would soon cover the earth.  All vegetation would droop and die as it turned yellow, then brown and black and crumbled into the earth.  Soon after that all animal and human life would have the same fate.  The verdant creatures which grace the surface of the earth have been created to live in light and by light.  No one who has ever seen the sickly color of some plant that has struggled for life in semi-darkness can fail to miss the contrast between the green thing which grew in the sunshine, and the pale travesty which grew in the shade.  In total darkness every man would become blind within three days, and death would follow shortly after.  The life that we know comes from the sun, for the light is the life.  In the same way, Christ Jesus our Lord is the Sun of Righteousness!  He is the illumination of our Day, and the light of our Life!  The sun’s rays are the vital life in the environment of earth; the light of God in the face of Jesus Christ raised up within us is the vital life of the heavenly realm of the Kingdom of God where the sons of God live and move and have their being.

The sweet singer of Israel penned these meaningful words: “The entrance of Thy words GIVETH LIGHT; it giveth UNDERSTANDING to the simple” (Ps. 119:130).  The prophet Hosea, speaking of the Lord, said, “Thy judgments are as LIGHT that goeth forth” (Hos. 6:5).  “Thy word is a lamp unto my feet, and a LIGHT unto my path” (Ps. 119:105).  Also in II Corinthians 4:6, Paul declares, “For God, who commanded the LIGHT to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to give the LIGHT of the KNOWLEDGE of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.”  Can we not clearly see by this that TRUTH is LIGHT, UNDERSTANDING is LIGHT, KNOWLEDGE is LIGHT, and LIFE is LIGHT.  We often hear someone say, “I got some light on that.”  They are declaring the reception of understanding.  In like manner, DARKNESS is ignorance and error.  “But if our gospel be hid, it is hid to them that are lost: in whom the god of this world hath BLINDED THE MINDS of them which believe not, lest the LIGHT of the glorious gospel of Christ should shine unto them” (II Cor. 4:3-4).  The Day of the Lord speaks of the illumination and enlightenment that come by the Spirit.  The inner revelation and transformation which bring the Day of the Lord into our lives begin the very moment that we turn from the dead letter of the word and seek for its spirit.  We have turned from religion and the old static order of the church systems unto the living reality of the Christ within.  The elect of God who are being spiritually enlightened and quickened in the full reality of Christ in this hour are now experientially entering into the DAY OF THE LORD!

If we have considered the matter as we ought, we have surely discerned that there are two kingdoms in the world: the Kingdom of God and the kingdom of man, the Kingdom of Light and the kingdom of darkness, the Kingdom of Life and the kingdom of death, the Kingdom of Truth and the kingdom of error.  Praise God, He “hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of His dear Son” (Col. 1:13).  In this world darkness and light, day and night co-exist.  Here in El Paso, Texas it is a bright, sunlit day.  On the other side of the world people slumber upon their beds in the darkness of night.  Therefore I learn in the natural a principle that teaches me a spiritual truth: It is day and night at the same time!  These lines are being read by many thousands of people around the world.  Some of you walk in light and some of you walk in darkness.  Some of you walk in spiritual light in different dimensions, while some of you walk in spiritual darkness in different dimensions.  Some of you walk in the unveiling of the unbounded wisdom, understanding, power and glory of Christ within you, while some of you still walk in the bondage and limitation of the dead doctrines, traditions, and orders of the carnal church systems.  It’s a matter of your UNDERSTANDING!  It’s not a matter of whether you speak in tongues, how you were baptized, how many meetings you attend, or rules, regulations, methods, programs, or externals of any kind.  It is a thing of the spirit, a condition, a state of being, a spiritual mentality, a KNOWING OF THE LORD IN TRUTH AND UNDERSTANDING that brings transformation unto maturity.

Darkness is but the absence of light, or the lack of understanding.  Christ Himself IS THE LIGHT OF LIFE.  Life comes from light, therefore, if we want to know the condition of life in a man, we must see the state of enlightenment within him.  I don’t mean his knowledge about doctrinal facts, but the inward revelation of spiritual truth, purpose and reality.  We often think that if a man becomes a little more zealous, his life has grown; or if he is a little more pious, his life has increased.  Such concepts are totally erroneous.  Life is not in the zeal of man; neither is it in the piety of man.  There is only one realm and one source of life, and that is LIGHT.  Life rests with light; life comes from light.  Show me a man who has only a carnal understanding of the things of God and I will show you a man who has a very low level of spiritual life.  The churches are full of them!  And the pulpits, too!  To determine whether a person has grown in life, we must discern the condition of his INNER ENLIGHTENMENT.  Furthermore, if we want to help others grow in life, we must help them to be enlightened, to experience the truth of God as reality.  If they can receive enlightenment from us, they can obtain life and develop that life.  In this the sons of God are made manifest.

It is in this spiritual enlightenment that we step into GOD’S DAY.  It is in this Day that Christ is and that Christ brings, in which those who shall rule and reign with Christ now walk.  The “Day” of the Lord is not a date on the calendar, not a period of twenty-four hours or a number of years.  THE LIGHT OF CHRIST IS THE DAY!  This is our Day!  We are children of this Day!  The Day of the Lord is not a thousand years but the symbol of one thousand years stands for the Day of the Lord.  The sons of God reign with Christ for a thousand years that is, they reign with Christ IN THE DAY OF THE LORD!  That is the only place one can reign with Christ!  No man who walks in the darkness of sin, or in the darkness of carnal religion, will ever share the throne of the Lord.  No man devoid of spiritual understanding, illumination, and enlightenment can experience the power of God to rule.  And no man who abides in death is able to reign in life by Christ Jesus.

“And I saw thrones, and they sat upon them, and judgment was given unto them: and I saw the souls of them that were beheaded for the witness of Jesus, and for the word of God, and which had not worshipped the beast, neither his image, neither had received his mark upon their foreheads, or in their hands; and they lived and reigned with Christ a thousand years” (Rev. 20:4).  One great cause of error among the Lord’s people is their failure to understand this single precious passage of scripture.  If we can lay aside the traditions of the theologians and sects and listen instead to the voice of the Spirit, we will clearly see that it is those who live that also reign, and those who live and reign do so in the Day of the Lord.  “And they lived and reigned with Christ for a thousand years.”  We speak the truth in saying that only by life can we reign!  Paul speaks of our reigning in life by one, Jesus Christ.

Those who reign in life with Christ are also those who have been beheaded for the witness of Jesus and have gotten the victory over the beast of the Adam nature.  Unfortunately the Greek word rendered “beheaded” in our King James Bibles is not fully understood.  It appears nowhere else in the scriptures except here.  But one fact stands out plainly: It cannot allude to only those who died as martyrs.  This, too, is a symbol!  The beloved John who penned these words of inspiration did not die a martyr’s death.  However John intimately knew Christ in the fellowship of His sufferings and the fact is, he suffered more by living than if he had actually been beheaded.  Legend tells us that he was once boiled in oil in an effort to kill him.  He was exiled to the isle of Patmos there to starve, where he was given the Revelation.  When you read church history you find that a martyr’s grave was very often but a release from persecution, an easy way out.  So martyrdom does not necessarily mean an untimely death.  Those who take up their cross daily and follow Jesus, who lay down all claims to their own lives, to know Him in the power of His resurrection and in the fellowship of His sufferings, being made conformable unto His death, always bearing about in their bodies the dying of the Lord Jesus, are those who are “beheaded” for the witness of Jesus.  These blessed ones lose their own heads that they might put on the mind of Christ, thus making the Lord Jesus Christ their head.  If we have not died to self, my friend, we cannot reign in life by Christ Jesus!  And when you begin to live and reign with Him, you live and reign with Christ IN THE SURPASSING GLORY OF THE DAY OF THE LORD.  This is not the “letter” of the Word that I now share with you, but this is the spiritual meaning of the MILLENNIUM!

A day is the result of sunlight, and night is the absence of sunlight.  Just as the natural sun rises to bring an earthly day, so the rising of Christ in the hearts and lives of His elect also denotes the beginning of a new spiritual “day” in God’s purposes.  When Jesus said, “I am the light of the world,” He was not referring to natural light.  He is the enlightenment that comes spiritually, enabling us to see things in the spiritual world.  Christ is now rising in fresh, new, and higher dimensions in the hearts of His elect!  And this spiritual action within us heralds the arrival of the Day of the Lord in a new intensity of God’s unfolding plan of the ages.  It is not a day as man reckons time; it is a spiritual reality determined only by the moving of the Spirit.  The “millennium” is not a span of time from one point to another spiritual reality is incalculable!  It is not a quantity of time, rather it is a quality of experience.  We must be careful to both read and interpret the scriptures in the Spirit or we will think that everything will be fulfilled some day IN TIME, instead of seeing that the fulfillment is IN CHRIST.  All the sacrifices, offerings, sabbaths, feast days, temples, vestments, rituals and laws find their fulfillment in Christ.  HE is the reality of every type, the substance of every shadow, and the fulfillment of every prophecy!

Carl Schwing spoke of this beautiful truth when he wrote, “Our God is Spirit; and we, as His sons, are led by His Spirit.  He is the dawning Spirit, or the Spirit of New Beginnings, that has been sent forth to give us Kingdom Light, Kingdom Life, and Kingdom Knowledge.  He is the Spirit that is dividing the time.  As we leave time and times past, we move into the time that is to come.  This, my brethren, is the ‘dividing of time’ of which our brother Daniel was told.  In the time that is behind us men look for signs; while in the realm of Kingdom Time, we are laying hold of the reality.  As men struggle at the foot of the mountain with their end-time events, methods, and means, we are the ‘handful’ on the top of the mountain beholding only Jesus, our Elder Brother and  Crowned King; into whose image and likeness we are being born.

 “The glory that is transpiring will change the course of time.  It is bringing to pass the merging of the two realms.  Shall deep call unto deep and there be no answer?  Shall spirit cry unto spirit and there be no reunion?  Shall the old pass away and the new not appear?  Ah, it is appearing, my brothers...we are seeing it, we are touching it, tasting it, handling it and becoming it.  We are the NEW CREATION of which Paul spoke.  We do not belong to time as the world knows it...our kingdom is not of this world...nor do we belong to the times for they are lifeless and belong to vultures. Time that is to come belongs to us.  Hallelujah!  Eventually, every eye shall see this glory and all shall know that He is God.

“The ‘time’ of which I write, goes beyond the prophet’s voice, beyond the hope of the patriarchs, beyond the wind of doctrine, and far beyond the teachings of a pseudo Christianity.  I write of God’s time and of the sons’ time.  It is the time when the still small voice is like the sound of many waters.  It is the time when the storehouse of the Lord is being opened to the sons of God.  It is the time for the meeting of the Bride.  Can you not see, are you not aware, that we are in the Spirit on the dawning of the Lord’s Day?  He who was behind John is now before us...all that remains is to become Him.  He is sending forth the seven Spirits which are before His throne.  Within the dimension of  Kingdom Time dwells the fullness of all that the prophets foretold, all that Jesus taught, and all the early church died for; and it is in that dimension we have our true citizenship.  It is the City of our former birth, the City our fathers sought for, the City of His abode, and it  is the City John saw coming down.

“The sons are hearing the call of the Spirit.  They know it is daybreak; the transforming rays of the Morning Son, shine upon their yearning souls.  This is the beginning of the Rule of the ages, and it is given to the sons to have dominion.  Be not deceived, the day of this glory is not far off; already it appears in the eastern sky of the Son’s Realm.  The light of day pierces the darkness of man’s rule, it crumbles into dust the stronghold of Babylon’s vain religions, it is the substance of all creation hoped for.  The Spirit of the many-membered Lamb goes before us to lead us into the knowledge of the Holy One, that we might know, even as we are known.  He is leading us unto the Day where the sun never sets; yea, even the darkness shall be light around us...the day when they that toil not shall blossom as the lilies of the harvest, the Day when the wolf nature of our flesh shall lie down with the Lamb of God...the Day when the vipers and hypocrites shall not be able to hurt the children of God in all His Holy Mount...the Day when a thousand shall fall at our side and ten thousand at our right hand; but it shall not come nigh us, for we have made the most High our habitation...the Day when the Feet shall stand on Zion...the Day of speaking with a pure tongue, yea, even the language of our Everlasting Father.

 “If you should hear the voice of orthodoxy saying, ‘But there are many things that first must be,’ let it not dishearten you, rather let it strengthen your vision and press you onward toward the Perfect Day.  There are, indeed, many things that shall occur upon the earth within earth’s range of time.  We do not belong to time as such; we belong to the Father’s Time, to that invisible dimension, to that City whose builder and maker is God.  Our vision goes beyond today and tomorrow, it reaches out to the Day of the Lord.  Though battles rage and beasts appear, though death and darkness fill the air, and kingdoms fall and nations fail, and kings of earth are no more; yet, there is a plane where sons do dwell...at the right hand of the Glory Lamb.  Where He goes, they too must go, and when He shall appear, they too shall appear, and when He reigns, they too shall reign...for they were faithful and passed, with boldness, into the Father’s Time; they heard what mortal ears could not, or perhaps would not hear; they answered and were taken there...”    end quote.

Those who are spiritual, having eyes to see, ears to hear, and hearts to understand, know that God is now beginning to do a new thing in the earth.  God is now moving by His Spirit to restore all things beyond any work He has ever done in the past.  The new order of the Kingdom of God over the nations is now replacing the old church order of the past, bringing to pass in the earth a new Day in the purposes of God for this world.  This new order has begun within God’s elect by the establishment of the Present Truth in their minds, hearts, and natures.  This Day begins in those who are called to establish the new order in the earth.

The Day of the Lord is one continuous Day known only to the Lord, but it dawns upon different territories as it moves along in God’s purposes.  The natural earth-day is one continuous day, for it is always day somewhere in the world.  The day is not only arriving each morning, it has always been in existence since God spoke the command, “Let there be light!”  The day never really begins or ends, it simply moves across the earth bringing its light and warmth to different areas throughout a twenty-four hour period.  Likewise, the Day of the Lord is an eternal, never-ending Day, nor did it ever have a beginning.  The Day of the Lord has no darkness in it.  It shines and illuminates continuously.  The Day of the Lord is the light that He is, for God is light, and in Him there is no darkness at all.  The beginning of a day means the ending of night, but in a realm where there is not, nor ever has been, darkness, day has no beginning and no ending it is Eternal Day.  This Day of the Lord had its beginning for us when it arrived in our experience, to shine upon the territory of our lives.  No man knows when this Day begins apart from a revelation from the Lord, for it is the brilliance which He is.  He reveals this Day to those who are given eyes to see.  It is now time for the NATIONS to come to our light, and KINGS  to the brightness of our rising (Isa. 60:1-3).  That is the next step in the Day of the Lord.

Some time ago I read a book titled “Einstein’s God.”  It is a book that delves deeply into Albert Einstein’s concept of the Theory of Relativity.  One thing that stood out to me was that Einstein believed that there is no future and there is no past.  He claimed that the distinction between past, present, and future is only an illusion, however persistent.  Time, said Einstein, is not at all what it seems.  It does not flow in only one direction, and the future enters simultaneously with the past.  He concluded that within time, there is only NOW.  Everything that ever will be exists only in the now.

Let me explain how this works.  Let’s imagine that they are having a great parade through your city.  So you go downtown early and put up your little chair on the sidewalk in front of the hardware store.  You have the perfect vantage point from which to view the parade as it passes by.  The hour arrives and you begin to hear the beating of the drums, the tramping of the feet, and the noise of the wheels and you know that the parade is approaching.  Soon the floats begin to pass before your vision.  But you see, there are people all around, thousands of people standing and sitting on the sidewalk and curb.  There you are in your little seat and the only thing you can see is the one float, or perhaps two, that are right there in front of you.  So one by one, by one, you watch the floats pass by.  Soon there are a number of floats that are in the past they have already rounded the corner and passed out of sight.  There are some floats that are in the future because they are still far down the street, and you can’t see them yet.  You are like a horse with blinders.  All you see is that little portion right there in front of you.  That is your present, your now.  Those out of sight are in your past, and those still on their way are in your future.

Now let’s suppose that you make your way up to the top of a three-story building.  You perch yourself there on the edge of the roof and you have another view of the parade.  In that instant past and future pass away, because now you see the whole thing at once!  You see the float that is down in front of the chair you were sitting in.  But you also see all the floats that already passed by and all of those still coming up the street.  You see the whole parade at the same time, and there is no past or present the entire parade is in YOUR NOW!  If you get high enough you see it all at once and the whole parade, from beginning to end, and before the beginning, and after the end is all NOW!  This is where we touch God.  This is where we meet eternity.  This is where we discover the mystery of immortality.  This is the great mystery of life and reality.  This is where we converge with the Eternal Day of God.  The past and the future are the present for the Lord.  In the high realm of the Spirit there is only now.  When you get high enough there is no past or future, everything that ever happened or ever shall happen is in God’s Eternal Now.  If you are sitting on your little chair in front of the hardware store, that will blow your mind.  But the LORD SAYS, “I AM that I AM.”  God IS, and He changes not.  God dwells in that light that no (carnal) man can approach unto.  He lives in His Eternal Day, the Day of the Lord.

The Light shines in the darkness of this world at this very moment, and it shall yet shine to dispel all darkness from all realms, bringing Eternal Day.  There shall be no more night!  Speaking of the light of Christ John wrote, “The light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not” (Jn. 1:5).  That word “comprehend” is an unfortunate translation.  And a wiseacre did not help it by rendering it, “and the darkness was not able to put it out.”    That is no translation at all.  The word in the Greek is katelaben, meaning actually “to take down.”  It is the picture of a secretary to whom the boss is giving dictation, and she stops and says, “I can’t take that down, I am not able to take it down.”  The light shines in darkness and the darkness is not able to take it in.  That is it exactly!  Someone said to me, “Man, was I in darkness before I met Christ!  And I don’t know why I didn’t see.”  And after we met Christ, held captive in the blindness of the carnal church systems, there was still so much we didn’t see!  Well, that is it, we were in darkness and we did not see.  Just as walls keep out the sunlight, so the denseness of the carnal mind evades the penetrating light of the Spirit.  The darkness just cannot take it in!

Thank God, there is a time for the darkness to be chased away.  You go into a room and the minute you switch on the light, the darkness leaves, it disappears.  Darkness and light cannot exist together, although they do exist side by side.  Darkness and light, night and day, co-exist side by side on planet earth.  While it is day time here in the United States of America it is night time in China. We are working in the day while the Chinese are sleeping in the night.  The astronauts see both day and night at the same time as they circle in their orbit high above the earth.  There you have light and darkness side by side and the darkness just cannot take it in.  But the sunlight moves across the earth and the darkness is swallowed up.  In like manner, when God’s time comes for a man, a woman, a people, or a nation to be brought into the light, He has only to bring the light to shine upon them, and the darkness flees away.  The hour is wonderfully nigh at hand when the sons of God shall shine their light upon the nations of earth!  The darkness of all people shall be dispelled and billions shall come to the full light of God’s Christ.  Only the sovereign revelation of the Lord by His Spirit can accomplish this, and it shall be done.

It was when the prophet Joel beheld this Day in Spirit that he exclaimed, “The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the great and terrible (awesome) Day of the Lord come” (Joel 2:31).  This doesn’t mean that the literal, physical sun up in the heavens, ninety-three million miles from earth, is going to nova and go dark.  If it does, we’re all dead!  There won’t be even a cinder of earth left floating through space.  And if the sun could somehow go dark without exploding, we would be plunged into an instant ice age the likes of which planet earth has never seen.  Nor does it mean that the moon which graces the night sky with its beauty is going to turn into literal, physical blood.  This is symbolic language!  What does it mean when it says the sun shall be turned into darkness?  The sun is our natural light.  It is the natural source of all life.  Without the sun we would be in total darkness and instant death.  Should the sun of our solar system go out an icy coldness would grip us and we would all be dead before we could get to the door that’s how terrible and catastrophic the event would be.

The figure speaks of light turning to darkness. Natural light, figuratively and metaphorically, bespeaks of human understanding, intellect, reasoning.  The moon speaks of reflected light, that which has no light of its own, turning to blood.  Blood is a symbol of life “the life is in the blood” (Lev. 17:11).  Spiritually we have a lot of reflected light in signs, symbols, rituals, ceremonies, ordinances, rules, commandments, creeds, doctrines and programs.  None of these have any light of themselves, they merely reflect the light of God and truth and reality.  Water baptism, for example, is merely an outward symbol or reflected light of that true baptism into the death of Christ whereby our sins are carried away into the sea of forgetfulness.  The Lord’s supper or communion is but an outward symbol or reflected light of the deep spiritual experience whereby we eat the flesh (word) of Christ and drink His blood (spirit) in truth and reality.  We read of the woman in chapter twelve of the Revelation who has the moon under her feet.  SHE IS LIVING IN THE REALM ABOVE ALL TYPES AND SHADOWS AND SYMBOLS, ABOVE ALL REFLECTED LIGHT, CLOTHED WITH THE SPLENDOR OF THE NOONDAY SUN, THE MAJESTY AND GLORY OF THE LIVING CHRIST.  She has risen above the outward shadows!  Few Christians or churches in this world have touched that realm!  This woman, the virgin bride of Christ, dwells in a heavenly place in the dazzling glory of spiritual understanding, reality and power. Only the woman thus clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, is able to birth the manchild, the manifested sons of God.  The sons of God are not birthed out of the carnal, earth-bound religious systems of men who are ruled by the reflected light of the moon.  Coming out of Babylon was not our birth into sonship.  Oh, no!  It is only in the high place of pure spiritual experience that the life of sonship is conceived and brought to birth.

The Spirit of God is speaking to us today that in order to enter into this new Day of the Lord the natural light, the natural source of life, all of our carnal, letter-of-the-word, religious understanding which we have put upon the word of God and the things of God, must be turned into darkness.  There is no hope for it!  It has no spiritual illumination in it, nor can it quicken us or produce within us any spiritual seed of life.  That natural light must be turned off!  We must be clothed upon with the glory of the Living Christ!  And the moon all those reflective ordinances, rituals, creeds, religious works, programs, and activities must be turned to blood, brought to life within us, so that we are made partakers of the reality, having no need any more for the shadow. Instead of the cold, reflective light that only rules over us in the night time darkness of our walk as carnal Christians, the Lord is now bringing His elect into the hot, throbbing, pulsating, radiating, penetrating LIGHT OF LIFE.  Ah, our sun shall be fully turned into darkness, and our moon into blood, before that great and notable Day of the Lord comes in our lives!  The natural light of the carnal understanding must pass away, while the typical and symbolic must be spiritually fulfilled within each of us.  This is how the Day of the Lord is now dawning in our hearts!  This is the process by which the Day of God arises upon us in our experience!

The Day of the Lord is the Light of Christ illuminating the earth realm.  Christ is both the light and the life.  Sweet mystery of life, at last we have found Thee!  And we have found that Thou, O Christ, art the light of life, not life like the life of men, but everlasting life, the life of the ages.  “For if by one man’s offense death reigned by one; much more they who receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness shall reign in life by one, Jesus Christ” (Rom. 5:17).  Much more shall we reign!  When?  Where?  How?  How long?  A day?  A thousand years?  During the millennium?  In heaven?  In Jerusalem?  In the sweet by and by?  No IN LIFE!  “...shall reign in life by one, Jesus Christ.”  To reign in life is to reign in light; to reign in light is to reign in the Day of the Lord; to reign in the Day of the Lord is to reign for a thousand years in the symbology of scripture.  God has given us authority by the life of Christ raised up within us, and in and by that life we are destined to reign in the Kingdom.

 “Arise, shine; for thy light is come, and the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee.  For, behold, the darkness shall cover the earth, and gross darkness the people: but the Lord shall arise upon thee, and His glory shall be seen upon thee.  And the NATIONS shall come to thy light, and KINGS to the brightness of thy rising.  The sons also of them that afflicted thee shall come bending unto thee; and all they that despised thee shall bow themselves down at the soles of thy feet; and they shall call thee, The City of  the Lord, The Zion of the Holy One of Israel” (Isa. 60:1-3,14).

God is raising up Christ in a people as the Light of Life.  The elect of the Lord is the illumination of the Day of the Lord.  Just as Jesus stood on the mount of Transfiguration and went through that chrysalis metamorphosis and His astonished  disciples saw His face shine as the sun, and His raiment as white as the light, and His whole being radiating the glory of God, so God is bringing many sons to that same glory,  and this time the whole world will see the light, and all nations will come to your light.  That’s how the Kingdom of God is coming upon the nations in this hour of transition into the next age.  God is coming in a light that cannot be hid, and kings shall see that brightness and that rising upon all the holy sons of God.  They will want that light, hunger for that truth, yearn for that reality, and thirst for that life, and they will come to it and the NATIONS of them that shall be saved will walk in the light radiating from the City of God.

You, my beloved, will be called upon by presidents, kings, prime ministers, lawyers, educators, doctors, business leaders, and great men of the nations for the Lord shall bring heaven to earth and stand it up in a people.  The word that flows out of this people will be channeled out of the throne room of heaven, it will be the mind of God, it will be the mind of Christ, it will be a more sure word of prophecy, it will be a creative word that changes and transforms all things.  There shall be a wonderful, glorious, equitable outpouring of the Spirit of God on men and women, boys and girls, and little children  the fire, the glory, and the power  and the whole world is going to see this thing.  It will no longer be necessary to go out there in the energy of the flesh, knock on every door, mobilize, organize, and by carnal methods and religious techniques try to get the world saved.  A brother of perception once said to a large church crusade, “There are hundreds of people here tonight who have pulled your loved ones by the ears into the Kingdom of God.  And all you have accomplished is lop-eared loved ones!”  Ah, when God arises, when God does His strange act, your loved ones, your friends, your neighbors, your associates, your enemies will fall all over you getting to God.  All they need is the divine revelation of the love and glory and majesty of God and they will come to your rising and run to your glory!

The natural light of the world is the sun, and the sun brings the day.  THOSE WHO ARE THE LIGHT OF THE WORLD ARE THE DAY OF THE LORD!  Nothing could be plainer than that. We who are of the Day, and are not lovers or sleepers of the night, have a high heritage.  “For ye were one time darkness, but now are ye light in the Lord: walk as sons of light” (Eph. 5:8).  “While ye have light, believe in the light, that ye may be the sons of light” (Jn. 12:36).  “Ye are all the sons of the light, and the sons of the day: we are not of the night, nor of the darkness.  Therefore let us not sleep, as do others...” (I Thes. 5:5-6).  We who have received the love of the truth and have been made the light of the world have a higher calling.  We have privileges, and duties to perform.  We must be about our Father’s business!  There must be a parting of the ways with all who walk in the night of sin, negativism, religious bondage and spiritual drunkenness.  It is time to forsake the shame and error of former carnal and religious realms, and time to look up, time to arise and shine.

The Day is at hand!  The night is far spent.  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 of 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 new Day.  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 the King reigns gloriously.  The Kingdom of God is within us!  Its glory overshadows us!  Its light emanates from us!  Those who are born of this Word of the Kingdom are now standing on new Kingdom ground.

What is light?  No one has ever seen pure light, or even sunlight, for light is invisible.  Those things which we see are really only the objects that are revealed by light.  You and I do not see light, we only see that which reflects the light.  Remove the objects and we would see nothing.  Even what we perceive in our atmosphere as sunlight, or in our houses as light, is not really light, but those things within our atmosphere and in the room where you now sit, which reflect the light.  Light is invisible.  Light cannot be seen!  That is why ‘outer space’ consists of vast reaches of complete darkness, unless interrupted by some planetary body revealed by some source of light.  Truly did the apostle write, “God is light, and in Him is no darkness at all.”  And just as truly it is written, “No man has seen God at any time.”  You don’t see light, therefore you cannot see God, for God is light!  That is why God has channeled Himself through Jesus Christ, for in Jesus is revealed all  the essence of God in visible form.  The light of the knowledge of the glory of God is seen in the face of Jesus Christ.  Jesus is to God what a light bulb is to electricity.  Electricity is invisible, but channeled through the bulb the energy becomes revealed and expressed in a visible way, a way that we perceive as light.  As members of the Christ body, the light that God is, is also channeled through us.  God is invisible, but expressed through His people on earth He is perceived by the world in all the glory of His attributes and power.

The Father is now appearing within His chosen sons, imparting the light that He is within them.  By His light within, we shall dispel the darkness of this dark world.  He is awakening us to the new Day in which we now live.  We are like light bulbs that have just been screwed into the light socket.  God is now ready to appear in His saints in the greatest manifestation of His glory ever! He shall shine throughout the earth in a brilliance that will outshine a thousand noonday suns.  By His glorious appearing in us, the Day of the Lord shall come in the full brilliance of the glory of Christ, to turn this long, dark night into endless Day.  When the Day of the Lord has fully risen, all shall be awakened, illuminated, and quickened by His Light of Glory.  In the Day of the Lord there is no night!  There is no darkness!  That means the light illuminates all things and all men, for only by the reflection of the light is the darkness dispelled.  The realm of darkness no longer exists for those who walk in the light as He is in the light.  The church and the world shall be transformed, and this old earth of ours shall become the Paradise of God.  I tell you the truth, I lie not.  The Day is at hand!  Rejoice and arise, oh ye sons of the most High!  The glorious dawn is now painting the eastern sky, and the river of God is full of water!

Some people have asked me, “Brother Eby, don’t you believe in the devil?”  No!  I believe in the Lord Jesus Christ.  “Don’t you believe in the power of the devil?” they persist.  Some people do, and they are under that power.  They believe in the power of the devil, they believe he exists everywhere, behind every bush, in every circumstance, at every church meeting, in every sickness and trouble, everywhere all the time the devil is fighting them, tempting them, opposing them, hindering them, trying to trip, ensnare, discourage, and defeat them.  And no matter how many times they rebuke him, bind him, and cast him out, he always pops right back just like the roadrunner in the cartoons.  For them the devil is a power to constantly be reckoned with.   

“Do you believe in witchcraft?” people inquire.  No!  I’m not afraid of voodoo or any other kind of darkness.  No one can cast a spell on me.  That has nothing to do with me.  “Oh, but Brother Eby, don’t you stand in awe of the power of darkness?”  No, I don’t.  I stand in awe of the greatness of THE LIGHT!  Darkness is but the absence of the light.  How can light fear darkness, or attribute to it any power?  “Don’t you believe that as the people of God we ought to stand against the darkness, fight the darkness, pray and plead the blood against the darkness?”  NO!!!  Turn on the Light.  That is the only cure for darkness!  For darkness to cast a spell on me, or do anything to me, would be like trying to get a duck wet with a water hose.  Darkness has no power over light, but light has total power over darkness.

Darkness has no power except that which we give to it.  When I was a child we had a pitcher pump from which we got all our water.  The pump was down the hill just a little way from the house.  At night my mother would often send me to get a bucket of water from the pump.  I was always afraid of the dark.  To my childish mind the darkness was full of unseen dangers, wicked men, monsters, ghosts, and dreadful creatures of all kinds.  They were right there ready to snatch me.  They were behind the trees and hanging from the branches.  They were in front of me and behind me.  I would turn around and around and around all the way to the pump and back to the house, trying to face all the spooks at the same time.  None of them ever touched or harmed me and, of course, as soon as the sun rose in the morning they were all gone.  The fact is they were never there!  They existed only in my mind and possessed only the power my imagination gave them.  And the light is the only power on earth that could chase them away!

My beloved brethren, know ye not that ye are the light of the world?  Brother Bennie Skinner once gave the following illustration.  What if I came into your house at night and it was totally dark, and I found you standing  in the corner saying, “I curse this darkness, I rebuke this darkness, I command this darkness to go!”  I come in and you say, “Brother Bennie, please join me in prayer. We’re going to curse this darkness together.  We’re going to break the power of this darkness.”  I reply, “We’re going to do what?”  “We’re going to curse this darkness that is in this room.  This darkness has caused me to bump into things, I tripped and fell, I bruised and cut my face and nearly broke my arm.  This darkness is so dreadful, depressing, and threatening!”  Without a word I reach over, feel along the wall, find the light switch, and flip it on.  Instantly the room is flooded with light.  Every thing in it becomes visible.  The danger, depression, and fear are all gone.  What happened to the darkness?  WE JUST TURNED ON THE LIGHT!  That’s all that is necessary to defeat the darkness.  You are the light of the world!  Turn on the light!  Ah, as soon as we know this, when we truly understand that we are sons of The Light, then the darkness is past, and the true light NOW SHINES (I Jn.. 2:8).  All creation is waiting for the manifestation of the SONS OF LIGHT! Know the reality and power of the Light within your own experience, my beloved brother, sister, and you will be ready to enlighten this darkened world.

 


Chapter 54

THE INCREASE OF THE KINGDOM

(continued)

What is man?  The question is asked five times in the scriptures by men who probed the deep purposes of God.  We first find this question in the book of Job, which is the most ancient of the inspired writings we have come to know as the Bible.  It predates the first five books of the Bible, the books of Moses, and its exact origin is a mystery.  It came out of antiquity, emerged from the mists of obscurity, and has always been a classic of human history.  Job was a man of whom God witnessed that he was a perfect man, none like him in all the earth, an upright man who feared God and hated evil (Job 1:8).  And yet God subjected him to testings so severe, that it is hard to believe that any man has been more severely tried.  Why did God do this?  Job wondered about this himself.  He wondered about the plight of all humanity, the good and the evil that befalls every man, the joys and the sorrows, the triumphs and the tragedies.  Job saw that all men were being tested in various ways.  Why was this?  In some cases man’s lot didn’t seem reasonable.  So Job asked the probing question, “What is man that Thou shouldest magnify him? or that Thou shouldest set Thine heart upon him? and that Thou shouldest visit him every morning, and try him every moment?”  (Job 7:17-18).

It appeared to Job that there must be some great and divine purpose in man, that of all the creatures  God had made in the universe, man was singled out for special treatment.  God was dealing with man every moment of every day, in a way that was hard to understand.  Man seemed to be in some great school of experience where the lessons were uncommonly difficult and the discipline exceedingly severe.  There must be some purpose behind it all, some great goal, some grand scheme that God had in mind, and Job was moved to search out what it was.  And so his question, “What is man?”  What is the purpose of man’s experience on earth?  What is the plan behind creation?  Why was man created and formed, and why do You visit him every morning, and try him every minute? There has to be some divine reason for all this, some mysterious purpose behind it all.  But what?

Further along in Job’s testing understanding began to break like the light of morning with a view of God’s purpose in man and he cried out, “He knoweth the way that I take: when He hath tried me, I shall come forth as gold” (Job. 23:10).  Ah, when God had tried Job he came out on the other side a far different and better man, a greater man, with an experiential knowledge of God and His ways, and at the end of his training was able to confess, “I have heard of Thee by the hearing of the ear: but now my eye seeth Thee” (Job 42:5).  He had heard of God before, he had been taught religion and doctrines and creeds and ceremonies, and all he knew was men’s opinions, ideas, concepts and theories; but now he saw God, he knew God for himself, and understood the mystery of His great purpose in man as he had not understood before.  God answered his question: “What is man?”

This question is asked again in Job 15:14.  The next time we meet it is in Psalm 8:4.  “What is man, that Thou art mindful of him? and the son of man, that Thou visiteth him?”   This was David, the shepherd king asking it this time.  He prefaced his question with this astute observation: “When I consider Thy heavens, the work of Thy fingers, the moon and the stars,  which Thou hast ordained; What is man?”

Come with me now to the hills of Judea surrounding the village of Bethlehem, walk with me in the stillness of a star-studded night long centuries before the Christ came to earth.  A young lad, a shepherd boy, at the close of the day has gathered his sheep into the fold, and sitting upon a jutting rock, gazes with contemplation into the arching vastnesses of space, at all those billions of galaxies with their trillions of stars and suns and planets and moons, scintillating in all their glory.  Observing the harvest moon coming up over the dark horizon, he is awed and fascinated with the majesty of the heavens, and in the wonder of the moment begins to commune in his heart with Yahweh, the Creator of it all.  What a beautiful situation that must have been!  There alone in the sacred stillness of the night, no city noises, no clapping tires of eighteen-wheelers on the freeway, no noisy throngs of people rushing here and there, no gaudy flashing neon lights, no smog to blur the beauty of those exquisite stars.  Just himself, and his flock of sheep, now resting in the fold and God.

As David stared into the twinkling glory above him, he said to God, “When I consider Thy heavens, the work of Thy fingers, the moon and the stars, which Thou hast ordained; what is man, that Thou art mindful of him? and the son of man, that Thou visiteth him?”  “Lord, what is all this?  What are they doing out there?  Why did you make them?  What am I here for?  What is man that Thou art mindful of him?  Why do you visit and deal with the sons of men?  Where does man fit into the great scheme of creation?  What role is man destined to play in your universal purpose? Surely this was not all made for nothing!  Perish the thought that it is all merely your plaything, designed for your entertainment.  There must be some grand scheme behind it all, some great mystery yet to be unfolded.  Lord, tell me about it, give me understanding and wisdom, instruct my heart, enlighten my mind.  Teach me where I fit, where man fits, into the equation.  Am I here only to tend sheep, to live out a miserable existence, full of trials and sorrows, with only old age and the grave at the end?  Is that all there is to this?  Or is there something that I am missing?”  Ah, I know the feeling in David’s heart that blessed night, for I have felt the same way, and have asked the same questions in my heart.

It has always pleased the Lord to shroud the deep things of God in mystery and to cover them as with a cloud of glory.  Centuries ago David sought in prayer that he might understand God’s ways in man.  The word of the Lord came to him as it did to Job, and God granted him to be among that elect people to whom understanding is given of the great and glorious plan of God behind all His works.  David knew that God was dealing with man in a very special way, and he wanted to know why.  To David’s heart  came the most sublime of all truths.  His spirit rejoiced as the heavens opened and the mind of God was revealed in him.  When God revealed to David the purpose of His working with mankind, David began to speak eternal truths in the spirit of prophecy, declaring, “For Thou hast made man but a little lower than Elohim, and hast crowned him with glory and honor.  Thou madest him to have dominion over the works of Thy hands; Thou hast put all things under his feet” (Ps. 8:5-6).

As we meditate upon this blessed truth, surely we must realize that when God placed Adam, formed of the ground, in the lovely garden of Eden, he was just in the first stage of being the man that God wanted.  He was like the lump of clay placed on the potter’s wheel, he had not yet been scraped, glazed, and fired, and was in no way ready to assume his role as ruler of the universe.  Surely his “fall” is the proof of that!  He was the most glorious of all God’s magnificent creation, yet he was like a little baby in a state of innocence.  How could he exercise dominion over the earth and over starry worlds beyond (all the works of God’s hands), how could he stand as a judge and ruler over nature, how could he command celestial orbs, and living entities of all kinds, from demons of darkness to angels of might and glory, when he himself had no sense of right and wrong, no knowledge of good and evil, and no experience with the laws of the universe or the ways of divine government?

The scriptures tell us that we shall judge the world and angels, that we shall inherit all things and rule from the Father’s throne, but how many of us are in a position to do that yet?  Have any of us got the knowledge, the wisdom, the understanding, or the experience to fill such a position?  There is only one man thus far who has qualified for this great task the man Christ Jesus.  Jesus is God’s finished product!  Jesus is God’s perfected man!  And how was he made perfect?  Through the things that He suffered (Heb. 2:9-10).  This is the revelation God gave to Job when he posed the question, “What is man?”  Even though Jesus was born the Son of God, as the Son of man He had to be processed, He had to be subjected to the trials and the fire, He had to pass through God’s great school of dominion, He had to learn the lessons and be trained in the ways and wisdom of His Father, as every human-divine son has to be before he can ascend the throne and fulfill God’s purpose in rulership over all things.  “For it became Him, for whom are all things, and by whom are all things, in bringing many sons unto glory, to make the captain of their salvation perfect through sufferings” (Heb. 2:10).  “Though He were a Son, yet learned He obedience through the things which He suffered; and being made perfect, He became the author of eternal salvation unto all them that obey Him” (Heb. 5:8-9).  It was absolutely necessary that the firstborn Son of God first be perfected to bear the image and likeness of God before ascending the throne at God’s right hand.  But, praise God, He is not to be the only one!  There is going to be a vast multitude of sons who will be just like Him, and they are in the process now, even as I pen these words, of becoming like Him.

Can we not see by this that our present travail is distinctly necessary for the bringing about of God’s glorious purpose for His sons.  Our singular experience of trial, suffering, and overcoming is to render itself in a unique position of glory!  The eighth Psalm is a poem on the excellence of the divine government in all the world, yea, through the entire universe.  It begins by stating that God has set His glory above the heavens.  Then follows a not unnatural contrast between man’s littleness and the greatness of the unbounded heavens.  The universe in all its immensity is contrasted with man, who seems but a speck in the ocean of infinity.  What thoughtful mind does not echo the sentiment, “What is man, that Thou art mindful of him! and the son of man, that Thou visiteth him!” Yet there is something altogether unique even in the local habitation of planet earth which has been assigned to this mysterious being.  But it is not to this that the Psalmist refers.  He speaks of the extraordinary position of man in what may be called the spiritual universe, and describes him as being made but a little lower than Elohim, and being crowned with glory and honor, and enthroned as the ruler of all.  Man was meant to rule ALL THE WORKS OF GOD’S HANDS! Man was destined to exercise a divine and spiritual dominion, the authority of God Himself invested in man.  The image of God would clothe him with divine power.  All things would be subject to his word.  His life fluid would be heavenly.  His will would be in God, and the fullness of God would dwell in him.  He would live in paradise, clothed with heavenly glory.  The light of the majesty of God would emanate from him, and he would live on the paradisical fruit of the Word of God.  He would know no limitation, no sickness nor sorrow, and no death.  All things everywhere would be subject to him in the fire of his love.

MAN THE IMAGE OF GOD

It all goes back to the creation of man.  Jesus said, “The Father hath given Him (the Son) AUTHORITY...because He is the SON OF MAN” (Jn. 5:26-27).  One might think it should have read, “because He is the SON OF GOD,” but it doesn’t say that.  The awesome and universal authority of the Son is rooted in the fact that He is the SON OF MAN.  Why was it necessary for Jesus to be the “Son of man” to have authority on earth?  That man should bear the image of God and have dominion over all things is the first announcement of God’s intention regarding man and the first announcement of His purpose, and locked up in that wonderful declaration is a universe of meaning that does not reach the eye and that the mind has never understood.  We must re-establish and re-define the purpose of our existence.  Why are we here?  The purpose of God in man has been blurred, distorted, and hideously mangled by the carnal teachings of the church systems.

Oh that men would awaken to the truth that God has provided the answer to humanity’s dilemma!  “Because He hath appointed a day, in the which He will judge the world in righteousness by that MAN whom He hath ordained; whereof He hath given assurance unto all men, in that He hath raised Him from the dead” (Acts 17:31).  I hope that we all have become aware that that MAN by whom God shall judge the world in righteousness is a CORPORATE MAN.  “But unto every one of us is given grace according to the measure of the gift of Christ...for the perfecting of the saints...till we all come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto A PERFECT MAN, unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ” (Eph. 4:1,12-13).  “Do ye not know that the saints shall judge the world? and if the world shall be judged by you, are ye unworthy to judge the smallest matters?  Know ye not that ye shall judge angels? how much more things that pertain to this life” (I Cor. 6:2-3).

God in His great purpose of redemption and restoration is raising up A MAN, the MANY-MEMBERED CHRIST OF GOD.  He is preparing an instrument, a channel through which to rule, deliver and bless.  God has a MAN to fix creation’s problems!  You see, beloved, when God injected Himself into the history of this world to save, lift, redeem and restore it, He could not do it as God. He had to do it as man.  That is why God was manifest in the flesh, because anything that is done in a governmental way on this earth must be done through man.  “Let them have dominion...” is God’s own sovereign edict and delegation of governmental authority.  Man’s rulership of the earth and the heavens is built into the constitution which He framed for creation.  For God, as God, to do the job would be unconstitutional!  Man is God’s constitutional agent.  To man has been given the stewardship of the earth and of the heavens!  That is why there is now a perfected MAN reigning in the heavens!  God remains the owner, but man is the manager and overseer the judge, ruler, priest and king!  Jesus Christ had to take upon Himself the form of man, the likeness of flesh, being made in all things like unto His brethren, because nothing happens on this earth except through man  The Captain of our salvation, the High Priest of our profession, the Head of the Christ-body, the firstborn Son of God, the King of kings and Lord of lords IS THE MAN CHRIST JESUS, not the God Christ Jesus; He is the SON OF MAN, not God the Son.

 Man in the image of God is God's government in the Kingdom of God.  Creation was originally established with a degree of splendor suitable to the dignity of Adam as its appointed ruler.  Man was the final and crowning work of God’s hands!  I would draw your attention, beloved saint of God, to the fact that man was not created on the first day, nor on the second or third, but in the end of the sixth day when all the rest of God’s creation had been completed.  It was only after the vastness of the heavens and the earth and all the hosts of them had been made that the Creator proclaimed the awesome fiat, “Let us make man in our image, and after our likeness: and let them have DOMINION” (Gen. 1:26).  You see, the dominion of the whole Kingdom was given unto man!  David explains this universal dominion in the eighth Psalm.  “When I consider Thy heavens, the work of Thy fingers, the moon and the stars, which Thou hast ordained; what IS man, that Thou art mindful of him? and the son of man, that Thou visiteth him?”  And then he answers the question!  “Thou hast made him a little lower than Elohim, and hast crowned him with glory and honor.  Thou madest him to have dominion over the works of Thy hands; Thou hast put all things under his feet.”

Now that phrase, “under his feet,” is a Hebrew term which means that man was to have authority over all the works of God’s hands, over all creation, over the earth, the moon, and the stars, over absolutely everything!  He was to rule it all, govern it all, be head of it all.  God made man for that intent and purpose.  That is the answer to the question, “What is man?”  That is what man is! The writer to the Hebrews makes this truth so plain that only a fool could question it.  “But one in a certain place testified, saying, What is man, that Thou art mindful of him? or the son of man, that Thou visiteth him?  Thou madest him a little lower than God; Thou crownest him with glory and honor, and didst set him over the works of Thy hands; Thou hast put ALL THINGS in subjection under his feet.  For in that He put ALL in subjection under him, He left NOTHING that is NOT put under him” (Heb. 2:6-8).  There is holy wonder to these words that is almost beyond our understanding. Nothing has been left outside the dominion of man!  Weymouth puts it this way: “Thou hast put everything in subjection under his feet.  For this subjecting of the universe to man implies leaving nothing that is not subject to him.  But we do not yet see the universe subject to him.”  The whole cosmos really belongs to mankind, it is his dominion, his sphere of authority, and everything is to be put under his control.

Now for Jesus to have anything to do with this dominion He had to become a man, for the dominion was given to man, and in order for Him to receive the kingdom, He had to be a man.  As the eternal Word of God He could have nothing to do with this dominion, though it was through Him that all these things were made.  But become a man He did, and through His life of obedience to the Father, by His holiness, His purity, His grappling with sin, sorrow, pain, limitation, and death, and triumphing over it, He qualified to receive the Kingdom and be the ruling head of it, the King of glory.  The man in God’s image has a divine and royal destiny to exercise dominion and authority in this world and throughout the unbounded heavens.  He is to be the head of all.  All that happens in the cosmos must take place under the direction of man.  God created all things and then man in His image and likeness, as the connecting link between God and His creation, that through man in His image and likeness the invisible God might be seen and known and touched by the visible creation.  The face of God would be revealed for all creation to behold, in the face of man.  The likeness of God would be made known to the entire universe in and by man.  The love, grace, wisdom, knowledge, power and glory of God would be exercised toward every creature and world and order throughout the vastnesses of infinity  through the man in the image and likeness of God!

When God gave the world and all things into the power of man, who should rule it as a viceroy under Him, it was His plan that Adam should do nothing but with God and through God, and God Himself would do all His work in the universe through Adam.  Can we not see by this that Adam was appointed God’s KING-PRIEST on behalf of all creation?  It had nothing to do with the fall of man or of other worlds, but everything to do with the revelation of God to creation and rule over it.  When sin entered the world, Adam’s power was proved to be a terrible reality, for through him the earth, with the whole race of man, and all things, was brought under the curse of sin and death.  When he fell his kingdom fell with him.  When he came under the dominion of sin and death he took all that he ruled with him.  But when creation’s new rulers, the second man, the last Adam, the corporate Christ, Head and body, are manifested as the sons of God, their kingdom will be elevated again with them.  Christ has raised us up, and we shall raise them up!  As the sons of God are forever freed from sin, sickness, sorrow, fear, limitation and death then will their realm be.

From the earliest dawn of creation’s light it has been God’s intention, and His eonian purpose, to make man in His image and after His likeness.  This was His initial, original and only statement about His will for mankind: “Let us make man in our image and after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the works of our hands.”  We read in Genesis how God affirms that “it was good” after each act of creation except after the sixth day, when man was created.  There follows a concluding assessment that God saw that all of His creation was good but not necessarily the creation of man.  Man was not declared to be good, He was declared to be THE IMAGE AND LIKENESS OF GOD!  This was God’s purpose from the beginning, and He has never deviated from that purpose or changed or revamped it in any way.  When our Father’s great plan of the ages has been consummated, He will have accomplished exactly what He set out to do in that long ago beginning. He initiated this purpose when father Adam stepped forth out of His creative hand, He has been working on it ever since, and will continue until the whole race of mankind shines forth in the brightness, wisdom, knowledge, holiness, power and glory of the omnipotent Creator.

The making of man in His image and after His likeness is the pivotal point of all God’s actions.  This cherished plan which God kept hidden in His mind from eternity motivates all that He is working toward in the whole scheme of creation.  Everything that has happened in the history of mankind, or is happening, is working to bring about this glorious end.  It is with this unwavering resolution that God arranges all His works.  When once we see this by the spirit of wisdom and revelation from God, we are for the first time able to truly understand all the various aspects of His plan, and all His doings, and all that shall take place in the ages to come.  As the light of revelation streams from realms above, and our minds become enlightened to the higher and divine purpose behind all things, we see how great and glorious is the intention of God in man!  The idea held by most Christians, that God finished this work with Adam in the garden is far, far, from the truth.  God’s original plan was not to make just one man in the garden in His image, or one Son two thousand years ago in His image, or a few saints through the ages into His image, but to make a whole race of beings in His image and likeness and give them dominion over everything He has made!  When God began this vast, beautiful and wonderful creation, that is what He had in mind to do.  Oh, the wonder of it!

The grandest of all truths is that CHRIST IS THE IMAGE OF GOD!  If you want to know what God had in mind when He said, “Let us make man in our image, and after our likeness,” you have only to look at Jesus Christ.  That is what God meant!  “But if our gospel be hid, it is hid to them that are lost: in whom the god of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of CHRIST, WHO IS THE IMAGE OF GOD, should shine unto them” (II Cor. 4:3-4).  “In whom we have redemption through His blood...who is THE IMAGE OF THE INVISIBLE GOD, the firstborn (prototype) of every creature” (Col. 1:14-15).  His dignity is still further elaborated in these words of the writer to the Hebrews: “Who being the brightness of His glory, and the express image of His person, and upholding all things by the word of His power, when He had by Himself purged our sins, sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high; being made so much better than the angels...” (Heb. 1:3-4).  The Amplified Bible reads, “He is the...expression of the glory of God the Light-being, the out-raying of the divine and He is the perfect imprint and very image of God’s nature, upholding and maintaining and guiding and propelling the universe by His mighty word of power...taking a place and rank by which He Himself became...superior to angels...”

How totally inadequate do our words become in the light of words of such wonder as these!  Jesus is the prototype of what God intends man to be.  He is God’s finished product, God’s perfect man; what every man should be and ultimately will be.  We will only understand the majesty  of man in God’s image when we see Jesus as THE BEAM OF THE DIVINE GLORY, or THE OUT-RAYING OF GOD’S PERSON.  We have never seen the sun we have only seen the light-rays which emanate from it.  The light that floods our earth is not the sun itself, for were the sun to truly come into our world there would be nothing left but a cinder.  The sunbeams radiate from the sun, travel ninety-three million miles through space, arriving at planet earth some eight minutes later. The ray is of the same constitution as the orb from which it comes; if you analyze its character you will learn something of the very nature of the sun; they live in perpetual and glorious unity.  The sunbeam originates in and as the sun itself, and is the emanation, out-raying, effulgence, expression  manifestation and revelation of the sun.  We are reminded of those inspired words which tell us that “no man has ever seen God at any time; the uniquely begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared Him He has revealed Him, brought Him out where He can be seen; He has interpreted Him and He has made Him known” (Jn. 1:18, KJV & Amplified).  God’s Christ is the out-raying, projection, expression and revelation of the very Father Himself!

The Christ is also the express or exact image of the Father’s person, the perfect imprint and very image of God’s nature.  The allusion here is to the impression made in ancient times by a seal on molten wax; and as the image made on the wax is the exact representation (though on another substance) of the die, so is Christ the exact representation of the Father in human flesh.  And thus He was able to say, “He that hath seen me hath seen the Father.”  The life of Jesus is the life of God transmuted into the form of our human life, so that we may see, touch, hear, know, understand, and experience the very being and nature of God in human terms.  The natural mind cannot understand such a truth as this, but this is what God meant when He said, “Let us make man in our image and after our likeness.”  CHRIST is the image of God and God meant for every man to look and speak and act and be just like Jesus Christ.  This is the value of man’s life in redemption, for God sent One who was all that man was meant to be to purchase us not to harps and golden streets and fluttering wings in some far-off heaven somewhere but back to relationship with God as sons in His very own image.

As we consider the wonderful advent of man created “in the image of God” we can only conclude that this is a SPIRITUAL MAN brought forth out of the very spirit-substance of God almighty, and bearing His own divine nature, character, power and attributes.  The image of God is the nature of God reproduced in man.  Thus, man is the true image of God!  The divine nature was best and fully expressed in the man Christ Jesus who shined upon mortals the truest revelation of God and lifted man's sights higher than their poor thoughts would allow.  Jesus revealed to men their true origin, heritage and destiny.  He came to show man what man really is, was intended to be, and through redemption and so great a salvation shall be THE IMAGE OF GOD.  Christ is the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end, the first and the last.  In Jesus Christ you see man as he was in the beginning, and as he ever shall be world without end THE IMAGE OF GOD WITH DOMINION OVER ALL THINGS.

We have come to the most sublime of all truths.  The beauty of these celestial realities is found in the fact that all Jesus did He did “for us” not in our place, but on our behalf.  A musician demonstrates the beauty of the music he teaches in order to show the learner the way by practice as well as precept.  This was the precious import of our Lord’s sinless life and of His demonstration of power over the whole flesh realm, including death.  Our heavenly Father demands that all men should follow the example of our Lord and Master.  In order to enter the Kingdom of the Heavens, the anchor of hope must be cast beyond the veil of this carnal, dying realm into the Shekinah into which Jesus has passed before us; and this advance beyond the law of sin and death must come through the joys and triumphs of a people “led by the Spirit”  who are “the sons of God” as well as through their sorrows and afflictions.  It is by facing the enemy in the crucible of experience and by the authority of the Spirit that victory is snatched from the jaws of defeat.  Each and every test in our lives is an opportunity to prove for ourselves and demonstrate to those about the triumph of the Spirit over the flesh.  Step by step, battle by battle, victory upon victory we ascend into the heights of the Kingdom of Heaven. the image of God and the dominion restored in man.

One can never comprehend the length and breadth and height and depth of God’s great plan of creation and redemption until he first understands that Jesus Christ is the revelation of the value of every man.  In the mysterious mists of Eden God breathed into man the breath of His own divine life and prophesied of this man that he would be the image and likeness of Himself, and in due time would take his place in the Father’s great Kingdom with dominion over all the works of His hands.  There is a story about a little piece of wood that once bitterly complained because its owner kept whittling away at it, gouging it and making holes in it.  But the one who was cutting it paid no attention to the stick’s protests.  He was making a flute out of that piece of ebony, and he was too wise to stop when the wood complained so bitterly.  The man said, “Little piece of wood, without these rifts and holes, and all this cutting, you’d be just a stick forever a useless piece of ebony.  What I am doing now may seem as if I am destroying you, but instead it will change you into a flute.  Your sweet music will charm the souls of many and comfort sorrowing hearts.  My cutting you is the making of you, for only thus can you be a blessing in the world.”  The meaning of this little parable is clear: That flute, whose music blended so sweetly in the orchestra, was made a flute only by the knife and file that filled it with rifts and holes which seemed to be its very destruction.  But the purpose of the master was that it might become a melodious instrument to the praise of God.  The Lord is shaping us.  He is processing us into His image, that His glory might be revealed in creation.   Hallelujah!

This divine potential lies in the spirit of every man and shows the value of man’s life.  Some do not believe that the seed of God abides in every man, but I do not hesitate to tell you that the spirit of every man originated with God and came out of God.  If every man is spirit, soul, and body, then where else did man’s spirit come from?  When the Word became flesh and tabernacled among us we learned the true dignity of man.  The wonder is not that God could stoop so low but that man was created so high, that He took our nature.  The sinless Son of Man reveals indeed what a fall man has suffered, but shows what a destiny is his, when once the image of his Creator has been restored.  Why lift a sot from his gutter to care for him and rehabilitate him and bring him to God?  The reason is that man has in him some touch of the eternal and must be saved; and some ultimate tide of compassion moves us to save him!  His salvation is not merely from his drink, from his lust, from his sin and bondage and hell; it is salvation unto all his awesome potential as a child of the Father in heaven!  Is that not what Jesus’ parable of the Prodigal Son teaches us?  Man was meant to be the head of creation.

Can man who has sunk so low be raised so high?  Consider with me the destiny of one muddy road.  The clay, left long enough, hardens into a sapphire.  The sand becomes by refraction of light an opal.  The soot is a diamond in the rough.  And the water when it freezes, is a snow-white star.  Ah, there is a finer destiny for muddy humanity, but you do not see it in our raw state!  Only the mighty pressures and processes of God’s redemptive dealings can transform the murky elements into the essence of divine beauty, glory and power!  And this, my beloved, is the answer to Job’s piercing question, “What is man, that Thou shouldest magnify him? and that Thou shouldest set Thine heart upon him? and that Thou shouldest visit him every morning, and try him every moment?”

 Sin-cursed  and sin-broken, sick and weak, murderer and prostitute, proud and arrogant, mean and vindictive all that is humanity!  But is that the value of mankind?  What is the value of human life?  JESUS is the value!  For just such humanity there was the Man from Galilee, the Son of God, the express image of the Father, the pure, sinless, harmless One, love personified, the heir of all things, the Lord of the universe there was that One nailed to a cross, to redeem every man that ever lived or shall live.  THAT IS THE VALUE OF MAN’S LIFE!  JESUS IS THE VALUE OF MAN!  The price that is paid for an object reflects its value.  The price God paid for humanity was His own Son in the image and glory of the Father.  God saw beneath man’s tattered garment and marred image His own omnipotent potential buried there.  Love pierced through the gloom and roughness and saw a diamond in the rough, but a diamond sure enough.  It was in that divine spark within man’s spirit capable of being renewed that we find the reason for the cross.  The cross was God’s great act by which He released His life-flow, the precious blood of Jesus, to heal, quicken, and restore man to his place in God.

 It would do us all a world of good to take inventory of our attitudes how we see men.  I fear that we would be both surprised and disturbed to see how often we view men out of our carnal minds rather than with the eyes of our heavenly Father the prodigal’s Father!  Oh mystery of mysteries!  Jesus went to the cross not only to take away our sins, He went there for the good in man, to redeem it and restore it into the image and likeness of God.  The deepest mystery of all is that God is multiplying Himself in man, and is bringing Himself into a new dimension.  There is a MAN seated upon the highest throne of heaven.  Not an angel, not a cherub, but a MAN!  That man still is clothed in the body that walked along the shores of Galilee, for the cave of Joseph of Arimathea is empty, although that body has been spiritualized by the power of incorruptible life.

The dwelling place of a son of God is in the Father and the dwelling place of the Father is in the sons.  The sons are the out-raying of the Father’s substance and the perfect imprint of His nature in human form.  I never enjoy trying to see pictures where no picture exists, but it is plain to an understanding born from above that ultimately all men will be manifested sons of God, for Jesus Christ, the Son of the living God, died and rose again to save and redeem and restore all men to God as His very own children.  That will be the glorious consummation of God’s ages-long purpose to make man into His image and after His likeness.  Nothing short of that can suffice.  Only then will God be ALL-IN-ALL!

This wonderful truth cannot be stated more eloquently than it has been by F. B. Meyer in his book THE WAY INTO THE HOLIEST.  He writes, “‘We behold Jesus...crowned with glory and honor’ (Heb. 2:9).  This is the crown wherewith His Father crowned Him in the day of the gladness of His heart, when, as man, He came forth victorious from the wrestle with the prince of hell.  All through His earthly life He fulfilled the ancient ideal of man.  He was God’s image; and those who saw Him saw the Father.  He was Sovereign in His commands.  Winds and waves did His bidding. Trees withered at His touch.  Fish in shoals obeyed His will.  Droves of cattle fled before His scourge of small cords.  Disease and death and devils owned His sway.  But all was more fully realized when He was about to return to His Father, and said, in a noble outburst of conscious supremacy, ‘All power is given unto Me in heaven and in earth.’

 As He is, we too shall be.  He is there as the type and specimen and representative of redeemed men.  We are linked with Him in an indissoluble union.  Through Him we shall get back our lost empire.  We too shall be crowned with glory and honor!  The day is not far distant when we shall sit at His side joint heirs in His empire; comrades in His glory, as we have been comrades in His sorrows; beneath our feet all things visible and invisible, thrones and principalities and powers; whilst above us shall be the unclouded empyrean of our Father’s love, for ever and for ever.  Oh, destiny of surpassing bliss!  Oh, rapture of saintly hearts!  Oh, miracle of Divine Omnipotence!”    end quote.

Bill Britton penned these instructive words: “Paul tells us in I Corinthians 15:49 that ‘as we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly.’  We were once in the image of the Adamic man.  We once bore the image of the man of sin, of the earthly man, but we shall bear the image of the Christ.  We have born the image of Adam, we shall bear the image of Christ, Paul says.  ‘Have borne’ is past tense that means I am not bearing it now.  I am not under his control.  I am free from sin I don’t have to walk in sin.  I don’t have to obey it any more.  I am not a slave to sin any longer.  But I’m not yet bearing the fullness of the heavenly image because we ‘shall bear’ is a future tense.  I’m not yet bearing the fullness of what He has prepared for me. Then where am I?  I am in a process a progressive development.  There is a present, progressive work going on in me.  That’s that redemption of the soul that is happening.  The quicker we get our souls redeemed, the quicker we yield to the spirit, the quicker we are going to get in there for our bodies to be redeemed.  As we have borne the image of Adam, we shall bear the image of Christ.

 “John 1:14 says that the Word of God was made flesh and dwelt among us.  Does that mean the Word of God actually put on the wicked, sinful nature of old Adam?  When Jesus was here, was He a man of sinful nature?  The word ‘flesh’ here is not the word for sinful nature.  Nor does it mean that He was just made fingers, toes, and so forth.  If that was true, we would all have to try to work on our natural appearance so we could look like Jesus as much as possible.  I don’t know, and thank God the Bible doesn’t say, what Jesus looked like physically.  It doesn’t tell us whether He was tall or short, fat or skinny, whether He was black, white, or brown.  Some folks say He had a Jewish father, so He must have been brown.  But He didn’t have a Jewish father!  He wasn’t a Jew by race.  He had a Father in heaven, and He was born of a virgin.  He had a heavenly nationality.  So I don’t know what He looked like physically.  And thank God I don’t, because I would want to be just like that to bear His image, and I would be dissatisfied with the way I look, and I couldn’t change it!  But I’ll tell you what I can change I can change this nature by the help of the Spirit, into the likeness of the nature that He was made of.  That Word became human nature, or flesh, inside of a physical body.  And that human nature was a holy nature the image of God!”    end quote.

One of our long-time readers, Paul Stumpo, wrote in one of his letters this beautiful illustration of the image of God in His sons.  “There is a technology today for making pictures that can be viewed in three dimensions.  That is, the image has height, depth, and breadth.  This technology is called holography.  As with all photographic processes, light is needed to radiate a photographic plate with the desired object.  However, with a holography, a special source of light is needed, light that is produced by a LASER.  LASER light, simply stated, is completely harmonious with itself, light that is in time, in phase, and traveling in the same direction.  Using a LASER, the object and the photographic plate are radiated and the image becomes ‘inscribed’ onto the photographic plate.  The amazing thing with a holograph is that the complete image resides everywhere on the plate.  This means that if a small piece is broken from the whole plate, that small piece will have the complete image on it and the complete image can be seen.  Now, because this piece is not the whole piece, the image on it is blurry not clear for lack of details.  The remaining large piece is diminished somewhat because of the few details lost by the removal of the small piece, but most of the clarity of the image is still there.  Is it not the same with us, since we are very small pieces of that whole which is the body of Christ.  As He radiates our life with HIS Image, we begin to take on that same Image.  Now, if we view this Body as He views it, it is one complete whole, and that whole is now being radiated with the Light that He is that perfect, complete, in time, in phase, same direction LIGHT.  Each of us being small parts carry within ourselves the whole Image with a certain aspect of the whole more pronounced within each of us, so that when fitly joined together, one clear, crisp, distinct Image can be seen.”

THE SON OF MAN

Jesus constantly referred to Himself as “the Son of man.”  Most Christians read right over that, thinking it means Son of God, though it says He is a man.  This does not mean that He was born of Adam, the fleshly man, nor even that Mary in some mysterious way contributed to His genetic makeup.  In solemn truth we may search the Bible through and we will not find that the “second man” was in any way derived from the “first man.”  Jesus was not conceived by the union of divine sperm with Mary’s human egg.  Mary’s life was Adam’s life, and if Mary contributed anything at all to Jesus’ life He would then have been from the fallen Adam and would have Himself been of the first man Adam.  He would, therefore, have needed a Saviour instead of being the Saviour!  Nothing is more certain than this Adam cannot redeem Adam!  The fallen cannot perfect himself to redeem and restore himself.  The very thought is an absurdity.  I have heard men say that when Jesus says, “I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end, the first and the last,” He means that He Himself was both the first man Adam who sinned and the last man Adam who redeemed.  I do not hesitate to tell you that this is not only an improbability it is an impossibility!

The first man is of the earth, earthy, the record states; the second man is the Lord from heaven!  The first man fell by sin, marred his image, lost his dominion, forfeited his inheritance, becoming a poor, miserable, degraded creature, ignorant and godless, the impotent plaything of circumstances, and weak and helpless to the last degree.  The second man knew no sin, was holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners, and walked even upon this earth in a realm higher than the heavens.  Have you ever wondered how the second man became the Saviour of the first man if He Himself was the first man?  How could the fallen man become the Saviour without a Saviour?  If Jesus was like us in that He needed a Saviour, but was able to save Himself without a Saviour, and then save others, then mankind really needed no Saviour at all, for they could have, like Jesus, simply saved themselves.  Such reasoning is spiritual tomfoolery and theological drivel.

What, then, does Jesus mean when He calls Himself the “Son of man”?  He means that He was born from the realm of true manhood, formed in that state of being in which the first man dwelt before he sinned.  Jesus stepped right out of that prophetic, spiritual, creative dimension where the word of God proclaims, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness.”  He was the second man to be fashioned in that realm of true manhood by the creative word of God.  Being the second man of GOD’S MANHOOD CREATION, He is called “the Son of man” or the offspring of GOD’S MANHOOD IDEA.  The first man Adam stepped forth out of the Creative Mind of God’s Idea of Manhood, and Jesus was the second man to proceed out of that Creative Manhood Idea of the Father. As the second man He is the SON OF MAN, the second of an Order, the second revelation of the image and likeness of God in man, birthed from the Manhood Mind of the Father.  This man, being tempted in all points like as we are, yet without sin, is THE IMAGE AND LIKENESS OF GOD!

What is an image?  An image is something which is formed, a representation of something, a likeness.  A true image would be that which correctly depicts the appearance, form, substance, nature, character, and being of whatever it stands for.  A true image of God would have to be a true expression of who and what God is!  Today we have many false images of God!  These, whether idols, concepts, ideas, or theological creeds are manufactured out of the carnal minds of men according to their own darkened understanding.  So we have a distorted image of God.  Many preachers portray God as vengeful, vindictive, unforgiving, unmerciful, demanding, laying heavy yokes upon His followers, taking away our salvation the moment we slip or fall into sin,  consigning all who die outside of Christ to unending torture in hell-fire, and many other hideous, monstrous images.  But, blessed be God!  Jesus Christ brought a true and correct image of God, by faithfully walking out the true and divine manhood.  It was in MAN, the highest of God’s creations, that God placed  the “invisible things of Himself” for display.  Now we are being conformed to the image of Jesus Christ the image of God that Christ gave.  All the holy sons of God  are becoming the image of God in the earth to reveal the heart, nature, wisdom, power, glory and love of God to every order of the universe, worlds without end.  Through these manifested sons all realms shall be blessed to see and touch and experience the image of God.  ALL shall come to know Him!  This is the purpose of God in man.  And THIS IS THE INCREASE OF THE KINGDOM OF GOD!

 


Chapter 55

THE INCREASE OF THE KINGDOM

(continued)

Man in God’s image, man in Christ at the right hand of God, is God’s government in the Kingdom of God.  This magnificent purpose burned in the heart of the heavenly Father when on the sixth creative day He proclaimed the wonderful decree: “Let us make man in our image...and LET THEM HAVE DOMINION over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth” (Gen. 1:26).  Far away in the depths of my spirit I am convinced that within this shadowy type we behold a vivid portrait of God’s purpose for man, that when man comes fully into GOD’S IMAGE he shall be, first, the ruler of things beneath, the lowest realms of the bottomless, typified by the fish swarming in the depths of the seas, and the creeping things; next, the things upon the earth, typified by the cattle, and all the earth; and finally, the things of the heavens also, typified by the fowl of the air.  One may find it difficult to embrace so great a truth from so small and insignificant a type, but did not our Lord Jesus employ many of these same analogies when He said things like, “Ye shall tread on serpents, and on scorpions...I give you power over all the power of the enemy.”  Spake He of creeping creatures slithering through the grass?  Certainly not!  He spoke of spiritual realities represented by the orders of things in the natural.  The natural world is but the type, symbol and shadow of the heavenly.   

Was it not upon this very Edenic type that the writer to the Hebrews enlarged when by the Spirit he wrote, “For unto the angels hath He not put in subjection the world to come, whereof we speak.  But one in a certain place testified, saying, What IS man, that Thou art mindful of him?  Thou madest him a little lower that Elohim (Ps. 8:5, Hebrew); Thou CROWNEST HIM WITH GLORY AND HONOR, and didst set him OVER THE WORKS OF THY HANDS: Thou hast put A-L-L  T-H-I-N-G-S in subjection under his feet.  For in that He put ALL in subjection under him, He left N-O-T-H-I-N-G that is NOT put under him!” (Heb. 2:5-8.

You won’t quite grasp that at first.  It’s too overwhelming!  To be CROWNED means to be given KINGLY RULE.  To be crowned with GLORY and HONOR is to be given such rule as Jesus Christ has now, and of that rule we read, “Wherefore God also hath HIGHLY EXALTED Him, and given Him a name which is above every name: that at the name of Jesus Christ every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth; and that every tongue (in all those three realms) should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father” (Phil. 2:9-11).  We have already stated that man in God’s image, man in Christ at the right hand of God is God’s government in the Kingdom of God.  Paul said it this way, “Who (Jesus) IS THE IMAGE of the invisible God...by Him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers...and ye are complete IN HIM WHICH IS THE HEAD OF  A-L-L  PRINCIPALITY AND POWER” (Col. 1:15-17; 2:9-10).

Have you noticed that the rule the firstborn Son of God now has is the very same rule over the identical THREE REALMS of heaven, the earth, and the abyss, which God delegated to Adam, the man in God’s image, in Genesis 1:26!  This is the dominion reserved for all of God’s sons!  What a hope!  What a calling!  How much better, how much higher and more meaningful is this than harps and fluttering wings and white night gowns!  A kingdom denotes rulership and advancement of all kinds.  It means work and responsibility and a place of ministry and authority to bless.  All who in Christ come to God’s image are destined to share that awesome dominion, seated together with Him, far above all principality and power.  The reason so many people fail to attain to the great heights of the Spirit is because they are unable to see God’s purposes, and therefore they have no particular incentive to seek the great heights that are IN HIM.  So many Christians are far too taken up with carnal ideas and childish notions about mansions in the skies and harps and wings and sitting on clouds eating pork chops with nothing to do and all eternity to do it in, to be able to see the true purposes of God at HIS RIGHT HAND.  Simply speaking, the purpose of God is that we might reign with Him, and to reign is to exercise authority for God to rule all things.  Paul tells us that we are to seek those things which are above where Christ sits at the right hand of God.  This means that we are to SEEK THE THINGS OF THE RIGHT HAND!  Reigning with Christ must become one of the great goals in the life of every man and woman who has received the call to sonship.

When our Lord Jesus said, “I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it,” He spoke of that true church which is His body, the fullness of Him that filleth all in all.  It should be abundantly clear that He spoke of His “many brethren” who would be conformed to His image, matured in His life, and perfected in His wisdom, power, and dominion.  The sad truth is that for nearly two thousand years the gates of hell have prevailed against those systems which call themselves the church, and every foul and unclean spirit has overrun them and sits enthroned in their creeds, liturgies, ceremonies, rituals, and ecclesiastical orders.

The Greek word for church is ECCLESIA.  We all think we know the meaning of this word, for we hear it so often.  Ecclesia means “called out,” it’s a chosen, separated people.  That is true. But ECCLESIA means much more than that!  The word ECCLESIA is a special word, with a particular usage in the Greek in which our New Testament is written.  It is a word that denotes a legislative body.  In New Testament times when they wanted to gather people together for various purposes they had different words for different gatherings.  For instance, the word SUNAGOGE (synagogue) means a gathering of people for the purpose of worship.  In every Jewish community there was the synagogue, the gathering of people to worship the God of Israel.  But whenever they wanted to gather together the ruling class, the legislative body the mayor, the senate, the pro-consul, etc. they would announce the gathering of the ecclesia.  It was a ruling class of people with power to legislate, to make laws, to initiate governmental actions, to control events within the nation.

That is what the church is intended to be!  What today is called the church is not the church at all!  The gatherings are not gatherings of rulers, but gatherings of babes seeking blessings and spiritual thrills.  The church has become a spiritual kindergarten where people go to be entertained and taught and taught and taught again, those things which are but the elementary principles of the doctrine of Christ.  These so-called church systems are decaying before our eyes and nothing can save them.  They are not at all  what Jesus had in mind when He said, “I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.”  The imperfect things that have been used of God in an imperfect age are vanishing away with the age itself, for “when that which is perfect is come, then that which is in part (imperfect) shall be done away.”

KINGDOM DOMINION

Dominion means to live in authority, to reign in life by one, Christ Jesus.  God is teaching His sons in this hour to live victoriously!  With the pen of inspiration Daniel wrote of this Kingdom-Dominion: “I saw in the night visions, and, behold, one like the Son of man came with the clouds of heaven, and came to the Ancient of days, and they brought him near before Him.  And there was given him dominion, and glory, and a kingdom, that all people, nations, and languages, should serve him: and his dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away, and his kingdom that which shall not be destroyed” (Dan. 7:13-14).  Daniel said that he saw something in the night visions.  He saw one like unto the Son of man.  There was given unto Him dominion, glory, and a kingdom.  These were given Him for the purpose that all peoples, nations, and languages should serve Him.  It describes His dominion as an enduring dominion, an invincible dominion that shall not pass away and a kingdom that cannot be overcome or overthrown.

KINGDOM DOMINION!  The terminology that Daniel used is that the dominion and the kingdom are given to God’s Christ, Head and body, and it is an enduring dominion and an indestructible kingdom.  That is powerful!  The kingdoms of men crumble very quickly, all the vaunted empires of history lie in ruin in the dust of the ages.  The rise of any earthly empire is but the early proclamation of its fall.  The Roman empire, apparently invincible, exists today only in the crumbling ruins of buildings, roads, and aqueducts.  All of man’s systems are doomed the short span of the twentieth century saw the decline of the British empire, the meteoric rise and fall of the Third Reich, and the emergence and collapse of Russian communism.  If this is the “American Age,” then nothing is more certain than the fact that our greatness, too, shall pass away.  The kings of the earth have dominion one day, and lose it the next.  But when you connect with God’s Kingdom, you connect with an enduring dominion and an indestructible kingdom.  The dominion that you receive from God and His Kingdom will not only last forever in your life, but it can never be defeated. The victory of Christ is being raised up within every son of God that will triumph and remain it cannot be affected by anything within or without or diminished in any degree.  You, my beloved, have omnipotent potential in Christ!  What we are walking in as citizens of the Kingdom of Heaven is an everlasting, continual, full and indestructible Kingdom!

One cannot talk about Kingdom dominion without recognizing the King of the Kingdom.  Jesus Christ is the King of the ages.  It is Jesus who now reigns and shall rule for all the ages.  It is the Lord Jesus Christ who has been given power, authority, influence, and control over the spiritual heavens, over the universe, over the earth, over humanity, and within your heart.  Matters not what demons, devils, men, or any other creature says, those called to sonship to God have received the spirit of kingship the Lord of glory sits in royal majesty upon the throne of our lives and all power in heaven and in earth is given unto us.  “And the kingdom and dominion, and the greatness of the kingdom under the whole heaven, shall be given to the people of the saints of the Most High, whose kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and all dominions shall serve and obey Him” (Dan. 7:27).  “Fear not, little flock, for it is the Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom” (Lk. 12:32).

The power of the Kingdom of God begins to have dominion first within our individual lives.  The beginning of the Kingdom dominion of God is right there in your heart today.  In 1932 a young actor, trying to make his mark in Hollywood, took a screen test.  A talent judge who watched the performance was less than enthusiastic.  His note about this particular actor read, “Can’t act, can’t sing, can dance a little.”  The actor was a man named Fred Astaire the same one who went on to stardom.  When the world looks at us or when we look at ourselves there doesn’t seem to be much potential in us for sonship.  We have little natural ability that God can anoint and use for His Kingdom.  Fortunately, the reality of our sonship doesn’t depend upon any potential we have in our natural constitution all the potential comes from God!  It is the potential of the Christ who has come within!  Our potential is not limited by our own resources but, instead, is limitless because of Christ’s infinite resources!

Jesus Christ did not come to earth to win the world by political action or military rule.  He didn’t come to set up a police state.  “My kingdom is not of this world (system),” Jesus said.  Some of the Jews came to forcefully make Him a king and what did He do?  The scripture says that He escaped away from them, He walked right out of their midst and vanished.  He came representing and manifesting the spiritual rule of God, the invincible heavenly dominion, which is destined to consume all the visible kingdoms of this world and raise them up into the realm of the Kingdom of God. That’s exactly what Jesus came here to do to consume the visible kingdoms, the existing ones, until the words of the prophet are truly fulfilled: “And the seventh angel sounded; and there were great voices in heaven saying, The kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our Lord, and of His Christ; and He shall reign to the ages of the ages” (Rev. 11:15).

The rule of God on earth begins to become a reality when the dominion of the Spirit is established in the minds, hearts, and lives of God’s elect.  When the Kingdom of God is fully established in God’s elect, then God begins to take hold of the kingdoms of the world.  It is just as simple and effective and powerful as that!  God doesn’t take the kingdoms from the top down, He takes them from the bottom up.  He starts at the grass-roots level.  Every time a man or woman is born again into the Kingdom of God there is the increase of His government and peace.  There is the increase of Kingdom dominion in the earth as He forms His Kingdom in His sons and daughters.

 “And Jesus being full of the Holy Ghost returned from Jordan, and was led by the Spirit into the wilderness, being forty days tempted of the devil.  And in those days He did eat nothing: and when they were ended, He afterward hungered.  And the devil, taking Him up into an high mountain, showed unto Him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time.  And the devil said unto Him, All this power will I give Thee, and the glory of them: for that is delivered unto me; and to whomsoever I will, I give it.  If Thou therefore wilt worship me, all shall be Thine.  And Jesus answered and said unto him, Get thee behind me, Satan: for it is written, Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and Him only shalt thou serve” (Lk. 4:1-2,5-8).  “All you’ve got to do is worship me, and all will be yours.”  Well, it is true that all the kingdoms of the world, their glory, their power, their beauty and their splendor were delivered into the hands of the devil through the transgression of Adam.

Have we considered that the apostle John knew what he was talking about when he wrote, “And we know that we are of God, and the whole world lieth in the wicked one” (I Jn. 5:19).  That’s the very reason Jesus came to take the dominion back and give it to the sons of the Most High.  It is delivered into the hands of God’s elect!  Notice the testimony of God: “The Ancient of days came, and judgment was given to the saints of the Most High; and the time came that the saints possessed the kingdom...the judgment shall sit, and they shall take away his dominion, to consume and to destroy it unto the end” (Dan. 7:22,26).  Can you imagine what was going through the mind of the firstborn Son of God when Satan offered Him all the kingdoms and dominion of the world if He would fall down and worship him?  By revelation of the Spirit Jesus could say, “You don’t give me anything I’ve come to take it!  Just stick around, devil, you’re going to lose it, but not because you gave it to me.  I’ve come here to take the dominion from you, and all power in heaven and in earth shall be given unto me and to the sons of the Most High God.  You’re not offering me anything.  I’m about to subdue you!”

Jesus came into the world to transfer the power and the dominion to the sons of God.  He came as a Son of God, He came by divine force, by might, by strength, by ability, by God’s potential in man.  Within Himself He entered into the adversary’s dominion, to his throne room, to the seat and stronghold of his kingdom and wrested from him the power and the dominion.  He came upon him abruptly, suddenly, powerfully, seized him and took his dominion from him, left him humiliated, stripped of all his power and dumbfounded at the swiftness and magnitude of his defeat.  Jesus accomplished all of this within Himself, and now His victory is  given to us to accomplish within ourselves.  Sons of God!  The spirit of sonship is within us!  That’s what Jesus came to do: to destroy, render impotent, make of none effect the devil and bring to naught all his works.  This power and authority is within the Christ, and ye are the body of Christ.  Jesus Christ is the Son of God, and it is He who lives within us.  The Life He lives is nothing less than the Life He is.  Within His Life is all His love, grace, wisdom, ability, power and authority.  Don’t let anybody tell you the devil is after you, the devil is fighting you, hindering you, tripping you up, defeating you or thwarting God’s purpose in your life.  Oh, no!  All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth,” says Christ the Head.  “All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth,” must be the testimony of every member of Christ the body.

All power is all power.  For those who stand in God’s Christ no power belongs to the devil anymore!  For these blessed ones the devil’s kingdom has come to an end!  His rule is terminated!  His dominion is over!  His power has been stripped, his authority revoked!  And now the sons of God are “Giving thanks unto the Father, which hath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light: who hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of His dear Son” (Col. 1:12-13).  Therefore may I boldly say, “Fear not, little flock; for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom its righteousness, its joy, its peace, its incorruptible life, its power, its authority, its dominion, its wisdom,  its knowledge, its anointing, its blessing, its potential, its fullness, its riches and its treasures!”  It is the Father’s good pleasure, it pleases Him to make you the sons of God with power.  It pleases Him to give you life more abundantly. It pleases Him to raise you up into the fullness of His Christ and send you forth as deliverers of creation.  Jesus took it all all power and raises it up within the sons of God.  The hour has now come for this to be realized, personified, and consummated in the many brethren of our Lord.

Men of God throughout the church age have tasted the earnest and firstfruits of this Kingdom dominion, but just as the seed planted eventually produces a harvest of many seeds in which the life settles, reproducing in form, quality, and power the original seed, so now the life of the all-triumphant Jesus is settling in fullness of form, quality, and power within the sons of God.  We who have received the call to sonship are learning, growing, developing and maturing into His dominion within ourselves, the rule of His Kingdom raised up within us.  We can never understand  the deep mystery of Kingdom dominion until we clearly see that Jesus does not now enforce His victory over satan and His acquisition of All Power on behalf of all creation.  If He did, there would be no sin, no darkness, no sickness, no sorrow, and no death anywhere!  Though Jesus has all power in heaven and in earth, and has fully and forever overcome sin, satan and death, men continue to be ravaged by fear, carnality, sin and death.  It is like a boxer who fights the world champion boxer and defeats him.  HE has defeated him for himself, but no one else has defeated him.  Now suppose that the new champion trains every other man to box as he does, and one by one they are developed into world-class boxers and enter into a match with the former world champion and each in turn defeats him. The new world champion’s ability has thus been transferred, conveyed, and imparted to all men, making them champions.  This is the law of Kingdom dominion!  We do not merely glorify the victory, power and authority of the man Jesus two thousand years ago,  but through His Spirit we are brought into the same relationship with God that He knew.  Then by the gracious ministry of the sons of God all men shall be ushered experientially into the same victory!   How awesome is this Day!

Paul Mueller has ably written, “David expressed the magnificent wonder of man having the glory of the Lord.  ‘When I see Thy heavens, the work of Thy fingers, the moon and the stars which Thou hast formed; what is man that Thou shouldest think of him, and the son of man that Thou shouldest care for him?  Yet Thou has made him but little lower than God, and dost crown him with glory and honor!  Thou madest him ruler over the works of Thy hands, Thou hast put all things under his feet; all sheep and oxen, and also the beasts of the field; the birds of the heavens and the fish of the sea, that traverse the paths of the seas.  O Lord, our Lord, how glorious is Thy name in all the earth!’ (Ps. 8:3-9, Smith-Goodspeed).

 “This is a Psalm showing the authority God has given man over His creation.  It presents a picture of man as he is now, and as we shall be when redemption is complete.  During this and previous ages, man was given dominion over all God’s vast creation (Gen. 1:26-28).  The earth and all things of it have been given to man to manage and to govern according to his ability.  But man has not done a very good job of managing the Lord’s creation.  We have polluted the earth and its environment.  Man has not judged the world in justice and righteousness, nor has man handled the economic affairs of this world with equity.  And man has certainly not represented the Lord and His kingdom very well.  Man has had the God-given authority and dominion of the earth, according to the Lord’s plan and purpose, yet he has done a miserable job managing the Lord’s wonderful creation.

 “Why is this true?  What is lacking in man that makes him such a poor administrator of God’s creation?  Those who managed the creation did poorly because they were not yet in God’s image and likeness, nor were they crowned with glory and honor.  The glory and honor of the Lord was lacking!  The likeness of Christ also was lacking!  And unless man is transformed into the image of God, and crowned with glory and honor, he cannot possibly take the dominion of the creation and govern it in righteousness.  The whole fallen, corrupt order of man is in the debased condition it is because man has ruled in his fallen state.  And the Lord has ordained that it should be this way for an appointed time.  But in the age to come, a corporate man shall come forth in God’s image and shall be crowned with glory and honor.  They shall then administer His kingdom with justice, equity, peace and righteousness just as the Lord intended it to be.

 “The glory of the Lord now rests upon the sons of God who make up the true church, the body of Christ.  God’s glory is not now, nor has it ever been, on a denomination or a building of man’s design.  His glory is the glory of Christ, which is His splendor in the realm of the Spirit.  The glory of the Lord is that holy and awesome presence of the Lord that is miraculous, marvelous and beyond the feeble words of man to tell.  That glory belongs to the Christ body.  And the hour is upon us when we shall be anointed, empowered and crowned with the fullness of the wondrous, majestic, and awesome glory and honor of the Lord.  Then we shall be qualified by the authority He has given us to have dominion over His creation.  Then it shall truly be said by many, ‘O Lord, our Lord, how glorious is Thy name in all the earth!’  When the Christ body is complete and united in one, we shall all be changed into His likeness and crowned with glory and honor.  We shall then have dominion over the whole creation in that wonderful, resurrected, new creation state.

 “The writer to the Hebrews also proclaimed the truth of the creation of a new heavens and earth.  ‘And, Thou, Lord, in the beginning hast laid the foundation of the earth; and the heavens are the works of thine hands: they shall perish, but Thou remainest; and they shall all wax old as does a garment; and as a vesture Thou shalt fold them up, and they shall be changed: but Thou art the same, and Thy years shall not fail’ (Heb. 1:10-12).  One aspect of the vision the elect shall have in this hour is the vision of a new heaven and a new earth wherein dwelleth righteousness (2 Pe. 3:13).  We shall not forever rule and reign over an earth that has been worn out and destroyed by the effects of man’s sin, perversion and darkness, and by Satan’s dominion.  We shall eventually reign over a restored universe.

 “The earth, as we see it now, is slowly wearing out and its resources are diminishing.  It is all waxing old as doth a garment, just like the word of God says it will.  To those without a vision, it appears that we will not have enough water, oil, gas, trees, rain forests, vegetation, spotted owls, birds, beasts, creeping things, insects, fish, and sea mammals.  Environmentalists are trying to stifle agriculture and industry, for they think that we are at the end of earth’s resources.  There are many unbelievers and skeptics who are far from God and have no vision.  They are worshipping the creation rather than the Creator (Ro. 1:25), putting the creation before man.  But man was given this dominion (Gen. 1:26-30).  God and man must always come before the creation.  That is the divine order!  Many millions of those in darkness have no vision of God’s power of restoration!  Though mankind has done a terrible job of managing our resources, there will be enough of everything to the end of this age.  Then the whole creation shall be made new again.  And the reason we are running out of the earth’s resources is because we are at the end of the ages of man’s dominion.

 “By the inspiration of the Spirit, the writer to the Hebrews prophesied that both the heavens and the earth would ‘perish,’ and would ‘wax old as doth a garment.’  Thank God he didn’t end his dire prediction there, but went on to declare, ‘And as a vesture (garment or mantle) shalt Thou fold them up, and they (the heavens and the earth) shall be changed: but Thou art the same, and Thy years shall not fail.’  The entire universe is in God’s sight as a vesture, as a mere piece of cloth or garment that the Lord shall pick up and turn over in His hands, thus making it all new again. With the ease and simplicity of someone changing garments the Lord will restore the whole creation.  The restoration of the earth is to the Lord as if He would remove an old coat from the mantle of the earth and put on a new one.  That is the truth of God’s word which is presented in Hebrews chapter two, in Peter’s epistle, and in Old Testament prophecies (Ps. 102:25-28, Is. 66:22).

 “The heavens and the earth will be changed and restored by the same power that is changing us.  The whole creation shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious freedom of the sons of God (Rom. 8:19-22).  When the Lord has completed His work of restoring the earth, there will not be one needy, starving, famine-ravaged person anywhere on earth.  Then every man shall sit under his own vine and fig tree; and none shall make them afraid, for the mouth of the Lord of hosts hath spoken it (Mic. 4:4, Zech. 3:10).  Only our omnipotent God could make such a promise as this, and back it up with His glory and honor.  And He alone is worthy to be adored, revered and worshipped by all.  The restored heavens and earth will not be under the dominion of angels, but will be given to the saints of the most High.  Let this be our vision, and the daily struggles and conflicts of this life will be seen as nothing when compared to the greater plan and purpose of our omnipotent Father that is now coming into view”    end quote.

REIGNING FROM THE HEAVENLIES

Many a sermon has been preached on the rule of the Kingdom of God on earth, and I think most of them have missed the mark because they see only God reigning over His Kingdom.  The greatest mystery of the ages is that seated at the right hand of God today is a MAN.  God came down from heaven and invaded humanity, He took upon Himself the nature and the body of a man, so that when He went back to the throne (His omnipotent power in the Spirit), He would take humanity back to the throne.  There is no mystery to it that God sits on the throne, He belongs there; but to think now that MAN is sitting on the throne!  “Jesus of Nazareth, a MAN approved of God among you by miracles and wonders and signs...THIS JESUS hath God raised up, whereof we all are witnesses.  Therefore BEING BY THE RIGHT HAND OF GOD EXALTED...” (Acts 2:22,32-33).

There is confirmation of this in Acts 7:55-56 where we read concerning Stephen, “But he being full of the Holy Ghost, looked up steadfastly into heaven, and saw the glory of God and JESUS STANDING ON THE RIGHT HAND OF GOD.  And said, Behold I see the heavens opened and the SON OF MAN standing on the right hand of God.”  The “right hand of God” is simply a metaphor denoting the spiritual realm of all authority, power, and dominion.  It is the divine realm of God’s omnipotence.  It was rankest blasphemy in the minds of the persecutors of Stephen for him to say that he saw JESUS, the SON OF MAN, standing at the RIGHT HAND of God.  Such words were for him to seal his doom at the hands of the high priest and all the council.  If Stephen had said he saw the SON OF GOD  there, it would not have been so grievous, perhaps, but when we realize that it is the SON OF MAN seated in such a place, then it assumes proportions that we never before have thought about.

The right hand of God is not a physical location somewhere in the universe.  The throne of the God who is omniscient, omnipotent,  and omnipresent spirit is not a material one, but bespeaks of the REALM OF HIS SUPREME AND UNIVERSAL AUTHORITY AND RULERSHIP; and our Lord Jesus Christ has been exalted to the glory of that rulership.  The right hand of God is a realm of power and authority, a position of eminence, a condition and a state of divine being.  It is the assumption of the almighty power and universal dominion of the Father!  It is the dispensing of His positive energy force into His creation.  Exalted to that high realm Jesus no longer walks in a limited physical body, for He now indwells the spirits of His many brethren, who are the FULLNESS OF HIM THAT FILLETH ALL IN ALL (Eph. 1:22-23).

And blessed be God!  We now have a share in the REALM OF THE RIGHT HAND.  “If ye then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ sitteth at the right hand of God.  Set your affection on things above, and not on things on the earth.  For ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God” (Col. 3:1-3).  Ephesians 2:5-6 tells us that “when we were dead through our trespasses, God made us alive together with Christ...and raised us up with Him, and made us SIT TOGETHER WITH HIM in the heavenly places (the heights of His own exaltation).”  This shows that as we come to know the resurrection life of Christ, we are also made to experience the ascension of Christ.  We are chosen of God not only to be made alive from the dead and have God’s life, but also to sit in the heavenly places as ASCENDED MEN.  He causes us to ascend with Him and sit with Him in the heavens NOW!  Therefore, ascension truly is the position of those who know Christ in His fullness.  The position of ascension rests not only on the fact of Christ’s ascension, but on the LIFE OF ASCENSION WE HAVE OBTAINED WITHIN US.  The Christ who indwells our hearts and is being formed in our lives is THE ASCENDED CHRIST, and His life is ascended and heavenly, and is given from heaven.  Although in the conditions of the outer man we still live on earth, yet according to the inner man we are already in heaven.  The situation is just like our Lord’s during His time on earth.  He said then that though He “descended from heaven” He was still “in heaven” (Jn. 3:13).  This was due to the fact that His life and consciousness were heavenly and one with heaven.

It is true therefore that as we ascend into the high places of God in the spirit, we are reigning with Christ from His heavenly, spiritual throne.  As we truly become overcomers by the ascended life of Christ, we are also given power over the nations to rule them with a rod of iron, and as the vessels of a potter they shall be broken to shivers (Rev. 2:26-27).  This rule is given to the overcomers in Christ!  As the life of ascension within us raises up Kingdom dominion in our lives we reign with Christ in the Spirit, and the worldly powers of man can be broken by the authority within God’s sons.  The will and ways of man are displaced by the power of the Spirit and replaced by the spiritual power of the Kingdom of God.  We are a spiritual people.  And the Kingdom of God is the spiritual realm of our Father’s dominion.  Therefore our reign in Christ is a spiritual reign, which is accomplished as we move in and by His Spirit in relation to things in the earth realm.  Through that spiritual dominion God’s will is brought to pass on earth as it is in heaven.

All the vaunted thrones, powers, and dominions of earth are as sand castles on the beach before the power of the Kingdom within us.  The greatest power in the universe is that which flows forth from the throne of God in the heavenlies!  Although the Lord has ordained the “powers that be” for a purpose and for a season, the true throne of God remains in the heavenlies in the realm of the Spirit.  During the days of king David, who was one of the most powerful and honored kings of Israel, and who reigned gloriously from his physical throne on the earthly mount of Zion, the throne of the Lord was really in heaven, for David ruled by the Spirit of God and it was the Spirit of God upon Him out of the heavenly realm that constituted the throne of the Lord in the midst of His people.  The prophet Isaiah, who prophesied during the reign of four kings of Judah, also beheld in spirit and saw the throne of Yahweh in the heights of the heavenly realms of the Spirit (Is. 6:1, 66:1).  Jesus also proclaimed the truth that the throne of His Father was in heaven (Mat. 5:34, 23:22).

Armed with this sacred knowledge that the throne of God is a spiritual throne in the spiritual heavens of His divine life, wisdom and power, it is clear that there is no throne anywhere that can withstand the moving of God by the Spirit in Kingdom dominion.  As His sons we must take our place in the heavenlies, acknowledge that we are seated with Christ at the right hand of God, and begin to move more and more out of the unity of His mind and will within us.  As we sit in the high place of spiritual ascension in union with our Lord we are establishing a vital link between heaven and earth by which the Kingdom of God more fully comes to earth, thus usurping and overcoming the powers of man.  As one has written, “Each time we rise in the Spirit to worship our Father at His spiritual altar, the fire from His altar is cast to the earth to change the world (Rev. 8:3-6).  This is the direct result of the reign of Christ, which shall continue to increase until all is changed!”

The sons of God are called in this hour to minister to the Lord and for the Lord from the realm of His presence.  The throne of God is in the presence of the Lord in the heavenly realm of His Spirit.  Our spiritual ministry in the presence of God releases a mighty stream of God’s life and power from the heavenlies that flows from the presence of the Lord to all the earth.  As heaven casts its shadow upon the earth, all things are changed just as the sick were healed when the apostle Peter’s shadow fell upon them.  It is by the word of the Lord that flows through us from the throne in the presence of God within ourselves that causes God’s will to be done on earth even it is being done in the heavens.  This is taking place even now as God calls His sons higher into His presence and glory. There is nothing that cannot be affected on earth through the spiritual ministry of the sons of God in the Most Holy Place in the heavens of His Spirit!

Multitudes of Christian ministers today are ministering from the lowlands of carnal church programs and promotions.  We have a higher calling in God.  Only as we rise into the heavens of God’s Spirit and minister to the Lord and for the Lord from the realm of His greater, spiritual presence in the Most Holy Place of His throneship, shall the blessings and benefits of His heavenly Kingdom continue to change us and the world.  Father has raised us up into a unique place in this spiritual temple of the body of His sons.  Our hearts cannot settle for anything less, for we yearn and long and pray and travail and seek for His will to be done on earth as it is in heaven.  Nothing else will satisfy!  As we abide in this heavenly realm of His presence, taking our position seated in Christ Jesus at the right hand of God in the higher than all heavens  His mighty spirit-power shall continue to flow to the earth, changing the world and shaping the nations for the full and powerful reign of the Kingdom of God.  Those who are called to sonship are experientially ascending in the Spirit to the high places in God.  They are recognizing and taking their rightful place on the throne of the Lord, by the Spirit, where they reign with Christ.

Today we are living in momentous times.  We are living in a period between the ages, and God is initiating a new order and ministry in the earth.  My prayer is that all who read these lines will see in the spirit this new ministry of the Kingdom of God on earth!  As we fulfill this Kingdom ministry, this Kingdom dominion in the Spirit and by the Spirit, all evil and darkness shall eventually be removed, to trouble the world no more.  The spiritual ministry in the Most Holy Place of the heavenly realms of the presence of the Lord is the secret to conquering all evil and all darkness! Preaching and ministering according to the old carnal methods and techniques of the church systems will avail but little in this battle against the corrupt kingdoms of this world.  But when we ascend in the Spirit to the heavenlies where God’s will is revealed to our hearts, and God’s word is put in our mouths, and we worship and intercede and speak from the throne of the Lord, we then begin to defeat all darkness and evil and put every enemy under Christ’s feet by releasing the presence and power of the Kingdom of God in the world.  This is a new ministry we are entering at this time, and it is real and very powerful.  It will bring the blessings and benefits of the Kingdom and God’s power and glory to all mankind.  Make no mistake about it sons of God have a tremendous responsibility.  We are not called to merely learn deeper truths; we are called to RULE AND REIGN WITH CHRIST!  We are called to possess the Kingdom, to take the Kingdom, to take dominion over all darkness, sin, and death.  We are called to break the kingdoms of man to shivers, and to rule mankind as if we were shepherds tending a flock of sheep.

God is bringing us in the power of the Spirit to a new place.  There are certain principles of the Kingdom of God that must be a part of the frame of mind and the experience of all who fulfill the high calling of sonship.  We must learn to think like God.  We must begin to RULE WITH CHRIST IN THIS LIFE.  Kingdom dominion begins in that inauspicious place where we now dwell.  Too many saints are weak, frustrated, troubled,  and defeated.  Many run to and fro seeking someone to deliver them out of their distresses and problems.  May the dynamite of God’s Spirit blow us all out of the low places of lethargy, discouragement, oppression and defeat into a vibrant walk with Christ in the high places of joy, peace, faith and triumph of His Kingdom within.  “Strengthen yourselves in the Lord and in the power which His supreme might imparts.  Put on the complete armor of God, so as to be able to stand firm against all the stratagems of the devil.  For ours is not a conflict with mere flesh and blood, but with the despotisms, the empires, the forces that control and govern this dark world the spiritual hosts of evil arrayed against us in the heavenly warfare.  Therefore put on the complete armor of God, so that you may be able to stand your ground in the evil day, and having fought to the end, TO REMAIN VICTORS ON THE FIELD” (Eph. 6:10-14, Weymouth).

Once the believer embraces the truth that he is now seated with Christ at the right hand of God in the higher than all heavens, his heart will find rest and joy and confidence in the face of all situations and circumstances.  The right hand of God is the place of omnipotent universal power and dominion FAR ABOVE ALL THINGS!  Such all-embracing majesty is far too vast for my feeble understanding, yet I know by the Spirit that the body of Christ is being formed and prepared for the explicit purpose of UNIVERSAL DOMINION!  Yet, how can a man rule over principalities and powers and universes if he cannot rule his own spirit?  If my mother-in-law, my boss, or my neighbors get me down, how can I handle nations?  It is my deep conviction that what happens in your life and mine is a result of the use or abuse of the principles of the Kingdom of God.  Learn this, beloved, and you will know one of the fundamental principles of  reigning with Christ in the heavenlies: OUR AUTHORITY IS OVER SPIRITUAL WICKEDNESS FIRSTLY IN OURSELVES!

I never think of the glory of reigning with Christ without remembering an incident that happened many years ago.  In 1966 three brethren and I made a mission trip from Florida to Central America by automobile.  We arrived late one night in Tegucigalpa, the capital of Honduras.  From there we were scheduled to fly to the island of Roatan for a series of meetings.  Three things needed to be done the following day before our departure.  The brakes on the car must be fixed, we must find a place to leave the car while away from the capital, and we must locate the Embassy of El Salvador and secure visas for our return trip through that country.

After breakfast at our hotel the next morning we inquired at the desk for the address of the El Salvadoran Embassy.  The desk clerk courteously gave us directions and we set out to accomplish our business.  But there was no Embassy at the address we were given.  Driving around the block we found nothing in that area that resembled an Embassy.  Finally, inquiring of a man on the street, we were informed that the Embassy had moved to another location.  But when we arrived at the new address, there was no Embassy there, either!  I entered a small shop nearby and introduced myself to the owner, a well-dressed, distinguished looking business man.  He said, “Oh, yes, I know exactly where the Embassy is; in fact, I have business in that part of the city and will be most happy to accompany you.”  He climbed into our vehicle and happily we sped away.  An hour later we were driving around in circles and our distinguished guide still could not find the building he was quite certain he had seen a hundred times before! Disheartened, we dropped that project, concentrating instead upon getting the brakes repaired.  In a matter of minutes we discovered a large garage and were motioned in.  We stated the problem, whereupon a mechanic proceeded to jack up the car, take off the four wheels, and disassemble the brakes.  Once the parts were laying out on the floor an attendant informed us that it would be three days before they could fix the brakes!  Astonished, we instructed them to reassemble the brakes, and made our departure.

I was aware of an American church in the city and thought perhaps we should seek help from the pastor.  We did find the church rather quickly.  Leaving the brethren in the car I made my way to the door of the residence attached to the sanctuary, and rang the doorbell.  A young American girl answered the door.  I asked if she could direct me to the pastor of the church.  Her response was that she didn’t know the pastor, neither did she know his name, where he lived, or how he might be contacted.  By this time I was completely confounded!  We had spent the entire morning accomplishing absolutely nothing!  Our efforts to locate the Embassy were fruitless.  The attempt at getting the brakes repaired ended ridiculously.  And now here we sat atop a hill in front of an American church in a Spanish-speaking capital in the heart of Central America, and an American girl in that American church denies any knowledge of the pastor of that church!

I related this news to the brethren, whereupon one brother, especially sensitive to the Spirit, exclaimed: “The Lord shows me that this city is RULED BY SPIRITS OF CONFUSION.  We must agree together and bind these governing spirits in Jesus’ name!”  We joined hands there on that hilltop and spoke to the spirits of confusion reigning over the city of Tegucigalpa, Honduras, commanding them to loose their hold.  After several minutes of praise and rejoicing we drove down that hill, saw a Texaco station, and were impressed by the Spirit to pull in.  We met the proprietor, an English-speaking gentleman.  In the conversation that ensued we found that he knew where the Embassy was, and he graciously offered to park our car by his station while we were in Roatan; furthermore, he would fix the brakes while we were gone and then the icing on the cake he picked up his phone and arranged a free night’s lodging for us at a Bible School on top a mountain just outside the city.  Within forty-five minutes after we took our position in the higher-than-heavenlies and bound the spirits of confusion that had us (and the entire city) running in circles, every problem was solved, every need met, and all our business accomplished!  Furthermore, we were convinced in spirit that not only had we personally triumphed in Christ, but something tremendously glorious had transpired in the heavenlies that would redound in blessing to that city and country for years to come.  And the subsequent history of Honduras in relation to events in Central America over the past thirty-five years proves that we were right!

Simply speaking, the purpose of God is that we might reign for Him, and to reign is to exercise authority for God to rule all things.  All who in Christ appropriate the fullness of His life and glory and exaltation are destined to exercise that awesome dominion by the Spirit, seated together with Him, far above all principality and power.  This is the blueprint and strategy for the triumph of His Kingdom in all realms, from the lowest hell to the highest heaven.  Ah, beloved, we shall reign throughout the age and the ages to come until all enemies are conquered and Christ is All in All.

Let me give you another example of how we are called to rule and reign over the nations at this present time.  In 1983 the Lord spoke to me in a dream.  In the dream I was standing on a wide boulevard at a busy intersection in the city of Moscow.  At this intersection was a large vacant lot, and erected on this lot was a tall pole on the top of which was affixed crucifixes and religious emblems of the type used by the Russian Orthodox Church.  I stood in transfixed wonder, astonished that in a nation ruled by an atheistic government which harshly suppressed all outward expressions of religious faith, this religious symbol should be planted in such a prominent place with no connection to any nearby church edifice.  As I marveled, I turned and saw to my left a vast throng of people coming, marching down the boulevard.  The street was completely flooded with this crowd of demonstrators, and those at the head of the parade (who I presumed were priests) held out in front of them a great number of crucifixes and religious emblems identical with those on the pole.  Again I was amazed that in an atheistic nation where public religious demonstrations were forbidden, this multitude of people should be uninhibitedly parading their religious symbols through the thoroughfares.  At that moment I started across the side street, but the demonstrators turned toward me and I found it necessary to run in order to keep from being trampled.

Immediately the scene changed.  I was in the same city, but found myself in a storefront building.  There was nothing in the large room where I stood except a number of folding chairs.  I was aware that this building was used by certain believers who met for prayer, counsel, preparation and planning; for from this place teams of ministry were sent forth throughout the length and breadth of Russia.  Suddenly I was transferred to a small room at the back of the building.  The room was furnished only with a single cot with a small table at its head, upon which lay a book with a dark purple cover, and embossed across the front in gold letters was this title: THE UNITED STATES IN PROPHECY.  The next scene was back in the larger room where several people were congregated.  I knew that a meeting was soon to begin, with prayer and a strategy session for sending out the ministry teams.  In connection with this activity I was shown a massive intervention of God’s  power accompanied by a dramatic move of the Holy Spirit across Russia, by which the nation would be stirred with the manifestation of the glory of God.  With this electrifying knowledge planted within my consciousness, I awoke.

Immediately the interpretation of the dream flooded my spirit.  It was clear that a new condition of RELIGIOUS LIBERTY was to come to the people of the Soviet Union.  Remember this was 1983.  At that time Yuri Andropov was in power and Mikhail Gorbachev was unknown to the Western world.  We had not yet heard the words GLASNOST and PERESTROIKA.  And the imminent collapse of the Soviet Union was the farthest thing from anybody’s mind!  In 1984, first at a Convention in Daytona Beach, Florida, I commenced to proclaim the word the Lord had given me; following that in meetings in El Paso, Texas and in other parts of the country.  The Spirit revealed to me that the advent of religious liberty (typified by the pole) would be followed by a revival of religion (represented by the parade).  This we have seen come to pass!  Late in 1989 as I watched the NBC Evening News, suddenly THERE IT WAS!  The reporter was giving a report from Moscow.  Down the broad avenue I saw them coming...a vast throng, literally hundreds of Christian believers marching on foot...at the forefront of the crowd marched the Russian Orthodox Priests holding out the crucifixes and icons the exact scene I had witnessed in my dream six years prior!  I shouted through the house to Lorain, “Honey, come, look!  That’s it!  There is the procession I saw in my dream!”

Exactly as the Lord said, much of what is happening in Russia today is taking place within the precincts of religious Babylon.  The Russian Orthodox Church has had a dramatic increase of people, priests, seminaries, and restoration of power and prestige.  Thousands of new churches have opened  representing many denominations and groups.  The Lord has opened doors tremendous avenues for the gospel of salvation.  Teaching services in Russian churches are now diverted to evangelistic messages in deference to the masses of unbelievers (most first-time attendees) flooding the meetings.  Invited by friends or attracted by a printed invitation, many Russian people come to churches seeking an answer to their great spiritual hunger.  Evangelical churches are filled with new inquirers, and many newcomers are converted to Christ.  Most have dramatic and emotional experiences all are life-changing.  Excitement permeates Russian churches as believers have the joy of leading unbelievers people who have never prayed before in their lives to the Lord.  And there is a very significant revival in the cities, especially among the youth.  But for the most part this is all an elementary move of the Spirit within the context of the church systems of man.

The sovereign move of God in miracle working power that the Lord showed me in 1983 HAS NOT YET BEGUN but it looms upon the horizon.  There was to be a revival of religion first, then the mighty move of the Spirit of God.  Since 1984 I have had a ministry to Russia in and by the Spirit and through that saw the collapse of Soviet Communism there just as the Lord had moved me to proclaim.  Everything that has happened there has been according to that word of the Lord and the proclaiming of it!  That is what it means to be given power over the nations and to reign over them from the heavenlies!  By prayer, by faith, and by the revelation and proclamation of the word of the Lord we have heavenly governmental power and authority to change things!  The sons of God are beginning to reign in the heavenlies, and earth is being impacted by their authority and dominion!  When the present distress in Russia has run its course, there will be an unprecedented, sovereign move of God in that country that will bring the glory and honor and power of the Kingdom of God in a new and higher dimension, and bringing multitudes into living relationship with God beyond the religious systems of man through the power of the Holy Spirit!  I was made to understand that the book I saw THE UNITED STATES IN PROPHECY indicated that American ministries were destined to play a pivotal role in this move of the Spirit in Russia.  But beyond that, America represents to the whole world the concept of LIBERTY, and God is about to PROCLAIM LIBERTY to the captives of communist ideology, sin, darkness, bondage, hopelessness, poverty, sorrow and death throughout Russia!

The groundwork is being laid.  The preparation is in progress.  The stage is being set.  And regardless of what events, positive or negative, may yet transpire, the mighty God, in due time, will utter His voice from the heavens and great shall be the sound of abundance of rain.  Can you comprehend, dear reader, what effect you can have upon creation by REIGNING FROM THE HEAVENLIES?  There is no need to board a great airliner and fly to far-away nations with strange sounding names and quaint customs in order to bless the world.  I have never set foot on the soil of Russia, yet I do not doubt for one instant that the faith and prayer in my heart and the declarations of God’s word through my mouth aided in some mysterious and divine way the amazing events that have unfolded and are unfolding in that land.

The sons of God are now arising on the world scene.  It will be MORE than revival this time, my beloved, IT WILL BE THE KINGDOM OF GOD WITH POWER!  There is a fresh move of the Spirit, a new ministry from the Holiest of all, and a new work of God in the earth that transcends by far anything that has ever been seen or known.  We are nearing the hour of the full manifestation of the sons of God.  The long awaited liberation of planet earth is near at hand.  The greater works that Jesus told us of are ready to begin.  The hour is at hand when THE GOVERNMENT SHALL BE UPON HIS SHOULDER and the enduring Kingdom of God which shall never be destroyed shall consume and destroy forever all other kingdoms.  The sons shall reign in the power and authority of the Spirit over all dominions from pole to pole, from sea to sea, and from galaxy to galaxy, and all nations and peoples and entities shall know and serve the Lord.  There shall be peace on earth and goodwill to men, with justice and judgment and equity and LIFE ABUNDANT FOR ALL.

 


Chapter 56

THE INCREASE OF THE KINGDOM

(continued)

It’s a fascinating thought . . . could there be somewhere out there in the vastness of space . . . beyond the solar system . . . beyond our Milky Way galaxy . . . other worlds of intelligent beings? This is a subject that intrigues scientists and theologians alike.  What is the likelihood  of other intelligent life in the universe?  It is not a new question.  In the 4th century B.C., Metrodoros of Chios observed: “It seems impossible, in a large field only one shaft of wheat to grow, and in an infinite universe, to have only one living world.”  We do not know what other races of intelligent creatures there may be, but I think it is no stretch of the imagination to believe that, as this world is only one speck in the vast creation of God, there may be millions, yea, billions of other races in the countless worlds around us, and all of these are invited to behold the glory of the invisible God manifested in the many sons who are His image and likeness.   

In 1966 two astronomers, Carl Sagan and Josef Shklovoskii, desired to estimate the number of planets in the universe with favorable environments for the support of biological life.  They determined that it takes a certain kind of star with a planet located at just the right distance from that star to provide the minimal conditions for life.  Working with just these two parameters, they estimated that 0.001% of all known stars could have a planet capable of supporting advanced life.  By that estimate there could be more than one million life-supporting planets in our galaxy alone!

We must not think that when our ministry is finished here on earth, and all men have bowed the knee and happily owned Jesus Christ as Saviour and Lord, when all the earth has been set free from the curse and sin, sickness and sorrow have flown away; when the dirge music has sung its last song, and the minor chords are all gone, that the Master will then say, “Go and sit on a heavenly mount, and sing yourselves away forever and ever.”  No way!  What Bethlehem was among the thousands of Judah, this little earth is to the great Universe of God for it is here that the glory of God has broken forth!  All those stars, those worlds of light, who knows how many of them are inhabited?  It is my conviction that there are regions beyond our imagination to which every son of God shall become an everlasting illumination, a living expression of the love, wisdom and power of their Creator and God.  The people in those far-distant lands could not see Calvary as this world has seen it; but they shall see it in the redeemed that are conformed to His image.  Some entertain the foolish notion that each of those worlds have their own way to God, but such cannot be the truth, for it is the testimony of  scripture that it is in Christ that all things are gathered together into one, of things both in the heavens and in the earth (Eph. 1:10).

Truly in that day the Lord shall say to His sons who have brought the Kingdom of God to pass in the earth, “Well done, thou good and faithful servant: thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will make thee ruler over many things.”  He is to keep on doing something, you see.  God’s Kingdom does not stop here on this globe, and God’s revelation is not limited to mankind. Compared to the orbs of space the earth is insignificant.  The celestial realm is unutterably greater and its glories grander.  Men will risk all of their fortunes and their lives to seize the reins of even the smallest of earth’s governments.  Yet the glory of universal dominion promised to the sons of God is greater than all!  The man who has been a faithful and wise steward of God here, will be promoted by our heavenly Father to more eminent service in the ages to come.  This shall be our heaven, not to go there and walk on golden streets waving palm branches and playing harps, but to enter upon some larger, nobler ministry for which we are preparing by the lower and more arduous service of this present time!   

There are worlds beyond this one, scattered throughout the vastnesses of infinity, all created by our Lord Jesus Christ and all included within the scope of His ever-increasing Kingdom.  Long millennia ago God “created the heavens and the earth.”  A universe of raging infernos called stars came into existence.  Astronomers estimate that their number is equal to 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 or one sextillion yet, their utter extremity has never been seen!  There seems to be no end to the twinkling points of light.  Only of the earth was it said that it was “without form and void empty.”  The scriptures refer repeatedly to “the hosts of the heavens.”  Scattered among these myriads of stars and nebulae are millions of solar systems composed of suns, planets and moons.  Those worlds, too, are to be explored and God’s great purpose fulfilled in them through the sons of God, for God’s Christ is heir of A-L-L  T-H-I-N-G-S.  Ages to come...it will take them all, precious friend of mine, though there should be billions or trillions of them, to complete the great and grand purpose of our Creator.  What a calling!  What a plan!  What a destiny!  How magnificently awesome and meaningful the words of the inspired prophet: “And of the INCREASE OF HIS GOVERNMENT AND PEACE there shall be no end!

UNIVERSAL DOMINION

More than thirty years ago, standing in the darkness of a jungle in South America, many miles from the nearest road or town, and further yet from anything that could be called a city, it seemed that every star and galaxy of the heavens adorned the night with the scintillating brilliance of diamonds.  Looking up I could see the immensity of God.  On some dark night look up and behold the infinity of God, look up and consider the majesty of God, look up and see the glory of God, look up and wonder, look up and be awed, look up and be overwhelmed.  Take a look at the heavens, consider this infinite universe, contemplate the immensity of it, examine the balance of it, reflect upon the order of it, give attention to the symmetry of it, observe the way everything works by divine law and purpose in the light of all this, “What is man, that Thou art mindful of him? and the son of man, that Thou visiteth him?” (Ps. 8:4).  What is man, that God cares for him and visits him do you want to see it?  Continuing this divine assessment of man the inspired Psalmist says, “Thou crownest him with glory and honor.”  He’s showing how mindful God is of man, the greatness of His purpose for man.  “Thou didst set him over the works of  Thy hands.”  Do you want to see how great man is in the scheme of things?  Consider what are the works of God’s hands over which man, crowned with glory and honor, is set: “When I consider Thy heavens, the work of Thy fingers, the moon and the stars, which Thou has ordained...” (Ps. 8:3).   

“Thou has put all things under his feet” (Ps. 8:6).  Now “his feet” is not Jesus, his feet is MAN.  It’s not talking about Jesus, it’s talking about MAN.  Quoting this passage and speaking again of man, not Jesus, the writer to the Hebrews says, “Thou has put all things in subjection under his feet.  For in that He put all in subjection under him, He left nothing that is not put under him!” (Heb. 2:8).  Man was created to be king of the universe.  Man was designed by God to rule and reign over all things everywhere.  Man was destined to have dominion on earth and in the heavens.  Man was to have authority in all realms.  Man was appointed to be sovereign not merely over the earth, but over all the unbounded heavens.  Did you know that?  It was the divine intent that man should be lord of all with all created things under submission to him, that man would explore, conquer, control, harness, utilize, bless, rule, and direct all the earth, the elements, the heavens, and all worlds and realms, visible and invisible, and all creatures, visible and invisible the whole creation of God!

But there is a problem.  Although man is destined for universal rule and dominion, the apostle continues: “We see not yet all things put under him.”  Does any wish to debate that?  Take a look at the world in which we live.  Man was made to reign over the earth, but man broke his covenant with God.  When man sinned he brought ruin to the earth, the ruin of sin, the curse, and death.  Before sin man’s hair was not turning gray, his teeth were not decaying, his heart was not giving out, his skin was not becoming wrinkled and flabby, his bones were not getting brittle or his body weak and stooped.  There was no cancer, there was no stroke, there was no disease.  There was no famine.  There was no weed.  There was no rust.  There was no flood.  There was no plague.  There was no storm no frightening hurricane, no devastating tornado.  There was no hatred, no greed, no lust, no cheating, no lying, no deceit, no murders, no crime, no war.  God created man in His own image, He placed him in a perfect environment, and he told man that he was to rule and reign and that all things were in subjection under his feet.  But man violated his union with God.  Every broken body, every disturbed mind, every lack and weakness and sorrow of the human race for at least 6,000 years can be traced to man’s violation of his union with God.  Therefore, we see not yet all things put under man!  Look at the terrors of our world and it is plain to see that not yet has even the earth been subjected to man, much less the celestial realms above!

But “WE SEE JESUS!” (Heb. 2:9).  It is interesting to note, there are two prominent words used in Greek for “see” HORAO and BLEPO   and the writer uses both in one sentence.  He says, “We see not yet all things put under man,” that is, take an in-depth, studied, wide-angled look, examine carefully we see not yet all things put under man.  That is HORAO.  “But we see Jesus” it’s a fleeting glance, one look is enough to settle the issue that is BLEPO.  Ah, we see not yet all things put under man, but we see Jesus “made a little lower than the deity for the suffering of death, CROWNED WITH GLORY AND HONOR...” (Heb. 2:9).  Jesus was lowered for a season that He by the grace of God might “taste death for every man,” that through His redemption He might restore all men to the righteousness, joy, peace, wisdom, authority, power and dominion that was theirs in the beginning.

The world is filled with hopelessness today only because men do not see Jesus!  All is despair and futility and lack if we don’t see Jesus!  He is the great Captain of our salvation and the Firstborn of many brethren.   He is the Firstborn from the dead, and the Firstborn of every creature.  He is the proto-type of God’s ordained destiny for all men.  Oh yes, we who have been quickened by His Spirit, infused with His life and imbued with His mind we SEE JESUS!  We see Him overcoming sin, self, the curse, and death.  We see Him risen, ascended, crowned with glory and honor, exalted to the throne of the Majesty on high, heir of all things, with all power in heaven and in earth, having obtained a name above every name, Lord of all, King of the universe, higher than angels and principalities and powers, the image and likeness and dominion of God over all things restored in man.  That is what we see!  We see Jesus and in Him we see our very own calling and destiny!

Therefore, let us consider the honor and glory with which Jesus has been crowned.  Present estimates no doubt underestimates put the size of the universe at over twenty thousand million light years in diameter.  That’s about 120,000 million million million miles.  Present estimates also no doubt underestimates put the number of galaxies in the known universe at over 100,000,000,000.  Since each galaxy has roughly 100,000,000,000 stars, that means the universe has over 10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 (ten thousand million million million) individual stars or “suns”.  Why did God design such an immense universe?  And why did God create such an innumerable number of stars?  For no reason?  For some reason?  For an incredible reason!

God, away back before the mountains were formed, or ever the sun and moon appeared, had perfected His plans for the future rulers of the works of His hands.  Those plans called for a planet named earth, and for His future rulers, his sons, to be placed there for their training in God’s school of dominion.  And those plans called for a tempter to ensnare the original pair, who were made to be deceived and subjected to a realm where they could learn to overcome and rule, first within themselves, then over the earth, and finally over all things of God’s vast creation.  “For the creature was made subject to vanity, not willingly, but by reason of Him who hath subjected the same in hope” (Rom. 8:20).  God had a better plan for men than a garden a very beautiful garden, of course, yet a garden in which nothing ever happened and no one ever learned anything or got anywhere.  If there had never been a fall, then there could be no salvation, and man could never have learned through grace to rule over his enemies within and without.  The fall with its plan of redemption provided the perfect school where man could experience in a practical way the principles of dominion.

 Man was created a human being, formed of the earth, infused with the spirit of life from God, with not one thing wrong with him.  He never had a headache, nor a heartache, nor a trouble, nor a care.  He was just a perfect specimen of humanity, a son of God, a prisoner of earth, placed in a garden “to dress and to keep it.”  This man was completely untested, untried, undeveloped, and inexperienced.  And if there had been no tempter and no fall, then man would never have attained to anything higher.  I don’t like farming.  I am neither a farmer nor the son of a farmer.  I’m rather glad Adam got out of that place!  I have higher aspirations than messing around eternally in a park, tending to the birds and beasts in it, and bossing them around.  Oh yes, I know that park must have been a very delightful place and filled with allegorical realities.  But I soon get tired of frittering away my time in beautiful parks.  Man was not made for that!  If man would have been made for that, God would have kept him there.  It’s just as simple as that.  I am getting tired of being a prisoner of earth.  Instead of being shut up in a park with Adam and the rest of his race, having dominion over the beasts and the fowls and creeping things in it, my feet are beginning to itch to go exploring beyond this old world.  And what’s more, that is exactly what I am in preparation for!  And I am going to do more than that; for my Father tells me that now, since breaking out of Eden, I am not only going to explore, but I am going to own, as a joint-heir with Christ, all the countless worlds of His endless heavens and every creature in them.  Who wants to go back to Eden?

Thanks be to God’s wise and wonderful plan, we now, who are recipients of  God’s grace, His dealings, processings, and His glory, have advanced to the place where we shall judge angels and reveal God  to the principalities and powers in the heavenly places (I Cor. 6:3; Eph. 3:10).  Go on with your Eden, you folks who want to go back to it.  I have something better.  The Bible begins with man in a garden, but it ends with the Holy City coming down from God out of the heavens with life and light and love and glory for all creation: “Behold, I make all things new!” (Rev. 21:5).  I never did like cleaning out horse stalls and cow stables anyway.  I have aspired to a better job; for my Saviour now promises me a seat with Him on His throne, helping to rule over His endless and eternal universe (Heb. 2:5-8; Rev. 3:21; Rev. 21:7).  This heavenly calling is not as a park attendant, playing valet to a lot of beasts and birds, but a king-priest after the order of Melchizadek (Heb. 3:1).  Eden never offered anything comparable to this!

The Bible clearly teaches that God’s sons shall inherit all things (Rev. 21:7; Heb. 2:8).  The whole universe shall be theirs!  Every world that floats in space shall be subject to their word and at their disposal, as they range the broad fields of the boundless heavens.  Here and now we are a people in whom there is royal blood; sons of God, heirs to the throne; we are born to rule over all things, and God is preparing us for that dominion.  The rule of one little world is not enough for a man born of the omnipresent God of the universe.  It may be for a chipmunk.  It is not for a son of God, because one born from above is too big in his spirit, which is his real divine self.  To be a spiritual man, a heavenly man, he must reach out to the future, to infinity, to eternity, and grapple with the powers of the ages  to come, and compel them to gird him with strength to fulfill the ultimate intention of our heavenly Father.

It reminds me of the review I read of Thornton Wilder’s famous play, “Our Town.”  A little girl is leaning out a window on a beautiful moonlight night, telling a little boy friend about a strange letter that has just arrived in their crossroads town of Groves Corner.  The letter was addressed in a most unusual way.  Instead of just having the name of the crossroads post office, and state, it was addressed:

Groves Corners,
Sutton County, New Hampshire,
United States of America,
Continent of North America,
The Western Hemisphere,
The Earth,
The Milky Way Solar System,
The Universe,
The Mind of God.

When the little girl finishes telling about it, the little boy who listens has enough insight to pause and say, “Well, what do you know!  What do you know!”  All the while he thought he had been living in Groves Corner, New Hampshire, and that was all.  Instead, all the while he had been living in the Universal Mind of God!  Ah, my beloved, you have a more complete address to which your mail must be addressed when once you perceive yourself as spirit seated together in union with Christ in the higher-than-all-heavens at the right hand of God.  And if you have the insight, even of that little boy, you will pause long enough to say as you contemplate the fact that in union with God you live not just in Connecticut or California, in the United States of America, or Europe, or Asia, or Africa but in the omniscient, omnipotent, omnipresent Spirit of God, “Well, what do you know!  What do you know!”  We are children of the universe.  As sons of our heavenly Father we are universal children not to be confined to any spot or place in the cosmos.  Even as now our minds roam over the vast expanses of God’s universe, even so shall we ourselves follow our minds and fill all things.  This is our heritage.  We are not bound to this earth.  God yet has an obligation to all of the creation and it will be by and through us that He will fulfill that obligation.  The sons have not yet come to manifestation to bring deliverance to the earth, but that is about to be accomplished, and it is only after that that the work of revealing God to the whole universe will begin.  With humbleness of mind and holiness of heart let us prepare ourselves for the change that is coming.   

If you wish to be dwarf men, stunt them, cut them down, reducing them to a race of spiritual Lilliputians, then proclaim that earth is the extent of the dominion of those who rule in the Kingdom of God.  But God made us on no such diminutive, low-down scale as that!  He made us so big that unless we can penetrate beyond the outer shell of flesh and lift our spirits, breathe the air of eternity, and soar into the All-ness of God, our understanding fails, and we will grovel like worms of the earth.  The King of glory comes and irradiates us with the glory of transcendent hopes.  He begets within us a living hope, an eternal hope, an unbounded hope which, like leaping and dancing flames, lights up all that is within us, and then throws its golden glory out to the farthest shores of infinity.  Sons of God!  Oh, the mystery of it!

The sweet singer of Israel was a seer and this truly is the understanding he had when by inspiration he penned the Eighth Psalm.  When we read the words of this Psalm we get the impression that the writer is a great astronomer.  He speaks as though he had just come from one of our observatories where he had been peering into the depths of the universe through a great telescope.  But David did not have access to a modern observatory.  We can only understand the wisdom of his marvelous words when we recognize that he spoke by the spirit of wisdom and revelation from God. When he considers the heavens and the stars, he asks as we all might ask who know that the earth is but a grain in the towering mountain of creation “What is man, that Thou art mindful of him? and the son of man, that Thou visiteth him?  For Thou hast made him for a little while lower than Elohim, and hast crowned him with glory and honor.  Thou madest him to have dominion over the works of Thy hands; Thou hast put all things under his feet.”

A report that came across my desk recently states: Today a small group of physicists are seeking to understand the infinite.  Their cherished goal is beautifully expressed in a statement by Murray Gell-Mann.  He put it this way. “It is the most persistent and greatest adventure in human history, this search to understand the universe, how it works and where it came from.”  In strictly geographical terms it seems astoundingly presumptuous of men and women to even seek such understanding.  Physicist Gell-Mann explains the paradox of human desire to understand where and why everything began: “It is difficult to imagine that a handful of residents of a small planet circling an insignificant star in a small galaxy have as their aim a complete understanding of the entire universe, a small speck of creation truly believing it is capable of understanding the whole.”  But in fact, such ambitious projects are typical of the story of man.  As the proverb says, “It is the glory of God to conceal a matter, but the glory of kings is to search out a matter” (Prov. 25:2).  Never satisfied with what he knows today, man always wants to know something more tomorrow.  He never rests content.

Today, unregenerated, carnal man is shooting rockets to the moon and Mars, boasting that he is going to use the planets as a launching pad to soar to the universe beyond.  But man is simply getting in too big a hurry!  He is striving to “take over” and rule what he has not fitted himself to manage.  There is that deep, innate knowledge in the subconscious of man that he is destined to explore and subjugate the universe.  But man has not yet proven his ability to rule  this planet, much less the worlds beyond!  Man with his history of greed, lust, strife, treachery, wars, bloodshed, deceit, and perversion has now stockpiled enough atomic bombs to not only blow this earth to smithereens, but twenty more just like it!  Shall God indeed commit into the hands of corrupt, depraved human nature the rulership of the universe?  No way!  Man is reaching out to rule that which he has not qualified himself to rule and before it has been made lawfully his!  Man is still a rebel.  But what mankind does not know is, that when, through Christ, he first qualifies for the trust, it has been God’s intention all along to place not only the moon and Mars, but the WHOLE VAST, LIMITLESS UNIVERSE under his jurisdiction!

We see not yet all things put under man, but we see Jesus, crowned with glory and honor.  We see the first son of God to qualify for universal dominion!  To be “crowned” means to be given kingly rule.  To be crowned with glory and honor speaks of the excellence and greatness of the rule Jesus has now as the administrating, Ruling Executive over the ENTIRE UNIVERSE!  He has ascended far above all heavens that He might fill all things.  All authority and power is given unto Him in heaven and in earth.  God has highly exalted Him, and given Him a name which is above every name: that at the name of Jesus Christ every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth.  Oh yes!  A man in God’s image and likeness is now the Head of all principality and power, angels, authorities and powers being made subject to Him.  Christ is now ruling over all things, for He overcame all things.  As qualifying sons of God we are now in preparation to be raised up with Him into the power of an incorruptible life in spirit, soul, and body, to inherit with Him ALL that HE has now inherited!  When we have been changed by the redemption of our bodies, we will need no space craft to ascend through the heavens, but will soar to worlds unknown just as Jesus did in His resurrection and ascension.

So that is the supreme heritage of  man if he is willing!  Man, and man only, of all the life-forms God has created, has been given the incomprehensible privilege of being born into the GOD FAMILY, the ELOHIM, the universal ruling family of GOD.  This family relationship is a GOD-PLANE relationship, not an animal-plane, human-plane, angel-plane, or alien-plane relationship. Angels are ministering servants of God in the administration of His universe-ruling government.  Are there aliens flying around the galaxies in flying saucers?  I do not doubt it for one minute.  But the fact is it is really irrelevant to anything!  Some are caught up in the different orders of aliens the Grays, the Nordics, the Reptilians, etc. but to none of them is the dominion given.  God may have many kinds of servants throughout the universe, but it is a higher calling to be the very SONS OF GOD.  “He that overcometh shall inherit all things; and I will be his God, and he shall be my son” (Rev. 21:7).  Even the angels of might and glory are mere servants, “ministering spirits sent forth to minister for them (not to them!) who shall be the heirs of salvation” (Heb. 1:14).  During the days of His flesh, in times of severe testing and weakness, angels came and ministered to Jesus.  But not any more!  For when He ascended He sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high “being made so much better than the angels, as He hath by inheritance obtained a more excellent name than they” (Heb. 1:4).  And seated with Him in the heavenlies we are seated far above the dominion of angels!  “For unto the angels hath He not put in subjection the world to come...Thou hast put all things in subjection under his (man’s) feet” (Heb. 2:5-8).  Some speak of angels as “sons of God,” but such a notion contradicts the word of God.  “For unto which of the angels said He at any time, Thou art my son, this day have I begotten thee?  Or, I will be to him a Father, and he shall be to me a son?” (Heb. 1:5).  We speak the truth in saying that angels are servants, but we are the sons and the heirs of God.

A young son of a wealthy man, while still a child, may be under the care of an adult servant.  The servant is older, farther advanced in knowledge, on a higher plane physically and mentally but far lower potentially.  For when the son is mature, he will inherit ALL HIS FATHER’S WEALTH AND POWER!  Therefore, the servant who is temporarily older and more mature is a servant to the young heir.  But when the heir comes into his manhood he will then command the servant.  Such are the angels!  Rulership over the universe does not mean merely the physical universe, the moon, sun, stars and galaxies.  It is a dominion over ALL THINGS, ALL REALMS,  and ALL DIMENSIONS within that universe; every being, entity, order,  all worlds, aliens, angels, devils, principalities, powers and dominions.  Therefore, the apostle wrote, “He seated Him (Christ) at His own right hand in the heavenly places, far above ALL RULE and AUTHORITY and POWER and DOMINION, and EVERY NAME that is named above every title that can be conferred not only in this age and in this world, but also in the age and in the world that is to come...and He raised US UP TOGETHER WITH HIM and made us sit down together GIVING US JOINT SEATING WITH HIM in the heavenly sphere” (Eph. 1:20-21, Amplified).

Oh, the wonder of it!  Our Lord Jesus Christ has been exalted to the right hand of God.  He has been given the dominion and the kingdom.  The whole universe has been delivered into His mighty hands, and now He tells us that it belongs to us; that we have been raised to sit together with Him at the right hand of God, angels and authorities and powers being made subject unto us (I Pet. 3:22).  We are to sit with Him on His throne, which is the Father’s throne (Rev. 3:21).  We are not only raised up to sit with Him on His throne, but He has been given a name that is above every name, and we are also to share that wonderful Name.  Listen to this: “To him that overcometh...I will write upon him the name of my God, and the name of the city (government) of my God, which is New Jerusalem, which cometh down out of heaven from my God...and I will write upon him MY NEW NAME” (Rev. 2:12).

This present time is but a proving ground for those who through grace will reign with their Lord over the endless vastnesses of infinity.  They have proven faithful over few things.  Now they shall soon be made rulers over many...over ALL HIS POSSESSIONS (Mat. 24:45-47).  He has given us His glory because we are His brethren, bone of His bone, flesh of His flesh, spirit of His spirit, life of His life, mind of His mind.  We are of common parentage, brothers by the new birth, becoming like Him in name, nature and being.  We are all “out of one” for which reason He is not ashamed to call us brethren.  He has raised us up to sit with Him in the higher than heavenlies, hence we belong on His throne.  And the place which He has been preparing for each one is not only a world to come, and a Kingdom of Life and Light, but a position, a place of eminence at His side, ruling with Him over all the eternal endlessness of His unbounded heavens!

As I have pointed out before, I now remind you that the Kingdom of God, having filled the earth in the dispensation to come, will from thence extend eternally outward to reconstitute, reconcile, bless, quicken, illuminate and transform the entire universe, enfolding within its mighty branches the vast limitless expanse of nebulae, luminaries, and galaxies until the multiplied myriads of the ransomed and reconciled shall in chorus fill the vastness of the universe with this glad song: “Praise ye the Lord.  Praise ye the Lord from the heavens: praise Him in the heights.  Praise ye Him, all ye angels: praise ye Him, all ye hosts.  Praise ye Him, sun and moon: praise ye Him, all ye stars of light.  Praise Him, ye heavens of heavens, and ye waters that be above the heavens.  Let them praise the name of the Lord: for He commanded, and they were created.  He hath also established them for ever and ever: He made a decree that shall not pass...let them praise the name of the Lord: for His name alone is excellent; HIS GLORY IS ABOVE THE EARTH AND HEAVEN” (Ps. 148).

 “For by Him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers; all things were created by Him and for Him: and He is before all things, and by Him all things consist.  And, having made peace through the blood of His cross, by Him to reconcile all things unto Himself, by Him, I say, whether they be things in earth, or things in heaven.  And you that were sometime alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now hath He reconciled” (Col. 1:16-17, 20-21).

I must emphasize that God is the Creator of ALL THINGS.  Notice the things that the inspired apostle includes in creation.  ALL things in the heavens, all stars, galaxies and worlds with all the life forms, entities, and powers they contain.  ALL the things on earth, from the highest to the lowest.  ALL things that are visible, or that are discernible to the physical senses ALL that the eyes can see, ALL that the ears can hear, ALL that we can touch, feel, taste or smell has been created by God.  ALL things that are invisible were created by our God ALL the wisdom, ALL the knowledge, yea, even all that which has not been discovered, tapped, or conceived by the mind of man God created.  ALL of the myriad machines and devices that shall yet come out of the mind of man, were created by God.  ALL of the vast forces and powers and universal laws that science has discovered and has not yet discovered, were created by God.  ALL the thrones, and the glory and the power of them that occupy them, in the heavens above and on the earth beneath, were created by God.  ALL the dominions and lordships, the mastery and the supremacy, were created by God.  ALL the principalities and powers, angels, intelligences, chief ones, demons, devils, and spirits of every order in heaven, on earth, and under the earth, were created by God.

It is not just the fact that all these were created by God that startles us the most, but it goes on to say that BY THE BLOOD OF HIS CROSS ALL THESE THINGS ARE RECONCILED TO GOD IN HEAVEN AND IN EARTH.  This implies that every alien entity on every planet in all the galaxies of the universe are reconciled by the blood of God’s Son.  Furthermore, it means that the principalities and powers in the heavenly realms needed reconciling and are reconciled by the blood of God’s Son.  Is this not why the blessed Redeemer was both a heavenly being and an earthly being?  He was the Word from heaven made flesh upon the earth, heaven and earth, spirit and flesh, divinity and humanity, blended into one so that the Son could say, “No man hath ascended up to heaven, but He that came down from heaven, even the Son of man which is in heaven” (Jn. 3:13). Praise God, even the principalities and powers in the heavens are included in the glorious reconciliation, peace, blessing and life secured by the blood of His cross!  The man who was from heaven, born on earth, is reconciling both realms and gathering all things INTO HIMSELF what a wonder that is!

Hear it!  “By Him to reconcile PRINCIPALITIES AND POWERS IN HEAVEN and on earth” (Col. 1:16-20).  These are the words that stopped me in my tracks one fair day.  “What is therein heaven that needs to be reconciled,” I queried.  The thought had never crossed my mind!  I had always assumed that all was at peace and that never a cloud had darkened any brow in that bright eternal realm of Spirit.  Discord in heaven?  Perish the thought!  Sin in heaven?  Impossible!  Negative forces in heaven?  It couldn’t be!  Wickedness in heaven?  No way!  “But,” I thought, “not only does it plainly state that Christ will reconcile things in heaven, but it furthermore states that among the things to be reconciled are PRINCIPALITIES AND POWERS.  Principalities in the heavens that are discordant with the will of God!  Powers in the heavens that are hostile to God!  Principalities and powers in the heavens that must be reconciled, and that by the blood of God’s heavenly Son! I had always assumed that Jesus died only for men.  But comparing the following three scripture passages it becomes very plain.  “He hath quickened us together with Christ...and hath raised us up together, and made us sit together IN THE HEAVENLY PLACES in Christ Jesus” (Eph. 2:5-6).  “For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers...against WICKED SPIRITS IN THE HEAVENLY PLACES” (Eph. 6:12).  “For by Him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers...and having made peace through the blood of His cross, by Him to reconcile all things unto Himself; by Him, I say, whether they be things in earth, or things in heaven” (Col. 1:16-20).

It is not just the scope of “things on earth” being reconciled that startles us the most, for it goes on to say, “and things in heaven.”  One day the words struck me with such incredible force! There I faced anew one of the old, well-known verses of the Bible, and when the profound truth of it broke in wonder and glory within my consciousness, I had a completely new Bible, and an increasingly wonderful God.  For the first time in my life I saw what God had created in the beginning.  “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.”  And the scope of things created is the full scope of the things reconciled!  God must reveal the fullness of Himself to all realms and worlds and bring every spirit, creature, and entity in the whole vast universe into relationship and union in Himself.  I discovered at least sixteen different items or groups of items CREATED AND RECONCILED in that one short passage in chapter one of Colossians:

1.    All things in heaven
2.    All things on earth
3.    Visible things
4.    Invisible things
5.    Visible things in the heavens
6.    Visible things on the earth
7.    Invisible things in the heavens
8.    Invisible things on the earth
9.    Thrones in the heavens
10.  Thrones on the earth
11.  Dominions in the heavens
12.  Dominions on the earth
13.  Principalities in the heavens
14.  Principalities on the earth
15.  Powers in the heavens
16.  Powers on the earth

All this is to be reconciled BY THE BLOOD OF GOD’S SON!  God is raising up a priesthood after the order of Melchizedek, the body of the High Priest in the heavens, the king-priest sons of God.  Their parish will be not only the earth, but the heavens also.  God is going to make Himself known through us to the myriad hosts of the heavens.  Our bliss will be to bestow the boon of God’s favor and redemptive power throughout the bounds of stellar space.  Out of the magnificence of God’s grace and glory we will gladden the hearts of all His creatures in worlds we have never seen.  Can we not see by this that the Royal Priesthood, which shall be the instrument of God to effect this universal reconciliation, is itself both earthly and heavenly, composed of men of earth who have been born from above, raised up and made to sit AMONG THE CELESTIALS IN JESUS CHRIST?  “Wherefore, holy brethren, partakers of the heavenly calling, consider the Apostle and High Priest of our profession, Christ Jesus...” (Heb. 3:1).

There is to be a restoration!  Today we see a terrible lack of things being right, or in divine order.  There is a divine order for creation, an order of life and harmony.  There is a proper order for animal life, vegetable life, and human life.  There is a proper order for every planet, every world, every life form, every order of beings throughout all the infinite stretches of space.  Reports I have heard from those who have been abducted by aliens in space ships indicate that many of those aliens do not know the life, ways, or power of the living God.  They do hideous things to people, leaving them psychologically traumatized, physically mutilated, and filled with fear and torment.  All things everywhere are out of order, in frightful chaos.  The curse must be lifted, every enemy put under our feet.  Divine order for the universe must be restored.  All creation is groaning and crying for release from the curse of sin, decay and death.  And everything hinges on that body of sons that are to be manifested in that perfect state of divine order.  And those who receive of this victory and glory, the wonderful mind of Christ, conformed to the image of the Son, with a full and complete triumph over sin, carnality and death, in spirit, soul and body these make up that blessed company TO WHOM IS GIVEN DOMINION OVER ALL THINGS!

How we praise God that we are living in the times of this restoration!  It is the greatest day in the long history of man.  It is at hand!  I know it’s at hand because I see a people being pressed and processed into the very life of God.  Over fifty years ago the revelation of manifested sonship broke forth in the earth in a blaze of glory, and since that time God has been dealing in deep and powerful ways with those who have embraced the hope.  The knowledge of God’s purpose has spread over the whole earth, to every kindred and people and nation.  It has been the sovereign work of God apart from any organization or the united efforts of any group or ministry.  Not only you and me, but all creation as well will thrill to what God brings to pass in this grand and glorious restoration!  “The creation itself also shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the liberty of the glory of the sons of God” (Rom. 8:21).  The word of God, as well as the witness of the Spirit, makes us know that this is not for some other age.  It is now!  It is here!  Be ready!  Prepare yourself!  Cast aside all doubt and fear!  The kingdom and the dominion is being given to the saints of the Most High! Victory over every enemy is arising within a people the SONS OF THE LIVING GOD!

While we thus stand, as it were on Pisgah’s heights, and view the grand prospect just before us, our hearts rejoice in the Lord’s great plan, with unspeakable joy; and though we realize that God’s true church is still in the wilderness of humiliation and testing, and that the hour of divine breakthrough has not yet fully come, yet, seeing the indications of its rapid approach, and in spirit already discerning the dawn of the New Day, we lift up our heads and rejoice, knowing that our redemption draweth nigh.  Oh what fullness of blessing and cause for joy and thanksgiving the truth contains! Truly, the Lord has put a new song into our mouths.  It is the grand anthem, the first note of which was sung by the angelic choir at the birth of the infant Jesus “Behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be unto all people, for unto you is born this day a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord.”  Thank God, the harmonious strains of this song shall ere long fill heaven and earth with eternal melody as a whole family of sons in His exact image and likeness and form are born Saviours on mount Zion and the work of universal salvation, the restitution of all things, which they come to accomplish progresses toward its GLORIOUS CONSUMMATION!

What glories lie beyond this, we cannot know.  Of this we may be sure: we who are redeemed have entered a progressive institution, a Kingdom in which stagnation will never enter.  We will ever go on “from glory to glory,”  for “of the increase of His government and peace there shall be no end.”  We will never come to the place where we may sit down with folded hands and say, “This is the end.”  We, who have been born into the heavenly realm, have entered a stage of action, we have become active agents in the greatest development program ever conceived.  A whole universe awaits our touch and guiding hand.

Away out there in the blue is a Kingdom of life and light and love for every son of God to explore and develop and perfect.  And if ever, in all the countless ages to come, that Kingdom should become too small or overcrowded for its citizens, let us remember that we, being as He is, are therefore, one and all, the very same kind of Beings as He who simply spoke the word, and lo! the present worlds appeared.  Being like Him, the offspring of His own nature, wisdom and power, we will also be creators, one and all, and not destroyers, as in our human state.  “WE SHALL BE LIKE HIM.”

THE LAUNCHING PAD

We are inclined to lightly pass over many profound statements of holy scripture.  Consider with me for a moment the opening words of the divine record.  “In the beginning God created the heavens...” (Gen. 1:1).  That phrase, “the heavens,” is an inclusive one, and it is “the heavens” not “heaven.”  The Hebrew word used in that way is always in the plural, and used in that way it refers to what we would speak of as the whole universe.

You may have heard of Heptarchus who attempted to catalog all the stars in the sky, and in his final report he said, “There are thousands of them.”  Now scientists today tell us that, if we took the time, even with the naked eye we can count up to 2,000!  They say that is the extent of the possibility of vision of the human eye.  But with the aid of telescopes and reflectors, it was Ptolemy long ago who peered into the vastness of space and said, “There are millions of them!”  And when Herschel turned his great reflector on to the heavens he made this announcement, “They cannot be numbered.”  That is the last word of the scientific investigators of the heavens.  The most recent estimates reveal that there are at least trillions of them!

The divine record continues, “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.”  Now why is the earth referred to in a sweeping cosmic statement?  Is it not enough to say “the heavens?”  Is not the earth included in that great statement?  This earth of ours is just one tiny speck in this cosmic sentence why specify it?  Simply because the moment you say “earth” you set the scene of the great drama of the Bible.  In the scriptures the scene of all its activity is this earth on which we are now living.  That is because God’s purpose in the whole universe begins with earth! Earth is the cradle of God’s revelation of His glory to all realms!

The earth is but a speck and the sun a spark in the vast creation that is known to the modern astronomer.  So insignificant is this earth in comparison with the universe of celestial bodies, that its removal from space would cause less commotion than the loss of a penny from the trillions  of dollars in the national treasury in Washington.  But with all our modern knowledge of astronomy, which reduces to insignificance our infinitesimal planet and the people that populate it, we have no scientific or scriptural ground, strange as it may seem, for believing that this world in which we live is anything less than the ancients imagined it to be the center of the universe!  It is the revelation of God’s infallible word that has mightily magnified the importance of this grain of sand in the mountain of creation.

In this hour when our whole universe is becoming our backyard, there are some who have settled for a very small and inconsequential purpose for the earth.  Such as these have great difficulty understanding why our little earth, by comparison so small a place in the universe, should be the divine stage whereon God is enacting His great plan of the ages.  The inference seems to be that God’s purpose in man and in redemption cannot be so great when the place chosen for its chief events is so small and insignificant.  But this miscalculation arises from the failure to discern the difference between a seed plot, where the seeds are planted, and cultivated, and grown, and the immeasurable acreage in which those same seeds are afterward sown to produce a vast harvest.  The great mistake that many have in their minds is the notion that this world is the whole sum and substance of God’s redemptive plan and purpose.  OUR PLANET IS ONLY THE PLACE  FOR THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE SEED.  Christ (Head and body) is the seed, yes! He is the wondrous seed corn that fell into the ground and died and rose again.  And in the end, this seed shall grow and multiply and bring forth and fill and satisfy all the acreage of God’s vast field of the cosmos!  Thus, we are justified in calling earth the launching pad of the universe!    Just as the space shuttles and rockets blast off for other worlds from the launching pad at Cape Kennedy, so is the earth itself the launching pad from whence the sons of God, when their hour comes, shall blast off by the power of resurrection life to fulfill God’s great purpose in all realms of the unbounded heavens.

Not only is the earth the present center of interest, but the attention of all creation was centered in this orb in those prehistoric days when the morning stars sang together and all the sons of God shouted for joy.  Methinks that they sang and shouted the wondrous message penned millennia later by the inspired apostle, that “in the dispensation of the fullness of times He might gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in the heavens, and which are upon the earth: in whom also we have obtained an inheritance” (Eph. 1:10).    The earth was, is, and shall continue to be the seed plot of the universe!  Do you think those sublime sons of God shouted  over the beauty and grandeur of a sterile and purposeless universe?  No, it was a wise plan and a glorious purpose for every galaxy and world and creature that called forth this oratorio of the sons of God.  And there was a special reason why these sons of God should rejoice in this new creation called earth.  It was to be the first sphere of their development and dominion the launching pad of God’s cosmic purposes!

The whole creation, suns upon suns, systems upon systems, worlds upon worlds, immensity beyond comprehension is centering its attention upon what is transpiring upon this little earth, and the reason for all of this is because God has graciously seen fit to make this world the theatrical stage of the universe.  It is here that the drama of God’s universal program is presented.  It is here that Jesus Christ, the proto-type of man in God’s image and likeness with divine life, power and dominion is first introduced.  It is here that His many brethren, the manifested sons of God, enter into their inheritance and commence their ministry and rule.  “And to make all see what is the fellowship of the mystery, which from the beginning of the ages hath been hid in God, who created the all things by Jesus Christ: to the intent that now unto the principalities and powers in the heavenly spheres might be known by the church the manifold wisdom of God, according to a plan of the ages which He purposed in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Eph. 3:9-11).  “Wherefore seeing that we also are compassed about by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith” (Heb. 12:1-2).

The church systems today offer no hope for this earth and no plan or purpose of God for the universe.  In their view the world is going to the devil, getting worse and worse, and will end with the antichrist, the great tribulation, and fiery vengeance, with only a few saints evacuated off to a heaven somewhere beyond the blue.  Their attitude pictures humanity’s condition somewhat like poor George.  George fell off a scaffold from three stories up, broke half the bones in his body, scalded himself with hot tar and lay in the hospital covered with bandages from head to foot, strapped in traction, fed intravenously only his left eyeball was visible!  The doctor came in, checked the chart at the bottom of the bed of pain, hummed knowingly, but not too encouragingly, came around the side of the bed, looked closely at George and said, “I don’t like the looks of that eye!”  Hopeless!  That is how the church world views humanity today.

The wonderful truth is that “the whole creation is on tiptoe to see the wonderful sight of God’s sons coming into their own.  The world of creation cannot as yet see reality, not because it chooses to be blind, but because in God’s purpose it has been so limited yet it has been given hope.  And the hope is that in the end the whole of created life will be rescued from the tyranny of change and decay, and have its share in that magnificent liberty which can only belong to the children of God!  It is plain to anyone with eyes to see that at the present time all created life groans in a sort of universal travail.  And it is plain, too, that we who have a foretaste of the Spirit are in a state of painful tension, while we wait for that redemption of our bodies which will mean that we have realized our full sonship in Him” (Rom. 8:19-23, Phillips).

 


Chapter 57

THE INCREASE OF THE KINGDOM

(continued)

Scientists finding fossil footprints of extinct dinosaurs assure us that these great creatures must have roamed the earth in the long ago.  As they walked upon the semi-solid earth, later hardening into rock, they left these indisputable evidences of their existence.  In like manner God has trod this earth; He has traveled the infinite depths of space leaving His mark on everything touched.  The starry heavens are studded with countless universes flung from His omnipotent hand.  He has set them in their destined locations and marked out for them their appointed speeds and orbits.   

The notion that God for many ages through incomprehensible measures of time countless billions of trillions of earth years remained inactive and then at a comparatively recent date created the universe and our world is both illogical and fallacious.  This view assumes that eternity preceded time, that time began from several thousand to several billion years ago, and God was within eternity uncreative and unproductive.  Here, in the picture people have of God first contemplating the idea of a creation and then resolving to bring it into existence, we have God suddenly becoming something in recent history that He had never been before!

Just as a king is not called a king until he has a people subject to him, so in like manner the name “Creator” cannot be applied to one unless there is something that has been created.  God is not called “God” until He has a people, as it is written, “And I will be your God, and ye shall be my people” (Lev. 26:12).  Furthermore, the smiter can smite, but he is not called “the smiter” until he has smitten something.  Even if there is no smitten object, and there is nothing lacking in the ability of one to smite, yet it is only when there is a smitten object that it is proper to call the smiter by that name.  Thus with the Creator possessing the ability, wisdom, and power to create does not make Him a Creator.  Only when He has created something is He the Creator!

I declare to you today that our God is spontaneously creative.  He is not systematically creative.  What I mean by that is that God does not employ a program in His purpose and activity.  God is a God of spontaneity.  God moves, not by system or method, but by the creative power of His life.  God is speaking in this hour a word of life.  He is energizing us with His life, transforming by His life.  The life of God is the creative power of His nature.  When I say that God is spontaneously creative, it is my conviction that God has always been everything that He is.  He says, “I am Yahweh, I change not.”  You can’t add anything to God.  There is no increase of what He is.  There is an increase in manifestation, a progression in His purposes, but God Himself does not change.  If God changed one iota today, He would cease to be God.  He is God by virtue of the fact that He IS.  “I am that I am; I change not; I am the eternal.”  By this God is saying, “I am what I am.  I always am all that I am.  I have never been anything that I am not now.  I never will be anything that I am not already.  What I am I have always been.  All that I am I ever will be.  I change not.”  That is what makes God eternal.  Anything that changes in any way is not eternal, for in the change some characteristic is left behind or a new one acquired.  In every change something ends or something begins. That which dwells in an eternal state knows no change.  Change is possible only in that which is not stable, is limited, is imperfect, or not fully developed.  The Lord declares of Himself, “I am Yahweh, I CHANGE NOT” (Mal. 3:6), and the inspired apostle says of Him, “with whom there is no VARIABLENESS, neither shadow of turning” (James 1:17).  God is never surprised.  God has not learned anything this week, nor this year, nor in the past billion trillion years.  If God learned one thing today, it would destroy Him.  He would no longer be the omniscient One, the all-knowing One, for known unto God are all His works from the creation of the world.  God does not experiment.  God does not become stronger, wiser, mightier, or increase Himself in any way.  God is the omnipotent, omniscient and omnipresent One.  He CHANGES NOT.  He eternally is all that He is without any decrease or increase or fluctuation whatsoever.  Therefore He is the ETERNAL GOD! Eternal means more than unending, it means unchangeable, and therefore unending!  Therefore, God has always been Creator!

I don’t know about you, but I used to have the idea that God sat around in His heaven for all of “eternity past” and never did anything.  There was just God, there was nothing else.  God had never done anything except be God.  God had never spoken a word.  God had never created anything.  God had never related to anybody, for there was nobody else, just Himself.  He was just God and that was all there was!  And then one day, unexpectedly, suddenly, mysteriously an idea came into His mind.  A thought presented itself.  God thought, “Why don’t I do something?  Why don’t I speak a word?  Why don’t I make a creation?”  And in that sublime moment God first purposed to bring forth a creation!

We are wrong when we teach such a concept.  God is life and the wellspring of life.  In the outflowing of that life I know Him; and when I discover that He is love, I see that if He were not love He would not, could not create.  Now let us consider together the nature of this God who has eternally been Creator.  We must clearly see that God is all-inclusive, and that He lacks nothing whatsoever.  And God is love all goodness.  Having said that God is complete within Himself and therefore good, we can now go on to describe the attribute through which we are aware of His existence His desire to share.   This is the consequence, the effect of His goodness.

Some have said, and I have said it too, that God created man because He was alone and yearned for fellowship for creatures of like kind with whom He could commune.  But this falls short of the nature of God which is Love.  Love does not give because of the desire to receive; rather, love gives purely out of the desire to bless.  The desire for fellowship is the desire to receive not give! Now God possesses that attribute also, as we shall presently see, but is first and foremost love the pure, unmixed desire to impart.  Here we have the first principle of creation God’s infinite desire to impart  led to the creation of a vessel to receive His blessings.  The creation of the vessel (the one we know and are a part of, the present cosmos) is the revelation of God by creation.  He created the universe with all the hosts thereof, and this world with its inhabitants.  Thus the Creator could now bestow upon the creation His infinite love and inexhaustible abundance.  God is the Lover, creation the beloved, as it is written, “For God so loved the world...

We have shown that the Creator’s nature is that of sharing, giving, imparting, and blessing.  However, there can be no sharing unless there is some agent that can receive.  So God’s infinite and eternal desire to impart implies a desire to fulfill every possible dimension and quality of desires to receive.  Can we not see by this that God’s infinite and eternal desire to give demands AN AGENT WITH THE DESIRE TO RECEIVE!  The very nature of God requires CREATION!  To impart or share with others, on any level, can only be considered noble or kind when the recipient desires and enjoys that which is offered him.  When the recipient rejects the gift, yet the donor continues to insist on its acceptance and finally forces him to accept, one can hardly consider this an act of giving much less of love.  In fact, it is brutality and tyranny!

All who read these lines know by experience that the mere mechanical act of giving is, in itself, unsatisfactory and unfulfilling.  Clearly there must be a desire to receive on the part of the recipient, a knowledge of what the gift entails and signifies, before we can say we are truly giving.  If I should give a box of books to a thousand people who cannot read and have no interest in books, I have not really given anything.  It follows that God could never give anything to anyone without an active desire to receive on their part.  So the first step in creation was to bring forth the manifestation of the DESIRE TO RECEIVE!  This desire is inherent in creation, just as the would-be mother desires the implantation of the seed from the father.  Although some are so blinded by sin and benumbed by death that they seek the answer to their cravings in all the wrong places, even rebelling against the glorious Giver, yet God has a plan for all these, to bring them to repentance (a change of mind and desire) so that they can desire properly and discover the true source of life, blessing and reality.  And thus, as it is written, it is “the goodness of God that leadeth men to repentance.”

It readily follows that because of His giving nature God must create an instrument with both the capacity and desire to receive.  The only way to accomplish this was for God to withdraw Himself, to remove Himself, that there would be a place or condition where HE WAS NOT.  God is light, the scripture declares, and in Him there is no darkness at all.  Therefore, let it be clearly known that darkness is naught but the ABSENCE OF GOD!  “And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep” (Gen. 1:2).  You will understand a great mystery when you see how it is that creation was brought forth in the domain of darkness, the realm from which, though created by God, God had withdrawn Himself!  “For the creation was made subject to vanity, not willingly, but by reason of Him who subjected the same in hope.  Because the creation itself shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God” (Rom. 8:20-21).

Someone asks, “But isn’t God omnipresent how could there be some place where He is not?”  We say that God is omnipresent, yet there certainly are realms from which He withholds some measure of Himself, otherwise He could not say, “Behold, I stand at the door and knock: if any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me” (Rev. 3:20).  We say that God is omnipotent; yet He has placed a limitation upon the exercise of His own power, just as it is written of Jesus that “He did not many mighty works there because of their unbelief” (Mat. 13:58).  We say that He is absolutely free, that He can do anything He wishes; yet He has put Himself under obligation by His promises and is bound by His covenants.

Not only was darkness (the absence of God) the first state of creation, it remains the condition of the Adamic creation unto this day.  The command, “Let there be light!” is not merely an historical event, but a prophecy of the glorious reality that would be birthed out of the darkness of the first creation.  The work begins with darkness.  God said, “Let there be light,” and at once light shone where all before was dark.  It is only when the word of God pierces the dense darkness of our alienated, carnal mind with the divine fiat, “Let there be light!” that our darkness displeases us and we are turned to the light.  In that blessed moment the shroud of ignorance and death is removed from our heart and the light of life shines in to illuminate, quicken, and transform that world which we are.  “The people which sat in darkness saw a great light; and to them which sat in the region and shadow of death light is sprung up” (Mat. 4:16).  “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).  “Giving thanks unto the Father which hath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light: who delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of His dear Son” (Col. 1:12-13).

God’s method in His going-forth cannot be better understood than by the use of a somewhat uncommon word parsimony.  We may say that God’s method of realizing Himself in creation is by parsimony.  To use an illustration if we desire to understand the composition of the great white rays of light, we break them up into their constituents and see them as the colors of the rainbow. All the colors are in the white light, for that is what white light is.  When we pass white light through a prism, through stained glass, or even through the cover on the tail light of your automobile, what takes place is that part of the light is held back and we see the remainder.  This is parsimony.  To change the figure, those who love little children often act upon the same principle.  We have to shed a portion of our experience, dispense with a part of our resources, yield up a measure of what we are, and become children ourselves if we are to understand and relate to children.  We isolate some of our persona, as it were.  Your little boy or girl knows you as father, but perhaps your fellow citizens know you as professor, banker, lawyer, carpenter, electrician, mechanic, or proprietor.  You have a larger life than the little child knows anything about, and yet to live your fatherhood properly you have to shed the other persona in the presence of your child and live and act as a child.  Chapter of your nature is dismissed, or withdrawn, or held back.  Many know me as a man of God, a preacher and teacher of the Kingdom of God, and there is a certain esteem of the ministry the Lord has favored us with; but for a few years my little grandson knew me as someone to play cars with!  A lot of who I am was held back in my relationship with him.  Now he is discovering other parts of me that he did not know at that time.  There is, furthermore, a part of me that only my wife knows, it is withheld from all others.  What is this but parsimony?  The principle of parsimony helps us to live our life truly.  When we get home from work we shut the world out; when we are at business we live in that as though there were nothing else to live for.  In different relationships we insulate or restrict portions of our being.

It is not difficult to see how this applies to God’s great principle of creation.  God withdrew Himself, creating darkness and void this is the self-limitation of Deity; or to state it in other words, God retained, or held back, His full resources in order that there could be formed outside of Himself and beyond Himself and yet within Himself the desire to receive.  The desire to receive is the basic mechanism by which the world operates, the dynamic process at the base of all manifestation.  The desire to receive affects all creation because it is the basis of all creation.  As we view the animate creation we find a remarkable physical dependence upon the external world for survival culminating in man, who has the greatest desire to receive of all creation not only for physical things like food, clothing, houses, and possessions, but also for psychological things like peace, happiness, satisfaction, love, and above all, the deep inner craving for spiritual life, the insatiable hunger after reality.

When God created man male and female in His image, He revealed the great truth that He is Himself male and female in His nature and attributes.  God would never have known the action of giving and receiving had He not known them as characteristics inherent within Himself.  The masculine nature is the nature of the Giver.  Aggressiveness, boldness, strength, valor, authority, power, and dominion are among the traits of the masculine nature.  And it is the man who provides the sperm out of himself for the creation of a new life.  Thus, man is the Giver.  Modesty, gentleness, tenderness, sensitivity, and dependence are attributes of the feminine nature. It is the woman who receives the sperm in the act of procreation.  And this is why men hold doors open for women, and offer a woman their seat on the bus, instead of the other way around.    Woman is therefore the Receiver.  When a woman conceives, the realm of her conception is in darkness the new life, the new creation, the product of her union is formed in the seclusion and darkness of the womb.  In its beginning the new life is without human form and darkness is upon the face of the deep.  What marvelous things are wrought in darkness!  Said the Psalmist: “I will praise Thee; for I am fearfully and wonderfully made: marvelous are Thy works; and that my soul knoweth right well.  My substance was not hid from Thee when I was made in secret, and curiously wrought in the lowest parts of the earth.  Thine eyes did see my substance, yet being unperfect; and in Thy book all my members were written, which in continuance were fashioned, when as yet there was none of them” (Ps. 139:14-16).  And yet, the receiver  in turn becomes a giver!  The mother who receives the sperm at last gives a child and pours out upon that child love, affection, care, instruction, and discipline as a Giver!

We have been receivers up to this day, but with Peter we can say, “Such as I have, give I unto you!”  The great principle of sonship is that we receive in order to be able to give!  The sons are receiving in fullness that they may give out of fullness.  The sons are receiving ultimately that they may give ultimately.  The sons are receiving infinitely that they may pour into creation infinitely. All men give out of the measure they have, but God is bringing forth a people in this hour in such a dimension of His nature, life and power that He shall be expressed through them in the fullness of Himself.  For these creation groans, for only as this mortal puts on immortality, and this corruptible puts on incorruption, shall we be able to deliver creation from the bondage of corruption.

I know nothing deeper in God than love, nor believe there is anything deeper than love, nay, there can be nothing deeper than love!  The being of God is love, and love demands an object the beloved.  If God never created until six thousand years ago or twenty billion years ago, then He could have not been love before that event, for there was no object of love, therefore no expression of love.  God would have been throughout eternity before time loveless.  Our existence is not accidental: it had to be.  God must love, therefore God must create.  The reality of love is a property inherent in the essence of the lover.  The Divine Lover, God, cannot love in a limited way because in His nature and being He is limitless, so He loves to the furthest limits of possibility.  Creation is therefore intrinsic to God’s very life, it is the outer landscape of His own being, God making Himself visible to Himself and simultaneously making Himself visible to us.  It is in some sense His very self, as Eve was Adam’s self.  And in this relationship with His creation God’s love is revealed in the interchange of giving and receiving!

Far away in the depths of my spirit I see that from all eternity God has been creating!  “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.  The same was in the beginning with God.  All things were made by Him; and without Him was not anything made that was made” (Jn. 1:1-3).  “Through faith we understand that the ages were framed by the word of God” (Heb. 11:3).  That creative word was already there with God in the beginning of our present cosmos.  “In the beginning...God said, Let there be...and there was...”  That never-begun existence of the Word has eternally been the out-raying of the Father’s nature.  The Word did not come into existence at the beginning of the present creation He already was.  He is the CREATIVE WORD! To say that God never created anything before Genesis 1:1 is to deny God His own being, nature, and expression from eternity.

If God never until recent times created anything, then God eternally never spoke and never loved!  If at any time He either spoke or loved, then He created!  These truths are self-evident. There has never been a time when there was nothingness and only God in existence.  The scripture says that He is “before all things,” but that doesn’t mean that He eternally existed alone, only that He is the origin, the source, the cause of all things, as it is also written, “For from Him and through Him and to Him are all things for all things originate with Him and come from Him...” (Rom. 11:36).  There was never a time when His omnipotent power was not outspread everywhere.  We are so narrow when we naively suppose that this universe is the first or only thing God has ever done! God has never been contented to be alone, for He is love.  He has ever willed and labored to give existence to other creatures and worlds who should be blessed with His blessedness creatures whom He has eternally purposed to conform to His own image and likeness, a likeness developed over eons of time, forever growing: perhaps never one of them yet, though unspeakably blessed, has had even an approximate idea of the blessedness in store for him.  It is the ministry of God’s firstfruits company of sons to bring this blessedness to all realms of all the creations of God in all dimensions forevermore!

It would make no difference if there were a googolplex (the largest number that has a name) of universes and a googolplex to the googolplex power of sons of God.  Eventually God’s plan of the ages would be finished, and then comes eternity what would seem to be an eternity of stagnation, of the status quo, of no more change or growth or creation forever after.  There would then be nothing more anywhere with the need to receive, and God’s nature of love would forever cease to be expressed, His creative power  eternally inactive.  If we can lay aside the traditions of men we will see that the creation of God and the family of God will increase forever.  And that is what the prophet Isaiah indicates: “Of the increase of His government and peace there shall be no end...” (Isa. 9:7).  The key word is increase the government of God forever increasing in number, area, power, scope, responsibility, creativity, fulfillment, fullness of life and purpose.

What happens when the universe is fully occupied, and the glory of God’s sons has brought the fullness of God to all worlds everywhere?  Ah, some astronomers postulate that the physical universe is potentially infinite in size, with space expanding and matter continually coming into existence.  Even if this were not the case, God is CREATOR and other universes and dimensions may exist or be created.  There is nothing impossible with God!  It is absurd to straitjacket God’s great plan and power by the confines and limitations of the cosmos as we know it today.  God is unlimited, almighty, omniscient in wisdom, infinite in potential, omnipotent  in power and ability.  The human mind cannot even conceive of, much less verbalize, what the scope and glory of God’s activity and purpose throughout the unending eternity shall be!  No end to the increase!  What incomprehensible potential!  Involvement in God’s government unto infinity is  what God is offering us as His very own sons.  Infinity for eternity!  What a prospect!

If God has always been Creator, it follows that He is still creating today.  One astronomer describes how throughout the interstellar space freshly created particles of matter cluster first into gaseous thin clouds and then swirl into even denser forms, finally bursting into flaming suns whose energy is nourished by the transmutation of matter itself.  These swirling celestial fires are not merely single stars, but systems of stars within systems of stars.  Hundreds of millions of them move in the rhythm which produces the galaxies.  Who can deny that God is still creating!

 You see, my beloved, creation is co-extensive with the Creator.  I don’t believe there was ever a time when God was not Creator, and therefore creating, because if God one fine day became a Creator, then He changed.  Something was added to Him.  He became something that He had never been before.  As long as there has been God, there has been creation.  I don’t know how many creations there have been, or how many parallel universes exist even now in other, unknown, dimensions.  I know the one that I see with my eyes, that I perceive with my senses.  I know the one that my natural man has been birthed into.  I gaze at the majesty and immensity of the heavens at night.  I behold the symmetry, the harmony, and the wonder of this earth with its towering mountains, vast oceans, and teeming life forms.  But I cannot conceive today that what I see is the only thing God has ever done!  There may have been ten billion zillion googolplexes of creations, on scillions of levels, before the one that we are beholding today.  And I do not hesitate to tell you that this is not the last creation!  God continues to create today and without His ceaseless activity all would sink into chaos and nothingness.  Jesus said it this way: “My Father is working still, and I am working.”

Ray Prinzing contributed a beautiful depth of insight into God’s Createrhood when he wrote, “The security of all the good things to come is in Jesus Christ since it is IN HIM that all things are to find their perfection and fulfillment.   We see Him as the Son of man, we see Him as the Son of God, we see Him as the great High Priest, but we need to also see Him as the GREAT CREATOR— ‘for by Him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible...all things were created by Him, and for Him’ (Col. 1:16).  It is this GREAT CREATOR who has become our Redeemer, and you cannot separate redemption from His creativity.  As Peter writes, ‘Let them that suffer according to the will of God commit the keeping of their souls in well doing, as unto a FAITHFUL CREATOR’ (I Pet. 4:19).

 “What about this ‘CREATOR’ part in today’s sufferings?  For the majority of Christians, CREATING was an historical happening that was wrought a long time ago.  ‘In the beginning God created...’  A creation was brought forth hazy, nebulous, but in some way a revelation of His power.  Then the erroneous teaching follows that an enemy came by guile, treachery, and marred that creation, so now God has to try and patch things up, rescue a few, and then close the book on the whole sorry chapter.  What nonsense!  Rather, we firmly declare unto you that CREATING IS A PROCESS STILL BEING CARRIED OUT BY THE WILL AND GRACE OF GOD.  Our Redeemer, as our Creator, is still creating us, and we are being perfected in His hand as He conforms us into His own image and likeness.  This is why Peter, by inspiration, holds before us the fact that the Creator is faithful still operating as such, and using suffering as a part of the creative process.  ‘As we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly.’

 “God’s creative acts are not just limited to history they are still in progress, and some are very much yet in the future.  ‘I have showed thee new things from this time, even hidden things, and thou didst not know them.  They are CREATED NOW, and not from the beginning; even before the day when thou heardest them not; lest thou shouldest say, Behold, I knew them’ (Isa. 48:6-7). Even though He has given us promises of things that shall happen, good things to come, yet there is such a unique creativity involved that no man shall out-guess the way He shall accomplish His plan.  That is why Peter admonishes us to ‘be established in the present truth’ (II Pet. 1:12).  Our God is marching on, but are we marching with Him?

 “The usual first thought for ‘Creator’ is Genesis 1:1, ‘In the beginning GOD CREATED the heavens and the earth.’  I realize that one could go off in several directions with this, perhaps placing the emphasis on the fact that it was God who did the creating; or, that it was the beginning of His plan of the ages; or, we could spend hours meditating on what it was He created.  But the thought that strongly comes to me is that far too often we limit HIS CREATIVITY to the book of Genesis, chapter one, and we are not aware that HE IS OUR CREATOR RIGHT NOW.  There is a NOW-NESS in His creating which is presently taking place in a people.  To say, ‘remember now THY Creator,’ the THY makes it a personal experience now.  Yet it is the proclivity of the carnal man to turn away from the Creator, and involve himself with what was created instead.

 “How beautifully the scriptures turn our eyes to behold a higher creation.  For ‘Christ being come an high priest of good things to come, by a greater and more perfect tabernacle, not made with hands, that is to say, not of this building’ (Heb. 9:11).  The Greek word used here for ‘building’ is ‘ktisis’ which literally means: thing made, a creation, and could rightly be read, ‘not of this creation,’ meaning, not of this present Adamic man.  THERE IS A NEW MAKING TAKING FORM, in His image, with His divine nature.  This NEW MAKING is a part of the on-going creativity of our God.  And each member of this new creation is an original handiwork of the Creator.  ‘If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature (thing made, creation)’ (II Cor. 5:17).  There is a totally new creation being formed, and it is ‘not of this building,’ not after the realm of the earthy, but OF THE HEAVENLY.  It is in the new that the scripture shall be fulfilled which saith, ‘For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them’ (Eph. 2:10).

 “With a broad sweep the prophet declares that God is ‘the Lord, the Creator of the ends of the earth’ (Isa. 40:28).  The vast galaxies, its farthest outreach, beyond the beyonds HE prepared, formed, created it all.  But lest one would become overwhelmed by the immensity of it all, the prophet also reminded them that ‘I am the Lord, your Holy One, THE CREATOR OF ISRAEL, your King.  Thus saith the Lord, WHICH MAKETH a way in the sea, and a path in the mighty waters’ (Isa. 43:15-16).  Yes, He created the entire universe, but He also CREATED YOU, and He reveals that creativity by making a way for you now, a path through the waters, a way where there is no way.  Who ever heard of a path through the Red Sea?  God created one when needed!  But God’s creative acts are not just limited to history, they are still in progress, and some are very much yet in the future.  Christ consistently pointed the people towards the new, things that were to happen in their day, and the future, because the working of the Father was progressive in its unfolding.  ‘My Father worketh hitherto, and I work’ (Jn. 5:17).  He is ‘the Lord our MAKER,’ and He is still MAKING/CREATING that which furthers His plan and purpose.  And then, in tremendous love and grace He includes us in that creative working.  How utterly awesome!

 “These are truths being revealed today which have been reserved for this very time, and no one can say ‘I already knew them.’  God has a creative work for this day which has never been seen before!  God has a truth for our today and it is sufficient for our times as we walk on in His creative unfolding.  People are so prone to look back to yesterday’s revival and want to repeat it over and over again, so they can say, ‘it is just like the good old days.’  Little do they know that those days are gone, that God has a most unique, original work of creation for this day which is peculiarly fitted to our times.  Why do we think He has ceased to be OUR CREATOR, and has now become a ‘Do It Again Worker.’  I find no witness of His Spirit within me to return to the ‘early church’ patterns.  I have no inner Divine Urging to dredge up the pattern of Israel’s historical dealings  for a repeat.  Indeed, we are challenged to ‘Remember ye not the former things, neither consider the things of old.’  Rather, we are to ‘REMEMBER NOW THY CREATOR,’ He is the Originator of that which is ever new, and He says, ‘Behold, I will do a new thing; now shall it spring forth; shall ye not know it?  I will make a way in the wilderness, and rivers in the desert...this people have I formed for myself; they shall show forth my praise’ (Isa. 43:18-19,21).

 “We have borne the image of the earth.  We do not need to go round and round on the wheel to see how many times we can bear this earthy image, or have a repeat of His earthy works, or works in the earthy.  There is also an image of the heavenly to be borne.  Let the natural give way to the spiritual, let the earthy be replaced by the heavenly!  He continues to mold and shapen and form, because HE IS CREATING A NEW SPECIES, that is, CREATING AN HEAVENLY HOST.  Resurrect and build replicas of all the old orders that you desire then pray them through repeated cycles of revival after revival, but they will always go into a decline, for God has not meant for them to endure.  In our heart He has spoken of A NEW, and for us the former has now waxen old, and we pray it will swiftly vanish away.  We do not belittle the days that have passed.  We praise God for every move of His Spirit, every work that He has wrought, but we see them as stepping stones of preparation for that which is to come.  For, we repeat, HE IS THE HIGH PRIEST OF GOOD THINGS TO COME!”

 “Even Paul, in turning the attention away from himself, and unto God, told the people, ‘Ye should turn from these vanities unto the living God, which made heaven, and earth, and the sea, and all things that are therein’ (Acts 14:15).  When you worship let it be THE LIVING GOD, He has the power  to create, He is OUR MAKER, the living Lord of all.  Briefly and simply stated, when we need help, let it go beyond Christ being our Healer, see Him as our CREATOR, He can create whatever is necessary for us.  We can see Him as our Provider, but when we see Him as our Creator He can create provision when there is nothing in hand.  HE is our MAKER, and He can continue to make, to produce, to create.  ‘My help cometh from the Lord, which made heaven and earth’ (Ps. 121:2). Ah, to see Him as our faithful Creator means that we are connected to One of total sufficiency, total power, total victory.

“Remember thy Creator, the Spirit speaks today,
And let His love and mercy attend thy pilgrim way.
To turn the shades of darkness into the dawning light,
O’erthrow the force of evil, and turn the wrong to right.
Why need we fear the future, or fret at things behind?
For He is all-sufficient e’en when our faith is blind.
And He remaineth faithful, to succor those who call,
Remember thy Creator, He is our All in all.”
Ray Prinzing

We are even now a new creation.  “If any man be in Christ, he is a new creation.”  There is an old creation and there is a new creation.  But I have news for you!  The new creation shall also be a creator, for the new creation is that which is in union with Him who is the ETERNAL CREATOR.  And I tell you that I have higher objectives than this, but I did joke with my wife on occasion that when I become a creator and create my worlds, I think one of the first things I am going to create is a six-legged chicken!  (I guess you can tell which part of the chicken is my favorite!).  That, of course, is merely a humorous thought, for I am quite sure that any kind of chicken will be the farthest thing from our minds when we come to that awesome and glorious task of being participators with God in His ever-expanding, universal Kingdom.  What I am saying is this: God IS.  God has always been everything that He is, and always will be all that He is.  God has always been Creator!  He will always be Creator!  And now He is making us His sons that we may in all things be like Him!  God is creating today, and He is a God that is infinite in all of His ways.  The sons of God are SONS OF THE CREATOR and are therefore creators as is their Father.

The creative spirit already dwells within man.  If you have ever noticed even a child loves to create.  Have your children not brought something to you, a picture they drew, something they made, something they did?  They were so proud of it, so excited about it!  But that is really the image of GOD in them shining through!  You see, the nature of creativity is within every man.  That’s why we have artists, poets, musicians, architects and inventors.  Where does a picture, a poem, a song, a building, or an invention come from?  Someone says, “Well, the picture is canvas and paint, and it’s the artist who does it.”  But give me canvas and paint and you don’t want to see it!  I bought a guitar once, too, and you wouldn’t have wanted to hear it!  These things all proceed out of mind, out of spirit.  They emerge from the invisible realm and are made visible by those who receive them.  They come right out of that creative nature breathed into man’s nostrils, the very breath and life of OUR CREATOR.  They are not made, they are created!  They are products of the inspiration of the Almighty!

Paul Mueller once quoted a letter he received from a brother who obviously has a deep understanding of the creative processes of God.  A portion of the letter said, “This has been a very exciting morning for me, as the Lord gave me a new picture and understanding of what He is doing and how He is doing it.  These are days of continuing creation.  Our Father, being a Creator, has never stopped creating.  He is still creating out of nothing!  A Creator can’t stop creating.  Now He is creating through His sons.  But how is He creating?  Where is He creating?  That is the glorious mystery that is unfolding to me as I journey on His highway!  We sons are learning the higher way of God, our Father, who created everything out of no-thing.  It all came out of Himself.  We are creators made in His image, learning to create the kingdom as we live, move, and have our being moment by moment, day by day.  We are creating the kingdom where there was and is no kingdom, only darkness. We are bringing it right into the midst of that darkness!

 “How do we go about turning spiritual darkness into Light?  Just by knowing and being who we are, children of light!  It is all done out of rest!  It is done by the Person of the Holy Spirit who lives in us.  It is actually the Holy Spirit who is doing the creating through us, precept by precept, speaking the word of faith that becomes fact.  It is taking many of us, who together are His body, to create the world-wide kingdom.  We are interconnected in Spirit.  In Christ, we are one omnipresent Spirit.  Now instead of 120 in an upper room, we are a world-wide body of spiritual creators, bringing the kingdom into being where before there was no kingdom in manifestation.

 “The kingdom of God appears in the midst of the darkness as the sons speak the word of their Father from His center of higher spiritual knowing, wisdom, and understanding within, ‘Let there be light!’  As the sons of God walk in earth’s spiritual darkness and nothingness, wherever they are, they all say the same word, ‘Let there be light!’  And that light shines away the darkness. Because we are children of light, made in the image and born into the family of our Father in Light, we may knowingly and purposefully speak His Word.  This is spiritual Light, spoken in the power of the Holy Spirit.  He is omnipresently networking the children of Light, those who speak the same Word with the one mind of Christ in them, and who are brought into one accord and agreement together.  If one hears this Word in the Spirit, ‘Let there be light!’ although he may be surrounded by spiritual darkness, he will speak to that darkness, and it must go.  In that higher way, each child of Light enters into the creation of the kingdom on earth and becomes a living part of the present kingdom.  We’re busy creating the kingdom that was not there beforehand in visible form.  By faith it comes into manifestation, and those who have been held captive to the world’s systems are loosed from the darkness.  They come into the kingdom with rejoicing, singing, and an abundance of feasting on kingdom infinite supply”    end quote.

Everything that God creates is unique.  He is a God of unlimited diversity, of infinite variety, of inexhaustible capacity.  We see this throughout the whole creation of God.  To me it is amazing, it’s a wonderful thing that astronomers tell us the heavens are composed of more than two hundred billion galaxies yet I don’t accept that!  I believe that not only is the creation co-extensive with the Creator in the sense that God has always been creating, but I also believe that the creation is co-extensive with the Creator in the infinity of His person.  In other words, the only reason the scientists believe  that there are two hundred billion galaxies is simply because that is as far as they can see.  The fact is that everywhere God is He is creating!  Not only is God always all that He is, He also is all that He is everywhere that He is!  His power, his glory, His wisdom, His knowledge, His love, His goodness, all is as omnipresent as God Himself.  God does not have two eyes somewhere out in space with marvelous X-ray vision that can pierce through all things.  No!  The eyes of the Lord are spirit eyes, and everywhere God’s Spirit is, the eyes of the Lord are.  God does not see you today, my friend, from heaven above.  God in the room where you are, God within by His Spirit, sees you right where you are, for the eyes of the Lord are all about you and within you.  All the attributes, powers, functions, and abilities of God are spirit and are as omnipresent as His Spirit.  God is all that He is everywhere, and He can do all that He does everywhere.  The mouth of the Lord is an omnipresent spirit mouth, His ability as Spirit to speak in every place at the same time.  Out of His Spirit He can speak within your own heart or ears, while at the same instant He is speaking to millions of other people around the world and to holy angels and creatures of all kinds in far distant worlds.  He speaks to each out of His Spirit present with them, not from some distant place where His “mouth” is.  In like manner the creative power of God is an omnipresent power and God creates, not in one locale, but out of the infinity of Himself.

The astronomers can discern and calculate two hundred billion galaxies, but no man can see further than his vision can go, naturally or spiritually.  God is quickening His sons in this hour to see further, to see deeper, that we might perceive the truth of all things.  It is only as we see by the Spirit that we can see as God sees, know as God knows, understand as God understands, and act as God acts.  God is infinite.  I don’t know how many galaxies there are, because there is no end to them.  You could never find the outer extremities of the universe because God is everywhere,  all things are out of Him, God upholds all things, He fills all things, and if you were to discover the limit of the creation, you would discover the limit of God Himself!  Not only does God always do everything that He does, He always does everything that He does everywhere that He is.  So there is no limit!

God is always doing.  Jesus said, “My Father works, and I work.”  Again He said, “I do only those things I see my Father doing.”  That is the mark of every son of God.  We must see farther, we must see deeper, because we can only do what we see our Father doing.  Most Christians see so little of God!  But within His sons that are coming to maturity God is expanding and enhancing our vision.  Our Father is bringing us to the place of His perspective, to see as He sees, to see according to His own heart and purpose. God IS Spirit; therefore the Spirit is God, searching and comprehending all the inner depths of God’s being.  Because He has been sent into all who are in Christ, He brings the insight of divinity into us as sons of God.  Not only does He impart to us the thoughts of God, but for the first time we become awake to His nature, out of which all His actions spring.  We are now beginning to SEE WHAT THE FATHER IS DOING, and are becoming participators with Him in His Kingdom purposes.

Our minds cannot comprehend infinity, but if you were to discover the end of God you would discover the end of creation.  Yet Paul assures us that in all the universes of the universes there are no two stars that are equal in glory.  And stars are still being created!  Universes are still coming into existence throughout the immensity of what we call space.  With my natural mind I can’t conceive of creating two hundred billion stars, and making every one of them different, giving each of them a glory that is unique from any other glory, and then realize that over the millions and billions of time-years, with literally millions and billions of new stars coming into existence, there will be no duplication in the glory of any one of them!  And God knows every one of them and calleth them byname!  Our hearts are awed with reverence by the sacred knowledge that spiritually each star of the heavens represents a son of God.

The natural sun is the brightest luminary in the natural heavens.  And to help us in correctly interpreting the spiritual meaning of the sun, Genesis 1:16 informs us that God made “the greater light to RULE the day, and the lesser light to RULE the night.”  Here we first have the idea expressed of both the sun and the moon being RULERS.  Then we find that God, the supreme Ruler, is called in the Word a “Sun.”  “For the Lord thy God is a SUN and a shield” (Ps. 84:11).  Also, our Lord Jesus Christ, the King of kings, is in Malachi 4:2 called “the SUN of righteousness.”  He rules! Furthermore we read  that “He that RULETH over men...shall be as the light of the morning, when the SUN ariseth” (II Sam. 22:3-4).  And in II Samuel 21:17 we find David the king called “the LIGHT of Israel.”  In Matthew 13:43 we find, concerning saints who are kings and priests and rule with Christ (Rev. 3:21; 5:9-10), that they are compared to the sun: “Then shall the righteous SHINE FORTH AS THE SUN in the kingdom of their Father.”  Of these same ruling saints, who are the manifested sons of God, Jesus says, “He that overcometh, and keepeth my works unto the end, to him will I give power over the nations and he shall RULE them with a rod of iron...”  Then He hastily adds, “And I will give him the MORNING STAR” (Rev. 2:26-28).  That is, I will give him power over the nations rulership and I will give him the POSITION AS THE MORNING STAR to herald the dawn of the Day of the Lord for all mankind.  Now consider how meaningful these words of Daniel the prophet wherein He foretells the manifestation of the sons of God: “And they that be wise shall SHINE AS THE BRIGHTNESS OF THE FIRMAMENT; and they that turn many to righteousness as the STARS for ever” (Dan. 12:3).

Then we find in Daniel 4:26, “the HEAVENS DO RULE.”  God’s heaven is His throne.  “Heaven I-S  M-Y  T-H-R-O-N-E” (Isa. 66:1).  Heaven in the spiritual terminology of the scriptures is the seat where the SUN, the MOON, and the STARS RULE.  As God’s heaven is His throne, so God’s heaven is not a place in some far-off space, but includes all the governmental realm  through which God rules, and He is Lord of all.  You, my beloved, are a star in God’s governmental heavens!  “Ye are the light of the world,” said Jesus, the firstborn son of God.  Don’t try to be like anybody else. Each star has its own glory.  How many snowflakes do you suppose have ever fallen upon the earth?  And yet they tell us that no two snowflakes have the same design!  More than six billion people walk the face of this planet today, and no two fingerprints duplicate, and there are no two people who are identical.  Everybody and everything is UNIQUE.  You can’t be like Preston Eby, and I can’t be like you, but we can all be sons of God, stars in the firmament of His ruling Kingdom.  And you are very special, beloved, for when God speaks the superlative comes into existence!  The shining constellations spreading across the enormous expanse of the heavens represent the Lord’s dwelling place in the Kingdom of His new creation people.  God is setting His star-sons in the heavens of His throne to rule and reign over all things.  Just BE what God has called you to be where you are, and let Christ shine through you in the glory He has given you there cannot be another YOU!

Praise God, the heavens are ablaze with the glory of God a people who embody and personify the hopes of creation, a people who are experiencing deep within the transformation so necessary to bring deliverance to the earth, and to make all things new.  The reason there is darkness today is because of the false doctrines and dark traditions of the church systems and all religion. No wonder God’s precious people are full of unbelief, filled with doubts, held captive by circumstances, and overwhelmed with fears.  No wonder they magnify the works of the devil and declare him more than they declare God.  They know not the DAY in which we are living, because of the darkness of their minds.  They receive death and feed on darkness all about them.  But God has arisen within you, my brother, my sister, as a light this very day, first dispelling the darkness within you, that you might dispel the darkness and remove these heavens that men have been living under and establish something altogether new in the earth.  Bring forth in your life a new likeness, the image of God, that you may declare HIM that is supreme throughout all the earth and to every world that God has made, that He may reign in every heart.  Just BE what He rising up to be in you.  Thus you have a share in the glorious INCREASE OF THE KINGDOM!

 


Chapter 58

THE INCREASE OF THE KINGDOM

(continued)

The sons of God do not have to be afraid of the passage of time, because time is on our side.  History is working toward our objectives which are according to God’s plan of the ages.  Nearly four millennia ago God appeared to Abraham with the promise that through him and his seed all the families of the earth would be blessed.  Abraham was only one man in the midst of a pagan world of false gods and superstitious religion.  How could such a promise be realized?  Must he form an organization, design a strategy, and begin to enlist workers to help bring the objective to pass?  Not at all!  He stood by faith in the God who promised and staggered not in unbelief.  He did nothing more than that.  He understood that this was God’s strange work, not man’s.  

Centuries passed monotonously and uneventfully by until the day God appeared to Moses in the burning bush at the backside of the desert.  Swiftly momentous events were set in motion which brought Abraham’s multiplied family out of Egypt and formed them into a nation  at the foot of blazing Sinai.  Forty years later God gave them their homeland in Canaan, according to His promise to their father, Abraham, and eventually they became a power to be reckoned with among the nations.  Then fifteen hundred more years of unclimatic history passed until the angel Gabriel was dispatched to the young virgin in Nazareth and announced, “Behold, thou shalt conceive in thy womb, and bring forth a son, and thou shalt call His name JESUS.  He shall be great, and shall be called the Son of the Highest: and the Lord God shall give unto Him the throne of His father David: and He shall reign over the house of Jacob for ever; and of His kingdom there shall be no end” (Lk. 1:31-33).   

Jesus came into the world at the time of the Roman empire.  He was crucified on a Roman cross, pierced with a Roman spear, and sealed in His sepulcher under a Roman seal.  But, praise God!  He burst the bands of death, shattered the seal of mighty Rome, and arose the Conquering Christ.  And not only that — He ascended victor over sin and all the powers of darkness, having brought to naught the prince of this world, having brought in eternal redemption and everlasting hope for a lost world and reconciled all things back unto Himself.  He sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high and poured out upon the first few citizens of His Kingdom the gift of the Holy Ghost.  The Kingdom of God was birthed, and gathered from Jew and Gentile alike a vast multitude into its bosom.   What a flood of light and glory and power fell upon the world through the ministry of the humble followers of the Lamb!

What glorious days those were!  How God blessed His people!  Mighty signs and wonders were performed as God confirmed His word with signs following.  The word of God, anointed by the Holy Spirit, swept the world like a prairie fire.  It encircled the mountains and crossed the oceans.  It made kings to tremble and tyrants to fear.  It was said of those early Christians that they turned the world upside down — so powerful was their message and spirit!  The knowledge of the glory of the Lord covered the earth  as the waters cover the sea.  Paganism fell.   The mighty Roman empire shut up its pagan temples, sheathed its persecuting sword, and sat down as a disciple at the feet of Christ and His apostles.  Jesus had said, “I will build my church,” and build it He did!

Now two thousand years more have gone by and nothing new has happened!  But — can you not see the progression?  God appeared at the first to one man — Abraham.  It is plain to see that out of Abraham came a nation.  Out of that nation came the Christ.  Out of Christ has come the church.  And now, out of the church is being birthed the manchild, the manifested sons of God, destined to rule all nations with a rod of iron.  No man understands history who has not the knowledge of this progression of events!  The truth is that not one history teacher out of ten thousand has any idea of what history is all about.  The proof of the Bible is found in the fact that its prophecies have been, and are being, meticulously and precisely fulfilled.  The mighty works of God throughout the ages are the very core, the momentum, the purpose, and the meaning of history.  History reveals the outplaying of God’s purposes in the earth.  Just as surely as Abraham fathered a nation, just as surely as that nation produced the Christ, just as surely as Christ raised up the church — just that certain is it that the church shall birth a manchild!  It is history in the making.  It is the mighty God controlling destiny.  It is God’s plan of the ages unfolding through the divine events that shape the course of the world.

The ministry and rule of sonship is ready to be released upon the nations of earth.   At this junction of history we now stand.   We are on the threshold of momentous events!   The Lord God of the universe is about to sovereignly interject Himself once more into the world of mankind.  The sons of God are now standing in the wings.  Every day brings us closer to the realization of the glory of the Lord covering the entire world, changing and transforming the nations, all people, all cultures, and all things.  The nations will love and serve the one true God and Father, and will cease to make war; the earth itself will be changed, restored to Edenic conditions; all nations will be released from the bondage of corruption: sin, sickness, sorrow and death.  It is a wonderful thing that we have been called and chosen at this junction of history to enter into the Kingdom.  The prophets prophesied of this Day and I do not doubt that some of us will see the power and the glory of it with our own eyes.

The coming age will be one that will see the fullness of God in operation through His sons, the demonstration of the mighty power of the Kingdom of God.  It is not a mansion over the hilltop, or a cabin in the corner of glory-land, or white night gowns, or harps, or palm branches, or dangling feet in some celestial stream.  There is a job to be done!  A battle to be fought!  A victory to be won!   An enemy to be conquered!  A glory to be secured!  “And there shall be no more death.”  This is God’s will for humanity upon this earth, not in some far-off heaven somewhere.  And this is what our call to sonship is all about!  It would be a most beautiful thing if all the saints of God could have an open vision that would enable them to understand the glory of God’s purpose on earth, and His election in man.   The writer to the Hebrews spoke of those who have “tasted the heavenly gift, and are made partakers  of the Holy Ghost, and have tasted the good word of God, and THE POWERS OF THE AGE TO COME” (Heb. 6:4-5).  The Rotherham translation renders this last statement, “Mighty works also of a coming age.”  The Interlinear Greek New Testament says, “The works of power of the age to come.”

Jesus said concerning the mighty miracles which He did, “Greater works than these shall YE DO!”  But have the followers of Jesus really done any greater works than He did?  The book of Acts doesn’t record them.  Neither do the Epistles.  Nor does church history.  And, my friend, after a hundred years of the restoration to the church of the baptism in the Holy Spirit; after more than fifty years since the restoration of the five-fold ministry, the gifts of the Spirit, and the prophetic flow, have you seen any greater works than raising the dead, cleansing lepers, walking on water, calming storms, and turning water into wine?  You know you haven’t!  But according to Hebrews 6:5 all the signs, wonders, gifts, miracles, and glory we have experienced are simply a taste, a small sampling of THE MIGHTY WORKS OF THE COMING AGE, GREATER WORKS THAN JESUS  DID 2,000 YEARS AGO!   Why friends, we have seen only the firstfruits of what God will do through His enChristed body upon this earth.  The hospitals emptied, the dead raised incorruptible, natures changed, nations turned to God, the crucial problems of poverty, crime, violence, war, corruption and the environment  solved, the whole world system transformed — and GREATER WORKS THAN THESE SHALL YOU SEE as the glorious mind of Christ rules and reigns over the earth through the manifested sons of God bringing THE INCREASE OF THE KINGDOM OF GOD!  The fullness of what we have had just a taste will be the normal works on behalf of humanity in that new age of the Kingdom.  The next dispensation is to be as different and as much more glorious as every succeeding dispensation has been to the one preceding it.

ALL THINGS NEW

Those who are now being transformed by the Spirit and gathered into God’s Christ are the new creation (II Cor. 5:17).  How little we knew when we started this wonderful journey into God what glories He had prepared for those who love Him!  And even less did we realize that in that blessed day when we began to follow Christ we had joined the triumphant march that leads at last to the reconciliation and transformation of the universe.   We did not know that one day every thing and every one throughout all the unbounded heavens would echo and re-echo the praise of Him who created all things for His pleasure and redeemed them with His own precious blood.   “And He that sat upon the throne said, Behold, I make all things new.  And He said unto me, Write: for these words are true and faithful” (Rev. 21:5).

God’s purpose is not merely to make the members of the body of Christ a new creation, but to make ALL THINGS NEW.  Like the sons of God who are now being raised up into the heavenlies and made one in Christ, from the moment of creation’s first dawning it has been the divine intention “that in the dispensation of the fullness of times He might gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven, and which are on earth; even in Him” (Eph. 1:10).  I believe Paul gives the clearest insight into this supernal mystery when he writes: “In my opinion whatever we may have to go through now is less than nothing compared with the magnificent future God has in store for us.  The whole creation is on tiptoe to see the wonderful sight of the sons of God coming into their own.   The world of creation cannot as yet see reality, not because it chooses to be blind, but because in God’s purpose it has been so limited — yet it has been given hope.  And the hope is that in the end the whole of created life will be rescued from the tyranny of change and decay, and have its share in that magnificent liberty which can only belong to the children of God!” (Rom. 8:18-21, Phillips).

What a glorious liberty!  What a wonderful purpose!  What a transcendent hope!  Ultimately the whole creation will be raised up into this same spiritual, heavenly, divine and incorruptible realm that God is now bringing His sons into.  God’s plans are as big as the universe!  This shouldn’t seem strange.  God created all the stars and planets and all who inhabit them.  So should not the vast universe fit into God’s Kingdom purpose?   “For thus saith the Lord that created the heavens; God Himself that formed the earth and made it; He hath established it not in vain, He formed it to be inhabited: I am the Lord, and there is none else” (Isa. 45:18).  This passage confirms that the physical creation exists as the arena for God’s majestic purpose.  But consider the imperfection throughout the known universe.   It needs further development, a transformation, a mighty change!  The spectacular novas and multicolored clouds are undeveloped galaxies.  Our own moon  offers evidence that outer space needs much reworking.  The other eight planets, like our moon, are also disordered, bleak, uninhabited, seemingly purposeless places.

God has raised His firstborn Son, Jesus, to an exalted position above all things.  He has made Him Head over all things to the church; but we miss the whole truth of His glory until we see that God has made Him Head also of all principality and power (Col. 2:10).  He has given Him all power in the heavens and on the earth.  He has given Him a name that is above every name anywhere.  So far as position and honor and glory and authority is concerned, Jesus is higher than all else in the universe, and all things are being made subject to Him and gathered into Him.  He and His government of sons will reign until everything in the universe is brought into subjection to Him and resonates with His life; and when this is accomplished, Jesus will deliver the Kingdom up to the Father that God may be all and in all (I Cor. 15:24-28).  Everything in all realms, from the depths of the bottomless to the heights above all heavens, will find their one Head in Christ.  “And this is in harmony with God’s merciful purpose for the government of the world when the times are ripe for it — the purpose which He has cherished in His own mind of restoring the whole creation to find its one Head in Christ; yea, things in heaven and things on earth, to find their one Head in Him” (Eph. 1:9-10, Weymouth).

It should be clear to every enlightened mind that God is in the process of making an entirely new creation, or making all things new — not this time a mere natural creation, nor yet a purely spiritual one, but a spiritual-physical one.  This present natural creation is really only a step in the process of making the creation God had in mind from the beginning.  “First that which is natural, and afterward that which is spiritual,” is the divinely revealed order.  Does that mean the natural is completely done away with, supplanted by the spiritual?   Not at all!  It means that the natural is swallowed up by the spiritual.  The natural is a necessary step in the process of making the kind of creation God purposed from the beginning.  Jesus Christ is the proto-type of that new creation — the PHYSICAL SPIRITUALIZED, RAISED UP INTO THE DIVINE AND HEAVENLY!  The physical body of Jesus was raised from the dead, brought out of the tomb, spiritualized, and made a spiritual body — not a spirit, mind you, but a spiritual body.  Jesus is still referred to as a man all through the New Testament.  “There is one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus.”

The firstborn of this new creation order is a GOD-MAN upon the throne of universal power!  Think of it!  When you see Jesus as a divine-human, a God-man, one of the natural creation metamorphosed, spiritualized, raised up into the celestial and incorruptible, then you see exactly what God is after in the whole creation.  “This mortal must put on immortality.”  Oh, the wonder of it!  We see the natural creation all around us, but this natural creation is not the finished product any more than the ore dug out of the earth is the fine piece of jewelry the artisan has in mind when he begins his work.  The whole creation is still in the process of being made into the kind of creation God started out to make.  God is still Creator!

We have in our theology limited the new creation to the church or to all mankind, as though we are the only ones or the only things that God cares about or that Christ has redeemed.  God has a great plan for man, but the rest of His creation is included in it, and when God was in Christ He was reconciling not just the world, as we have it in the King James Bible, but the KOSMOS (universe) unto Himself.  Then in the letter of Paul to the Colossians we have this remarkable statement, “For it pleased the Father that in Him should all fullness dwell; and having made peace through the blood of His cross, by Him to reconcile all things unto Himself; by Him, I say, whether they be things in earth, or things in the heavens.  And you, that were sometime alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now hath He reconciled in the body of His flesh...to present you holy and unblameable and unreproveable in His sight” (Col. 1:19-22).   Here we can see the whole plan of God in a nut-shell!

Odd it is that we limit God’s restoration to planet earth, when the ultimate objective of God , as portrayed in the Bible, heralded by prophets, taught by mighty men of old, is the complete redemption and recreation of the whole universe.  The purpose of God reaches out to infinitude and to eternity.  The formation and glorification of the body of Christ is but the first step on the way to “heading up all things in Christ,” the ultimate raising up of the universe into its union with God in the Spirit where God becomes All in all.  Grace has ordained that twice-born men should be the first to experience the powers of the age and the ages to come, but how much more there is beyond that for the glory of God and the admiration of His people!  First of all that in His earth-born Son the fullness of Deity should dwell, and then making peace through the blood of His cross, by Him to reconcile or bring into oneness ALL THINGS, whether they be THINGS on earth or THINGS in the heavens.  God in Christ proceeds to “reconcile” or to “merge”  the natural world with the spiritual world, making them ONE NEW CREATION.  God is not simply reconciling things to things, He is reconciling all things to Himself — the natural to the spiritual, making something that has never been — one new creation that is neither natural or spiritual, but both.  I would draw your reverent attention to those significant words: ALL THINGS.  He doesn’t say all men, or some men, or all entities, or all creatures, but ALL THINGS.  “Things” includes a lot more than men, and it isn’t only all things on earth that He is reconciling, but all things also in the heavens or the worlds above, and the realm of Spirit.   What a word!

All the kingdoms shall become
His whose imperial brow with crown of thorn
The men of war in mockery did adorn.
Peace shall prevail, and every land shall own
His rightful sway, and low before His throne
Shall bow and worship; angels there shall kneel.
The soul of the vast universe shall feel
The quickening touch of its life-giving Head,
And shall break forth in song.  The heavens shall shed
In the lap of earth immortal joys,
And every living thing, with thankful voice,
Shall sweetly raise the universal psalm
Of glory unto God and to the Lamb.
— BOYD

Paul Mueller has articulated so well the travail of all creation: “The whole creation also groans to be delivered of its bondage to corruption.  The creation has no language or voice, yet their message reaches from the ends of the earth to the throne of God’s heavens (Ps. 19:1-6).  The whole creation is expressing the desire for the kingdom, just as we are, without speaking it audibly.  Every created thing groans for release from this bondage.  The whole creation travails to be delivered from the curse, and to be restored and raised to enjoy the blessings of the liberty of the sons of God.  Like the rest of God’s creation, we may not speak forth this kingdom prayer.  But it is the universal groan that emanates from every one of us.  We groan within ourselves, waiting for our adoption, which is the glorious manifestation of the Life of Christ and the kingdom of God (Rom. 8:18-23).  And God hears the groans of His suffering, burdened creation, from the smallest form of life to every person on earth.  In due time, death shall be conquered in us first, for God has made us a firstfruits (Ja. 1:18).

“The whole creation is attuned and synchronized in spirit with our spiritual growth.  Every blade of grass, tree, shrub, bug, bird, animal, creeping thing and fish, including every microscopic form of life, has an inbred intelligence, instinct or faculty that will trigger its release from the present bondage when the manifestation of the sons of God takes place.   Then, there will be no hurt nor harm in all the earth.  The wolf shall dwell with the lamb.  The leopard will lie down with the kid, and the calf and the young lion and the fatling shall also lie together, and a little child shall be able to lead them in peace and harmony.  The cow and the bear shall feed; their young ones shall lie down together: and the lion shall eat straw like the ox.  The suckling child shall play on the hole of the once poisonous serpent, and the weaned child shall put his hand on the den of the adder.  ‘They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain: for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea’ (Isa. 11:6-9).  If we truly want to see the rest of creation changed, restored and blessed with the Life of Christ, we will grow in Christ and in the knowledge and wisdom of the truth that He is.  We will earnestly seek to grow to the fullness of Christ, for our spiritual growth  in the kingdom of God is the only answer to the many problems facing the world”   — end quote.

What a glorious and beautiful picture the prophets have painted of this great day of the release of creation from the nature of the curse and the bondage of corruption!    No genius or artist, or wisdom of poet can ever convey the glory and beauty of this bright Day!  No matter where you live, you will awaken every morning to be greeted by a smiling sun that will shine through an atmosphere as pure as the very breath of heaven.  The army of germs and viruses will be neutralized by the very breath of heaven.  The curse and the sorrow that the curse brings will be removed.  Farmers will plow the soil with the knowledge that no tares will grow, and every troublesome weed will turn to a beautiful flower at the word of the sons of God.  With all curse lifted, the glories of Eden will be restored.   Glorious indeed will be the sight as you stand on the summit of the mountains and gaze across the fertile plains, vibrant with beauty, fertility and color.  Mankind shall no more eat bread by the sweat of his face.  Nor shall men any longer return to the dust of the earth, for all men shall freely eat of the tree of life which is the Spirit of Life in Christ Jesus.  All enmity and strife shall be removed.  All sorrows, trouble, sickness, pain, sin and death shall cease to exist.  The eyes of the blind will be opened, and the ears of the deaf shall be unstopped, literally and spiritually.

The Spirit of the Lord will draw all mankind to Himself, giving them eyes to see and ears to hear.  The stranger you meet in the city will be no stranger, for all men will know one another by the spirit and all will know the Lord, from the least to the greatest.  Waters shall break forth in the wilderness, and streams in the desert, both literally and spiritually — for the literal is but the sign and parable of the spiritual.  No nettle will sting the legs of the playing child, who in that glad day can play anywhere without danger from ferocious beast or reptile.  No mountain lion will ever again stalk the beautiful deer, for “the lion shall eat straw like the ox.”  No hunter will ever sight the muzzle of his gun.  The wild goose on his swift unerring flight will not have to fly at a dizzy height because of its fear of man.  No woman will be afraid on the street, no one will fear anyone or anything anywhere, for “they shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain (kingdom),” saith the Lord.  No hungry man will walk the icy streets, no sobbing mother or father, wife or husband, son or daughter will gaze into the casket at the ashen face of their beloved.  No aged saint will hover over her small stove to measure out her meager food — just enough to keep body and soul together until her body wears out and her heart gives up.  The heavens will no longer be as brass.  The presence of the Lord will be closer to us than the air we breathe, closer even than the blood coursing through our veins.  Before anyone shall call Him, the Lord will answer them.  And while they are yet speaking, He will respond to their plea.   The earth, without and within, shall be full of the glory of the Lord!

The whole of created life, according to Romans 8:19-21, will be delivered from the bondage of corruption.  This presents a very striking truth about God’s grace to the lower creations, including the animal and all other animate creatures, and to the whole system of things, who are also under the bondage of the curse, violent natures, fear, decay and death.  Against their own wish they were put into this bondage.  The thing that appeals to our sympathies at once is that the creation is spoken of as though conscious of this. It, too, is suffering as well as we.   And the man, woman or child who has felt oftentimes to the point of pain, the mute appealing look in the eye of some horse or dog as though asking for sympathy or help, or the melancholy braying of the burro in Mexico, will feel at once an answering within, to this marvelous promise of God.  The whole creation is joining with us in unutterable groans and birth pangs, earnestly looking forward to its release with ours, out into full free Life.   It is this exalted thought of the glory, that will come at the manifestation of the sons of God, that makes us so eager for the blessed Day of release!

Creation groans in every wisp of grass blown by the breeze,
In every stirring of the countless leaves upon the trees,
In every minor song of feathered fowl that rides the air,
In every blossom fading fast away just everywhere

Creation groans in every dog’s low whine and muted sound,
In every kitten’s tongue-tied plaintive mew the world around,
In every caged and bright plumed singing bird that chirps its plea —
Yea, all of these repeat creation’s groan to be set free.

Creation groans in jungle land and fen and desert dry,
In every mountain’s soaring rocky heights that pierce the sky,
In every rock that hides an insect’s nest beneath its weight,
In every grain of sand too numberless to estimate.

Creation groans — and echoes in our hearts its longings deep,
That YAH will manifest His own indeed, His promise keep;
For we are groaning, too, to be released, redeemed, set free,
That we in turn might grant creation’s hope — His liberty!

— CRYSTALIA

In this connection A. E. Knoch wrote, “The resurrection of the Son of God has a wider range of beneficence than we are accustomed to consider.  God’s glory demands that not only mankind who sinned and marred His glorious creation, but every part of that creation itself shall be restored to Him in more than pristine perfection.  Mankind has many characteristics in common with the lower creatures and is linked to them by the possession of a body...resulting in a living soul.  This is the reason why Jesus did not tell His disciples to go to every ‘nation’ or all ‘men’ but, using a word of special emphasis, He tells them to go into all the world and herald the evangel of His resurrection to the entire creation (every creature).   Man is not the only creature on the earth!   He is not the only one to be blessed by the resurrection.  The lower creatures have suffered with man in his plight.  They have come in for a share in the corruption and bondage and death which is his due, and theirs only because they were made subject to him.  Let us rejoice, then, that these who suffer on our account, they also shall obtain deliverance, by the same power which delivers our mortal bodies.  Paul tells us, further, that the creation has a premonition of God’s unveiling of His sons.”

The animal world will be transformed, their natures changed, and they will prey upon each other no more, for there shall be no more death.  Eventually in this restoration process God will touch even the plant life and infuse it with eternal, iridescent glory, for God will be All in all and all things shall be made new.  Even the inanimate creation shall have its share in the release from the bondage of corruption.  What science calls “the order of nature” is really her disorder; for all creatures feed upon other living things and all systems are slowing down, wearing out, and passing away.  Every star, sun, planet and moon is moving inexorably toward its day of dissolution.  Here also will be felt the renovating, transforming, spiritualizing power of God’s Christ!  If we can see this by the Spirit — nature itself, an unwilling slave to vanity and corruption, stands, impatient in her bonds, with uplifted head, scanning with longing eyes the distant point of the horizon from which she looks for help, her hand stretched out to grasp and welcome the redemption into freedom and perfection which she yearns for and confidently expects.   What a calling rests upon God’s firstfruits — to deliver the whole creation from the bondage of corruption and give them an entrance into the glory of the liberty of the sons of God!  Hallelujah!

GOD ALL IN ALL

“And when all things shall be subdued unto Him, then shall the Son also Himself be subject unto Him that put all things under Him, that God may be ALL IN ALL” (I Cor. 15:28).  GOD ALL IN ALL — this will be the grand conclusion of the great drama of universal history and of Christ’s redemption.  As someone has said,   there will come a day — the glory is such we can form no conception of it, the mystery is so deep we cannot realize it — when the Son shall deliver up the Kingdom that God gave Him and which He won with His own blood and established and perfected from the throne of His glory.  “He shall deliver up the Kingdom unto the Father...that God may be all in all.”  ALL IN ALL — such is the grand goal of our God!  He will yet be everything to every one of His creatures and all things will radiate the effulgence of His glory.   Nothing less will satisfy His heart for “He has created all things, and for His pleasure they are and were created” (Rev. 4:11).  Nothing less than this will vindicate His love, or form a fit conclusion for the sins and sorrow and death of the ages.  Let us with joy believe it!  Let us exult as we receive it!  Let us be “laborers together with God” to accomplish it!  May this simple phrase, that the smallest child can utter, become the very basis of our being, the root of all our faith, the strength of all our dreams, the background of every act, the key to every occurrence, a light in every darkness, a balm for every wound, and our ages-lasting consolation and good hope!

Let all who read these lines awake from the terrifying nightmare of Babylon’s delusions and let us wing our spirits to God’s glorious consummation!  Here is a vision worthy of the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ — GOD ALL IN ALL.  And now, this ultimate reality must begin in us who have this day received the call to sonship.  If this is what fills the heart of Christ; if this expresses the final end of the work of Christ, then, if I would have the Spirit of Christ within me, the motto of my life must be: Everything made subject and swallowed up in Him “that God may be all in all.”  What a life that will be when that truly becomes our hallmark!  To walk with the Father fully, to keep ourselves unto Him wholly, only, to have Him ALL IN ALL!   I am praying, believing, yielding, and pressing on “that God may be all in all.”  By this the day of glory is hastening!  Would that all the saints of God realized what a grand cause we are made participators in, that all had some conception of the scope and power  of the Kingdom we are walking in, and what a manifestation of God we are preparing for!

That God is not All in all at the present is quite obvious, for only a fraction have faintly felt that God was indeed ALL to them.  Some have known Him as their Saviour, some have experienced Him as their Healer, some have received gracious gifts from His hands, some have acknowledged Him as their Lord, but I am not certain that any have found Him as their ALL.  Some have tasted of the cup ineffable, which quenches every thirst, satisfies every hunger, meets every need, dispels all darkness, conquers every enemy, and destroys all death.  I, too, have only tasted, but I live for this and only for this — that God may be All in all.  I am living in Him, and as I move and have my being in Him I shall have a part in it all — the Kingdom delivered up to the Father, and God All in all!  I shall have a part in it and in adoring worship share the glory and blessedness with all creation.  Let us permit this to penetrate deeply into our hearts that it may rule our lives — this one thought, this one faith, this one aim, this one joy: GOD ALL IN ALL!

Everything in history is moving inexorably toward a day when Jesus will have conquered everything and everyone.  Like a mountain of dirt before a gigantic bulldozer steadily moving forward, all that can be conquered is being collected into the loving arms of Jesus, whose right it is to rule.  When Christ ascended on high after His resurrection, He led many captives out of the prison house and also set forth His great purpose: “Now He that ascended, what it is but that He also descended first into the lower parts of the earth?  He that descended is the same also that ascended up far above all heavens, THAT HE MIGHT FILL ALL THINGS” (Eph. 4:9-10).  The message is clear — redemption includes the complete transformation of the entire universe (all heavens) and all that is within it so that God in Christ shall FILL ALL THINGS.  There shall not be left one corner of this vast universe, nor one creature in it, where He shall not be Lord and King.  EVERYTHING EVERYWHERE SHALL BE RESTORED TO THE BEAUTIFUL HARMONY AND ORDER OF THE LOVE OF GOD.  Indeed, HE SHALL FILL ALL THINGS SO THAT GOD MAY BE ALL IN ALL!

All that God has ever done or ever will do, all that He has said or ever will say, will ultimately redound to His glory, that He may be “All in all” — and why not?   “In the beginning GOD...”  Everything else is because of God — God’s love, God’s wisdom, God’s purpose, God’s power, God’s righteousness.  And for all things to find their purpose, their reality and their end in Him is the final goal of salvation’s history.  It is an extraordinary thing, yet sublimely true, that the Lord Jesus gives us to understand that what He is doing on earth today and throughout the ages to come is only a beginning.  What He has given us is a root, and not yet a tree, a foundation, and not yet an edifice.  The Kingdom Seed must grow, the branches spread out, the blossoms appear, and the fruit be formed.  In the end the Kingdom of God will have filled all realms everywhere and God will be All in all!  And yet, this work first begins in man.  Those who are now being perfected in Christ are the firstfruits of this marvelous revelation of God All in all.   Truly HE is becoming ALL in us, as the poet has written:

Suddenly one day
The last ill shall fall away,
The last little beastliness that is in our blood
Shall drop from us as the sheath drops the bud,
And the great spirit of man shall struggle through
And spread great branches underneath the blue.
In any mirror, be it bright or dim,
Man will see God, staring back at him!

When God is finally All in all the Kingdom will have been delivered up to the Father.   By this is meant that there will no longer be any external rule of one person ruling over another, or one group ruling over the other — not even God’s Christ!  God Himself will then be everything to every one as one translation beautifully expresses it.   God Himself will so be the indwelling factor, principle, mind, nature, will and power of each life that there will be no need of anyone ruling, teaching, guiding or instructing anyone else.  It is evident that our God is reserving for that glorious consummation the greatest wonder of all time — GOD ALL IN ALL!  When God is all in me, what could you add?  When God has become all in you, what can I contribute?  God Himself will be everything we need within us!  God will be all to us, in us, through us, and as us.  Oh, the mystery of it!

The writer to the Hebrews spoke of it thus: “For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, saith the Lord: I will imprint my laws upon their minds, even upon their innermost thoughts and understanding, and engrave them upon their hearts, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people.  And it will nevermore be necessary for everyone to teach his neighbor and his fellow citizen or everyone his brother, saying, Know the Lord; for ALL WILL KNOW (perceive, have knowledge of, be acquainted by experience with) ME, from the smallest to the greatest of them” (Heb. 8:10-11, Amplified).  

In long ago Israel, before the people rejected God as their King and anointed a king of their own choosing, it is stated that “In those days there was no king in Israel; every man did that which was right in his own eyes.”  Now some view that state of things negatively, as though because there was no external authority, it was just one big free-for-all, everyone doing as they pleased!   But it seems to me that the state of things in Israel at that time, when the Lord Himself was King in their midst, should be the model for all who truly walk with God in the Spirit.  As we enter into the relationship of sons we discover the glory of being and doing everything exactly as we desire because we desire nothing but the Father’s glorification.  This must have been the awareness of Saint Augustine when he exhorted, “Love God and do what you please!”  When one is under the will of God by love, he is in dominion of all things.

At that same time in Israel a certain family set up a place of worship in their own home and there was much ignorance, superstition and abomination in their form of worship, until God sent a Levite to be their household priest.  Is that not a dramatic picture of the priesthood of God being raised up in our own house, in that living temple of God which we are?  Those who are the true worshippers  of the Father do not worship Him at certain times or in prescribed places, for they worship the Father in spirit and in truth.  The Father seeketh such to worship Him!  Worship is not something we go somewhere to do, rather, it is the living expression and manifestation of our devotion, love, and honor of our glorious Father within the Most Holy Place of our own spirit and reality.  When we have learned what it means to be a “true worshipper,” we will see that worship is not something we do, but it is what we are.  We ARE WORSHIPPERS!

During our journey into God there are varying degrees of growth, experience, fellowship, and relationship with the Lord.  “In a great house” like the Kingdom of God, “there are not only vessels of gold and of silver, but also of wood and of earth” (II Tim. 2:20).  The Kingdom is indeed a great house, in which are many vessels, varying in quality, capacity, purpose, rank and order.  Jesus said it this way, “Many shall come from the east and west, and shall sit down with Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, in the kingdom of heaven” (Mat. 8:11).  Paul stated this truth yet another way.  “For as the body is one, and hath many members, and all the members of that one body, being many, are but one body: so also is Christ.  For the body is not one member, but many.  If the foot shall say, Because I am not the hand, I am not of the body; is it therefore not of the body?  And if the ear shall say, Because I am not the eye, I am not of the body; is it therefore not of the body?  If the whole body were an eye, where were the hearing?  If the whole were hearing, where were the smelling?  But now hath God set the members everyone of them in the body, as it hath pleased Him” (I Cor. 12:12,14-18).

The scriptures and our own experience both give ample evidence that there are degrees in the spiritual race.  The fruit of God that men bear in their lives are, Jesus taught us, some thirty fold, some sixty fold, and some a hundred fold.  Paul spoke of those he had fed with milk because they were babes.  John wrote his epistle to three classes of believers: little children, who are the new born in Christ; young men, who are those who have grown up and become strong in many ways, but lack experience; and old men, who are the fully matured sons of God.  These are not permanent states, but merely stages of growth and development.  “Let patience have her perfect work, that ye be perfect and entire, lacking nothing” (Jas. 1:4).   “I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus” (Phil. 3:14).  We see the same variety of levels of attainment in the Old Testament economy.  Moses was above other prophets (Num. 12:5,8).  Only the tribe of Levi were priests.  The birthright was given to Ephraim and Mannaseh.  The scepter was given to the tribe of Judah.  David classified his mighty men according to their attainment (II Sam. 23).  All men shall be made alive in Christ, but “each in his own order or rank” (I Cor. 15:23).

More than half a century ago Seeley Kinne shared the vision given to a brother David Lee Floyd who wrote: “I stood upon a large stadium, that had been erected to face a large gradual sloping hill.  The hill sloped downward toward the stadium.  Thousands of Spirit-filled Christians were seated upon the hillside, and they faced the stadium.  They were grouped in many orders.  They were also in many shades of color.  I do not mean races or nationalities.  Some were very white, some very dark.  There were many varieties of shades between black and white.  These thousands of Spirit-filled believers were gathered and seated in their various ranks.  They were waiting for the Lord to give them the Last Great Message, for the preparation to set up the Kingdom of God among men.  I was seated in the stadium not knowing that I was going to do more than to just view the thousands of God’s people, seated in their various ranks upon the hillside.  I studied their faces.  I was fully aware that the Holy Spirit was opening my eyes and my understanding to discern the many ranks of His people.  As I have stated above, every group or rank was of a different shade or color.  The highest order was the whitest; and the lowest the darkest.  Everyone was in rank according to the light of God abiding within them.  This has nothing at all to do with their race or nationality.  Everyone was located according to their individual rank in the Spirit.  I was in deep meditation concerning their various degrees of experience.  The Spirit of the Lord began to  move upon me.  I was moved to raise up and say something.  I arose to my feet, opened my mouth, and the voice of the Lord began to pour forth like water, calling upon the people to repent...and prepare for the judgment of God that begins with His house.”

In the great house of our Father’s Kingdom there are different degrees of experience and various heights of attainment.  In the book of Revelation we see in the progressive unveiling of Jesus Christ within His people a number of different companies or levels to which men attain in Christ — there is one outstanding company called overcomers, or kings and priests, or the manchild, or the 144,000, or the sons of God; another called the woman, or the bride, or the New Jerusalem; another called the church, or the candlesticks, or the woman; and then the remnant, witnesses, martyrs, messengers, the great multitude, harpers, etc.  These are all a variety of redeemed people who walk with God in varying degrees of light and glory, different depths of intimacy, and diverse levels of calling and experience.  Some are very near to the heart of God, while others dwell and serve in the outer courts of His presence.   Some are queens, virgins and concubines; others are counselors, judges, priests and kings; some are soldiers and warriors of various ranks; still others are servants, guests, and courtiers.

I pray that the Holy Spirit will impress upon all who read these lines the great truth that the end of the matter is not any or all of these various companies and ranks.  These are merely the blueprint of our progression into God.   In that glorious end where God is All in all there are no companies or ranks.  In the end there is no Outer Court.  In the end there is no Holy Place.  In the end there is no Holiest of all.  At the conclusion of God’s great plan of the ages there is no Passover, Pentecost, or Tabernacles; no first Day, second Day or third Day.  In the great consummation of all things there are no servants, no bride,  and there are no sons.  In the end there is only GOD ALL IN ALL!  God All in all reveals the blessed fact that every creature will move through the progression from realm to realm.  All may not move in this Day, just as all have not moved in other Days, but God has a great, tremendous, glorious plan of the ages, and all creation will move forward!

 You see, my beloved, it’s just like a school — it is the great school of God!  The purpose of a school is not the school itself.  The purpose of a school is the progression through the grades so that you graduate.  Everybody who enters the school is supposed to graduate!  So we are not to glory that we are in the first grade, the seventh grade, or the twelfth grade.   We are not to cling to our status as a junior, sophomore, or senior.  It is wonderful to be a senior, but if you remain a senior you will never graduate!  To be senior is not the goal.  The beauty of all the grades is that each in turn accomplishes its purpose, bringing everyone to the same, final state of accomplishment and attainment.  Everyone receives their diploma and goes out into the world a finished product.  

That’s how it is in the Kingdom of God!  Today we view believers as being Nominal Christians, Catholics, Orthodox, Fundamentalists, Evangelicals, Charismatics, Pentecostals, Kingdom, Sonship or some other identification.  We equate their standing in God with whether they are in the Outer Court, the Holy Place, or the Most Holy Place — but those are merely pictures of their growth and development, their progression into God.  Each is just a temporary arrangement, a grade to pass through, and all creation will pass through the grades!   When every man who has ever lived, or ever shall live, has received his diploma and walks off the cosmic stage of spiritual graduation — God will be All in all!  There will be a sign posted on the door of the school of God’s great redemptive and restorative purposes — “Closed.”  When everybody graduates, you don’t need the school anymore!

Some of us have been in school for a long, long time and have moved through many levels of God’s teaching.  We have been passing from grade to grade, from realm to realm, from experience to experience, from discipline to discipline, from dimension to dimension in God.  We have moved through the Tabernacle with all of its furnishings and compartments.  We have partaken of the Lord’s Feasts one after another and He has now brought us to the Feast of Tabernacles.  We have arrived at the threshold of the Third Day.  We have stepped into the Most Holy Place.  He has ushered us into the throne room within the City which has the glory of God.  We have been passing through the grades, and all creation will pass through the same grades.  God has plenty of time.  His plan is the plan of the ages.  It began ages ago, and will extend ages into the future.  In one sense each of us is a microcosm within the macrocosm.  There are ages within us.  I lived a Pentecostal age, and it ended.  I lived out a Latter Rain age, and it ended.  I lived out an Anglo-Israel age, and that ended too.  I lived out an Apocalyptic age, and God took that heaven and rolled it up.  Every one of us has lived ages within ourselves, according to God’s plan of the ages.  All creation will come the same way, not necessarily with identical ages, but they will grow experientially into God from glory to glory, and God has plenty of time!  God has brought us from Abraham to the Manchild in our brief lifetime, for the ages are within us.

There is a beautiful truth wrapped in the arms of one single verse in I Corinthians 15:24.  “Then cometh the end, when He shall have delivered up the kingdom to God, even the Father; when He shall have put down all rule and all authority and power.”  The Amplified and a number of other translations make the import of these words clearer and more meaningful.  “After that comes the end, the completion, when He delivers over the kingdom to God the Father after rendering inoperative and abolishing every rule and every authority and power.”  The message is just this: When Christ delivers up the Kingdom to the Father so that God may be All in all, He will have put down and nullified and rendered inoperative ALL SOVEREIGNTY AND AUTHORITY AND POWER. 

All rule out of God’s sovereignty that has been delegated to subordinates, as administered by authorities and powers, be they kings, presidents, prime ministers, judges, policemen, apostles, prophets, pastors, priests, teachers, or any other — when God becomes All in all such rule becomes obsolete.  God will no longer rule anyone anywhere through those agencies, as He does through the ages, for He will rule by the authority of His divine nature and the mind of God in every man.  I know that these words seem to be incredible but they are the truth.  Christ and His holy sons continue to reign only until all other authority is swallowed up into the Allness of God in every heart.  When every enemy is subjected and all immaturity, carnality, self-will, self-hood, rebellion, sin and death is swallowed up of HIS LIFE, God will no longer need to govern through the medium of His saints.  The external rule of delegated authority will give way to the internal rule of the Spirit of Life.  His will, His word and His ways will be the motivating spirit within the renewed heart and mind of all His creation.  They will have found their All in Him!  School will be over, classes dismissed, the teachers relieved, and all men everywhere will have obtained their diploma of DIVINE LIFE!

All the sons of Adam shall one day become the sons of God; that was God’s purpose in creating man in the first place.  “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness.”  Those who complete their growth and development into the image of God now will be the firstborn sons of God.  Theirs will be the highest possible calling, bearing the greatest of all responsibilities, for upon them rests the ministry of shepherding the rest of creation into the Kingdom of God.   It is my conviction that in the ages to come there will be company after company after company graduating from God’s great School of Sonship — the second-born sons, the third-born sons, and so on.  What a beautiful plan and purpose!  What a glorious, breath-taking prospect!  What everlasting hope and joy!  This is THE INCREASE OF THE KINGDOM!

 


Chapter 59

QUALIFYING FOR

 KINGDOM DOMINION

“Let me help, Mommy!” cries little Mary to her busy Mom.  She then proceeds to mop the floor with streaks and messy wet and dry spots here and there.  Having finished, she eyes it with a satisfied sigh and says, “Didn’t I do good, Mommy?”  Her mother stands back and with a cheerful smile replies, “Yes, sweetheart, you did a wonderful job!”  Now, does that mother need Mary’s help to get her house clean?  Not really.  In fact, Mary’s childish efforts at “helping” actually create more work for her mother.  As soon as Mary is out of the house Mom will quickly re-mop that floor!  But she knows that Mary needs to learn how to do housework, and feel the importance of her contribution, because one day Mary will have her own house to clean!

The question follows Does our heavenly Father really need our puny help with the accomplishing of His great universal Kingdom work?  Not really, for He is self-sufficient, omnipresent, and omnipotent!  As such He is not dependent on man for the fulfillment of any of His plans or the accomplishment of any of His purposes.  But God has purposed within Himself to expand Himself in us as His very own sons and daughters, and bring us, upon our maturity, into HIS FAMILY BUSINESS.  God’s love for us is utterly pure and unselfish, and His plan for us is paternal, eternal and sovereign.  He bestows upon us the high honor of sharing His nature, life, wisdom, knowledge, glory, power and dominion.  Our work in God’s family business His great and eternal and inexhaustible Kingdom is our response to His love.  We are destined to rule all things for God and therefore we must learn how to rule!  Sometimes, along our journey to maturity, we may not do the job much better than little Mary, but our Father is patient and persistent and we will eventually grow up into Him in all things, praise His name!

If a young athlete wants to play major-league baseball, he usually has to play in the minors first.  Major-league teams raise their players in their minor-league farm teams.  Every year they hope to get a harvest that justifies what the minor-league teams cost them.  The Kingdom of Heaven is similar.  Jesus said that if we are faithful in little things, He will increase our responsibilities, and that if we use our gifts and resources for His purposes and only for His glory, He will give us more to use.  The reward for work well done is . . . well, more work!  God has great responsibilities just waiting to be entrusted to His sons.  His Kingdom has major-league openings to manage, judge, lead, supervise and rule to establish His Kingdom forever.  But whom will He put in those major-league slots?  Those who have been faithful in the farm leagues of the Kingdom!  God is, at this very moment grooming a body, a people, a company of kings and priests to bring the glory of the Kingdom of God upon earth and throughout the universe.  Men and women are being selected for this awesome responsibility from among all nations, cultures, races and tongues around the earth, and are being processed and prepared in their present walk with God.  We are in contact with thousands of people who are experiencing the special dealings of God for this Day!  The world as a whole is not cognizant of what God is doing, but this selection and preparation process is nonetheless well underway.

Have we, in our desire to reign with Him, forgotten that “if we suffer, we shall reign, and if we deny Him, He will deny us?”  Have we forgotten the words of Jesus, which He spoke, saying, “Ye that have followed me, in the regeneration when the Son of man shall sit in the throne of His glory, ye also shall sit upon twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel.”  Do we know what it means to follow Jesus?  Do we know what it means to drink His cup and be baptized with His baptism?  Are we truly followers with Him from the cross to the throne, or are we merely the throng that flock about Him seeking the blessings, the loaves and the fishes, and not brethren at all?

David, Christ’s kingly ancestor, is in this way himself a type of his Lord.  For chosen by God to succeed the lawfully appointed but rejected king (Saul), he was yet for many years allowed to be hunted and persecuted by the doomed monarch whom he was to follow.  During these wanderings over the mountains and wilds his faithful followers shared his hardships, and he and they together learned to endure and to fight; and thus when God’s time of preparation was over, and their training had been completed, David and his men were found equal to the great task of freeing God’s people from all bondage to their foes.  And, of course, those brave men who had shared their leader’s path, with its dangers and distresses, were rewarded with the chief positions of glory  in his kingdom. Surely all who read these lines can see the correctness of this, and can appreciate how worthwhile it finally proved to be to have shared their king’s rejection and persecution.  And thus in an intensified measure will it be in this Day of the Lord!  There is truly a price to be paid to walk with God in the new order of this new Kingdom Day that is now dawning, and there is great heavenly reward to those who pay that price!

A brother we have heard from through the years shared this illustration in one of his communications: It is as a great king of old who had two sons.  Twins they were.  The sons grew together. Soon they reached an age when much correction came.  The boys needed the rod and found it in full force for their errors.  One day both sons still felt the pain of the rod and their tears still flowed. There came by a young orphan about their age.  He said to them, “I am free to do what I want.  I am not as you who must endure the force of a father.  I can skip and play and do cartwheels in the streets.  I can beg, lie, steal, and sleep anywhere I please.  I have fun every day for I am under the king’s protection as one in his realm but I need not suffer as you with his corrections.  I am free!  Why do you not come with me and we can be free together?”

The boys made a decision that day.  The first said, “No, though I am hurting from my father’s rod, I would endure it every day for I will grow and inherit all that belongs to my father.  I will learn and follow him wherever he leads me.”  The other boy was sore tempted for the pain of correction and the harshness of restrictions laid upon him was so much to bear.  Soon he decided to follow the young orphan.  Oh, how they played for days and years!  They skipped and jumped and did cartwheels.  They lied and stole as they wanted.  They begged in the streets when it pleased them.  They rejected the call of the king to serve him in any way.  They only thought of their great fun and so chased after it.  The two children grew.  One learned of, and thus loved greatly, his father and his ways.  The other rejected the loving call to come back into the household.  The father let him go to do what he wanted.  He knew that a love that is forced upon another will only bring bondage and hatred.  Thus, for the will of the rebellious child, he left him to his fun.

The hour came to inherit the kingdom.  The first son received great honor.  All that his father had became his.  The other son wanted some of his father’s riches, too, for he also grew old and the pleasure of being an orphan left him.  Being of age, if he stole, he would go to prison.  Skipping and playing failed to please him anymore.  Begging got him little.  He wanted some of the kingdom too.  However, the judge of the kingdom deemed him unworthy of  even a morsel from the king’s table.  In like manner, God has many who want all that is His.  They say, “If it is of my Father’s, I want it!”  They want the mercy, the grace, the blessings, the benefits, the healings, the miracles, the experiences anything they can enjoy without coming under the disciplining hand of their Father.  Oh, they want to skip and jump and do cartwheels and shout and rejoice and prosper and get rich and use God’s blessings in any way they want, and to their own ends.  But they have no desire to learn God’s ways, to put on His mind, to be conformed to His image, to do His will and be involved in His purposes.  The churches today are filled with blessing seekers who follow the Lord for the loaves and the fishes, but have no heart for His corrections, to suffer with Him, to endure the cross, to die to all the carnality of the flesh and of the fleshly religious systems, in order to qualify to share His throne.  The way to sonship is not an easy way, and some find it a little too hard, and would rather choose an easier way.  This reminds me of the young aspiring musician  who said to an old master, “Can you tell me of an easy way to become a great musician?”  The old master just looked him in the eye and said, “Son, there is no easy way.”  And there is no easy way to sonship and the throne of God!  This is why God has chosen certain ones, who have the stamina to seek first and only His Kingdom, to endure, and persevere, submitting to His will and His dealings, come what may.

I will have you to know that the Lord, having saved the children of Israel out of Egypt, afterward destroyed them that believed not.  There is a teaching that God saves, and the devil destroys.  I do not believe that the devil can destroy anybody.  After having saved the people out of Egypt, GOD destroyed them, not the devil!  And the angels that kept not their first estate, GOD cast them down, not the devil.  When Ananias and Sapphira lied to the Holy Ghost, GOD slew them, not the devil.  I could go on and on.  The old idea is, you try to live for God and the devil is on your trail trying to drive you to hell.  But once God has called you and you belong to Him, whatever happens to you after that is from HIM, not the devil.  When Israel was in the wilderness, it was not the devil that sent fiery serpents.  The Bible says, “And YAHWEH sent fiery serpents among the people, and they bit the people; and much people of Israel died” (Num. 21:6).  God sent the plague that judged them.  So we need not be afraid of the devil, we need the fear of God, the reverence for the disciplines of our Father, in our hearts.  God is not out to kill people, for all of these things are examples written for our learning.  God is after the carnal nature, the religious foolishness, the selfhood of the Adamic mind He is out to slay the beast in us.  “Wherefore we receiving a kingdom that cannot be moved, let us have grace, whereby we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear: for our God is a consuming fire” (Heb. 12:28-29).  “For whom the Lord loveth He chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom He receiveth.  If ye endure chastening, God dealeth with you as with sons” (Heb. 12:6-7).

These are the days in which God is preparing a people to reign in the Kingdom of God over all things.  These will have to be those who are washed in the blood of the Lamb.  They will be those who have been filled with all the fullness of God.  They will be those who have learned to be led only and always by the Spirit.  They will be those who have kept His word and walked according to His will.  This company of people will be one with God in mind, heart, and purpose.  They will have put on the mind of Christ and their will shall have given way to His will in all things.  The people whom God shall use to reign over the nations and the universe, bringing God’s Kingdom to pass in all realms, will be a strong people.  They will be those who live in the presence of God and breathe in union with Jesus Christ.

Those who reign with Christ cannot be tossed to and fro by every wind of doctrine, nor deceived by every good sounding theory of man that poses as deep revelation.  They will not be moved by smooth-tongued orators or fast-talking deceivers.  They will perceive the hearts of men and understand the true nature of all things.  God is not interested so much in what is going on today within the church systems of men.  God does not want just anybody to go out and do miracles, signs and wonders.  He is preparing an incorruptible order of people to do these things on a level never seen before.  There are many miracles and good works done in the name of Jesus by men whom the Father has not sent.  God is very selective in this hour of those He chooses to manifest His power in the earth.  Not just anybody is suitable.  God trains and chooses in many ways.  Moses was in the backside of the desert for forty years.  David went through many years of battles and trials and testings to be eligible for the throne to which God elevated him.

In the natural realm you can get away with a lot of things.  You can break the law and get away with it.  You can go 50 miles an hour in a 30 mile an hour zone and probably not get caught. You can squander your bosses time on the job and cover it up.  But you cannot get away with anything in the Kingdom of God!  You can wallow in carnality, live in sin and partake of the harlot’s table in the carnal religious systems of man and still go to heaven when you die.  That is grace.  But one does not reign in the Kingdom by grace.  Oh no!  Paul said, “By grace are ye saved...”  He did not say, “By grace you will reign...”  Of a truth I tell you that God knows all of our thoughts, He knows every motive and intent of our heart, every root of bitterness and lurking power of sin, every hidden weakness, and those unexplored tendencies and propensities that, under the right conditions, would make us traitors like Judas.  He just knows everything!  The very hairs of our head are numbered and He knows all of our ways.

We are talking about the Kingdom of God, not about being saved by grace.  If you want a shack in the corner of glory-land, you can have it.  Grace will secure it.  But we are talking about the power and the glory of the Kingdom and those to whom it shall be given.  To be saved there is only one prerequisite Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved.”  But there are higher qualifications to rulership in the Kingdom!  We cannot come to God and say, “I am eligible because I have attended church every Sunday for many years; I have brought a certain number of souls to Christ; I am eligible because I have paid tithes and given offerings to support the work of the gospel; I have taught Sunday School and worked in the programs of the church.”  There are many reasons that we could come to God and try to pay our entrance into the Kingdom.  None of these will suffice.  Not even the fact that we have come out of Babylon and believe the truth about sonship, reconciliation, and the Kingdom of God.  What God wants is character the mind of Christ formed in us, the obedience, submission, love, purity and maturity of the life of Christ raised up in us as our very own reality, the image and likeness of God appearing in us, and the will of God done by us.  Nothing else will suffice!

God is shaping our lives with a view to the future.  What is happening to each son of God today has a bearing on what his role will be in the Kingdom of God throughout the ages to come.  Our present travail will be easier to bear when we understand this truth.  A crown prince cannot live like other people.  When the crown prince of Great Britain is born, he is a marked child from the day of his birth.  He is different from other children.  His education, his way of dress, what he is taught in the home, his associations, his activities, where he goes and when and how, his leisure time everything about his life is planned to prepare him to be a king.  The man or woman called to sonship cannot be like other people or other of God’s children any longer.  God has a special plan for this one!  The truth is that a son of God marches to a different tune than his contemporaries.  He hears the band playing the march of victory.  He stays in line with those enChristed ones  who march with him.  He keeps in step with his leader, Jesus Christ.  He marches to the music of the celestials.  He marches in the procession of Christ.  His music is the music of the Kingdom.  Because this is a different kind of marching from that of those in the church systems, he is often out of step with them.  They are not all marching to the same place!  Most Christians are marching to a place in the sky with golden streets, palm branches and harps, to sing and dance and play and frolic for eternity.  Sons do not have time for such frivolity, for they are marching to the throne of the universe, to a position of eminence, power, authority, responsibility, and eternal glory as lords and kings and priests and creators after the likeness of their eternal Father.  Their business is not dancing over the hillsides of glory, but bringing the Kingdom of God to pass throughout the infinity of God’s universe.

The great artist, Sir Joshua Reynolds, once painted a picture of Lord Holland, a prominent Englishman.  The artist asked a large sum for his work, which he had completed in only a few hours’ time.  Lord Holland said to him, “You get money very quickly.  It did not take you much time.  How long were you in painting this picture?”  Reynolds replied, “All of my life.”  The artist meant that the talents which had been developing all his life had entered into the picture and had made possible its production in a few hours.  And he was correct.  No great picture is painted in an hour.  Life is back of it.  And kings are not made in the day of their coronation.  Oh, no!  The willingness to submit to God’s dealings and the work of conformation into the image of God’s Christ is not reached in a moment.  It is the outcome of an upward process by which we are transformed from glory to glory into the likeness of God.  Kingship is the outcome of breakings, purgings, experience, growth, and development in the spirit throughout long months or years.  God gives us a lifetime to build the character of a king, and that is generally how long it takes.  It is the flowering out of the seed of Life which has been nurtured in our experience and testings day after day after day.  It is not attained by one grand leap into a spiritual experience.

A. E. Knoch put it so well when he wrote, “Those who endure shall reign with Christ for the eons (II Tim. 2:12).  It is a great pity to make this everlasting.  Eonian life will, indeed, never end, because death itself shall be abolished at the consummation.  Therefore it is unwise to overstress that the word eon does not denote endlessness in relation to our life in Christ, for it does involve it.  But reigning is a different matter.  All will be made alive eventually, but by its very nature, all cannot reign.  Some must be subject.  Reigning implies submission to intermediaries, and insubordination to God.  When the kingdom is handed over to the Father, God cannot be All in all so long as some of His creatures reign over others.  All rule, even that of Christ, shall cease when all authority is transferred into the hands of the Father.  Endurance now is the proper preparation for reigning with Christ in the future.  How different would rule be today if every officeholder had to undergo a thorough course of training in patient suffering!  A prominent medical specialist in Europe tried to express a similar thought when he said that every physician ought to be thrown out of the window before he should be allowed to practice on a patient.  He should know what suffering is, to deal with it sympathetically and successfully.  So it is with governing!  Only one who has felt the pains and penalties of mortality, and has endured the consequent suffering and shame, is fitted to rule.  Only such a one will reign so successfully that ruling will eventually be ruled out!”

Today God is preparing the nobility of His Kingdom.  Therefore, the qualifications are exceedingly stringent.  The constant challenges and testings of our pilgrimage in Christ are not for the purpose of earning our salvation, rather the challenges and testings are for the purpose of preparing us to reign with Christ.  The story is told of a certain bank in which there was a trust department in which four young men and one older man were employed.  It was decided by the directors that they would promote the older employee and also promote one of the younger men to have charge of the trust department after the older gentleman was removed to his new position.  After considering the merits of each of the men, a certain one of the four younger men was selected for the new position and a substantial increase in salary.  It was decided to notify him that afternoon at four o’clock.

At the noon hour the young man went to a cafeteria for lunch.  One of the directors was behind him in the line with several other customers in between them.  The director saw the young man select his food including a small piece of butter.  The butter he flipped on his plate and threw some food on top of it to hide it from the cashier.  In this way he lied to the cashier about what was on his plate.  That afternoon the directors met to notify the young man that they had intended giving him the promotion, but because of what had been seen in the cafeteria they must discharge him.  They felt that they could not have one who would lie and steal as head of their trust department.

It reminds me of when Lorain and I were in Egypt.  We took a cruise up the Nile to the Aswan Dam, visiting a number of ancient Egyptian temples along the way.  At these temples are great, huge, colossal granite, sculptured pieces of kings and queens and gods.  It was interesting to learn that these great sculptured pieces  were all mined from one super granite quarry.  The tremendous obelisks that the ancient Egyptians made were carved from one chunk of granite.  These huge obelisks were monuments to history.  They were placed at the entrance to a temple.  Often an obelisk was more than a hundred feet high.  Their sides were carved with hieroglyphs telling of the wonderful things their rulers had done.  We saw a number of them at the temples, but in past centuries the finest pieces were dispersed all over the world by nations that controlled Egypt.  There’s one in Saint Peter’s Square in Rome.  Others are in Paris, France, London, England, and in Central Park, in New York City.  But the best and biggest one of all still lies in the quarry up near Aswan.  They spent decades cutting it out, chiseling it, filing it, sanding it and there it lies.  It is fourteen feet square at the base.  We were able to walk all over it.  It’s 142 feet long.  And it’s still lying there.  Why?  Because just before they got ready to move it, the experts looked at it, and they saw what no one else could see flaws in the basic quality of that granite.  Flaws!  And because there were flaws, they wouldn’t move it.  They abandoned it!

Many students who enter college are required to take an entrance exam.  As with every test, the entrance exam is given to determine, and prove, those who qualify, and eliminate those who don’t.  Those who pass the test will remain and continue with their studies; those who fail are rejected.  Every test and trial has within it the element of elimination.  Those who do not stand and pass the test are eliminated not killed or tortured but cast off, excluded, rejected, prevented from entering in to the new realm.  That this possibility exists in the callings of God is clearly seen by the earnest exhortation of Paul when he writes to the saints at Corinth, “So run that ye may obtain.  And every man that striveth for the mastery is temperate in all things.  Now they do it to obtain a corruptible crown; but we an incorruptible.  I therefore so run, not as uncertainly; so fight I, not as one that beateth the air; but I keep my body under, and bring it into subjection; lest that by any means, when I have preached to others, I myself should be a castaway” (I Cor. 9:24-27).  The Revised Standard Version reads, “I do not run aimlessly, I do not box as one beating the air (a shadow boxer), but I pummel my body and subdue it, lest after preaching to others I myself should be disqualified.”  Paul realized that the thing that could disqualify him from the high calling of God was his old body with its desires, passions, and deceits  his flesh.  He fought against it, he pummeled it, he beat it down, as some translations say, not yielding to the desires of the flesh, but bringing his flesh man into subjection to the spirit, lest after a wonderful and successful preaching ministry setting forth the deep things of God, he himself would be cast away, rejected from the High Calling of God.  Being a preacher, even a great preacher, articulating the wonderful truths of manifest sonship and the Kingdom of God, is not sufficient to qualify one for sonship in the Kingdom or the priesthood after the order of Melchizedek.  And I can assure you that there are vast numbers of preachers who will be eliminated in that day; those who have not been able to pass the test!

Listen carefully to the wonderful provision God has made for those who love Him and seek His Kingdom  above all else.  “Who may abide the day of His coming? and who shall stand when He appeareth? for He is like a refiner’s fire, and like fuller’s soap: and He shall sit as a refiner and purifier of silver: and He shall purify the sons of Levi, and purge them as gold and silver...” (Mal. 3:2-3). In the refining and purifying process there is a purging taking place.  Purging is getting rid of unwanted and unnecessary material.  When Hitler came to power in Germany he instituted a purging of the government.  He cast out all of those not in favor of his agenda and whom he believed he could not trust to cooperate completely with him.  These were put out of office.  When a conspiracy to get rid of him was discovered there was another purge.  Those involved in the purge were not just relieved of their responsibilities, they were executed.  Under the communist government of the former Soviet Union there was a purge of the high officials every time there was a change of leadership.  Many were demoted  to a lesser office, some were retired altogether, while others were promoted to higher positions and power.  This is what is called a purge.

The Lord, when He comes to His temple of living stones and purges the sons of Levi, or His kingly priesthood, He first of all purges out one man old Adam!  He comes to cleanse us from the carnal, Adamic mind, nature, and ways.  He comes as a consuming fire to burn out of us all that is contrary to the righteousness and wisdom and purposes of the Lord.  He is coming to each one of us in the new Day of the Lord and is executing the old man of sin in us.  But on a corporate level He is also coming to those who have received the call to sonship and is separating out all who talk the Kingdom but do not walk the Kingdom.  Only the ones who have completely surrendered to His will, and have walked in His ways, and have obeyed each sound of His voice, who have clean hands and pure hearts, will remain to reign with Him.  How can anyone be put in a place of authority and power in the Kingdom who has not come to the place of complete SUBORDINATION TO THE KING? He will purge the sons of Levi, the kings and priests of His Kingdom, disqualifying those He cannot trust to do His will and cooperate completely in the administration of His Kingdom.  The ways of Babylon and all the soul-possessing demands of the insipid church systems must be purged, the attributes of the carnal mind must be cleansed, all self-hood must be purified, and all desire to make a name for ourselves and to gather men to ourselves rather than to Christ must be purified.  The ones who will abide the day of His coming and stand when He appeareth are those He is refining and purifying now.

 “Kings and priests” are not honorary titles conferred on us because we have believed on Jesus, had our sins forgiven, and made it to heaven.  Rather, these are positions of responsibility ,authority and power.  Kings and priests of God must be trained with far, far more rigor than are subjects of the Kingdom who bear little responsibility.  They must also be trained and equipped more thoroughly than the church age ministries which are in part and last only until the Perfect Man is formed.  The sons of God partake of a more excellent ministry and bring in a better age!  The Kingdom of God is God in His Christ ruling over all things, performing the will of God on earth as it is in heaven.  Obviously a great transformation must take place in our personality if we are to meet the standards for ministry at this high level!

This is a day of instant things.  In the fast-paced, fast food society, we are used to having things as we want them, when we want them.  Everything is instant.  We can walk into a room and get instant light, heat, and air conditioning by flipping a switch.  We get up in the morning and drink instant coffee, eat instant oatmeal, instant soup, instant mashed potatoes, and instant other things too numerous to name.  If it isn’t instant, then we turn on the microwave.  All too often we also expect instant results in our spiritual life instant perfection, instant power, instant maturity, instant sonship!  But, dear one in Christ, God doesn’t believe in shortcuts!  Haste in the high and holy things of the Kingdom of God is freighted with grave danger.  As someone has pointed out, when the almighty Creator plants a redwood tree in the womb of mother earth, He is looking forward in infinite wisdom and patience perhaps five thousand years to a day when it is a towering monarch of the forest.  Think it not strange, then, that He would spend the entire span of a man’s brief life-time in bringing to perfection a saint who is to rule the world as a son of God, bringing life and order out of the dreadful death and chaos that everywhere reigns upon earth.  The wonder is that it does not take much longer!  Let us, therefore, not be weary in well doing, for in due season we shall reap if we faint not.

I am deeply impressed with the words of George Hawtin penned some years ago in his paper THE PAGE.  “God increases our faith through patience.  At first what faith you had was void of patience.  It wanted to see creation leap in response to its impatient demands.  The sick must be healed right now.  The world must be converted right now.  You must get rid of carnality and become perfect now, of course; but as years went by and things continued much as they were before you tried to set the world on fire, you began very slowly to see that God is not enthused about impatient faith; you came to see that faith and patience are inseparable and methinks someday you will see that patience is faith.  We have heard a great deal about faith, much of it springing from the desire of the carnal mind.  Little indeed have we heard of patience without which there can be no real and lasting faith.

“Harvests do not come without patience and waiting.  Vainly we have tried to squeeze God into our mold of haste and hurry.  We have cried, wept, and teased like spoiled children in an endeavor to get our way and hurry God in His program.  We have demanded of God and tried to command Him.  We have quoted scriptures to try and bolster our position but all in vain.  To learn faith in patience is much more important than for us to have our own way about things.  In Hebrews 10:35-37 the apostle wrote, ‘Cast not away therefore your confidence which hath great recompense of reward.  For YE HAVE NEED OF PATIENCE that after ye have done the will of God, ye might receive the promise’”    end quote.

Ah, beloved, does it seem that you shall never overcome the flesh, the world, and the devil; that you shall never live the abundant life, never arrive at perfection or attain unto maturity of sonship?  Be encouraged, dear ones, for our gracious heavenly Father dropped a word into my heart in such an hour of foreboding when progress seemed so slow in my spiritual life that it appeared I was going backward instead of forward.  His voice fell in quickening illumination upon my attentive ear with this beautiful word of wisdom: “My son, look back upon your walk five years...ten years...twenty years...how were you then?  Have you changed at all?  Have you grown some?  Have you learned lessons and gained victories?  Are you in any measure wiser, stronger, more enlightened, experienced, and triumphant?  Do you know me in a deeper way than you did at the beginning?  Have you made some progress?  Can you see how much different is your life today in the deepest recesses of being than it was before?  Ah, my son, if all this has been wrought by my hand in your life within the span of these years, can you not now trust me to finish and perfect that good work which I have begun in you?  Do you not know that I am silently but faithfully working in you this very day to conform you to the image of my Son?”

Sons of God!  Do not spend your days fretting about whether you are making progress.  There is nothing in the world that grows so fast that you can see it grow!  My eight grandchildren are growing every day of their lives, but I cannot see them grow.  Tomorrow they will be taller, stronger, and wiser than today but I will be unable to discern it.  Let God be the judge of  how much or how little you have grown.  Your duty and mine is to press relentlessly onward heedless of circumstances or conditions, but pressing patiently toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.  Few of us look in the mirror and come to the conclusion of Hall of Fame quarterback Joe Namath.  During his heyday as a player, Namath wrote a book titled I Can’t Wait Until Tomorrow ... ‘Cause I Get Better-Looking Every Day.  As egotistical as that title sounds, it can help us see how we as sons of God being conformed to the image of Jesus Christ should view ourselves in the lifelong process of becoming like Him.  Scripture tells us that to become more like Christ, we need to keep getting better every day!

I will tell you a great secret.  I read a story about a wonderful violinist who traveled to Houston to give a concert.  He had recently spent thousands of dollars on a Stradivarius violin.  Naturally all the news media carried stories about this wonderful opportunity to hear the fabulous music that such an exquisite violin would produce.  The local newspapers ran photographs of the Stradivarius and published articles about its history and marvelous tonal quality.  Few words were printed about the violinist himself.  Most of the praise went to the violin.  On the night of the concert, the hall was packed.  The crowd was thrilled with every note and the auditorium filled with wave after wave of tremendous applause.  The concert ended with a prolonged standing ovation.

But then the violinist did something quite shocking!  He took his violin, that beautiful instrument that had been the source of such wonderful music, and lifted it over his head.  After the crowd rose to its feet in adulation, he brought the instrument down hard across his knee.  Its back was broken and the strings hung loose.  Now it was completely worthless.  A gasp of horror went through the auditorium as people wondered if the violinist had lost his mind.  But he raised his hand to quiet the murmuring and said, “This is not a Stradivarius!  I went down to the pawn shop and bought this violin for ninety-five dollars.”  The message is clear it wasn’t the quality of the instrument that produced those beautiful, soul-stirring sounds.  It was the quality of the person playing that instrument!  And today, in our present state of spiritual growth and development, some of us may feel like ninety-five dollar pawn shop violins along side the famous Stradivarius Jesus, the firstborn Son of God!  But the reality is that it doesn’t matter whether you’re as gifted, accomplished, fluent, knowledgeable, wise and externally holy and spiritual as other saints.  If your life is committed into the Father’s hands, then you too, can produce the most beautiful music imaginable.  The key is to get your focus away from yourself and on to the Great Musician God Himself. Right where you are, let God begin to “play” you!

A dear friend of ours in the city of Detroit shared this meaningful experience with us some years ago following a message I brought along this line.  She said, “I will never forget my first day in school in a rural community in the South.  I arrived alone, but refused to go inside.  I didn’t think that I would enjoy school, and was quite certain that I didn’t need an education.  In my childish mind I made a firm decision not to go to school at all.  Quickly I passed by and went straight to my grandmother’s home.  Grandmother, surprised at seeing me, asked, ‘Why, Veta, what are you doing here? Didn’t school start today?’  I actually felt that I was in command and could carry out my plans, so I replied with finality, ‘I have decided not to go to school!’

 “Grandmother was a wise old woman, and appeared to respect my decision.  She didn’t scold, but sadly said, ‘I’m so sorry to hear that, Veta.  I’m really disappointed that you aren’t going to school.  You see, grandmother needs someone to write letters for her, and I had hoped that you would go to school and learn to write.  I thought you would be the one to write the letters for me.’  I loved my grandmother very much, and her words impacted my childish mind.  I changed my mind, deciding to go to school just long enough to learn how to write.  I left grandmother’s, made my way back down the road to school, arriving late, of course, and walked in with my hat and coat on for I was certain that I would be there for only a short time.  The teacher was very understanding and quite gentle with me.  Later, I found myself at the blackboard, chalk in hand, the teacher’s hand upon mine, showing me how to make the number 2 along with the letters of the alphabet.  After some minutes I asked the teacher when would we get on with the writing.  Suddenly the whole prospect loomed menacingly before my mind and irritatedly I inwardly shouted, ‘If we don’t go faster than this, I’m going to be here ALL DAY!’  And I was, of course!  I went back to school the next day, and the next, and the next for many years to come!  I became a star student, and a joy to my grandmother.”

So God, omniscient and omnipotent, has established here upon earth a School for the training of those destined to be the future rulers of the universe.  This School is known as “the church, the body of Christ.”  None shall ever rule as King-Priests after the order of Melchizedek who have not graduated from this School!  And what a great Teacher we have!  One begins in God’s School of Kingship and Priesthood in the first grade.  You start with the ABC’s.  God opens the class and says, “Now children, we are going to learn how to rule.  To rule means to govern, to control, to be master over that which is ruled.  You can never rule anything until first you overcome it within yourself.  To ‘overcome’ means to COME UP OVER THAT WHICH IS OVER YOU.  When, within yourself, you rise above the circumstance, the problem, the obstacle, the weakness, the temptation, so that it no longer controls you, you are then ready to control it, no longer to be the victim of circumstances, but the master of them.”  That is the first lesson, the first step in becoming a King!  And so, in the nitty-gritty of everyday life God teaches us how to overcome, how to reign, how to bless, how to love, how to have compassion, how to be a King and a Priest in His Kingdom.

The promises of God are vast and varied.  Some of them, like forgiveness of sins and healing, are free and unconditional and may be obtained very easily.  That is why so many receive them! But if you would be a King-Priest and receive the power to rule over, bless, and deliver creation, if you would learn the life, authority, and government of God to reign in His Kingdom, then that is a different matter altogether!  You must become a follower of them who through faith and patience inherit the promises.  It takes patience to attain any worthy goal.  It takes endurance too.  No man having put his hand to the plow and looking back is fit for the Kingdom of Heaven.  Even in this hour some do look back to the former orders of the church age that God has brought them through, and clinging to a lesser realm disqualify themselves for God’s fullness.  We do not attain sonship by a single bound.  Neither do we qualify for Kingship and Priesthood in a moment of time.  It is not an experience we can receive one night at the altar.  It cannot be conferred on us by the laying on of hands.  We cannot claim it and seize it today by faith.  We have need of patience.  We must through faith and patience grow up unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of the Christ.  We must become mature, spiritually skilled ones through experience.  Only such can serve as Kings and Priests of the Most High God!

The following historical sketch came across my desk.  It was the time of the French Revolution.  They beheaded the king and then the queen.  The crown prince was left orphaned.  Somebody said, “Behead the little prince.”  But then the devilish suggestion was made, “Don’t behead him; you’ll only send his soul to Heaven; that’s too good for royalty!  I say turn him over to Old Meg; she’ll teach him the vile, filthy words and ways of the street.  Then he’ll end up going to hell.”  So, as the story goes, he was turned over to this wicked woman of the streets, who tried to get him to repeat these ugly, profane words and commit vile, filthy acts.  But, he would stamp his feet, clench his fists, and his little golden curls would shake on his velvet shoulders, and he would say, “I will not say it; I will not do it; I was born to be a king, and I will not do it!”  I say to every person reading these lines today, you were born to be a prince, you were born to be a king with Christ upon His throne and His Father’s throne, and therefore you will be an overcomer!

Ern Baxter, who worked and ministered with William Branham and the great healing revivals of the late 1940’s and the 1950’s was once asked to share how he later faced the change in his relationship with William Branham and the whole healing movement.  He said, “In the ministry with William Branham, I saw a dimension of the supernatural that had in it such seeds of spiritual unity and other good fruits that my excitement was hard to contain.  But when I saw carnality start to invade the movement exaggeration, misrepresentation, metaphysics, and eventually the breakdown of many of the healers in critical areas of their lives because they couldn’t handle the crowds, the popularity, or the money I had to withdraw from it.  That was one of the most traumatic times in my life.  I did a lot of praying at that time, a lot of groaning.  In fact, I did a lot of screaming because I was close to an emotional breakdown.  A tremendous move of God had been sold out so cheaply; it was difficult to handle.  If I hadn’t had an experience with God, if I hadn’t had a consciousness of His sovereignty, if I hadn’t had some kind of a relationship with God based on process, I don’t know what I would have done.  I had maintained the pastoral oversight of a church while working with Branham, and I went back and gave myself totally to that.  I was now ministering in a church, where before I had been with thousands of people in city-shaking meetings.  It was quite a shock.  I would go to my study, get down on the floor, and just groan.  I’d talk to God, and just wait.  I couldn’t do anything else.  If it were not for my relationship with God, my knowing God, I could have taken the extreme position that Christianity was all just a ‘bunch of bunk.’  But I couldn’t do that, because it wasn’t a matter of Christianity; it wasn’t a matter of the healers; it was a matter of who was the most important person in this, and that was GOD.  God wasn’t bunk to me.  I knew that.  I knew God, and I knew where God was.”

Ah, yes, my beloved, many have failed in the in-part realm and have been disqualified and fallen by the wayside, leaving heartbreak, tragedy, and disaster in the body of Christ.  Of a certainty I know that it shall not be thus in the King-Priest ministry of the manifested sons of God!  Those who come with the Christ making war, subduing the nations unto God, restoring all things and delivering creation from the bondage of corruption shall themselves be incorruptible, having been called, and chosen, and faithful, tested in the wilderness, tried in the fire, proven under pressure, purged, refined, purified, molded and fashioned into the very nature and character of Christ.  These shall reign with Christ over all things because they have first reigned with Him within themselves!

As I have pointed out many times before, the journey to the throne of the universe begins in that small  and undistinguished place where you are.  The Kingdom of God is within you.  The enChristed who are to reign with Christ from sea to sea, then from planet to planet, and finally from universe to universe, are being prepared.  Think not in your heart, precious friend of mine, that you may pass your life here careless, indifferent to the dealings of God, suddenly to awake one fine morning to find yourself sitting with Christ governing the galaxies, because such a thing will not be. Begin today to prepare for the kingship!  This present time is but a proving ground for those who through grace will reign with their Lord over the endless vastnesses of infinity.  He is raising us up to sit with Him in the higher than heavenlies.  And the place which He is preparing for each one is not only a world to come, and a Kingdom of Life and Light, but a place IN HIM, bone of His bone, flesh of His flesh, spirit of His spirit, mind of His mind, nature of His nature, wisdom of His wisdom, power of His power, authority of His authority, and life of His life!

Years ago an IBM junior executive made a mistake that cost the company several million dollars.  IBM’s founder, Thomas J. Watson Sr., summoned him into his office.  Assuming the worst, the sullied young executive said, “I guess you want my resignation?”  Mr. Watson replied, “You can’t be serious.  We’ve just spent millions of dollars educating you!”  God is the founder of the most important enterprise of all the Kingdom of God.  God is now in the process of hiring, educating and developing His management team.  He is training us to become powerful rulers in that Kingdom in the day when He initiates the next phase of the Kingdom of Heaven on earth.  How much has God already invested in your training and education?  God has made a supreme investment in us through the sacrifice of Jesus Christ.  Without that price none of us could even enter into the Kingdom of God, much less attain the high-ranking positions God has waiting for those who overcome who graduate from His school.  But God doesn’t stop there.  He invests in us daily through His guidance and processings, and through the continuous gracious outpourings and deep and vital dealings of His Spirit.  God is at work in us!

In a very real sense, God owns us.  The apostle Paul reminds us, “For ye were bought at a price; therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God’s” (I Cor. 6:20).  The great King of this Kingdom expects to see a profit for all of His time, effort, and sacrifice.  God, of course, is not interested in making money.  He already owns everything.  God is in the business of developing His family sons with character.  If those of us who are called now succeed in qualifying for positions of rulership, we will in turn be able to help millions of others become citizens of the Kingdom.  To put it in business terms, our future profit to the Kingdom of God will more than make up for our present losses if we stay with the organization and apply the new lessons!  Saints, like the junior executive at IBM, are capable of making costly mistakes.  Have you ever felt that God has given up on you?  Do you feel like you are wasting His time?  Sometimes our mistakes are very costly to us, too!  Have you ever felt that the cost is too high, and that you are wasting your time?  Let’s see what God says: “Being confident of this very thing, that He who has begun a good work in you will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ” (Phil. 1:6).

God will never give up on us!  He is investing in us with every intention of making a profit and expanding His Kingdom.  Our all-wise Father sees our potential.  He knows our capacity to grow and develop.  He is keener at discerning it than we are.  He is also well aware of our weakness, and is ready to help.  “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me,” said Paul.  The children of God make a lot of mistakes, for children are children.  Our ability to learn from our mistakes is part of what God uses to build character in us.  In the book of Revelation, we read that it is the overcomers those who don’t leave God’s school or resign from His calling who ultimately are given power in His Kingdom.  “And behold, I am coming quickly, and my reward is with me, to give every one according to his work” (Rev. 22:12).  “For everyone to whom much is given, from him much will be required; and to whom much has been committed, of him they will ask the more” (Lk. 12:48).  Have you made costly mistakes?  Have you been stumbling and seemingly wasting God’s time?  Don’t resign!  Don’t drop out of God’s school!  His investment in you is too great!  He will see you through!  Graduation day is coming!  The positions in His authority and glory are waiting!  Learn the lessons that will help you to better serve in the Kingdom of God.  If you do, great heavenly wealth and power and opportunity lie ahead for you in the age and in the ages to come.  Through you creation will be lifted, redeemed, restored to life and liberty and glory and that’s where the real profit begins!

Let us learn our lessons well and let us never presume that we have attained to something in God that we have not yet qualified for.  And let us never grasp after a place or position the Father has not conferred upon us.  There is no need to DECLARE OUR SONSHIP the Father Himself declares His sons.  “This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.  This is my Son, hear ye Him.”  Some today have grown weary of waiting for the manifestation God has promised, so they have “watered down” the hope and settled for a lesser reality, declaring themselves sons of the Kingdom on a lower plane than God has called us to.  Some have settled for a “revival” realm, or a “New Testament Church” realm and now speak disparagingly of what they term “classical sonship.” These impetuous souls just can’t wait for the Father’s appointed time.  The place that God has called us to will be in His time, not ours.  “The heir, as long as he is a child, differeth nothing from a servant, though he be lord of all; but is under tutors and governors until the time appointed of the Father” (Gal. 4:1-2).  The story is told of a fifteen year old boy who stole his father’s car keys.  The father’s plan was to give the keys to his son a year later.  The boy, however, thought that he had all the attributes necessary to drive the car.  The father knew better; he understood the law, insurance liability, driving skills, and such like.  As a result, the court would not let the boy drive a car until he became twenty-one.  Let us earnestly seek wisdom from above to avoid such a costly error of SELF-MANIFESTATION!

Brother Bob Torango wrote the following powerful exhortation some years ago, and it is still as pertinent today as when he penned it.  “Are we ready now for the greater things of this word and walk?  I pray so.  If not, you can be sure of one thing, the Lord will be faithful to hide them from us until such a time as they will be a blessing in our life and not a curse.  I believe it to be vital that we leave the rudimentary basics of this word and shove away from the shore to the deepness of the waters.  We have only dealt with the surface things thus far.  We have striven to be happier than we were yesterday, more prosperous than we were last year, try not to cuss so much and love our families like we should.  Excuse me for being so blunt, but shouldn’t we be doing these things by now?  I may be wrong, but it seems to me there are too many people connected with this revelation that are constantly having to attend self-help meetings and seminars on ‘How To Keep Your Marriage’ and ‘Have You Talked To Your Kids Today?’  Those are First and Second Day problems.  Surely somebody is ready to venture into the things beyond the keeping of the basic rules necessary to live in a civilized world.  The ten commandments should suffice to keep us from killing each other!  If we can’t even love our own mate or friends, how in the world can we expect to come into a word that says we must love our enemies?  We need to be EMPOWERED!

“I hear from the community of Kingdom folk how much revelation we have, and we are in the Third Day, and we have arrived into the Holiest of all, and just any moment now we are going to walk on water and glow in the dark.  But look around you!  Ministry are still playing a game of politics and preying on feeble-minded people, and the body of Christ can’t even forgive one another of wrongs or say an apology if they have wronged someone else.  There has to be a people that is ready to go on into the things that God has prepared for this new dimension of ministry regardless of whether their friends are ready to go or not.  We’ll just have to pick them up on the next go around visit them in the next visitation and leave them our forwarding address.  We must go on!  If we stay here we will die.  The only hope for those who refuse to pay the price of this next transition is for you to leave them in the hands of the First and Second Day ministries and go through the door and believe that God will send you back to them at another time.”

Everything that is worthy and valuable is filled with labor, and the road to it always lies through the mountains of difficulty and the valleys of testing, never through the plains of ease.  Dearly beloved, let us give diligence to make our calling and election sure.  Let us strive to enter the straight gate.  Let us run that we may receive the prize.  Let us fight, not as those who beat the air.  Let us press toward the mark and never flinch under stress or the pain.  Let us not be mere religious wind bags who make great claims of revelation and attainment but do not live up to them.  A religious windbag claims intimate knowledge of God, but his behavior shows no signs of such knowledge.  He claims to walk with God and to know  the ways of God, but such a relationship has little affect on the way he treats his wife and children.  He is like the farmer in the fairy tale who brags that his daughter can spin straw into gold but, of course, that is all talk.  His poor daughter is forced to try and live up to her father’s lie, but she never can.  Our claims to sonship must not be empty.  If we want to be sure we have this Life, our expression of nature and character must be like Jesus.  Love describes Jesus!  Love was made perfect in Him, and it must be in us, too.   

A dear brother pointed out that there was a time in our childhood when we played “grown-ups.”  He added, “I see in my spirit that there are children who are merely playing ‘sons.’  They appear to be sons, they speak like, and they act like, yet there is more pretending than being.  They still cling to worldly joys, to family ties, and to the old ways and customs of Babylon.  My dear brethren, this is not a voice of condemnation, for there is no condemnation to them that are in Christ, it is a voice of discernment, a voice of love, tenderly admonishing the precious jewels of the Father to abandon all, and to enter into the dawning of the Day of the Lord, that He might manifest Himself in us, as He prepares to manifest us to each other and then to the word.”  God grant it!

 


Chapter 60

QUALIFYING FOR

 KINGDOM DOMINION

(continued)

To Jesus, the firstborn Son of God, the Kingdom of God was the most precious thing in the universe and possessing the reality of it was of all things most valuable.  Repeatedly He made it clear that the Kingdom had a worth which was above all earthly things and standards.   He admonished, “Seek ye first the kingdom of God.”  He said, “If your eye causes you to miss the mark, pluck it out; it is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye than with two eyes to be swallowed up of death.”    He spoke many parables about the value of the Kingdom.  He said that once there was a man who was digging in a field; as he dug his spade struck across a buried treasure   It was the law of Israel that such finds might be kept by the finder; and so the man went away and sold every single thing that he possessed in order that he might buy the field and so possess the treasure.  He said that once there was a merchant man who had spent his whole life searching for lovely pearls. At last he found a pearl which was the most perfect and beautiful pearl he had ever seen; so, when he found it, he went and sold out his whole stock and everything he had in order to buy the one precious pearl. It is that way, said Jesus, that a man must be about the Kingdom! To inherit the power and the glory of the Kingdom is worth everything that a man possesses and all that a man is; and if anything hinders a man from inheriting it, even if that thing is the dearest thing on earth, it must be rooted out and thrown away.

Only the spiritually ambitious man will lay hold upon the Kingdom of God. Note — I do not say merely “ambitious,” but  spiritually  ambitious. To be spiritually ambitious is to earnestly desire God’s best—  in His way and time, according to His purpose, and always and only for His glory. It means to seek first the Kingdom of God in all things.  It means to love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, mind, soul and strength.  It means to come only to do the will of the Father, and to do only what we see the Father doing.  To be spiritually ambitious is the very spirit of sonship! There is a place for ambitious men in the Kingdom of God.  Jesus said, “Whosoever of you will be the chiefest, shall be servant of all.”  He did not turn the man away from the ambition to be great.  He simply told him how greatness can be achieved —become the servant of all!  And then there are degrees of this greatness.  If you want to be great, be “the servant of all.”  If you want to be first, be “the bond-slave of all.”  The servant and the bond-slave represent degrees of self-giving, and they, in turn, represent degrees of greatness attained, namely “great” and “first.”  Beyond that is a level to which Jesus Himself had attained.  “The Son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give His life a ransom for many.”  In other words, since He went deeper than being servant of all, or a bond-slave of all, in that He gave His very life, so He becomes the Son of man, which is more than being great, or first, among a group — it is the acme of being!  So the door is open for ambition.  You may be least, or less, or great, or greater, or greatest, or first, or one like unto the Son of man!

Yet, it does not mean that we give in order to get — that is not the Kingdom of God at all!  We do not put on humility and serve others with the motive of becoming great, attaining to exalted positions of power and honor.  If we are serving to gain advantage, to receive a position of authority over others, for the sake of authority, then our motive is all wrong — yet carnal, earthly, sensual and devilish.  That is not how the Kingdom works!  We do not serve to be made great — we serve because we are great with God’s greatness.  This is not a position of exercising power over others but of serving them.  Serving is the power and the greatness.  The motivation of our desires must be the same as that of the Captain of our salvation.  Filled with the great love of God, the desire to attain to this position is to give ourselves in sacrifice and service for the deliverance and restoration of the rest of God’s creatures.  Having attained to this deliverance from the bondage of corruption as the firstfruits of the creation, our only desire will be to labor together with the Lord in the deliverance of the rest of His creation, to lift them up to the same level of life as He has lifted us.  The heart of God, the heart of unconditional and unlimited love and all goodness, is the greatest heart in the universe.  It is not serving that makes us great, it is true divine greatness that causes us to serve!  Oh, the mystery of it!

Let us see how beautifully Jesus taught this by His own example.   Everything is prepared and set in order for the last supper, to the very water to wash the feet of the guests, as their custom was.   Christ and His disciples gather in the upper room to eat and fellowship together on this solemn night.  Each one waits for the other, for there is no servant available to perform the customary service of washing the guest’s feet.  Washing feet was one of the basest tasks in the culture of Jesus’ day.  It was a job usually done by a house slave.  Just as we offer a visitor hospitality, so in Jesus’ time they customarily washed a visitor’s feet.  Washing feet was an undesirable responsibility: the roads were dusty well enough.  But the filth of the road was more than dust.  The transportation of that day was the camel, the donkey, the horse and the mule.  It takes little imagination to understand that the streets and roads were littered with their manure.  The traveler's feet would be covered with this as well as being caked with dust.  The washing of feet was assigned to the lowliest slave because it meant handling the filth of the streets.  This job was thought to be below the dignity of the “good man of the house.”

Not one of the twelve thinks of humbling himself to do the job, for, are they not the honored ones, the disciples of the very Son of God, the flaming evangelists of the Kingdom, the future rulers of the world!  Even at the table they were full of the thought — who should be greatest in the Kingdom that was then beginning to dawn.  Suddenly, unexpectedly Jesus stood up from the table, and began to take off His inner layer of garments until He was stripped to the waist, wearing only His loincloth.   He then took a large towel and wrapped it around Himself, poured water into a large brass basin, and, beginning with one of the men at the end of the table, laid heavy emphasis upon His words of a few moments before, “I am in the midst of you as one that serves.”  Oh, the wonder of it! on which angels gazed with adoring wonder. Christ, the Creator and King of the universe, at whose word all worlds and galaxies flooded the infinity of space, who might with one word have compelled any man or legions of angels to do His bidding, Himself chose the slave’s place as His own, taking the soiled, filthy feet in His own holy hands, and washes them.  It was to this task that the Lord of Glory stooped!

But listen more carefully to the divine why and how of this wondrous spectacle.  Jesus does it in the full consciousness of His divine glory, for the apostle John records, “Jesus knowing that the Father had given all things into His hands, and that He was come from God and went to God, rose...”  What a startling combination of sublime cause with curious consequence!  How could Jesus have done this?  How could the Master and the King of the universe wash dung from His disciple’s feet?  He could do it because HE WAS SECURE IN WHO HE WAS.  He knew that the Father had given all things into His hands.  He knew that He had come from the Father and that He was the Son of God and the promised Messiah.  He knew that He was going back to the Father after He defeated sin, sickness, death, the grave and hell.  He didn’t have to prove anything to Himself or to anyone else.  His life had already proven who He was to those who had eyes to see.  And He didn’t stoop so low to become a tyrant, to rule over this world by force.  He came to heal and bless and deliver, to reign by serving!   Ah, yes, precious friend of mine, once we thoroughly know who we are there is no need to proclaim it, no need to sound a trumpet, no need to wear a badge, to remind people of who we are.  Once we know that we are the sons of God WE ARE FREED TO SERVE!

You see, it wasn’t in spite of the fact of His greatness that Jesus took the place of the servant — it was because of His greatness!  The greatness of Jesus is the greatness of the Father’s heart.  The greatness of Jesus is the greatness of divine love and humility.  The greatness of Jesus is the greatness of sonship!   For the hands into which the Father gives all things nothing is common or unclean.  Because one is the offspring of the God of all grace, compassion, love, mercy and goodness, in whose hands all things are given, it is not difficult for him to stoop so low.  In this taking the form of a servant, Jesus proclaims the divine order of the Kingdom of God and the house of sons.  The higher one stands in attainment in the Kingdom, the more it must be his joy to be servant of all.  “Whosoever will be chief among you, let him be your servant” (Mat. 20:27).  “He that is greatest among you shall be your servant” (Mat. 23:11).  The higher I rise in the consciousness of being like Christ, the deeper shall I stoop to serve the creation around me.  The reason why we so often do not bless others is that we wish to appear to them as their superiors in blessing, calling or rank, or at least their equals.  But that is not the spirit of sonship!  The truth is that only as a son can we truly be a servant.  It was the Son of God who assumed the form of a servant and humbled Himself.   Ah, beloved elect of the Lord, walk among men as a son of the Most High God.  A son of God is only in the world to show forth his Father’s glory, to demonstrate how Godlike and how blessed it is to live only and always to find a way to love, bless, redeem and restore God’s lost creation. Someone has said, “God has three sorts of servants in the world: some are slaves, and serve Him from fear; others are hirelings, and serve for wages; and the last are sons, who serve because they love.”

In a book I read there is a story which beautifully illustrates why the mighty God would stoop so low as to appear as a servant in His sons in order to restore creation.  A little child is handed over to the keeping of another by her own father — not that he wants to part with her, but they are poor, and so he gives her into the rich man’s keeping, making her the rich man’s daughter so far as a resolution can do it, in order to find bread for both.  He then hires himself as a servant to the rich man and stays about where she is.  He keeps watch and care over that little life until it is matured; and the girl, as she grows up, begins to feel that she can always rely upon the unselfish love of him who seems but a serving man.  But her father, as she supposes him to be, is cold, distant, and even cruel.  The day came when he repudiated her with anger, selfish and base, because she had brought what seemed disgrace on his name.  Then forward stepped the serving-man, and flung his arms around her, shouting, with the fierceness of righteous indignation to the man who had evilly entreated her, “She never was your child!”  Then the girl knew why it was that she had felt such rest, peace and joy in the presence of the serving-man.  She had listened to his language of love many a time, not knowing the speaker was her real father.

Old father flesh, old father world, old father the devil repays all men with cruelty, injustice, baseness, lack, sorrow and death.  But there is a better Father — the One that sent you here, the One who has watched over you, blessed you, cared for you, counseled you, entreated you, woo’d you and overshadowed you with His love.  Even when you knew it not, He was already your Father!  And in Jesus He came as a servant to minister to your need, to lift and redeem and restore you unto Himself and His Kingdom.  And now, bless His name, He comes in many sons to reveal His heart of love to the whole vast creation and restore all things.  We, as sons of God, are among men as Him that serveth!

This is the great miracle of sonship!  It unites greatness and humility in a divine combination.  This is the new creation in Christ Jesus!  This is the balance that is rarely attained in this world of natural men.  The great secret lies in the indwelling spirit of Jesus.  Being made partakers of His nature and mind we are able to stand before Pilate, and when he says, “Are you a king?” we answer, “Thou sayest it.”  At the same time it is possible to kneel before our brethren with a towel and a basin of water, washing their feet — cleansing their walk — in the spirit of service and humility.  Only in sonship do power and humility find their true relationships and their true balance.  Have you ever seen the President of the United States cutting the grass at the White House?  How about Queen Elizabeth scrubbing the floors of her palace?   Or the Prime Minister of Canada washing dishes?  We don’t expect people of high position to do lowly and seemingly unimportant tasks.  Yet Jesus has revealed the law of a Higher Kingdom, a Kingdom where power and humility are joined together in a divine outpouring of love, grace and goodness!

Lyn Gitchel, a dear friend of ours in Pennsylvania, shared a precious point about the meaning of what we call ministry.  She wrote,  “The Son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and give His life a ransom for many.   The whole idea that we have of “ministry” has got warped up in these days, and I believe we shall have to have a new picture of what ministry really is put into our minds by God.  The word ministry comes from two Latin words, minis, (from which we get minus), which means lesser, and tri, which is the Latin word for servant.   Now, when you think about it, a LESSER SERVANT is a whole lot different from what we think of when the word ministry is put in our minds.  We think of famous evangelists, and large meetings, crowds with a tremendous flow of miracles and of worship, and people that can really hold your attention by their great preaching — and then we find that the word means LESSER SERVANT!

“The impact of this hit me recently and I’ll share the experience with you.  For most of my life I have served in a professional capacity.  Before I was an ordained minister I was a registered nurse.  I have never really worked as a servant of any kind, until recently.  A friend of mine was doing a little job here in town which involves helping an elderly lady who has had a stroke.  You need to help her in whatever capacity she needs, from housework to bathing her.   My friend had to leave town and, to help her out, I took the job.  Nearly a year later I am still doing it!  One day I was kneeling on the bathroom floor drying her feet when suddenly I said to myself, ‘Whatever am I doing here? — I’m supposed to be an Ordained Minister!’  Immediately the Spirit of God answered within my heart, ‘You wanted to minister, didn’t you?’

“The time has come when we must understand that ministry is not preaching but servanthood.  We are going to have to learn all over again what it means to serve people with the same heart of love that Jesus had when He walked among men.  It was not beneath Him to lift a woman caught in adultery to her feet and speak a word of reassurance to her, nor was it beneath Him to eat at the house of an ungodly tax-gatherer and his friends.  Jesus did not hire a huge auditorium and put out publicity announcing great meetings.  He simply moved among men and women where they were and touched them with love, and healing, and compassion”   — end quote.

There is the story of a man who desired from the Lord a true understanding of heaven and hell.  One night in a dream he was told that he would soon receive this understanding.  He was taken into a room where a few dozen people were sitting around a huge kettle of stew.  Each one had only a long handled spoon to eat with, and their arms were straightened so they could not bend them and bring the food into their mouths.  This, he was told, was hell.  Then he was taken into another room which would be a picture to him of heaven.  To his surprise, the room was identical.  The large pot was there, as well as people with stiff arms and long spoons.   There was one major difference, however.   In this room, each one would dip into the stew with his or her long-handled spoon and feed his fellow on the other side of the kettle! In this day we are being translated from hell to heaven within ourselves as we learn the way of the Kingdom of Heaven which is the Kingdom of Love — by SERVING!

Every new year the Queen of England publishes her Honors List, conferring titles and decorations upon the men and women who have rendered distinguished service to mankind or to the country or to the political party in power.  I have in my mind a little Honors List of my own.  There is not much point in publishing it, because you will never have heard of these people.  They include a dear sister who was poor in this world’s goods, who lived in a little house that approached being a shack, yet was committed to God’s purposes in this Day and vibrant with the love of God.  She was always sharing the word with the neighborhood children who graced her porch, continually cooking and sharing with others, fixing up and maintaining a building for the gatherings of the saints, entertaining the ministries the Lord sent their way, and encouraging everyone.  She never murmured or complained about anything that came her way.

Honor goes also to a brother who prayed earnestly and is credited with “praying down” a mighty move of the Spirit of God many years ago, by which others with whom he was associated were propelled into world-wide fame, while he unpretentiously cherished the deep truths and hope of sonship and the reconciliation of all things, continuing in prayer, setting an example of righteousness and humility before his family and community, regularly visiting the widows, orphans, and shut-ins.   I honor another brother whose name I do not even know who, during our Conferences in Florida years ago, would sweep and clean the meeting place until the wee hours of the morning (without being asked — it wasn’t his responsibility!), while most of the brethren and the preachers were enjoying rich fellowship over food at the local restaurants.  The one thing that these quiet heroes have in common is that they lived the spirit of servanthood without pretense or any motive other than a pure love and the deep desire to bless creation and advance the Kingdom of God into men’s lives.  Truly such shall be called great in the Kingdom of Heaven!

That there are different levels in the Kingdom of God, from the least in the Kingdom to the greatest in the Kingdom, Jesus clearly taught.  He told His disciples, “Verily I say unto you, Among them that are born of women there has not risen a greater than John the Baptist: notwithstanding he that is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he” (Mat. 11:11).   And again we read of Jesus’ disciples that “they disputed among themselves who should be the greatest.  And Jesus sat down, and called the twelve, and saith unto them, If any man desire to be first, the same shall be last of all, and servant of all” (Mk. 9:34-35). Christ Himself was the greatest among them.  He said, “I am in the midst of you as he that serveth.”  He was the humblest, and, therefore, the greatest, but had He no authority?  He had authority in heaven and on earth!  Because He takes the place of deepest humility, does that strip Him of His kingly authority?  No!  It intensifies and magnifies it.  “And whosoever would be first among you shall be your servant.” “Bondservant” is the meaning of the word in the Greek.  The man who is to be the greatest among God’s kings and priests must be the slave of all.  The man who will be the greatest, the primus, or first, will be the man who is, as it were, the very bondservant; willing to serve his brethren as if he were their slave with a deep and true humility.  Jesus Christ died the death of a slave.  Amongst the Romans, crucifixion was the death reserved for a bondservant.  No Roman citizen could be crucified, but the slaves were punished in that manner.  Christ was the greatest, yet He took the place of the lowest.  He who stooped from the highest heaven, not only to earth, but to the deepest hell, who went into the deepest depths to seek for sinful men, is greatest.  That is why He exercises authority today in the heavens and on the earth.  He now takes the highest place as the Head of the body, the High Priest of our profession, the King of kings, the Lord of lords, and the Head of all principality and power.  He is the greatest!

He that would rise to be the highest,
Must first come down to be the lowest,
And then ascend to be the highest
By keeping down to be the lowest.

It is only when you keep down to be the lowest that you can be a power.

The following words by brother Paul Mueller clearly express another aspect of this same beautiful truth.  “What does it mean to rule and reign with Christ?  The Greek word poimaino is translated rule in some New Testament passages, and means ‘to tend as a shepherd.’  This agrees with the prophecy of Isaiah, ‘See! the Lord is coming with might, His own arm having won Him the kingdom; See!  His reward is with Him, and His recompense before Him.  Like a shepherd He tends His flock, with His arm He gathers them; the lambs He carries in His bosom, and gently leads those who give suck’ (Isa. 40:10-11, Smith-Goodspeed).   ‘Like a shepherd He tends His flock,’ this is the manner of the Lord’s dealings with mankind.  He cares for each one, observing them and supplying their individual needs.  He gathers them with His arm so that not one is lost (Mat. 18:12).  Some He carries and still others He leads, but all will be gathered into His kingdom, for He is a faithful Shepherd.

“The story is told of a person who saw himself walking in the sand as he was going through a very difficult trial.  Suddenly another set of tracks were seen in the sand next to his.  He knew instinctively that the other set of tracks were made by the Lord, who was faithfully walking by his side.  Then, just as suddenly, he saw that there was only one set of tracks in the sand, and fearfully he thought the Lord had left him.  But then he was made to realize that there was only one set of tracks in the sand because the Lord had picked him up and was carrying him through that most difficult time.   Indeed, the Lord had not left him after all, but was carrying him in His bosom.  And these are the ways of the Lord that must be imparted to all who will rule and reign with Him.   The love of the Lord for all mankind is as the love of a faithful, loving shepherd.  The kingdom of God shall be established in the earth by the omnipotent and sovereign power of the Lord.  He shall rule and reign in union with all His sons in the spirit of a loving shepherd who gently leads his subjects, yet His power is mighty.

“The same Greek word is used for rule both in Matthew 2:6 and Revelation 12:5.  It is the Greek word poimaino which means to tend as a shepherd.  What does it mean to rule and to reign in the kingdom?  All who are chosen for this high calling will shepherd the people into the kingdom of God.  Each one of them will be like a hiding-place from the wind, and a shelter from the storm.  They will cover and protect their subjects, sheltering them until they are firmly rooted into the life of the kingdom.  They are like streams of water in a dry place, and like the shade of a great rock in a wearisome land.  Their new Life, which is the very Life of Christ, flows from them like streams of water in the desert.  They are that mighty Rock which has smitten the image of the nations, causing them all to fall (Dan. 2:34), but which now gives forth shelter and protection.  They are entrusted with the ring of kingdom authority, the best robe of kingdom righteousness and life, and the royal scepter of the kingdom of God.  Indeed, when one rules over men as a righteous one, when one rules in the fear of God, then it is as the light of the morning when the sun rises, a morning cloudless and clear, after rain upon the tender grass”   — end quote.

God has called a people aside in this hour and brought them to a place of brokenness, humility, and nothingness in the eyes of the world and the church systems of man.  We have obeyed the word the apostle Peter admonished, “Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you in due time” (I Pet. 5:6).  God is about to exalt His sons, but it shall be the exaltation of humility.

The following prophecy from the late Norene Nicholls has come into my hands at this time, and it surely speaks for this Day.  “A strange and wondrous thing is about to come, for the Lord has spoken to those that will hear, and their ears have been sharpened.  There is a gathering of the royal family, and the shepherds of Israel shall become rulers on the thrones.  They have stood in desolate places and listened to the low sound of the sheep — even a little flock in a wilderness place, but now it shall change.  The shepherds who have proven their worth in aloneness shall now come forth to be acknowledged of those who would not have Me to reign over them in times past.  Behold the thing is at the door.  Some have chosen high places for themselves, but others have allowed the Lord to choose for them, and thus have they been separated from their brethren and lost to sight.  But now shall events bring forth the deserted ones and show them before kings who are really not kings at all.  The scepter of these kings shall be righteousness and the girdle of faithfulness shall be upon their loins.  They shall be recognized, not because they are of great stature nor commanding of personality, but they shall be recognized because the Spirit of the Lord is upon them.

“Men shall no longer gather to men, but the men of God shall gather to the establishment of truth where the angels activate the holy ground.  There shall strange but wondrous things take place, for instructions from the presence of the Lord shall be heard, and kings shall lift their voices in confidence and courage at the declaration.  And, there too, shall be that peculiar anointing reserved for kings come into being; and that anointing shall teach you all things.  Then from that pillar of truth shall the kings issue forth to do exploits and turn the aliens back from the shores of the land promised.  Be not afraid nor amazed, for the Lord has spoken in verity and truth and shall bring it to pass.  No longer shall you stand idly by and wait for another day, but there shall be activity of a new source — yet activity that is effortless and quiet.  You shall slip quietly into palaces and judgment halls and speak a word in season.   You shall stand before prelates and counselors, but not one of your words shall fail.  You shall see the manifestation of what you have spoken, and men shall shut their mouths nor argue the point.  This is a strange work to be done, but it shall come by the decree of God and stand unmovable before heaven and earth.  The closing of the day is also the opening of the Day, and to this time have you been called.  See to it that you be not discouraged, for you shall stand in the land and turn the enemy from the shores.  So it is and shall be”   — end quote.

SONS AND SERVANTS

It is when we come to this thought of servants that there is a great deal of misunderstanding among the Lord’s people.  When we speak of servants, some boast that this calling does not apply to them, for they are no longer servants, but sons.  That is true in the spirit in which Paul argues in Galatians 4:6-7 wherein he says, “And because ye are sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, crying, Abba, Father.  Wherefore, thou art no more a servant, but a son; and if a son, then an heir of God through Christ.”

It is far from the truth, however, to say that there is no sense in which those who are sons are also servants.   Paul is speaking  in the passage above of our relationship to God, the Father.  Under the Old Covenant the people of God had not received new birth by the Spirit, to live in the Spirit and walk after the Spirit, but were placed under the rule of law.   They were not a house of sons, but a house of servants.  Their relationship to God was the relationship of servants.  They were not sons.  God had not sent the spirit of sonship into their hearts.  By the New Covenant God has redeemed us from the curse of the law that we might receive placement as sons and has birthed into our hearts the Spirit of His Son, the spirit of sonship, whereby we cry, “Father!”  This has brought a change in our relationship to God.  Unto Him we are no longer servants, but sons.  As sons, however, we become related not only to God, but we also become related to men.  Jesus is the Son of God, but He is also the Saviour of men, the Redeemer of men, the Reconciler of men, the Blesser of men, the Deliverer of men, the Sovereign Lord over all flesh.  It is here that we must be very clear in our understanding.   Unto God I may be a son; but unto men I must be a servant.  I am God’s servant, sent of the Father to serve mankind.   I cannot be a servant to God, for I am His son; and I cannot be a son to men, therefore I much approach unto men in a relationship through which I can minister unto them the life of the Son who dwells in me.  The only way I may minister Christ unto men is as a servant.  To minister means “to serve,”  and both minister and servant are a number of times translated from the same Greek word.

 Can a son be a servant?  Jesus, the pattern Son declared, “Even as the Son of man came not to be ministered unto (served), but to minister (serve) and give His life a ransom for many” (Mat. 20:28).  It is the SON who SERVES!  The Son is a Servant-Son.  The very same Jesus of whom the Father witnessed, “This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased,” of Him the Father also witnessed, “Behold my servant, whom I uphold; mine elect, in whom my soul delighteth; I have put my Spirit upon Him: He shall bring forth judgment to the nations” (Isa. 42:1).  Matthew 12:15-21 shows unmistakably that this servant of the Lord is Jesus.  The Son came as a Servant-Son.

John understood this significant truth, for the same John who wrote, “Behold, what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God,” later stated, “The Revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave unto Him, to show unto His servants things which must shortly come to pass; and He sent and signified it by His angel unto His servant John” (Rev. 1:1).   Paul understood this truth, for the very same Paul who wrote, “Wherefore thou art no more a servant but a son,” also said, “Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle.”  “Apostle” means a “sent one,” therefore Paul was sent to serve!  To God he was a son, but he was the servant of men.  Is Jesus a Son or a Servant?  Was John a son or a servant?  Was Paul a son or a servant?  And lest the elect of God in this Day should exalt themselves above John, or Paul, or even Jesus, we further find that of the 144,000 overcomers, that glorious company of the sons of God who stand with the Lamb on mount Zion, having the Father’s name in their foreheads, it is written, “Hurt not the earth, neither the sea, nor the trees, till we have sealed the SERVANTS OF OUR GOD IN THEIR FOREHEADS” (Rev. 7:3).  So there you have it! The sons are the servants!  Not servants to God, but sons who are servants to men, humble ministers of the mercies and goodness of the Lord.

What blessedness, what value has sonship without the outpouring into the depths in which men dwell?  The whole purpose of sonship is that God may be revealed, expressed, and communicated to men even unto the lowest hell.  Sonship is not some country-club set of super-spiritual-elite-gods who spend their time polishing up their halos while basking in the meretricious brilliancy of their own self-importance. If, upon our road to manifested sonship, we first learn to identify with the creation which we are ordained to deliver, to associate with the lowest and basest of men in the blessed spirit of a servant, what a blessing we shall become to the world!  THAT IS WHAT JESUS DID.  If Jesus were here today He would be condemned for eating with politicians, lawyers, mobsters, drug lords, call girls, crooks, drunks, and a whole host of unsavory characters, just as He was two thousand years ago.  We think of the mighty anointing of the seven spirits of God that rested upon the firstborn Son, and shall rest upon all the manifested sons of God. But is it not written of these seven spirits that they are “sent forth into all the earth” — into the earthiness of man’s experience.  Only as a son can one truly be a servant, for only the son possesses that life which can quicken all things!

There is a striking and beautiful parallel between sons and servants, between kings and priests.  It is the son who reigns, and the priest who serves.  As sons we are destined to reign as kings, as servants we are called to serve as priests.   “For thou wast slain, and has redeemed us to God by Thy blood out of every kindred, and tongue, and people, and nation; and hast made us unto our God KINGS and PRIESTS: and we shall reign over the earth” (Rev. 5:9-11).  God makes us kings that we might rule; He makes us priests that we might serve, bringing reconciliation, blessing and transformation to mankind.  As priests we live for others, to pray for them; to work among them; to teach and instruct them; to bless and lift them; to deliver and redeem them; to bring them to God!  “And I beheld, and lo, in the midst of the throne . . . stood a Lamb as it had been slain, having seven horns (power, kingship) and seven eyes (perception, vision, communication, priesthood), which are the seven spirits of God sent forth into all the earth” (Rev. 5:6). The sevenfold intensified Spirit of the Lord is given to God’s King-Priests so as to be a channel for the outpouring of His glorious life to creation.  To be a king is marvelous beyond words, but to be a priest is no idle self-seeking blessedness.  It is a compelling power to enter into God’s presence on behalf of mankind; the power to receive from the Lamb all the blessings and provisions of His wonderful life, and to receive and carry and distribute them!

You will never be a priest without the servant-nature.  The story is told of a farmer who had just sat down to the table and prayed, “Oh Lord, bless the poor people in this neighborhood, and feed them.” Very soon after, there was a knock at the door and a poor neighbor came in and asked the farmer for a bushel of potatoes.  The farmer began to make all kinds of excuses.  He had fifty bushels of potatoes, and his little boy said, “Papa, there is a chance to answer your own prayers.”  That is the servant-nature, and the spirit of priesthood.  So many in this hour want to be sons and kings and priests while living in their own little world, studying the deep revelations, singing beautiful kingdom songs, but never having any practical outworking of the servant-nature in the nitty-gritty of everyday living where the needs of creation are met.  May the Spirit of God make very real to all our hearts the great truth that he who will not serve cannot be a son.  “For even the Son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give His life...”  The sons come for the same purpose!

 What a blessing there is in giving!  Even on the natural plane it is a part of the makeup of everyone that they feel good when giving or helping others.  But in many people, and even in some who aspire to be kings and priests of God, this attribute is never developed into becoming a part of their life-style, so the opposite takes place.  However many wonderful people spend their lives in giving service to others. When analyzed, the servant-nature is the most prized possession of the human race.  What a joy is the restaurant waitress who gives true service.  To be a real nurse requires this above all else.  The secretary in an office can be an inspiration to everyone through her ability to be of help and support in every situation instead of merely doing what is required of her.   Then there is the teacher who is vitally concerned for every member of her class.  In such as these is the servant-nature revealed even on the earthly level.  Serving those about you will never of itself make you a priest of God, but YOU CAN NEVER BE A PRIEST WITHOUT THE SERVANT-NATURE!  HE makes us kings and priests!  Because we have priestly hearts we shall stretch forth our hands to heal the nations and speak forth the word that brings them life!

Many years ago amidst a great moving of the Spirit of God the revelation of sonship fell with wonder upon our ears and burst with glory within our hearts.   We sat enraptured for hours, day after day, and were taught by the Spirit about the Father and His purposes and about that elect company He has called, apprehended and chosen to be His sons to rule with Him in His Kingdom and restore all things.  We learned that these sons would have power unlimited — power over everything.  Power over sin, power over sickness, power over the elements, power over demons, power over all the power of the enemy, and power over death.  We were going to rule and reign in power, and our eyes sparkled   like diamonds in the light and our hearts swelled with joy in expectation of the wonderful position and authority we would soon have in the Kingdom.  We could think and talk of nothing else but the power we would have, and in our glorying we tried to usurp and demonstrate this power.  We were intoxicated with illusions of grandeur as we pressed our way into the Kingdom and the exalted position of sitting on the throne with Jesus and ruling the world and the vastnesses of infinity forever.

Little did we understand in those early days that the way up is down.  The carnal mind would have us believe that the way up is up.  Thus we have pressed our way into ministry, pressed our way into the Kingdom, “stood on the promises,” demanded of God our “rights,” presuming even to command God to do this and that, and sought to seize the throne.  It is true, elect of the Lord, that God wants to take us UP— high into the realms of God — UP to the throne — but God would have us know that the way UP is always DOWN!  Do you remember what Jesus said to His disciples when they aspired to greatness in the Kingdom?  “Now an eager contention arose among them, which of them was considered and reputed to be the greatest.  But Jesus said to them, The kings of the Gentiles are deified by them and exercise lordship, ruling as emperor-gods over them; and those in authority over them are called benefactors and well-doers.  But this is not to be so with you; and on the contrary let him who is the greatest among you become as the youngest, and he who is the chief and leader as one who serves.  For which is the greater, he who reclines at table (the master), or he who serves?  Is it not he who reclines at table?  BUT I AM IN YOUR MIDST AS ONE WHO SERVES” (Lk. 22:24-27, Amplified).  The one who serves the people well as a priest is the one who will also reign well as a king.  “They shall be priests . . . and they shall reign.”  That is the order!  Though He is calling us to be kings with authority over all, yet our inner spirit must be that of a servant, that we might freely minister, loving, touching, doing good, speaking kindness and encouragement, healing, reconciling, restoring, with mercy, compassion and love.  The problem with many people is that they have never learned to live for anything other than themselves and their own — me, my wife Mary, my daughter Sue, my son John, these four, no more.

God by many and varied experiences brings preparation into our lives to teach us the attitude of a servant.  Pride shows that that person has failed to grasp that rulership is rooted in God, who is Love, and not in ourselves.  Jesus was the most lowly and humble of all men, and also the most powerful and authoritative.  He was not a super-duper-elite-country-club Son of God.  He didn’t bounce onto the platform under the lights with a flare of worldly showmanship and then disappear out the back door to escape contact with the people.  “Although He existed in the form of God, He did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and was made in the likeness of men.  And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross” (Phil. 2:6-8).

THE MELCHIZEDEK PRIESTHOOD

At the last supper, in addition to taking the form of a servant and washing His disciple’s feet, Jesus offered His disciples bread and wine.  These are the two symbols of the Melchizedek Priesthood.  “And Melchizedek king of Salem brought forth bread and wine: and he was the priest of the most high God” (Gen. 14:18).  Deep down in the heart of men there is a strong and instinctive demand for a priest, to be a mediator, to lay one hand on man, and the other on God, and going between both to bring the two together into unification.  A priest or priesthood infers that there is a reason why such has been called into play. It denotes that there is an estrangement between God and His creatures and the priest ministers to bridge that gulf and bring about peace or at-one-ment.  Many today proclaim that there is no estrangement, no separation between God and man, that it is only a false sense of duality in man’s mind, that he has only to see that he himself is God, and as soon as his true identity is recognized, he can proceed to manifest out of his divine self.  If that is the truth then man did not truly fall, there was no sin in Eden, and no penalty for that sin; God did not drive man out of paradise, there was no need for Jesus to come to ransom us with His precious blood, and there certainly would be no need for the Melchizadek Priesthood!  Nor would there be any purpose in any scriptural teaching of forgiveness by God, atonement with His blood, redemption through His blood, justification by the blood, sanctification by the blood, regeneration, new birth, or the baptism in the Holy Spirit.  Jesus should have just come and told us who we really are and explained to us   that none of these things can add anything to our inherent divinity, and gone back to heaven.

Webster’s dictionary defines priest as: a mediatory agent between God and man.  In the Old Testament the word priest is translated from the Hebrew word cohen, the root meaning of which is “one who stands up and draws nigh for another.”  The Greek word, in its root, means “to minister.”  Thus, a priest is one who “draws near and ministers on behalf of another.”  And the priest always draws nigh and ministers in two directions — drawing nigh to God on behalf of the people and drawing nigh to the people on behalf of God.  The priest stands and ministers unto the Lord on behalf of the people while, on the other hand, he ministers unto the people on behalf of the Lord.  The ministry of the priest is an intermediary or go-between ministry.  He reaches out with one hand and takes hold of God; he reaches out with the other hand and takes hold of humanity; and he brings the two together by virtue of his priestly ministration.

The inspired writer to the Hebrews says of our Lord Jesus the Christ, “We have such an high priest who is set on the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in the heavens; a minister of the sanctuary, and of the true tabernacle, which the Lord pitched, and not man” (Heb. 8:1-2).  What does he mean when he says that Christ is “the minister of the sanctuary”?   In every temple there was a god, an unseen god, to whom the temple was devoted.  But there was a priest, the priest of that temple, who was to receive the petitions and sacrifices of the worshipper and to get the answer back from the god.  So it was with Aaron in the Old Testament.  It is said of him and of the priests of Israel, “they shall stand in my presence to minister,” and “they shall go out and bless in my name.”

The High Priest in Israel was the mediator between God and the nation.  He carried into the presence of God the sins and needs of the people, and carried the people in him.  He obtained from God the power to declare the remission of sin and the right of blessing the people.  God drew nigh unto the people in the person of the Priest.  God ministered of Himself unto the people through the blessing of the Priest.   “And Moses and Aaron went into the tabernacle of the congregation, and came out, and blessed the people: and the glory of the Lord appeared unto all the people” (Lev. 9:23).  From this Old Testament shadow the service of the priesthood under the New Covenant is clear, first to minister to the Lord, then to minister the life of Christ to those who sit in darkness, in the region of the shadow of death, until all are fully reconciled to God.  The sons of God are called to be “a kingdom of priests,” the government of God ministering unto creation!

There is both a Godward and a manward work in reconciliation, redemption, and restoration.  And so our great High Priest, Jesus, stands as the minister of the sanctuary, the temple of God, “which temple ye are.”  Not only are we God’s Royal Priesthood, WE are also the temple of the living God, a temple of living stones, an habitation of God through the Spirit!  WE are the realm of His dwelling and the sanctuary in which, and from which, Christ ministers to creation!  As we minister unto the Lord, there flows back from His presence a stream of blessing to impart to men upon the earth.

I cannot emphasize too strongly the important truth that ALL PRIESTHOOD has a double outreach — ministry to both God and man.  It could not be otherwise, for a priest is one who “stands between” two factions in mediation, and the moment a priest ceases to touch both God and man, unifying the two, he simply ceases to be a priest.  He may be a worshipper who speaks to God, or a king who rules the people for God, or a prophet who delivers a message from God, but no man can have a one-sided ministry and be a priest.  The priest must touch God with one hand, and mankind with the other, bringing the two together by his ministration.  Anything less or different than this is not priesthood at all.

It is interesting to note that the Melchizedek Priesthood is likewise a priesthood flowing in two directions.  “And Melchizedek, the king of Salem, brought forth bread and wine: and he was priest of the most high God.  And he blessed him (Abraham), and said, blessed be Abram of the most high God, possessor of heaven and earth, and blessed be the most high God” (Gen. 14:18-20).  How meaningful that Melchizedek blessed Abraham, and then goes on to also bless the most high God.  God is raising up a priesthood, the body of the High Priest after the order of Melchizedek, that will not only be able to bless men, but they will bless God, for they BECOME THE BLESSING OF GOD in the earth.

Our Lord Jesus Christ is the High Priest of the Melchizedekian Order, to which we, the members of His body, the Royal Priesthood, are called.  As we grow up into His fullness we shall experience all that the Order of Melchizedek represents.  In Jesus we see the dual aspect of true priesthood for while He has beautifully offered Himself up to God as a sweet smelling savor, an acceptable sacrifice, with the incense of all His divine attributes, He also “is able to save them to the uttermost that come unto God by Him, seeing He ever liveth to make intercession for them” (Heb. 7:25).  I have met many would-be sons of God across the land who pride themselves that they have been called aside to minister unto the Lord, but they have no corresponding vision to bless or save men, and wouldn’t walk across the street to minister to a needy soul.  I do not hesitate to tell you, precious ones, that such have no true revelation of what is embodied in the Melchizedek Priesthood.  How I rejoice in the knowledge that Jesus Christ, the High Priest of the Melchizedek Order, does indeed have a ministry manward.  He is still saving all who come to God by Him!  He is still touched with the feelings of our infirmities!  He still maketh intercession for us!  He is still writing His law upon our hearts!  He still has compassion on the ignorant and them that are out of the way!   He is still reconciling by His blood all who call upon Him!  Without His Priestly Ministry I, and you, too, precious friend of mine, would still be lost without God and without hope in the world.  Thank God, HE REACHED DOWN HIS HAND FOR ME!  What if Jesus only ministered unto the Father?!

 n light of the Melchizedek High Priesthood of Jesus we are admonished, “Let us therefore come boldly unto the throne of Grace, that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need” (Heb. 4:16).  “ . . . that He might be a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God, to make reconciliation  for the sins of the people” (Heb. 2:17).  “And  He is the propitiation for our sins: and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world” (I Jn. 2:2).  He ever liveth to bring such victory to His creation, none left out, none rejected, none too filthy or depraved or rebellious for Him to touch, for “I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me” (Jn. 12:32), and “all the ends of the world shall remember and turn unto the Lord: and all the kindreds of the nations shall worship before Thee” (Ps. 22:27).  And there shall come a priesthood that shall truly labor together with Christ until all enemies are subdued under His feet, until death is no more, until all things are made new, until the knowledge of the glory of the Lord fills the earth as the waters cover the sea, and until HIS LIFE FILLS THE UNIVERSE, praise His name!

We have received the call from our Father to follow Christ into His new Kingdom order for this New Day.  He is preparing our hearts to enter into an entirely new kind and dimension of ministry that will transcend the church age ministry as far as the heavens are above the earth.   This is the ministry of the Melchizedek Priesthood!  The Melchizedek Priests are the genetic reproduction of God, born of His life, revealing His heart, expressing His love, manifesting His glory.  The Melchizedek Priests inherit all the wisdom, splendor and power of their Father.   They are the fullness of God shed upon the earth in the ministry of the restoration of all things.  They are the source of divine blessing for all the families and peoples of the earth.  Being born of God, the Melchizedek Priests do not minister according to man’s carnal religious ways, ideas, traditions, methods, or means.  They are motivated only internally, by the leading of the spirit of God and by the outflowing of agape-love.  The Melchizedek Priesthood is the new, spiritual state of being God’s sons for the new age of the Kingdom now dawning.

The Melchizedek Priests are born of this new order and character that transcends the in-part ministry of the church systems wherein we walked in our childhood in Christ.  These Priests are not apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, or teachers — they are King-Priests after the order of Melchizedek, which is the order of manifested sonship.   They live in the fullness of God, but come forth with bread and wine to nourish and bless and restore in the form of servants.   They are the sons of men who become the sons of God.  They are born of agape-love, enter the Melchizedek Priesthood, and become God’s Kings and Priests unto all creation.  Becoming a son is not an ego trip.  It is a position of great responsibility.  We pray that we will be equal to the challenge God has set before us, and that we will be enabled to fill the place He is calling us to.  Amen

 J. PRESTON EBY

The End of the Series

The Kingdom of God

 

Contents Page 

Home Page

Links to other ministry websites

 

Not finding what you need?  SEARCH HERE


Search this site or the web powered by FreeFind


Site search Web search