NO GREATER LOVE

NO GREATER LOVE - audio link 

Whenever we hear new truth or receive a revelation from the Spirit, it is incumbent upon us to ensure that this newly planted seeds in our heart are nourished.  This is our responsibility towards the Word of God.  We are to allow the Spirit to further open up this new truth and make it part of us and ultimately shift us from one place to another.  This is so that we in fact change and not just be amazed by new truth and accumulate knowledge.  A new revelation is supposed to affect our disposition, if not change it all together.  We are to meditate on it, chew on it, and swallow until it becomes part of our bowels, our gut.  Knowledge that does not change us has no purpose.  Character is built when we appropriate, not just when we are revealed a truth.  Unfortunately, in today’s society people demand sermons at the press of a button and have an assembly line attitude regarding teachings.  With our mouths wide open at the end of the assembly line, we swallow teaching burger after teaching burger.  We end up full of new teachings, but we are not changed.  Year in and year out we are saturated with knowledge, but we still remain the same person.  We are in fact immature Christians boasting about our knowledge without the character to back it up.  This disrespectful attitude towards the Word and he who brings the word, whether through teaching or prophecy is that of, “It is his calling and so it comes naturally”.  There is no appreciation for what went into the delivering of this teaching, by the forming of the teacher or prophet themselves.  Afterall, today everybody is a teacher or a prophet.  The years the Lord God invested in him by stripping him and keeping him accountable for what he knows are not even considered.  In the same way we easily make empty promises, even unto ourselves, and do not see how lightly we look upon words.  We treat His Word or revelations flippantly.  Easy come and easy go.  There is no waiting on Him to allow Him to flesh something out and lay prostrate before Him to make a new truth a reality.  Insisting that you do not leave the room the same.  Our flippant attitude towards words in general is directly relative to our flippant attitude towards His Word or new revelations, because we have not sufficiently counted the cost of delivering that word or the nature of Him who speaks to us and that we are in fact made in His image.  Therefore, we frustrate the purposes of God in our own lives and in the Church by not waiting on Him to make a new revelation part of our being and reality.  It is my prayer that even before reading or listening to this devotional, you would pray and allow the Spirit to give you eyes to see and a desire to appropriate by faith what is revealed.

I will be writing three devotionals that follow up on one another and are vitally connected to each other.  They constitute three words…to “see”, to be “sent” and “to serve”.  This devotional is about seeing, which is the prerequisite for being sent.  To be sent, is to be Apostolic.  To be Apostolic is to serve.  This sending does not come just because you raise your hand, but rather as one chosen.  The Word clearly says that the Lord God is not a respecter of persons, but because as one prepared, you are chosen and then sent.  We are sent in order to represent the One that sent us.  Therefore, we can expect that we have to be made in His image in order to be sent and that is far more important than just being able to do miraculous exploits.  It is our character that will sustain us in the time to come.  And those He sends, He not only prepares, but equips.  In Isaiah 6: 8 we read, “Also I heard the voice of the Lord, saying, “Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?  Then said I, Here am I; send me.”  This devotional bears a bit of light on those chosen to be sent. 

JOHN 8: 42

…for I proceeded forth and came from God; neither came I of myself, but He sent me.

To be Apostolic is to serve the church from a basis of being prepared and sent from His Kingdom.  The office of Apostle is more than just being able to do miracles, prophecy and preach the gospel, but has with it the responsibility of overseeing and serving the Church in community.  Therefore, it is more than just a call or a purpose, but it has to do with the man in his totality, whether he truly represents the One who sent him.  Community is directly linked to Apostleship.   If you wish to know more about this, please see chapter 8 and 9 in the free book on my blog, called “A Kingdom of Priests”.

 

Let’s read John 13…

JOHN 13: 3 - 5

3 Jesus knowing that the Father had given all things into his hands, and that he was come from God, and went to God;

4 He riseth from supper, and laid aside his garments; and took a towel, and girded himself.

5 After that he poureth water into a bason, and began to wash the disciples' feet, and to wipe them with the towel wherewith he was girded.

In verse 3 Yeshua makes a statement that He kept on repeating in John 8, which bears great significance to being sent.  This statement is, “knowing from where He came, and where He was going to.” 

Knowing from where He came and where He was going, having received all things from the Father…, the Word says, “He rose...”  This is more than just getting up from His chair, but was a resurrection statement in itself.  It was the foundation for the rising.  This foundation, from where He came and where He was going, was the enablement of all His rising.  This word “knowing” tells us that it was not just a mere statement for us to know that He came from the Father, rather it beckons us to find out about this knowing.  Why did the Spirit inspire John to write this?  Why is this significant?  And does it apply to us?   And what did He rise to?  He rose to wash their feet.  If anything, although an act of great humility, but having been sent from the Father, it was Apostolic.  Not only Apostolic, but also Kingly in its essence.  The King rose to wash their feet.  Not only Kingly, but a divine demonstration of who God is.  Yeshua, who is the divine expression of God, was demonstrating who God is, which is exactly what we as sent ones are to do.

Matthew 20: 28 says…

The Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve…

 

This “knowing”, should cause us to ask whether there be any other way for us to serve?  As the Patterned Son, He came to show us how to live.  We will not be able to do acts of ultimate humility or servitude, to which we are called, except we ourselves know from where we come and where we are going, and that all things have been given unto us.  John writing this was letting us know that Yeshua would not have been able, unless He knew.  Just like Him, we too need to have this “knowing”.  Knowing constitutes a confidence and assurance, an unwavering disposition in order to get up and go down.  And so, we can understand that any act of serving that does not come from this knowing as a natural outflow, is affectation.  An effort as opposed to a natural outflow from this disposition in the Father.  True service is an outflow of who we are in the Father, just as Yeshua demonstrated to us.  Which beckons the question, what is this knowing? 

“This knowing is not cognition or mental consent to truth, but a deep inward appropriation of such a kind that permeates the entire personality and opens it to a conduct that cannot be otherwise given or expressed.” – Art Katz

This is why I started this devotional with understanding our responsibility to allow the Spirit to make what we hear or read a reality to us, which is true knowing as opposed to mental consent.

Yeshua also knew where He was going, which constitute an eternal perspective as well.  We read the same of the cloud of witnesses in Hebrews 11, always knowing where they were going. It is imperative for the Bride of Christ to have an eternal perspective. 

Hebrews 11: 8 - 10

8 By faith Abraham, when he was called to go out into a place which he should after receive for an inheritance, obeyed; and he went out, not knowing whither he went.

9 By faith he sojourned in the land of promise, as in a strange country, dwelling in tabernacles with Isaac and Jacob, the heirs with him of the same promise:

10 For he looked for a city which hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God.

 

The Kingdom of God is an eternal Kingdom.  It is Davidic and will be on earth as it is in heaven, with the root of Jesse, the Son of David, Yeshua reigning as King of kings from a redeemed Zion.

Daniel 7: 27

27 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.

 

On the 3^rd of February the Spirit led me to watch the movie Joan of Arc.   If there was someone who had an eternal perspective, it surely would be her.  She was obsessed to have France and Burgundy united, as she received visions from the Lord and felt that she was sent by Him to do so.  She was absolutely fearless in her resolve.  It made me think of the Northern and  Southern tribes, the two sticks that Ezekiel were told to hold together, prophesying that this was the intend of the Most High at the end of the age.  The Jew and Gentile that will be one under one King.  It was said that when she was burned at the stake for being a heretic, all of her consumed, but not her heart.  I believe her heart was already inflamed with the zeal of God’s Kingdom to be established on this earth.  The Kingdom of God suffers violence and the violent take it by force.  Zeal is that which consumes the heart, where you are willing to risk it all, just like Joan who left her family and the safety of her home, to stand before kings and challenge them with the Word of God.  To be eternal minded is to be Kingdom minded, for His Kingdom is eternal.   People need something bigger than life to fight for.  Something greater than themselves to believe in.  In the same way, Yeshua left all for the Kingdom of God on this earth.  All of what we see now on this earth is the battle of kingdoms.  The enemy says, “As above, so below”, simply meaning that they want this earth to resemble the kingdom of below.  Whereas Yeshua said, “Pray, Our Father which art in heaven, hallowed be Thy name.  Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.”   Here we have the desire of the Father to establish His Kingdom which is already in heaven, to be on earth.  This is why He sent His Son…to establish that which is in heaven on earth.  It is a battle for Kingdoms.  This is the Son’s inheritance, a Kingdom on earth, which is also our inheritance as co-heirs.  But how real it this to us?  Even though we know that we will rule and reign with Him, we are still not Kingdom minded.   It is something that will happen one day, as if we are not vitally a part of establishing this Kingdom.  This is what we are now about.  We ascribe to reality, but live outside of it.  Many are now presently focused on this world, focused on tomorrow and whether they should go to this or that place on holiday, or their children’s future. But the Kingdom of God is not even given a thought.  They do not see the fact that they are called as workers in context with the Kingdom.  The Kingdom of God seldom passes over their lips.  It is a lofty idea of something that will be at the end and not a reality now.  It stands to reason when the order of these considerations have changed that only then we are affectively in the Kingdom and not waiting to be translated.  Only when we have left all for the Kingdom’s sake does the Kingdom become our foremost consideration and not a side issue.  How we deceive ourselves and are blinded to the reality of our lives and our true disposition towards His Kingdom.  There is a longing to be used by Him, but if we are to be honest, it is because of us.  Our intention is to be of use, to have meaning and purpose.  Hence why we flock to the words, “God have a purpose for you”.  We fail to see how we use His gifts for our own uplifting, when in fact all is for His Kingdom.  This has to change if we are to have any zeal for His Kingdom, because without this zeal for His Kingdom He cannot send us.  The Kingdom of God suffers violence, and the violent take it by force.  His Kingdom has to become literal, a reality to us and not something in the sky up there as if it is something that can be only categorized and pinpointed to a location, and not a vital dynamic of His sons and daughters that live in it even now.  It has to be tangible.  Each time we hear that word, something must fan the flame of zeal in us.  It is the rule of God over all the nations of which Israel will play a pivotal role.  Eternity is not only given to affect the future, but given in our knowledge now to affect the present.  It shapes the way you perceive your life.  We have to have an eternal perspective now.  We have to factor in the things that are eternal, less we live beneath the glory He has intended, which is eternal life now.  Not in quantity of life, but quality of life.  This will make you not only distinct from this world, but even from your Christian brothers and sisters, who do not share in this knowing.  We have to be the thing in itself.  Stop and ask yourself whether you have an eternal perspective.  Not whether you are going to heaven, but whether you live in such a way that all your present doing and speaking are done in the light of how it affects eternity.  That is an eternal perspective.  This zeal can only come when we have a knowing from where we have come and are going.  This zeal is the absolute burning love for the King and His Kingdom that cannot be separated. 

Hebrews 10: 34

34 For ye had compassion of me in my bonds, and took joyfully the spoiling of your goods, knowing in yourselves that ye have in heaven a better and an enduring substance.

They were willing to be stripped from all their substance, their goods, their savings, their homes, because of the compassion, the love they had for Paul, but they also had a view of an eternal reward.  Do not think that this came easy, but rather it stripped them each time.  They basically walked the talk.  Note, they joyfully took the spoiling because they knew, that knowing, where they came from and where they were going, and that they have been given all things.  Something that we no longer see amongst the brethren that was typical and characteristic of the first Church.  Mere assent to doctrine does not do it.  It has to be a knowing within yourself, because it will affect how you see the world and how you live. 

Knowing from where He has come needs to be something that we ourselves meditate upon and receive revelation, in order to understand where we have come from.  The one is relative to the other and the greater the revelation by the Spirit, the more this knowing forms the foundation of being a sent one.  “As My Father has sent Me, so I send you”, Yeshua said.  This sending comes with a knowing.  One would be hard pressed to find sermons on the preincarnate Son of God and the Church has left this very important factor from out of her consideration and have suffered terribly in her understanding of the full weight of what He did for us because of this lack, as well as the having an understanding of her role in establishing His Kingdom. 

Yeshua came from the bosom of the Father, from out of the glory of heaven.  All we know is that it must have been unspeakably sublime.  No words have ever been afforded us to describe that divine union of love and glory.  Before there was time or anything created, He was.   And yet, it is from this place He left.  From the bosom of the Father.  A place that we will never leave for anybody should we just have one small taste of it.  However, this knowing was the provision for Him to leave and be sent.  Only through knowing from where He came, could He strip Himself from His garment and leave.  What an outpouring!  Yeshua had to leave voluntarily.  He is the Lamb slain before the foundation of this world.  And so when Yeshua said in John 10 that nobody takes His life from Him, but that he lays His life willingly down, He was speaking not of what was to come on the cross only, but what already took place in heaven.  It is from this place you pour out, whether water in a basin, your blood or your life.  In the same way, Yeshua saw the pouring out of the alabaster box, which was no small container, lavish in her love and devotion, as no small expense on her part.  This a reflection of the pouring of His Spirit from out of the throne of God, the living water of mercy to a dying world, by the lavish giving of His Son.  God, lavish in His mercy.  And if this is our disposition, our knowing, how can we not ourselves be lavish in our giving, whether in goods or our lives in service?  How can we then not serve as He did, knowing as He knew, from where we come?  Can there then be place for stinginess, self-pity or an identity crisis?    Of course, if we ourselves would be spoiled by the Father to taste just one drop of the relationship enjoyed between the Father and His Son, we ourselves would be ruined in our categories, and will too joyfully take the spoils of our goods.  We would be lavish in our giving and serving, even as the Son was.  This type of relationship is not born in a moment, a point of time, but it is eternal. 

Yeshua’s faith was built on this reality.  There was no doubt and He knew that nothing is impossible for Him…all things were given unto Him. He operated and lived from out of both realities, that is to say, operating from being seated in heavenly places with His Father, as the Son of God, whilst being on earth as the Son of Man.  This is also the reason why we have not come to that transcended place of spirit and truth, because we only relate to Yeshua from the basis of the Son of Man, even though we know He is the Son of God.  This is reflected in our own lives, because by the same degree that we relate to Him only as the Son of Man, we relate to ourselves only as sons and daughters of man, and not sons and daughters of God.  How radically different would our lives be if we truly believed.  We may be able to verbalize it, but it takes an opening of the spiritual eye to see things as they really are.  The question we need to ask ourselves is, “Do I truly know that I am a son or daughter of God or am I only mentally agreeing to it?  Is it my reality and does it show?”  Therefore, we live beneath the glory and only live as mere men.  We have yet to come into reality and our faith suffers for it.   Therefore, we cannot think of Yeshua only in terms of His earthly life.  That would be inadequate thinking.   We cannot only consider the Man on the cross and not the God on the cross.  We have to consider from where He has come. When this veil of our understanding is lifted, it will enable us to arise and take off our outer garment too.  You rise from knowing where He has come and where He is going and see this in context from where you have come and are going as a sent one. 

We need to consider the cross not only in the light of what happened on Golgotha, but what took place in heaven, the pre-incarnate Lamb that was slain.  For the cross, the coming down, is the full expression of who God is.  God is love and love gives lavishly and sacrificially, but how lavish and just how sacrificial it is will not be fully appreciated by us unless we know what He left in order to come down.  We have to see and deeply consider both sides of the coin.  The cross is the manifestation of the God we serve, not only with what happened on earth, but what have always been in heaven.  The cross is central to the Church’s understanding not only of who God is, but who she is.  His will was done on earth, as it was already done in heaven.  He is the Lamb slain before the foundation of the world.  Think of that.  Ponder it and let it sink in.  When He created all, He also foreknew that Adam and Eve would sin and even before the creation, He was the Lamb slain.  There is always a corresponding type and shadow on earth as it is in heaven.  For the Lamb to be slain, there had to be an altar.  And so a type and shadow is seen on the earth when Moses was instructed to make exactly as the heavenly blueprint shown to him, a tent in the wilderness.  As it is in heaven, so also on earth.  And again, we find this right through the history of the Bible until the manifestation of what already took place in heaven was seen on the cross.  I do not know how He was slain before the foundation of the world was made; all I know is that it is clearly what the Word tells us.  Questions need to rise within us, such as whether it was a suffering then as it was on the earth?  What did it cost Him to leave the Father’s bosom?    And why would He leave?  What was in it for the Father?  He came to serve, but also to save the lost.  Souls have an immeasurable value to God, for it is He who is the life of every soul.  And if that was the price He was willing to pay for lost souls, how much more should we value our own souls, knowing that we are the sons and daughters of God that have come from His bosom?  How will this transform the Church who is only the Church as He intended when there is true fellowship?  When we truly value our own souls and those of our brothers and sisters we enter into authentic fellowship, where brothers and sisters dwell in unity.  It is there He commands His Spirit to dwell amongst us.  And how can fellowship be true in any other way?  Also, how can He send us if we ourselves do not value the souls of the lost for whom He left heaven to die for?  This is why we need to apprehend His pre-incarnation in conjunction with the cross.  We need to understand the magnitude of the sacrifice He made for our soul’s sake to come into that place of adoration of Him, but at the same time the value of all souls.  When we know, it will be a natural outflow to serve as He served. It is then that we value the Christ in one another as His Body and will love one another and give lavishly as He did.   Our eyes will have opened to reality.   

All of this adds depth and dimension to the mystery of the faith and the true intent of God for the Church against which the gates of hell will not prevail.  How can it, if this is our reality?  Who shall separate of us from the love of God in whom we are?  This understanding of the pre-incarnate Christ is the foundation of the love that believes, bears, hopes and endures all for the sake of the King and His Kingdom.  It transcends human understanding and requires the light of revelation only found in the Holy of Holies.  This will take a supernatural grace, because the enemy especially wants to keep us from knowing the love of God from this perspective, wanting to prevent the Church from coming into her full inheritance.  He would rather want us to analyze our past and be occupied with the things of the earth than consider the place where we are from and will spend eternity.  We need to deeply apprehend and know this truth, for this truth will set us free.  This knowledge of God needs to be restored unto the Church and brought once again as foundational to the faith and our sending, as was the case with the first Church in Acts.

Paul states in Ephesians 2 that we have been raised together with Christ and are seated in heavenly places.  Surely, we need to consider this and really meditate on the practical and spiritual reality of this truth.  How does this affect us presently, or should we ignore it, because we do not understand it?  When the word says, “walk in the Spirit”, it is not just in dependence with our whole being on the Spirit, but literally to walk in the spirit realm. This is why Yeshua said that he was in heaven, whilst standing right in front of Nicodemus in John 3: 13.  We are all aware that right around us at all times, the spiritual dimension is a reality, but we cannot see it.  It does not make it less true.  Also why Paul wrote in Hebrews 12 that we come to heavenly mount Zion and that we enter the throne room of God to receive grace and mercy in a time of trouble.  When we go into the Holy of Holies in our prayer closet, we are not to think of it as symbolic, which we tend to do, but we are to understand that by faith, we truly do enter into that very place in the heaven.  Faith is not seeing that which must be or what you desire it to be, faith is seeing what is.  It is the evidence of things not seen with our naked eye.   That changes everything.  It changes our day-to-day life?  What we do and say.  It changes our faith and how we read the Word.  Everything changes once we understand from where we come and where we are going.  It also gives understanding to what Yeshua said about seeing what the Father does and then He does it and that He only speaks what the Father tells Him to speak.  Together we are raised up with Christ in heavenly places, even whilst here on earth.  Just as He was.  When we say that we are sojourners, we tend to see this from a perspective of where we are going…to heaven.  But the truth is, we are sojourners because we are seated in Christ, in the Spirit.  We are not of this world, not just because we are not like this world, but because we are seated in heavenly places even now.  To know as He knew, we need to understand that just like Yeshua, we are sent not from man, but from the Kingdom of God.  We too are sent from the bosom of the Father.  Sent from that place which we have been born into by the Spirit of God.  You have to ask Him to show you this, which is by faith…the only way of seeing in the Spirit.  How it works, we may only get to know when our bodies are resurrected.  Listen to what Romans 8 tells us.

Romans 8: 9; 11 – 14; 29 - 30

9 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.

It is clear that we are on this earth, however, our being is also in Christ in heavenly places.  How real is this to us?  Our spiritual eyes do not see this reality, but it does not disqualify what the word says, just because we cannot see it with our natural eyes.  We are all presently just like Christ was, both on earth and heaven (John 3: 13) when we are born of the Spirit.

 

11 But if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you.

12 Therefore, brethren, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live after the flesh.

14 For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God.

15 For ye have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear; but ye have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father.

16 The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God:

17 And if children, then heirs; heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ; if so be that we suffer with him, that we may be also glorified together.

And…

29 For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren.

30 Moreover whom he did predestinate, them he also called: and whom he called, them he also justified: and whom he justified, them he also glorified.

Please note that the word glorified is in past tense.  Our bodies may not be glorified, but in the spirit, we are already glorified and in Christ.  It is from this context, when the Spirit of God reveals to us that we are in fact sent, not from man, but from the Father, that we are to have our being.   “As My Father has sent Me, so I send you.”  Still in our bodies, but glorified within, divinity residing in earthly vessels.  Just like His Son.  Can anything be impossible for us when we live by the Spirit and in the Spirit?  Can anything be against us?  Man without God is beastial, but with God, as Adam was created, the image of God. Man is the supreme expression of God, in the same way that Yeshua was the expressed image of God.    Until we see ourselves as in Him, His deity in us by His Spirit and that we are to walk by faith as His Son walked by faith, in utter dependence, we will only walk as mere men and live beneath the glory He intended, which is to be the express image of Him. Everything in the spirit works on the basis of faith.  Man is not man without God, man is man with God. 

John 8 is about seeing and sending.  Yeshua says that He is the light of the world and then He tells the Pharisees that they cannot believe.  And what they cannot believe is written in verse 14, which is from where He has come and where He is going, exactly what He says in John 13. They cannot see this.   Yeshua who is the Light, that light not made by hands, but that comes from the Holy of Holies that gives wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of God, the ability to see, came that we may have light.   And so He tells us that we too are the light of the world.  So that those who believe, may see and in that seeing, the truth sets them free.  The Pharisees are in darkness, and therefore they did not see him as the Son of God.  They only saw Him as a man.  “Is this not the son of Joseph?” they asked.  They see the Son of Man, but not the Son of God.  It requires faith to see that which is right in front of us.  And that faith comes by means of a veil that has to be lifted in order for the light of revelation to fill us and be set free. In the following chapter, John 9,  Yeshua heals a man born with blindness.  In verse 20 this man’s parents tells the Pharisees, “We know that this is our son, and that he was born blind…”  David says in Psalm 51, “Behold I was shapen in iniquity and in sin my mother did conceive me.” We are all born in darkness, blind to the truth of who He is and who we are, until He comes and opens our eyes.  After clay was placed upon the man’s eyes, Yeshua told him to wash himself in the pool Siloam.  We know clay resembles what we are made of, and is this not exactly what needs to happen to us in order to see.  That as we walk by the Spirit, we are to also see by the Spirit and not with clay eyes that are blinded. The pool he had to wash his eyes in is by interpretation the word, SENT.  The word says in verse 7, He went his way therefore, and washed, and came SEEING.  Should we forget the prior chapter and the context, we will be bound to see this seeing merely as a miracle of a blind man that now sees.  However, this seeing is that knowing, which not only set the man free, but after he washed himself, which speaks of sanctification, he was sent.  Sending comes from a place of seeing and knowing, after sanctification.  And this seeing is knowing from where He has come and where He is going, together with your own knowing of where you have come and are going.  How can we be sent, unless He opens our eyes to see first?  In verse 35, Yeshua asks the man, “…dost thou believe on the Son of God?”

The truth is that we do not really know who we are and from where we come.  This is why we still struggle with trying to make a mark or desperately seek the approval of man.  This is why we are trying to work for His love, if only just subconsciously.  This is why we get so easily offended and live a “tit for tat” life.  We live as mere men when in fact we are the sons and daughters of God who is sent from His Kingdom to establish His rule.  Unless we truly know this by revelation, we will fall short of the glory He intended, which is to demonstrate His love by a life poured out for one another.  As in heaven, so on earth.  Representing the Father as sons and daughters, by being the express image of our Father, just as His Son.  His Spirit is given to us in no lesser degree than the measure given to Yeshua when He walked this earth.  How then can He ask us to emulate Him when we are at a disadvantage?  But the truth is, we are not.  And our unbelief is our blindness, because we do not truly know, that knowing, that He loves us just as He loves His Son.  Not one drop less.  And it should be our deepest consideration to think upon the love that the Father has for His Son, seeing that He loves us the same.  Not in the context of an earthly Father, but a heavenly Father that is love.  Not love as an attribute, but the very thing in itself.  And we are the object of His love.  May He open our eyes that we may see and truly be set free.  May we wait on Him to show us His divine love that is in heaven.

When we know who we are, from where we have come and where we go, it is then that we operate from that transcendent place where others will not know where God begins or you end.  The unity of that bond of love can no man separate.  No thing on earth or in heaven.  No calamity or darkness.  Indeed who can separate us from the love of God?  Not being insecure and unsure, but a deep knowing of the love of God that transcends mere human understanding and can only be known through the eyes of faith.  This seeing only comes when we come to the Great Revelator, the Spirit of God who is the Spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of God.  Paul prays in his letter to the Ephesians for this knowledge.

Ephesians 3: 14 - 21

14 For this cause I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,

15 Of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named,

16 That he would grant you, according to the riches of his glory, to be strengthened with might by his Spirit in the inner man;

17 That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith; that ye, being rooted and grounded in love,

18 May be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height;

19 And to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that ye might be filled with all the fulness of God.

20 Now unto him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us,

21 Unto him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus throughout all ages, world without end. Amen.

May we all hunger for a greater and deeper revelation of the love of God that does not come from a human perspective or from the context of an earthly Father, but from that which transcends, which is from Heaven and is eternal, by His Spirit.  So that knowing from where we come and where we are going, all our present day categories will be radically aligned with this reality, which is to establish His Kingdom on this earth.

I felt led to combine part of a word I received on August 2021 with a word that I received from Father on the 2nd of November 2021.  You may have heard it before, but know that the Spirit led me to these words because of how it is applicable to what He is saying to us in this critical time.  I call it a letter from our Father.

 

My child,

YOU ARE LOVED. 

I have loved you with an everlasting love.

Not just because I stand in covenant, but because I am your Father and you are My child.  Not because I formed and molded you in your mother’s womb, but I have set My love on you.

All your days I wrote in your book and have planned only good for you.  For as your Father I desire good in your life.  That you may KNOW Me.  That you may KNOW My love.  For My love is set on you and I have indeed watched over you to teach and guide you.  All your ways shall be peace, even in the midst of turmoil.  For the paths I have set for you lead to the Prince of Peace.  Do not fear My child.  I will keep you in the hollow of My hand.  Nobody can snatch you out of My hand.  Remember that.

Even though the oceans roar, in Me is peace.  Therefore, remain in Me no matter where you are, for I will keep you.

I love you My child.  You are not as a child, YOU ARE MY CHILD. 

KNOW THIS.

Know this in all you do.  I desire you to be secure in My love.  Live from the KNOWING that you are loved by Me 

I AM LOVE.

You have not chosen Me, but I have chosen you to bear fruit, to bear abundant fruit.  This can only be as you remain in Me and in My love.

KNOW therefore that you are loved.

Therefore, let us run together.  Cast your eyes on Me and let us go forth to the nations, to the highways and byways, to the cities, and let the river of life from Me flow through you.  For you can do nothing without Me, but when you surrender all, nothing is impossible.  Look unto Me and live.  Look unto Me and see My Kingdom in Me.  For I and My Kingdom are one.  Inseparable.  For it is not a Kingdom ruled and governed by that which is physical, but spiritual.  Therefore, when you walk in the Spirit, you walk in the ways of My Kingdom.  You walk in Me and I and My Kingdom are one.

Therefore, do not look to man, but look with spiritual eyes and you will see.  Nobody can see or enter My Kingdom unless they become as babes.  See through the eyes of a child, in simple trust.  Not wavering, in simplicity, without guile and purity of heart.  This is My Kingdom.

The door of My Kingdom is wide open for all those who wish to enter, but many stay at the gates, the everlasting doors and are not willing to leave the kingdom of this world behind.  You cannot be in two kingdoms.  You have to forsake the one to enter into the other.  Yes, through birth, through death you enter into life.

I long for My children to enter and I long for My Bride to know that My Kingdom is her inheritance.  Unto such is the Kingdom of God.  Be therefore zealous to enter through the narrow gate.  Leave all riches behind that you may enjoy the treasures of heaven.  A new heaven and a new earth.  The masterpiece of My hands for My children.

Out of the abundance of who I am, I give to My children, to My Bride.  For theirs is the Kingdom.  And I shall rule and reign over you and love you My children.  I will draw you continually to Me and love you. 

For you are Mine.  You belong to Me…Sons and Daughters of the Living God.

Your Father.