Let us begin this devotional with Luke’s discourse in chapter 12 where the disciples are asking Yeshua what will happen during the end times.
As we read the scripture, we must remember to read it also
in the “is to come” mindset and not just historically or how it applies to us
now. We want to read this as if we are
standing there with Yeshua and the great tribulation has started. Imagine Him standing right in front of you,
and He is saying this directly to you as His worker.
1 In the mean time, when there were gathered together an
innumerable multitude of people, insomuch that they trode one upon another, he
began to say unto his disciples first of all, Beware ye of the leaven of the
Pharisees, which is hypocrisy.
The very first thing He says to us is to be aware of the
leaven of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy.
In verse 15, He says:
2 For there is nothing covered, that shall not be revealed;
neither hid, that shall not be known.
3 Therefore whatsoever ye have spoken in darkness shall be
heard in the light; and that which ye have spoken in the ear in closets shall
be proclaimed upon the housetops.
4 And I say unto you my friends, Be not afraid of them that
kill the body, and after that have no more that they can do.
5 But I will forewarn you whom ye shall fear: Fear him, which
after he hath killed hath power to cast into hell; yea, I say unto you, Fear
him.
6 Are not five sparrows sold for two farthings, and not one
of them is forgotten before God?
7 But even the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear
not therefore: ye are of more value than many sparrows.
8 Also I say unto you, Whosoever shall confess me before men,
him shall the Son of man also confess before the angels of God:
9 But he that denieth me before men shall be denied before
the angels of God.
10 And whosoever shall speak a word against the Son of man, it
shall be forgiven him: but unto him that blasphemeth against the Holy Ghost it
shall not be forgiven.
11 And when they bring you unto the synagogues, and unto
magistrates, and powers, take ye no thought how or what thing ye shall answer,
or what ye shall say:
12 For the Holy Ghost shall teach you in the same hour what ye
ought to say.
In verse 4, He mentions his friends, and these are the
workers. John the Baptist is known as a
friend of the Bridegroom, and the 144,000 are also known as the friends of
God.
Before I go on, I would just like to share that as I prepared this message, everything was ready to go. In the week-and-a-half I took to get it ready, I had it all typed out with all key words highlighted, all the scriptures ready, and all was in order. I always go in well-prepared before I present one of my devotionals. The weekend prior to posting it, I wanted to read it again. I read it with conviction and in the Spirit wanting Father to reveal if there was anything that I should take out or even add in. As I read it and got about nine pages in, my spirit just felt dead. What I read was dead. When I prepared it initially, it was alive. The conviction that came through the pages and all the connections spoke of His hand upon it, and yet when I read it later, it was as dead as a doornail. It seemed there was no anointing on it. It was at that moment Father spoke to me. This is what I previously referred to in verse 15 not to hold on to the things which we possess and that a man is not the sum of what he possesses. What He was saying to me is, “I don’t want you to prepare beforehand; instead let Me speak through you. Yes, you know more or less what I want to talk about, but I don’t want you to go prepared before me. I want you completely dependent upon Me.” I must tell you I was thinking of Moses, officially a murderer and a fugitive, who he spent 40 years in the desert, and then came upon a burning bush all to receive one line, “Let my people go”. Here he is assigned to go to the Pharaoh of Egypt who was seen as a god, a mighty man with many slaves and people revering him. He, Moses, a fugitive and a murderer and a man of stammering lips, is to go and walk into the presence of this man and say with the authority of God, “Let my people go”. What kind of faith is required to do that? All because he saw a bush burning and heard a voice? I doubt that.
This is what all the wilderness experiences in our lives are all about…to deal with the very issue of the fear of man in our lives. When I think of the time we are going into, I cannot help but think that there will be no gray areas left. At this moment, people are still opinionated and have an opinion about everything. Then there are also of those with no opinion. This reminds me of something my daughter said to me the other day. She was talking to me about the people who are identifying themselves as various things, even wolves and other animals. I responded that maybe we should identify as “unidentifieds”. At that moment, it made me think that we can still sit on the fence and say that we don’t identify with any of these things, or we don’t have an opinion about it. But there is a time coming, very soon, where there will be no gray area or fence-sitting; you will either be for Him or against Him. Yeshua said, “He that is not with me is against me; and he that gathereth not with me scattereth abroad.” (Matthew 12:30). In this time that is coming, there will be persecution, and we will be seen as the outcasts and the scum of the earth, to be taken out and hunted down. In the face of that kind of fear that will be prevalent, we cannot sit with the issue of the fear of man in our hearts. We cannot depend on man or look to man. We will have to be holy and utterly total towards God. This is the thing about the gospel… the true gospel of God is an offense. The Lord God orchestrated it in such a way that it is offensive, and the offense is the totality that it requires. Those Christians that are still mediocre and lukewarm, knowing what to say and using the right lingo, but their hearts are not ablaze, are not sold out to Him. They don’t give everything over to God, and their focus is not where His is. They are trotting along making sure that their noses are clean and they are not exposed. They go to church and pray and read their bibles, but they are not truly in love with the Bridegroom; they are still lukewarm. They will be found out when the “heat” comes in the time to come. It is now the time to deal with the issues of the fear of man, so that when we stand before authorities and magistrates, a sentence of death or imprisonment or slavery is given, we will truly, truly fear no evil. Not because it is written, but because it is a reality for us. We will have dealt with the fear of man.
3 And as he journeyed, he came near Damascus: and suddenly
there shined round about him a light from heaven:
5 And he said, Who art thou, Lord? And the Lord said, I am
Jesus whom thou persecutest: it is hard for thee to kick against the pricks.
Kicking against the pricks is a reference to pricking the
heels of cattle to get them to do what was needed, so here Yeshua is telling
Saul that he is resisting the guidance of His voice; he is resisting the
Spirit. It is very interesting that his name is Saul. We know there is another Saul in
scripture. In my previous devotional "Two
Johns and a Jezebel", I pointed out that Saul is a type and shadow of
the Jezebel spirit, that antichrist spirit, that in these last days will
persecute the children and true prophets of God. It is that same spirit that is here in the
type and shadow of Saul, the Pharisaical spirit. The Word tell us that members of our own
families and of our churches, those with a Pharisaical spirit, they will think
they are doing God a service by giving us over to the authorities. Both the Saul in the Old Testament and the
Saul in the New Testament are a type and shadow of the Jezebel spirit and the
antichrist spirit that will come against the “Davids”, with this being a type
and shadow of Yeshua. It is a spirit
that is covetous of the gifts of the Spirit that will be used mightily at this
time.
Reading further in verse 7:
This is the most important part of this scripture… seeing no man. The men who were with Saul could not see the man he was speaking to. But even so, it is the fact that no man was seen. There was a voice speaking, and this is what He wants to do in us, that we will come to the point where we see no man and all we are about is God. We see no man, including ourselves. At the moment, we are so self-conscious and self-aware of what will be and how God will use us or about our call; the self-awareness is heightened. Father wants to get us to the point where we see no man, not even ourselves and we will not look to ourselves for anything.
Saul, now becoming Paul, was blind and was guided by the men who were with him, almost like a babe, so dependent upon someone else to guide him. This is what happens with the opening of the eyes where you see no man. It brings you into such dependence upon God, to such a place of weakness and awareness that you have nothing to give and your words fall to the ground. This is what happened when I read what I had prepared for this devotional, which was seemingly significant and interesting with important information, but it lacked the power. It lacked the anointing, because my dependence was on what I prepared. Even though He showed me all these things, He did not want me to look to man, to my own wisdom and understanding, not to anything that I had compiled, and not even my past and everything I’ve been through. He wanted me to look only to Him and to be blind to whatever I could give, so that He could speak to His children a word in season and of Him alone.
He told the multitude and His disciples that man does not
live by bread alone but from every word that proceeds out of the mouth of
God. He also told this to the enemy
during his 40-day fast. We are to live
by the words that come out of His mouth, so that we are so dependent upon Him
that in the time to come, the Spirit will remind us of what He has said and
give us utterance. This will be because
we are so given over to Him alone and we see no man.
24 But Jesus did not commit himself unto them, because he knew
all men,
25 And needed not that any should testify
of man: for he knew what was in man.
The Word says that the heart is deceitful and desperately
wicked, who can know it? He says in
Jeremiah 17:10, “I, the Lord search the heart, I try the reins, even to give
every man according to his ways, and according to the fruit of his doings.” Yeshua knew what was in the heart of man, and
that is why He did not commit Himself to man.
23 That all men should honour the Son, even as they honour the
Father. He that honoureth not the Son honoureth not the Father which hath sent
him.
24 Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth my word,
and believeth on him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come
into condemnation; but is passed from death unto life.
25 Verily, verily, I say unto you, The hour is coming, and now
is, when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God: and they that hear
shall live.
26 For as the Father hath life in himself; so hath he given to
the Son to have life in himself…
He is the patterned son for us to emulate, and He says that
in His own ability as a man, He can do nothing.
He says, “As I hear, I judge”, not “as I know or as I have learned
through studying all these years from a young child going to the temple and
learning scriptures and accumulating information”. No, He says, “as I hear”. He explains that it is in the moment that He
hears that He speaks, and that is when He judges, because He hears the Father
speak. He seeks not His own will, not
that of His own flesh, understanding, and even wisdom from scripture, however
true and impressive it may be. He seeks
only to hear His Father’s voice, and in that moment, then He speaks so that
only the Father’s will may be known.
Even further He says:
32 There is another that beareth witness of me; and I know
that the witness which he witnesseth of me is true.
33 Ye sent unto John, and he bare witness unto the truth.
34 But I receive not testimony from man: but these things I
say, that ye might be saved.
He
does not receive a witness from man and does not need us to agree with Him or
approve of Him. He does not look to man
to give Him a pat on the back or tell Him how eloquent His words are, or to
affirm Him, or to thank Him. He simply
testifies of the Father. The words that
He speaks are those of the Father, so when we reject Him, we are rejecting Him
who sent Him. This is why it is important
for us to understand that when He tells us not to prepare beforehand what we
will speak, it has everything to do with not fearing man and being wholly and
completely dependent upon God to hear His voice in that moment. Just as it was in the case with Saul who fell
down to the ground and said, “Who are you Lord?”, then He heard the voice. This is God’s same dealing with us. You must also fall to the ground and say,
“Who are you Lord? That I may hear your voice, that I may be blind and see no
man, but only hear your voice, so that I can be a vessel given over to you and
speak your word that you give me in that moment”. So, when they come against us and reject us, just
as in John 16, we can know that the servant is not greater than his master. If they persecuted the Master, they will
surely persecute the servants. We can
know according to His word, that He said when they reject us, they actually
reject the Father who sent us. Just as
when Yeshua said that it was not Him they rejected, but they rejected the
Father who sent Him.
35 He was a burning and a shining light: and ye were willing
for a season to rejoice in his light.
36 But I have greater witness than that of John: for the works
which the Father hath given me to finish, the same works that I do, bear
witness of me, that the Father hath sent me.
37 And the Father himself, which hath sent me, hath borne
witness of me. Ye have neither heard his voice at any time, nor seen his shape.
38 And ye have not his word
abiding in you: for whom he hath sent, him ye believe not.
Yeshua
tells them here that they rejoiced in the light of John the Baptist – a man –
they were willing to receive this light.
But He was one with the greater witness than John, because the Father
sent Him. They did not hear His voice,
because they had not fallen down to the ground to ask, “Who are you
Lord?”. They had not humbled themselves
or come into the Father’s presence, asking Him to reveal Himself to them. They had not seen themselves in the light of
who He is. They did not fear God,
because they did not know God. They were
willing to receive the word a man, John the Baptist, and were willing to
accommodate his preaching and listen to what he had to say. But not Yeshua, who has the light and the
Father speaking through Him. He was an
offense to them, shaking them in their categories, confronting them with their
religiosity and dependence upon self and the way they deemed God to be. They were holding on to how they see God and
had already determined in their minds and hearts who the Father is. They had already determined His ways and how
He operates, and they were willing to accommodate their own understanding. But when Yeshua speaks the truth, and the
gospel is an offense to them because it required that they give up their own
understanding of the Father, then they were offended and not willing to receive
the light that would expose their own darkness.
They believed in their own light, their own fleshly understanding. He says:
40 And ye will not come to me, that ye might have life.
They
had searched the scriptures and gained their own understanding of the Father;
but it was the scriptures that testified of Yeshua and who He is, and He was
the one who wanted to reveal Himself to them that they may know Him. Likely to us as well… we can boast ourselves in the scriptures in
how much we know. We can memorize
scripture, gain more understanding through the Strong’s Concordance, we can put
all the puzzle pieces together, and we can even go out and minister using
eloquent words based on scripture that sound very impressive. However, the difference between life and
death lies in whether or not we have the ear to hear and allow Him to speak
through us, because only those are the words of life, that two-edged sword that
will pierce through marrow and bone and will prick the hearts of those who
listen to us. This is just as the hearts
of the people who were pricked when they listened to Peter speak after the
outpouring of the Holy Spirit. He
confronted them as the Spirit came over him and he began to testify that they
were the ones who crucified Christ. That
“pricking” means they were vexed in spirit and irritated emotionally, and they
cried out, “What must we do to be saved?”.
That is a word of life that comes from a mouth of someone wholly given
over to the Spirit and it pierces into the hearts of people, not stroking them,
causing them to say, “Interesting point, let me think about it. Or, let me pray about it and come back to
you.” In this situation with Peter, they were literally pricked in their hearts
and spirits, causing them to cry out in desperation. This is how the Father wants to use us, but
unless we fall to the ground and say, “I bear myself before you God to take
away any dependence upon any form of flesh that I hold onto, no matter how much
understanding I have accumulated over the years or how beautiful or impressive
it sounds. I come before you as
nothing. I know nothing, and I have
nothing to say. Only your words of life
will be able to raise the dead.”
Ultimately the Jews Yeshua was speaking to would not come to Him that
they might have life, because the cost was too great. The gospel was an offense to them and was not
going to accommodate where they were or how they viewed Him.
Him
not receiving honor from men is the same as not receiving testimony from
man. He was saying that He would reject anything
nice they might want to say about Him or any approval they might want to
give. In Mark 10 in the story of the
rich young man who asks Yeshua what he must do to be saved, he approaches Him
and says, “Good Master, what shall I do that I may inherit eternal life?” Yeshua answers with, “Why callest thou me
good? There is none good but one, that
is, God.” He is saying there is no good
in man, and this is what He has to show us.
He has to show us the depths of the depravity of our hearts. He has to lift up that veil, as a light from
heaven figuratively speaking, of the depths of our own understanding regarding
the depths of the depravity of our hearts.
This is true especially when it comes to our religious service – how we
serve Him, how we worship, how we minister, how we talk, how we study, and what
we know. Ultimately where Jezebel hides,
this antichrist spirit and flesh that exalts itself against God, is in
religion; it hides in our walk. Remember
Saul, a Pharisee of Pharisees, with one impressive resume that he could have
boasted in, counted it all dung for the excellency of knowing Christ. It is all about knowing God, but you can only
know Him, when He shows you who you are…nothing, dust.
Somehow the love of God is vitally connected to knowing Him
as He truly is. He is basically saying
to them, “Because you don’t know my Father, you cannot perceive that which I
say, because my Father is ultimate. He
asks everything. And He is asking this
of those who will follow Him.” He says, “If any man come to me, and hate not his father, and
mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own
life also, he cannot be my disciple.” (Luke 14: 26). Why
would He say that we must “hate” these people and ourselves? This is obviously quite contrary to what the
world says, “You must love yourself”, or the lie that “You cannot love another
person unless you love yourself “. That
is the problem… we don’t hate ourselves; we love ourselves. This is why we get offended, depressed, and
cannot take critique. It’s not because
we don’t love ourselves, it’s because we do love ourselves and cannot handle
it. But He says that unless you hate that
life in you -- that “self” who wants to exalt itself in a religious garb, that
self that wants to depend on what it knows and its own wisdom -- unless you
hate that and you deny that, you cannot be my disciple. Being His disciple means you’ve left all
those things, and you see no man. You
see only God. You do not look for the
approval of man, and you do not fear man.
You are wholly dependent upon the words of life that He gives you.
He is
saying that we have a choice that you can either receive honor from God or
honor from man. You can have a man
applaud you and tell you all these nice things and build you up, and you can
say you are doing it for me, but deep in your heart, you know you relish and
enjoy it. Or you can seek the honor that
comes from Him, but this honor does not come immediately. It comes right at the end when you will
receive a crown. But will you be able to
wait in the face of persecution for the honor that comes from Him alone? If not, it shows your unbelief. This is why He says, “How can ye believe,
which receive honour one of another…?”
The honor of man has everything to do with unbelief. If there is anything in you that still gets
offended when you don’t get a thank you, when you don’t get recognition; or
when you have to do something you don’t want to do and you mope and moan; or if
you still need to do something so that you are recognized or you want to be
seen as the prophet of the hour with the greatest dreams and visions… If there is anything like this still in you,
no matter how small, knowing that a little leaven will leaven the whole lump;
if there is anything Pharisaical like this in you that covets these things of
man, you are still in unbelief, and you do not know the Father. You do not know Him as you ought. When you do know the Father, you will be
brought to dust, you will see no man, and you will be utterly dependent upon
Him and His Spirit, and you will not dare to look to yourself. You will cling to Him in utter weakness,
because this is how the Spirit waxes strong.
In Luke 1, it says that John the Baptist’s spirit waxed strong, and in Luke
2, it says that Yeshua’s spirit waxed strong.
God’s currency is your weakness for His strength; for in your weakness, He
is strong. When you are weak, and when
you are suffering and going through all these types of things, this is how He
does business with us. “Your everything
for My everything. Then I alone will get
the glory, the honor, and the praise.”
The
word says, “Blessed is the man who is pure in heart, for he shall see God” (Matthew
5: 8). It has everything to do with the
purity of heart, being without guile, and not cutting corners when we speak to
people. What kind of person will it take
to endure in the time to come, when there is no gray area and we are either for
Him or against Him, and people will hate us because we are for Him? What kind of work will the Father have to do in
us to make us that kind of person who will not fear death? What does He need to work in us so that we
will not cut corners when we need to speak truth? How can we become those people who will not play
games or placate to people’s needs but instead speak the truth in love so that
it will cut to the heart, even to the bone and marrow? The only way this can be done is when we say,
“Lord judge me first. Let me fall to the
ground. Judge me by your word. Expose the leaven in my heart and the trust I
have in my own understanding and all I have accumulated. Expose the idolatry of my heart and anything
that is at enmity with you.” We ask
Father to do these things, even though they are covered in religious garb,
because it will persecute the truth that He wants to speak through us. It silences the truth, because we would
rather want to be seen and have the biggest platform. We say, “I want to glorify Him”, but it is actually,
“I want to be seen.” Our desire must be,
“Expose this in me Father, so that I am nothing in my own sight and I see no
man and only you. I hear your voice, and
I see you, because I have allowed the two-edged sword to judge me first.” This is the reason the sword is double-edged,
because both sides cut, first cutting the speaker before he goes out to preach,
so that he will only speak that which God gives him to speak. He has allowed the sword of the Spirit to cut
him first, before he goes out with that sword and cuts into the hearts and
pricks the hearts of men. It is a living
word then, because it has become a reality.
27 John answered and said, A man can receive nothing, except
it be given him from heaven.
28 Ye yourselves bear me witness, that I said, I am not the
Christ, but that I am sent before him.
29 He that hath the bride is the bridegroom: but the friend of
the bridegroom, which standeth and heareth him, rejoiceth greatly because of
the bridegroom's voice: this my joy therefore is fulfilled.
30 He must increase, but I must decrease.
31 He that cometh from above is above all: he that is of the
earth is earthly, and speaketh of the earth: he that cometh from heaven is
above all.
32 And what he hath seen and heard, that he testifieth; and no
man receiveth his testimony.
33 He that hath received his testimony hath set to his seal
that God is true.
34 For he whom God hath sent speaketh the words of God: for
God giveth not the Spirit by measure unto him.
We
can receive nothing, unless it comes from God.
Whatever you have to give will fall to the ground if it comes from
yourself, no matter how great a revelation you think it is. It has to be His words through you. John says that he hears the voice of God, and
he is not the light, but He hears the voice of the One who is. He acknowledges himself as a man and dust,
and that what he has to say is human wisdom, even though it is religious. It is only words of life that cause the dead
to be raised. The word, “Apostle”, means
sent. And a word coming from one who is
sent, is a “sent word” from God. Just as
Moses was the first apostle sent to Pharoah; he is a sent one with a sent word
because he has received it from above.
In order to receive it from above, he must decrease, so that God may
increase, so that it is the literal word of God through his mouth and not the
word of the apostle or prophet or anyone sent to speak. As Isaiah said in chapter 6 when the train
filled the temple, “Woe is me, because I am a man of unclean lips…”. He acknowledged he was just a man with
unclean lips, aware of the guile in his heart before a mighty holy God. He asked the Lord to touch his lips, and the
angel came and did so with a burning coal.
The living word of God must touch our mouth, and He will only do that
when we realize we are a man with unclean lips; we are nothing and have nothing
to give, unless He gives it from above and unless we hear His voice.
36 He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life: and he
that believeth not the Son shall not see life; but the wrath of God abideth on
him.
It is
a mercy and a grace for God to extend this time for us to seek His face that He
may reveal Himself to us. In
earnestness, we must seek Him and say, “Lord, who are you? I’ve served you for so many years, and I am
tired of this world and Christian clichés.
I’m tired of hearing of dreams and visions, but yet I don’t have the
reality of who you are in my life. I
want you to be so real to me that I see no man; that I don’t even see my own
seeing or hear my own hearing, that I don’t speak my own words. But instead, it is you. As a servant or
handmaiden is looking to her Master, I am looking to your hand Lord. I am looking to you to move; I don’t want to
move. I want the reality of God, of who
you are as the truth in my life, even if it means everything that is not real
in me or that is dressed in false religious garb must be exposed.
I would like to share a word that Father gave me back on February 27th of this year before He showed me all these things. He is so faithful to come afterwards and flesh it out and bring substance to it. I pray that you will hear what He has to say.
FROM DUST
TO GLORY
I the Lord dwell with the lowly.
Those who
seek not honor nor glory but choose the path of humility.
They seek
not the applause of men nor the praise of the crowds.
Those who
seek Me in the lowly places of their inner sanctuary, who are contrite and
broken and know that they are dust.
For
surely when they have come to this place, they cannot raise themselves.
They can
only see My feet.
But I
will raise them in My appointed time to be kings and priests who have walked on
the road I have travelled.
They have
followed Me when I called and were willing to go into the depths of depravity
and poverty of spirit.
For
blessed are the poor in spirit, yes blessed indeed, for I will raise them up
from dust to glory.
But who
can ascend into My holy hill and stand before Me in My presence?
Only
those who have travelled to the depths of darkness and have seen and know the
depravity of their own hearts.
Those who
are willing to look and see and be known as even as I know them.
For them
is given to know Me, to know My heart, and to come into My secret counsel.
They see
only Me, therefore, they are not lured into the temptations of this world.
They look
neither to the left or right but only see Me.
Therefore,
they will not follow another, for they truly know My voice.
I will
teach them My ways and will guide them to walk through the valley of the shadow
of death, as there is no darkness in them.
A light
unto many to lead to Me, many will follow simply because they follow Me.
And they will lead many of My lost sheep
into the shelter of My arms.
It is
them I anoint and their cup will surely run over.
For they
were willing to drink the cup of poverty of spirit.
Therefore,
I will not only restore but give in abundance to those who walk in lowliness of
mind.
Then
those who seek only Me, they will come up to the mountain and there be fed in
My presence and My glory forever more.
I
think of Psalm 24:
PSALM 24
1 The earth is the Lord's, and the fulness thereof; the
world, and they that dwell therein.
2 For
he hath founded it upon the seas, and established it upon the floods.
3 Who
shall ascend into the hill of the Lord?
or who shall stand in his holy place?
4 He
that hath clean hands, and a pure heart; who hath not lifted up his
soul unto vanity, nor sworn deceitfully.
5 He
shall receive the blessing from the Lord,
and righteousness from the God of his salvation.
6 This
is the generation of them that seek him, that seek thy face, O Jacob. Selah.
7 Lift
up your heads, O ye gates; and be ye lift up, ye everlasting doors; and the
King of glory shall come in.
8 Who
is this King of glory? The Lord strong
and mighty, the Lord mighty
in battle.
9 Lift
up your heads, O ye gates; even lift them up, ye everlasting doors; and the
King of glory shall come in.
10 Who
is this King of glory? The Lord of
hosts, he is the King of glory. Selah.
These are they, they who are willing to have clean hearts and
hands with no guile in their hearts; these are they who seek Him. In verse 9, it says, “Lift up your heads, O
ye gates…, and the King of glory shall come in”. Think of your mouth as a gate, think of the
Lord who comes into our hearts and He walks through the gates of our mouth as
the King of Glory. It is a word filled
with the glory of God coming out of a pure vessel. That word that comes out of your mouth comes
and brings life. This is why He tells us
not to think ahead of what we will speak, because the Spirit will give you
utterance. As a vessel given over to
Him, the Spirit will utter life-giving words out of your mouth as living water. Just as Proverbs 10:11 says, “The mouth of a
righteous man is a well of life”. Your
words will be a well of life, and it will give life. People will look to us and want to go with
us, because we have the words of life.
Just as Peter looked to Yeshua and said, “Lord, to whom shall we go? Thou
alone hast the words of eternal life.” (John 6: 68)
1
CORINTHIANS 1
17 For Christ sent me not to baptize, but to preach the
gospel: not with wisdom of words, lest the cross of Christ should be made of
none effect.
18 For the preaching of the cross is to them that perish
foolishness; but unto us which are saved it is the power of God.
19 For it is written, I will destroy the wisdom of the wise,
and will bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent.
20 Where is the wise? where is the scribe? where is the
disputer of this world? hath not God made foolish the wisdom of this world?
21 For after that in the wisdom of God the world by wisdom
knew not God, it pleased God by the foolishness of preaching to save them that
believe.
Paul is saying that if he speaks of everything he knows as
a “Pharisee of Pharisees” and can give great understanding of the scriptures,
coming with the wisdom of his own knowledge, he would then make the cross of
Christ of none of effect. Paul wanted to
come in weakness so that he could depend upon the finished work of the cross,
so that the power could be manifested in what he was speaking. When you are fully dependent upon God to
speak through you, because you are weak, you are manifesting the power of the
cross through your words. It will be the
power of God made manifest through a weak vessel, and here He alone gets the
glory and the honor and the praise.
Remember the Pharisees, those who thought they knew the scriptures and
could open up the word to the people.
The people went to them for understanding. Paul is saying that even that is to be made
foolishness, for when God speaks, whatever man knows and however impressive and
true, falls to the ground as dust. Only
His words have the words of life, eternal life.
Continuing in verse 22:
23 But we preach Christ crucified, unto the Jews a
stumblingblock, and unto the Greeks foolishness;
24 But unto them which are called, both Jews and Greeks,
Christ the power of God, and the wisdom of God.
25 Because the foolishness of God is wiser than men; and the
weakness of God is stronger than men.
26 For ye see your calling, brethren, how that not many wise
men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called:
27 But God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to
confound the wise; and God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound
the things which are mighty;
28 And base things of the world, and things which are
despised, hath God chosen, yea, and things which are not, to bring to nought
things that are:
29 That no flesh should glory in his presence.
30 But of him are ye in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto
us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption:
31 That, according as it is written, He that glorieth, let him
glory in the Lord.
Paul says that the Jews require a sign, because they are in
unbelief, a wicked generation seeking signs.
The Greeks seek after wisdom, as they lean upon the tree of the
knowledge of good and evil, even if it is in Christian things. He emphatically states that he and those like
him preach Christ crucified, they preach totality of the cross, weakness, they
are nothing, and they preach that it is only Him and they see no man. And then this preaching is received by the
Jews as a stumbling block and by the Greeks as foolishness. But to the called, it is received as the
power and wisdom of God. This is just
like me… a housewife in South Africa with nothing to my name. That is God’s wisdom. That is what He does; He uses His “nobodies.” We must be a nobody. It cannot be just lip service. We must be brought into that reality. When we stand before the magistrates and
those in authority and He speaks through these weak vessels, these “nobodies”,
it will confound them, because it will be His words.
2 For I determined not to know any thing among you, save
Jesus Christ, and him crucified.
3 And I was with you in weakness, and in fear, and in much
trembling.
4 And my speech and my preaching was not with enticing words
of man's wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power:
5 That your faith should not stand in the wisdom of men, but
in the power of God.
6 Howbeit we speak wisdom among them that are perfect: yet
not the wisdom of this world, nor of the princes of this world, that come to
nought:
7 But we speak the wisdom of God in a mystery, even the
hidden wisdom, which God ordained before the world unto our glory:
8 Which none of the princes of this world knew: for had they
known it, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.
9 But as it is written, Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard,
neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared
for them that love him.
10 But God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit: for the
Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God.
11 For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit
of man which is in him? even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the
Spirit of God.
12 Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the
spirit which is of God; that we might know the things that are freely given to
us of God.
13 Which things also we speak, not in the words which man's
wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth; comparing spiritual things
with spiritual.
14 But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit
of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because
they are spiritually discerned.
15 But he that is spiritual judgeth all things, yet he himself
is judged of no man.
16 For who hath known the mind of the Lord, that he may
instruct him? but we have the mind of Christ.
Paul was clear that he did not come with wisdom and the
things he understood. He came in
complete dependence upon God, and that left him in weakness fear and
trembling. He didn’t come to impress
them. He came to speak the wisdom and
mysteries of God. When God speaks, He
speaks in mysteries as well. Those who
are not in the Spirit, who are still carnal and depend upon their understanding
of scripture, how they see things, and all they have accumulated, they are
still carnally minded whilst they think they are spiritually minded. They cannot receive the things of the Spirit,
because they still see man. They still
see and depend upon themselves, and they do not live by faith. They are still in unbelief. When we trust the Father as we ought, we
receive the things that He has prepared for us by the Spirit, the mysteries and
the wisdom of God. As a man, we cannot
know the things of God, but the Spirit of God speaks to us and freely teaches
and gives us these things. That natural
man in us, with our own understanding and opinions and ways of thinking about
God and life and everything, hates and is in enmity with the Spirit of
God. The natural man must be brought to naught,
to the dust, and to fall and be blinded so that we see no man, not even
ourselves.
The Lord has led me to do a voice recording of a book I read some time ago, called “The Antichrist in Man”. With the previous short teaching video I posted, “The Appointed Time”, I was speaking about the different veils of the worker bride during the tribulation, which were scarlet, purple, white and gold. I mentioned how we find the same example with Jezebel in Revelation 17, also dressed in scarlet, purple and gold and pearls. We see that she represents the bride of satan, so to speak, and how the enemy duplicates the bride of Christ and what she will look like. This book speaks of this Jezebel, the flesh that depends upon our own understanding, that is in enmity with the Spirit of God in us and wants to persecute it. When we look at the Book of Revelation, we see the macro view of the end time as an eschatological understanding. This book, “The Antichrist in Man”, speaks of the reality of that within us. It was written in 1647 and is very revealing, exposing the works of the flesh in us. I plan to post it on YouTube and on my Telegram channel in 15 - 20 minute segments. I pray that you will listen and allow the Spirit to show you these things and allow Him to bring you to that place of nothing. I believe Father guided me to do this in order to serve His children and minister to you and encourage you to allow the Lord to bring you to such a place where you say, “Lord, cut it to the marrow, bring the ax to the root, so that I am fully dependent upon you in the time to come.”
I pray that you will hear what the Spirit is saying to us in these last days and continue to seek His face every day, asking the question, “Who are you Lord?”.
