Over many many years Absalom stole the hearts of the people of Israel. You see, Absalom wanted what his father had. He wanted the exalted place among the people. He would rise up early and stand beside the gate and those who came looking for the king, he intercepted them and spoke to them. They were not his people, they were his fathers people but Absalom, falling foul to that most ancient of sins that caused Lucifer to fall down from the heavens, desired to have what was not his to have. And so he wooed the hearts of the people away from their King.
Is that not the very essence of religion? There is one mediator between man and God and His name is Jesus. How many men and religious institutions have sought to replace Jesus over all the centuries? One pretender after another, rising early in the morning, slowly and deceptively seeking to displace God and stealing the hearts of the people away from their rightful King. And all the worse is the fact that so many of these men and institutions knew something of the mercy of God, had been blessed in many ways by His goodness and His forgiveness. They had been touched by His love and by His word which only serves to make their deception and their desire to have what He alone has all the more treacherous.
And so finally David hears of this rebellion against him. Oh what a dagger must have penetrated his heart, to know that his very own had turned on him. One that he loved and had forgiven and had showed mercy too, and he repaid all of that with hatred and animosity and a heart bent on taking what was not his. It is hard to imagine the anguish of David, now no longer a young man, having suffered so much in his life and so much of it undeserved, now as an older man, having to flee from everything that had been his. The city of David, the tabernacle, the ark of the covenant would all be left behind and he and a remnant few would flee the jealous forces that were arraigned against him. They would flee into the wilderness.
Today there is a remnant few who have fled into the wilderness. They have left the city behind with all of its religious trappings. No walls, no tabernacle, no ark of the covenant. Stripped of all the religious trappings, they have something that David had. He had the presence of God with Him. Not that which represents the presence, but the actual presence of God. While religious men hung onto the trappings and rituals and icons, for that is all they have, David goes into the wilderness, the remnant go into the wilderness with God Himself. And as he ascended Gods holy hill he wept, he and the people with him wept. With tears the seed is sown brothers and sisters, tears of sorrow for what has become of something that should have been so beautiful and brought glory to God, but has been so thoroughly corrupted by men who desire to steal the glory of God and steal the hearts of the people.
Do not despair in the wilderness brothers and sisters. In God we have peace no matter what men think about us. In God we can rejoice despite the fact that the forces of Absalom are arrayed against the remnant few. Listen to some of the things that David says in this time and be comforted…… Because thou hast been my help, therefore in the shadow of thy wings will I rejoice…… because thy lovingkindness is better than life, my lips shall praise thee……….I remember thee upon my bed, and meditate on thee in the night watches……….From the end of the earth will I cry unto thee, when my heart is overwhelmed: lead me to the rock that is higher than I……………………. For thou hast been a shelter for me, and a strong tower from the enemy.
There is an inevitable end to the forces of Absalom, those who would attempt steal the glory of God and from His King. David speaks to this very thing and to those very forces in psalm 63……But those that seek my soul, to destroy it, shall go into the lower parts of the earth. They shall fall by the sword: they shall be a portion for foxes. But the king shall rejoice in God; every one that sweareth by him shall glory: but the mouth of them that speak lies shall be stopped. Glory to God saints! Is the end we shall come out of the wilderness by the power of God. The soul that weeps, the soul that thirsts after God in the wilderness shall find joy and inexhaustible waters of life even in the driest deserts and when He comes again into His rightful place then all of God saints will rise up and cry Holy.
Years ago I saw a documentary of a certain part of Africa. For 10 long months it sees no rain. First the mighty river dries up and then it becomes pools.Then the pools slowly shrink until they are nothing more than wet mud-holes. In this particular documentary, it showed a giant crocodile that had taken up residence right in the middle of a mud-hole. Despite its presence, deer and other animals risked their very lives in order to partake in the last of the water. A small number of animals, rather than taking up residence with the crocodile,undertook a long migration in search of water. Yet almost all the animals that were indigenous to this geographic location, refused to go in search of water and died before the rains came. Animals that in normal circumstances would never come within 100 yards of a crocodile, came right up beside him in a desperate attempt to get some satisfaction, from this drying mud-hole.
When God withdraws the rain of His presence from the church we see many strange things. The majority stay where they are and slowly die as they throw their lot in with their former predators.Others, like the deer that panteth for the water-brooks, are driven to make journeys they would otherwise never make. Driven out into the deserts and dry places in their desperate desire to find living waters. The tragedy for many in the “church” today is that they can live a life, devoid of His presence, and not even know that they are dying. Imagine that this ten months without rain is a season or seasons in Christendom. Generation after generation sucking on mud, barely surviving on the moisture that remains in the mud hole. Getting down and dirty in the mud, and being dangerously close to the world as they try to survive in the dry season. To try and operate in this world as a church without the Holy Spirit and the presence of the living God is to be reliant upon a mud-hole. Vestige of some by- gone days where once the river flowed. Talk of past victories but no present life. Living on memories and manna from a bygone age.
As someone who now lives in Kansas, a place that only gets about 33 inches of rain a year, I know how dry the ground can become and how deep that dryness is. At first when it rains the rain merely flows over the top surface. The ground is so hard it does not penetrate. It needs to consistently rain over several days for the ground to become saturated,to be thoroughly penetrated. Flash floods come and go very quickly and when it is gone, it is like it has never rained because it never penetrated. Yet, when it rains consistently over time, the effects are deep and lasting.There is a deep penetrating rain coming for Gods people. He has taken His people into the wilderness, the valley of death, the valley of decision. Because of the intensity of the battle that lies just ahead of us, it was and is necessary for the Lord to take His people into the desert place of testing. They have left the mud-holes of the world and the crocodiles behind. They refused to stay and die in a place of compromise. They have been driven into the desert and there they will find the Church, in a place where it seems impossible for anything to live, never mind thrive. Survival here does not depend upon traditions or past victories or the dusty heritage of religion. No, rather it depends upon the hand of God alone., A place where we once again cry out to the Living God for Him and Him only. Those who truly desire Him will stay in this place of testing. The Remnant of Gods people will prevail for our God is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him.
Yes there is an intensity of persecution for Gods people just appearing on the horizon. There are storm clouds gathering even as you read this. There is coming a time such as has never been seen before for Gods people. Yet with huge storm clouds come great rain falls. God will pour out His Spirit in a such a way that His children will stand in the pouring saturating rain of His presence. And despite the intense persecution and all out war that the old serpent will wage on us, we will rejoice and glorify and lift our hands on high. We will praise God for the rain that falls. The persecution will seem light in comparison to the eternal weight of glory that is to be experienced in His presence. God will inhabit the praises of His people who worship Him with their whole hearts. Gods people will only care that His presence is with them. As long as He goes before them, they will follow. They will follow Him right into the valley of the shadow of death. For they know that He will lead them to the pure waters of life.They will allow nothing to separate them from their God. Stay the course brothers and sisters, the rain is coming, and then comes the King.
I believe God will ignore most of the Evangelical churches standing today. They have what they want, they are satisfied with what they have, and there is no room in their program for the Holy Spirit to do His thing…………………to go forward requires that we go backward to rediscover and reclaim our spiritual roots. We have abandoned our roots and are wandering helplessly in a spiritual desert………what is happening across the board cannot be salvaged from a spiritual standpoint, and the chances are pretty high that God may have to start all over again,my prayer is that it happens quickly…..I am not sure this can begin in todays church. I am absolutely sure it cannot begin in most denominations (Tozer- Alive in the Spirit)
Now can I suggest that since this was written over fifty years ago, brother Tozer could be even more emphatic than his above statements. In Psalm 11 David asks “What can the righteous do in the foundations are destroyed?” What will happen when the average Evangelical church has exactly what it wants but is given over to leanness? ( psalm 106 13-15) Can dimmed lights replace leanness? How about musical concerts? Smoke machines? What disaster has befallen us? We are exceedingly lean people wandering lost in a desert of our own request and all we have to encourage ourselves is crowds? Somehow, if we have many folks walking through the doors and three services on a Sunday then maybe no one will notice the leanness? If they do we just need to make it darker or increase the entertainment value. Lets start to teach them how to live and somehow ignore the fact that the Holy Scriptures first teach us how to die.
Our spiritual roots which Tozer advises us to go back to can only be found in the Scriptures. If the programs have become the service then the service has to end until the only program available is the Holy Spirit’s program. What? If we shut down the programs who is going to pay the light bills and the staff’s salary. Someone might whisper “maybe we could just meet in our homes,” and upon overhearing this the professionals howled in protest. Now if we are to return to our spiritual roots where would a man give a word of wisdom? Where would a woman give a tongue? Where would one give a prophecy? Obviously not in the professional gatherings, only the ordained experts and trained worship leaders can be heard there. No scripture for that but lets not let that get in the way of the fact that this is how we have always done it for decades and centuries. Tozer goes on to say ” the next generation or two will face a challenge that cannot be overcome in the natural. Throughout history God has selected certain people to come out of the established church and start over again using biblical authority. What is happening across the board cannot be salvaged from a spiritual standpoint.”
Tozer gave a dire report on the state of the Evangelical church and its denominational counterparts fifty years ago, since then they have plunged down into the depths of leanness and depravity. One could only imagine the horror of men like Tozer and Ravenhill and even Wilkerson if they saw the depths to which the established church has fallen. Lean churches produce lean leaders who produce lean converts and that’s the best of them. The others will cross land and sea to make one convert and make them twice the child of hell than themselves. What can we do if the foundations are destroyed? We must discover anew the proper foundation that is laid down in Christ and the Apostles and the prophets. We must raise spiritual walls using only the Word of God. We must be found in these days of danger in our high towers. The righteous run into to it and they are safe. The high tower, the fortress, the deliverer, my shield in whom I trust. Upon Christ alone and upon His word we must go forward, baptized in the Holy Spirit that emboldens us to stand in such a day. This is our spiritual roots.
There is one body, and one Spirit, even as ye are called in one hope of your calling; One Lord, one faith, one baptism, One God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all.(Eph 4:4-6)
There is one Body and one Spirit and that’s the plain truth of it. Whoever attempts to divide the Body is on a fools errand. The catastrophic failure of denominationalism flows from the root failure to understand our calling. To walk as one in Christ, this is the hope of our calling. We endeavor to keep the unity of Christ which means we diligently work to tear down walls of separation just as the walls that separated the Jews from the Gentiles were torn down on the bloody battle-field of Calvary. The Body of Christ spans the world and churches and denominations. Christendom, all that calls itself after Christ is not the Body, but for the most part the Body dwells within the confines of Christendom. Christendom needs them but they do not need Christendom. For by our new birth we were born into Christ, into the Body and it is one. One faith, one baptism and one God the Father who is in us. If the Father is not in you then you are not in the Body of Christ, no matter what “church,” you belong to. If the Father is in you then you belong to the Body of Christ no matter what “church,” you belong to.
Being a member or an attendee of a “church,” is of no consequence to those in whom the Father does not dwell. Circumcised or uncircumcised has no spiritual value. Church goer or non church goer has no spiritual value outside of the Spirit of God that dwells with us. Among the true Body of Christ there are some apostles and some prophets, some evangelists and some pastors and teachers. Their purpose is to bring the saints to maturity and to edify the true Body of Christ until Christ comes again. They are not for the amusement or the hiring of the unsaved or the religious. No one outside of the Body can be edified by those whom the Lord calls, for the calling is to the one true Church. In Christendom we see “the trickery of men in the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting.” (Eph 4:14) The plotting is always in association with self-serving. Every wind of doctrine is employed by the trickery of men to build themselves up, and build for themselves a kingdom. Yet God will always have those of the Body who shall speak the truth in love, seeking only to edify and protect the Body. It is incumbent upon you, O saint, to discern these things by the Word of God and His Spirit.
1Co 14:37 If any man think himself to be a prophet, or spiritual, let him acknowledge that the things that I write unto you are the commandments of the Lord.
I will probably have a couple of devotionals on this chapter. I believe it to be one of the most important “chapters,” in the NT. Nowhere else do we have such a description of an early gathering service. Paul clearly states that what he is saying in regard to these matters is ” commandments of the Lord.” He further states that if you believe that you are a ” prophet or spiritual,”or leaders among the brethren then you must acknowledge the things of which he has just written about. And what has he just written about? He has just relayed to us “commandments of the Lord,” as to how a service should be conducted. To ignore Paul in this is to actually ignore God. He ends the chapter just as he begins it by saying “therefore brethren , desire earnestly to prophecy and do not forbid to speak with tongues. Let all things be done decently and in order.”
Before I begin to talk about the manifestation of the Spirit among us in the service, in all its many demonstrations, we must speak to the purpose of it all. The purpose of the manifestation of the Spirit among us in the service is primarily for edification. The word edification or to edify is mentioned five times in this one chapter. Those who come to Christ must be fed. We know that God Himself fed the children of Israel in the desert. Manna fell from heaven and water poured forth from the Rock. If it were not for the supernatural hand of God, all of the children of Israel would have starved in very short order or returned to Egypt. Now, in the NT God also feeds His children, and just as the children of Israel in the desert, we too shall die if He does not feed us or we shall turn to the world. We must be edified. He who prophecies speaks edification and exhortation and comfort to men.( 1 Cor 14:3) For he who prophecies is greater than he who speaks with tongues, unless indeed he interprets that the gathering may receive edification. (1 Cor 14:5) Even so, since you are zealous for spiritual gifts, let it be for the edification of the gathering. (1 Cor 14:12) Let all things be done for edification. (1 Cor 14:26)
So brothers and sisters, you see the clear purpose of the manifestation of the Holy Spirit among us as we gather. It is to edify us. To feed us, to build us up. To strengthen us. If we are not edified then we are not fed. If we reject the clear commandments of God then we are not fed. A intellect will not nourish your body, it needs to be fed spiritual food. God has, in His great wisdom, laid out how we shall be fed and from what source we shall be fed from. He is the source. He alone. We are not building up the intellect, we are strengthening the inner man. The spiritual man. And He can only be fed in the prescribed manner. Jesus says to the devil in the garden that man does not live by bread alone but by every word that proceeds forth from the mouth of God. And so our singular source of spiritual food comes from the Word of God and the mouth of God. And how then does this happen? By the manifestation of the Spirit in our midst when we gather. He edifies through the prophet. He edifies through the word of knowledge. He edifies through the word of wisdom. He edifies through the interpreted tongue. He edifies through the Word. He edifies through a teaching. He edifies us in worship as we sing praises unto Him. In all these things, and more, He speaks to us and His words are life. They feed the deepest parts of who we are that we may rise up and be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might. It is by His Spirit alone we are fed. To reject this is to starve.
A number of years ago I came across the story of the Decian persecution of Christians while I was doing research for a book I was writing. I did not include this in the book but it is interesting to consider the facts. Decian was the Roman Emperor in 250 ad. He issued an edict that required everyone in the Roman empire to perform a sacrifice. The sacrifice was to be made to the Roman gods, and also included a loyalty oath towards his rule as Emperor. (See above image) The sacrifice had to be carried out before a Roman magistrate who would then sign a certificate which would allow them to carry on with whatever business they were involved with. This certificate would enable them to buy or sell.
The particular region I was studying was Carthage. It was expected that there would be great resistance to this from the Christian community and indeed this was part of the motivation for the decree in the first place. Imprisonment and death were the penalties for those who refused to participate in the sacrifice. The Carthaginian authorities settled on the days that the city was to participate. They were totally taken by surprise by the large numbers of “Christians,’ who rushed to “get their certificate.” They had to extend the time they had allotted for the sacrifices and certificate signing.
Out of the group that refused to be involved in sacrificing to gods, many were martyred, others were imprisoned and still others went into hiding. Interestingly, at the same time as this “empire wide,” persecution, a plague had broken out and was killing up to five thousand Romans per day. This only added to the hatred of Christians as they were deemed to be in some way responsible for this. And so, when this particular persecution ended, there was a great deal of tension between those who had stood their ground for Jesus and those who had capitulated in order to save themselves.
This was not the first time this had happened, nor would it be the last. The Diocletian persecution would be the most intense staring at around 300ad and last for around a decade. Again the spit would happen. A large majority would capitulate and deny the faith, the smaller minority would be killed, imprisoned or flee. When the smoke cleared from this latest persecution, the larger group that had capitulated to the state would be the group favored by Constantine. No surprise that the Emperor would choose the group who he could count on to bow the knee to him and the State. That group were the Catholics. The minority group, the group that had refused to hand over their scriptures to the State and to bow the knee, were known as “Donatists.’ They refused to acknowledge anyone who had capitulated to Rome as a Christian. For this they were hunted down and killed.
I would just like to say that some things never change. There is and always has been a large group, a majority group, within the world that identifies itself as Christian, that will not “stand in the evil day.” It is such an evil day that separates the sheep from the goats. It is the storm that tests the foundations of the house. It is not what a man or woman calls themselves that counts for anything, it is who they actually are. Those who have received the love of the truth, who are genuinely born again, will stand in that day. They will be martyred, they will be imprisoned or they will flee. What they will not do, what they could never do, what they have never done, is to deny their Lord. As it was, so it always shall be until that glorious day when Christ returns.
The present position of Christ in the gospel churches may be likened to that of king in a limited constitutional monarchy (think of Great Britain) The king, sometimes depersonalized by the term “the Crown,” is in such a country no more than a traditional rallying point, a pleasant symbol of unity and loyalty much like a flag or a national anthem. He is lauded, feted and supported, but his real authority is small. Nominally he is head over all, but in every crisis someone else makes the decisions. On formal occasions he appears in his royal attire to deliver the tame, colorless speech put into his mouth by the real rulers of the country. The whole thing may be no more than good-natured make believe, but is rooted in antiquity, it is a lot of fun and no one wants to give it up (Tozer)
This is a quote from the last piece Tozer ever wrote. It is a confession to being part of a system that had relegated Christ to being no more than a figurehead and that same system had robbed Jesus of His authority within their gatherings. In Great Britain there is a Queen. She and her family survive within what is known as a constitutional monarchy. She has no real power. The power all resides within Parliament and the Prime Minister. These of course are elected positions, the people choose. The Queen’s main role is cutting ribbons, launching ships and drawing tourists. She also is a symbol of stability, but in the end, she could be rejected from even this limited role if the people so chose.
This is Tozer’s argument. The average church in America has relegated Jesus to a limited role. Rather than a Prime Minister, we have a senior pastor or minister. Jesus is acknowledged as Lord, of course, but it practice He has been relegated and man has taken the position. The Holy Spirit, for the most part, has no role within the average American church. The Word of God is readily dismissed in favor of tradition and customs. The Protestant world readily criticizes the Catholic mass (as well they should) as nothing more than the same thing repeated every week. (laying aside the obvious erroneous centerpiece of the Eucharist) And yet, for the most part, you also know exactly what to expect every week at your local church.
Tozer blames the following two reasons for this disaster…..1. The power of custom, precedent and tradition within older religious groups. These, like gravitation, affect every particle of religious practice withing the group, exerting a steady and constant pressure in one direction. Of course direction is toward conformity to the status quo. Not Christ but custom is Lord. And the same thing has passed over into the other groups such as the full gospel tabernacles, the holiness churches, the pentecostal and fundamental churches and the non-denominational churches found everywhere throughout the North American continent.
The second cause is the revival of intellectualism among the evangelicals. This, if I sense the situation correctly, is not so much a thirst for learning, rather a desire for a reputation of being learned. Our Evangelical faith ( which I believe to be the true faith of Christ and His Apostles) is being attacked these days from many different directions. IN the Western world the enemy has forsworn violence. He no longer comes against us with sword and fire, he now comes smiling, bearing gifts. He raises his eyes to heaven and swears that he too believes in the faith of our fathers , but his real purpose is to destroy that faith, or at least modify it to such an extent that it is no longer a supernatural thing it once was. (Tozer-The Waning Authority of Christ in the churches-pages 14-16)
Tozer lays this out almost 70 years ago, on his death bed so to speak. The old prophet saw in one last sweep of history, what had become of the professing churches. Can I say brothers and sisters, it has degraded so much more so in the last 70 years. If the authority of Jesus was waning 70 years ago in the churches, it is all but gone now. So the question becomes “what must we do.” Tozer asks that very question in the last paragraph and I will leave you with his suggestions……….
What, then, are we to do? Each one of us must decide and there are at least three possible choices. One is to rise up in shocked indignation and accuse me of irresponsible reporting. Another is to nod in general agreement with what is written here but take comfort in the fact that there are exceptions and we are among the exceptions. The other is to go down in meek humility and confess that we have grieved the Holy Spirit and dishonored our Lord in failing to give Him the place His Father has given Him as Head and Lord of the Church. Either the first or the second will but confirm the wrong. The third, if carried out to its conclusion, will remove the curse. The decision lies with us.
The Spirit of God is always the Spirit of liberty; the spirit that is not of God is the spirit of bondage, the spirit of oppression and depression. The Spirit of God convicts vividly and tenesly, but He is always the Spirit of liberty. God who made the birds never made birdcages; it is people who make birdcages, and after a while become cramped and can do nothing but chirp and stand on one leg. When we get out into God’s great free life, we discover that that is the way God means us to live “the glorious liberty of the children of God.” (Oswald Chambers)
There are two main types of garden in this world. There is the garden designed by man. Wonderful and regulated in its design, measured distances between flowers, well thought out patters that please the eye. And then there is the seed that has committed itself to the Wind of the Spirit which carries it and deposits it where it will, and there it springs up and flourishes in the garden of our God. The wide open fields of God’s great free life. The so called wildflowers that grows in open meadows or drainage ditches. or in the side-streets of slums or in valley floors or mountain ranges. Who knows where the wind of the Spirit shall deposit them. God knows.
So, shall you commit the seed of your life to the wind of the Spirit? Shall you surrender yourself to be taken wherever you shall be taken? Or shall you commit yourself to the hand of man? To the designs of men? To the relative safety found in regulation? One of those choices involves great risk but also results in great freedom. The other guarantees certainty and the price is conformity. Imagine a bird, designed to fly in open skies, trapped in a birdcage. What a tragedy. Guaranteed food and shelter but the cost is no flight in open skies. Maybe the one who constrains you lets you out of your cage every now and then and you fly straight to the window. There is something in you longing to be free as you gaze at open fields or eternal skies. It’s Gods calling. Are you free today or are you being called to freedom today?
The congregation, the gathered, the called out ones are, in and of themselves a set of instruments. Each a vital part of the orchestra and without such there can be no genuine praise and worship. Without the instruments of God making beautiful expressions composed by the Holy Spirit all we have is professional music and a professional speaker. The true instruments remain silent. And the one who fine tunes each and every one of these instruments is dismayed to see that they are silenced. .
The people hear manufactured music that lulls them to spiritual sleep. They have long forgotten that they themselves are instruments in the hands of the Master musician. When the orchestra of God has been silenced, when the conductor has been usurped, then all we are left with is noise, clanging symbols and sounding brass. Only as the full orchestra plays, conducted by the Holy Spirit Himself, can the hearts be pierced rather than be dulled and lulled into a state of slow death. For the symphony to rise to heaven all instruments must be engaged. This is the Body, all moving together, conducted by majesty and producing a magnificent holy sound that brings down the weight of heaven’s glory. We have been drowned by the noise of silence. Sparks rise up and dance in the darkness from the fires of our own making. Oh to God that the usurpers would fall and the preeminent One would take His rightful place.
Psa 97:5-6 The hills melted like wax at the presence of the LORD, at the presence of the Lord of the whole earth. The heavens declare his righteousness, and all the people see his glory.
No one stands in the presence of God, all are silent before His majesty, all are hushed as awe descends like a blanket upon the heads of His people and their heads are bowed and their hands raised up and trembling. Not because they were instructed to bow their heads or raise their hands , sit , stand ,or jump . No, no, not in the presence of God. One assumes a position before the living and the mighty God just as a natural instinct. No instructions are required as one is prostrate in His holiness. Every part of who you are is penetrated by light. It is glorious and traumatic all at the same time.
And the oil that dwells within your chest is set aflame by this light, this fire from the throne itself. “Did not our hearts burn within us as we walked with Him?” Yet we are not walking now, we are in the throne room itself, God has come down. Our whole body burns with a beautiful warmth. All things are possible, eternity stretches out before us and we never want to leave this place. The candlestick burns. God speaks, sin melts like wax, refining, yes refining. We offer ourselves and the dross that lies within and the Lord says “Come.”
What we have today bears no resemblance whatsoever to what God initiated. We have man centered church. Programs of men. Teachings of men. Musical programs. None are bad in and of themselves, they are just not God ordained. Religious social clubs. I believe that shortly, God’s people will come out of the social clubs because they will be desperate to rediscover the glory and the majesty of God and they will seek Him where He can be found.
We were warned in 2 Cor 6:14 not to be unequally yoked with unbelievers. So of course the question becomes “what is an unbeliever?” In the context of the Scriptures and the times of the Scriptures being written, a believer was someone who had trusted God with all of his/her heart.
Someone who had counted the cost. Someone who loved not their lives unto death. Someone who was willing and desirous even, to suffer for the cause of Christ, someone who would even rejoice that they were counted worthy to suffer for Jesus. This was a believer, and an unbeliever was someone not willing to do these things. What fellowship could one have with the other? What fellowship can hot have with lukewarm? One is desirable and the other is vomited out.
How does this apply to the modern day church? People like Tozer and Ravenhill spoke of the tiny percentage of professing believers that are actually saved. Let us be really generous and say that 30% of professing Christians are actually genuine believers, that leaves 70% who are not. Next time you go to a church building, look around and consider these numbers. The question then becomes, ” are you unequally yoked,” based upon a Scriptural model of what it means to be saved.
We are asked “what fellowship has righteousness with unrighteousness.” One is darkness, the other is light. Listen to the instruction given “Wherefore come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing; and I will receive you.” Have you given serious consideration to this commandment from the Lord? What does it mean to you? Come out from what? Be separate from what? Do not have fellowship with who? These are serious questions and I cannot answer them for you.
All I can say is, if you go back to the second paragraph and see the traits of the saint, is this who you fellowship with? Jesus talks about vomit when it comes to lukewarmness. Could He make it any clearer? Are you gathering with lukewarmness? I would put it to you that you are in direct violation of the commands of God if you are. Fellowshipping with other saints is not about ticking a box. It’s not about a three minute conversation in the foyer after a “service.” It is at least two passionate like-minded individuals getting together to talk about their common passion, Jesus!!! This is what we are driven to do if we indeed have the Holy Spirit burning at the core of who we are.
We would talk about Jesus, we would talk about His word, we would talk about how He talked to us. We would talk about how He just brought us through whatever He just brought us through. We would talk about the passion of coming into His presence. We would talk about the conviction of the Holy Spirit upon us and how it was sanctifying us. We would talk about our love for one another. We would confess our faults and our failures and our sins to one another. We would talk about how He raised us up when we were down. We would sing the glories of Christ our King together.
We would talk about a word of knowledge He gave us, we would share a word of wisdom, a word in season, an exhortation. We would rebuke and correct one another. We would love one another enough to do all of the aforementioned things. The hours would fly away as we spoke about our common passion. Our bonds would grow deep and our unity would grow strong. It would not be the name of our denomination that bound us together, there would be no such thing. It would not be the four walls that we shared that would bind us together. It would be Christ alone, the Lord Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit that would unify us. Our identity would be in Christ alone.
We would share what the Lord had taught us and in the sharing we would be teaching one another. We would stand up and testify to His power in our lives. We would stand up and testify to the magnificent beauty of the King off Kings and of the things that we had seen in the Spirit. We would shed tears together. Tears of joy, tears of pain, tears of sorrow. When one of us suffered and testified to the suffering we would all suffer. When one would testify of great joy and overcoming an obstacle we would all have great joy together. We would pray together, genuinely pray together. We would be one in our prayers. That is the gathering brothers and sisters. I would say to you that almost none of that can or does happen when the majority of the people that we gather with live, at the very best, in lukewarmness or even outright darkness. How can light fellowship with darkness? It cannot. Consider your position saint.
I believe with all my heart that Gods remnant children are being raised up all over the world. They are being separated, like the sheep from the goats, the wheat from the tares. Many of them are in a sort of desert, not of their own choosing, but by the calling of God. In that desert they are learning to depend upon Him entirely so that when the time comes, persecution and so on, that even if none go with them, still they shall follow. Yet that does not change the fact that they have a sincere and genuine desire to have genuine fellowship with those of like-mind, meaning those who burn with a passion for the Lord and are hungry and thirsty for His presence and simply just cannot do business as usual anymore.
This is the process of God calling His own. This is the process of counting the cost. Certainly, when the Lord was crucified, one would have to be found outside the walls in order to be identified with Him. To be outside the walls, to be detached from the system is not an easy or a simple thing, it comes with great cost and indeed if it did not it would not be the decision that it is. This calling is only going to get more intense as we move forward, as the day of the Lord approaches. Yet the Lord has called us to gather together, and all the more as we see that day approach and that is why I believe you will begin and are beginning to see a visible representation of these called out children.
This is the reply to this post from a dear sister who testifies to its reality in her life………… ” I know this is an old post, Frank, but it speaks so profoundly to me. How often has being called out of the system been commented on by others as simply a sort of laziness about attending church or perhaps a bitterness because of strife among members. How can I describe the heart wrenching decision it required, the loneliness and isolation that resulted, the abandoning of an entire culture my life revolved around, the shunning by those who were once friends? How often have I had the Hebrews 10:20 verse thrown at me? So often that I took this verse to the Lord for understanding. What a glorious meaning this verse actually has! How surprised I was the “forsaking the assembling of ourselves together” was referring to the very assembling you are talking about in this writing.
The very words used here are used in 2 Thessalonians 2:1 being translated there as “our gathering together unto Him” speaking of the Day of Christ even being echoed in the Hebrews scripture when it says, “as ye see the day approaching”. Following Christ has always been the call to come out, lay down our lives, pick up our crosses and follow only Him. As you have said so many places, in each generation there has been such an assembly. That is the general assembly and church of the Firstborn we draw near to – that is the assembly we dare not forsake. THAT is the assembling of ourselves together IN Him. And the dreadful warning given in Hebrews for those that forsake this assembling together – this being gathered unto Him – and draw back! You have but to read the rest of the chapter to have the unbidden prayer roll out from the heart smitten by the enormity of this glorious call, “Oh God, may I be accounted worthy to stand before the Son of Man in the general assembly of just men made perfect and Jesus Christ the mediator of a new covenant in that day!” “For yet a little while, and He that shall come will come, and not tarry.” Heb 10:37″
A Call To The Remnant 