Archive for the ‘Uncategorized’ Category
Posted by appolus on January 28, 2020
What can happen in the Kingdom of God without sacrifice? Sacrifice is a fundamental concept among believers. Even our praise is considered to be a sacrifice and we know that the Lord inhabits the praises of His people. For the Lord to come in our midst we have to offer the sacrifice of our praise to God which is the fruit of our lips giving thanks to His name (Heb 13:15) You know I missed out one word when I was paraphrasing that Scripture, that word is continually. To praise God we must be in a position to give thanks continually. We cannot be in that position without sacrifice. We must sacrifice many aspects of the flesh in order to be able to genuinely give thanks. So sacrifice is a vital part of our walk.
Now in order to sacrifice,an altar is required. Under the law there were different types of altars, the golden altar of his intercession and the one I am interested in is the brazen altar of sacrifice. Now the altars of the Old Testament were types, types of Christ. They were the shadows of what was to be when the light came forth. Now the brazen altar lay at the beginning of the tabernacle in the outer court. There was three main parts to the tabernacle. The outer court, the Holy place and then the holy of holies. The temple also had, for the most part, three main parts. The court of the gentiles, the Holy place and the Holy of Holies. And so in every example of tabernacle , Solomon’s temple or Herod’s temple we see three main divisions.
The order of progression would go something like this. When entering the tabernacle we are faced with a huge brazen altar, a place of sacrifice. There could be no moving forward without a sacrifice or a burnt offering. A sacrifice was a partial burning, a burnt offering was all consuming. After that you made youR way to the laver bowl where you cleansed your hands. Now you moved into the holy place where you would find the Menorah and the table of shewbread then the altar of incense, a place where prayer is offered, then behind the veil and into the holy of holies.
Today we have an altar in most churches and for the most part it is a place where you come and get something is that not correct? And yet we see in the types of altar we just described that they were a place of sacrifice, a place where you brought something, where you laid something down. Nowadays for the most part its a place to get something. Come forward and get salvation, come forward and get healing, come forward and receive a gift. Now of course, none of these things are inherently wrong. Yet if it is in the context of looking for something rather than laying something down it becomes grasping and self fulfilling. A church I have visited runs to the altar. Seriously, they sprint to the altar to receive something. They believe their running is a virtue, that they so desire the things of God for their life that they run to it. It sounds kinda good, but there is no aspect of it that is sacrificial, it is only a place where you might get something. What a disaster. They will never, as a church or individually. make it past the brazen altar, they are forever stuck in the outer court.
So how does one rightfully proceed in our hearts as we come before the Lord? If there is something before us and the Lord we must lay it down, it must be sacrificed, there has to be a burned offering if we are to move beyond the outer court. Let me suggest that the greater part of Christendom dwells in the outer court, the court of the gentiles as it would later be described. They dwell there because they refuse to sacrifice, they refuse to lay down that foul smelling thing that requires to be burned in the refining fires of the brazen altar. And so there they stay and there they will stay. For those who would move forward to the holy place, they are the ones who are willing to lay their sin down at the altar. Jesus is the altar. Confessing sin one to another is the beginning of a burned offering.
Now one can cleanse their hands in the lavar bowl and move through the door into the holy place and leave the outer court and the gentiles (the world) behind. Jesus is the door. Jesus is the altar. Jesus is the laver bowl. In the holy place we are nourished by the shewbread. Jesus is the shewbread. He is the bread of life. We stand illuminated in the light of the Menorah, Jesus is the Menmorah, He is the Light of our lives and in Him there is no darkness. Then we move forward to the altar of incense. Jesus is the altar of prayer. He made the way for us to come before the Father and cry Abba. Then the incense of of prayers infuses the Holy place with a sweet smelling savor. Jesus is that sweet smelling savor for He has given himself for us an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweetsmelling savour. (Eph 5:2)
Finally brothers and sisters our prayers come before the throne of grace, we now stand in the Holy of Holies before the Living God Himself. In that place we touch eternity as we stand in the manifest presence of God. We are surrounded by shekinah glory. His glory. It fills the temple, the tabernacle, the place of meeting. This is not a place that is to be found in the court of the gentiles so to speak. Not in the world nor in the outer courts nor even in the holy place. The brazen altar and the altar of incense has done its work. Jesus has done His work, He has made a way for us to come back to the heart of God. This, I would argue, is far removed from the altars that men have erect4d in most churches. One is self serving and the designs of man, the other is sacrificial and the work of God. Sacrifice is the key. Are you taking up your cross every day? Are you continually giving thanks unto our great God who is worthy to be praised? Diligently seek the Lord our God today for in the diligence ( a word that encompasses sacrifice, taking up ones cross, overcoming, enduring and thankfulness) you will find that God’s manifest presence is your exceeding great reward.
I wanted to add one last thing. Almost 13 years ago I had a vision. I have only had a few in my 30 years of salvation. I was “taken up,” by the Lord.I Dont really know how to define that. I saw some kind of amalgamation of the tabernacle and the temple. The Lord showed me the court of the gentiles and how almost all of what calls itself after His name dwelt there and refused to move forward. There was a wide low door that led to the brazen altar ( so that would be more akin to the temple) It was wide because all were welcome. It was low because to enter one must humble himself and face the brazen altar. Most of the folks in the court of the gentiles had no desire whatsoever to humble themselves and face the brazen altar. They were quite content with their activity in the outer court. Only a few would come to the place of sacrifice. Then the scene changes and I saw people who flew in the lofty heights of the presence of God. Few there were. Most were earthbound, laden down with gifts they had accumulated. The gifts were love and mercy and forgiveness. They refused to share what had been freely given to them and the weight of what they had gathered to themselves and stuffed into their pockets held them down. In order to fly into the heights of His glory they would have to empty themselves and give to others what they themselves had received. The very gifts, that were designed to bless, when held back from others, became a terrible weight that held them earthbound. And the great irony was, those who gave to others what they had been given received even more in the presence of the Living God.
Posted in Christian, christian living, Christianity, church of scotland, end times, Jesus, pentecostal, revival, the deeper life, The presence of God, the remnant, The State of the Chuch and Manifest presence, the state of the church, theology, Uncategorized | 3 Comments »
Posted by appolus on January 27, 2020
Behold, thou desirest truth in the inward parts: and in the hidden part thou shalt make me to know wisdom. Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean: wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.
(Psa 51:6-7)
In another verse from this psalm David cries out “Cast me not away from your presence oh Lord and take not your Holy Spirit from me.” Here we are witnessing the agonizing process and the inner workings of a broken and a contrite heart. David knows his problem is an internal one. The external sin of adultery and murder was a direct result of the inner workings of his heart, his hidden parts. He realizes that he has sinned against God alone. This is where it started and this is where it must be finished. The sin is a mere symptom of a disease that was working deep inside his heart. When we are stricken in such a way as this we no longer have the fellowship of the Holy Spirit. Joy has fled from us as the darkness of our souls floods the inner sanctums of our heart.
God sent a prophet to speak to David. The prophet reached into the dark places and exposed the process of David’s spiritual death. He brought it into the light and the full horror of Davids actions are suddenly visited upon him. He staggers into the light from the depths of his darkness. God had called David out from the grave. David had placed himself into the tomb and a stone was rolled in front of it. In the story of Lazarus, Jesus has the stone rolled away and commands Lazarus to come forth. He staggers out of the tomb and the grave clothes are removed from him. Who do you know that has buried their hearts in the depths of darkness and rolled a stone in front of it? Perhaps the garden of your own heart, the most intimate part of who you are has been buried in death and sin? It has become a grave and you have robed yourself in the the death clothes of sin and separation from God. The Lord requires truth in the inward parts, the most intimate part of who we are. Without this it is impossible to walk in fellowship with God.
God desires that the joy of your salvation would return to you. He desires that you would walk in the newness of life in the Spirit and not the darkness of spiritual death. In the very depths of you He desires to create in you a clean heart and renew a right spirit within you. The question is, do you desire such a thing? Do you want to have ears to hear the Lord cry out ‘come forth.” Do you want to have eyes to see the light of a brand new day? Do you want to awaken the dawn with the praises of God? Listen to what the Spirit is saying to you and with a contrite and broken spirit come back into that place from where you have fallen. Today is the day.
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Posted by appolus on January 24, 2020
Mat 21:44 And whosoever shall fall on this stone shall be broken: but on whomsoever it shall fall, it will grind him to powder.
The Word of God is immovable, it sits as the cornerstone of all that exists. The arc of our lives must bend towards the Word of God.Time and space itself bends to the Word. The revealed truth of God establishes the foundations of all existence. In the beginning was the word and God created the heaven and the earth. The spoken word of God calls forth light and the light creates a separation between itself and the darkness. The light of God is still separate from the darkness. And in the end the Word remains and every knee shall bow and every tongue confess that the Word, the Lord Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father.
The word of God speaks to the sons of light and it calls them to bend. If the arc of your life does not bend to the word of God then the word of God does not hold sway over your lives. It may intrigue you. It may fascinate you. It may challenge you. You may argue about it and it may be mere philosophy to you, but if it has not bent you, if your life has not been broken by it and renewed and put back together by it then it does not sit on the throne of your heart. The truly broken will bend, yet in the end all those who resist and reject the chief cornerstone, that stone shall fall upon them and they shall be ground to powder and be scattered like dust.
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Posted by appolus on January 23, 2020
Ecc 1:18 For in much wisdom is much grief: and he that increaseth knowledge increaseth sorrow.
The more we know, the more our sorrow increases. Grief follows wisdom and sorrow follows knowledge. True wisdom from God is surely mingled with grief because our spirit resides within flesh. When a wise man hears the foolish speak then he is grieved in his soul. It is said that you cannot put an old head on young shoulders and it is true, yet neither can wisdom prosper in the hearts of the unwise. Only those who truly seek after the Lord can benefit from the wisdom of God.
To know the deep things of God, to have been touched at the very center of your soul with something of the knowledge of God brings with it sorrow. No man can stand before the presence of God and grasp something of His majesty and be filled with his eternal beauty and not suffer upon his return from this place. The world grows dim and dark and exists in shades of grey to the one who has stood in this impenetrable light. The closer we move into the depths of His heart, the harder it is to live in a fallen world. It is a very good thing to know God more and to move in His wisdom. Yet let us be clear, all attachments of this world will begin to lose their grip upon your soul. And one might say then where lies the problem? To the man or woman who walks only in the Kingdom reality it is no problem, yet for the rest who still has something of this world in them, which is most of us, then sorrow and grief are like two intimate companions.
He is despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief (Isa 53:3) No one knew sorrow and grief like our Lord knew them. Everything stood before Him, He knew it all. He could see the destruction of Jerusalem and He wept. He could see His own rejection and crucifixion and yet He loved. The greater the knowledge of Him, the greater the cost. The greater the wisdom of God in us the more we share in His grief. And yet all of this is offset by the glory and the joy. In this world knowledge and sorrow are life long companions. Wisdom walks hand in hand with grief. And yet for the joy that is set before us let us endure all things looking unto Jesus, the author and the finisher of our faith and let us ever come before the throne.
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Posted by appolus on January 20, 2020
1 Cor 6:19 Do you not know that your bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own;
How many of us know that the Temples of old were magnificently adorned? A rich man’s status lies in his home, his car, his belongings. The richer a man is the more elaborate is his dwelling place. He fills his house with symbols of his wealth and status. The man of God also decorates his temple, the temple of the Holy Spirit, with riches. His dwelling place will be no less elaborate than the richest men of the earth. He will decorate his temple with the finest gold of unconditional love. His walls are encrusted with the jewels of forgiveness and mercy. His windows are draped with opulent coverings of meekness and humility. Trophies of grace hang on every wall. They are framed with the finest materials of patience and kindness.
Let us ask ourselves this question, do we pursue the riches and the glories of heaven with the same vigor and single-mindedness that men here on earth pursue the treasures of the world? And the treasures that we have attained in Christ, do we protect them with all the resources that we have? Do we value the treasures of our heart in the same way men value their wealth? There is a direct correlation between how much we value something to the lengths we will go to protect it. Guard your hearts brothers and sisters in Christ, for we have an enemy who seeks to steal and destroy what we have. Satan knows the value of what we have oftentimes more so than we do.
Share your treasure this day. The more we give our treasures to those who have none, the more our treasures shall increase. The word says “He gives power to the weak and to those who have no might, He strengthens them.” We have been called to empower the weak, to bind the hearts of the brokenhearted, those who are weakened, we come along side and strengthen. We have been called to wipe the tears of those who mourn, to grieve with them. Let us move in Christ brothers and sisters, and know that He that goes before you is He that lies within you.
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Posted by appolus on January 15, 2020
Isa 55:6 Seek ye the LORD while he may be found, call ye upon him while he is near:
The real test for us as Christians is how we walk along the path set before us. We can walk with the Lord by our side, and by that I mean we can walk with His empowering manifest presence. Not unlike the disciples that walked with Jesus after His resurrection and their hearts burned as He taught them. His very nearness and His Spirit caused their hearts to burn and glow. Or, we can walk alone, and by that I mean we can walk in our own strengths minus the awareness of His presence.
Now we know saints, as good Bible scholars, that God is omnipresent, meaning He is everywhere at the same time. And as saints we know that He also dwells in our hearts. This is not what we are here referring to here. We are talking about what it means to walk in the nearness of the Spirit of God as opposed to walking in the flesh. And as saints we can do both. If we would walk in the Spirit of God, walk in His awareness and therefore walk in His power, then we must, as the Lord told us to, seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness. Every day. Every moment. We must be aware of the Kingdom and the Kingdom walk. Our eyes must be engaged in Kingdom sight. We must see things through the lense of the Lord and His word. Our mouths must be engaged in the Kingdom language, we must speak as ambassadors of the King. We must draw near to Him and not quench the Spirit of God. To quench the Spirit of God is to pour cold water upon our burning hearts. Will you throw another log on the fire and cause it to burn brighter, or will you douse it with the cold waters of the world?
A man and a wife can stay in the same house but never be intimate, perhaps even stay in two different bedrooms. Are they close? Yes, in proximity. Are they married? Yes, still married. Yet, because they are not intimate they are really no better than room-mates. One may call it a love-less marriage. Who would want to be part of a love-less marriage? It is considered by most as a tragedy. How greater a tragedy than to be room-mates with the Lord? Yes He is in your heart, yes you are saved, but you are never spiritually intimate. The real tragedy in a marriage is if one longed for intimacy but the other never responded or had no such need or desire. Jesus longs to be spiritually intimate with His disciples. Only as a result of this intimacy can we expect to be aware of His presence. We grow together in intimacy. We become alike in intimacy. Two become one in intimacy. The man or the woman who does not understand, seek or desire to be intimate with the Lord shall never grow and his or her walk will be a very lonely one.
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Posted by appolus on January 13, 2020
Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me (Psa 23:4)
Isn’t that the beginning and end of it all? No matter what we are suffering, no matter what we are going through, as long as He is with us then we can go through it. Through the waters, through the floods, through every trial and tribulation and vexation of heart and soul and mind and body. If we are found in Him and He is in us and with us then we shall prevail, we shall overcome. And not only prevailing and overcoming but also victory. There is victory in Jesus and that is why there is and can be joy even in the midst of the valley of the shadow of death. For when He is with us, and we are aware of His presence, He is our green pastures. His presence restores our soul. His presence is our still waters.
I find in Him I have no want, He is my all and all and He is my everything. And because He is my everything He is my path and He leads me and guides me. He anoints my head with oil and my cup is overflowing, whether in the valley of the shadow of death or the glorious mountaintops of His transfiguration. This table that He sets before me is an everlasting and eternal one. There has been served upon this table the delicacies of goodness and mercy and love and forgiveness. A feast fit for a hungry heart that pants and longs for the good things of the Lord. Saint, today is the day that you are invited to sit down at this table and the goodness and the mercy that you shall find there will follow you all the days of your life.
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Posted by appolus on January 12, 2020
Joh 6:68 Then Simon Peter answered Him, Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the Words of eternal life.
Where shall we go, those of us who know Jesus? To the world? Impossible. Back to the life that we came from? Who would want to be dead again and wallow in our own vomit? No, those of us who know Jesus, no matter how hard the calling, no matter how difficult the road, shall stay right there by His side for in Him is life and everything else is death. Man does not live by bread alone but by every word that proceeds forth from the mouth of God. His Word and His words are life to us. They sustain us in the rain, they keep us in the storm, they cover us when the darkness rages all around. His Word, His presence keeps us and upholds us.
By coming to Him, by staying close to His presence, His manifest presence, you receive His power like living waters through your pores, through your senses, through your spirit through every particle of your being right down to the very molecules that makes up who you are. You are infused by Him and by being infused by Him, by consuming Him, by being consumed by Him, you are changed by Him. And you become more like Him and worship Him more. You read the Word more and you pray more and you weep more and you live more and you love more. And most importantly, you are obedient to His Word and that still small voice.
You are more compassionate and you are more joyful and more grateful and more thankful and you witness more, not out of any legal requirement but out of necessity because your bones burn within you. Your heart is on fire, your whole body glows in the residue of your encounter. You are infused by Him and it makes you diffuse the fragrance of His knowledge in every place(2 Cor 2:14) So many men choose their own strength to try and achieve everything that can only be achieved in His presence because to come to Him, to come close to the light, it illuminates our dark deeds.Yet eternal life dwells within His presence and it draws us and it keeps us close to our Lord. Better to come before Him in intimate confession and dwell in the light and in life, than to stay in the darkness and in the shades of grey where only death dwells.
Posted in Christian, christian living, Christianity, church of scotland, Daily devotional, Devotions, end times, Jesus, pentecostal, revival, the crucified life, the deeper life, the persectuted church, the remnant, the state of the church, theology, Uncategorized | 2 Comments »
Posted by appolus on January 9, 2020
A mark of a genuine saint is someone who loves to praise God with his lips in song, especially corporately. We know that the Word tells us that the Lord inhabits the praises of His people. Ponder and rest upon that phrase for a moment. We know that He inhabits the hearts of every genuine believer, but here we see that He also inhabits the praises of His people. There is what I call rarified air. The saints of God come together to worship the Lord in song that is led by the Spirit. An atmosphere if you like. The awareness of God all around us. We breath it in and we soak it in through our very beings. It is in an encounter. There is the presence of God to be found in enthusiastic and energetic worship, the kind of worship that lifts your spirit. It can lift up the head that hangs low and invigorate the heart and fill you full of joy and leave you strengthened. This is good worship. Yet there is another kind of worship that seems to have fled the land. A worship where we breath in rarified air. Oh how desperate is our need for this kind of encounter in our day.
The first kind of presence lifts your heart to gaze upon the Master, the second kind of presence invades every part of who you are. It falls from heaven like a heavy dew, heads are lowered and hands are raised. All becomes quiet, one barely dares to breathe as the Spirit of God slowly descends down through our out-strecthed hands and our hearts and minds and down to the very soles of our feet, and the ground upon which we stand becomes Holy ground. The first kind of presence uplifts us, the second changes us fundamentally. As living waters pour into us then it rises up like a great river that is so full that it overflows its banks. The genuine saint gives himself or herself to this river, no longer ankle deep or up to our knees or waist, but fully immersed and taken by the current to a different place. And in that place we are changed. In His presence we are always changed. The counterfeit manipulates with noise and beat and dimmed lighting and smoke machines. A momentary sugar high that only ever penetrates the soul but can never enter into the spirit. In this soulish atmosphere nothing changes, you shall leave the same way you came in.
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Posted by appolus on January 8, 2020
2Co 2:14 But thanks be to God, who in Christ always leads us in triumphal procession, and through us spreads the fragrance of the knowledge of him everywhere.
Every triumph we have we have in Christ. He is our victory and in Him we have victory. If we overcome it is because He overcame. If we love it is because He first loved us. If we forgive it is because we are forgiven by Him. When we weep, we know that He wept first. And when we give comfort to others it is because we ourselves were first comforted by Him. Every good thing, every triumph we have we have in Christ. This is why He leads us in a triumphal procession. And as we follow Him in victory then the world gets to witness the knowledge of Him and His victory over hell and sin and death.
They get to see how He broke every chain and how He healed our broken hearts. Every obstacle removed. They see a new creature in Christ who in Him has taken captive that which had formerly held us captive. We are more than conquerors in Christ Jesus. You see that phrase “in Christ.” This is the key to everything. We must be found “in Him.” Paul suffered the loss of all things to be found “in Him.” And when we are found in Him, then and only then is the fragrance of His beauty and glory and majesty and knowledge spread abroad in the hearts of man everywhere.
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Posted by appolus on January 7, 2020
Eze 47:3 And when the man that had the line in his hand went forth eastward, he measured a thousand cubits, and he brought me through the waters; the waters were to the ankles.
There is a river that flows from heaven itself. It flows through our hearts and beckons us to come deeper. This river is spoken of in many places in Scriptures. It is the presence of God and it brings us deeper into the heart of the Almighty. There are trees on either side of this river and their roots are directly connected to the river and they are perpetually green, evergreen trees for the healing of the people and the nations. The river itself brings healing everywhere it goes. To be walking in the Spirit is to be swimming in the river of life. As we see in Ezekiel 47, the Lord brings us to through the waters. Always the Lord, compelling His children to come deeper into Him. Not ankle deep, not knee deep or even waist deep but fully immersed in a river so vast that it cannot be crossed, it can only be swum in. We must give ourselves to the river, let go and give way to the current of the Holy Spirit. Whether you are ankle deep, knee deep or even waist deep, you are still standing on your own two feet. In many respects you are still in charge. Yet to give ourselves completely to the river we are no longer standing.
When we are fully given to our Lord. When we are yielded to the depths and the power of this vast river, the power of the Holy Spirit, only then can we truly be led. All resistance is gone in its depths. It is carrying you towards the sea, the vastness of God Himself. Ever closer, ever deeper into the Father’s heart. And the Lord says to to you “come, I will bring you through the waters into the deep.” “Seek me with your whole heart and I shall be found and you shall be rewarded for your diligence, I am your exceeding great reward.”
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Posted by appolus on January 6, 2020
The genuine saint will love other saints. Brothers and sisters I have never met a genuine saint who does not love other saints, it’s in our spiritual DNA. Now, how do we know? How do we know who is a part of the Body of Christ? But we do “know.” We have a witness in our spirits. It defies explanation. It is part of all the previous points but most of all it comes down to having a passion for Jesus. We know that out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks. Speak with passion about Jesus and watch many back away from you slowly with their eyes rolling back in their heads. This passion for Jesus either repels or draws people. Saints, genuine saints, love Jesus with a great passion, He is their grand obsession. He wont be obsessed with Calvin or Luther or any man’s name or title, He will be obsessed with the man, Jesus. Find those people who love Jesus and you will find the Body of Christ. And you will love them, despite completely different backgrounds and cultures and economic class, you will find the beating heart of Jesus. And together your hearts will burn within your chest with love for Jesus and for each other. Our love for one another is how the world will know that we belong to Jesus, especially in a day and age when every society and religious organizations are tearing themselves apart.
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Posted by appolus on January 4, 2020
Genuine saints love the Word of God. Can I just say that I have been a believer for a long time now and I have yet to meet a genuine saint who does not love God’s word. It is a lamp unto their feet and a light in the darkness and especially in times of trouble it is their very strength. How often a single verse can hold you through the darkest periods of your life and of course its not the verse itself its the author of the verse. The author of the word has given us a love for the truth. (2 Thess 2:10) This is something we receive from God Himself. The Word keeps us with its reminder of God’s promises and faithfulness and it assures us of what it to come. It is the revelation of God to man and it is illuminated by the Holy Spirit. It can be understood to a certain degree without the Spirit, which is why many religious men preach from it, but it can only be truly understood by the Spirit working in the hearts and minds of the children of God. Not only understood but lived out. And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth (Joh 1:14) The Word of God is made flesh in His children. It is realized and expressed by the children of God. The Living God as expressed in the Word, taking up residence in us as an expression of Christ Himself to a sick and dying world. And the world beholds His glory through through the genuine saint.
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Posted by appolus on January 2, 2020
The desire and the joy in prayer. This point is so important. To put it very simply, we love to talk to those we love is that not right? When we are walking with God then talking to God is as natural as breathing. It becomes your constant source of strength and sanity. Yet you must believe that you are actually talking to God, and this is where understanding and having experienced the awareness of God plays such an important part in the saints relationship with God. If you have never experienced the manifest presence of God then quite possibly your prayer life is at best a discipline, like exercise, something that has resistance and must be pushed through. This is quite a bit different from the breathing analogy. Now in everything in the spirit there are seasons, this is not what I am talking about here. There can also be spiritual warfare in the realm of prayer, and there will be, I am not talking about that either, I am simply saying that for the most part, there will be delight in prayer. We know what happens if we stop breathing, we die. If we stop praying then the process of spiritual death has already begun. Our relationship with Jesus begins and ends with prayer. If you have no prayer life then you do not have a relationship with Jesus. You must breathe to live yet you are not consciously aware of having to breathe. It is so important to the body that that it comes as a default in us. The genuine saint is enraptured by prayer for he or she is talking with the one that they love. The grand obsession of their life is ever there before them and they walk through this world hand in hand.
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Posted by appolus on December 30, 2019
Things that are common to the genuine saint #5 ….
In the life of a genuine believer, he or she is clearly separated from the world. This leads on from point number four. When we see and know and walk in the Kingdom reality, it necessarily separates us from the world for we will be Kingdom minded, our hearts and thoughts will be eternally focused. The closer we walk with the Lord, coming into His presence and dwelling before His throne, the dimmer the world becomes. One by one the things of this world begin to lose their savor. None of these things are necessarily bad in and of themselves, they simply do not have eternal value. The currency of heaven and its eternal treasure is what captivates the heart of the saint. This is a process and as each year passes in the life of a saint, as he or she becomes mature, we begin to see this decided lack of interest in the things which tend to captivate the world. Yet, lets not confuse separation from the world with separating ourselves from the world. We go into the world every day as we should do. We do not run from the world and hide behind walls seeking some kind of holiness away from the world’s influence. It’s in the very midst of a dark and dying world that we have the most impact as Kingdom minded saints who walk in a very different reality. We bring that reality everywhere we go. We bring our light into the world’s darkness. We are a city set on a hill, a light for all the world to see. This is our calling.
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Posted by appolus on December 30, 2019
Now when Daniel knew that the writing was signed, he went into his house; and his windows being open in his chamber toward Jerusalem, he kneeled upon his knees three times a day, and prayed, and gave thanks before his God, as he did aforetime.Dan 6:10
Wicked men who hated Daniel and who were jealous of him came up with a decree that they persuaded the king to sign. This was a trap. By decreeing that no man or woman could petition their God for thirty days they knew they could either control Daniel or destroy him. Now Daniel certainly knew this. What he did was instructive for us today. Now perhaps many of us would go home and shut our windows and pray to God anyway despite what had been decreed. Maybe some of us would follow the decree and rationalize it by thinking that it was only 30 days, what harm would it cause? Daniel went home, and with his windows wide open, prayed unashamedly to the one true God.
Now saints, we are living in a day when many traps are being set for us and there will be many more to come. The enemy will not be satisfied with “30 days.” If Daniel had relented, then another decree would come along more intense and longer in duration than the one before. It is not good enough for the enemy to see outward compliance. He will demand much more than that. He will demand that you bow down to him and acknowledge the lie as truth. Compromise leads to disaster. It is one step down a slippery path that at its end lies destruction. The two wonderful aspects of Daniel’s story was that he unashamedly, in the face of certain death, refused to deny God or bow down to the decrees of this world that demand we deny our God and His truth. The second wonderful part was the fact that God was with Daniel in the lions den. What was decreed for his destruction only strengthened Daniel in the end.
What is pressing upon you saint? What decree is the world demanding that you compromise your faith for? Do not do it. Like a paid blackmailer, it will not end there it will only get worse. Better to go down into the lions den and meet God there than than to please the world, your family, your job or your career, and stand alone. One is temporal and the other is eternal. If you cannot run with the footmen now without being wearied, how then shall you contend with the horses when the world is drowning in gross darkness? Stand upon the truth saints and do not be moved.
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Posted by appolus on December 27, 2019
Rom 6:14 For sin shall not have dominion over you: for ye are not under the law, but under grace.
The freedom to do what is right, towers above the prison and the chains of commandments. One is initiated by love, the other is enforced by the whip. Holiness comes from freedom and freedom comes from love . And this love inspires and draws us and compels us to honor and respect and obey our Father in heaven. His love is the very air that we breathe and the air before His throne is rarified air and if we cannot breathe this air then we die. The impetus for us to follow the commands that are written upon our heart is love. It is more powerful than the commands that were written upon tablets of stone. Those who would sin without conviction and use some kind of legal fiction (cheap grace) to excuse or justify their actions simply do not have the laws of God written upon their hearts. The grace of God is such a beautiful and dynamic and fundamental part of our relationship with the Lord. It is never a license to sin, God forbid. It is the very opposite for those who know Jesus. When we sin there is a separation between ourselves and the one that we love. We cry with David “restore unto me the joy of thy salvation.” The blood bought heart can never be at peace when there is any kind of distance between it and his or her Lord. Love compels us to humble ourselves, broken and contrite, and come before our Lord in confession so that we may once again walk in the beauty and closeness of His presence and holiness.
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Posted by appolus on December 27, 2019
Things that are common to the genuine saint #4 ….
An eternal perspective. Understanding the Kingdom reality of our lives and knowing it is like a vapour.. There is a reality of this world and it is powerful, it presses in on the senses and for those outside of the Spirit of God it is all-consuming. Yet there is a greater reality that lies within the saints. It is the reality of the Kingdom of God as they walk in it. Now these two realities undoubtedly compete. We as saints must be on our guard that we do not let the realities of this world overwhelm us and rob us of the realities of the Kingdom in which we truly walk. This is the battle line between the spirit and the flesh. The clear sense of reality therefore is truly knowing that our time here is short, and knowing that we are on a narrow path that leads us to eternity.
When we walk in this reality, the reality of the world begins to lose its power. We begin to see more clearly in the spiritual than we can see in the natural and the spiritual begins to dominate everything that we do. Day by day, precept upon precept, a process of sanctification, all of these things that are led by the power of the Holy Spirit should cause the scales to fall from our eyes. The light of the body is the eye: if therefore thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light.(Mat 6:22) The Kingdom of God is the Kingdom of light in which there is no darkness. When we walk in the light as He is in the light then we truly have fellowship one with another.
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Posted by appolus on December 26, 2019
Things that are common to the genuine saint #3 ….A genuine saint now speaks with authority. In Acts 2 when Peter spoke to the crowd, scripture tells us that the crowd were “stabbed in their hearts.” The Greek word for this phrase is Katanusso. A similar word is used when Jesus is stabbed with the spear, that word is Nusso. Now Katanusso is a much more violent word than Nusso. It means to agitate, to thoroughly pierce, to violently agitate. And so the Holy Spirit is showing us that there is greater violence taking place in Acts chapter two than even when the Lord was run through with a spear. The violence was to men’s souls. Their hard hearts were being violently penetrated by the very words spoken under the influence of the Holy Spirit. In Acts chapter two those affected cried out “what must we do,” yet just a few chapters later when Stephen is speaking with the same power, men were stabbed in the heart but gnashed their teeth and fell upon Stephen and stoned him. In either case, men were not left unmoved by the power of the Spirit speaking though the saints. Every genuine saint is going to agitate those around them. Loved ones, friends and associates will be drawn or they will recoil. There is no apathy for the saint. The kingdom of heaven suffers violence and the violent take it by force. The genuine saint is part of an army that presses in. They will live and they will die, they will suffer and they will endure. They will fight with everything that is within them. They stand in the authority of God and upon His word and they do not relent. They have found a pearl of great price and hell itself will not wrestle it from their hands. With the armor of God and a two edged sword in their hands and the power and authority of the Holy Spirit, they will overcome.
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Posted by appolus on December 24, 2019
Things that are common to the genuine saint #2 …..Having the genuine joy of God. Now this joy is not the joy of the world nor as the world knows it. It is very much related to that part of the spirit that is ever connected to the presence of God. The world’s definition of joy is “a feeling of great pleasure or happiness.” Yet this is not the joy of the saint. The saint’s joy is not rooted nor does it spring from the soulish realm of feelings. It is an activity of the spirit which produces joy from our very relationship to the Lord. It is sensed in its greatest depths when, at least as far as the world can see, there is absolutely no reason for pleasure or happiness at all. The essence of the joy of the saint is to know that he is loved and that the Lord is with him in whatever his circumstances are. This produces an inner happiness and contentment when there should be none and it is one of the great strengths of the saints. It is also a testimony to the genuine nature of their relationship with the Lord. It emanates out from the spirit, though the soul and manifests itself in the flesh for all the world to see. This kind of joy cannot be counterfeited. Whatever is dominant in the life of the saint will be seen by all when the fire burns the hottest. When the smoke clears the world will know who is His.
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A Call To The Remnant 