Your Lovingkindness is Better than Life
September 30, 2022
Psalms 63
O God, you are my God, earnestly I seek you; my soul thirsts for you, my body longs for you, in a dry and weary land where there is no water. 2 I have seen you in the sanctuary and beheld your power and your glory. 3 Because your love is better than life, my lips will glorify you. 4 I will praise you as long as I live, and in your name I will lift up my hands. 5 My soul will be satisfied as with the richest of foods; with singing lips my mouth will praise you. 6 On my bed I remember you; I think of you through the watches of the night. 7 Because you are my help, I sing in the shadow of your wings. 8 My soul clings to you; your right hand upholds me. 9 They who seek my life will be destroyed; they will go down to the depths of the earth. 10 They will be given over to the sword and become food for jackals. 11 But the king will rejoice in God; all who swear by God’s name will praise him, while the mouths of liars will be silenced.
Your Lovingkindness is Better than Life
For us to truly know the Lord and the intimacy of His relationship is the most sustaining power I know. We can go through some very hard and difficult places and it is the knowing of His presence and love that can sustain us. His love and assurance is so great that we can come to the place of relinquishing our life if need be for His sake.
David had this revelation of God because he had been to the sanctuary. He is not just talking about a building or a physical place, he is talking about that meeting place with God where we begin to get a comprehension and revelation of His love and the truth of who He is in relationship to us. It is in this place of revelation and comprehension of the love of God for us that the praise and worship flows out of us like water out of a saturated sponge. His love is so great, so precious and so real that it is better than life itself.
It is usually in the in the valleys and the dry difficult places that we seek Him and come to know Him in faithfulness and loving-kindness. How many times have there been in our lives when we have been unfaithful, yet He has proved Himself faithful, when we deserved chastisement, but instead He gave us grace and loving-kindness? Perhaps this is what overwhelms us the most is that He has given us so much more than we could ever deserve or earn. His loving kindness is better than life itself.
When we come to the revelation of who we are in Christ, we, like David, find ourselves wrapped in the mantle of the anointing and love of the Lord. He looked favorably upon us. We can’t really say why. It is not because we are so much more than anyone else and we certainly aren’t deserving, but by His grace we have found our way into the sanctuary of His presence. There His glory, love and awe overwhelms us. How could we not but praise Him and express the deep thanksgiving for that which He has placed within us.
Some don’t know what I am really talking about, because you have not been there, but when you do come into His sanctuary, His majesty is so great it is a fearful thing and yet His loving-kindness is so gentle is cradles us like a child in its mother’s arms. It was this place of fellowship and knowing of God that sustained and encouraged David when King Saul pursued his life.
Many of us are facing or will face very difficult circumstances in this hour, but if you want real encouragement, peace and joy, even in this place, come into the sanctuary of His presence. Worship Him in spirit and in truth and the pure out-crying of your heart and spirit will bring you there. Draw near to Him and He will draw near to you. You will find the grace to get you through and sustain you through every trial because His loving-kindness is better than life.
Blessings,
#kent
Intimacy
November 18, 2021
Intimacy
John 14:20-21
At that day ye shall know that I [am] in my Father, and ye in me, and I in you. He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me: and he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father, and I will love him, and will manifest myself to him.
Intimacy is what we think of when we think about our closest times of relationship. Intimacy is not sex; rather sex should be but the outward expression of the deeper emotional and spiritual connections of our heart and relationship. Our intimacy with God and the intimacy in a marriage are very closely related and by understanding one we have insight into the other. God’s idea of intimacy is not just gratifying our needs, lust and wants. Man often has that approach with God. “God you are there to give me what I want, what I pray for or what I name and claim.” No, that is not intimacy, that’s exploitation. Anytime we are using another simply for our own gain, then we are exploiting them, rather it is God, or man, or woman. In God’s eyes intimacy is what we begin to experience when we move into a covenant relationship with someone. Intimacy is a sharing through relationship our hearts, our souls, our feelings, our emotions. It is that place where we feel safe and unashamed to get naked before that other one; naked, not just in the outward physical sense, but inwardly being able to expose to the other our weaknesses and vulnerabilities, as well as our strength. In that place of intimacy we should feel safe, secure, loved, wanted and needed in the completeness of who we are, both in strength and in weakness. True intimacy moves past the outward act of relationship, it is first established in trust and commitment.
Just as intimacy is vital to a marriage relationship, it is vital to our God relationship. If our general success at marital relationships is any kind of thermometer to our intimate relationship with God then it is no wonder we are not connecting on the level that we desire. Our marriages fail because we lack intimacy, true unselfish commitment and love to that other individual. Intimacy can’t be one-sided; it takes two to be intimate. It takes an exchange of heart to heart.
Personally, I think women are more attune to intimacy than most men. I find that I can get caught up in the busyness of life and all that is going on around me. Emotionally I may not feel differently toward my wife than I have before, but if I’m not spending the quality time with her, she is letting me know that we lack intimacy. It isn’t any different with our relationship with God; we get all busy and caught up in life. Yes, we love God and are committed to Him in our minds, but under the surface our hearts are moving away from Him because we lack the intimacy and time with Him. What an example we see in Jesus as He spent what must have been exhausting days of ministry with people and yet He didn’t forsake His intimacy with the Father. He knew that was vital to His walking and expression of the will of the Father. It took intimacy for Jesus to express the full purpose and will of the Father in His everyday life, if it took that for Him, then how much more so for us. That longing that we have to come into God’s presence, to experience the secret place of the Most High, it will only be found through intimacy with Him. God does desire to give us the desires of our heart, to meet our needs and fulfill our longings. He doesn’t want to be loved for what He can do, anymore than you and I would want to be loved because we were wealthy. We are all looking for the one who will love us for who we are, not what we can do for them. God so desires a people that in blessing or distress, in much or in want, in sickness or in health, they will love Him no less and they are committed wholly to Him in life or death. God is a jealous God. He is jealous for our intimacy with Him. Do we want more of God, then we have to get into relationship and stay intimate with Him. In that place of intimacy is where we are going to begin to hear His heart and find His perfect will. God so loves you. Come into that covenant relationship and intimacy with Him.
Blessings,
#kent
Arise, My Darling , and Come with Me
July 30, 2021
Arise, My Darling , and Come with Me
My beloved spake, and said unto me, Rise up, my love, my fair one, and come away. For, lo, the winter is past, the rain is over [and] gone; The flowers appear on the earth; the time of the singing [of birds] is come, and the voice of the turtle is heard in our land; The fig tree putteth forth her green figs, and the vines [with] the tender grape give a [good] smell. Arise, my love, my fair one, and come away.
Do you know the lover in your Lord Jesus? The one who is passionately in love with you? He watches you and longs after you. His affections are ever toward you. He would know your heart. Do you love Him? Are you passionately inflamed with love and desire toward Him? Do you treasure those quiet times in His presence where the world around you fades away and it is only you and your beloved? If you haven’t come to know Jesus as your lover you are missing the richest experience of love in your life. So many of us know about Jesus, we know him in an outward sense. We may go to church and worship him and occasionally read the Bible, and of course we do pray now and then.
“To Know” in the biblical sense is to know in intimacy as a husband knows his wife. Jesus wants us to intimately know Him in the secret place of our spirit. He desires such union with us that the product of that union is divine life and nature within us. As His life is alive and flowing through us it will in turn impregnate others with His divine life, love and grace.
Some of us have loved our Lord. We have longed after Him, but He has seemed illusive as He did to the Shulamite maid in the Song of Songs. She would not be dissuaded but continued to pursue her lover till she would lay hold of Him. Are we that passionately in love with our Lord where nothing will turn our eye or heart from pursuing Him? Perhaps these have been the winter seasons of your life. Spiritually you are languishing as you have gone through the stormy trials of life and have so longed for that closeness with Christ.
His word to us today is “Rise up, my love, my fair one and come away”; it is springtime in the spirit and a time of renewal, refreshing and blossoming in His love and presence. It is a time for fruitfulness and spiritual life to spring forth. It is a time when He will meet with you in the intimacy of the chambers of your heart. He will draw close to you as you draw near to Him. His desire is for those that love Him just for Him. Even though He is the source of rich blessing and provision our heart is not on what He can do for us or what He can give us. Our heart is passionately in love with who He is. There is nothing richer than our fellowship in His presence. This is why we never cease to praise and adore Him, because He is so worthy, lovely and our heart beats for Him.
Christ is coming for a Bride that is passionately in love with Him. She is the one that will know the deep places in the treasures of His love. If you are that lover be encouraged that He is coming to take you away in Him. He will be your all in all and He will meet the needs that no earthly person can. If you have not known the Lord in this way, you are missing out on the greatest love relationship of your lives. Come fall in love with Jesus in a way you never have. Come to know Him as your dearest friend, companion and lover. Your life will be so much richer than you have ever known. “Arise, my love, my fair one, and come away.”
Blessings,
#kent
The Lord’s Presence
May 17, 2021
The Lord’s Presence
Jude 1:20-25
But ye, beloved, building up yourselves on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Ghost, Keep yourselves in the love of God, looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life. And of some have compassion, making a difference: And others save with fear, pulling [them] out of the fire; hating even the garment spotted by the flesh. Now unto him that is able to keep you from falling, and to present [you] faultless before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy, To the only wise God our Saviour, [be] glory and majesty, dominion and power, both now and ever. Amen.
There is no more awesome place than the Presence of the Lord. It is a place of great glory and majesty where the power and presence of the Almighty emanates. There are times in our worship and God experiences that we enter may enter into the Presence of the Lord where our actual body and soul experiences, at least a measure, of that Presence. For those who have tasted of His Presence you know that there is nothing in earth that can imitate or match it. When God’s Presence truly comes into a place, we become prostrate, for we can’t even look upon Him in our natural state. He is as a consuming fire and cleaners soap. There is no pretense, excuses or falsehoods that can abide in that presence, for they are totally exposed for what they are. We know that as His children we have access into His Presence through the Son, for we are in Christ. We are accepted in His Presence in Christ, our High Priest. Hebrew 9:24 says, “For Christ is not entered into the holy places made with hands, [which are] the figures of the true; but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God for us.” It is His righteousness that clothes us and we wear those garments in faith. The Apostle Paul gives us a revelation of what it is to press into the Presence of the Lord in this life in Philippians 3:8-11, “Yea doubtless, and I count all things [but] loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord: for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and do count them [but] dung, that I may win Christ, And be found in him, not having mine own righteousness, which is of the law, but that which is through the faith of Christ, the righteousness which is of God by faith: That I may know him, and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings, being made conformable unto his death; If by any means I might attain unto the resurrection of the dead.” When we catch a revelation of the place of God’s Presence then everything else will loses its meaning and value in comparison. That place of God’s Presence, it is the place of the richest treasure we can experience. That is what makes heaven so wonderful. It is filled with His presence.
We have a portal of access, a door of faith by which we may enter in. For those in Christ the Presence of the Lord is our fullness of joy, but to the sinner that seeks to come in some other way or with other garments than those washed in the blood of Lamb, there is a terror and dread. For outside of Christ we would be cast out of the Presence of the Almighty. This is why we want to put off the garments spotted with sin and flesh. Put on Christ and pursue His Presence. Pursue His Presence with intimacy, worship and fidelity to your faith. Make the Lord what your eye and heart covets and let your contentment be with nothing less.
Blessings,
#kent
The Joy of His Fellowship
September 28, 2020
Psalms 5:11
But let all those that put their trust in thee rejoice: let them ever shout for joy, because thou defendest them: let them also that love thy name be joyful in thee.
The Joy of His Fellowship
When you think back over your life what strikes you as the times when you had the greatest joy and contentment in your life? For many of us has been the loving relationship that we have shared with our spouse or some special individual, but I don’t even know if that joy can exceed or compare to the joy of an intimate relationship with the Lord. There is not greater joy than when we are in right fellowship with Jesus. When I think of the times of greatest joy and fulfillment, I have to say they are in the Lord. In those days when there is a constant dialogue with the Father and the Holy Spirit is just speaking little things into your heart that encourage you or just give you a new different revelation of Him. It is such a joy to see the little miracles that He performs in our lives as we are fully trusting on Him and looking to Him for our every need. That is why it is good that we don’t have everything. We need to keep exercising our trust in Him. Some of our poorest times were some of our richest times, because we had the privilege of seeing God’s ability working in our circumstances and His provision in our needs. When we become prosperous and enjoy success, we often lose sight of the One who brought us where we are and who gave us the prosperity that we enjoy. We begin to take ownership and pride in what we have accomplished rather than what the Lord has imparted through us and to us. We tend to quit trusting in Him and looking more to our own devices and means. He blesses us with all of His riches and wonderful gifts and then, ironically, we tend to have less and less time for Him because now we have to be focused on all that we have and all that we are still trying to get. Meanwhile, in all of that we lose that most precious commodity and possession that we can have in life, the joy and fellowship of the Lord. We have allowed that intimacy and fellowship we once enjoyed to become replaced by other things we think we want, but that usually only bring us into more bondage and obligation to care for them. Somewhere in our travels through life we look back and we wonder where did it go, when did I lose it; that special relationship I had with Him? It is not that we have forsaken our faith or that we don’t still love and trust the Lord, but it becomes like many of our marriages; we lose our first love.
God show us again how to recapture the fervent passion and joy we had in our first love. Help us to turn our backs on the weights and sins that so easily encumber us, stumble us and have robbed us of our joy with YOU! Help us to find again the elements of our love that made our time together so sweet and memorable. Help us to revisit and possess again that joy. We tend to lose it with You and in our marriages and other human relationships as well. It was that joy that made life so rich and so worth living. Bring us back to that joy of when You were everything and fellowship was so sweet.
Blessings,
#kent
A Word from the Lord
November 10, 2015
A Word from the Lord
Romans 13:12
The night is far spent, the day is at hand: let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the armour of light.
Leave this day the things of the earthly realm behind you. Look into the dawn of the New Day for from the East arises your salvation and from the West the sun is setting on the former things and the things of this time and place. Open your heart to me and I will fill it. Open your mouth to me and I will fill it. Open your hands to me and I will fill them. I will be your supply and your provision. All of your need is met in me. Lean not upon the arm of the flesh to feed and provide in your day of want. I am your Provider and the supplier of every need. Lean not upon your own understanding, but lean on the council of My Word, for it is the light unto your path and a lamp unto your feet. Take care that you walk in the light of the council of my Word. It is a sword to prove you, to divide and separate soul and spirit. Far too long my people have been a mixture and double-minded in their ways. Let your eye be single and your heart true to the calling that I have given you to walk in My ways and obey My commands, if you do this, then do you love Me. Far too long my people offer up the oblations of praise and worship, but their hearts are far from me. Outwardly they do their homage, but within their heart and their thoughts they entertain wickedness and impurity. I do not judge the outward man, but the inward man, the man of the heart. What value does a beautiful cup or vessel have if it is full of abominations and wickedness? The fire is sent to purify that which I have sanctified. It will burn with unquenchable thirst until there is no more left to feed its desire. Mercy and grace will wet and temper the steel of godliness in my people, lest they be consumed in judgement. My people shall turn to me from the least to the greatest and those that are mine shall gather beneath My wing. There I will shelter them from the storm. It is a time of pruning and separation so that those who would bear fruit may do so more abundantly and those that are dead upon the vine may be cut off and cast into the fire. What a man has sown and what he is now sowing will bear its fruit and he shall eat the fruit thereof either to life or to death. Take care how you plant into your life and into the lives of others. Clay pots hold divine life. Only as they are emptied are they perpetually filled. Stop holding the life till it becomes stagnant and putrified. Pour out that which I place within each one of you. It is only in giving that you truly receive. Release the life. You are not vessels for storage, you are the vessels of daily use to wash the feet of common people and make their way clean and sure. Some of you say, what do I have to give? Give your life, your service, and My love that abides within you. With Me there is never a lack of supply or increase. You are shallow, because your deeds are shallow. Become the vessel that is tipped over and poured out. If you sow sparingly you will reap sparingly. Revelation is coming, but it comes with a price. It must be received with humility and obedience. The revelation of the Most High is revealed in what you live and not in what you know. The revelation of Jesus Christ in you is revealed through a crucified life, laid upon the altar of obedience and service. Today is the day to seek Me and lay all else aside. I am your refuge, your hiding place, your mighty fortress, but you must truly know me to be hid in me. It is no longer about outward actions of religion and godliness, it is a day to know intimately my heart and come into the inner sanctuary of relationship and abiding that is only found in intimacy and relationship. Come quickly, for the days are getting short and times and seasons are at hand. Rouse you up out of your sleep and slumber and come away with me. I speak these things to you, because I love you. Let him who has an ear hear what the Spirit is speaking to the Church. It is the day for the Bride to prepare herself and make ready for her Groom. Take heed and act quickly.
Blessings,
#kent
Fallen is Babylon
November 4, 2015
Revelations 14:8
A second angel followed and said, “Fallen! Fallen is Babylon the Great, which made all the nations drink the maddening wine of her adulteries.”
Fallen is Babylon
Through the ages we have seen both a real church of God and pseudo church who worshiped God outwardly in form and in name, but the true Spirit and nature of God was not found in them. In the world they represented the church and truth of God and yet through inquisitions and martyrdom they persecuted and killed those who possessed the reality of Christ and refused to be conformed to her ways and doctrines. The great Babylon has been the source of tremendous influence in the world and yet she has been in bed with the world in so many of her ways and dealings. Ironically enough it has often been the real that has been hidden in the midst of this great harlot Babylon. Babylon is the epitome of man’s religion and devices. Her leaders have taken the holy vessel of God’s true temple and defiled them in their drunkenness and debauchery. The world sees her hypocrisy, but even they don’t see the depth of her sin and defilement of Spirit. Even so, in her midst, true saints of God and the Bride has been hidden, but their effectiveness and light has often been hidden and obscured by the corruption and watered down religion of that which surrounds them. This results from a system of men that use God for their own gain and power. They have built great edifices and monuments more to their own glory than to Father God. As they come into the fullness of their corruption they will try to bring their masses into the mindset of this world system. They will use condemnation and coercion to do what would not bear witness with the true Spirit of Christ. What she does not yet know is that her time is short and her days are numbered. Her spirit is that same one as the religious leaders that crucified our Lord.
We hear this word coming out of God’s word repeatedly as expressed in Revelations 18:4 to the saints of God to come out of her, because here in Revelations 18 it tells us of her demise and ultimate destruction. “After this I saw another angel coming down from heaven. He had great authority, and the earth was illuminated by his splendor. 2With a mighty voice he shouted: “Fallen! Fallen is Babylon the Great! She has become a home for demons and a haunt for every evil spirit, a haunt for every unclean and detestable bird. 3For all the nations have drunk the maddening wine of her adulteries. The kings of the earth committed adultery with her, and the merchants of the earth grew rich from her excessive luxuries.” 4Then I heard another voice from heaven say:
“Come out of her, my people, so that you will not share in her sins, so that you will not receive any of her plagues; 5for her sins are piled up to heaven, and God has remembered her crimes. 6Give back to her as she has given; pay her back double for what she has done. Mix her a double portion from her own cup. 7Give her as much torture and grief as the glory and luxury she gave herself. In her heart she boasts, ‘I sit as queen; I am not a widow, and I will never mourn.’ 8Therefore in one day her plagues will overtake her:
death, mourning and famine. She will be consumed by fire, for mighty is the Lord God who judges her.”
God is calling us saints of God to true religion and undefiled. He is calling us out of man’s version of religion and into the truth of Spirit and His life. In that place we find no longer just outward expressions, words and acts of religion, God is bringing us into that place of intimacy and relationship where we can intimately know Him, not just in head knowledge, but in Spirit and in Truth. It is a place where we can finally experience the reality of His presence and fellowship in our personal lives. Our relationship is no longer dependent upon what we do for God or how good we can be. We come into the place of knowing Christ who is the finished work of our salvation and who is able to complete the good work He has began in you and I.
This is the hour to leave the old wineskin of dead religion and move into the reality of His true Church, which is alive and pregnant with the Spirit of God. God loves His own and so He is calling His own unto Himself. He is calling us out of dead religion, old paradigms and ways of thinking and out of our traditions. Jesus told the religious leaders in Mark 7:13, “Thus you nullify the word of God by your tradition that you have handed down. And you do many things like that.”
Press in for yourself and find the reality of Christ for your life. He is bringing you into a place of freedom. Your religion may condemn you, but then little does it know it stands condemned and under the judgement of God. He is calling you to be part of the true Church that He is raising up to the glory and praise of His name. A church that will be mighty and will go forth doing exploits, signs and wonders. He is setting you free and He is calling you out!
Blessings,
#kent
The Road back to Love and Intimacy
August 28, 2015
Colossians 3:18-19
Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands, as it is fit in the Lord. Husbands, love [your] wives, and be not bitter against them.
The Road back to Love and Intimacy
Remember when your romance was as sweet as honey and the love of your life could do no wrong. You adored them, idolized them and wanted to spend every moment together. Many of us, looking back at those younger years, ask ourselves, “what happened to that first love?” We still may love each other, but many couples struggle with the “feelings of love” that are missing. The romance has died way down and now you may find that instead of really loving and cherishing that wonderful man or woman you are struggling to get along with them. The man may feel like the wife is always nagging him, he can never do enough or anything right, she doesn’t respect and honor him. The woman may feel like the husband has become an insensitive jerk that never communicates or works through the problems, he doesn’t meet her needs. Over the years and the cycles of good and bad times, we can accumulate a lot of baggage. If I ask you if you love your husband or your wife, you would quite likely reply, “will of course I do,” but neither one of you may be experiencing the love from one another that you feel and know should be there. We may say we hold no unforgiveness toward one another, but in reality both parties bear scars, wounds, unresolved conflicts and issues that linger in the subconscious ready to rear their ugly heads at the right moment, opportunity or provocation. We find that we fail to often treat each other with the love, dignity and respect that both parties are due in a marriage.
Fifty percent of our marriages fail due to these kind of issues, but how many more are struggling and hurting? We need to return to that place of intimacy and closeness that we once shared, but we can’t until we are able let down the walls we’ve built up and are willing to let go of all the offenses, hurts and bitterness that we carry.
When the Word says, “Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands, as it is fit in the Lord,” that submission might be just creating a safe place where your husband can share with you. It needs to be a place where you aren’t venting your anger, frustration, criticism and unhappiness, no matter how justified you may feel with those feelings. If you want your husband to communicate and be sensitive to your needs, you have to create an atmosphere of submission where you really want to see, feel and understand his heart. That can be a hard place for a man. He may not be in touch with his feelings the way you are, so be gentle and be patient and above all, be kind.
“Husbands, love your wives, and be not bitter against them.” Husbands can be very confrontational, critical and harsh, but many repress their feelings and emotions. They retreat into that shell of seeming insensitivity and non-communication. Many times it is a response of self-preservation. Often the harder the wife tries to break through that seeming insensitivity with harsh or critical words the more the husband withdrawals. If you want the turtle to stick his head out of the shell you have to stop beating on the shell and make him feel that when he sticks his head out it won’t get bit off. Husbands can hold a lot of things in their hearts that they may not even be fully aware of. Their means of retaliation may be more passive or subtle, but it may be coming from a bitterness that has built up in their hearts against their wives. They, on the other hand, need to really listen to the heart of their wives and make those needs their goals to fulfill. They need to make them feel secure in your love for them and remember them often in the little gifts, the things you do and say. Marriage is a teaching ground for unconditional love and service. It is where we should both be learning to lay down our lives for the other. Love is not always about feeling, but about commitment, covenant and a decision to love your spouse unconditionally even when they don’t derserve it.
Maybe we need to come together as a couple where we can agree that the love of Christ is going to rule and dictate our behavior and response to one another. We need to hold one another, not sexually, but intimately, while we confess our sins, our hurts and failures to one another. We need to truly commit to a willingness to really forgive and hear the other person’s heart. We need an uninterrupted time of reconciliation where we can write down and commit to one another some realistic goals where we will begin to address some of our deepest issues. Keep it simple and not more than we can realistically deal with at one time. Start with just three things each. Then let’s make a date for our next intimate time we can meet with the same right heart and attitude, in the love of Christ to see how we are doing. Again, we need to keep it safe and non-confrontational. This is a team project and we can’t succeed if we only have our own agenda and interest at heart. We can’t expect to mend and restore a broken down barn in a day or even a week, it will take time to restore, just as it took time to deteriorate. We can change the cycle and the direction of our marriages if we will both commit to it and stay with it. We will begin to see our true intimacy and love begin to come alive in our feelings and the way we treat one another. God wants to see our marriages strong and alive with His love. There is a lot of truth to the addage that ‘the family that prays together, stays together’. It is hard to be right with each other when we are not right with God. If we are committed to Christ, then we must also be committed to one another, for we are one flesh. Together let’s build the road back to true love and intimacy like we had in our first love.
Blessings,
#kent
The Law of Sin and Death
August 18, 2015
Judges 21:25
In those days Israel had no king; all the people did whatever seemed right in their own eyes.
The Law of Sin and Death
The state that we see Israel in, in the book of Judges is the same state that we could see a lot of us as Christians in. We have the promise and the inheritance and we have the Word of God, but we haven’t embraced our King. Just as the Israelites could be God’s chosen people by name, it didn’t mean they were His people in their heart. They became apostate, doing whatever seemed good to them, while ignoring who God had called them to be. Isn’t that the way many in the Christian world have become. They have become apostate because they live and do what is right in their own eyes and justification rather than according to the will and calling of God in Christ Jesus.
I am not writing this to bring condemnation, but to make us aware of which law we are living under in this state of mind. Before Christ, we were living under the law of sin and death. It was a law of the commandments whereby sin abounded because of the weakness of the flesh to live and keep it. Under that law we stood condemned because we were lawless and law breakers. Even in our best efforts we were not able to find reconciliation and intimate relationship with Papa because our sin stood to condemn us. Because sin would ultimately rule us, God had to send judgement to correct us and bring us back to repentance. There we would cry out under our judgement and God in His mercy would send a judge to bring us back to Himself where we would remain briefly before repeating the cycle again.
Now, we have a King and His name is Jesus. He is not only the King, but the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords. In His realm of authority and dominion He has called us out of the old law of sin and death, because the crucifixion of His divine life nailed that old law of condemnation to the cross. When we come to Him in faith we must recognize that is where our old selfish sinful nature and man has been identified; with Him on that cross. We also died to that former way of doing, “whatever seemed right in our own eyes.” As He raised us up by faith into His life we come under a new law, because we have entered and become citizens and partakers of a new kingdom. The laws of this kingdom don’t operate like the former one. Here there is no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus. “In Christ” speaks to a state of being in our spirit man that is manifested through our physical being.
We find this in Romans 8. “Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, 2because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit of life set me free from the law of sin and death. 3For what the law was powerless to do in that it was weakened by the sinful nature, God did by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful man to be a sin offering. And so he condemned sin in sinful man, 4in order that the righteous requirements of the law might be fully met in us, who do not live according to the sinful nature but according to the Spirit.” The key to living in this realm and kingdom is living by faith out of the law of the Spirit and no longer after the flesh. A line of demarcation has been drawn that you live under one law or the other, but you can’t live under both.
Jesus says you can’t serve two masters in Matthew 6:24, “No man can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon.” Mammon is the old world order that falls under the law of sin and death.
The question then really becomes, “What law are we living under?”
Romans 8 goes on to define what it is to live in the law of the Spirit of life and what the differences are. “Those who live according to the sinful nature have their minds set on what that nature desires; but those who live in accordance with the Spirit have their minds set on what the Spirit desires. 6The mind of sinful man is death, but the mind controlled by the Spirit is life and peace; 7the sinful mind is hostile to God. It does not submit to God’s law, nor can it do so. 8Those controlled by the sinful nature cannot please God.
9You, however, are controlled not by the sinful nature but by the Spirit, if the Spirit of God lives in you. And if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Christ. 10But if Christ is in you, your body is dead because of sin, yet your spirit is alive because of righteousness. 11And if the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit, who lives in you.
12Therefore, brothers, we have an obligation—but it is not to the sinful nature, to live according to it. 13For if you live according to the sinful nature, you will die; but if by the Spirit you put to death the misdeeds of the body, you will live, 14because those who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. 15For you did not receive a spirit that makes you a slave again to fear, but you received the Spirit of sonship. And by him we cry, “Abba, Father.” 16The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children. 17Now if we are children, then we are heirs—heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory.”
The Word doesn’t say we don’t still struggle with the inclinations toward our former sinful nature, but it has become a matter of new identity, allegiance and citizenship. If you move to the United States from a foreign country and decide to become a US citizen then you have changed your identity, allegiance and citizenship. You must renounce the old to embrace the new. If the United States is at war with your former country, who are you going to fight for and stand with? Where is your identity and allegiance? You may feel the soul ties that want to draw you back to the former feelings you had for your country and countrymen, but now you have to cut them off, because it is no longer who you are. You can no longer go between countries and have your allegiance divided or you will be considered a traitor. You can no longer live under the former laws and traditions of the old country and still be a US citizen. They don’t work in this new country. You no longer have to live under tyranny, but you can live in freedom, but freedom isn’t freedom if it brings you again under the bondage of sin. “13For if you live according to the sinful nature, you will die; but if by the Spirit you put to death the misdeeds of the body, you will live, 14because those who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. You see it is the Spirit that now indwells you that is the power in you to overcome who you used to be. As we learn to live in obedience and faithfulness to Him we are led by Him. It is living under His banner and direction that we become the sons of God.
If we are still doing whatever is right in our eyes we are missing what it is to live under the higher law. It is only under this law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus that we live and abide in the life of God and we come to experience the intimacy of relationship with Him. God has given us the choice to be sons or slaves. Where is our true identity, allegiance and citizenship, in the law of sin and death or the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus? Your identity is who you are, not what you call yourself.
Blessings,
#kent
tricklesoftruth 