The House of God

The House of God

Ephesians 2:19-22
Now, therefore, you are no longer strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, 20 having been built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ Himself being the chief cornerstone, 21 in whom the whole building, being fitted together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord, 22 in whom you also are being built together for a dwelling place of God in the Spirit.

The house of God, as most of us know, is not a structure of wood and stone. It is not a religion or an organization, but it is a living organism structured, designed, and formed by the Spirit of God for His Holy Habitation. It is like a house within a house. You and I are individually the temples and dwelling place of the Holy Spirit, but at the same time we are being formed corporately into the temple and dwelling of the Most High.
What comes to mind is a honeycomb of fitted individual cells all joined together into a hive. It is there that you find the honey, the anointing, the sweet out-flowing of the Holy One. All of its members work in one accord and unto one end, to perpetuate the life of that hive. Each member has their own functions and abilities and as each one is faithful to function in their gifting and calling, the hive will prosper.
Before we knew Christ we had no real home, no real purpose and we were strangers to God. It was His grace that led us unto repentance and salvation that He might join us unto His own where we now have purpose and true meaning in our lives.
It says we have been built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets. These were the stones through which God’s Word came forth and established what we now read as our Bible. They gave the tenants and blueprints of God’s design so that we could continue to be built with continuity from generation to generation, not wavering from the original design and purpose of our Master Architect and Builder, who is Himself the chief cornerstone, the primary support and anchor of God’s temple as well as the capstone and crown of glory that completes and finishes it.
Ephesians 4:11-16 says, “And He Himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers, 12 for the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ, 13 till we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ; 14 that we should no longer be children, tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, in the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting, 15 but, speaking the truth in love, may grow up in all things into Him who is the head—Christ— 16 from whom the whole body, joined and knit together by what every joint supplies, according to the effective working by which every part does its share, causes growth of the body for the edifying of itself in love.” From this scripture has come the terminology of what we call the five fold ministry. A brother shared with us a good analogy the other day as we were having fellowship. He said he saw the five fold ministry much like the forms in construction that are assembled with reinforcements placed within them and then filled with concrete. The forms are not the actual structure or building, but are there to give shape, dimension, and form to the structure, but once the concrete has set up and taken the shape it was designed for the forms are stripped away. The fivefold ministry is not an end in itself, but they are the materials and tools to build the house into God’s design. The end purpose is to have a unified structure that is an organism that functions in the fullness of Christ, whose head is Christ. Each member works together with the other and no one member works for their own good, but for the good of the whole. Much of our mindset today is “what’s in it for me.” In the true body of Christ, me doesn’t exist, it is all about Him. That is the house of God.

Blessings,
#kent

Advertisement

Fullness

Fullness

Ephesians 1:22-23
And hath put all [things] under his feet, and gave him [to be] the head over all [things] to the church, Which is his body, the fulness of him that filleth all in all.

Some of us are pessimist and some of us optimist. Some of us see the glass half-empty and others see it half full. Many see what they can’t do while a few see what they can do. I would probably tend to categorize myself more on the pessimist side. I believe one of the reasons for this is that we see things often through the eyes of our perceived abilities and capabilities. While we don’t wish to be pessimistic, we see ourselves as more pragmatic and practical. While that may be of some advantage in the natural world as we move into the spiritual dimension of God’s calling and purposes that ideology becomes often impractical to our call of faith. As we read the Word and understand more and more of God’s high calling for us who believe, it demands that we leave off with our natural reasoning and thinking. This takes place as we begin to put on the mind of Christ and by the Spirit comprehend and lay hold of the mind and will of God. The Lord can often lead us in some very impractical ways according to our natural reasoning. Our faith begins to lay hold of God’s thinking and His plans and promises rather than our own. This is often difficult for us to do. The Lord says in Isaiah 55: 8-9, “For my thoughts [are] not your thoughts, neither [are] your ways my ways, saith the LORD For [as] the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts.” As some of us are truly grasping who we are in Christ and the high and holy calling and plans He has for us, it strains the natural mind to fully see ourselves in that place. We comprehend the concept that we are the body of Christ, but sometimes it is not as easy for us to comprehend that the body becomes the full expression of the head. We often try and see, as well as understand, this concept in terms of our immediate lifetime, but God sees it in the light of His eternity. While that may tend to put it out of the realm of our immediate grasp and concern we need to realize that the body of Christ is a culmination of Christians throughout the ages and that the body of Christ is not a function of time or space. It is an embodiment of the All Mighty, a holy temple of His divine presence, and as it says here in Ephesians 1, “the fullness of Him that fills all in all”. The divine destiny of each believer is incorporated in this truth. How we live out our individual lives in connection with the will and purpose of God is what determines what part we are in this plan. As we are yielding our hearts and lives to the life of the Spirit we are being incorporated into the fullness of Him that fills all things. “Christ in you” is your hope in glory. It is what takes you and translates you out of the perishable and corruptible into the incorruptible nature and life of God.
If we do one thing today, let’s take a moment to step outside of our natural thinking and religious reasoning and begin to grasp what it is that our God has called us too. It is that place that is so far beyond us and what we could ever hope to be in ourselves. The Lord our God has adopted us into His bloodline through Christ. The blood that flows through His body ebbs with the life of the Father of all eternity and creation. What a humble and awesome privilege to grasp that He desires to make us so much a part of Himself. Is it of little wonder, in light of these things, that He has called us to a place of separation from the world and the unclean things of this life? We have become a part of a different bloodline and lineage than that of our natural man. With the eyes of faith and confidence we must lay hold of the revelation of who we are in Christ and live our lives accordingly. Our growing and abiding relationship with Him is causing us to grasp in an ever increasing way the high calling that is ours in Christ Jesus, that even as He walked, lived, suffered and died all of those things are incorporated in our lives as we live by the Spirit. He is that hand and we are the glove in which it moves and ministers it’s divine service.
Let us open up our hearts and minds to what the Spirit wants us to comprehend right now. We need the vision of who we are and the calling that is upon us in order to pursue with our whole hearts the high and precious promises of His Word. Begin to imagine the fullness of Christ in you, for Ephesians 3:20-21 concludes with, “Now unto him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us, Unto him [be] glory in the church by Christ Jesus throughout all ages, world without end. Amen.”

Blessings,
kent

Raise the Standard

Matthew 5:14-16
“You are the light of the world. A city on a hill cannot be hidden. 15Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house. 16In the same way, let your light shine before men, that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven.”

Raise the Standard

Raise up a standard, the stakes are high. Set your heart upon me and don’t allow it to be moved. Praise Me in all things and acknowledge Me in all that you do. You are a separated people; a people of My possession, a holy temple and a royal priesthood.
Takes your eyes off of the earthly mess and only upon Me let them rest. I am the sovereign One. Mine is the light from the sunset to the rising sun. In the darkness of this present age, I am your guide that lights your way.
Come now you who have broke amends, who have not lived up to the promises and vows that you made. Know that in your strength you often fail, but in My strength you can prevail. Take hold of My hand and I will lift you up, but also be willing to drink from My cup.
I stand with you when you can’t see and even when you wonder what has become of Me.
I am not always there to bail you out, but to exercise your faith without fear and doubt. It is an overcoming people that I will raise up. They have known My blessings, but have also drank from suffering’s cup.
Rise up My people. My people rise up. You are the light that illumines this darkened land, that brings the water of truth to its dust and sand. You are My rain that refreshes the earth, washing from it fear and gloom, death and dearth. You bring hope, because of what you have seen. You know of the blood that has washed you clean. Carry My light to each nation’s shore. Carry the truth to your neighbor’s door. People be the light of My glorious presence. Carry My love, My life and My essence.

Blessings,
kent

When We Call

Psalms 138:3
When I called, you answered me; you made me bold and stouthearted.

When We Call

This morning as I waited for some time before the Lord dropped this scripture in my spirit.  It made me realize that God does hear us, but we don’t always hear His answer right away.   What makes us bold and stouthearted is the confidence in His Word and in Him that is answering us even through we may not audibly hear or physically see the answer right away.  As we wait upon the Lord, we need to do so from the perspective of worship and faith.
Now let me share with you the two verses preceding verse three.  “I will praise you, O Lord, with all my heart; before the “gods” I will sing your praise.  I will bow down toward your holy temple and will praise your name for your love and your faithfulness, for you have exalted above all things your name and your word.”  Notice the approach and attitude toward God, as David, the Psalmist, approaches God for his answer.  David first exalts the Lord in praise, secondly he bows and prostrates himself in the attitude, position and spirit of worship.  Then he makes declaration of the Lord’s faithfulness to His Word and to His name.
Sometimes, in our busy life and Christianity we forget that there is a protocol to our coming before the Lord.  In the light of that protocol that we see here, we might see how rude it could be for us to just pray as we go; telling the Lord all that we are having problems with and all that we need.  Most of the time we are never get quite or still long enough to listen and see if the Lord has anything to say back to us.  Remember the awesome, holy God we pray too.  He is not just part our “to do” list and He’s not just part of our “to do it for us list”  He is worthy of our every day, every moment, highest regard, reverence and praise.  God wants to meet with us and have relationship with us, but let us never get so flippant and complacent that we dishonor Him in the way we approach and seek Him.
Listen to whom God says He is, to whom God says He will look and to whom He will listen in Isaiah 66:1-2.  “This is what the Lord says: “Heaven is my throne, and the earth is my footstool.
Where is the house you will build for me?  Where will my resting place be? Has not my hand made all these things, and so they came into being?” declares the Lord.
“This is the one I esteem: he who is humble and contrite in spirit, and trembles at my word.”
You see, the attitude and position of our heart has a great deal to do with how God receives us.  This word “esteem”  means to look, consider, pay attention to.  If we wonder why we seldom or never hear from God, then we might want to consider how we approach and honor Him with our lives, our praise, worship and prayers.  Learn to ascend into His presence.  Remember, when we call upon the Lord to follow how Psalms 100 gives us  instruction on how to approach our awesome and wonderful Father.
“Shout for joy to the Lord, all the earth. Worship the Lord with gladness;
come before him with joyful songs.  Know that the Lord is God.
It is he who made us, and we are his; we are his people, the sheep of his pasture.
Enter his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise; give thanks to him and praise his name.
For the Lord is good and his love endures forever; his faithfulness continues through all generations.”

Blessings,
kent

Do not Abandon the Works of Your Hands

Psalms 138
I will praise you, O Lord, with all my heart; before the “gods” I will sing your praise.
2I will bow down toward your holy temple and will praise your name
for your love and your faithfulness, for you have exalted above all things
your name and your word.
3When I called, you answered me; you made me bold and stouthearted.
4May all the kings of the earth praise you, O Lord, when they hear the words of your mouth.
5May they sing of the ways of the Lord, for the glory of the Lord is great.
6Though the Lord is on high, he looks upon the lowly, but the proud he knows from afar.
7Though I walk in the midst of trouble, you preserve my life;
you stretch out your hand against the anger of my foes, with your right hand you save me.
8The Lord will fulfill [his purpose] for me; your love, O Lord, endures forever—
do not abandon the works of your hands.

Do not Abandon the Works of Your Hands

Those who walk with the Father, in the Son and through the loving direction of His Spirit know, appreciate and worship how awesome He is.  Our testimonies are many as we look back over His faithfulness in our lives.  Before, all that are acknowledged as gods in this world, we exalt our God and sing His praise.  We have embraced and been embraced by our love affair with Jesus and in the intimacy of that relationship we have come to know Him personally.  As the scripture says, we have come to recognize that above and beyond all things stands the integrity, power and foundational truth of His Name and His Word.
God has put that awesome Word in our hands that we may live out of the power and the kingdom dimension of His holy truth.  That truth He is not only forming in our minds, but conforming in our beings.  We are becoming that truth, as we move by faith in that truth.
What is the name of God?  Did you know that the Father gave Jesus His name?  John 17:11 says, “I will remain in the world no longer, but they are still in the world, and I am coming to you. Holy Father, protect them by the power of your NAME—the NAME you gave me—so that they may be one as we are one.”  Jesus came both as the Word of God and the Name of God.  He was the incarnate physical manifestation of those in the earth.  Do we fully comprehend that when we have received Christ and embraced Him by faith, God’s Name and His Word have been imparted into us by the Holy Spirit?
God often takes us places in our lives where we begin to experience and lay hold of what is resident inside of us.  As such we see Father move on our behalf  in the midst our troubles as we humbly lean upon His Name and trust in His Word.  We live with the resources of heaven on our side.  We are coming to know Him as our resource in every need.  It is the trials and the testing that stirs us to begin to really draw upon the resources that Father has made available to us.
What we don’t sometimes see is that because He has invested Himself so much in us, we are His resource as well.  Even as Jesus carried the Father  in His earthen vessel to manifest His nature, character and love, so we carry Christ in us.   Jesus declares more than once in John 17 how we are  one with the Father and the Son.  We are part of the Holy Family.  We are God’s resource in the earth to communicate through every aspect of our being who He is.  As we look over the earth it is evident that maybe we, as the body of Christ, aren’t really grasping and living into who we are.  Religion has again become the replacement for what God looks like to the world.  Only we, who have a revelation of the Father and who He is in us can truly manifest Him to the world.
Our cry in this hour is, “Father, do not abandon the works of your hands.”  Bring forth in your true people the image and likeness of who you are.  Allow the world to see you for who and what you truly are.  May God’s Name and His Word be what is operating through us and providing the resources that we need to bring the kingdom of God to earth and to see His will done in the earth as it is in heaven.  We are the resources of God’s kingdom building.  We are what make up His holy mountain and the temple of His glory that will be exalted above every other mountain and kingdom. He has chosen us to be the light and the outshining of His glory in the earth.
“Father, do not abandon the works of you hands, but bring us into the fullness of what you created us for.”

Blessings,
kent