I want to pursue a little this matter
of our vision and our expectation, our intention
for doing what we're doing, our intention for
gathering together, God's intention in the body of
Christ.
And God wants us to see the ultimate
that he has intended for his people, for
his church.
Otherwise, where there's no vision, the people perish.
And whether that refers to being lost or
there's a perishing of God's purposes in us,
there's no real vision.
And so God wants us to see what
he has in mind, and that what he
does along the way is never to be
considered in any sense an ultimate.
But we're prone to make ultimates of experiences.
We used to do it in the church,
you get saved, and then days of Wesley,
and after that, and I'm not denying the
fact that God did do another work in
people, and he called it sanctification.
And then Pentecost comes along, and no, there's
still the baptism of the Holy Ghost.
And so now we've got the full gospel,
it's saved, sanctified, filled with the Holy Ghost,
and you've got the whole thing.
And God wants us always to know there's
much, much more.
No matter how far we go, there's still
much more.
And when we pass into the great beyond,
there's still much more.
Heaven isn't going to be a boring place.
It's not going to be boring.
Oh, I saw that yesterday, I saw that.
If God is God, there will be an
eternal unfolding of his heart to his people.
I have not seen nor ear heard, neither
have I entered into the hearts of men
the things that God has prepared for those
that love him.
But unto us God hath revealed them by
his Spirit.
The Spirit searches all things.
Why is God's Spirit given to us?
Well, going up in Pentecost to give you
power.
Well, that's one aspect of it.
But you go through the Scriptures and you
find that we're so inclined to say, this
is what it's for, and then leave it
at that.
Instead of recognizing that anything that has life
is unfolding, has growth, never stagnant if it
has life.
And the life of God is not stagnant.
It's a continual growth.
And it begins here.
That's the thing we want to emphasize.
It begins here, and God wants to continue
it here, not just get a few experiences
and then, okay, I'm ready for heaven, Lord.
And then when you get older, Lord, please
take me, Lord, please take me.
And I realize perhaps the burden of old
age has been heavy on many.
You'd sooner go than stay.
But I believe in God's ideal.
You don't retire.
Your work is done.
And I know it doesn't happen that way
very often, but you don't have to die
of disease or shouldn't.
But we're not blaming anybody.
We just recognize that the church is not
in that place where God wants it to
be.
Moses lived to be 120 years.
And that was under the law.
He was the minister of the law.
Well, we're under grace that's far greater than
what Moses had.
And Paul says that.
But then you talk about some of the
things that Moses saw and experienced, some of
the things that John of Israel experienced.
If we had one-tenth of it, you
say, why are we spiritual?
For instance, the cloud of glory that hung
over the camp of Israel every day and
night for 40 years.
And there was a camp up in Ontario,
Canada, where I heard in the days of
great revival at the beginning of this century,
that light of God would hover over this
tent.
People coming from a distance would see it
and come to it.
I forget the name of it.
And I heard about that.
Well, how tremendous.
That happened over the tent of Israel for
40 years.
Every day.
It became so common it was no longer
a miracle.
It happens every day.
You don't consider it a miracle.
I mean, the very sun rising and setting
is a miracle, but well, it's happened that
way all our life, so it's no miracle.
In the hearts of God's people, it becomes
so hard.
We get so accustomed to God's gracious benefits
that it's no longer wonderful, no longer a
cause for thanksgiving.
It's there.
It's always there.
And so the constant burden of God's heart
is to lead his people on.
How far?
As far as God will take you.
But you say God only wants to take
us here.
Now, be careful you don't go too far.
God doesn't lay out restrictions like, don't go
too far here.
He's always inviting us to come further.
But you say I might get swamped.
Well, that's what he wants, if you use
an illustration.
When he invited Ezekiel to measure a thousand
cubits and took him through the waters, and
the waters were to his ankles.
He invited him to come another thousand and
the waters were to the knees.
Come further.
And the waters were to the loins.
Come further.
But you know, it gets scary.
You go too deep and you've got all
kinds of people warning you, don't get deep.
I remember a letter we got up when
I was helping up in the school there
many years ago, the time of the revival.
Oh, I like some of these writings, except
they go off to deep ends sometimes, but
I enjoy the writings.
I remember writing back and I told him
the story about Ezekiel's vision.
And he went on a thousand, and the
water kept getting deeper and deeper.
And then I says he went another thousand
cubits and walked off the deep end.
And he did.
He got in waters to swim in.
And that's what God wants.
But we want to have a little bit
of solid footing, you know.
You just don't feel comfortable.
You can touch the bottom.
I remember once before, I can't swim very
well, but when we moved to the coast,
I read a book on how to swim,
so I'd go down and I'd paddle around
until I knew how to float, and then
I lost fear.
But boy, I remember one time the tide
was coming in, and I could hardly touch
bottom when I was going back to shore
there.
It's a little scary if you can't touch
bottom.
God wants us to come to a place
where we can't touch bottom.
And don't be afraid if it's in the
river of life.
Oh yes, if it's in some muddy stream
that man has concocted, or some muddy cistern.
Yeah, that's dangerous.
But God wants us to flow in his
river where we lose control.
We lose control.
Oh, that's scary, I know.
But where the Spirit of God is in
control, then that's not scary.
Because he's the one who brought order out
of chaos.
He moved upon the face of the great
deep in the beginning, and through the Spirit
of God all things are held in their
orbits.
And we marvel at it, how universes and
galaxies and planets and stars are all up
there, and billions and billions of them, and
yet somehow this little planet, this little speck
of dust in which we live, it survives
it all.
You read of scary things sometimes, that what
might happen if one of these big asteroids
hits us, and what it could do could
wipe out life on the planet, and that's
so.
It won't happen as long as God's in
control, unless that has something to do with
the burning up of the elements of this
old earth that God might bring forth a
new one.
God wants to be in control.
And when we say that, it's not an
autocratic thing that we should think of, like
we think of when we're under control.
But we should think rather of being under
the control of him, who is total life,
total love, total light, total truth, the author
of all peace and harmony.
How wonderful to be under that kind of
control.
I remember once reading in a version that
had marginal reference in it, and I came
across this scripture here in Mark 1 where
there was a man in the synagogue with
an unclean spirit, and he cried out saying,
let us alone, what are we to do
with thee?
And there was a note there, that word
with, and it said, the Greek said in.
And then the note said, he didn't just
have his unclean spirit, he was in it.
And he said in the note, that means
he was dominated by it, he was under
the control of it, he was in it.
And I don't know if that thought remained
with me concerning what I was to discover
later, that the same word is used for
those who are in the Spirit, in Christ.
Not just that they have the Spirit, but
we're in the Spirit.
And if that's true of that evil spirit,
and people recognize how awful it would be
to be under the control of an evil
spirit, how beautiful to think that God wants
to take away that evil spirit of control
and cause us to live in another spirit,
the Spirit of Christ, where he's in control.
And yet it still seems abhorrent in the
minds of most Christians.
I must always have control of myself.
God wants to be in control.
Not in an autocratic sort of way, but
in the Spirit of life.
How healthy we would be if the law
of the Spirit of life and Christ Jesus
had control of these mortal bodies.
And I believe God wants to do that.
I believe he will yet do it before
immortality.
I'm not talking about immortality.
God leaves us in a body of mortality
that we might be able to suffer with
Christ.
But our Lord Jesus Christ did not die
of any cancer or tuberculosis or some kind
of disease that fastened itself upon him.
Though he took that to become our salvation
and our healer, but he lived in a
mortal body.
But nevertheless, a body that was healthy and
strong.
And the only time he became weak was
when for our redemption.
He who was the great and mighty one
became weak for our sake.
This just comes in passing here, but the
law of the Spirit of life in Christ
Jesus, God's full intention in giving us the
Spirit is that it might become a law
within us, not just something we have to
possess to use, to administer by it, to
do things for God by his Spirit.
He didn't just give us his Spirit as
something for you and I to control, as
often seems to be the case, especially in
ministry, where God has given certain authority and
the thought seems to come, I'm in control
here because God has made me to be
apostle or prophet or whatever.
But rather, the Spirit of God wants to
be in control.
And that no matter how great that ministry
is, God wants that minister to be under
the control of that Spirit.
I believe that's what God means, where Jesus
said, Abide in me and I in you.
We read that, memorize it, very simple, Abide
in me and I in you.
Begin to contemplate that.
I hardly touched yet.
We know what it is for Christ to
be in us, do we not?
Christ in you, the hope of glory.
Do we know?
Can anyone here say they know in some
great experience what it means for us to
be in him in an experiential way?
You say, What's the difference?
There must be a difference.
Jesus says, I want to abide in you,
but I want you to abide in me.
It's a simple illustration, of course.
This person goes down to the river and
fills up his glass with water, and he's
got river water in his glass.
But then he, and I won't And we
make much of immersion in water, because I
believe the word baptism implies that.
Immerse in water.
How much emphasis do we place upon this
matter of being baptized, immersed in the river
of God, immersed and living there?
There are heights and depths in God that
we haven't touched yet that God wants us
to touch, to experience in this life.
I have not seen, nor hath ear heard,
neither hath entered into the heart of man
the things that God hath prepared for those
that love him, but unto us God hath
revealed them by his Spirit.
For the Spirit searcheth, searcheth all things, yea,
the deep things of God.
And I believe, Brethren can confirm it, that
we use the word deep things as a
translation of a word that, it's one word,
the all things.
I don't know Greek very well.
And I believe that word says, not in
deep things, as if we've got to know
these deep things of God, but the depths
of God.
Look it up.
We might know the depths of God.
Give me a new thought.
The depths of God.
And we're born for the depths of God.
And I'm not talking about deep mysteries of
the scriptures or theology, but the depths of
God, the deep things of God, the depths
of God that God wants to bring us
into.
And how Paul prayed for the Ephesian church
that they might, like the book of Ephesians,
where Paul would begin to utter these unsearchable
things, and yet using the Greek language to
portray it, to say it, and yet knowing
that there is a language beyond any Greek
or Hebrew or Spanish or English or German
that man cannot speak.
Maybe in the Spirit, maybe in tongues sometimes
we speak some of that.
We call it the unknown language.
The things that God is so far beyond
us that they're unsearchable.
And the heart of God, how is he
going to reveal himself to us in my
English language or your Spanish or your German
or your Hebrew?
How is he going to talk to you
in the language of heaven?
Use your language, but your language with 25
letters, 26 letters, how can God reveal himself
in that?
There's another language that if we do not
have, we cannot comprehend the things of God.
And that's the language that God bridges by
his Spirit.
And so that's what Paul meant when he
said, What things knoweth the things of man
but the Spirit of man?
What do you know about mankind if you're
not a man?
Very little does an animal know about any
human being.
Yet sometimes we say they're very intelligent, just
somehow they can relate a little.
But who knows what's in man except by
the Spirit of man?
Then he says, Then who knows what's in
God but by the Spirit of God?
That's why how vain it is to think
that by intellectually we can figure out the
heart of God, because only the Spirit of
God knows that.
So Paul says in 1 Corinthians 2, maybe
we'll just turn to it a minute, 1
Corinthians 2, Now we have received not the
Spirit of the world, but the Spirit which
is of God, that we might know the
things that are freely given to us of
God.
He gives us the Spirit, not just to
make us happy or jump or dance or
preach or minister or, oh, you could go
on and on.
He gives us the Spirit of God that
we might know the things that are freely
given to us of God.
He wants us to know what he's freely
made available to us.
He's already told us that eye hasn't seen
it, ear hasn't heard what God's revealed, what
he's prepared for us.
But he says, God is revealed amongst us
by his Spirit.
For the Spirit searches all things, yea, the
deep things, the very depths of God himself.
God gives us, we're humans of the dust,
nevertheless capable of receiving his Spirit because we're
made in his image.
He gives us that Spirit, and that Spirit
might search out those things in God.
And so here's Saul of Tarsus, knowing Greek
and Hebrew to perfection and never really knew
God, because he didn't have the Spirit.
I studied Greek a little in time, and
I wasn't able to pursue it.
I often regretted it, and I still regret
it in a sense.
But I think God gave me courage to
know and to understand that some of the
great theologians that knew Greek and Hebrew to
perfection yet never really come to know the
Lord in great depth.
And that to have the Spirit of God,
he can reveal to you these unutterable things
in the heart of God that no earthly
language can unveil.
And yet we're very thankful for our translators,
for those who have given us the concordances.
Those who know Greek and Hebrew, God has
always provided those because he is concerned about
maintaining the integrity of the written word of
God.
But let us never be disturbed if somehow,
sometime the Bibles are all taken up and
confiscated and destroyed.
The living word, the true word, still remains.
They're in steadfastness.
And God could raise up someone to stand
before the people and declare it if there's
no Bibles.
I know a man who would do that.
A man who had the gift, you might
say, of the Bible.
Not that he could quote Genesis 1 right
on through.
He didn't read the Bible much.
But when he stood to minister, he'd quote
scriptures.
That's about all he would preach for a
half an hour, three-quarters of an hour.
And he'd say, take your Bibles, and he'd
be standing there without a Bible.
He shall know that I am the Lord,
comma, when I have opened your graves, comma,
O my people, comma, semicolon, colon, just like
that.
I mean, accurately, a gift that God had
given him.
He wasn't walking with God.
I'm going to, Lord willing, come back to
some of that.
I want to talk about going on to
know God and not to stop short in
any benefit he has given us, any blessing
he has given.
Never to think, I've got this blessing, I've
got one, two, three, I've got the third
blessing, and so finally I've got it.
Because a blessing from God is not the
fullness of God's intention.
It's what that blessing will do.
Let's take note in the scriptures when God
says he's done this in order to do
that.
Pay attention to it.
Because God does this with it, well, that's
great.
And it is great.
It might be tremendous, but in order that
something else might happen, we'd better see what
God has in mind that might happen.
So when he says, I've poured out my
gifts upon the church, and I've raised up,
I've given to the church gifts from my
own heart.
When he ascended on high, he led captivity
captives and gave gifts unto men, apostles and
prophets and evangelists and pastors and teachers.
Isn't that great?
God's restored the apostolic, the fivefold ministry, and
that has become the theme of the church
in this last half century, almost 40, 50
years.
And God did emphasize it, because he did
that.
He restored gifts to his people.
And when God restores anything to his people,
for a season he'll emphasize it greatly.
But he doesn't want us to stop there.
So God's intention in giving the gifts of
the spirit, precious as they are, his intention
is something else.
For the perfecting of the saints, for the
work of the ministry, for the edifying of
the body of Christ, till.
Till.
Well then, if it's till something, when that
comes, well then these others somehow have got
to be put in the background.
So it hasn't come yet, so we shall
thank the Lord that he's given us gifts
and blessings and ministrations, and we anticipate he'll
do much more in the days to come,
because there's been a perversion of many of
the gifts that God has given, there's been
misuse of them, people have become disillusioned because
of much that's gone on.
Not that it comes from the gifts of
God, but it comes by reason of the
fact that those who have these gifts have
not realized God's intention in giving them, and
feel they're in control, rather than recognizing when
God makes an apostle or prophet, he wants
that apostle, that prophet to come under the
control of the Spirit of God, and his
ministry is going to be valid.
And not denying that if he doesn't come
under that control, that man might still have
power.
He may still have power without coming under
the control of the Holy Spirit.
But it'll be to his own loss.
It might benefit the people of God, but
it will not benefit the one who is
manifesting that particular gift or ministry.
It's necessary that we understand these things, because
God's people have become so disillusioned in seeing
mighty men of God, so-called.
God says, don't call any man mighty.
But we see these mighty men of God,
and they become heroes, and men become totally
captivated by the great things they do.
And God's people have been disillusioned when after
a season somehow, they fail, something happens, they
get so disillusioned, many of them quit church,
they don't want to go anywhere, they don't
want to hear any more preaching, because they
do not understand that you can have all
the gifts of the Spirit, you can have
all power, all wisdom, all knowledge, prophetic utterances,
and if you don't have love, it profits
nothing.
Paul said that.
We say, yeah, I know, but we don't
pay much attention to that.
We think, well, a man couldn't have all
that and not have love.
But he can.
And so, if we know that God's ultimate
intention for his people is to come unto
love, then that's what we'll pursue.
And Paul says, desire earnestly spiritual gifts, but
follow after love.
You don't follow after spiritual gifts, you follow
after love.
So let's continue a little, this message here
in Ephesians 4, for the perfecting of the
saints, for the work of the ministry.
So then the ministry is given to minister
Christ to the people, that the body might
be edified, that they might impart to the
people of God something to enable them to
be ministering servants in the house of God,
for the perfecting of the saints unto the
work of ministry.
So what we call fivefold is, in their
ministration, to impart something to God's people that
they might be ministers.
And I'm not talking about anything clerical, anything
to do with the clergy.
The intention of ministry is to produce ministry
in the body of Christ, so everyone in
the body has a ministry.
Everyone is called to ministry in the body
of Christ.
You can't make it happen.
But that's the intention of ministry.
And I say this, it's the ministry that
God has sent for the edifying of the
saints, for the work of ministry, and for
the building up of the body of Christ.
If it doesn't build up the body that
every member has a vital function in that
body, that ministry has failed.
And I don't see much desire, as I
hear and read of these big prophetic apostolic
conferences, where thousands come to it to listen
and to go away admiring the great teachings
they got, the great apostles that spoke, the
great prophets that ministered.
No thought, it seems to me, in those
great ministers of solely imparting something to God's
people, that they become ministers in the body
of Christ.
I'm not saying that's universal, but that's the
sense you get, that as long as you
uphold this fivefold ministry, everything is lovely and
that's magnified.
And it's till this work has been accomplished
in the body, and then the schism will
disappear in the body of Christ.
I discovered that recently.
God has tempered the body together, giving more
abundant honor to those parts which lack, that
there be no schism in the body of
Christ.
How?
We'll read 1 Corinthians 12.
I cannot say to the hand, I have
no need of thee, or again the head
to the feet, I have no need of
you.
Nay, much more of those members of the
body which seem to be more feeble are
necessary.
God looks down and he sees you when
you say, well, I love coming to church,
I love fellowship with God's people.
I don't have anything, of course, but I
love God's people.
I like to hear the word that you
recognize you're feeble.
That's a good attitude to have.
But God is not pleased until he has
put such honor upon you that you become
something that the rest of the body cherishes
as being vitally essential in the body, instead
of thinking, well, poor guy, nice guy and
all that, but he doesn't have any great
value.
It might be so because of his neglect,
but it might be so also because there
hasn't been the ministration of the truth of
God in power to these people to impart
to them something that that feeble person needs.
God's intention is to take those feeble members
of the body and to put more abundant
honor upon them, because those members of the
body, that's verse 23, which we think to
be less honorable, upon these we bestow more
abundant honor, and our uncomely parts have more
abundant comeliness.
For our comely parts have no need, but
God has tempered the body together, giving more
abundant honor to that part which lacks, that
there should be no schism in the body,
but that the members might have the same
care one for another.
So you see the system we have, the
care is on the pastor.
If it goes and goes from 1,000
to 2,000, well, you've got to build
a temple to seat the 2,000.
You'll go that, build one to seat 3
,000.
I don't know what you'll do if the
whole city is converted to the Lord, and
that's nothing to do with expansion in the
body of Christ, nothing to do with enlargement
in the body of Christ.
We met a man from India a year
ago, Pastor Joseph, he calls himself, from Bombay,
India.
Struggled away there for a year with a
small group of people like any normal pastor,
very concerned and interested in his people, and
yet somehow, always with so many troubles and
problems, he sought God in prayer and fasting,
and God said, Don't try to build up
this church, but establish home churches.
Let the people gather a few in a
home, and then when that home is filled,
go to another home.
I don't know when he started that, a
few years ago.
Last year when he told us this, he
said, Today there are thousands of churches in
Bombay, 15 people, 20 people, that's about it.
They won't go to the Christian temples, because
they've got their own temples, Hindu temples, Sikh
temples, they've got all that.
But the person living in this little humble
cottage, a neighbor will go over and say,
Come and visit us tonight, we're going to
have a gathering.
And they get converted.
And the first thing you know, that house
is filled up.
And there's an elder in charge, and an
elder might be in charge, when I say
in charge, I mean hopefully under the Holy
Spirit.
Maybe two or three under him, and then
there's another home, and another home.
And a year ago, he said there was
a thousand house churches, and he might go
away two months and come back, and there's
25, 30 more house churches.
And I'm not saying that's to be the
explicit pattern.
I'm just saying that it's God's way to
divide, in order that there might be true
unity, and that the schism might be eradicated.
To divide in segments, that there might be
administration of the body, by God putting honor
on all these members that sit there and
say there's nothing to do.
Oh, we'll make you a choir leader.
Oh, you can be the youth leader, you
can be the leader of the seniors, and
creating ministries in order to keep a Babylon
functioning smoothly.
You want to keep all under control.
The real reason for this, the megachurch system,
is really to keep control.
And you know that, and they know it.
It's to keep control, because if it gets
too scattered, we can't control it, they don't
want to flow in the river.
But this river of life is not dangerous.
He will cause you to flow in his
purposes.
Thomas says it's full of water.
What does man do then?
How come we end up in the state
we're in?
God said through Jeremiah, my people have committed
two evils.
They have forsaken me the fountain of living
water.
And they have hewn for themselves cisterns, broken
cisterns that can hold no water.
Now, I thought of those two evils.
Which is the worst?
To forsake him the fountain of living water,
but if you recognize it, hurry back to
the river.
But no, we don't have the river, we
don't have what we had in Azusa Street,
we don't have what we had in the
Great Awakening, or the Wesleyan Revival, we don't
have that.
But we want to retain some of the
flavor of it.
So when Wesley's dad, they organized the Wesleyan
church, when he's dead and gone, instead of
seeking God for a new river if the
streams are drying up, not a new river
but the opening of the one that they
channeled off into human cisterns.
Which is worse?
To forsake the fountain, or having forsaken the
fountain to dig cisterns, holes in the ground
to pour that pure water in, in order
to keep it pure.
Because we're always afraid of heresies and false
doctrines.
So if you have this little pool here,
we can't control the river, but we can
control that and keep it clean.
And you know what happens when you pour
water into a cistern to keep it clean.
It doesn't stay clean.
It might stay clean for a month, a
couple of months.
And they think they've succeeded.
God is pouring out his Spirit upon all
flesh.
And the churches in this day and hour
are excited about filling their cisterns with charismatic
water.
Excited about it.
And there's a freshness about it for a
season.
And they call it a move of the
Spirit that began, when was it?
In the 19th, whatever.
And really it began as a river.
Boy, that.
But what began back whenever it was, and
what became known as the charismatics, was the
channeling of this wonderful flow into their cisterns.
Because they discovered it still works there.
They can still talk in tongues.
They can still heal.
They can still prophesy.
They can still preach.
They can bring in the people.
People are still blessed.
And we're not denying any of that.
But it's not God's order, and it won't
last.
Because God's intention is not blessing, but the
fruit of this blessing.
And so back to Ephesians 4, where the
perfecting of the saints.
And so there's a standard somewhere in Canada,
no doubt here in the States, where this
is the standard.
And anything that's made in feet and inches
has to be according to that standard.
It's set.
It's fixed.
So anybody who manufactures tools or tape measures,
it's got to be right on.
Now let me tell you what the standard
is when God says he wants to bring
his people to perfection.
And to the measure of the stature of
the fullness I know it's too high, but
it's something God's doing, not you and I.
I wish somehow we could emphasize that.
It's just as much a work of God
as when God soothed down and molded together
a bunch of clay or whatever and formed
a man.
And you know very well that if any
other creature was around and says, there, that's
the man that God's made.
Stand up, Adam.
You know it couldn't happen.
But you don't have any trouble believing that
God did that and then breathed into him
the breath of life and became a living
soul.
And so, oh, God did it.
Well, don't think for one moment that what
we're talking about is something that you and
I are supposed to do or that the
Bible ministry is supposed to do.
It's God who breathes in this life to
bring us to the measure of the stature
of the fullness of Christ, not the nine.
God's people, I don't care if it's the
humblest saint in the body of Christ, comes
over to minister to one of God's needy
ones.
He can, as it were, by the Spirit,
breathe that life into them, not of his
own volition, but if God the Spirit is
in him, God will enable that to happen.
So we're not saying, well, oh, it's not
possible.
It can't happen.
You know very well nobody can be perfect
in this life.
I know that.
I'm talking about God the Creator, who, when
you look at that human body of yours
and you say, isn't it tremendous?
You're amazed at the functioning of the human
body.
A famous doctor wrote a book on it
and likened it to the body of Christ.
I mean, you can't conceive of the wonderful
unity and harmony and the ability to ward
off disease and fight disease.
I mean, David said, I was made in
secrets in the lowest parts of the earth.
I know when he said that he was
speaking prophetically of our Lord Jesus and the
body that he was forming for Jesus and
ultimately for this body of Christ.
Thine eyes did see my substance, yet being
imperfect.
And in thy book all my members were
written, which in continuance were fashioned, when as
yet there was none of them.
And David, I know, was speaking concerning the
Christ and the body of Christ.
It's something that God formed that we don't
understand how he did it.
We understand it concerning this human body.
We don't understand it, but we believe it.
How much more cannot the God who is
the God of the spirits of all flesh
at the appointed time stoop down and breathe
into the body of Christ his own life,
that they might rise up in the beauty
of the stature of Christ?
It's going to happen.
I don't know how quickly it can happen,
very quickly.
Ezekiel saw it.
God called him out to the boneyard, the
valley of dry bones, and they were dry,
and lo, they were very dry.
I was thinking of my mother, come back
from a meeting, and what was, oh, lo,
it was very dry.
And God says, can these bones live?
I mean, imagine Ezekiel standing in a boneyard
and saying to Ezekiel, Ezekiel, do you think
these bones can live?
What would you say?
What he said, oh, Lord, I don't know,
prophesy to them.
I'm telling you, God is going to put
a spirit of prophecy in his people.
Thank the Lord for prophets he puts in
the church.
He's going to put a spirit of prophecy
in the people of God, where when they
gather together in his name and Jesus is
Lord and the Spirit is in control, there's
going to be a witness of Jesus, which
God says is the spirit of prophecy.
The spirit of prophecy went forth.
And as he prophesied, behold, there was a
noise, a shaking.
I remember one time, because God emphasized that
prophecy of Ezekiel very much back in 48,
49, and with such emphasis that it somehow
just sticks in everyone's heart that heard it,
about the valley of dry bones.
And years later, when it seemed to all
peter out, which bothered me tremendously for a
season, only for a season until I saw
something else, which if we get time, we'll
touch on it.
But God emphasized that so is the church
of Jesus Christ, like these dry bones, scattered
about in the valley.
How about that spirit of prophecy going forth?
There's going to be a shaking and a
moving and a movement together and so forth.
And I remember years later, I thought, well,
what did happen there?
And I remember that prophecy, and I wrote
down in my Bible somewhere, behold, there was
a shaking.
And I think I wrote, and bone came
to bone a few years later as I
saw that indeed God was drawing people together.
And I stopped there.
I don't know if I'll live to finish
it up or not, but someday the next
part of that prophecy is going to be
fulfilled.
There was no life in me.
And then he said to Ezekiel, stop prophesying
to the bones now.
Prophesy to the winds.
And so he prophesied to the winds.
The time has come when God wants a
ministration unto him.
To people, yes, but they will only be
truly impressed upon by God's Spirit as it's
to God first and he hears it first.
You see, I want to tell the people,
God knows all about these things.
Heaven knows all about it.
God knows about it, but I don't know
if all the angels there know about it
or if all the angelic hosts know about
it who are there to minister on behalf
of the church because they're seeking to learn
from you and I.
Don't get too excited if an angel tells
you something.
I might believe it and I might not.
Depends what you tell me he told you.
When they start teaching you things from God's
Word, I'd be very wary because they're ministering
servants to help you and I.
God hasn't set them as teachers in the
church.
They might be around here listening in to
see what they can learn.
You're getting a little arrogant now?
Not a bit.
Peter says, angels desire to look into these
things that we're talking about.
And they're peering, looking, wondering what's going on,
because they don't understand too much about our
glorious redemption.
They're not the objects of redemption.
Somehow God is using the church of the
living God to reveal his wisdom in heavenly
places.
I'm just interested in this earth.
Well, God's not.
He's interested in this earth.
Of course he is, but he's not concerned
about you and I just being earthbound.
He wants us to begin to hear what
the heavens are saying and to respond to
what the heavens are saying and to hear
what we're saying.
If we're moving in the Spirit, the heavens
will hear what we're saying and the heavens
will be alerted to war and good warfare
on behalf of the church if they hear
what the church is saying.
Imagine Moses standing there before the congregation and
saying, hear, O heavens, and I will speak.
Oh, shut up, Moses.
We're the ones listening to you.
No.
Heavens must hear what God's people are saying,
because we're depending on the forces of heaven
in this warfare that we're engaged in.
Spiritual weapons.
They're standing there in the heavens.
They're ready to be marshaled at God's command
and they're listening to what the church is
saying.
I mean the church that's walking in the
Spirit.
Hear, O heavens, and I will speak.
Give ear, O earth, to the words of
my mouth, Moses said.
Paul tells us that God gave him administration
of the gospel to the intent that he
might declare among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches
of Christ.
You say, that's what I want to do.
Nothing else.
No.
If you stop there, you don't have the
full gospel.
To declare unto the Gentiles the unsearchable riches
of Christ.
We can't go into that in detail, but
that's what has been going on.
People declaring these unsearchable riches that are in
Christ Jesus.
To declare these unsearchable riches of Christ and
to cause all men to see what is
the fellowship of the mystery which from the
beginning of the world has been hidden in
God.
Let me find that in Ephesians chapter 2
or 3.
Paul said God gave him the revelation of
the gospel as a mystery, a secret that
God revealed to him.
That he should preach among the Gentiles the
unsearchable riches of Christ and to make all
men see.
Aren't we trying to make men see?
Because if they don't see, they don't hear,
they don't know what the gospel is about.
So what do we have?
I don't like to always come back to
this, but it's so ridiculous.
People going around and dramas and puppet shows
and mime and pantomime to show people the
gospel.
This is what the gospel is.
We're acting it out.
Clowns there with their painted faces all white
and going through all sorts of motions to
show forth the gospel.
Men might see.
I think those things are happening in what's
called the church of Jesus Christ.
But Paul had a ministration of a living
word that when he spoke the gospel, the
same thing happened that when God said, Let
there be light.
And in that creative word that Paul sent
forth, it caused men to see.
And so if that creative word doesn't go
forth to cause men to see, they remain
in their bondage.
They remain in their blindness.
They can't see unless there is power in
the ministration of the gospel to open blinded
eyes.
Because the God of this world has blinded
their eyes.
Let the light of the knowledge of the
glory of Christ just shine unto them.
It caused men to see the fellowship of
this secret, the mystery which from the beginning
of the world has been hid in God
who created all things by Jesus Christ, to
the intent.
So you see, it's not finished.
You don't have the full gospel yet.
Preach the unsearchable riches, but in the power
of the Holy Spirit and going forth, shining
as a bright light, a light that will
remove the blindness, the darkness, but take away
the veil to the intent that now unto
the principalities and powers and heavenly places might
be known by the church the manifold wisdom
of God.
But why do I care about those things
up there?
Here's where the need is.
God knows that.
But unless the principalities and powers and heavenly
places, unless to them is revealed the mystery
of God, they're not going to be shook
up.
You say, what's the mystery of God?
What do they mean to know about the
mystery of God?
They know, and God wants you and I
to know, that the mystery of God is
the mystery of the cross.
Paul goes through that in quite some detail
in 1 Corinthians 1, that the mystery of
God is the mystery of the cross.
The Greeks seek after wisdom, and we preach
Christ crucified unto the Jews a stumbling block,
and unto the Greeks foolishness, but unto them
which are called Christ, the power of God,
and the wisdom of God.
The wisdom of God and the cross.
They're at the cross by a man overcoming
evil with good, by overcoming darkness with light,
by overcoming hatred with love, by overcoming deceitfulness
with truthfulness, by overcoming everything that is evil
with everything that was good, for he was
the sum total of all that is good.
Hanging on a cross, he overcame those principalities
and powers and heavenly places.
And when that which God calls the wisdom
of the cross penetrates the heavens, it causes
them to be terrified, because they know they
were defeated at the cross, not at the
resurrection.
At the cross they made an open show
of principalities and powers.
And so that's why God wants the people
to go forth with the full gospel, proclaiming
unsearchable riches in the power and in the
anointing and in the light of God that
removes scales from eyes, and penetrating the heavens,
that the heavens might know that the victory
of the cross has been accomplished, and they'll
be aware of it and be terrified because
of it and will surrender because of it.
That's why the weapons of our warfare are
not carnal, but spiritual.
That's why the weapons are, as old Paul
uses the likeness of a sword and a
helmet and all that, don't go so much
by the likeness that he's using, he takes
a Roman soldier as a picture, but he
says that helmet is the helmet of salvation.
That breastplate is righteousness.
That girdle about their loins is truth.
Those shoes that they wear are shoes of
the preparation of the gospel of peace, because
the gospel must have a preparation made in
the hearts of those who deliver it and
in the hearts of those who receive it.
Say, just keep to the simple gospel.
Well, what is the simple gospel?
I don't know what that is, but the
gospel of God is the power of God
unto salvation, because it's not in our strength,
it's in our weakness.
It's not in confronting evil with forces like
he's got, that he can muster a great
army and a great rally and get them
marching in Washington and making a big show
of how strong they are.
But it's in a weak people, hidden away
perhaps on their knees, perhaps lamenting over the
lost condition of mankind, that the forces of
evil are weakened to the intent that now,
under principalities and powers in heavenly places, might
be known through the church the manifold wisdom
of God.
God wants to restore the full gospel to
his people.
He's going to do it when he has
the people walking in control and flowing in
the river of God.
Prophesy to the dry bones, and they came
together, no life in them.
But there they were in a form.
Then he said, Now prophesy to the wind.
And he prophesied to the wind and he
said, Come from the four winds, O breath,
and breathe upon these slain that they may
live.
He's going to take the breath of God
to do this.
He's going to take that same prophetic utterance
that we've rejoiced in when we hear it
given to us and send it forth to
the people.
The prophetic utterance from the heart of God
is going to take that same spirit penetrating
the heavens, that same prophetic spirit going forth
into the heavens, whether it be an intercessory
prayer or in a proclamation of the truth
of God that causes principalities and powers to
tremble from God's weak ones in the earth
as the wisdom of God penetrates the heavens,
the wisdom of the cross.
Don't think these things are strange.
They're only strange because we're not familiar with
such things.
Paul went forth with the full gospel.
The heavens heard it.
They heard it.
They knew all about it.
This one girl under the power of an
evil spirit, she spotted them because those principalities
and powers were aware of what Paul was
doing and the havoc he was working in
their kingdom in the heavens.
And she cried out, These are the servants
of the Most High God, which show unto
you the way of salvation.
Well, that's what Paul was preaching, eh?
Why would Satan use the same words?
Why would he magnify the Apostle Paul?
Satan wouldn't hesitate to magnify the Apostle Paul
if he could get a little footing there
in his life.
And he won't hesitate to magnify the greatest
preacher or apostle or prophet or healer on
this earth if he can get a little
glory out of it.
And he didn't hesitate to try to get
an edge in Jesus when he said to
him, When Jesus was hungry, take this stone
and turn it to bread.
You're hungry, aren't you?
Aren't you the Son of God?
You can do it.
He could have done it, couldn't he?
But had he done it, he would have
been responding to the challenge of the devil
instead of following the will of God.
And he didn't do it.
God wants us to be subject not to
the challenges of the devil, but to the
mind of God.
Not to show the devil I can do
it, how strong we are.
Not for these great men to show the
world or the church how powerful they are
to do what God says to do his
will.
I'm going to close shortly, but I want
to mention something about this whole thing that
we're talking about.
It almost sounds that no matter where you
go here, you can get into trouble.
And you can, if we don't go all
the way within.
I don't care how exalted a man might
be with gifts and ministries and power.
There's still a place that God hasn't fully
dealt with him.
There's still a place where Satan might gain
a foothold.
And we've seen this happen.
It's sad to say the church condemns them
instead of saying, God, search our hearts.
Because we're looking for more power than we
have.
We realize we don't have much power and
it bothers us because we don't have much
power to deal with a lot of situations.
God, why don't you give us more power?
God is saying I want a people who
will not fall.
God was to pour out upon this congregation
tonight a great manifestation of power that you
and I could go out and perform miracles
unheard of.
I wonder how many of us would survive
it.
I mentioned this man that had this gift
where he could stand up and quote scripture
after scripture after scripture from the authorized version
given in verse, where it is found, chapter,
book, comma, semicolon, everything else.
And the man was living and mourning.
The pastor that brought him in had to
tell him not to come anymore.
I mean, it's the saddest thing that a
man can have tremendous gifts from God, and
yet the heart not be changed.
Many people were blessed because of that.
Many people came and found Christ because he
was quoting God's words.
And under the anointing, you could sense it.
But it took some weeks or months to
discover he wasn't living for God.
He wouldn't read the Bible.
He didn't need to.
He'd stand there and the scriptures would come.
I don't like God doing things like that.
We don't like the way God pours out
his gifts upon the rebellious.
He said he's going to do it.
I'm saying this, and that's the substance, really,
of what I wanted to come to.
The blessing of God is not the fullness
of God's intention.
It's intended to bring forth fruit.
What became known as Latter-day Saints, the
intention was to bring forth fruit.
Apostles, prophets, gifts, ministry, yes, but the intention
was to bring forth fruit.
And where it did that, there was abiding
fruit.
Where the hearts were not right, it brought
forth kingdom building.
The blessing of God did it.
They wouldn't have done it if it wasn't
for the blessing of God.
I don't understand.
Is this Toronto blessing of God or not?
Well, God will bless wherever his people are
gathered looking for blessing.
He'll bless.
They say it's of the devil.
I say, no, it's of God.
Some say it's half and half.
One man said it's 23 percent of God.
Well, I don't know about all that.
I'm just saying that God will bless wherever
people need blessing.
He's a blessing God, and God's intention is,
don't you know, Paul says, that the goodness
of God is intended to lead you to
repentance.
So let's not get amazed about this matter
of the blessing.
The rain comes down.
Let's read it there in Hebrews 6.
For as the rain comes down upon the
garden of God, it's going to bless two
kinds of seed that are in the ground.
There's seed in the ground, and the rain
is going to bless both of them.
If the earth which drinketh in the rain,
Hebrews 6, that cometh oft upon us, and
bringeth forth herbs meet for them by whom
it is dressed, receiveth blessing from God.
But that which beareth thorns and briers is
rejected, and is not unto cursing, who is
entered to be blessed.
The same rain that brings forth vegetables, your
tomatoes, your trees, your fruit trees, the same
rain nurtures your thistles and everything else that's
obnoxious in your garden.
The same rain does it.
Is it of God?
Well, I'm not sure.
Let's assume it's all of God.
What's it bringing forth?
That's what God's looking for.
What's it bringing forth?
If the seed is right, it'll bring forth
good fruit.
If the seed is wrong, it'll produce evil
fruit.
The blessing of God will do it.
Some of you find it difficult for that,
if you understand that.
Just before I close, Psalm 78.
I think it's necessary for us to know
this.
If God's going to pour his blessing again,
we sang about it, we need it.
We need that rain.
We need it.
It was God's heritage.
But that rain is going to feed any
seeds that are in your life.
There have been many a man who has
received great gifts of the Spirit, even in
those early days when prophecy came over people
and hands were laid upon them and great
gifts were given.
Many a man, that gift went to ruin,
ruination in their lives, because they thought, God,
he's going to give me this gift, so
I guess he figures I'm all right.
And maybe they go on living carelessly and
they still could perform miracles.
Well, that proves God thinks I'm all right,
doesn't it?
It doesn't.
We have no indication to believe anything else
but that when God sent the 12th voice,
Judas went out preaching the gospel, healing the
sick, casting out devils.
As far as we know, he did the
same as the rest.
And at the Last Supper, when the 12
were gathered around the table and Jesus said,
One of you shall be turned in.
You think there were 11 eyes suddenly turned
in?
I think he's the one.
Each one said, Lord, me?
Lord, is it I?
They weren't pointing fingers.
He passed off as a disciple, an apostle
of Jesus Christ.
But he was a thief.
He carried the bag, stealing with the money
that was put in.
Looking for enlargement in the kingdom of God,
a mercenary.
Why did Jesus choose him?
You ask the Lord when you get there.
I don't know.
He had to be there to fulfill the
Scriptures.
I'm saying this.
He had the same kind of power that
the rest had.
But that didn't make him any different.
It made him worse.
Don't pray for power, except the power that
Peter talks about when he says, According as
his promises have given unto us all things
that pertain to life and godliness.
That's the kind of power God wants you
and I to live for.
The power that will produce more of his
life, his real life, life of purity, holiness,
graciousness, bringing forth the gifts of his Spirit.
Power to do that.
But let's not pray for any other kind
of power until this has wrought its work
within us.
Pray rather, Lord, don't give us any more
power than you give us an equal measure
of grace to counterbalance it.
Because if we receive a greater measure of
power than we have grace and virtue to
counterbalance it, it should be to our own
ruin.
So before saying all this, after saying, According
as his divine power hath given unto us
all these things, add to your faith virtue,
virtue, knowledge, knowledge, temperance.
They say self-control, but let's understand it's
not our carnal nature being in control, but
the renewed man having control of that new
man.
And do the temperance, patience.
Did you pray for patience?
Well no, we want the greater things, but
God wants that patience, because that's part of
God's nature.
He wants us to have his nature.
He wants the fruit.
That's part of God's nature, patience, long-suffering.
Lord, make me like you, Jesus.
I mean, your power, even your love.
But I'm not sure about this long-suffering
and this patience thing.
But love, then, is long-suffering.
But you can't get away from it.
Yeah, one is love, but add to your
faith, virtue, knowledge, temperance, patience, godliness, brotherly kindness,
the brotherly kindness of love.
A brother said to me, and it's a
very honest question because it's come to me
many times, after the message this morning, this
afternoon, Well George, if that's all you really
want, that love of God, what's all this
other?
Why bother with all this other?
And I had to reply with a question,
an answer, that I think the Lord gave
me many years ago when I pondered the
same thing, is love all we need?
Well, let's just have love, until I think
the Lord showed me.
It's the ministration of the truth of God
to the hearts of his people that causes
them to grow into maturity, the maturity of
love.
You don't say, let's have it, and here
it is.
We don't know the, we haven't begun to
fathom the power, the beauty, the authority, the
life that there is in love.
I mean, God's love.
And so that's why we don't evaluate it
as we ought.
It's the greatest thing in the universe.
There's nothing greater.
It's greater than all gifts and all ministries.
It's greater than all that.
And so if we could just have it,
say, okay, forget everything, I'll have that.
It doesn't come that way, because we have
to come to know God.
And before you know God, you have to
walk in his ways.
Jesus said, I'm the way, the truth, and
the life.
Well, Jesus, just give me the life.
No, he says, I'm the way, I'm the
truth, and I'm the life.
And so you can't, you can't take any
shortcuts in this thing.
God leads you in his way before you
come to the truth and life.
Oh yeah, you get truth from the Bible,
I know, but you never really know it
in any experiential way until you walk in
it.
And so if God says, I want to
lead you into truth, he leads you into
wilderness, the first thing he does when he
brings you out of bondage, what he does?
He leads them through the wilderness, to learn
God's way.
Because they were that wilderness and they didn't
know it.
They had to come to springs of bitter
springs of marrow, because that was them.
They had to come through all these hard
places to test them, to prove them, to
try them, to root out of them all
that evil that they might come to Canaan.
No shortcut to Canaan, which is the realm
of perfect love.
No shortcut there.
God didn't take them across the shortcut.
There was one there, but they wouldn't arrive
at the heritage God wanted them to have.
He led them a roundabout way.
God, why do you lead us in such
roundabout ways?
Because it's not in vain.
The roundabout way is intended of the Lord
to discipline us, prove us, try us, test
us, that at the end of the way
we might have found God.
We've come close to the end of the
way.
Oh God, why didn't you do this quicker?
Son, it took me those 75 years to
do it, that's why.
But don't be discouraged, young people, because God's
going to do a quick work in there.
And there's a people coming into Canaan, a
few old guys, but mostly younger ones, and
little babies are going into Canaan.
Because that doesn't mean that's the end of
it all.
There's warfare in Canaan.
There's lots of trouble there, too.
And so they're going on and they're going
on, never come to the place, God keep
us from ever coming to the place where
we feel finally I've arrived.
Because Abraham, though he'd wandered through the land
of promise roundabout for 100 years or more,
ended up living in the land of promise,
I think, for over 100 years, with Isaac
and with Jacob.
Because God told him to go, so he
went.
He said, I'm going to show you a
land I'm going to give you.
He found the land and he lived in
it.
But when he found it and lived in
it, a sense came to him, this doesn't
really satisfy me.
There must be something better, something you'll discover
in Hebrews 11.
He says, By faith Abraham, when he was
called to go to a place which he
should afterwards receive for an inheritance, obeyed.
He went out, not knowing where he went.
You want to be like Abraham.
Wouldn't it be wonderful to have the faith
of Abraham?
Then be prepared to go when you don't
know where you're going.
A young man wrote me a couple of
weeks ago, I want you to pray that
God will show me his plan for my
life.
I wrote back and I said, God won't
show you his plan for your life.
He might give you a few little indications.
Because if God showed you his plan for
your life, you'd be working on it.
You'd be working on it and you'd have
it all figured out and then you'd be
so frustrated because it wouldn't work out.
Because God won't show you.
He leads you in a way that you
never anticipate.
But he does give you a little indication
along the way and gives you a little
bit of a vision.
But no matter what God shows you or
tells you, no matter what kind of a
ministry God gives you, don't let that become
your vision.
Don't let the blessing of God become something
ultimate.
The blessing of God will produce hairs or
wheat.
I shouldn't say produce.
It'll nurture hairs and wheat.
In God's field, Jesus sowed good seed in
the field, the garden.
The enemy came and sowed hairs in that
field.
It received the water from heaven that God
sent, and that water from heaven produced those
hairs.
So the blessing is not a sign of
spirituality.
We'd better know that.
And don't get troubled about trying to analyze
these revivals.
Is it of God or not?
Let's assume God's blessing the hungry ones in.
Let me read you in closing, like one
man said the second closing.
Just in closing here.
Psalm 78.
I'm not going to read it all.
But he declares God's wonderful provision for the
children of Israel.
And yet, in spite of the fact that
God has blessed them over and over and
over and over again, they never came to
know God.
They tempted God in their will.
For all this they tempted himself.
Yet he was faithful, pouring out his blessings.
He rained down manna upon them to eat
and given them the coin of heaven.
That's Psalm 78, verse 24.
Man did eat angels' food.
He sent the meat to the foe.
Wasn't God doing that?
He was blessing them with bread from heaven,
with water out of the rock, with healing
when they were sick.
Not one feeble one amongst them, when that
nation walked in obedience to God.
Millions of people.
We've inherited all the diseases of Egypt.
We haven't got very far yet.
God says, I will not lay upon you
the diseases of Egypt.
We're not there yet.
We're far from it.
God wants to take us on.
But in the wilderness he wants to take
us on.
Say nothing of going into Canaan.
He caused an east wind to blow into
heaven.
By his power he brought in the south
wind.
He rained flesh also upon them.
Why did he rain flesh?
When he provided in the manna everything they
needed.
Because they cried out for it.
Ask God to check your prayers before you're
so insistent.
I insist, God.
By faith I claim this.
I've got to have this.
If you keep at it, if it's not
God's will, he might give it to you.
He might answer your prayer.
He's done it before.
He answered their prayer and along with answering
their prayer, he sent diseases into their midst.
It says, sent leanness into their soul.
One translation says, he sent evil diseases amongst
them.
He gave them their heart's desire and sent
evil diseases amongst them.
God did it because they wanted him, because
they insisted on it.
He blessed them in a way he didn't
want to bless them because they insisted on
it.
I'm not judging what's going on in these
different churches, because I've never been to hardly
any of them.
I'm saying this.
I'm prepared to recognize that God is blessing.
So this whole charismatic move or whatever is
going on in Toronto, I don't know, I
haven't been there.
I do hear people are getting saved and
healed, so God's blessing, God's meeting me.
But I recognize there's a lot of perversion
going on in a lot of places.
It depends on the state of the heart.
It depends on the kind of seed.
If you're insisting, I've got to have this
blessing in our church because they've got it
somewhere else, so I don't get it in
my church.
My pastor friend over there or enemy or
whatever will get it.
My people will go over there, so we
want the blessing here.
You're asking for trouble.
God will give it to you if you
insist on it.
They insisted on flesh because they got tired
of the provision that God had intended, the
word of God, the living word of God,
fresh manna from heaven every day, which when
they ate, it kept them healthy and strong
and they had the ability to hear what
God was saying.
That's why he gave it.
I said to you with manna that you
might know that man does not live by
bread alone, but by every word that proceeds
out of the mouth of the Lord does
man live.
And that morning God rained down manna upon
them and they ate of it.
That evening he sent an east wind to
blow in the heavens and rain flesh on
them.
He rained manna in the morning and that
evening he rained flesh as dust and feathered
fowls like as the sand of the sea
and it fell in the midst of their
camp and about their habitation so that they
did eat and were filled for he gave
them their own desire.
Another psalm says, and then sent leanness into
their souls.
But while the meat was dead in their
mouths, the wrath of God came upon them
and slew the fattest of them.
Don't talk about blessing and asking whether it's
of God.
God's a good God.
Ask what does God intend when he blesses
me?
We're looking for his blessing.
We must have the blessing that God help
us right now to have the right seed
planted within our hearts.
Ask him right now, God help me to
be with all these roots that are there.
Because if God blesses you with those roots
there, God's blessing is going to water those
roots of bitterness, lust, pride, arrogance.
The blessing of God will feed those things
and magnify it as truly as the rain
from heaven will cause those thistles that I
had in my garden before it was a
garden go six foot tall.
It's the same rain that I wanted to
have a garden there someday and I looked
so hopeless and the time came for me
to have a garden.
I kept working on it.
Got it pretty well under control.
The same rain from heaven watered my thistles
as it waters my corn.
Same rain.
These are awesome.
I keep repeating it because God's people can't
understand that.
That a man can stand and prophesy and
heal the sick or raise the dead.
It has to be of God.
Well, maybe that work is of God.
It doesn't prove that that vessel is in
harmony with God's plan and purpose or with
God himself.
And so God sends the rain to produce
the fruit and the fruit is that which
is akin to his own nature and life.
In springtime it's wonderful to see the fruit
trees where it's not too far from fruit
country and they blossom out and they're beautiful.
The rain did that.