Bride of Christ | Radical Disciples - A Remnant Revolution

Posts Tagged ‘Bride of Christ’

Arise And Possess the Kingdom

Posted: April 27, 2011 in disciples life, Kingdom Teaching, Prophetic, teaching, wilderness
Tags: Bride of Christ, Christian life, kingdom growth, Kingdom life, Kingdom living

If you are reading this, you are privileged to live in one of the most dynamic times of change upon this planet. The core of reality as has been practiced in the church is changing. In 1990 God spoke clearly to me, one of His nobodies, and said, “Church is over.” I replied, “What does this mean”. I quickly heard, “Church as you have known it is over”. Fifteen years ago that was an astonishing word to me and did get me into a heap of trouble when I dared to share it with a few others. I do remember being preached at from at least a few pulpits.

This word was preceded several years earlier by a life changing response to another question that I had asked God in 1985. I had simply asked, after beginning again to read the gospels, “God what does this word kingdom really mean? Why did Jesus speak of it so much?” I was quickly within an open heaven as God poured revelation of His Word into my astonished soul. Many of my religious views and formulas began to dissolve as truth became reality.

My grave concern of being the only person I knew who was hearing this (though there were others unknown to me) was soothed by an assurance that He was also giving this revelation of kingdom truth to others around the world and eventually it would “come up like grass in a field”. The resulting rejection by all religious organizations, friends, and family was most painful but there was no possible turning back from the revelation and call of God.

Today we are alive in a day when the gospel of the kingdom is being preached widely and the great transition of the church from the church emphasis age to the church of the kingdom emphasis age has begun. Many have seen and are moving into the experience of the reality of the manifest presence of God changing the people of God (the church) to change the world. Religious pomp and ceremony are, over time, being replaced by the reality of the joy, power and love of intimate relationship with God and with one another. The focus on “me” and “my needs” is becoming a focus on God and His desires. Our will is fading into His will. Our ways are beginning to transcend into His way.

We must fully awaken from the soul sleep of religion to the purposes of God to establish the kingdom of God as a practical reality; eventually ruling and reigning over all the earth. God has not sent angels or any other beings other than mankind to possess the kingdom of God. Only man is made in the image of God and today can be filled with the life of the Spirit of the resurrected Christ. Only man has the God-given place to rule and reign with Christ on earth.

Sons must arise from the limitations of fallacious doctrines of demons and traditions of men to the reality of Almighty God and His truth. All things are possible to him who believes. Believe false limitations and it is possible to limit the life of God in and through you. Believe the truth and it is possible to become as Christ in the world. The question is not whether you will believe or not. The question is “Whose report will you believe?”

The world is in great darkness. And sadly many people of God who are called by His name are in much darkness as well. Many leaders are stumbling in darkness even in the noon day of the light of God coming forth. Spiritual blindness will be broken as the people sitting in darkness see and begin to move toward the great light of the gospel of the kingdom manifesting in the holy humble servants of God filled with the power and love of the resurrected Christ. Christ living within them is beginning to possess that which was created for God and redeemed by Christ at the cross and now must be possessed by the life and power of the resurrected Christ living through mature sons of God.

It is not going to happen some other way. There is no plan B. Sons and daughters of the most High God fall on your face before Him. Let His manifest presence of ultimate fire burn everything from your life and refill you with only His life, His love, His ways, His power, and His wisdom – pass through the dark night of the soul of death and then ARISE IN HIS GLORY! ARISE IN HIS LIFE AS CHRIST IN THE WORLD. Speak carefully, speak only His words from His Spirit within. Speak with the authority of Christ. Destroy the works of the enemy. Instruct and bless your brothers and sisters.

Light come! Will of God be done! In the name of Jesus.

Pursue Love, It Never Fails,

Lots of Love,

Ron McGatlin

A Matter of Life or Death – By Ron McGatlin

Posted: April 24, 2011 in disciples life, Kingdom Teaching, Prophetic, teaching, wilderness
Tags: Bride of Christ, Christian life, discipleship, kingdom growth, Kingdom living, radical christianity, righteousness, salvation, Spirit led life

From where we stand today on the brink of great changes of eternal proportion, life or death is before us. The Fire of God has come near the earth and the heavens are opening. Spiritual blindness is being removed. Captives are being set free from the bondage’s of carnality. The power of God is changing death to life. Those who were deceived by the cunning of religion are coming to truth. The power of true worship is being felt across the world.

The light of God is penetrating the darkness of hearts. Love is replacing bitterness in broken lives as pride is dissolved by the deep love of the Father flowing through Christ in a new people – a people who love God above all else and openly seek Him with their whole hearts. The Spirit that raised Christ from the dead is raising up a generation of “Christ in you” people who walk in holiness and love that overcomes the work of the enemy.

The world is in position to receive the greatest blessings every poured out – the very life and presence of God within and among His people on earth. This is a great gift to the world. But to whom much is given much is required. Because God is coming forth on earth excuses are disappearing. There will be no place to hide and the earth shall be purified through unrelenting loving judgment.

Multitudes are entering the valley – “the valley of decision”. As the “Christ in you” people manifest the reality of God in man everyone will be able to view true holiness, purity, and love without hypocrisy. They will know that God is real and must decide to give their lives to Him or face the judgment of self condemnation – the terrible judgment of love. Death will become very common and a daily reality for multitudes who reject the love of the Father. The standard of Christ will be lifted up through the Holy Spirit forming Christ in His people.

The new called out ones will not gather under the banner of religion nor any other manmade or demonic authority but only the real authority of Christ and under His banner of love. Gatherings of the “Christ in you” people will meet in homes, business places, parks, churches or wherever. These will be highly committed and submitted people who will follow the voice of their true shepherd and will not follow another. Christ from the throne will come in glory by the Holy Spirit to meet with His people and His glory shall fill the earth. The government of gifted elders (mature ones) will follow only the Spirit and will bring forth the feeding of the immature ones as they grow.

It is a very deadly mistake to hold on to the past when God is severely changing things.

Ron McGatlin

Called to be radical

Posted: April 22, 2011 in disciples life, Kingdom Teaching, teaching, wilderness
Tags: Bride of Christ, discipleship, kingdom growth, Kingdom living, radical christianity, radical disciples, Spirit led life

Being “radical” brings up images of an argumentative protester or even a violent terrorist, but a truly “radical” Christian should be someone who typifies the very “root” of who Jesus is, practicing what He taught.

Jesus said, “Everyone then who hears these words of mine and does them will be like a wise man who built his house on the rock.” Matthew 7:24

Simple statements like “love one another” were never intended to be feel good statements but direct “world changing” commands from Jesus to his followers. Words like “love your enemies”, and “do good to those that spitefully use you”, would be considered “radical” if actually practiced, even though they are believed by all Christians.

It would seem that like a professional athlete needs a “public relations” agent after a blunder that ruins his “public image”, in the same way the Christian church in America needs the ultimate agent, Jesus himself to change not only our image, but our practice as well. He is not someone who will “spin” things to our advantage, but someone who cares enough to change our very lives, our hearts and our behavior to become like Him.

Radical means “of or pertaining to the root of origin; reaching to the center, to the foundation, to the ultimate sources, to the principles.”

Radical Christianity calls us to examine the foundation of everything we call “Christian” in order to discern what is, and what is not, acceptable to Christ. Jesus is building His Church upon the foundation of Himself. We have the privilege of co-laboring together with Him, but we must follow His blueprint, not ours.

Everything in His Church is weighed, measured, and tested according to “the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ”. If it falls short or goes beyond THIS measure, the Lord will tear down what they have built.

Therefore let us all walk as humbled radical disciples of Yeshua, seeking to be and expression of the Fathers heart and not out of our owns hearts imagination of what we believe God the Father should be. In this manner let our minds, souls and spirit’s always be aligned to the Lord Jesus Christ, rooted in His teaching – His Word, infused with His Spirit and walking in His power and authority.

At times we may be called to walk in the wilderness for His honor, wade thru the valley of suffering for His praise and march up to the mountain tops of revelation for His glory. We are called by His name, therefore let us represent Him in truth according to all that He has taught us in His Word and continues to teach us with revelation brought forth by His Holy Spirit, that His Name may be lifted high above everything and anything found in this world, that we may be His glory manifested in this present world!

For Indeed we do serve an awesome God!!!

By this all will know that you are My disciples……

Posted: April 19, 2011 in disciples life, Kingdom Teaching, Prophetic, teaching, wilderness
Tags: Bride of Christ, Christian life, God's love, Kingdom living, radical christianity

“By this it is made clear who take their nature from God and are His children and who take their nature from the devil and are his children: no one who does not practice righteousness [who does not conform to God’s will in purpose, thought, and action] is of God; neither is anyone who does not love his brother (his fellow [i]believer in Christ).For this is the message (the announcement) which you have heard from the first, that we should love one another,”. ( 1 John 3:10-11)

I spend the past several days recuperating from surgery yet it has been several days of basking in the love of the Father. He took me a journey back thru the past 10 years of the life I have lived and showed me where love was lacking – not in a condemning way but in a loving way as He said “See how love could have brought My light into the darkened times.

Back to when I first got ordained when I allowed the spirit of religion to come in an sit me on the horse of un-righteous judgment, up to the very spot where His Love broke thru in my heart causing me to for once start seeing people thru the eyes of mercy and grace even as He who is above all see’s. This was such a powerful moment as I felt the weight of His Love flow upon me and totally captured my surroundings.

He also pointed out the wrath of His love, as during this time hell had risen up in an attempt to derail His destiny for my life. Some may say, how can someone put wrath in the same line with love. Take for example the Love of God towards His creation – it was in a moment of wrath that He went to the cross, birthed out of love. Righteous wrath towards the works of Hell that had so un-prejudicially distorted His creation from the image of Himself, that imagine of holiness and beauty. You see the wrath of God is that which is a Holy Righteous kindled fire against sin and all that is unholy, bound and woven in darkness.

This was such a revelation to me that it began to crush me, the fleshly side of me that had incorrectly judged God’s wrath as something awful birthed in the throngs’ of punishment, when in reality it is something that destroys evil and restores life. It is this nature of wrath that the Father desires for His children to take hold of – that we would become so enraged with the injustice of sin and its hold in our own lives and that of the children of God as well as those that are lost that we, would march forth with the power and authority of Heaven and enter into a battle spiritual warfare to loose Hell’s grip on these individuals. Not allowing our anger to be miss guided toward the lost and blind, towards the individual that it has imprisoned, rather against the root, the very nature of Hell itself.

As the Lord took me thru these years I saw moments of His wrath against Hell, where His Word in all it’s majesty flew out of His throne room intercepted and destroyed the works of Hell that had come against my life – it was like a mighty river that rushed toward false words, words of deception as it totally washed away Hells power and influence. Yet in its wake it remained upon me – Here He said, “What you are seeing is My Grace upon your life, that I sent forth to rescue and empower you to stand firm”.

He even took me back through some religious establishments which I had been thru and as I went back to these times I saw what appeared to be a person, who kept covering and uncovering my ears. And it was as though I heard “This was My mercy overshadowing you – for in these places you heard both truth and deception – My mercy blocked your spiritual ears from receiving what was false and they we allowed to remain open to receive that which was truth”. I was so taking back by this and then a looked at what appeared to be a Bible yet on its cover was written the word “Mercy”. Then I understood, that by keeping myself in His Word, His Word became a shield of mercy which weighed out the darkness from the light”.

In my mind I was thinking “I thought these places were houses of the Lord and then I saw them as they were in the Spirit, like that of half lighted house, the Light of His Word did light them at times, but then the darkness of the world would come in and snuff out the light.

I honestly didn’t fully understand the battle between the two, as I believed that the Light over powers the darkness, thus the Light should prevail in these places, then I heard, “because of My love for My Bride, in Mercy I continue to send forth My Grace, the hearts of men grasp it for a moment, yet like that of stony ground the wiles of the carnal heart take control and distort My truth. Yet in My Mercy I shall continue to send forth My Grace for a season, that they who earnestly search for truth might grasp hold of her and not let go”.

Then I spent a time reflecting on the faces of those whom I had known over the past 10 years, most of these people I had forgotten about. Yet as I saw each one of them I noticed many of them were holding a cup and each cup was empty. When I asked what the cup was I heard, this represents their spirit, and each one was empty, each one needing to be filled up with My life, My presence, My love in truth.

These spiritual cups represented those who inwardly thirsted for My love, even though they may not have known what the thirst they felt was and you passed by each one, having been focused on your own needs you failed to see theirs. This caused my heart to sink for I had fooled myself during many of these years believing I desired to help people, yet now I saw what it was, a self righteous spirit had taking root in my life and blinded me to my own selfish agenda.

After this time, though only a few moments, it felt like hours, I went from seeing those faces to many faces sitting in a large crowd of people and I heard “My people flock to see their spiritual thirst filled each week, running into buildings, yet they leave empty and unsatisfied – Now look closely that you may see.

As I looked closely, I noticed that in the opposite hand from the empty cup, was a cup that was also empty in almost every hand, yet not in everyone for a number of them were filled and over-flowing. Then I heard “ My Spirit has poured into these peoples lives an overflowing supply –yet they are blinded to this truth and they themselves remain athirst for one can never sip from this cup unless they are filling another. Yet there are some who upon filling the cups of others with what I have poured into them find that My River flows forth and their own cups are filled, it is in this place of selfless love that they shall experience no lack, when they begin to walk in the same direction of My River’s current..

Then I was beginning to understand, people had flocked to what they thought was their supply, those things made by human hands and in the process of searching out what man had made, they missed the reservoir of God’s supply which He has purposely hidden in His Church – a Spiritual Body made up and fit together perfectly according to His design. A design, which when man and hell has attempted to re-create it is found void of Life, a spiritual desert. Yet when this Spiritual Body, this family of God walks in its truth, seeking and receiving its very breath from the Creator – it is vibrant, alive and fully able to reproduce.

And thru this whole process I continually saw the word LOVE. That it is His love which created everything, His love which was poured out to redeem everything and it is His Love which is the life food of His Bride, without it its members will shrivel up and die.

Yet when operating in, and completely and radically deposed of all self desire, it is alive, producing life and it expansion can not be prevented for it is like a Mighty River, flowing forth, Cities can not stop it, Nations can not stop. Not even the mountains reaching up to the skies can slow down its flow. For the dam of His River of Love was opened upon the cross and though the generations since that time have thought it had slowed down, it is a Spiritual River which has gone under, deep to where it is not seen by the natural eye.

There have been those in each one of these generations who have seen it, swam in it, lived and drank from it. For when a child of God sees this River with their Spiritual eye they are opened to the revelation of its power, they see the direction of its current. One need but look at the witnesses through past generations to see that even though it appeared and still appears in a sense to be running under ground, it is an awesome splendor weakening the polluted religious soil of this world and continues to be eroding away everything that has attempted to prevent its flow.

I feel like a light has come into my life that will never allow me to remain the same and it is my prayer that the Father will give me the words to open the eyes of those who have yet to see this River of Love that flows from the Throne of His Heaven. It is this River of life, this sustaining love that is written about in every book of the Bible.

When one but receives just one drop from it their lives begin to melt under its power – the wounds of the heart and spirit are healed. It is in this River of love that one sees the true reflection of who they are in Christ and though one is immediately aware that their thirst is being filled, they then at the same time develop a hunger to share it with others. They see the lost and thirsty about them and an urgency to fill their cup overwhelms them.

For even looking about, those who have drank from this River of love sees the reflection of others as they are seen through the eyes of He who has created them and longs to become intimate with them as their Father and they as to Him as His children. I believe this is the light of which John is speaking of here, for one who stands in the light of His love, he who stand having drank from the River of His love becomes infected, as though they are possessed with an overwhelming desire to love even as He has loved, they come into the full knowledge that we are to be His love here on earth.

For once you drink from this River of love, the pure love of God, you like John will be able to proclaim “All who have this hope in him purify themselves, just as he is pure” And with this I pray that you do now drink from His cup of love my brothers and sister for His Word declares:

We know that we have passed over out of death into Life by the fact that we love the brethren (our fellow Christians). He who does not love abides (remains, is [j]held and kept continually) in [spiritual] death.. ( 1 John 3:14)

Let us walk in the obedience of our Lords doctrine:

“A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another; as I have loved you, that you also love one another. By this all will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.” John 13:34-35

I highest rank is that of servant,
Russ Welch

BEYOND REPENTANCE

Posted: April 16, 2011 in disciples life, Kingdom Teaching, Parents
Tags: Bride of Christ, Christian life, kingdom growth, Kingdom teaching, radical christianity, Spirit first

Beauty for ashes. One thing is certain; if you have ashes, you have had a fire. We cannot build anything back from ashes. If the structure had been blown down by a storm, we might have been able to have gathered up some fragments and rebuilt something of the ruins. But when a fire has totally destroyed the building, man cannot rebuild from the pieces. If your life seems to be ablaze and is being destroyed, take hope. God will truly give you beauty for the ashes, if you continue to move toward the kingdom of God life.

Before we turned and started moving, we were not meeting the enemy head on. We unknowingly were going the same way. Now that the turn around is made, we will meet the enemy head on and overcome him in the strength of our Lord, the Victorious One.

Now, he can be successful in preventing them from standing up and fighting. If he can keep Christians focusing all their hopes in heaven someday, he will keep them from fighting now.

God gives the victory, but we must fight the war.

The kingdom of heaven does suffer violence and the violent do take it by force.

Spiritual warfare is fought with faith in God and His Word, hearing and believing the Word of God by the Spirit of God, praying the fulfillment of the Word of God, speaking the Word of God by the Spirit of God, proclaiming what God has said by the power of the indwelling Spirit of Christ Jesus, walking in the Spirit and not in the lust of the flesh, believing what God says above any other word, standing in the Spirit and Word of God, speaking the truth of the Word in love at all times, using the authority of Christ flowing through love by the Holy Spirit within us to rule and reign with Christ, and doing the will of God by the power of the indwelling Spirit of God.

Ephesians 6:12: For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places.

Ephesians 6:17b-18a: …and the sword of the Spirit which is the word of God; praying always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit…

APPROPRIATING GOD’S PROVISION
(THE MINISTRY OF JESUS)
Our battle is for faith–knowing and believing the words of God. The ministry of Jesus, the Anointed One, provides complete salvation including redemption of our spirit, soul and body. The ministry of Jesus is for the healing of our broken spirit, mind, will, and emotions; deliverance from spiritual captivity; recovery of spiritual sight to the spiritually blind; liberty from downtrodden bondage of wounding oppression; and the favor or spiritual prosperity of God, if we have faith. The provisions of God are activated in our own life when we believe in our heart and confess with our mouth.

Luke 4:18-19: (And Jesus said), The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me, Because He has anointed Me to preach the gospel to the poor. He has sent Me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed (bruised), to preach the acceptable (favorable) year of the Lord.”

Romans 10:8-10: But what does it say? “The word is near you, even in your mouth and in your heart” (that is, the word of faith which we preach): that if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes to righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made to salvation.” believe in their heart and confess with their mouth are saved. He has provided kingdom of God freedom for all believers to walk in now.

However, not all believers are walking in kingdom freedom now. The provision of Christ must be appropriated into the individual’s life by believing in the heart and speaking with the mouth.

Jesus is the “life-changer”. The ministry of Jesus, the Anointed One, by the Holy Spirit can make deep, permanent, inner changes in the person’s life-structure. Jesus will, without discrimination, change anyone who will meet the necessary conditions of believing in the heart and confessing with the mouth the resurrected Christ.
James 5:16: Confess your trespasses to one another, and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The effective, fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much.

“Pray for one another”

Intercessory prayer may be required to release the anointing of Christ to break through the canopy of spiritual blindness, deception, and delusion of the enemy before the light of God can enter to expose sin. Once the enemy is pushed back and the light enters by the hearing of the Word by the Spirit, the person can and must decide to repent of exposed sin and not continue to justify or defend it. He must agree with God that sin is sin and be willing to turn from it toward Jesus as Lord.

“But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness and all these things shall be added to you.” appropriated by faith and executed by prayer, can tear down the old life-structure and create a new heart. The work of enemy spirits and negative character qualities can be eliminated and the true victory of overcoming can be established in the life. The kingdom of God is righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit.

The story in Mark chapter two, of a man carried by others to Jesus can help to kindle or renew hope in the person who feels hopeless because he does not yet have faith to make it to Jesus for his freedom on his own. Jesus did not just look at the faith of the man on the cot. He was perhaps too weak, too far gone to have much faith. But Jesus saw the faith of those letting him down through the roof, as well as the lame man’s faith.

Mark 2:5-12: When Jesus saw their faith, He said to the paralytic, “Son, your sins are forgiven you.” But some of the scribes were sitting there and reasoning in their hearts, ‘why does this Man speak blasphemies like this? Who can forgive sins but God alone?” And immediately, when Jesus perceived in His spirit that they reasoned thus within themselves, He said to them, “Why do you reason about these things in your hearts?

Which is easier, to say to the paralytic, your sins are forgiven you, or to say, arise, take up your bed and walk? But that you may know that the Son of Man has power on earth to forgive sins”— He said to the paralytic, “I say to you, arise, take up your bed, and go your way to your house.” And immediately he arose, took up the bed, and went out in the presence of them all, so that all were amazed and glorified God, saying, “We never saw anything like this!”

Say in faith, in accordance with the Word of God, particularly with two in agreement, has great impact in the spiritual realm to bring forth the will of God into the natural realm. Principalities and powers of darkness in the spiritual realm must respond to what we believe and say when we speak in the name of Jesus. The conditions and character qualities of our own heart will also respond to the Word of God as we speak to ourselves in the name of Jesus, the Anointed One.

Mark 11:23-24: “For assuredly, I say to you, whoever says to this mountain, ‘Be removed and be cast into the sea,’ and does not doubt in his heart, but believes that those things he says will come to pass, he will have whatever he says. Therefore I say to you, whatever things you ask when you pray, believe that you receive them, and you will have them.”

Matthew 17:20: So Jesus said to them, “Because of your unbelief; for assuredly, I say to you, if you have faith as a mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move; and nothing will be impossible for you.”

Matthew 18:16b: “… by the mouth of two or three witnesses every word may be established.”

Proverbs 18:21: Death and life are in the power of the tongue, And those who love it will eat its fruit.

Matthew 8:8: The centurion answered and said, “Lord, I am not worthy that You should come under my roof. But only speak a word, and my servant will be healed.”

Matthew 8:16: When evening had come, they brought to Him many who were demon-possessed. And He cast out the spirits with a word, and healed all who were sick.

Matthew 18:18-20: “Assuredly, I say to you, whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven. Again I say to you that if two of you agree on earth concerning anything that they ask, it will be done for them by My Father in heaven. For where two or three are gathered together in My name, I am there in the midst of them.”

How do we bind or loose according to the word of God? Binding and loosing might be compared respectively to either tying up a subject with ropes or cutting the ropes and letting that subject go free. We bind or loose with our words. As we ask (speak) in agreement on earth, the power of God in the spiritual realm is activated to restrain or to set free. What we say and pray has a restraining or a releasing effect in the spiritual realm. It is as if our words are the ropes that go out from our mouth and wrap around something to bind it and stop its activity. Conversely, our words are the power that cuts the ropes off the subject and allows it to become active.

When we pray for a person in severe need, we may need to bind the powers of darkness that are keeping the light out. Until their power and work is stopped, the person’s spiritual sight is impaired. Binding is the releasing of spiritual power by prayer that can temporarily stop the enemy’s activity. We may also need to loose spiritual enlightenment, so the Word can flow into the person’s heart leading to repentance, cleansing, and strengthening. When the works of the spirits are bound, the Word of God can and must then be built into the life. Then, Jesus can and must truly become Lord of the life. It is always important to follow the leading of the Holy Spirit in effective prayer ministry. The

Holy Spirit can lead an individual or a group in this prayer ministry.

Once the works of the spirits of spiritual blindness, darkness, deception, and delusion are temporarily bound, the person will be able to hear the truth without hindrance. Then the individual must make a decision to receive the word of truth or to reject it. Until the spirits of darkness have been stopped the person may not be able to hear the word of kingdom truth in his heart; and, therefore is not free to make a decision.

(Matthew 6:10-15), He showed us how to pray and taught us to forgive others. According to these Scriptures, forgiving is an important factor in seeking the kingdom of God.

Unforgiveness can be a serious hindrance to the kingdom of God coming on earth in our lives. One of the most important aspects of being restored by Christ to the kingdom of God lifestyle is forgiving.

Keep on Pursuing Love
It Will Never Fail,
Ron McGatlin
http://www.openheaven.com
basileia@earthlink.net

HEAVENLY FAMILY PATTERN

Posted: April 13, 2011 in disciples life, Kingdom Teaching, teaching, wilderness
Tags: Bride of Christ, kingdom growth, Kingdom living, Kingdom teaching, Son ship, Spirit led life

FROM REPLICA TO REALITY

Christ Jesus came to restore the reality of the kingdom of heaven on earth. Since the fall of Adam there had only been a facsimile or picture of the kingdom of God in an institutional structure of patterns to preserve a type of the future kingdom. In the fullness of time, Jesus came bringing with Him the potential restoration of the kingdom to replace the Old Testament order that had foreshadowed it.

A great tragedy occurred shortly after the first few centuries. The work of Jesus and the disciples to restore the reality of the kingdom of God to the world was perverted. The church was deceived into returning to the religious institutional shadow of the past and mixing it with the work of Jesus and the disciples. The original, pure heavenly pattern Jesus brought was perverted and the reality of the heavenly kingdom on earth was altered.

In more recent times, kingdom minded people have understood the governance of the world was to be patterned after the government of Heaven. During the last several centuries since reformation began, there has been an effort to pattern the church after Heaven’s government. This attempt to replicate the heavenly government on earth has been a step in the process but is not the final design of God.

God does not desire to only replicate the government of heaven on earth. He fully intends that the earth be governed with the government from heaven. This is to be direct governance of the church and the world from heaven on earth. The kingdoms of this world will not become like the kingdom of our God. They shall become the kingdom of our God.

Holy Spirit led reformation leading to God’s original patterns of governance on earth has begun. It is yet in the early stages. However, this is a major step toward the reality of the kingdom of God from heaven ruling and reigning on earth.

THE HEAVENLY GOVERNMENT

The government in heaven is entwined with the kingdom government of earth. The government of earth cannot be separated from the government of heaven in God’s pattern.

The government of heaven is a FAMILY RELATIONAL structure. God chose to define Himself to man in terms of family relationships. The great SPIRIT GOD who is beyond description and “omni-everything” chose to be FATHER. In Scripture, heavenly relationships are spoken of in terms of family. FATHER has one first-born SON, who was with the Father from the beginning. The FATHER, SON, and HOLY SPIRIT are all ONE GOD in heaven. If it were possible for you to spiritually stand in the fire of the heart of God, the three would be there. There would be no distinction; the three are truly ONE GOD. The holy angels relate in the heavenly household as God’s holy servants or messengers.

What is missing in this picture? The WIFE of God and many more Sons! Wow! This is getting huge! Are we about to discover why God spoke the earth into being, made mankind in HIS OWN IMAGE, and breathed HIS BREATH into man? Is it not God’s purpose that the earth be an extension of heaven filled with many Sons among whom FATHER DWELLS and from whom His beautiful BRIDE comes forth and becomes the WIFE of God?

The government of God on earth is the government of heaven and earth. In this sense, the heaven on earth is a direct intimate part of the government in heaven. Likewise, the government in heaven is a direct and intimate part of the government on earth. The Bride or Wife/Mother and Sons on earth are an intricate and intimate part of the family of God. (There is no gender distinction here; all can be Bride and all can be Sons.)

Since most all church and world institutions are currently NOT functioning in real kingdom government, coming into kingdom living is a great change. At best they function as replicas as men seek to represent God on earth. In the kingdom reality we do not represent God but become a part of the family of God. We intimately relate in the family and flow the actual work and ways of God into the world by the Holy Spirit.

This is a major shift from the replica or foreshadowing of the government of God that we have lived in to this day. This is a major breakthrough in becoming what God desires us to become and ruling and reigning with Him on earth now. It is God ruling through His heavenly family pattern of government in the world.

With only a facsimile of the kingdom of God, we have not been able to bring down the government of the enemy. He continues to have a great influence on the governments of religion, business, education, entertainment, and nations of the world. However, the enemy kingdom is not a facsimile but the direct work of evil spirits. This has led to the church’s failure to reclaim the world for God. As the transition from replica to reality takes place, the kingdoms ruled by the enemy will begin to fall under the superior strength and power of the true kingdom of heaven.

HEAVEN’S FAMILY PATTERNS

As we continue to move into actually living the kingdom lifestyle, the patterns that govern our lives must become those that govern heaven. This means major adjustments in how believers live in the world. We are not just talking about the adjustment from the worldly, evil patterns of society; we are talking about adjustments regarding believers seeing, understanding and walking in the principles of heaven-style living on earth by the power of the Holy Spirit.

The first principle is that there is only one God and one Head of all. God is Head of all things. There is one authority in heaven, the authority of the Father. The throne of God is the absolute rule of all. The kingdom of God on earth is not separate from the kingdom in heaven. The throne of God is the seat of all governments at all levels in the kingdom of God on earth as it is in heaven. There is no replicated authority.

Secondly, there is no distance and therefore no need for any form of delegated authority. God does not delegate His authority as King of all. Our heavenly Father, through Christ by the Holy Spirit, is potentially available directly to every person on earth at all times. God’s authority flows through others but it always remains His authority. All authority in heaven and on earth is given to the Son.

Through the Holy Spirit, the Son and the Father can indwell mature Sons in the many-membered Body of Christ on earth. Great authority flows through the Body; but it always remains God’s authority. The holy angels are sent with specific authority for specific tasks; however, it is always the authority of God. It is not delegated or given over to them.

The sent servants on earth flow in gifts and authority. The gifts are like tools and may remain as part of the person or may come and go as God wills. However, the authority is never part of the person. It only flows through the person. No one is given delegated authority from God. The gifts of apostle, prophet, evangelist, shepherd and teacher are tools for service–not “offices of authority.” God’s authority can flow through all human beings including those who carry these gifts; but again, it remains only God’s authority.

In the beginning, man was given dominion on earth and the ability to choose to obey or to disobey. But God did not give man the authority to disobey. Disobedience is rebellion to God and obedience to the enemy. Man’s disobedience to God (sin) submits to the enemy as an authority and releases the enemy to have a measure of authority in the world. In disobeying God, man seizes authority he was not given. He makes himself an authority apart from God. Functioning as an authority apart from God is the original sin of Adam.

Thirdly, God and everything in Heaven is completely holy. The kingdom of God in heaven and on earth is altogether holy. Nothing that defiles is allowed to enter the kingdom of God. Every member of the family of God must be completely holy just as He is holy (Rev 21:27).

This is very different from the cheap version of what we have called the “kingdom of God”. Yet this is the reality of God and His kingdom. Most who think they have entered the kingdom of God have only begun a journey of complete cleansing and total death to sin as they become fully alive unto God (Rom 6:11). The kingdom of God cannot rule on earth without a holy people flowing the authority of God to govern the earth.

Fourthly, God is love and His kingdom is established and sustained by love. The love of God is the power that changes the hearts of men and cleanses the earth. Love is the predominant principle and law of the kingdom of God in heaven and on earth. Love permeates heaven and the kingdom on earth. Nothing in the kingdom works without love. Without love there would be no faith, no hope, no redemption, no mercy, no grace, and no life. Love is the glue that holds the kingdom together and is the gold standard of obedience.

The heavenly family is connected by love. The Father loves the Son and the Father’s love reaches toward all mankind. The Son loves us and gave Himself for us at the cross. The Father so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son.

We are probably more accustomed to thinking of the love relationship with God in the sense of “agapao” love. Scripture speaks of the “agapao” love in the family (social, moral, ready-to-serve kind of love). It also speaks of “phileo” love in the family (deep, tender affection, cherishing above all else, characterized by consistency).

1 Cor 16:22: If anyone does not love (phileo) the Lord Jesus Christ, let him be accursed….

The heavenly family pattern includes social love and a deep, tender affection flowing from the Heavenly Father and the Son Who becomes the Bridegroom and Husband of the Bride/Wife. The same love also flows to the children. The heavenly family pattern is relationship through love including tender affection. Apparently, according to the above verse there is a curse attached to not having the “phileo” kind of love for the Lord Jesus Christ.

The kingdom of heaven pattern is the Bride/Wife (Bride of Christ) loving her Husband (Jesus) with deep, tender affection to the point of complete submission with worship and adoration. The Husband (Jesus) loves His Wife (Bride of Christ) to the point of giving Himself for her and caring for her with deep and tender affection. The work of the Husband (Jesus) is not complete without the Wife (Bride of Christ).

THE KINGDOM ORDERS AND PROVIDES

The spiritual government from heaven is the absolute, supreme, above all else, authority that provides all life and establishes all order in heaven and on earth. Earthly institutions of life and order or supposed to flow the design and substance of the heavenly spiritual government into all natural life. The heavenly family pattern should be visible in the earthly family institution, business institutions and all governmental institutions.

All aspects of spiritual and practical needs of mankind and the planet are provided for through the heavenly family patterns of government both in heaven and on earth. The Wife of God does the business of the kingdom on earth and brings great honor to her Husband. Proverbs 31:10-31 paints a picture of the government of God carried out by the pure and holy Wife of God. The Lord safely trusts His heart to her and there is no lack of the work of the Lord being done. She never does harm or brings reproach to the Lord. She is industrious in business. She is strong and powerful in the Lord. She provides for the poor and needy of the world. The Lord is known through her and governs the affairs of the world. She is honored and will rejoice in times to come. She speaks wisdom and kindness into the world. She is diligent and not idle. She is blessed and praised by her children. There will be much fruit of her labor, which will not be lost. God’s Wife’s works will praise her and bring glory to God.

Proverbs 31:10-31
“Who can find a virtuous wife? For her worth is far above rubies.
The heart of her husband safely trusts her, So he will have no lack of gain. She does him good and not evil All the days of her life.
She seeks wool and flax, And willingly works with her hands.
She is like the merchant ships, She brings her food from afar.
She also rises while it is yet night, And provides food for her household, And a portion for her maidservants.

She considers a field and buys it; From her profits she plants a
vineyard. She girds herself with strength, And strengthens her arms.
She perceives that her merchandise is good, And her lamp does not go out by night. She stretches out her hands to the distaff, And her hand holds the spindle.

She extends her hand to the poor, Yes, she reaches out her hands to the needy. She is not afraid of snow for her household, For all her household is clothed with scarlet. She makes tapestry for herself; Her clothing is fine linen and purple. Her husband is known in the gates, When he sits among the elders of the land. She makes linen garments and sells them, And supplies sashes for the merchants. Strength and honor are her clothing; She shall rejoice in time to come. She opens her mouth with wisdom, And on her tongue is the law of kindness. She watches over the ways of her household, And does not eat the bread of idleness. Her children rise up and call her blessed; Her husband also, and he praises her:

“Many daughters have done well, But you excel them all.”
Charm is deceitful and beauty is passing, But a woman who fears the LORD, she shall be praised. Give her of the fruit of her hands, And let her own works praise her in the gates.”

The government of God comes from the spiritual but is practical and real. Every aspect of life in the world is dealt with through the provision and work of the Father, the Son, and the Bride/Wife by the Holy Spirit. The heavenly kingdom family pattern governs the natural family, business, and political governments. It is God’s only plan for governing of all matters spiritual and natural, in the kingdom of God.

PATTERNS OF LIFE

New Jerusalem is the great pattern-city of God. The patterns of life are coming down from God to form and shape the Bride of Christ. The other great pattern-city, Babylon, has imposed its patterns of rule upon the earth. The kingdoms of this earth will become the kingdom of our God, as God’s people fall in love with Him and become one with the Lord. Then, New Jerusalem patterns of life will be planted into the hearts of men and then brought forth into the world.

The book of Genesis (the book of beginnings) is filled with patterns of New Jerusalem life. The Garden of Eden with its God-given patterns of life and ruling are New Jerusalem patterns of kingdom order.

God’s rule on earth is governed after the pattern of the Heavenly family.

God made man in the image of God and breathed the life of God into man.
Jesus is the image of God and the Spirit of life is within Him.

Genesis 1:26,28, Amp: God said, “Let Us (Father, Son, and Holy Spirit) make mankind in Our image, after Our likeness; and let them have complete authority over the fish of the sea, the birds of the air, the (tame) beasts, and over all of the earth, and over every thing that creeps upon the earth.” And God blessed them, and said to them, “Be fruitful, multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it (with all its vast resources); and have dominion over the fish of the sea, the birds of the air, and over every living creature that moves upon the earth.”

Adam was given dominion on earth. (Notice that Adam was not given dominion over other people.)
All authority in heaven and on earth is given to Christ Jesus.

Mat 28:18: And Jesus came and spoke to them, saying, “All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth.”

Adam was created and communed with God before having a wife.
Jesus was with the Father from the beginning and also had no wife.

God formed a wife for Adam from Adam’s body.
God is forming a wife for Christ Jesus from His Body.

God instructed man to leave his original state and be joined to and cleave to his wife.

Christ Jesus left His original state in heaven to be joined to and cleave to His Bride/Wife.

The man and his wife are to be open, transparent and intimate with one another.

Christ Jesus and His Bride/Wife are to be open, transparent and intimate with one another.

The man and his wife are to become one flesh (one with one another).
Christ Jesus and His Bride/Wife are to become one.

Genesis 2:18-25, Amp: Now the Lord God said, “It is not good (sufficient, satisfactory) that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper meet (suitable, adapted, completing) for him.” And out of the ground the Lord God formed every (wild) beast and living creature of the field and every bird of the air, and brought them to Adam to see what he would call them, and whatever Adam called every living creature, that was its name. And Adam gave names to all livestock, and to the birds of the air, and to every (wild) beast of the field; but for Adam there was not found a helper meet (suitable, adapted, completing) for him.

And the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam, and while he slept He took one of his ribs – a part of his side – and closed up the (place with) flesh instead of it; and the rib or part of his side which the Lord had taken from the man, He built up and made into a woman and brought her to the man. Then Adam said, “This (creature) is now bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh. She shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of a man.”

Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and shall become united and cleave to his wife, and they shall become one flesh. And the man and his wife were both naked, and were not embarrassed or ashamed in each other’s presence.

The husband is to deeply and tenderly love his wife.
Jesus loves the church (Bride/Wife) and gave himself for her.

The wife is to be subject, submit, and adapt to her husband.
The Bride/Wife of Christ is to be subject to, submit to and adapt to Christ Jesus.

The husband is the head of the wife.
Christ Jesus is the head of the church (Bride/Wife).

Ephesians 5:22-24, Amp: Wives, be subject – be submissive and adapt yourselves to your own husbands as a service to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the Head of the church, Himself the Savior of (His) body. As the church is subject to Christ, so let wives also be subject in everything to their husbands.

The wife is instructed to see that she greatly respects and admires her husband.
The Bride/Wife of Christ has this same respect, reverence and worship for her Husband.

Ephesians 5:33: However, let each man of you (without exception) love his wife as (being in a sense) his very own self; and let the wife see that she respects and reverences her husband – that she notices him, regards him, honors him, prefers him, venerates and esteems him; and that she defers to him, praises him, and loves and admires him exceedingly.

God’s patterns always work. Nothing else will produce the kingdom life we all desire. Our only choices are to adjust to God’s pattern or try to adjust God’s pattern to us. I think we know which choice will work and which one will not. We can always find the love and grace in God to fulfill our part.

Please note there is a distinction between “man and woman” and “husband and wife.” Man and woman are the same being with no distinction in the spiritual realm. Husband and wife are places of service and, as we have seen, are without gender in the heavenly family pattern. Marriage of man and woman is an earthly replica made from the heavenly family pattern. It is only a type or shadow of the Heavenly Family.

In the spiritual realm there is no male or female, Jew or Gentile, bond or free.

Gal 3:28: There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for ye are all one in Christ Jesus.

The heavenly family patterns take precedence over all earthly replicas or types. It is the real from which all life is to be patterned. Earthly replicas are not extended into heaven.

Because people have such great involvement in marriage in this life, it is mistakenly assumed by many that marriage continues in the spiritual realms of heaven. Jesus made this clear to the Sadducees when they brought Him a challenging question regarding whose wife a woman would be in heaven when she had had more than one husband in this life. Please do not be greatly concerned about missing “being married” in heaven. Experiencing the fullness of your heavenly marriage to your husband, Jesus, for one moment will wipe away all of your concern.

Mark 12:24-25: Jesus answered and said to them, “Are you not therefore mistaken, because you do not know the Scriptures nor the power of God? For when they rise from the dead, they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like angels in heaven.”

In spiritual matters there is no male and female. The more completely we live in the Spirit, the more we experience no male/female difference. The more we live in the earthly realm, the greater we envision male/female differences. There are differences in our earthly experience but not in our spiritual position or functions.

When God took a part of Adam to build up Eve, it seems obvious that He removed much of the emotion from Adam and placed it into Eve and left most of the ego in Adam. This makes male or female more suitable for certain functions in life. This is particularly evident in the rearing of children.

CHILDREN IN THE HEAVENLY FAMILY PATTERN

Natural children possess all the potential of adults. They have gifts, personal qualities and attributes, but they are immature and undeveloped. Years will be required for them to develop natural maturity in order to use their innate abilities. Though some may mature more rapidly in an area than others, to some degree they are all tied to time to produce maturity.

Spiritually, maturity is not as directly tied to time. A child may possess powerful gifts and reach maturity to use them in a short period of time. On the other hand, some fully mature adults may not have developed spiritually at all.

The parents have a major part in the development of children.

In the heavenly family pattern for natural children, the husband/father (like Jesus) and the wife/mother are both corporately involved in the development of their children. The mother is equipped with all the tenderness and attributes needed to nurture the babies and help them develop to maturity. The father/husband has strength and all the power of heaven to provide protection and security for the fledgling child. He also has wisdom and knowledge to train the children.

The children feel extremely secure under the care and protection of their strong, loving father and tender, loving mother. The father’s strength instills feelings of safety in a child. His loving firmness gives them great assurance that firm boundaries exist for their protection. Only the special strength and love of their father can provide the security of discipline and protection they need. Small children are very sensitive to their mother’s feelings and attitudes. Because she feels safe with her Husband, the children feel safe.

Boundaries, rules, discipline and laws are part of the training and development of the immature. The children’s primary response is to obey their parents.

Ephesians 6: 1-3: Children, obey your parents in the Lord (as His representatives), for this is just and right. Honor (esteem and value as precious) your father and your mother; this is the first commandment with a promise: that all may be well with you, and that you may live long on the earth.

God’s pattern is for the children to be obedient and honor their parents. Children growing up in the heavenly family pattern easily come to know God. They see Him in their parents. They have a clear view of God’s love in the love their father has for their mother. They are trained to reflect God’s love as they see their mother respect and praise her Husband, their father. They understand God’s love and know how to respond to it with loving respect and submission.

I think we can all see that the godly natural family mirrors the heavenly family. The heavenly family pattern translates into the earthly reality of lives and families. We are moving toward the reality of the rule of God through Christ Jesus by the Holy Spirit in His people on earth as it is in heaven.

The Heavenly Family Pattern is the same for all types of corporate relationships including all kingdom business and governance.

BUSINESS IN THE HEAVENLY FAMILY PATTERN

God, through Christ Jesus by the Holy Spirit is to be the HEAD of all businesses and governments. Some of us have begun to accept the reality that Jesus is the head of the church; but it might be a big step to realize that, in the kingdom of God, Jesus is also the head of each person and all businesses, schools, governments at all levels, and any other corporate work or structure in the world. In the kingdom of God there is nothing that is not under the headship of Christ.

God will flow His authority through mature Sons to carry out management functions. However, He will not delegate His authority. The King is the rightful owner of all the assets of the kingdom. God’s empowerment and direction comes with the call and opportunity to serve in managing a portion of the kingdom. All things are for Him and through Him and nothing in the kingdom is done without Him. Our love relationship and intimate oneness with God provides the happiest, most productive life possible. As the Bride/Wife of God we are overjoyed beyond measure in the glory of our Husband/Father/King.

We saw earlier in the discussion on Proverbs 31 how the Wife serves her husband by meeting the needs of people and the world around her. The purpose of business and all other activity in the kingdom is to glorify God by providing for the needs of people and the world around us. All this is done according to His direction and from a motivation of pure love.

Every part of the heavenly family pattern rules in all forms of business. Employment is as permanent as marriage. Children (newcomers or immature) are loved and trained the same as in the heavenly pattern. Everyone looks to Jesus as Head and follows His leadership flowing through the Holy Spirit in those serving as father/husband, wife/mother and children. Everyone submits to one another and to the other person’s place of service in the kingdom order (family). The focus is always serving by meeting needs and never is the focus on gaining personal wealth to consume upon our lusts or to meet only our needs.

God never intended that business and other “secular” activities become competitive means of personal fulfillment of greedy motives. Competition, greed and other such things are patterned from Babylon and cannot exist in the kingdom of God.

Secular and godly are not opposites. In the past, there has been an inaccurate assumption that there was a division between secular and godly. The kingdom of God encompasses all life. The proper distinction or division is between godly and profane. The world is not inherently evil and is being redeemed and returned to the kingdom of God.

The heavenly family patterns of God’s government for families, businesses, churches, and every aspect of human life are New Jerusalem patterns coming down now from God to form and shape the Bride of Christ. The enemy’s patterns that have ruled in the world are harlot patterns from “Mystery Babylon.”

Keep on Pursuing Love
It Will Never Fail,

Ron McGatlin

http://www.openheaven.com
basileia@earthlink.net

GOD’S KINGDOM PATTERN

Posted: April 11, 2011 in disciples life, Kingdom Teaching, teaching
Tags: Bride of Christ, discipleship, God's love, Kingdom life, Kingdom living, Kingdom teaching, radical christianity, Spirit first, Spirit led life

THE GOOD SEED

The seed that will produce the good heart-tree when planted in good heart-soil is LOVE. The unconditional God-kind of real love flowing through an affirming attitude is received in the heart as pleasure or comfort.

The heart perceives love primarily as ACCEPTANCE along with mercy, grace, and forgiveness for our shortcomings. We find love, acceptance, mercy, grace, and forgiveness in God through Jesus Christ.

John 3:16: For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.

Ephesians 2:4-5: But God, Who is rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in trespasses, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you are saved).

Ephesians 1:6-7: …to the praise of the glory of His grace; by which He has made us accepted in the Beloved. In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of His grace…

Our hearts must experience the love of Jesus filling our spirits by the Holy Spirit. Our hearts also need to experience the love of Jesus in our souls through the manifest love of Jesus coming through other people. To grow a good life-structure we need to receive the seed of the love and acceptance of Jesus flowing through an affirming attitude from the people in authority over us and from those around us. We never outgrow our need for love.

God’s pattern is for the individual to be formed in a godly environment of love and acceptance; not just a Christian home with clean morals and firm discipline, but a family characterized by unconditional godly love. The seed-pattern of the kingdom of God is the real love from God flowing through godly parents, extended family, and community always affirming the worth of the child while tenderly nurturing and training from conception to maturity.

Ephesians 6:4b: Amp. “… but rear them [tenderly] in the training and discipline and the counsel and admonition of the Lord.”

THE GOOD ROOT

The seed of love sown in the soil of our heart will begin to grow the foundational ROOT system of our life-structure. The taproot is the reality of the LOVE OF JESUS in our heart. The tip of the taproot is abundant life. The main root of the love of Jesus, along with its beautiful secondary roots, will fill our heart-soil with the fullness of God. The secondary roots that branch from the main taproot are both in-working and out-working characteristics, such as peace, approval, devotion, kindness, calmness, blessing, joy, gladness, goodness, satisfaction, hope, cheerfulness, and delight.

Ephesians 3:17-19: …that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the width and length and depth and height – to know the love of Christ which passes knowledge; that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.

THE ENEMY’S SCHEME

THE BAD SEED

The bad seed is UNLOVE. Unlove is perceived in our hearts primarily as REJECTION, and is felt in the heart as PAIN. Seeds of rejection, accusation, condemnation, and unforgiveness flowing through a judgmental or critical attitude are the seeds the enemy uses to plant a bad life-structure. Unlove is the absence of the unconditional God-kind of love.

Rejection may come in many forms and from many sources. Usually the rejection that produces the most severe pain comes from those closest to us–from those who should love us. Rejection is often communicated in subtle ways. The child that is severely abused, abandoned, or that suffered the trauma of parental divorce may not be the only child who feels the pain of rejection. If our parents were just too busy with their own situations to really be there for us when we needed them, we experienced rejection, too. Apathy can be the worst kind of unlove.

Psalm 109: 2-4a, 22-23: For the mouth of the wicked and the mouth of the deceitful have opened against me; they have spoken against me with a lying tongue. They have also surrounded me with words of hatred, and fought against me without a cause. In return for my love they are my accusers. I am poor and needy and my heart is wounded within me. I am gone like a shadow when it lengthens; I am shaken like a locust.

Romans 2:1a, Amp.: Therefore you have no excuse of defense or justification, O man, whoever you are who judges and condemns another.

Ephesians 6:4a, Amp.: Fathers, do not irritate and provoke your children to anger; do not exasperate them to resentment…

There is no more painful seed which can be planted in our heart than being judged and condemned by someone we love, especially those who have some measure of authority in our lives. We are particularly open to parents, pastors, teachers, coaches, mates, older siblings, and close friends. The enemy knows this and will seek to cause unforgiveness, condemnation and accusations from those who should love us. He wants us to feel the devastating pain of rejection and react to it with resentment.

THE BAD ROOT

The pain in our heart begins to grow the foundational ROOT structure of our life. The painful seed of rejection begins to produce anger, resentment, and bitterness. Left to its natural course, the seed of rejection will always produce a root of BITTERNESS. The tip of the taproot of bitterness is death. The secondary roots are both out-working and in-working characteristics. The out-working characteristics are things like anger, resentment, hatred, wrath, retaliation, rage, and an attitude of murder. The in-working characteristics are things like grief, sorrow, guilt, remorse, hopelessness, depression, despair, and an attitude of suicide.

Remember, the heart did not want these things. They are the natural result of the seed of unlove planted in the heart soil. The soil will grow whatever is planted.

Hebrews 12:14-17: Pursue peace with all men, and holiness, without which no one will see the Lord: looking diligently lest anyone fall short of the grace of God; lest any ROOT OF BITTERNESS springing up cause trouble, and by this many become defiled.

The Greek word translated “bitterness” also carries the meanings of “piercing, sharp, pungent, and poison.” The life-structure becomes poisoned with bitterness, as the taproot of bitterness with all of its ugly subsidiary or secondary roots grows and entwines to permeate the entire heart-soil.

Acts 8:21-23: You have neither part nor portion in this matter, for your heart is not right in the sight of God. Repent therefore of this your wickedness, and pray God if perhaps the thought of your heart may be forgiven you. For I see that you are poisoned by bitterness and bound by iniquity.

THE BAD TRUNK

The root of bitterness will spring up, cause trouble, and defile many. The trunk of our life-tree that springs forth from the root of bitterness is always, without exception—REBELLION. Rebellion (a disobedient attitude) is the natural outworking of bitterness, which is the natural result of inner pain from rejection. Rebellion is not usually something we plan or even desire for our lives. We didn’t want it. It was planted in our heart-soil, often before we were old enough to choose. Feelings of being rejected by parents, teachers, siblings, relatives, and peers plant the seeds that will produce the structure of our life, a trunk of rebellion.

FEAR and PRIDE characterize the trunk of rebellion. The rebellion turns into fear as we feel unloved and subconsciously reasons something like this: “The authorities over me, or those around me, do not love me as much as they love themselves. Therefore, they are going to take care of themselves first and not me. And I don’t feel God loves me because I’m in rebellion against Him. Therefore, He’s not going to take care of me either. No one is going to take care of me, so I must take care of myself.” We are now self-focused, self-centered and have a poor self-image.

Then, we take a look at ourselves and a look at the big mean world and reason something like this, “Wow! I’m not very big and the world is so big. I don’t think I can do it. I can’t take care of myself.” FEAR, insecurity, inferiority, and anxiety enter at this point.

Eventually, we may look around and see others successfully taking care of themselves. We reason something like this, “If they can do it, I can too. So I’ll take hold of my boot straps, double up my fist, set my jaw and start getting tough.” When we begin to succeed at taking care of ourselves, get that good job, new car, etc., we are PROUD. Why not? I did it all myself. God didn’t do it. The authority over me or those around me didn’t do it. I did it.” Now we are filled with PRIDE, and we become stubborn, haughty, arrogant, self-willed, and unthankful.

When we are winning, pride reigns, but when things don’t go so well, fear rules. We will flip back and forth between fear and pride depending upon our evaluation of our performance. We have become performance-oriented. We find our self-worth only in our performance. Only perfection, which we never seem to achieve, will satisfy us.

The central characteristic of our entire life-structure has become NEED. It does not matter how much we have; it is not enough. There is always a sense of lack, not being good enough, not doing enough or having enough. This continuous feeling of need or lack becomes the primary motivational force in our life-structure.

THE BAD LIMBS

The limbs of the bad heart-tree do not grow from a trunk of well-being and abundance, but rather from a driving sense of intense need–a feeling that “I will not make it if I don’t have more.” From this strong sense of need, the limbs or branches of the life-structure come forth. The natural product of great need is a strong desire to have in order to attempt to satisfy the strong sense of need. This powerful desire to have is LUST. We are not talking about a spurious want type of desire. We’re talking about what seems to some people to be a life-or-death situation.

We subconsciously reason something like, “I must provide for myself or I might not make it. If I’m going to provide for myself, I must have money–money that is mine, that I control.” Lust for money and greed come forth in the life-structure. “If I’m going to get and keep money, I must have power and position.” A lust for power, control, position and fame develops into the life-structure.

The greatest need we all have, what we are really searching for, is love—to be able to receive and give real love. But, the person with this life-structure does not even know what real love is. The bad heart-tree has never fully experienced real love, the unconditional God-kind of love. However, this type of individual does know the good feelings of romance and sex. So, lust for romance or sex comes forth and promises to meet their deep, inner need.

Remember, we did not decide to be this way. It got planted in us a long time ago as painful rejection—unlove.

The major limbs of the bad heart-tree life-structure are lust for money, lust for power, lust for position, and lust for romance or sex. On these limbs the fruit of the life is borne.

THE BAD FRUIT AND SEED

The fruit that will always come forth on these limbs is BAD DEEDS. The attitudes and actions will be selfish and involve taking rather than giving. This type of individual may really wish in his heart that he actually cared about others. He may even convince himself he does care some. But, deep in his inner being, when he really gets honest, he does not care about others like he cares for himself. Some of the attitudes causing his actions and words to offend and wound others are aggression, competition, striving, high achievement, defensiveness, inconsideration, and hostility. Wounding others sets up his own rejection from those he offends. When he offends and wounds others, he causes them to reject him. This plants more pain in his heart and starts the cycle all over again.

These offensive and wounding bad deeds are the fruit. Most fruit has a seed inside. Inside this fruit is the SEED of unlove—rejection. The seeds produced by this person’s life are exactly the same as the seeds that were planted in his own heart-soil. The individual is helplessly unable to control his judgmental and critical attitude toward those he should love. Rejection, accusation, condemnation, and unforgiveness are sown from the person into the heart-soil of others, especially the wife or husband and children. And thereby the kingdom of darkness is reproduced in the hearts of others, producing the same life-structure all over again. In a real and practical way, the sins of the fathers are passed on to the next generation. The situation tends to grow worse to the third and fourth generations. (Exodus 34:7).

THE BAD BIRDS

Certain kinds of birds are attracted to the bad fruit of the Bad Heart-Tree. The birds are BAD SPIRITS. The Bible calls these bad spirits demons. Demon spirits of darkness, blindness, deception, and delusion will come with all their filthiness and torment to lodge in the limbs of the bad-heart tree. These spirits will shut out the light. The truth of God cannot get through to the heart, but lies, deceptions, and delusion will flow readily into it.

2 Corinthians 4:3-4a: But even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing, whose minds the god of this age has blinded…

1 John 2:11: But he who hates his brother is in darkness and walks in darkness, and does not know where he is going, because the darkness has blinded his eyes.

2 Thessalonians 1:9b-11: …according to the working of Satan, with all power, signs, and lying wonders, and with all unrighteous deception among those who perish, because they did not receive the love of the truth, that they might be saved. And for this reason God will send them strong delusion, that they should believe the lie.

This type of individual is now ready to receive occult interest and involvement. He seems powerless against the enticing drawing of the lying promises of the occult to meet the needs of the life-structure. Promises of excitement, power, control, peace of mind, and riches turn into hopeless bondages and addictions that imprison him and steal all hope and, eventually, his very life.

Anyone deeply involved in occult, witchcraft, or other demonic activities has the bad heart-tree as his life-structure. It is the only way to great deception. Occult activities can range from overt satanic worship and witchcraft to church members who are deceived into practices of spirit-power that look like God. Some have called this Christian witchcraft. The bad heart-tree, mixed with religion, produces false prophets.

Remember, this individual did not plan it this way. He did not want this at all. It was planted in him as rejection, which caused pain that grew into bitterness, and then into rebellion, with fear and pride. Then his need became lust, which produced bad deeds and bad seeds, which invited evil spirits to lock him into bondage and torment, unable to hear God or His truth. In addition, if the enemy can cause the heart to be closed off to godly people as well, this individual is locked into bondage.

THE WALL

This bad tree an its fruit is not pretty. The individual soon learns his behavior is not acceptable and it causes him to be rejected and to suffer more pain again and again. He observes that every person who gets close to him eventually hurts him. He also recognizes that every person that gets close to him is hurt as well. As a result of this, he begins to build a WALL OF DEFENSE. This wall is designed to hide what actually is in the heart-tree. It is created to prevent closeness with people and stop the wounds caused by painful rejection. The wall is constructed of things used by the individual to attempt to make him feel better by venting on others.

Proverbs 18:19: A brother offended is harder to win than a strong city, and contentions are like the bars of a castle.

The person with a wall of defense is saying, “No one is ever going to get close enough to me to hurt me again.” He builds a wall as strong and as tall as necessary to keep anyone from seeing what is really in his heart and to keep anyone from ever really getting close enough to hurt him. He usually begins building his wall with contention and contrariness. Next are unaffection, withdrawal, and so on. If these characteristics fail to keep everyone away, the wall is built higher with more serious resistance.

Recall that the wall is supposed to hide the pain, bitterness, rebellion, fear, pride, lust, bad fruit, and spiritual darkness of the heart-tree that has grown from the seed of unlove planted in the heart-soil. One problem the person runs into is that the wall itself becomes very ugly. In order to cover its ugliness, one might whitewash the outside of the wall. However, this mask is only temporary, It may last long enough for a person to make it in the presence of others, such as at work or church, etc. Another problem is that the limbs keep growing over the wall. The person will continue adding more bricks to make the wall higher and stronger.

Acts 23:3: Then Paul said to him, “God will strike you, you whitewashed wall! For you sit to judge me according to the law, and do you command me to be struck contrary to the law?”

In the upper portion of the wall of defense, blame and slander are used to create separation. A major tool for creating emotional and eventually physical distance is the abuse of alcohol and drugs. If these big tools don’t create enough distance to keep others away, the individual becomes abusive, immoral and violent. In painful desperation and frustration, if he is unable to keep others out any other way, he will murder them.

Now that the wall is strong enough and high enough to keep people out from the side, and the spirits of darkness are keeping the light of God out from above, the helpless individual has become an island. He cannot give or receive love. The person is now isolated from other people and from God. Feelings of loneliness and hopelessness overwhelm him. The angry, hostile attitudes that had been focused outwardly on others begin to be focused inwardly on himself. Self-rejection now plants its painful seeds in his own heart-soil producing a deadly cycle of depression and self-hate.

The person now must attempt to build a wall to separate himself from himself. He becomes as two people in one body–one rejecting the other. He is actually dying for love and is unable to receive it or give it. Finally, he realizes it won’t do any good to just murder the one who rejects him; he’s must kill the one that is hurting him from the inside. So, he stacks the last brick on the wall. Suicide makes this statement, “You will never touch me now; you will never hurt me again; and I will never hurt me again.”

Remember again, this person did not want it to be this way. It just happened. It was planted in him. The work of Satan is complete when he can cause people to reject each other long enough to grow the seed of unlove to its final maturity—death and separation from God and His kind of life.

Keep on Pursuing Love
It Will Never Fail,

Ron McGatlin

http://www.openheaven.com
basileia@earthlink.net

HE HEART-TREE – THE LIFE-STRUCTURE OF MAN

Posted: April 10, 2011 in disciples life, Kingdom Teaching, teaching
Tags: Bride of Christ, disciples, Kingdom living, Kingdom of God, Kingdom teaching

THE LIFE-STRUCTURE OF MAN

Trees are often used in Scripture to symbolize men or the life-structure of a man. In the figurative language of Scripture, the tree, the root, the soil it grows in, and the seed that the tree grew from are all important in understanding God’s plan (kingdom pattern) for the individual and exposing the enemy’s scheme for causing affliction.

Isaiah 55:12: For you shall go out with joy, and be led forth with peace; the mountains and the hills shall break forth into singing before you, and all the trees of the field shall clap their hands.

Isaiah 61:3: To console those who mourn in Zion, to give them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness; that they may be called trees of righteousness, the planting of the Lord, that He may be glorified.

In the parable of the sower and other scriptures, the heart of man is referred to as soil.

Our heart is our spirit and soul.

Our spirit is who we are and relates to the spiritual realm.

Our soul is our mind, will, and emotions and relates to the natural realm through the bodies in which we live.

The heart of man, like soil, will grow whatever is planted in it. The soil does not determine the type of tree that will grow. The seed does. The same soil, that will grow a pecan tree when a pecan is planted in it, will grow a peach tree if a peach seed is planted in it. A thorn tree will grow if the soil is planted with the seed of a thorn tree. Our heart-soil does not in itself determine our tree or life-structure. Rather, the seed that is planted will determine the nature of our tree or life-structure. The fruit of the tree (our actions or deeds) will be determined by the nature of tree (life-structure) that grew from the type of seed planted.

Matthew 7:16-20: You will know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes from thorn bushes or figs from thistles? Even so, every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. Therefore by their fruits you will know them.

Matthew 12:33-35: Either make the tree good and its fruit good, or else make the tree bad and its fruit bad; for a tree is known by its fruit. Brood of vipers! How can you, being evil, speak good things? For out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks. A good man, out of the good treasure of his heart, brings forth good things, and an evil man, out of the evil treasure, brings forth evil things.

In the above passages, the Lord speaks of the tree (life-structure) and its fruit (deeds) coming forth from the soil of the heart of man.

The “Heart-Tree” of our life is either good or bad and will bear either good or bad fruit according to the tree. The seed planted determined the type of tree.

As we see in Matthew 13:19, the seed is a word. A word is more than just letters arranged on a page; it is a pattern that is alive and able to grow into a structure of life that bears fruit. It can be a vision, picture, image, an action or a combination or series of these things. A communication in any form is a word or seed.

Since there are two kinds of trees and two kinds of fruit, obviously there are two kinds of seeds, good and bad. Good seeds are good words or living patterns Bad seeds are bad words or living patterns.

All words or seeds ultimately have their origin from either the tree of life or the tree of knowledge of good and evil, which produces death. Every word, seed, action, or communication of any form has its source in either God or the devil.

A child planted with inordinate premature, sexual activity will grow a life-structure of sexual confusion and disorder. A child planted with legalistic rigid harshness will grow a life-structure of frustrated perfectionism. A child planted with violent acts will grow a life-structure of fear and aggression. A child planted with unconditional love and peaceful security will grow a healthy, happy life-structure.

The seed of the kingdom of God is a special, good seed that will grow the life and rule of God.

THE ENEMY’S SCHEME

UNGODLY HERITAGE
(OPEN TO BAD SEED)

Our ungodly heritage causes our heart-soil to be born with an openness to bad seed.

The ungodly heritage of Adam has passed down through the generations. We were each conceived and born with a heritage that goes back to Adam. Sin and the curse of death entered through Adam and spread to all men. Through our forefathers, the sin of Adam reaches to each of us.

Romans 5:19: Therefore just as through one man sin entered the world and death through sin, and thus death spread to all men, because all sinned.

Psalm 51:5: Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity, and in sin my mother conceived me.

Though we bear no personal accountability for the sins of our parents and forefathers, each of us are born under the curse of sin and must at some time become personally accountable for our own sin. However, we are directly affected by the inheritance of the iniquity (tendency to sin) of our forefathers.

Exodus 20: 5-6: …. visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and fourth generations of those who hate Me, but showing mercy to thousands, to those who love Me and keep My commandments.

Leviticus 26: 39: And those of you who are left shall waste away in their iniquity in your enemies lands; also in their fathers iniquities; which are with them, they shall waste away.

Exodus 34: 7b: … visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children and the children’s children to the third and the fourth generation.

The sin of Adam, working through our heritage (the iniquity or perversions of our forefathers), serves as a big hammer to drive the wedge of sin into our own heart-soil, causing an opening for bad seed to be planted. Then, in our own experience, the seeds are planted and our life-structure (Heart-Tree) begins to grow. Eventually our lives will bear the fruit of it.

UNGODLY LIFE EXPERIENCE
(CLOSED TO GOOD SEED)

Our ungodly experience causes our heart-soil to be unable to grow the kingdom of God seed (the good seed).

Matthew 13:3-9: Then He spoke many things to them in parables, saying; Behold, a sower went out to sow. And as he sowed, some seed fell by the wayside; and the birds came and devoured them. Some fell on stony places, where they did not have much earth; and they immediately sprang up because they had no depth of earth. But when the sun was up, they were scorched, and because they had no root, they withered away. And some fell among thorns, and the thorns sprang up and choked them. But others fell on good ground and yielded a crop: some a hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty. He who has ears to hear, let him hear!

THE WAYSIDE SOIL

Matthew 13:19: When anyone hears the word of the kingdom, and does not understand it, then the wicked one comes and snatches away what was sown in his heart. This is he who received seed by the wayside.

Notice that this scripture refers specifically to the word of the kingdom. It does not say the word of “being born again” or some other word from God cannot be received.

The word of the kingdom cannot be received or understood in the hard-pressed soil of our heart. The heavy, wounding footsteps of man and his ox cart’s wheels may have pressed down the soil of our heart and made it hard. These wounding experiences and the hard-press of life have damaged our soil and our ability to receive the good seed that could have produced a kingdom life-structure. Because it cannot penetrate the hardened soil, the enemy easily and quickly steals the word of the kingdom from us. The wayside heart must be plowed to break up the hardened soil, and then healed by the gentle rain of the Holy Spirit before it can receive the good seed.

THE STONY SOIL

Matthew 13:20-21: But he who received the seed on stony places, this is he who hears the word and immediately receives it with joy; yet he has no root in himself, but endures only for a while. For when tribulation or persecution arises because of the word, immediately he stumbles.

The word of the kingdom of God cannot be brought to fruition in a stony heart. The stones represent hardened, firm, previous convictions. If we are so convinced that we already know how things are (what the Bible says, what life is like, what people are like, what we ourselves are like, etc.), then we will not grow the new life-structure to maturity. We will let it go when challenged, because negative, hardened, previous beliefs or convictions will prohibit the word of the kingdom of God from taking deep root in our heart. Rocks of earlier, hardened beliefs or convictions must be either thrown out or smashed before the kingdom life comes to fruition

THE THORNY SOIL

Matthew 13:22: Now he who received seed among the thorns is he who hears the word, and the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches choke the word, and he becomes unfruitful.

The word of the kingdom cannot be brought to fruition in a heart growing thorn bushes of the cares of this life. If feel we must have anything of this life in addition to, or apart from what God desires for us, we have thorn bushes. We must love God above all else and be fully content with Him and his desired provision for us. The thorn bushes must be uprooted and thrown out before the kingdom life can come to fruition.

GOD’S KINGDOM PATTERN

THE GOOD SOIL

Matthew 13:23: But he who received seed on the good ground is he who hears the word and understands it, who indeed bears fruit and produces; some a hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty.

The word of the kingdom of God will be received and grow to fruition in the good heart-soil. The good soil is the heart that is healed of wounds, has had its stones of hardened, previous convictions thrown out, and the thorn bushes of cares of this life pulled up and discarded. This heart can produce the kingdom of God lifestyle. It will be fruitful in producing the kingdom of God on earth. It will not receive the bad seed but is ready to grow the good seed.

We are told in Scripture to be careful what we hear–what we plant in our soil. It is God’s plan for us to receive good seed. If we are filled with the peace of God, our hearts will receive only good seed, which will grow a good tree (life-structure). This will produce good fruit (deeds or actions).

The peace of God guards our hearts from bad seed.

Philippians 4: 7b-9: … and the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus. Finally, brethren, whatever things are true, whatever things are noble, whatever things are just, whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue and if there is anything praiseworthy, meditate on these things. The things which you learned and received and heard and saw in me, these do, and the God of peace will be with you.

Proverbs 23: 7a: For as he thinks in his heart, so is he.

We will be formed by the thoughts we think–by the words in any form that we receive into our hearts. Our heart-soil grows whatever we allow to be planted in it, whether good or bad. Whether it is a spoken word or some action carried out against us, if we allow it to be planted in our heart-soil, it will determine our life-structure thereby, determining our feelings, self-image, attitude and eventually, our actions whether good or bad. We will live in peace or in turmoil and stress, according to what we decide to allow to be planted in our heart-soil.

What are you allowing to be planted in your soil? What are you watching, listening to, and thinking about?

What did you plant in your heart-soil from the time you were born until you were about six years old? Obviously you had no choice at that young age. Someone else decided what would be planted in your heart-soil at that time. It is a known fact that most of our life-structure was formed in us as small children. Before we developed the ability to choose, the seeds that would determine the majority of our life-structure were already planted. What kind of seed was planted in our soil from the time we were in our mother’s womb until five or six years old?

Unfortunately, not all of us grew up surrounded by the peace of God. Many of us did not have our heart-soil planted with seeds of unconditional love and acceptance. On the contrary, we may have received seeds of a conditional, performance-based kind of love and grew up feeling unaccepted. Or, we may have felt little or no love at all. Anything short of unconditional, affirming love and acceptance becomes a bad seed. If so, then the seeds of unlove and rejection sown into our heart-soil began to grow into our life-structure.

God’s kingdom pattern is that we be planted with good seed and grow a good life-structure (a Good Heart-Tree). If, however, this was not so, then Jesus came to uproot our bad life-structure (the Bad Heart-Tree), heal our heart-soil, and replant it with His good seed to grow His good life-structure (the Good Heart-Tree).

God has given us the ability to take the cover off and see the methods or schemes the enemy has used and is using to afflict individuals and cause them to afflict others. We know his plan is to kill, steal, and destroy. Once we see his plot to kill us, steal all we have including our faith and joy, and to destroy the plan and work of God, we can make the necessary adjustments to appropriate the ministry of Jesus to destroy all the schemes of the enemy and establish God’s kingdom patterns.

Understanding God’s kingdom patterns for individuals, families, businesses, and all aspects of life and planting them in our heart will produce abundant life. Learning to personally appropriate the ministry of Christ will bring about the uprooting of the old and the planting of the new tree. Jesus has provided and is providing everything we need to completely destroy the old work of the enemy and establish the new work of God in our life.

We are absolutely without excuse. The enemy would like to cause us to believe that because it was planted in us, we can do nothing about it. To say, I can’t help it; someone did it to me, is to say, Jesus is not sufficient to meet my need. His blood, resurrection life, and omnipotent power are not enough to fix me.

If we attempt to avert our responsibility by placing the blame on others (the ones that did it to me), then we are deceived. It really does not matter who did it; ultimately, it was the enemy who did it. And the Lord Jesus, the Anointed One, has been and is manifest to destroy the work of the enemy. He is no respecter of persons. His freedom-giving ministry is available to all. His ministry begins with our real repentance, not our phony excuses. Our escape and defense mechanisms are designed by the enemy and brought forth in our soul to prevent true repentance.

Keep on Pursuing Love
It Will Never Fail,

Ron McGatlin

http://www.openheaven.com
basileia@earthlink.net

PREPARING THE BRIDE

Posted: April 9, 2011 in disciples life, Kingdom Teaching, Prophetic, teaching
Tags: Bride of Christ, Christian life, Kingdom teaching, radical christianity, radical disciples, Spirit led life

The mature church must become the body of Christ, a living organism, a network of spiritually-connected cells and parts, individuals emptied of self, filled with Christ. It must be without man’s leadership or man’s structure. There will be no human hierarchy in the Bride. One individual will not rule over another, but all will serve one another. Christ Jesus will spiritually rule within each individual and serve as overall Head of the church thereby establishing spiritual structure, not human. In the natural, the head rules a healthy body, life from the head sends signals to each individual part and every cell responds in obedience to the head. So it is in the Body of Christ.

Much of the church is sick; much like a person would be if any part failed to obey the head. The great apostasy of the past continues to affect the health of the body today. Men establish themselves as heads and develop hierarchical systems of church rule. This defection from the true Head is fostered by the enemy and is carried out by a spirit of antichrist, which opposes or replaces Christ as Head. Religious spirits in the church sustain spirits of spiritual blindness, darkness, deception, and delusion.

The enemy has effective tools for stirring men and causing them to have strong desires to rule. The enemy must work in and through the individual parts of the Body because he cannot affect the true Head.

Our purpose in this part of Kingdom Growth Guides is to expose the enemy’s schemes and plans to rule, and to help us recognize true patterns of God’s rule, which can produce the overcoming life, the kingdom of God lifestyle.

People are the church.

The church is sick because individuals are sick. The enemy’s plan is to cause strong needs or desires within the individuals. To accomplish this, he must prevent them from being in contact with the reality of the love of God.He uses negative life-experiences and deceiving spirits to blind individuals to God’s love and power. This causes each individual to become keenly aware of his own needs and to look only to himself to supply them. This self-focus becomes self-centeredness. Selfish thoughts and actions lead to fear, pride, greed, lust, and disobedience to the true Head.

Once a disobedient lifestyle is established, the enemy can bring much inner turmoil and outer conflict thereby causing increasing emotional wounds and spiritual deception. Spiritual darkness, deception, and delusion open the door for occult and other demonic influences. The inner turmoil will eventually produce negative behavior such as aggressiveness, defensiveness, or withdrawal, which can produce conflict, marital strife, racial strife, religious strife, and power struggles in the church as well as in the world.

The strife, turmoil, and conflict cause stress and deterioration of mental, emotional, and physical health. Often the individual will seek escape from the inner turmoil and stress. Many avenues are available that seem to offer some temporary escape, but often lead to more stress and turmoil. Drugs, alcohol, immorality, some kinds of music, sports, gaining wealth, entertainment, withdrawal, overworking, overeating, violence, and religion are some of the common escapes used. The buildup of stress often leads to increased conflict, strife, and more intense power struggles resulting in violence, beatings, murders, and suicides. Sickness and premature deaths then become normal in such a violent society.

Remember, the enemy’s purpose in all this is to cut us off from the knowledge and experience of the love of God. It is easy to see how difficult it will be for a child growing up in this violent culture to even imagine the love of God. Power and strength are seen as synonymous with “mean and violent.” God is often seen as only judgmental, and except the individual be healed in their heart, he cannot begin to know the love of God. The person is, therefore, locked into the bondage of the enemy, doomed to live and die in the torment of inner turmoil and stress. There is truly no rest for the wicked.

Most churchgoers feel that, if they can control their stress and in some way contain it; they are doing as well as can be expected under the circumstances. As someone once asked, “Why are you under the circumstances?”–Implying that there is potential life in Jesus that is over the circumstances. And it is really true. Jesus can totally remove our turmoil and stress not merely help us to live with distress until we die and are relieved of it in heaven someday. We are not talking about perfect circumstances, although they may improve in time. We are talking about living above them now in the real peace of God. As we live in real peace, we become a part of the solution instead of part of the problem. As our lifestyle changes, we stop affecting those around us for bad and start affecting them for good.

Until we can see Jesus the King as He really is, we do not have the power or motivation to move toward ultimate closeness with Him. When we see the true abundant love and magnificent glory of the King, we will decide to move toward Him.Once we experience the reality of the glorious peace and eternal joy found in the King’s presence, we will repent in order to enter intimately into His glorious presence.

Preaching the Cross, personal salvation, the baptism of the Holy Spirit and the indwelling Spirit of Christ are foundational building blocks of the overcoming life. Preaching the kingdom of God now establishes the goal or objective. Teaching God’s kingdom patterns and exposing the enemy’s schemes allow us to see where we are and what changes need to be made. Jesus the Anointed One is our source of power for change.

THE RESTORATION MINISTRY OF JESUS

Luke 4:18-19: “The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me, because He has anointed Me to preach the gospel to the poor. He has sent Me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed, to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord.”

The restoration ministry of Jesus is the cleansing process that we must go through before we can walk into the Holy City, the New Jerusalem, purified Bride-of-Christ, kingdom-of-God lifestyle. It is the work of Jesus by His grace and power through the Holy Spirit. It is not of man “that any should boast.” Our part in helping one another is to bring forth the Word and the anointing of Christ by the Holy Spirit.

Christ Jesus destroys all the work of the enemy–the work the devil has done, and the work he is doing. Jesus repairs, renews, and rebuilds all the damage inflicted by the enemy. Jesus will establish righteousness, peace, and joy in those who seek Him with their whole heart. He will set free those in bondages created by the enemy. He will bring an end to mourning and a beginning to joy and praise.

1 John 3: 8b: For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that He might destroy the works of the devil.

Isaiah 61: 1-4: “The Spirit of the Lord God is upon Me, because the Lord has anointed Me to preach good tidings to the poor; He has sent Me to heal the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to those who are bound; to proclaim the acceptable (favorable) year of the Lord, and the day of vengeance of our God; to comfort all who mourn, to console those who mourn in Zion, to give them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness; that they may be called trees of righteousness, the planting of the Lord, that He may be glorified, and they shall rebuild the old ruins, they shall raise up the former desolations, and they shall repair the ruined cities, the desolations of many generations.”

The enemy has inflicted much damage on individuals and, subsequently on the entire planet since Adam released him thousands of years ago in the garden. Primarily, he uses his powers of darkness to affect people and cause them to negatively affect others. If he can prevent someone from knowing and experiencing the love of God, he can devastate their life and cause them to wound many others.

Since Jesus defeated him, the only real power the enemy has is deception. He seeks to prevent us from knowing and believing the power we have over him in Christ. One of his favorite tricks is to make Christians believe he and his demons are not really around any more. He likes to disguise himself as an angel of light and works under cover as a “religious spirit.” This way he can influence Christians away from truth that will expose him. Undetected, he can move them toward a false doctrine that protects him. He can then fan the flames of natural differences to cause painful rejections among the people. Through this pain he can excite the flesh to anger, bitterness, and many negative works.

2 Corinthians 11:14-15:And no wonder! For Satan himself transforms himself into an angel of light. Therefore it is no great thing if his ministers also transform themselves into ministers of righteousness, whose end will be according to their works.

1 Timothy 4:1b: … some will depart from the faith, giving heed to deceiving spirits and doctrines of demons.

The enemy does not use a vast number of schemes. He doesn’t need very many. The ones he uses have been highly perfected over thousands of years of practice and work very effectively on unbelievers and uninformed Christians. His schemes are always designed to pervert the truth of God in order to divert man from the plan of God.

God’s kingdom patterns for life always lead to an abundant life of love, righteousness, peace, and joy. The enemy’s perversion of these patterns always produces unlove, evil, pain, affliction, and despair. Christians may be easily deceived and diverted to an alternate plan if they do not have a clear foundational understanding of God’s kingdom patterns. The best way to recognize a counterfeit is to thoroughly know the real thing. If the enemy cannot totally pervert, he will attempt to divert by drawing attention to some other less important matter.

The restoration ministry of Jesus always involves two processes. One is the tearing down of the old life-structure, and the other is the building of the new. In order to help us recognize and tear down the work of the enemy, and to help us avoid his schemes, it is important to uncover and expose his work and methods.

To begin rebuilding, we must renew our minds to God’s kingdom patterns of abundant life. The world system currently is highly affected by the enemy’s deception. Therefore, it is very easy to be trained in the devil’s perversions and diversions. One need only grow up in a modern, secular family, watch TV and movies, attend public schools and attend an institutional-type church to be grounded in the perversions and diversions of the enemy.

We must be retrained to recognize what is kingdom of God living and what is not kingdom of God living. Our understanding must be renewed to the Word of God. Kingdom-life patterns must be revealed to us. Also, we need to learn to recognize the enemy’s patterns for our lives and the schemes he uses to press us into his perverted ways.

Unfortunately, the institutional church does not often have the power to effectively answer the situation and sometimes fosters the deception by joining with the world system. Churchgoers often respond with hypocritical, legalistic attacks against people while allowing the same or other perversions to operate in their own lives. A Christian under conviction for their own hidden problem may attack others in whom they see the same problem. Such legalistic attacks further wound people and often drive them out for the enemy to further afflict.

Some of my readers at this point are agreeing, “Yeah! I’ve sure seen that over there or in that particular person.” One scheme of the enemy is to divert attention from our need to the problem of others. As the Spirit of God reveals God’s kingdom patterns, the enemy’s workings to pervert them will be uncovered.We must unmask ourselves as the Spirit of Jesus uncovers and exposes the enemy. We must agree with God about our own needs and be willing to allow our old life-structures to be cut down and uprooted in order that the new may grow and flourish in its place.

Matthew 3:10: “And even now the ax is laid to the root of the trees. Therefore every tree which does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.”

Matthew 15:13:“Every plant which My heavenly Father has not planted will be uprooted.”

Isaiah 61: 3b-4a: …that they may be called trees of righteousness, the planting of the Lord, that He may be glorified, and they shall rebuild the old ruins.

Keep on Pursuing Love
It Will Never Fail,

Ron McGatlin

http://www.openheaven.com
basileia@earthlink.net

Radical Disciples – A Remnant Revolution

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