LIFESTYLE
The Word of reconciliation is not a message but rather a lifestyle. The throne
of God is being established here among us in mercy, and only the truly merciful
shall reign with Him. I wish I could say with assurance that all who have come
thus far will go the rest of the way and enter into the glory prepared for us
from the foundation of the world, but I have no such assurance. Rather I fear
that some have already turned aside, having loved too dearly the things that
belong to this present age. Our hearts are deceitful and desperately wicked. It
is far too easy to put on a false front, refuse to call a spade a spade and face
up to things as they really are. Be it far from me to be the instigator of a
system of do's and do not's. Doing this and refusing to do that will not commend
us to God in any way. Nevertheless, only a fool would deny that those who have
begun to feel the touch of the celestial realm find nothing but repugnance and
disgust in the trivial nonsense and humbug that belongs to this age and its
fleshly desires. How can one whose soul has basked in the sunlight of the
celestial world and whose feet have wandered in the fields of God enjoy for even
a moment the corrupt products of the most carnal minds on earth? I do not
believe it can be done. There is something wrong somewhere. An hour of feeding
on the husks of the carnal mind causes the soul to be drained of spiritual life.
The face of Christ grows strangely dim and prayer loses its power.
I am thankful that God is not counting on our performance and work to enter
therein. I am grateful that ALL is based upon and dependent upon the finished
work of Christ Jesus. The way that I have observed things is that if your
salvation had anything to do with you at all, you would be lost. The sons of God
who are being prepared to reign in the kingdom with Christ are not just ordinary
Christians with ordinary experiences. There has been a great fault among
Christian people of all ages. They have always been prone to try to make the
Word of God fit the measure of experience they had instead of making their
experience fit the demands of the Word of God. They have claimed to be filled
with the Spirit of God when all they had was a tiny earnest of the inheritance.
They have insisted that they were Born Again, though to this day they have not
been able to see or understand the Kingdom of Heaven, and though we are plainly
told that `that which is born of God cannot sin, for His seed remaineth in him
and he cannot sin because he is born of God,' (1 Jo. 3:9 & 5:18) still we go on
sinning and insisting that we are born of God. Ask any denomination and they
will all have their own explanation of the new birth, or what it means to walk
in the Spirit, or what it means to be in Christ, or what it means to be a son of
God, but they all, every one, fall far short of the glorious experience the word
of God actually describes. All this confusion of ideas and doctrines of men was
permitted by the Lord for the age which we have just passed through, but we are
about to see something new, even the age of the kingdom of God, and we must
prepare ourselves for that.
What are we preparing ourselves for? We are to prepare our hearts and mind for
the complete restoration, redemption, and reconciliation of all things. It is
written…"ALL the ends (which includes the beginning - Isaiah 40:28) of the world
shall remember and turn to the Lord; and all the kindreds of the nations
(including all people - Daniel 7:14; even all the families of the earth -
Genesis 12:3) shall worship before thee.
Each Sunday in church I see people confessing their Christianity yet struggling
in their walk. If Christ appeared today there would be a great cry from the
church "My God, My God why have you forsaken me!"
This cry would go out because people have not established a true relationship
with the Father. Without a change of nature, a change of character a change of
heart a person is not in Christ Jesus.
There is coming a great change to all things as we now know it. If a change has
not yet occurred in your heart to where you are living each day to please the
Father without effort on your part then you are not where God wants you to be.
The Call has gone out unto the ends of the world "for today is the day of
salvation so enter into God's Rest."
Only in God, the Father by Christ Jesus through the Holy Spirit will you ever
know peace. If you are not living in a place where your heart is at ease and
your full confidence is in the Lord I would encourage you to start hearing the
voice of the Lord now.
May the Lord bless this word to all who have ears to hear, eyes to see, and the
faith and determination to WALK IT OUT! The Lord's faithful elect will "strive
to enter by the narrow door" into a greater fullness of the Kingdom of God -
into abundant life.
Dale Thompson