MAN'S BEING
An analysis of the composition and function of the parts of man.
Man's being
Gino Iafrancesco (Colombia)
In Genesis, chapter 1 we see man's mission and in chapter 2 we see his constitution, which depends on the mission. According to man's mission, God does it, and God teaches it. It will be easy to understand what God wants, why He made us as we are.
Genesis 2:7 says: " And Jehovah Elohim formed Man, dust of the ground, - that's why it is that natural medicine has such good effects with mud. That part refers to our physical body. "and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life." Now that refers to man's spirit. In James it says that the body without the spirit is dead. When the spirit entered into man through is nostrils, then, "Man became a living soul."
When Paul analyzes this passage, he says: "Because we have this treasure in vessels of clay", understanding that man is a vessel; that's why in Romans 9 it speaks of vessels for honour and of others. The word "vessel" indicates the plan of God towards man which is to contain God; because, how will we carry His image and be a channel for His Kingdom and His Dominion, if we don't contain Him? How will we contain Him and reflect Him if we don't have affinity with Him? Man's spirit is kindred with the Spirit of God; they can mix and make a single spirit. That's why it says in 1 Corinthians 6:17: "...he that is joined to the Lord is one spirit with him." They unite like coffee with milk. Beforehand, the coffee was to one side and the milk on another. Now we are totally in Him and He in us.
The spirit is the Holiest Place of the temple and the soul is the Holy Place, it is the one that has to receive so much information from inside and outside us. God moves in man's spirit, and He tells the soul which understands and interprets it. Because of this, it was in the Holiest Place -where the ark was placed - that bars were placed to mobilize the ark, and the two tips of the bars came out into the Holy Place.
Composition of man's parts
The spirit is the Holiest Place of the human temple, where the Spirit of God dwells, and consists of the following parts: conscience, communion and intuition. Intuition is the perception of God, of His presence, of His voice, of His guidance. Intuition is not merely a rational deduction; it is like a kind of traffic light that inspires our movements.
The soul is the Holy Place in the human temple. It is the seat of the ego, of the mind (reason, memory, concentration), of the will (preference, decision, choice), of the emotions. All this integrates what is called the personality, and it characterizes each human being's individuality; it is what makes us ourselves and not others.
The body is the Atrium in the human temple, and it is the seat of the senses (sight, smell, tact, hearing, pleasure, vestibular and sensitivity [pain and fatigue]). It is also seat of the different biological apparatuses: bones, muscles, nerves, breathing, digestive, circulatory, endocrine, reproductive.
The temple of God and the Trinity
That breath of life that God blew into man refers to man's spirit, the human spirit. Romans 8:16 says that: "The Spirit himself testifies to our spirit, that we are children of God." That means that man's spirit is created, it is not eternal; it had a beginning in the creation of God. Zechariah 12:1b says that: "Jehovah ...formeth the spirit (ruja) of man inside him." We have a human spirit, human soul and human body; we are a vessel that unites with the Lord and it is in the human spirit that the divine Spirit is received who brings all that belongs to Christ and all that belongs to the Father. The Father comes through the Son.
Jesus says: "My Father did not leave me alone; the One who sent me is with me, and the words that I speak, I don't speak of my own account. The Father who lives in me, He has given me commandment. Don't you believe that I am in the Father and the Father in me? The one who receives me, receives the One who sent me. He who has the son, also has the Father." So the Son doesn't come alone. When we receive the Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit brings the Son. That's why Jesus said: "If any one love me, he will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our abode with him" (Jn. 14:23). The Father comes with the Son and in the Son, and they come through the Holy Spirit. The Spirit won't speak to us by His own account, but rather he will take that which is of the Son. It is like when we shake a person's hand with glove on; we touch him with the glove, but we also touch him with the hand that is inside the glove. The Son of God has been sowed in us, he grows in us, he is formed in us.
When we are in communion with God, we receive the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, because we are the house of God, and God is Triune; three People in one God. In the essence of God three People subsist, but the essential substance of the three People is the same. Only, it is that the divine essence in the Father subsists as He who is begotten, as He from whom the Spirit proceeds. The same divine essence in the Son subsists as the image of the invisible one. The invisible one is the Father, and the visible one, the image, the splendour, the Word, the agent, is the Son. The divine essence in the Son subsists as begotten by the Father, that's why we speak of the Only-begotten of the Father; but one cannot speak of the only-begotten Father, because nobody engendered the Father, on the other hand the Son was engendered by the Father "You are my Son; today I have begotten you" (Psalms 2:7.
That same essence subsists in the Holy Spirit as coming from the Father and of the Son, because the Holy Spirit comes from the Father and from the Son; on the other hand the Father doesn't proceed. In procedure He is distinguished from the Spirit, but not in the essence. Three people have the same essence because it is a single God. In the Father subsists engendering and breathing; in the Son begotten-ness and expressing, and in the Spirit proceeding. The essence in God is one alone, but He subsists in three ways and each way has consciousness of Himself and is a Person.
Those three different subsistences from the unique essence, are personal, because each is manifested with personal characteristics and they use the pronoun I/me. The Father tells to the Son: "I have begotten you." The Son tells the Father: "You, oh Father, in me." The Holy Spirit also speaks and says in the first person: "Separate unto me...." That's why that those three different People make a single true God, the Trinity, and can say: "Let us make man... let us descend and let us confuse... who will go for us", etc.
Those three people are inseparable, even co inherent, because one is in the other. The Father is in the Son and the Son is in the Father; the Father and the Son come by means of the Spirit to the Church. When the Spirit comes, the Son enters, and when the Son comes, he brings the Father, to express his glory in the Church.
That's why God says: "Let us make man..." with spirit to receive Him, with soul to interpret Him and to represent Him and with body to serve Him. The soul interprets, that's why it says that if someone prays in spirit, his spirit prays, but his mind is without understanding and it is necessary to ask God that the understanding interprets the movements of God in his spirit. The divine life flows from the inner most part to the outer most part; moving from the Lord in your spirit it passes to the understanding, and it is when the soul understands, it sympathizes and decides, and gives the order to the body, and then the body obeys.
The president is the spirit, the soul is the steward, and the body is the servant, the secretary. Although in the natural man things are the other way around: the president is the body, the soul is the slave, and the president has been assassinated; that's why redemption is necessary.
It is necessary to understand that mess which happened in man from the fall. That tripartite man was put by God amid the garden of the Eden. God didn't only make to man with a body, no. God told man: "Of all the trees you can eat." There were fruit-bearing trees to feed the body; but man had a spirit. How will he feed the spirit? The tree of life was amid the garden; and that word life refers to the very life of God, the eternal one. He wants to be man's food; God wants to be digested by man, to saturate him and that he assimilates to God; that's why God is presented as if He were a meal. "He who eats of me will live... take, eat." Men were designed as vessels to contain God, to eat God. Jeremiah says: "Thy words were found, and I did eat them" (Jeremiah 15:16; Revelation 10:9), and it says: "Nutrients", because it is life, it is spirit.
God put the tree of life there, which was not forbidden. There was another tree that was to the side and that represented Satan, acting for himself, independently of God, living for ourselves as if God didn't exist, as if we didn't have anything to do with Him; that was what represented the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. But the tree of life, represented living for God and that is what He wants us to understand, and that's why He became manifest through His Son - the one who has the Son, has life. Christ is the life, the way and the truth, and the life has light and it illuminates, and the light and the life are the truth, and the truth is eternal; and the life builds the house of God, so that God is manifest in the whole Church.
In Genesis we were mud, but in 1 Corinthians we are already stones, and in Revelation we are already precious stones. Man wants that precious transparentness of the stones; it is in man, that's why man wants to adorn himself with stones, and that is what represents the work of God in us. The house of God should be built with gold, silver and precious stones. Thisis the divine nature, the Father who is represented in gold; with the redemption whose price is represented with silver, and which symbolizes the Son; and with the precious stones that it is the work of God in men, the Holy Spirit transforming us under pressure, so that the coal becomes a diamond. If right now we are under pressure, understand God. He wants His work to be manifest so that you become beautiful, by the preciousness of the Lord.
In Ephesians 3:14-16, it says: "For this reason I bow my knees to the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, of whom every family in the heavens and on the earth is named, in order that he may give you according to the riches of his glory, to be strengthened with power by his Spirit in the inner man." The apostle Paul, by the Holy Spirit, here presents, in a masterful and synthetic form, the development of the house of God, Christ's body; he shows us a first stage, necessary for the second, then for the third, and then for the fourth. It is the person's experience and of the Church, because the Christian person, daughter of God, is part of the Church. Paul, knowing what God wants and having received from the Father the way He carries out His purpose now with the new man which is the Church, begins to pray for special points, but what Paul wants God to give is not a material thing; that comes as an addition.
He begins to ask for the Church, so that each brother may be strengthened in his Spirit; that of the Lord, in the inner man. These are the priorities of the apostle Paul's intercession. Without strengthening in the inner man, nothing of value is done; all things have to begin with the inner man's strengthening, by the gift of God. Glory is the wonderful expression of God, and those riches of the glory of God, in grace, strengthen our inner man that is the spirit. That is where the work of God begins, from the inner most part toward the outer part. "He who believes in me, from within will flow rivers of living water."
It is necessary to pay a lot of attention to what happens within. We are sometimes so quick and upset, so drawn by the world, by activities, even delights, and we pay very little attention to the very soft but very faithful and true voice of God in the inner man; our being's most intimate part, there in the conscience, in the intuition of the spirit. The true events of spiritual value, the authentic ones, are given first in the inner man's environment, of the spirit; first God has to move in grace, God has to take the initiative and to blow into you.
Job 32:8 says: "there is a spirit which is in man, and the breath (ruja) of the Almighty giveth them understanding." He moves like a soft breeze, like a very fresh inner breeze. Maybe we are accustomed to the psychedelic accelerations of this century, to the agitations of the soul, to the external man's emotions, and we pass by that soft but overwhelming, clear breeze, with direction of God. We don't realize that God sometimes approves, he sometimes applauds, and is sometimes happy, and you know it in the spiritual, but sometimes he is sad; when you are afflicted it is because the Spirit of the Lord is afflicted. Mary says in Luke 1:46-47: "My soul magnifies the Lord; and my spirit has rejoiced in God my Saviour." In the Greek, regarding the soul, it says magnifies in present tense, but regarding the spirit, rejoiced appears in past and that is because things happen in the spirit first, because that's where the traffic light of God is located, which gives a green light or red light; it is sometimes yellow, when God tells us that we must walk slowly, with much care, because this is a holy matter.
You sometimes have freedom, you have life, you have peace, because when the Lord agrees he lets you know via life; the spiritual life is like a kind of lamp of Jehovah; when the lamp is lit dimly, it is necessary to add fuel, then it increases. The Bible says: "And the peace of God rule in your hearts" (Colossians 3:15). It is the peace in the sense of receiving it; it says that if we have the Lord, we are sensitive in the spirit; our spirit is a lamp of God, so when the Lord agrees he lets us know in the spirit, and when he doesn't agree, it is the same. There are occasions in which God wants us to go slowly. We sometimes don't realize our sins that are hidden; perhaps we realize the clear sins; that's why the psalmist, referring to sins, said: "Deliver me of those that are hidden" (Psalms 19:12, those mysterious disagreements that waltz about in my mind in a natural way.
Work of the spirit
The spirit is the part of man that functions to communicate with God and to behold Him in His different manifestations. It is the part of us where God comes to dwell. Man's spirit has functions different to those of the human soul. The human spirit is the headquarters of the conscience, intuition and communion with God.
a. The conscience, alerts us, tells us what is right and wrong.
b. Intuition or perception, are something different to our feelings (these are in the soul), because it is to perceive more intensely and much deeper within our being. By means of intuition we can perceive the presence of God, the movement of God, His approval or reprehension; it is a kind of traffic light that allows us to feel the opportune approval of God.
c. Communion with God, is the human being's intimate component. It is the part of the spirit by means of which we pray and worship God in spirit.
In 1 Corinthians 6:17 we read: "But he who is joined to the Lord, is one spirit with him." That means that the work of God dispensing Himself to us is first through our spirit, when it operates the regeneration of our spirit; the Spirit of God being made one with our spirit; the divine life uniting with the human spirit; mixed into a single spirit, like the example of the coffee with milk. Then that life goes on manifesting itself in the transformation of the soul and later on and as a consequence, is manifested in the body. Each organ is designed to enter into contact with something. The organ to enter into direct contact with God is the spirit. Romans 8:16 says: "The Spirit himself testifies to our spirit, that we are children of God." This life of God that entered into our spirit, becomes rivers of living water whose end is to run from within toward the outside, transforming all our being, passing first from the spirit to our soul, transforming our character; hence we begin to be renovated and irrigated in a flowing from inside toward the outside, as the Lord Jesus says in John 7:37b-39.
Moving of God in our spirit
God decided to come to dwell in man's spirit, which gives His testimony; the one who receives the testimony of God, has it in himself, in the spirit, in the most intimate part of his being. It is necessary to give due attention to the moving of God in our spirit, because it is there where the government of God is manifested. God gives us signs in our spirit, and it is there where we should distinguish the impulse of God, the restriction of God, the warnings and admonishments of God, the lesson of God.
God told Moses: "Moses, in the Holiest Place of the tabernacle you will put the ark; on the propitiatory and under the wings of the cherubs I will declare myself to you" 1. The Lord declared Himself in the Holiest Place when the blood has been spilled on the propitiatory to cover the sin. Under the wings of the cherubs, so as to not go to any extreme, because God doesn't dwell nor speak in extremes; sometimes we go too far. All of that is a figure of real things. Today the ark, Christ, is in our heart. It is in our spirit where the Spirit of the Lord is, and it is there, where you perceive the presence of God, the hour of God; but if you are in the parties of the agitations of your soul, God passes by and you don't know the day of His visitation, as was the case of Samuel that when the Lord called him, at the beginning he thought that it was Eli.
All those who are guided by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God, who are characterized by the Spirit that has given them new life. In Galatians 4:19, Paul speaks of having childbirth pains, "until Christ is formed in you." Like what happens in woman's pregnancy, in the believers, as a wife of the Lord, there are periods in which Christ is being formed in their inner most parts. At the beginning the women feel a small weight, and we don't always pay attention to that small weight and we risk the creature. If a woman who is pregnant begins to lift heavy things, to go up stairways very quickly, she is putting the baby's life in danger. A haemorrhage can occur and an abortion. There are even women who didn't know that they were pregnant until they lost the child. There are people that offend the Lord without realizing it. They already had the Lord living inside, yes, but because they didn't feel it because they were very accustomed to the psychedelic acceleration of the soul. They didn't pay attention to that intimate and deep movement of the Spirit, to that kick. Sometimes you say that the Lord Jesus shivered and the Spirit moved in your heart, but actually it moved in your spirit first.
Beloved, do you want to be in the Kingdom of God? Do you want the Lord to govern in your spirits? Don't make yourselves men's slaves; you are freemen of Christ, but he must govern you in the Spirit. You have to know the Lord in gentleness, faithful to him, without having fear of man; otherwise, you are not a servant of Christ. If we try to please men, we are not servants of Christ. We have first to please the Lord in spirit, to be loyal to him. How often we have excitedly looked here and there, and there and here, but the Lord is in those that have sought after Christ, the sons of God who received Christ. It is not necessary for them from the outside to tell you.
Pay attention to your inner man, so you may know where God moves. Then you will know peace, then that is when you will take on his yoke, and that is what: "Deny thyself, take up thy cross and follow me" (Matt. 16:24) means. How will you follow Him if you don't know where He goes? But those who know him, know where He goes, because He says: The Father loves the son and shows him the things he does, so that the son does them, and the Father says: "To him who loves me, I will also manifest myself and I will give him understanding about what I am doing, so that he may do it together with me."
Don't be deceived by external appearances; know the glory of the Lord, know the situations, know the people, know the brothers and sisters. The spiritual one judges all things, the spiritual vision in the Church; exercising their spirit, their inner man. Nicodemus didn't understand Jesus. "What is that that you speak? What is that of being born again, how is that, should I maybe enter again into my mother's womb? I don't understand, that is very complicated." Jesus tells him: "Thou art the teacher of Israel and knowest not these things! Verily, verily, I say unto thee, we speak that which we know, and we bear witness of that which we have seen, and ye receive not our witness." (John chapter 3).
Man's being and his relationship with God
We should pay permanent attention to our spirit, to what it testifies, because that's where the narrow path of the Kingdom of God is, where one has to deny his own interests, when the Spirit doesn't like something. It is necessary to humble yourself, repent, admit that that is happening in your life, and to say: "Lord, if there is something that I don't understand which remains hidden, examine me, oh God, in your light; You are the light." But if you don't ask him, he will act as though he were going to pass you by, and you would miss His visitation. You have to invite Him, you have to consecrate yourself so that He reigns over you; otherwise He allows you to go where you want. But if you decide to deny yourself and to continue with him, in your spirit you will know where you are going. It is necessary for the inner man to be strengthened by the Spirit; be made sensitive, that this thick layer which stops us perceiving be broken, as the Lord says: "for the heart of this people has grown fat, and they have heard heavily with their ears, and they have closed their eyes as asleep, lest they should see with the eyes, and hear with the ears, and understand with the heart."
Take care not to offer your burnt offerings just anywhere, but in the place that God chooses, there you must go, and that place is Christ in the spirit, and Christ's Body; that is the unique sanctuary of God, where we all reach spiritual unity and in legitimate inner coordination, under the true government of the Spirit of God. God have mercy on us and grant us to walk with him along the narrow path which is the legitimate one, Jesus Christ.
(Extracts of messages imparted in Teusaquillo and Fontibón, Colombia).
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By: Gino Iafrancesco V. / Traslation: Andrew Web.
lunes 29 de diciembre de 2008
THE TRIPARTITE SALVATION
THE TRIPARTITE SALVATION
The Word of God speaks about salvation in three stages and at three different times.
The tripartite salvation
Gino Iafrancesco (Colombia)
Salvation is not a simple thing, but rather it is deep and complex. The Word of the Lord speaks to us about a salvation of three stages. Firstly, it tells us that we are saved by grace: "Because by grace you are saved through faith" (Ephesians 2:8a); that is to say, it declares an accomplished fact. Secondly, it speaks to us of working out salvation with fear and trembling: " …work out your own salvation with fear and trembling" (Philippians 2:12 ; that is to say that there is a salvation that is progressively given. Lastly, it speaks to us in the future tense, of a salvation that is "ready to be revealed" (1 Peter 1:5), and that we "shall be saved" (Romans 5:9).
Therefore, there are verses that tell us we are saved, verses that tell us we are working out our salvation, and verses that tell us we will be saved. What does all this mean? Are we, will we be, or are we being saved? The answer is that we are, we are being and we will be saved, because the Holy Spirit tells us these three things through the Word of God.
Because of this, we should carefully examine the topic of the salvation of God achieved through Christ Jesus and applied by the Holy Spirit. If we have understood our being's tripartite constitution: spirit, soul and body, we will also understand why of those three stages of salvation one relates to the spirit (you are saved), another relates to the soul (you are being saved), and another relates to the body (you will be saved). That is why it speaks in the past, in the present and in the future tense.
Past Tense: we are already saved in our spirit
This first stage can be seen by examining the Scriptures in the apostle Paul's epistle to the Ephesians, 2:1, 4-9: "And you did he make (notice the past tense) alive, when ye were dead through your trespasses and sins… but God, being rich in mercy, for his great love wherewith he loved us, even when we were dead through our trespasses, made us alive (again the past tense) together with Christ (by grace have ye been saved), (notice that this is an accomplished fact) and raised us up (in the past) with him, and made us to sit with him in the heavenly places, in Christ Jesus: that in the ages to come he might show the exceeding riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus: for by grace have ye been saved (again declared an accomplished fact) through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not of works, that no man should glory. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God afore prepared that we should walk in them."
With supreme clarity the Holy Spirit, by the apostle Paul's hand, is declaring that we are already saved, that is to say that we are no longer lost. Conforming to this biblical declaration, we can see that we are no longer in the claws of Satan so as to go to hell, that we are no longer under God's judgment, and that the judgment of God already fell on Jesus Christ, on the Lamb of God. We identify ourselves with the Lamb, we died with him, we were raised with him and we are already sat with him in the heavenly places. We are already spiritually saved. Our spirit already has life, because it has the eternal life, the life of God, that which has neither beginning nor end.
In the apostle John's first epistle, chapter 5:11-13, we read: "And this is the testimony: that God has given us eternal life (not that he will give us, nor that he is giving us); and this life is in His Son. He who has the Son, has (already has) life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have life. These things have I written unto you, that ye may know that ye have (not that you will have) eternal life, even unto you that believe on the name of the Son of God (that is, not for everyone, but for those that have the Son). "
Brother and sisters, let us realise that these declarations here are firm, they don't allow for doubts; we already have the life of God, we already have the Lord in our spirit; the Lord has forgiven us, and gave us life. Being dead, he came, spoke, awoke our hearing, awoke faith; by the Word he gave us the Spirit, by faith we receive him and we received life; that is to say that the life of the Lord already came to our spirit, like 1 Corinthians 6:17 says: "But he that is joined unto the Lord is one spirit."
We have already called on him, we have asked him for forgiveness, therefore, Christ's Spirit already came and became one with our spirit. As a result, we were born again, and therefore, we were already regenerated, we received a new life, a new spirit, the eternal life and the divine nature.
We have received God the Father because we have received the Son, and we have received the Father and the Son because we have received the Spirit. We have what the Son obtained in his human life, that which the Spirit took, and what he achieved has been given to us. Where do we have it? In our spirit. Our spirit is already saved, because we already have eternal life. We already have the Lord, we already have the provision, and we lack nothing of His provision. God the Father put all His provision in the Son; all spiritual blessing is in the Son, and when receiving the Son, we receives life, we received the Father and we received everything.
But having life in the spirit doesn't mean that that life has grown in us.
Present tense: we should work out the salvation of our soul
It is one thing that Christ is revealed to us, but another altogether deeper thing is that Christ lives in us, and deeper still is that Christ is formed in us, and deeper still is that Christ will be magnified in our flesh.
Christ is already here, he already came, he was already revealed. Christ now dwells, he is already living in us; but the will of God is not only Christ living in us, but rather that he who dwells in us may also be formed in us; he regenerates us first, then he renovates us, and through renovation he transforms us and conforms us to the image of the Lord. First he was made flesh, so as to be able to give life to our mortal body and later to adopt it and glorify us into the likeness of His Son Jesus Christ.
This whole process of God goes from the inside out. As believers, the life of God came to our spirit, but God doesn't only want to have a human spirit. When God made man, he made him spirit, soul and body; so from this we can deduce that man's redemption consists of forgiving and cleansing his spirit, soul and body. To give life to his spirit, but also to win his soul.
The Lord used a phrase that catches our attention because if we don't understand that salvation was given in the spirit, and that salvation is being progressively applied to our soul then eventually to our body at His coming, then that phrase would seem very strange.
But when looking at these aspects attentively, it becomes clear to us. In Luke 21:19 the Lord Jesus says: " In your patience ye shall win your souls." The curiosity of this, and worthy of taking note of it, is that on the one hand it says that by grace we are saved, but on the other hand it says that with patience we will win our souls. We already know that the soul is the headquarters of our mind, of our thoughts, of our emotions, feelings and will. What this indicates to us is that to win the soul means not only Christ's life remaining in our spirit, but rather it must also saturate our thoughts, because we can have the Lord in the spirit, but our thoughts wander. How can we control that wild horse of our thoughts? That internal life, the spirit, grabs it and says: "Sir (or lady), come over this way, don't keep thinking such crazy thoughts." So our mind is being subjected to Christ, because our thoughts are brought to Christ's feet, but this is not an instantaneous matter, but rather a process.
Regeneration is instantaneous; regeneration is given in the moment in which one receives the Lord, the life of the Lord. The Spirit of the Lord comes to our spirit and becomes a single spirit with ours and we begin to have life. But that life is like a seed that was sowed. Now that life that is already complete, with all its potential, everything programmed to do a work of complete and entire salvation, has to begin to win the soul. It is then that the work of the soul comes, which is not as quick as that of the spirit. The Spirit already received life, but are all our thoughts in that life? Or is it the case that some are, from time to time, whilst others are still in darkness? Our emotions are sometimes governed and live with the Lord, but at other times they are conquered by sin. That is to say that to win the soul requires patience and a process.
Another important biblical verse is in Philippians 2:12: " So then, my beloved, even as ye have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling." Salvation is something that we already have, but it is also something that we are to work out; and working out salvation is the exercise of the soul in the life of God. Simply because the Lord has given life to our spirit doesn't mean that our emotions, our mind or our will are renovated. Often we have life in our spirit, but we are lazy in the flesh, or what is worse, sinful. God's intention is therefore that the life that is in the spirit also reaches the soul.
Let us pay attention to the Lord's intentions here. All that belongs to him, by His Spirit comes to our spirit, and has to flow out from our spirit. Let us call to mind that passage in Ezekiel 47, when it speaks of the throne of God and His temple. It says that under the throne, there in the Holiest Place, the river flowed: that is to say that the river of God comes flowing from the inside outwards. That tells us that life - because that is a river of life- is translated into living waters, which comes from the Holiest Place, and flows through the Holy Place, then through the atrium, and even out to the nations. And that is because the Lord wants to vivify everybody who enters into the river of His Spirit.
The river of His Spirit flows from the Holiest Place out to the Holy, to the atrium and outside. But let us remember that the Lord already gave us life, and we already have that life in the spirit, but not yet enough in our soul or in our body - although we are already feeding our resurrection body, and that's why we partake in the Lord's supper. That's why in John 6:54 the Lord says: "He that eats my flesh and drinks my blood has life eternal, and I will raise him up at the last day."
The curious thing about this is that there are passages like Ephesians 2:6 that says: "… and has raised us up together ", affirming that we were already resurrected. And in other parts, like in John 6:54, it says that He will raise us up; which means that the resurrection is already provided in the Spirit, and that Spirit is already complete in our spirit, but has to go on bringing us to life, winning, subjecting our soul and renovating it by the Spirit Himself, and then, eventually, our body. We read, for example, in Colossians 3:4: "When the Christ is manifested who is our life, then shall ye also be manifested with him in glory." This verse confirms that there is a process working from the inside out; the Lord works from the inside of us toward the outside. It is confirmed by the Lord in John 7:38: "He that believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, from within him shall flow rivers of living water." Where toward? Toward the outside; from the interior toward the exterior. Satan, in contrast, attacks from the exterior, dealing first with the senses, then the mind, then the emotions, so as to then be able to assault the will. Until that point, everything is temptation, but when it reaches and bends the will, it is then sin.
The devil attacks from outside in; but the Lord resists him from the inside toward the exterior, and so the fight is in the mind, or in the emotions, or in the will. The fight is in the soul; she is the battlefield. The Lord is inside, in the spirit, and the devil is outside, in the airs, and sin is in the flesh; and sin and the flesh are the runways where the devil landed, the spirit that operates in the children of disobedience.
We see then, that it is necessary to work out our salvation. It doesn't say that salvation will be lost in the verse, but rather it is necessary to work it out. It is necessary to apply salvation to our emotions, to our thoughts, to our decisions, to our soul. And that is a thing that requires time.
As Philippians 2:12 speaks of working out salvation, Hebrews 2:3 speaks of not neglecting it: "How will we escape, if we neglect such a great salvation"? This verse belongs together with the one of working out salvation with fear and trembling. Not neglecting salvation means that it is necessary to work at our salvation. If we said: "The Lord already saved me", we are speaking a truth, but it is necessary to speak the whole truth. The Word of God also says that we should work out and not neglect salvation, and that means that it is necessary to work in that salvation, which is a process.
Future time: salvation of the body at the coming of the Lord
This part is in several passages of the Bible. Let us take that of Matthew 24:13first: "But he that endureth to the end, the same shall be saved." Let us observe that it speaks in the future tense; that is to say, you are saved in the spirit, work out your salvation and don't neglect it (that is the application in our soul), but our body is not yet free of the Adamic condition, although it was bought. It needs to be transformed into the glorious body of resurrection that Christ obtained; then that will be the moment when the complete salvation will come to our body.
God wants the spirit, the soul and the body to be saved. Our spirit is already saved, our soul is being saved and our body must be saved, because our whole being was already bought and the Lord declares us glorified, as it says in Romans 8:30 b: " … them he also justified: and whom he justified, them he also glorified", but the life of the Lord that we received in the spirit has to be applied little by little, saturating our soul, and finally arriving at our body.
In the apostle Peter's first epistle we read: "Wherefore girding up the loins of your mind, be sober and set your hope perfectly on the grace that is to be brought unto you at the revelation of Jesus Christ." In this stage of the process our understanding is already girded, dominated; that is to say that it was necessary to pass the life from the spirit to the understanding, but now it is necessary to continue. To gird up the loins of our understanding is the life of the Lord that already reached our being. Now our will is renovated for the girding up of understanding, that is to say, to be able to govern our thoughts, because before we wanted to but were unable. Now the Lord can; the Lord gave us life, and now it renovates our soul.
Our soul now has power in union with the Lord to say: "thoughts, you will no longer think this, but rather that", and can do so because it is a renovated mind that thinks what it wants because it has recovered its dominion. Before whatever we didn't want to think, we thought it, and whatever we wanted to remember we forgot. Rather now understanding is programmed, renovated and used.
When the Word says: " set your hope perfectly on the grace that is to be brought unto you at the revelation of Jesus Christ", it demonstrates that there is a grace for the future. The Bible speaks of a determined grace for us since before the foundation of the world, but manifested in Jesus Christ, and that begins to operate with regeneration, and that continues operating with transformation and that will continue operating in our bodies. That's why it says: "The grace that is to be brought" (future). This is not that which refers to the forgiveness of sins, nor even that of the transformation of our understanding, of our soul, but rather it is grace for the adoption of the body, for the transformation of our body.
We read in Romans 8:22-23: "For we know that the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now. And not only so, but ourselves also, who have the first-fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for our adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body." Not only creation itself is in childbirth pains, but so too are those that have the first fruits of the Spirit. Why does it say the "first fruits"? Precisely to show that we are not yet complete; the first fruits are a down payment, but the down payment takes us toward everything. This groaning is the childbirth pains; it is the process of the soul being developed with patience; thoughts dying to themselves and being renovated in Christ; emotions dying to its independence, to its stampede, and being controlled by the Spirit; our will stopping being so obstinate, ceasing to be stubborn, being faithful to the Lord. That is a childbirth pain, and that is not from one moment to another, because it requires a lifelong discipline.
To adopt our body, the Lord says, is to take it as his. Before, we had sold it to the devil - with Adam we had sold him the human nature, including the body. And if it was sold to the devil, it is under the devil's power, and that's why the Lord has to adopt it, to take it as His own.
From there the redemption or adoption of our body has two stages. One stage is developed here, and consists of being vivified in our mortal body. We are sometimes tired, we are sick, but we invoke the name of the Lord and the Spirit gives us life and strengthens us. Then we get up and He renovates us, and it is medicine to our body, to our bones. That is a down payment; it is not yet the complete resurrection, but it is operated thanks to the power of resurrection; that is to say, it is the down payment of the powers of the coming age. The intention of God is that Christ's glorification, the whole resurrection that he got in its body passes to our body, be the adoption or complete glorification of our body.
In the Bible there are many passages for each one of these parts that we are now viewing in panoramic form, because our intention is not to exhaust the topic in this chapter, but it is worthwhile studying each one of those passages. For example, in Philippians 3:20-21, it says: "For our citizenship is in heaven; whence also we wait for a Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ who shall fashion anew the body of our humiliation, that it may be conformed to the body of his glory, according to the working whereby he is able even to subject all things unto himself " Colossians 3:4: " When the Christ is manifested who is our life, then shall ye also be manifested with him in glory." 1 John 3:1-3: " Behold what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called children of God; and such we are. For this cause the world knoweth us not, because it knew him not. Beloved, now are we children of God, and it is not yet made manifest what we shall be. We know that, if he shall be manifested, we shall be like him; for we shall see him even as he is. And every one that hath this hope set on him purifieth himself, even as he is pure. "
That we are now children of God is a fact; the Spirit of God gives testimony to our spirit that we are already children of God, and we have divine life in the spirit, but it has not yet been revealed what we must be. We are children of God in spirit, but God doesn't only want saved spirits, but complete children: spirit, soul and body in one; including the creation being freed of the slavery of corruption, and that's why you can understand when it speaks of something that is already, something that is being and something that will be.
First, what is already: Children of God. Second, what must be: what will be manifest. When he is manifested we will be like him. Third, that which is being. But, what is that part for now? "And every one that hath this hope set on him purifieth himself, even as he is pure. " Notice that it doesn't say that the Lord purifies him (although He does), but rather he purifies himself. That is the exercise of the soul, of the will, of ourselves acting in grace to be saved from what we are, undergoing the cleansing of the Lord.
We have seen that salvation is very complete and very complex. As man was affected in the spirit, in the soul and in the body, salvation comes to the spirit, to the soul and the body. It has already reached the spirit, it is reaching the soul, and will reach the body.
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By: Gino Iafrancesco V. / Traslation: Andrew Web.
The Word of God speaks about salvation in three stages and at three different times.
The tripartite salvation
Gino Iafrancesco (Colombia)
Salvation is not a simple thing, but rather it is deep and complex. The Word of the Lord speaks to us about a salvation of three stages. Firstly, it tells us that we are saved by grace: "Because by grace you are saved through faith" (Ephesians 2:8a); that is to say, it declares an accomplished fact. Secondly, it speaks to us of working out salvation with fear and trembling: " …work out your own salvation with fear and trembling" (Philippians 2:12 ; that is to say that there is a salvation that is progressively given. Lastly, it speaks to us in the future tense, of a salvation that is "ready to be revealed" (1 Peter 1:5), and that we "shall be saved" (Romans 5:9).
Therefore, there are verses that tell us we are saved, verses that tell us we are working out our salvation, and verses that tell us we will be saved. What does all this mean? Are we, will we be, or are we being saved? The answer is that we are, we are being and we will be saved, because the Holy Spirit tells us these three things through the Word of God.
Because of this, we should carefully examine the topic of the salvation of God achieved through Christ Jesus and applied by the Holy Spirit. If we have understood our being's tripartite constitution: spirit, soul and body, we will also understand why of those three stages of salvation one relates to the spirit (you are saved), another relates to the soul (you are being saved), and another relates to the body (you will be saved). That is why it speaks in the past, in the present and in the future tense.
Past Tense: we are already saved in our spirit
This first stage can be seen by examining the Scriptures in the apostle Paul's epistle to the Ephesians, 2:1, 4-9: "And you did he make (notice the past tense) alive, when ye were dead through your trespasses and sins… but God, being rich in mercy, for his great love wherewith he loved us, even when we were dead through our trespasses, made us alive (again the past tense) together with Christ (by grace have ye been saved), (notice that this is an accomplished fact) and raised us up (in the past) with him, and made us to sit with him in the heavenly places, in Christ Jesus: that in the ages to come he might show the exceeding riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus: for by grace have ye been saved (again declared an accomplished fact) through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not of works, that no man should glory. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God afore prepared that we should walk in them."
With supreme clarity the Holy Spirit, by the apostle Paul's hand, is declaring that we are already saved, that is to say that we are no longer lost. Conforming to this biblical declaration, we can see that we are no longer in the claws of Satan so as to go to hell, that we are no longer under God's judgment, and that the judgment of God already fell on Jesus Christ, on the Lamb of God. We identify ourselves with the Lamb, we died with him, we were raised with him and we are already sat with him in the heavenly places. We are already spiritually saved. Our spirit already has life, because it has the eternal life, the life of God, that which has neither beginning nor end.
In the apostle John's first epistle, chapter 5:11-13, we read: "And this is the testimony: that God has given us eternal life (not that he will give us, nor that he is giving us); and this life is in His Son. He who has the Son, has (already has) life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have life. These things have I written unto you, that ye may know that ye have (not that you will have) eternal life, even unto you that believe on the name of the Son of God (that is, not for everyone, but for those that have the Son). "
Brother and sisters, let us realise that these declarations here are firm, they don't allow for doubts; we already have the life of God, we already have the Lord in our spirit; the Lord has forgiven us, and gave us life. Being dead, he came, spoke, awoke our hearing, awoke faith; by the Word he gave us the Spirit, by faith we receive him and we received life; that is to say that the life of the Lord already came to our spirit, like 1 Corinthians 6:17 says: "But he that is joined unto the Lord is one spirit."
We have already called on him, we have asked him for forgiveness, therefore, Christ's Spirit already came and became one with our spirit. As a result, we were born again, and therefore, we were already regenerated, we received a new life, a new spirit, the eternal life and the divine nature.
We have received God the Father because we have received the Son, and we have received the Father and the Son because we have received the Spirit. We have what the Son obtained in his human life, that which the Spirit took, and what he achieved has been given to us. Where do we have it? In our spirit. Our spirit is already saved, because we already have eternal life. We already have the Lord, we already have the provision, and we lack nothing of His provision. God the Father put all His provision in the Son; all spiritual blessing is in the Son, and when receiving the Son, we receives life, we received the Father and we received everything.
But having life in the spirit doesn't mean that that life has grown in us.
Present tense: we should work out the salvation of our soul
It is one thing that Christ is revealed to us, but another altogether deeper thing is that Christ lives in us, and deeper still is that Christ is formed in us, and deeper still is that Christ will be magnified in our flesh.
Christ is already here, he already came, he was already revealed. Christ now dwells, he is already living in us; but the will of God is not only Christ living in us, but rather that he who dwells in us may also be formed in us; he regenerates us first, then he renovates us, and through renovation he transforms us and conforms us to the image of the Lord. First he was made flesh, so as to be able to give life to our mortal body and later to adopt it and glorify us into the likeness of His Son Jesus Christ.
This whole process of God goes from the inside out. As believers, the life of God came to our spirit, but God doesn't only want to have a human spirit. When God made man, he made him spirit, soul and body; so from this we can deduce that man's redemption consists of forgiving and cleansing his spirit, soul and body. To give life to his spirit, but also to win his soul.
The Lord used a phrase that catches our attention because if we don't understand that salvation was given in the spirit, and that salvation is being progressively applied to our soul then eventually to our body at His coming, then that phrase would seem very strange.
But when looking at these aspects attentively, it becomes clear to us. In Luke 21:19 the Lord Jesus says: " In your patience ye shall win your souls." The curiosity of this, and worthy of taking note of it, is that on the one hand it says that by grace we are saved, but on the other hand it says that with patience we will win our souls. We already know that the soul is the headquarters of our mind, of our thoughts, of our emotions, feelings and will. What this indicates to us is that to win the soul means not only Christ's life remaining in our spirit, but rather it must also saturate our thoughts, because we can have the Lord in the spirit, but our thoughts wander. How can we control that wild horse of our thoughts? That internal life, the spirit, grabs it and says: "Sir (or lady), come over this way, don't keep thinking such crazy thoughts." So our mind is being subjected to Christ, because our thoughts are brought to Christ's feet, but this is not an instantaneous matter, but rather a process.
Regeneration is instantaneous; regeneration is given in the moment in which one receives the Lord, the life of the Lord. The Spirit of the Lord comes to our spirit and becomes a single spirit with ours and we begin to have life. But that life is like a seed that was sowed. Now that life that is already complete, with all its potential, everything programmed to do a work of complete and entire salvation, has to begin to win the soul. It is then that the work of the soul comes, which is not as quick as that of the spirit. The Spirit already received life, but are all our thoughts in that life? Or is it the case that some are, from time to time, whilst others are still in darkness? Our emotions are sometimes governed and live with the Lord, but at other times they are conquered by sin. That is to say that to win the soul requires patience and a process.
Another important biblical verse is in Philippians 2:12: " So then, my beloved, even as ye have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling." Salvation is something that we already have, but it is also something that we are to work out; and working out salvation is the exercise of the soul in the life of God. Simply because the Lord has given life to our spirit doesn't mean that our emotions, our mind or our will are renovated. Often we have life in our spirit, but we are lazy in the flesh, or what is worse, sinful. God's intention is therefore that the life that is in the spirit also reaches the soul.
Let us pay attention to the Lord's intentions here. All that belongs to him, by His Spirit comes to our spirit, and has to flow out from our spirit. Let us call to mind that passage in Ezekiel 47, when it speaks of the throne of God and His temple. It says that under the throne, there in the Holiest Place, the river flowed: that is to say that the river of God comes flowing from the inside outwards. That tells us that life - because that is a river of life- is translated into living waters, which comes from the Holiest Place, and flows through the Holy Place, then through the atrium, and even out to the nations. And that is because the Lord wants to vivify everybody who enters into the river of His Spirit.
The river of His Spirit flows from the Holiest Place out to the Holy, to the atrium and outside. But let us remember that the Lord already gave us life, and we already have that life in the spirit, but not yet enough in our soul or in our body - although we are already feeding our resurrection body, and that's why we partake in the Lord's supper. That's why in John 6:54 the Lord says: "He that eats my flesh and drinks my blood has life eternal, and I will raise him up at the last day."
The curious thing about this is that there are passages like Ephesians 2:6 that says: "… and has raised us up together ", affirming that we were already resurrected. And in other parts, like in John 6:54, it says that He will raise us up; which means that the resurrection is already provided in the Spirit, and that Spirit is already complete in our spirit, but has to go on bringing us to life, winning, subjecting our soul and renovating it by the Spirit Himself, and then, eventually, our body. We read, for example, in Colossians 3:4: "When the Christ is manifested who is our life, then shall ye also be manifested with him in glory." This verse confirms that there is a process working from the inside out; the Lord works from the inside of us toward the outside. It is confirmed by the Lord in John 7:38: "He that believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, from within him shall flow rivers of living water." Where toward? Toward the outside; from the interior toward the exterior. Satan, in contrast, attacks from the exterior, dealing first with the senses, then the mind, then the emotions, so as to then be able to assault the will. Until that point, everything is temptation, but when it reaches and bends the will, it is then sin.
The devil attacks from outside in; but the Lord resists him from the inside toward the exterior, and so the fight is in the mind, or in the emotions, or in the will. The fight is in the soul; she is the battlefield. The Lord is inside, in the spirit, and the devil is outside, in the airs, and sin is in the flesh; and sin and the flesh are the runways where the devil landed, the spirit that operates in the children of disobedience.
We see then, that it is necessary to work out our salvation. It doesn't say that salvation will be lost in the verse, but rather it is necessary to work it out. It is necessary to apply salvation to our emotions, to our thoughts, to our decisions, to our soul. And that is a thing that requires time.
As Philippians 2:12 speaks of working out salvation, Hebrews 2:3 speaks of not neglecting it: "How will we escape, if we neglect such a great salvation"? This verse belongs together with the one of working out salvation with fear and trembling. Not neglecting salvation means that it is necessary to work at our salvation. If we said: "The Lord already saved me", we are speaking a truth, but it is necessary to speak the whole truth. The Word of God also says that we should work out and not neglect salvation, and that means that it is necessary to work in that salvation, which is a process.
Future time: salvation of the body at the coming of the Lord
This part is in several passages of the Bible. Let us take that of Matthew 24:13first: "But he that endureth to the end, the same shall be saved." Let us observe that it speaks in the future tense; that is to say, you are saved in the spirit, work out your salvation and don't neglect it (that is the application in our soul), but our body is not yet free of the Adamic condition, although it was bought. It needs to be transformed into the glorious body of resurrection that Christ obtained; then that will be the moment when the complete salvation will come to our body.
God wants the spirit, the soul and the body to be saved. Our spirit is already saved, our soul is being saved and our body must be saved, because our whole being was already bought and the Lord declares us glorified, as it says in Romans 8:30 b: " … them he also justified: and whom he justified, them he also glorified", but the life of the Lord that we received in the spirit has to be applied little by little, saturating our soul, and finally arriving at our body.
In the apostle Peter's first epistle we read: "Wherefore girding up the loins of your mind, be sober and set your hope perfectly on the grace that is to be brought unto you at the revelation of Jesus Christ." In this stage of the process our understanding is already girded, dominated; that is to say that it was necessary to pass the life from the spirit to the understanding, but now it is necessary to continue. To gird up the loins of our understanding is the life of the Lord that already reached our being. Now our will is renovated for the girding up of understanding, that is to say, to be able to govern our thoughts, because before we wanted to but were unable. Now the Lord can; the Lord gave us life, and now it renovates our soul.
Our soul now has power in union with the Lord to say: "thoughts, you will no longer think this, but rather that", and can do so because it is a renovated mind that thinks what it wants because it has recovered its dominion. Before whatever we didn't want to think, we thought it, and whatever we wanted to remember we forgot. Rather now understanding is programmed, renovated and used.
When the Word says: " set your hope perfectly on the grace that is to be brought unto you at the revelation of Jesus Christ", it demonstrates that there is a grace for the future. The Bible speaks of a determined grace for us since before the foundation of the world, but manifested in Jesus Christ, and that begins to operate with regeneration, and that continues operating with transformation and that will continue operating in our bodies. That's why it says: "The grace that is to be brought" (future). This is not that which refers to the forgiveness of sins, nor even that of the transformation of our understanding, of our soul, but rather it is grace for the adoption of the body, for the transformation of our body.
We read in Romans 8:22-23: "For we know that the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now. And not only so, but ourselves also, who have the first-fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for our adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body." Not only creation itself is in childbirth pains, but so too are those that have the first fruits of the Spirit. Why does it say the "first fruits"? Precisely to show that we are not yet complete; the first fruits are a down payment, but the down payment takes us toward everything. This groaning is the childbirth pains; it is the process of the soul being developed with patience; thoughts dying to themselves and being renovated in Christ; emotions dying to its independence, to its stampede, and being controlled by the Spirit; our will stopping being so obstinate, ceasing to be stubborn, being faithful to the Lord. That is a childbirth pain, and that is not from one moment to another, because it requires a lifelong discipline.
To adopt our body, the Lord says, is to take it as his. Before, we had sold it to the devil - with Adam we had sold him the human nature, including the body. And if it was sold to the devil, it is under the devil's power, and that's why the Lord has to adopt it, to take it as His own.
From there the redemption or adoption of our body has two stages. One stage is developed here, and consists of being vivified in our mortal body. We are sometimes tired, we are sick, but we invoke the name of the Lord and the Spirit gives us life and strengthens us. Then we get up and He renovates us, and it is medicine to our body, to our bones. That is a down payment; it is not yet the complete resurrection, but it is operated thanks to the power of resurrection; that is to say, it is the down payment of the powers of the coming age. The intention of God is that Christ's glorification, the whole resurrection that he got in its body passes to our body, be the adoption or complete glorification of our body.
In the Bible there are many passages for each one of these parts that we are now viewing in panoramic form, because our intention is not to exhaust the topic in this chapter, but it is worthwhile studying each one of those passages. For example, in Philippians 3:20-21, it says: "For our citizenship is in heaven; whence also we wait for a Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ who shall fashion anew the body of our humiliation, that it may be conformed to the body of his glory, according to the working whereby he is able even to subject all things unto himself " Colossians 3:4: " When the Christ is manifested who is our life, then shall ye also be manifested with him in glory." 1 John 3:1-3: " Behold what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called children of God; and such we are. For this cause the world knoweth us not, because it knew him not. Beloved, now are we children of God, and it is not yet made manifest what we shall be. We know that, if he shall be manifested, we shall be like him; for we shall see him even as he is. And every one that hath this hope set on him purifieth himself, even as he is pure. "
That we are now children of God is a fact; the Spirit of God gives testimony to our spirit that we are already children of God, and we have divine life in the spirit, but it has not yet been revealed what we must be. We are children of God in spirit, but God doesn't only want saved spirits, but complete children: spirit, soul and body in one; including the creation being freed of the slavery of corruption, and that's why you can understand when it speaks of something that is already, something that is being and something that will be.
First, what is already: Children of God. Second, what must be: what will be manifest. When he is manifested we will be like him. Third, that which is being. But, what is that part for now? "And every one that hath this hope set on him purifieth himself, even as he is pure. " Notice that it doesn't say that the Lord purifies him (although He does), but rather he purifies himself. That is the exercise of the soul, of the will, of ourselves acting in grace to be saved from what we are, undergoing the cleansing of the Lord.
We have seen that salvation is very complete and very complex. As man was affected in the spirit, in the soul and in the body, salvation comes to the spirit, to the soul and the body. It has already reached the spirit, it is reaching the soul, and will reach the body.
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By: Gino Iafrancesco V. / Traslation: Andrew Web.
THE IMPORTANCE OF MAN'S SPIRIT
THE IMPORTANCE OF MAN'S SPIRIT
The human spirit was designed as an appropriate organ for entering into contact with the divine Spirit.
The importance of man's spirit
Gino Iafrancesco (Colombia)
Man's spirit, the special objective of God
Man is made up of many parts; he has a mind, he has emotions, he has a will, he has a conscience; he is endowed with a body, he has organs, bones, muscles, senses, a heart; but of all man's being, there is one part that is special to God. It is the spirit. It is possible that for the Church this part isn't so important; perhaps what is more important is its hair, eyelashes, figure, or silhouette. We sometimes do not even distinguish the spirit from the soul, so how will we be spiritual if we do not even know our own spirit, its operation, and its functions, as being something important to God?
God could have said: I am Jehovah, I set forth the heavens, I made the earth, and I created man's eyes. But He didn't say eyes or silhouette. God said, spirit. The spirit is the Holiest Place of the temple, and the Spirit of God comes to man's spirit to live. The Spirit of God settles in man's spirit (Ezekiel 36:26-27). It is in man's spirit where the Spirit of God communicates what he is, what he wants, what he approves, what he reproves. We could say that the earth is the capital of the universe, that man is the capital of the earth and that the spirit is the capital of man.
The spirit is very important to God. There are several passages in the Bible where it speaks of it worshipping God, of serving God, of singing to God, etc. But when we read those passages we forget some details, some important phrases. We read in Romans 1:8-9: "First, I thank my God through Jesus Christ for you all, that your faith is proclaimed throughout the whole world. For God is my witness, whom I serve in my spirit in the gospel of his Son, how unceasingly I make mention of you, always in my prayers."
This is a curious phrase. Paul could say: " ...God is my witness, whom I love with all my heart, whom I praise every day...", but he says: " ...whom I serve in my spirit...." He doesn't only say "whom I serve", but "whom I serve in my spirit." To serve is not the same thing as to serve in spirit. God wants us to exercise our spirit. Man's spirit is the most important part to God, so that's why we need to know what it is and what its functions are; to know it doctrinally through the Bible, and also experimentally. We have to distinguish the moving of the Spirit of God in our spirit, because if we don't walk in the spirit, but rather we allow ourselves to be led by our carnal nature, our service to God will be a natural, carnal service, and not like Paul's, as he says, in spirit. In chapter 4 of John's gospel we find a classic example where we can observe this difference.
The Samaritan woman, after discovering that the man who she spoke with was of God, began to discuss religious matters and doctrines, as we human beings usually do. We enter into discussions about doctrines and religious things, because we inherit denominational traditions, and we create fruitless discussions, comparing one doctrine with other, entering into a religion atmosphere of controversy, of criticism, and the Samaritan was on this level. She wanted to draw the Lord Jesus into her unstable atmosphere, but the Lord stayed put and he didn't allow himself to be drawn into that controversial atmosphere. In verse 20 of that chapter, the Samaritan woman says to the Lord: "Our fathers worshipped on this mount, and you say that Jerusalem is the place where he should be worshipped."
The Samaritan woman is indicating here that "you Jews, instead of thinking like our fathers (the Samaritans), have another idea." She is arguing, clarifying that their position is different to that of the prophet, but she doesn't still know who He is. The Samaritan woman shows her merely religious condition by saying to him: "Our fathers, our ancestors worshipped on this mount (Gerizim) for many centuries, so it is necessary to worship here; on the other hand you Jews now say that it is in Jerusalem where one has to worship", so as to draw Jesus into that argument between the Samaritans and the Jews. That's why the Jews didn't like Samaritans, and that was the reason why the Jews got angry when the Lord Jesus spoke well of the Samaritan who assisted a wounded Jew, in the parable of the good Samaritan (Luke 10:30-35); and the Samaritans didn't like the Jews either.
Worshipping in the spirit
In verse 21, the Lord Jesus tells the Samaritan woman: "Woman, believe me, the hour cometh, when neither in this mountain, nor in Jerusalem, shall ye worship the Father." She argued over external issues, of the natural world; is it here or is it there; it is in this religion or it is in that one; some say that it is here, others say that it is there. But the Lord tells her (verses 22-23): "Ye worship that which ye know not: we worship that which we know; for salvation is from the Jews. But the hour cometh, and now is, when the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and truth: for such doth the Father seek to be his worshippers."
The Father was waiting and seeking. There are things that God remains silent about; because in the Bible there are things that are not revealed, that are secret and are not told. In Deuteronomy 29:29 it says: "The secret things belong unto Jehovah our God; but the things that are revealed belong unto us...." But God revealed that He seeks after that class of worshipers, and the hour is coming for them to do that; that hour has almost arrived. God had been served via religious means for long enough; "on this mount, on another mount, in that sanctuary, in that way, which has to be done like this, that has to be like that; that has these borders and these measurements"; always trying to serve God in external things. God must be served, but with faith.
What had the Father been waiting for? The Father had been waiting for the hour in which the Lord Jesus came to produce true service to God. The feast of the tabernacles figured amongst the main Jewish feasts, which lasted seven days, and Jews from many different places attended, and it was the last of a great circle of feasts.
The Lord Jesus, being in Jerusalem for this feast, we read in John 7:37-39 that: "Now on the last day, the great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried, saying, If any man thirst, let him come unto me and drink. He that believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, from within him shall flow rivers of living water. But this spake he of the Spirit, which they that believed on him were to receive: for the Spirit was not yet given; because Jesus was not yet glorified."
Jesus manifested himself to them when the feast was finishing, because it was the last day, as though saying: "You already celebrated all the feasts, and this it is the last day of the last feast, and everybody already came to Jerusalem and sang, and did lots of religious things, but now God invites you; if the religious rites have not satiated your thirst, they have not filled that emptiness that comes from drinking of the Son." "If anyone comes to me... he that believes on me, from within...." Which is this part of man within? The spirit. "He who is connected to me, from within life will begin to flow"; and that was said about the Spirit of God. That meant that from the Spirit of God living water must flow from the inner most part of man, from man's interior, that is to say, from the human spirit.
The human spirit is nothing other than the channel, first of the Spirit of God. The woman who discussed religious matters didn't look to anything but the external. Israel had its circle of feasts: that of the Passover and the unleavened bread, then the first fruits of the harvest, later that of Pentecost, the feast of the trumpets, the day of atonement, and finally the feast of the tabernacles, the great feast of the harvest. Everyone came away tired by so many activities and many were unsatisfied, because external things don't satisfy, they don't satiate spiritual thirst, that's why the Lord enters in directly to deal with the spirit.
That's why the Lord also tells the Samaritan woman: "Woman, believe me the hour cometh... and now is." It is the hour that the Father had waited for, when true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit; which means that worship is of the spirit; unbeknown, and ignored by some. Worship which is not in the spirit is not true, it is like training, but it is not authentic. There is worship of the religious type that can be like training; like the boy who thinks that when he grows up he will be an architect, and begins to play with sand and to make castles or highways. He is simply playing, he is happy, but it is playing; that is not a true highway; that is not the true castle.
We play this way at praising God, serving God, doing things, but the Lord distinguishes between that which is true worship, done in spirit and truth, and that which is not, because the opposite of true is false. False worship exists. When it says that the Lord entered into the true sanctuary, does it mean that the other was false? No, it was merely a symbol of the true sanctuary. Moses brought the symbols. "For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ" (John 1:17). The word truth here is aletheia in the Greek, which means reality.
The reality of things. It is not only to worship, but worshipping in spirit; not only serving, but serving in spirit. Paul also says that: "I will pray with the spirit, but I will pray also with the understanding; I will sing with the spirit, but I will sing also with the understanding" (1 Corinthians 14:15). The Bible also says: "... in spirit fervent" (Romans 12:11). Many times we speak of the divine Spirit, but we forget that the divine Spirit made a human spirit in man. That is the burden of the present article: the importanceof the human spirit.
The Spirit of God speaks to our spirit
In Romans 8:16 it says: "The Spirit (with a capital letter, of God) testifies (to who to our spirit (with a small letter), that we are children of God." That is the place in which God, who forms it, is to live in man. The Spirit of God is eternal; man's is created, formed by God, but the human spirit is that which is designed to contact the divine Spirit. It is not the mind, nor emotions, nor even the will, much less the physical senses. It is the human spirit, which was designed as appropriate organ for entering into contact with the divine Spirit.
We should keep in mind that each part of our being, each organ, as much the body as the spirit, is designed to enter into direct contact with a portion of reality. There is a reality that consists of colours, fruits, tones, light, warnings, and forms. Sight enters into direct contact with light, with colours; hearing enters into direct contact with sounds; smell enters into direct contact with scents; taste enters into direct contact with flavours; tact enters into direct contact with textures; the mind enters into direct contact with thoughts; emotions enter into direct contact with feelings; the will is to exercise decisions. But, which is the organ designed by God, in the likeness of God, which can have an intimate relationship with God? That organ is man's spirit, the human spirit. That's why it says that the "Spirit testifies to our spirit that we are children of God." It could say to our hearing, or to our mind; but no, it is to our spirit.
The organ designed to receive the light of God is the spirit. It is through the spirit that you sense the presence of God; that's why Jesus says He is to be worshipped in spirit; that's why He is served in spirit, and He is prayed to in spirit. The spirit has several functions; intuition, communion and conscience. Through communion, for example, one worships God in spirit.
When you are really in the spirit, you perceive the Lord. You perceive if he is happy, you perceive if he is sad, you perceive if he is angry, if he is still, if he is reproving, if he is approving; you perceive if you have still not received the certainty of being forgiven; you perceive if he is happy with what you have done; you perceive he is satisfied, if he receives the praise, or if it was for this reason or that. How do you know? It is not with the mind; it is with intuition. That word is found in the Bible and is also called perception.
In the Word it says that Jesus perceived in his spirit. It also says that the natural man does not perceive the things that are of the Spirit of God (1 Cor. 2:14a). Sometimes believers perceive things in their spirit, but they are not accustomed to giving due attention to them, because we have lived in the external man, and the external man likes strong, psychedelic emotions. The Lord's voice is softer; it penetrates deeper than the agitation of our soul; and afterwards, we say that we perceived something but we didn't pay much attention to it. We have not discovered the importance of man's spirit. It is necessary to know about this important topic, so that God may help us to wake up to the importance that our spirit has for him; so that we become aware of His movements in our spirit, because the children of God are Christians. To whom does the Spirit of God testify? To our spirit.
Some are hoping an angel, or a light, or a thunder bolt will appear to them and to say something in a psychedelic style, something touching, something external. The prophet Elijah was a very mature man, and during a certain crisis that he suffered, he went away and entered a cave in the desert, and a wind passed by, then an earthquake and fire, and Elijah was very calm. He could have shown a great deal of emotion, made a lot of noise, but he remained calm. A wind blew, but God was not in the wind, then an earthquake, but God was not in the earthquake, then fire, and God was not in the fire; but then it says that a gentle and delicate whisper passed by, perhaps a soft breeze, a breath of air, and that word is pneuma in the Greek (1 Kings 19:9-13).
I am glad to know that Elijah was a man who didn't allow anything to swallow him up, because what the devil wants is to engulf you in agitations. Sometimes they want to drag you off in one direction, others in a different direction, up here, down there, saying that the Lord is moving from the above to down below, this way or another. But what the Lord wants is to lead you, to guide you; that the peace of God governs our hearts (Colossians 3:15a). What does it mean to govern us? When you are going to do something and you lose your peace, don't allow external agitation to engulf you; look to within, because from within is where the message of God flows from, from the most intimate part of your being, where the Spirit is. The Bible says that the tabernacle had three parts, and those three parts are joined and have a relationship to one another. The brass altar in the atrium, with many other things; then the Holy Place with the candlestick, the altar of the incense, the table of the showbread and other things; and the ark was in the Holiest Place, and the ark had two cherubs.
The ark was like a box with a cover called propitiatory, and on each end of the propitiatory there was a cherub with extended wings. And the Lord in His Word says: "And there I will meet with thee, and I will commune with thee from above the mercy-seat, from between the two cherubim which are upon the ark of the testimony, of all things which I will give thee in commandment unto the children of Israel." (Exodus 25:22). Let us bear in mind the place from which the Lord spoke. It was not outside the tabernacle, nor in the atrium inside the tabernacle; not even in the Holy Place, but in the Holiest Place, in the most inner-part of the tabernacle; that was where He spoke. We sometimes want to look for things from the outside, or we seek to be guided by external things, from here and there. No; "there between the wings of the cherubs I will speak to you."
How often we say: "Brothers and sisters, what must we do here? Should we fast for long or short periods, or not fast at all? Could it be determined by whether we are tithing, or whether the women wear trousers or not"? All those questions arise and you go to such and such a vicar or reverend, and you go from one reverend to another seeking that type of orientation; but the Lord says: "...There I will meet with thee and I will commune with thee." If you try to serve God by putting everything in a box: "don't touch here, don't look here, don't go up here", from outside, you are not serving God in spirit. But if you call on the Lord...remember what he says: "Whosoever cometh unto me..., whosoever believeth in me...", and the anointing will teach you all things, from the most intimate part of your being, even though you want to make your point in external things and want your opinion to prevail; and you are sometimes tricky, and manipulate situations to get what you want; but inside you there is a small voice that says: "cheat". Because the Spirit of God testifies to your spirit. Your spirit is the one that perceives the voice of God; He is declared there. Man's spirit is the most important thing for Him; the central part.
We sometimes walk in the great mistake of waiting to hear what man will say, what so-and-so will say. Undoubtedly they can give an opinion, because the Spirit testifies through other brothers and sisters, but it is the Spirit who informs you if God is satisfied with this or with that. And one can say: "There are so many opinions." What will this person say? What will they say if you do it in the spirit? If you do the correct thing, that interior traffic light will give you green light.
Do you know which the green light is? The spirit of peace. The Bible says that if we are in the flesh and we sow in the flesh, we will inherit the corruption of the flesh; but if we do it in the Spirit, we will have life and peace from the Spirit (Galatians 6:8; Romans 8:6, 13). How do we know if we are in spirit or not? If there is a source of life, if there is no blockade, if there is peace, if you are not doing being foolish, saying: "But it's just that...." Every one of us is given to going round and round in circles, but if the Lord is present: "Greater is he who is in you..." (1 John 4:4). He is in you, within you. The Lord says: "...deny thyself ...and follow me" (Mat. 16:24); How will you follow him? Because inwardly he is in Spirit, and the external voice of the Spirit is the Word. So you need to listen to the spirit within, in accordance with the Word which concords with the feeling of the spirit, with the spiritual brothers and sisters, the Body; that is the correct path.
It is necessary to keep three things in mind: The Spirit, the Word and the consent of the Body in spirit, since consensus in a democracy is in the flesh. We have an example: It is decided that it will be voted upon whether to commit adultery or not. Out of a hundred brothers and sisters, 95 choose adultery; 5 don't want adultery. The 95 win, and adultery is accepted. That is an example of how consensus in the flesh, without keeping in mind the Spirit and the Word, is not of God. It may be a majority in the Church, but it is not the voice of God. Consensus should be in the spirit, albeit between two or three, but in spirit; that is the voice of God. The Lord says: "...deny thyself, take up thy cross, and follow me." That self is the soul. Paul says: "Don't you know that Christ is in you"? And he tells Timothy: "Timothy, the Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit." He who is your spirit, the Spirit of God, gives testimony to your spirit.
Man's spirit is of great importance to God. We sometimes live psychedelically, shaken by the external world, without realising the importance of learning what our own spirit, the most intimate of our being is, and spend so much time wondering what to do, being upset, dragged away by this and that. We should not allow ourselves to be dragged anywhere.
A useful example is that of divers, those who put on a diving suit. They take a kind of tube through which to breathe. Placed in that atmosphere under the water, they don't breathe in the water, because the air is received from above through the tube, even though they remain under the water. We too, for the time being are here in this world, as though at the bottom of the sea, but there is a clean spirit; breathing the Lord. Brothers and sisters, the Lord is the God who stretched forth the heavens, and set the earth in its place and has created a spirit in us that it is very important to Him, because it is with the spirit that he communicates with us; it is from our spirit that the Spirit of God flows. "... will flow from within...", meaning from within toward the outside; from our conscience and intuition to our understanding; and that's why we sometimes pray in spirit and we don't understand, because the flow is in the spirit but hasn't reached our mind.
That is the reason why we often don't understand; so we need to pray to be able to interpret the spirit. It is the Spirit who says something there within, in our inner man. He says something, but you don't know how explain it; you sense it, there it is, like a baby kicking in a pregnant woman, we too sometimes receive kicks from the Holy Spirit. But all that happens inside first, and that's where we should perceive it, because it is a perception, or what is also called intuition. It is an intimate perception; it is not a natural deduction, because our natural deductions are not reliable. " Now the natural man receiveth (perceiveth) not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him; and he cannot know (discern) them, because they are spiritually judged (discerned)" (1 Corinthians 2:14), that is to say, using the spirit of people.
If it is not perceived in the spirit, it is judged in the flesh
On many occasions we begin to judge people with our natural mind, if they are similar to us, and we say things like: "What a dear person! but oh he/she is different!" or "I don't like her because she resembles my mother-in-law." But let us note what Paul says in 2 Corinthians 5:16: "Wherefore we henceforth know no man after the flesh: even though we have known Christ after the flesh, (because he lived in a generation who knew him externally, not internally) yet now we know him so no more." So, there are two ways to know someone: a natural knowledge, through a natural opinion, of the flesh, by tradition, by customs, by prejudices; the other knowledge is based on denying oneself to depend directly on the guidance of God, on the revelation of God, receiving a testimony from the Spirit in our spirit; so as to known someone not in the flesh but in the spirit, being guided by the truth. If it is not by the spirit, people cannot perceive the life and the peace that is as soft as the breeze that Elijah perceived, who passed through that testing unaffected, and whose external agitation which surrounded him disappeared. That whole heap of external problems did not affect him because he perceived what was of the spirit.
We should not judge by appearances, because they are deceiving, and drag you off toward thinking like them and them like you. No, it is by the Spirit in the spirit, by Jesus Christ, to guide you to himself. Where is the throne? Jesus is at the right hand of the Father and the Spirit is in your spirit, and the voice of His Spirit springs from you, and all that is of God must concord with the Word. On the inside; the Spirit, and on the outside; the Word, and in between; the communion of the Body and the consensus of the spirit of the other spiritual brothers and sisters.
Paul says: "If then ye have to judge things pertaining to this life, do ye set them to judge who are of no account in the church?" (1 Corinthians 6:4). He isn't referring to those that want to vote over your sin; those that will be sympathetic to your feelings, to your gossiping, or your other issues. They really have to be people who deny themselves and don't represent their own taste or preference, nor are frightened of the preferences and opposition of others, but rather they represent God's feeling, to the point that the world comes against them; that are faithful representatives of God, of God's feeling, and say what needs to be said and emanate the Spirit in the spirit and that which is according to the Word.
(Extracts of a message shared in Fontibón, Colombia).
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By: Gino Iafrancesco V. / Traslation: Andrew Web.
The human spirit was designed as an appropriate organ for entering into contact with the divine Spirit.
The importance of man's spirit
Gino Iafrancesco (Colombia)
Man's spirit, the special objective of God
Man is made up of many parts; he has a mind, he has emotions, he has a will, he has a conscience; he is endowed with a body, he has organs, bones, muscles, senses, a heart; but of all man's being, there is one part that is special to God. It is the spirit. It is possible that for the Church this part isn't so important; perhaps what is more important is its hair, eyelashes, figure, or silhouette. We sometimes do not even distinguish the spirit from the soul, so how will we be spiritual if we do not even know our own spirit, its operation, and its functions, as being something important to God?
God could have said: I am Jehovah, I set forth the heavens, I made the earth, and I created man's eyes. But He didn't say eyes or silhouette. God said, spirit. The spirit is the Holiest Place of the temple, and the Spirit of God comes to man's spirit to live. The Spirit of God settles in man's spirit (Ezekiel 36:26-27). It is in man's spirit where the Spirit of God communicates what he is, what he wants, what he approves, what he reproves. We could say that the earth is the capital of the universe, that man is the capital of the earth and that the spirit is the capital of man.
The spirit is very important to God. There are several passages in the Bible where it speaks of it worshipping God, of serving God, of singing to God, etc. But when we read those passages we forget some details, some important phrases. We read in Romans 1:8-9: "First, I thank my God through Jesus Christ for you all, that your faith is proclaimed throughout the whole world. For God is my witness, whom I serve in my spirit in the gospel of his Son, how unceasingly I make mention of you, always in my prayers."
This is a curious phrase. Paul could say: " ...God is my witness, whom I love with all my heart, whom I praise every day...", but he says: " ...whom I serve in my spirit...." He doesn't only say "whom I serve", but "whom I serve in my spirit." To serve is not the same thing as to serve in spirit. God wants us to exercise our spirit. Man's spirit is the most important part to God, so that's why we need to know what it is and what its functions are; to know it doctrinally through the Bible, and also experimentally. We have to distinguish the moving of the Spirit of God in our spirit, because if we don't walk in the spirit, but rather we allow ourselves to be led by our carnal nature, our service to God will be a natural, carnal service, and not like Paul's, as he says, in spirit. In chapter 4 of John's gospel we find a classic example where we can observe this difference.
The Samaritan woman, after discovering that the man who she spoke with was of God, began to discuss religious matters and doctrines, as we human beings usually do. We enter into discussions about doctrines and religious things, because we inherit denominational traditions, and we create fruitless discussions, comparing one doctrine with other, entering into a religion atmosphere of controversy, of criticism, and the Samaritan was on this level. She wanted to draw the Lord Jesus into her unstable atmosphere, but the Lord stayed put and he didn't allow himself to be drawn into that controversial atmosphere. In verse 20 of that chapter, the Samaritan woman says to the Lord: "Our fathers worshipped on this mount, and you say that Jerusalem is the place where he should be worshipped."
The Samaritan woman is indicating here that "you Jews, instead of thinking like our fathers (the Samaritans), have another idea." She is arguing, clarifying that their position is different to that of the prophet, but she doesn't still know who He is. The Samaritan woman shows her merely religious condition by saying to him: "Our fathers, our ancestors worshipped on this mount (Gerizim) for many centuries, so it is necessary to worship here; on the other hand you Jews now say that it is in Jerusalem where one has to worship", so as to draw Jesus into that argument between the Samaritans and the Jews. That's why the Jews didn't like Samaritans, and that was the reason why the Jews got angry when the Lord Jesus spoke well of the Samaritan who assisted a wounded Jew, in the parable of the good Samaritan (Luke 10:30-35); and the Samaritans didn't like the Jews either.
Worshipping in the spirit
In verse 21, the Lord Jesus tells the Samaritan woman: "Woman, believe me, the hour cometh, when neither in this mountain, nor in Jerusalem, shall ye worship the Father." She argued over external issues, of the natural world; is it here or is it there; it is in this religion or it is in that one; some say that it is here, others say that it is there. But the Lord tells her (verses 22-23): "Ye worship that which ye know not: we worship that which we know; for salvation is from the Jews. But the hour cometh, and now is, when the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and truth: for such doth the Father seek to be his worshippers."
The Father was waiting and seeking. There are things that God remains silent about; because in the Bible there are things that are not revealed, that are secret and are not told. In Deuteronomy 29:29 it says: "The secret things belong unto Jehovah our God; but the things that are revealed belong unto us...." But God revealed that He seeks after that class of worshipers, and the hour is coming for them to do that; that hour has almost arrived. God had been served via religious means for long enough; "on this mount, on another mount, in that sanctuary, in that way, which has to be done like this, that has to be like that; that has these borders and these measurements"; always trying to serve God in external things. God must be served, but with faith.
What had the Father been waiting for? The Father had been waiting for the hour in which the Lord Jesus came to produce true service to God. The feast of the tabernacles figured amongst the main Jewish feasts, which lasted seven days, and Jews from many different places attended, and it was the last of a great circle of feasts.
The Lord Jesus, being in Jerusalem for this feast, we read in John 7:37-39 that: "Now on the last day, the great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried, saying, If any man thirst, let him come unto me and drink. He that believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, from within him shall flow rivers of living water. But this spake he of the Spirit, which they that believed on him were to receive: for the Spirit was not yet given; because Jesus was not yet glorified."
Jesus manifested himself to them when the feast was finishing, because it was the last day, as though saying: "You already celebrated all the feasts, and this it is the last day of the last feast, and everybody already came to Jerusalem and sang, and did lots of religious things, but now God invites you; if the religious rites have not satiated your thirst, they have not filled that emptiness that comes from drinking of the Son." "If anyone comes to me... he that believes on me, from within...." Which is this part of man within? The spirit. "He who is connected to me, from within life will begin to flow"; and that was said about the Spirit of God. That meant that from the Spirit of God living water must flow from the inner most part of man, from man's interior, that is to say, from the human spirit.
The human spirit is nothing other than the channel, first of the Spirit of God. The woman who discussed religious matters didn't look to anything but the external. Israel had its circle of feasts: that of the Passover and the unleavened bread, then the first fruits of the harvest, later that of Pentecost, the feast of the trumpets, the day of atonement, and finally the feast of the tabernacles, the great feast of the harvest. Everyone came away tired by so many activities and many were unsatisfied, because external things don't satisfy, they don't satiate spiritual thirst, that's why the Lord enters in directly to deal with the spirit.
That's why the Lord also tells the Samaritan woman: "Woman, believe me the hour cometh... and now is." It is the hour that the Father had waited for, when true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit; which means that worship is of the spirit; unbeknown, and ignored by some. Worship which is not in the spirit is not true, it is like training, but it is not authentic. There is worship of the religious type that can be like training; like the boy who thinks that when he grows up he will be an architect, and begins to play with sand and to make castles or highways. He is simply playing, he is happy, but it is playing; that is not a true highway; that is not the true castle.
We play this way at praising God, serving God, doing things, but the Lord distinguishes between that which is true worship, done in spirit and truth, and that which is not, because the opposite of true is false. False worship exists. When it says that the Lord entered into the true sanctuary, does it mean that the other was false? No, it was merely a symbol of the true sanctuary. Moses brought the symbols. "For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ" (John 1:17). The word truth here is aletheia in the Greek, which means reality.
The reality of things. It is not only to worship, but worshipping in spirit; not only serving, but serving in spirit. Paul also says that: "I will pray with the spirit, but I will pray also with the understanding; I will sing with the spirit, but I will sing also with the understanding" (1 Corinthians 14:15). The Bible also says: "... in spirit fervent" (Romans 12:11). Many times we speak of the divine Spirit, but we forget that the divine Spirit made a human spirit in man. That is the burden of the present article: the importanceof the human spirit.
The Spirit of God speaks to our spirit
In Romans 8:16 it says: "The Spirit (with a capital letter, of God) testifies (to who to our spirit (with a small letter), that we are children of God." That is the place in which God, who forms it, is to live in man. The Spirit of God is eternal; man's is created, formed by God, but the human spirit is that which is designed to contact the divine Spirit. It is not the mind, nor emotions, nor even the will, much less the physical senses. It is the human spirit, which was designed as appropriate organ for entering into contact with the divine Spirit.
We should keep in mind that each part of our being, each organ, as much the body as the spirit, is designed to enter into direct contact with a portion of reality. There is a reality that consists of colours, fruits, tones, light, warnings, and forms. Sight enters into direct contact with light, with colours; hearing enters into direct contact with sounds; smell enters into direct contact with scents; taste enters into direct contact with flavours; tact enters into direct contact with textures; the mind enters into direct contact with thoughts; emotions enter into direct contact with feelings; the will is to exercise decisions. But, which is the organ designed by God, in the likeness of God, which can have an intimate relationship with God? That organ is man's spirit, the human spirit. That's why it says that the "Spirit testifies to our spirit that we are children of God." It could say to our hearing, or to our mind; but no, it is to our spirit.
The organ designed to receive the light of God is the spirit. It is through the spirit that you sense the presence of God; that's why Jesus says He is to be worshipped in spirit; that's why He is served in spirit, and He is prayed to in spirit. The spirit has several functions; intuition, communion and conscience. Through communion, for example, one worships God in spirit.
When you are really in the spirit, you perceive the Lord. You perceive if he is happy, you perceive if he is sad, you perceive if he is angry, if he is still, if he is reproving, if he is approving; you perceive if you have still not received the certainty of being forgiven; you perceive if he is happy with what you have done; you perceive he is satisfied, if he receives the praise, or if it was for this reason or that. How do you know? It is not with the mind; it is with intuition. That word is found in the Bible and is also called perception.
In the Word it says that Jesus perceived in his spirit. It also says that the natural man does not perceive the things that are of the Spirit of God (1 Cor. 2:14a). Sometimes believers perceive things in their spirit, but they are not accustomed to giving due attention to them, because we have lived in the external man, and the external man likes strong, psychedelic emotions. The Lord's voice is softer; it penetrates deeper than the agitation of our soul; and afterwards, we say that we perceived something but we didn't pay much attention to it. We have not discovered the importance of man's spirit. It is necessary to know about this important topic, so that God may help us to wake up to the importance that our spirit has for him; so that we become aware of His movements in our spirit, because the children of God are Christians. To whom does the Spirit of God testify? To our spirit.
Some are hoping an angel, or a light, or a thunder bolt will appear to them and to say something in a psychedelic style, something touching, something external. The prophet Elijah was a very mature man, and during a certain crisis that he suffered, he went away and entered a cave in the desert, and a wind passed by, then an earthquake and fire, and Elijah was very calm. He could have shown a great deal of emotion, made a lot of noise, but he remained calm. A wind blew, but God was not in the wind, then an earthquake, but God was not in the earthquake, then fire, and God was not in the fire; but then it says that a gentle and delicate whisper passed by, perhaps a soft breeze, a breath of air, and that word is pneuma in the Greek (1 Kings 19:9-13).
I am glad to know that Elijah was a man who didn't allow anything to swallow him up, because what the devil wants is to engulf you in agitations. Sometimes they want to drag you off in one direction, others in a different direction, up here, down there, saying that the Lord is moving from the above to down below, this way or another. But what the Lord wants is to lead you, to guide you; that the peace of God governs our hearts (Colossians 3:15a). What does it mean to govern us? When you are going to do something and you lose your peace, don't allow external agitation to engulf you; look to within, because from within is where the message of God flows from, from the most intimate part of your being, where the Spirit is. The Bible says that the tabernacle had three parts, and those three parts are joined and have a relationship to one another. The brass altar in the atrium, with many other things; then the Holy Place with the candlestick, the altar of the incense, the table of the showbread and other things; and the ark was in the Holiest Place, and the ark had two cherubs.
The ark was like a box with a cover called propitiatory, and on each end of the propitiatory there was a cherub with extended wings. And the Lord in His Word says: "And there I will meet with thee, and I will commune with thee from above the mercy-seat, from between the two cherubim which are upon the ark of the testimony, of all things which I will give thee in commandment unto the children of Israel." (Exodus 25:22). Let us bear in mind the place from which the Lord spoke. It was not outside the tabernacle, nor in the atrium inside the tabernacle; not even in the Holy Place, but in the Holiest Place, in the most inner-part of the tabernacle; that was where He spoke. We sometimes want to look for things from the outside, or we seek to be guided by external things, from here and there. No; "there between the wings of the cherubs I will speak to you."
How often we say: "Brothers and sisters, what must we do here? Should we fast for long or short periods, or not fast at all? Could it be determined by whether we are tithing, or whether the women wear trousers or not"? All those questions arise and you go to such and such a vicar or reverend, and you go from one reverend to another seeking that type of orientation; but the Lord says: "...There I will meet with thee and I will commune with thee." If you try to serve God by putting everything in a box: "don't touch here, don't look here, don't go up here", from outside, you are not serving God in spirit. But if you call on the Lord...remember what he says: "Whosoever cometh unto me..., whosoever believeth in me...", and the anointing will teach you all things, from the most intimate part of your being, even though you want to make your point in external things and want your opinion to prevail; and you are sometimes tricky, and manipulate situations to get what you want; but inside you there is a small voice that says: "cheat". Because the Spirit of God testifies to your spirit. Your spirit is the one that perceives the voice of God; He is declared there. Man's spirit is the most important thing for Him; the central part.
We sometimes walk in the great mistake of waiting to hear what man will say, what so-and-so will say. Undoubtedly they can give an opinion, because the Spirit testifies through other brothers and sisters, but it is the Spirit who informs you if God is satisfied with this or with that. And one can say: "There are so many opinions." What will this person say? What will they say if you do it in the spirit? If you do the correct thing, that interior traffic light will give you green light.
Do you know which the green light is? The spirit of peace. The Bible says that if we are in the flesh and we sow in the flesh, we will inherit the corruption of the flesh; but if we do it in the Spirit, we will have life and peace from the Spirit (Galatians 6:8; Romans 8:6, 13). How do we know if we are in spirit or not? If there is a source of life, if there is no blockade, if there is peace, if you are not doing being foolish, saying: "But it's just that...." Every one of us is given to going round and round in circles, but if the Lord is present: "Greater is he who is in you..." (1 John 4:4). He is in you, within you. The Lord says: "...deny thyself ...and follow me" (Mat. 16:24); How will you follow him? Because inwardly he is in Spirit, and the external voice of the Spirit is the Word. So you need to listen to the spirit within, in accordance with the Word which concords with the feeling of the spirit, with the spiritual brothers and sisters, the Body; that is the correct path.
It is necessary to keep three things in mind: The Spirit, the Word and the consent of the Body in spirit, since consensus in a democracy is in the flesh. We have an example: It is decided that it will be voted upon whether to commit adultery or not. Out of a hundred brothers and sisters, 95 choose adultery; 5 don't want adultery. The 95 win, and adultery is accepted. That is an example of how consensus in the flesh, without keeping in mind the Spirit and the Word, is not of God. It may be a majority in the Church, but it is not the voice of God. Consensus should be in the spirit, albeit between two or three, but in spirit; that is the voice of God. The Lord says: "...deny thyself, take up thy cross, and follow me." That self is the soul. Paul says: "Don't you know that Christ is in you"? And he tells Timothy: "Timothy, the Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit." He who is your spirit, the Spirit of God, gives testimony to your spirit.
Man's spirit is of great importance to God. We sometimes live psychedelically, shaken by the external world, without realising the importance of learning what our own spirit, the most intimate of our being is, and spend so much time wondering what to do, being upset, dragged away by this and that. We should not allow ourselves to be dragged anywhere.
A useful example is that of divers, those who put on a diving suit. They take a kind of tube through which to breathe. Placed in that atmosphere under the water, they don't breathe in the water, because the air is received from above through the tube, even though they remain under the water. We too, for the time being are here in this world, as though at the bottom of the sea, but there is a clean spirit; breathing the Lord. Brothers and sisters, the Lord is the God who stretched forth the heavens, and set the earth in its place and has created a spirit in us that it is very important to Him, because it is with the spirit that he communicates with us; it is from our spirit that the Spirit of God flows. "... will flow from within...", meaning from within toward the outside; from our conscience and intuition to our understanding; and that's why we sometimes pray in spirit and we don't understand, because the flow is in the spirit but hasn't reached our mind.
That is the reason why we often don't understand; so we need to pray to be able to interpret the spirit. It is the Spirit who says something there within, in our inner man. He says something, but you don't know how explain it; you sense it, there it is, like a baby kicking in a pregnant woman, we too sometimes receive kicks from the Holy Spirit. But all that happens inside first, and that's where we should perceive it, because it is a perception, or what is also called intuition. It is an intimate perception; it is not a natural deduction, because our natural deductions are not reliable. " Now the natural man receiveth (perceiveth) not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him; and he cannot know (discern) them, because they are spiritually judged (discerned)" (1 Corinthians 2:14), that is to say, using the spirit of people.
If it is not perceived in the spirit, it is judged in the flesh
On many occasions we begin to judge people with our natural mind, if they are similar to us, and we say things like: "What a dear person! but oh he/she is different!" or "I don't like her because she resembles my mother-in-law." But let us note what Paul says in 2 Corinthians 5:16: "Wherefore we henceforth know no man after the flesh: even though we have known Christ after the flesh, (because he lived in a generation who knew him externally, not internally) yet now we know him so no more." So, there are two ways to know someone: a natural knowledge, through a natural opinion, of the flesh, by tradition, by customs, by prejudices; the other knowledge is based on denying oneself to depend directly on the guidance of God, on the revelation of God, receiving a testimony from the Spirit in our spirit; so as to known someone not in the flesh but in the spirit, being guided by the truth. If it is not by the spirit, people cannot perceive the life and the peace that is as soft as the breeze that Elijah perceived, who passed through that testing unaffected, and whose external agitation which surrounded him disappeared. That whole heap of external problems did not affect him because he perceived what was of the spirit.
We should not judge by appearances, because they are deceiving, and drag you off toward thinking like them and them like you. No, it is by the Spirit in the spirit, by Jesus Christ, to guide you to himself. Where is the throne? Jesus is at the right hand of the Father and the Spirit is in your spirit, and the voice of His Spirit springs from you, and all that is of God must concord with the Word. On the inside; the Spirit, and on the outside; the Word, and in between; the communion of the Body and the consensus of the spirit of the other spiritual brothers and sisters.
Paul says: "If then ye have to judge things pertaining to this life, do ye set them to judge who are of no account in the church?" (1 Corinthians 6:4). He isn't referring to those that want to vote over your sin; those that will be sympathetic to your feelings, to your gossiping, or your other issues. They really have to be people who deny themselves and don't represent their own taste or preference, nor are frightened of the preferences and opposition of others, but rather they represent God's feeling, to the point that the world comes against them; that are faithful representatives of God, of God's feeling, and say what needs to be said and emanate the Spirit in the spirit and that which is according to the Word.
(Extracts of a message shared in Fontibón, Colombia).
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By: Gino Iafrancesco V. / Traslation: Andrew Web.
STRENGTHENING THE INNER MAN
STRENGTHENING THE INNER MAN
The edification of the house of God has stages that are like the steps of a staircase, in which it is necessary to advance with all the saints until reaching the fullness of Christ.
Strengthening the inner man
Gino Iafrancesco
Reading: Ephesians 3:14-23.
The upward staircase
In the previous text we see a progression, a great staircase where the later step rests on the previous one and this in turn on the former. The edification of the house of God has stages or previous links which are necessary for all the saints in order to reach the final step which is the fullness of Christ. The Word of God tells us (Genesis 28) that Jacob in Betel saw a staircase; here we will see some of the steps of that staircase.
Paul begins by saying: "For this reason." Paul first saw something of God, and God's cause, because what chapters 1 to 3 of Ephesians tells us is the eternal purpose of God, the identity of the Church and the place of the Church in that holy purpose. That is the cause to which Paul's intercession was committed. Firstly he saw the purpose of God; he saw the meaning of the Church for God and the place of the Church in the purpose of God. But we can fall into the temptation of only talking about a mystic vision of the Church. The Lord doesn't want us just to talk about that beautiful and mystic vision of what the Church is in the Word of God, but rather God really wants to have the Church as a wife for Himself, as a Body for His Son, as a vehicle for His Spirit, as a dwelling place for His fullness.
First step: Life in Christ
That requires a very intimate work of God; first with each one of us personally; that is to say, in order for God to have the Church that he really wants, he has to do a serious work, without deviation; to truly take us in His hands and to do a true work. When the work of the Lord is true, you can feel it; it sometimes hurts; not always, but it is true pain, because God is truly dealing with us, he is truly transforming us, and that means that God unequivocally 'interferes' with us, with all our things; in every area of our life, even those that we least imagine, the time will arrive when God puts His finger on that and says: "I'm now going to deal with this are using the method that I alone know is the appropriate one. Until now I have dealt with other things, but it's now this part's turn."
We can see that the edification that God carries out in His dwelling place for His fullness, is done in a very practical way with very true dealings in each one of us, first as individuals, but the dealings of God in each individual, later become dealings with us as a Church.
Second step: To be strengthened in the inner man
God works with each individual, with 'self' of those redeemed, dealing with each one as a special case. Then the Lord deals with the interrelations of individuals, as a Church. He does a personal work with each one in order to be able to do a collective work with the Church. What sometimes happens is that we don't allow God to work in us as individuals, and that prevents the collective work of the Lord from advancing with the Church. That teaches us about how essential the work of the Lord is in us as individuals, in order to truly work with the Church. Verse 16 says: "... that he would grant you, according to the riches of his glory, that ye may be strengthened with power through his Spirit in the inward man." Here we find the first step on this staircase. Paul is praying that we might reach the first step; our intercession should end up understanding Paul's intercession in the spirit; and desire that God may allow this to become our intercession. It is sad that in many cases, we have rarely ever interceded for this cause. Being strengthened with power in the inner man by the Spirit of God is the first objective which we must commit to pray for, for one another, to pray for each one of our brothers and sisters.
If this first step is not taken, if we are not strengthened with power in our spirit, we may speak a great deal, we may have vision, but we won't have the reality of that vision, because the reality of that vision is given through the strengthening of the inner man. One may know what he should do, and have the ideals, but if we are not strengthened with power in the inner man, we cannot put the ideals that we have into practice. So the first necessity is life, the strengthening of the inner man. The apostle John in his first epistle, in chapter 5:16 says: "If any man see his brother sinning a sin not unto death, he shall ask, and God will give him life for them that sin not unto death. There is a sin unto death: not concerning this do I say that he should make request."
If someone sees his brother sinning which is not unto death -that is to say that God has not had to decide upon his death - he will ask God and God will give him life; that means that believers sin because we have a restricted flow of life; although we have the life of the Lord in our spirit, its circulation through the rest of our being is still very weak; it is not strengthened, and because it is weak we are able to do things that offend God and other people; we are not sufficiently consecrated. And to what does that owe? A lack of the flowing of life. When the Word says that if someone sees his brother sinning -that's where the intercession is - that is not of death, he will ask God who will give him life, and God will give him life. In Ephesians 2 it says that God, when we were dead in transgressions and sins, gave us life together with Christ. The first need that we have in the new creation is that of life. Life is the beginning, and this which says: "to be strengthened with power in the inner man", is a question of life. We are almost always inclined to criticize, to judge, to sentence, but nobody is helped by that attitude; only by asking for life. That is the first necessity that each person has, to be strengthened in their inner man.
Third step: That Christ dwell in our heart
Once the previous objective has been achieved it is the requirement for a second and more advanced objective which is the reason for which we need to be strengthened in the inner man. We now read (verse 17): "... that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith." So, as we have seen, we have to intercede; bow my knees before the Father to this cause, because I know what God wants, because I see what the Church means to God, I see the place of the Church in that purpose, and in order for that purpose to begin to be completed, we first need life, and then to be strengthened in life in the inner man. That is the main thing. Not religious activities; not the outward appearances that one usually has, but life; the thing that's really needed is life, the inner man's strength. The Word tells us that that being strengthened in the inner man, is so that Christ may dwell by faith in our hearts. Truly, the life of the Lord, the inner man's strengthening must flow from within toward the outside. The Lord Jesus identified the inner man as our spirit. The Lord Jesus says in John 7:38: "He that believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, from within him shall flow rivers of living water."
And then in the following verse John explains by the Holy Spirit: "But this spake he of the Spirit, which they that believed on him were to receive: for the Spirit was not yet given; because Jesus was not yet glorified " That confirms that it is necessary for the Spirit to flow like a river from within. When the Scripture says "from within", that word in the Greek language is ek, from which we have those roots in English: exodus, external, exterior; ek means to leave, from inside out; it is a Greek preposition that is drawn in grammar like a kind of circle with an arrow coming out of it, to give an idea of the meaning of the preposition: to come out of. Let us note then that when saying from His spirit, it means that the life of the Lord passes from the human spirit to the soul.
That's why he says to the Church - he isn't speaking to unbelievers, he says it to the Church who already has the Lord in their spirit -: "that Christ may dwell", as if he didn't already dwell. But he doesn't say "in your spirit" but "in your hearts." Is it necessary to understand what 'heart' means in the Bible, because when Paul says to the Church that they be strengthened in the inner man so that Christ may dwell in their hearts, if one thinks that he already received Him in the heart, then, how could he say "so that Christ dwell the heart of the saints", if they are already saints precisely because they received Christ in the heart? We need to understand what 'heart' means in the Bible. We must understand what it is that Christ dwell in the heart by means of the strengthening of the inner man through the flowing of the Spirit of God from man's spirit toward man's soul; since in the Bible it says that the heart is the soul as well as the conscience of the spirit.
In the Bible we can see that our spirit is our being's most intimate part, that is to say the Holiest Place of the temple of God. The spirit has three main functions: That of the conscience, as the Word says, "a pure heart... an upright spirit within me... a contrite and humble heart you will not despise." Contrition is a question of conscience; so man's conscience is related to his spirit; the conscience is a function of the spirit. The Word says: "my conscience bearing witness with me in the Holy Spirit." It is with our spirit that we receive the certainties that the Spirit of God communicates to us. In Romans 8:16 it says that: "The Spirit bears witness to our spirit, that we are children of God." The other functions of the human spirit are intuition and communion with God.
The soul has functions different to those of the spirit, like that of the mind. There is a verse that says: "My soul knows it very well...", so that which knows things, that of knowing, ofthinking, of reasoning, those mental functions correspond to the soul. But the whole range of emotions also corresponds to the soul. In the Bible the soul is that which is content, which is sad, which gets angry, which was given over to desire; and the will is also of the soul. Now when we see the functions of the soul and those of the conscience of the spirit, and we see what the heart does, we discover that the heart is the relationship of the soul to the conscience of the spirit, because the Word says that from the heart flows life.
Life comes from the Spirit of God to our spirit, but doesn't come to be still but to flow, to flow from the spirit to the soul; from the most intimate part of our being, from the intuition, perception and communion that we experience when we are in the presence of God, and so we experience a flowing of life in the spirit. From there, it has to flow; out from (ek) within; to flow toward our being's outer parts. In the Old Testament, when God symbolized the house of God with the temple, from the Holiest Place, under the throne, the river of life flowed, but the river of life came out from the Holiest Place, passed through the holy place, then through the atrium, and finally it flowed out to the nations and into the sea; from under the throne of God in the Holiest Place the river flowed outwards. That was the typology, but the reality exists today.
The river of God is the Spirit and the house of God is us; the Holiest Place is our spirit, the Holy Place is our soul and the atrium is our body. That teaches us that the plan of God is that the life of God manifested in Jesus Christ and given to us by the Holy Spirit, has first reached our spirit and from there must flow to our soul; that is to say, your inner man is strengthened so that Christ may dwell by faith your hearts.
The heart has functions that are a little more external than those of the spirit, because the spirit is more intimate than the human heart; on the other hand the heart is related with the conscience of the spirit, but it is, so to speak, the door through which life flows. "Keep your heart with all vigilance, for from it flow the springs of life" (Proverbs 4:23). The door from which the Spirit of the Lord comes out of the depths, out of intimacy, toward the outside, is the heart. If you study what the functions of the heart are in the Bible, you will see that they are the same as those of our soul, so that to say 'heart' and 'soul' is almost the same thing, with the difference that when you say heart, you are talking about something more, because it contains the conscience of the spirit.
Because, what are the functions of the heart? The Bible says: "... because if our heart condemn us, God is greater than our heart, and knoweth all things" (1 John 3:20-21); which is to say that that function of the conscience, of condemning or affirming, is of the heart. There we see the function that the heart, with the human spirit, is that of the conscience. Also in Hebrews 4:12 it says: "For the word of God is living, and active, and sharper than any two-edged sword, and piercing even to the dividing of soul and spirit, of both joints and marrow, and quick to discern the thoughts and intents of the heart." The functions of the soul are referred to here, because its intentions are exercised with the mind and the will. There is a flowing from within toward the outside, from the spirit to the soul, to the heart.
The life that every child of God already has is kept very deep within us. But often in our thinking -because when we say heart, we need to understand it in its totality: that the thoughts are of the heart, the intentions are of the heart, the conscience is of the heart, emotions are of the heart - we will say, yes, Christ dwells in my heart, I accepted Christ into my heart. It is very easy to say that, but to live it out is different. To have Christ dwelling in my heart means that Christ is dwelling in my thoughts. But how many children of God have thoughts where Christ doesn't dwell. This means that the process of Christ dwelling in the heart is something more complex; that Christ dwell in my thoughts, dwell in my emotions, requires a process, a development, because how many children of God have emotions of anger, of laziness, of rebelliousness, of adultery, or of anything else, and we are legitimate Christians and we have the Lord in our spirit, but our emotions are not yet sufficiently controlled or indwelt by Christ, and if we are not strengthened in the inner man, those emotions become a giant that is difficult to manage and to control. But if we are strengthened in the inner man, this controls those emotions, it brings our thoughts captive to the obedience of Christ, it brings the will into line with the will of God, because it is a flowing of Christ that comes from within toward the outside.
That is a spiritual law: all that which is of God is in Christ; all that which is of God and Christ, is in the Spirit; all that is of the Spirit comes to our spirit, and all that which is of God the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, and which is in our spirit, has to be formed, to be transfused into our thoughts, intentions, emotions, conscience; that is to say, in our hearts. In 1 Corinthians 14:15, when Paul speaks of praying in the spirit, he says: "I will pray with the spirit, and I will pray with the understanding also" In verse 13 it says: "... Wherefore let him that speaketh in a tongue pray that he may interpret"
Understanding belongs to the mind of the soul, the heart, but in the spirit one is interceding, so he gives a case in which, as the mind is a little more external, it is not able to interpret the prayer of the spirit, and that's why Paul exhorts saying (verse 14): "or if I pray in a tongue, my spirit prayeth, but my understanding is unfruitful." That's why it's necessary to ask in prayer to be able to interpret it, so that the light of life doesn't just remain in the spirit but rather it lights up the eyes of understanding and flows from within toward the outside and from the inner man to also inhabit the heart.
All that is a process. Receiving the Lord gave us life; we were dead in our trespasses and sins, but when uniting with the Lord he cleansed us from our sins and gave us life and the Spirit. Then the second stage is in the heart; it is a more serious work. The work of God is true. So in order for Christ to dwell in my thoughts, God has to combat with my mind, with my mental habits, with thoughts, with lies that I have accepted as truths and that are in our thoughts. He already dwells in my spirit, but it is necessary for Him to dwell in my thoughts.
There is a very marked relationship between thoughts and feelings, because according to what I think and feel, I do. So Proverbs 23:7 tells us: " …For as he thinketh within himself, so is he: Eat and drink, saith he to thee; But his heart is not with thee." According to what the person thinks with his heart, so he does. If the devil tells you a lie as though it were truth and you accept that lie as truth, you begin to mistakenly feel and also act. To correct the behavior it is necessary to correct the feeling, and to correct the feeling one's thinking must be corrected, so as to demonstrate where the devil's lie is, because a lie cannot be expelled as if it were a demon, because a demon is a person, and demons' deceit exists in the person; the demon can leave, but if the lie is there, that lie cannot be driven out, one has to remove falsehood with the truth.
That work of Christ's dwelling in the heart is a true and meticulous surgical operation conducted by the Lord, with our mental habits, decisive feelings; in that process God is operating. God truly wants something for himself; he wants to flow in us and that our thoughts agree with his, but often he thinks one thing and we another, because his thoughts are not ours, so our thoughts have to learn how to be subject to Christ; and that is a long work of God that one can only do with the strengthening of the inner man.
Before the strengthening of the inner man, we don't want to, but now we do; before you thought bad things, now you think good things; before you were opaque, now you are luminous, because you were strengthened in the inner man. But now your thoughts need to be indwelt by Christ. Your thoughts, your determinations, must go on being increasingly crystalline, more transparent. You can put water in a glass if it is clean, and if somebody drinks that water, it tastes like water because it is pure and the glass is clean. But if the glass is not clean, although the water is clean, the glass adds a different or strange flavor. It is water, but it also has some strange elements.
We are that dirty glass; we have the treasure but in vessels of clay. When we meet with our brothers and sisters, seemingly all is well, but there is always a strange flavor that should be treated; that strange flavor is where Christ is not dwelling, but rather there is an old element that should be renovated by the Spirit. That is a true operation of God, and it is not only a pretty doctrine but a surgical operation that God does with each child, with all our personality, because he wants to be reflected through our personality; our personality must be purified, renovated.
Fourth step: To understand the measure of Christ
In the previous steps we have spoken of a process on an individual level; now enters a step at a collective level. The objective of being strengthened in the inner man is for Christ to dwell in the heart, and the objective of this is the present successive link, which we can locate again in verses 17-19a: "that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; to the end that ye, being rooted and grounded in love, may be strong to apprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ which passeth knowledge…"
Why does the Lord need to do that work in the heart until the point where we listen to the guidance of God and the inner voice? So that you may "be strong to apprehend with all the saints" the measure of Christ. An individual cannot understand the measure of Christ, but rather he has to be understood collectively. In order for me to be able to understand the measure of Christ with my brothers and sisters, I must be previously dealt with in my heart otherwise I won't accept my brother. I will accept myself, but I won't believe that God can tell me something through another brother. That's why it is necessary for God to begin to operate in each one of us; so we may learn how to understand collectively. It's one thing to understand something individually, but it is another altogether when we are together, because between us we all understand more since what one understands individually is one solitary thing, but what one understands with others is greater.
Brother Watchman Nee gave a very beautiful example in a book which deals with some topics that he shared just before being imprisoned for 20 years. He said that if a glass is broken into many pieces, there may not be one piece missing; they may all be there; but, how much water can the glass pieces contain? A piece can only contain a certain level, but when all the pieces form a glass, they not only contain the sum of what each piece can contain, but even more. For example, if one piece can contain 2 and another 2, this equals 4, and another 2, equals 6, and another two, 8... 24... 32... 40. If each one of us contains 2, what we contain separately is 40; but if we join them together, we will no longer only contain 40, but 2,000, 5,000; because a whole glass fits more in it than the broken glass. As individuals, we can contain a certain measure, but as the Church we were predestined to contain the fullness, but this is something very serious.
Brother, you will perhaps learn that the greatest sufferings that you will have in your life won't come from the devil, or from enemies; you may receive them from those dearest or closest to you, from your friends; you will be deeply wounded, perhaps criticized or shown up or embarrassed, or perhaps looked down upon, or rejected, or ignored; but those sufferings teach us not to behave in that way with others.
One cannot realize how one is with others, until another is like that with us, then we realize. There we have the example of Jacob. He didn't realize that he was Jacob, the cheat, the usurper. God had a purpose with Jacob and needed to deal with him, and God knew where Jacob needed to go to learn, and guided him to Laban, his uncle. In the relationship with his uncle, he not only tried to change the skin of the livestock, but rather his uncle changed his wife, and he changed his wage 30 times. We realize what we do to others when they do it to us. The Lord truly deals with us. If someone tries to escape being dealt with, they will remain outside of the Church, far from God's plan; if we really want to walk God's way, we have to accept many dispositions from the Lord that may bother us or hurt us, because it is necessary to learn how to understand together with others, and this is very difficult. It is very difficult to come to an agreement with people who see things differently, who have a different temperament, different character; some are extroverted, others introverted; some are hyperactive and others are lazy.
Fifth step: The Church filled with the fullness of God
It is necessary to learn how to be a single and whole glass, not a broken one. In verse 19b it says: "... that ye may be filled unto all the fulness of God." God has predestined the Church as a vessel for His fullness; but in order for that fullness of God to fit into the Church, this has to be very coordinated as a single Body, and that coordination, that connection of the one with the other is painful for the flesh but good for the spirit, because God doesn't put us with people who we like. If the decision depended on us, we would choose people who we like, but God has other children, maybe those who one didn't want to be with, and God puts you with them and you must learn how to swallow hard, to bear with them and to suffer; and that means denying yourself, and another denying himself, until there is nothing left of him or you except Christ in him, and Christ in you.
That's where to find Christ's fullness. This is nothing theoretical; the Lord is not happy with theories or libraries full of the topics of the Church; that is all very well, but it is not enough; he wants a true Church, and for us to learn how to be integrated with one another, even if they are not our friends; there is every type of variety in the Church.
The Word says: "that ye may be strengthened with power through his Spirit in the inward man... strong to apprehend with all the saints...." How difficult it is to "apprehend with all..."; it is very easy to be sure of my opinion, to be sure of my wisdom, of the clear interpretation of doctrine, and so why should I have to listen to others' interpretation, and I refute it and I underestimate it before hearing it. It is necessary to try to understand others and to recognize that he was also right and that it enriches me with what I didn't see and perhaps God enriches him with what I say, and I am no longer alone seeing two, and he alone seeing two, but together we see ten, because by joining two and two they are four, but four have relationship with eight and increases the union; this is something very practical and it is necessary to learn how to avoid being guided by natural tastes, but rather allowing the dispositions of God to prevail as God has ordered the circumstances in ones' life, with people that he wants, be it that they are pleasant or not.
We have to learn something of that because the individual life is not sufficient, but rather we need understanding with all the saints the measure of Christ, and then to reach the last step, so that you are filled "with all the fullness of God", predestined as saints, as one Body. This is the way ahead that awaits us.
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By: Gino Iafrancesco V. / Traslation: Andrew Web.
The edification of the house of God has stages that are like the steps of a staircase, in which it is necessary to advance with all the saints until reaching the fullness of Christ.
Strengthening the inner man
Gino Iafrancesco
Reading: Ephesians 3:14-23.
The upward staircase
In the previous text we see a progression, a great staircase where the later step rests on the previous one and this in turn on the former. The edification of the house of God has stages or previous links which are necessary for all the saints in order to reach the final step which is the fullness of Christ. The Word of God tells us (Genesis 28) that Jacob in Betel saw a staircase; here we will see some of the steps of that staircase.
Paul begins by saying: "For this reason." Paul first saw something of God, and God's cause, because what chapters 1 to 3 of Ephesians tells us is the eternal purpose of God, the identity of the Church and the place of the Church in that holy purpose. That is the cause to which Paul's intercession was committed. Firstly he saw the purpose of God; he saw the meaning of the Church for God and the place of the Church in the purpose of God. But we can fall into the temptation of only talking about a mystic vision of the Church. The Lord doesn't want us just to talk about that beautiful and mystic vision of what the Church is in the Word of God, but rather God really wants to have the Church as a wife for Himself, as a Body for His Son, as a vehicle for His Spirit, as a dwelling place for His fullness.
First step: Life in Christ
That requires a very intimate work of God; first with each one of us personally; that is to say, in order for God to have the Church that he really wants, he has to do a serious work, without deviation; to truly take us in His hands and to do a true work. When the work of the Lord is true, you can feel it; it sometimes hurts; not always, but it is true pain, because God is truly dealing with us, he is truly transforming us, and that means that God unequivocally 'interferes' with us, with all our things; in every area of our life, even those that we least imagine, the time will arrive when God puts His finger on that and says: "I'm now going to deal with this are using the method that I alone know is the appropriate one. Until now I have dealt with other things, but it's now this part's turn."
We can see that the edification that God carries out in His dwelling place for His fullness, is done in a very practical way with very true dealings in each one of us, first as individuals, but the dealings of God in each individual, later become dealings with us as a Church.
Second step: To be strengthened in the inner man
God works with each individual, with 'self' of those redeemed, dealing with each one as a special case. Then the Lord deals with the interrelations of individuals, as a Church. He does a personal work with each one in order to be able to do a collective work with the Church. What sometimes happens is that we don't allow God to work in us as individuals, and that prevents the collective work of the Lord from advancing with the Church. That teaches us about how essential the work of the Lord is in us as individuals, in order to truly work with the Church. Verse 16 says: "... that he would grant you, according to the riches of his glory, that ye may be strengthened with power through his Spirit in the inward man." Here we find the first step on this staircase. Paul is praying that we might reach the first step; our intercession should end up understanding Paul's intercession in the spirit; and desire that God may allow this to become our intercession. It is sad that in many cases, we have rarely ever interceded for this cause. Being strengthened with power in the inner man by the Spirit of God is the first objective which we must commit to pray for, for one another, to pray for each one of our brothers and sisters.
If this first step is not taken, if we are not strengthened with power in our spirit, we may speak a great deal, we may have vision, but we won't have the reality of that vision, because the reality of that vision is given through the strengthening of the inner man. One may know what he should do, and have the ideals, but if we are not strengthened with power in the inner man, we cannot put the ideals that we have into practice. So the first necessity is life, the strengthening of the inner man. The apostle John in his first epistle, in chapter 5:16 says: "If any man see his brother sinning a sin not unto death, he shall ask, and God will give him life for them that sin not unto death. There is a sin unto death: not concerning this do I say that he should make request."
If someone sees his brother sinning which is not unto death -that is to say that God has not had to decide upon his death - he will ask God and God will give him life; that means that believers sin because we have a restricted flow of life; although we have the life of the Lord in our spirit, its circulation through the rest of our being is still very weak; it is not strengthened, and because it is weak we are able to do things that offend God and other people; we are not sufficiently consecrated. And to what does that owe? A lack of the flowing of life. When the Word says that if someone sees his brother sinning -that's where the intercession is - that is not of death, he will ask God who will give him life, and God will give him life. In Ephesians 2 it says that God, when we were dead in transgressions and sins, gave us life together with Christ. The first need that we have in the new creation is that of life. Life is the beginning, and this which says: "to be strengthened with power in the inner man", is a question of life. We are almost always inclined to criticize, to judge, to sentence, but nobody is helped by that attitude; only by asking for life. That is the first necessity that each person has, to be strengthened in their inner man.
Third step: That Christ dwell in our heart
Once the previous objective has been achieved it is the requirement for a second and more advanced objective which is the reason for which we need to be strengthened in the inner man. We now read (verse 17): "... that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith." So, as we have seen, we have to intercede; bow my knees before the Father to this cause, because I know what God wants, because I see what the Church means to God, I see the place of the Church in that purpose, and in order for that purpose to begin to be completed, we first need life, and then to be strengthened in life in the inner man. That is the main thing. Not religious activities; not the outward appearances that one usually has, but life; the thing that's really needed is life, the inner man's strength. The Word tells us that that being strengthened in the inner man, is so that Christ may dwell by faith in our hearts. Truly, the life of the Lord, the inner man's strengthening must flow from within toward the outside. The Lord Jesus identified the inner man as our spirit. The Lord Jesus says in John 7:38: "He that believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, from within him shall flow rivers of living water."
And then in the following verse John explains by the Holy Spirit: "But this spake he of the Spirit, which they that believed on him were to receive: for the Spirit was not yet given; because Jesus was not yet glorified " That confirms that it is necessary for the Spirit to flow like a river from within. When the Scripture says "from within", that word in the Greek language is ek, from which we have those roots in English: exodus, external, exterior; ek means to leave, from inside out; it is a Greek preposition that is drawn in grammar like a kind of circle with an arrow coming out of it, to give an idea of the meaning of the preposition: to come out of. Let us note then that when saying from His spirit, it means that the life of the Lord passes from the human spirit to the soul.
That's why he says to the Church - he isn't speaking to unbelievers, he says it to the Church who already has the Lord in their spirit -: "that Christ may dwell", as if he didn't already dwell. But he doesn't say "in your spirit" but "in your hearts." Is it necessary to understand what 'heart' means in the Bible, because when Paul says to the Church that they be strengthened in the inner man so that Christ may dwell in their hearts, if one thinks that he already received Him in the heart, then, how could he say "so that Christ dwell the heart of the saints", if they are already saints precisely because they received Christ in the heart? We need to understand what 'heart' means in the Bible. We must understand what it is that Christ dwell in the heart by means of the strengthening of the inner man through the flowing of the Spirit of God from man's spirit toward man's soul; since in the Bible it says that the heart is the soul as well as the conscience of the spirit.
In the Bible we can see that our spirit is our being's most intimate part, that is to say the Holiest Place of the temple of God. The spirit has three main functions: That of the conscience, as the Word says, "a pure heart... an upright spirit within me... a contrite and humble heart you will not despise." Contrition is a question of conscience; so man's conscience is related to his spirit; the conscience is a function of the spirit. The Word says: "my conscience bearing witness with me in the Holy Spirit." It is with our spirit that we receive the certainties that the Spirit of God communicates to us. In Romans 8:16 it says that: "The Spirit bears witness to our spirit, that we are children of God." The other functions of the human spirit are intuition and communion with God.
The soul has functions different to those of the spirit, like that of the mind. There is a verse that says: "My soul knows it very well...", so that which knows things, that of knowing, ofthinking, of reasoning, those mental functions correspond to the soul. But the whole range of emotions also corresponds to the soul. In the Bible the soul is that which is content, which is sad, which gets angry, which was given over to desire; and the will is also of the soul. Now when we see the functions of the soul and those of the conscience of the spirit, and we see what the heart does, we discover that the heart is the relationship of the soul to the conscience of the spirit, because the Word says that from the heart flows life.
Life comes from the Spirit of God to our spirit, but doesn't come to be still but to flow, to flow from the spirit to the soul; from the most intimate part of our being, from the intuition, perception and communion that we experience when we are in the presence of God, and so we experience a flowing of life in the spirit. From there, it has to flow; out from (ek) within; to flow toward our being's outer parts. In the Old Testament, when God symbolized the house of God with the temple, from the Holiest Place, under the throne, the river of life flowed, but the river of life came out from the Holiest Place, passed through the holy place, then through the atrium, and finally it flowed out to the nations and into the sea; from under the throne of God in the Holiest Place the river flowed outwards. That was the typology, but the reality exists today.
The river of God is the Spirit and the house of God is us; the Holiest Place is our spirit, the Holy Place is our soul and the atrium is our body. That teaches us that the plan of God is that the life of God manifested in Jesus Christ and given to us by the Holy Spirit, has first reached our spirit and from there must flow to our soul; that is to say, your inner man is strengthened so that Christ may dwell by faith your hearts.
The heart has functions that are a little more external than those of the spirit, because the spirit is more intimate than the human heart; on the other hand the heart is related with the conscience of the spirit, but it is, so to speak, the door through which life flows. "Keep your heart with all vigilance, for from it flow the springs of life" (Proverbs 4:23). The door from which the Spirit of the Lord comes out of the depths, out of intimacy, toward the outside, is the heart. If you study what the functions of the heart are in the Bible, you will see that they are the same as those of our soul, so that to say 'heart' and 'soul' is almost the same thing, with the difference that when you say heart, you are talking about something more, because it contains the conscience of the spirit.
Because, what are the functions of the heart? The Bible says: "... because if our heart condemn us, God is greater than our heart, and knoweth all things" (1 John 3:20-21); which is to say that that function of the conscience, of condemning or affirming, is of the heart. There we see the function that the heart, with the human spirit, is that of the conscience. Also in Hebrews 4:12 it says: "For the word of God is living, and active, and sharper than any two-edged sword, and piercing even to the dividing of soul and spirit, of both joints and marrow, and quick to discern the thoughts and intents of the heart." The functions of the soul are referred to here, because its intentions are exercised with the mind and the will. There is a flowing from within toward the outside, from the spirit to the soul, to the heart.
The life that every child of God already has is kept very deep within us. But often in our thinking -because when we say heart, we need to understand it in its totality: that the thoughts are of the heart, the intentions are of the heart, the conscience is of the heart, emotions are of the heart - we will say, yes, Christ dwells in my heart, I accepted Christ into my heart. It is very easy to say that, but to live it out is different. To have Christ dwelling in my heart means that Christ is dwelling in my thoughts. But how many children of God have thoughts where Christ doesn't dwell. This means that the process of Christ dwelling in the heart is something more complex; that Christ dwell in my thoughts, dwell in my emotions, requires a process, a development, because how many children of God have emotions of anger, of laziness, of rebelliousness, of adultery, or of anything else, and we are legitimate Christians and we have the Lord in our spirit, but our emotions are not yet sufficiently controlled or indwelt by Christ, and if we are not strengthened in the inner man, those emotions become a giant that is difficult to manage and to control. But if we are strengthened in the inner man, this controls those emotions, it brings our thoughts captive to the obedience of Christ, it brings the will into line with the will of God, because it is a flowing of Christ that comes from within toward the outside.
That is a spiritual law: all that which is of God is in Christ; all that which is of God and Christ, is in the Spirit; all that is of the Spirit comes to our spirit, and all that which is of God the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, and which is in our spirit, has to be formed, to be transfused into our thoughts, intentions, emotions, conscience; that is to say, in our hearts. In 1 Corinthians 14:15, when Paul speaks of praying in the spirit, he says: "I will pray with the spirit, and I will pray with the understanding also" In verse 13 it says: "... Wherefore let him that speaketh in a tongue pray that he may interpret"
Understanding belongs to the mind of the soul, the heart, but in the spirit one is interceding, so he gives a case in which, as the mind is a little more external, it is not able to interpret the prayer of the spirit, and that's why Paul exhorts saying (verse 14): "or if I pray in a tongue, my spirit prayeth, but my understanding is unfruitful." That's why it's necessary to ask in prayer to be able to interpret it, so that the light of life doesn't just remain in the spirit but rather it lights up the eyes of understanding and flows from within toward the outside and from the inner man to also inhabit the heart.
All that is a process. Receiving the Lord gave us life; we were dead in our trespasses and sins, but when uniting with the Lord he cleansed us from our sins and gave us life and the Spirit. Then the second stage is in the heart; it is a more serious work. The work of God is true. So in order for Christ to dwell in my thoughts, God has to combat with my mind, with my mental habits, with thoughts, with lies that I have accepted as truths and that are in our thoughts. He already dwells in my spirit, but it is necessary for Him to dwell in my thoughts.
There is a very marked relationship between thoughts and feelings, because according to what I think and feel, I do. So Proverbs 23:7 tells us: " …For as he thinketh within himself, so is he: Eat and drink, saith he to thee; But his heart is not with thee." According to what the person thinks with his heart, so he does. If the devil tells you a lie as though it were truth and you accept that lie as truth, you begin to mistakenly feel and also act. To correct the behavior it is necessary to correct the feeling, and to correct the feeling one's thinking must be corrected, so as to demonstrate where the devil's lie is, because a lie cannot be expelled as if it were a demon, because a demon is a person, and demons' deceit exists in the person; the demon can leave, but if the lie is there, that lie cannot be driven out, one has to remove falsehood with the truth.
That work of Christ's dwelling in the heart is a true and meticulous surgical operation conducted by the Lord, with our mental habits, decisive feelings; in that process God is operating. God truly wants something for himself; he wants to flow in us and that our thoughts agree with his, but often he thinks one thing and we another, because his thoughts are not ours, so our thoughts have to learn how to be subject to Christ; and that is a long work of God that one can only do with the strengthening of the inner man.
Before the strengthening of the inner man, we don't want to, but now we do; before you thought bad things, now you think good things; before you were opaque, now you are luminous, because you were strengthened in the inner man. But now your thoughts need to be indwelt by Christ. Your thoughts, your determinations, must go on being increasingly crystalline, more transparent. You can put water in a glass if it is clean, and if somebody drinks that water, it tastes like water because it is pure and the glass is clean. But if the glass is not clean, although the water is clean, the glass adds a different or strange flavor. It is water, but it also has some strange elements.
We are that dirty glass; we have the treasure but in vessels of clay. When we meet with our brothers and sisters, seemingly all is well, but there is always a strange flavor that should be treated; that strange flavor is where Christ is not dwelling, but rather there is an old element that should be renovated by the Spirit. That is a true operation of God, and it is not only a pretty doctrine but a surgical operation that God does with each child, with all our personality, because he wants to be reflected through our personality; our personality must be purified, renovated.
Fourth step: To understand the measure of Christ
In the previous steps we have spoken of a process on an individual level; now enters a step at a collective level. The objective of being strengthened in the inner man is for Christ to dwell in the heart, and the objective of this is the present successive link, which we can locate again in verses 17-19a: "that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; to the end that ye, being rooted and grounded in love, may be strong to apprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ which passeth knowledge…"
Why does the Lord need to do that work in the heart until the point where we listen to the guidance of God and the inner voice? So that you may "be strong to apprehend with all the saints" the measure of Christ. An individual cannot understand the measure of Christ, but rather he has to be understood collectively. In order for me to be able to understand the measure of Christ with my brothers and sisters, I must be previously dealt with in my heart otherwise I won't accept my brother. I will accept myself, but I won't believe that God can tell me something through another brother. That's why it is necessary for God to begin to operate in each one of us; so we may learn how to understand collectively. It's one thing to understand something individually, but it is another altogether when we are together, because between us we all understand more since what one understands individually is one solitary thing, but what one understands with others is greater.
Brother Watchman Nee gave a very beautiful example in a book which deals with some topics that he shared just before being imprisoned for 20 years. He said that if a glass is broken into many pieces, there may not be one piece missing; they may all be there; but, how much water can the glass pieces contain? A piece can only contain a certain level, but when all the pieces form a glass, they not only contain the sum of what each piece can contain, but even more. For example, if one piece can contain 2 and another 2, this equals 4, and another 2, equals 6, and another two, 8... 24... 32... 40. If each one of us contains 2, what we contain separately is 40; but if we join them together, we will no longer only contain 40, but 2,000, 5,000; because a whole glass fits more in it than the broken glass. As individuals, we can contain a certain measure, but as the Church we were predestined to contain the fullness, but this is something very serious.
Brother, you will perhaps learn that the greatest sufferings that you will have in your life won't come from the devil, or from enemies; you may receive them from those dearest or closest to you, from your friends; you will be deeply wounded, perhaps criticized or shown up or embarrassed, or perhaps looked down upon, or rejected, or ignored; but those sufferings teach us not to behave in that way with others.
One cannot realize how one is with others, until another is like that with us, then we realize. There we have the example of Jacob. He didn't realize that he was Jacob, the cheat, the usurper. God had a purpose with Jacob and needed to deal with him, and God knew where Jacob needed to go to learn, and guided him to Laban, his uncle. In the relationship with his uncle, he not only tried to change the skin of the livestock, but rather his uncle changed his wife, and he changed his wage 30 times. We realize what we do to others when they do it to us. The Lord truly deals with us. If someone tries to escape being dealt with, they will remain outside of the Church, far from God's plan; if we really want to walk God's way, we have to accept many dispositions from the Lord that may bother us or hurt us, because it is necessary to learn how to understand together with others, and this is very difficult. It is very difficult to come to an agreement with people who see things differently, who have a different temperament, different character; some are extroverted, others introverted; some are hyperactive and others are lazy.
Fifth step: The Church filled with the fullness of God
It is necessary to learn how to be a single and whole glass, not a broken one. In verse 19b it says: "... that ye may be filled unto all the fulness of God." God has predestined the Church as a vessel for His fullness; but in order for that fullness of God to fit into the Church, this has to be very coordinated as a single Body, and that coordination, that connection of the one with the other is painful for the flesh but good for the spirit, because God doesn't put us with people who we like. If the decision depended on us, we would choose people who we like, but God has other children, maybe those who one didn't want to be with, and God puts you with them and you must learn how to swallow hard, to bear with them and to suffer; and that means denying yourself, and another denying himself, until there is nothing left of him or you except Christ in him, and Christ in you.
That's where to find Christ's fullness. This is nothing theoretical; the Lord is not happy with theories or libraries full of the topics of the Church; that is all very well, but it is not enough; he wants a true Church, and for us to learn how to be integrated with one another, even if they are not our friends; there is every type of variety in the Church.
The Word says: "that ye may be strengthened with power through his Spirit in the inward man... strong to apprehend with all the saints...." How difficult it is to "apprehend with all..."; it is very easy to be sure of my opinion, to be sure of my wisdom, of the clear interpretation of doctrine, and so why should I have to listen to others' interpretation, and I refute it and I underestimate it before hearing it. It is necessary to try to understand others and to recognize that he was also right and that it enriches me with what I didn't see and perhaps God enriches him with what I say, and I am no longer alone seeing two, and he alone seeing two, but together we see ten, because by joining two and two they are four, but four have relationship with eight and increases the union; this is something very practical and it is necessary to learn how to avoid being guided by natural tastes, but rather allowing the dispositions of God to prevail as God has ordered the circumstances in ones' life, with people that he wants, be it that they are pleasant or not.
We have to learn something of that because the individual life is not sufficient, but rather we need understanding with all the saints the measure of Christ, and then to reach the last step, so that you are filled "with all the fullness of God", predestined as saints, as one Body. This is the way ahead that awaits us.
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By: Gino Iafrancesco V. / Traslation: Andrew Web.
THE FELLOWSHIP OF THE HOLY SPIRIT
THE FELLOWSHIP OF THE HOLY SPIRIT
The Trinity is the virtue and the model of the fellowship of Christ's Body.
The fellowship of the Holy Spirit
Gino Iafrancesco
God's desire is that man corporately participates in the fellowship of the Trinity. That's why God said: "Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion" (Gen. 1:26a). In the unique essence of the Divinity three people subsist: the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. These three divine people live in a perfect fellowship. It was the Father's pleasure that in His Son dwell all the fullness (Colossians 1:19). And all that belongs to the Father belongs to the Son, and all that belongs to the Son belongs to the Father (Jn. 17:10). Between the Father and the Son such a perfect, full and divine fellowship exists that the outcome of the Divine Love thus shared is the Holy Spirit who comes from the Father and the Son.
Jesus Christ established the fellowship of the Trinity as a virtue and a model for the fellowship of the Church, which is the fellowship of the Holy Spirit. In his priesthood prayer He prayed thus: "Neither for these only do I pray, but for them also that believe on me through their word; that they may all be one; even as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be in us: that the world may believe that thou didst send me" (Jn. 17:20-21). When Jesus said: "even as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee", it was with this that He established the pattern. And when He said: "that they also may be in us", He established the only virtue upon which that unity and fellowship are possible.
It is not just about any type of unity, nor any type of fellowship, but the fellowship of the Trinity, the fellowship of the Holy Spirit who is the divine fullness coming from the Father and the Son toward us, to incorporate us into the unity and into the 'koinonia ' or fellowship that God has established that we live on the earth.
What God has established is that the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be lived by the Church out on this earth before the world's eyes, so that it may believe. People will be liberated from the world and incorporated into this fellowship by the testimony of the Church.
The fellowship of the Trinity begins to be lived as the fellowship of the Holy Spirit. In fact that was the apostle Paul's burden regarding the Church. He wrote to the Corinthians: "the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Spirit, be with you all" (2 Co. 13:14). He mentions the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ first, since it is the first thing that we receive in order to become participants of God's love. The love of God was manifest through the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ; and it is the experience of the grace in Christ that demonstrates that love to us. The love of God should be received through the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ. The effect of having received that grace and that love is that we are introduced into the fellowship of the Holy Spirit which is mentioned third.
In the love of the Father, the grace of the Son and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, the Triune God has been given to the Church, in the universal and in each locality - in the case of this epistle, Corinth.
That the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with the church in each locality is the burden of the apostolic heart. The first burden is that in the locality the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ be received, because it is that which brings us into contact with the love of God; but once that is already in place, the burden is that the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be corporately with each of the members of the church of the locality and with Christ's body in general, because then the churches of the localities will also have fellowship with one another that is due of Christ's Body.
Apostles are administrators of the grace of God (Eph. 3:2), and that's why the burden of the apostolic heart is that as a result of this grace which is administered, as those sent by Jesus Christ Himself for this purpose, as ministers of reconciliation, that the practical experience of the fellowship of the Holy Spirit may take place among all those that, by the grace of Christ, have received the love of God. The fellowship of the Holy Spirit manifested in the church of each locality is here, in the verse mentioned, the burden of the apostolic heart. God wants this type of fellowship to be that which is in each locality on the earth, by means of the Church.
The fellowship of the Holy Spirit
If we speak of types of fellowship, it is because there are several classes of companionships and several classes of unity which exist between men. Therefore, it is necessary to be very specific when we refer to the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, because it is not necessarily the same as other types of unity or companionship. Here we speak of the fellowship of the Holy Spirit. This means, on the one hand that this fellowship is exclusively restricted to people who have Christ's Spirit. St. Paul teaches by the Spirit that "...but if any one has not the Spirit of Christ he is not of him" (Rom. 8:9. That is to say that only those who have Christ's Spirit participate in the fellowship of the Holy Spirit.
On the other hand, the fellowship of the Holy Spirit implies embracing all those that have Christ's Spirit. The fellowship of the Holy Spirit reaches wherever Christ's Spirit has reached. Participation with Christ's Spirit is the limit of the fellowship of the Holy Spirit. Christ's Spirit is, therefore, the element that makes this fellowship possible. Everything that is estranged from Christ's Spirit is not part of the fellowship of the Holy Spirit. Thus any type of ecumenism which seeks to incorporate something different to what is characteristic of Christ's own Spirit, is not the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, but rather a different type of fellowship or companionship whose virtue is not Christ, and therefore, is exposed to be used by the antichrist's spirit to facilitate the hegemonic purposes of Satan.
Some seek to mix biblical Christianity with Judaism, and even with Islam, suggesting that we all have the same God as Abraham. But Jesus Christ and the apostles are very clear in declaring that whoever does not have the Son, does not have the Father; whoever does not receive the Son, does not receive the Father either; and whoever does not honor the Son, does not honor the Father (2 Jn. 9; 1 Jn. 2:23; Jn. 5:23; 15:23).
So some may appear to be "apostles" of ecumenism, but that doesn't mean that they are apostles of Christ. On the contrary; Jesus said that whoever does not receive him, will receive another (Jn. 5:43). That's why other sought-out companionships which are not exclusively based around Jesus Christ's name, and that are truly in His Spirit, are so dangerous. The fellowship of the Holy Spirit is restricted to the limits of participation with Christ's Spirit.
But sometimes, when one doesn't sin in excess, one sins by defect. On the one hand, some, openly or subtly, seek to direct the people of God to a fellowship type beyond the allowed limits. This is related to other interests behind its diplomacy because Christ is not the basis. On the other hand, some seek to narrow the limits of fellowship in a sectarian fashion, impeding legitimate brothers and sisters in Christ from having full fellowship with one another. This is because neither their basis for fellowship nor their centre is Christ, but some organization that is inferior to Christ's own Body, or some exclusivist tendency. Thus some incorporate strange elements into Christ, mixing the Church with the world. And others divide the Church into tendencies and organizations that constitute divisions, because their principle of fellowship is not the common participation with Christ's Spirit, but some narrow type of sectarianism. This is not fellowship of the Holy Spirit either. That is one of the problems of denominationalism: That not all that are present are necessarily of Christ's Spirit, and that indeed, many who are of Christ's Spirit are not present.
The fellowship of the Holy Spirit is that, as a principle, all those who are present are of Christ, on the one hand. And on the other hand, it is open, as a principle, to the full fellowship with all those that belong to Christ, by virtue of Him. This full fellowship implies the disarmament of sectarianism, and in its place, to have the practice, in principle, of the fellowship of a single family, that of God, in full fellowship as a single church in each population in the given locality, and as a single Body in the universal.
On the other hand, there is a hybrid phenomenon of those who, in their ecumenical diplomacy, manufacture a "fellowship" whose basis is not Christ, whilst at the same time, in their exclusivity, place limits on the legitimate fellowship of the Holy Spirit among the brothers and sisters. This is due to the fact that their source is not the Holy Spirit, and that's why they can reject those of Christ and incorporate those who reject Him.
In the religious world these phenomena occur; and that's why the Church should discern what the true fellowship of the Holy Spirit is. Only the fellowship of the Holy Spirit is the legitimate fellowship of Christ's Body. It is not a fellowship of organizational leaders, but of the full fellowship of all the brothers and sisters in Christ, by virtue of Christ, and as a single church in each locality and a single Body universally. The same family. Their model and their sustenance is the fellowship of the Father and of the Son.
The apostolic fellowship
This is also the legitimate apostolic fellowship. The New Testament speaks to us of the fellowship of the apostles and of the fellowship with the apostles. The apostle John writes in his first epistle: "that which we have seen and heard declare we unto you also, that ye also may have fellowshipwith us: yea, and our fellowship is with the Father, and with his Son Jesus Christ" (1 Jn. 1:3).
So the apostolic testimony arises from the revelation and commission of Jesus Christ to the apostles; that which was seen and heard by them, and which is constituted in the doctrine of the apostles. The doctrine of the apostles produces the apostolic fellowship, the fellowship of the apostles and with the apostles. That doctrine of the apostles is found in all the New Testament.
The fellowship of the Trinity, of the Father and of the Son in the Holy Spirit, produces the fellowship of the apostles. The fellowship of the apostles is truly with the Father and with His Son Jesus Christ, a virtue and model of their fellowship. When we receive the Lord Jesus Christ, believing in the Son of God according to the doctrine of the apostles just as it is in the New Testament, then thanks to this, by the Spirit we enter into fellowship with the Father and with His Son Jesus Christ, by which we also participate in the apostolic fellowship which is the same. This is the fellowship of the Holy Spirit. The fellowship established by God on the earth, and to which we all owe as believers in Jesus Christ, is the fellowship with the Father thanks to Jesus Christ, and is also the fellowship with Jesus Christ resurrected by means of the Holy Spirit.
To have this fellowship with the Father and with His Son Jesus Christ, we need to fully receive the fundamental doctrine of the apostles, just as it is in the New Testament. Then we have the apostolic fellowship. Then we participate in the fellowship that the apostles had with one another in the Father and in the Son. Then we have fellowship with the apostles in God and Christ. Then we have the fellowship of the apostles belonging to Christ's Body and by that cause and that virtue we have fellowship with one another, the fellowship of the saints, the fellowship of the Holy Spirit. And if we participate with the apostles in the work of the ministry, we also participate in the grace and fellowship of the gospel (Phil. 1).
It is the doctrine of the apostles according to the New Testament that produces fellowship with one another in Christ, the fellowship of the saints, the fellowship of Christ's Body. Why? Because the doctrine of the apostles is the announcement of the fellowship with the Father and with His Son Jesus Christ. When we believe in such an announcement and we receive God through Jesus Christ, by faith, we receive the gift of the Holy Spirit, which introduces us into the fellowship. It is the common participation with Christ's Spirit which makes us a participant of the fellowship of the Holy Spirit.
From the fellowship of the Trinity comes the fellowship of the apostles, which is the fellowship with the Father and with the Son in the Holy Spirit; and, therefore, as a result, the fellowship of the apostles, the fellowship with the apostles, the fellowship of the Holy Spirit. This fellowship of the Holy Spirit extends to the church in each locality by means of the fellowship with the apostles. That is to say, being in one spirit with them, according to their doctrine, in accordance with the New Testament. So the fellowship of the Holy Spirit extended to the Church produces the fellowship of the saints with one another, thanks to the Trinity, which is the true fellowship of Christ's Body. The fundamental element that sustains the fellowship of the Holy Spirit in the body of Christ is the Spirit of Christ Himself, testified to by the apostles as in the New Testament.
If somebody has fellowship with the Father, thanks to Jesus Christ, according to the announcement of the apostles, according to the New Testament, then that person has Christ's Spirit, and therefore belongs to Christ's Body. All the members of Christ's Body draw near to God and to one another as one, by means of Jesus Christ's blood and His Spirit. Therefore, the blessing of the cup that we bless is the fellowship of Christ's blood. And the bread that we break is the fellowship of Christ's body (1 Co. 10:16-17).
Such a body is one, and, therefore, should not be divided, because Christ is not divided and we all participate of the same bread being one in Christ. So one must not be allowed to seek to break the full fellowship of Christ's members, if we are in the same Spirit of Christ.
Sectarianism
Sectarianism consists in impeding the full fellowship of all the brothers and sisters in Christ as a singularly manifest body in each locality as a candlestick, the church of the respective locality, where the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, in complete unity of spirit, doctrine and administration must be manifest.
When other types of fellowship and companionship are established, different to the full fellowship of the Holy Spirit in the church of the locality, and among the local churches universally, and instead of this, establishing divided organizations smaller than the Body and the church of the locality, then the sin of division and sectarianism is being committed. That type of fellowship is not of the Holy Spirit, because it separates the brothers and sisters in Christ in diverse parties, like those of denominational type. Therefore, brothers have no other option than, walking in Christ's Spirit, according to the doctrine of the apostles in the New Testament, to practice the full fellowship of the Holy Spirit with all our brothers and sisters in Christ, in our respective localities, and in the whole world as a single Church, universally and locally.
Whilst it depends on us, we are open to the full fellowship in Christ with all our brothers and sisters. In Christ, obviously. We don't have any other fellowship than that of the Holy Spirit, that of the apostles according to the New Testament, that of the blood and of the body of Christ. We are nothing other than The Church, universally speaking, and the church in our respective locality, including all our brothers and sisters, although some of them refuse to obey the Word and to give testimony of unity. The Church is universally one, and it is one in each locality, and has the doctrine of the apostles, Christ's Spirit, the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, and also its own discipline in the moral and doctrinal. The local churches are several, but only one per locality, according to population, municipality or city. Each one represents the universal Church in their locality.
Any "fellowship" whose limits are different to those of the Holy Spirit's, is not the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, because it is based on something else, and is under a control different to that of the Head by the Spirit of the Word. Any control that substitutes that of the Head, Jesus Christ, in the Spirit of the Word, and that separates those who belong to Christ, or that mixes that which is of Christ with that of the world is not under the direction of the Holy Spirit. Whoever doesn't practice the fellowship of the Holy Spirit within the only Body of Christ, according to the doctrine of the apostles in accordance with the New Testament, are not under the government of Christ, but are under the control or influence of another spirit.
A legitimate son of God can fall into the error of disobeying the Spirit of the Word of God and undergo the influence of other spirits, and thus harming himself. But he can be corrected by the truth in a spirit of meekness. Sectarian companionships hinder the full fellowship of the Holy Spirit, because their limitations are not Christ's Spirit, and by not being subject to the Word of God, they are under the control of another. The "fellowship" of Babel, where divisive structures are linked around a center different to the Christ of the Scriptures, is not the fellowship that God wants, but rather the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, in which all the saints in Christ, bought by His blood and regenerated by His Spirit, are one, and they meet as a single church in their respective polis, be it in one or several places, but together and in one accord in the locality, and in fellowship in Christ with the other churches of other populations.
The Trinity is the virtue and the model of fellowship
We are all called to walk to the height of the supreme calling in Christ Jesus, and we cannot be satisfied with the state of division or of mixture practiced by many among the people of God. The Trinity is the virtue and the model of the fellowship of Christ's Body, in order that it be lived out in the world in this time, so that the world may believe and see that God sent Jesus Christ and that He has loved us as He loved His Son.
To keep the unity of the Spirit in one Body requires application and diligence, since all the children of God have been made to drink of the same Spirit. We are only asked to keep the unity of the Spirit which is already a divine fact. All those who have Christ's Spirit participate in the unity of the Spirit and of the Body. The Spirit is one from eternity. If we allow the Lord to express Himself in us, then the fellowship of the Holy Spirit will manifest itself.
God did not create the earth in vain, nor did He give it over to the devil forever, but to manifest His divine economy in it. The Bible speaks to us of a single Body of Christ; therefore, we must have fellowship with all those who the Lord has received as children, because they are our brothers and sisters; it doesn't matter who preached to them or what mission has evangelized them. If those who led them to Christ were really servants of God and not of themselves, they would allow the Body, and nothing less, to take care of leading them toward the direction of the Head according to the Scriptures. Although the Lord will also distribute the work in the Body according to how He wants.
On the other hand, we cannot have spiritual fellowship with one with whom the Lord doesn't have fellowship. Our fellowship should be neither bigger nor smaller than that of what God wants. We should not guide ourselves by our merely natural likenesses, but according to the disposition of the Spirit of God according to the Holy Scriptures. All that comes from Adam must go through the cross, so that on the other side of it, reconciled in Christ, we can be a single Body.
The Gospel is preached precisely to introduce people into the fellowship of the Holy Spirit under Christ's authority, and not so that they may become proselytes of something smaller than Christ's Body and under a different direction than that of the Lord according to His Word. It is the doctrine of the apostles that produces the apostolic fellowship. If something other than this were sowed, something else will be produced. Secret societies also have rituals and covenants with which to bind people, as one makes in the sectarian practice, but they do not produce the fellowship of the Holy Spirit on the earth, nor the edification of Christ's Body.
When the apostles founded the churches, one per locality according to the New Testament, they didn't divide them into ministerial sects, a portion for each one in each locality, but rather all worked in the functioning of the entire Body. In Corinth they could not allow a "church" of Paul, and another of Apollos, and another of Cephas, but only the church in Corinth with all the saints in Christ in fellowship as a single Body, the candlestick of the city. In Jerusalem we do not see the "church" of Peter, nor of Andrew, nor of Thomas, etc., but simply the church in Jerusalem, all together and in one accord. The same thing was true in Antioch and in the rest of the New Testament. That is the fellowship of the apostles, of Christ's Body, of the Holy Spirit, of the Trinity, incorporating all the legitimate children of God in Christ into one.
To really co-work in the Father's business as Jesus Christ did, implies dying to ourselves and to live by the Spirit of Christ according to the doctrine and fellowship of the apostles. We must not be deceived by appearances, but judge with righteous judgment and spiritually discern the things of the Spirit of God, such as the true fellowship of Christ's Body.
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By: Gino Iafrancesco V. / Traslation: Andrew Web.
The Trinity is the virtue and the model of the fellowship of Christ's Body.
The fellowship of the Holy Spirit
Gino Iafrancesco
God's desire is that man corporately participates in the fellowship of the Trinity. That's why God said: "Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion" (Gen. 1:26a). In the unique essence of the Divinity three people subsist: the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. These three divine people live in a perfect fellowship. It was the Father's pleasure that in His Son dwell all the fullness (Colossians 1:19). And all that belongs to the Father belongs to the Son, and all that belongs to the Son belongs to the Father (Jn. 17:10). Between the Father and the Son such a perfect, full and divine fellowship exists that the outcome of the Divine Love thus shared is the Holy Spirit who comes from the Father and the Son.
Jesus Christ established the fellowship of the Trinity as a virtue and a model for the fellowship of the Church, which is the fellowship of the Holy Spirit. In his priesthood prayer He prayed thus: "Neither for these only do I pray, but for them also that believe on me through their word; that they may all be one; even as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be in us: that the world may believe that thou didst send me" (Jn. 17:20-21). When Jesus said: "even as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee", it was with this that He established the pattern. And when He said: "that they also may be in us", He established the only virtue upon which that unity and fellowship are possible.
It is not just about any type of unity, nor any type of fellowship, but the fellowship of the Trinity, the fellowship of the Holy Spirit who is the divine fullness coming from the Father and the Son toward us, to incorporate us into the unity and into the 'koinonia ' or fellowship that God has established that we live on the earth.
What God has established is that the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be lived by the Church out on this earth before the world's eyes, so that it may believe. People will be liberated from the world and incorporated into this fellowship by the testimony of the Church.
The fellowship of the Trinity begins to be lived as the fellowship of the Holy Spirit. In fact that was the apostle Paul's burden regarding the Church. He wrote to the Corinthians: "the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Spirit, be with you all" (2 Co. 13:14). He mentions the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ first, since it is the first thing that we receive in order to become participants of God's love. The love of God was manifest through the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ; and it is the experience of the grace in Christ that demonstrates that love to us. The love of God should be received through the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ. The effect of having received that grace and that love is that we are introduced into the fellowship of the Holy Spirit which is mentioned third.
In the love of the Father, the grace of the Son and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, the Triune God has been given to the Church, in the universal and in each locality - in the case of this epistle, Corinth.
That the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with the church in each locality is the burden of the apostolic heart. The first burden is that in the locality the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ be received, because it is that which brings us into contact with the love of God; but once that is already in place, the burden is that the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be corporately with each of the members of the church of the locality and with Christ's body in general, because then the churches of the localities will also have fellowship with one another that is due of Christ's Body.
Apostles are administrators of the grace of God (Eph. 3:2), and that's why the burden of the apostolic heart is that as a result of this grace which is administered, as those sent by Jesus Christ Himself for this purpose, as ministers of reconciliation, that the practical experience of the fellowship of the Holy Spirit may take place among all those that, by the grace of Christ, have received the love of God. The fellowship of the Holy Spirit manifested in the church of each locality is here, in the verse mentioned, the burden of the apostolic heart. God wants this type of fellowship to be that which is in each locality on the earth, by means of the Church.
The fellowship of the Holy Spirit
If we speak of types of fellowship, it is because there are several classes of companionships and several classes of unity which exist between men. Therefore, it is necessary to be very specific when we refer to the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, because it is not necessarily the same as other types of unity or companionship. Here we speak of the fellowship of the Holy Spirit. This means, on the one hand that this fellowship is exclusively restricted to people who have Christ's Spirit. St. Paul teaches by the Spirit that "...but if any one has not the Spirit of Christ he is not of him" (Rom. 8:9. That is to say that only those who have Christ's Spirit participate in the fellowship of the Holy Spirit.
On the other hand, the fellowship of the Holy Spirit implies embracing all those that have Christ's Spirit. The fellowship of the Holy Spirit reaches wherever Christ's Spirit has reached. Participation with Christ's Spirit is the limit of the fellowship of the Holy Spirit. Christ's Spirit is, therefore, the element that makes this fellowship possible. Everything that is estranged from Christ's Spirit is not part of the fellowship of the Holy Spirit. Thus any type of ecumenism which seeks to incorporate something different to what is characteristic of Christ's own Spirit, is not the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, but rather a different type of fellowship or companionship whose virtue is not Christ, and therefore, is exposed to be used by the antichrist's spirit to facilitate the hegemonic purposes of Satan.
Some seek to mix biblical Christianity with Judaism, and even with Islam, suggesting that we all have the same God as Abraham. But Jesus Christ and the apostles are very clear in declaring that whoever does not have the Son, does not have the Father; whoever does not receive the Son, does not receive the Father either; and whoever does not honor the Son, does not honor the Father (2 Jn. 9; 1 Jn. 2:23; Jn. 5:23; 15:23).
So some may appear to be "apostles" of ecumenism, but that doesn't mean that they are apostles of Christ. On the contrary; Jesus said that whoever does not receive him, will receive another (Jn. 5:43). That's why other sought-out companionships which are not exclusively based around Jesus Christ's name, and that are truly in His Spirit, are so dangerous. The fellowship of the Holy Spirit is restricted to the limits of participation with Christ's Spirit.
But sometimes, when one doesn't sin in excess, one sins by defect. On the one hand, some, openly or subtly, seek to direct the people of God to a fellowship type beyond the allowed limits. This is related to other interests behind its diplomacy because Christ is not the basis. On the other hand, some seek to narrow the limits of fellowship in a sectarian fashion, impeding legitimate brothers and sisters in Christ from having full fellowship with one another. This is because neither their basis for fellowship nor their centre is Christ, but some organization that is inferior to Christ's own Body, or some exclusivist tendency. Thus some incorporate strange elements into Christ, mixing the Church with the world. And others divide the Church into tendencies and organizations that constitute divisions, because their principle of fellowship is not the common participation with Christ's Spirit, but some narrow type of sectarianism. This is not fellowship of the Holy Spirit either. That is one of the problems of denominationalism: That not all that are present are necessarily of Christ's Spirit, and that indeed, many who are of Christ's Spirit are not present.
The fellowship of the Holy Spirit is that, as a principle, all those who are present are of Christ, on the one hand. And on the other hand, it is open, as a principle, to the full fellowship with all those that belong to Christ, by virtue of Him. This full fellowship implies the disarmament of sectarianism, and in its place, to have the practice, in principle, of the fellowship of a single family, that of God, in full fellowship as a single church in each population in the given locality, and as a single Body in the universal.
On the other hand, there is a hybrid phenomenon of those who, in their ecumenical diplomacy, manufacture a "fellowship" whose basis is not Christ, whilst at the same time, in their exclusivity, place limits on the legitimate fellowship of the Holy Spirit among the brothers and sisters. This is due to the fact that their source is not the Holy Spirit, and that's why they can reject those of Christ and incorporate those who reject Him.
In the religious world these phenomena occur; and that's why the Church should discern what the true fellowship of the Holy Spirit is. Only the fellowship of the Holy Spirit is the legitimate fellowship of Christ's Body. It is not a fellowship of organizational leaders, but of the full fellowship of all the brothers and sisters in Christ, by virtue of Christ, and as a single church in each locality and a single Body universally. The same family. Their model and their sustenance is the fellowship of the Father and of the Son.
The apostolic fellowship
This is also the legitimate apostolic fellowship. The New Testament speaks to us of the fellowship of the apostles and of the fellowship with the apostles. The apostle John writes in his first epistle: "that which we have seen and heard declare we unto you also, that ye also may have fellowshipwith us: yea, and our fellowship is with the Father, and with his Son Jesus Christ" (1 Jn. 1:3).
So the apostolic testimony arises from the revelation and commission of Jesus Christ to the apostles; that which was seen and heard by them, and which is constituted in the doctrine of the apostles. The doctrine of the apostles produces the apostolic fellowship, the fellowship of the apostles and with the apostles. That doctrine of the apostles is found in all the New Testament.
The fellowship of the Trinity, of the Father and of the Son in the Holy Spirit, produces the fellowship of the apostles. The fellowship of the apostles is truly with the Father and with His Son Jesus Christ, a virtue and model of their fellowship. When we receive the Lord Jesus Christ, believing in the Son of God according to the doctrine of the apostles just as it is in the New Testament, then thanks to this, by the Spirit we enter into fellowship with the Father and with His Son Jesus Christ, by which we also participate in the apostolic fellowship which is the same. This is the fellowship of the Holy Spirit. The fellowship established by God on the earth, and to which we all owe as believers in Jesus Christ, is the fellowship with the Father thanks to Jesus Christ, and is also the fellowship with Jesus Christ resurrected by means of the Holy Spirit.
To have this fellowship with the Father and with His Son Jesus Christ, we need to fully receive the fundamental doctrine of the apostles, just as it is in the New Testament. Then we have the apostolic fellowship. Then we participate in the fellowship that the apostles had with one another in the Father and in the Son. Then we have fellowship with the apostles in God and Christ. Then we have the fellowship of the apostles belonging to Christ's Body and by that cause and that virtue we have fellowship with one another, the fellowship of the saints, the fellowship of the Holy Spirit. And if we participate with the apostles in the work of the ministry, we also participate in the grace and fellowship of the gospel (Phil. 1).
It is the doctrine of the apostles according to the New Testament that produces fellowship with one another in Christ, the fellowship of the saints, the fellowship of Christ's Body. Why? Because the doctrine of the apostles is the announcement of the fellowship with the Father and with His Son Jesus Christ. When we believe in such an announcement and we receive God through Jesus Christ, by faith, we receive the gift of the Holy Spirit, which introduces us into the fellowship. It is the common participation with Christ's Spirit which makes us a participant of the fellowship of the Holy Spirit.
From the fellowship of the Trinity comes the fellowship of the apostles, which is the fellowship with the Father and with the Son in the Holy Spirit; and, therefore, as a result, the fellowship of the apostles, the fellowship with the apostles, the fellowship of the Holy Spirit. This fellowship of the Holy Spirit extends to the church in each locality by means of the fellowship with the apostles. That is to say, being in one spirit with them, according to their doctrine, in accordance with the New Testament. So the fellowship of the Holy Spirit extended to the Church produces the fellowship of the saints with one another, thanks to the Trinity, which is the true fellowship of Christ's Body. The fundamental element that sustains the fellowship of the Holy Spirit in the body of Christ is the Spirit of Christ Himself, testified to by the apostles as in the New Testament.
If somebody has fellowship with the Father, thanks to Jesus Christ, according to the announcement of the apostles, according to the New Testament, then that person has Christ's Spirit, and therefore belongs to Christ's Body. All the members of Christ's Body draw near to God and to one another as one, by means of Jesus Christ's blood and His Spirit. Therefore, the blessing of the cup that we bless is the fellowship of Christ's blood. And the bread that we break is the fellowship of Christ's body (1 Co. 10:16-17).
Such a body is one, and, therefore, should not be divided, because Christ is not divided and we all participate of the same bread being one in Christ. So one must not be allowed to seek to break the full fellowship of Christ's members, if we are in the same Spirit of Christ.
Sectarianism
Sectarianism consists in impeding the full fellowship of all the brothers and sisters in Christ as a singularly manifest body in each locality as a candlestick, the church of the respective locality, where the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, in complete unity of spirit, doctrine and administration must be manifest.
When other types of fellowship and companionship are established, different to the full fellowship of the Holy Spirit in the church of the locality, and among the local churches universally, and instead of this, establishing divided organizations smaller than the Body and the church of the locality, then the sin of division and sectarianism is being committed. That type of fellowship is not of the Holy Spirit, because it separates the brothers and sisters in Christ in diverse parties, like those of denominational type. Therefore, brothers have no other option than, walking in Christ's Spirit, according to the doctrine of the apostles in the New Testament, to practice the full fellowship of the Holy Spirit with all our brothers and sisters in Christ, in our respective localities, and in the whole world as a single Church, universally and locally.
Whilst it depends on us, we are open to the full fellowship in Christ with all our brothers and sisters. In Christ, obviously. We don't have any other fellowship than that of the Holy Spirit, that of the apostles according to the New Testament, that of the blood and of the body of Christ. We are nothing other than The Church, universally speaking, and the church in our respective locality, including all our brothers and sisters, although some of them refuse to obey the Word and to give testimony of unity. The Church is universally one, and it is one in each locality, and has the doctrine of the apostles, Christ's Spirit, the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, and also its own discipline in the moral and doctrinal. The local churches are several, but only one per locality, according to population, municipality or city. Each one represents the universal Church in their locality.
Any "fellowship" whose limits are different to those of the Holy Spirit's, is not the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, because it is based on something else, and is under a control different to that of the Head by the Spirit of the Word. Any control that substitutes that of the Head, Jesus Christ, in the Spirit of the Word, and that separates those who belong to Christ, or that mixes that which is of Christ with that of the world is not under the direction of the Holy Spirit. Whoever doesn't practice the fellowship of the Holy Spirit within the only Body of Christ, according to the doctrine of the apostles in accordance with the New Testament, are not under the government of Christ, but are under the control or influence of another spirit.
A legitimate son of God can fall into the error of disobeying the Spirit of the Word of God and undergo the influence of other spirits, and thus harming himself. But he can be corrected by the truth in a spirit of meekness. Sectarian companionships hinder the full fellowship of the Holy Spirit, because their limitations are not Christ's Spirit, and by not being subject to the Word of God, they are under the control of another. The "fellowship" of Babel, where divisive structures are linked around a center different to the Christ of the Scriptures, is not the fellowship that God wants, but rather the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, in which all the saints in Christ, bought by His blood and regenerated by His Spirit, are one, and they meet as a single church in their respective polis, be it in one or several places, but together and in one accord in the locality, and in fellowship in Christ with the other churches of other populations.
The Trinity is the virtue and the model of fellowship
We are all called to walk to the height of the supreme calling in Christ Jesus, and we cannot be satisfied with the state of division or of mixture practiced by many among the people of God. The Trinity is the virtue and the model of the fellowship of Christ's Body, in order that it be lived out in the world in this time, so that the world may believe and see that God sent Jesus Christ and that He has loved us as He loved His Son.
To keep the unity of the Spirit in one Body requires application and diligence, since all the children of God have been made to drink of the same Spirit. We are only asked to keep the unity of the Spirit which is already a divine fact. All those who have Christ's Spirit participate in the unity of the Spirit and of the Body. The Spirit is one from eternity. If we allow the Lord to express Himself in us, then the fellowship of the Holy Spirit will manifest itself.
God did not create the earth in vain, nor did He give it over to the devil forever, but to manifest His divine economy in it. The Bible speaks to us of a single Body of Christ; therefore, we must have fellowship with all those who the Lord has received as children, because they are our brothers and sisters; it doesn't matter who preached to them or what mission has evangelized them. If those who led them to Christ were really servants of God and not of themselves, they would allow the Body, and nothing less, to take care of leading them toward the direction of the Head according to the Scriptures. Although the Lord will also distribute the work in the Body according to how He wants.
On the other hand, we cannot have spiritual fellowship with one with whom the Lord doesn't have fellowship. Our fellowship should be neither bigger nor smaller than that of what God wants. We should not guide ourselves by our merely natural likenesses, but according to the disposition of the Spirit of God according to the Holy Scriptures. All that comes from Adam must go through the cross, so that on the other side of it, reconciled in Christ, we can be a single Body.
The Gospel is preached precisely to introduce people into the fellowship of the Holy Spirit under Christ's authority, and not so that they may become proselytes of something smaller than Christ's Body and under a different direction than that of the Lord according to His Word. It is the doctrine of the apostles that produces the apostolic fellowship. If something other than this were sowed, something else will be produced. Secret societies also have rituals and covenants with which to bind people, as one makes in the sectarian practice, but they do not produce the fellowship of the Holy Spirit on the earth, nor the edification of Christ's Body.
When the apostles founded the churches, one per locality according to the New Testament, they didn't divide them into ministerial sects, a portion for each one in each locality, but rather all worked in the functioning of the entire Body. In Corinth they could not allow a "church" of Paul, and another of Apollos, and another of Cephas, but only the church in Corinth with all the saints in Christ in fellowship as a single Body, the candlestick of the city. In Jerusalem we do not see the "church" of Peter, nor of Andrew, nor of Thomas, etc., but simply the church in Jerusalem, all together and in one accord. The same thing was true in Antioch and in the rest of the New Testament. That is the fellowship of the apostles, of Christ's Body, of the Holy Spirit, of the Trinity, incorporating all the legitimate children of God in Christ into one.
To really co-work in the Father's business as Jesus Christ did, implies dying to ourselves and to live by the Spirit of Christ according to the doctrine and fellowship of the apostles. We must not be deceived by appearances, but judge with righteous judgment and spiritually discern the things of the Spirit of God, such as the true fellowship of Christ's Body.
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By: Gino Iafrancesco V. / Traslation: Andrew Web.
TRUE CONSECRATION
TRUE CONSECRATION
No consecration or true service is possible outside of Christ, outside of His Spirit or outside of the communion of Christ's Body.
True consecration
Gino Iafrancesco
Reading: Deuteronomy 12:1-14.
The New Testament teaches us that there are essentially two ways of reading the Old. The apostle Paul, in what is called the second letter to the Corinthians, speaks to us of those two ways of reading Moses. " not as Moses, who put a veil upon his face, that the children of Israel should not look stedfastly on the end of that which was passing away: but their minds were hardened;..." Israel, when reading passages like the one that we have just read about Moses, had their minds hardened. "...for until this very day at the reading of the old covenant the same veil remaineth, it not being revealed to them that it is done away in Christ. But unto this day, whensoever Moses is read, a veil lieth upon their heart. But whensoever it shall turn to the Lord, the veil is taken away" (2 Co. 3:13-16).
From this, the Holy Spirit teaches us the relative of those two ways of reading Moses: with a veil, and without a veil. We can read Moses as the Israelites read it; with a hardened mind; but we can also read Moses, no longer from the synagogue, but in Christ and from the Church. God grants us the possibility of reading Moses without a veil in Christ, penetrating into the spiritual meaning that God anticipated when He spoke these things through Moses.
The Epistle to Hebrews in fact tells us this in respect to the following: "And Moses indeed was faithful in all his house as a servant, for a testimony of those things which were afterward to be spoken" (Heb. 3:5). Moses was faithful not only in the function of his time. When reading it one can read much more than a mere story of the past. In the times of the New Covenant something would have to be said, so God used the faithfulness of Moses. The Old Covenant was the time of figures, of symbols, of typologies. God had the intention of today stating what the hidden things behind the veil symbolized, what they were a figure of and what they typified. For that reason, in Hebrews 10:1, it also says that the Law had "a shadow of the good things to come".
When the light shines from behind a body that is approaching, the shadow arrives first, and then the reality. The shadow announces the reality that is approaching. Christ teaches us to read the reality of his mystery in the shadow that is cast. That's why Paul wrote to the Colossians saying: " Let no man therefore judge you in meat, or in drink, or in respect of a feast day or a new moon or a sabbath day: which are a shadow of the things to come; but the body is Christ's (that is to say, the reality that the shadow projected) " (Col. 2:16, 17). Today we are not in the times of shadows, figures or mere symbols, nor outside the veil, but in the time of the reality and the anticipation of the powers of the coming ages. Christ removes the veil from us so that we can experience the realities characteristic of the New Testament.
In chapter 9 of the Epistle to the Hebrews, the tabernacle that Moses erected is described; that which was inside: in the Holy Place, in the Holiest of Holies, and inside the ark, and how these things were prepared, "Now these things having been thus prepared...", also showing how the high priest entered once a year with blood. Then in the verse 8 it says: " the Holy Spirit this signifying that...", which is to say that with the things prepared in the tabernacle and its service, the Holy Spirit was today enabling us to understand things characteristic of the New Testament.
Therefore, we should not read Moses with a veil, but rather we should penetrate behind the veil and understand the spiritual meaning of those things prepared. In the following verse it says: " which is a figure for the time present ". So when we meet passages like this in Deuteronomy 12, we are not just reading old history about burnt-offerings and sacrifices in a unique sanctuary, but rather we are also reading figures, symbols, shadows and examples through which the Holy Spirit wants to say something to us for the present time. Hebrews 9:23 continues by saying: " It was necessary therefore that the copies of the things in the heavens should be cleansed with these; but the heavenly things themselves with better sacrifices than these ". So there are figures of heavenly things, and there are heavenly things themselves characteristic of the reality that the New Testament introduces.
1st Corinthians 10 reminds us of the days of Israel in the desert, and in verse 6 says: " Now these things were our examples ". Therefore, they are written for the Christian experience. Verse 11 tells us the same thing: " Now these things happened unto them by way of example; and they were written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the ages are come ". Paul wrote the same thing to the Romans: " For whatsoever things were written aforetime were written for our learning, that through patience and through comfort of the scriptures we might have hope " (Ro. 15:4). These verses not only authorize us, but rather also practically force us to interpret these passages from Moses and others in the Old Testament, in their spiritual meaning for today.
With this base we can now therefore consider the passage in Deuteronomy 12:1-14.
The true unique sanctuary
The Lord Jesus transferred the understanding of His people, from the physical temple to His own person and the Church. Moses built the tabernacle, Solomon built the temple, which was destroyed by Nebuchadnezzar, and restored by Zerubbabel. Then it was enlarged by Herod, and Jesus' disciples showed it to him in admiration. But the Lord had said: " I am able to destroy the temple of God, and to build it in three days. ". And they criticized him saying: " Forty and six years was this temple in building, and wilt thou raise it up in three days?". But when our Lord Jesus was raised up on the third day from among the dead, the apostle John said that the disciples understood that he referred to the temple of His body, which was figured by the temple. And His body is also the Church, as it is written: "... but Christ as a son, over his house; whose house are we, if we hold fast our boldness and the glorying of our hope firm unto the end " (Heb. 3:6).
So the true house of God, the true Unique Sanctuary, of that which the above-mentioned was merely a figure, is referred to as the mystery of Christ in the New Testament, of which our Lord Jesus is the head and life, and the Church the members of His body. Therefore behold the true Unique Sanctuary. Our Lord Jesus Himself is the true dwelling place of God where Yahweh wanted to put His name. The Word of God tabernacled among us as a man. And this Christ, by means of His Spirit, also entered to inhabit a spiritual house that is His people, the unique family of God. Therefore, we are built as a Holy temple on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, as a dwelling place of God in the Spirit. The chief stone of the building; the cornerstone, is Jesus Christ Himself. And He is the foundation on which the building, fitly framed together grows into the holy temple, the Unique Sanctuary.
When David wanted to build God a house, he was told that he had spilled a lot of blood, and for that reason he could not build such a house; but his son, the Son of David, He would build God a house, and God would be to Him a Father, and He would be to Him a Son. Solomon certainly raised the temple, but that was merely the figure, the scale model; the true King of Peace, the true Son of David, of which Solomon was only a figure, was our Lord Jesus, and the true temple is the Church.
Bartimaeus called him by this name, saying: "Son of David, have mercy on me." And as the Son of David He was received with 'hosannas ' when entering Jerusalem on a donkey. That's why Matthew begins his gospel recognizing the Lord Jesus as the Son of David. Stephen also remembered the words of God: The heaven is my throne, And the earth the footstool of my feet: What manner of house will ye build me?
The true house of God is not made by men's hands; it is the Church of our Lord Jesus Christ. And you know that I am not referring to any specific denomination, but to the sum of all the true children of God, truly cleansed by His blood and regenerated by His Spirit. These are the members of the body, the living stones of the house, of the Unique Sanctuary.
Therefore this refers to the mystery of Christ. The mystery of Christ is Christ's body whose head is the Lord Jesus. That is the true house of God of which Yahweh said: " Take heed to thyself that thou offer not thy burnt-offerings in every place that thou seest ". No consecration or true service is possible outside of Christ, outside of His Spirit or outside of the communion of Christ's body.
The place of consecration and service
We should look for the place chosen by God. That is the place of consecration and legitimate service. That is where they are to offer the burnt-offerings, the sacrifices, the tithes, the offerings, the first-fruits. We will only find God in Christ, and Christ in His Spirit, and His Spirit in His Word and body. Man's religious activity is almost totally useless if it is not carried out in the only place chosen by God to worship. That place is in Christ, in the Spirit, and in the communion of Christ's body. Self-righteousness, merely natural worship and division are not consecration nor true service, nor are they pleasant to God. All that is not done in Christ, all that is not done in unity with His Spirit, and in the work of the edification of His body, is a service out of place.
An altar is not enough; this should be in its place, in the Unique Sanctuary. The house is built on the good earth; which is Christ. We should destroy all rival altars in any place where they have beenraised. We should only leave room for God. All idolatry, spiritualism, animism, boasting, sectarianism, is abomination to God. The only name by which we can be saved is that of the Lord Jesus. God put His name in there for His dwelling place and to receive praise. Nobody goes to the Father but through Him. Nobody has life nor can they truly serve God if it is not in Him.
The head of the body is the first part of the mystery; the second is the Church that we know is not a stone or wooden temple. We are the Church, 24 hours both day and night in any place. We don't "go to church"; we are the Church that goes on His behalf to all places. The church works, rests, goes to the market, returns home, meets in one or more places, everything in Christ, in the Spirit and in the communion of the unique body. That is where it offers pleasant spiritual sacrifices to God through Jesus Christ.
We can only serve God in Christ, because what comes from the fallen Adam is no longer pleasant. Flesh and blood won't inherit the Kingdom of God. We need the inspiration and the sustenance of Christ's Spirit that has baptized us into a single body. This is the place that was given to us; this is what we will seek. If it is not in Christ's Spirit, then it is merely in Adam whose fallen condition was inherited by our flesh.
We only have the inheritance of Christ in His Spirit. Everything else is outside the place chosen by God for offering.
Jesus said to the Samaritan woman that God is Spirit and it is necessary to worship him in spirit and in truth. There were no longer to be any discussions about the place of worship, of consecration and of service to God. We won't take the way of Jeroboam who stole what was meant for the people of God, building a rival sanctuary and priesthood. The vineyard belongs to the Son of God. God is worshipped and served in the spirit, that which baptizes us into a single body. Only by walking in His Spirit will we truly be in Christ. Whatever is not born of the Spirit, cannot enter, nor even see the Kingdom of God. Regeneration is necessary because of the fallen state of Adam. Only by receiving Christ and walking in His Spirit will we be in the body.
To work in the flesh is to do what seems best to each person. It is necessary to cross the Jordan, dying to ourselves in Christ, which also implies dying to sectarian division. We will only have rest in the good land. God's will is that we live by faith in Christ, in His Spirit, and in the unity and communion of His only body, in the universal and in the local; that which is the true house of God which the Son of David raises for the Father. "I will build my Church," the Lord said, whose house are we, if we remain firm until the end trusting in this principle.
This whole passage of Deuteronomy 12 is for us today. Let us demolish, therefore, every place of rival adoration to the dwelling place where God put His name. Let us finish crossing the Jordan and let us, in the rest that we have in our Spirit, offer our consecration to God in the good land that is Christ where we should raise up the Unique Sanctuary.
----------------------------
By: Gino Iafrancesco V. / Traslation: Andrew Web.
No consecration or true service is possible outside of Christ, outside of His Spirit or outside of the communion of Christ's Body.
True consecration
Gino Iafrancesco
Reading: Deuteronomy 12:1-14.
The New Testament teaches us that there are essentially two ways of reading the Old. The apostle Paul, in what is called the second letter to the Corinthians, speaks to us of those two ways of reading Moses. " not as Moses, who put a veil upon his face, that the children of Israel should not look stedfastly on the end of that which was passing away: but their minds were hardened;..." Israel, when reading passages like the one that we have just read about Moses, had their minds hardened. "...for until this very day at the reading of the old covenant the same veil remaineth, it not being revealed to them that it is done away in Christ. But unto this day, whensoever Moses is read, a veil lieth upon their heart. But whensoever it shall turn to the Lord, the veil is taken away" (2 Co. 3:13-16).
From this, the Holy Spirit teaches us the relative of those two ways of reading Moses: with a veil, and without a veil. We can read Moses as the Israelites read it; with a hardened mind; but we can also read Moses, no longer from the synagogue, but in Christ and from the Church. God grants us the possibility of reading Moses without a veil in Christ, penetrating into the spiritual meaning that God anticipated when He spoke these things through Moses.
The Epistle to Hebrews in fact tells us this in respect to the following: "And Moses indeed was faithful in all his house as a servant, for a testimony of those things which were afterward to be spoken" (Heb. 3:5). Moses was faithful not only in the function of his time. When reading it one can read much more than a mere story of the past. In the times of the New Covenant something would have to be said, so God used the faithfulness of Moses. The Old Covenant was the time of figures, of symbols, of typologies. God had the intention of today stating what the hidden things behind the veil symbolized, what they were a figure of and what they typified. For that reason, in Hebrews 10:1, it also says that the Law had "a shadow of the good things to come".
When the light shines from behind a body that is approaching, the shadow arrives first, and then the reality. The shadow announces the reality that is approaching. Christ teaches us to read the reality of his mystery in the shadow that is cast. That's why Paul wrote to the Colossians saying: " Let no man therefore judge you in meat, or in drink, or in respect of a feast day or a new moon or a sabbath day: which are a shadow of the things to come; but the body is Christ's (that is to say, the reality that the shadow projected) " (Col. 2:16, 17). Today we are not in the times of shadows, figures or mere symbols, nor outside the veil, but in the time of the reality and the anticipation of the powers of the coming ages. Christ removes the veil from us so that we can experience the realities characteristic of the New Testament.
In chapter 9 of the Epistle to the Hebrews, the tabernacle that Moses erected is described; that which was inside: in the Holy Place, in the Holiest of Holies, and inside the ark, and how these things were prepared, "Now these things having been thus prepared...", also showing how the high priest entered once a year with blood. Then in the verse 8 it says: " the Holy Spirit this signifying that...", which is to say that with the things prepared in the tabernacle and its service, the Holy Spirit was today enabling us to understand things characteristic of the New Testament.
Therefore, we should not read Moses with a veil, but rather we should penetrate behind the veil and understand the spiritual meaning of those things prepared. In the following verse it says: " which is a figure for the time present ". So when we meet passages like this in Deuteronomy 12, we are not just reading old history about burnt-offerings and sacrifices in a unique sanctuary, but rather we are also reading figures, symbols, shadows and examples through which the Holy Spirit wants to say something to us for the present time. Hebrews 9:23 continues by saying: " It was necessary therefore that the copies of the things in the heavens should be cleansed with these; but the heavenly things themselves with better sacrifices than these ". So there are figures of heavenly things, and there are heavenly things themselves characteristic of the reality that the New Testament introduces.
1st Corinthians 10 reminds us of the days of Israel in the desert, and in verse 6 says: " Now these things were our examples ". Therefore, they are written for the Christian experience. Verse 11 tells us the same thing: " Now these things happened unto them by way of example; and they were written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the ages are come ". Paul wrote the same thing to the Romans: " For whatsoever things were written aforetime were written for our learning, that through patience and through comfort of the scriptures we might have hope " (Ro. 15:4). These verses not only authorize us, but rather also practically force us to interpret these passages from Moses and others in the Old Testament, in their spiritual meaning for today.
With this base we can now therefore consider the passage in Deuteronomy 12:1-14.
The true unique sanctuary
The Lord Jesus transferred the understanding of His people, from the physical temple to His own person and the Church. Moses built the tabernacle, Solomon built the temple, which was destroyed by Nebuchadnezzar, and restored by Zerubbabel. Then it was enlarged by Herod, and Jesus' disciples showed it to him in admiration. But the Lord had said: " I am able to destroy the temple of God, and to build it in three days. ". And they criticized him saying: " Forty and six years was this temple in building, and wilt thou raise it up in three days?". But when our Lord Jesus was raised up on the third day from among the dead, the apostle John said that the disciples understood that he referred to the temple of His body, which was figured by the temple. And His body is also the Church, as it is written: "... but Christ as a son, over his house; whose house are we, if we hold fast our boldness and the glorying of our hope firm unto the end " (Heb. 3:6).
So the true house of God, the true Unique Sanctuary, of that which the above-mentioned was merely a figure, is referred to as the mystery of Christ in the New Testament, of which our Lord Jesus is the head and life, and the Church the members of His body. Therefore behold the true Unique Sanctuary. Our Lord Jesus Himself is the true dwelling place of God where Yahweh wanted to put His name. The Word of God tabernacled among us as a man. And this Christ, by means of His Spirit, also entered to inhabit a spiritual house that is His people, the unique family of God. Therefore, we are built as a Holy temple on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, as a dwelling place of God in the Spirit. The chief stone of the building; the cornerstone, is Jesus Christ Himself. And He is the foundation on which the building, fitly framed together grows into the holy temple, the Unique Sanctuary.
When David wanted to build God a house, he was told that he had spilled a lot of blood, and for that reason he could not build such a house; but his son, the Son of David, He would build God a house, and God would be to Him a Father, and He would be to Him a Son. Solomon certainly raised the temple, but that was merely the figure, the scale model; the true King of Peace, the true Son of David, of which Solomon was only a figure, was our Lord Jesus, and the true temple is the Church.
Bartimaeus called him by this name, saying: "Son of David, have mercy on me." And as the Son of David He was received with 'hosannas ' when entering Jerusalem on a donkey. That's why Matthew begins his gospel recognizing the Lord Jesus as the Son of David. Stephen also remembered the words of God: The heaven is my throne, And the earth the footstool of my feet: What manner of house will ye build me?
The true house of God is not made by men's hands; it is the Church of our Lord Jesus Christ. And you know that I am not referring to any specific denomination, but to the sum of all the true children of God, truly cleansed by His blood and regenerated by His Spirit. These are the members of the body, the living stones of the house, of the Unique Sanctuary.
Therefore this refers to the mystery of Christ. The mystery of Christ is Christ's body whose head is the Lord Jesus. That is the true house of God of which Yahweh said: " Take heed to thyself that thou offer not thy burnt-offerings in every place that thou seest ". No consecration or true service is possible outside of Christ, outside of His Spirit or outside of the communion of Christ's body.
The place of consecration and service
We should look for the place chosen by God. That is the place of consecration and legitimate service. That is where they are to offer the burnt-offerings, the sacrifices, the tithes, the offerings, the first-fruits. We will only find God in Christ, and Christ in His Spirit, and His Spirit in His Word and body. Man's religious activity is almost totally useless if it is not carried out in the only place chosen by God to worship. That place is in Christ, in the Spirit, and in the communion of Christ's body. Self-righteousness, merely natural worship and division are not consecration nor true service, nor are they pleasant to God. All that is not done in Christ, all that is not done in unity with His Spirit, and in the work of the edification of His body, is a service out of place.
An altar is not enough; this should be in its place, in the Unique Sanctuary. The house is built on the good earth; which is Christ. We should destroy all rival altars in any place where they have beenraised. We should only leave room for God. All idolatry, spiritualism, animism, boasting, sectarianism, is abomination to God. The only name by which we can be saved is that of the Lord Jesus. God put His name in there for His dwelling place and to receive praise. Nobody goes to the Father but through Him. Nobody has life nor can they truly serve God if it is not in Him.
The head of the body is the first part of the mystery; the second is the Church that we know is not a stone or wooden temple. We are the Church, 24 hours both day and night in any place. We don't "go to church"; we are the Church that goes on His behalf to all places. The church works, rests, goes to the market, returns home, meets in one or more places, everything in Christ, in the Spirit and in the communion of the unique body. That is where it offers pleasant spiritual sacrifices to God through Jesus Christ.
We can only serve God in Christ, because what comes from the fallen Adam is no longer pleasant. Flesh and blood won't inherit the Kingdom of God. We need the inspiration and the sustenance of Christ's Spirit that has baptized us into a single body. This is the place that was given to us; this is what we will seek. If it is not in Christ's Spirit, then it is merely in Adam whose fallen condition was inherited by our flesh.
We only have the inheritance of Christ in His Spirit. Everything else is outside the place chosen by God for offering.
Jesus said to the Samaritan woman that God is Spirit and it is necessary to worship him in spirit and in truth. There were no longer to be any discussions about the place of worship, of consecration and of service to God. We won't take the way of Jeroboam who stole what was meant for the people of God, building a rival sanctuary and priesthood. The vineyard belongs to the Son of God. God is worshipped and served in the spirit, that which baptizes us into a single body. Only by walking in His Spirit will we truly be in Christ. Whatever is not born of the Spirit, cannot enter, nor even see the Kingdom of God. Regeneration is necessary because of the fallen state of Adam. Only by receiving Christ and walking in His Spirit will we be in the body.
To work in the flesh is to do what seems best to each person. It is necessary to cross the Jordan, dying to ourselves in Christ, which also implies dying to sectarian division. We will only have rest in the good land. God's will is that we live by faith in Christ, in His Spirit, and in the unity and communion of His only body, in the universal and in the local; that which is the true house of God which the Son of David raises for the Father. "I will build my Church," the Lord said, whose house are we, if we remain firm until the end trusting in this principle.
This whole passage of Deuteronomy 12 is for us today. Let us demolish, therefore, every place of rival adoration to the dwelling place where God put His name. Let us finish crossing the Jordan and let us, in the rest that we have in our Spirit, offer our consecration to God in the good land that is Christ where we should raise up the Unique Sanctuary.
----------------------------
By: Gino Iafrancesco V. / Traslation: Andrew Web.
THE TABLE OF SHOWBREAD
THE TABLE OF SHOWBREAD
Among the sacred furniture in the tabernacle was the table of the showbread. What message does it give us today?
The table of showbread
Gino Iafrancesco, Christian worker from Colombia.
Message shared in Temuco (Chile), in September of 2004.
Reading: Hebrews 9:1-12.
This passage from Hebrews describes the main features of the ordinances of service in the sanctuary, the ordinances of the furniture that the Lord placed in the Holy Place and in the Holy of Holies. In a wider context, they speak of things characteristic of the New Testament. God uses the figures of the Old Testament to speak to us of things characteristic of the New Testament.
Certainly that which we have read here, in that short passage, is extremely rich. We would not even have time to consider more than a little bit of it, but it was necessary to read the context so as to underline some things that -with the help of the Lord- we would like to read together with the brothers and sisters. "Now these things having been thus prepared.". God prepared these things. And then verse 8 tells us: "...the Holy Spirit this signifying...". Those ordinances were there so that the Holy Spirit -through those ordinances, those ordinances of service- could explain something to us today, living as the people of God, in the New Testament. For that reason, in verse 9 it says: " which is a figure for the time present ".
Now we go to chapter 25 of Exodus, where what was said in Hebrews 9 appears in a more detailed way. In chapter 25, the Lord requests a voluntary offering from his people, so that his people might make a sanctuary for him, because he wanted to live among them. And he gives his people the pattern so that they could prepare that sanctuary for him. And it begins to describe the furniture of the sanctuary from the Holiest of Holies to the Holy Place. We enter from outside to the inside, but God speaks from inside toward the outside. He begins by describing the ark, then he describes the table, then the candlestick; then the tabernacle, then the brass altar, and then the priesthood.
It describes the house and the priesthood, just like the apostle Peter: " unto whom coming, a living stone, rejected indeed of men, but with God elect, precious, ye also, as living stones, are built up a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. " (1Pe 2:4-5) Here Peter kept the same sequence that appears in Exodus. In chapters 25, 26 and 27 the house is described, and in 28- 29 the priesthood is described. We are the spiritual house and we are also the Kingdom and priests. So all these figures from the Old Testament were ordered to help us to understand the spiritual things characteristic of the New Testament.
The burden that the Holy Spirit has placed on my heart to share with my brothers and sisters is the following step after the ark. It is clear that we cannot begin to speak about the second step without implying the existence of the first one. There is a table of showbread but only if there is first the ark of the covenant. To understand the table a little, we also have to understand the ark a little.
God looks for the participation of his people
Then we go to Exodus 25:23: " And thou shalt make...". Throughout this whole description, God constantly tells his people, through Moses: "And thou shalt make...". Notice how verse 10 begins: "And they shall make...". And in 23: "And thou shalt make...". And in the 31: "And thou shalt make...". And in 26:1: "And thou shalt make...". God wants to have something from his people, in which his people spontaneous and voluntarily participate in union with him. He will provide everything, but he is not a determinist. When God created man, before the fall, he wanted the man to act responsibly. God wants a responsible man. Before man fell, he was not sold to the power of sin. He had the responsibility and the capacity to decide. After the fall, man continues being responsible, but became unable. Then redemption comes by the grace of God to return the capacity back to man so that he can fulfill his responsibility.
Grace doesn't make the decision for us; grace qualifies us once more to make a determined decision in grace. "Be strong in the grace", Paul tells to Timothy. It is necessary to make a decision. Before the fall we had responsibility and capacity. The fall came, and our capacity was lost. Now we 'must', but 'cannot ' what we 'must.' We are unable, because we were sold to the power of sin.
What does grace do? As Paul says to Titus: " For the grace of God hath appeared, bringing salvation to all men ". So the grace of God comes and helps us to decide, together with us, like when we are rowing with two oars. Because if you are in a kayak, and you row with a single oar, you just go round in circles one way, and if you row with the other oar you do the same the other way round; but you don't advance. So in order to advance, you need to row with two oars. The Lord in us, and we in the Lord. Like a coffee with milk. You put the coffee in the milk and the milk in the coffee, and it is the coffee with milk. You can no more separate the coffee from the milk, than the milk from the coffee. This is how it is with us; we in Christ and Christ in us.
It is not Christ alone, nor us alone. He can do it alone, but he doesn't want to. He wants us with him. He wants our co-operation, but we are unable to work together with him if he doesn't help us. But if he helps us, he wants our co-operation. We need to row with the two oars; with the Lord in us, and we also in the Lord. The Lord already entered into us. Now, we have to enter into the Lord; to put our foot on the land. He already gave us the land: "I have given you the land"; it is a fact, it is ours; but we have to put our foot on it. " Every place that the sole of your foot shall tread upon, to you have I given it ". That is to say that a co-working exists.
The capacity is returned by grace, and grace qualifies us to co-work with God. Nobody can co-work with God without grace.
But grace doesn't come to substitute you. Grace will use you. It will be God in you, you in the Lord, in Christ. That's why, when you see this ark that we have to make, the ark represents the Lord. How will we make the Lord? But the Lord says that we have to make an ark and we have to put it in the Holiest of Holies.
Why does God ask us to make an ark, a table, a candlestick, an altar, a sanctuary? Because God doesn't want anything that is not voluntary and spontaneous from his people. He gives us everything, but doesn't remove the responsibility. It is necessary to co-operate with God, being strong, in the grace of God.
"And thou shalt make...". We have to co-operate so that the ark be placed in the Holiest of Holies. We have to co-operate with God, submit him, commend all our uselessness in his hands, and to ask him to help us to ask him, so that Christ be formed in us. Without his help, we cannot do anything to make Christ be formed in us, but he can and will form his Son in us. But he doesn't want to do it against your will. Your will alone, abandoned by itself, cannot do anything. So, he helps you. The Spirit of grace comes to sustain you, but not to replace you. It comes to help you. God wants you to be there; him in you, and you in him.
The ark of the covenant
Let us look at verse 10: "And they shall make an ark of acacia wood: two cubits and a half shall be the length thereof, and a cubit and a half the breadth thereof, and a cubit and a half the height thereof."(Ex. 25:10) What curious measurements the ark has! Compare them with the measurements of the brass altar, in chapter 27. God is telling us something! Verse 1: "And thou shalt make the altar of acacia wood - it is the brass altar, where the lamb was sacrificed, where atonement was made. It is something that only the Lord could do for us-five cubits long, and five cubits broad; the altar shall be foursquare: and the height thereof shall be three cubits." Made to the height of God; a sacrifice to satisfy the heart of God. "Father, it is finished". The measurements: five by five, three high. The number 5 in the Bible is the number of God's grace.
Notice this: the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit are the Trinity. There is the number 3. Then, God wanted creation to exist. There is the number 4. The number 4 is the number of creation. That's why those cherubim that represent the creation had four faces. That's why in Revelation chapter 4, God is worshipped by creation. "...because of thy will they were, and were created". But in chapter 5 he is praised for redemption.
After the honor of creation - number 4, what was God's other work? After the work of creation, God rested from the work of creation, but he continued working in another way. "My Father worketh even until now, and I work." (John 5:17). The following work after the creation was redemption. Grace, the number 5, appears in chapter 5 of Revelation. The Lamb now appears and is praised because "for thou was slain, and didst purchase unto God with thy blood men of every tribe, and tongue, and people, and nation ". Number 5 is the number of grace. And there the altar appears, representing the cross of Christ. Five cubits by five cubits; a sacrifice made to the height of God: it is three cubits high.
But, returning to the ark, we realize that the measurements of the ark are half measurements. It is not 5 x 5 x 3. It is 2,5 x 2,5 x 1,5, that is to say, half. Do you see? Its width, its longitude will be two cubits and a half, half of 5. Its height is one cubit and half, half of three. That is to say that the ark has measurements that are cut in half. And what does that mean? If you find half an orange, you understand that somewhere else there has to be another half an orange. If there is half an orange here, there has to be another half elsewhere. Whatis this ark called? The ark of the covenant. "Covenant" means alliance, made of two halves. What is the tabernacle called? The tabernacle of the tent of meeting. It is to meet God with man. For that reason the measurements are halves.
The table of the showbread is the table of fellowship
I don't want to speak about the ark, but about the table. But, to understand the measurements of the table, we had to understand those of the ark: the measurements of the table are smaller than those of the ark, because the ark is first. Between the first thing and the second there has to be a difference. You cannot place that which is second, first, nor that which is first, third.
When God wanted to reveal the authority, the order and authority that he set down in the creation, he said that the man would have to pay a certain amount of shekels (tribute) of the sanctuary, and the boy, another amount, and the woman, another amount. Although we are all the same before God, in the authority of God, God put a different measure of shekels for atonement to each, showing an order and an established authority in his Kingdom, the creation. And here, if you notice, in verse 23 of Exodus 25, it says: "Thou shalt also make...". If you make an ark, if you co-operate so that Christ is formed in you, you also have to co-operate with the second part. If there is a head, there has to be a body as well. "whosoever loveth him that begat loveth him also that is begotten of him". So, after the ark comes the table.
And, what does a table speak of? A table is for eating together; a table speaks of fellowship. The Lord said: "... I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me" (Rev. 3:20). The Lord, when he wanted his people to have fellowship, gathered them together at feasts, and then they had to exchange gifts and they had to eat together. And that is what a table speaks of to us.
The Lord, besides forming Christ in us, that is, in each individual, also wants us to be one. "...even as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be in us..." (John 17:21). If after the Head the body comes, after the ark the table comes.
So, we will read a little more about the table. "... made of acacia wood". How astonishing! I don't know if you have seen the acacias. They are not so straight. The acacias are very badly bent trees. Do you think that we are anything but distorted? Well, at least I am, and I realize it more every day. However, God took hold of badly bent people, and I don't understand how he's able to make such straight boards out of them! Such badly bent people are used to make boards and other instruments. Notice that in that wooden table of acacia, which represents us, the human nature is the wood. John said that the axe was at the root of the trees. Were those trees not people? That wood represents us.
"...two cubits shall be the length thereof,- notice that it doesn't reach the length of the ark-, and a cubit the breadth -nor the breadth -, and a cubit and a half the height thereof" - it has the same height as the ark. This does have to be same, because " Even as the Father hath loved me, I also have loved you: abide ye in my love.". Made to the height of God. The height is the same height, a cubit and a half, the same as the ark.
"And thou shalt overlay it...". Do you know why it had to be covered? So that it is not seen. The boards had to be covered. In the temple, the stones had to be covered with boards. The boards had to be covered with gold. We came from that twisted state, and have to be straightened and covered so that we do not appear. Only the gold appears and we are behind it. Covered with gold, so that what is seen is the gold of God.
"...and make thereto a crown of gold round about. ". The crown is to reinforce it, so that it doesn't twist. First, it adorns the table; second, it reinforces it. " and thou shalt make unto it a border of a handbreadth round about; and thou shalt make a golden crown to the border thereof round about. ". The border also has to have a molding (a crown), and the border is a handbreadth wide. God asks us to make a border. What are the showbread? Are they not the tribes of Israel, the people of God, and in the New Testament they are the churches. The border exists so that the showbread don't fall off the table; the table has a border a handbreadth wide. We are in the hands of the Lord so as not to fall. " and I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, and no one shall snatch them out of my hand. My Father, who hath given them unto me, is greater than all; and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father's hand ". Because sometimes it was necessary to move the table, therefore the breads could slide off, and so they had to have a border to prevent this from happening. And this border is a handbreadth wide which speaks to us of the Lord's hands protecting, and maintaining his church.
"And thou shalt make for it four rings of gold, and put the rings at the four corners that are on the four feet thereof. Close to the margin shall the rings be, as receptacles of the staves to carry the table. ". The table can't to stay in Temuco, it has to go to Valdivia. From Valdivia it has to go on to Puerto Montt, and later to Punta Arenas. And toward the north, to Arica, and beyond; the table has to reach Colombia.
If you have the table here; the table is not for standing still, it has to be taken elsewhere! It must be carried! You will do whatever it takes to carry it elsewhere. You will take the rings, you will take the staves, but all covered with gold. And you will carry them. Everything has to be taken. The table is to be taken with you.
The utensils
"And thou shalt make the dishes thereof...". That is to say that those breads cannot be touched by hands. They have to be put on plates. The plate is the place for the bread. The table had two sets of six plates, and the showbread was placed on each plate. Each one of the tribes of Israel is represented. And now, in the New Testament, that bread is the church. "We, who are many, are one bread". The church of the Lord in each town is one bread.
But here it says: " and the spoons thereof ". Those spoons were not for soup, but to carry the bread. Look at the care that was needed to take hold of the bread. It had to be put in the appropriate place. You cannot put a bread between two plates, nor two breads on one plate, nor ten breads on five plates. No; one showbread for each plate. For each town, one church. So, the bread is not manipulated by human hands, but with instruments of gold. With those big smooth spoons, the bread could be moved from one place to another. And the bread also had a cover, so that the mice and flies didn't come and eat it, as seen in verse 29: " and covers thereof " (KJV).
That is to say that the bread mustn't be uncovered, but covered. And in the church, God protects the church. God gave elders to the church, to protect to the church, to feed her, to care for her, so that the hungry wolves don't come, nor the mice nor the flies, to pollute the bread. No, that bread has to be cared for. It has to be on a plate, to be moved by spoons, and under a covering.
There are also "the bowls thereof, wherewith to pour out", because those bowls were like jars from which they poured the wine. That wine was poured out on the sacrifice, and also on the bread, just as incense was also placed on the bread. And that incense on the bread is the prayer life of the church, the ministry of prayer in the church. And the church has to give up its life even unto death. The final sacrifice was the drink offering.
Paul, in Philippians, says that although he was poured out as a drink offering in service of the faith of the church; he gave his life and poured out the blood, like the wine that is poured out unto the last as a drink offering. This is how we must give our life, to be willing to die for Christ and to serve the church. That's why they have bowls.
"And thou shalt set upon the table shewbread before me continually". God always wants to see those breads. The bread of Temuco must never be absent. When God looks down, He must constantly find that bread. And that has to do with us. We are those that have to co-work with God, so that these breads are always before God.
The showbread
Let us go on to Leviticus chapter 24. Notice that in Exodus 25 the table appeared first and then the lamp-stand. And here the lamp-stand appears first and then the breads of the table. The order is reversed. Why? Because in the Holy Place, the table and the lamp-stand are opposite one another, that is to say, on the same level, representing two aspects of the same thing. To the north you have the table; to the south, the lamp-stand. It is like in the Acts it says that the church persevered in the doctrine of the apostles, which is about the Son of God - the ark- in fellowship and the breaking of the bread -the table and the lamp-stand- and the prayers -the altar of gold incense.
So here, considering that those two things are opposite one another to show that they are equivalent, the Holy Spirit begins with the lamp-stand this time, and then the breads, to show their equivalence, comparing it with Exodus 27.
Now read Leviticus 24, from verse 5: " And thou shalt take fine wheaten flour...". Ay ay ay! We know what fine flour represents. The flour comes from the wheat mill. Our Lord Jesus is like the grain of wheat who was crushed for our sins. But he not only had to be crushed. When he spoke of the grain of wheat, he said that the one who loses his life will gain it, but the one who gains it will lose it. But he wasn't referring only to himself. If he went through the mill, it was to also to help us go through the mill; if he was crushed to be made into fine flour, we also have to be crushed to be made into fine flour.
We have to take that fine flour, we have to appropriate of Christ to be able to be crushed with him, and also to be as soft as fine flour, because fine flour no longer has the sheaves attached. What the wind had to take away was taken; and now all that remains is the sifted flour, that of Christ in us. We have to take that, that fine flour.
"...and bake...". Oh, that phrase, that verb. That is to say, you will be cooked. That is to say, that fine flour that has to be kneaded, also has to go through fire, through the oven. We are only grains of wheat, but to be able to be together and make a showbread for the Lord as a church, we have to be crushed. Our ego is dealt with in the life of the church. Because if we continue to be hardened we won't be bread. Now we understand why we are here: to learn how to become a showbread for the Lord together. We all have to be crushed. All those hard shells have to be taken away by the wind of the Holy Spirit, to remain only with fine soft flour.
All the hardness of the flesh in us has to go. It has to become fine flour and has to be kneaded, together with others, and then cooked. Whenever somebody makes bread, they cook it. My wife, when she makes some bread, puts one side on-top and the other underneath. Then when one side is better cooked she has to take it out, and turn it over.
Our Lord takes us out and puts he who is on-top underneath. It is not comfortable. And those that are underneath are placed on-top. So that which was raw is turned over to be cooked. Do you remember that passage of Hosea? Those that don't remember should turn with me to the book of Hosea. We will return to Leviticus 24, but look at Hosea 7:8. "Ephraim, he mixeth himself with the peoples; Ephraim is a cake not turned. ".
What is a cake not turned? It means that one side is over-cooked and burnt and the other side is raw. And this sometimes happens to us. Perhaps we are already burnt in some things. We spend years doing the same things whilst we remain raw in others. It is because the cake has not been turned. What is underneath needs to be put on-top, and that which is on-top needs to be put underneath. It will be a revolution, so that what is raw becomes cooked.
The showbread represents the tribes. And now in the New Testament, it is the church. We, being many, are one bread. Today, we are this bread. And these breads are called the showbread ("bread of proposition" in Spanish version).
What is a proposition? There are a lot of people who have their own proposals. It is a proposition, a proposal. For example, Karl Marx had a proposal. "We will make an ideal society, we will do it this way and this way". You know how many millions of people died, and nothing remained. And Hitler had another proposal, and look how that ended. Today, many people have their own proposals. But God has His own proposal.
God's proposal is the life of the church. It is the bread of the proposition; to take those grains, to crush them, to purify them, to cleanse them, to knead them, to put them through fire. But not so that they burn, but so that they are cooked to perfection as bread, like cakes, and then put on the table of fellowship. That is God's proposal. "So that they see your good works, and glorify your Father who is in heaven". The life of the church is God's proposal for humanity; that they be saved, receive Christ, and come to be part of the bread of the proposition. The proposal of God that must be presented before God, at God's table. And this is how it is accomplished.
"And thou shalt take fine flour, and bake twelve cakes thereof: two tenth parts of an ephah shall be in one cake. " (v. 5). Two tenth parts each cake, and they are twelve cakes; twenty-four tenths. The number 24 in the Bible is the number of the priesthood. Do you remember when David established those songs, those shifts? They were twenty-four classes. Zachariah, John the Baptist's father, was of the eighth class, of the class of Abijah. Each class had fifteen days of service, and in the year there were twenty-four classes, twenty-four priestly shifts. That's why there were twenty four elders before God. And here they are twenty-four tenths.
All those cakes represent the priestly Kingdom of the church. A kingdom and priests. That's why incense was put on the bread, as you can see. " And thou shalt set them in two rows, - because that number means testimony-, six on a row, upon the pure table before Jehovah. And thou shalt put pure frankincense upon each row". In each row there were six cakes and incense was placed on them: the life, the ministry of prayer of the church. When the church meets together to pray, to intercede in a spirit before the Lord, that is when incense is placed on each bread.
"...it shall be a bread of remembrance, an offering by fire to Jehovah. Every sabbath day he shall arrange it before Jehovah continually, on the part of the children of Israel: it is an everlasting covenant.". That was the bread: a remembrance before God. We also have to remember others, to pray for one another; to constantly remember them before God, it is the prayer life of the church.
"And it shall be Aaron's and his sons'; and they shall eat it in a holy place; for it is most holy unto him of Jehovah's offerings by fire: it is an everlasting statute.". What do we see here? It is God's right to have the church that lives the life of the church in Christ to glorify God. God is entitled to this. Aaron and his sons were those that were entitled to eat that bread. Christ is entitled to eat of this bread.
Will we do this for the Lord? "thou shalt make...". We have to make him this table, we have to serve this table to the Lord, because he is entitled to the perpetual eating of this bread.
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By: Gino Iafrancesco V./ Traslation: Andrew Web.
Among the sacred furniture in the tabernacle was the table of the showbread. What message does it give us today?
The table of showbread
Gino Iafrancesco, Christian worker from Colombia.
Message shared in Temuco (Chile), in September of 2004.
Reading: Hebrews 9:1-12.
This passage from Hebrews describes the main features of the ordinances of service in the sanctuary, the ordinances of the furniture that the Lord placed in the Holy Place and in the Holy of Holies. In a wider context, they speak of things characteristic of the New Testament. God uses the figures of the Old Testament to speak to us of things characteristic of the New Testament.
Certainly that which we have read here, in that short passage, is extremely rich. We would not even have time to consider more than a little bit of it, but it was necessary to read the context so as to underline some things that -with the help of the Lord- we would like to read together with the brothers and sisters. "Now these things having been thus prepared.". God prepared these things. And then verse 8 tells us: "...the Holy Spirit this signifying...". Those ordinances were there so that the Holy Spirit -through those ordinances, those ordinances of service- could explain something to us today, living as the people of God, in the New Testament. For that reason, in verse 9 it says: " which is a figure for the time present ".
Now we go to chapter 25 of Exodus, where what was said in Hebrews 9 appears in a more detailed way. In chapter 25, the Lord requests a voluntary offering from his people, so that his people might make a sanctuary for him, because he wanted to live among them. And he gives his people the pattern so that they could prepare that sanctuary for him. And it begins to describe the furniture of the sanctuary from the Holiest of Holies to the Holy Place. We enter from outside to the inside, but God speaks from inside toward the outside. He begins by describing the ark, then he describes the table, then the candlestick; then the tabernacle, then the brass altar, and then the priesthood.
It describes the house and the priesthood, just like the apostle Peter: " unto whom coming, a living stone, rejected indeed of men, but with God elect, precious, ye also, as living stones, are built up a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. " (1Pe 2:4-5) Here Peter kept the same sequence that appears in Exodus. In chapters 25, 26 and 27 the house is described, and in 28- 29 the priesthood is described. We are the spiritual house and we are also the Kingdom and priests. So all these figures from the Old Testament were ordered to help us to understand the spiritual things characteristic of the New Testament.
The burden that the Holy Spirit has placed on my heart to share with my brothers and sisters is the following step after the ark. It is clear that we cannot begin to speak about the second step without implying the existence of the first one. There is a table of showbread but only if there is first the ark of the covenant. To understand the table a little, we also have to understand the ark a little.
God looks for the participation of his people
Then we go to Exodus 25:23: " And thou shalt make...". Throughout this whole description, God constantly tells his people, through Moses: "And thou shalt make...". Notice how verse 10 begins: "And they shall make...". And in 23: "And thou shalt make...". And in the 31: "And thou shalt make...". And in 26:1: "And thou shalt make...". God wants to have something from his people, in which his people spontaneous and voluntarily participate in union with him. He will provide everything, but he is not a determinist. When God created man, before the fall, he wanted the man to act responsibly. God wants a responsible man. Before man fell, he was not sold to the power of sin. He had the responsibility and the capacity to decide. After the fall, man continues being responsible, but became unable. Then redemption comes by the grace of God to return the capacity back to man so that he can fulfill his responsibility.
Grace doesn't make the decision for us; grace qualifies us once more to make a determined decision in grace. "Be strong in the grace", Paul tells to Timothy. It is necessary to make a decision. Before the fall we had responsibility and capacity. The fall came, and our capacity was lost. Now we 'must', but 'cannot ' what we 'must.' We are unable, because we were sold to the power of sin.
What does grace do? As Paul says to Titus: " For the grace of God hath appeared, bringing salvation to all men ". So the grace of God comes and helps us to decide, together with us, like when we are rowing with two oars. Because if you are in a kayak, and you row with a single oar, you just go round in circles one way, and if you row with the other oar you do the same the other way round; but you don't advance. So in order to advance, you need to row with two oars. The Lord in us, and we in the Lord. Like a coffee with milk. You put the coffee in the milk and the milk in the coffee, and it is the coffee with milk. You can no more separate the coffee from the milk, than the milk from the coffee. This is how it is with us; we in Christ and Christ in us.
It is not Christ alone, nor us alone. He can do it alone, but he doesn't want to. He wants us with him. He wants our co-operation, but we are unable to work together with him if he doesn't help us. But if he helps us, he wants our co-operation. We need to row with the two oars; with the Lord in us, and we also in the Lord. The Lord already entered into us. Now, we have to enter into the Lord; to put our foot on the land. He already gave us the land: "I have given you the land"; it is a fact, it is ours; but we have to put our foot on it. " Every place that the sole of your foot shall tread upon, to you have I given it ". That is to say that a co-working exists.
The capacity is returned by grace, and grace qualifies us to co-work with God. Nobody can co-work with God without grace.
But grace doesn't come to substitute you. Grace will use you. It will be God in you, you in the Lord, in Christ. That's why, when you see this ark that we have to make, the ark represents the Lord. How will we make the Lord? But the Lord says that we have to make an ark and we have to put it in the Holiest of Holies.
Why does God ask us to make an ark, a table, a candlestick, an altar, a sanctuary? Because God doesn't want anything that is not voluntary and spontaneous from his people. He gives us everything, but doesn't remove the responsibility. It is necessary to co-operate with God, being strong, in the grace of God.
"And thou shalt make...". We have to co-operate so that the ark be placed in the Holiest of Holies. We have to co-operate with God, submit him, commend all our uselessness in his hands, and to ask him to help us to ask him, so that Christ be formed in us. Without his help, we cannot do anything to make Christ be formed in us, but he can and will form his Son in us. But he doesn't want to do it against your will. Your will alone, abandoned by itself, cannot do anything. So, he helps you. The Spirit of grace comes to sustain you, but not to replace you. It comes to help you. God wants you to be there; him in you, and you in him.
The ark of the covenant
Let us look at verse 10: "And they shall make an ark of acacia wood: two cubits and a half shall be the length thereof, and a cubit and a half the breadth thereof, and a cubit and a half the height thereof."(Ex. 25:10) What curious measurements the ark has! Compare them with the measurements of the brass altar, in chapter 27. God is telling us something! Verse 1: "And thou shalt make the altar of acacia wood - it is the brass altar, where the lamb was sacrificed, where atonement was made. It is something that only the Lord could do for us-five cubits long, and five cubits broad; the altar shall be foursquare: and the height thereof shall be three cubits." Made to the height of God; a sacrifice to satisfy the heart of God. "Father, it is finished". The measurements: five by five, three high. The number 5 in the Bible is the number of God's grace.
Notice this: the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit are the Trinity. There is the number 3. Then, God wanted creation to exist. There is the number 4. The number 4 is the number of creation. That's why those cherubim that represent the creation had four faces. That's why in Revelation chapter 4, God is worshipped by creation. "...because of thy will they were, and were created". But in chapter 5 he is praised for redemption.
After the honor of creation - number 4, what was God's other work? After the work of creation, God rested from the work of creation, but he continued working in another way. "My Father worketh even until now, and I work." (John 5:17). The following work after the creation was redemption. Grace, the number 5, appears in chapter 5 of Revelation. The Lamb now appears and is praised because "for thou was slain, and didst purchase unto God with thy blood men of every tribe, and tongue, and people, and nation ". Number 5 is the number of grace. And there the altar appears, representing the cross of Christ. Five cubits by five cubits; a sacrifice made to the height of God: it is three cubits high.
But, returning to the ark, we realize that the measurements of the ark are half measurements. It is not 5 x 5 x 3. It is 2,5 x 2,5 x 1,5, that is to say, half. Do you see? Its width, its longitude will be two cubits and a half, half of 5. Its height is one cubit and half, half of three. That is to say that the ark has measurements that are cut in half. And what does that mean? If you find half an orange, you understand that somewhere else there has to be another half an orange. If there is half an orange here, there has to be another half elsewhere. Whatis this ark called? The ark of the covenant. "Covenant" means alliance, made of two halves. What is the tabernacle called? The tabernacle of the tent of meeting. It is to meet God with man. For that reason the measurements are halves.
The table of the showbread is the table of fellowship
I don't want to speak about the ark, but about the table. But, to understand the measurements of the table, we had to understand those of the ark: the measurements of the table are smaller than those of the ark, because the ark is first. Between the first thing and the second there has to be a difference. You cannot place that which is second, first, nor that which is first, third.
When God wanted to reveal the authority, the order and authority that he set down in the creation, he said that the man would have to pay a certain amount of shekels (tribute) of the sanctuary, and the boy, another amount, and the woman, another amount. Although we are all the same before God, in the authority of God, God put a different measure of shekels for atonement to each, showing an order and an established authority in his Kingdom, the creation. And here, if you notice, in verse 23 of Exodus 25, it says: "Thou shalt also make...". If you make an ark, if you co-operate so that Christ is formed in you, you also have to co-operate with the second part. If there is a head, there has to be a body as well. "whosoever loveth him that begat loveth him also that is begotten of him". So, after the ark comes the table.
And, what does a table speak of? A table is for eating together; a table speaks of fellowship. The Lord said: "... I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me" (Rev. 3:20). The Lord, when he wanted his people to have fellowship, gathered them together at feasts, and then they had to exchange gifts and they had to eat together. And that is what a table speaks of to us.
The Lord, besides forming Christ in us, that is, in each individual, also wants us to be one. "...even as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be in us..." (John 17:21). If after the Head the body comes, after the ark the table comes.
So, we will read a little more about the table. "... made of acacia wood". How astonishing! I don't know if you have seen the acacias. They are not so straight. The acacias are very badly bent trees. Do you think that we are anything but distorted? Well, at least I am, and I realize it more every day. However, God took hold of badly bent people, and I don't understand how he's able to make such straight boards out of them! Such badly bent people are used to make boards and other instruments. Notice that in that wooden table of acacia, which represents us, the human nature is the wood. John said that the axe was at the root of the trees. Were those trees not people? That wood represents us.
"...two cubits shall be the length thereof,- notice that it doesn't reach the length of the ark-, and a cubit the breadth -nor the breadth -, and a cubit and a half the height thereof" - it has the same height as the ark. This does have to be same, because " Even as the Father hath loved me, I also have loved you: abide ye in my love.". Made to the height of God. The height is the same height, a cubit and a half, the same as the ark.
"And thou shalt overlay it...". Do you know why it had to be covered? So that it is not seen. The boards had to be covered. In the temple, the stones had to be covered with boards. The boards had to be covered with gold. We came from that twisted state, and have to be straightened and covered so that we do not appear. Only the gold appears and we are behind it. Covered with gold, so that what is seen is the gold of God.
"...and make thereto a crown of gold round about. ". The crown is to reinforce it, so that it doesn't twist. First, it adorns the table; second, it reinforces it. " and thou shalt make unto it a border of a handbreadth round about; and thou shalt make a golden crown to the border thereof round about. ". The border also has to have a molding (a crown), and the border is a handbreadth wide. God asks us to make a border. What are the showbread? Are they not the tribes of Israel, the people of God, and in the New Testament they are the churches. The border exists so that the showbread don't fall off the table; the table has a border a handbreadth wide. We are in the hands of the Lord so as not to fall. " and I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, and no one shall snatch them out of my hand. My Father, who hath given them unto me, is greater than all; and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father's hand ". Because sometimes it was necessary to move the table, therefore the breads could slide off, and so they had to have a border to prevent this from happening. And this border is a handbreadth wide which speaks to us of the Lord's hands protecting, and maintaining his church.
"And thou shalt make for it four rings of gold, and put the rings at the four corners that are on the four feet thereof. Close to the margin shall the rings be, as receptacles of the staves to carry the table. ". The table can't to stay in Temuco, it has to go to Valdivia. From Valdivia it has to go on to Puerto Montt, and later to Punta Arenas. And toward the north, to Arica, and beyond; the table has to reach Colombia.
If you have the table here; the table is not for standing still, it has to be taken elsewhere! It must be carried! You will do whatever it takes to carry it elsewhere. You will take the rings, you will take the staves, but all covered with gold. And you will carry them. Everything has to be taken. The table is to be taken with you.
The utensils
"And thou shalt make the dishes thereof...". That is to say that those breads cannot be touched by hands. They have to be put on plates. The plate is the place for the bread. The table had two sets of six plates, and the showbread was placed on each plate. Each one of the tribes of Israel is represented. And now, in the New Testament, that bread is the church. "We, who are many, are one bread". The church of the Lord in each town is one bread.
But here it says: " and the spoons thereof ". Those spoons were not for soup, but to carry the bread. Look at the care that was needed to take hold of the bread. It had to be put in the appropriate place. You cannot put a bread between two plates, nor two breads on one plate, nor ten breads on five plates. No; one showbread for each plate. For each town, one church. So, the bread is not manipulated by human hands, but with instruments of gold. With those big smooth spoons, the bread could be moved from one place to another. And the bread also had a cover, so that the mice and flies didn't come and eat it, as seen in verse 29: " and covers thereof " (KJV).
That is to say that the bread mustn't be uncovered, but covered. And in the church, God protects the church. God gave elders to the church, to protect to the church, to feed her, to care for her, so that the hungry wolves don't come, nor the mice nor the flies, to pollute the bread. No, that bread has to be cared for. It has to be on a plate, to be moved by spoons, and under a covering.
There are also "the bowls thereof, wherewith to pour out", because those bowls were like jars from which they poured the wine. That wine was poured out on the sacrifice, and also on the bread, just as incense was also placed on the bread. And that incense on the bread is the prayer life of the church, the ministry of prayer in the church. And the church has to give up its life even unto death. The final sacrifice was the drink offering.
Paul, in Philippians, says that although he was poured out as a drink offering in service of the faith of the church; he gave his life and poured out the blood, like the wine that is poured out unto the last as a drink offering. This is how we must give our life, to be willing to die for Christ and to serve the church. That's why they have bowls.
"And thou shalt set upon the table shewbread before me continually". God always wants to see those breads. The bread of Temuco must never be absent. When God looks down, He must constantly find that bread. And that has to do with us. We are those that have to co-work with God, so that these breads are always before God.
The showbread
Let us go on to Leviticus chapter 24. Notice that in Exodus 25 the table appeared first and then the lamp-stand. And here the lamp-stand appears first and then the breads of the table. The order is reversed. Why? Because in the Holy Place, the table and the lamp-stand are opposite one another, that is to say, on the same level, representing two aspects of the same thing. To the north you have the table; to the south, the lamp-stand. It is like in the Acts it says that the church persevered in the doctrine of the apostles, which is about the Son of God - the ark- in fellowship and the breaking of the bread -the table and the lamp-stand- and the prayers -the altar of gold incense.
So here, considering that those two things are opposite one another to show that they are equivalent, the Holy Spirit begins with the lamp-stand this time, and then the breads, to show their equivalence, comparing it with Exodus 27.
Now read Leviticus 24, from verse 5: " And thou shalt take fine wheaten flour...". Ay ay ay! We know what fine flour represents. The flour comes from the wheat mill. Our Lord Jesus is like the grain of wheat who was crushed for our sins. But he not only had to be crushed. When he spoke of the grain of wheat, he said that the one who loses his life will gain it, but the one who gains it will lose it. But he wasn't referring only to himself. If he went through the mill, it was to also to help us go through the mill; if he was crushed to be made into fine flour, we also have to be crushed to be made into fine flour.
We have to take that fine flour, we have to appropriate of Christ to be able to be crushed with him, and also to be as soft as fine flour, because fine flour no longer has the sheaves attached. What the wind had to take away was taken; and now all that remains is the sifted flour, that of Christ in us. We have to take that, that fine flour.
"...and bake...". Oh, that phrase, that verb. That is to say, you will be cooked. That is to say, that fine flour that has to be kneaded, also has to go through fire, through the oven. We are only grains of wheat, but to be able to be together and make a showbread for the Lord as a church, we have to be crushed. Our ego is dealt with in the life of the church. Because if we continue to be hardened we won't be bread. Now we understand why we are here: to learn how to become a showbread for the Lord together. We all have to be crushed. All those hard shells have to be taken away by the wind of the Holy Spirit, to remain only with fine soft flour.
All the hardness of the flesh in us has to go. It has to become fine flour and has to be kneaded, together with others, and then cooked. Whenever somebody makes bread, they cook it. My wife, when she makes some bread, puts one side on-top and the other underneath. Then when one side is better cooked she has to take it out, and turn it over.
Our Lord takes us out and puts he who is on-top underneath. It is not comfortable. And those that are underneath are placed on-top. So that which was raw is turned over to be cooked. Do you remember that passage of Hosea? Those that don't remember should turn with me to the book of Hosea. We will return to Leviticus 24, but look at Hosea 7:8. "Ephraim, he mixeth himself with the peoples; Ephraim is a cake not turned. ".
What is a cake not turned? It means that one side is over-cooked and burnt and the other side is raw. And this sometimes happens to us. Perhaps we are already burnt in some things. We spend years doing the same things whilst we remain raw in others. It is because the cake has not been turned. What is underneath needs to be put on-top, and that which is on-top needs to be put underneath. It will be a revolution, so that what is raw becomes cooked.
The showbread represents the tribes. And now in the New Testament, it is the church. We, being many, are one bread. Today, we are this bread. And these breads are called the showbread ("bread of proposition" in Spanish version).
What is a proposition? There are a lot of people who have their own proposals. It is a proposition, a proposal. For example, Karl Marx had a proposal. "We will make an ideal society, we will do it this way and this way". You know how many millions of people died, and nothing remained. And Hitler had another proposal, and look how that ended. Today, many people have their own proposals. But God has His own proposal.
God's proposal is the life of the church. It is the bread of the proposition; to take those grains, to crush them, to purify them, to cleanse them, to knead them, to put them through fire. But not so that they burn, but so that they are cooked to perfection as bread, like cakes, and then put on the table of fellowship. That is God's proposal. "So that they see your good works, and glorify your Father who is in heaven". The life of the church is God's proposal for humanity; that they be saved, receive Christ, and come to be part of the bread of the proposition. The proposal of God that must be presented before God, at God's table. And this is how it is accomplished.
"And thou shalt take fine flour, and bake twelve cakes thereof: two tenth parts of an ephah shall be in one cake. " (v. 5). Two tenth parts each cake, and they are twelve cakes; twenty-four tenths. The number 24 in the Bible is the number of the priesthood. Do you remember when David established those songs, those shifts? They were twenty-four classes. Zachariah, John the Baptist's father, was of the eighth class, of the class of Abijah. Each class had fifteen days of service, and in the year there were twenty-four classes, twenty-four priestly shifts. That's why there were twenty four elders before God. And here they are twenty-four tenths.
All those cakes represent the priestly Kingdom of the church. A kingdom and priests. That's why incense was put on the bread, as you can see. " And thou shalt set them in two rows, - because that number means testimony-, six on a row, upon the pure table before Jehovah. And thou shalt put pure frankincense upon each row". In each row there were six cakes and incense was placed on them: the life, the ministry of prayer of the church. When the church meets together to pray, to intercede in a spirit before the Lord, that is when incense is placed on each bread.
"...it shall be a bread of remembrance, an offering by fire to Jehovah. Every sabbath day he shall arrange it before Jehovah continually, on the part of the children of Israel: it is an everlasting covenant.". That was the bread: a remembrance before God. We also have to remember others, to pray for one another; to constantly remember them before God, it is the prayer life of the church.
"And it shall be Aaron's and his sons'; and they shall eat it in a holy place; for it is most holy unto him of Jehovah's offerings by fire: it is an everlasting statute.". What do we see here? It is God's right to have the church that lives the life of the church in Christ to glorify God. God is entitled to this. Aaron and his sons were those that were entitled to eat that bread. Christ is entitled to eat of this bread.
Will we do this for the Lord? "thou shalt make...". We have to make him this table, we have to serve this table to the Lord, because he is entitled to the perpetual eating of this bread.
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By: Gino Iafrancesco V./ Traslation: Andrew Web.
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