“So faith comes by hearing and hearing through the Word of Christ.” -Romans 10:17
At issue is our Spiritual maturity. Our natural orientation is temporal and carnal but our new creation in Christ Jesus is Spiritual. Growth of our new Spiritual identity is not only our calling but nurturing Spiritual desires is the only wise choice for mortals to make!
This should be our highest priority as long as we are walking in sandals on this earth. The outcome of our salvation is at stake. No, we won’t lose our salvation, but by neglect we will suffer much loss! Maturity in Jesus Christ requires sharp focus and due diligence.
Carnality is not only well and alive in us, we have a new Spiritual enemy actively waring against our personal soul. Our maturity in Christ Jesus requires growing our faith! Our Spiritual health in Jesus is at stake!
The loss of gold, silver and precious stones is one thing but the loss of having intimate knowledge, experiencing Jesus Himself, has to be the most tragic loss of all. This unintended consequence of Spiritual neglect is a Spiritual tragedy.
Grace is abundantly available, grace upon grace; not maturing in Christ Jesus is an infamy we must all bear. Our neglect robs our own selves of the generous grace Jesus desires to provide. We not only rob our own self but those around us whose fellowship we share. We actually hinder the growth of others by our own self neglect!
Salvation is not at risk, but Spiritual maturity is! When we do not avail ourselves of God’s grace provisions, we hinder our own soul in Him! … and when we see Him face to face??
The Christian walk is hard! But the Christian walk is miraculously blessed at the same time. They go together like sweet and sour, like sweet and bitter, like easy and hard.
Walking in faith is letting the light shine into our personal darkness, so that, we begin seeing how our grey issues barricade our own blessings. We have experienced and know the peace of God. We know how real it is; it also leads into an abundant life when we take in the fulness of Jesus.
Desire can be our culprit! It can be sweet or it can be bitter.
I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. (It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me.) And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. -Gal. 2:20.
Faith without grace is human work relying on personal resources. We are unable to enter into our scriptural domain of faith without resurrection power operating within our soul. When we connect our earthly domain into God’s redemption, we, like Peter, sink into the water instead of walking on it.
We cannot operate in faith apart from the loving mercy of the lover of our soul, the One “who loved me and gave Himself for me.” THIS IS who Jesus is, the lover of our soul! Our new essence is Spiritual and our new birth is in Jesus’ love. This is an organic real relationship. Jesus sees our heart, we need to be righteous as He is. He enables us to live on His level. He loves us with the kind of love that tolerates our human weakness but provides what we need , love, grace and faith, if we will use it. We must consume what he provides in order to receive more!
Faith is our ability to walk in the reality of Christ’s own Life, … in us; we are to walk in Him; we are to walk in His Life giving power. It is gifted through redemption. To be overcomers, we must choose to conquer walking in His grace by faith!
We can walk in resurrection power!
We have this unique grace position because Israel rejected their Messiah. Our new covenant grace salvation is only offered during our present pause of mercy and grace. This grace period closes with the rapture of the Church. When our approaching rapture occurs, our humanity leaves the earth and we emerge into our Heavenly Kingdom home wearing imperishable bodies and no masks. We already are a kingdom of priests to our God on earth. Are we glorifying God as Priests? Soon we will be wearing spiritual bodies.
God’s chosen people came through Abraham and His promises to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. These promises are still valid, in place, waiting for God’s own timing. The Spiritual nature of who we are in Christ Jesus does not invalidate or replace the Kingdom message to Israel and the Jewish people.
Our present pause period of grace will soon end completed. Now is our opportunity to grow, grow in this abundant, marvelous grace. This blessed temporal time frame of grace is drawing to a conclusion. Jesus Himself tells us to work for the night is coming when no one can work! This is no longer our home, let us work now with eternity’s values in view!
We tend to take for granted the grace provisions we currently experience. Jesus became the sacrificial lamb of the Old Testament providing our New Testament salvation. His sacrifice on a cross pays for our willfulness and sin. This salvation is a provision of His Kingdom plan but there is a heavenly Kingdom as well as an earthly Kingdom.
Genesis is the beginning of this creation story including both the heavenly kingdom and the earthly kingdom. Revelation is the final chapter of God’s Book where God’s wrath, His jealously, His love and His righteous judgment is revealed.
Zechariah was God’s prophet after Israel’s return from captivity in Babylon. The temple had to be rebuilt but the people had much local resistance. Zechariah had many visions but one was a vision of the flying scroll depicting the rule of law covering the earth during the Kingdom of God on earth. The flying scroll was the Mosaic law of God’s righteousness. On one side of the scroll is the law to convict the thief and on the other side is the purity of God depicting His absolute sovereignty and justice. The earthly Kingdom is Mosaic law. Faith still provides salvation as in the time of Abraham but law rules the land, not grace!
Today we are still under grace until God’s cup is full, until His grace time is complete. Only He knows when His cup is full! But we do know our time is short, when we are taken from earth to home and God’s last week of Daniel begins ticking toward the great tribulation. Genesis was the opening book and Revelation is the closing Book of the creation story.
Our entry point into God’s Heavenly Kingdom is now during this period of Grace. Salvation via grace closes when the soon raptured bride is taken to be with her Bridegroom. After the rapture, earth resumes God’s provision for His earthly Kingdom where He will reigns as King of Kings and Lord of Lords. This is the Kingdom of the OT prophets such as Isaiah, Ezekiel, Daniel, Zachariah as they are still looking forward to the Messiah’s coming as King of Kings.
After the rapture, salvation is still provided during the tribulation period but it is an Old Testament salvation on earth. After the seven year tribulation judgment, Jesus will appear with His bride on a white horse. He will reign as King over an earthly Kingdom for 1000 years. One final judgment will occur and then a new heaven and a new earth will emerge!
Our Spiritual linkage into the promises of Abraham is God’s mercy to all people whom He has created through Adam and Eve. All people are reconciled back to God through the death and resurrection of Jesus but it is our choice to reconcile ourselves back to our Creator God through His own provisions of grace and mercy. God’s redemption is for all who turn their eyes upon Jesus and accept Him as Lord.
The salvation provided now, during grace, is a heavenly Kingdom. We actually become His children, heirs and joint heirs with Jesus, This is not the earthly salvation provided during a post-rapture period and the great tribulation nor is it the salvation of Israel prior to Jesus coming to earth in actual flesh when John the Baptist was a friend of the Bridegroom.
The love of God reaches out from heaven into man himself through Redemption. God’s created provision through redemption not only smashes through the darkness of our own self-deception, our pride, our fear, but provides a sanctification and Spiritual capacity for understanding His absolute truth on an eternal level. Our Spiritual understanding is eternal requiring a new Spiritual creation within us. It is the actual presence of our Living Lord Jesus, in resurrection power, through the indwelling presence of His Holy Spirit. He is the oil for our lamp. We need to keep it full, by faith, while trimming our wick. This is a Grace salvation!
In other words, the inherent sinfulness of natural man restricts his natural ability to reach outside of himself to the level of eternal absolute truth. But God’s redemption provides us with Spiritual resources to burn our light and trim our wick making it possible to grow in grace and knowledge of our eternal Jesus. We actually have within the divine nature of our creator God. We are given His wisdom, we are given the mind of Christ. But we must be continually cultivating His gifts made available through His grace upon grace thru our faith.
Being born again is not only our salvation, it is the beginning of a new relationship by which we grow into the fulness of Jesus Himself. By accepting the challenge of walking in the Light as He is in the Light, we have the fellowship needed to be the overcomers with a bright lite for others to see.
Look at the end of each letter to the seven churches in Revelation, chapters two and three. To each church, these are real churches, is promised to the overcomers, to those who conquer: They will eat from the Tree of Life, receive the crown of Life; they will eat the hidden manna and receive a “white stone.” They will receive the morning star and wear white garments, as they are introduced before the angels by name while actually wearing the name of God Himself. The overcomers will be living in the Heavenly City of New Jerusalem and actually sit with Jesus on His throne. “He that has an ear let him hear.”
When we are created new in Jesus, born again, we become Spiritual children and heirs of God Himself. An heir of God has access to eternal values and resources. Our walk on earth is our pre-heaven opportunity to exploit who we now are in Christ Jesus; this means grasping God’s grace, consuming it with our faith capacity, growing into more grace, grace upon grace. This is what faith is all about. It is simply learning how to trust what God has created … in us. God’s agape love, God’s truth, God’s eternality is in us waiting to be exploited by us in faith. This is what we are called to do. We are called to be good stewards of grace we already possess … if we are created new in Christ Jesus.
God has a plan. We are called to be participants. It is a plan conceived before the word temporal had meaning. God’s plan was eternal before it became exposed for our eyes by time. Our understanding is itself a gift. Genesis through Revelation is a story set in time but God exists outside of time! We have been born again to enter into God’s timeless reality because of His agape Love.
Now we are called to join with Him, reign with Him and enjoy the gift of His Life within our own created self! How great is our God!