Free Access to the Realms of Heaven
When you first hear teaching about the heavenly realms you might find it rather challenging to begin with. You may never have heard anything quite like this in the church before. Don’t be surprised if your spirit starts to respond before your mind has caught up. It is easy to get confused, or bogged down by trying to make sense of it all from a logical point of view. Not to mention the fact that some of you are probably trying to work out if we have gone completely off the rails…
Please set your mind at rest, and let your spirit lead. We are not going to ask you to do anything that is not firmly rooted in Jesus. Jesus is the Logos Word, and you need an ever-deepening relationship with Him. The Bible is an introduction to Him, a springboard from which you can encounter Him. It is only by experience that you can truly know Him: an experience you can have for yourself in increasing measure.
“I will grant you free access…”
And the angel of the LORD admonished Joshua, saying, “Thus says the LORD of hosts, ‘If you will walk in My ways and if you will perform My service, then you will also govern My house and also have charge of My courts, and I will grant you free access among these who are standing here” (Zechariah 3:6-7).
At that point Joshua is in the heavenly realms, not on the earth, and the others standing there are heavenly beings. This is where God promises Joshua that he can have ‘free access’.
But there are conditions. Since God does not show favoritism (Rom 2:11), we know that if we fulfil those conditions, the same offer is open to us. And in those conditions, we can see a distinct progression. Walk in His ways; perform His service; govern His house; have charge of His courts: then we will be able to stand in His Presence in a different realm.
Moses knew the ways of God
He revealed His ways to Moses, his works (or His acts) to the children of Israel (Psalm 103:7).
Moses knew the ways of God. There was a reason for that: He was prepared to risk engaging with God, to meet with Him face to face, when the rest of Israel kept their distance from the fire and the smoke on the mountaintop. It is not an easy thing to get to know God’s ways. But He invites us to come as Moses did, into the heavenly realms, into His Presence, into His glory.
Remember how Moses asked God to show him His glory, how God passed by before him and he was not able to see God’s face, but only what the King James Bible calls His ‘back parts’? Now, when we read that with a Greek (western) mindset, we probably think it means he saw God’s physical back. Whatever would God’s back look like? But with a Hebrew worldview we understand that what Moses saw was history, the things God had done, everything that had happened up to that time. That is how Moses was able to write the first five books of the Bible, including the story of creation and all the other events which happened before his lifetime.
But the rest of the nation of Israel did not go up that mountain, and all they saw was what God did. They saw His works, they saw His miracles, but they didn’t really begin to understand who He is, what He is like. God is inviting us to do as Moses did, so that we can know His ways. And when we know His ways, we can do the works that He does.
Moses performed miracles. He brought water out of the rock: he used his staff, he exercised power. Israel just received. The whole nation saw the works, but none of them ever actually did the works like Moses did. Jesus said that He did what He saw the Father doing (John 5:19): and He expects us to do the works He did (and greater ones).
If we are to walk in His ways, we first have to know His ways. To do the works of God, we need to know the ways of God. Then we can be among those who bring the kingdom from heaven to earth.
Walk in the ways of God
The Logos Word of God will be a safeguard for us, to keep us in the truth. The Word of God will be an anchor for all we do: Jesus is the Logos Word of God, the living Word. He is the exact image and likeness of the Father. If we have seen Him, we have seen the Father. If we get to know Jesus in relationship we can get to know the ways of God. The ways of God reveal His character, so it is really important for us to become familiar with His ways.
If we look at Psalm 119, the first 40 verses in particular speak of His word, ways, testimonies, judgments, law, precepts, statutes, ordinances, commandments, and wonders. If we will meditate on those facets of His revelation, we realize they are all different, and that they each express some different aspect of His character.
Meditate on scripture
Meditation on scripture is really key for unlocking this. We, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory (2 Cor 3:18). As we meditate on a Bible verse or passage, what is written becomes a doorway to experience, and we become what we behold. And the more we behold, the more we become like what – or whom – we behold. We are transformed. That word is ‘metamorphosed’, like a caterpillar changing into a butterfly. A change in its DNA takes place. Meditation like this can transform us that deeply.
Similarly, as we receive the DNA of God in breaking bread, the light comes into our DNA, and we are changed.
We need to hear the rhema word, the word that God speaks right now, straight to our heart. When we meditate on scripture, we can receive a rhema word as the Holy Spirit teaches us and draws out for us a message which speaks to us in our situation. And we can also have face-to-face encounters with God where He speaks a word to us directly. When that happens, we will know it is God because that revelation will line up with the truth of His nature that we already know- God is love. While we learn to recognize His voice for ourselves, we can use love as our plumbline, our standard. If it is not love, it is not God.
If you go back to the first 40 verses of Psalm 119 again, you will see another set of words which express things we need to do in order to know and experience and press into His ways. Those are words such as: walk, observe, seek, look, treasure, tell, rejoice, meditate, establish, delight, live, long for, cling, run, incline, reverence, and give thanks.
Again, there are yet other words in those verses which describe how God will respond to our walking and seeking: He will bless (that is, He will empower us to prosper, to succeed to the highest level), ordain, teach, open eyes, rebuke, take away reproach, revive, answer, strengthen, grant, enlarge our heart, give understanding, and deal bountifully.
These are some of the pathways and the protocols, the processes we will need to follow if we want to fully experience and demonstrate the life of God.
We need to take the time to read and meditate on scriptures like these for ourselves.