Paul begins the sixth chapter of II Corinthians by saying, And working together with Him… The phraseology is always so careful in Paul’s language. We have degenerated into a generation of Christians who work for the Lord and who think, “Jesus needs someone to work for Him.” He needs no one to work for Him. He has already finished the works from the foundation of the world (Hebrews 4:3). He needs someone to work with Him, someone to flow along with what He is doing.
And working together with Him, we also urge you not to receive the grace of God in vain;—for He says, “At the acceptable time I listened to you, and on the day of salvation I helped you”; behold, now is the “acceptable time,” behold, now is “the day of salvation.” II Corinthians 6:1, 2.
Notice that NOW is the acceptable time, and THIS is the day of salvation. It is strange how a certain phrase in the Scriptures has its meaning successively emphasized from time to time, and age to age. When God does something and He gives a promise, saying, “Now is the acceptable time,” He is not saying, “At this particular moment is the acceptable time.” The promise keeps coming up with an emphasis in successive generations and periods of time.
It is like one of Joel’s prophecies in the Old Testament. At the time Joel prophesied there must have been a fulfillment. “Whoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. There will be deliverance in the remnant” (Joel 2:32). There must have been a remnant at the time of the great plague of the locusts in Joel’s day. Then in the New Testament, Peter was saying on the day of Pentecost, “This is it. This is what Joel spoke of” (Acts 2:16, 21). Twenty-eight years later James said, … He hath long patience for it, until he receive the early and the latter rain (James 5:7), meaning that the prophecy quoted in the second chapter of Joel had not yet had its principal fulfillment.
In this generation, people in the Pentecostal movement have said for sixty or seventy years, “This is what Joel spoke of.” We come along and say, “Well, it is close. They have been speaking with tongues, but Joel was talking about prophesying, which they have forgotten all about.” Now we prophesy and say, “This is it,” and yet Joel’s prophecy said He will pour out His Spirit upon all flesh (Joel 2:28). So maybe we are not quite there.
When the Lord gives a promise it has a successive fulfillment and emphasis. It is not only inexhaustable, but it is almost repetitious in its fulfillment. It is difficult for us to understand what that means. For instance, look at the Lord’s Supper for another illustration. Jesus said, “Take, eat, this is My body, and this cup is the New Testament in My blood” (I Corinthians 11:24, 25). Yet, what the disciples partook of that night was more like a foretaste than a reality, because Christ was yet to shed His blood. In I Corinthians 11:23–26 Paul was saying, “I received of the Lord,” and he described the revelation the Lord had given, and added, “As you do this you proclaim that Christ has been crucified.” Further in the Scriptures, the book of Revelation gives the picture of the Lamb that had been slain and what the blood was to mean. (Revelation 12:11).
The death of Jesus Christ is like that; it has successive emphasis. As long as the door is open it can have a unique and special fulfillment. If you had been kneeling beneath the cross, and the blood had spilled upon you, there could not have been more reality to the words, “By this blood you are cleansed,” than in this day when the Lord is reviving the purity and the spiritual flow of the Communion. Now, more than before, as we partake of the Communion, it is as valid and real as if Christ were hanging on the cross in the center of the assembly giving His blood for everyone. It is just as real. It has a successive reality brought forward into the present. Every time you come into the Lord in an acceptable time, or you come to partake of the blood of Jesus Christ, all of those past provisions are suddenly made valid and as real to you as they could ever be in that acceptable time. In fact, more so, because the further we go, the more the Lord brings it forth.
I do not worship the Lord with anything historical in my mind. I look upon nothing as a past covenant. I am an heir of the covenant of Abraham, and when I read the stories of Abraham I am positive I am an heir of the covenant of Christ, and an heir of the covenant of Abraham (Galatians 3:29). It is more valid to me now than it was to Abraham.
I do not emphasize the historical: “By His stripes you were healed” (Isaiah 53:5). That gives an historical emphasis, but it is continually manifested in the present. That is why in the Gospel of John, He takes the name “I AM.” “… Before Abraham was born, I AM.” John 8:58. It refers to the name of God, “Jehovah”: “I AM that I AM” (Exodus 3:14)—The Ever Present One, The Eternal One, The Eternal Now. God is One who continually manifests Himself in the present. God does not come to us like a ghost from the past, and He is not coming to us as some specter who is about to come or will come in the future. Although we look for Him to constantly come, the emphasis has shifted, especially in this generation, to now. The emphasis has shifted to: “I AM THAT I AM. Before Abraham was, I AM.” In other words, He manifested Himself in the present tense to Abraham, and He is also manifesting Himself in the present tense to us.
As you read the New American Standard Bible, notice the asterisks used to denote a special form of the present tense in the Greek: “And He was saying to them…” It means that a past action is continued into the present to give an emphasis. In other words, it is a use of the present tense for an historical event that has happened in the past in order to make it real and vivid to those who read the Word. The Greek uses this tense constantly. God is continually trying to get you to take His Words, everything that He has ever done and everything that He will do, and bring it into your present experience. He is trying to make it real to you right now!
The battle we continually face in this Walk is that we have been conditioned to accept the limitation of the acts of God to the past, instead of realizing God did not do those things in the past principally. He did acts that are continually manifested in an acceptable time in any generation of His people. The stories and the promises in the Word are more real and valid right now than they have ever been. Don’t say, “Oh, the good old days, when they walked the shores of Galilee.” The Lord is doing more today! Some have been very critical of our literature. This is fortunate for us, because God has finally brought forth a Word to us like He did in Bible times, a Word that people do not ignore. They either open their hearts and embrace it, or they want to throw rocks. That’s all right; That is the way it was with Stephen in Acts 7. They could not resist the wisdom, so they put their hands over their ears, and gnashed him with their teeth. They didn’t dare to take their hands off their ears; they might have heard more Living Words. They did not want to hear anything like that.
People can be so set to reject; they are doing the same thing today. It will build, and build, and build, until there will be more active persecution against the Walk today than has occurred at any time since the Word was real as it was in Scriptural times. With the coming of the Living Word that same thing will happen again. People will hear it and open their hearts to it. This one statement has already brought persecution: “There will be more prophets in this generation than there were in all the pages of Scripture.” If you say, “I don’t believe that; those were the good Bible days,” then what is the matter with these days? Are these not good Bible days too? The Old and New Covenants and the principles of the Kingdom are being revealed out of all of it. We are standing at a conjunction of ages. Everything good from the Church age and everything glorious in all the powers of the age to come are being made real to the people of the Lord.
What a time! Do you think it is inferior? It will be to some because their hearts are filled with unbelief. The Lord spoke of this day: “Will the Son of Man find faith when He comes?” (Luke 18:8). We know He will find faith, because He is going to have a remnant. In that remnant the Lord is calling is where the faith will be found. They will be strong and do exploits. They are going to do greater works than the works Jesus did (John 14:12).
These days will be greater than the days of the Gospel, as far as miracles and signs and wonders are concerned. An example of one way it will be greater is Christ’s coming forth in a many-membered Body. There is a limit to that which one person can do who is localized in one spot, no matter how unlimited his capacities and ministries. Jesus was localized in the flesh and blood of One Man. Now He is universalized in a many-membered Body, and He is coming forth with His Living Presence, not to suffer as He did the first time, but to be glorified in His saints and to be admired in all them that believe (II Thessalonians 1:10). As literally hundreds of thousands of people are all doing the works of Christ, works involving judgment, works of glorifying the Lord, works of bringing the ultimate victory of Christ into full manifestation, wouldn’t you have to say, “Greater works are on us”? The first time, Christ came to make provision for this and to give His life a ransom for many (Matthew 20:28). There is a great difference in what He is coming for now. Don’t sell this day short. It is the acceptable time. “Now is the day of salvation” (II Corinthians 6:2).
We do not receive the grace of God in vain. It would be easy in this generation to give all the promises to a past generation in their long robes and beards, yet this generation has been loosed in some amazing ways. I have never seen clothes styles change as much as they have in this generation. People have been frozen to styles for long periods of time. But look around. Everything is changing. It is good. People are getting out of old ruts. More things are happening now within ten years time than used to happen in a hundred. What is happening? There is an acceleration; God is making provision for something to happen in the whole plan that He is bringing forth. It would be good to lift our sights to something more: walking in the Spirit, having faith, believing the Lord, not being afraid to stand for what is right and for the thing that God shows, having a faith to go after it in the name of the Lord.
This explanation of the acceptable time is important because we sometimes think everything that God is going to do was just finished or is about to happen, and that we stand in sort of a no-man’s land where nothing much is happening. More is happening now. The Kingdom of God is coming!
“I didn’t read about it in the papers.”
It is not coming with observation (Luke 17:20).
“But look at the old order.”
Yes, just look at the old order. Look into the political structures, the credibility of governments and politicians. Go back to what existed ten years ago, and look at it now—the whole world is changing. Why? Because it is coming down! The old order is crumbling. God is bringing it all down. There is a Rock cut out of a mountain without hands that will smite the toes of the image (Daniel 2:35). The Rock will grow and fill the whole earth.
Maybe you wanted to see the Rapture and see it in a certain order. Good luck—but just be ready for it to take place by another process. God did not prepare the Church all these centuries to suddenly get it out of the way while He singlehandedly reversed everything back to the Old Testament style of doing it. That is what they couldn’t understand in the first coming of the Lord. Why didn’t He get out a slingshot as a Son of David and kill the Goliaths? “If you are the Son of David, where is Your slingshot? If You have come to rule and reign why don’t You get an army and go after it?
But Jesus Said, “You don’t understand. My Kingdom is not of this world” (John 18:36). He had something else to do: His was to be a spiritual invasion. The Jews were ready to throw Him out; they couldn’t understand. How could He be the Messiah? He wasn’t delivering them from anything as Joshua or others had; all He was doing was casting out devils and seeing Satan fall (Luke 10:18). That was ALL He was doing?
This time the Lord isn’t coming with His slingshot—He is coming with a sharp two-edged sword that comes out of His mouth (Revelation 1:16). He is coming with a Living Word! He is coming to consume them with the brightness of His Parousia, or the very Presence of the Lord (II Thessalonians 2:8). These are very Scriptural truths; something for us to look for to happen every day.
Stand and prophesy; bring the Spirit of the Lord Jesus Christ to be manifested in an ever greater way. No generation will see the Spirit of Christ manifested as we will see it in this Walk. Stand and prophesy against Babylon. Prophesy against everything you can prophesy against, unless the Lord says, “I did that.” Say, “Thy Kingdom come. Now is an acceptable time for things to happen.”
You say, “It looks like chaos and anarchy,” but you sometimes have to demolish the old building before you can build a new one. Nero watched Rome burn and said that he could rebuild it better. “God, look at all these beautiful denominations, look at their programs, look at the annuities, look at all the great corporations they have built—surely, Lord, You don’t mean that not one stone will be left standing? You wouldn’t tear down our beautiful temple, Lord? You wouldn’t! All of the Jews come to this Temple to worship.” All the people judicially flow into the denominations in this day. They won’t know which church they are staying home from. We have the promise, “In wrath remember mercy. God is going to be working” (Habakkuk 3:2).
If no one stomps on Babylon, who will do it? Someone must open the door. You don’t look at Goliath and stand and shake in your boots; you begin to prophesy against him. At the beginning of the Walk, we were among a few who had a vision, and we prophesied. If you listened to those prophecies, you would find that they are up to date as tomorrow. When they came, they seemed ridiculous to the people. No one thought those prophecies could possibly be fulfilled. Now you would say, “Oh, that is happening today. Praise the Lord.” Those prophecies appeared out of place when they first came, however. It would be good for you to read them, bearing in mind that we are a prophetic community.
The whole scene is changing because God is putting a Living Word in people and they are beginning to speak that Word and prophesy it into existence. The Word of the Lord came to Isaiah, the Word of the Lord came to Jeremiah, and the Word of the Lord came to other prophets, like Jonah who was told, “Rise, go and prophesy against Ninevah.” Are we foretelling? We are doing more than foretelling when this Word comes, we are creating something into being. We prophesy to the wind, “Breathe on the bones.” We prophesy till the flesh comes on them, till they become a great and mighty army. (Ezekiel 37:1–9).
Prophecy becomes the tool by which God creates His will in the earth. “By faith we understand that the ages were framed by the Word of God” (Hebrews 11:3). When God speaks, that makes it happen. And He is pleased to bring forth His will in the earth by your feeble breath speaking His Word. Oh, how God has linked His omnipotence with our frailties so that we no longer can say, “I’m nothing,” but in His hands we become an instrument to thresh the mountains (Isaiah 41:15). Believe it; stand on it; prophesy it—believe it with all your heart. Have faith to believe for miracles, faith for anything that God sets before you.
We can’t help but be optimistic can we? Righteousness and optimism are a good combination. We do things right in the sight of the Lord, but with the greatest of faith believing for His mighty hand to be made bare. Remember what Peter said when he and John had healed the lame man and the people rushed to him: “Why look on us as though by our power or holiness we made this man straight. This was done in the name of Jesus” (Acts 3:12–17). He pin pointed it.
Two things happen when God moves: He manifests His character, and He manifests His power. When Satan moves, you have signs and wonders too, but not character. There is nothing there. God puts Himself in everything He says and everything He does—all of His beauty, all of His holiness, all of His perfection. Satan cannot do that because there isn’t anything to him—he is the evil one, altogether unrighteous.
Lord, not only give us power, but let the grace of God rest upon us to reveal Christ in all of His perfection in everything that is done in the Body.