Cornelius was a centurion, an officer in the Roman army, a professional soldier. However, we are not as interested in this phase of his life as in the fact that he was a devout man, and one who feared God with all his household, and gave many alms to the Jewish people, and prayed to God continually. He was much alarmed one day when an angel appeared to him, and he said, “What is it, Lord?” And he (the angel) said to him, “Your prayers and alms have ascended as a memorial before God.” Acts 10:2, 4.
This is somewhat disturbing—the fact that this man was technically not a Christian, He did not know the way of Christ, yet his prayers and alms were coming up to God for a memorial that was well pleasing to the Lord. I hope this next statement will be understood correctly. There is a better approach to God than what is taught in fundamentalist circles which try to preach people into a revelation. So often the quality of conversion is not there, because what is born of fleshly effort must remain fleshly (John 3:6). Many people have been converted to something less than what God wants.
Cornelius was different. He could not be kept out of experiences. He came to the Lord as an honest, deeply sincere worshiper. He found Christ and was filled with the Holy Spirit. Then Peter had to back up and baptize him in water, because none of the conventional procedures had been fulfilled in his life. First he was filled with the Holy Spirit, and then I suppose they showed him more plainly what salvation really meant. Without any question, he was a believer by that time; but he had to go through the formality of understanding those scriptural experiences.
In these days we will see many people finding God. There will be many who sincerely worship the Lord. We must not discount or discredit them. Without any knowledge of Christ they will come seeking God and worshiping Him. They will come into a walk with God quicker than some orthodox, fundamental believers who have been trained from childhood in all the doctrinal aspects of God, yet they have no worship in their hearts. When the evil days come, these will turn away because the letter of the law will not be enough for them. To be so close to the Kingdom and to miss it is a tragedy. But it will happen.
It is interesting to see that people who have had no knowledge of the Lord come into a walk with God often; times more rapidly than those who profess to be Christians. It is not how close you are to it in doctrine, but how close you are to it in your spirit that counts. The Pharisees in Jesus’ day had all the correct doctrines, and of all people they should have accepted Him; but they rejected Christ. All over the Roman world the Gentiles, without any religious training, eagerly pressed in while the Jews turned away, causing riots and blaspheming the name of God (Acts 13:45–50). What is God trying to tell us in all this? It is not that we should not study the Bible, but it is that we should be worshipers. Unless we are worshipers, all the rest is easily lost and is of no advantage to us at all. We must be those deep worshipers of the Lord.
Worship is essential because it leads us into three important areas: clearer perception and revelation, creative prophecy, and steadfastness. As we worship, God starts bringing revelation to us … For the letter killeth, but the spirit giveth life. 2 Corinthians 3:6. It is revelation that makes the Word live for us. That is the reason the farther we go with God, the more precious the Scriptures are to us and the more diligently we study them.
The second thing that happens as we worship the Lord is that we begin to prophesy, and the prophecy takes on a creative aspect. As we prophesy, we know that by the anointing of the Holy Spirit the words of our mouths are actually making the prophecies come to pass. We feel the reality of it. As the words come forth, we are aware that they are living and creative.
A man who worships remains steadfast in the times of sifting. In light of the things that are before us, we need to really be worshipers. If we fail to worship, we will feel that we are being shaken; however, the more we worship, the more we will feel the steadfastness and the security of our walk with the Lord. This is very important. There are many who have no obvious security right now. There is nothing on which they can really lean. Even those who have had plenty of this world’s goods feel the insecurity of the hour. God is bringing people to the place where they will either be fearful—actually filled with terror—or they will be filled with a confidence in the Lord as they worship and adore Him, believing for the preservation of the remnant which God has called by His Spirit.
When you begin to worship God in Spirit, you do so quite blindly at first. You begin many times without an awareness of what to do next. You worship when you do not know the answers, when you do not have a word from God to follow. You simply stand before God to glorify and adore Him. Your worship of the Lord takes precedence. It has a place of priority over your own needs. You do not come as a beggar pleading for God to give you an answer, to show you which way to go. You just begin to worship Him. Then as you continue worshiping, your ears come alive, your eyes begin to see as God directs you step by step into what you are to do. Worship is an aspect of waiting on the Lord. Your fears and anything else that is in your heart tend to surface during a period of worship. The Lord has the caldron boiling, as it were, and He keeps stirring the pot and ladling off the impurities of your spirit. Worship becomes a purifying process that clears the vision and the spiritual perception.
There is a great need for us to move into worship, or we will never be the prophetic community and the closely knit Body that God says we must be. These are the two basic things that must be worked in the Body in order for it to survive. When we stand and worship, we will be the prophetic community, as our spiritual sensitivity is heightened and we find ourselves overwhelmed with His presence. The presence of the Lord is very real to worshipers. He is in their midst. He said that if two or three of us are gathered together, He is in our midst (Matthew 18:20). He will never forsake us. Unto the end of the age His presence is with us (Matthew 28:20).
The Parousia could have taken place at any time, but there was never a people prepared. It is not the Lord who makes the Parousia; it is the people. “Parousia” is the Greek word for the time of Christ’s presence in the end time, when He will lead His people right through the endtime events. The Lord will not come down and force His presence upon us. When we are in the Spirit and our sensitivity is increased, His presence becomes an overwhelming experience.
How many other prisoners were on the Isle of Patmos besides John? The Bible does not tell us, but it would be safe to assume that the Romans did not maintain a penal colony for only one man, so there must have been many. But John was in the Spirit on the Lord’s day, and the revelation of the Lord came to him, and he fell down like a dead man (Revelation 1:10). There were many on the road to Damascus with Saul of Tarsus, and though his experience was more of a sovereign act of God, still we must remember that Saul’s heart had been prepared (Acts 9:3–8). When the Lord appeared to him, he fell to the ground; but as far as we know, it had no lasting affect on any of the other men in his company. They were on their way to persecute the believers, and they, too, were very sincere. But there was something different about this one individual. He writes later about the zeal he had: he was a Hebrew of the Hebrews, a Pharisee of the Pharisees (Philippians 3:5). None excelled him in his desire to worship and serve God. This was true of Cornelius also. His worship coming up to God was unexcelled. If we want a revelation of the Lord to our hearts, we must become deep worshipers of the Lord.
Two will be at the mill grinding; one will be taken in the judgments, and the other will be left (Matthew 24:41). I want to be one of those who is left; I do not want to be swept away in judgment. To be preserved through these days one must be sure that he is a worshiper, for that will be the sustaining factor. It is to the worshipers that the Lord reveals Himself. Because their sensitivity to God has been developed, at times worshipers are like men slain before the Lord.
Now do you understand why I keep emphasizing the need to come into a deeper worship? As long as we stand, blessed of God, on the fringe of the Kingdom, we can sing and carry on until we crack the rafters. But one day we will become the Kingdom of worshipers who meet God and become like dead men. We are not yet that deep in worship. We need something more in the depth of our worship. We must aspire to go on to a sensitivity to the Lord that is far greater. Every time we come to church we should have a meeting with God. The preaching and the teaching should actually be almost secondary to the fact that as worshipers of the Lord we break through to God.
Do you want to be that deep worshiper? Do you want to have a revelation of the Lord? It is not what you grasp with your mind that counts; it is how God meets your heart. When God meets the heart, very soon He meets the head. Set aside the things that are a confusion and a problem to you; push them into the background. You walk with God first with your heart, and then with your head. God first met Cornelius’ heart, and eventually He met his head. Peter spent several days teaching him and explaining what had happened to him (Acts 10:48).
We must come to the house of God determined to be led by the Spirit of the Lord. We must get out of any lethargy, any rut, or anything that holds us in a passive state where we are insensitive to the voice of the Lord. How do we do it? Worship; we worship the Lord. I appreciate the zeal in worship; I appreciate the psalms. We do not want to lose any of that, but we must keep uppermost in our minds this drive to come into a deeper worship of the Lord, into a meeting with God, into a walk with Him. I am sure we are not yet satisfied. Though our walk with God is rich, yet we are still stirred, almost unconsciously by the Spirit, to believe that there is something better that we can have.
Blessed are they who have ears to hear. In the book of Revelation the word was always: “Blessed is he who hath an ear to hear what the Spirit saith to the churches” (Revelation 2:7). Jesus was constantly pointing that out to people, but they did not know what He was talking about. How do we receive this capacity to hear God? I think we receive it while we are worshiping. Spiritual focus comes to a worshiper. He sets his heart upon God, and God grants him the capacity to develop an awareness of the Lord. In my thinking, that is what the Parousia will be.
Many miracles and releases come as God works through people with prepared hearts. This is the pattern we see in the Scriptures. Would the events on the day of Pentecost have happened sovereignly if those Christians had not been waiting on the Lord, preparing their hearts, and seeking God (Acts 1:14)? I do not think so. God allows the heart to be prepared first. It is the man who worships the Lord who is prepared for the revelation that God brings.
As the presence of the Lord is manifested in the earth, who will see it? Do you think the world will see Him? What about those in the Christian world who have denied that He is even God, who have denied the inspiration of His words—are they going to see Him? No, for the Word says that unto them that look for him shall he appear the second time without sin unto salvation. Hebrews 9:28b. There must be that expectancy, that looking for Him. And every man that hath this hope in him purifieth himself … 1 John 3:3. You will never make it any other way than by worshiping God and allowing Him to bring you that awareness.
Jesus told His disciples, “But blessed are your eyes, because they see; and your ears, because they hear. For truly I say to you, that many prophets and righteous men desired to see what you see, and did not see it; and to hear what you hear, and did not hear it.” Matthew 13:16, 17.
“The kingdom of heaven is like a treasure hidden in the field; which a man found and hid; and from joy over it he goes and sells all that he has, and buys that field. Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant seeking fine pearls, and upon finding one pearl of great value, he went and sold all that he had, and bought it.” Matthew 13:44–46.
A walk with the Lord is a pearl of great price, a treasure hidden in a field. Does the world consider it that? What would be the opinion of many churches concerning it? Would they call it a pearl of great price? or a treasure hidden in a field? God is moving in the earth today; He is bringing wonderful revelations that are as a pearl of great price or a treasure hidden in a field. But many see only the rocks in the field. We see the treasure hidden there.
What will the field cost? It will cost everything we have. Some may think that is a poor bargain, that the field is not worth it. But a treasure is hidden there. Otherwise, a walk in the Spirit would not be worth what we go through. If anyone becomes discouraged, if anyone is ready to give up, perhaps he needs to wait on God until he finds the treasure again. Maybe he needs to worship until he sees the treasure, for he may never have seen it in the first place. Perhaps he was just moved by some of the other manifestations that accompany a walk in the Spirit and did not really see the treasure or find that pearl of great price for which he would be willing to sell everything he has.
Some may think they would give anything to be able to prophesy and sing psalms or to be able to do signs and wonders. Those are not the true treasure; those are just the side benefits. Our attitude must be that we would give anything to walk with Him. Our basic need is the revelation of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the deeper worship will lead us to that revelation of Him. Above everything else, we want our hearts to be set upon this deep worship of the Lord. We want the veil to be taken from our eyes.
Are you one who has never really had this revelation of the Lord? You must ask Him to give you eyes to see and ears to hear so that the blindness passes from you and God makes you sensitive to Him. The sustaining, all-compelling revelation of the Lord, which comes to people in a thousand different ways, is what really makes a walk with God. There is no point in your trying to pay the price when you do not have the blessing. Look to the Lord to meet you.
In the name of Jesus Christ, we curse the darkness, we bind the strong man who would blind our eyes and keep us from revelation, who in a thousand ways would turn our focus on something else. In the name of Jesus, we command the veil to fall from our eyes. We command our hearts to be open for God to meet us gloriously in a way that we shall not try to analyze with our heads, but that we shall believe with our hearts and find it becoming real to us.
I prophesy unto you that the vision and the revelation shall surely come. The darkness will pass, and the Lord shall bring light unto you. For doth not the Lord see the sincerity of your heart? Are you not now even as Cornelius of old who sought the Lord with prayers when he did not yet have the revelation? So the Lord shall meet you also. He shall turn the darkness away from you and bring forth the glorious light of His revelation. You shall know that God is moving in the earth today, not because you have analyzed it with your mind, but because the Lord hath made it real to your heart and He has set your feet upon the path that He has chosen for you to walk. You will know that you are loosed to do the will of the Lord, raised up by the hand of God. You shall not wonder whether you are able to survive, but you shall know you were brought forth and born that you might walk with your God.