“Well, we were promised a new day!” Yes, but when God makes a day, He does it differently than you would. The evening and then the morning were the first day (Genesis 1:5). He often starts with a period in your life that eliminates your ability to see or perceive anything and your ability to really function anymore. He can devastate you deeply enough so that you come to the place of yearning for the night to end and the sun to rise on a new day. “I wait for the Lord, my soul does wait, and in His word do I hope. My soul waits for the Lord more than the watchmen for the morning: indeed, more than the watchmen for the morning.” Psalm 130:5–6, NASB.
You come to the place where you feel, “I have gone through so much. Where is it leading? What is it going to do? Is it really going to be what I expected?” Remember Abraham? Against reasonable hope he believed that what God had promised He was able to perform. In hope against hope he believed, in order that he might become a father of many nations, according to that which had been spoken, “So shall your descendants be.” And without becoming weak in faith he contemplated his own body, now as good as dead since he was about a hundred years old, and the deadness of Sarah’s womb; yet, with respect to the promise of God, he did not waver in unbelief, but grew strong in faith, giving glory to God, and being fully assured that what He had promised, He was able also to perform. Therefore also it was reckoned to him as righteousness. Romans 4:18–22, NASB.
Changes are already taking place for all of us; but it takes a little while to discern them and see how drastic they are. But they are here. Miracles are here. And the most exciting thing that happened to me is that after years of intercession, when the more they prayed for resurrection life for me the more I died, it suddenly dawned on me that you cannot have a resurrection unless you first have a death. Therefore, I willingly submitted.
David prayed a prayer like that: “Don’t let me fall into the hand of the enemy; I choose that You deal with us.” Remember that when he numbered Israel, the Lord counted it as an offense. So when we begin to choose, we come to the same place that David did, where the threshing floor shakes everything (II Samuel 24). God begins to deal with us. He deals with everything in us. We say, “All right, I submit to being crucified with Christ Jesus.” Now those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. Galatians 5:24. But may it never be that I should boast, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world. Galatians 6:14.
“Give me a hammer and some nails, and I’ll start in.” We nail our feet to the cross, and we nail one hand to the cross, and then we’re in a predicament. You say to the Lord, “O Lord, I want to be crucified so I can really live”; and He answers, “That’s no problem. I have some brothers out there with handfuls of nails all ready to help you.” Faithful are the wounds of a friend. Proverbs 27:6a, NASB.
Many times your crucifixion can be completed by that which a brother supplies. Circumstances supply it also. Because you desire to do the will of God, it happens to you. There you are with one hand dangling loose, thinking, “I will never get this work of the cross done!” Then why don’t you rejoice in a brother who comes up to you with a nail, picks up your hammer and finishes the job? Usually the human reaction is, “When I’m through with this cross, I’ll deal with that guy! I’ll get that hammer and really fix him good!”
May we all be able to affirm as Paul did, “I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me, and delivered Himself up for me.” Galatians 2:20, NASB. There are some important developments for all believers which have come forth. In the first place, the fact that many of us have had positions has taken away from the effectiveness of our commissions. As I think about that, I know that I am moving in more authority than I ever have. More things seem to happen in one month than I can point to in a past year. How is it happening? The awareness of Christ’s authority suddenly dawns on me, “I can do it. I can move!” Why? Because I have dropped out of what people were most insistent that I be: a position, a leader figure. And what I could not drop, the Lord took away by one means or another. Now as a result, I know it is a fact that there is nothing in the world like a commission without a position, or a provision you hold onto as a reserve because of your insecurity, or unbelief.
The sin and judgment of Ananias and Sapphira is an amazing incident to try to understand (Acts 5:1–11). Why should two people, who were in the midst of such grace and blessing and love, drop dead? It happened because God was moving upon the disciples to make certain commitments. That is what Peter told Ananias and Sapphira: “No one was requiring that you do this. You did not have to give up that money. It was in your hand. You didn’t have to do it.” “While it remained unsold, did it not remain your own? And after it was sold, was it not under your control? Why is it that you have conceived this deed in your heart? You have not lied to men, but to God.” Acts 5:4.
Selling all that you had and giving it to the poor to help finance brethren was not a requirement for joining the New Testament Church. But they lied to the Holy Spirit, inasmuch as God gave a Word to Ananias and Sapphira and they covenanted together to bypass that Word! Then Peter said to her, “Why is it that you have agreed together to put the Spirit of the Lord to the test? Behold, the feet of those who have buried your husband are at the door, and they shall carry you out as well.” Acts 5:9. God hated that. He had to give one example from the very beginning of the Church to show that we were not to cling to possessions or positions in our insecurity, but rather in faith we would fulfill His Word and His commissions in our lives.
Do you want a position, to be a pastor? We have had an almost unscriptural view of pastors, and we will have to correct that. A few can remember what I was for the first ten years of this walk: an overseeing elder. “But we see you as an apostle!” But remember that the word apostle means one who is sent. It is a ministry of commission; it is not an office of position. The Greek word apostolos means one who is sent. Missionary also means one who is sent. It is derived from the Latin mitto, meaning I send. Apostolo means I send. An apostle is one who is sent.
I was commissioned by the Lord Jesus. And if you insist, “We hold you up as the apostle,” you may have made a position out of it; and you will not receive what you should from me. But if you say, “You are one who was sent to me to give me a Word, and I am listening,” it will work. And for this reason we also constantly thank God that when you received from us the word of God’s message, you accepted it not as the word of men, but for what it really is, the word of God, which also performs its work in you who believe. I Thessalonians 2:13.
“Well, I’m a pastor and they should respect my position.”
Forget the position! Say, rather, “I am a shepherd; I am going to lead these sheep into something. I am an overseer.” Pastor is a word for shepherd.
We have been limited in the ministry of authority because we still had class distinctions just as they had in the Church Age. The title of Pontifex Maximus was given to the Roman Catholic Pope. It is the name for the highest ranking position in the religious order that Rome copied from ancient Babylon. That is the way Satan continues to bring Babylon into our lives. All Babylon, mystery Babylon, is the mother of harlots (Revelation 17:5). Babylon thrives on a religious position! Why does the devil move upon people to assume a preeminent position? He knows that the minute they assume any position, they have less authority because they have taken away from Christ’s exaltation. And in His Kingdom Christ Jesus is the only Lord! There is to be no other Lord. There is to be no other leading but that of the Holy Spirit.
But you ask, “What is this thing about position? Explain it a little further.” A few of the pastors were disturbed, thinking, “You send out the Timothys, and they are undermining the pastors.” They did not do it deliberately, nor did they intend to. The truth is, the Lord never did intend for the pastors to have the position they have. He certainly never intended for me to be pushed by some into a place that I should not have had. Many were saying “the apostle,” when for ten years all I said was, “I am an overseeing elder.”
What about apostle? Apostle is not a position; it is a commission. As a result of seeing it as a position, some brothers have difficulty relating to the apostolic ministry. I want to always speak to you the Word of the Lord. And that still will be subject to confirmation. A man with a position is always a little afraid of confirmation. But a man who has a commission is never afraid. Confirmation is never a threat to him. He can say, “Well, I can make a mistake and accept correction; but still God sent me to do a certain work.”
The early Church was not troubled with position. Later in the New Testament there are references to deacons; but we read in Acts 6 that the seven who were chosen, as a result of the dispute over the serving of widows, were not even called deacons. And when the apostles commissioned these men, they did not say, “We now endow you with all the rights and orders of being special deacons in the first New Testament Church.” They said, simply, … “It is not desirable for us to neglect the word of God in order to serve tables. But select from among you, brethren, seven men of good reputation, full of the Spirit and of wisdom, whom we may put in charge of this task. But we will devote ourselves to prayer, and to the ministry of the word.” Acts 6:2–4.
The same pattern can be seen in Acts 13:1–3. Did the Holy Spirit say, “Separate unto Me these illustrious apostles in your midst whom you never recognized”? No, He said, “Separate these men for the work—a commission, a work whereunto I have called them.” As they ministered to the Lord, and fasted, the Holy Ghost said, Separate me Barnabas and Saul for the work whereunto I have called them. And when they had fasted and prayed, and laid their hands on them, they sent them away. Acts 13:2–3, KJV.
The Lord sent out seventy men who went out doing fantastic things. What do we call them? We don’t have any titles for them. Every time they are mentioned, they are called “seventy.” They are never even named. He sent out His disciples, giving them specific instructions of what they were to do. When they returned, they didn’t grieve because they could not do those things anymore (Luke 10:1–20).
We need to learn that commission is everything and position is nothing. A young man who had great zeal said, “I want to go to Colorado.” The Holy Spirit moved on my spiritual grandfather to send him to Colorado. There he healed people, he prophesied over them, he moved in revelation. He had commissioned him in the Spirit to do that mission. When he returned, he became discouraged. He said, “I can’t do what I did in Colorado.” Grandpa told him, “Well, go back to Colorado.” He went back to Colorado, and he couldn’t repeat what he had done. He could not do it here, and he could not do it there anymore. Why? The only reason he could do it in the first place was because he had been commissioned to do it. He had a Word from God to do it.
Every time we bring in position, we are holding back the Kingdom because of one reason: “Many lords have had dominion over us, but Thou alone, O Lord, in that day, shall have dominion. Thou, O Lord, alone shall be exalted” (Isaiah 26:13; 2:11, 17). What do you need? Do you need status? Do you need some special credentials? Do you need a special position? Should we begin to create stations or ranks within? If we do, we will die spiritually. God is removing from the walk every apostle and pastor who has exalted himself to a special position.
“You can’t do that to me!”
No, but God will.
“You should be submissive to me because I’m an apostle.”
To your authority, but not necessarily to your position.
“But I’m an elder!”
Let’s see the ministry of the elders. The elders which are among you I exhort, who am also an elder, and a witness of the sufferings of Christ, and also a partaker of the glory that shall be revealed: Feed the flock of God which is among you, taking the oversight thereof, not by constraint, but willingly, not for filthy lucre, but of a ready mind; neither as being lords over God’s heritage, but being ensamples to the flock. I Peter 5:1–3, KJV.
You are not to be “lords over God’s heritage, but ensamples to the flock.” Peter said, “I, who also am an elder.”
“I thought he was supposed to be the first Pope.”
He was not a Pope. He said, “I witnessed Christ’s sufferings, and I am an elder with you.”
The orthodox church tried to perpetuate that but they did not succeed. They said, “This is the first among many equals.” How can there be a first among many equals? Well, we ought to know; we have had it. Some have exalted me to a position that I renounce. I am out of it and I am going to be simply one who is giving you a Word from the Lord. Who am I? Just a voice, an oracle of the Lord. But the Lord alone will be the ruler over us.
I am not going to hang onto what I cannot keep. I am going to lose so I can attain what I would never otherwise attain. Then Jesus said to His disciples, “If any one wishes to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me. For whoever wishes to save his life shall lose it; but whoever loses his life for My sake shall find it.” Matthew 16:24–25. And He summoned the multitude with His disciples, and said to them, “If anyone wishes to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me. For whoever wishes to save his life shall lose it; and whoever loses his life for My sake and the gospel’s shall save it. For what does it profit a man to gain the whole world, and forfeit his soul? For what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?” Mark 8:34–37.
Who is going to be the winner in all of this? The Lord is going to increase, and we are going to decrease (John 3:30). And the more He increases, the more His authority will be turned loose in what we say. This is what we saw from the beginning: the Lordship of Jesus Christ over everything. He is the Lord. Therefore also God highly exalted Him, and bestowed on Him the name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those who are in heaven, and on earth, and under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. Philippians 2:9–11.
There is no other prestige or seniority in the Kingdom, and … there is no discharge in that war … Ecclesiastes 8:8, KJV. The only discharge is that of your blood flowing out of your wounds. You are going to be what God wanted you to be in the first place—also in the second place, the third place, and the fourth place.
Why aren’t more results happening for some? Are they still looking to go out and fulfill their ministry? If they are thinking position, they are not thinking ministry. Philip went down to Samaria performing great miracles. How could he do such a thing when the Church was being scattered because of persecution at the time of the martyrdom of Stephen? (Acts 8:1–8.) The only reason was that the apostles had laid hands on him. They chose men, full of the Holy Spirit, full of faith; and they laid hands on them (Acts 6:3–6). Philip’s ministry to Samaria was fantastic; then the angel directed him to the desert (Acts 8:25–28).
Our Lord Jesus had that same humble quality about Him. After He fed the multitude in the wilderness, they wanted to take hold of Him and make Him king, but He withdrew from that (John 6:14–15). Every king had a political platform. They said, “We’ll make you king, Jesus. Bread and fish every Friday. Our fathers were given manna in the wilderness. This is good! How marvelous!” (John 6:26–31.) But Jesus said, “Eat My flesh and drink My blood” (John 6:51–56). He discouraged them and they all left Him. Who are the ones who stayed? He said to them, “Are you going to go also?” They answered, “We know who You are and we know You have the Words of eternal life.”
John 6:48–69: “I am the bread of life. Your fathers ate the manna in the wilderness, and they died. This is the bread which comes down out of heaven, so that one may eat of it and not die. I am the living bread that came down out of heaven; if any one eats of this bread, he shall live forever; and the bread also which I shall give for the life of the world is My flesh.” The Jews therefore began to argue with one another, saying, “How can this man give us His flesh to eat?” Jesus therefore said to them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you have no life in yourselves. He who eats My flesh and drinks My blood has eternal life; and I will raise him up on the last day. For My flesh is true food, and My blood is true drink. He who eats My flesh and drinks My blood abides in Me, and I in him. As the living Father sent Me, and I live because of the Father, so he who eats Me, he also shall live because of Me. This is the bread which came down out of heaven; not as the fathers ate, and died, he who eats this bread shall live forever.”
These things He said in the synagogue, as He taught in Capernaum. Many therefore of His disciples, when they heard this said, “This is a difficult statement; who can listen to it?” But Jesus, conscious that His disciples grumbled at this, said to them, “Does this cause you to stumble?
What then if you should behold the Son of Man ascending where He was before? It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh profits nothing; the words that I have spoken to you are spirit and are life. But there are some of you who do not believe.” For Jesus knew from the beginning who they were who did not believe, and who it was that would betray Him. And He was saying, “For this reason I have said to you, that no one can come to Me, unless it has been granted him from the Father.” As a result of this many of His disciples withdrew, and were not walking with Him any more. Jesus said therefore to the twelve, “You do not want to go away also, do you?” Simon Peter answered Him, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have words of eternal life. And we have believed and have come to know that You are the Holy One of God.”
That was the beginning of pure discipleship, when nothing could discourage them from just adulating the Son of Man. He kept calling Himself that (John 6:53, 62). “But He was the Son of God!” Yes, but for that moment know that He was the Son of Man, with the Words from the Father. He said, “I am speaking what the Father says. I am doing what the Father says” (John 12:49–50; 14:10; 5:19; 8:26–29). He was taking no position at all. It was the Father, not Jesus, who said that He was King of kings and Lord of lords. Jesus answered, “If I glorify Myself, My glory is nothing; it is My Father who glorifies Me, of whom you say, ‘He is our God.’ ” John 8:54. Therefore also God highly exalted Him, and bestowed on Him the name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those who are in heaven, and on earth, and under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. Philippians 2:9–11.
What did Jesus say? He did not say much except, “The Father said all authority is Mine. Now I’m washing your feet.” Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into His hands, and that He had come forth from God, and was going back to God, rose from supper, and laid aside His garments; and taking a towel, girded Himself about. Then He poured water into the basin, and began to wash the disciples’ feet, and to wipe them with the towel with which He was girded. And so when He had washed their feet, and taken His garments, and reclined at table again, He said to them, “Do you know what I have done to you? You call Me Teacher and Lord; and you are right; for so I am. If I then, the Lord and the Teacher, washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet.” John 13:3–5, 12–14.
There is an arrogance of the Church Age that God must destroy, or His people will not walk on into the next level of the Kingdom. Jesus did not have it. And He is not going to tolerate it in anyone else. “But,” you say, “that is the way it has always been in the churches.” Yes, that’s what has been wrong with them. The Restoration is bringing us back to the place where rank or position or personality is not the issue. There is one thing that matters: a commission by the Lord Jesus Christ.
“Who are you? Are you Elijah? Are you the Prophet? Are you the Christ?”
“I am just a voice” (John 1:19–23).
John didn’t even know who he was. Jesus identified him as Elijah: “For all the prophets and the Law prophesied until John. And if you care to accept it, he himself is Elijah, who was to come.” Matthew 11:13–14. When they asked John if he was Elijah he said, “No.” He really didn’t know. And he couldn’t have cared less. He was a voice crying in the wilderness (Isaiah 40:3; Matthew 3:3). The thinking of position was never in John. They told him, “Don’t you know that everyone is going over there to Jesus?”
“That’s what it is all about. He must increase and I must decrease” (John 3:26–30).
The more you decrease, the more authority comes to you. Do you want a miracle? Do you want to walk in your prophecies? Then forget who you are and simply remember who He is. Would you like to see the whole end-time prophecy happen? When it does, you may be only a nameless person in the crowd. When it happens we want to be there; we want the humble ministry like Jesus had. When they wanted to throw Him off a precipice He just passed through their midst and disappeared (Luke 4:28–30). When they wanted to make Him king He simply dropped out of sight and did not appear again until He was seen walking through a storm on the water (John 6:15–21).
None of the disciples said, “Lord, they want to make You a king. Why don’t You take them up on it?” They had to accept that He was not going to be a king if it was a position that man forced on Him. When He became the King of kings and the Lord of lords it would be because of an authority from the Father that He walked in. And from His mouth comes a sharp sword, so that with it He may smite the nations; and He will rule them with a rod of iron; and He treads the wine press of the fierce wrath of God, the Almighty. And on His robe and on His thigh He has a name written, “KING OF KINGS, AND LORD OF LORDS.” Revelation 19:15–16. Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into His hands, and that He had come forth from God, and was going back to God … John 13:3. And Jesus came up and spoke to them, saying, “All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth.” Matthew 28:18. “I kept looking in the night visions, and behold, with the clouds of heaven One like a Son of Man was coming, and He came up to the Ancient of Days and was presented before Him. And to Him was given dominion, glory and a kingdom, that all the peoples, nations, and men of every language might serve Him. His dominion is an everlasting dominion which will not pass away; and His kingdom is one which will not be destroyed.” Daniel 7:13–14.
“But you told us that we are to be kings and priests.”
That’s right. And before you are kings and priests, you are going to be nothing.
“I used to be somebody.”
Read Philippians chapter 3:4–8. Paul said, “I could be all of these things. I am a Hebrew of the Hebrews, a Pharisee of the Pharisees. I had it. But now I count it as nothing.”
Why, Paul?
“That I may win Christ.”
What are you doing now? Don’t you have any ambition?
“No, I am just pressing toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus. I just love Him so much! I want Him to be everything.”
“I thought we were pushing into sonship, and I thought it would be rather glorious if there would be a little glow or a little halo along with it.” Don’t count on it. God is not likely to give you that. What He is more likely to do is give you such a reproach that as you walk down the street, people will become upset. Some will say, “These that have turned the world upside down have come hither also” (Acts 17:5–6). Others will say, “No, they’re nothing. They’re the offscouring, the scum of the earth” (I Corinthians 4:13). Evil report and good report will come (II Corinthians 6:8).
No one will hear, “Well done, thou good and faithful apostle.” Instead He will say, “Well done, thou good and faithful servant” (Matthew 25:19–23). To be His bond servants has always been the issue with us. That is what we have been working on for a long time—to be bond servants. Because of that we haven’t been able to be concerned about what anyone else said. Let us pray for the same ministry Jesus had. If they want to throw us off the precipice, we will pass through their midst. If they want to make us king, we will disappear on a mountain someplace with the Lord. Perhaps we will never be what people want us to be either way.
This is a Living Word that creates. It is very interesting that in our preaching we still try to reason people into the Kingdom, to talk them into something. Years ago I prophesied that the day will come when people will become hesitant about speaking anything in the church. They will be like the Apostle Paul who said, “I was with you in much fear and trembling lest my words would be in man’s wisdom and not in demonstration and power of the Spirit” (I Corinthians 2:1–4).
Why fear and trembling? He knew that he could preach the best sermon in the world to a bunch of turkeys and it would not make them into anything else except turkeys. “Well, scientists say that porpoises are very intelligent; they have a big brain.” Okay, find a bunch of porpoises and preach to them. Afterwards, you will still have a bunch of porpoises. What would happen if we got some dolphins together and talked to them? In fact, let’s see if we can reach the whole creation. Let’s say we have a canary in a cage, a goldfish in a bowl, a dog and a cat all in the same room. Preach to them. What will you have? You will have a goldfish, a canary, a dog, and a cat.
Why is that? Everything brings forth after its own kind. God looked at creation and said, “Good, now lemon trees will produce lemon trees and orange trees will produce orange trees” (Genesis 1:20–25). “But you can cross them!” you say. Yes, but the seed will usually revert back to one or the other. If you cross an ass with a horse, you get a mule. But that is the end of the line. Mules don’t reproduce. That is what the Lord was saying: That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. John 3:6. In order to produce something in the Spirit you have to speak in the Spirit. And Paul knew that. So he said, “I want to speak in demonstration of the Spirit and power, because I intend to produce something on a spiritual level” (I Corinthians 2:4–16).
Are you receiving this Word? Why are you hearing it? There is only one reason, if you are truly hearing this Word it is because the creative Spirit that brooded on the chaos when God spoke, and order came out of it, is still moving on your heart (Genesis 1:2–3, NASB).
There is no other way to bring a new level out of what will remain on the same level until the creativity of a Living Word from God changes it. “Well, I listen to the Living Word tapes.” To the extent that you have listened and heard, you have changed. You are not going to change until a Living Word comes to you, alive and creative in the Spirit. “I thought I would work things out for myself.” Someday you will realize that you are not going to be anything more than what you started out to be without God creates it in you.
“Well, we believe in the restored New Testament church.” Then that is the level on which you will stay. And the Kingdom church is going to come forth and you are not even going to know what it is until the change in you comes. That’s why Paul was saying to those Corinthians, “I have to speak something to you in the power of the Spirit” (I Corinthians 2:4). That’s why Jesus said to Nicodemus, “You’ve got to listen to this. You were born on one plane, and that’s the plane you will stay on until some creative act of God through a Living Word in the demonstration and power of the Spirit transforms you into something else.” Jesus answered and said to him, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘You must be born again.’ ” John 3:3, 6–7.
You can preach to a whole flock of turkeys and they will still gobble. But you can speak a Living Word, and who knows what a turkey could be. I have a word for you turkeys. You are going to change. You are not just a sacrifice for Thanksgiving Day; you’re going to be manifested sons of God. This is a Living Word to you, and you are going to change. It is going to create something in your life. It is going to bring you forth into what God has for you, what He intended you to be.
Paul’s great ambition was: Not that I have already obtained it, or have already become perfect, but I press on in order that I may lay hold of that for which also I was laid hold of by Christ Jesus. Brethren, I do not regard myself as having laid hold of it yet; but one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and reaching forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. Philippians 3:12–14. What does that mean? He was saying, “All I want is to be what God wants me to be.”
The key now is not preaching, but impartation and appropriation. Do you know what impartation is? and appropriation? “He who has ears, let him hear. But blessed are your eyes, because they see; and your ears, because they hear.” Matthew 13:9, 16. “He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.” Revelation 3:22. Then you will hear it in the Spirit and you will become it. Are you really grasping that the Kingdom has come, and that the way in is not to make a manual on procedures and teachings and catechisms of the Kingdom. That is why the Holy Spirit is saying, “Lay hands-on people. Impart!”
At the beginning of this move of God, God took people out of one level. Most of them were Pentecostals. However, very few now are former Pentecostals. Why didn’t more Pentecostals come in? They already believed in tongues. They already had a token faith in gifts of the Spirit. Why didn’t more come in? It is because they were locked into a level, and they could not hear anything else. On the other hand, why have so many Roman Catholics come into it? They had a spirit to worship God. And because they could open their spirit to worship God, He led them into something greater. There is more chance for a good worshiper, who worships in Spirit and in truth, to come into everything God has. There is not going to be any end of revelation to a good worshiper. “But an hour is coming, and now is when the true worshipers shall worship the Father in spirit and truth; for such people the Father seeks to be His worshipers. God is spirit; and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.” John 4:23–24.
Something is reaching your heart in this message. “But I’ve learned all of this; I’ve had the doctrines.” You can be locked into doctrines. You can be locked into catechisms. You can be locked into one thing or another. But there are many people who have jumped over those hurdles. They say, “God is going to speak to me. I am going to hear from the Lord and walk in His will for me.”
From the Scriptures we learn that when God wanted to do something, very rarely did He go to someone of the priesthood. Zacharias was performing his priestly duty by burning incense in the Temple when God struck him dumb because he would not believe (Luke 1:5–20). He could not even say anything from God until John the Baptist was born (Luke 1:57–79).
John the Baptist became the voice in the wilderness; but his father, in all of his priestly robes, first was turned into a mute. Until the day the angel’s words came to pass, Zacharias did not have anything to say about it. “And behold, you shall be silent and unable to speak until the day when these things take place, because you did not believe my words, which shall be fulfilled in their proper time.” Luke 1:20. Yet the people outside the Temple were in expectation for what he might say to them. And the people were waiting for Zacharias, and were wondering at his delay in the temple. But when he came out, he was unable to speak to them; and they realized that he had seen a vision in the temple; and he kept making signs to them, and remained mute. Luke 1:21–22.
When John the Baptist came forth, he could speak. Was he to walk in his father’s robes? What was that he was wearing—camel’s hair? He ate—locust pods? (Matthew 3:4.) You mean he had no church? no synagogue? no temple? no degrees? But we read that all Judea and Jerusalem went down to the Jordan to hear him. “Who are you?” they said. “Show us your credentials. Surely you have some religious I.D.” (John 1:22.)
I wish we could have some communication with the cloud of witnesses. “Hey up there, Peter! Tell us, did you have a minister’s credential card in your pocket? What did the Lord say to you? Did He say you were going to be a Pope?” Peter would answer, “No, He said, ‘I am giving you some keys to open the door. No man will be able to get around that. I give you the keys to the Kingdom.’ ” Matthew 16:19: “I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven; and whatever you shall bind on earth shall have been bound in heaven, and whatever you shall loose on earth shall have been loosed in heaven,”
It was a commission. Later he was called an apostle to the circumcision (Galatians 2:8). He was also the first one to bring in Gentiles to the Church. Peter was a man under commission. The Lord said, “Go down and preach. Go with these men; don’t ask any questions” (Acts 10:17–20). When the Jews confronted him about it after he returned to Jerusalem, he said, “While I was speaking, the Holy Spirit fell; and my, it was God!” (Acts 11:1–17.) When it happened, Peter said, “Who can forbid that we baptize these people?” (Acts 10:44–47.) You say, “Well, Peter had that great vision.” But Peter did not have a full understanding of that vision. He was being led by the Spirit of the Lord (Acts 10:9–20). Peter was still so messed up in his thinking later that Paul said, “I had to resist him,” because he was still conforming or compromising to the Jewish thinking (Galatians 2:11–14).
Where are we now? What is happening to us? We are realizing that position never was anything in the first place. Even the position of a pastor as we have known it has been a holdover from past thinking, and we need only refer back to the manual The New Testament Church to see it is actually unscriptural.
Learn where we are today. There is a new level and a new experience that we are going to have in God.
“How exciting! What’s going to happen?”
What happened to you before?
“Well, it was amazing how I received the Lord as my Savior. I heard about it, and I sought the Spirit, and I was baptized in the Spirit and spoke with other tongues. It was wonderful!”
Now something new is coming.
“What is going to happen now? Just how exciting will it be? What’s going to be the sign of this one? If speaking in tongues and speaking by the Spirit was the sign of what God did in the last of the Church level, what will be the sign of the Kingdom?” It is intercession and travail. It is happening because sons are come to the birth; and they are going to be caught up to a new level, beyond the snapping jaws of the dragon that is waiting to consume them (Revelation 12:4–5).
“Well,” you say, “I want to reach that level as much as I can.”
Then don’t complain because you are going through travail.
“But this intercession just about wiped out our credibility in the whole world. They thought we were a little fanatical.”
Yes, but it worked.
“How did it work?”
It worked for me. You prayed me into a breakthrough.
“What is going to happen next?”
We are going to be led right into the next level of the Kingdom. But how can I explain it to a bunch of turkeys? It will have to be impartation. Something will have to bring you up to this level. Jesus told Nicodemus.
“You have to be born again” (John 3:4–7). Do you know what it means to be born again? “That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.” John 3:6. Do you believe that you are completely born again? That is not a leading question. I believe I have been born of God—born again. But was that such a complete experience that there is no flesh left? Do you believe that there is no flesh left in your life? You never have any discouragement or rebellion? No lust or any other problem ever comes up? According to II Corinthians 5:17, you are a totally new creature, born again. You know well that everything God does is an expandable experience that will continue on; and He ever lives to make intercession to save— “Oh, I’m saved!”—but to save you to the uttermost. Wherefore he is able also to save them to the uttermost that come unto God by him, seeing he ever liveth to make intercession for them. Hebrews 7:25, KJV. Do not forget that. He is able to save you to the uttermost.
Do you believe that there is some more saving to do in your life? Do you agree with what Paul said, “He has delivered, and He doth deliver, and we trust He will yet deliver” (II Corinthians 1:10). You see, it is an expandable experience. If God has a new level for us, is it any mystery that you are not going to see it until you are born again into that level? Don’t you think your born-again experience could expand to something greater? If there is something you don’t see in the spirit, don’t you believe you could wait before God, believe His promise, and a miracle again would come to you? Don’t you believe He died for your perfection, not just for your initial salvation?
So, what is going to happen now? I do not know. I have known the answers in the past, but I have been forgetting about problems, and I have been forgetting about answers too. I have been forgetting about dealing with those things. That is what disturbed a certain pastor in Edmonton. When we visited him there, this breakthrough in the Kingdom simply exploded. The first thing he said when I arrived was, “Now, we have a school to bless. We need to take an elemental spirit search of this area. The Swedish brothers and sisters want to fix you a special Swedish dinner. We have so many things lined up for you!” He had everything well planned. But I did not do a single thing on the list. I think I upset some of the ministers because they were all ready to go on an elemental spirit search, and about all I did was sit and talk and minister to their pastor. Now, there are very few like him for possessing the clear vision.
God did something in his heart. He is an organizer, a self-starter, everything that goes with being a real professional; he had Canada all lined up, right in his pocket. And so for almost two years the Lord had him in a place of working with a hammer, driving nails and fixing up an old church building. He could not avoid buying it because the Lord provided perfect vision and revelation about it. It was an amazing thing of revelation, and it became his cross.
Most revelations you receive from God become a cross to you. As it was said of Joseph, “Until the day that the Lord fulfilled it, the Word of the Lord tried him” (Psalm 105:19). This brother was put in a state of desolation. He said, “For a year I have been working in the basement of that church.” Then after we ministered to him, he just kept smiling. He began to move across the United States, ministering to different churches; and he said repeatedly, “I am coming out of the basement more every day.”
Do you want resurrection life? The Lord does not resurrect people who are not yet dead. There cannot be any resurrection without a death! Nothing will happen until you come to the end of the state you are in. “Well,” you say, “I suppose that applies to me because I came into this with high hopes. I saw everything that is going to come. Everything is going to be marvelous!” Fine, but the evening and the morning were the first day. You must have a midnight before you can have a dawn. All the time that you are saying, “It’s the dawning of Thy Kingdom,” you look outside and it is still dark. And it has been that way for a long time. Where are we then? We are at the dawning of the Kingdom. “But I can’t see it!” Well, you have to be born again a little more to see the next level of the Kingdom to walk in.
According to the New Testament, who had the most religion, the most word, the most revelation, the most insight, and the greatest knowledge of the Scriptures? Was it the Romans, or the harlots, or the publicans and the tax collectors? Or was it the Pharisees? How did the religious people make it? They didn’t. They had little secret meetings in rooms, plotting, “How are we going to crucify this man, Jesus?” They tried to trap Him, trick Him, question Him. If it were happening today, they would try to get Him on a T.V. program and interview Him. “We will do anything so we can make a buck on this and keep this guy from spoiling our little deal we have going.”
What was the greatest motivation that caused the planning of the crucifixion? “If this man goes on, He is going to take away our place with Rome.” Position! Did they ever hate the fact that He went through the Temple at the beginning and end of His ministry and upset the money tables! (John 2:13–16; Matthew 21:12–13.) He took a whip and drove out the moneychangers. “How dare He take away our position!” “If we let Him go on like this, all men will believe in Him, and the Romans will come and take away both our place and our nation.” John 11:48. And He made a scourge of cords, and drove them all out of the temple, with the sheep and the oxen; and He poured out the coins of the moneychangers, and overturned their tables; and to those who were selling the doves He said, “Take these things away; stop making My Father’s house a house of merchandise.” John 2:15–16.
Look at the Babylonian movements today that are commercializing religion. The Lord destroy them all. God never intended for His ministers to have a position that is a commercial enterprise for making money. God never intended it to be that. What should it be? I know that God in His will sets projects before us, and we sacrifice for them, but God never intended for us to be commercial, or Babylon, or to have a big position. He never said, “You, My dear pastor, My dear apostle, My dear prophet, are going to live richly. But to the new converts preach sacrifice.” But you say, “That’s the way life is, you know. There are various classes and strata of society. There are the ins, and there are the outs, and then there are the down-and-outs.” I know that is so, but not with the Kingdom of God. The ground is all level at the foot of the cross. When you kneel there—rich and poor, bond or free, Greek, Scythian, barbarian—you are all one in Christ! (Colossians 3:11.) There is no difference, because He is moving you into something together. That is the only level of the Kingdom.
“But that is not the way it has been!” I know, but it is the way it is going to be. “What will I do then?” Forget about position. Get a commission. Get a Word from the Lord that says, “You, go and do this,” and you will be able to do it. When you come back, someone asks, “What were you; did you have some special badge?”
“No, I didn’t have any badge.”
“Didn’t you have some special office?”
“No, I had no special office.”
“How did you do it?”
“Well, my Lord just said to do it and I did it.”
You can do anything He tells you to do. You can become anything that He has provided for you. There is no end to the grace of God. Where does it stop? It will stop when we all stand in His likeness (II Corinthians 3:18; Ephesians 4:13). We will be like Him, for we will see Him as He is (I John 3:2). But what do we do in the meantime? Well, try to be like Him now. “Oh good, I would like to do that. Let’s see, where can I raise a Lazarus?” No, I am talking about washing feet (John 13:12–17). Say, like Jesus, “I do only those things which I hear the Father speak and tell Me to do” (John 12:49; 5:19). Have this attitude in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus, who, although He existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant, and being made in the likeness of men. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Philippians 2:5–8.
Just about the time that you think you have mastered the Bible and you are seeking God with all of your heart, He lifts you into a new level and the Bible again becomes a new book. In the early fifties we preached Words that were recorded. There were not as many people then as there are now. Yet the Words that come now are being listened to by thousands of people because they are Living Words brought forth from the Scriptures. At every point of the Restoration, and at every age, God has put new light on His Word. And men have gasped in amazement and said, “Isn’t that amazing? We read it a thousand times and we never saw it before. We never saw it, but it is right here!”
“Well, what are you preaching? Are you preaching a new Word that you claim rivals or is superior to the Scriptures?”
That is what some of the persecutors have claimed. How false is that claim! Only Satan could inspire lies like that, not their ignorance. I have brought you nothing but truths and principles that are scriptural. They are always scripturally oriented, and they have opened up the Scriptures. “All right then, it’s the Bible.” Yes, it is the Bible. “Why can’t I read for myself?” You can, but let the Holy Spirit reveal it to you. The Bible is the best Baptist book that ever was, for a Baptist can read it and find everything there to be a Baptist. Presbyterians can read the Bible. Catholics can read the Bible. Lutherans read the Bible. They can see the devotion of Martin Luther who translated it into German, but they don’t see beyond being a Lutheran, unless there is the Spirit’s revelation on it for more light.
Until the heart becomes open for change, there is no change. “How am I going to change?” But we all, with unveiled face beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as from the Lord, the Spirit. II Corinthians 3:18. You will not change until you are looking into the Word beyond the level you have attained. Tapes of messages that came twenty-five years ago are amazing. But twenty-five years ago there was hardly a handful of people who would even listen to them. Why? They were not on that level. Oh, they would say, “That’s fine; people in the world should be hearing this.” But it did not create in them what it could have because they were not that open to change. Once in a while I listen to one of those old tapes and say, “Who spoke that Word?”
“That’s your sermon. You preached that back in 1956 or ’58.”
I listen to it and think, “That’s amazing.” But I rejoice that I have been an oracle of God. Whoever speaks, let him speak, as it were, the utterances of God; whoever serves, let him do so as by the strength which God supplies; so that in all things God may be glorified through Jesus Christ, to whom belongs the glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen. I Peter 4:11. Has this Word replaced the Bible? No, but there were prophets who were moved by the Holy Spirit who still inquired and wondered about what they were speaking (I Peter 1:10–11). I speak by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit; but I must confess, it has been a flow through my spirit and my understanding was not always fruitful.
There is a difference between the levels of the Church Age and the levels of the Kingdom church. We are to become a prophetic community; therefore, we will have a hundred prophets where there was one. We are to be a big family and learn to care for one another and shepherd one another. We have had three years of teaching on “relate and communicate.” You can reflect, “We heard ‘relate, communicate, oneness, unity’ for three or four years.
We make a simple declaration: In the name of the Lord be loosed by the Word from the Lord into a new level. Be loosed from the restrictions of the level you are on. The Holy Spirit bless you with ears to hear what the Spirit is saying now to the churches and bless you with an ear to hear on the level that the Lord is speaking. You are not going to see things as you have. By this Word of impartation, you are set free. People may still be stumbling over problems; but do not stumble, just rise into another realm in the Spirit. You can do it now. You are free to do it.
The first shall be last, the last shall be first (Matthew 19:30; 20:16). It’s the leapfrog principle. You can say, “I am going to leap into the Kingdom.” And just about the time you leap over your brethren and you’re there waiting on the Lord, you notice who jumped in front of you. Something must destroy our religiosity. Where do we go from here? We are going to leapfrog right along. But when you look up from your prayers and worshiping the Lord and someone has leapfrogged over you, all you may see is the back end of a Timothy.
This leapfrog procedure has not been the most encouraging thing that came for some pastors. They were apprehensive. “What do these Timothys think they are going to teach me?” A little humility perhaps. They helped destroy the positions that could have become an ecclesiastical feudal system in the name of local New Testament churches.
We are only losing what we cannot keep. I lose it in order to lay hold upon that which I could never attain if I did not.
Can you see why you are where God has put you? You are placed there in His purpose; you are there in the will of God. When the Lord brings a change to you, realize what is actually taking place. God has something in mind for you! Why have the changes come? They are coming because you were in a rut in which you knew how to move and you didn’t have to look to the Lord for His leading. You knew exactly how everything was to go. Now, everything is being changed so that congregations and elders and overseers will all have to look to the Lord every day for His leading. They are not going to know how to function otherwise.
We have travailed into an hour of birth, and we have indeed come into a new realm; and now we must quickly be caught up, or the dragon is going to snap us up (Revelation 12:4–5). The warfare against us has been almost unbelievable; it has hit so hard—not just persecution, but demonic level assault—because we have broken through to a new level. But the authority to cope with it is tremendous. What will come to us now? We will reach the place where the wicked one touches us not (I John 5:18). Let’s see that happen. Let’s believe for it. Don’t look at old Sarah, and don’t look at your own body as good as dead. But with hope against hope, believe that what He has promised He is able to perform, and it is coming to pass. In hope against hope he believed, in order that he might become a father of many nations, according to that which had been spoken, “So shall your descendants be.” And without becoming weak in faith he contemplated his own body, now as good as dead since he was about a hundred years old, and the deadness of Sarah’s womb; yet, with respect to the promise of God, he did not waver in unbelief, but grew strong in faith, giving glory to God, and being fully assured that what He had promised, He was able also to perform. Romans 4:18–21.