It is apparent that there is quite a difference between the form of membership that has locked in churches—even the local churches that were built on a New Testament pattern—and the freedom that exists in the Kingdom relationships to the Lord. Some of the most excellent spiritual ministries to come forth in the Kingdom are people who have been victimized and are completely disenchanted with church membership.
There is a greed that is universal in the Church Age. Every effort seems to be so easily tainted with Babylon that the commercialism prevails; and we have seen a number of the ministers seeking their own profit out of the church.
This was not true to Paul’s example. He said, Just as I also please all men in all things, not seeking my own profit, but the profit of the many, that they may be saved. I Corinthians 10:33.
Now comes the need, as Kingdom principles are more clearly stated, to eliminate the vagaries that exist even in the local church as it is striving for the restoration (Acts 3:19–21).
The Church Age embraces church membership. Yet there has been a diligence on the part of those in this walk to eliminate the membership in its formal sense—especially the two opposite extremes in which it manifested itself.
On one hand, church membership sometimes was a democratic process by which the people, in their fear, were reluctant to let a man of God be a man of God with authority, and so they made him a hireling whom they could control. At the other extreme we saw the archbishopric structure and various forms in which total control and ownership was vested in only one or a few of a hierarchy existing in a specific area.
However it manifested itself, church membership kept the people under bondage. If they had a bishop over them, they were virtually the property of the bishop, as were all of the schools and churches and everything else that existed within that bishopric. On the other hand, even if it was a more democratic form where the people voted a pastor in and out, it still had very formal demands of membership to which a man had to adhere if he was to become a part of that corporate body, with the privilege of voting and being a part of running the church. More and more, though, the democratic process was overwhelmed by a hierarchy that controlled the lives of the people. Excommunication became something so carnal that the leaders would remove people who were not cooperative or in full agreement with the demands made by the leaders in the church. All of this brings us to the fact that a great many people have been disillusioned through the years because of this, and have turned away from the churches, refusing to be a member of any church; and yet their hunger for God still continues.
Now let us look at what the scriptural background indicates concerning this. When we look to the New Testament, we see that they did not have church corporations which are almost a requirement in the present structure of society. Yet they did have very strong bonds; they had church order and church discipline. Perhaps one of the main things was the fact that church attendance was encouraged. The people were not to cease assembling together; they were to come together (Hebrews 10:25). You must understand that at the time when the New Testament was written, the believers did not own any church properties as such. That was illegal in the Roman Empire, and so they met in homes. Meeting in the homes during this period of the early Church was the greatest possible deterrent to forming a massive organization. After all, in New Testament times how many people would fit in a humble little home? Consequently, elders had to develop, and they had to be submissive to one another. The apostles traveled through occasionally. Even the pastors seemed to be more traveling ministries than stationary ones as we know them in the present church structure; the elders were more like pastors. Even then very few of them were supported by the church, although Paul said that an elder who ruled well and ministered in the Word was to be worthy of a double honor.
Let the elders who rule well be considered worthy of double honor, especially those who work hard at preaching and teaching. For the Scripture says, “You shall not muzzle the ox while he is threshing,” and “The laborer is worthy of his wages.” I Timothy 5:17–18. This meant that especially where finances were concerned, financial support would be given to him because of his total preoccupation in ministering the Word of God to the people. Everything was based upon getting the Word to the people—not upon building a kingdom around the leader. It was the Kingdom of God that was to come forth in mighty power and Word.
Paul said, For our gospel did not come to you in word only, but also in power and in the Holy Spirit and with full conviction; just as you know what kind of men we proved to be among you for your sake. You also became imitators of us and of the Lord, having received the word in much tribulation with the joy of the Holy Spirit, so that you became an example to all the believers in Macedonia and in Achaia. For the word of the Lord has sounded forth from you, not only in Macedonia and Achaia, but also in every place your faith toward God has gone forth, so that we have no need to say anything. I Thessalonians 1:5–8.
We are coming to the Kingdom principles once again, and I predict that a lot of people who have literally blown out of the church order and have refused to be a part of church membership in the past will be among the most dedicated disciples in the Kingdom, because of their love for the truth. They have loved the truth, but they have not loved the perversion of it, in which the truths and the very structure of believers’ lives have been used as a means of profit and of gain. We will see the time in which the churches in the Kingdom will not boast of how much land they own—that’s Laodicean thinking—but they will boast in how much they do not own, and how well they are able to function as the Kingdom of God without the control of great financial means. The Lord said to the church at Laodicea, “You say, ‘I am rich, and have become wealthy, and have need of nothing,’ and you do not know that you are wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked.’” Revelation 3:17, NASB.
At the beginning of the New Testament, when the Gospel of the Kingdom was to be preached, the Lord Jesus Christ sent forth His disciples two by two (Mark 6:7). He told them to take no money with them; they were not to take any visible means of support. Wherever they went, the laborer was worthy of his hire (Matthew 10:10). They were to abide in a house where they would be fed and taken care of, and if the people in the town would not hear the Word, the disciples were to shake the dust off their feet and go on (Matthew 10:1–14). This was very drastic. Today you have to be equipped with many credentials in order to be accepted by organized Christianity—whether it is Fundamentalist, Charismatic, Pentecostal, Roman Catholic, or whether it parades itself as a traditional, mainline church of the Reformation. You must have your credentials. You have to be a part of a system, or they refuse to let you be heard.
I don’t know how Christ would deal with today’s church world, but we do know how He dealt with the Jewish religious world in His day. He said to His disciples, “Shake the dust off your feet. It will be more tolerable for the people of Sodom and Gomorrah on the day of judgment than it will be for those who have refused to hear you” (Matthew 10:14–15). When the Lord sends a man, woe be unto the people who say, “Well, he’s a man of God and he has a Word from God, but …” Be very careful, because your reaction to the Word spoken by a man of God is the very basis by which you will either be included or excluded from the Kingdom.
Everything is going to be based upon the King—the Lord Jesus Christ—and the ones who are sent in His name. How shall they speak unless they are sent? (Romans 10:15.) It is a fact that faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God (Romans 10:17). But the great problem is this: How are they going to hear unless one be sent? Someone must be sent by God to speak the Word of God. That is the basis of faith—the faith that comes by hearing the Word of Christ. And that Word will be spoken by those who are sent. This is a truth found in Romans 10. “Whoever will call upon the name of the Lord will be saved.” How then shall they call upon Him in whom they have not believed? And how shall they believe in Him whom they have not heard? And how shall they hear without a preacher? And how shall they preach unless they are sent? Just as it is written, “How beautiful are the feet of those who bring glad tidings of good things!” So faith comes from hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ. Romans 10:13–15, 17.
Most ministers have called themselves to preach. They have proceeded to become very professional in their approach to it—very much church organizers and managers and the principal head of all committees. This is not what God intended at all. We see busy people doing busywork, but never challenged to speak a Word from God, never challenged into being transformed into the image of Christ (Romans 8:29; Ephesians 4:13). Yet they are very busy with bazaars and raffles and church work, as well as organizing the finances and working with the people until everybody is tithing. What a beautiful commercial system! Jesus said of the scribes and Pharisees, “They go across the land from sea to sea to make one proselyte, and make him twofold more a son of hell than themselves” (Matthew 23:15).
Religion is becoming more and more the instrument spoken of in the book of Revelation. Revelation 17:5b–6a tells of “BABYLON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS” … drunk with the blood of the saints, and with the blood of the witnesses of Jesus that is ready to be spilled again unless the Lord intervenes and says, “No, you will not crucify Me afresh (Hebrews 6:6). Especially, you are not going to crucify My people, in My name. You’re not going to do this in the name of Christ.” God’s Word prophesies Babylon’s judgment: And I heard another voice from heaven, saying, “Come out of her, my people, that you may not participate in her sins and that you may not receive of her plagues; for her sins have piled up as high as heaven, and God has remembered her iniquities. Pay her back even as she has paid, and give back to her double according to her deeds; in the cup which she has mixed, mix twice as much for her. To the degree that she glorified herself and lived sensuously, to the same degree give her torment and mourning; for she says in her heart, ‘I sit as a queen and I am not a widow, and will never see mourning.’ For this reason in one day her plagues will come, pestilence and mourning and famine, and she will be burned up with fire; for the Lord God who judges her is strong.” Revelation 18:4–8.
Church membership has become a very important issue. It dictates that you have to be a member of a church. You have to take upon you a name and a brand. But you don’t necessarily have to be given to the kind of faith that would work miracles. The requirement of membership is not so much that you have to believe anything, as that you have to conform to something. And that is the difference between church membership and coming into the Kingdom. In the Kingdom, the test is not what you belong to, but what you kneel to. You can either conform to the Church Age, or you can kneel to the Lord Jesus Christ as King of kings and Lord of lords (Revelation 17:14) and proclaim His Kingdom in the earth with all humility; yet it will be with signs and wonders, the greater works and the exploits, and all the things that are to attend the humble little ones who are the citizens of His Kingdom (John 14:12). “These will wage war against the Lamb, and the Lamb will overcome them, because He is Lord of lords and King of kings, and those who are with Him are the called and chosen and faithful.” Revelation 17:14.
Now let us go a little further and try to analyze the origin of this denominational structure which can be so exclusive that it can actually declare that unless you are a member of a certain denomination or sect, you will not be saved. It is easy to use Scriptures to produce such a false position and establish it. Rome started it, and almost all of the denominations which came forth out of the Reformation seemed to follow suit—the Lutherans, the Episcopalians, the Southern Baptists. Each denomination says, “There is no salvation except in our group.” And when we see that, we begin to see why God hates this thing. They have insisted that the walls are necessary for the individual’s salvation. And yet as we begin to come into the things of the Kingdom, we remember what Jesus said when He rebuked that sectarian spirit. John came up to Him and said, “Lord, this man over here is casting out demons in Your name, but he doesn’t follow us.” Jesus answered, “He that is not against Me is for Me” (Mark 9:38–40 and Luke 9:49–50). The implication was, “No man can cast out demons in My name unless he is really for Me.”
When you get right down to the bottom line, the issue is not what badge you wear, but do you move in the authority of the Lord Jesus Christ? Do you submit personally to the authority of His name? Do you consider yourself one who has been purchased by the precious blood of Jesus Christ, one who has been born anew and translated into the Kingdom of God’s dear Son? (I Peter 1:18–19.) For He delivered us from the domain of darkness, and transferred us to the kingdom of His beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins. Colossians 1:13–14.
Do you consider that what you are doing is being done to glorify God? Then you are not building a denomination. Since you are not assisting organized religion, they may resist you. But according to Christ, you are closer to the Kingdom than they are. Many will come and say, “Lord, Lord, look what we did!” But when He sees their deep iniquity, He will say, “Depart from Me, ye workers of iniquity” (Matthew 7:22–23). In the midst of all that they did in the name of Christ, their iniquity was so great that who knows the multitudes they turned away from Christ because of their vicious, sectarian, organizational, denominational approach to the truth. That attitude is not encouraged by anything in the Scriptures. Paul even rebuked those within one church—not in five or six different churches, but just one church—who said, “I am of Apollos,” “I am of Cephas,” “I am of Paul” (I Corinthians 1:12). He rebuked that and he said, “You are carnal and you’re walking as mere men.” For you are still fleshly. For since there is jealousy and strife among you, are you not fleshly, and are you not walking like mere men? For when one says, “I am of Paul,” and another, “I am of Apollos,” are you not mere men? I Corinthians 3:3–4.
It is dangerous in this age, too, that the denominational structures are built on men saying, “You must say you are of Peter if you are a Catholic,” or “You must say, ‘I am of Paul,’ if you are an Episcopalian.” Are you not carnal and walking as mere men? (I Corinthians 3:3–4.) In the teaching of these things, they are trying to show where their ordination originally came from. What a miserable thing apostolic succession has been in the sight of God, who can cause His Son to appear to any man on the face of the earth. He can go to the Sea of Galilee and appear to a man and say, “Peter, go. Be My apostle.” Apostolic succession has been an arena of argument of the theologians. But when we get right down to the basic doctrine, it just is not scriptural. As we see what God wants today, we are warned, “Be careful. You’re building again the things that Christ and the apostles tried to destroy—that sectarian spirit.” Do you say, “There is a man over here casting out devils who believes in the return of Christ, believes in His Kingdom, but he’s not following You, Lord.” What right have you, according to the Scriptures, to reject him? “Well, he doesn’t have my label on him.” Good for him! Maybe you had better get your labels off, too, and follow the Lord.
Let this be true: I am in favor of every identifying term being removed that can lump us into a group. I don’t want to be known as a member of “the walk,” because “the walk” has become a pigeonhole into which people can stick you and say, “That is this sect or that sect.” Never has there been doctrinal conformity; never has there been a formal membership in any church that is brought forth. These churches were brought forth with the idea that there was a spiritual fellowship of which they were a member, set in by the Holy Spirit (I Corinthians 12:18). And I wonder if there is one church, among all of the churches that have sprung up around the world, where they even have a file of membership cards which they call “an index of our members.”
Less formal membership exists at the present time in these churches than anywhere else. Who is holding you? What did you pledge to do? Did you raise your right hand? Did you even shake the preacher’s hand in a pact that you were going to be a member? No, you just sat there and listened to the Word, and one day you realized that the Holy Spirit had set you into that Body. There was never anything formal about it. This is probably the freest spiritual movement in the world, and the one most attuned to the requirements of the Kingdom.
This is what God is saying: Get away from the abominable idea that you have to be a locked-in member of something that has to be destroyed, and be God’s free citizen in the Kingdom of God. You say, “Isn’t that loose? Isn’t that anarchy?” Is it anarchy to declare allegiance to just one Lord and one King, the Lord Jesus Christ, and to acknowledge your brother wherever you see him, whatever label he has, whoever he is, wherever he is? If he believes in the Lord Jesus Christ with all of his heart, and his heart has been made clean by the blood of Christ, he is your brother. Whatever label he goes by, whatever he calls himself, he is your brother.
Now let us go on, and come to some conclusion. Do you say, “We must have a certain amount of organization”? Perhaps that is true. But is it to be a carnal organization, or is it to be a spiritual oneness? Doesn’t everything that God teaches tell us that there is a bond and a oneness of spirit (Romans 8:1–14), rather than the conformity on some soulish level of belonging to something? Sects existed in New Testament times. Look at the Pharisees, the Sadducees, the scribes; they were all sects. In fact, at one time Paul pointed out a flaw and a difference in their beliefs, and the Pharisees and the Sadducees were at one another’s throats immediately (Acts 23:1–10). (At least it distracted them from killing Paul.)
We are facing this: When the Kingdom comes, the Christian leaders are not going to like it. They have preached a “sweet Jesus” by which they can raise their millions. It is tragic how arrogant people can be, and yet claim that they are leaders of Jesus in all of His meekness and lowliness (Matthew 11:29). It is amazing how arrogant religion can be, when our Lord and Christ was so humble. The key of the Kingdom will be in our submission to the Lord Jesus Christ. The key of the Kingdom is that it will require a lowliness to enter in. It will be so humiliating to religious flesh to be in the Kingdom that many will turn back from it, and they will brand it as something else—as false—because their own hearts are still arrogant before the Lord (Matthew 19:13–15, 23–30).
How many wise, how many mighty, how many great ones in the earth accepted Christ? Paul mentioned it, “Do you see your calling, brethren? There are not many of them.” God had chosen the poor, the foolish, the things that were naught, to bring about what He wanted, that no flesh would glory in His presence (I Corinthians 1:26–29). The greatest enemy of the Kingdom today is not an antichrist; it is not the kingdoms of this world set in their financial despotism. The greatest enemy of the Kingdom today is the religious flesh that will not submit to Christ.
In I Corinthians chapter 2, Paul spoke a truth that has seemed to just ring over and over in our ears. “The rulers of this world didn’t know, for if they had known they would not have crucified the Lord of glory” (I Corinthians 2:8). Today these rulers—who serve the great beast and the whore that rides the beast—still don’t know, and they still use the name of Christ. Look at what they did back in the Middle Ages. We read of the divine right of kings, how priests and cardinals ruled over the known world at that time. How vicious they were to put down, mutilate, destroy, disembowel everything that stood in their way. They would torture it, kill it, get rid of it, all in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. But it isn’t much different now. They still will do what they can to destroy.
According to the law of the jungle, you killed a man and then you ripped out his kidneys and ate them raw to obtain his strength. Some of the cannibals still do that. Now the law of the jungle has many more sophisticated ways of destroying and breaking a man. You break him on the stock market; you take over his business corporation; you move viciously. And the religious world is not far behind. In fact, did the business world learn those tactics from the religious world? I am wondering if a lot of the things that are ministered through the business world and the political world in the name of law and order today were not learned from the days of torture and also during the Reformation. I heard recently that there are forty-one nations today which have had CIA acceptance and teaching on how to torture their people and keep them in submission—all of this from “good Christian America.” Denominations cover over; they go on peace marches. At the same time, those same denominations own stock in armament and ammunition companies. Isn’t that hypocritical?
God help us. If the Kingdom would come tomorrow and Christ Jesus would walk in person through the land, the whip would still be flailing at the money changers who have commercialized the house of God. And Jesus entered the temple and cast out all those who were buying and selling in the temple, and overturned the tables of the moneychangers and the seats of those who were selling doves. And He said to them, “It is written, ‘My house shall be called a house of prayer’; but you are making it a robbers’ den.” Matthew 21:12–13.
John 2:15–16 tells us, 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 money-changers, 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.” Today’s money changers have said, “Give it all to Jesus and you will get a double blessing, a double portion.” God forbid! When will come forth the citizens of the Kingdom who are willing to sacrifice and to give voluntarily, but with the discretion to know how to avoid putting it in the hands of the money changers or the self-appointed religious leaders who have made merchandise of the house of God long enough?
Who is going to cry against all of this? Who is going to say anything? Those who have lifted up their voices have been stilled and silenced. They have been destroyed. Their credibility no longer exists anywhere. All of this because they had a Word from God, and they spoke a Word from God.
This age has had its own way of producing martyrs. It has had its own way of destroying men. It has let them go on as zombies, living and breathing, but totally destroyed by mystery Babylon, the mother of harlots. That day is about over. And a lot of hungry hearts out there who won’t attend church anymore are still looking to God. I am in favor of seeing these people receive the truth. Sit with them and talk about it; and tell them, “We don’t have any movement for you to join. We don’t have any rip-off policy to which you have to subscribe. All you have to do is listen to the truth. Walk in it. Love it. Love the Lord Jesus Christ. Be a free man in your spirit. Only this we would require: Love Him. Minister to the poor and needy. Give yourself to those who are being oppressed. Share your bread. Share your life, as bond servants together of the Lord Jesus Christ. This is the Kingdom, in contrast to the best of the restored Church that we know” (Matthew 25:31–46).
Throughout the Old Testament, we have the vision of what it would be like for the Kingdom to come. The people saw it in simple terms. They looked round about them and saw the mountains, and they would say, “The mountains will be brought low, and the valleys will be filled” (Isaiah 40:4). Later we learn that the prophets were speaking of something very important—that the mountains were the peoples and kingdoms of the world that were going to be brought down. The rocks and stones of stumbling would be gathered out (Isaiah 57:14), and there would be a smooth highway for our God (Isaiah 40:3). No longer would the people be abased in the valleys or exalted on the mountains, for the time would come in which the Lord would remove those distinctions. “And the house of the Lord will be exalted above the hills, and all the peoples will flow into it” (Isaiah 2:2–3). This meant that the time would finally come in which the upward pull of God would be the only thing. You would not be required to climb a mountain of some denominational requirement, but you could look to God and make it into the glorious house of God, and worship Him in spirit and in truth. Jesus said, “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.
I see the day when all the human restrictions and all the requirements that have been imposed upon man will be removed, until the only thing that remains is that basis of faith in a man’s heart whereby he accepts Jesus Christ totally and completely, and finds his way right into the heart of God. There he becomes a part of the Father’s family upon this earth. And the Father’s family, in the final analysis, is the Kingdom of God.
Perhaps there was no more highly organized religious movements on the face of the earth than those which existed in the time of Christ—the Pharisees, the Sadducees, the rulers of the Jews, all of these people. To them Jesus cried, “O Jerusalem, how often I would have gathered you under My wing as a hen doth her brood, but you would not. Now your house is left to you desolate” (Matthew 23:37–38). The question is always in our mind: The common people had heard Him gladly; but what made them into a mob that cried, “Crucify Him! Crucify Him”? It was their allegiance and their submission to the religious rulers who sensed that they were threatened by the Lord Jesus Christ.
People today want deliverance, but how are they going to get deliverance when the religious leaders say, “Yes, we’ll give you deliverance. Come and subscribe to our magazines and join our churches. Tithe and give generously to this and that. Do all of these things, and we will be praying for you that the Lord will help you and deliver you.” But out of these groups, there is no real deliverance and there are no sons brought to birth. There are no prophets coming into the land to change it. There are no apostles springing forth from these groups. There is only a usurping of authority that is not theirs; it belongs to Christ. In His name they are proceeding to make bondslaves to themselves, instead of bond servants to the Lord Jesus Christ. That day is going to end. We are like a voice crying in the dark, in the wilderness. Who can hear these words? Where are the hungry hearts?
Prophecy: O Spirit of God, breathe upon these slain that they may live. For they have been the victims. They have been destroyed by those who have moved in Your name. They have not seen the knife until it was plunged into their vital parts. They have not understood until it was too late; then their hearts became bitter, and dead, and they did not know where to go. O Lord, loose Your people! Bring forth a new day. Bring forth a day of righteousness, when the adversary shall be beaten down. The man that hath come and said, “Behold, thus saith the Lord” when he had no word, shall be exposed. There shall be no hiding place for him in this day. For where can he flee from the Lord who pursueth?
O God, let truth reign in righteousness. Let the curse of God be upon all these things: the lies that have destroyed the righteous and exalted the wicked; the viciousness whereby they have become more a tool of Satan than were the inquisitions of the Middle Ages, to destroy and to mold the hearts of men, to stifle and end the cry that would arise within the hearts of men who seek after God; that which has put out every fire God started, by its ridicule and its opposition. The curse of God be on the media, and all of their lying reporters who say, “This is the truth; believe it.” The curse of God be upon those who have set themselves up to say, “You dear American people, you dear Christians, this is what you must believe, or you will be destroyed.” The price of the truth is great, but buy the truth and sell it not (Proverbs 23:23).
The church of this day says, “I am rich and increased in goods, and have need of nothing.” And they know not that they are wretched, miserable, poor, blind, and naked. The Lord Jesus Christ still speaks from His heavenly throne and says to the blind, stupid, poverty-stricken people who think they are the servants of God, “Buy of Me gold tried in the fire, that you may be rich. Anoint your eyes with eyesalve, that you may see” (Revelation 3:17–18). He is still standing at the door and knocking. Above the clamor and the voices of people who say, “Follow me; follow this. Do this; do that,” He is saying, “If any man will hear My voice” (Revelation 3:20). He is still standing there, knocking, and all you have to do is open the door. He will sit with you; He will eat with you and have fellowship with you. And He will open the door to the vastness of His Kingdom to your heart. This is the difference between church membership and being one of the precious sons and citizens of the Kingdom.
Christ said, “How am I going to speak to this generation? They are like children who call to one another and say, ‘We piped to you, and you did not dance. We played funeral, and you didn’t mourn’ ” (Luke 7:31–32). The children in the streets didn’t know whether they wanted to play wedding or play funeral. And Christ said that this was a picture of the religious world. When He brought them the truth that would stir their hearts, they wouldn’t repent. When He brought them the truth that would cause their hearts to rejoice, they wouldn’t dance. John the Baptist came preaching repentance (Matthew 3:1–2), and they didn’t want to accept that. Christ came preaching emancipation and total freedom, and they didn’t want to accept that either. You see, people can be so locked into their religious system that they are not prepared for what the Kingdom of God would bring to them.
There was a recent period in which people said, “We don’t want these songs. We don’t want to dance and sing jubilee music. We want to be religious. I just can’t handle this music.” So they didn’t handle it. They backed off from it. They never did accept it because they belonged to a system that never will break into the Kingdom of God. Then the Lord brought deep repentance, and it was shallowly followed by some; but others wept and mourned and were broken before God. They realized that the Kingdom was coming, and they were going to be prepared for it. But giving a little lip service is not enough. Some say, “But didn’t I repent? Why am I not accepted?” And yet the evil of the heart still comes forth.
This is a day that no religious facade, one way or the other, is going to avail. You must be sincere—worshiping God in sincerity and in truth, knowing that He searches out the hearts of men that He might reign over them totally and absolutely, and make them His own people. The Lord is not interested in your religious thoughts; He is interested in you having the mind of Christ (I Corinthians 2:16). He is not interested in your conformity to the ways that have blessed your soulish soul in the past. He wants you to come into the startling realization that God is speaking in the earth. What He is speaking, a religious ear cannot hear; only a spiritual heart can discern it.
When we cry unto the Lord because of the servitude of Babylon, it is much like the cries of the children of Israel in Egypt. They cried unto the Lord and the Lord heard, and He came down to deliver them. The strange thing is that Pharaoh’s bondage didn’t even begin to equal the bondage of men’s souls in this present hour. When you read of Babylon in Revelation 17 and 18, you are convinced that they make merchandise of the souls of men (Revelation 18:13). Nations, governments, and religious groups control—actually control. They buy and sell the souls of men. Lincoln didn’t really free the slaves. He tried. But it is the Son of Man who is going to set us free, and we will be free indeed (John 8:36).
We have yet to learn what that will mean in the earth, because always there are those who would coerce you and cause you to submit to them. Paul saw that happening to the Galatians. He said, “They exclude you so that you will make much over them” (Galatians 4:17). Always that negative salesmanship—“Now you’re going to have to come and totally submit to us, or we will totally reject you.” Paul saw that. He said, “They exclude you. They reject you so that you will have to come and submit to them in order to be accepted.” That day is over!
Brothers and sisters who love the Lord Jesus Christ with all of your heart, be of good courage. The beginning days of this next level of the Kingdom are here, and we are going to walk in a freedom and more liberty. We may see a hundred thousand little groups meeting in homes, not knowing what to call themselves. What are they? Are they a church? They may not conform to church standards as have been taught by Babylon, but they will be elders and shepherds over one another. They will be brothers and sisters in the household of our God. They will be ones who teach the little children the ways of the Lord (Isaiah 54:13), who walk in signs and wonders. They will be a firstfruits in the earth of the Kingdom that shall rule and reign over all men and over all men’s hearts (Revelation 2:26–27; 12:5). The end of the tyranny of religion is at hand, and the beginning of the rod of iron of the Kingdom is before us.
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, NASB.
The dealings of the Lord are certainly on all the earth, especially the religious earth. But here is something that we do not appreciate: In the churches that have been moving on in this Living Word, God has brought a real heart searching. He has brought the people into a place which is very difficult for us to describe. He has brought them to the place where they can no longer cover up. The Spirit of Truth has ripped off the veil, so that to be religious and to have a secure place will no longer be possible. We are becoming the spiritual people that God wants us to be.
We have watched the prophecies come to pass that the Lord was going to deal with the shepherds’ hearts. And now we come to this basic premise which is impossible for us to deny: God started this. God is the one who is searching out every heart to see where it is.
This generation is going to see a people come forth of whom it will not be said that their leaders are blind leaders of the blind (Matthew 15:14). It has been true that a higher level of dedication has usually been found in those who sit in the pews. But God is bringing forth a leadership, along with the Timothys and all of the other ministries who are dedicating themselves. They have a great realization of their own inadequacies, but also a great awareness of their commission to bring forth the Kingdom of God—His Kingdom, for His glory alone.
There is a sickness in the hearts of His people because of those who were not really following the Living Word that God was bringing. God spoke a Living Word, and many, many people heard it. But some would stand up and say, “I have a Living Word. Listen to me.” Yet they did not have one. They were leading the people into the place where they wanted them. God curse that thing in the leaders that brings in the sheep in order to make them a kingdom unto themselves. Anything that does not bring glory to the great, true Shepherd—let it be anathema. May God bless us to serve Him and love Him, all of us. And when the great Shepherd of the sheep appears, then we shall have the crown that He gives to every faithful shepherd (I Peter 5:4).
In the Church Age, one had the threat that if he did not conform, he could be dismissed from the membership, put under discipline, and so forth. And in that guise, I have seen a lot of travesties of justice and righteousness prevail. But whenever Christ speaks of people not conforming in the Kingdom, He says, “Depart from Me into outer darkness where there is weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth” (Matthew 8:12). We have yet to see what will happen to the people who have named the name of Christ, and yet have rejected Him as King and Lord over their lives. We have yet to see the terror of the Lord that will begin from the house of God (I Peter 4:17) and utterly destroy the hypocrisy, the veneer of religiosity, and bring to light the hearts of men.
When the fullness of God dwelt within the body of one Man—Jesus Christ the Nazarene, the Son of the Living God—it only required one Judas—plus the help of the religious leaders of the world—to crucify Him; but that was in the Father’s will. Now Christ comes forth in a many-membered Body. And the Christ is coming forth in this many-membered Body to manifest Himself through those of us who are His hands and His feet, members of His Body. This you know is scriptural. I Corinthians 12:12: For even as the body is one and yet has many members, and all the members of the body, though they are many, are one body, so also is Christ.
But at the same time, it seems that there are a legion of Judases arising to betray that Body. The tragedy is that many of them came up under the commission and appointment of the Lord, as did the first Judas, only to turn away. They held the money bag and what was put therein. (In almost every case, finances and position were involved.) Like Judas, they were very much against Jesus’ commercial and financial policies. Judas would much prefer that a woman not take her precious ointment and anoint the body of the Lord, but instead give that ointment to him so that he could sell it and have the money, ostensibly to give to the poor (Mark 14:3–5). But if he was that concerned about the poor, why didn’t he take the thirty pieces of silver of betrayal and give them to the poor?
The realization is going to dawn on some of the people who have been in this walk in the Spirit, and who have heard the Word of the Kingdom, that they had set about to betray innocent blood, to betray the Kingdom of God. Unintentionally, perhaps, they have become the Judases of all time. But it remains to be seen what will happen, because the Lord is not coming to be crucified afresh (Hebrews 6:6). It will be interesting to see the authority that will be given to those who walk humbly before the Lord with but one desire, and that is to see the Christ within them exalted and glorified. He is coming to be admired in us, and to be glorified in all them that believe. Paul wrote, When He comes to be glorified in His saints on that day, and to be marveled at among all who have believed—for our testimony to you was believed. II Thessalonians 1:10. Whatever we suffer in the process, we say, “Amen. Only let Him be glorified. God grant that He not be crucified afresh, or put to an open shame” (Hebrews 6:6). God shall give us deliverance from the hands of the religious world, and the beast she rides on.
“Rejoice over her, O heaven, and you saints and apostles and prophets, because God has pronounced judgment for you against her. And in her was found the blood of prophets and of saints and of all who have been slain on the earth.” Revelation 18:20, 24.
We are witnessing at the present time a moving of the Spirit of the Lord to which many men are responding, but they don’t know how to respond. They want to confront the world with the claims of Jesus Christ as King of kings and Lord of lords (Revelation 19:16). They want to see the Kingdom of God confront the kingdoms of this world and see them brought under the Lord. And the seventh angel sounded, and there arose loud voices in heaven, saying, “The kingdom of the world has become the kingdom of our Lord, and of His Christ; and He will reign forever and ever.” Revelation 11:15.
But what we are coming to grips with in this message is very simple: Until you confront yourself, how can you confront the world? How can you be half-hearted in your own acceptance of the order of the Kingdom that is coming, and still demand the world to conform to it? Until you yourself are completely yielded and surrendered, and one with those who would bring forth the Kingdom, how can you confront the world with its rebellion? Can you honestly say in your heart, “I am totally, one hundred percent, behind this Gospel of the Kingdom. I submit everything that I am as a church leader, including my position, on the altar of God to be searched out. I’m willing to lay it all on the altar at this moment, if He wants it”? If you can’t do that, how can you ask the world to bow—a covetous world that doesn’t even have a heart to follow Christ? No, we cannot confront the world until we have confronted ourselves. We cannot speak a Living Word into their hearts that will devastate them like a rod of iron and bring them into submission until that rod of iron has smitten us, and we have submitted to the Lord.
This total surrender and submission to our Lord and King is going to be the foundation and the springboard, the launching pad for the Gospel of the Kingdom to be preached into all the world. Devote everything to this vision and revelation that the Lord has given. And in essence it is this: The Lord will confront the religious world with its unwillingness to submit to Christ and His Kingdom first. There can be no extension of the Kingdom until the Lord has dealt with His Church.
Look back to the religious world as it was confronted by John the Baptist, a man who had every credential of the religious world, yet rejected them all. The priestly robes he did not wear (Matthew 11:8). He was clothed with camel’s hair, and his diet was locusts and wild honey (Matthew 3:4). The religious world came to hear him and he rebuked them; he called them “a generation of vipers” (Matthew 3:7). He was a man who moved to speak of things as they were. He was beheaded because people could not bear to listen to those words.
We are facing the same thing today. The religious world is not going to listen to the demands of righteousness that Christ is bringing forth. Instead, they will begin to find all kinds of faults. The religious world in Jesus’ day called Him a glutton and a winebibber (Matthew 11:19; Luke 7:34). They said, “We were not born of fornication” (John 8:41), indicating that they rejected the virgin birth of Christ. Isn’t it amazing that God did not do one religious thing when He brought forth His Son? Do you think now, when God brings forth His Kingdom, that He has been converted to become religious like you religious leaders? It is not so. The day has come in which the confrontation is made to the religious world. Bring forth fruits of repentance (Matthew 3:8), because the Lord has come. His flail is in His hand and He is going to thoroughly purge His floor; He will gather His wheat into the garner and burn the chaff with unquenchable fire (Matthew 3:12). Is there any other message you can see in the Word but this? Only the most arrogant heart would say, “I am a religious man. I am a member of a certain church. Don’t bother me.” Remember—to be religious is not to be righteous.
Prophecy: O Christian world, O apostate nation, though you have grown your giants and your Goliaths, and though there be a Goliath here and there, yet the time has come that there shall be those who say, “I come in the name of the Lord, and I bring you down” (I Samuel 17:45–50).
“It is not by might nor by power, but by My Spirit,” saith the Lord (Zechariah 4:6). The battle in this hour of the Kingdom is to come against all the mighty powers that unite themselves against our Lord and against His Christ. They crucified Him once, and they are trying it again. They are doing everything they can to discredit the hour of victory in which Christ inherits, in His people, His Kingdom that He suffered for at His first coming. Would you deny submission to Him, total subjection to Him as Lord? You have accepted Him as Jesus, and you have built your reputations and professions and your religious world around that—only to find out, or you will find out, that this was not all of His will. This was not building His Kingdom, but this was you using Christ for your reasons, your purposes, your ends. Your ambitions are cursed. Your greed will die with you. Your reputations will wither when He says, “Depart from Me, I know you not” (Luke 13:27).
The time has come when a few Davids are going to throw the Word of God into a situation, and these Goliaths, these giants, will fall. All that can be shaken will be shaken (Hebrews 12:27). He utters His voice before His camp (Joel 2:11; Jeremiah 25:30–38). And when He speaks, He shakes not only the heavens but the earth also, and only a Kingdom that cannot be shaken will remain (Hebrews 12:27).
How fearful the religious leaders of this world should be! But they will not be fearful. It will be too late for them, because they have not walked by revelation; they have walked by the deception of Satan that has blinded their minds. Mystery Babylon, mother of harlots, great whore that has ridden upon the kingdoms of this world—that beast will turn and devour you. Let the fear of God be upon you.
Babylon is the perversion of The Word of God to a means of position and profit.
True Credentials of a minister is that he is sent by God and speaks a Word from God.
Babylon’s Credentials are designed for restriction and rejection.
Church membership does not require you to believe so much, as it does to conform to so much.
In the Kingdom, it is not what you belong to, but Who you kneel to.
Churches make labels for you; The Spirit of the Lord brings liberty.
The greatest enemy of the Kingdom is the religious flesh that is not submissive to the Lord.
The Father’s Family, in the final analysis, is the Kingdom of God.
Religious Babylon will neither mourn nor dance, for a religious ear cannot hear what only a spiritual heart can discern.
The tyranny of religion will end; the rod of iron of the Kingdom will come.
There can be no great extension of the Kingdom until The Lord has dealt with His Church.