This is another of the lost teachings of the Word. Why do those who are born again and have joined the church are failures when it comes to walking with God?
We need to see the distinction, the difference between “union and communion.” Legal and vital aspects of redemption.
Our Relationship with Christ in the new creation, and our communion with Him, are based on two other words, “fellowship” and “relationship.”
I taught on the legal and vital aspects of redemption, we are right now righteous, sanctified, and glorified in YHWH’S sight in heaven.
When we go to heaven we are instantly changed by seeing him face to face.
But while we are on earth we are in school, and how we live our lives on earth determines our position in the government of the Kingdom. You must graduate with honors to get a high-level position in the government of the kingdom. In the future I will give a message on rewards and crowns.
John 10:10: “I came that they may have life and may have it abundantly.”
What was this life? It was the nature of God.
Who was to have it? Those for whom Christ died.
John 3:16: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth on him should not perish, but have eternal life.”
But the question is, how are we going to get that eternal life?
Jesus illustrated it in His talk with Nicodemus in John 3. He said, “Except one be born anew, 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. Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born anew” (verses 3, 6–7).
Now, if we haven’t Paul’s revelation, we don’t understand that, for we have nothing in Jesus’s teaching that explains the nature of the new birth. Jesus merely tells us that He is bringing us eternal life and that we must be born again.
2 Corinthians 5:17–18: “Wherefore if any man is in Christ [or if a man has accepted Jesus and confessed him as his Lord], he is a new creature: the old things, all we inherited from the first Adam has passed away; behold, all things have become new. But all things are of God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ.”
The Father has reconciled us unto Himself. The things that stood between us and the Father have been eliminated. A new creation has come into us. The old nature is driven out, and we are new creations in spirit, just as Adam was a physical new creation in the garden.
That spiritual new creation has come into being, imparted to us in eternal life that Jesus said He was bringing to the world.
You remember that the word “life” is zoe, the nature of God. Then the new creation is built out of the nature of God.
Ephesians 4:23 and be renewed in the spirit of your mind, 24 and that you put on the new man which was created according to God, in true righteousness and holiness.
That new creation is the product of God Himself. He, through the Spirit, has given birth to a new nature in us.
The old nature of failure, of sin consciousness, that was ruled by the adversary has stopped being. A New nature has taken its place. We are now the very sons and daughters of God Almighty.
Romans 8:14 is a reality: “For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God.”
As many as are willing to let the Spirit guide them, will be led into the maturity of the new creation.
Romans 8:15 For you did not receive the spirit of bondage again to fear, but you received the Spirit of adoption by whom we cry out, “Abba, Father.” 16 The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, 17 and if children, then heirs—heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ, if indeed we suffer with Him, that we may also be glorified together.
That is a fact of our relationship, it is a legal standing with God.
Now the next fact is that we have not only become new creations, but we are new creations with a God-given standing with Himself.
Romans 3:26: “For the showing, I say, of his righteousness at this present season: that he might himself be just, and the justifier of him that hath faith in Jesus.”
You see, you haven’t only become a son, but a son with a standing with the Father that He gives you Himself.
That is perfectly natural—that if the Father has sons, He will give them a standing with Himself so that they can approach Him with the uttermost freedom and liberty. He becomes their righteousness.
You know that righteousness means the ability to stand in the Father’s presence without the sense of guilt or inferiority, to stand in the presence of Satan without any inferiority, to stand in the presence of anything Satan has done without any sense of inferiority. You stand in his presence as his master. You are taking Jesus’s place in the world, and you are Satan’s master because when you do it.
Now you may have righteousness; you may have eternal life. You may have the consciousness of sonship. You may have the great, mighty Spirit come and make His home in your body, because that is the ultimate of the new creation.
You see, you are recreated so that your body might become the home of God.
You remember 1 Corinthians 6:19–20: “Know ye not that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, which is in you, which ye have from God? and ye are not your own; for ye were bought with a price: glorify God therefore in your body.”
All this may be true, but you may never have learned the secret of joy.
You say, “What do you mean by joy?” John 15:10: “If ye keep my commandments, ye shall abide in my love; even as I have kept my Father’s commandments, and abide in his love.”
Then we see in the ninth verse another secret: “Even as the Father hath loved me, I also have loved you: abide ye in my love.”
We are to walk in love and live love, and to keep His commandments.
John 13:34–35 shows us that the law of the new creation, the law that governs the new creation, is the love law. We are to love one another even as He has loved us.
Jesus said, “Even as I have kept my Father’s commandments, and abide in his love. These things have I spoken unto you, that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be made full” (John 15:10–11).
The secret of Christianity, the secret of evangelism, was that we are to have joy in our spirits.
You remember Acts 13:52: “And the disciples were filled with joy and with the Holy Spirit.”
When we are in fellowship with God, 1 Peter 1:8 tells us that it is joy unspeakable and full of glory.
In essence, “My joy I give unto you.” This is something that the world can’t take away from us. It is something indescribable that fills our spirits.
What does joy grow out of? What is the secret? 1 Corinthians 1:9: “God is faithful, through whom ye were called into the fellowship of his Son Jesus Christ our Lord.”
Fellowship is the secret; it is the thing that gives joy. When the fellowship is broken, the joy dies.
The happiness of marriage is the fellowship between those two hearts.
Misery comes when that fellowship is broken.
You may be a child of God and have all the knowledge and riches that belong to that marvelous relationship; but if you have no fellowship with the Father there is no joy in your life. It is an empty, dry thing. The power of our ministry lies in our fellowship.
1 John 1:3–4: “That which we have seen and heard declare we unto you also, that ye also may have fellowship with us.” Why? “Our fellowship is with the Father, and with his Son Jesus Christ: and these things we write, that our joy may be made full.”
Now what is that fellowship? It is that gratifying communion between your spirit and the Father. It is that richness that comes through the unveiling of the Word to your spirit. It is the quiet assurance that fills your heart with unspeakable joy.
Faith cannot grow without rich fellowship with the Father. It doesn’t matter how much knowledge one has of the Word, if their fellowship is broken, their faith is disabled. The adversary takes advantage of the person and holds them in bondage.
Most people who have chronic physical trouble have an unsatisfactory fellowship with the Father and with the Word. They develop a irritable spirit. They begin to challenge the faithfulness and the love of the Father. “Well, if God loves me, why has He afflicted me like this?”
You understand that the Father hasn’t afflicted them. The adversary has afflicted them, and they have submitted to the adversary’s affliction, and have lived in misery and bondage.
If they had known what held them, they would turn to 1 John 1:5–6: “And this is the message which we have heard from him and announce unto you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all. If we say that we have fellowship with him and walk in the darkness, we lie, and do not the truth.”
Notice now, if we say we have fellowship and don’t know His will, it is evident that we are in darkness.
1 John 2: 10 He who loves his brother abides in the light, and there is no cause for stumbling in him. 11 But he who hates his brother is in darkness and walks in darkness, and does not know where he is going, because the darkness has blinded his eyes.
That darkness may come from a hundred reasons. One may have failed in his finances. He hasn’t given the Lord His share of his income. He may have failed in speaking to men and women about their souls. It can come from a million different sources.
Fellowship can be broken because I willfully fail to do His will. I step out of light into darkness. I stop practicing love; and when I do that, I step over into darkness, want—into Satan’s territory. I am filled with restlessness.
Joy is gone. My fellowship with the Father is gone.
If I say that I have fellowship with Him and walk in darkness, I lie and do not tell the truth.
1 John 1: 7 But if we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanses us from all sin.
When we break fellowship with the Father by refusing to do His will, and step out of love, we walk in darkness. That minute the Bible stops being a Living Word to us.
No one ever criticizes another believer if they are walking in fellowship. All bitterness and criticism and unkindness are the products of broken fellowship.
If we walk in the light, as He is in the light, we have fellowship with the Father; but if we walk in darkness, we have no fellowship with Him. We can no longer hear his voice clearly.
But if we walk in the light the blood of Jesus cleanses us from all sin.” That is effective if we are in fellowship.
The correct meaning of the word “sin” is no inheritance.
If we are in fellowship with Him, we may stumble, but His blood still cleanses us.
If we deliberately refuse to do His will, and darkness overwhelms us. If we deny that we have sinned, we deceive ourselves and the reality is not in us.
The truth is not working in us. There is no sense of the reality of the spirit- realm. The Word is no longer a powerful force within us.
But the Word says, “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (1 John 1:9).
In other words, if we say we have not sinned, and yet are out of fellowship, we do not have the reality of his life flowing in us. But, if we confess our sins, He is just and righteous to wipe out all our sins, or the thing that stood in the way of our fellowship.
1 John 2:1My little children, these things I write to you, so that you may not sin. And if anyone sins, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.
I think that is one of the most wonderful statements in the whole of the epistles. Seated at the Father’s right hand is our righteous Advocate; and the minute that I break fellowship, He is there in fellowship with the Father. I lose my sense of righteousness. But He is the righteous One. He is there, in the presence of our Father, to plead our case.
We look up to the Father and say, “Father, forgive me for now walking in fellowship, I agree with you, that this must go from my life.” And the moment we do, He delivers us. It is wiped out as though it had never happened. The instant that I agree with God about it and tell the Father of it, Jesus says, “Lay that to My account, I suffered for that sin.”
The Father has no memory of your past mistakes and failures. You must also forget them too.
2 Corinthians 13:14: “The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Spirit, be with you all.”
Romans 8: 38 For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, 39 nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
This is the culmination of His great redemption: He counts everything that can come to a man or a woman, every calamity that can possibly come in our earth walk and tells us that none of that can separate us from the love of our Father.
No created thing shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. “Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?” Nothing can separate us from the love of Christ nor from the Father’s love. Nothing can do it. Know this legal aspect of our redemption and let this be the foundation of your faith.
HOW MUCH DO YOU REMEMBER?
- What other words the difference between union and communion?
- What is the nature of the new birth?
- How do we acquire eternal life? Give Scripture.
- What law governs the new creation?
- Why does joy die? What makes faith grow?
- Explain 1 John 1:5–9.
- When does the Bible stop being a living message to us?
- What are some reasons for darkness coming from broken fellowship?
- What happens when we say, “Father, forgive me for doing that thing?”