Bind the sacrifice with cords, even unto the horns of the altar. Psalm 118:27b.
Exodus 29 tells how the priests would dip a finger in the blood of sacrifice and put it upon the horns which extended up on each side of the altar. The horns had a specific purpose. The animal world seems to sense when death is coming, and when the priests brought an animal to be sacrificed, it had to be tied down with cords to the horns of the altar. Then the priests could proceed to officiate in the sacrifice of that animal to the Lord.
God help us to tie the sacrifice with cords to the horns of the altar, with an absolute determination to be living sacrifices unto the Lord. Many people come to the house of God to receive blessings rather than to give their entire lives to Him. It is most important that we come into a walk with God not only for the blessings we hope to receive, but to be a member of Christ’s Body, to be used of Him, an instrument in His hands. That is quite a different motivation. Sooner or later a problem will arise if your motivation is for what you will receive rather than for what you can give to God as His channel. This is what bothered Ananias and Sapphira. They were willing to go along to a certain extent, but they did not want to lose themselves and the instinct of self-preservation and really become deep givers. We are not here just to ride along. We want to be instructed in the ways of discipleship.
Let the Holy Spirit help you to probe the depths of your own heart, for the heart is deep and desperately wicked. See if your motivation is entirely right, because God will reveal to you sooner or later if it is not. You are in this walk to be a living sacrifice to the Lord. Do not expect a walk with God to open up a new way of life for you on a human level, giving you all the advantages and fulfillments, all the blessing and meaning to life that you desire. Things do not happen that way. At best, God will alleviate your circumstances so that you are liberated to do the will of God, but not to do your own will. Your liberation comes so you can walk with God, not for your own happiness or personal life. This is an essential truth because it is at this point that some people find themselves stalemated. Year after year they come to the house of God and go through the motions, but they do not make progress because they are not dedicated. A follower of the Lord is basically a disciple. You cannot become entangled with the affairs of this life and please Him who called you to be a soldier (II Timothy 2:4).
This idea of using God was found back in New Testament times. Acts 8 tells about Philip and the wonderful revival in Samaria, and Peter and John’s visit when they laid hands on the people to receive the Holy Spirit. A sorcerer was there by the name of Simon the Great. Some of the apocryphal writings give interesting accounts of his attempts at magic. The book of Acts tells us that Simon was so impressed with Peter and with what Peter could do that he said, “Give me this gift that on whomsoever I lay my hands, they may receive the Holy Spirit, and I will give you a great sum of money.” Peter said, “Your money perish with you, for I perceive that your heart is not right. You are in the bond of iniquity and in the gall of bitterness.” Why did Peter say that? Because Simon had the wrong motive. He wanted to see people receive the Holy Spirit, didn’t he? Was that wrong? No, that was all right. He thought they could receive it by the laying on of hands, which was all right. It was his motive that was wrong; he wanted to receive this gift for his own use.
Spiritualists try to use the spirit of a dead person so they can tell fortunes. When the disciples cast the spirit out of the girl at Philippi, those who were using her for fortunetelling seized Paul and Silas and had them beaten because their hope of gain was taken away (Acts 16:16–22). Many a man practices witchcraft because he wants to become important. He is not a benefactor of humanity; his only interest is his own ego. Such a man thinks he is controlling devil spirits and people’s destinies, but suddenly he finds himself deeply ensnared with no hope of release, and he himself becomes the victim. Simon’s motive was to take hold of this gift so he could use it. God says, “I want to take hold of you and use you as My instrument.” The question is: “Who takes hold of whom?” Who is to be the one in control? Do you want God to control you, or are you planning to use God? This becomes a matter of dedication. We do not receive gifts or a ministry so we can use them. We receive them so that we can be used of God.
When human feelings and desires arise which make demands on a human level, it is very difficult to put the will of God ahead of them. This is where the basic selfishness of an individual comes to the surface. A person may be generous, good, and industrious, but when he is put to the test you will discover his basic underlying motivation; and often it is a deep root of selfishness and self-centeredness—something that he wants for his own life. When God brings a new step, your motivation and dedication is tested. You may have walked along fine for a long time, but a new step may shake you. Regardless of how much people say they love God, it actually comes back to the issue: Are they getting what they want? That is where people begin to part company with you if their dedication is not right.
A man who had been a minister and the head of his own works for many years came to me recently and said, “I am ready to do any menial task, run errands, or whatever you want me to do.” He was not interested in his ministry; he was dedicated to serve. Many people want to preach, but are they equally concerned about every phase and aspect of the house of God? Those who only want to further themselves and their place are like Simon the Great.
What do you want to be? What do you want to do? Do you want to serve the Lord, or are you still trying to use Him? Young people often put on a phony act and appear very spiritual until they succeed in “landing” the one they want to marry. Then they could not care less; they will be no more spiritual than they have to be. God must give us discernment to see through that dishonesty. You have to be ready to really walk with God and not use the church, or someone whose will is set to do the will of God, to your own advantage and your own pleasure.
You may find that the Lord will deal with you until you are ready to relate yourself closely to those who are of like dedication to do the will of the Lord, and to draw away from every personal relationship where the other person does not share that same dedication to seek the will of the Lord. Being yoked with an unbeliever is dangerous. It is very easy to be drawn into giving a great deal of ministry and attention to someone who is not dedicated to do the will of the Lord. Why do it? Even though you do a great deal for such a person, he still is not dedicated to do the will of God. Spend your efforts with those who are of like mind and spirit with you. Those who are not dedicated are put under the dealings of the Lord anyway, and that is a good thing because God is bringing them to real dedication; so do not minister their dealings away. God allows their problems so He can put the pressure on them to get down to business and seek God.
We want to be dedicated to the fullest extent to that which God wants. In our fellowship we should avoid having any walls up toward each other, but we should also avoid forming cliques. Seek the Lord about fellowshipping with different people. Do not always seek the same group for conversation and eating or soon you will have formed a gossiping clique, and nothing will come of that except trouble. Try to always relate to other people in the Body as much as you can and build up their interest in doing the perfect will of the Lord. Be really concerned about them. Our joy comes in doing the will of the Lord and in helping one another find the fulfillment of God in our lives. After we find out what the Lord is anointing us to do, we do it as unto the Lord, not for our own personal position.
When troubles come, if you are not dedicated, you will find yourself being weeded out. In earlier years we called this process a “sifting.” The church was sifted after every new step, and certain ones were lost. Whenever I knew God was going to bring a new step, I would preach a number of sermons on repentance so the people would really want to serve God. The Lord will always anoint for that, because when a new level comes, the people are dealt with by the Lord to move up to that new level. The battles are different and the demands are greater and if they have not been walking faithfully in the previous level, they are lost completely when the new level comes. People slide along and nothing seems to happen until a new step comes, and then they are rocked right out of the boat. They are not ready for the new step because they have not accepted the measure of dedication God demanded of them.
Dedication amounts to saying yes with all your heart to the will of God, to what He wants you to do, to what He wants you to be, and to the way He wants you to serve Him. That is true discipleship. You must understand that dedication does not come all at once. No one is ever able to say a complete, irrevocable yes to the will of God when the demand is first presented to him. You say yes to the fullest extent you can at the moment God deals with you. As you go on, the pressure is on you so much that you strive to open your heart to God and say yes again, reaching in a little deeper. You may go through a number of God’s dealings and say yes a number of times, always under the impression that you have finally said a perfect yes to the will of God. As far as you know, you have said the perfect yes, but you will go on into greater demands and will have to say yes all over again.
God gives you a number of opportunities to re-enlist in His army. He presents His will to you like a challenge, “This is what I want you to do; this is the way I want you to glorify Me,” and you say yes to it and begin doing it. When you finally fulfill that, He lays something more before you.
Hebrews 11 tells us that if the believers had been mindful of the country from which they had come, they would no doubt have received opportunity to return, but because they confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims in the earth, they sought a better country. God was not ashamed to be called their God. This is what God is saying to you. If you want to go back, if you are mindful of the country from which you have come, you will have an opportunity to go back. You may say, “I made my consecration; I am dedicated to go so far with the Lord”; but when you reach that mark you will see that it is not enough. God is asking much more of you. If you say, “No, I did not bargain for that,” you can go back. God is testing us, and He is going to end up with a remnant that will say yes all the way.
When the trumpet was sounded in Israel, thirty-two thousand men were gathered unto Gideon. Gideon listened to the word of the Lord and told everyone who was not really dedicated to the battle, everyone who was fearful, to go home. As soon as they realized what they were to face with the Midianites, twenty-two thousand went home. God was sifting them. Then the Lord tested the dedication of the rest of the men. He told Gideon to bring them down to the water. Of the ten thousand who were left, most put aside their swords and shields and kneeled down to drink. Only three hundred lapped up water from their hands, while also keeping an eye open for the Midianites. Those were the ones God wanted, because even when they stopped for a refreshing drink, they were dedicated men. They would do what they were told. Those three hundred were enough to defeat the Midianites (Judges 7:1–7).
We wonder why so many people are sifted out. At the beginning of my ministry, the Lord spoke in prophecy after prophecy, “I’ll take one of a thousand and bring them into the land of promise.” It is not enough to know about the theory of a walk with God. The issue is: Are you dedicated enough to walk all the way? Are you set to be the servant of the Lord? Are you set to be a disciple? A church will not endure long if the people come only to be blessed. It will endure only if the people come to become the servants and handmaidens of the Lord. It is that kind of a walk.
You are not here just to have a happy marriage and settle down. I am grieved when I see the young people draw back after they get married. They were entering in and seeking God, but when they got married, something happened to them. Do you know what this proves to me? Such young folks said they wanted the will of the Lord in their marriage, but what they really meant was that they did not want to make a mistake and marry the wrong person. They wanted a mate God approved of, but did they really get married to do the will of God? It becomes evident afterwards.
People come into the services thinking, “Oh, I can have revelation over me; I could even have a gift or two for myself. How marvelous!” However, this demands total discipleship. You should not be led in on false pretenses. Luke gives an account of a man who said, “Lord, I’m ready to follow You everywhere.” The Lord said, “The birds have their nests and foxes have their holes, but the Son of man has no place to lay His head. I don’t know where I will sleep tonight, but if you still want to follow Me, you can” (Luke 9:57,58).
We do not feel sorry for those who have inconveniences. You have come into a walk in which the entire climate is ordered to bless you and help you into the perfect will of God. No matter what you have to go through—even if you have to sleep on the ground—go on with God. This is a day of discipleship and dedication. Then shall we know, if we follow on to know the Lord… Hosea 6:3.
God is laying a difficult path before you; it means that you must die out to your own interests. If you are not married and you do not find the right partner in the will of God, I would say, “Don’t get married.” If you do find the right one, but either one of you is not ready to walk in full dedication, you will only prolong problems and troubles if you enter into marriage before both are fully dedicated to it and to a walk with the Lord. One problem (and I am not speaking of the young people only, but of everyone) is that it is very difficult to find two people who have the same dedication to do the will of God. Some mothers are so involved with the sweet young children they are raising that they forget their primary allegiance is to the Lord Jesus Christ. Others are too dedicated to their garden and flowers, to their lawn or their house. A woman can be so dedicated to having a beautiful, immaculately kept house that everyone is ill at ease in her home, afraid of upsetting or disturbing something.
We must be dedicated to the perfect purposes of God coming forth in our lives, to please Him in all things. Paul was beaten and put in prison, but he was still dedicated to the will of God. Philippians was written in the most adverse circumstances, yet the theme of the book is “rejoice.” People went on fasts, vowing they would not eat until they had assassinated Paul—that’s how much he was hated. We, too, must be prepared for persecution.
If you are not dedicated enough to walk on with God, sooner or later you will rise up to be an obnoxious son of Belial. The Scriptures tell of men who were called by God, men who had the word and a revelation of a walk with the Lord to a certain degree, but when they stopped pressing on, they became the ones who crucified Jesus. They were the Pharisees. They wanted to see Christ’s body hanging on the cross, bleeding and dying. They plotted, connived, and even put up their money to accomplish it. The Pharisees were the religious leaders of their day, but their dedication was inadequate.
I am challenging the depth of your dedication. You may become angry and try to shift the blame to someone else; you may try to make up many excuses, but when God says, “Leave all to follow Me,” He means it. You had better not keep pushing it aside. If God speaks, you give. If He strips you down to nothing, give. Whatever God tells you to do, do it. Serve Him—He is the Lord! You are not using God; God is using you.
For yourselves, brethren, know our entering in unto you, that it hath not been found vain: but having suffered before and been shamefully treated, as ye know, at Philippi, we waxed bold in our God to speak unto you the gospel of God in much conflict. For our exhortation is not of error, nor of uncleanness, nor in guile: but even as we have been approved of God to be entrusted with the gospel, so we speak; not as pleasing men, but God who proveth our hearts.
For neither at any time were we found using words of flattery, as ye know, nor a cloak of covetousness, God is witness; nor seeking glory of men, neither from you nor from others, when we might have claimed authority as apostles of Christ. But we were gentle in the midst of you, as when a nurse cherisheth her own children: even so, being affectionately desirous of you, we were well pleased to impart unto you, not the gospel of God only, but also our own souls, because ye were become very dear to us. For ye remember, brethren, our labor and travail: working night and day, that we might not burden any of you, we preached unto you the gospel of God. I Thessalonians 2:1–9.
People who are not actually as dedicated as they appear to be, have problems. If they are sent to the mission field or are under stress, they break down. A great deal of mental anxiety results from an inner conflict, a conflict of loyalties and of dedication, the war between the spirit life and the self-life; and many people cannot handle that. Every young man who is called of God should face the fact that the highest rate of mental breakdown today is found among ministers’ wives. If you intend to be a sacrificial man, do not bring a woman into your life until you are absolutely certain she is dedicated to sacrifice too. You would be surprised how many things show up down the line. When the nesting urge comes out in the female, she will begin to nag you to settle down. That you do not need! You are not called to a secure life; you are called to live for God. If you play around with this, when you get so far down the road, you will lose out. You are being called to be strangers and pilgrims from the whole world system. Forget yourself and that instinct of self-preservation.
I watch how people suffer. I see what they go through. I know the price they have to pay as well as the price I have had to pay. I have experienced financial hardship and physical affliction. At times the spiritual assault was so severe that I knew there was only one way to prove that this was a true move of God: if they were to carry me out feet first, they would know it was not of God. Through all the years I have been dedicated to preach the word God gives me.
He is saying to us, “Do you believe the word? Are you dedicated to that word? Do you think it is something you can look at, examine, and lay aside?” You become a part of what God is doing when a word from God is so ingrained in your spirit that you cannot walk any other way; you refuse to walk any other way. You have absolutely relinquished any other way. You belong to the Lord; you have denied self. You have taken up the cross to follow Him. Neither suffering nor a pleasant life is the issue any longer. You are born of God to do His will and you become like Paul. This is the way you live because you are dedicated to live that way.
Do not think that you will be regarded as bright, intelligent, wonderful people. No one in this present generation would consider the early Church anything but fanatics. In those early days the people accepted joyfully the spoiling of their goods, knowing that in heaven they had a more enduring substance. Life then was not as unpleasant or difficult as you might think. People enjoyed life; it was quieter and slower. Yet, we cannot understand their joy in becoming a Christian with all the resulting harassment, unless we realize that God met them. There was a change of allegiance in their lives—and whether they had served Satan, or pleasure, or themselves selfishly, that ended. They became the Lord’s—He had redeemed them and they were His. Whatever He ordered them to do they were ready to do. That is why the early Church flourished.
Start searching your heart. What do you really want? Occasionally someone will come along who has allowed human drives and instincts to get ahead of God. Some women are more concerned with fulfilling the maternal instinct of having a baby than with doing the will of God. Have your babies and love them, but put God first. If you put God absolutely first, do not think that you are thereby neglecting your children. If you pamper them and make them the whole end of life and the center of your universe, you are sinning against them. Make them fit into God’s universe. Teach a child to bear the yoke from the time of his youth (Lamentations 3:27). Some children could not do any chores if they had to. They are total liabilities and they live and walk that way. They must grow up and live in the midst of the church where they can become prophets and prophetesses of the Lord, but you will not get anywhere with them if you permit their lives to become self-centered, as is natural to human nature. You must teach them to live for something bigger than themselves.
A dry rot of soul will ruin the churches if you do not become absolutely dedicated to do the will of God. Come what may, you must be set to do the will of God because that is your place and your purpose. Some of you live with very difficult situations in your home life, but now you have found something worthwhile to live for. Do the best you can to save your home, and if you cannot save it, realize that you have only lost the smaller portion of your life. The most important thing is to serve Christ with all your heart.
Some girls think they have to yield themselves or they will not be popular with the boys. Forget it! There are worse things than being an old maid. Some think the whole purpose of life is to get married. You do not have to get married, but if you do marry, it must be absolutely in the will of God. Re-evaluate what you live for. There were sixty teenagers in our church when I went to high school. By the time I had finished high school six were left. What happened? Where did they all go in less than three or four years? They took the blessings; they entered in, praying and seeking the Lord—but when marrying time came they found a mate out in the world. They still had to live for the flesh. They just did not make it.
You are either going to walk with God or you are not going to walk with God. You cannot become upset by what people do to you, nor can you live by their demands. If you are so weak that you are drawn to do anything anyone wants you to, do not think that you are pleasing God. Paul said, For am I now seeking the favor of men, or of God? or am I striving to please men? if I were still pleasing men, I should not be a servant (bondservant) of Christ. Galatians 1:10.
There must be a dedication to relate to people, not according to their demands, but in the way the Lord orders. We have to answer to God and do what He wants us to do. This is not referring to your submission to a word of direction from an elder or a deacon, for that is a matter of submission to the Lord. This is referring to all the people who try to get us to please them and be to them what they want. We had better want to please the Lord more.
To be considered a good pastor in the old days required that you function as anything from a chauffeur to a babysitter and do everything the members wanted you to do. There was no privacy. When I came into this walk in the Spirit, the Lord began to deal with me, “Your dedication is to Me; serve Me!” By doing that, I have been able to serve the people better than before. I am not doing any nonessential duties now; only the things that please God. And I am not neglecting the people. I am seeking the Lord on their behalf, and they have better teaching, better training, better and more available ministry, and a better word preached to them. And it is going to be even better, as God continues dealing with me about my dedication to Him.