Your membership in the Body of Christ is accomplished in the Spirit, not through human zeal. That which is born of the flesh is flesh (it produces a fleshly result); and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. John 3:6. A ministry of the Lord could lay hands on you to bless you, but apart from the Lord he would accomplish nothing; only by touching God could his touch become as the Lord’s hands. In Jeremiah 15:19 God said, “If you separate the precious from the vile” (getting rid of the fleshly element), “then you shall be as My mouth.” Intercession is effective only when it is an explosion of the Spirit. It is ineffective if it originates from the human flesh, even though it is based upon sound facts. Intercession must first reach into the Lord and touch Him.
You must strive for an absolute effectiveness in the Spirit in what you are doing. You cannot try to retain your own individuality, even though God has placed certain basic characteristics within your own personality, such as self-preservation, ego, and self-respect. When you come into the realm of the Spirit, you must drop those attitudes. Read the Sermon on the Mount, and notice how everything that is basic to you as an individual must be dropped. You cannot stand up for your own rights anymore. If someone takes your coat, give him your cloak also. Whoever compels you to go a mile, go two miles with him. If someone smites you on one cheek, turn the other (Matthew 5:39–41). Self-defense and everything of the individual nature must be laid down before God. You are not even to give thought to self-preservation—what you will eat, what you will wear, where you will live (Matthew 6:25).
This principle is very difficult for human reasoning to understand. In fact, many Christian teachers and pastors avoid the Sermon on the Mount because to them it is impractical. It means the end of the individual, but that is exactly what God wants. You are to be a new creation, not a sanctification of the old creation. Religions try to take what a person is and perfect it, to work on it and see what can be developed. God does not want that. The sons of God are not sanctified humans. They are a creation of God. You begin to walk with God as a babe in Christ. Little by little you die to the human level until you prevail on the spirit level. Your effectiveness is not based upon the force which comes from your own emotions on a human plane, no matter how sincere you may be. It is when you touch God that the intensity erupts in the realm of spirit and comes down to the human plane. It must originate in the spirit plane to be effective on the human plane. You must touch God, so that it is God who is working in you and through you.
What is the difference between traditional Christianity and the Kingdom? One example can be found in their sermons. In denominational churches, sermons may be highly anointed, but they still come through human ability. In this end time, men who are being led by the Spirit are speaking truths that were never heard before. These truths do not come from the human mind; they come by revelation because the speaker is in touch with the wisdom of God. A Word from God is coming down on a human plane today so that you can understand it, but it does not originate from the human plane. It is not attained by someone holding sermons up to God and asking Him to bless them, to sanctify them, and to anoint them. Do not look for anointed sermons. Look for a living Word that is flowing from God. Expect God to move through you.
Is the human will involved in this? Yes, but even the human will must be sanctified until it goes through a process of dying. You must take your will to the cross. Even your violence in seeking God must be taken to the cross. Then you will reach a place where a change seems to come; you die. Then the violence comes forth on a higher level. You are just as violent, but you are effectively violent. The human attributes will prevail somewhat. Paul saw that, as he wrote in I Timothy 4:8, “Bodily exercise profits a little, but godliness is profitable for all things.” When you move from the physical discipline into the spiritual discipline, then you have the effectiveness.
When a husband and wife come into a walk with God, they go through certain experiences which bring them into a oneness in spirit. At first they are excited, because their relationship is closer than ever before; but then their relationship begins to die. The relationship that worked for them on the human level must die. They do not understand what is happening because they are trying to follow the Lord’s teaching on the restoration and divine order for the home. The wife tries to be submissive, and the husband tries to take his place of authority; but when they attempt this on a human level, as individuals, God soon frowns on it. No matter how many books are written by preachers throughout the world, that kind of relationship will never work unless it comes forth in Christ. When it comes forth in the realm of the Spirit, it will work.
The old religious way is to find out what God wants and then try to whip it together for Him. That kind of thinking wants to make another tower of Babel. That process is the source of Babylon, and it will be blasted into hell. Find out what God wants, and then let everything die that He does not want. Let Him create what He wants to come forth. This process is not a sanctifying of human personality; it is an absolute change. It creates a new person, a new creature.
It is a new creation, not a reformation. Even your relationships and your prayers cannot be based upon anything that you plan to change, to reform, or to whip up. Some things in your life cannot be changed; they must be killed. If they were sanctified or reformed, you would be limited. Do not believe for a limited ministry. Believe for Christ to move through you, so that others will know Him through you.
A husband and wife will find their relationship deteriorating until they are one in spirit. Malachi 2:15a says, And did he not make one, although he had the residue of the Spirit? And wherefore one? He sought a godly seed. When God instituted marriage, He said, “And the two shall be one flesh” (Genesis 2:24). The oneness in spirit that God is bringing forth now is not the definition of marriage as we have known it. Jesus said, “The two shall be one flesh. What God has joined together, let no man put asunder” (Matthew 19:5–6). God gave many laws to the Jews. Even Moses received an extra dispensation for divorce because of the people’s hardness of heart (Matthew 19:8). Many years after Moses, Malachi brought a Word from God saying that God was seeking one spirit.
Believe for marriage relationships to come forth that will be far closer, far more intimate, far more anointed and directed than marriages have been. This does not mean that marriages which now exist should be dissolved. Let God deal with you and bring your marriage up into a Kingdom level. This process is superior to that of having marriage counseling to bring people together. A miracle must create a marriage relationship that comes up to a spiritual level where the two walk together.
What is a couple to do then? Shake hands and be brother and sister together after this? Will there be no more marriage and no more children? You have missed the whole point if you think that. Malachi said, “He sought a godly seed.” Joel 2:28 says, “Your sons and daughters will prophesy”; but many of those sons and daughters have not been born yet. They will be born when couples like Zacharias and Elizabeth wait on God. John the Baptist was filled with the Holy Spirit even from his mother’s womb (Luke 1:15). He was different. This was the miracle seed. A new kind of spiritual marriage is yet to be seen.
Are you looking for God to do something unequaled? Hang on; the best is yet to come. There has never been anything to equal the commissions, the designations, the relationships, and the anointing that will come. Do not be discouraged if you feel limited in your human ability. The works of God are not dependent upon good writers, good scientists, good musicians, and people with particular talents or abilities. Specific commissionings will come by the Holy Spirit’s moving upon particular members of the Body who may not have any human talents whatsoever. God will lay upon them an anointing to do a certain work. Problems arise when people who have special training and human knowledge expect God to sanctify their human talents.
Look for special knowledge and wisdom to come by the Holy Spirit. Do not be one to stand up and proclaim that you are the one whom God trained from his youth, that you are the one who has special qualities to do a job. You will only become an efficient, effective servant of the Lord after God has beaten you to pieces, after He has pounded out of you all your human qualifications. Look for qualifications that come from God. Believe for this. Loose it. Liberate it. This is not a matter of praying for something on the human level. Therefore, do not ask God for it from human zeal alone. Reach in and touch God. Be dedicated to the will of God that is coming forth. Be dedicated to the perfect expression of His will coming forth in you and in your brothers. Do you grasp the high calling of God in Christ Jesus that is being set before you?
Many of Jesus’ disciples were fishermen, and yet the time had to come when the Lord stood on the shore and told them where to let down their nets. Jesus was not a fisherman, but He told experienced fishermen how to fish in waters which they knew well. Simon Peter answered, “We toiled all night and caught nothing, but at Your word we will do as You say.” Soon the nets started breaking for the multitude of fish. The disciples were amazed. It was a level of working about which they knew nothing (Luke 5:4–9). First they had to fail on the human level and confess that they had toiled all night and caught nothing. Then the Lord could make them effective.
Keep praying, but also realize that it is not God’s fault if you are not breaking through limitations more than you are. God wants to pull you up by the anointing of the Spirit where you will move more and more out of the human level and into the divine level. Then you will see changes. Do not be discouraged. Realize that God’s people are actually moving into the spirit realm where kings will be bound with chains and the judgment that is written will be executed (Psalm 149:8–9). God’s people will do this, not because of their personal opinions, but because they see God’s will for the earth and they contend for it in the Spirit.
Do you want to be blessed? Do you want to be effective? Do you want to prevail with God and with man and be a prince? Then first you must have the old nature kicked out of you. That is exactly what happened to Jacob. He wrestled with the Lord who put his thigh out of joint. Incapacitated, all he could do was hang on and say, “I will not let You go unless You bless me.” Then God said, “What is your name?” He answered, “Jacob,” which means “supplanter,” a crook, a conniver. God changed his name to Israel, and he was a different man from then on (Genesis 32:24–28). He never again cheated or lied. Before that time he had done many ingenious things. He was able to make prenatal markings on certain lambs that were born in Laban’s flock so that they would be his. Laban changed Jacob’s wages seven times, but he was unable to devise a system that Jacob could not work around. Jacob was the supplanter. But after God met him, he submitted himself to his brother, whom he had robbed, and gave an abundance back to him. He became Israel, a prince of God. He prevailed with God and with man.
How do you prevail with God? You prevail with your hip out of joint. Then your ambition wanes and every personal motivation disappears. What is left? You hang on and believe God. You become more effective in prayer than you have ever been in your life.
We must believe for our physical needs to be met through the realm of the spirit. The day is coming when this will be the way we survive. No one could store up enough food to make it through the times of tribulation that will be coming on the earth, but we can believe for God to bring an amazing supply through the Spirit. Where did the miracle begin that fed the five thousand people? Did it start on the human plane? Or did it start with God? If someone wants to multiply loaves and fishes, he starts with God. He does not look around to find someone who can bless the fish from the human plane. He looks for God to put the blessing on the food; that can multiply it and change it. This is the level we must believe for. Our lives will come forth in the Spirit with a new anointing.
When you pray, do not be moved by the harassment and assault of Satan and just pray against him. That is a secondary target. Pray to see the ministries of the Kingdom loosed. Bless and strengthen them. Travail for the positive goals that will come forth through a release in the Spirit. If you pray this way, the devil will be taken care of and impasses will be broken. It may appear that you are ineffective. Does this mean that you are praying the wrong way? No, but you must go through the experience that God wants you to go through. When the release comes you will know how it was done. You will know what God did in you to bring it forth. God brings forth the purity. Vindictiveness dies. The spiritual warfare changes. You do not have to stop to cope with each problem. You merely deal with it in the Spirit, and the Lord ends it. When Jesus tells the waves, “Peace, be still,” you do not have to count the waves; they will all lie down quietly (Mark 4:39). By His Word it will happen.
Learn to walk with God. Learn to war in the Spirit. It is time to move out of the flesh and into the Spirit. A circumcision of heart will take place when you intercede for the Kingdom of God and for His ministries to come forth. Face the impasses. Roar and kick against them, but do not do it on the human plane. The release will come, and your spirit will grow stronger in the Lord every day. This will liberate you because you will come out of yourself. You must have a consciousness of failure on the human plane, because humans are incurably self-confident. They think that no matter how much they fail, they can still get up and make it the next time. A time must come in which you grasp a total living faith that comes through your spirit. It does not depend upon how things look. When Ezekiel was in the valley, he witnessed one of the greatest failures of an army. Nothing was left of that army but bones. Then the Lord asked him, “Can these bones live?” He answered, “Lord, Thou knowest” (Ezekiel 37:1–3). Ezekiel did not even venture a human opinion, because he knew that if he voiced a human opinion he would be speaking unbelief.
God called Abraham the father of many nations, and yet when Abraham looked at his body, he saw that it was as good as dead; he saw also the deadness of Sarah’s womb. He realized that he could do nothing about their barren state, but neither would he accept it. Without any human hope, he still had a hope that was born of God. He wavered not at the promises of God through unbelief, but waxed strong through faith (Romans 4:17–20). He never accepted a limitation. Neither should you accept limitations. Reach into God so that the promises come to pass. When you speak a Word from God, expect it to happen instantly. Violently, constantly, expect deliverance in every situation; expect immunity and victory in every realm.
You will have the hope in God that Abraham had when something is born in your spirit by which you know that you are a failure. Yet you will have stronger faith for total deliverance because your faith is born of God. There are two kinds of wisdom: the wisdom of man and the wisdom of God. There are two kinds of faith: the faith of man and the faith of God. You are to have the faith of God. There are two kinds of perfection: a phony human effort to be perfect and the perfection that comes in the Spirit. Christ exhorted His disciples, Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect. Matthew 5:48. There are two kinds of faith, two kinds of wisdom, two kinds of love, and two kinds of patience. They differ according to their level. You may think that you are a relatively patient person, until you pray for patience; then your own patience fails. If you determine before the Lord to be submissive, watch how you begin to grumble and growl until God’s submission is worked in your heart. The fruit of the Spirit does not consist of human attributes that have been blessed and strengthened; it consists of divine attributes such as love and joy and peace that come forth in the Spirit.
Get ready to live. Paul wrote to the Christians in Ephesus: Wherefore he saith, Awake thou that sleepest, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give thee light. Ephesians 5:14. Why did he talk like that to Christians, to believers? Many then, just like many today, were dead to the spirit world. If you blindly feel your way around in the spirit world, you are actually existing and living by your senses, by an earthly knowledge and an earthly wisdom. The Lord is saying, “Come on; rise from the dead. Come up out of that death and begin to live in the realm of the Spirit.” Set yourself to do that.
Romans 8 speaks of the sons of God coming forth; and it says that if we suffer with Him, we shall also be glorified with Him. Then the chapter focuses on the fact that the Spirit is making intercession with groanings too deep for utterance and that Christ is also interceding. It presents a fantastic picture of intercession, while it also speaks of the manifestation of the sons of God and the release from futility. The intercession of this hour is identified with the manifestation of the sons of God spoken about in Romans 8. The more we enter into the Spirit for that intercession, the more the deep groanings will come. Whenever an impasse is broken, no one will be able to say that it was done by some beautifully phrased prayers. Groanings will come up that we have no human capacity to utter, because the Spirit of the Lord is bringing the intercession, a travail so deep that it is like unto death. Out of it will come the life and the birth of a whole new age and the deliverance from the futility that is on all creation.
Let us examine Romans 8 from verse 14 to the end of the chapter. For all who are being led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God. When you are being “led” by the Spirit, you are not “following,” as the Israelites followed the pillar of fire. Ago, the Greek word for “led,” means that all of your life and all of your actions are activated by the Spirit of God. You must come to the end of your human drive and into the Spirit drive within you. Samson, for example, could do a limited amount physically; but when the Spirit of the Lord came upon him he was driven by the force of the Spirit, and nothing was a limitation to him. All who are being activated by the Spirit are set in motion. Their whole action, their whole life, comes forth by the Spirit.
For you have not received a spirit of slavery leading to fear again, but you have received a spirit of adoption as sons by which we cry out, “Abba! Father!” This is speaking of the spirit within you. The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, heirs also, heirs of God and fellow-heirs with Christ, if indeed we suffer with Him in order that we may also be glorified with Him. For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that is to be revealed to us. We are in these sufferings today. For the anxious longing of the creation waits eagerly for the revealing of the sons of God. For the creation was subjected to futility, not of its own will, but because of Him who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself also will be set free from its slavery to corruption into the freedom of the glory of the children of God.
For we know that the whole creation groans and suffers the pains of childbirth together until now. And not only this, but also we ourselves (the sons that will be manifested), having the first fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our body. Verses 15–23. This is what we are actually looking for: a final act of redemption to come upon us, where everything on the physical plane will be invaded by the authority of the Spirit. The sons will arrive first. Neither creation nor any individual will be loosed until the firstfruits come forth. God insists that the laborer be the first partaker of the fruit (II Timothy 2:6). The Word that God is speaking now cannot be preached continually for another century as a theory or a prophetic forecast. It is time for it to happen. Events on the world scale must be reserved until the miracle of the firstfruits comes forth.
For in hope we have been saved, but hope that is seen is not hope; for why does one also hope for what he sees? But if we hope for what we do not see, with perseverance we wait eagerly for it. And in the same way the Spirit also helps our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we should, but the Spirit Himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words (the groanings of the Spirit are too deep for words; as our prayers become more intense and violent, they only begin to touch the intercession of the Spirit); and He who searches the hearts knows what the mind of the Spirit is, because He intercedes for the saints according to the will of God. Verses 24–27.
Notice that He is interceding. He who searches the heart knows what the Holy Spirit is doing within us. Why could the Holy Spirit not pray directly? The prayer must come through the sons. The sons are the instrument to bring the liberation to pass. It will not come any other way. The whole groaning of creation is futile. Nothing will happen to creation until the release first comes to the sons. They are to be the firstfruits. Toward that end, the intercession and the groaning must continue deeply.
And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose. For whom He foreknew, He also predestined to become conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the first-born among many brethren. Verses 28–29. The subject has not changed. This Scripture is still speaking about the sons coming forth. God is causing everything to work together according to His purpose for these who are interceding, the ones who are to come forth into sonship, the firstfruits. These that He foreknew, He predestined to become conformed to the image of His Son that He might be the firstborn among many brethren. Christ is not up in the heavens trying to create a lot of little reasonable facsimiles of Himself down on earth. The groaning and the intercession is to bring forth the image of His Son among the many brethren. He is coming forth in them. This is a truth that few people have seen.
And whom He predestined, these He also called; and whom He called, these He also justified; and whom He justified, these He also glorified. What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who is against us? He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how will He not also with Him freely give us all things? Verses 30–32. If God did not spare His Son, but delivered Him up for our redemption and salvation, how much more, as He comes forth in us, will He freely give us all things? This paraphrases the exact meaning. Notice also: how will He not also with Him—with Him coming forth in us.
Who will bring a charge against God’s elect? God is the one who justifies; who is the one who condemns? Christ Jesus is He who died, yes, rather who was raised, who is at the right hand of God, who also intercedes for us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation…? Verses 33–35. When we are in the tribulation, who will separate us from Christ? He is coming forth in us. He is the One who is interceding. There can be no separation, because He is working His whole plan in us. Do not pray for events to happen. Pray for a spiritual state of oneness, which is the Kingdom. It is not miracles of circumstance, but rather miracles of relationship that are coming.
Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? Just as it is written, “For Thy sake we are being put to death all day long; we were considered as sheep to be slaughtered.” Verses 35–36. Is this speaking about the Christians who were being killed then? No. The sons coming forth today are going through that. They are being put to death all day long. They are being considered as sheep to be slaughtered.
But in all these things we overwhelmingly conquer through Him who loved us. As we press into sonship, we are slaughtered; and yet we come into reigning. We suffer, but we come into sonship as the intercession reaches through. It comes up through us by the Spirit, with groanings too deep for words. For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, 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. Verses 37–39. The love of God is in Him, and He comes forth in us.
As you press into the intercession for this hour, review often the teaching from Romans 8. The violence of true intercession does not come from the human level; the Christ within you becomes violent. As you loose the Christ in your brother, you will loose the Christ within yourself. You will move into intercession with deep groanings. He ever lives to pray for you and to intercede for you, to bring you forth and to save you to the uttermost, to deliver you completely to the uttermost (Hebrews 7:25). When you enter into intense prayer, let the Spirit of the Lord take over to the point that you find no words for it. The first stages of the manifestation of the sons of God are coming forth. Accept it. You must come forth as the firstfruits of the Spirit, having the first fruits of the Spirit. There must be less and less of you and more and more of Him. That is the way it is supposed to be. As He increases and you decrease, your every prayer will become more and more effective.
Hebrews 2:10–18 reveals that Christ will glorify God through us. For it was fitting for Him, for whom are all things, and through whom are all things, in bringing many sons to glory, to perfect the author of their salvation through sufferings. For both He who sanctifies and those who are sanctified are all from one Father; for which reason He is not ashamed to call them brethren, saying, “I will proclaim Thy name to My brethren, in the midst of the congregation I will sing Thy praise.” Do you believe that Christ will sing praises through you?
And again, “I will put My trust in Him.” And again, “Behold, I and the children whom God has given Me.” Since then the children share in flesh and blood, He Himself likewise also partook of the same, that through death He might render powerless him who had the power of death, that is, the devil; and might deliver those who through fear of death were subject to slavery all their lives. For assuredly He does not give help to angels, but He gives help to the seed of Abraham. Therefore, He had to be made like His brethren in all things, that He might become a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people. For since He Himself was tempted in that which He has suffered, He is able to come to the aid of those who are tempted.
Christ within you is even singing the praises. Christ within you is even bringing forth the worship. He is coming to the rescue of those who are tempted, because He is right within you. Independently of any help but the Spirit, Christ overcame all the enemy. Now He is coming forth in you, and the same victory that He won before is being repeated and manifested through many sons. You must not conceive of anything less than a total, absolute, complete liberation. Do not expect business as usual, with the same old oppressions and the same old limitations. It is not that you are to look for any change on the scene or for any change in circumstances. The important change will be wrought in you. Death is working in you, but Christ is coming forth in you. Your intercession will be the groaning of the Spirit too deep for words. The Holy Spirit within you will insist upon an end to a limited walk with God, and insist that you be absolutely changed. Your human initiative will give way to divine motivation and activation. The Holy Spirit will not only motivate you, but He will also activate you. This even goes beyond receiving an anointing in the Spirit to do certain things the Lord tells you to do. It is God working in you, to will and to do (Philippians 2:13). God is working in you to will it. God is working in you to do it. That is what it means to be led by the Spirit of God.
God is liberating His people in this day. Claim that liberty, completely and perfectly. There can be no more delay. God does not say, “This day is limited.” Every word of the Spirit now is a deep groaning, and it is interpreted thus: “Now is the set time. Now is the day of liberation. Now is the time for sons to come forth.” There is absolutely no scriptural or natural reason to accept an impasse as a necessary delay. God has already fulfilled too many promises for anyone to believe in delay. Any delay indicates a violation on our part of not reaching into the Spirit and touching the liberation. Therefore, let us walk in the Spirit, reaching in and pulling the total release out of God’s very heart.
The liberation we seek does not come from a human desire. It comes from a divine desire. It is in the heart of the Father to see the liberation. It is in the heart of the Father to see it sweep the whole world. It pleases the Father that His Son should be magnified. He is coming to be glorified in His saints (II Thessalonians 1:10). That is what the Father is interested in. The Father is not interested in glorifying any individual, not in the least. What pleases God? Find it in the Word. “This is My beloved Son. Hear Him” (Matthew 17:5). God has highly exalted Him, and given Him a name which is above every name (Philippians 2:9).
Loose the Christ to come forth. Loose the Christ to be glorified in the saints of God. This is what the Father wants. Some people believe that it is not the dispensational time, that it could be a thousand years away yet. That is not true. It is always the time. It is always the time for Christ to be glorified. It is always the time for the Christ within you to be loosed and liberated. When you pray for healing, believe for healing, not just because God has said that at a particular moment the healing should come; but believe because the provision has already been made: “By His stripes you were healed” (Isaiah 53:5). The Father wants to glorify His Son in the healing. Of the Holy Spirit that comes within you, Jesus said, “He shall glorify Me. He shall take of Mine” (John 16:14). “He will bear witness of Me” (John 5:37). The Father does that. The Spirit of God does that. Therefore, Christ is to be glorified and liberated within you, and within every one of His sons. Many Scriptures verify that it is in the will of God for this to happen now.
In intercession we must cry day and night for God to avenge His people speedily. The days of limitation have to be ended quickly. The Spirit is groaning for the days of futility to be at an end. When the liberation comes, it will come like a tidal wave; and the spirit realm will open up and become visible to God’s people. Now is the time to be careful not to draw encouragement or discouragement from one another. Draw your encouragement from the Spirit and your intercession from the depths of the Spirit. Let the depths of the Spirit intercede through you. The more the Holy Spirit cries forth from every member of the Body, the quicker the liberation will come. As long as those who are interceding are experiencing peaks and valleys, they are still too much on a human level. They are still responding too much to appearances, to the psychic and emotional level; and they are reacting to each other. Reach up to the higher level and stay there. Draw your encouragement from the Lord. Draw the whole flow from the Lord, so that it is the Spirit of God interceding in you.
The minute you start to become discouraged, rebuke it and start reaching into the Lord. Determine to speak in the Spirit, so that the Lord brings forth the intercession. The effectiveness of your intercession lies in the constancy of it. With your will, refuse the human level; refuse to go into a valley. By the same token, refuse to reach too high a peak emotionally, because that could dissipate your strength and your energy. Simply rise in the Spirit. Be careful not to exceed the flow of the Spirit’s anointing. Do not let your zeal take over on a human level. Let your intensity come forth on a spirit level so that you speak a Word from the Lord.
When our obedience is complete, the Lord will avenge all disobedience. God has set up His judgments like dominoes. When the release of the sons starts breaking, judgments will strike immediately against violations and real sins that have come against the Body of Christ. God is going to turn loose much more than blessing. Judgments will begin. Many things will happen. However, if judgment were to begin while we are on the human level, we would be judged also. For that reason we must move up into the spiritual level.
Scriptural proof showing why we must move into the spiritual level is found in I Corinthians 2:12–3:7. Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might know the things freely given to us by God, which things we also speak, not in words taught by human wisdom (Paul was not even moving on a level of human wisdom), but in those taught by the Spirit, combining spiritual thoughts with spiritual words. But a natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit of God (here Paul wrote about the unspiritual man who walks on the human level); for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually appraised. But he who is spiritual appraises all things, yet he himself is appraised by no man. The King James Version reads, “He that is spiritual judges all things, but he himself is judged by no man.” For who has known the mind of the Lord, that he should instruct Him? But we have the mind of Christ. Verses 12–16. When you walk down on the human level, you are open to punishment and judgment. That is why God’s people must move up out of that level.
Paul continued, And I, brethren, could not speak to you as to spiritual men, but as to men of flesh, as to babes in Christ. I Corinthians 3:1. Paul wrote that the human level is open to criticism, reproof, and reprimand; but the man on the spiritual level is judged by no man. No one can judge him or touch him, because he is on a higher level. If you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the Law (Galatians 5:18). Before judgment can sweep the earth, and even the church world, you must move out of the human level and into the spirit level. Otherwise your prayers for judgment will boomerang on you.
Paul also said, I gave you milk to drink, not solid food; for you were not yet able to receive it. Indeed, even now you are not yet able, 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? As long as you walk on that human level, as men walk, you are open to many problems. Get up out of the human level. For when one says, “I am of Paul,” and another, “I am of Apollos,” are you not mere men? What then is Apollos? And what is Paul? Servants through whom you believed, even as the Lord gave opportunity to each one. I planted, Apollos watered, but God was causing the growth. So then neither the one who plants nor the one who waters is anything, but God who causes the growth. I Corinthians 3:2–7.
Paul continued the rest of the chapter along the same line, pointing out the fact that there is a fleshly level and a spiritual level. He was still speaking about Christians. The natural man on the human level does not know the things of the Spirit of God. They are foolishness to him. He cannot understand them because they are spiritually discerned. He who is spiritual is able to judge everything because he sees it in another realm. Yet he himself is judged by no one.
Move up where you will not be judged: walking in the Spirit and not under the Law, not fulfilling the lusts of the flesh.