Revival – 4 of 4 – Faith not Sight

I realize that I have addressed several complex issues within the overall Christian movement with my previous post on Revival. Some of these items have been traditions Christians have clung to for many years without valid questioning. So, readers might have some confusing thoughts and feelings about what I wrote. I thought I would go into a little more depth and hopefully readers will grasp the truths being set forth. I will address each one in a separate post.

Walking by Faith not by Sight:
The only aspect of the new creation that was not fully transformed at the time of salvation is the carnal Mind(Romans 8:7). We all know what Adam lost at the fall, but what did He gain? The only thing Adam gained after the fall was the ability in his mind to know what constituted evil and to be able to consciously choose it(Genesis 3:22). He gained a carnal mind. The lingering habits and thoughts of our carnal mind is retained by us after salvation. The carnal mind of the flesh is sensing and reasoning through situations without applying the truth of the Spirit of God(Romans 8:6) in faith and standing firm until those situations produce the fruit of the Spirit and line up with the outcome the word indicates is possible.

If our experience is contrary to the word of God, the only explanation is that WE do not know how to appropriately operate in the “Life – Zoe”, authority, and ability of the Spirit living inside of us to practically impact the situation, causing it to obey the truth of God.

The Abide Project was started for this exact reason. We teach people how to do this, how to walk in and experience being “more than conquerors”(Romans 8:37), “overcoming the world”(John 16:33; 1 John 5:4-5), and not being subject to or in bondage to the beggarly elements of the world anymore(Galatians 4:9).

We are supposed to be renewed in the spirit of our mind(Ephesians 4:23). We are commanded to finish our transformation by renewing our minds(Romans 12:2). We renew our minds to the truth of the Word of God so that what we think, say, and do is in accordance with the mind of the Spirit(Romans 8:6). The subject matter of the mind of the Spirit is the word. Do the word, and we act on behalf of the Spirit and Jesus works through us as we step out in Faith. The answer is NOT to seek more of God or to try to get more IN His presence. We cannot get a partial piece of the Holy Spirit anyway, we get Him all. We just need to learn how to let the Holy Spirit move through us(experience Him).

The Abide Project teaches you how to do this. You do this by confessing and professing the truth of the word regarding His relationship to you(Colossians 2:9-10; 1 John 2:20,27), until your mind naturally accepts it as reality instead of accepting what your senses might be experiencing in the current circumstances of life. This is how you walk by Faith and not by sight. God calls forth the things that are not yet as though they were(Romans 4:17). IF we are supposed to think and act like God and be of the mind of the Spirit, then we too should be calling forth the unseen as though it has become seen. After all, that is the essence of faith(Hebrews 11:1). Faith is perceiving as real fact that which is not revealed to the senses. Faith, the ability to look at the unseen thing and believe it has been manifested no matter what the circumstances mirror back to us, comes by hearing the word(Romans 10:17). Repeatedly hearing the reality of the word exalted over the present circumstances is how Faith is built and how the unseen thing manifests into existence.

Now you have a pattern for how you experience all the other things God has provided to you. Do you need more faith? (Romans 12:3) says you have received THE measure, so confess and profess that until your mind believes it naturally. Do you need more freedom from sin? (John 8:36) says you are free indeed, so confess and profess that to your mind and heart until you believe it naturally. Do you need more blessing of a certain kind? (Ephesians 1:3) says we have already been blessed with ALL spiritual blessings, so confess and profess that you have the blessing you need in Jesus name and thank Him for it until the unseen is manifested and your mind accepts it as reality. Faith produces an outcome. Your Faith is the substance of the unseen thing.

See, this is also where I lose most Christians because they think I am advocating Name it and Claim it Christianity and are so afraid that they are going to get over into some false belief that they become paralyzed by fear and can’t explore the truth of it to prove out the good and acceptable will of God in it. That process is called working out your salvation in fear and trembling(Philippians 2:12). There is freedom to do so, if it produces fruit adopt the truth. If it does not produce fruit of the Spirit, cast it aside and don’t follow it anymore, you won’t be thrown in hell because you tested it. I and many others have worked it out and have proven that faith works in this way with fruit of the Spirit as proof. This is not name it and claim it, I want a million dollars or a big gold apostle watch stuff. That movement took the valid principles of faith and went off into asking amiss so that they could consume that which was received upon their own lusts(James 4:3). That is not what I am saying.

It is impossible to please God without Faith(Hebrews 11:6). Faith works. Whatsoever we pray, if we really believe, we will receive it(Matthew 21:22). The opposite must also be true, whatever you pray, if you really don’t believe, you won’t receive. What we pray must align with not asking for something selfishly that we want to consume on our own lusts. IF we want that work of faith to be pleasing to God, we must not ask amiss of His will. This is why it is so important to know His will and have the mind of the Spirit. None the less, the principle of Faith/belief is true. Faith is believing the unseen thing is present. It works, and quantum physics has proven it to be true. The more shocking thing is that God was gracious and merciful enough to even answer the name it and claim it people by sometimes giving them what they named and claimed. Believing and praying(Faith) works, but it must be exercised from the mind of the Spirit and not the mind of carnally minded flesh to be pleasing to God. God is not pleased with those who have used His principles for the satisfaction of their flesh. But that does not mean those principles don’t work.

We must walk by faith and not by sight(2 Corinthians 5:7). Walking by faith means we do not accept the present visible reality reflected to us. We accept the reality the word mirrors back to us(James 1:23-25), and as long as we don’t forget what reality looks like according to the word, we will be blessed in whatever deed we face. Like Abraham did when he was too old to produce children, we consider not our bodies, or the present “reality” of the deadness of Sarah’s womb. We stagger not at the promises of God. We stand strong in faith, give glory to God, and become fully persuaded that the truth of the word will be performed(Romans 4:19-21). It is not about what we can know or perceive in our own ingenuity, what matters is that we come into agreement with the truth of the Word with utmost conviction and persuasion. That state comes about through the renewing of the mind.

The truth in the word is a more sure word of prophecy(2 Peter 1:19). The Word is prophecy, it tells what should be. It is more sure than what we perceive to be with our natural senses. The Abide Project is designed specifically to teach people how to disregard the reality of this present world and manifest the reality of the word.

Revival – 3 of 4 – Sinners and Saints

I realize that I have addressed several complex issues within the overall Christian movement with my previous post on Revival. Some of these items have been traditions Christians have clung to for many years without valid questioning. So, readers might have some confusing thoughts and feelings about what I wrote. I thought I would go into a little more depth and hopefully readers will grasp the truths being set forth. I will address each one in a separate post.

Sinners & Saints:
If an unsaved person responds to this goodness of God that a saved person demonstrated, then upon water baptism they are now a new creature(2 Corinthians 5:17), born again(John 3:3). The sin nature in our flesh that we were born with died with Christ in His death(Romans 6:4). Our spirit is raised with Christ(Colossians 2:12) and seated with Him in heavenly places(Ephesians 2:6). The One Spirit of the Holy Living God is now implanted in us(1 Corinthians 6:17). The Holy Spirit of the Godhead, in all its fullness now resides in us(Colossians 2:9-10) forevermore, never leaving, never becoming less, always constant(1 John 2:20,27). We are now the temple of that Holy Spirit(1 Corinthians 6:19). It is no longer we who exist, but it is Christ Jesus existing in us and operating through us(Galatians 2:20). At this time, prior to being baptized with the Holy Spirit, we have the power to become sons of God(John 1:12). Baptism in the Holy Spirit is how we activate the authority, power, ability, and every other things provisioned to us from the work of Christ. Holy Spirit baptism gives us access to these precious promises(2 Peter 1:4) so that we can personally experience it as well as make it available to others. As a saved and Holy Spirit baptized individual we now have the “ability” to perform the actions that sons of God perform and gain access to the whole inheritance of promises provisioned us. We become as He is in this world(1 John 4:17) and can do the things He did(John 14:12) and have the things He possessed. Things like grace, peace, mercy, love, patience, power, ability, perseverance, holiness, the mind of Christ, whatever we need to live life and live it Godly!

As saved people, we do NOT have a sin nature anymore, just like Adam did not have one when he sinned. We are no longer enslaved to sin(Romans 6:6; Romans 6:14). God is not sitting up in heaven counting the sins we as saved people might fall into against us(Romans 4:8). The problem is that the immature Christian does not know how to handle this state or freedom. When the devil accuses us before God by pointing out our failures, we don’t believe that Jesus is right there as an advocate saying, No Father, I paid the price for that, they are clean(1 John 2:1). Our unbelief in this matter, lets our hearts condemn us(1 John 3:20-21) about our wrong doing which perpetuates a cycle of sinning. Sinning leads to the condemnation, which then leads to further sins, which then leads to guilt, which then leads to repentance, which then reaps forgiveness, which then gets us back to the good state of God’s grace/mercy/good favor….Or so we think. The next time we mess up we repeat that same process. Most Christians are stuck in this perpetual process for the rest of their lives trying to figure out how to get on God’s good side. They are tossed too and fro in and out of God’s mercy and grace. This is why we have Christians today who have been saved for more than 30 years, still stuck in this cycle, and believing that holiness(sanctification as they call it) is unattainable in our lifetime.

We are expected to quit sinning(1 John 3-5) as a sign of our repentance and a way to enter into holiness. If we mess up, move on and don’t do it again. The freedom of God not counting up our sins and remembering them against us, is not a license to keep sinning(Romans 6:15). It is possible to give up sinning and live holy, God has given us everything necessary to live this life and live it in a godly way(2 Peter 1:3). How do these things necessary to live life godly come into existence for us? Through the knowledge of Him. There is knowledge, from and about what Jesus provided to us through His Work and words, that if learned and understood gives us access to call forth into existence everything necessary to live life and live it Godly. A lot of the information I am sharing with you fits into this knowledge of Him.

The Abide Project is designed to teach people how to activate and experience all those things necessary to live a Godly holy life without sinning anymore.

This is where I lose most Christians, because they are so ready to claim that I am saying I am completely without sin. We are currently, as saved individuals, new creations and without sin, despite our propensity to choose against the Spirit of God. We were once sinners though. However, now that we are saved, sin has been eradicated for and from us(Romans 6:14-18). There is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus(Romans 8:1). What happened in Romans 7? Paul is talking about this struggle of doing what he shouldn’t and not being able to do what he should, how he wrestles within himself to do what is right. In Romans 7, Paul was building the case for how condemnation happens. Then comes Romans 8:1. Paul says, look Romans, all that back forth is for the birds. There is therefore NOW, instead of the back and forth, no condemnation to those who are in Christ and who walk not after the flesh, but who walk after the Spirit. He was telling them there is no struggle anymore because there is no condemnation, which is what the struggle is all about. Walking in the flesh is letting your heart condemn you. Walking in the Spirit is seeing that God is greater than your heart(1 John 3:20-21). NO means none and we must come into agreement with it. The salvation experience is indicative of us recognizing our sin, repenting from it, and reaping the experiential event of being set free from the bonds of the sin we recognized we had.

Therefore, we are not sinners anymore, we are saints(Colossians 1:12-13; 1 Corinthians 1:2; Ephesians 1:18; Ephesians 4:12). I was once a sinner, but I got saved, and I am now a saint whose propensity to sin has been removed from me as far as the east is from the west. Can I choose to do something against the Spirit of God? Yes, just like Adam did for the very first time, without a sin nature. However, Adam did not have a propitiation, sacrifice, or an advocate like we do! Therefore, the fact that we may choose to walk according to the flesh after salvation does not make us sinners or sinners “again”, in need of re-salvation(Hebrews 9:25). A sinner requires salvation and redemption. Our redemption as saved people is complete, the work of Christ was enough to make us not sinners forever more, never needing to be further redeemed or cleansed of sin by a sacrifice(Hebrews 9:12). Is there purging that still needs to be done? Absolutely, and that is why a man is to purge himself(2 Timothy 2:21). That is why we are called to renew our minds. When we do choose against the Holy Spirit and walk according to the flesh, it makes us immature Christians with UN-renewed minds who need to learn not to let our hearts condemn us(1 John 3:20-21). Condemnation is not from God, it originates from us, from our hearts condemning us(1 John 3:20-21). If we can learn to not let our hearts condemn us IF we do mess up, then we have confidence before God, can boldly approach the throne(Hebrews 4:16), and make our petitions be known with confidence that we are in God’s favor. There is no vacillation where there is no condemnation. We must purge ourselves and get our minds renewed so we do not “want” to walk according to the flesh.

The Abide Project is designed to teach people how to let God’s view of being bigger than our hearts, build confidence about our favor in God, thus overpowering condemnation. If we can prevent our hearts from condemning us, we walk in the confidence of God, despite potential wrong doing, and that keeps us from falling into the perpetuated sin cycle that is reaped from condemnation.

Revival – 2 of 4 – Evangelism

I realize that I have addressed several complex issues within the overall Christian movement with my previous post on Revival. Some of these items have been traditions Christians have clung to for many years without valid questioning. So, readers might have some confusing thoughts and feelings about what I wrote. I thought I would go into a little more depth and hopefully readers will grasp the truths being set forth. I will address each one in a separate post.

Evangelism, Jesus style:

The unsaved person is drawn toward repentance, and thus salvation, through the goodness of God(Romans 2:4). The goodness of God is displayed to the unsaved person, through those of us who believe. God desires to will and to do of His good pleasure, through us(Philippians 2:13). God desires for us to step out in faith and become partakers of the divine nature(2 Peter 1:4) displaying His goodness to the world. One of the good pleasures of His will is that we all would become adopted as His children(Ephesians 1:5; verses 1-12 is a list of the other good pleasures of His will). We, as saved individuals, are supposed to prove out the good and acceptable will of God(Romans 12:2) for the unsaved person. You have to know what that will is in order to do so. God’s will is found in His Word. As saved people, we must know the word in depth and be able to prove out the will of God for the unsaved person. That is how the unsaved person experiences the good pleasure of God’s will and can see that His ways are acceptable and pleasing. Revival is not the Evangelistic approach expected by the word of God.

Typically Christians expect that God is going to be the one going, moving, working, and we are somehow supposed to figure out what He is doing and partner with Him. The purpose of Christian Revival is to seek His presence so that He shows up and moves among His people so that we can participate. This concept of experiencing and partnering with God paralyzes a believer and causes them to legitimize their own unbelief because it is not what the Word calls us to. What happens is the newly saved person is not facilitated in how to partake of the divine nature, let God work as the believer goes, and so their experiences in life accumulate to not matching the outcome indicated in the word. The new Christian is taught how to handle this by other believers who have walked in the same path; it must be His sovereignty, His will, Him trying to teach something, you gotta just press in more, or we deserve it for something we have done(discipline).

Christians have typically not been taught how to explain how and why life seems not to match up to the word. They have also not been taught to how to make life outcomes match up with the word. Christians have gone down this path for so long they have begun to believe these traditions rather than take scripture at face value. I am here to tell you today, it is possible to understand why life might not match up to the word, as well as how to influence life so that it does match up with the outcome the word says is possible.

The Abide Project is designed to explain to people how to know and understand God’s will, experience dominion over the works of the devil, and how to influence life situations with the power of the Holy Spirit, thereby proving the good and acceptable will of God.

It is the will of God that the saved person demonstrates the goodness of God’s will. That is why God gave the saved person His authority(Luke 10:19), and the ability of His spirit(Acts 1:8). Jesus, with that same authority and ability spoke to every aspect of life to reconcile it to be the way the Father desires, the way it would be in heaven. He told wind to stop, waves to calm, water to become wine, a fig tree to die, demons to go, people’s bodies to be healed, food to multiply, and tormented minds to be sane all for the purpose of pointing people to God, to the fact that He was the Messiah, and that God’s will was good intentioned. God, also gave saved people that ministry and word of reconciliation(2 Corinthians 5:18-19). We are charged with reconciling the unsaved aspects of this world, which is crying out and expecting it(Romans 8:19). We do that by establishing the Kingdom of God wherever we go, in place of Jesus being down here trying to do it by Himself. That is why Jesus taught us to pray, “God’s will be done on earth as it is in heaven”(Matthew 6:10). Expecting that God is going to come and sit Himself down on a church house and draw people to that place, which is the typical mindset of Christian revival, exalts itself against the truth of the word.

We use the power and authority on behalf of Christ, in His stead, as His ambassadors(2 Corinthians 5:20) to perform these reconciliation tasks. We reconcile people’s bodies through healing them from sickness and diseases. We reconcile their hearts and souls through trans-formative teaching and preaching(also called prophecy in the NT – explaining the divine words of God found in the bible), and faith based exploits demonstrating how the name of Jesus is above all other things. We reconcile their minds by casting out any demonic influences(confusion, lies, anger, pain, witchcraft, etc.) and imparting truth, love, peace, etc. to their whole being. The keys of the kingdom for doing this have been provided, they are binding and loosing(Matthew 16:19; Matthew 18:18).

The saved person is supposed to be able to walk in all these things as a demonstration pointing to who God is, proving out His gracious, good, acceptable, and pleasing will for mankind, so that they will be drawn to repentance. This is Faith based biblical Evangelism. God has done His job to prepare us to work on His behalf, then He went away, and is going to return someday to see how well we have established His kingdom here on earth as it should be in heaven. That is the essence of every kingdom parable in the NT. The path of Christian revival has not been working effectively or efficiently in establishing His Kingdom or mature Christians, because it does not line up with the truth or commands of the Word.

The Abide Project is designed to teach people how to effectively bind and loose the works and efforts of the devil with the authority and ability of the Holy Spirit establishing the kingdom of God and showing forth the will of God in the lives of the unsaved.

Revival – 1 of 4 – Seeking

I realize that I have addressed several complex issues within the overall Christian movement with my previous post on Revival. Some of these items have been traditions Christians have clung to for many years without valid questioning. So, readers might have some confusing thoughts and feelings about what I wrote. I thought I would go into a little more depth and hopefully readers will grasp the truths being set forth. I will address each one in a separate post.

To seek or not to seek, that is the question:
The unsaved person, in order to be saved, must seek God to find Him, repent, and respond to the free gift that has been provided.

The Free Gift: The free gift is not Jesus. Jesus is who provided the free gift. Eternal life is not the free gift. Eternal life is the result experienced by accepting the free gift. The free gift is forgiveness of sins. The sacrifice of Jesus, once and for all time eradicated sin from people’s lives(Hebrews 10:12; 1 John 2:2) and now God is not holding sins against mankind(Romans 4:8). See, Jesus fulfilled the law, completing the necessity for any other man to follow it. And now, where there is no law to be fulfilled, there is no transgression(sin) that can happen(Romans 5:13). That is the good news of the gospel!

If an unsaved person wants to experience eternal life(which starts right here right now(see the definition of the Greek word Zoe in John 10:10)), the unsaved person must respond to the free gift. An unsaved person’s response to the free gift, is performing Romans 10:9-10. Romans 10:9-10 does not initiate sins being forgiven, that task was solely provided for by the shedding of Jesus’ blood on the cross and His resurrection sealed it forever. Only Christ’s sacrifice can do that, otherwise it is a work on part. Romans 10:9-10 activates a person’s experience of eternal “Life – Zoe” free from sin and God’s wrath, a son no longer a slave/servant(Galatians 4:7). Doing Romans 10:9-10 is like opening the Christmas gift you have already received under the tree. Whether a person continues to experience the “Life – Zoe” provided by the gift, depends on how willing that person is to renew their mind.

Once a person has acknowledged the free gift, repented, and responds, salvation is encountered. The saved person has sought and now found, they knocked and the door was opened. They no longer need to seek to find God or get in His presence. A saved person has no need to try to get God to come closer through the normal ways Christians seek Revival. Longing to be with God, in His presence, and close to Him, is not an appropriate activity for a saved person. Jesus told unsaved people to seek and knock. He told believers you will never thirst again, you will have rivers of living water flowing out of you(John 7:38).

Our faith becomes effective through the acknowledgement of every good thing that is in us in Christ(Philemon 1:6). Acknowledgement that you are One with God, that you are close to God, that He lives in you, that you cannot be separated from Him in any capacity, and that He and His Spirit abides in you and cannot be removed or decrease, no matter whether it feels that way or not, or whether your experience reflects that or not, is the appropriate activity for a saved person. Otherwise, the saved person is exalting “Experience” as more true than what the word says. Coming into agreement and alignment with the truth of the word, despite how present circumstances feel or what they reflect, is how immature Christians get mature. Christians typically believe seeking God the way they seek Revival is a requirement of believers. It is rooted in not being able to make their experience congruent to the outcome the word says is expected. They don’t feel close to God, they don’t feel like they are In His Presence despite the word saying that is so. They embark on a process to get closer, to seek Him more, to find a way to be touched by Him. The most common pathway Christians seek closeness through is worship because of the emotive aspects associated with music, rhythm, etc. These are traditions that man uses instead of relying on the truth of the Word. These traditions exalt themselves against the truth of the word, the knowledge of God(2 Corinthians 10:5), and make the truth of the word of God of none effect in their lives(Mark 7:13) because the word has not been mixed with faith(Hebrews 4:2).

Now, this is where Christians typically get protective of worship a couple sentences back. God desires our worship because of who He is and what He has done for us. We should worship Him in Spirit and truth. True worship should be us presenting our bodies as living sacrifices which is our reasonable service and spiritual worship(Romans 12:1). It is not wrong to stand in a church building and worship Jesus for an hour. But if that is the extent of your worship, there is no living sacrifice there, and you have fallen short of sacrifice, which is always associated with worship throughout the bible. Reasonable service involving sacrifice is undertaking activity that requires you to sacrifice your will and body in faith on behalf of another. It requires you doing something bigger than you know you are capable of(work of Faith) and then expecting God to co-labor with you in faith to complete the work. This is worship to God because we rely on Him and the power that He meets our work of faith with(2 Thessalonians 1:11) cannot be said to have come from us(2 Corinthians 4:7).

This is also where Christians typically launch into the sanctification tradition or stronghold that exalts itself against the word(knowledge of God)(2 Corinthians 10:4-5). Well it takes a while to get mature and get to the point where you can be Christ-like. It is a life-long process if we can get there at all in this lifetime. These are excuses based on not knowing how to come unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ(Ephesians 4:13). Most Christians don’t know how to attain to this image, so they use deflective techniques when young vibrant Christians get all excited about becoming like Christ. This position of not being able to make it there fully, ever, is used in a religious way to explain why Christians have not attained it. If it is attainable, and someone has not attained it, that looks bad. Christians don’t want to look bad, so they explain away why it is not attainable. References to Pride are often also used to deter other people from trying to attain what the bible clearly calls us to. They only believe this, because they have not been taught how to achieve it. They have never experienced not thirsting, or being the life supply for someone else(true discipleship), the fullness of the stature of Christ, or the perfect man. Their experience becomes the teacher and more real than the experience and truth of the word. Confessing and professing the truth of the word, which may be unseen by our natural senses in the current circumstances, is Faith and is how that truth is made manifest.

Saved individuals are already sanctified(Hebrews 10:10; John 17:19; Acts 20:32; Romans 15:16; 1 Corinthians 1:2; 1 Corinthians 6:10-11; Hebrews 2:11; Jude 1:1). All sanctification means is to be set apart for a particular purpose. Christians use the word to mean the path to holiness. Saved individuals are called to holiness(Ephesians 4:24). Holiness is achieved through discipline(Hebrews 12:10). When we discipline our carnal minds to be renewed to the Word of God, thus coming into alignment with the Spirit of God living inside of us, we enter into holiness. Holiness is expected of us and God would not expect something of us that He knew we could not fulfill. Excuses of Pride and that we will always fail or that we are always sinners are traditions Christian men have come up with to explain why they are not mature and to keep others from rising above them and making them look bad. More on renewing the mind in the next post.

The Abide Project is designed to show people, through true discipleship, how to experience the life giving waters and outflow of the Spirit for the purpose of taking it from personal experience into the realm of discipling others.