Spiritual Education

I was reading the book "The Ultimate Issue of the Universe" from T. Austin Sparks and there were a couple paragraphs that really stood out to me. The first one is as follows; 

"What lies behind spiritual education? Look at every fragment and phase of your spiritual education, the way the Lord deals with you, and leads you; the history that there is with God lying behind. What is the outcome of it all? Suffering, trial, perplexity, adversity, and all that which goes to make up our Christian experience - and there is so much of it - what is the outcome of it all - God has His way? Let us look at ourselves, the way we have with God, the way He has taken us through the depths; through suffering, affliction, trial and difficulty, sometimes to the point almost of despair, like Paul, despairing of life, having the sentence of death. But what is the result? If the Lord has His way, is it not that He has a larger place, and the enemy a much smaller place through it all? That is the marvel of it all. Sometimes when you are going through it, you come to a rock-bottom experience, as you think, and you feel the devil is going to gain, the Lord is losing. But when you come up out of it, the Lord has much more ground, He has something more that He can work upon. What He has done is to get rid of a lot that was in His way. Suffering is a great purger. Christian experience is all with one object in view, where the Lord is concerned, in His dealing with us as He does. It is worship, worship in this sense, that God is coming into His own and Satan is losing ground. We have often feared that it would be just the opposite, while we were going through it, but God is faithful and it does work out to a larger measure of the Lord."

The whole book can be read HERE.

Hope that you are encouraged by this. 

Persecution

This is an excerpt from a message by Art Katz. You can listen to this segment along with other pieces of other messages by others by listening to this link. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UsaINMpnvww

 

The above link is definitely worth watching and is safe. Quote as follows; 

"The greater number of Christians will not be able to be satisfied with conventional Christendom. That merely to sit in a church that speaks a correct word or doctrine is not enough. Things that are merely correct are not enough. Merely to be phraseologically correct is not enough. There needs to be an awesome, a power, an authenticity in our words and in our life. And there is going to be a restlessness in many Christians who have been able to be satisfied this long in situations like that. But the very issues that are taking place in the world will be a factor that will move saints to look for a deeper quality of faith and relationship than what they now know in their conventional and predictable "Christian" situations. 

And so we have the very formative factors by which a minority of the Spirit will increasingly be called out to be the remnant people of God who are willing to pay the price of true relationship and true faith. Whereas the majority who do not see the need or have not the stomach for the cost and the sacrifice of it and who remain in these normative "Christian" situations will be increasingly deceived, having the words that are appropriate to the faith but not the power thereof. But what's more, they will be irritated by that minority of the Spirit who have moved on to a more authentic existential quality of faith and look upon them not only as being strange but perhaps even being heretical and even threatening to what is considered normal or a  normative Christian. 

In a word, we are going to see formed the very elements that make up the church that is persecuted and the church that is its persecutor. And we need to know now that we are moving toward the one or the other. There will not be as I said before a neutral ground. That the logic of true faith is persecution and that the Scriptures will be fulfilled that says "and they will kill us and claim that they are doing God a service". We are going to see the  re-enactment of the persecution of the Anabaptists in the 16th century, even persecuted by the major reformation churches. Again to be the distinguishing character of the struggle at the end of the age again. "

The Word becoming flesh

"The tragedy today in Christendom is that the vast majority of Christians cannot discern between what is religious and what is spiritual. A lot of people think that if they have a lot of Bible knowledge they are spiritual. No, they are not, they're just religious. The devil is the most religious person in the universe, he knows more of the Bible than anyone else. It doesn't make him spiritual. We need to know this brothers and sisters. I see so many Christians meeting together for Bible studies and if that Bible study doesn't make you overcome your nature all that Bible study, I tell you in Jesus name, will only make you more like the devil. You can sit with your weekly Bible study meetings, Study Romans, Ephesians, Philippians, Hebrews, everything, study the Old Testament tabernacle, everything and you will only become more like the devil. You will still have a long way to go because he will still know more than you. The Word has to become flesh and I would rather have one word of Scripture become flesh in me than know all the scriptures and know where this reference is and that reference is and what this Old Testament thing symbolizes and the deeper meaning of Romans and Ephesians. That's not what I am interested in. It's Christ! The whole Scripture is meant to show me Jesus. And the Holy Spirit is come to make me like Him. Unless that becomes the passion of our heart we are not going to be able to build the type of church that God wants."

Quoted from a message titled "Secure in God our Father" by Zac Poonen that can be downloaded from this site. Look under Sermons and the series titled "A Heavenly Church". 

The thought is clear and I can only say Amen! 

He that believeth

All things are possible

Mark 9:23  Jesus said unto him, If thou canst believe, all things are possible to him that believeth.

Is not condemned

John 3:18 He that believeth on him is not condemned: but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.

Hath everlasting life

John 3:36 He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life: and he that believeth not the Son shall not see life; but the wrath of God abideth on him.

John 6:47 Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on me hath everlasting life.

Shall never hunger and shall never thirst

John 6:35 And Jesus said unto them, I am the bread of life: he that cometh to me shall never hunger; and he that believeth on me shall never thirst.

Shall live

John 11:25 Jesus said unto her, I am the resurrection, and the life: he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live:

Believes not only on Him, Jesus Christ, but on the Father which sent Him

John 12:44  Jesus cried and said, He that believeth on me, believeth not on me, but on him that sent me.

Hath no part with unrighteousness

2 Corinthians 6:15 And what concord hath Christ with Belial? or what part hath he that believeth with an infidel?

Shall not be confounded

1 Peter 2:6 Wherefore also it is contained in the scripture, Behold, I lay in Sion a chief corner stone, elect, precious: and he that believeth on him shall not be confounded.

Overcomes the world

1 John 5:5 Who is he that overcometh the world, but he that believeth that Jesus is the Son of God?

….and now comes the hard part. The other stuff most will say, Amen to pretty readily. However, we really should look at all of Scripture to see what the promises are to those who believe.

Out of his belly shall flow RIVERS of living water

John 7:38 He that believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water.

Shall do greater works….

John 14:12 Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall he do; because I go unto my Father.

You see, we need to ask ourselves the question, if God has given all grace unto us, if He has given us all things that pertain to life and godliness, if His desire is to redeem a people, a holy people, a bride for His Son; is this being manifest, or made plain, in our lives? If not, let us ask the question why and be honest about it before God, in repentance and turning in faith to believe the promises that He has for us and abide in Jesus Christ wherein, and only in Him, will fruit abound.

Philippians 4:13 I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me.

John 15:1 I am the true vine, and my Father is the husbandman.

2 Every branch in me that beareth not fruit he taketh away: and every branch that beareth fruit, he purgeth it, that it may bring forth more fruit.

3 Now ye are clean through the word which I have spoken unto you.

4 Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the vine; no more can ye, except ye abide in me.

5 I am the vine, ye are the branches: He that abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit: for without me ye can do nothing.

6 If a man abide not in me, he is cast forth as a branch, and is withered; and men gather them, and cast them into the fire, and they are burned.

7 If ye abide in me, and my words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you.

8 Herein is my Father glorified, that ye bear much fruit; so shall ye be my disciples.

Learning under the anointing

Reading: Matt 11:29; John 1:51; Matt 3:16; John 1:4; Rom 8:2; 2 Cor 3:16-18.

The School of Christ; that is, the School where Christ is the great Lesson and the Spirit the great Teacher; in the School where the teaching is not objective but subjective, where the teaching is not of things but an inward making of Christ a part of us by experience—that is the nature of this School.

THE MEANING OF THE ANOINTING

"Ye shall see the heaven opened." "He saw the heavens opened and the Spirit of God descending upon him." What is the meaning of the anointing of the Holy Spirit. It is nothing less and nothing other than the Holy Spirit taking His place as absolute Lord. The anointing carries with it the absolute lordship of the Holy Spirit, the Spirit as Lord. That means that all other lordships have been deposed and set aside; the lordship of our own lives; the lordship of our own minds, our own wills, our own desires; the lordship of others. The lordship of every interest and every influence is regarded as having given place to the undivided and unreserved lordship of the Holy Spirit, and the anointing can never be known, enjoyed, unless that has taken place. That is why the Lord Jesus went down into Jordan's waters, into death and burial, in type, taking the place of man in representation, from that moment not to be under the government of His own life in any respect as He worked out the will of God, but to be wholly and utterly subject to the Spirit of God in every detail. Jordan's grave set forth the setting aside of every independent lordship, every other lordship, every other influence, and if you will read the spiritual life of Christ in the Gospels you will see that it was to that position that He was every moment adhering. Many and powerful were the influences which were brought to bear upon Him to affect Him and govern His movements. Sometimes it was the full force of Satan's open assault, to the effect that it was necessary that He should do certain things for His cause, or for His very continuance in life physically. Sometimes it was Satan clothing himself with the arguments and suasions of beloved associates, in their seeking to hold Him back from certain courses, or to influence Him to prolong His life by sparing Himself certain sufferings. In various ways influences were brought to bear upon Him from all directions, and many of the counsels were seemingly so wise and good. For example, with regard to His going up to the feast, it was urged, in effect: It is the thing that everybody is doing: if you do not go up you will prejudice your cause. If you really want to further this cause, you must fall into line with the accepted thing religiously, and you only stand to lose if you do not do that; you will curtail your influence, you will narrow your sphere of usefulness! And what an appeal that is if you have something very much at heart, some cause for God at heart, the success of which is of the greatest importance. Such then were the influences that were beating upon Him. But whether it be Satan coming in all the directness of his cunning, his wit, his insinuation, or whether it be through beloved and most intimate disciples and associates, whatever the kind of argument, that Man cannot be caused to deflect a hairsbreadth from His principle. 'I am under the anointing; I am committed to the absolute sovereignty of the Holy Spirit, and I cannot move, whatever it costs. Cost it my life, cost it my influence, cost it my reputation, cost it everything that I hold dear, I cannot move unless I know from the Holy Spirit that that is the Father's mind and not another mind, the Father's will and not another will, that this thing comes from the Father.' Thus He put back everything until He knew in His spirit what the Spirit of God witnessed. He lived up to this law, this principle, of the absolute authority, government, lordship of the anointing, and it was for that that the anointing had come.

That is the meaning of the anointing. Do you ask for the anointing of the Holy Spirit? Why do you ask for the anointing of the Holy Spirit? Is the anointing something that you crave? To what end? That you may be used, may have power, may have influence, may be able to do a lot of wonderful things? The first and pre-eminent thing the anointing means is that we can do nothing but what the anointing teaches and leads to do. The anointing takes everything out of our hands. The anointing takes charge of the reputation. The anointing takes charge of the very purpose of God. The anointing takes complete control of everything and all is from that moment in the hands of the Holy Spirit, and we must remember that if we are going to learn Christ, that learning Christ is by the Holy Spirit's dealing with us, and that means that we have to go exactly the same way as Christ went in principle and in law.

So we find we are not far into the Gospel of John, which is particularly the Gospel of the spiritual School of Christ, before we hear even such as He saying, "The Son can do nothing of himself". "The words that I say unto you I speak not from myself." The works that I do are not Mine; "the Father abiding in me doeth his works".

"The Son can do nothing out from himself." You see, there is the negative side of the anointing; while the positive side can be summed up in one word—the Father only. Perhaps that is a little different idea of the anointing from what we have had. Oh, to be anointed of the Holy Spirit! What wonders will follow; how wonderful that life will be! The first and the abiding thing about the anointing is that we are imprisoned into the lordship of the Spirit of God, so that there can be nothing if He does not do it. Nothing! That is not a pleasant experience, if the natural life is strong and in any way in the ascendant. Therefore Jordan must be there before there can be an anointing. The putting aside of that natural strength and self-life is a necessity, for the anointing does carry with it essentially the absolute lordship of the Spirit.

You notice the issue of that in 2 Cor 3:16. "When it shall turn to the Lord", when the Lord is the object in view, "the veil is taken away, and we all with unveiled face beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord are transformed into the same image . . . even as from the Lord the Spirit", or "the Spirit which is the Lord". You are in the School and you can see Christ and learn Christ; which is being transformed into the image of Christ under the lordship of the Spirit. "When it shall turn to the Lord", when the Lord is our object in view! But with us, with us Christians, with us very devoted, very earnest Christians, what a long time it takes to get the Lord as the sole object. Is that saying a terrible thing? We say we love the Lord; yes, but we do love to have our own way as well, and we do not love to have our way thwarted. Have any of us yet reached that point of spiritual attainment where we never have a bad time at all with the Lord? Oh no, we are still found at the place where we so often think it is in the interests of the Lord that our hearts go out in a certain direction, and the Lord does not let us do it, and we have a bad time; and that has betrayed us absolutely. Our hearts were in it. It was not easy, absolutely easy and simple for us to say, Very well, Lord, I am just as pleased as though you let me do it, I delight always to do Thy will! We are disappointed the Lord does not let us do it; or if the Lord delays it, what a time we go through. Oh, if we could only get at it and do it! The time is finding us out. Is that not true of most of us? Yes, it is true. We do come into this picture, and that just does mean that, after all, the Lord is not as verily our object as we thought He was. We have another object alongside and associated with the Lord; that is, something that we want to be or to do, somewhere we want to go, something we want to have. It is all there, and the Holy Spirit knows all about it. In this School of Christ, where God's objective is Christ, only Christ, utterly Christ, the very anointing means that it has to be Christ as Lord by the Spirit. The anointing takes that position. Well, so much for the moment for the meaning of the anointing. It was true in Him, and it has to be true in us.

http://www.austin-sparks.net/english/books/001039.html