The undeniable and irrefutable bottom-line of the collection of Scriptures that follow is that while God is the God of Agape-Love, and actually the author/originator of same, that same God is also a God who HATES, that is holds utter contempt for those who hate and oppose Him, His Word, Will, and Ways. To say otherwise is to call God a liar and His Holy Word a lie!
While we certainly want to guard against the disastrous mistake of preempting patience to take matters into our own hands with respect to the major God-assigned purposes of our lives as did Abraham and thereby produce Ishmaels instead of Isaacs, in the post-resurrection era in which we live we have the fruit of the Holy Spirit of supernatural patience to help us with that, if only we will “walk by the Spirit” and thereby “not carry out the desires of the flesh” (Gal. 5:16-25). Our common problem is not so much getting ahead of God, but rather usually lagging far behind His purposes and plans for our lives.
Following His death, burial, resurrection, and numerous appearances in His resurrected Form, on the Day of Ascension, on the Mount of Ascension, as He was ascending on High, the Apostle Paul, who, as an apostle born late (1 Cor. 15:8), as it were, was not even there, but who reveals to us by revelation of the Spirit, that Jesus relegated and delegated His five-faceted anointing that He Himself ministered through during His fleshly ministry, unto the Church that He is building (Eph. 4:8-13), fulfilling the type and shadow of Elijah’s Prophetic Mantle falling down upon his successor, Elisha, as he was being translated into Heaven alive, having eluded death (2 Kgs. 2:1-15). Jesus, as He was ascending, according to Paul’s prophetic narrative in Ephesians Four, relegated and delegated His five-faceted ministry anointing unto certain persons of His own election: “some as apostles, and some as prophets, and some as evangelists, and some as pastors and teachers, for the equipping of the saints for the work of the service (ministry), to the building up of the body of Christ; until we all attain unto the unity of the faith and the knowledge of the Son of God, to a mature man, to the measure of the stature which belongs to the fullness of Christ.”
Prayer is the most powerful weapon we possess, yet the enemy makes it seem like the most difficult to wield, and even the most ineffectual. But, that is deception. God’s word says, “The effectual and fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much!” Interpretation? Prayer works! Is it difficult? About as difficult as thinking the next thought that wistfully and effortlessly flutters through your mind. The only thing difficult about prayer is overriding one’s flesh that resists us doing it with all it’s got!
For three years or so the Lord has been speaking to me out of the prophetic prediction of Malachi 3:1-6 concerning imminent events that He will be orchestrating in the Church that He is building, i.e., the genuine Body of Christ. In the first quarter of this year, the Lord has been continually increasing the intensity and urgency of what he has been showing and telling me in this regard. I rise today through the auspices of this forum to make a sincere and earnest attempt to convey what I believe I received as a prophetic word from the Lord Jesus Christ, the Head of the Church, which He has instructed me to convey to the Church He is building, that is, His Body. A few days ago, I heard Him instructing me in my spirit to sit down at my computer, write what He speaks to me, and title it “A Prophetic Prognosis.” I did; He did; and what He spoke is what this article is about.
Billions, in the last two millennia since Christ gave believers a model for prayer that became known as “The Lord’s Prayer,” have prayed, “Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be done, on Earth as it is in Heaven.” But, a rarefied few have prayed that portion of the prayer with knowledge of what it means and conviction that it would or even, if they were honest, could be answered. For most, it’s just a petition by rote, and they don’t really mean it. But, Jesus meant it when He instructed believers to pray that way and petition God in that regard. He really meant for us to petition God that His Kingdom come to Earth and that His Will be manifest on Earth as it is manifest in Heaven. The Government of the Kingdom of Heaven and God is the ultimate Theocracy. And, so when we are petitioning God for the manifestation of His Kingdom on Earth as Jesus instructed, we are asking (whether we understand it or not) that God’s Theocracy be manifest on the Earth. Yet, I would surmise it a reasonable assumption that the overwhelming majority of believers have not the slightest clue what God’s Theocracy is or how it does or would manifest on the Earth. This series of articles addresses that matter.
Nowhere does Scripture inform us that God has rescinded the appointment of the gift of various forms of tongues in the Church, though many have sought to have them “impeached” or “abrogated” from the Church without any Biblical justification for doing so. Cessationists must resort to extra-biblical theorization to support their unproven assertions, which are based virtually exclusively and entirely upon past Church history, which is the record of what the Church did vis-à-vis what God ordained and prescribed in His Word for the Church to do. The chasm between the two is vast!
In the previous post I indicated my strong disagreement with the conclusions of the group of elders and an overseer who identified themselves as the “investigators” who conducted an investigation into the long train of abuses, misdeeds, and other allegations against the founding senior leader of Mars Hill Church in Seattle, Mark Driscoll. Those men concluded that “While we believe Mark needs to continue to address these areas in his life, we do not believe him to be disqualified from pastoral ministry.” I ended that post by saying that abuse of spiritual authority is one of the most, possibly THE most, egregious affronts in existence to the One who is the Source of all legitimate authority, and that in a follow-up post I would offer 25 reasons why that is so that immediately come to my mind. This post consists of those 25 Reasons.
God’s people – leaders and laymen alike – need to give heed to the judgments of God that are clearly and undeniably manifesting all around us, and begin to earnestly and thoroughly “Humble (themselves) under the mighty hand of God!” (1 Pet. 5:6) for “God is opposed to the proud but gives His grace to the humble” (1 Pet. 5:5). It is much better for one to humble himself, as Scripture commands, than to refuse and leave it to an angry and avenging God to do the humbling.
One of the common denominators of false cults, false religions, and the occult is that their doctrines and practices are predicated upon the “isms” of vain, humanly invented philosophies. The same is true of the heretical hyper-authoritarian Discipleship/Shepherding doctrines, dogmas, and practices that were infused into the fabric and foundation of the Neo-Pentecostal church, which fact is further corroboration that they are all of the aforementioned characterization: cultic, false, and occult. One of the most significant “isms” of the Discipleship heresy is one that is specifically mentioned and condemned in the Bible—Nicolaitanism.
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