KINGDOM BIBLE STUDIES "Teaching the things concerning the kingdom of God..."
FROM THE CANDLESTICK TO THE THRONE Part 62
THE CHURCH IN LAODICEA (continued)
“Behold, I stand at the door and knock: if any
man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and
will sup with him, and he with me” (Rev. 3:20).
The book of Revelation furnishes us with a sequential
overview of the comings of the Lord. Its inspired title is found in
the first verse — “The Revelation of Jesus Christ.” The Greek word
for “revelation” is apokalupsis meaning “unveiling,
uncovering,” and hence, “revealing.” This is expressed in
Revelation 1:7, “Every eye shall see
Him…” The error of the unspiritual and unenlightened mind is that
it immediately assumes that every eye must see Him at the same time
and in the same manner. But the multitudinous ways in which the
Lord comes and comes and continues to come throughout the
illuminating pages of this wonderful book indicates to us the
progressive revelation of Jesus Christ, the many-faceted and
many-splendored appearing of the Lord from one degree of glory to
another until, when all is finished, every creature in heaven,
earth, and hell shall have had a revelation of the Son of God! (Rev.
5:13).
With what divine genius does the Holy Spirit on the
pages of God’s Word portray the living Son of God coming and
standing in the midst of the seven churches! This is an earthly
scene. The risen and glorified Christ was present in and among the
churches. Jesus had promised to come back, and according to
chapters two and three of the Revelation He had come back!
Then follows swiftly the tragic scene of Jesus Christ, the blessed
Head of the church, standing completely outside the Laodicean
church!
It is not my purpose here to explore the present
condition of the church systems, but when Jesus sent His message to
the wealthy church of Laodicea, which boasted that she was rich and
increased with goods and had need of nothing, He portrayed Himself
as One standing outside the door. He was not within, as He
should have been, but on the outside. Behind the doors that were
locked against Him they were preaching about Him, and singing
about Him, and working and building for Him, but He
Himself they had left outside. The membership of the church of
Laodicea is large and prestigious, its seats all engaged, its income
assured, its organization perfected. Men of good business judgment
manage its affairs, in the same shrewd way that they manage their
business affairs. The services are made impressive with eloquence
and music and well-appointed ritual. Its Sunday School prides
itself on its thorough, up-to-date organization and large
attendance. It may support some missionaries in the foreign field,
for that is the modern thing to do.
Never in the history of the world has there been so much
preaching and so much human effort, or so many multi-million dollar
church buildings, Christian programs and concerts, so much church
membership, or so many outreaches to convert the world; but the
living Christ, locked out of their grandiose schemes, stands
outside! The whole church system of our day is built on
flesh-appeal programs and promotions rather than the power and glory
of the Holy Spirit. In spite of all the glib mention of His name,
the truth is that Christ stands outside the church system and His
Holy Spirit is not in its works. The thundering message of Christ
to the Laodicean church will not even penetrate in to fall upon the
already occupied ears of the masses who assemble there, but will be
heard only by individual believers. Notice what He says, “Behold, I
stand at the door and knock: IF A-N-Y M-A-N hear my voice, and open
the door, I will come IN TO HIM, and will sup with HIM, and HE with
me.” “If ANY MAN will hear!” “If any man WILL HEAR!”
You meet one that is religious, awed by the crowds, the
buildings, the great meetings, the charismatic speakers, the
beautiful television programs, the professional music, and the
wonderful works supposedly being done. They exude the spirit that
they are indeed “rich and increased with goods, and have need of
nothing.” They can talk much of the milk of the Word, their
spiritual gifts, and religious toys. But they know nothing of the
present truth of Him gathering to Himself a remnant to bring them
into His perfections. They are well versed in the traditional
doctrines about the devil and the antichrist and the so-called
rapture, but they know naught about the mighty move of God in the
earth today to bring many sons to glory, a vast company of manifest
sons to bring the kingdom of God in power upon all men and nations.
You cannot begin to speak of the deep mysteries of the kingdom, of
God’s grand purpose to restore all men and the whole creation into
God again, or of those divine quickenings which the Holy Spirit of
truth has whispered into your being, for they have no ears to hear
them. Were you to declare them in the churches of our day, they
would cast you out! Their eyes are closed against the bright vision
of that which lies before us at the manifestation of the sons of God
and the consummation of God’s great plan of the ages. They are dull
to the keen-edge of the Spirit’s working. Yet, blessed be God,
there is a people whose ears have been touched by the finger of God,
a holy race of king-priests who have been quickened to hear the
voice of the great High Priest who speaks from the MELCHIZEDEK
REALM. There is a man, yes, a many-membered man, who has
heard His voice, and has opened the door, and He has come in to
them, and today sups with them, and they with Him!
Christ, the Spirit, is completely without the camp! He
is outside the camp of the systems of this world, including the
political, economic, and religious systems of man; He is outside the
camp of the denominations, churches, and fellowships; He is outside
the camp of those who continue in the old ways of the dead, church
order of the past; He is also outside the camp of anything that is
of man, or that man’s works have created. No longer is He dealing
with the apostate systems of man, but knocking, knocking, knocking
at the heart’s door of individual men and women,
saying to them, “Behold, I stand at the door and knock: if any
man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to
him, and will sup with him, and he
with me.” This passage can only refer to the spiritual presence of
Christ coming to any individual, to any man or
woman who will open their heart’s door to intimacy of
fellowship and vital union with Christ.
As one has written concerning this significant passage,
“The message is to ‘any man,’ a message that abandons the multitude
to their religious play, to their church creeds and their church
Christs. This is the church of the individual. It is the
individual believer with a personal relationship to Christ.
For the man who will forsake all else and sup with Christ
this an age of glory, an hour of preparation such as we have never
known. This is a time when the Spirit of God is speaking to you
as an individual. He seeks to sup and dine and feast with you
apart from all the religious confusion about us. It is a glorious
day when we see the promise that is ours in this hour.”
To sup with Christ is to commune vitally with Him; it is
to fellowship intimately with Him and freely partake of all that is
proffered by His Spirit. He comes in to dine! It is there, deep
within — in the inner union of soul and spirit — as nowhere else,
privately and alone, that spiritual edification and understanding
and participation in heavenly things begins and continues and
consummates. Multitudes of believers are weak and sickly in their
spiritual lives simply because they depend only on external things —
meetings, sermons, singing, ministry, public prayers, programs — and
never come to truly know and experience the Lord FOR THEMSELVES.
But all who have received the call to sonship have obtained this
glorious experience of Christ within, it is now
happening for others, and it shall yet happen for more who “hear His
voice.” It is, first and foremost, an individual experiencing of
Christ within ourselves.
Not many of the teeming millions of earth who profess to
know the Lord are ready at this time for this high and holy
calling! They still fill the pews of the church in Leodicea, and
have failed to hear the Lord’s voice calling from without. But
those who have heard His voice, and have opened the door, are
feasting with the Lord in the third feast, the feast of
Tabernacles! It is a blessed fact that the feast of Tabernacles is
taking place now, but only those with spiritual understanding know
it. The rest are busy “star gazing” — watching the clouds — waiting
to go to a banquet in the sky. While they wait, snug and smug in
their denominational beds, the Lord is calling a people to feast
with Him. The Lord stands knocking at their door — but they sleep
on.
The awesome scene is portrayed in the beautiful Song of
Songs, the Song of Solomon. The believer (Shulamite, type of the
church) speaks first and says, “I sleep, but my heart waketh: it is
the voice of my Beloved that knocketh, saying, Open to
me, my sister, my love, my dove, my undefiled: for my head is filled
with dew, and my locks with the drops of the night” (S. of S.
5:2-6). The word “voice” means “sound.” We have the same
construction here as in Revelation 3:20. In both cases the terms
“knock” and “voice” are synonymous in meaning — “I stand at the door
and knock,” “If any man hear my voice.” This reveals
that the knock by which the Lord announces His presence is in
reality His voice, and throughout the scriptures a voice is
used to symbolize a message. The Lord’s voice is the Lord’s
message, His present truth which He desires to convey to His
people. The message goes out to many, just as the seed of the
kingdom is sown in all kinds of soil, and the kingdom net catches a
multitude of many kinds of fish. It is the sound of her Beloved
that knocks at the door! Her Beloved (Christ, the Spirit) knocks,
not only once, but He continues to knock; He calls her to arise and
shake off the slumber that locks her in its embrace.
The sleeping believer replies, “I have put off my coat;
how shall I put it on? I have washed my feet, how shall I defile
them?” How often when our Lord is calling us to a deeper revelation
of Himself, He finds us asleep! We have washed our feet of all the
dust of the day, we have cleansed our walk in all those areas He has
dealt with previously, we have put off our garment, we have prepared
a soft bed of ease, and we have said to our souls, “A little sleep,
a little slumber, no need to press on any further at this time, let
us rest in the experiences we have had and the truths we have
learned.” You see, dear ones, she was not only His love and His
dove, she was still His undefiled! This is one who has
walked intimately with the Lord and experienced deep cleansings,
separations, and dealings. This shows that her greatest failure was
in lying down to rest and not watching with wide-open eyes for His
coming and the further revelation of Himself! And when He came, she
was slow to rise and let Him in, she had kept Him waiting throughout
the night. She had not gone off into spiritual fornication with the
systems of man, she had not mingled with the world, she had
committed no gross sins of the flesh, she had not been flirting with
those who hated Him, as many who are called by His name are doing
today; she had not lost her chastity. She was just spiritually
lazy, she simply did not seem to have the stamina to go further.
She felt that she had reached a plateau; she had attained to a high
place in Christ; but now she deserved to lie down and rest, but not
to go to sleep; but she was soon lulled into a half-slumber.
In desperate ardor her Beloved endeavors to enter her
room, but the door is locked. She had not only closed, but had
locked and bolted the door! When she locked the door, she did not
mean to lock HIM out; she only desired that her rest might be
undisturbed. She had no thought of refusing to get up and let HIM
in, nor did she deliberately lock the door so HE could not get in.
She only wanted a little rest! This is always the way slumber
steals in upon those who have received the call to follow the Lamb
whithersoever He goeth! Those who hear the call, but fall short of
following on all the way — it is not their set purpose to
reach the place of stagnation and loss where they finally find
themselves. They just forget that it is through the avenue of sleep
— indifference — that spiritual poverty comes and robs them of the
glory of the fullness of Christ within themselves! Slumber does not
prepare us for great attainment, it only paves the way for us to be
defeated and robbed.
Then we read, “My Beloved put His hand in the hole of
the door, and my bowels were moved for Him. I rose up to open for
my Beloved…but my Beloved had withdrawn Himself, and was gone: my
soul failed when He spake: I sought Him, but could not find Him; I
called Him but He gave me no answer.” While she was sleeping, He
had knocked; while she was refusing, He had called; but by the time
He had finally aroused her from her momentary lethargy, He had
withdrawn. She little realized the gravity of her sleepy refusal to
arise and open to Him! She thought He would wait until she had
stirred herself. He had continued calling and knocking through the
night, though she had treated Him as a stranger; though she had
snuggled more deeply into her bed of ease, and left Him out in the
darkness until His head was wet with the night dew, and His locks
with the drops of the night.
Beloved reader of this message, have you heard your
Lord’s voice calling you to enter into a deeper relationship with
Him? Have you heard Him bid you come apart with Him, to leave
everything and everyone that hindered you and enter into a higher
realm of revelation, separation, and reality in Him? Have you kept
your Lord waiting while you pampered your flesh, or while you did
something you wanted to do, or while you lingered in the old
religious ways that could never lead you into the fullness of
Himself? Did you have some “religious work” which you felt was very
important? Did you have some association you felt you could not
break? Did you tell the Lord to wait until you could leave them, or
finish what you were doing? Have you heard Him chide you because
you neglected Him, because you were not putting Him and His high
purposes above all else, because you would not scale the heights
with Him in the Spirit, to commune with Him in the secret place of
His presence and glory, because you were not following on to
know Him in deeper measures? Oh, yes! There are many in
this hour who think to respond and obey, who desire to come out and
go away with Him, who want to arise and commune with Him in the
heights of mount Zion, and sup with Him in the feast of Tabernacles,
who are going to explore the deeper measures of His wisdom, His
love, His power, and His glory which He waits to disclose — but
not until some propitious moment when they have finished what they
are doing!
How glorious is the walk in the Spirit with Christ in
this great day of His unveiling in His elect! I cannot imagine what
life would be like in this fear-filled maniacal world of today if we
knew nothing of God’s great plan of the ages. How dark and
uncertain everything would be! It is the truth, the truth of
Christ’s coming in us, the truth of sonship the hope of creation,
the truth of the kingdom of God coming in power and great glory, the
truth of the deliverance of creation from the bondage of corruption,
the truth of the restoration of all men to God, the truth of His
glory revealed in the manifest sons of God, the TRUTH THAT CHRIST
HAS REVEALED TO US AND WITHIN US AS WE HAVE SUPPED WITH HIM AND HE
WITH US — this truth gives us hope for today and for tomorrow. What
anticipation it stirs in our hearts!
Ah, the believer so accurately described in this moving drama had
closed the door and locked it. In her snug bed of religious myths,
folklore, and fairy tales and personal indifference she had disrobed
and gone to sleep. Her Lover was up and had come to commune with
her and ravish her heart with His love, revealing Himself to her on
yet a higher plane, and to call her away with Him to the mountains
of Bether (separation), to the top of Amana and Shenir (the high
places), and to the heights of Hermon (the mount of
transfiguration). He came knocking and calling her to great and
mighty things in the kingdom realm of God. When she, at her own
time, opened the door, lo! He was gone. The hour of her visitation
had passed!
In this midnight hour the lukewarm church of Laodicea
has no room for Christ and His glory and has their door closed
against Him. He has been standing outside and knocking at the
door! He is not within, as He should be, but on the outside.
Behind the door that is locked against Him they are loudly preaching
about Him, earnestly working for Him, but He Himself they have left
outside. We hear much about the great “revival” that is in the
world today. But methinks that the revival is but the stirring of
the Shulamite upon her bed as she endeavors to awaken herself out of
her stupor to the call of her Beloved. I assure you that He will
not remain in the place of a beggar at the door of His people
forever! His voice will cease and you will be left in your bed of
fairy tales and dreams and delusions! You can go on dreaming about
a banquet beyond the stars, and continue to ignore His knocking at
the door of your heart for entrance and love and union today. Many
individuals have heard His voice and have opened their door,
and He has come in, and is supping with them, and they with Him.
The feast is now spread! A new kingdom day has dawned! Throughout
this “evening time” as the kingdom of God has dawned in the hearts
of His called and chosen elect, the Lord has been standing at the
door of the church in Laodicea knocking, and those who have had
hearing ears have recognized His voice, have opened to Him, and
together with Him they have been enjoying the great feast of truth
and reality which has been spread before them. And now, now! He is
turning from the door, His head is wet with the dew of the night,
His locks are dripping with the night drops, and sadly He is
departing from all the church systems of man, leaving them with
their cherished traditions and the vanity of their fleshly
pursuits. But for those who have opened the door and let HIM in,
great and glorious things are prepared!
It is true that Christ stands outside the church systems
of man, knocking, that he who hears may open the door. That is the
sense of the meaning of Christ’s message in its corporate
application. There is, however, a further and deeper sense in this
message on the individual and personal level. The
Christ who knocks at the door of our individual heart is on the
inside of each of us, in our spirit! There is a pure realm within
man, an inner sanctum, an eternal dimension — the Holiest of all.
Christ is in our spirit, and though we hear His voice as part of the
corporate body of Christ, yet, is it not from Christ within our
spirit that His voice comes to us? You see, my beloved, Christ
is in our spirit, knocking on the door of our soul! He is in our
spirit, knocking on the door of our body! He is saying, “If any
(outer) man hear my voice, and open the door, I will not only be
joined to your spirit and be one with you in spirit, but I will come
into your soul and sup with you there, I will come into your soul
and be fused with your soul; I will come into your body and sup with
you there, I will come into your body and be fused with your body,
and you will know in the totality of your being the fullness of my
perfection, wisdom, power, life, and incorruptibility!”
It is in this experience that the soul is truly saved and this
corruptible puts on incorruption and this mortal puts on
immortality, that mortality might be swallowed up of life. So you
see, dear one, while we are believing into and entering
into Christ in one dimension of our experience, He is
entering into us FROM WITHIN! In the typology of the
tabernacle in the wilderness we begin our
journey into Christ in the outer court, at the brazen
altar, where the lamb is slain to take away our sins; that is the
order in which the priest, in his redemptive ministry enters into
the tabernacle. Then we progress onward through the holy place
where we are filled with the oil of the Holy Spirit, feast upon the
bread of the body of Christ, and worship at the golden altar where
we are transformed by the fire upon the altar from a cold, hard
substance (incense), into a spiritual fragrance that wafts its way
through the veil into the very glory and majesty of God; finally, we
awaken into the consciousness of the most holy place of His
fullness! But in the outworking of Christ in our
lives, He begins in the inner sanctuary (most holy
place) of our spirit, breaks forth from behind the veil to live,
walk, express and manifest Himself in our soul (holy place), and
finally to show forth His life in our body (outer court) realm. As
we go in, He comes out, and there is effected a perfect union, for
in this commingling there is the formation of the God Man — Christ,
Head and body. It is He in us, and we in Him! Herein lies the
power and glory of sonship!
You can never in a million years transform your soul by imposing
laws or demanding reformation. And there is nothing that you can do
for the body that will deliver it from the law of sin and death and
bestow immortality. The Holy Spirit could not have used a more
descriptive term than “dust” in describing the natural man! “Dust
thou art, and unto dust thou shalt return” (Gen. 3:19). A chemical
analysis of the human body reveals that twenty of the ninety-six
elements that comprise the universe are present in man — substances
such as carbon, nitrogen, calcium, phosphorous, sulfur, chlorine,
fluorine, potassium, sodium, magnesium, iron, etc. All the elements
are those found on the surface of the earth! Health foods,
vitamins, herbs, exercise — at best these can only slow down the
process of corruption and disintegration, postponing for a little
season the inevitable catastrophe. You can eat bean sprouts and
yogurt and drink teas and swallow supplements by the handsfull, all
of which are themselves but corruptible substances of earth, and
have not one whit of power to administer eternal life to a
corruptible organism. It is merely adding corruption to
corruption!
Immortality does not come through any natural, earthly, material,
physical, or temporal element that can be added to the body. So
Jesus says — “If you want a transformed soul and an immortal body —
Behold, I stand at the door and knock! I’m knocking from the
inside, at the door of your soul and your body; if any man hear my
voice, and open the door, I will come in!” When He marches
triumphantly through the corridors of your soul, and steps into the
territory of your body; when His Lordship and the power of His Life
are established there; when the Bridegroom (Christ, the Spirit)
marries and is joined in union with the Bride (soul), and in this
union of Life they fully and completely occupy their home (the
body), there will be manifest the full and complete salvation and
perfection of the WHOLE MAN! Aren’t you glad!
This is the Lord who has come to the door of your life
and mine today. This is the Lord who claims the right to reign, and
from whose patient, haunting pursuit we can never get free! Behold,
He stands at the door and knocks. While the sands of time are
running out and the hurrying days mold our destiny, He stands at the
door and knocks. While the purposes of His kingdom march onward,
and the hour for the manifestation of the sons of God draws nigh, He
stands at the door and knocks. Tenderer than the kiss of a little
child, mightier than the flashing lightnings of heaven, He stands at
the door and knocks. The moment any man opens the door and permits
the Christ of glory to emerge from his spirit to enter into soul and
body, to sit down there, to take up residence there, to sup there,
to be Himself, all that He is, there, that man enters an entirely
new realm. He has passed from the limited knowledge of a distant
Christ to CHRIST AS HIS LIFE. He has turned from the temples of
carnal zeal and fleshly prosperity. Christ no longer stands at the
door of a vast multitude gathered within the Laodicean church of
this dark age. He comes now to that “little flock” of footstep
followers who have been set aside of the Lord for the most intimate
and personal visitation. How wonderful it is when the Christ comes
IN to sup with us and we with Him! How blessed we are to have that
intimate and sacred communion with the Lord!
The very next words of the Lord, after saying that He
stands at the door and knocks, beseeching an entrance to sup with us
and we with Him, are these, “To him that overcometh will I grant to
sit with me in my throne, even as I also overcame, and am set down
with my Father in His throne” (Rev. 3:21). The great truth in this
hour is that God is bringing us into union with Christ as sons of
God. The wonderful work He is doing in us is part of that
glorious purpose! The overcomer is the one who leaves the
congregation of the Laodicean church to enter into union with Christ
within himself. “I will come in to Him, and sup with
him.” Father’s creative work within us is being fulfilled as He
draws us out of the old and from all that relates to the past order
of things. He may separate us from all outward fellowship until we
learn to fellowship only with Him! “Truly our fellowship is with
the Father, and with His Son Jesus Christ” (I Jn. 1:3). He also may
confine us and close all other doors to us, shutting us up to
Himself, and silencing all other voices but His. We may feel lonely
and restricted, but the real purpose of our loving Father is to
continue His grand work of making us His kingdom firstfruits, a
people in whom He has established His Life to be revealed to
all creation in authority and power.
As we continue to sup with Him and walk with Him in this
strange time, we are making a significant transition. The Laodicean
church is not admitting Him, nor are they eating and communing with
Him, nor are they listening to His voice that they might learn His
will and do it in this great hour. But in those who hear His voice,
and sup with Him, He is establishing His kingdom — His new
administrative order for the new kingdom day we are now entering.
Just as there is a change of ages, so is there a change of orders!
The first step is to let go of the old, for God can not establish
the new in people who cling to the old. Without a doubt, many who
read these lines have already been dealt with by Father and have
left the old church order, coming out to wait in Father’s presence
to hear and learn the truths and principles and realities He would
teach us and raise up in our lives in the power of Christ. We have
progressed beyond the spiritual nakedness, lukewarmness, blindness,
self-satisfaction, and spiritual poverty of the Laodicean church
order. The Lord rebuked and chastened us so that we repented of our
former ways. When the Lord knocked on the “door” of our hearts and
lives and began to speak to us, we heard His still, small voice and
invited Him in to sup and commune with us. And now we follow on to
truly be an overcomer in the fullness of all that means!
I WILL SUP WITH HIM AND HE WITH ME
“If any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will
come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me” (Rev.
3:20).
I speak the truth when I say that the hour has come, and
now is, when all the elect of the Lord have begun to KNOW THE LORD
FOR THEMSELVES. All who have received the call to sonship have come
out from all the promotions of man to seek God, walk with God, hear
His voice, know God intimately and powerfully, that God Himself
might be our Father and sup with us and we with Him. We
opened the door reverently and joyfully, and before we realized it
we found ourselves digging deep in the storehouse of God’s treasures
of wisdom and knowledge and sitting with Him at His banqueting
table. He has spread a table before us in the presence of our
enemies, He has led us through green pastures, He has revealed to us
fountains of living water flowing unceasingly from within; He
has caused us to rest beside cool, still streams; and HE, the Great
Shepherd of the sheep and Bishop of our souls has come to abide with
us and our cup overflows with the unspeakable riches of His grace
and the wonder of His glorious and eternal reality. Isn’t it
wonderful!
How precious the knowledge that we have a God who hungers, thirsts,
deeply desires, to feast with His people — a God who from the
beginning has tried to show us that His greatest delight is not in
showing His authority, but in enjoying intimate and close fellowship
with His own. He set a feast of fruits before Adam and Eve, the
likes of which man has never been able to reproduce, and then He
walked with them in the garden in the spirit of the day and communed
with them face to face. He ate with Abraham in his tent at
noonday. He spread a table in the wilderness for the entire nation
of His chosen, and He gave them the very bread of heaven. Jesus
performed His first miracle at a wedding feast. He fed five
thousand on a hillside. He did not hesitate to attend feasts, and
ate and drank with men until He was called a glutton and a
wine-bibber. He went up to Jerusalem to celebrate the feasts of
Yahweh. And He has established the new covenant with a feast, the
great spiritual feast, wherein He has given the redeemed His own
body (word) for their meat and His own blood (spirit) for their
drink, that death might be swallowed up of life. He has promised
through the prophet Isaiah that in the latter days He will make a
great feast of spiritual blessings and benefits for all
nations upon His holy Mount (Isa. 25:6). And the greatest
feast of all — the marriage supper of the Lamb — ushers a people
into the most intimate relationship with their Lord! It is not in
meetings, preachings, teachings, prophesyings, singing, or any
outward exercise that we enjoy the marriage supper of the Lamb; it
is at the marriage union of our “soul bride” with our “spirit
bridegroom” that we discover within ourselves the glorious
marriage feast provided by our Father!
We are commanded to feed upon Christ, to eat His flesh
and drink His blood, “for my flesh is meat indeed, and my blood is
drink indeed” (Jn. 6:55). No longer are we to feed off the husks of
man’s sustenance, no more are we to feed off the putrefaction spread
upon Babylon’s polluted tables, but we are invited to feast on the
bounties of the fullness of Christ in an exceedingly rich and
intimate manner, thereby drawing our sustenance from Him. “As the
living Father hath sent me, and I live by the Father: so he that
eateth me, even he shall live by me” (Jn. 6:57). “I am the bread of
life…” (Jn. 6:35).
There is an old song of the church that has a profound
meaning. It says, “Jesus has a table spread, where the saints of
God are fed; He invites His chosen people, Come and dine!” That
table is in the heavens of God’s Spirit, and in the Spirit and by
the Spirit we are seated there. Paul confirms that we have been
“raised up, and made to sit together in the heavenly places in
Christ Jesus” (Eph. 2:6). There is a table of the Lord spread for
us in the heavenlies! Jesus said to His disciples, “I appoint unto
you a kingdom, as my Father has appointed unto me; that ye may
eat and drink at my table in my kingdom” (Lk. 22:29-30). Moses,
Aaron, Nadab, and Abihu, and the elders of Israel ate at the Lord’s
table on mount Sinai. “And they saw the God of Israel: and there
were under His feet as it were a paved work as a sapphire stone, and
as it were the body of heaven in his clearness. And…the nobles of
the children of Israel…saw God, and did eat and drink” (Ex.
24:9-11).
What an awesome picture! Seventy-four men of God,
seated with Him in the height of a mountain peak, eating and
drinking! What a supernatural table! What glory was there! It
seems from the record that it was so overwhelming that none but
Moses could take it in. Can we not see by this that the one thing
the Lord seeks above all else from His chosen ones is COMMUNION AT
HIS TABLE! Oneness around His heavenly table! A continual abiding
in Him as our food, our strength, our enjoyment, and our life!
A sister in the Lord sent us the following beautiful
testimony. “I had a marvelous vision while alone in a secluded
cabin atop the mountains by Lake Arrowhead. It was in this very
place that I stayed for seven days, snowbound in 1981, when God
began this miracle transformation in me. The flood gates were
opened; scripture has come alive; I hear the voice clearly
now from God Himself and all things are being made known to me from
the Word who became flesh and now dwells among men, including me.
On this occasion, however, it was a balmy day atop the mountains as
I watched the squirrels scampering across the balcony and the sassy
bluejays compete for the corn and nuts on the railing. My husband
had gone for a hike in the woods and I felt a strange kind of
listlessness that one often experiences in saying final farewells to
things they know shall never return. Somehow I knew that every
stage of my walk with Christ and the experiences of my life in
general, were being buried in the past forever. I wasn’t sad about
it, but I was certain about the finality of it all, and I wondered
what was happening to me and where it all would lead.
“I began to talk with the Lord about it, and I do
mean talk with, for I hear His voice now whenever I take the
time to converse with Him personally and I no longer pray ‘at’ Him
or sort of hope I will ‘hit’ something out there that hears and
answers; but I have conversations and hear Him as clearly as any
human on this earth. I don’t remember the first part of our
conversation, for it was only the Father talking with me by His
Spirit. Then I looked at where we were. We were sitting at a
table! At first it seemed like it was just a cozy little table
where we were about to sup together. There were wine goblets in
front of us, and I had a flash of, ‘What would the church world
think if they knew Jesus drank wine!’ But, He read my thoughts and
only smiled at the foolish ideas and values of humans in their
doctrinal treadmill. There was a loaf of bread on the table and
meat, a roasted fowl of some kind, a platter of fish, and huge bowls
of fresh juicy fruit.
“Then I looked around and realized there was no floor under me. I
mean — no floor at all! Nothing. I was suspended, yet my feet were
on something that felt solid, but I saw nothing there. I was sort
of up in the sky; yet when I looked directly at Jesus, it was more
like I was in a romantic little private café with just Him and me
there. I had a strange feeling of a very, very personal, but
totally pure and holy love between Jesus and me that is unlike any
love or any relationship I have ever had. I can compare this with
nothing I have known before. Deep and pure and wonderful beyond
words and His face, that face so very kind and so penetrating with
healing in His very glance as if His eyes were able to look deep
into my soul and love away every disappointment and sorrow and tear
I’ve ever shed. He seemed to convey to me that He was there with me
through all those and He had taken them all upon Himself back into
the past to that tree at Calvary and they were buried there. All I
was experiencing were phantoms, lies that haunt and torment when one
doesn’t know they are not real and have been buried in the tomb with
the crucified Christ.
“After this I noticed that we really were not in a tiny
room together, but as I looked around in the heavens, more light was
shed on the table and I saw that it was instead a very, very long
table. In fact, it was extended as far as the eye could see, and
only then disappeared because of distance. It was simply in space,
suspended in the heavens, though I did not see the earth below, at
least not at first, and then not the earth I’ve always known. It
was very exciting and a wonderfully breathtaking view.
“I was aware that I was sitting at the head of the table
as if I was being treated like a queen, and Jesus was there to serve
me. That embarrassed me, and I did not think it was right; but I
didn’t want to offend Him. So I asked, ‘Who prepared all this
food!’ He said that He had done it Himself…that He had prepared
it just for me, even in the presence of my enemies. But I didn’t
see anyone around, and didn’t have any personal enemies anyway,
though I grieved at the enemies of the cross that I knew about. He
smiled. I was getting more and more uncomfortable sitting at the
head of the table though, and He said, ‘Say what you are thinking,
N——, because I can see your thoughts anyway, you know.’ ‘Well,’ I
said, ‘since you know what I am thinking, I must say that I do not
feel right about sitting at the head of the table. I will stay here
if it is what you want, Lord, but I really believe I would
feel better if you sat in the head seat and I sat at the
side.’ He agreed and we traded seats. He seemed pleased with that
and said that it was an act of proving I no longer wanted to control
my life but had come to prefer HIS headship to my own, or anyone
else’s. I didn’t know about all that; but I did feel better with
HIM at the head of the table and me at the side!
“During our meal, we did eat. While we ate, famous men
came up to the table and without really noticing the Lord or myself,
grabbed a platter of food from off the table and disappeared with
it. I recognized Jimmy Swaggart, and Billy Graham as a young man
with galoshes and an overcoat, and some others still in public
ministry today, including Oral Roberts, and some others I did not
know. I asked, ‘Who are these men?’ The Lord said, ‘They are ones
who were given a heaping serving of Truth at one time, but they
settled for just that and never returned for more, or to sit with me
and sup until I bade them go back out and serve others.’ ‘Then
don’t they know they need to do that?’ I asked. ‘No,’ said Jesus,
‘they have had that food devoured long ago, and now they pass around
an empty plate, too busy still taking glory for that first meal that
they don’t even know they no longer have anything of value to
offer.’ He seemed very sad at this, and I wanted to comfort Him for
a change. Isn’t that a strange thought! He said, ‘All those
characteristics, even of divine compassion, are from the heart of
the Father, which is why we are getting to look more alike all
the time.’
“Jesus smiled even more broadly at me. ‘After all,’ He confirmed,
‘we are family now. We have the same Father, don’t we?’ His
eyes twinkled with merriment and I quickly forgot His sad look as I
took a big bite of the drumstick in front of me. In fact, I had
plenty of everything which was, by far, the most delicious food I
had ever tasted and I was quite satisfied. But even after I was
full and content with the enormous feast set before me, I looked
down and it was all still there as though I had never touched it! I
was very puzzled by this. The Lord answered my thoughts and told
me, ‘No matter how much you eat, and how tasty and nourishing, it is
beyond compare; it will always still be there for more and more and
more.’ I knew He was talking to me about the Word of God! No
matter how much I feast, it is always a gigantic banquet and
we still haven’t even made a dent in it. I have come to feed off of
it as a source of very real life, and it continues to feed me as it
unfolds within me and I get my fill; yet I never get my fill! I am
always satisfied, yet I continue to look forward to more of my daily
bread.
“What a banqueting table the Lord Jesus sets before me, and I praise
Him for this miracle food. I cannot do justice or rightly describe
to anyone what has happened inside me, but it is a glorious and
never-ending supper with the Lord Jesus Christ. In fact, that is
exactly what it is — THE LORD’S SUPPER! It is the Lord’s supper in
the final, heavenly way that He has told us about in the Word and
now by His precious loving Spirit, ‘I will not drink wine again
until I can drink it new with you in my Father’s kingdom.’
He drank wine with me that day, and ate with me, and I with Him, and
He said, ‘I HAVE BEEN KNOCKING ON THE DOOR FOR SO LONG, and I
continue to knock on the doors of other’s hearts, and if they will
open the door, I will go in and sup with them as well.’ But the
chairs at that endless table were empty at that hour.
“I remember that the practical side of me arose within and I
wondered if the food might not spoil awaiting the arrival of the
wedding guests; for I realized this intimate loving meal with my
Jesus was the marriage supper. He said, ‘It won’t spoil. It will
wait till they arrive.’ Then I wondered if I couldn’t take (are you
ready for this awful humanness) a doggie bag of some of the
food back with me. I knew it was of the Spirit and thought
perhaps it might give others a taste of the Truth of this wondrous
living meal. But Jesus smiled again and said to me, ‘You have been
taking great heapings of my Word to others in the prophetic
revelations I have given you for them; but as you well know, it
hasn’t triggered anyone’s taste buds for more of the Truth thus
far!’ We both were grieved at this dreadful fact. ‘But then,
child, it is not yet time. Be not dismayed. No matter what
you do, it is the work of my Spirit that alone can enable others to
see Truth even as you now see it.’ So I didn’t feel like
such a failure after that. He was pleased with me, in our supping
together, so I wanted to rest in that.
“Then I became aware that crumbs fell off both His plate and mine,
yet there was no floor to pick them off of, and I was concerned
about cluttering (the practical me again). Jesus said to let them
go for the dogs. ‘Dogs?’ ‘Yes,’ said the Lord, ‘these are morsels
of Truth that they clamor for and yet settle for on earth and
believe they have the full course dinner! They have nothing to
compare it with, so they believe they have it all.’ ‘How sad,’ I
replied. ‘Only the crumbs I now spill are available to the weak and
hungry lambs, for the famine grows worse and worse in this terrible
time.’ That is why I was saying, ‘I’m starving to death in this
place!’ referring to church meetings before God dragged me out of
them to be taught by Him. ‘You were hungry,’ the Lord
replied, ‘so I feed you now myself.’” — end quote.
There is a great law of life revealed in the Lord’s
invitation for us to sup with Him. It is in the fellowship,
the communion of supping intimately with the Lord that His life, His
mind, His nature, His will, His ways, His very self is communicated
to us, yea, imparted to us. Let me give you an illustration. All
the communications of men with one another lie as it were in two
strata — two stories with a floor between them; one story is deeper
than the other. In the upper, superficial story, men tell each
other what they know. All schools, all books, belong in this
superficial realm of companionship. In the deeper story men give
each other what they are. All true communion, all merging of wills
and lives, belong in the profounder realm. Do you know the
difference? You go to a man’s school, or read his book, and there
are great and precious things that pass from him to you. The facts
which he has gathered in his industrious study, the ideas that have
come forth like stars out of the darkness of his concentrated
thought — these he can give you and he does, and you are richer for
them. He has only to teach; you have only to attend and
understand. But by and by you come to know the man, to
fellowship intimately with him, to love him, and to count his will
better than your own. You absorb his spirit into your life. Then,
is there not a new kind of communication birthed between your life
and his? Does he not give you things that he could not give before
— not only facts, ideas, and information — but motives, hopes,
fears, loves, emotions, inspirations? You have passed from the
upper to the deeper story of communication, and the passage took
place when you passed over from listening and learning to loving and
communing!
There are many today who have met Christ in the upper, superficial
story. We once met Him there in meetings, sermons, teachings,
prophesyings, scriptures, programs, activities, and as we listened,
He told us things we never could have known without Him. The
teachers we met were inChristed men called apostles, prophets,
evangelists, pastors, and teachers. Our classroom was the church.
The lessons we learned were truths, precepts, and principles of the
kingdom of God. But now, thank God! We have met the Christ in the
deeper chamber where, as we sup with Him, and He with us, He reveals
to us His heart and the very secret of His being and in the union of
our life He makes us like Himself!
Oh, the blessedness of private, personal, intimate communion with
Christ! I would rather spend one day alone in communion with
Christ, than a whole week with all the precious ministers I know in
this word of the kingdom. Yea, I would rather spend a day in
communion with Christ alone, than in the company of the twelve
apostles even, were it possible for them to pay me a visit. If we
have the joy of intimate fellowship and vital communion with Christ
the Lord, what can add to it? It is Christ who constitutes heaven!
The presence of Him, the flame of His love, the rays of His glory
are heaven indeed! If there is any other heaven beside the glorious
presence of Christ, I shall not covet it. If I have Christ, Christ
is enough for me, as says the Psalmist when he makes Christ his
habitation, his portion, his strength, his life, and the ultimate
end of all his desire. “The Lord is my portion,” says my soul. And
again, “Lord, Thou hast been our dwelling place in all
generations.” And, “When I awake with Thy likeness, I shall be
satisfied.” “For me to live, is Christ.”
Though we find deep satisfaction in the sweet communion
we have with Christ, the secret converse we have together as He
journeys with us through this wilderness, how oft our hearts yearn
for HIS FULLNESS, when all veils and limitations of earth shall
forever pass away! There are times when He makes Himself so real
that our small capacity can hardly stand the strain of such
revelations. It is as though we were bringing a pint cup to receive
the waters of Niagara; even the earthen vessel is almost carried
away! But the day is coming when our capacity shall be so enlarged,
that we can receive the full unveiling of our Lord and the glories
that are His; and He will give us such revelations of the Father
that we shall enter into His joy and glory, for all that is His is
ours in Him. Then we shall see Him as He is, and shall behold all
things clearly, with nothing between to obscure the vision. This
corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall
have put on immortality. The Father’s name shall be written in our
forehead. The nations shall walk in the light of that city which we
are, where the Lamb is the Light and the throne of God is in the
midst of her.
We come to know Christ in His presence and fellowship
when there is fulfilled within us the words of the prophet: “The
Lord is in His holy temple; let all the earth keep silence
before Him” (Hab. 2:20). It is not the earth of mountains
and valleys, of streams and forests, but THIS EARTH WHICH WE ARE
that must learn to keep silence before God, for it is this
earth of our body which is the temple of God,
bought with His precious blood and consecrated to be the habitation
of God through the spirit. This earth, with all its carnal desires
and ambitions, with all its fleshly wisdom and zeal, must be brought
to holy silence and reverence before the King of Glory; and we must
come to know Him, not in the abundance of words by which we
constantly clatter in prayers, entreating God for this thing, and
that blessing; but in waiting patiently before Him and listening
until He speaks to us. It is in holy quietness before
God that the deepest witness of the Spirit comes, testifying to our
spirits that we are the sons of God, and there the Father draws nigh
and delights in us and we enter into the full enjoyment of the
Father’s love.
It was at the commencement of Jesus’ public ministry
that an event happened which so attracted the attention of His
disciples that they wrote it down. After a day full of wonders and
works at Capernaum, the crowd in the evening became still greater.
The whole town was before the door; sick were healed, devils were
cast out. It was late before they got to sleep and in the throng
there had been little time for quiet or for secret prayer and
communion. And lo, when they rose early in the morning they found
the Master gone! “And in the morning, rising up a great while
before day, He went out, and departed into a desert place,
and there prayed” (Mk. 1:35). In the silence of the night He had
gone out to seek a place of solitude in the wilderness; and when
they found Him there, He was still communing with the Father.
Oh, my beloved! If you and I would be manifest sons of
God, we must especially contemplate Jesus praying alone in the
wilderness. There is the secret of His marvelous life! What He did
and spoke to man, was first SPOKEN AND LIVED THROUGH WITH THE
FATHER. He who would be like Him in His walk with the Father in
sonship may simply begin here — to follow Jesus into solitude. Even
though it cost the sacrifice of night rest, of business, of
intercourse with friends, or ministry to desperate needs, the time
must be found to be alone with the Father. This is the path of
sonship! The sermon on the mount was not a message to babes
teaching them how to act to be good little children of God; it is
the very essence of the principles of the kingdom of God and
the life of sonship, teaching sons of God how
to be sons of their Father, in what nature to live and reign in the
kingdom. And in that wonderful kingdom teaching the firstborn Son
of God reveals the great truth that it is in the closet, in the
secret chamber, with closed door, or in the solitude of the
wilderness, that the Father must be fellowshipped every day in the
communion of His life. If Jesus, the firstborn among many brethren,
needed it, how much more we! What it was to Him it will be for
us. While we greatly appreciate the blessed fellowship with other
saints of like mind and spirit, and there is a time for that, yet it
is quickened to our hearts that it is from heaven alone
that the power to walk in a heavenly life can come!
I have known saints who were embarrassed because of the
frustrating failure of being able to pray in public. Now, while
there is an occasional place for public prayer, the God-ordained
place of prayer is in the enclosed privacy where there is no other
motivational influence than the fellowship of a son with his
Father. I do not hesitate to tell you that I do not enjoy public
prayer. I would rather never pray in public! It is
unnatural to me. Why do others need to hear the words that are
addressed to my Father alone? I cannot pour out my deepest heart or
express my most intimate thoughts, desires, concerns, and
confessions in the ears of the listening multitude, or even in the
hearing of my most intimate friend, or even my beloved wife. Not
one word of my prayer is meant for any but my Father, not one word
of my prayer is directed toward any but my God. It is this being
with the Father, and the Father alone, that is the essence of
sonship prayer. And that brings to mind again the solitary nights
of clear starlight which Jesus spent on the hills of Galilee, when
the holiest events that ever occurred in a human soul took place in
His, when marvelous discourse with the Father unfolded within His
consciousness the reality of His sonship to God, when it must have
seemed as if a quite unique tone released itself from our earth and
made its way to the farthest expanses of the heavenlies above. And
now — in the secret place of the Most High His younger brethren, the
sons of God, are bidden to live this over again!
The life of sonship is a hidden, inner life, having to
do with the spiritual and invisible One who sees in secret. It is a
secluded life, hid with Christ in God. The life in Christ neither
strives nor shouts, nor does one hear its voice in the streets. It
shrinks from all outward displays, whether showy public almsgiving,
conspicuous religious exercises, oratorical prayers, ceremonious
fastings, broadened phylacteries, processional parades, clerical
costume, titles, or degrees, or holy tones. Like a planet around
the sun, it rolls in its orbit of obedience to the Father without
fanfare or advertisement; like the sun itself, it shines without
noise.
We live in a Laodicean day of much feverish running to
and fro, and Martha-like preoccupation about much serving; a day of
organizations, conventions, gatherings, seminars, television shows,
public meetings, and programs of all sorts. It has almost come to
be understood, even in “sonship” and “kingdom” circles that we can
do nothing for God unless we organize, promote, and hold a public
meeting. The secret life of aloneness with God has largely given
way to the public life of gatherings, meetings, and activities. The
closet has given way to the synagogue. And that is not sonship!
There is indeed a time for corporate expression, but first and
foremost let our watchword be: Alone with God. We
need to hide ourselves with God before we show
ourselves for God. And many who call themselves sons of God have
not hidden themselves with God long enough to have much to show for
God! That is the truth. All true sons are coming to intimately and
fully know the Father in the secret place, to be prepared and
equipped by Him there, before they are shown to the world in the
long-awaited manifestation of the sons of God!
J. PRESTON EBY |
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