For your amusement; (I thought you’d be interested to know) Father has me back inside a congregation. Also for your amusement and delight - I’m loving every minute of it!
It’s fascinating how He orders our lives. The one thing He asks us to do is to love Him and do what He says out of that place of Love. This is how I have ended up back in a congregational structure, by attending to His voice and obeying. He has opened in front of me some amazing relationships and fantastic experiences because of it.
This last week, I was humbled by the opportunity to share the communion message. It has been a long time since I shared in front of a group of people in any structured way - other than off the cuff, or lead by Holy Spirit. I think I managed to over-prepare, and while I know what I prepared was what Father and I spoke about, prayed through, talked over, dealt with, explored, researched, read, double checked, etc. etc. etc. it was stilted and didn’t flow the way He usually does when we speak together.
It was appointed, but I managed to prepare it out of its anointing. As it were.
This is about practice again. Less about “practice” and more about Practicing the Presence of God. Yes, remembering how to stand in front of people is important, but actually it comes down to remembering that I can trust Him to speak what comes out of my mouth. The preparation comes from my relationship with God and how much time I have put into Our Time Together and less important is how familiar I am with the notes I made.
Physical preparation is important, but not as important as the Person the anointing comes from in the first place.
This is what I shared on Sunday; God bless you as you read it, may it bring you to a new or refreshed place of understanding the scope of the importance of the sacrifice Jesus made. It is not a complete picture and it has rough patches, but we need to understand where we truly stand. I pray the essence of what Father wanted to share comes through.
When we enter the sacrament of communion – the remembering of Jesus’ death and resurrection; we are grateful for the sacrifice He made, deliberately laying down His life for ours. We remember the price He paid for our body, soul & spirit; and what we no longer have to pay because He has paid the price in our place.
What we don’t often address about the sacrifice Jesus made, is the view from the top. The view from eternity, from outside time. He went through that horrendous process for more than just the opportunity to save individuals; even though that is more than enough to be grateful for; my goodness…
There is more, even more available to us than just the process of being saved from having to pay the penalty for our own sin when we enter His Presence at the end of time.
If we go back to the beginning: When God made people, lucifer had already rebelled against God and been dis-appointed from his original role in God's order. Then God made people, He made us in His Own image – which was lucifer’s sin, he considered himself like God, and wanted God's Glory for himself. Lucifer then sought to corrupt this perfect relationship between God and those made in God’s own image, those made to rule with God over all other created beings - including lucifer and all angelic and (now) demonic beings.
We chose. We did choose. We were deceived, and we chose. Humanity’s perfect relationship with God was broken in that moment and could not be patched with a band-aid. God then chose a covenant relationship with Abraham and a covenant relationship with the Jewish nation, to detail the coming of Jesus and what He would do to restore the original design God had for His relationship with all people on earth.
It was now about noon, and darkness came over the whole land until three in the afternoon, for the sun stopped shining. And the curtain of the temple was torn in two. Jesus called out with a loud voice, “Father, into your hands I commit my spirit.” When he had said this, he breathed his last. Luke 23:44-46 (NIV)
In the moment when Jesus died, the curtain in the temple was torn in two. It removed the separation between God and ordinary people. God was saying in that moment that no priests were needed to have a relationship with Him. We could all go into His Presence and have an intimate relationship with all of Who God is. The system of sacrifice was over.
Then Jesus rose again, and all the power of death & hell which lucifer had held since the garden; Jesus took back and order was restored.
Jesus has not only paid the penalty for our sin, but He also returned with authority.
He did this to repair the breach, to repair the relationship. When we choose Him, we are clean by His blood, and all of how we formerly lived is completely forgotten.
…as far as the east is from the west, so far has He removed our transgressions from us. Psalm 103:12 (NIV)
I spent many years being told by people my sin could be forgiven, not that it actually was.
This is what we gather in this time to remember. Jesus actually dealt with it with His resurrection and it is gone. We are clean. We have Christ in us. We have Holy Spirit in us.
To them God has chosen to make known among the Gentiles the glorious riches of this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory. Colossians 1:27 (NIV)
Jesus came that we may have life and have it in all its fullness. To rescue us from the kingdom of darkness and return to us the place we were originally intended to have: a seat with Christ at the right hand of God the Father.
This is the eternal perspective.
When we remember the sacrifice He made, we need to remember not only the life He rescued us from, we also need to remember the life He rescued us for.
Let us not diminish the work He has done to save us from the place we were in before He found us. And let us also affirm what we are now part of. God’s eternal plan to restore all creation to His original design.
He has chosen us. When we choose Him we are clean by His blood and restored into the place of relationship and we become part of His restoration plan.
Through communion we are remembering our place in His purpose. We are remembering that we are created for a purpose, we remind the enemy he has lost, and we remember that because of Jesus power & authority, we also walk in authority.
God Bless You Very Much
Anita