How to Worship the Father in Spirit and in Truth (SOS)

Eternal Glorious Fountain Ministry (EGFM)

Programme: School of the Spirit

Date: Thursday, 15th September, 2022

 

 

Many saints do not begin with the Lord at obedience level; most often, we begin with sacrifices. Sacrifices in this sense refer to what we do without enlightenment; like the season the Ephesian church was, before the eyes of their understanding got enlightened was a season of sacrifices. In Acts, it was mentioned that the saints had all things in common; some sold their lands and possessions. Those were sacrifices; however, some may still struggle in that area even in a season when the Lord had begun to teach them higher things.

 

“And all that believed were together, and had all things common;” (Acts 2:44). This experience is not synonymous with charity. What these saints were exposed to in this season was the apostles’ doctrine, faith in the Lord Jesus and love for all the saints, yet they had all things in common. Whatever any saint had was for the use of all. However, with this level of sacrifices, there are spirits that the saint cannot overcome until one comes to a level of obedience. With these sacrifices, there was no walk up the mountain of Zion taking place yet. Although the sacrifices could bring them to the base of the mountain, it cannot take them up the mountain. It takes enlightened eyes to go up the mountain, because the journey is against the gravity of flesh and works of sin and death that were deposited in the flesh by Satan. Therefore, the ears of the saint have to be pierced and their eyes opened; also, the heart and mind (soul) begins to undergo dealings.

 

Acts 4 tells us another account of how the saints dealt with their worldly goods. This knowledge is important because one of the elements of milk faith is to begin to train the soul to exercise itself firstly in the act of letting go, giving, and emptying oneself so that one can live by faith. That was a dealing to help the saints take their trust off their possessions, but to rely on the word of God, which was not spiritual per se, but firstly carnal. The substance that will help them complete that discipline was carnal. ‘Carnal’ in this sense is not evil but refers to something of a low pedigree (1 Cor. 3:1). Though this was a low life, that is where God began with the believers.

 

“Neither was there any among them that lacked: for as many as were possessors of lands or houses sold them, and brought the prices of the things that were sold, [35] And laid them down at the apostles' feet: and distribution was made unto every man according as he had need.” (Acts 4:34-35). This exercise was to tamper with a wrong arrangement in their souls that was put there by the world (or sin and death). That exercise was necessary so that when they change substance to a substance of faith that is spiritual, they would have been exercised considerably to be able to let go of the life of sin and death. Milk faith makes believers know that what they have is not their own. It may be in their name, but it is for the use of saints and for the use of the household of faith. When that discipline is in place, many of us will have made much progress with the faith of the Son, which is in Christ.

 

Our sacrifices will speak for us in areas we need light, like Cornelius. It was said of him in Acts 10:4, that his alms had come up to God for a memorial, The things we part with, our money and goods, are a form of life. So parting with it is like laying down your life. God ensures that everyone has something to give. Those who do not have money may have their time to give in the place of service. Time is a higher currency than money because it existed before the monetary system (which came after the fall). While time means money for the world; for us, the gospel should mean everything about our time, such that even when we use our time for other things, we should be conscious of how those things will come back to the gospel; else, we would be strangers to the persons of the kingdom.

 

In the early church, those who had more goods provided for those who lacked so that everyone lived averagely. That discipline prepares the heart for a higher seed because the demands of that seed goes against a nature that the previous seed (milk faith) had handled. The next season, which is the season of the sowing of the seed of the Sower (word of righteousness), is one that attracts the wicked one, as described in Matthew 13.

 

The wicked one does not go against the seed that informed the life described in Acts 2 and 4, as it is not a threat to the kingdom of darkness, because it does not bring the soul into the kingdom of Christ. However, immediately Jesus began speaking the word of the kingdom, the wicked spirits knew because the seed has a smell. The seed has embedded in it the power that can make a soul let go of a kind of life and gain another life. This is where charity comes into play.

 

Charity has many sides to it; it is a wholesale demand. After we have kept the feast of charity and all its commandments, we will possess the law of the spirit of life in Christ Jesus, which is the law God can use to check us when we transgress that law, or do anything less than giving life. We would always find people in need of life, that is, the conversation that witnesses to the kingdom of His dear Son. Everyone who has profited with that seed should be a witness of that kingdom. The world should be able to see what a citizen of the kingdom of His dear Son looks like in us, and by doing so, we would be bringing comfort to others.

 

“To give light to them that sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the way of peace.” (Luke 1:79). Giving the life (conversation) of Christ is true charity, meaning, when you are kind or suffering long, you are actually giving life. Thus, when we fail to respond in charity, we are holding back a life we ought to give. Such a saint would not be fresh in the spirit, and often find it difficult to have a seamless flow with the Spirit. Sometimes, it seems like one’s peace is interrupted because the saint failed to keep the commandment that should have refrained him from a particular temptation.

 

We often withhold from giving because we consider tomorrow. On the contrary, our Lord Jesus never entertained that thought called fear. Hence, Luke 1:74 reads, “That he would grant unto us, that we being delivered out of the hand of our enemies might serve him without fear.” To deliver us from the hands of our enemies is to deliver us from their things that reside in us. And that can only be accomplished by giving the soul commandments. Hence, keeping commandments is not negotiable; if we would be freed from the nature of sin and death resident in our souls, we must be willing to lose a life.

 

The parable of the talents tells us about a noble man who gave talents to different men (Luke 19:12-27). By trading with the talents they were given, some men came into a full measure, and the noble man could commit to them 10 or 5 cities. Such men arrived in a place where they were made of no reputation before the world—a similar state Paul attained when he referred to himself as having been crucified to the world and the world to him (Gal. 6:14). To come to such a place where the world finds nothing valuable in a soul and vice versa, is a feat in the spirit. Such is a man with full age.

 

What the world does is to empower the soul to keep a life. There was a life we once lived as unbelievers or as carnal believers. Even when we come into the kingdom, we still want the praise of men. As a company, we are meant to embody the conversation of everlasting life. However, there will be struggles as long as we have not yet fully embodied the conversation of Christ. It is through the doctrine of Christ (which includes charity) that the world in us is dismantled. As we engage in charity, we expire a false life within us.

 

In 1 Corinthians 13:1-3, Paul enumerates activities a soul can engage in and yet be lacking charity. Those activities are still in the realm of sacrifice and not yet in the realm of obedience because one is not yet going against the nature of sin and death resident in the soul. Now, Paul did not mean to say such activities as the expressions of the gift of prophecy or the gift of faith were wrong, but that if while doing so, the saint is not letting go of the nature of the old man, the action is not profitable. Profit in the new testament occurs when the state of the soul is affected (changed).

 

The state of the soul is what makes it a sinner; and that is what necessitates obedience. Obedience brings about the breaking of laws and covenants of sin and death in the soul. This is what brought about the seed of the sower. The doctrine of Christ which we began to hear before the season of everlasting life is a costly pearl.

 

“Beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things.” (1 Cor. 13:7). This Scripture describes the state where the end of sin and death is seen. These attributes define how a soul that is free from sin and death looks. This is where we truly put off the old man and its deeds, and put on the new man. At this state, a sense has been born in the soul. A man at this state no longer observes the wind, having become wiser than a class of spirits. He knows the contentions against the seed of the sower listed in Matthew 13, and how to respond to them. He is wiser than those spirits because he has the wisdom of Christ. So, he can endure the situations that would see him lose the life called sin and death, having counted the cost. He knows that to journey to the state where the spirit is requires a cost.

 

For more than 33 years, Jesus was always under a temptation to keep His life and not give it. To give one’s life, one must take the fall; one must decrease. To sow one’s life is to live the life of Christ. Most times, we do not like to be ruffled or despised, rather we like to be accorded respect. But if we remain in that terrain, we would not grow because the law of life demands that when we are despised, we should go lower. When Paul enumerated things that characterized his life as a minister of God, he included dishonour (2 Cor. 6:8). Paul became a minister through dishonour; that was a major dealing (death sentence) which would culminate in him giving a life.

 

To give a life, we must respond to a commandment. The seed is sown in corruption and reaped in incorruption, sown in dishonour, reaped in honour (1 Cor. 15:42-43). To do this, one must be seeking something mere men are not seeking. We must be looking for the Father, else we would not be able to discern such occasions as a blessing in disguise. Jesus said if we keep our lives, we will lose it (John 12:25). One who keeps his life would be like a pond — stagnant — instead of a flowing river.

 

A spiritually minded believer always guns for life, and seeks out occasions to trap life. Whenever there is a reaction of death from men, his response is life because he has been equipped with commandments. His warfare is to ensure he keeps that commandment, and that the situation does not drag him out of the fellowship of life. We are often faced with temptations to make us keep our lives, or not respond to commandments concerning such temptations, and by doing so, we deny the Lord praise. In some of those temptations, we need to fetch the written word of the Lord. Sometimes, such words may be instructions that come through our parents. For example the Lord taught our mummy, Reverend Helen, that when you are despised, go lower. That was the secret of our Lord Jesus, even while in the house of Joseph. Our Lord Jesus had embodied a conversation that made His mother, Mary, to be confident that anything He says is right (John 2:5).

 

One of the things that the Lord has done is to raise our discernment of sin and death and the conversations that can be traced to sin and death. This is the arsenal we need to win the warfare of this season. When the children of the world come against us, doing what is natural to them, the Lord expects us to be doing what is natural to us, which is responding after the commandments of Christ. That is the only way a soul can witness to the life of Christ and embody Christ. And in many of such warfare, we have to lose in the natural/physical, to gain in the spirit. It is unrealistic, and sort of unrighteous, to expect that men of the world will do anything out of charity; that is not a life natural to them as they have not been taught faith, hope and charity.

 

A believer at the level of charity is dead to the world (crucified to the world and the world to him). Such a believer makes use of his spiritual sense (not his brain) to judge all things. His conscience has been equipped with commandment; and he has been trained to be accountable to his heart and conscience, having learned to put his spirit ahead of his heart and mind. Charity covers a multitude of sins (1 Pet. 4:8). These sins can be traced to sin and death because charity is what deals with the world.

 

There are always situations we would come to where we would have need of charity; hence, we must never let go of Christ. It is the life of Christ one has gathered that one would respond with in such occasions. In many of such occasions, Satan shows up especially amongst the brethren, because he is seeking an accusation against the saints, including saints in the sanctuary.

 

Defilement first begins at the level of thoughts, before deeds. Our thoughts sound an alarm in the spirit. Satan knows when a man lusts after a woman in his heart, and so already has a ground of accusation against him. Thus, to say charity covers a multitude of sins, it means that before a believer would come to full age, there is a count in the spirit we must attain unto. We must not have loose ends; charity is the bond of perfectness. Hence, we must be tight in the spirit, because the world is present everywhere in most men, including believers. Many believers have not employed the Father’s light to respond to sin and death, or conversations that are not of Christ, both in thoughts and in deeds.

 

A time would come when the least amongst us is Christ. That would be a sign for the wicked one to show up. To overcome the wicked one is a feat in the spirit. When God finds that heart of flesh amongst a company (not just a few), that would amount to a high pleasure unto God in the spirit. In that season, it would be said that the High Priest is able to succour those who are tempted just as it was stated in Hebrews 2:18. This implies that He is able to deliver them from keeping their life, as that was the temptation He too was faced with (Luke 22:28). To lay down our lives is to live Christ, to witness to Him.

 

Although there is a higher call to laying down one’s life, many of us are not yet necessarily in the practicals of this first level, where we will be beset with manifold temptations. Seasons of manifold temptations are seasons where one is carrying the incorruptible seed, seasons of everlasting life. Such temptations are immediately followed by many layers of temptations. And one might be tempted to question God. That is a unique season we would all face. If we can profit fully with this season, and do not deny those experiences that do not come well with our soul arrangement, the Lord would bring us comfort (Heb. 2:18).

 

For us, seasons of temptations are seasons where we run short of what it takes to keep giving life, that is, laying down our lives. Anytime you are not giving our life, you are keeping it; you are limited and so cannot win that warfare (temptation). Many of us go through and fail temptations without being aware. At such times, we cannot discern that sin and death came to us; and that is a witness to the fact that we lack the law. When we have continuously been brought to losing our lives, thus gaining it, we would come to a point when the knowledge and substances that we have gathered have become a possession to us, it has become a law. It is that law the Lord will use to check us when we do anything less than giving life. That law will make us lose our peace and drive us to repent when we fall short.

 

To cover a multitude of sins is to rise in compassion and do things that will limit that sin from spreading. Everytime our brethren do things that are wrong, or are not living by the life of Christ, they are being tempted. We can limit the span of such temptations and truncate the conception cycle of sin in their lives by responding in charity. In such situations, if we can ask ourselves, ‘what will Jesus do?’ and follow the answer that would come to us, we would be able to actually live without sin. We sometimes avoid the question because we are unwilling to truly follow the answer that would come, and die the death that follows. 

 

However, if we win in such trials, we would experience an increase in grace and peace within; such that we can even live in expectation of the next challenge/conquest. In this season, we are going to please the Father in ways that we have not. This would mean we would need to do things we have not been previously doing. Satan is not merciful enough to allow sunrise and sunset without showing up through men. Our responses to his temptations may not necessarily be in actions but in thoughts.

 

There is something that limits us from looking only for the Father. The season of looking for the Father requires a kind of possessing of our souls and regaining of one’s heart, and this requires some level of energy (Heb. 9:28); and any measure of sin and death found in the soul saps that energy. Everything about the Father are words and glory, thus, requiring all of one’s entirety to transact with that realm. There is a way we ought to relate with the realm of glory. We cannot seek the Father with old things as that would limit us from seeking the Father with all our hearts and soul, with the light of the menorah.

 

The season of charity wants to empty us of ourselves. Jesus was raised and trained to live empty. He was always giving all that He had per time. He had nothing of Himself remaining. For us, this can leave us very vulnerable. Jesus knew how to be so dependent on heaven; He knew how to live the specified life - covering a multitude of sins.

 

It is in covering a multitude of sins that we lay down our lives, hope all things and endure all things. This is where a man would be born who will be given the commandment that will train him to tremble. And then, we move from the season of sacrifice into the season of obedience. The character of charity enumerated in 1 Corinthians 13 constitutes obedience. Because, there are some enemies which are in an everlasting class of spirits that cannot be dealt with by obedience, God ordained a higher life. God is expecting that after we have exercised ourselves in charity, He can then bring a higher substance than the substance of faith that dealt with the world, into that exercised frame, so that we can live in an abundant frame that can handle conversations of everlasting life.

 

The conversations of everlasting life can be summarized in ‘all patience and longsuffering with joyfulness’ (Col. 1:11); these conversations are glorious. This is where we overcome spiritual wickedness in high places. This will make us journey to the beginning, where we can use the light of God in its true essence. The experiences of Paul were to make him exercise himself so that he can lay down a life he had not previously laid down. Patience in this Scripture is not the patience of Christ which helps to overcome the world, but ‘all patience’ (which is the realm of the Most Holy). This is the patience heaven expects us to respond with when a spiritually wicked spirit shows up through some who have crossed from the season of sin and death to the season of hell and death, having garnered some substances of everlasting life. When we respond so, we would be losing a life. In keeping the commandment that governs that situation, we find ourselves enduring (1 Jn. 2:17).

 

There are some seasons of fiery trials when we face contradictions and assaults from men. The wisdom to overcome the spirit that shows up in this phase is the same wisdom our Lord Jesus used, which is the wisdom of doing nothing except what you see your Father do (John 5:19). And in some of such seasons, one might not see the Father doing anything for months. And there would be pain, frustrations and pressures on the soul. However, the wisdom of that season is to do nothing of oneself. And that is the season where one would come to know the Lord as one’s defense, although He might not defend you at a time you desire or expect.

 

God did not defend Job for years. This was the season when Job was taught all patience, and where he was being sealed with all glory. Though he had some level of glory, heaven wanted to give him ownership of glory, to certify him, so to say. There was something Job shared in common with that spirit that was afflicting him — patience; and there was a nature God used that experience to remit in his life.

 

Angels have their patience, that is, they have their breaking point. The patience of a principality or power or ruler of the darkness of this world has a limited span. The timeframe where one would expire such spirit is shorter than that of a spiritually wicked spirit. As at Job 1, patience was not yet an inheritance for Job. He might have had the knowledge and revelation about patience, but it was not yet an inheritance. James said we count them joyful which endure because of the glory of everlasting life they come into (Jam. 5:11). Patience referred to here, is not that of the season of Christ, but that of the season of everlasting life. Job was wrestling with Satan, with the revelation of the name of the Almighty. Thus, this is a patience from that name. So, while Satan was running an errand in that season of Job’s trial, God was seeing an occasion where Job would receive a nature he did not previously have.

 

Patience is a thing of might. The true test of a man is shown in his ability to wait. Sometimes, we are trusting the Lord for something; and God, in wanting to use that season to measure some patience to us, allows for some delay. When heaven decides to measure patience unto one through dealing, they are actually measuring age to one in the spirit. They can tell our age in the spirit by how patient we are, how well we endured when God seemed to delay in answering our prayers; how long we could live on His words, waiting on Him.

 

We must fetch life through the very costly experiences that we go through, experiences that ruffle our reputation, because our reputation does not matter to spirits. Spirits do not respect us when we retain our reputation but when we lose it, that is, when we empty ourselves. Your reputation can be traced to your name. And because They are preparing you to have a name, like our Lord Jesus was given a name that is above all names, heaven wants to strip us of our name (nature). This is because there is usually a life attached to our name.

 

Heaven wants to strip us of that life that often wants praise and honour. If heaven gives it those things, sin would not be remitted. So in His wisdom, God begins to bring denials and delays to rid the soul of that life. And when we are in pain, like Job experienced, God too is in pain. God also has to engage longsuffering as He measures age with us, while we suffer long in coming into His age in the spirit. This is the age of fathers.

 

A father is identified by his accomplishments of patience or longsuffering. This is what tells us the manner of spirits that he has overcome. The Lord is very pitiful and of tender mercies (Jam. 5:11). God remembers our frame and knows that man was not originally like he presently is (Psa. 103:14); and He knows that what will correct our frame is in a crucible. Something called corruption found its way into man. The revelation of everlasting righteousness in our days is to restore our souls.

 

“Let nothing be done through strife or vainglory; but in lowliness of mind let each esteem other better than themselves” (Phil. 2:3). The temptation in this verse of scripture is before a Christ company like ours. It speaks of how a man can keep his life by doing things that are contrary to laying down our life. It is possible for someone who is Christ to still sow to the flesh and reap corruption (Gal. 6:8). This describes how such a person can stop giving life. We feel more secure when we are on the receiving end and our satisfaction comes from the fact that we are gathering, until we gather more than is necessary. That way, we keep getting poorer in our souls. We walk into temptation whenever we are keeping or holding back and are not responding with a commandment. 

 

It takes a lot for God to deliver us from the fear of living empty. The voices we hear when we get to such situations are not from the Lord but from death. We are all comfortable when our fuel tank is full or our account balances are fat, but this can not reveal the true state of our soul and can not tell whether we can really live by faith. Lowly situations leave an opportunity for God to reveal that with Him, all things are possible. We are going to be constrained to trust God like we never have. Whatever is limiting us from having constraints is not in our interests and is hindering us from tapping into certain graces in the spirit.

 

The only way not to strife is to lay down one’s life and allow God to handle a matter (Philip. 2:3). We naturally do not want God to handle everything; we want Him to handle some things while we handle other things. God wants to use the wrong deeds of others to correct something in us, if we can cooperate with Him and suffer long. Our patience eventually sees to it that God corrects the other person without us speaking plainly because our patience has remitted a sin that we were not initially willing to relinquish. While relating with that person, we were laying down our lives. By correcting the person, we would have kept a life or nature that the Lord could have dealt with.

 

Satan will speak through the imperfection of brethren, even in seasons when we were hearing everlasting life (Eph. 4:2). Satan has an interpretation for everything that we are doing that is not born out of the love of God. Such actions are from death and are natural to anyone to whom the light of the Father has not become natural or who has not become skilful in using the good and perfect gifts. An extreme of such conversations will come from our enemies, but we are also instructed to not hate our brothers because our brothers can do something that can tempt us to hate him (1 John 2:11).

  

Conversations of hell and death are not easily discerned in a short time. It sometimes takes days to see why such conversations are imperfect or selfish. The teachings that are coming our way are to equip our minds to discern everything that is traceable to flesh. We are to patiently bring the light of the Father into every conversation and weigh them properly. This may sometimes require that we submit such conversations to those who are ahead of us and have used higher light. Such men will give us good counsel (judgement) that we can use to make war.

Blessing!

 

 

 

  Summary

 

10. Many saints do not begin with the Lord at obedience level; most often, we begin with sacrifices. Sacrifices in this sense refer to what we do without enlightenment; like the season the Ephesian church was, before the eyes of their understanding got enlightened was a season of sacrifices. 

11. Milk faith makes believers know that what they have is not their own. It may be in their name, but it is for the use of saints and for the use of the household of faith. When that discipline is in place, many of us will have made much progress with the faith of the Son, which is in Christ..

12. Giving the life (conversation) of Christ is true charity, meaning, when you are kind or suffering long, you are actually giving life. Thus, when we fail to respond in charity, we are holding back a life we ought to give. We often withhold from giving because we consider tomorrow. On the contrary, our Lord Jesus never entertained that thought called fear. 

13. Luke 1:74 reads, “That he would grant unto us, that we being delivered out of the hand of our enemies might serve him without fear.” To deliver us from the hands of our enemies is to deliver us from their things that reside in us. And that can only be accomplished by giving the soul commandments. Hence, keeping commandments is not negotiable. 

14. As a company, we are meant to embody the conversation of everlasting life. However, there will be struggles as long as we have not yet fully embodied the conversation of Christ. It is through the doctrine of Christ (which includes charity) that the world in us is dismantled. As we engage in charity, we expire a false life within us.

15. In 1 Corinthians 13:1-3, Paul enumerates activities a soul can engage in and yet be lacking charity. Those activities are still in the realm of sacrifice and not yet in the realm of obedience because one is not yet going against the nature of sin and death resident in the soul.

16. Charity covers a multitude of sins (1 Pet. 4:8). These sins can be traced to sin and death because charity is what deals with the world. There are always situations we would come to where we would have need of charity; hence, we must never let go of Christ.

17. The season of charity wants to empty us of ourselves. Jesus was raised and trained to live empty. He was always giving all that He had per time. He had nothing of Himself remaining. For us, this can leave us very vulnerable. Jesus knew how to be so dependent on heaven; He knew how to live the specified life - covering a multitude of sins.

18. The conversations of everlasting life can be summarized in ‘all patience and longsuffering with joyfulness’ (Col. 1:11); these conversations are glorious. This is where we overcome spiritual wickedness in high places. This will make us journey to the beginning, where we can use the light of God in its true essence.  

19. Heaven wants to strip us of that life that often wants praise and honour. If heaven gives it those things, sin would not be remitted. And when we are in pain, like Job experienced, God too is in pain. God also has to engage longsuffering as He measures age with us, while we suffer long in coming into His age in the spirit. 

20. It takes a lot for God to deliver us from the fear of living empty. Lowly situations leave an opportunity for God to reveal that with Him, all things are possible. We are going to be constrained to trust God like we never have. Whatever is limiting us from having constraints is not in our interests and is hindering us from tapping into certain graces in the spirit.

21. We are to patiently bring the light of the Father into every conversation and weigh them properly. This may sometimes require that we submit such conversations to those who are ahead of us and have used higher light. Such men will give us good counsel (judgement) that we can use to make war.