How to see religion in ourselves and what is Spirit

In reference to the book we have been working on:-

First, let me say that I am impressed.  Your point about The Law and the inevitability of man’s failure in the face of The Law is flat out brilliant.  

Nothing you say ‘offends’ me, but man, you do keep me working!  I was up reading well into the wee hours of the morning for the last 2 days.  I PLANNED to just correct the grammar and send it back.  Instead, I spent hours checking and reading and researching and thinking (which always makes my head hurt.)

I don't get what it is that BOTHERS the churchitarians so much.  There is nothing contentious in what you've written.  It's a great message.  It SHOULD leave them feeling relieved and excited and hopeful.   I have to wonder what they're seeing that I can't.

Email from reader

I was talking with someone after receiving the above email and raised a few points. Now for sure people have varied responses. But this email helps strengthen a point we are finding. This person at one time many years ago was working to be in full time ministry. Now they are not religious and have been outside organized religion for a long time. We begin to understand these “out called” often are more open and subtle than we the religious. An army of sleeping spiritual giants awaiting the infusion of the Holy Spirit. They, like us have been caught up in organized religion at one time and somewhere along the line fell, stepped, walked out. Now living in carnality they are often more righteous than the folks they left behind. Maybe honesty arrives in such as they stop fooling themselves and making excuses for the contradictions they once called church. It may be of offense but we begin to realize these people many times are living more honest than those still inside the system. They see the contradictions of carnality in religion, have been disheartened and continued searching.

Funny that these “out called” are being enraptured in His love and lighting up. Others in religion seek manifestations and knowledge, that same knowledge that puffs up and has one thinking they are pregnant when as the bible says all they brought forth was wind. The same manifestations that feed their knowledge and self righteousness. Yes the manifestations may be beautiful but they in no way should be a validation.

The “out called” seem to be the type of person being touched the most. They are ecclesia or the “out called” they have been inside the organization and just could not lay down their spiritual principles and stepped out. As they stepped out they have been ostracized as backsliders and misfits. But here comes the Holy Spirit to gather His bride and the responses are amazing.

What is of concern is that the religious read to make knowledge but someone with no position reads for life. The religious read to correct or find fault and ecclesia reads for life. The self righteous read to see if they agree, ecclesia reads for life. It is evident that in religion that is organized we become so self righteous we read with a reason, we read from a place of superiority or false humility. How refreshing when the “out called” read just to be life and read to enjoy spiritual life together with the author. If there is no life they simply put it down and move on. The parts that are of spirit will stay with us but the parts that are not fall away. It is in reading we can discover if we are self righteous knowledge based or spiritually discerning. In spiritually discerning I may have no knowledge just the enjoyment of life and the relaxation of being.

Lessons from the VIKINGS

Romans 7:8 But sin, seizing the opportunity afforded by the commandment, produced in me every kind of coveting. For apart from the law, sin was dead.

It is a testimony to the power of the law when you realize that our whole society is based around the Abrahamic law. Our judicial system comes from the law and is an enforcement of the Old testament law. As believers we can think we no longer live by the law but when we look objectively we can see that our church life reinforces the law and the law reinforces church life. Many Christians vote according to a law of morality and expect a blessing on society. The law we teach in church is the exact same law that is lived in our society.

I think most good church going people today would be proud of the fact they are law abiding and this rings true for their life with Christ as well. The law is probably one of the most powerful written expressions ever known to mankind.

It raises a few thoughts firstly with all the attack on the morality of our society humanistic mankind endeavors to change the law to suit the times. As Christians we of course do not want to see an erosion of morality but maybe , just maybe God is trying to show us something else. Maybe He is allowing such to reveal in us His ultimate plan

I think about the disciples of Christ and the similar situation they were in. Their whole society was based in the Abrahamic law and they were better at it than we currently are. They knew the law was powerful and being raised under such had a healthy respect for its power. What a totally understandable thing to get mad when Jesus turned up on the scene and what a windows into the disciples lives we see in the gospels. Firstly Jesus came and the bible says to fulfill the law. Yes while walking this earth Jesus respected the law but we can all agree he confronted the religious system that had sprung up around the legal system. Both are sisters are take care of each other. For the American society to think they can separate church and state is ludicrous and the height of ignorance. They are the same spirit  and one in the same.

So these disciples underwent massive change as they followed Christ and they were exceptional men hungry for God or they would never have stepped out as they did. Then as massive as the changes were in them Jesus then leaves and sends the comforter. The comforter or Holy Spirit was to decimate everything they ever knew and we can see a progressive enlightenment in the disciples lives as to what the Holy Spirit did. Peter and James struggled whereas Paul not having walked with Christ stepped in and laid down his legal background. Paul we read in Galatians spent 14 years being unwound from a religious law zealot to a Holy Spirit inspired man.

Philippians 4:10 and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ—the righteousness that comes from God on the basis of faith

Yes if sin is apart or separated from or not connected to the law it is dead.

Let’s say it this way a bunch of lawless Vikings plunder and pillage as there is no law governing them. Take those Vikings and give them Pentecost and without anyone ever teaching them they will do as God wants. It will be who they are Romans 10:8  “The word is near you; it is in your mouth and in your heart,” that is, the message concerning faith that we proclaim: If we teach those Vikings to be respectable we are attaching the law to sin again and as such empowering sin. The Vikings will now start accountability groups to help them stop pillaging and will meet Sundays at 10am to hear how they should stop pillaging. Occasionally every Monday morning they sneak out and pillage a village or two but  they are working on it and better than those who do it every day, RIGHT?

The Pentecost Vikings just lost all desire to pillage. They never even went to church Sunday morning as they seemed to have people turning up at the homes and in the parks and shops wanting to be with them. Their days were filled with celebrating the new freedom they have and for someone to say “thou shalt not pillage” is insulting as there is no longer anything in them that desires such. That pillaging life sees so far away one had to ask did we ever do that?

Of course the Viking village next door is in church Sunday mornings learning to be good Vikings and in due course they separate from the Pentecost Vikings who don’t go on Sundays. These Pentecost Vikings obviously have not learned the righteous ways that the Sunday Vikings have attained to. After all the Pentecost guys seem to be always in each other’s homes eating and singing and dancing. They even go to the shops and laugh and pray with strangers who seem to get glued to them. Is that not disgusting! The Sunday Vikings have been to the shops as well, handing out literature inviting people to their Sunday life of righteousness. Their leaders told them on Sunday that whenever they slip up and pillage the funds must be given to the church as its dirty money.

The Pentecost Vikings have all these changes going on, one of them picked up a bible and read it. Funny thing was it described them and all the changes that had occurred in them. WOW, it is as if they could have written the bible as it was a mirror of their lives and they never even knew it. What a celebration what a party to discover others lived the same and the more they celebrated the more they looked like each other. Of course they all looked and acted different but they started to move as one, they were aware of a Holy Spirit moving them as a mass. They called that mass a bride as it just seemed so romantic. Kind of weird for a pillaging Viking to be romantic all of a sudden but they just could not help it. Why they even seemed to care for their neighbors more than themselves. Not by conscious thought it just happened. Funny thing was other Vikings just started turning up from other villages. They had never met something just drew them and now they understood it was a Holy Spirit.

The Sunday Vikings unlike the Pentecost Vikings spent a lot of time reading the bible and learning how to be good. Yes it was a struggle but as they read about the disciples in the bible they were inspired and encouraged to find someone reached perfection. But boy was it hard praying and fighting to stop pillaging. So many Viking brothers left the village, some just went back to pillaging and others are now partying with the Pentecost guys. So they worked at unity and invited other similar villages to come together and pray and talk. Their leaders knew so much and they worked so hard to keep other Vikings who looked strange away.

The hardest thing was one Viking village seemed a counterfeit of the other. One had romance and love associated with a bride, the other had a labor of love and worked to try and unify with other villages they secretly thought were misguided and incomplete. One was romantic the other was more like a harlot. Working at love for wages, wages like blessings and good feelings. The exact same things the other Pentecost village seemed to attract but never focused on or worked for. Yes indeed they both spoke about this new Viking that entered their village right at the beginning. He looked like a Viking only he never seemed to have a dirty past. This guy called Himself Jesus and to one village all He bought more of was romance. The other village had this Jesus who looked the same but even the Viking villagers that still pillaged knew He was not like the other he was another Jesus, actually this other Jesus turns out was just another Viking pretending to be the Jesus of Pentecost Viking life.

Thus is the Vikings dilemma. Das ist us!

You get the idea!

A little glimpse of God romance

Yesterday after not seeing a lady for 3 years she just turned up at or house with two friends. The timing was amazing as she cleans houses and here we were moving to a new hose and cleaning it. She had sent a text the day before asking where she could come to meet us. You know it was one of those God encounters.

Anyway the ladies she had with her were a mixed bag. One young lady the minute she stepped out of the car asked if she could smoke a cigar. She was young and looked as if all her innocence had been stolen by a world that promises pleasure and delivers torment. The other lady called herself a missionary as many Brazilian church women do. I guess inside the system of church a Brazilian woman can only aspire to be a missionary as men are pastors. She was a nice enough lady once you penetrated the facade of religion she had superimposed on her life to keep people out and torment in.

So as these ladies cleaned I asked them what was going on at church. Their answer was “oh amazing things signs wonders and miracles” so I asked them very genuinely to testify of such. I asked “what have you seen”, they acknowledged they had no such occurrences at church but do outside church occasionally. The nice religious lady then determined I must be against church as I asked too many direct questions. I later explained I am very much for church. Very much for a romantic lifestyle with people enraptured in such Holy Spirit romance they can only ever be together to celebrate Sspirit life. I am not for a fabricated system devoid of Holy Spirit romance that gives people knowledge that puffs up instead of igniting romance. A knowledge based worship is anti-Christ but a revelation rhema revealed worship life is Holy Spirit romance and draws people together in Holy Spirit passion for genuine worship. As is Acts 3 and 4, such a shame we take romance and try to teach it as love. All we get then is harlotry and a harlot church if we do such. YEAH lets live the romance!!!!

This nice lady imprisoned in her religion proceeded to then try and corner me by asking what about you? I proceeded to tell her of lives changing, dead returning to life, a hospital psychiatric ward having a move of God. People being changed as Sspirit people walk through malls and spontaneous worship being played by a man at a school and students just come and sit to listen. Attracted to the light of Sspirit but puzzled as to what they are encountering.

I was not in  a competition with the lady but blessing her with life. Unfortunately carnal religion will always be threatened by such and feel insecure. This lady presented such by total disinterest. But as disinterested as the religious are in hearing about God moving the young cigar smoking lady became excited. Something I am guessing does not happen a lot. She then as if a light came on understood what God had been trying to tell her since arriving to clean the house. She saw a glimpse of how precious she is to God and how He wants to romance her not use and abuse her. The religious lady kept trying to interrupt to prophecy how we need to start a church and was totally oblivious to the fact this young lady saw something she had never seen before, A ROMANTIC GOD. In between all the activity I shared with her about surrendering her life to Christ. She was so overjoyed and focused to hear Jesus wanted through romance to marry her and live inside of her without wanting to abuse her, emotionally of physically.

You see, she had been attending the local Brazilian Assembly of God and never knew she could receive Jesus into her life. I knew her pastor I had ministered in his church many years ago. They are a programs church always something is going on to keep the crowds entertained. One day we were there they bought a donkey into the church for the kids to ride. The donkey could not walk on the slippery floor and fell hurting its leg. So yes the church kept an image of happening but is lifeless and as a testimony to such here was a young lady who never knew Jesus waned to be part of her life.

So this morning I am thinking about how the religious want to hear about manifestations but when it does not appear the way they think it should, they are totally disinterested. My wife and I have a saying, what religious people do not understand they either isolate from or persecute. Carnal man wants to hear the stories to WOW and wants to come and look to WOW and market and promote itself. As the carnal call them miracles the Spirit man calls it life. I guess to make a point, can we say,  a Spirit man calls it a miracle when a carnal man eats a sandwich. To a carnal man it is just living, maybe highlighting when we live Sspirit what we have called miracles are just Sspirit life. Pentecost is not about manifestations it’s about LIFE. All I can say is nothing to see here just Sspirit people living life.

Understanding the will of God for our lives

We grow tired of trying to figure God out an ultimately have to just sit back in His arms, relax and let what He wants be. It is when thinking about the will of God we can become so entangled in a web of intrigue and carnal deception. Like a clandestine operative trying to figure out an ever illusive operative they are sent to find. That web will ultimately if approached the wrong way cause one’s self to be exhausted. It is the further we get out on the water so to speak that we begin to realize our brain cannot follow the will of God like we had thought.

So what should a believers life look like and how do we be the will of god. I guess it seems to me we have spent a lifetime making decisions on a minor scale to guide the ship of our lives. You know how that goes does God want me to or does He not want me to? We often forget that upon surrendering our life to Christ the decision has been made on a macro scale now it must be laying down our life and following Him.

It was in relation to this house I have been discovering God in a new way. I drew on all the knowledge of God I had, to try and bring a release over the last 9 months and as time went on I was exhausted by my own thoughts and lay them down. A broken man in many ways I was now devoid of all strength to do what I could have tried to think was the will of God. It was in this time of nothingness God began to move and we are now in the house. The circumstances of how that happened are strange but again when one is so tired of figuring out what he should be doing all we have the strength to do is walk one step after another. You see we had to be out of where we were by the 15^th and it was the 14^th we got word and moved.

Now rest assured there is much and I mean much uncertainty naturally around the house we now live in but it is evident once again that we have no ability to act in the will of God. As if that will is an external thing that we must find, or an action that we must do. Or a demon to bind or a release to release or……..? It is within this will of God something comes to light like it has never before and any who can say they understand what I am about to say have no idea of the words I will write. We have numbed down the following with religious dirt and lost the point.

We do not find the will of God, we are the will of God when we walk by the spirit we are that manifestation of His spirit life. When in the spirit I do not carry out the lusts of the flesh and the greatest lust is not what we have categorized as overt sin, the greatest lust is allowing the flesh to live. Allowing the flesh to need a will of God action or manifestation for security and comfort and missing the fact, as the will of God when I rest inside God things will just happen. Just like this house I wake in the morning bewildered that we are here. Never could I expect to be in such a place, in the woods  with deer and turkey walk past the windows. With a house so sought after people with a lot better positioning in life than us failed to enter it. God is doing and all I can do is look at God, if I look at the house I am no longer walking by the spirit. If I look at the house I become disturbed. I can but rest and be life. The crazy circumstances that surround the house can only be seen as gossip and any who listen entertain the carnality of death. Yet here we are in a safe harbor amidst a potential storm and rest assured as we just sit inside God and be His will then life follows.

Yes for sure my natural man is unsettled but as I walk by the spirit I will not carry out the lust of the flesh and listen to the flesh who lusts for control power and above all details and understanding. Any who walk spirit can only resolve themselves to say the only detail or understanding or glimpse of the future I need is God. God you are the great “I AM”