To be able to speak forth Christ to feed the saints, we must first learn how to hear Him. Christ speaks to us through the words written within the Bible. These words are alive and are spirit and life to us. “It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh profits nothing; the words that I have spoken to you are spirit and are life.” (John 6:14) To realize what the Spirit is saying to us, we must first be in the right place. We must dwell within His temple.
Samuel, a Nazarite, dwelt there. In the days when the word of the Lord was rare, Samuel dwelt within the temple where the ark of God was. “Now the boy Samuel was ministering to the Lord before Eli. And word from the Lord was rare in those days, visions were infrequent. It happened at that time as Eli was lying down in his place (now his eyesight had begun to grow dim and he could not see well), and the lamp of God had not yet gone out, and Samuel was lying down in the temple of the Lord where the ark of God was, that the Lord called Samuel; and he said, ‘Here I am.’” (1 Sam. 3:1-4) To hear the Lord’s speaking today we need to lie within the temple of our spirits where the Spirit resides. We need to be constantly living, moving, and existing within our spirits where the Spirit resides. “For in Him we live and move and exist.” (Acts 17:28)
When we are here, within the Holy of Holies within our spirits, we will be face to face with God. He will speak to us plainly, without riddles. “And Jehovah would speak to Moses face to face, just as the man speaks to his companion…” (Exo. 33:11) from the expiation cover between the two cherubims. “My servant Moses…is faithful in all My house. With him I speak face to face, even openly, and not in riddles; and he beholds the form of Jehovah…” (Num. 12:7-8) To see the Spirit openly and without riddles, we need to dwell within our spirits where the Spirit is. We need to live and move and exist in Him so we are always facing Christ and beholding and reflecting Him. “But we all with unveiled face, beholding and reflecting like a mirror the glory of God, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, even as from the Lord Spirit.” (1 Cor. 3:18 – Recovery Version) When we behold the Lord in our spirits, He will transform us so we reflect His glory. We begin to speak not from ourselves, but only when the Spirit gives us utterance. “And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit was giving them utterance.” (Acts 2:4)
When we speak forth from our spirits as the Spirit gives us utterance, the natural man will not understand this wisdom. “Yet we do speak wisdom among those who are mature; a wisdom, however, not of this age nor of the rulers of this age, who are passing away; but we speak God’s wisdom in the ministry, the hidden wisdom which God predestinated before the ages to our glory.” (1 Cor. 2:6-7) “For to us God revealed them through the Spirit, for the Spirit searches all things, even the depths of God… Even so the thoughts of God no one knows except the Spirit of God. Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, so that we may know the things freely given to us by God, which things we also speak, not in words taught by human wisdom, but in those taught by the Spirit, combining spiritual thoughts with spiritual words. But a natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually appraised… For who has known the mind of the Lord, that he will instruct Him? But we have the mind of Christ.” (1 Cor. 2:10-16) To speak, not from our natural man in our flesh, but from the Spirit dwelling within our spirits, we need to listen and hear the Spirit and follow His instructions. That is what Moses did wrong in front of the assembly of God’s people.
In the wilderness, when the people were thirsty, Moses was told to speak to the rock, which was a type of Christ, who will bring forth water to quench the people’s thirst. “Take the rod; and you and your brother Aaron assemble the congregation and speak to the rock before their eyes, that it may yield its water. You shall thus bring forth water for them out of the rock and let the congregation and the beasts drink.” (Num. 20:8) This rock was Christ. “And all drank the same spiritual drink, for they were drinking from a spiritual rock which followed them, and the rock was Christ.” (1 Cor. 10:4) We must learn to speak to this spiritual rock who is dwelling in our spirits. Christ must be realized in us in such a living way that we are speaking to Him, face to face, in our spirits. Each word we utter, must be the Spirit’s utterance.
An example of this is when Stephen was martyred. Realize he was speaking to the rock, to Christ, in front of the congregation of men stoning him…and in front of Saul. “But being full of the Holy Spirit, he gazed intently into heaven and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing at the right hand of God; and he said, ‘Behold, I see the heavens open up and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God… When they had driven him out of the city, they began stoning him; and the witnesses laid aside their robes at the feet of a young man named Saul. They went on stoning Stephen as he called on the Lord and said, ‘Lord Jesus, receive my spirit!’ Then falling on his knees, he cried out with a loud voice, ‘Lord, do not hold this sin against them!’” (Acts 7:55-60) When Stephen talked to God in his spirit, Saul became a witness of the testimony of Christ. Realize Stephen was speaking to the rock, the rock that was Christ (1 Cor. 10:4) so that men could see and witness the reality of Christ. So when Christ appeared to Saul, and said, “Why are you persecuting Me?” Saul realized whom he was persecuting. Saul received a spiritual drink. He realized, as Saul, although he might not have met Christ, he was persecuting the body of Christ. He was persecuting a man who was born of the Spirit with the mind of Christ. He must have questioned why Stephan, a man that was being stoned to death, was worried about the very men that were stoning him to death. He was asking God to forgive them, to not count this very sin they were committing on him. Realize this is the divine nature expressed through the human nature, the flesh of Stephen, because he had been transformed to the image of Christ. Christ was who Saul was persecuting, not Stephen. When Jesus appeared to Saul on the road to Damascus, Saul must have realized when he was persecuting Stephen, he was persecuting a man who had given up himself and was transformed with the mind of Christ. Saul received a spiritual drink, so Saul was transformed into a new creation himself, now called Paul.
When we have the mind of Christ, we will see Christ in every passage of the Bible because that is how the Bible is written. If we approach it from the flesh, we will only see rules and facts. In we let the Spirit living within us understand the Bible, we will see Christ spoken of everywhere. That is why “for until this very day at the reading of the old covenant the same veil remains unlifted, because it is removed in Christ.” (2 Cor. 3:14) This verse even gives the reason, “But their minds were hardened…” (2 Cor. 3:14) in their flesh, in their natural thinking and understanding. Realize “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” (John 1:1) When we look into the Word, we will see God everywhere, in every passage of the Bible, Christ will be there. [That is why I have rarely quoted the many authors in the past expressing their revelations of the Spirit. If we say Andrew Murray said this, we have diminished the significance of what he is saying because we have attributed the idea to Andrew and not to the Spirit living within Andrew. If it is the Spirit speaking through Andrew, why should we say Andrew said it? The natural man may call this plagiarism if we don’t attribute sayings to a human author. But if their words are from the Spirit speaking through them, why should we say they said it. It would be like attributing the words in Colossians to Paul rather than to God. What we say must not be new, but a revelation by the Spirit living within us of what is already written there in the Bible. If we think we are saying something new, that is not simply revealed to us by the Spirit, realize that is of the flesh. All saints should not only have these revelations from the Spirit speaking in them, but should have the same revelations if it is from the Spirit speaking through them. There should be no differences amongst the saints when it comes to the Word of God. (There may be differences in opinion in the things pertaining to the flesh – whether we should go here or there.) The differences in doctrine amongst the various denominations originate from man upholding various ideas based on his flesh and not according to the Spirit. Realize the common element among all the saints is the Spirit. Throughout the centuries, Christ has recovered various revelations of His Word through various men that dwelt in the Holy of Holies. At a time when the speaking of God was rare, and the light was about to go out, God spoke through Luther His thought of justification by faith. Realize Luther did not invent this – it was merely revealed to him. When he posted his comments, he posted it as questions. The Spirit speaking to Him never meant to form another group. What should have happened is all the saints should have “spiritually appraised” (1 Cor. 2:14) his speaking – they should have asked the Spirit in their spirit if what he said was according to the Spirit. If it is, they should have dropped all the things of human tradition, things of the flesh, to move on with all the things of the Spirit, that is, to move on with Christ, so they could follow the cloud wherever it moved. That is why as we mature, we follow Christ (John 21:18). We learn what it means to “Follow Me!” (John 21:19) When we speak from the Spirit within our spirits, and it is only the Spirit speaking, we are judged by no man. “But he who is spiritual appraises all things, yet he himself in appraised by no one.” (1 Cor. 2:15) Why is he appraised by no one? Because it is the Spirit Himself giving him utterance. We should speak only as the Spirit gives us utterance. Otherwise, we will be speaking from ourselves, from our flesh.] That is why “…Christ is all, and in all.” (Col. 3:11) When we speak to the rock, realize Christ must be expressed. Paul was such a person. When he read the Old Testament, he could see Christ everywhere. This was only after Jesus removed the veil from his eyes and restored his sight. For believers today, realize we all have this veil removed by Christ so we could see the Spirit, however dimly. But as we approach the Holy of Holies, as we go from the Holy Place into the Holy of Holies and begin to dwell there, we will see Him brightly. We will see Him as the Word. We will see Him as the Word made flesh, dwelling among us in His glory. We will see the Word as the sword of the Spirit, living and operating in us to separate thoughts that come from the natural man from thoughts that come from the Spirit (Heb. 4:12). We will see the morning star shining on every aspect of our lives on this earth – “…until the day dawn and the morning star arises in your hearts” (2 Pet. 1:19). “But we all with unveiled face, beholding and reflecting like in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, even as from the Lord Spirit.” (2 Cor. 3:18) That is why we believe. That is why we are all seeking more and more of Him.
As we speak to the rock, seeing Christ in all the Scriptures, Christ will flow out to quench the thirst of all those who hear. This is how man eats and drinks of the Spirit. When we see Christ in all the Scriptures, we are taking a spiritual drink and our faith is increased. We grow in Christ and are nourished in our spirits, growing in our spirit with the Spirit so we are saved from this world. Today, realize the fiery serpent has bitten all of us in our flesh (Num. 21:5-9). Our flesh has been poisoned to follow its own desires. That is why we need to see Christ. When He is uplifted in all the passages of Scriptures for us to see, our faith will grow and we will mature in Christ. We will be saved. “As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up; so whoever believes will in Him have eternal life.” (John 3:14-15)
Today, we must all learn how to lift up the brass serpent for others to see. We must uplift Christ and Christ alone from the Scriptures, not Bible thumping the law, but uplifting the reality of the story of grace and love, of uplifting a God who humbled Himself as a man, sinless without poison as a brass serpent, to die on the cross for us so we could live just by looking to Him. As we uplift Him in more and more passages of Scriptures, realize it is Christ Himself doing the lifting in us by revealing more and more of Himself to us. As this happens, there will be less and less of us, and more and more of Him. There will be less and less of our flesh, and more and more of the Spirit. We will live more and more by faith in the Son of God (Gal. 2:20) as we see more and more of His reality. We would have matured so we don’t live by the thoughts in our flesh, dressing ourselves and going where we want to go, but have surrendered to Him, allowing Him to dress us and take us where we don’t want to go. (John 21:18) We would have matured to follow Christ. (John 21:19) “Truly, truly, I say to you, when you were younger, you used to gird yourself and walk wherever you wish; but when you grow old, you will stretch out your hands and someone else will gird you, and bring you where you do not wish to go.” (John 21:18)
This is how we speak to the rock, to Christ, today to supply the Spirit of life for others to drink. Realize the spiritual reality that is supplied is Christ Himself. It will not be accepted by the natural man who thinks in the realm of his flesh. We might express our own frustration by striking the rock and trying in our flesh to nourish His people. We might feel that no matter what God does for His people, even opening the Red Sea, the people did not believe. However, realize that is an expression of the flesh. By striking the rock, Moses did not follow Jehovah’s instructions. He did not honour Jehovah in front of the congregation. He had his own way of doing things in his flesh. He did not follow Jehovah that spoke to Him face to face in the Holy of Holies. “And Jehovah would speak to Moses face to face, just as a man speaks to his companion…” (Exo. 33:11) “With him I speak face to face, even openly, and not in riddles; And he beholds the form of Jehovah…” (Num. 12:8) That is why Moses was not permitted into the good land.
Today God looks to see if we follow the instructions He speaks to us in the temples of our spirits. As believers, He instructs us in a much closer way within our hearts in our conscience. For it is in our hearts that God judges and deals with us. Not only are our outward actions important, but our inward motives and intents within our hearts are even more important. That is why there are cities of refuge for the children of Israel (Num. 35). If a person strikes another man with an iron object, a stone, or a wooden object and the man dies, he is a murderer according to the law. “But if he pushed him suddenly without enmity, or threw something at him without lying in wait, or with any deadly object of stone, and without seeing it dropped on him so that he died, while he was not his enemy nor seeking his injury, then the congregation shall judge between the slayer and the blood avenger according to these ordinances. The congregation shall deliver the manslayer from the hand of the blood avenger, and the congregation shall restore him to his city of refuge to which he fled; and he shall live in it until the death of the high priest who was anointed with the holy oil. But if the manslayer at any time goes beyond the border of his city of refuge to which he may flee, and the blood avenger finds him outside the border of his city of refuge, and the blood avenger kills the manslayer, he will not be guilty of blood because he should have remained in his city of refuge until the death of the high priest. But after the death of the high priest the manslayer shall return to the land of his possession.” (Num. 35:22-28) Today, our high priest is Christ, “Therefore, holy brethren, partakers of a heavenly calling, consider Jesus, the Apostle and High Priest of our confession.” (Heb. 3:1), who was anointed by the Holy Spirit (John 1:32; 1 John 2:20) and has died for us, once for all so that our sins are forgiven. We have come to one of His cities of refuge, the church in our locality today that should be full of the dispensing of His Spirit. The local church that we attend should be full of the dispensing of the Spirit, not only one that is doctrinally correct, but one that reveals Christ to us so our faith will grows. The church in our locality should supply us with the spiritual drink that is Christ so we will grow in our spirits and be transformed into His image, gradually from glory to glory. Christ must be expressed in the local church so our hunger and thirst will be satisfies. Our thirst for the eternal, “…He has also set eternity in their heart…” (Ecc. 3:11), “…As the deer pants for streams of water, so my soul longs after You, O God.” (Psa. 42:1), will be satisfied so we don’t leave our cities of refuge. The speaking from the church in our locality must be to Christ as our rock to supply his people with a spiritual drink. When it does so, our spirits will realize we are dwelling in the house of God because we are satisfied. The attraction and desire for things of this world will no longer be appealing. We will no longer be following the desires of our flesh, but be following Christ in our spirits. When this happens, realize the laws will be written in our hearts and on our minds (Heb. 8:10) and we will no longer leave our city of refuge. “…I will put My laws into their minds, and I will write them on their hearts, And I will be their God, and they shall be My people.” (Heb. 8:10) To be His people, He must be our God. That is why external things we do in our flesh, sacrifices and offerings, God does not want. “Sacrifice and offering You have not desired” (Heb. 10:5), but the intents of the heart, is more important to Him. “I will put My laws upon their heart, and on their mind I will write them…And their sins and their lawless deeds I will remember no more.” (Heb. 10:16-17) Realize why Christ had to come was to solve this inward problem of man. When His divine nature could not get into man without violating the righteous requirements of the law – “Then the Lord God said, ‘Behold, the man has become like one of Us, knowing good and evil; and now, he might stretch out his hand, and take also from the tree of life, and eat, and live forever” (Gen. 3:22), the divine nature that allows man to live forever – He sent His Son to be born as a man so Jesus would have a divine nature and a human nature so He could live a perfect human life, then died, unrighteously so, for us to absolve our sins. At His death, He released the Spirit of reality (truth) (John 14) to enter back into man to make a home in their hearts. This brought His divine nature to dwell in man, putting His laws in our hearts and inscribing it into our minds as we become transformed into the same image as He so that we have the mind of Christ.
If we have this reality and still sin willfully, we have left our city of refuge and it is a frightful thing. “For if we go sinning willfully after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, but a terrifying expectation of judgment and the terrible fury of a fire which will consume the adversaries.” (Heb. 10:26-27) When we sin willfully after having our eyes illumined and having believed, we have trampled under foot the Son of God. “How much severer punishment do you think he will deserve who has trampled under foot the Son of God, and has regarded as unclean the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified, and has insulted the Spirit of grace? For we know Him who said, ‘Vengeance is Mine, I will repay.’ And again, ‘The Lord will judge His people.’ It is a terrifying thing to fall into the hands of the living God.” (Heb.10:29-31) Only in Christ and in Him alone will we find forgiveness. Only when He lives in us will our hearts and minds be transformed to express Him. Only when we present ourselves as a living sacrifice (Rom. 12:1) to Him will we have returned to our greatest possession (Num. 25:38)…which is Christ Himself.
Only Christ can change a man from within by supplying us with the Spirit so we become partakers of His divine nature. By talking with Him, face to face within the temple of our spirits, He is transforming us into His image, gradually from glory to glory. This is what happened to Ezekiel. “And the Spirit entered into me when He spoke to me and caused me to stand up on my feet. And I heard Him who spoke to me.” (Eze. 2:2) When the Spirit speaks to us, He has entered into us and causes us to stand up on our feet. Realize this is what changes our behaviour. This is how we walk in newness of live. Today the Lord is no longer hidden from us but speaks to us in our spirits telling us what to do and how to live. “And though the Lord has given you the bread of adversity and the water of oppression, your Teacher will no longer hide Himself in a corner, but your eyes will see your Teacher. And your ears will hear a word behind you, saying, ‘This is the way, walk in it,’ when you turn to the right or turn to the left.” (Isa. 30:20-21) Realize this is how intimate the Lord is with us today in directing all that we do. To hear Him, just love Him and He will speak to you through His word, telling you how to walk in Him. Realize it is that simple. As we love Him, He will direct our ways. Then what we do is and expression of Him. How we speak will be an expression of Christ speaking from us. We become His instruments to bring for His reality into this world. That is how we speak forth Christ.
That is how the kingdom of God is established on this earth.
Why? The Divine Revelation 