She spelled which word to win the spelling bee? LAODICEAN. That's the front page of msn.com this morning. This is not what my post is about today but this is IN THE WORLD"S FACE kinda stuff. No beating around the bush whatsoever..
To todays writing:
Each time I read this I get a good smile out of it. Not that everything here is something to smile at but here's the part I like:
Mark 9 14 When they came back to the disciples, they saw a large crowd around them, and some scribes arguing with them. 15 Immediately, when the entire crowd saw Him, they were amazed and began running up to greet Him. 16 And He asked them, “What are you discussing with them?” 17 And one of the crowd answered Him, “Teacher, I brought You my son, possessed with a spirit which makes him mute; 18 and whenever it seizes him, it slams him to the ground and he foams at the mouth, and grinds his teeth and stiffens out. I told Your disciples to cast it out, and they could not do it.” 19 And He answered them and said, “O unbelieving generation, how long shall I be with you? How long shall I put up with you? Bring him to Me!” 20 They brought the boy to Him. When he saw Him, immediately the spirit threw him into a convulsion, and falling to the ground, he began rolling around and foaming at the mouth. 21 And He asked his father, “How long has this been happening to him?” And he said, “From childhood. 22 “It has often thrown him both into the fire and into the water to destroy him. But if You can do anything, take pity on us and help us!” 23 And Jesus said to him, “ ‘If You can?’ All things are possible to him who believes.” 24 Immediately the boy’s father cried out and said, “I do believe; help my unbelief.” 25 When Jesus saw that a crowd was rapidly gathering, He rebuked the unclean spirit, saying to it, “You deaf and mute spirit, I command you, come out of him and do not enter him again.” 26 After crying out and throwing him into terrible convulsions, it came out; and the boy became so much like a corpse that most of them said, “He is dead!” 27 But Jesus took him by the hand and raised him; and he got up. 28 When He came into the house, His disciples began questioning Him privately, “Why could we not drive it out?” 29 And He said to them, “This kind cannot come out by anything but prayer.”
Can you picture this? Jesus is standing there with this boy on the ground squirming all over the place, foaming at the mouth and the father of the boy says "if you can fix my boy" to Jesus at which point our Lord gets this incredulous look on his face and replies back to the guy "if you can?" This guy is asking Jesus "if you can.." What I love about this is the Lord's reply. He replies as we should expect him to..what exactly is it that God Almighty cannot do?
Here's the part that's not so funny.
Think about this:
And one of the crowd answered Him "Teacher, I brought You my son, possessed with a spirit which makes him mute; 18 and whenever it seizes him, it slams him to the ground and he foams at the mouth, and grinds his teeth and stiffens out. I told Your disciples to cast it out, and they could not do it.” 19 And He answered them and said, “O unbelieving generation, how long shall I be with you? How long shall I put up with you? Bring him to Me!”
Think about it, this is no different than the case of feeding the 5,000 and it all boiled down to BELIEF. Now these guys were not your run of the mill christians, they were the DISCIPLES, the Lord's inner circle and what did Jesus say "O unbelieving generation...how long shall I PUT UP WITH YOU." If the disciples who walked and talked with Jesus every day were accused of being "unbelieving" and told "how long shall I put up with you" then what is the condition of believers today?
When the Lord who is long suffering and more patient than we'll ever be asks "how long do I have to put up with your unbelief" to the disciples, what do you think he's thinking and feeling about what calls itself christianity today? Today's so called christianity has sunk into such a deep state of mediocrity, apathy, powerlessness from playing church and generations of idolatry (pastoral system) that I have no doubt the words he has today for self proclaiming "christians" is much worse than "how long will I put up with you."
Here's another thing about the casting out of this demon and the feeding of the 5,000 and all the other things Jesus did...Jesus expects us to go GREATER THINGS than what he did, and every single thing we should be doing takes GREAT FAITH.
John 14:12 ... Truly I say to you, He who puts his faith in me will do the very works which I do,and he will do greater things than these, because I am going to my Father.
The Lord has been all over this issue of FAITH with me now for weeks. You think maybe he has an expectation relating to FAITH when he comes back?
Luke 18:8
... But when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?"
We have Pentecost coming up which has "escape from all" possibility written all over it. We've got the 3.5 year mark from Dec 2012 coming up just weeks after that which has "escape from all" written all over it. We just had the word LAODICEAN splashed across the FRONT PAGE of one of the most heavily trafficked websites on earth. Just mind numbing...The Lord requires faith of us for everything, especially your salvation. Once saved always saved is a LIE from the pit of hell. If you find yourself faithless today you have BIG salvation problems. You cannot abide in Christ (John 15) without faith. You cannot please our God IN ANY WAY without faith. Our Lord is not some vanilla pudding sugar sprinkled candy daddy who is ok with scraping by with a minimum of effort or no effort at all.
This is so very serious. The people who have no faith/no prayer invested in the escape from all we were ORDERED to pray for, can likely expect to dive headlong into the time of Jacob's trouble. They fought for it, the debated for it, they argued for it and now they will get what they believed for. The Lord has established immutable laws in the heavens that stand firm as iron regardless of what you believe. One of those laws is you get what you believe.
John 11:40
... Jesus said to her, "I told you that if you believed you would see God's glory, didn't I?"
2 Thessalonians 1:10
... when he comes to be glorified by his saints and to be regarded with wonder on that day by all who have believed-including you-because you believed our testimony
Matthew 8:13
... And Jesus said to the centurion, "Go; it shall be done for you as you have believed." And the servant was healed that very moment.
Back to what the Lord expects from us, he expects faith and not just any faith. We are to live in a way that is pleasing to our God aren't we? When our Lord told the disciples "how long do I have to put up with your disbelief/faithlessness" that obviously was NOT pleasing to the Lord. We know that great faith makes our Lord marvel. The centurion's faith (a heathen!) made our Master MARVEL and he said he hadn't found such faith IN ALL ISRAEL!!!!! Nope, not in all Israel but in a roman soldier. We've already covered in previous posts what an indictment that was on Israel and the today's so called christianity by extension. What the real focus of today's message is, is that the Lord might show up any day for us. When he does show up what kind of condition will your faith be in? What's the last great thing you've exercised your faith on to advance the kingdom of God? How would you rate your own faith? On a scale of 1-10 with 10 being centurion level faith where would you put yourself?
I can tell you that there has been a shift in my life from standing full time on the wall as a watchman, to now coming down off the wall to put the final pieces in place to meet the Lord face to face. Sure I still peek over to see whats coming now and then because you don't have to look hard to see the signs all around us, like on the FRONT PAGE OF MSN.COM...LAODICEAN. No time for debate anymore with people who have no interest in hearing or learning anything different from what they already think they know.
We know from Luke 21:36 that there is an escape from all coming that allows us to escape ALL that's coming and puts us smack dab in front of the Son of man. Not on earth, standing before the Son of man, its very clear. Standing in front of the Son of man will involve giving an account of yourself to the Lord for the receiving of rewards. Its no coincidence that we see crowned (rewarded) redeemed men in Rev 5. Those men stood before the Son of man to get those crowns. How did they get into heaven to stand before the Son of man? Through the open door in Rev 4:1.
I hear and see the Lord working in my life to shore up and solidify the rewards aspect of what's coming. What a loving and gracious God we serve. He could have just allowed us to skid into the kingdom by the hair of our chin but he loves us sooooooo much he wants us to be STAGGERED by whats waiting for us on the other side of the door in heaven. He is a loving Father. Jesus is a faithful savior and high priest interceding for us all the time. There has never been a lawyer in the history of the world that employs sharper wits, or more insightful arguments on our behalf than what is happening today in heaven, by Jesus for me and you.
I am seriously impressed by the thought of finalizing rewards today. That's what the Lord is speaking to my spirit. Many people won't even make it past the starting line because it takes FAITH to do anything in or for our Father's kingdom. That's a simple but immovable fact. The people who argue that you can still get into heaven without faith are in for a very very rude surprise. If you are reading this you have been warned and encouraged today. You have been warned if you think that entering the gates of heaven is some walk in the park exercise based on one decision made on one day in your life. You must commit EVERY DAY, not one day. You must "make a decision" for Jesus EVERY DAY, one day won't come close to cutting it. This is an adulterous generation that wants to have lovers one after the other, not get married and stay married for life. Human marriage is a shadow of heavenly marriage and judging by the statistics I read lately humans are failing MISERABLY in the commit forever department..... FEW will make it in (Matt 7:14). MANY will be turned away (Matt 7:21+). You should be encouraged if you have given yourself completely to the Lord, body soul and spirit to entrust to "that day" when we will see him as he is..face to face.
You might be able to get by in this world with half hearted commitment and "going through the motions" to "fake it till you make it" etc etc, but that won't get you far with the kingdom of heaven. There is so much mediocrity, so much LUKEWARMNESS that is why many will be SPIT OUT/VOMITED UP by the Lord:
LAODICEAN:
Rev 3:15 I know thy works, that thou art neither cold nor hot: I would thou wert cold or hot. 16 So then because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spue thee out of my mouth. 17 Because thou sayest, I am rich, and increased with goods, and have need of nothing; and knowest not that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked: 18 I counsel thee to buy of me gold tried in the fire, that thou mayest be rich; and white raiment, that thou mayest be clothed, and that the shame of thy nakedness do not appear; and anoint thine eyes with eyesalve, that thou mayest see. 19 As many as I love, I rebuke and chasten: be zealous therefore, and repent. 20 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. 21 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. 22 He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches.
Do you really think that if Jesus just spued you out of his mouth you are still "saved?" To be spued out of the Lord's mouth..vomited out, that means you WERE "in him" but you aren't anymore. If you have been vomited OUT that means you are no longer "IN him" you are now outside of him. And we know that apart from being "IN CHRIST" there is no salvation ..period. Forgiveness of sins, being covered by the blood, getting credit for what was done on the cross ALL has the precondition of being found "IN CHRIST." In Christ all of your sins have been paid for. Not "in Christ" none of your sins have been paid for. Wake up people..
I just saw this as I was writing..just now....did you notice that both the church of philadelphia AND the church of laodicea have the DOOR mentioned? LOL...wow. The only two churches mentioned involving a DOOR are phildelphia and laodicea. One church is promised to be kept from the trial coming on ALL the earth, the other is promised to get vomited out if they don't get their act together.
The Rev 3 philadelphia church is shown the OPEN door AND the KEY that opens it
Rev 3: And to the angel of the church in Philadelphia write; These things saith he that is holy, he that is true, he that hath the key of David, he that openeth, and no man shutteth; and shutteth, and no man openeth;
8 I know thy works: behold, I have set before thee an open door, and no man can shut it: for thou hast a little strength, and hast kept my word, and hast not denied my name.
The Rev 3 laodicean church is shown the door with Jesus ON THE OUTSIDE KNOCKING.....with the promise to be spued out if they don't get off the fence.
Rev 3:20 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.
We have just days left before our Lord shows up, or maybe the time of Jacob's trouble doesn't start till 2012, I really don't know. What I do know is that the wisest course of action is to be ready and watching today, and everyday for our Lord's return. Take a good look at the strength of your faith and belief (or lack of). Strengthen what you have. If your "talent" (Matt 25) (faith) is buried somewhere go dig it up quick and put it to work on SOMETHING. Be able to show the master at least a couple coppers worth of faith interest on what you were given.
Last comment and I'm done. The Lord doesn't want us to skid into the kingdom of heaven with the seat of our pants on fire from just barely escaping the flames/just barely making it in. He is a loving Father who wants us to receive a HERO'S welcome when we arrive. Get busy guys..
2 Peter1:10 Wherefore the rather, brethren, give diligence to make your calling and election sure: for if ye do these things, ye shall never fall: 11 For so an entrance shall be ministered unto you abundantly into the everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.
grace and peace
