fellowship – Effects of Anxiety

1 John – Our Fellowship with God and with One Another

Trust me in my experience, a lot of people in the church world are very delusional. They think that simply coming into the building, that’s their salvation. Or simply because they know me, I’m somehow, their ticket to heaven. It doesn’t work like that. You’ve got to, it’s, that’s between you and God. This is not a church that has some intermediary here. You are given the goods; you’ve got to work it out. ♪ ♪ ♪ Okay, so today will be a little bit different type of message. Think of it more as a talk than a sermon. Even though the subject matter comes straight out of the Bible, you’d be surprised how many times I touch on a book or a verse, and whether or not people actually put this in writing or not, or whether it’s my perception, I sometimes get the idea that people think, “How could something penned at least minimally, 1900 years ago-plus, depending on which books you’re reading, be applicable and relevant in my life today? Aren’t these just antiquated old things?” And, the answer is, you couldn’t, you couldn’t be further away from the reality of trying, if you are looking for answers in life, these are timeless answers.Now, I’m going to be using the first epistle of John today, which, you know, it’s kind of a strange place for a message, and the message itself will be a little bit strange. So I’m giving you a heads-up. See, sometimes you read, for example, the first epistle of John, which I’m going to read in a second, and you can glean from just the introduction that John, the same John who wrote the Gospel of John, the same John who wrote the book of Revelation, is writing as an absent pastor. We don’t know where he is when he writes this. But what’s interesting about this writing: this opening kind of tells you in a roundabout way that he indeed was an eyewitness and is probably either speaking to eyewitnesses of his eyewitness, which means next generation, or one that is fully removed from even having contact with the risen Lord.And this is important for a reason. See, imagine, I’ll put it to you this way, imagine if we were the eyewitnesses to Christ in the disciples’ day. In our little circle, we would not be talking about things that other people would talk about. Why? Because we saw, we beheld, we have stories to tell. That second generation is listening to the stories. Maybe they may have been part of what Paul addressed as the better part of a group of 500 that were privy to see the risen Lord, maybe not. And then imagine where we are. We’re not eyewitnesses to eyewitnesses, but generations down now just hearers. The difference between the first generation and the third generation is big because by the third generation Christians, say, in the 90s, but before the year 100, apostasy and heresies had already crept into the church. You’re that close to the event, and heresies and apostasies have crept in. The reason why I say that is because we get baffled at seeing how far a certain church or a certain group has fallen out of the orbit of normality for a church.But you wouldn’t think that, say, only three generations or three removed from the source of Christ. So it’s important for us, several things are important. First at the top of the list is to read this book and recognize that there was deliberate intent in the way he opens it. Let me read a little bit, “That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled the Word of life,” referencing Christ, “(for the life was manifested, we have seen it, and bear witness, and shew unto you that eternal life, which was with the Father, and was manifested unto us;) that which we have seen and heard declare we unto you, that ye also may have fellowship with us: and truly our fellowship is with the Father, and with his Son, Jesus Christ. And these things write we unto you, that your joy may be full.” So let me stop right there. Telegraphed right at the beginning is the fact “we saw, we touched.” Now, it doesn’t say who the “we” is, okay? It’s just John writing, we don’t know who that other, either other individual or others are, but what’s important here is when you read this, the opening of this, it doesn’t reek of somebody who’s trying to write and tell a story like “Once upon a time,” or even the genealogies.It reeks of somebody who’s saying, “I was there. I saw. I touched. I beheld. I was with Him. Now, are you going to listen to me or not?” Right, it kind of has a little bit of that tone to it. So that’s number one. Number two, the impact, if you will, of believers; so let’s look at the first generation of believers that were around, immediately around Christ, and those disciples radically changed. Do you remember Christ’s word, “Follow me; I will make you fishers of men.” You’ve got the next generation, which we read of a couple of names here and there in the New Testament, they’re helpers to Paul, they’re certain folks that Peter might mention; we’ll call them the next generation of laborers. But imagine someone who was not an eyewitness and was not an eyewitness to the eyewitnesses reading this.How is the connection made to what is here on the pages? And that brings me to say all Scripture is given, inspired by the Holy Spirit. So the Holy Spirit helps the disciples to write all these writings. And embedded in here is a way of saying for us, for the church of Jesus Christ who is not direct eyewitnesses, and not even eyewitnesses to the eyewitnesses, but generations later, the instruction that’s in here is actually off the charts if we would listen to it.And it’s so simple. This is why I said, “Think of today more like a talk than a sermon,” because the instructions are so simple, but they can be missed very easily and they can be misunderstood (snap!) like that. So I want to, I want you to pay attention to something that is in here. The first phrase, if you will, occurs in verse 3, where it says, “That which we have seen and have declared; we’ve declared it unto you, ye also may,” and here are the words I want you to focus on, “have fellowship with us.” And then you’re going to read the same word again when I read down verses 6 and 7, “If we say we have fellowship with him, and walk in darkness, we lie, and we do not the truth: but if we walk in the light, as in; as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth from all sin.” So fellowship with us, fellowship with Him, and fellowship with one another, and I want to kind of camp out on this theme.That’s why I said, “Think of this more as a talk than a sermon,” because what I’ve found over the years is people will take liberty with words, specifically those that are in this Bible and may not carry the essence of modern language. So first things first, the word “fellowship” will be very familiar to this congregation if you’ve listened at any point, to this word and its cognates, derivatives of koinonia. And if you remember, I have spoken abundantly on this word koinonia. Probably the most famous one for this congregation is Galatians 6:6, “Let him or her that is taught in the word koinonia with the one who teaches him or her.” And that is “jointly share,” and “participate.” So the word can also be translated as “partaker,” “recipient,” or “sharer,” but there’s something important here.You see, “fellowship,” a lot of times in our blanket of English language, has more of a social connotation to it, okay. Fellowship, “Let’s get together and have fellowship,” right? But if we’re really using the word and understanding it aright, the only fellowship – we can have friends that aren’t Christian, but if you’re going to talk about this word within the confines of Scripture, you’re talking about the fact that we are having koinonia with one another, and that is not just social togetherness, but it’s one mindset in Christ that we’re able to get together and essentially share, enjoy, communicate, participate.So it has less to do with social understanding, social gathering, that type of stuff, and more to do with – the common thread to koinonia is God. Now you may say, “Could there be koinonia of other kinds?” Absolutely, but in this particular context, you can’t have this koinonia the way John is referring to it, without something happening to you and me from above that makes that possible. So specifically there’s something very specific being said here. Now let me add to this. The early church, by about the third generation, and we can trace this in ecclesiastical history, begins to have a boatload of heresies creep in. At the top of the list, Christ can, could not be God, could not be supreme deity, Christ could not be all human, and then the last one (these were the most prevalent), Christ could not be all-man and all-God simultaneously.So there were a lot of people that crept into the church to try and pervert Christianity or one’s faith in Christ. Now you tell me how that can’t be a relevant subject for today when most of the churches that you either are exposed to, social media, TV, or otherwise tend to now lean on every social justice – cater to, we’ll call it the small swath of society that is demanding that the church become something it was never intended to be.So if you don’t think heresies have already crept in, I mean, church history is pretty interesting. If you read church history long enough, you’re going to see that there is nothing new that has been invented in terms of heresy. It’s been all seen before; it’s been all done before. Let me go on now because the whole message kind of unfolds as you read through this. So verse 5, “This then is the message which we have heard of him, and declare unto you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all. If we say that we have fellowship with him, and walk in darkness, we lie, and we do not tell the truth.” Now you’re going to see this kind of repeated several times. “If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.” So there’s a starting point here. It’s kind of like tough, tough love, having to call something out so that people aren’t delusional about where they think they are in their walk.And that is probably the first big problem that he’s addressing. You’ve got to almost read between the lines because he says, “This is the message which we have heard of him, declare unto you, that God is light, in him there’s no darkness. So if we say we have fellowship with him,” we jointly participate, we share, we are partakers of Him “and walk in darkness, we lie, and do not the truth.” So the first thing I want to point out here in verse 6 is the necessity of being honest with self and that does not come easy. These are, I would say, easily missed, clear, distinct lessons in this book: we ought to not deceive ourselves. Now, what does walking in darkness mean for the believer? If Christ is light, it means you’re not walking with Him. Now we can walk in darkness in the respect of a valley or what we’d call some, something that eclipses us for a time, but not all the time.So the important thing that’s being said here is a lot of times I’ll hear people say – I’ve, I’ve said this now for many weeks on end, “I’m a good person. I do good things,” but that’s not what being a Christian is about. So let me backtrack a little bit. If we say we have fellowship with Him what does that fellowship mean? And again, stay away from the social ideology, and think about whether are you a partaker of Him. Being a partaker of Him begins with being a partaker in His word, and then you start looking at and you can, we’ll peel this apart as the message goes on, but you’ll see every dimension of Christ’s life is put in this book for us actually to share in, not just the work He did and we’re grateful recipients. Let me give you an idea. We’re told, for example, and you’ll hear me mention this again later in the message about fellowship in His sufferings. And you might think, “Well, that! I thought it was all going to be good for me, right? Isn’t that what being a Christian’s about, it’s all good?” No.Part of the trip is comprised of persecution, and suffering in valleys. It’s like the people say, “Well, how, how could this happen to me? Or how could this happen to this person, they’re, they’re, they’re such a God-fearing, God-loving person?” Well, first of all, let’s get this straight. The rain falls on the just and the unjust alike. But if we’re going to talk about fellowship with Him, it means that there isn’t anything at any time that we are engaged in or doing that He’s not aware of. Being; just, it’s a very subtle thing, being aware that He’s aware. That’s kind of the first place of fellowship because a lot of people think, “Well, I’m, I’m in church.I have my little compartments I go to,” but that’s not how it works. So when we talk about fellowship, fellowship with Him, let’s paint this as a diversity of different foci. They are not all positive. Some of them carry negative connotations, negative in the implication of suffering, persecution; those types of things. Now, how many here have suffered ridicule for their faith? Okay? Well, you are a partaker in a microcosm. You’re like a piece of sand in comparison to Christ and the mockery they made of Him, but that’s the concept I’m saying is that there is not just identification with the Lord, but I’m equally a partaker.Now, I could die on a cross a thousand times that wouldn’t save a squirrel, but all the things that I endure, as a Christian, make up that component of fellowship with Him in suffering, in, we’ll call it in the negative, if you will. So, the first thing we have to start looking at is, as I said, John writes, “Fellowship with us, fellowship with Him, and fellowship with one another,” and why these are integral to the health of the church, why these are integral to just the overall mindset. I want you to think of something. For example, when we talk about fellowship, we should equally think about the right use of the word communion; com, “with,” union, communion, “togetherness,” and “withness.” So, if you start kind of processing this, the fellowship concept, when I say “with us,” as John was writing, I want you to think that every time you open the book and are reading any of the writers, you are indeed having fellowship. If you want to say, you’re a partaker of words inspired by the Holy Spirit through John; there is fellowship right there.When you say, “Well, we can’t have fellowship with John; John is long gone,” you’re wrong. Every time I open this book and I’m reading, they are words inspired by the Holy Spirit, but they were written by John, I am sharing in John’s words that, again if you can get out of the social mindset and understand what fellowship means. You have fellowship with John, with Paul, with Peter every time you open the book because, you are sharing their words, yes, inspired through the Holy Spirit, but nevertheless. So, these all line up. Then if you look at the next one when it says, “We have fellowship with him,” I think I’m going to skip that one to come back because it’s quite lengthy. But “fellowship with one another” is quite suggestive.It suggests community. And this is the thing that, if I say one thing today, please hear this. We had people in this church some 30 years ago that thought their duty was to make little pockets of Bible studies and little things here and there; one person who seemingly had a very big ego thought that they – this is when Dr. Scott was still alive – thought that they should be pastoring and leading a group and, you know, I don’t know, lording it over the saints, maybe, who knows. But that’s not the fellowship I’m talking about. See, if you want to know the first book of Scott here, a lot of times people think, “Oh, we’ll get together for a Bible study,” and unless you have the discipline, whoever is orchestrating this Bible study, it’s going to turn into a social gathering.It’s going to turn into; sorry, I’m just going to say it, it’s going to turn into a BS session, okay? Everybody talks about what they ate, what they cooked, what their kids did, how bad things are, what medications they take, and less gospel, less Bible teaching, and more gossiping and social, socializing, okay? I’m not against people socializing. I’m saying, that if you’re going to do something for Christ and God’s sake, you better understand what you’re doing. And that’s why I said to you, even me, taking up 10 minutes at the beginning of a message to deliver a message before the message, I don’t even like that; it teeters on – I’m sharing things with you to answer questions, but even that’s kind of like, eh, I’m not sure about that, okay? But this one I am sure about.Fellowship with one another is a community, but it is not the community as in social gatherings, “Let’s grab a cup of coffee. Let’s sit down and cut the, shoot the breeze, all right?” (Laughter.) It’s not that type of stuff. Yeah, I know. It’s difficult. I’m struggling today, folks. I am struggling today. I just want you to know that. But think about this from the same writer, and I’ve quoted this before. Remember what John says, it’s Jesus’ words, when they ask, “Well, how will we know, how will people know that we are Your disciples?” He says, “Because you have love for one another.” So, and we’re not talking about Phileo, “I do for you, you do for me.” We’re talking about agape that comes from God, that has no strings attached, “Hey, I got your back. You don’t need to repay me.” Whatever, your issue is, think of it that way. So, if you bring this concept together with what fellowship with both Him and with one another means, there has to be a common center point, and that is everything that flows from Christ to us.We all may have different gifts, as Paul describes in Corinthians, but we all have this singular thing which is called faith in Christ, trusting Christ, and understanding His finished work. So when we talk about fellowship, there’s some other component I have to bring in here before I can move on in the book, and that is we are connected: Father, Son, through the Spirit. So when we talk about fellowship, you can’t go, “Yeah, we’re having a get-together. Let’s do a fellowship.” We’re talking about the same way that God is, Father, Son, Spirit. When we gather, we are the complement of one another in the body of Christ, not as a social, get-together, or whatever you want to call that, but as fathers who are connected. You know how remarkable it is when I meet people and they’ll say, “Did you know so-and-so’s sick?” or “We’re praying for them,” or “Let’s get together and pray for them,” or “Let’s pray for them right now.” There you have your fellowship, your, your, your immediately thinking, “What can we do in the Spirit of God together?” And that will never produce fleshly ideas, fleshly works, things of that nature.So remember, I told you, it’s going to be a different type of message because these instructions fortify. They’re so simple, but they fortify each listener and they fortify the church. Let me go back to something I said earlier about not being honest with myself. One of the worst, we’ll call it faith killers, is self-delusion. And you might say, “Well, how, how so? I don’t understand what you mean.” People who think they are above everything, people who think their faith is superior. I’ve met people like that. Have you met people like that? Their faith is superior. They attend the high holiness of whatever you whatchamacallit church.And they’ve been there for 50 years and they know every, every Bible verse that applies to you as nothing but a heathen vomited or something. And they’ll quote it to you too, all right? My point is, that if we say we have fellowship with one another, we are not delusional about ourselves. We are not deceiving ourselves. And I find, trust me in my experience, a lot of people in the church world are very delusional. They think that simply coming into the building, that’s their salvation. Or simply because they know me, I’m somehow, their ticket to heaven. It doesn’t work like that. You’ve got to, it’s, that’s between you and God. This is not a church that has some intermediary here.You are given the goods; you’ve got to work it out. So when we talk about this concept of fellowship, and there’s sharing in this, I’ve seen this many times even in this congregation. Somebody has been promoted. They’ve passed away, husband or wife, and people will come to the comfort, not come to socialize, come to the comfort of. That may be in the form of praying for the person without them even knowing it. That may be in the form of passing, saying a word to them, or sharing a Scripture with them. But it’s all rooted in Christ. It’s not rooted in social, “Hey, let’s grab a cup of coffee so you can feel better.” You can do that with anybody at any time. There’s nothing spiritual about that. So these are the things that I’m, I’m looking at and I’m focused on. Now, if we talk about, for example, comfort. Now we can comfort one another. We can understand the brotherhood of believers. I’ve said this before, When one hurts in the body, we all hurt.You know, too bad that that mindset hasn’t permeated to the degree that it should, because we would see the church be completely different. When you see somebody who’s suffering, yes, people call in prayer requests, We have teams of people that go in and they pray in the chapel. I read the messages, I pray, but I’m not talking about that type of togetherness. I’m talking about the togetherness that understands we are fighting a great foe on the outside. Now we can equally be destroyed from the inside if our faith isn’t strong, if our focus isn’t right. And this is what John actually; believe it or not, this is what he is making corrections for in this book.You might not think of it at first like this. Why? Because he goes from, for example, let me juxtapose them. We say, “We have fellowship with him and walk in darkness, we lie, and we do not the truth. But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanseth us from all sin.” So remember I’ve even taught on this word for “cleansing,” which we get our English word for “authorized” from. So staying connected in Christ, you are constantly, if you say, being kept, washed, cleansed. And there is a juxtaposition between “walking in darkness, lying, do not the truth,” versus trusting Christ, “walking in His light and being cleansed.” Then he says, “If we say we have no sin,” and I’ve met those people too, “we deceive ourselves, the truth is not in us. But if we confess,” so he’s juxtaposing, “if you say you have no sin, you deceive yourselves, the truth is not in us. But if we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.If we say that we have not sinned,” listen to what he says: “If we say we have not sinned,” it doesn’t say we’re liars, it says, “we make him a liar.” Now I want you to think about that for a second because God knows us. He knows our heart. He knows where we’ve been. So anybody that comes into this universe and says, “Nope, not me,” when God’s word specifically; and sorry to tell you this, but not just from Paul, from Isaiah, over and over again, the concept of sin is very, very clear. I’ve quoted it before, you should know it by heart, Romans 3:23, no one can say otherwise: “All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.” If you look at it from Isaiah, “All we like sheep have gone astray.We’ve turned each one toward his way. And our righteousness is as filthy rags.” There is no ability here to wiggle out of this if you will. So the important thing is, understanding, you’ve heard the phrase during COVID, “We’re all in this together.” But this is one where it’s true. Why? Based on our Adamic container and then everything we do in our lifetime, we are all of us, me, you, everybody in this room, anyone in the sound of my voice, born in the state of sinning flesh and then the sins that you commit during your lifetime.So anybody that says, “No,” again, think of; going back to “fellowship.” The fellowship with Him puts the light on you that reveals all the dirt. Stand in that light long enough; that’s Christ’s light. We’re in the darkness. It’s all going to come out. But if you’ve never stood in that light, you can be delusional or you can stand in that light and turn around, be pharisaical, and say, “Not me.” So believe it or not, every part of what he’s saying comes back to fellowship. It’s either fellowship with him or fellowship with one another. And I love the fact that you keep reading and you can see exactly how it’s almost like it’s a problem, a solution. Keep reading, “My little children, these things write I unto you, that ye sin not.” Here he goes again! Boy, Pastor John’s hung up on this “sin not” thing, right? “And if any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father,” that word “advocate,” the Greek word parakletos, the same word we have, we use for the “Comforter,” the Holy Spirit.“We have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ, the righteous: and he is the propitiation for our sins,” He is, the Greek word hilasmos, He is the “covering,” He is the removal, He is the washing, the cleansing; He does it all. So the question would be – and he says, “Not only for our sins but the sins of the whole world.” So the question would be, why would you not confess your sins if He’s faithful and just to forgive them? And you would not confess your sins to Him if you were a liar or if the truth wasn’t in you, because you’d recognize right away there is something called conviction that comes from the Holy Spirit that makes you, you on your own, our nature is not wired to come clean.The Holy Spirit has a way of bringing you under that conviction where you say, “I, I can’t take this for another minute. Bluh!” Right? Whatever that is, all right? So what we are looking at over and over again is the connection we have with Christ and with one another. And then he goes on to say, “Hereby we do know that we know him if we keep His commandments,” and he’s not talking about the law. “He that saith, I know him, and keepeth not his commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in Him.” Again, do you notice a pattern? He, “he deceives himself,” he, “the truth is not in him,” here again, “the truth is not in him.” So keeping His commandments, you’ve got to think back a little bit to what John wrote in John 14, 15, and 16 because if you remember, the question is asked to Jesus, “Which are the greatest commandments of all? Which is the greatest commandment of all?” And He says, “To love God with all your heart, soul, and mind, with every fiber of your being, and” to what? “Love one another.” There you go.Here is the fellowship with God and the fellowship with fellowman. So if you think about it, these are the commandments. Now there are other things that Jesus said, “Do this until I return,” speaking of the table of the Lord. There are, there are things that He did spell out and say these are things that essentially, for the people who are following Him, this is what you do. But John specifically referring to, “Keep not his commandments,” is referring to the thing I just referenced. And he says, “But whoso keepeth his word, in him verily is the love of God perfected: hereby we know that we are in him. He that saith he abideth in him ought himself also so to walk, even as he walked.” So again, sift it away. There’s a lot of words there. If you sift it enough, you’re going to see even the abiding principle, fellowship. It all comes back to, the union we have with God. Now if that fellowship is taken seriously, something else can happen, and that is the church, the church can always succumb to error. We’re humans touching the things of God.But if you think about it, what will keep the church on track? Let’s talk about it now. Let’s talk about people saying, “I think we should have a flag outside the church,” or, “I think we should have an emblem of this,” or, “We should be supporting that.” Now people who are keeping themselves in the love of God, which is what Jude said, “Keep yourselves in the love of God,” are constantly in communion with God, are going to look upon these things and say, “No.” “No, and hell no!” That is why I’m saying to you, you know, sometimes – I said this is more of a talk than a sermon – sometimes you need to just sift through the Scripture to see, “Wait a minute. There’s something already said that addresses this.” Pastors, including myself, we have one mission.See, I don’t know what’s wrong. I get letters from people saying, “Well, my pastor doesn’t teach the Bible anymore.” I don’t know what’s wrong with you. You were if you were called to teach out of this book, that is your calling. People are depending on you to feed them the word of God. There isn’t some choice. “Well, you know, it’s kind of boring now and I’ll, I’ll, I’ll choose to feed you with some other stuff like climate change.” Go chew on some ice, that’ll make you feel better. Here, look at it from a different direction. The prophet Amos asked the question, “Can two walk together except they are agreed?” And that is not like we understand, “We agree, we, we agree with each other,” but rather can two walk together except they agreed to have the mind of the Lord which comes from the fellowship we have with Him.That keeps the integrity of the church and the way, you surround yourself with like-minded people, which is very difficult to do, by the way, but if you do, you’ll find yourself, even if for a moment you are entertained or drifted somewhere, you’ll find that those are the people that might give you the good nudge to remind you of your fellowship with one another which is in Christ. So there are all these, what I’d call very good reasons to read this book with a different set of eyes because you begin to see how easy it is. If you keep reading, verse 7, “Brethren, I write no new commandment unto you, but an old commandment which ye have heard, which ye had from the beginning.The old commandment is the word which ye have heard from the beginning. Again, a new commandment I write unto you, which thing is true in him and you: because the darkness is past, and the true light now shineth. He that saith he is in the light, and hateth his brother, is in darkness even until now.” Again, there are all these juxtapositions, light and darkness, sin, confessing sin. So when he says here, “hateth his brother,” and “He that loveth his brother abideth in the light, and there is none occasion of stumbling in him. But he that hateth his brother is darkness, and walketh in darkness, and knoweth not whither he goeth, because the darkness hath blindeth his eyes.” So very interesting again and again, what happens in churches? You get people that come in, and people tend to do this, people gossip.People like to gossip. If they’re not gossiping, they like to criticize. Now imagine being on my end of things, see, I’ve got all these eyeballs looking at me, imagine being on my end of things, okay? That’s why I said I like to refer to the one-room classroom because imagine that people are sitting right in front of me right now saying, “How is this going to apply to me? , I came here needing healing. I need to be healed.” You’ve got other people saying, “I wonder when she’s going to start teaching with languages because I miss that.That’s more complex and that’s more, you know, high intellect.” But tell you what, maybe some of the church problems; not just in this church, but every church, are at the most basic fundamental level. They are not nestled in complexity. They are not nestled in great oratory skills. The problem with a lot of churches is people get bored or they start getting ideas of what the church should be, and how it ought to function, and they fall out of fellowship, both with me. Let me do this in a better order. With God first, they think they’re still in fellowship with God. I always said, “You know, if you think you can do better than me week in and week out, please write your name, your address, and your information and mail it in. And until then, keep your mouth shut,” because if you have to assume the responsibility that I have to assume, imagine having a restaurant where you’ve got to cater to hundreds of different taste buds, and some people like it spicy and some people like it salty, and some people don’t like salt at all.Now you’ve got all these minute details here, and there’s always somebody that has to be unhappy about something, right? My point is, if we have fellowship with Him and with one another in the truest sense, we find those simple truths and we apply them. And we start looking at ourselves. Instead of looking at the person back there, “Ah-ah,” we look at ourselves. Now that is the job of the Holy Spirit to help us to see ourselves aright, but you begin to see where things may not be as balanced in terms of fellowship. We may be leaning more on the flesh, and we talk about fellowship, it may be more friendship, but that’s not what I’m discussing today, and that’s and that’s not what will keep the church of Jesus Christ strong. Fellowship with Him, prayer I think I’ve kind of touched on that. Prayer is one of those where we get to – think about it this way. You’re sending your words up to Him. You’re also partaking. You’re partaking of His strength. You are partaking of His word, His will, His way. So it’s like putting this all together and for somebody who says, “Well, I, that’s not me, I’m too messed up.” Well, then go back to where it says, “If you confess your sins,” and please don’t do this whole, “Well, I read the book of James and James says we should talk to one another.” It’s very clear; James is the only person in the whole Bible that says that.Everybody else says, “Talk to God; don’t talk to me.” Talk to God. I’m to tell you don’t talk to me; talk to God about it. He’s the only one that can fix your problems. You, you can have my ear, and I can pray for you, but the problems that you need to be fixed require fellowship with Him. That’s pretty simple. Now I’m not talking about sickness, prayer, prayer requests, and things like that, but for the most part, what people tend to do. And when we are not honest with ourselves, and just hear me out, you read the opening of Romans, the first at least two chapters, people when they read that, some people will recoil. They say, “Oh, that’s, that’s just.. . .” But the reality is Paul was laying it out just as clearly as John is that sin is a, it’s in our blueprint. And if you think about Romans 7, “What I want to do I find myself not doing,” and visa versa, the idea is we are in a constant battle till the end over sin. You’re not going to go and sin no more, but you can be in fellowship with God and working it out and wrestling it out or fellowship with one another. That is, if I have agape for my brother or my sister, I’m able to say, “I’m sorry, you’re talking to me about adding a letter. We should have more inclusive. . .” I’m using that as an example, “but the Word already says all are welcome. Why do we need to do this?” That would be someone who’s got the mind of the Lord, who is in fellowship, not in maliciousness.And that’s why I said to you, if we understand this, this little book was written in the face of people coming in, penetrating the church and making all types of professions about things that were a lie and John called it exactly what it was. People who came in with the intent to make derision between parishioners, people who came in with the intent to make misleading statements that people might believe to lure them away and out of the church.Tell me that’s not what goes on or what’s going on in America. You see a lot of that. You may see a lot of people who seem to be worshiping together, but most pastors don’t want to talk about this because this requires some instruction. And the instruction is not; see, typical pastoral speech might be, “Everybody needs to get along.” That’s not what I’m saying. Everybody needs to be connected to Christ as Christians. You follow me as I follow Christ, you are in fellowship with one another, you’re in fellowship with Him, and the body can stay strong. It’s not going to be affected by what the world, the flesh, and the devil’s trying to put on it.So think about this. The other thing I want to talk, talk about here is John is emphasizing to his flock that we serve a God who forgives. Over and over he says, “If you say you have no sin,” and so forth. So what was going on here, wherever John is writing, that would make him repeatedly – there’s, there is a repetition here. The repetition is “we’re walking in the light, we’re no more in darkness, but if you say that you’re, you’re having fellowship with Him and you’re in, you’re in walking in darkness, you’re a liar, the truth isn’t in you. If you say thus and so; but the blood cleanses you,” and then he says, “If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, the truth is – but if we confess our sins,” so each one of these says the plague that hit this church was undoubtedly people coming in and usurping, being dishonest about the structure of the church, who Christ is, maybe even who John is, or the relation to one another.A church like that cannot stand. That’s not how the church overcomes. The church will always overcome when we stay connected and you lose that connection, the minute that connection is gone, the church is going to die. Period. Now if you keep going because he says some pretty good stuff here. If you keep going, “He that loveth his brother abideth in the light, and there is none occasion of stumbling in him. But he that hateth his brother is darkness; is in darkness, and walketh in darkness, and knoweth not whither he goeth because the darkness has blinded his eyes.” Now what’s interesting is that each of these sections is juxtaposed, good and bad, or problem and solution. It goes on to say, “I write unto you, little children because your sins are forgiven for his name’s sake. I write unto you, fathers because you have known him that is from the beginning. I write unto you, young men because ye have overcome the wicked one.I write unto you little children, because ye have known the Father. I have written unto you, fathers, because ye have known him that is from the beginning. I have written unto you, young men, because you are strong, and the word of God abideth in you, and ye have overcome the wicked one.” Think the whole time he’s talking, he’s trying to say, “These people stayed connected.” The rest of the people, usurpers or otherwise, I believe this is why he goes on to say, “Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him.” And that’s not saying that you can’t enjoy, but what you put first, what is the first preference on your list? And it comes back to being connected in fellowship with God.That will keep everything in balance. You know, the people that say, “Well, I just didn’t have time, to pray,” or, “I don’t have time to read.” You may want to make time. That’s how you’re going to, some, for some people, that’s how you’re going to stay in fellowship. For other people, I can tell you, they have what I call battlefield religion, which is they’re only in fellowship with God when the stuff’s hitting the fan when they need God.Otherwise, God’s an afterthought. When everything’s good, when the blessings come, there’s no going back and saying, “Lord, what did I do to deserve this, but thank You.” And again, it comes back to that connection in fellowship. And he says, “For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, the pride of life, is not of the Father, but it is of the world. And the world passeth away, and the lust thereof: but he that doeth the will of God abideth forever.” So now, let me ask you this question.If we are talking about this you want it from somebody else. Paul says in Ephesians 5, “We’re not to have fellowship with darkness.” Again, that’s the other side of that equation. So partaking with God can go a long way and be very spread out. As I said, if you’re going to look at what is the main problem in churches today, and I’m telling you, not that I’ve been to every church in America, but I can tell you it’s complacency. And the first complacency is not about the doing of things, it’s complacency in staying connected. That connection provides the spillover connection to one another. That fellowship connection I’m going to say it like this, it keeps you in check, and it keeps the church in check. When I say tough times are ahead, tough times are coming. There’s no doubt. How they will affect every one of us, I have no idea. And the only thing I can tell you is there are certain staples that if you adhere or abide by them, no matter what’s going on, no matter what, things in your universe around you may change, but this container here and all that’s within it will not be moved.And that is staying with that proper mindset. Now, John wrote to these people if you’re reading right, there was some type of tumult in the congregation. As I said, there were heresies and there was apostasy. What’s different than today? We’ve got all that stuff running rampant everywhere, and people that think that we should change the word of God, we should rewrite the Bible, we should remove the pronouns, we should, and just keep going.But the fact of the matter is for, at least, let’s talk about beyond the New Testament, 2,000 or 3,000 years, however long the entire book encompasses, no one has had a problem up until this recent time. Oh, there have been periodic groups here and there, but no one’s had a problem with being included or not included, and it used to be you’re either in the church of Jesus Christ or you’re not. It was, those were the choices. Now it’s like, “Well, let me decide, is my church inclusive enough and does my pastor wear enough colors, you know? Because that’s important. You have to, you have to look the part, right, to be inclusive. You’ve got to wear all the colors. And does the outside of the building say that announcement, you know, with all the colors on it too?” See, these are the things that in my mind are what have destroyed or are in the process of destroying the church in America, lack of the word of God, lack of the teaching of the word of God, and substitute that for entertainment and social issues.And then if you’re in an even Bible-based church, the lack of being connected with God and through that connection with one another, which keeps everything, I’m sorry to say it keeps everything in alignment. It keeps a brother or a sister in check. It keeps people from becoming judgmental, and critical. When you think about it, you’re able to put yourself in that other person’s shoes. You’re able to look at them with empathy, with compassion, with understanding. That all encompasses the word agape, to love one another, and that cannot happen because you will it to. The, we’ll call it the development of the brotherhood or the sisterhood within the body of Christ isn’t something that you work on. It’s something that when God places a new heart in you and a new mindset in you, you’re looking at people, the people that previously would have gone, “Oh God, get me out of here. I don’t want to see that person.” You’re now looking at them, you have compassion, you want to inquire that they’re okay and how they’re doing in the Lord.And these are the things that I’m talking about. This is what John was writing about. And it’s, I think it’s very important to understand something else. If you keep reading, he talks about, for example, eternal life. He talks about what, what’s separates a believer from a nonbeliever if you want to call it that. And then essentially, we’ll call it the miscellaneous part when he says, “Try the spirits.” A lot was going on here, and I think if you reread this book with the mindset, the modern mindset of being buffeted from every side, you recognize that sifting this away comes down to two things, and I keep repeating them, but there they are the fellowship that we have with Him and the fellowship that we have with one another.And with Him, we’re in the word. We’re able to see the errors. Now my job is not to go into somebody else’s universe of responsibility in some other church and point out their flaws or their errors. But if you are in the word, and if the word is guiding you, and if the word is a lamp under your feet, then you’re not walking in darkness, and you’re able to see all that is not or what is being perverted or what’s being omitted. And you’re able to take that and recognize – first place I have to focus on if these things are happening in my sphere is I need; I’m sorry, this is one time where I’m going to say it, I’ve got to look out for me and I’ve got to make sure I’m connected to God. You are to examine yourself to see that you’re in the faith.And if that faith connection is there, then you’re recognizing the, we’ll call it the straight-stick mindset that says, “I don’t – I’m not interested in all the crooked sticks. I’m not interested in the gimmicks. I don’t need entertainment.” We can go home for goodness’ sake. If you want entertainment, if you want music for an hour, go home and blast the music, your liking, your preference, your choice; not mine, because I’m not there, okay? But this is probably the most important, as simple as this is, it’s probably the most important, we’ll call it pastoral talk to ensure that as things change and as things maybe go a little bit strange in this land we call America and even within what I call the attacks upon the church, it’s important to recognize the body of believers that we are.And it doesn’t mean that I want to spend every waking hour with some of my brothers or sisters, not; that’s not the type of fellowship I’m talking about. But I am talking about staying connected to Him. And I guarantee you something, a reading, a rereading of 1 John will tell you something, this aged pastor was concerned for his congregation and the things that they were experiencing are not too different than the things that we are going through right now. When you think about that, it means, I’m going to take comfort in going back and rereading this book. Just in the first two chapters alone, there’s enough solid stuff, stuff there to say, “Okay, and even if you miss my main point, there’s a secondary point here.” Why is he talking so much about if a person sins, if a person sins? Do you think maybe they had lost their way in doctrine? That’s the other thing that happens when we get out of fellowship with God and with one another, we also get bent and warped out of doctrine.And it is the doctrine, sound doctrine that paves the way for us to walk. So all of these things tied together become an important component of keeping the body of Christ. It’s His church. He didn’t say, “I put you here and I leave you, I leave you to do whatever you want.” We still have a book to follow, a guide, if you will, through the Spirit and the Word. And through the Spirit and the Word are going to be the guide for this church, either until God takes me home or until Jesus comes. So for somebody here who came and said, “Well, you know, I was hoping that you might talk about something a little bit more complex.” This is probably one of the more complex subjects cloaked in very great simplicity: how to keep the church strong, united, and carefully and methodically.I’m not trying, to live your life for you, but I am trying to tell you, these are things that happened in 90, in the year 90, or somewhere between 90 and 100. What makes us think that we can navigate something better in the year 2023? Same problems, because the same problems exist today as they did back then, if not more convoluted. Just think of it that way. They might have been dealing with a handful of crazy people; we’ve got a whole nation of them, right? (Laughter.) So with that being said, I pray that you take this and don’t take this as something just to kind of, “Okay, I, I park that.” I want you to think about this because it is indeed the thing that will keep the church anchored, no matter what happens here, your connection with Him, your fellowship with Him, your partaking with Him in joy, in sorrow, in suffering; everything that you could think of, and then the fellowship with one another, which I call that the balancing act. You’re not to be someone else’s judge or someone else’s ruler, but we balance things out and we keep things focused on Him.That’s the recipe, at least right now I’m telling you, that’s the recipe to keep us strong, fortified, and a united body in Jesus’ name. That’s my message. (Applause.) You have been watching me, Pastor Melissa Scott, live from Glendale, California at Faith Center. If you would like to attend the service with us, on Sunday at 11 a.m., simply call 1-800-338-3030 to receive your pass. 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The Purpose of the Golden Altar and Table of Showbread

I think it's safe to say when we talk about prayer and pray without ceasing in the context of the altar, the same concepts, I don't think it necessarily means that you are to pray in the sense of, you know, I'm going to lock myself in a room and for, for ten hours I'm just going to not stop praying. If you want to do that that's your business, but the idea is that it is perpetual, it's continual. That means whatever I might have prayed for yesterday, I may come back again tomorrow and do the same thing and likewise and so on. And I think that's where people get a little bit nutty. They think taking it literally, which is I will, I will pray without ceasing, I will pray at all times. No one can pray at all times, okay. Just get, get that idea out of your head. ♪ ♪ So we've been studying the tabernacle in the wilderness, its particular; its dimensions, its material, colors, the structure itself, and the furniture therein. And today I want us to turn our attention to the table of showbread, the showbread, and if times permits, we will move onto the golden altar.

But here is what's important. So this table, which you'll find in a diversity of places, but in Exodus, specifically the mention for the building of the table, which is sometimes called “the table of showbread,” sometimes called “the pure table,” when eventually when we get to Solomon's temple it will be called the temple of; “the table of gold,” but again, made of acacia wood. If you remember I said to you there's a translation from the Septuagint, which is the Greek version of the Old Testament, and if you read the Septuagint version of these verses and passages, they call the translation of the acacia wood is “incorruptible wood.” And I think that's really pretty cool.

Always overlaid with pure gold; and the dimensions of the table, two cubits in length, and if you heard me explain the cubit, from the elbow approximately to the length of the, we'll call it the middle finger would have been a cubit, so two cubits in length and one cubit in breadth and one-and-a-half cubits in height. And as I've said, the numbers always mean something. And I've done enough on the numbers that you could probably go back into the other messages and see what those, if you don't know them, what the numbers symbolize. I've already explained the gold, referring to Christ's divinity and the acacia wood referring to His humanity, which He was both all at once. So I love that these pieces of furniture, except for the candlestick, which we saw, which was pure gold, I like that everything in here points to a description. Which, by the way, think about this: God could have just said, “Make everything out of gold.” They had enough, by the way. Don't think they didn't have enough; they had enough. Remember, at some point God says, “Tell them to stop bringing; we have too much.” Remember that? So it's not as though they couldn't have done it some other way.

This was God's design and this is why you read in the New Testament, “See to it that you build it exactly according to the pattern.” Why, because there was built into that pattern, we'll call them the shadows and types that reveal and point to Christ. So this table had two, what are referred to as crowns, separated by a border and four golden rings, one at each corner through which poles or “staves” would be put through in order to carry that table when it was time to move. I also want you to keep in mind; obviously they wandered in the wilderness for forty years, so I want you to keep in mind that everything that God did here, pretty interesting that God saw this is going to be a moving event, perpetually. So the fact that everything is incorporated into the design is, is pretty interesting, because you know, if you think about it, we humans would go, “Okay, let's build a table,” but we wouldn't think maybe of putting the rings on for the staves, because we don't; it would be an afterthought. God included all this in the design.

So what I like about this is if you're reading about the table itself, when it says it has two crowns, there are three pieces of furniture mentioned with crowns, and I think this is not an accident either. The ark of the covenant has what's referred to as “crowns” on it, the table of showbread, and the golden altar. And I need to say something here, because I hope I haven't confused people, who don't maybe have this down pat. The brasen altar, which is outside versus the golden altar of incense, which is what we're talking about; I'm moving towards that, which would have been on the, in the same realm, if you will, of the candlestick, in that same area. So three pieces of furniture that had crowns on them, and what's interesting about this is these three pieces of furniture at some point we might take a bird's-eye view, but having these crowns, I thought it interesting that the table, in fact, has what I would call a double crown on it. And I don't think it's an accident.

Obviously crowns in this case, at this point in time, can only have two references. One would be to the miter that the high priest would wear, which was referred to as a “holy crown,” and that obviously of a king. And if you think about it, Jesus fulfilled both the high priest and kingly role, so when you read about, for example, two crowns on one piece of furniture, it, to me, fulfills both of those roles. This is a lot of, as I said, type. We're looking at types, but you know, if you look at all the furniture it is not a mistake.

As I said, the numbers, for example, we're talking about four corners in this case of the table, which I've already said in numbers, four corners of the earth, like we have four seasons or four quarters. These numbers are incredibly important. The same thing, this table is described as having four feet. Luckily it has four and not two. You'll get that one later. Again, balance, representing what will be presented to the whole earth or what's available to the whole earth. So I love all of these examples in type. But the table itself would have twelve loaves of bread weekly, basically. So these twelve loaves would be baked and placed on the table every week, and at a certain set time during the week these loaves would be replaced. And we know from different parts of the Bible there's an explanation that once this bread basically has been replaced, the old bread can be consumed by the priests.

So it's almost as though everything in the tabernacle has a purpose. There's really no waste. And as I said, kind of interesting, if you go to the book of Leviticus; Leviticus, for example, explains in just a few verses about the showbread. Leviticus 24 says, “Thou shalt take the fine flour, bake twelve cakes thereof: two tenths deals shall be in one cake.” And you see, even that you might think, “Well, why is that important: 'two tenths deals shall be in one cake'?” I'll tell you in a minute. “Thou shalt set them in two rows, six on a row, upon the pure table before the LORD,” there it is. It's not called “the table of showbread,” but “the pure table,” right there. “Thou shalt put pure frankincense upon each row, that it may be on the bread for a memorial, even an offering made by fire unto the LORD. And every sabbath he shall set in order before the LORD continually, being taken from the children of Israel by an everlasting covenant. And it shall be Aaron's and his sons'; and they shall eat it in the holy place: for it is most holy unto him of the offerings of the LORD made by fire by a perpetual statute.” So it's kind of interesting this bread, baked every week, but the two tenths deal kind of got my attention, and why is that? Because if you read some of the other places where you find this “two tenth deal” for, for example the meal offering in the feast day of the sheaf of the firstfruits was to be two tenths deal of fine flour.

The wave offering, for example in the feast of Pentecost, the same thing: two tenths deal of flour. But the manna that was to be gathered on the sixth day of the week, you would actually end up with a double portion, because you had to gather twice as much, because you were not allowed to gather on a set day that was set aside where no gathering could occur. So I want you to think about this. It's equally interesting that the twelve loaves, inside each loaf basically would contain a double portion.

And that might not hit you right away, because the loaves are a little bit tricky to explain in their type, in their meaning, but I'll, hopefully I'll get to it. And then you come back to the understanding of the manna. And the manna has, I think, kind of baffled a lot of people. And I say that because, think it, think of it this way. God rains down this light bread, which the people, after they murmured that they were hungry, right, God rains down this light bread, the “what-cha-ma-call-it,” right, gives them instruction on how to gather, what basically what to do with it, and so forth. And one of the stranger things is when the instructions are given to gather up manna and put it in a pot that will be placed inside the ark, along with Aaron's rod that budded and the unbroken tables of stone, but what's strange is those, that manna that's placed inside the ark is, it's called something, we'll call it continuous or perpetually contained in the ark. And we'll say once the lid or the mercy seat was placed upon the ark, covered and not seen anymore.

And I've said this for many weeks now, with people asking, “Where's the ark?” When you read in the book of Revelation, and I believe it's in the second chapter, it talks about “To him that overcomes I will give to; to him I will give to eat of the hidden manna.” That's why I said to you be very careful to not exclude Scriptures that tell you that God had a purpose in taking away the ark. So think about that. While all of these mystery hunters out there think they're going to solve the problem and it will be an “Aha moment,” uh, okay. Knock yourselves out. So with that being said, I also read here about this frankincense that would be placed upon the loaves. And then of course, these loaves would be replenished weekly. Now, frankincense, there's kind of this shades of meaning. It can be representing holiness, righteousness, truth, even deity.

But if you recall of the gifts that were brought to the Christ child, it was gold, frankincense, and myrrh. And we know that there in those offerings we see a type again. The gold obviously was representing His divinity or His deity, the myrrh in preparation for His death, and the frankincense we can kind of ambiguously say either sweet savor, sweet aroma to God, but also His righteousness. There's a whole━there's kind of that. So applied to the bread it becomes, well, what would be the purpose if the bread, by the way, is going to be consumed by the priests? But it's, it is consecrated bread, in some places called “consecrated bread,” other places called “hallowed bread.” So why would God have them put this frankincense on there? And I think a lot of times there's, there's all these little nifty things we can read about, but the frankincense could also serve as a form of preservative.

So imagine, you know what happens when you leave something out, especially bread. What happens after a week of it being exposed? It's nice and hard, right. So I'm assuming that the frankincense actually had a preservative-type action with the bread. There's something else that's equally interesting about the bread. We read that the bread was pierced. And I think that's interesting, because the bread had to be pierced in order for it to rise.

Do I need to explain that one? That's pretty━okay, but I'm going to do it for the sake of the people that say, “Okay, well what? What the hell did she just say?” So if the bread, remember this I said it's tricky, because the bread is actually an offering out of God's provision from, basically from God, the people take it, and then the people bring it back as an offering to God, right. But so it has multiple, we'll call it, it could have at least two or three meanings or two or three interpretations.

So the bread being pieced, as I said, if we call Christ, as He referred to Himself as “the bread from heaven,” or “the bread of life”" that Bread of life also had to be pierced so it could rise. I love these little━they're very simple, but they're very clear. It's almost like God's saying, “Can you hear Me now?” right. All right, the measurements of the table, as I've already said, the height is one-and-a-half cubits tall, the same as the ark of the covenant. And this is important because the table being the same height as the ark, where the bread would be placed, puts it on the same level, if you will, as the mercy seat.

So the redemptive act where the blood would be sprinkled and applied would carry the same value in height as the bread placed upon the table. And this kind of is important to understand, because the bread may also be considered representing communion or fellowship with God. So if you think about it, the redemptive work of Christ and communion with Christ kind of go on the same level as the measurements depict. It's one of those things that if you're moving around you see that every detail here points to something. God didn't waste a crumb; pardon the pun. All right, there is I said, I mentioned a crown around the table; two crowns, in fact. And I love this, but be very careful about how you interpret what I'm about to say, because I know a lot of people will go far with this one. The crown around the table may have had a practical purpose, and that practical purpose may have been from keeping the bread from slipping off the table. Now if you go back to what I said about our two crowns and the full fulfillment of high priest and king being fulfilled in Christ, then Christ does help us, but unlike the bread that doesn't have free will, we do.

So we can slip and fall, if you will, off of God's table. All right, don't make the mistake. This is, again, one of those things denominationally speaking that some believe “once saved, always saved.” I do not preach that and do not believe that. I have seen more people in my lifetime, some very impressive, brilliant minds for the Lord, they were incredible, they made incredible contributions in ministry that fell away.

And then the people that believe in the doctrine of eternal salvation, “once saved, always saved” will say, “Well, they were never saved in the first place.” That's pretty hard to actually remedy when you look at some of the writings of some of these people who spent thirty and forty years of their life studying the book, preaching the word, and for whatever the events that happened fell away. So I, I don't think that this crown around the table, we can't go too far, as I said, because I don't believe in “once saved, always saved,” but it did have a purpose. And I'd say if you want to take this and make it something that could be applied, looking to the crowns, the high priest and king, can help you.

It doesn't mean it's going to stop you from slipping, but it can help you, and I, I'm just going to leave that there. The bread, sometimes called “the bread of faces,” the bread that would be placed before God, bread, lechem, and pânîym, so it's interesting. The bread of faces, if you translate the word “showbread,” just the word “show” from our English going back into the Hebrew is “to say,” or “to declare.” So it's, it's kind of a strange thing.

I'm not even sure why or how that came to be, but that's what it is. Sometimes also, as I said, referred to as “the continual bread,” and I like that. Remember that each one of these in proper context, the continual bread, which would mean the bread never ceases, even though the manna stopped the bread never ceased. If the bread for us is Christ, He is everlasting and ever liveth, so you can take that how you want. If you remember, there is a passage where David is fleeing for his live and runs in. He finds the priest and he's asking for two things: food and weapons.

Do you remember that? Okay, when he asks the priest, the priest says, “I only have hallowed bread here; not common bread.” And I like the fact that just in that one distinction it lets us know this is no ordinary bread. The priest did not see it as ordinary. Even though it was bread, it was not considered common or ordinary. And again, if you're going to keep going back to these references of Christ, who is the bread of life, no ordinary situation here in Christ either. So all of these, as I said, have great meaning if you're going to comb through the furniture here. The bread, as I said, represents both an offering; and this is where it get complicated and I'm going to try and do this as clearly as I can, but it's difficult, because the bread is, yes, an offering from the people to God, but let me take a little pause right here.

There are too many places specifically in the first five books of the Bible that talk about offerings and giving that explain something that if we all just kind of took a minute to process this, there would be no confusion here. Even that offering from the people to God came out of God's provision to the people, and if you think about it, every single offering that God along the way asked, whether; it didn't matter, it all came out of the provisions that God provided. This is what is frustrating to me as, as a preacher, but also as a person of God. I don't understand this.

And maybe someday, someone will come and argue and enlighten me on this, but I don't understand. If it's as clear as day here that God multiple times over gave to the people, in order that they could give back and participate in worship. What does that tell you about our response? I don't care what you've been taught; what does that tell you about our responsibility, first in recognizing who the Provider is, where the provisions come from, and why we need to be givers? It really kind of; you know, think about this. Have you ever given something to somebody, and we're just human flesh pots, but have you ever given something to somebody and they don't even say, “Thank you.” They don't even━it's like someone who's entitled.

They don't even recognize the gift that was just given to them. And you don't do it because you're expecting “Thank you” or recognition. Now put that on steroids. God, who has given us our faculties, our abilities, the breath in our lung, and yet; lungs, and yet people will still make this an argument. And I think probably this year for me has been the most crystal clear on this subject. It's not discussable. It never was discussable. For all the people out there, for all of you out there who still play this game of “Well, I don't think it's necessary,” or whatever it is, you're just deceiving yourself, because if I'm showing you the patterns that God put down here, not just the patterns of Christ and everything that points to Christ, but also how we are to relate to God. And even, remember I told you a couple of weeks ago, the approach to the tabernacle, those white curtains, right; think about this. Before you came into the church you might have been thinking, you might have been, you know, wondering about God, but then if you're like me, I stayed away from the church.

And I stayed away from the church, A) because I left the church long ago and out of, from a myriad number of reasons. But I also in my mind thought I couldn't possibly be accepted into the mix. So those white curtains still exist today. They're for any person who hasn't come to know the door that you must go through or the sacrifice that was made or the laver of cleansing; all of these things help us, including the structure in which God organized it. See, too many people focus on this idea of the tithe, and not enough focus is given here on who gave to be able to make you a giver. Think about that. Cain and Abel; who, who provided the offering for them? Who? And you keep going and you recognize all the way through it, every juncture it's the same thing. So what happens when we come before God? And I'm just going to say it like this, because the Bible talks about coming before God empty-handed.

What does it say? It says, “I completely deny that You ever provided for me in the first place.” Sorry, but if you can't see that you may not have the Spirit of God in you, because that's exactly, without telling somebody how much you need to give, but rather what's underneath it all. What is in the person's heart? Failure to recognize that, you can't━it doesn't matter what you take out of your pockets afterwards, it's all going to be works of the flesh, an endeavor to check a box and not see how God has laid this out crystal clear. So just put a little period right there, because that tells you my take.

Again, every week I'm going to maybe hammer on this. My take on giving is not some optional ideology or let's describe a percentage. Let's start with the right first place here. Every place here we're looking at, so the, the bread placed on the table, as I said, the oil in the lamps. And yes, there are two distinct types of oil; it doesn't matter. Again, the people had to gather it and bring it and produce it. So you've got enough there, all of the material that was required to build the tabernacle: all the threads, all the gold, all the silver; all of it, where did it come from? You could say, “Well, they came out of Egypt and they basically looted the Egyptians as God told them to do.” That's a good obedience right there. I mean, you know, we, we got people thinking they're coming out of Egypt in San Francisco and Sacramento all day long. That might; you'll get that one later.

No. All right, I was meaning in the looting part there, okay. So don't say, “Oh, well, it's biblical! I just went into whatever place to rip it off because it's biblical.” No, this is━but I'm, what I'm trying to show you is even there God made a provision and said, “Go get it from these people,” and there was a reason for them. Obviously, God didn't━think about this. God said, “Go get it from these people and take it from them as you go.” Why? If God wasn't planning to have this, all of what they took be a part of a pattern to build, then they'd just be a bunch of rich, heavy laden wanderers in the desert and with no point.

So again, this kind━I, I hope I've killed that one and it's clear. So I said the bread is complicated, because the bread, as I said, as an offering the bread can also be a representation, as I said, of Christ as I described that the bread being pierced in order for it to rise. So there, there could be multiple ways to interpret this, and I'm not going to get dogmatic over which one to go with.

They both embody the concept that I'm trying to convey. Twelve: the number of loaves that would be placed there every week, and replaced weekly; this number, as I've pointed out reoccurs over and over again. You've got the twelve tribes, you've got the, the twelve disciples. So twelve in this case, the number of divine government, which kind of is the pattern we're going to see spread throughout. Some people have labeled twelve as apostolic fulfill-ness or fullness, if you will. I, I'm just going to say I prefer to say divine government. It, it takes care of everything here. The number twelve also is carried into the heavenly city with its gates, if you think about it, twelve is everywhere in the Bible; twelve foundations, twelve precious stones, so not an accident in terms of the number.

I love the fact, by the way, that if you look at some of the references of twelve, like the twelve stones that Joshua took where the waters were basically arrested so that they could cross over, or the twelve stones of Elijah. Again, probably more of a mystery to me, the twelve stones of Elijah, because we're dealing with 1 Kings 17 or 18, where we're just starting to see the fracture that is beginning to occur within the kingdoms, and yet God didn't say, “Pick up two and ten.” He said, “Twelve”" there were twelve stones.

So again, with all of the separation we know that will occur, God's language is always going to be united; multiple parts, but united within. And I like that too. There's a mention in the table that might not make sense, and it says that there was a “border of a handbreadth between.” So I want you to think about this. Think about the table itself, and then almost a table within a table, so that you can understand what the border might be. And that border of a handbreadth, this is a tricky one, because no one is quite sure. And trust me; I went to some of my Hebrew sources. No one is quite sure what to make of the proper interpretation of this word, because it's so ambiguous. But I'm going to go for how I understand it, almost as the word connotes “fortress, safe place, enclosure,” a “handbreadth.” So I'm going to say that that concept basically separates. In other words, there is a ledge that is probably designed for the placing of utensils.

The table came with spoons and bowls and other things, so probably that area might have been to put some of those items on. That would have been enough space for it. But I'd like to say that the interior, what we'd call the interior border or that interior walled-off section was a way of separating. And I like this because it, it reminds me of a very strange, it's a very strange analogy I'm going to tell you right away. But if you remember, in the book of Ezekiel, God's describing the city, and He's taking Ezekiel through every part, and He says once He's finished in one area He takes him outside, and He mentions, in the Hebrew━you won't see it in English, but it's the same concept of a hand, hand's breadth to denote separation from other things coming in contact with other things.

So I think that's interesting that God put that there on the table. And whether that is to suggest the bread, if that is possible, being separated out, which it was, it wasn't common bread, or whether that is to represent those people who could approach the table, who were separated out, the high priests. But in any case, it denotes a form of separation, which I think it's like saying this bread is specific and not everyone is invited to partake and to touch, okay. And you might say, “Well, that's kind of unfair.” Well, whoever said it was fair? All right, I think I've probably covered enough on that to talk about, so why I say the separation of the bread is because within all of these pieces of furniture you're also going to find different concepts theologically that we talk about in the New Testament.

So I believe that part of the design of the table, you know, I just used the word “separation” or to keep out would represent what we would call in the New Testament “sanctification,” a separating apart. So kind of just put that as an important thing. And then I love this. In the realm of the tabernacle God basically says, I read it to you that Aaron and his sons, they shall eat it in the holy place. So God made a provision for the people who would be serving and doing the work of basically everything that was contained within that holy place.

Now we don't have a designated place anymore, but I love the fact that right there it basically says God provided. You know, bread is always interpreted as “the staff of life.” God provided for those serving Him the ability to partake. Now take yourselves right into the New Testament. We are a royal priesthood. There is no priests; Jesus is our high priest. But again, this comes back to provision.

And I believe this wholeheartedly. Someone who serves the Lord; and don't just say, “Oh, are you talking about being a pastor?” No, I'm talking about anyone who serves the Lord; you are a servant in your own home. You are a servant unto the Lord when you come here and you do whatever you do, if you do it in the name of the Lord that the Lord provides. And this is another one of these built-in messages that says to me when it says, “And Aaron and his sons, they shall eat it in the holy place,” as if to explain to us that anyone who's going to be committed. You know, there's another Scripture that says, “I have never seen his righteous ones begging bread.” Well, I've seen people begging for bread, hungry, okay. And that doesn't mean, no, they didn't serve. But I'm talking about I have yet to see God abandon the hand or the mouth of someone who is committed to serving, why, because God knows what's in your heart.

That's not to say that God's going to put out fillet mignon for you every night, but it's simply along the same lines of the Lord knows exactly what we need. And if bread is the staff of life, I'm going to go beyond the provisions of food to talk about the provisions of the total person, which come to us in the form of Christ. Again, everywhere you turn it's like mirrors that keep reflecting Christ throughout this whole tabernacle.

It's inescapable. And that's what I love about these studies. You cannot, if you're reading the same Bible I'm reading you cannot escape these types. And they tell me something. They over and over and even deeply or deeper every single week tell me God did not make━there were no accidents here like, “Oops, you know, I just, I decided I wanted this.” No, they're very deliberate. When I talk about these things, and I just mentioned the vessels that would be used in accompaniment with the table, the vessels were set apart for a specific purpose. You'd never see the flagons or the covers or the spoons being used for something else. They were specifically used for service at that table and nowhere else. And that tells me just like each and every one of us as vessels, we have a unique purpose.

That doesn't mean that we can't do multiple things or multitask, but we have a unique purpose in God's plan. And again, I, I think the concept, the question that's asked, you know, “Could God set a table in the wilderness?” Well, of course He did. And this paints the picture rather clearly, not only was this a table of fellowship and communion, but if you think about it, from the very beginning where they would have to go and gather the manna, I want you to imagine what that must have been like, all right, because God gives a specific command for how much they can gather and when they can gather and how they can gather it. So from start to finish God provided opportunities for the people of God to participate. Now I'm going to stop right there and ask you a question. Why is it that, fast forward into the New Testament church world and people think, “There's nothing for me to do”? I'm not talking about works.

I'm just saying that if you look even at the pattern of how everybody participated, each had their own. I said this last week. Some people were responsible for gathering the olives to make the oil, some people were charged with gathering the manna, some people were charged with the craftsmanship, but everybody did something that brought the whole camp to be involved. So think about these things, because I think it's pretty important. Now, when it came time to move the table, like other pieces of furniture, God provided the covering. And it's the same covering that I described, more or less. You've got the table that would be covered with a blue cloth that would be underneath it all. And of course, I've already blue, the color of eternity. The dishes, spoons, and bowls had a scarlet covering on them or red covering on them.

And the final covering would be badger skin. And I always like this because even the last time I mentioned this, people were like, “What the hell is that?” But think of it as the ugliest nondescript covering that you could have; nothing to look at. And this is what I love. To the natural eye, to the person in the flesh, if they saw the badger skin it, it would almost probably be repulsive. They would say, “What? What? How could that be holy?” because, you think about it, look at the complete opposite here. The complete opposite when people think of “holy” they think of opulence and they think of grandiose.

They think of the Catholic Church with its pomp and splendor and all the ornate-ness, right? You don't think badger skin. Badger skin is like, “Yuck, that's repulsive” to the natural man, to the natural eye. But someone who can look at this and really understand the meanings of these coverings, you're seeing what we'd call the, the, what the Bible refers to in Isaiah, speaking of Christ: there was no beauty in Him. So one has to look at the covering, and if it is with the eyes of the Spirit, you can see beyond the badger skin down to the blue and see the eternal purpose. But someone who doesn't have the Spirit is going to look at this and say, “What is this? This is like a junkyard with all kinds of stuff being transported, covered up with all kinds of”━it's like going to Grandma's house with all these different coverings on everything, right? What the heck? All right, so I think I've, I've given you enough of the picture of this table and its, its purpose.

I'm going to move on to the golden altar of incense, which was also in the holy place, as I realize if I keep going at this speed we will never get out of the tabernacle. So this piece once more, acacia wood overlaid with pure gold, sometimes called “the altar of gold before the throne.” There is that reference, by the way, in Revelation 8:3. I want you to ask yourself the question, why are there references to articles of furniture or concepts that were in the Pentateuch that appear in the book of Revelation if it's not because God is saying, “That was a shadow; I'm showing you what the actual substance, the tangible substance is now”? That's what will be revealed, the real thing.

So as I said, the altar before the Lord, also called “the altar of sweet incense,” it's dimensions, one cubit square and two cubits high. And I think this is pretty interesting myself, because that right there, one cubit square, means it was a square. It was square square. And I don't, again, I don't think this is an accident. If this golden altar, being probably the tallest or greatest in height of the table, of the ark of the covenant, or whatnot, the interesting thing here is that you have the shape. The shape brings me back to something pretty important, the, the city that is described as foursquare, the city that's yet to be, the heavenly city of Jerusalem described as foursquare. And again, the interesting relationship to the other pieces of furniture, what this particular altar, we call it the altar of incense; incense would be burned upon it, if you will. That altar represents for us what we would call another form of communion, prayers ascending to God, in the New Testament form if you will.

This golden altar had horns on each corner, a crown molding of sorts, gold around the edges with two rings of gold underneath what I'm calling the “crown molding,” which would kind of be a decorative something that goes around the exterior square. This altar would be found just before the veil. And I want to make sure that I make this really, really clear, because I know there'll be people that will be confused about this. So the difference between the brasen altar, which is further back, go back towards the entrance, all right. And sometimes I think people confuse the brasen altar with the golden altar. So the brasen altar is where the sacrifice for the sinner was offered. We call that judgment, we'd call that everything that you want to look at in terms of the act required to redeem or to forgive the sins of the sinner.

And you cannot, you would not be able to approach the altar of incense without having made or seen the sacrifice. So in translation for us, you come through the door to see the sacrificial and finished work of Christ, and when you are able to see, understand, recognize, no, and it doesn't have to be perfectly, but with that focus, then you approach and the incense of prayers can ascend. You know, people say, “Well, can I just pray?” Well, who are you praying to? So there, there is a pattern with purpose here. It's not just simply, “Okay, I'm going to go through the motions and check the box.” There was actually a method to this. Also, once a year on the great Day of Atonement, Yom Kippur, they'd also apply blood onto this altar as well. In fact, I think everything got blood-covered. The blood obviously being a picture of this sacrifice accomplished, and so the foundation of worship therefore and praise was going back behind what was already done, the shed blood that was already shed.

So again, none of this would have━do you realize if I wasn't giving you the other side, which is showing you Christ, it just kind of sounds like, “Well, what's the purpose?” because you'd have to repeat this every year, and some of this you'd have to repeat every day or every week. What's the point? So again, that's why I said to you, you cannot read this without seeing that God actually had a vision to carry out the fullness of His Son, but these all point in that direction. The incense, this is another interesting one, made of four sweet spices in equal amounts would be blended and burned, produced fragrant odors or perfume.

One of these spices, the Hebrew word nâtâph, “to drop,” or “to distill,” a balm, which suggests fragrant outpouring of a life yielded. It's kind of interesting if you look up that word. The second one is a little bit more strange, because the second ingredient would be, would come from a shell or a scale that would be ground down into a fine powder. They'd find this shell around the Red Sea. It sounds a little bit weird to grind down a shell, but when finely ground it would produce a very fragrant perfume. Some scholars have equated the, this kind of incense, the full compound of the incense with a complete dedication or devotion. I'm not sure that I want to go that far, but it all has meaning. The next ingredient was a sap-like substance called, “galbanum,” which is purported to have medicinal properties. And finally frankincense, which you can see frankincense would have a place almost, almost throughout the whole tabernacle.

Our English word refers to its fast and free-burning qualities. Frankincense as a medicine or antidote to poison in some cases, equally like that, it's kind of interesting, but it could also be used if you remember I talked about it being put on the bread as preservative. It could also be used in the context of purity. So remember that this consecration would also be like the memorial of the meat offering. So all of these ingredients, they are, it's not just one time that they appear. They appear in different places and I believe they all have a part, an important in; we'll call it the recipe and the formulation that God put together. So you put all these ingredients together; they're blended for one singular purpose to be put on the altar of incense, and then obviously it is something that ascends.

Now we are not burning incense, but that altar does represent our place of prayer, the prayers going up. And Christ, who is our high priest, would pass into the holiest place of all to obtain that eternal redemption for us. So it's, again, nothing can be done, it's weird, like everything is connected. You can't even start understanding all of the furniture, unless you come through the door; sorry, okay. And once you come through the door, that one singular door that brings you in from, from being outside of those white curtains, once you come through the door and you begin to see this furniture there must be an understanding of the purpose of the why.

And for example, if one was just going to stand at the laver of cleansing, we'd say, “Well,” as I pointed this out, we're washed and cleansed by the word of God. Each one of these has a connection. And the more you look at this━I'm just giving you a very generic picture. You want to knock yourself out, if you can read Hebrew or you have access to a Hebrew Old Testament, look up some of these that words I've talked about just in reference and you see, wow, there, there are deeper meanings to these words.

I'm trying to keep this generic, because I realize that I'm describing furniture, which you might say, “Well, a message on furniture; okay, interesting.” As I mentioned earlier, I believe the coals that came off of the altar of burnt offering were used on the golden altar as well. And God was very particular about this. If you remember the episode that happened with Aaron's sons Nadab and Abihu, remember where they took false fire, right. God basically warned them, by the way, it wasn't like they just stumbled upon and said, “Oh, let's try this.” God said, “Do not use strange fire,” meaning if there was a fire that was perpetually burning, that is from where you get the coals or whatever for whatever you need; you don't go and get it elsewhere. So I like the fact that God's very specific, even right done to the fire, when He says, “This is what I want you to do and this is how I want you to do it.” Of course, their disobedience and their blatant disregard for God's instructions and God's ways obviously cost them their life.

You have a similar scenario that plays out with Korah and the rebellion of Korah; not so much over fire, but the idea is still there, direct denial of God's chosen way, direct denial of God's way of approach. And of course, the same thing with Korah and Korah's band, it cost them their life. And my only lament is why God is not opening the earth up nowadays and swallowing people up, I don't know, but 250 men that followed Korah were consumed, completely consumed. So I think it's safe to say with God obedience is better than sacrifice. Let's leave that one alone. But what's unmistakable here about this altar is if, as I said, if the brasen altar was where satisfaction was made to the holiness of God for the sake of the sinner, then the prayers being offered by the saint are what are seen essentially in the golden altar of incense, accepted, by the way, because of the sacrifice that was already done. So I like to put it this way. If the first altar, the brasen altar flesh is sacrificed, here at the golden altar of incense you have basically the soul; if the flesh has been sacrificed the soul is communing with God.

So those are the two pictures that I like to use as a New Testament appropriation. I have one final thought here on, on the altar, on the golden altar, which is Aaron was instructed to offer a perpetual incense upon it. In the New Testament we are told by Paul to “pray without ceasing.” And this becomes a stumbling block for a lot of people, because the idea I think a lot of people think is, “What does that mean? Should I lock myself in a room and I, I pray and I pray and I pray and I pray and I pray, and I keep praying? Or I pray redundantly? Or I pray from a card? Or”━no, it doesn't mean that. The picture that has been depicted here, and I want you to think about this, if the offeror, in this case Aaron, was told to offer perpetual incense, then think about this.

What he brought, whatever those four ingredients were, had to be basically consumed before he would bring and replenish more. So I think it's safe to say when we talk about prayer and pray without ceasing in the context of the altar, the same concepts, I don't think it necessarily means that you are to pray in the sense of, you know, I'm going to lock myself in a room and for, for ten hours I'm just going to not stop praying. If you want to do that that's your business, but the idea is that is perpetual, it's continual. That means whatever I might have prayed for yesterday, I may come back again tomorrow and do the same thing and likewise and so on. And I think that's where people get a little bit nutty.

They think taking it literally, which is I will, I will pray without ceasing, I will pray at all times. No one can pray at all times, okay. Just get, get that idea out of your head. Not even the people who profess to pray all the time pray all the time. At some point you've got stop for some bodily functions here, okay, and I don't think that while you stop for that you're equally praying at the same time. Just save it for somebody who might believe you. All right, so I just want to say this about everything, because I've kind of done a very more generic approach here.

But these concepts, the table of showbread and the golden altar of incense, they do represent something to me that I think is desperately needed in this particular time, and that's called communion with God. And this got me to thinking a little bit, especially with Easter coming up, and I'll just tell you straightway in advance, because I was having a conversation with somebody last week, and I said, “You know, we have enough Resurrection, proofs of the Resurrection, different approaches to the Resurrection, many, many years of, of these messages.” But the application, it dawned on me; I think a lot of people don't actually know how to apply the resurrected life into their lives.

And that actually requires communion and fellowship with God to understand that. So when we look at these items you don't look at the table of showbread and the altar of incense without, as I just finished mentioning without all that came before. And recognizing just even how you came into the tabernacle, how the way of approach explains that without recognizing and understanding; you don't have to be a mathematician and understand formulas, but you do have to look at the big picture to recognize your standing of who you are before God, which as a sinner. We're all sinners, there's not one person in the sound of my voice who isn't.

We are sinners being basically washed and cleansed by the final and finished sacrifice of Christ, washed and cleansed by the word as He described in John 15. But all of this kind of comes down to a bigger picture, which is how do we understand this in fellowship and communion? Because it is in the fellowship and communion that the relationship is developed or built, it is a relationship. And you can't have the relationship just simply built on what I just described, the table and the altar of incense without recognizing the sacrifice, the way of approach, the way in, what walled you out, what kept you away.

And that that wall of partition has been broken down. But all of that is to say that when I do get around to, I believe next week is Easter, it may not be a traditional proofs of the Resurrection, because it dawned on me in all the years, my 18 going on 19 and probably 30 years of Dr. Scott's ministry here, I don't think I've heard a message on why it matters to understand about that resurrected life and how to apply it, because there begins the concept. See, I think a lot of people come in and it becomes it's an obligation for one day, “Okay, I've got to go because I know this is kind of a commemorative thing.

I go because, and here's all the reasons.” But there all the wrong reasons, because if you come to understand the proofs, and the proofs properly applied to your life bring something incredible to the believer that without that you may just say, “Well, it's enough for me to know, because Christ resurrected sits at the center.” But the lack of understanding, in my opinion, brings about a lack of communion, a lack of fellowship, and a lack of worship. And those things that are lacking keep the distance, in my opinion, between the believer and God. So hopefully we will, I'll get to that next week and I'll talk to you about that next week, but what I want to say in wrapping up; I'm not done in the tabernacle by any means. But I wanted to keep this simple because, as I said, showing each measurement or each color or each dimension is it, it's there, so you can go back and read the descriptions of the table and read it for yourself or the descriptions of the altar of incense and read it for yourself.

And understand now with the understanding of what is, what is a cubit and what the numbers mean or that the materials mean. But go back and read it, as I've said for many weeks now, looking at through the eyes of God in Christ, looking at how amazing God is to paint this picture. And the picture as I said, wasn't painted for a few people. That's why, again the numbers matter.

This four corners of the earth, to all ends of the earth; it wasn't designed for a singular people. This is the mistake that people get into when they say, “Well, this was given,” and I've heard people say this, “This, this was given to the Jewish people.” No, the Jewish people didn't exist at this time. I've already gone through that, and please, if you haven't listened to my message do not argue with me, do not post on my social media page. If you have not listened that means you are still ignorant as to what this book; not me, not my opinions; what this book says about what I just said. This was given as a pattern of what God would do for the whole earth. And when you come to see that it just makes God and His plan of salvation all the more amazing, because He said, “I don't need for people to keep coming to the door perpetually and slaughtering an animal anymore. I chose My only begotten Son,” and He gave His life that you and I may have life eternal.

And that life eternal is something so powerful in, especially in this day and age where people are vacillating in fear and confusion and everything else. This resurrected life says, “No matter what's going on, God has a plan.” He had it here, He had it here, He had it here, He has it here at the end of the book, and He's got it here and He's got it there. And if you just look it will bring something else to your life: peace. And without that I don't know how you're going to get along in this world, in this crazy lunatic world right now. So with all that being said, I hope that you can take what I've said today and without it being too detailed, very generic, to say there is definitely reason to go back, reread and study, and see the beauty of Christ in the Old Testament. That's my message. You have been watching me, Pastor Melissa Scott, live from Glendale, California at Faith Center. If you would like to attend the service with us, Sunday morning at 11am, simply call 1-800-338-3030 to receive your pass.

If you'd like more teaching and you would like to go straight to our website, the address is www.PastorMelissaScott.com.

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Zac Poonen – How Do You Stay on Fire for the Lord? – New

#Zac #Poonen – How Do You Stay on Fire for the Lord? – New

Ahava Jerusalem – Property Portal Network, MLS – Real Estate, Castles, Properties for Sale and Properties for Rent in Israel and International

@ahavajerusalem.com #ahavajerusalemAbout Zac Poonen: Zac Poonen was formerly an Indian Naval Officer who has been serving the Lord in India for nearly 50 years as a Bible-teacher. He has responsibility for a number of churches in India and abroad.He has written more than 25 books and numerous articles in English – which have been translated into many Indian and foreign languages. His messages are available on audio CDs and video DVDs.Like the other elders in CFC, Zac Poonen also supports himself and his family through “tent-making” and does not receive any salary for his services. He does not receive any royalty for any of his books, CDs or DVDs, that are published by Christian Fellowship Centre, Bangalore.http://cfcindia.com © 2014 Christian Fellowship Church, Bangalore, India. All Rights Reserved.

Zac Poonen – Are You Offended?

What does the Bible teach about head-covering for women in the church meetings?– If we ignore any command of God in Scripture (however small) we will suffer some eternal loss (Rev.22:19).– Those who cancel (or teach against) the smallest command of Scripture will be called “the least in the kingdom of heaven” (as Jesus said in Matt.5:19).– God tests our honesty in the way in which we deal with such verses of Scripture. He does not see whether we understand everything in His Word, but He does see if we are honest in dealing with His Word. The Lord says, “To this one I will look, to him who is humble and contrite of spirit, and who trembles at My word” (Isa.66:2).There are at least three reasons given in the New Testament why a #woman should cover her head when she #prays or #prophesies in the meetings of the #church:First: The Bible says, “A man should NOT cover his head.” . and the reason given is: “. because he is the image and glory of God”. In contrast, we are told, “but the woman is the glory of man” (1 Cor.11:7). The glory of man must be covered in the church . and since woman is the glory of man, she testifies to this fact by covering her head. This is the plain and simple meaning of this verse.Second: The Bible says, “A woman’s long hair is her glory” (1 Cor.11:15). The glory of the woman also must be covered in the church, just like the glory of man. And so she must cover her head which has the glory of her long hair. Almost all women are conscious that their long hair is a major part of what makes them look attractive . and that is why even among those women who do put a covering on their heads, most of them cover only a part of their hair!! If a woman does not want to cover her head, then the only alternative that the New Testament offers is to remove that glory, by shaving her head completely: “If a woman does not cover her head, let her also have her hair cut off; but if it is disgraceful for a woman to have her hair cut off or her head shaved, let her cover her head” (1 Cor.11:6).Third: The Bible says: “Man was not created for the woman’s sake, but woman for the man’s sake. Therefore the woman ought to have a symbol of authority on her head, because of the angels” (1 Cor.11:10). The head-covering symbolizes the fact that a woman accepts her God-appointed role as having been created “for man’s sake” as his helper and therefore her willingness to be submissive to male authority – whether as a wife to her husband, or as a daughter to her father, or as a sister in the church to the church-elders. It is significant that the disappearance of the head-covering from women in Western churches (on a large scale) coincided with the time that the movement for “Women’s Liberation” (a phrase used in a book in 1949) began to spread in Western countries . about 60 years ago. The “angels” mentioned in this verse could refer either to the fallen angels or to the angels in heaven. So it could either be a reminder to women to bear in mind that the fallen angels fell because they were not submissive to authority. Or it could mean “A woman should wear a covering on her head as a sign that she is under man’s authority – a fact for all the angels (in heaven) to notice and rejoice in” (as The Living Bible paraphrases that verse).1 Corinthians 11:16 says that every church that is a church of God, will insist on this head covering for women when they pray or prophesy. The Holy Spirit recognized that 20 centuries later this would become a controversial issue; and so He made Paul to state (in this same verse) that if anyone was going to be argumentative about this matter, he would not argue with such a person. He would just allow that person to continue on in his/her disobedience and inconsistency.“If anyone is truly determined to do God’s will, he/she will definitely know whether this teaching is from God” (Jn.7:17).Those who have ears to hear, let them hear.Amen.

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@ahavajerusalem.com #ahavajerusalemAbout Zac Poonen: Zac Poonen was formerly an Indian Naval Officer who has been serving the Lord in India for nearly 50 years as a Bible-teacher. He has responsibility for a number of churches in India and abroad.He has written more than 25 books and numerous articles in English – which have been translated into many Indian and foreign languages. His messages are available on audio CDs and video DVDs.Like the other elders in CFC, Zac Poonen also supports himself and his family through “tent-making” and does not receive any salary for his services. He does not receive any royalty for any of his books, CDs or DVDs, that are published by Christian Fellowship Centre, Bangalore.© 2014 Christian Fellowship Church, Bangalore, India. All Rights Reserved.

Zac Poonen – For Those Who Have Failed | Inspirational

#ZacPoonen – For Those Who Have #Failed | #Inspirational Like 👍 & Subscribe – @Ahava Jerusalem #home #family #parents #children #sermon #JesusChrist #God #Faith #Hope #Love #sermon #God #Jesus #Christian #Future #people #ahavajerusalem #Truth #Bible #Peace #Kingdom #HolySpirit #overcominglife #worship #grace #mercy #future #eternity More on: http://ahavajerusalem.orgThere are many brothers and sisters who feel that because they have sinned and failed God at some time in their past lives, therefore they cannot fulfill God’s perfect plan for their lives now.Let us look at what the Scriptures has to say on this matter, and not lean on our own understanding or our sense of logic.Notice first of all, how the Bible begins.In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth (Gen. 1:1). And the heavens and the earth must have been perfect when God created them, for nothing imperfect or incomplete can ever come forth from His hand.But some of the angels whom He had created fell away, and this is described for us in Isaiah 14:11-15 and Ezekiel 28:13-18. It was then that the earth came into the condition described in Gen. 1:2, “formless, empty and dark”The rest of Gen. 1 describes how God worked on that shapeless, empty, dark mass and made something so beautiful out of it that He Himself declared it to be “very good” (Gen. 1:31). We read in Genesis 1:2, 3 that the Spirit of God moved over the earth, and God spoke His Word – and this was what made the difference.What is the message in that for us today?Just this that no matter how much we may have failed or how much we may have made a mess of things, God can still make something glorious out of our lives.God had a perfect plan for the heavens and the earth when he created them. But this plan had to be set aside because of Lucifer’s failure. But God remade the heavens and the earth and still produced something very good out of it.Now consider what happened next.God made Adam and Eve and started all over again. God must have had a perfect plan for them too, which obviously did not include their eating of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. But they did eat of the forbidden tree and frustrated God’s original plan for them – whatever the plan may have been.Logic would now tell us that they could not fulfill God’s perfect plan any longer. Yet we see that when God came to meet them in the garden, He does not tell them that they would now have to live only on His second best for the rest of their lives. No. He promises them in Genesis 3:15 that the seed of the woman would bruise the head of the serpent. That was a promise of Christ’s dying for the sins of the world and overcoming satan on Calvary. More on: http://www.cfcindia.com/article/gods-perfect-plan-for-those-who-have-failed

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About Zac Poonen: Zac Poonen was formerly an Indian Naval Officer who has been serving the Lord in India for nearly 50 years as a Bible-teacher. He has responsibility for a number of churches in India and abroad.He has written more than 25 books and numerous articles in English – which have been translated into many Indian and foreign languages. His messages are available on audio CDs and video DVDs.Like the other elders in CFC, Zac Poonen also supports himself and his family through “tent-making” and does not receive any salary for his services. He does not receive any royalty for any of his books, CDs or DVDs, that are published by Christian Fellowship Centre, Bangalore. With Permission from www.cfcindia.com “Copyright – Zac Poonen” http://cfcindia.com © 2014 Christian Fellowship Church, Bangalore, India. All Rights Reserved.

Zac Poonen – Do All speak in tongues?

Zac Poonen – Do all speak in tongues?

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Zac Poonen | Q&A – I am tempted to look at women when they pass by me, is that a sin?

#ZacPoonen – I am #tempted to look at #women when they pass by me, is that a #sin? Like 👍 & Subscribe – @Ahava Jerusalem #home #family #parents #children #sermon #JesusChrist #God #Faith #Hope #Love #sermon #God #Jesus #Christian #Future #people #ahavajerusalem #Truth #Bible #Peace #Kingdom #HolySpirit #overcominglife #sexualsin #lust #attraction More on: http://ahavajerusalem.orgAbout Zac Poonen: Zac Poonen was formerly an Indian Naval Officer who has been serving the Lord in India for nearly 50 years as a Bible-teacher. He has responsibility for a number of churches in India and abroad.He has written more than 25 books and numerous articles in English – which have been translated into many Indian and foreign languages. His messages are available on audio CDs and video DVDs.Like the other elders in CFC, Zac Poonen also supports himself and his family through “tent-making” and does not receive any salary for his services. He does not receive any royalty for any of his books, CDs or DVDs, that are published by Christian Fellowship Centre, Bangalore. With Permission from www.cfcindia.com “Copyright – Zac Poonen” http://cfcindia.com © 2014 Christian Fellowship Church, Bangalore, India. All Rights Reserved.

Zac Poonen – How Do You Worship in Spirit and in Truth? – New

#Zac #Poonen – How Do You #Worship in #Spirit and in #Truth? – New

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Zac Poonen – Pride is More Dangerous than Adultery

#Zac #Poonen – #Pride is More #Dangerous than #AdulteryIn Obadiah Chapter 1, Obadiah spoke about God’s judgment on Edom. Edom is a type of our flesh. So this prophecy symbolises the destruction of the flesh. It speaks here about the pride of Edom. “You are proud because you live in those high, inaccessible cliffs. `Who can ever reach us way up here!’ you boast. Don’t fool yourselves! Though you soar as high as eagles, and build your nest among the stars, I will bring you plummeting down, says the Lord.” (v.3,4).The flesh always seeks to exalt itself. But God is determined to destroy that pride completely. If thieves came at night and robbed you they would not take everything. But here, “every nook and cranny will be searched and robbed, and every treasure found and taken” (v.6). The application of this for us is that every little corner that is called “flesh” in us, every lust of the flesh, will be totally destroyed and overcome by the power of the Spirit.Edom was being punished because of the violence that they did to their close relatives, Israel, because in the time of Israel’s greatest need, when they were being taken captive, they “deserted Israel in their time of need and stood aloof, refusing to lift a finger to help them when invaders carried off their wealth” (v.10,11). They had acted as if they too were Israel’s enemies. Edom did nothing to help Israel.There are sins of commission as well as sins of omission. Often when we think of sin, we think only of the sins that have been committed. Notice, in the story of the Good Samaritan, that the priest and Levite did not commit any sin. They did not beat up the wounded man. Their sin was that they did not lift a finger to help that needy man. Do we realise that not helping a needy person is a sin? That is a sin of omission. Edom did NOT do what they should have done – and the Lord took it seriously. Edom’s second sin was that they gloated over Israel’s capture (v.12). When something bad happens to somebody you don’t like, do you feel happy? That is sin. We are not to rejoice over someone else’s misfortune. But that was not all. Edom attacked those helpless Israelites and cut them down at the crossroads (v.14). They cooperated with Israel’s enemies. Finally, the Lord spoke about the restoration of Israel. Almost all the prophets spoke about restoration. “Jerusalem will become a refuge for those who escape” one day (v.17). It will be a holy place. And the people of Israel will come back to reclaim their inheritance. At that time Israel will become a flaming fire for the Lord, and Edom a field of dry stubble. “Deliverers will come to Jerusalem and rule all Edom (the flesh). And the Lord shall be King!”(v.21). Today, God has called us to be those deliverers, proclaiming to God’s backslidden people, “Behold your King,” and inviting them to come back to Him.What was the cause of Edom’s fall? “The pride of your heart has deceived you” (v.3). When we are proud, we open ourselves to spiritual deception – because pride is the very nature of Satan, the deceiver. The moment you become proud of something – good looks, intelligence, spirituality, Bible knowledge, anything – immediately the devil holds your hand and says, “You and I are in fellowship now.” Jesus Christ, on the other hand, was the humblest Man that walked on earth; and the moment you humble yourself, you come into fellowship with Him.Pride is more dangerous than adultery because adultery is an outward sin – and sins that are outward and obvious are not as serious as sins that are hidden. Obadiah warns those who are complacent in their pride that they are deceived. Let us learn from his brief exhortation to be concerned about those around us, who are in captivity to their flesh, and to proclaim to them that Jesus can deliver them completely.© 2014 Christian Fellowship Church, Bangalore, India. All Rights Reserved.

Zac Poonen – Should Sisters Work in Public Jobs? – New

Zac Poonen – Should Sisters Work in Public Jobs?

Ahava Jerusalem – Property Portal Network, MLS – Real Estate, Castles, Properties for Sale and Properties for Rent in Israel and International

@ahavajerusalem.com #ahavajerusalemAbout Zac Poonen: Zac Poonen was formerly an Indian Naval Officer who has been serving the Lord in India for nearly 50 years as a Bible-teacher. He has responsibility for a number of churches in India and abroad.He has written more than 25 books and numerous articles in English – which have been translated into many Indian and foreign languages. His messages are available on audio CDs and video DVDs.Like the other elders in CFC, Zac Poonen also supports himself and his family through “tent-making” and does not receive any salary for his services. He does not receive any royalty for any of his books, CDs or DVDs, that are published by Christian Fellowship Centre, Bangalore. Posted With Permission from www.cfcindia.com “Copyright – Zac Poonen” http://cfcindia.com © 2014 Christian Fellowship Church, Bangalore, India. All Rights Reserved.

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