Chapter 27: Important Encouragements

12/16/1990

ALL that has been said so far, as you can see, does not have to do with meetings, per se, as much as it has to do with a way of Life. I want you to see a way of living for Christ that obliterates the shadows and lukewarmness in our own personal lives, and then ultimately in gatherings.

It’s not our “Kingdom” — it’s His. King Jesus reserves the right to run His Meeting. And He’s not running it by “absentee vote” via man’s contradictory interpretations of a Book that He has written.

“As many as are led by the Spirit are Sons of God.”

In context: “Creation itself GROANS in eager anticipation for the Sons of God to be manifested!” The two verses couldn’t be more connected!

As for the “little things” that have everything to do with our potential and capacity for the future? Get practical! Christianity, as manifested in the Son, could not have been more tangible and practical! For starters, please get out of your rooms and homes, each of you, and consider who you can jump over and see. “Where is God’s Action tonight?!” Do not keep to yourself, your hobbies — or television, your electronics. (I know that you surely do not waste God’s time in this way, with such self-indulgence, but, believe it or not, there will be some who may eventually happen across these chronicles who will still be enslaved or engrossed in such banal and wasteful things as television.)

Go! Go! Go! Force your way into a productive life for Christ Jesus (Mat.11:12). Be DEVOTED, “lay siege,” as the Greek says in Acts 2:42, to fellowship, and to the breaking of bread, and to the apostles’ teaching, and to prayer. Go out and “forcefully enter the Kingdom.” Beat down people’s doors;80 just get out there and do it. Again, please don’t (if you are reading this and have been unknowingly sucked into the world system) vegetate in front of a mental pacifier, the trojan horse of a television set or electronics or “I’m tired,” or anything else you may have replaced True Life with. If it’s bad seed you’re sowing, don’t kid yourself, “Be not deceived, God is not mocked;” you’ll pay the price. Somebody said, in the Kingdom, “payday doesn’t always come on Friday, but it always comes.” If you spend your time in any other way than sowing good seed, even if it’s just “neutral” seed, you’ll pay the price eventually. (Farmers who don’t sow seed know that they get weeds for free.) You’ll be left in the dust of the people who have decided to “pull out the stops.”

Conclusion: Let’s make a difference on this earth before we leave it! I hope you’re all committed to that task and are not willing to leave this planet without considerable evidence that you have been here. It’s the will of the Father. “This is to the Father’s glory, that you bear much fruit…fruit that will last” (John 15). It’s to the Father’s glory. It is His idea that we bear much fruit, fruit that will last. It’s to His glory and it makes a difference. He cares whether we build with gold, silver, and precious stones that last and that will be refined, or whether we build with wood, hay and stubble which will be burnt up (1Cor.3:9-15). He cares. He wants us to make a difference on the earth. “Come follow me,” He said. “I’ll make you fishers of men.” And the Father is still calling out to us: “You will change men’s destinies. You’ll change everything around you just like my Son did, because the same Spirit who lived in Him and rose Him from the dead now lives in you. A man who is filled with the Spirit of Jesus, will make a difference. If a woman is filled and brimming with the Spirit of Jesus, she will bear much fruit — fruit that will last.” Let’s make a difference on this earth before we leave it. We don’t want to be “some neat church.” We want to tear down the gates of hell and break satan’s back. Jesus said we could, and He wants us to in a very real and practical way, greater works than even He did. Let’s be a Holy Nation, a people, a “vast army” (Ezek. 37) for Him. Go after it!

And the People of God said…“AMEN!”

Will You Follow Me?

If you want to be a follower of mine

You must leave self behind

You must take up your cross and come with Me

If you fear for your own safety, you are lost

But take up your cross

For My sake and you will find true life

Chorus:

Will you follow Me?

It will cost more than you think

Can you drink the cup that I drink?

Will you follow Me?

A servant only shares the portion of his Lord

You can be assured

Men will hate you as they’ve hated Me

The time is coming when they’ll think they do

God’s will by killing you

But he who’s faithful to the end is saved

(Chorus)

Living water welling up from deep within

Forgiveness of your sin

The tree of life to eat from as you wish

A hundred times more than you’ll ever lose

My gift to those who choose

To reject the trinkets of this world

Will you follow Me?

More blessings for those who believe

Than you even can conceive!

Will you follow Me?

— Tim

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Footnotes

80 Not just “hanging out” at someone’s house making small talk and calling that “encouraging one another.” Not a “christian fat farm” (1Tim.5:13) — but a place where warfare with the Enemy is waged, and we “strengthen one another’s hand in God.” Back

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