Still feeling the wonderful effects of yesterday’s meeting.  Between that, and the wonderful readings: Montanus and Father and Son, I feel so richly blessed.  Asking Jesus to let it go deep.  What you said yesterday keeps ringing in my heart, “if what you feel is from  God , and you recognize it is God, then that is knowing God” I love that!  That’s what I want more than anything.  To know God and be more like Him!  Walking over to the meeting yesterday morning, I was talking to Jesus.  I told him I don’t want what I’m saying to be just words and yet my heart is far from you.  What you sent yesterday (the blog “Let Both Grow Together” https://pastorjohnshouse.blogspot.com/2024/04/let-both-grow-together.html) about the wheat and the tares is always so sobering to me.  The thought of being so blessed in the middle of this body and me just being a tare makes me give pause and ask Jesus to not let me get by with anything!

But then to get to the meeting and feel the feelings and recognize they weren’t me.  I sat there thinking about knowing God and it just overwhelmed me.  Understanding the value of what it means to have the Spirit of God on the inside of us and recognizing it’s God is what all God’s children need!  Amen!

Lee Ann

Tell us what you think:

https://x.com/PastorJohnHouse/status/1783115808085819861

 

Hi Pastor John,

Doris and I are amazed at the book that you were able to write about Montanus from the little information of one liners and two liners that you were able to find that the scholars had written about him. It reminds me of the night that I woke up and asked Jesus how you were able to write a book with so little information?

When I asked, He responded with “he has had a measuring stick.”

I replied with a question, “With a measuring stick”?

 He said, “Yes”. There was a pause and He said, “the truth”.

 I pondered over His reply and the thought came to me that you understood Paul’s gospel of Uncircumcision and this was your measuring stick.  From this you were able to determine that Montanus understood Paul’s gospel, and that’s what he believed and taught.  This is why the apostate fathers, and Christianity hated him so much and destroyed his writings because it was contrary to what they were teaching.  We love these notes and what you have written about Montanus and we are very thankful that Jesus has given the understanding us to believe it.

Randell and Doris 

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Hi Pastor John,

I am working in Virginia today, and I spent the morning thinking on the reading from God Had a Son before Mary Did and what I felt last night.

I came into the meeting so exhausted.  We have both been working very hard to do things to the new house so that we can move in.  As I sat there last night, I could feel the rest that we were talking about.  The real rest and the refreshing that comes from Jesus.  I had to close my eyes and just breathe it in.  I have spent this whole drive to Virginia letting it soak in how merciful and true what Jesus said he would give us really is.  It is one thing to read about it but it is so wonderful to sit in that room and experience it as we go.  I remember what living in this world did to me before Jesus came for me. I understand to some degree what Solomon felt and what he was so desperately longing for. 

In the part called “The Spirit or the Flesh”, you quoted Paul: “But the fruit of God’s nature is love, joy, peace, patience, gentleness, kindness, faith, meekness, self control.  Against such, there is no law.”  Just reading that felt so good.  Jesus once told me in 2012 that there was only the spirit and the flesh.  He put that in my heart in the very beginning.  Just that title stirs my heart.

And when we read “Filled Not Touched”, I felt the Amen!  I thought of my recent visit with a dear relative of mine and some feelings I had after that visit.  Just a touch is not enough.  Jesus did not die for anyone to stop at just a touch. 

I used to wonder if I would ever know how true the truth is, like Jerry talked about knowing. It brings tears to my eyes to realize somewhere along the way Jesus has been making sure I do.  Somewhere along the way, he has put it in my heart.

I looked up some verses on rest, thinking about what I wanted to find, but what stood out to me most was these verses:

Isaiah 28:12 – “ . . to whom He said, ‘This is the rest with which you will cause the weary one to rest, and, This is the refreshing.  Yet, they would not listen.’”

Prov. 6:10 – “A little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to rest . . .

Prov. 21:16  – “The one who wanders out of the way of understanding shall find rest in the congregation of the dead.

I am so thankful for God’s rest!

Beth D.

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John,

Last night’s reading was very good, as others have already said.  I think this chapter is my favorite, although that could change as we continue.  Almost every sentence is a Pearl.  I particularly like the section on the saints’ warfare with the flesh. You have spoken on this matter many times over the years, but I think what you have written in Section 2 brings the point home more clearly.

This paragraph stood out to me:

“God’s life makes us foreigners to our old selves, our own human nature, and as new creatures in Christ, the warfare of God’s children on earth is a warfare against who they used to be and who their fleshly nature tells them they still are. As it was with Jesus, our warfare is not against any worldly power; it is a battle against the spirits of this age, including our own, to remain steadfast in who we are after we are created as God’s children in Christ (Eph. 6:12).”

It reminds me of Natalie’s testimony, “You can dig that old girl up, but you can’t make her live!”

Thank you for all the work you have put into this book.  Like you have said, it is an encyclopedia of spiritual truth.

Tom 

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John,

The online article on “The Irvingites and the Gift of Tongues” was very interesting.  Makes you want to know more about this guy!  I thought it was interesting how, at the very beginning of the article, the author describes Irving as “setting the foundation for the modern tongues movement”, as if speaking in tongues now was some new thing that Irving started. It’s the “Christian movement” that is the odd thing that quenched the Spirit which spoke in tongues in the first place!

It’s also pretty neat how this came up today.  Just last night, I was wanting to read what was said about Jesus ascending to heaven in Acts 1.  I decided to continue on into Acts 2, and I feel like Jesus let me see something about that scene more clearly.

The holy Ghost was first poured out on the disciples in the upper room in verses 2-4.  What I had never noticed before was that they began to speak in tongues in that upper room, AND THEN the sound was heard and people from different nations and languages began to hear them speaking in their own languages.  The disciples would likely not have been speaking in different foreign languages amongst themselves in the upper room, because they already spoke the same language.  It wasn’t until they spilled out into the street and multitudes of people could then see and hear them that the speaking in tongues “morphed” into (or included) speaking in the different languages of the people that were there.

Am I seeing that correctly?  This was pretty exciting to me, but I want to make sure I’m thinking of it rightly.  There are so many today who excuse speaking in tongues as “not for today”, because it was only for the day of Pentecost, so the gospel could be heard and understood by everyone there. But it looks like the disciples began speaking in tongues BEFORE they began speaking in foreign (human) languages.

Vince

=======

Thanks, Vince.  I had never noticed that, either.  There would have been no point in the disciples speaking in languages men could understand until they were outside, where men were.  It may be that the followers of Jesus on Pentecost morning were speaking in languages unknown on earth until they went outside, overpowered by the gift of God.

Pastor John

For those who read this email, here is the URL concerning the Spirit-filled saints in Scotland and England whom Christians slandered as “Irvingites”:

https://charlesasullivan.com/1826/the-irvingites-and-the-gift-of-tongues

 

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The reading last night was absolutely wonderful.  You were answering questions in my heart that I didn’t even know I had.  I’ll be watching it again today.  It is pure and good and wonderful food to my soul.

I’m glad we are taking it slowly.  Thank you for being who Jesus made you.

Donna N.

Good morning!

I was reading the Lessons from chapter 2 of the Father and Son book* that you sent out and I had to stop and write how much I love this.  Do you know what I love most, Pastor John?  I love that I know how true it is.

Lesson #25:  The souls of those who possess God’s kind of life have already been delivered from death (Jn. 5:24; 1Jn. 3:14), and the fear of it (Heb. 2:14–15).

In 2011, when Jesus really started changing my heart and my feelings, before I got the holy ghost, he did something really big for me.  I had a terror-like fear of dying.  I used to say it was an unnatural fear, but I feel like it was the most natural thing about me now.  I should have been terrified of death.

One day in 2011, Jesus took me flying with him and he took away that fear of death. In that experience that day, I felt the oneness with him, and he put it in me that I wouldn’t even think of this world or any loved ones when I was with him.  It is hard to describe, but it is just in there now.  And that terrible fear has never been back.

I don’t know what my flesh will feel in that moment, but my spirit still feels what Jesus put in me that day.

At the end of that experience that day, Jesus let go of my hand and dropped me back to earth.  And, oh, how I longed for him.  I did not want to be here.  I wanted to be back with Jesus.  I hurt for weeks after that, and I still think about what it felt like to be with him all the time.

I have told of that experience before, and didn’t write it all out again now because I didn’t want to make this too long for you.  But wow, when I read Lesson #25 and really think about that experience, coupled with the understanding of what it really means to be His and be delivered from death AND the fear of it, the truth of that Lesson takes my breath away.

And number 35, look what Jesus did!  I couldn’t stop sinning.  I wanted to, but I couldn’t be different.  Look what Jesus did!

Lesson #35: In Christ, we are freed from a sinful nature and the curse of death which attends it (Rom. 7:24–25).

I know this may be a bit of a ramble, but it is too good for me not to write you.  You are always the first person I want to share my “isn’t God amazing” moments with. Jesus did that too!

I watched and felt my mama leave this world, and it felt awful.  I also watched and felt Natalie and Lou Lou leave this world, and I feel comfort knowing they are home with Jesus.  It makes me smile to think of them laughing with Jesus and each other.

It makes number 36, even sweeter!

This is good stuff! 

Lesson #36. When our liberty from death is proved in the resurrection, how greatly we will rejoice!

Beth D.

*(The Father and Son book, also known as God Had a Son before Mary Did is currently under revision. The original may be found at the link below.)

https://goingtojesus.com/gtj_books.html?tname=fands

Pastor John,

I loved the reading last night!  Afterwards I reread through chapter one.  There is so much just in the first 12 pages!  In that one chapter we get to see the relationship and the love the Father and Son have for each other, and that they want God’s children to have.  The truth in those pages completely eliminates the Trinity and Oneness doctrines.  It is simple and loving, and all I keep thinking is, “Thank you, Jesus, that you let me know this, and to love this.”

I am so excited and looking forward to reading the rest of The Father and Son book!

Michelle

(Pastor John’s book, The Father and the Son, is currently under revision. The original version may be found at the link below.) 

https://goingtojesus.com/gtj_books.html?tname=fands