Pastor John,
I want to tell about something that has stood out to me from this morning’s reading.
In the last paragraph on page 8, you stated, “When Jesus sent messages to the seven messengers, or pastors, of the seven remaining assemblies in Asia, he sent them to men who were pastors in God’s sight over groups who were Assemblies of believers in God’s sight. He sent no messages to the many assemblies in the province of Asia who had forsaken Paul and turned from the Faith”.
After reading this, I realized that a message from God, hearing from God, was evidence that God was with a group of believers.
It is apparent that God did not immediately destroy those groups of saints that had “forsaken Paul and turned from the Faith.” And it appears that God did not put a stumbling block in the way of their gathering in the name of his son Jesus. But what He did do was cease from communicating words of Life to them, His words: instruction to their souls that would lead them to the salvation that only God can give.
God becoming quiet was a death sentence imposed upon those saints that had turned away from Paul. For without hearing from God, how could they possibly please Him?
Many years ago, there was a man that was a part of this work in the Lord. He then left it (and us) to go his own way. When he left, he left with all of the knowledge and all of the understanding that we had been blessed with, up to that point. He understood when a person is born again, and when and where the sacrifice of Christ occurred. He knew that there has only ever been one baptism (baptism of Spirit) for us Gentiles, and he understood that “he who endures to the end…shall be saved”. He left our little group of saints understanding and confessing these revelations that had been given to you, Pastor John, and to your father, preacher Clark, by God. And the man hasn’t moved forward from that place in all of these 20 plus years. I have seen his work in the Lord, as it is available on the internet. He is in the same place of understanding now that we all were then, when he forsook us two decades ago. But God is still speaking to His people! And He has been speaking all this time!
Immense growth has taken place. More truth from God is known, more revelations have been given, more of God’s heart revealed. Where are these things in that man’s work?
The bread that we were given 25 years ago was perfect, but God has fed his people everyday since then. Won’t we be required to answer to God for not having a belly full of that bread on judgment day?
I understand better now what you mean, brother John, when you say that we will never stop growing in the knowledge of God. And that we are either moving forward or we are backsliding; there is no “sitting still”, as God is always moving us forward by his word; he is always feeding us and speaking to us if he is indeed still with us.
Hearing from God is not an option; it is Life. It is the New Covenant! We cannot be saved without it, all the way to the end.
I looked up those 7 messages to the 7 pastors of the congregations. Not one of those messages from God is for the purpose of saying, “I am finished with you, and you are without hope.” Every message is to encourage the pastor there to steer his congregation back into the perfect and available will of God.
How blessed are we that we are really hearing from the Lord? What does it mean that God is still communicating with our little portion of the body of Christ? We have hope! God is with us! To communicate correction or to communicate praise, either way, He is communicating with us!
It makes me think that a man should run to wherever the word of God is most abundant, and flee from where it is not. And in any case, he should get still and do nothing – save for repenting and praying if God was speaking and has gotten quiet.
Jerry