Hey Pastor John,

I’ve been thinking about how sweet it was this morning being there with everyone.  I love godly conversations!

A few things Leeann said stood out to me and helped me so much!

First, she said your spiritual condition is going to influence people around you, good or bad, whether you know it or not, whether you try to or not.

Regarding the “GCC Stories”*, she said she saw that God is always moving chess pieces to get us where we need to be, and when you look back on it, it builds faith!  We can just relax; God’s got it!

What a way to start your day!  Love this sweet life!

Michelle

* The Pioneer Tract Society – Burlington, NC

Good morning,

I just had to share this with you.  I just wrote you about my experience Pastor John, but Amy and I talked about it yesterday.  I read the tract, “Stand Still in Jordan”* again and this just jumped out at me.  God is so good!  This just makes my heart jump for joy!  I feel like Jesus is saying, “Now Michelle, I have you where I want you.  Do not fear, trust me, and rest where you are.”  I just feel that all over me!  Whew…this is just so good!

From the tract:

“Now, my Reader, when the winds howl over your Jordan, and the floods come, do you become nervous?  Do fear, doubt, and unbelief take away what little peace you do have?  We read in 1John 4:18, “There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear, for fear has to do with punishment, and he who fears has not been perfected in love.” Child of God, can’t you perceive that there is perfume in those storms of yours, perfume coming from the flowers on the eternal shore?  Can’t you see Christ, our High Priest, stepping down into the raging torrent of life’s voyage and with bruised feet wading out into the waters for you?  Oh, how many need to catch a glimpse of this and get ready!

“Many floods would flow themselves out without harming us if we thoroughly understood the meaning of the promise of Isaiah 43:2: “When you pass through the waters, I will be with you, and through the rivers, they shall not overflow you.”  How many times have we given up and failed to win a great victory, when only a few more moments would have ended the fury of turbulent Jordan!

“Let us not fail to notice the word ‘rest’, as used here.  The feet of the priests had to ‘rest’ in the waters before the crossing could get under way.  Beloved, are you too restless or nervous for God to manifest Himself mightily to you?  Would you like to know the calmness of resting in the swelling streams of life?  If so, God will show you how.  He can pile the flood up in a heap.”

Michelle

* Going to Jesus.com Tracts – Stand Still in Jordan

Good morning,

I was reading in God Had A Son before Mary Did* this morning and this was really good to me.  It made me think of talking lately about not getting caught up in politics.  Our hope, our faith, our trust is not in Trump running again or another ” good man” being placed in office.  Our hope, our faith, our trust is in God’s Son, our King. There is nothing more dependable out there, and nothing more dependable coming, than Jesus.

It felt good to read this and thank Jesus for giving us real hope, and bringing our hearts out of the world, out of Christianity, out of our ways, and into His.  I really thank him because he made our hearts want him as our King.

Here is the excerpt:

Israel’s First Self-Willed Institution: A Kingdom

They did not understand that their demand for a king amounted to a demand for something more dependable than God (an impossibility), not just more dependable than the men and women God sent.  Paul said that the stories written in the Old Testament were written so that New Testament believers could learn from them (Rom. 15:4).  However, New Testament believers have failed to heed Israel’s bad example of demanding an institution.  Israel’s example is a warning to us that if pushed to do it, God will allow His people to reject Him and to form an institution for themselves instead.  If God’s people will not follow His lead, God will back away and let them choose their own leaders, formulate their own doctrines, and set their own standards of conduct and worship.  The Father will not force Himself on His children. But at what price do we drive Him away?

Beth D.

* Going to Jesus.com – God Had A Son Before Mary Did

Hi Pastor John,

I hope your trip to Louisville is going well. 

I wanted to write about Wednesday night meeting. I’m so thankful for that meeting. Testifying about what the Lord has done for me felt so good.  Jesus did something for me to testify.  It was so easy!  I actually felt comfortable and at one point, while standing there said to myself, “I’m enjoying this!  I like testifying!” 

That’s incredible to me because formerly, it seemed so hard, and I would get incredibly nervous.  But this time, I felt like something had changed.  And I’m so thankful for that. I want to never stop testifying!  I want to speak my heart, so I am known to the body.

Brother Jimmy said how he enjoyed my testimony and how he felt me open up to him (or similar idea).  And that I would be happier than I’ve ever been.  I loved that.  That’s how I want to be.  Open, and happy.  Jesus is changing me, and I’m thankful!

I’m thankful for all that Jesus has done for me.

Love,

Jenny

Wow!  I am sad I am almost to the end of your book that I am reading!  I read this (below) yesterday morning and am still thinking about it.  The highlighted sentence painted a whole picture for me.  I could see myself, young and sitting perfectly still in the Catholic Church, not moving except when prompted to kneel or stand, or to make the sign of the cross, speaking only to recite their chosen words, having “communion” when it was the appointed time. Wow!  Never a word needed to be spoken for me to be programmed to reject the truth, to reject Jesus and the power of God, to reject you.  Every mass I sat in was slandering the real Jesus.  But….. Jesus intervened!

My heart was conditioned by ceremonial form to reject moving when Jesus moves, reject rejoicing, clapping, dancing, and crying.  I was never encouraged to feel Jesus fill a room or praise him when I did, or speak in His language, in His words when He moved in me.  Nothing in my heart, trained by that religion, should ever have wanted Jesus and everything he has given us here.  The slander began before I ever knew you existed.  My heart should have never wanted you; it was trained not to.  But it does!  Jesus did that!

The power of God doesn’t need words either!  Just as Jesus said, it condemns sinners without words!  It condemns Christianity without words.  That is something!  Satan is never going to one-up God! 

From your book:

Slander

The mere existence of the Institution, with age lending weight to its claims, condemns true men of God without words. Those who belong to the Institution do not even have to dirty their hands to protest against true messengers of God. Merely by continuing in the Institution’s forms, without uttering a word against any man of God, they maintain their appearance of righteousness and bolster their claim to be the representatives of Christ. This is what I call “institutionalized slander”, and it is Satan’s most effective weapon against God’s servants. This is how the Lord described it to me some years ago: “When a lie becomes the norm, normal people become liars.” And when normal people become liars, God’s messengers are condemned because they tell the truth.

As one brother recently testified, “If you want to be right with God, you have to want to be right with God more than you want to be right.”

Amen!

Beth D.

Good morning,

This is really good, from your online book!  Especially that last sentence.

God Had a Son before Mary Did*:

Paul’s heart was broken (cp. Phip. 3:18–19). He was frustrated in his purpose, just as Israel’s ancient prophets had been, by ministers of the Institution who won the hearts of God’s people (cp. Gal. 2:4–5). Paul bitterly expressed his wish that those who had led his converts astray would be cut off from God (Gal. 5:12), that is, that they would be damned. Paul’s converts in Galatia and Corinth were among the victims of the deception:

Galatians 3

1a.O foolish Galatians! Who has bewitched you, that you should not obey the truth?

…

3.Are you so foolish? Having begun in the Spirit, are you now perfected by the flesh?

Galatians 5

7.You were running well; who hindered you from obeying the truth?

8.This persuasion is not from the One who calls you.

2Corinthians 11

13.Such men are false apostles, deceitful workers, masquerading as apostles of Christ.

14.And no wonder, for Satan himself is disguising himself as a messenger of light.

15.Therefore, it is no great thing if his ministers also disguise themselves as ministers of righteousness, whose end shall be according to their works

These scriptures show us that even in the days of the first apostles, Satan was working among God’s people to form an institution to which he could invite believers and thereby separate them from those who were the real government of God, such as Paul. In that effort, Satan’s eventual success is evidenced by his establishment of the Institution of Christianity, the church, as the norm for God’s children.

God’s children were seduced by the friendship of Constantine, the Emperor of Rome, into blending with the Roman Empire,^[129] and the Institution that was formed from that unholy alliance claimed for itself the name, “Christianity”. Holy men who were sent from God “not with enticing words of man’s wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and power” (1Cor. 2:4) were replaced by men ordained by the Institution, whose gospel was a “word only” gospel (1Thess. 1:5) imposed upon civilization by the State. But in replacing true servants of Jesus, Satan and his ministers had replaced the true Jesus, and in replacing the true Jesus, Satan and his ministers had replaced the true God with a god more to their liking. When Satan offered Jesus the world, he turned it down, but when he offered the world to Jesus’ followers, many of them accepted it.

Beth D.

*  Going to Jesus.com – God Had A Son Before Mary Did

Hey, Pastor John!

Last night, when I sat down before bed to catch up on emails, I read your blog* and all the responses, and they felt wonderful!  It was perfect timing, it seems.  It seems Jesus is saying, “Come on, let’s round it up and reel it in.” 🙂  Swirling everyone up together since people were having similar thoughts and needs lately.  He’s so perfect!  I had just finished reading them, and I checked a fb message real quick, and when I opened fb, there was a post from an acquaintance complaining about the gas prices, and she had put a sticker on the pump that said, “Biden’s America stinks.”  I was so thankful that we don’t have to be there!  Lots of “friends” post things about gas prices lately, or complain, or make fun of some sort of thing going on in the government.  It’s just everywhere.  What are we spending our time thinking about?

I’ve thought about it before.  Kids watch princesses and superheroes, and they reenact it and live that.  People watch horror movies or read suspense novels, and they think about the bad there could be on every corner. People watch the news and videos about everyone else’s opinion, and they start believing it and seeing that “corruption” everywhere.  Of course you will!  That’s what you’re thinking about! 🙂  When you read Solomon’s Wisdom, you see the good in people.  When you read the Pearls sent out, you have a good thought that might correct your thinking for the day.  When you read the Suffering and the Saints book, you look for God in everything that goes on in  your life!  So, when you’re ready for conversation, even quiet time, that’s what your mind is thinking about.  I feel sorry for those who can’t see God in things, and would rather spend their time complaining and seeing only bad.  What a waste of time! 

Steven called me (to tell me about that wreck this morning) after I talked to you about all this, so I took it out on him, too! 😀 I had just started singing again, “Look up, God’s got a blessing on the Way.”  I told Steven that when people have their minds on everything else, and aren’t looking up and waiting for a blessing, that God could possibly have for them, they will miss it.  Look up!  I pray we all do that so that we don’t miss our blessings.  They are so much better than what this life has 🙂  Thank you again for this message reminder!

Leah

*See post March 6, “One Human Condition”, by Pastor John Clark, Sr.)

In your Blog*, you wrote this: “There are no political divisions in the kingdom of God.”  That was such a relief to my spirit when we read the Blog you sent out this morning.  There’s not even 2 of anything to have to chose!  There are NO divisions!  And the opposite of that is Christianity; that’s all it is –divisions and “choices”.  I thank God that He has given us one way into his one body by his one Son Jesus; by one baptism we receive his one spirit, into the one faith, to know the one God and Father over all and to have the one hope of being with him forever and ever.  The gospel is good for all! Thank you for this. 

Donna N

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John,

I love this message and all the responses to it.  It seems like the perfect cap to the end of our Matthew Bible study.  Jesus worked tirelessly to help his disciples attain to the knowledge that his kingdom was not of this world,  and he is still striving to get that same message in our hearts today.  

I am so thankful to have been taught that we are ambassadors for God, and that even though we live in this world, we wear it as a loose garment.  What liberty Jesus has created in our hearts through his Spirit as we strive to live in one accord in this body in this day and hour!  It is exciting to me to think of our being in one accord  with Jesus!

My heart is so full of gratefulness to know that our God has time, purpose and judgment set in place for our good, and that all our times are perfectly in His hands no matter how insane this world becomes.  To be hidden in Christ is so full of love and mercy for the body that it seems beyond our understanding at times.  I feel so well taken care of by the One who holds us in his hands. 

Thank you again for sharing this message with us. It really touched me. 

Love,

Bess

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John,

I appreciate your blog, One Human Condition. It is easy to get the economic and political events happening around us on our minds. Your message is like a compass keeping us on course, pointing towards the right direction. 

The other day, I was watching the news and saw the massive military Russian force that Putin has amassed against Ukraine.  I thought, he thinks he is in control. He doesn’t know that the outcome has already been decided. 

Mr. Putin is just one of all the world leaders that have been raised up to serve God’s purpose.  There is peace in knowing that. 

What matters now is what you have been saying for months, “What does Jesus want us to do?” 

Thanks again for sending out your message. 

Tom 

*See post March 6, “One Human Condition”, by Pastor John Clark, Sr.)