Something MISSING!

Reply to Dorcas
A great thread, thanks

A great post may have been over looked purposely because it’s the root of divisions in a lot of Churches. A division that can not be resolved until faith in God replaces money in churches and is discussed and excepted by the ones in charge who are the beneficiaries of the present system . Members live by faith and the money changers and elites live outside the invisible realm in darkness and are dependant upon money and privilege to provide their necessities. We must become a house of prayer. Prayer that is predicated on God’s power.

Dorcas wrote:
In fact, I was horrified recently to learn how much OT scripture is used to support the 'prosperity gospel' - some of it is even reversed in meaning from its original context - and yet unchallenged by modern believers. How so?

Beloved, this is a very simple way for the enemy to entangle us or keep us in bondage, and it is a tool to prevent the renewing of our minds. end quote.

You will be blessed in the Heaven places for your stand but you will be scourged in the visible realm.
They will ask how do we pay the bills and our response is that we will not enslave our families to your possessions.

Is this reply in the same context as your thread?
Respectfully Eddie

Reply to Dorcas
I have been blessed and edified by your posts and look forward to reading more.
Quote by Dorcas
I've always liked the way Paul uses this phrase somewhat tentatively endeavoring to keep the unity of the body in the bond of peace (Eph 4), as it gently informs us that it may take some effort on our part to come onto the common ground of truth. This necessarily implies we must leave the ground we were on. End quote

Agreed, I can be wrong and you could have the truth. Sometimes the premises of threads cause us all to sound like Job’s friends. But answers must be prayed about and excepted if they fit the word of God but not necessarily men's wisdom of traditional religious understanding.
You may be advanced beyond me in understanding but if I reach the point you are presently standing, I must still be standing by faith on the Word of God.

Sometimes I feel compelled to post and I can’t explain how the post blends with the subject being discussed. But I need the help of the One that guides me so I don’t want to resist.

Peace beyond our understanding is rest. Sight beyond the horizon is vision. Where mans knowledge ends God’s word begins. As disciples of Christ and as building stones we have to fight the spiritual warfare to break the bonds of the world and become complete captives (prisoners) to the One that bought us and is drawing us and establishing us, The Son of David who is worthy of building The Father a house to dwell in. We collectively are The Body of Christ and the dwelling place and The House of The Living God that precedes time and stands undivided as it has and will through out eternity stand in harmony and in the bonds of peace that bind us in righteousness by faith. We have all that we can know about God in us and we must seek with-in this magnificent body guided by the Head Christ Jesus to edify the Body and manifest our Lord to the lost world

Ephesians 4

1. I Therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you that ye walk worthy of the vocation wherewith ye are called,
2. With all lowliness and meekness, with longsuffering, forbearing one another in love;
3. Endeavouring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.
4. There is one body, and one Spirit, even as ye are called in one hope of your calling;
5. One Lord, one faith, one baptism,
6. One God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all.

God sent His Son for us.

1 Corinthians 15
28. And when all things shall be subdued unto him, then shall the Son also himself be subject unto him that put all things under him, that God may be all in all.
Eddie

In fact, I was horrified recently to learn how much OT scripture is used to support the 'prosperity gospel' -

The New Covenant promises nothing about temporal blessings or land promises, or prosperity. Yet, land/nationhood/material security etc is very dear to many-a heart. Many believe that still today, if they obey God, then God should bless them – and secure our land. I see Christians from America trapped in that (and, no doubt from other blessed nations). And why not! They (we) have a lovely land that has blessed them with tremendous prosperity.

I fear that much of the revival longings that we see today are rooted in the wrong covenant. They are rooted in the hope that if people repent, then God will restore the blessings of the land.

Can we accept the fact that revival may be birthed in death of hopes, losses of all that has been valuable to us? Dispersion, loss of national identity, loss of heritage … ?

Can we be satisfied with the spiritual blessings promised in the New Covenant?
What are they?

Diane

Sis wrote:

Immediately, I knew the Lord was revealing to me that I am descended from Jacob. (So much could be said at this point I'm going to say nothing.)

What do you and Jacob have in common?

In Christ
Jeff

Greetings in Jesus' Name by Whose Blood we are Saved.AMEN.

you know i find it interesting the scripture quoted by the prosperity pundits in Malachi about robbing God by witholding tithes...i have yet to hear any one of them quote this one from Malachi 1:

[b]6 A son honoureth his father, and a servant his master: if then I be a father, where is mine honour? and if I be a master, where is my fear? saith the LORD of hosts unto you, O priests, that despise my name. And ye say, Wherein have we despised thy name? 7 Ye offer F2 polluted bread upon mine altar; and ye say, Wherein have we polluted thee? In that ye say, The table of the LORD is contemptible. 8 And if ye offer the blind for sacrifice, is it not evil? and if ye offer the lame and sick, is it not evil? offer it now unto thy governor; will he be pleased with thee, or accept thy person? saith the LORD of hosts. [/b]

the robbery of God in terms of us not giving Him the Honour Due Him leads to us not doing right by Him in tithing or otherwise. The failure to tithe is a symptom of this failiure to have God as the only focus. Clearly there is a benefit to giving to God, a benefit to sowing seed coz there is a harvest and so on, no question. the spirit of this giving though is what we need to check. are we sowing seed out of greed or to tend to someone's need?...clearly the focus of the prosperity people is more for their own gain that his Glory... :-(

Grace and Peace are ours in Jesus.AMEN.

the spirit of this giving though is what we need to check.

When I preach in churches I am acutely aware that parishioners know little of what they could have in Christ – (regardless of their denomination). Christ has commissioned us to preach THE GOSPEL not a behaviour modification formula. So my aim is to tell others about Christ and what we have in him.

The book of Ephesians was mentioned earlier. That book tells about an awesome prosperity available to us: the spiritual riches in Christ. Really our blessing is Christ himself.

Here’s a suggestion: Go through Ephesians and highlight all words related to Christ. The book is loaded. In fact Chapter six, the spiritual armor of God, is really about Christ – what he has given us in order to stand firm.

God has indeed promised us prosperity:–

3His divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness. 4Through these he has given us his very great and precious promises, so that through them you may participate in the divine nature and escape the corruption in the world caused by evil desires.

What more could we want?
Do we crave Christ above all? Is he sufficient?

Diane

-Quote-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Jef wrote
What do you and Jacob have in common?

If asked the same question I would say.
The kind of faith that is void of fear like Jacob and Moses had. Faith to lay down our carnal lives in the spiritual desert of the world and cross over into the rest that is in Christ Jesus our first love. Sheep do not try to escape but they are known to wander away and backsliding Christians sojourning temporarily in the world are subject to the same attacks of the spirit of carnality as those that live daily in anger, wrath, malice, blasphemy, filthy communication and lying as we all participated in before we put on the new man.
Eddie

Sis wrote:

Neil had finally posted 'Kingdom of Priests' on fireonthealtar, and I was listening to it through the second time. At the point where Joseph falls on his dead father and kisses him, suddenly (this is the vision) I was there in Egypt AND simultaneously I was at the place my mother's family come from in Lewis, Scotland.

Jacob's life was impacted greatly by dreams and visions. I was listening to Daniel Kenaston teach about the reason for visions and dreams...

The hebrew word of dream comes from the root Chalam...which means...

1) to dream

a) (Qal)

1) to dream (ordinary)

2) to dream (prophetic)

3) to dream (of false prophets)

b) (Hiphil) to dream

2) to be healthy, be strong

a) (Qal) to be healthy

b) (Hiphil) to restore to health

God gives visions and dreams to restore or to make healthy those who were once lost according to the ways of this world that is under the dominion of Satan.

.
Job 33:15 In a dream, in a vision of the night, when deep sleep falleth upon men, in slumberings upon the bed;
Job 33:16 Then he openeth the ears of men, and sealeth their instruction,

Job 33:25 His flesh shall be fresher than a child's: he shall return to the days of his youth:
Job 33:26 He shall pray unto God, and he will be favourable unto him: and he shall see his face with joy: for he will render unto man his righteousness.

You like Jacob, are given vision and dreams which restore to health that which was once dead..

Just a thought Sis

Love
In Christ
Jeff

sis D
Greetings in Jesus' Name by Whose Blood we are Saved.AMEN.

you said:

Brother, I agree that a failure to give whole-heartedly to God could be interpreted through the observation of one who is not tithing. But, I do not believe one needs to tithe, in order to give whole-heartedly to God and to have placed one's whole live, wealth and future into His hands whole-heartedly.

i don't believe one needs to tithe either and i agree with your assessment of how we are to give to God, that being EVERYTHING. i was speaking in terms of those among us to whom God has asked a specific amount be it 10% or otherwise for a period, i call that a tithe. For example, God asked my wife and i for 10% of what we made for the last 3 months. that for all intents and purposes is a tithe.We so did and now we are at the end of that 3 months. We gave in obedience and now there are some benefits which are coming our way as a result. Of course there are monies coming in but he real Gold is the Peace which we found in trusting God wholly with everything we had.

In fact, I would suggest to you there is a snare in thinking that by tithing, one is now off the hook. (I'm not suggesting you think this.) That now, what one has left, belongs to oneself to spend on anything one can still afford. Under the New Covenant, this can only be described as hypocrisy.

indeed i agree totally here. we see this playing out in Israel and even among ourselves. We do and say all the right things yet with rot in our hearts and thinking all the while we are off the hook when God isn't mocked.

Now, please don't (only) take from this that I'm saying it's ok to not give 'money' to the Lord, as a way of life (although I am also saying that!) because I believe it is good to have all our money available to the Lord for whatever He calls upon it. I do not believe a Christian is entitled to a moderately comfortable house\\home\\regular shelter, although many of us enjoy this. We should be deeply grateful to the Lord if we do (have such a place to lay our heads), as it is not in the manifesto of provisions He promises for this earth. He promises a home in heaven. Is that where our affections are settled?

now you know if i told God on the last day i didn't give because sis D said not to, He'd say back to me that doesn't fly! :-P i see your point and i agree with you. we gave as our Lord moved us to, sometimes a little bit, sometimes more and sometimes not at all, however recently, He had us give 10% to various people/causes as He led us to and we did so in obedience. sure we are not entitled to living well, but if we do have an abundance it is for one thing, the Glory of God in the benefitting of His Body by the abundance.indeed we thank God for the little we have every day and know He supplies our needs. i think of Elijah at Cherith, God sent ravens to feed him...Ravens are small birds and can't carry much so the provisions for Elijah were meagre, but sufficient.

Great question! The paradoxical answer is that we will reserve more treasure in heaven for ourselves if we do the latter; Spurgeon calls it 'lending' to God, or, 'investing' in our heavenly 'bank'

Under the Old Covenant, the animals chosen for offerings and sacrifices had to fit God's precise specifications, or they were unacceptable.

ok

Under the New Covenant, what do we offer? We offer ourselves and all that we have and are.

to me there is no difference in what must be offered in the sense that it is all to God's Specifications, in the Old Covenant it is animals, in the new it is our being.anything less is unacceptable before God because He gave us all of Himself first.

i catch your drift sis, we're on the same page!

Grace and Peace are ours in Jesus.AMEN.

sis D

Greetings in Jesus' Name by Whose Blood we are Saved.AMEN

you know sis D something funny happened when i responded to your second post. i read the title and wondered "so where is the first part?" after i was done responding, i found it... :-P

You raise an interesting text, which sparks me into fierce fighting mode for the gospel, and possibly from an unfamiliar angle... because I haven't heard preached either, what I'm about to say...

you know, i believe the word of God isn't bits and pieces we can cherry pick, it's not a buffet where one can choose this and reject that.

now i haven't been to a church where prosperity is preached, but i have met people from such churches or with that mindset (as you have) and seen quite a bit of it on t.v.

The first thing that strikes me about the verses you chose, is to whom the Lord is speaking - 'saith the LORD of hosts unto you, O priests, that despise my name' and that He tags them with the criticism that they 'despise' His name. OUCH!

AMEN...those who minister before God to the people...i guess the ones who teach, the pastors are indicted here. They are said to "despise His Name." OUCH alright...you see this is the dishonoring of God going on here, to dishonour His Name is to despise it. Now there may be some who teach foolish things out of ignorance, that is another matter, however to despise God's Name implies that they know what they ought to do and don't...Some of these prosperity preachers know full well what they ought to teach but they don't, too much money could be lost doing so. i discussed this with a brother some time ago who quoted Deuteronomy about God giving ability to gain wealth. ok, fine i have no qualms with that at all because it is true, on the other hand, we have the letter to Laodicea and Christ's admonition to us about the camel and the eye of the needle and storing riches in Heaven...He didn't seem to want to get that bit...This cherry-picking grieves our Lord to no end and what happens is we miss things and our view gets warped.

We see the same thing in Luke's account of Jesus' arrest, where, by the time He arrives, the whole council is gathered and later it is one of these men who strikes Him. I remember the shock I felt when I realised that this was a member of the elite religious leadership of Israel behaving like a lout.

i believe there may be a feeling of invincibility, infallibility or something going on here that would cause a man to do so wickedly, something which the enemy can latch onto. There is a somberness which comes with the office of pastor which i feel is lacking, Paul said that not many of us should want to teach because these will be judged more harshly...things like that get missed when we cherry-pick.

From other things I've heard about power-hungry people, I know it is often true that there is, literally, a gang of big strong men who go and intimidate (turn up late at night and threaten) those who speak out for truth not knowing (at the time) that this might befall them.

yes indeed.

What is often more scary in these situations is not the threats, but that they are being made by men who have respectable dayjobs (like, that among them are local ministers, lawyers, businessmen!), who are known as pillars of the community, who (the intimidated one feels) would be believed over and above him (the one speaking up for righteousness).

yes indeed, however i bless God for the testimony over the years of those saints whom God has held up even unto death for the cause of Righteousness. Paul said we are persecuted, but not forgotten. if indeed God has raised up a man/woman to stand up to these, such a one will not be intimidated because God isn't intimidated.

Therefore, that these men would offer polluted sacrifices (which necessarily cost them less), is not a surprise.

of course!

These men have strayed so far from God, that they think (if He exists at all), that He doesn't know what they do.

and Paul said that those who didn't want to retain thoughts of God were given over to reprobate mind, if what you mentioned above isn't reprobocity, i don't know what is. that saddens me deeply sis... :-(

And, they don't know why (because they have lost all sense of their sinfulness, and of His holiness) they should bother to offer anything unblemished. It's the same attitude as those to whom Peter refers with this rebuttal: 'The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness...

AMEN.

you know, when i read the O.T. through the lens of the New Covenant, that is leaving behind whatever isn't relevent to us the New Covenant and having it distilled so that i can see the udnerlying Truth which is aplicable now, it is amazing. We don't offer animal sacrifices for sin in the New Covenant, but we sacrifice ourselves and various other things and when we don't do so with a Godly attitude, it is the same as offering a blemished sacrifice would have been in the O.T. days.

May God give us Grace to offer acceptable Sacrifices before Him.AMEN

Grace and Peace are ours in Jesus.AMEN.