A New Generation - Marietjie Chase

When David accepted the challenge to go kill the giant, Saul tried to fit David into his own suit of armor. It did not fit. David did not fit Saul's mold.  Remember Saul was "the-peoples-choice". There is again a Davidic spirit released in the people of God. There are those who have been building a history with God on the back pasture, where they learn to trust Him and are not poluted with man's way of doing things. These people, young and old, male and female, from every race, tongue and nation are again crying out; " Is there not a cause?!!!"

They do not fit the mold. These people do not share the same spirit of fear that now makes christians cower and bow to the forces of evil. These are not schooled in the ways of religion and as a matter of fact have no use for religion. What makes them different is that they know God. They truely know God and will not be convinced to believe the lies about Him that are preached. They are convinced of the greatness of their God and know that God have not gone to sleep. They are not afraid of the challenges and will not go silently into the night. They will not be quiet. They will not bow to man's ways and the flesh.


They are not aware of or ignore the "older-brother" spirit that comes against them because their focus is on pleasing God. They have layed aside the fear of men. They have laid aside the concerns for this life. They have laid aside the affects of the systems of this world. They have wasted their lives...on Jesus.

These are the ones who are building a new dwelling place for God. These are the ones who have turned to focus one ONE THING only: GOD!!

LOVE - AGAPE

God is Love John 4: 8
Jesus Commands us to love God and love people as ourselves. John 15:12, 17 and 13:34

Love- agape is a self sacrificing type of love. Love that is found only in God and through God. The love of God. A Charity. A giving, benevolent love. God so love the world that He gave...

Let us love one another for love is from God and everyone who loves is born of God and knows, experience God. The one who does not love like this does not know God.

God gave us an example, a demonstration of this kind of love when He gave His Son to pay the penalty, punishment for the sins and mistakes of the entire world. If God loves like this and we call ourselves children, sons of God, then we ought to love like this as well. When we love we are doing what God does and He is in us and works through us. Because we know and believe that God loves us, we are part of God and His love for us and in us, can love like He does. When we find ourselves loving in this benevolent, self-giving way, it is prove of God living inside of us and of us living and existing in God. By this, love as a way of living, we become God's ambassador's, God's representation in this world. John 15:13

There is NO fear in love. Fear includes punishment, but love has NO punishment. Living in Love is better than prophecy, more excellent than any spiritual gift. It is a fruit of the indwelling Holy Spirit. Love is the vehicle, instrument, channel for Faith and without love faith is ineffective. There is NO slavery in Love but we willingly serve as slaves to one another because of love and in this we fulfill the entire law. Love never ends and will continue into eternity.

How do we love one another? By obeying God. Those who love and obey God also love those who are born of God. Jesus demonstratyed His love for God, the Father, through His obedience. John 15:10 and 14 : 31.

I John 2 through 5; Romans 8:28, 37-39; II Corinthians 5:14, I Corinthians 12:31 though 13:13; Ephesians 5: 1-2 and 5: 25; Romans 13:8; Galasians 5:6 and 22

A revealing God.  by  Bob Mumford  http://www.lifechangers.org/

The LORD, the LORD God, compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in lovingkindness and truth; who keeps lovingkindness for thousands, who forgives iniquity, transgression and sin. Exodus 34:6,7




Because God is a Spirit we cannot see or know Him unless He chooses to reveal Himself. God once let Moses see part of Himself. Moses had asked to see God’s glory, which would be to see all of who God is. God explained to Moses that anyone who saw all of His glory would die. What a way to go! However, He let Moses see a specific aspect of His glory that He most wanted us to know.



What God showed Moses was the essence, or the very heart, of His character. I like to call this God’s DNA. DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid) is the material inside the nucleus of all living cells that carries genetic information. DNA predetermines inexorably most of the physical, mental, and personality characteristics of offspring. God’s DNA determines everything He does and contains the code to understanding who He is. God could have shown Moses His power and greatness, but He wanted Him to know the deepest part of His heart – the “real” Him.



If you want to truly know and understand Who God is, then become familiar with these seven strands of God’s DNA:



➢ Compassion

➢ Grace

➢ Slow to anger

➢ Mercy

➢ Truth

➢ Faithfulness

➢ Forgiveness of iniquity, transgression, and sin.



Our journey up the Agape Road means being willing to be transformed by God’s DNA until it becomes our DNA. One of the most difficult things about God’s DNA is learning to receive and enjoy it. Our nature wants to earn, perform, and do religious things to gain His blessing because in our religious activity we are really trying to control Him. My primary goal in writing this book is to increase your capacity to receive the love of God, to expand your experience in loving Him, and to see His love for others cultivated in you. We all have ideas about how we want God to love us – I challenge you to allow God to love you the way He wants to!



Christ came as a living picture of God’s DNA. The only way the world can see God’s hidden nature or what He is actually like is in a living Person, Jesus Christ. In this age, the only visible repository of that DNA is in His people who have learned to walk the Agape Road.

The Lord is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in lovingkindness.




Let’s look more closely at the seven aspects of God’s personality:



Compassion is the quality of understanding the suffering and weakness of others and wanting to do something about it. Compassion is more than pity or empathy; it is an inward affection and tender mercy. The Greek word from which compassion is derived means literally “from the bowels,” denoting the seat of emotions, inner parts, or belly. It is a visceral heart reaction.



Graciousness or grace is the very source of understanding God’s Person. It means to find favor, kindly, friendly, benevolent, courteous, disposed to show or dispense grace and forgive offenses, and to impart unmerited blessings. In the Bible, it is usually used of God in His relationship to the sins and shortcoming of humanity.



Slow to anger (longsuffering) is fortitude, forbearance, or patience. It means it really takes strenuous effort to get God ticked off! Most of us think God as edgy and slightly irritated with the way we mess up, hence our continual need to apologize for every little misstep. Few distortions of God’s person are as pervasive, subtle, or numbing as this one.



Mercy is tenderness of heart and actions in which God looks past what is wrong in us and treats us better than we deserve. The Hebrew word is hesed, which means loving-kindness, steadfast love, loyalty, and faithfulness. It is compassion or forgiveness shown towards an enemy or person in one’s power. Mercy is compassion in action. Mercy is taking notice of one in need.



Truth is conformity with fact or reality. The word also implies that which can be trusted to be steady and unchanging. Jesus said He is the Truth. Truth is a Person–One who shows us ultimate reality and can always be trusted to be the same.



Faithfulness is fixed, determined love, to be kept, guarded, watched over, and preserved. It is steadfastness, firm adherence to truth and duty, true to the facts or the original, allegiance, careful to observe all compacts, treaties, contracts, or vows, true to one’s word. Faithfulness means that God will always do what He said and fulfill what He promised. This is a kind of faithfulness that does not come from a feeling but from God’s determination to stick by us no matter what. He was so serious about it that He swore an oath and gave us His word that He would never change. Therefore, He has no choice but to show us mercy!



Forgiving means pardoning, remitting, disposed to forgive, and inclined to overlook offense, mild, merciful, and compassionate as a forgiving temperament. God pardons us when He could and should give judgment. God, as Father, took care of all our failures in His Son, Jesus. God forgives because it is His character. He forgives iniquity, transgression, and sin. This includes every kind of sin, not only what we do, but even who we are.



These seven things are not what Father God does but who He is. Receiving the Father as He is self-revealed and wants to be known is the first step on the Agape Road.



QUESTIONS AND THOUGHTS

• How has Jesus shown Himself to you as having God’s nature?

• Think of someone who has hurt or offended you and write a prayer using these qualities.

• Describe how your relationships might be changed if these were practiced.

• When Moses asked to see God’s glory, what do you think he was expecting?

• When we speak of seeing God’s glory today, what do you think we mean by that?

• How do you think God expresses His DNA towards you?

Five Fold Hierarchy Heresy

.....As God has called you, live up to your calling. Accept life with humility and patience, generously making allowances for each other because you love each other. Make it your aim to be at one in the Spirit, and you will be bound together in peace. .... Ephesians 4:4-6

We ought to question anything that brings a spirit of division into the Body of Christ/ Kingdom/ Church/ Bride of Christ. We are all ONE. We need One Another. We are all ONE body, many members but ONE body. If one member suffers, all the members suffer with it.... and if one member is honored, all members rejoice with it... there is a more excellent way .... seek Love: Agape.

Ephesians 4:11 are jobs ( job descriptions) not titles. Some He gave a function, or "being" to be.... These are not titles or honors or medals or awards or a system. This was never meant to be some christian pyramid system of control and honor. There is no Levitical priesthood hierarchy in the New Testament. We are ALL kings and priests but our functions, roles and purposes in the Kingdom differs. We are all to humble ourselves and submit to one another. The authority of the believer is not over people, but over the works of the enemy.

The "five-fold" heresy comes from one single verse pulled out of context. Paul could have gone on and extend his list to helps, mercy etc. He was speaking of the Body being one and each one given a gift of grace or grace according to the gift of Christ...He gave gifts to men... as examples of these Paul mentions the five following gifts. There is no implication or hint that this is a hierarchy or system or an "authority" structure. To infer this from this passage is heresy.

Continue to read the rest of the chapter.. or book... It is clear that the whole Body has to grow up and mature with Christ as the head. From the head each part is directly connected and receive life to grow by the proper functioning of each individual part. V25 ... let each man..., for we are all parts of the same body... Here Paul is still continuing on his theme of One-ness.

I Corinthians 12.. again is about the One-ness of the Body of Christ. The gifts listed here are different from the Eph 4 list. So why not call it an eight-fold ministry.

In Romans 12, the passage actually starts out with (verse 3) a warning against the conceited arrogance now so rampant in the Body of Christ. Be humble. But here these "gifts" listed are actually called functions. And the list contains, prophecy and teaching... If we read the entire chapter, it is not about establishing some pecking order but simply to say that we have gifts that differ and that we are all One and must submit to one another in brotherly love,... give preference to one another in honor...

If Eph 4, I Cor 12 and Rom 12 were meant to establish an authority structure, God would have said so, clearly. He has no problem giving Moses very detailed instructions about the first Levitical priesthood... that ; by the way; is a thing of the past. Also the list of gifts would have been the same. It never says anywhere in the New Testament that all are under the authority of a certain gift. It is simply not there. It does say that ALL, that means everyone, needs to function in their gifting, while submitting to one another. There is NO longer a human mediator or authority. We are all face-to-face before God through Jesus Christ.

Do I propagate anarchy in the church? NO, instead the opposite. All in humility and love (agape) submitting to one another. We are all on even plane before God. I Cor 12 says plainly that an eye is an eye and an ear is an ear, both needed and important, both submitted to each other and the one not under or over the other in authority or control.

The only offices in the church are on a congregational level. One for the spiritual well being of the Body and one for the physical well being of the Body. The offices of elders/overseers and deacons are explained in Acts 6. Deacons [gr.diakonos: those who labor in the dust] are the physical servants of the congregation. Elders/ overseers are those who minister the word and devote themselves to prayer.

The instruction to submit to one another is in the same spirit and flow of the rest of the New Testament. The law of liberty of life in Christ Jesus made us free from the law of sin and death; Not so that we can run around and get ourselves entangled again in some sort of man made slavery, or into all kinds of sin and lust, but so that we can now have the power and ability to complete our God ordained destiny. Submit to God and one another by the power of the Holy Spirit through Jesus Christ and fulfill your purpose and function in the Kingdom of God.

What is "Born Again"? by Marietjie Chase

Prior to being Born Again a human is a dual/two-part being. The spirit- human spirit- though present, is dormant, inactive, dead. And if the human is indeed a spirit who lives in a body and have a soul; then those who are NOT born into the Kingdom of God, born of the Holy Spirit, then they are indeed dead.

At the moment of " New Birth" our human spirit comes to life and we take our first breath of the HOLY SPIRIT. The instant this happens, we become like God, a trinity/ a three-part-being, created in His image to be in fellowship with HIM. We are new creations. We are born from above. We have abilities, gifts and life(zoe) that does not end with body and soul. We have a whole being, not just two thirds.

Growing up into all God wants/purposed us to be is the Salvation of the Soul. After we receive new life in our spirit, we are now equipped for the process of Salvation of the Soul. Our Body is now the servant and not the master. We begin the task of re-ordering our lives. The body has to become subject to the spirit, through the soul. The soul having submitted itself to our spirit. (the human spirit albeit now filled and glowing with the life and spirit of God)

Our spirit is the God part in us. In Genesis, God breathed His Spirit/breath into Adam and he became a living soul. After the fall/sin in Eden, the Spirit of God withdrew from humans, making man the living dead. Since the soul has no "spirit" to submit to in this state, it takes it's cue from the physical body, to care for, please and serve it. The flesh grows in it's demands, since lust is never satisfied. Legitimate needs and pleasures given the wrong place becomes lust. This is the flesh: when soul serves this body instead of this body serving soul and spirit.

The will of man, that is seated in the soul, makes decisions aided by the mind and emotions. It really does not matter what agency - mind or emotions- brings the convincing. The beauty of God's design in humans is that even the retard, the brain dead, the 'dog' have emotions. Reaching the will through the mind may be more feasible in Western Society or the Orient but when you deal with Africa, or the Islands of the sea or less educated societies, (where the mind has not been elevated to the point of idolatry) the emotions becomes the avenue to the will. Once the will is reached, a decision, by the will, is made to either accept or reject Jesus Christ and His sacrifice and in the process either accept or reject God's New Covenant.

When the will makes this decision and it is uttered through the voice using the breath and physical body, the Spirit of God enters the spirit of the human and life ( zoe) results. This person who receives this life(zoe) will never die. This human spirit, once made alive will never die. It cannot be made "un-born" or "un-alive" anymore. So, the people who never accepted God's offer of LIFE are dead and if their physical bodies die in this state, they will NEVER live(zoe). If they are made alive, they will never die. In this life, this existence, we have the opportunity to spread the LIFE of God.

He that has the SON ( Jesus) has the life (zoe). He that does not have the Son does not have life. If you believe in Me(Jesus), you will live(zoe) though you will die( this bios).

For those who are not born again, whose spirits are dead and who are in enmity to God, this life in this earth is ALL they have. For those who are born again it is just a part- a passing through - a sojourn; just a small part in a so-much-better, so-much-better whole. No wonder the flesh - those whose souls serve and cater to the body- are in enmity to God. It is the boss, spoiled, over -indulged and now it knows that when the spirit is quickened/ born again, that the body will become the servant; no longer pampered, but now disciplined.

The soul is in discomfort since the pattern, habit, status quo has been disrupted. Catering to the flesh, has it's reward for the soul, yet the posture of worship to God through the spirit is foreign. Change is resisted since humans are basically lazy. Laziness and change does not co-exist.

Pre-New Birth - Born-Again- B/C (Before Christ) nothing really matters. It does not matter what you do. You will damage your body and soul and make it less useful but in the scope of eternity it does not matter. Once you are Born Again, you are starting to build, to live eternity. Everything has meaning. Nothing is wasted. Everything has value.

There is only two kinds of people walking this earth: the living dead and the living living. Those who does not have the life of God in them are dead while they live. Those who have the life of God in them will never die though their bodies may stop functioning.

Kingdom Principles by Marietjie Chase

For the past few days, I have been meditating on Kingdom Principles: stuff that should be obvious but are not.

In the Kosmos if you want to become wiser, bigger, richer or better, it depends on how much you can take in or add to your life. You labor to take in knowledge, money, food, honor, etc. In the Kingdom of God you grow and mature by what you give out. Give money and lay up for yourself treasures in Heaven. Give energy and worship and prayer and grow in your intimacy with God and knowledge of Him. Give ministry and service and grow in your stature as an ambassador of the Kingdom.

Often what happens in the Natural/Kosmos precedes the same thing happening in the spiritual/Kingdom of God but often the opposite is required. When the Kosmos is moving in one direction, the Kingdom of God is often moving in the direct opposite direction. Right now the whole world/Kosmos is moving toward a "one-world" system. It is becoming one centralized, connected, interactive, interdependent unit. The word of the Lord and direction of the Holy Spirit for the Kingdom of God is to de-centralize. Go smaller, NOT bigger. Multiply!! Replicate!! Hundreds of thousands of smaller works instead of huge mega structures.

This will require a re-thinking of our "church" set up. Pastors - Who are they? What are they? How are we to relate to them physically and spiritually? The office of "pastor" has been out of order in the church for too long. We need to re-think, re-pray and receive a new revelation on this...

• A small group of about 5 families cannot financially support a full-time pastor. Pastors have to either take a secular job or pastor several small congregations. Which begs the question: should the pastor be paid by the congregation at all. maybe that is just another Old Testament, "levitical" thing we kept for lack of something better.


• Are you still a shepherd/pastor when you oversee several smaller groups? Or does the fact/action of traveling make you an "apostle"?


• Could one of the more mature/experienced members with a full-time job be a shepherd/pastor? maybe members will grow up faster if more of the ministry is done by the members instead of the hired help/pastor.

Our current church system makes me think of the time in Judges 17 when each did what was right in his own eyes and some paid the Levite to be their priest.

Could we be brave and courageous enough to chance what is? Could we cross the bridge from tradition to blind faith? Where is God's Elijah's, Daniels, Deborah's and Esters? Are they ever going to come out of the caves, backside of the wilderness or prison?

There is a new Reformation coming - No, it's already started. Will we go with the flow or try to hold back a tsunami with our bare hands?

The Kingdom of Heaven/God by Marietjie Chase



The revelation of the Kingdom of God/Heaven, I am starting to realize, is not just another signpost or event in this journey , nor is it the next restored reality/truth to divide about. If Jesus spoke about this so often and seemed to keep going back to it; and then the apostles in their epistles, brought this down in more bite- size daily applications, it is in fact our life. Some wrote books on it, and that is important to help us think this through, but it is not even about the thinking part. It is not about knowledge or being right. It is not about structure, authority and methodology. It is not a truth that excludes all the others. It is not something to get fanatical about.... Jesus told stories to try to bring it to people: The Kingdom of Heaven is like... He said this over and over and over again.



So what is it? As I begin to see it, it is a changed heart and mind. It is the reality of seeing God's way, living God's way. It is to "not let the world/kosmos squeeze you into it's mold". It is to let the love/agape of God rule and reign in our hearts and minds. It is to love/agape the Lord our God with ALL our heart, soul, mind and existence.

"So?"

Well, it is easier said than done.



We, humans, have a sin-stained "action and re-action" attitude about life. We have our own inbred, yeah I mean inbred, sense of justice. We have a balance, an equilibrium, that helps us survive and succeed in this world/kosmos system. But in order to live in the Kingdom of God we have to let all this go. Yeah, let it go.



There is a new attitude, a new "breeding" that has to happen. Meditation on what Jesus said, what the Apostles said, brings us almost always to the conclusion that this cannot work in this world/kosmos. So we sit with this dichotomy that we would like to live and obey the New Testament but the Old Testament thinking and living fits easier in our polluted attitudes. We therefore keep parts of the old and embrace that of the new that we dare to swallow. None of us, or maybe I should say few, has yet to bet the farm.



What would make us see, really see, that the new is better? Would it take some cataclysmic event to erase our systems/kosmos/world that we so desperately cling to? This to, would not seem like the mercy and grace of God but it would be; wouldn't it?





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Meditations



"Whoever welcomes this little child in my name welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes the one who sent me, because the one who is least among all of you is the one who is greatest."



"Give, and it will be given to you. They will pour into your lap a good measure-- pressed down, shaken together, and running over. For by your standard of measure it will be measured to you in return."



In the same way, the last will be first, and the first will be last, because many are called, but few are chosen."



For he shall have judgment without mercy, that has showed no mercy; and mercy rejoices against judgment.



"But he said, 'No; for while you are gathering up the tares, you may uproot the wheat with them