4.1 Passover to Pentecost

God has three experiences with Him in a believer’s walk prior to the resurrection of our bodies. I am not speaking of an unfolding of our knowledge of God ever deeper; rather, I am speaking of three profound interactions with God that change us from the inside out.

The first experience is when we receive Jesus into our hearts, normally called being born again. The second experience is when we receive from Jesus full immersion into the Spirit of Devotion, normally called Baptism in the Spirit. This chapter is about a third such experience with God, greater than the other two, an experience open to all believers, an experience we are calling, “Completion.”

From April to December. Our third experience with God is receiving Jesus as Completion, an experience I received from God over a nine-month period from April to December, 2022. As a result, I know that I am seized into God and into His throne; I know that my whole life is now about God through me into my world.

In this lesson, I want to rehearse the incredible events for me from April to June, that is, from Passover to Pentecost. In the next lesson, I hope to set out the Scriptural basis for a third experience with God prior to the resurrection, how this experience is to be received. Then, in the third lesson, I will describe the finishing of this experience of completion as it now stands towards the Church.

The Dates of the Feasts. God stretched out His experience with me over nine months for several reasons, one of which was that I would certainly have been overwhelmed if such knowledge of Himself had come in one moment. When I looked at the calendar regarding the dates of these experiences, I saw that every one of them fell on the dates of the feasts of Israel according to the Eastern Orthodox calendar. I do not see this as God endorsing that calendar, but rather, as God making His Word certain and sure. To save space, then, I will simply reference the Feast day in this account. Each of these experiences was also tied into the Word shared with the local congregation, in our studies of John’s Gospel and Epistles.

“The Way.” On April 17, 2022, I shared the first part of a teaching on John 14:20, titled “I Live inside of Jesus.” I then began writing the second part titled, “Jesus Lives inside of Me.” On Friday, April 22, the day of the celebration of Jesus’ sacrifice, that is, Passover, I wrote these words as a confession of faith out from John 14:20, the Tree of Life – “The Way.”

~ Living inside of Jesus is my Way to connect with the Father sharing my life with me. Jesus living inside of me is the Father’s Way to connect with me sharing His life with Him, that God might enter creation through me. Life itself is my Way, moment by moment and step by step, not ‘to’ something, but rather life-unfolding, the living and dynamic expression of God-with-me unveiled new every morning forever. ~

Easter Sunday. In the moment of writing these words, I knew that my life had changed forever. From then until now, this sharing of life with the Father in every forward step we take together has only grown in my knowing. It was Easter Sunday, then, the day of Resurrection, when I shared this word in the service, making it the acknowledged expression of our lives together inside of God.

You can see, however, that this way of thinking is predicated on three absolute convictions. The first is that Jesus Himself enters into union with us first, and inside of Him, the Father. The second is that our human weakness is of God, that we are kept absolutely by the Sacrifice of Jesus. And the third is that God intends this sharing of life with us.

Intimate Closeness. Through the next week, I wrote “Father Makes His Home in Me,” out from John 14:23. There, the Greek word para (with) includes the thought of “with intimate closeness and participation.” Thus John 14:23 could read as follows. – We will come to him and make Our home together in intimate closeness and participation with him.

~ I continuously interact with God building our shared home. We work inside each other’s presence. We participate intimately together in combining each next step of our shared life into a habitation we live in together. My hands at work are filled with God; God’s hands at work are filled with me. God my Father with Jesus comes to me continuously and in every way to make our home together in intimate participation and fellowship. ~

This Is Me! Completion, then, is a life shared with the Father, every next step, through all that Jesus is as Blood Covenant, and for the sake of others, a continuous flow out into the Church. Completion is the certainty of knowing Father with me.

Through the week of May 12, I saw by the Spirit the Father’s delight in my human form, a form coming only out from the good-speaking of Jesus every moment. I knew that all the flow of the Spirit out from my heart fits and sings with, carries, and IS – ME! This is me. I can be me inside of the Father, as I find myself to be, with no need to be anything different. I need no sufficiency in myself, nor any need to pretend, for I live only inside of Love.

The Principles of Completion. Through the week of May 22, I wrote Lesson 2.1 “The Principles of Completion.” These things are true of us from the moment we receive Jesus, but it takes walking with God over time for us to grasp their certain reality. More than that, this faith in God is a miracle of the Devoted Spirit.

(1) Every Word that is Jesus is fulfilled now inside our lives. (2) We synergeo with God every moment, making all things good. (3) We walk in full assurance of faith. (4) The ability of Christ Jesus is given to us. (5) We are members of one another as the Church; we walk together inside of Love. (6) Now the Age of Tabernacles is begun; now the age of folly is stripped of any ability to continue. (7) We call God into visibility as our Love for one another, God made known.

From Our Prayer on May 22. “God, my Father, I ask You to give me a third experience in knowing You. …God, I ask that You seal me forever into LIFE and into the Completion of all Salvation and of all that You speak. Father, cause me to KNOW that You share every part of my daily life with me. Cause me to KNOW that I synergeo with You turning every single next step and moment and circumstance into all goodness as our dwelling place.

“Seal me into my commitment to You, Oh God, into the full equality of friendship with You, face to Face and heart to Heart, even as You are first committed to me. Let the completion of Your Word flow out of me as my entire human person joined with You in all familiar companionship. Let the ability of Your Son cause You and me to know one another in intimate participation together.

Just Like Jesus. “I ask for this experience from You, Oh God, my Father, inside of the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, that He might be proven faithful and true in all that You speak. And in asking I believe with full assurance of faith that I have received all that I have asked. I wait upon You in confident expectation that this experience of being sealed into Your Completion, into all the fullness of LIFE, will arise from inside of me, inside of my knowing of myself and of You with me, that I am forever just like the Lord Jesus Christ.”

Even though these things are true from our beginning, we Christians are wayward and fickle. God cannot show these things to us lest we abuse them for self-exaltation over others. – Those whom God loves, He chastises (Hebrews 12).

The Removal of Korah. Through the week of May 23-28, I wrote the chapter, “The Meaning of a Life,” for my autobiography. In that chapter, I listed every significant moment of God speaking to me in some way from age seven on. I had thought my life circumstances to be a stumbling from one mistake to another. I now saw them as filled with the intentions of God.

And the center of all of God’s dealings with me over decades was the removal from me of that which would challenge and speak against, out from contempt. It was God Himself who removed that “Korah” from me; my part was to see with honesty, to agree with God, and to be silent concerning myself.

The Meaning of a Life. The Ekenosis, “He humbled Himself” (Philippians 2), is God’s only entrance through you into your world. Your life is different from mine, but it is the same Jesus who has shared all with you. Every moment of your life becomes filled with meaning when you place Jesus upon yourself.

When God shows you how WRONG you were in any moment, do not accuse God of falseness by arguing with Him or by condemning yourself or others. Agree with Him and see how He has always used your every moment to prove Jesus faithful and True through the testimony of your life, regardless of your own foolishness.

God alone saves us; God alone gives our lives meaning.

At the Bottom of the Jordan. Next, I saw this truth as the longing of my own desire. The four priests who carried the Ark on their shoulders were the first into the waters of the Jordan. As the water swirled around their feet, suddenly the flood waters all the way across the river backed up and formed a wall to their right with a dry path all the way into LIFE. Those men stood there, unmoving, until every single little one of all the children of Israel had crossed over into the Promised land. Only then did they also turn, in defiance of death, and walk up into life.

This is what Jesus does for us – AND WE ALSO – commit ourselves to do the same for our brothers and sisters. Completion is to be just like Jesus, Jesus in us, that we would give our lives to the Father for the sake of others, that all might pass out from death into all the knowledge of God.

The Commitment of Our Lives. We commit ourselves to the Father to share Hheart with Him; to embrace a view of the Church as the passion of Jesus inside; to know the Spirit of intercession for the sake of others; to be the Mercy Seat of God; to know sharing life with the Father every moment; to be sealed into all completion.

We commit ourselves to the Father to speak as and for the entire Church; to walk together with other believers in Jesus; to know one another inside God-among-us, that is inside of Love; to love one another with pure hearts fervently.

We commit ourselves to the Father to be God-made-known, both individually and together; to be Love revealed, the Salvation of God made visible; to know God and to thrill with the joy of Father released to be Himself as He pleases.

The Day of Pentecost. Through the week of June 8-12, I was writing “The Spirit Leads Me.” I saw that because we drink of one Spirit with all who belong to Jesus, we can stand inside of God as the entire Church making our words to and out from God to be her words as well, that we can do in God what our millions of brothers and sisters cannot do, as them and for their sakes. Out from this knowing, I wrote a prayer of standing inside of God as the Church and for her sake in the early morning of June 12, as I was preparing for the Zoom meeting. I did not know then, but this was the Day of Pentecost.

“God, our Father, we belong to You because You first belong to us. Inside of our shared Spirit, Oh God, we join with You in travail for the sake of Your entire Church.

Drinking of One Spirit. “God, we know and drink of the same Spirit that fills all who belong to Jesus, and we are members with them of Your same body. We are, right now, the voice of that body and we speak as her with authority and in the power of the Devoted Spirit. God, cause the Fire of Your Spirit to burn, cause all eyes to open, cause all pretending and arrogance to be cast off, cause Your knowing to arise inside of all.

“God, our Father, we are in travail with You, inside our shared Spirit, with deep groanings, that Life, knowing You, would be birthed inside of creation, here upon this earth. No one remains inside of darkness, for we call all who belong to Jesus into All-Salvation-Now.

Our Prayer Together. “God, we will not let You rest until You have made the Church of Jesus Christ, our Jerusalem, to be a praise and a joy among all humans in this world, the revelation of Jesus. Let our 'Yes, Lord' be the 'Yes, Lord' of all, in Jesus name.”

Upon praying this prayer together in the Zoom meeting, I understood that we had taken the first significant step out from the Holy of Holies as the Ark of the Covenant going forth into and as the Church. I understood that Church, Christ Community, must come first out from those who speak as and for the Church inside the presence of God. I was utterly overwhelmed that June 12 was the Day of Pentecost, the birthing of the Church that then brings forth the knowledge of God into the knowledge of all.

The Next Lesson. The next lesson is titled “A Biblical Experience.” My purpose in it is to set before you your own engagement with God in knowing that He shares every next step with you forever.

As you read any of my experiences with God, or of anything God made real to me at different times in my life, never think that I am “special.” Instead, see me only as an example into your own confrontation with God that He has made these things real to you, in your life, as well. Engage with God for yourself regarding whatever line or truth I bring out from the Word and out from God teaching me.

This is the meaning of the Jordan, that we are for one another and for all who belong to Jesus. This is the meaning of our prayers.