11.2 By the Second Witness of Christ
I am tying three things together as the same group of people. – And I will give to My two witnesses, and they will prophesy one thousand two hundred and sixty days, enclothed with sackcloth. – And she brought forth a son, a boy who is about to shepherd all the ethnic families with a rod of iron, and her child was seized into God and into His throne. – And THEY have overcome him through the blood of the Lamb, and through the word of their testimony; and they have not loved their souls unto death.
We are looking at the ministry of Christ to His Church over the next few years. Their purpose is to convince the Church that Jesus loves her and that she lives in all Salvation now. And we are placing ourselves into this ministry.
God’s Timeline. My understanding of God’s timeline has now changed to fit the unfolding of ongoing reality. For the first eight years of Christ in His Church, all Christians lived together in Christ Community, only in Jerusalem. Here they were birthed out from the outpoured Spirit. Here they learned the meaning of Christ.
I now place the fulfillment of the Feast of Tabernacles in the life of the Church as the first years of the Age of Tabernacles, a glorious season during which millions of believers in Jesus learn what the Salvation of God really is, without distraction. And I place the final 3½ years of the Age of God’s Patience as the demonstration of the greatest Love ever made visible inside of creation. – My own arm brought Salvation to Me.
Know the Way. The knowledge of God comes into creation only through the Church. The Love of God is made known to that Church by the ministry that “follows the Lamb,” that is, the Lamb through them. In this lesson, we want to place ourselves into that ministry that is the Love of God made known to the Church, and in the next lesson, we want to consider how God is made known through her to all, Salvation revealed.
“When you see the ark of the covenant of the Lord your God, then you shall go after it. Yet there shall be a space between you and it. Do not come near it, that you may know the way by which you must go, for you have not passed this way before” (Joshua 3:3-4 reduced).
What God Is Doing. We have not been this way before. For that reason all we can do is set out the parameters of that way. Yet we know that this way through death and into LIFE, taking our brethren with us, is every next step we share with God.
When I read Christian ministries declaring what is wrong with the Church in this world and what must be done about it, when I read their descriptions of re-establishing the Kingdom of God in the earth, I see no relationship between their ideas and God. What God is doing through us is something they have never considered, even though it fills the Bible. God will turn everything inside out and upside down – through us.
Much More Than Power. Let’s start with power. – For we have this treasure in earthen vessels that the excellency of the power might be of God and not of us (2 Corinthians 4:7).
I want to compare two lines from John’s vision, for they are fully parallel, the first is the cause of the second. – I will give to My two witnesses, and they will prophesy (the golden oil flowing through them). – Then the sixth angel poured out his bowl upon the great river Euphrates, and its water was dried up (the waters of death feeding Babylon, the confusion of self-power built together). “I will give” is much more than power; it is everything that is God coming through into creation, now safe with us.
Two Rivers. The golden oil flowing through and the River of Life flowing out from the Tree of Life are the same thing – God released. And this flow is into the places of power and influence in the heavens all around all created things.
But here is the awful thing. When God raised Jesus from the dead, He removed all authority from Adam and his seed and gave it to Jesus and His seed. The power of death in this world does not come out from Adam’s seed, those who are unregenerate, no matter how much they lust for power. The power of death in this world has flowed out from the seed of Christ, Christians in this world who use God for their own ends.
Come out of Her. The flow of Life through us comes first, but it’s effect is the drying up of the river of death flowing still through Christians. And YES! Most of my Christian life was me cursing myself and my way. I had no idea of the death flowing into my world because I was not giving thanks, because God was not safe with me.
All Christians – ALL – are inside of Babylon; that’s why God says to you, “Come out of her.” And I am increasingly horrified at the unbelief and the lying that is woven all through Christian teaching and theology, driving wedges between God and us, exalting sin and self, and turning Jesus into a little ineffective wimp far away.
Who? The next question is who. Who are these whom we love? Who is the woman clothed with the sun? Who are those who come rushing into the Feast? We are speaking only of people alive on this earth today. I have used the phrase, “one hundred million or more.” I want the number to be large, and yet it is small compared to all humans. I want our view to be unlimited, “or more” can mean 2 – 3 – 500,000,000, and yet, it remains only a tithe.
Then we come to two parables Jesus spoke and realize the scope of their awfulness, the Laborers in the Vineyard and the Wedding Feast. Both parables tell us that millions of our Christian brethren, born again and filled with the Spirit, will REFUSE the revelation of Jesus Christ.
Free to Refuse. In one parable, they refuse, and then God brings in others. In the other parable, they refuse because they see God bringing in those who have never been Christians. No matter how closely you walk with God, you are free to refuse Jesus, just as you are free to receive Him. When we speak of being “sealed into God,” we mean, “Oh God, seal me forever into my ‘Yes, Lord,’ and pay no attention to anything else I might cry.”
Who are these millions who turn around with Jesus, that God might be known through them inside their world? Who are these who will rejoice in being clothed with the Lord Jesus Christ, never again needing any sufficiency in themselves?
Our Fellow Christians. Who are these for whom we give ourselves utterly to God, that He might Love them together with us?
Let’s continue with the thought of 100 million or more so that we might have something to conceptualize. It is our prayer that at least half of that number would be out from our fellow Christians, people who have loved Jesus for most of their lives, who are ready to place themselves under the mighty arm of God and be led by Him into Christ. Yet we are talking about Christians from every land and language, from every sect and denomination. But what about the other half, what about the fifty million or more who are NOT Christians at all right now?
Straight into the Feast. Think about that. We are talking about millions of Muslims, millions of Buddhists and Hindus, atheists and criminals and pagans of every sort, people just trying to survive in the emptiness of their souls. Compel them to come in – to the Wedding Feast. And we are not talking about them becoming Nicene Christians, but rushing straight into all the fulness of Christ through them into their world, loving one another with pure hearts fervently, clothed with the Lord Jesus Christ in all.
It would certainly astonish me, but not surprise me, if the Lord sent me, or someone carrying the same Word, to surround all the Palestinian people with the protection of God and bring them all into the woman clothed with Jesus.
Two and Second. I want to address the question of “two” witnesses. Here is my present understanding. The two witnesses of God are a Pure Word, the Son out from God, and a Pure Spirit, the Spirit out from God.
Yet this flow of Word and Spirit, always together, is embodied in a small company of people who are its channel. These we would then call “the second witness of Christ,” as they fulfill the second half of a seven-year ministry. This small company is focused only on the Church, or on those called into the Church, but not by themselves. Rather, they give God through them to thousands who are firstfruits, who then turn and give the same to millions, the Bride.
Judgment Begun. We could say it this way, though not as literal numbers. – 144 give to 144,000, who give to 144,000,000.
Then this, Revelation 11:6. – These possess the authority to the heavens, that no rain should fall in the days of their prophecy. And they possess authority over the waters, to turn them into blood, and to strike the earth with every wound or affliction as often as they want. Notice that their attention is on the rain, the waters, and the earth, but not the sea. Here is another way to say the same. – For it is the opportune time for the judgment to have begun from the house of God (1 Peter 4:17).
Great Consternation. The second witness of Christ does not preach so-called “repentance” to the unregenerate, to the masses of humanity. Rather, they prophesy Christ into His Church. Needless to say, this causes great consternation among Christians, not just mentally and vocally, but also inside their heavens, inside the realms of spirit in which they operate.
Revelation 12 shows us that all who receive this Living Spirit Word, this golden oil, enter into a place wherein there is NO demonic influence twisting that Word into good vs evil. We possess authority to the heavens, to prevent the entrance of impurity into the Word as it passes from us into the speaking of many.
The Bony Finger. The golden oil from the throne of God is the ONLY thing that makes the Church pure, prepared for full union with Christ.
I have NO interest in having some sort of “power” over the natural elements, or the physical earth, or the kingdoms of men. I have every interest that the Living Word of the Gospel, Christ in our mouths, be Pure in all of its going forth. And that Word must have one result – Christians on this earth loving one another with pure hearts fervently. I would be the bony finger of God All-Carrying in the forehead of every individual person who would draw near to speaking Christ. – What are you doing with God’s Word?
Mouth closed. Face on ground. “Let it be to me.”
The Moment of Authority. The titles of the lessons in this chapter create a sentence. – The Father made known by the second witness of Christ through the Church. The key is the moment of authority. I want to talk about that.
Then Moses answered and said, “But suppose they will not believe me or listen to my voice; suppose they say, ‘The Lord has not appeared to you’ ” (Exodus 4:1). And the Lord said to Joshua, “This day I will begin to exalt you in the sight of all Israel, that they may know that, as I was with Moses, so I will be with you” (Joshua 3:7). Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord (Malachi 4).
How You Hear. “Father, glorify Your name.” Then a voice came from heaven, saying, “I have both glorified it and will glorify it again.” Therefore the people who stood by and heard it said that it had thundered. Others said, “An angel has spoken to Him.” Jesus answered, “This voice did not come because of Me, but for your sake” (John 12:28-30).
Then consider these. – “Behold, the days are coming,” says the Lord God, “That I will send a famine on the land, not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water, but of hearing the words of the Lord” (Amos 8:11). – “If anyone has ears to hear, let him hear.” – “Take heed how you hear.”
Breaking the Power of the False. Christians right now cannot hear the Gospel because their minds are filled with the mixture of confusion, of truth and lies all swirling together. Thousands of people have come across what I write, but only around forty continue to read regularly.
Let me paraphrase Revelation 11:6 into what I am convinced God means by these things. ~ And these have authority to the heavens to break the power of the false words of another gospel, that its words would no longer be heard. They have authority to confront the Church, to bring her to silence in the presence of God. They have the authority to open her ears that she might hear Christ alone. ~
How? I identify completely with Moses, “No one listens to me.” Then we hear Jesus say to us, “I give all that I am to you.” And our hearts are overwhelmed because we know and perceive that He is telling us the truth. And so we wait upon God inside the Fire.
Yet we also want to address the question of how. How does this Love coming through the second witness of Christ work its way into visibility and effect? The next lesson contains part of the answer to our question, but here we want to draw from the last two lessons, “The Lamb as Victory” and “Father Made Known,” bringing those wondrous realities into this structure of this ministry.
Rooted and Grounded. In “The Lamb as Victory,” we saw how personal it was to Jesus that the Father would come through Him into His world. That same Jesus is now in us in the same ways. Yet more so, for this is the hour of the Father’s release and everything is coming to its fullness and completion. Then, in “Father Made Known,” we brought into ourselves this wondrous relationship with a God who is meek and lowly of Heart, inside of whose presence we dwell.
We know Ephesians 3:18 as never before, rooted and grounded inside of Love, and we know that this Love is God, and not of us, that we remain weak as God made us. We never seek for power. God is enough for us.
Our Desire. Our job is to believe in God. Believing is faith and faith is never “by,” but only “through.” Our confidence is a passageway and the One coming through is God Himself. We know that the Love that is God is shed abroad in our hearts through the Devoted Spirit given to us, now part of us. This is the place wherein we dwell, the knowing we know.
Jesus said, “Father, I DESIRE that – millions of believers in Me would be with Me, here inside of You,” and God answered Him. That same Jesus is now inside of us, inside our mouths, as Paul said He is, and as we speak the same word with Jesus, so God answers us as well.
“Father, we want our fellow Christians with us inside of You.”
Knowing God as Love. When I made a covenant with God at age 22, I said, “And I will walk with a people who know You.” I meant inside of Christian Community, life together as the Church. I said these words out loud, and now I know that it was Jesus speaking in my heart and mouth.
Here is what I am saying. – The two witnesses, the manifestation of the sons of God, Elijah to come, whatever you want to call this ministry of Jesus through us to His Church, this knowing of God as Love through us fills whoever that might be. We KNOW that God hears our prayer for His people, and we KNOW that He has answered us.
Every Little One. One final note. – The bottom of the Jordan is the place of my tears, standing here upon FIRM, as the Ark of God’s Covenant, holding back all that is death and lying and falseness until every little one who belongs to Jesus has passed through death all the way into all that is the LIFE and JOY of Christ, until everything is finished. This is our travail inside of God. There doesn’t have to be anything outward, except as God unfolds our steps together. No one knew what was really happening inside of Jesus except that God took David there a thousand years before.
By this we have known Love, in that Jesus set forth His soul for us, AND WE ALSO set forth our souls for the sake of our brothers and sisters all across the planet.
Reading for Next Time. An additional lesson has inserted itself into this chapter, a lesson that sums up everything until now to its most crucial point – “To Be Like Jesus.” Our “sentence” now reads, The Father made known by the second witness of Christ (to be like Jesus) through the Church. This new lesson is the culmination of the understanding I have been reaching for over many years. It is what I wanted to know when writing Chapter 8 “Redemption: A Love Story.” I would suggest you peruse that chapter before next time.
Jesus makes God known to us. We are just like Jesus only when we know that we are as incapable as He was and that God alone is Love through us, just like Jesus..
Let’s Pray Together. “God, our Father, we are inside of You, rooted and grounded inside of Your Love, Love that is poured out through our hearts by the wondrous Devoted Spirit whom You have made part of the fabric of our own beings. Here, inside of You, oh God, we give ourselves to and as Jesus, that His DESIRE would have full liberty inside of our own desire, that His bowels of Passion for the sake of His Church would consume us.
“Inside of the name of Jesus, the Lamb, filling us to completion, we speak LIFE into Your Church, into our Christian brethren all across the earth. We speak LIFE into all who belong to Jesus in this hour, even those who don’t yet know.
“Lord Jesus, You have given to us all of Yourself. We speak Your authority inside of us to the heavens, that the rains of death that have spoken falseness into the minds of our fellow Christians should cease, that they can no longer hear the meaning of a mixed “gospel.” By Your authority inside of us, we direct Your people to silence inside the presence of God, that they might place their faces upon the ground before all Devotion. In this way we strike the earth, that the shock of Your All-ness might prevail over every heart and mind.
“And, Lord Jesus, we open the ears of all who belong to You inside this wedding Feast, that they would hear Christ alone, a living Gospel, All-Salvation-Now. For this, we give ourselves to You, Father. You answer us.”