17.3 Real Sustenance
© 2017 Christ Revealed Bible Institute
I am so excited by the clarity God has given me regarding what His real LIFE sustenance is for His people that I have not paused long enough to present the actual topic of this session. You shall also make a table of acacia wood; two cubits shall be its length, a cubit its width, and a cubit and a half its height. And you shall overlay it with pure gold, and make a molding of gold all around. – And you shall set the showbread on the table before Me always (Exodus 25:23-24 & 30).
You will find a further description as well as pictures of the Table of Showbread on pages 58-59 of the Rose Guide. Their comparison of the Bread of Presence with the Communion of the Lord Jesus is excellent, the same as mine. The difference is that I extend these things as God means them in all fullness.
Breaking Bread Together. The only objection I have to the Rose Guide comments is that the Church breaking bread together is missing from their understanding. The central action of the Church is sharing meals together, for as we sit down at table together to eat our daily bread, we are experiencing Jesus in all fulness.
I believe this absolutely. I have nothing but memories of Christ out from eighteen years of eating meals together with other believers in Jesus in our shared dining room, gathered around the tables in joyous and good conversation. And this communion in the midst of Community, I treasured most and miss the most. Regardless of any other places of difficulty, our eating together was always Christ.
Defining Sustenance. I am defining “sustenance” by the subjective, though critical, concept of “life as it was meant to be.” Real sustenance is a quality of fullness that comes only out from a state of living in which every aspect of our lives, spirit, soul, and body, is made every whit whole.
Let me explain myself precisely. The Bread that is Christ, and eating of that Bread is a way of living together as the Church – His flesh. “Except you eat My flesh” is an experience found FIRST in eating meals together in a common dining room as the Church. If it is not found there first, it does not exist anywhere else. Ten million theologians will argue against that claim, yet I stand unmoved in my conviction and with MANY reasons.
Wholeness out of Heart. Except you eat My flesh is the Body part of life together, and remember that the Body of flesh is for God. Except you drink My blood is the Spirit part of life together, and remember that the Spirit of Life is for us.
Yet our breaking bread together in the common dining room is only the heart of our sustenance. When the heart is right, all wholeness is able to flow out to every part. Sustenance is every part of our lives made every whit whole – and that must be life together BECAUSE we cannot be whole except Father be at Home, and Father at Home is Church. It is not good for Father to be alone.
And so, I can talk about Christ as the Bread of Life only by presenting to you a model community, a Pattern of Wholeness.
Our Bond Together. Yet here is my dilemma. I want to describe community here – except that full description is Symmorphy V: Life. This course is Covenant. Thus it is imperative on me to give you only a brief view of life together, just enough to provide the context for the Covenant verses by which you and I are bound together as one Body of Christ, the expression of Father revealed.
So, let’s place here again the Covenant verses by which you and I are BOUND together as one Body of Christ. In Whom the whole building, being fitted together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord, in Whom you also are being built together for a dwelling place of God in the Spirit (Ephesians 2:21-22).
Being Knit Together. From Whom the whole body, joined and knit together by what every joint supplies, according to the effective working by which every part does its share, causes growth of the body for the edifying of itself in love (Ephesians 4:16). – Being knit together in love, and attaining to… the knowledge of the mystery of God – holding fast to the Head, from whom all the body, bonded and knit together by joints and ligaments, grows with the increase that is from God (Colossians 2:2 & 19).
Bearing with one another in love, endeavoring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace (Ephesians 4:3). – But above all these things put on love, which is the bond of perfection (Colossians 3:14).
Love One Another. This is My commandment that you love one another as I have loved you (John 15:) – Love one another with a pure heart fervently (1 Peter 1:) – By this we know love because He laid down His life for us, and we also ought to lay down our lives for the brethren (1 John 3:16) – For we are members one of another (Romans 12:).
I have here eleven verses. These eleven verses are Covenant; they are binding and absolute; they are forever; they are for God and for us. Memorize them. Let them fill all the pathways of your mind and heart. Let them define who and what you are as Christ through you. Ask God to fulfill these verses in your life as all that He means by them; never tire of speaking them out loud.
Defining Bread. And it is when your own heart sings in all outward expression and fulfillment of these Covenant verses that bind us together as one House of God that you will know LIFE as it was meant to be – that you will know the Bread of Life making you every whit whole.
Let me define bread. Bread, the Bread of Life, is the enjoyment of Christ in one another, enjoyment meaning every benefit gained by walking together. At the same time, we place the fire, the Energeia of God coming entirely through our faith, as the ONLY power causing our breaking bread together in community to be sustenance for all.
Seven Loaves of Bread. Please understand, every aspect of life together I have labored over in real experience, in tears, in seeking God through great difficulty and angst, with much thought and the deepest care, and over many years. I speak only out of what I know. I want to share seven specific ways (among many) in which the community of Christ I envision is the Bread of Life both to us and to all creation.
These seven progress from the outward through our intertwined stories to our ministry of Christ in the Spirit. 1. Buildings and spaces. 2. Natural health. 3. Personal contribution and service. 4. Sharing stories together. 5. Privacy and personal-ness. 6. People coming in. 7. A platform for Word.
Buildings and Spaces. I am thinking of two Christian communities, both in Canada, one of which was coming apart at the seams from the very start, and the other of which has endured until today in life and in joy. The one which has endured until today is the place where I have sent two of my children for school. The structure and layout of this community in its buildings and spaces follows well every principle found in the patterns of home. The other community, which is no more, violated every single one of those patterns of home in its buildings and spaces in every conceivable way.
People cannot live in spaces that are hostile to our humanity; people flourish when they live in spaces that make them sing.
Natural Health. Modern man, imagining himself to be smarter than God, has created two things that never existed in the physical world before, two things that destroy the human body. These two things are man-made chemicals and man-made radiation, both of which can be thought of as “strange fire” towards our physical bodies. To be whole includes being whole in our physical health and that includes severely limiting chemicals and radiation, everything from vaccines to wi-fi to unnatural corn-fed beef.
I like this, for I am finally able to place the things of natural health and nutrition into my full “religious” beliefs and an essential part of the practice of Christian Salvation, part of all the fulness of Christ.
A Wholesome Physical Life. Our food, what we put into our bodies, will be wholesome as God created it. In the Christian community where I will live we will grow much of our food in an organic garden. We will pasture our meat and eggs. We will rely on the real nutrition our bodies need as the first part of a wholesome physical life and turn first to essential oils and healing herbs when facing physical difficulty. The modern medical system is of great value when responding to terrible accidents or immanent death, but it is not designed to heal, only to keep people lingering in expensive sickness.
Living a wholesome physical life as a part of our Salvation includes many different and wondrous things that I love.
Personal Contribution and Service. Most of the psychological breakdown that drives people to do wrong or dangerous things comes out of growing up inside the constant story line - YOU ARE NOT NEEDED! No greater wreckage can be done in people’s lives than for their contribution, which they have labored over in love, to be rejected by “the leaders” or spoken against with contempt.
A certain brother asked me to come work on his house for him. He said to me, “Daniel, I could do it myself, but when I sit in my living room, I want to look at that part of my home and remind myself that Daniel made that for me.” The community of which I will be a part will go out of its way to make sure that every single member feels valued and needed in the real contribution of their personal gifts.
Sharing Stories Together. The single most valuable thing to me in my community experience was the sharing of our stories together, what I know now as sharing soul with soul.
Once at Blueberry, some of the brethren, driving home at night in the winter, hit a moose lying already dead on the road. They shared their story with us in the dining room after supper the next evening. Oh how funny they made it, how we laughed and laughed and laughed. The memory of that evening of 150 people as FAMILY together remains in me as a bright light of joy and togetherness.
Sharing our stories together is the very essence and soul of Salvation, of the fulness of Christ in His Church.
Privacy and Personal-ness. Some people are wired to receive their energy from interacting with other people. Being in a constant social mix strengthens them, and being alone drains them. Others are wired to receive their energy from solitude and quiet contemplation. It’s not that they don’t love being with others, but social activity is a net drain of energy to them, energy that must be restored through solitude.
Respect for one another’s person and privacy is the single most important element inside a successful Christian community. And the most important place for this respect to be front and center is in the governance meetings of the community members. We hear and honor one another. Even if we see something differently, we still value highly our brother or sister’s perspective.
People Coming In. I am convinced that the only way a Christian community can be successful as a community and be successful in supporting itself is by serving outside people coming into the community for that purpose. The three primary things people coming in will spend their money to obtain inside a community are recreation, natural health needs, and teaching. And as they come in to enjoy a vacation time, to seek natural/spiritual healing, or to learn any number of skills, or all three together, they are free to partake of much of community life, as little or as much as they wish.
This intermingling is the real and the most powerful witness of Christ through His Church.
A Platform for Word. Somewhere between 30 and 50 people hear Jesus speak to them through what I share on a regular basis. I count myself one of the wealthiest of humans. Yet the heart of Jesus over His entire Church, millions upon millions, He also shares with me. I know that it takes years of sitting under thousands of hours of Word to bring about the full knowledge of God in our hearts and minds. God’s entire church NEEDS the word of Christ I share, whether it comes through me or through others.
This Word, then, must have a platform from which to flow before it will be heard by many, and that platform is one thing only – a family of believers walking together in this word as a Community of Christ.
Life as It Is Meant to Be. As I have written regarding these seven things, I have written and then deleted many negative things, trying my best to counter the negative I have known with a full expression of the positive I have also known. And these seven are simply representative of many things that make life together the fullness of Christ, what Salvation is and means forever.
Bread becomes sustenance, and sustenance is every part of our lives made every whit whole. An organic vegetable garden and sharing stories together over supper are as much a part of the fullness of Christ as the preaching of Kingdom Word.
I am speaking of LIFE as it is meant to be.
In Jesus the whole building, being fitted together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord, in Jesus you also are being built together for a dwelling place of Father in the Spirit.