28.2 The Inner Victory
© 2016 Christ Revealed Bible Institute
Isaiah Chapter 26 is a song of the resurrection, utterly inside the gospel of Jesus Christ. I suggest you read the whole chapter entirely from that viewpoint.
Come, my people, enter thou into thy chambers, and shut thy doors about thee: hide thyself as it were for a little moment, until the indignation be overpast (Isaiah 26:20). I heard this song first sung at Graham River Farm almost 40 years ago, it has been a song of my heart ever since.
For, behold, the Lord cometh out of his place to punish the inhabitants of the earth for their iniquity: the earth also shall disclose her blood, and shall no more cover her slain (Isaiah 26:21).
Enter Thy Chambers
I will say little more about the last line from Isaiah, for I am angry against my Christian brethren here in America for their determination to believe lies and to give their hand to the murder of millions of innocent people across the earth, all the while hiding their eyes from their own violence. Let us turn from this mockery of God, this incredible “belief” that the United States and Israel, drunk on their arrogance, cannot reap what they sow, and look at this place, this secret place of the Most High, where God’s precious saints find refuge during the time of the uncovering of all iniquity.
“Enter into thy chambers” is the fulfillment of the six in-between days of Tabernacles in the life of the Church, the days of dwelling in booths.
Inner and Outer
Here is my contention. The inner VICTORY is the fullness of Christ among us, walking together in love, loving one another with a pure heart fervently in the bond of perfection, the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ – even while we are in these present dying bodies. The outer VICTORY is the moment when our souls are swallowed up by incorruptibility and our bodies by immortality.
There can be no outer victory before the inner victory is full and complete. You and me, walking together in these present bodies of dying flesh, loving one another with a pure heart fervently IS the ONLY proof of God that Jesus is faithful and true.
Entering Our Refuge
And it is this walking together in love that IS the chambers into which we enter; it is the shutting of the doors upon LOVE. It is the ark of Noah, our refuge; the evidence God needs to prove that Adam and the serpent are WRONG.
By faith Noah, being divinely warned of things not yet seen, moved with godly fear, prepared an ark for the saving of his household, by which he condemned the world and became heir of the righteousness which is according to faith (Hebrews 11:7). Noah and his family entering the ark, God’s people entering into their chambers, the fulfillment of dwelling in booths, are all speaking of the same reality, a present experience now upon us.
Victory
Now, this session mirrors one of the most exhilarating chapters the Lord has enabled me to write, the last chapter, “Victory,” of The Two Gospels. This course, Symmorphy II: Essence, is a replication at a deeper level of my purpose in that book. Click on the link to read that concluding chapter, Victory.
In these two lessons, Inner and Outer Victory, however, I hope to reduce all that glory down into specific definitions. For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality. Incorruption and immortality are simply two specific qualities found inside of Put on the Lord Jesus Christ.
Fellowship of Life
In this lesson, the focus is incorruptibility; in the next lesson, the focus is immortality.
Incorruptible is a negating word meaning no-rotting. Immortal is a negating word meaning no-dying. Yet in the resurrection, we will not be calling these things by their negative, but rather by their positive. The positive of incorruptible is fellowship; the positive of immortal is life. Incorruptible life is the fellowship of life.
The life was manifested, and we have seen, and bear witness, and declare to you that eternal life which was with the Father and was manifested to us …that you also may have fellowship with us; and truly our fellowship is with the Father and with His Son Jesus Christ (1 John 1:2-3).
God Seen and Touched
John introduced this fellowship of life with these words: That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, concerning the Word of life (1 John 1:1). The whole point of everything, God touched and handled, God seen and known.
Let’s look more closely at this fellowship that I see as being “incorruptible life,” putting the Lord Jesus Christ upon our souls, upon our entire story of self – as we relate together. That you also may have fellowship with us; and truly our fellowship is with the Father and with His Son Jesus Christ.
The Proof of God
This is the exact same word as found in John 17. That they may be one just as We are one: I in them, and You in Me; that they may be made perfect in one.
Here is my CONTENTION and my argument against all that Nicene Christianity teaches and practices. The proof of God is NOT you and me walking together in perfect love AFTER our bodies are swallowed up by life, after we no longer know what sin is. The proof of God, the demonstration to the universe that Jesus IS faithful and true, is you and me walking together in perfect love WHILE IN these very bodies of dying flesh – because we love Jesus and because this IS Jesus.
The Fulfillment of Tabernacles
PURE and PERFECT fellowship among each other and with Father and Son. I’m talking about the fulfillment of the Feast of Tabernacles in the life of the Church, in our lives right now as the real SUPER Shemitah, knowing Jesus AS HE IS, before the ages change.
The fulfillment of the first Day of the Feast, Father now among us in a power and grace the Christian church has never known gets us into this Fellowship. The fulfillment of the final Great Day of the Feast, rivers of living water flowing out from us across the whole earth, beginning with our physical bodies swallowed up by life seals us forever into this Fellowship. But the fellowship is what it’s all about; the fellowship IS Christ.
The Deepest of Friendship
And this fellowship, this walking together in love, our loving one another with a pure heart fervently, the fulfilment of all God’s desire, is focused on one active purpose we engage in together, working together – Nourishing God’s woman during the great time of all things being exposed as what they really are, the indignation.
Having lived in Spirit-filled Christian community for eighteen years, I know that I have tasted, just a bit, of what this Fellowship really is. It is the deepest of friendship, the highest regard for one another, and it is known in one place only, in the midst of the greatest battle, in the most desperate of circumstances, each one laying down his or her life for the other.
Real Fellowship
Why do both I and Rick Annett know that he loves me with an unbreakable bond that endures forever? Because Rick Annett laid down his life for me.
Why do both Rick Annett and I know that I love him with an unbreakable bond that endures forever? Because I laid down my life for him.
I’m not talking about any pie in the sky, but only practical reality right here in the blood, the dirt, and the tears of this planet. Yet such real fellowship comes only out from working together, eating together, worshipping together, walking together.
Christian Community
I’m talking about Christian community; I’m talking about Christ. I will see Jesus as He is only in your face. You will see Jesus as He is only in my face.
For it is the God who commanded light to shine out of darkness, who has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ (2 Corinthians 4:6). That face is Christian community, brethren walking together in love. With all the grace that is upon me, I would convince you that there is no other revelation of Jesus Christ.
The Fellowship of Love
Inner Victory, the fellowship of Love, is a trillion times more important than the outer victory, our mortal bodies being swallowed up by life. And it’s a billion times more important than rivers of living water flowing out of our bellies setting all creation free.
The fellowship of Love, brethren walking together in practical daily life in perfect liberty and love, is the ONLY source of the appearance of the New Creation. It IS Jesus proven faithful and true. And I have devoted an entire course, the last in this series, Symmorphy V: Life, to explore the wondrous truths of this fellowship of reality as expressed in the New Testament.
Definitions
Yet this course is a definitional approach to God and the gospel, thus let’s attempt, somehow, to write the definitions of the Victory of Fellowship as we expect to see it for real in the fulfillment of Tabernacles.
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). – Christ—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 4:15-16).
Temple and Body
The Victory of Fellowship is Father and Son filling their fully completed house, you and me, a corporate body in which every part does its share. This Temple, this Body of God, is joined and knit together by what every joint (you and me) supplies. This joining and knitting together is the fellowship of Father and Son among us, it is the connections of God between each one of us.
The Spirit is the life-giving One; the Son is the victorious warrior, but it is the Father who wants a house for Himself, a body in which to dwell. That house is many brothers and sisters walking together in love.
Purity
I want to switch back, now, to purity, to this need for the elect, you and me, to be “extremely purified.” This purity is also part of the inner victory.
In the last lesson I spoke of those who gave themselves to life poured out in Christian community and in the anointing of the Spirit for decades, yet, in the end, knew nothing about their union with Christ, but rather only a sense of falling short. Those precious saints, certainly loved by God, sought Father by church, but could not find Him. We, on the other hand, KNOWING Father by faith, seek Church by Father.
Church cannot take us to Father, but Father does take us to Church. The difference is purity (the white garments). Purity is full union with Christ, with no sufficiency in ourselves.
A Dream
We do not know exactly which day of our calendar is God’s first Day of the Feast of Tabernacles, we do know it is sometime in October.
I want to share a dream I had last night. In my dream, I was standing at the top of a stairway looking down at Jesus in the room below. Jesus was beneath of me. His eyes beckoned to me and I said to Him, “Jesus, you are the same as me and I am the same as You. I am a man, just like You, filled with all the fullness of God.”
When I said that, I knew that Jesus was no longer “beneath of” me, but now part of me, Jesus and I as one person together. I knew, now, that I must share these words with others.
Teaching Others
The first person I saw next was a girl, around six or seven. Eager anticipation was upon her face as I told her to say, “Jesus, You are the same as me and I am the same as You. I am just like You, a girl filled with all the fullness of God.” I knew that in that moment, this little girl was sealed into God and that our bond together was complete, regardless of outward proximity.
I continued teaching others to say that same thing, “I am just like You, Jesus, a man/a woman filled with all the fullness of God,” and many responded with joy, each now sealed into God, each now part of me and one another. (Speak those same words out loud yourself.)
Yet not all would hear.
Self-Righteousness
I noticed a group of “deeper truth” Christians in a room high above me, some of whom I had known. I wanted to speak this word to them, but I could not get up to them and they showed no interest in coming down to hear. Then I stood in front of a group of young people, filled with themselves, talking earnestly about unimportant things. I spoke loudly to them, “I have something to say to you.” (Even in my dream, it was not easy for me to speak in that setting, it’s not something I do.) I spoke that three times, yet, although they were turned in my direction, not one ever looked at or acknowledged me. They would not hear me.
And I knew that, in both instances, it was self-righteousness, being filled with their own “perfected” self-story, by which they refused to hear me.
Just Like Jesus
I continued speaking to others, however, those not “put together,” those not successful in either church or world, and they gladly spoke those words of union with Christ.
I am convinced that God will birth His perfect fellowship among us together in whom He dwells out from that pure union of each individual member with the Lord Jesus. Yet I am also convinced that the ark of God, the only place of safety, the total purification of our souls is our precious union with the Lord Jesus, He the same as us and we the same as He.
You and me, men and women just like Jesus, filled with all the fullness of God. And out from Father, filling us full, comes Church by Father.
Come, My People
I knew, in my dream, that I had spoken and was teaching others to speak the very fulfillment of the First Day of Tabernacles, of being sealed into God and of being made a part of one another.
Extreme purity is NO righteousness, no self-story, of our own, but His story alone, our only life, our only consciousness, including all we find ourselves to be in our human weakness.
And so I sing this song to you, those chosen of God to receive this precious and pure union with the Lord Jesus Christ.
Come, come my people, enter into thy chambers;
And shut the doors around about thee;
And hide thyself for a little moment;
‘Till the indignation be overpassed.