8. An Apostolic Covering

I suspect that the most important single element on any battle field is the mind of the military commander. Having a larger army, having more highly skilled fighters, having greater resources, these things can all be defeated by the right mind commanding the other side.

For some strange reason, even though I believe in non-violent responses to violence, both in my upbringing, in my nature, and in my present knowledge of God, still, I have a continual fascination with the great battles of history and the nature of military strategy. Since I never judge myself, I don’t worry about this incongruity at all.

The three military minds I know the best, from amateur study, are those of Subodai, who was Genghis Khan’s most brilliant general; Arthur Wellesley, that is, the Duke of Wellington; and Napoleon Bonaparte, though I draw from others as well.

Now, I don’t think for one moment that I could be, then, a capable mind directing a battlefield in this world. I was thinking about that just the other day, and I realized again that what God has taught me from this arena of study is fully applicable to this great World War in which we are engaged.

Neither Subodai nor Wellington ever lost a battle, in spite of the many, many fierce engagements in their careers. And there are very definite reasons why.

For starters, both men KNEW their own strengths and weaknesses, both men KNEW their enemies’ strengths and weaknesses and committed all resources to gathering that information before they ever committed to battle. And both men KNEW the terrain upon which they fought and how both they and their opponent would use that terrain.

Having said all this, I actually do not want a study of the apostolic covering by which a Third Feast Church lives and moves to be dominated by a study of military thinking. You see, the ideas of how victory is ensured must be translated from the arena of the natural man over to our victory over all sin and death.

And so, we must understand apostolic covering before we can draw from military strategy to understand how our victory, having the mind of Christ, is certain. And when I say, “our victory,” I mean – LOVE ONE ANOTHER defeating all Accusation in this world.

Apostolic covering was one of those many things I placed into that locked closet when I left the move fellowship twenty-one years ago. It is only after writing Symmorphy V: Life that I am fully able to see God bring it back to me arising from Father as my only source.

You are fellow-citizens with the saints and of the household, the family, the domestic intimacy of God, having been constructed together upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus Himself being the extreme angle or corner (Ephesians 2:19-20).

While writing “The Sheltering Roof” in Symmorphy V: Life, I realized that the foundation of the house is the most important part of the roof. The roof is able to do its work of overshadowing the layout of the house and protecting its inhabitants only as it arises from and is firmly fixed upon a sure foundation.

As we saw in Symmorphy IV: Covenant, the covering over the house of God is the knowledge of Christ Jesus as He is, first as every word God speaks, second as the one who lives as us, third as a connecting Spirit of power, and fourth as a many-membered Body, that is, life together. It is this knowledge as life inside of each individual believer in Jesus that is the covering tying a Third Feast Church together across this earth.

The foundation by which that covering can exist is life laid-down and love poured-out.

Let me explain. As I shared in “The Apocalypse Part II,” take two or three individuals, each one knowing personally that they are coming out from God’s thoughts concerning them, spoken as the Lord Jesus Christ now becoming them and written in Person as Spirit Word all through the pathways of their hearts, and put them together in the same place. Now they walk together in absolute CONFIDENCE that God their Father, Himself in Person, IS their source and, Himself in Person, IS all their connections together. In short, that God IS Love.

This is how I now understand Jesus’ statement – “Wherever two or three of you are gathered together inside of My name, there I am in the midst of you.”

In any gathering together, then, of a local church, it is this relationship that Jesus calls “Love one another,” that is, a full reciprocal love, God Himself between and among these two or three. These few do not have to be smart or strong, and they especially do not have to be “leaders.” The one requirement is that they believe in Jesus.

What is coming out from them, then, is the knowledge of Jesus as He is, the life of every believer in Jesus. When we looked at Revelation 12:10-11 in Symmorphy V: Life, we realized that “and they overcame him,” although it is fully applicable to each of us personally, still, those words are speaking of that covering of the knowledge of Jesus-as-He-is against all the assault of accusation coming against the Church of Christ.

As brothers and sisters are drawn to this gathering together of two or three inside of Jesus’ name, so they will learn Christ their only life by seeing and participating with these who KNOW that God is their only Source, Christ is their only life, and Love One Another is their only expression. In this way, two or three become four or five.

Then, in God’s seasons, two or three go out from those four or five to be the genesis of a new Community of Christ to which other brothers and sisters are drawn. – And so on, like the reach of fungi under the soil, going forth to establish a new “node,” and then branching out ever further from each of those many nodes or centers of gathering together, all of it a mighty foundation unnoticed for the time being.

 You see, I simply do not believe that God will ever zap. God does not wave His magic wand in order to transform things from one thing to something totally different. Everything needed for victory is inside of us as every Word God speaks, and every expression of God through us must come out of daily human reality – the life of Jesus also made visible through our dying human flesh (2 Corinthians 4). Otherwise, the Word God speaks is meaningless.

And, of course, we have this Treasure [God, that is, Love One Another] inside of earthen vessels that the excellency of the power might be of God and not of us.

Apostolic covering, then, does NOT mean individual humans called “apostles” as the “covering over” all these wayward and fleshy Christians, making sure everyone is “hearing and obeying.” That model has been death in the Church from the passing of John until now.

Apostolic covering is the knowledge of Christ as every Word God speaks, the knowledge of Christ as the One who lives as us, the knowledge of Christ as a connecting and life-giving Spirit of power, and the knowledge of Christ as all of us together, coming out from those who, by nature, live at the bottom with Father God, underneath of everyone.

Love walks beneath. – Love covers all for all, love hopes all for all, love believes all for all, love carries all for all, love never fails. – And as love, Love has no need to be recognized by anyone. Love needs to know that each little one who loves Jesus KNOWS Jesus as He IS, and thus is just like Jesus in all ways except honor.

Why would any so-called “apostle” need to keep Jesus “safe” from making fleshy mistakes? That very mind demonstrates a profound unbelief in Christ. How can someone who neither knows nor believes in Jesus be sent by Him to His Church?

Please understand this, however. I know “apostolic ministry” moving in the power of a Third Feast Spirit Word who exhibited both a taste of Christ, of “good things to come,” as well as the other. My job is to understand both. What that means is that those brothers and sisters whom I knew as an “apostolic ministry” were far more a true example of Christ than many so-called “Apostles” and other “leaders” in today’s church.

And so, even though I am giving you an entirely different model than the move fellowship practices, I am able to draw many good things of Christ from my first-hand knowledge over many years of these brothers and sisters who showed Christ to me by their lives.

Nonetheless, each one of these were “good leaders.” And I want a model of the foundation of God’s Church coming out from people who are anything but “good leaders” in their human form.

Those whom God has chosen are incapable of making anything happen. That’s why God wants them as the foundation of His Church. – That the excellency of the power may be of God and not of us – having no sufficiency in ourselves.

 Inside this picture, then, let’s bring back in the three things any victorious military commander must know.

I know myself. I know that I am always coming out from Father through Christ speaking me. I know that I have no sufficiency in myself, that apart from Christ, I can do nothing. I know that all that I am in my present humanity IS the revelation of Father’s personality and character in exactly the way God intends me to be from the Source. I know that Loving One Another is the greatest treasure and power I could ever possess. And I know that you love me more than I can know, that you are always laying down your life for me.

Therefore, I know us together, that our every interaction together is God among us, Father making Himself visible and known through the swirl of our daily human life together.

I know my enemy. I know accusation and shame, firsthand. I know that same accusation and shame as it is hurled against dear believers in Jesus who imagine that the accusation is God speaking at them. I know the full measure of the serpent’s words and the deceit found in them. I know how those accusations work against the Word God speaks, against man as God’s image, and against God as a loser in claiming that humans together are what He looks like.

I know the gross unbelief that makes death to be Savior and being dead to be Salvation.
I know how the beast works in this world. I know the assault rising against Christians across this earth (and it’s not coming from Muslims, regardless of specifics.) I know how satanic mind control works through pop culture and symbolism. I know what demons are in the human experience. I know how they are driven out. I know the lies being told in the name of “science.” I know the lies being told in the name of political “government.”

And I know the terrain of the battle field. I know Christian Community. I know walking together, what it is and means, how it can be successful and how it can be the biggest mistake someone could make. I know what it is to be a human in this world. I understand the human frame. Having taught in the classroom for years, I know how people tick. I know the issues; I know the context. I know where this great World War must be fought, that is, I know how the evil one holds my brothers and sisters in the chains of religious imagination. I know how the mind works by itself, and how it works as a servant of the heart.

Considering all of these individual pieces of knowledge, which one is the most important single piece?

I have a fair knowledge of Wellington’s thinking. The single most important piece of knowledge in Wellington’s calculation was his knowledge of his men, their strengths and weaknesses, their abilities and inabilities. As an aristocrat, he despised them as gutter rats; as a military commander he was proud of them and knew just exactly how they would fight like devils if he made sure they were able to be what they were.

The single most important thing I must know for Victory IS Christ as you.

The study of Christ as you is the most important study I could make in this present season. And thus, “Knowing One Another,” one of the primary lessons and topics of Symmorphy V: Life, is our true safety and the final defeat of all our enemies.

Every single weapon used by all of our enemies can be summed up inside of one large word – ACCUSATION.

A victorious general is always thinking about what his enemy is thinking about and how his enemy is planning to trap him. He is always putting himself into his enemy’s mind and seeing his own position through his enemy’s eyes. Then, when he is certain that he knows exactly what his enemy will do, he positions his own army in such a way as to do the opposite of what the enemy is expecting and to catch the enemy in his own “brilliance.”

This is exactly how Napoleon won one of his greatest victories, the Battle of Austerlitz, against the Austrians and Russians in 1805. But Napoleon was always willing to sacrifice thousands of his own men to win the victory; Wellington was not. Wellington was always much more reluctant to fight than Napoleon was, because Wellington (and Subodai as well) insisted on a victory with as few of his own men dying as possible.

Now, consider this letter that I am sending out with copies of my book, Knowing Jesus as He Is. Think of how this letter uses clear military strategy in order to defeat the enemy – Accusation – in the battlefield of the mind.

~~~

Dear Believer in Jesus,
I want to share with you what you mean to me, that is, what you are in my sight.
First, I am assuming that you believe in Jesus, that you have received redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins. If so, then you are my brother or sister.

The first thing I know about you is that the Lord Jesus Christ, Himself in Person, lives inside of your heart. And because I also believe in Jesus, I know that God is telling me the truth when He tells me that His love is shed abroad in your heart through the Holy Spirit whom He has given to you.

For that reason, I know without any shadow of contradiction that you love me more than I can know. I know that you think more highly of me than you do of yourself. I know that you lay down your life for me. I am humbled and silenced by your love for me, for I know how costly it is.

Do not be concerned about doing anything that would cause me to doubt how much you love me. Regardless of anything you might do, say, or even think about me, I believe in the Jesus who lives inside of you, and I know that the love of God through you for me is without end.

When I look at you, I am always looking up, for I see you as the very face and revelation of the Lord Jesus, my Lord and Savior, the One whom I love, for He is doing far more inside of you than just “being” there. The chance to serve you in any way is an honor greater than I could imagine.

Because I am so awed by the Jesus who lives inside of you, I want to talk about Him just a bit. I know that you are always coming out of Him.

You see, this Jesus alive inside your heart is first every Word God speaks. Jesus is the becoming known of God in your heart as God is becoming known to you and as God is making Himself known to me through you. And as every Word God speaks, this same Jesus is written as Spirit Word all through the pathways of your heart.

I love the Bible, and that’s why I love your heart even more, for, although the Bible speaks of Jesus, it is inside your heart where He lives. Your heart, your human heart of flesh, is more the Bible than the opened Book on my desk ever could be, as Paul said that it is.

God knows you. God knows you in the depths of His own being. And when God speaks Jesus, you become, as John said in his gospel. You are coming into existence every moment because Jesus Himself is speaking you out from the Father. In fact, He sustains you in power by every good Word that He is.

How do I know that you are generated and sustained every moment by the good-speaking of Jesus? I know because you cannot be your own “god”; that is, you cannot be your own source. You cannot generate yourself. Since you believe in Jesus, then Christ already is the only life you are. You cannot have a life of your own because there is no such thing.

It is because I know that you are not a “god,” generating yourself, that I know that you are coming out from the Lord Jesus every moment; you are His image and revelation; you are the embodiment and expression of Christ.

I believe in Jesus, and therefore I am certain that God is telling me the truth about you.
God is meek and lowly of heart, and He thinks more highly of you than He does of Himself. God always carries you, walking beneath of you, lifting you up, causing you to know Him, causing Himself to be known through you everywhere you go. Your Father carries you through a way you could not go yourself, all the way through death and into life. Your Father causes you to be His dwelling place.

You see, the extraordinary thing about Jesus alive inside your heart is that Father God is inside of this Jesus living inside of you. You are filled with God. In fact, you are filled with all the fullness of God, for Jesus has already made you to be just like Himself. You may not know that, but I do because I believe what God says. More than that, rivers of Spirit are always flowing out from you bringing life and healing into every place that you go. You don’t need to “see” or “feel” any of that. It is true because God is true, and He always speaks the truth; that is, He always speaks Jesus the only life you are or could be.

For that reason, I acknowledge every good thing inside of you inside of Christ Jesus. Because you are filled with God, you are so filled with good things that it would take an eternity for me to know just how wonderful you are and just how much you love me. The good things of Jesus inside of you are simply without end.

I also know that since Jesus lives inside of you there is no sin in you, for He takes all of your present mistakes upon Himself as His own, placing them into His empty, empty grave. That’s why your Father cannot accept any “accusation” against you, for He does not know such a thing. Since God put you into Christ Jesus, with Jesus’ express permission and willingness to become all that you are, there in Gethsemane, therefore I know that God has placed you into sinless perfection, for Christ is sinless perfection, and you ARE inside of Him.

You see, Jesus is doing much more inside of you than just generating and sustaining you. Jesus is always setting you free of Himself. You are entirely free of God, even though you are found only inside of Him, for there is no other “place” to be. Yet this same Jesus is always winning your heart to Himself and to Father by always trading His soul for your soul. And this same Jesus is connecting you together with Father in every way and in every moment and circumstance of your life.

I know these things because these are the things God tells me about you in this Bible of His open on my desk. And the thing is, I know that God is always telling me the truth. And every single word in this Bible is entering into you through your faith to be written and to be fulfilled all through your heart and life as Jesus Himself, just as God says it is.

Therefore, I ask our Father that He would grace me with the opportunity to demonstrate my high regard for you through the kindness and encouragement that is the Lord Jesus, this One upon whose breast I always lean my head, this One who does all things well.

In that grace and kindness, I would like to share this book, Knowing Jesus as He Is, with you. The truth is, I cannot imagine living inside of Jesus without you together with me, knowing also that you are already just like Him because you see Him and know Him as He is.

Be blessed in all the love and revelation of Jesus.

~~~

What, exactly, are you seeing as you consider the strategies of victory at work in this letter?

First, you are reading words written by a complete loser. I don’t say these things or anything like them to anyone. I live in this constant contention of liking people and despising them, both at the same time. I will be stricken with anxiety every time I include this letter with a book and drop it in the mail. And if someone should respond directly to me from reading this letter and my book, I would be thrown into quite a tangle of apprehension.

Second, you are reading someone who is placing himself beneath of the reader, completely beneath. In so doing, you see that the fear of accusation and the fear of domination are completely sideswiped. They attack, but find nothing before them to hit, for I am beneath of them, lifting them up with Father. In fact, any attack will hit Jesus, not me.

Third, you are seeing the knowledge of Christ their Savior, in all that Christ is, arcing over them and enveloping them in goodness, safety, and trust. It’s not me, however, going “over them,” but their own knowing of Jesus their only Life.

Yet I also KNOW my present state of military weakness, for I am not yet walking daily together with two or three gathered together inside of Jesus’ name. And that is a problem.

You see, I know full well the power of the knowledge of God that comes out from two or three walking together in that knowledge. It doesn’t come from them or their great “abilities”; it comes from their certainty that Jesus IS each one and that God IS all our connections together.

And so, fourth, you are seeing, in this letter expressing our mightiest weapon in our great war against all Accusation, a profound knowledge of and belief in Jesus sustaining all.

This Jesus through us together is apostolic ministry, the foundation of the Church of Jesus Christ, sending the knowledge of Christ our Life out over the dwelling place of God.