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| Half-built Tower |
I am grateful for the exposure that both blogging and Facebook have given me. The process began with the writer of the next blogpost in 2008, when I used to comment along with other , now facebook friends, in his comments section.
In 5 short years I have brushed up against all sorts of folk from all areas of Christendom which has given me tremendous pastoral insight, usually aquired painfully over decades, of the sort of differing trends of belief that are at large currently all over the earth. Obviously some of these differences are taught with posh sounding names in seminaries, but nothing can really compare with talking with those who hold these many strands of believing.
At least some of St Paul's missions experience was speaking in a teaching forum for 18months or so, and for me this has been very similar. The advantage of Facebook has been to get down to some of these brass tacks of inner believing, whereas you would have to be going some in the real world where most people are far more coy in opening up about such deeply held things.
Now recently several people who I have been walking closely (continual exchanges) or at a distance (infrequent exchanges) with, have simply upped, turned their heel and in the worst cases completely defriended me. Humanly some things have been my own foolishness, and other things have occurred through me holding truths I believe are unpopular. They may only turn out to be "shades of truth"...that is true to a certain limited extent only....but sometimes these things have to be said in order that later they don't prove to be wholly true, and by then it is often too late.
REAL WORLD EXAMPLE in the last few weeks
I have been working alongside and under a South African who started to have unpleasant brushes with other colleagues. I was alerted to this some 6 weeks before things came to a very unpleasant head, which resulted in his sacking. I wanted to alert someone high up to avert this disaster, both for colleagues, but also the man's sake....I had started sharing about this very blog with him and his wife. My lowly position with this firm means there was no real outlet for me to act on my insight. Then the inevitable occurred and it was far worse than it should have been.
I don't believe I am always right. I don't believe I am always wholly right....but picking up directions that we could be heading in. I believe "directions" can be headed off at the pass if flagged up soon enough.
Really from the moment that Living Word issues forth a clock starts ticking in the earth.
There are those who are READY for the teaching of God. John 7: 17 If anyone is willing to do His will, he will know of the teaching, whether it is of God or whether I speak from Myself.
The teaching comes when the pupil is ready (Buddhist precept). A person has cried out in his heart to know some truth, and God hears and supplies....by any of the above means...blog/social networking/reading in a magazine or book....
But really WORD comes in a covenantal context. You see WORD pins you down covenantally. If you HEAR properly you are saying AMEN...be it unto me according to your Word. Bind the festal sacrifice to the altar.... ME.....and you Holy Spirit fulfil that in me.
Really from the moment that Living Word issues forth a clock starts ticking in the earth.
You either HEAR and accept....what begins as sweet to taste in the mouth, like honey.....but then is exceedingly bitter in your stomach as the Holy Spirit WORKS that transformation on your insides...piercing to the division of soul and spirit (Hebrews 4)
OR you don't carry it through
and you become yet another LIAR in the earth
one who declares God to be a liar, by half building a tower only.
Our experience so far, which I was convinced was the beginning of a new thirdlevel church in the earth, a new pattern, has indeed turned out to be a NEW CART stumbling at the first bump. It is not the proper Covenantal framework by which the Word can be brought forth.
That one Divinely recognised form, outside of the usual vicissitudes of life, which is also a womb for the Word....see some of the negatives listed in Matthew5....is the CHURCH. Expressed in the local Body of Christ. The Woman that encompasses the Manchild in Revelation 12.
The LOCAL church has to be specifically Christ in us the hope of Glory...Galations 2:20 It is nolonger I who live but Christ.....we are new creations entirely by virtue of Christ's work
But I realise now Jorge Pradas's word to our little church at Emsworth holds true...
WE have to specifically BELIEVE and confess to (by faith) that we are the CHURCH...a building not made with hands, coming down from God in heaven.
It has been painful to realise that while grace opens up the doors to all the victories of Christ, it is the same grace that unpacks salvation in its true corporate context, only as believers are as specific in their believing that they are the Church.
The Congregation that will prevail against the Gates of Hell IN THIS AGE. This is the Rock of confession upon which the Church is built.
The Covenantal Church is a church that is made of individuals who are open and laid bare before one another....but this only works in the Living Presence and sustaining power of God as Father, God as Son, and God by His Spirit amongst us.
OR you don't carry it through
and you become yet another LIAR in the earth
one who declares God to be a liar, by half building a tower only.
This is church as in
where the dead body is there the carrion gather...there the overcomers rise or are birthed
This is church as embodied in the Cutting of Covenant together in Genesis 15.
How will you know that you will POSSESS the promises of God?
Because He will write them in Covenant across your body by the Spirit.
Firstly in baptism in water and the Spirit.
But also baptising you (again by His Spirit...you can't do this)...into His people of faith as under the Cloud of His Presence.
Notice Abraham had to drive away the carrion...signifying Jesus later words, that such a body would draw those interested by instinct...because they want to come...because they voluntarily are drawn as it says in Psalm 110.
But then such open carcasses have the Shekinah Burning Pot of the Fire of God pass right through their midst. Every church gathering should be covenantal....should experience this nature of deep presence of the Living Lord.
This is CHURCH and BODY and CLOUD as I know it, and became first aquainted with in the Billy Graham films, then as we were baptised in the Spirit in Great Kingshill...
this is what I have found so hard to articulate here on Facebook in a rather mixed, fuzzy setting.
THESE are the people I am now seeking the world over and locally, and who I want to spend my time here on earth with. If you are such a person, be aware that it is as far from the word NICE as you can get....but as near to the LIVING PRESENCE of the LORD as you can experience now this side of heaven.
GLORY is not nice...but it is GLORIOUS, TRUE,HOLY, and bathed in COVENANTAL LOVE.
These blogposts are published automatically using NETWORKED BLOGS to my former Facebook Timeline which has not been erased in case any of you want to delve into some of the upbuilding material .
I myself at present cannot be communicated with via Facebook but my email address is still
07000intune@googlemail.com.
Chris Welch... author of this blog and this current post.
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