It’s not those that want to go to heaven that go but those who accept the Way to heaven.
It’s not those living in sin that have imputed righteousness but those whose sins are forgiven
It is not those whose sins are forgiven that are blessed but those who dare to believe it and live it
It’s not those that preach, teach or write about forgiveness that are blessed but those that forgive
It’s not those that preach love that are blessed but those that love
It’s not servants who are Nicholaitians (lords, directors, bosses, or priests over the sheep) that are blessed but servants who are serving
It’s not those that say, “Lord, Lord” that are blessed but those that obey the Lord.
It’s not those that give that are blessed but those who give their widow’s mite bountifully and cheerfully.
It is not those that go about looking for a wife that are blessed but those that marry the one they find
It’s not those who have firm promises of marriage from faithful people that get married but those promised who abide or remain available to those that promised them
It’s not those that go to church that are the church but those in Christ and abiding in Him
The leaders are not those recognized to be so but those through whom the Leader is administering His life to the church and the world
It’s not those clamoring for purity that are pure but those whose minds are stayed on God
It’s not those that approve themselves that are approved but those whose hearts God has approved
Have faith in God! No one is approved or disapproved by God because we did.
Without a shadow of doubt, God has given all who are in Christ a gift with which to serve the church 1 Corinthians 12:7. I believe Brother Diotrephes had a gift of an apostle but in failing to recognize his gifting, maybe for reasons similar to the one of our day, he opted to act as the pastor (senior or junior I am not sure) of the assembly of God’s people. Diotrephes in creating and occupying a false position of authority became short sighted.
As it is with all shortsightedness, recognition of God’s authority (grace or treasure) in others cannot be perceived 2 Corinthians 4:7. So, Diotrephes LOVED TO HAVE “The Preeminence”,—to be “The First” or “The Leader”.
Therefore, he couldn’t imagine how God could bypass him to speak to John about a church plant he was “leading”. Assuming himself as both servant and leader (servant-leader), he unwisely rejected God’s word through John the apostle 3 John 1:9 NLT.
Diotrephes was competing with Christ about who should have the preeminence or lead the sheep Colossians 1:18.
Unfortunate
What happened to Diotrephes was unfortunate. He loved to lead, oversee or be an elder in the church which is a good thing but failed to understand “lead, oversee or be an elder” to mean to “serve” the church 1 Timothy 3:1NLT. Coupled with the lack of discerning of his gifting, he placed himself in a position of challenging God by resisting and stopping others from receiving Christ’s words to the church.
For clarity, the authority of the servants of the Church is the grace of God in them. To understand this more, the scriptures prescribe that after a brother or sister refuses to listen to two or three believers’ advice in a conflict, the matter is to be brought to the church to execise the authority of excommunication. Excommunication is one of the church’s greatest powers against a believer. So the highest authority (grace) lies with the church—not a handful of elders who more often than not are under the “influence” of their “Senior Pastor or Elder” Matthew 18:15-17.
Rightly, man’s word must not be taken as God’s. God’s words are objective and imperative while man’s, are subjective though they can be useful.
While Diotrephes was suppose to be on the move according to his gifting with its accompanying grace (authority, right or power) to the measure of his faith, he was busy knowingly or unknowingly blocking those with the gift of shepherding in the assembly. He was fighting against the Apostolic Spirit of Christ coming through John to serve (bless) the church though John did not necessarily gather with them regularly.
By the way, every Christian must—not should, have a gathering or Assembly of God’s people they regularly meet with and are held accountable to as per the profession of the faith.
Preeminence
Those who led and reigned in the Roman religion were empowered by the spirit of Jupiter—a merciless spirit of preeminence. This spirit constantly hung around the churches of God—with intent to seek out those who abandon their gift or calling in God and tries to establish its stronghold on them. Given the Jewish long association with the Romans, Diotrephes became a victim.He quickly learnt their leadership style. In not giving his mind to that of Christ, he started practicing what he had seen from the Roman religious leaders. His name Diotrephes (empowered by Jupiter) became his practice.
Hopefully, that beloved brother came to his spiritual senses at some point.
In our day, many gifted as apostles opt for the “pastor thing” and are battling with the spirit of preeminence like Diotrephes.
In acting as protectors of God’s people, they stifle the words of God to the churches. Even if John the apostle were to come today with God’s word, they will advise him to go plant his own church. As a result of this evil attitude, the body of Christ is suffering in many ways she ought not to.
We need to keep praying that all the Diotrephes’ of our day will hopefully one day recover from the spirit of preeminence by repenting and accepting God’s actual gift to them. In so doing, the gospel will not only spread but they will be serving not just joyfully but also, travailing that Christ may be formed in many of God’s people everywhere God will take them Galatians 4:19.
The trumpet from heaven is blowing a clear sound to all the assemblies of God’s people, “build up the body of Christ,until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ” Ephesians 4:12-13.
The least of us should be a matured man in Christ. What took new believers in time past many years to comprehend and walk in, should now take much less for new believers because the word of God is filling the earth presently like water covers the sea. A quick work of the Holy Spirit is on and it will be cut short in righteousness.
The gospel is reaching the ends of the earth and Christ’s coming (our salvation) is nearer now than when it was first believed. Even creation is also eagerly waiting. Come, Lord Jesus!
In the first post on mentor and protégé, I identified that, when we seek to advance our entire life (spiritual and temporal) we come face to face with our creator—Christ Jesus. As said also in the previous post, it will be the reverse of wisdom to become a man’s protégé or disciple rather than Christ’s.
Importance of the Church
God who is Omniscient has placed His gifts we need to fulfill our destiny in His Body. He is the Alpha and Omega! He pilots us through His ways to prevent our fleshly ambitions dressed up in spiritual facade from leading us to destruction—that is, away from destiny.
Like He often instructed Israel not to adopt the styles, models, aspirations and goals of the other nations, so does the Holy Spirit instruct us individually and as the Church today.
Therefore, if we plant our feet in the shadow of His wings in His household (gathering together of believers) we will certainly drink from His stream of rejoicing (Psalms 36:7-8). Given, that the functioning of the gifts (not mentors) He has set in His household will constantly calibrate us to His ways that places the temporal (marriage, children, degrees, cars, houses, popularity, writing books, own businesses etc.) at our disposal without jeopardizing our destiny.
In 1 Timothy 6:12, Paul tells Timothy, “Take hold of eternal life to which you were called”—That is destiny! All who are in Christ are already in their destiny. The works Christ does through us is the fight of faith or the following of God’s ways that ensures we stay on course of our destiny. But, the devil is standing by to readily fool us that our ambitions are the same as our destiny. Our lack of understanding of the difference between destiny and ambitions is evident when we say, (so and so Christian’s life was cut short of achieving their destiny e.g. Stephen in Acts 7:59).
A Christian’s destiny can’t be cut short by those who can kill only the body and not able to touch the soul Matthew 10:28. At best, they have only hastened the Christian’s destiny. In Philippians 1:23, Paul says, going to Christ is better. But, if it is to stay, it’s for serving the saints for their progress and joy in the faith (verse 24-25). In verse 26, the saints can see Paul’s lifestyle and be encouraged. What lifestyle was to be seen in Paul? Verse 27, A life worthy of the gospel of Christ to be constant in them not playing eye service for Paul to promote them. But for them to be bond by one spirit and having one mind (the spirit and mind of Christ) to the work of His gospel and verse 28, as they oppose the enemies of the gospel and not fight themselves. This standing fearlessly together in the gospel against the emenies is a sign for their destruction but, salvation for the saints. This is God’s kind of salvation in the saints, it is evidenced by boldness in the gospel not compromise.
God alone holds our destiny and it is eternal.
The temporal things we want are our ambitions which are dispensable and must remain secondary—including seeking to establish grand godly things for which we will be remembered and counted among God’s generals which does not exist except in our little competitive minds. The pressure of seeking to institute grand things, whether we admit it or not is a huge part of the reason we’ve adopted secular model of mentor and protégé. We simply need to repent and trust the Holy Spirit to lead us into all truths and blessings.
But, if we insist on mixing our theologies with management courses rooted in ESP, unity of the faith in the bond of peace will remain a mirage though, union will blossom—blossoming to hell except we repent turning again to Christ (the faith) and to Him alone who is the Mentor of the Church.
As the church wakes up to the Truth—to Christ, the following results will be inevitable:
* Many of God’s people will have a healthy desire to be intimate with God and serve others; not full of ambition to be servant-leaders (a cunning word) not found in the bible Romans 8:14. A servant is not a leader, teacher, a guide or mentor and a mentor is not a servant but a leader, guide, teacher or master.
To systematically hype up an individual in the gathering of the church because he or she is giving false allegiance behind closed doors to gurus in Christendom is a shame. Yes they will climb in servant-leadership but, let’s hear this: the tactics by which man has elevated you will be the same way by which man will easily destroy you if the union goes pear shaped. So, to prevent this demise, you have to keep the false allegiance to man going. Under this condition, Christ can speak to you the much He like; you’ll not obey Him at the expense of your elevated position in man’s sight. Saleh!
To the Body of Christ (those in Christ and Christ in them) hear this: Jesus clearly said He alone is the Master—that is, Lord and the teacher or Mentor John 13:13-17. Note also in Matthew 10:25—He depicts all his disciples as students and servants, not teachers and masters. Not servant-leaders. Servant-leader is a sanctimonious rebranding of the word “clergy” whom God’s people have come to recognize does not exist among those in Christ by understanding 1 Peter 2:9.
The Safty
Are you led by the spirit of Christ or your “servant-leaders”? Be honest with yourself for it is your own life and destiny being examined here.
* With the servant-leadership crap scrapped, the inevitable importance of the Church on earth will once again come to our forefront. Then, many that are driven by the “leadership rat race” and those giving false allegiance at the expense of their consciences in order to be recognized and promoted to leadership will leave the body of Christ alone. They will go to pursue their leadership thing in the circular workplace or in politics. Or, they’ll repent which is our earnest prayer for our brothers and sisters taken in by the spirit of pre-eminence or leadership.
It is J.R. Woodward who said, “The problem is that when we enter the rat race, we often become rats in the process. Will we fear God and learn from this wise word?
The Church in helping us understand the difference between destiny and ambition will help make us…
*Take God’s word seriously and searching it constantly for the right reasons
*Go consistently to the throne of mercy and grace to obtain grace for the right reasons
*Appreciate the fellowship of believers increasingly for the right reasons
*Submit to one another for the right reason (out of reverence for God)
The benefits will not be theoretical—actual growth in Christ will happen and evidenced by strong unity in the Faith in the bond of peace not union of faiths which is just mutual beneficial friendship and fake peace.
For everyone to believe what they like and practice what they like works against God’s redemptive purpose. It creates religious harmony but not unity of the faith for which Christ specifically gave five dimensions of himself as a gift to some parts in His body Ephesians 4:11.
Every time the church loses sight of the importance of the unity of the faith, we become loud mouthed about how much we have increased in goods and or, the number of people trailing behind us as our own followership. Little wonder we adopt any model available to succeed in our ambitions. This is why we’ve incorporated mentor and protégé approach against what we see clearly in the scriptures.
By the way, the scripture never uses the word growth to describe the church when God joins people to her. The word always used is added. Growth is used to describe the church’s increase in the stature of Christ (loving one another, honoring one another, holy inside and outside the cup, preaching His gospel, perseverance, patience, long suffering, faith, forgiving, praying, no laziness—for short, obedience to the faith Acts 6:7.
But, in lusting to be “successful and recognized”, unavoidably we have muddled up things.
Give thought to Jesus the Mentor—He is the destiny to be taken hold of and to never let go! Seek the Kingdom of God above all else, and live righteously, and he will give you everything you need Matthew 6:33NLT.
In this article, we’ll look at the difference between the Old Testament (OT) and the New Testament (NT) Prophets. The aim is to establish that, the New Testament prophets unlike the oldies are not exactly given to loneliness, extreme acrimony and hatred from the majority of the Church “representing the Israel of God”.
For clarity, I am not for replacement theology.
The Church, being those who are circumcised in heart by the atonement of Christ’s blood, have the Spirit of Christ in them. This point is crucial for the positive assertion of the theme of this article.
In the Old Testament, the natural Israel as a nation was unquestionably chosen by God as His people—This, they inherited from their forefathers that had the promise from the faithful Creator of the universe and beyond.
It is interesting and important to note that they did not choose God rather they only inherited His promise to their fathers. This has implications.
One key implication is this: they did not have the faith seed in their lives as their fathers. They were mere men struggling to keep the laws the God of their fathers gave. This had implication on the prophets.
The implication on the Prophets of old
The definition of a prophet elucidates the reason they had to be an extremely set of lonely people in their environment and interaction with this “mere men” who know not the God of their fathers that the prophets represented. The OT prophets had the faith seed in them and were always speaking the things which only faith, not law, could comprehend. See 1 Peter 1:9-25.
In verse 9 of 1 Peter 1, Peter the apostle spoke of, “Receiving the end of your faith, even the salvation of your souls”. Then, note what he says next in verse 10 regarding the OT prophets, “Of which salvation the prophets have inquired and searched diligently, who prophesied of the grace that should come unto you”.
While the prophets was talking about the salvation of their souls, the Israelites were overwhelmed with desire to be saved from their earthly problems:
*For the God of their fathers to rescue them from physical Egypt,
*Give them cucumber and meat
*Make them greater than other nations they considered better than them because those nations had kings ruling them.
So, the prophets of the OT were prophesying to their people of something to be a gift by faith through grace to a future people in the dispensation of the Church. The prophets talked to a people whose spirit, soul and body was accustomed to naturalism—to only what they could see, feel and touch.
Against the above background, only those who by faith yielded to the God of their fore-fathers not just His laws could ever have been at peace with the prophets.
Only by faith did anyone escape the natural realm at their time to worship God in spirit and, it remains the same today. It is only by the means of faith could anyone interact with the great “I am that I am” the Yahweh of Israel and maker of the heavens and the earth!
Therefore, unavoidably, the OT prophets had to have loneliness, extreme acrimony and hatred from their own people because they were neck-deep with a people who had not what they had. The prophets’ only solace was to keep far away from their people and come to them only as the Spirit of Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit moved them to speak out to the people. God kept speaking to the people through the Prophets despite the fact that they were hated.
God kept speaking to the people through the prophets though they were in the dispensation of the law because, He intended for the prophets words to burn in their hearts and ignite faith for their salvation. Even at their time, faith came “by hearing, the hearing of God’s word” Romans 10:17. Praise God the scriptures has record of those who at that time had faith and so, lived beyond the law and gazed at Christ Hebrew 11:17-38. They searched after Him as one searches after a precious city till they died or were taken Heb 11:10.
In each generation of the Old Testament, all who were searching for the City (Christ and His body) whose architect and builder was not man but God never had problem with the prophets. Men and women whose lives were centered around searching for the City no matter what happened to them or trade they engaged in, never joked with presenting their bodies as a living sacrifice to God. They always eventually came to understanding not by some human persuasion and persuaders’ that God, deserves to be loved by being worshiped in spirit and truth—mean, to give God our spirit, soul and body totally and progressively till we’re taken or die Genesis 5:24, 6:9 Hebrews 11: 13-14,39-40.
Prophets in the Church
Having defined the church and the much said above, NT prophets are relieved from the aloofness, loneliness, extreme acrimony and unpleasantness coupled with hatred the OT prophets suffered from their own people. Their people were law en-caged and governed, while the people of the household of faith in the NT are utterly faith and grace regenerated, lead by the Faith and Its grace. This NT peoples (the Church), serve one another by faith and grace in love and honoring one another because they are a spiritual people .
In OT, the people had nothing to give the prophets since they lacked faith while the prophets were motivated by faith. The prophets towered far above them rightly because, faith surpasses law by far! The prophets dealt with the Reality (Christ) while the people followed the shadows (laws). Even the levitical priest feared the prophets and could not really serve them. The prophets walked with God like Adam and Eve did before they fell in Eden garden.
The NT people however, are a royal priesthood headed and lead by only One High Priest, Apostle, Prophet, Teacher, Shepherd and Evangelist from the beginning and so shall it be for all eternity. All the parts of this “many one body” which, the people who lived by faith in the dispensation of law longed to belong and have now belonged as part of the cloud of witnesses above through Christ’s resurrection had their gifts with which they served God and His people.
We in the NT are better advantaged in that, we all have been engrafted by faith as cloud of witnesses on earth, having each our own gift(s) by which we serve God and one another in the different assemblies God has planted on the earth. No gift in anyone is above the gift in another. They just function differently for His vision which is, to glorify Christ in serving one another by the power of the Holy Spirit at work in each part. And together, declaring the manifold wisdom of God to the principalities and power in the heavenly places as we preach the gospel that redeem those outside Christ.
No one should accept to be driven to aloofness because of Christ’ gifting in his or her life and cheated out of the rich life of Christ flowing out from the parts of His body. No gift in the body is unique since, it is in the Body— this body whose origin and all who are in it have the same component (Christ) by faith.
How then, can anyone with the spirit of Christ fear, hate or disrespect any aspect of Christ’ ministry gifted to some of His sheep to serve other sheep and also be served.
Let us view this with respect to 2 Corinthians 13:5, “Examine yourselves, to see whether you are in the faith. Test yourselves. Or do you not realize this about yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you?—unless indeed you fail to meet the test!”
For the People of God who love and want the truth, He obligates Himself to give them the truth and they will know what the truth is in living relationship with Him without doubt and confusion.
Those who seek a truth to use for their own kingdom purposes must be astute theological lawyers, authenticating and priding themselves in the knowledge of the law without the expectation of finding the truth in a living relationship with Christ and the Holy Spirit. This is why many of us are unbeatable in theology with our world–wide reputation yet, we remain cessationists which also indicate that we don’t believe in the Holy Spirit at all.
How then, will we not beat down those parts Christ’ ministry is flowing out from.
Have we failed the test…? I fear the subtle sin of being presumptuous therefore, I am examining myself… please dear reader, would you be exhorted to examine yourself too?
To those truly gifted with the ministry of Christ and his spiritual gifts, please come out of the false emotion of being lonely or, confined to walking only with people of similar gifting. Just be wise to know you operate in the gathering or places to which God has set you.
Not as a prophet but, I prophesy this: “We’re in a time for prophets to enjoy. Though, full of heaven’s burden, it shall be lightweight for, the ministries in My Body and the spiritual gifts are about to serve (bless) you greatly by playing their part to you. I the Lord am working in my Body to cause all parts of My Body to function well. Her increase is coming to fullness as each part is releasing My assigned measure. In Her, My banner of “Love” will be seen and Her hidden foundation will remain established as “love”. My glory and peace is with my Body”.
