Receiving a measure of the fullness of God.
Wayne Duncan
There is a experience of God that is beyond Knowledge.
There is a realm of our relationship with God that goes beyond mere intellect and cerebral processes.
Gods desire is for us to be rooted and grounded in this experience of God.
Knowing about marriage and being married are very different, and being married and being happily married are very different experiences.
God wants us to enter and experience deeper realms of Him and in Him. And there is always more and more, and deeper places to go in God. Every part of God radiates glory beyond comprehension, and God wants you to experience them all.
As a team of God placed leaders, we come in line with Gods desire for you. We make it our goal therefore to partner with the will of God. He wants every one of us filled with Him, and to know Him experientially.
Paul was a person who knew the depths of God. He had experienced various dimensions of the Glory of God. He knew miracles, he knew signs and wonders. He knew what it was to fall under the power of God and to co-operate with the spirit of God in ministering the new covenant.
He also was catapulted into higher realms with God going into the third heavens, look at this..
2 Cor 12 will go on to visions and revelations from the Lord. 2I know a man in Christ who fourteen years ago was caught up to the third heaven. Whether it was in the body or out of the body I do not know--God knows. 3And I know that this man--whether in the body or apart from the body I do not know, but God knows-- 4was caught up to paradise. He heard inexpressible things, things that man is not permitted to tell.
Here we see Paul talking about visions and revelations, and spiritual or physical transportations God opened to Him.
These things are still happening today. These experiences strengthen you in your inner being. They bring deeper understanding of God, revelation. They bring God glory! God can even show you deep things that are just for you, that others might not know, or may not be ready to know. Such is the depth of God and the realms of the Glory of God. It's the realm where God could show you anything, and you could experience anything….
Ephesisan 3:16 pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, 17so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, 18may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, 19and to know this love that surpasses knowledge--that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God. 20Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, 21to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.
God wants to give you something out of His glorious riches….
God wants to strengthen you in your inner being…
God wants Christ to dwell in your hearts…through faith.
God wants to root you and establish you in love..
God wants you to have His power in you, and flowing out of you…every saint "all the saints"…
God wants you to know the multi dimensional scope of His love…Its dimensions are beyond the scope of science and physics…4 dimensions in this example…entering the eternal spiritual glory realm.
It's a love that surpasses knowledge. Knowledge is in the head, but there is a deeper inner man, spiritual heart arena that God wants to dwell in, to touch, effect, strengthen and have dominion over.
With this deep experience comes the reality of "filled to the measure of all the fullness of God".
20Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, 21to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.
He wants His experience and work in you to pass your prayers. He does not want to be limited to our feeble prayers, no he has much more for us that we can even imagine…
All this is to His glory, in the church, for all generations…this is a desire of God for us for all time..
These thing will happen for all time, in the church, to those who are in Christ Jesus. Then they will continue to happen through eternity. Actually entering into the glory realm is tasting the eternal realm.
What happens is we transcend earth and enter the glory of God…
The bottom line is that God has more for us. Every revelation s an invitation to a deeper encounter.
It may start with a gentle presence, where you know he is in the room. I could be that you feel His power coming into you. You may feel an emotion released such as love, or peace. The presence can burn away strongholds, addictions….or bring healing to the body. I've seen demonic deliverances come in the glory. No prayer and no person, just the glory…bringing freedom.
It could be more, visions, dreams. There could be signs and wonders in that climate. Gold dust, gold teeth, feathers, oil..anything is possible, for he can do more that we can imagine.
You may get caught up into heaven, or even transported to another place. All these things happened to people in the bible and still happen today. I know people with which these things have happened to, and they are still happening. We can't always explain all of it…but it is real…real signs that make you wonder.
God wants to take you deeper. He will meet you where you are at. He will only let you experience what your ready for. Not everyone will experience all the same things.
We do however need to hunger for these things. We need to submit our minds, we need reach out for an experience that surpasses the cerebral, we need to want to align ourselves with Gods invitation to go deeper. Being totally passive will not manifest the reality of more.
We don't have to work, or be holy enough, these things come by grace to those who position themselves in love and adoration for who God is and how magnificently glorious he is, and then content to enter the realm of that glory. It's a submission, a rest in His goodness and a longing for more of Him.
18 comments:
God wants to take you deeper. He will meet you where you are at. He will only let you experience what your ready for. Not everyone will experience all the same things.- Please can you help me? Where does the bible teach what you are saying here?
You also say -
We do however need to hunger for these things. We need to submit our minds, we need reach out for an experience that surpasses the cerebral, we need to want to align ourselves with Gods invitation to go deeper. Being totally passive will not manifest the reality of more.
Can you please explain exactly which scriptures teach us that we need to reach out for an experience that surpasses what God has already done for us, or we need to align ourselves, or that God invites us to go deeper, or that the reality of more needs to manifest?
Hebrews 10
18And where these have been forgiven, there is no longer any sacrifice for sin. 19Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the Most Holy Place by the blood of Jesus, 20by a new and living way opened for us through the curtain, that is, his body, 21and since we have a great priest over the house of God, 22let us draw near to God with a sincere heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled to cleanse us from a guilty conscience and having our bodies washed with pure water. 23Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for he who promised is faithful. 24And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds. 25Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one another--and all the more as you see the Day approaching.
For me it would be a sad thing to understand grace, but not have the experiance of going deep with Him.
Also 2 cor 3 says we are part of an ever increasing glory, so there is more glory to experiance...all the time.
Als Phil 1v6 says he has begun a work that he will complete...
Do you have complete healing...(i know we all do through the crooss), but has it manifest?
Do you release whats inside of you in its fullness...eg do you heal every one who comes your way who is sick...
The reality is that everything has been done on the cross but we neet to have that reality manifest itsself...
So for me the call to go deeper is a good one..
Many live sub- what God has for us. We live with hurt, dissapointment, fear, sickness, poverty, defeat...somewhere each of us needs the deep of God to touch us and appropriate the victory of the cross...
We need God to bring us to belief in everything he has done...this may require some deep work. This is not in the cerabral realm, but the deeper spiritaul. We yeild to that working , we want that working, we co-operate with it..not grieving the spirit...this positions us to recieve an acceleration for the reality of what he has done to/for/in us to manifest in reality..
Or should we just passivly accecpt where we are...?
Be transformed by the renewing of your mind...
Yes God does want the finished work of the cross manifest in us..
I Corinthians 12:31:
But eagerly desire the greater gifts. And now I will show you the most excellent way.
I Corinthians 14:1:
Follow the way of love and eagerly desire spiritual gifts, especially the gift of prophecy.
I Corinthians 14:1:
Follow the way of love and eagerly desire spiritual gifts, especially the gift of prophecy.
The word encourages us to desire spiritual gifts...
It's gods will that we manifest what is inside of us to a dying hurting world.
When we goo deeper we drink of Him, and then release that around us..to the church in various ways..this blesses the body..and to the world..
Jesus loves to show off with signs miracles and the supernatural...how is the church in the world doing with releasing that?
Or do we just sit back passivly and say...well God im ok, so who cares about your bride, or the lost..
22let us draw near to God with a sincere heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled to cleanse us from a guilty conscience and having our bodies washed with pure water.
I presume this is the scripture you use saying God wants to take you deeper.
I don't understand, deeper into what ... your whole teaching seems to imply deeper into a supernatural realm, please forgive me if I am hearing wrong.
Hebrews 10 teaches us that we can now with out any hinderence and with total confidence draw near to God, that we can be sincere and totally be ourselves, with FULL assurance of faith ...etc.
23Let us hold unswervingly to the hope ..... He says we must hold onto ....why, because God HAS DONE it for us and God is faithful...etc
Am I missing something that we need to do .....
We do however need to hunger for these things. We need to submit our minds, we need reach out for an experience that surpasses the cerebral, we need to want to align ourselves with Gods invitation to go deeper.
2Cor3 explains if the old .. ministration of death was glorious... :8 how much more the ministration OF THE SPIRIT...
:9 ministration of righteousness exceed in glory...
:12 Seeing then that we HAVE such hope ....( Remember Heb 10:23
23Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess,)
:17 NOW THE LORD (ref verse 8)
IS THAT SPIRIT!!
:18 We behold the glory of the Lord, and we are changed INTO THE SAME IMAGE from glory( the glory of the old as explained in the previous verses and in context of this chapter) to glory (the righteousness glory, the new glory that exceeds the old glory see :9 )
And by the Spirit of the Lord..see verse 8 again. The Lord is thi glory.. In other words we are changed from the glory of the old to the exceeding glory of the new by the Spirit of liberty who is Christ and what he has done for us.
When you study it out you will see the word does not say
" we are part of an ever increasing glory, so there is more glory to experiance...all the time."
That would be like subtely saying that Christ was not enough.
The word of God tells us that Christ is the sum total and the fullness of God's glory.
"The reality is that everything has been done on the cross but we neet to have that reality manifest itsself..."
Was the fullness of that reallity not already manifested in Christ, and now all we need to do is as you say "Be transformed by the renewing of your mind..." and because we believe, we speak and tell others of the good news of what God has done.....
Now how do you want to make that reallity manifest itself??
"We do however need to hunger for these things. We need to submit our minds, we need reach out for an experience that surpasses the cerebral, we need to want to align ourselves with Gods invitation to go deeper." And then you say we will have the reward.......
"He will meet you where you are at. He will only let you experience what your ready for. Not everyone will experience all the same things." You name things like gold dust, feathers etc... How can any of this be called God's glory, and then on top of it you teach that we need act or feel in a certain way to attain this. By implication you teach that believers will then be deeper with God, and have a fuller more complete experience of God.
"We live with hurt, dissapointment, fear, sickness, poverty, defeat...somewhere each of us needs the deep of God to touch us and appropriate the victory of the cross..." By implication you teach that this deep of God is largly the
supernatural, and it is by this evidence of the supernatural that we can measure our experience of God.
You are right we do not passively accept who and where we are, no we go forth with joy and with praise and with thanksgiving ... shouting out the complete and total and finished salvation of our God! We find we are compelled and constrained by this wonderful love of God ..etc nothing passive about that, but I can tell you this much - what I read you saying made me feel I was not quite there yet
Spiritual gifts in 1Cor 14 - Tongues, which are different languages - interpretation of these languages - prophecy = inspired preacing and teaching, interpreting the devine will and purpose. And it deals with the use of these gifts ... eg. not to be confusion... all to be done unto edifying.. not about a persons personal experience of God, but of the whole church, done decently and in order.
No mention he of gold dust and feathers etc. And what does gold do for the edifying of the church?
God does want the finished work of the cross manifest in us..
Are you saying that the manifestation of the finished work are various supernatural experiences from God?
I don't think so, because our life in Christ sealed by the Holy Spirit all by faith is the manifestation. Remember faith is the substance of our hope and the evidence of things not seen.
You are saying we NEED TO hunger and submit our minds.... to manifest a reality of more! This will only encourage believers to try and work up something. Also, when they don't have a real manifestation they will feel inadeq. for others it will encourage them to make up and act up all sorts of spiritual manifestations just to remain in with the crowd or not to feel left behind etc etc.
hmmm interesting debate...sounds a bit like the "we have been glorified" teaching thats floating around...saying that we are everything already...even living forever..
well iguess that there is now nothing left to change, no maturing to do, and im there...
Just wondering then howcome i get sick, feel down and cant produce miracles constantly..
Maybe i do need to partener with God and let Him change me...Maybe im not there yet...its all available through the finished work of teh cross, now i hunger for it to become a reality beyond theology
Theology without reality or experiance is a theory at best and religion at worst.
many know god heals...but are not healed
many have bondages, addictions...
Many are not walking in the freedom that christ has already given us..its a good idea to want that, and to help people see there is more..
And then there is the whole glory realm that goes beyond much of what can be explained...in heaven the glory realm will make more sence..
how does gold dust and feather edify the church..well first of all if you dont like these things your disliking something God does..anything God does..i like.
God loves to encourage and bless His bride, He can do it anyway he likes. They point to a deeper reality. The entire book of acts is filled with supernatural signs and wonders..
How was the church edifyed when Jesus told his disciple to go fishing and get a coin to pay temple tax...how does obeying the temple law build the church..yet Jesus did not mind doing it..
Sometimes when God touches you, you are edifyed. Happy people happy church.They point to a greater reality..God is good, creative, and unexplainablly creative and free. He could give anyone anything at any time...Ive met some of these people who have had gold dust, gold teeth etc...all respond in worsip that God touched them, all feel loved and special..sound quite edifying to me..
I know somone who God gave new skin to over a scar...now how does that edify the church? well it did not...but God does what he wants, and he wanted that girl to have new skin coz the scar bothered her..
Not everything he does is to edify the church, somethmes hes showing off hisa glory, or his power. Sometimes he can just be good...no explination needed.
no one is living in the reality of the fullness of the inheritance that comes to us through the finished work of the cross...we have it, but the substance is sometimes missing...its good to want that substance, and to let God show us how to get it.
Eph 3
20Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, 21to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.
I want the immerasurably more...not just the theology of it..
I want the power at work in me to effect this world..for his glory
I hunger for it, i want it to manifest...thank God for grace, is all there, its all available...release it through me lord..
"Do you have complete healing...(i know we all do through the crooss), but has it manifest?
Do you release whats inside of you in its fullness...eg do you heal every one who comes your way who is sick..."
What I do is pray for every sick person that comes my way, or asks me to go and pray for them ...I do this fearlesly, trusting God to heal them ..(He is the healer) But I do not find any qualification or the evidence of how much of the fullness of God is manifesting through me today! My realization of the fullness that is inside of me does not get measured by how much or what is manifested. I live by what the Truth says and not by what I see ... You want to make what you think is super spiritual manifest in people and that will be an evidence and a measure of fullness and deeper!
To teach this is just a glorified law teaching. If you pray every day then God will hear you more and you will know this by the manifestations of Gods favour in your life. Or if you give your first fruits to God you will see the manifestation of God's blessing by your finances increasing .... Oh the poor dude who does not see the manifestation of this ..can you imagine espscially after he hungered so deeply and alighned his mind the best way he could. He will feel and think only lack and condemnation! God give us grace I pray to not just blindly or unthinkingly teach and preach what might sound good but is actually no good. Help us Father to teach and preach your unadulterated pure grace, concerning Christ and Him crusified only.
Are you saying that the manifestation of the finished work are various supernatural experiences from God?
I don't think so, because our life in Christ sealed by the Holy Spirit all by faith is the manifestation.
No not at all, Im saying that God will do things to teach us the far reaching effects of the finished work of the cross...he will show you the deeper meanings of it, for none of us have the full revalation...he may take you into heaven and into the throne room of God, and then into His heart and litterally shoe you His love..i know somone that God did this too and he was changed forever, he came into a deeper understanding of god love..
I know another who had a vision of Jesus destroying demons...he was set free from his fear of demons..
now i know the bible says God loves us, and that we have authority over demons...but Jesus might help us grow in our faith if it lacks...he is so kind he does not wait untill we have faith but will even do things to us, and show us things to help us...
We all have more to learn, wanting it, and humbling ourselves, knowing we dont know everything, positions us to recieve a deeper knowledge and operation of what is already ours through Jesus obediance, death and resurrection.
Why did these things happen to Paul and John...they did not need to...but yet God did, and i believe thery were strenghtened and the church was edified through their experiances...
Well let us tear out a few pages in the bible and then we supplement that with what we think we would like to feel and experience from God. If you still feel so short changed by God after all He has done for you, you have not understood grace, and you need to hear the message of God's love for you again... You have been created in His image and His likeness. God has total faith in what He created in you, and the proof of that lies in Christ ... And this Christ is our hope! By faith I believe the total work that God did for all of us. When I get sick I pray to God, in my healing I glorify Him - in remaining ill I don't stop giving Him glory ... If someone receives new skin that is awesome, If you need new skin and you don't receive new skin ... do you have to go deeper to experience the manifestation .. what if you miss it and you still don't see the manifestation. You can want all kinds of things from God that will make you feel special or more spiritual. You can hunger all you want, but it is not the gospel of Jesus Christ. We have a hope and as individuals God will touch us and bless us and heal us and even give us feathers and gold, but that will happen regardless of...
" We do however need to hunger for these things. We need to submit our minds, we need reach out for an experience that surpasses the cerebral, we need to want to align ourselves with Gods invitation to go deeper."
This hope assures us that we never have to fear or work to get more of God, that God will provide for us, and when we put off this tabernacle and die (1Cor15), that we will be raised with Him when He comes again and we will then see in full, the full manifestation of the promises and we will then put on immortality ...It is just another subtle way of putting control on people when you teach them that there is more they must aspire to and try and get to & that the fullness of God is some mistical glory realm thing that no one can explain, and by the way it can be anything... because God can do anything and whatever He wants to ... only thing is you must be carefull that you don't miss out because if you didn't achieve this taught glory realm you will be missing God's fullness and you will only know God in theory! What condemnation! No, Christ is All IN All, God has done it all for you in Christ, He is not going to do anything more for you ..All has been done in Christ.
For me there remains nothing left to say ... I don't have to justify limiting my belief to what God did for us in Christ and the fullness of God that all can experience in that. Any other teachings outside of that is just not the gospel of Christ ... it becomes the gospel of prosperity or the gospel of surpassing the cerebral etc etc.
Don't turn a blind eye to the possible bondage and condemnation it can bring in some people regardles that there are some that flurish on this kind of thing.
I think its bondage and controlling to tell people that these things are not real and dont exsist.
I think its manipulative to tell people who do teach these things that it is a ministry of condemnation.
I dont think it releases condemnation but freedom, and greater reality of intimacy and power in the church.
I do think that Jesus wants the church to rise above mere theology and partner with Him is producing healings, signs wonders and the miraculous.
Here is an interesting 3 pointer on the religious spirit:
1) Have a form of godliness but no power
2) Dont enter or allow other to enter
3) dont embrace forward move of the prophetic...
I hunger to be part of a people who transcent cererbal intellect to experiance that is beyond knowledge, and for this to touch a dying hurting world with more than just wise and persuasive words, but with a demonstration of the spirits power.
If I may, my thoughts on "no one is living in the reality of the fullness of the inheritance that comes to us through the finished work of the cross...we have it, but the substance is sometimes missing...its good to want that substance, and to let God show us how to get it."
Jesus Christ and Him risen from the dead is the SUBSTANCE of the finished work of the cross. Him risen and seated at the Right Hand. Only Jesus the Christ Himself can be the Substance! Otherwise we don't have a reality to identify in and our faith is in vain and Christ suffered and was crusified in vain. God has shown us already that we do have this substance ..it is Christ, and now we can see ourselves in Christ because He is risen. And we see that Christ reveals who we really are!
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