Loving friction makes for true unity

The spoken word of G-d uttered at the dawn of creation did not create man a boring kind of bland, and so simplistic a substance without each man or woman owning the glorious addition of individualized uniqueness, what we commonly see in the face of human beings everyday. This reality clearly reveals in the heart of Our Creator in making diversity of people and of gifts in people.

The more we study the micro-substance of human cell structure and the DNA of each human we see incredible diversity in how each person is literally woven together with its own unique code language that was developed personally by Our Creator in our mother’s womb.

One look at the depths of the ocean reveals incredible variety and diversity of living things that operate in glorious harmony, if the ocean offers such a great example of diverse beauty without the human element in play why then do we humans tend to build churches that produce a much more bland way of life?

Don’t you think deep down inside of your heart that if G-d so loved the world that He gave His Son to save the world from hatred and strife and since the world is made up of diverse people and cultures, if this is G-d’s ultimate desire than shouldn’t our churches actually look like that unique blend of people groups and diverse talents that G-d foreordained should be members of this heavenly gathering?

Churches that operate under that guidelines of a mantra of, “don’t rock the boat” or challenge existing and established ways of effective operational methods may fall into the trap of the world system we live under in our America today.

We see the encroaching power of our media infrastructure that has even our children linked up to satellites through small little mobile devices that allow them to easily view all the propaganda of the one-worldism that drives the entire effort to control our minds and our wants and desires.

Self-expression in our modern world is only allowed to surface in the corporately controlled media if the expression properly fits the overall “control” blueprint of the ultimate authority structures designed to promote this very determined agenda to keep the masses of humanity dependent on their goals for religious unity and corporate happiness.

A structure built around the perpetual feeding of the corporate engine’s continued control of more and more of humanity’s affections for acceptance and prosperity, in spite of the realities of our unique geographical climates and cultures that have come out of the time of the Great Flood, the Dispora of Babel, and the judgments of the 12 tribes of Israel.

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So this existing pressure to conform to the status quo comes to us straight from the secular world system which promotes its agenda every time we turn on the radio, TV, or open a browser window on our computers, so I propose today that this formula of vetting new ideas against the backdrop of the preexisting ideas that fit the prearranged or prescribed way of management is in direct contradiction to the way of achieving our heart’s desire of true unity

But if we are honest this is the way American churches operate and grow in 2013.

I believe this reality just described holds back what the Spirit of the L-rd longs to do for His church and to prepare His precious Bride for His Glorious return.

After all, isn’t it clear from reading the scriptures that the main reason that a new idea and prophetic voice emerges in history is for the purpose of bringing the church from a state of idolatry to repentance and blessing by turning back to the ancient truths found in the writing of our fathers the patriarchs.

So the current secularized church management team has a dilemma, either they open their hand and hearts to whatever the Holy Spirit wants to do in their midst at this time in human history or will the church leadership continue steadfastly on the path of safety and control even if this path leads to the peril of the church.

We all agree that we need people who are truly separated to do something for G-d because that’s what we always needed in our history to see positive change. We all need to connect with the prophetic folks that hear the same Voice that spoke to our father Abraham to DO a new thing on the earth, those willing to get up and leave the Babylonian structure and follow the invisible Voice of heaven.

Yet the skeptics of anti-change fight anything that smacks of un-vetted and looks a bit unwieldy, simply because these folks have not been stamped for approval by the higher levels of the religious order, so a new revelation from an unknown and unproven source goes through the ear and heart without even the slightest inquiry or a biblical testing of the spirit that is being presented to the church authorities… such as this word that is being written today.

So the individual person genuinely called out of our Babylonian thinking and who aches to please G-d with all his heart in the passionate way a flower seeks to open its pedals on a sunny day in the spring; the uniquely called out one feels like their uniqueness has to find its own expression elsewhere, most of the time this leads that person to a life of wandering outside of the duly recognized church structure, many times putting them on the outside looking in without any positive influence on the current church structure.

Today I would submit that true and blessed unity comes at a great cost, that cost is an uncompromising love of the brethren that has each of us looking for the evidence AND substance of the Hand of Our Creator in the unique calling of each member of the Body of Christ that comes to our assembly, all the while knowing with certainty that each of us has been separated for His Glory to perform a distinct service in performing His will on the earth.

If we don’t believe in the existence of prophets in our time than we have an out, we can easily retreat to the comfort of the norm of those interpretations of scripture made by our forefathers.

Read without prejudice Eph 4:7-8:

7 But to each one of us grace was given according to the measure of Christ’s gift. 8 Therefore He says: “When He ascended on high, He led captivity captive, And gave gifts to men.”

We must know that every born again man, woman, and child is called out of darkness to His marvelous light in the same way a child is woven together in their mother’s womb. All of His true sheep have been framed and built in His love for a distinct purpose or calling. Sadly many our forefathers never discovered their gifts and callings because of the error in interpreting the verses I will share with you from Ephesians 4.

Each of us has inherited in our new birth into the Kingdom of His Light a unique calling and work completely defined by Our Creator for the ultimate purpose of occupying our pre-destined place in the Land of our eternal rest.

Each of the in-grafted branches that have found their proper place in the root of the eternally blessed tree of the Messiah’s work on earth has to know his role and function in order to find the place of real prosperity. There simply is no substitute for the kind of peace and happiness found in the soul of a true born again believer who is occupying his or her place in the Kingdom of G-d.

If you have read or listened to my teaching on this topic before than I again make this retort, “when the church of Jesus Christ is in decline who will speak for G-d?”  If no one is saying anything new or calling for true change in the way of church life than what is G-d to do with His church?

If staying stuck is a safe place than stay stuck, but if staying in the place of stuck-ness is truly putting you in harm’s way than change is necessary which will not only deliver you from judgment but also those who hear your words.

The new birth brings to us a new responsibility, the leadership of your life, and mine, is under a new champion, the Living G-d, we have to tap into His way to contradict the world system which is currently taking millions upon millions straight into the mouth of Hell.

The Living G-d has given us His word and with this creative word we find new life and a new way, with that lets look carefully and prayerfully to the words found in Eph 4:9-16: 

(Now this, “He ascended”—what does it mean but that He also first descended into the lower parts of the earth? He who descended is also the One who ascended far above all the heavens, that He might fill all things.) And He Himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers, for the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ, till we allcome to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ; that we should no longer be children, tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, in the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting,but, speaking the truth in love, may grow up in all things into Him who is the head—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.

Notice I have highlighted certain phrases and words here?  What is the main purpose of Christ’s sending gifts directly down from His heavenly Throne?

Is it not the continued growth, established perfection, and climatic and triumphant unity of the Body!

So then, why is the current church we see operating in our world so divided and weak?

What kind of heavenly work must be established to energize the Body and get the church back to truth with every part of the Body working in their place, performing their Christ ordained function and established in real unity?

To really draw a honest biblically based answer to the questions posed here, you will have to read through the gifts or offices that Christ has sent down to His church to make her ready for His return.

These office gifts to the church are not granted to men by men but they granted to men that have been pre-selected by King Jesus. Just as in the days of His Earthly ministry, Yeshua deliberated and selected 12 men to form the foundation of His Church. 

What if Jesus just let the chips fall wherever they may after He rose again? What if Jesus took no time to train His 12 chosen ones during the days of His public ministry? 

So we see that the first and second offices, the foundation offices established 2000 years ago, are the key offices to the work of ministry. The men and women who form the basis of healthy and continual growth in the church of Jesus Christ. 

Where are the true apostles and prophets operating in the Church today?

Who are these apostles and prophets?

Are these guys found exclusively back in ancient first century Palestine?

Only to be quoted from the history books? If you are a sincere man or woman of the Book are you fully persuaded that apostolic ministry ended with John the Revelator, or do you see the value of Jesus trained apostles and prophets today?

Whatever your interpretation of this scripture, be careful and be sure of your interpretation of this text. If you are a pastor and you preach the words of the apostle Paul, are you the apostle taking on his words and enforcing them in your congregation? Are you charging young men and women with ministries in faraway places? Are laying your hands on men and training them for ministry in our decadent culture? Are you seeing the best way to bring the gospel to our lost culture? Are being sent to unique and hard places to bring the Gospel of Life?

Do you see my dear church friends what I see clearly in this text, it is the function of apostolic ministry that remains a need in our time and in every epoch of church history.

Church planters are apostles and so are missionaries that go to indigenous people groups that have yet to hear the gospel risking their lives to perform the work of the Great Commission.

Prophets, do we really need them today?

Well I ask this question of you my fellow believer, do we need to know what is coming in the world, the series of events that will usher in the return of Jesus Christ?

No nation fights a war without knowledge of the enemy they are fighting, so spies are sent out to learn the strategies and plans of the opposing armies that would come against them. Do you remember the account in scripture when Jeremiah, as it were, was seemingly listening into the king's conversations which were held in top secret?

“Then all the princes came to Jeremiah and asked him. And he told them according to all these words that the king had commanded. So they stopped speaking with him, for the conversation had not been heard.”

Any leader engaged in a battle knows that the more he knows about the enemy the better off his chances are of victory, so we need to see the work of Satan in our time, his strategies to keep the church dead and sleeping. Remember the enemy came to kill, steal, and destroy, he cares absolute zero for our success and yearns for our failure passionately.

Prophets fight the tide of spiritual declension, whether we admit it or not they have always been a part of the establishment of the church for the last 2000 years. Why? Because satan hasn't stopped trying to destroy the church from the face of the earth whether he uses the sinister schemes of internal deception or all out oppression to stop the work of grace in the world. Both Technics are still very active and at work today.

So if we remove these two offices from the gifts that Christ sent today, notice I said today, I know the scriptural argument that apostles have done the work of setting a pattern for us and they have written the words of the New Testament, but wait my dear friends, wait just a minute, where are computers, nuclear warheads, the internet, and artificial intelligence in the word of G-d, where are the allusions to the deceptions found in the Catholic church today?  They are there in veiled language but the text we are studying paints a much clearer picture.

Where are these apostles that open up a new frontier for the gospel using current language software to decode distinct languages we have not encoded in order to translate the scriptures?

But then is the work of translation enough?

We need evangelists to be added to the mix don’t we? How beautiful are the feet that bring glad tidings of great joy. Apostles train and send young indigenous men and woman and prophets direct toward what the enemy is trying to do to thwart the work of the Gospel but the evangelists goes and keeps going and does not stop preaching the good news of salvation.

After a church gets planted and fostered we will need pastors and teachers, right?

All five offices released by Jesus from heaven are necessary for us to come to the unity of the faith, for saints to properly equipped for service, and in order for the church to be properly fitted together and beautifully unified in Him in these last days.

Can I have a hearty Amen?

You know I've built a good case for my interpretation of this passage of scripture, the problem you just don’t know how to implement this new kind of way in the church.

I recognize that change is hard from the known and common order of the pastor / sheep way of life, but nonetheless we must change in order to find true unity in the Body Christ today. Countless numbers of prophets have been turned out of the church just because pastors did not understand their calling in Christ.
 
I also appreciate change will not come instantly, the sheep of G-d need time to digest the information being presented, but look at it this way, what choice do we really have?
 

We will change before He returns, the question is will we do so willingly, or will we do so through a process of refinement in the loss of things we hold so tightly in our hearts; those things that Our Lord would have us release to back Him and His Spirit so He can reestablish His rightful place as King over His Church - The Bride of Christ?

He is saying to all of His true sheep as He said through Moses to Pharaoh, “let MY People go to worship me” Let my people be released to do the work of preaching the gospel to the nations in this end time re-gathering of the Bride of Christ the Israel of G-d.

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I wind this word down to this final appeal to my dear church family in America:

Let’s let loving friction do its perfect work in the church, let the prophets speak and let the elders judge their words in decency and order. And let's discern the apostle from the elder, they are different in calling and nature. In the original church the apostles were mostly elders but in those days they were preachers and prayer warriors, how many churches today have an eldership made up of this kind of leader?

Keep praying and keep on praying over the words that the L-rd is releasing at this time all over the world, look for apostles to be brought to your congregation, free yourself up from the encumbrances of the knowledge of the past way of doing things and the known ways of doing things and let the Holy Spirit redefine His way for you…

The benefits are amazing!!

The glory of G-d will descend on you and all of us who are truly hungry for His Presence and the world we long to conquer for Him will be conquered far more efficiently.

Clubbish religion can only produce the same clubbish way of life, only the Holy Spirit through His uniqueness and surprises of new revelation for our time will keep us all on our toes, new life will come to your prayers and your prayer times, expectation and life will usher in a new way of doing church!
 

Ultimately your church will look like the diversity that is represented in our culture and in the culture and church of heaven.

Much love in Christ,


Jonathan David Keener

Praying for a spiritually prosperous 2013