School of the Spirit - Week One

How blessed we were to have completed week one of our School of the Spirit. Though we expected to be blessed, I can’t express more how pleased we were to have so many Holy Spirit hungry and gifted people come along to our first week.

The calibre and maturity of this group, in my opinion, sets the mark very high for the weeks to come and for what I believe the Holy Spirit is wanting to do in an through us. Already in the first week we have seen the Holy speak to those in attendance with words of knowledge.

I have received a number of emails confirming that it was not only I that was blessed by our time together but this event is evidently something the Lord would have us do. Only on Friday I received an email from Canberra House of Prayer who heard along the grapevine that we were to hold this school, inform me that the Lord had also told them to hold such a school on the exact same day at even the same time in the afternoon. Our God is truly amazing!

The Call cry from the day was “Let the Spirit of the Lord saturate my soul” and there is no doubt the Lord is doing just that.

Our topic for discussion and study this week was “We the Temple of God” emphasising that it is you and I who are meant to be filled with God’s Spirit and to bear with us wherever we  go and with whatever we do for His purposes.

This coming Saturday we will examine the topic “Ichabod - The Glory (Spirit) has departed” and see how we can personally impact on how the Holy Spirit works in and through us.

I hope you have a week filled with God's Spirit and continue to be a blessing to your local congregations and those in your community!

SOS School of the Spirit - One more sleep

It sounds a little childish, but Jesus said we must come to Him as children...

Just one more sleep until the launch of our School of the Spirit.
After twelve months, it is finally time to launch our long awaited school of the Spirit. In effect the school is not just a 12 month wait but it has been several years since I started a new work here in the Blue Mountains west of Sydney were we live.

As a choleric personality this is no small feat, as a person who normally wants everything to happen immediately, to simply wait and allow God's Spirit to lead is very difficult.

As Is 40:31 indicates, when we wait for the Spirit to breath and blow His wind upon us is when we really begin to soar with Him. I am fully expectant that He is going to cause those in attendance to run and not be weary, walk and not grow faint...

God Bless

We the Temple of God

Introduction

If we are to believe God has sent the Holy Spirit, then we must also know and understand that He sends His Spirit to those whom He loves and chosen to represent Him upon the earth. As ambassadors in this earth, we bear with us the very answer and power to eternal life. It is therefore imperative that the vessel that the Spirit of God indwells is set apart.

I recently heard a sermon from an English pastor who likened the re-building of the temple walls by Nehemiah, after the captivity in Babylon of the Israelite's, as to how we are to build the church. At face value this could be seen as a sincere call for all believers to build their lives on holiness and commitment to God's word. Yet the pastor went down the track of seeing the local church as the body of Christ. This is a common way in which clergy today refer to the body of Christ, yet this is not God's view of the body.

The body of Christ are the believers that are being built up, with Christ as the head and the cornerstone, to a glorious and marvellous temple that God's Spirit desires to invade when we live holy and righteous lives.

Called to Posses God’s Spirit

·         Paul & Peter call us temples of the Holy Spirit; 1Cor 3:16; 6:19; 2Cor 6:16; Eph 2:20-22; 1Pet 2:5

·         God breathed His Spirit into us at creation and again promised at Pentecost; Gen 2:7; Jn 14:17; Rom 8:9; 1Jn 2:27

A Holy Priesthood

·         God’s intention was for a holy priesthood; Ex 19:6; 1Pet 2:9

·         Melchizedek was the first example of that priesthood Gen 14:18-20

·         The role of the priests was intercession likened unto Christ today; Rom 8:34; 1Jn 2:20-27

·         Jesus was born into that line, a priest, prophet & King like Melchizedek; Heb 7:3

• We as followers of Christ with a spirit of sonship are called into that same line and priesthood

The Temple was a shadow of things in heaven but also of God’s people

·         Like the temple in Jerusalem we are meant to posses or be filled with God’s presence & Spirit see 2Chron 5:14; 7:1; Acts 2:4.

·         The temple is a shadow of things in heaven & is seen as a symbol or type of Jesus’ own body; Heb 3; Acts 7:44-50; John 2:13-22

·         If we are meant to possess God’s Spirit then we must also ensure we make room for Him and invite Him in. Matt 3:11; Lk 11:13; Lk 24:49

 

The In, With & Upon of the Holy Spirit
Jesus in John 14 and onwards began to proclaim the different ways in which the Holy Spirit works in us

• Jesus spoke of the IN-working or regenerating work of the Spirit and himself breathed upon the disciples see Titus 3:5
• Jesus promised the Holy Spirit would be WITH them as a counsellor or in the Greek an advocate (one who walks with us) John 14:26
• Jesus told us to wait for the Holy Spirit to come UPON us Acts 1:8

Preparing the Temple

Cleansing precedes the infilling see Acts 2:38 more of this to follow next week...

Acts 5:1-11 Ananias & Sapphira

When we read the verses of Acts 5:1-11 it is easy to do distance ourselves from this scenario, especially if we have never gifted the proceeds of land to the church, as Ananias & Sapphira lied directly to  the apostles and to the Holy Spirit.

After seeing the outcome of these verses, namely the bodies of this husband and wife being carried away for burial, no one in their right mind would directly lie to the Holy Spirit. Yet I have no doubt that everyone of us have made promises to the Lord which we have not kept.

As a Christian man of more than thirty years now, I couldn't count on both my hands and feet the number of times I have come to the Lord in prayer promising to do things which usually within a short time I have had to come back to the Lord in repentance because of my unfaithfulness.

Though the story of Acts 5 is an extreme one, it brings to home the need of each of us to consider the power we have in the tongue. The book of James (see 3:1-12) describes the tongue "as a fire, a world of evil among the parts of the body."

James goes on to say that with the tongue we both praise our Lord and Father, and with it curse men, who have been made in God's likeness. Just over the page in chapter 5:12, James says to "let your yes be yes and your no be no". In other words don't make promises you can't keep and certainly not the ones that you are not meant to keep.

These verses in Acts however have important undertones that all of us must consider when approaching the Throne of Grace. Our God is a Holy God who in turn has called each of us to lives of Holiness. As their is only one who is Holy, namely the Lord Jesus, we must and can only compare our lives to Him who was without sin. Put simply, we must be in Him and he is us for us to be made holy.

As a result, our lives should be a reflection of Him. I remember the first time I entered the auditorium of the church building where I gave my life to Christ some thirty years ago. It seemed as though everyone in that building shone with the presence of God. The result therefore of being in Him, is that He will be seen and heard in all that we do and say. As Philippians' says, we are to shine like the stars which we are when we are in Christ.

I pray that each of us could truly reflect Christ in our lives and let His love in us for each other be seen around the world.

God Bless

School of the Spirit SOS 2 Weeks To Go

Just two more weeks before the launch of our School of the Spirit, SOS and the start to something new that the Lord Jesus is going to do through the Holy Spirit in our region.

It was whilst I was in Sweden last year that I felt the Lord prompt me to start a School of the Spirit with the hope and expectation to see the functions and gifting's of the Holy Spirit renewed. In recent years many charismatic and Pentecostal churches, renowned for seeing the Holy Spirit at work in their gatherings, have taken a less charismatic approach to their meetings. Whilst this is not a judgement upon them by myself it is certainly an obvious shift in how these churches direction has changed.

We could spend hours talking about why this has happened, but that is unimportant and the best thing we can do is simply be obedient to what each of us know the Lord is calling us to do in our own ministries and functions within the church body. Might I also had that whilst this observation is a general one it is not true of all those churches that call themselves charismatic and Pentecostal.

In addition, many non charismatic churches have in my observation become more charismatic in their ministry. This I believe mainly due to the shift amongst congregations whereby many Pentecostal members have moved to more traditional or mainline denominations. I also believe this was foretold to me approximately six years ago when the Lord indicated that the next move of His Spirit would come from unexpected avenues and in particular from church denominations not traditionally charismatic.

Either way, as scripture says, obedience is better than sacrifice and I am eagerly awaiting to see what the Lord has in stall for us as we meet for our new School of the Spirit.

If you would like to know more the School please drop me an expression of interest at  rego.lolaus@yahoo.com.au

Our school begins Saturday the 25th of April from 3pm at Wycliffe Christian School, 133 Rickard Rd Warrimoo NSW 2774.

John 15:15-17 Bring forth Fruit

The true test of any believer is in their fruit and according to scripture the kind of fruit that really matters is fruit that remains. According to John 15:15-17 a pre-requisite to this fruit that remains is understanding who we are in Christ and being obedient to His commandments, namely to love one another.

Jesus, when wanting fruit from a certain fig tree cursed it when He found no fruit on it and it consequently died as a result (Luke 13:6-9). Over and over again we see this pattern unfolding in scripture, that God expects fruit to come from our lives. See Matthew 12:33-35; Matthew 7:19

Bearing fruit, however, is a natural part of life and we see this in all aspects of the world around us. A mother naturally conceives a child as does the animal kingdom bring forth their offspring according to their kind. Bringing forth fruit or offspring should therefore be a natural thing to do.

There are however  aspects of producing fruit which I think should shine in the lives of followers of Jesus. Firstly, as the scripture above says, fruit should remain. In other words fruit that is not temporal but in it's self brings forth more fruit. Jesus said unless the kernel falls to the ground it cannot produce a crop. Jesus saw His own life as seed  that would bear fruit but in it's turn would bear fruit in the lives of those that would follow. We see this in the early church, the followers of Jesus not only did as He commanded but produced their own fruit and many of us here today that follow Christ are a result of fruit giving forth to more fruit.

I am always excited to meet with people who I have personally mentored or discipled in my own life, not only to know that they are well but also to know what kind of fruit their producing in their own lives. Fruit brings forth more fruit and has exponential ability. As one put a thousand to flight, two put ten thousand to flight. See Deuteronomy 32:20

Secondly, as I have already indicated, it is natural to bear fruit and is therefore not something that is strange or foreign to us. I believe in what I call a holy ease, that is doing those things we are called to do in obedience and not trying to strive and struggle in our own strength. 1Samuel 15:22 talks about being obedient over sacrifice in other words rather than chasing after things with our own strength doing the things we hear and see the Father telling us to do. Jesus made a point of this in His life stating "I do the things I see my Father doing" and over and over again would pass by what we may have assumed to be opportunity to pursue the will of the Father. Zechariah 4:6 states "It is not by might, nor by power but by my Spirit says the Lord..."

Therefore, lets go and bear fruit for the Kingdom of God, fruit that remains and produces it's own fruit in turn and fruit that we are called to bear not by some selfish ambition or guilt trip put on by others but in response to His commands and leading by His Spirit.

God Bless - Shalom