the need for spiritual understanding and divine revelation (LS 1 Thes msg 3)

Message three from the life-study of 1 Thessalonians is so rich and so exposing! In the first few verses of 1 Thessalonians Paul speaks of the church in God the Father and in the Lord Jesus Christ, the work of faith, the labor of love, the endurance of hope, the manner of life, turning to God from idols, serving a living and true God, awaiting the coming of the Lord Jesus, etc. If you speak English, you understand what these words mean, but we don't really get the deeper meaning of these matters.

I was so exposed to see that I read the Word of God and I think I understand it, but I don't have an exercised heart, spirit, and mind to see the divine revelation in the Word. I take the Word of the Lord for granted. I can even declare, Praise the Lord, I have turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God! - but what does it really mean that God is living and true? Is God living to me? Is my God living to others through me? Am I in God and is God living in me? Is He real, living, and true to me and through me?


O, Lord... how much we need a spiritual understanding of the divine facts - we need to be enlightened by the Lord every time we read the Bible, so that in the organic union with the Lord the divine facts in the Word would be transmitted into us!  We need to have a spiritual understanding of the Word of God (in contrast with the natural understanding of what the Bible says) and the divine revelation in the Word (in contrast with our self-made light according to our natural mind when we read the Bible).

Lord, save us from thinking we know! We don't want to take Your word for granted! Keep us so open to You whenever we come to the Word! May the objective faith be transmitted into us to become our living and subjective faith, by which we are organically united with You! Lord, we want to have a view of what You are, what You have, what You have accomplished and obtained! Save us from our natural ways... we want Spiritual understanding and Divine Revelation!

[NB. There may be a few days ahead in which I may not post here from my enjoyment in the life-study of 1 Thessalonians - but I still do my best to read it, enjoy it, and maybe even share a bit about it. Tomorrow we start the video-training on the Crystallization-Study of the Psalms(part 2), and I will focus on getting these messages in... Lord, re-constitution!]

the Characteristics of the Christian life (Life-Study of 1 Thessalonians msg 2)

I read the life-study for today, message 2 of the Life-Study of 1 Thessalonians, and I was simply blown away! Wow, I never ever thought even in my highest appreciation for the Christian life that these three  characteristics of the Christian life - turning to God from idols, serving a living and true God, and awaiting the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ - are SO RICH in meaning, sense, application, and experience! I am still amazed at what the ministry of the age has dug out in the Bible, pointing to us the obvious - it's there, in black and white letters, we just need to put some effort into "digging it out"!

O, Lord Jesus.... I need You, Lord, in the reading of the life-study of 1 Thessalonians! Especially as the video training on the Crystallization-Study of the Psalms(part two) is coming up this week, Lord, I need You so much! I give You my time, Lord! How to redeem the time in such a way that I don't get into TOO MUCH and get too little, neither do I get into only some portions and not be serious on the schedule? O, Lord...

Three Characteristics of the Christian life

1. Turning to God from idols - not just turning to God from sins, but from idols! Everyone worships something / someone, even if they are self-proclaimed atheists (who mostly worship themselves). God created us with a spiritual stomach to contain the Triune God - and when we hear the word of the gospel, we are filled with appreciation for Him and drop any other idols to be joined to Him in an organic union! This is the "work of faith", which joins us to God and strengthens us to drop our idols (who can be anything or anyone that replaces God in our life).

2. Serving a living and true God - our God is living, and He can be seen as the living God by our living today! He is living now in us, and we love Him - in love, we allow Him to live and be expressed in us. He corrects us, guides us, instructs us, speaks to us, fellowships with us, and lets us know how He feels about every aspect of our living. I was touched by this paragraph, "What about your God? Is He a living God to you? The proper Christian life should bear a testimony that God is living. The reason we do not do or say certain things should be that God is living in us".

3. Waiting for the Son of God - we have a hope, the endurance of hope, which is the return of the Lord Jesus that we may meet Him! We don't live an aimless Christian life, and we are not rooted or grounded in this earth. Our hope is not in the earthly things, in positions, careers, etc, but in the coming of our Lord Jesus! The Lord Jesus is our hope, our future, and our destination!

... wow, you need to read this message! This genuine Christian life is for the church life, so that God would get what He desires, the Body of Christ to express Him on the earth in a corporate way! O, Lord, gain the Body of Christ!

corporate 30-day challenge, one life-study message per day, 1 Thessalonians

It is so wonderful to set goals! Sometimes last year I did this 30-day challenge - One meaningful Thing I did Today - and it was a very good experience. Since then I've been thinking concerning "the next challenge", whether I should take one or how to go on in this... I am so glad now that there's a solid burden for all the young adults to get into the truth in a solid way, reading not only the Bible portions for the day but also getting into the life-study messages in a consistent way! Via Living To Him "the life-study reading program" has started today! So here am I with another challenge, this time a corporate one :)

Corporate 30-day Challenge - One Life-Study Message per day, LS 1 Thessalonians!

On Living To Him they are daily posting the reminder with the outline and a link to where you can read the message, so the one for today is, Msg. 1, Life Study of First Thessalonians. The way I want to kind of do this is not only read the message and enjoy it, together with the Scripture reading and the notes (if possible), but also have at least 1-2 paragraphs of sharing (either in my own words or as a quote from the book). And since they are posting daily there, maybe I can post my enjoyment both here on the blog and as a comment on the blog post at LivingToHim.

Message 1 of the Life-Study of First Thessalonians - enjoyment

I am so encouraged to do this reading together with all the saints :) As those learning to take responsibility in the church life and making the Lord's recovery "our Lord's recovery", we firstly need to be constituted with the truth! Here's my portion of enjoyment from the reading today:

Praise the Lord - we are the church IN God the Father - we are organically united with Him! God is not merely our Creator but our Father, and we are His many sons. Also, it is so precious to call on the name of the Lord - O, Lord Jesus! Not just, I love You Jesus, but I love You Lord Jesus! In our experience we have a relationship with the Lord and we love Him - we love to call on His name!
I was particularly impressed with the meaning of the work of faith (our work is our faith; the strength with which we work and the nature of our work are both faith), the labor of love (deeper and harder than work, our shepherding becomes a labor - in and out of love), and endurance of hope (hope is the source of endurance, and endurance involves suffering)! This is the structure of our Christian life. 

Lord, what about this additional reading? O, Lord, the next 30 days and, why not, the rest of the year! Fill my days with the Word and with the ministry! Lord, hunger for the Word! Lord, understanding of the Word so that there would be a solid deposit of the truth in my being! O, Lord... 

The Picture for Today :) - Wood Green, London Underground

Pretty self-explanatory, the above picture was taken at the Wood Green tube station in London. I checked outside the station, there's lots of green stuff (a bit more up the hill there are lots of parks, green grass, etc) - just in case you were wondering whether the name is linked to the place. 

not a superficial knowledge but a constitution with the truth! (1 Picture + 1 Experience with the Lord today) 30-days challenge

Many times I am asking myself and asking the Lord also, Lord, am I just "guilded" with some general knowledge of God and the Bible? Or am I constituted with the Word so that it became my intrinsic constitution? Sometimes if you're young and speak these high truths as seen in the Bible and pointed out in the ministry of the age - people may say, It's all superficial, it's not your constitution.... Or even more, maybe you think you have it but you didn't spend time to get into the truth adequately so that the truth may become yours by being wrought into you.... Yes, it's the Lord's job to bring about situations and things that would "burn these truths into our being", but we have a responsibility to diligently get into the truth - more about this after,

1 Picture for today - One Wall on Caledonian Road

I have no idea what this building used to be, but there used to be an old-style construction in this place, and it appears that they tore it down in the back but they left the front wall! Of course, the front wall looks good, classy, with the inscription and all... Location: on the Caledonian Road, close to the Caledonian Tube station. I have to say: it looks good, but it's just a facade, just something for others to see, with no proper back-up or anything behind it. One may get fooled by the looks of it, but if you look closer, you will see it's "superficial", and it is something that is not really that normal...

One Experience with The Lord - Not Having a Superficial Knowledge but having a Constitution of the Truth!

Today I was really impressed with my need to be constituted with the truth in the Word of God. I may have read the Bible many times, I may read it daily and pray over it, and I may read other ministry books that help me get into the intrinsic significance of the Word of God. But the question still is: is this a superficial knowledge of a lot of things in the Word of God and in the ministry, or is this a genuine and intrinsic constitution of the truth? You can't give others something which you don't already possess - you can't bring others to a place where you are not yet! I need to be constituted with the truth!

This doesn't mean that "I am superficial in my study of the Bible", but it means that I don't want to take the way of "having a facade" or "being gilded" with the knowledge of the Word of God(see the picture above), but I want to take the way of constitution. It is so easy to be "gilded with gold", but to be made of gold is costly, takes time, requires a price, and is precious. Actually, the Great Babylon is gilded with gold and precious things(Rev. 18:16) - the fallen and apostate Christianity has many "precious things" and persons they can be proud of - but inside there's all kinds of uncleanness.... How much we need to be cleansed by the blood of the Lamb and washed in the water in the Word so that we may be cleansed, purified, re-constituted, saturated, and intrinsically filled with the Truth in the Word!

Do you want to be useful to the Lord? Give yourself to get into the truth, to study the Word of God - especially with the footnotes - diligently. Don't take the way of general knowledge, and don't take the way of being superficial. We need know not only what books are in the Bible and in what order, not only what are the topics of the books of the Bible, not only what is God's economy as viewed in the Bible, but also what are the major topics in the whole Bible and expound them to the saints. Not just the brothers - but even the sisters - need to take this way.

I've been thinking about it - what if I don't just read the Holy Word for Morning Revival but I also get into the "further reading" bit? What if I read maybe even the life-study messages that are recommended there? What if I listen to the message for the week - once or twice? I can tell u what may happen - there may be a deposit that is being diligently - if we are diligent about it - constituted into us. Little by little, day by day, bit by bit... - we gain a deposit of the truth, something precious in the Word of God. And if we come to the home meetings and the group meetings, we can function and be perfected in our speaking!

This whole world is not dying because of the diseases, famine, or other natural calamities... they are dying because of the lack of food! The food the Christians put today on the table for others is "junk food", "ready-made food", "microwave food", etc. or at the best, food that is weak in nutritious elements - you can't survive or grow on that food! But what about us? We have the riches of Christ in the Word of God(let the Word of Christ dwell in you richly!!! Col. 3:16), we have the ministry of the age opening up the riches in the Word of God, and we even have the high peak truths of the Bible being unveiled before us... what's left for us is to...

DIG! 

Get some Digging into the Word! Get some digging into the ministry! Labor on the Word, on the footnotes, on the life-studies, on the ministry books, on the morning revival... get filled with the Word of God! We have the storehouses of Joseph, and the whole world is in a famine! Give Them Food! First YOU eat and be filled, YOU be constituted, and then "go to a world that is dying" and "rescue the perishing" by speaking to them the high gospel! People already know and have rejected the low gospel preached today - they need something HIGHER, something that gives them purpose and meaning in their life! People need to hear God's Economy! They want to know God's Full Salvation! They desire Christ, the Reality, the Desire of all the nations!

[every time I read the Word and the ministry I am being exposed - Lord, I need to and want to labor in the Word and the ministry much more! Save me from just "mentally understanding these things" - I want to be constituted with the truth! Not just "facebook statuses" with things I was impressed in the Word(which are good, but you can't live on those!) - but a constant living according to the vision given by the deposit of the Word and the ministry in our being! You can't take a break from or run away from that! I Want to be Constituted!]

One Meaningful Thing Today: Going Through Psalms 2 thoroughly! (30-day challenge)

Especially if you love the Lord and love His Word, you will enjoy reading the Bible! The Lord speaks to us here and there, here a little and there a little, bit by bit, verse by verse, etc. Sometimes from a whole chapter there's only one verse or even one sentence or one word that stands out. In our consecutive reading of the Bible we enjoy the Lord so much, we see the history in the Bible, the poetry, the commandments, the teachings, etc. In our more in-depth study with other spiritual guidelines, ministry books, life-studies, the footnotes in the Recovery Version, etc - we get even more riches out from the Word. And when we get together with the saints in different home meetings, group meetings, prayer meetings, vital group meetings, Lord's Table Meetings, prophesying meetings, training meetings, conferences, etc - we get even a richer deposit. There's so much in the Word of God! 

It's not easy to pick only ONE meaningful thing from what I was in today or from what I did today(not that I was doing a lot of things or anything like that...)! Especially on Tuesday there's the prayer meeting - and I have to say, this is THE MOST MEANINGFUL thing I did today! Praying to enjoy the Lord, to fellowship with the Lord, and to cooperate with the Lord that His kingdom may come and His will be done on earth as it is being done in the heavens - this is the best thing you can do on a Tuesday evening! But for today I would like to choose this particular matter as the

One Meaningful Thing I Did Today -
Going Through Psalms 2 Thoroughly

Many times I desired so much to go through a chapter in depth, verse by verse, not only through the life-study, but also through the crystallization-study, through the up-to-date speaking, through the footnotes, through the portions in the morning revival, through the pray-reading of the verse, etc. I never had time to do that, in a thorough way, for any chapter in the Bible! I even memorized chapters and Psalms, but never went through in a thorough way with a concise abstract / summary of the study. "Milking the Word" and drinking the milk in the Word, getting the nourishment...

So today in the Morning Revival on the Crystallization Study of Psalms I couldn't help it - I had to go through the whole second Psalm and immerse myself into it! I enjoyed it so much - reading it, praying over it, remembering from the message, listening to portions in the second message in the last training, reading the footnotes, reading the life-study... - this Psalm is so rich! And I managed to get two portions out on the aGodMan blog that summarize my enjoyment and my study of this chapter: Psalm 2 in the light of God’s systems of grace and of government – the nations are in open rebellion, and, Kiss the Son! Love the Lord!

Wow, how wonderful to see God's economy in Psalms 2! Though the whole world is in rebellion against God and even I AM in rebellion against God, He already has installed His King in Zion! And now all we need to do is Kiss The Son - Love the Lord! We can't and we wouldn't submit to God in His government - but the Lord can do it in us through our enjoyment of Him, loving Him, kissing Him, and allowing Him in us! This Psalm has become so rich to me, and I am so happy I could set aside a considerate amount of time to get into it and share about it!

[Disclaimer: I have the feeling that if I continue to do this "challenge", everyone who reads these portions will see not a THING but will love the Lord more. At least this is my purpose, and this is my heart - not to give people ideas or things, but to get to know this Loveable One and enjoy Him - even in practical things, normal things, day-to-day matters such as... reading the Bible and thoroughly enjoying a chapter! Read the two articles about Psalms 2 - Open Rebellion and Kiss The Son - and you will definitely love the Lord more!]