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Three times in a year shall all thy males appear before the LORD thy God in the place which he shall choose; in the feast of unleavened bread, and in the feast of weeks, and in the feast of tabernacles: and they shall not appear before the LORD empty: (Deuteronomy 16:16) |
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All families of the great Christian body are familiar with the spiritual fulfillment of the Jewish "feast of unleavened bread," that is, with repentance, water baptism, and being born again. This is the basic message of the Gospel. Many soldiers of the cross have given their lives that whoever will do so might believe, be baptized, and thus be saved. |
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Around the turn of the century the "feast of weeks" (Pentecost) was added. Those who have embraced the phenomena of the Spirit have learned that it is only by the Spirit we can truly minister and only by the Spirit we can keep from obeying the lusts of our flesh. |
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But the act of salvation includes three great platforms, not just two. The types of the Bible reveal three installations of the grace of God, three interventions of God in man's transformation, such as the three convocations of Israel or the three areas of the Tabernacle of the Congregation. It is on the third day that there is a wedding in Cana of Galilee. |
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Are you ready to move past Pentecost in your experience with God? |
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The "feast of Tabernacles," the convocation after Pentecost, portrays God's great plan, which is to dwell in His people. |
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Unlike the other creatures of God (as far as we know), human beings were made in half. We are either male or female. Why were we made this way? Why were we made so vulnerable in the realm of relationships? |
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The answer is, man was made to be the dwelling place of God and also to be the gate through which others can find rest in God. The person who is alone, without God or other people, needs to be ministered to. It is not good that man be alone. |
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In basic salvation we receive the blood of God's Lamb so we might have the authority to enter the Kingdom. In Pentecost we receive the wisdom and power by which we enter the Kingdom. Neither of these is the Kingdom. They are the authority and ability to enter the Kingdom. |
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The Kingdom of God is God in Christ in the saints loving, governing, and blessing the creatures of God. |
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Passing from "Pentecost" to "Tabernacles" requires a fierce warfare as all that is not of God's Kingdom is driven from our personality. But there comes a day when we have received double for our sins, when our warfare has been accomplished, when our iniquity has been pardoned. |
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God tears before He binds up. He is angry and we are rebuked and chastised before His glorious Presence finds untroubled rest in us. |
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Does this speak to your heart? Are you a seasoned Christian who suddenly is being faced with the unfathomable deceit of your own inner nature? |
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Rejoice! You are moving from Pentecost to Tabernacles. When you come forth from the fire only your bondages will have been burned away. The Son of God has been with you in the fire. |
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We have compassed the mountain of Pentecost long enough. Let's move on toward the land of promise. |
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Let both grow together until the harvest: and in the time of harvest I will say to the reapers, Gather ye together first the tares, and bind them in bundles to burn them: but gather the wheat into my barn. (Matthew 13:30) |
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The tares are those who act wickedly and the wheat are those who act righteously. After all has been said and done, after all the scaffolding of religion has been removed, this is what it boils down to: the tares are those who act wickedly and the wheat are those who act righteously. |
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The primary goal of every righteous person, whether he knows it or not, is to have fellowship with God. God has given the Lord Jesus to us so we can have our sins forgiven and learn to act righteously. The wicked can never have fellowship with God for our God is a God of righteousness. |
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In the last days (which are now!) God will remove the tares from His Kingdom. First, God will remove the roots of wickedness from His people. After this program has been completed, God will remove the people themselves if they have not been willing to allow God to remove the evil from them. |
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This is what is taking place today. The Lord Jesus is moving among His people. He is knocking at the door. Can you hear Him knocking at your heart? If you will open the door He will come in and dine with you on His body and blood. |
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He wants to remove every tare from your personality—all worldliness, all the unlawful passions and appetites of your flesh, all the self-will and striving of personal ambition found in you. |
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Let these go as He calls for them. They will only keep you in misery—now and throughout eternity. |
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What a joy it is to have God change us like this! We are becoming new creations of righteousness in the Potter's hands. We are being made heirs of the new world of righteousness that is on the horizon. |
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Let us not look back but come out of the world. Let us, through God's Spirit, cleanse ourselves from all moral filthiness. Let us walk hand in hand with our Father as it was in the beginning. |
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It's not too late for you or me to come to Calvary. Cry, "Dear Father." Tell God you love Him. He desires fellowship with you. He will forgive you through the blood of the cross and make Himself real to you. |
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We never can be satisfied or fulfilled as a person until we are walking with God. |
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As we look about us in the world, we observe the tares of wickedness coming to maturity. Let us not forget that both the tares and the wheat come to maturity at the same time, according to the Lord's Word. |
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Christians can see clearly that Satan is rising up in the peoples of the world. But if we will listen to the Spirit of God we will discover that God is inviting us to partake of more of Christ. There is a greater portion of Christ for every believer who will look up to God and receive. |
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What is the answer to the moral darkness? It is a greater forming of Christ in us and a greater portion of the Holy Spirit. |
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God is waiting for you to ask Him for more of His Spirit to enable you to stand no matter what darkness confronts you. Ask Him now. He will not disappoint you. |
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You will be more than a conqueror through Christ who strengthens you no matter how dark your environment becomes, no matter how the tares abound. Taste and see that the Lord is good! |
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His lord said unto him, Well done, thou good and faithful servant: thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will make thee ruler over many things: enter thou into the joy of thy lord. (Matthew 25:21) |
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Every Christian has a talent. The Holy Spirit divides to every believer a portion of the wisdom and power of the ascended Christ. |
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Perhaps our talent is expressed in a tremendous, recognized gift to the Body such as the apostle or the prophet. Or it may be true that we are the custodian of the church building. |
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The apostle and the custodian may vary widely in importance in the sight of people. But they do not vary widely in importance in the sight of God. A custodian who does a job in utter faithfulness before the Lord is highly esteemed in the Kingdom of God. He will be issued greater responsibility. |
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The apostle may be revealing the Scriptures with great power. The prophet may be lifting the saints into the glory of the Kingdom Age. But if the toilet begins to leak and floods the restroom the worshipers are quickly brought back down to the present world. |
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It is not unusual for the highly gifted individual, the one with ten talents, to go about his or her ministry conscientiously. The believer with the one talent, thinking he is of little importance in the kingdom, may become occupied with his job or family and pay little attention to his one task. |
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Such difference in diligence can be seen in the churches. The Pastor becomes the "chief cook and bottle washer" until he is "burned out." The members of the assembling who should be performing many of the chores that are killing the Pastor are busy with their home, their vacation schedule and their retirement program. |
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The one-talented individual who buried his talent suffered in four major ways. First, he was removed from fellowship with his angry Lord. Second, his talent was given to a more industrious person. Third, he lost his crown of rulership. Fourth, he was cast into the outer darkness. |
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We humans would reserve such harsh punishment for the murderer, the rapist, the thief. We do not view the timid, negligent believer as a candidate for total loss of inheritance. |
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The Kingdom of God is at hand and will be given to those who esteem it highly enough to turn away from the world and seek it with a whole heart. The fearful, the cowardly, the negligent, the spiritually lazy, may be acceptable to us; but to God who is busily bringing forth a new world of righteousness they are a complete frustration. They are neither hot nor cold. |
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Let us be up and about our Father's business. We must be faithful with our few things if we are to be the rulers over many. There are great rewards for serving the Lord! |
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What do we do about this? We attend diligently to the task set before us. Meanwhile, we ask the Lord for an increased area of service. Ask your Pastor and elders where they think you fit in the work of the ministry. |
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Covet earnestly the best gifts! |
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Let us therefore fear, lest, a promise being left us of entering into his rest, any of you should seem to come short of it. (Hebrews 4:1) |
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What is the rest of God? |
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The Christian Jews to whom the author of Hebrews was writing had been saved, had been filled with the Spirit, had seen the miracles of the Apostles, and had been persecuted to the point of having their possessions confiscated. |
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Most of us haven't come even this far. |
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Was the writer congratulating them on their stature in Christ and encouraging them with the soon coming of the Lord to take them to Heaven? |
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No such thing! The way the author spoke you would think he was addressing unsaved people who were rejecting the Gospel. But the internal evidence is that he was addressing "holy brethren." |
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They knew about repentance from dead works, faith toward God, water baptism, the baptism with the Spirit of God, the laying on of hands, the resurrection of the dead, and eternal judgment. They had experienced the heavenly gift of eternal life, had been partakers of the Holy Spirit, had tasted the good word of God and the powers of the world to come. |
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Now they were being warned about neglecting their salvation, about not holding their confidence resolutely to the end, bearing thorns and thistles instead of the fruit of righteousness, not assembling together, drawing back from the program of salvation—about failing to enter the rest of God. |
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It reminds us of the Apostle Paul who toward the end of his life was seeking to win Christ. |
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Our salvation is past, present, and future. When we neglect one of these aspects at the expense of the others, we are risking the fullness of our inheritance as man and as a son of God. |
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What is the rest of God? The rest of God is based on the fact that God finished all things on the seventh day of creation and we are not required to create our own heaven and earth. God is resting and we are to enter His rest. |
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It is the land of promise, the resurrection ground where we are eternally alive in the Spirit of God. |
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It is the eternal Sabbath where we cease from speaking our own words and acting according to our own pleasure, choosing instead to abide in Christ to the point we are crucified and Christ is living His Life in us. |
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What is the rest of God? It is that condition in which God's will and our will have become synonymous. The place where our greatest joy is to do the will of the Father. |
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No human being ever will find perfect peace, perfect joy, perfect love, perfect fulfillment, until he or she is abiding in untroubled rest in the bosom of the Father through Christ Jesus. |
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Let us through Christ conquer every enemy until God can find rest in us and we can find rest in God. |
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I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus. (Philippians 3:14) |
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The land of promise offered to the tribes of Israel was set forth clearly in several passages of the Old Testament. Canaan, the land of milk and honey, was the goal. |
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How wonderful it is to embark on a quest, to be pursuing the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. A vision, a hope, keeps us pressing forward in anticipation. We can carry our cross when there is joy set before us. |
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In the Christian tradition eternal residence in the garden of God is our hope, our promised land. But as the time for the coming of the Kingdom of God to the earth draws near we need to look again to the Scriptures to see if we can discover what God has said concerning the land of promise of the believer in Christ. |
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Actually, there is little said in the New Testament concerning what happens to us from the time we die until the day of resurrection. We have preached and sung about our mansion in the sky. There is nothing at all wrong with looking forward to Paradise no matter where it is located. We have been commanded to set our affection on things above. |
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Because Paradise was at one time on the earth, the memory of Eden can be found hidden in the subconscious of all the children of Adam. To think and dream about Paradise releases us from the drudgery of life on the earth. |
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When we turn to the New Testament, we find that our hope is to be directed toward the Day of the Lord, the return of Christ. In that Day of all days we shall be raised from the dead and then clothed with immortality. We shall appear with Christ and restore Paradise to the earth. The meek will inherit the earth in that hour! |
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But Adam and Eve (they are living somewhere in the spirit realm) cannot be brought back into Paradise with their descendants until first they all are changed—not just forgiven but changed! |
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And why not? You guessed it. Because an unchanged Adam and Eve with their unchanged descendants would fall again and we would have another six thousand year lesson to see if we can finally learn to keep God's commandments. |
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I am not particularly anxious for that to happen. Are you? |
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The Kingdom of God is coming to the earth. The best aspects of Heaven, the Presence of God in Christ, the Holy Spirit as a great River of Life, are to fill the earth in the days to come. The saints will return with the Lord Jesus and bring salvation and healing to mankind. This is why we are enduring rigorous training in righteousness, holiness, and obedience to the Father. |
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The earth and its peoples are the inheritance of Christ and His coheirs. Even today the Lord may be pleased to give us some people to love and guide—and more so as the Day approaches. |
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He has kept the good wine until now. Look about you and see the hundreds of millions who are waiting for the royal priesthood to minister to them. Ask the Lord and He will give you the nations for your inheritance. They are your land of promise. |
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The next day John seeth Jesus coming unto him, and saith, Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world. (John 1:29) |
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The slain lamb, the figure of Christ, always is the emphasis of Passover. |
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In human thinking, the important aspect of Passover was the release of the Hebrew tribes from Egyptian slavery and their start toward the land of their inheritance. In God's thinking it is not the release from Egypt but the lamb that is of primary significance; for the lamb speaks of Christ who is to come. Only Christ can bring true, eternal release to human beings. |
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In the exodus from Egypt, Israel left one kind of bondage only to enter another. After the Jews settled in Canaan, they embraced demons. They gave themselves to serve the lusts of their bodies (a vicious kind of slavery) and offered their children as burnt offerings to the god Moloch. |
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Israel turned against the Lord. The members of the royal priesthood accepted the chains of demonic bondage. As a result the Lord gave them into the hands of their enemies. |
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We understand, therefore, that the central issue of Passover is not the physical release from Egyptian slavery but the eternal release of spirit, soul, and body that can come only at the hand of Christ. |
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The true Passover Lamb is Christ. Christ is the Hope of Israel, the Light of Israel, the Bridegroom of Israel. |
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In the Passover, God is telling us that release from slavery to the wickedness of the world can come only through the atonement made by the blood of Christ and through eating the flesh and drinking the blood of Christ. To be free from the sin of the world we must eat Christ—eat of Him in whom God dwells, whom God has chosen. |
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When we eat Christ, we come into union with Him. We marry the Bridegroom. The Lord has come to Israel and to us Gentiles as well in the Person of Christ Jesus. The Lord, the Bridegroom, has come for His Bride. Israel is the Bride of the Lamb. We Gentiles become part of Israel by eating the Lamb. |
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John the Baptist pointed to Jesus of Nazareth as God's Passover Lamb. |
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Indeed, the Lamb of God takes away the sin of the world. He is our Passover. By the protection of His blood we are saved when the judgment of God strikes the gods of this world. |
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Even though we are shielded from the death angel by the blood of Christ, we remain chained in bondage to the wicked world spirits, to the lust of our flesh, and to our stubborn self-will. |
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How can we escape the chains of spiritual slavery? By eating the flesh of God's Lamb and drinking His blood. Only by eating of the Lamb of God and drinking His blood can we escape spiritual slavery and begin the sometimes joyous, sometimes painful journey toward the land of inheritance, the land of righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit. |
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Christ Jesus stands before the door of the heart of each of His elect, Jewish and Gentile. He patiently knocks. If the individual opens the door and receives Him, Christ enters and dines with him or her. He gives him to eat of His body and to drink of His blood. This is the new covenant. |
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Let us always and forever live by eating the flesh of Christ and drinking His precious blood. The Spirit and the Bride say come. Let whoever will, come and eat and drink freely of eternal Life. (from Behold the Lamb!) |
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Behold, I come quickly: hold that fast which thou hast, that no man take thy crown. (Revelation 3:11) |
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It is important to note, in the verse above, that the believers already have a crown. You could not take a crown from someone who has no crown. |
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When we are born again of Jesus Christ, we assign our old adamic nature to the cross with Christ. We then view our new born-again nature as having risen in Christ to the right hand of the Father, there to await the day of resurrection. As soon as Christ is born in us, He is raised to the highest of all thrones. |
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We can never go any higher. Our fight is not upward but downward as we seek to bring the Life of the Throne of God into our life here on the earth. We are striving by means of the Spirit of God to do God's will in the earth as it is performed in Heaven. |
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Because we are dwelling with Christ in God's Throne, we have a crown. The crown is the inheritance of man, that is, rulership over the works of God's hands. It is a crown of righteousness, of life. |
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It is true we have been imprisoned in a lowly body, a body that keeps us humble and dependent on the Lord for all things. Nevertheless, the role of man is to govern the creation. |
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Because of jealousy and envy the fallen lords of the heavens, often working through people, attempt in every manner possible to pull us down from our lofty position. They bang on their pots and pans. "Look here! Look there! See what we're doing in the earth. Isn't it awful?" |
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Or, "See what we are accomplishing. You aren't getting anywhere just waiting on the Lord. Why don't you follow us?" |
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Or, "Look at how desirable this is! Why don't you reach out your hand and take a taste? There are deep pleasures here you could be enjoying and no one will ever know" (only the entire universe!). |
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Or, "God doesn't want you to be denied any good thing. It is true that if you walk out of your present situation you might be going against what the Bible says. But it can't be God's will that you not have what you want so badly. It must be that an exception is being made for you because you are special." |
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Or, "Let us eat, drink, and be happy for tomorrow we die." |
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The saint knows better than to look down or disobey the Scriptures. His eyes are glued on Christ and on the reward that has been set before him. |
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How many stars of God have fallen because they were pulled down by fear, by doubt, by dread, by lust, by personal ambition, by impatience, by attempting to please people, by carelessness, by trying to make a paradise of the present sin-cursed world? |
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God started you off at the highest level. He forgave your sins and handed you the crown promised to man from the beginning. |
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There are many angels and people who would like to get some of your talents. Don't let anyone take that crown from you! |
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