Mark 5:34 And he said unto her, Daughter, thy faith hath made thee whole (perfect); go (imperative) in peace, and be whole (imperative) of thy plague.
There are two imperatives in this verse, describing a command. When Jesus says that we are healed, then He commands us to walk into and maintain the healing. It’s not automatic. He commands us to conduct our life in the shalom peace commensurate with the healing that we have received in the certainty of its wholeness, healthiness or soundness. It’s no wonder that for many of us, I included, find it hard to walk into the reality of what Jesus says we now have. I had not realized that Jesus commands us, because the responsibility is ours.
Mark 5:36 As soon as Jesus heard the word that was spoken, he saith unto the ruler of the synagogue, Be not (me) afraid (imperative), only believe (imperative).
Two imperatives, or commands. “me” in the Greek is defined as a negative. Jesus commands us to cut the process of fearing something, at once, and enter into a state of habitual believing. The imperatives, put the responsibility on us, in conjunction with the grace of God. It’s not automatic.
The devil’s lies are to make the church complacent and passive and believe that God by His grace will cause faith and an absence of fear to ooze out of us.
Mark 11:22 And Jesus answering saith unto them, Have faith (present imperative) in God.
The present imperative is a command to the church. We must live in a habitual attitude of faith of God. It does not automatically happen. The responsibility is ours.
Many things in the kingdom are a combination of the grace of God working in conjunction with our active free will to choose to step out and obey God.
The devil’s attack is to rob the church of free will and make it a complacent and passive victim engulfed in the paralysis of a deceiving demon of fear.
Mr 3:7 But Jesus withdrew himself with his disciples to the sea: and a great multitude <4128> from Galilee followed him, and from Judaea,
The unchurched in Jesus day followed after Him. And it’s no different today. People are not against God, but against religion.
When Jesus tells you to do something which goes beyond our regular services, you will find the same unchurched multitude which followed Jesus, still here, still waiting and still following Him.
They have never left!
You always find God doing a work of revival or outpouring, in every corner of the USA.
When you step out, He pours out.
I propose that our stepping out then must equal our prayer for revival.
Mr 3:8 And from Jerusalem, and from Idumaea, and from beyond Jordan; and they about Tyre and Sidon, a great multitude <4128>, when they had heard what great things he did, came unto him.
Lu 6:17 And he came down with them, and stood in the plain, and the company of his disciples, and a great multitude <4128> of people out of all Judaea and Jerusalem, and from the sea coast of Tyre and Sidon, which came to hear him, and to be healed of their diseases;
Lu 23:27 And there followed him a great company <4128> of people, and of women, which also bewailed and lamented him.
Joh 5:3 In these lay a great multitude <4128> of impotent folk, of blind, halt, withered, waiting for the moving of the water.
The cross is the only surgical instrument available to God to remove the cancerous and sinful self-life from us and reveal the Christ who bears all of God’s treasures, and when lifted up through us, draws all men unto Himself.
The “law of the cross” of Christ dwells in Christ Himself. Every time we obey the voice of the Spirit of God it will automatically activate the cross into our lives.
Every act of obedience to the Lord entails sacrifice, a walk of faith and a humbling ourselves before the mighty hand of God. This is the law of the cross being triggered.
With every step of obedience to the voice of God, the cross continually frees us from the diseased self-life through the action of this very law residing in the voice of the Spirit.
As I have said, the law of the cross to execute continuous death of the self-life and manifest the Person of Christ in you resides in the Person of Christ Himself.
This is why we must understand and love the cross.
The church has effectively stopped teaching on the cross, and has gone from much fruit bearing, to little.
If the church is to be really relevant it must effectively teach on the cross again.
The critical things in any leader are moral integrity of character according to God, and the deeds which this leader executes.
Peoples, nations, cultures and civilizations have risen or fallen in the public’s recognition or lack thereof of these things in their leaders. When a nation stops paying attention to God, who is the author of right morality, it will stop valuing morality in itself and its leaders. It will focus instead on the leaders charm, whit or looks. If the leader is bad, the nation will groan under his or her bad leadership. This is the price that results in rejecting or putting little value on the guidance of God. Hopefully, as the people pine and groan under the oppression of bad leadership it will once again cry out to God.
We are always asking God for things. God in turn wants to reveal His Son to us who CONTAINS ALL THINGS!
And His Son is only revealed through our embracing of His cross.
1Tim 6:5 Perverse disputings of men of corrupt( thoroughly corrupted) minds, and destitute (defrauded) of the truth, supposing that gain is godliness (esteeming as the law or the custom of the land that material acquisition brings godliness): from such withdraw thyself.
Men who are thoroughly corrupt have defrauded themselves of the truth.
If you are corrupt, you will defraud yourself from the truth. That’s a promise. Watch out!
Romans 1:18 For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who hold the truth in unrighteousness; ( Greek: Suppress or tightly cover the truth.)
“Doctrines of men” activate the methods of error, and suppresses the righteousness of God.
God’s righteousness is the visible manifestation of His glorious deeds upon the earth. If we teach, or are taught what is wrong, the activity of the Spirit of God is restricted or suppressed in proportion to the error.
There has been no time, since I have been in this country, that there has been a more concerted attack to suppress truth through habitual lies grounded in corruption.
This must be countered by the manifestation of truth, in all of its forms.
The devil’s clear resolution against America goes back to Ephesians.
Eph 4:14 That we henceforth be no more children, tossed to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the sleight of men, and cunning craftiness, whereby they lie in wait to deceive;
Greek translation: By the “spiritual dice playing” of men in which they work around you with the goal of implementing the methodology of error.
Col 3:10 And have put on the new (Neos) man, which is renewed in knowledge after the image of him that created him:
A man or woman of God who is being filled with the Spirit is characterized by ever increasing youthfulness.
Though the body will gets old due to aging, which are the effects of sin, the disposition, outlook, psychology and spirituality of the one who follows Christ, is progressive freshness, child-likeness, youngness, and newness.
The definition of the “neos anthropos”, or the new man, which is Christ Jesus in you, is one new in relationship to age. Such is a baby, an adolescent or a teen. The new man is “the adolescent or teen age man.”
If our religion is stuffy or churchy or boring we must ask God if we are fully renewing the “neos anthropos” within us. The adolescent or teen lives out of the box, and is fresh, unique, inquisitive, adventurous, and creative. He lives by faith out on the limb of life, and so does the “neos anthropos” inside of you.
Sometimes when ask for God’s mercy, I think that we ask God to continue to wink at the sin that we are habitually doing, and continue to bless us. That’s not true love or mercy. The real definition of mercy is that God loves us too much to leave us in the place where the sin is hurting us. God’s mercy is to bring circumstances and situations that will set us free. These can be painful dealings.
Proselytize :
“To induce someone to convert to one’s faith or to recruit someone to join one’s party, institution, or cause.” Merriam Webster Dictionary
Do you realize that almost everybody in the world is constantly proselytizing each other? Everybody is trying to convert everybody else to their belief about a service or a product or an idea. Do you realize how many daily try to recruit you to a cause, an ideal or philosophy, or a business? Yet it’s all fine until it comes to God, especially the Christian God. I wonder why?
On top of that everybody has a religion. Everybody worships something, even if its themselves, and its all fine. Yet, there is a problem with the Christian religion? I wonder why?
Jose and Mary Alvarez 