GETTING ON GOD'S PROGRAM

GETTING ON GOD’S PROGRAM

                The tabernacle of Moses contained the Gospel of our salvation in type and shadow. We are not saved by the types and shadows, but by the realities to which they point. Approaching the Tabernacle we encounter the white curtain that surrounded it. But in order to enter within that white curtain (Which represents the robe of Christ’s righteousness,) we must confess our sins upon the head of an innocent lamb (Jesus) and His blood is shed for us. And now, through the shed blood of Jesus we are inside the white curtain of His righteousness and this is called Justification.

                We then encounter the altar of burnt offering where we offer our bodies as a living sacrifice to God. By faith we also enter into Christ’s death and when we do, we die to the Law that condemned us and we will begin to live by the resurrection power of Christ and not by the power of our own flesh.

                We next encounter the laver. Here we are baptized into Christ and He enters into our heart          (spirit) to dwell in us. So our spirit is saved when we are born again and we are saved apart from any works that we might do. Our salvation is based upon Christ’s righteousness and not our own.

                But this is where many people get stalled out. They come to the altar… they get saved and then they go into a holding pattern. They continue on living in much the same manner as before they were saved, only now, they’ve got Jesus covering for them. They are justified (just as if they have never sinned) and that is enough for them… but it is not God’s full program.

                So, to see what God is accomplishing in our salvation we must look at the whole package and not just the outer court experience. Our salvation is a three stage process.

 Our spirit is saved… that is justification

Our soul must be saved… that is sanctification

Our body must also be saved… that is glorification

                Paul speaks of this process in 1 Thess. 5:23 saying: “Now may the God of peace Himself sanctify you entirely; and may your spirit and soul and body be preserved complete without blame at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.”

                In other words man was created as a tri-part being consisting of spirit, soul and body. So salvation consists of a three stage process of salvation. He saves our spirit first, because we need to learn how to live by that spirit in connection with the Holy Spirit. So He saves our spirit man first. Then He begins to work on our soul, or mind. In other words, Justification takes us out of Egypt by the blood of the Lamb, but now God must get Egypt out of us. We must be transformed by the renewing of our minds in Christ Jesus. This process happens in the Holy Place and it is called Sanctification. In the Holy Place we are being transformed into His image from glory to glory and as the Holy Place furniture shows us, this is done by the Holy Spirit (The Menorah) the Word (Table of Showbread) and Prayer (the altar of incense) that is before the veil.

                The third compartment, the Holy of Holies, is our spirit in which the spirit of God dwells. It is where the Law is written on our hearts as demonstrated by the Ark of the Covenant and it is where Jesus presides as our high priest after the order of Melchizedek.

                In Christ the veil between soul and spirit is removed so that we can walk in fellowship with Jesus. This place within the veil is both a present reality as well as a future reality. We can be seated with Christ in heavenly places right now, but we also look forward to a further fulfillment of this when our body has been glorified and we can enter into the presence of God without veils of protection. “This hope we have as an anchor of the soul…” Hebrews 6:19-20

                It is the blood of Jesus covering our sinful nature so that we can stand in God’s presence without being destroyed. Through the blood of Jesus our fellowship is renewed with god as it was with Adam before the fall and it is in this fellowship with Him that we are being transformed into His image.

                Now, it is within the context of this three stage plan of salvation that God has a problem. He is looking for a great harvest of souls but the crop is not all maturing at the same time. We have the Barley, which ripens first. Barley is easily separated from its chaff… in fact it can be tossed into the air and its chaff blown away by a gentle breeze. Likewise there are some who inter into full cooperation with Christ so that the gentle breeze of the Holy Spirit is enough to take the chaff away from their lives.

                These Barley Christians are those who walk in the Spirit, who are overcoming by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony. And because they are walking by the Spirit of God they are becoming the sons of God as seen in Romans 8:14-19

                Now, there is a second group of Christians. These we call the “Wheat” company. These must undergo a more violent method of sanctification. Wheat must be threshed in order to separate the wheat from its chaff. This group is made up of Christians that have a soulish relationship with Jesus. They remain in the intellectual realm. They may have a good set of doctrines, but they depend upon their intellectual prowess and their good doctrines, but they don’t walk in the spirit.

                Salvation is a tough go at this level because they tend to depend upon their own works rather than the perfect work of Christ.

                There is yet a third group of Christians, who “get saved” and then park in the outer court with no intention of ever entering into the process of sanctification. They are called outer court Christians because they remain carnal and worldly. They do not engage in Christ’s program of sanctification at all and almost take pride in calling themselves “Just poor old sinners saved by grace.”

                In order to save some of these, they will have to be tossed into the wine press of God’s wrath and literally crushed in order to bring forth the wine.

                Now just what the implications of this are, I cannot say for sure. Many Christians only want to think in terms of the entire church happily being caught up in the rapture regardless of their level of maturity. Well, there is merit to that view simply because it is Christ’s righteousness that saves us and none of our own… and yet the bible also talks a great deal about growing in grace and overcoming even as He overcame. We also see a picture of mature saints in Eph. 4:13 where they have all come to unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a mature man, to the measure of the stature which belongs to the fullness of Christ.”

                Well, we will have to leave it up to Christ as to how He will deal with such a wide variety of levels within Christianity, but we must also realize that God as our heavenly Father disciplines us according to our responses. Some He can winnow with the gentle breeze of His Holy Spirit while others will have to be threshed violently to bring forth the wheat from the chaff while still others will have to be crushed in order to bring forth the wine… and I would say that it is very much to our advantage to walk in the Spirit right now… to submit to His winnowing Holy Spirit now to be separated from our chaff, rather than to stubbornly go on in the flesh, ever resisting the work that the Holy Spirit wishes to do in us.

                In our lesson for this week found in Psalms 145:14-19 David assures us saying: “The Lord upholds all that fall, and raises up all those that be bowed down. The eyes of all wait upon thee; and thou givdest them their meat in due season: thou openest thine hand and satisfiest the desire of every living thing. The Lord is righteous in all his ways and holy in all his works. The Lord is nigh unto all them that call upon him to all that call upon him in truth. He will fulfil the desire of them that fear him and he also will hear their cry and will save them.”

                But there is a severe side to God’s judgments as well for it goes on to say in verse 20: “The Lord preserves all them that love him: but all the wicked will he destroy.”

                So we have choices to make in this life as to whether we will enter into God’s program, in being gently purged and purified by the Holy Spirit and the Word, or whether we will continue to cling to the ways of our flesh so that our chaff must be removed by the violence of threshing.

                Everything God does is for our good, but it is up to us as to determine whether the goodness of God appears to be grace to us or wrath… for the same heat that melts wax hardens clay. Our response to that heat determines whether we will be wax or clay, Barley or Wheat or Grapes.