Paul’s aspiration and prayer in Phil. 3:10 was that he would know Christ and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death. We need to ask ourselves, How much do we live, serve, and do things in the resurrection life? We may have a good coordination with […]
the Spirit honors only what we do in, by, and through the resurrection life
We need to learn to turn to our spirit and first contact the Lord, be one with Him, and then do anything or say anything. Anything that is natural coming out of ourselves belongs to the old creation and is not pleasing in God’s sight. King Saul wanted to offer to God the best of the Amalekites sheep and cattle, which God ordered to be fully destroyed, but God did not receive it but rather Saul lost his kingship because of this. God was not happy with the product of Cain’s sweat, the fruit of his human labor, no matter how good they were. What God desires is something in resurrection – He wants Christ to be lived out in us, the Christ who passed through death and is now in resurrection! [read more online]
through the church as the Zion today God will turn the whole earth to Himself
In the local churches and in the proper church life we as God’s servants “take pleasure in her stones” – we learn to take pleasure in all the saints, the stones in God’s building. We all are stones as building materials for the church (1 Pet. 2:5). We should take pleasure in all the members of the church. When we experience the resurrected Christ, we will see more than the natural features of others, and we will treasure all the other stones. Yes, others may have some peculiarities, but Christ as the stone element is in them, and we also have Christ as the stone in us! Praise the Lord for all the stones. [read more online]
the results of our deeper experience of God by dwelling in God as seen in Psalm 92
Psalms 90 and 91 show us a person who seeks to have a deeper experience of God by dwelling in God and taking God as his habitation. This person is Christ Himself – He took God as His habitation and He did everything in God, by God, and through God. By virtue of us being identified with Christ in the organic union with Him (1 Cor. 6:17), we also dwell in God and take God as our habitation. Psalm 92 tells us of many wonderful issues and results of our experience of God in a deeper way by dwelling in God and taking God as our habitation. [read more online]
treasuring being in the house of God: here we’re enjoying all the blessings of God
From our experience we can testify that one single day in the house of God is better than a thousand anywhere else. We may be away from God and we may think “we have the time of our life”, but when we come into the house of God and we aspire to have the highways to Zion in our heart, taking the way of the church internally, we will realize how good it is to be here! We would rather “stand at the threshold of the house of God than dwell in the tents of the wicked” (Psa. 84:10). It is much better to be at the door, on the threshold, of the house of God, than to be in the house / tent of the wicked. [continue reading online]
turning our tears of weeping into springs of blessings by setting our eyes on Zion
The highways to Zion is not superficial or cheap; the way of the church life demands a price that we need to pay. It is not external, superficial, or cheap. If we wouldn’t care for Christ and the church that much, we wouldn’t suffer; but as we care for the church life, we will partake of the sufferings needed for the building up of the Body of Christ. We will have sufferings related to the church, related to God’s economy, some misunderstandings from your family because you stand for the church, etc – and you may shed tears…. But the Lord turns those tears to be the Spirit! You will be all the more filled with the Spirit and released in your spirit that you may flow! [read more online]
having the highways to Zion in our heart to be the overcomers who enter into God
We need to take a strong decision to be on the highways to Zion today – we need to pray that the Lord would produce us as His overcomers today! The Holy of Holies is Zion, the place where God is, His presence – and this is what we aim for! We are not satisfied to be “in Jerusalem”, in the general church life, but we want to be on the highways to Zion, on a journey toward Zion, by experiencing the Triune God internally for the Body of Christ in all His consummations! Today, in the church age, we need to be the God-men who are perfected and matured to be Zion, the overcomers, the vital groups within the churches. [read more online]