Our cross- loving with Christ's love not ours.

Luk 14:26  If any man come to me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple. 

Luk 14:27  And whosoever doth not bear his cross, and come after me, cannot be my disciple. 

Excerpt-

'He wishes to rid us of our natural love towards others so that we will not love with our own love. Of course He wills that we should love others, but not with our natural soulical affection. If we love, let it be for the sake of the Lord and not for their sake. A new relationship comes to us in the Lord. We should receive from Him His love so that we may love others. In a word, our love must be governed by the Lord. Should He desire us to, we must love even our enemies: if He does not ask us to, we cannot love even the dearest of our household. He does not want our heart to be attached anywhere because He wants us to serve Him freely.

This new love relationship being the case, the soul life must be denied. That is a cross. In so obeying Christ as to disregard his natural affection, a believer’s natural love suffers intensely. Such sorrow and pain becomes a practical cross to him. Deep are the heart wounds and many are the tears when one has to forfeit the one he loves. These inflict intense sufferings upon our lives. How very loathe the soul is to yield up its beloved for the Lord’s sake! But through this very action is the soul delivered to death; yea, it even becomes willing to die; and thus the believer is liberated from the power of the soul.'

The Spiritual Man  - Watchman Nee

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Do you believe those we hold dear are more important than our love for God? How do we feel about God taking our loved ones from us- through death, divorce, and any other way? Do we comprehend that we are truly being refined by Christ?  That we do have a cross to bear. We've been talking about the cross, our own individual cross that is connected to the cross of Christ. We have to bear our cross as He bore His cross. We need to comprehend that we may even feel as if God has forsaken us when we are bearing that cross. We may be in agony- spiritually, mentally, emotionally and physically as we take up our cross.  If we are expecting a life without the cross bearing we are NOT in Christ!  We cannot be Christ's without our cross - it's impossible. 

Loving God first- we then receive God's love which will enable us to love others with HIS love, not our own screwed up idea of what love is or should be.

Is love getting along with someone?  Is love never fighting?  Is love an understanding? What IS this thing WE call love?  If we LOVE with Christ's love we are putting others first- even our enemies.  Those who love their enemies are NOT loving them with their own love, but loving them with CHRIST'S love.  Christ would have all people know HIS love and it goes beyond all things.

We want to teach our children to know Christ, to know Christ's love and to do this, we need to live Christ's love. 

The cross we bear is RECOGNIZING that even in all our frustration over life and all its squabbles, even when we are being UNJUSTLY used, NOT thought about lovingly, emotionally stripped of affection, demeaned daily-  even in all that and more we know that it's all a part of our CROSS!  

We have to bear our cross, but all too often we don't even know what that cross bearing is.  When we are shown that our cross is all those things that would keep us dwelling on ourselves in any way at all, we need to understand that Christ would have us kneel at HIS Cross and seek HIS love in which to love in His way, NOT ours!

More tomorrow on this by the GRACE and WILL of God!

In Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior's name always!!!!!!!!

We lose our carnal life when we take up our cross.

'Mat 10:38  And he that taketh not his cross, and followeth after me, is not worthy of me. 

Mat 10:39  He that findeth his life shall lose it: and he that loseth his life for my sake shall find it. '

We lose our life when we take up our cross.  Not literally our body's life- we keep on breathing, our heart keeps pumping, the life we lose is a different part of us.

Rom 7:14  For we know that the law is spiritual: but I am carnal, sold under sin. 

Rom 7:15  For that which I do I allow not: for what I would, that do I not; but what I hate, that do I. 

Rom 7:18  For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good thing: for to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not. 

Rom 7:19  For the good that I would I do not: but the evil which I would not, that I do. 

Rom 7:20  Now if I do that I would not, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me. 

Rom 7:21  I find then a law, that, when I would do good, evil is present with me. 

Rom 7:22  For I delight in the law of God after the inward man: 

Rom 7:23  But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members. 

Rom 7:24  O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death? 

Rom 7:25  I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord. So then with the mind I myself serve the law of God; but with the flesh the law of sin. 

Rom 8:1  There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, WHO WALK NOT AFTER THE FLESH, but after the Spirit. 

Rom 8:2  For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death. 

Rom 8:3  For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh: 

Rom 8:4  That the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, WHO WALK NOT AFTER THE FLESH, but after the Spirit. 

Rom 8:5  FOR THEY THAT ARE AFTER THE FLESH DO MIND THE THINGS OF THE FLESH; but they that are after the Spirit the things of the Spirit. 

Rom 8:6  For to be CARNALLY MINDED is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace. 

Rom 8:7  Because the CARNAL MIND is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be. 

Rom 8:8  So then they that are IN THE FLESH cannot please God. 

Rom 8:9  But ye are not IN THE FLESH, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his. 

Rom 8:10  And IF CHRIST BE IN YOU, THE BODY IS DEAD BECAUSE OF SIN because of sin; but the Spirit is life because of righteousness. 

Rom 8:11  But if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you.

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Plain as day we can see that the CARNAL MIND, our WALKING AFTER the FLESH, these things are what are contrary to the cross, contrary to our Savior.

When we take up our cross we are taking up the instrument that is to put our flesh, our carnal mind to death.  Our flesh/carnal nature is that of the soul-self in us.  We know that our BODY by itself can't sin, it is the part in our mind that chooses to sin.  The carnal part of our mind and that is the soul-self part of us choosing.  Only by living in Christ, only by having Christ in us, only by living after the spirit can we have hope- the hope Christ brings.

The Spirit raised Christ from the dead and this same Spirit will bring life to us because the Spirit will dwell in us!

Christ died upon a cross.  He could have been killed in any number of ways, but the cross was chosen and He suffered terribly.  We each have a cross to bear, and we need to put to death our carnal flesh, soul-self, and we need to live after the Spirit.  Christ has to be in us, we cannot please God if we live in our flesh.   Did you read those words up there- 'If any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his.' 

We are told this--

'Mat 10:38  And he that taketh not his cross, and followeth after me, is not worthy of me. 

Mat 10:39  He that findeth his life shall lose it: and he that loseth his life for my sake shall find it. '

We have to lose our life and find Christ's.

Christ in us, living for Christ NOT FOR OURSELES, JUST LIKE CHRIST, THROUGH CHRIST!

We all have our own cross.

'Mat 10:38  And he that taketh not his cross, and followeth after me, is not worthy of me. 

Mat 10:39  He that findeth his life shall lose it: and he that loseth his life for my sake shall find it. '

There IS a cross for each of us.

We have to take that cross and follow our Savior.  We can no longer follow Jesus in a literal sense because He is in heaven. When He walked the earth people could and did follow Him. Read this--

Joh 6:2  And a great multitude followed him, because they saw his miracles which he did on them that were diseased. 

Joh 6:10  And Jesus said, Make the men sit down. Now there was much grass in the place. So the men sat down, in number about five thousand. 

Five thousand people!

Did they take up literal crosses and follow Him, no. No one did. We take up our cross and that cross is connected to us losing our lives because a cross represents a death. Did Jesus advocate suicide for Him like 'death by cop'?  No. NO. NO! We put to death our soul-self, we put to death our carnal tendencies that lead us into sin. We put away all that would keep the Holy Spirit from uniting with our spirit and letting the spirit live and rule in our lives- which lets Christ live in us!

More on this tomorrow by the grace and mercy of our LORD, JESUS CHRIST!

Are you resisting the devil?

 'Unless Christians are keenly alert in resisting the devil, they shall encounter great defeat through their self life. That the Christian’s soul life could be deceived and could be used by the devil is indeed beyond common expectation.'   The Spiritual Man- Watchman Nee.

Jas_4:7  Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.

Tell me something, why would we be told to RESIST the devil if we weren't really supposed to resist the devil?

Seriously.  Can we resist something if we don't even believe it's real? Can we resist something that we don't believe has anything to do with us? Is the devil real to you?  I'm not asking you to MAKE him real to you, he'll oblige anyone who desires to really want to be his. Then again, my asking you to make him real to you is something you can't do if you simply do not believe he exists in a REAL and active way, other than on tv shows meant to entertain you. Very few have any trouble believing the devil exists in a fictional, very abstract way.

We are told to RESIST the devil.

Watchman Nee talks about us being 'keenly ALERT in resisting the devil'. He says that we can be deceived and used by the devil.   Our soul-self which loves to be in control will often give way to the devil, because the devil will tempt us with so much that our soul-self loathes to give up.  We enjoy our self-righteousness. We enjoy our self-indignation. We pat ourselves on the back every opportunity we get. Or, we enjoy our self-depreciation in a very selfish way.  It's not enough to loathe ourselves if we've made it something we inwardly enjoy. Do you see how many traps there are that the devil uses at every opportunity he gets. We have to fall to our knees in front of the cross of our Savior. We have to give our lives over to Him. We have to yield to Jesus Christ, all of ourselves and this must be a constant submission.

Resisting the devil means examining our actions, the heart of them.  It is amazing what can be revealed to us if we yield to the Holy Spirit's leading. We will be allowed to recognize the devil working in our lives in so many ways. We will be shown his temptings and we NEED to remember the tempting is NOT the sin! It's the giving in to that temptation, letting that sin be conceived in us. There is a difference between indulging our thoughts with the temptations we face and having the thought there that can be given immediately to Christ as we RESIST.

May the LORD please bless us with all we need whatever it may be for us to resist the devil so he will flee from us! May we recognize the soul-self and it's constant temptation to give in to all that has its roots in selfishness whether it's seems good or is outright evil. Help us NOT to be deceived, Lord, please, help us!

All in the name of our Savior, Jesus Christ our Lord now and forever!

Overcome our accuser by---

Rev 12:11  And they overcame him by the blood of the Lamb, and by the word of their testimony; and they loved not their lives unto the death.

The blood of the Lamb.

The sacrificial Lamb.

The Lamb slain for YOU, for ME.

By the blood of this sacrificial LAMB - Jesus Christ, the only begotten Son of God- we can overcome our accuser, we can overcome our ultimate enemy, the Devil.

By the word of our testimony we can overcome the Devil.

What is our testimony?

Rev 12:17  And the dragon was wroth with the woman, and went to make war with the remnant of her seed, which keep the commandments of God, and have the testimony of Jesus Christ

Rev 1:2  Who bare record of the word of God, and of the testimony of Jesus Christ, and of all things that he saw.

Rev 1:9  I John, who also am your brother, and companion in tribulation, and in the kingdom and patience of Jesus Christ, was in the isle that is called Patmos, for the word of God, and for the testimony of Jesus Christ. 

Rev 6:9  And when he had opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of them that were slain for the word of God, and for the testimony which they held

Rev 19:10  And I fell at his feet to worship him. And he said unto me, See thou do it not: I am thy fellowservant, and of thy brethren that have the testimony of Jesus: worship God: for the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy. 

Luk 24:44  And he said unto them, These are the words which I spake unto you, while I was yet with you, that all things must be fulfilled, which were written in the law of Moses, and in the prophets, and in the psalms, concerning me. 

The TESTIMONY of JESUS.

Think about it for a moment. The testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy, and that same spirit of prophecy was what predicted Salvation's unveiling in Jesus Christ, the only begotten of the Father God.  Jesus said those words above in Luke 24:44 '…all thing must be fulfilled which were written in the law of Moses, and in the prophets, and in the psalms - concerning me.'  So MUCH was written predicting our Savior and it ALL came to pass. This is the testimony-  the proof offered- unfailing, unwavering, predictions that have come to pass without a single prediction failing to take place! This is TRUTH, hard TRUTH, undeniable TRUTH and SO many refute through their blindness, through their unseeing hearts, through their self-imposed righteousness over TRUTH that causes them to NO LONGER be the center of their own universe! The Testimony of Jesus - with this testimony that prophecy has proven true beyond ANY doubt at all- is what will enable us to overcome along with the sacrifice of the LAMB and also this--

'Rev 12:11  … and they loved not their lives unto the death.'

LOVING NOT OUR LIVES UNTIL DEATH!

Loving NOT our lives even to the point of death!

NOT deeming our lives more important than the Word of God, not more important than the TRUTH which we know is found in Christ Jesus in His message of Salvation!  Salvation offered beyond this current existence we live in. TRUST, FAITH in our SAVIOR to the point that we realize HE ALONE is WHY we live! If we are called to face death may we do so in HIM. May we be willing to give our LIVES to Him by faith!

Do you love your life? Do you love yourself more than anything else? Do you teach your children that to love themselves is more important than loving God or others? 

We grow up convinced by society all around us that we are most important, that our selfish, self-centered life is a good thing- as long as we aren't hurting anyone.  We are educated to be self-focused.

May GOD HELP US to become GOD FOCUSED, JESUS CENTERED, not all caught up in ourselves at every turn!

PLEASE GOD! PLEASE!

We would be among those who would overcome our accuser who only seeks to drag us down into the darkness of nothingness with him.

Bless us! Keep us!

All through Jesus Christ our Lord, our Savior, now and FOREVER! PLEASE LORD! Please.

Ask yourself right this moment, do you want Christ living in you?

We need to LIVE for Jesus but you know what? We are too busy living for ourselves! We are! We are so busy living just for ourselves that to truly live for Jesus is something we can't quite fathom as a reality. Is it a reality to you?  Do you UNGRUDINGLY obey the Holy Spirit? Seriously, do you?!  Does the Holy Spirit even speak to you? Do you even comprehend the Holy Spirit's leading? If we DO NOT we have to get down on our knees and pray that our God help our UNBELIEF! 

You say you believe, that believing isn't your particular spiritual problem? I say you're wrong. It is TRULY believing that allows us to have the Holy Spirit's leading in our lives. It is by FAITH.

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1Co_3:16  Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you?

'God today would have His own enjoy such a temple experience in their spirit and soul: if only the cross is allowed to perfect its work in them. As they ungrudgingly obey the Holy Spirit the communion between the Holy and the Holiest grows deeper day by day until they experience a great change. It is the cross which effects the rending of the curtain; that is, the cross so functions in the life of the believer that he has a rent-curtain experience between his spirit and soul. His natural life renounces its independence and waits upon the spirit life for direction and supply. The curtain was torn in two, “from top to bottom” (Mark 15.38). This has to be God’s doing, not man’s. '   --The Spiritual Man-  Watchman Nee

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By faith we allow the Holy Spirit to guide us, to lead us. By faith we OBEY the Holy Spirit. Truly we need our temple experience. We need to RENOUNCE our independence. To comprehend the truth of God's word.

Our RIGHTEOUSNESS - that part of us we deem God fearing, that bit of us we try to tell ourselves is doing what it should do as God instructs- is nothing but filth.

I mean it, our righteousness is filthy. Every good act we commit is nothing but filth the moment we are deeming it self-goodness, self-induced obedience, our righteousness. IF by the GRACE of God we commit a single act of right behaving it is due to God's power not our own.  We want to have power of our own and we want to call that power a good power, but we have none! We want to be Christian super heroes but they don't exist. Every single Biblical person who belonged to God and committed Godly actions in a Godly life did so through God's POWER not their own. They stepped aside and allowed God to work through them. We need to know that God uses us, that God works in us and through us. We need to accept our very breath is from God. We need to truly live by the grace of God, recognizing it's God's grace and not us being 'good', not us attaining  a special Christian status.

Remember this--

Isa_64:6  But we are all as an unclean thing, and all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags

We need the temple experience in us- we need the Holy Spirit flooding into our soul-self allowing us to be led by the Holy Spirit towards the life Jesus would have us lead.

We can't hope for this experience to give us self-righteousness, if that's what we are waiting for it will be a wait in vain. We have to hope for this experience to give us Jesus' righteousness! We need the constant realization that Christ must live in us-- not an improved us, a fixed up us, a repaired us, but a Christ filled us - filthy sinners that we are.    Christ in us will alone give us the life we need.  Ask yourself right this moment, do you want Christ living in you?

Col 1:26  Even the mystery which hath been hid from ages and from generations, but now is made manifest to his saints: 

Col 1:27  To whom God would make known what is the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles; which is Christ in you, the hope of glory: 

Col 1:28  Whom we preach, warning every man, and teaching every man in all wisdom; that we may present every man perfect in Christ Jesus

Christ in you the hope of glory.

Is Christ in us- remember we can't wait to become clean and pure to have Christ in us-Christ needs to be in us now, doing His special work in us!  All by His grace and mercy, His love, always by His forgiveness, His sacrifice.  

The Temple Experience.

We need a TEMPLE EXPERIENCE.

What is a temple experience? Glad you asked. The temple of old, before our Savior came to earth and gave us His unique message of salvation, was used to point towards the ultimate sacrifice that would be made by our Savior. When our Savior died upon the cross of cavalry inside that temple the extremely large curtain that separated the Holy Place from the Most Holy Place inside that temple was torn in two starting at the top. Nothing in the temple was out of place, there wasn't anybody who climbed way up to the ceiling and took a knife to slice the curtain from the top to the bottom. No human being tore that curtain, no freak of nature, no animal, nothing but the supernatural force of God being used to signify the way into the Most Holy Place was now open to all. No longer would man stand in doing the work of God as His priests. No longer would man go to that building before those men and make sacrifices for their sins. There was now only ONE man who fulfilled the High Priest office in the heavenly temple. There was now only ONE man who could give to all the sacrifice He made for them, the perfect sacrifice.

We who are in need of a temple experience are in need of God's work in us. We need the CROSS working in us so that our spirit and our soul-self are completely divided just as that temple curtain . That temple curtain could not have been torn without Jesus' death on the cross. That cross experience of our Savior made the temple experience possible. We need anything that would stand between us and our Savior- gone from us!

We need to LIVE for Jesus but you know what? We are too busy living for ourselves! We are! We are so busy living just for ourselves that to truly live for Jesus is something we can't quite fathom as a reality. Is it a reality to you? Do you UNGRUDINGLY obey the Holy Spirit? Seriously, do you?! Does the Holy Spirit even speak to you? Do you even comprehend the Holy Spirit's leading? If we DO NOT we have to get down on our knees and pray that our God help our UNBELIEF!

You say you believe, that believing isn't your particular spiritual problem? I say you're wrong. It is TRULY believing that allows us to have the Holy Spirit's leading in our lives. It is by FAITH.

More on this tomorrow by the GRACE, by the WILL, by the LOVE of our Savior. We need the temple experience, we need the Holy Spirit leading us. Please, Lord, get us out of our own way!
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1Co_3:16  Know ye not that ye are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you?
1Co_3:17  If any man defile the temple of God, him shall God destroy; for the temple of God is holy, which temple ye are.

'God today would have His own enjoy such a temple experience in their spirit and soul: if only the cross is allowed to perfect its work in them. As they ungrudgingly obey the Holy Spirit the communion between the Holy and the Holiest grows deeper day by day until they experience a great change. It is the cross which effects the rending of the curtain; that is, the cross so functions in the life of the believer that he has a rent-curtain experience between his spirit and soul. His natural life renounces its independence and waits upon the spirit life for direction and supply. The curtain was torn in two, “from top to bottom” (Mark 15.38). This has to be God’s doing, not man’s. ' --The Spiritual Man- Watchman Nee