Introduction
The end of the church service had come and I stood there, with my eyes closed, enveloped in the peaceful atmosphere listening to the pastor’s voice. ‘Is there anyone in this place who would like a new start with God?’
What? A new start? Well, my hand shot up immediately, I absolutely wanted that…a new start with God! It had never occurred to me that I could have a new beginning.
I had grown up in a traditional church and for me God was someone in the distance, someone I had failed and whom I had really disappointed. I was truly saddened by that.
It was the most wonderful thing to discover that God loved me, wanted a relationship with me and I could start again, from scratch, just as if I had never sinned! I went forward for prayer and my life has never been the same since!
I had never seen a bible before and now, opening this book of truth, I was transported into a realm beyond this world. A world where hope resided, unconditional love was in every breath I took and where a loving Saviour peeled back the darkness and light flooded in. I was totally captivated and in love.
It was some time later that I found out that Jesus Christ would be coming back to fetch His glorious church. A church that He was preparing. A church known as the bride of Christ. It is not a denomination. He is coming back for every believer (male, female) in Christ who is passionate about Him.
In 2004, He began to teach me about the bride of Christ. It took two years for me to put together a teaching that would take me three months to teach on a weekly basis.
The preparation of the bride of Christ had begun!
I have heard it said that in the ancient Jewish weddings, once the young woman had agreed to marry the young man, she would not see him again until he had prepared a place for them to stay in his father’s house. The only way he would know that she was still committed to him was that she would keep a lamp burning in her window as a sign that she was his betrothed.
My prayer is that you will be that one who is fervently looking out of the window for the soon return of her betrothed.
Make sure that your lamp is filled with oil and that you keep it burning so that when He returns, He will see that you are eagerly waiting for Him.
(An excerpt from ‘Behold the Bride’ by Sylvia Colville)
All your heart
Matt. 22:37 – Jesus said to him, ‘You shall love the Lord with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.’
Rev. 2 :1-5 – To the angel of the church in Ephesus write; These things says He who holds the seven stars in His right hand, who walks in the midst of the seven golden lampstands: ‘I know your works, your labour, your patience, and that you cannot bear those who are evil. And you have tested those who say they are apostles and are not and have found them liars; and you have persevered and have patience and have laboured for My name’s sake and have not become weary. Nevertheless, I have this against you, that you have left your first love. Remember therefore from where you have fallen; (Jesus calls having left your first love – having fallen) repent and do the first works, or else I will come to you quickly and remove your lampstand from its place, unless you repent.
If we examine this scripture a little more closely we see the following:
These Christians are working hard for the Lord. They are patient – a fruit of the Spirit.
They have spiritual discernment. They have separated themselves from those who are evil. They are faithful, another fruit of the spirit and they have not grown weary in well doing.
Man…these Christians are gems. Every Pastor trusts God for faithful hardworking, trustworthy, dependable saints like these to work alongside him in the harvest fields.
Yet Jesus, who commends them for all the works that they are doing, for their faithfulness, their steadfastness…Jesus has something against them, “you have left your first love”, something so serious that He warns them that if they do not repent, He will remove their lampstand from its place.
Secondly, He tells them to do the first works. He can’t be talking about good works because He has already commended them on those. So somehow, the first works that He wants to see must be a response to the first love.
From His rebuke or warning in Rev.2 we can see that this first love is extremely important to Him.
Jesus is not interested in marrying you and I for our theological position (we have been redeemed and reconciled to the Father). He longs to be married to someone who loves Him with all their heart and whom He can know intimately and who longs to know Him intimately.
First love…love the Lord with all your heart, with all your soul and with all your mind.
First works is everything that we do in response to that first love.
God said about David, ‘I have found David, the son of Jesse, a man after My own heart, who will do all My will.’
We can see from what God has to say about David that the Father is David’s first love and his resulting first works – are doing the Father’s will.
ALL your heart… this surely is a description of an all-consuming passion. This is talking about being wholly devoted.
ALL your soul and mind… this is being sensitive and aware of His Person…by being completely attentive to the Presence of Jesus Christ.
The bride is attentive to His Presence. He is her beloved. He has her attention.
It is in that attentiveness…that she becomes aware of His Person, who He is and she becomes aware of His voice, what He wants to share with her.
Giving His Presence first place in your life declares the value that you place on His Person. In other words, when we give attention to His Presence, we value His Person and when we don’t give attention to His Presence, we don’t value His Person.
You can tell how much you value His Person by how much attention you pay to His Presence.
First love is I choose You, I prefer You. Jesus must become our soul addiction.
An early writer had this to say, ‘Prayer is me looking at God and God looking at me and when the eyes of the soul looking out meet the eyes of God looking in, there heaven has begun on earth.’
Once the Presence of the Lord becomes the Lord Himself, a real person to you, a relationship is birthed and you entire life becomes about, ‘How do I walk hand in hand with the Bridegroom in His garden?’
Charles Spurgeon – ‘Some of us may not doubt our salvation, yet we are not feasting with Him. He invites us into the experience of His Person. If you don’t have a vibrant living exchange then my question is, ‘Are you the spouse of Christ, yet content to be without the presence of your beloved?’
Even in church…if His Presence is a side issue…then He is a side issue.
A.W.Tozer – The tragedy of the church is that from childhood to old age, men have only known a synthetic God, compounded of theology and logic, having no eyes to see or ears to hear and this is the difference between men who know about God and men who know God.
Being at church is not the goal of church…the goal is Jesus Himself…He is the goal. Even our worship should be songs TO Him, not about us.
The Holy Spirit has the job of glorifying Jesus. If we want the presence of the Lord Jesus Christ, then our songs must be songs of adoration to Jesus.
Even in the scriptures…the point of the text is to find Him. The bible is not about the bible but about the author of scripture, who said, ‘The scriptures speak of Me.’ (John 5:39). Look for Him in the scriptures.
Knowing Jesus is the pinnacle of everything and it begins with us. We initiate this intimacy.
James 4:8 – Draw near to God and He will draw near to you. Does He know you? He burns to know you intimately.
Jesus puts so much weight on whether He knows you or not. He is looking for a bride, pure and full of power and bold in taking the gospel out there.
What you want to know is when you step through that door one day, you will hear Him say, ‘I know you, yes, I know you well. You burned for Me.”
Psalm 25:14-15 – The secret of the Lord is with those who fear Him, and He will show them His covenant. My eyes are EVER toward the Lord, for He shall pluck my feet out of the net.
The phrase, ‘My eyes are EVER toward the Lord’, speaks about attentiveness.
Whatever you give attention to is what you look at. Whatever you look at is what you are giving attention to. Whatever you look at, you receive from.
David is showing from this scripture that you receive from that which you continually give your attention to.
That is why it is so very important to gaze upon the Lord, for when you look at Him, you receive Him.
As you gaze upon an image, that image is installed inside of you.
The reason why many people are lacking life is because their attention is upon something else. Their attention is on this or that…any attentiveness that is not on the person of the Lord cannot give life FOR life is found only in Him.
The person of the Lord is His Presence and His voice. If you pay attention to His Presence you will receive His Presence. If you pay attention to His voice, you will receive His voice.
If you feel your attention is waning, then you simply turn it back. ‘Lord, I give You my attention, I turn my heart back to listening to You.’
How do you know if your attention is off the Lord? Well, nothing else is able to impart life, so when you are lacking life, that’s when you know your attention has drifted. What does that look like? It looks like this…lack of love, joy, peace, patience, goodness, kindness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control…the fruits of His Presence.
Abiding in Him.
John 15:4 – Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, UNLESS you abide in Me.
V5 I am the vine and you are the branches. He who abides in Me, and I in him, bears much fruit; for without Me you can do nothing.
V6 If anyone does not abide in Me, he is cast out and is withered.
The abiding Christian bears much fruit…the Christian who does not abide…is withered and has no fruit. Fruit does not mean good works. Fruit means the fruit of the Holy Spirit, the character and nature of God. The person of God.
Whatever area of your life you let His Presence into…is an area that He can develop. Whatever area you will not allow His Presence into…is an area that He can’t develop.
It’s by locking yourself away with Jesus and devouring His word that Christ is formed in you. When we go into His Presence, His Presence will reside in us. God wants you as His habitation so that others can see Him.
Go deep, deep into the Word and pray in the Holy Ghost, praying in tongues. Pray in tongues so that you build up the inner man.
So often in Christianity we see that God has been eclipsed by His things. It is possible to cheat on God by paying attention to His things rather than Him. He wants first place in our lives.
One day you will stand before God to give an account of your earthly life. He will not be expecting you to write an exam to see what you know about Jesus nor will He be interested in reading through your resume and all the things that you have done for him.
He will be interested in one thing alone…how you conformed to the image of His Son.
Rom. 8:29 – He predestined you to be conformed to the image of His Son.
2 Cor. 3:18 – and remember, we are transformed by beholding (gazing upon, paying attention to Jesus) not our behaviour.
2 Peter 1:2 – Grace and peace be multiplied to you (how?) in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord, as His divine power has given to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, (how?) through the knowledge of Him, who called us by glory and virtue, by which (the glory and the virtue) have been given to us exceedingly great and precious promises, that through these (the exceedingly great and precious promises) you may be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust.
The people who are caught up in their love for God are a different breed. The enemy can’t stop them. He can’t get foxes into their wool because they live so pure. They abide in Him. They fear the Lord. (Eric Gilmour.)
This song “Eagles Wings’ by Hillsong is a wonderful and apt prayer:
Here I am waiting, abide in me I pray. Here I am longing just for You. Hide me in Your love, bring me to my knees. May I know Jesus, more and more. Come live in me, all my life, take over. Come breathe in me and I will rise on eagles’ wings.
