Exodus 23:14 KJV Three times thou shalt keep a feast unto me in the year.

Many teach that the Old Testament is the New Testament concealed and the New Testament is the Old Testament revealed. The Old Testament is full of spiritual truths which are “shadows” of things which were fulfilled in Christ. As an example, in the Old Testament the Lord instituted three feasts to occur within a year. His people were commanded to make the journey to His appointed place, Jerusalem, the main city of government as well as the center of worship unto the Lord.

For many, keeping a feast required making a long journey that required time and endurance. It was an act of worship, a sign of putting the Lord first place. The phrase “keep a feast” meant to move in a circle and it reflected individual lives and the lives of families being centered around the Lord and His ways. This was a cycle of events which was repeated every year.

Proverbs 22:20 KJV Have not I written to thee excellent things (measures of three) in counsels and knowledge,

Throughout the Bible, the Lord spoke of and performed things in groups of three. For example, in Mark 4:8, the Lord teaches the harvest of the Word of God takes place in a 30, 60, or 100-fold fashion. This three measure working of the Lord reflects the trinity of the godhead himself:

• The Father,
• The Son and
• The Holy Spirit.

The three major feasts found in the Old Testament reflect the three fold nature of the trinity producing a New Testament harvest of maturity in His sons and daughters. Though many still keep the natural elements of these feasts, the Lord’s intention was for us to experience the fullness of Himself by allowing His Word to come to full maturity in our lives.

• First the blade,
• then the ear, then –
• the full corn in the ear

(Mark 4:28).

Deuteronomy 16:16 Three times in a year shall all thy males appear before the LORD thy God in the place which he shall choose; in the feast of unleavened bread, and in the feast of weeks, and in the feast of tabernacles: and they shall not appear before the LORD empty:

The three major feasts instituted by the Lord are:

1. The Feast of Unleavened Bread –Passover
2. The Feast of Weeks –Pentecost and
3. The Feast of Tabernacles—the great feast of ingathering.

The first and the third feasts were further broken down into three feasts each; producing a total of seven feasts altogether; seven being a number of perfection. Each of us should experience the work of the three major feasts (seven feasts in total) within our lives before we finish our race on this earth.

As a quick summary,

• The Feast of Unleavened Bread and Passover represents:
• Our encounter with Jesus Christ, the Passover lamb.
• Without the blood of Jesus Christ there is no redemption, no reconciliation back to the Father.
• Jesus Christ is the incorruptible seed of God.
• By receiving that seed we are born again and receive the nature of God.

• The Feast of Weeks or Pentecost represents:
• A baptism into the person and work of the Holy Spirit.
• The Holy Spirit empowers us to become true witnesses of Christ;
• Martyrs who die to their own selfishness and live their lives to the glory of God.

• The Feast of Tabernacles or Ingathering represents:
• An immersion into the work of the Father, an ingathering of mature fruit.
• Living our lives as sons and daughters of God, whose purpose is to please the Father, as we continue to grow in grace and maturity in Christ.
• Our lives being conformed to the very image of Christ, not doing our own will but the will of the Father who sends us out into the world to represent Him.

The truest elements represented by these three feasts are an ongoing spiritual work within a son or daughter’s life. However, the Lord has chosen the pattern of three feasts a year here in the Church in Marshall to bring a concentrated work of God to our lives. These events center around the apostolic and prophetic work of Christ where Christ sets His children’s lives in order. It is during these set apart times, the Lord often sets another stone in the foundation of our lives. Those who come hungry and seeking the Lord never go away disappointed.

I would encourage you to check out our calendar for scheduled events, seek the Lord and see if He would have you to join us in one of these spiritual encounters with Him. In doing so, we outwardly express His commandment to “keep His feasts”.

1Co 5:8 ESV Let us therefore celebrate the festival, not with the old leaven, the leaven of malice and evil, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.

Males have dealt with pornography lightly… as if it’s understandable because we’re male and filled with testosterone…and you know, it’s got to have an outlet…Let me just say that if that is you, something is missing from your relationship to Christ. Not only will the sin lead you into sexual perversion, it will destroy your character, your confidence, your relationships…It is an old adage but I will repeat it here, “Sin takes you farther than you want to go, keeps you longer than you want to stay, costs you more than you want to pay. You cannot make a deal with the devil and come out on top.

Go to 1 Corinthians 6:13-16:

13 Meats for the belly, and the belly for meats: but God shall destroy both it and them. Now the body is not for fornication, but for the Lord; and the Lord for the body.

14 And God hath both raised up the Lord, and will also raise up us by his own power.

15 Know ye not that your bodies are the members of Christ? shall I then take the members of Christ, and make them the members of an harlot? God forbid.

16 What? know ye not that he which is joined to an harlot is one body? for two, saith he, shall be one flesh.

The body is not for fornication (pornos) but for the Lord. If a woman walks by and you “check her out”, your eyes hit her rear-end and you think, “Boy, I’d like to…” According to the Lord, you just did. In the eyes of God, He sees according to the thoughts and the intents of your heart. The moment you have any thought, He reads it. I am convinced of this because the moment I stepped out of my body, my thoughts were audible words. Your thoughts are read easily by God. Satan reads you as well. If he sees you look her over, he tells the demons to watch you and seize their opportunities to negotiate.

Pornography is nothing but fornication by proxy (substitution). You’re substituting the real with the image. When you boot up your computer and you select pornography you have to pay for that encounter with money and more. When they bill your house you have to deceive and lie to just deal with the bill without your parents finding out. The Scripture says this:

Flee fornication. Every sin that a man doeth is without the body; but he that committeth fornication sinneth against his own body.

Flee porno…he that committeth pornography sins against his own body. It is a sexual sin against your own body. He says in 1 Corinthians 7:2, “Nevertheless, to avoid fornication…” How do you avoid it? Get married and have a wife. If you want to see a naked woman, get married.

We are sexual by nature but religion has always denied our humanity. Religion always denies the good things of God and the things that God has given us richly to enjoy (1 Tim. 6:17). God is not opposed to husbands and wives making love; He is opposed to fornication and pornography. Sex in marriage is recreational, it’s pleasurable and it’s fun. The marriage bed is undefiled.

Now, we have to face some issues. Paul said that every man should know how to possess his vessel unto sanctification. He said, “I keep under my body.” In other words, he was saying, “I make my body come under, and keep it under subjection. Lest at any time, I should become a castaway, or rejected from the very thing I am preaching.” This principle is of the manifest sons of God. I cannot preach or teach something and not do it. That’s hypocrisy. The reason that we are having a lot of problems with our teenagers is because we’re facing that now. As I deal with a lot of our teenagers, I have to deal with the fact that they are angry at their parents because of their hypocrisy. This is not about that old adage, “Do as I say, not as I do.” That is what causes rebellion among youth. We are the sons of God and the Word became manifest and dwelt among us. We are the living epistles, the Word has got to be made manifest among us. I want my children to know that I have a very loving amorous relationship with t heir mother. I want them to see it. I don’t hide it from them. I don’t flaunt it in a perverted way but I’m always loving on her around them. I want my girls to know that there is nothing wrong or unclean with making love to their husband.

There are three loves: agape, phileo, and eros. Spirit, soul and body. Both phileo and eros answer to agape. Christ was the first to use the word agape – the love of God – He is agape, not phileo or eros. It is the only true love that exists. It is not self-serving, self-seeking or self-mastery love. This love is the love of somebody else at your own expense. God so loved that He gave…He doesn’t get. Phileo and eros are very self-centered in their root nature. Agape is not. If you get these out of their right order it changes things.

Let me show you why Paul said that he keeps his under subjection. It is the law of the temporal which could also be named the law of “repeat”. The law is this: whatever you do with your body, you will have to do over and over again. It will never be enough. If you eat, you have to eat again; if you sleep, you have to sleep again…there is no end to it. True or not? Work out, brush your teeth, wash your hair…no matter what you do, you’ll have to do it again. You’ll have to do it again and again and again. So, is it really fulfilling? No. The Scripture words it this way regarding a stand that Moses took , “…the pleasures of sin for a season;” The pleasure of sin is only for a moment… a season. But, is agape temporal or eternal? Agape lasts forever. You don’t have to keep feeding it over and over again. It is the power of eternal zoe. We have eternal light, life and love – the three “Ls” of His divine nature. All three of those are eternal.

Although phileo can be temporal, it is also eternal – when it is sanctified. The first two times that Jesus asked Peter if he loved him, the word translated as love in English was the word agape. The third time Jesus asked Peter if he loved him the word He used was phileo. Peter, it is recorded, was grieved…Christ had found out his heart; his love was only phileo, and the Lord knowing that, knew also that Peter would betray him despite his profession of loyalty to the death. Only the Apostle John had a revelation of the agape of God – He was the only one that used that word. He was the disciple whom the Lord agapeo.(John 21:20) In all but one instance when the Scripture refers to John as the disciple whom Jesus loved, the word love was translated from agapao. In John 20:2 the word loved was translated from phileo. Jesus loved him eternally, from the spirit, but he loved something about his personality, as well. He was fond of John, he li ked his temperament and nature. Is that not true of all of us? We love all of our brothers and sisters but there are some that we just love in personality and like to be around. That’s phileo. It’s very good but it can also be very self-serving. You choose your friends from those that are rich, from those that bless you the most…it goes on and on. However, there is also the “real” behind it. Phileo is dangerous…it can go in ungodly ways. Instead of waiting for God to give you a wife to love you, you love yourself. That is where the term “masturbation” comes from…it means to be self-serving, to master yourself. You young men, wait for your wife. Let her master your desire, your need, your drive.

This is how you keep under your body; this is how you possess your vessel. You know that it is temporal and you treat it as if it is temporal. You know that it has to repeat everything that it does. Treat it like it does and be wise in how you handle it and how things operate in your life. The body wants food and you give it way too much. It’s gluttony. The body wants sleep and you give it way too much. That is being a sluggard. In everything that you do, you have to sanctify it. “… this is the will of God,(concerning you) even your sanctification…”(1Thess 4:3). We should know how to sanctify this body, keep it sanctified and in the honor of God.. We don’t overeat, we don’t over-indulge, we don’t over-anything. We keep our body under restraint at all times because, if you don’t, it is the one that will demand what it wants again and again. There is no end to it. If you smoke marijuana, you’ll do it again and again…you smoke “crack” once…then, you’re out all night long, always trying to find mo re until you get delivered from the power of serving your body and start serving the Lord! Then, you become motivated, not by sex, but by agape.

Everything that a man does is motivated by love – the love of God, the love of others or the love of self. Is money the root of all evil? Or, does the Scripture say that it is the love of it? Man is motivated toward money because he loves it. Does he agape it? Of course not. Does he phileo it? eros it? Did you know that there are men that get physically turned on by holding a lot of money in their hands? Did you know that cars are used as sex objects? How in the world do you name a car, “The sexiest car of the year”? Yet, people get in that car and feel, “sexy”. It is incredible but these things effect certain males..

There are two types of males here that are in trouble. There are those that over-indulge in sex and those that are malakos (soft, tending toward the feminine). We often wear military garb here. Why do we do that? Some get offended by it here but they have no idea of the spirit of what we are trying to do. Are we a militia group? No. Wearing military attire is an apostolic strategy to bring forth manliness, to bring out “maleness” in your behavior and the aggressiveness that is manly. We dressed these men in something opposite to a dress so that we would help bring something out in them. It is a strategy that we still use to bring out maleness. It is a prophetic statement to principalities that we are warriors. You are a warrior, a military man, trained to take on and combat Lucifer.

If you are going to be a soldier in the Body of Christ, in the war of God, you’re going to have to endure some hardness. Young men have to learn how to endure some things. That’s why we take them and put them in sports. We’re doing it and they’re doing it in a different way. Every sport that we get involved in is a contact sport. Our boys have got to endure getting banged up some and some roughness. They come out loving it because they get in touch with what is their true nature…the Zakar! the Iysh! Then, he’s glorifying God, he’s not afraid of demons, he’s not fearful, he’s not afraid of the dark. He’ll say to demons, “I rebuke you, in the name of Jesus!” You’ll hear them… there are little guys doing it now…laying hands on the sick, casting out devils, rebuking them at night.

Listen, we’ve got a good life, brothers. If you get married at age twenty, young men, you have three hundred and sixty-five days a year for approximately sixty to sixty-five years to have sex with your wife. How many times can you make love to your wife, if you want to, at a rate of just once per day? You’re looking at twenty-two thousand times! Don’t you think that’s enough? Sure, it is. You’re looking at reality here. This is not about God trying to withold from us. If you want sexual pleasure, fun and recreation…talk to your wife.

This is not a time of pride or embarrassment; it’s a time of cleansing. What will destroy your walk with God is if you hide it. You will be able to sanctify and cleanse it, if you are honest about it. We have to be cleansed. If you have any problem with pornography or fornication at all, confess it and pray. All we’re going to do is pray for you. You may say, “I really don’t look into it but it bothers me. I feel drawn to it.” You may not look at it but you feel drawn all the time…that’s a power, there’s a power to it. We’re going to break the power of this. It’s all about power, tonight. It’s not about pride, it’s about power. It’s about how God anointed Jesus Christ with the Holy Ghost and power, who went about doing good and healing all that were oppressed by the devil…(Acts 10:38) Before I left the house tonight my wife asked me if she could pray for me. What she prayed was for you…that God would anoint me for you, to break the yoke of this unclean spirit. I am encouraging you, right now, that you break this power over your life. We’re all going to pray for that anointing. You pray for it. I am going to pray.

Father, in the name of Jesus, I break the power of this unclean spirit. I break the power, not just the fruit of it. The Lord Jesus is the Master of our bodies. Sever the root, right now. Say, I no longer make contact with pornography. My body is not for fornication, my body is for the Lord! Father, we bring our bodies to you right now and ask you to deliver our bodies from the power of sexual sin, sexual perversion, sexual uncleanness. I ask you, God, to deliver this body right here…cleanse your sons from sexual overactiveness, from the imaginations, from image worship, the picture-pleasuring that takes place. I rebuke you, Lucifer, in the name of Jesus! You unclean spirit, you are cursed this night! You have no place! Out! in the name of Jesus! Out! of every male who desires to walk with and in the presence of the Living God! The power of this is broken, in Jesus Christ’s name! Father, we thank you for it now. I want to thank you that this will no longer be a torment to these young men. They are free from it, sanctified, fit for the Master’s use and prepared for every good work. In the name of Jesus, Father, thank You. It is an hour of deliverance. Thank You now, Father, that they walk away from it. Let these young men be sanctified.

Thank God for the power of the blood of Jesus. You’ve been delivered by the blood of Jesus from the power of it. Young men, I am sorry to say that in this day you are going to see women’s nakedness everywhere…You’re not going to avoid it but you can avoid the power of it.

You young men, you’re not going to go crazy. You’ll be fine. You’re not going to explode. Get involved in life. Your day will come…you will marry and you will get all of the loving that you want in life.

I am encouraging you men to throw away the fantasies of your mind and embrace the realities of Christ. Every woman has the same parts. How many of the same thing do you need to see in life? Let’s go on with life a little more sober and controlled. Amen?.

Young men, do what the Scripture says, forget your pride, and go to someone in authority over you for help when you are struggling. Do you think that this is all about divinity?…that God just thinks that we are all just divine spirit beings? Do we have bodies and do we have natural desires? Do we have sexual desires? I will tell you this as I have told the teenaged boys : God is not opposed to sex – He made it to feel good. If sex were just for procreation (to have children), it wouldn’t have had to feel good. He intended for you to enjoy sex, but in your time and season. When you are married, you can enjoy it all. You can wait for your time. The Lord is with you to do it.

To you who have chosen to live in the kingdom, you need to reaffirm to yourself what you have chosen saying, “I did choose the kingdom of God. I chose Your government; I chose to live under Your rule, under Your statutes, Your precepts and Your judgments. Christ came here not to be ministered unto but to give His life for others. That is my King! He tells us to do the same.

If you will stay with Christ, He will deliver you from living life for yourself. He will put within you the desire to love Him and to love others rather than yourself. You can’t do that without Him; without Him, we are just natural, carnal human beings of this earthly order. You first have to be delivered out of that power of darkness, ushered into the kingdom of God, come under the rule of Christ and then, He will put within you, Him. You won’t be another but improved human being but another kind of creation. This is not a human reformation program. This is total transformation! Jesus Christ doesn’t make you a better human, you get to exchange yourself for another being. He’s not making you a better man or woman, He’s making you a man or woman of God!

Listen, our youth today hear the world’s message, “It’s all about you!” It’s preached to them constantly. It is producing the most self-centered generation that has ever lived in America. Our children must be trained under our leadership for the kingdom of God.

This generation lives by what they want. They know nothing about their will, they only know what they want. To you in that generation, you don’t know how to live by a decision of your will; you are moved only by what you do or don’t want to do. Nothing overrules your wants, impulses and desires. You are consumed by them. When playing a game, or on a team, you want to play as long as you’re winning. You quit if you’re losing. What happened to the motto of the NBA, “I love this game!”? You don’t love the game, you only love to win. Real athletes do want to win, but they love to play. Even if they don’t win, they’ll keep on playing and practicing until they do win. They don’t quit because they want to play. They have learned to will beyond their want. Jesus did not come here saying, “I’ve come to do what I want.” He said, “. . . I’ve come to do the will of Him who sent Me.” (John 6:38 paraphrased).

To those of you who are over the age of 17, let me ask; do you get up and go to work every morning because you want to? Do you go and work out every day because you like to? Or, do you do it because you choose to do it? That means that you will to do it.

Proverbs talks about, “. . . a little slumber. . . a little folding of the hands to sleep. . . “ and is describing a person who is slothful, who has chosen to be lazy, which will not work in this society. In the world, you might be able to get away with being lazy, slothful, overeating, drinking; the world has excuses and reasons for them. In the kingdom of God, Jesus Christ will address them, call them what they are and tell you to lay them down. He will address your eating, your drinking, your sleeping, your excesses and then certain will begin to say, “I hate it here!”

You hate what you can’t have. Parents, you teach your children by denying them because one day, if they are going to live in this regime of Jesus Christ’s rule they are going to have to know how to deny themselves. Denial involves the word, “No.” Children need to handle a ,”No.” without throwing a fit or demanding an explanation.

I was watching the “Dog Whisperer” on television the other night and the gentleman who is the one who deals with the dogs was trying to help some folks who’s little Pomeranian would throw himself on the floor and have fits (as long as his owners were watching). The man who helps their owners deal correctly with the dogs said that he sees more dogs than ever who have lost their natural dog behavior because humans treat them like humans, which confuses the dogs. He said that when they act like dogs, even the big dogs are predictable and are easily controlled because they know how to behave in that society. What they have to have is a leader. That is what we have to have, too, or we go crazy!

We have a beautiful social structure, created for us by Jesus Christ, if you choose to accept it. If you want to be successful in this society of our Lord’s, it is easy. It is easy to be successful in the kingdom of God. It is the way of the transgressor that is hard.(Proverbs 13:15). You must be a life-giving spirit not a living soul. A living soul sucks the life out of all those around them. Then, they’ll leave.

I have no patience with those who complain about the fellowship, the elders, the deacons, the body, the school. I choose to be here and I love what Christ has done here. If you dislike where you are, don’t complain, murmur and backbite. You, make a decision for your own life and go where you do like it. If you moved into another man’s home and you didn’t like it there, would you spend years there complaining and trying to change his structure? No. You’d have to decide that you don’t know how to live successfully within his structure or society. Then, you’d either have to learn to adapt to his society or make a decision to move on.

When you are born again, you are born into a heavenly social structure which is a society from heaven. You step out of one government and into another government; out of one kingdom and into another kingdom. If you don’t know how to be successful in this society, you might want to get born again! The only way you’ll ever be successful in this society is to be born again. Then, if you still struggle, you may want to get delivered from carnality.

Only two things will keep you from being successful in the kingdom community of Christ. Either you’re not born again and you have an unregenerate nature that is going to war against light all of the time, or you are born again but you live your life from the flesh. You cannot be successful living in the society of God while living in the flesh– not in a spiritual society where people choose to live from the spirit.

Listen, God hates your fleshy twin, “Esau”. I hate him, too. Just like you hate mine. As long as either of us lets that man live and rule, we are not going to get along. You need to take your “Esau” to calvary and crucify him with Christ. Tell him, “You are a dead man. You have nothing to say about how we live anymore.” Esau may be able to live successfully in the world but if you bring him into this society, somebody is going to kill him! That is the decree upon him by God!

God, Himself, put a mark upon Cain (an earlier type and shadow of Esau/the flesh)

Gen 4:8 And Cain talked with Abel his brother: and it came to pass, when they were in the field, that Cain rose up against Abel his brother, and slew him.

Gen 4:9 And the LORD said unto Cain, Where is Abel thy brother? And he said, I know not: Am I my brother’s keeper?

Listen, the flesh ruled twin is not the keeper of his spiritual brother but Jacob is Esau’s keeper. You had better be Esau’s keeper! You had better watch out for that fleshy twin in you, 24/7!

Gen 4:10 And he said, What hast thou done? the voice of thy brother’s blood crieth unto me from the ground.

Gen 4:11 And now art thou cursed from the earth, which hath opened her mouth to receive thy brother’s blood from thy hand;

Who was cursed? The first born or the second born? The first born (the flesh, the natural, the carnal) is cursed. Is he cursed? How then, are you going to bring that which is cursed into a society that’s blessed and not oppose everything in it? God has commanded the blessing on Jacob (the second born, spiritual man or community) and it cannot be reversed. He who wants to come and curse what God has chosen and set His blessing on may come, and may curse it with his mouth but they can never change the blessing on it because God Himself has commanded it to be blessed

That should give those who chose to live in this society great peace. No matter who comes, you cannot stop the Body of Christ because it is born of God!

The wisdom then is this: rather than being in the Lord’s society, constantly complaining, murmuring and trying to change it, look for a society that fits the way that you want to live.

Gen 4:12 When thou tillest the ground, it shall not henceforth yield unto thee her strength; a fugitive and a vagabond shalt thou be in the earth.

The moment that you step out of the second-born back into the first-born, you become a fugitive and a vagabond in the earth. You will wander from place to place because your flesh just cannot be satisfied. You will wander from fellowship to fellowship, from house to house.

A fugitive is one who runs from laws. Wherever you go, there will be laws. Cain will curse those laws because he is cursed. Abel will say, “I will obey that law because I live under rule. I am a man under authority.”

I shared with a group the other night that women are commanded of God to submit themselves to their husbands. The word translated to submit is hupotasso: to come under an orderly arrangement. This is an order of society that keeps that society from being chaotic. We’re not talking about American marriages or government, we’re talking about the kingdom of God. A wife is to submit to the order of God. If you first submit to the order of God, it won’t matter what that order is.

The Christian social structure has got to live by the laws of God or we will have chaos just like the world has. Things like: men who don’t want to rule and women who don’t want to submit make a community chaotic.

Reading on:

Gen 4:14 Behold, thou hast driven me out this day from the face of the earth; and from thy face shall I be hid; and I shall be a fugitive and a vagabond in the earth; and it shall come to pass, that every one that findeth me shall slay me.

Bring that fleshy man of yours in here (this society) and then wonder why it is so hard on you! Or, in your home, wondering why your parents get onto you all of the time…! Why? Because, when that man of the flesh is found, the judgment of God has been decreed that he be killed! We like the word slay much better, don’t we?

From the beginning, we were Cain and Abel, Esau and Jacob, the first-born and the second-born; I had to make a choice- so did and do, you. If you choose to live after the first-born you will be a fugitive and a vagabond – always opposing laws and traveling everywhere and anywhere trying to avoid them. And whoever finds you will be rough on you all the days of your life. Has it been tough on you wherever you have gone? We are not rough on the unregenerate man, we have grace for him given us by the Lord Jesus but the regenerated man who chooses to live after the flesh causes us to rise up and slay him! Believe the Word of God and make a choice to live from the second-born from now on!

Even some spiritual people are tempted to put their natural relationships above what the Word commands them to do but, if they continue to live after the second-born, who lives after the laws of God, they will honor God above their natural relationships. If we don’t, God will ostracize us from His society. Jesus Christ spells out in His Word that, “If you love Me, here’s what you will do. . .” (John 14:15,23 paraphrased). A son of God will say, “That is exactly what I will do, Lord, because I love your government. I love your rule. I love my King and His domain. I love His rules, laws, by-laws, statutes and regulations. I choose to obey them.”

I love this society. I hope you do the same.

The Kingdom of God is a citizenship which I belong to. It is a family that I belong to under the Headship and Lordship of Jesus Christ. Under His government I live and under His hand I live and move and have my being. I am grateful to be planted in the King’s domain. It is not something imposed on me or something that I have to do. It is something that I choose to do.

Many of you have paid a great price to be in the kingdom of God. It has been by your choice that you submit to the rule of God. The kingdom of God is far beyond going to heaven. I am not talking here about the kingdom of heaven but about the kingdom of God. The kingdom of heaven is called such because it came from somewhere into the earth. It is not the invention of men. It did not come from the earth or any man’s rulership or government. This kingdom is not of this world.

Philippians 3:20
For our conversation is in heaven; from whence also we look for the Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ:

The word translated as “conversation” in that verse is translated from the Greek word politeuma which means: politics or citizenship. To interpret the above verse with this meaning would go like this, “. . .our citizenship, our politics is in heaven. . .”

Upon this earth, we are a part of a commonwealth of spiritual Israel. We are a part of a heavenly political movement. We are revolutionists of this movement. We are adamant about our Father and His politics. Human politics are filled with humanism, falsehood, flattery, idolatry, the list goes on. In heavenly politics none of that takes place. Thank God for a righteous King!

In the heavenly system of politics, we are citizens of a heavenly community even while we are on the earth.

Philippians 1:27
Only let your conversation be as it becometh the gospel of Christ: that whether I
come and see you, or else be absent, I may hear of your affairs, that ye stand fast in one spirit, with one mind striving together for the faith of the gospel;

The same Greek word politeuma is translated here as “conversation”. Another translation puts it this way, “. . .behave as a citizen of heaven. . .”

There are those that don’t want to live with the rules, the laws, the regulations and they can dismiss themselves from citizenship.

Even in the natural, people pay a great price to gain citizenship in the United States of America. To come into citizenship, people must adapt to a different set of laws, of government, a different social structure.

To all those who murmur and complain about having to answer to the Word of the Lord, which fellow citizens hold you accountable to in matters pertaining to this kingdom, let me help you with some truth.

I choose to believe the Word and act on it which says that I am a citizen of heaven. Because of that, it places me into a certain social structure, even as it does you. In that social structure, you have the right to expect certain behavior, just as I have the right to expect certain behavior from you. As a citizen of the United States of America, there are certain constitutional laws that you need to know about and follow. These tell you how to behave yourself as a citizen. If you break those laws this society will ostracize you. You are taken out of American society if you commit murder, rape, armed robbery or other violent crimes. They actually come into your own house and take you out of this society and put you into another society, prison. They remove you from society because of your conduct. As citizens of the United States, are you grateful that our government removes these offenders out of society that are dangerous to you? Of course, you are. It makes us grateful to be citizens of the United States.

God has a social structure. In this social structure, if you do not obey the rules found in the Word of God, you are removed from the society. I’ve seen it happen and so have you. When people get narcissistic and selfish, they remove themselves or are removed because that doesn’t work in this society. Eventually they will be rejected from the world’s society, as well. Neither Christian nor secular society will tolerate a narcissistic person for long. Even in the world, people will figure out pretty quick that a person doesn’t care about them but is only using them in order to enhance themselves.

Let me say to those who are disenchanted with this society (Christian), those who are unhappy, angry, bitter, backbiting, gossiping and faultfinding: you have a job to do with your own soul to make a choice, even as I have to do. You must understand that you live in this society by choice. No one is forcing you to live in this society. God isn’t and if He isn’t, no one is. There are those here, like myself, who have chosen to be here; because of that, those who murmur and complain about being in this society will eventually come into conflict.

This is a Christian society, a social structure, a community under the leadership of Jesus Christ. It is not communal but it is a community of believers. We live by certain laws that we have chosen to live by. I love the rules of God as laid out in His Word. I love God’s law above the laws of the United States of America because of examples like this:

In the United States law it has been decided that you cannot legislate morality. God’s Word clearly lays out His laws for our moral behavior (“Thou shalt not commit adultery.” Exodus 20:14 and “. . . Be not deceived; neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers with themselves with mankind. . . shall inherit the kingdom of God.” 1 Corinthians 6:8b-6:9

This is a citizenship under the Headship of Jesus Christ. Our society has rules, boundaries and restraints that have been set forth in God’s Word. These rules or laws have come from the kingdom of heaven to His kingdom on earth. Through them, God introduced us to a higher dimensional lifestyle. No other government on earth can lift us into a higher plane of living. But God’s rule can. Christ came down to bring us up. He didn’t come just to give us salvation from hell, He came to bring us a government — a King’s domain — a social structure with conduct and behavioral standards expected of us as citizens of heaven. God brought us eternal life because it was the only way that we could see and enter into the King’s domain. Only through our human spirit do we have the ability to live in a higher dimension of lifestyle. When we are born again, He gives us zoe which overrules our selfish, self-seeking psuche lifestyle. It causes us to step out of a normal, average, self-seeking lifestyle and brings us into a higher dimension as a life-giving spirit. He brought us eternal life so that we can live in the realm where He is.

There are three things that you have to have to live successfully in this society:

1. Death
2. Denial
3. Discipline

These three elements are the constitutional laws of this society. The constitution of God requires that a man deny himself, take up his cross (death) and follow Christ. According to the constitution or laws of God, a Christian is not to live for themselves but to live for God and for others. Ours is not a community of self, fleshly or carnal indulgence. It is not a community that tolerates perversion or immorality. You cannot just live the way that you want to; this community will not tolerate that, eventually.

You can leave this fellowship and go any where that you want but you can’t get away from God No matter where you go or where you fellowship, you will have to live according to those three elements. You would have to get out of Christ to indulge your selfishness. Jesus Christ will not permit you, as a citizen of His society or a member of His family to live self-centered. To do so is contrary to His laws-His rules. Our heavenly citizenship endues us with the power to live beyond that kind of lifestyle.

This is a society of self-indulged people who came into the kingdom of God to have that taken out of them. If you came here to better yourself, you have come to the wrong place. You came here to die to yourself and to live unto God. Here you will find a society where you are always supposed to honor someone else, give to someone else and help someone else. We are here to be a life-giving, not a life-taking force. We are here to be empowered by Christ to help others with their lives in whatever part He gives us to do that.

This is a wonderful citizenship. You can’t vote in your President and you can’t vote Him out. Jesus will always be the “President” of the kingdom of God. This is a non-voting kingdom. It came from heaven, not earth. If you don’t like living in this society while on the earth, let me remind you where you will be spending eternity. . .there is no way that you are going to murmur and complain about this society and then get to heaven and live peacefully ever after. You are going to come face with Jesus Christ and He is going to say, “That behavior doesn’t belong here!”

Hopefully, you will understand this while you are still on the earth but you will definitely get the message when you get to heaven that this society isn’t about you; it’s about a Father and His whole family.