Scripture reading: Revelation 4:6-11
The soul is an area where spirits want to reign. Remember, the soul of man is the throne of God, therefore every other spirit desires to get in there to reign and to rule. When we accept Jesus, we receive a cleansing of the soul area – the mind, emotions, will, and desires. These areas are not yet fully possessed by the Lord Jesus. We have to surrender each area to the Lord. The sacrifice at the Golden Altar is where the soul of man is offered to God.
When the fifth trumpet is being blown, it is the fifth message to the soul of man. This message says that when we give God our heart, He will give us His kingdom. The heart of man, then, is being wooed by God. While this offering of the soul is being made, many other terrible things are happening (the pit is opened and so forth), but God has provided man a hiding place. Whenever we give our soul over to God, we come under the shadow of the Almighty (the sixth work of grace in the church). As we come under this shadow, hell literally breaks loose on earth. God will not allow the enemy to pour out his wrath upon the nations until His people are safe under His shadow. We see then that the fifth trumpet calls us to a place of safety. Those of us who obey this call will be under the shadow of the Almighty. When the sixth trumpet blows, we will already be safe.
We need to understand what God is saying to us, where we, the CHURCH, ARE at this time. We have been here for a long time. I have been saying from 1985 that we are at this point. God is bringing the church in. Some have been in longer than others. God is bringing people to the point where they do not want anything more of the world. They are fed up with the world. They hate the world and the things of the world. They want to submit everything to Christ. This is where we are! God is bringing us. The mind is being pulled towards thinking of nothing but Christ and the things of God. This is the work of the Golden Altar.
Those who turn back from the Golden Altar will go out to face the destruction in the world. Many men have turned from the Golden Altar without making the offering, not knowing that they have turned. They believe they are still going on. It is like a man going along a road lost, because the road is the wrong road, but he does not know it. He thinks he is going on the right road.
At this point of time God is requiring of every Christian AN OFFERING, and this offering is not from your pockets, it is from your soul! He wants your mind! He needs your emotions now! Unless your emotions are tied up and bound up under Christ, you are in trouble, because the enemy will be able to reach you. Brethren, our emotions (ANGER – and the things we use our emotions to do – many things – to love – to operate in the world), God is saying that OUR EMOTIONS must now come under God or we are in grave danger.
Where is our will? Is our will bound up with Christ or is it loose and hanging out there in a place of danger? The will must be offered to God even as the priest offered the burning incense praying for his soul and the soul of his people. As the incense burns and the smoke goes up before God, God accepts it because it is an offering of peace and an offering of righteousness. So it is that God is asking man to offer his will to God NOW!
The symbol of the will is the ox. In the Old Testament it was depicted as THE OX, a stubborn creature. In Revelation 4, when the will was brought under God, it was likened to a calf. A calf sucks milk and this is what GOD WANTS – THE CALF WILL, not the ox will. When the will is offered, it is transformed into a calf.
The last area of the soul to be offered is the desires. I once asked God, “How can I beat Satan at his game of tempting and disturbing and frustrating?” God said, “You can beat him by desiring nothing.” If you desire nothing, he has nothing to tempt you with. You cannot be tempted with something that you do not want. You are tempted with the things you want. This is the problem. If we could so control our desires that we put them entirely in God and we only want the things God wants for us, then we would be able to overcome every temptation of Satan. There is no way you can be tempted with something that you do not want or do not like. THE DESIRES then are depicted AS A MAN (Revelation 4:7), because the human being is a creature of desire. He has more desires than any other creature.
The mind is typed by the eagle, the flying eagle – restless, always flying high. The emotions are typed by the lion – savage, brutal. The will is typed by the ox. The desires are typed by the man. We have to get all these areas under the Spirit of God. When man has his mind, his emotions, his desires, and his will under God, then Christ can begin to come forth within the soul area of man and we receive the mind of Christ, the emotions of God, the will of the Father, and the desires of Christ.
(Excerpt from The Book of Revelation, Volume 1, pg. 178-179)
Thought for today: God is requiring of every Christian AN OFFERING, and this offering is from your soul!
Sonlight Devotional 