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Scripture reading: Ephesians 4:1-6

Let us talk about the Body of Christ today. How do we become the Body of Christ? How do we know that we are in the Body of Christ? There is only one God, one Church, one Body. When you read Ephesians 4:1-6, you will find out that it is very dogmatic. Anyone who tries to change these scriptures is not of God. If we do not belong to the one Body, then we are not of God. We were not of God before we were of God. Therefore, if we find out that we are not of God, we only have to repent, and be of God. There are many bodies in the world, so what makes us so sure that we are in the right Body?

The church was captured by the Roman Catholic system, back in the second century. The Catholics took the church and they immediately created a hierarchy. That means that they had to reject the ministry that God had set up in the world. We call the ministry that God set up in the world divine order. The order that was set up by the church is called man’s order. Now, let’s look at the difference between divine order and man’s order. Divine order is in Ephesians 4:11. And he gave some, apostles; and some, prophets; and some, evangelists; and some, pastors and teachers. It says here pastors, but in my Bible, it is crossed out and it says the word shepherds and teachers as it is in the Greek original version. You know, the Word of God is correct, but the translations are not correct. So, the Spirit of God in the people of God will correct the translations of man. Amen.

Now, we don’t have the order of man in the Bible, but we can at least talk about it. In the Roman Catholic Church there is a Pope. The Bible says that we should not have a Pope. Let us turn to Matthew 20:20-26, Then came to him the mother of Zebedee’s children with her sons, worshiping him, and desiring a certain thing of him. 21 And he said unto her, What wilt thou? She saith unto him, Grant that these my two sons may sit, the one on thy right hand, and the other on the left, in thy kingdom. 22 But Jesus answered and said, Ye know not what ye ask. Are ye able to drink of the cup that I shall drink of, and to be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with? They say unto him, We are able. 23 And he saith unto them, Ye shall drink indeed of my cup, and be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with: but to sit on my right hand, and on my left, is not mine to give, but it shall be given to them for whom it is prepared of my Father. 24 And when the ten heard it, they were moved with indignation against the two brethren. Here we see a rivalry begin to take place. They wanted position now. They were about to start church politics.

25 But Jesus called them unto him, Ye know that the princes of the Gentiles exercise dominion over them, and they that are great exercise authority upon them. The word dominion means having a big boss. So, it means that Jesus is saying that is a thing of the world. In the world you have the big boss and the little ones coming right down in the hierarchy position. 26 But it shall not be so among you: but whosoever will be great among you, let him be your minister. Those of you who are reading the King James Version of the Bible, if you have a pen on you, cross out the word minister and put servant. The Greek says diakonos (Strong’s Concordance #G1249) and it means servant. The minister is the man with the collar and the head of a church. In Latin, minister means servant, but the church changed it to mean the man who is the head of the church. And whosoever will be chief among you, let him be your slave (Matthew 20:27). I am reading the Greek. It says doulos (Strong’s Concordance #G1401). Doulos could not be anything else but slave.

We can therefore see very clearly that God is saying you must not have a hierarchical system in the church. So, if you are going to take charge of a church, the first thing that you would have to do is to break God’s divine order that He has put in the church and put in your own order. I am saying this to you, brethren, because if you are subject to any other order but God’s order, you are not in the Body of Christ. God has His order established in the earth in spite of all this confusion that we have in church business.

(Excerpt from Keeping in Touch, September 17, 2006, pg. 3-4)

Thought for today: It is necessary, especially at this time, for the people of God to find God’s order.

This message by Brother Cecil duCille entitled “Christ Is Our Sabbath” was given at a conference in Atlanta, Georgia, December 2005 and is part 1 of a 2 part series.

For more video messages please visit Butter and Honey.

Christ in the Soul

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Scripture reading: Matthew 25:1-13

When we accepted Jesus Christ, we received life. The blood of Jesus Christ is the life of God which we received in our souls, which were dead in trespasses and sins. This life had to help us die to the alien life of sin which had occupied the soul. Then we had the self life, also, which had to die. So we see that when we accepted Christ as our Saviour, it was a matter of submitting to death in order to receive life. When that process is completed, then we begin to enter into Christ. Paul speaking to the Corinthian Christians in 1st Corinthians 12:13 declares,

“For by one Spirit are we all baptized into one body.”

We are not baptized into the body of Christ until the body of sin and self is given a death blow. If sin is still reigning in our members, then it was not fully dealt with. The grain of corn cannot bring forth a new life until it has given up its own life. We must die to live, and that life does not begin until that death is complete. This is all done by faith. We cannot deal with this subject fully in this short article, because there would not be enough space.

The divine order of the entering into Christ is shown in the Tabernacle of Moses by the three veils. The first veil is called the Gate. The second is called the Door, and the third is called the Veil. The door is Christ, and the entering in is preceded by the washing at the Laver, which is death to self and a complete surrender to Christ. Self cannot be on the throne, and Christ be crowned as King at the same time. One King must depose the other, and even more than being deposed, ONE KING MUST SLAY THE OTHER, so that there is no further possibility of a coup to regain the throne.

THE ENTERING IN OF CHRIST INTO THE SOUL of man is a conscious act of man’s will, which is preceded by the three BAPTISMS of death.

There must be a death before there can be a resurrection. The three baptisms are:

1) Baptism in water, the baptizer being human
2) Baptism in the Holy Ghost, the baptizer being Jesus Christ
3) Baptism into Christ, the baptizer being the Holy Ghost

Christ enters into us, then we begin to enter into Christ. Just as the Holy Spirit enters into us, then we begin to live in the Spirit.

When Christ enters the soul as King, He begins His rule on earth within the individual. HE MUST REIGN TILL ALL ENEMIES ARE PUT UNDER HIS FEET, even death. We see, therefore, that He brings life and immortality to light by the gospel. 2 Timothy 1:10.

The beast nature of man, therefore. is being changed to the nature of the Christ.

From the illustration, we can see that the five wise virgins in Matthew 25 had oil in their lamps, which is the Holy Spirit which occupies our spirits, and not our souls. This stands to reason why, although we receive the Holy Spirit, we still have the power to reject His counsel and have our own way. It also is the reason why we still fall into sin, though having the Holy Spirit of God within us. The process of the Kingdom of God gently seeps into every area of our lives with our own free will consent, just as the leaven that leavens the whole three lumps of the woman’s meal in Matthew 13:33.

This, therefore, is the work of the overshadowing. The work is done in:

  1. The individual temples (individual lives)
  2. The elect church (called out of the called out)
  3. The time of the restitution of all things, the dispensation of the fullness of times, IN OUR TIME.

(Excerpt from The Pattern, 2nd edition, 1995, pg. 162-164)

Thought for today: One King must depose the other, and even more than being deposed, ONE KING MUST SLAY THE OTHER, so that there is no further possibility of a coup to regain the throne.

The Woman and the Glory

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Scripture reading: John 17:5, 22

God’s smile, His good will, and His permissive will are all that the church seems to have been enjoying until now. But now is the time of the overshadowing, when the manchild church is being brought forth within the woman church. We are moving into a time when nothing but the perfect will of God will be acceptable.

“And there appeared a great wonder in heaven; a woman clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet, and upon her head a crown of twelve stars.” Revelation 12:1.

This is not Mary, the mother of Jesus. This chapter was written of the future and not of the past. Mary was overshadowed by the Holy Ghost and brought forth Jesus Christ, the son of God. The church is being overshadowed by the Holy Ghost again to bring forth the Christ in us, not in a physical sense, as with Mary who had a natural child, but in the spiritual sense, where we shall bring forth the fruit of the soul and not the fruit of the womb. “Clothed with the sun” signifies an elect and called-out people of God, who at last will attain to the glory of God as their covering. Covering is not only for protection, but clothes which they wear daily – the righteousness of God being a part of our habit. The sun represents Christ, just as the moon represents the church. This woman was clothed with the sun, and her footstool was the moon. The meaning is clear. It brings out the scripture of Jesus’ prayer in John 17:5 and 22,

“And now, O Father, glorify thou me with thine own self with the glory which I had with thee before the world was. And the glory which thou gavest me I have given them; that they may be one, even as we are one.

We do not need ecumenism. The glory of God in us is making us one without reservation or fear of separation.

This glory which Jesus prayed about is the picture we see in Revelation 12. It is the same glory which hung over the tabernacle in the wilderness. The same glory Ezekiel saw at the river Chebar, and which Isaiah saw in Isaiah 1 and 6. All the prophets saw it, and Paul saw it when he was knocked down on the road to Damascus. I believe this is the same glory which I also saw in a vision in Greenwich Farm in western Kingston, when I saw the shadow of a man, cast by a great light in the sky, resting on the sea and on the land, and the voice of God speaking to me, saying, “The glory of God dwelleth in His people.” The glory is already given, and the church needs to appropriate it. The people of God is the only temple on earth now recognized by the Lord as His temple. In Haggai 2:7 and 9, there is a prophecy which is yet to come to pass, and it cannot be speaking of a natural temple, as there is none now standing which would have the approval of God. This temple, of course, must be the temple of the human body which God desires to dwell in, “not made with hands.”

“And I will shake all nations, and the desire of all nations shall come: and I will fill this house with glory, saith the Lord of hosts. The glory of this latter house shall be greater than of the former, saith the Lord of hosts: and in this place will I give peace, saith the Lord of hosts.”

This scripture speaks of Revelation 12:1, which is the fulfillment of Haggai’s prophecy. The woman, the church, will be clothed at last, not in her own righteousness, but with the GLORY OF GOD.

“Upon her head a crown of twelve stars.”

(Excerpt from The Pattern, 2nd edition, 1995, pg. 151-153)

Thought for today: We do not need ecumenism. The glory of God in us is making us one without reservation or fear of separation.

We Must Be Overshadowed

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Scripture reading: Psalm 57:1

In order to be filled with the “divine nature,” we must be overshadowed by the divine. The effigy of the two cherubim on the Mercy Seat in the Tabernacle of Moses is a type of the divine overshadowing. The Song of Solomon speaks of the love between Christ and the church, and the final act of planting the seed of life within the soul, the womb of the church. This is God’s divine order of bringing forth life.

Isaiah 51:16, “And I have put my words in thy mouth, and I have covered thee in the shadow of mine hand, that I may plant the heavens, and lay the foundations of the earth, and say unto Zion, Thou art my people.”

Since the heavens are of old, and the earth is already founded, we can only conclude from this scripture that it speaks of the heaven, or abiding place of God within the soul of man, and the earth, to mean the physical man which as the scripture says, will be made immortal. The covering here is one of protection, an overshadowing that does not only change man’s nature, but protects him while the change is being made. This idea is carried out by the scripture as shown below.

“And it shall come to pass, while my glory passeth by, that I will put thee in a cleft of the rock and will cover thee with my hand while I pass by.” Exodus 33:22.

It is absolutely amazing that God had to cover Moses to protect him from Himself. In simple terms, the power of radiation of God was too much for Moses’ eyes, so God simply hid him in a rock. The overshadowing always brings protection along with the main purpose for which God gives it.

“Be merciful unto me, O God, be merciful unto me: for my soul trusteth in thee; yea, in the shadow of thy wings will I make my refuge, until these calamities be overpast.” Psalm 57:1.

“For thou hast been a strength to the poor, a strength to the needy in his distress, a refuge from the storm, a shadow from the heat, when the blast of the terrible ones is as a storm against the wall.” Isaiah 25:4.

Here again, we see the double purpose of overshadowing. Not only is it a place of hiding, but in this scripture, it created strength to the poor.

“And, behold, I am with thee, and will keep thee in all places whither thou goest, and will bring thee again into this land; for I will not leave thee, until I have done that which I have spoken to thee of.” Genesis 28:15.

In 1st Corinthians 10:1-2, Paul writes in the Holy Ghost,

“Moreover, brethren, I would not that ye should be ignorant, how that all our fathers were under the cloud, and all passed through the sea; And were all baptized unto Moses in the cloud and in the sea.”

With every age, there is an overshadowing, and this must come forth within those overshadowed by the will of God for their time. We, therefore, in this time have an overshadowing, and this is the greatest of all the overshadowings of the past. They were only a type of that which God is bringing forth within us for our time and for all mankind.

(Excerpt from The Pattern, 2nd edition, 1995, pg. 150-151)

Thought for today: We, therefore, in this time have an overshadowing, and this is the greatest of all the overshadowings of the past.