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Scripture reading: Revelation 2:1-7

We have totally lost sight of Jesus Christ and what He stands for, where He has put us from the very beginning, from the foundation of the world, and the gospel. We need to get back to our first love. Our first love might not necessarily be anything pertaining to the church. When we accepted Jesus as our Saviour, there was a freshness in our first love. If you never had this experience, if never a change came over you, if never the sky looked bluer, if never the earth looked more glorious, if never the peace of God came over you, if never the glory of God came over you – YOU HAVE NOT YET RECEIVED THAT WHICH JESUS CHRIST DIED FOR. Jesus died in order that we might be SAVED. The word saved means reconditioned, reborn, delivered from the thing we were when we were first born of our mothers. We must have a renewing of the mind, a renewing of the spirit, a deliverance from what we were before.

This salvation needs to grow. Many have said that they have received Jesus as their Saviour, are all right, are going to heaven, and can freely do anything they please. This is not salvation. Salvation is a continuous experience, having a beginning and an end. If you turn to Ephesians 1:11-14, you will see that the Word speaks about the end of your salvation. Notice the progression:

11 In whom also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestinated according to the purpose of him who worketh all things after the counsel of his own will: 12 That we should be to the praise of his glory, who first trusted in Christ. 13 In whom ye also trusted, AFTER that ye heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation: in whom also AFTER that ye believed, ye were sealed with that holy Spirit of promise, 14 Which is the earnest of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession, unto the praise of his glory.

Many people do not believe in this progression in God. God is a God of progress and growth. If you are born again, you must grow. You MUST begin to move from that born again position into things higher and into things deeper. Nobody has to preach to you and say that you must do this, and you must talk in tongues, and you must prophesy. Those things do not have to be preached to the true child of God who is following Jesus Christ. The Scripture tells you certain things happen to you as you grow in Christ, but if you do not grow, then you will not have the signs of growth. Some people say that when you receive Jesus as your Saviour, you receive everything. Without going into too much detail, I will say that when you receive Jesus, you receive HIS LIFE to counteract the death that was in you.

God could not do business with a dead man. Therefore, He had to save you, resurrect you, and bring you to the same place where He made Adam. Adam was made a living soul, and you were a dead soul. Dead means you could not respond to God. You could slap or pinch a dead man, you could shout in his ear, but he is dead. That is how God felt towards you for God shouted at you many times. God would touch your body, shake you, wake you up many times but you could not respond to God because you were dead. Now God took some of His life and put it into you through the Blood of Jesus Christ and you became a LIVING SOUL. The Blood of Jesus hovers over the whole world. You can call upon His name and receive His Blood and the Blood quickens you. That is how you know you are saved. No one needs to tell you to say a few words and if you say them right you are saved. This is not a password business that if you say the right password, then you get saved. Nothing of the kind! Sometimes you can get saved by not speaking a word, but just submitting your soul before God and the Spirit of God will come and give you what you ask for. Salvation, therefore, is a quickening of the spirit and a bringing to life of the individual.

When that individual comes alive, he wants living food. Adam was alive but he died because he did not have the Christ. He had neither the Holy Ghost nor the Blood. The Blood first, then the Holy Ghost and then the Christ. This is the right order. After you have been saved, you get the Blood in your soul. When you receive the Holy Ghost, you do not receive the Holy Ghost in your soul. You receive the Holy Ghost in your spirit. The scripture says in Romans 8:16, The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God.

Those people who have the Spirit of God have within themselves a witness of God that they are the sons of God – little sons of God. Not little gods, but sons of God. Praise be to God.

(Excerpt from The Book of Revelation, Volume 1, pg. 29-31)

Thought for today: Are you growing higher and deeper in God? Remember, God is a God of progress and growth and those that are His must grow in Him.

He That Overcometh

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Scripture reading: Revelation 2:8-11

We find the church being split in two. Part of them will overcome and the other part will not overcome. There are overcomers and there are losers. Sometimes words do not convey the strength of meaning to us when we hear them. For instance, you hear the word overcomers and you wonder to yourself what is to be overcome. Overcomers first of all overcome their own natures. They overcome the mind of the world, the mind of the flesh, the mind they inherited from their families, and they overcome strong emotions. If you do not overcome your emotions and have them under control, then they will overcome you and destroy you. Overcomers overcome their own will and their own desires.

This is a battle royal when a person overcomes himself through the Blood of Jesus Christ and the power which God has given. For indeed, the Spirit of God has given us power to overcome familiar spirits, old family ties, things that pull us down and make us losers. We are not to go out and overcome other people. We need to overcome the flesh, the devil, and the world. This is what we mean by “he that overcometh.“

I John 2:15-17, Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him. 16 For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world. 17 And the world passeth away, and the lust thereof: but he that doeth the will of God abideth for ever.

What is the love of the world? One day I went to the supermarket and observed the people. They all looked alike. I knew somehow that some Christians had come in, but there was no difference between the way the Christians looked and the way the sinners looked. They all seemed to be part of the sexual revolution. They were showing as much of their bodies as they could, both men and women, young and old. The mind of the flesh had been ministered from Hollywood, Paris, London, and from other fashion places to the minds of these people. The people have become one with this mind of demonic spirits that control the world.

We must realize that the ways of the world, the thoughts of the world, the emotions of the world, and the desires of the world ARE NOT OF GOD. The people of God ARE EXPECTED to resist these things and to be different. It is difficult, but the Holy Spirit in us will help us to be different. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him.

We have many songs that say, “I love you, Lord Jesus” and the songs are so beautiful. When you hear the people of God singing, you hope and wish their love was true but there is very little truth in it, because those who love the world do not love God. The quicker we realize we do not love God, the quicker we will come to repentance and say, “Oh God, I have discovered that I love the world and I do not love you. Give me Your love.” God will pour out His Spirit upon you. “He that overcometh shall not be hurt of the second death.” This is the promise to the overcomer.

(Excerpt from The Book of Revelation, Volume 1, pg. 36-37)

Thought for today: Remember it is your own nature that you must overcome in order to be the overcomer.

Feed the Flock

This message entitled “Feed the Flock“ was given by Brother Cecil duCille in May 1983.

For more audio messages please visit Audio Messages – Foundational Teachings.

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Scripture reading: Mark 12:30

God says in John 14:15, “If ye love me, keep my commandments.”

This is the first rule we were given, the first law: Love God. “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, with all thy soul, with all thy strength.” (Mark 12:30) In order to love God, you must love Him as number one in your life; that is what He means. In other words, God is not saying that you have a mighty capacity to love like God loves. Your love might be like a little thimble in comparison to a big ocean, but if you put God first, if God is number one in your life, then you love God as much as God wants you to love Him. Do you understand? God is not asking you to do any impossible tasks. All He is asking you to do is to love Him as number one.

A little girl once said, “I love you, I love you way up in the sky.” Amen. She knew above her head was Number One. God wants you to have Him as number one.

Brethren, let us think about “number one” for a while. Many times God takes second place in our lives because we have other things that we count more important. The reason why you come to the meetings is not because you didn’t have anything else to do. Many of us have many other things to do and we could do them, we could enjoy these other things, but because we have a priority upon one thing, then we use the time to do that one thing. Sometimes you are tired; sometimes you are upset; sometimes you are in no condition to come to service, but to you it is important and so you sweep everything away and put it as number one. But there are other times when number one is something else for us. We are temper-mental – sometimes God is number one in our lives and sometimes He is not. We need to have a steady understanding. I would encourage you to take the Bible and read the law of the firstfruits. God has placed this law in the Bible because through it He is telling you that He should be number one. So whereas the Israelites would have firstfruits once a year, or in case of animals several times a year when the animals had their offspring, you have it every day. Your firstfruit is an everyday thing that God is giving you.

Every morning you say, “God…” When you go to bed at night you say, “God…” At midday it is, “God…” It is “God…” all through the day. If you notice the scripture says in Daniel that Daniel used to pray every morning, every midday and every evening. The Jews were taught to pray in the morning and at sunset. You are in a different order; you are called to something entirely different. God said, “Pray without ceasing.” It means that when you are going to do so and so, you say, “God…be with me.” You start to think about something and you say, “God…” Even in your dreams you will dream God first because it is ingrained, it is marked, it is carved in you like a carving on a chair. It is cut in, carved into your consciousness and your soul will come out with the brand of Jesus first. That is, if you continue to practice God first.

(Excerpt from “Led of the Spirit”, Foundational Teachings #077)

Thought for today: In order to love God, you must love Him as number one in your life.

The Jawbone of an Ass

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Scripture reading: Judges 15:9-17

Let us look at the following story today: Samson, after destroying the corn fields of the Philistines, went into a rock Etam, stayed there and the Philistines came to arrest him. I trust you understand that I am not talking about Samson. What am I talking about then? I am talking about the church hiding in the rock. And I am talking about the brethren of the church who give up the others. Some of us give up the others. Some of us are weak, afraid of the enemy. The Israelites went up, arrested Samson and delivered him to the Philistines; the church delivering up church.

So the Israelites bound Samson with new cords, took him down and delivered him over to the Philistines so that the Philistines would not hurt them. The church system is about ready to deliver those who are different from them, who won’t conform to their ways. Deliver them up to the world to be destroyed.

Samson went down bound before the Philistines. The Philistines began to celebrate their victory and God said, “They shouted against Samson and against God.” I want you to understand that a shout symbolizes a certain going forth of energy in whatever you are doing. They were praising their god for giving them Samson. Now remember that I am not talking about Samson. They shouted against him and the Bible recorded that when they shouted, God came upon him. In other words, Samson needed a move of God to move. God is saying that we need the move and when we feel the move, we must move. When this move hit Samson, the Bible said that the ropes were burned as if by fire. The fire of the Holy Ghost is going to lose your bands and set you free. And when your bands are loosed, you must know what to do; you must do the right thing. The first thing Samson did was to look around for a weapon, something to fight with. There was an old dead jackass. His bones were bleached white, bleached dry bones, and there was his jawbone.

Let us look at the spiritual meanings of all this: Samson means the body of Christ; the rope is the bondage that they have put upon us; His brethren are the other Christians who don’t like us. So what is the jawbone of an ass?

Your Bible is a beautiful, marvelous book. There is no book like it in the world. When you read your Bible, you know it could not be written by a man. Moreover, there were several men that God used to write it and there was no way those men could have gotten together to discuss it, because they lived in different ages of time. Go in your Bible and read about the jackass. The first reference I can think of is in the law – the firstfruits belong to God. You must take the firstfruits of your field and carry them to God. You must take the first animal you have from the doe, or she-ass, or anything else and it belongs to God. But God doesn’t want a jackass to be offered up as a sacrifice. So what do you do with the jackass? You redeem it with a lamb. If you don’t redeem the ass, then you must break its neck, because it belongs to the Lord.

When you take that right along, you will see that the ass is referring to you. We are the ass and God says that “out of the mouth of babes and suckling He hath ordained strength” (Psalm 8:2). In the end time, God shows a picture of a sharp two-edged sword coming out of the mouth of the church and destroying his enemy. In Revelation 11 we see the two witnesses and the fire, the word of their mouth, was coming out to destroy their enemies. So you want to know now what the jawbone of a jackass is? God is talking about our mouth! Oh, yes! Samson said, “With the jawbone of an ass, heaps upon heaps, with the jaw of an ass have I slain a thousand men.” (Jg 15:16) The ass is redeemed. The ass was bleached dry bone, but it was redeemed by Samson picking it up in the name of the Lord. And he slew 1,000 men with the jawbone of an ass.

So we see God doing something in our time. Samson couldn’t do anything unless the Lord came down on him. God had to give him a special anointing for every job he was going to do. Brethren, it is the same with you. If you think that you can get up and run out there and do your own thing, you are making a sad mistake. We must have that special anointing of God to do what we need to do, but we have to understand that He has certain rules by which the anointing is given and we must go by these rules.

(Excerpt from “Led of the Spirit”, Foundational Teachings #077)

Thought for today: God has certain rules by which the anointing is given and we must go by these rules.