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Posts Tagged ‘Five-Fold Ministry’

“My Sheep Hear My Voice”

Posted in Love of God, tagged , , , on October 25, 2021| Leave a Comment »

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Scripture reading: John 10:27-28

One day, I saw a brother, a prophet of God, moving in God in a meeting. Let me tell you something: hate can bar you from hearing God when God speaks. This brother got up and went over to a sister and put the finger on her. He just let loose the Word of God. Now, when somebody comes and prophesies to me, it would be so stupid for me to sit down and say, “He made that up. He heard somebody talk.” My God, you are killing yourself! You are committing spiritual murder! God spoke to that woman. I knew what he was saying; I knew more of what he was saying than anybody else in that congregation! What is five years or a few years? It is like a snap of the fingers to God. You make a wrong turn, you reject the Word of God, you reject God, you enter into hate, and you leave love behind you the moment you begin to say, “That man, the prophet, is this, and he is that and he is the other.” Don’t you understand that is the word of the devil to destroy the Word of God in the midst of His people?

God has promised that, at the end of time, He will bring forth the apostle, the prophet, the evangelist, the shepherd, and the teacher, and He will bring a five-fold ministry to massage the Body from head to foot to keep the Body, to bring the Body to life. Now, apostles have faults, human faults. Prophets have human faults. Evangelists have human faults. Shepherds have human faults. Teachers have human faults. So what the devil does is that he goes and picks out a fault and magnifies it. Magnifies it! After you finish talking about him, it is impossible to hear the Word of God and you have murdered yourself by the tongue, by talking about it, by unbelief. Now, another prophet comes and says, “Brother, you are blessed. You are wonderful. You are going to ride on high.” He prophesies and you accept that because he didn’t tell you what God was saying. He told you what was nice for him to tell you.

At one point in time, I was in the church, the denominational system. Remember now, we have come out of the church age. The tenure, the time that God gave the church to bring forth something is over. We have come out of that time and so God has given us another time – the Dispensation of the Fullness. He has given us the apostle, the prophet, the evangelist, the shepherd, the teacher and this is to bring the Body into perfection. Now, we have heard that but some of us don’t believe it. If you don’t believe it, you are one of those who are not hearing the voice of God. John 10:27-28 says, “My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me: 28 and I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand.” My sheep hear my voice. Some of us are not “My sheep.” Some of us are not in the “My sheep” because we won’t hear the voice of the Father.

Listen, brethren, the voice of God speaks in the Body from the smallest person in God to the greatest (whoever you think might be the greatest); the voice of God is speaking through them. You might say, “Howdy-do,” and that is the voice of God. The love of God comes out of that person. You feel a little down and somebody says, “God bless you, sister,” or may hug you and you feel the love of God. Amen. God is speaking in His Body and God’s Body is sending forth life, energy, love and we must get away from hate.

(Excerpt from The Omega Message, July 2005, pg. 46-47)

Thought for today: Don’t make any excuses. Hate is everything that falls less than love.

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Done by Man, but Done by God!

Posted in Christian Walk, tagged , , , on August 24, 2021| Leave a Comment »

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Scripture reading: 1 Samuel 17:48-51

1 Samuel 17:48-51 says, “And it came to pass, when the Philistine arose, and came and drew nigh to meet David, that David hasted, and ran toward the army to meet the Philistine. And David put his hand in his bag, and took thence a stone, and slang it, and smote the Philistine in his forehead, that the stone sunk into his forehead; and he fell upon his face to the earth. So David prevailed over the Philistine with a sling and with a stone, and smote the Philistine, and slew him; but there was no sword in the hand of David. Therefore David ran, and stood upon the Philistine, and took his sword, and drew it out of the sheath thereof, and slew him, and cut off his head therewith. And when the Philistines saw their champion was dead, they fled.”

Notice in this story that David went down to the brook and chose five stones. These five stones are a type of the five-fold ministry which God has put into the church: the apostle, the prophet, the evangelist, the shepherd, and the teacher. We find in Ephesians 4:11 that God has set this ministry in His church. The peculiar and marvelous thing in this story is that David did not use the five stones. He picked up five stones but he only used one. God knew beforehand that he would only need one yet God made him pick up five because five is the number of the ministry that God is going to use to bring down the Philistine, the Antichrist, the false prophet, and Babylon.

The whole picture of the image that Nebuchadnezzar saw in Daniel 2 is in living-action colors. It is depicted in Goliath, the mighty giant, whose spear was like a weaver’s beam. The man was nine to ten feet tall and he was brought down with ONE STONE. Notice that the stone smote him in “HIS FOREHEAD” and sank into his frontal lobe. It was more like a gunshot than a stone. I think the angel of God threw the stone. I do not think it was David’s arm although David did release the stone. The stone was blown by the angel of God right into Goliath’s forehead and smote him dead. The forehead is a type of the soul or the mind. Notice that this thing was DONE BY MAN but actually DONE BY GOD. Man was used of God. After all, the only time man really functions right is when he is used of God.

(Excerpt from The Book of Revelation, Volume 2, pages 211-212)

Thought for today: Let us remember, the only time that we function right is when we are used of God.

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Rise up and Do

Posted in Body of Christ, tagged , on October 23, 2020| Leave a Comment »

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Scripture reading: Psalm 40:7-8

As the days go by, we find God changing the word that comes forth. This is one of the reasons we cannot preach “canned” sermons, because the “can” would be producing the same thing that it produced last year. But we find the word changing and the clarity of it is increasing. Even the same old word is coming more alive. I believe you are finding the same thing: that there is liveliness about the word of God that is coming forth in the body of Christ.

The body of Christ must be alive. The body must minister. God does not have a class of people called ministers. Did you know that? He does not have a class of people called ministers. God has set in the body apostles, prophets, evangelists, shepherds and teachers. But where is the ministry? The ministry is in the body. This means there is no one who can come and say, “God sent me to minister to you,” unless he is a functioning part of the body. We are only different parts of the body of Christ. The finger is as alive as the toe, but the finger cannot do what the toe does; neither can the toe do what the finger does; but it is just as much alive.

God is directing us to an even more detailed understanding of what the body of Christ really is. He wants us to begin to walk in the body and live in the body. That is, if you cannot live as a body member, you are not of the body. We have too many dead members. Or, let’s put it a little better: members that will not exercise their rights to move and to live and to do what God wants us to do. In other words, God is feeding us more energy now; more life is coming forth now into the body than there was before, because this is the time when we are going to have to rise up and do.

(Excerpt from “Led of the Spirit”, Foundational Teachings #F077)

Thought for today: This is the time when we are going to have to rise up and do what God wants us to do.

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Believe in the Five-Fold Ministry

Posted in Body of Christ, tagged , , on August 3, 2020| Leave a Comment »

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Scripture reading: Ephesians 4:11-13

When I think of God, I cannot think of Him as a man, as a person. All I can think of is a BIG being, filling the whole space, and filling us. But I can think of Jesus as a man. Do you see how God is good for us? He gave us Someone Whom we can relate to. Now, if Jesus is a person, if Jesus is a man, you must approach Him as a person. I’ll never forget what happened when I prayed the first time, asked Jesus to come into my life and felt the quickening. That means that His blood had touched me; it touched my mind and touched my consciousness. Before that, I was not conscious of God, but now I am conscious of His presence.

The next thing that happened to me was that I said, “Jesus, why don’t You come and talk to me?” Now, I am not telling you to say that, because the devil might come and talk to you and you could believe that it was Jesus. That is, however, not supposed to be. The devil is not supposed to be able to talk to you and you believe it is Jesus. Do you know why? The Christ in you will not be happy. Amen. But the relationship between you and Jesus Christ must be such that you know that Jesus is a man, you speak to Him as a resurrected man, and you deal with Him and expect Him to respond to you as a man would respond to you. What kind of doctrine is that? That you would expect Jesus to respond to you as a man would respond to you?

You see, we have made a step backward. Let me tell you why. We were going upward to believe that God has a five-fold ministry in the heavenlies, in the spirit. Jesus Christ is in the five-fold ministry or the left hand, in the natural, among us. But what I have noticed is that we have started not to believe in the five-fold ministry any more. We have started to believe in our abilities to do.

Now, if you have a pastor in your midst, immediately you would have rejected the five-fold ministry, because the five-fold ministry doesn’t have any pastor in it. Those who occupy the place of the shepherd would be too busy shepherding to be able to be fooling around and doing anything else. There is a problem that I see and I don’t know if it is as if you have forgotten, or if you want to be like another church or something, but I don’t see the function of the five-fold ministry. I don’t see the function of the prophet in your midst. As a matter of fact, if the prophet should function, you probably wouldn’t believe it. I don’t see the function of the evangelist. I don’t see anybody evangelizing anything. If the evangelists had the spirit of the evangelist, they would be praying and God would be sending people into your fellowships. Amen. “But why should I leave my church over there with my pastor and come to your gathering with the same function?”

I don’t see the function of the five-fold ministry. You don’t function in the five-fold ministry anymore. I don’t know if you understand what I am talking about. Every ministry of these five-fold has branches in the church among the people. In other words, Christ is working in you. Amen. As Christ is working in you and among you, He will give one a vision; He will give another a dream; He will give somebody something to uplift the brethren. But if I dream that you become a dog and start barking and bite up everybody in the place, what profit is that to everybody? God is telling us to run for our lives, the dog is coming. Don’t you understand? The ministration of the Spirit is to profit withal. If the Spirit of the prophet is in you, you will find that as you begin to function, there will be many more that will be functioning and together it will bring life and not death.

(Excerpt from Keeping in Touch, December 2007, pg. 9-10)

Thought for today: Let us believe in the five-fold ministry that God has in the Earth and not in our abilities to do.

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The Ministry of the Teacher

Posted in Doctrine of God, tagged , , , , on June 15, 2020| Leave a Comment »

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Scripture reading: 1 Timothy 2:7

A congregation can appoint a teacher, but it cannot give him/her a ministry. God alone sets ministries in the body. The ministry of the teacher must come directly from God. From my own experience, when God tells me what to tell His people, He tells me how to tell it. I teach sometimes with a chalkboard, and the drawings I put on the board are those things which I see in the Spirit.

There are, however, many, many different administrations of the Spirit. Although God deals with me in this way, He may deal with someone else in an entirely different way, BUT with the same result – His people will get the message, and it will be directed by Him.

There are ministries with the same name as gifts of the Spirit, but the ministry is different from the gift. The gift is the manifestation of the Holy Ghost within the believer, working whatever gift God sees fit to bring forth through the individual.

On the other hand, the ministry is a special and more powerful endowment to the church. The minister, therefore, is the gift of God to the church. His endowment is not his own. He cannot preach where he wills, do what he wants, but as an important part of God’s machinery, he must move when and where God wants him to move or go.

Every human being is capable of some gift of the Spirit if he or she surrenders to God, but not everyone is an anointed preacher of Christ. It must be remembered that every believer, as part of a body, is a ministering, functioning part. In a sense, everyone who is born of God is expected to work with the ministry in one capacity or another. Without these sinews of the body, the ministries could not function effectively.

These are the five bars of the tabernacle.

We should not forget one important observation. The golden rings which hold the bars are attached to the gold on the boards, thus signifying that the nature of God in the body is that which holds the ministry, and not the ministry or minister holding the congregation.

(Excerpt from The Pattern, pg. 80-81)

Thought for today: The nature of God in the body is that which holds the ministry, and not the ministry or minister holding the congregation.

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