Oklahoma City Churches

Don Keesee

There is a great transforming truth embedded in John 14—one that has changed the world and will change it much more if believers grasp it. Let me explain. Here Jesus tells us that it is the Father speaking through Him and that it is the Father in Him doing the works He has been doing. Jesus is the Messiah. He is God the Son. Yet, it was the Father in Him doing the great works we see Jesus doing, including the buying back of humankind. The Father did these things. Jesus paid the ultimate price with His life. Yet, the Father led Him to do that also.

Jesus' power came as the Father worked through Him, for the Father was in Him. Well, in verses 15-17, we see the great “secret” to living our own lives on earth in a powerful way: As God the Father was in Jesus and did all those great works through Him, so God is in us and is willing to do great works through us. It is all His power doing the works and none of our own. Yet, we do now have to allow Him to do these things. We can choose to be passive about it and nothing will happen. But if we look to God, getting to know Him, looking to Him for leading, we will see great things happen. There is so much more to what God is willing to do in us than many of us have realized. If we actively seek Him and His ways, realizing that it is Him doing the works, we will see great miracles take place. This world needs great miracles right now, and God is willing to do these works through you.

Through Jesus death and resurrection, bringing a New Covenant with us, God brought us new life—eternal life. He transformed us into new creations, children of the Living God. He does the works in us as He did through God the Son, Jesus the Messiah. He is ready to work His great power in us. So now we can understand verse 12, a truth difficult to grasp without this God-inside-us understanding:

12: Truly, truly, I say to you, the one who believes on Me, the works that I do, he will do also, and greater works than these will he do, because I go to my Father.

We believe on Jesus the Messiah, God comes inside us, and through us, if we actively allow Him, believing Him to do it, He works great things through us as He did through Jesus. We do not have to believe that we can do things things—for we cannot. Rather, we simply believe that He can, that He will.

John 14:10-17:

10: Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father in me? The words that I speak to you I do not speak of myself, but the Father who dwells in me, He does the work.
11: Believe Me that I am in the Father and the Father in Me, or else believe me for the very works' sake.
12: Truly, truly, I say to you, the one who believes on Me, the works that I do, he will do also, and greater works than these will he do, because I go to my Father.
13: And whatever you ask in My name, that will I do that the Father may be glorified in the Son.
14: If you ask any thing in My name, I will do it.

15: If you love Me, keep My commandments.
16: And I will pray the Father, and He will give you another Comforter, that He may abide with you forever, 17: Even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it doesn't see Him, neither knows Him. But you know him, for He dwells with you and will be in you.

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1) Believe what God said 2) Don't Fear 3) See the glory of God come in

Here is a key that I believe will bring a needed miracle into a person's life: “Believe, don't fear, and then see the glory of God come.” Here is a passage about the raising of Lazarus from death:

38: Jesus therefore again groaning in Himself came to the grave. It was a cave, and a stone lay upon it. 39: Jesus said, “Take away the stone.” Martha, the sister of the one who was dead, said to him, “Lord, by this time he smells bad, for he has been dead four days.” 40: Jesus said to her, “Did I not say to you that if you would believe, you would see the glory of God?” (John 11:38-40).

We know Jesus believed. And it appears that Martha also believed. Earlier, after telling Jesus that Lazarus would not have died if He had been there, she said: "But I know, that even now, whatever You will ask of God, God will give it to You.” But the point is that here we have the key to opening the door to the glory of God to come into earthly situations: Believe. Believe Jesus' words. Believe in His ability. Believe that God has made you the righteousness of God in Jesus Christ and therefore you can stand before your Father and fully expect your prayers offered in His will to be answered. Believe and see the glory of God.

Jesus and apparently Martha believed, and they saw the glory of God manifest itself on earth. Lazarus came back from death. He had been dead, but now he was walking out of the tomb. The glory of God showed itself through this great miracle. It created a stir. It seems that we in the Church world are always wanting there to be a stir so that God's Kingdom will spread further throughout the earth. To see that, we need to open the door for the glory of God to come into people's situations. How do we do this? Believe. Believe Jesus' words. Don't doubt but believe. And about the don't doubt part of this . . . .

In Luke 8, Jairus just found out his twelve-year-old daughter had died. Jesus immediately spoke to this man who with all his heart wanted his daughter back: “Fear not, believe only, and she will be made well.” Fear, anxiety, doubt—it is all of a piece. It is anti-faith, faith that God will not manifest the glory. Faith that the bad thing will happen. But if a person just places himself right on top of Jesus' words and/or the words of the rest of the Bible (which are also from Him) and believes them only, not doubting, not fearing, the glory of God will come in.

To break through to where we have never been or to the place where need to be, we simply don't move off standing upon God's perspective, off from what He said. We hold to Him and and refuse to hold onto fear. We keep standing on that “territory” not on fear. We hold to Him and His words only and the glory of God will come into the situation, the miracle comes. I am not talking abstractions. I have seen this happen as many of you have. Believe, don't fear, and in comes the glory of God.

Doing this may be a fight. Surely Martha had a lot of doubt coming at her mind. She was concerned about Lazarus's body's smell. But the glory manifested. We can have doubts assail our minds but keep believing with our hearts. The truth is that if we don't fear and believe only in our hearts, the answer will come. The glory of God will come. There is a way to hold to the word and release fear. Actually the Word drives it out of our hearts. It may take some repetition. It may take some holding on when it seems there is no answer coming. But the answer will come. The glory of God will come in. the miracle will come.

(Please see the audio (podcast) section below for an audio on this teaching. Just clink the link below, then click on the audio when you get to that site. The audio will play automatically. Feel free to make CD's of any of the audios: Click "download" on the audio site, which will open up the audio on Windows Media Player, or your preferred player. Once it is the audio playing, click on "burn." Or burn a CD from iTunes.)

Jesus had friends. Yes, He spent time alone with the Father. I am sure He did this a great deal, spending more time with Him than anyone else. But, of course, very often we see him with people talking, interacting—the twelve apostles and many others. He had friendships with other people than the disciples. Jesus went very deep in conversations with the people He came across as He traveled along, even though He had just met them. And He had very deep and rich relationships with the people we could call His friends.

Jesus loved people and He loved to be with them. He was moved by compassion to help them. Jesus is moved by agape, God's love. For He is God the Son. And we know that as Hebrews 1 says, He is the exact representation of God. We can learn what God the Father is like by seeing what Jesus, God the Son is like.

Now a certain man was sick, named Lazarus, of Bethany, the town of Mary and her sister Martha. 2: (It was the Mary who anointed the Lord with ointment and wiped His feet with her hair, whose brother Lazarus was sick.) (John 11:1-2)

In John 11 and in other places in the Bible, we see very clearly and assuredly that God deeply loves people. He loves to be around them. He loves to have deep relationships with them. He doesn't want to be separated from them, being far away. He wants to be close to them. What the New Testament teaches is that through the Holy Spirit God is right here with us, inside us if we want Him to be. And He loves to communicate with us. He talks. He listens. We see Him interacting in this way with people in the New Testament, and if we are open to Him, we will experience this interaction of love—His communing with us—in the same way.

In this chapter we see some of Jesus' friends—Mary, Martha, and Lazarus. Mary is a very interesting person. John tells us that she was the one (In John 12) who anoints the Lord with ointment and wipes His feet with her hair. Obviously, her devotion to Jesus was very strong. She is locked in on Him and not so much on what people think of her. This is amazingly important in the whole scheme of things in the Kingdom of Heaven.

In the famous passage where Mary is sitting at Jesus feet hearing him speak and Martha scolds Mary for not helping her serve, Jesus says this:

Martha, Martha, you are anxious and troubled about many things. 42 But one thing is needed, and Mary has chosen that good part, which shall not be taken away from her. (Luke 10:41b-42)

Mary seems to know how to lock in on Jesus and His Word. She shows that here. The one thing that is needed is hearing what God has to say and following Him. It is getting out of anxiety and onto God and His word, His Kingdom. “Seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness and all these things will be added to you.” If we really trust God and His word, we have no reason to let ourselves fall into anxiety, for it works against faith—the thing that brings God's power into our lives, the answers we need, the things we need. Mary appears to understand the most important thing—seek the Kingdom first.

Seeking the Kingdom is the key, then. But what is the key to seeking the Kingdom? It is relationship. Relationship with God. From what we have seen so far, Mary appears to be very close to Jesus. This is how we seek the Kingdom. We come into close relationship with Him, speaking with Him on a deep level, hearing His Word on a deep level.

Throughout the Bible and throughout history, those who sought the Kingdom first were precisely those people who got to know God better and better, putting that relationship first. The priority in their lives was walking with God in deeper and deeper ways, communing with Him, believing His word above all else. Seeking the Kingdom first is putting first one's seeking to know God and His Word.

Mary seemed to be quite special to Jesus. Why? She was special because she had chosen the best part, chosen to seek God and His Kingdom above all, chosen to lay aside worry and develop a relationship with God, as she had God the Son, the Messiah right there with her.

Could it be that beliefs embedded deeply in believers are walls that make it more difficult for others to come into the Kingdom? Yes. Because some things we wrongly believe cause us to project an image of God that is not really the image of God. In the the verses we call "The Lord's Prayer," Jesus says to pray to the Father, "Our Father who is in heaven, hallowed be your Name." The Father's name represents all that he is. It represents the way he is. So his Name which represents all he is should be spoken of as holy. It should be reverenced. All he is and what he is really like should be as clearly as possible. Jesus, God the Son, came to redeem us and also to show the world what the Father is like. Yet, we sometimes present an image of God that doesn't look very much like him.

One time Jesus siad this of some people who did not believe in him: "But you do not believe because you are not of my sheep," Should we take this to mean that some people cannot come to God even if they want to? No. Yet, how then do we understand John 6:44 which says, “No one can come to me, except the Father who has sent me draws him, and I will raise him up at the last day”? After all, there there does seem to be here some sort of predestination of people outside the Kingdom. We see something similar in John 6:37: “All that the Father gives me will come to me, and the one who comes to me, I will in no way cast out.”

Well, the only way I can see that we can blend these passages with the principle in Rev. 22:17b-- "Whosoever will may come, and whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely"-- is to consider what it is that moves the Holy Spirit to draw a person to the Father. I would like to suggest that it is a sincere heart really wanting to find God. In other words, if you decide in your heart to really find God, you will find him. Jeremiah 29:13 confirms this: “And you will seek me and find me, when you search for me with all your heart.” Also, Proverbs 8:17 give us basically the same truth: “I love those who love me; And those who diligently seek me will find me” (NASB).

Now, we can see that all these passages harmonize with 2 Peter 3:9: "The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness but is longsuffering toward us, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance." (The people Peter is speaking about are people of the world coming to God, not the "beloved" (dear friends) of verse 1, who are believers to whom Peter is attempting to explain God's longsuffering towards unbelievers, as before the flood). It also helps us harmonize the verses above with John 3:16: "For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have everlasting life."

There is really a big problem in the church and, of course, in the world: not seeing God as he is, as he says he is. Our view of God the Father colors our whole lives. In John 10, Jesus says that he is the Good Shepherd. Most of us believe it. But is the Father good like that? Is he really looking after our best interests? If we do not believe this very deep down in our beings, we will have problems following him. Is the Father like the Son, the Good Shepherd?

John 10 talks about our ability as his sheep to hear him. The sheep know his voice. We are able to hear. We are able to follow. But even though we are free will creations, we can choose, for whatever reasons we may have, to turn off our hearing to the Holy Spirit and turn it on to the many voices in the world. But why would a person do this? We can hear God, so why not listen to him and follow him?

Well, there are many possible reasons a person might turn away from listening to God. One big one is this: We sometimes do not really trust that God has a plan for each of us that is the best thing for our lives. The truth is that he is a loving Father, better than any earthly one, however good that earthly father might be. Jesus clearly tells us this (Luke 11:13; Matthew 6:24-33). Yet, doubts have made their way into our minds.

All our lives we have heard things to the contrary, that God is not really like Jesus after all. The voices of the world have said this, and those voices have mixed themselves into the voices of the churches sometimes. These thoughts go deep inside. They make our souls ill, so to speak.

So what is the cure for this sickness? It is so very simple. Jesus said that when you see him, you see the Father. In other words, Jesus, God the Son, gives us a perfect image of the Father. In Jesus, we see exactly what the Father is like. So is the real image of the Father in the New Testament one of a loving heavenly Father who would do anything to help us and nothing to hurt us or one of a harsh God who is always after us, always looking for a way to make us stumble? The former, of course.

So we actually have been told what the Father is like. We really do know we can trust Him with our lives, that we can follow him. We really know that he is exactly like Jesus. What were Jesus' reactions to the problems people around him had? He fixed those problems. If this sounds too good to be true to us, then we have to change our image of the Father deep inside, lining it up with the image of him Jesus gave us. He said that when you see him, you see the Father.

The Father is just as Jesus portrayed him in his own life on earth, in what he said and in what he did and simply in the way he was. He is just as Jesus revealed Him to be in the parable of the Prodigal Son in Luke 15. Let's go home to the Father. Jesus is the Good Shepherd. And the Father is just like him. Getting this truth firmly in our spirits can change everything for us. Ω

A huge problem: not seeing God as he is, as he says he is. Our view of God the Father colors our whole lives. In John 10, Jesus says that he is the Good Shepherd. Most of us believe it. But is the Father good like that? Is he really looking after our best interests? If we do not believe this very deep down in our beings, we will have problems following him. Is the Father like the Son, the Good Shepherd.

John 10 talks about our ability as his sheep to hear him. The sheep know his voice. We are able to hear. We are able to follow. But even though we are free will creations, we can choose, for whatever reasons we may have, to turn off our hearing to the Holy Spirit and turn it on to the many voices in the world. But why would a person do this? We can hear God, so why not listen to him and follow him?

Well, there are many possible reasons a person might turn away from listening to God. One big one is this: We sometimes do not really trust that God has a plan for each of us that is the best thing for our lives. The truth is that he is a loving Father, better than any earthly one, however good that earthly father might be. Jesus clearly tells us this (Luke 11:13; Matthew 6:24-33). Yet, doubts have made their way into our minds. All our lives we have heard things to the contrary, that God is not really that way after all. The voices of the world have said otherwise. And those voices have mixed themselves into the voices of the churches sometimes. These thoughts go deep inside.

So what is the cure for this sickness? It is so very simple. Jesus said that when you see him, you see the Father. In other words, Jesus, God the Son, gives us a perfect image of the Father. In Jesus, we see exactly what the Father is like. So is the real image of the Father in the New Testament one of a loving heavenly Father who would do anything to help us and nothing to hurt us or one of a harsh God who is always after us, always looking for a way to make us stumble? The former, of course. We really do know what the Father is like, after all. We really do know we can trust Him with our lives, that we can follow him. We really know that he is exactly like Jesus.

What were Jesus' reactions to the problems people around him had? He fixed those problems. If this sounds too good to be true to us, then we have to change our image of the Father deep inside, lining it up with the image of him Jesus gave us. He said that when you see him, you see the Father. The Father is just as Jesus portrayed him in his own life on earth. He is just as Jesus revealed Him to be in the parable of the Prodigal Son in Luke 15. Let's go home to the Father. Jesus is the Good Shepherd. And the Father is just like him. Getting this truth firmly in our spirits can change everything for us.

♥

When the Kingdom of God comes on the scene, people's worlds are upset. It's the nature of the Kingdom to do this. And what is it about the Kingdom that causes things to get upset like this? Truth. Kingdom power, authority. God's truth comes in contact with the world's purported truth and trumps it, causing major problems.

Despite the witness of the man in the following passage from John 9, some people there still do not believe that this man had been blind and received his sight. But all along in this confrontation, the main focus is on Jesus, not on the man who Jesus healed.

John 9:17-23

17: They said to the blind man again, "What do you say about Him, since He has opened your eyes? He said, "He is a prophet."

18: But the Jews did not believe concerning him, that he had been blind and received his sight until they called the parents of him who had received his sight. (The parents came and substantiateh his story.)

Once the parents of the man who was born blind and healed by Jesus substantiate that he was, in fact, born blind, the questions go right back to ones about Jesus. It is Jesus who was upsetting their world, and would upset it much more in days to come.

We see it said here that to no one's knowledge had there been a report in history of anyone healed who had been born blind. But the truth of the Kingdom is that when the Kingdom comes such things happen. This caused a great problem because leaders and others had a great deal of trouble with the fact that a man who they did not approve of was doing such amazing miracles. It pushed them toward considering the possibility that this man was from God, something they did not wish to consider.

This miracle (and others like it) shook the world of the Pharisees. It made them very uncomfortable for it challenged their understanding of what was true and not true. It challenged their "truth" about whom the Messiah could be. They wanted a Messiah that believed the way they did, not one who challenged their religious belief. They had let themselves be set in traditional concrete and had great difficulties changing their thinking. The truth that Jesus was the Messiah came in direct conflict with what most of the leaders of the nation thought the truth was-i.e., that the Messiah would not be like Jesus, who challenged their reverently held traditional beliefs. But the great miracles Jesus was doing challenged them to consider this possibility. Yet many of them simply refused and made up weak excuses for not doing so.

Jesus spent His ministry going around the country bringing the real truth of God to people. It simply didn't fit right with human thinking and traditions, and conflict was the result. And here, there is strong conflict. Jesus is in Jerusalem and He is dealing with the nation's leaders. God the Son is there with them. There is confrontation of a very powerful kind. The story is authenticated, and the leaders are trying to deal with that news. They do not know what to do with the facts, for they so much wish to repudiate them. But a great miracle has taken place. They do not know what to do except reject it.

Jesus brought the Kingdom with Him. He shared Kingship of the Kingdom of God with the Father and the Holy Spirit. When Jesus came, the Kingdom light shone very clearly upon the earth (Matthew 4:12-17; Isaiah 9:1-2). And again and again it came in conflict with religious beliefs of people who had a great deal of worldly thinking mixed into their beliefs-thinking that bound them, that set them in mental and spiritual concrete. But the truth would set free everyone who would accept it ("You will know the truth and the truth will make you free" (John 8:32). People need to accept the greatest truth-that Jesus is the Messiah, God the Son. And after this, they need to accept more and more truth of the Kingdom to make it through life. We are now children of God seated with Christ in heaven-right now. We need to live as Jesus did by living on earth in the power of heaven. We are to live not by the world's material and spiritual resources by heaven's promises. As we study the Word (as we are doing now) we learn about how to do this.

In chapter 7, Jesus made a statement that we have dealt with several times; it contains a great truth in the Kingdom of God: "Do not judge according to the appearance, but judge righteous judgment" (7:24). True judgment comes when we look below the surface, when we do not automatically go by our first take, particularly if that first take is framed by thinking that was influenced by the thinking of the world. This was the mistake the Pharisees made over and over. It is one that we can also make even after we become a believer in Jesus. We can let strongholds of erroneous thought in ourselves block of from getting to the truth of a matter. We can look right at the Word and fail to see what it is clearly saying.

We can just keep on judging by appearance if we want to get to the truth. But what should we do? We should keep digging in openness to the Holy Spirit. Keep looking at the Word with an open mind and an open heart to the truth. If we keep going, we will get beyond our prejudices to the next thing God wants to reveal to us. Our strongholds of wrong thinking, of wrong believing, will fall away from us like old grave clothes. Life is largely about getting from point A to point B. Working in the Word and while following the Holy Spirit takes us to point B.

The Pharisees do not go very deep here in John 9:

15: Then again the Pharisees also asked him how he had received his sight. He said to them, "He put clay on my eyes, and I washed, and I see." 16: Therefore, some of the Pharisees said, "This man is not of God, because he does not keep the Sabbath." Others said, "How can a man who is a sinner do such miracles? And there was a division among them.

They apparently were using only one litmus test: "keeping" the Sabbath. If they would only go deeper, if they would only seek God, they would find that the Messiah is above the Sabbath and that the Sabbath was made for mankind, not vice versa. So if possibly this man is the Messiah, there is no Sabbath problem. And if they followed God deeper still, they would discover that Jesus is the Messiah and is God the Son. The Holy Spirit would witness this to them as He revealed it to Peter at some point, Jesus telling Peter that not a human but God Himself had revealed the identity of Jesus to him (Matthew 16:17). And if they accepted this, they would live forever.

The Pharisees short circuit their own path to God by ending their search with their Sabbath problem. An amazing sign had occurred. They could search out the source of the power that performed it. But they do not. Many people in the world do this. They let some stumbling stone block their way to Jesus. "Seek and you will find," Jesus tells us. Yet, unbelievers are not the only ones who stop short of receiving God's revelation for them. There is a much deeper life in the Holy Spirit than most of us live. But we must keep seeking to find it, not selling ourselves short by stopping our search in any area of the Christian life. Some of we believers hear people teach things we do not agree with and we turn off our minds and hearts not even asking God and searching the Scriptures to see if what we are hearing is really in the Word.

There is a great life in the Kingdom of God waiting for us, much greater than we have known. So much greater. We simply need to keep going deeper into the Kingdom life God gives us and live it out more and more fully. The Kingdom of God way is the way of seeking to know God better and better. And He has given us a way to do this: Seek and you will find.

The world is filled with universities, great centers of learning of many kinds. But, actually, how great are these institutions, or any educational institution? Education is a very helpful thing, but if the highest area of education is left out, the rest is of much less value to students. We see in John 7 what the highest kind of learning is. It is learning from God Himself. He will teach us by the Holy Spirit. He does this through the help of others and directly. And a person is in great spiritual poverty without this. A Harvard education could help some people, to be sure, but if a person got a Harvard education without also getting a Holy Spirit education, he or she would be taking on the essence of poverty.

Jesus had a Holy Spirit education and it showed. Here people marvel at His learning: "14 Now at about the middle of the feast, Jesus went up into the temple and taught. 15And the Jews marveled, saying, ‘How does this man have learning, having never studied?'16 Jesus answered them, saying, ‘My doctrine is not Mine, but His who sent Me'" (John 7:14-16). Later in the chapter the temple officers say, "No one ever spoke like this Man" (7:46b). He spoke out of the learning He tells us about here. His Father taught Him (the words being from the One who sent Him, He says). We have a similar possibility open to us. So many believers barely get into the edge of the learning God Himself wants to give them. But the world is shaken and changed by those who are willing to go deep into the teaching God has for them. The School of the Holy Spirit-Harvard or Princeton or Oxford or Cambridge cannot hold a candle to it. But a dual enrollment could be a very good thing for some people.

In the very early days of Princeton University (then called the College of New Jersey), a quite notable man came to serve as president of the institution (1758). His name was Jonathan Edwards. He was a great revivalist whom God used to spark a signal event in the history of the United States-the Great Awakening, it is called. He died a few weeks later. But Princeton was on the right track. Edwards united a Holy Spirit education with great classical learning. He is known as one of the most brilliant minds of his era, and his writings are in almost every anthology containing early American literature. These days, people like Edwards (though, admittedly, they are very few) tend not to get leadership positions in Ivy League universities. We might wonder what would happen if they did.

Throughout history the greatest men and women influencing the world for the greatest good were and are those who pursued a true education of the Holy Spirit. Some of them also attended great universities-C.S. Lewis, for instance. Some of them attended no university-Smith Wigglesworth. But all got an education directly from the Spirit of God (though books and people may have been involved in this "higher" education). One of the most important things in the world we can come to know is that the principal thing is wisdom from the education of the Holy Spirit:

3 When I was my father's son,

Tender and the only one in the sight of my mother,

4 He also taught me, and said to me:

"Let your heart retain my words;

Keep my commands, and live.

5 Get wisdom! Get understanding!

Do not forget, nor turn away from the words of my mouth.

6 Do not forsake her, and she will preserve you;

Love her, and she will keep you.

7 Wisdom is the principal thing;

Therefore get wisdom.

And in all your getting, get understanding.

8 Exalt her, and she will promote you;

She will bring you honor, when you embrace her.

9 She will place on your head an ornament of grace;

A crown of glory she will deliver to you."

(Proverbs 4:3-9, NKJV)

Some believers rarely pick up their Bibles, yet study many other things in great depth. What great things we miss. But we do not have to miss what God has for us. What it takes to be truly educated is to fervently dive ten miles deep into the Holy Spirit and the Scriptures. All we have to do is ask God to teach us and then spend time in class (studying the Word, praying, listening, walking with God). One day long ago a Man came by the side of a large beautiful lake and asked some people to follow Him. They did, and in doing so embarked on the greatest educational adventure of all times-learning from God Himself. Yet now we have the same invitation. I remember when I was small and the great anticipation I had when the first day of school rolled around every year. Maybe we are starting to sense a much greater anticipation for a much greater school. If we open up to the Holy Spirit and dive into the Word, we will be on fire with this kind of excitement. And this excitement is very contagious.

(To get an audio message on this or other teachings, check the podcast section of this hub. If you cannot find it, try clicking on any podcast episode and checking the podcast site. Most teachings have related poscast episodes.)

Believers need to know a secret-a secret that can bring freedom that has seemed very illusive up to now. But it is a secret that should not be one. It should be as plain as road sign, an exit sign off a broken up highway full of rocks and potholes. Or better yet, it should be as clear as an entrance sign onto a brand new beautiful highway passing through a wondrously verdant country. The secret is this: God doesn't see anything at all wrong with them.

So, am I exaggerating in order to make a point? No. I am stating a fact. I am simply repeating a life-changing truth from the New Testament.

Or maybe some are saying, "Yes, but believers know this already." My answer is that if that is so, many do not live as if they know it, or at least not very strongly. They have way too much guilt. Surely this failure of many believers (to see their freedom from sin and the condemnation that comes from it) is affecting their lives very powerfully. Feeling that they somehow have a condemning sentence from God connected with sin and death keep them in fear. Hebrews 2: 14-15 puts it this way:

14 Inasmuch then as the children have partaken of flesh and blood, He Himself likewise shared in the same, that through death He might destroy him who had the power of death, that is, the devil, 15 and release those who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage" (NKJV).

The Bible and some in psychology agree on this: the fear of death is at the root of all or almost all fear. And out of fear flows bondage after bondage in which people in and out of the Kingdom are ensnared. It's a very big thing. Yet people in the Kingdom (the Church) have been set free from these bondages to sin, death, fear of death, and a sense of condemnation of a death sentence. We have been set free from this curse that keeps people in bondage for entire lifetimes. So what is the problem?

In the Garden, Adam was told that in the day he ate of the fruit, he would die. We know from Romans that this was a spiritual death (for Adam kept living physically after this). Well, this fear of the condemnation of a death sentence stuck in the human soul for millennia to come. But Jesus came and fixed it. Right?

Well, the amazing thing is that after Jesus came and took that sin, believers still act and believe as if He had not. Why? Many of us have not allowed the truth to break through all the strongholds in our minds that keep transformation of our lives from happening. We have not let this truth overpower the sense that we still have a condemning sentence of death. We have new life in our spirits, but our minds need to let what is in our spirits flow to every part of us-deep, deep within us and into to all of our thinking.

Romans 8:1 says there is no condemnation for believers, yet this freedom has to be believed deeply and appropriated. The following passage from Hebrews states this truth we are dealing with here very clearly. For freedom to come, the truth in this passage must be allowed to work its way out of our hearts and then go deep into every part of us:

11 But Christ came as High Priest of the good things to come, with the greater and more perfect tabernacle not made with hands, that is, not of this creation. 12 Not with the blood of goats and calves, but with His own blood He entered the most Holy Place once for all, having obtained eternal redemption.13 for if the blood of bulls and goats and the ashes of a heifer, sprinkling the unclean, sanctifies for the purifying of the flesh,14 how much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without spot to God, cleanse your conscience from dead works to serve the living God? 15 And for this reason He is the Mediator of the new covenant, by means of death, for the redemption of the transgressions under the first covenant, that those who are called may receive the promise of the eternal inheritance. (Heb. 2:11-15, NKJV).

It's all done. We are free. The perfect sacrifice took all condemnation away. In 2 Corinthians 5:21 we are even told that we get God's own goodness (righteousness) in this transaction. We are plainly and simply seen that way by God Himself:

21And you, who once were alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now He has reconciled 22 in the body of His flesh through death, to present you holy, and blameless, and above reproach in His sight. (Colossians 1:21-22, NKJV)

Believers have this blessing, no matter how we feel. God sees us as holy and blameless because of Jesus' sacrifice. He sees us this way now. Jesus has already done the work to make this a reality. Notice the words yet now He has reconciled. It is already done! It really is. God sees us with Jesus own righteousness now.

Yet . . . in order for believers to live in the freedom of what they already have, we need to do something that Romans 12:1-2 makes very clear-renew their minds to the truth:

1 I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. 2 And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God. (NKJV)

What do we have in this passage of truth from God? We have the method for achieving the deep realization of what we already have and the transformation that follows. We renew our minds to the truth by continuing to look at it by reading it, by meditating upon it and by continuing to hear it taught to us. When we keep this truth before us, we will begin to live out the truth more and more authentically. And this will change us radically. Radically. So many believers are living as if this is not a part of our salvation from God. But it does not have to be this way.

Some believers have hardly ever been told this truth. Some maybe never. But the people need to know. They need to know that God sees them as having already arrived as far as acceptance is concerned. They are totally accepted by Him right now. They will never be more accepted by Him than they are right now. Why? Because Jesus has already done the work to make them holy in the Father's sight. They can continue to grow spiritually, but they are already "holy, and blameless, and above reproach in His sight." The people need to know.

John 8:51-55

51: Truly, truly, I say to you, if a man keeps My word, he will never see death."

52: Then the Jews said to Him, "Now we know that You have a demon. Abraham is dead and the prophets, yet You say, ‘If a man keeps My saying, he will never taste death.'

53: Are you greater than our father Abraham, who is dead? And the prophets are dead! Who do You make Yourself out to be?"

54: Jesus answered, "If I honor Myself, My honor is nothing. It is My Father who honors me, of whom you say that He is your God.

55: Yet you have not known Him. But I know Him. And if I should say, ‘I do not know Him,' I would be a liar like you. But I know him, and keep His sayings. 

Moments before this, people on the scene accused Him of having a demon. Now they think they have further proof of this in His words about giving life to people. To them, Abraham and other great ones are dead. If they are dead, how can this man cause lesser people to never die? They see Him as crazy, possessed. They simply do not grasp spiritual things. They don't "hear" God's words. They are lost in a dark forest of unbelief. They wonder if this man is placing himself above Abraham.

So, again, the big question comes up. They basically ask Him who He is: "Who do You make Yourself out to be?" In dealing with this question, Jesus makes it clear that it is not Himself who is lifting Himself up. It is the Father who is honoring Him. He says that He knows the Father and that they do not. Because they don't know the Father, of course they don't recognize Jesus, God the Son. This is simple.

Jesus emphasizes His knowledge of the Father. He says that He would be lying if He told them that He did not know Him. False humility is useless. Jesus is who He is, and this is not at all a hard thing for Him to grasp. He is God the Son. He is not trying to be, but He is. What a refreshing thing this is. One thing believers need to do is be confident in who they are-children of the Living God.

Confident. Secure. Security in this reality would wipe out insecurity in so many other areas. Jesus is, of course, an amazing example in this. He is not striving to be someone, not striving at all. He just is. And He is keeping God's words, following them, following the Father. A simple life, but a rich life beyond mankind's ability to explain it. Only living it explains it. And that is what Jesus did. Yes, He told us about this life. But He showed us also. And if we will really follow Him with determination in our hearts, we will understand too.

What a change in the lives of these people would take place if they would dig into truth and actually grasp Jesus by faith in their hearts. If they would really seek, they would really find. Again, it's a law of the Kingdom. Transformation from inside to outside, as we see in the lives of some of Jesus' followers-Mary Magdalene, Peter, Paul, the demoniac called Legion.

But people can choose to remain in darkness and many apparently did. In the understanding of most of us, it would be impossible to find a greater tragedy in history than this: God came and people rejected Him and refused the eternal life He tried to give them. If we are looking for something to label madness; if we are looking for something demonic, for tragedy beyond tragedy; we have found it. God offers people what He has and they don't take it. That is the result of pure evil. What else could deceive people into making such a grand mistake.

"If you continue in my word, then you will be My disciples indeed. And you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free." John 8:31

Those who keep pressing into the Word, following Jesus, will become strong followers of Him. They will find truth that will set them free. If a person will press in to find the real truth about Jesus, he or she will find it. Seek and you will find. It is a promise of God-a principle of the Kingdom-that will last forever. Keep digging into the words from God-the Word of God-and you will find the truth that will set you free.

This is such a great principle for all time. It gets us to the truth that brings us through the door of the Kingdom of God, bringing us into new life in Jesus the Son of God. And it brings us everything we need in this life and beyond this life. It shows us the way to victory in any problem we will ever find ourselves in. If we press in, we will find the truth that sets us free-from the bondage that sin brought into the world and from any bondage we encounter afterward. When we seek God and dig into His Word, we find the specific truth we need to set us free from whatever we need freedom from. Some believers receive that first truth about Jesus that sets them free, but then they stop, living a life of bondage like slaves, when in truth they are children of the Living God.

OKC Churches Can Shine Brighter and Brighter

The fact is that God has a way. And if we are open to hear Him, He will put a dream for our churches deep within us.

Could it be that the main reason we do not shine brighter is simply that we need to see that dream of His more clearly and more full elicit His help to bring it to reality? There is a great potential for greatness in the churches of this city. Yes, there is a great potential in every city. But we are here, not somewhere else. And we can shine much brighter if we want to.

Dreams. God's dreams. After all, haven't most of the truly great-eternally great-things that have ever happened in the history of the world happened because someone got a glint of God's dream for the world? Paul the Apostle, Augustine, St. Francis, John Wyclif, Martin Luther and many others in times long ago saw a desire in the heart of God and a play to bring it to reality. In modern times, William Cary, Hudson Taylor, Smith Wigglesworth, Lester Sumerall, Billy Graham and thousands of others, known and unknown, did the same.

It is so simple. We here in OKC can do the thing that needs to be done. We can do it His way. We can see a glint of His dream. I cannot tell you specifically what His way is for your church. But He can. And it is so much better and clearer and truer than our ways. It is the Kingdom of God way. A transforming way, a revolutionary way.

For mere mortals like ourselves, having really successful local pods (what we call churches) of the BIG CHURCH in heaven is a tricky business. For to really be successful, we have to do what we are doing God's way. In the end, something we build mostly via the world's way will collapse in upon itself like a black hole.

Speaking of physics, maybe we can see what we are dealing with here a little more clearly by finding a parallel in modern physics. MAYBE MUCH MORE CLEARLY.

Why is it that the past century had the most technological progress of any century? It wasn't that people worked harder in factories, if they did work harder. It wasn't that our food got better (which it probably did not for most people). It happened because theorists/researchers like Einstein and many others made discoveries about the way the universe works. Principles. Nuclear power (very dangerous progress), cutting edge electronics, spaceships, etc., etc. were not made of matter really (though, of course, technically they were constructed of stuff we got from the earth). No, they were made of ideas.

So what do we need to make these earthpods of the Big Church operate as God intended--as churning dynamos of God's power to heal the world? Ideas. But really good ones. Ideas of God. Principles of God. Ideas of the world (Col. 2:9) won't work well enough--really not at all in the long run. And then after we get God's ideas, we have to apply these ideas. Applied research.

How do we get God's principles? Prayer, study of the Word, open hearts to the voice of God. Not content with unproven and broken theory of the past, or worldly thought and gimmicks of the present, we press on into reality--WHAT GOD HIMSELF ACTUALLY THINKS. Not content to merely criticize certain researchers (preachers, teachers) of the present or the past because of idiosyncrasies (hairstyles, mannerisms, etc.), we press on to examine in a spiritual way whether WHAT THEY ACTUALLY TEACH OR TAUGHT is true. We become seekers of the actual truth. Then we apply that truth. God's truth is not static. It transforms.

What are you doing in a church in Oklahoma City? Are you just here or is there more? . . . . Are we really also in heaven in the BIG CHURCH at the same time? Yes, we are.

We are right now--at this instant and at all instants--in heaven with Jesus. Now. Ephesians says,"Even when we were dead in sins, [God] made us alive together with Christ (by grace you are saved) and has raised us up together, and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus" (2:5-6). This might be shocking, but it is true. You are living in Oklahoma City and in heaven right now. This could change a person's perspective. A lot.

So what difference could this make to Oklahoma City? Well, if we lived with the knowledge and wisdom of heaven (which we should have since we live there--"you have the mind of Christ," 1 Cor. 2:16c says), if we lived in light of God's thinking, this city could be a lot more like heaven on earth.

Yes, we can scoff at such an idea if we like. Or we can live on earth as Jesus did--with light from heaven. In John 8:12b He said, I am the light of the world. He who follows Me will not walk in darkness but will have the light of life." His way is for us to know what is going on . . . in heaven and on earth, so that we can shine heaven's light down here. Here we will explore how to do this in Oklahoma City.

PLEASE JOIN IN THE DISCUSSION ABOVE ABOUT THE GOOD THINGS HAPPENING IN OKLAHOMA CITY CHURCHES. POST ABOUT WHAT IS GOING ON IN YOUR CHURCH. DISCUSS WHAT'S IN YOUR HEART ABOUT THE GREAT THINGS TO COME FOR CHURCHES IN THIS CITY.

I am connected to All Nations Fellowship, which for 9 years has been a ministry working to strengthen Oklahoma City churches (and churches beyond this city). I am also a leader in a local church--WordChurch (born two years ago).

To be put an email verse by verse, book by book Bible study list, just request it at the podmail option (right side down) at www.allnations.podomatic.com (link below in the podcast section. Read about three emails a week (about 3-4 minutes each) and before long you will have studied a complete book of the Bible in depth.

Photo: Photographer: Kb35. Attribution license: http://www.everystockphoto.com/photo.php?imageId=2489567