Preparing the Bride of Christ For His Return By Janet Van Hierdan
A Tale of Two Brides is now available on Amazon.com:
Tuesday, November 11, 2014
Another
Coffee Break:
Going Beyond, Part 1
November 7, 2014
The Son has risen on a new
era. Strange way to put it, I know, but
as the age in which we live comes to a close, society has become so dark and
perverted that the previous generation would hardly recognize things. Yet, we live in the most spectacular time in
all of history. I have said to many
throughout the past years that I wouldn't trade living in this era for any
other time in history. We are entering a
time when the Glory of the Lord will be revealed in dimensions the body of
Christ has never seen, and likely cannot imagine in their wildest fancies.
Isaiah prophesied of this day
and time like this:
(Isaiah 60:1-3, NASB) “Arise,
shine; for your light has come, and the glory of the LORD has risen upon
you. For behold, darkness will cover the
earth and deep darkness the peoples; But the LORD will rise upon you and His
glory will appear upon you. Nations will come to your light, And kings to the
brightness of your rising."
Nevertheless, for the Glory
of the Lord to arise upon us in such a way as to draw kings and nations to see
and know and understand what is taking place, we MUST as a body of overcoming
people -- a Bridal company fit for the Lord Jesus Christ -- move beyond the
foundational truths into a spiritual dimension that awaits every believer who
will lay aside every mental reasoning and religious weight that holds them back
from total, uncompromised, unreserved responsiveness to the requirements of
Holy Spirit.
That
said, let's begin this series with a statement that Paul makes in writing to
the Jewish Christians at large -- a people who had been steeped their whole
lives in traditions and legalism before coming to the knowledge and acceptance
of Jesus Christ as their Messiah. What
Paul writes has the same power and application to us as modern-day believers,
many of whom have grown up in the traditions of the church world with many
doctrines that are man-made.
Hebrews 6:1-3, KJV:
“Therefore leaving the principles of the doctrine of Christ, let
us go on unto perfection; not laying again the foundation of repentance from
dead works, and of faith toward God, Of the doctrine of baptisms,
and of laying on of hands, and of resurrection of the dead, and of eternal
judgment. And
this will we do, if God permit.”
If you don't mind, let’s take a deeper
look at what Paul is saying. Both the
original Greek text and the Aramaic text put these statements in a clearer and
much more detailed realm of understanding.
Hebrews
6:1-3, RAC Translation & Amplification: Therefore, and as a consequence, it is
critically important that we forsake [what
Jesus has already eradicated from existence] the beginnings and
commencement of the [initiating] Word of the Anointed One and His Anointing
(Jesus Christ),
Let us move
forward energetically to the place of completion and consummation; not laying down
[or setting in front of you as a continual requirement] the legalistic
requirement to repent, and re-do your thought processes concerning the old,
dead works and requirements of the Law [as though it were necessary in order to
attain redemption from past sins or iniquities], under the guise that this
builds faith in and toward God, the line-upon-line, precept-upon-precept
instruction in the purification processes in baptisms, the necessity of laying
on of hands (for impartation or conveyance of power), [the foundational truth
that Jesus provides] resurrection from the dead and cancelation of the curse of
death, and — finally — the understanding and revelation of the judgment and
decrees that exist throughout the eternity of the eternities.
And this is
what we will be enabled to do conditional upon God’s transfer of authority,
granting license and liberty to move past these foundations.
To
place Paul’s statements in context, it is important to remember that he was
writing to Jewish Christians who had grown up under, and subject to, the Law of
Moses. For them to walk and live and
grow up IN CHRIST — never mind having Christ in them — they needed to totally
free from the Law and its constraints.
They needed to understand that Jesus was the complete fulfillment of the
Law, and that no aspect of the Law could be alive in them, their thinking, or
their behavior.
When
Paul begins his discourse, he identifies six specific areas of legalistic
understanding they have grown up with (and I will label them as they understood
them):
(1) Atonement for sins
(2) Trusting God (albeit from a
place of fear)
(3) The washing of hands and/or
baptism as an act of separation from uncleanness
(4) The laying on of hands (from
the perspective of prophetic anointing)
(5) Resurrection of the dead
(viewed as an act only after the coming of Messiah, and ONLY for the purpose of
being judged by God
(6) Eternal judgment (as being
cast off from God)
We
are going to try and just deal with the first aspect of this “leaving behind”
today: NOT revisiting and reenacting the dead works of the Law.
The
Christians of Paul's era were not — and are not — the only people who still
live their lives continuing to apply the law (or even modern man-made laws) to
themselves as believers. Religion has
become so intertwined into the modern life of Christians that they don’t
realize just how much of their lives are operating in a sub-standard mode.
Religion
places performance standards and a set of measurements that folks have to live
up to that have absolutely nothing to do with our progress in God. Let me give you a few examples:
1. Don’t smoke.
2. Don’t drink wine, beer or hard liquor.
3. Don’t go to dances.
4. Don’t frequent the theaters, watch movies — even
television is bad for you.
5. Ladies, make sure you wear long dresses.
6. It is
improper for women to wear pants because they will look like men.
7. No
wearing of jewelry.
8. No fancy
hairstyles — women should keep their hair plain.
9. When you
pray, make sure you pray on your knees.
10. You must attend church on Sunday morning, Sunday
Evening, and either Tuesday or Wednesday night for Bible Study.
This
list could go on and on and on, but you get the idea. Nowhere in the Word do you find any of these
things. None of these things are a
measure of holiness, and none of these things have anything to do with one’s
relationship with the Lord — and here’s the caveat: UNLESS Holy Spirit says so
personally to them!
I
grant you that smoking isn’t good for you, and drinking hard liquor will create
long-term physical problems, but these aren’t things that Jesus requires of us
in order to come to Him. I don’t
recommend that people smoke cigarettes or chew tobacco, but that isn’t a
requirement I can place on anyone! That’s
something that only Holy Spirit can require of you.
Della
and I enjoy a glass of wine — and Paul even encouraged Timothy to “drink
a little wine for thy stomach’s sake and thine oft infirmities” — but
at the same time, our liberty in having a glass of wine is not license to drink
to excess or to over-imbibe; and that rule can be applied to just about
everything!
It
isn’t the drinking of wine or having a cup of coffee, or a bottle of beer that
is the issue: it is the drinking to excess that creates problems in our
responsiveness to the Lord. There is
also the instance for some folks who simply cannot have even a single drink of
wine or beer or anything alcoholic because of the responses it produces in
them. This is, again, something that
ONLY Holy Spirit can require as an act of personal obedience.
When
Paul addresses the Hebrew Christians, he is also addressing us as modern-day
believers in Christ Jesus. When he
begins drawing the picture of “going on to completeness” he starts with “not
laying again, the foundations of repentance from dead works.” That’s a mouthful!
My
amplified translation of the Greek hardly does justice to what Paul is
communicating by the Spirit. First of
all, he lays a foundation (pun intended) for our “going on” by saying that the
real issue among believers is “religion.”
He is referring to “the works of the Law,” in the same way that John
writes under the direction of the Lord to the seven Ekklesias saying, “I know
thy works.”
Before
I continue, let’s define “repentance
from dead works.”
Under
the Law of Moses, the Israelites were required to keep not only the ten
commandments but a series of some 600-plus laws, statutes, and commandments,
not counting a fistful of feast-days.
When
Isaiah opens up his prophecies to Israel, the Word of the Lord through him is
that God is sick of the sacrifices and burnt offerings, the keeping of the new
moon feasts, etc., and that he will hide His face from them and not hear or
respond in any way because of the filth they continue in all the while they
“keep His commandments.”
In
Isaiah 28:13, we are told, “But the Word of the Lord was unto them precept upon precept, precept
upon precept, line upon line, line upon line, here a little, and there a
little; that they might go, and fall backward, and be broken, and snared, and
taken.”
What
Isaiah was driving at, even some 700 years or so before Paul’s directive to the
Hebrews, was that folks had lost sight of the Spirit of the Law.
Paul
takes up this same theme and is essentially saying to the body of Christ,
“There is nothing left for you to do!
Pleasing the Lord is not in the keeping of laws, statutes and
commandments; pleasing the Lord and having fellowship with Him is not in the
doing of things, it is in BEING in Him!
Everything
that could possibly have been done that had been a part of the past was
finished. Jesus was the finishing of the
Law, the Statutes and the Commandments.
He didn’t invalidate them, as the “religionists” of the day would like
to believe; He wrapped them into the very agape nature of Father God and
fellowship with Him!
That
wasn’t doing away with them, but it WAS doing away with the observance of them
as laws and commandments.
Unfortunately,
the body of Christ has been caught up in the same dilemma today with opposite
extremes. On one hand, you have those
who run with it so far to the right that “Grace” covers everything including
their continuance in sin and utterly perverse activities.
Within
the GBLT agenda, there are those who profess to be born-again (even supposedly
Spirit-baptized) Christians who maintain their right to “love whomever they
choose” and/or marry someone of the same sex because “God is a God of love, and
His Grace covers us.”
On
the other side of the pendulum swing are those who preach and teach the
necessity of digging into one’s past, their family histories, past generations
(in some cases attempting to go back ten generations or more) in order to deal
with iniquities (a fancy word which essentially describes a character flaw, or
a twist in one’s way of thinking) or “family curses’, or the visiting of the
sins of the father upon the children, etc., etc., etc., ad infinitum.
When
Jesus went to the Cross Isaiah, seeing things prophetically some 700 years into
the future, wrote, “Surely He has suffered and accepted as His own our maladies, our
anxieties, our calamities, our disease and sicknesses, and carried our anguish,
pain and grief:
“Yet we
fabricated and maliciously invented His being stricken violently, beaten,
punished, wounded and slaughtered as if by God -- choosing to believe that God
browbeat, demeaned and looked down upon Him.
“But He was
broken and profaned for our rebellion, our revolt, our apostasy and our
[religious] quarrel against God;
“He was
crushed, oppressed and smitten, and (emotionally) broken into pieces for our
perversity, our evil, our mischief, sins and faults; the breaking and
ridiculing of our peace, our welfare, our prosperity, our health and our safety
was upon Him;
“And with
His bloodied and blue wounds we are cured, mended, repaired and made thoroughly
whole.” (Isaiah 53:4-5, RAC
Translation & Amplification)
Understand?
All
of that happened BEFORE He went to the Cross!
Do you see anything He didn’t cover?
Then consider what happened on the Cross.
Remember
what happened when the centurion pierced Jesus’ side while He was hanging on
the Cross? Water and blood came forth
from Him. Jesus’ last words before He
died were, “It is finished!”
And
what was finished? Death. What was finished? A new birth was taking place: a bride was
being birthed for the Lord Jesus Christ.
But this birth was unlike any in history. In the realm of the flesh, a birth takes
place in the midst of water and
blood. Babies come forth out of the
water or amniotic fluid that keeps them alive while they are still in the womb,
and blood accompanies the birthing process.
Jesus,
however, made it clear that this new birth was NOT of water — not in the normal
sense — nor of blood, even though His blood was shed in the process. A supernatural transformation — a
regeneration — was taking place. This
new birth was taking place in that realm which has authority and power over the
flesh and the soul: the spirit. A
dimensional change was occurring.
I
need to stop here. The illustrations I
need to make will make today's Coffee Break much too long if I continue, so
this is where we will pick it up next week.
Again, if you are in
need of healing -- especially if you have some terminal disease or prognosis of
a very short time to live from the doctors -- please join our prayer conference
calls on either Monday or Wednesday of each week at 7:00 PM Eastern. Once
again, the number to call is (805) 399-1000.
Then enter the access code: 124763#.
To get into the queue for prayer, when Randy opens the call up for
everyone, hit *6-1 on your keypad. Let us minister to your need for healing!
Blessings on you!
Regner
Regner A. Capener
CAPENER MINISTRIES
CAPENER MINISTRIES
RIVER WORSHIP CENTER
Sunnyside, Washington 98944
Sunnyside, Washington 98944
Email Contact: Admin@RiverWorshipCenter.org
Our book, A
Tale of Two Brides, published by Destiny Image, is available on
Amazon.com as an E-book: http://www.amazon.com/Tale-Two-Brides-Relationship-ebook/dp/B00BSV6HZC/ref=sr_1_8?ie=UTF8&qid=1363139096&sr=8-8&keywords=A+Tale+of+Two+Brides#_
All Coffee Break articles are
copyright by Regner A. Capener, but authorization for reprinting, reposting,
copying or re-use, in whole or in part, is granted –provided proper attribution
and this notice are included intact. Older Coffee Break archives are available
at http://www.RegnersMorningCoffee.com. Coffee Break
articles are normally published weekly.
If you would like to have these articles arrive each morning in your email, please send a blank email to: Subscribe@AnotherCoffeeBreak.com.To remove yourself from the mailing list, please send a blank email to Unsubscribe@AnotherCoffeeBreak.com.
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CAPENER MINISTRIES is a tax-exempt church ministry.
Should you desire to participate and covenant with us as partners in this
ministry, please contact us at either of the above email or physical addresses,
or visit: http://www.RiverWorshipCenter.org.
Monday, November 3, 2014
Another
Coffee Break:
Dealing With Fear, Part 11
October 31, 2014
More and more as I share on
this topic, I realize that our entire society is predicated on a culture of
death. We are all horrified at what we
see taking place with ISIS and other terrorists across the globe and even here
in the U.S., but they only represent the extreme aspect of this culture of
death -- and the Fear of Death -- that pervades our society. That said, let's consider this spirit and its
operation and its camouflage in the body of Christ -- never mind society.
Let me start once again with something
that David writes in the Psalms:
“The sorrows of death
compassed me, and the floods of ungodly men made me afraid. The sorrows of hell compassed me about: the
snares of death prevented me. In my
distress I called upon the LORD, and cried unto my God: he heard my voice out
of his temple, and my cry came before him, even into his ears."
(Psalm
18:4-5, KJV)
The Hebrew word translated
"sorrows" in this passage is the word, khehbel,
and this draws the picture more clearly of what David is saying. This word describes the twisting of a
rope. It also describes the sense of a
noose tied around your neck and the unbelievable emotional and psychological
effects it causes within a person.
Though perhaps not as dramatic as
these words might describe, this is precisely what our entire global society is
caught in. Worse, far too many believers
in Christ Jesus are caught in this snare and struggle to get out of it or evade
it, or simply suppress it.
Back in late 1969, Derek Prince was
teaching on deliverance from the fear of death and he made a profound statement
that I've never forgotten.
"Suppression is not the same as
deliverance!"
The very concept of suppressing fear
is foolishness personified! The more a
person tries to suppress fear, the greater the hold it has on them. That hold captures people in ways they fail
to recognize and often consider that what they are dealing with is nothing more
than a part of their makeup and character.
That's a lie, and it is a lie of the spirit(s) of fear!
The various spirits of fear want to
dwell and live and occupy every nook and cranny of our lives so that they can
divert our attention from the things of God and contaminate our relationship
with the Lord Jesus Christ. Last week on
our healing prayer call, I made a statement while teaching on deliverance from
fear that needs to be re-stated here in writing and even amplified.
First, let me dig into the culture
of fear and the culture of death that pervades our lives and our society at
large. David has a unique way of
expressing it in Psalm 49.
"Nevertheless
man being in honour abideth not: he is like the beasts that
perish. This their way is their
folly: yet their posterity approve their sayings. Selah
Like sheep they are laid in the grave; death shall feed on them; and
the upright shall have dominion over them in the morning; and their beauty
shall consume in the grave from their dwelling.
But God will redeem my soul from the power of the grave: for he shall
receive me." (Psalm 49:12-15
KJV)
David
makes the statement that , "like sheep they are laid in the
grave." He got that right! The Fear of Death produces what we sometimes
refer to as "sheeple." Like sheep, they follow with a "herd
mentality," doing what some wanna-be leader (or leaders) think everyone
should do.
[I
know I'll probably get in trouble for saying this, but that's what happened in
2008 and 2012 in the national elections.
People who should have known better and had some sensitivity to what
Holy Spirit was warning against went ahead and followed the herd and voted
their emotions instead of what the Lord was saying.] Folks had better wake up and listen to Holy
Spirit when they vote in next week's mid-terms!
OK,
I'll behave!!
The
current mentality of death and dying pervades every aspect of our society. One of the most worn-out clichés is,
"The only thing we are guaranteed in life is death and taxes." And that, folks, is a lie! It flies in the face of John 11:26, along
with a fistful of other instances when Jesus made virtually the identical
statement. (more on this after a bit)
Think
about insurance companies for a minute.
Have you ever considered the fact that they are betting that you will
stay healthy. You pay them because you
are betting that you will get sick. If the
policy you purchase happens to be a life insurance policy, the insurance
company is betting that you will live beyond some actuarial projection. You are betting that you will die, and so you
pay them gobs and gobs of money over a span of years, and depending on what
kind of policy you buy, the money you pay is virtually thrown away!
Some
folks believe that life insurance policies are a good investment -- and that's
the drivel the insurance company sells you in order to entice you to bet on
your death. Now, folks, hear me well! I'm not telling you not to buy an insurance
policy. What I'm addressing here is the
mindset that considers insurance a necessity.
I'm addressing the Fear of Death that drives the decision-making
process.
Della
and I have not purchased, and will not purchase, either life or health
insurance policies because we simply don't believe in them. When folks ask me what kind of insurance I
have, I simply tell them that I have a Life Assurance Policy -- one that is
guaranteed by God's Word! Understand?
Have
I gotten sick or suffered injury? Of
course! You've heard me share (or read
some of my testimonies in these Coffee Breaks) of numerous occasions and
infirmities: tuberculosis, cancer, arthritis, tumors (and a variety of lesser things
like colds, flu, etc.), not to mention dropping dead of a heart attack at age
41.
That
doesn't count the broken wrist in a car accident, the broken leg when I was 15
and dropped 150-pound barbell on my ankle, the snapped tendon in my leg
following a spill on the ice carrying over a 100-pounds of newspapers on my
back, along with the usual other bumps, bruises and fractures that come in
childhood.
My
personal repertoire of receiving health and healing and being raised from the
dead includes the tuberculosis, the cancer, the arthritis, the tumors in my
sinus cavities and/or the instantaneous healing of the snapped tendon, along
with headaches, colds, sinus issues, flu, etc., etc. Because the Word of God is so clear on these
things, and the covenant we have with the Lord Jesus Christ for our healing,
our health, our deliverance from death when the Enemy tries to take us out, our
safety in the midst of crisis -- and on and on and on -- I'm sorry but I've
become rather biased on this topic, and not ashamed to admit it!
I was
healed instantly of tumors in my sinus cavities at age 22. I was healed instantly of tuberculosis at age
40. I was raised from the dead at age
41, along with medical proof of a new heart and new lungs. Healing from skin cancer came at age 47, and
the healing from arthritis came at age 68 without medicines or medical
intervention.
The
Lord Jesus Christ is my health from day to day.
If I need healing, I go to him.
That healing was paid for by Jesus with the stripes that he took on our
behalf. (see Isaiah 53:5 and I Peter
2:24) When I suffer injury and have
broken bones or other severe injuries, the Lord is my healing and restoration
-- NOT the doctors or the hospitals or the medicines!
After
sharing all this, you're going to think that I'm opposed to doctors and
hospitals and various remedies. NO, I'M
NOT! I just don't have or live in a
culture of death, death expectancy or sickness and disease expectancy. For those of us who are in Christ Jesus,
whose lives are being transformed by His Word, we are in a transition, folks --
a transition from a death and dying and sickness mentality to having our minds,
our thoughts and our character into His character!
There
is no sickness or disease or infirmity in Jesus. There is no dying in Him. There are no injuries or broken bones in
Him. He is the totality of everything we
have need of and are being transformed into.
And that's the catch word here!
Transformation! This is a
process.
Two
of my daughters are, or have been, in the healthcare profession. My daughter-in-law, Michelle, is heading
toward her degree in nursing. I have
cousins who are (or have been) medical doctors.
There are many, many, many really good doctors and nurses whose mindset
and lives are oriented towards healing and wholeness. There are many physicians and healthcare
professionals who receive divine wisdom and understanding -- and they depend on
the Lord for that wisdom and revelation -- in how to treat people.
What
I'm driving at is the fact that the Lord is out to change our mindset and our
dependencies. He is out to deliver us
from the Fear of Death and the contamination it brings us in our
decision-making processes.
The
medical profession as a whole is not our answer: Jesus is! But that doesn't mean that the Lord hasn't
provided some really good physicians in the meantime until we can totally
transfer our dependency from the medical profession to Him. There are doctors who don't depend on the pharmaceutical
companies to provide answers to various symptoms and problems -- and that's not
meant to be an accusation against pharmaceuticals.
At
the same time, I'm not endorsing medicines as a whole. There are many, many medicines whose side
effects and after effects are worse than the intended cure, and the premature
release of these medicines to the general public is more of a money-decision
than a health decision. The companies
that release these medications trade on the Fear of Death, and make their money
because they know that our society is both fear and death-minded.
I'm
making these points in order to highlight a couple of scriptures that we need
to be aware of in our decision-making, and all the more so as we grow closer to
the Lord and His mindset.
Consider
what the Word says about Asa, King of Israel -- and this was no compliment!
"And Asa in the thirty and ninth year of his reign was
diseased in his feet, until his disease was exceeding great: yet
in his disease he sought not to the LORD, but to the physicians." (II Chronicles 16:12)
The
clear implication is that had Asa sought to the Lord for his health and
healing, he would have been healed. Then
there's this one:
"And had suffered many things of many physicians, and had
spent all that she had, and was nothing bettered, but rather grew worse, When
she had heard of Jesus, came in the press behind, and touched his garment. For she said, If I may touch but his
clothes, I shall be whole. And straightway the fountain of her blood was dried
up; and she felt in her body that she was healed of that plague." (Mark 5:26-29)
Here's
a lady who literally spent her life savings and monies she needed just to live
on with doctors and medicines who got worse instead of better. When she came to Jesus and simply touched the
hem of His garment, she as instantaneously healed and delivered!
Am I
making this clear to you? Are you seeing
the picture? I'm the last person to beat
someone up because they go to the doctors or the hospitals and depend on
various and sundry medicines in order to stay well. What I'm after is to borrow from the apostle
Paul and say this to you: Yet I show unto you a more perfect way.
Jesus
put it like this: "Verily, verily, I
say unto you, He that heareth my word, and believeth on Him that sent me, hath
everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation; but is passed from
death unto life." (John 5:24)
The
last thing I want to do is to convey any sense of condemnation to anyone
because they haven't arrived at the place of perfect trust or confidence or
faith in the Lord for their healing, their health or their deliverance. What I'm trying to do is to point folks at an
answer that costs nothing more than faith.
We don't have to live with a mindset of fear, doubt, unbelief, death and
dying.
You
can take steps methodically and systematically to change your way of
thinking. You can move from death unto
life. One of the simplest changes you
can make is the way you speak about yourself or your situation.
Jesus
makes this very clear when He says, "But I say unto you,
That every idle (non-productive or destructive) word that men shall speak, they
shall give account thereof in the day of judgment. For by thy words thou shalt be
justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned." (Matthew 12:36-37)
Instead
of praying about your situation or your need, begin to speak directly to it --
and I mean, speak out loud. If you have
a heart condition, begin to speak to your heart and command it to be whole. If need be, call for a new heart from the
"body parts room" in Heaven.
(We've done that many times with demonstrable results! :-) ) If you are afflicted with cancer, speak to
the cancer as a spirit and command it to leave your body. (We have a case with a pastor friend who
spoke to the stomach cancer that was plaguing a woman in his fellowship a
couple weeks ago. She began coughing and
coughed up a tumor. She was healed
instantly.)
You
get the picture.
We'll
continue this line of sharing in the weeks to come, and pick up the series on
dealing with fear from time to time, but we're going to take a break next week
and shift gears. We will begin talking
about the necessary foundations that MUST be laid in our lives if we are going
to move from the natural to the supernatural realm, from spiritual baby-hood to
spiritual maturity in Christ Jesus.
Again, if you are in
need of healing -- especially if you have some terminal disease or prognosis of
a very short time to live from the doctors -- please join our prayer conference
calls on either Monday or Wednesday of each week at 7:00 PM Eastern. Once
again, the number to call is (805) 399-1000.
Then enter the access code: 124763#.
To get into the queue for prayer, when Randy opens the call up for
everyone, hit *6-1 on your keypad. Let us minister to your need for healing!
Blessings on you!
Regner
Regner A. Capener
CAPENER MINISTRIES
CAPENER MINISTRIES
RIVER WORSHIP CENTER
Sunnyside, Washington 98944
Sunnyside, Washington 98944
Email Contact: Admin@RiverWorshipCenter.org
Our book, A
Tale of Two Brides, published by Destiny Image, is available on
Amazon.com as an E-book: http://www.amazon.com/Tale-Two-Brides-Relationship-ebook/dp/B00BSV6HZC/ref=sr_1_8?ie=UTF8&qid=1363139096&sr=8-8&keywords=A+Tale+of+Two+Brides#_
All Coffee Break articles are
copyright by Regner A. Capener, but authorization for reprinting, reposting,
copying or re-use, in whole or in part, is granted –provided proper attribution
and this notice are included intact. Older Coffee Break archives are available
at http://www.RegnersMorningCoffee.com. Coffee Break
articles are normally published weekly.
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Another
Coffee Break:
Dealing With Fear, Part 10
October 24, 2014
After returning on Monday
from a 4,800 mile (driving) business trip that took me to several places in
Texas, and an opportunity to minister in James Matchett's fellowship in Fort
Worth on Sunday, my physical body has been playing catch up with the missed rest
and sleep but my spirit has been absolutely fired up! I saw and heard things in our various
business meetings which have prompted me to take a different approach today in
dealing with the Fear of Death.
Let me start with Psalm 55:4-7 today
to lay a foundation, “My heart is sore pained within me: and the terrors of death are
fallen upon me. Fearfulness and trembling are come upon me, and horror hath
overwhelmed me. And I said, Oh that I
had wings like a dove! for then would I fly away, and be at rest. Lo, then would I wander far off, and
remain in the wilderness. Selah"
The
spirit we know as the Fear of Death has many tentacles and its purpose is to
drive people far from voice of God. When
Holy Spirit speaks to us and prompts us to do something, or say something, or
give something, or go to a certain place, the Fear of Death will often try to
intervene and cause us to become extremely fearful of obeying that prompting.
As
David notes in the Psalm, his reaction was to run away, to hide, to not be available. The instinct to hide is a natural one when a
person is afflicted by any spirit of fear.
Fear -- no matter what family it is in, whether the Fear of Evil, the
Fear of Man or the Fear of Death -- always causes a reaction, and the first
reaction is to draw back or to avoid moving forward.
Today
I would like to deal with a specific attribute of the Fear of Death and how it
causes Christians to react when they hear the Word of God. Because the financial realm is such a big
part of our daily living, and because financial circumstances are so critical
for most Americans today in this abominable, tax and spend economy which drains
the pocketbooks of even the fairly well off, let me begin with describing a
tentacle of the Fear of Death that most folks don't even recognize.
We
call it the Spirit of Poverty. It
affects people from all walks of life.
I've met folks who have millions of dollars in the bank who've been
tormented by this spirit, and they don't realize that their place of reaction
is because it is driven by the Fear of Death.
Let's describe some fundamentals of the Spirit of Poverty before we get
into some nitty-gritty.
1.
The
Spirit of Poverty is totally self-centered. It only thinks of its own
needs or desires.
2. The Spirit of
Poverty is Avarice. It is the personification of greed. It is never
satisfied with "enough."
3. Corollary to greed
is hoarding. People driven by this spirit have the need to store up
"for emergencies" -- but not just normal "storing
up." They hoard, they gather to excess, they put away extra food,
extra groceries, extra money, extra tools and supplies, extra anything,
to the point that things spoil, they rot, they rust, they decay in
storage. (More on this later.)
4. The Spirit
of Poverty is totally driven by the Fear of Death. The Fear of Man works
hand in hand with the Spirit of the Fear of Death to keep one from appearing to
be in need or dire straits to those around.
It forces people to "keep up with the Jones" in order to be
thought as acceptable or on the same socio-economic level.
5. The Spirit of Poverty robs people
financially. It is a thief who comes to steal, kill and destroy. It
deprives them of complete trust in God and in His Word.
6. The Spirit of
Poverty causes Christians to short-change God at every hand. When they
tithe, they tithe on the "net" rather than the "gross"
paycheck, and then wonder why their money never increases or multiplies to more
than supply every possible need. They only see the actual amount of what
they get to deposit in the bank or receive in cash instead of recognizing that
the money deducted for payroll taxes, insurance and social security is still
part of their income. Thus, when they pay their tithe, they make God wait
in line until the taxes are paid, their life insurance or health insurance is
paid, and their social security retirement has been paid.
Because this isn't money they get to spend
-- at least right now -- they treat it as though it isn't income. It is a
relatively small portion of their total income, but it is still part of
it. Hence, they cheat God of a portion of His money. It isn't any
different than Adam taking one bite of one piece of fruit from the Tree of the
Knowledge of Good and Evil. He didn't take the whole tree: just one bite
of one piece of fruit. The curse came nonetheless.
7. The Spirit of Poverty brings and promotes
doubt and unbelief. It tricks you into doubting God's Word; and
specifically Matthew 6:25-34. Take a
quick look:
"Therefore I say unto
you, Take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink;
nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on. Is not the life more than meat,
and the body than raiment? Behold
the fowls of the air: for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into
barns; yet your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are ye not much better than
they? Which of you by taking thought can
add one cubit unto his stature? And why
take ye thought for raiment? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow;
they toil not, neither do they spin: And
yet I say unto you, That even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one
of these.
"Wherefore, if God so
clothe the grass of the field, which today is, and tomorrow is cast into the
oven, shall he not much more clothe you, O ye of little
faith? Therefore take no thought,
saying, What shall we eat? or, What shall we drink? or, Wherewithal shall we be
clothed? (For after all these things do
the Gentiles seek:) for your heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need of all
these things. But seek ye first the
kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto
you. Take therefore no thought for
the morrow: for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself.
Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof."
8. The Spirit of Poverty stands in direct
opposition to the promises of God. It opposes the Blessing of
Abraham. It opposes and exalts itself above the name, the authority, the
power, the character, the personality and the very essence of the Lord Jesus
Christ.
9. The Spirit of
Poverty rejects the fact that Jesus' death on the Cross cancelled out its very
existence and its right to torment God's people.
10. The Spirit of Poverty revels in want, in need,
in doing without, in living an austere, sub-normal life on the bleeding edge of
death. Working in conjunction with the
Fear of Evil, it promotes the false idea based on a single scripture that "The
foxes have holes, and the birds of the air have nests; but the Son of
man hath not where to lay his head" taking this
scripture totally out of context to support a poverty-ridden life.
11. The Spirit of Poverty causes people to fear
having any abundance. Abundance becomes a sin to Christians who are afflicted
with this spirit. This spirit
obliterates any reference to the fact that those whom God chose to demonstrate
His Glory and His Power through became the richest people on earth of their
day.
12. The Spirit of Poverty drives sickness, want
and disease. It is one of the primary motivating factors behind stress
and depression.
13. The Spirit of Poverty is the driving force
behind slavery. Stop and consider the history of America for a
minute. Slave-traders sold human beings into slavery in order to make
more and more and more and more money. (see #2)
Our nation's early forefathers -- as they began to realize the Blessing of God
over America -- saw through the lie of slavery; and each of them in succession
set their own slaves free.
14. The Spirit of Poverty -- like all evil
spirits -- is a lying spirit. It couldn't tell the truth to save its
existence! Jesus said, "If ye continue in
My Word, then are ye my disciples; And ye shall know the Truth and the Truth
shall make you free." (John 8:31-32)
Jesus continued that same conversation with
the Jews as He said, "Verily, verily, I
say unto you, Whosoever committeth sin is the servant (The Greek word
here is doulos: slave
-- see #13) of sin. And the servant abideth not in
the house for ever: but the Son abideth ever. If the Son therefore shall
make you free, ye shall be free indeed." (John
8:34-36) The Truth of God's promises frees people from the lies of the
Spirit of Poverty -- if they are willing to believe the Truth.
Believing the Truth also means acting on
the Truth, obeying the Truth, living the Truth!
I've laid this rather lengthy preamble to a series of stories -- both
scriptural and current -- to demonstrate what I'm getting at.
Throughout the years I've seen many, many
believers deceived by the Fear of Death -- and specifically the lies of the
Spirit of Poverty -- so that they disobey or draw back from obeying the
prompting of Holy Spirit to give -- especially when they are in need
themselves, and the obedience to Holy Spirit means that they give the last that
they have.
Consider the widow (see I Kings 17) during
Israel's famine when Elijah commanded her to FIRST bake him a cake before
feeding herself and her son, despite the fact that to do so meant she wouldn't
have enough to feed herself. She obeyed the Word of the Lord through
Elijah, and -- during the entire time of famine -- we are told, "And
the barrel of meal wasted not, neither did the cruse of oil fail, according to
the word of the LORD, which he spake by Elijah."
Although
we don't have the end of the story recorded in Scripture, Jesus sees (Mark
12:42) a widow give two mites into the treasury at the Synagogue, a paltry
amount, to be sure, but the very last money that she had. She commends the widow and places her in
higher esteem in God's eyes than those who came and gave of their
abundance. I don't think it takes any
rocket science to figure out that if Jesus noticed this lady give in such a
sacrificial way, that she would ever again have need in her house. Knowing how
God rewards sacrificial giving and treats it as worship, that lady never again
would have been destitute.
Back
in the 1980's I was teaching a university broadcast engineering course in
Alaska. One of my students came to me
one day and said that he needed to drop out of the class. He had lost his part-time job and couldn't
afford to stay in class because his rent was past due and he was in danger of
having his wife and child on the street with no place to live. We were only six weeks or so from the end of
the engineering course and I hated to see him have to drop out.
Heading
home that night after class, Holy Spirit prompted me to not only pay his
past-due rent, but also the next month as well.
I talked to Della about it and she agreed that we needed to do
this. Here's the problem. We had our monthly lease due in about ten
days, and we didn't even have enough in our bank account to take care of our
own need. To pay this young man's rent
would require draining our bank account.
As I recall, we would have perhaps two dollars left in the bank.
Nevertheless,
the prompting of Holy Spirit was clear in our spirits, and the following day
Della went to the bank and got a cashier's check for the student's rent
payments. We went to his apartment that
night and gave it to him. To say that he
was astonished doesn't do it justice.
"Why
would you do that for me?" he asked. "Because the Lord loves you, and
He instructed us to do this." He
and his wife were overwhelmed by what the Lord did for them, and of course he
finished the engineering class, graduating among our top students. He later went on to become one of Alaska's
premier radio morning show hosts.
The
following Monday or Tuesday, when I went into my office at the school, I was
informed that my pay had been raised and was given a retroactive check for the
past weeks to cover the pay raise. It
more than covered our rent need!
Obedience pays dividends!
Then
there was the time when we were living in south Texas and Holy Spirit spoke to
me about paying off a certain minister and his wife's mortgage. They were people we had known and
fellowshipped with in previous years in another state, and hadn't had any real
contact with for some years. There was
no way I had the money to pay off that mortgage, and to obey the Lord meant I
would have to borrow it. It was such a
big move that I said to the Lord, "OK, Father, this isn't something I'm
doing without Della's complete agreement.
You need to put this in her spirit as well without my saying
anything. When that happens, I'll know
it's time to do it."
It
couldn't have been more than a couple of days later when we were getting ready
to sit down in the living room and relax after a hard day's work. Della spoke up and said, "Honey, before
you turn on the TV, I need to share something with you." She named the couple and said, "The last
few days, I've really been burdened for D & M and feel like we are supposed
to pay off their mortgage." That
was all it took!
The
following day we contacted them and asked for the payoff amount on their
mortgage, and where we needed to send the money. The response on the phone was stunned, of
course, but we assured them it wasn't a joke; that this was what the Lord was instructing
us to do. It took a few days to get the
information and we borrowed the money to
cover the payment, and sent a cashier's check to the mortgage company.
It
might have been some six weeks or so that went by but we were advised that we
were recipients of an inheritance from a relative. That inheritance was several multiples of the
monies we had borrowed in obedience to the Lord.
Dad
used to say it, and I absolutely believe it: "You can't outgive God! I've just scratched the surface of this
picture. We'll continue this theme next
week.
Again, if you are in
need of healing -- especially if you have some terminal disease or prognosis of
a very short time to live from the doctors -- please join our prayer conference
calls on either Monday or Wednesday of each week at 7:00 PM Eastern. Once again,
the number to call is (805) 399-1000.
Then enter the access code: 124763#.
To get into the queue for prayer, when Randy opens the call up for
everyone, hit *6-1 on your keypad. Let us minister to your need for healing!
Blessings on you!
Regner
Regner A. Capener
CAPENER MINISTRIES
CAPENER MINISTRIES
RIVER WORSHIP CENTER
Sunnyside, Washington 98944
Sunnyside, Washington 98944
Email Contact: Admin@RiverWorshipCenter.org
Our book, A
Tale of Two Brides, published by Destiny Image, is available on
Amazon.com as an E-book: http://www.amazon.com/Tale-Two-Brides-Relationship-ebook/dp/B00BSV6HZC/ref=sr_1_8?ie=UTF8&qid=1363139096&sr=8-8&keywords=A+Tale+of+Two+Brides#_
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CAPENER MINISTRIES is a tax-exempt church ministry.
Should you desire to participate and covenant with us as partners in this
ministry, please contact us at either of the above email or physical addresses,
or visit: http://www.RiverWorshipCenter.org.
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