Preparing the Bride of Christ For His Return By Janet Van Hierdan
A Tale of Two Brides is now available on Amazon.com:
Saturday, June 27, 2015
Another Coffee
Break:
Supernatural Maturity, Part 14
June 19, 2015
Greetings
and Solutions! Today, we were going to move on to the second part of Jesus' use
of the two metaphors describing our authority in the earth -- the first one was
the way we permeate and "season" our homes, our neighborhoods, our
communities, etc., as salt -- and the second being our function in Christ as
"the light of the world." We WERE going to move on to that second
part, but I got to thinking about some experiences that really illustrate our
"saltiness" and decided to share those today. We'll move on to the
sharing on being light next week.
First of all, here again is the
amplification to Matthew 5:13.
"In the same way that
salt personifies the need for seasoning, restraint and protection from spoilage
or rotting, and preparation for soil to produce; in the same way that salt
represents wisdom and grace in one’s speech and behavior, you are that grace and
wisdom, that seasoning and protection for the world. You are that which
restrains and holds back the execution of my judgment upon a world corrupted,
spoiling and decaying in sin. If you lose the ability to season and influence
the world around, you lose your usefulness [to the Kingdom] and, like salt that
has lost its ability to make things palatable, and winds up being thrown out,
you become worthless [to the Kingdom] and cease to have (spiritual) value, requiring
that you be cast aside." (Matthew 5:13, RAC
Translation and Amplification)
I may have shared the following with you in
the past, and if I'm being repetitive, well…be blessed! (grin!) During my years
at Long Beach Christian Center, I found a house for the family on Harding
Street in North Long Beach, perhaps a mile and a half or two miles from the
church. It was in this house that the Lord stirred me to begin fasting at least
once each year for forty days.
Following one of those early fasts, I just
felt in my spirit to begin walking the neighborhood each morning. In
Deuteronomy 11:24, we read of Moses’ prophesying in part to Israel prior to
their entrance into the Land of Promise, “Every place whereon the
soles of your feet shall tread shall be yours.”
That scripture went through me like a shot!
The emphasis of the Holy Spirit was that I should “possess” the territory where
I lived – not by buying up all of the houses and property, but by exercising
the authority of the Lord in a tangible way. I was also fulfilling the mandate
of being "salt" for our neighborhood.
As my walks began, I started one block at a
time. Each morning, I would walk the complete circumference of the block,
praying over each home on that block, occasionally stretching out my hand
toward a home as I was directed by the Lord and speaking something like this,
“Father, in the name of Jesus Christ, I establish your Kingdom authority in
this home. Raise up righteousness here. Bring salvation, healing and
deliverance. I claim this home and this family for the Kingdom of God.”
Over a period of weeks and many months, the
practice continued. I began to enlarge the territory. For awhile it was simply
one block. Then it was two. Then it increased to three, then four, then five,
then six, and so forth, until I was covering a pretty large territory.
The practice was always the same. As I
walked, I would pray in tongues. Sometimes I would pray with my understanding,
saying, “Father, I agree with your Word, and I take this territory for your
Kingdom. Everywhere the soles of my feet tread, I take this territory and
possess it for your Kingdom.”
I frequently extended my hand towards
homes, towards the public schools, toward businesses, praying over the
occupants, the school children, the school administration, the businesses and
their owners. There were other churches in the area, and I would extend my hand
toward them, declaring the release of Kingdom authority and revelation by Holy
Spirit. There wasn’t any visible effect from my prayers for perhaps as much as
two years. One by one, I began to hear of or meet families in the homes I was
praying over. Very few of them actually came to our church, but I began to find
that many of these families were coming to know Jesus Christ as their Lord and
Savior.
Frequently, as I met the families, they
would tell me where they had begun to attend a church or become involved in
some fellowship. In some cases, I actually met their pastors. People began to
be saved, healed of various diseases and afflictions, and set free from evil
spirits – all as a direct result of simply consistently walking the territory,
praying over them and extending the authority of the Lord Jesus Christ as I
walked and prayed.
One day, about a block south of our home, I
happened to see the Long Beach police conduct a raid on one of the houses I had
prayed over. It was a house I had really felt strange about, but was new enough
to this kind of prayer and intercession not to recognize what I was sensing. It
was a house I consistently proclaimed the authority of the Kingdom of God over.
Turns out the house was being used for the
manufacture and distribution of drugs – heroin and cocaine. The police shut it
down and put the drug dealers out of business – at least in my neighborhood. I
knew it was a direct result of the prayers and the consistent walking of the
area.
A few months later, a house on the opposite
side of the street and down a half block from our home was raided by the police
and shut down. It was a whore house. Again, the Holy Spirit made clear to me
the fact that it was because of the exercise of spiritual authority taking
place.
I became emboldened. I called up Dick
Parrish, who also served on the pastoral staff of Long Beach Christian Center,
and asked him to join me in some of these walks. Then Dwain McKenzie (who had
been my lifetime friend, brother in the Lord, and was the senior pastor at
LBCC) began to join in the walks. We began to walk the territory near the
church.
About two blocks from the church was a home
where some bikers lived. Every time we walked past the place, I stretched out
my hand toward the home and proclaimed the establishment of the Kingdom of God.
Nearly twenty years passed after we had
walked that territory when the Lord orchestrated an opportunity for Della and I
to meet the bikers who had occupied that home Dwain, Dick and I had walked past
and prayed over. Della and I were in Atlin, British Columbia sharing and
ministering with friends from Anchorage. We were invited to come over for
dinner to the home of an artist and sculptor who lived in Atlin with his family.
Sitting around the dinner table that night, we happened to mention Long Beach.
The artist perked up his ears, as did his wife.
“You were in Long Beach, California?” he
asked. “When was that?” I responded that I had been there for about five years
in the early and mid-1970’s. “Wow, what a coincidence,” he exclaimed. “So did
we!”
I asked him what part of Long Beach he had
lived in, and he described the street where Dwain, Dick and I had walked. Now
it was my turn to be amazed. He and his wife went on to tell us that they had
been a part of the biker crowd, living a pretty wild, hippie kind of life. I
started to laugh. “We never met during those days,” I said, “but you were
surely some of the people we prayed for as we walked the neighborhood.”
He almost came out of his chair. “You! You!
I used to watch you stop in front of our house and stretch out your hand toward
us. Never could hear what you were saying, but we figured you must have been
praying or something like that. That’s when my wife and I experienced the Lord
Jesus Christ coming into our lives and convicting us. That’s when we came to
know the Lord for the first time in our lives!”
I continued to walk the neighborhood where
I lived, gradually increasing the size of the territory where I walked until I
was walking portions of Atlantic and Long Beach Blvds. One day as I was walking
Long Beach Blvd., I was shocked to see an X-rated porn theater that had just
opened up. Something rose up inside of me in anger that Satan would attempt to
so brazenly encroach on territory I had been claiming for the Lord. I walked
right up to the front of the theater, put my hands on the building and began to
proclaim the establishing of the Kingdom of God in the place.
Despite the fact that folks were standing
out front of the place and staring at me like I’d lost my marbles or something,
I began to speak out loud, “Father, in the name of Jesus, I establish your
Kingdom authority in this place. I shut this theater down!” It was several
weeks later that I was driving down Long Beach Blvd. and decided to check on
the porn theater. Not too surprisingly, it was shut down. All of the billboards
and placards were gone and the theater marquee was empty. I thought to myself, Wow,
this is just too good to pass up!
I parked my car and walked over to the
front of the building, and again I placed my hand on the outside of the place
and began to proclaim the Word of God. I said, “Father, in the name of Jesus
Christ, I again establish your Kingdom in this place, and I raise up righteousness.
Let this building become something that will serve your purposes and be to your
Glory.” Then I got back in my car and drove away.
Again it was some weeks that passed before
I thought of the theater and decided to go and check on it. As I drove towards
the building, I saw a man standing on a ladder putting letters on the theater
marquee. I pulled over and parked and watched him spell out the following, one
letter at a time: E – V – A – N – G – E – L T – E – M – P – L – E.
Brother, did I ever let out a war whoop! It
had worked! What was once an X-rated porn theater was shut down, and a church
and worship center opened up in its place. I’ve no idea how long that church
functioned in that building, but years later when I came back to Long Beach for
a visit, it was still operating.
Naturally, I wasted no time in sharing it
with the folks at Long Beach Christian Center. Dave Dobbs, who was also part of
the pastoral staff, happened to be driving with his wife in the San Fernando
Valley some months later. They came across a huge construction site where a
large number of construction workers and a lot of equipment were busy building
some very elegant appearing structure.
Dave drove around the place out of
curiosity to see what was being built. A large sign with an artist’s rendition
displayed a future Buddhist temple. Dave remembered my experience and sharing
about the theater and thought, This is a principle we need to apply here.
He and his wife parked their car, got out
and walked to the chain link fence that surrounded the property. They stretched
their hands towards the partially constructed building and proclaimed, “Father,
in Jesus’ name, we establish your Kingdom over this place, and we shut down
this project now!”
It must have been two or three months that
passed before they happened to be back in the Valley and thought about the
incident. They drove back to the construction site of that building, and –- to
their astonishment –- saw weeds grown up around the place. Construction had
ceased almost from the day they had spoken the word of authority.
It must have been almost a year later that
Dave was back in the Valley and thought about checking on the place one more
time. The Buddhist trappings of the place were gone, and it had been redesigned
into a nice office building.
By now, you are beginning to understand
what I mean when I talk about our ability to season and alter the taste (to the
Lord) of the areas where we live. That is the authority of the Holy Spirit
working in folks who are submitted to the Lord and sensitive to His voice and
leading. That's the authority that comes when you function IN Christ Jesus as
the Salt of the Earth!
That’s the kind of authority that brings
healing. That’s the kind of authority that brings deliverance to people in
captivity to Satan. That’s the kind of authority that tears down the thrones of
spiritual rulers – the apostle Paul refers to them in the Greek text of
Ephesians 6 as kosmokrator: world rulers of darkness – demon princes
who exercise power and influence to execute wickedness.
What is so incredible is that Joe everyday
Christian has access to that authority, if he only knew it. Folks get cheated out
of living and walking in this realm because of false teaching, because of
screwball doctrines, and mostly because of fear, doubt and unbelief. If
Christians could see themselves in Christ Jesus, and Him in them, they would
understand their role as salt right where they live! If Christians would begin
to exercise this kind of authority right in the neighborhoods where they live,
we would have a radically different world today.
I said it last week, and I'll say it again!
That means that those people will truly season, add savor, and alter the status
quo in the earth the way they are supposed to. We have been commanded to be the
salt of Heaven in the earth. We have been commissioned to be God’s salt to
restrain, to hold back, to preserve this earth.
We have been commanded and commissioned to
season the societies that live therein until the day our role as salt has
completed that purpose. That role can never be minimized or degraded, or else
we suffer the consequence of losing our “saltness,” and cease to fulfill the
destiny He has set before us.
Let's do it, folks! Let's bring back an
America under God! Let's restore the savor of God's presence in this nation,
and on this continent! Let's be the seasoning of Heaven!
OK. Now we can move on to being the
"Light of the World" -- next week, that is.
I remind those of you
in need of ministry that our Healing Prayer Call takes place on Mondays at 7:00
PM Eastern (4:00 PM Pacific). Once again, the number to call for healing is
(805) 399-1000. Then enter the access code: 124763#.
At the same time, in
case you are missing out on real fellowship in an environment of Ekklesia, our
Sunday worship gatherings are available by conference call – usually at about
10:45AM Pacific. That conference number is (559) 726-1300, and the access code
is 308640#. We hope to make these gatherings available by Skype or Talk Fusion
before long.
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
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Saturday, June 13, 2015
Another
Coffee Break:
Supernatural Maturity, Part 13
June 12, 2015
Good Morning! Gotta share
a recent event that took place as an illustration of our continuing study of
what it means to be "the salt of the earth."
A couple weeks back, our daughter, Shelley, stopped in to see us
and brought a friend of hers (whom I will call "Arlene" for the sake
of this discussion). Arlene had pretty
obviously been through the mill and had been battered emotionally, mentally,
spiritually -- and possibly even physically.
Drugs and alcohol had played a big role in recent years and the
destruction of the Enemy showed.
Nevertheless, at some time in her past she had been exposed to
the Gospel and had at least made some kind of mental assent to the claims of
the Lord Jesus Christ. When Shelley and
Arlene walked in the front door, they were scarcely through the living room and
into the dining room when Arlene began to cry.
She said, "The peace in this house is unbelievable! I've never felt anything like this. There are angels in this place."
Shelley had brought her friend over so she could shower and clean
up, and Della told her to help herself.
After a lengthy period, she finally came out of the shower and sat down
on one of the bar stools in our kitchen.
She continued to struggle with her composure and kept reiterating that
she'd never felt anything like what she was feeling.
It gave Della and me a perfect opportunity to share with her,
and Holy Spirit gave us some direct words of knowledge about her that we were
able to utilize in ministering to her.
The occasion was ready-made by the Lord.
Arlene had never actually accepted Jesus Christ as her Lord and Savior,
but she readily prayed with us and wept buckets as she invited Jesus Christ to
take over her life. The glow of His
presence was all over her as she left with Shelley later that afternoon.
It was a perfect illustration of what happens when we are in
Christ, and He is in us. The saltiness
of God's presence so affected the atmosphere that even though this perfect
stranger -- Arlene -- had never met us and knew nothing about us, other than the
fact that we were Shelley's parents, it brought change and the savor of the
Lord into this young woman.
It's not unlike the story of the FedEx driver I shared with you
not that long ago who had this startled look on his face when he visibly saw an
angel standing behind me when he answered the door. We can't help but chuckle over the fact that
he still reacts that way when he comes to the door with his packages, glancing
up over my shoulder to see if the angel is still visible.
OK, time to get back to our discussion. Here again is the amplification to Matthew
5:13-16.
"In the same way that salt
personifies the need for seasoning, restraint and protection from spoilage or
rotting, and preparation for soil to produce; in the same way that salt
represents wisdom and grace in one’s speech and behavior, you are that grace
and wisdom, that seasoning and protection for the world. You are that which restrains and holds back
the execution of my judgment upon a world corrupted, spoiling and decaying in
sin. If you lose the ability to season
and influence the world around, you lose your usefulness [to the Kingdom] and,
like salt that has lost its ability to make things palatable, and winds up
being thrown out, you become worthless [to the Kingdom] and cease to have
(spiritual) value, requiring that you be cast aside." (Matthew 5:13, RAC Translation and
Amplification)
"[When I said, “Light be,” that
was the light that brought this world into being. I AM that light.] (Because you are in me, and I AM in you, you
are — likewise — the light of this world.
That is a light one cannot hide.
"[As representatives of the New
Jerusalem] you are like that City which is elevated on a high hill or mountain
and cannot be hidden from view. (You
have been made and destined to be visible to this world.)" (Matthew 5:14, RAC Translation &
Amplification)
"No one lights a candle, and then
hides it under some kind of covering or utensil. Rather, they put the candle on some kind of
lampstand or decorative piece in order to elevate it so as to give light to the
whole room.
"Let that light (My light) which
is in you, therefore, radiate brilliantly in front of all men and women so that
the value of your relationship with and in Me — manifested in the works, the
signs and wonders — is demonstrated.
That, in turn, will cause Father in Heaven to receive glory and honor
and praise!" (Matthew 5:15-16,
RAC Translation and Amplification)
Let's
take a different approach to the concept of being the salt of the earth.
In
Genesis 18 and 19, we have the story of Abraham pleading with the Lord
concerning the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. God tells Abraham that His intention is to
destroy the cities because their sin is “very grievous.”
The
Hebrew text uses the word, kabad,
to describe the weight of their sin and its impact on the region.
These
two cities resided in the “Vale of Siddim.”
That translates to “the Valley of Salt.”
These two cities were supposed to be “salt” in the region — an influence
for good. Instead, they had become the
epitome of all that is evil and wicked in the earth. Their “salt” had become perversion of every
kind and God would no longer tolerate it.
Consider
Abraham’s plea. In cities numbering an
estimated population of more than 50,000 people each, Abraham — understanding
the significance of the righteous as salt to preserve those cities — began with
50 righteous in asking God if He would destroy the cities were there 50
righteous. God agreed with Abraham that
if 50 righteous were to be found between the two cities, it would suffice to
keep them from being wiped off the map.
Abraham
took it step after step after step until he reduced it to ten righteous — five
for each city, or one righteous person for 10,000 wicked. God promised him that if there were even ten
righteous found among the two cities, He would preserve them.
Genesis
19:24 makes clear that He did not! We
are told that He
“overthrew those cities, and all the
plain, and all the inhabitants of the cities, and that which grew upon the
ground.”
Talk
about destruction! The destruction with
fire and brimstone so reduced the area to ash that absolutely nothing has been able to
live there ever since. In 1987 and 1988,
a friend by the name of Henry Gruver accompanied the archaeologist, Ron Wyatt,
as he surveyed the area and found that the ash remains as a kind of burned salt
— and it is the only place on the planet where that kind of ash exists! The brimstone produced a valley of salt
unlike any anywhere else in the world.
What
makes this so fascinating to me is the fact that this fits exactly what Jesus
was saying, “if the salt have lost
his savour, wherewith shall it be salted? it is thenceforth good for nothing,
but to be cast out, and to be trodden under foot of men.”
The
“salt” of Sodom and Gomorrah had long since ceased to have the savor that God
wanted for the land. It became “good for
nothing.” In order to demonstrate to the
land — and to the world of that day — just how critical our role is in
seasoning and making the area around us palatable to the Lord (and I’ll address
this more, momentarily) and how abominable these cities were to the region, God
sent fire and brimstone to rain down upon those cities of the Valley of Salt
and render their salt worthless for all time!
Ever
wonder why God considers it so important for us to be palatable and to make the
world around us palatable to Him? One
only has to go back to Creation to see that the world and all that God created
were nothing but perfect.
Genesis 1:31a: And God saw everything that he had made, and, behold, it was very
good.
The
Hebrew word translated “very” in this passage is the word, meòd.
There
is a vehemence in this word, indicating that everything was finished to
perfection. The world wasn’t simply
palatable to God, it met His definition of “finished, complete,
whole, perfect!”
When
Adam ate of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil and brought sin into
Creation, it was no longer palatable to God.
The smell and taste of the Earth had become corrupted. It smelled rotten because of Satan’s presence
and influence, and tasted even worse!
In
1996, when the Lord enabled me to travel backward and forward in time, and I
was transported into the Garden of Eden, the beauty was indescribable. It was stunning! But there was more.
There
was a fragrance to the Garden that I have only smelled a very few times in my
life when that presence of the Lord flooded the atmosphere where I was. There was a peace and a quiet that the world
of today does not know. That peace and
quiet was punctuated by the sounds of birds singing or chirping musically —
harmonically. Their sounds were not
discordant or strident.
Eating
of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil changed all that! It seems strange that a single act like that
could bring such corruption, but David expresses it quite succinctly in the
Psalms when he writes:
Psalm 115:16: The Heaven, even the heavens, are the Lord’s: but
the earth hath He given to the children of men.
That
brings us back to the origins of that rulership.
Genesis 1:26-28:
And God said, Let us make man in our
image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea,
and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and
over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.
So God created man in his own
image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.
And God blessed them, and God said
unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it:
and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and
over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.
God
had given man absolute dominion over the earth and everything in it. With Adam’s disobedience, there was a
consequence. That consequence was death. Nothing about God’s Creation was ever
designed to corrupt and/or die.
If
the DNA of humans, plants, animals, birds, fish, etc., is corrupted so that it
now begins to break down and die, there is a rottenness and a stink that comes
with it.
Salt
greatly slows the breakdown. Salt will,
in some cases, eliminate the odor of spoilage.
Salt changes the flavor and causes things that might otherwise not be
palatable or edible to be consumed easily and tastily.
When
God covenanted with Israel, therefore, His covenant with them was a Covenant of
Salt. They were to make the earth tolerable to Him. They were to be the seasoning in the earth
that provided seasoning to those peoples and nations that didn’t yet know Him. He required the priests and Levites to add
salt to the sacrifices as a symbol of the necessity of their restoring what had
been lost.
At
the same time, He required that the priests offer up incense in order to make
the fragrance of the earth around them “a sweet-smelling savor” to Him. Each sacrifice and each offering had an
enormous spiritual significance which related back to God’s original Creation,
the dominion which had been given to man, and the corruption that came into the
earth as a result of sin. Each sacrifice
and each offering was designed as a prophetic symbol of the redemptive plan in
which each aspect of Creation would be restored. No offering, and no sacrifice, was offered
without salt. Salt was a symbol of the
coming redemption.
Now,
let’s return to Jesus’ statement:
In the same way that salt personifies
the need for seasoning, restraint and protection from spoilage or rotting, and
preparation for soil to produce; in the same way that salt represents wisdom
and grace in one’s speech and behavior, you are that grace and wisdom, that
seasoning and protection for the world.
You are that which restrains and holds back the execution of my judgment
upon a world corrupted, spoiling and decaying in sin. (Matthew 5:13a RAC Translation and
Amplification)
This
may seem like a deviation from our sharing, thus far, (and what I’m about to
share may fly in the face of some traditional doctrines) but consider something
that Paul wrote to the Ekklesia in Thessalonica:
II Thessalonians 2:3-7: Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day
shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin
be revealed, the son of perdition; Who
opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God, or that is
worshipped; so that he as God sitteth in the temple of God, showing himself
that he is God. Remember ye
not, that, when I was yet with you, I told you these things? And now ye know what withholdeth that he
might be revealed in his time. For
the mystery of iniquity doth already work: only he who now letteth will let,
until he be taken out of the way.
You
see that word, “letteth”? That’s an
archaic English word which, in today’s usage, means the exact opposite. The word in the original Greek text is, katecho.
This
word means, to restrain, to hold back, to hinder, to hold fast. Get it?
So who is doing the restraining?
Who is doing the preserving? Who
is hindering the full-blown rottenness and decay in society and in the
world? Right! You’ve got it! The salt of the earth! The people of God who, as Daniel so
appropriately puts it:
Daniel 11:32b:
But the people that do know their God
shall be strong, and do exploits.
That
means that those people will truly season, add savor, and alter the status quo
in the earth the way they are supposed to.
We have been commanded to be the salt of Heaven in the earth. We have been commissioned to be God’s salt to
restrain, to hold back, to preserve this earth.
We
have been commanded and commissioned to season the societies that live therein
until the day our role as salt has completed that purpose. That role can never be minimized or degraded,
or else we suffer the consequence of losing our “saltness,” and cease to
fulfill the destiny He has set before us.
Obviously,
we never got to the second part of Jesus’ statement concerning our being the
light of the world. That’s where we will
pick this up in our next Coffee Break.
I remind those of you in need of ministry that our Healing Prayer Call
takes place on Mondays at 7:00 PM Eastern (4:00 PM Pacific). Once again, the number to call for healing is
(805) 399-1000. Then enter the access
code: 124763#.
At the same time, in case you are missing out on real fellowship in an
environment of Ekklesia, our Sunday
worship gatherings are available by conference call – usually at about 10:45AM
Pacific. That conference number is (559)
726-1300, and the access code is 308640#.
We hope to make these gatherings available by Skype or Talk Fusion
before long.
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.
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.
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.
Saturday, June 6, 2015
Another
Coffee Break:
Supernatural Maturity, Part 12
June 5, 2015
And another TGIF day to you!
If my calculations are correct, we have passed the 1,000 mark in these
Coffee Break articles during the past few weeks -- and that spans a period
which began in December of 2004 on a sporadic basis. Beginning in January of 2005 and spanning
several months, I actually tried to publish these posts on a daily basis. That schedule caught up with me and I had to
back it off in stages.
Another Coffee Break currently reaches somewhere between 1 and 2
million readers on a weekly basis in more than 80 countries, and it is a
blessing to me that we are able to encourage many thousands of individuals who
are leaders in the body of Christ and engaged in active ministry around the
globe. Readers are being added every
week to our subscriber database to the point where Rich Hoffman, our webmaster,
has had to increase his server capacity.
That said, in the transition from one server to another, some readers
have notified me that they are not receiving their Coffee Breaks like they used
to -- and if you are among that number, and just haven't said so, please let us
know so we can correct the situation.
Time to move on. Thus far
in this series, we have dealt only with the first dozen verses of Matthew 5
which are commonly referred to as "the Beatitudes." Now we're going to make a significant shift
as we talk about an entirely different aspect of supernatural maturity -- that
maturity represented in the character, nature and makeup of the Lord Jesus
Christ. We’re going to shift gears going forward to describe the character and nature of the Lord
Jesus Christ, and how His nature in us influences the world around.
Matthew 5:13-16: Ye
are the salt of the earth: but if the salt have lost his savour, wherewith
shall it be salted? it is thenceforth good for nothing, but to be cast out, and
to be trodden under foot of men.
Ye are the light of the world. A city
that is set on an hill cannot be hid. Neither do men light a candle, and put it
under a bushel, but on a candlestick; and it giveth light unto all that are in
the house. Let your light so
shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father
which is in heaven.
The
standard KJV translation isn’t bad, but let’s see what we can do with it by
retranslating and amplifying it.
"In the same way that salt
personifies the need for seasoning, restraint and protection from spoilage or
rotting, and preparation for soil to produce; in the same way that salt
represents wisdom and grace in one’s speech and behavior, you are that grace
and wisdom, that seasoning and protection for the world. You are that which restrains and holds back
the execution of my judgment upon a world corrupted, spoiling and decaying in
sin. If you lose the ability to season
and influence the world around, you lose your usefulness [to the Kingdom] and,
like salt that has lost its ability to make things palatable, and winds up
being thrown out, you become worthless [to the Kingdom] and cease to have
(spiritual) value, requiring that you be cast aside." (Matthew 5:13, RAC Translation and
Amplification)
"[When I said, “Light be,” that
was the light that brought this world into being. I AM that light.] (Because you are in me, and I AM in you, you
are — likewise — the light of this world.
That is a light one cannot hide.
"[As representatives of the New
Jerusalem] you are like that City which is elevated on a high hill or mountain
and cannot be hidden from view. (You
have been made and destined to be visible to this world.)" (Matthew 5:14, RAC Translation &
Amplification)
"No one lights a candle, and then
hides it under some kind of covering or utensil. Rather, they put the candle on some kind of
lampstand or decorative piece in order to elevate it so as to give light to the
whole room.
"Let that light (My light) which
is in you, therefore, radiate brilliantly in front of all men and women so that
the value of your relationship with and in Me — manifested in the works, the
signs and wonders — is demonstrated.
That, in turn, will cause Father in Heaven to receive glory and honor
and praise!" (Matthew 5:15-16, RAC Translation and
Amplification)
OK! That was a bit windy and long, but I’m sure
you see it. Everything that Jesus said
and did was designed to bring Glory to Father.
Everything that He said and did was nothing more than a duplication of
what He had heard and seen in and from Father.
We
have two metaphors here which essentially mirror each other in terms of our
character and essence, being in Christ.
In order to better understand why Jesus used these two metaphors, follow
me back to the Law of Moses for a moment.
Leviticus 2:13, NASB: Every
grain offering of yours, moreover, you shall season with salt, so that the salt of the covenant of your God shall
not be lacking from your grain offering; with all your offerings you shall
offer salt.
Numbers 18:19, NASB: All
the offerings of the holy gifts, which the
sons of Israel offer to the LORD, I have given to you and your sons and your
daughters with you, as a perpetual allotment. It is an everlasting covenant of
salt before the LORD to you and your descendants with you.
The
importance of salt as a spiritual picture cannot be over-stated! If we are to reflect the character and nature
of the Lord Jesus Christ, we MUST be that essence which flavors and adds savor
to the land around.
When
God commanded the priests and Levites to add salt to their sacrifices He was
making it abundantly clear that everything they offered to Him had to have His
savor.
The
earth had been corrupted by sin, along with everything in it. The plants, the animals, the birds of the
air, the fish of the sea, the air we breathe — the environment in its
totality. Any offering that would come
out of this environment had to be seasoned with salt. We’ll come back to this picture as we get
farther along in this specific discussion.
We
refer to these pictures a metaphors because they represent influence on their
surroundings. Israel was a Covenanted
people with God. Covenants were created
between parties for the express purpose of making them as ONE unified being.
Consider
the ancient pictures of farmers creating covenants with soldiers. Soldiers’ lives were spent in the defense and
protection of their lands. Soldiers
rarely had time to care for their own lands, and had no time to spend tilling
the ground, sowing seed and harvesting grains, vegetables and fruits for their
own food and preservation.
Farmers,
on the other hand, were not skilled warriors and had little or no ability to
engage in the art of war or be concerned with the defense of their lands or
families. Covenants were often,
therefore, created between farmers and warriors. The farmers and the warriors became as One!
The
farmers covenanted with the warriors to become their source of food and sustenance. The warriors covenanted with the farmers to
provide their defense, to ensure their safety, personally, as well as that of
their families and their crops. With
this covenant, each functioned not only for themselves, but for each other.
The
Covenant of Salt that God made with Israel was a covenant in which Israel
promised to serve God and be His representative in the earth. Israel became God’s unique people — a people
who would demonstrate to the rest of the world just exactly what kind of life
and what kind of provision God could and would make with those who would enter
into a covenant relationship with Him.
God’s
Covenant with Israel ensured that they would stand out in the earth above every
other people. They would have the
Blessing that God promised in Deuteronomy 28.
Before we take a look at the very first part of God’s Covenant with
Israel, consider the truth upon which He based His choosing of Israel in the
first place:
Deuteronomy 7:7-11: The
LORD did not set his love upon you, nor choose you, because ye were more in
number than any people; for ye were the fewest of all people: But because the LORD loved you, and
because he would keep the oath which he had sworn unto your fathers, hath
the LORD brought you out with a mighty hand, and redeemed you out of the house
of bondmen, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt.
Know therefore that the LORD thy God,
he is God, the faithful God, which keepeth covenant and mercy with them
that love him and keep his commandments to a thousand generations; And repayeth
them that hate him to their face, to destroy them: he will not be slack to him
that hateth him, he will repay him to his face.
Thou shalt therefore keep the
commandments, and the statutes, and the judgments, which I command thee this
day, to do them.
Israel
wasn’t chosen because of their greatness, nor because of their numbers. They were chosen because of the oath — the
Covenant — that God made with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.
Abraham,
Isaac and Jacob exhibited a faith and total trust in the Lord during a time and
an era in which faith in God — YHWH — was absolutely non-existent. That faith was manifested when Abraham
pleaded and bargained with God to spare Sodom and Gomorrah for the sake of not
less than ten righteous people.
Abraham,
Isaac and Jacob WERE God’s salt in the land!
They were the manifestation of His presence. They salted the earth in a time and place
where thousands of idols and false gods permeated the nations and cultures, and
where the practices we see and abhor with ISIS were the norm as a part of those
nations’ cultures. That said, take a
look at the benefits and blessings of Israel’s (and ours) Covenant of Salt.
Deuteronomy 28:1-2: And
it shall come to pass, if thou shalt hearken diligently unto the voice of the
LORD thy God, to observe and to do all his commandments which I command
thee this day, that the LORD thy God will set thee on high above all nations
of the earth:
And all these blessings shall come on
thee, and overtake thee, if thou shalt hearken unto the voice of the LORD thy
God.
From
this point forward, we see a sequence of the blessings which came of the
Covenant. But look, now, at the
consequences of walking away from the Covenant.
Consider this small part of those consequences:
Deuteronomy 28:15, 29: But
it shall come to pass, if thou wilt not hearken unto the voice of the LORD thy
God, to observe to do all his commandments and his statutes which I command
thee this day; that all these curses shall come upon thee, and overtake thee:
And thou shalt grope at noonday, as
the blind gropeth in darkness, and thou shalt not prosper in thy ways: and thou
shalt be only oppressed and spoiled evermore, and no man shall save thee.
Even
if Israel failed to serve God, the judgment that came upon them and the bondage
they fell into would also show to the world what happens to folks who live
outside of a relationship with Him.
There
is a key phrase in verse 29, however, that needs to be paid attention to: “and no man shall save thee.”
Get
it? “No man…!” What God is saying to Israel is that His
Covenant with them stands no matter what!
No amount of human flesh or its endeavors will intervene to save them
from the bondage they are in, BUT, if they will turn back to Him, He will save
them and deliver them from the oppression of their enemies.
THAT
is a Covenant which stands the test of time!
That is a Covenant which says to the world, Israel has a Covenant
relationship that ensures their deliverance whenever they turn to Him, whenever
they repent of their wayward ways, whenever they once again acknowledge Him!
THAT,
Folks, is the Covenant of Salt! It
ensures that Israel would continually be a representative of the nature and
character of God, that they would perpetually be a people in whom the presence
of God will provide the savor and preservation of those who are around them.
And
that brings us back to Jesus’ statement, “In
the same way that salt personifies the need for seasoning, protection from
spoilage or rotting, and preparation for soil to produce; in the same way that
salt represents wisdom and grace in one’s speech and behavior, you are that
grace and wisdom, that seasoning and protection for the world.”
WE are the new
Covenant of Salt in the earth! As
representatives of the Lord Jesus Christ, we are in Him, and He is in us.
We, therefore, become
His presence in the earth.
We become His
presence in our communities, among our families, among our friends and business
associates.
We
become
His presence in the business world.
We become His
presence in government.
On
and on it goes! By the same token, just
as there were consequences for the nation of Israel when it abandoned its
covenant with the Lord, Jesus makes it clear — without threatening us — that if
we fail in our responsibility to be His Salt — His life-changing Presence — that
we can be cast aside.
That’s
a statement that needs clarification.
This is not some threat that we lose out on our eternal Salvation, but
it DOES mean that we will miss our intended destiny and the Plan of God in our
lives. Everyone of us have a Plan laid
out before us by the Lord.
Holy
Spirit leads, He nudges us, He pricks us, He quickens us, but He does NOT force
us; and if we fail to follow His plan and design in such a way that God’s Glory
is seen in us, we can be passed over and our assignment given to someone who
will respond to His leading.
We'll
continue this discussion next week.
I remind those of you in need of ministry that our Healing Prayer Call
takes place on Mondays at 7:00 PM Eastern (4:00 PM Pacific). Once again, the number to call for healing is
(805) 399-1000. Then enter the access
code: 124763#.
At the same time, in case you are missing out on real fellowship in an
environment of Ekklesia, our Sunday
worship gatherings are available by conference call – usually at about 10:45AM
Pacific. That conference number is (559)
726-1300, and the access code is 308640#.
We hope to make these gatherings available by Skype or Talk Fusion
before long.
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.
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.
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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