By: Generals Jim and Deborah Green (p. 2 in Issue Four of The Tribal Call)
Praise God, we are going to be teaching again on the Tribal Call, Ecclesia #2. God is issuing forth His Tribal Call in this hour, and in this generation He is calling forth His people to be separated unto Him. As I was reading through the Old Testament, what I found over and over again was that many times, God’s people were under great suffering and distress, and they were under the oppression of the oppressor or the enemies of God. When you go through the chapters, you can read what God had to say through the prophets to the people, and even to their oppressors time, and time, and time again. The message was very clear: their sins had separated them from God. The reason that God’s people had to suffer so severely and the reason that they were in distress, agony, and sorrow, was because God’s people chose to be independent of God.
Tonight as I was praying, the Lord was ministering to me that independence is a curse. Now we Americans don’t believe that. We think independence is the greatest thing; for example, Americans sometimes toot, “Independence is a blessing. Independence is God’s will.” But the truth is that independence drives a wedge between us and God because when we want to think independently, putting more value on our thoughts than on God’s will, that drives a wedge between us and God. That was the sin of Adam and Eve: independence from God. They chose to be independent of what God ordained in His requirements, orders, and laws. They swallowed satan’s lies and believed they could be as gods.
We are living in a time when the curse of independence is rampaging. Go down a street in any neighborhood, and you can see a large home owned by an average family. It will have six cars parked out front. Now, all those cars don’t belong to visitors. Would you believe that everyone has to have their own car? Even the teenagers have to have their own car so they can drive to school by themselves. Members of the same family cannot drive anywhere together.
The curse that follows independence is loneliness. You can see the same lonely people going down the street, with all the glitter of Sodom and the filth of Gomorrah that makes up America, all alone in their car with the music blaring. Why? Because they are so independent that they don’t even have human companionship anymore. People in the same household cannot even communicate; persons in the same family cannot even sit down together for a peaceable meal and talk about the Lord or what transpired in the day or what is stirring in their hearts or lives. They have to sit in front of the idiot box (TV) that stares at them twenty-four hours a day, with their eyes glued to it, yelling at one another, “shut up, shut up,” because it might interrupt their program. Television has become the master of their hearts, souls, bodies, and minds. It has done more than any other thing to break down personal communications among people. Then everyone has to have their own room so that they can go off into their little section of the house and commit their sins in private. And they call that a blessing, a prosperous life? Independence and loneliness bring separation within the family structure. Parents and children cannot communicate, husbands and wives don’t even know each other, and family life is reduced to yelling and cursing at each other and fighting over money. Then each goes their own independent way. That is independence – American style.
God’s people are guilty of the same sin. Whenever they have wanted to be independent of God, they have gone off into wretchedness and then captivity. God is saying to us in this hour, “Stop being independent; stop thinking that you have it all together; stop believing that you don’t need anyone, not even Me!” It takes humility to admit that we need God and that we need God’s people. Christians in this hour like to exist independent of God’s order. If we don’t like one church, we run to another, and Christian (?) Television has added to that independent spirit: just turn the channel if you don’t like what they say and tune into another one. This creates the impression that the individual operating in independence is always in control, or so they think. But you know, God is wanting us to bow down and know what it is to crawl before Him, to desire Him, and to know that we cannot function without God. Many times we lie to ourselves as we live in a plastic world. Hollywood has sold us a whole package of goods; it has shaped our entire lives, and we live in our plastic world believing we are happy. We do what we want to do and do not interact or function with other people except in a negative, destructive way. Then we think that we are really on top of it. But it is all just a lonely, empty, isolated act.
What is the correlation between all of this and the Tribal call? Well, the message of the Ecclesia, the Tribal Call, means putting down your pride of independence and separating yourself from the curse of independence. Tribal Call means admitting that you need God and you need God’s people. It is true – I need God’s people. Not because they support me or take care of me, but because God put the capacity in my heart for them. If I don’t live with God’s people, a part of me is dead. God did not intend that His people would function independently of each other, but that they would function as one body. That means that if we are part of the body, we cannot function without the other parts of the body.
Independence is a curse. It brings loneliness, separation from God and His people. It brings isolation. God does not want us independent, isolated, and separated, but He wants us to be a corporate body, a people who are living and functioning as one in Him for His purpose. God desires that His people would get in unity of mind, body, and spirit around the world, and begin to function in the capacities that He has for them. He must become our heart. He must become our head, our legs, our arms, so that we can be empowered to do the will of God. If we stop and look at the American lifestyle, it is the most absurd, selfish, piggish, wasteful lifestyle that I have ever observed in all the cultures and nations that I have visited. During my travels, I have been to many nations, and I have seen many, many cultures and lifestyles, and America is by far the most selfish, the most wasteful, the most greedy nation on earth. And it all goes back to INDEPENDENCE: “I’ve got my own car! I’ve got my own house! I have my own job! I have my own money! I’ve got my own this and my own that!” Independence is a curse!
American lifestyle, it is the most absurd, selfish, piggish, wasteful lifestyle that I have ever observed in all the cultures and nations that I have visited.
CHURCH
The English word “church” is derived from the Gk. Adjective kyriakos as used in some such phrases as used in some such phrases as kyriakos doma or kyriake oikia, meaning “the Lord’s house,” i.e., a Christian place of worship. “Church” in the N.T., however, comes from Gk. Ekklesia… Although we often speak of these congregations collectively as “the N.T. church” or “the early church,” no N.T. writer uses ekklesia in this collective way. An ekklesia was a meeting or assembly. Its most common use was for the public assembly of citizens duly summoned, which was a feature of all the cities outside Judæa where the gospel was planted (e.g. Acts 19:39); ekklesia was also used among the Jews (LXX) for the “congregation” of Israel which was constituted at Sinai and assembled before the Lord at the annual feasts in the persons of its representative males (Acts 7:38). (New Bible Dictionary, second edition Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Wheaton, IL)
Independence has even invaded the realm of human relationships in this country to the point that countless men and women are living “liberated” lifestyles, where the idea of remaining faithful to your husband or wife for life is considered old-fashioned and stupid. Women don’t need men anymore, and men don’t need women. They’re all independent now, and everyone is switching and swapping partners at the blink of an eye. The spirit of independence is especially manifest on the children of this age. They no longer need their parents, and they are taught at public school that if their parents try to force them to do anything they don’t want to do (like live by God’s principles) that they can TURN THEM IN and the parents will be punished. The point I am getting at is, INDEPENDENCE IS THE ENEMY OF THE PURPOSES OF GOD! Independence is the enemy of true love, and independence is the enemy of the true sovereign army/nation/tribe that God is going to bring forth. So, if you see independence crop up in you, are you going to bow down to a demon, or are you going to bow down to God? The choice is very simple: your own way or God’s way. Independence as we know it in this country is a waster and a destroyer. It is a tool of the devil, plain and simple.
God is issuing a call in this hour, the Tribal call. He is wanting to reach out around the world and pull people into himself again. You may wonder why He is doing that when we have so many churches full of people who claim to be God’s people. It’s because they are not really God’s people. They claim to be, but they are not. In word, they are, but in deed, they are not. Why? Because of independence. Now, I am going to read Hebrews 3:1-6 from the Amplified Bible:
“So then, brethren, consecrated and set apart for God, who share in the heavenly calling, thoughtfully and attentively consider Jesus, the Apostle and High Priest whom we confessed as ours [when we embraced the Christian faith]. [See how] faithful He was to Him who appointed Him [Apostle and High Priest], as Moses was also faithful in the whole household [of God]. Yet Jesus has been considered worthy of a much greater honor and glory than Moses as the builder of a house has more honor than the house [itself]. For, [of course,] every house is built and furnished by someone, but the Builder of all things and the Furnisher [of the entire equipment of all things] is God. And Moses certainly was faithful in the administration of all God’s house, [but it was only] as a ministering servant. [In his entire ministry he was but] a testimony to the things which were to be spoken – the revelations to be given afterward [in Christ]. But Christ, the Messiah, was faithful over His [own Father’s] house as a son [and Master of it]. And it is we who are [now members of] this house, if we hold fast and firm to the end our joyful and exultant confidence and sense of triumph in our hope [in Christ].
The key concept I want to focus on in this scripture has to do with the words “household” and “house.” Now, when Paul used these words was he talking about a physical building? When he talks about the Father’s house is he referring to nothing more than a structure like the one we are in right now? No! The actual physical place where we meet, with four walls, a floor and a roof, is a building. When Paul mentions the Father’s house, he is referring to us, the people of God, the body of Christ, the Spirit-filled, born-again Ecclesia of God. When someone is born again, they are ingrafted into the community of believers, becoming part of the Ecclesia, and the building in which you may meet doesn’t matter at all. God is interested in people, not buildings.
When Paul talks about the house of God, you can also look at it like a realm or domain in the Spirit. It says in Colossians that our citizenship is not of this earth but it is of heaven. I’m a citizen of America just because I live here. First and foremost, I am a Christian, and I owe my loyalty and allegiance to the Kingdom of God, not any earthly government. When you are born again, you become a part of God’s household, part of the Kingdom of Heaven, part of the Ecclesia. It is a spiritual thing, not just a natural, physical membership based on where you were born or where you now live. Of course, each of us lives in some country, defined by men, somewhere on the earth, yet at the same time each one of us, if we are truly born again, belong to the household of God, the Ecclesia, which becomes the supreme authority in our lives and demands our undivided loyalty.
Another scripture that can help us to understand the idea that a house is not just a physical building is in Genesis 18:19 where it says, “For I have known (chosen, acknowledged) him [as My own] so that he may teach and command his children and the sons of his house after him to keep the way of the Lord and to do what is just and righteous, so the Lord may bring Abraham what He has promised him.” This is dealing with the house of Abraham. In those days, they did not live in structures like we have today, which we call houses. They probably lived in tents. So what did they mean when they talked about Abraham’s house? Obviously, they were talking about a realm, a domain, an extended family unit, a tribe, a community. It was talking about those who were part of Abraham’s family and who followed Him in faith. Another example along the same lines is found in Genesis 46:27 where it talks about the house of Jacob, referring to those who came out of Jacob’s loins, those who were going to carry on His life. All these things are shadows and types that we can learn from today. Those of the house of Abraham and the house of Jacob were meant to carry on the faith, the life, the relationship with God that their fathers had. And that is what Jesus wants to do. He desires to bring forth sons and daughters, His house, His body, His tribe, who will reproduce and carry His life to others.
Now, do we see the true life of Jesus Christ being carried on today through those who claim to be part of His household? Be honest. How much of the life of Christ have you seen among those that claim to be Christians? I don’t see much of it. I don’t see much love, much compassion. I don’t see many miracles, or much virtue and righteousness coming from those people. Instead, I see a lot of whoremongering and entertainment. I see a lot of sodomy, filth, and pretension. I see a lot of false, fictitious, phony things, yet I don’t see the righteousness that is Jesus. I don’t see people carrying on the true life of Jesus, like the house of Abraham and Jacob carried on their life to successive generations.
So, you see that when we are talking about God’s household or house what we mean is a realm of life that we can live in, a realm of faith, a realm of obedience, a realm of seeking God and living by His Spirit commands. This is where Israel failed. This is what brought Israel into destruction so many times in the Old Testament, and it is what will bring us to destruction today – when they started looking to and desiring to be like the heathen around them. They started looking to the Sodomites, to the Canaanites, to the Egyptians and Chaldeans, and they said, “Hey, I want to be like them. They look like they are having so much fun because they can do all kinds of things that our God says we can’t do.” And when they lusted after the ways of the heathen, when they desired
Instead, I see a lot of whoremongering and entertainment. I see a lot of sodomy, filth, and pretension. I see a lot of false, fictitious, phony things, yet I don’t see the righteousness that is Jesus.
to imitate their activities and worship the same gods as the heathen, they lost the glory of God. They lost that position of being part of God’s household. They fell flat on their faces because they insisted upon imitating the ways of the heathen. And eventually, because of their continued idolatry and harlotry on God, the kingdom of Israel was divided, and it remained divided up until the time of Jesus. And that is exactly what we see today, a divided, fragmented mess called the “Church,” which has insisted upon imitating the ways of the heathen around them, and has completely lost the true concept of what it means to belong to the household of God, the holy tribe or Ecclesia.
Now in Jesus’ day, when the Pharisees, the Chief Priest, and the rulers found out that there was someone proclaiming Himself to be the Messiah, they got offended and began plotting how to put Him to death. Why did they want to do that? Because they didn’t want to lose their jobs, they didn’t want to lose their position and prestige, and they didn’t want to lose the peoples’ money. Sounds like a lot of preachers I know today. They don’t want to give up their old ways even though they are completely corrupt, even though they know that God is bringing in a new order, that He is raising up A SPIRIT PEOPLE! The resistance of the established religious order to the new move of God is nothing new. It happened to Jesus, and it will happen to anyone who truly follows the Spirit of God. In fact, Jesus aggressively cleansed the temple twice, chasing out all those who were using God’s house to make money off of the people. And when they crucified Jesus, the veil in the temple was ripped in half, signifying that the way to the throne of grace was now open for all mankind, and do you know what the Chief Priest did? He got a big needle and thread and sewed it back up so they could continue on with their ROUTINE. They knew that if the people found out that they could have direct access to God through Jesus that the whole priesthood as they knew it would come to an end, and they would be out of a job permanently. We see the same kind of behavior today among the chief preachers and religious racketeers who set themselves between God and His people, creating jobs for themselves and extorting funds from God’s people. And when the Holy Ghost comes in and wants to shake up their show, they immediately start looking for somebody to crucify.
The church as we know it today has got to come to an end. It is so corrupt. The priesthood is so wicked and the people have turned to such abominations that it has got to be stopped. God is bringing forth a true people, that is what He is telling us. It doesn’t matter if you believe it or not. God is bringing forth a SPIRIT PEOPLE. You say, “There are already Spirit-filled churches where they speak in tongues, and they prophesy and dance in the Spirit. What about them?” We’ve seen them all throughout the years, and upon close examination, you will usually find that it is nothing but a show and an act put on for the people. I’m not saying that there aren’t some people who truly love God out there, but let’s face it: we do not see a true Ecclesia today, a true community of God’s people like you read about in the book of Acts. We can’t find it, and we know that God is desiring it. God desires a true people, a righteous people. He is wanting a people who will execute His judgements, keep His laws, and live by the commands of His Spirit in their lives everyday.
The Christians of today cannot even offer up pure sacrifices of praise and thanksgiving anymore. They go to church, lift up their hands to God, and they are defiled. Their eyes are defiled from watching television all week long, from lusting after all the things of this world. They’ve seen countless murders, rapes, perversions, people taking drugs and alcohol, every kind of filth you can imagine, people blaspheming God, and the idolatry of material possessions until it is running out of their ears. Then they have the nerve to go to church and say, “I love the Lord!” NO! You don’t love the Lord. You love that television; you love that sodomite device, that sewage inlet in your living room. You love to partake of the filth that it spews forth. You love to hear it, and you love to eat it with your eyes. That is the truth of the matter. God knows it, and He is sick of it. It is HYPOCRISY!
God is wanting to bring forth a new tribe of people, and they are going to be all different colors, and they will come from all parts of the world. He is gathering them in unto Himself and He is forming a new, clean tribe. Everyone knows that when something gets totally corrupted that it has to be done away with. And that is how God is looking at the present religious order. It has been so corrupted by the world, the flesh, and the devil that it must be done away with and something true to God’s heart must be put in its place. God feels a need for new people, a clean people. And we know that many will go on in their church routines. They’ll go on building their mega-churches with expensive sound systems and the best of everything that money can buy. Everybody will deck themselves out in the latest fashions and say, “I love you; I love you” to each other, and their preacher will continue to steal from them, and the show will go on. The Babylonian church circus with the pretty boys and dancing girls will go on. But at the same time, God is going to raise up a clean people. He is calling a people out of those places. He is calling them into a new life, a new realm of the Spirit. He is calling forth something that is clean!
Just recently, someone said about us that we have got evil in our hearts because we don’t love the Church. Well, they are right on one count: I don’t love the “Church” because it is not built and controlled by God. I cannot love any institution or organization that is built and controlled by man. Now if a “church” truly humbles themselves and gives control of their affairs over to God, seeking Him in all things, then they are really not a “church” anymore. They become a Spirit body, an Ecclesia. And that is exactly what God desires. Yet the facts are that very few are willing to do this because of the humility, pain, and suffering involved. When people accuse us of being “Church haters,” it only goes to show how brainwashed they are. Why would I love and support something that is corrupt and controlled by men with corrupt, warped minds, who are opposed to the true Spirit purposes of God? I can’t. These places that call themselves “churches,” where people go to be entertained and put on a good show for each other, are not what God wants. That is not God’s house. It is a mixture of flesh and Spirit. It is an abomination. All this becomes especially clear when you begin to study the Ecclesia and seek God for yourself about how His true people should live.
Let me use an illustration which I think is very effective to make my point. Let’s say you are married and you love your mate very much. Now, unfortunately, your mate doesn’t love you as much as you love him or her, and they insist upon going out and committing adultery. So, when they come home at night, and you try to hug them and tell them you love them, all you smell is the stink from their fornication and adultery. If you were a normal person with your right mind, it would be very difficult to honestly say, “I love you” when you are being repulsed by the stink of their adultery. This exactly describes the predicament that Jesus Christ is facing with His people today. He is faced with a whoremongering, sin-ridden, sin-stinking prostitute who is supposed to be His true, faithful bride, but who instead lays with every filthy thing the world has to offer. They fornicate from morning ‘till night, either in their minds or with their bodies. They do it in their hearts also. They fornicate with the world, God knows, and then they have the audacity to go to some place they call a “church” and say stuff like, “I just love the Lord! I love His word!” Yet they break every commandment He ever gave. How long do you expect God to put up with such hypocrites and liars?
God doesn’t want to embrace a stinking whore anymore than you would. Isn’t that true? He doesn’t want to come up and embrace His bride, who is professing to be a virgin, when she stinks like fornication, when she reeks like alcohol, cigarettes, and marijuana. Yet this is exactly where Church people are living today. They think that they can do anything their flesh desires and God is obligated to embrace them and shower His blessings down upon them because they use His name. They wipe their mouth and say, “I’ve done no evil; I’ve done no evil” after they’ve just watched perverted sex and murder on their T.V. set all night. You would be shocked if you actually knew how many preachers, pastors, and ministers of today are addicted to pornography. We’ve known lots of them who have come to us for help, for deliverance, and for casting out of demons.
…tell them you love them, all you smell is the stink from their fornication and adultery. If you were a normal person with your right mind, it would be very difficult to honestly say, “I love you” when you are being repulsed by the stink of their adultery.
Multitudes of God’s people today are addicted to filth. And you wonder how did it come to this in the first place? It has come to this because those men and women who profess to be the leaders of God’s people no longer ATTACK SIN over the pulpit. They no longer expose and pinpoint the sins of God’s people because they would become unpopular and their offerings would go down. What happened is that those who claim to be God’s leaders have sacrificed the spiritual health of God’s people, allowing them to become addicted to sin, so that their cheap religious shows could continue to flourish and they would continue to look great in the eyes of men. This is one phenomenon you won’t find in the true Ecclesia under the leadership of Jesus Christ.
As I have said before, when you go back and try to clean off and uncover something that has been buried, it is a lot of work. You have to throw all the garbage off of it before you can get down to the real thing. And this is what we are having to do with the concept of the Ecclesia. Over the centuries, the man-made Babylon church system has dumped so much garbage on the concept of the true Ecclesia that virtually no one knows what it really is anymore. I want to bring out another point in John 14:1-3. It reads, “Let not your heart be troubled: ye believe in God, believe also in me. In my Father’s house are many mansions: if it were not so, I would have told you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also.” I want you to notice that He was speaking in the present tense when He said, “…that where I am, ye may be also.”
Where was He? He was standing right there speaking to His apostles! In essence He was saying, “Hey, my Father has a big house, or tribe, and in this big, overall realm are many smaller houses or tribes. He wanted them to understand that in the big realm called the Kingdom of God that there were many little kingdoms. He was not talking about when you die and go to heaven; he was talking about the realm of the Spirit where He was living at that time, and how we, as members of God’s house, would be able to live there also. But first He had to do something. First, He had to go and die and make the way that we could actually become part of His Father’s house. He said, “I will come again and receive you unto myself that where I am, there ye may be also.” He wasn’t saying that we have to wait until we die to enter into that realm of the Spirit. No, He was saying that the Holy Spirit would be sent back to be our leader, our guide, to take us into this realm of the Spirit where Jesus IS.
We can belong to God’s house now, today, here on earth. It has nothing to do with some big, fancy mansion on a hill in Heaven, with streets of gold, and angels playing their harps everywhere, and we get an apartment up there in that mansion. No, Jesus was talking about the realm in the Spirit where He was living while He was walking around with the Apostles. Yet no one could enter into that realm until He died, opening up the way for each of us to the throne of Grace. And today, I have got the Holy Spirit in me, and I am living in that place, in that realm of power with Jesus Christ. I belong to the house of God here and now, and I am walking in the dominion power of His Spirit. I am overcoming my enemies now, and I don’t have to wait until I die to go to Heaven because Heaven is a realm in the Spirit.
We can have the same Spirit in us that raised Jesus from the dead. We have that Spirit in us if we are truly born again. We have that Spirit that has conquered sin, that has conquered death, that has conquered Hell. We can partake of the power of that Spirit if we will cooperate with God. You may wonder, if all this is true, why don’t we see this power working among God’s people? There are two main reasons that I can see, the first being that God’s people, including His leaders, are ignorant of this truth. It has been neglected and covered over for so long, and the gods of entertainment and greed have come in and set themselves up instead, that God’s people no longer realize that they can live their everyday lives in the power of the Spirit. They no longer know that they can have dominion over sin. In fact, they have actually been deceived into believing that sin doesn’t really matter, and that the Kingdom of God is in Word only, not in power.
The other reason, which is related to the first, is that God’s people have become increasingly independent of God. They have been taught that they have their “freedoms,” their “liberties” in Christ, and that they should never allow anybody to tell them what to do or how to live. If you teach even the slightest principles of discipline today, you will be branded as a cult, and they will say that you are taking people into “bondage” because you won’t allow them to live in sin and be part of your assembly. They have got God’s people convinced that they don’t need to submit to authority anymore, and that they should never have to take correction from anyone concerning spiritual matters. It is so bad today that leaders have become nothing more than paid entertainers whose job it is to keep the people occupied when they come to church once a week, telling jokes and tickling their ears with new revelations about the “End Times.” No longer does the power of God lead and guide, convicting of sin and disciplining the body when necessary. True discipline and discipleship cannot be found in the Babylon church system. Yet discipline, whose end is holiness, is the essence of the Ecclesia, and you can’t have a true Spirit Tribe without it. So, it is because of ignorance and independence that you no longer see the power of God working among His people.
It is only too obvious that the power of God is lacking in the lives of those who claim to be His. It’s because they are not living in the realm that I have been talking about. They have not entered into the Kingdom of God, for the Kingdom of God is power, it is righteousness, it is holiness, and it is freedom from sin. The Kingdom of God is the power of God. God is an absolute God, and He wants an absolute people. And if you want to know the power of God, you have got to be in absolute obedience. And this is why God’s people do not have the power of God anymore, because they are not letting God have power over them. Do you want to know the key to the Kingdom of God, the key to dominion power? The only way you can experience true dominion power of the Kingdom of God is TO LET GOD RULE OVER YOU! If you let God rule over you in an absolute way, then you will have the power of God in your life. You’ll have power to put demons under your feet, you’ll have power to resist temptation, and you’ll have power to overcome sin. I am not saying that all your problems will go away. I am saying that you can experience the power of God in your life so that you won’t have to go around moaning and groaning and whining about how the devil keeps beating you down, and how you keep falling into the same sins over and over again. You will be able to break out of the bondage of sin and begin waging an effective war campaign against the enemies. And the key to this realm of power is letting God rule over you, letting God become your absolute dictator, your only master, ruler, and King.
We hear so many people say that Jesus is their King, but do they really mean that? Is He really their King, or are they just kidding themselves and blowing hot air? Do they really bow down and worship Him? Do they really give Him reverence? Is He really the King of their life? Or is He just “King” in word only, not in actual deed? What do you think? Look at their lives: do you see the power of God manifest? Do you see Christians taking dominion over sin? Unfortunately, we don’t. Instead, we see them making excuses for their sins and continuing on in their independent lifestyles. The power of God is not there. They use His name when they want to pray for material possessions that they lust after, or when they want to act spiritual in front of other men, but when it comes to actual obedience, sacrifice, and discipleship, God is not the king – they are! Yet God is an absolute God, and He demands absolute obedience. I am going to keep preaching this truth until I die because I know that the only way that true Ecclesias are going to be formed and maintained is through absolute obedience to the Spirit of God. I know that the only way you will ever see the power of the Kingdom manifest and working in people’s lives is through absolute obedience.
In closing, I want to read you 1 Corinthians 4:20 which says, “For the kingdom of God is not in word, but in power.” This is a short but powerful punch. I am sick of all these “Word” ministries that don’t have enough power to knock a flea off a dog’s back. “Word, word, word…” – they act so spiritual because they know the “Word” – but when all the cards are on the table, you come to find out that their lives are still plagued with sin, that they don’t know how to cast out demons, and that they can’t offer any real help to anyone at all. We have seen enough ministries like this throughout the years to last us a lifetime. When all is said and done, the only thing that will matter is whether or not you obeyed God. Whether you decide to come into the realm of absolute obedience or not, the truth remains that God is going to have a people, a called-out Spirit people, a holy tribe who will obey Him and demonstrate the power of His Kingdom in this earth. Let God search your heart, let Him show you the power of community, and let Him open your understanding and allow you to see the beauty of the true Ecclesia. Amen.