Last night was amazing listening to all of your testimonies.  What a blessing and honor to be in the House of the Lord with our brothers & sisters!  I have received my eyesight.  What does that mean?  When I read the old testament now, I see it in a whole new light.  I see it like it was written to me and for me.  You see, I thought of the verses above in Revelation last night when we were giving our testimony.  But how do interpret this verse properly?  The old testament is the new testament concealed and the new testament is the old testament revealed.  I heard someone say this once and I didn’t really get it.  Now I do.  Let’s take a look.

Read with me Genesis 12:6-8. Let’s take a look at this through the lense of the passage in picture.  What do we have?  First, we have the blood.  The blood of Christ was shed for everyone.  Look at this picture.  In Exodus we hear the male lamb may be taken from the sheep or the goats.  This even points to us non-jews being saved.  But look, everyone killed the lamb.  The blood was drained into a basin or bowl that could then be used to paint the blood onto the doorways of the home.  Well, what if the lamb was slain and the blood put in the basin but never applied to the doorposts?  Would this blood in the bowl help anyone escape the death that was coming to the land?  NO!

The Blood, in and of itself, would not have helped a single person escape the judgement that was coming.  Listen!  Judgement was coming on the enemy, but these people were going to get caught in the crossfire if they did not follow instructions and properly apply the Blood of the Lamb to the each side and the top of the doorposts.  So, ‘innocent’ or not, they had to kill an innocent lamb and apply the blood to the doorpost.  I think we can all understand this pretty good.  Jesus is the Lamb, we are the house, and the doorpost represents the cross (blood above and on both sides – head & hands).

Ok we got it.

But how do we apply the blood?

Listen, we are called to …

I know, we’ve been over this.  But, how do we heal the sick?  How do we cast out demons and raise the dead?  Most importantly, how do we make disciples?  Let’s consider the ‘tool’ used to apply the blood – hyssop.  Angie & I know a little about hyssop as we use it in some of our healing preparations.  Hyssop is a wonderful healing herb.  You know what else, it’s not a special plant.  It’s kinda like a weed.  It has pretty flowers if it gets enough rain but it’s kinda like a tumble weed.  It’s common, and grows in abundance in the arid environments in which it’s found.  So what does the hyssop represent?  Again, the old testament is the new testament concealed and the new testament is the old testament revealed so let’s get our answer from the new testament.

We apply the blood with the “Word of our testimony”!  I think this is quite profound.  You see, we have 2 parts here, the Word and our testimony.  So what is our testimony?  Listen to this very carefully because I heard someone who I have high respect for say this.

 

Read that again.

So we transfer the blood of Jesus to the place where we need protection and victory when we give our testimony!  What a revelation!

I have been struggling with something that I have heard my entire life from every church I’ve ever attended and from every Christian I know.  The thing I struggle with is this … “Salvation is by grace & faith alone”.  Now I haven’t always struggled with that.  I accepted it for a long time but recently, after reading many places in the Bible, I don’t think I can agree with that any longer.  Now, I can, but only when the true meanings of the Words come out.  Let’s take a look at Ephesians 2:9-8, the most famous verses that reiterate this doctrine.  This makes it appear that I’m in error here.  But let’s examine 2 words here, grace and faith.  Grace means “a supernatural enabling to God’s will” and faith means “an action based on belief”.  I can’t get into here how I came to those definitions but I will if you reply to this email.

 

Let’s take a look at a few Scriptures:

Ok, so confession is an interesting word to me and I have brought this up before in group.  Confession means “to say something about yourself that’s already true”.  You see, there’s ‘false confessions’ all the time.  Think about prisoners who confess to certain crimes to bolster their reputation in prison.  This is why a simple confession is not valid in court without corroborating evidence.  A ‘confession’ is only a confession if it’s actually true.  BUT!!!  Without this confession, we are not saved!  We are only righteous.  The church has been teaching that we can’t work for salvation and if we are talking about obeying the Law to get right with God, this is a true doctrine but what does James say?

Ok, this little short devotional has gone on long enough & I didn’t mean to get into all that but here’s the point …

 

I’m not the one saying this.  This is Scripture.  What is our testimony again?  It’s “testifying personally about what the Word of God says the blood of Jesus does for us”. I’m pumped up after writing this.

What do we do?

In light of all this, I would like to begin setting up times with each of you to video record you giving your testimony in an interview fashion.  Who would like to go first?  Reply to this email to let me know.

 

PS – In light of what I’m sharing, we need to realized that these promises ARE to us and for us!  These are not just commands and promises to the men of old.  As we go through this Daily Word together, lets remember what Jesus said in Matthew 22:31 (“have you not read what was spoken to you by God”) and echoed in Hebrews 12;5 (“the encouraging words God spoke to you as his children”) and then again in 2 Peter 1:5 (“In view of all this, make every effort to respond to God’s promises”).