JESUS is Near! Broadcast Transcript from July 26, 2020

Good Morning Blessings – thank you all for joining me today on this ROF Ministries broadcast.  I can hardly believe this is the last weekend of July – can you?  It seems like the minutes go slow and the time goes fast in some weird way.  I pray your week was blessed by more moments with Jesus revealing Himself in your lives.  He reminded me how just as we are walking out the Book of Revelation, which is actually the revealing of Jesus during the last of days – He is revealing Himself in our own lives in little and big ways!  As all of this is unfolding we are so blessed to have been given the gift of the Holy Spirit – not a spirit of fear.  And as we release all fear, we are being comforted in the Lord Jesus, resting in His peace which surpasses all understanding – Thank You Lord.

Just a couple things to clarify our eyesight a little – in the year 2020 our spiritual acuity is unveiling our eyes to see increasingly in truth, before we were blind, now we can see.  He is opening the eyes of our hearts in a most precious way and we know this because we may initially see men walking as trees, eventually we see past all the shadows, having eyesight to see Him fully, just as He is… Loving Father.  You know Jesus saw Him as such too.  Once we see Him in truth we accept His truth without presumption or condition, letting go and just submitting to His perfect will.  We know we are aligning with Him in such a way when the cry of our heart is to be pleasing in His sight.  The church right now needs a great shaking so badly, to open the eyes in such a way so that we learn – no man rules God’s House, only He does.  And when He shows up, He cleanses His house where He dwells – nothing He touches, not you or me or His household remains the same because He really does make all things new.

We’ve talked so much about this “birthing” and how it is spiritual and also let’s not forget it is inward and not always manifesting outwardly where others can partake of the fruit yet.  It is in this “ending, where we actually begin…”  The death to self and the beginning of who we were created to be – a new creature in Christ Jesus.  Hidden in Him, decreased, Him revealed through increase.  For fullness to reach its highest point spiritually, we must experience victory and suffering by picking up our cross daily to walk with Him.  In this it is no longer I who live, but Jesus lives within me as I have been crucified with Christ, which is the plan and purpose for us all.  The old creature dies a slow death when we hang onto the ways of the old life and the patterns of thinking which keeps us bond to what we thought we knew or for what worked for us in the past – which never really did, but these ways became our coping skills to make it through each day’s struggles.  He reminds us that any reaction we give or words we speak or activities we participate in that do not reflect Jesus Himself, is still me or you – the old creature trying to resurrect itself or refusing to die.  So with that we endure some more purifying, in order to attain the victory found in Jesus – we carry our cross daily for Him to be glorified in and through us as an encouragement for those who are also struggling.  All victory belongs to Him, Jesus, Who is victorious, we simply surrender to His will.  The more we die to self, the less self that puts up a fight and in Him we overcome all things. 

Knowing it is the pure in heart which sees God – if we look for Him in a very pre-conceived specific way, we will miss if He appears differently than what we thought – which is a piece to the mystery of Jesus being revealed.  He is appearing each day to assist and help us to walk in His footsteps and how we live tests if we believe His return is near.  We have a tendency to hide from Him when we are convicted or know we’ve done something wrong so we retreat.  And I know I say this all the time – but thankfully, He leaves the 99 to go after the 1 lost sheep – in which we’ve all been in that place a time or two haven’t we?  Which even that is purposed so we realize we cannot save ourselves, proving we need Him even more.

It is when we see Jesus appearing in situations we can then become an authentic witness for Him and I saw all this as I was reading Acts Chapter 1.  Right prior to Jesus ascending in a cloud He told them when they receive power when the Holy Ghost comes upon them – you shall be witnesses unto Me – are His exact words.  In the next verse it says immediately after He spoke these things, while they watched, He was taken up and a cloud received Him out of their sight.  Later it also says by the same manner in which He left shall He also come – in the clouds.  Can you imagine being a witness to this yourself?  Just amazing. 

Prior to this happening in John Chapter 21 I was reading how Jesus asked Simon Peter THREE TIMES if he loved Him and if so He gave him a command… which was – TO FEED HIS SHEEP.  But I want to show you something… Remember when Peter denied Jesus THREE TIMES before Jesus was crucified?  Look at this redemption – this mercy – at the hand of Jesus.  He denied Him because he sought to save His own life (old creature won out that time) but now, the new creature, reformed look how Simon Peter was given a chance of reconciliation and this time he passed with flying colors…  He laid down his life and fears this time, truly being a disciple of Jesus and what was the command to obedience?  Feed Jesus’s sheep.  Again, we know what we do to the least of these we are actually doing unto Jesus.  This just makes you smile and warm inside doesn’t it?  You can read the whole story in John 21 – because here it reveals “feeding” of sheep is both spiritual and natural.  I just find this so incredible how Jesus saw hope within Peter – not giving up on him when he denied Him, giving him a chance to reconcile all that was lost while embracing the cross.  And that same outstretched hand is directed to you and me…  We make mistakes galore, but the Lord Jesus always makes a way of escape for us to make amends, being a redeemed soul – as long as we are looking and longing for Him, accepting the invitation to repent – He leads us right where we need to be, securely in His arms of grace.  I just pray this encourages you even more – Jesus will not let you go, as long as you keep seeking Him with your whole heart.  Seek Him… While He can be found.

Okay… So today we are going to study in Luke Chapter 6, for no other reason than it was what I turned to while preparing for our talk today.  That’s a good enough reason isn’t it?  Stunningly it is quite relevant to us, which is not surprising because that is just how the Lord moves in our lives, isn’t it?

We are going to skip all the way down and start in verse 20 – because this is a really long Chapter.  I guess I had forgotten all about this chapter and how it compliments the Beatitudes until I read it again.  In verse 17, it sets the scene as Jesus was standing in the company of His disciples looking down at a sea of people, a great multitude who were vexed with unclean spirits and He actually healed them all!  Verse 19 says, the whole multitude sought to TOUCH HIM, so His virtue went out of Him and healed them all!  This is already good news today, isn’t it?  Jesus TOUCHES those afflicted, He embraces those needing saving, He cleanses the unclean…. Wow, at His appearing —- death flees, losing its grip on the maimed and broken – including many of us.  We at times are just like those in the multitude of people, aren’t we?  Immediately after He healed them all with His virtue – in verse 20 it says He lifted up His eyes, looking directly at His disciples and said what we are going to study today.  We little sheep are gonna be fed today and then go out and feed Jesus’s sheep because we love Him.

Luke 6 –

²⁰ And he lifted up his eyes on his disciples, and said, Blessed be ye poor: for yours is the kingdom of God.

²¹ Blessed are ye that hunger now: for ye shall be filled. Blessed are ye that weep now: for ye shall laugh.

²² Blessed are ye, when men shall hate you, and when they shall separate you from their company, and shall reproach you, and cast out your name as evil, for the Son of man’s sake.

²³ Rejoice ye in that day, and leap for joy: for, behold, your reward is great in heaven: for in the like manner did their fathers unto the prophets.

²⁴ But woe unto you that are rich! for ye have received your consolation.

²⁵ Woe unto you that are full! for ye shall hunger. Woe unto you that laugh now! for ye shall mourn and weep.

²⁶ Woe unto you, when all men shall speak well of you! for so did their fathers to the false prophets.

Broken contrite vexed humble in need of saving vs. proud self-righteous boastful

²⁷ But I say unto you which hear, Love your enemies, do good to them which hate you,

Do not return evil for evil – let the Lord Who is mighty justly deal with them

²⁸ Bless them that curse you, and pray for them which despitefully use you.

They are poor, naked and blind – and don’t even know, so we pray for them and for the Lord to intervene quickly and show mercy upon them, not returning a reaping of the cursing they’ve sowed

²⁹ And unto him that smiteth thee on the one cheek offer also the other; and him that taketh away thy cloak forbid not to take thy coat also.

Remember those who gather at your love feasts – I call them spiritual bullies – they always like to smite you, because they think they can get away with it and quite often they do for the short term – by us not defending ourselves, it activates the Lord to deal with them directly. They may even strip us down naked – let them – He will deal with them in His timing, His way.

³⁰ Give to every man that asketh of thee; and of him that taketh away thy goods ask them not again.

³¹ And as ye would that men should do to you, do ye also to them likewise.

I love this verse – don’t you?  If we would all follow this simple instruction how much more at peace we would be with one another.

³² For if ye love them which love you, what thank have ye? for sinners also love those that love them.

³³ And if ye do good to them which do good to you, what thank have ye? for sinners also do even the same.

³⁴ And if ye lend to them of whom ye hope to receive, what thank have ye? for sinners also lend to sinners, to receive as much again.

³⁵ But love ye your enemies, and do good, and lend, hoping for nothing again; and your reward shall be great, and ye shall be the children of the Highest: for he is kind unto the unthankful and to the evil.

More confirmation of us holding our peace, storing up our treasures in Heaven.

³⁶ Be ye therefore merciful, as your Father also is merciful.

³⁷ Judge not, and ye shall not be judged: condemn not, and ye shall not be condemned: forgive, and ye shall be forgiven:

If we allow the Lord to intervene our payout is divine and perfect and eternal, if we judge, condemn etc… our reward may be immediate to the flesh and quickly dissipate.

³⁸ Give, and it shall be given unto you; good measure, pressed down, and shaken together, and running over, shall men give into your bosom. For with the same measure that ye mete withal it shall be measured to you again.

³⁹ And he spake a parable unto them, Can the blind lead the blind? shall they not both fall into the ditch?

It is amazing how when you hold your tongue, the blindness falls off and you begin to see just how blind many are and those that follow them by upholding their evil ways.

⁴⁰ The disciple is not above his master: but every one that is perfect shall be as his master.

Perfection is seeking the Lord – we just studied that recently.

⁴¹ And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother’s eye, but perceivest not the beam that is in thine own eye?

When we look at only what others are doing wrong we have a beam called ego/pride in our own eye which blinds us to our own shortcomings. 

⁴² Either how canst thou say to thy brother, Brother, let me pull out the mote that is in thine eye, when thou thyself beholdest not the beam that is in thine own eye? Thou hypocrite, cast out first the beam out of thine own eye, and then shalt thou see clearly to pull out the mote that is in thy brother’s eye.

If we are gauging how everyone else is walking with the Lord or not by our own footsteps we are egotistical in nature – unable to see the truth of them.  We first must see the truth of us before we can see how someone else is living for Jesus.

⁴³ For a good tree bringeth not forth corrupt fruit; neither doth a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit.

⁴⁴ For every tree is known by his own fruit. For of thorns men do not gather figs, nor of a bramble bush gather they grapes.

⁴⁵ A good man out of the good treasure of his heart bringeth forth that which is good; and an evil man out of the evil treasure of his heart bringeth forth that which is evil: for of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaketh.

Observe and you can see who is evil and good by what they say is the truth of them in how they say it.  Words are like fruit – a display of what resides in the heart.

⁴⁶ And why call ye me, Lord, Lord, and do not the things which I say?

Jesus has a controversy with those who call Him Lord and do not do what He says.

⁴⁷ Whosoever cometh to me, and heareth my sayings, and doeth them, I will shew you to whom he is like:

⁴⁸ He is like a man which built an house, and digged deep, and laid the foundation on a rock: and when the flood arose, the stream beat vehemently upon that house, and could not shake it: for it was founded upon a rock.

When we lay to heart and do what Jesus commands we become a pillar in the Lord’s kingdom, unshakable and unmovable.

⁴⁹ But he that heareth, and doeth not, is like a man that without a foundation built an house upon the earth; against which the stream did beat vehemently, and immediately it fell; and the ruin of that house was great.

Those who hear or even read His words and yet does not obey by walking out His ways will be left in ruin by falling away.

Thank you Lord for this teaching today.

Now… The Lord laid something particularly on my heart to share today, even giving me an example.  He spoke to me saying “There is a difference between knowing the truth and loving the truth, many know the truth of the My words yet at times we are hesitant and do not love to apply it to our own lives by walking in His footsteps.  Only those who love the truth will enter fully into it.”

Then He began to show me something… It is simply not enough to KNOW TRUTH…  We must EMBRACE THE TRUTH, as well.

For example…  Gabriel knows his curfew is 10:30 – which is a truth, but being 17 Gabriel does not love that truth.  He doesn’t want to come home at 10:30, but he does so because he knows there are consequences if he doesn’t.

We can use this example to apply the commands the Lord gives us to follow.  But the clincher is – who loves to follow His commands and who just does so in order to not receive discipline or a consequence or worse yet, rebels against them altogether?  When we love the truth – we love to know our boundaries set forth by the Lord in order to be pleasing in His sight – it is like we say in our hearts – tell me more Lord about your ways, I want to follow only You.  We don’t see it as rules, we see it as instructions on this road map on a journey to everlasting life – we see it as a light guiding us Home, while others see only constraints and rules.  But those who only know the truth are in a constant struggle and battle within to somehow wiggle their way out of it, to take the path of least resistance, finagle a way around obedience – the broad path.  The first flock is the sheepfold, the second are those who entered in another way and without spiritual eyesight, they all look like sheep, but if you observe it is very easy to discern who is who, having threads of rebellion woven still into their garment.

Those who enter in another way – constantly quote scripture, engage in debate, provoke others to tangle them up in legalities and challenge authority – thinking themselves to be the only authority which is final.  They are very self-absorbed, full of themselves with planks still in their eyes blinding them so they go around trying to remove specks in others all the time.  They do not love the truth, because they know it already.

The first group loves the truth and may not even know all of it.  They are the more submissive of the sheep, kind hearted, even kind of dirty at times, yet hungry – starving all the time for more of Jesus, they follow Him wherever He goes because He feeds them continually and their main heart’s desire is to learn more about Him. 

The Lord pointed all this out so we are not fooled by a truth…  Just because someone tells the truth about something does not mean we are of the same fold.  Remember, even lucifer quoted Scripture – truth to Jesus, but Jesus did not receive it as such or embrace it because – the source offering it was wrong.  The truth was still the truth, but the source was evil – get what I am saying – the same thing happened during the fall?  Before we receive anything anyone is offering – even if it is truth, we must ask ourselves – is the person offering what I am about to receive in love with the truth or just parroting a truth?  Anything not said IN LOVE… is like a clanging symbol – love is key if the source is from the Lord.

So as we move forward with Jesus on this journey, we are decreasing so that He is increasing – as we move from glory to glory – the World appears darker and yet is not, what is happening is we are getting lighter.  As we move from strength to strength through a submitting of our wills being done – His will is being accomplish in break neck speed and met with much Worldly resistance.  He told us these things, so that when they happened we would not be shaken, only at rest hidden inside Him.  Most importantly our trustful rest is found only in Him – we are starting to see Him just as He is, thank You Lord.  It is my prayer that we lay our lives down, picking up our cross and follow Him, not to pick up our own lives again – becoming distracted with the cares of this life.

At times I am hopeful the Body Christ is getting our main purposed calling and then other times it seems we are leaps and bounds away from the fullness of Jesus – and I am speaking of myself too, because often frustrations in not walking in the Spirit is with me more often than I desire it to be.  So next week, Lord willing, we are going to talk a lot about the FIVE FOLD MINISTRY – how we are to compliment one another and not compete and recognize the FIVE FOLD MINISTRY is a gift given, not earned, containing the fullness of the anointing Jesus carried.  There is too much confusion in the Body right now because churches have sought and assigned positions, rather than edifying and enhancing the gift of each individual soul, which fosters competition over compliment.

So – the word of the day is – Either we are excited about what the Lord is doing or distracted by what the enemy is doing, which is indicative of just who we have our eyes upon.  Amen!

It is such a blessing how so many of the prison inmates we serve encourage us on our walks, returning joy to us in many unforeseen ways.  I had this one inmate send me something about “Excuses that will not stand the test” and thought I would share it today with you all.  The Word tells us all will be without excuse and this inmate was just reassuring that we must be authentic our walks, not fooling ourselves thinking we’ve already made it.  This is some of what he shared with me:

• You cannot blame God for God is not willing that any should perish, knowing He would have all men and women to be saved.  In order to not have everlasting life, one must rebel against believing in His Son Jesus.
• You cannot blame Jesus because the whole reason He came into the World was to save sinners like you and me, He said He came so we would have a more abundant life and if we just come to Him, He will not cast us away or out of a life of salvation.
• You cannot say you are not a sinner because death passed upon all men, as all of sinned and fallen short knowing there is not a just man upon the Earth that does good and does not sin – Jesus came to save the sinners by calling them forth to repent.
• You cannot say I am doing the best I can, I have turned over a new leaf or I have a good heart, God is too good to send anyone to hell or that I’ve done nothing worthy of punishment because all of our righteousness is like a filthy rag – no works will assist us to enter into His Kingdom because according to His mercy He saved us.  There is a way which seems right unto man, but it leads to death because the wages of sin is death and it is only through Jesus one must be saved.
• You cannot say you have not been warned, the whole World is without hope and helpless without God and is condemned already however, the Holy Spirit is striving with all man continually leading everyone to come into the saving knowledge of Jesus.  It is our decision whether we receive this gift of salvation or harden our hearts by being stiff necked thinking our ways are better or above His to enter into everlasting life.
• You cannot say there is plenty of time to live for Jesus because He says today is the day of salvation in that He has called all and some refused and He has stretched out His hand and man disregarded it and one day they will call upon Me and I will not answer.  Jesus is knocking at the door or our hearts, will we open it and invite Him in?
• You cannot blame your Pastor, leaders, teachers or brethren who seek faithfully to warn and guide you to turn your thoughts away from anything which does not align with Jesus, Who takes away the sins of the World.
• You cannot blame circumstances in your life because there is nothing that can keep a sinner from Jesus if he wants to come to Him for salvation.  The only thing which prevents anyone from entering in is rebellion and pride.
• You cannot blame hypocrites – those who talk one way and live another because you have a Bible to direct you and you need not follow the footsteps of others – just Jesus.  Read the Bible for yourself, it is the living word and everyone of us shall give an account one day to the Lord for studying and keeping His words, not man’s.
• You cannot say you don’t need Jesus because you keep the law because even if it were possible to keep the law – if you offend one person, ever you are guilty.  The law is fulfilled in one word – love… and it is only through the love of Jesus can we be made whole in order to fulfill His ways while on Earth.  The debt we owe we could never repay, which is only cleansed by the blood of Jesus who cleanses us from all sins.
• You cannot say you believe in Heaven but not in hell when Jesus spoke frequently warnings of going where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth, even those in hell today would not want anyone to perish as they are. 
• You cannot say you believe your own formed truth which goes against scripture, our beliefs will never alter God’s word because God’s word was written to alter our beliefs.
• Lastly, when we believe on the Lord Jesus we shall be saved.

I just thought that was so encouraging to keep us focused on who is important here – our precious Jesus, the only way to the Father in which we can be redeemed from this Earth.  Jesus the Name above all names – our Lord, our Savior.

Thank you all so very much for fellowshipping with me today.  Thank you for your loving support, encouragement and prayers.  May you have a blessed week ahead knowing Jesus has you securely in His hands.  Love you all!