I want to repeat an earlier post to bring out an important fact that each believer, as part of the body of Christ, the Church, is to be a participant in an overall process of maturing the whole body. And it is something that has to occur so that the eternal prospects God has deemed to come to pass will happen just as He has spoken them. Eph 4:11-13 (AMP) And His gifts were [varied; He Himself appointed and gave men to us] some to be apostles (special messengers), some prophets (inspired preachers and expounders), some evangelists (preachers of the Gospel, traveling missionaries), some pastors (shepherds of His flock) and teachers.
Every perspective of these five ministry gifts is afforded to the body by Christ and given to those who are a part of the same spiritual union. All believers have a common birthright with Jesus by the Holy Spirit, and not one receives such a gift and is placed in some euphoric position of authority, but all are called to fulfill a purpose. Each believer must continue to grow themselves while nurturing others. No one is a special part; all are equally a part of the same body, and each one is to individually assist in an overall process of growth from the word of God by the Holy Spirit.
Understanding this reveals that a primary function of these gifts is to equip believers with every aspect of service, so they can not only be active participants but also workers in the same. 12 His intention was the perfecting and the full equipping of the saints (His consecrated people), [that they should do] the work of ministering toward building up Christ’s body (the church), This process must continue in its purpose within the churches and in marriage for all to attain faith for the Church to arrive at a level of authority and power that equals that of Christ and His Divine stature.
13 [That it might develop] until we all attain oneness in the faith and in the comprehension of the [full and accurate] knowledge of the Son of God, that [we might arrive] at really mature manhood (the completeness of personality which is nothing less than the standard height of Christ’s own perfection), the measure of the stature of the fullness of the Christ and the completeness found in Him. An image of the Father was expressed in Jesus’s life, and He did this not as one who had Deity but as the Son of Man, obedient to reveal the nature and character of His Father.
I want to emphasize that God designed that, outside the Tabernacle and a Church’s physical dwelling, is the anointed covenant of marriage, where the most intimate aspects of a relationship in Christ are nurtured and matured. The Holy Spirit promotes such activity since marriage covenants cannot be out of an old nature prone to sin or any living fashioned by the world’s ways, but an image fashioned out of a process perceived by God. The view that marriage is treated in the churches as it is in the world has kept the truth about God’s purpose for it from the body of Christ.
Under Christ’s headship, the unity of character from all His sons and daughters is to appear. The body of Christ is not a place for its parts to gather and act as if they had it all together spiritually. Instead, it is a place where those parts come together to unite as His spiritual offspring, transformed by the Holy Spirit and the word of God. Acts 4:32 (MSG) The whole congregation of believers was united as one heart, one mind! They didn’t even claim ownership of their own possessions. No one said, “That’s mine; you can’t have it.” They shared everything.
The Church did not exist until Christ’s resurrection, and the Old Testament Tabernacle was a place where sacrifices and offerings were made. But God determined that there is an entity capable of nurturing and maturing for a spiritual purpose: the unity based on the family and the marital covenant He anointed. This co-opted manner of family living came into existence on the day of Adam’s acceptance of Eve as his wife, forming the first marriage covenant God would anoint and establish as a place to nurture His eternal offspring.
The Tabernacle, the Temple, the Synagogues, and the Church are places where the Spirit of God manifests a supernatural presence for continued maturation through teaching and maintaining a spiritual consciousness before God. But the real nurturing and revealing of true knowledge among Israel and believers today is to be done within the family structure. As parents, led by the Holy Spirit, tutor their children, they learn together about God and principles, traditions, and customs He instructed His offspring to observe. As they learn the truths about spiritual matters for today’s life application, they build the faith to trust God in His word.
God knows better than to rely upon the religious leaders of Israel or the Church to be the means to impart the truth that brings about His eternal purpose for humanity. Because man’s heart is continually evil, Gen 6:5, and errors appear through leadership throughout its entirety, the truth comes only from the one who was sent to deliver it to the Church, the Holy Spirit. John 16:13 Howbeit when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth: for he shall not speak of himself; but whatsoever he shall hear, that shall he speak: and he will shew you things to come.
God ordained the marriage union long before the Church or Israel came into existence. And He is still today relying upon it to bring forth His spiritual offspring. But leaders have reigned by religious doctrines that remove the true eternal purpose of marriage and replace it with ordinances of social traditions and customs of immoral statutes. While the Church has a purpose in spiritually developing God’s offspring, its ministerial path to accomplish this is still through individual persons in covenant with God and one another.
Many believe the Church is the only place where the Spirit of God appears in acts of supernatural power and intimate work. However, it can never bring forth the intimacy that occurs both natural and spiritual in a marriage covenant. Marriage is a setting where nurturing can occur within a family structure that, by the Holy Spirit, is far more valuable to the faith of all. Sheep produce sheep; that is the way God purposed it to be within His creation, and spiritual offspring are to produce more spiritual offspring.
In today’s warped sense of righteousness, believers say the local church is the only place where the power and authority of God prevail. And diligently flock to them, seeking an appearance of the Holy Spirit. Truth is God’s authority, and power existed long before the Church appeared and was then and is still today purposed to be revealed through His family lineage founded upon a marriage union. The births of Abraham and Sarah, Isaac and Jacob, and David and Jesus Christ, His own Son, were all brought about through marriage covenants rooted in family unity. Although Jesus’s birth was by the Holy Spirit, God did not remove the purpose of marriage and family in His life.
I do not intend to end the Church and its eternal part in God’s plans, but the true purpose of marriage is, unfortunately, by pulpits diminished to the bedroom and sexual intercourse. And yet, marriage should not be the precipice of our life in Christ; it should be the pinnacle of an eternal promise exercised by authority and power through spouses moving in the Holy Spirit. 1 Peter 3:22 (GW) Christ has gone to heaven where he has the highest position that God gives. Angels, rulers, and powers have been placed under his authority. Spouses as believers are a part of His body, and the authority and power of Christ are to flow through them by the Holy Spirit.
If spouses are of faith, the first manifestation occurs within their covenant marriage, guided by principles that reveal His image. Rev 19:7-9 Let us be glad and rejoice, and give honour to him: for the marriage of the Lamb is come, and his wife hath made herself ready. 8 And to her was granted that she should be arrayed in fine linen, clean and white: for the fine linen is the righteousness of saints. Why is a marriage union conveyed as the final one in Christ at the end? Jesus revealed to John that this revelation is true because God said it. 9 And he saith unto me, Write, Blessed are they which are called unto the marriage supper of the Lamb. And he saith unto me, These are the true sayings of God.
A significant truth to be learned, or in this case, a mystery to be revealed, about who the Church is to Christ is that it is a spiritual body that completes His eternal purpose for humanity. Similarly, what is a wife to her husband or husband to his wife? They together complete the marriage union for the eternal purpose of humanity becoming His spiritual body. It all works just as God proposed. Eph 5:30-32 For we are members of his body, of his flesh, and of his bones. 31For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and shall be joined unto his wife, and they two shall be one flesh. 32 This is a great mystery: but I speak concerning Christ and the church.
Today, many in the church appear to have thrown away the real purpose of marriage and replaced it with the evil dexterity of worldly-minded activity to nullify its true purpose. As a result, many marriages among believers now emphasize sensual interaction rather than supernatural power. The eternal purpose of marriage is not about an individual’s destined purpose, but a purpose ordained by God for a union of male and female, procreating the replenishment He decreed in the beginning. Mal 2:15-16 (MSG) GOD, not you, made marriage. His Spirit inhabits even the smallest details of marriage. And what does he want from marriage? Children of God, that’s what. So guard the spirit of marriage within you. Don’t cheat on your spouse. 16 “I hate divorce,” says the GOD of Israel. GOD-of-the-Angel-Armies says, “I hate the violent dismembering of the ‘one flesh’ of marriage.” So watch yourselves. Don’t let your guard down. Don’t cheat.
Only males and females were to fulfill His eternal plan, no chosen nation, no (body of believers) He calls the Church, and no worldly order to divert any supernatural presence of authority and power, making it happen. Gen 1:28 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. Although the Church remains present, the purpose of reconciliation has not changed, and only the Church can fulfill it, as only marriage can fulfill an intimate unity for the Spirit of God to nurture the offspring of the Most High God.
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