From our perspective the beauty of a sacrificed life is not in the laying down and letting go of the life that is being sacrificed. The beauty for us is in the treasure that has been found to be worthy of the sacrifice of life – the perfect pearl of His life. A man will only sacrifice his life for something or someone that He loves and deems of greater value than His own life.
However, the beauty of our sacrificed life in God’s eyes is our total worship of love we have for Him. It is the real love bond with God that causes us to leave our past life and make the sometimes perilous journey to dwell as one with God in the High places of the abundant life of Christ Jesus.
Recently, I awoke one morning from a dream about visiting some places of my past life. Only a bare remnant of what I had left remained. Other people occupied the places where I had once lived. I had long since been moved on into spiritual places leaving the possessions of the past. I heard as I awoke, “You have lived a sacrificed life.” Instantly Romans 12:1-2 came to mind. “I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.”
God became man in Christ Jesus to become the firstfruits of many sons by His sacrificed life. God Himself became flesh and dwelt among us becoming both our substitute sacrifice and our role model of living a sacrificed life in this world – a perfect sinless life of obedience to the will of the Father.
The Real Grace of God
Our Heavenly Father knew from the beginning that man apart from Him could never live the fullness of the life that He intended. Before the fall Adam intimately knew and walked with God in the life that God designed for man. Sin entered, and death (separation from God) separated man from God’s design. Without God it was no longer possible for man to bring forth the kingdom of heaven on earth.
EVEN WITH THE SACRIFICE OF THE CROSS, IT WOULD NOT BE POSSIBLE FOR MAN TO ESTABLISH THE KINGDOM OF HEAVEN ON EARTH WITHOUT THE RESURRECTED CHRIST JESUS NOW ABIDING WITHIN HIS PEOPLE.
EVEN WITH THE SACRIFICE OF OUR LIVES, IT IS ONLY POSSIBLE TO BRING FORTH THE KINGDOM ON EARTH BY THE GREAT GRACE GIFT OF CHRIST JESUS ABIDING IN US BY THE HOLY SPIRIT.
God sovereignly opens our spiritual eyes and ears to see and hear the glory of the perfect love, righteousness, peace, and joy of the kingdom of heaven life now on earth through the resurrected Christ Jesus truly living His life in us.
THE BEAUTY OF OUR SACRIFICED LIFE IS THE LIFE OF CHRIST JESUS ABIDING IN US AS WE ABIDE IN HIM
When you and I lose our lives so that Jesus can live in our spirit, soul, and body, we save our lives to become the abundant life of God’s great grace in Christ Jesus abiding in His Body of many sons, His perfected Bride. Mark 8:34-35: “When He had called the people to Himself, with His disciples also, He said to them, “Whoever desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me.For whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake and the gospel’s will save it.”
Luke 18:29-30: “So He said to them, ‘Assuredly, I say to you, there is no one who has left house or parents or brothers or wife or children, for the sake of the kingdom of God, 30 who shall not receive many times more in this present time, and in the age to come eternal life.’”
If you have the revelation light of the gospel of the kingdom that Jesus really preached, then you know that when He said, “for My sake and the gospel’s,” He was referring to the gospel of the kingdom. Jesus preached and demonstrated the gospel of the kingdom which included the gospel of being born again and much more about the living kingdom of God life on earth now.
Jesus did not come to condemn the people and destroy the world. He came to save that which was lost including the world. He came to transform the sons of this world into sons of God and the fallen world systems into the kingdom of God. His perfect sinless life on earth plus his death on the cross, resurrection, ascension, and return in the Holy Spirit are all about God’s kingdom on earth as it is in heaven. “Your kingdom come. Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven” (Matthew 6:10).
The Great Mystery
Christ Jesus in me has a dream, a vision, a mission to see the earth fully matured as the kingdom of heaven on earth. The dream is alive and very real in the Spirit realm. I see the world filled with the love of God in perfect righteousness, peace, and joy of HIS GLORY – a world of bountiful life as every living thing and every part and portion of Planet Earth functions in perfect harmony – a world in which everything that has life praises God. Love rules all life, and every situation bears the eternal weight of His glory for all time and eternity.
Christ Jesus now has His eyes fixed upon that goal. All that He is doing is moving toward the reality of all the kingdoms of earth becoming the kingdoms of our God. Christ Jesus is calling out and preparing many purified holy sons of God to lead their portion of the armies of God to reclaim and restore the entire earth to the fullness of the kingdom of heaven on earth.
The battle of the ages is upon us in this millennium. The shaking of all that can be shaken has begun. The fulfillment of scripture is taking place before our eyes. The time is now for mature sons of God to arise in the glory of God to proclaim the arising of the absolute purified holy power of God in Christ from the throne in heaven establishing His throne on earth. The rule of God has come to be established on earth. The explosive power of Almighty God in Christ Jesus is come to earth in an incorruptible people of God. A Spirit people without spot or wrinkle, holy and pure in the sight of God in whom Christ Jesus fully dwells. Beyond all we could ask or think. There is no one like our God: the ONE, the only God in whom all the fullness dwells, Christ Jesus the Lord and Savior of all. The King of all kings the rightful ruler of all the earth shall reign as King, and there shall be no end to the increases of His kingdom. Amen and Amen!
Our time on earth now in this present life is short. Our opportunity to be and do what God has given us to be and do is only now. We are here to bring forth something more than what our fathers had. Our bodies, souls, and spirits are the abode of God in Christ Jesus by the Holy Spirit on earth. We are NOT our own.
I beseech you to present yourselves as living sacrifices unto God which is your reasonable service. Break out of the mold of this world and its self-life which is death to the God-life. Accept your death to receive His resurrected abundant life fully abiding in your body, soul, and spirit. That which was impossible in your life is fully available in His life.
Perfected holy life is His life in us. There is One who is righteous – One who is holy. That One living in you is Christ in you, the hope of Glory. “The mystery which has been hidden from ages and from generations, but now has been revealed to His saints. To them God willed to make known what are the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles: which is Christ in you, the hope of glory.” (Colossians 1: 26-27).
Perhaps the saddest thing in all life would be to come to the end of this short life and discover that we had missed the life and purpose for which we were sent to this world. Set your affection on things above and not on things of this world. Bless the things that God is blessing, and disallow the things that God is disallowing.
As we return to the place in God from which we came, Christ Jesus in all love, power, and glory is alive on earth in His manifest sons. The fullness of Christ Jesus can now arise on earth to deliver the full authority of God to transform the world to the glorious rule of the kingdom of heaven on earth. Nothing can stand against the mature sons of God in whom Christ Jesus is manifest King of this world.
The broken down world of chaos and failure will be transformed into the peace and perfect order of God’s plan and purpose. The all-consuming fire of God is igniting PASSION in the hearts of His people that cannot be stopped or turned back. Passion to bring forth glorious life of heaven making all things new in God’s perfect order on earth as it is in heaven. Arise and be strong and very courageous for the Lord God is with you!
All things are possible to those who believe.
The Joy of the Lord is our strength.
Live by the Spirit, Walk in the Spirit,
Ron McGatlin
www.openheaven.com
basileia@earthlink.net