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 Sermon > Measure of Faith |
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Title |
Measure of Faith(26) - 5th Level of Faith(7) |
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Speaker |
Rev. Jaerock Lee |
Bible |
Romans12:3,Psalms37:4 |
Date |
2006-06-25 |
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[Scripture]
[Romans 12: 3] [Psalm 37: 4]
"For through the grace given to me I say to everyone among you not to think more highly of himself than he ought to think; but to think so as to have sound judgment, as God has allotted to each a measure of faith."
"Delight yourself in the Lord; And He will give you the desires of your heart."
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ,
There are some people who have very generous hearts and take delight in giving gifts to others. If they become aware that somebody is in need of something, they fetch it for him. Or, even when they receive something from others, they think, "To whom shall I give this so he can be happy?"
They like to give to others than to have or receive. When they can only give one thing, they want to give two or three, or even more things. Our Father God is more generous and wants to give to others more than anybody else.
We can see this when He blessed Solomon. When Solomon offered the thousand sacrifices with all his heart, God received it pleasingly, appeared to Solomon, and said, "Ask what I shall give you."
What Solomon asked was not health, fame, or honor, but wisdom.
It was not for himself either. It was to rule well over numerous people entrusted to him and rule wisely in peace.
God was so delighted with Solomon's request.
1 Kings 3:12-13 says, "Behold, I have done according to your words. Behold, I have given you a wise and discerning heart, so that there has been no one like you before you, nor shall one like you arise after you. [13] "I have also given you what you have not asked, both riches and honor, so that there will not be any among the kings like you all your days."
God gave Solomon wisdom as he asked, and it was unprecedented in history. Furthermore, God gave him things that he had not asked for, so Solomon enjoyed the greatest honor and fame of all kings at that time.
How great a blessing it is to have the greatest wisdom in the world and to enjoy the greatest honor and fame?
But hearing this message, I suppose you wouldn't think, "God delights the most when we ask for wisdom."
Asking for wisdom itself is not the important thing; but Solomon's heart in asking for wisdom was good before God.
Since he had already pleased God with his one thousand sacrifices, God would have given him anything unless it was something very evil.
It was a chance to ask for anything he wanted, but he didn't follow his own desires. He answered with good intention as a king to look after the people. That is why God was pleased.
At that time, Solomon was not even sanctified, but with one good answer, God was very pleased, and God gave him incredibly abundant blessings.
Likewise, our God the Father is so generous and benevolent, and when you ask for one thing, He always desires to give you ten or even hundred things.
But the problem is that it is we who have to prepare the vessels to receive and hold the blessings.
We can please God if we have good hearts and wills in everything. Through this message, I hope in the name of the Lord that you will abundantly receive blessings of God who will say, "Ask what I shall give you."
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, this is the 26th session of the Measure of Faith, and I will talk to you about the blessings of God given to the men of whole spirit, who have gone into the fifth level of faith.
Before, we get into it, let's quickly review each level of faith.
When you listen to the gospel, believe it, and receive the Holy Spirit, you enter into the First Level of Faith. It means you have the level of faith necessary to receive salvation.
As you learn more of God's word and try to practice it, you enter into the Second Level of Faith.
Because you can believe in and acknowledge God in your heart, you try to obey His Word, but there are some things you obey and some things you don't obey.
Even though you obey, you feel forced and find it difficult to obey. But if your faith grows and matures , then you enter into the Third Level of Faith, you have gained some strength to keep the Word of God.
You don't practice the word with difficulty and feeling of being forced, but you practice the Word more naturally like it is your habit. It is a stable state of your faith.
You act by the Word and don't commit sins, and also if you cast off the original sinful nature in your heart, you will enter into the Fourth Level of Faith. It means you have become a holy and sanctified true child of God.
In fact, the 1st level and 2nd levels of faith belong to flesh. These are the levels of laying the foundation of a fleshly kind of Christian life. You lay the foundations of a spiritual Christian life only at the third level of faith.
In order to be recognized as having true spiritual faith, you have to enter into the Fourth Level of Faith.
At the Fourth Level of Faith, you don't have any doubts whatsoever, and all your words and deeds are done with full trust in God.
So, from the beginning of a Christian life to the Third Level of Faith, it is the period for establishing the foundation of spiritual faith. From the Fourth Level of Faith is the process of filling your heart with the perfect love that is contained in the origin of the Father.
At the Fourth Level of Faith, if you cast off traces of flesh that are hidden deep inside your nature and bear all the spiritual fruits abundantly, you enter into the Fifth Level of Faith. This is the highest level of faith.
From this time, the Father pleasingly accepts the aroma of each one's heart, and He refines each person to allow for them go into New Jerusalem by becoming more beautiful and more perfect. They are the best fruits.
In broad view, we can combine the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd levels of faith as one group and the 4th and 5th levels of faith as another.
The standard is whether it belongs to flesh or spirit.
I already told you that the difference between the third level and the fourth level is like the difference between heaven and earth in receiving answers and blessings on this earth and in the heavenly glory.
Actually, all the promises and blessings recorded in the Bible are for those who have gone into the fourth level or higher, namely for men of spirit. If you go into the fifth level of faith, you will receive all the blessings in full.
Of course, this doesn't mean there are no blessings for you before you enter into spirit. However, up to the third level of faith, you can only receive blessings partially to the extent you act rightly before God. From this point on, let's look into the blessing for the those people who are in the whole spirit in more detail.
Above all, men of whole spirit will receive anything immediately upon their prayer. They receive answers even to the things that they don't even ask but just desire in their hearts.
The almighty God knows what they need and at what point in time they need it.
So, God prepares things in advance and supplies them as said in "Jehovah Jireh."
Today's passage Psalm 37:4 says, "Delight yourself in the Lord; And He will give you the desires of your heart." To delight yourself in the Lord literally means you will have great joy and pleasure because of the Lord God.
Of course, you can delight yourself in God to some extent at each level of faith, but in order to have true joy coming from above, you have to please God having the fifth level, the "Perfect Level of Faith".
Those who have faith to please God will quickly answer and they will receive even what they just desire in their hearts.
When you go into whole spirit, how can you receive the answer as soon as you ask for it? Our God always answers us according to the law of justice.
The most representative standard of justice is the measurement of the 'seven spirits'.
It means we can receive answers and blessings only when we are qualified within our measure of faith when seven spirits measure us in seven aspects, which are faith, joy, prayer, thanks, keeping the commands, faithfulness, and love.
For example, if a person who is at the Third Level of Faith prays very much but has no joy in their heart, or is very faithfully working for God but has no thanks but only complaints, he will receive answers slowly as he is lacking in the standards of measurement by the seven spirits.
But those who have gone into the whole spirit are already sanctified, so they have no wall of sin against God. Also, their hearts are filled with fruits of truth completely, so they will always be qualified according to the measurement of the seven spirits.
That is why they can receive answers immediately.
Furthermore, with their heart that resembles God completely, they ask for only the things that are pleasing in God's heart. Therefore, even when they receive overflowing answers every time, it is not against the rules of justice.
I think you now understand that, when you sow something before God, men of spirit will reap 30 or 60 times more, and men of whole spirit will reap 60 or 100 times more.
Also, men of whole spirit will hear the voice of the Holy Spirit 100% and they will even understand what is deep in the heart of the Father, so they find the ways of understanding in every situation. 1 Corinthians 2:10 says, "For to us God revealed them through the Spirit; for the Spirit searches all things, even the depths of God."
If you can just hear the Holy Spirit's voice clearly, you will always be prosperous in everything.
If you are going a way that is dangerous, He will tell you not to go that way and teach you the way of blessings. If there are complicated problems, He will teach you the way to solve them.
If you can just obey the voice, you will always be prosperous.
But to hear the voice of the Holy Spirit clearly, you definitely have to cast off untruth.
You can hear the voice and receive the guidance of the Holy Spirit to the extent you have cast off sins and evil from your heart and accomplished pure and clean hearts without untruths.
If you just go into the Fourth Level of Faith, you can hear the voice of the Holy Spirit clearly with your sanctified heart, so you can clearly discern what God wants.
Moreover, in the Fifth Level of Faith, you understand clearly the heart and will of the Father. You can have understanding of why He wants a particular thing done.
In the Fifth Level of Faith, as you go into deeper dimension of it, you will realize 100% even the methodology of the Father in what He wants.
For example, in case of Joseph , who is the subject of our Friday all-night services, please think of how he acted when he met his brothers.
Joseph was sold into Egypt as a slave at a young age because of the envy and jealousy of his brothers.
But even in that situation, in the providence of God he overcame all kinds of hardships and became the prime minister of Egypt. He finally met his brothers who had sold him 22 years prior.
Joseph asked for mercy from his brothers long ago, but he now had become an authority of a strong nation, and his brothers had to bow before him without even realizing who he was to get some food, so the situation had changed completely.
If Joseph was at the Fourth Level of Faith, he could have certainly realized the providence of God embedded in that situation.
As he had dreamt when he was very young, God lifted him up. Now he had to forgive his brothers, but, he had to guide them to repent for themselves. He could have clearly understood these things even if he had only been at the Fourth Level of Faith.
But the inspiration that Joseph received in his heart was greater than this. He had to guide his brothers to repent, and he understood even the methodology on how to guide them to repent from their true heart.
For example, if he revealed himself and told them, "I am Joseph, whom you sold into Egypt as a slave. Now, repent your sins," then, his brothers would have been very surprised and definitely repented.
But this would have been only the repentance coming from fear. It could not be considered true and complete repentance from heart.
Because he knew this, Joseph had a very specific plan to let his brothers repent from the depth of their hearts and turn from their misdeeds.
Joseph didn't reveal his identity, but confined them for a while. Then he also took one of the brothers as a prisoner and accused the last brother as a thief. He made many kinds of situations.
In that process, his brothers felt the value and preciousness of each of the brothers. They also remembered that they sold one of their own brothers and came to repent from their heart.
Until it happened, every single word and each action resulted from Joseph's amazing intelligence and wisdom to cause those situations to occur. You are probably so surprised when you heard about this in the lectures of Genesis.
It is these kinds of works of the Holy Spirit that you experience in the Fifth Level of Faith. You are able to understand even the deep things of God and realize even the detailed methodology in perfect understanding.
The next blessing for men of whole spirit is that evil ones cannot even touch them.
When I explained to you about the powerful works following those at the fifth level of faith, I told you that diseases and germs cannot infect and infirmities cannot come upon those who have gone into whole spirit. They can heal the diseases and infirmities of other people as well.
They can also drive away demons.
Because of the spiritual authority that comes out from a holy and perfect heart, the power of darkness cannot harm any man who has gone into whole spirit.
That's why 1 John 5:18 says, "We know that no one who is born of God sins; but He who was born of God keeps him, and the evil one does not touch him."
Because there is no sin or evil to be accused of, the enemy devil and Satan cannot bring any kind of trials or hardships upon them.
Even in case of Jesus, many evil people hated Him, but they could not directly curse Him or stand against Him until the time came for Him to be arrested.
Even in my case, after I came into whole spirit, even though there were people who persecuted and slandered me, nobody said anything directly in front of me.
Some people made false rumors about the church to stand against it in my absence, but when they stood before me, they just kept quiet.
Of course, the enemy devil and Satan do not give up disturbing those who have gone into the whole spirit..
With the authority given to them on this earth, they continuously try to cause problems for those in the whole spirit and try to hinder the further advancement of the kingdom of God.
But no matter how hard the devil tries to hinder these men of whole spirit, God does not allow it to happen, so not even a single hair on their heads can be harmed. But even for the men of whole spirit, God sometimes allows some kind of trials when the enemy devil and Satan bring charges against them.
This is when God wants to accomplish God's kingdom greatly within His justice or to prove that these men have proper vessels to receive greater power from God. For example, in case of Peter and the apostle Paul, they had already reached the full measure of faith, but they still received persecutions and hardships in the name of the Lord and they were finally martyred.
Also, even though the members of the early churches who were martyred hadn't really gone into whole spirit, they didn't have such great sins for them to be punished and put to death. But it was to fulfill the rules of justice that more souls would be saved and the gospel would be preached to more places through the price of the blood of the believers.
Of course, those who became martyrs with faith received great honor in the heavenly kingdom that could not be compared with the momentary hardship on the earth.
Also, if men of whole spirit who are blameless and spotless receive persecutions for no reason and overcome them with pure faith and love, the enemy devil and Satan cannot object even when God gives them more blessings and increased power of God.
Likewise, sometimes God momentarily allows disturbances of the evil people against men of whole spirit with His providence to pour upon them more of His power and to let them glorify God more greatly.
[Conclusion]
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, today, I explained to you about what kinds of blessings those who go into the whole spirit will receive.
Other than what I explained today, there are so many blessings for us after we go into whole spirit that we cannot mention them all.
When I explained to you about the blessings at the Fourth Level of Faith, I told you that you will be blessed whether you come in or go out, and in your family, workplace, and businesses, and also people around you will receive the blessings together with you, if only you can just become a man of spirit.
As said, "You will be saved; You and your household," you will be able to evangelize your household and you will begin to receive the authority to bless and curse.
Though not perfectly, you can walk with God, too.
All these blessings start to be given one by one from the Fourth Level of Faith, and at the Fifth Level of Faith, they are given completely.
But more than all these blessings, the most precious and greatest blessing is the glory given in New Jerusalem in the eternal heavenly kingdom. They will go into the most glorious dwelling place in all of the heavenly kingdom and dwell with God and the Lord forever.
About this glory of New Jerusalem, I will continue to explain in the next session.
I hope you will reflect yourself upon the word of God who is light and change yourself diligently so that you will quickly get to the perfect measure of faith being blameless and spotless.
Therefore, I pray in the name of the Lord that you will receive all the blessings that God promised us and finally you will dwell in the glorious New Jerusalem. |
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