Fruitful Living
Resurrection of life (Final part)
Do you walk in white?
Buried with Him…that…even so we also should walk in newness of life,” – Romans 6:4
No one enters into the experience of entire sanctification without going through a “white funeral” – the burial of the old life. If there has never been this crises of death, sanctification is nothing more than a vision.
There must be a “white funeral,” a death that has only one resurrection – a resurrection into the life of Jesus Christ. Nothing can upset such a life, it is one with God for one purpose, to be a witness to Him.
Have you come to your last days really? You have come to them often in sentiment, but you have come to them really? You cannot go your funeral in excitement, or die in excitement.
Death means you stop being. Do you agree with God that you should stop being the striving, earnest kind of Christian you have been?
We skirt the cemetery and all the time refuse to go to death. It is not striving to go to death; it is dying— ”baptized into His death.
Have you had your “white funeral,” or are you sacredly playing the fool with your soul? Is there a place in your life marked as the last day, a place to which the memory goes back with a chastened and extraordinary grateful remembrance – “Yes, it was then, at that ‘white funeral,’ that I made an agreement with God.”
“This is the will of God, even your sanctification.” When you realise what the will of God is, you will enter into sanctification as naturally as can be. Are you willing to go through that “white funeral” now? Do you agree with Him that this is your last day on earth? The moment of agreement depends upon you.
HIS RESURRECTION
“Ought not Christ to have suffered these things, and to enter into His glory?” Luke 24:26
Our Lord’s cross is the gateway into His life; His Resurrection means that He has power now to convey His life to me.
When I am born from above, I receive from the Risen Lord His very life.
Our Lord’s Resurrection destiny is to bring “many sons unto glory.”
The fulfilling of His destiny give Him the right to make us sons and daughters of god.
We are never in the relationship of god that the Son of God is in; but we are brought by the Son into the relation of sonship.
When Our Lord rose from the dead, He rose to an absolutely new life, to a life He did not live before He was incarnate. He rose to a life that had never been before; and His Resurrection means for us that we are raised to His risen life, and not to our old life.
One day we shall have a body like unto His glorious body, but we can know now the efficiency of His resurrection and walk of newness of life.
“I would know Him in the Power of His Resurrection.
“As thou has given Him power over all flesh, that He should give eternal life to as many as Thou has given Him.” “Holy Spirit” is the experimental name for Eternal Life working in human beings here and now.
The Holy Spirit is the Deity in proceeding power who applies the Atonement to our experience. Thank God it is glorious and majestically true that the Holy Ghost can work in us the very nature of Jesus if we will obey Him.
* All scripture texts are from the King James Version.
TO PONDER:
Do not set foot on the path of the wicked or walk in the way of evildoers. Avoid it, do not travel on it; turn from it and go on your way. For they cannot rest until they do evil; they are robbed of sleep till they make someone stumble. They eat the bread of wickedness and drink the wine of violence. – Proverbs 4:14-17
Stay blessed!
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By Dr. Joyce Aryee, the author
Fruitful Living
Honeycomb Ministries founder ordained as Priest
Rev. Dansu (third from left) with other officiating ministers at the event
The Dominion College of Bishops, last Saturday commissioned and ordained as Reverend Minister, Ms Cecilia Dansu, the Founder and Lead Facilitator of the Honeycomb Ministries, a non-denominational end-time revival movement, in Accra.
Minister Dansu who undergone an intensive theological training and gazetted by the government was ordained in recognition of her humanitarian outreach and dedication to spreading the word of God to schools and communities.
The colourful service which was officiated by the Deputy Prelate of the Dominion College of Bishops, Bishop Dr Albert Ken Dapatem and Director of Programmes, Bishop Peter Koomson was attended by family and loved ones.
In a short exhortation on the theme: ‘You were chosen for a purpose (John 15,16),’ the Associate Pastor of Change Life Baptist Church, Rev. Samuel Ohemeng Damptey, admonished Christians to avail themselves for the gift of God to operate in them.
According to him, it was not only the clergy that the Lord had called but each and every one for a specific purpose.
“If you cannot preach like Paul, or all the other Bishops, at least there’s something you can do. You can share the word of God with children for the bible says, He has chosen us for a purpose to bear fruit-a fruit that will last – and so that whatever you ask in my name the Father will give you,” he added.
Rev. Damptey charged the newly ordained minister to be committed to the cause of God, and use her mantle to save people and expand the ministry, whiles keeping in mind that she was called by God to spread His message.
She was presented with a Holy Bible, pastoral collar and awarded a certificate of recognition.
As part of the consecration, the officers used the opportunity to officially inaugurate her ministry, the Honeycomb Ministries to ascertain the feasibility of the ministry’s vision and action plans.
In addition, two Christian publications authored by her was also launched to shape the Christian youth in their everyday lives with God.
By Vivian Arthur
Fruitful Living
WHAT IS THE LOVE OF GOD? (PART 1)
God is love
As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love. If you keep my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commands and remain in His love – John 15:9-10
INTRODUCTION
Remain in my love – Jesus calls us to a life of holy intimacy and personal devotion to Him. This is possible because of God’s love for us, which he has poured into our hearts by the holy spirit (Romans 5:5). God demonstrated His great love through Christ’s dying for us while we were still sinners (Romans 5:8). We remain in Jesus’ love by pursuing spiritual intimacy and communication with Him, and by obeying His commands, just as He did with the Father.
See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are! The reason the world does not know us is that it did not know Him. – 1 John 3:1
CHILDREN OF GOD
The truth that God is our Heavenly Father and we are His children is one of the greatest revelations in the New Testament.
1. Being a child of God, adopted in Christ as His very own (Ephesians 1:5), is a high honour on privilege of our salvation. (Galatians 4:7).
2. Being a child of God is the basis for our faith and trust in God (Matthew 6:25-34) and our hope of glory for the future. As God’s children, we are heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ (Romans 8:16-17; Galatians 4:7).
3. God wants us to be increasingly made aware through the Holy Spirit, the “Spirit of Sonship” (Romans 8:15) that we are His children. The Spirit produces the cry “Abba, Father” in our hearts (Galatians 4:6) and gives us the desire to be “led by the Spirit” (Romans 8:14).
4. Being a child of God is the basis for our discipline by the Father (Hebrews 12:6-7-11) and the reason we live to please God.
God’s ultimate goal in making us His children is to save us forever (John 3:16) and to conform us to the likeness of His Son (Romans 8:29).
Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. – 1 Corinthians 13:4-8
Love is an activity and behaviour and not just as an inner teaching or motivation. Other aspects of love are characteristics of God Himself who has been revealed by our Lord Jesus Christ.
The love of God is His passion to sustain and uphold and exalt His holiness and His Son for your everlasting enjoyment. If you put yourself at the centre, you’re suicidal because it robs you of the very glory of God and his enjoyment.
1 John 4:8 describes one of God’s primary attributes as love. “Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love.” This verse does not define God as love; it describes God’s love as permeating His essence in all He is and all He does. As for today’s headlines tout stories of scandal, tragedy, and war; believers can be confident knowing all they need is God’s love.
I agree with the Theologian A.W. Tozer once stated, “Nothing God ever does, or ever did, or ever will do, is separate from the love of God.” Everything He has ever done has been out of love.
THINGS WE NEED TO KNOW ABOUT THE LOVE OF GOD
1. God’s Love Is Incomprehensible. – “And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ” – Ephesians 3:17-18.
2. God’s Love Is known and Proven – “For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life.”. – John 3:16.
3. We Can Trust In God’s Love.
4. God’s Love is Pure.
5. God’s Love is Perfect.
6. Our Salvation Is An Expression Of God’s Love.
7. Our Ability To Love Is Enabled Through God’s Love.
8. We Can Rest In God’s Love.
9. We Can Have Confidence In God’s Love.
