“A Voice for the Gathering Saints”
Duane Stewart
“Thy Kingdom Come”
Matt. 6:9-10, in this manner, therefore, pray: Our Father in heaven, Hallowed be your name. Your kingdom come. Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven”. Matt. 6:33, “But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you”. As a people putting God’s kingdom foremost in our lives, we enter upon the pathway of becoming God’s miracles. Putting God’s kingdom first is but the first step upon this pathway, but we cannot walk upon this pathway unless determining that His will, purpose, and glory is our first priority as we pursue His call on our life. To do so we must turn to His word, which is the atmosphere in which we may understand His will, recognize His way, and hear the voice of His Spirit. Watch for the little things, the little signs along the way, not in the great wind, earthquake, or fire, but rather in the still small voice. For often it is the small, seemingly insignificant things or events that ultimately determine our destiny.
Recognition must be given to the truth that all things built by God are built upon a foundation. God’s kingdom is likewise built upon a sure foundation, not upon the sand, but one that is built upon the rock which is Christ Jesus. Is it not so that God is love and all that comes forth from Him is based upon that love? Even as Jesus came forth, and now the body of Christ, love remains the foundation upon which the kingdom of God is erected. With a person being placed within Christ body, a pathway begins, which is a journey of increase. One of the greatest indicators that we are growing in our relationship with God is found in our willingness to love. Matt. 22:36-40, “Teacher, which is the great commandment in the law? Jesus said to him, you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like it: you shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets”.
God is love. Love is not just something that He does. It’s what He is. It follows then that we are never godlier, never more like God, than when we love. How easily we may look at these two commandments and say quickly, “I love the Lord”, yet struggle with loving our neighbor. Jesus made the second commandment as important as the first. We cannot fulfill the first commandment to love God without obeying the second command to love our neighbor. Nor can we avoid this problem by narrowing our definition of “neighbor” to just a people in our neighborhood, only speaking of those of our family, race, perspective, economical and intellectual level or religion. Jesus makes the world my neighbor by qualifying anyone God puts in my path, or who needs me, as “my neighbor”.
By allowing the love of God to be shed abroad in our hearts (soul = mind, will, emotions, desires), we begin to qualify for that place in Him as being “led by the Spirit”. The person who is led by the spirit will do what is right freely, and not by the compulsion of the law. In this, we become free from laws bondage and condemnation. Gal. 5:18, “But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law”. Love, a nature implanted at the acceptance of Christ, does live within us. In the progress of maturity, the receiving of God’s increasing Spirit of love, reveals that God is, without which no person shall see the Lord. Love increases knowledge, which reveals God, which brings forth a “new birth”. I John 4:7-8, Beloved, let us love one another, for love is of God; and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. He who does not love does not know God, for God is love”. This birthing is more than being “saved”, but a fitting for us to begin a walk in God’s kingdom order which makes faith come alive. Live faith enables each vessel to respond to God in all things. Enabling those sent one’s to come and go according to God’s direction. John 3:8. “The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear the sound of it, but cannot tell where it comes from and where it goes. So is everyone who is born of the Spirit”.
Most Christians are well aware that at the death of Jesus Christ on the cross, the veil in the old covenant tabernacle was rent from top to bottom. The rending of this veil speaks to us that God’s people can now enter into that Holiest of All, to stand in God’s presence. Love not only opens the veil, but also enables us to stand, to live and dwell, in His presence. In that presence, a people can begin, through love, to see Him as He is. God’s word tells us, it promises us, that as we see Him as He is, we shall be like Him. Where is it that this presence of God dwells? Are we not told that the “kingdom of God is within”? He, dwelling within us, speaks of the heart of man which becomes the Holy of Holies wherein God dwells. Therefore, as we do away with that “covenant of death”, the letter that kills, by a turning to that Spirit of love which abides within, the peace of God begins to rule over us. Phil. 4:7 declares, “And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus”.
A people of faith know that the hope of great blessings will not turn out to be false because the Holy Spirit gives evidence in our hearts of God’s love for us. Rom. 5:5, “Now hope does not disappoint because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who was given us”. This word love (agape) denotes an undefeatable benevolence and unconquerable goodwill that seeks the highest good of the other person, no matter what he does. It is the self-giving love that gives freely without asking anything in return, and does not consider the worth of its object. Agape is more a love by choice than a love by chance. Meaning it refers to the will rather than the emotion. Agape describes the unconditional love God has for the world. Love, the agape of God, is the fruit of the tree of life which dwells in the Holy of Holies, the heart of Spirit filled people. It is here, in this Holy of Holies, that we can buy gold which, we as over-comers, are counseled to buy. Love conquers all and buys all. Rev. 3:18, “I counsel you to buy from Me gold refined in the fire, that you may be rich; …”. This fire is that which has been promised of God. Fire is the agent which either purifies or destroys and unto the vessels who accept Him, He purifies as fine gold. Matt. 3:12, “His winnowing fan is in He hand, and He will thoroughly clean out His threshing floor, and gather His wheat into the barn; but He will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire”.
This love, which is tried in the fire, which buys the gold or nature of God, is the agent which also enables faith to create. Faith is the divinely implanted principle of inward confidence, assurance, trust, and reliance in God and all He says. Faith is substance. Heb. 11:1, “Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen”. Faith is established conviction concerning things unseen and a settled expectation of future reward. “Substance” literally means “a standing under”, and was used in the technical sense of “title deed”. The root idea is that of standing under the claim to the property to support its validity. Thus, faith is the “title deed” of things hoped for. The things hoped for, can be all the promises given to us by God. James 1:6-8, “But let him ask in faith, with no doubting, for he who doubts is like a wave of sea driven and tossed by the wind. For let not that man suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord; he is a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways”.
Unto the vessel who releases faith, because of love, the prospect of being transformed into the likeness of Christ motivates each one to live righteously. These become a people who are being continually changed, spirit, soul and body. I John 3:2-3, “Beloved, now we are children of God; and it has not yet been revealed what we shall be, but we know that when He is revealed, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is. And everyone who has this hope in Him purifies himself, just as He is pure”. Love is causing a people to know Him and because of knowing Him, they are now becoming like Him, as He reveals Himself. Herein is the ability to know and abide in truth. The anointing of the Holy Spirit, whose illuminating power enables us to distinguish truth from error, to receive spiritual knowledge under the guidance of the Holy Spirit is to know truth in a way that human instruction cannot provide. The Holy Spirit is able to bring revelation to the human heart filled with love. I John 2:27, “But the anointing which you have received from Him abides in you; but as the same anointing teaches you concerning all things, and is true, and is not a lie, and just as it has taught you, you will abide in Him”.
Therefore those things we see in Him, because of love, do likewise abide in those who are seeing Him as He is. Not as man would teach us intellectually, but as the Holy Spirit would reveal Him unto us. That which man teaches must be confirmed by the same Holy Spirit which abides in us. Remember, love enables faith to create in us a righteous heart which is the Holy of Holies. From this heart, the fruit of the tree of life is manifest as gold brought through the fire. Gold refined to manifest the risen Christ who sits within the throne-room of God. Within us the kingdom of God is come. Now, through love it must be manifest. “Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is done in heaven”.
