Debrecen Messages #4 – The Fellowship of the Godhead: Christ Before Creation

Tomorrow morning you’re going into Christ. Doesn’t matter whether you’re here on earth or somewhere else—you’re in Christ. As you behold Him, you’re in Christ. Speak a few words. Receive love. Give love. You will touch life. You will be fellowshipping with your Lord, who is fellowshipping with His Father, always. Beholding Him. All in the world you’re going to do tomorrow morning is enter into the fellowship of the Godhead. You’re just going to add one more. Now, I need to tell you that, in fact, in the mercies of God, the Lord always sees you this way. This is the amazing part. He always sees you this way. And all we’re doing is bringing into earth—bringing to earth, to time and space, into our souls and bodies—that which is real in our spirits. But we need that so desperately because we are locked in time, and we’re locked here in this space.

We’re going to stop for those of you who are listening. Do not preach that which you do not experience. Do not declare what you do not know. And pursue your Lord. 

Number one to this message: don’t go away. We have been sitting here talking and decided that we should add this to the tape. It was by vote. Everybody voted that you shouldn’t hear this…

We were talking about divine instinct—that we have a divine instinct to know our Lord, to behold our Lord. We have a divine instinct for the church, as surely as we are the deer hunting for the water. In the same way, we are—meaning we are the deer, the human, looking for Christ, the water. In the same way, we have a divine instinct for body life, for ecclesia life, for true church life—for the community of believers. And sometimes we get mad at the church because it doesn’t give it to us. And certainly, it does not. But we seek after the church with all the passion—our spirit does—that we seek after Christ. And then I added something:

There’s another divine instinct. As you get to know the Lord better, this instinct will become more evident. Before I tell you what it is, you have two instincts in you concerning the same subject, and they are both very powerful. As you grow in Christ, your spirit instinct will grow more powerful. But your soul is going to fuss and rant and rave.

I’m speaking of the cross. Of all the things that can be said about your soul, it is this: the soul does not want the cross. The soul does not want to hear about the cross, and the soul does not wish to be crucified. And I said that in eternity past, or before creation, the Son had no problem in His divinity submitting to being slain—because that was divine. But when He entered time and space and became a human and added to Himself a soul, then your Lord had a terrible time facing crucifixion.

By the way, there’s a slight difference between the cross and crucifixion. The cross is terrible, it’s bloody, it’s awful—but it’s nothing compared to a public crucifixion. Of all the things the soul cannot bear, it is a public, bloody, shameful crucifixion. And there are Christians waiting to crucify you. And we reject the cross in our souls. But we want the cross in our spirits—because it’s part of divinity.

God did not think up the cross for you. God thought up the cross for Himself. He touched that cross long before there was a humanity on this earth, long before there was a creation. The cross is in the very center of His being. And as your contact with Christ and your experience with Him grows, things will become more painful to you. And even knowing the cross becomes more and more painful and more and more destructive—destructive to your outer man. I have made the statement that if you know the cross a great deal, in this lifetime it will eventually destroy your physical body. From the very pain of knowing the cross. Your body was not made for crucifixion any more than a piece of paper was made for fire. And knowing the cross will destroy you. And you must die for the body of Christ. If you live to be an old, old man, there’s something wrong with you.

If you are a Christian worker, you should have known the cross so painfully that it kills you young. It’s very destructive to the body and to the soul to know the cross. But your spirit will grow stronger and stronger. And the desire to know the cross with Christ will grow. So we have given you a little addendum to our discussion here. And a request was made that I put this on because I may never speak this again as long as I live.

Because of His humanity, in the Eternals, in the Father, He had no problem with saying yes to the cross. But on the earth, He had to have a Gethsemane in order to take the cross. And we do too. And I was discussing a few minutes ago the great need of knowing how to turn to Christ. Sometimes you’re going to be in your flesh and you don’t want anybody to tell you you’re in your flesh. You don’t want anybody to tell you you’re in your soul. Nobody wants to tell you that you’re being willful or just plain ugly. Ugly. Fleshly and ugly. And something in you needs to be broken so that in that moment you break and turn to Him. And some brother will be so mean. He’ll be so ugly. He’ll say, “Brother, stop just a minute…”

“Is this Christ? Is this Christ? Brother, have you—have you filtered this through the Lord Jesus Christ?”