Foundation Stones (Part 4) Called or Sent – God’s Pattern for Christian Ministry and Church Life

We have two brothers who are sent out also by the Lord. They both were indwelt by the Lord on the day they got saved, and who knows if you’re Pentecostal, you got to believe that Paul spoke in tongues the day he was baptized, but he didn’t go out raising up churches that day. Barnabas had been a Christian for a minimum of 14 years on the day the Lord sent him out. If you’re Pentecostal, you gotta believe he’s been speaking in tongues ever since the day of Pentecost. That’s 14 years and he’s not been sent out anywhere until that time. So, we see a tremendous lapse of time between getting saved and getting sent out, be ye Pentecostal or be ye not Pentecostal. All right, Tom, stop asking questions. That took 15 minutes to answer.

Okay, they’re sent downstairs. Now what are they going to do? They have several tasks. One of their tasks is to simply live by the life of the Lord. Okay. Another task they have is to be in the church. And another task they have is to raise up the church, or they have to raise up the church and be in the church.

Let’s look at these men. I bet you Sunday night they were absolutely astounded that 3,000 people had been saved, and they remembered when they had been running around saying, “Look, even the demons obey us,” and people are now getting converted and they can hardly believe it’s them. They have established a habit for four years that Christ had established for 30 years and eternity. What is the habit that they have established during those four years? Please, quickly. Fellowshipping with God. They have been running around with the world’s only Christian. They have been fellowshipping with God incarnated. We come back to the word habit. Will they now break their habit, or will they continue their habit? They have to make a small transition. They have to get used to fellowshipping; they have been used to fellowshipping with Him physically. Now, they have to get used to fellowshipping with Him invisibly, but the fellowship will go on.

Brothers, Jesus Christ can be fellowshipped with whether you’re lying on His chest as John did or whether He came into your rib cage as He did on the night that He rose from the dead, and He breathed the Holy Spirit into them. On that night, 12 men got Him inside. Now I will ask you, which is more intimate fellowship, to be sitting next to somebody or for them to be inside of you? That is really oneness. Is it not? This comes back, excuse me, I realize this is sensitive, but it is nonetheless pictured to us in marriage. The one being in the other, and the Bible says they are therefore one. There is an intimacy there not known in any other kind of relationships because the two become one entity, and when the Lord comes into you, marriage is but an illustration of His coming inside of you and making Himself one with your spirit. That is true intimacy. They have watched Him behold the Father, fellowship with the Father, hear the Father, speak to the Father, respond to the Father, be loved by the Father, love the Father back, obey the Father, and obey what the Father has said.

They have been watching Him do this for four years. Now, they wake up one morning and say, “Yes, this is happening to me.” As the Father indwelled my Lord for 30 years, this morning, the day after the resurrection, He has indwelled me. I’ve got to go start a Bible class. I’ve got to go found the seminary. I’ve got to go build a church building. No, I’ve got to tune in to this indwelling Christ the way He in tuned Himself with an indwelling Father. I’ve got to start sensing this love and love back. I’ve got to start listening and hearing, and what I hear I must respond to, and if I get something, that means to obey, I’ve got to obey. I’ve got to continue the pattern. It has now been passed out of the Father into the Son, and out of the Son into these men, and of course will stop there forever and never go any further. No, of course not. Hey, will y’all just grin a little bit every once in a while? Don’t look so serious at me. I never know when you’re believing me when I’m being sarcastic. You don’t want to believe that. I’m afraid some of you will go start a Bible school.

They wake up. They wake up and they hear voices. That’s right, brother. They are now men hearing voices. I hear the Lord Jesus speaking to me. I fellowship with Him. It is not primarily a matter of I’ve got to be good. I got to behave and be nice. It’s a matter of internal fellowship with an indwelling God. Who lives inside these apostles? I’m calling them apostles now, not disciples anymore. They’re sent men. Sent ones, apostles, sent ones, apostles. Who lives inside of them? Say it. Christ. Who lives inside of Christ? Well, who lives inside of them? The Father and the Son. The fellowship of the Godhead is now inside their rib cage. It’s not in eternity. Praise the Lord. It’s not in Nazareth. It’s not in Galilee. It’s in men. And it’s getting bigger. Praise the Lord. Hallelujah. Glory. The Father, the Son, and a bunch of men are all fellowshipping inside their bosoms.

Amen. The wonders of the Godhead. Well, they get down there to Solomon’s porch, and they see 3,000 people. Jesus Christ got down to the Jordan River and saw two or three men; he later picked up a few more. When the Lord Jesus Christ got into a room of those 12 men, He thought about what He had been doing for all eternity and 30 years. These 12 men take a look at 3,000 people sitting there, and what do they think? They think about what they’ve been doing for 3 and 1/2 years plus 50 days, 51 days.

Now, they look around and they don’t have any new ideas. All they got is a very old idea. This is the oldest idea there is. Praise the Lord. Hey, let’s teach them. Let’s say, listen, let us declare unto them that which we have seen and heard, that they may have fellowship with us, for our fellowship is with the Father and with His Son Jesus Christ. Praise the Lord. That’s what they said when they got out there that morning. Let’s tell these people what we’ve seen and heard.

Thomas, have you got that chart of Ezekiel’s? Andrew, have you got that chart on the book of Revelation? Let’s tell them about premillennialism. Let’s pick out some of these young brothers and build a building, raise some funds, put them in a class, and teach them the scrolls. All they know is what they share, and all they share is what they know, and that’s all they’ve got. Well, the 3,000, of course, they’re all out there waiting to learn the Bible. Teach us the book of Daniel. We want to know about the 70 weeks in Daniel. Tell us about the man of sin and the mystery of iniquity. That’s what we want to know.

I’ll tell you what they said to those 12 men. This is exactly what they said. That which you have seen and heard, declare you unto us, that we may have fellowship with you because your fellowship is with the Son Jesus Christ. There could have been nothing else that happened that day. I’m certain of it. Argue with me and you will absolutely lose. We are so Bible. We’re so orientated to the Gospels. We think they taught them the Gospels. They undid the Gospel of Matthew and taught it. I’m going to turn now to Matthew 1 or John. Take that one you’ve written. John says, “I’m going to open this scroll. We’re going to turn to John chapter 1 verse one, and I’m going to teach you chapter one of the book of John.”

Can you see John standing up there? He’s going to say, “Listen, God was in eternity and then He became flesh, and He came and dwelt among us, and we’ve seen His glory.” Yes, He has such great glory. Some little kid writing it down. Tell us about it, John. A lot of people he preached to, but not many received Him. Some brother’s writing this down, when He gets real, real old, maybe this guy comes back to Him and says, “John, you remember everything you taught down there in Solomon’s porch? I made a bunch of notes; they’re getting old, they’re falling apart. Could you maybe put it together and put it in a book?” And John is 100 years old now. And he says, “Well, if I can see it well enough, I’ve got plenty of time, stuck out here on Patmos, nothing to do but write, but the day that John started talking about Jesus there in the porch of Solomon, he was talking about his fellowship with Him. I rested on his bosom.

Today, as we come to scripture, you brothers, listen to me. You don’t know how to do this; that’s why you’re here this week. When we come to the Scripture, we have one orientation and only one. I am going to read Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John to see what it is God wants me to do. What is He expecting of me? Because if I don’t do it, He’s going to get mad at me, and we start tearing those books apart, trying to find out what I’m supposed to do to be a good little Christian, be a good little boy, and be a good little girl. That is not what those three or four books are about. They are a record of Christ’s own fellowship with the Father. Look for it, and with His fellowship, with a group of people. Look for it. You are reading how another species lives the Christian life. You’re reading the record of Someone who is indwelt by the eternal almighty living God, the Father of all things. That’s what this story is about, and it’s about some men who had fellowship with one who was in dwelt with the eternal almighty everlasting living God. That’s Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, and don’t you ever look at it from any other view. That’s the only view you want to look at it, and don’t ever let anybody put you under the pile with it.