Living by Faith: Entering the Invisible Realities of Christ (Part 2)

I would like for someone to…maybe I’ve already done this, but I would like for someone or two or four of you to get together and write out the history of how you got to this point, and then keep the history going. After that, it might just be that we went to Atlanta, or we went to Philadelphia, or things like that. I would like it to be left… we don’t know what the future holds, except that it’s Jesus Christ. And somebody may want to know how this weird group got started someday. I want it to be remembered that you have a hard time. I even want you to write down some of the hard times. I want some of you to confess some of the things you said, of the things you thought, and maybe even some of the things you did. We’ll just make that a nameless brother. Y’all don’t want to talk to me now? Are you too tired? What time is it? It’s only 11:30.

Audience: You said we were born for this, and I think that’s exactly right. We’re created for this, and I, for one, have waited for five years for somebody to tell me. I’ve waited for somebody to tell me…I know how to do what you want to do. Let’s do it. Ever since I’ve been a person, I’ve been waiting for this minute. Amen. Praise the Lord.

We have just been cheating ourselves about 18 or 1900 years, and we’re going to get back to the way the brothers and sisters treated the Lord and one another in space and time and the other realm. We’re just going to start treating it the way they did and seeing things that are unseen. We are those who see things that are unseen, and we’re going to look for them. And when we find them, we are going to “faith” them into reality. Audience: And treat those things that are seen as insignificant.

Wait a minute, I’m going to give you the privilege, brother. Audience: Of what? Of how to start. Oh, I am a holy and blameless one. I agree with Dan that I think I’ve been waiting for this since I became a Christian. My spirit has known it, but the part of me that is reality has known it. Uh, praise the Lord. This isn’t what people…this doesn’t happen.

I think we can say tonight that…by the way, my name is Gene, and I’m just as holy as holy gets. When you have seen me, you have seen the epitome and apex of holiness. If you think that I have taken something away from my Lord, I have not. For my Lord is my holiness. And my holiness matches Him so perfectly that you can’t tell the difference in my holiness and His holiness because He is everything that is holy, and I just happen to be part of Him. I’ve forgotten what else I was going to say. (laughter) Am I not wonderful? Am I not just glorious? We are. She is. This person is all of that. Everything I just said about me is true of this person who’s in this room. I wonder what I was going to talk about. What was I going to say?

There’s one thing we can be sure of. Nobody’s ever done this before. Just count it. Don’t say, “Well, maybe somebody…” No, they didn’t. Nobody in this world has ever been this stupid. We’re going to do this, and somehow we’re going to do this and remain unspiritual despite our best efforts. Sister, I’m making you steward of this thing from henceforth. Okay? Boy, I love it. I really do. I feel so good about this meeting. You can’t imagine how good I feel about this. I feel like I’ve just started young all over again. I’m about to get on a boat I’ve never been on, and I’m going to sail into places I’ve never sailed before, with a whole boat full of brothers and sisters.

Audience: I’m Jeb, and I’m holy. That does feel really awkward. Oh, I was sharing with some of the brothers and sisters, I don’t know, a few weeks ago still. We were singing one night, and I think we were singing We Keep Falling in Love with You” over and over. I had heard the song singularly. I keep falling in love with you over and over again. And when we sang that night, also the song, “I am to you,” and I felt like I had seen those songs as individuals singing to the Lord, when that night they were corporate. I’m just singing, and it was really clear that I wasn’t Sandy, and John and I; it was a corporate “I” singing to the Lord. It seemed like it really fit, that the song fit as a singular. It always seemed uncomfortable that we had to somehow try to fit a “we” in there to make it plural, but it was corporate as “I”.

I hope we can find a way to signal it when we sing without changing the words. I’m going to read a book in the New Testament. That’s all I’m going to do. That’s why I don’t think you’re going to…don’t expect anything great here. But as I go along, I want you to follow me if you have a New Testament, and let’s discover, brothers, how much plurality there is in the letter. That’s all we’re going to do. It is a book that is filled with plurality. Still, then you’re probably going to think, well, this book is different…there couldn’t possibly be that much plurality in other books… corporateness, but I think it’s pretty average.

I don’t know what else I’ll do while I read. I’m going to make some comments. Why are you doing this, Gene? I don’t know, except to leave you with some, I can’t even say any practical method here. I want to do this so you can see it, and I know you have. Now, this doesn’t always have to do with things that are visible and invisible, and yet some of it will. Maybe I’ll stop there; I don’t know what I’m about to do, frankly. So, join me in my lack of knowing what I’m about to do. Okay? I’m going to see if it turns out to be fun. You were there one night when Gene admitted he might bring a boring message. I don’t know what’s about to happen here. I do know that…boy Gene, you are really a mess. Would you turn with me to the book of Galatians? I started to take the notes that my wife and I made, and honey, they’re inadequate. They’re just…as much as there are, they didn’t begin to touch this. So, I’m probably going to read about 2.5 chapters, and I may read the others.

Paul, sent not from men, but by means of Christ and God the Father, who raised him from the dead. And I’m sitting in a room with a room full of brothers. To the churches of Galatia. Let’s make this just one church. Pick whichever one you wish. Let’s make it Iconium. No, let’s make it right here in this room, only don’t take all this too personally because you haven’t messed up nearly as badly as they have. To whom does all this grace go? It is not to you. It is to an entire body of people. The peace rests on the church, and it flows from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. And He gave Himself up for not my sins or your sins, but our sins. He delivered all of us, those of us where I’m writing the letter and those of you who are listening, and He delivered us out of this present evil age. That was God’s will for a group of people. To God the Father be glory forever and ever. Amen.

I’m amazed that you, a body of believers, have so quickly deserted Jesus Christ, who called all of you, a body of believers, by the grace of Christ. That means that an entire church can be called to Christ. You, as a group, have taken on a different gospel, and it’s not a gospel. And they want to distort an entire church with a gospel that is not Christ, and to take away from you an undistorted gospel. But if I, or an angel from heaven, should come into your midst as a people and preach contrary to what I preached to you, a body of people, let him be damned. I said before, so I say now again, if anybody comes and preaches to you a gospel other than what I preach to you, let him be damned.