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Disciple, What Is Your Name?
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The Conflict of Faith and Natural Heritage in the Prophetic

I. Spiritual Identity Conversion: Its Practical Meaning


Throughout Christian life, we are faithfully taught there is no other name than the name of Jesus by which we are saved and the world is to be ruled. Our worship daily exalts and lifts up the Name above all names—even Jesus Christ, Yeshua Hamashiach.


What we haven't been taught is how that Name must become ours to the point that it consumes our inner sense of natural origin. We haven't been taught that, as a basic of discipleship, we not only bow to the Name of our great Savior, but we must be engulfed by it at the expense of our human family and national identities.


I can't overstate the importance of this, nor the damage we have incurred as a "prophetic" kingdom people for generations by failing to realize this. The critical concern of today's global church is the practical effect of spiritual identity relative to national identity. Spiritual identity conversion is inseparable from spiritual maturity—ie, from the ability to be fully joined to Christ and to bear spiritual kingdom authority in the world.


If the enemy can bar us from inward identity conversion, and even convince us to redefine our new identity in terms of human ancestries, then he has everything he needs—not only to stop us from fulfilling our Eternal destiny—but to create his own counterfeit "kingdom of God" on earth. The stakes are high. We must pay attention to this.




- Discipleship: the losing and gaining of a name


We all affirm the Great Commission's call to enter the world, make disciples, and baptize them in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Our English translation requires us to picture conducting an objective act on people. But follow closely this more literal Greek rendering:

"Go into all the world, discipling all peoples, saturating them into the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit."


Whoa!! Please, read that again slowly and drink deeply. See what we have missed in this word.


From this rendering, we see that the Great Commission is not about eking "professions of faith" out of people, or just creating adherents of teachings and practices. Nor is it really about dunking people in water. It is about producing a spiritual identity conversion through spiritual saturation into the Name of the Father, Son and Spirit.


In other words, it is about producing an entire inner identity re-alignment in a follower of the Lord. This ongoing identity conversion and realignment is the definition of discipleship. "Discipling" and "saturation into the Father's Name" are one and the same.




- Jesus On Natural Fathering

To grasp the root meaning of discipling through "saturation into the Father's name," we have to appreciate what Jesus taught about discipleship relative to natural fathership. Consider:

"If anyone …does not hate his own father …he cannot be My disciple." Lk. 14:26
"Do not call {anyone} on earth your father; for One is your Father, He who is in heaven." Mt. 23:9
"Let the dead bury their dead." Lk. 9:60


Quickly note, Jesus is not teaching hatred or disrespect for one's parents as people (just like He wasn't teaching to literally cut off one's hand to keep from sinning). This would violate His deep will that we love people and honor parents.


But in these words, Jesus was teaching the hating and despising of one's identity rooted in natural fathering together with the artificial cultural expectations imposed by that identity. To be a disciple, one must turn his back on his adamic ancestry with its obligations. It's the same spirit as where Paul counts his natural heritage as refuse.


We must always love and respect our natural parents as people. But to be disciples, we must renounce our identity inherited through natural fathering and lineage. The Heavenly Father is a jealous Father. He will not share His Fatherhood of us with naturally fathered identity.


It is the same as when Jesus says we cannot serve two masters. We cannot have two fathers, two sources of identity. Thus baptism into the Father's name is predicated on burying one's ancestral identity.





II. A Disciple's View of Patriotism

[The following definition is courtesy of etymonline.com:

patriot - 1596, "compatriot," from L.L. patriota, from Gk. patriotes "fellow countryman," from patria "fatherland," from pater (gen. patros) "father" + -otes suffix expressing state or condition. Meaning "loyal supporter of one's country" is slightly later in Eng. Johnson defined it as "one whose ruling passion is the love of his country"…]


In the Western prophetic church, patriotism is valued and even cherished as a Christian ideal. This is especially so in nations like America where Christians had great influence on the nation's beginnings.


This will come as a shock to many readers, especially American believers: the concept of patriotism is precisely the concept Jesus had in view when He commanded us to leave behind naturally fathered identity. The word "patriotism" comes from the Latin for "father." It is "pater-ism." We could as easily name it "fatherism."


Western believers are wont to note the demonic error of ancestor worship in the Far Eastern cultures of Japan and China. But the spirit of fatherism abounds throughout the world, not just in the East. In the West, it takes the form of patriotism.


Where Easterners worship their literal ancestors, Westerners, through inordinate esteem, "worship" their historic national "founding fathers" and their "fatherlands" (ie, countries). It is a different kind of worship, but it is all of one spirit.


Nationalism, ancestralism, patriotism: all are terms for the one spirit of fatherism—the adulation of one's natural / national heritage—an esteem every true disciple must forsake and bury if he is to become saturated into the Eternal name of the Heavenly Father.




- American Propheticism or Prophetic Americanism?

Of all Western churches, the spirit of patriotic fatherism is strongest in America—again because of America's predominant early Christian influence. The American church shows the least discernment of earthly churches concerning its identity relative to national fathering. So strong in some places is the intermingling of Jesus worship and patriotism that it is appropriate to describe it as cultic (—some churches are built on doctrines that in effect deify American national destiny.)


In America, it is commonly expected that, in addition to the cross, a true Christian must feel a reverential awe for an historic group of national forefathers, cherish an array of national symbols, ascribe to a list of cultural tenets, and pledge allegiance to a tricolor flag—none of which will appear before the Eternal Throne or will have any more relevance in 10,000 years than ancient Babylon or Rome has today.


The troubling reality is that all this is as true in the "prophetic kingdom" churches as in any unillumined "non-revelatory" church.


Here in America, it is sung "No other Name, but the Name of Jesus." But is that really true? As soon as the singing is over, the prophesying begins. And the name "America" is often at least as prominent as the Name of Jesus—if not more so. The American prophetic is indeed saturated into a name—but it is not the truly Incomparable, Uncompromisable Name of the Father.


By centering our consciousness on "America," American Propheticism crosses a line to become "prophetic Americanism," a fatheristic religion in its own right—one entirely at odds with saving Christian discipleship. It is on the wings of precisely this religion melded with all earthly fatheristic religions that a Man of Sin will establish his throne. All but those with hearts anchored in the eternal (ie, "the elect") will be deceived.




- In the End...

To conclude this segment, let's acknowledge that a certain degree of Patriotism is to be expected in the early childhood of our faith. (God accommodates our childhood ignorance.) Beyond this, there is always a right place of simple respect for a nation's founders and for appreciating the natural blessings of one's earthly land. Americans have had especial cause to thank God for the influence of Christian men and women that significantly impacted formation of the early American nation.


But patriotism—the esteeming of oneself and of the church in terms of national forefathers and fatherland—is not acceptable to discipleship. It can have no part in the mature—in those who seek to speak from the Eternal throne, or who expect to bear kingdom rule over the nations. There must come a point at which patriotism is buried if we are to be baptized into the name of the Father.





III. The Bride's New Name

It goes without saying that in getting married, a bride gives up her maiden name to be identified by her husband. So also, a spiritual bride gives up her earthly name to take on her Husband's heavenly name. Consider the words of Psalm 45:

10 Listen, O daughter, give attention and incline your ear: Forget your people and your father's house; 11 Then the King will desire your beauty. Because He is your Lord, bow down to Him. …16 In place of your fathers will be your sons; you shall make them princes in all the earth.


When Jesus issued His call to hate one's national fathering and be baptized into the Name of His Father, he was really issuing the call to His Bride to come and marry Him. The call to discipleship and the call to brideship are identical.




- A "National" Bride-in-Waiting?

In recent years, our prophetic movements have been led to expound on the Bride of Christ. And well we should! The Lord has released this dear end time revelation to His people in preparation for His Coming.


But there is an issue here. The issue is that the Bride of Christ is composed only of a people who have answered Jesus' call to forget their father's house. Only those "made ready" through purification—beginning with the burying of their fatherism—may be joined to the Son.


Today, it is fashionable in some parts of Western society for women to keep their maiden name, hyphenating it with their husband's name (for example, Hillary Rodham-Clinton). Many in the church look down on this trend. Yet this trend is actually a true reflection of the Western prophetic bridal church's own devotion to Her maiden national name, especially in America.


Where Jesus taught that to love Him we must "hate" our country (ie, "fatherland"), patriotized bridal ministry perpetuates the noble-sounding but erroneous concept that we can and must "Love God and Country." It prepares us for a hyphenated spiritual marriage where we can keep our national names and allegiances. In spirit, we are being led to believe the Bride's new name will really be written as "Mrs. National-Jesus."


In America, the aspiring Bride expects her married name to be "Mrs. America-Jesus."




- The American Church's Maiden Name

Would you like to know what the name America means? The following definition is abridged courtesy of behindthename.com:

"America" is the Latin fem. form of the name Amerigo, the early medieval Italian name for Henry (or Henrietta). [The land was named after the explorer Amerigo Vespucci.] "Henry" is from the Germanic name Heimerich which meant "home ruler", composed of the elements heim "home" and ric "power, ruler."


In short, friends, the name America means "ruler of the home."




- The American Church's Bridal Plea

Through constant focus on her country alongside the Lord, the American prophetic/intercessory church is in spirit declaring that She wants the Father's name without having to give up her own. She is expectant on hyphenating her maiden national name, 'Ruler of the Home," to the name of the Father. She wants Him to be first—among equals.


So it is that by the hour—


With every prophetic declaration centered on America's final glory,
With every intercessory plea ultimately centered on America's welfare,
With every song sung in the sanctuary to America's name,


The following message—and only this message—is reaching the Bridegroom's Ears:

"Lord, Lord, beloved Jesus, I want to marry you Lord and do your will, but I am devoted to my heritage as the one who rules the home. When will you come for me, Your bride—I mean, when will You come on board as MY Husband?"


… as the saints from every age, peering over heaven's embattlements, groan in sheer disbelief.




- The Bridegroom Responds

In reply to this earnest intercession, the Bridegroom has only this heartfelt response:

"Woman, you know not what you ask! Are you able to be baptized with My baptism?"


"Daughter American Church, I admire your intense desire for Me, but are you able to bury your fatherland's name to be saturated into My Name alone? How shall you rule with Me over those past whose identities you have not matured? For those who share My Eternal Throne neither marry nor are given in marriage, nor retain names of such origins.

"Tell me, Daughter church, with whom do you identify more? Is it with My lowly Afghani Sheep unknown to you, or with your distant forefathers [     ]  who, unknown by Me, now burn eternally? Do you feel closer to My humble Iraqi Sheep, or with those you call "your boys," ready to invade their land, who know Me not and whom I have not fathered?

"Daughter, I admire your intense desire for Me, but at this time, I must decline your earnest request for my Bed. You are yet too young. You have much yet to surrender which I cannot partake of with you. I may not take on your name, nor may you rule My Home. But desire earnestly My Name alone—leave your fatherland's house—and I shall come for you together with all those in earth who have left their nations' names to take only Mine.

"Oh, and Daughter American Church…. You must hurry."

*******

To all my friends, but especially my American friends, I say: we must all ask ourselves, are we really ready to be part of the Bride? Look in a mirror, and ask yourself:




"Disciple, what is your name?"

Selah.



Chris Anderson
New Meadow Neck, RI, USA

First Love Ministry
- a ministry of Anglemar Fellowship
http://www.firstloveministry.org

03/03



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