The Holy Spirit In The Church Of Laodicea
[Introduction] [Part I] [Part II] [Part III] [Footnotes]
Footnotes
The roles of these two natures as described here are in the broad sense only, but are by no means exclusive. We're not saying that the Comforter does not minister to the individual heart, or that the Spirit of Truth does not speak to the whole church. The Spirit of Truth certainly has a ministry of corporate correction and discipline as we see in the letters to the churches of Revelation. And certainly the Comforter ministers to the individual as the Psalms make abundantly clear. We have only outlined the major theaters of each of the Spirit's natures. The main point is that we grasp the essence of these natures according to their relative roles and major theaters of ministry.
What this means is that the church body exists for the sake of the individual members, not vice versa. The individual believer's relationship to the Father does not exist for the sake of building up an anointed corporate machine. The supreme importance of the individual relative to the body is seen in Paul's burden to "present every man perfect in Christ Jesus" (Col. 1:28). This is also echoed in Jesus' parables about the lost sheep and the lost coin (Lk. 15:3-10). According to Jesus, it is our attention (or lack thereof) to the individual that proves whether we are sheep or goats (Mt 25:40,45. See also Mt. 18:5). Later we will see how extremely important it is to rightly discern this relationship between the individual and the body.
Identifying partiality to the Comforter as the major problem of the age is not to minimize the very real distortion that occurs when the Spirit is received as the Truth but denied as the Comforter. Anyone who has suffered under the bondage of isolated, self-preoccupied groups who continually preach a legalistic "purging" and mystical asceticism while railing against the Comforter's broader ministry knows how painfully destructive this error can be. A great evil that exalts the hard-core nature of the Old Testament prophet as the complete essence of Christ exists in its own right. However this is not the majority error among those that have welcomed the Spirit's outpouring—nor therefore the focus for this letter. This topic requires its own discussion, but must not blind us to the larger problem in the spirit-filled church.
We also do not want to minimize the distortion that exists where truth is proclaimed as a form, but the Spirit is not acknowledged. The intolerable state of judgmental legalism that exists among those who exalt the Bible as its own end cannot be overstated. However, this study is not addressed to that portion of the church which has rejected the outpouring of the Holy Spirit.
This is not meant as a blanket indictment of everyone who is partial to the Comforter. Not everyone who is partial to the Comforter in the spirit-filled church is partial for the same reasons. There are some who have only had a first contact with God through the Comforter, but the Spirit of Truth has not fully awakened them to His requirements of obedience. For these, partiality toward the Comforter exists out of innocent ignorance and immaturity. But for the multitudes whom the Spirit of Truth has confronted, continued partiality toward the Comforter has become a cloak for conscious rejection of the Spirit's Truth.
The issue of combining the anointing with the love of money creates the strongest form of delusion, and forms the context for Jesus' analogy about the prism.
I have been asked, "What if the vessel for the Spirit's ministry is false, does that necessarily invalidate the anointing toward me if my heart is true?" The answer is no. Unless the vessel is definitely imparting an anointing originating from satan, the recipient can receive the true anointing from a false vessel without fear. Though that anointing is false to the vessel, it can still be true to the recipient as long as the recipient's heart is pure. Personally, I have received many edifying prophecies and even healings through vessels whom I knew were closed in some way to the Spirit of Truth. However, the Lord has also steered me away from receiving from Him through certain vessels, even though they were ministering under the Spirit. After all, how would you feel about receiving a prophecy from Balaam, or a healing through Judas? Though you may be safe in the short term, in the long term, your exposure to such false prophets can be injurious to you as they eventually draw you into their own heart's deception, whether love of money, or whatever.
Translated from Strong's Concordance
It has been customarily believed within the spirit-filled church that all who are spirit-filled are by virtue of this alone part of the elect remnant of God. But when we remember that the Israel which received all of the Lord's miracles also rejected Him except for a few, then we see how far from the truth this is. Only those who receive all of the Spirit, Comforter upon Truth, can truly be considered elect.
As a world force, the age of laodiceanism started when democracy began replacing the tyranny of kings in Britain. This crystallized in the emergence of the United States whose founding documents contain words as, "We hold these truths [ie, rights] to be self evident," the "Bill of Rights," and later "Government of the people, by the people, and for the people." Democracy actually developed on the back of the spread of the gospel and then deteriorated. As it deteriorated, socialism's harsher forms arose in those places where the gospel had penetrated little. Today, communism is felt most greatly in the Far East where group consciousness reigns in the extreme. Here, the laodicean emphasis is seen commonly in such terms as "The People's Republic" etc.
Ironically, because of the early influence of gospel truth which stresses personal moral accountability and responsibility, original American democracy also stressed personal responsibility and prized individuality. But humanism quickly replaced the gospel's influence to give all western democracy the plain socialist face it has today. Humanism exists today because of the Gospel. Because of the salt of the gospel and the obedience of a few, entire western society became blessed by the grace of God. But instead of recognizing God's grace on human nature for what it was, man took credit for the grace received through the effects of the gospel and ascribed goodness to himself. Thus humanism was born. In turn, the church has bought into the "man is basically good" theory. This has led to the withdrawing of God's grace from society which is now falling apart from lawlessness.
Today, under the guise of individual freedom, democratic laodiceanism is quietly corralling all the world's peoples to become one indistinct body of "united nations." This body is being prepared as an "anti-bride" for the antichrist, the Man of Sin.
As a system in which relationship to the body is the final rule in all faith and practice, religious laodiceanism is nothing more than renewed catholicism. Only the name is different. While Luther succeeded at exposing the evils of a more obvious system of works and offices between men and God, he only wounded a head of the beast. But religious laodiceanism has never been put to death. The priesthood of the believer partially restored through the Reformation has continued to be crushed under conformity to group consciousness and herd mentality in the church.
As the model of perfected church unity, the elders encircling God's throne in Rev. 4:4,9-11 demonstrate that true unity exists where each man has his own clear vision of the Lamb. This also applies to the 144,000 followers of the Lamb in Rev. 14. Their eyes are not on one another in an attempt to promote body unity. Group consciousness cannot produce godly unity.
This is not to say that all those under laodicean delusion necessarily deny the concept of Truth or other concepts that relate to the Fathering nature of God. However, where they are acknowledged, because the laodicean church knows only how to relate to the mothering nature of the Comforter, all such concepts are spiritually emasculated of their hard implications. Truth, discipline, obedience, the fear of Godall of these are effeminized to the point that they have no effective meaning.
It is also worthy to note that because the laodicean church is receptive only to the Comforter's ministry, the offices of pastor and evangelist have provided the mainstay of leadership. The offices of prophet and apostle which are more oriented toward the Spirit of Truth are either not recognized or relegated to token acknowledgment. Where they are otherwise truly embraced, they too are emasculated and effeminized.
In citing the teachings above, I hasten to remind you that none of this is to deny the reality of the Comforter's ministry in the laodicean church. Nor do I wish to implicate the integrity of every leader and participant in the present church. Many who are subject to the present delusion are genuinely ignorant. The Spirit of Truth simply has not confronted them about these things. It is vital that those who have responded to the Truth realize that they are not responsible to pass personal judgment on those who give no evidence of having so responded.
Despite the evils associated with the body, we can't underestimate the importance of engaging the Comforter's ministry by submitting to the corporate relationship of His directing. There are many who, having responded to the work of Truth in the inward parts, have concluded that isolationism is the best course. As the minority problem in the church, we have not given equal time to this error and are not prosecuting this problem in this article.
Wind is a readily recognized type of the Spirit. The very word for Spirit in Greek is also the word for breath. Also, the Spirit is often associated with the waters of the earth and is typified by them (See Gen. 1:2; Ps. 29:3; etc.) Joel likens the Spirit to rain; Jesus likens Him to rivers (Jl. 2:23,28; Jn. 7:37-39). Plugging these values into the Mt. 7 passage, we can see that the "rain, streams, and wind" to which Jesus was referring easily represent the Holy Spirit.]
It is by the Comforter's gifts that the church (house) is built [see Eph. 4]. This means that the power by which the church is built becomes the very power that eventually tests the strength of the building!
Paul also uses the picture of the Comforter as wind to warn the church about being rooted in Christ relative to multitudinous teachings. These are not necessarily false teachings. The Comforter's wind ministry produces innumerable doctrines relative to church life and spiritual ministry. Consider the numberless charismatic teachers in our generation alone. Paul warns us not to be blown about by these, true as they may be, but to be centered through the Spirit of Truth on relationship with Christ.]
Many who have sought to preserve their rooting in the Spirit of Truth have mistakenly cast in their lot with the landlubbers. Hating laodiceanism and despising spirituality without fruit, and having failed at their own attempts to ride the sea, these have come out of the water altogether, concluding that the essence of Truth is found in the land itself. But this is a deception that in the end only leaves us with a form of truth. This is largely the state of the Deeper Life, Keswick, and other mystic-ascetic groups devoted to the Father who have rejected the Spirit's outpouring. Today, it is hard to tell the difference between those who have tried to escape the spirit-filled church to preserve their relationship with the Father, and those who have tried to escape because they simply don't believe in the Spirit's coming at all.
[Introduction] [Part I] [Part II] [Part III] [Footnotes]