The Daily Word of Righteousness

Two Current Issues, #9

One of the seven angels who had the seven bowls full of the seven last plagues came and said to me, "Come, I will show you the bride, the wife of the Lamb." And he carried me away in the Spirit to a mountain great and high, and showed me the Holy City, Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God. (Revelation 21:9,10—NIV)

Now, who composes the heavenly Jerusalem?

The Church, the Bride of the Lamb, composes the heavenly Jerusalem. The Bride shall descend from Heaven and be established on the new earth.

The saved nations want to bring their worship and wealth to God. This is in the heart of every person whose mind has not been corrupted by Satan. But no one can approach God except through the Lord Jesus Christ. So the nations must bring their worship and wealth to Christ in order to please God.

It has pleased Christ to pass the glory on to His Church. In order to bring their worship and wealth to Christ they will have to bring it to the Church, which is the Body of Christ, the new Jerusalem, the Wife of the Lamb.

The nations will walk by its light, and the kings of the earth will bring their splendor into it. (Revelation 21:24—NIV)

If all we have presented above is scriptural and true, if in fact it is the Church, the royal priesthood, who will receive the nations and teach the nations, then what does that mean for the members of the Body of Christ today?

It means we must mature to the place where we have been conformed to the moral image of Jesus Christ and are dwelling in untroubled rest in the Father and the Son, and They in us. We have more growing to do toward spiritual maturity!

For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the likeness of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. (Romans 8:29)

I in them and you in me. May they be brought to complete unity to let the world know you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me. (John 17:23—NIV)

And to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God. (Ephesians 3:19—NIV)

Jesus replied, "If anyone loves me, he will obey my teaching. My Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him." (John 14:23—NIV)

Until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ. (Ephesians 4:13—NIV)

"The whole measure of the fullness of Christ." Have we of the churches attained such maturity? Can we truthfully state we have been crucified with Christ and now it is Christ who is living in us?

I don't think so. From what I have seen I would venture that most Christians have never denied themselves, taken up their personal cross, and set out after the Master.

If we are to be the presence of Jesus Christ in the earth so people can come to us and receive the teaching and commandments of Christ, then it must be true of us that Christ is living and walking in us. I do not expect that any true Christian would disagree with that concept.

To be continued.