Grace, The PERSON!

I found this compilation in my little note book. This compilation had helped in the awakening of my spirit when I was on my "Road to Emmaus". This compilation still refreshes my spirit and it brings back fond memories of what I have done during my journey in encountering the wonderful Person of grace...

There are seven occasions in the Gospel of John that our Lord Jesus declares that He is the great “I AM”. In the contexts of each declaration, the phase “I AM” is enforcing the deity of Jesus as God.

John 4:26 Then Jesus declared, "I who speak to you am He."

John 6:20 ~ But He said to them, "It is I; don't be afraid."

John 8:24 ~ I told you that you would die in your sins; if you do not believe that I am the one I claim to be, you will indeed die in your sins."

John 8:28 So Jesus said, "When you have lifted up the Son of Man, then you will know that I am the one I claim to be and that I do nothing on my own but speak just what the Father has taught me.

John 8:58 ~ I tell you the truth," Jesus answered, "before Abraham was born, I am!"

John 13:19 ~ "I am telling you now before it happens, so that when it does happen you will believe that I am He.

John 18:5 ~ Jesus of Nazareth," they replied. "I am He," Jesus said.


The number 7 is the number for perfection. Jesus again declares Himself as God seven more times with the used of symbolized objects in this world to describe Himself as the only One who can meet our greatest needs in life.

John 6:35 ~ Then Jesus declared, "I am the bread of life. He who comes to me will never go hungry, and he who believes in me will never be thirsty.

From the basic necessities of food for life, He alone is able to satisfy the greatest spiritual hunger in our life as the Bread of Life.

John 8:12 ~ When Jesus spoke again to the people, he said, "I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life."

In the area of sight for direction, He opens our spiritual eyes so that we can stop wandering around in a spiritual darkness following one blind religious guide, one after another.

John 10:9 ~ I am the gate; whoever enters through me will be saved. He will come in and go out, and find pasture.

He is the only Light that guides us into God’s Secret Place as he declared He is the only Door to the sheep pan. All other doors lead down the wrong path and to eternal destruction. Jesus is the entrance into eternal life.

John 10:11 ~ I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.

We are like wandering, lost lamb caught in the briers of sin. There are a lot of false shepherds herding up stray sheep to take to slaughter. For the well being of our spirit man, Jesus declared He is the only Good Shepherd. He will take of us individually by the hand and led us personally into the Father’s presence and give each and everyone of us His nourishment.

John 11:25 ~ Jesus said to her, "I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will live, even though he dies;

Jesus conquered death; the ultimate fear of man. Not only did He say, “I am the resurrection and life”, He demonstrated His victory over death with His resurrection on the third day of His death. For those who believe, Jesus is their hope in the face of death. Resurrection is not a deed for Jesus Himself is the Resurrection.

John 14:6 ~ Jesus answered, "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.

Who else dare to declare that he is the way, the truth and the life? Jesus is firm in declaring Himself is the Way, the Truth and the Life like no others...

John 15:5 ~ I am the vine; you are the branches. If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing.

Through the biological aspect of a vine, Jesus demonstrates how He sustains our spiritual life. Apart from Him, we are nothing…

John 20:31 ~ But these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.

This verse is self explanatory. It is through believing Jesus is the Christ, and what He had done on the Cross that we could have life in His Name. It is not through our performance. To understand the meaning of we do not have to performance to deserve this blessing makes me see the Person of Jesus magnifying the grace of the Father, and set me apart from religiosity.

Grace is not a doctrine but the Person of Jesus for He did not come to teach us how to do but He came personally to accomplish what we could not do... On the Cross, He took it all upon Himself until He cried out, "It's Finished!"... Grace is the foundation of Christianity.

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Floodgate

Yesterday, I had a chance to fellowship with two precious Brothers from other congregation who have been enlightened by His grace. They are full of the revelation of His grace and because of this truth in them, their faith is prompting them to join us because of the grace message we preach in SIB Grace, a Church that Jesus loves.

As they are exercising their faith of Abraham in moving out from their mixture of law and grace environment, they face challenges in their emotional realm posted by the members of their congregation. They are being pull them back from moving forward. However, the joy from His grace overshadows their hindrance.

During our fellowship, one of the brothers embarked on expressing the overflowing love that he experienced under the power of His grace, i.e. when we love someone, the question of “Do I have to” or “Do I need to” just does not exist at all. Our entire approaches of “have to” or “need to” are spontaneous as the result of our revelation of His Grace as a Person. If grace is still a doctrine to us, we will still be doubtful over our decision on “Do I have to” or “Do I need to”.

His sharing immediately triggered me to a verse which Apostle John is saying, “We love, because He first loves us” in 1 John 4:19. In that flip of a second, the Holy Spirit arrested me with a revelation on how this verse works!

Our hearts are just like a floodgate; before we are touched by His grace, by our fallen nature we are always selfish and our floodgates are closed because we are connected to our limited resources. When His grace touches us, our hearts begin to open; and we started to love and bless each other. By His mercy, our floodgates are now channeled to the resources of the whole Heaven by a river called Grace. During our growth in His grace, because of our old mind set and our little faith, we tend to close this floodgate still thinking that the resources are from us. But the truth of the matter is “We love, because He first loves us.” He has first loved us!

At this point, the Holy Spirit encouraged me with His love that to love is His nature and that love is from Him. His grace has already opened our floodgates. As a floodgate, we just have to exercise our faith by letting the gate open fully for His blessings to flow; knowing full well that this river of Grace, is the channel between the storehouse in Heaven to our floodgates. We do not have to worry about how the blessings flow because this kind of worry is not the function of a floodgate. We just open our hearts and let His love flows through us. We love, because He first loves us!

But out of our flesh, selfishness and little faith in Him, we tend to focus on the flow instead of putting our faith on His resources and push away His grace by closing the gate; and we have made void His grace and we have failed to magnify His nature as the Awesome Loving God.

If He has already opened our hearts, He has made ready the necessary infrastructures to enable His resources in Heaven to flow through us. We are able to bless others, because He first blesses us and we are able to love, because he first loves us…

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So open up the floodgate of your heart and let His blessings flow!

Grace and Peace

Apostle of Grace to the Gentiles, the Apostle Paul, who had written 2/3 of the New Testament in the Bible, started all his letters to all the churches with “Grace and peace to you from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ.”; and he ended every letters with grace.

Romans 1:7, 1 Corinthians 1:3, 2 Corinthians 1:2, Galatians 1:3, Ephesians 1:2, Philippians 1:2, Colossians 1:2, 1 Thessalonians 1:1, 2 Thessalonians 1:2, 1 Timothy 1:2, 2 Timothy 1:2, Titus 1:4, Philemon 3.

This simple insight of the way Paul began his letters shows that this former Law Enforcer, the Pharisee of the Pharisees, had precious revelation on the importance of grace for all the Churches in the New Covenant.

God has reconciled us to Himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation; that God was reconciling the world to Himself in Christ, not counting men’s sins against them. And He has committed to us a message of reconciliation. We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making His appeal through us. We implore you on Christ’s behalf; be reconciled to God. God made Him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God.

He reconciled the world with Grace not Law and we are the ambassadors of Christ not Moses or even Elijah. If we are still unable to accept the Grace of God, we will never be at peace with God even though He had already reconciled us with Him at the cross.

Still not convinced yet? Well, look at Apostle Peter’s letters! The name “Peter” in Hebrews is “Kepha”, which means Stone, a symbol of the Ten Commandments. Apostle Peter too, started his letters in 1 Peter 1:2 with Grace and peace be yours in abundance; and he even went on to teach us how to receive grace and peace in 2 Peter 1:2, “Grace and peace be yours in abundance through the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord.”


Our Heavenly Father is using a former Law Enforcer and a symbol of the Law as Grace Radio to broadcast what is in His heart to all His churches in the world... Are we in tune with Him? Interestingly, this pattern of writing did not appear in the Book of James, John’s letters or even Jude’s letter.

The Ten Commandments and the Prophets can never make us to be at peace with God. Jesus, by fulfilling the Laws or the Prophets, He forgave us all our sins, having canceled the written code, with its regulations, that was against us and that stood opposed to us; He took it away, nailing it to the Cross and lavished God’s grace and peace at the cross when He cried out, “It’s Finished!”

Grace and peace to you from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ.

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Be A "Right Believing" Believer!

The first “you must not” started at the Garden of Eden while God commanded Adam not to eat from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. Adam failed from that little demand and ever since, mankind is trying to reclaim their righteous status by doing the good and avoiding the bad.

Because of this consciousness, man began to ask God for more laws so that they might have a standard to abide to for their righteousness. Men still failed from the Law and by their own human wisdom, more rules and regulations were ordained to “help” men to achieve the task of Law abiding.

It was through the power of His Finished Work on the Cross that everything that are of the facts and natural in this world stopped at the cross and everything that are of the truth and supernatural started at the Cross.

Friends, it is not what we do that make us righteous. It is what Christ has done at Calvary. Romans 5:19 says, “For as by one man’s [Adam] disobedience many were made sinners, so also by one Man’s obedience many will be made righteous.” It is the obedience of one Man — Christ, and not our obedience, that has made us righteous!

We have to understand that when we have come to Christ, we are a NEW CREATION and a NEW CREATION does not have the consciousness of sin but the consciousness of His everlasting righteousness.

Hebrews 10:22 let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water.

We don’t need a revelation of how sinful we are. We know it when we sin. The devil reminds us of our sins. Even our friends and loved ones sometimes point out our sins. What we need, instead, is a revelation of how forever righteous we are in God’s eyes, especially when we sin.


Before we came to Christ, we were slaves to sin and no matter how many good we have done, we were still sinners. And now as a believing believer, we are already a slave to His righteousness. If only we can believe the words of God from the bottom of our heart, as a slave to His Righteousness, even we do wrong, we are still righteous.

God wants us to establish ourselves in what Christ has done. He wants us conscious of our everlasting righteousness in Christ. To do that, we can listen to anointed preachings that remind us of our righteousness in Christ because faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the words of Christ. Don’t just know it in our head; but speak forth the word that was preached to us. Every morning, tell ourselves, “I am the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus!” When we are so full of the consciousness of this gift of righteousness that is everlasting, we will reign in life! We will reign over sin, bad habits, sicknesses, lack and everything that holds us back from a victorious life!

Don't be an "unbelief" believer! Right believing will lead us to right living; and be a “right believing” believer…

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Tithing

Though the term “tithing” could only be found in the Bible… to date, tithing is still remain sensitive and is the most debated issue in the body of Christ.

If only the truth can be revealed, tithing is actually a privilege granted to a believer and it is closely associated with sowing in the Bible. “Sowing and reaping” is the Kingdom system whereas; the system of “buying and selling” is from the world.

We are able to know the number of seeds in an apple, but we can never know the number of apples in a seed. Unless we sow the seed, a seed will still remain as a seed. When a seed is sown, it will grow to become a tree! So whenever we sow, we are to expect a harvest.


If we are still a non believer, what we are giving is not a gift to God; it is a repayment of debts. It’s a far cry from being considered as tithing because we cannot give to our Creditor, while we still owe the debt that we could not pay. Our Heavenly Father, offered up His begotten Son Jesus Christ, paid not only our debts, but the debts of the whole world. It only took us a belief away to be debt free from sins, sicknesses, curses, poverty… and you name it. As a debt free individual, a believer and sons or daughters of God, we have been placed in the prestigious position to give instead of paying debt!

In the midst of my road to Emmaus, I too, have all sorts of silly Q&A sessions with our Lord. These are those silly questions… (Mind you, a lot of times His threw questions back to me instead of answering my questions…)

Me: “Do I still have to tithe in the New Covenant? Or under the grace dispensation, do I really have to tithe?”
Lord: “I AM not a God under an old or a new covenant. I AM above the Covenants and I am the same yesterday, today and tomorrow. You are tithing to God not to the covenants…”
Me: “???... Ok”

Me: “Do I have to give the net or the gross?”
Lord: “Are you not pleased to see that you can tithe more? Have you realized that the more you can tithe means more is your income? You are now tithing out of your income; not tithe to increase your income. If to tithe less is your wish, then I will supply you with less seed so that you can tithe less.”
Me: “The gross, Lord” I did not feel condemn, I laugh instead with a warm sensation in my heart… Praise Him!

Me: “Will I be 10% poorer after I have tithed? I can actually do quit a lot of thing with this 10% You know....”
Lord: “Who have made you focus on the 10% instead of the 90% that you have?”
Me: “???… Ok.”

A truth is always has to be built on Jesus’ finished work. It was only when I have been enlightened by grace that I started to understand God actually had shown us a very powerful example. He gave up His begotten Son, Jesus Christ, the First Fruit and the best from Heaven, to the world. He redeemed all that Adam had lost and now, receiving multitudes of sons and daughters through the death of Jesus on the cross.

With this revelation, I understand sin is already a settled issue to God and I am now totally free from debt. God has put me in the prestigious position of giving instead of paying. I understand that I have already been blessed with every spiritual things in heavenly realm in Christ, so tithing become a worship and a thank giving. It is no more a mean for me to force God to bless me. I am amazed to realize that the figure of my tithe is increasing. Praise Him…

I like an illustration used by Pastor Joseph Prince on tithing. A man asked him, “Do Christian need to tithe?” And he just gave a very cool answer; “Does a husband needs to kiss his wife?” Cool… Sound very much like our Lord; using a question to answer a question…

Tithing is a relationship not a requirement; it is not even a regulation or even a law. We tithe because He is alive…

Hebrews 7:8 ~ Here mortal men receive tithes, but there he receives them, of whom it is witnessed that he lives.

Definitely we don’t give to the dead right?

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Have You Graduated From Kindergarten?

The Bible says those who are still an infant can only drink milk and unable to eat solid food and is not acquainted with the teaching about righteousness. Whereas those who are mature eat solid food and they have constant use of the righteousness have trained themselves to distinguish good from evil.

Milk is the product from a mammal. Lets us use cow as an example. If you drink milk, you only need the cow to produce. The cow is happy and you are happy. But if you eat of it’s meat (solid food), it takes the life of a cow to give you beef! Understand the difference? When you eat meat, somebody will have to die! It’s the cow.

When infant drink of its milk, the cow is not killed and the blood is not shed. It is actually the shadow of a religion under an inferior covenant, of which, is a duplication of religious principle where sin is not a settled issue and needed constant reminder for repentance. Therefore, an infant has to be taught over and over again on the repentance of the acts that led to death. It is all about their effort, their behavior, and their right conducts, their approach towards God and their personal holiness so to speak. The infants have been bound with lots of rules and regulations; on you cannot do this or you cannot do that, you cannot fellowship with certain group of people, you cannot eat this and you cannot eat that…. you cannot, you cannot....

The scenario is just like the kindergarten our kids used to go to. The problem with the infant is that, even there are time that kids will be graduated from the kindergarten, those infant are still there years after years. These infant are not taught to be Jesus conscious; they are not make to understand what Jesus had done for them on the cross and worst of all, they have been led to misunderstand the Holy Spirit…

Those who are taught with the teaching of righteousness are bold to make Jesus their righteousness and they do not trust in their flesh to produce self righteousness. They understand that through Jesus finished work on the cross, all the sin issues had been settled. They look to Jesus for their holiness, their righteousness, their wisdom and their provision.

Isaiah said of our righteous acts are like filthy rags while Apostle Paul considered his achievements through self righteousness as dung. And interestingly, the meaning of flirty rug in Hebrews is sanitary napkin….

Therefore, before God considers us as mature, we need to constantly use His righteousness. Before we can constantly use His righteousness, we need to establish ourselves in His righteousness. Before we can be established in His righteousness, we need to establish ourselves in His grace. Sorry, it is about grace again, no place for law keeping. And if we want to be established in His grace, we need to rest in Him and received from Him. Before we can rest in Him, we must understand what He meant by “It’s finished!”

Whenever we try to perform to justify ourselves, we are alienated from Him and fallen away from His grace. In other words, we are saying, “Jesus, You have not done a good job, You are a liar, Your finished work is not actually finished. You still have something for me to do.” Let’s put it short, no human effort, it’s all about His finished work.

To have meat (solid food) as our food, we have to kill and killing involves with shedding of blood. Those who are mature can eat meat because they have taken full advantage of a sledded animal. Because of this reason, those who are mature are able to take full advantage of Jesus’ death and depend on His righteousness. Our Lord Jesus had been slain on the cross and His blood had been shed. He was made sin to die on the cross so that we can be made righteous. Have we taken full advantage of His death and depend on Him for our righteousness?

Christianity was born out of the death and the shed Blood of our Lord Jesus Christ. Whoever approaches Christianity without recognizing His death and His Blood or bypassing His death and His Blood is defined as religious. Anyone who stays in the realm of religion is still an infant while the mature is about taking full advantage of the death and the Blood of our Lord Jesus Christ without shame.

Have you graduated from kindergarten? Or you are a teacher in a kindergarten...?

Hey Alan, the Bible says solid food you know, not meat…..

Well, an infant is unable to take bread as well. Think about it, the process of making bread is also signifying the suffering of our Lord Jesus Christ. To be a bread, you have to go through grinding of the grain, pounding, kneading of the dough, make into shape and to be baked in a high temperature oven… He said, "I am the Bread of Life!" Didn't He?

The Tree of Life

This post was originally part of the posting in “A Mail from Jacky” posted on 1st August 2008. As I still received revelation concerning the Tree of Life, I felt led to take this potion out from that post and post as a separate title.

The message preached by Pastor Joshua Lee on the 13th July 2008 was a heart revolutionizing message as it touches on Christian's approach on their conducts in everyday life. So we start with the question whether we are drawing our source from the Tree of Life or The tree of The Knowledge of Good and Evil?

As for me, I don’t think I ever put a thought on this subject even though I have been a Christian for almost nine years; and because of this ignorant, even though I know I have been enlightened by grace, here and there, I still find myself bound by my own weaknesses.

I realize that as long as you dwell in the grace of God, the grace of God and His faithfulness will bring you deeper into His truth because you just cannot be stagnant but grow in grace. You are just like flowing in His river. I also realize that this is part of the process of growing in grace. Significantly, a Christian needs to be established in grace before this kind of message can take any effect because a truth is built on a truth. If you are legalistic, the focus is on your effort and thus, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil is your source. Grace is contradicted to the legalism’s approach, so as the Tree of The knowledge of Good and Evil.

A legalism is earth bound and is restricted by the conduct of doing right or wrong, of which, the root is eating from the Tree of The knowledge of Good and Evil. If Christianity is to do good and avoid doing wrong, then Christianity is the same as any other religions. Every Christian knows that Christianity is not a religion but relationship with Jesus, and in spite of that knowledge, Christian still follow the worldly system or religious way of doing right and avoid doing wrong.

What is Christianity then? Will the real Christianity, please stand up! Christianity is depending on Jesus instead of human effort and Christianity is about eating from the Tree of Life. Jesus said He came to give life and life more abundantly! Praise God, if Jesus did not call me out from the legalistic environment I was in, I will never have the revelation on the importance of eating from the Tree of Life. I will still be living my Christian life religiously, continue to be taught with the earthly way of how to do right and how to avoid doing wrong (of which, we could not, of course..). Or even continue to make Jesus as my example, so that I can be a better man….

Faith comes by hearing, hearing by the words of Christ. If preaching is not based on the grace of God, then there will be no faith to rise up to that level to approach the Tree of Life. Ignorantly, legalists have preached Christian away from the grace of God and make them fallen away from His grace by their justification of good works.

The following passage from the Book of Hebrews caught my attention for quit a long time already and only now I begin to understand what this passage means.

Hebrews 5: 11 ~14: We have much to say about this, but it is hard to explain because you are slow to learn. In fact, though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you the elementary truths of God’s word all over again. You need milk, not solid food! Anyone who lives on milk, being still an infant, is not acquainted with teaching about righteousness. But solid food is for the mature, who by constant use have trained themselves to distinguish good from evil!

The passage continue with, “Therefore let us leave the elementary teachings about Christ and go on to maturity, not laying again the foundation of repentance from acts that lead to death, and of faith in God, instruction about baptisms, the laying on the hands, the resurrection of the dead, and eternal judgment. And God permitting, we will do so."

If only we can read these passages ourselves without the interference of the legalistic preachers, it is so clear that the teaching on the foundation of repentance from acts is the elementary teachings. It is not about learning to do good or bad, it is to distinguish good from evil. Learning to do good or avoid evil cannot make us distinguish good from evil. We need to be established in grace so as to have the ability to distinguish good from evil. The good and evil here means whether the teaching of God's word is filtered through the cross or not.

The purpose of the forgiveness of sin from God is not for us to start a new sinless life ourselves but to make us have the confidence to enter the Most Holy Place by the blood of Jesus so that we can draw from the Tree of Life. Through the cross, we have already been reconciled; we have already been made righteous and we are already one with Him in Christ. So let us move on to enter with boldness!

These passages bring out another issue; i.e. the knowledge of righteousness is not milk but solid food. Therefore, the knowledge of righteousness is for the mature not for the infant. We can only be established with the teaching about righteousness through His grace. We have to settle the issue of sin once and for all that we are made righteous by His grace through faith. This righteousness is about His righteousness not our righteousness. Our righteousness is described as filthy rags by the Bible. When we understand what His righteousness is, we will know that teaching on the foundation of repentance from acts is elementary. It’s finished! Or else, we will continue to drink our milk.

Therefore, humble ourselves knowing that God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble. The proud in God's eye are those who depend on themselves and the humble are those who draw from Him. Knowing also that grace is with the truth. If we think that grace is not with the truth, then we will never find our way to the Tree of Life.

Humble yourself before God not before legalism. Start to believe that Jesus loves you and He had done everything on the cross just for you. If you guard this little faith in you, you will know His grace and you will be set free.

The purpose of His forgiveness is not for you to start your new sinless life yourself; His forgiveness is for you to have the boldness to enter into His grace.

Quotations

I read all types of book written by reputed preachers in my early Christian life. I would record down those phases which I thought meaningful. But as I read through this lists of quotation this morning, I found myself able to discern what is the bone and what is the flesh. So I began to harvest the fishes and throw away the fishing hook, the string, fishing rod as well as the fisherman. Before I was enlightened by grace, I swallow everything, including the fisherman's boots.

These are the few that leave standing and surprisingly, these are the phases that I did not quite understand then. I suppose these phases are of gold, sliver and precious stone which could withstand the fire.

Depression is the deception that comes from seeing the world from our perspective.

Every day that our Lord delays His judgment is His mercy to the world!

Few, if any, believers came to Christ because they loved Him. We all came to Jesus because we needed Him!

First Love is divine in its origins. We cannot produce it. We simply receive and respond to it.

God love us not because of our nature but because He is God.

God people are the book that Jesus is writing, and the wise can see Jesus in God people, and in their works.

God’s power is released in our lives to the degree of our obedience. Obedience is not based on emotion, but on faith. It is the obedience of faith, not man.

He will not send us anywhere; He will take us everywhere!

If revelation of Jesus’ love could come to our heart, revolution could come to our life!

If Satan cannot overcome a person by temptation, he’ll try accusation, or intimidation.

Judge all prophecy. We base that judgment on the written Word of Christ, not on the reputation of the speaker.

Love is the desire to benefit others even at the expense of self, because love desires to give and God gave His begotten Son, Jesus Christ.

Ministers need to remember that the Sword of the Spirit only slices off ears when wielded in the flesh. Legalistic preaching produces deafness instead of revealing truth. Truth is in the realm of grace.

Our failures should serve to bring us back to God’s First Love.

Worship is not the declaration of the love of the worshippers. It is a declaration of the love of Jesus.

Religion is man’s attempt to get to gods, but Christianity is God’s attempt to come to man!

Repentance is change of mind.

Right believing produces right living.

The basic art of communication is the ability to hear!

The Bible emphasizes on Who made the universal and not how the universal was made.

The responsibility for where we are spiritually is ours. We can make excuses, but in the end we are where we want to be.

Waiting on God to bring us to the end of our journey is much faster than our feet.

We are given the gift of eternal life because Jesus had died on the cross. We are given the gifts of the Spirit because Jesus had been glorified.

We are not saved because we love God. We are saved because God loves us!

We can never make ourselves into who we should be, but we must trust the Lord to make us into who we should be.

When someone is lost, he does not need correction, he needs direction!

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Ask

Ask and it will be given to you.
Seek and you will find.
Knock and the door will be opened to you.

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As He is, So Are We In This World!

Recently, I happened to have the changes to talk to Christians from different congregations. Some of them are still defending the Ten Commandments! And some, after all these years, still fast and pray to re capture the “First love” that they have lost along their Christian walk. Some still fast and pray to seek God for more anointing. They still believe that anointing will not come upon you unless you sacrificed, just like oil will not come out unless the olive is crushed! Some are still running after prophets while Jesus had said all the Prophets and the Law prophesied until John the Baptist. Some of them are still begging the Holy Spirit not to leave them while Jesus said, "I will never leave you nor forsake you!"

Through these conversations, my Lord gave His affirmation by showing me that I am so blessed to be in His grace. I was also like them before Jesus enlightened me with His grace. It was His mercy that I was still righteous in God’s eye though I was self seeking then. Though I was self seeking, I would still be heaven bound because I have received Jesus as my Savior. It is all because of His grace and mercy and non of my effort!

The truth of the matter was I had wrongly position myself. This is definitely not of His delight! I had position myself before the cross not after the cross. The biggest miss I had was, I had missed the death of my Lord Jesus Christ. I did not know much about His death. I did not know the meaning of His finished work. I did not know that Christians in the new covenant are in Christ. I never realized that it was God’s will for His Begotten Son Jesus Christ to die for me on the cross and gave me that position to be in Christ! I did not know all these because nobody told me. I would never know that I am in Christ if I continue to sit under a self centered preaching instead of Christ centered preaching.

However, whether I know it or not, I will still be in Christ. That is His mercy. My ignorant would not make me fall away from Christ, but it has robbed me of all the inheritance that my Lord Jesus died to give me. My faith has been made void by my ignorance and could never be activated under this wrong platform.

The verse “As He is, so are we in this world” means nothing to me because I did not know that I was in Christ.

Through His enlightenment, I started to receive His light in respect to this verse. In the midst of my meditation, He impressed me with the word “Identify”.

At two thousand years ago, He had already identified Himself with us. He was made sin though He knew no sins so that those who believed in Him are made righteous. He took away our curses, sickness, brokenness and everything that are bad, and nailed them on the cross so that we can enjoy His blessing, good health and peace. He called out God, God so that we can call God, Father, Father! He went to hell for us so that we do not have to go to hell because of our sins. He was resurrected on the third day so that we are resurrected together with Him, for our justification. Can you see that everything He did was for us! The divine exchange of all these conditions took place when He cried out, “It’s finished!”.

He had done everything that were needed to be done according to God’s knowledge not according to our knowledge. Now, it is our turn to identify ourselves with Jesus, i.e. as He is at the right hand of the Father, so are we in this world!

Now, my problem come again.... Lord, the problem with me now is this, how am I going to identify with You?

I started to search my bible in my hand phone for the word “identify”. It came out “No word found” and I try out the concordance, I could not find the word also.

The Greek word “Homo logo” suddenly echoed in my mind. “Homo logo” means confess, “speak the same as”. Hey, my Lord is telling me to identify myself with Him by confessing His words. That's means speaking the same thing as God speak!

What did God say about us?
We are the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus!

What did God say about our sin?
We are forgiven, past, present and future! Hallelujah!

What did God say about our life?
He came to give us life and life more abundantly!

What did God says about our financial standing?
For I know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though He was rich, yet for my sakes He became poor, that I through His poverty might become rich. Hallelujah!

What did God says about our lacks?
God says he who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things?
Now to Him who is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think, accordingly to the power that works in us.
And my God shall supply all my need according to His riches in glory by Christ Jesus!

What did God says about our infirmity?
By His strips we are healed!

Confess His words folk. Speak forth the words. Speak like God speaks. As You are, so am I in this world!

Hallelujah, to identify with Him is to speak the same thing that God speaks! Start identifying yourself with Him now through "Homo Logo"!

Do Not Worry

It was the morning of 4^th June 2008, the day the increase of fuel price took effect. I was sitting on my “throne” dispensing my duty after the morning breakfast. As I was trying to reign over my situation, some thoughts came in my mind and I was a bit disturbed, particularly on the fuel price increase.

Suddenly, I heard a voice rose up inside of me, saying, “Hey, listen to the bird!” Well, birds were singing joyfully outside my house. What stunned me was that, I did not even notice the birds before I heard the voice. Maybe I was too occupied with my thoughts.

Immediately I was set free from those concerns because Jesus said on the Mount of Beatitudes in Matthews 6:26 ~ Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they?

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Jesus says do not worry, is that beautiful?

Grace ~ The Aroma of Our Lord

"The Story" is the gospel and is also called good news. News is about an event that had already happened. The good news is not a good prophecy. A prophecy is about thing that is yet to happen.

The Apostle Paul said in Galatians 1:6~7 “I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting the one who called you by the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel – which is really no gospel at all. Evidently some people are throwing you into confusion and are trying to pervert the gospel of Christ.”

I am wondering how many of us on this earth were saved by hearing the Ten Commandments. The Story is not about the Ten Commandments, it is about the good news of what Christ had done! We heard of "this" gospel on Christ’s suffering and what He had done for us on the cross. We believed in "this" gospel and accepted Him as our Savior. We were saved by His grace through faith and even that little faith in us was giv en by Him through grace. As a born again Christian, we are supposed to grow in the Lord by f aith.

Unfortunately, after I was saved, I was turned to a different gospel. The "gospel" of law abiding, self modification, and I had to work hard to maintain my salvation through law keeping (work out my salvation), self effort (for faith without work is dead), so that by doing all these, I could be justified in front of man to please leaders and of c ourse, God. But this, according to the Apostle Paul, is no gospel at all.

I was more and more confused as times went by and everything seemed dry and lifeless because I was seeking my own kingdom and my own righteousness instead of His kingdom and His righteousness. When I failed from my good behavior, some good "intention" brothers would come to me and say the grace of God is sufficient for me and I turned to His grace again. When I started to depend on His grace, I was strengthened. After I have been strengthened, I started to seek my own righteousness again. I stepped in and out of the old and new covenant without knowing that this is called “spiritual adultery”. Spiritual adultery means married to Jesus (Mr. Grace) and still have relationship with Mr. Law.

Whatever results I could achieve were sustained by my own effort. In time, I could see myself more and more “cold” in the Lord, the church termed this is as “back-sliding”, “lost of the first love” and even the bible verse like Matthew 19:30 “But many who are first will be last, and many who are last will be first.” was used to condemn those who were crowned with the label of “back-sliding” or “lost that first love”. I knew something was wrong and I fasted, prayed and sought God’s face but to no avail. I never knew that everything had been taken care of by Christ on the cross until I was enlightened by grace.

In John 19:30, Jesus cried out,“It’s finished!” Ha, ha... man could use Matthews 19:30 to condemn me, but my wonderful Lord used John 19:30 to set me free! Praise God for His mercy and love, that He enlightened me with His grace at His own timing and set me free from that legalistic environment and all those religiosity which the Apostle Paul said is not gospel at all!

Jesus used this anointed message tape by Pastor Joseph Prince of New Creation Church to set me free from my legalistic background. This tape was given to me by a lovely brother who bought me to Christ in the year 1999. This message tape was recorded in a Sunday Worship Service on 18th of July 1999.

Message by Joseph Prince on 18th July 1999

He gave me a "NIV" positive bible on the 21st of September, 1999 and this message tape on the day I came to Christ, and that was 1st of October 1999.

This is the best gift I could ever have in my life

However, I leave this tape on my shelf for three years before I listened to it. The reason for not listening to it was because I could not afford to waste any precious time but to work for Jesus. I was to "not be distracted", I did not want to look to the left and look to the right, because I was told that to work for God is part of the reason why Jesus saved me and died for me on the cross! I was told not to listen to other preachers as they are not my spiritual father. And I was supposed to eat what I was fed in my own spiritual house. I could only say that I was very very obedient then...

It was until I was totally down and out in my spirit; by then, the Lord by His grace, prompted me to listen to this tape which has been leave behind on the shelf for three years. Man, I tell you, faith come by hearing, hearing by the words of CHRIST! The grace of God just melted me and the rest is History. Here I am, first running after the Aroma of our Lord and now, running in the Aroma of Christ!

Come to think of it, I was actually being set free when I started to be disobedient. I mean to disobey man... Hmmm... He who has ears to hear, let him hear !

I suppose this is called Gospel Revolution! How many of us were from that sort of environment, stepping in and out of the old and new covenant, living in Babylon (in Hebrews means confused by mixing)? We should be living our life honoring and glorifying the good news, which is after the cross and in the dispensation of grace under new covenant, instead of living our life honoring and glorifying the good prophecy, which is before the cross and in the dispensation of law under old covenant. We lived a confused life as if Jesus had not yet died for us on the cross.

Because of all these confusions, many of us are still ignorant trying to help Jesus to accomplish His finished work.

Do you know how finished is His finished work? Look for Grace, Grace can tell you...

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