It has been a while since I have written, as there are some major transitions going on. These transitions are necessary to get us through to the next stage of our walk with God. In this time I have shared in many instances that God is giving us a time of the greatest harvest of souls ever recorded, and the Jews will all return to the land for their own revelation of their Messiah. These programmes in God needs the Church in a place of flowing perfectly in His plans for the greatest effectiveness and intimacy with Him. The more I study, the more I meditate the more I see Glory ahead, the more I see the majesty of Jesus the King.

The verse cited above is purposely put there to enlighten those who seek God through the Scriptures. This represents a description of what comes after Paul’s presenting those who are the enemies of the Cross of Christ. The result of being in this group of people is that being an enemy of the Cross puts you into the place of destruction, substituting the God of Heaven with the god of their own belly, and being deceived that earthly glory equates true glory, becoming heavenly shame!

You become an enemy of that which you oppose

Enemies do not start out such. They become enemies over ideology, belief, whatever that can divide. The end result of emnity is always war. And as I look out over the Church, the deceptions that are coming, and the corresponding march toward the AntiChrist system, I see Church people become as deceived as the world. Some of the ideals of life become indistinct. You can see no difference. Here we see Paul specify that even believers can become enemies of the Cross and what it represents. What are people opposing? The Cross must be an application to all who embrace Christ for salvation. The cross represents all that which is opposite to the world and what its pursuits are. The Cross teaches us that humiliation is the road to exaltation, ridicule a road for honour, Philippians 2 tells us the humiliating processes that Jesus had to undergo, the result of walking them out brought exaltation of the Father.

James tells us that God resists the proud. This resistance I believe is being evident in this pandemic, in that what is being revealed is a lack of preparation, a lack of discernment, a lack of substance. What we see therefore their lives becoming confusing and a decline. Many of us were warning that times were to become difficult and were positioning the true Church on a collision course with political power. Pride is illustrated in Isaiah 14, with five particular “I will” statements, which typify some of our own narrative now. My ear becomes very atuned when I hear believers plan with the words “I will” and their ambitions are laid bare. Many are treating the meeting of the saints as a opportunity to “ascend” to take on certain attributes. God is resisting that now. The dependence on the typical Christian meeting is waning, as governments across the world resist the meeting of the Church. So spiritual autonomy is becoming the quality that will sustain us at this time. Therefore pride is the first thing that turns us from being a friend of the Cross, even Paul says “It is not I that lives, but Christ that lives in me.” The first takedown of the Cross is the dismantling of the “I” in our lives, so that He lives and is given preeminence in our lives. So the sign we are becoming an enemy of the Cross of Christ is we live our lives in opposition to the things which the Cross represents in terms of who we serve and what we pursue. The enemy of the Cross of Christ will begin to note a Divine Resistance.

The Cross of Christ is a necessary School to walk in

As the heart is the most deceitful and a betrayer of our good intentions, there is a need to apply in our lives the Cross of Christ. There we must die in Him, so that He may regenerate us and make us walk in the New Man. As the world sees comfort, fame, influence, money as the things that define us, we must be aware that these same things will be the very vehicles which the antichrist system will move through to enslave mankind. So if our pursuit are those things we shall find ourselves on the wrong side in the day God confronts these systems. The cross of Christ is an essential preparation which puts us on the Cross, and we have to pass through the humiliations, deprivations, shame, isolations so that in that place of inner suffering we meet Christ in them. In meeting Christ in our self death we meet new life, sonship and heirship. The Cross of Christ is our place of identity, we don’t get that determination via other people if not from God, which is the most important. The most deceptive on the earth is the fame you can have for a moment and a despising the next. Some in embracing fame have thrown off their identity in Christ so they can bask in human recognition…certain ruin follows. The Cross of Christ will be the only safe place to be in the day of wrath.

It is not any Cross, it has to be the Cross of Christ

The Cross of Christ, an historical event that eternity revolves around. It is here that eternity is determined, God crowns Jesus, the Eternal King, man is reconciled to God, and through the Cross satan is forever consigned to his eternal fate. It cannot be a cross we fashion, Jesus has gone through it, and He determines we also be there, for us to access salvation and all that which comes with it. Our identity dies with Him, our pursuits gives way to His programme, our desires give way to His Destiny. It can be no other way. The doorway from perdition to perfection is very narrow. In our self death we rise to life, and we begin to live in Him. There are no short cuts.

The message in all this is that this world crisis on many fronts is a time of decision, a time of positioning. Church cannot go back to what it was before. We cannot play at our commitment. God will look into our lives to see if the Cross has been imprinted, and this will determine where we spend eternity. Many say “Once saved, always saved” but if we see this phrase in the light of Paul’s enemy of the Cross of Christ statement we shall see it does not hold up. How can an enemy of the Cross spend eternity in the light of the same Cross they opposed?

The Description Paul gives in Philippians 3:19 he qualifies what is the state of those who live as enemies of the cross, and it is striking. Destruction follows them, their god is themselves, and they exchanged spiritual honour for earthly fame. What comes out from this is money and influence. What comes is corruption and all other evils. These will form the foundation for the final society that exists on the earth, devoid of God and full of self.

You only have to look out with a discerning eye that changes are taking place and those changes are visible and foundational for a society less free, more restrictive, more anti God day by day. We must position ourselves and see. Overcoming the world is a condition for seeing and hearing God in leading us to our eternal destiny.

Shalom.