Oxford Bible Church - Living in the Last Days

Derek shares the key scriptures that tell us how we can quickly rebound from (1) sin, (2) setbacks, (3) success and (4) hurts.

Spiritual warfare is being waged over the battlefield of men's hearts and minds. Join Derek as He shares about the war between the Romans and Pirates in 63 BC, which gives the background to 2Corinthians 10:3-6, which talks about the weapons of our warfare being mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds. Paul used this war, where the Romans defeated the Pirates, as a picture of how we can be victorious, by using (1) God's mighty weapons (words), and (2) His strategy for deploying them, which is to first locate and pull down the enemy strongholds (false beliefs erected against God's truth), and then take every pirate-thought captive to the obedience of Christ, just as the pirates were made to surrender to Rome.

When we trust in Christ as our Rock Foundation for our being, life and eternal salvation, we are unshakable (Matt 16:18, 1 Cor 3:11, Isaiah 28:16, Matt 7:24-27). As we look to Him and trust in Him, He upholds us by His power, so we will not fall, as Peter discovered when he walked on water. The Christian life is based on a personal relationship with God. By knowing and trusting the Lord, we experience His abundant and eternal life (John 17:3, 10:10). The Christian life is trusting and loving the Lord, our Rock and Life, rather than living by a set of rules.

God designed us to be His Temples (dwelling places of God) on 3 dimensions: (1) our spirit (holy of holies), (2) our soul (holy place), and (3) our body (outer court). We can understand how we should live by understanding the dynamics of God's Temples. Man was made to live by faith, trusting in God's Spirit flowing from his spirit to God's glory. When man sinned he died spiritually, cut off from God's Spirit. He then lived according to his independent soul life, under the power of the sin-nature in his flesh. When we receive Christ as our Lord and Saviour, by His Spirit, he enters our holy of holies, applies His Blood to our spirit, making it into a perfect new creation, and sits enthroned there through His indwelling Spirit - this is the New Birth. We then become a functioning Temple of the living God. Christ now lives in us as our Rock Foundation for our soul and life, both now and forever (Col 1:27).

Derek shares the significance of all the articles in the Temple and what they teach about how we should function as God's Temples. In the holy of holies (our spirit) is the Ark of the Covenant (God's Throne, where Christ sits as Lord), and 3 items: (1) the tablet of the 10 Commandments (the righteousness of Christ in our spirit), (2) Aaron's almond rod that budded (our anointing to minister, from Christ's resurrection life in us), and (3) the Pot of Manna (the life of Christ, the bread of life, to feed and sustain our souls). Likewise, there are 3 items in the Holy Place (soul) which correspond to the 3 items in the spirit: (1) the Altar of Incense next to the Holy of Holies, but separated by a veil (out heart or will, which is in direct contact with the spirit, although separated by unbelief - the tablet of the heart corresponds to the tablet of the 10 Commandments - 2Cor 3:3), (2) the Menorah (our mind, which God illuminates with His 7-fold light - Isaiah 11:2), which is an almond tree, and (3) the Table of Showbread (Bread of the Presence), representing our emotions kept ever fresh from God's Presence, shining forth from the Holy of Holies.

The power generator of the Temple is the Altar of Burnt Offering in the Outer Court, representing the Cross, where Christ was offered up for us, to purchase and release His grace (every blessing of righteousness and life) to us. When we trust in Christ and see His sacrifice of love for us, the coals from the Altar with His Blood are applied to our Altar of Incense causing the incense of our heart (our thanksgiving, praise, prayer and worship) to rise up before His throne, so that we submit to Him and offer ourselves to Him as a living sacrifice to do whatever he wants us to do (Is 6:1-4, Rom 12:1). As we turn to the Lord in this way, He progressively removes our veil (barrier) of unbelief, the hardness of our heart (2Cor 3:16), so with unveiled face, we can behold the glory of the Lord, shining from our spirit by the Holy Spirit. His Spirit flowing from our spirit into our soul, by His presence possessing our soul, sets us free from the sin-nature and transforms our soul into the His image from glory to glory, as we submit our souls and yield our bodies to the process of transformation - our spirit has already been made Christ-like (v17-18). His Spirit (1) writes His law (righteous nature), imprinting His Word on the tablet of our hearts, aligning and strengthening our will in line with His will (2Cor 3:3), (2) lights up our Menorah (renews our mind, so we can know Him and His will for us, and lay hold of His anointing to do it - Rom 12:2-8, Is 6:2), and (3) comforts, inspires, renews and refreshes our emotions. Thus, God works in us to know and will (desire) His will, and also empowers our soul to do His good pleasure (Phil 2:13). So, as long as we behold His glory, through the mirror of His Word, our soul is being transformed into His image by His Spirit (2Cor 3:18, Jam 1:22-25). The One doing the transforming is the Spirit of the Lord, who is also the Lord (2Cor 3:17-18), so to cooperate effectively with Him in this work He requires (1) the submission of our heart to His Lordship, enabling Him to fill our soul, and (2) our obedience to do what He has shown and empowered us to do. The transformation begins with our dedication and submission to Him, but is only is completed when we do His Word (obey).

Love is the measure of who we are (1Corinthians 13:2,3,8,13, Matthew 20:26). Although feelings, decisions, thoughtfulness are manifestations of love, they are not the ESSENCE of LOVE, which is SPIRITUAL, coming from the Presence of God in us, for God is love, and all love is of God (1John 4:7,8,16), and the fruit of the Spirit is love (Galatians 5:22). God is the Source of love and He pours His love it into our hearts through the Holy Spirit (Romans 5:5). This then empowers us to think loving thoughts and making the decision to act in love. We cannot generate love from our own soul, for it comes from the Spirit of God (Matthew 5:3). In our soul, we must believe in and receive the love that He gives us, and surrender to His Love as He pours into our hearts, and yield to it in our lives (obedience). This is our soul aligning to the Love of God that comes from the Spirit. How much you know God (through your fellowship with Him) determines how much you are connected to the Source of Love, which determines how much love you can express in your life. We GROW in LOVE by (1) RECEIVING His LOVE into our heart by faith, and then (2) RELEASING His love through our words and actions.

First, we must PRAY and ask God to FILL our HEART with His LOVE. The classic PRAYER to be FILLED with the LOVE of God is Ephesians 3:14-19, which Derek expounds. God wants us to comprehend, receive and experience: "(1) the WIDTH (John 3:16) and (2) LENGTH (Jeremiah 31:3) and (3) DEPTH and (4) HEIGHT of the LOVE of CHRIST, which passes knowledge (it does not come from your mind, but from the Spirit)." In this way, we "may be filled with all the fullness of God (who is love).” God is ready to fill us with Himself abundantly above all that we ask or think, through the power of the Holy Spirit who is working within us, but He is limited by our (1) THINKING and (2) ASKING, so we need to (1) meditate on His Word and pray for more revelation of the 4 dimensions of His love, and (2) come to Him in confident faith and lay hold of His love, with which He wants to fill our hearts (Ephesians 3:20). God's ultimate purpose is that He would be glorified through His Church; that is, through our union with CHRIST, the GLORY of GOD (the manifestation of His LOVE) would shine through us by the power of the indwelling HOLY SPIRIT, to the glory of GOD, the FATHER (Ephesians 3:21).

Two miracles of Jesus demonstrate how we can walk in victory over the power of sin, circumstances and satan: (1) crossing to the other side of Galilee through a storm, and (2) walking on the water. God has called us to be overcomers, who go over, not under!

The first sign-miracle of Jesus in John 2 was turning water into wine, which was a demonstration of what He will do for us if we believe in Him. This is a picture of our New Birth and our ongoing transformation by the Spirit of God. The way this miracle happened shows that we must give Jesus the right to turn our water into wine, by submitting to His Lordship.

There are 3 foundational BAPTISMS that should take place at the start of our Christian life: (1) BAPTISM into CHRIST, (2) BAPTISM in WATER, and (3) BAPTISM in the HOLY SPIRIT. The word ‘BAPTISM’ means to DIP or IMMERSE into a medium – effecting a union, resulting in a permanent change. The 3 Baptisms are distinguished by WHO does it and the MEDIUM into which the person is baptised.

*1. BAPTISM into CHRIST by the HOLY SPIRIT. This happens at the moment of salvation.

*2. BAPTISM into WATER should follow soon after salvation, in which we act out and testify publicly to what God did in our spirit when we were baptised into Christ.

*3. BAPTISM into the HOLY SPIRIT by the Lord Jesus (Matthew 3:11), empowering us for ministry.

Adam, as the head of the human race, sinned and rebelled against God, and as a result he received sin, curse and death into himself, and all who are born IN ADAM are born into that same position of condemnation before God. Many things were true about us simply because we were born IN ADAM – we were spiritually dead, sinners under the power of the sin-nature, in the kingdom of darkness, guilty before God and under His wrath, destined for eternal destruction in Hell. This was our positional truth in Adam.

Jesus became the 2nd Adam, offering Himself to us to be our new Representative before God. As we inherited from Adam the result of his sin, so when we receive Christ as our new Head, we inherit the result of His righteousness (forgiveness, grace and eternal life).

On the Cross, He paid the price to cancel out our inheritance from Adam and reverse its curse. As He was perfectly righteous and obedient to God, as our Representative Man, He was fully accepted by God, and in His resurrection He received every blessing from God on our behalf. Through the Gospel, His forgiveness and His abundant and eternal life is offered to us as a free-gift. When we received Christ as our Lord and Saviour we were taken out of Adam and put (baptised) us into Christ, so that now every blessing is ours automatically, because of our new position in Christ. Just as death came to all through our union with Adam, so now abundant grace comes to all who are in Christ, through our union with Christ (Romans 5:12-21). The key issue is: Are you ‘in Adam’ or ‘in Christ’? As in Adam we were automatically under the curse of death because of Adam’s sin, even before we sinned, even so in Christ we are under the blessing of life (grace) because of Christ’s righteousness, simply because of our position in Christ (independent of our works): “As IN ADAM all DIE, even so IN CHRIST all shall be made ALIVE.” (1Cor 15:22).

When we were baptised into Christ, we receive the NEW BIRTH of our spirit as Christ comes into us through His indwelling Spirit, and every blessing is ours, for sons of God are joint heirs with Christ (John 3:3-7). We were born IN ADAM, but now we are born again IN CHRIST. You still have a body and a sin-nature in your flesh from Adam, but the real you (your inner man) is now positionally in Christ. You are a new reborn spirit, a new creation in Christ, and qualify for every blessing in Christ (2Cor 5:17, Ephesians 1:3). Jesus, our Representative, lived a perfect righteous life and was fully ACCEPTED by God on our behalf, and is totally LOVED by God. So if we are IN CHRIST, we too are fully righteous and ACCEPTED by God, and are totally LOVED by God IN CHRIST (Eph 1:6).

A key verse on the BAPTISM into CHRIST is 1Corinthians 12:13: “BY one SPIRIT we were all BAPTISED into one body (the body of CHRIST, the Head), whether Jews or Greeks, whether slaves or free, and have all been made to drink into (receive) one Spirit.” Other key verses are Romans 6:3-6, Galatians 3:27, Ephesians 4:4-6 (where the 'one baptism' that all true believers have experienced is the baptism into Christ), Colossians 2:11-13.

All the IN CHRIST verses tell us who we are and what we have simply because we are now IN CHRIST, having been put into union with Christ, through our baptism into Christ (1Corinthians 6:17, 2Corinthians 2:14, 5:21, Ephesians 2:10, Galatians 3:13-14, Colossians 1:13-14, Romans 8:37). In order to experience our freedom in Christ, it is important to know who we are in Christ, through God's Word (John 8:31-32). According to Ephesians 2:4-6, the moment we were put into Christ, (1) His LIFE was imparted to our spirit, changing it from death to life. So, our spirit is now alive to God (v5, Romans 6:11), (2) His VICTORY was imparted to our spirit, RAISING it above the power of the sin-nature and satan, making us victors, and setting us free from sin, and (3) His DOMINION was imparted to our spirit, empowering us to reign in life.

God's mighty power is in us, through the Holy Spirit, and it is available to us, but we need to have a revelation of this power, so that we can draw upon it by faith, as well as the wisdom to walk in that power, for it is released through our obedience. Ephesians 1 gives us a revelation of this mighty power, by describing what it has already accomplished when it was released in Christ, when He was (1) made alive from the dead, (2) raised far above all powers, and (3) enthroned on high. Then Ephesians 2 describes what this resurrection power accomplished in our spirits when we were born again in Christ: (1) Our spirit was made alive with Christ, changing us from spiritual death to being spiritually alive to God. (2) Our spirit was raised far above all opposing powers (sin, satan and the world), for His victory was imparted to our spirit. (3) Our spirit was seated with Christ far above, having been empowered to reign with Christ. This same power is available to us in our life today! (Ephesians 3:20).

Derek describes the triune nature of man (spirit-soul-body), made in the image of our Triune God, and how every part of man was affected by the Fall. Since man lives on 3 dimensions, he needs a 3D salvation, which only God can accomplish. If we trust in Him, the God of peace Himself will sanctify you completely; so that your whole spirit, soul, and body will be blameless at the Coming of Christ (1Thessalonians 5:23). First, (1) our spirit was saved in the New Birth. Then (2) our soul is being saved now by God's Word and Spirit. Finally, when Christ returns He will save our bodies by resurrected them. Our salvation will then be completed by our glorification.

In these evil times, it is essential that we stand firm in the Lord and do not compromise our faith to the spirit of the world. The Lord is seeking those whose hearts are loyal to Him, so that He can show Himself strong on their behalf (2Chronicles 16:9). Derek relates the events in 2Chronicles 16 to our present life in the world, and reveals from Ephesians 6:10-17 the keys to being able to stand strong and stay loyal to God in the present spiritual warfare. First, we need to be filled with the Power of His SPIRIT (v10), and second we need to put on the whole Armour of God, which God provides to us through His WORD (v11-17). Derek describes all the pieces of God's Armour, and how to put them on, so that they become effectual in our fight of faith.