Gtcotr/ws091218
We previously discussed how Each Prophecy is fulfilled in three ways:
·
The Initial or Specific Fulfillment – It will happen to a specific person at a specific time
to clearly fulfill the Word of the Lord. Such is the case of Isaiah 43:2 which
was specifically fulfilled in Daniel 3:25&27.
·
The General or Continual Fulfillment – Every Believer can look to, profess, and have
confidence in each and every Word of God. It gives hope to all and for many it
releases the anointing and manifests the eternal will of God in this temporal
life.
·
The Eternal or Ultimate Fulfillment – One day, when eternity begins with the new heaven and
the new earth, every prophecy will have its ultimate fulfillment as it applies
to the eternal will and purpose of God for His children. God has always been
building an eternity …
Mark 16
15 And He said to them, “Go
into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature.
16 “He who believes and is
baptized will be saved; but he who does not believe will be condemned.
17 “And these signs shall
follow those who believe: In My name they will cast out demons; they will speak
with new tongues;
18 “they will take up
serpents; and if they drink anything deadly, it will by no means hurt them;
they will lay hands on the sick, and they will recover.”
1.
Cast out
demons
2.
Speak with
new tongues
a.
Speak: The use of words and
sounds to communicate or disclose one’s mind and declare one’s thoughts.
b.
New: Unprecedented,
uncommon, unheard of, unusual and new
c.
Tongues: A language
or dialect specific to and distinct from those languages spoken by other
nations
Joel 2
28 ¶ “And it shall come to
pass afterward That I will pour out My Spirit on all flesh; Your sons and your
daughters shall prophesy, Your old men shall dream dreams, Your young men shall
see visions.
29 And also on My
menservants and on My maidservants I will pour out My Spirit in those
days.
Acts 2 was a Specific Fulfillment of the
prophecy given by Joel: (Joel means = Jehovah is God.)
Acts 2 NKJV
1 ¶ When the Day of Pentecost
had fully come, they were all with one accord in one place.
2 And suddenly there came a
sound from heaven, as of a rushing mighty wind, and it filled the whole house
where they were sitting.
3 Then there appeared to them
divided tongues, as of fire, and one sat upon each of them.
4 And they were all filled
with the Holy Spirit and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit gave
them utterance.
In Acts 2 there was a specific fulfillment of
Joel’s prophecy in that every person who was in the upper room on the Day of
Pentecost was filled with the Holy Spirit to the point to where when they
attempted to talk or pray or witness, the Holy Spirit changed the pronunciation
of their words and instead of speaking their native language, they began
speaking a heavenly language.
This was the specific fulfillment and we can
look forward to the eternal or ultimate fulfillment when we get to heaven. It
will have to happen to you and to everyone else … everyone else, forever and
ever – or else we will not be able to understand 95 percent of the people in
heaven or God for that matter. Without this miracle gifting you will be very
lonely and isolated throughout eternity. I don’t imagine everyone who goes to
heaven is going to speak English. And, if there was only one language everyone
would have to speak I’m guessing it would be Chinese. 29,000 Chinese are
currently born-again each day. Thank God there is a heavenly language!
Between Pentecost and heaven, we are in what
I have called the general fulfillment period of this prophecy. This simply
means that not everyone who gets saved experiences the Baptism of the Holy
Spirit and begins to speak in tongues. Not every person receives the miracle
gifting of interpretation of tongues and prophesying when they get Born-Again.
It is the same with healing, prosperity, deliverance, faith and other miracle
giftings from God. All of the miracle giftings and manifestations or the Holy
Spirit are available to every Believer, but they are not automatic. We are
encouraged in the scriptures to pray for these blessings and even to earnestly
desire spiritual gifts and seek to prophesy. But, as the Apostle Paul says in:
1 Corinthians 12 NKJV
29 Are all apostles? Are
all prophets? Are all teachers? Are all workers of miracles?
30 Do all have gifts of
healings? Do all speak with tongues? Do all interpret?
31 But earnestly desire the
best gifts. And yet I show you a more excellent way.
1 Corinthians 14
5 I wish you all spoke with
tongues, but even more that you prophesied; for he who prophesies is
greater than he who speaks with tongues, unless indeed he interprets, that the
church may receive edification.
14 For if I pray in a tongue,
my spirit prays, but my understanding is unfruitful.
15 ¶ What is the
conclusion then? I will pray with the spirit, and I will also pray with the
understanding. I will sing with the spirit, and I will also sing with the
understanding.
18 I thank my God I speak
with tongues more than you all;
19 yet in the church I would
rather speak five words with my understanding, that I may teach others also,
than ten thousand words in a tongue.
And not only was the miracle of tongues
present on the day of Pentecost but there was also the miracle of interpretation
of tongues given to the thousands of people walking the streets of Jerusalem
that day.
Acts 2
5 ¶ And there were dwelling
in Jerusalem Jews, devout men, from every nation under heaven.
6 And when this sound
occurred, the multitude came together, and were confused, because everyone
heard them speak in his own language.
7 Then they were all amazed
and marveled, saying to one another, “Look, are not all these who speak
Galileans?
8 “And how is it that
we hear, each in our own language in which we were born?
Without regard as to how God chose to do it,
this event was definitely a specific fulfillment of the prophecy given by the
Holy Spirit in Joel 2 as testified to by the Apostle Peter on that day. As
well, there are several other instances recorded in the Bible and throughout
history where people were filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke in this
heavenly language. (Acts 10:44-48)
In Acts 19 the Apostle Paul encountered 12
men he recognized as disciples. Assuming they were Born-Again Believers in
Jesus as Messiah working to spread the Gospel through Asia Minor, Paul asked
them a reasonable question of that day. Let’s read from that passage:
Acts 19 KJV
1 ¶ And it came to pass,
that, while Apollos was at Corinth, Paul having passed through the upper coasts
came to Ephesus: and finding certain disciples,
2 He said unto them, Have ye
received the Holy Ghost since ye believed? And they said unto him, We have not
so much as heard whether there be any Holy Ghost.
3 And he said unto them, Unto
what then were ye baptized? And they said, Unto John’s baptism.
4 Then said Paul, John verily
baptized with the baptism of repentance, saying unto the people, that they
should believe on him which should come after him, that is, on Christ Jesus.
5 When they heard this,
they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus.
6 And when Paul had laid his
hands upon them, the Holy Ghost came on them; and they spake with tongues, and
prophesied.
7 And all the men were about
twelve.
A similar thing happened to Peter and John
when they went to Samaria to check on the progress of the revival being held by
one of the deacons named Phillip.
Acts 8
14 ¶ Now when the apostles
who were at Jerusalem heard that Samaria had received the word of God, they
sent Peter and John to them,
15 who, when they had come
down, prayed for them that they might receive the Holy Spirit.
16 For as yet He had fallen
upon none of them. They had only been baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus.
17 Then they laid hands on
them, and they received the Holy Spirit.
The conclusion we draw from the whole counsel
of God’s Word concerning speaking in is without reasonable refute. The Baptism
of the Holy Spirit is secondary and subsequent to being Born-Again and this
“infilling” either awakens or deposits or releases certain manifestations of
the Holy Spirit in a person’s life. Acts 1:8 is clarifies what a person
receives when the Holy Spirit comes upon a Believer.
Acts 1: 8 “But you shall receive
power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be witnesses to Me
in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.”
Two conditions can be found in the New
Testament for the Believer who wishes to pursue this offering and they are no different
from those associated with a Believe seeking healing or prosperity from God.
First: Acts 5:32 – obedience; and Luke 11:13 – asking God to fill you.
Good News! You can be filled with the Holy
Spirit just like on the day of Pentecost if you will simply dedicate your life
to God and seek that miracle gift of God just like you would pray for healing
if you were sick.
3.
Take up
serpents
Mark 16:18 “they will take up
serpents; and if they drink anything deadly, it will by no means hurt them;
they will lay hands on the sick, and they will recover.”
The specific fulfillment of this prophetic word came to the Apostle Paul as
recorded in:
Acts 28
3 But when Paul had gathered
a bundle of sticks and laid them on the fire, a viper came out because
of the heat, and fastened on his hand.
4 So when the natives saw the
creature hanging from his hand, they said to one another, “No doubt this man is
a murderer, whom, though he has escaped the sea, yet justice does not allow to
live.”
5 But he shook off the
creature into the fire and suffered no harm.
6 However, they were
expecting that he would swell up or suddenly fall down dead. But after they had
looked for a long time and saw no harm come to him, they changed their minds
and said that he was a god.
The general Word gives each
Believer hope that if spiritual or natural serpents attach themselves to us
that we will be victorious and that they cannot harm us. We can hold to this
Word of God to know His will and therefore never doubt God’s ability to save
and deliver us from evil.
If we were to consider the wording in the
translation of Mark 16:17 of the phrase, “will take up”, we would find
the Greek word used herein is also translated: take off; take away; remove;
carry off; carry away; take from among; and cause to cease. This shows a
clear intent to reveal the power and the authority we have over serpents
whether natural or spiritual. In other words, … nothing shall by any means hurt
you … and this is for today!
Luke 10
19 “Behold, I give you the
authority to trample on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the
enemy, and nothing shall by any means hurt you.
20 “Nevertheless do not
rejoice in this, that the spirits are subject to you, but rather rejoice
because your names are written in heaven.”
There are … nonetheless, greater concerns and greater miracles and greater priorities for
the Believer.
As well, the eternal fulfillment of this Word
from Jesus will be seen in the ultimate binding of the original serpent which
deceived Eve in the Garden of Eden … One day we will witness the physical
binding and removal of this sneaky snake from our midst forever and ever!
I do not believe, nor do we teach that anyone
should ever put themselves in the path of a poisonous snake or any other danger
on purpose trying to prove faith or spirituality … one might as well step in
front of a moving train and trust God to be delivered. It’s not a consideration
of faith … that would be more akin to testing God from the standpoint of
stupidity … forgive me for using the S word.
4.
If they
drink anything deadly, it will not hurt them
Just like the practice of handling snakes, we
should not drink any deadly thing on purpose either. Jesus encourages us with a
strong admonition to not tempt God.
Matthew 4
5 Then the devil took Him up
into the holy city, set Him on the pinnacle of the temple,
6 and said to Him, “If You
are the Son of God, throw Yourself down. For it is written: ‘He shall give His
angels charge over you,’ and, ‘In their hands they shall bear you up,
Lest you dash your foot against a stone.’ ”
7 Jesus said to him, “It is
written again, ‘You shall not tempt the LORD your God.’ ”
However, if anything does try and harm us,
thank God we have an advocate with the Father and a reason to hope and pray
that no deadly thing will hurt us. But, if we tempt God, we may find ourselves
discussing this doctrine in person with St Peter.
5.
Lay hands
on the sick and they will recover
James 5
14 Is anyone among you sick?
Let him call for the elders of the church, and let them pray over him,
anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord.
15 And the prayer of faith
will save the sick, and the Lord will raise him up. And if he has committed
sins, he will be forgiven.
I cannot tell you why we don’t see every
person instantly healed from every sickness and disease when we pray. I can
tell you that it does happen and that our faith has a huge part to play in
moving the hand of God however, even the greatest faith a man or woman could
possess will not and should not override the purpose-filled plan and will of
God.
We are told to not worry about anything but
instead, pray about everything; tell God what we want and then thank Him for
everything He does. (Philippians 4:6 NLT)
I believe that there is more work to be done
in heaven than there is on the earth. I also believe that the work which is
being done in heaven is very important. Jesus said that He was more needed in
heaven and that it would be better for us if He went there and worked from
here. I believe that Jesus did His job on earth and He is doing more for us
from there than He could do from here. It was the will of God to limit the span
of lives on earth and to take the limits off of life beyond death for the Believer.
We pray to keep the ball in God’s court … And
to help keep our heart and will in agreement with His. Prayer always gives us
the victory … and we often see victory in the situation before we see victory
over the situation.
When discussing the plight of Shadrach,
Meshech and Abednego, we confirmed that:
1.
We know what God is able to do
2.
We do not know what God will do
3.
We do know what we will do
4.
We will trust God, put our hope in Him and pray the Word.
Mark 16
19 ¶ So then, after the Lord
had spoken to them, He was received up into heaven, and sat down at the right
hand of God.
20 And they went out and
preached everywhere, the Lord working with them and confirming the word
through the accompanying signs. Amen.
Notice: He sat down, and they went out …
·
The work of the Kingdom of God has now become
the responsibility of man.
·
Each person who gets saved as a result of us
going and preaching the Gospel to every creature gets to go to heaven.
·
Every worker/disciple of Christ will be eternally
rewarded/paid according to the work they have done for Christ on planet earth.
·
We have been given power and authority to go
in His name.
