The revelation and power of firstfruits.
What was happening?
- God was reminding us.
- God was speaking and making a point.
- He is asking us to make a shift in the spiritual atmosphere of our lives.
- He is asking us to connect the dots in His Word.
- To
be in the Spirit is to be a person who gives.
Giving: a portal of
entrance into the spiritual world.
- God established a principle in His Word for blessing and increase for his people and that principle was the giving of ‘firstfruits’.
- Firstfruits are the first and best portion and they are set aside and given to the Lord as a sign that the remaining harvest, yet to come, is holy and blessed of the Lord.
- Firstfruits are a sacrificial faith offering of the first and best fruit of any increase given by the Lord. It was a promise of a future harvest.
The revelation and
power of firstfruits:
- A new attitude.
What is happening
to us now?
- As
a church, we are being awakened.
Awakening:
- Therefore
He says: “Awake, you who sleep, arise from the dead, and Christ will give
you light.” Eph. 5:14
How do we awaken
out of our sleep?
- Remember your story.
- Remember, your story is who you were and who you are.
- Remember your dreams for they are who you are going to become.
- Remember that just because you can not see something does not mean it is not real.
You were created to
remember.
- Genesis
1:27 tells us that God created man and woman “in His own image”.
- In
this passage, the word man is translated from the Hebrew word zakar, which
means “the remembering one”.
- When
we die we take our memories with us. Jesus died to redeem our memories.
Why were we created
to remember?
- 1st,
we have something important to remember.
- 2nd,we
have reason to remember.
- Remembering
is a repeated theme throughout the Bible.
- Men
are called to remember God by faithfully telling others who He is and what
He has done.
We are to remember
and tell our children.
- Deuteronomy
4:9: Only be careful, and watch yourselves closely so that you do not
forget the things your eyes have seen or let them fade from your
heart as long as you live. Teach them to your children and to their
children after them.
A typical old
testament meeting:
- Worship,
prayer, and remembering what God had done.
- God
gave Israel feasts to help them remember each year what He had done for
them.
God gave Israel
feasts to remember.
- Leviticus
23:1-3: The Lord said to Moses, “Speak to the Israelites and say to them:
These are my appointed festivals, the appointed festivals of the Lord,
which you are to proclaim as sacred assemblies. There are six days when
you may work, but the seventh day is a day of sabbath rest, a day of
sacred assembly. You are not to do any work; wherever you live, it is a
sabbath to the Lord.
Remember your
story.
- Just
believe in your story and in His stories.
- Psalm
77:11: I will remember the works of the Lord; Surely I will remember
Your wonders of old.
- Your
life is a story being written.
The dark side wants
you to forget your story…
- And
only remember when you fall and not when you are redeemed.
- Revelation
12:11: And they overcame him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word
of their testimony (story), and they did not love their lives to the
death. Therefore rejoice, O heavens, and you who dwell in them!
Your Testimony
(story) is Prophecy.
- Revelation
19:10: And I fell at his feet to worship him. And he said unto
me, See thou do it not: I am thy fellowservant, and of thy brethren that
have the testimony of Jesus: worship God: for the testimony
of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy.
Testimony (story):
spiritual crossroad
- Exodus
25:22: There, above the cover between the two cherubim that
are over the ark of the Testimony, I will meet with you….
- Exodus
30:6 Put the altar in front of the curtain that is before the ark
of the Testimony—before the atonement cover that is over the Testimony—where
I will meet with you.
Remember that just because you can’t see
something…
- does
not mean it is not real.
- Remember,
we are what makes it real.
- Remember
Hebrews 11:1: Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence
of things not seen.
- Faith
is: creating future memories.
What is happening
to us now?
- As
a church we are being awakened.
