DIVIDED KINGDOM
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Judah is one tribe, while Israel is ten tribes. Our Lord Jesus Christ is the Lion of the Tribe of Judah. (Revelation 5:5)
Judah, your brothers shall praise you. Your hand shall be on the necks of your enemies; your father’s sons shall bow down to you. Judah is a young lion—my son, you return from the prey. Like a lion he crouches and lies down; like a lioness, who dares to rouse him?The scepter will not depart from Judah, nor the staff from between his feet, until Shiloh comes and the allegiance of the nations is his. He ties his donkey to the vine, his colt to the choicest branch. He washes his garments in wine, his robes in the blood of grapes.His eyes are darker than wine, and his teeth are whiter than milk. Genesis 49:10-12
All who belong to Christ are spiritually counted in this tribe of Judah.
Our Jerusalem is from above, we are the Temple of the Holy Spirit, and we are all kings and priests in this holy nation of peculiar (set apart, special) people. I trust you are familiar enough with your New Testament to recognize these truths without me having to provide chapter and verse.
Well, Israel came to represent something quite different from Judah. Although Judah came out of Israel, it definitely stood apart from Israel. We see the Church that Jesus is building as a body called His Ekklesia which is something over and above the “Church” that man is building. So what do we see in the divided kingdom?
Today, I want to share a dream about the divided kingdom and metaphorically journey one must take to find their way to Jerusalem of God.
My Dream
I was traveling to pick up supplies with my truck and trailer, when I got a call from a friend who is an elder of his church. I drive up his rough gravel road and end up crossing this metal bridge that was very narrow.
I couldn’t drive any further, so I parked carefully, knowing others would come this way and would need to pass my car on this tiny bridge. After parking, I head down this narrow boarded path towards his house. Along the way, I pass a nursery full of sleeping babies, probable 20 or so, but one baby was wide awake!
I continue on to enter my friend’s house. He and his wife are an elderly couple and they have friends visiting. Their living room is large and full of people. Immediately, I notice everyone is holding a baby and these elderly people were upsetting these babies more than consoling them. Their cries are getting louder and noone in the room could console them. I could see right away what was needed and I quickly picked up the first baby and swaddled it, rocked it a bit and ever so softly sang a lullaby in it’s ear until he had fallen asleep. I began consoling each baby one at a time, repeating the steps over and over until each one had fallen asleep. Just as we were leaving one baby woke up, but one of the ladies in the room quickly picked up the baby repeating my steps and the baby went back to sleep. A lot more happened in this dream, but there were lots of babies along my journey that needed my care and protection. Just before I woke up the Lord said, “You have everything you need.”
To interpret this dream, we first must understand the babies are the believers in Christ who belong to the Tribe of Judah. The elderly people are the mature believers in the body of Christ who belong to the Tribe of Israel.
The metal bridge represents our refinement of our soul and the course of courage it takes to cross over the bridge to find the narrow path.
And his heart took delight in the ways of the Lord; moreover he removed the high places and wooden images from Judah. 2 Chronicles 17:6
The wooded path represents our heart as we travel to the City of Jerusalem where we belong! The path take’s vulnerability to become inhabitants of love ❤️ and to carry love for others.
Nevertheless good things are found in you, in that you have removed the wooden images from the land, and have prepared your heart to seek God.” 2 Chronicles 19:3
The meaning of my careful parking of not only my truck but a trailer is how much we must humble ourselves to enter the City of Jerusalem. That’s a lot of humbling - a whole truck and trailer full! We humble ourselves to the Father, His son and God’s people. Remember, I was very concerned about allowing enough room on the narrow bridge for another to pass.
The nursery full of sleeping babies, but only one is “spiritual” awake which reminds me of the following verse.
God Redeems Jerusalem Awake, awake! Put on your strength, O Zion; Put on your beautiful garments, O Jerusalem, the holy city! For the uncircumcised and the unclean Shall no longer come to you. Shake yourself from the dust, arise; Sit down, O Jerusalem! Loose yourself from the bonds of your neck, O captive daughter of Zion! For thus says the Lord: “You have sold yourselves for nothing, And you shall be redeemed without money.” ... Isaiah 52:1-3
The crying babies are broken souls - working to be regenerated. Just like those of us afraid to appear vulnerable as our world says it is weak. The elderly people in my dream failed to console these babies with methods of religion or perhaps false teaching, or false doctrines deceiving them into believing they were born again!
However, by calling me over the elders had humbly admitted defeat and it was obvious that they were open to new methods. God was sharing His love of their worthiness through me. I was just the willing vessel.
It was through Godly wisdom that I knew how to properly comfort the infants in my dream. After I demonstrated the proper method, one mature believer repeated the process to keep the room of babies happy.
What a beautiful imaginary by God!
We are told by Peter as he defends the disciples and preaches that Joel prophesied about the anointing of God in Acts, Chapter 2:14-21
“In the Last Days,” God says,
“I will pour out my Spirit
on every kind of people:
Your sons will prophesy,
also your daughters;
Your young men will see visions,
your old men dream dreams.
When the time comes,
I’ll pour out my Spirit
On those who serve me, men and women both,
and they’ll prophesy.
I’ll set wonders in the sky above
and signs on the earth below,
Blood and fire and billowing smoke,
the sun turning black and the moon blood-red,
Before the Day of the Lord arrives,
the Day tremendous and marvelous;
And whoever calls out for help
to me, God, will be saved.”
If Christ is in us, and we abide in Him by humbling ourselves, our sanctification begins and we truly have everything we need!
We don’t need to search for it or work for it!
We have entered His Tribe of Judah!
The king went up to the house of the Lord, with all the men of Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem—the priests and the Levites, and all the people, great and small. And he read in their hearing all the words of the Book of theCovenant which had been found in the house of the Lord. 2 Chronicles 34:30
If we say we are born again, and truly abide in Christ than we are inhabitants of Jerusalem. We are not looking and longing for “new” anointing through the laying of hand or being anointed by oil.
Are you still searching?
Maybe ask ourselves are you really born again?
Jesus answered and said to him, “Most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.” John 3:3
Maybe you are born again, but your mind is still in the world or you have not renewed your minds with enough of God’s truth to believe you are redeemed.
Maybe your mind is full of false doctrines? For years it never occurred to me to seek God for myself. Instead, I looked to man’s opinions, findings and experiences. Somewhere along the way, a tare was sown and I began believing the lies; preaching of special gifting, a certain mantle, or special anointing.
In truth, we don’t need special anointing or special gifting to live and do the word of God. The Word of God tells us the Holy Spirit abides in His Fullness inside of you.
However, if we can’t feel the fullness of the Holy Spirit or hear him speaking to our souls then we have a form of deception, a stumbling block or hindrance.
This is the deception spoken of in God’s Word!
Are you living a deceived life?
For when they speak great swelling words of emptiness, they allure through the lusts of the flesh, through lewdness, the ones who have actually escaped from those who live in error. 2 Peter 2:18
If so, go to God in prayer ask Him to show you your sin. This is surrender.
and with all unrighteous deception among those who perish, because they did not receive the love of the truth, that they might be saved. 2 Thessalonians 2:10
If we are actually living within our flesh, we cannot receive the truth to humble ourselves before the Lord.
And he said, “What is the word that the Lord spoke to you? Please do not hide it from me. God do so to you, and more also, if you hide anything from me of all the things that He said to you.” 1 Samual 3:17
We have not filled our mind and souls with the WORD. Once we begin to fill our minds with the WORD, we can begin to live with a mind that lines up with His WORD. We become a doer of the Word and naturally learn to walk after the Spirit of God. It takes time, but God is with us! Jesus is in you!
If our minds still seek the desires of the flesh than our prayers are about protecting ourselves from the fiery furnace [judgment] and it’s time to stop and step out of Egypt.
We actually need the hot coals of the furnace to convict us of our sin and burn away all the dross. All our baggage must go! These hinderance and stumbling blocks keep us living in a divided kingdom of self-denial. A divided house cannot stand!
Can you see why we need to welcome His fiery furnace?
This is how we get free … we confront the flooding devils of emotions harassing us. The enemy of this world wants to scare us by telling us JUDGEMENT is coming.
Listen my friend, judgment is here!
Look at the world, look at our cities and look at our children. Our children are the fruits of a broken separated vine! We wonder why kids today want to change their identity - well, it’s because our families have not humbled themselves before The Lord. We are such a prideful bunch aren’t we.
We are living like the eagles in Ezekiel 17 serving a kingdom that is not protected by God. Ezekiel describes it as the Kingdom of Babylon that overcome the Tribe of Judah.
I have provided an over view of Chapter 17, but I encourage you to read it for yourself.
17:1-24 The first eagle in this chapter represents King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon (see 17:12), who appointed (“planted”) Zedekiah as king in Jerusalem. Zedekiah rebelled against this arrangement and tried to ally with Egypt, the second eagle, to battle against Babylon. Ezekiel described these events while living in Babylon, many miles away from Judah (explained in 17:10-21). Jeremiah, a prophet in Judah, was also warning Zedekiah not to form this alliance (Jeremiah 2:36-37). Although many miles apart, the prophets had the same message because both spoke for God. And God still directs his chosen messengers to speak his truth all around the world.
17:10 This east wind was the hot, dry wind blowing off the desert, a wind that could wither a flourishing crop. The hot wind of Nebuchadnezzar’s armies was about to overcome the nation of Judah.
17:22-23 Ezekiel’s prophecy of judgment ends in hope. When the people put their hope in foreign alliances, they were disappointed. Only God could give them true hope. God said he would plant a branch, the Messiah, whose Kingdom would grow and become a shelter for all who would come to him (see Isaiah 11:1-5). This prophecy was fulfilled at the coming of Jesus Christ. (Life Study Bible)
The babies in my dream are crying and cannot be consoled which is a metaphorical approach of God saying, “In your infancy you are separated from God”.
In all the ways in which the babies were being consoled - not a single one was helping because the elders were applying a counterfeit or lame replacement of God.
We have talked about some of counterfeits and they are spirits, but in order to be free of them, we must seek the face of God!
Jesus, the Son of God is the healer and deliver of all demonic strongholds. He came to set us free! It’s work to get free, but needed work to understand all that Jesus did for you and me at Calvary!
If we are struggling every single day, over the same problems, year after year and can’t seem to stop discussing them, Can I tell you, you have an open gate! Open gates are places in your soul that need God’s healing by the power of Jesus.
This is a place were we are unable to walk in faith because our senses, feelings and emotions control us. We are unable to close the gate! This is the power of our flesh and it never stop speaking. We become its prisoner.
Are you still living a soul-filled life?
Sadly, we have entire culture living this way! Our society encourages this through our culture to self-sooth, self medicate, self indulge…. Self self self to the point where we have become our own little gods. We don’t need God!
There are only two teams, the Team of Darkness and the Team of Light and the majority of both are self absorbed fueled by fear. We can’t be on both teams. We must pick one.
We want God to step in and save our nations, but the “plagues” we are told in the Book of Revelation 11:6 are caused to come upon the wicked. They have certainly caused torment making us want to repent. Should we consider the problems we are facing today as plagues because they have affected every nation across the world. There sickness plagues, unjust leaders plagues, programming in the media and schools plagues, corruption in our religious leader… the list goes on and on.
Do you agree? Are these our modern day plagues?
Over the last few years, fear has been the biggest obstacle for all of us. God sent plagues in the Old Testament to judge his Tribes and he used plagues to draw his people back to himself.
We must confess our fear. James 5
If you are living in fear, your spirit is being short-circuited!
Adam and Eve hid themselves from God in the garden because they felt unacceptable to themselves. They had fear remember?
And they heard the sound of the LORD God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the LORD God among the trees of the garden. Genesis 3:8
How do you present yourself to God if you are unacceptable to yourself?
If we present ourselves to God with sincerity, we have turned away from our sinful nature and confessed our fear.
A fallen man goes looking for a special leading, a word, a feeling or a confirmation from someone other than God because he can’t face God for himself.
That’s whole point of nakedness in the garden is to reveal sin. This is the message. Can you receive it?
The Holy Spirit doesn’t come and go as we are read in the Old Testament, but dwells and abides in you unless you send Him away!
We are the ones who send the Spirit away in our ignorance.
The Holy Spirit is not an energy we seek or a substance or feeling. Holy Spirit is the Comforter and Spirit of Truth. He is not a feeling that manifests from our flesh, but a Spirit that works with our spirit not our flesh!
When we live according to God’s will and act upon His Word, then the Holy Spirit will always empower our actions.
We send Him away when we reject the truth!
Is He nudging you right now? In my dream it was the Spirit of the Lord working through me to console the babies because Holy Spirit empowers us.
Now may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit. Romans 15:13
We should be seeking and studying how to live a life of Godly character, a holy and sanctified life after the will of God - this is the empowerment of God.
This is the freedom of the Tribe of Judah!
Please listen, stop waisting time looking for a special leading of the Holy Spirit. Through your sonship of God, you are given continuously leading of the Holy Spirit, every single day! Grasp this please! Our world needs solid believers praying the will of God for our nations.
For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God. Romans 8:14
We have everything we need!
That’s why we must read, study and know the Word of God. Only through the Word of God will we know His Will and find out who we really are in Christ and what we have received in Him.
When the disciples received their baptism of the Holy Spirit in the Book of Acts, Chapter 2, it sounded like a strong wind, they were able to do what Jesus had commanded them to do. They were given and possessed everything they needed!
When the Feast of Pentecost came, they were all together in one place. Without warning there was a sound like a strong wind, gale force—no one could tell where it came from. It filled the whole building. Then, like a wildfire, the Holy Spirit spread through their ranks, and they started speaking in a number of different languages as the Spirit prompted them. Acts 2:1-4
There is only one anointing and regeneration of the soul.
According to the Oxford English Dictionary, to be regenerated is to be 're-born; brought again into existence; formed anew', no doubt an accurate usage but one that is arguably too narrow. More appropriate meaning is suggested: 'restored to a better state'.
When we are born again, we are no longer separated from God, but fully His. The doubt is gone, and the belief that you carry His anointing means you actually belong to God.
You can do all things through Christ.
You have been made holy and righteous and have the holy spirit abiding in you to accomplish His work and bring the Kingdom of God to earth through you as a yielded vessel! Hallejuah!
As Charles Spurgeon preached:
A far greater work must be done before a man is saved. A wonder of divine grace must be wrought upon the soul, far transcending anything which can be accomplished by the power of man. Of all whom we would fain win for Jesus it is true, “Except a man be born again, he cannot see the Kingdom of God.” ( The Soul Winner by Charles Spurgeon
God’s work through his Holy Spirit regenerates our soul to love others and to be loved! We become worthy of His Love!
This is the great work that must be done in order for a man to be saved!
Evidence of loving others above yourself is a true sign that you have become new creatures of Christ Jesus. As I was writing this post, through the leading of the Holy Spirit, I did some research of the Tribes and you can read my findings over on my devotion page. It’s truly remarkable and such an encouragement!
It’s the same energy that accomplished Jesus’ resurrection is the power upon which we must meet be born again from above.
God does it, we just have to humbly admit and surrender like a prisoner to free ourselves from our own soulish-life.
I’d like to share that this voyage of regeneration to be “Born again” happens quickly, but we all start with a divided kingdom and it’s a slow burn!
Just like Christian in the book “Pilgrim’s Progress”, we must trudge through the muck and mire toward our destiny to the Royal Palace before we are Born Again.
Let GO and Let GOD!
Now do not be stiff-necked,[a] as your fathers were, but yield yourselves to the Lord; and enter His sanctuary, which He has sanctified forever, and serve the Lord your God, that the fierceness of His wrath may turn away from you. 2 Chronicles 30:8
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