Charlotte Seminar 5-27-00 Am — George Warnock

Faith That Sees Without Physical Sight

When we gather together unto the Lord, I invariably think of the scene we see in the scriptures which John the Beloved saw and which he was told to write it in the book that the church of every age would be able to read it and hear it and by his spirit be able to see it also according to the measure of illumination that God is pleased to give us.

So I see that I see the Son of Man standing on the throne but still in our midst. Can't see him with these natural eyes. God is so pleased to cause us to bring forth the people in the earth who believe without seeing and because there's a spiritual insight in having faith where we do not really see whom having not seen yet we love in whom so now we see him not yet believing we rejoice with joy unspeakable Peter said and full of glory and so John was caught away in the spirit isolated out there in the Isle of Patmos.

John's Vision of the Son of Man

Heard a voice behind him as of a trumpet and you see they turned to see the voice that spake with me and being turned I saw seven golden candlesticks. I turned to see the voice. People have a lot of criticism with the way the Bible especially the authorized version I guess relate some things.

You don't see a voice. John saw the voice because he is the word. He is that word of God. I turned to see the voice and being turned I saw seven golden candlesticks in the midst of the seven candlesticks one likened to the Son of Man clothed with a garment down to the foot gird about the paps with a golden girdle his head and his hairs were white like wool as white as snow his eyes as a flame of fire there he stands the great high priest standing and sitting on the throne of glory.

John saw him in the midst of the candlesticks. We got to realize that though he is the Lord on the throne of glory he walks in the midst of the seven golden candlesticks which are the seven churches which is the church of every church age the church of that's the beginning when God ordained and set the church in motion in the earth.

He's been walking there in the midst of the candlesticks. The book of Revelation is for the church of every age. It's unfortunate when theologians come up with a bright idea that the church disappears from the earth at the end of chapter three.

You know, no scripture for it. Just because they heard a voice then come up higher oh oh that's the rapture. Call it rapture if you like but it's to take place now right here on earth. John was caught up in the spirit.

Becoming a Spiritual People

God wants his people to be caught up in the spirit. To hear and see the voice to have that impact of the spirit in our lives till we are a spiritual people instead of a natural people. God wants us spiritual people.

He wants to spiritualize us so we're spiritual like he spiritualized the man in the wilderness so it became spiritual food. Oh you say no to the real food they had. I know spiritual things are the real things don't you know that?

Oh you know spiritualizing things. I believe in the real thing. So do I. I believe the streets of heaven are paved with gold. The real gold though not that stuff we have down here. The real gold. The divine attributes of the Lord God Almighty himself.

That's the real gold. There's a phenomenon of gold dust appearing. I don't know about that. I suppose God we know God could do it. But I think oftentimes he does these things to test the hearts of his people.

Do you want the gold dust that covers your suit or do you want the gold tried in the fire? That you might be rich says the Lord. So let's pursue the real things. God gives us some of the natural. Well fine too but let's pursue the gold.

They're going for the gold when they go to the Olympic games. They're going for the gold. A little wedge of some kind perish. Gold that perishes even though it's tried by fire perishes. God tells us the trial of your faith is more precious than that.

More precious than perishing gold that perishes. You say it's indestructible. Yeah almost I guess. But it's losing its value even now in the world when gold was once the thing that everybody went after.

It's losing its value. The time will come it'll be just like dust on the floor when the fires of God began to burn. Destroying, bringing down everything that can be shaken the apostles said. Everything that can be shaken is going to be shaken.

The Unshakable Kingdom

Does it cause you to fear? It ought not. It's our mighty God speaking from heaven. Yet once more says the Lord I will shake not the earth only but the heavens also. The apostle is quoting from the Old Testament and he says this word yet once more signifies the removing of all things that are shakable that those things which cannot be shaken may remain.

Don't you have something within you that can't be shaken? Oh then let us rejoice when God begins to shake everything that can be shook. If you've got something unshakable within you. Paul says we have we therefore receiving a kingdom which cannot be shaken.

Let us have grace whereby may a servant serve him with reverence and godly fear. Godly fear because when things begin to topple around us so I believe there's got to be a strength in God's people to know there's a kingdom abiding within.

I'm in the kingdom and the kingdom's in us. It cannot be shaken by any atom bomb or hydrogen bomb or device that man can create. So he stands there in the heavens with that white garment with eyes as a flame of fire.

His hairs of his head like wool. Feet as a burnished brass. As our great high priest but in the heavens but walking in the midst of the candlesticks. Because it was the job of the priest to make sure that the candlesticks would keep burning and be furnished with oil.

Revelation as the Revelation of Jesus Christ

I know we can read all those letters written to the seven churches in Asia and it seems like defeat. Every almost every letter you read it looks like a defeated church because it depends what kind of vision you have when you read the book of Revelation.

You'll see either beasts and serpents and dragons and seven-headed monsters and a woman riding on this scarlet beast and you'll see frogs out of the mouth of the dragon and 666 until the Lord illuminates your eyes to see that He is the one who is to be seen and noticed and worshiped and adored in the book of Revelation.

It's the revelation of Jesus Christ. Not of Antichrist. He's there. We know beasts are there and dragons and frogs and all that stuff and 666. But God's putting a number on His people and I went to Sunday school all my life and church all my life and I never knew until a few years ago, oh perhaps a few, depends how you're related, that God has a number to put on His people.

Don't take that mark. Don't take the mark 666. Beware of that. I had it in the license plate once. Don't take that mark. God's got a mark for His people. Take the mark of Jesus and nobody can put a mark on you that's not of Him.

Before the judgments fall on the earth, the command goes forth, don't let the winds of God blow in the earth until I've sealed the servants of our God in their forehead. Don't worry about any mark that you think Satan's going to put upon you if you've got the mark of Jesus in your forehead.

I didn't know about the mark of Jesus. All I knew about was the mark of the beast. Because in those days, the book of the revelation wasn't the book of the revelation of Jesus Christ, it was the revelation of Satan, of Antichrist, of beast.

They're all there. The objects of God's wrath and Christ stands in the midst of the church to cleanse the church that there might be an overcoming people in that day. In all these churches, there's an overcoming people.

The Overcoming Church and the Kingdom of Christ

Perhaps they're in the minority, but that doesn't matter with God. The majority are generally wrong on the scriptures. They're generally wrong, but democracy is supposed to be a Christian thing. And so they bring it into the church and their leaders in the church function under the democratic order.

They're voted in, voted out. Democracy, as if it's a Christian thing. God chooses the minority. God doesn't choose the majority. The minority are who is ruling and reigning in heavenly places. Christ the Lamb has conquered single-handedly and has overcome all the evil in the world.

He sits on the throne of glory. King of all kings. Lord of all lords. Howbeit we see not yet all things under his feet. So what? God says reign there till they're all under your feet and he's going to do it.

He's our king. Let me know if there's a king. We've got a king. I know you folks have a republic down here. We are still under the monarchy in a sense, but our king or queen is really just a figurehead.

But we've got a king who rules and reigns and he's our king now. Not a coming king. He's our king now. We must emphasize that because somehow it's still in our system that poor Christians were down here struggling with governments and evil things.

And we've got a king who rules and reigns in the heavenly Zion. And he's got everything he needs in himself to deal with every situation in the world and in the church, but he starts with his church. For his judgments must begin in the house of God.

Christ's Messages to the Seven Churches

And so he writes to Ephesus, the one who holds seven stars in his right hand. Those whom he has set in leadership in the church, he holds them in his right hand under his control. He writes a letter to Ephesus, the one who holds the seven stars.

Then he writes a letter to Smyrna and Smyrna has their problems. And he's the one who was dead and is alive. He writes to Pergamos. These things say of the church of Pergamos that has the sharp sword with two edges.

Pergamos, where there was a lot of evil going on in the church. There he stands with a sharp sword with two edges. Don't you think he's not going to use those things that he has in his own nature and being and character?

He's got a sharp sword in his mouth. He has everything in himself that's necessary to deal with every evil in the church. And he's going to use it. He's going to do it. And he says, if there's no repentance, I'll come to you and I'll fight against you with a sword in my mouth.

God has a people in the earth whom he is disciplining to hear his voice so well that when he, the son of God in the heavens, opens his mouth for that sharp sword to go forth, there'll be a people in the earth opening their mouth that that sharp sword might go forth saying what he is saying and doing what he is doing.

People walking in such union with him that they are his people doing his will. Sons of God disciplined like the only begotten to have no agenda of their own, no works of their own to perform, no ambition to fulfill, but to hear what he is saying and to declare in the earth what he is saying with the same authority with which he declares it.

Entering God's Rest Through Obedience

For that people who enter into his rest. We're after talking about this rest that pertains to the people of God, this Sabbath. That's for those who cease from their own works as God did from his, and enter into his works.

God rested from his works when he finished it for a short season only. Because man sinned and God went to work. Jesus said, my father worketh hitherto and I work. And when he performed a work where he was questioned for doing it on the Sabbath or for some other reason, he says, my father worketh hitherto and I work.

The father's rest was broken after man sinned and God began to work again. Has been working ever since. Jesus came to earth to do a certain work and he finished the work in earth and he's gone to heaven to continue the work that the father's doing.

Ministering as a high priest upon the throne in the heavenly sanctuary. We get little glimpses of him here in these seven letters. God has that sharp sword for his people who are walking in union with him.

It'll be the voice of the son of God in the church. The word of God is quick, alive, powerful, sharper than any two-edged sword piercing, even through the dividing asunder of soul and spirit and joints and marrow.

And it's a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart. Oh, how God would continue to work in the lives of his people to let sword become that sharp sword of the spirit. Is that the only weapon you and I have?

The only offensive weapon we have? All this precious armor to clothe us, to protect us, helmet of salvation, breath-bleeder of righteousness, girdle of truth, shield of faith, all these wonderful protective weapons that God has given us.

We only need that one offensive weapon. And the sword of the spirit, which is the word of God. Did you bring your sword? Well, I'm sorry, this is not the sword. The time comes along when they're going to take this, what you call your sword, what are you going to do then?

God wants this word to be in your heart and mine, that that word will go out of the mouth, a sword out from the mouth. Word of God is alive, powerful, sharper than any two-edged sword. But how we need to let the Lord sharpen that sword within us as he keeps us in his hand, as he keeps us in the scabbard, in the sheath.

May the Lord continue to sharpen that edge until when we speak it will be quick, powerful, discerning the thoughts and the intents of the heart, making manifest what goes on in the church that might be exposed and dealt with by the sword of God's spirit.

So how vain, you know, how empty, how shallow is our knowledge of what goes on and how we need that quickening spirit in our midst. God's going to bring it, bring forth that quickening spirit, that quickening word that he might deal with the uncleanness in his people.

May he begin with us. May that be our prayer, Lord, begin with us, let your word search us out. That there might be a cleansing and a purifying, that that word that he gives us will come forth pure and holy and cutting, with a cutting edge, two cutting edges, sharper than any two cutting edges, Paul says, than any two-edged sword.

Discerning the thoughts and the intents of the heart that God might deal with our minds, take away every thought, every imagination that lists itself up against the knowledge of Christ, because the mind of man is opposed to the mind of the spirit.

The mind of the flesh is enmity against God, it's not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be. So that mind must be replaced by the mind of the spirit, replaced, oh consumed by the mind of the spirit.

As he takes hold of us, may that spirit of God purge out all that uncleanness, that our minds might be renewed, made new, that we might begin to think as God thinks, see as God sees. Somehow God gives us those glasses that permit us to see with seven eyes, seven eyes, seven eyes of the Lamb.

He's seen with seven eyes and seven horns and fullness of power and fullness of illumination and fullness of light. Pergamon's got a sharp sword to use against those who are bringing forth the doctrines of Balaam in the church and the doctrine of the Nicoletans, which we're not going into.

But he did say, repent or I'll come unto thee quickly and fight against them with the sword of my mouth. We have this thing in the church that he's coming, yeah, well, when he comes what? Well, he comes and every eye shall see him, he comes in clouds.

We know that's all true, but he comes in many ways. And he says to the church at Pergamon, if you don't repent, I am coming to you to fight against you with the sword of my mouth. Oh, he says not the second time.

I don't care what the second or the ten thousandth coming. He's coming to his church to purge them from the evil that's there. How is he coming? He's coming with this sword. Or he's coming with those eyes of fire.

He's coming to his church first to deal with that iniquity that's there. Three times in these letters he says, I will come to you. I'll fight with you with the sword of my mouth. You'll shine upon us with those seven eyes and whatever it is.

Christ's Work in the Remaining Churches

He has it all in himself to deal with everything that's wrong with it. Church of Third Tyre. These things say that the Son of God has eyes like unto a flame of fire. Feet like fine brass. He says, I'm coming to deal with Jezebel.

Oh, he goes on. Sardis. These things say he has the seven spirits of God. Oh, he's got the fullness of the Spirit. We haven't got the fullness of the Spirit yet. God wants to put that fullness in his people.

It's all in him. He's coming with those seven spirits of God to deal with the iniquity that's in the church at Sardis. Philadelphia. These things say he has the key of David. He opened us and no man shut us.

And shut us and no man opened us. He has the key of David. Philadelphia. Wonderful church. Church where God would begin to open doors. I'm not trying to differentiate between these different ages because I believe in the church history.

We have all these churches revealed. Perhaps one after the other historically and perhaps like today. I believe all these aspects of the church are right here now. And that God has the power in our Lord Jesus the High Priest to deal with all these things.

He says, I've got the keys of David. I open and no man can close. So we rejoice and open doors. God opens doors. I remember when the doors closed in China. I was a young man and communism had just taken over.

Sort of a sad feeling in the church to think that doors are closing out of China. God says, I close doors too. He says, I open doors and then I close doors. He closed the doors in China that he might do a pure work in those people by his Spirit.

Go on. Take all your organizational stuff back to America. I'm going to do this thing in China. God closes doors. Oh, you say there's an open door. Oh, wait a minute. God might close it. Just because there's an open door doesn't mean you're supposed to go in because He says, I close doors.

No, He's not going to close the door that's already closed. There's an open door and God says, I close doors. So before you say, oh, there's an open door, I've got to walk into it. Wait a minute and see if God wants to leave it open or close it.

He does both. Open doors that no man can close. I close doors that no man can open. Got the key of David. Certainly we must pray for our brethren going through those horrible times of persecution. Did you know some of those are praying that God would...

Oh, I'm not going to put words in their mouth, but this Chinese pastor who spoke on one of these national and international television broadcasts and the host said to him, now do you have a message for the church in America?

And he said, yes. He says, what is that? He says, the church in America is pretty well dead. But God is going to raise up a powerful church in America. And they're praying that God will do what it takes that they might, in America, include Canada, not that we're a part of your country, but we're the same people, same kind of people.

Partaken of the same kind of prosperity and riches and of the same kind of lukewarmness and shallowness that is prevalent in any society which is affluent. And our problems and our trials are probably more severe in countries where they're not.

More difficult to stay close to God in an affluent society, perhaps, than it is in one that's under persecution. I've heard it said that some of them are praying that God would send that persecution to this country because they know that it took that to revive the church in some of those lands.

It took that for God to close the doors to all that is evil that He might open the door to truth and righteousness. Laodicea, of course, the last church, which we feel has no hope, you know. And it's in a sad state, I know, but God has overcomers in every church age.

He's got overcomers. He's got tremendous things for the church of Laodicea if they'll listen to His counsel. God help us to take counsel from He who is alone able to give the counsel that we need to the church of Laodicea.

He says, I counsel thee to buy of me gold tried in the fire that thou mayest be rich. So He has it there for the Laodicean church. He's got that gold tried in the fire that thou mayest be rich. Give us that gold, but be careful when we pray.

I shouldn't say be careful, but be sober. The fire that will refine the gold that we buy from Him is the fire that He kindles within us, sometimes through trial and test and troubles of many kinds. For the word of the Lord is a pure word as silver tried in the fire, purified seven times, the psalmist said, and I read that.

The word of the Lord is a pure word tried in the fire and purified seven times. Isn't the word of the Lord pure to begin with? Yes, but this is a furnace of affliction in our hearts that God puts that word, and that's when it becomes polluted as it's mixed up with all our ideas and thoughts and imaginations.

Pure word, yeah, but it has to be refined, and the furnace is in here. And so Joseph was sent into a furnace of affliction. A good man, a real good young man, but then why would he go through the furnace of affliction?

Because God saw the gold there, and it had to be refined. God sees the gold in His people, because if you have faith, if you have God's faith, you've got gold. God is intermingled with all your own ideas, and so that's the trial of our faith that removes all that.

The trial of your faith being much more precious than of gold that perishes. So God sees the gold, that's why He sends the trial. You want the gold? I'm going for the gold. You're running for the gold, racing for the gold.

Well, God says, then I've got gold for you, yes, but run the race well, and you'll get the gold. And then trouble comes, and it's the trial of your faith that worketh patience. In this race, you must run with patience.

I know it sounds a little stupid, but you get there out in the field to run a race. I mean, you're just waiting for the signal, and you're going to put everything you have into it. But God says, this race, let us run with patience.

Patience doesn't mean taking it easy, being slothful. Sort of the meaning that is put on that word so many times. Patience is God trying us by fire to purge out the dross. And having purged out the dross, that method, that method that God used is what's called patience.

So the trial of your faith worketh in you patience, which is faith being purged of the dross, and faith coming forth as gold. Let's remember that. Patience is, forget that patience stuff. Let's get active here for God.

Listen, we're not going to be active for God until God works patience within us by His Spirit, till we learn to lay aside all our own ideas and our own thoughts and imaginations, and go God's way. And that takes the purging of our faith from all human presumption to bring us to that.

Hearing the Spirit's Voice and Overcoming

Now I didn't intend to spend much time on that part, but I did want to deal a little more particularly with Revelation 2 chapter 17, the letter to Pergamos. He that hath an ear in all these letters, though the Lord rebukes and rebukes again and again for the sins, the failures, the shortcomings of his people, and every one of them, he's seeking to get a hearing ear.

If we have an ear to hear, he says, I want you to listen to this. I want you to hear this. He's got a hearing ear. I know there's all that stuff there God's going to deal with, but he's got a people coming forth out of it all.

Triumphant people, victorious people, and overcoming people. Whether it be many or few, that's not for us to say. In the midst of it all, he's going to have an overcoming people. And so we thank the Lord that in the midst of, oh, we look at the church and we see such coldness, lukewarmness, such lethargy, such sin, iniquity, worldliness.

Oh, you could go on and on. God, our Lord Jesus, stands there. Everything he needs to purge us from all that. The only requirement being of you and I that we hear his voice. Let his voice be that word.

Let his eyes look upon us that we might see those eyes, those seven eyes of fire that will burn out, oh, purify our vision so from then on we see only him. Oh, I'm not there. I'm far from it. Far from it.

But I know there's a place when somehow God enables us to look him face to face. It'll deal with our vision that our whole body will be full of light. Having no part dark, Jesus added in one of the Gospels.

Your body full of light, but yeah, more or less full. Having your body full of light, having no part dark. If we can't look in the eyes of Jesus and have any dark areas there, that light will drive out all the darkness and he wants us to seek his face.

Like our brother used to say, we're on his hand. God, move your hand. God, you know, seek ye my face. And when he said that to David, he responded, thy face, O Lord, will I seek. And he did. And as he sought God's face, he found himself in troubled waters.

He found the depths overwhelming him. But because he'd seen a glimpse of him, he kept looking at his face. Depths overwhelmed him. But then in the midst of the depths that were overwhelming, he said, deep, calleth unto deep at the sound of thy cataract.

Trouble's overwhelming him. There was a deep there that God was calling for. He that hath an ear, let him hear a statement which I think is repeated over and over again in all of these churches, these letters.

He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches. To him that overcometh will I give to eat of the hidden manna. I'll give him a white stone and in the stone a new name written which no man knoweth, saving he that receiveth it.

God has hidden manna for his people. Out there in the wilderness, they had manna that fell. When they came to the point which they thought after three days they were at the point of starvation, nothing to eat, the little supplies they had brought from Egypt would soon be consumed in that large multitude.

Miracles, Manna, and Daily Dependence

Now, suddenly they realized they were without bread and were without water. They panicked. It's strange how that we can look at miracle after miracle after miracle and rejoice in them and never learn from them.

You say, what do you learn from a miracle? When Jesus multiplied the loaves and the fishes and fed the multitude, oh, what a miracle. Five thousand men, plus women and children, twenty thousand people maybe with a boy's lunch.

Oh, what a miracle. And when they heard about it, they said, this man is going to be our king. And when Jesus perceived they were going to come and force him to be king, he went up to the mountain alone, told the disciples to get in the ship and go to the other side.

And on the way over they panicked because God sent the storm. God sent the storm. They panicked in the storm. They'd just seen a miracle. And they just heard him say, go to the other side. And they started in the storm and they were panicking.

Then they saw one like the form of a spirit walking in the water. And they were afraid. They'd seen a ghost. Fear not, it is I. And when Jesus got into the boat, he said, why are you so fearful? What does it say there?

They considered not the miracle of the loaves, for their hearts were hardened. Another version says they didn't understand the miracle of the loaves, for their hearts were hardened. And so, have you seen miracles?

I'm sure that all of you have seen miracles. And people will tell the biggest stadiums you've got in this country to come and see miracles. But do they understand the miracles? Oh, I saw it. I know, but do you understand it?

I mean, with this kind of understanding that Jesus spoke about? Is the miracle doing something in your heart to cause you to know that when calamity strikes, there's one who is in charge of the situation?

They panicked because they didn't understand the miracle of the loaves. We thank the Lord for every miracle he performs for his people. For God is a God of miracles. But it saddened the Lord's heart that no matter how many miracles he would perform, they still couldn't hear what he was saying many, many times.

Eight of the loaves, wonderful miracle worker, didn't change their heart. And so, God sent them manna in the desert. They didn't know what it was, and they weren't supposed to know. And so, as they saw that stuff in the ground, Moses said, this is the bread that the Lord has given you from heaven.

Gather it. Just gather what you need. Don't try and store it up. There'll be some more there tomorrow. Don't store it up. Gather what you need. They went out and they saw this flaky thing there in the ground, white, small.

And they gathered it and took it home and ate it. And what is it? Everybody was saying, what is it? And so, they called it that. Manna meaning, what is it? I think Dr. Strong points out it not only implies what, but where, why, and all these different questions could be the meaning of that word, manna.

It's a question. Why? What? What for? And God leaves us with the precious manna, but he doesn't necessarily answer all our questions. God gives us the bread of life and the water of life, and we rejoice in the gifts he bestows upon us, but it doesn't take away the question.

Now, I know it was announced here that there'd be a time when you would ask questions, and I don't mind questions being asked. And sometimes it actually stirs up a new thought that I hadn't had before.

So, you know, but not those kind of questions. Why, Lord, are you doing this to me? Lord, why would you do this? I thought that, you know, I thought that, you know, you blessed me, you gave me a gift, you called me into ministry or whatever.

I don't know. And now, why this? But it's part of the manna. It's the working of the manna within us. We really love his word and feast upon it. We derive strength from that living word. Strength for the journey, but very little knowledge of where we're going.

And that's what bothers us. Very little knowledge of why God has brought us where we are. Instead of leading us on to a greater measure of fruitfulness, brings us into a barren land perhaps. I don't know.

It's different with everyone who partakes of the manna. It's always different, sure. It's not up to me to say what God will do. But the manna will leave you with questions, but it's precious. It supplies your needs.

It gives you everything you need. And that's what Jesus said was the way we're supposed to pray. Give us this day our daily bread. In other words, give me, Lord, what I need for today. That's really what it means.

Give me bread that's sufficient for today. That's really what it means. But then, what about tomorrow? Well, God says there'll be some more manna tomorrow. But they couldn't believe Moses, so they, ah, they better make sure.

We'll take a little extra here. So they take extra, and they fill up and still have the extra there, and then the next few hours is full of worms. So they soon learned that you can't do that. God forbid that we should.

I always pray, God, give us something fresh for your people. Not something that you haven't heard before necessarily, but something fresh. I hate to feed you wormy bread. God, give us fresh manna every day.

From your stores of plenty. Knowing that tomorrow, if tomorrow comes, it'll still be today. Because today is the only day God's given you. And therefore, the word of you and I who would enter into rest is this.

Today, if you hear His voice, I do not share with you. That's the word that God gave concerning this matter of entering into rest. Hear His voice. He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith to the churches.

Give you, Jesus, a hidden manna. Well, this manna was hidden from the other nations, but it was open there to all the Israelites. But inside the holiest of all, under the mercy seat, in the Ark of the Covenant, there was a golden pot full of manna.