Camp Spalding - Part 3 — George Warnock

Thank you very much, Brother David. I'll be alright in a minute. I do feel honored to be here, not because it's a David Wilkerson convention, but because I do recognize that God is raising up a people in this day, a people who are going to go in all the way.

And I prayed much in times past that God would allow me to be identified with that people who are going in all the way. And I want to be with you as long as you go all the way. Let us turn to Hebrews chapter 4.

Entering God’s Rest Through Faith

Let us, therefore, hear, lest the promise being left us of entering into his rest. Any of you should seem to come shortly. For unto us was the gospel preached as well as unto them, but the word preached did not profit them, not being mixed with faith in them that heard it.

I think maybe I'll just stop there and maybe read back later and then some more after that in this chapter. But the Apostle writing to the Hebrews says, Let us, therefore, fear. And I know God wants us to have a confidence and a faith and assurance that what he has said and what he has promised, he will surely perform.

But there's a godly fear that God would put upon his people that though he wants us to have faith and confidence and assurance, he does not want us to have any presumption, and there's a vast difference.

So writing to the Hebrews who were inclined to be wavering because coming out of Judaism, they were coming into something that they couldn't touch, something maybe insubstantial as far as the natural goes.

There was always a tendency to go back to something structured, something they could see, something that they were brought up in, something that gave them a sense of security. But Paul would remind them that God had brought them to a new day and a new hour.

And had done new things. And had brought forth the reality of which their temple and their structure and their priesthood and all their ritual was but mere types and shadows. And so he would put upon them a godly fear that lest the promise being left to us of entering into his rest, any of you should seem to come short of it.

Going All the Way Into God’s Purpose

God's problem with his people has always been to get them to go all the way. Oh, how blessed it is when God moves and there's a flowing of his spirit. Perhaps there's utterances and healings, a manifestation of his presence.

And it's so good that we just want to camp there. This is good, what more can we ask? But God cannot be satisfied until his own heart is satisfied. And that's why God is so anxious. And I know he's going to have a people in this last day who will go all the way in with him.

For the delight of his own heart. We've been all, I suppose, brought up to look upon God as the great and mighty one, alone and by himself, who doesn't really need us. We're the ones that need him. The fact is that God has a tremendous need for fellowship with you and I.

For the simple reason he can't find true fellowship in the midst of angels and archangels and cherubim and seraphim. Because they're not like him. You can't have real fellowship except with humankind.

You can enjoy the other creatures that God has made, but only with man can you have real fellowship. Some when you're a kin. And of all the creatures that God ever made, man alone is the only creature that God can have fellowship with because only he was made in his image.

Humanity Made for Fellowship With God

Only he was made in his image. I think it was Augustine that said that man was made to find rest in God and he'll never find true rest until he comes back to his God. And I remember reading that and the thought came to me one day, that is true, that God made man in his image, that in that man God might find a place, a resting place for himself and God can never be satisfied until he draws man back into himself.

That he might find his habitation in the human heart and therefore it is for him and for his glory that we are and we're created. I know we need God but God needs you and I for his glory, for the expansion of his glory and for the rest and satisfaction of his own heart.

What our brother just said is so true. He wants the people who will sit at his feet and hear his words. Doing what he says is no great problem if we've learned to sit at his feet and hear his words. And we're told that the Lord Jesus chose 12 apostles for 12 disciples, they were not called apostles immediately until he sent them forth.

Do you know why he chose them? Anyone venture just to guess why he chose them? That they might be with him. First, that they might be with him. Secondly, that he might send them forth to preach. For how shall they preach unless they've been with him?

How shall they truly relate Christ unto others unless they know him themselves? And so God does not want us to fall short of the rest that he's provided for his people. Not only that he's concerned that you and I find the delight of our hearts, but he desires to delight his own heart.

And he never truly founded in the fullness of the sense of that word until his only begotten came to earth and was made in the likeness of man. True, he had a little fellowship in the Old Testament. He had one man whom he called his friend.

Imagine that. God had a friend in the Old Testament, the only one that I know of. Abraham was called the friend of God. And Jesus chose these twelve that they might be with him and become his friends.

So he says, I'm not going to call you servants. For a servant knoweth not what his Lord doeth. He doesn't need to know. You just do what you're told. But he says, I've called you friends because whatsoever I've heard of my Father I've made known unto you.

The Lord Jesus today has many servants, many good servants. Many servants who are doing what the Lord says. I wonder how many friends he's got. I trust that we'll go away from this gathering and determine that we're going to be the Lord's friends.

And we can be his friends if we'll sit at his feet and learn of him. And therein will we find true rest. The word bothers a lot of people, troubles them. Talking about rest in this day of great need, this day when the world is starving, the world is lost, going headlong to destruction.

Rest Means Ceasing From Our Own Works

You hear people talking about resting in God, but it's just that they don't understand what God means by rest. It doesn't mean inactivity. It means ceasing from our own works, as God did from his. It means laying down our own works and beginning to take upon ourselves his yoke and thereby learn of him.

Jesus says, take my yoke upon you and learn of me for I am meek and lowly of heart and you shall find rest unto your souls for my yoke is easy and my burden is light. Jesus, the Son of God, who carries such a load, says my burden is easy, my yoke is easy and my burden is light.

Why was it light and why was it easy? Because he came with no other thought in mind but to do the will of the Father. You say he came to perform the great, and perform the great plan of redemption? We know that.

But in actual reality, if you want to pinpoint it, he came for one purpose and one purpose only. And as it were, in his pre-incarnate condition, we hear him saying through the prophet, sacrifice and offering, thou wouldst not, but a body hast thou prepared for me.

In burnt offerings and in sacrifice for sin thou hast had no pleasure. Then said I, lo, I come to do thy will, O God. And so he's revealed and he walks amongst men, walks in and out the temple gates, ministers inside the temple courts on occasion, and the whole religious system was greatly overtaken with sacrifice and offering and ritual and priestly service, which God ordained.

But way back there in the book of Psalms, I don't know which singer it was, but God gave him these words. Imagine, even while they were singing this song, no doubt with their symbols and everything, it was in music, the book of Psalms was the hymnal of the second temple.

They'd be singing and rejoicing, sacrifice and offering, thou wouldst not, sacrifice and offering, thou wouldst not, little realizing that they were prophesying that the day would come when all that which they were doing would become but an empty shell, an empty ritual would have no meaning because God was moving on to something different and he was manifesting in the earth this son in whom would be revealed the finality of every type and shadow that was ever offered in the Old Testament.

Imagine Jesus walking in and out of the temple courts and seeing the ritual and seeing the sacrifices and he knew that God had no delight in it. I wonder how much delight God really has in the structured religious systems that we have in Christianity today.

This is my beloved son in whom I am well pleased, he said on two or three occasions from heaven and I was surprised to discover that he was saying more than is said in the authorized version. What he actually said was this is my beloved son in whom is my total delight because you can be well pleased with many things but God was saying this is my beloved son in whom is my total delight.

I can find delight nowhere else but in my beloved son. Perhaps we'll come back to that thought a little later but the yearning of the heart of God was that God's people would not fall short of God's desire for them.

Whenever there's a beautiful moving of the Spirit of God having been through one or two at least movings where there was a precious new thing that God was doing having seen the joy and the rejoicing in the new thing that God was doing and then somehow discovering that the people wanted to go no further because God cannot be satisfied until you've come right nigh unto His very heart.

He'll continue to love you, He'll continue to bless you, He'll continue to give you gifts and ministries and anoint the word that goes forth from your lips and bring healing and deliverance to mankind and for that we thank Him and He cannot be satisfied until you go out from that realm of the holy place and into the holiest of all.

From the Holy Place Into the Holiest of All

You say, oh, the veil is rent and twain and so I'm already in there and I remember a great teacher one time had it all up on a blackboard and he had the outer court and the tabernacle which is divided into two realms holy place and holiest of all.

He says, I don't know why people teach that we should go into the holiest of all. He says, don't they know the veil is rent? So he rubbed it out. Yes, the veil of the temple was rent in twain from the top to the bottom when Jesus died on the cross and that means there is access into the holiest of all but just as in that day they continued to worship in that temple for another 40 years how could they do it with a rent veil unless they took needle and thread and sewed it up so though Jesus Christ has rent the veil through His own flesh that veil, as it was in the case of Moses remember when he went up in the mountains saw the glory of God and came down with the glory of God radiating from His countenance with a light so brilliant that they could not even look upon Him so that Moses when he saw them squinting and looking away he beckoned to them some think he immediately took a veil and covered his eyes.

But I discovered one day that he didn't do that but he beckoned to Aaron and the elders and so fearfully they came forward and he spake unto them the word of the Lord with the glory of God radiating from His countenance.

And then he sensed that that glory was departing. And it says when he finished speaking to them because he sensed the glory was departing he put a veil on his face so that the children of Israel would not see the end of that which is abolished look it up.

In any other version he put the veil upon his face so that they would not see the last rays of that fading glory. He put a veil upon his face so that they would not see the finish of the splendor which was done away.

And in Exodus it says till Moses had finished speaking with them he put a veil on his face. But in every other version when Moses had finished speaking with them he put a veil on his face. Because that glory was gone it was not destined to remain.

It was only for a season. How could it remain for the ministration of condemnation that he had. And if the ministration of condemnation came with glory says the apostle Paul how shall not rather the ministration of righteousness exceed in glory.

How shall not the ministration of righteousness exceed in glory. God grant that this ministration that is beginning in the hearts of His people in this day and hour might continue to increase and increase and increase because such is the nature of the new covenant.

The nature of the old covenant was to decrease and the glory would fade away. So when Moses would talk to them he'd come fresh from the presence of God with the glory of God upon him. He'd talk to the people and then he'd sense that glory was going and he'd cover his face again.

He lacked that boldness. Paul says not like Moses the covenant that we have and the ministration that we have is not like the one Moses had who put a veil on his face. So the children of Israel would not see the passing away of that glory but their hearts were blinded.

For until this same day remaineth the same veil untaken away which veil is done away in Christ. I know that veil was rent in twain but that veil is now in the hearts of the people of God. But the secret is whensoever it shall turn to the Lord the veil is taken away.

Jesus did it at the cross. The Spirit does it in your heart and mine. The wonderful revelation to me when I discovered that everything that Jesus accomplished on the cross God would now accomplish in your life and mine through the ministration of the Spirit.

When your heart and mine turns to the Lord the veil is taken away. And so Paul concludes that message in the new covenant there I think it's 2nd Corinthians 3 by saying. But we all with open face and the word open is unveiled with the veil removed.

We all with the veil removed are changed into the same image. The same image the same image the same image from glory unto glory even as by the Spirit of the Lord. Reflecting as a mirror. Another translation.

Beholding as in a glass reflecting as a mirror. God wants us to be mirrors reflectors that as we partake of His glory we reflect it to someone else. They partake of it and they reflect it to someone else.

That's why your hope and mine through the ministration of the Spirit in this day and hour as in any day and hour. But in this day of the consummation God is going to consummate His plans and His purposes.

He's going to bring into being and into fulfillment all that for which we have had bits and pieces through the church age. He's going to bring to one glorious climax. And so it's so essential that you and I begin to relate to the body of Christ and that we be fitly framed and knit together in the body of Christ in this hour.

That we all with that open face might edify our fellow members until the church of Jesus Christ goes on from glory unto glory from one degree of glory unto another until we stand face to face with Him in His unveiled splendor.

Israel’s Exodus Was Meant to Lead Into Canaan

For unto us was the gospel preached as well as unto them that the word preached did not profit them not being mixed with faith in them that heard it. And the Apostle Paul is referring to that occasion in the Old Testament when good news was brought back to them concerning their heritage in Canaan.

You remember how at the hand of Moses God had led them out of Egyptian bondage. And as He brought them forth by the hand of Moses His purpose was to bring them in to the land of Canaan. But they must go through a halfway house.

God's purpose in bringing the children of Israel out of Egypt was to bring them into Canaan. And God said I brought you out that I might bring you in. He didn't tell them too much about the halfway house because it was only intended to be a halfway house just that.

And if He had told them in detail it might have frightened them. God does not want the trial and the test and the tribulations of life to dampen our spirit and our zeal to go on with Him. For He has provided grace sufficient for every trial or every test that He will bring our way.

So God doesn't have to worry about you know, not informing His people. I'll look after them. I've got grace for them. And so He says I brought you out of this house of bondage and I'm going to bring you in.

Thou shalt bring them in and plant them in the mountain of thy inheritance in the place O Lord which thou hast made for thee to dwell in in the sanctuary O Lord which thy hands have established now. That was the song of Moses one of the songs of Moses when they came out of Egypt and crossed over the Red Sea.

What a time of victory. And they sang this song of Moses. And this is part of it so that even in the song of deliverance there was hope of a something better for us here brethren lest the promise being made of entering into His rest you should seem to come short of it so that even in that great thing that God was doing in delivering them out of the hand of Pharaoh God reminds them this is not all I'm going to bring you in.

I brought you out to bring you in. That's the purpose for which He brought us out to bring us in. But you know that by and large the church of Jesus Christ has remained in the wilderness by and large.

But what a victory to see the host of Israel crossing the Red Sea with the armies of Pharaoh following them and Moses lifts his rod and the waters go back and overthrow the horse and his rider in the sea.

No wonder they sang the victory song and I think it's even been put to music. I will sing unto the Lord for He hath triumphed gloriously the horse and his rider as he's thrown into the sea. And I hear some victory songs here.

But I trust from this day forward when you sing your victory song that you'll remember the purpose for which God gave you that victory to bring you in to the mountain of His heritage. And so when they come out of Egypt into Canaan God set His very own presence in their midst as a cloud of glory and as a cloud of fire a cloud of glory by day and a pillar of fire by night to lead them in the way that they should go.

And God said you just follow the cloud just follow the cloud for I'm leading you into this realm of My inheritance. And so the cloud of God went ahead of them and brought them to a certain place called Marah.

They went out into the wilderness of Shur and they went three days in the wilderness and found no water. And so as they searched around for water they suddenly came to Marah first. No water and the cloud must have been leading them because they had to follow the cloud.

They'd lose direction if they didn't. And they came to Marah and found water but they could not drink of the waters of Marah for they were bitter. Therefore the name of it was called Marah similar word to the word Myrrh which is a bitter herb.

It's also the word from which we get the word Mary. I noticed once looking through my concordance that there's, I don't know five, six, seven Marys in the New Testament it just seemed that Israel had gone through such desolation and bondage that when this little child was born they said call it Mary.

And you'll remember when Naomi and Ruth came back from the fields of Moab where they had gone to take refuge during the time of famine. She'd lost her husband. She'd lost her two sons. She came back with her daughters-in-law but turned to them and said go on back home dear God the hand of the Lord had dealt very bitterly with me.

God's gone against me. And Orpah you'll remember went back to her God that Ruth said whither thou goest I will go. Your people shall be my people. Where thou dwellest I will dwell entreat me not to leave thee.

And she'd clave unto her. When they got back into the land of Canaan the people were excited because this long lost relative was back home and they said Naomi is home. And she says no not Naomi anymore Marah for the Lord hath dealt bitterly with me.

There's a lot of bitterness in God's people. I don't mean just that kind of bitterness where you have resentments one against another but an inward bitterness simply it's just bitter the way it's been bitter it's been hard, it's been difficult.

Can you tell me why God would lead the children of Israel out of Egypt and across the Red Sea and then they're famishing for water and he leads them to a place where there's water which is bitter which they can't drink.

As the brethren have been emphasizing whatsoever things were written before time were written for our learning that we through patience and the comfort of the scriptures might find hope and so for our sakes were these things written.

The Wilderness as Preparation and Testing

And God wants us to know that before he can take us into this land of true rest where we are enabled to cease from our own works and to be so enveloped with the canopy of the Lord's presence that it is no longer you and I that work but it is the living Christ that worketh through us.

He wants us to know it's a prepared place and we can't just barge in there but that for this prepared place there must be a prepared people. And that's what the wilderness is all about. That's what the wilderness is all about.

That God might prepare you and I for the coming into this good land. You say, you mean that God has to lead us to bitter waters to prepare. No doubt you've often heard as many teachers are explaining that the fullness of the work of God and his people is always in triads.

And oh we could probably name a dozen or so different triads too to show the fullness of God's work and his people. I'll just mention a couple. I've already mentioned the tabernacle how that there was the outer court holy place, holiest of all.

Then there were the three feasts in Israel Feast of Passover, Feast of Pentecost Feast of Tabernacle. And John speaks of three realms of growth in God's people. Little children, fathers, young men. I quoted it right.

Never heard a minister yet who quotes it right. Always little children, young men, fathers. No the order is little children, fathers, young men. I thought John might have slipped up until he repeated it.

I write unto you little children. I write unto you fathers. I write unto you young men. Because though the whole family could get strength from that as they opened that letter and read it John would have us know that he was also writing of a spiritual growth in the family of God little children whose sins are forgiven fathers who have come to maturity and know him.

And men, young men, overcomers not referring to age but people who like Moses at the age of 120 his natural force was still there his eyesight was still good and the only reason he couldn't go in and conquer Canaan with Joshua and the rest of them was because he disobeyed God.

And God says you're going to have to die. And when his time came he says go up in the mountain there and die. And he went up, walked up a mountainside at the age of 120 and laid down his life. Caleb when he comes into Canaan he had waited a long time for this generation to arise to take the land.

When he came into Canaan he didn't rush over to Hebron to take possession of his heritage though God had sworn an oath to him 38 years before because your spirit has been right and your heart has been right.

I swear I'll bring you into this land. But when they got there Caleb didn't rush over and get his little inheritance. But he spent 7 years bringing others into their inheritance. And when the others got there as he came to Joshua and he says now Joshua remember what the Lord promised you and I 38 years ago and you and I went over there and he says I'm just as strong now as I was then give me this mountain young men.

God's got some gray haired men, some in this room today you think you're in the place of retirement. Forget it. You hear what God's saying, forget it. Little children, fathers, young men overcomers hope I'm with some of you young fellas who take the land and I don't mean by that you know that the man might be feeble and all that.

But there's no retirement for those who'll go all the way with him. I'm not saying they're out active in ministry but that's nothing to do with doing the will of God anyway. I shouldn't say that it's not first but Jacob there laying in his bed just about ready to die.

And they brought the sons in to kiss them goodbye. And he props himself up in his bed and prophesies the word of the Lord with a prophecy that's written down in holy scriptures concerning what God would do with his people in the last days and laid back and died anyway.

Another three. The one that I always like the kingdom of God is like a seed that's planted in the ground and springs up. First the blade then the ear and after that the full corn. But I didn't quote it all.

The full corn in the ear not in translation not in rapture not in resurrection. The full corn in the ear first the blade then the ear after that the full corn in the ear so that the ear becomes the connection the transition between the blade and the full corn.

What I want to impress upon you is that almost invariably in the history of God's people they will settle for that area of transition. And even the holy place in the tabernacle was a place of preparation for the priest to come into the holiest of all.

You need to go through that you can't. There's no other way. There's no back door into the holiest of all. We must have gifts. We must have ministries. We must have the illumination of the candlestick.

We must have the table of showbread. Aaron must stand before the altar of incense and offer up the holy incense before the Lord. Appreciate what Brother David has been writing about the altar of incense.

And incidentally I'd also written something about it just before I got his letter on it. And I discovered that they didn't light the fire of the incense there in the golden altar. The golden altar wasn't made for the burning of fire but he would take the incense off the golden altar put in a censer.

But the fire for that incense came from the altar of the Lord out in the outer court. So he'd have to go out there. That's where the fire was kindled. Take coals from the brazen altar and bring it in and put the incense upon it in order that there might be a cloud that covered the mercy seat in order that the incense might ascend unto God as a sweet smelling savor.

As David said my prayer shall be set forth before thee as incense on the lifting up of my hands as the evening sacrifice so that God is saying it is true. I don't want your prayer. I don't want your praise.

I don't want your worship except it is ignited by an act of obedience and submission to the will of God at the altar of Berthoffen. The blade, the ear, the full corn the full corn in the ear. So let's just consider for a while the purpose of God in leading His people through the wilderness.

Marah and the Sweetening Power of the Cross

We look upon it geographically. They came out of Egypt. They traveled through the wilderness. Then they entered into Canaan. But ours is a spiritual journey. Ours is an inward journey. And so we have to see the wilderness in you and I.

And because God must have a prepared people for this prepared place He has to deal with you and I in the wilderness. And in leading us through the wilderness He is revealing that old life that carnal nature that we have there in the wilderness that we might deal with it so that the wilderness becomes a preparation a place of preparation something that Israel did not learn.

And yet tenderly was God leading them every step of the way showing them His glory in such a way that He might entice them unto Himself and cause their hearts to be turned unto Him that they might realize that God meant what He said.

I'm bringing you into a good land. And if God's word is true and if they believe God all they could say is God. I see the drought. I see the waste in the howling wilderness. I see bitter waters. But Lord it has to be for Your glory.

You must have a purpose in it. What are you trying to reveal to me? What are you trying to show me? He brought them to Marah because Marah is the condition of our heart. He brings you to bitter waters that you might know that this is what my heart is like.

Deuteronomy chapter 8. By this time He's talking to another generation. This first generation didn't make it. So He's talking to another generation but He does tell us the purpose of the wilderness life.

Verse 2. Thou shalt remember all the way which the Lord thy God led thee these forty years in the wilderness. Now that's something different. The Lord led you forty years in the wilderness. God was leading them but because they did not know God's ways they wandered.

To them it was a wandering place. No purpose. No real intention. God was mad at them so He's just leading them around haphazardly. That's the way they looked upon their God. I don't think it's without significance that the first stopping place was.

No, I don't think it was the first. I think it's the first one mentioned here. It came to Rephidim, I believe, first. But one of the first places where they stopped in camp was Marah. Because God knows the bitterness that's in the human heart.

And when God leads you to waters of Marah He has a purpose in it. You say, what purpose can there be in God giving me bitter waters to drink? Until we discover that God didn't give you bitter waters to drink.

God gave you bitter waters that you might see the grace and the glory of God of changing those waters and making them to be sweet. Instead of that, we stoop down and we drink of the bitter waters and grumble and complain against God and man.

Drink some more, drink some more and more and more bitterness and complain and murmur. Instead of saying, God the cloud of your glory led me here the cloud of your presence brought me here. What are you trying to show me?

He'll show you. So Moses cried unto the Lord. The Lord showed him a tree and he cut down the tree and threw it into the waters and it became sweet. So God led them to Marah to perform the miracle of changing the bitter into sweet.

And by that to show you and I that if we truly embrace the cross of Christ in our life no matter what experience may come our way as we cast the tree into the waters it becomes sweet and it changes our nature from one of bitterness to one of sweetness.

Moses cried unto the Lord and the Lord showed him a tree which when he had cast into the waters the waters were made sweet. There he made for them a statue and an ordinance and there he proved them or tested them.

The wilderness is for testing. It's not for destruction. It's not intended to bring murmuring or complaining. It's intended for testing for proving that you might be prepared for that land of union with Christ.

The land of Canaan. For Jesus cannot join unto himself your fleshly nature, my fleshly nature your sin and mine. But he's going to join a people unto himself. Therefore he would rid us of every bitterness every stain, every sin every bit of carnality that he might join us unto himself that we might find rest in him and that he might find rest in you and I.

It's your life and mine that becomes the wilderness. We're the wilderness. So going through the wilderness it's that spiritual work that God is doing in us. That out from the wilderness of our life he might bring forth the beautiful garden of the Lord.

For the Lord shall comfort Zion. He will comfort all her waste places and he will make her wilderness like Eden and her desert like the garden of the Lord. Joy and gladness shall be found therein thanksgiving in the voice of melody.

God wants to make of this wilderness which you and I are the garden of the Lord. There's so many different illustrations and pictures and types of the work that God is doing in his people. And the reason God chooses so many different types and shadows or illustrations is for the simple reason that there's no one there's no one picture that can show the whole story but we see the one picture and we get caught away with that perhaps and we fail to realize that it takes all the other pictures and together to get the real picture.

The Church as God’s Temple and Christ’s Body

And so those who are strong, ready for battle they like the thought of being part of God's army. There is an army marching through the land. That's one picture but to be God's army. You've got to know also that we're God's temple.

Of course a temple can't march through the land not that literal temple but it's another aspect. Temple speaks of where God dwells. So if God doesn't dwell in you don't talk about going forth to defeat the enemy.

And then of course we're the body of Christ. And without getting into that in any particular detail this morning I'd just like to remind God's people it is the body of Christ in the same way that you have a body in which you dwell.