While Bethlehem Slept….

“Therefore let us move beyond the elementary teachings about Christ and be taken forward to maturity, not laying again the foundation of repentance from acts that lead to death, and of faith in God” …Hebrews 6;1

Merry Christmas to you all brethren.

Its that time of year again when we celebrate the birth of our Lord & Savior Jesus Christ – to HIM be praise for ever more!

The expectation of the triune GOD is that we move beyond the ‘elementary teachings’ about Christ and ‘be taken forward’ (by the Holy Spirit) to maturity.

Bearing this in mind, let us consign the traditional story telling & teachings about Mary, Joseph, Bethlehem and the manger to our children and take one further step into the meaning of Christ birth to you and i as believers. 

What does Christmas mean to me? 

10 years ago if you had asked me what Christmas meant to me: the response you’d have gotten would largely revolve around Holidays / Mold Wine / Turkey Roast  / and Star Trek Box Set dvd catch-ups. 🙂

One sign of being ‘taken-forward’ into maturity is that the ‘christmas story’ SHOULD take on a new meaning for you every other year. This Christmas lets take a fresh look at the Christmas story from the perspective of the gifts of the canonical sages.

The narrative of the visit of the magi (otherwise known as the 3 wise men) to the manger to visit baby Jesus presents a true prophetic picture of Jesus’s ministry and relationship to God. By extension it provided ‘the template’ that every true christian’s ‘walk’ (ministry) must be patterned after. A fundamental lack of understanding of’ this ‘template’ has meant that there are many workers and christians whose ‘walk’ and ‘work’ do not ‘fit into’ the Kingdom specification & pattern.

Mathew 2:11
And when they were come into the house, they saw the young child with Mary his mother, and fell down, and worshipped him: and when they had opened their treasures, they presented unto him gifts; GOLD, and FRANKINCENSE and MYRRH.

The three gifts of Gold, Frankincense and Myrrh presented to baby Jesus bore a prophetic significance to whom Jesus is and becomes symptomatic of our relationship to God having become sons by adoption.

When i worked for a trustee company i learned that ‘trust funds/estates’ are better than wills…..because they are ‘Living Trust’…which are not subject to inheritance contests that wills often are. That said, there are almost always certain “clauses” stipulated within them which will only yield certain benefits to the beneficiary when certain conditions are met. E.g When he/she reaches age 21. etc. etc.

THE GIFT OF GOLD:

The gift of gold in the christmas story represents the kingship in Jesus.

1 Peter 2:9 describes every born again christian’s ordained position as “A Royal Priesthood”. To be born again into Christ is to be a King..
Because the gold was given to Christ as an infant, the gold is given to us in our spiritual infancy as a seed sown ‘in trust’. However our enthronement is subject to our ‘maturing’ in him through discipleship (Mark 3:13-15). Until then the amount of authority we can ‘wield’ on his behalf over a delegated realm is limited.

Isa 45:19 tells us God has “not called the descendants of Jacob to seek him in vain”.
Thus we are not paperweight kings without a ‘realm’ or ‘scepter’. All the benefits and responsibilities accruing to the office are ours.
Ecc 8:4 says “where the word of a King is there is Power”….but many christians cannot ‘decree a thing and it be established unto them’ job 22:8 because our mouths are full of filthy worldly language, increasingly defiled via commitment of lewd sexual acts, slander, etc.

As kings, (or Kings-in-waiting) the bible tells us in 1 Samuel 8 that we have the following responsibilities:

Executing Judgement:
As Kings we are to carry the Spirit of Christ in Judgement, Judging after the spirit as Christ did not after sentiment or selfish gain. Expertly wielding the ‘word of GOD’ as Solomon wielded the sword in judgment between the two harlots 1 Kings 3:24-25.

Our ability to wield the ‘sword of the spirit’ is dependent on how much revelation and truth we have come to know via berean study/meditation and by how much the gift of discernment is in us.

 As Representatives (Ambassadors):
Jesus stated in John 5:19 that “the Son can do nothing of himself, but what he seeth the Father do”. The gift of gold as an indicator of his (our) kingship is the ability to represent the kingdom of God as “Lights of the world” (showing forth the righteousness of God’s kingdom).

As ambassadors of God’s Kingdom we are to carry the consciousness of God, who we are and what we represent: in our daily lives and interactions. Not by merely professing it and placing our denominational stickers on our cars but by our actual actions!!!

Sadly the Church today cannot Judge the world of Sin because of compromise! We are about as effective as brother Lot was in Sodom Gen 19:9.

As Spiritual Commanders:
Kings ‘go for the people’ and ‘fight for them’ against the philistines and amalekites. Christ our forerunner went before us and wrestled power back from death & hell for our sakes. The people of the world are lost, many are groping about in darkness unfulfilled. The Kingship of Christ in us compels us to ‘show them the way’ and lead them down the path to life where they need to be. And where required breaking the chains of bondage in their lives, casting out demons from them, freeing them from the bonds of diseases and sicknesses.
“For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that he might destroy the works of the devil”…1 John 3:8

THE GIFT OF FRANKINCENSE:

The physical properties of Frankincense oil make it useful as an antiseptic, disinfectant, diuretic (reducing body toxicity), boosting the immune system and lots of other general healing properties in treating many organ ailments .

The Gift of frankincense to baby Jesus prophetically pointed at ‘The Priesthood in Christ’. By extension every born again christian receives the priesthood office upon birth. The priesthood in us specifically points at 2 things which GOD expects us to function in and execute. These are the roles of ‘Intercession’ and ‘Teaching’

Intercession:
Christ is a priest forever in the order of Melchizedek who has ascended to heaven and continually makes intercession for us. Heb 7:17, 25

By giving the gift of frankincense to Jesus the magi were prophetically indicating his role of intercession on our behalf unto God. (This is why catholic priests burn frankincense as incense in their censers). As priests, we are primarily called into the office of reconciliation. to reconcile the people unto God and making intercessions for them through our prayers before him.

The dominant spirit in the world today is the spirit of ‘Self’ .. epitomized in the ‘Selfie’ movement. Sadly many churches and denominations misunderstand the kingdom specification and instead offer the people ‘Self-help’, ‘Philosophies’ and ‘Self-Actualization’ meme’s thinly guised as sermons. Christ did not come to ‘put us back together again’ but to ‘KILL US!’ (i.e. our flesh & all it contains …such as our selfish ambitions)

Schemes and ‘Methodologies cannot change us. Only the WORD of GOD can! Christ didn’t die for us to pave the way for us to ‘become the best we can be’! NO! but “to be like him”
He explicitly instructed in  Luke 9:23 “If any man will come after me, he must deny himself, take up his cross daily, and follow me”. As christians let us remember this christmas day that we are called into a life of sacrifice through discipleship.

As priests we must understand that we have a higher calling, and must look to continually ‘hallow the name of God before the people’ not build golden calves (mammon) for them to worship from their trinkets (offerings) which they received from Egypt (the world).
We are to seek first the kingdom of GOD, before all other things will be added to us. When we become overly concerned with our selfish ambitions and personal targets than we are for reconciling our generation to God then we are in error and become of very little use to the kingdom. Are you minded to stand in the gap for your family members? your colleagues? the body of Christ? are you carrying any burden for the lost?

Leviticus 21 lays down the precepts for priesthood operation, and one key factor is that anyone ‘bearing scabs, festering or running sores CANNOT operate in the office of the priesthood”. Unforgivenes, and bitterness are just some of those sores so often present in our hearts that make us unfit to offer sacrifices unto the Lord on behalf of others.

Hosea 4,  2 Cor 15 tells us that anytime Israel lacked teaching priests the people degenerated into harlotry & became wayward. Christ taught in the synagogues and in the villages, are you concerned enough to share personal words of revelation to others that they might grow?

Standing in our roles as priests enables us to spiritually ‘engage’ the properties of frankincense oil as an antiseptic and disinfectant to cleanse the wounds and sores of men.

Jesus laid down the marker for us in Mathew 9:6

“But that ye may know that the Son of man hath power on earth to forgive sins, (then saith he to the sick of the palsy,) Arise, take up thy bed, and go unto thine house”

and then subsequently positioned the new testament priest (christian) above all that came before John the Baptist by delegating His authority to us in John 20:23

“Whose soever sins ye remit, they are remitted unto them; and whose soever sins ye retain, they are retained”.

Do you engage the prophetic office in pardoning the sins of men? wether through deliverance ministrations, healing ministrations etc? It is not just the work of your pastor alone but for us all. We all must grow to know our respective places in the body and function effectively therein.

THE GIFT OF MYRRH:

In presenting Myrrh to the baby Jesus, the 3 wise men where foretelling the Prophetic Office of Christ Jesus. The gift of Myrrh is an indication of the prophetic office that a born-again christian bears.

A bottle of Myrrh placed before you has a very attractive smell, but when tasted or applied, the experience is often very bitter. This is appropriate. Spiritually speaking the prophetic office is often the most attractive to all christians alike, however the true prophetic office actually comes with a bitter experience..like John the baptist who ate locusts and wild honey and declared things as they are. Or as Jeremiah who suffered for his message to the people.

Many christians are ignorant of the fact that they have at the very least an allowance to prophetic utterance and can speak to situations and circumstances within their ‘given’ sphere of influence. So on many occasions we erroneously wait for GOD to come down, when Psalm 115:16 tells us that he has given the earth to us for ‘exercise/dominion’. In developing a closer walk with GOD and in maturing, we begin to understand who we are in him and how to walk in dominion.

Sadly the prophetic office has become extremely abused and is perhaps the most highly misunderstood office in the body of Christ today. Time will not permit us to delve into this factor – but suffice it to say that during every electoral cycle in Nigeria we see the rise of ‘Prophets’ all making declarations concerning who will occupy what post etc  They are all mostly prophets of baal eating from the table of jezebel.

In the new testament church, the office of the Prophet was no longer a stand-alone office as it was in the past. Rather it was fully integrated into the ‘body’ and was to ‘serve’ the body of Christ as Agabus demonstrated in Acts 11:28. Because of the pursuit of filthy lucre, many men who have have perverted this very vital organ of the body of Christ and contributed to its scorn amongst the people.

Summary

Moving beyond the rudimentary teachings and narrative of the christmas story we can see that the birth of Christ continues to bear a very real and present significance for every believer in this present age.

The gifts of Gold, Frankincense and Myrrh were used by GOD to prophetically set the ‘mold’ for my christian walk and your christian walk, with Christ having proceeded before us as the forerunner.

Bethlehem slept whilst its King was being born, whilst heaven and earth shaking events transpired within its borders. On this christmas day let us spare a moment to examine the 3 gifts of the canonical sages that were delivered to us as seeds at the point of accepting Jesus as our lord and saviour and becoming born again.

Have the seeds borne fruit? are they bearing fruit? have they taken root at all? have they become choked by the weeds and thorns (cares of this life) or have the birds of the air succeed in carrying them away?

But ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people; that ye should shew forth the praises of him who hath called you out of darkness into his marvellous light:…1 Peter 2:9

Let us wake up from any spiritual slumber we may have slipped into, and be determined to take our rightful place as Kings – Priests – and Prophets of The most high God, fully operating in those offices in our respective spheres of influence in order that our lives may shew forth His praise in conformation to Christ Jesus our forerunner born on this day 2000 years ago.

God bless you and merry xmas.