Building up believers and the New Testament church

His Ultimate Goal

The Order Of God

"He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For by Him all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers. All things were created through Him and for Him. And He is before all things, and in Him all things consist. And He is the head of the body, the church, who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in all things He may have the preeminence." (Colossians 1:15-18)

What God is doing has order because God is a God of order. Order gives the purpose of God beauty. In the plan of God, order is one of the means that God uses to bring us to His glorious end purpose. The order is God's alone. In God's plan, everyone is not a law unto themselves or doing what they want to do for God. We move willingly in God's order if we are a part of what God is doing.

God has an order for the family, an order for the church, and an order for our lives. God's order is not hidden; it is plainly revealed in the Scriptures. There is an order in creation which is revealed in the family. God's order is brought into His working in the body of Christ. If we don't move in the order God has set forth, we are not going to move in the life of God. If we are moving in the Spirit in reality, we must be moving in God's order. The Spirit is God and cannot move apart from God's order.

What the Lord began is right up-to-date; it is never old. We don't need a new order. We are moving in God and He is the same always. Man is always wanting to do something separate from God. He doesn't want to be told, "This is the way; walk in it." Rebellion is moving in your own thing, serving God in your own way--making your own order for the way you want to serve God. Today religious men and women are looking to themselves and what they feel is good for themselves. It's the same old thing: "Eat of this tree and you will be as God."

God made man with a choice: "Choose God or choose yourself." When you choose yourself, you have chosen death, and this is what we are seeing today all around us. Man doesn't want any absolutes. He wants to be free to do what he thinks is right. In reality that is bondage--being entrapped in death while moving to "do something for God." "O wretched man that I am! Who shall deliver me from the body of this death?" "There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit" (Romans 7:24, 8:1). The religious man has entrapped himself again and the answer is still to come back to the order of God, which is Christ is the head of Man and man the head of woman (I Corinthians 11:3). The order of God is God Himself.

In God's order there is safety and real freedom and it is the only thing that will bring us to God's purpose and allow us to move in God's plan. God's ways are perfect. We can never find or think up a better way or plan. What man is doing may look good but it can never bring us to the fullness of God. Man needs a fresh revelation of who Christ is, what He came to do and how God is working it out. God is doing a new thing and it never gets old. He reveals it to those who wait upon Him.

Those who are moving in the Spirit hunger after the things of God and obey Him as He leads them in His purpose. The flesh cannot do the will of God and is always looking to self--to satisfy its own desires in the strength of flesh. We need to realize that the flesh is blind to what it is doing. Flesh thinks it is doing something lasting, but is always deceived because of the blindness of self. If self could save us, we would not need Christ or God's plan and order. Man is blinded in his own "doing good" in the flesh, rather than moving in faith in the order of God.

When men don't see what the body of Christ is, they go about to establish their own "church," and move in it according to man's thinking rather than by the Spirit. It is like Jesus said, "There are two houses being built--one on the sand and the other on the rock. But when the storms come, it is too late. This is because man has chosen to blind himself to what God is saying. Men are searching the Scriptures, but will not come to Christ that He might open their blinded eyes to see and to be set free.

The limit that God has set before us is Himself and man is not satisfied. He is always striving to do things "his way," which ends up always in death rather than life and peace. The Lord knew this, and this is why in the book of Revelation the Spirit says, "He that has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit is saying to the churches." It is no different today. Those who have an ear will hear. But we must do more than just hear--we must obey. "He has become eternal salvation to those who obey Him." What the Lord has done, He has done openly for all to see.  He has promised that the hungry and thirsty shall be filled. The life of God flows from order.

God is a God of order--we can see it in all His creation. We are not going to change God's order. It is given to us to move in, so that we might know the fullness of God and enjoy what He has prepared for us in this union with God. Let us move in God's order. We will if we are sons of God. God's sons are led by the Spirit. Time will come to an end, and those who have moved in His plan, according to His purpose, will enter into fullness and be brought into that complete oneness with God which is His ultimate goal.

His Ultimate Goal