God's Revelations of Jesus to David through the prophet Nathan
Hey blessed people,
I'm sure all of us have felt the "full force" of Pastor Prince's power after his return trip from Israel. I wished I could have gone to Israel but it's ok. I'll go next year, when I have the leave and the money to spare.
For those who missed last week's sermon, here's a brief re-cap.
Pastor shared that his greatest revelation from the Israel trip was that of how the Ark was being brought back to Jerusalem to the house of David. Basically, he started off from the story of Obed-edom and how David tried to bring the Ark back from the house of Obed-edom. While Pastor and the leaders were visiting on the hill of Kiriath-jearim, he asked the Israeli tour guide what "edom" meant in Hebrew, and the guide told him the root word of "edom" means blood or wine. And that's where Pastor caught the revelation.
The root word of "Obed" in Hebrew is "servant" and "edom" is "blood/wine". Put together, it means "servant of the blood". Now we know that while the Ark was left in the house of Obed-edom the Gittite (non-Jew) for three months, "the LORD blessed Obed-edom and all his household." (2 Samuel 6:11).
And then he went on to illustrate how David tried to bring the Ark back on the ox-cart, Uzzah was struck dead when he stretched out his hand to touch the ark as the oxen stumbles. Firstly, according to Levitan laws, the Ark is suuposed to be carried on poles on the shoulders of priests, and we are told that when the Ark rests on the shoulders, it becomes light and in fact directs the priests (Pause a moment and recall what Jesus meant when he said "My yoke is easy and my burden is light").
We know that under the new Convenant, Jesus represents our modern-day Ark, and truly He has blessed us all richly, exceedingly and abundantly. Pastor then drew a parallel between how when David sent his men to bring back the Ark of the Convenant, this time, on the shoulders of priests and every six steps, he sacrificed an ox and a fattened animal to the LORD (2 Samuel 6:13), and when our Lord Jesus entered Jerusalem, the city of David on a donkey. Pastor also drew a comparison between how David was dancing and leaping before the LORD and there was a multitude of people but his wife Michal despised his actions.
Then Pastor said:"Remember how when Jesus entered Jerusalem, the City of David, on a donkey, people were lining the streets, waving palm leaves and shouting "Hosanna Hosaana!!"(Mark 11:9-10), and who are the ones who are despising all these? They are the self-righteous, self-proclaimed "holy" people called Pharisees. And they asked Jesus to rebuke his disciples not to make so much noise and Jesus replied:"I tell you, if these were silent, the very stones would cry out!" Okay folks, you still there? Good...while Pastor was sharing all these, something hit me. Hey, isn't Obed-edom a Gentile, technically speaking, but the LORD blessed him and all his household (2 Sam 6:11) and the Ark was only there for three months.
Today we have the modern Ark, that's Jesus Christ, living inside us. Wouldn't we be blessed so much much more? And you know what, techically speaking, we are also the Gentiles, but by the grace of God, we have been brought into the house of David while the Israelites, the true sons and duaghters of David have rejected their Messiah and Saviour!
It's like a picture of modern day Israel but we believe that one day, Christ will once again enter the city of David just as King David brought the Ark back to Jerusalem. Hallelujah!!!
I'm not finished yet!
This morning I have a fresh revelation. To me, it was so powerful though perhaps some of you may have already known. (I'm the sua-ku one lor but I don't care). This is really powerful!!! Do you guys know that right after David brought the Ark back to Jerusalem, GOD actually preached the gospel to David and showed him Jesus and everything that was to come.
This came about because David had a desire to build a house for the LORD. But GOD answered David by revealing this vision to Nathan the prophet in 2 Samuel 7:12-16, saying:"When your days are fulfilled and you lie down with your fathers, I will raise up your offspring after you, who shall come from your body, and I will establish his kingdom. He shall build a house for my name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever. I will be to him a father, and he shall be to me a son. When he commits iniquity (Jesus did not commit iniquity but He bore ALL the iniquities of mankind that the world might be saved through Him), I will discipline him with the rod of men, with the stripes of the sons of men (remember Jesus's suffering on the cross and Isaiah 53:4-5), but my steadfast love will not depart from him...Your throne shall be established forever."Then Nathan relayed all these to Daivd, and David understood.
David caught the revelation, and he saw everything clearly and he said to GOD:"You have spoken also of your servant's house for a great while to come, and this is instruction for mankind, O Lord GOD! And what more can David say of you?" (2 Samuel 7: 19-20)
In fact, David wasn't done in his prayer. He prayed further:"Because of your promise, and according to your heart, you have brought about all this greatness, to make your servant know it...blah blah blah (the words we have come to know in the hymn - there's no one else like you for you are great)...then David said:"For you, O LORD of hosts, the God of Israel have made this revelation to your servant...and David prayed for us when he said:"Now, therefore may it please you to BLESS THE HOUSE OF YOUR SERVANT, so that it may continue forever before you. For you, O Lord GOD, have spoken, and with your blessing shall be the house of your servant be blessed forever." Hallelujah!!! You understand what all these means?
Rejoice! Today, we are the house of David!!! AND WE ARE BLESSED!!!Phew!!! That's quite a lot. I hope you have managed to 'tahan' to this end.
Hey, be blessed brothers and sisters! Becasue King David already saw the future in us today, how blessed we are!!! If you're interested, 2 Samuel talks about David's victories from 2 Sam, chapter 8 onwards, I pray that you have caught the flow.
Be blessed!!!
Cheers,
Weiwen
Revelations of Jacob
Dec 25, '04 9:14 AM ET
Hihi blessed and beloved people of Christ!
This Christmas has truly been amazing for me personally. Not only because I had the chance to proclaim our Lord's name in praise and worship in the heart of Orchard with the rest of my fellow brothers and sisters in choir. But also, personally, I truly believe that the year of 2005, like what Pastor Prince has prophesied, is going to be a year of divine, abundant, overflowing favour.
It's uncanny that I should receive a book titled "Finding Favour with the King" as an early Christmas present from a beloved sister, Gail (who's also from New Creation) at a Christmas gathering with my uni clique. Even before that, I've experienced so many instances of favour in my daily living that I lost count, and I expect more to come in 2005. These few weeks leading up to Christmas, the Lord drew my attention to Jacob, and revealed to me how this person is truly one with great favour upon his life.
Now when we think of favour, we often associate it with Biblical characters like Abraham, Joseph or David. But the Lord said: "Son, can you see the favour in Jacob'ss life?" And he opened my eyes to the reasons, which is what I'm going to share, and I want to pen it down just in case I forgot about all this as time passes.
We all know that Jacob was a very deceitful and conniving person "he stole his brother, Esau's birthright (Genesis 25: 33-34) and later Esau's blessings from his father Issac as well by pretending to be his elder brother (Genesis 27: 34-36). It's interesting why the Lord chooses to bless and pours forth His favour on such a person. Even Jacob's name, in itself, means "supplanter" (one who takes the place of someone else) or deceitful because the Bible says "his hand took hold of Esau's heel; so his name was called Jacob" (Genesis 25: 26). Esau was the one that Issac loved and favoured because he was a macho-michie. He's a skilful hunter, very ga-rang kind, you know, a man's man. But the Bible describes Jacob as "a mild man, dwelling in tents", the quiet-quiet and like-to-stay-at-home kind.
But Rebekah loved Jacob. (Genesis 25: 28). And she was the one who actually taught him how to steal his elder brother's blessings from Issac. Read the story on how Jacob stole Esau's birthright. "Jacob (the nerdy SNAG - he likes to cook stew too) cooked a red stew, and Esau came in from the field, and he was weary." (Genesis 25: 29). And he asked Jacob to feed him the red stew. But Jacob wanted Esau to sell him his birthright as a pre-condition.
We don't know what Esau did that caused him to be so tired because he actually said to Jacob:" Look, I am about to die, so what is this birthright to me?" Look at what Jacob did in Genesis 25: 34:"He gave Esau bread and stew of lentils; then he ate and drank, arose, and went his way."
I was drawn to the word "lentils" because I didn't know what it means. So I checked the dictionary, and it means "a type of leguminous plant", basically, your long-beans kind of plant, any plant with peas. And Lord spoke to me: "Son, read it again."
And I was drawn to the word bread, red stew with lentils. And I recalled Deaconess Lian's sharing on why Cain was rejected by God and Abel's offering was accepted. Because Cain offered plants to God, a picture of self-effort while Abel offered meat sacrifices which speaks of blood being shed.Notice that you cannot mix "bread" and "red stew" with "lentils". The bread speaks of the body of Christ, the red stew a picture of the sufferings that Christ went through and the shedding of his blood. You know what "a stew" means? It's to boil something until it becomes very soft. You can't mix that with lentils, a picture of self-effort; it's mixing grace and self-effort. And that's how Esau surrendered his birthright.
Today as Christians, if we mix grace and try until we are so weary to gain right-standing with God by our own efforts, we are "surrendering our birthright", just like what Esau did. And many Christians are doing just that. They're wondering: what happened Lord? I did this for you Lord, and I did that for You, went to China, Africa and Myanmar for Your missionary's sake but why am I not enjoying the blessings of a true child of God. God's favour was on Jacob because he understood the significance of a son's birthright, and he wanted it so much.
Now I'm not trying to encourage you guys to resort to all means, like what Jacob did. Because today, we don't have to. We have that birthright because of the blood of the true Lamb of God, who came to Earth in human form and died for us on the cross. But we must be conscious, always, of who we are in Christ, lest we resort to self-effort, like Esau, and relinquish that birthright.
The Lord pointed to me another illustration that really got me so excited. In Genesis 29. Jacob fled to Laban, Issac's brother in Haran because Esau sought to kill him for the two treacherous acts of deceit Jacob brought on him. And we all know the story of how Jacob wanted to marry the beautiful Rachel but was given the ugly Leah, and he worked for the cunning Laban for 14 years. So Jacob was kana conned himself too. We know the story about the spotted and streaked sheep that the "magician" Jacob created. (I tell you Jacob is an expert in genetics man. He started R&D way before Charles Darwin came up with the Theory of Evolution). And Jacob was so blessed with favour that he basically took over and multiplied whatever Laban gave him, and even took over his flocks as well!
Now here's something that happened in between these two chapters that the Lord drew me to. In Genesis 28, the Lord appeared to Jacob in a dream and he saw "a ladder set up on earth and its top touched the heaven; and there the angels of God were ascending and descending on it." (Genesis 28: 12) And there the Lord stood above it and promised Jacob that his descendants will be like the dust of the Earth, and He would be with him and keep him wherever he went.
Then Jacob said: "Surely the Lord is in this place, and I did not know it. How awesome is this place! This is none other than the house of God, and this is the gate of Heaven!" (Genesis 28: 16-17)
Then something puzzled me as to what Jacob did next. Early the next morning, Jacob took the stone that he had used as his pillow the previous night, and set it up as a pillar! And he poured oil on top of it! Come on, I hope you are getting the revelation. Who was anointed with oil before he took to the cross? Who was set up like a pillar, the Rock of our salvation?And then it was mentioned that Jacob made a vow before the Lord there before the stone. And he said:"And this stone which I have set up as a pillar shall be God's house, and of all that You gave me I will surely give a tenth to You."
Hmmm...We know that tithing was first mentioned earlier when Abraham tithed ten per cent to the Lord. We don't hear of it later, not in Issac's story but it was mentioned here again in Jacob's story.So we now know that Jacob is so highly favoured because he was always conscious of his birthright as the son of God, he was conscious of Jesus, the Son of God, and he was conscious of God's blessings in his life and he was conscious of tithing to the Lord.
Hallelujah!!! Praise the Lord!!!You may ask how can we assume Jacob ever know Jesus? Because Jesus had not appeared. But earlier when God cut the covenant with Abraham, we know that Abraham was not a participant at all.
In fact he was put to sleep by God. (Genesis 15: 12).Whatever Jacob saw or experienced in the dream, we only know this much from the text in the Bible. But we can conclude that Jacob was truly overawed by what he saw, and felt impressed sufficiently to "set up a pillar and pour oil on it" and called that place Bethel, which means the House of God. So, brothers and sisters, get excited for 2005! Because we can expect more favour in our lives, the favour that Abraham, Jacob, Joseph, David and other great men of God experienced. Because weâre the beloved children of God!
HM5...Been there, done that, don't wanna come back...(longer version)
Just got back from HM5 about 2 hours ago, had a quick shower, makan, and settled down a bit...that's when I read Peer's entries...wahhhh...so sentimental and "goose-pimples"-inducing...hahaha..okok, juz kidding Peer. (Yoz, Peer! You wanna consider joining Publications Ministry?
Okay, here's my take on HM5, hopefully, it'll make you laugh, not shed a tear...I think it was on the last night when a sister came up to me and ask: "Eh you know the first day I saw you, I thought you are 30 years old leh...I'm like...thinking...what are you doing here? And you were wearing pink some more..."Those words struck a chord...not in a negative way.
Truth be told, I'm actually quite used to it already. I think I'm somewhat a veteran of church camps, having had three church camps with my previous church and two now with New Creation. In a strange way, this is the first camp that I worship God like I never did before. Tears were flowing so freely and rapidly that for the last session, I think my tear glands spoil liao, my eyes just keep watering for the rest of the last two days.
I never knew there were so many different definitions for "kueh", which we were told, includes "han chee peng", "prata" and "soon kueh" as well. Just as well, I never really had that problem anyway. Honest. Not even in my own master bed-room. I never knew Han was such a "se lang" until Deacon reveals it and coach Maddy affirms it...hahaha...Anyway just kidding Han...I think this man's so annoited in the Ministry of Laughs...the jokes he tells can make you "chio gao beng". And yes, he's a mighty man of God. Any sister wanna say Amen to this?
There were many things I never knew before. And some I may never know (for example, what was shared during the Women's Meeting...keke).
Some of us came to this camp feeling like a total mess. Some of us were a total mess. Hey but you know what, God makes miracles out of a mess. We see ourselves as rubbish but God sees rubies in all of us. And He has the power to polish that gem out of the rubble. If there's any craftsman greater than all the artists of the Renaissance, the Michaelangelos, the Van Goghs and Picassos, it is God. And while these artisans shape from the outside, God polishes from the inside.
If there's any regret, it is that I wished I haven't started the camp, already down with flu, and I felt so weak all over and cold on the second night - so much so that I wore my Historymakers sweater to sleep, with the blanket over me.
And I still felt cold.
Had I not been ill, I would have been able to fellowship late into the night with my caregroup, been able to enjoy all the sumptuous food every meal...Oh well...God healed me on the third day (Saturday).
In more ways than one.
I had some questions before the camp and I was looking to God for answers. I remembered on the last night when Deacon and the other leaders were going around praying and annoiting us with oil. I remembered being prayed for. First by Lewis Chan. He spoke some stuff. (Of course cannot say what stuff la...this one personal mah).
Then came Adeline. And she asked if I've been prayed for. I said "Yes". But she said: "Never mind, I pray for you again k..."It felt weird but I thought:"Ok lor...double portion siah..." If this is not favour, I don't know what is. Then she spoke. I realised, there and then, that both of them spoke of the answers to my questions. And I thanked God! I really thanked God! Hallelujah!
I asked Peer later how come the oil automatically heats up when applied. He gave me a blank look, and said it's just normal olive oil. I asked that question because my face was burning, or at least my forehead was, literally. It's like suddenly having a sudden attack of fever. Peer said it could be a manifestation...I wonder...Hmmm...I'm excited.
Because I'm just waiting. And I know God gave me the thumbs up, I know God has a season for everything, I know it will surely come to pass. And I just can't wait for the things He said to me during HM5 to be fulfilled in my life. And for the record, I'm only 25 years old.
