February 12, 2021
Pieter Kirstein
The Holy Spirit spoke the following about the overcomers, to those that follows Jesus on the road of the cross in obedience unto the death of their former selfish sinful way of life lived in the flesh.
1. The call of the cross is to die to self.
2. The way of the cross is to follow Christ.
3. The purpose of the cross is to live for God.
4. The glory of the cross is to reign with Christ.
If what you speak is not a wrought out reality in your life to which you can testify, then you are a false witness.
Revelation 12:11 And they overcame him by the blood of the Lamb, and by the word of their testimony; and they loved not their lives to the death.
Focussing on the overcoming power of the blood; These have embraced the ministry of the redemptive work of the Holy Spirit by the blood of the eternal covenant. A covenant that seals the marriage between Christ and His beloved bride in death through the working of the cross and the ministry of the blood.
These abandoned love slaves continued with the Lord in His trials, being faithful, and through the cleansing power of the furnace of affliction they have been given a new heart.
A heart in total submission to God, a heart according to Isaiah 48:10 and 11 that will not touch the glory of God.
These devoted ones lives have been redeemed by the power and the working of the blood in that their souls are completely cleansed, healed and delivered of earthly defilement and by way of surrender are seated in heavenly places living a life hidden with Christ in God.
This overcoming reality is not just referring to the salvation of the blood while you carry on living in the sin and rebellion and the stubbornness of your own carnal ways. It speaks of those who appropriate the ministry of the blood by the Spirit of burning as they follow Jesus into the wilderness of testing and trying circumstances.
This is the true power and meaning of the cup of the Lord’s passion by which we are not just saved by His cross, but also allow ourselves to be slain by the cross.
After the salvation experience Jesus invites us to partake of His cup if we want to be counted worthy to receive the crown of the overcomer and a place with Him in His throne.
Mark 10:35 And James and John, the sons of Zebedee, come unto him, saying, Teacher, we would that you should do for us whatsoever we shall desire. 36 And he said unto them, What would you that I should do for you? 37 They said unto him, Grant unto us that we may sit, one on your right hand, and the other on your left hand, in your glory. 38 But Jesus said unto them, You know not what you ask: can you drink of the cup that I drink of? and be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with? 39 And they said unto him, We can. And Jesus said unto them, You shall indeed drink of the cup that I drink of; and with the baptism that I am baptized shall you be baptized: 40 But to sit on my right hand and on my left hand is not mine to give; but it shall be given to them for whom it is prepared.
Revelation 3:21 To him that overcomes will I grant to sit with Me in My throne, even as I also overcame, and sat down with My Father in His throne.
He denied himself to the will of the Father by drinking the cup of self-denial.
Mat 26:42 He went away again the second time, and prayed, saying, O My Father, if this cup may not pass away from Me, except I drink it, Your will be done.
To deny oneself by following Christ on the road of the cross is to answer the actual upward call of the Father into the maturity of manifested sonship.
The seat and the crown of the overcomer belongs to the disciples of Christ who have been brought to the end of themselves and their own ways as they pass under the rod of the Father’s discipline through seasonal trials and their own wilderness encounter.
We find the type and shadow of this in Ezekiel 20:35 And I will bring you into the wilderness of the people, and there I will enter into judgment with you face to face. 36 Just as I entered into judgment with your fathers in the wilderness of the land of Egypt, so I will enter into judgment with you, says the Lord Jehovah. 37 And I will cause you to pass under the rod, and I will bring you into the bond of the covenant.
We cannot escape the rod of the Father’s discipline and then expect to be brought into the glory and fruitfulness of mature sonship as a functioning heir.
Hebrews 12: 5 And you have already forgotten the admonition that He addresses to you as to sons: “My son, do not despise the chastening of the Lord, nor grow weary of being reproved by Him; 6 For whom the Lord loves He chastens, and He severely disciplines every son whom He receives.” 7 If you endure chastening, God is dealing with you as a Father with His sons. For who is the son whom the Father does not chasten? 8 But if you are without chastisement, of which all are partakers, then you are bastards and not sons. 9 Furthermore, we have had our fleshly fathers who chastened us, and we respected them; should we not all the more willingly be subject to the Father of spirits, and live forever? 10 For in the first case, they chastened us for a few days in whatever way seemed good to them; but in the second case, He chastens us for our own benefit that we may be partakers of His holiness. 11 Now truly, no chastisement for the present seems to be joyous, but grievous; nevertheless, afterwards it yields the peaceable fruits of righteousness to those who have been exercised by it.
His bride honors His covenant by giving themselves to Him fully in love. They allow Him to strip them of self so that they might be filled with His fullness. Our ways must die in order for His ways to live. This happens as we discover Him as our greatest of treasures in the wilderness of intimacy.
Focusing on the testimony part: They overcome by the word of their testimony means that their whole lives have been conformed to the power, the truth and the reality of the Lord’s gospel.
Their lives testifies of the reality of the overcoming truth because of their experience and faithful witness to the truth. In other words they become expressions of the Lord’s truth and victory. No experience of the truth, no testimony and experience comes through obedience by applying the truth.
First the word becomes flesh within you through your obedience and relationship-building with the Word (Jesus), next you become filled with the Holy Spirit because the Word and the Spirit are one and the Spirit manifests the life of the Word in you. Then you become the voice and the operation of the Word by the power of God through the leading of the Holy Spirit. In God you become the authority.”
Focusing on the loosing their lives unto the death of self means that they, by revelation of the Spirit, saw, tasted and live in the experiental reality of a heart that has been conquered by the love of God.
They esteem being wholly devoted to the Lover of their souls far above any earthly gain because they have discovered, through the sacrifice of all, the Lord their God as the only satisfying factor, experience and reality in their surrendered lives.
Therefore the god of this world and all of his carnal fleshly lures have lost their power to intice these devoted ones to draw them away because they perceive what this world has to offer as a total obstacle and hindrance through the eyes of love.
Their desire is that there must be no interference to their devotion to Christ because the truth and power of the cross has unlocked the joy and the freedom of His love in which is no earthly desire. By abandoning all they have gained Christ and there is no greater treasure and desire fulfilled than this.
Never lessen the glory and the crown of the overcomer to just a salvation experience.
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