Mrs. Hall meets Jesus

[Seeker]

Words of wonder from RK! Masterfully written, but oh, so obvious! This one is titled: Easter: Delivered from other gospels...(all except good ol' Unkie Vic's Gospel!) 15, May 2022...slightly (just slightly folks!) edited

Introduction

It has been a wonderful weekend; wonderful to sing together and a real blessing to learn the songs that we can continue to sing together in our homes and in the many settings of agape fellowship that we will enjoy, in the coming days and weeks.

It really is lovely to have Lach and Mel with us. I appreciate that they have committed to bring the song of the Lord to us. They labour to put the word of the Lord to song, so that we can enjoy it. So, thank you for your labour over many years.

The word ‘exhortation’ has the suggestion of briefness about it; however, this is a slightly extended exhortation today.

I want to focus on one of the key elements of the weekend and will draw my thoughts from each of the two Easter publications.

The Lord wants to deliver us

There is a thought in the preface to The Freedom of Choice; fellowship at the tree of life which emphasises the present reality that the Lord wants to deliver us from loyalty to gospels and doctrinal understandings from our past.

Through the course of the weekend, we have heard that the Lord wants to bring this deliverance. That is where I will focus our thoughts this morning. There is deliverance that the Lord wants to minister regarding other gospels and doctrinal understandings from our past.

Uncertainty comes when we mix the word of God

We read in the preface that a person ‘runs with uncertainty’ when their reception of God’s word, which should be ‘a lamp to their feet’ and ‘a light to their path’, is filtered through other gospels and doctrinal understandings.

It is filtered by our enduring attachment to ‘other gospels’. If I asked you to put up your hand if you still hold firm to another gospel, I suspect that not many of us would put our hands up. That is because not many of us would wake each morning, taking the view that we are holding on to another gospel.

Yesterday, Allan Wills spoke about the matter of blindness. A person who is physically blind knows that they are blind, and they accordingly put in place appropriate measures to assist them in navigating their way through life.

But, when we are spiritually blind, we do not wake up with a view or the awareness that we are blind.

Illumination regarding our mixture is essential

I want to put before us today, regarding our allegiance, or loyalty, to another gospel, that unless the Lord breaks into us with an illumination, we will grope in the dark, wondering what on earth we are going on about.

You may think, ‘Of course, I am committed to this fellowship. Of course, I am committed to this church. I am here this weekend. Isn’t that enough proof that the gospel that is being proclaimed is my gospel?’

The Lord wants to break in upon us today. He wants us to understand and to see, by illumination, that there is indeed another gospel which we have been loyal to and to which we have committed ourselves. It sits under the layers of life that we live.

He wants to meet us today. This is the point that I want to begin with.

Mixture hinders our participation

We have learned from Christ Himself that only agape fellowship in a lampstand church gives a person access to eat from the tree of life which is in the midst of the New Jerusalem.

The implication of this is that those who hold fast to their doctrinal loyalties, and maintain their factions, will be removed from His church by ‘the sword’ of His mouth.

Jesus is making it very clear to us at this time, that the word of the cross is the sword of His mouth, which cuts out of His church those who maintain their allegiance to doctrines that are contrary to the culture of the agape meal and its fellowship.

The sword of the Spirit cuts us in or out

It is not that a person will come and ask you where to find the closest exit door.

It is Christ Himself, by the word of His cross, who cuts ones out.

It will look as though you are deciding to step out. It is, in fact, the Lord Himself who removes the other gospel and the other conversation that is not fundamentally the meal and the fellowship of


His agape table.

This morning, I want to exhort the church to give urgent attention to His word. Believing this word is how you will receive illumination to see the loyalty and the allegiance that you have maintained to another gospel.

Alternative gospels

There is a particular alternative gospel that I want to address this morning.

We will first review our growing understanding of the agape meal and the nature of our participation, which the Lord has been teaching us over this past season. What a precious season it has been.

To do this, I would like you to give attention to the fourteenth chapter of the Gospel of Luke. I would love you, in the coming days, to meditate around this chapter. It is a tremendous passage, particularly in the light of the word of present truth.

The context of this passage is a meal that was hosted at the home of a prominent Pharisee. Jesus was invited to this meal. During the meal, Jesus addressed three key points in relation to the agape meal.

The first was to tell the parable of the guests. The parable of the guests!

Second, Jesus went on to describe how to host an agape meal.

Then, finally, Jesus told the parable of the great supper. It is this parable that plays an important part in the meditation before us today.

You will find in the second publication, The Restoration and Culture of the Kingdom of God, that a significant portion is devoted to the understanding of that parable.

Lessons from the guests at the wedding feast

Concerning the parable of the guests, let us briefly make mention of this. Jesus observed how the guests selected where they sat as they arrived for the meal. People came to this lovely, grand house. Jesus was seated and watched how people came in to take their seats.

He proceeded to tell the story of the wedding feast, where people presumed to take the seat of greatest honour as they entered. However, He said that they would be humiliated by the host, who had to come to them to adjust their choice of seating when a person more honourable than they had arrived. It would have been a little awkward, wouldn’t it?

This was the story that Jesus told the group who were seated there.

Immediately, you would have felt uncomfortable with the seat that you had selected.

Jesus made this very important point: upon what basis did you choose where you sat?

Today, He wants to make a really important point for us about the agape meal, because the issue was presumption, presumption of how we participate in the agape meal. What is the nature of your participation?

Lessons from the wrong wedding garment

This immediately connects us to the parable of the wedding feast in the Gospel of Matthew, where a certain man presumed to enter the wedding feast, minus an appropriate wedding garment.

Importantly, the accounts of the wedding feast parable, in both Matthew and Luke, addressed the same issue − the issue of presumption; the sin of presumption.

Presumption demonstrates that we are not aware of our sanctification. More than that, it demonstrates that we do not honour and respect the sanctification of others.

I want to make this simple point; however, it is a major issue if you are to participate in the agape meal.

If you do not know the nature of your sanctification, the call of God upon your life; if you are unaware and unable to honour and respect the sanctification of another, it will be a very difficult scenario of meeting, knowing, and expressing love to one another in the agape fellowship. This point is being highlighted for us and we need to give attention to it.

Lessons about hosting an agape meal

Jesus then directed His next comment to the Pharisee who hosted the meal.

He said, ‘When you give a dinner or a supper, do not ask your friends, your brothers, your relatives, nor your rich neighbours lest they also invite you back, and you be repaid. But when you give a feast, invite the poor, the maimed, the lame, the blind. And you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you; for you shall be repaid at the resurrection.’ Luk 14 12-14.


Jesus emphasised that the agape meal was not a social occasion, nor was it a trading exercise.

Again, if I asked you, ‘Is it your motivation to come to church on Sunday or to meet during the week to have an agape meal, with an undercurrent of trading as a part of your motivation’, not one person would say, ‘Yes, that is exactly what I do.’

None of us do that. But we are urged to avoid the temptation of inventing a new sacrament.

Mixing the word to suit our wants and needs

Wherever the word of the Lord is proclaimed, there is always the inclination to take hold of it and ‘build it into our program’. We do this by handling the word and ‘programming’ it so that it fits us and fits our needs. It fits our family, and it fits conveniently into our program.

The word is no longer our reference point. We now utilise the word as a resource to support our need.

The Lord is challenging this matter in us.

Agape fellowship is not a social occasion; it is not a trading exercise.

We are urged to avoid this inclination, this human propensity, to invent a new sacrament.

We are urged to put off the expectation of a neat and tidy interaction at His meal table; or, worse, of seeking validity or affirmation for our good religious performance, individually or as a family, at the agape meal.

Jesus is challenging this presentation; this performance.

He is calling us to register that there are not some things to share at the agape meal, and then different things that are kept for a private confessional with an ‘important’ leader in the church.

Much of our pastoral care in the church appropriately sits within an agape meal.

It is not just, for example, ten per cent of things that we think might be good to share.

Faith for life from the agape meal

We receive faith for life and for daily realities, in the agape meal.

We sang the song today that we are ‘speaking to one another’. I wrote it down because I did not want to forget it. ‘Lord, we’re hearing Your word in the mouth of our brethren.’

A messenger is proclaiming the word.

Then, in the agape meal fellowship, there is multiplication of the capacity and grace of God, in that context. My brethren are speaking and ministering life to me; faith to me.

The Lord asks us to press in; to put off the face-saving approach that has continued to allow shame to be our motivation, and to press beyond.

Do not be partial

Now, there is a need for discretion; for appropriateness, in our speaking.

However, there is something more that the Lord is asking of us. That is to open our hearts to receive the word that is ministered to us.

When this word is in our heart, in our mouth, in the fellowship − the agape meal − it ministers grace for edification and healing to one another. Our focus is upon another.

We are not to look around to ensure that we avoid the poor, the maimed, the lame and the blind, in preference to gathering at a table with those whom we prefer. That would be choosing our neighbours, our friends. I think He said ‘rich’ neighbours, not ‘poor’ neighbours. We must register the partiality in that, which is another gospel.

Operating according that mode does not put the body of Christ first. Rather, it is putting you first − your family, your comfort, your needs. It is a kind of fraternising for mutual benefit.

Do you see how, in this way, the word of the Lord is tidied up and utilised as a method or a mechanism for a new religious experience?

That is our natural propensity, but the Lord wants to bring illumination to us.

Excuses for not joining the agape meal

The third point that the Lord then focused on, which He spoke to the Pharisee about, was that there was an invitation to a great supper. Luk 14:15-23.

This is a fascinating parable. Three excuses were put forward as to why those ones could not respond to the invitation to attend the agape meal.

When one of those reclining with Him heard this, he said to Jesus, ‘Blessed is everyone who will eat [at the feast] in the kingdom of God!’ Luk 14:15.

What a beautiful statement; blessed is everyone who will eat at the feast in the kingdom of God!


Jesus replied, ‘A certain man prepared a great banquet, and invited many guests. And when it was time for that banquet, he sent his servant.’

The man who prepared the banquet was the Father, who sent His Servant, Jesus Christ, to tell those who had been invited, ‘Come, for everything is now ready.’

However, one after another, they began to make excuses. The first said, ‘I have bought a field, and I need to go and see it. Please excuse me.’

Another said, ‘I have bought five yoke of oxen, and I am going to try them out. Please excuse me.’

Still another said, ‘I have married a wife, so I cannot come.’

The servant returned and reported all this to the master. Then the owner of the house became angry and said to his servant, ‘Go out quickly into the streets and alleys of the city, and bring in the poor, the crippled, the blind, and the lame.’

‘Sir’, the servant replied, ‘What you ordered has been done, and there is still room.’

So the master told his servant, ‘Go out to the highways and to the hedges, and compel them to come in, so that my house will be full. For I tell you, not one of those men who were invited and made an excuse will taste my banquet will taste My supper.’

This parable describes three primary excuses that a person will offer in their refusal to participate in the agape meal.

They are, ‘I have bought a piece of land’; ‘I have bought five yoke of oxen’; and ‘I have married a wife’, so I cannot come.

Marriage culture and the agape meal

I want to focus on the third one. ‘I have married a wife so I cannot come.’

Why on earth would marrying a wife have prevented him attending that great banquet? If it were you, why wouldn’t you bring your wife with you to the banquet?

To answer this, we need to look at the very first marriage.

I will be very conversational here, because I will not have time to ‘drill down’ into the Scriptures in detail. But all of this is contained in the word that has been committed to you in the two publications.

The Fall and our marriage cultures

As we look at the first marriage, I want to make the point up front that getting married was not the problem.

The problem was the fallen culture of the marriage covenant.

It turns out that Adam gave a very similar response to Yahweh when he himself was a ‘no-show’ at the daily agape meal that he had been enjoying for 4000 years. We heard that this weekend. Adam was a no-show.

She fed me and I did not need Your meal

Adam said, ‘This woman You gave me.’

‘She fed me, and I was no longer engaged or in need of Your meal. She fed me another food source. And I was no longer in need of the food that You fed me.’

The excuse is not that we do not sit on a Sunday morning, next door or downstairs, or in the local venues where we gather. It is not that you do not sit and do not connect and congregate. It is not that you do not talk.

Your participation in the agape meal is not that you are physically present.

It is not that you are not in the venue. It is not that you are not seated around a table.

Rather, it is that you are eating another food source.

You are finding energy in another context.

You are not compelled by the word of God as the only means by which you are then being fed and proceeding from.

The simple reason why the man would not come to the great supper was because he had already chosen to eat what his wife had given him. Instead of receiving the Lord’s provision in the agape meal, he preferred the food that she fed him.

By implication, he had committed himself to serve his wife’s agenda and to meet her expectations.

Sons of God choose the food that He supplies

In this present season, we have considered why Adam chose to eat the food that was offered to him by his wife.

The key point is that Adam had not chosen to be a son of the Father.


As such, he had not chosen to live by every word that proceeded from the mouth of God.

If Adam had made this choice, he would not have viewed Eve’s proposition as being an alternative to the truth. It is the same for us. When we make a choice, it immediately rules out every other alternative.

When he was put under pressure, we see what Adam’s choice was. Under pressure, we see what we choose. This is what the Lord is helping us with this weekend.

Alternative sources of food energise our fallen goals

The failure to choose sonship was the underlying problem for the man in the parable of the great supper. Instead, he chose to eat the food that his wife offered him, with the most obvious implication of serving her agenda.

This was because it was more palatable for him. How so? It was because he believed that he would receive the necessary energy from this food to achieve his goals and aspirations, including a happy and harmonious marriage.

This man, just like Adam, was reliant upon his success, and his wife’s affirmation, to verify the projection that he had created for himself.

There is a powerful, and an all-encompassing, gospel that many have remained loyal to that has kept many Christian people in captivity.

The word ‘gospel’ means ‘good news’. For many of us, our primary pursuit in this lifetime has been the pursuit of a good and happy marriage within a church community.

The Scripture reads, ‘He who finds a wife finds a good thing’. So the good news that you have believed and pursued is the ‘good’ of acquiring a good marriage.

But the Lord asks the question: ‘What image of marriage have you chosen?’

What image of marriage have you chosen? Is it His image of marriage; or is it your self-defined image of marriage?

Christ knocks on the door of our marriages

Let us remind ourselves of how Christ has come to us in this past season. He has come, knocking on the door of each home, desiring to come in to sup with you to share His meal with you. This is the Laodicean account, isn’t it? Rev 3:14-22.

I want you to register this: Christ has been on the outside of your house.

He has been on the outside of His church.

He has been knocking on the door with the desire to come in and share His agape meal with you.

But the whole matter that we must realise with the Laodicean church is that He was on the outside. Why was He on the outside?

It is because we are sustained by another gospel on the inside.

He wants to sustain you by His word. He wants to feed you His meal, which is the meal and sustenance of a son of God, so that you might grow and fulfil and know the fullness of what He is calling you forward in.

The Lord asserts that we feed from another source

Now, hear this. The Lord is inviting you today to His agape meal. That is the good news!

But here is the sober point that we can no longer ignore.

The Lord wants to illuminate you to the fact that you are still sustained by another food source, which is another gospel.

Praise the Lord that, by His prevenient grace, you are being made free. We sang about it today. In your marriage, you are being freed from the bond of iniquity created by the impediments caused by the inertia of your history.

His word is to be the food of sons of God

Today, you can choose to accept His invitation to live by every word that proceeds from His mouth.

Scripture makes it clear: if you continue to prefer another gospel − the gospel of a fallen marriage meal, which is the image of a self-defined marriage covenant − the Master will proclaim, ‘You will not taste My supper.’

Allan Wills said to us yesterday that ‘our eyes are open’ when we hear and believe the word that is being spoken. Amen!

A portion of the Spirit

The Lord did not choose fallen romance which is based in trading, as the basis for marriage in His image and likeness.

What, then, is the true romantic model for marriage, which the Lord God has chosen for us?

If we have received and enjoyed the fellowship and ministry of the word, we know that it requires a portion of the Spirit, through connection to the order of headship at the tree of life.


What is the nature of the remnant, or portion, of the Spirit in a marriage?

It begins with two sons of God − a man and a woman − who have been born from above, baptised into Christ and filled with the Holy Spirit.

They obtain a portion of the Spirit as heirs together of the grace of life as they participate in the dialogue of fellowship at the tree of life.

The apostles’ doctrine

This means that they continue together in the apostles’ doctrine.

Those that ‘feared the Lord spoke to one another’.

They meet in fellowship concerning the apostles’ doctrine, which informs the culture of their conversation and interaction.

They are in fellowship, through the blood of Christ, which is operative to cleanse them from sin.

They participate in the breaking of bread as they care for and nourish one another.

And they are in the dialogue of prayer, daily together, as they begin the day.

Through this dialogue at the tree of life and in the fellowship of one Spirit, they receive a remnant, or a portion, of the Spirit.

This portion of the Spirit, which is unique to their marriage covenant, equips them for the works through which the life of God is multiplied in the family to their children; and then overflows as a blessing to other houses. This is house to house life, isn’t it?

From this one-Spirit fellowship, the man is endowed with grace for the diversity of expression that belongs to his identity as a head and as a husband and a father.

Likewise, the woman, proceeding from this one-Spirit fellowship, is endowed with the grace for the diversity that belongs to her expression as the centre of her house, as a wife, and as a mother.

[Stargazer]

Could someone please interpret this to me??? Is this a normal Vic Hall sermon? I think I started snoring half way through it!,

[BreakFree]

Its hard to interpret jibberish, with lots of jargon but no actual meaning. This is classic CF sermons a complete word salad.
Cults in general are good at making people shut down their critical thinking. So if they make it sound really intelligent, throw lots of unrelated bible verses together as a form of intimidation people are less likely to question it, for fear of being reprimanded for not being in the spirit enough or relying on human wisdom to obtain the things of God.

[guest]

Col 4:4. Teachers should be proclaiming the gospel clearly. That sermon is not clear.

[guest]

The sermon has numerous references to congregants having ‘another gospel’. But the gospel of Jesus was not even mentioned.

Also, I don’t think it’s sound biblical interpretation to say that the man didn’t come to the great feast because he had ‘another gospel’ in his marriage. This is pure BCFism being forced on the text.

The doctrine on agape meals is very problematic. But even worse, this is the kind of sermon that provides an avenue for vicious narcissists to drive a wedge through families and marriages. This topic is very triggering for some, and no doubt, it will be triggering for some reading through the above. Please be kind and compassionate to those have been affected by the actions of those speaking this false doctrine.

[Dexter]

I’ve learned to be very careful with the way I read and criticise RFI publications. There is too much truth in them to throw them out wholesale, but like fish they are full of tiny ‘bones’ that are deceptively hard to see but have the potential to choke the life out of you if swallowed.

(I’m praying a blessing over the congregation, and all of us ‘scattered sheep’ too, that we will be delivered from deception, that our eyes will be opened, so that we can rightly divide the truth from the lies.)

There is a lot of good in meeting with brothers and sisters to open up about your life and receive encouragement and edification. Actually, it’s critical that we do it regularly. But consider the following mandates regarding the Agape Meal:

put off the expectation of a neat and tidy interaction at His meal table

there are not some things to share at the agape meal, and then different things that are kept for a private confessional with an ‘important’ leader

Now, there is a need for discretion; for appropriateness, in our speaking.

However, there is something more that the Lord is asking of us. That is to open our hearts to receive the word that is ministered to us.

Seems good and normal right? Well, when you know how these guys operate, you know that the danger is in the hidden message (the fish bones). In this case it goes something like this:

“Tell us everything about yourself, in front of everyone. Keep it clean, but keep no secrets. Then, once we know all of your secrets, which you freely told us (under compulsion) in front of several witnesses (so that you can’t deny it later), we will have leverage over you and will be able to tell you what to think, what to say, and what to do.”

If I’m not mistaken, public confessions are a typical strategy used within abusive cults to humiliate, de-individualise, and control their members.

_____________________________

On another note, I’m not sure if anyone else has picked this up, but there is something I just noticed about all of the RFI “present truths”. As they are only penned by the presbytery for the congregation, they can be read as a confession from the presbyters to the congregation:

The Lord wants to break in upon us today. He wants us to understand and to see, by illumination, that there is indeed another gospel which we have been loyal to and to which we have committed ourselves. It sits under the layers of life that we live.

Wherever the word of the Lord is proclaimed, there is always the inclination to take hold of it and ‘build it into our program’. We do this by handling the word and ‘programming’ it so that it fits us and fits our needs. It fits our family, and it fits conveniently into our program.

The word is no longer our reference point. We now utilise the word as a resource to support our need.

There you have it. In plain sight. The men have confessed that they have been loyal to, and committed themselves to, another gospel. And they’ve confessed that they have manipulated the Word of God to support their own needs. That’s their confession, not yours. Don't agree with it. They constantly try to get you to come into agreement with their confessions so that you come under the same condemnation that they’re under. Don’t do it. Separate yourself from their ungodliness.

”Therefore submit to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you.“
‭‭James‬ ‭4‬:‭7‬ ‭NKJV‬‬

[guest]

Dexter,
You do not need to be careful criticizing this stuff.

If you mix a bucket of ice cream with a cup of dog poo, the resultant mixture will be more like dog poo than than ice cream.

When things are contamininated like this, it is best to throw the whole lot out.

pw.

[guest]

We have learned from Christ Himself that only agape fellowship in a lampstand church gives a person access to eat from the tree of life which is in the midst of the New Jerusalem.

The implication of this is that those who hold fast to their doctrinal loyalties, and maintain their factions, will be removed from His church by ‘the sword’ of His mouth.

Jesus is making it very clear to us at this time, that the word of the cross is the sword of His mouth, which cuts out of His church those who maintain their allegiance to doctrines that are contrary to the culture of the agape meal and its fellowship.

The sword of the Spirit cuts us in or out

.

Quote from Victor Hall to Richard Kaa NOT Christ Himself.


How can any of us know what is true and what is false?

Jesus Christ is truth. The Word of God is truth.

No man alive can claim to have the power to dictate who will be ‘in or out’.

Salvation is not under the control of the administration of the Lampstand mob!!!

Salvation is in Christ alone. There is no man between us and God except Jesus Christ.

DO NOT BELIEVE THESE LIES

[Dexter]

Dexter,
You do not need to be careful criticizing this stuff.

If you mix a bucket of ice cream with a cup of dog poo, the resultant mixture will be more like dog poo than than ice cream.

When things are contamininated like this, it is best to throw the whole lot out.

pw.

Fair point. I never thought about it like that.

[Dexter]

You know what, I can't deal with this (brown ice cream) anymore.

Should auld acquaintance be forgot,
And never brought to mind?

Yes.

Happy New Year.