From Many Comes One

Series: Other Speakers

Sun am 16 March 2014 – Shane Egypt

2 Pet. 1:12-15; 2 Pet. 1:3-9 (MSG); (Lev. 26:8); Num. 11:12-17, 26-29; Rom. 12:4-6;
(Gen. 49); Deut. 33:1; Num. 1:4; 1 Chron. 12: 21; 2 Sam. 5:1-5; 1 Cor. 12:24-26

What I will share this morning will come as a reminder.   Peter was concerned about the short-sightedness of individuals. Everything that goes into a life of pleasing God has been miraculously given to us by getting to know, personally and intimately, the One who invited us to God. The best invitation we ever received! We were also given absolutely terrific promises to pass on to you—your tickets to participation in the life of God after you turned your back on a world corrupted by lust. So don’t lose a minute in building on what you’ve been given… (2 Pet. 1:3-9). Paul refers to the spiritual qualities in your life. Without them we are shortsighted as individuals. The body is built up of individual members, so if members are short-sighted, what will happen to the whole body? God has a remedy for this concern. The Lord says.  And five of you shall chase an hundred, and an hundred of you shall put ten thousand to flight (Lev. 26:8). God in His design has built us into one another and we cannot function without each other. God has placed us in a local body with different members, all fitted together. Even when some of the members are shortsighted, others will help.

Was it I who conceived all this people? Was it I who brought them forth, that You should say to me, ‘Carry them in your bosom as a nurse carries a nursing infant, to the land which You swore to their fathers’? …The Lord therefore said to Moses, “Gather for Me seventy men from the elders of Israel, whom you know to be the elders of the people and their officers and bring them to the tent of meeting, and let them take their stand there with you. Then I will come down and speak with you there, and I will take of the Spirit who is upon you, and will put Him upon them; and they shall bear the burden of the people with you, so that you will not bear it all alone (Num. 11:12-17). God had given Moses the grace to lead his people. This burden came with many frustrations caused by the murmurs and complains of the people and he analyzed rightly that he alone was not able to carry this burden. The task was too burdensome for one man. God placed His spirit, the same Spirit which was upon Moses, on 70 elders and the officers of the elders. Even the 2 elders that were not in the tent of meeting received the Spirit because they were connected to God. But two men had remained in the camp; the name of one was Eldad and the name of the other Medad. And the Spirit rested upon them (now they were among those who had been registered, but had not gone out to the tent), and they prophesied in the camp. So a young man ran and told Moses and said, “Eldad and Medad are prophesying in the camp.” Then Joshua the son of Nun, the attendant of Moses from his youth, said, “Moses, my lord, restrain them.” But Moses said to him, “Are you jealous for my sake? Would that all the Lord’s people were prophets, that the Lord would put His Spirit upon them!” (Num. 11:26-29).

For just as we have many members in one body and all the members do not have the same function, so we, who are many, are one body in Christ, and individually members one of another. Since we have gifts that differ according to the grace given to us, each of us is to exercise them accordingly (Rom. 12:4-6). Each of us has to exercise our gifts accordingly.

I am looking at the different things that God has imparted into your life through spiritual fathers. When Jacob blessed his sons who became the twelve tribes of Israel, he bestowed upon them different graces and gifts (Gen. 49:1-28). He blessed every one with a blessing appropriate to them (Deut. 33:1), each one different from the other and each of them fulfilling different functions. God has given us to one another and we are connected in the spirit. Let us recognize the different graces amongst us. There are various functions, God loves variety. He designed us in a way that we are fitted together, that we can function optimally in the Body of Christ. Whereas our more presentable members have no need of it. But God has so composed the body, giving more abundant honor to that member which lacked, so that there may be no division in the body, but that the members may have the same care for one another. And if one member suffers, all the members suffer with it; if one member is honored, all the members rejoice with it (1 Cor. 12:24-26).

We need to walk in the corporate mandate that God has given this household. God has blessed all of your lives by speaking through a father-ministry. He has affected all our lives, but it needs to be for a certain purpose and function. My call and concern is that we will move away from the shortsightedness. God is transitioning us to another level so we need one another.

Pastor Kobus: We are a corporate body, each one carrying a different grace gift. Divisions in the body are demonic; diversity is divine. We don’t major on differences; we see the diversities and appreciate that. It has been proven that God loves diversity. The twelve apostles were different from each other. Jesus chose his twelve disciples because of the diversity and variety of gifts. I want to appeal to this household to accept one another as Christ has accepted you. Make room for each other and appreciate the diversity.