(tm) Nothing shall escape the army of Christ!
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When Israel invaded Canaan they won some excellent initial victories; but soon their will to conquer began to weaken as they met determined resistance from the Philistines.
This will not be the case with Christ’s soldiers. They have been trained, trained, trained by the Holy Spirit. They are tough, well-disciplined, organized in the Spirit to perfection. They will follow Christ and none other.
Christ’s soldiers possess His love of righteousness and hatred of sin and rebellion. They are invincible and they have an unconquerable desire to please Christ. They never will show mercy to the enemies of God. They cannot be stopped or appeased. On and on they will march until every enemy of Christ has been judged and destroyed.
The appearance of them is as the appearance of horses; and as horsemen, so shall they run. (Joel 2:4)
The army of the Lord is a mobile striking force. Their charge is that of a cavalry. The horses are spiritual creatures and transport their riders with speed and strength unparalleled in the material realm. There are other passages where the same vision is described:
Thou didst walk through the sea with thine horses, through the heap of great waters. (Habakkuk 3:15)
And the armies which were in heaven followed him upon white horses, clothed in fine linen, white and clean. (Revelation 19:14)
God’s horses of war are as fierce as their riders.
He swalloweth the ground with fierceness and rage: neither believeth he that it is the sound of the trumpet. (Job 39:24)
The appearing of Christ with His mighty men will occur with the sound of a furious onslaught.
Like the noise of chariots on the tops of mountains shall they leap, like the noise of a flame of fire that devoureth the stubble, as a strong people set in battle array. (Joel 2:5)
Christ will descend from the heaven as the advance of a roaring fire that consumes everything and everyone in its path.
In flaming fire taking vengeance on them that know not God, and that obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ: (II Thessalonians 1:8)
The world will have established a well-developed culture and imposing institutions under the guidance of the lords of darkness. The culture and institutions will possess none of the saving Presence of Christ in them. They all shall be destroyed at the appearing of the Lord and His saints.
Anyone who thinks that the members of Christ’s army are anything like the double-minded, pleasure-loving, churchgoers of our day has no concept of the Divine strength and fury being created in the personalities of God’s saints in the present hour.
David had many extraordinary warriors in his army. Notable among them were the Gadites.
And of the Gadites there separated themselves unto David into the hold to the wilderness men of might, and men of war fit for the battle, that could handle shield and buckler, whose faces were like the faces of lions, and were as swift as the roes upon the mountains; (I Chronicles 12:8)
The Gadites exemplify several characteristics being created in the saints in the present hour. First, they were separated to David, that is, they gave themselves wholly to their lord.
The Gadites did not attempt to satisfy both Saul and David so they would be accepted by whichever side prospered. They chose one side. The true saints of God always must go outside the camp with Christ, bearing His reproach. In one way or another this decision will be forced on each of us.
Christ is "in the wilderness" today, and King Saul (the flesh) is on the throne. Saul tolerated the growing popularity of David as long as Saul profited and was not injured in any way. But soon Saul’s true murderous instincts for preeminence revealed themselves.
So it is today that organized Christianity may accept the gifts of the Holy Spirit. In the days to come, as the Body of Christ begins to emerge from the Saulish sectarian structures, the true nature of all sectarianism will come out of hiding and show itself to be the murderer of Christ.
How many contemporary religious organizations do we see possessing the pure desire to allow the Holy Spirit to exalt Christ to absolute preeminence in the Body of Christ?
The Gadites were men of strength and experience in battle. They were swift and courageous. The saints of today are being made strong in the Lord and in the strength of His might. The strength of the saints is the strength of faithfulness, holiness, and obedience. By many methods of His own choosing the Holy Spirit is guiding us into ever-increasing faith and strength in Christ.
Little by little we are maturing in the ability to resist the flesh, the world, and the adversary. We are gaining skill in using the shield of faith to quench the fiery arrows of the wicked one. We are learning to pray, to praise, to meditate in the Word, to look to Jesus for solutions instead of to other people. We are not as easy to frighten or to deceive as when first we were saved.
We are learning to lean on the wisdom and strength of the Lord Jesus.
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