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The Endame

Two. If you are like me, you want to know where what you are doing is headed. What is the endgame? Why does God work in our lives the way He does? Does He have a plan? Does He know what I am going through?

Strengthening the disciples and encouraging them to remain true to the faith. "We must go through many hardships to enter the kingdom of God," they said. (Acts 14:22)

Yes, He indeed does. During the first six days of creation, God planned opportunities for every one of His creatures, man and beast. And then He rested.

The Spirit and Word of God are directing and energizing that plan, and it is proceeding towards God’s goal. The plan encompasses the beginning of the world through to the coming down of the glorified Christian Church to the new earth, and then what shall take place throughout the endless ages after that.

The work is finished. Your task and my task is to enter the opportunities already in place for my life and your life. We have to endeavour every day to enter that finished work, that rest of God. There is a temptation to create our own plan and destiny, and that is unprofitable at best; tragic at worst. There is a goal, an endgame, for you and for me. The endgame is well worth the battle!

Your eyes saw my unformed body. All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be. (Psalms 139:16)

I have given a lot of thought to God’s goal, toward what He is working. While I was in Bible school, as a fairly new Christian, not having been raised in a Christian home, I was open to the teaching and assumptions of the teachers in the Bible school; and also to the assumptions of church people generally.

What was coming across to me is that God has no plan. He has made provision on the cross of Calvary for our salvation (whatever "salvation" is or means), but He has left it largely up to us to burn ourselves out, if necessary, to tell people the Good News so they will escape Hell and go to Heaven when they die. There really is no Divine plan in place. Salvation is kind of open-ended. This is what I was taught.

If this were true, there would be no "rest of God," as mentioned in the Book of Hebrews, because the works were not finished from the beginning of the world. There is room for all sorts of creativity and spontaneity.

Being a conscientious sort of individual, I could not live with the idea that God has no specific plan for me or for anyone else, other than: "Go out and compel them to come in."

I tried to do the Evangelical thing. I endeavoured to force myself to "testify to everyone you meet." I had a good friend in Bible school who did this successfully. I was not as successful.

One morning, while standing in line for breakfast at a base in Hawaii, during World War Two, I was labouring under the burden that I was to "testify" to everyone. This was before I was in Bible school. I turned to a tall Marine behind me and said, "I want to tell you what Christ has done for me."

The tall Marine said, "What has Christ done for you?" Do you know, I could not think of one blessed thing. I was tongue-tied. Maybe you could have thought of something. I turned back around and moved forward with my canteen cup so the Marine on KP could dip into the big can and pour out some coffee for me.

I had a few other similar experiences, and finally said to myself: "If the whole world goes to Hell, then that’s where it goes. If God doesn’t know what He is doing, how am I supposed to know?"

Later, in Bible school, I promised the Lord that if He would give me the grace, I would do anything He said. I have kept this promise to the present day. I was twenty-four years old then. I am eighty-four years old now. God always has enabled me to do whatever He is requiring.

I think some people have come to Christ because of my preaching and personal testimony. But whatever gifts I have are primarily in the realm of encouraging God’s people to live a victorious life.

I am interested in God’s endgame. I know by now that God has a very specific plan for each person and each sparrow, from the beginning and then throughout all eternity; from the beginning of history throughout the endless ages of ages.

Maybe you don’t believe God is that great or that specific. Well, I know He is; so I am seeking to find His will each moment and live in it. This is the "rest" of God.

The forty-seventh chapter of the Book of Ezekiel speaks of the four levels of the Holy Spirit, of the Water of Life.

The first level is water to the ankles, representative of our initial salvation.

The second level is water to the knees. This is representative of our learning to commit our life to the Spirit of God.

The third level is water to the waist. This is a portrayal of the believer who turns away from life lived in the flesh. He keeps saying, "Not my will, but Yours." He loves not his life to the point of death to his plans and ambitions.

The Charismatic movement, as I see it, is between the knees and the waist. The majority of believers are supposed to use their gifts and go out and save the world; at least that is what they are being encouraged to do. The minority of believers are waiting in their prison, learning to listen to Jesus and obey Him sternly in every circumstance.

You ought to see the dear Pentecostal people draw back when they realize they are not going to be able to live any longer according to their own plans, that is, if they want to enter the third level of the Water of Life.

But I am speaking now about the endgame. The endgame is the fourth level. It is waters to swim in, a river that cannot be crossed.

A person can attain to the third level, and rejoice that he or she is experiencing a greater measure of the Spirit of God.

But the third level leads, for those who are willing to surrender their life completely, to waters to swim in, a river that cannot be crossed. The River is endless. It is eternal.

When we get as far as "all the Fullness of God," the Spirit of God leads us back to the bank of the River. What does this mean? It means that God wants us to forget about our own spiritual prowess and become a tree of life.

Now we are to lose our life in God and other people. People can come to us and receive of Christ. I do not mean they can learn doctrine. I mean they can receive of the Life of Christ so they can live in the Presence of God. Also, if they have been wounded in body, soul, spirit, or emotions, they can be healed. The Sprit of God and the Bride (which we have become because we live by Christ’s body and blood) say, "Come. Whoever will may come and eat and drink of the very Life of God which is in Christ."

This is the endgame. God has an eternal tabernacle through which He can govern and bless His creatures. We possess God, Christ, the Holy Spirit, and those of God’s creatures whom He entrusts to us.

Our nation, the United States, no longer is as we have known it. It slowly but surely is being internationalized. We can fight this transition if we wish, and seek to resurrect the "good old days" of Shirley Temple, Roy Rogers, and the Hardy Boys. "Over the fields and through the woods we go to Grandmother’s house so we can raid the cookie jar."

However, the empire of America is passing away, as happened to the empires of the Sumerians and the Hittites. Empires rise and fall so that God’s will shall be accomplished in mankind.

I have gone to the Lord many times, but He never has told me He is going to restore the "good old days" in the United States. What has He told you?

But God also has told me that the darker it becomes in our land, the brighter will be the Light that God has prepared for us, and for all members of His Body throughout the world. That Light, that new and surprising thing of which Christ has spoken, is the establishing of the Throne of God in the heart of every Christian who will press past the sin and foolishness of our culture and listen to Jesus and obey Him diligently.

How do you feel about all this? Are you going to fret yourself when public nakedness, incest, and bestiality are protected by law? Or are you going to turn to Jesus and discover that when sin abounds, grace does much more abound. I have made my decision, and I invite you to share Christ’s stunning victory with me.

For anyone who enters God's rest also rests from his own work, just as God did from his. (Hebrews 4:10)


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