Second Corinthians 4:13 is a well known verse. It is something very practical related to the exercise of the spirit of faith. The spirit of faith is not exercised when we only think about things. “And having the same spirit of faith according to that which is written, ‘I believed, therefore I spoke,’ we also believe, therefore we also speak.” We need to open our mouths. Faith is related to the word, to the mouth. We need to speak. Please speak! Let’s speak! Let us receive the word with “Amen, Hallelujah! Yes Lord!” Then the word which we hear may profit us. Saints, we need to gain this crucial experience to transfer us into the spiritual realm. The spiritual man knows and judges everything. If we are not transferred, we will not be able to receive things from heaven.
So, the gospel of John shows us the signs the Lord did because John was in spirit and the Spirit reminded him. Everything you are hearing, you need to take advantage of and make good use of it. John 14:25-26 says, “These things I have spoken to you while abiding with you; But the Comforter, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things and remind you of all the things which I have said to you.”
Thus, John learned to follow the Lord closely and to pay attention to His word. He learned to not only listen with his ears, but to exercise his spirit of faith, and to open his mouth and say, “Amen!” He learned to call on the name of the Lord with a burning spirit, so that the words might be burned into his being. This was John’s experience. Almost fifty years after he had heard the words the Lord had spoken to him, the Spirit Himself reminded him of what he had kept in his heart.
When we hear the word, we need to exercise our spirit. This is more important than writing everything in a notebook. The first generation of the church substituted the things of the law for Christ. The things of the law of Moses became a substitute of Christ. They preferred to keep circumcision, to keep the feasts, and to keep the dietary regulations, all those practices which were written in the Law of Moses, because they did not see that Christ was the reality of all things. The traditions annulled the effectiveness of the word of God and annulled their faith. Without faith there is no life and without life there is no work. The Lord cannot trust in human nature.
Paul gained his heavenly vision and his ministry according to the need. When he wrote his letters, he transmitted to us what he had gained from the Lord. But we also saw that his desire to lead the saints to be constituted with his vision brought him to the school of Tyrannus where he reasoned daily with those who came to hear him. In Acts chapter 28, we see Paul was imprisoned in Rome where he also remained two years receiving all those who wanted to know the things of the kingdom.
This kind of practice influenced all Christianity. It gave the impression that to serve God one needs to go to school to learn and study the truth and revelations in the scriptures. But what happened? Studying the truth became a substitute for the person of Christ; it became a substitute for a living touch with the Lord’s name and the Word. Interpretation, studying, and the pleasure of discovering new things, became a substitute for the living contact with the name and the Word of God. Little by little, they hindered people from a living contact with the person of the Lord. That’s why John wanted to bring us back to the beginning and he related the cases in his gospel.
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