Spring 1995
Choosing Life or Death
Nancy Warner

"I know thy works that thou hast a name that
thou livest and art dead. Be watchful and
strengthen the things which remain that are
ready to die for I have not found thy works
perfect before God. Remember therefore how
thou hast received and heard and hold fast
and repent" Rev 3:1b-2.

"If by any means I might attain unto an
resurrection out from among the living
dead" Phil 3:8 (Greek Interlinear).

David had recognized the anointing upon Saul as king, and had observed the favor of God rest upon Saul's life. But after his disobedience to the Word of the Lord, David watched the growing torment as the anointing departed from Saul.

No wonder David, with a repentant spirit before the Lord, prayed many times that the Holy Spirit would not depart from him. He had learned to highly value the presence of the Lord.

Moses pleaded for the presence of the Lord by praying that if the Lord Himself would not go with them into the land of promise, he did not want to be sent, regardless of the promise of victory. He too, greatly valued the presence of the Lord.

The church at Sardis was pronounced dead even though it seemed to some that they lived. But the presence of the Lord was lacking in their midst. Not only that, but the anointing that did remain was about to die also. They were admonished to repent, to remember how they had been quickened and received the living Word, and to hold fast to and value the "little" that remained.

There is little that we can say or do without the anointing, we are spiritually dead. As a result, church becomes a mere program rather than the expression and outworking of a living relationship with a personal God.

Cultivating an anointing in our lives requires that we spend much time in the Lord's presence and maintain a pattern of consistent uprightness, that the presence of the Lord might abide within us and flow unhindered through us.

Also, we must have right relationships with each other. It is our love for one another that perfects the love of God within us, and causes us to abide in the light, giving no occasion of stumbling in our hearts. Paul said,

"If by any means I might attain unto the resurrection
of the dead. Not as though I had already attained,
either were already perfect: but I follow after, if
that I may apprehend that for which also I am
apprehended of Christ Jesus ... I press toward the
mark for the prize of the high calling of God in
Christ Jesus" Phil 3:11-12, 14.

Rather than remaining satisfied with the fact of his salvation, Paul desired to come to a place of communion with the Lord that would lead to his personally knowing Him. He desired to so die to his own ways that he would experience "the power of His resurrection" and enter a level of identification with Him in which he could share in "the fellowship of His sufferings."

1 John 3:14 tells us, "We know that we have passed from death unto life, because we love the brethren. He that loveth not his brother abideth in death." As we truly come to know the Lord and experience His presence and anointing, a change takes place within our hearts that enables us to become more like Him. Only then will we be able to intercede, love, and even lay down our lives for one another.

Through our fellowship with the Lord, we enter into a higher experience of communion with Him which then affects all those lower relationships. Earthly things become but "refuse" to us for the excellency of knowing Him.

Paul said that we are to "let nothing be done through strife or vain glory; but in the lowliness of mind let each esteem other better than themselves" Phil 2:3.

As those in Sardis, we can settle for a name and be dead, or we can contend for the anointing. The Lord is looking for places where He can abide and for clear channels through which He can move. He is building a temple with living stones.

The habitation that the Lord desires cannot come forth from any single stone, but rather through the joining together of "stones" which are of the same substance as Him, which results in the Head being joined to the body. He is causing us to become witnesses, or samples of Him, a habitation of God through the Spirit.

The Lord is calling for a people to come higher, out of the soul realm. He is calling us out of the land of emotional reactions into the Kingdom of Godly decisions, where all that we say and do is motivated by the will of the Father; and where our love toward the brethren is constant and able to lift them toward the Lord's highest and best.

It takes the power of His resurrection to know the fellowship of His sufferings. Otherwise we respond on an emotional level instead of entering into the purpose of the Lord in spirit and in prayer.

The "overcomer" is to sit with the Lord in His Throne. To the Church in Philadelphia, which is the Church of "brotherly love," the Lord speaks of an open door. He is calling us to respond on a higher level to the pressures of daily living, that there might be a birthing within the church.

There is a passing from death unto life, an out-resurrection from among the living dead into a new life in Christ Jesus, where we are no longer spiritually dead, but quickened by the Holy Spirit, we then become channels for His presence to flow out to others. He is seeking such, those who will deny themselves and follow Him to the Throne.