ONE BREAD – ONE BODY
“For WE, though many, ARE one bread and one body;
FOR we all partake of that one bread”
I CORINTHIANS 10:17
Love is the fruit of a relationship with Christ. Love surpasses knowledge, rejoices with the truth, stands for truth, and knows that the only hope for anyone to be truly free, truly righteous, and truly like the Son is by the ministration of truth. Where truth is neglected the corresponding result will be a “love” which will lack the holiness and power of His Presence. I cannot know what love is except in the true knowledge of God. Truth is my only hope for knowing what LOVE really is.
Love is the selfless and pure expression of the God who so loved the world that HE gave His only Son. That same Love that gave The Only Begotten Son is the same God who in total holiness and impartiality is the judge of all men. All the heavens and they that dwell there are awestruck with the Holiness, the Righteousness, and the Omnipotence of His Majesty. The holy angels who have never known sin or rebellion shield themselves from His glorious penetrating light; such a contrast with the apathy and religion of today. Where there is no unity in the midst of God’s people there will be little or no glory.
In every case of unity in both the Old and New Testaments, there was God’s glory to such an extent that men were bowed and the heavens were opened. The unity PRECEDES the moving of God. On the day of Pentecost, they were in ONE ACCORD prior to the outpouring of the Holy Spirit. We read in the Old Testament that when the singers and dancers were of ONE Voice the Glory of God fell (2 Chronicles 5:13). May we hear afresh His Word to us.
“And he spake also a parable unto them; “No one tears a piece from a new garment and puts it on an old garment. If he does, he will tear the new, and the piece from the new will not match the old. And no one puts new wine into old wineskins. If he does, the new wine will burst the skins and it will be spilled, and the skins will be destroyed…”
LUKE 5:35-38
The New Wine will not be poured out into old wineskins. They are old, inflexible, and weak. They have become rigid and have a form of righteousness that cannot be changed. God is not in the renovating business; HE TRANSFORMS anyone who dares walk in truth and in the light. His Love does not compromise with sin and religion. He cleansed the temple in His Day and He has not changed!
In His day men and women were satisfied with their paltry offerings, the money changers, and “business” of religion. Even the disciples (prior to Pentecost) were found marveling at the temple buildings in their day. Yet Jesus declared that there will not be left one stone of that old order. For the new was ready to break forth upon the grounds of the pure sacrifice of the LAMB OF GOD. Now it is a temple not made with hands; a living temple made up of living stones mortared together by the simplicity of the LOVE of God. Men no longer build their own edifices but are themselves built together INTO this glorious temple.
“ In Him, you also are being built together
into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit.”
EPHESIANS 2:22
The Living Temple
“Coming to Him as to a living stone, rejected indeed by men, but chosen by God and precious, you also, as living stones, are being built up a spiritual house, a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ”
I Peter 2:5
The ONE BREAD is to bring forth the ONE BODY in truth and reality. Not a oneness based on the effort of men or the compromise of the truth! This ONENESS is the revelation of the truth not the ignoring of it. True love is the fruit of the Holy Spirit which is called the “Spirit of Truth”. When men love programs, teachings, the esteem of men, and self-promotion more than they love truth they reap the fruit of their own ways. This in itself is the great judgment of God. When men are content with such things nothing changes. Agnosticism*, apathy, and unbelief have rendered truth to a form and a concept instead of the living demonstration of Christ. Truth is seen as being relative; there is no concern for wrong teachings and soulish ways. We are not to say anything, do anything, that might offend others. God has a name for such a generation… ICHABOD!
“And she named the child Ichabod,
saying, The glory is departed from Israel”
I SAMUEL 4:21
It is time to read the scriptures for what they say and to see through the “status quo” of today. It is a day to return to the simplicity of truth and the power of His Spirit that can only be found where the New Wineskin is made up of those that love one another fervently out of a pure heart. We can no longer meet in the ways of the world. The true church is not an earthly organization but a spiritual organism living in the breath of the Holy Spirit, where men no longer walk in titles and positions but live and walk in the pure expression of His love. It is a place where our meeting together is no longer orchestrated by the programs of men but has become the place where the Spirit of Liberty is free to EXPRESS THE LIVING CHRIST. A place where His Glory comes in such power that the ways of Ananias and Sapphira are judged and God is glorified. A place where HIS Glory so permeates our gatherings unto Him that no earthly agenda can survive and men speak as the oracles of God (1 Peter 4:11).
Daniel and the Word
Daniel in captivity UNDERSTOOD by the reading of the scriptures that they would be in exile for 70 years and began to pray and repent; GOD ANSWERED! It is as His people read the scriptures and hear HIS voice that repentance and change come. Daniel did not simply say “Well, God is going to do it”… HE knew God enough to know that HE MUST RESPOND to God’s Word personally to experience the LIFE OF IT. Faith is simply the ability to respond to God’s Word.
The scriptures are read every day across our land but the famine of the word is not in the reading of it but in the HEARING of it. For FAITH comes by hearing not reading. So Jesus warns us to take heed “HOW WE HEAR” and “WHAT WE HEAR”.
“Behold, the days come, saith the Lord GOD, that I will send a famine in the land, not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water, but of HEARING the words of the LORD”
AMOS 8:11
That day is upon us, but the promise of God to His Church is …
“He who has an ear,
let him HEAR what the Spirit says”
The unity of the true Body of Christ is only known by the simplicity of WALKING IN THE LIGHT…
“But if we WALK in the light, as he is in the light,
we have fellowship one with another”
I JOHN 1:7
*NOTE: “Agnosticism is the view that the existence of God, the divine, or the supernatural is not known or knowable with any certainty” (Wikipedia) Can we not feel the spirit of this malaise permeating the hearts of many. Many believe in a god, many declare their “faith” in God but few reveal His reality in their lives. There is a fireless faith, a lukewarm attitude to His Word. The faithless teachings of men declare concepts and ideas instead of the fire to OBEY His Word. We hear many who say ‘be content’ with a God who remains hidden in the heavens rather than a God who breathes the power and the dynamic of Christ into His Own. How long will we tolerate the false, the carnal, and the pedantic atmosphere of unbelief? What many call “belief” in this day is unbelief, what many call faith is a trust in an idea of God rather than in the person and the truth of Christ.
Many mock the scripture… “Faith without works is dead…”. Yet it is certain that we will stand before Him at the judgment seat of Christ and give an account of what we have DONE with the measureless wonder of Christ Jesus our LORD! (Read the parables of the Talents and the Pounds)
“So whether we are at home or away, we make it our aim to please him. For WE must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each one may receive what is due for what he has done in the body, whether good or evil. Therefore, knowing the fear of the Lord, we persuade others“
2 Corinthians 5:9-11
The measure of our believing His Word is found in our hearts and lives warning His people of their accountability. Read afresh the Word of the Lord.
Let us all take heed to our ways.
“Examine yourselves, whether you are in the faith; test yourselves. Or do you not yourselves perceive that Jesus Christ is in you, unless you are disapproved”
2 Corinthians 13:5
Disunity is the result of sin,
unity is the fruit of walking in His Light.
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“The unity of Christendom is not a luxury, but a necessity. The World will go limping until Christ’s prayer that all may be one is answered. We must have unity, not at all costs, but at all risks. A unified Church is the only offering we dare present to the coming Christ, for in it alone will He find room to dwell”
CHB
Updated article from April 2014 – “One Bread, One Body”
Brian Troxel