A Resting Place for His Headship
Written by Sam Sullivant
David constructed buildings in the City of David; he then prepared a place for the ark of God and pitched a tent for it. Then David said, "Only the Levites may carry the ark of God, for the LORD chose them to carry the ark of the LORD and to serve before him perpetually. David assembled all Israel at Jerusalem to bring the ark of the LORD up to the place he had prepared for it. 1 Chronicles 15:1-3 (NET)
The dwelling place of God is not a psychological experience. Much of the western Church is plagued with confusion between the presence of God and a psychological experience. There is a spectrum of deception at play starting with confusion then escalating to deception, and then on to delusion. Delusion is active demonization, and there are demons involved in all stages of deception.
The human psyche has a measure of lateral power, but the upward call of God is in Christ which human power cannot touch. The Lord would bring the human psyche to the Cross. If we see this rightly, then we will see God desires to protect us from delusion that we may partake of Him in purity. Though we all are born into and have suffered some measure of deception, I aim to allow the Lord to continually draw the lines of distinction between what is of my own psyche and what is of His Spirit. The spiritual war within the Church is over this issue of soul versus the Spirit.
God has called for a dwelling place and that among humankind. However, that’s not humanity in her present condition. God will only dwell in a humanity who has been and is being sanctified by the grace of God through faith in Jesus Christ. God has made the way in Jesus to recover humanity to become a new human race. So then, to continually abide the Adam-nature is to embrace deception. The true Ecclesia of God has been reckoned at the Cross of Christ. The Ecclesia is being continually transformed if and only if we are embracing the Cross and following Jesus daily. Thus, the journey of being made into a dwelling place of God is rigorous, spiritually-speaking. There is rest for us in the Person of Jesus, but we must labor diligently to enter the Person of rest (Heb 4:11). David said that,
"I will not enter my own home, or get into my bed. I will not allow my eyes to sleep, or my eyelids to slumber, until I find a place for the LORD, a fine dwelling place for the powerful ruler of Jacob.” Psalm 132:3-5 (NET)
This passage is a reference to 1 Chronicles, and there is a lot of context to the history of the restoration of the ark of the covenant to Jerusalem in that time. I won’t get into that here, but the ultimate message is that the way the Lord’s people have approached Him and approached restoration has become offensive to God. I believe we are in no different a condition in the western Church presently. We approach the presence of God out from the human psyche and even offer our resources to God to our fate. Being recipients of a most glorious New Covenant in Jesus, we will be held to a high account before the judgment seat of Christ if we have squandered the Covenant (see Hebrews 6) or asserted our headship. Let’s look for a moment at Peter’s warning to the Church in his day:
Therefore, dear friends, since you have been forewarned, be on your guard that you do not get led astray by the error of these unprincipled men and fall from your firm grasp on the truth. But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To him be the honor both now and on that eternal day. 2 Peter 3:17-18 (NET)
The "unprincipled men” referenced in this passage are scoffing at the promised second coming of Jesus. “The truth” Peter is speaking about is that Jesus will return imminently. Not only is this dynamic still happening in our time, the principle of unbelief is still operating in much of the Church concerning our heavenly calling and His promised return. Let’s carry this over regarding the presence of God. In 1 Chronicles 15, we see David’s rebuke to the priesthood for their negligence concerning how to carry the ark of the covenant.
"David summoned the priests Zadok and Abiathar, along with the Levites Uriel, Asaiah, Joel, Shemaiah, Eliel, and Amminadab. He told them: "You are the leaders of the Levites' families. You and your relatives must consecrate yourselves and bring the ark of the LORD God of Israel up to the place I have prepared for it. The first time you did not carry it; that is why the LORD God attacked us, because we did not ask him about the proper way to carry it." The priests and Levites consecrated themselves so they could bring up the ark of the LORD God of Israel." 1 Chronicles 15:11-14 (NET)
If we are off seeking pseudo-spirituality, but neglecting the absolute necessity that Christ is to be Head in our hearts and thus the Church, then we are going to pay for it later before the Lord. David’s burden is to see a proper resting place for the presence of God. If we’ve grown accustomed to a psychological presence then we are in for a rude awakening when we come before the Lord at His return. That proper place for the true presence of God is in Christ, and that is upward, meaning above us. There are also boundaries and requirements surrounding Christ, and that is at the full expense of the mind of man. Again, the resting place for the presence of God is in Christ, and we are to be the resting place for His headship. If we lose Him as head, then we lose God entirely. The Holy Spirit is impartial in this matter, He is patient, but impartial.
I believe by revelation, we are suffering in the western Church under a multi-generational neglect of the Headship of Christ. Instead of being faithful to Him in this way, we are high or drunk on a psychological experience with demonic influence keeping us bound up in an old wineskin. We have replaced Him with experiences. When our experiments fail we react and use reverse psychology to try to fix the problem. Even still, fallen Adam is in charge while being under the influence of Satan. I believe we are going to be caught off guard and unprepared at the coming of the Lord. We already mis-discern Him arising in judgment now, how much more so will we be caught off guard at His return?! Not only are we arguing over the return of Christ, we are not manifesting the Life, Authority and Power of God in Christ.
Unless we get outside our present Church systems, we will not come to see Him and know Him as we were always meant to. There is presently too much clutter and compromise in the Church to uphold the system. The system involves a false priesthood, a false prophetic and a false headship. I say this because too many of our systems are built upon the human psyche. It’s not a false accusation, it’s an unredeemable system. The people caught up in the systems of man can absolutely be redeemed. However, the truth is that the Lord is not in those systems, and He is not in my system either. Until I lose my life entirely by taking up my Cross, I cannot know the Lord in unveiled fellowship. He is still at work, but not in the way my idealism or pessimism would think.
There is an important picture for us however when Jesus died on the Cross. In Mark 15:22-24 (NET) it says, “they brought Jesus to a place called Golgotha (which is translated, "Place of the Skull”). They offered him wine mixed with myrrh, but he did not take it. Then they crucified him[…]”. Here Jesus is dying on the skull of man which represents the mind of Adam. There is spiritual death in man’s mind, and Jesus knows it. Jesus denied the wine concoction which was used in that time to help as an anesthetic to make the pain of crucifixion less painful. He bore the full brunt of the sting of death for our sakes. Ministry is never meant to overshadow His sacrifice, but only magnify His offering. Modern ministry also often tries to lessen the full work of the Cross within believers and thus hinders the Lord’s work within us. We are meant to bear the full brunt of the Cross along with Jesus not for the sake of atonement but for the sake of true worship. Ouch! Hurts doesn’t it?! But it is all quite true.
When the Lord is ministering the Cross to His followers, we must not intervene wrongly but tread lightly or else we could aid Satan in keeping the Adam and Eve nature alive among believers. This is Satan’s entry into the House of God. Reintroduce Adam, and then he can corrupt God’s beloved. God is not renovating Adam and Eve, but has given His Son to remove our fallen nature completely through death, burial and resurrection. This is the meaning of water baptism. In redemption we don’t become Christ, but become His dwelling place. It’s incredible, but God never abides the mixture of soul and Spirit. He always brings separation between the two. Baptism does not represent fallen Adam dying then resurrecting back to life. It represents fallen Adam being put to death permanently and Christ alone as Life arising within.
In times past, I’ve heard preachers say that the Holy Spirit never divides, He only unites. Though that sounds nice, it is untrue. One of the first and primary works of the Spirit is to separate soul from the Spirit. In fact Jesus said,
“‘If anyone comes to Me and does not hate his own father, mother, wife, children, brothers, sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be My disciple. Whoever does not carry his own cross and come after Me cannot be My disciple.’” Luke 14:26-27 (NASB20)
So the Lord is keen on bringing proper separation to our inward man and away from our generational lines when it comes to discipleship. There is sinful division in the Body of Christ, which is often a result of gossip, hatred, jealousy and more. I would say, in the big picture, division is our baseline not simply an upcoming risk. The solution is not more unity, it is Christ alone in headship. When it comes to becoming a follower of Jesus, we must lose our lives. This is not a negative thing, but quite positive. Taking up our Cross is a critical aspect to our walks with Jesus, and should be encouraged and celebrated.
So, how about we take a moment and realize how seriously we take our lives in a wrong way. Do we place our social bonds above relationship with Jesus? Our allegiances? Our preferences? How much do we add our skills, personalities, and flavors to the Gospel?! What if we just let it all go on the altar of true worship?! What if we simply returned to a really foundational truth. God is God and we are not. His thoughts are higher than our thoughts in every conceivable way. What if we became a humble people and did not presume so much on the Lord’s will, taking His name in vain by endorsing everything we do in ministry as if He loves it. Can you imagine how this makes Him feel?! I can. Modern ministry has become an industry, not a house of fellowship. We have adulterated the words of Jesus, Paul, Peter, James, Jude, John and more with our own worldly words and practices. We use His name in vain for our own earthly gain. It is deeply grieving.
Theology and rhetoric have failed us. We are not facing an intellectual puzzle that needs to be solved. We are facing an intellectual stronghold that is empowered and aided by Satan. That’s not an accusation, it is our present reality and it is worse than I would like to believe. The more I have denied this truth and been idealistic about the condition of the Church, the more I resist the Lord in this matter. God is truly grieved and angry over this issue of broken Covenant and defiled communion. It is because we abide Adam while claiming the Spirit. We have fallen short of the Person of Grace and God is inviting us to suffer with Him outside modern christianity that we could come to know Him and be possessed by Him in the way He most fervently desires. The answer to the problem in our modern time is not traditional christianity, but the real remedy is Christ Himself as He is in heaven.
So this is a time and a call to repentance and lament. We will have to lose our present intellectual, Adamic stronghold and come to know the real Jesus in greater measure than ever before. God is not holding back in Christ. He is only holding back from Adam. If we abide this mixture, we can barely hear God and discern His greater will. We are stuck in cycles of delay. We abide a blend of christian philosophy and worldliness. We simply need to repent, and very deeply. We are being called by the Spirit to enter into the depths of Christ. He is calling us to walk by faith once again not by our forms of mental wisdom and discernment. As for me and my house, we repent.
The encouragement here is we can align ourselves to the will of God by becoming a dwelling place of God through deep faith and humility. This leads to the full and sound mind of Christ. Remember David “prepared a place for the ark of God and pitched a tent for it”. We can become that prepared vessel of the Lord. The Levites were chosen to minister to God perpetually. This is the calling of the true Church, but to an even more profound priesthood than the Levitical. The primary calling of the Church is to become a dwelling place of God forever and minister unto Him. All true ministry comes out from this reality, and specifically from the Spirit of Christ in us. It can be very easy to build and admire ministry that is built by people, but God is not blessing everything we do in His name nor how we do it.
The Voice of God is not my inner voice that affirms my wants or criticizes my weaknesses. The Voice of God is an entirely different Voice that is from God Himself. Often we must experience Him in that way to tell the difference, and how great a difference He is! We should take comfort in the fact that it is impossible for man to manufacture God’s true Voice, presence, or accomplish His full work. When the Lord said it is “hard for a rich person to enter the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matt 19:23), the disciples were awestruck and said, “‘Then who can be saved?’ Jesus looked at them and replied, ‘This is impossible for mere humans, but for God all things are possible.’” (Matt 19:25-26). The road to true recovery is a road to full dependence on the Holy Spirit. Without the fear of God deeply involved, I’m afraid we will not be following the true Holy Spirit.
So, Lord in that light, help us to no longer trust IN ourselves or in people, but to trust entirely in You! You are the only wise God and the only One worthy of true worship. Everything else is empty idolatry. Help my heart to be humbled completely before You, and to not bow in any way to people or to the messages of this world. I long for your leadership to be restored in me, and in your House. May it be so in this time and not put off to another time.