THE WORD!--How Not to Backslide!         DFO1089  5/10/81

         1. HOW CAN THEY BECOME ALIENATED FROM THE LIFE OF GOD? (Eph.4:18) It's the Word!--When they neglect the Word, they neglect the Lord! How can you become separated from the Lord? It's when you become separated from the Word, because He is the Word. You become separated from the Word, you become separated from the Lord.
         2. What is the Life of God? He said, "The WORDS that I speak unto you, THEY ARE Spirit & THEY ARE Life!" (Jn.6:63) That's the Life of God, it's His Word, that's what gives us life & food & nourishment & strength & spiritual health. When they get cut off from the Word it's like cutting off their food, stopping the flow of nourishment.
         3. That Scripture always impressed me: "The Words that I speak unto you, they ARE Spirit & they ARE Life!" Think of that! They are Spirit & they are Life! They're real things! They're really something. They are Spirit & they are Life. These are things you can't see, you can't touch, but without them everything would be dead, totally dead. And without the Word, those people become completely dead, just dead, without life. Without the Word, which is the Spirit & the Life of Jesus, they're without Him, without His fellowship, without the Word.
         4. I'm convinced it's because they get away from the Word. If they live in the Word, I don't think they'd ever get away, they couldn't get away, because they'd get so full of the Word. That's why our children are so spiritual, we just baptise them & fill them with the Word! My first family just lived in the Word, memorised the Word, & all the first disciples, that was our main thing: Memorisation & study of the Word.
         5. Jesus IS the Word, He IS the Spirit & the Life, & you have to have a dose of Him every day, really, & have a good feeding & feasting & drinking. Just like you have to eat in order to have physical strength, you have to eat of the Word, drink of the Word to have spiritual strength. And I think that's how they get so alienated from the Life of God, they neglect the Word, they get away from the Word. "Without Me ye are nothing." (Jn.15:5) They get away from the Lord. They don't lose their salvation but they "follow afar off" like Peter (Mt.26:58), to the point where they could even deny Him, like Peter.
         6. HOW SAD IT MAKES ME FEEL WHEN PEOPLE NEGLECT THE WORD, the way Jeth & Deb used to do, how they were reluctant to even read the Letters to the Camp at TSC. He never liked the Word, he always dreaded the Letters. His interest was not the Letters, his main interest was as Judas, he held the bag, the money, & power & popularity were next. He never pushed either me or the Word, all he pushed was his system & the way of life. But you can't have that way of life & living without the Life that makes it live. You've got to have the Life, or the way of life will die!
         7. I'll tell you, it's dangerous to neglect the Word! The minute you start crowding the Word out of your lives, you are getting too busy! Or you lose confidence in the Word because of your own double-mindedness & double-heartedness because it offends you & you don't like it, or something we say, or FFing, or whatever. Boy, that was the acid test was the FFing, that really divided the men from the boys & the girls from the women!
         8. God gives tests like that! Remember the test He gave Abraham? He gave His Word to Abraham, "Go sacrifice Isaac!" Boy, was that a test! He was the promised seed, the promised son, the miracle son. God wanted to see if he'd still believe Him, put His Word above his son, even above the fulfilment of the Word, put the Word even above the effects of the Word.
         9. Some people just worship the EFFECTS of the Word: "Oh, look at all these people! Look at all this Family! Look at all this wonderful communal living! Look at all this way of life! Look at these wonderful kids!" This is the way Jethro used to do. You can't even put the fruit of the Word above the Word itself. Without the seed there never would have been new life, there never would have been fruit. Without the sap the tree dies.
         10. I'LL BET YOU'LL FIND EVERY ONE OF THOSE BACKSLIDERS WERE WEAK IN THE WORD, DIDN'T REALLY LIVE IN THE WORD. And I'll bet you'll find every single one of our strongest leaders today are those who really live in the Word & know the Word & know the Letters, because they really have faith in the Word & live in the Word! Therefore they have confidence in the Word-giver, the Worder, & they follow, & they obey! TYL!
         11. If they're not followers of the Word, they can't be followers of the Prophet, & if they're not followers of God's Prophet, they're not followers of God!--They may be saved but they're not following. I'll bet you every one of those backsliders were weak in the Word or had little or no Word, were not really steeped in the Word, not filled with the Word, not really students of the Word or really living in the Word. But the ones who did & were survived & they're still with us today!
         12. SO THAT'S THE SECRET--THE WORD!--The secret of power & victory & overcoming & fruitfulness & fire & life & warmth & light & leadership, everything, is the WORD!--And the lack of it is the secret of backsliding & failure & coldness & darkness & weakness & dying spiritually without the Word. Because they've never had it emphasised & never really put it foremost.
         13. So there it is, that's the secret of why they backslid. They got away from the Word first of all, & when they got away from the Word they became darkened in their understanding, & then they became alienated from the life of God & filled with the lies of the Devil, because they rejected the Word. That's the equivalent to rejecting the Word, if you don't love it, then you don't like it & you don't believe in it.
         14. So that's the secret!--It's the secret of victory or defeat! It's the secret of success or failure! It all depends on how they treat the Word & how they live in it & live on it or try to go without it, that's the secret.
         15. BACKSLIDERS FORSAKE-ALL TOO, THEY FORSAKE THE WORD, THE LORD, THE LIFE, THE LIGHT, THE PROPHET, THE FAMILY & they backslide & go back & forsake the House of the Father, forsake it all! They forsake it all in the wrong direction just as much as they had once forsaken all to follow the Lord. They desert the plow in the field & they look back & they're totally defeated.
         16. Lord help us, & Lord help them, in Jesus' name! Help those poor backsliders, Lord, it's so hard for them. They're so weak because they're so weak in the Word, they haven't really been really strengthened by the Word & really indoctrinated with the Word & filled with the Word, baptised with the Word. They haven't lived on the Word, drunk the Word, feasted on the Word, lived in the Word.
         17. They were always weak in the most important area of their whole Christian life, they neglected the Word! Jesus, help our Family, help our children, Lord, even help our backsliders somehow to get back to the Word! You're begging them to come back! "Behold, I am married to the backslider!" (Jer.3:14) You plead with them, beg them! You wept over Jerusalem. You said, "How often would I have gathered thee as a hen doth gather her chicks, but ye would not!" (Mt.23:37)
         18. O Jesus, have mercy on those backsliders! Shake'm up! Wake'm up! Jolt them out of their lethargy & their blindness & the entrancement of the System, hypnotised zombies by the Devil because they've lost the light of Thy Word! In Jesus' name, somehow get through to them & help them to turn & repent, have a metanoia, change of mind, & really come back!--This time, Lord, knowing that there's no place else to go. "Thou alone hast the Words of Eternal Life!" (Jn.6:68) Have mercy & bring them back to Thy Word, in Jesus' name, amen.--Are you coming NOW? Tomorrow will be too late! GHU!


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