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beholding God, darkness, deliverance, demons, discerning the spirits, dying to self, experience, following Jesus, God's love, hope, joy, light, love, peace, Prince of Peace, self, T.A. Sparks, The Holy Spirit, the light of the world, visions, walking by the spirit
In fact, I never wanted to leave this dark place there at any time. Staying there forever with Christ would have been no problem. I even had the courage to turn around and close the door to the demons’ room myself, even without asking Him as I sensed His approval to do so. But then there was another surprise ahead. Jesus told me before that He wanted to show me another thing. Looking up into this dark staircase, I observed a bright light coming from Himself that was spreading in a split second from the bottom where we were standing up to the top of that staircase while illuminating everything that might have been hidden or covered before. Indeed, there seemed to have been countless flats out of which people who lived there could have never escaped. The connection between them, the stairs, were fully missing just like the common roof on the top.Jesus by ‘turning on the light’ has provided the only stairway possible between heaven and earth. Every other ostensible staircase that has not been founded on the Living God in Christ will sooner or later be destroyed. That lonely man I had seen in the only lit apartment represents the believer who tries hard to be a Christian by using his own little ‘light’, that is, his own mind and reason that have not been illuminated from above. He is limited in his small flat while the liberty to move between heaven and earth with his Lord is very, very close to him. However, he cannot see it yet as such a possibility seems to be far beyond him in his prison-like earthly dwelling place.
What was not possible there in this dark building, either, was true fellowship in the Body of Christ through all those believers living there. They neither had a connection to their Head which is Christ nor to one another by the Holy Spirit indwelling them. Except for one flat all other apartments had not been lit at all. It appeared to me that those Christians were no longer seeking the truth on their own. It was only one representative Christian who was still seeking (the man in the lit apartment). Since darkness always represents death in one form or another, the dark staircase displays today’s spiritual condition of ‘the Church’ on the whole.
[UPDATE]
It was only today as I came to see that the lonely man whose identity I do not want to reveal on here was someone very close to our family. However, I had not come to hear about his death struggle until yesterday. We prayed for him to be redeemed from his bodily pain and I, suffering from pains myself, asked the Lord to take this man into the kingdom of God where he could experience eternal peace and so much more. During this night and later another person and I both got a confirmation from God that this man had been delivered from all his suffering here on earth before we got to know it as a matter of fact.
Today I realized that looking up from the dark bottom into what looked similar to the tunnel of a near-death-experience truly had to do with death. The apartment dimly lit in which this man was searching for “something” had been pretty close to the more enlightened top where Jesus had been standing while looking down. When our Lord enlightened this dark tunnel or staircase from the bottom up (the bottom represented death or Hades), the light spread everywhere and thus opened the way, the stairway to heaven for everyone who was searching for the truth.
Christians have almost ceased to seek the truth for themselves as they rather follow those who claim to have more light than they really do. Nowadays it is truly a rare thing to find another believer who has given up on searching for the truth on this earth, in earthly buildings (churches) and in earthly teachers or preachers. You need to walk for years on end until you finally find another Christian who has been born from above and knows the real God through Jesus Christ rather than doctrine, teachings and creeds. Where is our real hope, dear brothers and sisters? Can we fix our beliefs in a system that is called Christianity or do we want to go on and leave that which hinders us to see the truth which alone can set us free? 🙄
We might ask what happens if one or another believer eventually comes to see the light that has been hid before his eyes when he turns to the window and looks outside to the true stairway, so to speak? 🙄 We read in Isaiah this part which is often heard in churches at Christmas time,
“The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; those who dwelt in a land of deep darkness, on them has light shone. You have multiplied the nation; you have increased its joy; they rejoice before you as with joy at the harvest, as they are glad when they divide the spoil. For the yoke of his burden, and the staff for his shoulder, the rod of his oppressor, you have broken as on the day of Midian. (Is 9:2-4 ESV)
When Jesus has broken this false religious or other yoke that was on our shoulders, when He has set us free from our unimportant self-life to walk with Him wherever He leads, we can rejoice whatever happens on the outside as this world and all who dwell on it will be eclipsed at the sight of Him. Then there is only one bright light left that will never ever be quenched. Our eyes will be fixed on Jesus Christ Who is The Light of the whole world. Our Lord wants to share this eternal light with every one of us so that this dark world will realize that there is real hope of deliverance from everything that causes us human beings fear. Our Lord is mighty to do what we cannot do as He promised with the following words,
“The Spirit of the Lord GOD is upon me; because the LORD hath anointed me to preach good tidings unto the meek; he hath sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to them that are bound;
To proclaim the acceptable year of the LORD, and the day of vengeance of our God; to comfort all that mourn;
To appoint unto them that mourn in Zion, to give unto them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness; that they might be called trees of righteousness, the planting of the LORD, that he might be glorified.” (Is 61:1-3 KJV)
What I tried to share with many words on here, T. Austin Sparks did with only a few with which I want to close now. If we do not know where our daily struggles and tribulations come from, here is TAS’ answer.
If you ask what the secret of misery is I can tell you very quickly: to be occupied with yourself. The secret of joy is to be occupied with the Lord. (1)
(1) https://www.austin-sparks.net/english/books/000749.html
All images © Susanne Schuberth 2021
Entering the Promised Land 
Susanne,
There is a lot to this vision you had. You wrote, “Christians have almost ceased to seek the truth for themselves as they rather follow those who claim to have more light than they really do. Nowadays it is truly a rare thing to find another believer who has given up on searching for the truth on this earth, in earthly buildings (churches) and in earthly teachers or preachers. You need to walk for years on end until you finally find another Christian who has been born from above and knows the real God through Jesus Christ rather than doctrine, teachings and creeds.”
I think that Jeremiah saw this coming when he wrote,
“An appalling and horrible thing is committed in the land; The prophets prophesy falsely, and the priests bear rule by their own power; and my people love to have it so: and what will you do in the end?” (Jer 5:30-31, KJ2000)
I think we are seeing what they are doing in the end. What once had a wonderful stairway (I am reminded of Jacob’s ladder which is Christ) connecting all the dwellings of these Christians was discarded and came to not and finally they became isolated from one another. What makes it worse is that many pastors feel threatened when church members find a connection with one another in Christ. When the Holy Spirit shows up and starts to bring about that spirit to spirit unity and the people move in the love and freedom that goes with it, all hell breaks in upon it and often the pastor becomes in league with these demonic forces to bring it to a halt.
I thank our Father that we can come out from among them in that state of nullified faith and obey His upward call by entering into HIS Light. It took me years to quit seeking Jesus in that spiritual isolation all those flats represent. I was a lot like that man who lived in the one flat with some light in it but still cut off from true fellowship. Like you, I finally had to go out and meet Jesus outside that defunct system of fallen down man made structures known as the Christian religion. Real fellowship happens when we meet other believers who have also borne the reproach on not belonging to a Sunday church and gone outside the camp to join Jesus there.
My eyes were opened when He showed me that the church of Laodicea in Revelation chapter 3 is not only rich and increased with good and sees itself in need of nothing, it the same church that has closed it door on Him at which He was found knocking, hoping to be let in. But that is not all John saw in that vision. The next thing that he saw as an open door in heaven and a voice up there was calling Him, “Come up here! I will show you things…” This is also what you saw represented by that deep hole called religion. It is interested that the room with demons in it was at the bottom of it all. You can be sure that the fallen down state of the church has had demons at the bottom of it all!
Susanne, it is such a blessing to be in this sweet fellowship with you and Jesus, experiencing His Light and Love together. 🕊💖
Michael
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Thank you, Michael. Yes, this Scripture from Jeremiah nails it, this seems to be the very condition we see today.
I also had Jacob’s ladder in mind as I was moving up and down in a sort of invisible elevator with Jesus. This lonely man in the only apartment with some light is a seeker as we all are or have been. It seems we need to be connected to our Head which is Christ first before He provides the fellowship we need, a spiritual fellowship that helps us grow in Christ.
What I did not explicitly mention in the blog was that the fact of this building not having a rooftop of its own revealed its unprotectedness against those demons that made Babylon their dwelling place (see Rev 18:2). The protection on top comes from the Head whom we all must obey. What has been encouraging to me, though, was to see how much our Lord cares for everyone in the Church, whether they know Him or not. He is so gracious and humble where we might rather get angry when we are confronted with lawlessness and false spirits. That does not mean that God is not angered. I am inclined to think that God keeps back His righteous anger because this is all part of this dispensation now which is called “the year of the Lord’s favor” (Lk 4:19 ESV).
Michael, our God-given fellowship is a wonderful blessing of which I wish more Christians would be able to experience it. 🕊💖 So many hunger for real fellowship in the Body of Christ. May God provide this spiritual blessing only He can give. ⭐
Yesterday I found an interesting excerpt by T. Austin Sparks which reveals that there is a fine line between discerning the spirits (i.e., knowing where wrong spirits are found), going our way with the Lord led by the Holy Spirit and to not hurt or even condemn those who are still captured by the wrong spirits as we once were, too. Love and truth seem to belong together. We might know the truth and still behave unloving toward those God has not given up yet. It is God, our Savior “who desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.” (1 Tim 2:4 ESV) Here is what TAS wrote.
“THE WORK OF THE CROSS
Now first of all, you and I have to allow the Cross to smite and to slay everything represented by the first three, that is, teachings, interpretations, specific lines of truth, of ministries and personalities in ministry, so that in no way are we attached to these as things, but rather, in a true and right and spiritual way, it is Christ who is our focal point, our meeting point, our basis — Christ Himself. We may have Paul, Apollos and Peter and not grow one whit spiritually, like the Corinthians. We may have all that they have to give us and still remain stunted because there is an ‘it’, a something, a line, a teaching, an interpretation, a ministry. We think, of course, that it is the Lord. Are we quite sure? That it really is the Lord is a matter about which we have to be made very sure. And then the Cross must deal with this fourth thing, or that which is represented by the fourth thing: ‘I am of Christ!’ I will be very practical and come right to the point. It is a false apprehension of a heavenly position for anyone to run down Christians because they are in denominations, and to have anything in them which separates them from children of God because they are in these things. That is a false apprehension of a heavenly and spiritual position. I want to say that with great emphasis. Such people have not yet come to the place where they can discriminate between children of God and things in which children of God may be. You and I might come to the place where, more or less, we could not participate in the things, and might see that the things — call them what you like, ‘sects’, ‘denominations’, such things — are limiting things and are a contradiction to the thought of God. We may come to see that there is all the difference between a very strong feeling and conviction about that, and allowing our feeling toward the thing to touch the people who are children of God. Dear friends, you have to keep a very wide gap between those two things, and when you meet someone who is in something, which thing you feel the Lord has delivered you from or led you out of or shown you to be not in accord with His mind, you must not allow your feeling toward that thing to touch that child of God. Our attitude toward a child of God is to be the love of God for His children as His children wherever they are, and there are children of God in some extraordinary places and in things which may be unthinkable to us. You and I have to recognize children of God wherever they are, in whatever they are, and keep the street intact — one street, one thoroughfare. We walk with children of God as they walk with the Lord because they are children of God. Satan’s business is to try and make that impossible and to split up this street into a thousand highways and byways and cul-de-sacs. It is true! He is fighting against this all the time, and there is nothing too sacred for him. The tragic, painful, grievous story of the Church is just this — the story of Satan’s mischief in dividing the Lord’s people.”
http://www.austin-sparks.net/mags/wat47-1.html#18
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Susanne, once again you have gone on in the flow of this vision with your reply to me. You wrote,
“It seems we need to be connected to our Head which is Christ first before He provides the fellowship we need, a spiritual fellowship that helps us grow in Christ.”
This is so true. Paul wrote of this very thing saying,
“…holding fast to the Head, from whom the whole body, nourished and knit together through its joints and ligaments, grows with a growth that is from God.” (Col 2:19, ESV2011)
The most important thing is to be attached to Christ our Head and as we meet others who are attached to Him in a life giving way and receiving the same nourishment we can be knit together in His love. This is what John was writing about when he said, “If we are walking in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship…”
When we have gone without spirit to spirit fellowship for a long time and finally find it, it is easy to switch from seeking first our Head for our supply and look for it with this other person or group and then we are right back in the trap of following after men as does the visible church today. God will not bless this, either, for He will have no other gods before Him.
The second point you addressed is so important. Sparks wrote,
“…It is a false apprehension of a heavenly position for anyone to run down Christians because they are in denominations, and to have anything in them which separates them from children of God because they are in these things. That is a false apprehension of a heavenly and spiritual position. I want to say that with great emphasis. Such people have not yet come to the place where they can discriminate between children of God and things in which children of God may be. You and I might come to the place where, more or less, we could not participate in the things, and might see that the things — call them what you like, ‘sects’, ‘denominations’, such things — are limiting things and are a contradiction to the thought of God. We may come to see that there is all the difference between a very strong feeling and conviction about that, and allowing our feeling toward the thing to touch the people who are children of God. Dear friends, you have to keep a very wide gap between those two things, and when you meet someone who is in something, which thing you feel the Lord has delivered you from or led you out of or shown you to be not in accord with His mind, you must not allow your feeling toward that thing to touch that child of God…”
Yes, this has been a battle, keeping the “things” that His children are in separate from those captivated by it. I have met many of them that are still in these things that distract from a full relationship IN Christ and the Spirit bears witness that they are God’s children when we meet and fellowship starts to happen with them. The sad thing happens when they require us to join in with them in that system instead of continuing on together IN Christ. That is where the fellowship breaks down and is usurped by “things.” I have seen this happen over and over and it saddens me so much for I DO long for the fellowship of the saints IN Christ. Of course we can be just as divisive by speaking against the thing that they are in and this is what Paul was addressing when He said, “Accept anyone who is weak in faith, but not for the purpose of arguing over differences of opinion.” (Rom 14:1, ISV). Asking them to come out of it before they are ready only causes confusion.
Satan is really good at keeping the Church divided, for the unity of the body with the Head in the Spirit is where Satan’s world system becomes threatened, not by having the same doctrines. Jesus prayed at the end of His earthly ministry about this very thing saying, “…that they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me.” (John 17:21, ESV2011). Without this unity of the Father and the Son in we who are His there is no witness of the kingdom of God as a reality.
Thank you, dear sister, for this soul searching reminder,
Michael 🕊💖👍
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Michael, thank you for this confirming Scripture from Colossians.
Indeed, this excerpt and a bit more of TAS’ article have been soul searching for me, too. Whenever the Lord reveals to me that I have to do with a wrong spirit in a Christian or else, I FEEL it and it hurts! 😦 It seems that TAS said we should not act according to our feelings then. We always need the Spirit’s guidance to do as He pleases. The best example for me is apostle Paul when he preached Christ in Athens. In Acts 17:16 we read,
“Now while Paul was waiting for them at Athens, his spirit was provoked within him as he saw that the city was full of idols.”
Martin Luther used a stronger word than provoked or stirred (as KJV translates). Luther said that Paul became angry or furious. It appears to me that such anger is the normal reaction from the Holy Spirit in our own spirit when confronted with untruth. But afterwards the love of God comes in, eager to undeceive and thus save people. Paul himself mentioned in another place that he had become all things to all people, that by all means he might have saved some (cf. 1 Cor 9:22) So Paul somehow pulled himself together (i.e., followed God’s leading) and started preaching on the Areopagus by addressing those idolaters that way,
“Men of Athens, I perceive that in every way you are very religious. For as I passed along and observed the objects of your worship, I found also an altar with this inscription: ‘To the unknown god.’ What therefore you worship as unknown, this I proclaim to you.” (Acts 17:22-23 ESV)
Paul was no people pleaser but He followed God’s wisdom that opened a way to their very hearts. If Paul had been without God’s love, he might have re-acted much stronger. Of course, it is a different thing when we have to do with a false leader/teacher/preacher whose message must not be heeded as it leads Christians astray. In such cases, just like having spiritual fellowship with unclean spirits, God won’t have us go our own ways.
“What agreement has the temple of God with idols? For we are the temple of the living God; as God said, “I will make my dwelling among them and walk among them, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people.
Therefore go out from their midst, and be separate from them, says the Lord, and touch no unclean thing; then I will welcome you,
and I will be a father to you, and you shall be sons and daughters to me, says the Lord Almighty.” (2 Cor 6:16-18 ESV)
There is a big promise included. God welcomes us as His children when we follow HIS Spirit which is light, not darkness.
“Do not be unequally yoked with unbelievers. For what partnership has righteousness with lawlessness? Or what fellowship has light with darkness?” (2 Cor 6:14 ESV)
My brother, your comments have been very inspiring. Thank you! 🙂
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