Dear Brothers and Sisters in the Lord:
A few months ago, the leadership of Tour of Truth invited me to be a contributor to their website to share the things which the Lord has and is speaking to me about.
I try to be transparent, informative, and reflective in the different prophetic and oracle topics or themes I post for your read. I want you to know that I am just a servant – a scribe for the Lord delivering to you the mail He sends me from heaven.
I do not know any other way to say this – I am just a mailperson being sent on a mission to deliver what He wants me and others to know, ponder on, and be instructed by.
I sometimes ask Him, “Why me Lord? Why did you choose me to be your mail carrier to bring to the people the wonderful things you place in my heart, spirit, and mind?
At times I have indicated to the Lord I am not worthy to be your servant even though you have gifted me with the prophetic and oracle areas as well as to write things way beyond my intellectual ability. It is like He bypasses my mind and moves my spirit to listen and to act on what I hear by writing or speaking the Word.
But again, why me, I ask the Lord? Then I think of all the ways in my life I have failed the Lord, been disobedient at times, made some bad decisions, offended others, etc. At this point I hear the following:
Rich,
don’t you think I know all of this?
I have got all that covered
by My Son’s sacrifice
on the cross.
Your call has been
and
is to
continue to walk
the narrow road
and
go through narrow doors
I will continue to open for you.
You are to walk the narrow road
and
enter the narrow doors
by speaking truth,
doing what righteous,
acting in compassion
and
humility toward others,
and
giving your life away
to those I call you to serve.
Don’t be taken up with your past,
and
allow it to have influence on you today -
for it is dead
and
I have delivered it from you.
Walk in the newness of Life
provided by My Son
He has given you for
in His Life
you will find
a new level of Life
I wish to impart to you.
You are now
in the last days
which will require all those
who seek me with all their heart to come
up higher in sacrifice
and
in holiness
in their walk for me
and
before others.
Thank you, Jesus!
With the above said, allow me to invite you to read this oracle.
Introduction
This past week was a very unusual week for me. Unusual meaning that at times throughout the day I would find myself weeping and crying out to Jesus. These weeping moments were intense and lasted for several minutes.
I would be driving and all at once, I began to weep. I might be shopping in a store when the same thing would happen again. I would quickly find my way to the back of the store and find a corner away from people and just weep knowing the Holy Spirit was working deeply within me.
I want to say that the Holy Spirit was rolling over me like the waves coming in on the seashore. There was the first “weeping wave” hitting me and I broke and then a short release with the wave flowing back out sea and then another wave more intense than the first “wave of weeping “would hit me. This would continue for several minutes.
During these moments which I call called “weeping bursts,” I would receive images of Christ on the cross before Roman solders on Golgotha hill.
I was reminded before the cross was raised up with Christ hanging on the cross, the wooden cross must have laid flat on the ground.
I like to believe that the soldiers did not have to force Christ to lay down on the cross but He no doubt volunteered to lay Himself on the cross and then accepted the nails driven through His wrists and feet. I cannot imagine the excoriating pain He had to endure and certainly the loss of blood leaving His body. I weep while writing this!
The solders then picked up the cross with Him nailed to it and placed it securely upright in a deep hole in the ground. It was at this point that my weeping increased when I thought of the Father’s love for His Son and the Son’s obedience to the Father to lay down His life for me.
I knew all this down through the years of walking with Jesus, but the Lord was impressing on me once again to never to forget what His Son accomplished on the cross for me – my salvation, my healing, my deliverance, my peace, my hope, my trust in Him, my refuge, and my gaining eternal life with Him in heaven.
Then the Lord said to me, “My Son took the “bullet” for you for that is how much He loves you and those He calls you to love unconditionally.”
It was as if the Holy Spirit was saying to me that I need to daily realize the sacrifice of Christ and what it cost Him as well as His extravagant love for me and others who seriously seek the Master.
With all that said, I now invite you to ponder on the rest of this oracle regarding the theme of this oracle, “Taking the bullet.”
His perfect love!
Apostle Paul says:
…..to walk in love
[esteeming one another and delighting in one another]
as Christ loved us
and
gave himself up
for us, a slain
offering
and
sacrifice
to God
[for you, so that it became]
a sweet fragrance.
(Ephesians 5:2, (AMP)
Christ walked in perfect love toward His Father – a perfect bond and a perfect relationship.
He delighted in the Father, obeyed the Father, and sacrificed Himself (laid down His life) for the Father and all who walk on planet earth who come to Him and make Him their Savior and Lord.
He pleased the Father and became a sweet aroma to the Father. Christ being of the same substance as the Father returned the love of the Father through His suffering, death, and resurrection. He did it for me and you! He truly took the “bullet” for me!
His taking the bullet!
In essence, Christ took the “bullet” for all of us so that we could come to Him through His shed blood and inherit eternal life. One part of the Godhead, sacrificed Himself because of His love for the Father and love for others. Jesus made this very profound statement:
No one has greater love
[no one has shown stronger affection]
than to
lay down
(give up)
his own life for his friends.
John 15:13 (AMP)
The Message Bible says it this way:
This is the very best way to love.
Put your life on the line for your friends.
John 15:13 (MSG)
His Love in action!
Jesus would say to me today, “Look, if you want to move beyond the usual greetings of “Hi, how are you?” “Good to see you,” or “Let me pray for you,” or “Come and visit us,” or “Have a nice day,” or “You are invited to our church pot-luck supper,” than you need to allow me to show you in greater depth of how you can sacrifice your life for others and be willing to allow the nails which pierced my flesh and the spear which pierced my side can work in you.”
“Sacrifice my life….nails….spear.” A profound and hard statement for me to contemplate, understand, and digest as I write this! And let me say, I struggle with this and call on the Lord to help me to overcome the flesh and truly allow His Holy Spirit to lead me and help me to live His command….
……If any person
wills to come after Me,
let him deny himself
[disown himself, forget, lose sight of himself
and
his own interests, refuse and give up himself]
and
take up his cross daily
and
follow Me
[cleave steadfastly to Me,
conform wholly to My example
in living
and,
if need be,
in dying also].
Luke 9:23 (AMP)
His Call to Discipleship!
Sacrificing my life is not a pleasant way of thinking about my responsibility to Christ and my brothers and sisters and to those lost in the world. But this thing called discipleship is serious business for Jesus further says:
For whoever would preserve his life
and
save it will lose
and
destroy it,
but whoever loses his life for My sake,
he will preserve
and
save it
[from the penalty of eternal death].
Luke 9:24 (AMP)
When one reads the New Testament and especially Apostle Paul’s writings, it is hard not to recognize the extremely difficult road the early Christians had to walk while living in their pagan Roman society.
If the demonstration of Christ’s love of the brethren had not been the primary lifestyle for them, it would have been hard to overcome all the other obstacles that confronted them on a day-to-day basis.
They were severely persecuted and suffered tremendously for the Name of Christ. But they were faithful to Christ and loved one another to the end. Many took the “bullet” for one another when it came to sacrificing their lives for their brothers and sisters.
Furthermore, if I am to believe what Christ and Apostle Paul recorded about love, then I must accept and believe that His sacrificial love imparted to me needs to be daily given to others by the leading of the Holy Spirit. I believe is in this action that I am able to overcome all hardships, afflictions, sufferings, and conflicts. The focus is not on me but on fulfilling Christ command, “Love others as I have loved you!.”
His command to love will see me through to the end. It will overcome my self-centeredness, my selfishness, my sinful history, the temptations, and idols of a decadent culture, and all which is opposed to “taking up His cross” and allowing it to crucify my flesh.
His call to agape (love) the brethren!
Therefore, the love (agape) for the brethren is just not a cute, warm, and platitudinous concept of words to be tossed around and lived half-heartedly or take it or leave it attitude.
The authentic and transparent love for the brethren should be my holy offering, my sacrifice, my sweet aroma to the Father and the Son in heaven. It is my meeting His commandment, “…..lay down [your] life for [your] friends.”
It seems that sacrifice, suffering, persecution, yielding, and “putting my life on the line” are things that are relegated to the backroom of the Christian’s walk in the Western world and especially in the modern church.
His love in the early church!
To preach this word “…..lay down [your] life for [your] friends,” or “putting my life on the line for others) from the pulpit in American churches would no doubt mean diminished attendance and possibly a severe drop in the tithes and offerings. A situation that many modern churches do not want to risk.
This is a heavy word for me and for all of us who fly under the banner of Christian. It is a biblical word which one does not hear that often nor does it go away.
It is not “cool” to talk of these concepts yet in the early Church, these things were understood to be part of the lifestyle of the Christian. It was not normal in the early church when these things (sacrificial love, persecution, and possible death for the cause of Christ) were absent.
And when they were part of the everyday life of the early Christians, the church grew in love, faith, hope, and perseverance. As a result, the culture became transformed for a period of time.
We know from the historians of Roman history that by 300 A.D., the Roman Empire adopted Christianity as its main religion. The early Christians were able to overcome because…..
…..they have overcome
(conquered)
Him
(Satan)
by means of the
blood of the Lamb
and
by the utterance of their testimony,
for they did not love
and
cling to life even when faced with death
[holding their lives cheap till
they had to die for their witnessing].
Revelation 12:11 (AMP)
The two commended churches!
The place of persecution and suffering have a place in the Church of Christ and should be embraced by the church.
The church at Smyrna was a suffering church and Christ commended this church and said,
“I will give you the crown of life.”
(Revelation 2:10)
The church at Philadelphia was a faithful, loving, and
persevering church, and Christ commended this church and said,
“He who overcomes
I will make him a pillar in
the temple of My God…
and
I will write on him the name of My God.”
(Revelation 3:12)
The saints in these two churches were willing to sacrifice for each other in order to remain faithful to Christ. They were willing to give up everything for Christ – to walk with Christ – to live Christ – to testify of Christ no matter what it would cost them in terms of affliction, suffering, persecution and yes, even death by being thrown to the lions in the Colosseum, crucified on a cross, or accepting the thrust of a Roman solder’s sword or spear.
They were “all in for Christ” and willing to take the “bullet” so to speak in loving and serving each other. And Christ commended these two churches while scolding and calling the other five churches to repent (Book of Revelation chapters 2 and 3) for their lack of love and unfaithfulness to Christ and His commandments.
The Revelation!
The other day I was with my brother in the Lord, and we were talking about love – the agape kind imparted by Christ into our lives. I felt the Lord added to what He told me about “taking the bullet” discussed previously….
“Love is just not an emotion,
but it is an
act of sacrifice.
If a man was standing in
front of your brother with a gun
about to shoot him,
your sacrifice is to exchange places
with him
and
you take the bullet.”
I turned to my brother and told him what the Lord just said to me. We both were taken back with the Lord’s statement but knew in our spirit love really is sacrificing for each other or a willingness to lay down our lives for one another as Jesus called us to do.
How all this works out in practical ways for individuals is totally dependent on what the Lord reveals to the individual’s heart. Christ’s love in the heart of the saint is a continuous revelation of how one can share that love with brothers and sisters and those who have no relationship to the Lord (unbelievers).
It is not human love because human love can be shallow, pretentious, fickle, deceiving, and will falter when put under pressure or stress. But the love (agape) of Christ is deep and abiding and does not think of self or pleasing self but pleasing the heavenly council.
It is delighting in others, building and strengthening others, and preferring others rather than elevating self. It is a love that will sacrifice one’s life for another if needed. Strong words but this is the ultimate discipleship I believe Christ is talking about.
Christ’s last statements to Peter
It is interesting to note Christ’s statements concerning laying down one’s life when he says,
I am the good shepherd,
the good shepherd
lays down His life
for the sheep.
(John 10:11)
…..I lay down My life for the sheep.
(John 10:15)
…..I lay down My life so I can take it again.
(John 10:17)
No one has taken it away from Me,
but I
lay it down
on My own initiative.
I have authority to
lay it down,
and I have authority to take it up again.
This commandment I received from My Father.
(John 10:18)
Will you
lay down
your life for Me?
(Christ asks Peter)
(John 13:38)
Jesus rapidly fires this expression “laying down His life” in John 10 four times within nine verses and it is His Father who has commanded this action.
The Father loves so much that He had to have Jesus be the sacrificial lamb. And Jesus loved the Father so much that He obeyed and went to the cross to fulfill the Father’s Will as we talked about in the Introduction.
It is like He does not want me to miss this sacrificial action on His part. And then He says to Peter, “Will you lay down your life for Me?
Jesus would not ask His disciples to do something that He would not do. But He knew all of them would sacrifice for Him to shepherd His sheep and they did - they gave their lives for the sake of the Gospel and the sheep.
They took the “bullet” to serve the Master and now they are casting their crowns before the Throne of Christ (Revelations 4:10).
Then, Apostle John, sixty years later, reinforces what Christ said,
We know love (agape) by this,
that
He laid down His life for us;
and
we ought to
lay down our lives
for the brethren.
(1 John 3:16)
Here is another translation of this verse:
This is how we’ve come to understand and experience love:
Christ sacrificed his life for us.
This is why we ought to
live sacrificially
for our fellow believers,
and
not just be out for ourselves.
1st John 3:16, (Message Bible)
In other words, I ought to “take the bullet” for my fellow believers and walk and live with this attitude. I used to toss around these verses not really having Christ’s revelation on how they really applied to my walk with Him.
When He spoke to me about the bullet, it was like a light bulb coming on in my spirit and heart. He was calling me to account and saying to me,
“Do you really want to follow me…..
“Do you really love me to the point of sacrificing your life for others if called to do so?”
Will you go and lay down your life for those I bring to you and if necessary take the “bullet” for them?
It is one thing to read these words intellectually but quite another thing to understand what Christ is asking of me when revealed to my spirit by the Holy Spirit and what it means to my walk with Christ.
Now faced with this revelation, I have had to continually position myself to take the “bullet” for my brothers and sisters in whatever capacity that God calls me to serve them. His taking the “bullet” for me at the cross now becomes my “bullet” I take in serving, sacrificing, and loving the brethren.
O’ Jesus, this word written here in this oracle cuts deep within me. Please help me to walk out this word for I know my flesh will fight against it. Daily strengthen me and causes me to continually focus on taking Your love to others no matter what the cost.
And Jesus, to the person who reads this – please show them what it means for them to “Take the Bullet” in serving You and others.
Thank you, Jesus. So be it!
Rich Arnold
Servant of the Lord
311 Adelaide Ave SW
Hartville, Ohio 44632
330-704-9306
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