Leaking Vessels

Pastor John,

I started listening to the “Leaking Vessels” cd this morning. I haven’t gotten that far, but have already gotten so much out of it!

Yesterday when I texted you, I was feeling so overwhelmed in my job! But I knew I needed peace and patience. I was given an important task; however, I could not do my part until someone else had done theirs, and they were not in any hurry. Everything in my flesh wanted to control the situation to get it moving. I started feeling very overwhelmed, helpless, and very anxious! I sent you that text and then took a walk to the restroom. I just wanted to get alone with Jesus, if only for a minute.

When I came back to my office, I knew there was nothing I could do; it was out of my hands. I kept hearing, “Relax. Do what you can do, and when the time comes, you can do your part.” So, with Jesus help, I began to slowly relax, work on other things and eventually, after others had done what they needed to do, it was time for me to work on what needed to be done.

This morning as I was listening to the cd, it stood out to me, that you said, “We’re
supposed to know things that people don’t know and to conduct ourselves in a way that people can’t conduct themselves without the knowledge of the truth. When the word of God abides in us, we behave the way people cannot behave who don’t know the truth. It means something to have faith in God, to trust God with what you hear and what you see. I believe God puts in front of you what you need to see. I believe everything that is spoken to you, you need to hear. He tries your heart every moment.”

That was so good to me! What happened yesterday in my office was from God. Not only is He watching, but others around me are watching, too. I’m so thankful He helped me through it! I hope that next time it comes around, I’m quicker to let go of the control and the anxious feelings, and hold tighter to the peace that He has given to me. I’m thankful for the situations he puts me in! Sometimes, it doesn’t feel so hot at the moment, but I’m thankful for it!

I can’t wait to hear the rest of the CD and to see what else Jesus has waiting for me!

Michelle 

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Hi, John.

I listened to the leaking vessel CD yesterday, while I was viewing the list of folks who are not here with us anymore.  There are some who have lived faithfully and gone on with the Lord.  There are just a few cases where they had to put out from the body in order for the body to not be damaged (further).  But as I was listening to the CD, you were preaching how that a branch must bear fruit.  If a branch does not bear fruit then it is cut off from the tree and burned in the fire. And if we do bear fruit, then those branches will be pruned so that the tree and branches will bear more fruit.

As I was listening further, I read all of the names on the list that had quit.  It was sad because we know and love these people, and at one time we have had fellowship with most of them.  As I was reading the names, the Spirit was saying in my heart, “This is what happens when there is no longer any fruit developing.”  It made me feel sad and fearful of the Lord because I know that God is not a respecter of persons, nor does it matter how long you have been around.  On the list were young people, adults, and a few older ones.  It may say “quit” besides their names, but actually they have been pruned from us so that we can bear more peaceable fruits of righteousness. It wasn’t their choice to leave the tree.  They may have said, “I quit” in their hearts, but the Spirit may have said, “Cut that branch away!”

I remember helping to prune Bob’s grapes.  I thought I was pruning them back enough, but Bob came behind some of us and pruned the branches even more.  I said to myself, “How in the world can they live?”  But they did, and they will produce grapes this year.  Bob does this every year.  He doesn’t take a year off, or he will not get the yield that pruning produces.  I pray that I bear good fruit, but I pray the more that I endure God’s pruning.  There is a season for pruning.

This CD is a treasure!  No wonder Sheila didn’t want to let it go. 

Love always,

Billy

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Was Nebuchadnezzar Just Pretending?

Pastor John, 

In Daniel, King Nebuchadnezzar made a statement for all the wise men to tell him his dream and the meaning thereof, or they are dead.

I would like to know, if at all possible, if he was testing his wise men, or if he really forgot his dream and would be able to remember it if someone would tell him what it was.
 
This seemed to happen right after he met Daniel.  Was he testing his people because he felt God through Daniel, and knew he was a different person from what he was used to?
 
We read it and then watched the movie.  When we read it, we took it one way, but when we watched it, it came across the other way.
 
Steve W.

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Hi Steven.

Movies about the Bible are worse than commentaries on the Bible.  Stick with the feelings you had when you read the Bible itself.

Pastor John

Healed Knee

Brother John, 

Sunday morning I asked for prayer for my knee which has been hurting for a few weeks. Last night I slept without any pain. Thank you Jesus he has been so good to us. Hope you have a good night.

Jim G.

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Hey John,

I want to mention something about my knee that Jim’s email brought to my attention. 

I was having trouble with my left knee for several weeks. It would often just go out on me without warning while walking up steps.  If I made a sudden move left or right, as I often do playing tennis, I would feel pain. 

Sometimes, I had to pull myself up the stairs going from your basement to the office. 

I don’t remember exactly when I prayed for my knee but I asked Jesus to heal it. I believe that other people I mentioned it to also prayed for me. 

Not long ago, I noticed that it was not bothering me when I climbed stairs. I was cautious at first and told myself that I would wait and see if my knee was really healed before I said anything. 

Well, I believe it is healed! Thank Jesus! 

Tom

 

 

 

Sister Beth on “Jesus Hated Life in This World”

Pastor John, 

I want to tell you hat I love about this Blog (below). There are two things:

1. I love that it gets more Christianity out of me. I can feel it. 

2. I love learning that the hidden Son of God was waiting patiently in heaven, wanting to tell men of the mercies of his Father.

That is exactly how we feel when we know the Son’s mercies toward us; we want to share it with others who don’t know how wonderful he is. I can feel Jesus waiting and wanting to come to earth and tell people of the Father and His glory.   As you said, “Repeatedly, in the book of Psalms and in the prophets, we find the hidden Son of God asking the Father to let him come to earth and teach men about the Father.  For example: “Let me sing of the LORD’s eternal mercies!  Let me make known with my mouth your faithfulness through all generations!” (Ps. 89:1″

Mmmmm…this is so good.   This new thought didn’t shake me up at all, and for me, that’s big, Pastor John. I feel at peace knowing I don’t anything rightly unless Jesus teaches it to me, and I feel wide open for new thoughts from Jesus. No guilt. No shame for thinking Heaven wasn’t perfect until the risen Son made it that way.

I love this: “There was certainly something about life in heaven that Jesus hated, for when he returned to heaven, he made enormous changes there, purifying it, according to the author of Hebrews (9:23).”

That just makes sense. I feel kinda …free 

Beth

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Jesus Hated Life in This World

“He who loves his life shall lose it, and he who hates his life in this world

shall keep it unto eternal life.  If anyone serves me, he must follow me.”

John 12:25–26a

Preacher Clark testified once that God had spoken to him and said, “I am not a hypocrite.  I don’t command you to do something that I don’t do.”  Jesus was our example, and he expects us to follow it.  He did not tell us to hate this life even though he loved it.  He hated this life as an example for us, showing us how to hate it in a godly way, as he said, “If anyone serves me, he must follow me.”

But what is it about life in this world that Jesus hated?  First of all, when he came into the world, the righteous and the wicked were both living in it.  Second, when he came into the world, nobody in this world had the kind of life that he had, the eternal life that God gave him when He created him.  Therefore, nobody in this world truly knew or understood either him or his Father.  His Father knew him, and he knew his Father; every other creature in heaven or in earth was in darkness.

Before the Son of God rose from the dead, ascended into heaven, and cast Satan and his angels out, godly and ungodly creatures dwelt in heaven, too.  Also, no heavenly creature, except the Son, had God’s kind of life, just as no earthly creature had God’s kind of life.  Moreover, Paul said that from the foundation of the world, the Son of God was hidden from both men and heavenly beings until he was revealed in Jesus Christ (Col. 1:26; Eph. 3:9).  This means that no creature in heaven knew or understood the Son before he was revealed, just as no creature on earth knew or understood the Son.  In short, the kind of life Jesus hated in this world when he came into it was very much like the kind of life Jesus knew in heaven before he came.

All this brings us to a question.  If Jesus hated life in this world, then did he also hate life in heaven before he came to earth and returned to heaven, and cast Satan and his angels out, thus purging heaven of all ungodliness?  There was certainly something about life in heaven that Jesus hated, for when he returned to heaven, he made enormous changes there, purifying it, according to the author of Hebrews (9:23).

When Jesus prayed that the Father would restore glory to him, he said he was praying for “the glory that I used to have with you before the universe existed” (Jn. 17:5).  Before this universe existed, the Son dwelt openly with the Father in supreme happiness (Prov. 8:22–31).  After the universe was populated, in heaven and in earth, the Son was hidden by the Father, to be revealed at the appointed time.  Repeatedly, in the book of Psalms and in the prophets, we find the hidden Son of God asking the Father to let him come to earth and teach men about the Father.  For example: “Let me sing of the LORD’s eternal mercies!  Let me make known with my mouth your faithfulness through all generations!” (Ps. 89:1).

How happy must the Son have been when the Father at last sent him to earth to be revealed, to be free to teach men, as the Son of God, about his Father – and to return to heaven and openly enjoy again the Father’s presence as His precious Son!

(To read more of Pastor John’s blogs please click on the link below.)

http://pastorjohnshouse.blogspot.com/2009/12/why-world-hates-you.html

 

The Father and the Son

Pastor John,

One of the pastors in church messaged me.  She said: “The author of the book (God had a Son before Mary Did) is just giving [his opinion] of what they say is “truth”, but the BIBLE is inspired by the Holy Spirit.  Jesus Christ – was the Co – Creator with the Father, when all things were created.”

Pastor John, kindly help me to explain to her that the doctrine of trinity is false.  What is really the true doctrine of Christ?  As I learn in your book, the Father created the Son, then the world.  The Son is the firstborn [of all creatures].  The Father created the Son to have authority and dominion over all the things created.  The Son already existed before the foundation of the world (Prov. 8:22-31). They don’t have the same power because the Father is greater than the Son. The Holy Spirit is not separate from the two.  The Holy Spirit is in the Father who, like us, has a body and a spirit. They become One as Jesus said, “I and the Father are one,” because the Spirit of the Father dwells in the Son.  I have a question.  When Jesus was here on earth, was he fully God and fully man, as people say?   He didn’t sin, the Bible says.  Does the dove represent the Father spirit?  
 
Please Kindly explain to me what is our stand to the doctrine..
 
They said to me that the title of the book is correct, but the content is questionable.  
 
Thank you,
 
Leika

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Hi again!

It sounds as if you have a good understanding of the relationship of the Father and the Son.  Jesus will perfect our understanding as we continue to serve him humbly.  I hope that your former pastors will also be blessed with greater understanding as they seek to do the will of God.
 
The Father is a person.  The Son is a person.  The holy Spirit is NOT a person; it is God’s life, which He shared with His Son when He created him, and which He shared with us when He baptized us with it.
 
The Father gave the Son the power to create all things, according to the Father’s will.  I don’t believe that either of them considers the Son to be the Father’s “co-creator”.  The Father alone is the Creator, but He chose to create all things through His Son.  He alone rules this world, but He chooses to rule it through the authorities whom He has put in power (Rom. 13:1-6).

As for Jesus being both God and man, that is true, and I fully explain that in my book.  And the Spirit is both the Lord Jesus (2Cor. 3:17) and the Father (John. 14:23) because it is their life.
 
Leika, if your former pastors are really seeking the truth, they will receive from my book the same revelation that you did.  Just love and respect them, and avoid trying to convince them of what God has shown you.  To reveal truth to people is the work of God; our part is only to testify to the truth He has revealed to us.
 
Just rejoice that the truth has been given to you!  And be content with your testimony, which God has given you.  All who are truly of God will hear you.
 
Pastor John

Cain’s Wife

Hi Pastor Clark.

I have question:  Who is the wife of Cain in Genesis?  how the humans scattered in the earth?   That is always the question of my brother, and I cannot answer him.

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Hi Leika.

Adam and Eve, over the centuries, had a multitude of sons and daughters (Gen. 5:4).  Cain, as well as Abel, Seth, and Adam’s other sons, married their sisters,
and that was good at that time.  Human population, given the life span of men before the Flood, would have multiplied very swiftly.

About two thousand years after Adam, Abraham married his half-sister, Sarah, but by the time of Moses, almost a thousand years after Abraham, the human race had grown so diverse that marriages between brother and sister were no longer needed, and so, God said not to do it any more:  “None of you shall approach to any that is near of kin to him, to uncover their nakedness: I am the Lord” (Lev. 18:6, KJV).

I hope that helps.   Thank you for your question.

Pastor John

Revelation 12

I have question pastor John.  ​​

Who is the woman in Revelation who give birth? (Revelation 12).

Leika M.

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Hi Leika.

The woman in Revelation is Israel, and the child the woman bore is Jesus.

​Thank you for the question.

Pastor John