We will never know abundant life until the unseen and eternal realm is home to us in our everyday experience. Until then, we will be living according to appearances, and appearances will never lead us deeper into the life of God. Only faith will. God wants to bring us to the point where we say, "I live by what God says about the things in my life-situations, people, and myself." Then we see as He sees. We discern that situations are not as they appear to be, but that God’s absolutes are operating in the realm of appearances. We are at rest in the unseen and eternal realm, and we experience His fullness within us.
The Rest of the Gospel, One Press, 2000, p. 33.
Jesus is the Lamb slain from before the foundation of the world. In the seen and temporal, He was the lamb slain 2000 years ago. In the unseen and eternal, He has always been the slain Lamb. In the seen and temporal realm, you and I live physically right now. In the unseen and eternal realm, you and I were crucified on the cross with Christ. Our old man, inherited from Adam, dead to and separated from God, died with Him.
The Rest of the Gospel, One Press, 2000, p. 42.
As we grow spiritually, we learn the difference between the Spirit’s voice and the evil one’s voice. The Spirit never witnesses to your spirit in condemnation. He might give you a check sometimes: “Wait a minute. Wait a minute.” But not in condemnation. He might tell you you’re wrong sometimes. But not in condemnation. He rebukes, He corrects, He points out, but He never condemns. He wants to build you up, to undergird you, to increase your understanding of the life of God in you. He wants you to see how God already sees you. You are a saint, a holy one. You are blameless. You are beyond reproach.
The Rest of the Gospel, One Press, 2000, P. 104-105.
God has created each of us with a thirst that only He can quench. French philosopher Pascal called it a God-shaped vacuum in our hearts that only He can fill. Or as Augustine put it, “Our souls are restless until they find their rest in Thee.” Man is perpetually seeking. To whatever degree we don’t know the unseen and eternal realm; we seek answers in the seen and temporal. We look for eternal answers among temporal things. But we discover that they cannot provide them.
The Rest of the Gospel, One Press, 2000, p. 31.
Christ lives in us to manifest His life through us. Christ in us accomplishes His own purposes. Part of His purpose is intimacy with us, but His plan encompasses more than that. He is working toward His own ends, and we are the vessels through which He works. We are the visible manifestation of what God is doing, with Himself as the ultimate goal, “that God may be all in all” (I Corinthians 15:28).
The Rest of the Gospel, One Press, 2000, Preface.
God’s plan was to bring into being a host of sons and daughters whom He would indwell; through whom He would live and manifest Himself; and in and through whom Christ would reign supreme. We are the beneficiaries of that plan. God, in His love and grace, has made us a part of His plan. But we are not the center of it; Christ is.
The Rest of the Gospel, One Press, 2000, Preface.
We are programmed for failure if we’re looking for ultimate answers in a non-ultimate realm, a realm that’s partial, fragmented, incomplete. We end up worshiping the creation rather than the Creator. We can do that as believers. The total answer is a Person, Jesus Christ. It’s part of God’s program to make us dissatisfied with what the temporal realm offers, so that we might seek life in Him.
The Rest of the Gospel, One Press, 2000, p. 31-32.