2.2.5 God Loved Us First – Love and Relationship (2)

2.2.5 神先愛了我們-愛與關係（二）

Life Academy Healing Course Sharing: MING

What do people need most in a relationship?

The security of being completely loved.

Total openness, complete trust in God.

Prayer: Dear Jesus Christ, the Trinity God is among us. Thank you for pouring your love into our hearts. I know that your love surpasses our knowledge. May we be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God, according to God’s power that is at work within us, God is able to do immeasurably more than we can ask or imagine. Lord, you anoint us and lay your hands on us, so that our spiritual life can truly wake up. Thank you. You have chosen us in love, please anoint this sharing, I pray in the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.

In the last teaching, we talked about how to establish a relationship with God. What is the relationship between man and God? Through what means can we know God’s heart? We know in our minds that God loves us, and love requires relationship and expression. We can express love to a teddy bear, but a teddy bear cannot express love to you. This is why God created us in his likeness, so we can have a relationship with him, which is why we have the identity as the son of God and bear his image and likeness.

What kind of relationship do you want to have with God?

Work?  Love?

Our God is a supernatural God. To establish a relationship with God is to live in the kingdom of God and experience Him. The focus is not on the experience of the supernatural kingdom but on Jesus. All things have only one purpose: to revolve around Jesus, so everything that happens in all things depends on seeking the face of God, rather than seeking the work of God.

When it comes to the supernatural, we want to experience God’s glory, power, gifts, and anointing. Of course, these are all given to us by God’s hand. God’s heart not only allows us to have these experiences, but He also wants us to have Jesus. God’s intention is not that we simply be part of God’s work, but to have Himself.

I remember one time I was in a church and a speaker asked me a question, he said, what do you want? My instinctive answer at first was that I wanted the glory of God, but when I said it, it turned out that I wanted God Himself. It turns out that having God Himself means possessing everything, not just glory. Everything we say and do comes from Jesus Christ, and is all based on our relationship with God, not anointing.

The kingdom of God is very wonderful and powerful. When we are facing a kingdom with so many splendid and supernatural wonders, we must pay attention to our relationship with God. This relationship will lead us to enter a supernatural kingdom. From the supernature kingdom, this relationship will lead us into another realm which is the infinity kingdom. Therefore, the kingdom of God enters from one level to a higher level, and then to another level. For the heavenly father, what matters to him is not how many signs and miracles we perform, but how much and deeply we know Him.

The manifestation of the kingdom of God is due to the presence of Jesus Christ. When the kingdom of God comes among us, if we only focus on the power, glory, anointing, and miracles, it is easy for us to neglect our relationship with God. Because we are attracted by the glory, power, and miracles, we will neglect our relationship with God. This is why the Bible says that not everyone who says to: “Lord, Lord”, will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only he who does the will of my Father can enter. Many will say to me on that day, Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, cast out demons, or perform many miracles? I will tell them plainly, "I never knew you. Go away from me, you evildoers." (Matthew 7:22-23)

In the last days, we have seen many people perform miracles and great powers, but Jesus said you know my power and my name, but who are you and I don’t know you, why?

Aren’t these people preaching in the name of Jesus? Cast out demons in the name of Jesus? Are miracles performed in the name of Jesus? Why don’t they know him yet? Because the name of Jesus itself carries power, it doesn’t matter who uses the name of Jesus Christ, the name itself already carries power. When that name is used, everything in heaven and on earth will pay attention, including hell, because this name is the most powerful name in the world.

I remembered that there was a young brother in our ministry who had many bad habits in life. He often went to bars. But you know, he heard the name of Jesus Christ. Once he entered the bar and saw someone was drunk and felt uncomfortable, the drunk man was rolling on the ground, the young brother followed our example and put his hand on the man, saying "In the name of Jesus Christ, you are healed," and the man stood up and was healed.

Once when I was helping an unbelieving lady, she said, "I don't accept the God you believe in. I have my own belief." However, she agreed to pray for her healing. As a result, when I laid my hands on her, the healing came immediately. it was The very name of Jesus carries such power that even hell has to obey.

A few years ago, there was a patient with leukemia in a church. His family did not believe in God. He often went to the Buddhist temple to worship, and he had a dream at night. In the dream, the Bodhisattva appeared. The Bodhisattva told him not to ask healing from the temple but to the church and worship God, and that God is powerful, so he goes to the church and believes in the Lord. Of course, it is a personal and unique example. We may wonder why evil spirits persuade people to believe in God. This is another question, but we see an important part: the name of Jesus Christ carries power!

Power happens when we do it in the name of Jesus Christ, so Jesus is never surprised that we can perform miracles, can you understand that? Jesus understands that people may know his name and use his power, but people may have nothing to do with Jesus. We need to be careful about this. What does God value? He values the relationship more than the things we do. All Christians, including Gentiles, can receive God’s power, including healing and deliverance and performing miracles, but we don’t quite agree with such things as chasing powers and gifts, because the final condition of that person could be worse ( Reference Matt:12:45)

When we heal, we first pray for that person’s soul and salvation.  Can healing come to those who have not believed in the Lord? Absolutely! People can even cast out demons because of the name of Jesus Christ. All Christians can receive the power of God.

We do not establish a relationship with God’s power, glory, and anointing. This is what we need to be vigilant about. When we see many people who have God’s power, and glory, but are not centered on Christ, it is easy to make our Eyes turn from Jesus to other things, including focusing on other spiritual things instead of God himself.

Our relationship with God must surpass everything we experience. We must have a first-hand relationship with Jesus, the Holy Spirit, and the Father. This is a new challenge I propose today, you must know God with you own first-hand information, not second-hand. Second-hand means hearing about it without personal experience.

In the beginning, everything in the Garden of Eden started with a relationship. All of this happened because God wanted to establish a relationship with us. He is a God of love and relationships. What kind of relationship do you want to establish with God?

When I was still working , the company I worked for needed to recruit employees. Every time we receive a lot of resumes when we are hiring, it will not take more than 1 minute to read one resume. We only focus on  "recruitment requirements", so when the resume is in hand, what are the academic background, qualifications, certifications, etc. We just looked at a few keywords, and it is easy for us to establish such a working relationship with God.

What is a working relationship? It's base on  job titles.

We know that God has many attributes. God is a healer, protector, and provider, and God’s resume amazes us. He has more than 10,000 names in the Bible, when we know what our Heavenly Father can do for us, we just quickly look for his attributes and cry out for help. What attributes are they? Jehovah Shalom -  peace, Jehovah Jireh - prepare, Jehovah Nissi - banner.

Therefore, we can know what we want from God according to his name ( Attributes), and we go to God every day to deal with what we need. We seek what God can do for us.

When we need healing, we will definitely run to God, because Jehovah has a name, Jehovah Rapha. He is the healer. This is a working relationship. The relationship we establish with Him is based on his power, it is not Intimacy.

If it is just a working relationship, we have no way of knowing God’s heart. In the kingdom of God, we cannot distinguish the relationship between the two. Our relationship with the Triune God is like what I just called a working relationship, we can quickly and effectively deal with work-related abilities, but not intimate relationships.

So entering the kingdom with a good relationship is better than entering with supernatural miracles.

The intimate relationship with God will take you into the infinity kingdom.

Therefore, we must seek the face of God, not just what He does, not just establish a relationship with His power, but establish a relationship with His heart. Everything starts with the relationship and trust in God. It also means that: we cannot gain intimacy through spiritual disciplines and exercises.

It is very important for everyone to pray, fast, and read the Bible. What is your purpose for these spiritual exercises? Why do you read the Bible and pray? Why do you fast? In order to do something, such as fasting and praying for Montreal this time, it is to win the spiritual battles in Montreal. This is not a relationship, this is an assignment, a work. God has entrusted us with a responsibility and we have to do such things, so we get up to practice fasting, praying, and reading the Bible.

Can we have a relationship with God in the workplace, just like you have a relationship with your boss or your colleagues in the workplace? Of course! Is that the relationship has the same extent as your best friend? Not the same!

In the working environment, God equips us to use abilities and gifts in ministries, God also allows us to learn to know him through the works, but that is just the work of the kingdom of God. What we do is to exercise and build up our spiritual lives and it is just work. If you stay at that level, you cannot touch the heart of God. You can only establish a working relationship at work, and it is difficult to establish a deeper intimate relationship because it needs heart-to-heart communication.

You can know someone at work for 20 years, what is the hardest thing in that situation? Open our hearts!   In our working relationship, we are surrounded by the things we have to do, so there is no way to open our hearts and share emotions on that occasion because it requires heart-to-heart communication.

I found that, like everyone else, I often live in a working relationship with God. For me, this is also a challenge that strikes me. It also triggers me to think about what my God is truly like. We can read Ezekiel’s first chapter for his appearance. The Bible also describes in detail what my God can do, but who is God? What can make him laugh? What does he do when he's not busy? What does he do when he is sad? Who is his best friend?

In fact, we are very pitiful as human beings, because we have no trust, and it is difficult for us to be naked and open like Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. I ask everyone every time, can you be undefended? Can't. That's the thing about us humans, we can't trust that person unless we interact with that person, so we have to know God firsthand.

Unless we realize what kind of person and God Jesus is, we cannot trust God. Without trusting God, we cannot have Him. Therefore, we have to experience God ourselves. Most Christians know that there is a trinity God, by hearing and reading everything about Him in the Bible, but we have not experienced Him personally, the information we get is only second-hand. However, the kingdom of God must not be obtained through second-hand information, it takes our own Experience with God to truly know him.

One day someone shared with me that they heard the Lord Jesus laugh, and I told God that I also want to hear you laugh, because God does not show favoritism. ( ACT 10:34) The world will show partiality to people, but God will not. Peter did not know that people could walk on water until he saw Jesus Christ walking on water.

This is not a matter of the imparting of anointing, it is about trust and relationship because in this way the power of God is around us and angels come and operate around us. Why is this happening? Because I believe! God is powerful, noting is impossible for him.

I have a spiritual daughter who gave me an orange-flavored supplement. One day she came over excitedly and told me that this product could help me lose weight. I quickly glanced at what was written on it: ** Something something Soup on the package( full of Japanese words)* * . After my colleague got off work, I went to the water boiling machine to fill the bag of granules with water. The granules were very interesting. They made a lot of bubbles, similar to the nutritional supplements we used to drink. The room was filled with the aroma of oranges. , I picked up the cup and drank it.

Very soon, on the way home my stomach and intestines felt very uncomfortable. The spiritual daughter called over and asked, "What did you do with that product?" I said of course I mixed it with warm water and drank it into my stomach. She suddenly fell silent for a moment and asked, are you okay now? That thing was for taking a bath, so she asked me if I wanted to call an ambulance. The very moment I hung up the phone, I suddenly heard laughter exploding in the car. It was so loud. It was from Jesus Christ. Laughing, I finally heard Jesus laughing. I benefited from this matter. I received first-hand information from God, which was a great encouragement to me. It turns out that Jesus Christ can laugh.

How does God establish a relationship with humans?

What is described in the Garden of Eden is God's heart, God's desire, God's intention. God reveals everything to His children. It's not about the resurrection of the dead, it's not about the clouds of glory staying in that place, none of that.

Adam and Eve did not seek their ministry in the Garden of Eden, nor what they could do. One of the key points in the Garden of Eden was the understanding and relationship between each other, so the scripture also describes it in this way. In the cool of the day, God came to the garden to visit them. This is a very private matter. God privately enters someone's home to visit. This is a relationship connection. They get along with each other and understand each other, every evening. So God expects us as heirs to also know that there is such a private and intimate relationship available, that God can visit us.

Moses

God met Moses on the mountain and covered Moses' eyes on the mountain because God's holiness and power can strike down people. When the glory is revealed in front of us, we cannot stand.

But it was different in the tabernacle. In the tabernacle, God allowed Moses and the priests to face him. Has this God changed? No. As much as he wants to have a relationship with us today, he remains unchanged. Exodus 33:10  Whenever the people saw the pillar of cloud standing at the entrance to the tent, they all stood and worshiped, each at the entrance to their tent. 11 The LORD would speak to Moses face to face, as one speaks to a friend. Then Moses would return to the camp, but his young aide Joshua son of Nun did not leave the tent.

In the Tabernacle God talked with Moses, and they visited each other, Numbers 12:8 With him I speak face to face, clearly and not in riddles; he sees the form of the LORD. Why then were you not afraid to speak against my servant Moses?” Therefore, there is no need for metaphors between God and Moses. They can talk very intimately, it all started with an intimate relationship.

God said Abraham was my friend, James 2:23, which fulfilled the scripture: "Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness." He was also called God's friend. The Book of Songs says this is my beloved and my friend.

Genesis 18:17 And the LORD said, Shall I hide from Abraham what I am about to do? God only said one thing here, he would not hide secrets from this man because he was my friend. God did not say that because I gave him a lot of power, I did not hide secrets from him. God only said that I hid nothing from Abraham because He is my friend.

What is recorded in the Bible does not say how much anointing Abraham had, but because of the relationship. He and God were friends. Therefore, when God was about to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah , Abraham approached and spoke: Genesis 18 :23 Then Abraham approached him and said: “Will you sweep away the righteous with the wicked? 24 What if there are fifty righteous people in the city? Will you really sweep it away and not spare[e] the place for the sake of the fifty righteous people in it?  This is a very personal relationship between friends. God said that Abraham is my friend. Before God does anything, God must first tell his friend Abraham. Is this a great privilege?

Enoch

Enoch was God’s best friend. Enoch walked with God. In the Bible, he was God’s best friend.

Genesis 5:22 After he became the father of Methuselah, Enoch walked faithfully with God 300 years and had other sons and daughters. We see that Enoch and God had a very good friendship in the Bible. God often walked with Enoch, doing things and sharing every day. What do friends normally do? They don’t just stay in a room, they also chat, they also eat together, go shopping, etc. How good is the relationship between God and Enoch? Enoch went for a walk one day when he was 365 years old and didn’t come back. What was the reason why he didn’t come back? It’s because God couldn’t tolerate not seeing Enoch for a day. They were so close, so close every day. For God, 300 years of visiting was not enough, so God took him away forever, and he stayed with God forever.

In John 14:9 Jesus answered: “Don’t you know me, Philip, even after I have been among you such a long time? Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? 10 Don’t you believe that I am in the Father and that the Father is in me? The words I say to you I do not speak on my own authority. Rather, it is the Father, living in me, who is doing his work.

Therefore, every church and every Christian’s service on earth has only one ultimate goal, which is to be like Jesus and to represent Jesus. Therefore, every child of God serves full-time. Full-time service is not about being paid a salary in the church nor being hired to do things for the kingdom of God, but every Christian represents Jesus on earth. Therefore, after we are born, God has given us many roles and opportunities to represent Jesus. You must be the light. John 15:15 From now on I no longer call you servants, for a servant does not know what his master does, but I call you friends, for I have made known to you all that I have heard from my Father.

This verse has told us that He has told us everything about the Heavenly Father, so from now on He will no longer call us servants but friends. The disciples’ relationship with Jesus was not that of friends at the beginning. They were saved because of their faith. Yes, they believed that Jesus had the power of God and saw his signs and wonders, so they got to know him and then came to establish a relationship. The relationship that the disciples established with Jesus was not a service relationship, they had the eternity relationship. The disciples began as the servants of Jesus and ended as his friends.

After the disciples began to meet God and serve Him, they spent time with God, not just at work. They laugh, stay, and cry together. They build relationships in this way, not because of glory and power. Acts 1:21 Therefore it is necessary to choose one of the men who have been with us the whole time the Lord Jesus was living among us, 22 beginning from John’s baptism to the time when Jesus was taken up from us. For one of these must become a witness with us of his resurrection.”

Who are they looking for? They are not just looking for someone who knows the power and anointing of Jesus. They are looking for someone who has lived with Jesus, has their own first-hand information, and personally knows Jesus himself. Only then can they be appointed as one of the twelve apostles of Jesus. This is the characteristic of having the apostleship: they heard Jesus with their ears, saw him with their own eyes, and experienced him personally. This is what Peter was talking about at. 2 Peter 1:16 For we did not follow cleverly devised stories when we told you about the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ in power, but we were eyewitnesses of his majesty.

On the Mount of Transfiguration, they all saw God with them, so the relationship between servants and friends is different. This is something we need to spend time investing in. The same is true for Jesus and the disciples. There is also trust building between them, so we often ask Brothers and sisters: do you trust God?

Many of us are very weak in terms of trust. When disasters or storms come, that trust is gone. For the invisible God, it is even more challenging for us. Only when disciples have such a relationship with Jesus can they inherit the Kingdom of God and all things, only when you truly recognize your status and identity in the Kingdom of God can you inherit that inheritance.

When you enter a castle, you are the prince of this castle, if you do not recognize that you are a prince, the servants also won’t recognize you, and you have no way to inherit the property. It is not God does not give inheritance to you, the problem is you don't know your identity and status and you can’t receive it.

Because Peter and Jesus have such a relationship, after Jesus leaves, Peter’s shadow will also heal people. That one is not due to the anointing, but the relationship, out of his knowledge and trust. A relationship needs to be established. Can God trust us? How do we do it? Can God trust you?

Do you know why some people have a lot of work and some have less? Only in the process of trust, the more you trust God, the greater the amount of things and ministries God will entrust to you. Otherwise, if you can’t account to God for our trivial matters, will He trust you with more? I know that our brothers and sisters want to enter the kingdom (Global) level ministries and want to step into the territorial level ministries, but I must ask a question, can God trust you? What was your reaction? What is your attitude towards that little thing entrusted to you by God? Because when it comes to work, God has no shortage of people to use. When you don’t move, will God send someone else to take your place?  Of course, Yes.

We have seen that intimate relationships are very important, so before the power of the kingdom of God can be reached, it starts with relationships. That’s why the scriptures say that we should seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. (Matt 6:33) We need to know one thing: that is, God’s inheritance has been inherited by Christ, and we have also inherited it. It is not something we can fight to have, and we do not need to do anything to get it, but it has been inherited. To receive the inheritance, you must be a family member, and you must have a relationship with the owner.

Three questions:

1. Trust comes from relationships. Can God trust us?

2. What do we need for God to trust us? Can you give an example? What have you done in your life that makes you feel like God can no longer trust you? Or have you ever done anything in your life that distrusted God?

3. What kind of relationship do you want to have with God?

Prayer:

Lord, I thank you, thank you for being among us. When we say that we want to touch your heart, you are so delighted and joyful. You are so pleased with each of us. We come before your presence and we truly repent. Many times, we do things to get the anointing and glory instead of doing things for you. Lord, you are the God who knows people’s hearts. You know our motives. Even when the motivation comes in secret, you know them all.

Lord, forgive us, forgive us for wanting to have a relationship with Your glory and anointing instead of being God-centered with Jesus Christ. Lord, please help us to overcome the insincere part of us, the part that does not understand. Lord, please make us more like you. We come to you to repent. Please help us so that we can step into all the abundance you promised.

We thought we trusted you, but when the storm came, we discovered how little faith we have. Lord, take away this part and do deeper work in us so that we can truly know you and be able to trust you.  Take away all the defense lines and blockages between us and you, and review the reasons that make us unable to trust you. Show us, Lord, that we may know that you are faithful, God.  We were created by you ,so that we may inherit the kingdom with Jesus Christ.

Thank you for encouraging us so that we can have a trusting relationship with you. Please replace all belief systems in us that are not in line with your will and make them aligned with your own. This prayer is in the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.