Companions In Tribulation
Introduction
"I am Alpha and Omega...who is,
and who was, and who is to come, THE ALMIGHTY," speaks the divine voice at the opening of the book of
Revelation. A little later we read, "When I saw Him, I fell at His feet as
dead. And He laid His right hand upon me, saying unto me, Fear not; I am the
first and the last..." (Rev. 1:17). At the closing of the book the same voice
declares, "I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end, the first and the
last.. I, Jesus, have sent mine angel
to testify these things unto you in the churches" (Rev. 22:13,16).
People have great difficulty
understanding an abstraction, a force, or a spirit. It must be personalized, it
must take form, and that is why God has come in the person of Jesus Christ so
that we might see Him and see what God is like. That is why in the book of
Colossians the apostle Paul says of Christ, "He is the exact likeness of the
unseen God; the visible representation of the invisible.. .for it was in Him
that all things were created, in heaven and on earth, things seen and things
unseen, whether thrones, dominions, rulers or authorities; all things were
created and exist through Him and in and for Him" (Col. 1:15-16). Therefore,
the embodiment referred to as Jesus in the physical world, in the atomic world,
is the invisible Yahweh who exists in a Spirit or Light World. He is Almighty
Creator of everything in heaven and in earth! "In the beginning God created the
heavens and the earth." Other scriptures tell us that it was Yahweh who is the
great Creator! Glorious, indeed, and wonderful beyond human description is the
great truth that the book of Revelation is the unveiling of God-Yahweh-Yahshua
; the invisible Almighty God who came to earth as our Lord Jesus Christ!
I have no desire to dispute
doctrines about the Godhead. I am sure each of us has our understanding of God,
how God is one and how God is three, and all the rest of it. I am not writing
to debate those issues, rather to point out a truth which the Spirit has made
very real to my heart. There are many kinds of terminology that we still use
that are not the Spirit's terminology. They are not what the Spirit has
witnessed concerning God, but terms that men have coined to express their
conception of the Godhead! Many of these terms have come right out of the
darkness of religious carnal minds and the Lord's people have embraced them and
parrot them as though they were divine revelation! Christians talk about God
the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost. Did you know there is not a
scripture in the Bible that talks about God the Son? There is not a scripture in the Bible that speaks of God the Holy
Ghost! Yet the title "God the Father" appears many, many times throughout the
New Testament. "To us," Paul said, "there is but one God, the Father, of whom
are all things, and we in Him" (I Cor. 8:6).
Jesus is always referred to as
the Son of God not God the Son. Now you say, "Wait a minute, brother, are you
telling me Jesus isn’t God?" Not at all! I am saying that He is not called God
the Son. Likewise, the Holy Spirit is most often referred to as the Spirit of
God not God the Holy Spirit. God
Himself said, "I will send my Spirit; I will pour out my Spirit." He no where
said, "God the Holy Spirit will come to you." Do you see what I mean? We use terminology that has been formulated
by the theologians of the church systems which are not found in the word of
God! Jesus said that the Father had sent Him, and that the Father is God. So to
us there is one God who is the Father! The question follows "Was Jesus God?"
Absolutely! But did you know that the God in Jesus was the Father? What did He say? "Believest thou not that I
am in the Father, and the Father in me? The words that I speak unto you I speak
not of myself but the Father that dwelleth in me, HE doeth the works." (Jn.
14:10).
Can you imagine GOD saying, "I
can of mine own self do nothing?" Yet Jesus confessed that He, of Himself,
could do nothing! Only the Father in Him could speak and do the works! So what
I am saying is, THE GOD THAT WAS IN JESUS WAS THE FATHER!" Great is the mystery of godliness: GOD was
manifest in the flesh." (I Tim. 3:16). Not God the Son manifest in flesh. GOD
was manifest in the flesh!
The great Indian apostle and
mystic, Sadhu Sundar Singh, was caught up in the Spirit. I know not whether he
was in the body or out of the body, but he was caught up in the Spirit and saw,
in Spirit, the throne of God. Just as John saw, when on Patmos he was caught up
in Spirit, Sadhu Sundar Singh saw the throne of the heavens of God's Spirit and
there was ONE who sat upon the throne. He did not see three thrones! He did
not see God the Father sitting on one throne, God the Son sitting on another
throne, and God the Holy Ghost upon a third throne. Nor did he see one throne
with three Gods seated upon it! He saw one throne and on the throne he saw One
sitting, and the One he saw was Jesus. He saw Jesus sitting on the throne! But
emanating, radiating out of Jesus in a never-ending and all-encompassing
effulgence of glory, majesty, wisdom, power, dominion, love, mercy and goodness
was the Father! Shining out of Jesus was the scintillating glory of the Father
so that Jesus could say, "Have I been so long time with you, and yet thou hast
not known me? He that hath seen me hath seen the Father; and how sayest thou
then, Show us the Father?" (Jn. 14:9).
My heart's desire and prayer to
God is that all who read these pages may now see themselves in Christ. May God
enable you by His Spirit to see yourself IN CHRIST
J. Preston Eby