"ON THE THIRD DAY"
ON THE THIRD DAY
Sunday, October 17, 2015, the Year of Our Lord
Pastor Carolyn Sissom
One of the spiritual truths of the Third Day is the principle of the Overcomers who hold fast to their faith even unto death against the power of foes, temptations and persecutions.
As all of you know, I have been made aware this fall of so many ministries who are being “worn out”, “burned out”, “beat up and left for dead”. We, at Eastgate have been pressing through our own challenges of which we have been transparent. However, I have been through harder times than these more often than I want to count. Always, we kept our eyes on Jesus, didn’t look to the left or right, burned our exits, and pressed in. My enemies called me “stubborn”. God called me an “overcomer”.
This past week a light bulb came on, which is to say the Lord gave me clarity.
When the Lord released the “Third Day” i.e. “overcomer” anointing through my life, it was after I rose from the death of my carnal soul. Even though I was a born again, Spirit filled, tongue talking, Bible preaching Christian, the pain in my soul qualified me for the walking dead.
In short, when the Spirit of God raised me from the death of my carnal soul, The Spirit imparted to me the anointing of the “Overcomer”. This is the spirit that will not accept defeat. It is the anointing over “death”. Once we no longer fear the death of our soul, fear has no more power over us. On The Third Day, Jesus rose from the dead and had total victory over death. Absolutely, we know we have the victory over death. When we die, we will go to Heaven.
Yet, there are the “walking dead”. These are the ministries who have been beaten up in the realm of the Soul. The reason the Lord has called the horses (overcomers) to press in is to hold up the arms of these who are at risk of being “worn out” that they may be overcomers.
We are pressing in for a greater anointing of raising the walking dead.
Who are these walking dead? People---who are in so much pain that they are not living in the realm of the glory of the Kingdom of God. Where is the pain in your life? Whatever area of your soul which is experiencing pain will also affect the physical body. How do you measure this pain? If your soul and heart cries out to God continually day after day, week after week, month after month, concerning your broken heart, broken dreams, broken promises, a broken life, then you are not living in the rest of the Lord. When we overcome the pain of those broken areas of our life or a lingering sin, we enter into the righteousness, peace and joy of the Lord. We are an overcomer.
Rev. 12:11: “They overcame him by the blood of the Lamb, and by the word of their testimony and the loved not their lives unto the death.”
Decayed places indicate the realm of the soul – desolation, drought, destruction waste. This is also indicated by the wilderness wanderings of the Israelites. This is part of the ministry of the Sons of God to raise people up from the decayed places of the soul into the realm of the Spirit.
“He that overcomes shall inherit all things; and I will be his God, and he shall be my son.”
The overcomer will not worship his fiery trials or wear them as a badge of honor. Our testimony is not the pain we left behind. Our testimony is that through the power of the Lamb, we overcame.
There is a story in the 19th chapter of Numbers concerning the sacrifice of a red heifer to cleanse the Israelites from a spirit of death. The ordinance of the red heifer is unique to Numbers and the wilderness wanderings. A heifer as a sacrifice is mentioned in Leviticus and Deuteronomy, but only in Numbers 19 do we read of the red heifer.
The law could not conquer death, abolish it, nor alter the property of it. Our Redeemer died, was buried and rose again on the third day. Death was conquered by the Death Conqueror. Jesus Christ has abolished death and brought life and immortality to light.
The red heifer was slain outside the camp (reproach) and its blood (life) was sprinkled before the Tabernacle 7 times (complete cleansing). All was burned with cedar wood, and hyssop. The cedar-rod of faith is symbolic by which we receive and apply Jesus’ life and death.
A small quantity of the ashes of the red heifer was mixed in a cup of running (living, not stagnant) water and was called “a water of separation”. (Num. 19:21) The ashes of the heifer signified the purity of Christ. The running water signified the power and grace of the Holy Spirit, who is compared to rivers of living water. It is by the operation of the Holy Spirit that the righteousness of Christ is applied to us for our cleansing.
The Israelites of old had to be sprinkled, first on the third day, and afterwards on the seventh.
Numbers 19:19: “The clean person shall sprinkle upon the unclean on the third day; and on the seventh day; and on the seventh day he shall purify himself, and wash his clothes, and bathe himself in water, and shall be clean at evening.”
I was reading this for my own devotional with no intent to preach it. No one but me would be interested in the red heifer. But a light bulb came on. I overcame the death of my carnal soul. This was when the Lord anointed me for full time public ministry. The Parousia of His Presence is the anointing that I received when I overcame the spirit of death.
When we are in bondage to the fear of death of anything, whether it is love, money, life, ministry, friends, family, our own life, or livelihood, we are in bondage to death. Jesus destroyed him that had the power of death. That is the devil.
Whatever has power over us to control us, cause us pain, or make us unhappy is the very avenue the devil will use to break through our fortress and steal our joy, peace and happiness. God is bringing the Church to a place of maturity whereby we can stand boldly against the devil’s schemes and not be moved.
Paul said he died daily. The Remnant of the Remnant is again being tested, proven, pulled out of our comfort zones, commissioned, and given marching orders to prevail over the spirit of death and decay assigned to “wear out”, “discourage”, and “dissuade” the saints.
The “naysayers” are carrying the spirit of death. Only listen to the voices that speak life.
Romans 8:2: “For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death. (vs. 6) “To be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace.”
We were completely justified when we received Christ as our Savior. We were justified forever. We are “washed”. We are clean.
But complete sanctification will not be attained until we exchange earth for heaven. The man was not made wholly clean until the evening of the seventh day---the closing hour of the week.
"Until we all come into the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ." Jesus rose on the "third day" in resurrection power. He will rise again in the hearts of the Elect and reveal the Glory of God to the whole earth. "God willing let us go on to perfection" (Heb. 6:1).
There is one solemn statement added to Numbers 19:20: “The man that shall be unclean, and shall not purify himself, that soul shall be cut off from among the congregation.”
Reject Christ and you are lost! Neglect so great a salvation (justification through the blood, and sanctification through the cleansing of the Spirit) and “there remains no more sacrifice for sins; but a certain fearful judgment and fiery indignation.”
“Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool” (Isa. 1:18).
The unclean Israelite could not have the ashes sprinkled upon him without the water, or the water sprinkled without the ashes. In the new dispensations these are similarly combined---“We are washed, and justified, and sanctified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, and by the Spirit of our God.”
“For if the blood of bulls and of goats, and the ashes of a heifer sprinkling the unclean sanctified unto the purifying of the flesh; how much more shall the blood of Christ---who through the Eternal Spirit, offered himself without spot to God---purge your conscience from dead works to serve the living God?”
(This message is not meant to magnify the red heifer, but to glorify Jesus Christ’s victory over death of our carnal souls, our sin, as well as our bodies. The mystique of the red heifer has continued through the ages. The last red heifer to be sacrificed was in Ad 58-60 prior to the temple being destroyed in A.D. 70 by the high-priesthood of Ishmael ben Phiabi. Jewish history indicates there were only 9 incidents of red heifers sacrificed. We know that Jesus Christ fulfilled all of the temple sacrifices, the temple and the Old Testament Priesthood. The Jewish mystique continues as they are expecting a messiah who will sacrifice a red heifer on a future Jewish Temple.)
There is One offering for sin by which Christ has perfected forever them that are sanctified. “It is finished.” “…But now once in the end of the world has He appeared to take away sin by the sacrifice of Himself.” (Heb. 9:26)
Carolyn Sissom, Pastor
Eastgate Ministries Church
Scripture from K.J.V.