Love, Light and Life

On December 22, 2007, I received a vision - a powerful vision. I saw three words - Love, Light and Life. I asked the Lord to illuminate the vision for me, but that's all He gave me at the time. Just three words.

I spent a few days reflecting on the vision. I knew intuitively something important was going on, but I wasn't sure what the Lord wanted me to do. I went ahead and purchased the following URL:

http://www.lovelightlife.org/

I mentioned the vision and the URL to Christine and a few other Spirit-filled hearts. They thought it was great. The title of the organization resonated with them. They all asked the same simple question:

What is LoveLightLife.org?

I wasn't sure. I knew Sweetbird's music would be a piece of the organization, but the other pieces of the organization were sketchy. I meditated for a while and was able to draft a mission statement for LoveLightLife.org (LLL.org for short). Here's what I wrote:

To provide assistance to those who are struggling in life and to help them find their way back to the light through works of love. The organization will provide free counseling services to individuals, couples, and families seeking help with their lives. It will also include the publication and distribution of free written materials (articles, books), recorded inspirational talks and music. Organizational members will be available for educational seminars and other speaking engagements. The organization will seek partnerships with companies and other organizations that can facilitate its works of love throughout the world.

I had Christine cook up a logo for the organization. Here's what we came up with:











It's been over nine months since my vision. I've thought about creating a website for LLL.org, but I haven't been able to see the site yet - it's like the proverbial ship out in an ocean fog. However, something happened this morning that made me see deeper into the vision the Lord gave me last December. Let me explain.

I was meditating this morning and came across something T. Austin-Sparks wrote back in the late 1920s, from a book titled: The Centrality and Universality of the Cross. Here's what I read:

"Let Christians also realize that all enmity; lack of love, divisions, and strife; all prejudice, suspicion, and spiritual blindness; with all spiritual death, is because the Cross has not been apprehended aright. Somewhere uncrucified flesh is holding the ground. It is impossible to be a truly crucified man or woman and at the same time either have personal interests or be at variance with other children of God, i.e. without love for them. The essential basis of life, light, and love - which is Christ in full manifestation - is the Cross as a working reality in the realm of the old creation, and the Risen Power of Christ in the new.

All this is but saying in other words that the Cross of Christ brings us into living union and oneness with God, and if we will but live in the full meaning and value of that union we shall be living epistles of Christ in terms of life, light, and love. Failure in these means failure somewhere, and for some reason, in our fellowship with God in Christ. The measure of our walk with Him will be the measure of these three features of Christ."

There, in two simple paragraphs, from a book published nearly 100 years ago, is the clear vision of what LLL.org is all about! Let's have closer look at the parts in bold. In the first paragraph, Sparks is saying that all the darkness we see in organized Christianity is produced by uncrucified flesh. In other words, the Cross isn't there. There has been no crufixion. There are people worshiping God and Jesus Christ, but they haven't been crucified. Their flesh is still very much alive. Sparks says this explains the enmity, divisions, lack of love, strife, prejudice, suspicion, and spiritual blindness we see in Christianity. All of this is present today in modern day Christianty.

Oh, how I cried out to the Lord after my revelation for clarity on this very issue. After my revelation, I ran into organized Christianity thinking that's where I would find more hearts filled with the Spirit. But I was sadly mistaken. What I found was all the things Sparks mentioned in his book - enmity, divisions, strife, prejudice, suspicion and worst of all, lack of love and spiritual blindness. To be sure, I met a few people that clearly had seen the Lord and were not spiritually blind. But I would say 99.999% of the people I met were uncrucified Christians. They had little if any Spiritual fruit (Galatians 5:22-23).

It took me a few years, but I let go of organized Christianity, just as the Lord told the disciples to let go of the Pharisees and their Judaism (Matthew 5:14). I learned a valuable lesson over that period of time - never confuse Christ with Christianity or with Christians. Many people make this mistake, and it is a bad mistake to make. Christ is God's true expression of love. Many Christians have not entered into this love nor do they know it. They haven't yet seen Christ. They may one day. Let us pray mightily that they do, for there is always hope (1 Cor. 13:13).

Let's examine the last piece of what Sparks said in his book. Note the words: "Living union and oneness with God" and "if we live in the full meaning and value of that union we shall be living epistles of Christ in terms of life, light, and love." The Cross produces life, light and love!!! We enter into Christ through the Cross. The Cross is the gateway to a living union and oneness with God.

I wrote in yesterday's blog post that the Cross is central to all things of Christ. The Cross is crucifixion, but it is more than that - it is, death, burial and resurrection. Without the Cross, there can be no life, light, and love. The Cross is the place where we are utterly broken. It's the place were our egos and our wills perish and we become One with God and his true expression of love. The Cross represents God's will. The crucifixion of Jesus was all about doing God's will. It was the ulimate act of love. And out of that act arose life, light and love.

The Cross, death, burial and resurrection = Love, Light and Life

Can you see the power in that equation?

Having read Sparks this morning, I can now see the mission of LLL.org more clearly. Everything revolves around the Cross. There is no love, light and life without the Cross. I have no idea at the moment how LLL.org will evolve in the future, but I do know with great certainty that the Cross will be the foundation of everything the organization does - everything!

As I've noted before, walking in love (Ephesians 5:1-2) is a process. Often times the Lord will give us a vision, but leave out the details. I believe He does this because we need to grow more fully into Christ in order to understand the vision. The Spirit guides us into that deeper understanding, but it takes a lot of prayer and meditation. It will be interesting to see what happens with LoveLightLife.org. Stay tuned!

May we all become living epistles of Christ in terms of life, light and love.

Agape,

Steve

Postcript: I've just begun reading Sparks' book, The Centrality and Universality of the Cross. I have no doubt that I'll be blogging a great deal on material from this book in the near future.