When Grace Pours in the Latter Rain

We are living through a time right now which is unique in every respect for all people around our whole world. Anger, frustration, hate and despair are gripping people as never before. Among all the din we hear and hear of, we search for havens of rest, and hopefully realize that these times are no times for rest, they are times for the mobilization of God's people to live the life of Christ, to overcome our lethargy and finally be in tune with Jesus. And so we recall how we were advised to study the minor prophets in these last days for there are truths still to be found which we must follow.

As Christians we know that God wants to pour out His Holy Spirit, Zech. 12. We read here,

"I will pour upon the house of David, and upon the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the spirit of grace and of supplications ..."

But that outpouring, the latter rain, is something very special. It is a power which will mobilize the church to do something we have been unable to do so far. Zechariah says that this final outpouring that God is going to give His church is an outpouring of grace! See here what Ellen White wrote about the Latter Rain,

"But near the close of earth's harvest, a special bestowal of spiritual grace is promised to prepare the church for the coming of the Son of man." (Acts of the Apostles, p. 55)

So, we find out here that the outpouring of this spirit is likened unto grace!

She also wrote,

"We must seek His favors with the whole heart if the showers of grace are to come on us." (Faith I live By, p. 334)

"Let us, with contrite hearts, pray most earnestly that now, in the time of the latter rain, the showers of grace may fall upon us." (Testimonies to Ministers, p. 508)

"We must not wait for the latter rain. It is coming upon all who will recognize and appropriate the dew and showers of grace that fall upon us. ... The whole earth is to be filled with the glory of God." (SDA Bible Commentary, Vol. 7, p. 984.)

In other words, she is saying, the whole earth is to be filled with the grace of God.

We heard it said that God's grace is abundant - no limits to God's grace. But that does not mean that it comes cheap, the truth is, God's grace is amazing, its main characteristic is that God's grace is so amazing, and why?

One reason is that it is the way by which Jesus saves.

"Being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus." Rom. 3:24.

"I will pour upon the house of David, and upon the inhabitants of Jerusalem the spirit of grace and supplications." Zech.12

"The message of the renewing power of God's grace will be carried to every country and clime, until the truth shall belt the world." (Counsels to Teachers, p. 532)

How is that going to be done? It is our task to do this work, who else could do it - take God's grace to the world?

But we cannot take God's grace to the world if we ourselves do not understand and experience what that grace is. We cannot give what we do not have. And so we size up the situation and we realize that God is waiting for His people to understand something so He can pour out the Spirit upon us to preach the message of the three angels, so people will have no doubt in their mind that the message they hear is the truth.

That is why we read,

"For ye know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that, though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor, that you through his poverty might be rich." 2.Cor. 8:9.

Here is another eloquent quote,

"When the latter rain is poured out, the church will be clothed with power for its work; but the church as a whole will never receive this until its members shall put away from among them envy, evil-surmising, and evil-speaking. Those who cherish these sins know not the blessed experience of love; they are not awake to the fact that the Lord is testing and proving their love for him. ..." (R&H, Oct. 6, 1896).

Considering what we learned, we realize that Jesus manifested His great love for us on His cross and if we truly understand that love then we understand grace. Jesus calls His endtime people to have an experience which reflects His experience. So we read,

". . . they are not awake to the fact that the Lord is testing and proving their love for him by the attitude they assume toward one another." (R&H, Oct. 6, 1896)

Ouch, we might say.

How We Regard Each Other

The attitude we have towards one another demonstrates whether we have truly understood what grace means (John 13:34,35). Grace is the work of Jesus's saving. Jesus came not to destroy but to save. Too many of us are seeking to destroy one another. That is the message we must understand and remember and base all our future decisions on. And if we are seeking to destroy one another, to tear down one another, we do not understand nor have experienced the work of grace.

God is waiting for His people, His church, to experience real grace, this grace we just read about, so that, when we go forth to tell the world about it, they will want to be part of these people, this under His grace united church. It will be a church where all love one another. If we do not yet love one another, we have not yet experienced grace - the kind that loves and forgives - everything.

A special outpouring of His spirit, then, the Spirit of forgiveness and love, is supposed to come into His church, to fill His people, to infect them with so they can't be, but be so - forgiving everything and love one another and be willing - willing to do what? ...

We can see now too, why God has not been able to come yet, not been able to pour out His Spirit - for, you see, we cannot just get the Spirit, we have to be willing to learn the Spirit from Jesus, because He is our example.

Therefore, the same way that Christ forgave me, I must be willing to learn to forgive.

And so we ask, `How did Jesus forgive?'

Isaiah 53 says, that Jesus was "a man of sorrows." He was not that way because of the traumatic experience on the cross. No. He was a man of sorrows because He was worried about us. - He was not sorry for Himself.

He was so sorry for us that He is described as a man of sorrows - like it was a main character trait of Jesus - and it was.

Can you imagine going to your family, much less your school or place of work, saying, `I have become a man of sorrows?'

The world does not know how to relate to such a revelation. - So how can we convert the world with such a message about a `man of sorrows?'

We must love Jesus so much that we have the same amount of passion, emotion, care ... that Jesus had for the lost and dying.

While He had these sorrows, we hid our faces from Him.

That is the same as saying, `Wait a minute! Why is He acting that way? What's wrong with Him?'

Well, there was something "different" with Jesus. He carried the sins of the world and its history on His shoulders. He acted the way He did, because He was sorrowing over us.

So, what kind of faith do we find in the church? What kind of grace do the members of the church exhibit?

Well, Moses was one of the members of the church of God long ago. It was in his days that Israel sinned against God when they murmured and complained until Aaron, the brother of Moses, made them a golden calf to dance around, in remembrance of the pagan worship they had just escaped from. They had a sort of 1844 experience in that the Lord came and led them out of bondage, but then, their bodies were saved from slavery, but their hearts were still in bondage. Moses understood the gravity of their sin. He knew it was judgment time. So he prayed to God and said,

"You my people Israel have sinned a great sin: and now I will go unto the Lord: peradventure I shall make an atonement for your sins." Ex. 32:30.

"If thou wilt forgive their sin -, and if not, blot my name out of your book which you have written." Ex. 32:32.

That is the kind of `amazing grace', the kind of attitude, God would want His end time people to have. Moses had become a type of Christ. Moses was as innocent as Jesus. But Moses was not able to bear the sin of his people on his shoulders. The worst among Israel must suffer the punishment for the sin they committed after God had shown them the greatness of His power so many times in a few weeks.

The solution to all these sins would come in the person of the Son of God, who, even though He was innocent, suffered death for the sins of all. The sin that nailed Him to the cross was not His sin, it was the sin of everybody.

Can we imagine today that kind of forgiveness in the church? Among us members?

Imagine when someone does something wrong against you: Are you able to say,

`Ok, this is serious. This sin can get this person to be lost for the kingdom of God: Father, I will take the responsibility. If you must destroy him, destroy me in his stead. If he cursed me out, let us pretend it did not happen. I shall take the responsibility, the loss of love, kindness, humbleness and faith - because I do not want this person to suffer the consequences for his sin, Lord, lay it on me.'

Grace Over the Ages

Is there anyone in our church today, who is willing to pray as Moses did? Is there anyone among us Christians, who is willing to die on the cross as Jesus did?

Or do we hear that people say, `Lord, make sure he gets those extra 15 minutes in hell for his sin.'

Which spirit do we display to the world today? The spirit of Moses, of Jesus, or of Aaron?

What did Aaron say? Aarons said,

". . . You know this people, that they are set to do mischief? For they said to me, Make us gods . . . so they gave me their gold and I cast it into the fire and there came out this calf." Ex. 32:22-24.

When we sin today, is there no background to our sin, which, if it continues unchecked, is like a casting form which will produce one calf after another, one sin after another: And, unless we destroy it, we are lost?

Are we not to search out the root causes in our life in these last hours of world history so we do not commit the sin of Adam and Eve, the, `You God gave me this person on my side who . . .'

The sin of Cain, `God, you sent us out of the Garden and I am mad about it.'

The sin of the anti-deluvians, `We will be marry and there is no God. God is dead. We have never met Him.'

The sin of the `Tower of Babel' builders, `Let us build skyscrapers so we can live above the flood waters next time around and survive these weird storms - so we can survive - never mind the animals next time.'

The sin of Nimrod, `I will be a hunter for it is an easier way to make a living than pulling weeds and sowing seeds.'

These men became `mighty on the earth.' 1.Chr. 1:10. What does it mean to become `mighty upon the earth?' Does it mean to become more selfish, deal fiendish with the neighbor? Care only about our own, self invented code of ethics? Never mind my fellow man? Laying the seed of destruction of all peoples, all over again?

To become `mighty upon the earth,' must mean that those are mighty only on earth. They have no might in the eyes of God. They do not care about the Kingdom of God, only their own.

So we are called to analyze our motives, over and over again. We are to root out the seeds inside of us which cause these sins to foster and grow roots and sneak in and destroy our love for God and elevate our own love. - We are to become wise unto salvation. We must not trust our own thinking mind quite so much when it is not surrendered to God. In fact we must develop the mind Christ had in order to be saved at all.

We are not to become mighty over our fellow human beings. Instead, we are to become willing to lay down our life for those who are within our sphere of influence - be more Christ like. We must be willing to take that or the other person's sin - those who wronged us - and say, `God, do not blot their name out; blot out mine instead.' We must come to the point which Christ came to, and be willing to lay down my life for yours that by the grace of God that person can be saved.

When Jesus died, He died the second death. He shed all divine authority and was willing to die the second death not exactly knowing in advance if His sacrifice was accepted by His Father.

He could not see His way clearly to the end. We also cannot see our way clearly today. We must have the faith of Jesus. We must say, `Not I, but Christ.'

We must learn to be willing to die the death in the accomplishing of the task to bring the gospel to everyone, develop the trust that God will see us through. We cannot just demand the justice of God against all those sinners around us. If we demand the justice of God to be carried out, God has to be fair and we must meet our own justice. We would set us up for destruction.

Right about here, our skin may creep and a mighty shame might overcome us. That is a good reaction for it shows we recognize deep wickedness inside of ourselves. We need to be saved from this deep down wickedness, this deep down sin which causes us to be partial to people around us. We must learn to love all, no matter what happened between us. - Between husband and wife, divorced people, parents and children, uncles and aunts. We must not follow the world and cast out the evil doers all the while pretending we have not sin in our own life.

Men released from prisons cannot find a place to live. The neighbors regard their sins more heinous than their own. We must come off this platform of `You are worse than I' and admit, `I am bad enough myself.'

We all need Christ, everyone of us. Cast not a stone on your fellow men, for our God knows it all. Instead we are to look deep inside of us and see the sins of those around us are also rooted inside of us.

If we can watch the lying and cheating in our living room, we are no better than those who commit the sins and where caught. We are showing that we have not yet seen our own self, our inclination to sin likewise if the opportunity would present itself.

Instead, just imagine that person sinning against you and you going to God in prayer as though it were `your own' sin. Confessing in behalf of that person who has wronged you. That is what Jesus did during all of His ministry. How can we miss it. How can we ignore it any longer?

We can't. God looks for a people who will comprehend what it means to love like God `agape' loves.

Jesus said, `Father, forgive them.' He took their sin away so that when God looks down at them, He would see a pure human race if they were willing and accept the forgiveness offered by Christ. - So if I want my neighbor saved, I will say, `Lord, I do not want you to see that one. I'll accept the loss for I know, sin demands a loss. Strike my name out of your book instead of his.'

The natural man will say, `I demand justice. That person must pay.'

Governments are set up that way. A person must suffer the loss for his sins - that is the principle of life on earth. But Jesus says, "I want you, the one wronged, to say in your heart, `Father, do not hold this sin against him.'" - That is what grace is all about, this amazing grace.

Sin demands that the person suffers the loss. Forgiveness says I'll take the loss and still love them.

Jesus said it this way,

5:43 "Ye have heard that it hath been said, Thou shalt love thy neighbour, and hate thine enemy.
5:44 But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you;
5:45 That ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven: for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust.
5:46 For if ye love them which love you, what reward have ye? do not even the publicans the same?
5:47 And if ye salute your brethren only, what do ye more than others? do not even the publicans so?
5:48 Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect." Matthew 5:43-48.

Our faith, our message is weak because while we know the truth we still say, I do not like you and you do not like me. So how can our message really have an effect in the world, though it is a true message, if we do not even love one another?

Greater love has no man than this, that he lays down his life for his friends.

Who are our friends?

Jesus loved us so much, that, while we were yet his sinful enemies, He said, `Oh, these are My friends.'

When Stephen prayed he said, "Father, lay not this sin to their account." As they were stoning him to death he was manifesting the grace of God.

When someone steps on our shoes, we say, "Father, I am glad there is a judgment. I am glad that there are books in heaven that will record that this brother just stepped on my shoes that I just bought. Make sure he pays, Father." Stephen said, "lay not this sin to their account." - - That is amazing grace.

All Out Grace

The Bible tells us that we should rejoice when we experience the sufferings of Christ. Did you know that? - Most of us were raised by parents who desired that we do experience less sufferings than they did. - - That is why we need to be converted. Our value system is suspect. We are not seeing things as God would have us see them. Our American values are man made, they are not of God. We must come back to God's value system we just read in Matthew.

We must obey these words,

"A new commandment I give unto you, That ye love one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another. By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another." John 13:34-35.

Is there anyone you would be willing to save by laying down your life?

And our minds go back and we remember the stories of those men and women in the role of a good Samaritan, who did just that, because they were there and saw someone in trouble and laid down their life for reasons which may not even be based on knowing Christ, yet they died, so someone else may live.

Therefore we must be very careful. We must not think or say, that only good Christians good deeds save. Oh No. There will be a multitude before the Lamb who sing the song that no one else can sing, for "they have come out of great tribulation, and washed their robes, and made them white in the blood of the Lamb." - In other words, "they came through the valley of death and are saved. They followed that voice of love for our fellow man, in the time of greatest need. They sacrificed themselves so another may live and have more opportunities to be saved.

And those of you who have been saved by such a one reciprocate this love and follow Him to the cross of self-denial and choose life - the Life that only God can give.

So we have this appeal presented to us, when amazing grace becomes a reality in us, in our church, it is then that the message of `God's so great a salvation' will go forth in power throughout all the world. When whole congregations commit themselves to follow the Lamb where ever He goeth.

Can you imagine a church full of people willing to give up their place in heaven for the person sitting next to them or for someone they just met? Can you imagine a love that is that strong? In `Song of Solomon' we read, "... love is as strong as death." Song of Songs 8:6.

And we stop and think and realize that the love of Jesus was as strong as the second death - the death that He died and from which there is no resurrection. Yet He was without sin and rose.

Do we believe that, though we sinned, He will resurrect us should we die now?

We must die daily - to all selfish desires, the Bible teaches.

For you see, there is a level of

hurt, of
death, and a level of
second death.

If we are lucky, someone may go to the level of death for one or two people, the husband or wife, son or daughter, mother or father, but that's it. The list comes to an end.

We think, `I be willing to die for them. So if they hurt me, that's fine. I am willing to die for them'

Jesus says, your love cannot be on the first or second level. It must be on the third level.

And when that, your love, gets to the third level, if someone hurts you, you say, `Well, that was just hurt. Do you think I am angry at you?'

Jesus could not hate those for whom He was willing to die the second death. That is why He prayed, "Father, forgive them." That is why He called them His friends, because things like this were different through His eyes.

Do you, do I want to see people through eyes like He did and still does?

When we are willing to die, there is nothing anyone can do to us that will destroy our love for them - even if we do not agree on doctrinal issues, you will still love them.

Oh, dear people, that is a dream for the church! I may believe that you are wrong, but I still love you. - I may be wrong, but you still love me.

Beloved, that is the time when we love one another that the world knows we are His disciples. That is how the redeemed swell to crowds of large numbers of people standing before the throne of God singing the song of their experience.

Oh, dear reader, let us have this love for one another. Let us love as Jesus did, no holes barred.

Here is the appeal we want to make,

Do you want to come to the place and say, `I do not have that love Lord. Have mercy on me. I need that love. - Father, I do not know how that love can be possible, but that is what I need. -- I need to be willing to see my place vacant in heaven . . . so someone can fill it. - - I am still going to worship God, though He slay me, yet will I trust Him. Even if I never get to the kingdom of heaven, I am going to love Him and serve Him with everything so that heaven is not my reward .. but Jesus is.'

Say, "Father, I need that love."

If you say in your heart, I do not want to give up my place for anything or anyone, then , this appeal is not for you. I am talking to those who want to say, "Lord, give me that kind of love we have learned about today."

Can you imagine if God's whole church had this love? Yes, we know that it will not be possible. There will be wheat and tares. But dear reader, when we have this love for one another, we will not be doing those things that we are doing now. If a person entices us to sin, we will look at that person and say, "Man, I am willing to die the second death for you. I am not going to get you into trouble by indulging in that thing you are tempting me to do."

Every soul will become precious in your sight. `Oh, may it be possible to be willing to die the second death for my enemy. The `I have loved as Jesus loves.'

Do we understand this message? Tears come flowing free even as I type these words. How can we dare to walk into a church of Christians and ask them to be willing to give up heaven? What in the world is such a message? And yet, in doing so, the Bible says, "He who seeks his life will lose it. And he who loses his life for my sake will find it."

We may say, `I do not understand all of this yet Lord. But Lord, it is just so amazing how my life has changed so much this past week since you gave me this revelation. It is unexplainable, Father; I did not know we could change so quickly, so rapidly; in no time at all. That we could see people in such a different light so quickly.