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Supplementary Question and Answer

This morning a friend called to ask for clarity on an important question: Specifically, how does one abort the Manchild? I felt that many probably would like a more concrete answer to that question, so this is how I see it.

The simple answer is that we abort by rejecting the feast of Tabernacles. Of course, many people have not even heard of such a feast, so they neither reject nor accept it. So we have to probe a bit deeper. What is the message of Tabernacles?

The core of it is bound up in the concept of "Sonship." Most people have some idea of Sonship, and so it is a good starting place.

There are three levels of Sonship, each level relating to a different feast day. A Passover view of Sonship focuses upon conception. A Pentecostal view of Sonship focuses upon embryonic development. A Tabernacles view of Sonship focuses upon birthing the Manchild.

In practice, there are non-Pentecostal denominations whose focus is upon "getting people saved." Such evangelism is the most important thing on the agenda. The argument is that this is the most urgent and pressing need, because we must save people from a burning hell.

I am in favor of presenting the gospel to others so that they might be saved. The problem comes when the Church focuses so much upon evangelizing unbelievers that they neglect the spiritual growth of the Christians. I have been in Churches where they have not had a new member for many years, and yet they feel compelled to give a salvation message complete with altar call every week. After some years of this, the Christians begin to believe that they know pretty much everything that is important, and they settle down in that mindset. Then when something comes their way that goes beyond the simple salvation message, they reject it, because it rocks their world.

The second problem is the motive for evangelization. Most evangelization today is based upon a fear motive, rather than the love of God. Getting saved is more a matter of obtaining "fire insurance" than love and respect for a loving God. But when we see that God has a plan for His entire creation (Rom. 8:19), the motive begins to change from fear to love, awe, and respect. This is what I tried to show in my book, Creation's Jubilee.

In the Pentecostal view of Sonship, the Pentecostals tell believers that there is a "second work of grace" to attain. It is called the baptism of the Holy Spirit. If we put this in Old Testament terms, it is the call to move on from the border of Egypt and go to Mount Sinai to hear the voice of God and have His law written on our hearts.

Those who refuse the feast of Pentecost are like the Israelites who remain at the Red Sea, dancing with Miriam, rejoicing in their deliverance from Egypt--but who never get to the Promised Land (full birthing of Christ in them).

Pentecostals, however, also have problems. I have found that most of them were never told that Pentecost was an Old Testament feast. They do not know that it began when God came down upon Mount Sinai and spoke to the people in their own language. Because they are not shown that the purpose of Pentecost is to have the law of God written on the heart through hearing His voice, they neglect the study of the law or reject it in favor of the New Testament.

We are to live by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God, as Jesus said in Matt. 4:4. The inspired Word begins in Genesis, not in Matthew. To reject any portion of the Word is to limit one's diet, and at some point, these limitations will create unbalanced Christians.

When the revelation of the feast of Tabernacles was presented to the Church through the Latter Rain movement (1948-1952), most of the Pentecostal denominations rejected it. In reading their reasons, it seems that they did not like the fact that God was teaching the Latter Rain missionaries real languages overnight. Pentecostal objections rang hollow and showed a spirit of envy, because these people were going beyond their view of "unknown tongues."

And so Pentecost largely rejected the feast of Tabernacles. This was the equivalent of Israel refusing to leave Mount Sinai when God said to go all the way to the Promised Land.

It is unfortunate, then, that a movement soon sprang up in the 1950's and 1960's that had a half-truth of Tabernacles. It called itself "The Manifested Sons of God." While they had a revelation of Tabernacles, they presented it as if they had already been perfected. They taught that all one has to do is THINK one is perfect, and that makes it so. It was based upon positive thinking, not upon a spiritual process.

Thus, many rejected not only the messengers, but also the message of Tabernacles. They used the faulty messengers as an excuse to reject Tabernacles, instead of discerning the truth of the Tabernacles Word.

It is not so much the rejection of a message per se that is the problem. The problem is a matter of the heart, not of doctrinal acceptance. The doctrines, or teachings, help to facilitate heart changes, of course, but they are external in themselves. I have met many Baptists (for instance) who reject Pentecostalism itself, who have not had a Pentecostal experience as such, but yet they know what it means to be led by the Spirit and to hear His voice. To me, that is the essence of Pentecost, and these Baptists are therefore Pentecostal in the eyes of God--maybe even more than many who carry the Pentecostal label.

There are many who do not accept Tabernacles as a doctrine, but yet they live it in their hearts. They have read Heb. 6:1, and it has stirred their hearts:

"Therefore leaving the elementary teaching about the Christ, let us press on to maturity, not laying again a foundation of repentance from dead works and of faith toward God."

Such people have also read Heb. 4:1, and it has motivated them to go all the way to the Promised Land:

"Therefore, let us fear lest, while a promise remains of entering His rest, any one of you should seem to have come short of it."

If a believer sincerely prays in his heart that God would lead Him fully into His rest, and is able to overcome the mental obstacles, or idols of the heart, there is no doubt that God will answer that prayer--with or without in-depth doctrinal understanding. The greatest value of learning about Tabernacles is that it helps overcome and overthrow the idols of the heart, which act as mental blockages.

Probably the biggest obstacle to birthing the Manchild is the fact that the Church has substituted the hope of "going to heaven" for the hope of bringing Christ to birth. The Promised Land is not heaven. The Promised Land is the Kingdom of God, which is fully come when His glory covers the whole earth.

The Promise of immortality is not the promise to release us from the body so that we can live in a purely spiritual existence in heaven. When Paul spoke of us coming into immortality (2 Cor. 5:1-4), our spirit was not in need of immortality. It is the BODY that needs immortality. The promise of Tabernacles is to receive a glorified body, the kind that Jesus had after His resurrection. It is a body in which we are able to go back and forth between heaven and earth.

The beginning of salvation (i.e., "justification") is the revelation of Passover. The sanctification process, whereby He is saving us daily, is the revelation of Pentecost. But the goal of salvation is revealed in the feast of Tabernacles. To fall short of this promise is to inadvertently miscarry or deliberately abort the Manchild.

Model Prayer: "Father, work in my heart to bring Christ in me to full birth through the revelation of the feast of Tabernacles. Thank-you for answering my prayer."