BACK TO BASIC…..

No Special Titles—We are All Priests

The book of Revelation says Jesus purchased us and made us a Kingdom and priests to serve our God (Rev. 5). If we are all going to be priests, we need to know what it means to be a priest. If we are going to experience God’s power in our lives, we must agree with God’s thought for our lives. Jesus said, “Go…and I’ll be with you.” He taught us, “Do my will…and I will give you Life and Power.”
False christendom has for many years pushed people down. It has taken a few people and pushed them up making some “leaders” rich and famous and powerful, while pushing most people down. In the United States, India, Poland, Romania, Brazil, and all around the world, there are “hero” Christians and “low” Christians. This is very wrong. Jesus said to the twelve apostles in Matthew 23 to “Call no man teacher, call no man father, call no man leader, call no man master, call no man ‘rabbi,’ call no man ‘pastor,’ call no man ‘reverend’—for you are all brothers with one Father!” There are no “heroes” in True Christianity except for Jesus. There must be no official bosses who control the decisions, the money, and the people—except Jesus in and through His People together by His Spirit.
A Living Sacrifice
When God wants us to be priests, He has a thought in His mind. A priest offers spiritual sacrifices to God. You can do that. God wants you to do that. That’s not for “heroes.” That’s for all of us. A spiritual sacrifice—there are many parts to that. One part of a spiritual sacrifice, as Paul said, is to offer our bodies as a living sacrifice. God wants you to be a priest by offering your body as a living sacrifice. Jesus wants your tongue, your eyes, and your ears. He also wants your mind, hands, and feet. You can offer the parts of your body as instruments of righteousness only. Or you can give in to sin, selfishness, pride, lust, and fear. But Jesus wants us to give all the parts of our bodies to Him as a sacrifice everyday, and we will be priests. Most people know about this first part of being a priest—offering your

Will you all do that?
Serve the People and
Help Each Other be More Like Jesus
Another function or part of a priest’s duties in the Old Testament that not many people know about was to serve the people—not just to offer sacrifices, but also to serve the people. A priest in the Old Covenant would bring God to the people. Now, in the New Covenant, we are all priests. If you are truly a follower of Jesus, you are a priest. We don’t sit and watch the priest do God’s thing. We are priests. Do you believe in your heart that you are a priest? Then bring God to the people. There are two ways you can bring God to the people. One way is to tell others about Jesus in your neighborhoods. We are all priests, so we all bring Jesus to our neighbors and friends and families. Amen?
A priest also brings Jesus to the family of God. We do tell others about Jesus and His ways, but there is another way we bring Jesus to the people. Let me be very practical here. If you are a priest, you will help others become more like Jesus. If we look at a picture of Jesus in our heart and see Who He is, then look at our brothers and sisters and see a difference between them and Jesus, as priests, we live to make them the same. Is Jesus selfish? Are any brothers and sisters selfish? You are a priest; help them. Is Jesus afraid? If you ever see a brother or sister that lives in fear, help them. Does Jesus care for the little children? Did He say, “Bring the little children to me.”? If you ever see a brother or sister that doesn’t love the little children and care for them, then help them change. That’s what a priest does. You help everyone become more like Jesus. If Jesus were married, would Jesus have ever been angry with his wife and yelled at her? If Jesus were a wife, would He ever be angry or selfish with His spouse? You know the answers to these questions. Jesus is Wonderful in ALL things!
You are priests. You must help your brothers and sisters become more like Jesus. This is very risky. This is dangerous. Why? Because someone might think that you are being prideful or judgmental. But no, you are being a priest as God has called you to be. We don’t want to have pride or be judgmental. We want to have deep, deep love in our hearts for everyone. But we must beg them to change, to become more like Jesus—because we are priests of God. Every one of us is a priest of God. But we each have our own problems, too. There are things about each of us that are not exactly like Jesus. If I believe that you are a priest, then I must listen to you if you see things in my life that are not like Jesus. I must welcome you as a priest to see into my life and to help me. So we have courage and love to help others. We have courage and humility to have others help us and to speak into our lives. Church is NOT a place that you come to. Church is people being priests together. You become the Church when everyone helps each other everyday become more like Jesus. You are not a Church because you come somewhere and listen. You are a Church because you care deeply for each other every day. The Church is called the Body of Christ. If we are not helping each other become more like Christ, then we are not part of His Body. We must help each other.
Holy Father, Lord God Almighty, it’s our prayer together that You would open our eyes and those of all your children everywhere. Holy God, show us how to be priests. We beg You for the courage, the help and the wisdom to be able to touch each other’s lives. We beg You for the humility and the courage to welcome other people speaking into our lives. We need You so much. We want to be Your Church. We want to kick down the gates of hell and love each other into greatness. Holy Spirit, help us. Teach us Your ways. Help us to change fast. We do love You very much. Give us Your wisdom. We know that Your House is built with wisdom, and we desperately need that. Amen
Solving Problems
“If your brother sins against you, go and show him his fault, just between the two of you. If he listens to you, you have won your brother over. But if he will not listen, take one or two others along, so that every matter may be established by the testimony of two or three witnesses. If he refuses to listen to them, tell it to the Church. If he refuses to listen even to the Church, treat him as you would a pagan or a tax collector. I tell you the truth, whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven. Again, I tell you that if two of you on earth agree about anything you ask for, it will be done for you by my Father in heaven. For where two or three come together in my name, there am I with them” (Matthew 18:15-20).
Most people that hear verse 20 think that this means when the Church is together and we are happy worshipping then Jesus is there. We sing praises to Jesus, we feel good and we feel His presence. While this is all true, this is not what verse 20 is about. This verse does talk about people being together and Jesus coming to be with them, but He is not talking about worship here; he is talking about solving problems. He is saying that as we are all priests and we help each other be more like Jesus, there are times when we will need to come and speak about things in each other’s lives. If you see me being selfish, you need to come to me and tell me this. If you sisters hear another sister gossip, you must talk to her about this. Gossip is sin. Gossip breaks Jesus’ heart. Gossip is slander and hurts Jesus. So if we see that these things are sin and wound Jesus in the side, as priests and as the body of Christ, we must help each other.

Jesus said that if there is sin you must “go to him and him alone” (v. 15). We never want to embarrass anyone or shame them. In love, we just want them to become more like Jesus. If they are selfish or if they gossip, they can’t hear God. Since we want them to hear God, we must help. If they are selfish or prideful or slanderous, then they can’t love God or love people very well. So as priests, we must go to them and help them become more like Jesus. But we must be very humble. We are not wagging a finger and pointing; we are grabbing their legs and begging them to give their lives to Jesus. We want so much for them to have a friendship with God, and they can’t have a friendship with God if there is sin in their hearts. So our master and teacher Jesus says to go to them and to them alone. Do not shame them nor embarrass them. Love them. But go to them and help them. You are a priest; you must go.

If Two or Three Others Come…
Jesus Comes, Too!

Jesus gives us solutions to problems if things are difficult. If we go to a brother or sister in humility to try to help and they say, “Go away, I don’t want to listen,” or “Don’t judge me. Get the log out of your own eye.” Jesus gives us a solution to this problem. There is a chance that you might be wrong, but you still must go if you think you are right. You must try. If you are afraid to try, then you can’t be a priest. You can’t make Jesus happy unless you try. Sometimes you will be wrong, though, and that’s okay, because then you will learn from that too. Jesus said that if you go to this brother or sister and they won’t listen, then bring two or three others to try to help. This is not a teaching about “church discipline”. This is a teaching about how to help each other.
“For where two or three are gathered together in My name, there am I with them” (Matthew 18:20).
Do you see how beautiful this is?!! If you need to bring two or three others to talk to this brother or sister, Jesus comes too. Where two or three are gathered to do His work, Jesus comes. This scripture is not about a worship service. This is about working together to help each other become like Jesus. If we go to a brother or sister, and they won’t hear us because they don’t understand or they don’t like it, then we bring two or three others with us. This is a command of Jesus. He didn’t say if they won’t listen to you, just forget it or just pray about it. He said if they won’t listen to you, bring two or three other good brothers and sisters, and Jesus will come, too. If we come in His name to do His work, He will come to help. He goes on to say that if that person still won’t hear two or three witnesses, then tell it to the whole Church. Again, this is not “church discipline”; this is about bringing all the priests together to try to help solve a problem. That is very, very good.
Our Jesus is wise beyond measure. He’s a Wonderful Counselor, isn’t He? Jesus said that if we have problems being priests trying to help each other, we can bring in more people to help. If I come to you and I think that there’s sin in your life and you don’t agree, maybe it’s because I’m wrong—maybe I don’t see things correctly. When we bring two or three witnesses, maybe they’ll tell me that I’m wrong. So Jesus wins, and everyone grows! This is a very special thing that you must understand if you’re priests. Things don’t always go smoothly, but we must have courage and love. We must obey Jesus in what He said to do when things don’t work well. If things don’t work well we must involve other people and listen to Jesus together. Sometimes one person is right. Sometimes the other person is right. And sometimes they’re both right and we just don’t understand. Sometimes they’re both wrong. But when we obey Jesus’ command to bring in two or three others—if we are all listening to Jesus and really caring—then Jesus will solve our problems and help us.