Sis Dorothy Sunday School 2/19/12

Sis Dorothy 2/19/12

Finding God’s will in the Gardens of God. 

In the Garden of Eden mankind lost the will of God which was that they live holy.  We were born with that will to sin.  This is so sad.  We cannot live a holy life in ourselves.

In the second garden, the will was brought back.  Jesus said, “Not my will but thine.”  We now can have that choice to have God’s will in our lives.  Jesus bought it back.

In the heart’s garden, we study what produces good soil.  God’s presence and His will to be holy is fulfilled.  The gardens ability to promote life and good fruit is seen in this garden.  By God’s help and his Spirit we can have a living garden in our heart.

The fourth garden is the King’s Garden, the church.  It is beautiful.  As in the first Garden, God’s presence dwelt there, so must we dwell in the King’s Garden

Dwell with Him and make our abode with Him.

Act 20:28  Take heed therefore unto yourselves, and to all the flock, over the which the Holy Ghost hath made you overseers, to feed the church of God, which he hath purchased with his own blood.

1Co 6:20  For ye are bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which are God's.

He bought and purchased it with His own blood.  It is wonderful that He bought it, He bought me.  I thought of my life: as the song goes, “We were on the slave block of sin.”  The old enemy was bidding high.  Even though we are saved he will not stop bidding high for us.  The blood of Christ Jesus completely paid the price that we could be saved and out of his clutches and no temptation can take us back. 

Ah the blood of Jesus.  If He were willing to die for it shouldn’t we be willing to live for it?

In the scriptures when it says, “In that day” it refers to the Gospel Day, the day in which we are living.

The king’s garden, the church is a most glorious and beautiful sight.  P412 in the hymnal.

Glorious things of thee are spoken. 
Zion, city of our God;
He, whose word cannot be broken,
Formed thee for His own abode:
On the Rock of Ages founded,
What can shake thy sure repose?
With salvation’s walls surrounded,
Thou mayst smile at all thy foes.

See the streams of living waters,
Springing from eternal love…

John Newton wrote this song.  He had been a slave trader but he got saved and he saw the church.

Isa 26:3  Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on thee: because he trusteth in thee.

Mind in this scripture means imagination.  Use your imagination as we walk through the word and paint a picture in your mind of this glorious church that He bought and paid for.

Isa 35:1  The wilderness and the solitary place shall be glad for them; and the desert shall rejoice, and blossom as the rose.

Isa 35:2  It shall blossom abundantly, and rejoice even with joy and singing: the glory of Lebanon shall be given unto it, the excellency of Carmel and Sharon, they shall see the glory of the LORD, and the excellency of our God.

Son 4:12  A garden inclosed is my sister, my spouse; a spring shut up, a fountain sealed.

Son 4:13  Thy plants are an orchard of pomegranates, with pleasant fruits; camphire, with spikenard,

Son 4:14  Spikenard and saffron; calamus and cinnamon, with all trees of frankincense; myrrh and aloes, with all the chief spices:

Son 4:15  A fountain of gardens, a well of living waters, and streams from Lebanon.

Son 4:16  Awake, O north wind; and come, thou south; blow upon my garden, that the spices thereof may flow out. Let my beloved come into his garden, and eat his pleasant fruits.

Zec 13:1  In that day there shall be a fountain opened to the house of David and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem for sin and for uncleanness.

Here is a desert and a wilderness blooming as a rose.  Can you see it?  It is so fragrant.  It is blooming abundantly.  Think of all the spices that are in the garden, can you smell them?  There is a fountain there. 

This is the Kings’ Garden.  It is beautiful.  Can you hear it, see it, smell it, feel it?  As you walk through the King’s Garden think of the things you can see and smell.  The spices are beautiful.  When you get a whiff of a fragrance in the garden, it stops you and you stand and just breathe in and enjoy.

Isa 26:1  In that day shall this song be sung in the land of Judah; We have a strong city; salvation will God appoint for walls and bulwarks.

Isa 26:2  Open ye the gates, that the righteous nation which keepeth the truth may enter in.

Isa 26:3  Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on thee: because he trusteth in thee.

Isa 26:4  Trust ye in the LORD for ever: for in the LORD JEHOVAH is everlasting strength:

This is a great enclosure.  Make it big on the white board in your mind.  The bulwarks are armies and entrenchments.  There is protection in this city.  It is surrounded by the walls of salvation.  There is only one door in this king’s garden.  Jesus is the door.  The only way in is through the blood of Jesus Christ.

We must protect this garden that is made so beautiful and fragrant.  We must keep it and dress it.  Guard it.  There is only one door for whosoever will.  There is no barring some people, no barring some color or culture.  Whosoever will can be saved.

Isa 32:1  Behold, a king shall reign in righteousness, and princes shall rule in judgment.

In your mind, put a king ruling in this garden.  He is ruling in righteousness.

Isa 2:1  The word that Isaiah the son of Amoz saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem.

Isa 2:2  And it shall come to pass in the last days, that the mountain of the LORD'S house shall be established in the top of the mountains, and shall be exalted above the hills; and all nations shall flow unto it.

Isa 2:3  And many people shall go and say, Come ye, and let us go up to the mountain of the LORD, to the house of the God of Jacob; and he will teach us of his ways, and we will walk in his paths: for out of Zion shall go forth the law, and the word of the LORD from Jerusalem.

When you think of something flowing you think of it flowing downward.  This flows up.  They are coming up to the house of the mountain.  Water flowing down hill is an involuntary thing: it goes with the force of gravity.   

This flowing upward is a choice of our heart.  It is a voluntary thing.

Psa 93:5  Thy testimonies are very sure: holiness becometh thine house, O LORD, for ever.

Rev 22:1  And he shewed me a pure river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb.

Rev 22:2  In the midst of the street of it, and on either side of the river, was there the tree of life, which bare twelve manner of fruits, and yielded her fruit every month: and the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations.

We see the pure river of the water of life without a blemish in it; it is clear as crystal.  It proceeds out of the throne of God which is on top of the mountain.  There is a tree of life in this garden as in the Garden of Eden.   

This tree bears 12 manner of fruit every month with leaves for healing.  All our needs supplied here.

Isa 40:4  Every valley shall be exalted, and every mountain and hill shall be made low: and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough places plain:

There are no crooked paths here.  It is a straight path right up to the mountain.  There are no big I’s and little you’s.  You cannot put me out and I cannot take you in.  It is all God.  He is the king that rules. 

Rev 22:9  Then saith he unto me, See thou do it not: for I am thy fellowservant, and of thy brethren the prophets, and of them which keep the sayings of this book: worship God.

Don’t exalt man or abase man.  Worship God. 

I see tilled fields.  A field ready for harvest and a field with reapers.

Isa 33:21  But there the glorious LORD will be unto us a place of broad rivers and streams; wherein shall go no galley with oars, neither shall gallant ship pass thereby.

We see broad rivers and streams.  It is beautiful.  Don’t you love to come upon a little stream trickling along or a broad river?  It makes the atmosphere good for our plants; it quenches our thirst.  It is wonderful in the King’s Garden.

Heb 11:10  For he looked for a city which hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God.

Paint a city on your canvas.  Put it on a foundation.

Isa 32:1  Behold, a king shall reign in righteousness, and princes shall rule in judgment.

Isa 32:2  And a man shall be as an hiding place from the wind, and a covert from the tempest; as rivers of water in a dry place, as the shadow of a great rock in a weary land.

Put this in your picture: hiding places, a covert, a great rock in a weary land.  It is all provided there for us.

Isa 32:17  And the work of righteousness shall be peace; and the effect of righteousness quietness and assurance for ever.

Isa 32:18  And my people shall dwell in a peaceable habitation, and in sure dwellings, and in quiet resting places;

There are peaceful habitations and quiet resting places.  We each individually have a hearts garden.  When I fly in an airplane and go over a city I don’t see individual gardens, it is all the city.  This peaceful habitation is like a big city with no individual plots.  We don’t see the chaos or anything particular as we look down on this city.  These peaceful habitations are beautiful because God loves them.

When we are built into the church we take care of our individual heart gardens but we are no more individuals we are a body.

Eph 2:21  In whom all the building fitly framed together groweth unto an holy temple in the Lord:

Eph 2:22  In whom ye also are builded together for an habitation of God through the Spirit.

Isa 31:9  And he shall pass over to his strong hold for fear, and his princes shall be afraid of the ensign, saith the LORD, whose fire is in Zion, and his furnace in Jerusalem.

There is a source of heat in this garden.  It takes a source of heat to make tools.  Tools must be heated, shaped, and hammered.  I want every kind of dross burned out of me.  The gold is refined in this furnace.  I’m not here to play church.  I’m not here just to fill my pew.  I come to be refined.  Thank God if it gets hot.  We want to make it.  We got to make it.

Isa 62:6  I have set watchmen upon thy walls, O Jerusalem, which shall never hold their peace day nor night: ye that make mention of the LORD, keep not silence,

We see a watchtower and a watchman.  Do you see the watchman?  God has given us a watchman. 

They watch for your soul that they may give an account with joy and not grief

They watch for our souls and God has placed him on the walls to watch.

There are vineyards.  Grapes must be crushed in order for wine to be produced.

Mat 26:26  And as they were eating, Jesus took bread, and blessed it, and brake it, and gave it to the disciples, and said, Take, eat; this is my body.

We must each become broken bread and poured out wine to feed the hungry that are around us.  We must be so that God can use us to feed some hungry soul.

I have trodden the wine press alone. 

This prophecy speaks of Jesus He did trod the winepress alone. 

With bread and wine you don’t see the individual grape or wheat berry.  We must be the same, one whole body.

Marbles rattle.  We cannot be like marbles batting one another around in a can.  If we are true grapes on that true vine it is easy to be pressed and be used for God.  As we work together under the directing of the Spirit of God all of us together are greater and we accomplish more and are more beautiful as the church than we could ever be on our own.

The World tastes and sees that the Lord is good through us.  We want to be broken bread and poured out wine.