Where there is no vision, the people perish: but he that keepeth the law, happy is he. Pro 29:18
September 8, 2022
Innovators
Every great society or group had innovators who foresaw a need and set out to build something that would involve other people. Some organizations survive and some do not. It may all depend on the ability or foresight of the innovator. For the purpose of this writing, let’s call this person the framer.
Without a vision the people perish. A frame presents a product that someone else had visualized. Framers are visionaries who see a project from the raw materials, through potential difficulties and successful outcome. They may lay out a plan for the help of others using their skill set to bring it to completion. It may take a great deal of knowledge, intuitive ability, experience and wisdom to plan a major project involving many people because he who has the vision must also supply the details to bring it to pass.
National Framers
Perhaps reading to this point has already given away the direction of this message. The word “framers” is very familiar to Americans because we talk quite a bit about what the founding fathers of the nation of America had intended for the nation. Like our natural parents who lay the foundation and training for their children, they may not be present to actually see the conclusion of their preparatory work but its success is envisioned.
The framers of our constitution could only lay the foundation of the nation that would long outlive them. They were framers because like someone working a puzzle where they formed first the borders of the puzzle, adding pieces
until all can see the finished picture. Our challenge today is to understand and stay within the frame they built to produce the expected outcome. Americans would have difficulty ever imagining the fear the founders must have experienced trying to form a government to protect basic rights such as free thought, personal worship, and assembly, which they were denied in past governments.
The framers of our constitution also had some advantages so few have today. The most widely read book the early scholars studied was the bible. The bible, not only foretold the future; but it gave wisdom through the knowledge presented of men’s past experiences with God and other men. Not only, America but many nations had newly formed Christian governments that they struggled to govern by biblical principles no one really understood. Considering the difficulty of mastering the principles of the bible and living accordingly, you can probably understand why so many people and nations did not get it right.
The framers of the Constitution had a broad range of knowledge to draw from because they were also mostly professional men, who studied at the great Universities of Britain, nine coming from Princeton. More than half of them were lawyers and many had political backgrounds. Others were from professions of manufacturing, banking, financing, physicians, ministers, merchants and small farmers. The 70 men originally summoned from the states for this work ranged in age from 26 to 81. They had to use their collective knowledge from professional work, religion, life experiences and their past civic history to consider every aspect of life and form a governmental frame large enough to encompass all of those activities for a nation made up of laws and practices for a diverse people. They struggled among each other and debated over the details from May 1787- Sept 1787 before signing a document that would withstand the inward and outward fighting of its people over those very details. The founders had a wealth of knowledge and they framed their governmental design within the frame of Creator God whose servants they were; but they did not foresee or plan for racial and gender debates that plague our life today. Their work has survived for the past over 200 years but the societal changes they did not foresee are threatening to break the frame of their superb work. The founders who overcame their varied opinions on religion and civil life to form a binding constitution did not contemplate a people who would no longer want to be contained within the very base borders of a Divine Creator and diverse thought that was the very floor of their agreement and that they worked within as intelligent men being reasonable.
A Divine Framer
Another great visionary also set a frame for us to live within. This Great Visionary saw all the times to come and the efforts of men; and He built a frame for mankind that was to contain all of man’s work and life. This Visionary, who is Creator God, set the boundaries of man’s life and work for all eternity; and He did consider the temperament of mankind. He is the one who gave man vision to foresee a future beyond his natural abilities and then gave him the details for bringing it to pass. Only He could give our world continuity from one visionary to the next to maintain the journey until its conclusion. He informed mankind down through the ages who it is that plots the path that man imagines and treads (Prov. 16:9). Every nation must fit within the frame that God built and no man is able to break out of the borders set by God (Act 17:26).
To instruct mankind how to live within this frame, God has given His verbal voice, the written Word and anointed servants to instruct us how to conduct our daily lives by His counsel. Amazingly, this biblical frame is the one most difficult for mankind, who often believes himself more knowledgeable than the Creator who made him. God has always reminded mankind that when defiant against his Creator, the foundations of his world would shake or as in Noah’s day, break. The problems we see in every nation today results from cracked or broken foundations where man is wrestling the borders that frame his life to extend them and do things his own way.
Many of us can relate to this frame of God as our religious beliefs. There was a time when mankind, after the fall, had no religious belief in God as his Father and they worshipped gods of stone, trees, animals and strange spirits. Through man’s restored faith born in Abraham, the world gained back a relationship with God and divine guidance for his life. Even later through the life and death of Jesus Christ, we gained even more insight into putting the puzzle pieces of our life into their proper order. Jesus left instructions with His twelve disciples, whom He walked and talked with every day, to give continuous guidance for framing our new life according to His will. These disciples went to every nation of the world and took the gospel message that Jesus gave them. At the conclusion of Apostle Paul’s journey, all nations had been instructed in the ways of the Lord for successful living with each other. The teaching and visions of the apostles are encapsulated in the Living Word of the New Testament for the continuous learning and development of every nation on earth.
All Nations Are in God’s Hand
In America, as in the nations around the world, people have strayed from the original teachings. Some nations have gone back to idol worship and denouncement of Christ. Not only can many people not see clearly the picture of the puzzle, but some are denying there ever was a frame or framer for our life. America is a younger nation than many of those around the world and it has had marvelous knowledge of God and advantages in freedom to enjoy it according to its belief unlike most nations. With great privileges also come great responsibilities. The nation that was founded on profession of Christian faith under a Holy God is now tempted to throw off its divine framing and its Framer to form a new picture that they have envisioned for themselves. In this week of Queen Elizabeth’s death some Americans have an opportunity to see the differences between the Christian monarchy of the U.K., Christian liberty and democracy in America, and well as Christian authoritarian rule in Russia. None of them is what God ordained for the church! America is the only one with enough liberty to still find the right way if it will refuse the authoritarian efforts of some legislators, who claim, seek to enforce but fail to demonstrate Christian ethics.
What I would like to share with America is that the divine framing is still in place because it is an invisible frame with invisible boundaries enforced by its Omnipotent World Framer with His guardian angels. God both performs His Word and enforces it. The bible informs us that the frame of the true church sets the boundaries for believers, and they are given spiritual power and leaders that should operate within the boundaries of scriptures to perform according to the will of God and serve the church until maturity.
“And he gave some, apostles; and some, prophets; and some, evangelists; and some, pastors and teachers; For the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ: Till we all come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ: That we henceforth be no more children, tossed to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the sleight of men, and cunning craftiness, whereby they lie in wait to deceive; But speaking the truth in love, may grow up into him in all things, which is the head, even Christ: (Eph 4:11-15)
The church should remember that God still works through His Word and appoints the leadership of apostles as visionaries in the church to relay what God’s will and boundaries are for His people in a specific place at a specific time. Apostle Paul had a special vision of the framing of the Christian church that included the gentile nations. He had a specific mission to carry the message of Jesus to every gentile nation during his lifetime. If God has indeed said, as the bible reveals, that there will be apostles and other officers of the church to help prepare His people for the imminent return of Christ, then we ought to believe Him. We ought also to believe that the God who shaped every living creature and detail of our world and said it was “good” will not allow mortal man to destroy His work. Every nation and person through access to media information can discern that God is speaking to His people at this hour and cannot claim ignorance.
Brokenness we are seeing in the church and nations are occurring because the church has diverted from the path that God ordained. The true church has power and authority under God to bring correction within the body and to put down the enemy’s work in the earth. The true church has power to affect the whole world for good as did the first apostles, but many professed Christians today have decided to become like the world and still call themselves Christ’s church. They have contaminated the picture of the church and confused the world, which can no longer envision the well framed picture of church as their role model for the development into a wholesome society. The breakdown of the church is the spoiling of cities and ultimately, the nations. Christ is still sovereign over His church and knows how to bring it back in alignment. Mankind must never forget that God has the final word on everything.
My website has been dedicated to giving God-inspired messages to reveal to the church some missteps for adjustment and realignment. The framing of the church in Ephesians 4 was given to help us see the church’s operation in the earth through God, the Father; Jesus Christ the Lord; and the Holy Spirit in the Church working through the offices of apostle, prophet, evangelist, pastor and teacher. During my search for fellowship with the spiritual body of Christ, God was showing me the brokenness of His church. Apostles are given a specific vision of the church that they are to bring to pass through their ministry work like Apostle Paul, who was successful in bringing the gentile nations into the fold. The apostle and prophet on whose ministry the church is built, together paint a picture of the church so that believers can envision and become a part of it. The church is structured by Father God to meet every need of the body and be a light for this darken world. Every believer has a place and gifting to use in the body of believers to help fragrance the world with the love of God to send up praises to the Father who made us.
One of the main shortcomings of the church in our day is the position of pastor serving as the sole leadership authority over the body of believers without the proper multi-layer leadership ordained for wholeness that also provides checks and balances necessary to protect the saints. Ephesians Chapter 4 clearly shows us that every Christian church comes under the Godhead first; then under an apostle, who is the visionary for the Church; served by a prophet, who hears Christ speak; an evangelist, who declares the word to the unbelieving community; and next the pastor and teacher, who instructs Christian believers in sound doctrine and ministers to their needs. The bible never authorized pastors as the sole leader of the church. That was man’s doing and it has failed in the church and been falsely duplicated in the world system. God the Father has shown us His reliance on and agreement with the office of the Son and the Holy Spirit to get His work done. If God relies on the administration of the Father, the office of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, all three working in unison and agreement to perform His work; why would mortal man think he could do all the work needed for the church through his solo administration over the body of believers. The church has no authority for what Christ did not ordain. God’s children and church in their proper place in the earth gives the unbeliever a small glimpse of heaven.
Just as one piece missing from the puzzle distorts the picture, so does changing God’s order hinder us from seeing the image of Christ and prevents the perfection of the body of Christ. The church needs to operate in the order Jesus established to be effective. He set up each piece of the puzzle to operate in its proper place. The completeness of body causes blessings to flow unhindered through the whole body and forms a beautiful picture of Christ for the community to see and imitate. When the unbeliever comes into such a church, he is made to bow in confession that Jesus is indeed Lord. The framer of the church is Christ; and if we work within the borders He set up, we should be the church He envisioned us to be, bringing to pass the purposes of God and a witness for the world. Believers have a right to question churches that operate outside the church framing we see in the bible. They should heed Christ’s warnings and flee the false to unite with His true saints (Jn10:5). The Lord knows the heart of all people and will lead His true saints by the Holy Spirit. True apostles are ordained like Paul to establish a work that is set in godly order and produces fruit that brings glory to God. Paul’s work gives us the best demonstration of a New Testament apostle sent to help the church realign itself to perfect the body of believers throughout the earth. If we stay steadfast in seeking the Lord, He will bring us out in victory.
And the rest will I set in order when I come. 1Co 11:34
Truth and Life Ministries of Christ with Apostle Joyce Reba Payne 