Divine Passion: Face To Face With The Bride of Christ
Is There Room For Divine Passion Within The Church?
Lately, it’s become so apparent to me that, in order to call the Bride, we must first be the Bride. This means that we must dare, as lead by His Spirit, to be the one who gives the first Holy Kiss. Though the Bride of Christ is full of Divine Passion, she is waiting for us to make the first move.
What we write here on Tabernacles Central is the equivalent of a holy kiss. We show others who we are in Christ in order to woo the future wife of the Most High. Opening our hearts, daring to be transparent and vulnerable with you, helps us connect with those who share a similar heart.
In this essay, I am going to speak about some intimate issues as they relate to believers. Please understand that during our time of love with God, we will deal with topics that touch on various aspects of intimacy. Though this may be uncomfortable for some, our aim is not to offend, but to help others understand why God made us and what He desires from us.
“Hey guys, get a room”
Often times, when people see others acting smitten with each other, they just pass it off as “they’re in love”. This is, oddly enough, just how it is when you fall in love with God through each other. The intensity of Divine Passion makes others around you, who are not experiencing God like that, want to say, “Hey guys, get a room”. However, when you think of it, God is only going to choose those who are madly in love with Him to spend eternity with. So, being all doey eyed with YHWH isn’t a bad thing at all. Divine Passion is the most natural/supernatural thing in the universe!
We have passed the day when salvation was restored (reformation). We have gone through the time when being Spirit Filled was new (Azuza Street). Right now, we are in the time of love and our thoughts naturally turn towards intimacy. When we are deeply in love with God in one another, they fill up our senses until there is practically no room for anything else. It is so common, the world actually has a term called “love-sick” for it. This is, in fact, the first love of Eden manifesting in and through us.
Please be careful with my heart
Spiritually connected, i.e. manifesting Divine Love through one another, is at the core of what God made us to be . The very purpose of creation is to provide a way for an omnipresent, omniscient and omnipotent Spirit, called YHWH, to join with mankind. We are not only suppose to be naked and unashamed before our mates, we are supposed to be totally vulnerable to our God too.
A common aspect of a new spiritual connection, is that people tell everything they have ever done to each other without shame. It is almost like being in confessional booth with God in each other. There is an instinctive reaction to Divine Love that encourages people to open up and trust their spiritual connection implicitly.
We love only as the Holy Spirit leads
Intimacy, any form of it, is to be Spirit led. Only as our actions flow from the Holy Spirit, are they pure. Lust is just natural minded sexual desire carried out in inappropriate ways. Sex, outside the will of our Lord, meaning non-Spirit led, is of necessity fleshly. People don’t know, or perhaps do not normally acknowledge, that God is highly erotic. Admitting this is not sacrilege, for our Lord created everything. Spiritually joined mates experience passion that is simply not of this earth. Moreover, their Divine Passion for each other does not diminish over time, but only deepens.
What actually happens when God joins a man and woman in holy consummation, is that the Shekinah glory manifests in them. This is the first love of Eden made manifest through the Spirit of our Lord during orgasm. During climax lovers not only mate physically, but they become one with YHWH and the Glory that filled Solomon’s Temple reveals itself in them. Not many people ever experience this type of Holy Consummation, but for those who do, it is simply out of this world.
Can God give us this much freedom?
Sometimes, natural minded Christians feel a sense of shame when they consider such things. To them, merely being around a person of the opposite sex puts them in danger of sinning. Many believe, mistakenly, that avoiding the thing they fear doing, precludes them from doing it. However, sin is of the heart and if they imagine having inappropriate sex, the sin has already been committed.
The reason many Christians fall into temptation stems from expressing a God created desire in an unholy way. The church, unfortunately, has little room for Divine Passion, discouraging it at every turn. To them, almost all passion is out-of-bounds in a religious setting. Thus, the intimacy that should take place in the house of God, is relegated to dens of iniquity. People, believing that they must avoid intimacy to be pure and holy, suppress their natural, God-given instincts. Eventually, when the pressure mounts, many succumb to seeking relief in ways that are not godly. Condemnation ensues, enslaving many in a perpetual cycle of guilt and shame.
I never touch myself
For example, I was speaking with one woman who confessed (out of the blue), that she never touches herself intimately. While I was not expecting her to say anything like that, trying to take it in stride, I asked “why not?” She replied, “it is sinful”.
This woman was a counselor in a large church and she said many came to her under extreme condemnation for practicing self-gratification. Though they prayed together, asking God to strengthen them, very few ever found victory in that area. I really did not carry on the conversation after that, but it got me thinking about how people’s assumptions sometimes set them up for failure.
It is sin to touch yourself intimately?
The truth about masturbation is that almost everyone does it. However, most Christians think it is wrong and some even think it is a mortal sin. I have heard preachers thunder from the pulpit that people who masturbate are going straight to hell. Thus, Clergy take a natural thing that God made good and tell people never to do it because it is bad. It is like telling a fish that water is evil: good luck with that!
The truth is that masturbation is not wrong at all, God designed our erogenous zones with great care and forethought. The problem comes about when we pleasure ourselves outside the bounds the Holy Spirit sets for such experiences. Many churches teach you simply can’t do that and be holy.
God created holy ways to express Divine Passion
The truth is, though, that God desires to unite with us both spiritually and physically. With a mate of His choosing, our God desires to bring forth after His kind through His Divine Love expressed through us. This is how it was in the beginning and it is how it will be in the New Heavens and New Earth. Therefore, be as erotic as you like, just do it within the bounds the Holy Spirit sets for you.
Here is a truth,
“The boundaries that God sets through His leading and guidance are not the boundaries that the natural man deems appropriate.”
Actually, self-gratification is not the real problem at all
The practice of delaying marriage until late into our twenties or early thirties creates the conditions for sin. Delaying choosing a mate gives ample time for the Devil to snare both men and women with sexual temptation. On one hand, God creates men and women to become sexually active during their late teens. On the other hand, we decide that we should delay marriage until we have finished preparing for our careers. Therefore, God-given desires are pitted against natural minded thinking and, as they say, “somethings gotta to give”.
Don’t delay Divine Passion
Believers are not supposed delay choosing a mate until their sexual desire becomes so intense. God wants us to find a partner and be with our God-given mate in any manner that we find pleasing. However, delaying marriage makes us vulnerable to all sorts of sexual sin. As we do not marry, by choice or by circumstance, many resort to satisfying their desires in inappropriate ways. I know I may be stating the obvious, but nevertheless it’s true.
In the mean time, until you get married, don’t live in condemnation about it. God made you to love pleasuring yourself and going against His design is futile. Don’t walk around continually feeling guilty for something you cannot control. We all sin many times a day in many ways and God’s grace covers us. Until God gives you a mate that satisfies our desires, don’t let the Devil continually drag you down.
This is where spiritual connections within the Body of Christ meet/fill a vital role. Many people just need to feel loved by someone without actual sex. If given the choice, they will be fully satisfied with hugging, kissing. For many, simply being held by a person who loves them unconditionally is enough. Holy intimacy within the Body of Christ can satisfy our need for intimacy. When led by the Holy Spirit, you can be very intimate with another brother or sister without sinning in your heart.
Divine Passion: the first love of Eden
When led by the Spirit, a woman can kiss a brother and hold him close without sinning in her heart or action. A man can look at any woman, no matter how she’s dressed, and see her only as a beloved sister in the Lord. The only time people touch each other in a sexual context is if they are being led to be spiritual mates. Otherwise, there is no intent to carry physical intimacy further than God leads.
For people who do not know the power of the Holy Spirit in Divine Passion, I might as well be talking about infinity. Without experiencing Divine Love in its glorious purity, most believers simply have no frame of reference to relate to. However, suffice it to say, that the first love of Eden simply does no wrong to another. It is pure, unselfish, love that manifests Gods nature through us. God cannot sin, therefore, His Divine Love truly does no harm.
Dear Connections,
Orginally, I password protect this post. However, since I am talking about vulnerability with the Bride of Christ, I thought it was inappropriate to keep this from people in anyway.
Hugs,
Michael