The Wilding of the Church

For a couple of years now, the Lord has been speaking to me about the revealing of the sons. I heard Him say, "We are in the days of the revealing of the sons." This truth has been resounding in my spirit, growing louder by the day.

The earth is groaning waiting for the revealing of the sons. Romans 8:19

The first thing that struck me about this verse was the word ‘revealing’. The revelation of the sons uses the same word to title the book of Revelation.. or to give it its full title: The Revelation of Jesus Christ. The Greek for revelation is apokalyptein which is where we derive our English word apocalypse, which we usually understand to mean catastrophe or destruction or end of the world, but in the Greek it means to uncover, disclose, reveal and unveil. I have read this verse many times, but this time, I was seeing something brand new. I was seeing and understanding that it is not simply the same word but it is also the same event.

Christ has no body but yours,

No hands, no feet on earth but yours,

Yours are the eyes with which he looks Compassion on this world,

Yours are the feet with which he walks to do good,

Yours are the hands, with which he blesses all the world.

Yours are the hands, yours are the feet,

Yours are the eyes, you are his body.

Teresa of Avila

How does Jesus Christ reveal Himself in the earth? Through you! Through me! Through His church!

This is the mystery of His body and a mind-blowing truth. These days, at the end of days, Jesus is revealing Himself through His sons. The earth is groaning along with all creation as in the pains of labour, waiting for the revealing of the sons because when they are revealed, Jesus is revealed in the earth through them.

Can you feel the earth groaning?

I watched a film a few months ago called Wilding, about a young couple who inherited a stately home in Knepp in Sussex with 3,500 acres of land. They were told ‘they would never make a go of farming on that land. It doesn’t work. It's a virtual biological desert.’ They made a brave and ground-breaking decision to re-wild the estate, battling enormous opposition from the local farming community, but they persevered, and through the re-introduction of indigenous mammals and birds, they utterly transformed an entire landscape.

This film deeply impacted me at a level that was way more than mere sentiment. It felt like a signalling back to Eden. Back to how life, our environment, and our relationship with the earth should be, instead of pillaged soil and forced cycles of performance and production. It struck me that the church has also been forced into cycles of performance and production, following franchise models, promoting consumer-driven, spectator Christianity, watered-down teaching, a dearth of mothers and fathers and a lack of understanding of the 5 fold ministry, purposed by God to bring the church to maturity…

... so that we will no longer be infants, tossed back and forth by the waves and blown about by every wind of teaching... Eph. 4:14

The Earth is groaning!

The word for sons is incredibly instructive. In the Greek, there are 5 or 6 different words for child and son. The word used in Romans 8:19 is Huios. A huios son is a mature son. Huios sons could also be adopted sons. Huiothesia means adoption in Greek. It literally means the placing of a son. In Greek and Roman culture, it was normal practice to adopt your own biological son. It was a legal term; an understanding that the son was now able to step into his inheritance, appointed to represent his father, able to walk in the maturity of governance of all his father’s affairs.

You don’t receive the spirit of adoption to become a son; you receive the spirit of adoption because you are a son.

Contrast a nepios son, a child or infant at the other end of the spectrum. We just read in Ephesians 4:14 the Lord’s model for bringing the church to maturity (the fivefold) so that she will no longer be an infant—a nepios. A nepios child is unlearned, immature, simple, and carnal-minded.

The levels of sonship are: Nepios, Paidon, teknon, Neaniskos, Huios

The earth is not groaning, waiting for the infants to be revealed. It is waiting for the Huios sons. Those who are led by the Spirit of God are the sons of God (Huios). Like Jesus, they are led by the Spirit and only do what they see the Father doing. Jesus is the pattern son… the firstborn among many.

For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that the Son might be the firstborn among many brothers. Romans 8:29

The first born to bring many sons to glory In bringing many sons and daughters to glory, it was fitting that God, for whom and through whom everything exists, should make the pioneer of their salvation perfect through what he suffered. Hebrews 2:10

The Huios sons are the ones who have been placed into their inheritance, position, destiny, and purpose; the ones who are about their Father’s business. These ones are not looking for a person to tell them what to do; they do not merely attend church on Sunday and assume their dues are paid. They are not pressed into a franchise model like cookie-cutter Christians. They know who they are in Christ. They have suffered with Him and have been appointed to rule with Him. They, like Joshua and Caleb have assessed their promised land and declared ‘yes there are giants but we are more than able to overcome them’. They have clothed themselves with strength and courage and set their faces to pioneer forward into destiny and promise. They seek to do their Father’s business always. They live to honour Him and to please Him both in this life and in the next.

When each son is placed by the father, there will be an end to side-eyeing someone else’s ministry, calling, promotion, visibility, or gifting. There will be an end to feet wanting to be hands and eyes wanting to be mouths. Each part of the body will embrace its own unique giftedness and will operate fully and with joy inside the parameters of individual mandate and calling.

Beloved, this is how the church is re-wilded. Biodiversity in the body! Each one doing what they have been called to do, rooted and grounded in love, walking out the plans and purposes of God in them and through them, enriching and being built into a beautiful, diverse ecosystem.

It’s not only in our current cultural climate that diversity is such a catchphrase. God is the original author of diversity. Every person is made in His image / the Imago Dei. As we follow Him and His Spirit, He will lead us into our Kingdom inheritance, and the eventual outpouring of that will be that the earth itself will be re-wilded, freed from the strait-jacketing of performance and production, driven by sin and greed.

From a reading of Romans 8, we must know that we will not see the fullness or completion of this in our present dispensation.

And not only the creation, but we ourselves too, who have and enjoy the firstfruits of the [Holy] Spirit [a foretaste of the blissful things to come] groan inwardly as we wait for the redemption of our bodies [from sensuality and the grave, which will reveal] our adoption (our manifestation as God’s sons).  For in [this] hope we were saved. But hope [the object of] which is seen is not hope. For how can one hope for what he already sees? Romans 8:23-24

We will not see its fullness yet, but it starts now. We are not called to put off maturity until after we die, and we are not expected to wait until then before we taste glory.

And all of us, as with unveiled face, [because we] continued to behold [in the Word of God] as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are constantly being transfigured into His very own image in ever increasing splendor and from one degree of glory to another; [for this comes] from the Lord [Who is] the Spirit. 2 Corinthians 3:18

Beloved church, we are not called to merely hang on until the rapture, but we are called to be overcomers, to occupy, to rule and reign with Him NOW. This is not about overturning the governments of the world and ruling the spheres and kingdoms of the earth (which are presided over and controlled by the ‘prince of this world’, and are under judgement). It is about taking up our authority and trampling on snakes and scorpions. It is about ruling with Him as sons and heirs, for He has ALREADY raised us up together and made us sit with Him in heavenly places.

And He raised us up together with Him and made us sit down together [giving us joint seating with Him] in the heavenly sphere [by virtue of our being] in Christ Jesus (the Messiah, the Anointed One). Ephesians 2:6

Our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ is bringing the nations into judgment until the day when…

The Kingdoms of this world have become the kingdoms of our God and of His Christ. Revelation 11:15

And it starts NOW!

He has heard the groaning of the earth, and He is wilding His church and placing His sons into their inheritance, for He will be revealed in the earth through them this day.